“Nota Bene” (w/ Mike Birbiglia)

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Look Mayer, Oh, I see you. My own look over
there is that culture. Yes, we lost Cultu Ding Dong,
lost Culturistas calling.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
I think we can switch the count of lovely straight
male guests that we've had on the show on two hands.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
Now skyrocketed with this one. I just wanted too, he
and I think that that that warrant celebration, like well,
by the way, you know, I have got my coke
sharrow in front of me, and of course it says
bro and that had to be cosmic. Absolutely. I have
to tell you, I'm a little distracted because Bone and
I were eating something spicy today and our stomachs are

(00:42):
in a place, and I think it put me on
a bad moon or on a call we just had,
And I'm concerned about the way that I actually.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
My I admired you on that call. I mean you
were you were sort of like it wasn't directed at anyone.
It was kind of a rallying cry to get the
whole team everyone on this zoom on the same page
about something.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
Readers Katie's publicised by all those Kyle's, you know, Like
sometimes it's just like you get frustrated and it has
to come out like.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
And I don't even I don't like being like I
had a moment like that this morning with you, before
we with me, know, with just the people in the room.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
Yeah, and I was just like I was just exasperated.
I think sometimes you get to a certain point where
you're just like I have to vent frustrations and it's
it's hard because like I feel like my modus operandi
every day is like cheerful, want to leave places better
than I that I came in. And then but sometimes
you get a little human moment and your stomach is
heard from reading something spicy, and things are kind of

(01:36):
like getting to you and you express.

Speaker 2 (01:39):
Can I point out something else? Your em O lately
has been to say the full modus operandi rather than
abbreviating it to m O. Because this is I think
the second time this week that you've said the full
modus operandi, And.

Speaker 1 (01:51):
Can I tell you every time I say the expression
modus operanity, I'm like, I think this is right, it is,
it is right, you know what it means. I actually
did it. I didn't know that. M oh yeah, I
just I've literally been thinking of them as.

Speaker 2 (02:07):
I kind of love that for you, that you're saying
the full that your modus upper randy, You're you're tripling
the vale the syllable count.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
I think it's such a beautiful phrase, modus upper randy.
Think about like the peaks and valleys of that.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Of course, you know what I want to kind of
work in which is so insufferable as NB or not
to benh What does that mean? Like you know, like
when like when someone writes something and then go n
B as in as in like A, it's like A,
it's like a PS. But it's like within the same paragraph.
It's like I went to the store today NB. It
was crowded. You know, I don't know about n B.
No whateever uses Well anyway, that's Latin slash Italian. And

(02:46):
we have an Italian legend with us in the room. Truly,
it's a Roman Catholic Italian Roman. We got to talk
about the pope, the pope, the conclave.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
This maybe see this is why this fate and karma
in the air, because we have one of the we
have a we have a scholar on the Catholic Church.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
He met a pope, met a pope, maybe met the
last great one?

Speaker 3 (03:08):
Can I say that now that more and more comes
out about Leo.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
I Also, I know that I'm saying this from like
a place of like having an upset stomach and also
like a little bit ornery because of your ornery. I
had a thing today, But like, what the fuck did
people expect with them?

Speaker 3 (03:23):
No?

Speaker 2 (03:24):
No, no, I'm not surprised. It's just like it's so funny.
It's so funny the way that like popes are like
ripe for like literal adulation from like internet people like,
oh my god, that the new pope.

Speaker 1 (03:37):
It's like, let's get together and watch the conclaven like
what then be Immediately then you find out that they're Catholic.
It's like you're you're can I be real, Like this's
never gonna change, Like you're never gonna the pope is
never gonna be like, yeah, I think gay guys should
rock the fuck on. That's never what the pope is
gonna say now.

Speaker 2 (03:53):
But we liked We liked Francis because he was kind
of like gag guy should rock the fuck on and
then still used slurs in a literally in a way
that made me go I like him, really made me go,
that is hilarious.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
Gene. Okay, I thought I forgot about that. It's as
beautiful as modus operanda. Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
Well, anyway, our guest is a real legend, truly, truly.
This is his fourth Netflix special, The Good Life, The
Good Life.

Speaker 1 (04:21):
It's really sublime.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
Might have shed a tear, but that's because I was
at serotonin zero when I watched it, and that's exactly
where the state in which I should have watched.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
I probably was like, my serotonin probably was a little
bit higher than that. But I also cried, Oh, I
mean it's yeah, there's an incredible storyteller. It was a sensitive,
amazing man.

Speaker 3 (04:41):
Cute guy, guy, not bad, not bad. I'm not bad
to look at either.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
Well, don't make his head explode, everyone, please, Well, Miclia,
this is the best introduction of the podcast I've ever seen.
Was it? Cute guy, not bad, not bad? No, Hey, hey, hey,
it's great to have a front runner front title of app.

Speaker 3 (05:08):
His modus operandi operan di Do you see die or D?

Speaker 1 (05:12):
I guess Latin is D die?

Speaker 3 (05:13):
I think die? I like to get in the Latin
in You like that? Modus operandi?

Speaker 1 (05:18):
Can you talk to us about your current modus operandi?

Speaker 3 (05:20):
My current modus operandi anything the mode of working. I
guess is I'm in writ a writer space right now.
I'm writing my next movie.

Speaker 2 (05:32):
Yeah, yeah, how is okay? And can you share what
stage you're out with it.

Speaker 3 (05:36):
I'm at the stage of like, I want to film
it next spring, and I've written drafts of it and
I just want to get it to a point where
it's an ensemble where all eight characters are like lovely
and it's very like Don't Think Twice. And yeah, we've
all talked about Don't Think Twice a bit because.

Speaker 1 (05:51):
It mirrored the NYU improv life. I mean in that movie.
I remember I told you this one I came on
the podcast. I'm sure you guys spoke about you Don't
Think Twice as well. Like it shook me to my
core when I first watched it, because I was like,
I remember, it was like, I don't know how you felt.

Speaker 2 (06:07):
We've never really talked about that. We hadn't really talked
about Don't Think Twice.

Speaker 1 (06:10):
Ye, maybe because it was a sensitive subject at the time,
but like it really scared me. I was like, Oh,
there's no way I'd be that much of a dick
to my friends as the character you play in that movie.
I was like, I don't know if this is like
a depiction of what our community is really like. And
then you go through that experience and you're like, oh, yeah,
all sorts of humanity can come out, you know.

Speaker 3 (06:31):
Yeah, it's like an interesting life experience of like the
first time for me, it was like in my thirties
when you realize, like life isn't fair, like not everyone
gets the same thing in your group of best friends
from college exactly.

Speaker 2 (06:45):
But then as this new film a lovelier bunch than
the Don't Think twice group, you would say.

Speaker 3 (06:52):
It's an I think mixed bag. Oh, I think it's
it's a fun ensemble film. I'm really excited about it.
I don't even know if I'm going to be in it.
Like I'm excited to just write and direct and making
movies is so fun and I just love it.

Speaker 1 (07:06):
I love I'm obsessed with movies.

Speaker 3 (07:07):
I think that's my My lost cultures is kind of
like way in movies we watch, for example, like we
watch Wicked probably seven or eight times.

Speaker 1 (07:20):
She would lose her mind if she knows I knew
I was here right now. I don't think the kids
care about me.

Speaker 3 (07:26):
No, she cares, and she watches SNL and I think
maybe you've been on it.

Speaker 1 (07:31):
As a cake. Is it possible I have not been.

Speaker 2 (07:35):
Huge folks cross over to That's huge for her, Yeah,
and the same way that it's huge for me, because
can I tell you the thing that breaks my heart
about my summer is that I can't line up with
the shooting dates.

Speaker 1 (07:49):
Damn it.

Speaker 3 (07:49):
I guess I gotta whatever it's got to. It's gotta wait,
but it's coming back.

Speaker 1 (07:55):
There's something you know, who I feel like would connect
with kids and clearly has is my There's something very
like infectious about his energy and childlike about it that
I think, like.

Speaker 3 (08:06):
To my daughter, Mikey is like my Steve Martin. Like
sometimes I'll explain to her, I'll be like, so the
way you see Mikey is like how I see Steve Martin,
and she kind of gets it.

Speaker 2 (08:19):
I think you have this joke in the special where
when people stop you on the street when she's with you,
like a big fan of your comedy whatever, when they
like when they like throw praise at you in passing.
You know, you finally asked her one day, like how
does that make you feel? When that happens? And the
spoil it and she said, well you you say it.

Speaker 1 (08:37):
She goes, it's a waste of my time. Right, But
then and I got, that's the mean thing name has
ever said that.

Speaker 3 (08:42):
And I know Bill Burr, great joke. But then when
someone called me the other day and they go, who's
like a friend of Bill Burr And they're like, hey,
I think Bill Burr might have some concerns about that,
I'm like.

Speaker 1 (08:53):
It's a compliments. You think he's a sweetheart, I don't know.
The reality is he is. For so is like, you know,
he's a ballbuster, right, That's the way it ran to me,
And I misunderstood. No, no, I think let's just okay,
we can just address this here and now. Let's address
it here and now Bill Burr is one of the
great sweethearts of the industry, so lovely. The persona is ballbuster,

(09:16):
I think, so, yeah, unless I misunderstood all the special well,
I think that it's like to an audience watching your special,
like I would imagine they watch his specials as well.
And the persona is ballbuster. So you're speaking to the persona,
you're speaking about this person with the you know, well,
I was, well.

Speaker 3 (09:33):
Of course I overthink everything, so this person says this
to me, and I go, well, what do you think
he'll say?

Speaker 1 (09:38):
They go, well, he might call you. I go, well,
if he calls me, here's what I would say.

Speaker 3 (09:42):
I would go if it wasn't your name, it wouldn't
get a last exactly. It's like, that's that's the meaning
thing anyone's ever said to me.

Speaker 1 (09:49):
And I know Chris Rock, he doesn't have that persona.

Speaker 2 (09:54):
Mean whereas other other Yeah, and there's something about the
ear hit of Bill or that the sound of the
pop pop pop. But then you say that your daughter okay,
and I believe that your daughter has said to you
that that is a waste of It's a waste of
her time. It happens, But does she understand that, you know,
her dad, being who he is and doing what he does,

(10:17):
ends up like is the reason why she gets to
go to Rome, or that he gets to be in
a Taylor Swift music video or something like that.

Speaker 1 (10:24):
Does she can connect to it on that level?

Speaker 3 (10:26):
I'd like to think so, But you know, it's like
you and I make the joke in the special it's
like we're My parents were not physically affectionate with me,
and like Jenny and I are the opposite, which I'm
gonna we'll find out what problem actually is when she's
a grown up, right, So it's like you know you're
messing up something and you just try to do your best.

Speaker 2 (10:45):
I'm starting to see like a micro generation under us,
like we know people, okay, perfect example, friend of the
show Natalie Roder Lateman, and then another friend of the show,
Celeste Jim says the reason they love Natalie so much
is because Natalie is someone who is a product of
their parents loving them so much. And she's just this wonderful, chill,
like just like care free kind of person and in

(11:07):
a way that is like so unfettered, and I feel like,
hopefully that's where gonna ends up.

Speaker 1 (11:13):
I think so.

Speaker 2 (11:13):
Yeah, I'd like to think for her to be able
to say it's a waste of my time, hilarious.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (11:17):
I showed her the trailer the other day and then
this week I'm gonna show her some clips kind of easy.
Some of this stuff is a little over age ten Yeah,
you know what I mean in terms of in terms
of like heaviness or in terms of heaviness. I think, yes,
the stroke stuff is pretty heavy. Yeah, this is for
people listening like it's about my dad having a stroke
and kind of yaling with that and yeah, it's pretty heavy.

Speaker 1 (11:40):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (11:41):
Would it play the same in every iteration that you
would do the show? Where like there are there are
these really quick shifts in room tony even not even
just like your tone as a performer, but like the
room hush falls in the room so quickly and then
you immediately break that and picks back up. But like,
what did you see the peaks and valley every time
in the same way.

Speaker 3 (12:01):
It definitely varied and over you know, over time it's
like calibrating how do you signal to the audience and
quickly that I'm gonna say something serious?

Speaker 1 (12:15):
Yeah. Yeah, A lot of it is like honestly just silence.

Speaker 3 (12:18):
Like there'll be moments where like I'll just walk stage
right and just not say anything.

Speaker 1 (12:23):
For a second.

Speaker 3 (12:24):
I think at this point my audience is like they
kind of know from the old man in the pool
and the new one that like that's in there. Yeah,
and that's like actually, like one of the coolest things
about making these shows now is that like it's not
out of nowhere to there's drama.

Speaker 2 (12:42):
I feel like the drama in the past is always
I don't know, maybe my memory is bad, but it
felt like it like lived a little bit longer. And
in this one, it feels like in the Good Life.
It feels like it's the rhythm. The cadence is like
a little bit more contracted in a way that I'm like, oh,
this is really interesting, Like you kind of like toggle
between them in a quicker way.

Speaker 1 (13:03):
I feel like that.

Speaker 3 (13:04):
Yeah, I think part of it is my other shows
were about kind of pain that I experienced in the past,
and this one, for the first time, it's about pain
I'm experiencing in my present. My dad is like still
hanging on after having a stroke fifteen months ago. It's
like it's devastating. Yeah, Like it's like every week it's
just really really hard.

Speaker 1 (13:24):
And we have moments. Right, It's like, and I talk
about that in the special.

Speaker 3 (13:27):
Is like going to celebrate his eighty fourth birthday, was
beautifully surrounded by his children and his grandchildren, and like
I gave him rosary beads from the Vatican that the
at the last Pope blast and it's like, I mean,
I'm hoping that that's the rawness of it, Yeah, is
what connects with people, and you guys are saying like
you're a little choked up from It's like I want

(13:48):
that to be the case. Yeah, I think like I
think the for me, like the comedy that I connect
to most. And that's why I was saying, like, like
movies is my like love language of like my culture.
ISA is like it's like movies. I think, do that
really well when they like James L.

Speaker 1 (14:05):
Brooks movies or like.

Speaker 3 (14:07):
Like even this weekend, like we were watching because it's
on Netflix now because four seasons Tina Fey's Great series
on we watched The Originalist week and so I'm just
so choked up something about those seventies movies that like Rex.

Speaker 1 (14:21):
Me, Yeah, what's your favorite James L. Brooks broadcast news?

Speaker 3 (14:24):
Absolutely and in terms of endearment number two terms is wild.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
So I have a question though, because you talk about
like how there wasn't a lot of affection from your parents,
like were you always someone? I have two questions. One,
you went to Georgetown, right, Yeah? Do you think if
your parents had hugged you more you still would have
gone to Georgetown? No? Probably not right? Right? So that
thank you for answering that question. So in a way,

(14:51):
who for thought out there. And another thing is were
you always seeking out emotional outlets as a kid or
is that a did you arrive at wanting connections with
emotional films and media a little bit later because you
felt maybe delayed or lacking in that.

Speaker 3 (15:09):
I think I found it when I was a kid.
I would write like poems and songs like I have
these ridiculous like a joke book, a poem book, a songbook,
and then my you know, I still have and they're ridiculous,
and I had no real outlet for it. I did
a little theater in high school, and when I went
to college, I auditioned for the improv group and I

(15:29):
didn't know what improv was. And then I was like,
I'm all in on this and so that became my
entire existence and I was that was yeah, and it
kind of weirdly still is, like yes, Like lately I've
been improvising with the pad book Boy over at UCB
and like it's my most joy outside of being with

(15:51):
my family.

Speaker 1 (15:51):
Yeah, I love it.

Speaker 2 (15:53):
I'm a bad friend and I have yet to be
a one of those, but they've asked me multiple.

Speaker 1 (15:57):
Cots do it.

Speaker 2 (15:58):
I would love both of you come let's do you
guys got to come Uprose. It's we've been doing We've
been doing with Josh Sharp and Aaron Jackson. It's it's
been like it's so fun.

Speaker 3 (16:08):
Yeah, I'm afraid of that one. But it's too I
feel like the Bellhouses it's too big. It's amazing.

Speaker 1 (16:16):
It's like that feels weird for a second, but then
it kind of becomes part of the bit. The thing
with them and the thing with like I feel like
it's got to be with PDD two because there are
such little joy bubbles I feel like is it's like
you immediately feel so comfortable and taken care of. And
I think that what was stressing me out when I
was like doing improv and even doing comedy at large

(16:37):
when I was younger, is I always felt like I
had something to prove and I was incapable of clearing
the mind and just saying yes and listening because you're
so concerned about what you say being funny or good
or smart or worthwhile that like you need to be
you either need time to understand how to do that
or you need to be comfortable right at the jump,

(16:59):
and they make now that I think time has passed
and I understand what comedy is and they make me
so comfortable. It's like a perfect situation. I think part
of it is well, first of all, I love those guys.
I love Dixon music all the best. You're great, thank you.
Second of all, I think part of it is you're right.
Like I think when you get older, you start to
trust what the wisdom of the part form is or

(17:21):
anything like literally, like I played tennis recently, I'm like,
I think I'm better than I was like in high
school when I did you give less of a fuck? Yeah,
because do you want to know why? There's nothing there's
no one that's going to tell you, hey, that you
did a bad job and we were counting on you.
That's right, It's so true. I mean it's literally, it's
like it's funny because I did a lot of team

(17:42):
sports when I was growing up. I was a big athlete,
and then I didn't want to do that anymore, and
so I went to college and all of a sudden,
it was like, oh, get on the improv sketch team,
or like take classes at UCB, where it was unfortunately
a team sport and you could disappoint people and when
you're like when you were that that age and you've
got your hang ups and stuff, just like twenty people
is the top of the list that it would suck.

Speaker 2 (18:04):
Yeah, even because in high school, was it like a
team structure, was it a ladder or something? In tennis, yeah,
yeah because you had because you had like a wrestling
thing too, or.

Speaker 1 (18:12):
Tennis and soccer. Those are my high school sports.

Speaker 2 (18:15):
And in all those situations, it's just there are so
many opportunities for someone to be like, hey, you're not
good at this or something, just making me.

Speaker 1 (18:22):
Feel one hundred percent.

Speaker 3 (18:23):
And also I think you most people me, I didn't
have the presence of mind in high school to be like,
they're right, I should relax, you know what I mean,
Like when you get older, you're like, no, no, you
should relax. Yeah, like that's how you do things.

Speaker 2 (18:38):
Well, you can't tell a teenager or a young person
to chill out.

Speaker 1 (18:41):
No, they don't have to. They can't do it. Yeah,
it's like they haven't experienced enough life to not know
that it's end all be all right.

Speaker 3 (18:48):
That's why it's so weird when you see someone who's
like fifteen years old and they're like amazing at a thing, yes,
and you're like, who told you?

Speaker 1 (18:56):
But you know they how do they know? They're so
fucked up later in life.

Speaker 3 (19:01):
That's why I love like Queen's Gambit though, Like I
was watching that recently the first time, late to the party,
Like it's fun to watch a prodigy, Yeah, even though
it's fake, you say, it's fun to watch, Like, oh,
what would that be like if you were a prodigy
you get.

Speaker 1 (19:15):
Addicted to drugs.

Speaker 2 (19:17):
That's one of the few pieces of media where it
does depict the full arc of prodigy and then it
all falls apart, right, yeah, and then comes together and
then comes together, which is yeah, which is the best case,
thank god, thank god.

Speaker 1 (19:28):
It's also really interesting because different adults relationship to her
power and success. It really is. Really it's very good
at exploring that as well, you know what I mean,
like her adopted mother and then you know, like all
the things that go on with that. Yes, it's yeah,
really that like that actually was way better at it

(19:49):
was about so much more than that one situation. And
I got great art that made.

Speaker 3 (19:53):
Me think to watch show my daughter searching for Bobby
Fisher the other day, I've ever seen oh wow, great one. Yeah,
And then the other to day for my daughter's ten birthday,
five person sleepover, and they watched Clueless. Oh no, some
of them had, some of them had DoD They like it.

Speaker 1 (20:09):
What do they think? I think they loved it? Oh good.

Speaker 2 (20:11):
Oh that makes me so happy to hear, because I'm like,
does this will because one of my curiosities is will
this work on a younger A way younger generation. Yeah,
and I'm so glad to hear that it has or
that it might.

Speaker 1 (20:21):
They seem pretty happy. I think I think it will.
Wonder we want to know why, because what's what makes
that movie work so well is that it's a shared
language in the movie that like you may not understand,
but they understand itself.

Speaker 2 (20:34):
Fantasy is so fun. It's such a fun world. Yeah,
it really is.

Speaker 1 (20:38):
There's definitely some things over the over the kids heads. Sure.
I remember watching it the first time and being like,
I remember the moment. I was an astro van on
a road trip with my parents and you know how
they put the like big TV in the back of
the astro vans and my sister I was I think
I was nine and she was six, and we watched
List and it ended and we both just stared at

(20:59):
the screen and I said, I don't know if I
vocalize this, but I was like, if something to the
effect of like I think I love that, and my
sister who's six, goes me too, I want to watch
it again right now. Oh wow, you know what. And
it's speaking to what you just said about. It's visually
so fun. They're so confident doing it. Yeah, it feels

(21:20):
like it still feels after it's tried to be copied
so many times, it feels like it's doing its own thing.

Speaker 3 (21:27):
And also Alicia Silverstone just in like a magical period.
It's something sometimes stars are having it, like Valkilmer is
a good example passed away recently. You look at like
real genius. You just go, I don't know what was
going on.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
Something was something was happening. Yeah, with Valculmer in that
movie is like magic is that person?

Speaker 2 (21:47):
Yeah, it's so aligned with the era. Yeah, it's when
it Yeah, it's when a performer isigned with the era.
But I mean it's like.

Speaker 3 (21:52):
Tom Cruise, like risky business, just like I don't know
what you're doing.

Speaker 1 (21:56):
Yeah, but I would say Lindsay Lohan too. I was
gonna say I was just saying and like who else
for like a for like a longer period that was
like a five six year period.

Speaker 3 (22:06):
But I was just so Aaron Stapplindsay Lohan is fantastic
and my daughter loves, oh my god, the best.

Speaker 1 (22:12):
Yeah. Have you seen this play? John Proctor is the villain.
I wanted to make sure I brought it in today
and they can even use this. It's about a classroom
in high school in twenty eighteen, who is reading The
Crucible under new eyes amidst me too and everything. It's fantastic. Oh,

(22:35):
we'll go see it for sure. But it got me
in a work. Oh she was one of the best.
Abigail Williams is in The Crucible. Oh yeah writers another one.

Speaker 3 (22:45):
Yes, magical in that era like be Beatle, Juice, Heathery, Yeah,
Age of Innocence. This is the thing I always have
to remind myself about living in New York. Sometimes you
with New York, you're like too many people, this is
just too many people. But then you see a show
like that you go, oh, right, like we we went
for UNA's birthday to see Wicked. After She's in the

(23:07):
movies at times and I'm just losing it, like dancing
through life just like.

Speaker 1 (23:13):
That ending unbelievable. That's me gets me.

Speaker 3 (23:16):
But what you're saying, there's too many people in New
York and there for you don't want you want to
go and go to the theater.

Speaker 1 (23:20):
Exactly, We're going to take advantage of what we have
to it. Honestly, I'm on my kick again right now.
Obviously it's like it's like Tony sees it, well now
you have more time time soon. But and I'm seeing
a lot, and I try to only come here with
like the highlights because I see a lot. So I
just saw maybe happy ending, which was amazing. And this
John Proctor is the villain is my favorite thing I've

(23:41):
seen in quite some Oh wow, yeah it's it's and
Sadie Sync is the star and I'm like really excited
that she used her star power from Stranger Things to
highlight something like this. That's great. The player at is
Kimberly Bellflower. She's amazing, Yes, yes, yes, and the whole
cast is fantastic. It's just it's really I thought like

(24:02):
at first, like when I saw like it marketed, it
looked like Girl Boss the Crucible, and I was like, okay, interesting, but.

Speaker 3 (24:08):
It's like which we would still gladly see you know
what I'm saying, But you never know what like mainstream
theater is going to do, of course, But they've been
impressing me every time I've gone out lately.

Speaker 1 (24:17):
I'm just like really excited about what's on stage. Love,
I love, good night and good luck George? What else?
What else is upright now?

Speaker 2 (24:25):
As you see, I'm not the person to ask this
is your guy, But now that I've got time, I've
said the things I love.

Speaker 1 (24:31):
Okay, you know what I mean? Yeah? Yeah, are you
read the subtag? Read the subtext?

Speaker 3 (24:37):
Are you pre dreading the questions you'll be asked about
the Pope and about how this special kind of presciently
focuses on the pope pre.

Speaker 1 (24:49):
Conclave, pre election. Yeah, it's like it was like a
year ago.

Speaker 3 (24:53):
Jim Gaffigan calls me, who was on behalf of Stephen Colbert,
asking me to go made the Pope.

Speaker 1 (24:59):
But I was very torn.

Speaker 3 (25:01):
It was older boy as a kid, and you know
in the eighties like Spotlight. You know what Spotlight was about?
Literally in Boston, Yeah, Massachusetts. That was a movie that
Tom McCarthy's movie Spotlight that hit me so hard. Incredible movie,
but but like, yeah, so I've always had like deep
concerns about the Catholic Church, and and I thought about it,

(25:23):
and ultimately it was just like this is very important
to my parents, Like they raised me Catholic, my my
my mom went to Latin Mass when she was a kid,
like pre Vatican to Catholic Church, and so I knew,
like and they were going through a hard time, and
I was just like, Okay, I'm gonna go. And there's
a oddsyn chronicity. Poe Francis's real name was Bergoglio. My

(25:45):
last name is Bera Bilio, and uh yeah, so that's
like he just he just kind of like kind of
like googled himself or something or no, he just looked
at it though.

Speaker 1 (25:55):
He like, look, yeah, he just googled comedian. And he's like,
I'm a bit of agodio. It's my he's got to
be here. We gotta make sure he's in the room.

Speaker 3 (26:03):
But uh, you know, as far as popes go, he
was pretty good, I thought, right, And yeah, he bus
gay couples and he was open. This is what would
Big Goldberg pointed out because she was one of the
people who was there with us. She was a big
fan of Frances. He welcomed divorced couples back into the church.
I was like, we weren't welcoming divorce.

Speaker 1 (26:22):
Like what I did not get the memo on that one.

Speaker 3 (26:25):
But then, but then when I was there, there's a
lot of talk when with the insiders of like we're
a little worried that it might be a conservative pope
because the international side of the church is sometimes very
much more conservative than Po Francis was. And so to
your point earlier of like this new pope Leo, it's

(26:47):
like it's like, yes, there's there's things you can criticize,
but also we dodged a bullet of like yeah, we
got the trump of popes right right, and could have
been like could have been sure, and we were tracked
what we what we've said about Leo. I would that's
the first thing I was gonna ask you to do.
I have really strong feelings with this. No, I know

(27:08):
almost nothing about the pop Leo guy.

Speaker 1 (27:10):
I mean, all I know is with the way that
queer media was up in arms about him being not
up in arms, but you know what I mean, Like
people had something to say and expressing disappointment about him
saying that marriage is between a man and a woman,
And unfortunately, I would I would remind those people, this
is the Catholic Church, Like it's kind of that's that's
what that's their modus operand so it's it's like, I

(27:32):
don't know, maybe I was more irritated at it being
like a news itemdline.

Speaker 3 (27:38):
There's might take on all major world religions because I
like to disrespect, disrespect.

Speaker 1 (27:43):
All religions equallyam is.

Speaker 3 (27:45):
I think a summit we could have it, the three
of us call a summit all the major world religions.
We'd like to talk about sexuality and gender.

Speaker 1 (27:56):
How do you feel about gay people? How do you
feel about women? Yeah, there's like open open forum, talk
about it. Reality. Put it on a fucking record, you
know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (28:05):
But if that's how you feel, put it on the
record in front of all these people, and we're going
to talk about it. Because I think it's weird that
we have this this vague.

Speaker 1 (28:13):
Thing like this is kind of homophobic. This is you know,
this is sexist. They don't let women be priests.

Speaker 3 (28:19):
They kind of do, but only sometimes sometimes in Europe.

Speaker 1 (28:22):
It's okay, whatever, and I'm like, no, let's have a
summ up.

Speaker 2 (28:25):
Yeah, let's record feel and then put that on a
one sheet you know what I mean, put it on
a Google doc.

Speaker 1 (28:31):
Put it on Google doc, and then have lead PR
and send that out. Yeah, I DPR, get involved, get
involved and send that out to Conde nasten Hers. Yeah.
People who are religious of any religion YEA like no, no,
we're are our religions. Okay. With women, I'm like, well
I've heard some things. Yeah, right, you know what I mean,

(28:51):
It's like we're okay with game for something. Yeah, I
guess it's like if anyone did gymnastics, you know enough,
like you could you could justify anything. Like I understand
that people find, you know, a lot of peace and
solace and you know, community and these types of things.
But it's like, let's just not pretend they're not what
they are.

Speaker 2 (29:09):
Yeah, I mean, every religion is a structure of structured meaning,
and then people like seek out meaning in religion and
then they just have to like reconcile how much of
themselves is compatible with like that meaning. I'm being so general.
There actually is.

Speaker 3 (29:27):
A good there's a really good documentary about the Pope Francis,
who passed away called the man Pope Francis a man
of his word, and it was interesting because he actually
did like meet with a lot of different religious world
leaders about the religion. And I do think that that
is at the moment we're in world history. Like I
never talked about it this ship, but like no, but
like that's what we should do. I think the religion
should be that because it's like they have more in

(29:49):
common than not. Yea, yeah, It's like you look at
all the religions they're arguing with each other. It's like, no, no,
you all believe the same kind of totally fake thing,
totally like and no, no, FA was like maybe it's fake,
maybe it's not, but it's very similar. What you guys
believe in is very similar. Right, So maybe we'll get
on the same page about like human rights. I don't know,

(30:10):
just an idea.

Speaker 1 (30:16):
We have to ask you the question of our podcast.
We've sort of been dancing around it in several ways,
I think, But Mike, what was the culture that made
you say culture was for you?

Speaker 3 (30:27):
Okay, since I already covered my epiphany of auditioning for
an imprupture, it's the movie Jerremyguire, Oh wow, because when
it came out I loved it and it made me
feel a thing. And then I went and studied screenwriting
at Georgetown and my professor John Glavin taught it like

(30:50):
it was a text, like it was a book in
a class. We read the script, we watched the movie,
we broke down the beats, and I started to understand, like, oh,
this is not magic, and this is not just a
popcorn movie. No, Like that's the thing. Is like even
Wickeds another examples, like is a popcorn movie. A lot
of people pop tickets to it, but it's really meaningful,

(31:11):
like I cried during it. I cried during Jurream Maguire
like I take the stigma away from movies that are popular.

Speaker 1 (31:19):
But make you feel something like that's a great feat.
I I'm so glad you said that. Yeah, he has
he has formative stuff.

Speaker 2 (31:26):
Formative with dry Maguire one of the one of the
first movies we got from Blockbuster. I think way too
young to be watching it. Yeah, sure is watching Tom Cruise,
fuck Kelly, Oh my god.

Speaker 1 (31:40):
Yes. I was like, don't ever stop sucking me as
we stop, and then and then later and then later.

Speaker 3 (31:47):
Post eat like no, no, no, like like eating something strawberry.

Speaker 1 (31:52):
No no, she like disnounced them. She goes, I'm gonna
get some fruit.

Speaker 3 (31:54):
It's like a tight, close up, tight sing along Kelly
Preston so crazy Wall.

Speaker 1 (31:58):
Yeah. But that movie Mede, Yeah, kind of a perfect movie,
a perfect man in many ways. And also you know
what I was just thinking, so many elements come together
to make it good. Like the song Secret Garden. Oh
my gosh, fuck off, I know.

Speaker 3 (32:14):
Y right.

Speaker 1 (32:18):
On the radio, they would play that song with clips
you had me at Hello. Literally I would be listening
to like whatever radio station one to six point one
b L when I was younger, and like they would
play Secret Garden with Renee doing it. And they also
did that for Sometimes My Heart Will Go On in
titan Y. Yeah, there was certain movies they did this with,

(32:40):
and it was always always those like emotional peaks of
the movie that created lore. And this is a time too,
when I feel like soundtracking was speaking to movies in
such a specific way, you know what I mean, Like
it would like I remember having like the City of
Angels soundtrack because yeah, you remember the image of her

(33:03):
Meg Ryan riding the bike with her arms out like this.
It's like there was that you kind of need music to.
They still do that. I Barby Barbie was the most significant.
Oh yes, Barbie did that.

Speaker 2 (33:17):
I think, oh that song's great, so good, and so
many of those songs. But I was gonna say the
last time that like maybe I'm maybe I'm misremembering this,
but I feel like with Star is Born, when they
would play either Shallow or like always remember Us, this
is the way they would cut in some bits from
A Star is Born.

Speaker 1 (33:31):
It was like there was a there you could listen to,
like the radio version of Shallow, or there was like
a movie version. And you know what you're thinking of
is at the end when it's I'll Never Fall. They
sometimes will at the end, she's like singing the last chorus,
and then they'll cut to him doing it from the
movie and that way, which is what it is in

(33:51):
the movie. She doesn't because there's a version of that
song where she literally just belt her tits off for
the last remainder of it and it ends like like
when those ballads does. But then the movie just literally
cuts to him finishing the song and then it's back
with her crime. Yeah, it's amazing the.

Speaker 3 (34:06):
Other thing about Jerrey maguire is like it has a
love story that's not perfect, it's kind of beautiful. It
is beautiful because you're just like at the end, you go, well,
maybe they shouldn't be together.

Speaker 1 (34:16):
I don't even know.

Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah, and you're like, that's kind of sweet, like they're
they're taking the leap together.

Speaker 2 (34:22):
Of course, talk about the other kind of unless it's
hard to capture with language, like talk about the magic
that you felt watching it growing up, that like was
dispelled once you got to college.

Speaker 3 (34:41):
The magic was I'm laughing. It's the thing I try
to achieve in my shows. It's like I'm laughing, I'm crying,
I'm feeling emotions. And then somehow you just think because
it's a quote unquote popular movie, popcorn movie, you're just like, well,
that's not important. Oh, it's so important.

Speaker 1 (35:03):
I know.

Speaker 3 (35:03):
It drives me crazy when cultural things that are great
are viewed as not important.

Speaker 1 (35:11):
Because snobs come in. Yeah, and you know a great
example Wicked, the original Broadway production.

Speaker 3 (35:16):
People always say this. They're like, you know, it's been
running for what twenty years or whatever. It's like the
first reviews were like snobby. They're like, it's not good
and it's like, well, actually, let the audiences decide, because
audiences are crushed by it. Yeah, I am crushed at
the production of Wicked.

Speaker 1 (35:32):
I'm just like crying.

Speaker 3 (35:33):
Yeah, my wife and I were crying and are you
know our daughter.

Speaker 1 (35:38):
Was just like great, you know what I mean, I'll
never forget you. She loved it. She loved it, but
it's not like that, not like that. Well also because
not for nothing, but she doesn't understand. She's not old
enough yet to understand maybe why. It's like, I think
that young girls obviously respond to that movie because of
friendship and because of you know, what it feels like

(35:59):
to feel outcast or to accept someone and to really
work hard on, you know, proving loyalty and like that. Though,
all those things are really beautiful, and I think that's
why young girls love it. But also like when I
saw with my parents, I took my dad and mom
to it. I saw it five times as well. I
daught her, you know bias aside, like I also fucking

(36:19):
love the movie. And I turned to my dad and
I was like, well, it's about fascism, and he was
like and he just sat there and he was like, yeah,
it is and I think that that is something that's
like also part of it for an adult man, is
it's like, wow, like this movie is literally about speaking

(36:40):
truth to power and paying for it. She she's just
an example of someone who is not strong enough and
is not willing to make the sacrifice that she does
in the end. She does in the end, but in
the where specifically about that movement, that moment of defying gravity,
it's like, I'm sorry, I cannot give up up all

(37:00):
the things that make me me to join you, even
if I know it's right. And that's that she is
in process because she's been so protected and the privileged,
and it's going to take a while, and she's gonna
have to lose real stuff yes spoiler alert fact too
for her to do those things. And even then she
doesn't really do it publicly, you know what I'm saying.

(37:23):
So that is complicated ship for an adult, and it's
it is very moving and.

Speaker 3 (37:28):
It's not and by the way, it's not just similar
to the thing I'm saying. It connects me with Jerry maguire,
the imperfection, the drawing out of the imperfection of just
being alive and how nothing is cut and dry.

Speaker 1 (37:42):
And Tom Cruise has never looked better, never looked better. Also, Yeah,
I mean here's here's what I'll say, Fucking Renee. I
think Renee is the reason why. It's not even just
because of her line deliveries, which are spectacular, it's just
it's an example of perfect casting.

Speaker 3 (38:01):
Yeah, they the first kiss thing and he's like snaps
her bra by accident and he laughs and it's charming.

Speaker 1 (38:08):
Tom Cruise Web. Yeah, I'm gonna watch that tonight. It's perfect.
You you're you've really.

Speaker 3 (38:13):
Jenny and I have my wife and I Jen's a
poet and we both have this obsessive thing with movies,
which is great.

Speaker 1 (38:20):
Movies are like songs.

Speaker 3 (38:21):
It's just what you can watch them over and over again,
and there's something peaceful about it.

Speaker 1 (38:25):
Yeah. It changes your parameters as you're consuming this. Yeah,
it's not lost. I'm wearing wearingis shirt that I got
a advint. This is one of my favorite movies, Thelma
and Louise, And it's the same thing, same thing. It's this,
it's it's and also there's this, which they don't do
in movies that much anymore, where they'll end it on
a real curveball that's like, yeah, makes it art, you

(38:46):
know what I mean, Like I feel like there's something
non traditional and weird about her stopping him in the
middle of his sentence to be like stop doing the
proclamation you had me at hello, right, you know what
I mean. And also, like you said, maybe they shouldn't
be doing this, like the relationship i've been a little toxic.
But it's like, but they're gonna try anyway. And in
this movie Thelema and louis obviously spoilers, but if you're

(39:07):
listening to this podcast, you probably understand they choose to die.
They would rather drive off a cliff no get caught.
And so I remember when the movie Rock it is
And also it's just it's not it's clearly ignoring what
I'm sure our studio notes, you know.

Speaker 3 (39:25):
And by the way, they probably shot it both ways
and probably exactly they probably shot it without them going
off the cliff.

Speaker 1 (39:31):
Yeah, or I don't know, it's a good question. We
should find that out.

Speaker 3 (39:35):
Yeah, but you know, this has made me realize. It's
like you're saying, like, what's the epiphany thing for me
in culture? The other one was Maybe Say Anything, which
is another Cameron Crow movie.

Speaker 1 (39:44):
Because I still say anything.

Speaker 3 (39:45):
When I was a kid, and I remember quoting it
with Michael Kavanaugh, my best friend, like back and forth.

Speaker 1 (39:51):
And doing the this you know that the boom box
in the air.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
And we were like ten, yeah, I mean, Cameron crow was,
I'm gonna come up here and say, Elizabethtown underrated movie.

Speaker 1 (40:03):
I love Elizabeth, I love this, I love that. I
think it's so.

Speaker 3 (40:08):
I think Elizabeth towns great. I think almost famous is fantastic.
Course of course, that's just that's really that's quite a
good And also he wrote a Fast Times, Oh I wrote,
didn't direct it. Oh God, I got it. I think
Fast Times classic classic.

Speaker 1 (40:23):
There's something wasn't Fast Times. Ammy Hackling she directed.

Speaker 2 (40:28):
You Go.

Speaker 1 (40:28):
Yeah. So that all these movies, it's like there's stuff
about them that Bowen uses this wonderful word serrates them,
that makes the memorable like a little bit just literally.

Speaker 2 (40:39):
Just like a little bit askew, so slightly off completely.

Speaker 1 (40:45):
Like even like for example, like even in Clueless, like
you watch that movie and you see the way they're
dressed and you think, oh, the early nineties, No, they
were dressed like badly and stupidly even for that really,
but it's like, it's like, that's not how they dressed
at Beverly Hills High School. I don't think, but like,
but but it's it's over drawn. You remember, you'll you'll

(41:09):
never forget seeing her in that yellow you know it was.
It wasn't Vivian West what it couldn't have, but it
feels like it. It feels like it speaks in that world.
I can't say what designer it was, but there's this
stuff that you go out of your way. You have
to go out of your way to make it memorable
and iconic. This to say anything thing, it's like who
holds a like that doesn't move no one, but but

(41:31):
it made it iconic drama. It's so good it's crazy.
And then the other ones.

Speaker 3 (41:35):
I mean, like I'm obsess with that whole seventies eighties movies.

Speaker 1 (41:39):
ET is like that, just like I could watch it
over and over again. It's super emotional.

Speaker 3 (41:45):
You watch ET now, it's like it's an indie film, right,
you know what I mean, looks like the biggest blocks
like an Jaws feels like an indie film.

Speaker 1 (41:53):
Oh Jaws is It's unbelievable that that's a huge of
a blockbuster as it is because of how slow moving
it is.

Speaker 3 (42:00):
Yes, Oho, there's this great story about the director who
who did Paper Moon, Bugdanovic. We run Peter Baniavitch runs
into runs into Stielberg at like the Boston like Logan Airport,
and Steelberg had just shot on Martha's vineyard shot Jaws,

(42:21):
and he's like, how did it go? And he was
just like, there's a shark. It's a disaster. We don't
have the movie. Oh, it's just like one of those
funny stories where like they leave the movie set thinking
they don't happen.

Speaker 1 (42:34):
Yeah, right right, right, right right. They were like, well,
this was.

Speaker 3 (42:36):
A huge catastrophe, and I think they found it a
lot in post in editing, and then it changed the
movie industry. Yeah, I mean we had that. We don't
think twice to some degree. You know, there's that speech
where Chris Cathery goes, I think your twenties are about hope.
In your thirties are about realizing how dumb it was
to hope. We added that in post because Ira Glass,
one of our producers, we were watching the movie and

(42:59):
he goes, the audience doesn't.

Speaker 1 (43:01):
Get when we show cuts to people, they.

Speaker 3 (43:03):
Don't get that they know they're losers or there.

Speaker 1 (43:07):
They know they're under the characters.

Speaker 3 (43:09):
The characters, they know they're underdogs, and so we would
have a we showed it. We did a screening at
NPR Downtown and these two these two ladies got up
and they were like, it was a feedback screening in
the early cut, and they go, we don't like it,
and you go, why don't you like it?

Speaker 1 (43:26):
Ira goes, why don't you like it? They lose it
and what was so funny? We went back to the edit.
We're like, they're losers.

Speaker 3 (43:33):
They're losers, but like, how come we think it's funny
that they're losers?

Speaker 1 (43:36):
But they know it? And it's like, oh, we haven't.
The characters haven't acknowledged it. They know what they are. Yeah,
And so.

Speaker 3 (43:43):
We're like, what if we shot a scene where they're
packing up and they're moving out of the theater and
Chris Cather goes, Your twenties about hoping to thirty is
about realizing how dumb it was to hope change the
whole screening every like isn't great? Yeah, but also such
a smart way to convey all of that. That's a
lot to communicate, and you did it. All in that
one and that one scene.

Speaker 1 (44:02):
Thanks.

Speaker 3 (44:02):
It's a funny thing, like even writing my movie right
now that I'm writing, it's like you really have to
toe the line between how much do the characters get
what's funny about them?

Speaker 1 (44:11):
That's a really interesting idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 (44:14):
Because like Gilmore Girls is like that super witty right,
like they're in on it, but they're almost not exactly
they like they they know that they're codependent or whatever.
But yeah, and yet to what extent yes or something.

Speaker 1 (44:27):
It's like a really interesting thing that you bring up
that these women like, we don't like the movie because
they're losers. Because I actually think one of the things
about Don't Think Twice that shook me to my core
so much when I watched it, and now I see it,
I see it now looking back, and I fucking love
the movie and I appreciate it in a way I
didn't at the time because I felt so defensive. Yeah,

(44:47):
because I think your movie Don't Think Twice. It really
makes you think about yourself, and.

Speaker 2 (44:54):
Especially if you were doing comedy in that time, yeah,
doing improv and yeah, yeah, like I just.

Speaker 1 (44:58):
Remember thinking, like this is a mean depiction of our community.
I couldn't believe that your character, I'm gonna use an
explicit word that upsets people, but your character calls Tammy
Sager's character a cunt, and I remember I was just like,
I can't believe. But now I think that that was
such a brave, bold thing to do, weirdly enough, because

(45:21):
it really showed ugliness and envy and in like a
very abject, painful personal way. And I'm not saying that
like anyone that we knew or even us went as
far or as shallow as any of this. I'm just
saying that, like, it's an incredibly intense situation that you're depicting,

(45:44):
because it's kind of like being a kid and not
knowing that the world is bigger when you are confronted
with what you assume is the only job in the
world for you and it doesn't go that well, it's
about everything else. Everything else breaks down. Yeah, And friendship
is so intense.

Speaker 3 (46:00):
When I was writing that movie, I was hosting A
Q and A with Noah Bombback for the movie While
We're Young, I think it was, or maybe it was
Fans's I Forget, and I said to Mike, I'm writing
this movie about an improv group and they're best friends.
One of them gets on SNL and there are some
don't I go, but the people giving me notes are
like the stakes aren't high enough. He goes, I know,

(46:21):
it's the funny thing because it depicted, you know, indicative
of all of his movies.

Speaker 1 (46:24):
He goes, there's no stakes higher than friendship. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
that's great. Yeah, as we just sit here and just
say the word yeah fifty times. But it's I want
this to.

Speaker 3 (46:37):
Be our engagement of a deeper friendship between the three
of us. Yes, because I feel like whenever I see
you guys, whenever we run into each other, it's like,
I think there's love. There is, but I'm like, we
should spend more time together. Well you you.

Speaker 1 (46:52):
Are good with the gays. Oh yeah, the gaze. You know.
He is old friends with Jordan Ardino really Gilmore girls. Yeah,
this is high school and college friends. Yeah really Massachusetts. Yeah,
in California, California to Massachusetts. Yeah yeah, yeah, Jordan's amazing.
There's a great writer. He's a great writer. Right. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (47:13):
He and I were that in That's great same screen
writing class in college.

Speaker 1 (47:16):
Oh really, we were close friends.

Speaker 3 (47:17):
In high school and then he came to visit me
when I was in college. He was at Tough and
then he was just like, I just want to go here. Yeah,
and so he transfer. We went to college together.

Speaker 1 (47:26):
Yeah, where we wanted to go to Georgetown. A lot
of not hugs. That's a lot of that's a really
number thirty. I don't want to go to Georgetown. That's
a lot of hugs. I would say.

Speaker 3 (47:41):
I don't want to speak for Jordany, but I think
I can say there's.

Speaker 1 (47:44):
A lot of It's a lot of, man, it's a
lot of enough hugs. You and I both well, we
don't have to bring in that's nothing. I don't want
to talk about in what you.

Speaker 3 (47:58):
Necessarily I was going to say, you and I you
not got very different amounts of hugs growing up. I
would say, well, it's funny at.

Speaker 1 (48:07):
The same school. Yeah, n y U was different. But
I think we're I think we were both there for
different trauma. That's not related to hugging or not hugging.
But I think that something that's so clear is like,
it's good that you hug your daughter a lot. And
I don't want you to think about because I think
what you're doing is you're teaching her what real love is,

(48:27):
and a lot of people have and something I don't
think I understand because I'm privileged to genuinely know what
real love is because my parents have always shown me
real love and have always been very good with me
in terms of that is a lot of people just
don't baseline know that. They don't baseline know what it
really is to be cared for and to have someone

(48:49):
at the end of the day that's going to say
I love you. And I think that I didn't realize
that was such a privilege, you know what I'm saying,
until until I was you know, having like conflicts with
people later in life, or you know, things work out,
don't work out whatever with different people, and you're just realizing, oh,

(49:10):
I'm operating with a different emotional deck. Yeah, thank god, No,
you're right.

Speaker 3 (49:15):
It's funny when you, yeah, if you get into like
a petty disagreement with somebody and sometimes they go so
hard on it and you and you have to step
back and just be like, no, no, we're all just
doing our best, right, you know.

Speaker 1 (49:28):
But yeah, I agree with you, Like it's yeah, no,
it's definitely more better to love more than less.

Speaker 2 (49:35):
Right, And even in the moments in the special, I'll
say where you're like a huge part of my life
is going to children's birthday parties.

Speaker 1 (49:42):
I get two hundred three hundred.

Speaker 2 (49:43):
Yeah, so like ooh, I can grow up and hear
that and think, oh, like my dad is making is
like exasperated by this thing that he had to do
for me, and he's like, is that something resentful? But no,
even in that, you're like, I do this. I show
up for my daughter, right, and it's this thing that
I can.

Speaker 3 (50:03):
Joke about hating because it'll make this room full of
people and adults laugh.

Speaker 1 (50:06):
Yeah she can.

Speaker 2 (50:07):
I think it is so clear with that messages to her,
which is my dad loves me.

Speaker 1 (50:11):
He takes me to these birthday parties. Yes, show up.

Speaker 3 (50:13):
I had to talk through a joke with her the
other day that in the special, because it's going to
be seen by a lot of people, and you know,
I had to be like.

Speaker 1 (50:20):
Because there's a joke, I say, doesn't have it? Yeah,
that explain that to that because I remember listening to it.
I was like, Oh, that's it. That's a that's a
pretty rough So I said.

Speaker 3 (50:30):
To her, I go, there's this joke and I say,
we went to my wife and I went to our
daughter's vallet recital, and we're in the audience crying, crying
because she doesn't have it. You know.

Speaker 1 (50:41):
I go, no, we're crying because she's not going.

Speaker 3 (50:43):
Dollar on the lessons and hundreds of hours going to
rehearsal and she's not going prop And then I go,
I go, no, No, We're crying for the right reasons.
And then afterwards I'm squeezing out. You know, you were
so fantastic. And she said to me, it's true to life.
She goes, Dad, you would say it was fantastic even
if I wasn't a fan past that.

Speaker 1 (51:00):
I said, that is so true.

Speaker 3 (51:02):
You're so much better at logic than you are at ballehet, right,
I got, I didn't I.

Speaker 1 (51:06):
Left out that last part.

Speaker 3 (51:07):
I'm going to say that too when she's fifteen and
she tells me I'm garbage, and I'm gonna say I
had some candid thoughts about you as well when you
were seven that I withheld out of respect.

Speaker 1 (51:14):
But I did share with a group of strangers at
the Beacon Theater.

Speaker 3 (51:16):
But I explained it to Una in relation to I go,
sometimes jokes are something that is true, and then something
that is the opposite of true or completely not true
or a variation on true. And the show the special
that I wrote is a series of things where it's

(51:37):
like true, not true, true, not true, true, silly true, silly.
And then at the end of the movie or at
the end I have sometimes a complation with movies. Yeah,
at the end of the show, it lands untrue. And
because it lends untrue, I think the audience knows, oh, okay,
this person's in earnest.

Speaker 1 (51:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:55):
And the true thing about this special is the way
a parent loves their chime.

Speaker 3 (52:00):
Yes yeah, and understanding my dad and after he's had
a stroke and realizing when his defenses are down and
he doesn't have the anger that he had before the stroke,
that I do think like he meant well.

Speaker 1 (52:13):
Of course, that is a whole can of worms, because
especially because you know, men as they get older and
the estrogen creep up, you know what I mean, Like,
it's they get more emotional. I think they get more contemplative,
and I think it's just harder for men to look
back on being men. Yeah, like, because so much of

(52:36):
it is just not cruel, but it's rough and it's
speaking to this idea of what a man is, which
can never really be justified in the way that we
accepted it for such a long time. But I think
that's really hard for men as they get older, as
they look back, and they they have regrets about trying

(52:58):
to attain that idea of what it means to be
a man and no absolutely and all those things. And
I've had a couple emotional conversations with my dad about,
you know, one time, it was after we taped my
special and he was expressing I think we had a
few drinks and he was expressing some regrets about you
know whatever, like like having a gay son and not

(53:20):
feeling like you didn't get it right. And I had
to like tell him, I was like, you got to
let yourself off the hook, because nothing you ever did
was because you didn't love me. You were trying your
best and like, and it is a moment that I think,
I'm I'm obviously very happy I had and I and
I will can continue to have because of that moment.
But it's really hard, like men relating to each other

(53:42):
in that type of way. That's why I think it's
so beautiful that like you have that like open channel
with your with your child, because it's like it takes
some people really long time. And I always heard I
love you from my dad. I always heard proud of you,
always heard those things. But it's just it's just in
like as as men get older, like it can be

(54:03):
uncomfortable to have those types of conversations, like even just
when you put your hand on his shoulder and rub
his shoulder like that probably took a lot lot, yeah,
but but those are really those are so important because
what if Because what if you didn't you know what
I mean.

Speaker 3 (54:18):
Yeah, but we talked about that when you were on
my podcast a lot with your parents, because you had
the challenging stuff, which I really hope you should do
a solo show someday.

Speaker 1 (54:28):
We'll see. Yeah, that's there. There's there's definitely.

Speaker 2 (54:31):
I mean I did even do it underground, so such
a jumbled mess of a show. I don't even know
what I was trying to do with it, but uh,
there's there's something there for sure.

Speaker 1 (54:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:44):
I just I'm still making sense of it and we're
still talking about it as as a family, and it's
all it's all okay, it's all it's all true.

Speaker 1 (54:54):
Do they say I'm proud of you.

Speaker 2 (54:56):
Now they do, do they now they do? But it
took them a while and and they came to the
show a few weeks ago, and just I took them
out for Mother's Day and a lovely we have a
we have a lovely time.

Speaker 1 (55:08):
Now. I also want to say your show was not
a mess. You were just you. It was not a mess.
You were just in process on you were so in
process and the feelings. It's kind of like what we
were saying last week about like Marsha P. Johnson not
having correct recollection of Stonewall because she was Stonewall. It's
like you were literally going on. I was the pit.

(55:30):
You were all those experiences and emotions at the time.
So it's of course you weren't going to create like
you know what, especially you with a high bar for yourself,
feels like cohesive salient to art about this thing that
you were like enduring.

Speaker 2 (55:42):
That was me squarely in the zone of what I
here Glass talks about, which is there's that gap between
like the case that you have and like what you
can accomplish as someone who makes things.

Speaker 1 (55:55):
And so anyway, when I.

Speaker 3 (55:56):
Remember doing a completely messy version of Sleepwalk, with me
my first solo show, which eventually years later was on
Off Broadway and Nathan Lane presented it, and it was
just a really beautiful thing that I was lucky enough
to do the movie and I remade the movie and
it was it was But the first versions of it
at UCB were so rough because it was like me

(56:19):
just being like, here, here's this breakup I had, and like, like,
the emotions are so raw and I've been sleepwalking and
it's a metaphor for this, Like I was so on
the nose. And then I remember like the artistic director
at the time pulled me aside and he was like, hey,
I think you should see Dimitri Martin's show, like you

(56:41):
should do more like jokes.

Speaker 1 (56:43):
Was this Anthony King who was that I.

Speaker 3 (56:47):
Can say he's a great guy Owned Burke and I
feel like we've talked about since He's like you figured
it out, yeah, But it was funny like sometimes when
you were in the wilderness artistically, like it's not because
you're not going at the right thing like I was
going at like I want to make an emotional show, but.

Speaker 1 (57:04):
Also I hadn't figured out the joke side of it.

Speaker 3 (57:07):
I haven't figured to your nice thing you were saying
about my show is how it's like silences and then
jokes and then serious moments and then.

Speaker 1 (57:14):
Jokes like I didn't figured that out yet, Sure's I'm
also like, I'm really feeling very seen by you talking
about like and like true false true false true false,
and then it ends on a false or true, like
my special the one I've done ends on a false,
and I think it's and I'm so happy about it. Yeah,
that being said, like, I do think that that's one
extension of myself and I want so badly to say

(57:36):
something real and true about myself, but it's the hardest
thing to do. I think that's why you had strife
with it all those years ago, doing that, because you
were deeply trying to say something true about yourself, which
is fucking hard, especially when you're at like a comedy festival,
but yet also tasked with like this thing of like
this is a solo show, an opportunity that you're being given, right,

(57:58):
And it's like, I think we all want to be poignant,
but it doesn't always happen. Right. If there's a question
here that I'm saying is it's like how uncomfortable is
your process very uncomfortable. Yeah, like like every step of
the way.

Speaker 3 (58:12):
Like some nights I'm on stage and I'm like, like,
there's that moment in the show where I go, I
didn't have a sex talk when I was a kid,
but when I was twelve, I had hard nipples.

Speaker 1 (58:21):
Yeah, and suddenly you're exposed out there with your hard
nipples again.

Speaker 3 (58:24):
Yeah, And I go, exactly right, And so I go,
I tell my dad because I thought I was a
hypochondriac as a kid, and so I tell my dad
like I think I have cancer.

Speaker 1 (58:32):
Right, He's like, take your shirt off. We're in like
my living room. It's like a truth, completely true story.

Speaker 3 (58:36):
What's weird, Actually, I'll tell you the very I'll tell
you the variation on it is like I had to
take this part out. It wasn't in the living room,
it was in his bedroom. But it was so weird
because the audience was reading. It's like always got to
get les. Yeah right, you had to walk them away
from the right I got. So he was like, take
your shirt off in the living room, take me shut
off and he felt my hard, hard nipples and I
go and I go, and it was nice, you know,

(58:59):
there wasn't a lot of physical affection the family.

Speaker 1 (59:01):
You were being reassured by a doctor and your father.

Speaker 3 (59:04):
So the first few times, exactly the first few times
I said it, first forty times I said it, I
was just like, this is so uncomfortable.

Speaker 2 (59:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (59:13):
I even had people like in my inner circle creatively
be like they got the nipples part, because you do
get that sometimes where even people who are close to
what your process is or like I think the audience
is not here for that.

Speaker 1 (59:26):
But then you got sometimes you just gotta be like, no,
this is like.

Speaker 3 (59:29):
This has happened, because fully happened is like part of
the story I'm telling.

Speaker 2 (59:33):
But what you're saying with like sleepwalk with me like
you were you were in the wilderness. It's like, well,
process in general for anybody is just ay a wilderness.

Speaker 1 (59:40):
Yeah, yeah, I'm the movie I'm writing right now in
the wilderness. Great. Yeah, it's all part of it. Yeah.
I think something too, And I think I often when
we have like music artists in this chair too, this
question comes up, and also with reality stars or anyone
that's like exposing the part of themselves, which is obviously
anyone in that chair probably is. I don't think I

(01:00:02):
ever really understood the stakes of what happens when you
involve a depiction of someone else in your life, and
that is what trips me up sometimes. It is really
hard for me to think if I say this thing
about myself, I'm saying this thing about someone else, and
I feel like that's unfortunately if you're someone that wants

(01:00:26):
to create work and art, like, it's probably the ugly stuff,
you know what I mean. And that's not just outly
stuff about you, it's ugly stuff about people you probably
care about or don't ever want to talk to you again.
So it's like it's never someone in the middle, you
know what I mean. It's like I either really care
about this person and therefore they're worthwhile including or this
person but even believe.

Speaker 3 (01:00:49):
Is that Like I had people in my life come
up to me and be like I'm the character and
don't think twice.

Speaker 1 (01:00:54):
Who's the rich girl? Like yeah, No, I was like, no,
you're the gilly.

Speaker 3 (01:00:58):
And sometimes they wrong, they're wrong.

Speaker 1 (01:01:02):
Sometimes it guess wrong.

Speaker 3 (01:01:05):
My parents saw Sleepwalk with Me the movie Yeah and
Carol Canon James Redhorn as my parents say these lines
that literally my parents said in real life, and my
and I was worried about my parents seeing it, and
they came out of the movie and they go, they're
nothing like us.

Speaker 1 (01:01:22):
Mmmm somehow like we can't even see ourselves. Well, yeah,
you never can. Yeah, only you have the real bibliography
on your experiences with them because you saw it. They
didn't see it. They were it right.

Speaker 2 (01:01:34):
Right, But either like someone comes up to you and
like validates or like I don't know, like entrenches those
things even more where you were like, oh, I like
had it was a huge decision to include you in
some way in this like depiction of reality, or it's
your parents being like it wasn't that was enough. It's
like it's it's it's like you can't really even win
with that there. It never goes the way you want

(01:01:56):
it to.

Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
You guys have a.

Speaker 3 (01:01:57):
Lucky thing, I think, which is your close friends and
you have like a creative partnership with this show.

Speaker 1 (01:02:05):
I think is so lovely because you get to.

Speaker 3 (01:02:07):
Share that people like I love the show, like everyone,
like I know tons of people love the show. It's
like you guys get that together, which I think is
not less lonely. I think we're very fortunate and being
a lone wolf I wouldn't do it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:21):
You really didn't do it alone? What do you mean?
Like like I couldn't.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
I couldn't have my own podcast where I was just
kind of riffing on culture and then commenting.

Speaker 1 (01:02:29):
On things and then like.

Speaker 2 (01:02:31):
Like I like you're always my gut check in terms
of like do I share this little anecdote.

Speaker 1 (01:02:36):
Yeah, it is. It's it's kind of nice to like it.
It's it's really interesting because because we're also so close
like that we we have this, we protect the same
things pretty much. But also like in terms of like
the sharing of it all, like you know what I mean,
Like it's also like you can never I can, we

(01:02:57):
can never give everything about like about everything. But you
know what I'm saying is it's like it's that's I
think that's like why they don't think twice of it all.
It just recalls such a specific era that like it's
it's it's it's a trumpa of course today, but I
think that's why I love it now.

Speaker 3 (01:03:18):
Meanwhile, like I wanted to live your life like I
when I was at Georgetown, I was like saying to
my parents, I want to transfer to n y U
and be a theater huh, and they're like, no, you
know when.

Speaker 2 (01:03:27):
I got all you got a full net? Well good,
I mean, I know it's good.

Speaker 1 (01:03:31):
Everyone wanted to be someone else exact literally still does.
But I remember, like I was in school at M
y U and I wanted to be doing something else.
Everyone's always like, I'm sure you because I was pre mad.
Of course I was, but I was doing improv, you
know what I mean? Like I wanted to be something else.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be like

(01:03:52):
I would. I would be like I want to go
to Boston an audition for commercials? Yeah, like fuck, no,
Boston audition for what the commercial auditioning is that you
don't know what the fuck is. It's like, he looks
at the camera and half smirks. It's like, that's the audition.
I'm going to go into rooms and do bite and

(01:04:13):
smile exactly, smile smile. Have you ever done a Biden smile? No,
I've never done. You want to see a stip and smile?

Speaker 2 (01:04:21):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (01:04:21):
Yeah? And that was probably too big skill can be noted,
is that that was something else? Perfectly? Did you ever
book a commercial? I'm trying to think.

Speaker 3 (01:04:37):
I think I was a spokesperson for like a cable
and internet company in the South for a while.

Speaker 1 (01:04:42):
That's great. Yeah they're not. I don't love it. I
don't love it. I don't love it. I kind of
wish you didn't. So he has fine, it's fine. Straight
up commercial. I never did a straight up commercial.

Speaker 2 (01:04:54):
I went to one commercial audition because like someone at
ECB was like, yeah, I'm going, I'm going on this
thing if you want to come, And it was so humiliating.

Speaker 1 (01:05:02):
It was really impossible to leave feeling good. And you've become.

Speaker 2 (01:05:11):
Straight and I've become straight, and I never thought that happened.

Speaker 3 (01:05:15):
But Jordan Neardina texted me last night just crying, laughing
at the boat inside.

Speaker 1 (01:05:20):
It's the only It's the only one I can barely watch.
For some reason. When I watched him make up with women,
I have I have an outrage. Why are you? I
don't like it? I want you.

Speaker 3 (01:05:30):
A game that gets me is her showing up at
your place and you're playing video games two in the morning.

Speaker 1 (01:05:37):
It's so well, by the way, that's I'm then hiding
in the last cool threes. So sure, and honestly it is.
It is my favorite sketch because it's clearly it's it's
like but it's just like we were watching it. We
were in his dressing room for the finale, and you
were watching it with us in the room.

Speaker 3 (01:05:55):
I wanted to say, I want to surprise Matt with
the lostchol Trees to sure.

Speaker 1 (01:05:58):
I wanted to see it so fun. And then he
comes in making out with sorry, Check's notes, Scarlet Johansen
and I just go like, I scream like it's a
horror movie. I'm like, I can't believe it. Like maybe it's.

Speaker 3 (01:06:11):
Because Colch is gonna have a twenty twenty five because
it's Lost Culture Awards too. That's right, So it's in
that sketch it's Lost Culture Award.

Speaker 1 (01:06:18):
It's gonna be huge. Yeah, I mean we're we're putting
it together now and it's gonna be it's gonna be something.
Culture is Award. You campaign huge. I'm gonna campaign. What
can I do?

Speaker 3 (01:06:30):
What can I do to campaign? Did you guys have
a strategy? Hen strategize with me. We can strate yet
strategy to do a step one Best dat Award. I'm
a brainstorming category was a Daddy Award and the Father Award.
Daddy word Father Award and the Daddy Award was won
by Pedro Mascal.

Speaker 2 (01:06:48):
The Father Award was uh who who won the father
Award last year?

Speaker 1 (01:06:52):
And he wasn't Seth Myers. It wasn't.

Speaker 2 (01:06:54):
I don't think you have to campaign necessary. I think
being on this episode of campaign like you're absolutely top
of mind with special and with the listeners being and
then you're in the mix of y Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:07:07):
Yeah, I just feel like this was an amazing six
straight man to have.

Speaker 2 (01:07:13):
Absolutely, this is this straight mail. Yes, straight is huge.
It's the deep honor. It's six. It's not eight. Yeah,
it's not eight. It's six or seven. And we're not listening.
We don't want to make a big thing out of this,
but but it's a big dealer.

Speaker 1 (01:07:33):
Gays, do you feel like gays come up to you
on the street they're like, hey girl. I think I
get a lot of gays impression.

Speaker 3 (01:07:40):
I think, like the thing that's hilarious about my audience
is sometimes when people come up to me there and
it's like it's like some like para shaped middle aged
ogre dad.

Speaker 1 (01:07:52):
It's just like I totally relate to everything. He's like,
come on, I want that. I love the dad.

Speaker 3 (01:07:58):
I know, but sometimes wouldn't it be great if someone
came up to you and they're so hot? Like I
totally relate to everything you say. It's just like my
pilates class. That's why we have the Kyles. Now we
have we have a new subsect of a fan community
called the Kyles. And sometimes the Kyle will come up
and I just can't believe that they almost drop their
weight to the gym.

Speaker 1 (01:08:15):
They laughed so hard exactly, which is what they say.

Speaker 2 (01:08:17):
They say sometimes, so you should, you should come up
with your own buckets of of your fans like like
like like really visualize the person, give them a name
and then and then you will start to see them.

Speaker 1 (01:08:27):
But you know what it is. It is Katie. You
have a ton of Katies. Yes, yeah, Katie's is twenty
eight year old twenty eight to thirty five year old
communications major from the Midwest name Katie. They're all named Katie. Okay,
so asking them their names.

Speaker 3 (01:08:41):
So I'm most proud of with my audience is I
always say like it's age twelve through one hundred and twelve.
Like when I see THEE I was gonna say, you
are really for a quadrant. Whereas we are people who
are constantly approached by men and go, my girlfriend loves you,
which is so sweet. But also it's never like I'm
a fan, which which is okay.

Speaker 1 (01:09:00):
You know what, though, a lot of them, I've been
noticing because they're they're excited to initiate the conversation because
their girlfriends are nervous, and but they come up and
they initiate the conversation, and I can tell it gets
them laid. So they're so excited, and that I think
will make them listen. Yeah, because I think, and you know,
some of them they want to be shy about how
much they know, because, as I said, masculinity is hard

(01:09:22):
to deal with when you're still I guess, like you know,
when it's all ahead of you still. I'm just saying,
don't be shy, boys, It's okay to like lost culch.
It's okay, that's right. Look, luc who's here.

Speaker 3 (01:09:33):
You know who's great at A great straight male who
will all often say how much he loves the show,
John ham will Steven, writer of Bonus Straight but sometimes
with August right, that's a real ally.

Speaker 1 (01:09:46):
We love you. Well, okay, it's time for I don't
think something we're gonna go first, did you type it out?
So we wing in here? I have something that you know,
I didn't realize was a thing until last night. I
was at dinner and I was made aware. And this
is rock my world. I can't wait to go after

(01:10:07):
restaurant culture here. This is Matt Rogers. I don't think
so many as time starts now, I don't think so honey.
When mocktails are almost as expensive or as expensive as cocktails,
I am not even a part of the sober community.
And I am outraged on behalf of the sober community
because let me tell you what the expensive part of
a cocktail is the alcohol. So why for grenadine, orange juice?

(01:10:27):
Bitterers maybe and like a little bit of soda water?
Am I paying twelve dollars? I don't think it's fair.
I don't think so honey. I also want to directly
say where this is happening, which is where I have
my new home, Lower Manhattan. I don't think so honey.
This is a lot of you guys. I'm telling you,
you know a rock you had a fourteen dollars mocktail,

(01:10:49):
and I don't care how big the orange is. I
know because I'll tell you, what's only a couple bucks
in an orange? A whole thing. So I don't care
that the slice is that big. Yes, you made it
look expensive. That's so different than being expensive. I mean,
for example, I could walk in here wearing a white suit.
I'm not Zendea or Anasy. At the medgala, they cost

(01:11:11):
a million dollars. I cast six. I don't think so
harm and that's women. You are more than six dollars. Yeah,
but you know what, though, not not really, And I'm
saying that like these these cocktails in Monck's infuriating. It's infuriating.

Speaker 2 (01:11:26):
Well, I mean I feel like they are maybe offsetting
that by like no, actually there's no explanation.

Speaker 1 (01:11:33):
I'm only and you know what. It's like, It's like,
I'll tell you what. The alcoholics don't miss paying for
the alcohol, right, okay, So it's like they might miss
the alcohol, they can't have it. They're not missing the prices.
Is not like, oh, you know what, I really miss
hitting it hard and paying nine dollars for a Heineken.
You know what would be great nine bucks for a
Heineken zero, which is essentially piss.

Speaker 3 (01:11:56):
They should be like, here's an orange juice and an edible.
It's fifteen dollars dollars. Yeah, really good ideas.

Speaker 1 (01:12:03):
Give you something else, yeah yeah, or it's but you
know what it's like, what would that even be? I mean,
you know, it's like they also, I guess you know
what they try to get away with. They're using the
nice glass wear too. Yeah, but you don't kid for that. No no, no,
no no no, that's not part of the experience. Or
you get to keep it. You get to keep it
like a souvenir glass. Yeah, yeah, okay. I used to
be big into souveneur glass culture. And then I'll tell

(01:12:25):
you what. You have a lot of huge cups you
never drink out of. Yeah, because that's really what I
a on a shelf. Maroon mug. That's totally that. That's
really good.

Speaker 2 (01:12:33):
But wait, I want to just talk Maru mag and
you're talking about LA like you always struck me as
pure New York but I am, I am. But you
do have this this really good world and worldliness about
Los Angeles.

Speaker 3 (01:12:45):
I just like been you know, I've been in show
business for like what twenty three years, and so you
just you know, where go back and forth and and
you know, I have my spots.

Speaker 1 (01:12:54):
I like those Felas Marou. I mean I have places
I really like aspirational. Yeah yeah, despirational it is.

Speaker 3 (01:13:00):
But you are in New York, Okay, Yeah, No, I'm
through and through New York. I can't imagine living anywhere else.
I saw this Adam Got Next Solo show the other day,
and he has this beautiful piece where he talks about
how his favorite place on the planet is Central Park
because it's just this place where everyone is in like
a social pact to be like, we're gonna come to

(01:13:21):
this place that's completely manufactured and completely fake, but there's
beautiful trees and beautiful statues and everyone. There's no premium
pricing for a different part of the park. We're all
just at the goddamn Central.

Speaker 1 (01:13:35):
Park and it's great. It's like that I love New York.

Speaker 3 (01:13:38):
It's like it's like and I have frustrations with it,
of course, but also you know, look, we're all in it.

Speaker 1 (01:13:45):
It's so funny coming back to New York and being
like a New Yorker again too, because the first thing
that happens is you start to be real opinionated about
New York. Ship. I am ready to crack skulls about
the subway by the way, like I'll get up my
one time, I'll get political. I can't believe Cuomo is
this far ahead. It's fucking crazy. It's fucking in even

(01:14:05):
following that race? Is he ahead? Oh sixty forty? Oh
really yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:14:10):
But like I think it's just it's just name recognition.
Is what's kind of it's name recognition.

Speaker 1 (01:14:14):
I've got, I've got I've got a frivolous one frivilla. Yeah,
maybe that's a good dragon.

Speaker 3 (01:14:19):
That's a great technically, No, this is what I wanted
to say, the only good dragon that I've come up with.

Speaker 2 (01:14:24):
And this is what I wanted to say, the most
annoying sentence in the world. This is what I wanted
to say. At the end of my Criterion Closet video.
My drag name would be Janis Films. Okay, oh, Janie Films.

Speaker 1 (01:14:36):
I just opened my calculator instead of my timer ten
million I want or like I just added five million,
five million.

Speaker 3 (01:14:51):
You were just brainswimming what Kevin Hart makes movie seven figure?
It was like, it's probably this.

Speaker 2 (01:14:58):
This is Bowen Yang's don't think of honey, his time
starts now. I don't think so, honey. Do you guys
know what I'm talking about? Plastic hooks on gift bags
that you purchase at the gift store. You buy a
little paper gift bag and there's a plastic thing to
make it hook. You cannot take that off, even with
all the gorilla's strength in the world, even when there's

(01:15:19):
a perforated little thing there that mocks you because you
try to tear it off, it's not coming off. Now,
you got to get a damn pair of scissors, Like
I have the time in ninety second to find scissors
to trim off this little plastic hook thing so that
I can actually make it presentable to you, so that
you don't receive my gift and see the plastic cook

(01:15:42):
and the first thought you have is of me sliding
it off a.

Speaker 1 (01:15:45):
Little paper source.

Speaker 2 (01:15:48):
Please find a better way to hang gift bags, maybe
I don't know, by these string handles that are already
on them. Rather than put a useless single use plastic,
might I add element to these things?

Speaker 1 (01:16:00):
And that's one minute? Wow? Really clean? Oh my god?
You know what I mean? You know what I'm talking
We do. I don't. I didn't even know. I didn't
know that they were four hanging. Really I kind of
thought it was one of those just annoying things about
like there's no classic.

Speaker 3 (01:16:18):
Single used plastic sneak attack because it doesn't even seem
like it's part of it.

Speaker 1 (01:16:24):
No, it's like that thing is going to go in
a landfill for it.

Speaker 2 (01:16:26):
Absolutely, it's never it's it's or it'll go to our brains.
I don't know, Like, you know, what's also crazy when
you go to CVS and get a receipt like just
talk just crazy to talk about how much how much
room it takes off or like how much you don't
need it. It's like those receipts are still it's crazy,
and I'm.

Speaker 1 (01:16:44):
Like, I'm just gonna throw this out. And they don't
even give you the option to have the receipts. And
I feel like with these things, it's like what is
the what is it?

Speaker 3 (01:16:52):
It's weird, Like I think in our lifetime it has
been this thing where we're like we're going to recycle,
We're going to save the planet to like the planets fucked.

Speaker 1 (01:17:00):
Yeah, we're not trying, And it's such a bummer. I've
never been angrier than I feel comfortable saying this. A
few years ago, we were on Fire Island and a
friend of ours had a new boyfriend and this, and
he walks back to us. We're sitting at the canteen
and he comes back and he goes the gaze at

(01:17:21):
the at the at the the docks were so annoying.
Guess what just happened? And he goes what he goes,
I threw my plastic cup in the bay and they
yelled at me like we were like, excuse me, excuse me.
And the guy goes, yeah, like I was done with
my drink and I threw my plastic cup in the
bay and they all yelled at me. It's like, okay,

(01:17:41):
the planet is dying already. And then our friend goes, yeah,
isn't that crazy? And I had to walk away. I
was like, I know love is blind, I know, dick
feel good and whole. But no, they did break up.
Thank god, my god.

Speaker 3 (01:17:57):
That was That was a moment where I had check
my respect for someone proudly proudly being a litter bug
is nuts.

Speaker 1 (01:18:06):
I hate littering. It drives me nuts. And also like,
you know there's the fish in there, the fish. You
know that, you know there's a fishing well, it's what
he said. They're gonna die anyway. Oh God, okay kill
me then I'm on my way out at some point
that that is actually textbook.

Speaker 2 (01:18:23):
I'm sorry to get a little academic here. This is
n YU maybe, and I think they taught this at
Georgetown as well, metabolic rift theory, where it's it's the
human disconnect between the disconnect between between man and nature,
and it makes use. It makes it so that you
don't understand that this came from something and that you
throwing it at the window or throwing it into the
water is actually the reason why you are broken as

(01:18:46):
a person and why literally the phrase touch grass is
important because you need to connect to that anyway. Microbiglia,
you have a written I don't think so, honey, and
we are very and there's a reason for this.

Speaker 1 (01:19:00):
See it at the end.

Speaker 2 (01:19:01):
You'll see because it could have been on your phone,
is micro Bigles, I don't think so many and as
time starts now.

Speaker 3 (01:19:08):
I don't think so, honey. Hating on people who try hard, Literally,
everyone good at anything tries hard, you know, tries hard?

Speaker 1 (01:19:16):
Tailor you who else? Beyonce? You know who else? Reygun
the breakdanswer, I'm.

Speaker 3 (01:19:22):
More suspicious of people who don't try hard, or people
who lie and say they're not trying hard when they are.
If someone does something amazing and they say it was easy,
be suspicious. Not only are they lying about it, they
also committed crime. Remember when Anne Hathaway and James Franco
bombed so hard hosting the OS.

Speaker 1 (01:19:40):
James Franco just left.

Speaker 3 (01:19:42):
He's a loser and I'm hashtag team anne Hathaway, your hand, Hathaway.

Speaker 1 (01:19:47):
You know who else tries hard?

Speaker 3 (01:19:48):
Fontine and lay mish Cy Andrea Saxony.

Speaker 1 (01:19:53):
Where's God working? From? Her? Intofreest is hard?

Speaker 3 (01:19:57):
She has to show up to work every day, sacrificing
a relationship with Adrian Gray is character Nate, who I
think is a chef but never has to go to
work for the reason that's never explained. I'm reaching the
end of my minute, but I want you to know
this is my fifth draft of this.

Speaker 1 (01:20:10):
You know what I'm telling you, because if you're a
fellow try hard, you deserve to know. Yeah, that's one minute,
really good, and you know what, You're right? And I
never liked Nate and Devilworth. I never liked this.

Speaker 2 (01:20:22):
It's ridiculous. Outrageous, character outrageous. And this is the thing,
this is I'm gonna misquote Dorian Gray. But the people
who are not in the arena don't know the pleasures
of don't don't know the triumphs, and so therefore how
could they know anything about defeat or something like.

Speaker 1 (01:20:39):
That, you know what it is? Yes? And also it's
just like it's like you talking about your hard nipples
on stage or having strife, emotional strife about being vulnerable.
It's like it's because you know it's going to take
work to get there, and then you are exposed. And
it's like it's so easy for people to be like
fuck her about someone who tried. I beIN guess they're trying.

(01:21:00):
I know. It's like I'm so over that.

Speaker 3 (01:21:03):
It also takes so much effort to hate on people.
Yeah you got to create a log in.

Speaker 1 (01:21:08):
Yeah you know there's a workaholic Charlie XCX literally noted
admitted workaholic always has to work. And it's just like
maybe that can help, like people stop being such assholes.
It's like someone who's effortless and cool looking is working
to be that, you know what I mean? Like I
can't stand that because I am a try hard and

(01:21:30):
type a millennial, and it's like for that to be uncool,
it's like, okay, ridiculous.

Speaker 2 (01:21:35):
That was a wonderful, wonderful I don't think so, honey.
Draft why I do have to ask why why print
it printed?

Speaker 3 (01:21:42):
Just because it's like draft over draft over draft, And
then I like the paper. It's like a touch draft thing.
I like, that's good. You're in a way touching tree. Yeah,
I'm touching tree.

Speaker 1 (01:21:54):
But I wanted to. I wanted to get it right.

Speaker 3 (01:21:56):
Because I'm a huge fan of the segment and I
just wanted to lay something down that felt that felt
true to me.

Speaker 1 (01:22:02):
Thank you. That was really that. I feel like we
we're taking it back the narrative. I really did take
it because the thing about people that don't try hard
having the narrative for a second, they didn't work hard
enough to keep the narrative. So now it's just like
it's gone. Yeah, you know, power can be wrestled very
easily from those who wieled power carelessly and thoughtlessly. What
is that from? That actually was our guest last week, Tourmaline.

(01:22:25):
Tourmaline from an incredible biography on Marsha P. Johnson and
that was the educational moment of our episode.

Speaker 3 (01:22:34):
Also, if we try harder, maybe we'll win the next election. Interesting,
I think maybe we need hard enough. Yeah, I think
it's part of it. That's probably part of it. It's
in the mix, in the.

Speaker 1 (01:22:45):
Mix, it's I think I think it's in the mix.
Do you think AOC will win the presidency. I think
it's possible. AOC's fire could be pretty cool.

Speaker 3 (01:22:53):
She has a message that hits. I also think Budage
is great. I mean it might be controversial.

Speaker 1 (01:22:57):
I love him. Yeah, I don't think the country.

Speaker 3 (01:23:00):
You know, sometimes people oh whatever, they think he's too moderate, this, that, whatever.
They think he's trying too hard, they think he's trying
too hard. But I like how he mixes it up
on Fox stuff like that. I know, like he's willing
to he's willing to keep it, willing to go there.
And so he's AOC by the way, and Bernie and
Bertie and Bernie's obviously kind of a legend. But like, yeah,
I think both of those people are phenomenal.

Speaker 1 (01:23:21):
Yeah, yeah, it is interesting. They can catch a wave. Yeah,
I think they are catching waves. It's just like I think,
after everything that's gone on. It's like, I don't want
to be that person that's like, oh, I'm nervous to
put up a gay guy or I'm nervous to put
up a young woman. Yeah, I agree, you can't be
the nervous person. I refuse to be. But it's like

(01:23:44):
there's truly people out there who just solely think I'm
a lost because she's a black woman or black Indian woman.
And it's just like, I feel like we need to
I don't think that's why she lost. And I do
think we need to stop saying that because if that's
the ideology that we go down, like we're just gonna
end up with cuomos forever.

Speaker 3 (01:24:01):
I Also, I think if we knew for a year
out the whole thing with people googling day of who's running,
Yeah that's real?

Speaker 1 (01:24:08):
Is that really real? Millions of people googling who's running.

Speaker 2 (01:24:12):
And some of us didn't know, okay, and some of
us just had to us just like had been remind
how busy he is.

Speaker 1 (01:24:19):
I'm busy. I mean, I don't want to hit him.

Speaker 3 (01:24:21):
I don't want to hit Biden while he's down because
I'm sympathetic to the hell step.

Speaker 1 (01:24:25):
It's like yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:24:26):
I think there's a lot of things he could have
done for the four years also to safeguard democracy, Like
there's a.

Speaker 1 (01:24:33):
Lot, I mean, there's a lot going on. Its pandemic, there's.

Speaker 3 (01:24:36):
Luck going but still and just introducing Kamala everyone.

Speaker 1 (01:24:40):
Hey, yeah, hey, I don't think he knew she was
there exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:24:45):
I'm I'm one hundred years old. There's this other lady
who's fandasdig you know. Anyway, go pick up Jake Tapper's book.

Speaker 4 (01:24:52):
Everybody Episode who, by the way, was shaming people for
suggesting that there was something wrong maybe not or maybe
not right with Biden for a while.

Speaker 3 (01:25:02):
And there's a book, right, So anyway, I love that.
Love that guy. I love that dude on Jake Tapper.

Speaker 2 (01:25:10):
Yeah, love for Jake Tapper's book The Good Life Is
Odd Netflix made twenty six.

Speaker 1 (01:25:16):
Yes, you're gonna love it. We loved it. We loved it.
I mean, you're just the greatest. You really are such
you're one of the pre eminent storytellers. You're just so
good up there. You feel so safe when you watch you.
You always have and you're getting better to blind you.
I love you, guys so much. This is such an
honor to be here.

Speaker 3 (01:25:32):
If I could only be on one podcast, it would
be this and this whole thing. But this hasn't been
so beautiful for me because I love bonding. Also on
all of these movies. I know it's like so deep
to me. All these movies are so deep to me.

Speaker 1 (01:25:44):
Yeah, Jeremy mcglare is gonna be a good watch for
you later.

Speaker 3 (01:25:47):
Yes, I can't wait. Thank you for bringing that in.
And we love you very much.

Speaker 2 (01:25:50):
And there is love and there is friendship, and we're
all in New York now, so let's let's hand yes
when return return.

Speaker 3 (01:25:55):
When Bowen wrote an email on me about my special
last night, it made me covel and I wrote about
my journal.

Speaker 1 (01:26:00):
Oh email that we were all on. I'm sorry I
didn't email. I wanted it this morning. Yeah, it's okay,
I'll send you an email. Okay, I'll write about my
gerald tonight. We never ever sad of the song. I
wish I was off booked to Secret Garden. I know.

Speaker 4 (01:26:16):
Anna to see me because I don't thing the day
out understand where everything's.

Speaker 1 (01:26:26):
Made to be broke. I just want you to know why,
I Drews want you to know how the song ends.
I Drews watch you know. Yeah, It's so good. Hi,

(01:26:50):
You're funny.

Speaker 2 (01:26:53):
Last Culturesis is the production by Will Ferrell's Big Money
Players and Then I Heart Radio.

Speaker 1 (01:26:56):
Podcasts, created and hosted by Matt Rogers and Bowen Yeg,
executive produced by Anna Hasnier and

Speaker 2 (01:27:02):
Produced by Becker Ramos, edited mixed by Doug Baby and
Nikola Board and our music is by Henry Murski