Sonic The Hedgehog 3: In theaters now, a great dose of nostalgic fun with some great comedy moments. Get some tickets and enjoy the holidays with family. Ben Schwartz (voice of Sonic) joins us tonight, we talk about the Netflix Roast of 2024 with Jeff Ross, Tim Dillon, Adam Ray, Ms. Pat, Hannah Berner and more. Deep dive into comedy, great recs from Ben and just a fun episode hanging with friends. Support the show and sign up for a $1 per month trial of Shopify at https://www.shopify.com/drunk Subscribe to We Might Be Drunk: https://bit.ly/SubscribeToWMBD WMBD Merch: https://wemightbedrunkpod.com/ WMBD Clips Page: https://bit.ly/WMBDClips Sam Morril: YouTube Channel: @sammorril Instagram: https://instagram.com/sammorril/?hl=en Tickets/Tour: https://punchup.live/sammorril/tickets Mark Normand: YouTube Channel: @marknormand Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marknormand/?hl=en Tickets/Tour: https://punchup.live/marknormand/tickets We Might Be Drunk is produced by Gotham Production Studios https://www.gothamproductionstudios.com/ @GothamProductionStudios Producer Matt Peters: https://www.instagram.com/mrmatthewpeters/?hl=en #wemightbedrunk #marknormand #sammorril #podcast #drunkpodcast #comedy #comedian #funny #gothampodcast
We're here with Ben Schwartz. He's promoting Sonic 3. Whoa. I know.
Real open.
Mm-hmm.
Wow. You want another? We'll do another. Wait, we should talk. You just got back from roast? Yeah. Yeah, roasting the year. How does it feel? The roast of the year or the roast of the year?
Roasting the year 2024. Okay, how do you guys feel? Definitely not the roast of the year. It was one of the worst of all time.
I gave him the brief rundown that it was not good.
Yeah.
I think it'll be edited to be hopefully good.
But you guys did well. You hit it. We did well. I ended horribly. I fucked up the ending.
We thought it would be funny if we ended it by being like, oh my God, we're going to get canceled. And we pretend and Mark picks up the phone and then goes, oh shit, Trump just made a secretary of agriculture. Oh, that's good. That's funny.
It killed.
We did it at the club and it killed. And then we did it there and it got, we didn't have a phone. We forgot to bring a phone up. So the actor Simon Rex is in the front row. So you asked for his phone? So we said, Simon, can we have your phone? He just gave us his phone. Oh, that's cool. And you still have his phone now?
Yeah, we took it wet. Very cool.
But it didn't work.
Are you guys able, if you have a good set, how do you, because it seems like you're both very chill. If you have a good set, would you give yourself credit? Would you say we killed or would you always say like, yeah, we did well? We'd go, we got through that. That was good. So you're never like, we crushed? No. Rarely. Even when you feel like you did, you just can't say it? No.
Why do you think that is? Because there's always something wrong. You can always find a way.
You always feel like a fraud on some level where like if it's a special, you're like, well, now I got to write a whole new act. It's hard to celebrate the win.
So you can't even enjoy it.
I can't.
Wow. I get that. I'm bad at enjoying things at the moment. I'm always worried about the next thing.
Because you got a big movie up. You got to go on a press tour, right? So you're like, fuck. That sucks. The press tour?
Yeah. Great. It's fun. This is the very last thing on the entire press tour. I've been doing press for three months. Yeah, you seem wiped. I'm sick. I don't feel great. International. He went international. Yeah, we went to Brazil and London and LA and New York. And this is it. We're ending. This is it. We're ending. I can't wait. This is amazing. All right. Well, hey, we're happy to have you.
I want this to be seven hours long. I want us to really have a marathon. We can do that.
Sonic is kind of crazy it took this long to make a Sonic movie.
Are you a video game fan?
As a kid growing up, I liked it, but I'm a younger brother, so my brother would make me be Tails.
Yeah, of course.
I was like, this game fucking sucks.
I'm not even on the screen.
Right, right, right.
Every now and then you lift Sonic up.
But then he'd leave and I'd get to play his and I'd be like, oh, this is kind of cool. Oh, that is cool. Sonic's, hey, it was legendary. The best.
Turned into a little ball. The best. Come on, what are we doing? I was Younger Brother 2. I was Luigi. I shot a CEO. Oh, yeah. There you go. Oh, no. Got it.
Yeah, there you go. Is he younger? Is Luigi the young one?
I assume, although he's taller. He's taller. They're not twin brothers, right? Mario and Luigi? I don't know if they're twin. I thought they were related. They've got to be brothers. Give it a go. They're definitely brothers. They're Super Mario brothers.
Oh, there you go.
Mario's supposed to be 43. Okay, what's Luigi? I was right. God, this is a great question. How old is Luigi? What do you think their last names are? Mario Mario and Luigi Mario. Is that right?
Luigi's 24?
Wait, so how old is Mario?
Wow, they look like shit. That's a different mother.
Yeah, I thought they were like 48. By the way, 24 and 26 for full mustache is crazy to me. Well, they're bucking their wops. This is crazy. I was 24 years old.
Great. So their last name is Mario.
Yeah.
I never knew that.
Mario Mario. All right. I don't know if Sonic has a last name. This is really bringing up a lot of stuff. Well, he's an animal. He's a hedgehog.
Yeah. Was that your game growing up?
Loved Sonic, but I love role-playing games. I love RPGs. I don't know how much video games you guys play. Like Metal Gear Solid type stuff? Like Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger and Legend of Zelda. Oh, boy. Like all that stuff I really like. The vagina's drying. Do you hear him? What does that sound? Give a sound effect. Okay. I've heard it before in high school.
That's another thing we cut from the roast.
The vagina's dry and act out. Hey, I was a Warcraft guy. You were? Yeah. So you're a PC man.
Yeah, I guess so. Did you play Diablo and all those things? Nah, I never got into Diablo. Warcraft took over. Warcraft took over. You were a big Warcraft man. Yeah, my brother liked it, so I played Tales. Yeah, I played Second Fiddle. He would go pee and go eat, and I would get in there.
I was just sports. The craft is so intense to just jump in for two seconds.
I loved it. The orcs killing him. How about Sin City? Not Sin City.
Sim City.
Sim City is Leisure Suit Larry. Remember Leisure Suit Larry?
Oh, do I?
Coonhound. He's me too by now.
That guy's finished. He's got to be done, right? He's got to be in jail somewhere. Got to be.
That was a weird game. Just a horny, chubby guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you're a kid. You're like, I'm supposed to be.
Yeah. It was very exciting. I remember as a kid being like, I can't believe they're cursing in a video game. We're like, he's trying to like flirt with women. Does that say wet dreams dried twice? I mean. Whoever's thinking of the titles is an absolute genius.
The sports games are crazy now because not only do you get to play as the players, you get to be a GM. That's right. That is like, as I'm older, that's all I want to do, by the way. I'm like, I want to rebuild the Knicks. I want to make some moves. Yeah, yeah, yeah. As a kid, it was like NBA Jam to like NBA Live.
NBA Live was one of my favorite series of games of all time. I played every single, every year I get a new one. Yeah. And people that play 2K right now don't quite know that NBA Live was like everything when you were a kid. I don't know that. I was an NBA Jam guy, and that's where I capped it. NBA Jam's amazing, too. Yeah. Razzle dazzle. Razzle dazzle. He's heating up. Boom shakalaka.
Yes, boom shakalaka.
It is all in the shoes, by the way. Did you know that? No, I did not know that. Yeah, it is all in the shoes. 100% in the shoes.
Those shoes they wore, like, pull up. Like, Walt Frazier would play in Pumas.
Really? They were playing like Birkenstocks. How did they last four years? It's crazy. All those old guys were playing like literally- Converse? Converse All-Stars. Crazy.
That's the 80s.
Well, you remember Jordan first shoe was like the most uncomfortable. Didn't he say you'd get blisters? Yeah, like the beginning of when they're really starting to figure out how to make basketball sneakers. Those are uncomfortable walking shoes. I know.
And then you're like, what the hell? They're dunking with them.
Well, it's crazy. Back in the 40s, guys worked in a factory in dress shoes. They served in the war.
Ted Williams was a fighter pilot. There you go. Joe DiMaggio lost like three years of his prime to just like be like a guy who would go like hit balls around for the troops. Really? He lost three years of his prime. He had to come back and be like, you know, and you're like, DiMaggio should have better numbers. It's like he was, he lost.
Three years. That's incredible. I didn't know that. Isn't that crazy? That's amazing. He served.
People served. You were supposed to. That was like back in the day when you got a bad look if you didn't serve, you know?
Ali, Elvis. Ali was gone for a bit. Yeah, those are right now, those would be considered street wear sneakers. Like you would skate in those. I wouldn't wear those because they're uncomfortable now.
I know. You've got to put a Dr. Scholz in there just to walk.
Even look at the Adidas next to him, whoever's guarding him in the bulls or whatever. Those are almost these, exactly. Yeah.
You barely walk around with them. Now they're wearing pink, neon green shoes. It's all different ball games.
The flying coach. They weren't doing charter. They were sharing hotel rooms.
Wow. It's like the WNBA now.
I know. They got their first year of charter because of Caitlin Clark. Oh, yeah. Congrats.
All right, Clark Barr.
Good for her. Clark Barr. You're famous for making up nicknames for WNBA players, right?
That's my thing.
You have another one? So Clark Barr. Who else do you have from WNBA? Reese's Pieces. There you go. Angel Reese's. Yeah, Angel Reese's Pieces. Did you guys do this on the roast or no?
I cut a WNBA joke from the roast because they said that they own the material. I'm like, I'm putting that in a special.
Oh, yeah. You have to be careful with what I used to freelance jokes for Letterman. And if they got an SNL, we can update. And if they use it, I'm no longer allowed to say it. They own it and they're allowed to keep it for three months. And if they don't use it, then I get back. But I would always have to be careful not use anything that I would want to use in a movie or whatever.
So I wonder if that's the same for you guys. If it's not your special, do you want to use it and waste it on a roast? Is that something?
I wasted two bits on this because I just want to make sure that our set was good. So I was like, it's a Pete Diddy joke. I'm like, how long am I going to tell this? And then an Epstein joke that I'm like, I never tell this. There you go. I'm seeing a theme with your stand. I know. Jesus Christ.
Kid fucking.
Jesus Christ. Well, you know. Take it down a notch. By the way, you're in a movie I enjoyed called Standing Up, Falling Down. Did you see a movie? Shout out Pete Horry for writing that. Pete is the best.
Pete Horry is the best.
Yeah, it's a good movie, man.
Oh, thanks, man. I got to work with Billy Crystal. That's awesome. The end up legend. Wow. He was incredible. And we filmed it in Long Island right where he grew up. Wow.
You were governors, weren't you?
Yeah, we were. Whoa. We did everything. We did everything. It was awesome. That movie cost $1 million to make. So we would like change in the car or change in like the restaurant we were going to film in. It was crazy. I can't believe you said yesterday. It was amazing. Yeah, it was a good movie and it was like, you know, I was a stand up in that.
It had some darkness to it. Well, making a stand up movie is always challenging because punchline, they're all kind of considered a joke.
Yes. And my character is supposed to be bad at the beginning and then better. And so we use tweets of mine at the beginning that were cheesy and then slowly like started to write better. Yeah, yeah. Like shitty tweets by me and then Neil Brennan tweets by the end. Yeah. But that was fun. It was also funny to go do, you know, stand up and like do it over and over. It's so different than...
I started doing standup when I first started comedy. Nice. And it wasn't, I couldn't, I did improv at the same time and I was so drawn to improv because when you suck, you fail with everybody. And then when you succeed, you succeed with everybody.
And at the beginning, you guys, you guys know way more about this than me, but it's like, I feel like it's so lonely at the beginning of standup because you don't really know anybody. Everybody has five minutes. You have to bring people to your shows. Yeah. It's like, so you have to love it. You would have to love it to keep going. And I loved improv and sketch. And I like stand up.
I was like, I'm not good enough to get on stage. I got to the point where they said, you don't have to bring people. I was like, oh, this is exciting. And I just bombed. In front of friends. In front of no friends. The one with like, you don't have to bring people anymore. Just come and do a set.
It makes no sense that you have to bring people at the beginning. Because I'm bad.
I know. It's like your first show. But that's how they make money. The only way they make money.
Of course. But it makes no sense for us, I'm saying. But you found improv and sketch. What about that? For improv, your mind works quickly. I saw a snippet of you when you were doing it with Middle Ditch. Yeah, Middle Ditch and Schwartz. And I think we both did Clusterfest one year. And I was on one. I saw a bit of you.
Oh, nice.
Yeah, yeah. So I was like, oh, man.
That was Ben Schwartz and Friends or Middle Ditch and Schwartz? I think it was you two together. Oh, yeah, yeah. Probably.
But I was like, man, their minds are working quick. Do you have stuff that you're like, please hit this, please hit this?
No. I go on stage with nothing. Wow. Literally zero. You two are insane. Oh, thanks, dude.
The connection. You're so in sync.
It'd be so funny if you've never seen us. I've seen it. I've seen it. Never seen it, but it's sound. No, Middleditch. This is the way I've heard about it. I watched Coming Up. He was always great at the UCB Theater. Yeah. That's where we started doing stuff at UCB in New York. And then at the same time, do you guys know Adam Pally and Gil Azaridon? Yeah, yeah.
So me, Pally, and Gil had a three-person sketch team called Hot Sauce. And then Montreal Comedy Festival first introduced sketch. And we were able to do like that first batch where like Bob and Dave or Bob Odenkirk and David Cross were hosting it. So it was like the biggest thing in the world. Yeah. Because we could not get into Aspen for some reason.
All these festivals, I don't even know if they exist anymore. Nassman's gone. Montreal's kind of gone.
I think this is the first year it's gone. Isn't that crazy?
It's wild. It was such an exciting thing. That was like the landmark.
If you could do that. It was exciting, but then it like slowly, like back in the day, you hear stories from the 90s where a guy's like, I got a $750,000 holding deal. Yeah, dude. I'm like, yeah, I went there and I got like a shitty agent.
Oh yeah, I didn't get anything. It's like all you get. I was so excited though. I remember being so excited, but you're right, nothing happened afterwards.
I got an agent and then like the guy, you know when you're signed with an agency, like the big guy comes in to like close it. Yeah. They're like, this is like the big dog at our agency. And I was like, oh shit. And then I was like, so that guy's my agent? They're like, yeah. And then I was like, whatever happened to Fred? They're like, oh, he left. He just went to another agency.
Within signing me, like two weeks later, he went to like UTA.
I'm out of here.
I'm gone. I was like, he was like the guy. That's so funny.
I was that stupid. We have a friend who, I'm not going to say his name, but he did Montreal and had a bad set and lost his manager. No. So he went to Montreal and lost industry. Wow. Lost representation. Jesus. I've never heard of that before. Yeah. He must have been really bad. Yeah.
he's good he just had it was like one of those uh industry nights where they're all in their blackberries no one's listening and he just tanked and they're all there to see one hot guy yeah that guy skyrocketed matt rife and then uh all the other people they're just waiting like oh who's this douche get out of the way and then they bombed Wow. Yeah, but it was better off. He's better off.
You don't want that manager. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The person that gives up on you immediately. Yeah. After one bad set.
Remember getting new faces? What did you guys call it for improv? That was it for... Well, improv doesn't exist. Improv, also the touring that I'm doing now for improv doesn't exist. It's the first time we're playing like... The venues that I play are bigger than any improv tour kind that's ever happened. So we're like trying to show that...
100%.
But not good improv people, though. I mean, I think, look, here's the thing. If you're great at improv, it's like, that's insane. But I've seen, it's like... It's kind of like magic. You see someone who's bad.
That's exactly what I say. Oh, I'm talking about magic in general. Just the idea of like when you pull it off. But it's the same with you guys when you have a great stand-up set and everything's going.
There's so much bad stand-up. How are stand-ups, you know, how are we portrayed outside of stand-up? We look like the corniest.
No, because you can point to a thousand movies. You can point to a thousand specials. You can even point, like you can point to Pryor or Steve Martin. You have different versions of stand-up. And in improv, before Mildred Schwartz, there was only like one
real special out there and then there's a documentary on a team called tj and dave who are great but it was a doc kind of and the other one was like ass cat which was a ucb show but it was on bravo and it was shot different so it wasn't really what they do so like we never had something we could point to like a kevin hart special or whose line i know that's super mainstream but that's short form i do that totally different so that's like uh it's like quick little jokes as opposed to like um so you're like building something you're
Yeah, like we do. So if you ever watch a special, it's an hour, an hour and a half, like almost a play. We do an entire hour. We talk to an audience member for 10, 15 minutes. For Ben Schwartz and friends, what I did this year was I asked the audience, tell me about the most exciting day or night of your life. And people raise their hands. And we pick someone that doesn't seem fucking bananas.
And then we ask them. They tell us a story about the most exciting day or night of their life. And then we say, thank you so much. They don't talk the rest of the show. And then we improvise for 70 minutes. And we try to do like the whole thing.
And now I'm trying to give an intermission because I'm kind of learning that to give even more show, and people like going and getting to drink, like we never gave an intermission, but now like the venues are also like, they would appreciate it and stuff like that. So we're doing two halves.
So we're doing two tiny shows, but by the end of the second one, we're calling back everything from bullshit.
Are you ever up there when you're like, this is, are you ever like, no, that's bad, give me someone else?
When I'm interviewing the audience? All the time. Yeah. Because I can also tell when, like, if they're telling us a story. Like, there's an example of, I was like, tell us the most exciting day in our life. And the guy's like, it was in Chicago. We were playing in the Chicago Theater. And he goes, dude, when the Cubs won the World Series. I was like, amazing. Were you there? He's like, nope.
I watched it on my TV. And I was like, okay. Did anything happen? He goes, I watched the game, my man. And I was like, well, we have to do this for an hour and a half. We need, like, tell us a story or, like, you know. Right. Who are you around or blah, blah, blah. So it's like, so I learn really quick, like, oh, this isn't going to be good.
Or this person's really excited and not really doesn't have anything to say. But I'll like politely go to someone else or someone else. But the most I'll go to is probably three people or something like that. And then I'll be like, all right, we got to figure out something from these three.
Have you ever had one of those? Because you've done a million shows, I assume. Yeah. You ever had one of those ones like, there's good, there's great, and then one is just magic. Everything just comes together. I did improv for like 10 minutes. Did you? Oh, yeah. Somebody told me if you're going to do stand-up, you should do an improv class just to learn how to riff.
This is great. Where did you take an improv class?
The Pit. Yeah, I performed with The Pit when I first started.
Who was your teacher? Nice.
He was an old kooky guy.
Armando Diaz.
maybe he's not kooky but he's like the old he's like the veteran over there he was not he was he was low bar oh he's like the guy that like their forms named after armando diaz yeah okay this guy he's intro he probably was an intern that they gave us but it was bad but first thing i noticed was improvisers are supportive comments like get out of my way you piece of shit open mics and stand up were like oh they're just not listening ruthless the guy the guy i tour with who's like now one of my best friends barack obama
Barack Obama. Yeah. We started out, you know, bad. No, my friend Gary Veeder just saw me spacing out during an open mic sit at Maui Taco. And he goes, this fucking asshole's not listening. That's how I met him. Really? And we were on a show the next night. And he goes, I'm really sorry. And I was like, no, I get it.
I saw how much bigger you were. I was like, sorry about that. He's a little guy. Oh, is he? Yeah. Amazing. But yeah, first of all, it was crazy supportive. That's when I knew I was like, this isn't for me. I didn't care about any of them, you know, but they were super nice. They're like, oh, you're having you need a place to go to Thanksgiving.
And I was like, oh, I mean, like in life, they were support both everywhere.
That's great. This makes me so happy for my community. Yeah. You're scared of it. You hate it.
Well, I just wasn't. I knew it was.
How are you at improv? Were you so I bet you were very you're trying to get the laugh. So you're not the scene. Exactly. For people who start with stand-ups that start, they'll break the scene to make themselves look funny. I'll be like, man, God, it's cold out here. They'll be like, no, it's not. And I'm like, well, it's like now you got a joke and the scene is over, but now that joke is over.
We're like ball hogs.
I wasn't that bad. I hate the negate guy. Get rid of him. That guy's a problem. The negate guy. The real N-word.
I think it's crazy that you had no one to look for what you want as a career. People don't really get paid for this.
True. You guys have a thousand examples of people getting paid.
Exactly. Like there was a trajectory.
Like what did you think your career would be? We perform for free. We probably shouldn't get into this too much. But at UCB, I perform for free for my entire career. From 2003 to 2009, I never got paid for a show. And then at the beginning, this is why I think it happens. At the beginning, nobody's coming to my shows. Literally nobody.
Sure.
But I'm still able to get up and do 30 minutes of improv. So they're not making money at all. They're losing money off me. And slowly, as I got better and better, and the shows got better. The word got out. The word got out. Word got out. People started being like, oh, you should come see this guy or our group or Hot Sauce or Shitty Jobs or someone.
And then now we're selling out every show, but still not getting paid. But in my head, it's probably, I mean, I don't even know how much this, so when you go to a comedy seller, how much do you guys get paid? We shouldn't.
Yeah, that's what it would cut that out.
Oh, really? Beep it.
Yeah.
Why, you think that's bad?
It's weird. I feel like they look bad, yeah.
Okay, okay.
Yeah, it's like a week.
Per set. Yeah. And then you guys will try to fit in a bunch of different sets. Yeah.
But I think the deal in our head at this point is like we're trying shit.
100%.
You still care, but. Still hurts.
Yeah, it still feels bad, but it's like, you know, did I get a new bit? We were honing a joke, joke, joke, joke set for like a week for this roast.
Yeah.
And we were really like, you have to really be hard on each other because we'd never worked together on a set.
Right.
Really? So we're like, yeah, we've never gone up together. So we're like, we'll just like that.
Wait, what was that like thing? Because you guys both have specials. You guys both have your own thing.
Is it weird? This is you guys. Completely new and different. But we've worked together for 15 years on jokes. But this is the first time we went up together and told them. So you have to be like, that one's not hitting. Or you got two killers. I got two weak ones. We got to swip and swap.
Do you ever share a joke? Someone sets it up and they'll run punches? Or no, it's always I do my bit, then you do your bit. I do my bit, you do your bit. We tag each other, but we didn't.
We didn't want to get too Sklar brother-y. We wanted to keep it stand-up-y kind of. Not that they're not stand-ups, but you know what I'm saying. We didn't want to finish each other.
Love the Sklar brothers. Also, huge Knicks fans or huge basketball fans. Huge sports fans. Did you like... Would you want to do it again? Or no, you hate it?
Well, the show was such a... I feel like we came prepared. The show was a little... Unorganized. Right. So that's the risk you take. Right, right, right. I think we could do it again if we were. If we wanted to. If we wanted to. Yeah. Do we secretly hate each other? Yeah, it's rough. You've barely looked each other in the eyes. That's my, I can't look people in the eyes. Really?
That's not him, yeah. Why not? That's too intimate. He's gotten better, though.
I'm doing it with you right now. Try it. Try looking me in the eyes. I'll kiss you. No, you won't. Talk to me for two seconds. Just saying. Kiss him. All right. What does it feel?
It just feels like... What are we going to hug? We're talking to each other. Well, I'm listening. If I look in the eye, I'll listen less. When you do stand-up, where do you look? Right over the head. Never look at anybody in the eye. Well, that's different because I think when you look at the audience, they'll go, ha-ha. Yeah, I agree. I agree with that. I don't want to force a laugh.
I hate when I see the audience. I love when it's totally dark.
Same.
I love when I hear the, for me, if it's like a big show, you know, I come out, after all these shows, I've probably done 2,000 shows by now, but it's like after all these shows, like I'm not nervous anymore unless it's like a big one, like unless a biggie is coming up. But I'm always, whenever I get my first laugh, I'm fine. I'm so comfortable.
I just, just to know like, oh, okay, we're all, we're here, we're going to have fun. And I feel like a part of what I do, I remember Jim Carrey used to say this also, is trying to make the audience feel comfortable. Yeah. So it was like at the beginning when I come out there, because for improv, they're like, they're going to make it all up on the spot. It could bomb.
Oh my God, I'm nervous for these guys. I come out, I talk to the audience for five minutes, just talk to them. And then I invite the people I bring on my show, which is three people who I change up per show. And then we all talk to the audience. And then I do the interview. And now everybody's fucking calm. The audience knows what's going to happen. They're relaxed. We're relaxed.
And then we do the show. And it always helps. Is there a version of that for you guys? Or you have to go out blasting with like a great joke?
i go out blasting i want to get them right away because i don't feel like they trust that i'm funny right to prove it right but they know what stand-up is sometimes people at our shows don't know what improv is so that's true they're like what's gonna happen so we kind of explain it i get that there's less of a trust thing with you guys yeah or just from the audience just being like what's gonna happen just a little bit nervous and now they're learning more people always go stand up i don't know how you do it it's so brave and it takes balls this to me is way ballsier because you have no net
We have nothing. We have, at least if it's written, and it still could bomb, but you know what you're going to say when you go out there.
You got to go out blank. It's scary. I think, so for me, when I started doing stand-up, I was way more nervous for stand-up than I was for improv. Really? Way more, because you have to work. And then you're saying, this is what I found funny. I find this so funny that I've been working on it for weeks. And now I'm going to show it to you. Let's see what you think.
For me, it's like I listen to something. Now on the spot and everybody in the audience knows on the spot, I'm going to try to make a beautiful scene that makes you laugh. But it's like we all know what's happening on the spot and we're trying to find it. You guys are like, I've been working on this. This is the funniest thing I can think of right now. I'm like, let's see what you think.
And if they say no, it almost feels like. But again, anytime I talk to a stand-up, it's the same thing. They're like, I'm not going to go on stage with nothing. That's crazy. By the way, you're looking so much more. This is amazing. Do you feel yourself doing it? It's all nose. You're looking at my nose. You can't look at my eyes. No.
Even the greats have a low batting average, though. I mean, we were talking about the other. We'd throw jokes that we thought were hilarious to each other out, and it would get just nothing. Yeah. I had one that I was like, maybe that's a bit. And the line between truthful and too mean is so thin. Yeah. I had an article that wasn't working that he thought was funny.
It was about Luigi and about like, we were doing all these topical jokes. Oh, just recently then? Yeah, it was last week. Yeah. Remember that one? You were like, that's got to be in because it hit. And then the next show, they looked at me like I was the biggest asshole in the world where I said, you know, women, you know, you like all these bad boys.
It was like Luigi Mangione and the Menendez brothers. Like, you're like, these guys are hot. I'm like, maybe that's why you're so mad that they're taking away a woman's right to choose. You choose horribly. Oh, God.
That's funny.
And how'd it go? The first show it killed. And then the second show they were like, what? Are you guys the barometers for each other?
Well, a little, but you can never know as good as the audience. But no, I'm saying for you guys, who's the person you go to to be like, is this funny? Is it each other? We text each other sometimes. Not just is this funny, but like.
cooperative that's amazing not just is this funny but is this hack has this been done right does someone do this angle but like you know you're doing when you see a perfectly honed joke like there was trial and error it didn't just come out perfect that thought i mean because we're so numb we're so numb to what we didn't we don't realize how offensive some of the jokes we're telling are because we just don't we were like yeah you guys are your own audience yeah yeah yeah
But we were trying out jokes where they were like, like we had a couple of Stephen Hawking jokes where they're like, what the fuck is wrong with you guys? And we're like, oh my God, we thought that was just like a funny play on words. I don't know.
Oh, wow. Right. Sometimes you get so lost in the mechanics of the joke, like the wordplay or the punchline, they don't realize we're saying something about Lizzo being fat.
Yeah.
I used to have a joke where I go, you know, kids back in the day, they yelled shotgun. Now they're in a classroom. And to me, I'm just like, shotgun, shotgun. There you go. That's a joke. The audience is like, Jesus, you're talking about dead kids. And I'm like, oh, yeah. I was just working on the shotgun thing. Right. So you're like, then you adjust. Nah, I kept it. But my crowd liked it.
No, you have to tweak though. I mean, that's the thing.
It's like you do figure it. That's why we still do the cellar because like some comics get spoiled with their crowd and then they. Yeah, I agree. It's like, no, you want to make sure you're still just funny to the masses.
Yes. Although when you go tour, people are seeing you for you guys. Yeah. So you can do your style whenever. That's why it's interesting when you did that roast. That's not your audience. No. People there may like you guys, but they're not there just to see you. That probably is more nerve-wracking.
It was, yeah. That's why we prepared the shit out of it. Yeah, that's awesome.
I mean, we were on a flight. That was great, just being on a flight. I mean, the people next to us must have thought we were the worst human beings. Terrible mean jokes. Literally, Jeff Ross is revealing he has cancer on this thing. He's okay. In real life? Yeah. What type of cancer does he have? Colon. Really?
But we're bouncing cancer jokes off each other because he wanted us to roast him for the cancer. Really? Yeah, he was moved by the fact that we could roast him. Is he in remission?
yeah he's he's they're cutting the last chemo sure so he's okay yeah i mean there were so many cancer miss jokes too oh yeah oh really yeah yeah we're just but yeah i mean uh we're just like what does jeff look like a lump yeah right then you're like you look like a lump and like a lump women are terrified to find you in their shower joke you know so we're just bouncing bits like that imagine hearing that in first class
Yeah, it's great. What the fuck? I love that you guys flew first class. Well, they're flying us. Netflix. I flew back coach, by the way. What the hell? Why? Because I needed that time slot. That's all they had. Yeah. I'd rather a red eye and just pass out. Did you get any sleep? Yeah.
Oh, you look good.
Look at me. It's the best I felt in weeks.
You look awake. You're ready to go.
You look like hell. This guy's sick now. Everybody. I'm the only one that's sick. You're doing great. Thanks. Yeah, I feel good. But back to the movie, goddammit. Yeah.
Sure. Jim Carrey.
Jim Carrey's in it is that not crazy classic insanely crazy he's so good in it too I don't know if you've seen him but he like he like feels like you know those movies in the 90s obviously you do like where he just crushes she is crushing in these movies he's so funny and playing like a big character and then in this one he plays uh himself which is Ivar Robotnik then he plays his grandfather
Oh, wow. So he's playing two characters who play with each other. So he would do scenes where he would do one side and someone else would be the other guy. And then he'd have to respond to what he did the day before as the other character. Wow. So he had scenes where it was just him two. And would he watch the scene? So he'd kind of nail it?
You'd pick which ones, which takes that I think he wanted. I'm never on set. I'm in a booth the whole time. Sure, sure. Is that weird that you're just not, he's in this movie. So I only get to see him for like press.
uh well at least you get to see them it's amazing keanu reeves is in this one too so we did dude yeah we did press and the line was uh idris elba's in it keanu reeves is in it jim carrey's in it james marzen is in it and i'm just looking down the line and it's like fucking oceans 11 it's like crazy that's like all these huge actors in a video game movie sonic the hedgehog yeah that's crazy all these pictures are fucking bananas that's incredible you made it
It's crazy. And do you have any cool Jim Carrey stories? Or Keanu? Keanu, so Keanu, the thing is, like, I shook Keanu's hand beforehand, and he seemed really nice, and then we were doing this, the UK red carpet, and we closed down Leicester Square. Would you guys ever been to London? It's like...
huge deal it's like our time square kind of and so they close it down there's an enormous thing i've only said hello to keanu and said hey man i'm a big fan sugar saying he was very nice and then they come to me they go hey you're gonna go live on television with keanu in 20 seconds and then they go i go what and they bring me to the end and uh there's a woman from itv a local news station there a big one and she has a microphone and she's like nice to meet you and i go and keanu looks at me and then i was like i
I guess we're, this is like how I meet you and let's go. And they're like, all right, three, two, one. And they do the interview. And I kind of started playing in the interview and being like doing a little bit of bits. And he immediately jumped on and loved it. And the whole press tour, when we did interviews together, we would do bits and it would, and he was, he was, he just couldn't wait.
Of course. He's like, he was the best. We had the best time.
Look at that. That's a photo.
I know. It's crazy. I do. I did. It's amazing.
Well, I'm just glad he's still working because Mike Myers is kind of done and Eddie Murphy's kind of done. It's just good to see.
Dude, he's so funny in this thing. Eddie Murphy was in a movie like four months ago. Yeah, he came out with three movies. Oh, really? He's been in three movies in like three months. And a new Beverly Hills Cop. Yeah. All right. Well, shit, I missed it. That's true. But that's the London premiere.
Yeah, Jim Carrey, other than this, he hasn't done... I think this is the only movies he's done since...
covid maybe wow could be because our movie came out during covid i think he's semi he said he's semi-retired he takes power breaks yeah yeah but she's like i i just if something amazing happens and i want to jump in i'll jump in but like outside of that it's like i think he's pretty content and a pretty he's a very um spiritual guy he's pretty remarkable yeah he's a painter now he paints he does every he's he's amazing
Yeah. I mean, what kind of stuff, when you guys talk, what kind of stuff do you talk about?
We'll talk about it. He's very macro, very big universe type thing. You guys have no Shanley at all? Are you friends with Shanley at all? Love Shanley. We never met him. So I was very close to him. He was one of my guys. Wait, you knew him? I played in his basketball league every week for six years. Larry Sanders is like my... Larry Sanders, I think, is the best. Gotta get him on the wall.
Why is he not on the wall? There he is. Oh, there he is. Good. He's the best. Oh, and he was so close to Bob. So the fact that they're next to each other makes me so happy. He's probably really close to Norm too. But he was very spiritual also. So it's like that type of feel where he was like a Buddhist kind of. Yes. He would talk about spiritual stuff all the time. He was enlightened. Yes.
Jim has that. I think he was... He was the most famous person in the world, Jim, for so long, I think. Sure, I believe it. That I wonder. We could never relate to what it feels like to be him. Because even when we go to dinner or something, when he walks in, when we're with a famous comedian, some people look and they're excited. But he is. There's nobody that doesn't know who he is. Yeah.
So he can't. have a genuine normal experience, I bet. I don't know, I'm not asking, but it's like, when he walks, I remember when I was a page at Letterman, and Letterman's security guard would be like, Letterman can't even go get a pack of cigarettes. He can't, and like, he wants to, but he can't, and that drives him crazy or whatever. So for a gym, I wonder if it's like, He's amazing.
He says hello to everybody. He's incredible. You guys would love him.
It is crazy. I remember I was doing an interview thing at the Big 3 tournament when that started, the NBA thing. Oh, yeah. Who'd you interview? Ice Cube? Everyone, yeah. That's so exciting. And everyone was like, oh, cool, that guy. Oh, Kenyon Martin. This guy was a good player. Great. He's a good player, right? New Jersey Mets.
But then Allen Iverson walked in, and it was like that, where everyone was like... Yeah, dude. Oh, really? It was that type of energy. Yeah. AI is definitely a league above. I mean, he's a superstar. You get a little starstruck because it's Alan Iverson.
Of course. I feel like also before you meet somebody that we've known in movies or TV or stand-up for a long time, before you meet them, they're the person you've seen. They're not a real person yet. They're like this fictional character. And then when they start talking like normal humans, like, oh, I can bond with you about real shit.
Right.
And then they become human beings and stuff like that.
yeah does that make sense yeah of course who who was a good hooper in the shanley league um in that who is it there's a bunch they by the way it was a thing where we were always supposed to he liked to keep it private nobody talked about it and nobody talked about it and then when he passed away like a big article about it came out and like a couple magazines and i was like oh the whole point was like to not whatever but like stand-ups that played there that were amazing uh kevin nealon and dude kevin nealon i think is one of the funniest people in the world yeah
Whoa, we were just talking about that.
And Adam McKay played in that too. And he's also one of the funniest people in the world. But Nealon would do these bits where he would be like, he's just so committed. He commits so hard to bits. He would be near, he was standing near a tree. And he goes, Ben, did I ever show you my Coach Giraffe character? And I go, Coach Giraffe? I go, no, let me see it, Kevin. And he literally did this.
So imagine, you know, he's six foot three, probably a four, something like that. He goes, I need you to get up there. I need you to play three, two defense. You know, make two, three difference. I need two guards up top, three in the bottom. And then he slowly eats a leaf. Just eats a leaf and never, and commits like a real monologue from a coach.
Wow.
But slowly eats leaves throughout the whole thing. Wow. And it was, he's so good. Funny. That's great. And his delivery is so dry that it's like so good.
Yeah. Can we pull up? I know this could be a tough find, but Larry, I mean, sorry. Gary? Gary. I'm thinking Larry Sanders. Gary on the green room going at it with Bo Burnham. It's pretty funny. With Bo Burnham? They kind of got into it a little bit.
They're kind of getting a little squabble, but they're both funny, and it's good.
Yeah. I mean, it's going to take some whittling down because that's a long clip.
Yeah, this looks like it's just Bo.
I think it's right out of the gate. This show is amazing, by the way.
It was a good show.
It was a tough crowd.
He shouldn't be able to talk before him. Wow, there's a lineup. Fair point.
He's like 22 here. God, he's so young in this.
I wonder for all of you.
Here we go. Who are you? So that gets a fun laugh. Young guy with this. He's locking and loading.
No, that's him respecting the joke. Absolutely, that's him respecting the joke.
Hold on.
It's so good.
See? It's so good because it's so mutual.
The delivery was so perfect. I mean, that was like Jedi shit.
He's amazing. He would work on stuff for a bit also, like Gary Fee. I don't know if we needed that part. I don't know if we needed the gun. But that's amazing. That's them playing with each other. Yeah, I love that scene. The whole episode's great. So funny. Larry Sanders, I think, is the best comedy ever made. I watch it so much. It's perfect. Any episode that starts with Hank. Oh, my God.
I know. Hank Kingsley is fun. There's this scene where they do where he's asking... He's trying to get him to ask for... He's trying to either ask to be invited for a party and Hank comes in the room pretending like he has boxing tickets for the same night or like he's trying to offer boxing tickets. I wonder if we can find it.
There's also one where he like and he goes in his pocket and he's like, so Larry Sanders calls him out on it being like, let me see the tickets. Let's go. And he goes, huh? Because let me see the tickets. I'd love to go there. And he's like, I'm butchering this, by the way. If you find it, it's unbelievable. All right. I'm sure we've seen the scene. I'm sure you have. But it's them at the office.
Anyway. but he goes in his pockets and he only has pills and he's like cast embarrassing like, I don't have the tickets.
I just watched one where he has this long scene with Gloria Steinem and it's so painful.
Hank Kingsley does?
Yeah. And there's this long talk and he's just like, I just want you to know I'm a feminist. I think women can do anything men can do. He goes, men, you know, we're a little bit stronger. You know, has to throw that in. And she's just in hell for like that whole minute. And then she walks away and he turns to his receptionist and goes, she's got a great ass.
It's just perfect. Apatow wrote on that show. There are so many great writers on that show. Oh, yeah. Everybody, like young Piven, young Duchovny. Sarah was on that show. Sarah did that show. Todd Berry the other day.
I'm like, this is amazing.
I just saw Todd Berry in L.A. L.A. setting of Todd Berry is very rare. That's gross. Very rare. This is it. This is exactly it. Wow. All right, Peters. I can't believe you found it. This is the exact scene.
I hope you're sitting down. Oh, Denise, I am sitting down. Well, then, don't get up, because I have here... So good. ...for tonight's holy thing to fight, and I would like to bring... That's great. Let me see him. Let me see him.
Come on, Hank.
Let me see. This is... Please invite him. Please invite me to your party.
There are no tickets.
Hank, I was just going to invite you when you came in.
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You got that right. Thank you. Can you just imagine? This is some sappy shit, but Seinfeld and Gary started basically around the same time. They kind of came up together. Did they?
Yeah, Carson. Carson, yeah.
Very paralleled careers stand-up wise, and they really fell in love with each other and became fast friends. They both get a sitcom. This is in the same lot, Seinfeld and Larry Sanders show. Is that true? I didn't know that. And so they got to do the shows together, and then both win Emmys together. I mean, it's pretty wild. That's crazy.
Yeah, they were tight. That's amazing. I know he did – so, Shanley did these things on the DVD. You get this black box set of it where he did these incredible interviews with people from the show. But they were like slow, patient interviews. And he wanted them – if they felt uncomfortable, that's what they were. He just let them be what they were and he let them play for a long time. Mm-hmm.
And they're amazing. Some of the coolest interviews ever. Because he's interviewing comics. He's interviewing actresses like Sharon Stone and all these people that did the show. They dated for a while, too. Did they? Yeah. And then I think he did it with Seinfeld. I think he did it with Seinfeld. Yeah, right? I've seen that. Or was that maybe that was Seinfeld's coffee? No, no, no.
It was way before that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then he did one with Seinfeld. But those are the coolest, especially if you like comedy, the coolest. He did one with Tom Petty. He was boxing with Alec Baldwin. The Alec Baldwin one? Yeah, Baldwin's like kind of trying to elf him. But he kept it in because he's like, he always talked, I remember when he did...
He would always talk about keeping everything in. He's like, yeah, but like even instead of adding it down, what if we just kept, let the whole thing breathe. Let people understand how we got there. Let it be uncomfortable for a bit. When he went near the end, I remember he always was pitching that. Like he was talking about how people would edit stuff down.
Like even when he was doing interviews or like a thing, he was like, how fun if you just kept that whole thing in and see what it felt like. That's what podcasts are.
Yeah, I was going to say, before podcasts, seeing that kind of stuff was so rare. I remember on the bench there in the park, and Seinfeld's like, don't you hate when everybody says comedians are depressed? Like, people driving bread trucks aren't depressed. Come on, get the hell out of here. And he goes, I'm sensing rage. Fucking broke up. It was great. It's great. He's the king.
He's the best delivery. He's the best guy ever. I miss him so much. Another nerdy comedy nugget. Have you seen the Ricky Gervais interview with him? Yes.
Oh, it's so good. And Ricky went to his house before he was supposed to. Yes.
Like, in real life, he went to his house. He's annoyed. Yes, he should be. Yeah, and he kind of calls him out. It's all on tape.
Yeah. It's great. It's nothing that isn't out there, but I think they were supposed to interview each other for each other's things. Yes, yes. And Ricky kind of set up and, like, did everything, and, like, he didn't have his contacts in yet. You know what I mean?
Like, it was like... Pull that up if you can.
It was like... Pretty cringe. It is. It was... It wasn't... I don't think it was handled the best way. And Gervais does that big high-pitched laugh, and he goes...
Are you really mad? Are you actually mad? And he's like, yeah, yeah, I'm mad. Ah, it's great. You got to find the, yeah, that's in his house. There it is. It's part one because it's right in the beginning. So you can skip all the makeup bullshit. And if you get right to the, what he gets in the house.
We should have gifted you YouTube premium. Why did we give you a freaking Theragun?
But didn't he say also that like the office couldn't exist unless Sanders came out? Oh, wow. I think that's what Ricky said.
Nice feather in your cap. That's what I think Ricky said. Yeah, you're probably right, because he just... No laugh track.
A lot of those kind of awkward, just let it play out scenes.
Right. Wow, he's so young and chubby. Yes, his kitchen. He's in the house. Such an L.A.
house. It's his living room. Is there like a British thing to wear the muscle to you when you don't have muscles? Because that was like a Simon Cowell thing, too. Oh, yeah. Going through his fridge.
That's crazy. Oh, here it is. He's already directing.
Is that you that was looking this way? No. Who was looking right here when I was walking in? When I was standing out there, didn't you see that I was walking in? No. Was that you?
No.
Hold on. Before I shake your hand and say... First you said, no, that wasn't me. No, I didn't see you. I swear I didn't see you.
He's like a lawyer.
That's true. But you said, is it you that looked out there? What I was doing was talking to my producer that was here. Right, because you were standing about here looking this way. Yeah. Well, that is the way it sounded, but it was me. Don't touch me. Did it look like me? It looks like me. And it smells like you. But it might have been me. I doubt that it's you. What are you doing?
It's my contact lenses. That's why I have these on. These are my prescriptions. Okay. Hi. Pleasure to see you. Gary Shandling. I've never met Ricky before. So this is actually... It's real uncomfortable.
Great, great.
And yet exciting because there will never be, as they say, this first moment again when I meet you the first time. Well, where do you want to do this interview then? I'll go long as long as the kitchen sink isn't so bad.
All right, all right, all right. We can keep going. But yeah, these are, these ringage, he does that one with Larry David. They're all great. Amazing. Sanders is the, Sanders. Shanley is the king.
The best. I miss him so much. Yeah.
He's so fun. I mean, what was your relationship like with him?
I mean, we would see each other every week for a long time. He had a basketball game. So like we went there. Sarah was the one who invited me over there for the first one. And I was really young. I just moved to L.A. and Sarah played my sister in a movie. And I play basketball. Back then I played basketball a lot, like multiple times a week. My favorite thing to do.
And then you get older and your knees hurt more, you know, becomes harder to do. And so we never talk business. We all just do whatever. When we're playing, everybody's really trying, really playing. And then afterwards, we'd all watch sports together. And that's when we'd do bits and everything. And the funniest people in the world are just in the room.
And then it becomes normal after a while because you're there every week. But he was the best. I could text him. I could talk to him about stuff. Have real conversations. We'd go on hikes and talk about real stuff. He's very... He just has a grasp on life and even looking at things. It's in such like a level that's so much more zoomed out than most other people.
So you just want to listen to him and stuff like that. Do you want to hear a sappy? Please, sap it up. Okay, so when he passed away, it was very sad. Very sad. He died? He did die. You didn't kill him, right? No, it wasn't me. All right, it wasn't you. Okay, so there was a funeral and there was this crazy funeral where everybody from Sanders was there. It was crazy.
And then afterwards, I ate with Wayne Fetterman and Sarah and we were talking about Gary. It was amazing. Wayne had known him forever. Sarah had known him forever. And then I went home. I know this is probably not the right audience for this, but I went home and I lived in like a small apartment and I had a guitar and I thought, I said, this is so stupid. I can't believe I'm going to do this.
I said, okay, Gary, if you're there, I know this is stupid. I can't believe I'm saying this. You're dead. I'm even thinking, I remember even saying, I was like, why would you fucking haunt me? You have so much people that you're closer than I am. But if you're here, Like do something or make me understand that you're here. And I sat down for like 30 seconds and obviously nothing happened.
And I started cracking up so loud being like, oh my God, if he was here, that's exactly what he would fucking do. That's so funny. And then my guitar made a noise on the other side of the fucking room. No. After I laughed and was like, of course, my guitar made a noise. Nobody was there. It was just me in the apartment. Crazy. That's beyond.
And I immediately called Sarah and was like, you'll never fucking, this is insane.
Wow. Isn't that crazy? Kooky. Very kooky.
Kooky. One more.
Dookie? Good album. Way off. Ah, shit. Well, last nugget on Shanley, and then I'll put it to bed. Please. Do you see the documentary about him? Yeah. Apatow made. It's great. It was great. Gorgeous.
My favorite. Every doc he's made on comedy lately has been Apatow. Yeah, Apatow is so good, too.
He is someone who loves comedy. The first half is always great.
But, so, he always does two-parters. But, okay. Funny people, four-parter. You can't get him on the podcast. What are you doing? Oh, we've had him many times.
He's a friend. There you go, friend.
But he...
what told his wife wanted to get married or his girl his girlfriend wanted to get married we got to get married we got to get married you know gary did yeah gary's girlfriend's like we have to get married you're like 48 linda was that it was that maybe maybe he won't so he's like i don't want to get married i'm scared she's like you got to marry me and he goes how about this i'll marry you when the house is finished being built and she was like done that that works and he's like all right and he kept adding wings to the house just to get out of the marriage he was like oh the pool's not
Not done. Oh, the garage is halfway. And then she'd be like, well, the garage is done. He's like, I added a guest room to the third floor. So he kept building, and then he died.
That's so funny. Yeah, his house was never done. There you go. He always talked about how much more work he had to do to his house.
What a great loophole.
That's so funny. That is crazy.
I love it. That's so funny. You love it. I'm a commitment phone. I caved because I can't afford to build more house. But ran out of things to build. Yeah.
But so, so cool. I love this is a love fest for Gary. What a cool thing. Because a lot of people probably listen to you probably don't even know about Larry Sanders. I know. I think a lot of them know.
We have a lot of comedy nerds. All right. Good, good, good. I mean, an incredible standup too. We haven't talked about a standup. He was so strong. If you haven't seen the Larry Sanders show, that's your rec for this week. You got that right. Great show. Amazing show.
He's got a joke, oh, I'm going to fuck this up. He goes, you know, I fucked Miss Georgia. And then the guy goes, really? He goes, well, former Miss Georgia. He goes, well, really? He goes, all right, it was George Foreman. Norm MacDonald, the king, the funniest guy ever, quotes that as like, I can see how every joke is constructed. I've been doing comedy so long.
He's like, I have no idea how he wrote that joke. Really? Yeah, he's just like, that joke is on another level of joke writing. Did you have Norm on this podcast?
No, we never did. This started after he passed, I think.
Oh, no, we got the news while we were rolling. Yeah. Really? That was tough. Did you get it on camera? Yeah. Wow, that must be so hard.
11.
Yeah, we just had Spade on, and we should have asked. Oh, yeah. We should have asked some more Norm stories. Colin Quinn. Oh, my God, dude.
Bam!
Are you good with dates?
I'm autistic. Are you for real? Well, no, I just remember that date. And my birthday is four days later, too. My birthday is September 15th. Hey, Virgo!
Come on. Virgo here too.
Whoa!
What are we doing here? This is great, isn't it? August 29th.
Amazing. We're really doing it. What's your favorite Norm joke?
I love the joke. I mean, I can't pick one, but one of my favorites is, He goes to the gay pride parade. I was going to say that. Oh, my God. Are you fucking kidding me? That joke is established.
Wait, I don't know it. This is great. Can you do it? Don't say what it's like. Just do it.
I'm going to fuck it up, but it's like he's at the gay pride parade. A mom had a sign that said, I'm proud of my gay son. Or I'm proud that my son is gay or something. And he's like, well, what are you proud of? It's not an accomplishment. You know, it's like if you're like, my son graduated from law school at Harvard. You're like, all right, that's proud of. That's worthy of being proud of.
Now you're just like, he loves cock. Yeah. Something like that. I can't do it like that.
Yeah, no, you're butchering it. But it's like.
Yeah, no, you're butchering it. I butchered it.
Yeah, no, you're butchering it. It's hilarious. I would have done better. It's his delivery is what makes it. Pull it up. Are we watching too many videos?
Sorry.
Do you guys watch a lot of videos usually? Not usually, but this is fun.
Oh, here it is. Wow.
Peter's is on fire. We can get rid of Salick. Salick is canned.
And I saw in it there were these old men and old ladies with these signs that said, we are proud of our gay son. That's an odd thing to be proud of, you know, because it's not an achievement, you know. It's not like something you work all your life to be gay or any of that. That's a great point. My kid, oh my God, we're proud of him, Johnny. He graduated from Harvard, you know.
Now he's articling over at a law firm. Oh yeah, he loves cock.
I mean, first of all, that observation is brilliant. Anyone would see I'm proud of my gay son and go, oh, that's nice. Mom's proud of her son. She's not homophobic. That's nice. He goes... Why are you proud of him? It's not an achievement.
I mean, that's a brilliant... You're kind of mocking the idea of parades. That's true. It's kind of taking down the idea of like, well, you were born this way. I mean, it's good to like, you know... I don't know. It's an observation I hadn't heard. I love that, and I loved... He's so funny.
He's also so amazing at, like, the joke is this, and he'll just make you go here for, like, five fucking minutes. Yeah, that too. And then come back and cry. Some of my favorite stuff that he did was, like, the joke is here. He could easily say the punchline in about 20 seconds or 10 seconds. Yeah. He will take a long walk around to get to that point, and then it makes it so much funnier.
Fun nugget, the moth story. You know, it's five minutes long. That's a one-liner. That's an incredible joke. It probably is like Masterpiece. But the moth joke is one line that Colin Quinn told him. He's like, hey, you ever heard that joke? Why'd the moth go to the therapist? He goes, well, what are you in here for? He goes, the light was on. That's the whole joke.
But he made it five minutes long because Conan said, oh, our guest didn't show. Can you stretch a little?
No.
So he took that joke and just stretched. That was on the fly. Is that true? That's true.
You could tell he was improvising that shit, too, because he was going in weird directions.
And that joke is amazing, too. The funniest people ever, but also knowing when to be the straight man, like a great host. But I was going to say the Norm joke from his last Letterman set. Oh! When he did the Germany versus the world.
Oh, incredible. That's also the set where he gave him a hug and told him how much he meant to him. That was an incredible moment. Yeah. That was an incredible moment. Letterman didn't give much back. If I can be so bold.
I think he's not good with emotions, man. You can't look people in the eyes. Yeah. What are you talking about? Mark wrote me a very long, I was shocked the message you wrote me yesterday.
Well, I get sappy on a plane. I get emotions on a plane.
But you won't say it to him. You'll email him. I'll text you. I even said the way that you gave your gift to your friend was the most, you didn't look at him and go, we got you something.
I'm bad with that.
Literally gave it to him. Why are we going to log? Matt, so we were right here. Me and my friend Emmy were right here. And he comes in and then has a bag, takes out his dog, I think, or something. No. And he goes, yeah, and this is for you. We got this for you. No, this is for you. We got it. Didn't look at him. And Matt's enjoying it. Doesn't look at him to see if he's enjoying it.
Matt understands what this relationship is. He gets it. He just nods. And I was like, and then we're like, oh, that's a cool gift. And Matt's like, yeah. Like, yeah, yeah. What's the alternative? I'm like...
Check it out, dude. You didn't even look at him. I'm sorry I didn't look at you for that. We appreciate you very much. Because it must have been awkward for you to give a gift. I'm not good at gifts. I'm good at getting gifts. I'm not good at giving the gifts. I'm bad. I hate receiving gifts, too. I mean, getting, like, picking them out for someone.
I love getting gifts for people or I'm good at getting gifts for people like who like specific things That I'm alright at but you're right giving and receiving. I'm not gonna getting compliments either I'm very I get awkward when someone says something nice. I feel like find a way to make it about them immediately I'm probably like oh good show. Oh, man. You were two weeks ago.
You owe me a long message I was shocked.
I mean it was a text
Let him get this out. This is good. It was a text this long, which was all how much he appreciated building this thing with me. And I was like, oh, wow. You're not like that. No, it was surprising. Do you think you're changing a little bit as you get older?
No, I just think it felt necessary. Maybe I'm changing.
I think you are. I think you're more comfortable with your feelings than you were. Guys, I have cancer.
What? Jesus. Well, you look like a lump. I don't know. It had to be said, and it felt like we left abruptly. We did a podcast, then he got into a car, I got into a car, I went to the airport. I love it. We're getting older.
We're all getting older.
It was too abrupt, so I felt like I needed a ta-da at the end.
A button on it. What are you uncomfortable with? This dog is unbelievable. Absolutely in the zone. I'm not good at getting compliments. I'm not receiving gifts I'm bad at because I'm afraid I'm not going to like it before I open it. I'm like, oh, boy.
Don't get me gifts. It just piles up. Unless I really need it. Right, right, right. A good hairline. I do. Yeah. Oh, thanks. I was trying to compliment you.
Thank you, brother. I appreciate it.
Yeah, there you go. You took that.
You guys have great hair, too. It's fun to see both of your hair. It's a bird's nest. No, it's great. That's what I do. I can't talk. They'll be like, oh, that's whatever.
That's flowy, black. Thick, thick black head of hair.
What's like a peeve for you? What bothers you? That just people do in general? Yeah. Any peeves. Any peeves at all about anything that bothers me?
I got one to buy you some time. Go, please. All right. How about this one? The guy who doesn't know the answer to something, he asks you, you don't know either, and then he gets mad. Oh, that's good. I like that. This happened to me today. What's the example? Well, the guy's like, when does this place open? Or he said something like that. Where does it close? And I go, oh, I don't know.
I try to give a little, oh, show. Because I don't want to be the guy who goes, I don't fucking know. Get out of here. So I go like, ah. I go, ah, I don't know. Four or five. I'm not really sure. And he goes, thanks a lot. And I'm like, well, you didn't know either, dick cheese. What the fuck?
I guess there's more industry stuff that makes me – like if people say like – they're like, oh, the Ben Schwartz of it all. There's sentences that I can't read anymore in emails. Like the Ben Schwartz of it all or like – What does that even mean? It means like let's say we're talking about Larry Sanders show. Like, yeah, we'll have a meeting about the Larry Sanders show of it all.
And I was like – Oh, I like that. There's just some sentences where I can't read them anymore. And oftentimes when we have a phone call, if it's a lot of people for business – I just want to get to what we're talking about. I was ready, you know what I mean? But there's so much time that is wasted just saying hello and catching up.
100%.
This was a recent peeve of mine that in the business type emails, thanks for understanding. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. We'll circle back soon. Circle back. Also, when I don't get a role, they said they went a different way. I'm so tired of hearing they went a different way, but not telling me why.
Yes. They love you, but they're going a different way.
You crushed it, but they're going a different way. They're an executive. They could give me something. I know. They're such a big fan.
There's a couple others. Let's table that.
Yes.
Put a pin in it. Unpack this.
These are true things that I can't do anymore. Pin, table it. You're seeing all the ones. Unpack is big. This is my biological father. This is a fucking. Let's unpack this. I agree. So those are the things I'm like for business wise. Sometimes I'm like, I can't do it anymore. I've been doing this for too long where it's like, please don't. I can't. Don't do that.
yeah i can't do that you ever heard that bill burr thing he says those those uh la meetings you got to do over the phone like a general or whatever yeah yeah he goes i throw my phone across the bed while i'm laying on the bed and i cover my eyes and i just wait till it's over so like unless they ask me a question i i'll answer it but if they don't i just wait and like that's amazing and then wait till it's over and i totally understand do you guys have top comics what's your favorite comic of all time
Come on. What are we doing? I'd be like Cosby's later work.
I mean, we praise David Tell no end on this.
Oh, yeah. My God. David Tell, when I was a kid on Comedy Central, was like the biggest thing. And he was a guy that played at the Cellar a lot, too. I don't know if he still does. Still there all the time. Every night. But he had a, what was his show on Comedy Central called? Insomniac. Yeah, dude, that for a kid that loved comedy, I was obsessed with that show. Me too.
And then I remember I went to the comedy cellar when I was finally old enough. And the first time I ever saw a standup show that was like me as a kid going to the cellar, Colin Quinn got fired from SNL that day. Whoa. And he brought the newspaper, I think, that said that he was getting fired. And it was like such a crazy burst. Crazy. Yeah.
I don't know if he got fired, but I'm assuming he was because I think he did a bit about it. That must have been the 90s, right? Or early 2000s? Must have been.
yeah but i remember that set and i was like there and he was right there with the newspaper and i was like oh my god i love this guy from snl and his stand-up and then that but david tell as a kid was one of the funniest things in the universe oh of course so cool 98 wow there you go damn so who were you 10 17 16 17 you're going to the cellar at 16 17 i guess so that's fucking awesome you're a new york kid
Yeah, I grew up in Riverdale. Oh. Riverdale, then went to Westchester, and then I was living in Manhattan when I was doing UCB after college. Hell yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Riverdale.
Yes. You're one of those fucking kids that lives up in Riverdale. That's your taxi driver.
Do you have any recs otherwise in Larry Sanders? Because sometimes we do recs on this show.
Oh, yeah. My favorite comedy shows of all time? Anything. Any movies. It could be anything. Drama. Oh, my God. Songs. Born. The Tyler Creator album is pretty amazing. Oh. The new one. The TV shows that usually I say are Larry Sanders. Simpsons I think is probably the most influential show for me. Love it. I think it taught me how to write. I write a lot of movies and TV shows for places.
So many killers in that writer's room.
Dude. Up and at them. Incredible. The goggles do nothing. Incredible. UK Office is a top five show for me, I think. Love it. Love it.
Have you met Gervais?
No. I've met him.
Have you guys met him?
He's met him before.
Yeah, we've DM'd a little. Okay. Yeah. How'd that go? Good, actually. It was very nice and complimentary of my dumb tweets. I love it. Also, I got a joke on the Globes. From him? I sent him.
Oh, I used to. I did some. I wrote for like the Oscars one year. Oh, really? Yeah. So I used to freelance jokes for Letterman's Monologue. Right. And I used to freelance jokes for SNL Weekend Update. So I was writing jokes a lot when I was younger. And so every now and then I get a job to do that for people.
Uh-huh.
Yeah. Who do you write for for the Globes? I wrote for the Oscars. I wrote for Hugh Jackman. I wrote his musical opening number. Wow. Do you remember that musical opening number? Pull it up. So it was Dan Harmon, Rob Schraub, and I writing it. Rob Schraub? Yeah, dude. He's fucking a genius.
Dan Harmon must have been fun to write.
It was when he was trying to cast Community. So Community- Wow. So we wrote this musical. It's going to be too long. But it won an Emmy. So I won an Emmy for writing for the Oscars. Man, he's a hunk, huh? He's great. And- The full callback is that I did a show. I do two shows in New York every year. And he came to one of my shows at the Beacon. Oh! Like I hadn't talked to him in years.
And then he came and watched one of the shows at the Beacon. It's like the best venue ever. Dude. I think I played almost every theater in New York now. Nice. And that's my favorite one. It's classic. Easily. Yeah. I did Radio City, which was fucking enormous. Oh, that's too big, I think. For improv, imagine four people doing improv on there. Yeah, that's crazy.
It went great, but I was like, I think we pushed it. I think we pushed it a bit.
Something's lost when you lose.
The beacon's huge, but it still feels kind of intimate. Beacon feels like you're talking to friends. Yeah. You don't need screens. You don't need any of that stuff. That's true. Anyway, it was the recession. So we did a recession musical opening number. You wrote this whole thing? Me, Dan Harmon, Rob Trout.
But Dan really did the, I got like, there's a bit that I wrote, which was probably coming up, which is he brings Anne Hathaway on stage. And I wrote that whole part of the song. Wow. And then I wrote a bunch of jokes for him to tell as like a monologue. Yeah. And my joke was going to be the opening of the Oscars. And it was lined up.
And then the writing team, I guess, that wasn't us three, nixed it and put something else there. But I was so excited that I was going to get jokes on too. Of course. But I started my career by writing jokes for Letterman. That's crazy.
Remember Frost Nixon? That was a cool movie.
That was good. That was good. I wrote this whole thing.
and i did it like ucb where he pulled her up from the crowd and he interacts like because the upright citizen brigade me and hot sauce would always like do like we would before we did a set we would start a heckle uh-huh and i would come out there and we would they would heckle me and then they would join me on stage and then we do an improv show yeah so it kind of starts where like he pulls her up on stage wow they kind of like make fun of whatever anyway how old are you here this is right i bet it was
2009?
2009. So I would be... Jesus, you got in the business early. I mean, well, I'm 43. Am I older than you guys? You look young, yeah. I'm 41. Thanks, guys. I'm doing press, so they make me look pretty. But 2009 would be 28? Yeah. Is that right?
That's pretty good to be at this level, writing on this, the 81st Oscars.
I moved to L.A., and I got a job to write for his part of the Oscars. And then I got very lucky when I moved to L.A. A lot of things fell into place. I was in New York. I didn't want to leave New York. My family's here. I'm very close to my family. And I waited until literally the last second, and then I left New York. Were you happy you ended up leaving? Yeah, it changed my whole life.
You live in L.A. now. Yes, but also like I wasn't doing stand-up, so the options for me in terms of movement, like I wasn't going to be a writer on SNL. It didn't look like I wasn't going to be writing for Letterman at the time.
Did you want to be on SNL at the time?
Oh, my God. Everybody who does sketch or improv, it's my head.
How did you not get on SNL?
I didn't even get an audition. A shoo-in. I don't know if I'd be good because they do like characters and impressions. I don't know if I can do any impressions. Oh, okay. So I was like, I don't know like how, I mean, but writing, I didn't even get to really like give it a shot. Right.
So I was like, okay, if I want to act, I can go out there and there's an Upright Citizens Brigade out there so I can improvise and people who actually make decisions on TV shows can see me improvise. And then I had a lot of short films and that was the way I was going to show people like, so we just like, I got a job writing for Robot Chicken. That was my first writing job.
Hey, we just met Seth Green the other night. I heard that he was at the roast with Brecken. Brecken's the best. Yeah. So that's how I started. I started very much as a writer that did improv and slowly got into commercials and slowly got into all the other acting stuff.
Wow.
Yeah. Man, what a career. Because your resume is bananas.
Pull it up. You've been in so much stuff. I mean, yeah. What do you get recognized from the most? Is it Parks and Rec?
Yeah. Still Parks and Rec. Oh, sure. Parks and Rec is number one, I think. And now... Baby Shark's Big Show. Blizzard Wizard. Now it's... That's big money right there. Sonic is a big one, too. Of course. I got to do a scene with Animal and the Muppets. Whoa. Which by the way is so funny. I bet you guys would be the same way as that.
We just started going and you just know, I just know the rhythm how to make Animal funny because I've watched the Muppets my whole life. Sure. So I know exactly what to do to set him up. Yeah. So it's so easy. So it's like I know the cadence to make a Muppet funny because I know the Muppets so well as a kid.
Man, so many kids yelling, a lot of kids stuff.
It's a lot of voiceover.
I love voiceover. Wow, boy, if you can get into voiceover, you are set for life, baby. It doesn't pay very well. Oh, it doesn't? Yeah, voiceover does not pay very well. I just thought, I guess I go off the Simpsons guys. Those guys are- Oh my God, no.
I mean, usually all these jobs that you're looking at are probably SAG scale. What?
I took a lotto ticket to be Hank Azalea.
Oh, my God. And it doesn't exist anymore because now there's not even residuals. Exactly. So it's like even like in the beginning when I did DuckTales, we would get a bunch of residuals because they played over and over again in Disney. But now they give it a Disney Plus and you don't really get residuals.
God, they fuck you every way. And then that writer's strike I think had like an opposite effect.
I know.
Modern Family. Wow, that show is underrated, I feel like.
This is very weird to look at this. Sorry. Blue Iguana was with Sam Rockwell, and I just sold a movie with him. That's going to be fun. He's a beast. Dude, he's the best. Great actor. He's the fucking best. And I wrote a really fun movie for us that Yorma's going to direct.
You wrote the movie, Yorma the, what's his name?
Yorma from Lonely Island. Oh, yeah. He's going to direct it.
And so you, what kind of comedy is it? They haven't announced it yet.
They haven't announced what it is yet. Oh, yeah, I did the voice of BB-8 from Force Awakens. Wow, BB-8.
my man uh and then i think they i think jj just found a fucking app on his ipad and that was what he used oh wow it was me i did lines as bb8 and then they transformed them into beeps and boops and then um and you made it on the simpsons your dream that was it i had three goals when i first started one was to be because i was a page at letterman showing people the bathroom was so one was to be a guest on letterman i did it two weeks before he stopped okay simpsons to be voicing simpsons the third one was to host snl which i have not wow
That's coming, baby. Sonic 6.
I did a Letterman thing, but it was on Netflix, like one of those sit-down things, and it was- Wait, you did his interview show? Yeah, it was- That's enormous. Pull it up. It was stand-up. It wasn't like the one that Obama did. Kardashian. He did one for stand-up, so you do a stand-up segment, and then you'd sit down and talk with him, and it was like... I know exactly what you're talking about.
That's enormous.
There it is. That was a great moment.
Do you realize how insane this is?
It was insane. I mean, that was one of my lines. I was like, you went to... He goes, when do you think you'll know when you made it? And I'm like, I'm talking to you, dude. dude. I agree. And I said, I'm like, I'm like, well, where are you going to be in a couple of years? I said, you went from Obama to me. Are you going to be talking to a crackhead?
Oh, I love that. And he was like, if I'm talking to anyone, you know, but no, you know what this means though, by the way, this means that he had to have seen you do comedy. He was very cool. And think you're funny enough. Cause he would not have you on the show unless he personally thought you were funny.
He was so cool. I did a thing during COVID where I just filmed a special on rooftops in New York. Oh, that's great. So he was like, what's that called? It's called up on the roof. Great. But he, uh, Dude, this is crazy. He was crazy. He was crazy cool.
And it's funny talking to a guy from that era because he doesn't understand how we have to make comedy now because he came up in the 70s, 80s when you just wanted to get on TV. But he goes, for stand-up, we wanted a sitcom. And I was like, yeah, but they don't really do that often anymore. It's impossible.
It's not real. That's not real anymore.
because he didn't understand why I put a special out for free. I was like, well, because we make the bulk of our money touring. So he was, I think, just, you see why he's the best interviewer, because he's so cute.
He is the best. I was a page at that place. I watched him do it. I watched him my whole life. My parents would be lying down on their bed like this. I'm perpendicular to them. And we would all watch Letterman every single night. Wow. It was such a big deal in our house. And then when I was a page there, And I hustled my way to get that job. We didn't know anybody.
So it's like I got so lucky in getting that job. And when I was a pager, I saw him every night. And then when I started freelancing for the monologue, whenever he ended all of his monologues, he would point to Paul Schaefer and say, ladies and gentlemen, Paul Schaefer and the CBS Orchestra. And that's how you know no more jokes are going to be said.
And so me as a page, I'm there helping people in the audience. How cute. Oh, yeah. I just posted that yesterday because I did Colbert yesterday. Oh, cool. That's me as a page on the bottom. Wow. So 20 years ago. That's me 20 years ago. That's amazing. And so then anytime you'd point, you know, it's over, I know I didn't get a joke on.
So I started to say like, fuck, and you could hear it in the show. And I started to get yelled at by the audience person being like, Ben, you can't be on the floor anymore because you're cursing when you don't get your jokes on. And I was like, I'm so sorry. I had no idea you could hear that. That's amazing.
Man, you could host. You look right in that desk. I love Colbert. He's so smart, dude.
He's a very talented guy.
I love Colbert. I was in college. I was an intern at his show, The Colbert Report.
Oh, my God.
Yeah.
That's huge.
That was a pretty epic experience.
What does an intern do for The Colbert Report?
any run they need. I bet people were nice there though, no? Yeah, and he was incredible. I was there when he threw water in Richard Branson's face. Pull it up! Richard Branson pulled, and you could hear me saying, fuck, no. But you could see Richard Branson got mad during the interview, so he just takes water and throws it in his face. And Colbert, he got water back.
He waved over for his producer to bring water and he threw it back in his face. And I was like, this ain't a bit. This is weird.
Whoa. Branson didn't know he was joking, I guess?
No, I think he would fuck with people on that show. I mean, that was kind of what was incredible.
He was playing a character.
Yeah, I mean, he was kind of- Oh, I can't wait to see this. He was kind of messing with- I mean, it might not be online. Whoa, scrubbed. But he was- Oh, I guess he came on a late night show. No, it's not on his late night show. It's on Colbert Report. Well, at least he came back. They rekindled. Yeah. There you go. But it was a tense moment where I was like, that is bad. Damn.
Did it air, you think?
It aired. Yeah, I mean, you can't not air that. Right. Takes off his pants. Yeah, I think they scrubbed it. They scrubbed it. What the fuck?
It was weird.
That's a good moment.
So was he a dude, were you watching like Stranger with Candy and Colbert Report?
17?
Wow. I did it more than anybody else. That's crazy. Crazy. By the way, my goal as someone who's a page on Letterman, when they needed someone, he would have his people. Yes. I always wanted to be that person. And they weren't even the most famous people. Sometimes they were, but sometimes they weren't. Who was Letterman's people for that?
There's a stand-up that came over every Christmas, I forget, and he took a football and he hits a meatball off the top of the Christmas tree. I forget who the people were, but he had his people. Bill Murray, anytime he came on, was amazing. Howard Stern would come on and be incredible, and he would come on a bunch of times a year. Tom Hanks was amazing on that show.
But I always wanted to be like the whatever. And then for Corden, I slowly became a thing when people dropped and I lived in LA. They're like, hey, can you come here today and whatever? I'm like, great.
And were you ever on with someone where it just didn't vibe at all? Because they did the two guests, right?
Yeah, they do sometimes more than two guests. It never really, I've been on with so many people that they kind of use me as someone that could, let's say they have guests and like they need someone to like be a little bit funnier, you know, liven it up. I think that I've kind of helped with that. Comedic relief. I think a little bit or like to make people feel comfortable or whatever.
now we did cordon i think once each i did it twice twice i was i did stand-up i wasn't a guest and that's got to be terrifying no they were the most produced and because that lives on forever like and you're but can you use those on a special after or no yeah you probably could use them if you want i don't think i used all of them but i didn't either but i used some of them and uh you know he was one of the coolest in that he would be like this is not normal what this is but not everyone does this he'd
Yeah. It's not normal what's about to happen. This guy's doing standup at 5 p.m. Yeah, dude. For a studio crowd, give him everything. And like, dude, not everyone does that. That goes a long way for a young guy. I love Conan. I'm a huge Conan guy, but he would just be like, you're next guest.
Yeah. Dude, come on. Wait, so who, is there some show that you- Fallon does it too. Is there some show that you always wanted to get on that like- Conan. Conan was the one. We got on Conan a bunch. We did that a few times. Yeah, because Conan had the coolest music guests and the coolest stand-ups.
And he seemed fun. Letterman, to me, was cool, but he was like this older statesman where Conan felt like a guy I would hang out with.
My brother loved Conan so much that that kind of became...
our guy yeah yeah yeah yeah but i love letterman yeah i mean he's amazing i gotta ask though you did 17 cordons that's what i was let's see how many 13 could you do ferguson five times i bet wow i bet i've done every i did leno i've done ever i've been a guest on every talk show host that was dick cavett he was gone god i wish yeah me i went on tom snyder for three hours steve allen yeah me and steve allen really go back um
I kind of miss, I feel like. But I love late night. Like, I love late night.
I love the crowd. I love the. Showbiz of it all. That's not normal anymore, I feel like. Podcasting's great, but I miss, I turn it on so much harder when there's a crowd there, and I miss, I do miss that. Like, even doing a live podcast when there's a crowd. Oh, I bet it crushes.
I bet you guys go crazy. We're better. You guys are drawn to crowds. That's what you know. It's better. You want the laugh. You want the big laugh in the room. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I did one with Julia Roberts, which is really cool. Every now and then you're like sitting next to someone. That's banana. 13, 13 episodes. That's amazing though. What a TV. Yeah. It was, how was Julia Roberts? Amazing.
Amazing. You know, they take a picture of you like before you go on and you like, they take a picture of you and she like snuck into my picture and I kept it. I have it in my fricking, you know, like I have like a wall of like all these things. No, I never show anybody that.
Well, it's funny. We were just talking about this the other day. If we photobomb a photo, people will stab us. But if Julia Roberts does, it's like a huge win. I literally have kept it my whole life in the same place.
You have to be famous to pull that move. It was so cool. I can't believe I have it. Damn. How's she look in person? Gorgeous. I bet. Incredible. Hubba hubba. She's amazing. Hachi machi.
Hot. Is there anyone that you've wanted to meet that you haven't met yet?
Oh, like directors. I want to work with a lot of directors. Yeah. I'd love to work with Steven Spielberg. Oh. We were just talking about how we, what did we say? We was like maybe top three ever. Easily. It's got to be. Easily. It's got to be. I did a movie with Zemeckis who did Back to the Future. Back to the Future is my favorite movie of all time. Come on. Yeah. What are your favorite movies?
The Power of Love. Never heard of it. Is that from the movie? Yeah, Huey Lewis. Oh, okay. I think that's it. Is it just him? I think the news as well.
Okay. Yeah. What are your favorite movies? Well, we got to wrap this up, but yeah, throw something out there.
I'm a fucking annoying, I love film noir so much that like, I'll throw like 1940s movies at you. Oh my God. So like, Out of the Past. You're begging to go on Letterboxd. Well, I love... Those are like my two... Double Indemnity and Out of the Past. Oh, Double Indemnity is amazing. It's just the most perfect script ever. It's an incredible film.
But then like Guilty Ple... Like Back to School makes me laugh.
Sure.
Rodney Dangerfield is a great... Of course. I love... Fuck, man. There's so many... If Fargo's on TV, I'm always watching Fargo.
Yeah, any Coen is pretty great.
Yeah, what are you saying?
Well, I like Cool Hand Luke. I just love that movie. I love Groundhog Day. Oh, that's a perfect comedy. Deep.
Dumb and Dumber is awesome. Dumb and Dumber is a top five movie of all time for me. It's perfect.
I think it's a top five movie of all time.
It's great. Yeah, there's so many. Any badass throwback, if a Michael Mann movie's on TV too, it's impossible not to.
I find myself watching older movies now. I don't know if it's to connect with me being a kid, but I love watching older movies now more than I love watching newer. Give us a couple more. Stuff that I love? My top five is probably, I mean, listen. Ferris Bueller's up there, too. Ferris Bueller's amazing. Oh, yeah, I'm going on tour again. Back to the Future, probably Dumb and Dumber, Shawshank.
I'd put an animated movie in there, so probably Aladdin. Oh, great movie. Yeah, great movie. Robin Williams is amazing in that. And then there's a hundred other ones. Jurassic Park is probably there. Hell, yeah. There's some big is probably up there. Big. There's so many good. Gimme, gimme, go, go, bup. Sonic is out right now. I don't know when this comes out, but it's literally out this moment.
I just went to the first screening that the public could see. We just surprised people. It's great. I'm so happy with it.
And it's in theaters, which is nice. I love a theater movie.
Yes. Keep the theaters alive. It is in theaters. And the hope is that if enough people see it, we keep getting to make them. But this is like, imagine for like two years you're waiting for this movie or a year. And today is the day it was out. And we went to the first screening that fans went to today at 3 p.m. right before we came here. And we got surprised.
It was awesome. I saw Ghostbusters, the new one with Paul Rudd. Yeah. With Ronnie Chang in Lincoln Center. It was so fun. So cool. Yeah. So cool. Day of the, what is it? The release day. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The premiere. It's so fun to still go to the theater, man. So yeah, support this movie so they can keep making more. Check it out. Oh yeah, my tour. That's a P when people say support. Go see the movie.
Enjoy it. Enjoy the movie.
Support. He's not fucking homeless. He's crushing. He's in the theater.
Enjoy the movie. Have a great time. And then my tour starts in January in Milwaukee. Alone? It's Ben Schwartz and Friends, so it's me doing improv. Got it. So we'll do improv, but we're playing more casinos than we've ever played. Whoa, a casino. A bunch of them. We did a couple. Now we're like, well, I guess we'll just do a couple more.
But we're playing the Beacon again for New Yorkers in April. Hell yeah. And then we're going, I'm doing Sydney Opera House in May. Nice. Oh, that's legendary. That's a beauty. That'd be great. Yeah. There's like all these venues that I always want to play and that's the last ones.
It's one of the most beautiful, I mean, just on the water.
I know. It's crazy. And also, you guys know, when we, like I played Royal Albert Hall this year, you won't get paid a ton of money to do these venues because it's so expensive. Yes. Radio City Music Hall, 6,000 people. You don't get paid as, like it's, you don't get paid more. No.
But there's really no one you can complain to about it.
And also it's like, I don't even care. I know. I just want to say that I played, I want to be in that theater. I want to say that I was on the same stage as blank. Right. And it doesn't even matter. Like we have our other shows that we can make a little bit of money, but there are some that you're like, man, so Sydney Opera House was one of those and Royal Opera Hall, Radio City was one of those.
If you do two, you make some money. Yeah, I bet that's how it works. Oh, you're going all over. Yeah, you got to go all over. Oh, Vets is a great one. We sold out Sydney Opera House, so we did a state theater show right before it. Hell yeah. Wow. And then we're going to go to Melbourne. But this is great. You guys ever been to Paramount Theater in Seattle? Yes.
One of my favorite venues to perform comedy. It's nice. And Prince used to play there, or Prince has played there. I didn't know that. I like sometimes looking through and seeing what other people have played.
This is exciting. All right. Well, go. What's the website called?
It's rejectedjokes.com because when I started to freelance jokes for Letterman, I used to take all the ones that he rejected and I would perform them to zero people. And then I put those videos on the Internet and that's how I started. Whoa. That's smart. Crazy. And because there's a low bar already. And nobody's in the audience, so they all bomb. And then I just release them.
And that's like how I. Wow. I haven't updated this in a long time.
Anyway, that's right. You don't have to look at any of this anymore. Check it out, rejectedjokes.com, folks, for the tour dates.
Go see Ben on tour. Check out Sonic 3. Yes. And thanks for joining us. Thanks, guys. How fun. Drink Bodega Cat Whiskey, by the way. Is that yours? That's ours.
Bodegacatwhiskey.com. You have your own whiskey? Oh, yeah. We'll give you a bottle. How does that happen? Do you go to where they make it? It's a long story. It's a long process. We make it in a bathtub, and then we ship it out. God, how exciting. I can't believe you guys make the labels for this and everything.
Well, we had a lot of help. We don't know what the hell we're doing, but we're getting there. We're in all these comedy clubs now, and it's online.
It's building, for sure.
How cool is that? Very cool. Are you happy you're doing it?
Yeah. Oh, yeah. It's awesome. We're going to retire on this beauty. Where are you going to be?
We'll let him leave.
Oh, okay. I'll hear it.
Where are you going to be? I don't know. i'll hear it all right get it up what do you got what oh i got san antonio uh january 3rd and 4th i'm doing clubs to warm up for this tour san antonio 3rd and 4th i got uh liberty township ohio the following weekend pittsburgh improv the 23rd through 25th and then it's just all theaters charlotte richmond philly's so fun to play bethlehem
Austin is, ooh, dude, that Paramount Theater is really fun, too.
Tulsa, Austin, Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, Memphis. Memphis, we're moving slowly, guys. Come the fuck out. Knoxville.
Atlanta, great one. I play the Tabernacle. It's great. Birmingham. Durham's such a fun city. Yeah, I love it.
New Haven.
Hey, we're playing the same one. I'm playing that Vets, too, in Providence. It's a good room.
Oh, I'm pumped. Yeah, I heard it's great. Portsmouth, we added one there, so come check it out. Portland, Maine, Burlington.
Oh, do you like food? Are you a food person?
Fuck yeah. I'll give you Rex for a bunch of these cities. Please. Hell yeah. Montreal, Buffalo, and more and more, but that's Albany. Punchup.live slash samorell or just samorell.com. All these, so many. I'm moving to the West Coast, too, so you'll see if you don't. Are you touring now, too? In here, your city.
Yeah, my wife's eight months pregnant. Oh! I'm taking a break after January. Congrats. Thank you, sir. How cool. Not mine. Houston, Texas. All right. Phoenix, Dallas. And then I'm going to take a break. And then we're back in Nashville at the Ryman. Dude, that venue's the best. I'm excited. And then Asheville, I'm doing a make-up date because of that cunt Helene ruined the city.
So I'll be back in April. Look how sold out you are. Go up. Look how exciting this is.
Does it say sold out? All of them.
So many of them sold out.
So you don't have to think about this at all. No. We pump out the jokes. So come on by. We pump out the jokes. I don't know when this comes out. Oh, shit. All right. Well, yeah. Happy New Year. Happy Holidays.
Happy Hanukkah. Happy Hanukkah, everybody. Do it up. Have a great, we'll see you before the New Year, but thanks for listening, guys. Support, support. I'm going to say it again. I'm an idiot. Go see Ben's movie and go see him on the road. Thanks, guys.
Comedy.
I've had a little too much bourbon And Norman's talking shit about the fucking Pope And I get down in the same way Up on the roof like a cop's coming And naked Samuel is feeling dangerous I'm out to lunch here in New Orleans This woman doesn't look like I remember her And I get down in the same way