Ira Glass

[0] Hmm.

[1] Hear that pitter of rain on the roof, Monica?

[2] It's a nice gloomy day.

[3] Rain clouds.

[4] I just love that relaxing pitter patter.

[5] I'll close my eyes and see if it really sounds like rain.

[6] Dove.

[7] So calming.

[8] Trying to fall asleep if you're driving in your car.

[9] You know, this actually is bad for me because I don't like the rain.

[10] Well, I love it.

[11] Well, I don't like it.

[12] Well, welcome to armchair expert anyways.

[13] We're here on a very rainy, rainy Monday morning.

[14] It's so rainy.

[15] It's almost a storm.

[16] I'm your host.

[17] Well, it's very heavy raindrops falling on the ceiling, as you can hear on the roof.

[18] Very real raindrops be out here today.

[19] I am your host, Dan Shepard, and I'm joined by Latica Ladman.

[20] The ever beautiful and talented and smart, Alenica Ladman, And, of course, Wobby Wob's here in this rainy, rainy studio.

[21] Oh, he's opening an umbrella.

[22] Oh, Rob.

[23] Oh, my God.

[24] He took it way too far.

[25] Are you really superstitious?

[26] Yes, I don't like that.

[27] But won't the bad luck befall onto Wabiwap?

[28] You're not going to be the recipient of that, are you?

[29] Well, if bad stuff happens to Rob, that affects the whole show.

[30] I guess that's a point.

[31] But don't you think this will hit him on the way home?

[32] Like, you might wear into a ditch or something.

[33] happen you never know and look it's rainy outside so he might it might flood listen let's all calm down a little bit because you got a little hot under the collar over that and I think it was a really good sound effect wabiwob and inappropriate now anyway today we have a this is a really appropriate situation we've created that's true an environment because we have one of the great orators we have one of the great storytellers on today and there's nothing better on a rain Monday, then bundling up with a nice, beautiful story.

[34] Ira Glass is our guest today.

[35] You've probably listened to him millions of times.

[36] He's probably regaled you with stories for hours and hours on this American life, arguably the best thing in this space, this American life, wouldn't you agree?

[37] Yes.

[38] Also, I believe it was raining when we recorded this for real.

[39] In New York City.

[40] Yeah, because we were lugging all this gear around New York City, and it was raining, and I loved it.

[41] Yeah, and I didn't like a trauma.

[42] No, because you have seasonal mood disorder, which people probably know this about you by now.

[43] And it's self -diagnosed, which is most great disorders are.

[44] Yep.

[45] So, listen, we're huge fans of Ira, and we felt flattered that he made time for us.

[46] We even went to his studio, which was fun.

[47] It was a glorious day.

[48] And I don't really know what you included But I just want to add one thing Because it's probably not in there Because it dips so deeply into my interview with you But boy, Ira got on the case First he was being interviewed It's not in there Okay, he was being interviewed And he had a certain kind of engagement But then he turned the tables on Monica And started asking her about her personal life And then I saw the tiger leap out of the forest Sure He got a scent of blood And it was just thrilling to be there with him as he pulled the story from you.

[49] He got in his element.

[50] Yeah.

[51] Yeah, he did a good job.

[52] He's good at what he does.

[53] He should keep doing it.

[54] Without further ado, Ira Glass.

[55] Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and add free right now.

[56] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts.

[57] Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts.

[58] Ira Glass, first of all, this is rare for us.

[59] We're on a field trip.

[60] We've only done one other interview outside of our attic, and that was for the esteemed Ellen DeGeneres.

[61] Oh, wow.

[62] Just want you to recognize the...

[63] I feel honored.

[64] I heard her in your podcast.

[65] She was really good.

[66] Very honest, yeah.

[67] Yeah, I liked how you talked about her early career with her.

[68] In a way, I didn't know any of that stuff.

[69] and then she also was just like a lot of that interview was her saying like oh you don't know this about me and like they're filling you in right it was really like and I felt like oh but I didn't know that either yeah and then you know I don't know if you you have seen so she just did a stand -up special and we went and saw her kind of I guess workshopping it as stand -ups do before they do their show and a bunch of that was in there wow that was all new to me that's really interesting yeah like I loved hearing that on the show It's not surprising that she would be doing the special Because she's doing the special Like TIG Natara is her producer, right?

[70] Right, which is And TIG now like she goes for the pain Yeah Tig would be like the first person to realize She kind of started what appears to be a new paradigm Because that's also the Anna Oh, Hannah Gatsby Yeah, who I saw perform live And then I saw her Netflix special But I feel like she was like What she was doing was on her own She was inventing the same thing on another continent that people would...

[71] I feel like I wouldn't want to take credit away from her.

[72] I feel like she was coming to similar conclusions far away.

[73] Yeah, but a movement nonetheless, apparently in comedy, where, yeah, you're going to get some of the pathos with the jokes.

[74] Yeah, it's interesting because I work a lot with Mike Barbiglia, who that's been what...

[75] I've watched him go from being a person who told little stories to being a person who then tells, like, big stories with full feeling and emotion and stories, and stories arcs and pathos all true and i've watched him go through that too during this last seven or eight years i wonder what it is culturally that that is now in demand or desirable you know i don't i wonder if because most of the content we're receiving is so snippety whether it's instagram and twitter that we have this whole now like you wouldn't want to go see a stand -up view punchlines i just want to i just want to stop you on your premise i actually think like people say that but i actually think the truth is more interesting.

[76] I think it isn't that most content is like short attention span.

[77] I think there's a lot of short attention span comic, but then the biggest things in the culture are like binge -worthy series that we spend like 40 hours watching.

[78] And so like to say that people don't have an attention span, like people have a huge attention span.

[79] But now I'm going to counterpoint that.

[80] So yes, I've made the same observation.

[81] And that is in my opinion because drama does not lend itself to snippets.

[82] So if you watch what's happened with the vinging of TV shows in the golden era of drama on television.

[83] Which is now?

[84] It's just now.

[85] We're right in the cradle of it.

[86] It replaced a whole strata of movies that Hollywood made.

[87] There was all these $35 to $60 million dramas that were made.

[88] And they've completely disappeared.

[89] Right.

[90] Now, there were also a ton of...

[91] Broadcast news, terms of endearment, like that whole generation of...

[92] Yes.

[93] Yeah.

[94] And in fact, when I now go back and watch those, like I watch broadcast news not too long ago, I thought, oh, this would be a show now.

[95] And it would be great because we could do it for 12 hours or whatever.

[96] Yeah.

[97] So we know where those movies went.

[98] They went straight to Netflix.

[99] Now, the mystery is where did comedy go?

[100] Because there's far, far fewer comedies, theatrical comedies, and especially successful ones.

[101] And it didn't migrate to television.

[102] So you're not seeing a huge uptick in the viewership of, like, Kristen's show, any of these shows that are by today's standards successful comedies.

[103] Christian, you're referring to your Mr. My wife, Kristen Bell.

[104] I just wanted to see what happens up on the show.

[105] If I say, Kristen, who is this?

[106] Kristen, Bill.

[107] But it seems to have gone away.

[108] The huge audience for comedy, and my personal armchair theory is that it is, you can pick up Instagram, see a guy get hit in the head with a wheelbarrow, and you're like, you get filled up a little bit.

[109] You're like, oh, I got a good laugh.

[110] You know what I'm saying?

[111] That itch is being scratched.

[112] But drama, you need.

[113] need to settle in and be patient and to get really emotionally invested, I think you need some time.

[114] Essentially, you say it because I think of now as being like a huge age of comedy, just like all the people who came up with Jet Apatow after Freaks and Geeks, that whole like, that whole like click of people.

[115] And then from the comedian side, it just seems like there's this army of comedians who tell stories about them and tell stories about themselves and talk about themselves, including Mark Maren, including Barbiglia, who I've worked with, including like, you know, Tig, Nataro, including Louis C .K. when he was working, you know, just like, comedians seem to be doing it out there.

[116] It never occurred to me. There aren't that many comedies, like, as movies.

[117] That's what you mean.

[118] I'm saying eight years ago, in any given year, there were probably nine comedies that crossed $100 million.

[119] And this year, there wasn't a single one.

[120] Last year, there wasn't a, you know, I'm probably leaving out one or two.

[121] Like, girls trip.

[122] That was a huge hit.

[123] But just in general, yeah, they're just not doing what they used to do.

[124] But back to coming to your studio, starting this podcast, I expect to be able to talk to other actors, but there are a handful of people and you are so among them that I feel so flattered that somehow we've earned the right to sit and take up an hour and a half of your time.

[125] I'm putting you in the category with the one that really blew my mind is Sedaris.

[126] Yeah, I heard your thing with Sedaris.

[127] I loved your interview with Sedaris.

[128] Yeah, and you have such a history with Sedaris.

[129] But yet to have David Sedaris come up to our little attic in the middle of construction zone, I thought, I'm dreaming.

[130] There's no way this is happening.

[131] But Ira, you're that person.

[132] You're also one of those people for me. So I don't feel worthy of sitting and talking to you how much effort you've put into building this whole thing.

[133] And then I just kind of woke up on morning about, I'm going to do what Ira does.

[134] That's really funny.

[135] I feel like, oh, wait, we've gotten to the point where it happens in every episode of the podcast where you start to admit your own insecurities.

[136] Am I achieving what I, is this a part of the podcast where you ask the questions about like, but isn't, do you dream that there's something better that you should be doing?

[137] Do you compare yourself to people who are more famous and more successful?

[138] And what do you do with those feelings?

[139] I mean, basically, are you a human is the question.

[140] But you, I want to start at the beginning.

[141] You're from Baltimore.

[142] Yes.

[143] Yeah.

[144] And Baltimore, if I'm to believe the wire, rough town in the 70s and 80s.

[145] If you've seen the wire, you've seen exactly where I grow.

[146] That's right.

[147] I did work the projects selling drugs for long time and then got out.

[148] Yeah, no, I grew up in the suburbs.

[149] Okay.

[150] And so it was not super well -off suburban area where I grew up.

[151] Like we were near the big Jewish suburb in Baltimore, Pikesville, but we didn't have the money to live in Pikesville.

[152] Pikesville adjacent?

[153] Yeah, kind of.

[154] In Lockern, but nobody ever says Lockerun.

[155] You just say, like, what's between, like, Ricestown Road and Liberty Road.

[156] And, you know, like, went to like a normal, decent but not great public school.

[157] and just really wanted to get out of there.

[158] But it was nothing like The Wire.

[159] It was just like growing up in the suburbs.

[160] When I'm in the suburbs anywhere, it feels very familiar.

[161] Yeah, they're all kind of a cookie cutter, aren't they?

[162] Kind of, yeah.

[163] This was a particularly Jewish suburb, and I didn't understand that that was unusual.

[164] I share that with you because I'm from a community right next to West Bloomfield, Michigan, which is a super dense population of Jewish people.

[165] So I too assume that every suburb was...

[166] Yeah, my ex -wife was from exactly there.

[167] I know exactly that area.

[168] Yeah.

[169] We are told that it's the second highest concentration outside of Israel.

[170] I don't know if that's true, but that's certainly what we're told.

[171] Monica will fact check that.

[172] Of Jews?

[173] Uh -huh.

[174] West Bloomfield.

[175] Hmm.

[176] Look, you seem very suspicious.

[177] Concentration, you mean percentage?

[178] Yeah, per capita, yeah.

[179] You're not sheer numbers.

[180] That's got to be New York.

[181] Right.

[182] Sure numbers has got to be New York.

[183] Yeah, we think.

[184] Yeah, so it's a per capita density.

[185] Oh, I look forward to the fact checking.

[186] Yeah, we'll see.

[187] We had a few claims in my childhood.

[188] We also were the blackest city.

[189] in the country, Detroit.

[190] It was 92 % black when I was growing up, which was the highest.

[191] It's also the most Arab city in the country.

[192] Yes.

[193] Or something like that.

[194] Or Dearborn as, actually.

[195] Our brand is the most.

[196] The most, exactly.

[197] No, which is suspicious.

[198] You can't be the most everything.

[199] Come on.

[200] I just think it means that we're very compartmentalized in Detroit and it's surrounding.

[201] But your mother, so I think we both, I've never met your mother, nor have I even really heard you talk about her much, but I think we also share in common and very strong mothers.

[202] Is that accurate?

[203] Yes.

[204] Yeah.

[205] When I was in middle school, she became a psychologist.

[206] In the 60s, right?

[207] Well, middle school was 70s.

[208] Early 70s, yeah.

[209] And then she was a psychologist.

[210] She got her PhD.

[211] She became a researcher.

[212] She wrote a book about extramarital affairs.

[213] What researched did survey research with people about affairs, but then also would see couples.

[214] That was a specialty in her practice.

[215] And had a whole theory, actually, about something that was changing.

[216] I'm interested in this paradoxical way of living we've chosen.

[217] Monogamy.

[218] Of monogamy.

[219] Well, the thing of my mom discovered that was new at the time was she found through survey data that she did and then was seeing it in her own practice.

[220] Like the quickest way to summarize it is that people would have affairs who weren't unhappy in their marriage.

[221] Which if you think about it, of course that's true for some people.

[222] But she was finding it was a significant percentage of the men and a smaller percentage of the women.

[223] And what was going on in the 70s when she was doing this research was that more and more women were, in the workplace as equals to men.

[224] And so in our practice, people would come in and people would say, like, I'm happy in my marriage, but like you spend 10 hours a day with somebody at your office and you get closer and closer to them and then, you know, then stuff happens.

[225] And then without them having meant to when they began that process.

[226] And so that was part of what she was seeing.

[227] And it had like clinical application because what would happen when you went into a therapist back then is if you went in and said, like, well, I cheated on my partner, but I want to stay with my partner, the thing that the therapist would talk about is what's wrong with your marriage.

[228] And in like a third, I can't remember the exact numbers, but it's like a third of the cases with the men, nothing's wrong with the marriage.

[229] They're happy with marriage.

[230] Totally happy.

[231] And by trying to talk about what's your wife doing that's like annoying you, well, you can always find something.

[232] And like, and it was just sending people down the wrong path whereas the right path you were saying was the lying.

[233] Like basically, you know, you lied to your partner.

[234] It's completely traumatic for the person you were with.

[235] And that's the actual problem the couple has.

[236] If they want to get back together, that should be front and center for for these couples.

[237] The other thing she said was that she was very strong in this.

[238] She said the point at which you've cheated is not when you kiss for the first time.

[239] And she says there's a very specific moment in the cases she was seeing.

[240] And she's like, that's when you cross the line.

[241] And she could name it.

[242] And it's so usable as a thing that I've really carried it with me. And it's the moment when you confide in the other person about your partner.

[243] It's like as soon as you confide in one about the other, that person's your primary person.

[244] And so as soon as you're telling the person at work, well, my wife's kind of driving me crazy or whatever.

[245] At that point, you've crossed the line and you've broken your vow.

[246] And she said, then kissing is just like, that's just going to come.

[247] Sure.

[248] And actually, operationally, it's actually very concrete because you can just be like, if you feel yourself start to do that, you stop yourself if you want to stay with your partner.

[249] And it's like just a really good role of thumb.

[250] So is it safe to say that she did value fidelity and she thought monogamy?

[251] was something that was worth She did, yeah, but she was also treating people who wanted, she was treating people who wanted to stay together.

[252] Yeah, but I could see where you would, if you started really looking at all the mechanics of it and started understanding the psychology of it and everything, I could see it as happens when you look at things scientifically, you get kind of dispassionate about it or clinical about it.

[253] Like anthropologists, you go to enough cultures and they're practicing polygamy or whatever, polyandry, all these things, kind of you go oh it's a choice and it's cultural and so it's not a god ordained and it's not you know it starts to become a little more yeah uh i don't know are you saying this to say that you're you're against monogamy i'm not against monogamy i what i am interested in is can we be honest about the whole endeavor realize some things and then say to ourselves oh yeah the whole thing's counterintuitive and illogical yet it does work like i'm open to having a full conversation about the decision and then the answer might be oh no it makes no sense we're not supposed to live this way but counterintuitively the result ends up being great or healthy for you you know yeah yeah there's many things like i've come to recognize that a lot of things that are patently illogical still bear great fruit did you watch wild wild country i watched a couple of episodes of it and and was so blown away by how much those ladies still loved that guru.

[254] The Bhagwan.

[255] It's so, it's amazing.

[256] He had rhythm.

[257] Yeah.

[258] And to look at, oh, the craziest part of that, let me just tell you, because you probably don't know.

[259] Wait, are you bringing that up as an example of, like, a counter -examble to monogamy?

[260] Not of monogamy as much as if you break down what that guy's telling them and the things they're doing, I can't really defend any one of those, the premises.

[261] but if I look at the results of their life they're dancing around they're happy and they're joyous and all these things you know who am I to say I could get bogged down in his explanation of why they're feeling that way or I could just look at like what was their physical life what were their actions what day to day did they do maybe the results you know maybe the ends justify the means I feel like I feel lucky when it comes to this question because I feel like I understand that for some people this is a question about like is monogamy the way to be.

[262] But, like, personally, I don't feel comfortable if it's not monogamy.

[263] Like, literally, like, I just got divorced a while ago and just started dating.

[264] And the thought of, like, dating more than one person at the same time just gives me the willies.

[265] I feel like I would feel so, like, I don't know, like, protective of each person in that situation or just, like, scared of getting one of them mad at me for being with the other one.

[266] Like, any situation where there could be triangulation, like, I just couldn't be into.

[267] Like, I, even, like, I've never, like, I've never, even introduced to like i know that like people have three ways and i just can't imagine that seems like the most unpleasant for somebody who's like a people pleaser and just like worried about what other people are i can't imagine like why anybody would even want that it just doesn't seem fun well i wanted it very bad and i've had a couple in my day and what i found was when it's two ladies what inevitably happened for me is I just like one more than the other and then I feel bad to your point because I'm a co -dependent.

[268] I'm like, it's pretty obvious I like this one more, right?

[269] I'm like kissing more maybe with her.

[270] But then it's like it's sort of hurtful to the other one.

[271] Yeah, so now there's just someone I basically want to leave because it's making me feel bad that I've picked one.

[272] Unless you were maybe with identical twins, I don't know how you wouldn't favor one of the two people or at least in my experience I favored one.

[273] now a couple times i've been with a friend in one lady and that works great wow because i'm sorry i'm just like sort of pausing like i don't have i don't know any man who i'd want to like take off my clothes in front of and have a take off my clothes in front of and have sex with somebody else like i can't like i don't have any friend who's a good maybe you just you don't have a childhood best friend who i'm still friends with and i would take off my clothes in front of and have sex with some lady no If this interview goes perfectly for me, we'll take our clothes off at the end.

[274] He's also the most open human on planet Earth, so that's also part of it.

[275] No, no, no, no, no, I know.

[276] Yeah, that would be very uncomfortable for you.

[277] Yes, there's been no day of my life when I felt a kind of body confidence where I was just like ready to.

[278] I feel like, yeah, no, I was like a chubby kid and never really like totally got rid of the chubbiness and not and, you know, just meaning like it's not.

[279] That's not my path.

[280] I feel like if I can convince somebody to really super like me and the lights are a little bit low, I'm okay.

[281] You know?

[282] Sure.

[283] So would you be a little bit afraid in that scenario that you would be the unfavorable person?

[284] Like, is that part of the...

[285] Oh, good question.

[286] I wouldn't even get that far.

[287] That's even more sophisticated than what I would feel.

[288] But Ira, what if the friend...

[289] I would just feel bad from the start.

[290] Yeah, you'd just be uncomfortable.

[291] But Ira, what if the friend was objectively by today's standards in much sense?

[292] worse shape than you.

[293] That would mean going to feel a little better.

[294] Right?

[295] Yeah, no, that would be a little better.

[296] So in this hypothetical scenario, I'm the hot one.

[297] Yes, you're the hot one.

[298] Does that?

[299] I'm the Ashton Coucher.

[300] Yes, yeah, yes, you're the Ashton Coucher.

[301] And I'll tell you, so one of the elements is like, I think, I don't know if you're like me, but there's a healthy amount of performance anxiety in any sexual encounter.

[302] You're like, you really want to make sure you're pleasing the person.

[303] so that just cuts the workload in half right there.

[304] Oh, I never thought about that.

[305] And if it's a total disappointment to her, you're at least shouldering the blame.

[306] It's like it always helps to fail with a partner in my experience.

[307] It just seems more vulnerable because there's two witnesses to it.

[308] I don't know.

[309] The whole thing seems like, also it just seems like awkward.

[310] I don't know.

[311] Is it physically awkward?

[312] No. No. No, it's beautiful.

[313] It's like a ballet if it's executed.

[314] But was this, like, were you sober during these things?

[315] The first one was in high school with, I don't think he'd care my very best childhood friend, Aaron Weekly.

[316] Yeah, we found ourselves in a menagerie twas.

[317] No wonder you love him so much.

[318] All he does is to talk about Aaron.

[319] Yeah, exactly.

[320] He literally had sex with now we know.

[321] And I guess, too, I had a comfort level with all the other three gentlemen.

[322] in these scenarios but I was quite certain they had zero attraction to me so it's not like I had my guard up like oh is one going to get handsy with me right you know right I've hijacked your segment um listen I don't know like yeah but fidelity wise it's something that you value for sure it's not like I value it like fidelity I just find that like I am not I find like I'm not really built for juggling that those emotional like I don't want I don't want anything complicated I want things to be really simple.

[323] I feel like, I'm saying this out of principle.

[324] I don't think it's better.

[325] I just understand.

[326] You're not saying there's like a moral imperative.

[327] There's no moral imperative.

[328] It's like, no, I can't handle it.

[329] Logistically.

[330] Like, I just think it's not built for it.

[331] And it's good because it takes a lot of questions off the table.

[332] Yeah.

[333] It makes things simpler.

[334] Oh, it's way, in fact, I, my brother and I often talk about how excited we are for when the penis just completely stops working.

[335] I feel like that's just going to free up so much of my mental space, my free time.

[336] huh that's interesting I've interviewed people about that who are on the other side of that and they do say like yeah it does free up some time older older man there's one interview I did with a writer in particular but then in the middle of interviewing him about it he got a little aroused that's the funniest thing you could possibly say yeah it just made him hot and he ran out of the room and he suggested a minaja twang he got a surprise boner and then just left the interview I've got to use this while I've got it.

[337] I can't let this go to waste.

[338] Yeah, exactly.

[339] But when you were, how long are you married?

[340] I mean, we were together for like 20 years.

[341] We were married for a lot less than that.

[342] But over 20 years we were together.

[343] And you had to have been confronted with the thing that happens to anyone that ends up in the public eye where all of a sudden you have options that you're really not entitled to have.

[344] Like you're, you know, you can.

[345] But for me, it was simpler.

[346] Like, in a way, like knowing I have.

[347] a partner it was nice to just be like like that's fine this is off this off the table like I don't know like it wasn't I didn't there wasn't a high school kid in you that's going like wait the cheerleader likes me that's I mean my wife is really good looking yeah yeah I looked at pictures ever today I don't know it wasn't like I didn't have any leftover feelings like that like before she and I got together like I went out with a lot of people and so I felt like I was fine I was good I think that's part of the equation then yeah yeah like I didn't need to And it was a relief to not be in it.

[348] In a way, like, there's, like, a kind of innocent getting to know somebody when you know that nothing's ever going to happen.

[349] Like, it actually, like, opens you up to a kind of super safe talking to somebody who's, like, charming and attractive.

[350] Because when you've already decided, like, I'm just not interested.

[351] Right.

[352] Like, in a way, it was freeing.

[353] Well, it makes you the guy who can't get an erection, basically.

[354] You can just kind of.

[355] I don't know.

[356] I didn't see that.

[357] It fast forwards you to that state.

[358] Oh, to that state.

[359] to be an old man. You're just like an old man becoming friends with Agale.

[360] Yeah.

[361] Did you find it exhausting?

[362] I found it emotionally taxing to date because saying to somebody, you know what, I don't want to go the whole way with you.

[363] I like you, but I don't love you.

[364] All those conversations you have to have while dating.

[365] Yes.

[366] They're rough, right?

[367] Yeah.

[368] Yes.

[369] I'm not sure how much I can talk about this because I'm so like in the world of this.

[370] But yeah, like it's, it's a. it's confusing to know because it turns out there's a lot of people who I think it's possible to get close enough to that you want to sleep with and it's fun to hang around with and then it's really hard to evaluate so do you want to stay with them like it's just hard to know and honestly when when things were bad in my marriage and I did start to imagine like if I would be with somebody else what would I who would I be with like I had such a clear picture in my head of what it would be and no I haven't met anybody like that person at all.

[371] Like I just figured it would be like another reporter, like writer, up here, like my own age.

[372] And like having to my own age, but like, just like nobody like that, everybody's been so different.

[373] And then I've had to kind of like push away that picture and just be like, I don't know.

[374] Like I'm truthfully feel very like new to this.

[375] And I did not wish for it.

[376] Like I really was not unhappy with the idea.

[377] of being with somebody till we're dead.

[378] Like that seemed like a great...

[379] Yeah, till we're dead.

[380] Yeah.

[381] There is a parallel though because, and you shouldn't feel...

[382] I don't think anyone should feel guilty about it.

[383] It's like, think how many people are in your friendship circle, but you have a best friend or two.

[384] So like in that paradigm, like, yeah, there's tons of people you'd like to see once a week or once a month or twice, whatever that number is.

[385] But there's only a handful you'd like love to see seven days a week.

[386] And the same as for us.

[387] partner yeah yeah yeah so it's to be expected i would imagine yeah now having but but i have to say like dating dating people like i'm 59 like i'm really old first of all you you are so youthful i don't say that to flatter you when i looked you up today i was like wow that blows my mind iris 59 because i think of him as like being 40 right but that's because i'm very immature or something i think i have like a like I don't know.

[388] It was just a part of me. Yeah, I think actually is.

[389] But anyway.

[390] I know what it is.

[391] And it's something I want to talk to you about is how on earth do you keep your enthusiasm and curiosity alive for such a long period of time?

[392] But that was going to be a later question.

[393] But I think one of your crowning accomplishments as a human being is that you're still on fire to learn stories.

[394] And you don't seem to have gotten like, oh, I'm in a routine or a rut or I'm bored.

[395] like you've sustained your passion which I think is very hard it's hard for me personally no it's hard can I say though it's more of there's a little bit of illusion in it because like I do go through periods where I'm tired and it's hard to like find a story or think about a story or get excited about a story but fortunately like I'm working on a show with you know 10 other people and for all of us like we all go through like sort of periods where we're on fire and where we're not and unfortunately there's enough of us that as long as somebody's excited about something it creates the the illusion that the whole show is excited about something and so when i've had like a few months where things weren't so great for me personally and i you know just like fortunately like i work with other people who are so super talented that i could just coast on their incomplete skill and enthusiasm and and you know the world would never know and then the fact is like i really am interested in stuff like i get excited when we're doing stories.

[396] I get excited at thinking at how to make the stories really sparkle, and sparkle seems like a dumb word.

[397] No, I think that's a great description of what you guys are great at.

[398] And then I'm nosy.

[399] Like, I'm a nosy person.

[400] You know, and I, like, I, you know, and like the advantage of the format of show that we're in is it really does exist for our own amusement as a staff and anything that we're interested in we just run at and any idea that we can think to do.

[401] Like, it really, you know, we, we have a very strong sense of mission, but like, but really we also understand that, like, we are out for our own fun and like you know it's just it's not hard to get up energy for that because it's actually what we get to do is so interesting we get to talk to anybody who we want ever and you know I mean it's well you've built this incredible thing where when you guys call people generally you know no that is so not true that's not true oh my god no no no no especially with people like especially when we're doing oh I guess you're reporting when we're doing political stuff or like nobody you know like nobody, you know, we just did a whole show on immigration policy and we couldn't get anybody in the administration to talk to us.

[402] Really?

[403] Because they don't talk to any reporters, really.

[404] But they see no upside to talking to the press and they view public radio as being hostile to them, wrongly, I would think, but whatever.

[405] And no, it's very hard to get people on the political stuff.

[406] And then we spent eight months doing these shows about a little town in Alabama and, like, people didn't know who we were.

[407] Like, people didn't want to talk to us.

[408] Like, they're normal Americans.

[409] There's a reporter shows up.

[410] Like, why am I talking to you?

[411] Like, what's in it for me?

[412] Like, what would I talk to you?

[413] You know, if I call up a comedian, like, I can get the call answered.

[414] And like, the advantage of the show doing so well and being around for so long is if there's a writer who we want to try to talk into coming on the show or something like they'll know us and they'll come.

[415] Yeah, I guess I'm trapped in my own experience with the one time you reached out to me to potentially be a part of a story.

[416] I like, my eyes got as big as saucers.

[417] I was like, oh, the notion that I could be a part of this American life.

[418] But you're on TV.

[419] Like, what are you talking about?

[420] because I hold, you know, I worship and idolize certain things.

[421] And this American life is definitely one of them.

[422] Like, if I got to be on, here would be the pantheon for me. We'd have to go back in time for one of them.

[423] But to sit at that stupid round wooden table with Charlie Rose with that abyss black background and have him talk to me. Really?

[424] Oh, I've done it.

[425] You've done it.

[426] Yeah.

[427] I have to say, the best conversation I ever had with him was backstage at a thing we were doing at Bam.

[428] at your regular venue in New York, there.

[429] Sure, sure, sure.

[430] My clubhouse in Brooklyn.

[431] Yeah, the little clubhouse and the little 2000sate clubhouse that you call home.

[432] And we were backstage for like something that he was doing interviewing people.

[433] And I just asked him to describe his day to me back then.

[434] And it was fascinating because, you know, he would get up at like three or four in the morning, if I remember this right, and then he would read the newspapers and prep for his TV show.

[435] And then he would be on television from like 6 a .m. to 10 a .m. I don't remember the exact numbers.

[436] And then he would go and take like a one hour.

[437] nap and then he would prep for his second television show for his PBS show and then do that and then he would like go out yeah i've seen i saw him only one time in real life at the spotted pig in new york and it was valentine's day i was there with uh christin bell to make you happy oh yeah and then our friends ryan and amy and we were on basically a four -way valentine's date but old chuck rose was next to me with a younger lady now again this is pre any revelation about anything and yeah just killing a couple bottles of wine and I missed our entire and I admittedly to Chris and she was like said like well should we go or not and I'm like honey I haven't heard a word you're saying I am eavesdropping on Charlie Rose on this day desperate I'm just getting I'm just nervous we're going to mess up all the audio no no no get closer to the mic I'm sorry I'm sorry radio nerd I'm just like please work the mic a little closer you know what this is like is if Tiger Woods just helped her with her swing yeah What could be better?

[438] Yeah.

[439] I'm not afraid of advice from the best.

[440] The best and the biz.

[441] Yeah.

[442] Now, why not?

[443] Because we're on this road.

[444] So my other thing would be 60 minutes.

[445] Have you been a part of a 60 minute segment?

[446] No, I maybe shouldn't admit this on tape, but I've seen 60 minutes maybe three times.

[447] I'd tell you to get the fuck out of my attic, but I'm in your sound stage.

[448] Yeah, I've never, I haven't really seen it much.

[449] Oh my God.

[450] I love it.

[451] Yeah, I'm sure.

[452] I just don't watch much TV.

[453] You don't.

[454] No. But you seem to listen to a lot of.

[455] stuff.

[456] The fact that you've listened to our podcast really absolutely blows my mind, even though we have a personal friendship.

[457] Well, when you guys booked me, I thought I should like know what I'm doing.

[458] Smart.

[459] So you hadn't heard it prior to...

[460] Well, it wasn't before you booked me. It was like around the same time that you guys booked me. Like a month or two ago, like, I knew you guys...

[461] My agent reached out, Kristen Bell.

[462] Your agent, Kristen Bell.

[463] It's true, actually.

[464] Kristen email me. Yeah, I did wonder about that.

[465] I was like, poor Kristen, man. You have my email.

[466] I've never asked her to do this.

[467] This is one of her many benevolent traits she'll just go like, I'm going to ask Ira for you.

[468] I was wondering if she's booking the whole show.

[469] Well, she knows I hate asking people to do anything.

[470] It's hard to do.

[471] But anyway, so she emailed me that you guys were coming to New York for the podcast.

[472] I was like, wait, there's a podcast, and then I started to listen.

[473] And I have enjoyed it.

[474] I did more than a perfunctory number.

[475] I actually started to get into it.

[476] Stay tuned for more armchair expert if you dare.

[477] What's up, guys, it's your girl Kiki, and my podcast is back with a new season.

[478] And let me tell you, it's too good.

[479] And I'm diving into the brains of entertainment's best and brightest, okay?

[480] Every episode, I bring on a friend and have a real conversation.

[481] And I don't mean just friends.

[482] I mean the likes of Amy Polar, Kell Mitchell, Vivica Fox, the list goes on.

[483] So follow, watch, and listen to Baby.

[484] This is Kiki Palmer on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast.

[485] We've all been there, turning to the internet to sell.

[486] Self -diagnose our inexplicable pains, debilitating body aches, sudden fevers, and strange rashes.

[487] Though our minds tend to spiral to worst -case scenarios, it's usually nothing, but for an unlucky few, these unsuspecting symptoms can start the clock ticking on a terrifying medical mystery.

[488] Like the unexplainable death of a retired firefighter, whose body was found at home by his son, except it looked like he had been cremated.

[489] Or the time when an entire town started jumping from buildings and seeing, tigers on their ceilings.

[490] Hey listeners, it's Mr. Ballin here, and I'm here to tell you about my podcast.

[491] It's called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries.

[492] Each terrifying true story will be sure to keep you up at night.

[493] Follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts.

[494] Prime members can listen early and ad -free on Amazon Music.

[495] I do have two questions about the show.

[496] Good.

[497] Okay, and I'll ask them in the order that are easier to answer.

[498] Question number two is, why is it so long?

[499] I can tell you exactly why the shows I love are long so why would I do Sam Harris I love Sam Harris That's two sometimes three hours How do you have time to listen You know a week or so Real Americans drive an hour to work And an hour home from work So Monday it's like they get halfway through On the way there and then they're done When they're pulling their driveway So for them but I will say Yeah I see that I see that When we started we were advised This is a lot more sellable as a one -hour thing.

[500] And I stressed out about that.

[501] And then I thought, fuck that.

[502] I got to do the thing I like doing or the thing I would consume.

[503] Minimally, you should try to do the thing you would consume, I think.

[504] Minimally, that's the base level.

[505] It's like the golden rule due unto others.

[506] Like, of course, you have to make the thing that you would want to consume.

[507] Of course.

[508] That's the primary important.

[509] And in fact, unlike you, I'm furious that radio labs end at 48 minutes.

[510] Like, I'm pissed.

[511] I hear a good radio lab.

[512] I'm like, I would, I could, I'm in for three hours.

[513] of that topic.

[514] I get frustrated.

[515] If I love something, I'm an addict.

[516] I want it to never stop.

[517] Are you listening to The Daily?

[518] No. What's the daily?

[519] Best podcast out there.

[520] Really?

[521] What is it about?

[522] New York Times puts it out.

[523] It's 20 minutes a day.

[524] And basically they take the day's news from the previous day and they do it as narrative.

[525] So it's stories.

[526] Oh, that's cool.

[527] And it's really just incredibly well done.

[528] And often it's just really like the person who wrote the lead story for the New York Times and maybe one of their interviewees.

[529] But, like, sometimes it's, like, lyrically beautiful.

[530] They did one two weeks ago from the time that we're recording this about when the hurricane hit North Carolina.

[531] They did this hurricane thing about when the hurricane hit in Houston, this two -parter with this guy whose wife had just had surgery and he brought her back home and they couldn't.

[532] And, like, she started to have medical problems and they couldn't get somebody to come in and get her out there because the 911 was so overloaded with calls.

[533] And it's the most, like, beautiful, sad, like, totally full.

[534] fucked me up thing.

[535] But then just this last week, you know, like you and I were recording this in the week right before the Supreme Court hearings where the woman came forward about Judge Kavanaugh.

[536] And they found, they did a thing, which was like kind of an obvious thing to do, a woman wrote this article for the Atlantic, which I hadn't seen about how she had been attacked by a boy when she was in high school.

[537] And she fought him off, just like the woman who claims that she fought off Judge Kavanaugh.

[538] And she just wrote about what it did to her.

[539] And just to hear somebody say, like, no, no, this was 30 years ago.

[540] And here's how that was traumatizing then and its effects that lasted and didn't last.

[541] And just here's what I make of this.

[542] And it just made super real the thing that we've been talking about in the abstract, I think maybe not for a lot of women, but I think for me as a man, like I understood in an abstract way that somebody like molesting you in high school could still have lasting effects that you would feel into adulthood, but didn't really know it emotionally, like in a way where you feel like, Oh, right, if that happened to me, I would feel exactly that.

[543] And just hearing her lay it out was so valuable.

[544] I just felt like, I am so glad you did this.

[545] And again, it would just be like 20 minutes or they'll be like, let's explain to you why this thing is happening in North Korea.

[546] And they'll go back to like 1960 to say, okay, let's start back.

[547] You know, and they'll just like walk you through it really fast and entertainingly.

[548] And the production is great.

[549] And it's just like, it's just the very most useful, thoughtfully made thing that's out there.

[550] I want to say back to your your passion because one thing I'm curious.

[551] Wait, I want to get back to the number one question.

[552] And I want to add something to why it's so long real quick.

[553] Because it's since it's a conversation and the goal is to get into some deep water, people don't just immediately become vulnerable.

[554] But then you can cut out those parts.

[555] We cut out a lot.

[556] We cut out a lot.

[557] In my opinion, to not provide the context.

[558] Like to just cut into a moment.

[559] moment where I can't even think of one that we've had.

[560] Well, it's even something semi -benine of talking about a divorce or something.

[561] Like, if you cut out how you got there and it's just like immediately you're in, I don't know, it doesn't seem like it's portraying the person correctly necessarily.

[562] No, I see that.

[563] It just is so weird to say like you're going to listen to a thing for two hours.

[564] It's long.

[565] Trust me. I know.

[566] But yes, from your point of view, it's so, it's the very opposite because you're, so you have all audio of, let's say, someone in Kentucky who experienced something, and you've interviewed them for maybe six, seven hours.

[567] And then, yes, you're going to take the 11 -minute breakthrough they had.

[568] And we're going to walk through beat by beat in the way that we feel like is going to get to each feeling in order.

[569] Like, we're not going to do the thing that you're scared of Monica.

[570] Like, you know, we're just going to, like, walk you through it in a way that'll have the most feeling.

[571] But you have the advantage of narration.

[572] Yes, that's true.

[573] And also of, like, just the time to, like, think through the beats of the story Yeah, and you'll go, Gail's dad left when she was three, and she blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and then you basically, you prime us, you give the context by which now this huge confession or emotional moment will make sense.

[574] But if I do that to someone Ellen DeGeneres who has spent her whole life...

[575] No, no, no, no, I see that.

[576] It just feels like I can't just cut into her going...

[577] No, no, no, I don't argue.

[578] Okay, so then my number one question is...

[579] Well, complain, I think.

[580] Let's be honest.

[581] No, it's not a complaint.

[582] No, it's like an actual question.

[583] because I haven't heard you talk about it on the podcast is why did you want to do a podcast?

[584] That's very simply, simply, yeah.

[585] You haven't listened to all of them clearly because he has talked about that.

[586] You have talked about it, okay.

[587] I was the guest on many, many podcasts, and I enjoyed being a guest so much.

[588] And as someone who mostly has been interviewed in seven -minute segments on talk shows, and there's a huge demand to be.

[589] You have to hit your pot points and be funny.

[590] I got a crush in seven minutes, or it's a failure.

[591] Yeah, yeah.

[592] To go onto these shows or like just being dax is enough.

[593] Yeah.

[594] I just loved it.

[595] And then also the feedback I got from, say, being on Sam Jones's one hour long show or Mark Maren's podcast or nerdist.

[596] Stern.

[597] Yeah, the response was people would go like, oh, I really know you.

[598] And I really like this thing about you.

[599] And I really relate.

[600] I could have never got that.

[601] Kimmel.

[602] I just loved being a guest.

[603] And I thought, if I like being a guest so much, why aren't I doing this weekly?

[604] I like talking to people for two hours.

[605] It's my, this is my hobby, is shooting the shit, as I think is your hobby.

[606] That's why you and I like each other is...

[607] That's true.

[608] That's true.

[609] Put us in a room.

[610] Like, I don't want to meet you at a restaurant or at a fucking event.

[611] I want you to come sit in our living room.

[612] Right.

[613] And I want to talk to you.

[614] Right.

[615] Right.

[616] That, to me, is a roller coaster ride.

[617] Yeah, I'm with you on that.

[618] Yeah, it's just intoxicating.

[619] I thought the complaint you were going to say, which is, I'm embarrassed up is I talk about myself a ton.

[620] Yeah, but I like that.

[621] Well, I wouldn't like it.

[622] But can I just say there's a method to it, which is, and it's not cynically a method, but if I want you to be honest about your thing.

[623] Please, I know this trick.

[624] Of course, and it's not even a trick.

[625] It's not.

[626] It's sincere, but it's required.

[627] No, no, no, no. Like the person who taught me my mentor at NPR, this guy, Keith Talbot.

[628] but he always said that an interviewer is a party that you're throwing, and the guest will act the way that you act.

[629] And so if you talk, if you tell stories, they'll tell stories back.

[630] Yeah, and there's almost like a social responsibility.

[631] Yeah, agreed.

[632] I'm going to meet you there.

[633] Yeah, I agree.

[634] Okay, so I want to go back to what I find to be your crowning accomplishment is that you've kept your passion alive.

[635] I do wonder, is part of it that there are chapters in this ride?

[636] So one is probably right out of the gate Just like, oh my God, I'm going to be in journalism That's like, that's a ton of fuel in the tank Isn't that?

[637] Did you have a romantic notion about like being a journalist And being in the radio?

[638] I didn't before I got into it.

[639] Like I really backed into it.

[640] Like, and in fact, like the whole first 10 years I was doing radio, I was not that good.

[641] And in fact, the whole drama of my 20s was getting from a plan.

[642] And I've talked about this a lot in public.

[643] Like I give speeches, you know, like I could go around to public radio stations and give talks.

[644] I just did one last night.

[645] And like one of the things that's always like a surefire.

[646] Part of it is to just play stuff from like year, from year seven or eight of when I was doing this.

[647] Because it's, I'm terrible.

[648] Good for you.

[649] I'm terrible.

[650] I'm so glad you do that.

[651] And it's just like encouragement to people who are trying to like get their thing together.

[652] Like I was so bad for so long.

[653] And in a way where like I have recordings, I can prove it.

[654] It's not some weird humble brag or something.

[655] And so, And also, like, it's funny, I only realized this, like, this last year is that when I was a kid, I wasn't, my heroes weren't journalists at all.

[656] It was all just like, I really, there were certain comedians I loved.

[657] I liked plays.

[658] Yeah, I was going to say, you were in drama.

[659] I was in school.

[660] I was in drama nerd.

[661] And so when I started at NPR, like, I didn't know anything about journalism.

[662] I was just looking for, like, a summer internship, you know, like, I wanted to do something in the media, TV, radio, or something advertising.

[663] And, like, I happened to be able to talk my way into NPR in Washington, which.

[664] at that point had only been on the air for like four years.

[665] Nobody was listening.

[666] It was tiny.

[667] You were 19?

[668] Yeah.

[669] So it was in 1978.

[670] And they started in 1973.

[671] And it was this tiny little operation.

[672] There's no morning show.

[673] They had only had a couple of shows.

[674] You got in at the ground floor, as they say.

[675] Yeah.

[676] And they didn't even have an internship program.

[677] You just had to talk somebody into letting you stick around.

[678] And just liked it.

[679] Then started on the staff of all things considered as a production assistant just as a kind of summer job.

[680] And there was this guy.

[681] who became kind of my mentor.

[682] There was a guy on staff to invent new ways to do radio documentary and basically worked for him for a couple of years and learned half of what I know.

[683] And then at some point I just went to work for the news shows trying to apply what I had learned from him, from this guy, Keith Talbot, to the things we were doing on the news shows.

[684] And then just led me down a path of trying to invent a kind of radio that sort of combined what I'd learned from Keith with what I was learning at the news shows and that felt right to me. And that just took forever.

[685] Like I really, I was bad for so long.

[686] And then finally, when I was like 29 or 30, I was like competent.

[687] I was like, I was good.

[688] And then I started the show when I was 35, 36.

[689] And how did that come about?

[690] I mean, I had this idea.

[691] Like, at that point...

[692] You were in Chicago at this point?

[693] I was in Chicago.

[694] At that point, I was getting assignments from NPR.

[695] Like, they would send me into a high school for a year.

[696] Oh, my gosh.

[697] And I would file every week or two.

[698] two from this one high school.

[699] And it would it be like a 20 -part story?

[700] How were they?

[701] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[702] It was like there was this one high school that was kind of trying every trendy thing you could do to fix their high school and everything they tried failed.

[703] And it was like really fascinating, actually, why it failed.

[704] Yeah.

[705] And so you got to know the teachers and the principal and different kids over the course of the year.

[706] This is all and all things considered.

[707] And then after that year, my editor is like, you have to find a school that's improving.

[708] This was too depressing.

[709] And so I found an elementary school, which was doing like a killer job and we did a year there.

[710] and so I was doing these stories which felt a lot like this American life except presented in a more public radioe way like the narration wasn't just like me talking but what it had that was similar were characters and scenes and funny moments and emotional moments and building around story arc instead of around the news like it was very much but also driving it ideas but building the way you build a screenplay where you're building around story arc and how are the characters changing and what are their feelings that each beat of the story and then at the same time I thought I want to do something else besides this and with two friends started a late night show on Friday nights on the local public radio station, WBEZ.

[711] In that show, what I was doing was practicing, performing differently on the air and basically learning to talk on the air the way that I talk in real life.

[712] Isn't that funny?

[713] Because that's virtually what you do as an actor and can take you 15 years to find your voice, your real life voice, while a camera's rolling.

[714] Yeah, that's true.

[715] It didn't occur to me. Right.

[716] Like, anytime I'm working with Kristen on an audition or my sister or Monica or whatever, or we're all helping each other, I'll just go, you're almost at your voice.

[717] It's weirdly just even an octave.

[718] Like, you're almost there, but you're not in your voice.

[719] Wait, are you saying literally like your voice is pitched high?

[720] Yes, or low or slow or fast or whatever.

[721] It's interesting because there's a studio trick that we do with people and that sometimes I have to do with myself because often, like, on Fridays when we put out the show, I'll be running into the studio to record narration.

[722] and I'll be reading badly and often I find what's happening is I'm kind of talking up here and kind of overselling and I have to be like, no, no, no, you talk, where do you talk, you talk down here?

[723] And literally, like, pitching your voice down to, like, making yourself speak more low.

[724] Yeah.

[725] It's actually a broadcast trick to, like, actually make your performance better.

[726] Oh.

[727] Yeah.

[728] Well, I mean, there are many approaches to acting, but one that I most believe in is that is like, let's at least start with your voice.

[729] God, I've never heard that.

[730] How would Kristen walk into this?

[731] room and tell me this thing it's generally more boring than you're inclined to do right because you sell less you feel like you want to be theatrical or you know passionate or whatever but that's not life and then weirdly that thing is way more interesting undersold right in a performance i thought that once you get to be a professional actor you don't have to tell yourself that like that's the thing that you actually like turn on but i think a large percentage of working actors don't ever ever even get there.

[732] Because no, I meet them in real life.

[733] And I go, oh, that's...

[734] Oh, really?

[735] First of all, your voice is different in real life and your cadence is different.

[736] And almost without exception, I'm more interested in the real life version.

[737] And I think, why aren't you doing this?

[738] But I think...

[739] That's interesting.

[740] I read a great interview with Nicholas Cage one time that was saying it was not until he did that movie Face Off with John Travolta.

[741] Do you remember that movie?

[742] Yeah.

[743] They exchange faces.

[744] So basically, each actor ends up having to do an impersonation of the other for the whole filming.

[745] And Nicholas Cage said, until that moment, I had no idea I could even, someone could do an impersonation of me. I didn't think I was distinct enough as a human being that you could impersonate me. Wow.

[746] And watching Travolta do me made me for the first time in my life think, oh, I'm enough.

[747] I'm unique enough.

[748] I can be.

[749] That is so Mimicked, which tells me I'm enough.

[750] Like, what a weird, for how many movies had he done until that point?

[751] So, like, obviously I can't ask you, like, what are the actors who don't do it?

[752] But, like, what are actors who, you know, do the thing, who you admire, who are doing the thing that you're talking about as being the good thing?

[753] Oh, yeah, I can think of a bunch of them.

[754] I think Mickey Rourke's great at it.

[755] Yeah.

[756] Like, the wrestler.

[757] I'm like, oh, good for him.

[758] He let the info be the character.

[759] Right.

[760] Like, he's huge and he's scarred, and we know this about him and then he's just in his voice I think he's great at that I think generally actors on Jason Katham shows like Friday Night Lights most of that cast I feel like they don't really and that I think that's a trick that you can do with improv there's a couple great things about improv that can knock people out of bad habits one is because you don't know what's coming you have to listen it's essential that you listen to what I'm saying because it might change because Jason Kadams was also was he parenthood too yeah parent and so And it was produced the same way.

[761] Was there improv impertinently?

[762] Tons.

[763] Encourage.

[764] So you would go into the scene with a script or with plot points?

[765] Full script and you had permission.

[766] Well, and it varied depending on people's aptitude for improv.

[767] But in my case, I was always really encouraged to like dachs it.

[768] Yeah, yeah.

[769] You know, put it through the dax filter.

[770] Yeah.

[771] Which, again, I applaud his confidence to just go like, yeah, it's still mine even if you do that.

[772] But through improvving, you have to listen.

[773] Your scene partner has to listen because you're going to get left hooks out of nowhere.

[774] And then secondly, you can only improv in your fake voice so well.

[775] You have to go into your real brain to be creating content.

[776] And then your real brain is creating your real content.

[777] And it can accidentally break you into yourself.

[778] Does that make any sense?

[779] Yeah, it does.

[780] It seems tricky, though, to do that.

[781] And also to be that other guy who you're being in those scenes, who is definitely not you.

[782] That guy is, the guy who played in parenthood is not you.

[783] It's not, but again, it's a part of you, like, obviously.

[784] I'll go, I'll go more, which is Daniel Day Lewis, God bless him.

[785] I'm so glad we have a Daniel Day Lewis, but I'm not, I can't do what he does.

[786] And he certainly is a character, right?

[787] He's, I don't even know who Daniel Day Lewis is.

[788] Yeah.

[789] But in general, I think people underestimate the power of story and the power of the information.

[790] So, like, yes, I'm not Crosby, but I also wasn't single with a kid I never, like all that stuff you do the work the viewer did the work right i just got to talk in dax's voice and then all those little things will make you say it's crosbie yeah i see that but it is it's cool that you were super interested in in theater yeah and i feel like i feel like what happened is that without thinking about it in retrospect i see that like once i actually learned what journalism was i had this feeling of like these stories are good but but they don't have all the feeling that i think a thing could have, and then basically just moved the journalism I was doing to have the form of a drama, you know, of like an old musical or something where, like, they start off funny and then, you know, they're about a bigger something, and then they go to something sad at the end.

[791] And I feel like that's basically the prototypical this American life story.

[792] Like, you know, like it pulls you in with like a funny little something, and then it turns out it's the stakes are bigger and about something.

[793] And then the whole thing is about a bigger idea and then goes to something more emotional at the end when it's working and were you so myopic in the process of making those that you were unaware that you were creating something entirely new or did you have an awareness of that i'm not sure if it's entirely new like there are other people in radio doing things that are very much like it but they just didn't turn out the sheer volume that i do like there's a guy named david i say who did some stuff around the same time that i started this american life.

[794] But were you aware of him?

[795] Yeah, of course.

[796] Oh, you were?

[797] Okay.

[798] Okay.

[799] Like, and there's a guy named Joe Richmond who does really beautiful work who we have on the show sometimes.

[800] Like, like, there were a couple people kind of working the same territory.

[801] But, like, it wasn't like I heard their work and was imitating them.

[802] Like, I was off in my own corner making a thing that made sense to me. I don't know.

[803] Like, I didn't think of it as I'm inventing something original.

[804] I was just really thought of it as I'm just inventing something that I like.

[805] I don't know.

[806] It's just like, this works for me, this way of performing on the air and this way of structuring a story.

[807] Like, I don't have any other way to say it.

[808] Like, that's all I thought about.

[809] And it wasn't like I was doing the other thing so well.

[810] Like, it was a perfectly good regular reporter, but it wasn't as special as this other stuff.

[811] Yeah.

[812] And I have to say, like, one of the most surprising things to me is that this form of making a story has turned out to be so imitatable.

[813] And I'm glad.

[814] Like, I feel like this way of structuring a story, where you drive at scenes and anecdotes and then drive at ideas and you try to make it have a voice and that it's all a little more intimate than the way public radio had been before.

[815] You never feel ripped off like you don't.

[816] No, I feel like, you know, like Radio Lab.

[817] Yeah, I said Radio Lab and then I got self -conscious.

[818] I'm like, oh, should I be telling Ira, I love radio.

[819] No, but I love Radio Lab too.

[820] I feel like it's amazing.

[821] And I feel like, no, in a way, it's much more sophisticated than the production that we do in this American life.

[822] I mean, it's less emotional, generally.

[823] but that's out of choice and when they go for emotion they do it so beautifully and thoroughly and in general it's just like - Did you hear that episode blame?

[824] No, that's a good one.

[825] I literally could start crying just even saying that word.

[826] Really?

[827] What happens?

[828] There's three stories in the hour, one of them being a guy who adopted a young, white couple, older adopt this young black girl and they raise her as their daughter.

[829] She becomes a social worker and she's working on.

[830] a case and she comes to know this man this man breaks into her house at some point high on crack and murders her and the dad develops not initially with this intention but he develops this pen pal relationship with the guy in prison in the story that unfolds in the way this man could be forgiving and loving i don't not from the bible is there an example of someone living this way I just heard this thing and I thought All my instincts are cancerous Like I would want to kill the person who killed my daughter And it says you want to talk about a fucking warrior Like a brave human being as someone who could Be kind and forget I just never seen an example of it like this ever It's so beautiful I just wanted to go meet this man and go like How do you even become this way And then through I mean it's great You'll love it but at a certain point They've been pen pales for a long time time and the guy's now sober in prison and he says i need to know about that night the dad asks oh my god and he says i knew this was coming and i owe it to you to tell you every single thing and he does and it's it's incredible i can i can see this place on the road chris and i were driving in florida when we were listening to it like it's it's etched in my mind i know that feeling of like of like when something really hits you like yeah you totally remember where you were when you heard it yeah i totally get that too suck in the whole environment so no those guys are amazing and when I hear every time I hear radio live I just like oh you guys are doing such a better job like the way the whole show sounds and just everything is so much more sophisticated well it's funny but like and yeah like yeah I'm not in your world so I wouldn't have known that there were other people doing what you were doing but just for me from the outside to me this American life is is as unique as the tonight show like to me it's a thing that no I think I think we very much became there weren't many people doing it and they weren't doing it visibly and we became because we were there every week we became the single most visible exemplar of like this kind of thing nobody had ever done this much of it and you know we really pushed it as a staff and like no we definitely we own it as a staff i have to say like at this point like i do feel like we did invent a thing and how many episodes have you done 600 something 680 episode i don't know it's been on there for a long end it's been there since 1995 wow Yeah, yeah.

[831] And it's so weirdly hard.

[832] Like last week I worked 80 hours the week before.

[833] I worked 80 hours and worked both weekends and the weekends before.

[834] And just like, yeah, no, it's weirdly still very hard.

[835] You know, just like we keep trying to get more ambitious and do new things.

[836] Stay tuned for more armchair expert, if you dare.

[837] So I would imagine a first chunk, a first chapter of your long story doing this.

[838] is the excitement of creating the thing itself, right?

[839] That has to sustain you for quite a while.

[840] When the show starts.

[841] Yeah.

[842] The enthusiasm of...

[843] Yeah, and also, like, the weird science experiment of it of, like, are we going to even...

[844] Are this even going to succeed?

[845] Like, also, nobody had ever made a show like this.

[846] And when we started the show, it was just me and three other people.

[847] Uh -huh.

[848] And we made 48 episodes in the first year.

[849] Oh, my gosh.

[850] Which is, like, now we make 30, you know, like, and it's a much...

[851] With way more people.

[852] Yeah, yeah.

[853] And, like, and so it's just three...

[854] Like, honestly, during the...

[855] those first two or three years, like those who worked on the show, we were never not working.

[856] Like, there was never a point in the day.

[857] Like, you know, just like we were either working or asleep.

[858] And then also, like, we had to talk public radio stations into picking us up.

[859] Oh, really?

[860] Yeah, like the way the public radio system works is like there's not like a network boss.

[861] It's radically decentralized to every single station decides what they're going to take and when they're going to run it.

[862] And so you have to talk them all into it.

[863] So it took a salesman as well.

[864] Yeah, and had to market the show to the stations.

[865] And we, like you had to invent things like we do these killer pledge drive modules and one of the reasons why is because it was the only way we could get stations to take us is that they would make so much money off of us like like you'll see around the office here there's some postcards that we used to send out in the first year or two which say like don't pick us up because we're like trying to remake public radio pick us up because we will make you money and then with like program directors saying like we played one of their pledge modules and it made us $30 ,000 you know in 10 minutes on a Tuesday morning and like you know just just yeah like and not to get into your finances but What is even the model?

[866] So you're making the show in Chicago, and then obviously every satellite MPR station that plays it, do they pay a royalties?

[867] Well, at the beginning, no, they don't.

[868] At the beginning, they don't because they're offered so much stuff for free on the public radio satellite that you can't charge originally.

[869] And the idea is that you want to get on the air any way you can.

[870] So you give it to them for free for the first year or two.

[871] And then at some point, you have to start charging just to like make your money work.

[872] Yeah.

[873] And then traditionally you lose 15 % of your stations.

[874] And then we were just, Like, we don't know how many stations we're going to get.

[875] Like, our business model was to get on 60 stations by the end of our first year.

[876] We just thought, like, this Tori Malatia, who ran the public radio station in Chicago and I, who, like, we ran the business side of this together.

[877] He was like, I don't, he's like, I like this, you like this, but I don't know if people are going to like this.

[878] So, like, in a way, it was like exactly when we started cereal.

[879] We were just like, I don't know.

[880] We like it.

[881] I don't know if people were going to go for this.

[882] And so our business model was 60 stations by the end of the first year.

[883] And then basically you get grants.

[884] We had, like, foundation grants and stuff to get us on the air.

[885] and like our original budget for the first year was like $240 ,000 with which we paid the salaries for four people.

[886] Oh, wow.

[887] And also built a studio.

[888] And also we didn't fly many.

[889] Oh, you didn't?

[890] Okay.

[891] A lot of local.

[892] There was a lot of like phone interviews and satellite interviews.

[893] And, you know, and also like, you know, did the marketing to stations.

[894] And it was really bare bones.

[895] And then as things go on, once you get a big enough audience, you can get underwriters who will pay to get their name on the end of the show with those little, you know, things we do at the end of the show.

[896] And then at some point, a couple years in, you can start to ask stations for money.

[897] Right.

[898] And then that's the business model.

[899] And so in podcasts must have opened up, like, is that the greatest thing ever?

[900] It's crazy.

[901] You guys own that catalog, right?

[902] You can put it out now on your own platform.

[903] Yes, yes, yeah, absolutely.

[904] And then also, like, podcast has more than doubled our audience.

[905] Like, we were at $2 .2 million on the radio, and that stayed the same for over a decade now.

[906] Yeah, you're either listening to NPR or not.

[907] Yeah.

[908] And then we've added $2 .5 million.

[909] on podcast oh that's so great so that's incredible so five million people in general a little less but yeah and so then and then the advertising money that came in through podcasting is really just change what we're able to do and add reporters and reporting time and they would have really like the story we ran this week about ms 13 along island and these cops who basically more or less ignored parents who came to them and said i think my kids my kids missing might be murdered and the cops So like, yeah, he's a run away.

[910] And, you know, just ignoring evidence that they're bringing over and over and over.

[911] You know, that story like that takes four or five months.

[912] And we have, you know, like we could never have produced a story like that.

[913] A story that takes four months to make when we started.

[914] Yeah.

[915] Yeah.

[916] That you're ultimately going to get an hour out of.

[917] Is that?

[918] It ran them this week.

[919] Yeah, it was an hour.

[920] Yeah.

[921] It's really admirable.

[922] Again, I feel terrible that we use something in real time.

[923] But I want to know, were there waves where you were losing enthusiasm, but then another element of the building right there has to be do you enjoy the just the the like the entrepreneurial yes i do yeah i do yeah like one of the things that was good is that like i like i like i like one of the things that was good is that like i like i like it was interesting to me the puzzle of having to talk in talk stations and taking us and just having to make the business work and i like the budgets and spreadsheets and all i can have it comes easily to me it feels like a game yeah so much easier than writing or like it's easier than creative work you know it just seems like a nice break from having to like figure out like wait should this part of the story go here like wait did we get the right interview for this like you know just like all that kind of creative decision making and um no i really i feel i feel proud of the business side of it because like i feel like kind of like the weirder the project is that you have the more cunning you have to be about the business side of it and i feel like like it was always very aggressive about seeing that the business side of it was competently managed.

[924] It's unique for someone to have kind of both skill sets.

[925] You know, as a writer, to be a good, to be a good...

[926] It's funny.

[927] Like, I wasn't aware of that when I was doing it, but now that I know so many more creative people.

[928] Like, I don't know many creative people who actually enjoy it.

[929] In fact, all the creative people I know sort of resent it.

[930] Yeah.

[931] Whereas, like, I don't know, my dad was an accountant.

[932] It's even true with actors.

[933] Like, they like acting and someone else is handling everything.

[934] And then you're just kind of like, Like, wait, how are you broke?

[935] I'm confused.

[936] Like you weren't you doing X, Y, and Z?

[937] Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[938] So then I'm wondering, so building the actual business, which has become incredible, like I jokingly said when we walked in here, like, let me see the empire, but it's, that's not really a joke.

[939] Like, you really have built something truly incredible.

[940] Has another bit of fuel in the tank been taking on the role of a mentor and giving people opportunity and supporting people with talent?

[941] Like, is that, has that become something?

[942] that is really fueling for you?

[943] And I don't say that in a saccharine way.

[944] I don't know.

[945] Like, I feel like I could be such a better, like, mentor.

[946] I feel like if anything, what I've done is at the show, just create an environment where everybody's on the same level and we all just kind of work out what we're doing together.

[947] And then a lot of people just thrive in that kind of thing.

[948] And we edit each other.

[949] And, like, it's just people understand that, like, if they have an idea, it can happen.

[950] And then a lot of people thrive.

[951] But I don't feel like, I feel like other people and staff, are much better mentors than me and have more time for it and more energy for it.

[952] Mentor probably wasn't the right word.

[953] Do you not take tremendous pride in something like cereal or you built this thing that allowed for somebody with this skill set to shine?

[954] I mean, without Ira, there's, I don't know.

[955] How could you not feel like so happy that you gave those people an opportunity that turned out to be such a huge home run?

[956] I mean, do I feel so much pride I feel like I feel so aware of how hard it is to make cereal and how incredibly special both Julie who produces and edits it and Sarah who writes it and reports it I feel like they are both more skilled at what they're doing than I am at what either of them is doing like I could not do those stories that Sarah does at all and I couldn't write them as well and I couldn't like those that's a kind of reporting that just like she is so much better at than anybody, like in a quiet moment, like, yeah, I feel, I guess, proud that they had the space to do that.

[957] But really, like, I don't feel like they take much credit for it at all.

[958] I don't, yeah, no, no, no. I don't mean, like, yeah, ownership over their accomplishment is, like, I feel it on a micro level when I direct a movie and I get to put people in it that I met at the growlings that didn't get an opportunity.

[959] I'm not, like, patting myself on the back.

[960] I'm just so excited to be a part of someone getting to do this thing.

[961] they love and I had a role in allowing them to do a thing they love.

[962] That feels to me better than my own accomplishments.

[963] There are a lot of people who are talented and good, but who never get to shine or get their thing out there in any of these creative capacities.

[964] And you need cheerleaders and you need people to see you and, and usher you in.

[965] And if you get to be one of those people like you are and you are, it should feel good and it should feel special.

[966] I think that the thing that's holding me back is I feel very aware of how in a week to week way, I have so many things that I'm just trying to manage and get through and just get through the edits for that week's show and the stuff that I'm supposed to write, that it's not like I'm like holding people by the hand and like helping them make stuff.

[967] Like it's much more like a system of benign neglect where they know that like I'll support them doing it and then sit in on edits and give notes and stuff.

[968] I don't know.

[969] I feel like my role isn't quite as active in their work.

[970] It's just that I happen to make a place where there was eventually enough money that we could make it happen.

[971] But that's significant.

[972] That's the accomplishment.

[973] That's humongous.

[974] I know, but like my experience of my week is so much more anxiety filled and running from one deadline to the next.

[975] I said, honestly, like, that's my experience of my job, much more.

[976] Right.

[977] But like last night, we went out on stage in Brooklyn, and I come out and they clap for a very long time, way longer than I deserve for them to clap.

[978] And that feels really good.

[979] That maybe is a seven for me, right?

[980] Yeah.

[981] When Monica walks out and they go bananas, for three minutes, I'm at a 10.

[982] Like, I can weirdly experience it for her better than I can for myself.

[983] The amount of happiness it gives me to see Monica, this person I've known for four years that deserves that kind of thing, that just is overwhelming for me. And I just wondered if you had that kind of feeling now that you're in a position to build something that can amplify people that deserve amplification.

[984] Yes.

[985] Yeah, totally.

[986] Isn't it great?

[987] Yes, that is great.

[988] Yeah, it's exciting.

[989] Yes, of course.

[990] Now, unless...

[991] We love cereal.

[992] We do.

[993] In fact, as a stupid anecdote, you and I have the same ad salesperson in the podcast space, David Raphael, who's great.

[994] My very first conversation I had with him, he said one of the funniest sales pitch things ever.

[995] He said, I just want you to know I have the distinction of having undersold the worst ever.

[996] Because you guys pre -sold the initial serial with no one knowing what it was.

[997] And then it had 50 million downloads or whatever.

[998] That would be 17 million or 18 million downloads per episode.

[999] Right, but cumulatively, 50 million maybe?

[1000] But whatever, 8, 15, 17 million times 12 episodes is.

[1001] Oh, because even more, 150 million.

[1002] Yeah, whatever, yeah, that's a lot.

[1003] And I can only imagine he modeled it out at...

[1004] 300 ,000 people per episode.

[1005] Right.

[1006] So what a great thing who has your sales pitch as an agent is I'm more...

[1007] I undersold something on a level that's never been done before.

[1008] So Mailchimp really got a good deal.

[1009] They did get a good deal.

[1010] Good for them.

[1011] They deserve a good deal.

[1012] But they were there when nobody else was.

[1013] So I'm glad.

[1014] The last thing I want to talk about before we go is I have to assume your identity is so interwoven with your profession and what you do and who you are as a creator and how that can be dicey or not navigating that.

[1015] Like how much of your identity is Ira Glass, a guy who creates this show or these many shows.

[1016] Is that too abstract of a question?

[1017] No, I'm thinking about, yeah, maybe, like, I'm thinking about what is the answer to the question?

[1018] I guess, let's say, like, like, you've had the experience where you were married for years and years and years.

[1019] And that can be a fracturing event for your identity.

[1020] To split up, yes.

[1021] Right?

[1022] Yeah.

[1023] And similarly, if you take away, like, tomorrow, Ira Glass, there's no this American life.

[1024] There's no any of that stuff.

[1025] It's funny, like, if I picture that, I just figure, like, well, I'll just go back to whatever I was doing before.

[1026] there's no way it's that simple like I could just make little stories again like whatever it'd be easy it would be so much easier than my life now like I don't know but a lot of your self -esteem has to be derived from how hard you work I mean yeah I don't know like like I a lot of my identity sure of course is like I spend so many hours every week there's some weeks like the last few weeks we've just been in this production binge or in these hard shows where it's like I'm almost doing nothing but making the show.

[1027] And so in periods like that, it's like I'm not even thinking about what is my identity.

[1028] I'm just like making my way through the trenches as we're like going from this edit to this edit to this edit to this edit.

[1029] You cannot see the forest in that.

[1030] Yeah.

[1031] And like it, but I feel like so much of my life is like that.

[1032] Like so many, I'll go for weeks at a stretch like that and then kind of come out of it.

[1033] Have you had any prolonged periods of not working?

[1034] No. And there's certain things that I've like never even done.

[1035] I've never been camping.

[1036] Like I'd never been hiking until like until, until just the summer somebody was like, let's go on a hike.

[1037] I was like, I've totally, I was like, it was just walking around, right?

[1038] I was just walking around.

[1039] But yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1040] They took me, like, we live in New York City and they're like, let's go upstate.

[1041] Like we have a friend who is like a house upstate.

[1042] We'll stay at their house over the weekend.

[1043] I was like, great.

[1044] And so we went upstate.

[1045] And then like all these people who were upstate at these places that they have upstate, I was.

[1046] I was like, we went upstate.

[1047] And then like all these people who were upstate at these places that they have upstate, I was.

[1048] I was.

[1049] I was.

[1050] I was.

[1051] I was I was like, oh, I've never been away upstate.

[1052] They're like, wait, how long have you lived in New York?

[1053] I was like, over a decade.

[1054] They're like, what do you?

[1055] It was like incomprehensible.

[1056] And I don't know.

[1057] I've been busy.

[1058] Like, I don't know what I've been doing.

[1059] I don't know.

[1060] So I haven't really organized my life around many non -work things.

[1061] Yeah.

[1062] But that doesn't concern you at all.

[1063] It does concern me. Okay.

[1064] Like, I think I'd be happier if there were more other things.

[1065] Do you think there's a certain amount?

[1066] It's more like I kind of got in over.

[1067] my head and then didn't didn't organize it well to get out of that and then I like making the show like I like I like making stories like I just like there's a part of it where it's just like I actually it's interesting to me still and to get to the question you're asking of like how much my identity is caught up in it like I think a lot like obviously and do you think in this bubble where we're sitting now but can I say if it went away I feel like I'd be totally fine it would be a really yeah i would just as an experiment just i would just want you to just to take even a let's not take it away but let's send you in a three -week vacation and i want to come interview you on day 16 okay i mean i've been on like a two -week vacation but okay yeah i guess here would be a more specific even better question is in this realm where we're sitting now you're very competent at it you have the 10 000 hours minimally uh probably this year you you have 10 ,000 hours.

[1068] And with competence and a position of leadership comes a lot of control.

[1069] This is an environment you can control.

[1070] Now, of course, there's elements that you can't control.

[1071] But in general, you have a large degree of control.

[1072] And when you leave here and you go on a blind date or you go to the grocery store.

[1073] Yeah.

[1074] I know.

[1075] It's nice.

[1076] It's nice.

[1077] In fact, I had the experience of a couple years ago I toured in this dance show where I told stories and these dancers dance.

[1078] And it was with this incredible dance.

[1079] company.

[1080] Monica Bill Barnes Dance Company and Monica was the director of the show and it was such a relief.

[1081] You liked it.

[1082] Oh my God, it was so great.

[1083] It was so great it was her show.

[1084] Like, and you know, I'd have ideas but she'd be like, no, like not that.

[1085] No. Like it was so really like and somebody else was producing it.

[1086] Somebody else was in charge.

[1087] I was like an actor in her show.

[1088] It was like wonderful.

[1089] So you don't have, do you think you have control issues or are you a control freak?

[1090] I'm a control like enthusiast I would say like yeah totally freak makes it sound so negative a control unicorn but it's a very specific kind of control like there's certain things that I find are very hard for me to give up like right now I'm trying to train people into taking over like something which sounds so small but is sort of like big too which is just literally the mixes of the show like where the music comes in where it goes out the pauses between sentences like just the performances that people are you know right now like I give mixed notes on most shows on all of it and it takes a day you know it's a full day of my week to do the mixed notes and review the mixed notes and it's just like it's not that interesting and I keep trying to pass it off but I feel like that is an area where I feel like a sense of like I don't know why like in some primal way I feel like a need to control it but if I could just get somebody to the point where I've gotten people in other parts of the show where they just do it just as well as I do well I would be happy to pass it off and over the years I've turned over more and more of the show to other people and there are all kinds of things like most of the show now is something that we all decide together like overwhelming like the story selection the way things are edited like it very much as a group decision and so I don't need to control things like that like we do so many stories that that I think we shouldn't do like I do stories that I'm not in favor of but like everybody was like no we should do this and then I go do them like there have definitely been times in the staff meetings where I've said like well okay well someday when I get my own radio show I'm totally doing this idea.

[1091] You know, like...

[1092] Yeah.

[1093] You know, like...

[1094] The Ira Glass Hour?

[1095] Yeah, like something, yeah.

[1096] But to defend the one thing, though, I will say not being an expert on it.

[1097] It appears to me, though, that mix is actually, in a film, the job of the director really is to establish a tone and hopefully maintain that same tone through every scene of it.

[1098] And that tone can only come from, is this really my point of view?

[1099] Is this my exact sensibility?

[1100] and I know scene to scene to whether even one scene's comedic and one scene's dramatic at least my personal sensibility will be the unifying thread and I have to imagine that that phase of this is where tone is the pauses when the music comes in does it come in slowly does it come in abruptly isn't that tone that's part of tone for sure yeah that's part of it I mean there's so many other things like in story selection or who you're talking to and what you say and you know like every element But the vibe, when I hear this American life, it's like McDonald's.

[1101] I get the same thing every time.

[1102] Even if the story's radically different, I would never drop five minutes into that show and not know what was that show.

[1103] And that's weirdly the accomplishment you've, that's your true accomplishment is it is a single, you know, it's a consistent product.

[1104] Yes, yes, true, true.

[1105] I read Glass, I just want to tell you publicly, I can remember not like the episode of Blame, but up there with it.

[1106] blame.

[1107] I got an email forwarded to me from my wife that you wrote her about having seen hit and run on an airplane.

[1108] Yeah.

[1109] And I was just a fan of yours for 15 years and all of a sudden and I'd never met you and I get an email from you about hit and run.

[1110] I loved hit and run.

[1111] I have to tell you, it's hard to know what your real effect is on other people.

[1112] But the highlight of having made that movie, the process was the highlight, but post it coming out, the singular, the singular, The zenith of the experience was getting that email from you.

[1113] Really?

[1114] I promise you from the bottom of my heart.

[1115] That's so sweet.

[1116] I got this email.

[1117] I'm like, Ira fucking Glass wrote me a two -page email about a movie I made.

[1118] This can't be.

[1119] I really liked it.

[1120] I really, like, I think I'm a sucker for a story about, like, a guy who's trying to fix himself.

[1121] I thought it was like, it was like a real surprise that that's what it turned out to be.

[1122] I thought like, why isn't this America's favorite date movie?

[1123] I get suicide.

[1124] I thought it was like, surprisingly, it was very unexpected.

[1125] Well, but in true self -loathing fashion, I was like, well, hey, it's an airplane.

[1126] Everything goes up 40 % on an airplane.

[1127] It gets better because you are trapped.

[1128] And then second, I was like, I wonder how many cocktails he had.

[1129] And then I eventually asked you like, do you think maybe you were drunk while you saw the movie?

[1130] Yeah, no, no. But anyways, I was so flattered because I'm just a humongous fan.

[1131] and I've spent so many hours of my life enjoying the fruits of your labor and I'm so flattered you like Kristen and I know I recognize you like her more as you should but it does it does Oh my God I always say the need is part of it now they're spending more time together Who knows, who knows?

[1132] I feel like you could totally beat her.

[1133] I'm kind of a slow burn You're totally edging her out Like where's Kristen now?

[1134] Where's Kristen Bell now?

[1135] She opens the door for us and sometimes we get invited to stay because I'm there.

[1136] You never know how it'll go.

[1137] But thank you so much for spending time on your Sunday.

[1138] Not unlike Cedaris, I feel very flattered that you would give us your time and be a part of our show.

[1139] So thank you so much.

[1140] Yeah, it's fun.

[1141] Thanks for having me. I love you, I agree with the listener.

[1142] And now my favorite part of the show, the fact check with my soulmate Monica Padman.

[1143] Facts, Facts, let it all out.

[1144] These are the facts that I care about And come on Monica's talking to you Come on Do you even recognize that song?

[1145] Yeah, I do Shout Yep Shout That's good When you say yep, you really mean it I don't need to then do it again Because you said yep And then I kept going It's okay you can Did you like that I kind of affected An English singing accent?

[1146] I was going to comment on that Yeah, that you often do that.

[1147] You become them.

[1148] Channel them.

[1149] Yeah.

[1150] Hi, Monica.

[1151] Hi.

[1152] What facts are you checking today?

[1153] Ira Fax.

[1154] Ira Flax.

[1155] Um.

[1156] Oh, no, it's picking up here.

[1157] Oh, the rain.

[1158] I thought it had passed.

[1159] Oh, gosh.

[1160] This happens sometimes where the sun comes out and I get happy again and then it passes and then there's rain again.

[1161] Oh, but wait, I see the sun's peeking through the clouds.

[1162] It looks like this is going to pass.

[1163] Oh, it's going to just be a quick shower.

[1164] Oh, I think that was the last rain drop.

[1165] Great.

[1166] You know what I do enjoy.

[1167] I do know a lot of things you enjoy, but maybe not the specific one.

[1168] You don't know about this.

[1169] I don't like the rain, but I do enjoy a sun shower.

[1170] Oh, okay.

[1171] You know what my grandma Yolas used to say.

[1172] When the sun's shining and it's raining, it means the devil's beaten his wife.

[1173] Oh.

[1174] You know, she was from Kentucky and she had all these great, great sayings.

[1175] I think when something stunk, she said, that smells like a pole cap.

[1176] A pole cap?

[1177] Yeah, I don't know.

[1178] What's that mean?

[1179] I don't know.

[1180] I think it's those long things that stick out of swamps.

[1181] I have a little fuzz at the end.

[1182] Oh.

[1183] Yeah.

[1184] I mean, I think.

[1185] I don't know.

[1186] What does it do?

[1187] Well, stinks to high heaven if you believe Yola's Shepherd or Yola's Honchels or birth name.

[1188] What does it do, though, out of the swamp?

[1189] I have so many, you really just opened up a door to a lot of questions.

[1190] Okay.

[1191] You know when you're driving on the side of the highway, you see a swamp.

[1192] And in the swamp, there's these really straight up and down, tan -colored.

[1193] Poles?

[1194] Well, they're, their plant, their, their, their, their flora.

[1195] It's growing up from the bottom of the swamp.

[1196] Okay.

[1197] It's foliage.

[1198] And then they're straight up and down and they have these big poofs at the top.

[1199] Can you picture one?

[1200] Like a dandelion.

[1201] Not at all.

[1202] No, the poof is much more parallel with the stock.

[1203] It's, it's not a spherical.

[1204] It is tubular.

[1205] Oh.

[1206] So it puffs out at the top in a little tubular fashion.

[1207] Totally tubular?

[1208] That's not a pole cat?

[1209] Wobby, wabs.

[1210] Correcting me. What is a pole cat?

[1211] Oh, an African skunk is a pole cat skunk.

[1212] Why would my grandma know about an African skunk?

[1213] I mean, granted, she had a double master's degree.

[1214] Very smart.

[1215] Smartest person in our family, I believe.

[1216] Yeah.

[1217] And that makes the most sense because skunks stink.

[1218] They sure do.

[1219] Well, that stinks like a pole cat.

[1220] And we don't know about that fully.

[1221] If you don't know how that smells, it could smell lovely.

[1222] I just filled in the blanks.

[1223] I liked it much more when I thought my grandma was talking about that.

[1224] Fuck you, Wobby Wob.

[1225] I guess that opening of the umbrella was bad luck.

[1226] Those are cat tails.

[1227] Cat tails.

[1228] Oh, those are called cat tails.

[1229] Do you know the funny thing about my grandma Yolus, which she was named after?

[1230] Uh -huh.

[1231] You do know?

[1232] Oh, no. Ulysses asked Grant.

[1233] Isn't that interesting?

[1234] They decided Ulyss was the female version of Ulysses.

[1235] Oh.

[1236] Also interesting because she's from the south.

[1237] And Ulysses has Grant famously defeated Robert Lee.

[1238] He's a northerner.

[1239] But what's also interesting is.

[1240] I was just thinking this the other day because one of her brothers was named Lee.

[1241] I don't know.

[1242] I think they might have honored both of them.

[1243] Wow.

[1244] They just were big fans of the Civil War.

[1245] I think everyone in the South is pretty aware of the Civil War.

[1246] They seem to think about it way more than the people in the North.

[1247] I agree.

[1248] Well, with those rebel flags and whatnot, you see Confederate flags.

[1249] Confederate flags, yeah.

[1250] Yeah.

[1251] I don't love that.

[1252] No, no, it's not a great symbol.

[1253] I will say this about the Confederate flag.

[1254] First of all, it was a rebellion against the United States.

[1255] Secondly, a lot of people are in favor of saying it was about state's rights.

[1256] It was about states' right, a single right, which was slavery.

[1257] So, sure, it was about states' rights.

[1258] But let's just be honest about the fact that it was about a singular right.

[1259] And I think I was telling you, because I'm reading this Robert E. Lee book right now.

[1260] And the Mexican -American War was very, very instrumental in causing the Civil War, which I had no idea.

[1261] Because all that land that we stole from Mexico.

[1262] Yeah.

[1263] It was all new land that was going to be incorporated in the United States.

[1264] And the Southerners, of course, wanted that land to be slavery.

[1265] That's territory.

[1266] Welcome to, you know, because of the North, it was illegal.

[1267] And so really, the Civil War was really, really instigated by that war, which I never knew that either.

[1268] That's very interesting.

[1269] But now, back to the Confederate flag.

[1270] So, you know, it's a terrible symbol.

[1271] It really represented people.

[1272] desire to own slaves.

[1273] You can't get around that.

[1274] I know.

[1275] People really do want to, but the truth is you just can't.

[1276] Yes.

[1277] Now, with that said, I have met many people that have a seemingly no awareness of that.

[1278] Like, they really look at that flag as a symbol of being an outlaw.

[1279] And so, you know, it's a bad flag.

[1280] We got to get rid of it.

[1281] also you have to just have a a little forgiveness in your heart for some people that don't really know what they're what they're waving around well i think the way through to this is is not to deem everyone that's got one of racist just to just start with it there's there's a lot of people that have some misconceived notions about what that the history of the flag we can be honest and say the majority of people who are flying that flag know what it means well i guess here's my from my own anecdotal example, I have known a lot of people that have had that sticker on their truck or something that I can say with certainty aren't racist.

[1282] So that's where it gets a little compelling to me or just, you know, multifaceted.

[1283] How about that?

[1284] Sure.

[1285] A complicated issue.

[1286] It's like, do you know a lot of people that have had that flag or a T -shirt or something?

[1287] And they're not racist.

[1288] I mean, of course, this was 25 years ago.

[1289] I feel like now that conversation really has been being had publicly.

[1290] Yep.

[1291] I also know people.

[1292] Look.

[1293] From Georgia.

[1294] The thing is, when you say I know with certainty that people aren't racist, the problem I have with that is if you know what you're doing and you are flying that flag.

[1295] Yes.

[1296] And you say it stands for fishing and being a, that's what people say.

[1297] Sure, sure, sure.

[1298] It stands for what it means to be a Southerner.

[1299] Self -sufficient.

[1300] Exactly.

[1301] I can't say that you're not racist because you are choosing to fly a flag that is a symbol of hatred for a group of people.

[1302] You're choosing like your southern roots over somebody else's humanity.

[1303] And to me, it's not overtly racist, but it's not.

[1304] not good.

[1305] Well, I hope I'm being incredibly clear that I don't think that flag is good.

[1306] Yeah.

[1307] I don't understand why anyone's celebrating a failed rebellion.

[1308] Yeah.

[1309] I don't get it.

[1310] But I also don't believe that you're necessarily racist if you have that flag.

[1311] A black person who sees that flag is not, is never going to feel safe.

[1312] Never, never, never.

[1313] And you and I know that.

[1314] You know, some people are stupid.

[1315] Some people are uneducated.

[1316] And it doesn't mean their heart's black.

[1317] But if somebody tells them.

[1318] Wrong choice of words there.

[1319] I know.

[1320] I blew past that.

[1321] Got dicey.

[1322] I should have used a different thing to say.

[1323] Cold.

[1324] Cold.

[1325] Hardened.

[1326] Whatever you want to say.

[1327] If they're just ignorant, which there are a lot of people that are, I get that.

[1328] But then if somebody says, hey, this represents this and it's really painful.

[1329] It's really hurts.

[1330] It's painful, yes.

[1331] A black American's feelings to think that one of their neighbors has a symbol celebrating when they were owned.

[1332] I think if you start there, I think you're going to get a lot of growth.

[1333] I think if you start with going, hey, dude, you're a racist for having that flag.

[1334] I think you're going to get a lot of defensiveness.

[1335] Yeah.

[1336] How on earth do we get on the Confederate flag?

[1337] I don't know.

[1338] All right.

[1339] Hit me with your facts.

[1340] Okay.

[1341] Oh, you said that we've only, we'd only done one other interview outside of our attic.

[1342] That was Ellen.

[1343] And that was technically true at the time we recorded it.

[1344] But since we've released these out of order, it's not true anymore.

[1345] Amy and Seth were both also out of the attic.

[1346] Mm -hmm.

[1347] And our live shows, you could say, are out of it.

[1348] That's true.

[1349] But to go to somebody, yeah, was unique at that moment.

[1350] At that moment.

[1351] Didn't mean I was a racist because I went at that moment to his studio.

[1352] Tomato, Tom.

[1353] We'll see.

[1354] I guess like it's okay to, it's not, I mean, it's not okay to be ignorant, but if you're ignorant and somebody corrects you, you have to change.

[1355] Or else you are that thing.

[1356] For sure.

[1357] And when you watch the news about the Confederate flag stuff, it's not all ignorance.

[1358] It's a lot of people hear it and they don't care.

[1359] It's not a coincidence that that flag was on huge display during the Charlottetville, white supremacist March.

[1360] Yeah.

[1361] You can't really deny that.

[1362] So, yeah.

[1363] I feel like I had a conversation with my very, very good friend from home who is very smart.

[1364] And he comes from a very, very southern part of Georgia, his whole family.

[1365] and we were having a conversation about the flag because he has people in his family who fly it and I think he at one point had to reconcile like I think he was on the like it represents this for a long time and at some point he just had to be like no it's just not okay to do that well again I'll use a far more innocuous example for us not if you're Jewish but you know the swastika was used in in hindu religion it was very much a part of their iconography in fact really yes 100 % in fact the it was that that symbol was stolen oh rob is saying it was flipped uh no there was a school built in our hometown that was deserted we used to go into it and they had put a huge rug over it but on the floor the school the the school is built in like 1909 in mosaic on tile on the floor it had a swastika the old high school in Milford.

[1366] We would peel, we would sneak into the high school and we'd peel back the carpet and there was a big swastika on the ground and that was, you know, 30 years before the Nazi party.

[1367] So they, they took that symbol.

[1368] They hijacked it.

[1369] Now, of course, that symbol's dead right, as it should be.

[1370] But you could certainly be Hindu and have that symbol and then if someone pointed out to you, hey, by the way, there was a Holocaust, six million people died and that was pretty much the mascot of the atrocity, you'd probably go like, oh, I should probably take it off my roof.

[1371] But all I'm saying is that person could quite innocently be not really understanding the gravity of the symbol.

[1372] I guess.

[1373] You wouldn't see that and go like, that guy, that's a fucking anti -Semite.

[1374] Well, you might now.

[1375] I mean, I would.

[1376] Also, I've never, I believe you.

[1377] I totally believe you.

[1378] But it's definitely clearly not like a ubiquitous enough thing within Hinduism now.

[1379] because I've never seen it.

[1380] Mm -hmm.

[1381] But I think you could definitely say that if a Hindu had that, like for sure at this point in history.

[1382] All I'm asking for is like a tiny bit of goodwill and benefit of the doubt where you go to the person and go, I doubt you mean.

[1383] You may not know this.

[1384] You seem like a nice person.

[1385] I doubt you mean this.

[1386] I just want to let you know the history of this thing.

[1387] Yeah.

[1388] You probably don't want to fly that.

[1389] Yeah.

[1390] That's all.

[1391] I'm just talking about like step one.

[1392] instead of going like, oh, that person's a fucking racist and I'm going to tell them, I just, I just, you know, I don't think the result of that approach is all that great.

[1393] I know.

[1394] I also just don't think any, I don't think most people are starting that way.

[1395] You don't think, I understand, and I would understand where a lot of people would say, someone with the Confederate flag on their truck doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt.

[1396] No, I'm not saying that at all.

[1397] I think it's always good to start with educating, Yeah, you don't lose anything.

[1398] If you find out the person is a racist prick.

[1399] I just know, I know that a lot of these people are educated in it and are still doing it.

[1400] Of course, that's definitely the approach.

[1401] But the initial approach, then when you see what's left, then I'm going to say, okay, this is a symbol of racism.

[1402] You're perpetuating.

[1403] Yes.

[1404] Of course, ignorance is a different thing.

[1405] And if people, because also our friend Jed put something on Instagram recently.

[1406] Yeah, he used to.

[1407] A sweet story about that where he had like.

[1408] He's from Tennessee.

[1409] He's from Tennessee.

[1410] He's the most liberal human being on the planet, progressive.

[1411] Yes.

[1412] And he had a Confederate flag bandana on.

[1413] Oh, and he wore it to his black friends.

[1414] He wore to a black church or something.

[1415] Yep.

[1416] He went to a black church.

[1417] Yeah.

[1418] And a very kind, warm.

[1419] Elder.

[1420] Mm -hmm.

[1421] Pull them aside.

[1422] Yeah.

[1423] And just said.

[1424] like basically just said like hey when when you wear that it makes us feel unsafe it reminds us of the single worst part of our history yeah and he took it off immediately and felt terrible and learned if everyone did that that would be incredible and amazing that's not the reality everyone could find themselves in a loving black church in the south well if everyone could hear those words and say oh this really causes pain, I'm going to stop doing this because it causes pain.

[1425] That would be great.

[1426] That would be awesome.

[1427] Yeah.

[1428] Maybe it will happen someday.

[1429] Yeah.

[1430] Something tells me that the people who don't understand that a flag represents slavery probably aren't listed in an armchair expert.

[1431] That's the bad news.

[1432] That's true.

[1433] I'm probably talking in our silo.

[1434] You're right.

[1435] Yeah, we get it.

[1436] No, we know.

[1437] We're already on your page.

[1438] But it's good then for people who are like -minded to us to hear that like the best approach, the best initial approach is kindness and education.

[1439] Yeah, yeah.

[1440] Yeah.

[1441] Okay, so you said eight years ago at any, at any given year, there were probably nine comedies that crossed $100 million and this year there wasn't a single one.

[1442] Last year there wasn't a single one.

[1443] And then you said, I'm probably leaving one out.

[1444] Girls' trip was a huge hit.

[1445] So in 2017, Girls' Trip did cross $100 million.

[1446] And then Daddy's Home 2.

[1447] also did.

[1448] Mm. Mm -hmm.

[1449] And then in 2018, this year, so far none have crossed.

[1450] Mm, we're pretty late in the year, too.

[1451] Yeah, we're in November.

[1452] Those $100 million commies generally don't come out in the fall.

[1453] Exactly.

[1454] They don't.

[1455] Probably not going to get there.

[1456] Yep.

[1457] And so far the highest grossing is night school at $71 million.

[1458] Tiffany Hattish.

[1459] That's right.

[1460] You're listening, Tiffany.

[1461] We really want you on the podcast.

[1462] Can you come on, man?

[1463] in 2008 to 10 years ago you referenced it was kind of hard for me to differentiate what was comedy and what was drama because there was like Horton here's a who Well cartoons I'm not gonna count no Well whatever there was still There was a lot there was like a lot Uh huh there was a lot But interestingly we might have figured something out On our conversation this week With Jason Manzukas Yeah another avenue I hadn't even considered in this Failing comedy business What do you say?

[1464] There weren't a paradigm show shift.

[1465] Yeah.

[1466] Yeah, it hasn't been to find the next big leg yet.

[1467] Yeah.

[1468] That was encouraging.

[1469] I like thinking about it that way because I think it's dead.

[1470] I think Instagram and YouTube has killed it.

[1471] But I'd be delighted to know that, no, there's just a new voice that this generation will gobble up and run to the theaters to see.

[1472] Well, I think the other aspect is like what you qualify is dead.

[1473] I mean, when you think about like I equated to commercials, before I was doing commercials way a long time ago, you could make like $200 ,000 on one commercial.

[1474] Well, can I tell you something?

[1475] Because I even did it 15 years before you.

[1476] And I was told that as well.

[1477] And that is not my experience.

[1478] I did a Miller -like commercial that they bought a trillion spots for and I made $17 ,000.

[1479] And I kept thinking.

[1480] $17 ,000?

[1481] Yeah, $17 ,000 all in.

[1482] That was weird.

[1483] That's weird then.

[1484] Well, all I'm saying is I knew all these old timers at these auditions that were telling me they were making $200 grand off a single candy commercial.

[1485] And yet I didn't know anyone in my circle and I was very much submerging.

[1486] So I think it might be a little bit of lore.

[1487] Well, maybe.

[1488] That could be true.

[1489] Although my friend's friend.

[1490] I'm already getting into choppy water.

[1491] She did an Olympics commercial a long time and she was really young.

[1492] And she, and she, I was told she made $150 ,000 on it.

[1493] And the thing is, I can see that being true based on some of the commercials I've done.

[1494] I haven't made nearly that amount.

[1495] But knowing that it's changed a lot.

[1496] Yeah.

[1497] What's the most you've ever made on a commercial?

[1498] A lot for you.

[1499] That doesn't seem right.

[1500] I think you got jipped.

[1501] Well, don't say that word anymore.

[1502] You're not allowed to say that?

[1503] Yeah, I love when you error.

[1504] It happens once in a million years.

[1505] You're not allowed to say that?

[1506] No, because it references gypsies.

[1507] Oh.

[1508] Oh, I never knew that.

[1509] They'll take advantage of you.

[1510] Oh, my God.

[1511] You'll get jipped if you do a deal with a gypsy.

[1512] Whoa.

[1513] So we're going to, that's all right.

[1514] I'm not going to say it anymore.

[1515] You just have.

[1516] I had a Confederate flag.

[1517] Oh, my God.

[1518] I can't believe it all happened in real time.

[1519] This is incredible.

[1520] I'm not going to say that again.

[1521] Although, that's really interesting because in my brain it's spelled J -I -P -E -D.

[1522] Oh, really?

[1523] Yeah.

[1524] I had no idea.

[1525] I had no idea.

[1526] Well, now I know.

[1527] Yikes, embarrassing.

[1528] So anyway, I think you got screwed.

[1529] You can't say that anymore.

[1530] That references the Scrumerians from Mesopotamia.

[1531] Um, yeah.

[1532] We used to insist on having sex before they'd close any grain deal.

[1533] Here's the best part about me making 17.

[1534] It was 1 ,000 more than I made on the entire season of punked.

[1535] I made $16 ,000 on punk.

[1536] I had a few 24 bits that took.

[1537] It almost took a year to film that verse.

[1538] Yeah.

[1539] That's a big, that was a big year for you.

[1540] Honestly, it was because I made like 33 ,000 bucks.

[1541] And prior to that, never made more than $8 ,000.

[1542] Wow.

[1543] Yeah, yeah.

[1544] Eight.

[1545] I can't believe you even lived.

[1546] Oh, I lived.

[1547] I lived like a king, too.

[1548] I was drunk all the time.

[1549] I ate sandwiches and stuff.

[1550] And alcohol costs a good amount of money.

[1551] It didn't.

[1552] I'd buy these 32 ounces of Miller High Life at the Savon.

[1553] They were $1 .19.

[1554] It was mainly beer you were drinking.

[1555] No, no. I would drink early times was the cheap version of Jack Daniels.

[1556] I drink that.

[1557] A bunch of knockoff liquors.

[1558] Oh, wow.

[1559] Then I had friends who had nice liquor and I'd drink their liquor too.

[1560] Yeah, you'd steal.

[1561] The more compelling thing is how I did drugs because those were pricey.

[1562] Yeah.

[1563] For there's a will, there's a way.

[1564] I guess so.

[1565] Okay, so you said West Bloomfield is the second highest concentration of Jews outside of Israel per capita.

[1566] Oh, God.

[1567] If you ruin this for me, I'll be so sad.

[1568] I'm of course going to.

[1569] Because you guys are also saying it's the highest black population.

[1570] It can't be the highest every single population.

[1571] Well, no, Detroit was the highest percentage, not total.

[1572] I keep doing it.

[1573] 92 % black at one point.

[1574] Okay.

[1575] Here we go.

[1576] According to the North American Jewish data bank, the 104 counties and independent cities as of 2011, in a few years, with the largest Jewish communities as a percentage of population were.

[1577] Number one, Rockland County, New York, 29 .3%.

[1578] Number two, Kings County, New York, 22 .4%.

[1579] Number three, Nassau County, New York.

[1580] New York's really holding down the fort, 17.

[1581] 2%, Oakland County, Michigan is 41 on the list.

[1582] Yeah, but...

[1583] 5 .1 % of their population.

[1584] Just to be clear, I didn't claim Oakland County at the highest concentration.

[1585] Well, that's the only Michigan one.

[1586] Right.

[1587] I said West Bloomfield, which is a city within Oakland County.

[1588] And let me just tell you about Oakland County.

[1589] None of those Jews live anywhere but West Bloomfield and Bloomfield Hills.

[1590] So the fact that I made 41 in a county that's really just WASP, I was only saying West Bloomfield.

[1591] which is a city.

[1592] Maybe we could do a city diet.

[1593] It says of 104 counties and independent cities as of 2011.

[1594] Yeah, but you're naming counties.

[1595] But those are probably...

[1596] I didn't hear any cities.

[1597] I know because those are probably the ones with the highest population.

[1598] I don't know.

[1599] I don't know, but I don't think you're right.

[1600] We got to earmark this, though.

[1601] We got to do cities.

[1602] Okay?

[1603] Because that was my claim.

[1604] I know you hate me. You hate me very much right now.

[1605] There's no way there's more Jewish people.

[1606] than in one of the cities in Rockland County then.

[1607] Like, there's just no way.

[1608] Well, that's what you're saying, but I don't know that that's true.

[1609] If there's 29 .3 % Jewish people in that whole county...

[1610] You think there's a city within it, but I'm telling you that I think that West Bloomfield's over 50 % Jewish.

[1611] Okay.

[1612] I don't know why you're so mad at me. Because I can't, I won't be able to find that.

[1613] This is the best statistics we're going to have.

[1614] The reasonable conclusion is that's not.

[1615] That's not the reason of a conclusion because this number one county could have Jews spread all throughout the county.

[1616] But I'm telling you Oakland County doesn't have Jews spread all throughout Oakland County.

[1617] It's primarily just in West Bloomfield and Bloomfield Hills.

[1618] Okay.

[1619] We'll do more digging.

[1620] Okay, we can't.

[1621] You very may well still be right.

[1622] I just think you think literally 41 on the list compared to all these other, mainly all these New York counties.

[1623] Still super possible.

[1624] Okay.

[1625] So I'm telling you that just those two cities tip the whole.

[1626] county up into the top 50.

[1627] So yeah, I think it's still possible.

[1628] Okay.

[1629] I would love if we could disagree about this.

[1630] You'd not be mad at me. But you're not mad.

[1631] It's just don't you think if I'm researching and I'm typing in all the stuff that at some point West Bloomfield would have come up in my research, probably if that were true.

[1632] I don't, I don't know.

[1633] I don't know if you search counties or cities or.

[1634] That's fine.

[1635] Yeah.

[1636] Yeah.

[1637] We can keep looking.

[1638] Okay.

[1639] Ayra is right, though, that he said Dearborn, Michigan is the most Arab city in the country.

[1640] The city's population includes 40 ,000 Arab Americans.

[1641] Per the 2000 census, Arab Americans totaled 29 ,181 or 29 .85 % of Dearborn's population.

[1642] The city has a largest proportion of Arab Americans in the United States.

[1643] So, he's right about that.

[1644] I'm not shocked.

[1645] He's very smart.

[1646] Mm -hmm.

[1647] He also has a higher bar.

[1648] Like, he's on NPR.

[1649] He really has to get his shit, right?

[1650] He's more of, like, a journalist than us.

[1651] He is, he is, yeah.

[1652] Not a little bit more.

[1653] Like, he's a journalist and we're not.

[1654] Yeah.

[1655] Oh, one thing I wanted to clarify is we talk about wild ball a country so much on here.

[1656] And we often come to the conclusion that, you know, they're in a cult, but ultimately they're happier.

[1657] Seemed happier.

[1658] who is really winning and who's losing here.

[1659] But what we never really say, which I think it's time for us to say, is they were doing some really shady stuff.

[1660] They were like poisoning a town.

[1661] Some of the people were.

[1662] There was some bad stuff happening, some harmful stuff happening.

[1663] So we can't say that it was just totally pure and everyone was, people were happy, but.

[1664] I agree.

[1665] You know what I mean?

[1666] I still like to think it was a smaller percentage of the Rushneeshis that were like out there poisoning things.

[1667] It was, I think.

[1668] But the fact that these happy people are worshipping humans who are poisoning towns and doing this stuff, just because you're happy doesn't mean that's okay.

[1669] 100%.

[1670] And I think I say when we talk about it, I like to say at least, maybe I'm not saying enough that both sides came to escalation.

[1671] Like that, to me, the big learning principle of that whole documentary is the difference between de -escalating and escalating, because both sides just kept escalating.

[1672] You know, they shut down their town.

[1673] Then they got enough residents in there to overthrow the election.

[1674] Then they changed the county rule.

[1675] Then they changed, you know, like, so great.

[1676] So they shipped in all these people.

[1677] To me, it's just like, both sides were tremendously guilty.

[1678] It was like just escalating beyond belief.

[1679] Yeah.

[1680] I guess they both felt like that was the only way to get what they wanted.

[1681] I would have been one of those idiots.

[1682] I know that's a shortcoming of mine.

[1683] Who, what?

[1684] Like if you push me, I'm going to punch you.

[1685] And if you punch me, I'm going to stab you.

[1686] You know, like, that's my worst quality.

[1687] I don't know that I would have poisoned a salad bar, though.

[1688] I don't think I would have.

[1689] That's really, that's, that's a lot.

[1690] I started thinking, wait, is this, like, if I'm ever going to an AA meeting, and they're like, let's go before the meeting, we're going to poison Bob's big boy.

[1691] I'd be like, I can't do that.

[1692] Yeah.

[1693] Yeah.

[1694] So we talk about blame the episode on Radio Lab.

[1695] You also talked about Radio Lab, and then you felt guilty.

[1696] Yeah, I did, yeah.

[1697] But I do want people to listen to that and listen to the other part of that Blame episode, too.

[1698] There's three parts.

[1699] You detailed one.

[1700] The other one for me is the most powerful part of that whole episode.

[1701] Well, there's the porn addiction, the guy whose daughter got murdered.

[1702] And what was the third one?

[1703] That one I can't remember.

[1704] Oh, I thought you were saying the third one.

[1705] No, porn addiction.

[1706] Oh, you liked that one the most.

[1707] Yeah.

[1708] What do you think?

[1709] Well, as a brief rundown for.

[1710] our audience.

[1711] The episode is about a guy who basically has a brain surgery.

[1712] It fixes epilepsy.

[1713] And then that was great.

[1714] Everything went well.

[1715] No more seizures.

[1716] No more seizures.

[1717] And then a couple years later, the FBI knocked us on the door.

[1718] Yeah.

[1719] Homeland Security, I think it was.

[1720] And he had all the child pornography on his computer.

[1721] In addition to bestiality, underage.

[1722] Yeah.

[1723] Yeah.

[1724] He had every single thing.

[1725] Yeah.

[1726] And they basically can.

[1727] included that it happened during the surgery that they like fucked up his brain.

[1728] Yep.

[1729] The part of your brain that would tell your, yeah, your pleasure center, well, yeah, we want that, but that's ridiculous.

[1730] Yeah.

[1731] There was no communication.

[1732] Yeah, they had like, like tapped it or like took it out on accident or something.

[1733] And yeah.

[1734] And the even sadder part I thought was completely treatable condition.

[1735] Once the psychiatrist discovered what happened, they said, oh this is what happened this can happen in that procedure but don't worry we have this medicine we'll put them on and it'll dull that pleasure center and he'll be completely back to normal and they're like yeah well tough shitty still has to serve some time yeah yeah for me that that story is the most compelling because it's very enlightening about the human brain and like when people do bad shit can you like it's not is it their fault yeah that's why it was called blame it might not And, like, how can we...

[1736] You have to be so generous and benevolent to view things that way.

[1737] Especially if it's your family member who's been a victim of these things.

[1738] I know.

[1739] I've also seen it, though.

[1740] I've seen it in life.

[1741] Like, I've seen people have brain stuff.

[1742] And we're just, we're so powerless to it.

[1743] Yeah.

[1744] It's scary.

[1745] The whole, the whole system seems a little precarious.

[1746] It seems a little, it seems very fragile.

[1747] It doesn't seem like it'd take much to disrupt.

[1748] You know, keeping you acting like a semi -normal human being.

[1749] Yeah, I know.

[1750] Me on drugs quite often.

[1751] I mean, like, I look at some of my behavior.

[1752] I can't compute the person that would do that stuff.

[1753] Yeah.

[1754] Oh.

[1755] That's scary.

[1756] It's so weird.

[1757] Yeah.

[1758] So everyone should really check that out.

[1759] Um, how many episodes of this American life?

[1760] 659.

[1761] I'll be excited when they do 10 more.

[1762] 669.

[1763] Oh.

[1764] Yeah.

[1765] That would be a hot episode.

[1766] Oh, gosh.

[1767] Actually, I can't wait until they get to 6 ,969 episodes.

[1768] 69 -69.

[1769] Yeah, you'll love that.

[1770] Maybe they should have that guy on where his pleasure center is all going wacky.

[1771] Oh, no. Oh, it's raining again.

[1772] It's just a little pitter -patter, though.

[1773] It's going to clear up really quick.

[1774] Let's go.

[1775] Oh, Son's out.

[1776] Sonny.

[1777] Okay, so you said everything gets 40 % better on an airplane because you're, trapped.

[1778] And that's not a real figure.

[1779] No. But we are more likely to cry on airplanes.

[1780] Oh, really?

[1781] Uh -huh.

[1782] There's been a lot of research.

[1783] Nothing super definitive, but there's an article in Time magazine, and it said a mix of psychological factors related to the plane's altitude and a perceived loss of control can cause a person to break down emotionally once in the air.

[1784] We have little control over our environment while we are traveling by plane.

[1785] Although we may not be consciously aware of our emotional vulnerability, our emotional brain is working over time.

[1786] I cry on planes sometimes.

[1787] You do?

[1788] Yeah, and not very much in life.

[1789] Not with much provocation?

[1790] I cried last time I was on an airplane.

[1791] You did?

[1792] Last two weeks ago.

[1793] Why?

[1794] I think you cried after you got off the airplane.

[1795] I cried both.

[1796] Before.

[1797] I cried on the airplane.

[1798] Okay.

[1799] Uh -oh.

[1800] I feel bad now.

[1801] Don't feel bad.

[1802] I was editing an airplane.

[1803] episode of our podcast and I got upset.

[1804] Oh.

[1805] Though, if I'm going to be honest, I also did have one mimosa.

[1806] Okay, great.

[1807] So it was a real recipe for a little tear session.

[1808] Did you enjoy it?

[1809] Can you, because I do recall when I used to cry, it being very nice.

[1810] Carthartic.

[1811] Yeah, just like you like releases all the stress.

[1812] It depends on why you're crying.

[1813] Okay.

[1814] If it gets resolved, yeah.

[1815] Okay.

[1816] But if it's not or if it's.

[1817] because you're angry, it's not, doesn't feel good.

[1818] I don't cry very much at all.

[1819] No. But I've made you cry like five times, I think, in the last four years.

[1820] Kristen's made me cry too.

[1821] Oh, good.

[1822] Isn't that you guys aren't making me?

[1823] That's not a fair.

[1824] That's not fair.

[1825] I'm crying in reaction to you guys.

[1826] I feel much better now.

[1827] Look, but you know who else makes me cry?

[1828] My parents.

[1829] So that's, so that's all.

[1830] Also, mm -hmm.

[1831] Your brother ever make you cry?

[1832] Oh, they do?

[1833] Yeah.

[1834] Like if they're, and it's so embarrassing.

[1835] If they're disappointed in you or just when you're mad at them?

[1836] You mostly cry out of anger, which is interesting.

[1837] I do.

[1838] Or embarrassment.

[1839] Oh, uh -huh.

[1840] Did you cry the time you hit the door leaving that place?

[1841] I think I might have.

[1842] You might have?

[1843] After you got clear of all of us.

[1844] Man, I loved it and you hated it, but it was so great.

[1845] I ran into a door.

[1846] A glass door.

[1847] A glass door.

[1848] A glass door.

[1849] It really almost went through the glass.

[1850] It was so embarrassing.

[1851] And all of our friends were there.

[1852] We were going to see Bob play, right?

[1853] Yes, we were seeing Bob play, and it was after.

[1854] And all our friends were there.

[1855] Ryan and Amy were there and other people.

[1856] And then I...

[1857] You pulled an Ace Ventura.

[1858] It was so weird.

[1859] It's like one of those very, like, cartoonish moments.

[1860] Like a popout.

[1861] It was a big pop out.

[1862] Yeah.

[1863] Anyway, have you ever cried on an airplane?

[1864] No. Is it in your life?

[1865] Mm -mm.

[1866] Do you ever watch sad movies on the airplane?

[1867] Yeah.

[1868] Oh.

[1869] I'll watch any movie on an airplane.

[1870] I literally watch movies where I go, I can't believe I'm about to hit play.

[1871] And then I love them.

[1872] Oh, really?

[1873] Yeah.

[1874] Like, I watch movies I think I'm going to hate.

[1875] Oh.

[1876] Why not?

[1877] I'm just sitting there.

[1878] You don't watch a movie I hate's better than twiddling my thumbs.

[1879] I've been watching crazy stupid love on the plane.

[1880] Over and over again, the movie?

[1881] Oh, really?

[1882] Yeah.

[1883] You're so interesting.

[1884] I like it for my plane movie.

[1885] And I have cry at that, too.

[1886] Oh.

[1887] I can't believe you watch it over and over again.

[1888] Yeah, that's how I pretty much consume most things.

[1889] That's it.

[1890] Oh, that's it?

[1891] Yeah.

[1892] Great.

[1893] Thank you.

[1894] I love you.

[1895] I love you.

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