The Good Place Week: Mike Schur

[0] Hello, everybody.

[1] Welcome to armchair expert.

[2] I'm Dax Shepard.

[3] I'm joined by Monica Padman and Wobby Wob.

[4] Your third installment in The Good Place Week is Mike Sher.

[5] He's an incredibly special show creator.

[6] Everyone who's ever worked for him loves him, which is a reputation that's almost impossible to get as a showrunner.

[7] Running a show is by far the hardest thing in show business.

[8] People give directors a lot of credit.

[9] They need to give show runners all the credit.

[10] My friend Rob McElheny.

[11] You're beast mode if you're a showrunner.

[12] Maryweather.

[13] You're doing everything.

[14] Yeah, your favorite, Mindy Kaling.

[15] These people are beasts.

[16] They are work machines.

[17] So to execute that job, it's hard not to break a lot of eggs.

[18] Yeah.

[19] You would be a special person to be loved, and he is universally loved.

[20] Now, as I've reflected on this episode, because we had to slowly record these over the course of time, knowing we were going to put them all in one week.

[21] So this was a while back.

[22] Yeah.

[23] And he and I get into some debates that I've since had with other guests.

[24] Right.

[25] I want to say my positions even evolved a bit.

[26] Maybe.

[27] maybe but you'll hear some retread that's just a warning i haven't devolved i guess that's i felt compelled to say that this happened a little while ago but yeah i get you know i really like to talk to him about what's funny what's not funny and i don't think anyone will feel disappointed or tired of any of these conversations because mike brings a very specifically he's got a lot of conviction he is i love him so much you're so in love with him yeah i am i think he's one of the coolest, most evolved people on earth.

[28] Yeah.

[29] I really do.

[30] I think he's so fantastic.

[31] And you will too when you listen to this.

[32] Yeah.

[33] So, you know, if I'm being honest, like, I don't even, I don't think it occurred to me until just this moment.

[34] Maybe there's a tiny bit of tension with the fact that my wife loves him, too.

[35] He's the other man in her life.

[36] They spend a lot of time together.

[37] And she is head over heels for him, as he deserves to be head over heels over.

[38] And you too are head over heels.

[39] So he's kind of, maybe I was feeling a little competitive that you guys love him so much.

[40] And I'm just this caveman, wipes my ass with bark.

[41] Yeah.

[42] You know?

[43] He's not a caveman.

[44] He hits people with clubs.

[45] He's an evolved man. Yeah, we've picked opposite lanes.

[46] Let's just say that in our approach to being attractive.

[47] But anyways, I have a ton of respect for him.

[48] He is so smart and he's such a brilliant writer.

[49] And again, an amazing leader.

[50] That's basically what a showrunner is.

[51] He empowers people and he's a great guy.

[52] His name is Mike Scher, and he is up now.

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

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

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

[56] Mike Scher, welcome to the armchair expert.

[57] Thank you.

[58] This is the earliest one we've ever done in it.

[59] It was a concession to your busy schedule.

[60] So I just want you to know that the, you know, you have a lot to deliver on.

[61] I also have, I have pull with your production team.

[62] You do.

[63] You're on the inside track.

[64] So I would have said this in the intro, but obviously Mike, sure, is my wife's boss.

[65] So the stakes are also high for me because you're supposed to be nice to your spouse's boss.

[66] Can I say she calls me boss in person and it's, it makes me feel absurd.

[67] It does.

[68] Yeah, like I, it's, I mean, she's doing it.

[69] obviously a little bit jokingly, even though legally, technically it's true.

[70] It's true.

[71] But calling me boss, I feel like I want to giggle and say like, I'm not your boss.

[72] That's crazy.

[73] In general, do you not think of yourself as a boss or just her boss?

[74] I don't think of myself as a boss of anyone except the other writers.

[75] Yeah.

[76] You got to whip them into shape, right?

[77] Yeah.

[78] But also, you know, TV production is such that there are many bosses.

[79] The real boss of the show is the line producer who kind of oversees the hiring of much of the crew and kind of runs the ship, really.

[80] Who is?

[81] Morgan Sackett.

[82] Morgan.

[83] And I've had the pleasure of being around Morgan.

[84] And he has a superpower that we discussed at your house at dinner one time, which is he gives zero feedback if you make a joke, right?

[85] He looks like Mount Rushmore.

[86] You could tell the world's best joke.

[87] And he would stare at you.

[88] And he might say, that's funny, but he will not laugh.

[89] He is an Easter Island head of a man. Yes.

[90] And he looks and talks like New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick.

[91] Yeah, absolutely.

[92] He's like a skinny Belichick.

[93] Yes.

[94] And so, yes, but when, because he is so taciturn, when you do get him to laugh, you feel like a world champion.

[95] Exactly.

[96] Well, that's what I want.

[97] I wondered if there is something to his lack of feedback that is appealing to you.

[98] Because for me as a comedian, I'm just an approval junkie.

[99] You know, I want to run around.

[100] and just that my pay is you smiling.

[101] So when he doesn't smile at me, it just makes me hit the throttle harder.

[102] I mean, one, like, you find yourself just like tap dancing.

[103] Like, you remember the Daffy Duck cartoon where like he comes out and he tap dances and he ends his tap, his manic tap dancing by thrusting his arms out and looking at the audience and just breathing like, yeah, I tell you around people who don't give it up.

[104] That's like, that's how I always end up feeling.

[105] And I had, I think I recommended to him at that dinner that.

[106] that he should just take classes at UCB, which is a comedy theater because surely there would be lots of female comedians that would not be able to make him laugh.

[107] And that would be a superpower unto itself.

[108] Interesting, yeah.

[109] Yeah, like if I had had that foresight when I was going through the ground lanes, if I just stayed stone face, I probably could have done so well.

[110] You're describing the game thing of like nagging people basically.

[111] Oh, that book, game about how to get laid?

[112] Was that part of?

[113] I believe that.

[114] And he gave that a term, negging?

[115] Negging, yeah.

[116] Come on.

[117] Well, it's like you just don't like, don't praise anyone or are you tell them that they're not funny or whatever.

[118] But I think that's bad advice.

[119] There was a, of course it is a terrible.

[120] Hold on, no, no. It is, I assume somewhat effective if the person's an approval junkie, right?

[121] Because there's also an old Richard Gear quote, I want to say in like either, American Jigelow or something, which was treat queens like whores and horrors like queens.

[122] Do you remember that?

[123] I mean, there's a terribly un -cool thing to say currently.

[124] All of like, like all of that book and like most quote movie quotes from the 70s, it just is a kind of brand of misogyny that I have no interest in trafficking in.

[125] Right, right, right.

[126] In society.

[127] Yeah.

[128] And I would say, look, on this huge spectrum of like liberal or conservative or progressive or whatnot.

[129] I think of myself is, you know, 60 % just a bit left of center.

[130] Okay.

[131] And then I think you're beyond me left, right?

[132] Yes.

[133] So yeah.

[134] And you're right.

[135] Just by the opening bars of this conversation that was established.

[136] But yeah, you are, you are particularly, and by the way, I admire it.

[137] So I applaud it.

[138] I don't know what my weird, I have some weird fears, I guess.

[139] in some of them, and this is a great question for you, is I feel like we whittle away more and more of what can be made fun of, just generally speaking.

[140] You mean?

[141] Like in the 70s, to your point, you could have fucking porkies.

[142] That was a movie, everyone loved it, you know, whatever.

[143] You could do racial humor, you could do sexist humor, you could do pretty much anything.

[144] The sky was the limit.

[145] For better or worse, I'm not saying it should be that way now, but I guess I do have this slight little fear that we're getting more and more and more and more and more narrow on what we're allowed to actually make fun of.

[146] Well, okay, I would say a couple things.

[147] Number one, when you say you could do this kind of humor or you could do that kind of humor, the definition of you there is white men, right?

[148] Oh, yeah, that's a good point.

[149] When you're, it's like the, the, the people who lament the loss of the ability to make fun of certain things are almost always the dominant power position people who have, who never were on the other end of it.

[150] Right.

[151] There's never been a like, and that's why those arguments are always people on the far right often make this argument of like what if the white what if we had white history month or whatever it's like motherfucker every month is white history month yeah so so when you so that that's the first thing i say about that general idea the second thing is i don't think anyone is interested in making the world less funny i think that the the question is constantly now as people are like waking up to some kind of systemic calcified injustices in a number of different ways in the society in which we live The question is like, are we going to continue to blindly make fun of entire groups of people without considering the consequences or considering the meaning of it or considering the effect it has on people?

[152] And my point is always, no, we're not.

[153] We shouldn't be doing that.

[154] What we should be doing is saying like, oh, I'm, I think the tradeoff of now I can't make the same kind of jokes I made in the 70s.

[155] And the tradeoff you're getting is entire groups of people don't feel marginalized and ridiculed.

[156] I feel like we got to take that quote, hit, end quote, and just not make those jokes anymore.

[157] Well, and also, you might need to be a little less lazy.

[158] It's probably the lowest hanging fruit on the tree, right?

[159] So it's got to then drive you to come up with even, you know, a whole new genre maybe of comedy.

[160] And if you want, I mean, I think now, even like looking back at movies that, like, you, how old are you?

[161] 71.

[162] You're 71.

[163] No, I'm 43.

[164] I'm 43.

[165] So we're almost exactly the same image.

[166] I'm 42.

[167] Fuck you.

[168] I do this thing unconsciously where if someone's more successful than me, I just go, oh, they're older than me. So I was certain you were at least 45.

[169] No, I'm 42.

[170] But not that you look 45, just that, you know, your accomplishments told me, oh, he's got to be older than me. That's kind of you.

[171] The point is, like, when I go back and look at movies that you and I, that were from our childhood.

[172] Yeah.

[173] It's horrifying to me, the jokes that are made in those movies.

[174] Yeah, like, and I don't want to cite specific examples, but there is.

[175] Let's just talk about, Fletch, is that one of our favorite movies?

[176] I love Fletch.

[177] Yeah, it's top, right, top five.

[178] Yeah.

[179] What's some others that we love?

[180] Well, for me, it was like Ghostbusters, Fledge.

[181] I was, I didn't, I wasn't into the Caddyshack Animal House.

[182] I wasn't that into that.

[183] Yeah.

[184] Those movies are garbage in terms of their politics.

[185] Oh, okay.

[186] And they had a political.

[187] No, they don't, I don't mean, when I say politics, I don't, I don't, I don't mean, when I say politics, mean, like, expressed politics.

[188] I just mean, like, the kinds of jokes they traffic in and stuff.

[189] And also, by the way, like, you know, think about all of those movies.

[190] Where are, where is any non -white dude in those movies?

[191] Where is any non -white writer, non -white director, non -white actor?

[192] Like, think about Fletch.

[193] Think about, like, there's no reason that, you know, there's one, uh, African -American actor in that movie.

[194] And he plays like a junkie, right?

[195] It's like, that's just, oh, at the beginning.

[196] Yeah.

[197] His name is, uh, like, Bobo or something.

[198] He has a, he is a fun name, despite the fact that he'd be portrayed as a chunky.

[199] He does have a fun name.

[200] That's what counted his characters for black actors.

[201] Is they a fun name?

[202] Well, okay, you could say that, but at the exact same time as that movie, you also have Eddie Murphy movies and you have.

[203] So they're playing heroes as well.

[204] And but Eddie Murphy, I mean, go, try to watch some of his stand -up specials now, man. It is not easy.

[205] They are not, yes, he, he is not nice things to say about gay people.

[206] Oh, sure, sure, yeah, yeah.

[207] So it's so, that's what I'm saying.

[208] saying though when we were kids look we this was that was just the world like I did it so when I was in when I was in high school I directed plays and when I say plays I mean like there were evenings one one year my junior year we did a Monty Python night and my senior year we did a Saturday Night and I love what a comedy nerd you are I mean you're doing that in high school you deserve everything you've got by the way we didn't most of us for Monty Python night didn't need scripts because we just memorized this the whole stuff but in there's There's a, in, you know, the famous lumberjack song, the Monty Python saying, I'm a lumberjack and I'm okay, work all night and asleep all day.

[209] What happens is they start talking about how they're, like, I wear high heel, I'm a lumberjack, I'm, okay, whatever, I wear high heels, suspenders and a bra.

[210] It becomes about how they're transvestites or cross -dressers or whatever.

[211] Yeah.

[212] And in the sketch, they start screaming the F word at the other, like the audience kind of, of the sketch, starts screaming the F word at the men.

[213] Okay.

[214] And we just did that.

[215] We had high school kids on stage screaming that word because it was part of the sketch.

[216] And now when I think back on that, it's like, I mean, good Lord, I never thought for one second about how horrifying that is.

[217] And now 30 years later or whatever it is, 25 years later, you would never do that.

[218] In a million years, you would never do that.

[219] Well, I had a sketch at the groundlings that I wrote with my friend Josh Nathan where we were in high school and we were egging a kid's house and we were calling him queer and fag and all these things.

[220] And then as the sketch is unfolding, we're like, what are you doing in that room?

[221] Come in your fucking beautiful hair.

[222] You know, and then it becomes reveal we're very, very in love with Sean.

[223] And we're accusing him of being gay, but we're clearly in love with Sean.

[224] Now, you know, I don't know where that falls on the spectrum now.

[225] Certainly, what I knew know for sure is we couldn't currently get through the beginning of the sketch before the turn is revealed, right?

[226] And I, you know, so it's interesting to me. So you, when you watch, say, Eddie Murphy's stuff, right?

[227] And he's doing, because what he would, he would play a gay cop, right?

[228] Yeah, he had over, right?

[229] Didn't he have a whole routine about that?

[230] And he had the whole, the whole first 10 minutes of raw, I think it's raw, are just him in the leather suit saying like, you know, they're looking at my ass and that all that stuff.

[231] I mean, it's obviously ironic because he then later was pulled over for having a trans prostitute in his car with him.

[232] So like, who knows what the psychology is there.

[233] Yeah.

[234] But there's, I think it's pretty transparent, but yeah.

[235] I don't want to speculate.

[236] I take big leaps on this show.

[237] I'm going to say that that's, yeah.

[238] But yeah, I mean, there was a lot, like he had a, his classic, like, mincing gay voice was a pretty constant statement.

[239] Yeah, it was a character he did.

[240] Yeah.

[241] Yeah.

[242] Yeah.

[243] But so when you, so when you're watching that, you can't divorce yourself from today's reality, right?

[244] You can't like just go back to being 10.

[245] No way.

[246] Like I can, I just showed, Kristen really had no awareness of.

[247] of Andrew Dice Clay.

[248] Right.

[249] And somehow it came up and we started watching all the videos of him like from the beginning, you know, lighting a cigarette for five minutes and then, you know, I've got my tongue up this chick's.

[250] Bell loved it.

[251] Really?

[252] Oh my God.

[253] Did she fucking love it?

[254] Because it's, first of all, she can just, she recognizes what context the jokes were being made in, right?

[255] Like that's not hard for her to figure out that this thing at that time that the intention was not negative or evil.

[256] See, I would, I would disagree.

[257] You would say his intention was.

[258] I think he was just a toxic nightmare of a dude who was like I'm going to, I sense a void for toxic negativity and I'm going to fill it.

[259] Like I hated him when I was a kid.

[260] You did.

[261] Despised him.

[262] I found him to be, first of all, I didn't laugh at anything he ever did.

[263] Even when I was 15, I didn't laugh.

[264] You didn't.

[265] No. And I didn't understand why people did laugh.

[266] And I thought his like hickory dickery doc.

[267] Yeah.

[268] Like I found none of that funny.

[269] Okay.

[270] And for and I, it just, I still haven't.

[271] Like I've never, I, sometimes I, but really quick.

[272] Yeah.

[273] Was he not funny because like when I was watching it with my brother as a kid, he was clearly a bozo.

[274] He was not, there was no part of us that thought that Andrew Dice Clay, the man on stage walked out onto, you know, Fifth Avenue and was that person.

[275] It was like, look how preposterous this, you know, generic New Jersey.

[276] Jersey type character can go.

[277] And so it was clearly to us making fun of that stereotype of the New Jersey dude.

[278] But that's not how you.

[279] No, I mean, honestly, it may have been that I just didn't, I wasn't aware enough of the stereotype or something to even consider whether it was a mockery of that stereotype.

[280] All I knew is I didn't find any of his jokes funny and I thought his attitude was awful and disgusting.

[281] And I didn't, I just didn't find it funny.

[282] Right.

[283] It just didn't make me laugh.

[284] And so I, and then I remember when he hosted S &L and Nora Dunn very famously said, if you, if you let this guy host, I'm not, I'm walking.

[285] Uh -huh.

[286] And then she did.

[287] And for the rest of my life, I've been like, Nora Dunn's the best.

[288] I love Nora Dunn.

[289] Yeah.

[290] So that was a really historic moment, right?

[291] So he, he hosted kind of at the height of his stand -up career.

[292] And there were protesters in the audience, right?

[293] Yep.

[294] And what was the fallout of that whole thing?

[295] Other than Nora, did you say Nora?

[296] Nora Dunn refused.

[297] In my memory, I hope I have this right, Nora Dunn refused to be on the show and in fact left the show.

[298] I think that her last show was the week before he was on, I think.

[299] Yeah.

[300] And what I think the real fallout was he sucked on the show.

[301] And I think that was sort of the peak of his popularity.

[302] Like that, that week that he was like he had hit the mainstream.

[303] Well, famously, what really took him down right is he then went on Arsenio Hall and he cried.

[304] That's right.

[305] That was the actual end.

[306] Like if you, I believe there's even a documentary about it.

[307] But he cried.

[308] And so I would say this is in defense of my point.

[309] All of a sudden, you went, ooh, this is weird.

[310] He's a character, but now he's out there as Andrew Dice Clay.

[311] But now the real human being not playing the Dice character is crying on Arsenial.

[312] And then it just shattered everything for all of his fans.

[313] Yeah, like there's something, you know, profound about that whole thing in some way.

[314] I don't know what to gleam from.

[315] I have zero sympathy for him.

[316] Yeah.

[317] I don't care.

[318] I think he's a terrible person and I don't want him to succeed.

[319] Right.

[320] Do you ever hear him on Stern?

[321] No, I'm not a Stern guy.

[322] Oh, you're not?

[323] No, I missed Stern somehow entirely.

[324] And you grew up in Connecticut?

[325] I grew up in Connecticut, but I wasn't, I just didn't.

[326] My dad was really into Stern.

[327] and he would listen to him.

[328] My parents were split up when I was nine and my dad was living in southern Connecticut and when I would go to his house for the weekends.

[329] Like he would...

[330] Because it was being broadcasts out of New York.

[331] At a New York, he would get it in New York, yeah.

[332] Right.

[333] But I just kind of missed it.

[334] I just didn't quite, for whatever reason.

[335] And do you probably, if you didn't like Dice, was he maybe too misogynistic as well?

[336] Yeah, I think...

[337] Throwing bologna at people's...

[338] By the time I like, by the time I kind of like dabble, I could get into Stern at all because, like, knew who he was and he had gone national and stuff.

[339] I think it was probably the same problem.

[340] I was just like, he's just talking about strippers and like, I just like, it doesn't suffer me. Yeah.

[341] So I think I might have told you the story already, but Bell had, you know, a similar aversion to Howard Stern.

[342] And I had done the show and I really got along with him and I liked him.

[343] And then I wanted to, he was in town and we got invited to go out to dinner.

[344] And Kristen was like, absolutely not.

[345] I'm not going to dinner with the guy who throws baloney.

[346] at women's ass.

[347] I'm like, I get it.

[348] He is a different person than the character on his show.

[349] Whatever.

[350] I beg her to go to dinner with him.

[351] And then we sit down and he starts asking her questions.

[352] And within 45 seconds, I'm seeing that she has this glow about her that she hasn't had since the first two months we were dating.

[353] And she fell head over heels in love with him.

[354] And has since been to his house without me. Like my dad was sick.

[355] I'm like, we got to cancel the trip to Howard's house and she said, no, I'm still going to Howard's house and tell your dad, I love him.

[356] I think Howard, Howard Stern is, to me, is a very different thing than Andrew Dice Clay.

[357] Indeis Clay to me was a one -trick pony and the trick wasn't that interesting.

[358] Howard Stern is a talented, deeply talented person.

[359] It takes an immense amount of talent to do what he does.

[360] And I also more, frankly, believe in the idea that he is playing a character than I do with Andrew Dice Clay.

[361] I think Andrew Dice Clay was a toxic asshole who was like got fame.

[362] money for being a toxic asshole and then then it ran out and then he was done.

[363] Howard Stern is obviously like a he's a broadcaster.

[364] He's like a person who has a deep...

[365] He's Bill Murray Letterman.

[366] Can I tell you a great Howard Stern story?

[367] No, no, we got to move on.

[368] We're under a tight, tight time construction.

[369] So Howard, so my my wife is Regis Philbin's daughter.

[370] I was going to bring that up, but I'm glad you did.

[371] And so so Stern used to kill Regis all the time.

[372] Just make fun so much fun of him and just you know of course he did right yeah so one day and and regis you know is a new york hero at the time and people are kind of saying like hey howard did this do you again he's like oh so okay doesn't really care um or doesn't really know what's going on so Howard but he know but he's aware that Howard is is killing him on the radio yeah so Howard moves into regis's building totally accidentally he moved buys like the you know the penthouse in the building and one day they're in the elevator together and they get on and Stern gets in and it's awkward and Regis turned to him and says also a gigantic height difference if they never speak and we just have a 30 second shot of them taking the elevator down it's already a golden story it's a girl from Epinema's playing to his brothers so so Howard says so Regis Philbin how are you and Howard Regis Philbin how are you?

[373] And Howard says hi Regis and he goes hey can I show you you're new to the building right can I show you my let me show you my apartment and Howard says, okay.

[374] So they get off of Regis's floor and he walks in and he just shows him around the apartment.

[375] He tells him how long he's lived there.

[376] He tells him about the neighborhood.

[377] One thing leads to another.

[378] They become friends.

[379] And Howard goes on the show the next day and he says, I was totally wrong.

[380] I'm like a straight up admitting I'm wrong.

[381] This guy's great.

[382] He showed me around his place.

[383] He's so charming.

[384] His wife, Joy, is so lovely, blah, blah, blah.

[385] Just totally wins him over.

[386] Oh, yeah.

[387] It's like that's, that is, to me, there's two things to note about that.

[388] is that's who Regis is.

[389] No, that's exactly what I was going to say is like, I pray I could handle a situation like that.

[390] I, I don't think that's.

[391] And then the other thing is to me, that's what makes Howard more of a human being than standardized class.

[392] Half of his current guests are people he had longstanding wars with like Rosie O'Donnell's on the show all the time.

[393] They had like a, you know, it was in the papers what they would say about each other.

[394] And then that is, you know, he's in a situation that I have to imagine you find yourself in a little bit, which is he has had to face a lot of, because we can all get into this gear where he's like on the radio.

[395] You don't think anyone's hearing you as dumb as that sounds.

[396] Clearly a lot of people are hearing him, but he's not actually thinking these things he says about Regis are going to get to him.

[397] And then they do, of course.

[398] And then he's running into these people.

[399] And so I think a big part of his life has been bumping into people who he's been, you know, rough on.

[400] Yeah.

[401] And well, We used to have this problem at S &L sometimes because S &L's whole worldview.

[402] I used to, so I worked there from 98 to 04.

[403] And, you know, part of the, part of the worldview of S &L is like, we're the, we're the scrappy underdogs.

[404] Forget about the fact the show's been on the air for, for 58 years.

[405] Yeah, yeah, it's the most successful TV show in history.

[406] It's still up and comers.

[407] It has, well, it has the attitude of like, it's the middle of the night, no one's watching.

[408] We're the irreverent underdog.

[409] Like, we're the little brother kind of punching up or whatever.

[410] Yeah.

[411] And, but occasionally, so I produced Weekend Update when Jimmy Fallon and Tina Faye were doing it.

[412] Oh, yeah, which was pretty catty.

[413] Yeah, and all, but also like, you know, Jimmy was a rocket ship, even at the time.

[414] He, his, his level of fame.

[415] I watched him go from, you know, in the first week he was there, obviously, in the first week, anyone's there.

[416] You go out and you have a drink in a bar as the cast and writers go out and no one recognizes you.

[417] Yeah.

[418] Four episodes later, he had played the guitar on Weekend Update for the first time and was like, instantly a, a, thing.

[419] Right.

[420] Right.

[421] And then a year later, it was like, this is the most famous guy in the show.

[422] It happened for Fallon.

[423] It happened more quickly than anybody else.

[424] I've ever seen.

[425] Yeah.

[426] At least when I was there.

[427] And do you attribute that to him being so cute?

[428] Yeah.

[429] He was adorable and he did impressions and he sang songs and he played guitar.

[430] He was just like he was.

[431] I feel like Samberg had a similar thing.

[432] Samberg was in the same.

[433] But he didn't, that didn't really happen for Samberg until Lazy Sunday, which was more than significantly more than four episodes into his tenure.

[434] Yeah.

[435] Yeah.

[436] Yeah.

[437] But But anyway, what would happen is Tina and Jimmy would make jokes about whoever, the biggest people in the, in the country.

[438] Yeah.

[439] But pretty quickly, like, we would be producing, you know, the segment and someone would have a joke about some big star.

[440] And it would be like, you would see in Jimmy or Tina's eyes, like, I can't do this.

[441] I know that person.

[442] Yeah, yeah.

[443] And it's dicey because the whole, the world of S &L is the world of being irreverent and telling truth to power and all that sort of stuff.

[444] and it's hard when the people who were doing the jokes are themselves kind of in this power structure.

[445] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[446] You know, it was an interesting thing.

[447] I was just going to say, yeah, I one time had a movie coming out against the, what's the Stallone series, like the undesirables or something or the unwanted.

[448] What is the, the, the, yeah, you do.

[449] It's got like every guy with muscles in the world is in it.

[450] I'm going to accidentally go back into this routine.

[451] I can't.

[452] Now I can only think of undesirables.

[453] Which, by the way, should we Should we do our own?

[454] Wait, we have the, what's the answer?

[455] Rob, give us.

[456] The untouchables?

[457] I just said that as a joke.

[458] It's not the untouchables.

[459] Is it?

[460] Expendables.

[461] Expendables.

[462] Man. Undesirable is such a better name.

[463] It really is.

[464] So I had a movie coming out against the, I've already forgot.

[465] The undesirables.

[466] The undesirables.

[467] And I was on Conan and I was saying like, you know, don't go see that movie, see my movie, blah, blah, blah.

[468] And then it somehow spiraled into, like, me saying that those guys are really muscular and that, but I don't think they can move quickly.

[469] Like, because as much as you can inflate your muscles, your tendons are just old, right?

[470] So I had this whole thing of like, you know, uh, lay down in this bed and fight me, you motherfucker.

[471] Like that they had to come up with scenarios where they either to lay down in a bed and fight a guy or walk over here.

[472] I'm going to kick your ass.

[473] Anyways, I did this thing and then I had all this like, you know, people on Twitter were mad at me, of course, that are fans of Sly Sloan.

[474] I too am a fan of Sliced Alone.

[475] But I just thought, oh, wow, again, this comes back to my fear.

[476] I was like, you can't make fun of the most hyper alpha successful men.

[477] If you can't make fun of like the pillars of success and strength, who the fuck can you make fun of?

[478] Yes, yes, 100%.

[479] And I feel like it's your job if you are one of those people to take all of the.

[480] hits.

[481] To Regis Philbin in.

[482] Invite a motherfucker into your apartment and show what a nice guy you are.

[483] But also to just laugh at it.

[484] Like if you are a like 40 year veteran of Hollywood who has had nothing but success and happiness for the most part in your career, you get everything that's coming to you and you take it and you smile.

[485] That's just the deal.

[486] That's hard because you're behind that success.

[487] You're a human.

[488] Like did you see the Carrie Grant documentary?

[489] No. Oh, it was really great.

[490] He had a famous quote that was a lot of people want to Carrie Grant, and I'm one of them, which is, it's both funny and it's super true because he was like an orphan kid in England.

[491] He changed his name on a boat to come here.

[492] He wasn't really Carrie Grant, nor did he, was he able, like most of us can't internalize what people on the outside saw of him or the level of success or all that stuff.

[493] He couldn't internalize.

[494] And he was doing LSD therapy once a week on a couch at the height of his popularity and fame because he didn't feel like that person.

[495] Right.

[496] So it is hard, you know, to ever go like, well, fuck it.

[497] I'm Carrie Grant.

[498] Let's let them have a laugh on my account.

[499] It's an aspirational goal, but I don't think it's easy.

[500] Well, I, you know, it's not supposed to be easy.

[501] None of this is supposed to be easy.

[502] But I have this, the older I get, the more I have this feeling of like, look, if you, if you're a, especially if you're like a white dude in America, you're, it's like, you started by winning the lottery.

[503] Like start there.

[504] Start by just like, I'm a, white man in America.

[505] Like, wow, that can die better.

[506] I'm in the top one percent of human beings alive on earth.

[507] Can I tell you why that concept, although I 100 percent agree with it.

[508] We had Joy Bryant on and we got into this at length.

[509] Although I think it's inarguable that white privilege is a fact.

[510] There's no question, especially and male.

[511] I'm male and what.

[512] There's no question that I had a leg up.

[513] The reason the concept isn't easily embraced by people is that no one's life feels privileged.

[514] No one feels like someone knocked on their door and handed them a fucking writing job at SNL.

[515] So I guarantee your life was very challenging to do all the things you've done.

[516] So there's a couple things.

[517] One is it feels a little bit like you're diminishing my accomplishment.

[518] And a little bit feels like, oh, this was given to me, which it wasn't.

[519] It's hard to see the gradient of how, you know, what advantage you actually had or how much harder it would have been if you weren't a white male.

[520] Absolutely.

[521] And that is the, that's what I think people are asking for.

[522] What they're asking for is, please realize how lucky you were, right?

[523] It's like, it's not, you shouldn't, I don't think this comes easily.

[524] I don't think it comes like naturally of like, you wake up all the time when you're, you know, 14 and go like, wow, I'm a white boy in America.

[525] Yeah.

[526] Well, Joy always said, oh, it's white boy day.

[527] Oh, it's white boy day every day, which I love.

[528] Yeah.

[529] And so I think that is, that's what this is about to me is the request.

[530] that you realize it.

[531] Start realizing it and start thinking about it.

[532] Yes, I guess what I'm saying is I wish the messaging was a little bit different.

[533] I wish the messaging was a little, there was a better way to ease this concept in.

[534] Just screaming that you're privileged, if you live in a trailer park in fucking Louisville and you have never met your dad and you're on welfare, if I'm that kid, I'm like, you know, fuck you.

[535] A hundred percent, yeah.

[536] There's a nuanced difference in that.

[537] It's not that you're privileged if you're white.

[538] It's that being white is a privilege.

[539] privilege that's different.

[540] And by the way, that's a great angle right there, which is it feels very specific and personal to you.

[541] It helps when it's just a condition of white people.

[542] Is that making sense?

[543] Like there was this, I think there was a radio lab on this where Google and there are, or rather Facebook, there were reasons you could list for why you wanted a photo taken down.

[544] Have you heard this podcast?

[545] No. I think it was.

[546] I mean, I know radio lab.

[547] If you wanted to be taken out of someone's photo or you wanted to take it down, there was like a drop -down menu.

[548] You could check, you know, the reason why.

[549] And originally when they made it, it said, I'm embarrassed.

[550] And when it said, I'm embarrassed, no one checked it.

[551] And then they would put an other category and people would write in, it's embarrassing.

[552] Right.

[553] And they were writing it in so frequently that they decided, oh, let's change it to it's embarrassing.

[554] Because to say, I'm embarrassed is a vulnerable thing to say.

[555] I'm embarrassed.

[556] But if you can say it's just objectively embarrassing, And then I don't have to be vulnerable.

[557] It's just like, well, this is fucking, anyone would agree this is embarrassing.

[558] Right.

[559] And I think there's some, there's a nugget in there about this white privilege thing.

[560] Absolutely.

[561] Where if it wasn't a personal thing where people felt like.

[562] But it's not.

[563] It's just people take it personally.

[564] They make it defensive, but it's not.

[565] It's just saying it's a privilege to be a white person in America.

[566] And it is.

[567] Yeah.

[568] And I, but I also completely agree with you in the sense that it is not the, it is not the job of all white people everywhere.

[569] to start from that place because there are millions of white people living in abject poverty, living below the poverty line, living in terrible circumstances because some aspect of the country or the world has failed them.

[570] That's not, so it's not like...

[571] There was a rural ghetto in my town where my two best friends lived and I can promise you the horrors that exist in their work on par with any in the world.

[572] And so the point is not to say, hey, every aspect of your life is privileged because that's objectively not true.

[573] In fact, it's objectively not true for most people what the ask is and it's not a big ask is to say consider the fact that because you are white there are certain aspects of the world that you don't have to worry about getting pulled over in general although I will say in my town where there was rural ghettos poor people got treated like shit like if you you saw the old clunkers on the side of the road all the time with the cops harassing those people and they didn't hurt because they weren't going to have insurance and they might have something in the car like there were a lot of all the exact same indicators of why they harass other people.

[574] They were doing that.

[575] And they were certainly, you know, at the mercy of police just like they are in, you know, in the city.

[576] I think of it like this.

[577] Think of it as like a hundred point scale.

[578] And every person has, every white person in America has to, is going to try to in sort of engage with his or her privilege at some level between one and 100, right?

[579] Uh -huh.

[580] For you and me, you, Daxon.

[581] me, Mike, it's a hundred.

[582] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[583] Absolutely a hundred based on socioeconomic standards, the city we live in in our situation.

[584] Yeah.

[585] For those people who grew up in your town.

[586] Or our kids.

[587] And our kids are at a fucking 120 thing.

[588] Our kids are redlining.

[589] Because I'll even, I'll even nepotism their ass into show business.

[590] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[591] Don't think if they write a good script, I won't fight to get a paid.

[592] My son is a Dodgers fan.

[593] And when the Dodgers made the World Series, it wasn't a question of what.

[594] He took a few pitches.

[595] Yeah.

[596] He started a few.

[597] third base in game two.

[598] He relieved the pitcher in the fourth inning.

[599] But he like, I mean, the, his, the amount to which his life is better than my life is shocking already, and he's 10.

[600] And so, so we're at 100.

[601] Our kids are at a one night.

[602] Our kids are like in Star Trek when Scotty were like, I'm already giving it 107%.

[603] Kirk would say give it 110, those are our kids are, but those people in your rural village, in your rural ghetto in your town growing up, they might be at a two.

[604] Oh yeah.

[605] And so it's like there's, and it's only in very, very, very specific circumstances that any reasonable person would ask them to consider their privilege.

[606] Yeah.

[607] So it's not like it doesn't, it's not one size fits all.

[608] None of this stuff is one size fits all.

[609] It's not.

[610] But I don't think that's part of the messaging.

[611] And I think it wouldn't hurt anyone to make that part of the message.

[612] I totally agree.

[613] Because again, I think that's part of this or whatever that feels like you guys have lost your mind.

[614] I'm not privileged.

[615] I'm not right.

[616] I'm not that.

[617] And that's part of the issue.

[618] Yes.

[619] And I think it's an unreasonable ask on the part of people.

[620] people like you and me, for example, to ask that other, the people in other parts of the country with different circumstances, consider, think about that, think about privilege in the same way that we do.

[621] It's not reasonable.

[622] They don't have it the same way we do.

[623] No, not at all.

[624] Yes.

[625] Their kid gets sick.

[626] It's like fucking life or death.

[627] They're not.

[628] Yes.

[629] And so I believe you're right in that like the messaging of it, especially from the left, from the strident left, can be really bad.

[630] And it can be like when you, when the subjects come up on, especially on social media or some place where there's not a lot of nuance, it can be blindingly stupid.

[631] Yes, yes.

[632] I find quite often that, yeah, the stuff on the far left is equally as preposterous to me as the stuff on the far right.

[633] Yes, and the targets are like the left likes to eat its own.

[634] And so the, yes, we live to.

[635] Oh, my God, you watch these award shows and it was like, oh, they can't wait to like the guy that they were hugging last year.

[636] They can't wait to light on fire.

[637] So it is, it is an absurd and unreasonable ass.

[638] to think of the concept of white privilege as the same everywhere in the world.

[639] And it shouldn't, it's a bad message.

[640] You're right.

[641] Stay tuned for our armchair, thanks for if you dare.

[642] What's up, guys?

[643] It's your girl Kiki, and my podcast is back with a new season.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[651] We've all been there.

[652] Turning to the internet to self -diagnose our inexplicable pains, debilitating body aches, sudden fevers, and strange rashes.

[653] Though our minds tend to spiral to worst -case scenarios, it's usually nothing.

[654] But for an unlucky few, these unsuspecting symptoms can start the clock ticking on a terrifying medical mystery.

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

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

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

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

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

[660] Prime members can listen early and ad -free on Amazon music.

[661] And do you know this concept of intersectionality?

[662] Are you familiar with that?

[663] I'm not sure.

[664] Tell me. Here we go.

[665] This came from a Samire.

[666] Who was the guy who came out of Evergreen that was talking about this?

[667] He was our favorite.

[668] Brett Weinstein.

[669] He's a professor.

[670] And he was confronted by a bunch of students, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[671] But there's this thing about intersectionality where if the more, characteristics you have that make you marginalize, right?

[672] So let's say you're black, then let's say you're female.

[673] Let's say you're lesbian.

[674] Let's say you're, you know, as these increase, that increases your authority in this new system of equality.

[675] Okay.

[676] And so those, that intersexuality gets elevated, right?

[677] So the person that's going to have the most power in this movement is the person with the most amount of intersectional, you know, marginalized.

[678] attributes.

[679] Sure.

[680] I'm so nervous to what words I'm choosing.

[681] But that to me on the very far left is scary to me. I think that's where to me it starts getting a little out there and crazy.

[682] One of the things that they talk about is understand my story, but you can never understand my story.

[683] That's a dangerous place to live.

[684] Right.

[685] You know, we can understand other people's stories.

[686] Not to the degree that they can, but yes, we can understand other people.

[687] That's the power of story.

[688] You know, I can watch Philadelphia and I fucking finally understand what that life is like.

[689] It is, it is fucking hard and we need to change.

[690] You know, like we can.

[691] That's the upside of all this.

[692] Sure.

[693] That's how I felt when I watch Ghostbusters, I feel like I finally understand what it's like to bust ghosts.

[694] That's right.

[695] Because no, none of us.

[696] No one was talking about it.

[697] Busting makes me feel good.

[698] Probably the best lyric ever in a song.

[699] Bustin makes me feel good.

[700] I mean, it's, it works on a lot of levels.

[701] It's one of the worst and best songs ever written, I think.

[702] Yeah.

[703] So how did you, you were born in Ann Arbor?

[704] Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, yeah.

[705] Right.

[706] And so that's right down the road for me. Right.

[707] And how long were you in the, were you there?

[708] Not long.

[709] My dad, so my dad went to grad school there and he was getting a master's and then was planning getting a PhD in linguistics.

[710] Oh, wow.

[711] And after he got a master's in linguistics.

[712] This is 1976 or something.

[713] His advisor was like, congratulations.

[714] You have a master's in linguistics.

[715] I strongly recommend that you stop studying linguistics because no one's hiring linguistics.

[716] Yeah.

[717] And he at the time was already married to my mom and they had a daughter and I was on the way, I think, or maybe I had just been born.

[718] And he was like, well, shit.

[719] So he just switched over and went to the law school and graduated.

[720] So he was at the law school for like two more years after I was born and then we left and moved to the so you have no real memory of that no although I remain loyal it isn't Eden I remain Ann Arbor or Michigan in general Ann Arbor particularly I remain loyal fiercely loyal to the mid to University of Michigan sports oh good football team and the basketball team there was someone once told me that's the most popular brand in in college football is you of M at least way yeah I heard Notre Dame right I would have thought that but they said merchandising wise mind you this was an alum that told me this, so maybe this is bullshit, but Monica will fact check us at the I would guess it.

[721] I would guess it would be Notre Dame and Alabama one and two.

[722] And then I would guess that most of it is.

[723] What's Bama's thing?

[724] Rolling Tide.

[725] Roll Tide.

[726] Yeah.

[727] The SEC has got to be in a lot.

[728] There's no way Michigan.

[729] Well, look, we'll find out because Monica fact checks all these episodes.

[730] Yeah.

[731] Yeah.

[732] So, but you grew up in Connecticut.

[733] Mostly grew up in Connecticut.

[734] And did he practice law?

[735] Yes.

[736] He was a lawyer.

[737] He was a, a still is to this day.

[738] except he's mostly retired, but he was a, like, a tax lawyer.

[739] Oh, he was?

[740] Okay.

[741] And it was very boring.

[742] He hated it.

[743] He hated his whole life.

[744] And he, I like to say that he's the only dad in suburban Connecticut history who told all of his kids that they could not under any circumstances go to law school.

[745] You know, my first experience was with this was I did a student film in Ohio like, I don't know, 18 years ago or something.

[746] And one of the other actors who was also a stand -up comedian had been a lawyer for like seven years and quit.

[747] and I was dead broke, and I couldn't comprehend quitting being a lawyer.

[748] He was like an intellectual property's attorney, and he quit.

[749] And he said to me, you know what's funny is every time I tell people I quit, they have the same reaction you have, which is, oh, my God, why did you do that?

[750] He goes, I've never told another lawyer that didn't say, oh, my God, I got it.

[751] I wish I could quit, yeah.

[752] And since that interaction, it's been almost unanimous.

[753] Every lawyer I've talked to pretty much hates it.

[754] It's crazy.

[755] And then I have a friend here in California who she had a kid.

[756] and she tried to quit her law firm and she said, there's no way I can raise this kid right now and be a lawyer.

[757] And they said, you have to stay.

[758] How about we take you to part time?

[759] And she goes, okay, what will that look like?

[760] And they're like just 45 hours a week.

[761] And she goes, I'll take it.

[762] And that was part time as a lawyer was 45 hours a week.

[763] Yeah.

[764] I think one of the things that the kind of new post like internet explosion economy has done is ruined law firms.

[765] because I think when you, if you went to college, if you were a high achieving kid and you went to college and you were ambitious, all the way through like 1993 or something, you went to law school because that was like a high paying job and whatever.

[766] And then you would go to a law firm.

[767] You would be a, you know, you would like struggle your way through law school.

[768] And then if you were really ambitious, you would go, you'd be a first year associate a law firm and you'd work 110 hours a week and you'd sleep in the office and like just bleary eyed all this stuff.

[769] And then you would slowly work your way up and you would kill yourself.

[770] kill yourself and you'd make partner and you move to the suburbs and buy a big house.

[771] And then when the like internet economy exploded and suddenly there was an option that was like go work at Google and like wear a hoodie and sweat.

[772] Yeah.

[773] Like I think it I feel like I read this article a long time ago about how like maybe right after I graduated from college in 97 and there was these articles being written where like law firms white shoe hardcore old timey like maniac law firms were having to like cater to their young Oh, that must have killed them.

[774] Yes, can you imagine being like a 62 year old asshole lawyer?

[775] Yeah, boss log basically.

[776] Who like get to like an almost sexual thrill from destroying the lives of their first year associate and then having to be like, do you guys need anything?

[777] Do you want any more sprit?

[778] So we're building a break room.

[779] Does everyone like ping pong or should we go with foosball?

[780] Check it out guys, we got an Xbox.

[781] That must have absolutely murdered them.

[782] Yeah, I wish I could have watched like closed circuit video of of them telling the boss before the meeting what he's got to say and look Mike I know you want to keep circling back to this your grown up babies thing but they're not going to like that yeah I was so I never considered that I don't know did you ever what did you want to be you wanted to be a race car that's right yeah that's all I wanted to do is yeah and you've been able to live out that fantasy I understand yeah in large part yes I have to the point where I had this very profound moment where I had two races on a weekend in Fontana here in California last race of the season.

[783] It was the first time Lincoln had gotten kind of sick where she was really snugly and had a fever and everything.

[784] So I was snuggling her all morning and then at a certain point I was like, all right, I got to go to the racetrack and it's like an hour drive from my house to Fontana.

[785] And the entire ride I was thinking, how many trophy stacks?

[786] What's the number your ego needs?

[787] Is it 20?

[788] Is it 18?

[789] What are we even going for?

[790] What is your fucking ego need that you just left your cute little snuggly baby?

[791] Yeah.

[792] Yeah.

[793] So go find glory to win glory on a circle.

[794] So I basically quit, but now I'm back into, now I decided I do want, I do want more trobeys.

[795] Your ego reset.

[796] Yeah, somehow it dissipated.

[797] It was feeling strong for a while.

[798] So you, so the same friend that went down to part time.

[799] my friend, Christine Rainer, she went to Harvard Law School.

[800] And I have been in her company many times where people have asked her where she went to law school.

[801] And then she has said I went to Harvard Law School.

[802] And almost 100 % of the time people go, ooh, Harvard, La Dita.

[803] And I have to watch them just patronize her for about five minutes.

[804] And I've thought ever since witnessing this, wow, I would have thought having great.

[805] graduated from Harvard would be this great thing.

[806] It'd be like a fucking racing trophy.

[807] But no, it totally backfires, right?

[808] People are just generally so threatened by this.

[809] Is it miserable saying where you went to college?

[810] So allow me to indulge in my white privilege for a second.

[811] Oh, please, please.

[812] And complain about going to Harvard.

[813] Oh, my God.

[814] It is a weird.

[815] It's a weird lose -lose thing because if you say you went to Harvard, that's the reaction.

[816] And if you say you went to school in Boston, which is what some people do.

[817] A lot of people do, I went to school in Boston or whatever.

[818] And then they would do, oh, where, be you?

[819] And then you're good, you're dead.

[820] And you go, no, I went to Harvard.

[821] And then they were like, oh, you didn't want to say.

[822] It's a double whammy.

[823] So you just, it's easier to say I went to Harvard, you know.

[824] You may you start by going, I'm an asshole.

[825] Where'd you go to school?

[826] I'm a fucking asshole.

[827] Let's start here.

[828] Start from this baseline.

[829] I'm an asshole.

[830] Yeah, you hate me. I'm an asshole.

[831] Do we need to talk about college?

[832] Yeah.

[833] I mean, I was on like 75 % of my education was paid for with financial aid.

[834] Uh -huh.

[835] And so I feel less.

[836] I feel less embarrassed about it because I do feel like I earned it and all that stuff.

[837] Like it's it's actually so sad that we as humans are so easily triggered and threatened.

[838] Yeah.

[839] That's something that is, look, I could have never fucking got into Harvard.

[840] It wasn't within me either through the due diligence or, you know, test scores.

[841] It's a huge accomplishment.

[842] And it's crazy that we hate it.

[843] If someone wins an Olympic gold medal, no one's like, Oh, a gold medal.

[844] Ooh, the Olympics.

[845] I don't know what it is.

[846] You know what I think I know exactly what it is.

[847] We all have some weird fantasy of had we committed ourselves to learning the high bar or whatever fucking thing that we could have.

[848] But there's something about like intellectual feelings of intellectual inferiority that really trigger something much more deep to our identity.

[849] I would actually say, I think you're right, but I would rephrase it a little bit.

[850] I think that the reason we don't do that with a 100 meter dash winner is because it's like, well, that guy's not, I'm not that guy.

[851] There's no way in a hundred million years.

[852] But Harvard is like, well, I went to this college and you went to Harvard or Yale or Stanford or Princeton or whatever.

[853] And so it's like it's the closeness.

[854] It's the proximity to it that makes people get defensive or whatever.

[855] That's a wild guess.

[856] I don't know if there's any truth.

[857] But there's so many things in life like this.

[858] Like I will, I happen to on a talk show mentioned that I don't eat gluten, right?

[859] Sure.

[860] And I don't eat gluten because I have psorietic arthritis and it inflames my joints.

[861] And the amount of people on Twitter that were, you know, like, oh, you don't eat gluten.

[862] You know, like they took it as a, like that I thought I was better than everyone.

[863] Too good for gluten.

[864] Yes, that I was too good for gluten.

[865] That's exactly it.

[866] And I think it's because, you know, all of us, to be human is to wrestle with your diet.

[867] You know, we have access to way more food than we were designed to have access to.

[868] too so it's an issue for everybody right or at least 90 % of people so if someone seems to have licked it there is some weird it triggers like well fuck i should have let well fuck that guy oh of course well he's got money he can afford not eat gluten or whatever the thing becomes it's just it triggered it's so weird yeah because i then tweeted i also don't eat pickled herring you know i don't know what to tell you there's a lot of things i don't do yeah well gluten is now a it was for a while kale and before that it was something else.

[869] Well, it is trendy.

[870] It's a stand -in for a kind of like fru -frew -frew L .A. life.

[871] Like being gluten -free, regardless of whether it has to do with your actual physical well -being is like the, oh, that's the trend.

[872] That's the wealthy L .A. kind of like lefty world.

[873] Well, but also it is a trend, right?

[874] And so whenever there's a food trend, people will be on it around you.

[875] And they will talk incessantly.

[876] about it.

[877] Because it's consuming so much of their brain power.

[878] And so it is seen as a way to get attention to.

[879] I think it triggers like attention getting, which we all have, I have it in spades.

[880] Yeah.

[881] But I think we, we hate it in other people.

[882] Well, you know what I love about gluten is like no one knew what the gluten existed like five years ago.

[883] And now everyone talks about gluten all the time.

[884] But there is a fascinating history of gluten, which was on stuff you should know, a podcast I listened to nine years ago.

[885] But there was a concerted effort to deal with the growing population in the limited amount of agriculture that was happening.

[886] And wheat was re -engineered.

[887] I forget what year, but like in the 30s or something.

[888] Yeah.

[889] And so the wheat we're eating, which yields so much more does have a significantly higher amount of gluten in it than it ever had than like maize or you know any of these crops so yeah so whatever it did go through the techno machine and change well there's I can't remember the guy's name I believe he's Indian or Pakistani the scientist who engineered that wheat that like disease is a blight resistant wheat is like the reason that there are eight and a half billion people on earth like without and he's being tried for war crimes because of my sorry I had arthritis.

[890] But that is one of the, it's one of those things about history that just flew by everybody or most people is like, we wouldn't have, the world would have not gone the way it has gone unless that invented this wheat that could be, that could resist disease.

[891] In fact, so many of the least sexy historical things were the most impactful.

[892] Yeah.

[893] Yeah, you love history, right?

[894] I do.

[895] Yeah.

[896] And you once described to me your ideal vacation.

[897] And I just want you to walk people Or is this JJ your wife's description of your ideal vacation?

[898] It was technically my wife's description of my ideal vacation.

[899] We were trying to plan.

[900] This is before we had kids.

[901] We were trying to plan a trip.

[902] And she, my wife likes beautiful, picturesque sort of islandy vacation.

[903] That's her dream.

[904] Yeah, Bora Bora.

[905] Yeah.

[906] Or even just Hawaii or any place that's like warm and breezy and sunny, you sit out and on a chair and you read a book.

[907] Or you like go swimming and then you go on a boat and whatever.

[908] and she described my ideal vacation as going to England and going to a castle in England and reading books in silence while it's raining outside yeah yeah yeah it's 51 degrees in raining we're inside in the dark reading books and you have the perfect excuse to never leave there right because that's got to be built into the fantasy that's the rain the rain yeah yeah even if we wanted to drive around and look at something we couldn't yeah you'd love to go check out Winston Churchill's childhood home but look it's pouring outside yeah we can't possibly get through these conditions.

[909] Yeah.

[910] So how did you go from Harvard to writing on Saturday Night Live?

[911] Because that seems to be...

[912] Is it harder to become a writer on Saturday Night Live or a performer?

[913] What's the ratio?

[914] There's probably more performers than writers, yeah?

[915] No, I think there's more writers.

[916] Oh, really?

[917] Yeah, I mean, obviously the size of the cast varies, but there's a lot of writers on the show.

[918] And also, by the way, most of the actors are also writing stuff every week, and they're not credited as writers, which they should be.

[919] No, they don't need more.

[920] attention.

[921] So I wrote for the Harvard Lampoon, which is the humor magazine that like Conan O 'Brien was in and all the...

[922] By the way, I know you hate Stern, but Conan had the best Stern interview where he told his whole history there at the Lampoon.

[923] Oh, really?

[924] And how he had tricked.

[925] Oh, Bill Cosby.

[926] You certainly know that story.

[927] I don't know if I do.

[928] They decided to give him an award Bill Cosby.

[929] And, you know, it's coming out of Harvard.

[930] So it seems like a very esteemed award.

[931] but they just made it up to see if they could get him to come.

[932] And he did.

[933] And he went and picked up Bill Cosby from like a private airplane in his dad's station wagon.

[934] And it was just him and like Bill Cosby and two of his handlers.

[935] And, you know, the trophy was a bowling trophy.

[936] And he made a speech.

[937] This whole thing is incredible story.

[938] That's a pretty typical story.

[939] Yeah, yeah.

[940] So that magazine, which was the, which is where the national lampoon came from, all that stuff.

[941] So I wrote for that and I didn't, it wasn't until I really got to college that I understood that writing comedy professionally was a thing.

[942] Yeah, yeah, like, well, you're obsessed with comedy as a kid and were you obsessed, did you have fantasies of being a performer or always you wanted to be a writer?

[943] I kind of always wanted to be a writer.

[944] I mean, I did, I acted in high school in college, but I, there was a moment I was in a play in college and, and I got really frustrated because I thought to myself, I know how this is supposed to sound.

[945] And I can't make my voice sound, I can't make the right sounds.

[946] I can't make the line sound the way I want it to.

[947] And literally the next thought, one third of a second later, was, oh, I'm a writer.

[948] That's what a writer is.

[949] It's like, you know what it should be.

[950] You just can't do it yourself.

[951] So you get someone else to do it for you.

[952] I had that same experience trying to draw a picture of the sailboat when I was a young kid.

[953] Like I woke up with this image.

[954] I was going to draw this sailboat.

[955] boat it had like 10 masks and it was it was rainy and I sat down to draw this thing and it was you couldn't it would look like a barn and I was like oh I can't get the thing in my head onto the piece of paper it's a very important I think moment in every person's life when I mean I think I if you would ask me when I was I don't know a senior in high school I might have said I want to be an actor I think it's the moment that you realize you can't do something is such a powerful thing it's like I'm not good enough like right I remember the moment I realized I wasn't good enough to be a professional baseball player Like I came up I was I love baseball more than anything I was 13 years old I was in like Babe Ruth league is what they called it And I came up in a game In the bottom of the last inning with the tying with the winning Tying run on second base and two out And a and a guy struck me out on three pitches And it was a really good hitter It was the first time I struck out all the year It was the last game of the year When it counted And I and I remember sitting to I remember waiting for my mom To come pick me up and being like yeah like if I were a professional baseball player, if that's where I were headed, I would have just knocked in that run.

[956] Yeah, you would have doubled your abilities in that moment.

[957] Yeah.

[958] Yeah.

[959] So that's probably the defining characteristic of these great athletes is not even their base skill level, but how they perform in those crazy situations.

[960] Of course.

[961] Yeah.

[962] Like it's like Reggie Miller hitting three threes and nine points and 20 seconds or whatever.

[963] Yeah.

[964] Like yes, that's right in a in like a playoff game.

[965] Yeah.

[966] No one can do that.

[967] Um, so yeah, I, I, well, that's a theme we have here by the way, which kind of comes up a lot as we talk to people, which is having a bit of a fluid identity is very key, I think, is like...

[968] When you're that age, you mean?

[969] In general, like, recognizing which way the river's flowing, you know, like, you have this idea of yourself, I'm going to be this, I'm going to be a race car driver.

[970] But then other, you know, there's other bits of proof, you know, raining in that you should probably acknowledge and maybe deviate a little bit.

[971] Like, being fluid is probably helpful.

[972] There's a thing in, when you're in a writer's room and you're breaking a story, like there's a there's a sort of weird zone and i i've never really defined it or tried to describe it but you want to like you want to hold on to targets for like the season that you're that you're in the middle of or the episode you want to hold on to like these ideas that you think are good ideas can i just tell people really quick just in general what happens mike sits down with all these writers and they say okay season two of the good place at the end of it we know that we want Kristen to be dead on an airplane.

[973] But we're going to start with her here and we got it.

[974] We have 15 episodes to get her there.

[975] Right.

[976] And so you're designing the architecture of that.

[977] Of the entire season.

[978] Yeah.

[979] You're looking.

[980] So especially on a show like the good place, the good place is heavily serialized.

[981] So everything kind of has to link up to everything else.

[982] So really quick episodic means that's friends.

[983] You could just turn on an episode.

[984] You didn't need to see the one before.

[985] It doesn't matter if you see the one after.

[986] It's a standalone serialized is, you know.

[987] cliffhanger is the pick up right after they left off.

[988] And yeah, by the way, could you follow me around and just describe, explain everything that I say to everyone I'm talking to you.

[989] That would be great.

[990] This is all a learning curve to me because I'm just speaking weird Hollywood nomenclature all the time.

[991] And then I'm getting questions and I realize, oh, I need to bring people up to speed.

[992] Right.

[993] So the good place is serialized, which means like at the end of the first episode of a season, there's a cliffhanger.

[994] And at the beginning of episode two, it's probably going to pick up right where that cliffhanger left off.

[995] And then we tell another story.

[996] And then it leads to some other thing.

[997] And it's like one long continuous stories are broken.

[998] so we always have to have in our heads a general idea we do a lot of discussion at the beginning of each season where are we going because we can't we can't march into this season blindly if if episode a is linking directly to episode b and c and d if you get to z and you don't know you don't making that where you're aiming gets very fuzzy and you will screw it up because if you you will eventually take a wrong turn without knowing it and they have to correct it and it will be awkward and it won't feel natural and won't feel like a reasonable flow for the story that you're telling.

[999] The point of all of this.

[1000] And you won't have to cheat either.

[1001] That's right.

[1002] Right.

[1003] So the point of all of this is that you, there's a zone that you get into where you're like, okay, I feel like I understand the basic targets, the basic places we're heading down the line.

[1004] And you want to hold onto them because they become like North Stars for you to navigate by.

[1005] And as you come up with other ideas for stories, you're thinking, let's remember, that's where we're aiming at.

[1006] So you want to hold onto them and they need to be meaningful and they need to kind of have weight, but you can't hold onto them so tightly that you become blind to other better ideas.

[1007] Right.

[1008] So if someone, you want to, you want to hold them loosely in your hand and your mind so that if after like seven or eight episodes, someone says, hey, I know that we used to be aiming for this target.

[1009] But what if instead of that it were this slightly different target?

[1010] And you, if you're holding onto the original target too closely or too tightly you might say no no don't we can't rock the boat forget it and you might and you might miss a better idea so it's this weird kind of um there's an acting term for it i remember from the old days when i used to be an actor called that it's called soft focus where you're sort of like it's like you're not staring on the stage you're not staring at anything in particular you're kind of aware of all of your surroundings and you can see i can see monica sort of out of the corner of my eye she's over here isn't that great and And I can sort of, I can sort of sense the room.

[1011] And I'm not looking.

[1012] I'm sort of the toilet.

[1013] Do you see the toilet?

[1014] The toilet's over there.

[1015] It's weird.

[1016] There's no door, like guarding the toilet.

[1017] So earlier when I went to the bathroom, everybody had to leave.

[1018] Yeah.

[1019] You're off track now.

[1020] And so I think, so I think at some level writing, especially as Shirley the Good Place, is keeping the whole season in what I would call soft focus, which is making sure that you're aware of everything, but you're not so laser focused or tunnel vision focused on one thing.

[1021] You're not going to kick a diamond off the path.

[1022] That's right.

[1023] Yeah.

[1024] And how do you, I would imagine so much of your, do you, do you write individual episodes?

[1025] Like, do you, do you write the first episode in the last of a season?

[1026] Me personally.

[1027] Yeah, you personally.

[1028] I have, I tend to only write the last one of the season.

[1029] Obviously, the very first one was the pilot that I wrote.

[1030] Yeah.

[1031] And then I tend to write the, which is terrible.

[1032] What have you found out in this interview that I couldn't stand the good one?

[1033] Well, I'm really glad you turned over the writing to other people.

[1034] That's why I had you here.

[1035] You were going to intervene and tell me I had to.

[1036] I write the last one because when you write it, so the way it works is generally speaking on most shows, not every show, but most shows is you what's called break the story with in a group where everyone's sitting around in a comedy room and you're saying like, okay, this is episode seven, here's the kind of stuff we need to do.

[1037] What if she broke her leg?

[1038] Yeah.

[1039] Yeah, you do a lot of blue skying.

[1040] Like, what if it's this?

[1041] What if it's just?

[1042] What if it says?

[1043] Eventually sort of narrow it down.

[1044] You come up with the general outline.

[1045] Everybody sort of pitches jokes and stuff like that.

[1046] Once you sort of settle on the outline of the story, you assign it to one person and that person goes away for three or four days and they write the script.

[1047] Do they write it in three or four days?

[1048] Yeah.

[1049] God damn.

[1050] I mean, not a lot of time for writers blocking that scenario.

[1051] In an ideal world, you would have much longer, but the nature of the machine.

[1052] The machine, the treadmill keeps moving.

[1053] Yeah, yeah.

[1054] They're going to put something on the air.

[1055] That's right.

[1056] Lauren Michaels used to say at SNL, which is the extreme example of the machine is the show doesn't go on because it's ready.

[1057] It goes on because it's 1130 on Saturday.

[1058] Right, right.

[1059] That's the reason the show is happening.

[1060] Well, by the way, isn't that a great, I don't know if you agree with this, but my technique as a writer to get over writer's block is to give myself permission to write something shitty.

[1061] Oh, yeah.

[1062] Don't you think that's one of the greatest assets you can?

[1063] have is like, of course, don't, you can really, you can become paralyzed with trying to write something perfect and you'll just never write.

[1064] But I'll go, fucking write eight terrible pages.

[1065] That's okay.

[1066] There'll be two in there.

[1067] I'll edit tomorrow.

[1068] And then inevitably five are good, you know, but yeah, you got to really give yourself permission and there's a great.

[1069] There's a, there's an industry term that my wife uses religiously, which is a vomit draft.

[1070] Oh, uh, where it's just like just vomit out.

[1071] Yeah, I've heard puke draft.

[1072] Yeah, it's just, yeah, there's a lot of versions of it, but she's like, she believes fully in the vomit.

[1073] Shit it out.

[1074] we could also say probably just shit it out.

[1075] Yeah, if you're trying to be Shakespeare from minute one, you're just going to be probably never right.

[1076] Anyways, so that script comes back and then you everybody sort of rewrites it and rewrites it and rewrites it.

[1077] I'm seeing a lot of landmines for insecurity.

[1078] One is you as the leader of this writing room have to respectfully and kindly shit on bad ideas, right?

[1079] And that's its own.

[1080] You've got to develop.

[1081] I'm sure, a technique for that is yours evolved or did you learn it from Greg Daniels?

[1082] I learned from Greg Daniels.

[1083] So Greg Daniels ran the office where you worked for quite a while.

[1084] Yeah, Greg is sort of my mentor.

[1085] I left S &L.

[1086] I moved out to L .A. My first job was on the office.

[1087] Great.

[1088] Great first job.

[1089] American adaptation of the British show.

[1090] Not nearly as good.

[1091] Terrible show.

[1092] Anyways, continue.

[1093] He's been really mean to me today.

[1094] He and I took the job.

[1095] There's an email that I sent to my agent at the time.

[1096] which I think about a lot and which my agent sends back to me a lot in which at one point I forwarded to Greg to thank him and the email says look I don't think this is a good idea to adapt the offer.

[1097] I was a huge fan of British shop.

[1098] I was like I don't think this is a good idea I think it's not going to work but that guy meaning Greg is going to teach me how to write and that's why I'm going to take this job and it was literally that simple I had a meeting with him it was two hours long I felt a kinship or a kindred spirit or some kind of relationship attraction or something.

[1099] Maybe, maybe all three.

[1100] And I was like, he's going to teach me how to write.

[1101] And then that's exactly what he did.

[1102] And that writing staff, the first year, the only full -time writers were me and Mindy Kaling and B .J. Novak.

[1103] And none of us really knew how to write.

[1104] But you've adopted that similar kind of spirit, which is you'll find, you have found people on Twitter, right?

[1105] And said, I thought they would be a great television.

[1106] I have indeed.

[1107] And that, like, many things that, that idea sort of came from him.

[1108] So he, he basically, like, he taught us how to write.

[1109] He taught me of the rules of, of like long -form comedy writing.

[1110] And he, so his, like all of the kind of individual things, like, for example, how to navigate turning down bad ideas without hurting the ego of the person who pitched them.

[1111] All of that, not all of it, but 98 % of it comes from him.

[1112] Lauren Michaels has many sort of producing aphorisms.

[1113] They're all good and they're all true.

[1114] And one of them is that being a producer, which is essentially your job when you're running a show, being a producer means having to say no. That's your job.

[1115] Your job is to say no. And the reason is when you're coming up with, when you're running a show, producing a show, the SNL version is this.

[1116] The SNL version is you write a sketch that takes place in a, in like a...

[1117] Could it be sizzler?

[1118] Or like a toll booth, some boring place, right?

[1119] And the production designer will come to you and say, hey, I know you were thinking of like normal, like your, you know, toll booth or whatever, but I was in Cologne Germany and they have these toll boosts there that are designed with these cool arches and this and that and I was thinking and your job is to politely somehow say that's cool.

[1120] The show set in America.

[1121] Yeah and I know you want to be creative and you want to do a interesting thing and you've designed 34 toll boost in the last 38 years of S &L but this just needs to be a regular toll booth and then the production and then the costumer will come to you and say hey so for this guy I saw this guy walking on Venice in Venice Beach.

[1122] With an alligator on his shoulder.

[1123] That's right.

[1124] And he had, yes, he had a shirt made out of parrot feathers, whatever.

[1125] And you go, no, just like jeans and a t -shirt.

[1126] Yeah, yeah.

[1127] Just like a human would dress.

[1128] That's right.

[1129] But the thing is, everyone just wants to do the best job they can do on a set.

[1130] So you're, and so they want to be creative and they want to expand their repertoires and all that sort of stuff.

[1131] And so your job usually is sort of saying like, thank you, but no, let's keep this normal.

[1132] And being open to the fact that occasionally, those are going to be brilliant ideas, right?

[1133] So you want to keep the door open.

[1134] You want to encourage them to keep bringing you these ideas, knowing that 80 % of them are not going to be great.

[1135] So we had a character on Parks and Recreation, a couple characters.

[1136] Ben Schwartz played a character named Jean Ralfio, who was just this absurd maniac of a person.

[1137] And he was a cartoon.

[1138] He was like he was being animated as he had seen.

[1139] And I used to say to our costumers, Kirsten and Alexis, I never want to know what you're putting him in.

[1140] Like you get to choose 100 % your decision.

[1141] I want to be surprised by it.

[1142] And I basically said your job is to get me to tell you that it's too absurd.

[1143] And if I don't tell you it's too absurd, then you can keep getting more absurd.

[1144] As a result, if you look back on his episodes, you can see compendiums of them on YouTube.

[1145] He is wearing the most ridiculous clothes they could find.

[1146] And it's wonderful.

[1147] They get progressively more insane.

[1148] How fun to chart.

[1149] And so that's the soft focus.

[1150] thing.

[1151] That's the saying, like, you pick your moments where you say to the creatively minded people who work for you and work with you.

[1152] Go nuts.

[1153] Just go nuts and it'll be fun.

[1154] And we have room right now for you.

[1155] This will not in any, this will only help the show.

[1156] You don't hurt the show.

[1157] It'll only help it.

[1158] And if you do that, everybody is happy and likes coming to work.

[1159] I heard through the grapevine that you guys basically fuck around a good chunk of the time in that writer's room, right?

[1160] Like Bell stopped by the other day and you guys were playing a game.

[1161] Like, right?

[1162] You'll play games to get the creative juices flowing.

[1163] Yeah.

[1164] One of the main, okay, so there's a bunch of different kinds of writers rooms in Hollywood.

[1165] And one of them is a kind of no fun, nobody laughs, writers room where it's like you get in, you sit down, let's get to work.

[1166] After like 90 minutes, the show runner will say five minute break and five minutes later everyone's back and they're writing again.

[1167] And like, look, I don't want to disparage any the way anybody does it.

[1168] weird job.

[1169] It's a very hard job.

[1170] I don't want to, everybody has his or her own way of approaching it.

[1171] Yeah.

[1172] I feel very strongly like the only reason, really, to get into this business in the first place is because you get to laugh with your friends.

[1173] Like, yeah, there's, well, as I say, the thing you got yelled at in school for, passing notes, being funny, making jokes, that you're now encouraged to do with reckless abandon.

[1174] And people are paying you so much money.

[1175] Yeah, yeah.

[1176] I have to do it.

[1177] And it's, and this is a, this is yet another thing of like, if you don't understand how you're a good fortune, then you're, you're, you're missing.

[1178] you're missing the point here.

[1179] So I have this feeling of like, look, work is, work is crucial and vital.

[1180] I take a lot of pride in it.

[1181] I think it's, I take a lot of pride in what I do.

[1182] I think I'm good at it.

[1183] I think the shows I make are of a high quality, but also I am not going to, this is, it's not the military.

[1184] It's not, and it's not, by the way, it's not even tax law or something.

[1185] It's not, it's not important work in the, in the sense of like, it is worth not, people not having any fun.

[1186] And if people aren't having fun, then it's, to me, I'm failing at my job.

[1187] So we have a bunch of games and stupid stuff we do.

[1188] I think the point of all of this is to say, if you, if something amusing is happening, you should engage with it and indulge in it and let it happen because what's really, what's the worst thing that's going to happen?

[1189] You're going to blow 23 minutes of your day doing something that makes everybody happy and everybody enjoys.

[1190] Like, yeah, that's got in the long run, that's got to help the show.

[1191] Like people are in a good mood.

[1192] and they're happy and their endorphins are flowing.

[1193] Do you get, because I think of myself as having a similar approach when I have been in the leadership role.

[1194] I want it to be fun and I don't yell at people.

[1195] And I think I'm generally pretty benevolent.

[1196] Maybe people disagree.

[1197] But when people take advantage of it, I'm extra upset about it.

[1198] Because I feel like, no, no, guys, don't, like we can do this.

[1199] But if you fuck me over now, now I got it, you're going to force me to be that guy I don't want to be.

[1200] Do you ever run into that?

[1201] Yeah, sure, of course.

[1202] Like not, I mean, at this point now I've been, you know, there was seven years of Parks and Rec.

[1203] I co -ran Brooklyn 9 -9 with Dan Gore who created it with me for a year plus or so, two years -ish.

[1204] And now it's, you know, this is year three of good place.

[1205] So it's been like, you know, a solid, more than a decade of me running a show.

[1206] Yeah.

[1207] And at this point, like there's a team, a production team that's been with me almost the entire time.

[1208] Some people, the actual entire time.

[1209] And there are writers who have been with me for five, six, seven years.

[1210] And so the number of people who could take advantage of the atmosphere is pretty small.

[1211] It's mostly new people, but the new people come in and they see the way that the senior writers behave.

[1212] Right.

[1213] And they follow their lead.

[1214] And then it's generally, generally speaking, I haven't had too many situations where I felt like I was being taken advantage of.

[1215] One of them was at times the late Harris Whittles, R -I -P, who the only real, like, fights I ever had to do.

[1216] He, yes, he was loved by several of my friends.

[1217] I never met him, but.

[1218] The old, yeah, see, we just passed the, the, whatever it is, the six -year, four -year anniversary of his death.

[1219] I can't, it's a little bit, yeah, yes, it has.

[1220] And he, but it, I felt like he was taking advantage of me. He was, he was disappearing and he was going to fish concerts.

[1221] he was not working hard and he would turn in work that I knew was subpar for him.

[1222] Yeah.

[1223] And I eventually sat him down and it took a lot to get this to happen.

[1224] I sent him down and I said, I think you're taking advantage of the atmosphere here.

[1225] And he broke down in tears and said he was addicted to heroin.

[1226] And then I was like, as you were telling me about the fish concerts and stuff, I was like, this also sounds like very addict -e behavior.

[1227] Yes, exactly.

[1228] But it took someone at that level to make me feel like I was really being taken advantage of.

[1229] And in general, are you opposed to confrontation or are you fine with it?

[1230] No, I'm pretty bad.

[1231] I'm not, I am not built for, I'm pretty conflict diverse.

[1232] Yeah.

[1233] I'm a rule follower by nature.

[1234] And so my whole life, like I'm, and Bell get along so well.

[1235] I was literally, I think she and I have talked about this because I, my, I would literally, I was a guy at college parties who would, was tracking like the noise ordinance cutoff.

[1236] And when it was like one, I would sort of sneak over to the stereo and turn it down because I was like, I don't want to get, I don't want anyone to get in trouble.

[1237] Like, there's a rule.

[1238] The rule is no noise after 1130 or.

[1239] whatever.

[1240] Yeah.

[1241] And I would be like, well, we got to follow the rule.

[1242] I just want to, I want to dive into a couple things that maybe could be uniquely personal between you and I, which is you, you, uh, you have, you like to make fun of alphas, right?

[1243] Yeah.

[1244] And masculinity be in general, right?

[1245] So what do you think that is, uh, if you're a rule follower, do, were you looking at these like over testosterone guys at the party like smashing a chandelier while you were monitoring the, uh, the burial volume and you were like, they're everything that's wrong with this world or, or where do you think they're places?

[1246] Do you think they, walk me through your take on it?

[1247] I like, you're bringing this up in part, I think, because you played a literal demon on the good place who's, who tortured, who was in the toxic masculinity department.

[1248] Yeah.

[1249] And you were excellent.

[1250] You know, what's interesting, I've thought about this a lot because it's not as you might expect.

[1251] Okay.

[1252] From a place of I was bullied.

[1253] I was never bullied.

[1254] Okay.

[1255] I went to a, it was a, I did the bully.

[1256] I want everyone to know that.

[1257] I think like, I mean, I grew up in like a suburban, I went to a suburban Connecticut public school system, which was pretty benign.

[1258] It had its, I mean, it was jocks and geeks.

[1259] There was no question.

[1260] But I happened to straddle both groups because I was a geek who played baseball.

[1261] Right, right.

[1262] I didn't get made fun of that much.

[1263] I didn't get bullied ever.

[1264] So it's not that.

[1265] It's, I think to me, there's a toxic masculinity.

[1266] I think there's two things.

[1267] I'll say this.

[1268] Can I just tell you 100 % of my listeners are off -road racers?

[1269] Go ahead.

[1270] Continue.

[1271] They're going to love this.

[1272] They're going to love my suburban Connecticut life story.

[1273] I was raised by all women.

[1274] My parents, my parents divorced.

[1275] I live with my mom.

[1276] I had two sisters.

[1277] We had a cat.

[1278] We had two cats who were girls and a dog who was a girl.

[1279] Yeah.

[1280] You're describing my current life.

[1281] Yeah.

[1282] Yes.

[1283] Female dog.

[1284] So I think it was just like that.

[1285] I watched dudes be jerks to my older sister.

[1286] I saw like I lived through a divorce from my, mostly through my mom's vantage point.

[1287] Yeah.

[1288] So I think that was formative.

[1289] And then I also think that toxic masculinity is a specific brand of human cluelessness that I just find hilarious.

[1290] I think that dudes like dudes in like Vegas nightclubs or in or on like in gyms or in or in gyms or in.

[1291] Or in.

[1292] wherever, where it, there's a, there's a, like a tribalism.

[1293] Yes, there's, it's absolute tribalism, but it's also a sense of like, like so little of what they think matters actually matters in the global worldview, right?

[1294] And so I just, I always just found it.

[1295] I didn't have a label for it.

[1296] Toxic masculinity is a recent, fairly recent label, at least to me. Yeah.

[1297] But when I heard it the first time, I was like, oh, that's exactly what it is.

[1298] That's the, that's the term for this thing I've been tracking my whole life.

[1299] Well, but here's the part that I want that, that, that intersects with my own life.

[1300] So I'm arguing with Monica and Kristen on a car ride once, right?

[1301] And where I'm back to where this all started, where I said I'm nervous that we're getting narrow and narrow with what we're allowed to make fun of.

[1302] And they're saying, there doesn't have to be, someone doesn't have to be the punchline of the joke, right?

[1303] It doesn't have to be about ethnicity or a sexual orientation or an accent from a country, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[1304] You can make, you can just have jokes that have no no victim.

[1305] And Monica said, look at the good place.

[1306] And she brought up the good place.

[1307] And my argument to her was, no, there's definitely someone being targeted.

[1308] It is whether the Jacksonville Florida jokes or dumb dumbs, right?

[1309] There is, there has to be, doesn't there, there does have to be a target for comedy.

[1310] Yeah, but I think of it as punching up a little bit instead of punching down.

[1311] Like if you are, if you're, look, you, it is okay.

[1312] to make fun of Jacksonville, Florida.

[1313] It's fine.

[1314] Jacksonville, Florida is an insane place.

[1315] It's got, I mean, Carl Heison, for example, is a novelist who was a Miami Herald, I think he's a Miami Herald reporter.

[1316] He's been writing books about Florida for 25, 30 years and saying like, this place is insane.

[1317] It's just insane.

[1318] Did you vacation there as a kid being from Connecticut?

[1319] No, I never went.

[1320] Oh, you didn't?

[1321] No, we did.

[1322] We did.

[1323] And it was, it was, it was a, it had its clear culture.

[1324] it was specific.

[1325] Right.

[1326] And so in Jacksonville being a place of insanity and Florida being a place of insanity is not punching down because Florida, like I, when I was at S &L, I wrote a sketch called, it was a, it was a commemorative plate set just celebrating all of the insane things that had happened in Florida.

[1327] Because at the time, it was like, it was Elyon Gonzalez and the 9 -11 hijackers had trained there and there were shark attacks every week.

[1328] And like, yeah.

[1329] And so like, look, Florida is insane.

[1330] That is not up for debate.

[1331] There's a hurricane every five seconds.

[1332] So, like, there's a difference to me. And like, look.

[1333] Well, I was recently in South Beach, like, doing promotion.

[1334] And I was just standing there going, wow.

[1335] So all these people recognize this place is going to be underwater very shortly.

[1336] Yeah.

[1337] And everyone's just breezing about their day.

[1338] I mean, that is fascinating.

[1339] It's a lunatic, it's lunatic fringe out there.

[1340] Uh -huh.

[1341] So, and that Jason Mendoza, Mani Hissinto's character on the show is from Jacksonville.

[1342] And he's a total ding -dong.

[1343] Yes.

[1344] And that, but like, ding -dongs, you can.

[1345] can't have a comedy show without a ding -dong.

[1346] Well, okay.

[1347] But I agree with you, but I feel like that supports like, it does require a, it requires a target.

[1348] Okay, so he has to be a target, right?

[1349] Because he's a ding -dong.

[1350] He's an uneducated person who says very stupid things.

[1351] However, to my mind, so what we do is we try at least, and I'm not the only one who does this.

[1352] I want to claim that I'm some visionary.

[1353] First of all, he's Filipino.

[1354] The actor's Filipino.

[1355] The character's Filipino.

[1356] Okay.

[1357] And I, my thing is like Filipino being dumb on a TV show is really fun.

[1358] You get a lot of good jokes.

[1359] My whole career is playing dumb.

[1360] Right.

[1361] So I thought, well, there's never been a Filipino dumb guy that I know of.

[1362] They're always the same.

[1363] It's always the same guy.

[1364] So this will be interesting.

[1365] I'll make him Filipino.

[1366] Yeah.

[1367] And then aside from that, we're going to say he's not just dumb.

[1368] We're going to give him characteristics that make him a good, interesting person in who's three dimensional.

[1369] Those characteristics are he's incredibly loyal to his friends, almost to a fault.

[1370] He has the capacity for true sweetness.

[1371] and goodness.

[1372] He fell into a relationship with Jamila's character, Tahanis, her name, who was like a British aristocrat by way of the elite of the elite.

[1373] Yes.

[1374] And when it was revealed in an insane way that he had once in a previous incarnation of the neighborhood that they're living in, been married to Janet, the piece of artificial intelligence, they had a weird moment in their relationship.

[1375] And he was very comforting and sweet.

[1376] And he said, I'm sorry, this puts you in a weird position.

[1377] I still like you.

[1378] So we're like, we're going to show you that he's not, being a ding -dong is not the only thing he is.

[1379] Right.

[1380] And as long as you're doing that for a character, I think you're on solid footing.

[1381] If it's just, if it's punching down, straight punching down on a, taking a group of people who are in a disadvantaged position and just mocking the disadvantaged position that they're in, then it's no good.

[1382] Then it's boring and it's cliche and it's not funny.

[1383] But as long as you know.

[1384] I'm only going to point these out just, by the way, I love, I love the good.

[1385] place.

[1386] I think the writing's off the chart's brilliant.

[1387] So I don't actually have an issue of any of this.

[1388] I'm just, I'm vocally being an advocate so I can try to prove my greater point, which is even Kristen's character.

[1389] It is, from my point of view, it is making fun of white trashness.

[1390] And white trashness is no different to me than inner city poor black folks.

[1391] Like it's, it's, you're making fun of a socioeconomic group.

[1392] Sure.

[1393] And so, is, Is it okay because we're white, we're free to make fun of white trash?

[1394] Well, here's what I would say.

[1395] Number one, it is different, at least in this character's position, because this character, look, she had, the character had miserable parents who were awful, awful people.

[1396] Absolutely.

[1397] Who really, like, ruined her childhood.

[1398] She's a victim of circumstance.

[1399] But also, she is able to, at least through the story that we've told, she has, she goes to a school that seems like it's a pretty good school.

[1400] She gets a job.

[1401] She has her own.

[1402] apartment.

[1403] She lives in Arizona.

[1404] She has a pretty, she's like sustaining a pretty decent, what you would call a middle class life.

[1405] Yeah.

[1406] So it is different than, for example, inner city, what you would call inner city African American poor communities in a number of ways already just by like, just by the way we've portrayed it.

[1407] It's not the same thing.

[1408] Right.

[1409] It's a, it's, but you're not, you're also not wrong when you say that it is a socioeconomic class.

[1410] It's just that this socioeconomic class that she's a part of is comparatively speaking.

[1411] Can migrate north?

[1412] And she went to college.

[1413] Like she had the ability somehow or another.

[1414] She went to Arizona State on the show.

[1415] Yeah.

[1416] And so that's where she went.

[1417] So again, it's like it's, in theory, you're right.

[1418] In practice with this particular character, we have shown that she has probably in part because she is a white person who is not born into abject poverty.

[1419] Yeah.

[1420] She's had certain advantages that led to her having certain more advantages, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

[1421] Okay.

[1422] So basically what I'm saying, though, globally is I absolutely accept that and I embrace that.

[1423] And I agree with you.

[1424] But I do think it is weirdly, I think people underestimate the power of society.

[1425] We are a group animal humans, right?

[1426] And making fun and gossiping is actually how traditionally we've kept the person in power in check.

[1427] Like it has served an evolutionary purpose.

[1428] purpose.

[1429] And so we make fun of things.

[1430] I would say it is okay to make fun of certain aspects of being white trash.

[1431] Let's just call it that.

[1432] We're doing it because we can do better.

[1433] We're saying this is funny and that is actually the lever by which we get change, which is we make fun of it publicly and we can take the specifics out of it.

[1434] But we make fun of any given thing and we do it so loudly but the next time someone does that thing, they get a little embarrassed because they realize, oh, society has deemed this is ridiculous or funny.

[1435] And so it is, it is weirdly performing a sociological service to make fun of shit.

[1436] It's kind of how we say, this is preposterous and absurd.

[1437] If you're wearing an affliction shirt in a jacked -up truck and you drive through a sizzler and you order your Coke, you know, whatever the scenario is, we are saying, guys, pretty much no one agrees with this behavior.

[1438] That's why this is.

[1439] is funny.

[1440] Yeah.

[1441] And I do think that that is the service that comedy can provide to society.

[1442] Yes.

[1443] I feel like I understand what you're saying.

[1444] And I would add to this that there is a way in which you can do it reductively and sort of pointlessly.

[1445] And to me, look, my grandparents, my whole mom's side of the family's from the South.

[1446] That my grandfather was born in Mississippi and they lived in Texas their whole lives.

[1447] And I take offense whenever someone in the culture represents the concept of stupidity or backwood's life by giving them a southern accent.

[1448] I personally, even though I'm from Michigan and Connecticut, I take offense at that.

[1449] Because I feel like that's reductive and stupid.

[1450] And so.

[1451] And you object to laziness.

[1452] That's right.

[1453] Yes.

[1454] It's lazy and it's inaccurate.

[1455] Again, lazy is something we should make fun of.

[1456] We should never stop.

[1457] That's right.

[1458] And so let's take Kristen's character on The Good Place again.

[1459] A lazy, ugly, terrible human being.

[1460] Continue.

[1461] In real life.

[1462] But on the show, she, her, again, the idea here was, look, there are aspects of her life.

[1463] And we are explicit about this that we, you would call trashy.

[1464] She reads, um, celebrity, she reads it, her favorite magazine is called Celebrity Baby Plastic Surgery Disasters.

[1465] She's, she's a, and she loves, she loves pro wrestling on the show.

[1466] Like, so does, uh, who loves it on your writer, uh, james?

[1467] Oh, Jen Statsky, yes.

[1468] And Jen Statsky is from Massachusetts and refers to herself as a garbage person.

[1469] And so that's what we have said about.

[1470] There are certain aspects of Eleanor on the show that you would call trashy.

[1471] However, there are also certain aspects of her character that are incredibly aspirational.

[1472] She's a completely independent person.

[1473] She left home and she was 14 and put herself through college.

[1474] And she like, pays her own way and she is like a, she's a striver.

[1475] She has a really good emotional intelligence.

[1476] Her antenna are up all the time for people's phony behavior.

[1477] She recognizes it and other people, all this sort of stuff.

[1478] And so again, it's - And most admirably, she is capable of change.

[1479] She's capable of change.

[1480] To me, the number one thing, right?

[1481] The high watermark of a good person.

[1482] Yes.

[1483] So I feel like even if you think that we are punching down on the concept of white trash or something like that, we're not doing it in the typical, it's not deliverance.

[1484] Her character is not from the movie deliverance.

[1485] And also, we are trying at least to show that there are 12 different personality components that make her more interesting than the kind of reductive stereotype we might otherwise be presenting.

[1486] And I think you're doing a great job of it.

[1487] Again, I was only taking that side of the argument just to further my own agenda.

[1488] But I, too, I was in idiocry, which is the entire movie from credits to credits is basically making fun of stupidity.

[1489] Right.

[1490] And that can be mean if you have a. child that is testing at 79 and is being mainstream.

[1491] That's a very fucking mean movie.

[1492] Yeah.

[1493] And so I could see a pretty significant contingent of the population saying that's bad and it's evil and that's mean.

[1494] And I would agree to all those things, but I would have to take a utilitarian stance and say, but overall, the net result of that show, our movie, is positive.

[1495] We are pointing out things.

[1496] We're putting things out there that we should all try to avoid or you know what I'm saying.

[1497] Yeah.

[1498] Well, the meanest part of that movie, is the beginning when it lays out how this happened because it's showing two sort of thoughtful sort of intellectual people having a nuanced discussion about family planning and then it shows a different couple that's right and he's in that southern kind of way say and then they just populate like rabbits and there is something very dicey about that that sort of like graphical layout of like how the world got stupid that's the part of that movie that makes me the least comfortable and I don't, I'm not talking about the truth of it or the false of it or falseness of it or whatever.

[1499] I'm just saying watching that graphically represented on the screen made me feel icky.

[1500] It made me feel like one of the groups was rats.

[1501] Yes, that's exactly what it suggests.

[1502] Yeah.

[1503] And it was like, these are like thinking people.

[1504] And I see that.

[1505] I would agree with that.

[1506] But I would also say it is taking just as sharp of a view of the smart people, which is they're completely.

[1507] fucking paralyzed by their own fears and everything has to be perfect and so to me it's it is it is um equally handed in that i think he's make mike is making fun of smart people and elites just as much he's making fun of them but he's also positing that the world got terrible because they lost because the recundity rate of yeah yeah so at some point you're like yes he's he it is satire obviously it's satire and you know look we live in l .A and the idea of like discussing the size of your family like it's it is a thing we are like we there is a lot of that's not that it's not true no if i meet someone with four kids in los angeles i go oh are you still Mormon you know i go straight to there must be a religious yeah explanation for why on earth you would that's right and so burden yourself the part of the part of the part of videocracy that that that gives makes me a little queasy is the idea that like he ultimately even though he's he it is satire of like quote intellectual people end quote He's also essentially arguing that they lost and because they lost the world's, the world went AWOL, right?

[1508] Right.

[1509] So he's landing on the side of the kind of nuanced intellectual elite instead of the less fortunate, less wealthy people of the world.

[1510] Yeah.

[1511] And you're going to break some eggs when you make an album, right?

[1512] You're going to try to make some broader point that might be worth making and you're going to fuck up all along the way.

[1513] That's right.

[1514] And there's no like there's no. way to, that movie came out.

[1515] How long ago is that movie?

[1516] 2006, I think, 12 years ago.

[1517] So it's like the world changes dramatically every 12 years.

[1518] You know, there's no, like now looking, it's easy to look back now and say that was not a, like, that movie maybe didn't make the exact point it was trying to make.

[1519] It's very easy for me to say that 12 years later.

[1520] Well, by the way, it thought it was making one point.

[1521] And then in the last election cycle, it appears to have been making a completely different point, right?

[1522] Like, its relevance kind of, uh, peak.

[1523] Yeah.

[1524] Well, Mike, you are a very, and I don't say this lightly, you are a very ethical person and it's really admirable.

[1525] And it's cool to see someone that is working so diligently to be mindful of all these things that someone 100 % on the white privilege scale should be.

[1526] And I'm very encouraged to see that you've had success with this ethical constraint, as I would call it, because I'm less ethical than you.

[1527] I'll be, I'll make a true.

[1528] joke of anyone's expense.

[1529] But I appreciate you and I'm glad you are so gainfully employed and I hope you continue to keep doing this.

[1530] Keep being your wife's boss?

[1531] Yeah.

[1532] Yeah.

[1533] One thing I do want to say is the, so you, as we've now just learned, Mike is uniquely kind and nice.

[1534] My wife is uniquely kind and nice.

[1535] And Ted is maybe he's a monster.

[1536] He's a monster of kindness and niceness.

[1537] Yeah.

[1538] And my first thought when I, because I knew you prior to her working on show.

[1539] And I had met Ted and my first thought was this is the dream set for a pickpocket.

[1540] If I were a pick pocket, I would live at the good places.

[1541] Everyone's nice.

[1542] That says so much about you, but that was your thought.

[1543] You're not, you're not wrong, though.

[1544] In fact, what would happen is all three of our pockets would be picked.

[1545] And we would have the same thought, which is like, you know what, in the grand scheme of things, this doesn't matter.

[1546] And we would all fill our wallet.

[1547] We would get new credit cards and put more cash in our And it would happen again.

[1548] We'd go, look, you know, that's a bum luck on our part.

[1549] But, you know, I'm sure things will turn around for us.

[1550] And it would just keep happening.

[1551] Yeah, you guys, you're saying, is it supposed to fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice shame on me. It's just always shame on me. All right, Mike.

[1552] Well, thanks for taking the time.

[1553] Thanks for having me. I begin my favorite part of the show, fact check with Monica Padman.

[1554] You know what?

[1555] Because this is the third episode of the week, I'm going to spare people a song.

[1556] Oh.

[1557] Yeah.

[1558] Maybe I should do an impromptu poem instead.

[1559] Okay.

[1560] When driving my car, I often wreck fantasizing about fact check.

[1561] I need to know all the truths, even when passing the toll booths.

[1562] She is my guiding star for all that's true.

[1563] Her name's Monica Padman.

[1564] She says, I love you.

[1565] By Dak Shepard.

[1566] That was beautiful.

[1567] I don't even know what I said.

[1568] I love that poem.

[1569] Oh, thank you.

[1570] Oh, wow.

[1571] Promptu poems.

[1572] I didn't pick the easiest words to rhyme.

[1573] When I said truths, I was like, what am I going to say?

[1574] I got nervous for you.

[1575] I was panicked inside it.

[1576] My palms are sweating like a, like a, what do they say, a whore in church?

[1577] A whore.

[1578] Oh, I love that.

[1579] Great.

[1580] Mike.

[1581] Sure.

[1582] He's great.

[1583] Oh, boy.

[1584] He is great.

[1585] He's great.

[1586] Give it up.

[1587] Give it up, y 'all.

[1588] He really is.

[1589] He's also a couple things that didn't really come up.

[1590] One, I happen to know that he make sure that there's an equal number of female and male directors on his show.

[1591] Mm -hmm.

[1592] Which is fantastic.

[1593] He's very committed to diversity and diversity and equality.

[1594] And he would never say that or brag about that, but I will because I know it to be true.

[1595] And he's just so respectable.

[1596] I love you.

[1597] I love you too.

[1598] We all have our roles.

[1599] I get it.

[1600] It takes all of us to make this world go around.

[1601] Yeah.

[1602] You need both.

[1603] You do.

[1604] Okay.

[1605] The game and nagging come up.

[1606] But we talk.

[1607] talk about that on Vincent Donofrio's fact check if people want to But you know, you and I talk about it Three times a week and I always love that You're my resident expert on it How often do I say to you?

[1608] Monica, what's it called?

[1609] I always am like queuing you up To explain the game to people.

[1610] Yeah, the game nagging.

[1611] Yeah.

[1612] Oh, because we were just at the Hanson's party And there was an example of it.

[1613] It was really great.

[1614] Yeah, when did that?

[1615] It was someone Oh, someone that said something to Erica Like, oh, I know.

[1616] Someone had called her a hippopotamus because of her teeth.

[1617] She has a gap in her teeth.

[1618] The cutest gap in her teeth.

[1619] Oh, my God.

[1620] The cutest gap in her teeth.

[1621] Oh, my God.

[1622] Oh, my God.

[1623] Eric is Charlie's wife.

[1624] Charlie of the Perfect 10 calendar.

[1625] My main heart throb.

[1626] So you can imagine that she's beautiful because Charlie is married to her.

[1627] It would just be incongruous if they weren't equally beautiful.

[1628] Exactly.

[1629] And they are.

[1630] And she has the cutest gap in her teeth.

[1631] And I guess somebody called her a hippopotamus.

[1632] And then they said, I love that because my ex, all my ex -girlfriends have that.

[1633] Are hippopotam -I.

[1634] Yeah.

[1635] Like, it was so, such a weird backwards compliment.

[1636] So it's like the subtext is I would date you, even though you're disgusting hippopotamus.

[1637] It was a really good.

[1638] Good nagging, bro.

[1639] He read the game.

[1640] I hope his bro high -fived him afterwards.

[1641] Sweet nag, my man. Oh, anyway, nagging is, is detailed.

[1642] during the Vincent DiNoffrio fact check if you want to hear about it.

[1643] The black character in Fletch, you said his name is Bobo.

[1644] His name is gummy.

[1645] Yeah, okay.

[1646] I don't feel too bad about that mix -up.

[1647] Well, you don't feel bad about the mix -up, but the point made, he was talking about watching old movies and old things and now it's like, oh my God, about a lot of stuff.

[1648] And you had brought up some comedies and you said Fletch.

[1649] And then he was like, yeah, there's no, you know, there's no diversity in that movie.

[1650] You're like, well, no, there's one black character.

[1651] I think his name is Bobo.

[1652] He was strung out junkie that lived under the pier.

[1653] Right.

[1654] And Mike was like, yeah, that's the example of the black person in a movie like that.

[1655] Anyway, so his name being gummy is actually way worse than Bobo.

[1656] You think it's worse.

[1657] Okay.

[1658] I think it's worse than Bobo.

[1659] I'll co -sign on this.

[1660] It's worse.

[1661] Okay.

[1662] Oh, so Nora Dunn did leave S &L because of Andrew Dice Clay, his appearance.

[1663] Okay.

[1664] She left in 1990 after the fact some cast members, especially John Lovitz, claimed that she was simply trying to draw attention to herself.

[1665] But she said, like she did an article for Salon Magazine and just basically debunked that and said, My objection to Andrew Dice Clay was that his character was only about one thing, abusing women and laughing about abusing women.

[1666] There was nothing else behind it.

[1667] Yeah, this gets tricky because one of the best tools in outing misogynistic, archaic, stupid caveman thinking is to comedically portray them and make fun of them.

[1668] So, like, what you're really laughing at is the character of this person.

[1669] that's where it gets really dicey pun intended to know when what's happening you know it's great to be on Saturday Night Live while Jersey Shores out and parody that culture of roids dancing fucking whatever you should be able to go on the show and play a character where you're actually pointing out how ridiculous it is that's a great tool in actually making it seem embarrassing.

[1670] So what we're really saying is that this is this would be embarrassing to act like this.

[1671] Yeah, that's true.

[1672] But I think when you're on S &L, you have the benefit of everyone knowing like this person is playing this character.

[1673] And generally, even in those sketches, the character normally receives some sort of comeuppance.

[1674] Like it's not funny if they're just winning and they're terrible.

[1675] So with Andrew Dice Clay, he just is this character.

[1676] that he's portraying always and there's no he just is that so you're just seeing this horrible person although i do feel obliged to defend him because if you listen to him on stern he is a i don't know what his feelings are about females or not but i can tell you on stern he is 100 % not the character he plays on stage is the dice man like he's a real human being and as a character he played and he actually when you hear a story he was he never saw himself as a stand -up comedian he was too afraid to go out as himself and try to tell jokes and so he created this character he wasn't afraid to if he could hide behind that character he could get on stage so it's just there's a lot to the story minimally and he was a real person and i don't think he he you know he wasn't that person yeah i don't think anyone's saying he wasn't but the character that he chose to portray was this toxic yeah massaginist yeah and I think the reason it was funny is that, especially in the 80s when it was popular, we knew about this Guido stereotype of the Italian -American guy with chains driving a Camaro with the leather jacket.

[1677] Like he was playing on that that we already thought was embarrassing.

[1678] You know, it was kind of like the fallout of Saturday Night Fever.

[1679] So it was sending up that character.

[1680] But not in any way where that character received anything negative because he was the that way.

[1681] And you need that.

[1682] I guess the element that.

[1683] Yeah, I guess when like Steve Martin used to do with Dan Aykroy, two wild and crazy guys and they had a swinging bachelor pad and all they wanted to do is fuck and they were immigrants.

[1684] And yeah, they never got laid.

[1685] I guess that was the joke.

[1686] Right.

[1687] They were total puss hounds, but they never ever got laid.

[1688] Yeah.

[1689] Yeah.

[1690] I wonder if like his thing could have played out in a different.

[1691] I don't know how you do it on stage as stand up where.

[1692] you get yours you know it's interesting yeah i mean i think that's all why it was so messy and why people couldn't really distinguish him from that character what's funny though is when you now view him in a time capsule and he's not a threat to our current society if you ever thought he was one like christin who's definitely a feminist will watch that and just laugh hysterically because it's so preposterous that someone would light their cigarette for 15 minutes and they would talk about sex the way he does.

[1693] It's like now that he's not a threat, you can kind of, you can laugh at it.

[1694] Now, Mike can't.

[1695] Mike doesn't enjoy that.

[1696] But I certainly do.

[1697] And like, Kristen does.

[1698] I'm sure people have varying opinions on it.

[1699] But it's all tricky, though, because we were listening to the, we were listening to Malcolm Gladwell's podcast.

[1700] And it was all about Sammy Davis Jr. And all the things he went through.

[1701] It's incredible, man. Yeah.

[1702] What Sammy Davis went through.

[1703] And there was a period where he was really shunned by the black community because he had he had introduced Nixon on stage and hugged him during the election and then he went to a rally I think in Chicago and in the black community like really didn't want him there and then Jesse Jackson I think made a speech saying he's one of ours you got to embrace him and he performed and all this stuff and the point of the podcast was the role of the token person The first person who's the token female at a company or the token black person, what they have to do to survive and what they have to do to overcome is such a different dynamic than everyone that then follows them.

[1704] And the part of it that was absolutely I couldn't even listen to, so where I can relate to Mike and you quite often on these topics, they played the NBC televised roast of Sammy Davis, the audio from it and every joke is just the most racist terrible joke and these are his friends like there's no question they actually loved him but like Don Rickles and all these guys getting up yeah and they're just brutal and to see that someone had to just take that yeah to open the door for Richard Pryor and everyone else that then had the luxury of fighting against that as they should is very heartbreaking.

[1705] So it's interesting.

[1706] I can watch the massaginy thing and see it as a funny character.

[1707] But then, yeah, if I hear that roast, it's terrible.

[1708] But then again, also, they're talking about a real human being.

[1709] They're talking about someone in front of them that's real.

[1710] And Andrew Dice Clay, like, this chick had her tongue up my ass.

[1711] I don't really think there was ever a chick that had her tongue up the Dice Man's ass.

[1712] So it's all like fantasy.

[1713] But even if it isn't real, what are you putting out there?

[1714] Why?

[1715] Like, even if it's a total made -up story, what is the point of it and what does it do for society?

[1716] Does it make people, what is the point?

[1717] Let's use a more innocuous example.

[1718] Did you ever watch episodes of Married with Children?

[1719] Yeah.

[1720] Yeah, so Al Bundy's playing the stereotype of like a misogynistic dad who just wants to watch football, drink beer and look at boobs.

[1721] and it's serving a purpose.

[1722] Like, it's actually pointing out that that's preposterous.

[1723] Like, they're in on the joke.

[1724] But that's a TV show where they, that's what I'm saying.

[1725] They have the luxury and the benefit of, of al being a character, being an actual character that's on TV.

[1726] And then, yeah, he faces repercussions for that behavior or at least like.

[1727] He's not winning.

[1728] He's not winning.

[1729] Exactly.

[1730] You see the whole picture.

[1731] Yeah.

[1732] And when someone's just portraying, like being a dick and saying like, that's just my character.

[1733] What?

[1734] Yeah.

[1735] Why?

[1736] Well, at that point, I'm just evaluating whether it makes me laugh or not.

[1737] Yeah.

[1738] That is really interesting about the token person.

[1739] Because when we just recorded somebody today and we were talking about young people.

[1740] on college campuses and sensitivity and those issues.

[1741] And I was thinking, like, they have the luxury of being sensitive to this.

[1742] Like, I was sensitive to all of that.

[1743] Not all of them.

[1744] You don't think there's books that should be outlawed on a college campus.

[1745] No, God, no. Right.

[1746] But I also never felt like I could say, hey, that's, don't, please, don't do that.

[1747] Like, I never felt like I could say that.

[1748] Let's just be really clear.

[1749] Quite often, people meet you and they go, where do you from?

[1750] And you go Georgia.

[1751] But they're not satisfied with that answer because what they really want to know is what ethnicity are you.

[1752] Are you Indian?

[1753] Are you Pakistani?

[1754] They're curious.

[1755] Yep.

[1756] And of course, you get sick of answering that question.

[1757] Yeah, because I'm from Georgia.

[1758] Right.

[1759] So they say, where are you from?

[1760] And I say, where are you from?

[1761] Yeah.

[1762] And again, this is, it's hard from my egocentric point of view.

[1763] Like, I would love for someone to be interested in where I'm from.

[1764] Like all.

[1765] So in that person's mind, like, I think I would, I would love it as someone's like, are you German?

[1766] I would just want anyone to be interested in me trying to like figure out what I am or something.

[1767] But again, I'm in a position of power in this balance.

[1768] So I would like that.

[1769] But in my mind, I'd love it if a girl came up to me and said, where are your ancestors from?

[1770] I'm like, oh, she.

[1771] was looking at me and now she is curious about me and now I get to tell her like, oh, well, half is English, Irish and then the other, some friend, you know, whatever.

[1772] So that's, if, if that person who asked me was asking every person where they were from, where their ancestors were from, it wouldn't bother me. They're only asking me because I look different to them.

[1773] Right.

[1774] They want to put me in a very specific box of, okay, that person's this.

[1775] I think the super vulnerable, like evolved answer would be when you ask me that, I feel like I'm on the outside of this group.

[1776] Like, I feel excluded.

[1777] Like that would be the thing that could break through to me. Again, because I'm locked in my perception where I'd love to be asked where I'm from because it would mean you're interested in me. So to break me out of that, like an act of vulnerability would be when you ask me where I'm from and I tell you Georgia and then you say, no, where are you really from?

[1778] I feel like you're saying I'm different than you.

[1779] I'm the other.

[1780] Right.

[1781] I'm just an American girl.

[1782] I think it would click for people like, oh, God, yeah, that does, that would make me feel that way.

[1783] You know, it shouldn't be, it shouldn't be incumbent on the person that's getting bothered.

[1784] But if we want to, like, help people evolve, like, then a little starting with, because another part of this point was assessing people's intention is relevant.

[1785] Yeah.

[1786] You know?

[1787] And so if we want to.

[1788] to break this cycle and let people know how those things hurt us, I just think vulnerability is probably the best course of action.

[1789] Okay.

[1790] But I, the problem is you say that and that that should be the response.

[1791] But if that is the response, the, the, mostly the reaction is, that person's so sensitive.

[1792] You think so?

[1793] Yes.

[1794] And I think that's, that's part of this whole conversation.

[1795] I think that's why people aren't vulnerable because I think they fear that.

[1796] No, that's what that's What this conversation is that, of course, there's extremes, but microaggressions, you generally think some of them are reactive when people are feeling too sensitive, that people are feeling too sensitive.

[1797] I do think people, some people are feeling too sensitive.

[1798] Yes.

[1799] So, so the responding to where are you from, where are you from in a way that's anything other than India, which is what I always had to do.

[1800] is also lumped into this sensitivity thing.

[1801] And it's pain.

[1802] First of all, I 1 ,000 % see what you're saying.

[1803] And it would drive me crazy that everywhere I went, someone asked me where I was from.

[1804] Yeah.

[1805] I'm saying it seems like I would like it because it doesn't happen to me at all.

[1806] Right.

[1807] So it would feel unique.

[1808] So first and foremost, I think that it breaks in my heart that that's something that you've always had to contend with.

[1809] I would get so sick of it.

[1810] Yeah.

[1811] If nothing else, even if it didn't trigger insecurities in you, the redundancy of the conversation.

[1812] Yeah, it's very annoying.

[1813] But, like, my whole point of this is younger kids now have the luxury of feeling sensitive and saying something about it.

[1814] And I did not have that.

[1815] I was like, you know, the Indian kid amongst all these white people.

[1816] And if they were saying something offensive to me or microaggressing me, I, of course, would not say anything because what would that do?

[1817] That would put me even further outside of this thing I was trying to be super inside of.

[1818] You're kind of the token.

[1819] Yeah, I was.

[1820] And you do have to just sort of bend over a lot when you're in that position.

[1821] So I have a little more sympathy for the.

[1822] stuff happening.

[1823] I don't think it's great.

[1824] But the stuff that's happening on college campuses, I have a little more sympathy towards because I'm like kind of good for them for being able.

[1825] Now is the time that people are able to do that.

[1826] Yeah.

[1827] I couldn't.

[1828] Yeah.

[1829] So.

[1830] I just think, again, I'm with you all the way to there.

[1831] They should they should stand at the top of the rooftop and shot whatever it is that they feel disgruntled about or dissatisfied with.

[1832] Yeah.

[1833] Surrounding professors.

[1834] I agree.

[1835] Like 40 people, you have to recognize anytime a group of people has surrounded one person is shouting at them.

[1836] Yeah, it's terrible.

[1837] That's just, that's not how you handle your fucking business.

[1838] I don't care what your, it's not human behavior.

[1839] It's not, it's not, it's not academic discourse.

[1840] Well, it's not how you should treat anyone on any place ever.

[1841] It's not, even apart from college campuses, it's just a terrible threatening way to be.

[1842] And this notion of shut up, it's not your time to talk.

[1843] Also, I completely reject.

[1844] This is always a conversation.

[1845] It's always a dialogue.

[1846] All growth comes out of both sides being heard.

[1847] Yeah, I fully agree.

[1848] Okay.

[1849] What's the most popular brand of college football merchandise?

[1850] Ooh, because I had claimed you of M was.

[1851] You did.

[1852] And then Mike said he thought it would be Notre Dame or Bama.

[1853] Business Insider in 2016 said the school that's made the most money.

[1854] in college sports, this is not merchandising, money in college sports is Texas A &M, 192 .6 million.

[1855] That includes like ticket sales and stuff like that.

[1856] That was per year?

[1857] That was in 2016.

[1858] Damn.

[1859] Yeah.

[1860] There's a lot of money to not be giving those athletes even $10.

[1861] Yeah, that's true.

[1862] But in 2013, that was the last time I could find for merchandising.

[1863] University of Texas.

[1864] Yeah, Austin.

[1865] Your University of Texas, Austin, was number one and number two was Bama.

[1866] Oh, wow.

[1867] I knew that SEC would make it in there.

[1868] You thought so.

[1869] Oh, yeah.

[1870] I don't even know what those.

[1871] I have so many.

[1872] What does that mean?

[1873] SEC.

[1874] Isn't that the Southeastern Conference?

[1875] Securities and Exchange Commission?

[1876] Oh.

[1877] Well, yeah, it is.

[1878] The Southeastern football conference.

[1879] Oh, okay.

[1880] I myself have a lot of T -shirts.

[1881] So I know that the South is really pulling their weight in merchandising.

[1882] I wore one the other day.

[1883] Okay, you talked about the reengineering of wheat.

[1884] Oh, uh -huh, and gluten.

[1885] Yeah.

[1886] And I sort of had a hard time finding stuff on it.

[1887] There was something in a journal, joc .com in 1998, said it had produced a new wonder wheat.

[1888] Maybe this is what you're talking about.

[1889] No. No?

[1890] No, this is from the 30s.

[1891] I learned this on Stuff You Should Know, which is a great podcast.

[1892] So if you want to learn what I learned, I can't remember the particulars of it, but Stuff You Should Know did a Ciliacs disease episode.

[1893] And they give you the full history of that wheat that was re -engineered.

[1894] I want to say it was in the 20s.

[1895] Got it.

[1896] Okay.

[1897] So you can go find that on things you should know.

[1898] Yeah, stuff you should know.

[1899] Stuff you should know.

[1900] You ever listen to that podcast?

[1901] No. It's awesome.

[1902] They sit down and they talk about a topic.

[1903] And they've both had to research it all week.

[1904] Uh -huh.

[1905] And then they just exchange everything they learned about it.

[1906] That's cool.

[1907] And they're really both funny.

[1908] Yeah, it's great.

[1909] Oh, the scientists that invented the disease resistant wheat.

[1910] Mike, I'm going to fact -check Mike, thought that this person was from India or Pakistan.

[1911] Okay.

[1912] But he's from America.

[1913] Mm -hmm.

[1914] His name is Norman Borlaug.

[1915] Mm. Yeah.

[1916] He basically is credited for feeding a billion.

[1917] people through this disease resistant wheat.

[1918] This is probably the person that I'm talking about.

[1919] Does it say what yours Bore log was in business?

[1920] By the way, way to overcome a rough last name.

[1921] It's basically a boring log.

[1922] A log's already boring in it of itself.

[1923] And then if you have to put an adjective in front of it to say it's a boring log, that might be the boringest thing in the planet, Bore log.

[1924] Maybe.

[1925] Okay, he launched the Green Revolution.

[1926] Tell me if this is it.

[1927] Yeah.

[1928] This sounds, yeah.

[1929] sounds from out, yeah.

[1930] Dr. Borlaug is most famous for having launched what came to be known as the Green Revolution, the agricultural phenomenon responsible for an exponential increase.

[1931] This is it.

[1932] A veritable explosion in the amount of food produced on Earth.

[1933] What years was he?

[1934] Saved a billionized.

[1935] I don't know how much.

[1936] Yeah.

[1937] This is it.

[1938] He was deployed to solve this potential world.

[1939] He went to India with a peace corps.

[1940] and he figured out the dwarf wheat.

[1941] So standard wheat plants are fairly tall and have narrow stalks.

[1942] Dwarf wheat plants are relatively short and squat and have thick husky stocks.

[1943] Gertie.

[1944] Yeah, sure.

[1945] One advantage of that unique feature is that dwarf plants can remain upright.

[1946] They don't fall over from their own weight and lie rotting on the ground.

[1947] They don't break down on a windy day.

[1948] Another advantage, indeed the most important advantage is that compared to to standard wheat plants, the dwarf produces a prodigious amount of wheat kernels.

[1949] The comparison is astounding.

[1950] So.

[1951] And in that dwarf wheat, the gluten level went way the fuck out.

[1952] Oh, interesting.

[1953] Okay, there we go.

[1954] Now we, no, look at that.

[1955] We figured it out.

[1956] So now you don't have to go listen to stuff.

[1957] You should know.

[1958] Fuck them.

[1959] Mike said there were 8 .5 billion people on Earth.

[1960] According to the internet, 7 .4.

[1961] Yeah.

[1962] I love when Mike's wrong.

[1963] No, you're just glowing over there.

[1964] Yeah, I did.

[1965] Well, he didn't.

[1966] He said maybe Notre Dame.

[1967] I don't really.

[1968] He said, Bama.

[1969] He was right.

[1970] How many writers versus performers on S &L?

[1971] Varies, but in the past 10 seasons, there was a range from 24 to 34 writers and cast is more around the 18 number.

[1972] Ooh, more writers than?

[1973] More writers.

[1974] more writers more problems more money more writers more problems Catch them by the pussy Catch them by the pussy Different faction I can't remember That's it I really think we could have Something could take off with Catch them by the Pussy Shirts would say catch them by the pussy And it's just innocent Cheerleaders Just cheerleading Just helping one another and supporting them You love Mike I do.

[1975] He's your number one.

[1976] I respect him so much.

[1977] I respect you so much too.

[1978] Yeah.

[1979] I love you.

[1980] And tomorrow, if you've made it this far, tomorrow's the knockout punch.

[1981] I'm sure you can smell what's coming, but tomorrow's the knockout punch.

[1982] That's right.

[1983] So download that shit.

[1984] Love you.

[1985] Love you.

[1986] Follow Armchair expert on the Wondry app, Amazon music, or wherever you get your podcast.

[1987] You can listen to every episode of armchair expert early and ad free right now by joining Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple podcasts.

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