Eric Goode (documentary filmmaker)

23:55Sure. I have an apology to make, an immense. So the keys at the Bowery are amazing. The fobs. They're legendary. Yes, exactly, the fobs. For people who don't know, they're this big tassel. Your number, hotel room number, is carved onto the brass. It's beautiful, okay? I like items So you stole the fob I didn't, I didn't I kind of did Okay, so I was in room 1111 Very, very auspicious Very, very That's my lucky number I'm always seeing 1111 I get that room And I was like I have to have this tassel Like, I don't know How I'm gonna get it But I have to Now be careful Because what happens at the Bowery Stays at the Bowery, Monica So don't say anything to Well, I've already said it Unfortunately, this whole story Is known to all the list Unfortunately, everybody knows.

24:42I'm not good at keeping secrets. But I'm also not good at stealing. So I did go up to the front desk and I said, how do I have this? I will buy it. I would like to buy it. How do I do that? And they're like, they're not for sale. But if they are taken, we charge this amount. Some ridiculous number. Yeah. And I was like, thank you for telling me that news. This is the last you'll ever see of this key. And they took it. We try to trick people into taking them so we can charge this enormous. That's right. So it's the real way we profit on the Bowery. That's where the margin's at, isn't that? It is.

25:14I'm shameless right now plugging my other hotel. I have a hotel in Ojai called Hotel El Roblar, and we have these brass cowboy hats on the fobs, and everyone wants the brass cowboy hat, and they do take them all the time, and we do have to charge. Yeah, I'm going to do that. You have to. I do want to go there. You have to. That's been on my Instagram algorithm. I was looking at it this morning, and it's gorgeous. And my wife has stayed at your tortoise place. Oh. Oh, the conservator. Right? Is that not yours? It is. Yeah. I have a hotel for tortoises. As well. I'm in Ojai as well. And I'm much better at tortoise hospitality than human hospitality.

25:50They get pampered really well. You are not. The hospitality at those hotels are incredible. I can't believe this. This is very... This is great. But let me just tell you one last thing about hotels. Owning hotels, the thing that you learn is what do you do when someone commits suicide? What do you do with all these weird things that happen in hotels? So there's this whole thing we don't talk about when you own hotels. When do most people have sex? It's Friday afternoons when people are cheating on their wives. And between the hours of like 8 p.m. and midnight, you can hear the cacophony of sexual activity when you walk down the hallway.

26:24And so there's all these sort of things that we... And I shouldn't be saying anything. No, this is fantastic. I'll keep my mouth shut about what happens in hotels. But it's very interesting. My grandparents owned the roadside motel on the border of Indiana and Michigan growing up, and I would go there for the summer. It was called the Colonial Motor Inn. My sweet, sweet grandmother, who is very tiny, the amount of dead bodies she found in her tenure of running the Colonial Motor. Like, every time I saw my grandma, I mean, how many dead bodies have you found since I saw you? Because people do go to hotels to end their lives.

26:55And it's a whole thing, by the way, because your housekeeping won't go into those rooms until you have someone come, usually a priest, and bless the room and cleanse the room. And there's a whole thing about, you know, the shining kind of like that kind of thing. Like, oh, is this hotel haunted? You can get that rumor of a haunted hotel, the Maritime. Maritime. I was just going to say that. And it's like, I'm sitting there for like a couple of weeks and people just start telling me these ghost stories about the Maritime. And one of them was a woman woke up and a ghost was having sex with her. Oh my God.

27:26I said, what was your reaction? She goes, I was terrified. And I'm like, I would be so fucking delighted if I woke up. Well, that's one of the amenities that we offer at the Maritime. The ghost-sex interaction is one of the most popular. It's upgraded package. Wow, what a life. So, yeah, that chapter was pretty long. What are the borders of that chapter where that was your full focus before you really start getting into conservation and stuff? Yeah, like you said earlier, I like to figure something out. And, you know, you kind of crack the code and you do it. And then you don't want to just keep doing the same thing over and over again.

27:58So the progression was the hotels were great. It afforded me resources to do other things. I made some money. Clubs are ephemeral. I didn't really make money, but it was fun in my youth. And after a while, I had a few hotels. And then I started thinking, what's next? You know, life is short. And I kind of always was a closeted reptile guy and turtle guy in New York and never really spoke about that love affair that I would have. Did you have a bunch in your apartment? I did. and girlfriends would always be kind of like, oh, my God, what are you living with? Why is most of the apartment filled with these reptiles and tortoises?

28:33And do you not think there's a little bit of a smell when you have those aquariums? Yeah, I started feeling a little bit like goats in the apartment. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Some tortoises were big and they grew. But listen, that was an indelible love affair since I was a kid. Did you have any hijinks? Like, did any reptiles get loose ever? Yeah, of course. Yeah, it's their nature. I mean, listen, I don't recommend this to people, but in the early days, you know, we had themes at this club I owned in the early 80s, and we would have natural history theme. Any chance I got, I would try to figure out how to incorporate animals into the club.

29:02I had a great horndale. I had bats. I had a 15-foot python that escaped under the floorboards. I only found it years later when we took the club apart, the skeleton. No! No, no, I shouldn't even admit that. No, you're honest. I like your honesty. Yeah, we like it. Yeah, I'll regret it later. But snakes escaped in my life. You know, I used to sleep with a lizard when I was in high school called a tegu, a big black and white South American lizard. Wow. It wasn't the best creature to sleep with because it couldn't control itself, you know, its bowels. They're in common. Oh, boy. Anyway, anyway, but yeah, I did the hotels.

29:36I still have them. They just opened one in Ojai last year. Open one here, please. In L.A.? L.A. needs better hotels. I have old friends with Andre that owns the Chateau Marmont, and that's a whole other story. We love that, but that's far away. Yeah, if you know of any, Monica, just tell me. tax and now I would maybe like to get in the hotel business. Yes, I think we could really diversify. We could have a fun little another chapter Not for you, but for me. We need a side hotel. I'm putting that out there. Oh, then just quickly because you said, but did you have a little Addiction did ever get a little questionable?

30:08Oh, yeah in my life. What are you talking about? I'm like living in New York City. I like the dopamine rush of everything career dopamine rush drug dopamine rush the euphoria of having a success, and then the, you know, then why? You always want more and more and more, of course. And I think my father was really an alcoholic, to be fair. I think it runs in the family sometimes. Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah. You know, look, Jean-Michel died of a heroin overdose. Yeah, yeah. Jean-Michel Bosca. I was with him the night he died. And I've seen a lot of casualties along the way, obviously. It's like the opposite ends of the spectrum in the most dramatic way possible.

30:44Well, we always have euphoric recall, right? We forget the bad stuff, right? And then we go back and then we forget all the shit. No, it's definitely taken a toll on certain periods of my life for sure. So then you must love Monsters of God. I mean, we're getting to deal with a lot of drugs, which is fun, because we haven't had that in your first couple. Well, no, that's not true. Tiger King was very meth heavy. Yeah, I try not to go deep into the meth. But yeah, there was a lot of meth. I kind of didn't include as much as I could have. But it would be crazy not to acknowledge. It's such a powerful force within the stories we're witnessing.

31:16It's like when you wonder, well, why is Joe Exotic got these young guys? What's the leverage? That needs an explanation, and the explanation is drugs. Yeah, I mean, it's a little like that horrible saying, a little pooch gets you a lot of cooch. A little tiger gets you a lot of boys. Nothing better than a little tiger. Sorry about that. No, we love that. But, you know, like the little baby tigers were a good gateway drug into getting boys for Joe. and then sprinkle a little meth in with the tigers, and then you have a threesome and a foursome. You've got these cute little monkeys on top of it that you can sugarcoat everything.

31:54He had a pretty good trap to get his victims. Yes, he had a mems. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure. But all of that was going on. It was a cocktail of baby tigers, baby animals, meth, and boys. But I guess what I'm saying is I think it's helpful. Like, we'll go into 7-Eleven, me and my family, and we get back in the car, and they're a little bit like, what was going on with blank, blank, blank? And I'm like, okay, so that dude was on meth for three days. That dude was nodding off from junk. I know what's going on immediately. I know what the fucking scenario is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think that is a useful skill set when navigating a world like that.

32:30I have offices next to MacArthur Park. Oh, yes. My hotel's on the Bowery in New York. I can tell when I see someone walking across the street, barely able to stand, I usually go, and I go, oh, I want to feel like that guy. I know what that feels like. He's just barely teetering. He's on dope. And then the meth addicts are over there. I don't know if I want to feel like that. I'm an anthropologist. I can tell what's what. An urban anthropologist. Yeah. I can tell who's on what. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare. We are supported by Allstate. Checking Allstate first could save you hundreds on car insurance.

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34:19Background play also comes in clutch because I can lock my screen and keep the audio going. This comes in handy when I go out for a walk or when I'm in the middle of a great podcast. Plus, it has a ton of other features I didn't even know about. Like, did you know Premium automatically downloads videos from channels you subscribe to? So even when I forget, my content is still right there for me. So if you're like me and you already like YouTube, you're going to love YouTube Premium. Try it now for two months free. Trial eligibility varies. Terms apply. Cancel anytime. We are supported by Arm & Hammer Toothpaste, Monica.

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37:10I think it's a great skill set for navigating in the doc world because you're dropping into these things. You're getting the fast pass to what's really going on. Dax, I was filming in Vegas, another project I'm doing with Netflix right now, and we were filming this guy who was smoking fentanyl and meth, and my cameraman is sober, and he blew it right in his face. Oh, God. And contact high. You know, I'm okay. Freeman, but a cameraman literally absolutely had to take a pause, a timeout. But we've been filming a lot of people that are in that state. Would we call that a hillbilly speedball? Meth and fentanyl?

37:47I think we call it like death, right? Well, apparently it's a good blend for a lot of people. Well, it's a speedball. I don't understand fentanyl then. I thought if you had just a little bit, you died. So how are people doing it? It's insanely, insanely powerful, but you can get the right dosage. You're getting it at the hospital. How much? No, they did it great on 60 Minutes when they had an expert on. They had this little kilo, and then they had a penny, and on the penny had a little amount of fentanyl. and said this is enough to kill a 10 ,000-pound elephant. And then the little bag that was next to it said this is enough to kill, like, the village or something.

38:25You know, it's insanely powerful. But it obviously could be, as the doctors do, dosed correctly. But a lot of these people, they're even smart enough to have Narcan. A lot of these people just have it already. So if you go into a drug den house, which I've been in recently in Vegas, where there's 20 people in there doing meth and fentanyl and everything, they have Narcan. But, yeah, Narcan doesn't always. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so you also dabble in the 90s. And again, there's so exciting research in you today. You did the Nine Inch Nails video. Pinion. Pinion. I did two Nine Inch Nails videos.

38:58They were more like making short films in the early 90s. I see, oh, he directed a video. I wonder if I ever saw it. And the second it starts, I'm like, oh my God, this is one of the most like indelible. You know, this is a very memorable video. It starts with these three toilets, black and white, in clearly like a New York bathroom. It's not inviting. You follow the swirl of the water down a pipe. You're going through all the pipes in the city. Following it for a while, there's machinery. All of a sudden the pipe is linked to a person in a rubber BDSM outfit. And it's just spilling out. I mean, what a visual.

39:29It was funny. In between clubs and restaurants in New York, I thought it would be fun to make some music videos. Someone came up to me on the street and said, you want to write something for Nine Inch Nails? I didn't even know Trent Reznor. I didn't know Nine Inch Nails. and I wrote a treatment, that one, and they said, we love it. I did some drawings and I made that short film. They gave me 10 ,000 bucks to make a music video. And this is when David Fincher and Mark Romanek and all these guys were doing music videos before they were big movie directors. And we were all sort of writing for the same artists, Black Crows and Nirvana and et cetera.

40:03But anyway, I thought it was really fun because the band wasn't even in the music video. So I basically could do whatever I wanted and make a short, weird, Boonewell film. So I did a second one called Help Me, I'm in Hell with a guy in a padded cell eating a steak dinner, shaved head, with just hundreds of flies flying around and landing on him and landing on his fork. And that was it. And then it goes down a little bit of a dark rabbit hole. You're almost like artsy John Waters. Oh, you know, John and I are old friends. You are? He's coming to Ojai in October. Oh, okay. John, I'm talking about you.

40:39I've known John Waters. For 40 years. I love John. I interviewed John in Baltimore at his house not so long ago for a different project. But yeah, it was like making short films and making those music videos. Yeah. It was fun. Okay, so you do the hotel thing. Now it's like, what next? It's conservation first, then into docks, right? Yeah, I reached a point, like I said, where I was successful with the hotel world and restaurants. And I had the resources to start thinking about other things. And maybe things that were more important to me. and maybe also things that were going on with the world at the time.

41:13And this was in the early 2000s, late 1990s, when I became more aware of the extinction crisis, a serious topic. And there was a great book by Elizabeth Colbert called The Sixth Extinction, which is the first man-made extinction ever, which is also called the Anthropocene. The current extinction we're in right now is because of us. Climate change, us, you know, the impact on the planet. Eight billion people on planet Earth. When I was born, there was two and a half billion people. All the things that we've done have created this extinction crisis we live in today. And so primates and turtles and tortoises are the two vertebrates that are the most threatened with extinction.

41:49Because over half of each group is threatened with extinction. So I said, I want to do something about that. I want to help with these turtles that I love. So I started getting involved with turtle and tortoise conservation. But conservation in general, working with different groups around the world. It's interesting because I'm watching last night with my family episode two. You know, of course, my wife and my children are horrified. There's some very horrific things about these very, very rare animals dying. And I'm just admitting my own shittiness. I don't have a major connection to reptiles, right?

42:18So it's not hitting me. I'm more fascinated by the culture of the dudes. And then there's a bit of footage where they're talking about like, oh, yeah, he had everything. How do you get a baby gorilla? Now, my specialty or my focus was primates when I majored in anthropology. That was my interest, right? And I'm immediately like, I'll tell you how motherfuckers. they killed all the family members of that little baby gorilla. That's what happened. That baby gorilla represents six probably dead adults. And I was like, fuck, fuck these motherfuckers. And I was like, oh yeah, that's just the power of, that really affects me.

42:49And I've done the gorilla track, the majesty of those things. No, no, the old school way of getting menageries into zoos where you go to wherever and you shoot and kill the adult hippos and you bag the baby. Because you're not going to be able to get a giant hippo onto a boat or onto a plane. And so the old way was you shoot the adult elephants and you get the baby. The gorilla, you shoot the silverbacks and you get the baby. That was what menageries did back in the day. And so it was really horrific. What are menageries? Are these traveling like animal shows? Getting a collection of animals. Oh, okay, that's called a menagerie.

43:21So to get all these animals into zoos, they would do precisely what you just said. They would shoot the adults and grab the babies. Today, that's not the case. Gorillas now are being bred in captivity and we're not going and killing adult gorillas. to get the baby. But definitely in the Diane Fossey days, that was an epidemic. Yeah. Okay, so you start first, I guess, the Turtle... The Turtle Conservancy shameless plug. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no. You donate$30 million of your own money to this. Probably more at this point. At this point, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, we're right now... This comes out after the show series, right?

43:55So I can... No spoiler alerts, right? Yes, right? There's only three more weeks, right? Yes, yes. No, but at the end of Monsters of God, there's sort of an optimistic ending after a lot of dark, you know, history. Well, yeah, just things that will be really surprising when you see all five episodes of Monsters of God, there'll be things that you would not expect. But at the end, we successfully breed at the Turtle Conservancy, the rarest tortoise in the world that's never been bred before in the Western world, ever, in any zoo. And it was auspicious that when we basically finished Monsters of God, we got our first hatchling of what's called a plowshare tortoise, which is a tortoise that's functionally extinct in the wild in Madagascar.

44:36It only comes from a tiny part of Madagascar. But we're sending our young, now we have 30 young baby plow shore tortoises back to Madagascar. So there's this kind of optimistic, really cool ending to Monsters of God that's sort of beautiful. And it was just, like I said, really auspicious because we've worked with this species for over 20 years. And I got to give a shout out to Leonardo DiCaprio right now. Let's do it. Because he's helped us with some funding and he's doing this thing right now with Bezos. that's incredible, that's helping us basically save a lot of really, really endangered species right now.

45:07Oh, wonderful. He should probably come on and talk about it. Leo? We should probably, he should probably just... Well, I gotta just say, people always say that actors shouldn't be doing anything other than acting and they shouldn't do philanthropic things. They shouldn't have any opinions. They shouldn't have an opinion. They shouldn't be political. People always say, Sean Penn, stop, you know, doing anything but acting. Stay in your lane. And I know Sean, and I have to say, Sean, you went and met with Chapo Guzman. That was fucking unbelievable. And I felt like that when I met with some of the characters you're going to see in Monsters of God.

45:39Like, it's dangerous. And Sean, he understands, you know, drugs. And he understands that just putting Chapo in prison isn't the answer. And he went to Mexico. And I got to give Sean a lot of credit for that. But anyway, I'm sort of digressing or diverging. But I will say just because of the community you're involved in, it's great when people speak out and do something. Whether it's political or conservation-related or whatever it is, whatever your thing is. You're pretty busy, I would imagine, doing that work. And then how do we get to directing Tiger King? A friend of mine, Fisher Stevens, who won an Oscar for the film The Cove with Louis Savoyos, I was talking with Fisher about doing something on the reptile world.

46:19And there was a book called The Lizard King written by a friend of mine, Brian Christie. And I said, Fisher, read this book. It's a great story. And we met at the Bowery Hotel at Gemma one day for lunch. And he said, I read the book. It's really good. But how do you make this documentary without getting killed? And that kind of discouraged me because there's a lot of scary people in this story. My favorite character of the whole thing is Mario. Mario. Well, wait until you meet Anson Wong in Malaysia, who's the kingpin. Yes. The Pablo Escobar of the, you know. Yeah. But anyway, I was discouraged.

46:48That was in like 2012. And then Fisher did a film with Leonardo DiCaprio called Before the Flood about climate change. and he was trying to sell it to CNN and CNN passed. And then Fisher goes, well, you know, my friend Eric Good has this footage of this weird guy, Joe Exotic. And then I did a CNN pilot. They were interested in that. Really quick, how had you met Joe? I just started filming reptile people in the beginning with these guys, the Safdie brothers that you may know. Josh Safdie, who just was up for an Oscar with Martin Supreme. And he's a producer on Monsters. Yeah, so 12 years ago, we started filming in South Florida.

47:25We were filming some reptile people, Mario, Josh and I, and his brother. And one day, a guy drove in with a snow leopard in his van, and we were like, wait a minute, you can just buy a snow leopard. So that got me focused on big cats. I got off reptiles. The CNN thing didn't work. Jeff Zucker, who was running CNN at the time, didn't want another old Anthony Bourdain. Anthony Bourdain was still alive, so our CNN pilot didn't work, which was about our relationship with animals. Anyway, but I got into Tiger King accidentally because I just fell into it. You followed that snow leopard track. Yeah, I was really doing a story about reptiles.

48:01Yeah. Tiger King got in the way. Chimp Crazy got in the way. Finally finished Monsters of God. But yeah, Joe was a lot of fun. And Oklahoma was a lot of fun for me. So this is my question about Tiger King. I'm not conflicted. I don't mind loving bad people. I think I grew up with a lot of bad people that I love, right? So I am at both times judgmental, obviously, of Joe Exotic's terrible treatment of animals. And I don't think people should have any of these animals. But also, I am very attracted to him. He's a very compelling person. And I'm attracted to him, right? And I do wonder what your tension is when you're making these.

48:37Do you fall in love with some of these people that obviously you condemn their behavior, but do you fall a little bit in love with them? Yeah. There's a lot of lovable things about Joe Exotic. And, you know, all of us have our good parts and bad parts. He had some really bad parts as well. I think him being gay really helped me. That's a rough road in Oklahoma where he grew up, and he's kind of twisted now because of... That gay extreme narcissism was really interesting with him. But, you know, I think what I'm interested in is often we think about New York, L.A., London, Paris, whatever. These are the places where everything's happening, and the truth is in flyover states, middle America, places that you don't think anything interesting is happening.

49:15In fact, there's a lot of interesting, weird shit going on. And if you start turning over the rocks and looking, you find these really interesting characters. And you mentioned John Waters, or you think of Errol Morris and Vernon Florida, a really great film he did in the panhandle of Florida. Or you think of Todd Solons, another director who kind of looked at that landscape. He did that film, Welcome to the Dollhouse. But I'm really interested in worlds that aren't so obvious to all of us. So Joe Exotic wasn't really what people were thinking about. Same with monkey moms. Who knew that there were all these monkey moms across the country?

49:49Women that need and want to have a baby forever. And it becomes a monkey. And so, yes, back to what you said earlier. I think that it's the characters that are really important. But in the end, watching these stories, the silver lining is, of course, can we do something to prevent having a chimpanzee incarcerated in a basement in solitary confinement when they are complex social animals? And you know about primates. You know, can we do something about that? Can we make change with people keeping 200 tigers in a zoo and basically killing off the adults because they are expensive to keep because you have to feed them a lot of fresh meat.

50:24You want the line so well. Tiger King got a lot of criticism, but at the end of it, what's this act that was passed, the Big Cat? Big Cat Public Safety Act, which banned people from having big cats in the private sector. Wow. And creating big cat puppy mills. Yeah. And so this movie that had its critics did get legislation passed and changed. I never thought in a million years Tiger King would be what it was. Well, no one on the planet. 39 million people watched it in the first 10 days. But who could have imagined that COVID hit right when it hit? It was a good time. I had a captive audience watching captive tigers.

50:58When you have something like that, there are always going to be criticism and jealousy and all these kinds of things happen. But in the end of the day, it did change a really important piece of legislation or that legislation was passed to stop this abuse of tigers and big cats, lions, and jaguars, et cetera. And we also donated money to tiger conservation in India. And that's why I was in Kerala not so long ago, a lot of money. So there was a lot of things that I think came from that. And of course, more importantly, and it's a cliche to say this, but you don't want to make films that just preach to the converted, right?

51:33Because why make a film that everyone already knows the issue and I'm going to show it to a small group of people and we can talk about tigers. You need to cast a wide net and obviously preach to the unconverted. And I think Tiger King did that to some extent. That's why I think you're a very special face of conservation because I don't find you to be preachy or saccharine or pretentious or sanctimonious. And that is what's off-putting about a lot of these movements. We need a lot more, I think, level centristy people attacking these issues because the other mouthpieces are just very polarizing.

52:07Yeah, for sure. And I was on a call yesterday with someone from an animal rights group that wants me to speak, do a keynote at a big animal rights conference that's going to take place actually in Mexico City. And I was saying to him, listen, you're not going to want me speaking because I'm not as polarized as you guys. I'm more of an animal welfare person. I kind of walked the line of trying to get everyone together, I work in a lot of red states. Thank God. We need that. Yeah, but I have to talk to everybody. Yes. Yeah, and if I walked in and just was like, I hate what you do. Don't do what you're doing.

52:39You're fucked up. You're morally repugnant. No one's going to talk to me. Exactly. Because listen, I'm watching Monsters of God and it's like, again, what they're doing is terrible, clearly. But I'm also seeing a story of manhood unfold, too. I'm seeing Tommy who starts this reptile pet shop and all of a sudden bikers are hanging out there. And all of a sudden he's getting invited with the big boys to biker stuff. And he's feeling like a man. And a lot of these guys, it was their pathway to feel like a man that the nerdy guy who reaches out to Tommy, the reptile dude, and he even says in your dog, he's like, that's the second time I had sex on that trip.

53:13I'm also quite empathetic to like this masculinity journey that kind of directionless men are feeling. And whoever embraced them, yeah, they ran towards the motorcycle gang and they ran towards the drug dealers because they were invited. And so there's a lot of stories being told, and I'm very, very empathetic and sympathetic to those men and their weird journey of trying to be a man. There's a lot of sadness I have for them. Yeah, nothing is black and white. When you continue with the series, you'll start to see that a lot of best intentions, a lot of laws that are out there about what you can keep in this country, pythons or this or that, a lot of them actually don't work.

53:55So there's a lot of unintended consequences from best intentions. The Endangered Species Act doesn't fit all. So there's species right now on the Endangered Species Act that should not be. There's species that should be added on. They need to be. But U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in this country is understaffed, undermanned. They're trying the best they can, but it needs to be better. The zoos need to be better. I've gotten a lot of criticism from Monsters of God from the zoo community that I showed some of the skeletons in the closets that the zoos have been responsible for. You know, the Bronx Zoo in 19, I don't know, 15, 20, had a human being in a cage in the ape house called Adabanga.

54:34They had a human, a guy that was captured in West Africa, you know, sort of a small indigenous pygmy with these teeth that were carved like shark's teeth, and they put him in a cage in the ape house at the Bronx Zoo. There were people that were kept in zoological institutions on exhibit in Europe. There were Native Americans in tents at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago in the 50s. So we've exploited humans and animals, and zoos have a long history. But we, as a culture, have a long history that isn't very good when you look back. Women couldn't vote, and gay rights, and you mention all these things.

55:07So anyway, zoos have evolved, and they need to get better even still. But we show some of the skeletons in the closets, but not just with zoos. We also show law enforcement's not perfect in this story. and you'll see something really revealing in the fifth episode. And so the conclusion at the end of Monsters of God is we're all complicit. There isn't necessarily one clear bad guy. But let's walk through it a little bit because I think a lot of people will have not yet started Monster of God. So in a nutshell, we meet these two guys who are pretty infamous reptile traders and they're mostly in the 80s, right?

55:39Yeah, yeah, Tom Crutchfield and Hank Mould. Right, and Hank, he's a very specific archetype and he's a very intelligent guy. And by my non-expert judgment, mention. He seems a little sociopathic. No, no, for sure. So Hank kind of starts this thing, right? He publishes this list and you can buy these different reptiles and some of them are super rare. And then some of them become endangered, which ups the value enormously. And he's willing to travel the world and gather these things. Most of his heavy paying clients are zoos, the San Diego Zoo, the Detroit Zoo. So we're in a murky territory, right?

56:12These zoos want these animals and who's going to go get them? The zoo doesn't have anybody to go do that. And so this guy fills this niche and he starts making a lot of money and he's now hiring people. And this Tommy guy's fascinated and he then gets into it. And so that's kind of working out. And then what happens though to Hank? How does he go to prison? There's a shipment that comes in from Southeast Asia, big shipment. And the customs agents at the time, it's sort of before US Fish and Wildlife was really doing this stuff, you know, were like suspicious of that shipment. And then ultimately, one thing led to another.

56:46It was illegal animals coming in. A law had just been passed called the Endangered Species Act, and another law that was called CITES, the Convention of International Trade and Endangered Species. They both happened around the same time. So he was in trouble, and he did some time for bringing in animals without getting, obviously, permission. And those laws were in effect that went into effect in 1973. So Hank started a little earlier, before the 80s, and then Tommy came into play in the early 80s. So when Hank goes to prison, Tommy just picks up basically his price list. Now he's the Hank, and Hank hates him for it.

57:20So now we have the Carol fucking basket and Joe Exotic war, right? Which I don't know how you keep stumbling into these crazy feuds. But this is one of them. And so they kind of hate each other. And then Tommy becomes incredibly successful. And it's funny because he just starts doing the exact same thing Hank did. And now he kind of gets rich, relatively rich in his world. Yeah, yeah. So that's simmering so far. That's episode one's kind of simmering. Then Hank gets revenge on Tommy and puts Tommy in prison for the Fiji Island Iguanas. And then episode two, yeah. So episode two, we meet Ray Van Nostrand and Mario.

58:03Tell me about those two guys for a second. Mario was born in Cuba. his father was in the Bay of Pigs and worked for the CIA. CIA operative. They migrated to South Florida when he was very young. Mario has this affinity and love of animals that his family doesn't embrace. And of course you do what your family says no to and he gets into the animal business. But he also starts to realize that the skills that his father learned in Cuba from the U.S. government, what do you do with those skills? And they became very valuable. A lot of the famous 80s Miami cooking cowboys had been in the Bay of Pigs.

58:37And they hated John F. Kennedy at that time because he didn't go through with what he had promised. And the U.S. backed out and left these guys high and dry. Anyway, they turned that skill into smuggling drugs. And so Mario was part of that culture. His father obviously had those skills. In Little Havana, they own a jewelry store where everyone would hang out and drug dealers like jewelry, as you see in the show. And Mario got into both bringing in animals, parrots, monkeys, snakes, and drugs, cocaine and marijuana mostly. And ultimately at the time, Janet Reno was, I think, the district attorney of Florida before she went up to D.C.

59:14And they basically were looking at the big drug kingpins in Florida. Mario and his father were part of a group that was bringing in tens of millions of dollars worth of drugs. They targeted him, and he got away a few times, and then he made a fatal mistake of killing an undercover informant, tried to bury him, but in South Florida, all you hit is coral. You can't dig, so they burned the body, and that's what started everything, and ultimately Mario did get caught, sentenced to 100 years in prison. And Mario's life, the footage of this guy's life in the 80s before he gets arrested, he has this compound that probably would only be rivaled by Pablo Escobar's town in fucking Medellin.

59:54Or Scarface. Yes. He's got lions and tigers at his house, and he's got monkeys running around, and he's got all these crazy reptiles, and he even says in this doc, my addiction is animals. I sold drugs to fuel my addiction for animals. And you're talking to him in this doc? Ultimately, he's warned the whole doc, right? He's talking to this DA agent. He's like, just even be careful the way you're talking. And everyone he interviews about Mario, a husband will walk in and be like, hon, don't say more about that. It's clear from the beginning, no one wants him to talk about Mario at all. He's still very dangerous.

1:00:29The DA guy said he's the only person I still fear. Don't even talk about him. And Eric goes to his fucking house and sits with him. You know what's funny about, I don't know anything about profiling and law enforcement, but I was told to call his lobbyists in D.C. These guys have lobbyists to make sure they can keep their animals at their roadside zoo. I called this guy, he had an Italian name, Frank something, Perillo or something. And he said to me, there's a hundred reasons why you shouldn't talk to Mario. And he listed some of them. I can't think of any reason why this would be positive for Mario.

1:01:04So I struck out. And then I finally ambushed Mario one day and just went in there and got my foot in the door. The first thing he said to me, and I was with Josh Shafty, actually, the first time we went in with Mario and Josh. He put on these spy glasses that were so obvious. Like, wow, Mario was showing a spy that was filming. Of course, in the end, the footage didn't even work. But the next day we went, Josh goes, oh, fuck, Eric, I got to wear the glasses for continuity. He's going to think it's weird if I don't have the glasses. So he had to put the glasses on again. They're not even working.

1:01:33And Josh is like wearing these glasses. But Mario, it was almost like the cliche of that film, Analyze This, with the mafia guys. And what's his name? Place the shrink. Billy Crystal. Billy Crystal. It was almost like that in real life. Mario, first time I went there, I kid you not, because maybe we're similar age and I'm not really a journalist. I had nightclubs. He confided with me the first day, and he says to me, you know, I go to a therapist once a week or twice a week, but really I'm screwing this girl that works for me. I go to a motel down the street, and his wife's standing right over there.

1:02:05But he confides in me, and we have this sort of simpatico situation. He would tell me the most intimate things, and we got on this level that was so unbelievable, way beyond just someone coming in and filming. It was almost cathartic for Mario to have someone to talk to, and there was a certain sadness with Mario. So I have this very mixed feeling about Mario to this day. There's honor among thieves and he has this certain moral code that's really unbelievable. He has principles. It's really interesting. Yeah, yeah. Well, all the guys, one guy's like, I'll steal the animals, but I don't want to do guns.

1:02:39I'll do the drugs, but I won't. Everyone has their boundaries and limits so that they feel okay doing it. He saw episode two though and at first he was pissed because he was like, I didn't ship cocaine in with a cobra. And we were like, Mario, we're not really saying you necessarily did it, but people did. And then at the end of the show, he goes, I loved the sex scenes. I love that I'm still such a, you know, such a dude. But he loved that. Yes, of course. And also, Monica, you're watching. It's like he got sentenced to 100 years. He's out in 12. This is a big mystery. It's one of the only things he doesn't want to talk about.

1:03:13He says something very innocuous, like, you know, sometimes the government needs people who. So you get the sense that they've let him out. I don't know. Who knows what would happen? No, that's crazy how you can get out of prison if you have information. Yeah. I'm always fascinated. Like, these guys have insane amounts of money, right? Did you ever read Killing Pablo? No, no. I'm terribly illiterate, but keep going. If you're ever going to read a book, that would be the one. You know, these guys, they're burying money. They forget about it. Rots. Their big problem is the cash. They couldn't ever convert it.

1:03:44And you always wonder when these guys go away, it's like, well, surely they had some somewhere. And when I at least see your doc, I'm like, yeah, somehow that guy still has, he's still in a big compound driving a G6. It's so interesting because when I had nightclubs in the 80s, it was cash. There was no credit cards. Yeah. It was a cash business. I remember having so much cash at a certain point in my life. Yeah. They didn't have cash machines back then. And counting millions of dollars in cash is so tedious. Oh, yeah. And Mario used to tell me again, confiding with me, like, you know,$10 million in cash.

1:04:13And to count it and to figure out where you put it. Yeah. And, you know, back in those days, you're trying to get banks to take. Yeah, you can't really use it. I buried some cash one time. It was the biggest mistake of my life. I came back eight years later and it turned into mud. I never want to touch cash again in my life, even though it's so fun to have cash. But when you're making that much cash, it's a liability. This is Pablo. It's like he had no problem getting the cocaine in and out of places, but he couldn't do anything with his fucking cash. It's this weird, paradoxical. You know, South Florida in the 80s and 90s really was like that, by the way.

1:04:48The only time in my life I ever was shot at, randomly shot at with guns, was in Florida, in Miami. In 1993 or something, I was going to a nightclub at night in a rented minivan with some friends. We didn't have cell phones. We got lost. We were trying to call Fab Five Freddy, who was telling us to go to some club in New York. Freddy, where's the fucking club? I say to one of the girls I was with, go and call at this phone booth. And the next thing I knew, these two guys were walking at night towards us and started shooting at our van, blew out the back window, blew out the side window. And I suddenly, I was like, listen, you guys, we're going home, going back to the hotel.

1:05:22I had long hair back then. I woke up in the morning with all that little glass ice cubes from the, you know, in my hair and everywhere. But South Florida was like the wild, wild west. People were shooting everybody. The emergency rooms were insane. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert. If you dare. We get support from Instagram teen accounts. So we talk a lot on this show about how the world is different now than when we were growing up. And one of the biggest differences is obviously social media. And I think a lot of people wonder, OK, what's actually being done to make it safer for teenagers?

1:05:59Which is a fair question. Yes. So Instagram has got something called teen accounts and they come with automatic protections built in by default. So anyone between 13 and 17 is automatically placed into this experience. They get age-appropriate content settings, contact limits, so that by default, only people they're already connected to can message them. And time management tools, daily time limit reminders, and also sleep mode that mutes notifications from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. Sleep mode is genius. Right? And here's the thing. For anyone under 16, a parent has to give permission to change any of those settings to be less strict.

1:06:35The guardrails are on and Instagram keeps building new safety features to create age-appropriate experiences for teens. I am really glad Instagram's helping to give parents peace of mind with teen accounts. Learn more about teen accounts and Instagram's ongoing work to protect teens online at instagram.com slash teen accounts. This episode is brought to you by Peacock with a new season of The Paper. The documentary team that immortalized Dunder Mifflin has found a new subject, a Midwestern newspaper and the ragtag team trying to revive it. What they lack in journalistic experience, they make up for in heart, but the issues just keep unfolding.

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1:09:02I'm going to make a weird observation. Maybe if it comes off bad, I still want to go to the Bowery. But in all your docs, we're following people and we're like, these people are crazy. But you're a little crazy. Like, you are a little crazy to be going to these people to put yourself in these positions. the danger is so high and do you get like off on it what's the draw to the danger the honest answer is i'm not like some tough guy by any stretch and the honest answer is it's like back to sean penn meeting chapo guzman in mexico bad guys kill people for a reason drug routes are a big deal and they kill over drug routes they kill if you stole their drugs or whatever i'm walking and i've done nothing to these people so i'm not really worried about someone coming and killing me unless I wrong them.

1:09:54Where it gets scary isn't when you go in and first meet these folks. People don't just start killing you unless there's real reasons. And so it's when they've watched the show. Of course. And then Mario sees, oh, you passed a law that means I can't have my tigers anymore. I need my tigers to make a living at my zoo. Or they feel used. So that's when I've talked to law enforcement and people about, are the people that are really threatening me online over and over the ones to be careful with. No, it's the ones that never say anything. I'd be stupid, and I'm probably stupid even saying this right now, but yeah, it's more later down the road when you impact their lives.

1:10:31Sure. Not when you walk in the door and are interviewing them. Right. Because they don't know. They're not serial killers. They don't get off on just murdering people. That's not the incentive. I'm not interviewing and fucking around with serial killers. Yeah. Back to the crazy part is like, I often say this about when I was smoking crack, which is like, a lot of it's crack. It's great. But a lot of us going downtown have to interact with the 17-year-old dude who's got a handgun and we got to go into this house. Like that is very dopamine rich. It's half of what's going on and the addiction to it.

1:11:04Yeah, of course. That's kind of what I wonder. Like when you're walking up to the door to ring the doorbell. And everyone's told you do not go near this guy. Is it a high? I mean, it's a high to get in and then get that comfort where you realize you did it. Yeah. It's nerve-wracking getting to that point of ringing that doorbell. Once you're in and you have the fluency that takes place, whether it's drugs or whether it's my knowledge or reptiles, and they realize you're one of them, takes one to know one, then you get comfort. But you're sure it's a high to get the access. Of course. Because documentaries, at least the ones I make, it's all about access.

1:11:40And so people think, oh, I'm going to go out and make a doc. Good luck getting to that person. It's not so easy. Okay, so I can't wait to watch the next episodes because I would have begged for you to let me join you meeting Mario, right? Like, that's a no-brainer for me. The person that I probably don't ever wish to meet nor be in his world would be Anson Wong. Anson Wong is kind of this mythical guy, sort of the Pablo Escobar of the wildlife trade. He's in Malaysia, Penang. He has been operating for 30, 40 years at least. He used to come to the United States and be able to go to the Bronx Zoo and all over the country.

1:12:18And people knew him. Tom Schultz at the San Diego Zoo knew him personally, the curator of reptiles at the San Diego Zoo. So Anton Wong had access to everybody until he was wanted for smuggling into this country. Then he became bad guy number one in the wildlife trade. He became this sort of mythical figure. He was not allowed back in the country or he'd get arrested. Ultimately, he was arrested. They managed to get him, which happens in the story. did one of the longest sentences for wildlife crime ever in the 90s. I think he did seven or eight years in prison, which was a big deal back then. But Anson Wong, the government spent millions and millions of dollars to get him, five-year undercover operation to get Anson Wong.

1:12:57They finally did. He was released, went back to Malaysia, never to return to the U.S., not allowed to. He got arrested again in Malaysia for smuggling reptiles, which was really incredible because he had connections to the royal family. He had high-level connections. Getting him and knowing who he was, I had pretty good access in the animal world and know people. And I knew people that knew him. And I would try to get inroads to Anson Wong in a number of ways and failed. Ultimately, COVID became a problem. I couldn't travel to Malaysia when I was filming this. When COVID broke, I literally just went there.

1:13:32I couldn't get to him. And I had these fixers in Malaysia that I was trying to use to get access to Anson Wong. And they kept saying, oh, you know, we know his cousin, his brother, this person. When I finally got to Penang in Malaysia, I realized, oh, they never really even wanted to reach him because they were scared to death. And so when I said to them, hey, can you call Anson? I got his phone number with a Malaysian number because he's not responding to a U.S. number. They were like, we're not calling Anson Wong for you. And then I realized, okay, everyone's scared of this guy. Yeah. So I just kept calling and calling and calling.

1:14:03And one day, you know, I was in a weird place in Malaysia, and he answered the phone, and then I got access to answer. Wow. But yeah, it was scary. And he says something in jest when we were driving one time about how his driver was killed. And he says it in such a nonchalant way because his driver turned on him, and he obviously made sure his driver isn't with us anymore. Yeah. So, you know, he's a heavy guy. Well, man, I just think you've made like three of my top ten favorite documentaries of all time. Chimp. Chimp. We were obsessed with Chimp Crazy. We actually, just so you know, again, how your hotel affected us.

1:14:39Yeah. Tell Eric. You gave us a gift. Tonka is a huge part of our lives. We talked about Tonka nonstop on the show. And mainly just like we loved him. And you know how he would throw poop at his cage. He'd be like, clean it up. And he'd try, but it made it worse. We were obsessed with that part. We were. And then. Somebody had a little. Okay. There was an incident. there was a unauthorized evacuation incident by me. While driving a car. Okay, well. That's important. Yes, that's important. It was a bad situation. And Monica didn't want to actually say what she did. Yeah, I was so demoralized, but I had to share, right?

1:15:17I had to tell Dax, and I also, I guess, had to tell everyone. I was like, I'm an animal. I'm Tonka. Like, I felt like him. Just like disgusting, just animals. We're all just animals. I'm Tonka. So now if anyone poops in their pants, we say they Tonka'd. And the listeners know. Like people write in the comments like, I fucking Tonka'd at work. So now it's become a verb. It's a verb. For shitting your pants. And I just want you to know. We just want to thank you for giving us that. Yeah, we do want to thank you. It's the cutest way to say it. I couldn't start Chimp Crazy because that's my obsession, right, is primates.

1:15:54I knew I couldn't police myself. I've gone too hard. Some people do have, they're like, I can't watch those because I love animals too much. It's like, then you should watch them. I think even more. Well, we try to not show too much suffering or battering of animals. Because otherwise people turn the channel. We try to keep a balance. But if we go too into that realm, and we could, we don't. And we try to keep it fun, even though there's serious shit going on. Just because people don't have the stomach to watch brutality. I would say because I know so much about them. This weirdly parallels Monica and I have talked about this several times.

1:16:31Us addicts in recovery, we have a very specific way that we feel and react to when other addicts die. And for the non-addicts, it's this crazy heartbreak. And then sadly, and this isn't nice, but for us, it helps confirm. That's right, man. That's what happens when you're not in the past. So for us, it's weirdly a little bit of like. It's a reminder. It's a reminder. Cautionary. And it's a moment of gratitude. And it's a moment of like, oh, right, that's right, man. And thank you for that reminder because that's where we end up. We're dead, institutionalized, or incarcerated. And so when it happens, it's like, check.

1:17:07We have a different feeling about it. I would say in the same way when I was in Afghanistan and, you know, I watched the soldiers deal with people that were getting killed around them. It's like you see it a bunch of times and certain predictable patterns happen and there's a way and it's just kind of like, yeah, and when you light a cigarette, that happens. You know, it's weirdly comforting to go, right, that's how it works. I don't know. But similarly, from the second it started, I'm like, well, I know where this goes. I know what happens when a male chimpanzee gets fertile. What a lot of people don't know, when we were doing Chimp Crazy, I was communicating with some of the world's top privatologists about Taka.

1:17:40Craig Stanford, who's here at USC, and a good friend of mine who's actually in Madagascar right now working with me, Russell Mittenmeyer, I don't know if you know him. Now that we don't have Jane Goodall with us anymore, bless her heart, Russell Mittermeier has described more species of lemurs than anyone in the world in recent times. And so anyway, I was communicating with them about this chimp and asking them, you know, should I do something now or is Tonka okay or can I wait? And the reason I waited, a lot of people don't know this, is because I thought Tanya Haddix, who's now in prison, would lead me to more chimps, which she ultimately did.

1:18:13It's sort of like drugs. We want to just get the little guy with five ounces of cocaine. I wanted to get the source. And so I kept waiting. A lot of people thought, oh, I'm exploiting her. I'm not doing anything about Tonka in the cage. But of course, we were very sensitive to Tonka's well-being when we were doing chimp crazy. Yeah. The craziest part of that entire doc is when those knuckleheads fucking drag that cage up the stairs at a holiday. Like, a lot of times when you look back on your addiction, like the times you go, this is the most absurd I ever got. It's like, if they're looking at their weird addiction, it's like the time they drug a fucking chimp upstairs in a cage at a holiday.

1:18:48I'm like, they must go, how did I end up in this situation? Keeping these animals and hoarding and the obsession. And by the way, I like the word obsession. I don't think being obsessive is a bad thing. I think you wake up in the morning, you have something to do. People that have no interest, I worry about. But when it goes into addiction mode, addiction isn't only drugs, alcohol, you know, sex addiction, gambling. It's also shopaholics. And in this case, it's wanting these animals so badly that you'll do anything and ruin your life. And what happened to Tanya after Chimp Crazy wrapped, you know, she went and got another chimp in her basement, and now she's in prison for it.

1:19:26And I really worked with her after Chimp Crazy, trying to counsel her, help her, to sort of just have some contrition. Don't keep doing the same thing. The owner of Travis tried to get a baby monkey. Well, she did. She did. She did get another chimp. I mean, how on earth? That is the most horrific of all of them. It's so deep. I mean, that's like the sadness of it. it's really trying to fill a void. Yeah, for sure. Yes. And whether it's like she was never loved, it's like I'm the chimp lady, look at me. It gives you some kind of self-worth. Purpose, yes. Purpose, validation. But another day, if you come up to Ojai, we can trade crazy drug stories because drug addiction, the shit you do, when you just said that, oh my God, the shit you do.

1:20:08Yes. Like the stuff I've done, crawling on the floor trying to get the crumbs or trying to snort the floor or whatever, the stuff you do. We can go down a drug rabbit hole, but it is crazy. But the stuff you do, even these animal people, they're addicted. Do you know, every using dream I have is the exact same. I've had over the last 22 years, many, many using dreams about cocaine. And all of it involves me getting the Coke out of the carpet. And there's so much fucking lint and carpet in the Coke. And I'm deciding, do I snort all the lint? I have those too. Why do we still have those? I don't know why.

1:20:39And they're panicking dreams. Yes. Yes. I'm like, it's there, but I can't get it but I can't get it but why still do we have those dreams yes yes those are indelible yes I want to shake those dreams every using dream is that dream I wish my using dreams were about getting a rare tortoise or like you know I used to have basketball dreams hoop dreams of like me being able to do things like Michael Jordan but the drug dreams it's hard to shake those but maybe it's good for you it's like because then when you wake up you're like oh I'm so glad I'm not doing that. Oh my god. Waking up's the best part of that.

1:21:12The dream Dax has said, waking up, you're like, oh my god. Thank god, because they're really intense. They are. I'm so glad I agreed to interview a director. This was fantastic. Oh, Eric. I love meeting you. I don't know what I am. I just fell into this. I'm the biggest dilettante ever. No. I think you're everything. I can't wait for you to keep doing more of these because they're really important, I think. but also so entertaining. I have a really crazy one that we're just finishing. It's three episodes. You'll love it, I think. Oh, I can't wait. I probably have the same feeling about you as I have about us.

1:21:48It's like, I don't know, we're 1 ,100 in or 1 ,200 in. I keep thinking, why aren't we going to run out of famous people? And then someone sits down, I'm like, I guess there's another famous person. When I watch your shit, I'm like, what's left? A guy with a dolphin he's making love to? Oh, that's not so bad. We're fascinated with that. We know about those guys. Yeah, the scientists that are in love with the dolphins. There's people that have fall in love with a horse, live with their horse, fall in love with their dolphin. That's more of an A &E show. Fatal attraction. You're really good. Both of you, and you really work well together.

1:22:16It's really cool. Thank you. We appreciate that. Sorry I hogged so much of the oxygen. No, that's your job. That's why you're here. It's to take up the oxygen. If you haven't watched Monsters of God, you must, I know you've already seen Tiger King and Chimp Crazy, of course, is great. You're so talented, and I certainly hope you'll come back. This was so fun. Thanks, guys. All right. Take care. Thanks for having me. Thank you. He is an armchair expert, but he makes mistakes all the time. Thank God Monica's here. She's got to let him have the facts. I would like to officially introduce you to a new friend of the studio.

1:22:54His name is Peter. Peter loves knowledge. And Peter's a crow. Okay. And Lincoln made this. It's beautiful. Isn't it great? Yes. Doesn't Peter look friendly? Somehow my kids, when they draw pictures, I don't know how it happens, but they're able to, they always look friendly. Yeah. Right? Doesn't he look like a particularly friendly crow? Yeah, he's really cute. I can't really see him that way. You can't see him here. Now your head. Oh, now my head is there. Yeah. But you can tell he has really pretty feathers. Uh-huh. Yeah. And he's holding cherries. Yeah, she's very good at drawing. It's kind of crazy how good she is at drawing.

1:23:32She did a glass the other day, like a pencil drawing of a glass, like a pint glass. Oh, nice. And I'm like, how did you get all, like, you know, it's 3D. She's really good. And she just lets it rip. It's cool. Oh, there's a really funny thing happening. Do you know Delta's new life, Beth? Well, I know she was learning sign language yesterday. Yeah, so on her own instigation, she said, I'd like to learn sign language. and Kristen through Disney, of course, as an employee of Disney, she knew that Disney had this project where they had used a lot of ASL consultants. So she reached out to that production, found this teacher.

1:24:10He came over. He's so sweet. She's learning it at the craziest speed. And even he is like, this is bonkers. He gave her a card on like maybe their fourth session and it said, Delta, welcome to the ASL community. We've been expecting you. Oh. Isn't that so sweet? That's really sweet. So she's bonkers good at it. She knows like 300 signs already. I have a question about her teacher. Yes. Is he deaf? He's deaf. Okay, okay. Which became its own funny hijinks because when he very first came to the door, Kristen kind of opened it. She was in the middle of 19 things and she has her back to him. She's like, oh yeah, come in here.

1:24:52You can sit over here. And she realizes she's just giving this whole stream of things. And then she just hears a noise come from the door. And she's like, oh, fuck, of course. Why wouldn't have I assumed he was deaf? Oh, right. So then she turned around, you know, and made it very clear what she was saying. And he can read lips. Great. I've talked to him. I know. So, yeah, yesterday I walked in the house during the lesson because I wanted to say hi to the kids. And I then didn't know what to do. Right. You know, you just have to look directly at him and like speak. Don't mumble your words. I was like, is it rude for me to be trying to talk to someone who like, I don't know if he can read lips.

1:25:33But he can. He can. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So at any rate. Yeah, it's great. It's just this bizarre. I mean, I've really not seen anyone learn something so quickly. I'm like, well, this is fucking. And by the way, before this, and I think the reason she wanted to learn ASL is she loves mime. I mean, I can't stand it. She'll be in bed and she wants to like mime what she needs. And I'm like. Like charades. Yeah, like some version of. And then in some weird way, her and Kristen have worked out. They have a lot of hand signals that they just made up. So she just really wants to communicate that way.

1:26:06Yeah. So we're driving in the car the other day and she's just talking about how much she loves it. And I'm like, yeah, maybe you should do something career wise with it, you know. And then we're talking about the different things you could do. Like, you know, you can sign at events. You can sign, you know, DTF. You can sign on the news. And then her other thing is she wants to be a therapist. So then we put it together. And so now her new dream in life is to be an ASL therapist for kids. Great. And she told her teacher this, and he said that would be so great. There's not a lot of therapists who can sign.

1:26:42I think that would be amazing. That's so sweet. Yeah. Great job. I was such a piece of shit. Like, I wanted glory at her age. I wanted to be Evel Knievel or, you know, like I wanted to be some kind of world-renowned hero. Uh-huh. Yeah. And she wants to do sign language therapy for children. Well, I hope she does. Yes. Because she'll be great at that. But anyways, yeah, they're both, it's so fun to watch them both have these crazy skills. Yeah, that's so awesome. Your sister taught them sign language both when they were little. Yeah, her and Kristen really learned sign language and they could talk to the babies.

1:27:19I learned like this. I brought this up in my defense yesterday because I said, I'm scared I'm not going to be able to communicate with you guys. Like you, Kristen's also learning it pretty quick. And they're talking a lot. And I'm like, I'm afraid I'm going to be like left out. And then Kristen said, well, you could learn. And I was like, I mean, I don't think I can. I'm not trying to be lazy about it. I'm not lazy. But remember, I put a lot of effort into learning when they were kids. And I knew like five things. Yeah. You know, more and water and stuff. I knew some of that, too. Yeah, you knew some.

1:27:51You picked it up about as good as I did. Well, no. By the way, no. I came in when everyone had already learned, and I was like, okay, I guess some of this is happening. But, yeah. So maybe their brains are, like, since they've been doing it since they were really little, maybe they're more, like, adept. Yeah. Yeah, and if I were listening to this and I didn't have kids and I was in my 20s, I'd be like, why did you teach your—why wouldn't you try to teach your— A lot of kids do that. I mean, parents. Right. So this is the thing that I doubt if you had kids you wouldn't know about, which is like they can't—they're not going to develop their speech for a long time.

1:28:28But they can learn signs much quicker, and it alleviates so much of their frustration when they're babies, when they want to tell you they want water, but they don't know how to ask for it. And they can or they want more of something or no more. All done. All done. Yeah. All done's make you sad. Remember, Kristen took Lincoln to Universal and they were on the tram and she didn't realize it went through like, you know, like a King Kong exhibit. Yeah. And she was just a baby and she was doing all done, all done. Yeah. So sad. Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. But, yeah, I mean, I kind of, maybe this is an excuse, but I think it's in, like, the foreign language department for me.

1:29:11You know, as you know, I had to take it at, like, three different colleges to pass. Yes, we've discussed this. We both, I had to take an eight. I took eight. I took four years in high school and eight. Four in college? Four semesters. Semesters? Great semesters. A long time. I had to do a lot. For the theater department, they required you to do a lot of foreign language, which like, okay, I guess. Anyway, I was very bad at it. I was very bad at speaking. I was good at reading it. Okay. And I could write it. Like make sentences. Yeah. Because I got to choose the words to put in. Yeah. But the communication, I just could not do.

1:29:56This will not surprise you, but I was okay by the end at saying some stuff. But once people were speaking to me in Spanish, I was like, I don't know what they're saying. It sounds so fast. I can't even grab it. I also think I'm just uniquely bad at that. Like, I was telling Ryan, we were in Nashville for Labor Day. Uh-huh. And my very favorite song of all time, which is, this is the place slash Naive Melody by Talking Heads. Mm-hmm. I have listened to this song more than any other song in the 10 ,000 range. There's been weeks where it was on repeat. I don't know one word of that song. And I'm like, how could this be?

1:30:35I can't hear what he is saying. Yeah, same. I have, again, we have discussed this. Yeah, we know this. We have holes in that part of our brains. Weaknesses. That's a big weakness. Yeah. Knowings, lyrics, and language. And I do think they're in the same space in the brain. I've just decided that. I think they are, too. And it makes sense that they would be. Yeah. Yeah, symbols, converting symbols into whatever. Yeah, it's like an auditory. But you're good at auditory because you like audiobook. Like you retain audiobooks. Yeah, I retain whatever I do here. Yeah. Also, I'm great at like rap lyrics and country song lyrics.

1:31:16If they talk slowly. Right. I can get it and then it's in there pretty deep. Huh. Yeah. I got to tell you, we had the greatest four days in Nashville. Tell me. It was crazy hot, too. I just keep going from heat bubble to heat bubble. It's hot. All summer I did it, and now I just did it. It was blazing hot there. It was like 98, and you know the humidity. Yeah. But we were on the boat mostly the whole time, and what I discovered, my pontoon boat, I was swimming under it early part of summer this year, and I could see I had LED light strips under the deck of the pontoon. But I don't know where any buttons are for this thing.

1:31:56Thank goodness Ken Kennedy was visiting, and he likes nothing more than going through the menu of a screen. And lo and behold, he figured out, I have disco lights on my pontoon boat. Oh, that's fun. So now we're in a habit of going swimming at night with the disco lights on and loud music. Oh, is it fun? And you're floating in your dipe, which is an upside-down life jacket. And it was just boating after boating. But the thing that I most want to talk about, do you have a favorite breakfast spot in America? In America. Because, like, I have so many favorite lunch spots and dinner spots. But I have only one favorite prior to this breakfast spot.

1:32:41It's in New York. Bubby's. You ever been to Bubby's? Yes, I've been to Bubby's many times. Love it. Yeah, that's great. Love it. I don't, I mean, I guess I don't know. Are you about to say Waffle House? No, that's fine. I love Waffle House. It is. It's nostalgic. It is. It's fun. It's damn affordable. Hash browns. Yes. Weirdly, they built one in about five seconds by my house recently. Yeah, great. But I discovered this through chat. Oh. Last, right before I left for the end of summer, I discovered a place in Mount Juliet. And Monica, this is my favorite breakfast spot I've ever had. Ooh. Anywhere in the world.

1:33:19What do they have? Oh, my God. They have this thing called Piggy Benedict. Okay. It's a biscuit, freshly made biscuit, a big round sausage patty, poached egg, hollandaise and gravy. Nice. Fuck. Then they have a chicken and waffle that will put it up against Roscoe any day. It's unreal. They have this banana bread that is like bananas foster almost. It's impossibly good. And then you get like the basket of mini biscuits. Yeah, that's yummy. I don't think it's a low caloric breakfast. Doesn't sound like it. Well, I guess we should tell people you're eating gluten again. I've been eating gluten again.

1:34:04Yeah, yeah, I have. Post that Ackermensia probiotic. The one that Pendulum, we had an episode and she gave us. I'm not endorsing anything. I'm not a doctor. I'm not saying it'll work for you. I don't know. I've been eating gluten. Yeah. And it's been going well. That's amazing. And I enjoy it. Yeah. Boy, is it fun to eat biscuits. That's so good. But we were only there for four mornings and we went twice. Nice. And fucking just. What's it called? I crave it so much. Do you want to shout it out? Paper Mill. Cute name. This town is so tiny and it has in it now my favorite breakfast spot I've ever eaten at Paper Mill.

1:34:42And then the best Thai food I've ever had in my life, Smiley Thai. Yeah. This is crazy. Yeah. That's great. You're meant to be there. Yeah. Meant to be. Motorcycle rides at night. There's a little mix up. I know he's listening. It was really sad. Ryan had a little mix up. What happened? On the dirt bike. He fell? He had a fall. Oh, sorry. We were out in the go-kart in the dirt bike, and he really let himself have it over it. He really, really abused himself. He was so mad that it had happened. Oh, I'm glad we're talking about it then. Yeah. Tore up his hand pretty good. Wow. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's dangerous.

1:35:20It's okay that you fell. That's why they're fun, yeah. They weren't dangerous. They wouldn't be fun. That's not true. Spades isn't dangerous and it's super fun. I'm not saying something has to be dangerous to be fun. Oh, okay. But what makes motorcycles fun is that they're dangerous. That I could see. You have your adrenaline up and you know the stakes are high. Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is why I don't like them. That's why you don't do a lot of motorcycling. I wanted to say Shailene Woodley from Paradise Season 2, which we talked about. She won the Emmy. Well, she did. Yeah. And I had put in my endorsement on this podcast for her to win.

1:35:57Might be why. Can you explain the Emmys to me? Yeah. I don't know what happened this year. I am confused. There was only Emmys last week, but then they're also next week. Creative Arts Emmys were last week and then this week. But doesn't Paradise, like winning for best supporting actor or whatever, that feels like that would be in the normal Emmys? I agree. Maybe because the TV has expanded so much. Yeah. It's too much for one show now. I think they've always had Creative Arts Emmys as a separate day, but I do think some of the categories got moved over. They were all kind of technical, right?

1:36:33Yeah. Yeah, they all felt more production-wise, but now, I don't know. Anyway, she won. Congrats. She deserves it. Yeah, incredible performance. Incredible performance. But yeah, the real Emmys, I mean, the. Oh. The traditional Emmys. The other Emmys. Yeah, yeah. Emmys part two. The Monday night Emmys. Yeah, are on Monday, which is also weird. That's weird, right? Wasn't it normally on Sunday? Yeah. What have they done? I present every year. I know the Emmys are coming up because I present every year at the Prop Master Awards. Oh, yeah. Are you doing that again? Of course. When is it? Saturday?

1:37:12I go support my best friend Jeff. Their Saturday evening, yeah. Oh, that's fun. Mm-hmm. Wow, cool. And he said, how about for a bit you carry me out because we carry you actors all the time. And I said, I'll carry you anywhere you want me to carry you. You mean you're going to lift him up? I'm going to carry him out on the stage. Oh, wow. Yeah, we usually do a bit, Jeff and I. Oh, you do? Yes, yes, yes. Who's Jeff? Jeff was the prop master on Parenthood is where I fell in love with him. But then he was the prop master on Chips. He came and did my movie, which was so fun. He's the greatest of any crew member I've ever met.

1:37:47I just love Jeff. Yeah. You like a lot of people. And I think he's the president of the Prop Masters Union or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. How big is he? Seven feet tall. No. How big is he? Because you have to carry him. Oh, he's not a large man. Okay. He's a good size man. He's probably six feet. Are you going to carry him piggyback or are you going to carry him like a baby? Yeah, like a baby. Right. Or on your shoulders. That's cumbersome because I got to get them off while we're on stage. Well, you want to do a bit. You might as well go all the way. Yeah. What if I had them on my shoulders and I came out on a pogo stick?

1:38:17Wow. Now that would be. That would really be something. Evil Knievel legendary status. So it would make sense. We would have a prop. That would make sense. Last year he was making a speech and I had his prop bag. Oh, kind of like. Like I'm his. It was a role reversal. Like that amazing speech that Julia Louis-Dreyfus made. Like she won an Emmy probably, an Emmy, ding, ding, ding for Veep. And then Tony Hale went up with her. And whispered in her ear the whole time. Yeah, it was so good. It was so funny. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare. Living your best life means being extra where it counts and skipping the extra where you don't need it.

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1:39:45I do want to say, I don't know if this was a wink, but Tonka was awarding Connections some days ago. It was interesting. And was it in reference to the, well, we don't know. No, we do. Tonka trucks? Yeah. Oh, because was it truck toy related or something toy related? It was like toy, yeah, toy brand related sort of. I want to do that one. Well, now you know. This happened to me. Jess always spoils things on accident. It's like his - Superpower? Yeah, but it's not a superpower. It's a kryptonite. It's like - Okay. Achilles heel. Evil power. Yeah, it's so bad. He cannot help but spoil things. Wow.

1:40:30And. What did he spoil? Well, he spoiled that. But then, you know, because he plays connections at the gym with his trainer. And then we were in line. That's not what you should be doing with your trainer. You should be lifting weights. He does. Listen, I don't know. He's a master of distraction. They do connections sometimes. Anyway, and so we were in line for a restaurant. And he was like, have you done connections today? I said, no, I'll pull it up. And I said, but don't tell me. He was like, no, I only did one. And he was like starting to. Oh. I know. Jess. I was like, Jess, stop. And then he was saying like, no, it's just.

1:41:05And I was like, don't say any other words. That's me in the F1 races when people want to start talking. I'm like, I haven't watched. Oh, yeah, yeah. No, I know. I know. And it's like, no, no, there's nothing more to say. If I've said I haven't watched. Some people just love to spoil. They don't even know they're doing it. It just is happening. It's happening. Anyway, he spoiled the talk. He spoiled Taco. It was funny. And it was exciting to think that maybe Winna had Tonka'd that, like, you know? Oh, maybe she was letting us know. Yeah, she was communicating with us. Bottom of pants, top of mind.

1:41:38That's right. That's right. Speaking of F1. Uh-huh. There's a very exciting thing happening right now in F1. I know I've already talked about him, but Kimmy Antonelli. Oh, yeah. He just turned 20. He's won seven races this year for Mercedes. I think the record is Lewis winning maybe 11 in a season. So he has lots of season left. He could break at 20 years old, this Lewis Hamilton record. Wow. And Lewis's car was actually more dominant over the competition, that iteration of the car, than Kimi's is. And Kimi last race, last weekend, he had to start at the back of the grid because he had an engine penalty.

1:42:18So he started in 19th and he won the race. No. This is like a Max Verstappen drive. This is impossible. And his teammate is up there in the lead in the exact same car. And he makes his way through 18 other cars. That's cool. Passes Max Verstappen in third and wins the race. And he's 20 years old and he couldn't be cuter. Yeah, and he's so nice too. And it was the Italian Grand Prix. And he's the first Italian to win the Italian Grand Prix in 60-some years. Oh, that's such a happy story. It's a really triumphant season of F1 right now. I love that. I'm going to be really conflicted when Max has a comparable car.

1:43:00Because obviously Max is my deity. He's my god. But I love this Kimmy kid. Oh, do I love him. Have you seen him? Are you going to flip flop? It's going to be tough, man. I don't know what I'm going to do. Because I love Kimmy, but Max is dangerous. You know, if they're in the same. Okay, that's enough. I don't know what you're going to do. No, I just like. Have you seen him? Have you seen him talk, Kimmy? Yeah. Look at him. You showed us the video. Oh, yes, of he and Lincoln talking. Yeah. He's so cute. He's so cute. He's got a great body, too. This summer, on the summer break, he posted a lot of photos of him doing different water sports.

1:43:38Oh, yeah. He was with Toto and Susie. Susie had a great bathing suit on in those pictures. I would serve them. I did not go looking. Oh, really? That came across? Probably because it knows I've posted about them. Oh, maybe. Algorithm is very smart. We came up with a good idea yesterday that we should urge. It'll happen again in the episode, but I want to get it out there as quick as possible. We think you should be able, like you can send your playlist to people. Yeah. Like your liked songs, you can do that. We want to be able to send our algorithms back and forth. Oh, yeah, exactly. On Instagram.

1:44:14We do. It'd be fun to be able to use other people's algorithms for however long you want it to. I agree. But I'd really enjoy having your algorithm for a couple days because it's just, it's closed, right? Is it just closed, closed, closed? Should I tell you what I see right now? Yeah, what's up? It has closed. Susie in a bathing suit. Yeah, it has Susie. Okay, first thing that pops up is Megan Fahey. Then Aziz. I'm just going to read everyone, okay? Okay. Then Aziz. Okay, now see, because I just said, oh, I just said Shailene Woodley. There you go. I got a pop up. Is this about Aaron Rodgers? Okay, listen, it is.

1:44:56And it's a page six. I don't follow. Uh-huh. So it's just serving. I know, I don't like when they serve me gossip. Tabloids. Yeah, it's almost irresistible to not read. Yeah, I just read it. Yeah. I didn't click it, but I hate that. That's why I don't like when they put threads in my timeline. Because Threads is all trash. It's all like. Threads is trash. It's all sticky gossip. It's like Twitter. It's all inflammatory. Yes, it's just like Twitter. And they never deliver, too. When I get suckered into clicking on a Threads thing and it takes me to that freaking app. I don't have it. And I read it and it's never as good as the first two sentences and it almost negates itself immediately.

1:45:34Yeah. I mean, they figured it out. I know. Yeah. You can have AI go like, make me a very sticky sentence and they can do it. I know. We're all so. predictable. Yeah. Yeah, we are. That's why you just like kind of can't have it. Because if you have it, we're clicking it. Or also if you enjoy it, that's great too. I get a hangover from it. I go like, oh, I read like three. Because then that app's open. Everything is terrible, right? And then I get sucked into four or five of them. I know. And then I'm just like, ew, I don't like how I feel when I consume this. Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty good to have during fashion week, though.

1:46:14Is it? Yeah, because I can see a lot of fun stuff popping up. Fun stuff. Anyway, all right, let's do some facts. Yes. Okay, facts for Eric Good. Great episode. Just fun guy. I mean. Wow, we loved him. I have to put him at the top of the heap. For most interesting person we've ever interviewed, and I'm just obsessed with him. I think I told you I sent him a text that was like, hey, next time you're getting into any kind of. Tricky situations. And you need a co-pilot. I'm there. Whether that's for work or just otherwise, like, bring me along. Yeah. Yeah, he's getting into all the tricky sitches.

1:46:52He really is getting into the tricky sitches. I don't think he can bring you along to some of them because I think it's going to do the opposite of what he is hoping to do, which is kind of just be under the radar and be one of them and be kind of, you know. I'm not that famous. I mean, most people. Even if you're not famous, you're large. Okay. You have a large voice. Okay. And a lot of tattoos. Large nose, yeah. And stuff. So, like, I don't think people. Are at ease if I'm there? Yeah. Interesting. Okay. At first. Okay. At first. I'm pretty good at winning people over, though. I know, but there's no time for that in some of these situations.

1:47:31Okay. He's got to get in and, like, you know. I think I would have done great with that drug trafficker, Mario. Oh, Mario. Oh, yeah, but you even said you didn't want to meet Anson Wong. You said that in the episode. I don't want to meet him. You have to be low status. That's exactly what I'm saying. Yeah, but how status is determined in that world, which is all toughness and intimidation, really. So it's like an actor is just like, he's not threatening at all. No, an actor. It's not like, okay, well, I almost said someone, and I'm not going to say it because I was mean. Okay. It's not mean. He's very.

1:48:07good actor? He's a great actor and he is he puts people at ease. Everyone can just guess who I'm thinking about. I don't even know. Steve Buscemi. Oh my god. It was obvious. I don't know. I don't even know how he crossed your mind just now. This is what I'm saying. Whether you're an actor or not you have a presence that shows status. Like, how many times do I have to say it? You're big. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Big nose, yeah. But what I'm saying is in the drug trafficking world, they're like, oh, an actor, he pretends to be tough. It's so easy to write me off. Like, they've been in gun battles. Like, it's just a different sitch.

1:48:52I know, but I just don't think. Okay. Okay. Ding, ding, ding. This is funny. The other yesterday at dinner, I don't remember how it came up, but we were, I think, discussing maybe we were discussing the incident in Palm Springs, maybe. And we were talking about how everyone reacts differently in these situations and confrontation and blah, blah, blah. and Jess said he's didn't mean it in the way that it's going to sound, but he was like, yeah, no, the only reason you're super successful is because you would fight with Dax in the kitchen. And what he meant was I'm not afraid to have a debate or meet someone intimidating.

1:49:39Yeah, you and Lincoln. Exactly. You should be grateful. You know, one time, you probably don't think this anymore, but at one time when I was babysitting, you did tell her, you said, I hope you grow up and you're like Monica. No, well, she, yeah, I feel that way. And she is. Yeah. So when she's being a little rastly. I'll tell you, she's not intimidated by at all me. Yeah. It's good. Of course it is. That's what I want. I know. Yeah. So anyway. That's what I hope to raise. A woman who's not afraid of anyone. Of her dad. Yeah, and I'm, as you, the aforementioned size and this and that. And she could give a fuck, and I love that.

1:50:20Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, so that's sort of what Jess was saying. It doesn't make it so easy for me all the time, but. I know. That's part of the cost. Yeah. It's part of the cost. Yeah. But yeah, he, so he, all to say, I am not like those drug dealers. I don't find you intimidating. I know. But they do. Or did we tell people that we do have an answer to the fact that remember when you pretended to be dead on the railroad tracks or passed out and I was trying to move you off the railroad tracks? In your dream. No, here. You were laying down. Oh, on the ground. We were role playing. Yeah. If I were on railroad tracks.

1:50:57If you were on railroad tracks and you were dead weight, passed out, would I be able to get you off the railroad tracks? And I said I would get superhuman strength. But we can't practice superhuman strength. And it's dangerous to rely on the notion you'll have superhuman strength when you need it. I know. But then we got the answer because I had to end up breaking into my house. And it required a level of strength I probably would not have had on a regular day. What, did you have to do a pull-up or something? No. Joe, my uncle, contractor, he was very impressed. Okay, great. He was very impressed that I could do that.

1:51:36And then I was like, oh, yeah, I can definitely roll Dax off of the trap. Right. Despite, yeah. You can't practice. You can't practice. Yeah. All right. Now, is the creator of Est, Warner Earhart, where was he from and was he a used car salesman? Yeah. All of the above? Yeah. He worked as a car salesman and encyclopedia salesman before creating the self-help program Est, which like traps. You know, I bet a ton of people got a lot of great stuff out of us. It couldn't have been so successful. Yeah, I'm sure. He sold both new and used cars in Pennsylvania and California. Ooh, sometimes using the alias Jack Frost.

1:52:18Oh, fun. Nipping at your toes. Put you in a nice Chrysler Imperial. Low mileage. All highway. This thing's never been on an arterial road. Ew. My dad told me he used to sometimes stand in front of dents. Dents? First starting off. Yeah. Oh. And he was a large man. So he could. When he was a used car salesman. Yeah, yeah, when he first started. Yeah. Oh, no. But then he graduated. And I know I've told this before, but he graduated. You know, he was the best car salesman at Avis Ford. He won two free cars. There's like a national. Whoever could sell the most Ford trucks, he won that. Incredible salesman.

1:53:00Yeah. And he kind of got so good that he had a helper who turned out to be my first stepdad. Carly's dad. He worked at the dealership. And so. So wild. Basically, Greg would set up the deals and my father would close them. And he mostly closed them across the street at the bar. Oh, he said like, let me take you to get a drink. Exactly. Oh. And on a couple different occasions, this is in the 70s. Sure. Where my book takes place. The people who bought the new car got so drunk with my dad at the bar that when they pulled out of the lot, they got broadsided and smashed their brand new car. That happened a couple different times.

1:53:36That happened a couple different times. So this is before your dad got sober, obviously. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow. Yeah. How big was he? That was when I was a kid. How big was my father? Yeah. Like probably 6 '1 and always 250 or more. Okay. And how tall is your brother? I think my brother's 6 '1 as well. Okay, you're a little taller. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. A couple inches taller. I'm writing that down. You're going to have a suit made for him? For later, yeah. Okay, you said in The Americans, she falls in love with Est. But it wasn't her. It was Phillip who got really into Est.

1:54:20Oh, sorry. Big mistake. It's a big mistake, but it's okay. Phillip is the Matthew Rhys character. Yeah. They both just slayed those performances. They really did. What is the most profitable club ever? Nightclub. Okay. Okay. XS Nightclub at Encore in Wynn, Las Vegas is widely recognized as the highest grossing and most profitable nightclub ever. Routinely pulling in between$103 million and$105 million in a single year. Ooh, wow. But they have big expenses. They're paying those residencies to those DJs and stuff. Definitely. Studio 54 had to be a cash cow because those guys, one of them had like the top two or three floors in the San Remo Tower in New York.

1:55:05Very expensive piece of real estate that I think now Bono owns. Wow. That's funny. When I was just in – when I was in New York, my friend Maddie and I were taking a walk and she knows – she was just pointing out all the buildings and she knows everything. New York real estate is a real like interesting niche. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I liked it. What is a hillbilly speedball? Generally refers to a slang or colloquial term for a combination of illicit or prescription drugs, typically substituting a rural accessible stimulant like meth or prescription amphetamines and a downer like a prescription opioid painkiller in place of the classic heroin and cocaine.

1:55:48Mm-hmm. Okay. So, yeah, fentanyl and meth. I'd call that definitely a hillbilly. Do not recommend it. We could call it a hillbilly highball instead of a speedball. That's got more of a—it's more marketable. Hillbilly highball. Yeah, I'm going to get flagged for sure, but— Were you— How much fentanyl— I— Well, this is so— This was really bad. Also, this is so person-specific. Right. I said, how much fentanyl can you survive with? First thing that comes up is speak with someone today, 988 suicide and crisis life. I like that they did that. Yeah, yeah, cool. But I'm going to say it's for a fact check.

1:56:24Oh, boy.

1:56:29Please call this number. We've heard that before. Even more reason. Oh, it's really searching. It's thinking. It probably can't ethically answer this. This is interesting. Well, also, there's no way they could give you a range. It would be humongous. All right. Like, are you already addicted to opiates? Do you have a million receptors? Yeah. Are you me? But when we're talking about the penny, Like, I'm just like, that can kill an elephant? Then I can't have even one... Micron? Yeah. You can, though. Really? Yeah, they administer fentanyl at the hospital. That's what I don't get. The nasal spray and intravenous.

1:57:09I know. That's what I really do not understand. Well, just the issue, of course, with it is they mix it perfectly. It's just diluted perfectly. Every bit of fluid in the vial has the same amount of fentanyl. Yeah. But when they're mixing these batches of fentanyl in a 55-gallon drum in Mexico, some portion of it may have 10x of some other portion. You know, that's the issue with black market manufacturing. Yeah. It says fentanyl is an extremely potent synthetic—oh, it says disclaimer. It's information that's for general knowledge and should not be taken as medical advice. Um, betanel is an extremely potent synthetic opioid and ingestion of even a minuscule amount can be fatal because there is an exceptionally narrow margin between a psychoactive amount and a lethal amount.

1:57:59There's no single safe threshold in individual outcomes depend heavily on factors such as body size, personal tolerance, and history of opioid use. Yeah. You can give a redhead that whole penny no don't don't do that oh my god it's 50 times stronger than heroin there's one now more powerful than fentanyl the one where the crank no that's trank oh that's a different drug altogether that's not an opiate oh but those people are so hunched over fuck are they oh it's so upsetting terrible advertisement for the drug it does not look like they're having any fun advertisement for it because it makes it mean they are the face of dare yeah you know yeah all right that's it that's all yeah fuck i loved eric me too what a dude i mean become the biggest documentarian and the best hotel and the biggest turtle conservationist yeah and it was really sim i i did say it in the episode but i didn't put too fine i didn't like scream it or emphasize I've been wanting to go to the El Roblar Hotel in Ojai for a while.

1:59:02And we drove by it on the way to the wedding. And I was like, fuck, do we have time to swing in there and have a tea? Oh, a tea. That's nice. We didn't, though. Oh, okay. All right. Love you.

1:59:29Thank you.