My Executive Producer Asked Me the Questions No One Else Does | Dave Rubin

25:16And then, and then obviously I would say your question was, so what's different about me from then to now, um, this whole year, I mean, you know, my driving, my driving ethos of the show this whole year is that I, I want the show to be a place that people can tune in and learn something, but I want them to laugh too. I want them to be entertained. That's to me, that's the most important thing. Like I should probably be a little more entertaining as I'm saying it right now. I think you are. But that's the truth because a lot of people can give them the news and distill it in a way and whatever.

25:47But it got very, you know, Trump was almost assassinated. That was obviously before that. But it's just gotten so toxic. And now we're watching this rise of communism. And that gets to the thing that I'm always worried about, which is, like, will Iran get the bomb? What I mean by that is, like, I'm worried about the existential stuff. Will the West survive and everything? So I don't want to do a show that like every day people are tuning in and then they shut it off and they're like pissed or angry or whatever. I want them to be like, oh, that was funny and maybe I learned something and I agree with Dave or I don't agree with Dave.

26:18And that's what I see. I mean, I think more than ever what I see with our audience now is they're like, oh, that was really funny today. Thanks for not, you know, doing like the worst clickbait garbage and whatever. And the other thing that I really learned this year is that I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything. I'm not. I'm telling people what I think. You can agree. You can disagree. You can watch. You cannot watch. Yes. Yeah. It is what it is. But I am going, I'm just going to tell you what I think. And I think the problem that a lot of these other guys have right now is they really want to, they want to force everybody or trick them into thinking the way they think.

26:52I just have no desire to do that. Like, I'll tell you what I think. You like me? Okay. You don't like me? All right. I'll be okay. Yeah. Yeah. That's very insightful. How has turning 50 affected you this year? and maybe couple that with the shoulder injury that occurred a week prior to turning 50 as well that yeah it was 50 is the first birthday that ever has meant anything to me in a why why is that i don't know because something about 50 definitely does not seem like young anymore even though even though i feel great i'm around young people all the time like i'm physically put aside the shoulder for a second like i'm before the shoulder playing basketball all the time like i'm you know Chasing my kids around.

27:35I feel young. My world is young. The interactions that we all have. I walk into this room. I'm with people basically in their 20s to early 30s. There's a rhythm that you guys have and a way you guys talk and whatever. When we have parties or birthdays or whatever, I can still drink tequila and have fun with you guys and all that stuff. But there's something about 50 that hit me that was really like, and maybe it should have hit me at 40, but I was suddenly like, wow, I'm really not a kid anymore. Like fatherhood obviously did that to me years ago, but like something about 50 just seems fundamentally different.

28:09And I know, believe me, I know when I'm 75, I'm going to go, man, when I was 50, I was just a baby. So I'm not sitting here like, oh, I'm old or something. But there was definitely something about rolling into 50 that affected me in a deeper way. And I was feeling so good about life. And then literally two weeks before my birthday, I'm playing ball and this 18 year old kid crashes into me. Shoulder gets completely mangled. and in a fitting way, who was it that, you know, literally picked me up and brought me to the hospital? Young Joey. But it was Joey who works here, obviously. And not only did he bring me to the hospital, like he has seen me in my worst because he literally picked me up, had to hold my arm.

28:45I mean, I couldn't move my arm, has to get me in the car, do the whole hospital thing. And then we get back to my house that day and David wasn't here. There was nobody here. And there had been a power outage. So we couldn't get any of the gates open. And so he had to scale a gate and he had to climb through something to get into the house and basically kind of carry me into the house. And I just thought the reason I'm mentioning it is it's just sort of like emblematic of of what we've all created here, I think, is is just so special. So 50. I'm not a kid anymore, but you know what? I can't believe this.

29:23I'm going to loosely quote Clavicular, who sat in that chair not too long ago. And I asked him to, I was like, you know, when you look at me, like, what do you see in the looks maxing thing? And I really meant that. Like, it would be interesting to me. What would he say? What would he think? 100%. And he was like, he said something about, like, your mandibles, your jaw should be a little more like this. But then he said something interesting. It wasn't, because, like, okay, whatever. Again, like, I feel pretty good about this, the jawline here. But... People were saying you mocked him. The internet said I mocked him.

29:53But then he said something interesting. He said, but it's not just about that. He said, you're successful. You have a business. You have money. You have a family. Like, I'm paraphrasing roughly. 100%. Meaning, like, at some point in life, you don't just worry about, like, the obvious aesthetic things. And there's, like, so even he, even someone who was, and that's what I was trying to get to him. I was really trying to understand, like, who is this kid? He's a 20-year-old kid, right? And I did get to something there that he's like, yeah, you want to maximize all of that stuff. But at some point it's not the only thing now obviously as an adult I know that but it was interesting hearing it from him So I would say at 50 what I've learned is I just want to I just want to optimize my life in every way possible And I really do try to do that whether it's my personal life or how I am You know like how I am as a father and husband or how I am as a boss or what I'm doing on the show Like I just I still want to get better at all the things that I'm doing and I think a lot of people not I think I know a lot of people particularly as you veer towards middle age it starts becoming obvious you're going to go one way or the other you're going to kind of like crumble to all of your your shit like everyone's got shit oh this happened when I was 12 yeah whatever yeah and you can either let it like own you and never solve all that stuff yeah or you can blaze a trail that's much more difficult right like you have to really like be willing to like slay some of those dragons and go forward.

31:18And I would say that's the path that I'm choosing to the best of my ability. So that energy you're describing, it's so potent, and your personality radiates that so much. You know, having been here with you for six years now, we've lapped the world twice on zero hours of sleep. We've had to do crazy things, managing a bunch of different businesses at once. You know things about me. You know, for example, when I go into a hotel, I often have no idea what room I'm in. And when we get back, I never know where I'm going. Yeah, I'm surprised. And you have to tell me what room number. And you also sometimes leave coffee outside because you know I can't function at 7 a.m.

31:58when our day is starting without coffee. Yeah, 100%. And I guess my question is, you know, I've just seen you walk in. You've walked in here with like a crazy shoulder injury before. We just always get shit. Knee injury. Yeah, we just, and like no matter what, we as a team. But you as the team leader like just always get shit done and where does that come from? Were you born with that? Did you have that as a kid or was that something that was built over time? Wow, that's a good one I I don't I don't know that I know the answer that one exactly like once I When I started doing stand-up right out of college I was just like all my friends were funny like everybody was funny that was the language we spoke in like of all the comedy movies you know Naked Gun all the stuff we watched and then the shows we watched and Seinfeld and all the stuff like somebody was going to do stand up and I was like well I'll do it and like I had all the successes and failures of that and the struggles and literally like having to steal coins out of my buddy's coffee jar for coffee when I lived on a caught in a hallway on the Upper West Side just so I could get on stage at night and had all that.

33:14But I just believed fundamentally that I could do it, whatever it meant. So it's like a Jordan thing that you have to aim to something. And it doesn't mean you're going to get that thing. I've looked. I can show it to you guys. It's somewhere upstairs. If you look at my high school graduation book, the high school yearbook, everybody is like, Dave, you're going to host the tonight show one day like every every single comment is you're gonna host the tonight show you're gonna host the tonight show you're gonna host it why why did they think that that was funny i was friendly like you know i was i always tell you guys like i was like i was definitely not in the cool class but i was not in the dorks i was like in this thin layer between like cool and dork and i could like i had like a little crossover appeal right like because i was like you were the most popular unpopular yeah something like that actually so i was like kind of like because i was pretty good at sports, but not awesome.

34:05I loved video games, but I wasn't the dorkiest dork from Dorktown. But I liked the dorkiest dork from Dorktown. So I was just sort of like my crew of friends was like that. We were sort of in it with everybody, but not totally in it. And I think that that's kind of translated to how I do the show and really what my politics are. I like people, actually. So I can kind of traverse a bunch of different things. But I don't know, was it born in me? I think I just aimed at something. I think that's really what it is. I remember when stand-up was really struggling, and it wasn't because of me or because of talent, actually.

34:47It was the industry was changing. People weren't getting, you know, this is early 2000s. Sitcoms were dying. Johnny Carson was gone. People weren't getting on shows as much. Reality TV was coming in. So comics that should have been on TV shows were still stuck at the clubs, and I was in the generation behind them. whatever it is what it is um but i remember thinking like if i give my entire existence to something like that this passion this craft that i love that i'm good at i was like i don't think i can fail like i just fundamentally believe that like i don't think i can fail and like you know as it stands now at 50 in 2026 like i didn't become like i don't think people will look back on me and be like oh my god dave was the best stand-up comic of all time but you go to our shows and people laugh non-stop the entire time.

35:32It's a riot. Yeah. And I mess around with people and you know me, I'm like very unscripted and loose and I'm playing with the crowd and doing all this stuff. So I took all the skills from that and then applied it to what I ended up doing with my life, which was being a talk show host. And I think that that's where I excel like years from now. They'll be like, I hope people will say, well, he was a pretty good talk show host. And, and then surprised, you know, you know, when we're doing our meet and greets and people are coming up to me and they want the two second hug, a lot of them are like, Dave, I didn't realize you were so funny.

35:59And I like that that's just like a thing that's in my toolkit in a way. So I don't know, I aimed at something and then I got something else, but that was in that universe. So looking back with all this wealth of experience now, what qualities make someone worth betting on? Well, passion, number one, passion, number one. I mean, like literally when you were my intern, I was like, this kid's got something. Like you were just like you were just like relentlessly grinding and willing to just do anything and go up to someone and you know we've had moments over the years where um i've needed to like i've been doing a million things and then i have to say something to somebody that's like could be you know not offensive but i could be say something that would kind of hurt them yeah like a business related thing and you're like i'll do it i remember the first time you said it to me i'll do it and I won't get too deep into it, but you and I got on a phone call once with a very well-known TV executive, probably an award winner who's been in the biz for like 30 years, and he was giving us the runaround on something.

37:02And you and I did the, I said to you right before, we could do a little good cop, bad cop. Like, I'll just kind of be like, you know, I don't know what's going on. And you went like evil psycho cop. Yeah. But it ended up working for us. But not for him. Not for him, exactly. But passion, I think passion is the number one thing. I think honesty.

37:28If one of you guys, I can't work with people that are not honest. I have to know what really is going on. And you have to be somewhat mission aligned. And I think to work for me, you have to be somewhat politically aligned, which is a shame. It shouldn't be that way. But how could I have a lefty working for me now? I'm going to have one of you guys as a secret commie over there, Joseph. Joseph. So I think passion is the number one thing. Like someone that wants to go get the world. And if you surround yourself with people like that, and then they have to have some skills too, right? You can't just be passionate with no skills, but you got to get the right people to do the right things.

38:07And then fit it together like a team. Like if I was to look at you guys, like, you know, I can relate everything back to basketball, but it's like, we have a team here that really makes sense, right? Yes. Like we have a director who knows how to, Connor, obviously, who knows how to do all of this stuff. And we throw things at him. Five minutes before the show, we throw 30 things at him. And I don't know what he's doing back there. And he's, and it always works. Like minority report. He's like flicking all these things. And Joseph, who's now. Let me just say quickly about Connor. I've interviewed other tech directors for other creators in this space that I'm not going to name here.

38:41And these applicants are extremely well qualified highly skilled but then when i sort of walk him through the sop that say somebody like connor has in the morning they all say the same thing they say oh i just can't do that that's it they say that's impossible they say that's impossible but we but that's the thing and he's right now even right now he's right there i can't quite see him i could just see the top of his hair he's waving to us but i know like things won't fall through the cracks you know what i mean yes and joseph who now has become like the jack of all trades and is doing a million other things some of the things that you used to do as i've handed other things to you or joey who's beautified everything that we do here and and become the creative director like what we built is a team that works so like we have somebody that can play like i guess in this case like well depending on which basketball way you wanted to go i'm probably i'm probably the center i suppose it's not the way basketball is played anymore but you get it yeah you have different positions and you all do different things.

39:38But when you get a team that like that gels properly, it's like the most beautiful thing that there is. Yeah, 100 percent. Starting something new can be intimidating. There's always that voice asking, what if this fails? What if nobody notices? That's why having the right tools matters. And that's where Shopify comes in. Shopify powers millions of businesses around the world, giving entrepreneurs everything they need in one place. Online stores, payments, inventory, analytics, marketing tools and more. Shopify also helps businesses grow with built-in email and social campaigns, AI tools for product descriptions and photos, and ShopPay, one of the best converting checkouts available.

40:14Plus, there's 24-7 support whenever help is needed. Turn those what-ifs into success with Shopify today. Sign up for your$1 per month trial at shopify.com slash Rubin. That's shopify.com slash Rubin. So, walk me through a little bit about the highlights and the lowlights of this season. and what were some things that stuck out for you professionally and personally? And maybe I should add on to this too is what are you hoping to accomplish when you complete August and when you enter into your 14th season? What are you looking to do in the future? What's your hope for this year heading into midterms especially?

40:51But I don't even say that politically. Yeah, yeah. Spiritually. Hold that one for a second. Ask me that one again in a second. So to answer the first one, the highlights and lowlights, I mean, I honestly don't really remember the show that we did the day that Charlie... Wait, were we on air? No, it happened... It was right before you were supposed to do Actual Friends with Russell. Right. So then we made the decision... So was it about noon, right? For you two to go live. Yeah, it was just powerful stuff. Yeah. So the next day, so I had about whatever that is, 18 hours or something to process.

41:27I don't remember. did we do a proper show that day or did I just get to the camera and just start talking? I don't remember how we set it up exactly. Yeah, I watched it yesterday. It was a proper DM narrative, but it was all centered around Charlie. There was no other news outside of Charlie. My guess is if we were grading shows for the year, that show was probably the best show we did all year. Yeah, it was a great show. It was probably the most raw, honest. And I've really, again, without getting into the whole influencer thing, I've really tried to honor Charlie this year and behave in a way that I think he would be proud of and all of that kind of stuff.

42:06So I think dealing with the Charlie thing the way that we did probably was probably the best, it was probably the most important thing that we did. And going, you know, I was on a zillion TV shows for that month every day. I happened to be at Fox that next morning. I was supposed to be on for September 11th stuff. and Fox usually if you go on one show they don't let you on other shows that day that's like a standing rule they had I was on like five Fox shows that day I was on all day long so I think probably the thing that I'm most proud of or the best work that I did was right at the beginning of the season for all the wrong reasons was related to Charlie some other things what else really stands out to me

42:48I don't know does something stand out to you we just had a great year the shows were fun We saw the numbers going up, which you know my feelings about the numbers. I'm like, I want them to be good, but it's not the end all be all. It's just we have to just do good things. Was there any other like super, can you think of it? Well, the show, the live show that we did with DeSantis was awesome. Yeah, I was going to say that. Yeah, it was great. Like we did, you know, we sold out a great theater at the Fillmore here in Miami. Like, you know, we did a live show that we basically wrote that day. I do all the other silly stuff and throw shirts into the crowds and all that stuff it felt like it was a nice honoring of DeSantis as he's ending his term which is just coming up in a few months so that was pretty great

43:41it's been good it just kind of turns into this thing that's good I thought it was very emblematic of the political season that we're heading into right now as well I think things are beginning to pick up the pace a bit. Well, one thing I always tell you is like, you know, like I always say to you jokingly, like you bet on the right horse, meaning by staying with me. Like I didn't go crazy throughout all of this. Again, you can disagree with anything I've done. I've made mistakes. I've made predictions wrong. You know, whatever. Like those are all real things. But I think that the people that work for me aren't walking around going, man, I'm embarrassed to work with this guy.

44:19He's such an idiot, where some of these guys, it ends up being like, you have to like, I can't imagine showing up to work for some of these people and having to live with yourself. Yeah, we have an extremely low turnover rate here at the Reuben Report. I think we're breaking records. Although we are doing team meetings after this, and I'm going to have to lower the boom. Yeah, I don't know. That might change after this. So two more questions for you. So what I said earlier, what are you, you know, I've seen the wins. I've seen the losses. I've seen the setbacks and you know from my experience we always endure everything and just come out on top even stronger so I think with that notion in mind heading into September after your August break what are you most hopeful for you know for the country for yourself professionally for yourself personally yeah I mean the politics version of that or the cultural war version is very easy which is like we got to give everything we got right now to November I cannot overstate how important this thing is.

45:16This really feels like it's it. And I know it always feels like it's it. And we needed Trump to be Kamala. I get it and all that. But if the Democrats get a couple more of these people in office, it's not just that Trump is impeached and that the Republicans start jumping ship. It's that we all just think in free societies they're always going to remain free. But if these communists take power, imagine what these people would do. Just as I always say on the show, you don't have to ask me. Listen to their own words. They will do all of the things to destroy the country as we know it. And they'll have used all of our freedoms against us to accomplish that.

45:49So, like, for me, the goal of the show, of, like, what we are doing on a day-to-day basis is very obvious, which is especially for those first two months, we've got to fight like hell, encourage people to vote, just get out there in every which way to wake people up. We've got to show the normies that are suddenly, you know, as I was talking about the nominal liberal, your Aunt Karen, who's like half a Karen, you've got to show her you cannot vote for these people, you really can't. So we have work to do with that. That's that part. And then I would say the other part is let's just keep building the stuff that we're doing and do it right.

46:22I have a successful tequila company right now. I had no idea how to do this. And now my problems related to that are related to we have to grow faster. We literally have to grow faster. The network we're running, which we will, I think, unveil a little more publicly in the fall, is going unbelievably well. We're working with tons of people that everyone watching this knows and building great businesses for them as the whole point was could we build what we built for me for other people? And it really is working. So I want to just keep doing those things. I just want to keep, well, you know what my schedule looks like.

46:53I want to just wake up every morning and be like, man, I got a lot to do today. And I'm going to do all of it. And then we'll do it again tomorrow. Does this all feel like work to you? No, it's very rare that it feels like work. Like every now and again, Connor sees it more. If I do a late hit on a long day where I've had a break for like a night. You're like, I could do away with this. Yeah, so if there's like a 6 or 7 o 'clock hit, meaning media hit, after a day when I've done four or five shows and I went in there and then I'm like literally like playing Transformers with the kids and then I got to get my shirt back on, you know, my jacket back on and then talk about politics again, I'm always like, I shouldn't have done that one.

47:33I just got to let it be. But it's very rare that it feels like we've traveled the world, literally traveled the world together. And it never feels like work. And the thing is, we always make sure that we're having a good time, too. Even if we're doing hardcore politics during the day and everything else, we're having fun at night and visiting places and seeing people and all that stuff. Yeah, this is a very work hard, play hard company. So I got one last question for you. I'm going to read it. Not bad. Because I just don't want to mess this up, and I think this has a lot of weight to it. So I wrote, every year millions of people watch you interview everyone else.

48:12Today I got to interview you. Is there a question you've always wished someone would ask you, but nobody has ever? I've taught you all of my tricks. This is like the Padawan becoming the Jedi. He has to kill me after this. That's how it works. This is very upsetting.

48:36Is there anything that no one's asked me or that I wish you could ask me right now?

48:47God, there should be something that I can come up with here. What does this all mean to you? Well, it just... I'll try it this way. This is going to sound a little dark, but I think this will maybe be the right answer. The day before Kobe Bryant died in the helicopter crash, we were living in LA in Sherman Oaks, and I was flipping the channels. And, you know, I don't watch a lot of current basketball anymore, but the Lakers had a channel. Like, there was a channel that was dedicated to the Lakers, and I'm just flipping. I still had cable TV. I'm flipping the channel. And I stopped. I saw Kobe, and I stopped.

49:24And he had a beard. He looked great. Like, just, like, looked great. I think he was wearing a suit. Like, just looked sharp as hell. and I stopped and I was watching. I always loved Kobe. At first, I can't say I always did. At first, I thought he was a little too much of a Michael Jordan copycat. All of his moves were like right out of Jordan. He looked like Jordan and everything else, but I really came to respect that, that he was molding himself after somebody and his competitive nature and all that stuff. But anyway, there was something about it that I stopped and I remember he was definitely wearing a suit.

49:51He had a beard. He looked good and he was talking about being competitive and waking up in the morning before I made his routine and da, da, da. And I remember thinking, I swear to you, This is the day before he died. I remember thinking, man, this guy is living the life he's supposed to be living. And then quite literally the next day, he was dead. And I remember when I saw it on Twitter, I was waiting for an Uber. I was going somewhere for a speaking gig. And I immediately, I couldn't believe it. Like, you know, I thought it was just like a hoax or whatever, like everybody else. Immediately started tearing up.

50:24And then I got the beat that my Uber was there. I walk out and it's a young black guy is the driver probably late 20s early 30s something like that he's hysterically crying have I told you the story before I don't think so he's hysterically crying and I opened the door and I was like I was like dude I I get it and I realized I was early like I didn't have to be at the airport for a while right so I was like listen you don't have to drive right now you want to just like talk about Kobe for a little bit and we just started going back and forth about the 83-point game and flying in from Denver during the trial and scoring 50 and all of this stuff and just everything and his moves.

51:05And for a half hour, then he kind of composed himself and everything else. And it was like raw and whatever else. And then he lost it again. And I was like, listen, it was obvious he couldn't drive. I was like, listen, don't worry about me. I'll get another car. And I got out and I took another Uber. The answer to your question is that I would hope that, well, the dark part is I don't want to die in a helicopter crash tomorrow. The non-dark part is there are some people that you see that I think are living the life that they're supposed to be living. Like they're really doing it. And it makes you admire them and want to be more like them.

51:41And you know me, I have no, I just don't have jealous. It's not a thing. Like when I see people that I admire, I'm like, that's freaking awesome. You know, when I've been to billionaire houses with you, I'm never like, oh my God, I want, like, I'm just like, that's so cool. Maybe we could, when we went to, you were with me, when we went to Joe, I'm like, if they can do it, so can we. Right, right, like, no, but that is it, and I know you feel that too, like, the world is yours to get, right? So, like, when we went to Joe Lonsdale's house, and then at the end, he's walking us out, and he's like, oh, Dave, you might like this, and he opens the door and it's the sickest indoor basketball court I have ever seen, which is literally the one material thing that I would ever want that I don't have.

52:20That's it. I have, I don't need any more. I'm good. But, and, but my, my reaction was not, how does he get that? And I don't have that. My, my reaction was like, I was like, I literally said it. I was like, holy cow. Like I was like, this is amazing. I want this. And he's like, well, then you better get it. And I was like, That's the spirit. So I love that. When I see people interviewing people, sometimes people who I don't even really care specifically about what they do, but if they love what they do, then I love that. And I like being around people like that. I actually, maybe this is sort of an answer to people.

52:56I don't like being around people that are lost or something or not doing what they're supposed to be doing. I really feel that energy around them. And I love being around people that are doing things and that you can just be like, go get it. And then let's see what we can do with all of that. So I guess that's what brought us together. And now I'll be the executive producer on the Phoenix Play Show. There we go. Work a job you love and you'll never have to work a day in your life. Dave, thanks so much for joining my show. You want to shake hands? Okay.