E440 John Mulaney

28:37And I was like, literally, I was just crying to my brother. I was like, man, I just can't live like this. And I know it sounds like such a weak thing to say, but that's just where my mind was. What do you mean, was that a weak thing to say? I don't know. there's something about it when you like look and you know that you have food and you have shelter to be in a space where you're like to feel like something is wrong with you that you can't fix i guess or if you're just someone who likes to have control and thinks you manage well and you're capable there's some real thing that feels like almost weak.

29:21And I'm not saying it is weak, but it feels weak sometimes to be like, something's wrong with me and I can't, there's nothing I can do about it. I felt like something's so wrong with me that I have like, I've overrided, like, cause we're designed to survive. I'd overrided the desire to survive. Like when you're like, when you want pills and drugs more than you inherently want to make it through the day, that's some weird reverse evolutionary shit. For your brain to basically be able to run the scenario and go, we haven't slept in four days. We chain smoke. We eat Sour Patch Kids. We'd never drink water.

30:09We're blowing tons of Coke. This isn't going to last. And you go, I think we're going to keep on with this. I think we're going to keep doing this. So you were deep in. How'd you get so deep in? Because I don't think anyone would look at you and think this is the Coke guy. Good. That was the whole thing. I mean, I certainly tried to talk about it on stage as having had like a drug and alcohol problem. But it just, I don't know. Yeah, it didn't. Something about me seems. so to me it's like well of course the guy that seems like he has it all together has the problem because that's just like how life is it's text yeah it's almost like it's textbook yeah um but that's i don't put that on other i don't put that on you to be like how come you didn't see it because i was i also i really thought like i really thought that i was doing life i was able to achieve at life with the drugs as opposed to in spite of them.

31:13It took me a long time over the past couple of years to realize that I did well at what I do in spite of drugs, not because of them. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Because it would be fun. Yeah. From an outsider, I would always look at him and be like, oh, that guy. Yeah. Drugs would not help that guy. Like that guy is his own. he is so unique in his own way that anything to like abase that or something or debase that would only mess him up but I would have thought like I'm delivering something people really like and I think I'm delivering it because I take two 30mg Adderalls and then one Z-bar and so I'm really sharp but I don't seem jittery and so I go on a podcast or I go on a talk show and I'm just delivering and I'm giving people what I'm naturally good at, but I'm a little tired, so I can't naturally do it.

32:05So it's okay. It's okay to rip open time-release Adderall and dump the beads down my throat and then pop a Klonopin because then I will get to the level that I naturally am at. I just got to deliver what I'm good at, and right now we're running on a lean mixture. And it used to be easier, but now it's harder. So whatever I'm putting in my body to get to that is fine. that's like a acceptable, you know, acceptable. You're like your own, you're like your own Geppetto almost in a weird way. Let me think about that. How do you, uh, in what way? Like you were, cause if you were kind of running, if you wanted to get yourself, you were a little burnt out.

32:48You're trying to get yourself to the place where everybody loves you at and where, you know, you operate best at. So yeah, I wanted to be like, I'd see myself never see a, I'd sometimes see a clip and be like, I need to be like of myself and be like, I need to be like that guy. Oh yeah. How do I get, that guy's confident, has a bunch of things to say. Yeah. How did he get the, how did I, how did he have the thoughts? Oh yeah. I thought, look, man, I miss my old self sometimes. You're, you're using self? No, just myself like a few years ago. Yeah. There was some, yeah, that's what it, I was chasing something.

33:24There was some moment, maybe, you know, like 2007. I didn't know what it was, but I was like, I had some electricity in my eyes. Yeah. Where, you know. Wow, it's so funny. I gotta get back to that. And I just gotta get back to that. And I just gotta get back to that. Yeah. Somehow it'll happen. Somehow I'll find the right amount. For real. You know, like. I'm 100 % serious. That's, yeah. That's what I think all the time. I look at old things and I'm like, oh man, I miss that guy. Yep. that was a yeah that's a really entertaining person yeah and i don't even put it on i don't even mean like and i and i people demanded i'm not acting like i couldn't have taken a break and you know it's not like the audience demanded this not at all it was what i wanted to do it's what i wanted oh yeah i don't yeah i don't get that perception yeah no okay but it's interesting yeah i wanted to get back to him i wanted to feel back to myself i wanted to be like Like that guy was so creative and original.

34:20I know. Now I think some of it. To take drugs because you want to feel like you're 12 or 13 again. It's a little messed up. It's a little messed up. But it also makes sense. I think if you, for me, some of that goes back to, I think I felt like I missed out on some childhood. So part of me wants to get back to that. I think there's some psychology. Missed out on it. Just missed out on like having some moments of childhood that would have felt more comfortable and fun. Okay. But I think part of it is I used to like the element of surprise when people didn't know me. You had an element of surprise to people.

35:02Yeah. And there was something that was nice about that. It was like it made you be able to be the only one who presented you to people. Yeah. And then as you get more popular, I think is the term that I'll use, or where people have seen more of you, then there's some expectations or the thing of surprise, which made me feel like unique that I can just be the controller of me. That goes away because people have already seen you and have some interpretation of you. And so I think this all may sound really egomaniacal, but that bummed me out a little bit because I think the only thing I ever felt like I had when I was growing up was myself.

35:54And so I wanted to be able to authentically present that as much as I could. And that goes away as you get more people have seen you. Does that make any sense? 100%. Okay. I don't know what it means. Dude, people used to have stage names for a reason. Because, you know, they could go home and be like, you know, Johnny Starlight is the guy on stage. John Mulaney is me, the person who I, you know, the person. Like, I got to say, I don't, you know, there's some real destructive part of me that I've worked on a lot. But I wouldn't say I have low self-esteem day to day, which is a really nice thing.

36:37and it doesn't seem like you do either. So it becomes like, I like myself. Yeah, if you like yourself and then yourself is out there in the world and they seem like, you just got to think of them as two different things. I'm not saying this that articulately. People had stage names because they could be like, well, that's something else. That's not me. That's not the little kid I was. Right. Yeah, I think now - It probably comes from like, those people would have fake names because they'd read a review of themselves and it wasn't their real name so they'd be like oh that's not me right that's a thing now we're so it's hard now everybody knows everything about you within reason yeah yeah i mean it's hard to detach it's hard to keep some things to yourself it's even hard to yeah um yeah though i mean whatever whatever people put out there is also right who knows if it's real or not yeah but it's like it used to be like um like i remember we loved michael landing growing up right we had drawings of him and once a year yeah you have highway to heaven behind you oh yeah we meaning your family i mean it's whatever whatever political party builds that dude i'm voting for him i'll tell you that you know um he was dying through my whole childhood, it felt like.

37:58Like Michael Landon, like I just remember being a kid and being at the supermarket and like every National Enquirer was like, Michael Landon's final battle. And I was just like, is this person, I didn't even know he was an actor. I thought he might be famously ill. Like just a guy in a jean jacket who was always sick. Cause I never saw Bonanza till like it was on Nick at Night. And then, yeah, there he is. God, look at him. So you were into Michael Landon from Bananas? We loved him from Little House on the Prairie. Oh, Little House on the Prairie. God, we loved him. You know what's crazy? One of the first times I learned about drug withdrawal was from Little House on the Prairie.

38:36Oh, I know what episode you're talking about. The opium episode. Isn't that fucking crazy, that episode? Yeah. I know nothing about Little House on the Prairie, but I saw that once. I think Michael Landon stays up with the kid who's on opium and he sweats it out. It's like basketball diaries level. It really is. In the middle of whatever the hell else used to happen on that show, cooking stew or whatever. Walnut Grove, yeah. A lot of like, I mean, that's when Pink Eye, you would lose a twin to Pink Eye. I remember one episode they had - Twins would be born with Pink Eye and it was a real problem.

39:06Oh, you'd lose one. Yeah, there it is. That's Albert Ingalls right there. He was addicted. Was that that character? So I know nothing about the show. Was that that character's whole deal? Was that he was a morphine addict or was that just a special episode? No, he was adopted. And so he had this kind of like interesting like space. He was always kind of could play this outsider character. But he was a friend of their daughter. He was a friend of the daughters. Okay. Albert Ingalls. You know, I saw Nellie Olsen one time at a Starbucks. Who's that? She was the blonde on the show. Okay. She was kind of like.

39:40I really only know the opium episode, but. Okay. Okay. She's the daughter. And I was excited. That's really cool. I know she wasn't excited to hear me tell her. I saw the little woman that, remember the principal in Kindergarten Cop?

39:58She's a smaller woman. Let me think. Her name's like Linda. Not Linda Ronstadt, huh? No, not Linda Ronstadt, the singer. Linda Hunt. Linda Hunt, thank you. I saw her at Bristol Farms. I was excited. There she is. Remember she goes, what did it feel like to hit that SOB? Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, I saw her at Bristol Farms. That just made me, I just thought of that when you said you saw Nellie Olson. Yeah, Nellie Olson. So why did you bring up Michael Landon? I'm sorry, I took a son of two. We used to love him. And we would draw every year, mom would like, usually at Easter, honestly, we would draw a picture of him and whoever like draw the best picture would get like a candy or something from mom.

40:37Wait, you and your siblings would do this? Yeah. And whoever would draw the best picture of him would get like a candy or something from mom.

40:47and he was supposed to come to town one year or something like at the fairgrounds or something. Where'd you grow up? In Louisiana. Okay. But something happened. There was like a storm or something and he couldn't come. Oh, shit. Oh, yeah. All the women's hearts were broken, man. Mom went down there and it was like our big like, mom's gonna meet him, you know? Oh, man. Did you guys bring the pictures to show him? No, no. We didn't go. Oh, it was just like women only? Yeah. Adults only. Michael Landon meet and greet at the county fair. Yeah. And I mean, and I just remember mom coming home and it just was sad.

41:20Yeah, for real. But yeah, it just made me think you couldn't know any more about an actor or character at that point. They were almost just their character. And yeah, if you saw some tabloids, you could learn some stuff behind them, but you didn't, it's hard to even now. I couldn't, I didn't even know about his career. That's how little I knew about Michael Landon. I just thought this man is battling cancer, like on the regular. in all denim. I thought Highway to Heaven was, I don't mean this like as a joke. No, not at all, man. I thought Highway to Heaven was like not a documentary, but I just was, it was like he was always dying and then he had this show called Highway to Heaven and I just thought they were somehow, I was like, oh, this is just someone we're all watching through go through the final stages of life.

42:02Yeah. And it turned out he had a big acting career. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like this guy's in traffic to get to heaven. Like how long is it gonna take this guy to get to heaven? Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, we missed. I mean, that was a bummer for us. When you look back, so whenever you start, so were you surprised that you were an addict or did you know you were an addict? I had like skin deep self-awareness of like, I have a drug problem. I love drugs. I like them too much. I don't like them the way other people like them. It's not like, oh, that was fun. Let's do that again in two weeks. This was like, I think the plan for the morning should be to get more of that.

42:45I knew I liked them more than other people. But no, not to the depths that it was. What do I mean to say? I had a surface level awareness and I would joke about that and say, you know, oh, I got sober in 2005, which I did. But I slowly got back into pharmaceuticals over the next, you know, 13, 14 years. prescribed then not prescribed or prescribed then abused but prescribed then bought on the street then everything. Were you buying them off a Craigslist and stuff like that even? No I always thought that might be cops smart and it's pressed pills it's a lot of like I have friends that have gotten them on there this was even before I had an awareness that there might be fakes out there like that I've definitely bought Adderall a couple times and snorted it and thought this is what is this.

43:37Yeah Oh, I bought a whole thing of something one time and did it all, and it wasn't. It wasn't cocaine? Nope. No, God. And I don't know what it is, and I still imagine one day I'm going to walk past a chemical, and it's going to connect a little. Oh, you'll smell it. Or something. You'll smell a chemical, and you'll remember that that was what you bought? It'll be like, oh, it was me. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. No, the realization that I actually had no control over this took a long time. Wow. It's a hard thing for people to convince. I mean, I still struggle sometimes even if I sit in a meeting and there's still part of me that doesn't want to say I'm an alcoholic or an addict.

44:23To me, I go, it's more complicated than that. Yeah. Like, you don't get it. It's not that I'm like, it's not that just that cocaine's addictive and when I do it, I'm addicted. It's a different thing. I use it in a different way and the way I see it and my relationship with it. And it's just. Yeah. I kind of have a romance. It's like I romanticize it. 100%. I romanticize everything in my life in a weird way. Me too. Yeah. Do you think you're in a movie? No, I don't. I do think I'm in a, like one of those fun houses sometimes, but the fair is fucking closed, you know? Oh, wow. Because the storm came in and Michael Landon canceled.

45:00And Michael Landon canceled. Who was the first famous person you ever met if Michael Landon canceled it? Let me think of who it was. That's a great question. Or maybe Saw.

45:13Probably the D.A.R.E. officer at our school, but he wasn't nationally famous. How famous was he? He was the biggest guy they ever made in the whole world. What do you mean? When the car would pull up. I remember one time he shot people from the car. he couldn't get out of like the officer vehicle or whatever. He was a huge man. He was a... Oh, he was a big fella. He was an obese man and... And he would come to speak about D.A.R.E. Yeah. And he got out of the car. But there were tales of him at crimes where he'd just pull up and just start popping off, you know, because he couldn't. At some point he couldn't even get out of the vehicle.

45:47Oh, so he'd fire from the vehicle and open fire on people. So he was like, in our area he was pretty popular. Ronald Reagan... Um, was his name? No, that'd be crazy. Also happened to be named Ronald Reagan. Uh, the first thing, I don't know. There was this, uh, like, did you see Reagan somewhere? No, but we built the tallest statue of Ronald Reagan in our town. Whoa. He was supposed to come and he didn't come. I just realized this. He, you built the tallest statue of Ronald Reagan in the U S or in the world. 10 foot tall. Look, look it up. Zachary, please. Tallest statue of Ronald, Ronald Reagan.

46:24Yeah. Reagan. Covington, Louisiana. There you go. God damn. That's not a bad statue. I thought they did pretty good. You know what I would do if I was putting a photo on this website is I'd show how tall it was. Yeah. As opposed to these close-ups. It's a great point, actually. See it in a cowboy shot. And it's supposed to be real bronze, but some of that could be a rumor, but... Oh, wow. And there we go. Oh, so, okay. Ooh. Look at the... Oh, whoa. Now that's nice. That's huge. yeah they did a good job uh pistol pete maravich was from our lived in our town and so his sons went to our school in were they good at dribbling and stuff they were good yeah they were good that's a good movie that pistol pete it is good yeah um ian sommerhalder do you know who that is that sounds really familiar he's a he's an actor can you look him up ian sommerhalder he went to our school when he was like the most beautiful guy that ever existed in the world and he would just come to the first day of school oh yeah yeah i do know oh that guy's got light eyes like a husky does yeah yeah like those dogs with the light eyes oh yeah like riffraff would own this guy um but he uh he would come to school the first day just so all the girls knew that he was like in town and then just go off and be like a supermodel but he would always come the first day of school oh so then you ditch the rest of the you just be like i exist and then he would ditched the rest of the year.

47:49Yeah, he was like a kind of - He's no dummy. No, oh, he was smart. He knew how to do it. But he was too, almost too handsome to even exist, kind of, you know, like he was just that Dracula handsome, you know? Yeah. I remember as a kid not realizing that people disliked Ronald Reagan. Like I remember being like, that's the president, so everyone likes him. Yeah. And then this kid in class, Matt Murphy, he told me, Ronald Reagan hates poor people. And I said, well, that'd be impossible because he's the president. And he's like the best person in the world because he's, why else would he be the president?

48:26Yeah. I did not have nuanced political views at that time. Yeah. Me neither. I think, yeah, if I thought somebody was the president, then they just cared about everybody. Yeah. It was an outlandish charge. Yeah. To go from, I was clocking him as best person in the world. Now to find out he especially doesn't care about poor people. Yeah. You know, Morgan Wallen's on tour, and so is Suicide Boys. I love both of them. Jessie Murph is touring. I like her. I like a lot of different bands and performers. Parker McCollum, all of that. And that reminds me, actually, SeatGeek, with over 28 million downloads.

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51:32Well, but as a kid, hmm. And you're from where? You're from? Chicago, Illinois. Oh, wow. Yeah, we grew up in the city. Mike Ditka, maybe? Did you see him? You know, I'm trying to, I feel like I saw Jim McMahon somewhere. Yeah. But I can't, I can't, I can't square it. Who was the first I ever saw? Jim McMahon Jim McMahon or was he just so famous I felt like I knew him that was a weird thing about growing up in Chicago in the late 80s early 90s is we just I just thought that wherever I was the best basketball team would be like I didn't I kind of associated it with my own well yeah and having been with my own presence and moved to LA wow that's crazy I was just like well of course like my you know and everywhere we go on vacation and people be like Chicago, Michael Jordan.

52:28I'd be like, yeah, I know. Like, we got it. We did it. We got it. We got it covered. And then you moved to LA. And then, yeah. And then I moved to New York. Yeah. Well, also the Bulls just, you know. They were so good. 97, 98, 99. I saw BJ Armstrong at my gym. Wonderful, wonderful guy. And I love seeing him. Yeah. Every time I see him, I'm like, I know it's you. And he's like, you've told me that seven times. He's out here in LA? Yeah. he's an agent I believe at a sports agency but super nice guy I think he went to Iowa or Iowa State for college but I always get so excited seeing him America love that team though I mean unless you were like in Cleveland or New York I met Barkley once or I met him twice because he hosted Saturday Night Live a couple times did he only host once no he hosted twice but I was only there the one time and I asked him about the dream team because we, you know, with Barkley, like we weren't going to write together.

53:29So Tuesday night, the host would walk around the different offices. And Simon Rich, this writer and I that worked together a lot, we just asked him, we go, what was the dream team like? And he went, oh man, he goes, if you ever get a chance to go to the Olympics, do it. I was like, okay, I'll make sure to. But he told me, he goes, we would beat those guys by a hundred points and then they'd ask for photos. He was like, it was the greatest time ever. of anyone doing anything. That's awesome. Larry Bird was on there. Yeah. John Starks. Horace Grant made that team, remember? Yes, he did. 92. David Robinson.

54:05Horace Grant made the team? I'm pretty sure. David Robinson. Scotty Pippen. I don't know if Horace made it. You're right, he didn't. Scotty. Yeah, Scotty. Stockton, Clyde Drexler. Yeah. Who always looked 55 somehow. Carl Malone out of Louisiana Tech yeah he went to Louisiana Tech he did Christian Laettner was on there I wonder how interesting that was for him Christian Laettner no Bobby Hurley he always looked like the richest guy in the world you know he had like the most he had the it was a haircut it was just a haircut thing yeah let's zoom in on Laettner a little bit he kind of had the most punchable face in a weird way which is a messed up term to use but he had it he had the most damn punchable Was it him or him?

54:53Christian Leitner's right there, yeah. Christian Leitner, you got the magnifying glass right over him. He looks a little zooted out there. Yeah. Dude, I ended up... Did you ever have a weird scenario? Because I had one, like, I ended up in a taxi cab. Okay. Zooted up, man. Some girl... Do you mind, where were you living at this point? I was living out here. Okay. And that's when I kind of, like, I had a couple nights in a row where I got really just coked out, right? And I started just, and then I was in New York one night and a girl said something to me in a taxi. Oh, I tried to give her a smooch, right?

55:28And I wasn't being aggressive or anything. She was flirting. I tried to give her a smooch. She kind of like rejected me. She was kind of mean about it, right? Or I took it as mean, right? Okay. And it was fine. She got out of the taxi. There was no animosity between us. It was just, you know, it wasn't going to happen. and but then I something in my head like I told the driver let's go get some cocaine you know so next thing you know me and this taxi driver getting some cocaine and and then he at one point wants to get some hookers you know the taxi driver yeah he wants to get I'm surprised he didn't think it was a uh sting that you were asking to get cocaine I feel like that's a lot of drivers actually get pinched that way yeah I think I I think maybe yeah I guess he You didn't seem undercover.

56:17Yeah. I seemed over-covered, probably. Or I think he seemed like, damn, somebody better cover this dude up. You were covered. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So anyway, dude, fast forward a couple hours later, I'm driving this guy's taxi. He's in the back. And we're talking about an LA yellow cab? We're talking about a New York. I'm sorry, New York? New York yellow cab. Okay, great. We're up in North Harlem. I'm driving this guy's taxi, and he's in the back with a hooker, right? Did he have the beaded seat thing? How was the seat comfort? The seat, the back seat was pretty nice, I remember. No, but the front seat, once you were driving.

56:50I thought it was pretty good. I was pretty scared. I just wanted to get back to my hotel. Sure, sure, sure. And I didn't know. I just, I would love to be up in that cockpit for a second, you know, of a real New York City yellow cab and just see the setup. Because I never get my setup right. It felt like. Drinks to phone cord to just like, I never feel like I have my console right. Yeah, you're right. So I'd like to see how they do it. I think it never, it felt like somebody had sat in there who had like, it felt like the guy in there was like, he was going to leave his children probably. Oh, okay.

57:22It had a sinking. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You could feel the despair. Also, the guy was in the backseat. That's true. So it wasn't just, yeah. So in terms of his vibe, you had it coming from a bunch of directions. Right. And then anyway, so I ended up on, and I had to do an Opie and Jim Norton that morning, right? Oh, wow. So I ended up on the radio and Daryl Strawberry was in there. And I get to the radio station. I can't even talk, right? I'm just like blasted out of my brain, you know? And I'm still thinking. I was still ducking off in the bathroom. I'm doing cocaine in the bathroom. In the stalls at Sirius Radio.

57:57Andy Cohen's in there peeing in the next one talking to me, right? And I'm just sitting in there just blasting up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then. What I would always kill for the single occupant bathroom. Yeah. With the key. When you got in there, you're like, God. It's your office. Welcome to Rome. Won't I blow this line off of? Yeah. I got every surface imaginable. From counter to counter. The saddest part was doing some cocaine off the... Baby changing station? Yeah. I got a joke about that in my new special. Do you? Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. Just for you. thank you but yeah so that was a that was a night for me when I saw Daryl Strawberry he was on the radio station right oh you saw Daryl while gacked up he was the other guest oh wow so that was a moment for me where everything kind of lined up could he tell no hmm I don't think I had on sunglasses which was weird I'd been doing well going on this show yeah and I had on sunglasses and uh I could barely talk I remember yeah and that was scary because my only gift I had in my voice, the only thing in my life I'd had to express myself was my voice.

59:09Yeah. And suddenly I couldn't use it. Okay. And you had, and your mind, which you now had to use because you were going to be interviewed on the radio. Yeah. And it was real scary. And then also this moment of seeing Daryl Strawberry, someone who I'd always thought was all coked out of his brain. Sure. Because that's all I'd ever heard, right? Yeah. Was the old stories. I didn't know that he was a sober guy and had his deal together. Oh, yeah. I assumed he had his deal together, but I did think he'd be able to spot you still. Yeah, I didn't know what I thought, I think. Okay. Which I don't know if that even makes any sense.

59:38But there was some alignment at that moment of like me not having control over my voice, me having a perception of somebody else that was false or something. Sure. And that just lined up. And you hadn't slept and you were on cocaine. Yeah. But that lined up for me that I needed something, whatever that like the... What's that thing you tighten with the colors in it? Kaleidoscope. Whatever the kaleidoscope is that it makes people have to realize that something is wrong. Yeah. That was the moment where it was like. Oh, that's interesting. I could see right down. Those things never made me. Those like being in midtown Manhattan have a meeting, have a, you know, have a big like production meeting on something.

1:00:27And you could be on cocaine. Get there half hour late. desperate to have a cigarette. So like finding an abandoned office and smoking out the window and being almost very much in trouble and it being really clear, those moments were so about surviving that, that hour that they, I never thought about them with any deeper perspective. I never thought, Oh my God, what has my life become? I was just like, I, it'd be easier to take the train. I'd be faster to take the train home to my cocaine, but I can't do Coke on the train. So it was all just like figuring out the video game of being a drug addict.

1:01:04It was just a scramble for the present problem. And as soon as that problem was solved, I moved on. I wasn't like, I can't believe, you know, I remember I went into a meeting holding a bottle of Pedialyte because I was not eating anything. I was just drinking Pedialyte, doing cocaine. And I was with people I knew and we were waiting for other people to join the meeting that we didn't know. and I said, if my nose bleeds or if I pass out, it's because I have a sinus infection. Don't worry, you know, and I'll give a signal if I think I'm about to pass out. And then, and even to them, I was like, because I'm sick.

1:01:42Right. Because that's why. Wow. Yeah. Yeah, what's the signal too? I can't remember. Something like I got, you know, Geronimo.

1:01:55That'd be a great thing to say before you pass out and your nose explodes with blood. That covered it well. Or timber. Timber, yeah. Uncle. Yeah, I cried uncle to all of life. To the gods, yeah. Wow, so people just didn't know, huh? Well, there reached a point where people wondered. Were you getting too big and popular? Were you getting too popular that people were even afraid to question you and kind of thing? Did that happen? I don't think so. Right. I don't think so. because like I've been very lucky with I've been very lucky with having an audience that's grown and grown but you know that's a certain level before no one will question you I don't know if they have that level anymore I was on TV sometimes but I wasn't like you know I wasn't Steven Spielberg or something Michael Landon I wasn't some Michael Landon who a bunch of yes men telling me he doesn't need to show up to the state fair.

1:02:57Oh, that shook us, man. Did you have a lot of people around who knew about your problem? I have family members. It's like addiction is in my family. So there's... Um, yeah. So I remember I would drive by the AA. There's an AA room down the street from where I stay in Los Angeles, and I would drive by there, even through the parking lot sometimes. And one time, a family member of mine was like, you know, normal people aren't driving through the parking lot of AA meetings to see what's going on, right? So there was something inside of me that wondered. And the biggest thing for me is trying to keep my emotions sober.

1:03:40I wasn't insane. I definitely partied some. I don't drink because I'm afraid if I have a beer, I'm gonna go get cocaine. I've never had a drinking problem. I'm gonna take one sip and then it just gives me an excuse to get coke, right? But mine was just always like thinking something was wrong with me. I always felt like, I've always felt like something, like there's a to-do list that I never even wrote that I'm responsible to do. And the pain, the energy, the responsibility of it is always, every day when I wake up I'm like I gotta go I just have to do I always have to do I have to prove I'm trying to prove myself to nothing I don't even know what it is so that was something in my life that made it tough that just exhausted me you know so a lot of my stuff came from that kind of thing like just feeling inferior trying to always make like I'd fall in love with a girl and then the second if I got a date with her the second I did there was some other girl it was like just always needed more always needed something else there was always a missing piece to me being okay yeah and there was no there i could there was never a piece i could find that was gonna make it that would fit there was no piece out there it was just there was something wrong with my program in a little bit how did you feel at that time did you feel like other shit needs to other people and other things need to fall into place so i'm happy or did you feel like it was on you you know people who blame the outside world.

1:05:09Yeah. They go, my problem is that people come into my life and create stressful situations or that thing of like, if you meet one asshole one day, you met an asshole. If you meet an asshole every day, you're the asshole. I think that happened kind of later. But early on, it was just, I'm not doing well enough. I'm not doing enough to be okay for myself was what it turned into. Doing enough like in your career? In anything. something yeah and it was always this invisible thing like nothing was ever i couldn't manage well enough to make things okay uh-huh even if i was managing great you know um and i couldn't enjoy i was never i was never enjoying myself i was always caught up how can things be different or better or you know uh so a lot of that stuff for me a lot of like not even knowing who i was like I need to needing you to let me know who I was if I was okay yeah for sure all that kind of stuff so the drugs was just I think uh I like drugs because I like cocaine because it I could feel how I wanted to immediately yeah of course like liquor and beer and stuff it's like that was just a bunch of damn just yeah it's it postpones shit yes I wanted the express train I wanted to feel how I wanted to feel right now.

1:06:35Oh my God. Yeah. But then I would get by, I would end up by myself looking at pornography, you know, just geeked out looking at hook or just, it always devolved into some weird space for me too. And well, and you're chasing some, you're chasing, I mean, people say you're chasing the first time you did cocaine. I don't think that's true. You're just chasing the, yeah, you're chasing the first line that night. Oh yeah. And if I think about doing cocaine, say if I think about it, right? I think some I'm at a party right there's somebody you open a cabinet there's some tits in there for some reason right it's a party you know and somebody has some cocaine if I do some in this hypothetical situation yeah the next thing I think about doing is another line of cocaine oh of course I don't think about enjoying the party I don't think about if you know I think about getting a bag I mean I just go okay well all right now we need a bag of this and fewer people that know about it the better yeah Now that was a fun thing too, is the secret espionage side of it.

1:07:36It was almost like you were - Oh my God, yeah. You were like the bad guy that everybody was looking for. You talk about the Craigslist thing. I mean, there was a guy, I don't know a guy, it was a Craigslist ad that someone was selling Adderall in LA. The ad was written like, home from finals and have all this leftover Adderall. And I remember thinking, I remember thinking, how can I pull up? And I was like, how will I know if it's a sting? And also I kept thinking like, this is a pretty low stakes sting for the LA County Sheriff's Office to be behind. Like to want to meet in a recreational park to sell someone 10 Adderall.

1:08:15It's a lot of manpower on a pretty small movement. And then I thought, will it help or hurt that I'm a little famous? Like when I pull up, will it be more like, could I, yeah. will I be more noticeable or will that become a distracting thing where I'm like officers I'm just you know of course it's not me I don't know man you paint so many great scenarios I was so late the funniest thing was I was so late to meet drug dealers because I was a cocaine ex everything was always running and I had a dealer in LA who was furious I mean she was so angry about the time She was always like, we don't do, she had some operation with her sons or something.

1:09:02She's like, we don't do this. We don't do this. It was like a family recipe. It was just like, this is a half hour late. I was like, you got to understand your clientele. Like we're nothing. We're not waking up ready for our errands. We're not waking up. Yeah, yeah, we've been up. We've been up. There's, you have to go to a bunch of different ATMs. You know that this is a process. Yeah, I'm on a Pedialyte hotline right now. I'm chugging Pedialyte, and if I yell Geronimo, it means I'm about to pass out. You gotta cut me some slack. Also, LA traffic is a real thing. I thought taking Wilton would save time.

1:09:40I had a dealer once who preferred to deal in front of police... Who preferred to deal in front of police stations on the theory that if he got jumped, he would rather be close to police. Oh, yeah. Yeah. That makes sense. I guess so. Wasn't the most fun thing. It's scary. Yeah, it wasn't a great meetup. Oh, the scariest, like, I remember, like, this guy would always bring his Husky with him, right? Okay. So the Husky would come up to the car first, right? And kind of he's like, you know the drill, right? Pause up, like, just up to the window? Yeah. And he'd be like, you know the drill, Willis is going to circle the car or whatever.

1:10:15The Husky was named Willis, right? So I'd be sitting in there, and I was just - What's that drill? What's the Husky doing? The Husky would kind of come up and just go around the car. You had to keep the windows down. Was it to make sure there weren't other people in the car? I think just to, you know, I think he, you know, the first time he brought the dog in just sat in the back of the vehicle. Okay. So the dog would get to know your smell, right? Oh, that's cool. So I think now the dog had like a semblance of, you know, who was who, right? Okay. So Willis would come up and he'd start smelling, but I would get, I was so just gacked up.

1:10:44I was just paranoid, right? And then one time he gets in, man, and he just starts crying. The dog?

1:10:56the guy the man the guy i don't know if i'd been able to know maybe i could have noticed if the dog was crying but i don't know if i could have but the man got in and wept and he started crying yeah and he said his mom had just died oh my god and i did it slow down the transaction I needed to get that coat yeah so it was like I remember in my head being like for 60 seconds you have to talk about his mom or make sounds that are sad sad sounds where's Willis at this point Willis sitting in the back okay so I just between you two yeah kind of like heading there we assumed dog's eyes moving back and forth yeah yeah yeah and I just remember just like making just like kind of sad like god that's awful just like oh that's awful god oh i never and or one of the sounds was like it was like oh like it was almost a little not sad it was like oh that's the worst sound because oh you just you went through your your sfx bank and you just hit a weird one yeah a through z of sad sounds yeah yeah and you know just like but i remember i got to one i was like oh because i'm just thinking i'm ahead 60 seconds sad sounds 60 seconds of sad sounds get to the coke get to the coke yeah and the dude is crying man it's just so moments like that where you're just like what is going on i don't know how to handle this well i will say there's a lot of factors in that story.

1:12:39And yes, you know, you could have had more empathy in the moment, but he's also a drug dealer who brings a Husky into your car and Willis is sitting in the backseat. So it's an odd situation. Yeah. It's not like anyone else would have handled it a lot better. Yeah, I always took odd situations like that. Like it was totally normal, I think. And I still have - Yeah, 100%. Nothing about that. Nothing about those things. I remember thinking like, God, the day is, how do people get through their day with all these meetups they have to do? Yeah. Cocaine dealers, you mean? Yeah. Just like, you know, yeah.

1:13:12Buying pills. I was like, man, I was like, I can barely, I got a call, but I'm supposed to meet this person at four. I'm not going to, you know how many business calls I did on mute, you know, like on a street corner being like, thank you. You said six. You said six. You said six. Yeah. Okay. Cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, I mean, we love, no, like we'd love the script. Like, you said six. I was like, it was a real, it was exhausting. It was exhausting. Yeah. But it kept you in the moment. I'll say that. I had reflexes like an alley cat. You know, like, could grab this. It was like, people meditate to be in the moment.

1:13:53You know, like when people do like mindfulness meditation, it's to be fully present. And like, when I was trying to get drugs, I was full. I was like, okay, bird, siren off in the distance. Bicycle, that's the second time. Like every single thing. We're here. Yeah. Yeah, it did put you right there. Put you right there. There was some immediacy, goddammit. Maybe there was something about that that I really liked about it. That it put you right like, because now I will say this, I've thought a lot about the moment, right? Like the moment doesn't exist as much as it used to. The moment, it used to be, if something happened, it wasn't recorded all the time, it wasn't captured on a phone.

1:14:30If you had a good story, where you had to get to your friends and tell it. And if somebody else had a good story, you had to get them to the party to, dude, listen to what happened to Ron, right? And that was the only way. The moment was like, it wasn't able to be captured, right? Okay. So it had so much value. Whereas now all moments are captured, right? So it's like, there is not as much value to them in a way because they're... yeah well do you think that's the capturing of it like you mean you can get a photo or a video of it or do you think that as we get older we just had so many moments they become I don't know they just become a little less it's a good point like time like time people say that about time that's a really good point like time when you're young everything takes so long but when you're older it takes it goes faster because you've done it so many times yeah like the most I mean we both get to do really exciting things, but we've done versions of them before.

1:15:34And you go, oh, this is, yeah, okay. This is how I thought. This is what I thought it might be like. Okay, yeah, it's the same feeling as, you know. Yeah, the moment. Yeah, I think - I never take stock in the moment. Really? I never do. I just like, I never - What does it mean? Like playing the world's greatest venue or I never, I mean, you know, I later I can appreciate those things, but I never have. I remember I was down in the bottom of Patagonia in Chile and it was like all glaciers three hours from Antarctica. I was just staring at the sun setting over all these glaciers. And I was saying to myself, like, try to enjoy this.

1:16:16Try to enjoy this. Try to enjoy this. Just just later. I appreciated it, but I'm never really. Oh, my God. Do you think that the world is boring to you? And this is in the judgment of you. This is like sometimes as a, I think as somebody who's been in and out of recovery and stuff like that, I've noticed at times that I looked at the world in ways the world always felt a little bit boring to me. I used to have that. Yeah, I did. Yeah. What do you think? Or that boring or that boring, not that the world was always boring, excuse me, but that boring was the absolute worst state to be in. Boredom was intolerable.

1:17:00Yeah. And it's tough if you have a creative mind because a creative mind can get kind of bored kind of easy because it can think of different things. Yeah. So it has more toys to play with, you know? I also have a thing. So it's less like you were saying you had kind of a the grass is greener envy for you always wanted more or some other scenario. I also, like, I reached a point where I felt I felt very satisfied. I remember I was doing this tour in 2017 and I was on stage at a theater in St. Louis and it was sold out and it was a Tuesday. You know, it wasn't like, and I remember when I first went to the comedy cellar, rock or one of these guys being like, anyone can sell out on the weekend.

1:17:48Wait till you sell out on a Wednesday or a Tuesday. So I'm on stage and it felt like the end of the movie Comedian, you know, the documentary Seinfeld, which when I saw that, I was like, that's what I want. I want to stand in a theater and do standup. Like, that's what I want. And then I was doing it. And I thought it wasn't a bad feeling, but the feeling was, okay, this is it. This is all, this is kind of as big as I pictured. like and I'm doing it and that's great right but I had a slight feeling of I don't know okay I don't know what's next like I was a bit um I started I started to freak out because I was kind of sad I was a little satisfied yeah but I but I don't want to I don't want to make it seem like it was a good feeling it was an odd feeling yeah or sort of this is it this is what I wanted and it's pretty cool.

1:18:43Right. But having a goal really kept me occupied. And I wasn't sure if I had another one. Wow. Dude, that sounds like a great entry to like a detective scenario. Having a goal really kept me occupied. Yeah, having a goal kept me moving and I had reached it. I wasn't sure if I had another one. Yeah. It seemed like, I mean, it was a very, very lucky goal. I got a P-Man. Yeah. I'm going to pee real fast. Okay, cool. You all right? 100%. All right. When you think about like your, so I think that these days there's kind of like two, can I ask you something else about addiction? Go ahead, please. Okay.

1:19:23I think there's like two types of addiction that I notice. I notice people that are like alcoholics, right? Like they have what is in like the big book of alcoholism. You know what I'm talking about? The disease, yeah. Yes, they have the disease of alcoholism. then i also noticed there's this other group who have opioid addiction right yeah yeah yeah and it's not i'm not saying that some of them couldn't also have alcoholism no but there's something about the i mean there's something so insidious about opioids and how they get in people's wiring yeah that you're not i don't want to get into the whole like willpower and disease and i know that a lot of people have a lot of feelings about that all of them valid but you're not choosing to take that opioid.

1:20:10That is science fiction level shit the way it gets into people's limbic system. You cannot stop taking them. You are in agony. And that just seems like some other... There should be a different word for it other than addiction because I think most people associate addiction... Most people would say like, eh, it's not a choice, but you guys are choosing it a little bit. And there's, I don't know. I really do respect everyone's thoughts on that because it's a tricky fucking thing. But with the opioid compulsion to take the opioid or the dependence, the opioid dependence, I guess, that does feel like something else sometimes.

1:20:56Yeah, it's almost like they made a cheat code for your DNA. Yeah, it'd be like if you, you know, if you like handed someone who doesn't like cocaine and you handed them a flower every day with cocaine in it and they smelled it, they'd eventually want more cocaine. Yeah, it feels like you're getting into the wiring of people who were just looking for pain management. Right, right. And we're not looking to feel, you know, some sort of psychological, physical. We're not trying to feel some drugged out feeling. Right, yeah. We're not trying to change their state of consciousness. Yeah, it's almost like they just, they took into a new lab and like we're gonna find some way to trump the system.

1:21:39Yeah, I mean drugs are already overriding your desire to survive in a lot of cases. And opioids it seems like 10 times more so. Yeah. Yeah, that's one thing that's just unbelievable to me. It's like, and how our country lets that kind of happen. Like how our drug administration like that, did you see Dope Sick? I did, yeah. It was excellent. It broke my heart. Yeah. You know, it just like, you think there's a, I think it used to feel like when Reagan was in, right? Back when Reagan never, never did a thing wrong. Right. Or just whoever. It used to feel like at a time in life, right? And this could be me romanticizing life, that there was a time when your government or some overall governing bodies, like they looked out for the humans, for the people in the country, right?

1:22:33Maybe that's just a crazy view. But it used to— No, no, no. I didn't make a face because it's crazy, but yeah, I guess— And maybe that was just me being a kid and the pledge of allegiance. It could have, you know. Yeah, I think there's a— But then now it seems like you cannot count on your country to look out for you or the administrations within your country. I'd say that— That's what I got out of Dope Sick, kind of. It was like they trumped the because they hired people from the Food and Drug Administration to then work on their own board. And they kind of like. They made it so they would keep getting these pills like passed, like able to be used.

1:23:18Well, it's the basic problem that with. With harmful habits, I know that sounds like a corny way to say it, but with things we do to ourselves, we have a morality play about it. You know, like, oh yeah, they took opioids for post-surgery and then they couldn't stop and they started lying to their doctor. And it very quickly becomes something got set in motion, but you, the user of the chemical, you're kind of the problem. You know, you don't have strong willpower. you would rather be high on an opioid. I mean, and there's, again, like, it's a strange thing. Here's how I sort of feel like are drug addicts making a choice when they use drugs?

1:24:12This is a crisis we set in motion, but I don't think we're in control of it at all at a point. I mean, this is, because it's a crisis whose timing you can't control. Like, the immediacy of drug addiction, you can't predict. you have no power over once it starts. No, it's that we see it as a story of a bad thing you did. You know, like, I think some people look at Tiger Woods and they go, his pill use is kind of because he had a tragic character flaw earlier in his life, as opposed to maybe the guy that has to perform at that level physically might develop a dependence on pills. I do think people like to read into the dependence on drugs some sort of like deeper moral problem you have.

1:25:06And it might be because when you are on drugs, you make seriously immoral decisions sometimes. So I don't know. So I don't think the country's ever looked out for it. I think a lot of, I mean, I don't judge people for having a harsh view of addicts. A lot of people have addicts in their lives and you can't just go, it's a disease. And I, you know, like it, it can really, um, it's very painful to other people. Yeah. Oh yeah. I mean, it's a mess. They're a mess. Yeah. Life's so hard already. Life's like, life's like a table piled high with so much shit, like a bad, you know, when you go to like a little restaurant and the tiny circular ass table and they don't have room for anything.

1:25:52Oh yeah. The table piled high with shit and drugs come in and drugs you think are going to solve all your problems and they kick the legs out from under it. Yeah. They're just a mess. It's, it's, they're a disaster. They're a disaster. Do you, what do you think? I know people use them and they don't feel it. No, and some people are fine. I'm talking just for myself. Right. They're a disaster. Oh, yeah. I remember I got back from that trip of doing the, the taxi driver ended up dropping me off. He, uh, after you did. Yeah. Right. So then I had to go to the hotel, go to the airport after, Oh, I ended up, I get to the air on the way to the airport.

1:26:33I'm still texting the taxi driver. Yeah. Seeing if he can get us some code. Like I'm leaving. There's no. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm texting the guy I've been up all night with. And then when I get home, I had left some cocaine on my counter. I finally get off the plane it was a miserable flight you're just kind of rattling the whole way you get there I walk in my apartment there was still some cocaine on the counter and I did it of course and I was like I gotta get some help because I would never for one it was part of my career I'd worked so hard for and then I'm having good opportunities like Opie and Jim was an amazing opportunity to be on there and I was letting drugs like drugs were there it was just like and if you'd asked me the day before, would you ever go to Opie and Jim high on cocaine?

1:27:18I'd be like, you are out of your mind. Yeah. And so there I was, you know, so it was like, wow, I have no control over this. And then it becomes who the hell scheduled Opie and Jim when I'm in the middle of my cocaine? Are people nuts? You want me to go to Midtown Manhattan to the Sirius Satellite Radio building and record this? When you were growing up, were you a hard kid for your parents to kind of deal with or do you think that they no i tried to keep my personal life very separate from my family i i really i like i knew really i didn't want to bring trouble home because that's everyone i i looked at people who would get in trouble a lot and it's like they'd leave their cigarettes out they'd you know they'd they'd get they'd tag up their own garage like whatever right right i was Just like leave that shit outside.

1:28:09So you were good at hiding things. I was like a Michael Clayton of bad kids. I was like a fixer. I was like, all right, here's what we're going to do. He's the fixer? Yeah. Have you seen that movie with George Clooney? He's a lawyer who kind of like, I mean, I guess he doesn't fix the major problems in the movie. But he's a fixer. Yeah. Just as a like, you know, we're going to get it. There it is. The truth can be adjusted. Yeah. There you go. That should be the tagline for stand-up comedy. A lot of these sound like titles for festivals that you would have, I feel like. Yeah, the truth can be adjusted.

1:28:54John Mulaney, baby Jack. But yeah, do you feel like it was any part of your childhood that you see the part of your addiction? like or do you not is there not a big connection there yeah there's i mean um uh is that a weird question no not at all i do what i do and i don't let it interfere with business aka in that case school and i don't let it interfere with my business meaning you know eighth grade freshman year of high school and i don't bring that shit home You know, I don't, um, I don't smoke pot in my parents' house, whatever it was. I, I, I took great pride in, in having a hard separation between my life and my family.

1:29:39Like real mafia, like rules. Like we don't talk, I don't bring that home to my family. That's pretty amazing. Yeah. And because it made my life easier not to. Yeah. I mean, I almost got kidnapped twice and I didn't tell my parents cause I thought it was going to gum up dinner. I just thought it was like, I need to be able to move free around the city. I'm eight years old. Okay. I got shit to do. And if they think, you know, it's dangerous, this is going to slow me down. Yeah. That's kind of the voice that comes out sometimes in your material. You'll be telling a story about being eight years old.

1:30:11You're like, but I need to be able to move free about the city. I don't have time for this. Yeah. This is the game. I'm in. This is the game. I'm in. Yeah. These are the decisions I've made. These are the choices we've made. um were you a happy kid yeah i think i was just kind of a loner i i didn't really trust the world so i got into my own space pretty early what were your hobbies i like to collect stuff and hide it under my i had three shelving unit in my in my closet i like to hide weapons under my bed did you yeah for home invasions oh yeah crowbar um hammers wow yeah ready to rock i i was on the third floor of our house.

1:30:54I figured I'd hear, I thought no one in my family was ready. That's what I thought. I saw Cape Fear, the Robert De Niro one. My dad's a lawyer, like Nick Nolte in that movie. And I was like, oh my God, Nick Nolte gets his ass kicked. Like my dad would get his ass kicked by Robert De Niro. Long-haired Robert De Niro would beat the shit out of my dad. So I started to put weapons under my bed and I was just ready to go. And my whole plan was the the circuits for the house were also on the third floor. So I was going to shut all the power off. And now they're on my turf. Now I'm in charge. Dang. Yeah.

1:31:30And I'm 10 and I got a crowbar. But you're planning. It's interesting to have almost so many of your own like plans. It was stressful though. Oh yeah. My parents wouldn't set the alarm. I was just like, you are fools. This is a dangerous world. Yeah. And I'm the only one ready to rock. I am locked and loaded. Bro, I would, i was so scared like our neighborhood like people are like dogs were always giving birth and people were always like they would always catch men like kind of gay and around like like married men like in abandoned pools and in the neighborhood and people are always doing pills and you know and getting you know filing lawsuits down at the fairground because you go to the fairgrounds like a day early down there and for 50 cents you could ride any ride why would people filing lawsuits because they'd go do that and then they'd try to you know the every you know half the people that show up are like laying outside of the road.

1:32:21Oh, I got you. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, just that kind of shit. Did you feel unsafe as a kid? Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah, people would drive by our house and like throw rocks through the windows and yell the N word and stuff. And it's like, we're not even, you know, it's just like - That could be very confusing to us. Yeah. I was like, well, I don't even know. Yeah. What's happening, you know? It was just a scary place, right? And so I remember at night I would, like I wet the bed every night. Sure. I'd wet the bed two or three times a night. And so I'd get up some nights and have to clean the sheets and lay them back down.

1:32:57And then if I did a third time, I wouldn't even have any sheets. What a lonely activity that is. Oh, it was the worst. Little kid in the middle of the night, just when you're washing your own sheets, just waiting by the dryer. I'd be like, all right, this is up all night. No one's, maybe your parents know, but. Just smoking invisible cigarettes even. Yeah, just like. Ugh, I gotta be. Okay, I'll switch them. What a lonely little errand kids have to do. Dude, that probably was one of the loneliest moments of my, probably, I would say, of my childhood. And not to try to get into self-pity, but it's like that was something it would be like, man, I hate that I do this because I'm scared.

1:33:35I feel like something's wrong with me. And then I always have to do this by myself, you know? Because it would take a good 20 minutes if you clean your bed up and then put on some other sheets. And then, you know, even if you didn't have to go wash them, you know, if you had to wash them the next day or something, but just to make it all clean, you know, get out the common or the cleanser and clean the stuff. But I remember I would look in my closet. I would tie a string from one doorknob to the other. Like I would make, I'd have to look outside of the windows and look in every corner, just making sure.

1:34:08Why would you tie a string from one doorknob to the other? And then I put a couple of J-Bails on, a couple of Jingle Bells on it. Okay. And then you'd hear them if somebody went one way or the other. If someone was coming into your room. Yeah. Okay. So there was just like a ton of like a lot of fear. I had a ton of fear when I was a kid, I think. Yeah. And then I guess when you're in fear, you kind of like, fear is kind of a lonely place to be. Oh, it's very lonely. Yeah. So you're always kind of, you're the one who's looking out. Yeah. So I think maybe a lot of that kind of shaped how I was when I was young, you know?

1:34:43It's probably what hell is. being very, very afraid. That's a good, interesting call. Yeah. There's nothing worse than being really afraid. Really ashamed and afraid is rough. Oh, ashamed too, if you put that in there. Well, if you add to it, like I'm in this disaster and I'm to blame for it. Yeah. Yeah. Did you have any issues as you got more popular with your own ego? Probably, but...

1:35:13But... Because I've noticed those in my own life, you know? It's not a judgment. I'm just curious about - No, no, no, no. And I'm not trying, when I say but, I'm not trying to dial it back. Yeah, I mean - Ego's kind of a scary thing, right? Because you don't really know where it is. Yeah, I don't know where it is and you don't know what doses are healthy. You know how some people have like good boundaries? Yeah. And they're like, no, I don't allow this. And you go like, that sounds, like sometimes there's a side of me that thinks that boundaries sound stuck up. like that doesn't work for me i don't allow a hundred people to crash on my floor out of nowhere you know and i'm like but though go on like i always uh that didn't really make sense my example um no like i i uh let me think about that i feel like i'm rambling right now it's my ego for sure like like did you feel like once you achieved like some level of success like do you think success was your driving force like what do you think kind of was some of your driving force to do stand up and to to entertain like where do you think that kind of comes from for you is it a necessity is it a desire to be seen as a creative is it what do you think do you have any thoughts on it i have many i'm trying to um let me i'm trying to think of a semi-interesting answer yeah I wanted to I wanted people to say that guy's the best at what he does wow me even if it's 10 people right I wanted some people to go that he's the best at what he does my dad's a very successful guy and very very smart very he just he had stature to me he still does I mean but he has stature he just people would tell me growing up your dad's the smartest person I've ever met your dad's the best attorney I've ever seen he just I wanted stature from a young age I think which is a strange thing because what does that mean?

1:37:19that means you've already accomplished things past tense and also it's not great for a comedian I don't like when I don't want to be a comedian where it's like everyone respects me but I'm not funny anymore yeah I don't think you could ever be that that's nice of you to say but we all we're all running from that well it's interesting you say about stature because you almost have this thing sometimes and I don't know if maybe I'm trying to see into this a little where it's like can't you you almost operate in a way that and you said it yourself like I've done this like it's already completed guys I'm already the number one entertainment in an America.

1:38:02Can we just sit back and please enjoy it? Right. Even though you couldn't even enjoy the moments. Even though it's like... But that's almost like what I would perceive stature to a kid. It's like it's already been done. It's already... Yeah, it's like the first concert I went to was when I was 11. I went to see Frank Sinatra for my birthday. Of course you did. Yeah. And what else would you take you to? And I asked my dad for tickets. I told my dad, you know, Frank Sinatra's coming to town. And he was like, what? You know, he's a busy guy. He hadn't totally been checking in with me in a couple of years.

1:38:39Yeah, obviously. He was like, Jesus, all right. So then we went to see Sinatra at a casino in Aurora, Illinois. And yeah, that's what I wanted. To come out and be. And everyone just go like, this guy's the best. Wow. Yeah. There's no question. You know, when you walked out, I don't know if I've ever. I've been jealous a couple times when you walked out in your Radio City special, the way that thing looked. And I was like, man. Oh, well, that's all Alex Timbers, our director. But I said, that guy looks like a real guy. That's what I thought to myself. Thank you. That was the intended, that was the desired effect.

1:39:18That guy looks like a real guy. Yeah. I'm very envious when I come into like, when I, when I've run into you, um, like I don't, I don't, I feel very out of place in like LA a lot. Like I feel like you guys, I feel like I have this thing of like, I'm scared to go to the store. I'm scared to go to the improv. You guys kill in a different way that I can't do. I feel like I get I think there was a time when there was certainly kind of like it was like there was the same guys kind of at the store a lot you know you specifically because you seem like you're having fun on stage oh thanks man and you're extremely funny thank you you seem like I wish I could be as I wish I could I feel like you're able to access a different level of understanding of comedy that I don't and I when I see you perform or I watch you I have a lot of I have a lot of envy that this man is this man is very good that's nice of you to say that's that stature I was looking for yeah this man is a 10 foot tall Ronald Reagan this is a 10 foot tall Ronald Reagan that Reagan won't even visit yeah yeah yeah I feel like you can go any I feel like especially these days the comedy store is very much like I don't know if they're even it's not even that there's not that many people performing over there that are headliners really you know yeah I guess that's not the term there's not as many there's a lot of new folks there.

1:41:07I think like I was doing the bourbon room last night and I was backstage and I have this thought a lot where I'm like I'm just like I wish I was funny like I wish I was funny like like I'm gonna get out there and I'm gonna do my thing and I just like I fucking wish I wish I was like like watching your special I'm like I wish I was like that I wish I was fun. oh that's sweet of you yeah I wish you're working on two levels at once you're working on two levels where you know you both know and you don't know what you're doing you know exactly what you're doing the only other person who can do it is like Tracy I feel like you you operate at one level that's extremely silly and funny but you're aware of that but what you present to us is that you're not aware of what you're saying.

1:42:03Yeah. Yeah, and I don't know if I am sometimes either. That's the toughest part. I think you are, but I don't know. And that's what's really, that's what's very captivating about it. Oh, thanks, man. I mean, I remember when Nate Bargats was on your podcast, you said that you were waiting till you got a little older to watch Malcolm in the Middle. Yeah. And I think about, like, I think about that a lot, you know. Thanks, man. Just what exactly that means. Yeah, I think some things I'm just saving. You know what I felt like most of my life? I felt like a late bloomer, man. I felt like only in the past few years when I got into trying to get into recovery and stuff have I started to even grow up.

1:42:46Oh, yeah. I felt like I put a lot of like, I didn't, I put a lot of my evolving off. And a lot of me has never wanted to grow up because I still want to get the things I deserved as a child from my environment, from my parents. And I think there's a part of me that like, I mean, I can feel it when I even say that. I can fucking feel something inside of me literally grip the fucking skin inside of me. Like don't make me grow up without being able to have had some of these things. There was a feeling you needed to have as a kid that you didn't have. Yeah. And you don't want to close the door on that until you can give yourself that.

1:43:37Yeah. And I think it makes it real, it almost makes me hate growing up because I'm never going to be able to get back there you know I know that sounds kind of crazy but like I'll never be able to get back to those moments where like my parents should have been in a certain way or things should have been safe or I don't know but man it it hurts me yeah you know and some people say it's like you got to get over those things and you have to go through your step work and you have to let go of resentments and and i believe that right but there's something inside of me that even though i do those things that still is having a very tough time letting go you know um and growing up it's tough man that that part for me has been tough.

1:44:38And I know some people may sound, that sounds like a baby or whatever. That's okay. I can't, I can't deny what I feel, you know, or what I know. It's not even a feeling. What's wrong with a baby? They're pretty interesting. Right. That's a good point, actually. The, the world wasn't that you had some times in the world, wasn't that kind to you when you were a kid. Yeah. I didn't trust it right out of the gate. Yeah. You know, and sometimes I don't know why my mother had a really tough time. Like, knowing if there was something wrong with you she couldn't she had like almost an emotional autism i use that term a lot but and my father was real old so i think i was always scared he was gonna die you know sure and uh so it made it just i don't know the recipe was really weird man so anyway i talk about that stuff a lot i'm not trying to harp on it but there's sometimes you just have to wait for yourself to get there you know it's like you can do a lot of the work on the outside but sometimes it's like that inner child or whatever they say like that motherfucker can be a little slow you know yeah and might always and and he might always be like that yeah i mean you got a lot you got a lot out of being that kid too like your independence the confidence you have like you had to adapt in a different way and a lot of that has helped you a lot.

1:45:59Yeah. I'm not saying that makes up for it. I'm just saying, sometimes I wonder myself, I go, I think I'll be like this all, always forever. Yeah. I think this might be it. And maybe that's all right. You know, I love the way you're able to have this. You have this very like, uh, looking at the presentation of yourself and like, almost like it's a judge at a, at a school fair, you know it's like this is what he's doing it's like the judge at a Michael Landon drawing contest yeah who's gonna get the treat well guess what no picture's gonna be perfect because there's a bunch of fucking little kids drawing Michael Landon yeah so not one of them is gonna be perfect but the effort and the joy of watching a bunch of little kids draw Michael Landon for their mother hoping to win candy is the is life yeah do I have the best drawing yeah I don't know but it's just the fact that everybody's doing it is a good time I guess yeah I mean dude nothing sounds more fun than a family having a Michael Landon drawing contest oh man we were keyed up we were excited um trying to think of what else we can talk about you know oh we've got a special coming out oh sorry and we'll start I'll put that in the beginning yeah what do you think about new specials as you get as you get older yeah and as we get further away from this the the part of us that was the first special yes yeah let's just call it let's call the exciting part of us the first special yeah do you like has it been tough to evolve as a person and as a comedian has there been scary moments where you're like i don't know if i want to evolve like who do I evolve into?

1:47:47That's something I think about sometimes. Yeah, I was more you know, this special I've got coming out is kind of it isn't kind of it is about everything from intervention through rehab and after. So at the moment or in the past two years I haven't wondered what I'm going to talk about on stage but now having shot this thing and, you know, and I'm really, really happy with it and it's longer than my other specials and it, I'm thrilled that it's longer. It's kind of, this was the time to do this chunk of material. This was the moment in my life to do this. With that gone, now I start to wonder. Hmm.

1:48:35Yeah. Now I'm, now I don't remember how to do comedy. Oh, that's a great statement. Oh, yeah, I don't. Last night, I was like, I don't have jokes. I don't, maybe I'll try this old one that was part of the hour that I cut, but I just, I don't, what is going on here? How do I do this? I don't know what I'm doing. Wow. Yeah, that's scary. It's really scary letting something go, putting out something that's new, putting out something that's more like, obviously we tell stories that are based on our real lives or have moments, some of them, you know? Yeah. But to put out something that's like, really, this is like me just tracking part of my life.

1:49:14And it was a little bit like, I can't talk about other things until I get this out. I don't mean like people were waiting for it. I just mean, this has to be what the next special is. And it was rather easy because there were lots of stories from it. It wasn't easy to get it where it was, but it took two years of touring. But it felt like, okay, inevitably, there's over an hour of nonsense that happened. So do you, is it interesting? Like, because some people, I think, as we get older, they want us to be older in a way. Or they want, we have to evolve or something, right? Because. For sure. You know, we can't have the same thoughts and stuff that we had when we were 10 years ago or 15 years ago when we were starting.

1:50:14Well, I don't know. Is that is anyone saying that? No one is. I mean, that might that's a good I mean, wanting to evolve is a good thing. It's scary, though. I think we're always arguing with some straw man that's not really there of what like what we should be talking. I mean, I don't think that's a good point. I was just doing that. Yeah. And now I was trying to bring you into it. No, I did that last night. I was like, oh, maybe I should be like, maybe I should have a lot of political jokes. I thought this standing back, I was about to go on. Well, you're respected enough, man. And it's such an interesting, you're so yourself that if you just get up on stage, I am curious as to what is John thinking about?

1:50:54No way. That's nice of you to say. But like, I went and saw Stavi at the Pittsburgh Improv. Stavros Haukies? Yeah. Yeah. And that I was like, God, I was like, that's a person who's just funny right away. That's a person who's funny where I'm like, I'm willing, like, I'm just going to watch him talk to the crowd. I'm going to watch anything. I would kill to have that. Wow. That's it. Well, I guess everybody wants a little bit of something else, you know, or would love to have moments of the other person, you know? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. That's like. He's wild. He says pussy a lot, too. and I don't say it that much.

1:51:34He does, yeah. Yeah. He does. He likes saying it. I feel like he almost does it deliberately. You think? I think he knows exactly what he's doing. Yeah, he might. He goes for it right away. Or Brody. Yeah. Like that. Brody was very interesting. Brody was almost a reverse psychology. I didn't even know what he was doing half the time up there. I mean, Brody, like, oh, I mean, the amount of times I went, Why can't I? Here I am. It's my own show. I'm in a theater. I'm in an arena. Like if I could bring the same excitement that Brody brought to warming up a Chelsea Handler audience, I'd be I'd have it made.

1:52:17Why can't I have that thing? You know, what do you did someone at some point in your life or did some straw man tell you that you don't? because like when I watch your special last night, I was watching the Radio City music. Yeah, I mean, some voice tells me I'm boring. Some voices, you're boring and no one wants to hear this. And you're not fun and you're not, you're actually not, you're not good at performing your own material. That's something. Dude, when I watched that, I was like, man. And I'd seen it before, but I was like, I'm just so involved. Even when you go to get the sip of water and drink it out of the cup and you probably think, man.

1:52:56It was a last minute decision, no stool, so the water's gotta go somewhere. Yeah, it was really interesting. I was like, that he put it there, that's what he's doing. But you probably think - Hit it behind a light bulb. Where you're going to get it, yeah. Oh, yeah, that was like - Everybody's so bored right now. No, in that moment, I was like, can I pick up a glass of water without dropping it in front of 6 ,000 people? Wow. Because I was like, I've never had it on the floor before. So, no, I mean, listen, I also, I don't mean to sound like, oh, I feel like shit about my - Well, we always want something different.

1:53:23but we always just want to be something different. Oh, it's funny. I think there's no doubt. There's probably 20 guys when I watch them, like, oh man, I wish I had some of that. Oh my God, yeah. That'd be really cool. Absolutely. And you know what? I don't think there's anything wrong with it. I think it's a totally healthy thing. I think we've been talking a lot about also the things in us that we feel are missing, but it's quite, it's a good thing to watch Stavros and be envious. Yeah. Like that's something that gets me, comedians who write jokes that I'm like, you know, when I hear a joke, well, I just saw Nate's special.

1:53:57I was like, God, I wish I had those. That's exciting. I don't, there's nothing to me unhealthy about that. Yeah, that's true. It's nice, I think. And it's really just an admiration to that person. But I think that there's so many people that for sure that look at you and think that way. Like, I wish I could be as put together as that guy, you know? And use the word haberdasher I saw in one of them. That was great. Did I? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Harry Truman ran a haberdashery that went bust. Did he? That's the first time I think I heard that word. Yeah. A little kid hearing about Harry Truman. Some guy opened one up, I think, bust when we were growing up and people thought it was like a hash den or whatever and they shut it down, I remember.

1:54:37Oh, wow. Yeah. But... In this violent place you were growing up, someone tried to open a haberdashery? Yeah. Very nice. They had a lot of narcs bust. a lot of people were always doing Narkin, you know? Oh, yeah? Where they get some kid to fuck, you know? There was a thing called Snap. Was it called Snaps? It was this weird program in Chicago where Chicago PD would send, like, two 13-year-olds up to a bar to try to get in, and then they'd bust the bar. I knew this one kid whose dad was a detective, and so they sent him, and he went up and he went, don't let me in. I am here with Snaps. I mean, if that was true, I, in retrospect, I can't imagine that would be like an actual CPD program.

1:55:27But I like that. I like that he didn't want the bar to get busted. Yeah. Then he could probably come back the next week and be like, I did you a solid. Yeah. Let me in. Yeah. Then he over, then he like gets carted out. Yeah. Yeah. What was your like, do you remember like your first relationship growing up? What was that like? What do you mean? Like dating and stuff. Was that tough for you as a kid or were you pretty good at it? No, I wasn't good at it. I didn't realize you weren't supposed to tell girls how much you liked them. Oh, damn. Because in movies, that's what the hero would do is he'd be like, I love you so much.

1:56:03And they'd be like, oh, my God, no other guy at school talks this way, right? So I thought, okay, you got to be like that. You got to be like these John Cusack types who tell you how they're feeling. And no one really likes that. Yeah. No one likes that. Yeah, it's too alarming for people. The reality of it is too alarming for people. But that was also like, again, like romanticizing romance. I was just like, no one had, I brought a heaviness to that, that I think people were like, this is, you got to relax. This is, you know, making out in winter coats here. Yeah. Yeah. This is not anything that serious.

1:56:37You don't need to be making speeches. Yeah, yeah. The train isn't leaving the station. Yeah, yeah. And this isn't Casablanca or something. Yeah. You need to like, yeah. we're gonna share a menthol and then hook up standing up. Like you need to bring it down a notch with this monologue. Yeah. Did you, how did, what was your first relation? at the end of Family Man. Exactly, yeah. At the end of Family Man. Have you seen that? Is that where he can choose between the two paths? He's got, we got a house in Jersey. She's tealing on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've got two kids, Annie and Josh. Yeah. And he like explains to her what their life is like.

1:57:14if she doesn't get on that plane. You can always go to Paris, just not tonight. God, dude. Is that a good one? Man. I haven't seen it in some time. It's good, man. It'll make you believe in something. What was your first relationship? Mine, this girl, this girl was kind of doing BJs at school and she liked me, right? And I didn't, it was like, she was really funny. That's what I liked about her. but she was also doing bjs right and people were and nobody was doing them sure and so it was kind of nervous because i i liked her right i really liked her because she was really funny and she was really cute but then the doing bjs part i kind of i liked that sure but i also was embarrassed in a way because i didn't want people like people were like kind of like you Other people were judging her because she was doing BJs real early.

1:58:13And you thought they would judge me. You thought your motives for hanging out with her would be suspects. Right. And I thought that they would judge me somehow. I've always been like, I've always taken on the responsibility or taken on the paint or the judgment that other people put on somebody that I have attached to me. in a weird way. Oh, you mean you get... I get offended or I get embarrassed. Oh, wow. For something that somebody else will do that I attach myself to. It's really not fair. I think I do that too. I think I do that too. It's really not fair. I had a girlfriend that used to...

1:58:56She wouldn't know where people were when we were standing around somewhere. She had bad peripheral vision? And yeah, the worst, dude. It was unbelievable. So she would always... We'd be talking beautiful girl. I loved her. She'd always like walk right back when somebody was walking. I'm just like, and it ruined it for me. Oh, wow. You felt her embarrassment. Was she herself embarrassed? Not that much. Oh, interesting. So you weren't even feeling her embarrassment. You were just feeling the only embarrassment. Yeah. It was almost like the universe had to give it to someone and she was unaware. Yeah.

1:59:28But I would take it on though. And I would always be like, I'm not going to let you be a reflection of how people see me. No matter who that was. and I think that probably goes back to my childhood I was very embarrassed of my situation that I was in or something about it made me uncomfortable so that's how I behave still it's not fair to other people you know but then you also like use the way you grew up and those things and now you know that they're of interest to talk about right well it's a big part of my still operating you know so it's like some stuff I still have to really work on I think you know or look at I see.

2:00:06But only recently in the past five years have I noticed how all these things play a role in my life. Yeah. But yeah, that first relationship. So yeah, and then we went to a party one night and everybody knew that I was going to maybe, you know, she was going to do a BJ on me or whatever. Okay. So we picked like this tree to do it behind, right? Did you talk to her about it? Yeah, we kind of have written letters at school. About that specifically? Yeah. Okay. or talk to a friend you know her best friend like it's gonna happen sure so I'm so nervous dude I remember I would barely even get out how old are we here we're probably in 7th or 8th grade okay wow and I remember just being so nervous dude yeah I could barely even walk over there and I get by the tree and then we like barely even said any words you know and then she might have felt a responsibility to do it now because we planned it you know I don't even know well you'd exchange She changed many letters over it.

2:01:06Yeah. And then she starts doing it. And then the girl's mom, whose party house it was, like we're behind a tree, so the only thing you can't see is the actual kind of BJing, but you can see me and her. Okay. And then the girl's mom came out and busted us, and it was so, and she was, it was just so embarrassing. It made me, oh, I just felt so much embarrassment, I think. For yourself? I think for both of us, you know, but what, yeah, what she's doing is embarrassing me, but then I'm also here to see, you know, I'm in, I'm here too. You were definitely part of it. You were half of it. You might say.

2:01:46So anyway, that was, I think, you know, I had some early uncomfort with that.

2:01:53And just the fact that I loved, I felt like I kind of loved this girl. Yeah. And other people thought that there was something wrong with her. Uh-huh. and so I think that made me you know I don't know I think it did something to me a little bit but changed your perception of her yeah and it just made it changed it made me often like really conscious of what people thought of who I attached myself to and do you still have that today I think I do still have some of it yeah yeah it's kind of unhealthy well but it's okay I just you know it's something I think I got to go through some different you know work on it more and that's fine but Yeah It's all okay man you know it's all okay yeah yeah um john malaney is there anything else that you wanted to talk about um i don't want to take up too much of your time because we've chatted for a while i think i want to ask what does baby j mean because weren't you calling your tour from scratch yeah the tour i was just on is called from was called from scratch just because i started calling these shows I did.

2:03:02Two months out of rehab, I started doing these shows at City Winery in New York. And I just called it from scratch. And there might have been, I was trying to say like, all of this is new and please come to the shows, but it's going to be rusty. And it's going to be all worked out and messy and etc. And then I just kept calling the tour from scratch. I never loved the name, but I didn't want to think of a new one. There was too much going on. There's too much going on in early sobriety. And I didn't, you know, I just, I just kept going with it. But the special is called Baby J, which is something I refer to myself as in the special because the people like when 40 year old men call themselves Baby J.

2:03:49People find that really cute and like that a lot. Yeah. Do you think, is it like about being like a late bloomer? What is it? What, what is it kind of in relation to? I don't know. I just refer to myself as it at one point in the special and it makes me laugh a lot. Oh, nice. But a part of it is trying to get back to that before time. Like something. A lot of the a lot of the tour I just did, we used my first grade photo as the like tour art. And I mean, it just was. It was like you and I were talking about trying to get back to that age where there was just like electricity and things were really exciting.

2:04:27and something went off track things got darker and now I was sober and so much of my life had changed and I was out on the road I liked seeing that poster of myself I liked seeing that photo of me in first grade outside the venue it just put me like okay, we're trying to get back to that. Something started chasing us after that time. Something started chasing us. That's interesting. Yeah, yeah. That was a thought I had in rehab. I don't mean like I heard, well, I sort of heard a voice, but it said, we've been after you since you were a little kid. And I felt like something, yeah, something's been, things have had, there's been many great moments, but something, something's been trying.

2:05:28To get your attention or to get you? To get me. Wow. You think it's like a disease or something? I don't know. Just some. We've been after you. We've been after you since you were a kid. We. I didn't care for the we. Yeah. Listen, I didn't like hearing voices in detox. I didn't like grinding my teeth. I cracked a molar. It was a whole crazy. But yeah, I didn't care for the voice. But if I'm going to hear a voice, I don't like the we of it. That's a lot of people. Yeah, there's a van now. There's a van. That implies bats. Guys driving around with bats. How bad is detoxing? I never had to do something like that.

2:06:10Is it really hard? Benzodiazepine, which is Xanax and Klonopin, that detox really sucks. And do you stay in a room? What do you do? So some people go to detox for a couple of days. I was there for five or six days. They try to taper you off with this medication called Librium, which I don't know if that's a benzo. Anyway, it's similar, but yeah, the first of that week, I was sort of in a medicated detox. And then the second week was like, my skeleton wanted to rip out of my body. Wow. Yeah. And does it hurt? And they said that they were like, those are the most, no, not like, ow, pain. Mine felt like I cannot be, like I cannot sit, it's not even like, I remember laying on my bed just like fucking writhing, just like I, every part of me wants to rip into.

2:07:14Wow. But they said that when I got there, they're like, Coke is not, I mean, Coke was my problem. They said, Coke isn't your problem. These, the benzos, the downers is going to be the real beast. Yeah. Yeah. Could you do an eight ball in a day, you think? Yeah. Wow. I mean, I don't say that like, maybe it would take a, what was a day also? Define a day. That's true. That's true. Maybe a day and a half. Yeah. If you're up for 24 hours, that eight ball, dang, dude. I would, I remember sometimes I couldn't even inhale anymore. Yeah. Yeah. that feeling of I also I would feel like vibrating so much but I remember times when I felt like okay I've done too much like this is serious and I've done too much and maybe I should go down to my lobby and sit there in case I need to get I lived right near right next to an urgent care that's great I was like maybe I need to sit here and just tell the doorman to grab a paramedic or something but there were a couple nights where I just thought I've done too much but then I would still be crashing so physically I'm like this is we've done way too much coke I can't feel my legs I'm totally like this is a real disaster and then mentally I'd start crashing a little and be like I need to do can I do another bump is there a way for to do a bump that would satisfy this but not affect the oncoming cardiac arrest we're about to have dang so isn't that crazy we would think that you're in such a balancing act you're in such you know what if I'm gonna go to the hospital I probably should do a line first yeah yeah yeah they'd want me to just so I'm talkative yeah yeah yeah they would want you to that's so interesting you on the road now yeah what do I have doing I got some shows in Phoenix next week oh nice oh yeah I'm excited about that I yeah you know I started my tour kind of like i i should have had my show more mapped out before i put it up into some like smaller theaters you know yeah so sometimes i feel a little bit bad about that i thought it was why did they feel rocky yeah they just felt a little rocky well you know but i just always want to make sure that i give the you know of course but you're trying to put on the best show you could right i was trying for sure yeah i mean the other route would be to just what stay in do weekends at clubs yeah yeah that would have been probably the route that would have been just to better service the hour you know yeah i get that yeah i think but sometimes people are like come out come perform well sometimes you have a couple great shows and you go this is ready for theaters and then you get there and you're like this is yeah wow these people paid money and yeah yeah and it wasn't bad it was just and we have high expectations yeah of course you have very high expectations of yourself of course yeah when i'm out there at the very beginning figuring out an hour and I'm like, this is actually 40 minutes with 20 minutes of filler.

2:10:17It's, I feel very, I work hard at the news. I work hard at what I can and I hope that I have enough charisma to pull off the whole that, that no one's noticing that this is, you know, padded. Yeah. Man. Yeah. I think you got a ton of charisma. Also, it's like you go back on the road after you've just done a special. So you, what you, the last memory you have is this product that was like finely tuned. Yeah. And now you're out there doing stuff about how big the Denver airport is. Yeah. Because you just landed in Denver. Yeah, I remember I had a show in Charleston, and literally the next night I had an hour that came out.

2:10:55And so the next night I knew this is when you have to turn over, when you can't do material that's on the special. You have to kind of turn over most of it and do new stuff. And that was a tough weekend because the first show was pretty awesome, and the second one was not. it was just kind of like, fuck. Yeah. Well, that's the thing. It's like, you can just hit all green lights one night and be like, I have a new 15 minutes. And you don't. You have nothing. You have one minute. You have one. Did you do like a first CD? Like, did you make like a comedy album? Yeah. Unrelated to a, not a TV. Yeah.

2:11:35Yeah. I did that too. And I thought when that came out, I can never do any of these jokes again. Wow. No one fucking listened to it. Yeah. I wish I was, I remember going out to do, was I just starting to headline? Maybe I think I was going to headline the Houston Laugh Stop. And I had a CD that was out and I was like, well, if anyone's heard the CD, they'd know these jokes. So I got to do a whole new hour. No, you didn't. No. Absolutely no one had heard this album. No, and some guys you can just do, that's one messed up thing about putting things out. It's like, if you never put things out, then you would just be this thing that people can only go see if they go see you.

2:12:12Yeah, I think about that. I think about like the Grateful Dead model too. Yeah. I was like, I wish I could make every show different and tour like that forever and ever. And you probably could. I guess so. Well, I think a lot - I mean, what you need to do is you need to get like three hours of stuff and then you just sample between it, which some people do, I guess. Do you think people come to see you or your material? Oh, I don't know. I think the material, because if you don't have it in,

2:12:43like if I don't have it in the first 10 minutes, in the first five minutes, it's not that fun. Yeah, that's true for anybody, huh? I don't know. I mean, in an arena, I don't know. Maybe they're coming just for the, maybe some people come for the, like, this is cool of it, you know? But especially though, no, what am I saying? I think it's all for the jokes. Yeah. Yeah, people want to be entertained for sure. I think at a certain point though, people kind of get to know you, especially probably after this special comes out where people are going to get to know maybe more just about some of your journey.

2:13:14There's a lot in it. You get to know me pretty well. So that, I mean, I think letting people get to know you, uh, that's, you know, it's important. And then they know you, you know, they get to know you. Yeah. It's, it's all fun. Them getting to know one side of you and then, and then you go, okay. Also, sometimes I'm not a great guy. Oh yeah. Yeah. that happens a lot to all of us. So you're out now. Yeah. Yeah, I'm out and not just do sporadic. Like I was doing like a night and a night and a night in different cities. Yeah. And now I'm doing more like kind of smaller venues, but staying in a city for five nights.

2:13:52That's the best way to do it. I agree. I just did the arena thing and that was awesome. But you are hitting a point where more, you can do more nights at a theater. More people will come see you over, more people will find out you're in town. Yeah. And you do like an eight night run or something. I did that down in Atlanta and Philly. You were in Nashville too, someone said? I did, I think it was four or five nights at the Ryman. Nice. That was really fun. Yeah. That was on my 40th birthday too. Really? Yeah. Oh, I thought you were younger than that, man. You look younger. That's a cool room that Ryman is in it.

2:14:27It's the greatest. Yeah. Oh my God, it's the greatest. Yeah, it's awesome. And the Wilbur is really awesome too, huh? The Wilbur's really fun. God, the Wilbur is cool. The Wilbur, really, you feel the energy there. With Bill Blumenreich, I think his name is? Yep, he's the greatest. Yeah, he's got the best stories, too. Yeah, he does. He's got Foxwoods, too. Yeah, he's got the best stories. What other goals do you have in your future? I know you have the amazing animation, right? Is that your series? Which one? Big Mouth? Yeah. Yeah, I'm on that. Yeah. Sorry, I know that. No, that's okay. that's created by Nick Kroll and Andrew Goldberg and Mark and Jen the Flackets and they're great and yeah we do that now do you have other stuff that you feel like you like creatively that you're like having done like worked in television created shows do you feel like stand up is really the best medium you do it's the most most fun best delivery service of comedy it's yeah It's free base.

2:15:31Yeah. Dude. It's the best possible situation in terms of delivering. It's free base. Yeah. It's grimy. Yeah. It's a little grimier than TV. Yeah. Yeah. Did you ever end up in a really cool place doing drugs? Meaning a geographic place? Yeah. Or just like a dicey like, you know, Shoney's or something, you know, someplace that was a little deviant, you know? Karaoke bar. I'm trying to think like were you that were you that guy that wanted to get deep into the trap houses and shit were you like kind of like the who was the guy Anthony Bourdain of like trap houses and stuff like that did Anthony what's a trap house a trap house is just like a place where people are doing drugs and there's like a lady who's like probably like you know if you wake her up she would have sex maybe like in the back it's like Anthony Bourdain went to these no he didn't but he went to like food places he went to restaurants I was not the Anthony Bourdain of Trap Houses.

2:16:31Yeah, are you like, would you be that guy? Like, was that kind of your, like some people like to get into the depths of the 5 a.m., you know? And like just the like, how weird can I get you? No, the weirdest times for me were the days. Because I was, I mean, that feeling of, you know when you haven't slept and the whole world has? Just the way that warmth you feel in your bones. you're going into Starbucks or like man like just running an errand and you're like does everyone know? Can everyone tell? There's just something kind of like shinier about us you know like just something like sleeker we're just a faster animal cause like we didn't just lay down for 8 hours Oh that's true you are more alert huh?

2:17:17Oh you're like an alley cat like an alley cat Yeah and you're like a fucking very But things also become far more complicated. Right. Oh, I would overthink things so much. Overthink everything. You're like a ghost. You're like a fast fucking, like a Tesla ghost. And you're like, these clothes don't look like someone put them on this morning. These look like yesterday clothes. Yeah. Not even that they're wrinkled. Not even anything. You just have an air about you that says, I did not just rest. Yeah. But I think no one can tell. If you're still gacked up enough to converse. person yeah fuck i would be so scared dude i would walk yeah my depth perception would feel weird yeah it's a lot of like cat you know cars everything's coming yeah everything's coming fast yeah oh god dude they're a disaster how yeah drugs are a disaster and that's a nice thing to not have to worry about anymore isn't it oh my god yeah that is not i'm not in a crisis all the time Yeah.

2:18:22Did you end up getting help? Like, did you go to recovery after that? Did you go to 12-step or you just kind of went to? I was in two rehabs. I was in sober living. I did 12-step, but you know. Was sober living pretty cool? Sober living was for a couple months after rehab. I can't imagine going from rehab to living on my own. Yeah. That would have been. No, I really needed as many training wheels as possible. Wow. So you really went through it all. Yeah. I mean, no, I mean, I mean, through it all. I mean, not like you, you went through the things that people go through. Yeah. To get better. That was a moment where I really needed to get as like textbook as possible.

2:19:15Right. Because I would have told you like, okay, I can go live on my own now. I've just been in, I've been in this place for two months and I'm clean. But it's like, you're clean because you've been in rehab. Right. But I would have thought like, I actually, I had a lot of good, and I had a lot of great moments in treatment, really did. Had great counselor and great people. But like the actual reason that I wasn't on drugs was because I was in central Pennsylvania living in a hospital. Yeah. You know. Was it nice out there? Was it pretty? It was a winter. It was a little desolate. But sometimes it was quite, sometimes it was quite beautiful.

2:20:00Did they have any horses or anything like that? No. I wish we had had some of that, you know, getting to put a shoe on a horse or whatever they have drug addicts do. them crazy yeah like you're petting him like okay i have a joke in this special about i feel so bad for that horse because it thinks it's gonna win the kentucky derby but then it's just drug addicts being like okay all right petting your strong leg gives me confidence i remember seeing this whenever i saw your set um john mulaney thanks so much theo vaughn thanks for having me dude it's awesome man it was great to talk to you yeah you too man i uh really admire you and your ability dude and i really admire you man it's it's uh very nice to have a conversation with you same man and you're dude when you get on stage man it is i want to know what you are gonna do and say same 100 i want you to know that just as a i am excited that you're up there thanks man i'm excited when you're up there yeah thanks sean i envy what you have man it's amazing you too man and uh yeah Check out the new special.

2:21:07April 25th. April 25th. And we'll post about it. I'll put a post up on my social media too, man, to make sure. Thank you, man. Not that you don't already have your own humongous audience. I'll take yours too. Okay. Awesome. We'll be happy to share. Thank you, dear. Now I'm just floating on the breeze And I feel I'm falling like these leaves I must be cornerstone Oh, but when I reach that ground I'll share this peace of mind I found I can feel it in my bones But it's gonna take a little time