0
SPEAKER_01
This show is sponsored by BetterHelp.
0
SPEAKER_01
Look at how fast, we re almost halfway through the year.
0
SPEAKER_01
Crazy, yeah.
0
SPEAKER_01
Are you proud of what you ve done in 2024 so far?
0
SPEAKER_02
I mean, you always want to do more, right?
0
SPEAKER_02
Life goes so fast, David.
0
SPEAKER_02
It s important to take a moment to celebrate your wins, make adjustments for the rest of the year.
0
SPEAKER_02
Therapy can help you take stock of your progress and set achievable goals for the next six months.
0
SPEAKER_01
Listen, therapy is the way to go.
0
SPEAKER_01
I did it for a while.
0
SPEAKER_01
And I think the thing that slowed me down was what they, is driving to Santa Monica in traffic once or twice a week.
0
SPEAKER_01
This is online.
0
SPEAKER_01
It s a great idea.
0
SPEAKER_01
Very convenient.
0
SPEAKER_01
It helps you.
0
SPEAKER_01
You ve got coping skills, how to set boundaries.
0
SPEAKER_01
I mean, there s so many things you can do here to be a better version of yourself.
0
SPEAKER_01
You can probably always sharpen it.
0
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, I mean, I had a therapist in Portland and I would commute and that was a pain.
0
SPEAKER_01
That s a long drive.
0
SPEAKER_02
I know it was 1300 miles one way, but you know, it s good therapist.
0
SPEAKER_02
But yeah, this one you can mix and match and your thoughts kind of control you and you want to master them.
0
SPEAKER_02
And when you talk to someone else, they re able to kind of discern it out.
0
SPEAKER_02
So if you re thinking of starting to give therapy a try, give BetterHelp a try.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, suited to your schedule.
0
SPEAKER_01
You fill out a questionnaire, get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapist if you want to for any reason, no charge.
0
SPEAKER_01
Take a moment, visit betterhelp.com slash FOTW today.
0
SPEAKER_01
Get 10% off your first month.
0
SPEAKER_02
That s betterhelp, H-E-L-P.com slash F-O-T-W.
0
SPEAKER_01
I m going to tell you first about this lady breakfast.
0
SPEAKER_01
I want to hear this.
0
SPEAKER_01
This is what we should be doing.
0
SPEAKER_01
More interesting.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
0
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
0
SPEAKER_01
Lady with breakfast.
0
SPEAKER_01
I m at breakfast and I sit like this sometimes.
0
SPEAKER_01
I actually turn around like a cat.
0
SPEAKER_01
You re sitting on your haunches.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, like this.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, got it.
0
SPEAKER_01
And then it s because my neck s bad.
0
SPEAKER_01
Anyway, I order my food and she s sitting over here and then, uh,
0
SPEAKER_01
The whole breakfast goes fine.
0
SPEAKER_01
And then when I leave, we re leaving at the same time and I almost slipped by the crosswalk.
0
SPEAKER_01
So I go, I almost wiped out.
0
SPEAKER_01
You were supposed to save me because she s just, I was talking to a total stranger.
0
SPEAKER_01
But I slid almost into the street and I thought she might grab me by the scruff and save me.
0
SPEAKER_01
She couldn t care less.
0
SPEAKER_01
And she goes, oh, why do you sit like that?
0
SPEAKER_01
Okay, personal question.
0
SPEAKER_01
I go, oh, in there, yeah.
0
SPEAKER_01
Well, my neck gives me trouble, so I don t.
0
SPEAKER_01
And she goes, oh, I m a massage therapist.
0
SPEAKER_01
I go, yeah, so I just don t sit like that.
0
SPEAKER_01
Anyway, nice to meet you.
0
SPEAKER_01
I didn t bite.
0
SPEAKER_01
She wanted me to go, oh my God.
0
SPEAKER_02
She said she s a physical therapist.
0
SPEAKER_01
No, massage therapist.
0
SPEAKER_01
Oh, massage therapist, I see.
0
SPEAKER_01
And she wanted me to go, oh, wow, this is kismet.
0
SPEAKER_01
It s like Reese s, you put your chocolate, my peanut butter.
0
SPEAKER_01
I go, oh, cool.
0
SPEAKER_01
Anyway, so I just sit, sometimes I sit normal.
0
SPEAKER_01
Anyway, oh, light screen.
0
SPEAKER_01
And then we get to the car and I feel guilty.
0
SPEAKER_01
So when we walk, when I m getting in my car, she walks by and I go, it s tougher to sit like that in here.
0
SPEAKER_01
She just kept walking.
0
SPEAKER_02
I went back to the same restaurant the next day.
0
SPEAKER_02
I said, how was yesterday?
0
SPEAKER_02
She goes, I had a haunch sitter.
0
SPEAKER_02
Tried to help him, but he walked away.
0
SPEAKER_02
I had some dope.
0
SPEAKER_02
I had a haunch sitter.
0
SPEAKER_02
You get haunch sitters in here and I know how to help them, but they just don t pay attention.
0
SPEAKER_01
When people go, I think I saw- But she said you were a big tipper.
0
SPEAKER_01
If they go, Spade, I saw him the other night.
0
SPEAKER_01
And they go, oh, I don t think it was him.
0
SPEAKER_01
And they go, does he sit on his knees?
0
SPEAKER_01
And I go, hmm.
0
SPEAKER_01
But that s actually pretty good you can sit on your knees.
0
SPEAKER_02
It means your knees are in pretty good shape.
0
SPEAKER_01
She did say, does it hurt your knees?
0
SPEAKER_01
And I go, no, the knees is the only thing that works.
0
SPEAKER_01
What does that mean?
0
SPEAKER_01
Your knee is starting to go.
0
SPEAKER_01
All right, we don t have to advertise the world.
0
SPEAKER_01
So our guest today is- Nanjani is actually an easy name for me.
0
SPEAKER_01
He s done a lot.
0
SPEAKER_01
Obviously, this Big Sick movie, which was a huge- Not underground hit, what would you say?
0
SPEAKER_01
It was sort of a big hit.
0
SPEAKER_02
Well, it s kind of an indie hit, but it got a huge splash.
0
SPEAKER_02
He won the Academy Award.
0
SPEAKER_02
He was nominated for an Academy Award for best original screenplay.
0
SPEAKER_02
He gives a lot of kudos to Judd Apatow, his producer.
0
SPEAKER_02
And he s from Pakistan, and I didn t know that he left Pakistan at 18, and then he moves to America, and the story of his journey is remarkable, and how he became this huge star in America.
0
SPEAKER_02
He s a brilliant stand-up, a really smart writer.
0
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, sharp writer.
0
SPEAKER_02
Silicon Valley.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it was great.
0
SPEAKER_01
Talk all about that.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I m working with Mike Judge.
0
SPEAKER_01
The stand-up specials.
0
SPEAKER_01
Specials, and then how he got Pomp You Up for the movie called?
0
SPEAKER_02
The Eternals.
0
SPEAKER_02
The Eternals.
0
SPEAKER_02
I told you.
0
SPEAKER_02
He just decided to do that, and we talk about that, and we get into how it affected his relationship with his wife.
0
SPEAKER_02
It s a very interesting podcast, David.
0
SPEAKER_01
I ve never had the experience of having a girl say, oh, do you work out?
0
SPEAKER_01
Nothing like that.
0
SPEAKER_01
Not your muscles are too big, not anything s too big.
0
SPEAKER_01
It s just like, hey man, you re what s known as a shoulder shrugger.
0
SPEAKER_01
So let s just get it over with and I can t.
0
SPEAKER_02
Well, sometimes it s hard because, you know, the shirt comes off and I knew a guy once who s man about town with the shirt came off and then the young lady with him kind of said, oh, look, a tummy and kind of wiggled his belly.
0
SPEAKER_02
Oh, I think I ve heard that.
0
SPEAKER_01
You don t look fat, you just have a gut.
0
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
0
SPEAKER_02
You re just soft like me.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
0
SPEAKER_01
When I look at you, it s like looking in a mirror.
0
SPEAKER_01
That s what girls say to me.
0
SPEAKER_01
I hope I don t weigh more than you.
0
SPEAKER_01
These are all not compliments.
0
SPEAKER_01
I know.
0
SPEAKER_02
You love it, though, when they pick you up, kind of bridle going across the threshold thing.
0
SPEAKER_01
When we walk into Chili s and they go, let me just carry you in.
0
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
0
SPEAKER_02
I ve seen you.
0
SPEAKER_02
Sometimes you re riding on their shoulders and you re running around the parking lot.
0
SPEAKER_02
Mostly at concerts.
0
SPEAKER_01
Okay, this is it.
0
SPEAKER_01
Craig s going, we can t use this.
0
SPEAKER_01
Say his name, ready?
0
SPEAKER_01
Here we go.
0
SPEAKER_01
And now you re listening to... Kamail Nanjani is our guest, David.
0
SPEAKER_01
Okay, here he is, that guy.
0
SPEAKER_01
You know, there s so many negatives that we could go into.
0
SPEAKER_02
Well, I don t want to spread rumors.
0
SPEAKER_02
Oh my God.
0
SPEAKER_00
Guys, this is so awkward.
0
SPEAKER_00
I ve been here for the whole time.
0
SPEAKER_01
I ve been here for the whole time.
0
SPEAKER_00
Do you remember when we met?
0
SPEAKER_00
Of course I remember when we met.
0
SPEAKER_00
What are you talking about?
0
SPEAKER_00
I know.
0
SPEAKER_00
Check your diary.
0
SPEAKER_00
Why do you remember, why do you remember when we met?
0
SPEAKER_02
I was kind of, that was a blur for me at Dan Harmon s podcast.
0
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
0
SPEAKER_02
At the comics show.
0
SPEAKER_02
I didn t even know what I was doing.
0
SPEAKER_02
I was invited to go there and watch.
0
SPEAKER_02
And then they re like, Hey, so I met you and a few others, but I was reminded by my son yesterday telling him I was going to interview you with David.
0
SPEAKER_02
And he goes, uh, podcast with you conversation.
0
SPEAKER_02
Uh, he goes, you ve met him.
0
SPEAKER_02
Oh yeah, that s right.
0
SPEAKER_02
I remember meeting your son.
0
SPEAKER_02
Wow.
0
SPEAKER_02
Did was he so much nicer person than you?
0
SPEAKER_02
Was it a pleasant exchange?
0
SPEAKER_00
It was very pleasant.
0
SPEAKER_00
You are very, very nice.
0
SPEAKER_00
Obviously, I ve been a fan of yours for a long time and you were very, very funny on the podcast and you were very, very nice.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I told everyone I know, hey, Dinakar is actually very, very nice.
0
SPEAKER_02
Actually, are we considered nice guys?
0
SPEAKER_02
I mean, David, David is a nice guy, but there s some people that I don t think they think anymore.
0
SPEAKER_02
You re snarky.
0
SPEAKER_02
You know, they for sure do.
0
SPEAKER_02
They still remember that.
0
SPEAKER_02
But he s a nice guy.
0
SPEAKER_01
Go ahead.
0
SPEAKER_01
Let let him talk.
0
SPEAKER_01
Let s hear what he has to say about me.
0
SPEAKER_00
Well, I want to say outside of since I m outside your circles.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
0
SPEAKER_00
Your guy s reputation as human beings is that Dana is a nice guy.
0
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
0
SPEAKER_01
Anyway, we wanted to talk to you today about... I like this little slide.
0
SPEAKER_01
I have to say, you are known as a nice guy because... well, Dana always was, but no one knows the real Dana.
0
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, but I m passive-aggressive.
0
SPEAKER_02
I have a lot of anger.
0
SPEAKER_02
Don t you?
0
SPEAKER_01
Oh, I do, yeah.
0
SPEAKER_01
I do, because we were both crazy families and I was not that tall.
0
SPEAKER_01
I ll never say the other word.
0
SPEAKER_01
I was not that tall and I was picked on, they called me shrimp cocktail my whole life.
0
SPEAKER_01
And so, shrimp cocktail?
0
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, shrimp cocktail.
0
SPEAKER_02
I was vertically challenged, absolutely.
0
SPEAKER_02
Oh, it just brings back triggering things.
0
SPEAKER_02
Camille, were you, were you, how big were you like when you were 12?
0
SPEAKER_00
I tell you, this is great.
0
SPEAKER_00
By the way, I want to say, David, you re also considered a very nice guy.
0
SPEAKER_00
I was just joking.
0
SPEAKER_00
OK, thank you.
0
SPEAKER_00
Wonderful reputations among, you know, people outside your circle.
0
SPEAKER_00
I was two things to that one.
0
SPEAKER_00
I m like five, nine and a half.
0
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
0
SPEAKER_00
Pakistan, where the average height is much shorter.
0
SPEAKER_00
I was one of the tall people.
0
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah.
0
SPEAKER_00
OK.
0
SPEAKER_00
Then I moved to America and it was like I lost three inches.
0
SPEAKER_00
Suddenly.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
0
SPEAKER_00
I remember I went to school and I got there early for international student, like college international student orientation.
0
SPEAKER_00
And so it was us and the football team.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I remember standing in line behind the.
0
SPEAKER_01
Bad scene.
0
SPEAKER_00
Bad scene.
0
SPEAKER_00
The game has changed.
0
SPEAKER_01
Well, my dad was stationed in Japan and he s
1
SPEAKER_00
He didn t want to come back because he said he was 5 7 and a monster and that s the way to go.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he said we should all pack up and go back to Japan.
1
SPEAKER_00
He knew I was a fucking pipsqueak and I was lighting up like, are you just joking?
1
SPEAKER_00
Are we going to go somewhere where I ll seem tall?
1
SPEAKER_02
Shrimp cocktail.
1
SPEAKER_02
I don t agree with that.
1
SPEAKER_02
Shrimp cocktail.
1
SPEAKER_01
That was the worst and it was real.
1
SPEAKER_01
Hey.
1
SPEAKER_00
Go ahead, come on.
1
SPEAKER_01
Well, I ll tell you what mine was.
1
SPEAKER_01
I was very, very small.
1
SPEAKER_01
Like I had very, they called me chicken shoulders.
1
SPEAKER_01
I had- Weird.
1
SPEAKER_01
Well, what would have been your, give us a weight.
1
SPEAKER_02
So you re 5 9 in high school.
1
SPEAKER_02
And what would be your lightest weight?
1
SPEAKER_02
Were you like 130 or something or 140?
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, probably 130, maybe 120.
1
SPEAKER_01
I was very, very, I wasn t,
1
SPEAKER_01
I you know, I had like it was the worst.
1
SPEAKER_01
I had like a potbelly and no meat or else at one twenty five nine.
1
SPEAKER_01
You have a potbelly.
1
SPEAKER_01
It s not the way to go.
1
SPEAKER_01
That s low lean mass, man.
1
SPEAKER_01
I was one twenty five, mostly head, but a very big head and a very tiny body for most of my adolescence.
1
SPEAKER_02
So where s the energy and drive and sort of maybe normal comedian chip on their shoulder or underdog status that created you coming from Pakistan to America and then killing it in America?
1
SPEAKER_02
That takes drive.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
1
SPEAKER_01
So it s a few things.
1
SPEAKER_01
One, very, very tough high school experience.
1
SPEAKER_01
Very, very not cool.
1
SPEAKER_01
You know, this is the thing I had sort of my whole life was like, I m not cool.
1
SPEAKER_01
I m not good looking.
1
SPEAKER_01
I m not good at sports, but I m smart.
1
SPEAKER_01
So I knew I was smart.
1
SPEAKER_01
So my all my drive.
1
SPEAKER_00
That s the name of my book, that whole thing.
1
SPEAKER_02
I knew I knew Kamal was smart is the name of my book.
1
SPEAKER_00
No, I was, The Pipsqueak Diaries is really my book, but I hear what you re saying.
1
SPEAKER_00
So you were all these things, and were you picked on at all, or was that part of it, or was that all of it, what you re saying?
1
SPEAKER_01
So I switched schools my last two years of schooling.
1
SPEAKER_01
So up until then, I was fine.
1
SPEAKER_01
I was always a nerd.
1
SPEAKER_01
I kind of got along with everybody.
1
SPEAKER_01
I wasn t popular by any means, but nobody picked on me.
1
SPEAKER_01
Even the bad kids were like kind of cool to me.
1
SPEAKER_01
And then the last two years I went to a new high school and suddenly I became the guy that was picked on.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yuck.
1
SPEAKER_01
Because I think because I had a crush on a girl that like a cool guy had a crush on.
1
SPEAKER_00
Oops.
1
SPEAKER_01
And it sort of came out and it just became a nightmare.
1
SPEAKER_01
All I wanted to do was be invisible.
1
SPEAKER_01
and all I was was completely picked on.
1
SPEAKER_01
I had a friend of mine who was like, you know when you first transfer to a new school, you re sort of like, oh, nobody here knows that I m playing.
1
SPEAKER_02
Oh, it s terrifying.
1
SPEAKER_02
Who are you gonna have lunch with?
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but I was also like, oh, I can be cool at this school.
1
SPEAKER_00
Oh, you got a new start.
1
SPEAKER_01
Oh, a fresh start.
1
SPEAKER_00
They don t know, exactly.
1
SPEAKER_00
They don t know.
1
SPEAKER_01
They don t know.
1
SPEAKER_01
And so I went in, I sort of had developed a new cool walk.
1
SPEAKER_01
I was like, they re not gonna know.
1
SPEAKER_01
Smart.
1
SPEAKER_02
Was it bouncy on the heels?
1
SPEAKER_02
Can you paint a picture of what a cool walk is?
1
SPEAKER_01
Is it sort of strutting?
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I don t care.
1
SPEAKER_01
Walking into every room dick first, you know?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
You know, I needed a PR person because when I would have hired one because I here s my thing and I ll let you talk in a minute.
1
SPEAKER_01
But could you afford five grand a month back back in those days?
1
SPEAKER_00
God dang, it s worse than that now.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s so sickening.
1
SPEAKER_00
Don t even let America know what we do.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s so gross and embarrassing.
1
SPEAKER_01
Let s keep that number.
1
SPEAKER_02
Keep it to yourselves.
1
SPEAKER_02
We ll get into money later because I want to know celebrity net worth.
1
SPEAKER_02
I look up people and I want to see what you got.
1
SPEAKER_00
Dana, I was a little skateboarder in Arizona.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was smart like this guy and
1
SPEAKER_00
and I was more pipsqueak, but I had white hair.
1
SPEAKER_00
I had some superpowers.
1
SPEAKER_00
We ll get to the Eternals in a minute.
1
SPEAKER_00
I had some superpowers because I had long, white, blonde hair, not extensions, they were real.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then I had- Thick, thick hair.
1
SPEAKER_00
I had cool shorts.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was tan back then.
1
SPEAKER_00
Obviously that s gone away.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I had two broken arms when I got to school from skateboarding in empty pools.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I had all this cool stuff.
1
SPEAKER_02
We had a double cast on.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, double splints.
1
SPEAKER_02
Double splints.
1
SPEAKER_00
My stepdad wouldn t give me a cast because he goes, let s wait and see.
1
SPEAKER_00
I go, they re both broken.
1
SPEAKER_00
What are we waiting for?
1
SPEAKER_00
He was a little, he was drunk.
1
SPEAKER_00
So he was a doctor also.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I went to school when I was a nerd at my school.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was like a math guy and a spelling bee guy and a chess guy and no one cared about me.
1
SPEAKER_00
I get to my high school and like he s saying,
1
SPEAKER_00
new PR campaign because my brother was cool and all his cheerleader friends liked me and then the word spread like wildfire Spade s cool and everyone s a bicycle is like oh wait no he s not no he s not it was too late it was five schools merged and mine was a minority they couldn t get the word out and was getting stomped on and then I was like I d walk by and go hey old friends um
1
SPEAKER_00
How s math going in the flashcards, nerds?
1
SPEAKER_00
Anyway, new friends, let s go to the assembly.
1
SPEAKER_01
And so I transitioned to a cool group.
1
SPEAKER_00
You pulled off something that s almost impossible.
1
SPEAKER_00
Almost.
1
SPEAKER_00
And believe me, everyone was baffled.
1
SPEAKER_00
Teachers, principals.
1
SPEAKER_02
Nobody.
1
SPEAKER_02
None of my friends had sex.
1
SPEAKER_02
Nobody.
1
SPEAKER_02
We re on the cross country team and the track team.
1
SPEAKER_01
Nobody had sex.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
Most of mine still haven t.
1
SPEAKER_02
And they would be in their mid forties.
1
SPEAKER_02
It s like calling Steve Carell.
1
SPEAKER_00
You re on Facebook with him going, you guys, I m just lucky I m an international star now or I d be in your same boat.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, exactly.
1
SPEAKER_01
All you have to do.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that s one big jump you got to make.
1
SPEAKER_01
Become kind of famous.
1
SPEAKER_01
So you, Spade, you must have been funny then already, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, it was back when the great looks came later.
1
SPEAKER_00
Back when you had to just mumble jokes and just try to sneak things in because no one s really listening and I don t really want to try to tell a joke and I m not ready.
1
SPEAKER_00
So it was a lot of throwaways and things and then
1
SPEAKER_00
It got because you have to get some girls attention.
1
SPEAKER_00
You have to get guys attention.
1
SPEAKER_00
No one is rushing to hang out.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so that s just like what a lot of us do.
1
SPEAKER_00
You just sort of work on that part because you don t have the ease of just being good looking guy or girl where everything comes to you and you don t need to work on that at all.
1
SPEAKER_01
So, but, but then you started at some point as you became cooler, you were probably known as like the funny guy.
1
SPEAKER_01
At some point people started listening.
1
SPEAKER_00
At some point we did talent shows and I would try old SNL sketches and try to write stuff with my buddies only to get it only because I wasn t on football.
1
SPEAKER_00
I wasn t on track.
1
SPEAKER_00
I wasn t doing anything cool or fun.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so we had two days of talent show.
1
SPEAKER_01
You weren t on the football team.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was not on any of the things.
1
SPEAKER_00
I did try out and I got fucking smeared.
1
SPEAKER_00
There used to be an old term for that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then the coach pulled me aside like Lucas, that old movie, and he said, I don t think this is for you, bud.
1
SPEAKER_02
Hey man, I was on D basketball.
1
SPEAKER_02
You guys are too young for that.
1
SPEAKER_02
There was varsity, junior varsity, soft frosh, and then D. And I m not kidding, our center who controlled the paint was 5 3 .
1
SPEAKER_02
Not a joke.
1
SPEAKER_00
Controlled the paint.
1
SPEAKER_02
He controlled the paint at 5 3 .
1
SPEAKER_02
Controlled the paint.
1
SPEAKER_00
How high was the basket?
1
SPEAKER_02
The basket was 10 and it was a Herculean effort to hit the rim.
1
SPEAKER_01
You guys didn t put on like a play school rim?
1
SPEAKER_02
Well at home... Nerf.
1
SPEAKER_02
At home, we had a nine-foot rim, and I d practice in the driveway, thought I was really good, thought I was really cool, and then I get to the real thing, it s a foot higher.
1
SPEAKER_02
Shit.
1
SPEAKER_02
I was fucked, man.
1
SPEAKER_02
What about your experience in high school, Kamil?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, we have to talk to him a little bit.
1
SPEAKER_02
A little bit, but I like hearing that, David.
1
SPEAKER_02
I m sort of co-hosting today.
1
SPEAKER_02
What was your experience?
1
SPEAKER_02
When did you go, I think I m funny?
1
SPEAKER_01
Well, I wanna hear yours, Dana.
1
SPEAKER_01
So all of high school, I was,
1
SPEAKER_01
I really do.
1
SPEAKER_01
All of high school, I was basically it was really bad.
1
SPEAKER_01
There was one.
1
SPEAKER_01
So when I first got there, I thought I could be cool.
1
SPEAKER_01
And my big mistake was right in the beginning, I started talking to some of the cool kids and they thought I was cool.
1
SPEAKER_01
And then at some point very early on, week three, they figured out I wasn t cool.
1
SPEAKER_01
I don t know what happened.
1
SPEAKER_01
I think what data did they get?
1
SPEAKER_01
Just something just because you can t hide it forever.
1
SPEAKER_01
You can t hide it.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I think my previous APB out or something being like, hey, just so you know, this guy is just going to be something not like a Netflix movie.
1
SPEAKER_02
Hey, you guys are triggering me a little bit.
1
SPEAKER_02
I just want to be honest about the fear I had in high school.
1
SPEAKER_02
And I m getting a little triggered, just a little warning sign.
1
SPEAKER_02
But yeah, just this idea of being cool.
1
SPEAKER_02
And do people like me?
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I got contact lenses.
1
SPEAKER_01
So I didn t have glasses.
1
SPEAKER_01
So I don t know how they found out, but they found out.
1
SPEAKER_01
So now the problem was they all know my name.
1
SPEAKER_01
And they know I m very lame.
1
SPEAKER_01
One of my guy, one of my friends who was sort of a cool friend, he had become cool, you know, because he had become like hot.
2
SPEAKER_01
Not over a summer.
2
SPEAKER_01
So he was a nerd, came back after a summer, suddenly he was very handsome.
2
SPEAKER_01
He got cool.
2
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s very rare.
2
SPEAKER_01
I would help him with math homework.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so he knew where I lived.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then one day he took all the other cool kids, brought them over to my house and they threw eggs at my house.
2
SPEAKER_03
Wait.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_03
I thought he was going to come over and give you a party.
2
SPEAKER_01
What a turncoat.
2
SPEAKER_01
Oh my God.
2
SPEAKER_01
He used that to gain permanent membership into the cool crowd.
2
SPEAKER_01
Oh, that, you know, that would do it though.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it did.
2
SPEAKER_01
That really helped him out.
2
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know that big nerd who s with the weird walk?
2
SPEAKER_01
I know where he lives.
2
SPEAKER_03
I got his 20.
2
SPEAKER_02
I probably, David did this.
2
SPEAKER_02
I don t know about you, but I would get an enforcer.
2
SPEAKER_02
His name was Steve Lee.
2
SPEAKER_02
And in fourth grade, I befriended him and he was my guard.
2
SPEAKER_02
And we had a club with one other kid and we call it the great club.
2
SPEAKER_02
And everyone wanted to be in the great club.
2
SPEAKER_02
And they say, how do we get in the great club?
2
SPEAKER_02
We ve got to be great.
2
SPEAKER_02
It was only three of us.
2
SPEAKER_00
Great.
2
SPEAKER_02
Steve Lee would beat up anyone who would attack me.
2
SPEAKER_02
That was my strategy.
2
SPEAKER_02
Cause I was then I was four, four, maybe 68 pounds.
2
SPEAKER_03
How did you manipulate Steve Lee?
2
SPEAKER_02
Well, I don t know.
2
SPEAKER_02
Funniness or whatever.
2
SPEAKER_02
I smoked.
2
SPEAKER_02
I stole cigarettes and smoked.
2
SPEAKER_02
I had fistfights.
2
SPEAKER_02
I shoplifted.
2
SPEAKER_02
I went through all that.
2
SPEAKER_02
But you were, like, actually cool.
2
SPEAKER_02
You know what, here I m gonna ask you guys a question, because I know our listeners are fascinated.
2
SPEAKER_02
You could have a cool fourth grade, fifth grade a little dormant, cool in sixth, and then seventh and eighth a little insecure, and then in high school it was all insecure, because I d never seen, the cheerleaders were like gods.
2
SPEAKER_02
Marianne Silvestri was the most untouchable, stunning teenage girl, and so it was just nervousness at that point.
2
SPEAKER_01
Right, right.
2
SPEAKER_01
Suddenly we re like children.
2
SPEAKER_01
We look the best we ve ever looked in our life.
2
SPEAKER_01
And the force that has kept our species alive for thousands of years is coursing through us.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s so unfair that suddenly this biological need to procreate is given to us when we re like, when we look our worst and feel the worst about
2
SPEAKER_03
You re really putting it politely.
2
SPEAKER_03
It was like boner junction at my, I mean, I was in school and I could not, I couldn t, I couldn t focus on literally anything.
2
SPEAKER_03
I m just like staring.
2
SPEAKER_02
I mean, this is like a standup bit.
2
SPEAKER_02
Did you ever have a thing where the teacher would ask you to go up to the chalkboard and you re already full throttle?
2
SPEAKER_01
We didn t have mixed classes.
2
SPEAKER_01
We had boys and girls classes.
2
SPEAKER_03
So not as many.
2
SPEAKER_01
So that was okay.
2
SPEAKER_03
But you can still daydream and then it s harder to explain.
2
SPEAKER_03
I was just thinking about girls, dudes, you know, chicks, while you re sweating.
2
SPEAKER_02
You can draw stick figure porn with your pencil.
2
SPEAKER_02
Not that I ever did that.
2
SPEAKER_03
What if you had porn like today?
2
SPEAKER_03
What if you were on your phone under your desk and you re just looking at
2
SPEAKER_03
monster, you know, I can t mother, daughter, stepdaughter, whatever would have.
2
SPEAKER_01
Well, that would have been like, it s too much.
2
SPEAKER_01
Getting porn at that age was such a quest.
2
SPEAKER_01
You had to go on like side missions and stuff to be able to worth it.
2
SPEAKER_03
Worth it.
2
SPEAKER_03
Yes.
2
SPEAKER_01
Beagle catalog high school was, I was not, I did not think I was funny all through high school.
2
SPEAKER_01
It wasn t until I got to college in the U S
2
SPEAKER_01
that everybody was suddenly very nice to me and kind to me.
2
SPEAKER_01
And they were sort of interested in me because I was Pakistani and there were really no there was one other Pakistani and you were like E.T.
2
SPEAKER_03
everyone.
2
SPEAKER_02
What was your accent like when you first came over compared to now?
2
SPEAKER_02
Was it you?
2
SPEAKER_02
Could you talk?
2
SPEAKER_02
You could kind of was it heavier or what?
2
SPEAKER_02
Or you always bilingual?
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I always was bilingual, but I had a thicker accent, a thicker Pakistani accent.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so they were really interested and suddenly I was funny.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t know what happened, but I remember at one point talking to a friend of mine and them doing some riff about Aladdin s sword.
2
SPEAKER_01
I don t remember what it was, but her laughing so hard she couldn t speak.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I was like, oh wow, maybe this is what I have.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then people started calling me like, you know, I m this of the group, I m this of the group, and you re the funny one of the group.
2
SPEAKER_03
Ooh, that s interesting.
2
SPEAKER_03
You get a little moniker, so it kind of makes you believe it, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
And suddenly I was like, Oh, I have a personality.
2
SPEAKER_01
I m a person.
2
SPEAKER_01
And my thing, my only thing is that I m funny.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so that became the most important thing in the world was being funny.
2
SPEAKER_03
Because you know what, Dana, where I think I would say you two guys were pretty smart growing up and it is not a panty dropper.
2
SPEAKER_03
Like when you re growing up,
2
SPEAKER_03
Funny that s because he was smart obviously this dude s smart, and it wasn t really turning heads to be smart Especially probably people are smarter Pakistan than over here There was always someone smarter, and oh yeah, it wasn t social currency.
2
SPEAKER_03
Yeah, and then you get to dumb America But even from Pakistan you talk funny.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you I
2
SPEAKER_00
Knowing how to speak and understand a new language can be an invaluable tool when traveling, meeting new friends, or just even to master a new skill.
2
SPEAKER_00
But it s not always simple when you re bogged down by textbooks and structure classes.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s why so many people trust Rosetta Stone.
2
SPEAKER_00
Rosetta Stone is the most trusted language learning program available on desktop or as an app.
2
SPEAKER_00
It truly immerses you in the language you want to learn, like Spanish, French, Italian, Chinese, and more.
2
SPEAKER_00
You won t just be studying English translations.
2
SPEAKER_00
The Rosetta Stone intuitive process
2
SPEAKER_00
helps you pick up a language naturally, first with words, then phrases, then sentences.
2
SPEAKER_00
Don t put off learning that language.
2
SPEAKER_00
There s no better time than right now to get started.
2
SPEAKER_00
For a very limited time, listeners can get Rosetta Stone s lifetime membership for 50% off.
2
SPEAKER_00
Visit rosettastone.com slash rs10.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s 50% off unlimited access to 25 language courses for the rest of your life.
2
SPEAKER_00
Redeem your 50% off at rosettastone.com slash rs10 today.
2
SPEAKER_03
Did you think when you were over there, like, was anyone doing stand-up?
2
SPEAKER_03
I mean, this has got to be beyond wildest dreams.
2
SPEAKER_03
Go to America, then be a stand-up, and then be funny enough to do it, and then jump to millionaire, highest tax bracket.
2
SPEAKER_03
Go.
2
SPEAKER_01
I won t say that I m where you guys are.
2
SPEAKER_02
Well can I have an addendum question that s related to David?
2
SPEAKER_02
So you re growing up at 8 to 18, you ve got impressions of America, you re watching America on TV, and then you come to America and you do everything David just said, but what was the difference between your impressions of America
2
SPEAKER_02
And when you got here, because you saw it through television, right?
2
SPEAKER_02
Stuff like that.
2
SPEAKER_01
Television and movies.
2
SPEAKER_01
Big fan of movies and TV.
2
SPEAKER_01
Really, you know, I was a very quiet, shy kid, so I spent most of my time watching movies, watching TV, playing video games.
2
SPEAKER_01
So my impression of America was what you project to the rest of the world, which is for the most part, New York and L.A.
2
SPEAKER_01
When I moved to America, I moved to Iowa.
2
SPEAKER_02
Wait, no, that s even funnier.
2
SPEAKER_02
Oh, OK.
2
SPEAKER_02
A whole different America.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
When I landed, I was like, wait, where are all the buildings?
2
SPEAKER_01
What happened?
2
SPEAKER_01
Why are there pigs everywhere?
2
SPEAKER_03
So weird.
2
SPEAKER_03
I was beautiful, by the way, but of all places.
2
SPEAKER_01
Beautiful.
2
SPEAKER_01
Now looking back, I m very happy I went to a place like Iowa where I was novel and it wasn t so packed, it wasn t overwhelming.
2
SPEAKER_01
I moved to a town of 9,000 people in the middle of Iowa.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s a good middle step.
2
SPEAKER_01
It is.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so it helped me sort of, you know, acclimate to speaking English all the time and shaking hands with girls and all that kind of stuff.
2
SPEAKER_01
And just how to talk to girls.
2
SPEAKER_01
I didn t know how to talk to girls, not just even, you know, I don t mean romantically.
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, just talking to a girl was nerve wracking in the beginning.
2
SPEAKER_01
So, so it was, America was very, very different for me.
2
SPEAKER_01
In Pakistan, to answer your question, Spade,
2
SPEAKER_01
There was not stand-up the way we have it here.
2
SPEAKER_01
Now they do.
2
SPEAKER_01
India actually has a huge stand-up scene in English.
2
SPEAKER_01
There were mostly people, there was one stand-up I really loved and he did impressions and he was very, very good.
2
SPEAKER_01
His name was Moin Akhtar.
2
SPEAKER_01
He has since passed away.
2
SPEAKER_03
But I follow him on Instagram.
2
SPEAKER_01
I would not.
2
SPEAKER_01
I would not say I was a fan of comedy or stand up comedy until I got to college.
2
SPEAKER_01
And that s all right.
2
SPEAKER_02
But what what impressions would that gentleman do?
2
SPEAKER_02
You just yeah.
2
SPEAKER_02
Pakistani impressionist.
2
SPEAKER_02
Would he do an American?
2
SPEAKER_01
No, no Pakistani celebrities.
2
SPEAKER_01
So those celebrities.
2
SPEAKER_01
OK.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like a Pakistani cricketer and stuff like that.
2
SPEAKER_01
Pakistani cricketer.
2
SPEAKER_03
Hilarious.
2
SPEAKER_03
How funny.
2
SPEAKER_03
Did you see that and think.
2
SPEAKER_03
The way I used to watch like Johnny Carson and see the comedians and you just go, it s so fun, but it seems too far-fetched for you to do it, but it s just fun to watch, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Oh, it was impossible thinking that I could be in the biz.
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I honestly still kind of can t believe it.
2
SPEAKER_01
Cause for me, it s been, you know, a million tiny little steps to it and your goals change as you get more opportunities.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, there wasn t a point where I was like, someday I want to be on a podcast with David Spade and Dinah Carvey.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know,
3
SPEAKER_00
I couldn t have imagined that.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so, no, being in this business was really, really not even a dream I dared to dream.
3
SPEAKER_02
I think gradual fame is a kind of a gift.
3
SPEAKER_02
It s your only chance of coming out somewhat sane.
3
SPEAKER_00
You guys both didn t have that.
3
SPEAKER_00
You guys became famous overnight.
3
SPEAKER_02
It took me probably longer than Dana.
3
SPEAKER_01
10 years for me from my first set to getting on SNL.
3
SPEAKER_00
For me, getting known has been tiny steps.
3
SPEAKER_00
I didn t go from open mics to then suddenly doing something that everybody sees.
3
SPEAKER_00
I had like small parts and things, slightly bigger parts and things, slightly bigger parts and smaller things.
3
SPEAKER_00
So my becoming known has been like a lot of tiny steps for you, Dana, I assume when you were doing standup, you weren t really famous.
3
SPEAKER_00
And then suddenly you end up on SNL and now there s a day where you become famous.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
3
SPEAKER_01
Pretty, pretty quickly because I, I, you know, it was a smaller cast and I had a couple of good characters the first year or so.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
It, uh, a really bizarre thing that s happened to all of us.
3
SPEAKER_01
When you first, first time someone wants your autograph back then that wasn t pictures.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s like, wow, you know who I am.
3
SPEAKER_02
I miss those days.
3
SPEAKER_00
Uh, yeah, I was at a mall with my mom recently and someone asked for a selfie and my mom laughed so hard she couldn t speak.
3
SPEAKER_00
She was like, why do they want yourself?
3
SPEAKER_02
I mean, a picture of you two together.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re a star or what?
3
SPEAKER_00
It doesn t it doesn t make any sense to her.
3
SPEAKER_00
So, yeah, Dana, you and Spade, you had a similar thing, I assume, where you went from not being known to being very known overnight.
3
SPEAKER_02
Well, even when I got on SNL, it wasn t the Dana overnight success.
3
SPEAKER_02
Dana hit hard starting in the cold opening.
3
SPEAKER_01
Smaller cast.
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, smaller cast.
3
SPEAKER_02
I got stand up and then I was sort of known around town in Arizona and Scottsdale.
3
SPEAKER_02
And that was a sort of fame, you know, that was a something.
3
SPEAKER_02
Of course.
3
SPEAKER_02
And that s probably what you did.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then going and getting on like,
3
SPEAKER_02
at the improv in LA that was, I was in LA, which counts as being famous in Arizona because someone actually broke out and said- Oh, I know.
3
SPEAKER_02
It s like saying, I m gonna go to the US.
3
SPEAKER_02
If you actually do do that, you re already way ahead of the game.
3
SPEAKER_01
If you re called for civilians outside LA and you re a comedy store regular or an improv regular, you are kind of a celebrity back home.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I mean, I moved from Chicago, I was in Chicago and my comedian friends would move to LA in my head just by moving to LA, they were famous.
3
SPEAKER_02
Exactly, just that part, Dana, forget getting on.
3
SPEAKER_02
They don t know that I m eating, you know, I go to Ralph s and I try to buy one of those little rotisserie chickens and gnaw on it in the alley.
3
SPEAKER_02
They don t know that it s like the walking dead, but I get two spots a week and I make $20 a spot or something and that s it.
3
SPEAKER_02
So I got to figure out a way to live.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then I got- You were doing the improv.
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
Then I get then I do a little bit of roadwork.
3
SPEAKER_02
Then I got an HBO Young Comedian special.
3
SPEAKER_02
That was a big jump because it was on HBO.
3
SPEAKER_00
So can I ask you, when you were doing these spots in L.A.
3
SPEAKER_00
at the improv, were you like crushing?
3
SPEAKER_02
No, no, I just, I look back and the lineups were like Leno, Paul Reiser, Kevin Nealon, Seinfeld.
3
SPEAKER_02
They were already really, they were big headliners, but that s the lineup.
3
SPEAKER_02
I mean, I couldn t believe I go, these are the guys I ve seen on Johnny Carson and they re all in one spot.
3
SPEAKER_02
And they re going, everyone s doing 20.
3
SPEAKER_02
And they said, why don t you, they passed me.
3
SPEAKER_02
Comedy store said no, but improv passed me just because I was 20.
3
SPEAKER_02
I looked 15 and I had long blonde hair.
3
SPEAKER_02
And they said, looking back, they just didn t have one of me.
3
SPEAKER_02
You know, I didn t look like I m from New York.
3
SPEAKER_02
I didn t look like.
3
SPEAKER_02
I wasn t that tall.
3
SPEAKER_02
I just didn t look like a comedian.
3
SPEAKER_02
So they said, why don t you host or do a set like at midnight?
3
SPEAKER_02
And that was it.
3
SPEAKER_02
And it s just to get out there and get warmed up and watch people.
3
SPEAKER_02
So gradual fame.
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
I mean, I want to get back to you, but I just got, then I got a movie.
3
SPEAKER_02
I had a small part and that was a big deal.
3
SPEAKER_02
What movie was that?
3
SPEAKER_02
Oh, it was a police Academy four, which was as a skateboarding guy as a skateboarder.
3
SPEAKER_02
And the reason, the reason I got that, I did not know how to act and I was blowing auditions.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then they said, I got there and they said, do you have the script?
3
SPEAKER_02
I said, oh, they didn t send it.
3
SPEAKER_02
And they go, oh shoot, they were supposed to.
3
SPEAKER_02
We don t have one here.
3
SPEAKER_02
uh but you re already here um should he go and they go well do you just if you were a skateboarder and you and the cops are coming around can you just say some stuff aren t you a comedian and i just start making up shit and they go yeah let s use him that s and if i would have had a script i wouldn t know how to look at it they would know right away i don t know how to cold read
3
SPEAKER_00
And I got lucky.
3
SPEAKER_00
Exactly that feeling.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s like a joy when they re like, there s no script.
3
SPEAKER_00
Can you just improvise?
3
SPEAKER_00
Thank you so much.
3
SPEAKER_02
Right.
3
SPEAKER_00
When that movie came out, was your scene funny in it?
3
SPEAKER_02
Not particularly, as my dad said, but it was, I was in a movie, you know, and the movie didn t even do that well, but it was a, it was a chain of movies or whatever they call a series where the fourth one and a franchise, I guess back then, and it had been pretty watered down at that point, but Sharon Stone was in it.
3
SPEAKER_02
And she blew up after that.
3
SPEAKER_02
And so it was like a legit kind of movie.
3
SPEAKER_02
I just was just window dressing, did a few lines here and there and skateboarded.
3
SPEAKER_02
Tony Hawk was my stunt double.
3
SPEAKER_01
But David, you were like 23 or something, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
I was 21.
3
SPEAKER_02
Wait, wait, wait, wait.
3
SPEAKER_00
Tony Hawk was your stunt double?
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
Another just super cool dude that I just, I knew from skateboard magazines from Arizona.
3
SPEAKER_02
So all his bones brigade was my, my, my little gang I ran around with.
3
SPEAKER_02
So in the movie, so I got to see them and then.
3
SPEAKER_01
I want to watch that now.
3
SPEAKER_00
Don t like the most legendary skateboarder of all time.
3
SPEAKER_00
The most iconic skateboarder of all time was your stunt double in your first movie.
3
SPEAKER_02
Right.
3
SPEAKER_02
And you re 21.
3
SPEAKER_02
And he wasn t that big of a deal.
3
SPEAKER_02
I mean, we re about the same age.
3
SPEAKER_02
He was probably a little younger.
3
SPEAKER_02
And Chris Miller, another guy, Mike McGill, all the big skaters.
3
SPEAKER_02
But he was taller than me and he rode goofy foot.
3
SPEAKER_02
No, I rode goofy.
3
SPEAKER_02
He rode the different way.
3
SPEAKER_02
So we had two stunt devils for me, plus I could skate.
3
SPEAKER_02
And so they would just intercut.
3
SPEAKER_02
Anyway, boring.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was a bus boy at Holiday Inn at 21.
3
SPEAKER_02
But then I got on that HBO thing and then Marcy Klein and everyone at SNL saw that and then I got, but I came on as a writer and I didn t really know I wasn t supposed to be a performer.
3
SPEAKER_02
So I was, as Lauren said the other day, Spade, I knew what we were doing with you.
3
SPEAKER_02
You were going to be on the bench for a while.
3
SPEAKER_02
Remember when he said that Dana?
3
SPEAKER_01
I was like, Oh, he d say, David s behind you.
3
SPEAKER_01
David s always ready.
3
SPEAKER_01
if anything happens he s always because he david would sit behind me and read through it snl and he was always there he s ready with my dana voodoo he s ready to go whatever if you falter um he ll like take your place meanwhile i didn t say that i know but dana s like a super
3
SPEAKER_02
comedian with impressions and plays every big person and he s looking at me like, this guy doesn t scare me.
3
SPEAKER_02
I m just like mumbling jokes.
3
SPEAKER_01
You re always funny.
3
SPEAKER_01
It worked out.
3
SPEAKER_02
Back to our guest.
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, let s go back to him for a little bit.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then we ll come back to you.
3
SPEAKER_00
Honestly, I think that your lives are much more interesting than my lives.
3
SPEAKER_00
No.
3
SPEAKER_00
So, so, sorry, sorry, so I want to, how did you get the, I m curious, unless you guys have already talked about this on the,
3
SPEAKER_02
No, it s boring.
3
SPEAKER_00
If you haven t talked about it, then I want to ask you, how did you get the, so you got to, you got, you got to do like five minutes on one of the young comedian specials.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
With other people.
3
SPEAKER_00
And who, and how did you get that?
3
SPEAKER_00
And who was on it with you?
3
SPEAKER_00
Cause those are crazy lineups.
3
SPEAKER_02
Rob Schneider was on it with me.
3
SPEAKER_02
We got plucked to audition off of that.
3
SPEAKER_02
You need some heat like that.
3
SPEAKER_02
We had management that had SNL people.
3
SPEAKER_02
I m in the vicinity of it.
3
SPEAKER_02
They had Dana.
3
SPEAKER_02
I lived with Dana.
3
SPEAKER_01
Insert here, Dennis Miller and I were just kind of fledging on SNL.
3
SPEAKER_01
I had done standup with Rob Schneider for years.
3
SPEAKER_01
He was my opener.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then when I met David, before I got on SNL, so they were in the ether and they came in like fricking frack.
3
SPEAKER_01
It was Rob Schneider, David Spade.
3
SPEAKER_01
They always were just a notch funnier than their peers at the time.
3
SPEAKER_01
And so they matriculated to SNL.
3
SPEAKER_01
Dennis and I recommended them and then they auditioned well and they ended up
3
SPEAKER_02
Those two were a big help.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then, um, then I got on, but it took me a while to get on, which got me back to the fame thing.
3
SPEAKER_02
It was exciting, but it was infuriating and frustrating.
3
SPEAKER_02
But then, then came movies and stuff.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
Didn t, did not do that well.
3
SPEAKER_02
But like, like I was watching your monologue on SNL, which listen, and that was a tough crowd.
3
SPEAKER_02
No, I m kidding.
3
SPEAKER_02
You did great.
3
SPEAKER_02
But I know you ve gotten so much praise for it.
3
SPEAKER_02
I had to stop for one second.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re weird.
3
SPEAKER_01
No, that wasn t even your fault.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was jealous of it.
3
SPEAKER_01
I watched it today.
3
SPEAKER_01
I ve hosted three times.
3
SPEAKER_01
I never had a monologue like that.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you fucking rocked that.
3
SPEAKER_02
That was that well formed.
3
SPEAKER_00
What are you saying?
3
SPEAKER_02
What are your negatives you get from people when they try to fake compliment you?
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, for me, with stand-up, if you don t do well,
4
SPEAKER_00
You always say, they were weird.
4
SPEAKER_02
So great.
4
SPEAKER_02
Right.
4
SPEAKER_03
When you get off, you think you kill and you go, fuck them.
4
SPEAKER_03
You go to you.
4
SPEAKER_02
How did you think it went?
4
SPEAKER_02
That s how did you, how did you feel about it?
4
SPEAKER_00
I always could tell if I had a good set or a bad set.
4
SPEAKER_00
If people said that was good, that was a bad set.
4
SPEAKER_00
If they said that was funny, that was a good set.
4
SPEAKER_03
I love it.
4
SPEAKER_03
And if they switch their compliment, a compliment also, Dana is when you say, if you don t like their act,
4
SPEAKER_03
but they do good, you go, you killed.
4
SPEAKER_03
You don t say anything.
4
SPEAKER_03
That s a polite way of saying your hacky garbage is working.
4
SPEAKER_02
I hate when they, and I ve said this before, when they switch out their compliment at the last second, like they re starting to say great and they switched to good.
4
SPEAKER_02
Oh, that was good.
4
SPEAKER_02
Fuck, just go good.
4
SPEAKER_00
Don t switch.
4
SPEAKER_00
The math in their head is, if I say great, he s gonna know I m lying.
4
SPEAKER_00
If I say good, maybe he ll buy it.
4
SPEAKER_02
Well, can I ask you a question?
4
SPEAKER_02
How did you deal?
4
SPEAKER_02
So you come to America, you go to college, you re going to try.
4
SPEAKER_02
How did you deal with the early bombs that we all have?
4
SPEAKER_02
How resilient were you?
4
SPEAKER_02
Or didn t you ever bomb?
4
SPEAKER_00
I was very lucky in that the first time I did stand up was on campus my senior year.
4
SPEAKER_00
I did a set my first semester of my final year and then the second semester.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the first set I ever did in my life, I did 25 minutes.
4
SPEAKER_00
I had no idea that that s what you do.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s crazy.
4
SPEAKER_00
You do that long?
4
SPEAKER_00
writing for a few months and I tried all these jokes for 25 minutes in this coffee shop and it was probably like 100 people crammed into a tiny room and it was a bunch of my friends and I, to this day, one of the best sets I ve ever had.
4
SPEAKER_03
That s what Dana always says.
4
SPEAKER_03
Dana says your first set sometimes is your best.
4
SPEAKER_02
Using the very first, cause you, you psychologically have a free pass.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s like when the quarterback gets hurt and the other guy comes in, well, there s no pressure on me.
4
SPEAKER_02
I hope I do okay.
4
SPEAKER_02
So the first set, like, did they announce you as that s my, it s his first time doing standup.
4
SPEAKER_00
Everybody, it was everybody s first time, except for the guy who had done it before.
4
SPEAKER_00
So it was all college kids, just a thing on campus.
4
SPEAKER_00
We all did 20, 25 minutes.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s too much.
4
SPEAKER_00
Dude, I wish I had a VHS of that.
4
SPEAKER_00
I have a picture from it.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m wearing this huge sweater.
4
SPEAKER_00
Comedy sweater.
4
SPEAKER_02
We all have hilarious sweater.
4
SPEAKER_02
You got to have a funny sweater.
4
SPEAKER_00
I really, really, genuinely, objectively crushed.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like, I really sort of became right after that kind of a little bit famous on campus.
4
SPEAKER_00
They were like, wow, you re that guy.
4
SPEAKER_03
Yeah, that means so much.
4
SPEAKER_00
Suddenly, and then I did it again the second semester, and now people were like excited to see me.
4
SPEAKER_00
A bunch of other people had also performed on it, but they were like, oh, Kumail s gonna go up again.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then the second time I killed again, not as hard as the first time, but still very, very good.
4
SPEAKER_00
And so after that, suddenly a little bit on campus, I was like one of the guys that people knew.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then I moved to Chicago and I just looked up in the Reader, which was a local newspaper, just open mics, and I was very lucky
4
SPEAKER_00
Um, Dana, in that I did not have a bomb until maybe my 25th or 30th set.
4
SPEAKER_00
I didn t call him for quite a long time.
4
SPEAKER_00
The first few months.
4
SPEAKER_03
How was that?
4
SPEAKER_03
How to feel?
4
SPEAKER_00
It felt
4
SPEAKER_00
it felt kind of great.
4
SPEAKER_00
I think I would have needed that confidence because I had no, I had, I was so insecure at that time that if I had bombed the first time, I would have never done standup again.
4
SPEAKER_00
And if I bombed the fifth time, maybe I never would have done standup again, which is what s always impressive to me.
4
SPEAKER_00
You know, when you start doing open mics and you meet comedians and you hang out and they ve been doing it for a couple of years and I m like, you have never once done well.
4
SPEAKER_00
I am so impressed that you had it.
4
SPEAKER_03
I know, the tenacity.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, they just- You have never once- You re not even funny at all.
4
SPEAKER_00
No, you re not funny.
4
SPEAKER_00
Your inner fortitude is so fucking impressive to me.
4
SPEAKER_00
You should be like a soldier.
4
SPEAKER_00
What are you doing?
4
SPEAKER_00
You should be in the army.
4
SPEAKER_02
Also, your bits aren t working.
4
SPEAKER_02
No, you keep doing the bits.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_03
You got to call the like there s something there and you want to shake and go.
4
SPEAKER_03
There s nothing there.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s nothing there.
4
SPEAKER_00
But, you know, sometimes there are people that you see.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s nothing there.
4
SPEAKER_00
And they re like those comedians that other comedians make fun of.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s what happened with Hannibal Burroughs.
4
SPEAKER_00
You guys know Hannibal?
4
SPEAKER_02
Oh, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
He got funny overnight.
4
SPEAKER_00
He was not funny.
4
SPEAKER_00
He was one of the guys that people were.
4
SPEAKER_00
We would be like fucking Hannibal here again.
4
SPEAKER_00
I remember a friend of mine called me and was like, have you seen Hannibal recently?
4
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, no.
4
SPEAKER_00
And they re like, he s funny now.
4
SPEAKER_00
I was like, what do you mean, Hannibal?
4
SPEAKER_00
Hannibal Buress is funny?
4
SPEAKER_03
He cracked the code.
4
SPEAKER_03
He figured it out.
4
SPEAKER_03
I mean, maybe that s what it takes.
4
SPEAKER_00
He didn t like slowly get funny.
4
SPEAKER_00
He was not funny.
4
SPEAKER_00
Jesus, like a twilight zone.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s so great.
4
SPEAKER_03
That s so great.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the first time I would say I bombed, I did a guest set at Zany s.
4
SPEAKER_00
You guys know Zany s in Chicago?
4
SPEAKER_03
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
I was, it was me, John Roy, who s a very funny comedian, also from Chicago.
4
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if you guys know him.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then I forget who the headliner was, but that was my first time I didn t do well.
4
SPEAKER_00
And it really felt, it was an awful feeling because
4
SPEAKER_00
I didn t understand what happened.
4
SPEAKER_00
I was like, these are the same jokes.
4
SPEAKER_00
These jokes do well.
4
SPEAKER_00
And that set, I had like a 10 minute set.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I was like, I m going to start strong and strong.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then you have the bits in the middle that are not quite as strong.
4
SPEAKER_00
Well, my first joke didn t do that well.
4
SPEAKER_00
So then I pulled my closer up, which didn t do well.
4
SPEAKER_00
So now I m out there.
4
SPEAKER_00
I got six minutes still left and all my B jokes.
4
SPEAKER_00
And that s it.
4
SPEAKER_03
Yeah, that s so funny when you scramble like that and you get spooked like a horse and you start going, what is going on here?
4
SPEAKER_03
And you jump ahead, mixing up your jokes, then you go, wait, did I even do this one?
4
SPEAKER_03
Because now it s out of order.
4
SPEAKER_03
Chris Rock used to go, Spade, tonight, just to shake it up.
4
SPEAKER_03
Open with your clothes, I go shut the fuck up.
4
SPEAKER_03
I m not opening with my clothes.
4
SPEAKER_02
That s a Louis C.K.
4
SPEAKER_02
trick.
4
SPEAKER_02
You know, you play around and then you try to bomb.
4
SPEAKER_03
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_03
And then he goes, then where are you?
4
SPEAKER_03
What are you going to do?
4
SPEAKER_03
Where are you headed?
4
SPEAKER_03
I go, fuck, don t scare me, dude.
4
SPEAKER_03
I ve been doing this too long.
4
SPEAKER_03
I don t do that shit.
4
SPEAKER_00
This is too risky.
4
SPEAKER_00
I don t want to put myself in a position like that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Why would I do that?
4
SPEAKER_03
I want to just, what I do is I pack it with jokes at work and then put one new one in the middle and then fucking baby it after that with stuff.
4
SPEAKER_03
Hopefully they ll get me out of that hole if it doesn t work.
4
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
4
SPEAKER_00
I mean, that s how I would always like, the way I planned my set was always, I really put a lot of thought into it.
4
SPEAKER_00
Some people don t do that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Some people just go up and like, I ll do whatever I feel like doing.
4
SPEAKER_00
Later, once I got, I would say, really experienced with standup and started feeling really confident, when I moved to New York, I really, there were a couple of years in New York where I was like, I was really feeling at the top of my game.
4
SPEAKER_00
Then the challenge to myself was how long can I be up there without doing a joke at all?
4
SPEAKER_00
So that was the challenge every- Ooh, just off top of your head.
4
SPEAKER_03
Was it crowd work or just your making up stuff?
4
SPEAKER_00
making up stuff, sometimes crowd work, whatever it was, I was like, the goal is to go up there, and when I step on stage, have no idea what the first words are to my- Wow, it is terrifying.
4
SPEAKER_03
I liked it, that s my favorite.
4
SPEAKER_03
I ve done it, but it s, I will go, or I ll have like two new things and go, I m gonna open with these two, get a feel for the crowd, and then just go into my act.
4
SPEAKER_03
But I just am so sick of my act, I will have to start with a couple of new bits.
4
SPEAKER_03
And sometimes you stumble into a winner.
4
SPEAKER_00
Well, for me, the good thing was, if I m doing well just riffing, I m like, wait till they get a load of the shit I ve been writing.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
You know?
4
SPEAKER_00
And if it s not going well, no problem.
4
SPEAKER_00
I haven t done any of my jokes yet.
4
SPEAKER_00
For me, I think the fear was, what if I do my first joke and it doesn t do well, where do I go?
4
SPEAKER_00
So that for me was what made me comfortable and safe on stage, was not doing any jokes for the, for as long as I could go without doing any jokes.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
I still don t have any jokes.
4
SPEAKER_02
I can t write a joke.
4
SPEAKER_02
I mean, I just, I have like three jokes.
4
SPEAKER_02
I love them, but I just can t come up with jokes.
4
SPEAKER_02
Like jokes, it s all rhythm and all attitude.
4
SPEAKER_03
But you re such a funny person.
4
SPEAKER_03
You do jokes and then you impress, every impression you have is woven in with jokes.
4
SPEAKER_03
So it s a combo hit.
4
SPEAKER_03
It s like, it sounds like somebody and you re saying something funny.
4
SPEAKER_00
Man, Megator, Megatea, that s a joke.
4
SPEAKER_00
Oh, okay.
4
SPEAKER_00
Oh, you saw that?
4
SPEAKER_02
Geez, I m gonna cry.
4
SPEAKER_00
Of course I did.
4
SPEAKER_02
I saw that.
4
SPEAKER_02
That s a pretty good bit about the frustration of parenting in that style of parenting.
4
SPEAKER_02
It was like as if a little kid s like a 100-year-old man you have to take care of or something like that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
You better buy me a toy or I m gonna be sad.
4
SPEAKER_00
yeah and how like the resell action figures were just a little bit slight change the name slightly different crook and he s saying that s not the right doll
4
SPEAKER_00
We re halfway through.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I want to say that Emily and I rewatched that not too long ago because she s such a huge fan of that.
4
SPEAKER_02
I love her.
4
SPEAKER_00
You know, I met a comedy nerd that we that s how we fell in love.
4
SPEAKER_00
She like used to record SNL.
5
SPEAKER_00
She didn t have a VCR, so she would record it on an audio tape and she would just listen to the audio of SNL sketches.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_01
Is she a hundred?
5
SPEAKER_02
No.
5
SPEAKER_02
When did you get together?
5
SPEAKER_02
2007 or when did you?
5
2006.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s right.
5
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
5
SPEAKER_02
So basically you have a pre-fame, pre-money for you wife.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
5
SPEAKER_00
And when we first moved to New York, I mean, she did meet at a comedy show and I was like, you know, Chicago famous at the time, which we are famous, but I was good enough on stage.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was like killing on stage enough that, you know, if I did a show, she was at the show, I was feeling pretty good about my chances.
5
SPEAKER_00
Um, but no money lived like, you know, I had a mattress on the floor.
5
SPEAKER_00
It was.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then when we moved David, solid gold mattress, David had a lot of mattresses.
5
SPEAKER_01
And what does that mean?
5
SPEAKER_02
Well, before you made it, remember the story in New York, you just back to L.A.
5
SPEAKER_01
When I lived in New York, Lorne wouldn t pick us up in the summer and he would make us wait.
5
SPEAKER_01
And so you d have to literally get out of your whole apartment and move back to LA.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then a month later, they go, we can t get ahold of him, he s in Amagansett.
5
SPEAKER_01
He ll decide in another month.
5
SPEAKER_01
I m like, they don t have any phones, no one can find him.
5
SPEAKER_01
So if I got picked up- You d have to move it back.
5
SPEAKER_01
I d have to move all again.
5
SPEAKER_01
And there wasn t Uber or delivery, so I d drag a mattress up some stairs.
5
SPEAKER_02
I felt so confident I had an interior decorator after the first season.
5
SPEAKER_02
Goddamn you asshole.
5
SPEAKER_02
I m gonna be here for a while.
5
SPEAKER_02
No, I m kidding.
5
SPEAKER_00
Well, dude, you were, Dana, you were like a hit right from the beginning.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_02
Well, the church lady was on the first show.
5
SPEAKER_02
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
I can t imagine that you re like suddenly one day you re just a person and the next day you re like famous in the country.
5
SPEAKER_02
I, before I went out there because I, I d never done sketch comedy.
5
SPEAKER_02
I was so nervous.
5
SPEAKER_02
Comedy.
5
SPEAKER_02
Look at this guy.
5
SPEAKER_02
I d never done sketch comedy, but I was a sketch comedy person by heart, but doing stand-up.
5
SPEAKER_02
So I did Church Lady as part of my stand-up.
5
SPEAKER_02
But I was so fucking nervous the first show that I was just swearing at myself in the mirror.
5
SPEAKER_02
Fuck, fuck, you know?
5
SPEAKER_02
And then afterwards, I was so emotional how well it went that I was just basically tearing up quite a bit.
5
SPEAKER_00
Can I ask you?
5
SPEAKER_00
It was a big ride.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re obviously very nervous.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re doing this thing.
5
SPEAKER_00
You go to dress and it kills at dress.
5
SPEAKER_02
Church Lady was the final sketch at dress as you know that s the graveyard spot like this isn t probably gonna work.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s a two-hour dress.
5
SPEAKER_02
Then it kills and it s moved up to the first sketch for the air show.
5
SPEAKER_00
I want to I just I m sorry, I just want to know every step of how you re like negotiating this.
5
SPEAKER_00
You go out.
5
SPEAKER_00
Are you nervous address?
5
SPEAKER_00
You re very nervous address.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is going to go.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_02
Yes.
5
SPEAKER_00
And at what point do you get your first laugh and you feel like, OK, wow, this is something.
5
SPEAKER_00
Or do you not feel that?
5
SPEAKER_00
No.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_02
There was an exact moment because I m out there with Victoria Jackson.
5
SPEAKER_02
I m very scared and I m doing the interrogating thing and
5
SPEAKER_02
Well, we don t do that.
5
SPEAKER_02
Well, church lady, I did this, and we didn t do that.
5
SPEAKER_02
And she goes, yeah, but I did this.
5
SPEAKER_02
And then I said,
5
SPEAKER_02
Well, isn t that special?
5
SPEAKER_02
Huge laugh.
5
SPEAKER_02
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_01
Already?
5
SPEAKER_02
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_02
Before they even knew it.
5
SPEAKER_02
It s a catchphrase already.
5
SPEAKER_02
But until I landed that, I was just wanting to articulate, just please don t blow it, you know?
5
SPEAKER_02
And then once I landed that, I connected to the 10,000 hours in the clubs.
5
SPEAKER_02
It was like, oh, I m off the races.
5
SPEAKER_00
Did you know this is the big line I got to land?
5
SPEAKER_00
Or were you surprised that...
5
SPEAKER_00
At the reaction to God.
5
SPEAKER_02
I had done it in the clubs and it would evolve from an improv.
5
SPEAKER_02
It s the ultimate patronizing put down when someone s being sincere.
5
SPEAKER_02
And it did become a catchphrase.
5
SPEAKER_02
I had it in the clubs and the church lady would work in the clubs.
5
SPEAKER_02
It was me interviewing myself.
5
SPEAKER_02
or dealing with hecklers.
5
SPEAKER_02
We don t quite know what to say, do we?
5
SPEAKER_02
You know, that thing.
5
SPEAKER_02
I knew that attitude worked, but I d never done it with the dress and never done it.
5
SPEAKER_02
So it was out of body.
5
SPEAKER_02
I don t know if you ve had experiences like that, maybe getting nominated for an Academy Award for the screenplay or getting cast on Silicon Valley.
5
SPEAKER_02
Let s go back to when you were shocked and amazed at your success.
5
SPEAKER_02
Was there any moment or was it just gradual?
5
SPEAKER_02
When did you start getting recognized?
5
SPEAKER_01
Was Silicon Valley your first national thing that people knew you from?
5
SPEAKER_00
No, the first thing I would say that I did a sketch on Portlandia, season one of Portlandia.
5
SPEAKER_02
Love that show, Fred Armisen.
5
SPEAKER_00
Fred Armisen, Kerry Brownstein, two very, very funny people.
5
SPEAKER_00
And the first thing I d ever done on TV actually was I had two lines on SNL.
5
SPEAKER_00
I read that.
5
SPEAKER_01
Do tell.
5
SPEAKER_00
They needed a brown guy and I was doing stuff.
5
SPEAKER_00
Sorry.
5
SPEAKER_00
They did.
5
SPEAKER_00
Casting breakdown.
5
SPEAKER_00
They still do.
5
SPEAKER_00
They still do.
5
SPEAKER_02
They got plenty of this flavor.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was doing one in New York and one of the writers for SNL emailed me and was like, hey, we need someone to just come in and do three lines for this sketch.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I said, yes, of course.
5
SPEAKER_01
Fuck yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Under five, so I like hang out with the extras all day.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know, we hang out in the theater that Conan was taping in at the time.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I have three lines and address.
5
SPEAKER_00
Um, it s, uh, it s an episode with James Franco and it s James Franco and Sudeikis are at the, you know, they re like at the dais and we re a bunch of reporters asking questions.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s a press conference and Sudeikis messed up his line.
5
SPEAKER_00
Oh no.
5
SPEAKER_00
Threw me so much in dress that I messed up my line.
5
SPEAKER_00
I just didn t know.
5
SPEAKER_00
I just literally just stumbled my words.
5
SPEAKER_00
So then suddenly when I get the script,
5
SPEAKER_00
for the, for air.
5
SPEAKER_00
Now I have two lines instead of lines.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I remember it was really cool.
5
SPEAKER_00
We re starting the sketch.
5
SPEAKER_00
I haven t, I don t know Sudeikis at all.
5
SPEAKER_00
He s there while we re about to do the live one.
5
SPEAKER_00
And he looks at me and he says, I m sorry.
5
SPEAKER_00
He like apologized to me.
5
SPEAKER_02
Oh, that s cool.
5
SPEAKER_00
A lot to me.
5
SPEAKER_00
I remember Will Forte was like really, really cool to me.
5
SPEAKER_00
He, he understood this guy has never been on TV.
5
SPEAKER_00
He s got live,
5
SPEAKER_00
He s got two lines live.
5
SPEAKER_00
So he went out of his way to like, be kind to me.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I ve told him that and he doesn t remember it.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was like, that s great.
5
SPEAKER_02
Sounds exactly like him.
5
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_02
Cool.
5
SPEAKER_00
Harold Hammond was very nice to me.
5
SPEAKER_00
Very sweet.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_01
By the way, it s hard to do that when you re in the, in the heat of a show and you re a cast member to think enough to go out of the way because you re so in your own head, terrified yourself, you know?
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I remember Kristen Waig, when you were rehearsing, laughed really hard at me and said, that was really funny.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I feel like maybe they could tell, Oh, this is another performer.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is a very big deal for him.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like I would just touch that.
5
SPEAKER_00
They all went out of their way to make me feel confident and comfortable.
5
SPEAKER_01
And well, I like this story.
5
SPEAKER_01
He s like, then Lauren came out and they sang for, he s a jolly good fellow.
5
SPEAKER_01
And they carried me around.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, that s right.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then Lauren, for some reason, blacklisted me from Hollywood.
5
SPEAKER_02
So you.
5
SPEAKER_02
So basically, why don t we jump to that?
5
SPEAKER_02
Because you go through Silicon Valley, which is.
5
SPEAKER_00
But but the thing that people really knew me from was Portlandia.
5
SPEAKER_00
I did it.
5
SPEAKER_02
So that was your first thing.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that was my first thing.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that was an improvised sketch.
5
SPEAKER_00
We improvised for like two hours and they cut it down.
5
SPEAKER_00
Jon Preisel, the director, into a four minute sketch, three minute sketch.
5
SPEAKER_00
And it came out really funny.
5
SPEAKER_00
Fred s really funny.
5
SPEAKER_00
Carrie s really funny.
5
SPEAKER_00
And it just came out really funny.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that show, the first season was kind of like a cool hit.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
every job I ve had since then to this day comes from that one sketch.
5
SPEAKER_01
Oh, nice.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so every little thing, every audition, everything comes from that.
5
SPEAKER_00
So then with Silicon Valley, and then I was another show on TNT called Franklin and Bash with Breckenmeyer and Mark Paul.
5
SPEAKER_01
Hilarious reference.
5
SPEAKER_01
Franklin and Bash.
5
SPEAKER_01
I love the name.
5
SPEAKER_01
I know, but Dennis Miliusko, when are you on fucking Franklin and Bash this week?
5
SPEAKER_01
Which is a great, great, Turner and Hooch.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s like a Turner and Hooch type of show.
5
SPEAKER_01
That was like a, that was like a, yeah, Rizzoli.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s, that s, that beats it.
5
SPEAKER_00
The Rizzoli and Isles.
5
SPEAKER_00
We were on the same time as Rizzoli and Isles.
5
SPEAKER_00
Much worse numbers.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is all true.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is all true.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was on that show for like two years and it was, you know, it was funny.
5
SPEAKER_00
It was a fun show.
5
SPEAKER_00
I had a fun part, but I was like, I got to be on a comedy.
5
SPEAKER_00
I didn t have a job.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I went to the creators and I was like, guys, can you like write me out of this show?
5
SPEAKER_00
They re like, did you get another job?
5
SPEAKER_00
I said, no, I just wanted to bet on myself.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I really want to be on a show that s a comedy.
5
SPEAKER_01
And they said, this is a comedy.
5
SPEAKER_01
And you go, oh, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
I just was like, I want to be on a sitcom guys.
5
SPEAKER_00
I want to be on a sitcom.
5
SPEAKER_00
So this said, okay, do one more season for us.
5
SPEAKER_00
But in the meantime, you can go audition, do whatever you want.
6
SPEAKER_02
that we ll just do one more season for us out of the contract.
6
SPEAKER_02
And and I said, thank you.
6
SPEAKER_02
And the first audition I did after season two was Silicon Valley.
6
SPEAKER_00
OK, OK.
6
SPEAKER_02
And I get a call from my agents.
6
SPEAKER_02
They re like, Mike, Judge has a new show.
6
SPEAKER_02
And, you know, I grew up on Beavis and Butthead.
6
SPEAKER_02
I office spaces have loved it.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
Mike Judge, a quiet genius.
6
SPEAKER_02
Quiet, quiet.
6
SPEAKER_02
Brilliant.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
And so I go and I audition for Mike and they gave me two different characters to audition for.
6
SPEAKER_02
So I m just, I m just excited to meet Mike.
6
SPEAKER_02
You know, he s a truly genuinely a hero of mine, Beavis and Butthead.
6
SPEAKER_02
I don t mean this in a, I truly mean this.
6
SPEAKER_00
No, I love, love those characters.
6
SPEAKER_00
I told him they re much funnier than Wayne and Garth.
6
SPEAKER_02
I don t know if you believe me, but I love Beavis and Butthead.
6
SPEAKER_02
There s a new season on Paramount Plus, Beavis and Butthead.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
6
SPEAKER_02
Just as good as the original stuff.
6
SPEAKER_02
I m going in an audition for Mike and I do these two parts and I had a good audition.
6
SPEAKER_02
You know, I could tell they were laughing and stuff.
6
SPEAKER_02
I was like, OK, that was a that was I feel good about that audition.
6
SPEAKER_02
I get a call from one of the other creators, not Mike.
6
SPEAKER_02
They say, we really like you.
6
SPEAKER_02
We don t think you re right for either of the parts.
6
SPEAKER_02
And I m like, fuck.
6
SPEAKER_02
but we re gonna write a part for you.
6
SPEAKER_02
And I said, I said, thank you.
6
SPEAKER_02
But people say that all the time, you know, they re like, you re not right for this.
6
SPEAKER_02
We ll find something that never happens.
6
SPEAKER_02
And then they re like, okay, we want you to come and do the network test for it.
6
SPEAKER_02
And I was out of town.
6
SPEAKER_02
I couldn t do it.
6
SPEAKER_02
I was doing a pilot that never went, that I didn t like doing.
6
SPEAKER_02
So I couldn t test.
6
SPEAKER_02
I was like, fuck, it s over.
6
SPEAKER_02
Luckily I d done a part, sorry, this is all confusing.
6
SPEAKER_02
I d done one scene, I d done one episode of Veep, season two, that I d auditioned for with Julia Louis-Dreyfus.
6
SPEAKER_02
And that part turned out funny.
6
SPEAKER_02
I ended up having like one funny moment in that episode.
6
SPEAKER_02
So HBO knew me.
6
SPEAKER_02
And so I flew back from Miami.
6
SPEAKER_02
I was like, fuck, I couldn t test.
6
SPEAKER_02
That s too bad.
6
SPEAKER_02
I landed and I got a call.
6
SPEAKER_02
And you know, when you get those calls where like all your agents and managers are on the phone.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s usually good.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
Usually good.
6
SPEAKER_02
They re all calling me.
6
SPEAKER_02
And I remember us since the signing meeting, you know.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
We re all on it.
6
SPEAKER_02
I land and I have a voicemail.
6
SPEAKER_02
They re like, hey, this is, you know, John, Mel, Molly, Jimmy, Michael, everybody.
6
SPEAKER_02
I call that and they re like, you have an offer to be on Silicon Valley.
6
SPEAKER_01
You got an offer with no audition.
6
SPEAKER_02
I just did the one audition.
6
SPEAKER_02
I didn t get the studio and the network.
6
SPEAKER_02
I didn t have to do that because they re so, so lucky.
6
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
6
SPEAKER_02
And just, we, we did the pilot and I just, the entire time was pinching myself because I got to work with all these funny people with Mike Judge, you know, we did the pilot and we didn t find out for a long time, like six or seven months, if the show was going to get picked up.
6
SPEAKER_02
And then it got picked up and we ended up reshooting most of the pilot.
6
SPEAKER_00
And they, the style of Portlandia and, and that, you know, it s, I mean, you, you have a very, how would you describe your acting style?
6
SPEAKER_00
Cause it s very, it s, it s subtle and it s- Describe it and I ll tell you if you re wrong.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s very natural.
6
SPEAKER_00
David wanted to know, I said, let s let him describe it.
6
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
6
SPEAKER_02
Well, I can t describe it, but I will say John Altshuler, who was one of the creators of Silicon Valley, gave me the biggest compliment I think I ve ever received.
6
SPEAKER_02
He said,
6
SPEAKER_02
And this is gonna sound bad, but it s a compliment.
6
SPEAKER_02
He said, you know, you can do a joke and make it not sound like you re doing a joke.
6
SPEAKER_02
And I was like, wow.
6
SPEAKER_02
I was like, that is a really wonderful thing to hear.
6
SPEAKER_02
Especially with standups, you know, sometimes you see them acting and you can see they re trying to nail a joke.
6
SPEAKER_02
And to me, the key is you gotta hide it s a joke.
6
SPEAKER_02
You gotta get the laugh.
6
SPEAKER_02
You have to get the laugh.
6
SPEAKER_02
But it can t sound like you re like delivering a punchline.
6
SPEAKER_01
But if it s the tone, like you re on shows that are interesting, Veep, that Near s show,
6
SPEAKER_01
are great for my sense of humor, for probably yours, Dana.
6
SPEAKER_01
And if you re on a sitcom, you might have to blast it out a little bit.
6
SPEAKER_01
And that s tougher because it might not be your style or what you like at all.
6
SPEAKER_01
But there are different tones of different comedies.
6
SPEAKER_01
But that kind of comedy is obviously my favorite.
6
SPEAKER_01
And but just your
6
SPEAKER_02
also very good at it.
6
SPEAKER_02
And when you were on Just Shoot Me, you know, you did a really good job of bringing that character to yourself.
6
SPEAKER_02
So it really felt like you were yourself the entire time.
6
SPEAKER_02
And the way you were doing jokes was the way you do jokes.
6
SPEAKER_02
It didn t feel like you were like performing outside of, outside of something that felt very natural to you.
6
SPEAKER_01
Right, like a super character.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it was more meeting with them ahead of time and talking, this is kind of what I do.
6
SPEAKER_01
And this is kind of what they want.
6
SPEAKER_01
And then
6
SPEAKER_01
tailoring it, letting you add jokes on the last take or say, do whatever you want here.
6
SPEAKER_01
Or sometimes they would just say, and then Spade says something funny.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s awesome.
6
SPEAKER_01
So yeah, they were great about it.
6
SPEAKER_01
And you know, it s funny is what you said at the very beginning about Dane as a nice guy.
6
SPEAKER_01
George Siegel used to say, the biggest question I get is, is David Spade as big of a prick as he seems like?
6
SPEAKER_00
Because you were playing a snarky character.
6
SPEAKER_01
I was and I was, you know, I ve tried even toned down even that kind of, I thought it was subtle then, I think it s got to be subtler now because I did, you know, you re going for laughs and it s a sitcom and you have a studio audience but you have to inch it up a little bit but I did like that kind of humor and all the shows I gravitate, just watching your monologue even on SNL and then you were doing the sketches, they were
6
SPEAKER_01
playing you, they did you justice because you are doing a lot of stuff that s throwaway.
6
SPEAKER_00
Super chill, super conversational, and then the subversion comes, or the twist, and it s so in rhythm with what you were just saying, you know, it s very, very effective and not easy to do.
6
SPEAKER_00
You guys could do a sitcom
6
SPEAKER_02
I d love to do a sitcom with you guys.
6
SPEAKER_01
This next couple of months are really tough for me, though, right now.
6
SPEAKER_02
So I m sorry.
6
SPEAKER_01
By the way, listen, we look at Dana.
6
SPEAKER_01
Here s what he said in Vanity Fair, which I thought was an interesting quote.
6
SPEAKER_01
You said our guest.
6
SPEAKER_01
And by the way, no, we will be doing a sitcom.
6
SPEAKER_01
I was kidding.
6
SPEAKER_01
You said I like
6
SPEAKER_01
I like, oh, you being a comedian makes you a better actor.
6
SPEAKER_01
Being an actor makes you a better writer.
6
SPEAKER_01
And then you re a better comedian than you were.
6
SPEAKER_01
And then you re being a producer, director, all that stuff.
6
SPEAKER_01
It all is very entwined.
6
SPEAKER_01
I think that s what you meant.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s great.
6
SPEAKER_01
I think that s, it is really true and it s good.
6
SPEAKER_01
You ve got your hands in different things and you see different things and then you go, oh, I m on that side.
6
SPEAKER_01
Oh, I m in this, you know.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, I remember shooting a sketch that I wrote on SNL.
6
SPEAKER_02
I wrote an SNL.
6
SPEAKER_01
Oh, you wrote, wow.
6
SPEAKER_02
For one week.
6
SPEAKER_02
And then they asked me to finish out the season, and I realized, I was like, sketch is not my strength.
6
SPEAKER_02
I don t, my brain doesn t work like this.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s a different animal for sure, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
And my brain has never worked like that.
6
SPEAKER_02
I still can t, I still can t write sketch, you know, and it used to like, I used to be like, you know, I have friends like Nick Kroll.
6
SPEAKER_02
I m like, wow, this guy can really do sketch.
6
SPEAKER_02
And it would bug me that I couldn t do it.
6
SPEAKER_02
And now I m like, you know what, I have my strengths.
6
SPEAKER_02
They don t include sketch.
6
SPEAKER_02
So I wrote that for one week and we, you know, being part of shooting a sketch and editing the sketch was very, I understood like, okay, you can do certain riffs.
6
SPEAKER_02
It was a taped sketch, pre-taped.
6
SPEAKER_02
You could do certain riffs that are going to make the crew laugh and the cameraman laugh and everyone s going to laugh, but those riffs are never going to make it into the show.
6
SPEAKER_02
And so doing the editing and being involved with the editing in a lot of the projects that makes me realize like, OK, improvising is good.
6
SPEAKER_02
However, if you re just going off the reservation, it s never going to be used.
6
SPEAKER_02
It s just going to make those people laugh.
6
SPEAKER_02
And ultimately, it s kind of a waste of time.
6
SPEAKER_02
And that s something I learned on the Silicon Valley, too.
6
SPEAKER_02
I remember we were doing this scene that was really, really funny.
6
SPEAKER_02
We were all riffing and Alec Berg, one of the showrunners, came up to us and said, listen, all of this is really funny.
6
SPEAKER_02
We re having a great time.
6
SPEAKER_02
However, this scene is about these three things.
6
SPEAKER_02
This person finds out this information and goes from here to here.
6
SPEAKER_02
The audience hears this.
6
SPEAKER_02
You can riff, but if they don t advance one of those three things, it s not going to be in the show.
6
SPEAKER_02
And to me, that like really connected everything.
6
SPEAKER_02
I was like, oh, wow.
6
SPEAKER_02
It s not just about being funny.
6
SPEAKER_01
We re just being funny here.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_02
And it s not helping furthering the point of the scene while being funny.
6
SPEAKER_02
And so all that, I think everything makes you better at everything else.
6
SPEAKER_01
And that s how you.
7
SPEAKER_01
you ended up writing The Big Sick and getting an Academy Award nomination.
7
SPEAKER_01
So you took all that experience and then your real life experience, for people who don t know, you wrote this incredibly successful, I don t know what you would call it, genre is, romantic comedy, basically.
7
SPEAKER_00
Um, uh, yeah, Emily drama.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s movie together, but I will say that Judd Apatow and Barry Mendel, one of the other producers really, Judd really taught us how to write.
7
SPEAKER_00
He really carried us through that entire process.
7
SPEAKER_00
Come here.
7
SPEAKER_01
Let me see your laptop.
7
SPEAKER_01
I don t know if this sounds like Judd Apatow, but this is a substitute impression.
7
SPEAKER_02
No, you ve actually, you ve done pretty well.
7
SPEAKER_02
I just got to punch up a couple of things.
7
SPEAKER_01
That doesn t sound like Judd Apatow.
7
SPEAKER_02
None of this does.
7
SPEAKER_02
It just sounds funny though.
7
SPEAKER_01
It sounds like a funny character.
7
SPEAKER_01
That s what I do.
7
SPEAKER_01
I do 10 minutes of this, the improv.
7
SPEAKER_00
Both of you have certain different aspects of Judd in there.
7
SPEAKER_00
If you could combine them, I think you d get Judd.
7
SPEAKER_01
No, we ve had Judd on this show, and he is very, very, very smart, very clever about writing, about what makes a hit.
7
SPEAKER_02
He knows what he s doing.
7
SPEAKER_01
And producing.
7
SPEAKER_01
He s the guy you want to call if you want to get something made.
7
SPEAKER_01
I saw your trailer.
7
SPEAKER_02
I have to say, I did not see the movie, and I ll take that part out later, but I did not see the movie.
7
SPEAKER_01
You re making me sick.
7
SPEAKER_02
When I watch the trailer, it s such a great trailer.
7
SPEAKER_02
First of all, I got teared up.
7
SPEAKER_02
Second of all, Ray Romano, who I work with a lot, is great.
7
SPEAKER_02
Just in the trailer, your first joke is funny.
7
SPEAKER_02
You re with the girl in bed.
7
SPEAKER_02
You know, she says, I never have sex twice on the first date.
7
SPEAKER_02
Is that her joke?
7
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_02
And that was funny.
7
SPEAKER_02
So it s off right away with a winner.
7
SPEAKER_02
By the time Ray comes in and Holly Hunter,
7
SPEAKER_02
You have no skills as a broadcaster.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
You have no schooling.
7
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_02
She, so she and Ray and Ray s doing these dry things to you and it s awkward.
7
SPEAKER_02
I just thought, oh shit, that s a very well done.
7
SPEAKER_02
And then that big twist of what happens to the girl you re seeing.
7
SPEAKER_02
I, anyway, it s, it s very, uh, well done.
7
SPEAKER_02
I, my first movie would not be anything that good.
7
SPEAKER_02
I mean, that s to write that shit.
7
SPEAKER_00
Well done, because we had Judd really carrying us through.
7
SPEAKER_00
And because of Judd, we were able to get, you know, a really good cast.
7
SPEAKER_00
So like Holly Hunter, well, Zoe Kazan, who plays Emily, you know, in the movie was the first person we cast and we auditioned a lot of people and a lot of great people.
7
SPEAKER_00
And a lot of like people who are very, very famous and were very, very famous then.
7
SPEAKER_00
And out of everyone, Zoe was just the best.
7
SPEAKER_00
And once we had that, Jed was like, okay, now we know who she is.
7
SPEAKER_00
Now we know what her parents can be like.
7
SPEAKER_00
And he was like, you know, I think it should be Holly Hunter.
7
SPEAKER_00
And we were like, good luck.
7
SPEAKER_00
And he was like, I think she ll do it.
7
SPEAKER_00
So we had a lot of conversations with Holly.
7
SPEAKER_00
And once we had Holly, Judd was like, that s when Judd sprung Ray Romano.
7
SPEAKER_00
He was like, I think Ray would be really good.
7
SPEAKER_00
And I was a huge fan of his sitcom and his standup.
7
SPEAKER_00
And I just never seen him do anything that wasn t hard comedy, you know?
7
SPEAKER_00
But Ray really brought, what Ray has inherently in everything he does is this like sadness at his core.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like he s sort of a sad sack kind of.
7
SPEAKER_01
He s a sensitive guy.
7
SPEAKER_01
He s a sensitive guy.
7
SPEAKER_00
That s what I mean.
7
SPEAKER_00
He s sort of sensitive.
7
SPEAKER_00
There s something like appealingly wounded about him.
7
SPEAKER_00
And he was he s so, so good in this movie.
7
SPEAKER_00
You know, David, if you you know, if you if you find yourself when you watch the movie, you ll see Ray and Holly really bring so much to it.
7
SPEAKER_00
Holly, it s not you know, Holly s done so much fantastic work in acting.
7
SPEAKER_02
with ray the dramatic work he does in the movie it s yeah it s more surprising because it s just uh i work with ray and i know a lot of stuff he does and and he every there that nothing was wrong everything was real everything was good just i m just saying the trailer and i m like fuck this movie s so interesting so uh and you
7
SPEAKER_02
pepper it out so you re hooked already.
7
SPEAKER_02
And Holly Hunter, of course, can t go wrong.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like any successful movie, you had a sensibility and you never winked, you never stepped outside of it, you never were gratuitous.
7
SPEAKER_00
That s the key.
7
SPEAKER_01
And you just stayed in that world, yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, because if there s a woman,
7
SPEAKER_00
There s a lot of funny jokes you can make, but if there s a woman in a coma, there s a ceiling to the type of jokes you can make, you know?
7
SPEAKER_00
You can t go, because then that kills the reality level.
7
SPEAKER_00
The entire time you have to feel like all these people have a loved one who s very, very sick right now.
7
SPEAKER_00
They can make certain kinds of jokes, but if they go past a certain line, it s heartless and it kills the whole movie.
7
SPEAKER_02
Did Judd make you change the name from Coma Lady?
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that was the working title with Mama Lady.
7
SPEAKER_02
Sounds hilarious.
7
SPEAKER_00
Maybe it s too much of a spoiler.
7
SPEAKER_00
So we did that and that happened, you know, I ve been doing, I think that was season three of Silicon Valley in between seasons three and four, I did that.
7
SPEAKER_00
And that was cool because Silicon Valley was very successful show, but then Big Sick was getting to do another kind of thing.
7
SPEAKER_01
I think that s when your name just became just way more familiar to a lot of Americans, when those two things came together.
7
SPEAKER_01
Did it feel like it to you?
7
SPEAKER_01
You ve arrived.
7
SPEAKER_00
The weird thing, I m sure you guys have had this experience, you fight for, for me it was
7
SPEAKER_00
years of fighting for roles, tiny roles.
7
SPEAKER_00
You know, I had the two years where I had a small, one funny scene in a big comedy.
7
SPEAKER_00
I did that for a couple of years, you know, so there s like six or seven movies.
7
SPEAKER_00
You watch them.
7
SPEAKER_00
I pop up for a scene.
7
SPEAKER_00
I deliver food.
7
SPEAKER_00
I m funny for two minutes.
7
SPEAKER_00
And then I walk away.
7
SPEAKER_00
Um, big sick changed the kinds of opportunities I get.
7
SPEAKER_02
Sure.
7
SPEAKER_00
overnight, suddenly I became one of the people who could, I became one of the new comedy actors, you know?
7
SPEAKER_00
So suddenly I m, that s, soon as the big sick comes out, I start getting scripts.
7
SPEAKER_00
I start getting more opportunities.
7
SPEAKER_02
People say that, but it s really hard to get to a point where you actually get scripts and get scripts that are like green lit.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like if you do it, we ll do it.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
I mean, that, that s a whole other thing that, you know, this new show that I have coming out, Welcome to Chippendales, um,
7
SPEAKER_00
on Hulu, November 22nd.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s the first time I ve had a real situation.
7
SPEAKER_00
You know, getting Big Sick made was a struggle.
7
SPEAKER_00
We had to really put a cast together and all that.
7
SPEAKER_00
And it was only 5 million.
7
SPEAKER_00
Welcome to Chippendales was the first time I ve had in my career where they were like, if you do this, if you join, if you attach yourself, we re going to make this show.
7
SPEAKER_00
I ve never had that before.
7
SPEAKER_01
And it s the guy who started Chippendales, the gentleman who started Chippendales, and there s nefarious stuff around him.
7
SPEAKER_00
So it s a pretty- People don t know this, but Chippendales, the male stripping thing, there s obviously a very, very funny, memorable SNL sketch about it with- Chris Farley.
7
SPEAKER_02
I didn t even think of that.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s the first time I haven t thought of that when I heard Chippendales.
7
SPEAKER_02
I just think of hot guys.
7
SPEAKER_00
Patrick Swayze.
7
SPEAKER_00
Hot guys.
7
SPEAKER_02
Speaking of hot stud crushed it.
7
SPEAKER_02
So when with Chippendales, it s like you re talking about the guy that actually started it.
7
SPEAKER_00
This is what started it was this Indian immigrant who was this like sort of fat, nerdy Indian immigrant.
7
SPEAKER_00
Um, he started Chippendales and the story itself is wild.
7
SPEAKER_00
Um, there s, people don t know this, there s murder and stuff involved.
7
SPEAKER_00
The first like few years of Chippendale, uh, it s, it s, it s really a lot of nefarious stuff that happens in it.
7
SPEAKER_00
It really, really crazy, intense stuff that happens in it.
7
SPEAKER_00
People get, multiple people get murdered.
7
SPEAKER_00
This dude was setting fire to other, like male strip clubs were popping up that were copying Chippendales.
7
SPEAKER_00
He started setting fire to them.
7
SPEAKER_00
And he got away with this stuff for years and years and years.
7
SPEAKER_00
And so this story is a really, really, I couldn t believe it.
7
SPEAKER_00
So much, like 20 crazy things happen in it that are unbelievable.
7
SPEAKER_02
Is it like a series or a straight movie?
7
SPEAKER_00
It s just eight episodes.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s a short series, eight episodes, November 22nd.
7
SPEAKER_00
We come out with two episodes.
7
SPEAKER_00
The cast is amazing.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s Murray Bartlett, who just met me for White Lotus.
7
SPEAKER_00
Juliette Lewis is in it.
7
SPEAKER_00
The Ashford, who s really, really wonderful.
7
SPEAKER_02
What are the- From Ashford and Simpson.
7
SPEAKER_02
No, that s a different one.
7
SPEAKER_01
So can we touch on, I mean, between these two, you hosted SNL and then The Eternals.
7
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I know it s probably like a sore spot.
7
SPEAKER_01
People go, hey, he got so muscular.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know, is that like just a dead horse at this point when you hear that?
7
SPEAKER_00
Well, no, because it is weird to sort of, what it helped me do, and it really did, and I think you guys probably related to some level.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I mean.
8
SPEAKER_01
I relate, as you can see.
8
SPEAKER_02
I was tired of being known as the most strongest comic.
8
SPEAKER_01
Spade is scrappy.
8
SPEAKER_02
I ll fight because when I fight, all I m going to think is my dad left me as a kid and all the anger is going to come out.
8
SPEAKER_02
So someone s going to get it all together.
8
SPEAKER_01
You have nothing to lose when you fight.
8
SPEAKER_01
What was your mental state about that?
8
SPEAKER_01
About that becoming a different physical person?
8
SPEAKER_00
What it helped me do was when you re in this, when you re a comedy actor in this business, it s very easy to be put in a box, you know?
8
SPEAKER_00
So all the stuff I did, I was sort of like the funny nerdy guy, you know?
8
SPEAKER_00
And what that allowed me to do was break out of that.
8
SPEAKER_00
I don t mean necessarily become an action star or anything.
8
SPEAKER_00
It just
8
SPEAKER_00
had people had people who give you jobs, see me as not just a nerd.
8
SPEAKER_00
So the actual opportunities I started getting from that were not specifically action opportunities.
8
SPEAKER_00
I started getting opportunities to play like normal, non-nerdy, just different.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_00
So that makes sense.
8
SPEAKER_02
But the actual biggest jump there was big sick.
8
SPEAKER_02
And then
8
SPEAKER_02
Eternals is such a jump, but once you get an offer like that or someone sees you like that, obviously you probably said, I m going to do my best and I m going to make sure they didn t make a mistake.
8
SPEAKER_02
I m going to work out, I m going to look the part.
8
SPEAKER_02
But what a huge flattering opportunity to be in a movie like that.
8
SPEAKER_01
A Marvel.
8
SPEAKER_01
I d like to be in one if they re listening.
8
SPEAKER_01
I ll play a character.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t know if I could,
8
SPEAKER_01
jack up, but what I m interested is, because then you do this and it helps you get out of typecasting, but then you re still walking around as that, because I went, I lifted weights a little bit, you know.
8
SPEAKER_01
I still, I did push-ups yesterday.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I do do things.
8
SPEAKER_01
But if you get to a low body fat and a high lean mass, then you re going to walk around different and your libido is going to go way up because any kind of little fat around the middle is not an inert
8
SPEAKER_01
thing in your body, it affects your hormones.
8
SPEAKER_01
So I m just curious about you as a person, that transition to that kind of fitness, just walking around that powerful, how are you feeling about it?
8
SPEAKER_01
It s like, it must be fun.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s a very good question.
8
SPEAKER_00
I don t feel any different in terms of how I think of myself.
8
SPEAKER_00
I don t feel that I am a different person at all.
8
SPEAKER_00
Um, I do feel on a base level, stronger, you know, bags are less heavy.
8
SPEAKER_00
If I do grow trees on his heart, the libido thing is very real.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s, um, it shifts, um, you know, the way my wife, she s always loved me, but the way she talks about my body now is different.
8
SPEAKER_01
What do you mean?
8
SPEAKER_01
What do you mean by that?
8
SPEAKER_02
She went from like to love.
8
SPEAKER_02
Okay, cool.
8
SPEAKER_01
What do you mean?
8
SPEAKER_00
She finally said, I love you.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s great.
8
SPEAKER_01
Well, Maria Shriver used to say that when she would get in bed, she would get in bed, Arnold would get in bed, and then his body was there.
8
SPEAKER_01
It was like a threesome.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
So it s like, you know, it s Kamal, it s you and wife, and then washboard abs.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I guess women like touching them.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t know.
8
SPEAKER_01
I ve never had that problem.
8
SPEAKER_00
He said initially it was so funny.
8
SPEAKER_00
She said when we when I first got in shape and we would have sex, she was like, it kind of feels like fucking the corner of a building.
8
SPEAKER_00
I was, you know, everything like hard.
8
SPEAKER_00
But every now and then still, if I like take my shirt off, she ll just be like, Jesus Christ.
8
SPEAKER_00
She knows me a certain way.
8
SPEAKER_00
And so to see just me just look differently, look different.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s still surprising to her.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s so interesting because, you know, we re interviewing, we re talking today and you re the exact same person.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s just interesting to be married to someone who does a physical transformation like that.
8
SPEAKER_01
So you physically, you re looking at a different person.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I guess it s a real turn on.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m, you know, I may, I m going to,
8
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying I m going to get like you are, but I m going to double down.
8
SPEAKER_00
Well, Emily seeing me and doing this about a year and a half ago, started weight training herself.
8
SPEAKER_00
And it s completely changed.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s completely changed her body and how she feels about her body.
8
SPEAKER_00
Like she s got like muscles now.
8
SPEAKER_00
She s got biceps and stuff.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s really interesting.
8
SPEAKER_00
And she sees what I get out of it.
8
SPEAKER_00
I get a lot out of just the working, the process of working out specifically.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s helped me with my anxiety.
8
SPEAKER_00
Obviously, you know, we re comics, I assume we all have anxiety.
8
SPEAKER_00
For me, anxiety is something that always requires management.
8
SPEAKER_00
Working out helps with that.
8
SPEAKER_00
I sleep- Incredible.
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_02
Sleep better?
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_00
So, all that sleeping has always been an issue for me and now I sleep better.
8
SPEAKER_00
Obviously, it s still hard sometimes.
8
SPEAKER_00
You know, I didn t sleep well last night, but- Hard to shut your mind off kind of thing?
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you look like shit.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you lay in bed, you think about all the things that could have been and all the things you re gonna fall back to in the future.
8
SPEAKER_00
All the regrets.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_02
All right, Dan, I think we have to let him go because... Oh, we have another one coming up.
8
SPEAKER_00
No, he s being very cool.
8
SPEAKER_00
You guys are so great.
8
SPEAKER_00
I m such a fan of both of you and this was such a thrill for me to do.
8
SPEAKER_00
Thank you for having me on.
8
SPEAKER_01
It was an absolute pleasure.
8
SPEAKER_01
I just enjoyed it as a conversation and the way it bounced around was great.
8
SPEAKER_02
You re a very honest, authentic, down to earth dude.
8
SPEAKER_02
I think it s very fun talking to you.
8
SPEAKER_02
I don t know you at all.
8
SPEAKER_02
It s great to sit here and
8
SPEAKER_02
This is a great hour with you, and we really appreciate it.
8
SPEAKER_02
It s gonna be, people are gonna love to hear from you.
8
SPEAKER_02
They heard from you part of it, right?
8
SPEAKER_02
It was mostly me and Dana, but it stayed with me.
8
SPEAKER_00
No, but I think that that s, I m sorry.
8
SPEAKER_00
I m just a fan, so that was really interesting to me.
8
SPEAKER_00
So thank you for sharing those stories as well.
8
SPEAKER_01
Well, we love people asking us questions, because we re fundamentally flawed.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, for interviewers, we both have narcissistic tendencies.
8
SPEAKER_01
So when you started saying, hey, Dana, what about this?
8
SPEAKER_01
You know, my brain lit up.
8
SPEAKER_01
I got an endorphin rush.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s more like dinner.
8
SPEAKER_02
We all just talk and everyone talks.
8
SPEAKER_02
It s not just a hard interview.
8
SPEAKER_02
It s not 60 minutes, you know.
8
SPEAKER_01
But I think our view, people who don t know you or they know about you, this will be a fun conversation for them to listen to.
8
SPEAKER_01
For sure.
8
SPEAKER_01
You know, especially ending on the high libido thing.
8
SPEAKER_01
Two people are in their forties, really fit, having a lot of sex.
8
SPEAKER_00
Talking about their wives fucking sides of buildings.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I want some.
8
SPEAKER_01
My wife said, I feel like I m fucking a delicatessen.
8
SPEAKER_00
How?
8
SPEAKER_00
How, honey?
8
SPEAKER_00
The deli meat section?
8
SPEAKER_01
No, she listens to this podcast.
8
SPEAKER_01
She ll be laughing.
8
SPEAKER_00
All right.
8
SPEAKER_00
Sorry, honey.
8
SPEAKER_00
Thanks, guys.
8
SPEAKER_00
Thank you.
8
SPEAKER_00
Thank you, buddy.
8
SPEAKER_01
Take care.
8
SPEAKER_02
Talk to you later.
8
SPEAKER_02
Awkward.
8
SPEAKER_02
Leave.
8
SPEAKER_02
Hey, what s up, flies?
8
SPEAKER_02
What s up, fleas?
8
SPEAKER_02
What s up, people that listen?
8
SPEAKER_02
We wanna hear from you and your dumb questions.
8
SPEAKER_02
Questions, ask us anything.
8
SPEAKER_02
Anything you want.
8
SPEAKER_02
You can email us at flyonthewallatcadence13.com.
8
SPEAKER_01
Oh, we have questions.
8
SPEAKER_01
Joseph.
8
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
8
SPEAKER_01
I like when he calls... My nickname now from Joseph... Botino.
8
SPEAKER_01
Botino.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m going to think it s Botino.
8
SPEAKER_01
It says Hans and Spudly.
8
SPEAKER_02
So I m Hans, Hans and Franz, and you re Spudly from... From Dennis Miller.
8
SPEAKER_02
Spudly.
8
SPEAKER_02
Okay, I heard a rumor that Lorne insisted... This is a good question.
8
SPEAKER_02
Lorne insisted that his movie posters be set against a background of blue
8
SPEAKER_02
Sky and white clouds, never would have thought of that in a million years.
8
SPEAKER_02
Tommy Boy, Black Sheep, both Wayne s World, Coneheads, Ladies Man, Superstar, all do this.
8
SPEAKER_02
Is it true?
8
SPEAKER_02
I guess it s true if you just said it.
8
SPEAKER_02
And did he explain himself?
8
SPEAKER_02
I would never think that.
8
SPEAKER_01
I never put that together.
8
SPEAKER_02
That must be a trick, Joseph.
8
SPEAKER_02
It must be some sort of testing that says that makes you happy.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s a psychological thing for the audience that the box office will go sky high.
8
SPEAKER_01
So you have a sky background.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s all I could think of.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m still not sure this is true.
8
SPEAKER_01
Joseph, is this a trick question?
8
SPEAKER_01
Let s look at a clip.
8
SPEAKER_01
Let s call Lorne.
8
SPEAKER_01
Hello?
8
SPEAKER_01
Who s this?
8
SPEAKER_01
Guys, we buried the clouds.
8
SPEAKER_02
Dana, you re cutting out.
8
SPEAKER_02
This better be important.
8
SPEAKER_02
Lorne, yes, it s about coneheads.
8
SPEAKER_02
What?
8
SPEAKER_01
I m putting on a show this week, yeah, but we need to know about the background of Ladies Man and Superstar.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m going to hang up now, but I love you both.
8
SPEAKER_02
No, I m going to put Marcy out.
8
SPEAKER_01
I ll come on the podcast soon again.
8
SPEAKER_02
Marcy, he s got some questions.
8
SPEAKER_01
So are we answering Joseph Patino s question?
8
SPEAKER_02
That he already knows the answer to?
8
SPEAKER_02
He s asking if Lorne ever explained this.
8
SPEAKER_02
Is it true?
8
SPEAKER_02
No he didn t, but I like this.
8
SPEAKER_02
I think it s a very interesting
8
SPEAKER_02
observation because it might be true.
8
SPEAKER_02
It seems to have helped because I ve heard of all those movies, so that means something worked, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
I have no opinion.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t know if Lorne did it.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t know if the posters look like that.
8
SPEAKER_02
There s some method to the madness.
8
SPEAKER_02
They have to do that for a reason.
8
SPEAKER_01
You know how the word trick goes with question?
8
SPEAKER_01
It s a trick question.
8
SPEAKER_02
You know when we re in, this is the last thing, we re in Readthrough and Schneider, if you go, and a garbage man comes into the scene, played by Ken Amon.
9
SPEAKER_01
and everyone laughs, and Shania goes, trick, trick, laugh, that s not a real laugh, that won t get a laugh on the show.
9
SPEAKER_01
Don t count it.
9
SPEAKER_01
Well, he has to call it out because it s not a, the audience wouldn t know who Kenny Gapmong is.
9
SPEAKER_01
Right, it s a read-through trick that we say some inside joke, and then it gets a big laugh, and he goes, make sure you negate that.
9
SPEAKER_01
Like, don t count on that on the show.
9
SPEAKER_01
That won t get a laugh.
9
SPEAKER_01
It s furious, flips over his pizza.
9
SPEAKER_01
One slice, flip.
9
SPEAKER_01
All right, that s it.
9
SPEAKER_01
Thank you for the question, and keep them coming.
9
SPEAKER_01
This has been a podcast presentation of Cadence 13.
9
SPEAKER_01
Please listen, then rate, review, and follow all episodes.
9
SPEAKER_01
Available now for free wherever you get your podcast.
9
SPEAKER_00
No joke, folks.
9
SPEAKER_00
Fly on the Wall has been a presentation of Cadence 13, executive produced by Dana Carvey and David Spade, Chris Corcoran of Cadence 13, and Charlie Finan of Brillstein Entertainment.
9
SPEAKER_01
The show s lead producer is Greg Holtzman, with production and engineering support from Serena Regan and Chris Basil of Cadence 13.