Breaking Bread with Tom Papa - Episode 210 - Craig Ferguson

Episode Date: May 28, 2024

Craig Ferguson joins the table to regale his 'Late Late Show' hosting days, growing up in Scotland and the future of comedy. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- About Craig: Craig Ferguson is a Scottish-American comedian, actor, writer, and television host. He is best known for hosting the CBS late-night talk show The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (2005–2014), for which he won a Peabody Award for his interview with South African archbishop Desmond Tutu in 2009. After leaving The Late Late Show in December 2014, he hosted the syndicated game show Celebrity Name Game (2014–2017), for which he won two Daytime Emmy Awards, and Join or Die with Craig Ferguson (2016) on History.[2] In 2017, he released a six-episode web show with his wife, Megan Wallace Cunningham, titled Couple Thinkers.[3][4] In 2021, he hosted The Hustler, television game show that aired on ABC from 4 January to 23 September 2021. After starting his career in the UK with music, comedy, and theatre, Ferguson moved to the US, where he appeared in the role of Nigel Wick on the ABC sitcom The Drew Carey Show (1996–2004). Ferguson has written three books: Between the Bridge and the River, a novel; American on Purpose (2009), a memoir; and Riding the Elephant: A Memoir of Altercations, Humiliations, Hallucinations & Observations (2019). He holds both British and American citizenship. About Tom: Tom Papa, a celebrated stand-up comedian with over 20 years in the industry, has made significant strides in film, television, radio, podcasts, and live performances. Notably, he's a regular on "The Joe Rogan Experience" and various late-night TV shows. Papa's literary skills are evident in his books “We’re All In This Together” and "You’re Doing Great!: And Other Reasons To Stay Alive," a collection of essays, and "Your Dad Stole My Rake: And Other Family Dilemmas," a comedic look at family life. His latest stand-up specials are “Tom Papa: What A Day!” and "Tom Papa: You’re Doing Great!" on Netflix. Beyond comedy, Papa's engagements extend to hosting "What A Joke With Papa And Fortune" on SiriusXM and appearing on NPR's "Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me." His love for baking led to hosting the Food Network series "Baked." As an actor, he's worked with notable figures like Rob Zombie and Steven Soderbergh and has appeared in several films and TV shows, including the HBO film "Behind the Candelabra." Additionally, Papa has contributed as a writer to projects like "Bee Movie" and various TV series. Residing in Los Angeles with his family, Papa continues to balance his professional life with personal interests like baking. Get in touch with or go see Tom live on stage! Radio, Podcasts and more: https://linktr.ee/tompapa/ Website - http://tompapa.com/ Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/tompapa Twitter - https://www.twitter.com/tompapa Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/comediantompapa #TomPapa #breakingbreadwithTomPapa Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hey! Don't you know? Hey! It's also a show. Hey! I feel like because your wife adores me Yeah. That maybe there's going to be a limit to our friendship.

No, no, no. No, that's nothing to do with it. No, the real reason is that I don't hang out with anybody. Like, Joe will tell you that. I mean, Joe and I have worked together for at least, what, 10 years more. No, more. if you go back to Late Late Show, we're looking at like 15 years. 15 years, yeah, but we don't hang out.

I mean, we hang out a little, a little bit. Yeah. But we don't, like, I would never call Joe up and say, hey, what's going on? I've been waiting for that call for 15 years. It's not going to happen, Joe. I don't call anybody off and say, hey, what's going on. I am, I swear, and this is why I struggle with the new kind of community of stand-ups, where stand-up comedians, like particularly younger ones,

are in this kind of collegiate environment, and they kind of, like, they're nice to each other and stuff, and they're friends and hang out. It's not why I go into it. I feel really antisocial. I was at the Comedy Star last night, and this is how I roll. I came in at a 9-15 spot.

I got there at 9, watched the first, the guy right before me, got up, did my thing, walked off stage, down the steps, into my car, and out of the parking lot. James Bondex. And I really have that thing of like, should I be hanging out more? Do I, am I antisocial?

No, you shouldn't. You shouldn't be hanging out more. You should be true to who you are. And I'm tired of this fucking relentless positivity about people who are positive. And those of us who have negative personalities have to pretend that we're not in order to be positive. And I'm like, you know what? I don't feel so fucking good a lot of the time. And that's why I do stand-up comedy.

The idea, like, that people would say, I would like a career in stand-up comedy. I'm like, that's insane to me. I do this because I failed everything else. I know. I know, exactly, that this would be a rational choice to... Well, I think it is now, though. Yeah, yeah. I think because I think actually the younger people are nicer and friendlier and smarter, dare I say, than us.

Yeah. Then am I making you the same age as me because you probably know? I'm older than you. Yeah, but not by much. But the time this airs, I'll be 62. Wow. 62, man. Wow.

Joe said 65, and I said that was not possible. You know, this is another reason why we don't hang out. Joe and I can never hang out because he's always aging me by a good three years. He looks so much younger, though. That's how I win him back every time. I mean, it's like, thanks, Joe. And it works every time. But there has to be a slight annoyance that your wife is a fan of my comedy,

because anyone that my wife likes, I don't, I'd like them a little less. You know, I've got to be honest, I don't feel threatened by it, and I'll tell you for why. Because I'm also a huge fan of your comedy. So I feel for us it's kind of a shared thing. Okay. And in a weird, creepy way, we will, like, watch you together. I like that. So it's not, no, I am also a fan of yours.

Okay. So it's not like, I don't like you and she does. Okay. I like you. I mean, I don't, look, I'll be honest with you, Tom. I don't know if she's attracted to you sexually, but she might be. She might be. I feel like, I feel like, and this is no offense to her, but who cares?

Why? Married and old. Well, she's a ready to go, she's ready to go one of those. She's ready to go, married and old. She doesn't need another married girl. Yeah, exactly. That whole part of life. That demographic is covered.

It's fine. Funny. I love this. Can I say, by the way, the Kianti in the basket is so beautiful. I know. It has a 1970s. Everything about it says 1970s. And I love that.

I know. And it's amazing that there's this place kind of, near your studio. What was it called? Micelli's maybe? Where they would, I don't know if they still do it, but they would,

if you bought a bottle of wine, they would ask you to sign the straw when you were done and hang them from the ceiling. So the whole place. That's a fire hazard. It's just filled. It's a terrible firehouse. It's probably why it's not there.

But, you know, I haven't drunk wine since it came in bottles like this. Right. That's how long has been. It's not a trigger. Well, we'll find out. I don't think so. I'm going to put it over here.

Yeah, maybe just put it over there just in case I go crazy. I break it open and start drinking on your point. Let me tell you something. If I'm going to start drinking on a podcast, it'll be my podcast. Because I need those numbers up if I'm drinking. I baked you this bread. Thank you so much. And I'm not sure if you're in a hotel or what you're doing while you're out here.

I've been in a hotel and I'm going to another hotel, but I'm flying home on Sunday. On Sunday. Will it keep for a couple of days and then make a transatlantic journey? No. Okay. It won't make it. But I bake this yesterday and it's a little denser. It's a little denser.

Yeah. But it looks so beautiful. It's lovely, yeah. But then I brought you another loaf from my friends at Lodge Bread as a backup that you could. I do need a backup loaf. This is lovely. And it's lovely. It takes away the smell of former porn studio as well.

Tell me about Scottish food. Tell me about who cooked for you when you were little. When I was little, my mother was the cook in our house. Now, my mother is no longer alive and neither is my father. So I'm going to tell you the truth about my mother's cooking. My mother couldn't cook for shit. She was a terrible, she was a terrible, she was a terrible, She was a great baker.

Oh, she was? Yeah, it was interesting. She could make great, you know, fairy cakes, she used to call them, and little angel cakes. Fairy and angel cakes. It was all quasi-religious baked goods all the time. And the angel cakes said they would, she would make these little cupcakey things and cut the top off,

then put cream in and put little wings on them. Whoa. With the bit she'd call it. It's beautiful. Sounds delightful. And fairy cakes, and she was a great baker, really good at it. But for actual day-to-day food, not her thing. But she was feeding you.

She was feeding us, yeah, well, clearly. I mean, we, and Scotland at the time, I mean, I grew up, we were, we weren't, I didn't grew up in a wealthy family, and Scotland at the time was very different to the way it was when I grew up. Scotland now is widely diverse and, you know, very cosmopolitan and, well, to a degree, you know. But in the 19, late, I was born in 1962. So in the late 60s, early 70s, it's just my memory kind of begins then. It was not, like the fanciest thing you would ever see in your life would maybe be a bottle of kianti in a basket.

Right. It was mostly egg and chips. On Sunday, we used to have a chicken because that was the day we had chicken. And the rest of the time, it was. It was fairly basic fare, I remember. But it was before mass-produced foods, really. Right. So it became local.

Realized now it was probably pretty good. Yeah. And here's the thing. Everyone in my family is tall. Uh-huh. And they never used to be. And this is my theory about food. My dad knew a guy that worked on the shipyards.

And every week, because of this connection, or every month or so, every few weeks, he would bring home a box of apples and a box of oranges, fresh apples and fresh oranges. And my mother used to put them in the hallway, because we couldn't really afford candy, you know. But we were allowed to just help ourselves, an apple or an orange, any time. And I think that's why all my family are, you know,

that or we are Pritchie giants. I don't know. But everyone's like, everyone's tall. And you think it was because they were eating healthy? Yeah. Yeah. I think we had vitamin.

And no one. to my knowledge and my family has had scurvy. So that's, not recently anyway. It really is kind of insane that we have to think about and listen to podcast and be told by experts that we really should be eating real food. Yeah. That is a weird place to be. There's so much ultra-process stuff.

It's kind of crazy. It's insane. And I get, when I was. a kid, like I can remember the first time I went to a restaurant. It was 16 and it was my grandfather's funeral. So that was, there wasn't really, I mean, it used to go to cafes when we were, and there were a lot of cafes in Scotland. There's a big Italian community in Scotland. Oh, really? In Glasgow, yeah. So there would be cafes. You could always get decent coffee. And a lot of the Italian, a lot of the fish and chip shops were owned by Italians. So you could always get really good fresh fish and ice cream.

ice cream is really good but that's Italian and not really Scottish right Scottish food is I think historically it's mostly

just what you can catch right like whatever it is so some of those are like smoke salmon and you know and like they do venison really well apparently I can't really eat venison but yeah that's a little gamey

it's Bambi You eat Bambi. It's like, it'll give me some Bambi and thumpur and some fries. I can eat fucking Bambi. That's terrible. My brother-in-law lives in New Jersey or New York now. And they have land.

They have like, you know, moved into. Oh, you mean New York State? Yeah. And they have land. And he just started getting into hunting. And my wife is a vegetarian and a delightful person and very caring. And we went to visit their new house. And we're looking at the house.

this land is like, oh, there's probably a lot of animals. And he said, yeah, you know, there's deer that come right at the edge right there. And my wife was like, oh, that's so nice. He goes, yeah, I think I'm going to keep a gun in the bathroom because I could actually get them right from the house. I don't understand the impulse. You know what I mean? I know. I'm fair.

I mean, I'm sanguine about people having guns, but I don't understand the impulse to kill an animal. I need it. Maybe if I got hungry enough, I'm sure if I got hungry enough. But I've never But hunger to me, it was like I was talking to a friend of mine A couple of days ago who was, he used to be quite heavy And he's lost a lot of weight and I said, did you take the Ozympic? And he said, yes, I did. I said, what does it do?

He said, it just takes away your appetite. Yeah. And I said, well, so? He said, well, and so you're not hungry? And I said, I don't eat because I'm hungry. I haven't been hungry since 1974. I eat because I'm sad. I'm full of anxiety. Yeah.

But eating for hunger, I don't know if, I mean, I can pretend I'm hungry, but how long is it since I had food? Is it really hungry? I don't know. Look at me. Look, I look hungry. You look great. I don't think I look hungry, though. Do you work out?

I kind of have to. now. Yeah. I'm 62. If I don't work out, it's... Really? It's fast. Fast to fat or fast to crazy town?

Fast to just... Fast to fat and crazy town. Yeah. My tendency is to gain weight very quickly. Uh-huh. So I have to... Were you always that way? Yeah, yeah.

When you were on the show, when you had your... Oh, that drives me so mad, like, late night. Like, I was doing it. I worried about my weight and my accent, and then, boom, they hire James Corden when I like... It's the fact. guy with an accent. Were you worried about your accent at the time?

I thought about it a little at the beginning. Towards the end, I didn't care about it. Or towards the last nine years. It's interesting because it was, it really is so funny. We all carry our own things, our own insecurities. But watching from the outside, to me it always seemed like this must be so cool to be one step outside of this country in its culture. Right.

It's got to be so cool. cool to be just sitting back and being like a little bit more of an observer, a little bit removed. Like to me, it seemed like the coolest thing ever that you had that accent. And you're there like thinking, do I have too much of an accent? Well, I kind of, I think what happened in the course of being on that show, I became an American citizen. And I also, I immersed myself completely in being in America. I'm completely identifies an American now. I'm an American. Absolutely. and I, you know, and I, like, it's funny, I'm reading, have you read Gorvidal's biography of Aaron Burr?

Yes, I did read that. So good. Spectacular book. But of course, deals with a lot of the input of my people and, you know, and Irish people. And, of course, half of my family are Irish anyway. So, and the kind of how bad we all are. Anger. It's like bad, the vengeance.

You know, and like, but also some good, but also some very, very bad. And, but how American we are. Right. You know, part of the American story for Good or ill is the input of the Scots and the Irish, which is what I am. And, and that's, that's how I identify now. It's how I think of myself as an American. What is, is there a mental shift? Like, do you know, like, when you say you identify as an American, what,

What mentally does that mean? I feel like the, like the, where I am philosophic, like when I'm in Scotland, I feel more of an outsider than when I'm in America. Like I feel like, I feel like here I fit in and I feel there I don't. But that could be just being Scottish because being Scottish, I think everybody probably feels like they don't fit in. Right. Maybe part of being Scottish.

Or being the type of. person that becomes a comedian that I don't belong to anything. Like, when you talked about the comedy store, I've never been in there. Really? Never been in? Really? Yeah. We should go. No, I don't think I should. Why not? What the fuck would I do? Get up on stage and school. Why? I do that for work. It's still work. Yeah, well, but yeah, so I work for, do they pay you? I, I don't know. No, I'm not really sure. No, I mean, look, I do it because I love to do it and I, it's how I myself, but it is my job and also I can't imagine like

if I was a painter. In fact, I had a friend of mine who was a painter, a very good painter. He's dead now sadly, like most successful painters. But he was very popular in New York in the 1980s and we were in a restaurant, one of the Café Desartiste where you draw things on the table.

And I said, you should draw something? He went, oh no. Why is it? Oh, no, no, no, no, no. That's not how it's done. It's kind of like, I kind of feel a little bit like that. I feel, I know what you're saying, but the reason I like it is that I like, I don't like, I feel like I have to make myself go into places where maybe a lot of the people don't know me

and I have to try and still make them laugh. Like you can end up, your audience comes to see you all the time. And it's a nice space. Right. I like to walk into... Well, they don't know you? Yeah, like 18-year-olds who are making out and looking at you like, who the hell are you? No, I have no desire to do that at all.

You don't like pain? Well, I feel like I did it. I mean, I did plenty of years of people going, who the fuck are you? When I started, there wasn't even comedy clubs. Right. There wasn't a comedy club. It wasn't like, I know your next comedian or welcome your head. liner or it. There's none of that shit.

They would stop playing. It would be music clubs in Glasgow and they would say that somebody would come on a microphone from behind a desk, a DJ desk and say, the next band will be on in 15 minutes but first here's a cunt that thinks he's funny. And that would be it.

That would be my 10 minutes. So I feel like I put it in that time and I don't. It's not that I object to not be known. Look, it's fine, but to seek it out, no. No.

Yeah, I feel like, I don't know. I feel like it just keeps me in check a little bit. Yeah, well, what do you want to keep yourself in check for? I mean, it's like that thing you do in the act, like people, I've heard you do it. It's a great bit when you say, oh, you're 10 pounds heavier, you're 15 pounds heavier. So let me just turn it around me. So you're fucking crazy and neurotic. You're a stand-up comedian.

You're crazy. It's not a non-crown. crazy job. No, it is. It's like, it's not like, wow, like people see this all the time about, when I was doing late night, ever met someone super fancy, super famous, you know, and people would always say, were they nice? And I would say, well, I don't know. Sometimes they were polite, but were they nice, I don't know. And anyway, why does that matter? Right. You know, it's like, you met Picasso? Yeah, was he nice? What does the fucking matter? I don't know. I mean, but Niceness seems to be the real currency of the land.

Yeah. It is a weird, it is a weird first question all the time. Yeah. What are they like? Are they nice? Would they like me? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Would they like me? No, they don't like anybody. Yeah, they're really weird. Yeah, they're very, very, it's the thing that I, I made this mistake about Tom Cruise. Mm-hmm. I used to, like, I did bits about Tom Cruise and the act when he jumped on Oprah's couch and all that. I made fun of them, and I regret that. We need Tom Cruise.

We need Tom Cruise to jump on Oprah's couch. We need it because we need them to make those movies, because those movies are great. They're not just, oh, did you like it? I don't care who you are. That is a great movie. That top gun second movie, I don't even fucking know where to start

with how great a movie that is. And who can do that? Who's got the fucking cahones to spend that amount of money? And then COVID comes along, and they say, oh, just stream it. And Tom's like, no. I know.

Well, wait until the movie theater's open. And he saves the movie business? I'm going to save the movie business. Yeah. And, like, no, I regret saying that Tom was crazy. Like, that's negative. I still think he's crazy. Yeah.

But I think it's awesome. There is a weird, I agree with Tom Cruise 100%. There is a weird thing. And you must know this more than most. The talk show host to the guest thing is, it's amazing how the old shows have been held up like, look at Dave talking to this young girl and flirting with her. Look at how they're making fun of Britney Spears.

Look at how they're, like it really, it's kind of gone through this filter. Right. And I don't know if it's, I mean, it seems so, you know, part of it is being caught up in the, we're trying to check everything. Right. But as a host, if you're there with this beautiful,

actress who's dressed to let everyone know how beautiful they are. Right. To not comment or flirt or have that moment. Well, I would flirt with anyone, male or female. I mean, I wouldn't, because it's, it's artifice. Right. It's a show. Right.

You know, so it's, yeah, we're doing a bit. Yeah, yeah, it's a bit. Yeah. So I don't feel like it's, but through the lens of now, I don't know. I mean, things are different. Like, I remember doing the late night show and I would, like,

I would tear up the cards for the interview. I would not do the monologue. I would, you know, do something else. I would talk about it. But I think because everything is a little more precarious, and I mean more for the guests, really. Like a publicist would say, we can't do that because we don't know

how the conversation is going to go, and that's too dangerous for my client X, whoever it is. And I think it would be difficult to get guests on a show the way I used to do it. Right. I don't know. I'm not going to do it again, but it would. But it's interesting because then now we have the submergence of these kind of shows.

Right. Where the audience wants you to talk deeper and longer and be more revealing. But the audience chooses it. Right. Like broadcast television is like, you know, You fell asleep when Dave was on, and then you woke up and I was on. Right. And so I would get whatever was lying around.

But you're, this show is a show of your volition. I'm going to, you know, who's on Tom's podcast? Oh, Craig Fries and I fucking hate him, so I'll wait until the next one. Or I like him and I'll listen to, you know, whatever it is. But you find, you find your stuff now. It's not, broadcast isn't really, I don't think it's really impossible unless it's a, like the Super Bowl or something. Yeah. And then it's broadcast to everyone.

But a broad, like literally a broadcast of entertainment, I don't, I think that's probably redundant now as an idea. Yeah. The thing it really stuck with me when we spoke last was how you were talking about the late-night gig for Americans who grew up as kids watching and trying to get those gigs. Right.

was like a lifelong sentence. It was like you got that game and you would never leave it. And for you, it was like coming from the outside. It was like, no, this is a gig. And I don't have to do it forever. And after a certain amount of time, I'm going to go do the next thing I'm going to do. And it was such like, it really is this mental shift.

Oh, I know. It was like I had committed some kind of blasphemy. When I was like, you know, and no one ever believes it. Right. You know, it's like, nah, I'm done. It's like, I was 10 years. a long time for me to do anything. Yeah.

And they, uh, feel like, oh, oh. Yeah. Yeah. Whatever. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. You must be sick. You got fired. I go, sure. Do you feel like it's been a, creatively, a cool move for you?

Like, do you feel since you are freed up from the daily doing the show, like, creatively? yes I think it is I don't know if I've created anything that I thought I couldn't

no you know what I wrote a book after late night and I don't think I would have written that book while I was doing it right and I've done a couple of things where I mean I've done shows like game shows and stuff like that was like creative I guess but yeah but there's a couple of things I've done I thought and I am writing a book right now

which is taken forever. Oh, yeah. And Peter Cook used to say, is I tell you that? Whenever Peter Cook used to say, when someone said they were writing a book, he would always say, neither am I.

But creatively, yes, I think it, I was done doing that. So I think yes, I think probably creatively it was a good idea. But I feel like, the great danger that I don't know if you suffer from this but I have this horrible habit like if I begin anything like I start writing a book like it was you know it was a sunny day and you know the flowers were just opening and by the

time I get to the end of the sentence I'm thanking everyone for the award I'm winning for the book that I haven't written yet you know what I mean is like and I'd like to thank you for all being here today and this book has been a struggle and you're welcome now you have to go back to the beginning and write the book again i do have this thing where i became conscious of it a long time ago like really early the same thing that as i'm i'll be writing or writing a joke or writing something longer whatever and uh i start thinking about oh i've got to send this to somebody immediately yeah someone's got to well no A lot of young artists now, they do that,

that they will include their fans or admirers or audience in the process of doing whatever they're making. And I remember, you know Kevin Bacon? Yeah. So I was talking to Kevin. He was doing some, like, pretty serious drama for Amazon. And it was that, I can't remember what it was, but it was pretty intense.

You know, Kevin does some real, you're a proper actor. And he was talking about it and he said, they want me to tweet out about it while I'm doing it. He said, it's really frustrating because my whole job is to try and convince you I'm not fucking care of taking. Right. And then you have to go, oh, it was really sunny the day this happened. And I was so hungry when I was pretending to be a killer.

And, you know, it's like, oh, jeez. I do really admire people who don't do it, who don't participate in it. it really, you can still create that allure of... It's the aspirational position of today's society is to not be connected to social media. Yeah. And I feel like that's, if I have a goal in show business now, is to get that shit out of my fucking life.

I think that social media, and I'm going to be very specific about social media, I'm not talking about phones, not talking about the wonders of the new technology. It's amazing. That shit's incredible. I love it. But social media, unrestricted digital bathroom walls for everyone to write on that has taken over.

And now all media is social media. Yeah. It is possibly the worst thing that's happened to human society in years. Yeah. Like maybe since, oh, I don't know, cholera. It's awful. What is the worst part of it? I think it is the, it is the, the.

what it does, I can only speak for it as it does to me, is it makes me feel paranoid and afraid. And I'm not quite sure why. But it engenders in me, I kind of, ah, ah, and I think it does it to that. I mean, I have children. And I don't, I'm, you know, my older son is very connected to the digital world. He's an animator. He has to be.

And my younger son has very restricted access to it, which he's actually very comfortable with. How old? He's 13. Uh-huh. And I think that, you know, he fights about it a little bit, but not really. I mean, I think it's a relief. Yeah. Because I think, you know that feeling when people say, I'm going to detox from social media?

If you're detoxing for something, that means it's talks. Yeah. If you're toxing, if it's fucking toxic, then it's toxic. Yeah. And I, you know, it is a struggle. I'm not going to deny it. I know. When I found that magnetism, you know, that magazine.

the fine glass thing on Instagram? I was like, I lost two days in my life until I went, whoa! And I had to get rid of it because I was like, oh, airplane landing, oh, cat doing something cute, oh, horrible murder, oh, yeah. That's Pandora's box, man.

I don't think that the human brain is equipped to take in that much, it's too much. It's way too much. And I don't know, maybe other more qualified people can do it, but I can't. And I do believe that the aspirational position is in show business now is not to win an Oscar, but is to not have a fucking social media presence at all.

I still make a living. I know. My pal Matt Damon does not do it. I'm not familiar with that. He's inactive. I love you. If he was a social media, I could directly do his account. Yeah, you can show me.

Is he on Instagram? Because if he's not, I don't. But it's so cool. It really is so much. It's so much better. When do we get to see Matt when he's in a movie? When he decides he wants to show you him. Yeah, if he wants to come on a late night show or something like that.

But it's not going to be every day and this is my wife and my kids and my breakfast and all the rest of it. And see, I've got social media presence in the sense that, you know, hey, everyone, I'm going to be at the Irvine Improv. Right, right. Well, I do that and then I give it to someone and they put it on the account. Yes, I know. That's, yeah, that is a big relief. It's also expensive, but it's kind of worth it, I think. It is worth it. That's the thing as a working comic, it's like, you know, people to know and see

where you're coming. You need people to know where you're going, and if that's how people get to know, that's how they get to know. And so, in one hand, it's very, it's very convenient. But to consume social media? That's the thing. If you're putting it out, that's one thing. But if to all of a sudden, and it really is as strong and intelligent as I think I am at times, walking through my bathroom,

it's stronger than I am. Oh, yeah. Also, it's now used as a source for so-called legitimate media of which there is none. I know. So they'll say, people are really angry about,

well, you know, five people on Reddit or, that's not a fucking poll. I saw as part of a news, like a real newscast. And they said, Bob on X said this. I'm like, who's Bob?

Right. It was just a random, tweet. Just take it out your computer and throw that piece of shit at the toilet wall and keep going. Does it create workplace envy or any of that stuff? Or is it more just the onslaught of... Yeah, I think, well, you mean like if you see other people doing well? Yeah, like we just had the festival. So I had to post a lot for the Netflix as a joke festival. You're posting and this is fun and we're all doing this stuff. but then at a certain point it starts to tip over and it's like well that guy's selling out an arena

and this guy's doing that and all of a sudden these thoughts I don't care I don't have I think that it can do that but then you have to get the scale and I think that social media doesn't give you scale but I think the thought process if you think about things for a little minute it does give you a sense of scale so for example if so a comedian you feel envious about is selling out an arena or a stadium um and then you think, well, who else? What other comedians have sold out stadiums? There's a few of them.

And then you go, do you want that? No, no, I don't want that. And, you know, it's getting stuff in perspective. I think that to be fed your perspective is to rob you of your own perspective. And I know that people think that they can handle social media. And maybe they can. And I'm not saying that, look, a lot of people can handle alcohol and be fine. with it.

Yeah. I can't. Right. And that's just the way it is. Yeah, I agree. There are certain people that stir shit up on social media and they love the vitriol. Sure. And they really do seem to enjoy it.

They get into it. I have no. No thanks. No thank you. No. It's like that, yeah, that's made everyone mad. Why did you do it? You make everyone mad?

But I don't know. I grew up where at the school that I went to and the way that I moved around when I was a kid, You made someone mad. There was, violence was at the end of that. Right. So it became, you don't want to make people mad. Right. You could punch in the face.

Right. So I feel like I held onto that a little bit. Like, I won't make anyone mad. You'll get, it's really, you get hurt. It is a wonder, though, like, if you do go to that little magnifying glass, and you put in some decent things you want to see, and it starts feeding you for the day, you'll just start noticing.

very positive, cute little things. Okay. And you seem like, oh, this is, this is lovely. Social media is a delight. Yeah. And then a little bit. Yeah. A little poison.

I know, I know we've been watching cat videos for an hour, but here's a little murder just in case. You like this murder? I was like, all right, all right. And then you go, and like, I notice now what the, the tabloids, remember there used to be supermarket tabloids, and now there have been.

legitimized because they call them like websites and stuff but it's still the same thing and what they will do now i think this is fascinating they put up headlines that you can't understand so it goes man in shop invents wheel that suddenly hits him and he falls over and people are laughing Palestine and you go what the fuck and you click on it engagement they got you and it's not like you have to read it you don't have to read it they've got what they want they got the click that's it that's all right move on right so So you don't, it's not even, or maybe they suffer from what I suffered from today, which is spell check, which is, somebody texted me and said, what time you get into Tom's podcast? And I wrote, as I was driving, I shouldn't have done it.

It was out of light. I went, I'll be there approximately 1145. And then I look back on it and it's coming in and it said, I'll be there, aromatherapy, 1145. I was like, oh, so I clicked on it. And then they got me. I have the thing on Apple, it's putting an underline under correctly spelled words. And I'm like, why? Why are you doubting my...

Just to fuck with you? Yeah, listen, I believe it. Yeah. I'm like, what are you doing? But I think there's a whole lie about tech as well that, you know, like the tech community and, you know, in northern California and all that. They're just 19th century industrialists. It's the same fucking... impulse. You know, it's not, you know, they're no better than any of the other fucking empire

builders of the door. Yeah, they're, yeah. Yeah, I mean, they're, like, oh, they're, you know, they care about, they don't get a shit about any more than Andrew Carnegie cared about libraries until he saw the grim rea were coming to him. And he's like, you know what, maybe we should have some libraries for everybody. Right, God? Yeah. Well, I didn't do the libraries. You did. That's true. What do you think of AI? I'm a fan. You're a fan. Yeah, because at least it's a robot and you can fuck with it in much more funny way.

I don't feel like it won't get mad at me, so maybe that's why I like it. I downloaded ChatGBT, GBT, a couple of days ago because I'd heard about it, and I was like, you know what, I'm going to look at it. And so I said, I asked it because I thought, oh, this could be great. Write me a short Craig Ferguson routine about giraffes. And I thought, and to see if it can write anything. I wasn't right now, but I thought it's random. him in our of giraffes, we'll see. And then it, I thought,

it wrote a short routine, apparently in my style about giraffes. I thought, man, I really suck. I'm a really fucking terrible comedian. Or my delivery is great. Because the material is shocking. On paper and shit. What's the deal with giraffes, ladies and gentlemen?

And I'm like, what? Did I say that? And then do I say, hey, folks, when giraffes are drinking, they look stupid? And I'm like, do they? I don't even feel like that's true. So I could have, but of course I go into what I would, of course, end up doing as I started asking it about the existence of God. And, you know, and then I realized it's just a search engine. Right. It's just a, so it just goes to, it just, you know, it's kind of disappointing when you go through it. I know.

I mean, maybe it'll, I'm sure it'll change. It's going to be, become more and more sophisticated. But at this point, it's, it's just like going to a Google that types out its reply. I think that's kind of it. Yeah. What I have noticed, though, I was in San Francisco a couple of days ago, and I've noticed it in L.A. now as well, is the driverless taxis, which I presume is an AI thing, right?

Yeah. And that, I think, I'm like, oh, that's kind of creepy. Also, I was at a hotel today, and I was leaving. I came out the elevator, and I bumped into the robot that was cleaning the floor. Oh. What do you mean? It was cleaning the floor. It was a robot, and it was just cleaning the floor, and I was like, oh, my God.

I was like, sorry, I guess. I saw it in the airport. There was something going through. Watching the human reaction of everybody like, whoa, looking at each other. Yeah, no, like, oh, there's a robot. Wait until you see the autopilot in your plane. You're going to shit your pants. But it's, I think that, like, I mean, I don't know if you remember this.

I've been here for years, like maybe 40 years. That, you know, it's going to be driverless cars in five years. Yeah. But now I've seen some. So maybe it will happen. Maybe it... And, you know, things change and that's all right. Grandpa will get over it and then he'll die.

You know what I mean? That's the way it is. Yeah. But it's a weird thing, though, you see people who seem to be in the know about it. Mm. And they seem to have a... No, this is...

It's begun. Yeah. It's happening. Yeah. And get ready. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah, that's fear, though.

That's the fear industrial complex. That's so you'll click. It's like, it's really, really bad. Well, here's the thing. Look at some history. It's always been really, really fucking bad. Look at Gore Vidal's biography of Burr. Look at the election, like,

maybe the second election in the United States of America, and they're like, this whole fucking place is going up. Yeah. In every election sense, this is the fucking one. I know. This is the one. and maybe one day they'll be right you know i know i was i was cheerleading for my sister the other day oh yeah she was she was she was uh she was just down

about the world she oh we got some good news in the family oh and it was like i was like oh this is great right and she said yeah so we got some good news in this in this horrible world and she's not that kid she's not that pessimistic and i was like what do you mean this horrible world What do you mean? I said, we just got this great news. You have this great business. We have this great family.

You're doing all these things. He goes, yeah, but things are so bad out there. I'm like, they've always been bad. Also, it's kind of, like, here's an example. San Francisco, you look at social media, type San Francisco on at social media and you'll, unbelievable, right?

Go to San Francisco. Yep. It's exactly the same as it always was. I know. It's exactly the same. I know. In fact, if anything, kind of a little.

bit. Maybe. Kind of a little better. And I was like, wow, I'm kind of shocked. I had that lesson when during the end, the beginning of the pandemic that first summer. Yeah. When Portland on was on fire. It was like there was, they were rolling skulls through the streets.

It was brutal. And I had a gig. I was like, I booked going to Helium Comedy Club. There were 10 people allowed in the club. But really, I went out. I was like, I'm going to go. I just, I have to go. And my daughter was going to come with me.

and we're looking at CNN. It was like, we're going there. We're going to Portland. Trump is talking about how it's a failed city and things are on fire. And I'm like, we've got to go. Let's just go. We have the show.

People are coming. And we get off the plane within 15 minutes. We're at this taco truck, food truck, and the sun shining. And all these lovely Portlandites are like hanging around. Fred Armiston is there through the bed. And yeah, there was shit going on in this one block downtown where the cameras were, and the rest was life.

It was just life. Yeah. And if you had digested everything that CNN was giving you, you would never have gotten on the plane. You'd go crazy. Yeah. That's the, it's one of the things I, you know, I went back and I lived in the UK for a while. And I've since moved back. But I would watch these documentaries in, like, British reputable stuff by reputable

journalists. And they'll say shit like, you know, the thing about Americans is that, and I'm going, Which ones? Which fucking ones are we talking? They talk about it like it's a small town just outside of Birmingham. You know, it's like, it's like, aren't Americans loonies? We go, well, not all of them. You know, and yes, some of them, but look at, you know, it has this, it's this odd thing,

but they will say things like, you know, people, I remember when I lived in Malibu and people would say, oh, you're keeping clear of the fires. You know, I'd be like, I don't know what you're talking about. Apparently there was fires up the coast. I mean, I saw two fires in California when I was here. I'm not saying they didn't happen. They did, but it's a big stay. It's a big place.

It's always like whenever my mother would call about something happening in New York when I lived in New York, it'd be like, that transformer blew. I was like, it's four blocks away. Do you understand how much life is between me and four blocks away? I was recently moved by. to New York within the last year. Oh, really? Yeah, and I was talking to someone in a store, and they didn't have what I wanted, and they said, we've got it in our other store in 34th Street. I'm like, I don't go below 79th Street. What the hell is wrong with you? And they said, I know.

I know, I don't even know why I said it. I guess we could go. I'll get a hotel. Midtown, are you fucking nuts? I'm not going midtown. Why did you come back to New York? I missed it. Yeah. I missed America. I missed the, I'm an American. I feel. I'm an American. I feel more comfortable here for all of its problems. Yeah. And I don't think anyone on earth, even the most resoundingly patriotic America, and wouldn't say that America didn't have problems, but it's where I belong. For better or worse, it's where I belong.

It's where I fit because kind of nobody fits. So I kind of think, oh, I fit in the place where there's a lot of different ways to fit in, I guess, in America. Right. Especially in New York. Especially in New York. Yeah. And New York belongs to the world, I think.

It does. 100%. It's sensational, city. Yeah. It's, it really is the best. I mean, and it's got a lot of problems. Yeah. Yeah.

But it's amazing. I was talking with, we had Barbara Corcoran on from a shark tank, and she built up this giant real estate empire. And she was going through her story of starting out real estate in New York. And how at the time, the Upper West Side was not even consistent. considered livable. Yeah, I think I can remember that. It was like, why would you even try and sell an apartment on the Upper West Side?

I know, and now it's like the Paris. Yeah. It's crazy. The best. But it's a changing, there's a guy called George Hahn. When I was on social media, I used to follow. He's a guy that lives in the Upper West Side. He's kind of comedian and he's a funny guy.

And he does these little New York Minute things. and he's fantastic. Yeah, you should, if you're still, if you're going to stay on social media, I don't follow him because he does, he's like angry,

but very funny bits about New York, very intelligent little pieces about New York. Yeah, yeah. I mean, look, we were there in like 2010 to like 14, and my kids were little,

and then we left and came to L.A. and did all the stuff, and then they went back, and I had to tell them, that moment when we were in New York and you kids were running up the subway platform and it was a it was an illusion. It was this golden moment of New York that didn't exist before and probably won't after. Right. This was very, keep your head on a swivel.

Yeah. Stuff is real. But life is like that. Yeah. It keeps moving. It keeps changing. And I think the difficulty is that, you know, especially as you get older, the challenges. is to not look in the rear of your mirror and think everything's great

and not look where you're going. Wasn't it better then? You go, well, was it? I don't know. Like, I grew up in Scotland in 1970s. I will unequivocally say that fucking suck. What was it like? Just terrible.

Yeah. You know, if the high point your day is getting an orange. You know, it's like, okay. It wasn't, I didn't love it. Did you have your sights on America at that time? Always. Always. Always.

From as far back as I can remember, rock and roll. I started hearing rock and roll. I was like, who makes this noise? You know? And then... Who were the first? I would like Elvis.

Elvis. And my parents listened to Johnny Cash album. Oh, wow. It's obviously not rock and roll, but it kind of is. America. And it's, yeah. And Johnny Cash, we knew that Johnny Cash's background was Scottish.

So they would listen to Johnny Cash, even though I was a little kid. Yeah. It was this fucking singing God. And they said, oh, you know, his family are from Scotland. I was like, what? And so I was like, so you can go there? So that gets in early.

And then when I was seven years old, it was one of my earliest memories, we were allowed to stay up and watch the moon landing. And I watched the moon landing. I was like, what the fuck is this? Who's doing that? nobody from my school was landing on the fucking moon. And so it was this... It was American cultural imperialism, and I'm a victim of it.

But in a way, yes, the way, no, because my people are part of it, you know? And then I had a conversation later on. The reality start coming in. I remember having a conversation with Cornell West, years later, about these American impulses when I was young. And he said, there's something which I'll never forget. He said, black people have never had the luxury of believing in American innocence.

And I was like, oh, okay, so there is, of course, you know, but if you only see your lane, you don't see everybody's lane, and then you kind of have to open up to more experiences of different ways Americans come to being. And it's not all good. No, 100%. I do feel like, I do get frustrated. with the All-America is shit. It's not.

I really, I think that's what's great about America is the acknowledgement of... There's shit here. Yeah, the acknowledgement of how bad and let's, like, I don't see other cultures aggressively trying to correct and trying to move forward and trying to... Because they're not, they don't have what we have. I mean, they're kind of getting to know a little bit. they don't have a country built entirely on other countries. You know,

it's like, it's like, blah, blah, and suddenly, and you know, and it's like the, the way it was,

you know, put together at the beginning. It was, you know, people from my background and Ireland and England and, you know, and making it that way for them. But,

you know, it's got to change and it has to change, but America does fucking change. And I think that's what's important about it. Yeah. And also, fuck them. You know what I mean?

It's like we're Americans. Fuck them. You know, it's, it's when they, I fucking hate those British documentaries. Then they go, you see, Americans are such loonies. Look at this man with a hat that says, who farted on it.

I'm like, that's one fucking guy. One guy. And I agree he's an idiot. But also he's awesome. Also, he's living his life. Do you know what one of the things was, have you seen, have you watched The Righteous Gemstones? Yeah.

I'm like, that's a, Danny McBride, I love his work. And that particular show, I just, like, nailed it. Sistine Chapples. That's the one. Because these are awful people,

but they're also awesome people. And they're also, they're terrible, but they're not really. And they're human and they're sometimes quite ugly in their behavior and appearance. But also, yeah. I know.

I know. I really checked myself in the airport, whispers of them, tired and cranky. Yeah. And you're like, what's going on with these people? Yeah. And then you stop and you're like, you see a guy in his flip-flops and his belly's hanging out.

And he's, it's 7 o'clock and he's got a bloody Mary in his hand. And yeah, you could be like, get it together, man. I'm that guy. You can get it, yeah, get it together. But then you're like, you know what? Good for you. Exactly. Exactly.

This is hard. Being a person is hard. Sometimes. And you're doing what you got to do to kind of get through and do what you, God bless. I mean, the people that, the people that kind of bother me, either in the kind of tactile real world

or the digital world, are the ones that sit in rampant judgment of other people with minimal information. Yeah. And I really try as I get older not to do that. Now, I'm not saying I don't do it. I know. You know, I mean, like, in fact, on the way here,

I was talking to my wife on the phone. There was a woman in front of me. smoking a cigarette out of the window of her car and driving and on the phone at the same time, and I could see her, and she was driving very badly. And I'm afraid I categorized her. Well, here's the thing, and this has been on my mind because you mentioned it early on. There is that, you said, like, well, that's what being a comedian is, if you're not angry and neurotic and all of that.

Is there a danger in becoming evolved? and more accepting of people and trying to put yourself in other people's shoes of eliminating a part of a part of your comedian head. Like there was a time I made horrible jokes about people on the bus

of horrible pictures about people's disgusting attitudes on airplanes, disgusting habits of people. And then you get into this kinder head and you're like, well, God bless those people on the bus. And God, you know, You know what I mean? Like, if you eliminate the rage.

So fucking what? You know, I mean, first of all, I don't think I'm in any danger of that. I think I am Saudi Arabia of unhappiness. I think I have deep, dark reserves of fucking, that nobody. But also, I think, Louis C.K. used to that great bit about they don't need to make any more porn. We kind of got enough. There's plenty of comedians, especially now.

I mean, there's like, it's like, everybody. everybody doesn't know. You know, not everybody, that's unfair, but there's a lot of comedians and good ones. Yeah. Good ones too. It was like, I don't know if you remember this, but sometimes back, like as recently as the, like the 1980s,

you could buy a car and it was fucking shit. And like, word would have to get out. Yeah. You know, people would buy them. And like, but now they don't really make shit cars now. Yeah. They don't really make them. and it's kind of the same

with like a lot of these comedians are working while there's so many comedians and they're good they're good so maybe it's time to find another job that's all I'm saying I feel like it might be time for me to do something now

I don't see that happening I don't know man I don't know you seem to look from the outside just from how little I do know you you do seem like the reservoir fills up and you want to go express it. I don't know how else to

live. Yeah. You know, I don't know how else to live. It's what I do. But I remember, I don't know Joe if you remember this, but Peter LaSalle, who was our boss in late night, Peter was like Johnny Carson's like, like a legend. And when I was, you know, when I was bitching about the job, because you do any job, but you know, long enough, you're going to start bitching about it. And I remember saying,

to P, as I was working out up to Quentin, I would say to P I'm going to I'm going to quit and he would say you'll miss that standing ovation every night when you walk out and I was like, I don't think I will.

And I haven't. Not fucking once. Yeah, I get that. Not fucking once. It doesn't last. And also a standing invasion when you get, it also used to be standard invasions were really rare. Yeah. yeah

yeah whatever you can't get also you know what I've started doing and I really fucking mean it now I really mean it like I'll start a show with an audience going

look I've been doing this for a long time and I've won awards and I've made money and stuff I've been you know I don't want to blow my own trumpet but I'm pretty successful so if this show sucks it's not me

it's just not it's you it's uny you're doing something wrong because I've done enough of this to prove the concept yeah you know and it's

like when people say, you know, comedy's like one of the odd places for this because they'll say that's not funny. And go, well, look at that. Stadium full of people laughing at it. Somebody thinks it's funny. Right. So you're the judge of what is and isn't funny. You're the ultimate.

But actually, you are. Yeah. You know, if it's not funny to you, it's not funny. But it doesn't mean he's not a comedian or she's not a comedian. Yeah. It's like, say, look, I'm not crazy about the work of. but I'm not going to try and shut him down. Do you know what I mean?

It's music. Yeah. And he's accomplished and he's, he does a thing that a lot of people get a lot of pleasure out of. And I, it's not for me. Yeah. The,

it's that thing about the applause. There is, you think when you're coming up that if I could have a theater full of people standing up and applauding, like that's going to be the, that's going to be, I will have gotten it. and you learn very quickly that as delightful as it is,

the feeling that you get from that, by the time you're in the dressing room, is kind of evaporated. Well, I think you're right. I think what it is is that what you find out very quickly, the condition you're suffering from is far more serious than you thought it was. It's like you're not just someone that needs a little validation. It's bad.

It's fucking bad. Because you'll get the validation in and it's just fucking, you know. So where do you, do you get it from just doing the work? Is this thing that satisfies you or something outside of the career that satisfies? All I care about is the health and happiness of my children and my wife. Right. It's all I care about. Everything else, I even though my own health would be nice.

I wouldn't mind making some money and I certainly don't wish any harm on anyone. Yeah. But bottom line is if you're a parent, I feel you're as happy as your least happy kid. Yeah. That's it. Yeah. That's really the truth. And so, you know, when,

And my, you know, my youngest is 13. There is an evolving thing in parenting that I'm going to, I'm having to deal with. Yeah. In the, you know, I'm the chore on a Sunday, you know. You know, it's like, I've been a phone, dad. Yeah, I know. Yeah. Oh, I've been my daughter's graduating this weekend from college.

Mussel tough. Thank you. But also, you know, it's a thing. It's a thing. And she's been really busy this week. And I keep FaceTiming her. And she's like, I'm just going. to a brunch.

I'm just, look where I am now. And I'm like, oh man, I am my dad chasing. I know. And that's why I've been talking to Megan about it. It's because we,

like, we were thinking, maybe we could just have more children. She could still have children. I mean, I guess if you, you know, I don't know if you add some juice to whatever I've got left.

You can De Niro it. In the dust bowl, I could probably figure something out. Some supplements. Yeah, But I don't think that's the... No. I think we have to change.

We have to figure out how to change. So I'm suggesting, let's go to Florida a lot more. But that's not... Megan's from New England, so that's not working at all. So what advice would you give young Joe Bolter, who's got this little boy kind of running around? Yeah, a little Sputnik. Yeah.

Yeah. There's really no... I mean, you can't, it's all cliche. It's going to go fast. It's trying and enjoy it. Try and enjoy it. Try and enjoy it. And don't give yourself a hard time about sleep deprivation.

It's part of it. Yeah, you pretty much don't ever sleep again. Not really. Because it goes to worrying about children to then you're just a mess. Well, you're a mess and then you get to the point your children are old enough and now you think, well, also I'm older now and I'm dying. So there is that. He's staring at the ceiling late at night.

Every time I go for a poop, I think, oh, is it? And it's, uh... Do you sleep well? It's interesting. I get into a point now that I am. You are? For the first time in, maybe ever. Really?

Yeah, I'm starting to sleep a little better. I don't... You're on drugs or... Fuck, man. No, I mean, I, I wish. What do you... I don't know. You doing it?

I try to go to bed hungry. Uh-huh. Because I feel like I sleep better if I'm hungry. And it's hard because I don't feel like sleeping because I feel awake. But if I go to sleep hungry, I sleep better. Oh, interesting. And the weird thing is then you wake up and you're not hungry. Weird.

Maybe I'm on kind of zemping and I don't know it. Someone's sneaking shots into your thigh. I'll take it. I don't think so. I don't sleep good all the time. And also, there's one of the odd gifts that comes with. age, which I'm so grateful for, is that nobody knows fucking anything. Nobody knows fucking anything.

See all these people that are going, well, this is and I'm the Secretary of State and I'm the governor of this. They're all fucking lying. They're shit in their pants, just like everybody else. So, you know, have a good time. Don't be a dick. And try not to fuck up. Yeah, right. And I really think that's kind of it.

Like, I used to get very intimidated by, you know, people that I, they're very successful. I mean, late night did me a huge favor, actually, with that, that demystified everything. There are some people you run into who are very smart, though. Very smart and very impressive. Yeah. Yeah. Of course. Yeah.

And that's fine. But it doesn't absolve you of insecurity. it doesn't absolve you of fear or all the human emotions. Of course you have all of those things. Yeah. My wife was, my wife is a teacher and your kids, a lot of times are saying, why do we have to learn history? What about history?

And, you know, these kids always have that. Sure. What do we need to know that? And I said to her last night, what I really could have, would have appreciated learning and would have made history a lot more interesting to me, I enjoyed it, but the reality that people have not changed that much. Oh, really?

We've become more educated, whatever, but the human being with its fears and anxieties and feeling of its physical self and all of that, that human being has not really changed. So 2,000 years ago, it was you that was trying to. to solve these problems and trying to, your food was different, your atmosphere was different, all those things are different, but to tell a kid, like, it's, imagine you being in that position 2,000 years ago facing these challenges and this is how these people did it and whether it was successful or not. Like that to me wasn't until I was really a grown up for quite some time to realize. Yeah, to be empathetic to people that have lived before you.

There's also that slow drip. It happens faster for some people through life circumstances. For me, it was a little slower. But you get that slow drip of mortality. And some people, through tragedy or mishap, get to know about tragedy. Like my wife's father died when she was very young. And so obviously there was like a big shock trauma lesson early on.

But there is that mortality thing. And you start to go, well, how important is this really? And the, you know, and a lot of the things that I thought were really important. Like when you were up all night when a kid got croup, I don't fucking change it. Yep. You know, like, ugh. Yeah.

You know, it's like, please just make this okay. Yeah. It's okay. everything falls away kind of you know kind of and that's that's kind of how I feel about it so all of the ambition

maybe it's maybe that's how ambition is meant to run that you feed it and then you get you get a lot of what you want it and you go well that that was all right I guess you know well you definitely it's almost like you can't learn these lessons too early or you won't make your way but there's also the greed component to it

like if you look at the the billionaire situation, like people who have these giant super megayots and like he's worth, or she is worth a petrillion million billion dollars. You go,

what's the point of that? Yeah. I really don't, I swear to God I don't understand it. I don't get big houses. Yeah, well, neither do I, because I've lived in a couple. I'm like, well, fuck this shit.

Like a massive, what are you going to do with it? Well, pay a lot of heat bills is what you're going to do with it. I mean, but that's, that's what, didn't know that until I, you know, until I went to the other side of it. And I, but I, I don't, I don't understand it. And I think money, money is a, is an odd thing because, like, where I, I, I come from

my modest background, I've been extremely modest background. And, you know, I don't want to be competitively poor with other people, but it, there was not a lot of fucking money. Yeah. And the, what we believed was a couple of things about money. We believed that rich people were kind of stupid. And that if I had their money, I'd be happy. Mm-hmm. And these two things are wrong about rich people. It's like, you might not be happy.

Like, look, money's better than no money. Hands down, I'm not going to say that. But beyond a certain point, what the fuck is going on? Right. You know, what are you doing? I know. I mean, anytime, you know, it's almost, you hear stories of like when kids grew up and they were like, you know, so,

and they had five kids in a bed and every kid's childhood was pretty great other than like an abuse of whatever sure but like you do you aren't adding up bank accounts you were just with your other kids in your house doing your thing and it was pretty great well well um i can't really go there with you i think there's a lot of people survive their childhoods and and and i think that there's a lot of that, you know, even in my own childhood, there's some stuff happened. I'm like, that's truly fucking awful. But, having said that, I didn't do it. I was a kid.

It happened to me. Right. I'm going to live the rest of my life fucking, you know, saying, oh, that shouldn't have. It shouldn't have fucking happened. But it happened. And now it's not happening. Yeah. No, but I'm saying short of, like, the traumatic thing.

Right. things, the apples in the hallway. Yeah, that was great. I'm not complaining about free fruit. You know what I mean? Through the lens of a kid, like you kind of have your needs are met. I think, and I think if they're not, your job as an adult is to fix that. You know, to know, if you can.

Yeah. You know, I think that there is a, look, there are traumas that I don't know how people get past them. No. And there are, you know, I just don't know how people, but they do. I am. You know, people do. And so I'm in admiration of people that come up tough,

but tough doesn't necessarily mean poor. It just means tough. And I think the myth that I bought into when I was young was that poor is the only tough. And it's not, you know, human is the only tough. Yeah. It can be tough sometimes. It's crazy. It's crazy that something that can happen to you very, very early is yours to carry forever.

I was heavy as a kid. I was heavy, you know, and I was like pre-teen. I was very chubby. And I still think I was too. Yeah, it's why you're a stand-up. Yeah, I always, I would, what do I say, Joe, nine times out of ten, do I look fat? Yeah. Yeah.

Am I fat? Is it the angle on my thing? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do the same. Isn't it weird? Yeah, you're not fat. You're not fat either. No, I'm not. But I know you don't believe me.

Yeah, I don't. Because I don't believe you. And that, it's the funny thing. It's like, and also, like, you have a bet about it. It's great, you know. What far? You know, you, you're, your thing, bobbing a couch. You're bob and a couch.

You're not an Olympic athlete. Yeah, it doesn't matter. You're done. Yeah. Yeah. By the way, are the Olympics this year? Is it this year? Olympics?

Yes. Paris. A couple months. Yeah, I'm not going. Why not? I don't care for the Olympics. Why? It promotes swimming.

It's like, people, every four fucking years ago, did you watch the swimming? No, I'm not going to watch fucking swimming. What the fuck is wrong with you? I've got kids. I watch my kids swimming. Is that what it is? There's like, grown adults swimming up and down, labs. And I was, yeah!

And people, like, did you see the swimming? I went, no, I didn't see the swimming. And they started to make out sports that, I've, no business being on primetime TV. Break dancing this year. Break, well, I may watch that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got you.

I may watch the break dancing. No wrestling, but break dancing. But some of the sports, I'm like, is that really a thing, like throwing the bowling ball or the stick? Oh, look, far. He threw a stick. Oh, that's great. I get excited about the Olympics because it's just something that's on that I know the family will all kind of drift in. It's like right now I'm watching a lot of Godzilla movies.

No one else in the house is interested. Nobody, nobody's going to. I'll come around. Yeah, I've watched Godzilla movies. It's pretty great. It's great, yeah. I don't know what it is. Did you see the new thing with Kurt Russell, the Monsters thing?

I started watching it. Oh, no, stay with it. Yeah, stay with it. Stay with it. Because also it's Carr Russell. Yeah, it's correct. So if you don't watch it, you're on America. It's true.

Yeah, yeah. You're a communist. Yeah, it's like, I love a good monster movie. I also like baseball. No one in my house is interested. They all go to their separate ways. I like the idea of baseball, but every time I watch it for more than like half an hour on TV, I'm like, it's kind of the secret is.

Well, then if that's okay, that's okay. And then I really am an American. A hundred percent. Yeah, I fall asleep with potato chips falling down my body. I kept telling Joe, for the radio show that we should try and go broadcast from from Paris for the Olympics. It sounds like we were going to make it happen. You don't want to do that.

We did the late night show from Paris. You remember? Yeah. You know they get really mad at me? Because I was like, because Joe was doing the inside of the horse, dancing horse. And I said, well, Joe's got to come in Paris. They went, can we get just a fucking friend actor?

You don't even fly this guy over to Paris? I'm like, no. And we had to get the back end of the horse as well. He had to come as well. Did you put a lot into the performance of it? Oh, yeah. Like if someone else stepped into it, you know that they wouldn't have done it as well. I think so, right?

Well, yeah. And if you're the French actor in the front of the horse, the horse would just go, which was only one of its many movements. Yeah, yeah. That's right, the little hoods. Smoking a cigarette. Actually, the horse smoking a cigarette was pretty funny. I'm sure we did that on the show.

I think we did. They're doing a thing now where they're training kids who work in restaurants in Paris, they're training them to be more polite during the Olympics. They're going to have to bus people in, because I don't know how that's going to fucking work. I don't even want that. No, who wants a polite French waiter?

Like, where am I? Fucking Orange County? This is ridiculous. Exactly. Don't be nice to me. This is why I'm here. I love it. I was talking to a French waiter once about how much he hates his job

and everybody. And it was fantastic. He said, the worst is when Americans come in and they say, do you have water? It's like, no. We don't, I don't know how we managed to cook. We don't have any water. We don't have any water in the whole restaurant. Do you have water?

Yes, we have water. Why weren't we going? You went with Craig? Why couldn't we go make that happen? We went, well, it wasn't for the Olympics that we were in. No, it was for. For anything? Who do you do the radio show for?

We do for Netflix. On serious. Right. Netflix and seriousness? Like Coke and Pepsi? Jesus Christ, they can afford it. This is what I keep saying. Yeah.

I want us to be there. Opening ceremony. I know. Do you know? I know. It would be pretty aggravated. Remember when we went to the Super Bowls and stuff and like you're low man in the totem pole.

Yeah, it's true. You know? Yeah. And you imagine how mean the French people are going to be to American radio shows. Walking around, will you talk to us? Yeah, oh, no, that's not going to be good at all. Yeah. And also, who are you going to talk to, swimmers?

I don't know many swimmers, but here's my guess. Talking isn't their thing. Can you imagine the number of condoms are going to have to hand out in the Olympic Village in Paris? Why? Well, you know, they always have to, they always import a bunch of condoms because they're young, beautiful athletes from all around the world. There's a lot of...

I didn't think young people had sex anymore. I thought it was all, hey, hey. Yeah, I thought that was what sex was now. Yeah, we're talking about the world-class athletes. Oh, yeah. And now they're in Paris. Well, well, well. Hello.

What's your stand-up schedule like? I'm going to, I've got a few more shows to do. I just shot a special. Nice. What's it called? It's called I'm so happy. It's perfect. It's good.

It's good, isn't it? I have to check to see if you had done it, actually, because I thought Tom would do that. It makes you laugh immediately. Yeah, it does because you're like, what the fuck? Yeah. So I'm doing, I've done the special, so you know, but it's like, what you do is special, you know, well, as soon as this goes out, there's materials toast. So I'm just kind of winding it up.

Then I'm going to take a few months off. and then. Okay. I'll maybe go back out on the road. Well, on the road. I'm going to start doing stand-up shows in the fall. Right.

But I'm going to take the summer off. I haven't been doing any TV at all. TV seems like it's on fire right now. It's like, it's so crazy. It is insane. Like, I talk to, every producer I talk to is like, I can't get anything made. I know.

I'm like, is it me? And then I talk to other people. Like, no, nobody's getting it. It's so weird. I know. There's a lot of people out of work. Yeah. I guess if you do stand up,

you're kind of not out of work. I know. It's kind of like this little blue collar part of show business. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's good. It's really good. I think that's why I still do it.

Yeah. Also, I think when you said blue collar, I like, you know what? It is a kind of a blue collar thing. It is it kind of you show up and do your job. Yeah. If you don't do your job, somebody's going to have something to say. Yeah. Yeah, I kind of like it for that.

I do too. Yeah. I know. It's just you. When did you first do it? 1993, June 12th, 1993. Wow, you know the day? Mm-hmm.

But how come? was it aspirational for you? You want it to be a comedian? Yeah. Yeah. That's good. And I looked it up in the village voice and... I used to look at things in the village voice.

And I was like, oh, if you bring a couple people to sit in the audience, you can get on stage. And I remember... Where was? It was the New York Comedy Club, which is in a different location now. But it was on the second floor from a cowboy bar on downstairs. And they had a little showroom upstairs. And I remember taking the village voice into... my room in my apartment and making the phone call and them saying, okay, yeah, you can come in on

June 12th at 7 o'clock and you'll get on and I hung up and I was like, I'm going to do it? June 12th, 1993. And how'd you go? It was, I got to bring a couple friends, sit in the audience, so I had like four and they were the other than maybe one other person, that was the audience. There was nobody else there. Okay. I've done shows like that and they weren't even my friends.

And Greg Giroldo was the other comedian. Oh, yeah. Waiting to go on. He's a good comedian. He's so good. Yeah. And I went up and it was great. I mean, the great thing about it, as you'll understand, is it was, you know, always being funny in your life.

But actually telling a joke in a joke structure and having it work was just, oh. Yeah, no, it's pretty good. That was great. It was pretty good. Yeah. Every night there's a joke that. I do it. It's in the special so I can tell you. There's a thing I'm talking about

when I had a UTI and the only relief I could get was standing with my penis in a glass of cold water. And then Joe, that I thought was the joke. And then I would mind me standing with a penis in a glass of cold water. And it does get a laugh. But then Joe wrote a punchline to that joke and I think about him every time I say the punchline

because it fucking hits the rafters every night. I say, you know, it was so bad. All I had to stand with my penis and a glass of cold water. And then I mime it. And then I say, I can never go back to that Denny's. And Joe wrote that joke every night. Boom. And it's one of it, you know when you've got a joke and you go, here comes that joke.

And no matter what this crowd is like, I know there's one come and this one's going to hit. And it does every time. That's great. Yeah. Wow. Still, well, yeah, I got to bring more cash because I don't think it was one line. When did you write that joke like two years ago? It was, I might, it was, I know it was January, but when was that?

Yeah, well, it'd been January 2022. 20, has it been that long? Yeah, probably. Wow. We were still COVID. Yeah, I think around the time we were working on it. Well, that's when I got the, yeah, I got COVID. And I got the UTI was my bonus feature from COVID.

Wow. Oh, what a treat. Oh, Jesus. What a treat. Are you worried about the bird flu? No. Yeah. No.

I mean, I can get there. Right now. If you want to ride me up. I mean, it's kind of like, I worry about a lot of stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I really try not to it. It's trying to build a clutch mechanism between you and terror.

You know what I mean? How do you put it at? I'm not always successful. Yeah. No, I know. It's a, yeah, or even worse when you're not afraid and you feel like everything's kind of okay for the moment, worrying that, well, something must be coming. Well, here's the thing. Because people used to say, you know, you worry about so many things and they never happen, right?

You worry about all these things and they never happen. So I extrapolate from that by worrying about things, I will ensure that they worry about things. I will ensure that they will not happen. So in order for something not to happen, I will worry about it. I think that gets in there for a lot of people. And I think also that it always happens when you least expect it is another one. And you go, well, yeah, because I, you know, oh, I didn't. Because if you're walking around expecting shit to happen all the time, you'd never go out.

So, yeah, it's going to happen when you at least moderately don't expect it. Because that's the nature of surprise. They're like, surprise. Oh, I was expecting this. Oh, they're not surprised. Right. Yeah. I think, yeah, there's a comedian default of, well, yeah, it's kind of happened.

Yeah, yeah. My wife and I were on a flight and we hit this crazy, more than turbulence. Like it was, I think the engine actually went out. Someone screamed from the thing and it was bumpy and it was just like, holy cow, like something's going to happen. And my wife turns to me and I'm, and I said, and yeah, that's kind of how I thought it was going to go down. She's like, you're just kind of ex- I understand.

You know what I mean? I understand. I learned to fly airplanes because I was so terrified of flying. Oh, really? Yeah, guess what? Still terrified of flying. And can fly airplanes. And have flown them on my own in dangerous conditions.

Right. Yeah, not terrified when I'm doing it. Yeah. Terrified after when I think about what it was. But also I can be like in a, risky situation in a single-engine small Cessna, I'm flying on my own and not worry about it. Mild turbulence in a 747 with a highly qualified team of aviators up front.

Yeah, yeah. So I don't think it's really about the flying, is it? No. No. How hairy of a situation have you been in when you were flying? No, one or two I've made mistakes. I mean, my first cross-country flight. Cross-country is not actually across the country.

In aviation tuition, your first flight away from the airport to another airport and back, it's called your cross-country. The first one I did was from Van Nuys Airport to Bakersfield to Porter Field, I think it was called, and then back to Van Nuys. So it's a round trip of a little while. Wow. And an hour and a half. And I'm in the airplane on my own. And I hit some pretty decent turbulence above the, what do they call these mountains? The San Andreas, it's not San Andreas, it's the Santa something.

And the mountains on the way into L.A. What are they called? That's the valley. So what's the... San Andreas? Is it San, it's not Santa, something. I don't know, the mountains anyway. So they're mountains, and I was flying over them and it's got a little bump.

and I got a little scared. And I, you know, kind of made some mistakes. And then I, well, I flew into Los Angeles airspace too high. Uh-huh. And you got scared and went up? Yeah, I was scared because I was trying to get out of this. But you don't change altitude, particularly around Los Angeles or in that airspace without getting permission from an air traffic controller.

Uh-huh. So they yelled at me a little bit. It's terrifying. Yeah, it's pretty bad. But, you know, everybody, we got... I wouldn't even move to a little bit. I mean, the good thing you know about this is they are so fucking on it. Yeah.

Like, I was, I moved a little bit and they're like, hey, where are you going? I was like, oh, it's pretty bad. They were, oh, you can't go there. I go back. I was like, okay. And then, man, that's the fuck. Yeah, it was, uh, it's scary. Yeah, yeah.

But there is that comedian thing of just, yeah, something's going to happen. I think you just have a, you don't, I was going to say, you don't really lie to yourself that everything's going to be okay. I mean, you do in the short term, but you have to survive, I think. Yeah. But look, here's the truth of it. At a certain point. Yeah.

You've got to die of something. Something's going to go down. Something's going to have. I'm hoping for this. I had a conversation with a friend of mine is about the same age as me, and we were talking about plumbing issues versus. is cognitive issues. Uh-huh.

You know, in the, and the, you know, as the horseman of the apocalypse approach, which one do you choose?

Do you want plumbing or cognitive? Uh-huh. And I said, well, you know, it's a tough choice, but I think,

honestly, for me, I choose, I choose, which, of course, you don't. Yeah. Because plumbing,

my problem. Cognitive, somebody else's a problem. Right. Yeah. But I don't think that's true. I think that's a naive view

of it. I think cognitive stuff, because I had, my grandma got Alzheimer's and it was kind of in a lot of distress sometimes. Yeah. So I don't think there's a free ride. No, there's not.

You just have to have a good time while you can, live in the day. Yeah, then get in a plane and go into the mountain. Please don't do that. I've got to fly back to the UK in like three days. You do? It's got to be my head. So are you still going back? I go back and forward and I'm doing, you know, I go.

go over there and I still have a place there. Oh, you do? So yeah, split your time. Well, I... Where are the kids? My son is at school, my youngest son's at school in Scotland, and my oldest son is left college and is working in New York City. That's what my, my daughter, maybe they could be friends. She's going to do the same thing, starting next week. Animation? She's doing animation?

She's a writer. Yeah, you probably could do the same thing. Is she finished in college? Sunday. Oh, right. Graduation. Oh, well, you said graduation, but I kind of, because you're so young, I thought it was like high school. No, she's graduating.

She's going to go out and be a person. Is that it? Is that all you got one? No, then I have another one who's a freshman. Right. Well, I don't understand the freshman. First year of college. First year of university.

Right. And I feel like that's where my future is going to be is just chasing them wherever they go. For sure. Yeah. I think, do you have any tattoos? Yeah. I think it's time to get more. I'm thinking the same thing.

I don't know if you noticed, I have a, my earring is back in. I didn't have an earring in for years and years and years. Years, like, since I was 40, I went, take it out. You're 40. Get the earring out. And then I put it, I was in the apartment in New York with my family the other day, and my youngest son said, do you think you could, because I was talking about, I used to have an earring.

And he said, do you think you could get it still in my, your ear? And I went, well, I don't know. And my wife said, here, try this. And I've got this ear and I went, boom, straight in. Oh, wow. And I, but I realized, I don't think the hole was open. I think I'm now so old and my ears are just sponge.

Just squished right through. Yeah, it just went straight in. You can do it to the other ear. But I thought to myself, you know what, maybe that's, I remember having a conversation with Margaret Cho about that. Because Margaret started to get a lot of tattoos and piercings and stuff. And she said, It's better, it's to combat the aging process instead of plastic surgery.

Yeah. Cover yourself in tattoos. Yeah. I went, all right. I like Margaret. She's crazy. Yeah. Crazy thinker.

I literally have been thinking that. There's this tattoo artist around here who. Yeah, I saw it. It's funny. Got my attention. I was like, yeah. And I was like, hey, maybe just go stop in. What have you got right now?

I have, uh, I have this, uh, this sun with, uh, Walt, Whitman quote around it. Nice. From when I was... Very much first tattoo. Yeah. Yeah. Very early.

Yeah. And my wife's name... Also, on this one... I got to have that. Yeah. Which I got before we were married. Risk. Yeah.

She came in and it was across my arm. I was like, well, there's no getting out of this. And on my leg, which was really the first tattoo. Yeah. Was this gnome. This horrible gnome. He was watering a pot. plant and I just picked it off a wall in New Jersey.

I think that's a great first tattoo. And just cut it on. Yeah, that's awesome. And when I went back to that tattoo guy near here, I was like, I either have to do something with this, something has to have, either has to go away or I have to improve on it. And I had my buddy add two little gnome girls, girl gnomes riding on his back as my daughters. Oh, that's kind of great.

So I added to the insanity. Yeah, I'm the guy with it. I'm the gnome. Yeah, that's pretty good. How long is this podcast? How long have you been talking? Yeah, an hour and a half. We're an hour.

Oh, we got to wrap it up. Fuck, Tom. If I didn't know when this, I'd have charged your money. I gave you two breads. Yeah, two breads. If you did one bread, you would have been out of here in an hour. Yeah, that's true. I'm a bread every 45 minutes.

How many tattoos do you have? I don't know anymore. I don't know anymore. I have a lot. You only on my arms. Only on your arm. Yeah, I got this. Which is great.

Yeah. I hate that this one's down on my leg. I don't want to get tattoos in my legs, but this is the one that, see this here? Uh-huh. That's Saturn. Yes. The bringer of old age. Oh.

Because I figure like this, whenever I forget to wear my watch and I look at my hand, still fucking coming. That's great. Still fucking coming. That's really great. Yeah. But I like the attitude, though. I like the attitude of more tattoos.

put the earring in. Yeah. Enjoy yourself. Disgracefully. Yes. Disgracefully. And don't hate on the young. No.

This is a real fucking problem I've seen with our generation. They're like hating on the young because they're changing it. Yeah. That's their fucking prerogative. Yeah. You know. Like I remember old comedians talking about young comedians when I was a young comedian, I fucking hated them for it.

I was like, fuck you fucking assholes. Are these alternative, so-called, The alternative comedians? Right. Yeah, the alternative to comedy. Anyway, and you're like, fuck you. It's really true. You're old fossil.

Yeah, it's like I don't want to hate on the youth. It's hard sometimes because they're pretty literal. I have to say. Well, yeah, some of them suck. I do feel like getting more tattoos and having more fun and being like, you know, I don't have to worry about things like the way the young kids have to is they're finding their way. But there is also, so there's this like fun rebellious part that I should go enjoy.

But there's also another part of me that feels like act your age. Like I should be, you know what? It's kind of cool being a grown up. And I should, I don't mind. Just depends what you feel that is. Don't being a dick about it. Just, you know, being a. Yeah.

It depends on where you are as well because like I'm 62. Right. So if I act my age in Scotland. Right. Yeah. It's very, or if I act my age in Malibu, I'm getting married again. I'm moving on to my third set of kids. In Scotland, I'm like, well, really are that's that.

And in Malibu, I'm like, ah, ha, hey. Thank you so much for doing this. Oh, God, it's such a pleasure. I am so glad we should spend time like this and note record it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, not that this was. Do we bring Joe? Yeah, I think that we could do that.

I mean, that's your call. He's working for you. I just know him. He's just a guy now. He's just a guy now. He used to work for me, but now I just know him, so it's fine. All right, that'll be great. And we'll hook up in New York?

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I'm there. I'm not there much over the summer. Okay. But in the fall. In the fall, for sure. All right.

And it's a beautiful time in New York. I don't know if you ever saw that movie, Autumn in New York, with Richard Gere and another person. I can remember everything. All right, we got it, Joey.