Fitzdog Radio - Kevin Pollak - Episode 1053

Episode Date: May 14, 2024

My dear friend and neighbor Kevin Pollak comes in (or does Al Pacino?) and chops it up. He has been in over 90 films. I have been in 4.  Follow Kevin Pollack on Instagram @KevinPollak123

Hey, welcome to FitzDog Radio. How are you today? I hope you're having today's Monday that I'm recording this, the 13th of May. It will come out tomorrow. Just had a great interview with Andy Richter, who I love. Old dear friend. Been on the show many times. So that'll be out in a few weeks. And then I got some great ones coming up. I got Paul Verzi, Rachel Feinstein, Harlan Williams. How about Tim Robbins?

Tim Robbins is coming up. So don't forget, like it on Apple Podcasts, like it, leave comments on YouTube and do all that stuff. Support the show. It's important to keep growing it. Happy Mother's Day to the moms who, I don't know, it's a hard job being a mom. My mom, she did a great job. She wasn't given a lot of tools, but she was given a sense of humor. And I think that she gave that to us. That was her greatest gift to us.

My mom, just biting, funny, silly, and great, you know, just, I think our house was a lot of laughter and she was behind a lot of it. Great storyteller. And, uh, my wife is so different. Not that she's not funny. She is funny, but in a totally different way. And, um, we had a nice day yesterday. We got up, Um, we had a nice day yesterday. We got up. We, uh, I ran out and got some bagels and lox, and then we went to see a movie. It's called, what's it called? It's about a stunt man with, uh, with the good looking guy in it. Who's the guy in it? Jesus Christ.

My brain is mush today. Mush! I shouldn't do podcasts on Mondays. What's the movie? Hold on, I'm looking it up right now. Is it Ryan Reynolds? I think it's Ryan Reynolds was in it. It was about a stuntman.

Ryan Reynolds movie. No, not Ryan Reynolds. JoJo, what was that movie we saw yesterday? She's not listening. By the way, JoJo is now working as an intern at the Green Lab Studios in Hollywood. She's working on the podcast, learning how to mix and switch and download and transfer and all that stuff. It's a green screen studio, so she's learned a bunch of cool shit. I love having her there. It's so much fun.

I have to kind of watch what I'm saying a little bit. You'll notice the interviews are a little less vulgar than usual. Maybe. Bomb the other night. Friday, Thursday night, I went to the comedy store.

And, you know, it was the comedy festival, so it was very distracting. There was just comedians everywhere. You walk in and there's fucking, you know, John Mulaney and Nick Kroll and Leslie Jones and fucking Spade.

Everybody big is hanging out. And you're trying to get to the stage. People are saying hello. I'm distracted. And I went up and my head was not right. And I was trying to get to the stage people are saying hello i'm distracted and i went up and my head was not right and i was trying to do all new stuff and adam eaglet was in the back the guy that used to book the uh store who's a dear friend who now books rogan's club in austin he was in town for the festival and he saw me bomb and there's nothing he enjoys more than

watching me bomb which it doesn't happen often. I don't bomb. It's very rare that I bomb. So when it does, it fucking stings. There's part of it that I enjoy. There's something surreal, almost like, you know, in The Graduate where Dustin Hoffman just lets go in the pool like he's drowning. That's what it feels like. Sometimes the bomb is so profound

that you don't even fight back. You just kind of sit in it and you look around and you're like, yeah, this is happening. This is not how it usually goes. So anyway, I finished the set, I get off stage, my last line was, well, tonight you guys won. And I walk off and I walk to the back and Egan holds his phone up to my ear. And it,

and it was this sound effect, which made me laugh for a solid 10 minutes. Um, anyway, we got some news about him coming up soon. What else is going on? I'm going to, oh, I did a show Friday night up in Malibu at a vineyard for a bunch of millionaires. And it's so weird when you look at the whole audience is white and good looking and rich. Like the parking lot was just filled with BMWs and Teslas and fucking Rolls Royces.

And so I said to them, I go, this is crazy because last night I did a show in East LA in La Hombra. It was all Latino. And now I'm here tonight. It's so, the women are so different. Like last night they had fake jewelry and real tits and that didn't go over well that was not the best way to open the show rich people do not

always have a great sense of humor about themselves somewhat i turned that one around though because that was the night after the bomb you will never do a better set than the night after you bomb it's like you just fucking dig in. It's like watch the New York Knicks and this next game against the Pacers because they got beat by 40 points last night. It was ugly. And I would put every dollar I have that the Knicks win the next game. That's how it works in life.

Your second marriage sometimes is better than the first, right? You spring back. I got some dates coming up. I'll be in Mamaroneck at the Emmeline Theater on May 31st. Come on out. Local show. That's where I grew up, not far from there. Escondido at the Grand Comedy Club, June 7th and 8th.

And Pittsburgh at the WDVE Festival, June 21st. I'm also coming to Buffalo, New York. I got to put that date in. I'm doing a date with Bert Kreischer, so that's going to be its own festival of sorts. Short intro today. I want to get right to it because I love this guest so much. He's my neighbor. I've known him for many years.

He's one of the most working actors he's just very skilled he's been in multiple long-running sitcoms including the marvelous mrs mazel that he's been in forever um a few good men grumpy old men Old Men, The Usual Suspects, Casino, End of Days, I mean, The Wedding Planner, Whole Nine Yards, Miami Rhapsody. He's also like a big poker player, and I think he hosted the Celebrity Poker Showdown, one of those shows. And just so happy to have him back on. He's such a great hang, such a good dude. Here is my interview with the great Kevin Pollack.

Ladies and gentlemen, my guest today, I am, it's so weird how it works, but, you know, actors get to a certain age and I guess they start looking for outlets that they would have never thought about before. This next guy's won multiple Oscars. Have I? He was in The Godfather. Multiple.

Scent of a Woman. Who? A Few Good Men. What? No. Al Pacino, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you. I am so honored that you're a Scarface.

I got to say, first of all, I need a few more things on the table in front of me. There's not enough props. Right. When I work these days, now, I will say to the prop person, I need four more things. Whatever you put in front of me, I need four more things. I don't know. I got to be touching.

I got to be moving. Things are constantly happening. Hello. How are you? Have you thought about playing poker? That seems like something you could really use your hands on a lot. Chips. I could shuffle chips. That's what I could do.

I could do that. How many chips can you get at once? And what is going on with you? You're having some kind of a beef with Taylor Swift? What is that all about? I don't know if it's a beef so much as a misunderstanding. She's young, right? Yeah.

How old is she? She's 21. No. Yeah, I think she's probably 29. Right, right. And there's a chasm between her age and mine, I would say, safely. But isn't there a chasm between you and your wife right now? What's your point?

Also, what year did I become an old black blues player? Really? I never thought about that, Al. You do sound a little bit like that. It sounds like I've been singing for a long time. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know how that happened.

From Louisiana, perhaps. But it did, clearly. Something happened. Did you ever do any singing in any of your films? Sure. I must have, right? At some point, Francis. Maybe. I don't remember. There's so much Timmy that I don't remember. It's Greg. Greg Fitzsimmons. That's right. It's important't remember. It's Greg, Greg Fitzsimmons. That's right. Yeah.

It's important you remember. Yeah. I don't. Now, when you did Scarface, was any of that cocaine real? Because it seemed like nobody could get into that intensive character. Oh, we're going back.

We're going back. I will tell you one funny story about Scarface that maybe people don't know. When I got into that jacuzzi, I said it wasn't big enough. I said, this is comically large, but we got to go bigger. We got to get past the funny and into, uh-oh. We got to go to, oh no. I think.

In order for this to work. No, the funniest part of that scene to me was when you're sitting there and you're looking at flamingos. Right. to me was when you're sitting there and you're looking at flamingos right and you with a with a cigar in your mouth and champagne in your hand said fly pelicans yeah and so the the question there was did he not the character did he not know uh know what pelicans were versus flamingos? Did he know the difference? Yeah. All right. I still don't have an answer. Or did you not know? So you're wondering whether or not you at that time-

Oh, no. I'm in character. Right. I'm always in character. Whatever film you're in, you stay in character. When. I'm always in character. Whatever film you're in, you stay in character. When there's a camera rolling, these aren't rolling, right? No.

Okay. They don't roll anymore. They're digital. They just record onto... Digital! Yeah. In the old days, the camera could only roll

for 10 minutes. Uh-huh. You know that, right? Yeah, I've heard that. A two-reeler in the old, old days was two reels, 20 minutes. Uh-huh. You know that, right? Yeah, I've heard that. A two-reeler in the old, old days was two reels, 20 minutes. That's how you can remember

every reel of 35 millimeters. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not comfortable unless I'm touching something. Yeah, I noticed that. I got props. I don't know if you've seen the latest picture I did

with Michael Keaton. He's good. But I clearly love my props. What was the Michael Keaton film? I think I missed that one. That's a good question. You've got a young wife. Well, here's the thing.

Here's the thing about her. So I realized at some point I was out of RAM space, right? Yeah. So I needed someone I could download my memories and stories into. Right. There she is. Yeah. So I'll say, honey, that place that we went to with the thing,

and she'll know what I'm talking about she's fantastic so it'll be like veep where tony hale is standing behind julie louise i love that i don't know what that means is have you seen veep what are you saying i hope you can keep up with this wife i mean i know she's beautiful and I know she's young, but I mean, is she going to get frustrated with you not being- Going to get. Cognizant. No, I think we started that way.

Yeah. I always believe you got to lower the bar. Yeah. Yeah. So I made it clear by forgetting a name on the first date four times. While we were talking, I could not remember who I was talking to. And I think she got the idea that even the worst prenup is better than nothing. Can I ask a personal question?

How is her ass? I'm an open book. Well, I don't know if I'm too old to be canceled, but you could bounce a quarter off it and it would break glass, a quarter. Post bounce. Post bounce. Through glass.

Wow. Yes, sir. So would you say she has a great ass? You know, I think I know what you're referencing. And if she was here, I would ask her to remind you of the line. Right. Yeah. In that scene, I'm yelling at this wonderful actor, Angus Harry.

In that scene, I'm yelling at this wonderful actor, Angus Everett. And he says, off camera, in the take, Oh, Jesus. After I yell big ass. You could hear it next time you watch it. He's off camera. And Michael Mann kept it in. That's great. Kept in his character saying, Oh, Jesus.

True story. That I remember. She's got a great ass. True. Yeah. Hank Azaria really did do that, by the way. He was in the scene with him

and said, oh Jesus. Yeah. Not improvising. Yeah. He was off camera, so he just spoke from his heart when he said, and it's still in the film, oh, Jesus. Yeah.

So thank you for making it here today. I know it is April Fool's Day, and I gave you the wrong address. Which I thought was hilarious. But then I thought, man, he did not mean to do that. No. I sent you to a dress store. Dance. A dance store.

Yeah. I'm sure they sell shit. They do. We had Pete Holmes was in here recently, and then he brought his daughter in, who's about five. And then we went downstairs, and they gave her a little dress, a little dance dress. What the hell? Yeah.

So I can look forward to that. Yes. All right. You're a girl's extra, extra, extra, extra large. When did you move into this situation? Because last time I saw you, and the last many times, you were four minutes from my home, which I really preferred. Yep. And it was not the big setup, but the thing.

This will not be a deal breaker in the future that you have to commute this far, is it? Well, it's a combination really of the distance. Yep. No, the distance is nothing. Right. How about when you meet people who you really like at a gathering, some sort of social gathering? And what do you guys live? You say to the couple.

We live in Eagle Rock. As someone who lives in Mar Vista, I'll say, okay, we will never see you. That's right. Might as well have said Colorado. Yeah. You might have said we're visiting from out of town. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, the demarcation mark for me is the 405. I don't go east of the 405 because last night I had a Easter dinner at the house and my guests walked to my house. Yeah, there you go. And then I have a poker night and I walk to my friend's house. On the weekends, I do not get in my car. It's just a little community of people. I want to talk more about the Easter dinner. Yeah. But let's cover this a little more thoroughly because I started to talk about it before we went right uh live ish and uh you said well let's talk about this on the show so I did a thing for 10 years called the Kevin Pollak chat it was amazing you were a guest great chat show several episodes

technically still on YouTube and it was a slightly larger round table I more ripped off Charlie I would tell people it's like Charlie Rose without all the handsy. Little Larry King mixed in. Yes, but I just mean the round wooden table. And the black backdrop where the cameras are sort of

less evasive. This is right up in it. I think the one under the table is a bit much. The basic instinct camera we call that one. Yeah. So this was 2009 when I started doing Kevin Pollak's chat show, and there was less than 50 podcasts on Apple.

They hadn't even created the podcast app clearly it was just apple right right um you had to explain to people what a podcast was yeah right uh we got up to a million downloads a month uh yeah a month not a week as one of my crew told me uh because i wasn't not a week as one of my crew told me uh because i wasn't tapped in at all on looking up the analytics and i said it was so early that i said there's there's uh how is it that this is the only thing on apple that doesn't charge yes or pay or yeah but doesn't charge. Yes. Or pay. Yeah. But doesn't charge the consumer. Right. And this was before much sponsor, even before stamps.com. Or the- Who were one of the first. Stamps were in there and there was a lot of attention to erectile dysfunction in those

early days. Sure. Right. Because you could only get, yeah. Because it was all male listeners. Yeah. Right. Because you could only get, yeah. Because it was all male listeners. Right. So a million downloads a month, I said, all right, well, what if it's like a dollar a month? Yeah. A dollar a month to a million people, this could be great. So I went on the show in the opening comments and said, all right, so we're going to do this thing because you pay for music, you pay for movies, you pay for TV shows, you pay for all the things available on Apple. But this seems, I have a crew here. This seems odd that no one's- You're losing money while a million people are being entertained. But this seems, I have a crew here. This seems odd that no one's.

You're losing money while a million people are being entertained. Yeah. And this was before sponsors and ad reads and anything. So I said, so, you know, next week I'm going to flip the switch. I flipped the switch and all the lemmings went off the cliff no kidding down to i'm exaggerating for comedic purposes a million uh a month down to 14 14 yeah it was unbelievable was it patreon did you put it behind a paywall so far behind before patreon or the the term paywall okay i'm telling you this this was early, early, early days.

Yeah. In fact, I went to the two biggest at the time were Kevin Smith and maybe Chris Hardwick. And I said, this is before Marc Maron. I said, do you guys want to join me in this effort? I think there's power in numbers. And they said, no, I use it to promote live yeah appearances right so um i was stupid foolish doing movies and stuff at the time so i think i missed out on creating this cottage

industry out of my own thing you had because i was busy so far ahead of the game. Those numbers are as big as anybody's world at that time. Oh, you'd kill for it. Now, sure. But again, there was no competition, really. Yeah, this was pre- Had to have been pre-Joe Rogan, right? 09? Had to have been.

Yeah, I think Rogan was more like 11 or 12. You were- Yeah, you were pre- I've done- I started in, I want to say 2000. But you were premium. I've done, I started in, I wanna say 2000. But you were radio, right? Off of- Well, I had, yeah, Stern gave me a show

for 10 years on his channel. And then I started doing a thing where I'd get somebody like you and I'd be like, after an hour, he'd be like, we're just warming up. And my producer said, let's keep rolling and we'll put it out as a podcast. I'm like, we're not gardeners. That's the only thing podcast where back then was like, you know, how to, you know, people's quilting or gardening. And so he's like, no, no, no, people are starting to do it. So,

so we started doing that. And then, uh, the Stern show ended and we just choose to see you. Oh, there you go. Hey, how's it going? And so we just kept on going and we did two a week for many years. Yeah. And now we're down to one a week, but then I do two other podcasts. I do one with, do you know Mike Gibbons, my buddy? Sure. Yeah. So he and I do the Sunday Papers, which is like a review of the news every week. Great. And then I do Childish with Alison Rosen, where she has babies and I have grown kids, one of whom you just met today. I did. And I'm trying to explain parenting to her and she's not really buying it.

Or yeah, much different. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, we had five cameras and a crew and- Damn. And I would pay them a stipend of a hundred bucks each. I had five cameras and a crew and- Damn. I would pay them a stipend of a hundred bucks each. Yeah.

Sorry if you guys are getting much less than that. We can talk afterwards. And eventually, it was stamps.com and Squarespace and all the other- So you were making money? No, I would eventually just do enough to because after i i've made the announcement and hit the switch and said everyone has to pay a dollar a month and the entire audience said oh there's 40 other podcasts i could be listening to right not over four million as there are now yeah there were 40 others so it took it took quite a while to get

people to come back and two weeks later i turned off the switch and we went free again oh it was an experiment oh i caved instantly okay because i was like okay i i was wrong see where i stand no one no one yeah has there's no rule book yet for this thing. Yeah. And there's no advice to be given to receive in terms of how to pay my crew. Yeah. And then eventually people started. But also for you, I mean, Jesus, you've done, I think you've done over 80 movies at this point. I don't know the exact number, 91, but I do know that six of them are quite good. I only know because of the internet.

But I mean, and TV shows where you're not just guest appearances, but you've been a lead. I did not know about this TV thing until I started doing the Maisel six years ago. Yeah. The Maisel program. In terms of, oh, this is what i should have been doing all along this television thing you were in mom before that weren't you yeah but that was like a guest star that became like a reoccur i mean there were opportunities along the way to star in television shows right but you and i was it was the 90s and as my better half jamie will point out i was very big in the

90s yes you were she loves to yell that at me in front of people. Yeah. It was you and it was Dolph Lundgren was huge. No, but so the thing was, that's when people were, you know, I was a character actor who was working too much because I came from stand-up comedy right and as a stand-up comedian when they offer you stage time the answer is yes uh-huh where what time so after fugue met in 92 it went from auditioning to getting offers and then once the offers started coming in i still had the brain you no longer have to audition they just call your agent and since 92 i'm saying yeah that's a bizarro world difference right um so when it first happened no audition i'd already auditioned 200 times yeah or more

right before anyone said yes yeah so when they when they flipped the switch in 92 and it was offers i was a girl who couldn't say no. I mean, it was just, where do you need me? Where do I go? There was no curating one's career. Right. But in the throes of that, I mean, I did, I promise you, turn down a couple of things. But I want to ask you that. What are the things, I mean, you must be asked this all the time because you have been offered so many things. What's one that you turned down? There was never one that I turned down that I regret, to be honest with you.

I mean, like Monk came across my purview as a pilot script, but Monk was just a script, right? Not the incredible show that Tony Shalhoub made it. Yeah. And the character on paper was very Tony Randall from The Odd Couple. He was very persnickety. Yeah. Very, very, all one note, really.

Yeah. But on paper, wildly annoying to everyone around him. Yeah. And also, USA, the network it was on, was not a network. It was transitioning from movies. Sports and reruns. Yeah. Late night, like a sorority girl having a car wash.

Uh-huh. And shows. Yeah. Right. But no series television. So that was a big consideration. And then it was the mid-90s when I was in the throes of doing all these movies. Right.

consideration and then it was the mid 90s when i was in the throes of doing all these movies right so to step away from that and do a tv show where i wasn't terribly fond of the character you have to sign up for five years minimum when they when you're doing the pilot which means you can't do movies at that point yeah and on a network that may not right even survive right you know it was so it was no on a lot of levels. And I don't want to say they came to me and offered me the show before they went to Tony Shloop. I mean, it just came across my desk during the process of them figuring out

what they wanted to do with the show. I hadn't met Tony, actually, until we did the Maisel program together. And his work on that show was revelatory yes especially from someone who read that script yeah when no one knew what that was right he figured out not just the combination to open the safe it was he bonkers he breathed life into the character turned it into a clinic right quite honestly he won some emmys on that i think yeah yeah i think you want several oh no he did yeah he did because they're on display in his home is he part of the poker game

no he's in new york oh okay yeah yeah then he's a piker like you he wants to play in my game but he doesn't really want to part with money right well your game and we've talked about this. I mean, my game is a $40 buy-in. Right. And listen, it's all relative. I'm not poo-pooing anyone's buy-in in any way, shape, or form. I'm really not. Because I get invited to games that are much bigger than mine. And instantly, the game's only fun if you're comfortable.

Yeah, but you came in in the top 200 of the World Series of Poker one year. You won $56,000. You know, these are numbers and it's not a competition, Greg. I mean, what game would you not win in if you're that good? You were the host of the World Series of Poker. No, no, no, no. It was a celebrity poker showdown. Yeah.

the world series of poker no no no no it's a celebrity poker showdown yeah um uh no so i guess of known film actors i mean i could narrow it down even further i probably went further than anyone um ben affleck oh yeah no bend is a really good player when he's not power drinking. He's a really good player. He won the LA Classic, I want to say. There's some big tournament at Commerce that he won. And I played with him. He's very, very good, but I don't think he plays regularly anymore. But he certainly didn't have a run in the WSOP main event that we're talking about. I know he's been banned from casinos. I don't know what that's about, so I can't comment. Unless you'd like to.

Can I tell you about the- You know how rare it is that I have a guest that says I can't comment? You are a restrained professional. Many people say things that they regret later. Well, you have an audience. Yeah. If you had 11 people listening, you have an audience. Yeah. You know, if you had 11 people listening, I'd say whatever I want. Right.

Speaking of which, can I tell you about the first Easter dinner I went to? Oh, yeah. We're back to Easter. As a- Jew. As a- Well, I'm a California Reformed Jew, which is basically Catholic. Yeah.

Oh, is that right? It's so Reformed. Yeah. It's so non-strict. Catholic. Oh, is that right? It's so reformed. It's so non-strict. Now, what's the difference between guilt and shame in terms of Jewish and Catholic? Well, I don't know much about Catholics other than I've had two long relationships with women, 20 in the current one going on 18, and they're both Catholic. Neither one too seriously. So I don't know much about the

religion itself until I talk to a Catholic comedian such as yourself. Then I hear all about it. Well, I married a Jew, so we discussed it. And it seems like the Jews have guilt and the Catholics have shame. That sounds right. That sounds right. So on the first one, when we first started dating and I went to my first Easter dinner with her family. Which is where? Of Catholics in the South. Oh. Sure.

Tennessee. And the 11-year-old niece, during the course of the Easter supper, found out that there was a Jew at the table and said, and asked me with the non-agenda and lack of guile of an 11-year-old. Yeah. Asked me if the Jews killed Christ. And I said, asked me specifically if I thought the Jews killed Christ. That's a more loaded question. And I said, again, no agenda, no guile. She's 11.

Yeah, sure. So it wasn't loaded at all. It was pure curiosity. Wanted to know more on the subject is what it seemed like. I said, well, because I'm looking at nothing but adults other than her who are now staring at me. Wondering the same thing. Yeah.

And I said, well, no, no, no, no, of course not. I mean, maybe we sold the Romans, the lumber at retail. Maybe there was, there was a little parade. There was an Easter parade parade but that was you know maybe we sold the romans the lumber at retail and then that developed into um a little bit of research and some awareness and knowledge about the goings-on in that neck of the woods when j Jesus was walking through the woods with his followers, you know, first of all, it's common knowledge he was a Jew, but there was only Jews as far as the

eye could see where he was raised. Right. A hundred miles in every direction. Yeah. Just Jews. And some Italians, clearly. The Romans. The Romans came in. Yeah. Yeah yep so the rabbis of the time were the politicians and there was a hippie in the woods uh with some followers talking about peace and love and forgiveness yeah and so they turned to the italians and said we'd like something to happen to the hippie in the woods now that was the first sort of if something should happen to the guy with the long hair some people wouldn't notice right and maybe if one it looks like one of them

had something to do um but after going down that uh potentially funny avenue i pull back even further to a more of a worldview and realized realized what everyone knows who's studied the story from the scripture. Yeah. This was all God's plan. I think I texted you that yesterday. I text you that. It's all God's plan. And then I said, so you're welcome.

Right. Right. You simply were your agent of fate doing their part right it was all god's plan yes both sides every side uh-huh he sent his son down yep to be die for y'all's sins martyred uh-huh right like a sponge just clean it all up take the sins yeah so i wish i had that in the chamber when the 11- That would have been great. When the 11-year-old Bailey Jane asked me if I thought that Jesus killed Christ.

Yeah. If I could have said, well, it was God's plan. Right. You're welcome. Well, as a Catholic, I'll tell you, here's what was fresh in her mind. Yeah. We have Ash Wednesday, which begins lent so we have 40 days where we are um withholding from something it doesn't matter what you gotta you gotta not do

something for 40 days and those 40 days represent in lent in some sort of catholic history or some sort of i believe it was jesus wandered in the wilderness for that time. Was that right? You believe? I believe it was either Moses- I'm just saying 40 days. Moses was 40 years. Okay. So Jesus was 40 days.

They liked 40. They really do. It was a very numerical book. I think the rains for Noah were also 40 days and 40 nights. 40 days and nights. Yeah. Not just the days. Not just the days.

Yeah. It rained all night as well? Yes. I mean, if you're going to fill up a planet. A planet, you really need to go 24-7. You got to commit. Yeah. And so-

We watched the Moses yesterday. We watched the 10 commandments. It's an annual tradition. Get out of here. Four and a half hours. No way. 440 would come up. Is that Charlton Heston?

It is. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Damn. Which, by the way, weirdly entertaining in terms of how absolutely dry this material is. Yes. On paper.

Yeah. It was made by the Catholics, right? Cecil B. DeMille. That's not Catholic. DeMille? Yeah. Troubles you? Yeah.

Where do you put his people? No, that's Italian, right? DeMille? Which tend to be Catholic. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, very dry material, and there's so much going on. And it covers an absolute endless history of the telling.

And they keep it entertaining and it has a good pace. Right. Is it campy to you? Well, you have to take all of that into consideration of the time of when these things were made. Right. It's like looking at a silent movie and saying, boy, the performance is a little's because they're not speaking numbnuts yeah so you gotta yeah sell yeah um so yeah there's there's some arch uh behavior and performances so going back to this young girl she's now giving up candy or she's giving up oh going into going into this meal. Yeah. She had the 40 days.

She suffered. And now on Good Friday, which is two days before Easter, you go into church and you literally act out the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. And you- When you say you, you mean it's act out on the stage in front of you?

No, the people sitting in the pews, the parishioners. Are acting out? You are given a script and the priest narrates. What are you talking about? And he pretends that he is the administrator for the trial of Jesus Christ. And up on the stage is Barabbas, who was a convicted something. He's also on a cross. Sure. Now there were multiple, as you saw in the Ten Commandments, there were multiple crosses up with Jesus. He wasn't the only, they called them zealots back then. Sure. And so the zealots were the ones that the Romans were going after. And so they

hung them up on crosses and they call out to the crowd, which you're in, do you want Barabbas to be free? Because one person gets freed. Barabbas or Jesus Christ? And you have to yell, Barabbas! Free Barabbas! You have to yell that. Yeah, you're seven years old. You're 11 years old.

And is it in a script in front of you? It's in a script in front of you. And then they say, and what should we do with Jesus? And you have to yell, crucify him! As you're looking at crosses with Jesus everywhere. And you don't think this was just your church that you grew up in? No, this was a... You've talked to others since.

I would imagine it happened in all churches. You're thinking that I had some kind of a weird congregation. Well, I'm not thinking more than I am remembering that no other Catholic has ever mentioned this particular performance on Easter Sunday Mass. Yeah. Ever. No one. You want me to call my mother right now? I feel like that would be slightly biased.

I think we need to go outside your family and your church. I don't know other catholics weird you've distanced yourself from the tribe have you i mean no i think that let me call mary fitzgerald i know that just the fits dot dot yeah let's keep it with that mary is a boston she's Boston Irish and Irish Catholic. Her father worked for Whitey Bulger. He was a bookie in South Boston. He spent a lot of her childhood in jail,

but her mother used to take her to church. She'll say hotline when she answers because when we call each other, we must pick up. Wow. It's a hotline. Hotline. Hotline. Hotline. Listen, you're on the podcast right now.

What? You're on my podcast right now. I'm interviewing the great Kevin Pollack. Do you know Kevin Pollack? Yeah. Okay. He's here. Okay.

He, as somebody from a Jewish background, is unfamiliar with the Good Friday proceedings in the church and casting doubt on how it was done in my church. Do you remember going to church on Good Friday? I do, really, really foggily though. Do you remember acting out the scene of the crucifixion i do remember that do you remember do you remember having to yell crucify him crucify him no having having a choice

between barabbas and jesus and the congregation has to choose a free barabb, and while you're at it, kill Christ? While you're at it. Oh, yeah, while you're at it. No, while you're at it. We're already here. We're already gathered. Yeah. Yeah, like I said, though, I mean, we went more on Easter to please the grandparents.

Right. Okay. So it was more of a joyous week for you than a... I mean, I always say that we were holiday Catholics. Holiday Catholics, yeah. Yeah, you know, and it was like, let's shut Nana and Papa up. Yeah. And put on a dress and go. So Good Friday was, because my parents were not believers.

Yeah. You know? Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry. I'm not as great as Mick to to uh bother about this well thanks for coming over for easter dinner last night anyway it was good to see you it was so great did you go to the gay bar with tom afterwards no i wish i wish i couldn't convince him oh yeah that's

usually not hard it's not it's not gay enough for him right okay but uh go go and enjoy all right fitzy i can't be more helpful no that was that you got me halfway there anyway okay thanks all right see ya well i think you got me well it wasn't a gotcha moment i'm sorry i came across that way i think uh it just makes sense on paper that every church is going to do things their own way yes there are differences and and what really gets me is when you go to church i don't know you grew up reformed jewish again just the most relaxed it was more of a social gathering at temple than it was a religious and did you go every saturday uh yeah i mean i was bar mitzvahed which means during the week i went three times a

week wow um but even that was just to memorize the a passage yeah uh that you would eventually do uh kind of wrote right did you understand the words no in my day you learn from a lp later you'd learn from a cassette and then you learn from a DVD or no a CD I imagine um and and even before me I suppose people were reading and memorizing text but um you know I was already a performer so what mattered to me most is that I got seven applause breaks during my speech during my bar mitzvah in Hebrew no? No, you read from the Torah, the Hebrew part, and then you do what's called the bar mitzvah speech. You freestyle after that. Yeah. Well, I'm sure most people did. Mine was written and rewritten many, many times. Really? Well,

this was, I was going to perform in front of the congregation. Wow. So you're 13 at this point? Seven applause breaks. No kidding. Yes. Was that videotaped? was that videotaped to the point of course not but to the point where during a few interviews over the years the journalists who did a the minimal amount of research would ask is it true you opened your bar mitzvah speech with a funny thing happened on the way to the temple which i did not but that was their way of getting me to talk. Was there, did you do an impression of the rabbi during your seven minute speech? At 13, I wasn't yet doing impressions. Oh, okay. Yeah.

I was- More like hard punch lines? Yeah. I mean, I had already been watching the Tonight Show and memorizing comedians and collecting them like my friends collected baseball cards. Right. So it was more about writing my idea of jokes. none of which i remember because again i was 13 um who was the first comedian to kind of mentor you well because they hadn't put in the liner notes of his comedy

album will go on to become the most prolific serial rapist in history as a comedian uh bill cosby's first albums were to the point where i memorized the noah and the ark routine i think i'm pretty sure we discussed this yes we did on your show here no i meant mentor like took you under their wing was there some real life yeah was there somebody like in san you started in san francisco yeah so i i was born in san francisco But then raised, Will's a little younger than me actually. Yeah. And then raised down in San Jose an hour south. Yeah. So when I started doing standup professionally at 17, 18 years old, it was in San Jose and the San Francisco scene was this Valhalla an hour north. Right. So I eventually worked my way there when I was 20, I think, 19, 20.

And then it was Marty Cohen. Sure. Party, hearty Marty on the solid gold television program. Yeah. But as a pure standup monologist, he was very slick, of course, but he had great, great jokes. Like he wanted to see a Jewish superhero, Superman. That's good. Able to lease a tall building in a single call.

Yeah. Yeah. Marty Cohen. And I remember I was 20 and I got off stage and he came up to me afterwards and said, when your material catches up with your stage presence, you're going gonna be something. That's amazing.

Which I even then was able to take as a compliment, even though I thought my material was good. Yeah. It was of course not. Right. Good at all. And then, so in the San Francisco scene at that time, was that like Dana Carvey? Yeah, so Dana was a year or two older than me,

but so Robin was there back and forth doing Mork and Mindy. Yeah. So Dana was a year or two older than me, but so Robin was there, um, back and forth doing, uh, Mork and Mindy. Yeah. But he had, he had started there as a standup, um, like a year or two before. Right. Right. Maybe three. Yeah. But pretty close. So he was constantly there and, and, um, a great mentor and friend and supporter. Oh, no kidding. Every comedian at the time. Wow. Yeah, yeah. He did a really funny bit of my last HBO special,

also 30 years ago. So, yeah. But that scene was pretty potent. So I moved there when I was 21. Right. And started, you know, full-time, the serious nature of one's career. Yeah. I think San Francisco seems like a place that has kept its character over the years. It's still a place that has kind of a liberal slant, but it also, everybody talks about it being PC.

I go up there, I do my most outrageous stuff that I do anywhere else. And I find that they always embrace it. I think that's kind of a misnomer. Yes. Well, also, when I was 10 was the birth of the hippies in San Francisco. And my dad loaded us into his Volkswagen Bug. his Volkswagen bug. And he said, get in the car. We're driving to San Francisco to see the hippies. My brother and I, 10 and 12, didn't really know what he was talking about.

Yeah. And he treated it kind of like an African safari. And pointing and judging. Yeah. And I wish I had the wherewithal at 10 to say, Dad, can we put a pin in the judging thing for a moment and first talk about us driving here in Hitler's people's car? Can we step back a little bit from the Coliseum? That's amazing.

Yeah. I wish I had the wherewithal then. I did not. Yeah. I was captivated, mesmerized, curious. Did you ever become part of that scene as you got older? Well, by the time I was old enough, I mean, I grew up in it. Yeah.

I was old enough, you know, I mean, I grew up in it. Yeah. Because we had cousins that were closer to the city, the Zuckers, and where I did my first performance on their white painted out brick fireplace. Because my mother caught me standing in front of the seven foot wide stereo. I told the story on your show. Lip syncing the Noah and the Ark Cosby thing. And said, that's it. You're doing it for the Zookers that passed over. That was her first comment, by the way.

So she booked me at my first gig and also was instantly supportive, which none of that was clear to me at the time. So anyways, the Zookers lived very close to the city and they were five to seven years older. So they were already into the hippie scene. So every summer when we would go and stay there for a month or whatever we were indoctrinated into you know that's so cool it was unbelievably cool yeah to have hippies in the house right right not just at haydash

right right where the african safari but i mean it was bumper to bumper traffic. I mean, people were clearly, we weren't the only ones who had lined up to see the scene that was as pure and organic and without political agenda at the time. Yeah. And that it seems like drugs were used as a way of expanding the mind early on before they became just an all-out party. It seems like there was very serious exploration going on. Yeah, I'm sure. Timothy Leary. Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. Yes. And also, then soon thereafter, finding out this rich history of stand-up in san francisco right from back in the 60s with lenny bruce and woody allen and right dick gregory was a part of that jonathan winners so many were performing at the hungry eye was joan joan rivers was part of that as well? I feel like she was New York. Maybe she made it out West.

Okay. Yeah. I feel like she was there sometimes too. I mean, the guys, most of the people I mentioned, Woody Allen and Lenny were certainly New Yorkers. Yeah. Yeah. And Woody Allen, did you memorize those albums as well? The double album from 1970?

Yeah. Sure. Yeah. About the Moose. Shot of Moose. Yeah. Upstate New York. Strapped into my bumper and then he goes to the party with the moose yeah the whole thing yeah

fantastic the moose the moose mingled mingled did well scored scored and the joke was on them because in the end yeah what is it well there was a couple dressed as a moose at the party. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I forget their name. Yeah. The Rosenblatts or whatever. Yeah. At one point, I remember the Rosenblatts and the moose were locked in the horns in the foyer. Yeah.

Yeah. So those comedy albums were certainly my college. Yeah. For sure. Certainly my college. Yeah. For sure. It is amazing when you think about Woody Allen and Bob Newhart as guys at that time that were doing comedy that absolutely stands the test of time.

And yet they were not seasoned vets when they were doing it. They were very cerebral. They were almost the opposite of you. Their material hadn't caught up to their persona on stage. They didn have a stage persona yeah they were reciting jokes in fact newhart's case his album was recorded before he performed live anywhere oh that was his first show live well no it was recorded in a radio station no kidding absolutely and and the button down bob newhart album yeah that won a grammy yep yeah either all of it or parts of it were recorded at the radio station where he i think sold advertising yeah yeah right i know he sold advertising yeah he he had not performed

this is what i was told yeah uh we Apparently there's a thing called the internet. These things can be looked up. But anywho. So yeah, I mean, following that rich history was important. Did you go to the Hungry Idol? Well, it was an old timey strip club soon thereafter. Yeah. I mean, just instantly that. Right.

I think last time I was here, I ran by some ideas. I'm allegedly performing tomorrow night. Nobody sees this right away, right? No, this comes out in two weeks. Yeah. You're plugging a show that will have happened two weeks ago? Yep. Well, there's no reason to plug it.

But I am performing tomorrow night, and I've done so little stand-up lately that i started writing things down again okay um where's uh oh these are new bits okay good well they're ideas yes now last time you had some great ideas i'm trying to remember what they were oh everyone who's in a conversation and chimes in involuntarily, it seems to me, with yeah, yeah, yeah. Stop it. This isn't an answer to anything, nor is it a comment, nor dare I insist is it answering in the affirmative, which the word yeah is meant to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you're just not paying attention or you want this to move

yeah right you want you you want to yeah yeah yeah it's become a thing it's become an absolute problem for me um here's another i like that it reminds me of uh colin quinn talks about when uh new yorkers they don't really ask you how you're doing they kind of tell you how you doing you doing good yeah yeah it's like that you're moving it along there's no space being allowed yeah yeah even in the in the inception of it being meant to be uh agreeing with the person or or letting them know yes i've heard that yeah yeah yeah then it becomes a little dismissive yeah this thing you're saying yeah yeah yeah um here's another one to absolutely never ever do when you are i have people over for dinner never ever get everyone's attention and say, okay, let's go around and everyone tell their when I had COVID story.

I've also, I've just realized that everyone's story of having COVID deserves a yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes. Yeah. I think the idea of bringing up COVID and I'm helping somebody with their one hour special right now. And they're opening with 10 minutes about COVID. And I said, nobody wants to hear about COVID, not in dinner conversation, not on a standup stage. It happened. And we are going to deal with the trauma someday. But right now we need to just kind of do other stuff. Also to hear your COVID experience is ill-advised. Well, if you're from New York, there's also the 9-11 story. Everybody's got the 9-11 story. Sure. Yeah. Of course. Yeah.

Please. Yeah, no, it goes back to my people still say they remember where they were on Good Friday. Which, by the way, we might have named because it was not a bad Friday. It was a bad Friday for us. It's not a bad Friday.

Again, by the way, God's plan. You're welcome. Why do we grow tiresome with certain common terms, words and phrases? Example, what the hell is so wrong with saying, hey, it's been a while since i've seen you nothing right so why must i now reply to a been a minute the old one you like the 2.0 you like the old bit a minute has replaced several overused pronouncements most depicting a disturbingly longer passage of time haven't seen you in forever or its melodramatic cousin it's been an eternity

yeah how about this one 40 years ago it was not uncommon to hear someone say haven't seen you in a tit i never heard that a tit where i grew up was a measure of time nice yeah tits was occasionally the highest compliment that one fellow could offer another regarding A tit, where I grew up, was a measure of time. Nice. Tits was occasionally the highest compliment that one fellow could offer another regarding his new car. Hey, have you seen Larry's new car? No? It's tits. It's tits.

Right? Yeah. That you remember. Yeah. Once commonly said, the tits, you knew what a person meant when they insisted something was the tits. Yeah. Let's see. It is the universally appreciated body part. There is no other body part

that has gotten that much attention. Yep. All advertising is cleavage. All Roman statues, cave drawings. Yeah. And it just comes from nursing with your mother. Yeah. And wanting that comfort forevermore. Yes. Which is what my wife does now. She's a doula and she's a postnatal doula. So she swoops in and there's actually a rubber breast on our nightstand.

I'll say. And one on the other nightstand that's she's been around a while um okay this one is pacino i find if you want things done correctly uh or a certain way you got to do it yourself that's why why, for example, I've never owned a Roomba. And that is because I just love hearing Pacino say Roomba. A Roomba. A Roomba. Let's see.

Can someone help me with Instagram? I can't. No, it's just, I don't understand how, you know, it's simple for you. Sure. I don't need any of it. I just can't stop buying shit on Instagram. Really? I, I, I get constantly the ad comes up and it's slightly interesting that I, I drill down and I've purchased. I I mean I'm going to ask the audience how many people here have purchased shit you simply did not either know

about or need ultimately from Instagram you may not be one of them but I'm not alone in this I am fascinated because to me you don't seem like a buyer from social media you seem a little bit more no well I don't I don't I haven't before.

This is a fairly new development. I would say the last year. And it's things like these little lights for the steps in the garden or whatever in the front yard. So now that you've bought something, they're going to really barrage you with ads.

It hasn't stopped. It's gotten much worse. It's gotten much worse. It's gotten much worse. Yeah. In fact, I need someone to create a little recording where when I see, when I tap on one of those, shop now or swipe, it's like Richard Kine's voice saying, no, no. That would be helpful. No voice saying, no, no. That would be helpful. No, no.

No, no. George. Sometimes when you're with Richard Kine, he'll just say George Clooney's name for no reason. George. Is that all I have for you today? That seems like a very short list. You want to hear mine?

Yeah. All right. Here's my list of new stuff that I've written down but have not yet done on stage. Oh, nice. Okay. This is under the file, newer jokes, because there was already a new jokes. Yeah, I feel I had that. Love.

This is the best part for the viewers, I'm guessing. Well, you know, there's a show that's called- Where you just watch people do this? Yes. Actually- There's a British show where you watch people watch television. Is that true? It is true. I don't know the name of it. I'm shocked it hasn't taken over here

in these formerly United States. And there's probably a podcast about the show about people watching television. There's a show called Love Island. Are you familiar with Love Island? It's actually a British show as well. Fuck Island, but yeah. Yes. And then there's also a show called Love on the Spectrum, which is people with intellectual disabilities. And I often don't know until about 12 minutes in. Which one you're watching? Yeah. Yeah. That's great. That's a great joke. When I get in my car and I punch in my destination and an estimated time of arrival appears i take that as a personal affront from my car because it's not just a challenge oh i see because i always beat it yeah

but and it becomes a problem all right how important it is for me to beat that yes right yes i take it as a personal yeah yeah and i and i think to myself you'll be there in 14 minutes fuck you right right what yeah do you not are you not how do you i mean mine's live google maps and they bought waves right so do you not know that i can i just especially when they write you in capital letters you will get there in 14 minutes you don't know me that's what i say to my car greg would get there in 12 you will get there in 14 minutes um what about the people that are just starting meth now like didn't you notice anything that's like my uh i love that i think the last time I was here,

my new joke that I still haven't done on stage was, have serial killers also moved on to almond milk? Yeah. I wonder if somebody's last meal before execution was vegan. There are two political parties. There is an annoying group and a group that overreacts to the annoying group. Yes. Oh, I like that. Yeah. I was thinking about having a dog. Do you have a dog? We're cat people. Oh, all right. If you had a dog, do you have a dog? We're cat people. Oh, all right. If you had a dog, it's fun to rename it because nobody knows your dog's name at a dog park.

And so you can almost ingratiate yourself with different people. The dog responds to your pitch of your voice anyways, not really its name. Yes. Yeah. So if you're, say you're a single man and you want to meet a woman and she's got on like- You wrote this joke for single men? Yes. Right. Yes. Yeah. So if you're, say you're a single man and you want to meet a woman and she's got on like- You wrote this joke for single men? Yes. Okay. So you're a giver. This is not just about you getting-

Well, most of my audience are single men. Incels, I think they call them. Do they? Yeah. Other single men call them that? Yes. And so you could go to the dog park and say you're talking to a woman who has like a tie-dye t-shirt and Birkenstocks. You say, come here, Jerry. Come here, Jerry. Or maybe you're with- Birkenstocks. You're still dropping that as a shoe type. What's the newer one? I don't know, but that seems like such a dated reference. It seems really old. Yeah.

but that seems like such a dated reference. It seems really old, yeah. The check was sent to Italian Birkenstocks, huh? What am I? Quick quag the clown boy. Jeez. What else has she got? Patchouli oil?

Yes, there you go. And then you talk to a black couple and you go, come here, Rosa Barks. Oh, that's nice. Rosa Barks. Because you want's nice. Rosa Barks. Because you want them to know you also write puns. Well, that you're not only open-minded to other races, but that you're so comfortable with it that you're actually clever. Yeah.

You're comfortable putting a hat on a hat in front of strangers. That's right. What about when you go to Walgreens, or most pharmacies will do this. You're online. There's a line of people in front of you listening as you're paying. And then the cashier goes, do you want to donate a dollar to the juvenile diabetes? Round up. If you want to round up your purchase to an even number, I think sometimes.

But anyways, donate a dollar. You want to round it up it up yeah and you just look at them like no now you've humiliated me you put how about this i'm i'm collecting money for uh widows of 9-11 do you want to donate some money to me you got a cash register there's tons of money in there right seems to me like i should be the one asking for money from you i know that they that the person behind the counter was asking you to steal though they've got money in their pockets in this similarity you've they work for walgreens they're getting paid then double down and turn around and face the people in the crowd or the crowd in line who are i i and stink i yeah i like that yeah yeah what about you jerks yeah dollar each let's go

Yeah, I like that. Yeah. What about you jerks? Dollar each, let's go. We're just here to help each other with new bits. All right. All right, my last one. And then you're going to drive me home? And then I'm going to drive you home. Last time you visited me, you drove me because you had, not the last time, many times ago, you had a Tesla when nobody had a Tesla. That was 12 years ago. But I mean, I think you literally knew somebody and got one. Oh, to jump the line? I think you did, didn't you? No, the first one I waited forever. Oh. Yeah. I don't know that... That's interesting about him. I don't know that they've ever

created a shortcut on that thing, but it just got... It went from 13 months on the first one, because I got it before the car was on the road. Right. I ordered one. And then it became five weeks, and then, yeah, I'm on my fourth, now it has the yoke. You've seen the yoke? What's the, oh, it's like a spaceship? It's no longer a wheel. Really?

It's a yoke. Yeah. Like in our F1. So how do you do this? Let people know you're gay? What is that? This is how I i drive i put i put my wrist over there there's still a column you can put it on there that the yoke is attached to yeah you could do that okay sure and if you're angry after an audition you can still slam the top of yeah sure okay yeah i like it, I thought I would hate it. Yeah.

Yeah. Anyways, nobody wants to hear this. All right. Let's get to a thing called who tweeted. This was a segment on your show. On Kevin Pollak's chat show. Kevin Pollak's chat show. You would often pick quotes from or tweets from celebrities.

Real tweets. Females mostly. From either Demi Moore. Paris Hilton. Paris Hilton. pick quotes from or tweets from celebrities real tweets females mostly from either demi more paris hilton paris hilton or uh demi more paris hilton it was a third one and then i would ask uh i think usually sam levine was the uh alleged uh host of the game show and he would stand at the edge of the round table. And the guest and I would compete. Okay. So I'm going to ask you to match up these tweets

with their writers. Okay. Because I remember. Their writers? Their composers. They composed a tweet. Okay. Yeah. When I go, I want my casket to be driven through the New York City Pride Parade with a plaque that reads, I wasn't forket to be driven through the New York City Pride Parade with a plaque that reads,

I wasn't for everyone, but I was for us. Who can arrange? Okay. That's the first one. Right. But I gave a multiple choice as to who wrote the tweet on the chat show. Well, I'm going to give you each tweet and then I'm'm gonna tell you three names and you're gonna match them together didn't understand your version of the game well you know please continue you know

this is fitz dog radio right not the chat show i didn't understand the setup okay yeah i thought you were actually pulling something wow what a workout had to run up flights of stairs and all i could think of were the brave firefighters climbing the Twin Towers on 9-11. Oh, my God. Who is this douchebag? Holy shit. Holy shit. Oh, my God.

It was in the steam room, and all I could think about was the Jews during the Holocaust. Yeah, similar. Yeah. Yeah. Just heard there's an ICE checkpoint on Hollywood a few blocks from where I live. Everyone better give

their housekeepers, nannies, and landscapers a ride home tonight. Another detached personality. Yeah. Utterly. Yeah. Okay, the names are Lena Dunham, Amber Heard, and Greg Sulkin.

Do I know who Greg Sulkin is? I don't. I don't. I mean, look, I know in the chat show you used people that were recognizable. I don't know where to begin. There are a billion famous people on X. You chose one you didn't know. I think you'll understand why when you guess.

Well, I'll understand why. Okay, so Amber Heard, Lena Dunham. Lena Dunham would be the first one about the gay pride. Dunham. Lena Dunham would be the first one about the gay pride. Amber Heard would be... Oh, God. Oof.

Wow, what a workout. Had to run up flights of stairs and all I could think of was the brave firefighter who's climbing the... Yeah, that could be Amber Heard. You, sir, were one for three. Lena Dunham was the gay parade. A gentleman named Greg Sulkin was the 9-11 running up the stairs. And Amber Heard was drive your housekeepers and landscapers home.

Just pile them all in the car. Right. So getting back to choosing someone that no one has heard of, how does that even happen with your game? Well, I Googled stupid celebrity tweets. Right. And that one was so good, I couldn't not put it in. I now utterly appreciate how it made the list, the actual tweet. But, well, I don't need to control your show. But the purpose of the game.

Okay. Okay. In my defense. In other words, I couldn't possibly know what this person would tweet. Right. Right. But you gets the other two and that's a process of elimination, isn't it? Sure. I just, yeah. i just yeah so sure before you critique fitz dog radio i went too late i went to paris hilton's twitter account oh no it is literally all ads this new purse from breeze is absolutely hot you gotta buy it's all she writes yeah and also to her credit, she speaks out about child abuse because I believe she was abused

in a boarding school in high school. All right then. Wow. Well, it's great that she speaks out. Finally? Finally. Yeah. Okay. Did you want to go longer? mean sure we can finally what it's your

show i don't feel like we've talked about nothing is that the show now yeah okay kind of talk about nothing i mean do you want me to go through like no what was your childhood no no no no god no please you don't like that on interviews. The childhood? Yeah, like did you have a troubled childhood? Do you have like trauma? I don't like it only because mine is incredibly boring because we were a glass half filled family. Right.

Yeah. It was middle class and everybody was not hiding anything. Yeah. And pretty uneventful. Yeah. To the point where it's boring and I can't remember most of it. Yeah. Because nothing happened.

Wow. Like I'll watch an episode of a series that Jamie and I are watching. And it just happened last night. I said, oh, I really like that episode something happened yeah um yeah so so that's my memory of my childhood is very scattered because I was asked or it was arranged, I don't feel I was forced, but maybe I was, to have a sit with someone who I later learned was a psychiatrist. And I think I was about eight or nine, who we played a game of chess and during which a few questions were asked. Uh-huh.

But even that, I don't have any- Wait, so your parents duped you into talking to a psychiatrist? I don't know why this happened. I don't know, they're both gone, so I can't ask. Once I had the memory come back, because there was nothing traumatic about it. It was just once, so it wasn't an ongoing thing.

Right. It wasn't like, if you do this, we're going to send you to a thing. Uh-huh. I don't remember whether it was part of school. Yeah. And I remember my brother's two years older. And so not too long ago, I said to him, how much of our childhood dinners do you remember?

Just the family of four gathered around having dinner because i can't remember any of them other than mom's horrible fucking cooking to the point where the the point of vegetables did not exist in my house um they were to be boiled yeah or taken from a can oh yeah and then boiled right we had that. My mother was, I thought it was an Irish thing, but my mother, she was not taught by her mother how to cook anything. And so, she was a very young mother and she started traveling around the country.

My father was a radio announcer. So she went from living in her father's house in the Bronx to Youngstown, Ohio. Yeah. With two boys that were 13 months apart and a father who was working nonstop. We are 13 months apart, two boys. Oh, is that right?

Yeah. They call that Irish twins. Yes, they do. Yeah. So then off to Philadelphia and no idea what she's doing. Cans, boiling cans of things, taking meat out of the wrapper and putting it in the frying pan with not even salt. No seasoning whatsoever.

Right. And then serving it. Sunday nights was gluck. She made a dish called gluck, which she figured out on her own. You take ground beef and you sprinkle it into a heavily buttered pan. And wish the family luck? And you wish the family luck with the gluck. And then you spread more butter on white Wonder Bread.

And then you put the gluck on top of that. At which point the bread- So kind of a sloppy joe, but not really? A sloppy joe has a bun that can handle some slop. Certainly does. Wonder Bread says, you win. You're on your own. Yeah. of a sloppy joe but not really a sloppy joe has a bun that can handle some slop certainly does wonder bread says you win you're on your own yeah yeah yeah yeah we we had a similar thing where no there was no uh so consequently the dinners were nothing really eventful or interesting or, yeah, just, and raised by TV for sure. Uh-huh.

Yeah. Andy Griffith show? Mm-hmm. Yeah. In fact, the only transition I remember that was awkward was you just had a lot of TV until the day you were told, now you have to go to kindergarten. Uh-huh. There's a school, there's a place.

Right. You will now enter school. And sorry, today's not going to be watching tv just that all day maybe go outside for a little bit uh-huh and and not enjoying that at all right at all yeah like whoa what is the point of this but no friends you weren't like playing? Oh, absolutely. In the streets. The streets where there was, of course. The tough streets of San Jose. Well, there was a walnut orchard at the end of the street when I grew up in San Jose. Walnut Grove.

I would... Oh, no. That's up by San Francisco. Yeah. Right. But, yeah. So, there was definitely kids playing and be sure you're... When the streetlights come on, come into the house sort of thing. But on your own, walking to school, riding your bike to school, all that stuff. But I would just prefer to be in front of the TV watching Andy Mayberry and all those

shows. Dragnet freaked me out. Yep. When the hippies smoke pot and we're up on the roof. That's right. I remember that episode. I remember when he's talking to them and he gives them the hard talk. Is that how you want to spend your life? You want to grow up and be that? in the roof. That's right. I remember that episode. I remember when he's talking to them and he gives them the hard talk.

Is that how you want to spend your life? You want to grow up and be that? Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, but so very uneventful and very- Was there ever, when's the first time you experienced anti-Semitism? Didn't.

Like as a kid, no kids ever said anything? No, no, because again, we were so reformed. We weren't in anyone's face about it. Right. To the point where no one on the block was Jewish. So when we're four and six or three and five and Christmas comes around, my parents were like, I'm not fucking telling the kids there's no Christmas here. Yeah. Are you going to tell the kids that?

Right, right. And we had a tree. Uh-huh. And we had Christmas. That is reformed. We also lit candles at the menorah uh-huh but and the passover seder was at one of the cousins house yeah never at our house we never had a family seder yeah and i yeah it it's all on a need-to-care basis for me for decades yeah i

haven't been to a seder i like this is the strangest thing. I light the menorah every year. I make a point of it. It bothers me if I can't be home when it's time to light the candle. But that's it. And I don't know why that still means something when nothing else means anything. I'm not a big fan of organized religion in any way, shape, or form. I don't trust it as an institution. Right. Isn't it interesting though how much good... I mean, I am no longer practicing Catholic, but my mother, who is, spent years volunteering at a women's prison. She worked at my school- Extraordinary.

... teaching English as a second language. Extraordinary. There is a boots on the ground mentality about a lot of religions. Obviously, the Jews are very altruistic. Looking after the neighborhood too. Yes. And the other great thing about is, I'm not a big fan of the institution, but i am a fan of the uh creation of religion as a way to remove chaos and have order right so i'm a big fan of that yeah anything make you happier than no clutter on the kitchen counter because there's very few things in life that make me happy really than losing the clutter yeah and what does that have to Is that a metaphor for religion?

Well, in the sense of, I think religion- Clears the table. A great deal of it is about having order and removing chaos. And I think one of the things that slowly drives me insane over the last 10 years is the erosion of society and us caring about each other. Yes. And the sense of, I'm just waiting for oncoming traffic, someone to just plow right into me. Are you ready? Because they're just, they don't care anymore. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, I don't know what, 15, I used to say 10 years ago, but now I think maybe it's 15 years ago. Have to pee in a stall. I don't know why, but people lining up behind me feels like too much pressure. So I got to go in a stall to pee at a public urinal. And I'm waiting on the stall, door opens up, father and son walk out, seat down, pee on the seat. And I realized, all right, that's it, we're done.

As a society- That's the fall of the Western civilization. That young father taught his son to pee on the seat right forget the people already peeing on the seat yeah and i mentioned this to women like we've been peeing on the seat for centuries because of the hovering and you don't want to sit down but and the and the instrument is not as precise there's no precision and also you have to hover yeah but so men uh uh as i was raised you you pick up that. If in fact you have to use the stall. Do you use your foot or your hand to lift the seat?

Foot always. I'm not touching anything. Not touching anything. Nope. How wide of a straddle do you do on the urination? You mean my own personal feet? How wide are they? How far apart are they?

Yeah. I think I'm okay on the straddle. Mine are often almost in the stall next to me. I go so wide. I'm more, I think, awareness issues. I don't want either person on either side to see my shoes. Yeah. Because then on the way out, they're going to go, that was the guy that was in there farting.

That's right. Yeah. That's right. But the biggest laugh I ever got out of my son in my entire life is we flew to New York from LA. And as a good aerial citizen, held in my gas for five and a half hours. Don't know how you do it.

Get into the men's room. Yep. Urinate. And I let out- Kablooey. Probably a 16 second fart. And he was about nine and he doubled over. I had to help him out of the bathroom.

He was laughing so hard. You've never done anything that funny to him? No. Ever? No. Before or since? That's it. That was the peak.

That was the end. I mean, it is the first laugh and the last laugh, the fart. Babies giggle when they fart. Yep. Yeah. And it's involuntary yes at this point and i'm not sure why for you it's involuntary to laugh to laugh oh right right i think i think my my comedy palette is so sophisticated yeah until somebody farts in a movie and i'm laughing and it happened involuntary right right so there's no It is the one thing about laughter, right?

Yes. When it's involuntary. Yep. Who do you like now? What comics are you watching? Any specials you watch lately? I don't know that I have my finger on the pulse. Don't think I do.

Yeah. I don't think I do. And where are you doing stand-up these days? I'm not. I thought you said you're going doing stand-up these days? I'm not. I thought you said you're going out. I was asked to do somebody's thing. Somebody's thing? Well, there's a brewery and they've got literally how I started 45 years ago.

Yeah. In a bar. Yeah. I don't know why I said yes. Oh, we went to see them perform, Jamie and I, out of support. Uh-huh. That's my better half, by the way. I realize I've said her name twice as if everyone knows.

She was the head writer and one of the sidekicks on the chat show. Her and Sam Levine were sitting there. And she has a background in comedy, doesn't she? No. Okay. No. I mean, she writes sketch. She's quite talented, but no ambition, which is why we're still together.

You know what I love about you? I know right where to find you. But yeah, what was I saying? You went out to see comedy. Yeah, we went out to see a friend perform at this brewery, and it's a once a month thing. And it's fairly new that they're doing a show there. I think the venue has been doing shows. It's in the West Side. So if I was producing a show, which I do, I do benefits, I produce benefits. That's when I perform every now and then. You would come out and do that? There's no worse audience than a Los Angeles audience.

They're the worst. Yeah. So that's probably the reason I stopped. Like when I first moved here from San Francisco in my mid-20s, having risen to the top of that scene, which is very difficult, and got to here and had to start over. The improv on Melrose was my home turf. Yeah. And only because comedians I'd opened up for, Leno, Seinfeld, Reiser, whoever, had said, when you come to LA, I can get you stage time at the improv.

I think you're good enough, you know, blah, blah, blah. And so that's why I gravitated there. And then that became my home turf. Yeah. And the moment I didn't need to do stand up because I started doing movies. Yeah. I stopped. Really?

In LA. Yeah. I would still do some stuff on the road. Yeah. To find out what actually is funny. It's a difference of- Oh my God. Even if you drive to Irvine or it's, you feel the difference immediately.

Yeah. There's just people that are showing up with the agenda of laughing. Yes. Not to see somebody famous. Yeah. Not to be part of a cool scene. Yeah. And so many of the LA places have personalities.

You go to, people go, you wanna do a show on Los Fieles? No. No. Not at all. Oh God, oh God. Like a bunch of kids with PBRs sitting there, like wearing work boots that are worn out, but they didn't wear them out,

they bought them used from a store. And only bought them because they look worn out. Right, right. And I feel like I'm a million years old, used from a from a store and only bought them because they look more now right yeah right and and i feel like i'm a million years old because i'm talking about my kids or yeah prostates and they oh that's the other question i had for you yeah i'm so glad you mentioned that if you have direct tv you'll know what i'm talking okay or maybe some other kind of cable. Who books Larry King's prostate? I'd like to get on that. Have you gone around the dial and seen Larry King's prostate? First of all, I got news for you. It's not great at this point. It can't be. It's gone. But who books that? Because I would love to. All right.

It's time for Fastballs with Fitz. Was this segment on the last time you did the show? Possibly. Sure. It's like five questions kind of thing real quick. Yeah. Have you ever saved somebody's life? No.

I balked at saving someone's life. And thankfully someone else was there to do it. Interesting. Yeah. One of my most horrendous single moments in life. Wow. Middle of Cabo San Lucas waves. Have you ever tried to body surf in Cabo San Lucas? It's tough. You'll die. Really? There's six, seven foot waves and you should not be body serving. And no one told us that. So five of us went out and it was one after another also. So I thought I was going to die. And the person two feet away was saying, help, help me. And I was in instantly the thought was, I'm going to die. how can i help you yeah and thankfully someone within that five second span of me being in my own panic yeah uh grabbed this person and swam away with

them and i remember thinking also but you can you come back for me because i mean so when i say i balked at saving someone else i didn't have an an option. Yeah. As I saw it in that nanosecond, I really did believe I was the next person to yell help. Right. You were a tow truck with four flat tires. Yeah, I don't know how I survived.

Yeah. But I certainly didn't help that person survive. It is the scariest thing in the world when you are caught in waves. Oh, fuck. And you cannot breathe and your muscles are tired. That's exactly it.

Yeah, your body is shouting to your head, this is it, we're going down. Yes. Fuck you. Fuck you for getting us out here. And you know what? You're on your own. Why do we fuck with water? I don't know.

We crawled out of it safely. We evolved. And now we go, hang on, I'm going to go back in there. Well, I don't, as a rule, don't. I have respect for the ocean. I think it's much more. But you have a pool in your backyard. Well.

You play with gravity and an inability to breathe on a regular basis. I mean. You challenge it. It's mostly four feet deep. Okay. So. Yeah. As long as I can stand, I think.

Do you go in there year round or just in the summer? I can stand, I think. Do you go in there year round or just in the summer? I would say previous to the last couple of years when the weather flipped on its axis. Yeah. It started in March and goes through till- Is it heated? October. Can be, but I don't. It's black bottom, so it kind of heats itself with the sun. Allegedly, I don't know. Yeah. Okay. There are two types of people in the world. Are we on question one? No, we finished that. You did not save somebody's life, so you're O for one. Okay. I just had that traumatic memory,

but now let me think if I actually ever did save someone's life i feel like we were about to across into traffic and i did grab the back of somebody's oh jacket uh as a bus went by but maybe i saw that in the movie it wasn't me did the bus have no brakes no Sandra Bullock was driving it? It was, yeah. Yes, yeah. Yeah. All right, there are two types of people in the world.

Uh-oh. Go. I finished that? That's right. Dot, dot, dot. Okay. Those who have acute awareness of their surroundings and 90% of the population. Wow.

Yeah. This drives Jamie and I insane. Yeah. Because we have an acute awareness of our surroundings. Yes. At all times. And it's important to us. Yes.

It's also similar or not too dissimilar, a cousin of, you're either early or you're an asshole. Yeah. Yeah. This late thing. A total disrespect to everyone. Yes. And so crosswalks, there's two, like, according to you, there's the people that look up, see you, give a quick wave, double their pace.

And there's the people that look at their phone. On the phone all the way through the crosswalk. They dawdle slowly. It happened yesterday. Yeah. Yeah. Just an impressive level of assholiness. Yeah.

Yeah. Are you kidding me? That sort of thing. Okay. I feel like I did better with two than one. You did good with that one. Have you ever not finished a set on stage? Yeah, I was heckled so badly by a drunk in the front

that I started laying into him. This is in a comedy club? This is in a comedy club 35 years ago, maybe more. He was just hammered, wouldn't stop. club 35 years ago, maybe more. He was just hammered, wouldn't stop. And finally, the normal versions and clubs in the bag of dismissing this heckler weren't working because he was just too drunk. So I think I said something like, this is tougher than you think. You think you can do this. He got up out of his chair,

came to the side of the stage, walked up the steps and was coming at me. But he was 6'6", 280. And he was coming at me as if he wasn't going to take the opportunity to perform. He was going to kill me. Physically destroy me. And the bounces are doing nothing.

It happened too quickly, I think. And so I handed him the microphone and jumped down into his seat and started heckling him. But that was the only time. That's amazing. Yeah. But it was fight or flight. Yeah, yeah. It was not great improv.

Wow. It was. This guy is going to throw me from the stage. At least I'll fly into people. Did he talk into the microphone? Oh, sure. He was convinced he was hilarious. And man, did he not do well.

That's amazing. Yeah. That's very- Surprised to no one. He was not prepared. That's some martial arts shit you pulled. Yeah. That might have been the only time i saved somebody's life yeah yeah the circle back to one uh finally what is the hackiest bit you've ever done

hackiest i i i'm i know there are well it's probably the first seven to eight years of my act yeah it just i don't remember any of it it was just super hacky yeah um because i didn't understand i started out just doing impersonations where you didn't really have to write material. You just put them in any situation. And it's a parlor trick, the impersonation. If I can think of someone you like and I can recreate them in front of you, I will steal the affection you have for the actual person. Got it. I don't have to have any particular awareness of writing a joke. It's like a cover band. Truly.

Yeah. But it's more freakish than a cover band. Yeah. Because people are looking at you and they're hearing Jack Nicholson. Right. Or Al Pacino. But they cannot believe this alien voice is coming out of this squat jew on stage yeah um so this is before you started writing good material yeah with the character and then it became important to me

to do like 30 minutes of when i realized a comedian was just their point of view and once you have a point of view then everything's material yeah and so i didn't have a point of view because I didn't really have a personality on stage. Yeah. And then all I, as you can see from the alleged new material, it's all, I realize all my material now is what annoys the piss out of me. Yes. And I imagine that you've been doing this for decades. Yeah, I think it's stuff that annoys me. And but I think with you, it's very consistent because there is a levity to it that keeps it from becoming curmudgeonly. Well, that's amused. You're amused by how annoying people are. Right. You're angry, but it's not it's not the fucking blistering rant that you get from a lot of comics about stupidity now right that is the that is sort of the equity of comedy now is how angry can you get at things

that you go like it's not not really that bad yes you know yeah i directed a documentary talking has documentary nothing really impressive but it's's, uh, a cup misery, love comedy. And the thesis was, do you have to be miserable to be fun? And, and from it, I learned, you know, that every artist is articulating, whether you're a painter, a playwright, songwriter, you're articulating at some point some form of past misery right our job as artists is to articulate it in a way that is either universal so the audience goes oh yeah so this anger thing we're talking about yeah if you can find the levity and have the audience go fucking me too yeah right um or so personal that the audience goes oh you poor fucker while they're laughing because you have the audacity of sharing this uh debilitating personal

thing yeah um and i learned that from doing that documentary and i I think it was Rob Brydon. Do you know who that is? He's a British comedian. He and the famous partner, they do the Trip movie, Trip to Italy, Trip to... Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they both do the Michael Caine, the dueling Michael Caine. But he's the less famous of the two. Okay. What's the other one?

He did the great TV series. Ricky Gervais? No. It's a little before Ricky. God damn it. If only we had Google. Or one of your staff of 27. The Trip Movies.

It's Rob Brydon and this is so horrible for the audience who's listening or watching thing. I thought you both were comedians. You should know this. Steve Coogan. Steve Coogan. Right, right, right. I can't believe- Yeah, he's confirming. I can't believe I won that race. Yeah. So those two, Rob Brydon is the other one of those two that do the trip movies. And Rob Brydon said a version of what I just said, well, either it's so personal that the audience yeah and the other thing he said about bombing because there was a chapter in

misery loves comedy that was just about uh bombing yeah he he he has i start bombing i slow down and i really take my time because i want the audience to go wait a second this guy is not panicking i thought he was bombing is it me yeah do I not get what's happening? He looks very comfortable with what's happening because there's an instinct. Talk about fight or flight. Yeah. When we're all bombing, that is not slow down and lean into it. Yeah. I mean, sometimes you might laugh at it because it's so absurd that the audience has decided as a group of strangers who did not come to rehearsal, what you just said is wholly unfunny. Categorically no reaction at all.

Yeah. Yeah. And then it becomes- That's your favorite bit. Right, right. There's that problem. Yeah, there's that. And then there's also just that, you know, that they can come together and it becomes infectious.

Now that most of them aren't laughing. Yeah. You don't want to be the outlier who's laughing at this guy, except the back row. Yeah. Which is the other comedians. That's right. Who fucking love it. Why do they love it so much when we're bombing?

Because they've been there and they've survived. You saw Kevin Me meanie bomb i'm sure in your day right i saw mostly bomb yeah because he was um definitely not doing jokes he was definitely not um he was telling stories uh about his family and the big pant people were big pant people but it was a big performance it was a big boisterous performance that was not quite andy kaufman because it wasn't off-putting ever right it was kind of anti-comedy and watching him bomb was a way of him saying what you guys are doing is so absurd like yeah you know i got uh i didn't have a map i didn't have a map my car i had a globe take it out of the glove compartment

no room for my gloves i don't care it's like just silliness yes but completely committed to, which is why watching him bomb was so joyous. Yes. Because he didn't sweat. He just kept on going. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I realize also I've written very few jokes. That's the other thing. It was always sort of stories. Yeah. To the point where I'm overly proud of the few jokes that I wrote that I can remember. Right. Like raising a Jewish home and had an uncle who was a faith healer. Of course, he was a Jewish faith healer. He did things a little differently. He would heal people by comparing his illnesses to theirs.

Oh, he just sprained your ankle, huh hmm i have a growth on my colon the size of your face how do you feel now mr ankle and they would yeah yeah person would walk right out right i love it all right listen uh i'd love to promote your date, but you don't have one, as we know of right now, your stand-up dates. Oh, is this going to come out before April 19th? Yes. Okay, I'll be at a theater in Livermore, California. Oh, nice. The Bankhead?

Okay. Maybe. This is a- This is a stand-up. The oddity, Bankhead Theater, Livermore, California. I love it. The oddity of my career, I don't know if we've talked about this and I'm sorry to bring it up at the end, is that almost not a day goes by where someone, one or more people aren't stopping me as a member of the public to say, oh, hey, I like your work. So I'm a character actor who's constantly recognized. Yeah.

I'll also be at the Roxy Theater in Rochester, Michigan, May 17th. Oh, nice. So the oddity of my standup career is I don't have a draw anywhere. So the theater gigs, these folks are probably going to lose money. And I feel bad about it. Yes. It is weird how often I'm recognized.

And in New York especially, which is weird. Yeah. You know what? It's not weird. And Jamie and I finally realized the reason was because they're more boisterous about it. Everywhere else people will recognize you, but they won't say anything. Right.

And you ought to go, hey. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Weinberg. Right. Right? Weinberg. Weinberg. Whereas everywhere else, people who are with me will say, did you see those people walk

past and turn around immediately and they can't try to figure out who you are? So, yeah. What do you attribute that to because it is a very bizarre because i didn't much like the early podcasting i didn't nurture the the thing the social media the i didn't um first of all as i said the moment that a few good Men happened in 92 and I started getting offers and started doing all these movies to the point where it was like 40 movies in the 90s. I remember being at the end of the 90s, the millennium was changing. So there were all these top 10 lists. And I ended up on a top 10 hardest working actors in hollywood the criteria of which was you had to have done at least four movies per year every year of the 90s it was like

me and sam jackson and maybe one other person uh-huh it's like ridiculous yeah um but again six of these movies were good you know uh i'm not listing my batting average like i'm somebody so consequently at 92 when that started happening by 93 i'm off the road not doing stand up doing all these movies right not even knowing the death of stand-up comedy clubs was was about to happen oh yeah there was a crash in the 90s. The crash was around 93, 94 is when it kind of began. So you made an elegant dismount. Did not know.

Nobody told me. So by the time I came back to it in 2000, 2001, and wanted to get out there again, I realized that almost a decade had gone by where I'd not nurtured an audience. People didn't think of you as a comic anymore so when they announced me at the bankhead theater in livermore yeah people of livermore were like the actor from the thing is coming to the theater what's he gonna do

scenes yeah from a thing yeah is it a one-man theater thing what is this where however people know you is how they know you yeah however they discover you is how they know me so even though a few good men came out around the same time as my second hbo stand-up special the one that robin williams is in um called stop with the kicking uh a few good men was this juggernaut that was so huge and that I was the only not famous person in the movie when it came out, that I was the only one that the audience could go, did you see the guy with the, he's good. Right. So there's that thing. And then that kicked off all these offers where people were like, who was the guy in the thing? So there was no nurturing of that all right stand up i didn't go out and promote the stand-up special by doing a tour and yeah you know it wasn't a thing so when i came back to it it was

yeah it was the actor who's playing at the theater it was probably but now i gotta think with mazel i mean that now i can kill it doing a temple tour oh it's a very Jewish audience. Yeah. I think everybody enjoys that. Is it? You think it skews very Jewish? Well, it skews all over the world. Like it's the number one export from Hollywood television wise to India, the country. And I think it's the Bollywood similarity with the wardrobe and the music background and also the family, the big, big family unit.

So I do know that it had an international, it was global instantly. Yeah. Which was weird and bizarre because as Tony Shalhoub said, when they did the pilot, the guy came in episode two. Well, I'm pretty sure the Jews, the Upper West Side of New York will watch the show. Yeah. And then, so yeah, there was an, and then like a group of three 22-year-old African American young women will come up to Jamie and I at dinner and say, hey, Kevin, I really

like you. So it kind of crossed all these, every walk of life, truly. Yeah. But I'm still the actor from the thing. Right. But I'm still the actor from the thing. Right. And so if you list me at your theater, maybe I need to get it to the subscription fee of Center for the Performing Arts.

Like if you saw me on the calendar. Yeah. I think Bob Dubek made that turn 25, 30 years ago. Right, right. He's just a part of the subscription of the Center for the Performing Arts of every town in the country. Yeah, I think it's really, I mean- An evening with, how about this idea? Okay. And I might, if you like it, think about it.

I would love to write the show with you. Okay. It's called, well, I'd like to name it Al, Chris, and Jack, but to put butts in the seats, I should probably name it Pacino, Walken and Nicholson. Yes. And it's three half hours made into 90 minutes. Yeah. Of me just walking out on stage as each of them and talking.

Wardrobe change. Wardrobe change, but maybe nothing else. Uh-huh. And talking just as them about minutia of their lives. Uh, and it can be from real like when i told this story about uh jack nicholson on a few good men on the rich eisen show on his show it popped up in everyone's google feed and it got 4.5 million uh views in weeks so I'm told. Did you do the impression during it or you just

told the story? I did, but it was the sort of non-Nicholson story of it. Let's see if I can have that sort of strength on the Fitz dog. uh one of the absolute most bizarre surreal moments in my history of of acting in movies while doing a few good men the world finds out that magic johnson is hiv positive and at the time for the heterosexual community this was a a atom bomb right it was always prior to this exact moment it was their problem uh not ours in the heterosexual community and there was a certain uh uh of course a body of the heterosexual community that had great empathy and did what they could. But it wasn't a problem for John or Jane Q public in terms of life threatening the way it was in the gay community where you just didn't know at any given moment in your pursuit of happiness if you

were susceptible. when magic johnson is very high profile family man uh the story breaks and so now i'm on a soundstage shooting the movie where there are 110 crew members and everyone's walking around in zombie camp truly no one knows what to do with this information and it was a bizarre atom bomb that had gone off. Well, here on set, we have the Lakers authority in Jack Nicholson. Right. And slowly, I see crew members going up to him and asking, what does this mean? How did this happen?

Yeah. They're just looking for answers. Right. Because again, everyone's understanding of the world has been shattered. This guy's healthy. He's in great shape he's playing basketball right he's currently playing and it just changed everything and it's very difficult maybe for people to appreciate because this is a 32 year old story also his

number um so later that afternoon i'm released from set i'm walking from set to my trailer which is a not a long walk and i hear somebody mumbling behind me and i turn around and it's jack and he's talking to himself and he's basically just saying it's surreal the whole fucking thing is surreal and he gets to his trailer and he puts his hand on the knob and he sees me and he turns back away from his trailer to me and he says you want to know surreal i remember thinking i'm sorry jack nicholson did you just ask me if i wanted to know what you think is surreal i'm doing this picture chinatown i'm sorry jack nicholson did you just start a story with Nicholson did you just start a story with I'm doing this picture Chinatown and one day I'm rehearsing this scene with John Houston who you have to understand was like a surrogate father to

me he meant more to me than my own family I worshiped the ground he walked on and we're rehearsing this scene between our two characters and um at one point in during this rehearsal i see over his shoulder about 50 yards away walking towards us his daughter angelic who uh well i had just started banging a couple of weeks before and uh and i'm realizing that i hadn't figured out a way to tell the old man and i didn't want to tell him because i didn't want to break his heart i didn't want him angry with me i didn't want to upset him in any way shape or form he i would have killed her if he asked me to that's how much this man meant to me anyways i'm thinking all this in the middle of this rehearsal

and i come out of my own thoughts back into the scene at the exact moment that his character says to mine, Mr. Giddish, are you sleeping with my daughter? And with that, Nicholson spun and walked into his trailer. And I remember standing there in this parking lot at Culver Studios looking around for a witness. Anybody else see that? What just happened? Jack Nicholson wanted to know. And for years, I never told that story other than a couple of friends.

Wow. Never told it on stage. Never told it publicly because it was his story. Yeah. Right. This happened to friends. Wow. Never told it on stage. That's amazing. Never told it publicly because it was his story. Yeah. Right. This happened to him. Yeah. But then I realized him sharing it with me happened to me.

Right. And him telling me, him just choosing. Clearly, he needed to tell someone. Yeah. Yeah. Clearly, it was on his mind just in that moment. Right. He was walking to his trailer saying the words, it's surreal.

Yeah. Just surreal. He had already started the story and then he turned around and saw you. Yeah. Yeah. He was probably running the first couple of beats. Right, right. In his own thoughts.

Wow. What else was surreal? That's amazing. Yeah. So that happened. Kevin Pollak. Great to see you. Great to see you.

Thank you for your time. Yeah. So that happened. Kevin Pollack, great to see you. Great to see you. Thank you for your time. Yeah, the Bankhead in Livermore and the Roxy Theater in May in Rochester, Michigan. And old episodes are no longer a dollar

if you want to go back and see the chat show with Kevin Pollack. It's on YouTube. And if you have ideas, YouTube, yeah. If you have ideas how I can not expensively, because I own all of them. It's a two, it's 400 episodes, averaging about 90 minutes plus.

A lot of two, two and a half hours. And they're not online. Two hours of Elon Musk in 2009, prior to Elon becoming a bond villain damn um and i feel like if i just put out 20 second pieces yeah of just his talking head right as an example but tom hanks going on two hours and 50 minutes right um you know it's it's so you need a good editor well there's there's caption clip i mean put on social media i feel there's money to be i think well even if there's no money to be made there's assets to

be put in seats just to draw attention to something yes no i think you're doing a disservice to the world i think i need to take it off youtube yeah and then figure this out. Great to see you. Great story, Kevin. You're the best. Thanks for coming on. That's a great reach. We'll see you next time on FitzDawg Radio.