Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - 273. Larry “Ratso” Sloman

Episode Date: August 19, 2019

Gilbert and Frank are joined by author, journalist and songwriter (and Gilbert's old pal) Larry "Ratso" Sloman for a conversation about the Jewishness of Elvis Presley, the glory days of "Rolling Stone," the mysterious death of Harry Houdini and the new Martin Scorsese documentary, "Rolling Thunder: A Bob Dylan Story." Also, Al Lewis takes the stand, Joni Mitchell takes umbrage, Floyd the barber meets Robert Zimmerman and Ratso recalls adventures with Joan Baez, Leonard Cohen, George Harrison and Al Goldstein. PLUS: Gogi Grant! "Renaldo and Clara"! "Fred Mertz' Night Out"! Ratso samples Bela Lugosi! And Gilbert stars in "National Lampoon's" Foto Funnies! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Visit Miele.ca to learn more. Hi, this is Robert Wall, and you are listening to the one, the only, my longtime buddy, Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast, Need I Say More? Need I say more? Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast with my co-host, Frank Santopadre. Our guest this week is a journalist, editor, screenwriter, best-selling author, songwriter, occasional actor, and as of April of this year, a recording artist. and as of April of this year, a recording artist. He's a former writer for Rolling Stone,

as well as the editor-in-chief of the publications High Times and The National Lampoon. I think I've heard of that one. He's also the author or co-author of best-selling books about everyone from illusionist David Blaine to Kiss drummer Peter Criss and Red Hot Chili Peppers frontman Anthony Kiedis, to heavyweight champ Mike Tyson, to counterculture hero Abbie Hoffman. His 2006 biography of escape artist Harry Houdini, called The Secret Life of Harry Houdini, The Secret Life of Harry Houdini is soon to be a major motion picture. And, of course, he co-authored two of Howard Stern's best-selling books, Private Parts and Miss America. Again, this all sounds vaguely familiar. I think I've heard the Howard Stern show. Are you sure? I'm not positive.

I can't. It's so long ago. But there's more. He also penned one of the most respected books on the subject of rock and roll, a first-hand account of his friend and musical hero, Bob Dylan's infamous Rolling Thunder Review Tour, entitled On the Road with Bob Dylan. In a long, diverse, and fascinating career, he's worked with, hung out with, and befriended legendary characters such as Allen Ginsberg, Joan Baez, Kiki Friedman, John Cale, Lou Reed, Nick Cave, Tom Waits, Penn Jillette,

Leonard Cohen, and even me, Gilbert Godfrey! Perhaps his greatest honor of all. Perhaps. His very

first solo album recorded with the help of some famous friends is called Stubborn Heart. And he's featured prominently in a brand new Martin Scorsese directed documentary, Rolling Thunder Review, A Bob Dylan Story. Please welcome to the podcast a dear old friend, a New York City icon, and an artist of many talents. A man who says he aspires to be the Jewish Susan Boyle. The one, the only, Larry Ratso Sloman. Hi. Wow. I'm sorry, Larry.

We don't have time to do the show now. Yeah. Thanks for having me. It's a 47-minute intro. Wow. Welcome. The only thing missing is found dead in his New York apartment. How long have you guys known each other?

This is going to be a silly one, I can tell. How long have you guys known each other, and do you remember meeting? Jesus. Well, I think I first met him at one of the old, old Carolines. I was friends with Belzer. Oh, wow. Should have put Belzer on that list of characters. And it was before I was at Lampoon, I think.

I was at High Times. Probably. I think we met at the clubs and then later on at Lampoon all the time. Oh, well, Lampoon. But before we get into this sordid history, I have actually a gift for Gilbert. How nice. And it's a legendary Nike ripoff that says Oy vey. Classic, classic.

Now, this is a gift from... It says Oy vey with a Nike smoosh. It gets better. I have another gift. This is a gift from David Mannheim who has his own podcast called Dopey, but he's the last Jewish deli waiter in New York. He had another podcast like that. Wow.

And I met him at Katz's because I was there with my wife, and he comes up to me. He says, Ratso, I'm a big Stern fan. Come sit at my table. So we're sitting there. We're ordering some stuff, and he's bringing all. You've got to try this. You've got to try this.

You've got to try this. I get the bill. He's charging me for all this stuff. Oh, jeez. Now, I happen to be married to a shiksa, but we've been married for 20 years, and she's learned something. She goes to him, this should be comped. He goes, what?

Anyway, he comped it. And so I just did his podcast last week, and I told him I was going to do this podcast. And he says, he told me a story about Gilbert. He says, Gilbert was, I guess it was the 125th anniversary

of Katz's or something and they hired you to do something. Katz's Deli? Oh, yeah. Right. Uh-huh. And part of

what they paid Gilbert was they gave him a card that said half price off for life. Then he says that Gilbert was in a lot. He abused the card. No, but then there was a new girl at the cash register. And Gilbert came in and he gave her the card.

And she looked and she says, what is this? I have no idea what this is. I can't give you this. Gilbert starts arguing with her. Gilbert leaves. Anyway, you'll be happy to know that your half-off card is now valid again. Anytime you want to go to Katz's, half-off. Nice.

What a nice gift. You love guests that come bearing gifts. So you pulled some strings, and now he can eat at Katz's Deli for half price. Half off. That's right. Wow. What do you think, Gil? Well, free would be better.

Well, yeah. I mean, they never honored it in the first place. That was the thing. They were very generous giving me a little shit piece of plastic as long as they don't have to honor it. Wait a minute. They never honored it from the beginning? No. I went in there twice, and it was like full price both times.

Wow. You're going to get half price now directly from, and he's Mishpuka, so his uncle is the owner of Katz's, so you get him to have a press. How about that? He looks skeptical. Yatch. Yatch. I like the hat better. Are you 29% Italian?

Did I read that right? Actually, I'm more than 20. More than? More than. That's what I wrote down in an interview. I just did my 23 and me. But you look and act like a total kike. Well, I think.

See, I was under the impression that I was an Ashkenazi Jew. Okay. I was adopted. It was a thing that was prearranged by some Fagazi Jewish lawyer. And my parents picked me up. I was born in Bellevue. My parents, apparently my biological mother, came from Pennsylvania to Bellevue to give birth to me.

The next day, my adopted parents came and took me to Queens. Anyway, so... You're not entirely sure. So I didn't know. Okay. No, no. I just thought I was... Because they were all Ashkenazi Jews.

Gotcha. I did my 23andMe, and I said, half Italian, half Balkans. Now I'm going crazy. Maybe I'm not Jewish. So I googled Jews in the Balkans. Now I'm going crazy. Maybe I'm not Jewish. So I googled Jews in the Balkans.

And apparently, there were so many Jews at one point in the Balkans after World War I, they were thinking of putting Israel in the Balkans. And obviously, I think what I am now is that there were Spanish Jews, of course, who left because of the Inquisition. Okay. They migrated to Italy and then on. And I actually, to verify this, I did the other one, Ancestry. Ancestry, yeah. That's the one I did.

Yeah. And I found out not only is it the Balkans, but it's Romania. I love this. Gilbert, have you done this? Have you had any interest in doing your Ancestry? I think it was done And? Your siblings did it?

Yeah And I think Well I knew my mother My mother's side was from Russia Right And I always had heard my father's side was Poland They said Austria-Hungary. But I heard like all the borders

changed over the years. So, uh... What are you going to do if it turns out you have like 2% Italian blood? You're going to kill yourself? Yeah, pretty much. But I can't believe you have anything other than

Jew in you. Well, I think I'm Sephardic. I ever met my life. Sephardic Jewish. And he knew Goldstein. Yeah. Yeah. Did you do an Elvis impersonation at your bar mitzvah, by the way?

Okay. This I have to hear about. Okay. So. That's where it started. Yeah. It actually, no. So... That's where it started.

Yeah, it actually... No, my singing career actually started when I was about six or seven years old in my parents' living room in Kew Gardens because I was a big Elvis fan. And so I used to do an imitation of Elvis in my underwear holding a broomstick. And they'd bring the neighbors in

and I would entertain the neighbors by singing Love Me Tender. This was a big show in the hood. So then, 13 years old, now I got to be Bob Mitzvahed. And I was kicked out of two Hebrew schools from doing spitballs at the rabbi and stuff like that. So my parents then had to rent a rabbi to teach me my haftorah. And I also got an LP that you put it on, and you just memorized your haftorah.

All right, so by that time, the only place that would take us was Jamaica, a shul that was attached to the Jamaica YMHA. It's an Orthodox shul. We lived in Kew Gardens. You're not supposed to drive on your shoulders. So we drove and we parked

like 20 blocks away. And we walked the rest of the way. And I'm sitting up on the stage getting ready to do my haftorah, a little nervous. And the rabbi leans over and goes, So, you drove here today? And I go, hum-a-da, hum-a-da.

And so then I went up, did my haftorah, and I imitated Elvis doing haftorah. And I swear, afterwards, when you walk around with the torah, the old men were weeping. They were going to kiss the torah. They actually asked me if I wanted to be a cantor. Wow. That's an honor.

You're sitting next to a man who didn't have a bar mitzvah. What? I'm a horrible Jew. We know that. Yeah, everyone knows that. But the reasons are so varied when you really get to know me. We've done like 266 of these shows and I'm trying to remember,

we've asked so many guests about their bar mitzvahs. Yes! We just had the director, James Burroughs. He has bar mitzvah envy. Yeah, absolutely. But you know,

it's never too late. You could have a bar mitzvah now. Well, I was saying like, Kirk Douglas, he was like 90-something. He had a second bar mitzvah. It's not too late to get circumcised. What else did you listen to as a kid other than Elvis?

I found this in my... Well, can you do your Elvis impersonation now? Oh, God, I can't even do it now. Love me tender, love me true, never let me go. And you do this at the bar mitzvah. The old Jews went. Now, do you believe there's any truth at all to the theory that Elvis was part Jewish? Well, it's interesting.

Yeah, I do think there's truth to that. I mean, his brother, he had an identical twin brother who died. His name was Aaron. Apparently, Gladys supposedly had some Jewish blood in there. So Elvis, if the Jewish blood came through his mother, then he definitely was part Jewish. So Elvis was a Jew?

In part, possibly. It doesn't get any better than that. What else did you listen to? I found this is fascinating. Gogi Grant's The Wayward Wind was a song that had meaning for you as a kid. Remember that song bill do you know the wayward wind well can you sing it he's making he's making you sing rats the wayward wind is a restless wind a restless wind that yearns to wander and he was born the next of kin

the next of kin to the wayward wind oh it was a beautiful song. It is a beautiful song. It was about railroad tracks. I happened to live overlooking the Long Island Railroad in Kew Gardens. So the song resonated with me. It was one of the... You know how when you listen to music and for some reason

you just get this chill. Something just touches you. Golgi Grant's voice in that song. Still today when you hear that song? Oh, absolutely. We talk a lot about, we've had a fair amount

of musicians. Jimmy Webb was here. Tommy James was here. Peter Asher. Paul Williams. Paul Williams was here. We talk about how songs bring you back,

snap you back to a memory, to a place. Very specifics. Right. Very specific. What you were eating, where you were, sometimes even a smell. Very specific. What you were eating, where you were,

sometimes even a smell. Does that happen to you? No. Okay. Back to Jewish Elvis. Of course they do. I mean, you know, the songs, you know, have an emotional resonance. So, yeah.

I mean, you know, I'll never forget, we could probably talk about the first time I heard Dylan. Yeah. Which was 1965. I didn't come from a red diaper family. My parents weren't radical leftists organizing sweatshops or anything like that. My father actually owned a business in the garment center, and my mother was a bookkeeper. I like how you said your father was always waiting for the Nazis to come back.

He always lived in fear of that. Well, he was, yeah. And, you know, when I think about it now, it wasn't that many years. Yeah. So, you know, it was when I started rebelling and, like, hanging out in East Village with Abbie Hoffman and people like that, you know, my father would always say, You're going to those anti-war marches. You're going to get arrested and ruin your life.

That was his mantra. So he's a good dad looking out for you. Yeah. And tell us how you got the nickname Ratso. Well, that was years later on the Rolling Thunder review. Well, that was years later on the Rolling Thunder review. I was covering the review for Rolling Stone. And you get on the road.

And first of all, the Rolling Thunder review was two big buses, one full of the entertainers, one full of the crew, and Bob Dylan driving a little executive, what do you call those things, RVs, a small RV. And so I had to follow these things. I had to drive my own rental car. You don't sleep that well on the road. You start taking stimulants to be able to stay up, and you might miss a shower or two. So I drove up to the, it was in, I think it was in Vermont. And I drove up to the hotel where everybody was staying.

It was a beautiful Indian summer day. People were outside playing volleyball. And Joan Baez comes up to the car. And she looks in the car and she goes, hey, it's Ratso. So I said, oh, you call me Ratso because I remind you of Dustin Hoffman? And she leans in the car. She grabs my stringy, dirty hair and she goes, no, you remind me of Ratso. And that's how I got there.

And when she called me Ratso, I embraced that. Yeah. Because, you know, first of all, it was very distinctive. Second of all, you know, when I started writing the book, the book was in the first person until she calls me Ratso. And then the book shifts into third person. Interesting. And Ratso becomes another character in the book. It's sort of how Reg Dwight becomes Elton John and is a completely different person. Yeah.

He's acting out all the things he couldn't be in his childhood through through that persona and was a little bit of that to this day oh absolutely I mean Ratso you know I mean uh could get away with anything he wears the most outlandish clothing oh lord you know most of my clothing is from Soul Train Fashion in New Orleans. I get these incredible, like, you know, suits from Superfly, you know, kind of lavender suits, purple suits. I mean, just crazy stuff. This is what you need, Gil. You need an alter ego. Yes.

Yeah. But go ahead. I thought he had it all. I thought Gilbert was his alter ego. Who was that country western singer who had the altar? Oh, it was Garth Brooks. Oh, yeah. It was somebody else for a while.

Oh, right. That's right. Yeah, I can't remember the name he sang under. But talk about the Dylan record that you... You went into the record store, the thing that changed your life. I was walking up Bell Boulevard in Bayside, and I passed a record store. And they had a listing in the window of the top ten singles. And I remember looking up, and I saw a thing called, like a Rolling Stone, B. Dylan. First of all, at that time, growing up, you were either a Beatles fan or you were a Rolling Stones fan.

I was a big Rolling Stones fan because, you know, they were the guys who were like, you know, getting busted for drugs and then pissing on the courthouse outside. The Beatles were much too conventional for me. So I look at this and I said, like a Rolling Stones, who's this B. Dylan guy ripping off the Rolling Stones? So I went in and I bought the single and I went home and it just changed my life. Listening to that, I mean, the music was majestic. That organ, Al Cooper, Mike Bloomfield's guitar, and then the words. And I was so excited that I made my father, I had my driver's permit, but it was nighttime, so I couldn't use it at night. So I made my father drive me to Flushing, to Corvettes, to buy the album, Highway 61, which was on sale for $1.88.

And I went home and I put it on, and it was just one after another. Palette of a Thin Man and, you know, Desolation Row. At midnight, all the agents in the superhuman crew come out and round up everyone who knows more than they do. And they strap them to the heart attack machine. It was like, holy shit. You were transformed. There was a whole other way to look at the world. Interesting.

Yeah. I know that record store, too. Oh, yeah? I told you in the email. I grew up in Ozone Park. Oh,. Yeah. I know that record store, too. Oh, yeah? I told you in the email. I grew up in Ozone Park. Oh, right. And I knew that record store in Corvettes. Right.

Everything changed when you heard that song. Yeah. My whole life changed, without a doubt. Gilbert, do you remember, like, sort of the first rock and roll record you bought or listened to or cared about? Oh, you know, I don't. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I do remember having the LP, Frank Fontaine's Songs I Sing on the Track. Crazy Guggenheim. Yes. That counts? Yes. Actually, a formative song in my upbringing was my parents had a song by Leo Tully called Essen. And the song was all about when you go to the Catskills on vacation. Okay. And so first it says, you know, so we're going to the Catskills.

And you want to play volleyball? No. You want to play, you want to go swimming? No. You want to play tennis? No. You sit in the chair and maracashe and mabakashe. And then, ladies and gentlemen, and guests

of the Feidelbaum Hotel, lunch is being served. That's it. That's it. That's it. They go through the hall. But gay in essence. Does that mean anything to you?

They go through the hole. Belza loved that song. And Paul Schaefer. And I remember we were at Caroline's one night. And Paul Schaefer said to me, you got to meet the bartender. I said, why? He says, it's Lee Tully's son. Wow.

What was that Jewish song that Dara played? The one that Rassel must know it. Oh, okay. That was the one. Oh, you gotta have a little muscle. You gotta have a little muscle, cause muscle means good luck. And if you have muzzle, you'll always have a buck. Did you ever listen to the songs of Mickey Katz?

Of course. We had Joel Grey here. Really? Mickey Katz's son. Yeah. Gilbert loves how much is the pickle. How much is that pickle in the window? I grew up listening to that stuff, too.

And Alan Sherman. Oh, of course. Your folks had comedy albums in the house, too? Most importantly, what has, did Bob Dylan ever talk about me? Well, I actually, I do have a story about that. I don't know if you remember this, but Bob Dylan at one point, they gave him a record label. I think it was called Egyptian Records. And he was looking for artists to put on the label.

And I went to Caroline's and I taped Gilbert's show. Wow. And I gave it to Dylan's manager. And I said, they should put out a note because Gilbert had no records out at that point. And I gave it to the manager, and I never heard back. Not a big fan of Norman Fell jokes, Dylan's manager? No. Does that count, Gil?

But he never, didn't he have a bunch of those things that he would start and then just. Bob? Yeah. Yeah. Then just give up. Yeah. He'd like be enthusiastic for a day. Yeah.

And then forget about it. Yeah. One time he, I had a meeting with him at Gramercy Park Hotel, and we were in the bar, and he said, you know, I'm thinking about starting a movie company. I said, really? How would it work? He says, well, you know, you have a lot of friends, right, who are writers, and they can't sleep. I said, maybe some of them. He says, well, take a guy like Phil Oakes. So we can get one of your writer friends to write a script about Phil Oakes.

All right? And then we'll go to the studios, and we'll get a budget. And then we'll bring it in on the budget, and we'll keep the rest. That was his idea of starting a film studio. And someone we had a guest. It was a brilliant idea. We had a guest on the podcast. I forget who it was. What'd they say?

Who told us that at one point, one of Dylan's ideas that he was enthusiastic for a tiny amount of time was that he would be the next Jerry Lewis. Oh, it was Larry Charles. Yeah. Yeah, they made Mastin Anonymous. Bob Dylan wanted, was watching Jerry Lewis movies and thinking he wants to be the next Well, he and Larry went in on a, they went to a studio meeting and they pitched some sort of feature to Star Bob.

You know this? Yeah, but wasn't that the feature that they eventually made? Mass and Anonymous? Somehow, I think it was filtered down to becoming Mass and Anonymous. But I think what they originally went in there with was a broad comedy. Yeah. Set in a concentration camp. What about this thing?

This has Gilbert relevance. You sampled Bela Lugosi in one of the songs on the new album. Yes. And it's Gilbert's favorite bit. The bit from Dracula. What music they make?

Oh, yes. Children of the night. Listen to them. Children of the night. What music they make. Right. And that's an intro to a song called Living in Moonlight. Yes.

Was Dracula your horror film guy, like him? Oh, of course. Are you kidding? I mean, I had a... My grandfather used to babysit for me. And he was very cool. He was from Kiev, I think. And he used to babysit for me, and he was very cool. He was from Kiev, I think. And we used to either watch horror films on WOR, I think, or we would watch wrestling. And I would be wrestling with him while we were watching the show.

My grandfather thought wrestling was real, too. Professional wrestling. You watch Chiller Theater and Creature Features. Zachary. There's a good reference. We tried to get him on this show. He was in bad shape. Now, weren't you

like, wasn't your job like either handing out or investigating welfare checks? Didn't you have some strange job used to go to people's homes no i used to maybe you i think you're confounding that with when i graduated um queen's college okay so you so I made a pact with my parents. I'd get good grades, and you'd leave me alone. Let me grow my hair long.

Let me go hang out in East Village with Abby Hoffman. So I graduated Magna Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa. My father was so proud. He put big posters up in the apartment building. That's cool. We were in Bayside by then. And I was able to pursue my other things. But then when I graduated Queens College, I graduated a degree in sociology.

It still was iffy. This was the last vestiges of the draft in the Vietnam War. I had a very high number, but I didn't want to chance it. So I joined VISTA, and VISTA is the Domestic Peace Corps. And so they put us in an experimental program in Milwaukee. Now, the people in Washington had no idea what these people in Milwaukee were doing. They thought we were working during the day in the ghetto there as a paraprofessional with kids in school. At night, we would organize welfare mothers for Father Grappi, who was this radical priest.

You were close, Gil. Right. Radical priest. So, yeah. So, you know, they gave us an orientation. They said, all right, before we're going to put you out in the field, and we all lived in one big building on Palmer Street, right in the middle of the ghetto. And they said, before we put you out in the field, you have to get into the aspirations of the black community. You have to get into their goals and what they hope for and everything.

So the first thing I did was I bought a Lincoln Continental, a used Lincoln Continental, maroon Lincoln Continental with the suicide doors. And that's what I used to pick up the mothers to bring them to the demonstrations and everything. So it was a great game. How the hell do you know that about him? Yes. I don't know how. And didn't you say you used to get laid doing that job? Yeah.

Yeah. Well, and again, this is, okay, now this is thanks to Al Goldstein. That's what you told me in the email. So growing up in Queens at that point, unless you were to get engaged to a Jewish girl, no Jewish girls – you'd be lucky if you get a blowjob, but no Jewish girls would sleep with you then. So, I went to Vista, and we were living next door to a house full of very nice young black girls, and they invited

all the white Vista volunteers for a party. And I remember going to the party and hanging out for a little while, and then we went back to my place. And then this girl named Alice came back, knocked on the door. She says, come back to the party. I said, okay.

So just in the time it took to walk right next door, she said, I hope you don't think I'm too forward. But would you like to sleep with me tonight? And I went, huh? And he said, yeah. So we went back to my place. And now here was a chance for me finally. I wasn't a virgin, but I didn't have much experience. But here was a chance for me to use the education I learned

by watching Midnight Blue. Because Ron – Al would be so proud. That's right. I told him. Ron Jeremy was on once, and I remember watching. Ron Jeremy was telling Al the best ways to do cunnilingus. You basically use your tongue, and you trace out the alphabet

on the clitoris. So, and don't forget, this is 1970, so at that point, Italians, Italian men and black men would not do cunnilingus on a woman. They thought they were too macho

to do that. But here's a schleppy little Jew. So I get the girl in bed, and I'm doing that to her. And all I know is she moves into my room. She wouldn't leave. She wouldn't let me leave. So after like about two weeks of this, I'm saying, oh, my God, can we go shopping?

Can we do something? Just want to get out of the house. Yeah, but it was definitely a cultural experience. I like the parts of your life that Gilbert remembers. Very interesting. I could say, this one, she looked like Oprah Winfrey.

It was fantastic. Oh, man. And then there was this other girl. She looked like Star Jones. It was fantastic. They're laughing in the booth. She looked like Della Reese. Della Reese.

Oh, now you've gone too far. But really an obese Della Reese. Della Reese. Oh, now you've gone too far. But really an obese Della Reese. And she had teeth missing. It was fantastic. Wow. You know, Gilbert's an invitation to me. First time I've heard it. Yeah.

first time I've heard it there's a clip on YouTube where Howard said it was the funniest bit he's ever heard on the show he said it in the middle of the bit because I was talking about my house in Long Island because it was right by the water

you had to use marine toilet paper so somehow that morphed into you can't use toilet paper or you can't put it down the toilet at all. You have to put it in a little waste bin. And then Gilbert starts riffing on me. You said you can make

a game out of it. Why don't you take any shit? You wipe your ass and see if you can score a biscuit. Wow. You coming over the house

later? Oh, you didn't eat at McDonald's. My toilet can't handle that. Are you bringing back bits from the Stern Show? Yes. Okay.

Just checking. Tell us, while we're on the subject of... The Olsen twins. The Olsen twins even clogged up my toilet. And they never eat. They're both starving to death. And they clogged my toilet. Wow.

Gilbert, you had me sing before. I just want to request one thing because I haven't heard this for so many years. Uh-oh. Requests. When you were on Stern, you used to do Rabbi Gilbert Gash. Right. Right. Right.

Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right.

Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right.

Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right.

Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right.

Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. I'm trying this. Are you warmed up now, Russ? Oh, man. Talk about working with him at the Lampoon and doing photo funnies.

Because he had a flashback last week. We walked past the old building on Spring Street. Right. Remember? Oh, yeah. Yeah, he had a flashback to the topless ladies. Yeah. Remember? Oh, yeah.

He had a flashback to the topless ladies. Yeah. Well, in some ways, I'm responsible for Gilbert's literary career. Was there one? Yeah. Because when I took over at Lampoon, one of the things I wanted to bring was fresh blood. And I figured, what's the best way to get Gilbert because, you know, all kidding aside, you know, I think Gilbert is far and away one of the greatest comedians of our era. So I wanted to get Gilbert to contribute.

And I said, hmm, photo funnies. Because, you know, Gilbert was – this is before he met Dara, and Gilbert, you know, wasn't batting, you know, 600 or 500 or 300 or whatever he was batting. I was known as the king of cunt. So I figured if I write these scripts where Gilbert, and the greatest one I think was where he played Christ on the cross. I know, I have that issue. Yep. But we'd always get a topless girl in it, and then Gilbert would, first of all, he'd come an hour early. Yeah.

Of course. He'd hang around. He'd hit on my secretary for half an hour. Leave with a bunch of free issues. Oh, of course. He'd hang around. He'd hit on my secretary for half an hour. Leave with a bunch of free issues. Oh, of course. Yeah, of course. Right. Had to do that.

And I remember, like, I used to write them like crazy because, you know, I thought it was. It was like you spend the day with a bunch of naked girls. I keep adding, instead of two girls, it was three and then four. And the managers were complaining. They're saying, wait a second. This is like the same exact thing that he wrote in last month's issue except he made it for girls and and you because you always came along on those court of funnies you would you would defend me right and say no no it's totally different no no i read it it's really different that's a good friend setting

you up like that trying to get you laid and then i remember too there was one they were preparing an issue and they said we need like one extra part to fill up the issue and they uh i think they said to you do you well do you think gilbert could do another photo and now could he because i used to do these lists all right that's the other thing oh yeah like i did a hundred things to say when you can't achieve an erection and and they said do you think gilbert can write a list piece and do you remember what you said yeah they they said do you think gilbert could write a list piece and you said are you kidding he's a master of the genre that is a good friend. But it was true.

It was true. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast right after this. That's what you say. Baseball is right back. things baseball. BetMGM.com for T's and C's. 19 plus to wager. Ontario only. Gambling problem? Call Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. That's the sound of fried chicken with a spicy history.

Thornton Prince was a ladies' man. To get revenge, his girlfriend hid spices in his fried chicken. He loved it so much, he opened Prince's Hot Chicken. Hot chicken in the window. This is one of many sounds in Tennessee with a story to tell. To hear them in person, plan your trip at tnvacation.com. Tennessee sounds perfect. Hi, I'm Keith Carradine. You're listening to Gilbert Gottfried's podcast.

It's the best. You were the last editor under Matty Simmons? Don't say under Matty Simmons. Well, when the magazine was owned by Matty Simmons. Yes, and then Matty took a golden parachute and left us there with Jim Jamiro. J2. Boy, that was the death knell. Yeah, they thought Lampoonampoon would be Tim Conway. Well, he was the Dorf guy.

Yeah. That's what they thought. They wanted to do cruise ships with Lampoon. And I remember up at Lampoon is where I first met Drew Friedman. Yes. Probably, sure. And he used to do the drawings and to shade it

he would have millions of dots. So I followed him or I would follow him around the office and I'd scream at him, hey Jew dots! Come on, make some Jew dots! Are you listening, Drew?

That's for you. You also published the Friedman Brothers in high times. In high times, right. I won one of the first. Yeah, Fred Mertz's Night Out and the Andy Griffith show sketch. Great stuff. Gilbert and I had a lot of fun when every year we would go to the comedy festival in Montreal, Jusporia. And I remember one year,

Gilbert was performing up there. And we had a car that we'd rented. And I was with Andy Simmons, who was Matty's son. It was one of the editors. And Gilbert, we're driving around and Gilbert goes,

he goes, drive where the girls are so I started driving around you know where all the strip clubs are and Gilbert rolled down the window sitting in the back and we'd see a girl and we'd slow down and Gilbert would stick his head out

and go pardon me are you a hooker classy Gil and then we did that back in New York. My friend Jack. We had a big Cadillac. And we were with Simmons in the car. And he was like, shut up.

Just shut up. Close the window. Shut up. Matty or Andy? Andy. Poor Andy. Shut up. Matty or Andy? Andy. Poor Andy. Poor Andy. And so I just kept getting louder and louder.

Whenever there was a hooker there, I'd go, pop me. You are a hooker. And in New York, there was that one block. It was a block from my house, funny. that one block, it was a block from my house, funny, you know, back when New York would still have those blocks, that was

just the ugliest, scariest hookers. Yeah, street walkers, yeah. And it would take like an hour to get from one end to the other, because... Or the cars would be in line. Oh, the good old days. So Jack had a Cadillac, and Jack would be driving, and I'd be in the front, and Gilbert would be in the. So Jack had a Cadillac and Jack would be

driving and I'd be in the front and Gilbert would be in the back and we'd do the same thing just as we were going down that street. I hate myself for asking this, but on the subject of Dylan and Gilbert, do you think he's at all possibly aware of Gilbert's impression

and Gilbert's Dylan bits? I don't know. You never met him, right, Gil? No. So you never got any confirmation on that. You know the bit I'm talking about, where he does Floyd the Barber. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

And who was driving the car when we were going down that block with the hookers? Jack. My friend Jack. He was freaking out totally. Oh, no. Jack. My friend Jack. He was freaking out totally. Oh, no. He was freaking out because a car in front of us got pulled over by undercover cops. Yes, yes. There were cops there.

And then Jack goes, we're getting out of here. Boom. And he just was sped down the street, almost hit people. And then I would start yelling shit out. And he was going, his voice kept getting higher and higher. And he was like, shut up! Shut up! Shut the fuck up!

We're going to get arrested! The police are here! Shut up! Do you want to remind Ratso of the Dylan Floyd the Barber bit? In case he's forgotten? No, I remember. You know the bit? Yeah, but I like to hear it.

Hello, Floyd. Hello, Bob. How are you, Floyd? Still good. I'm fine Would you trim the sadburns Flood It's for you

It would be an honor How much do I owe you Flood It's on the house How much do I owe you, Flo? How much is this on the house? How do we make sure Bob Dylan knows about this? Ratso. Do we have a tape of it?

I think your guy just recorded it. Oh, okay. Ratso has his own documentary crew that he brought with him to the recording. Tell us about going pro for the first time. Tell us about the story in Milwaukee and how you wound up becoming a writer for Rolling Stone. Oh. Because your life was not necessarily headed in that direction at the time. So what happened was after, you know, I was in Vista for a year. In fact, during the year, I had to come back to do a physical.

for a year. In fact, during the year, I had to come back to do a physical. And I found out that I didn't even have to go to Vista because, you know, and everybody at that time was saying, how do I get out of the physical? Oh, I'll just say I'm gay. Oh, I'm going to rub some peanut butter on my ass and I'll start licking it and they'll say I'm crazy. Right? So, I didn't do any. I was too nervous to do something like that. But I got to the point where they say, take your glasses off. And they measured my glasses. And they said, 4F. That was it.

I was so myopic. Good for you. Yeah, so I got out. So when I was finished with the year in Vista, I still had no idea what I was going to do. and Vista. I still had no idea what I was going to do. And I had gotten, when I graduated, I had gotten scholarship offers from the three places I applied to, which was Michigan, Brown, and Wisconsin. The year later, I got a letter from Wisconsin saying, well, your year is up. Do you want to come now? And it was a great deal. I mean, they paid all my tuition. It was a four-year program in sociology.

They paid all my tuition. They paid me $500 a month living expenses. So I said, I don't know what I was going to do. So I went to, you know, Madison. And I'll tell you, it was culture shock because, you know, we thought, well, New York's the epicenter of the world, the epicenter of the protest movements, blah, blah, blah. So I got a house with a bunch of roommates. My first night in Madison, I'm about to go to graduate school the next day. I hear a big bang, and I thought it was a car backfiring or something.

I wake up in the morning. The Army research center had been blown up by one of the radicals. By radicals in Madison. Wow. Amazing. Wow, wow. So the first thing I did was I went to the Daily Cardinal, which was the Madison student newspaper. I walked in and I said, I'm about to start graduate school in sociology,

but I've written for underground papers in New York. I'd like to be the music editor. And they said, okay. And the reason I wanted to be music editor was immediately I wrote letters to all the record companies. You wanted free records. Free records. Good move.

That's a Gilbert move. Exactly. Slick. That's a Gilbert move. Yeah. That's a Gilbert move. Exactly. Slick.

So then there was a concert in the summer called Summerfest in Milwaukee. And, you know, because I had spent a year living in the black area in Milwaukee, I was hip to all the really cool black music. And Sly and the Family Stowe were one of my favorites. Yeah, mine too. They were headlining this festival. So I said, all right, I'm going to go to the festival. I go to the festival. And again, this is when Sly is so fucked up on cocaine and freebies.

He's an hour and a half late. He comes on stage. He does two numbers. He walks off stage. So you figure, you know, some people are going to boo, whatever. Not in Milwaukee, not in the Midwest. They tore down the stage. They tore down the fence.

They burnt the stage. Wowee. Wow, wow. So I call up Rolling Stone, and I said, this is Larry Sloman. I'm the music editor of the Daily Cardinal of Madison. And Sly Stone was performing at Summerfest and there was an altercation. Should I write a story about it? And he said, yeah, do it on spec, which meant we don't give a shit.

If you don't like it, you're not getting paid. But I was so proud. Hey, I had an assignment. And so I go to interview the PR person, this woman. And I had a big Sony tape recorder that I actually would plug into the wall. And she's not answering any of my questions. I forgot what the details I needed from her, but she's not answering anything. So I said, all right, thanks. I pulled out the plug, not knowing I left the recorder recording and that there were batteries in it.

This was a complete mistake. I just pull out the plug and she goes, oh, great. Now I'll tell you everything. It's still running. Yeah, it was still running. So that was my first piece for a Rolling Stone. Wow. And I'll tell you everything. And it's still running. Yeah, it was still running. So that was my first piece for Rolling Stone. Wow. And I had some great assignments.

I did a preview of Lou Reed's Berlin, which was a lot of fun. I got to come on the second tour, second leg of the tour of George Harrison. Ben Fong Torres had the first leg. And for some reason, Rolling Stone wanted to attack him. Because he wasn't doing Beatles songs. He was doing all his Mishigas with Ravi Shankar. Right. So

by the time I come onto the tour, hi, I'm Larry from Rolling Stone. The first piece had come out and they got slammed. So I was like a pariah. Bill Grand took me aside because he was the promoter, and he goes, kid, just hang around. We're playing out in Long Island next,

and then we come back to the Garden. I'll get you an interview with George Harrison. Now, I had already done a preview of Blood on the Tracks, Dylan's album, and that's how I met Dylan. Right. And I had heard the album before it came out. And so the day of the show at the Garden, Graham takes me down to the dressing room

and I open the door and there's George Harrison. He's sitting in a lotus position with all these pillows and incense burning and, you know, things on the wall. And he's very wary still. So said i said opposite him and i said uh hey george have you heard tangled up in blue yet and he goes yeah isn't it great and we both start singing oh that's great blue together that's great and so he he gave me so wait a minute. So I do the piece, and I say,

look, you got to give the guy credit. This is music that he loves. You know, he's got Ravi Shankar, his mentor, you know, opening for him. You know, he doesn't want to do the old Beatles songs. I don't, you know...

That's what I write. Then, apparently, Jan Winner wanted to keep the attack, and he rewrites my copy and leaves my name on it. So now I'm saying, oh, shit. So it wasn't even Xeroxes. What were those things? Mimeographs. Well, you'd type something in to have the –

Yeah. Was that it? Oh, yeah. It was carbon paper? Carbon. Carbon copies. So I had a carbon copy of my original article, and I sent it to Harrison in England. And a year later, I'm sitting at the bottom line.

I think it was to see Kinky Friedman. And all of a sudden, a guy comes up and says, hey, Larry. I look up. It's George Harrison. He goes, you know, I thought you were really a schmuck. When that article came out, I'm glad you sent me what your article was. Now we know who the real asshole is, Jan Wenner. Wow.

Good story. Good story. You met Leonard Cohen around this time? Yeah, 73. I did a piece on Leonard for a long time. Yeah, yeah, 73. I did a piece on Leonard for a long time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, it was the kind of thing where, you know, I can get very compulsive. And, you know, I always want to get more and more and more. And Leonard was very accommodating.

So, I mean, you know, I went to the shows. I went back to his hotel. We'd be interviewed for hours and hours. And he was just such a wonderful guy. I mean, you know, of all those people that I met in rock and roll, Leonard was the real mensch. That's nice. You guys became lifelong

friends. Yeah. I love that he would send you an email and write, Dear Jew. Yes. Well, my email was New York Jew. Right. Right. Yeah. What was he like to spend time with? I mean, I don't think we've had

anybody on this podcast that knew Leonard Cohen. Well, you know, okay, one time we were at his house, and I guess he was between girlfriends,

or the girlfriend wasn't there, you know, because Leonard was a real ladies' man. But I remember we were, we ate TV dinners and we watched joe pine joe pine wow there you go gil that's a name that's come up on this show oh man there's a talk show

host yeah let him yeah that's a jerry springer he loved he liked that's the kind of stuff he liked watching all that stuff he had a great sense of humor. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. So tell us about the Dillon meeting. I mean, you wrote the piece about Blood on the Tracks. Because you saw him live. I also love the story of when you saw him, I guess you were still pretty much a kid.

Your father said he looked like a shipping clerk. Exactly. So you met him once, or you saw him once. So I saw him once. At White Plains. At White Plains. It was a few months after I bought the album. And again, I was too young to drive.

My parents drove us there. I was with a friend. We were sitting all the way in the back. And then my parents picked us up afterwards. And he did the first half, you know, it was just solo. And then the second half he brought on the band. And, you know, there's, you know, well, Forest Hills supposedly was booed. Nobody was booing in the White Plains. Sure, I'm sure not.

But it really was something else. I mean, to hear this music just amplified, and you know how great the band is. So I was really hyped up. And on the way home, my father says, what are you so excited about? I said, what do you mean? He says, well, you know, when I came, I thought, I didn't know where you were sitting.

So I got there early, because they went to a movie, and I walked all the way to the front. I said, what? You walked up to the front? Was he wearing those boots with the buckles? What kind of stripes were on his suit? I couldn't see from where I was. And my father's going, what are you getting so excited for?

He's just a little puny guy. He looks like a shipping clerk. I love that. It's one of my favorite passages in the book. That was 66. That was 66. That was 66. Then you see him again in 74 is when you see him sitting in the car? 74, right.

On the street? Right. And then you did the piece for Blood on the Tracks and you and McGuinn approached him. Do I have this right? Yeah, that's the right chronology. So the Blood on the Tracks piece came out and then about six six months later, I had heard, or eight months, I had heard that Dylan was back in his old haunts in the Greenwich Village. He was working with Jacques Levy, who was a great Broadway director, off-Broadway director.

And he was doing the album. He was doing the album. McGuinn had played, I think, a gig in New Jersey. Then we met afterwards. We went to Chinatown. I said, hey, it was like two in the morning. I said, let's go to the other end. Maybe Bob's there.

He says, okay. We walk in the other end. There's nobody there. We walk all the way to the back, and we look around the corner. And at the table is Dylan, Bobby Neuwirth, Jacques Levy, a bunch of other people. And Dylan sees McGuinn, and he jumps up. He knocks all the glasses off the table and goes, Roger, where you been? We've been waiting for you all night. I mean, nobody was going to be there.

And that's when he says, yeah, we're going to do this incredible tour. It's going to be like a gypsy caravan. We're just going to go to a place with no notice and sell tickets a day and a thing. And he says, you've got to come on this tour. And then when Roger says, you know Larry, says you gotta come on this tour and then when Roger says you know Larry right

he goes oh yeah you're the one who did the piece you should come on the tour and I'd rather have you chronicle it than anybody else he was impressed

that you had done a piece on Hurricane Carter which was a pet cause of his right yeah you're not the person that turned him on to that

he was it wasn't your writing writing that got him involved. No. He had actually read Rubin's book. Rubin's book. This guy, Richie, I forget the guy's name, Richie something, was one of the early guys. But the big guy who spearheaded Rubin Carter's whole thing was George Lois, the famous ad guy. Oh, yes.

Right. That's right. Who's still around? Yeah. George Lois. Yeah, yeah, yeah guy. Oh, yes. Right. That's right. Who's still around? Yeah. George Lois. Kenara. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This documentary is fascinating. Gilbert, you've got to see this Scorsese documentary that

Ratso's in. Do you have Netflix? He doesn't know. It costs money. I don't have a television. I believe Dara has Netflix. You're asking the wrong person. Right. So it's on Netflix. You should watch it.

So this leads to the, we'll talk about the documentary too, which is a very interesting approach too, the put-ons in the documentary. If I'm not giving away any spoilers. But this led to the book. At some point, you parted company with Rolling Stone. Yeah. Fell out. Well, I mean, and it's in the documentary because I gave them. Yeah.

So don't forget again when i was doing the book i had a smaller tape recorder it wasn't a big one i had a plug in but i had a smaller tape recorder and everywhere i went because i i had been influenced by those andy warhol books uh-huh and um because they were basically somebody following andy warhol around and taping everything he said and then editing it so So that's what I did on this tour. I had a little recorder, but after a while, you put it on the table, everybody forgets that the recorder's gone. So I had basically the entire tour. So I gave Scorsese all of the tapes, and he used a couple of them. One of them he used was the big argument I got with Rolling Stone.

Because Rolling Stone has gone, well, the second piece you sent, it's got a lot of holes in it. Variety is reporting that the ticket prices are up and they're playing big halls now. Why are you not talking about that? And I said, what are you, crazy? This is not the Wall Street Journal. This is Rolling Stone. This is a musical cultural event of our lifetime. You want me to write about the ticket prices? And so one thing led to another. And they said, OK, we're taking away your expenses. You could do spot coverage, which meant I couldn't stay on the road because I couldn't afford,

you know, without the expenses. So that's where I had this great scene that's in Ronaldo and Clara, which was the movie. A whole other story. A whole other story. Dylan made a movie of the tour. You know this movie, Ronaldo and Clara, that Dylan made? It's like a four and a half hour movie. Sam Shepard was writing the screenplay for it. Four and a half hour movie.

Yeah, yeah. And the beginning of the movie is me and Roger McGuinn are in the lobby of one of the hotels. And when I got on the tour, besides getting hassles from Rolling Stone, I was getting hassles from Louis Kemp, who was Bob's childhood friend, who he elevated to become the promoter of this tour. The guy was a fishmonger. He had a salmon distillery, a hatchery, whatever you call it in Alaska. And now Bob made him his childhood friend to head it a tour. So once

in New York, I had total access to everybody. We get on the road he goes, what are you doing? You can't stay at the same hotel with us. So what are you talking about? Bob invited me in. No, no, you're oppressed. You can't stay here. So I had this running argument with Louis. By then, I had told Bob that I really wanted to write a book. So I'm standing there with McGuinn, and Dylan and Joni Mitchell walk in. And I'm complaining that, you know, I have nowhere to stay now. And I was also helping the film crew a lot, you know,

bringing them subjects that they flipped out over. And they were telling Bob, Ratso is bringing us golden things. You've got to keep them on. So Bob and Joni Mitchell come up and Bob goes, Ratso, what's the matter? I said, what's the matter? Rolling Stone just cut me off. I can't stay on the tour.

I want to write this book. He goes, Ratso, what do you need? He goes, I go, I need a room. So he goes to Louie or Barry, Barry, one of the other other promoters get him a room what else you need I said well I need per diem I have no expenses we'll get you per diem what else you need and I'm literally closer I mean maybe two feet from him and I start screaming, I need access!

And Dylan looks at me and he goes, you need X-Lex? What do you need? That's hilarious. So, yeah, that's how I stayed on the tour. Why wasn't Joni Mitchell happy at first with what she wrote? Well, first, she wasn't happy

even before I wrote anything. When she came on the tour, she came for one night, and then she just loved it so much, she stayed for the rest of the tour. Right, right. And so after a few dates, I was backstage once with her, and I started talking to her. And I said something like,

my three favorite male songwriters are Bob, Leonard Cohen, and Kinky Friedman. And she goes, what do you mean male songwriters? What about me? I'm just as good as them. And I said, well, Tony, yeah, but I can't compare you with them because you're a female songwriter.

You have a different perspective, blah, blah, blah. And we went back and forth for a long time. We eventually became very friendly on that tour. And then she moved to New York and we hung out for a long time. So she was one of the people. When the tour was over, I finished the book. I sent two copies of the book out. I finished the book.

I sent two copies of the book out. One to Bob, who was with Howard Alk, cutting what would become Ronaldo and Clara. And the other copy of the book I sent to Joni Mitchell. A few days later, I get a call. I come home, and there's a message on my answering machine. It's from Howard Alk. Ratso, we read the book. Bob read it in one night.

He gave it to me. I read it in one night. It's fantastic. We didn't think you could do it, but you really did it. So they loved it. And Dylan gave me that quote, the war and peace of rock and roll.

So then the next night, I get a call like 6 in the morning, which means it's 3 o'clock in the morning in L.A., and it's Joni Mitchell. And Joni Mitchell goes, Ratso, I read the book. How could you have me say all those things? I said, you said them. What do you mean? And then I said, look, go back, reread the book.

I had quotes from Gurdjieff about Ouspensky. No, no, Ouspensky about Gurdjieff. And Gurdjieff was talking about a rolling caravan that would expose everybody, you know, what they're really like. And she read the book in that context, and she called me back. She said, you're right, don't touch a word. It's a great read. I mean, I've read a lot of books about rock and roll and tours and it's a great read.

You're talking about that party, is it for the owner of Folk City when Bette Midler gets up and Phil Oakes is there? I mean, what a great time in history to be an eyewitness to all of this. And that's why I wanted to document it. Yeah.

Where have you been, my blue-eyed son? Where have you been, my darling young wine? I've stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains What did I have crawled on six crooked highways Been in the middle of seven sad forests Been out in front of a dozen dead oceans Been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard And it's a high, well it's a high graveyard and it's a high and it's a high

and it's a high and it's a high and it's a high and then Gordon Lightfoot shows up and Harry Dean Stanton shows up and Sam Shepard Dylan's mother is along for the ride.

I'm happy that not only do I have the only kind of quasi-interviews but I have a lot of conversations between me and Bob's mother. What was her name? Beattie? Beattie Zimmerman. And she was so great. I mean, sometimes I'd be sitting in the stands with her

and Bob would be singing Hurricane and then he'd be over and everybody would with her. And Bob would be singing Hurricane. And then he'd be over and everybody would give him a standing ovation. She'd stand up and she'd hit her chest and go, gets you right here, gets you right here. And then I remember saying to her, what do you think of all these people who wrote about you and your husband? You know, by hoodwinking you and saying, you know, coming, like they were visiting Hibbing.

She goes, I never gave him anything. You know, I don't talk about my son. My son is Bob Dylan. He created himself. I'm B.D. Zimmerman. He's Bob Dylan. Nice. Wow. She got B.D. Zimmerman. He's Bob Dylan. Nice. Wow. She got it. She really got it. She was a wonderful person.

We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast after this. Spring is here, and you can now get almost anything you need for your sunny days delivered with Uber Eats. What do we mean by almost? Well, you can't get a well-groomed lawn delivered but you can get a chicken parmesan delivered a cabana that's a no but a banana that's a yes a nice tan sorry nope but a box fan happily yes a day of sunshine no a box of fine wines yes uber eats can definitely

get you that get almost almost anything delivered with delivered with Uber Eats. Order now. Alcohol and select markets. Product availability may vary by Regency app for details. This episode is brought to you by FX's The Bear on Disney+. In Season 3, Carmi and his crew are aiming for the ultimate restaurant accolade, a Michelin star. With Golden Globe and Emmy wins, the show starring Jeremy Allen White,

Io Debrey, and Maddie Matheson is ready to heat up screens once again. All new episodes of FX's The Bear are streaming June 27, only on Disney+. I want to ask about Houdini. Let's talk about this quickly. He just escaped.

Did you know, Gil, that Ratso wrote a Houdini book? Yeah. With some controversial ideas in it? Now, you have like those kind of Richard Belzer-ish viewpoints. A little conspiracy theory. Everything's a fucking

conspiracy. It's an interesting theory you guys hatched. He was a Russian spy. I have to say. Well, no. No, not a Russian spy. A U.K. spy. He was spying for the U.K., but that we verified. Right, right.

You know, we actually have found a diary of the head of MI5 who had made indications that, you know, when he was in Russia or when he was in Germany, he was sending back emissives. And, you know, got a letter from HH, brought it right to the War Department. And we correlated the date and that's when Houdini was in Germany. But the other thing – well, we never said definitively that he was killed by the spiritualists. But it's an interesting theory and you guys support it. So he was getting information from the Nazis? No, no, this was way before the Nazis. Oh, this is in the early 1900s.

He was spying on their weapons, on their weaponry. Yeah, because the UK was always worried about Germany. I was always worried about Germany's potential. Yeah, and I remember someone saying to me that they always questioned that story about him being punched. Right. And the appendix, because they said if that were the case, then all these price fighters would have ruptured appendix. You're right. But when we did the research, we found out that he wasn't just punched once. He was punched three separate times in Montreal.

One time was at a demonstration at the University McGill where he said to the students, you come up, you can see how I've trained so hard for my stunts that you could punch me in the stomach. And he would tense and get ready and punch. And, you know, there's nothing to it. About a few days later, he's in his dressing room at the theater. And two of the students from there were actually doing pictures of him because he had saw their sketches before.

He said, come to my dressing room and do a thing for me. So they were sketching and an older guy comes in and this guy was, he had worked in the university. I think he worked at the library, but he wasn't a student. And it turns out he was a spiritualist. And he started talking to Houdini about the Old Testament and stuff like that. And then he said, would it be okay if I punched you in the stomach? And Houdini thought he'd let him get upset. And Houdini says, yes, and he's about to tense his mind. And the guy just punches him three times.

Before he could tense up, yeah. Then the next night when they were ready to leave to go to Detroit, Houdini is sitting in the lobby of the hotel reading a paper and a big burly guy comes up and just punches him in the stomach. Now, none of these things could have killed him because it's true. If you're punched in the stomach, you can't burst your appendix that way. But apparently, our theory was that in the weeks before, there were a few examples where Houdini or his wife came down with Tomei poisoning. And our theory was that the spiritualist was slowly poisoning them. And that eventually – Peter Robinson Mina Crandon and that crew?

Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah. Poor people who were working for her? Yeah. And just to tell our audience, she was a spiritualist that he had made attempts to debunk. Right.

Yeah, that was a big, big fight between the two of them. And he did debunk her. And that really pissed off all her followers. In fact, one of her followers, you know, I happened to, I met her, I guess it was a granddaughter at one of the seances where they try to contact her every year. Sid Radner used to do them. There's one on the Upper East Side by me where he apparently had an apartment. And they did one in Vegas.

And I think Penn and Teller were the guests of honor at the seance. And she was there, the granddaughter. It turns out she lived on Long Island. I said, well, do you think I can come out and interview you? She goes, sure. So I go out to her house. And her husband fixed me a nice dinner. We eat.

I start interviewing her, and when we finished the interview, I said, you wouldn't have any letters or any diaries or anything like that. She goes, come with me. She opens up a closet in a spare bedroom. It's filled with all of her papers, her letters, because her mother was an academic. Her mother kept all of her mother's papers. So I was going through the scrapbooks, and there was a scrapbook, and there's a guy named Dwyckoff, who was one of her millionaire supporters. And Houdini is in the hospital now where he had –

In Detroit. In Detroit. The appendix had burst In Detroit. In Detroit. Yeah. The appendix had burst. He's slowly dying. And this guy writes something like, I couldn't sit by and do nothing while that Jew maligned you. So it's almost like a mea culpa. Wow.

So they had it out for him. Oh, yeah. Wow. So they had it out for him. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I heard like Houdini for a short amount of time became friends with Sir Conan Doyle. Yes. Well, he factors into Rassos' theory. Yes. Because Conan Doyle became an avid spiritualist because his son died in the war. So this was a case of a lot of people.

They lose their kids, and then they want to contact them. And these fake spiritualists would say, oh, no problem. We can contact. And they'd have these seances and say, oh, your son says you should turn over the lease to the house to us. I mean, it was crazy stuff. And I heard a story that Sir Conan Doyle's wife, she said she got in touch with Houdini's mother and spoke to her in heaven. Now, first of all, it was in perfect English. The mother couldn't speak English. She speak english speak a word of english right she called him harry right his name was eric right and she puts up she

across right on the letter right that was a tip kill you and i are gonna go there's a chinese restaurant near me on the upper east side you aware this? It's in some tenement where apparently he lived for a short time. And there's an organization, one of the Houdini groups, that has a seance. We're going to go, you and I, next Halloween. Oh, that's the tenement on the East Side? It's on the Upper East Side. That's where he first lived. But then he had a brownstone in Harlem.

Yeah, but at this location, they stage a Houdini seance every year. We should go there and say, okay, we won Humphrey Bogart as a guest. But John Barrymore. They can put us in touch. because she graduated eventually into doing automatic writing from a 4,000-year-old spirit named Phineas. And so Conan Doyle was just amazed by this. So Conan Doyle was saying, well, we have to go.

We have to go to Norway. It was the middle of winter. We have to go to Norway to spread the word of spiritualism. And then the wife, through Phineas, through the wife says, no, no, not Norway. Maybe someplace warm. Whatever she wanted, Phineas would tell him to do what he did. Hilarious. And I heard one time in front of Sir Conan Doyle, Houdini did one of the simplest, like, hey, look, I took my thumb off. That you do with any two-year-old.

Well, he had fake fingers. Yes. Doyle said that he has some kind of weird power over his body that he can disconnect parts of his body and reattach them. And that Conan Doyle was, you know, just a – He wanted to believe in the worst way. It's crazy. I mean, here's a guy who wrote one of the most sophisticated characters, Sherlock Holmes. Certainly. Logical, rational character.

And he was just, you know. And I heard afterwards. Houdini was basically like, what are you, an asshole? Yeah, well, what about the little fairy photographs? Where these kids were making fake photographs, putting fairies in the pictures. And Conan Doyle, Felford, Hookman, and Sink. What's your co-writer's name? I want to give him credit. I forgot.

Bill Kalush. Bill Kalush. And I heard him say that the Tony Curtis treatment of Houdini is an affront. It's an insult to Houdini's memory. Yeah. Houdini wouldn't die in one of the tricks that he invented. Not only is it Hollywood horseshit, but that he wouldn't die

in one of his own contraptions. Any of the Hollywood biographies to this day, they're all bullshit. I got a quick question about Houdini from a guest for you, Ratso. Pete Nelson, has Ratso ever thought of writing a screenplay

about Houdini, either a straight biopic or a super fictionalized spy adventure? Well, what happened was that our book, Collusion Eye, was optioned. And it kept on being re-optioned and re-optioned and re-optioned. And they got Lionsgate had it for a long time. And they got Noah Oppenheim, who did that movie Jackie, the screenplay of Jackie.

He's a great writer. He also, he's the head of NBC News now. And so he actually wrote the script. Okay, so a screenplay exists. Based on a book. And yeah, so the screenplay. And then eventually, Lionsgate had a change of administration.

The new guys don't want to do the old films, right? Yeah. But Frank Marshall was attached to the film. Wow. And Frank Marshall loved the project so much, he brought it to another studio, and they bought it in turnaround. And they just did another revision with Noah. Good. So it's moving along, Knock Wood. It's going to seem like a 7% solution kind of movie. You know that movie?

Yeah. The other times we used to hang out all the time was those brunches from Al Goldstein, publisher of Score Magazine. We talked a little bit about Al on email. You and I. Well, I'm pretty sure I got you to come to those brunches, right? He's got you to come to them.

Didn't I get you to come to those brunches? Those are the ones Grandpa Al was at? Yeah. The cast of characters is incredible. He'd be there with his whole western outfit. And you'd have the guy who owned the deli, second-heavy deli, Abe. Okay.

He was there. You'd have the guy who wrote David and Lisa, the psychologist. Wow. He would have lawyers who were trying to have him thrown in jail. He was taking them so long. And you would have Michael Baden. Oh, the forensic guy. Yes, yes, yes.

The guy you involved in the Houdini project. I remember sitting next to this black woman who was a, she was a dominatrix. Right. And she went into detail. These are Goldstein's brunches? Yes.

I knew him in L.A. I didn't get any of these brunches. He had these great brunches. I don't think he had them in L.A. I didn't get any of these brunch invitations. He had these great brunches. I don't think he had them in L.A. Although he took me to the Friars to hang out with Larry Flint. And since he still had money back then and was still generous, I used to go there and say, I'd order a brunch, and then I'd say, and I won't want to go. No, no.

Let me tell the story. No. Let him tell it. You knew that, you know, this was heaven for Gilbert because it was really good food. It was an Upper East Side restaurant at the beginning.

And they had a great brunch menu. But Gilbert, not only did he want to eat at the brunch, but he wanted to take some. Of course. Yeah, I'm familiar. So Gilbert would look at the brunch, but he wanted to take some. Of course. Yeah, I'm familiar. So Gilbert would look at the menu and he'd go, and the waiters come around taking all our orders, and he'd go, I can't make my mind up. I don't know whether I want the omelet or I want the French toast. And it was so long that Al just said, Gilbert, order both.

He did that every week. That's hilarious. And I'd go home with like a big shopping bag with like about five Frenchies. What about, did you ever come with me to the Carnegie with Henny Youngman for lunch? Oh, tell us a Henny Youngman story. Because I was, one of the people I brought into the Lampoon was Henny Youngman. Yeah, Drew told me. And, you know, we took Henny Youngman out to Coney Island and we did something with naked girls and they're playing the violin in the back.

And so Henny had an arrangement with the great Leo Steiner, who Leo was the greatest deli man ever. And when the Carnegie was under Leo's watch, it was just fantastic. Those were good days. The food was the best. I remember. I used to come in with Kinky, and Leo would see us, and he'd go, this is the market. They didn't have like a VIP area.

They had Kinky and Ratz over here. Give them linen because that meant you don't get the paper. They would bring out an actual napkin for you. They would bring out an actual napkin for you. So Henny had an arrangement where he could bring anybody he wanted to lunch, right? Free. Wow. I mean, he was a great guy, Leo.

So, you know, we'd sit there. Henny would be cracking jokes the whole time. We'd be eating. The meal is over, and there's no check. And so we say, what kind of tip should we leave? Hennie would go, leave him a dollar each.

So I swear. Oh, God. So he put down like six single dollar bills. The waiter would come over and go, what's this? You're giving me single dollar bills?

and Lenny would go yeah take that you schmuck you're a lousy waiter and they would start fighting seriously unbelievable but wasn't it that they changed owners at the Carnegie and then they

stopped all the free lunches for Henny. Yeah, but Leo died. He died of a brain tumor. The whole place went down. Which I thought was like insane because you went to a place like that. Exactly.

Because you saw Henny Young. Exactly. Oh, in those days, the food was great under Leo. Really great. It's a great experience. Yeah. Any Al Lewis stories come to mind? Just, I guess, the story that I recount in the article I did about Al,

where Al called Al Lewis as a character witness. Al Lewis as a character witness. In one of his... I think he was being accused of harassing his secretary. I remember that. Accused, he did. He'd call up the secretary,

you piece of shit. I don't know what the fight was over. And Grandpa came up on the stand and he just made a mockery. It was like Abbie Hoffman at the Chicago A-Trap. He just made a mockery

of the whole thing. And he said like, and Al's friend Charlie DiStefano was his defense lawyer. And Charlie would say, well, Mr. Lewis, tell us how long do you know now? He goes, I already told you how long I know now. But it was beforehand.

He was not a cooperative witness. No, he was not a cooperative witness. I remember one time Al Goldstein explaining in detail to me. Goldstein, explaining in detail to me, he said, did you ever jerk off on the toilet? And I said, I don't think so, no. And he goes, you know, you should try it. Because, you know, the cold porcelain feels nice on your balls. The wit and wisdom.

Ratso, before we get out of here, here's another question from a fan. Jason Pagano. I love private parts. I know Howard said he hated acting in the movie. Not specifically. But, Larry, do you know if Miss America was ever greenlit as a movie? Or if certain people or certain studios did not want to make the follow-up film?

P.S. I love your work. No. I mean, there was no movie interest in Miss America. Even with all the money Private Parts made. Well, you know, think about it. Private Parts had a story. A story. You know, Miss America was basically just a series of – and in some ways Miss America was much more intimate because he talked about his jerking off, internet porn addiction, and he talked about his OCD.

But, you know. Not movie material. Yeah. Tell us about the new album. Before we go, and we'll plug it. Cool. So at my advanced age, what happened was,

after the Dylan tour, I started writing lyrics. First with Rick Derringer, and then with John Cale. And we wrote a number of really good songs together. And then Cale moved to L.A. And so I just went back to writing books and stuff. And I had a, I guess you'd call it one of the early podcasts at the KGB bar, you know, in the East Village. And we'd have a lot of, like, young musicians from Brooklyn on.

So one night, you know, these two musicians were playing Graham Parsons songs. And when the show was over, Tim Bracey and Elizabeth Nelson come up to me and go, Ratso, we didn't know you were the co-host of this. We're a big fan of yours. We read your Dylan book. So you got to come hang out with us in Brooklyn. So I said, sure. And I started hanging out in the Brooklyn indie scene. And

my juice is flowing again. I had some songs that I never gave Cale. And I wanted to get the songs out. I never thought I'd be the vehicle. So I hooked up with Vin Cacchione from Caged Animals, amazing producer, and we did a demo. And my idea was I was going to do,

take a page out of the Kinky Friedman playbook, which is you do a tribute album to yourself, and you get famous people to sing your things. Willie Nelson and a lot of love it people like that. So I was going to do the same thing. So we did a demo of one song and Our Lady of Light and we finish it and Vince says, why are you giving this to somebody else?

You should sing your own songs. You have a unique voice right away. Unique voice. Like Florence Foster Jennings. You thought he your own songs. You have a unique voice right away. Unique voice. What? Like Florence Foster Jennings? You thought he was insulting you. Yeah. No, I mean, I just thought it was weird.

So I brought the track to Hal Wilner, who's a legendary. The legendary Hal Wilner. Lou Reed, Marianne Faithful. Lou Reed, Marianne Faithful, Ginsburg, Burroughs. Right, Ginsburg, right. And, you know, I play it in his studio, and we listen to it. And it's over. I said, Hal, what do you think?

Should I sing my own songs? And he listens with his eyes closed, and he opens his eyes. He takes a deep breath, and he goes, what are you waiting for? So I took that as a yes. And I did the album. And we sold it to Lucky Number Records. And it came out April 5th. How's it doing?

It's doing great. It's getting incredible reviews. And a lot of the reviews are, we don't have Leonard Cohen around anymore, so this is the next best thing. I was going to say, when I listened to our lady of light to me it sounded you sounded like leonard singing a leonard cohen song yeah and

then sometimes they sound like dylan sing dylan song but i mean look those are two of my great influences of course i mean i'm proud of that congratulations for seeing this dream project through yes and you asked dylan to write liner notes at some point? Do I have that right? You do have that right. It was backstage in Vegas after one of his shows, and we were chatting. I was in Vegas staying with Penn and Emily Gillette.

Is Emily here, by the way? Did she come in? There she is. Yeah, she's there. And then during the day, I was working with Mike Tyson on his two books. And so I go to the show, and we're talking after the show's over,

and I said, Oh, by the way, Bob, I'm doing my own album. And he goes, you're doing an album? I said, yeah. And Nick Cave does a duet with me. Nick Cave does a duet with you.

I said, yeah. I said, and I want you. And I see him tense up. And I said, to write the liner notes. And then he breathes easy. He goes,

I don't know if I could write liner notes. I said, world gone wrong? He goes, yeah, that was real good. But I never followed. Penn got the job. Penn wrote some incredible liner notes. You went to the right man. Yeah, really.

You went to the right man. Terrific. I like your Dylan, but I like Ratso's Dylan, too. See? We'll have to have a Dylan. You know, with his relationship. Let's do that, Gilbert. His is whinier. His is more high-pitched.

Yeah. Between Larry Charles knowing Dylan and Ratso knowing Dylan, I think we have to get you together with Dylan. I know. Let's send him the... Let's send him the bit We're going to make a project out of it Does he have a sense of humor about himself like that? Will he laugh?

Yeah He does? He has a great sense Well you saw it in the film That's true In this documentary I love that he's influenced by Children of Paradise Of all things

And did the white face Really interesting influences His interviews in the film are so funny when he's talking about Scarlett Rivera. He is funny. Deadpan, tongue-in-cheek. He's always been a bit of a prankster. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Terrific. I mean, congratulations on the record. By the way, can I put a plug in? Please. Oh, the new website. Tell us about that.

www.ratso.org. Not that I'm a non-profit, but I that. www.ratso.org Not that I'm a non-profit, but I just couldn't get Ratso. Some schmuck in San Francisco has ratso.com. So we have a new website. All of the books,

personally inscribed, whatever you want me to say, friends, enemies, you know, bar mitzvahs, I'll sign anything. And you can get the album there, too. I want to thank our mutual friend Drew Friedman, too, who bar mitzvahs, I'll sign anything. And you can get the album there, too. I want to thank our mutual friend, Drew Friedman.

Yes. Who I called, and I said, tell me some cool shit about Ratso. And he had a lot of good stuff. And I want to say, too, this, about your book, reading your book, there were some sad moments where I realized how much of that New York City is gone. Fillmore, Kenny's Castaway, Max's, CBGB's, The Ritz, The Knitting Factory, Palladium, Roseland. It's gone. They're all gone.

They're all Starbucks. It's all gone. It's horrible. Comedy music. It's horrible. How do you feel about the death of record stores, too? Obviously, you're not happy about it. Well, no.

We've talked something we've talked about on this show. Did you see the Tower Records talk that Tom Hanks' son made? No, not yet. Oh, you must see it. I heard it's really good. You must see it, but it not happy about it. We've talked something we've talked about on this show. Did you see the Tower Records doc that Tom Hanks' son made? No, not yet. Oh, you must see it. I heard it's really good. You must see it, but it'll break your heart. Yeah, no, I mean, it's, you know, it's so-called progress. It's such bullshit.

I mean, look at Times Square. I mean, you know. Or St. Mark's. When we were growing up, we would go to Times Square and see a trained flea circus. You know, Professor Heckler's flea circus. Now you go and you get, you know. The Disney store. It's ironic, though.

Instead of, you know, going indoors to those, you know, the, what is it? Oh, the porn places. I remember. You put the quarters. The peep show. The peep show. Yes. What was the name of that?

Instead of that. What was the name of that? What, the big one? The Harmony? It was Show World. Show World. What was the name of that? Instead of that, what was the name of that? What, the big one? The Harmony? It was Show World. Show World. Yeah. But instead of that.

Why am I the one answering this? Instead of that, now you have naked women with body paints harassing little kids. I mean, it's crazy. Times have changed and not for the best. Yeah. Well, the thing I always talk about on this show, we always talk, and that is that movies are dying out. Movie theaters are dying out in New York. Yeah, like the whole idea of going to the movies, that's going to be like vaudeville.

Well, but look at, I mean, the way the movie theaters that have adapted are the ones like Nighthawk Cinema. Yeah. Where you can go there. Yeah. You can order food, a waitress brings it, and you lie back and you can drink alcohol while you're watching. I mean, that's great. Yeah, or the Alamo Drafthouse. Right.

But, boy, I've watched ten theaters close in the last five years. Yeah, no, I mean. And the Ziegfeld, we lost the Ziegfeld. Well, what about bookstores? Bookstores, too. Oh, bookstores? Yeah. It's crazy.iegfeld. Well, what about bookstores? Bookstores, too. Oh, bookstores? Yeah. I used to love hanging out in bookstores.

Sure. It's all changed, not for the better. See that documentary, All Things Must Pass. It's called. Did you see the Wrecking Crew doc? No. Also fascinating. Those are my two recommendations.

You want to thank this man? No. Okay. The website one last time? www.ratso.org Okay. And I want to ask you off mic when we shut down about Dylan's Traveling Wilburys career. I remember one Al Lewis story.

Uh-oh. Well, take us out on an Al Lewis story. Uh-oh. Well, take us out on an Al Lewis story. This is not the one about Penn. Yeah. Okay. He would wear, you know, he always dressed in his, you know, the string Western tie. Polo tie, yeah. And the snap shirts and the Western boots.

And his teeth were like brown. And he had the long rotten fingernails and smelly cigar. Right. And the frizzy gray hair. And we were at one of the brunches, and Al Goldstein is saying, you know, I'm putting out a new magazine, and each month is going to have a celebrity interview. The month.

And he goes, this month it's Penn and Teller. And Al Lewis turns to me and goes, ho? And I go, Penn and Teller. And Al Lewis disgustedly waves his hand and goes, P.J.J. shit. Which he tells in front of the man's wife. Yes! Emily, I'm sorry.

We haven't even met and I'm apologizing. You want to plug the documentary too? People should see it. Yes. The documentary is on Netflix. Yes, which Gilbert is not sure if he has. Right. And it's by Martin Scorsese.

And it's called Rolling Thunder Review. A Bob Dylan story. a Bob Dylan story. And after you watch the documentary, you can go to www.ratso.org and buy the book that describes the documentary. And the book is great. The book is a great read. Thanks, Ratso. Thanks. Oh, the lady will stun you when you meet face to face. Her beauty unbounded by time or by place. And she'll dance around your shyness, poke fun at your gloom.

But you can't help but smile As she gooses the groom Oh, she lives in the ruins Of a honeymoon suite The optimal place For the star- star crossed to me and the oracle says the maiden is cheesed now she's throwing those pennies Right back in your face And she'll shine on you tonight Let her shine on you tonight Our Lady

Our Lady of Light She will ask to be rescued from the first rays of dawn Then she'll throw down a rope that is studded with thorns. And at last, when you're climbing, when your palms are all torn, she'll be taking the sun in from a chair on the lawn. And she'll shine on you tonight

Let her shine on you tonight Oh lady Our lady of light Our Lady of Light Don't ask too many questions Or you'll end up like me Marooned on an island

circumscribed by her sea and I guess that I'm stuck here to no one's surprise I surrendered my freedom when I look through her eyes.

And she'll shine on you tonight. Let her shine on you tonight. Tonight Oh lady Dear lady Our lady of light Thank you. Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast is produced by Dara Gottfried and Frank Santapadre, with audio production by Frank Fertorosa. Web and social media is handled by Mike McPadden, Greg Pair, and John Bradley-Seals. Special audio contributions by John Beach. Special thanks to John Fodiatis, John Murray, and Paul Rayburn.