Girl on Guy with Aisha Tyler - girl on guy 196: horatio sanz

Episode Date: September 24, 2015

this episode was recorded live at LA Podfest on September 20, 2015. aisha was running on four hours of sleep, and horatio had to pee like a racehorse. consider yourself warned. girl on guy is going to need a minute.

This episode of Girl on Guy is brought to you by Audible. Go to Audiblepodcast.com slash girl on guy for your free audiobook download. That's audiblepodcast.com slash girl on guy. This is Girl on Guy. Hello everybody and welcome to season five of Girl on Guy and episode 196. It was a long and I got to tell you, not very restful hiatus. And I know you guys are eager to get back in. to this season, but I want to tell you right away that this episode is late. You know that already

even waiting for it. It was supposed to premiere on the 22nd and it's going up on the 23rd of September. And that is because atypical of my normal hiatus during which I rest and sleep and gather all of my scattered marbles back together and shove them back into my headhole, I worked for the entire hiatus. And look, these are champagne problems. I got an opportunity to join a television series entitled Criminal Minds. And so my nice long six-week sleep that I was intending to have, where I crawled back into the soil of my native land, evaporated before my very eyes.

And I was working 12 and 16-hour days acting. I love acting, so I'm not complaining. And my premier episode of Criminal Minds, debut September 30th next week. So check that out. Lots of exciting things happening. So many exciting things, in fact, that this show is late. You know I'm a one-man band.

this season I am going to try to add some help because I have literally run out of road. I think before this I was running with about a 10% reserve and now I am a 10% over capacity and I am trying to figure out how to juggle it all and it's a good problem to have. I am now on four television series and I'm again I'm not gloating, just sitting of fact, the talk, criminal minds, whose line is in any way in Archer. But as you can imagine, there just is not enough Aisha to go around. So I apologize for the show going up late, and I'm going to do everything I can to remedy that back going forward. But I do appreciate all the lovely and supportive tweets indicating that you guys would be patient and waiting for the show.

I'm very, very grateful to you for that. A bit more news. The Girl and Guy Bunker has moved into a new space. I have a new office space, and that means that the sound quality is going to be different than it was previously. I used to be in this adorable little kind of woman cave, very small and well insulated. and now I'm in this big fancy loft space, and so there's a little bit of an echo. Rather than freak out or try to remove the echo

with a bunch of fancy technology widgets and bits and bobs, I'm just going to let you guys know that there's going to be a little bit of an echo in the podcast, and then we could all live with it because art is not perfect, and clearly neither am I. But yeah, so it's just a different sound quality, but a very cool space that I'm really proud of, and a big, awesome bar that built out. And my Batcave has seen some improvements,

but one of the side effects is that the sound is a little different. The show is just going to sound a little different to you. You know, life changes. Shit's happening. I've told you all the things that are going on. The talk is back for season six. My run on Criminal Minds debuts Wednesday, September 30th, and lots of exciting things.

So let's just crash through the business quickly so that we can get to the good stuff. This show is brought to you in part by Audible. And you know that you can go to audiblepodcast.com slash girl on guy for your free audiobook download. You can choose the audio version of my own book, Self-inflicted Wounds, which I read to you, like a lovely yet disturbing bedtime story full of injury and near-death experiences,

or you can choose any book in the world that you like. And I hear a couple of suggestions. Last season I talked a lot about clinical introversion versus clinical extroversion and the nature of the introverted person. I am obviously not an introvert, but many people close to me that I care about deeply are. And there's a book called The Quiet written by Susan Kane that is available on Audible.

If you would like to learn more about how introverts work and why you can't just tell an introvert, hey, you perk up, make an effort, cultivate some small talk. That's a bunch of bullshit. Introverts don't work that way. And their brains literally run on a different biological and chemical path than extroverts. They're just wired differently. So if you want to learn more about how introverts work, check out that book The Quiet. That's on Audible.

You can also check out a brand new Lisbeth Selander novel. not written by the original author, Steve Larson, but by a new author, David Lagercranz, the book is called The Girl in the Spider's Web. So if you loved the girl with a dragon tattoo and all those other things, the girl who kicked the guy in the nuts and the girl who set the building on fire,

those are not the names of the other books. I'm not a librarian. Go to audiblepodcast.com slash girl and guy and choose one of those two books or a book of your own choosing. You know I recommended the magicians last season as a favorite book of mine, and that is now a series apparently

on the sci-fi channel, I think. So, you know, dreams come true, my friends. Dreams come true. Check out audiblepodcast.com slash girl on guy for your absolutely free audiobook download. And, you know, when you do that, you're letting Audible know that there are time and money spent advertising on Girl and Guy. It was well spent. And you're supporting the Army and you're getting free shit. I don't know what else you want for me. This show was also brought to you by Casper Mattresses, and I want to thank them for their ongoing support of Girl on Guy. I have had several Girl and Guy Army members say that they bought a mattress from Casper and they were super stoked.

And here is how Casper works. You get this brilliantly made, obsessively engineered, American-made mattress at an incredibly fair price. I've read and heard that people spend a third of life sleeping. I know I don't. I spend about 10% of my life sleeping. I'd love to get up to 15 at some point. But the little bit of time I do spend in bed had better be fucking amazing. and it better be restorative on a galactic level.

And so obviously your bed makes a big difference. Hasker brings together these two great bed-making technologies to make your bed most comfortable latex foam and memory foam. So the beds have just the right sink and just the right bounce, no matter what kind of sleeper you are. If you're a side sleeper or a face sleeper or a starfisher, however you get down in bed, this is the bed for you. And the coolest thing about this because, you know,

shopping for mattress is a pain in the ass and nobody's got the fucking time for that. But these guys have a risk-referrial and return policy. So they'll deliver the bed to you. You can sleep on it for 100 days, which is plenty of time to figure out what the hell is wrong with you and your sleep patterns. And if you're not happy,

they will come and pick that bed up. You know, the five minutes that you get lying on the bed and the showroom is not enough. So you get to sleep on the bed. You get to make it your own. You get to do what you do on that bed and see if it's the right bed for you. And after 100 days, if you don't love it,

they'll come and get it. They send it in these adorable kind of like vacuum-packed packages, and then when you cut the box open, the bed springs to life like some giant, exciting sea monkey, and you are on your way. It's just $500 for a twin-sized mattress, and only $950 for a king-sized mattress. That is an insanely affordable bed. And right now you get $50 towards any mattress purchase when you go to casper.com slash girl on guy and use the code Girl on Guy. So check this out. If you're looking for a new mattress now is your time, my friend. These are affordable. They're beautifully made, delivered to your home, and they have this incredible

100-day risk-free trial and return policy. You cannot lose. Go to caspur.com slash girl on guy. Use the offer code girl on guy, and you get $50 off any mattress you choose. So check that out. All right. This was a big, chunky open because it's the beginning of the season. And so lots of things happens, lots of business, lots of stories, and there will be more coming forward. Let's get into this show, which was recorded live at Los Angeles Podfest here in L.A. And this is always such a fun time. If you've never been to LA Podfest, I encourage you to plan to come next fall. It's always in September. It's always in Los Angeles, hence the name L.A. Podfest. And it is a collection of like-minded people, people who love podcasts, people who love podcasting, people who love drinking.

There's a giant bar set up in the middle of this thing, and you can start drinking at 9 a.m. in the morning, my friend. No one is telling you what to do, and we are not your mom. And then all day, you get to go watch a variety of great podcasts being recorded. There was everything from the smartest man of the world with great proofs to spontaneation with Paul F. Tompkins, Doug Loves movies, the Dork Forrest, the Dallup, comedy film nerds, mental illness happy hour, so many great shows. And of course, hoary old, I don't mean W-H-O-R-E-Y, but H-O-A-R-R-Y, old. whiskered standbys like a girl on guy with Aisha Tyler and what the fuck with Mark Marin. So it was a great, great podcast festival.

And I encourage you to attend next year. It's super fun. One ticket gets you just more podcasting than you could ever tolerate. And you get to meet your favorite podcasters. There's T-shirts. There's posters. There's fun. There's a live stand-up show on Saturday night.

This year they screened the podcast documentary earbuds. And apparently people cried. That's how awesome that was. So you missed it, buddy, but there's always time for next year. And I think you can actually go to LAPodFest.com and see, well, they're not live anymore, but live streams of all your favorite podcasts by just buying one streaming ticket, however it works, and then you can listen to all of the shows. So that's something to do as well, if you feel strong,

if you feel mentally prepared to get more podcasts than you've ever wanted to encounter at one time and your face all at once. You can do that. So this show was recorded there at LAPod Fest. with the brilliant and funny Horatio Sands, who has his own show called the Horat Show. See, it's a little homophone for his name. And he was so lovely and funny. And this was such an enjoyable time.

And I really hope that you enjoy it. And I'm happy to be back. And I am asking you, Army, for, I'm not a religious person. I'm not asking you for prayers. But what I am asking you for is support and patience during what is probably going to be the most challenging work year of my life. I mentioned a little bit at the top of the show when it starts that I'm suffering from what has become. something akin to a crippling workaholism. It has really become too much.

It used to be kind of funny, and now I'm thinking, oh, shit, I may really end up in the hospital with quote-unquote exhaustion, which I used to think was a bunch of bullshit, but now it's starting to feel like the penny taste of fear in my mouth. So just know that the show is going to go up

and I'm going to do everything I can to get it to you every week, and if it comes up a little late, please understand that's because I am a one-woman band and I am clapping away with my knee symbols as fast as I can. You guys are red,

You are my army, you know I love you. I hope you enjoy this episode. This is Girl on Guy, 196, live from LA Podfest with the hilarious sketch and improv comedian Horatio Sands. Coming at you, straight out of hellie, and right into your face. This is Girl on Guy. All right. First of all, I'm just going to start with a big mush pot of teary behaviors

that I didn't expect to happen until like 30 seconds ago when you guys started clapping. because every year and I put the podcast on hiatus for the month of August and part of September so I can do things like shower and eat and masturbate uncontrollably. And I keep it under control for the other 11 months. And while I'm off from the podcast, I have all these like, oh man, you know, I love my show, but it's so great to have a little bit of extra time to be human and the show is so much work. And I don't know if I want to keep doing the show. And then I come out to you guys and I'm like, I can never stop doing it.

doing girl on guy because of you. So thank you for coming. Thank you for listening to my show. You have no idea how much it means to me. So thank you. I'm also going to say, as a disclaimer right now, that people who do know me know that I have a real, like, what is becoming, quickly becoming,

like a crippling problem with workaholism. So this week, I worked on Thursday, up until Thursday on the talk. I worked all day Friday until about 1 o'clock on my film. I flew at 6 a.m. on Saturday to New York. I presented an award last night to a friend who was done a bunch of work on marriage equality. And then I got up again at 4 o'clock in New York

and flew back to L.A. and then came straight here from the airport. So I don't know who the fuck I am anymore. So if I start to move into a fugue state in Babel and Controllably, well, it'll just be like every other episode of Girlon, Guy, won't it? Okay. I'm super excited to be here. love L.A. Podfest, and thank you guys for coming and for buying

tickets, and if you're streaming it online right now, thanks for streaming the show online. And hopefully, it won't suck. And my assistant has my chaser for my booze. Step forward, Jerry. People may know Jerry from the random times when we mentioned Jerry during the podcast. There is

Jerry in human form. All right. Our guest today is super exciting. Welcome to Girl and Guy. Horatio Sam. Any minute. Any minute he's going to come out from behind that curtain. It's going to go so good.

Oh, there I'm going. So we're going to both speak to each other and try to make it not awkward as we both talk to each other and talk to you guys, and it's already weird. So thanks for being on my show. Thank you very much for having me. Yay.

Probably about 70% of the people in my show I've met previous to interviewing them, but we just met today. Yes. And I think it's going to be fine. I think it's going to be okay. Yeah. I meet most people, even if they're,

beautiful stars or not. I meet them and I'm kind to them and I think I'm good at engaging in conversation. I sense that in you. I sense that in you. You have a kindness. Good. Good. So I'm super excited to talk to you and we're just going to start at the beginning because that's simplest. But first of all,

I want to say you're, I don't know if you guys, if you knew Horatio when he was on SNL and for almost a decade, right? You were like one of the longest running eight years. Eight years. One of the longest running. cast members and kicking ass the entire time. But if you know it from the show, and I'm going to try to say this as a nice way possible,

he was like this really funny guy on the show, but he's kind of foxy in person, which I didn't expect at all. He has a, you have a foxiness to you. Yeah. I was shocked by that. And I know that I'm going to get that, so I kind of go in there going like, oh, you know, they're going to expect Debbie Downer Horatio.

And then they were like, in comparison, I'm pretty fine. Oh, you are, you are. Yeah, yeah. I was like, here's Horatio's a sexy brother. I I don't understand what's happened. So many feelings. Okay, so let's start out with the very first thing about you, which is that your name is Horatio Sans,

but I'm gonna hazard your name in Spanish. Horacio sounds. Close. I fucked it up completely. It's just Oracio. The age is silent, that's sneaky. It is sneaky. I clearly don't speak Spanish.

And I learned everything I know from Wikipedia. But you were not born in the United States. I wasn't, I was conceived in Chicago. Oh, okay, rock and roll. Way to make it international. My parents got busy in Chicago. And then my mother became pregnant. And they decided to fly back to Chile and have me born a Chilean citizen.

Interesting. Which is not how people typically do things. No. It isn't. I mean, that's not a fan. You're like, go for it, boy. Get that. Get that.

USA shit. Right out the shoot, as my father would say. There's a controversy about people calling, oh, anchor baby. I could have been an anchor baby. You could have been an anchor baby. Yeah. But I wasn't. So they brought me back.

I'm sorry, I'd cut you off. What did your parents do in Chile? They worked in a factory and my dad was worked at a hotel as a bartender. So they were, so I mean, this is interesting because they're just kind of like normal working class family. Sure. But that feels very, I don't have the right word for it, like very, very globetrotting and international and kind of upper class to like fly to Chicago and get pregnant and then fly back to Chile because you want your parents to be a Chilean citizen. Yeah, it's, it wasn't an effort. But my father said that you wanted to make sure that I could be president of Chile.

The problem is I can't be president of the United States, which is kind of where I really would like to be president. But I'll take it. Do as you can. And you have siblings as well, right? I do. I have two brothers. Older?

Older? Older? Six and nine years older. And my brother Carlos is a sexy brother. He's the sexy brother? He's the sexy brother. I think you're the sexy brother. Well, thank you.

Oracio. And so I guess that's so interesting because you already were kind of an international family and even though you were born there. Did you have a sense of that? Did you feel very Chilean when you were a kid? Or did you have the sense that your parents are kind of been a part of both worlds? Well, I didn't feel, the weird thing is when I was in Chicago,

I wasn't really in the Puerto Rican community or the Mexican community or the black community or the white community. So I was kind of like in making my own kind of world, which kind of maybe insulated me more. Right. So I never really felt part of a bigger group, which was kind of good because that kind of gave me

an individuality that kind of, It told me that I could leave that neighborhood or go anywhere and kind of do my thing. Did it feel that way to you, though? Like, I was kind of an in-betweeny kid. I didn't have as many things to be in-between. I just, you know, didn't fit in with the black kids and didn't fit in one of the white kids. Sometimes that felt liberating, but a lot of times it felt a little isolating as well. Did you make your own group?

By make your own group, meaning I played by myself? Absolutely, yeah. I kind of made my own group of misfits, which I still continue to try to keep around. I think it's good. I'm going to stop really quickly because I can hear this guy talking backstage. Can you guys hear him? Or am I just, am I having a stroke? You hear him a little bit.

We're just going to stop him. How about that? It's like I feel like a sound guy on a movie set. I can hear a guy. Yeah. Thank you. Anyway, so start again about you making your own group, which was way more awesome than my group

because it had more than one person in it. It was an actual group. I kind of, yeah, I kind of just kind of instead of trying to join those other groups, I kind of just started my own group, which was a mix of a lot of other things. How cool. Yeah, and I guess, you know, self-preservation,

I guess, is what started it. Was it? I mean, was self-preservation in the sense of, like, wanting to feel like you belonged, or self-preservation and, like, not getting your ass kicked? Not really.

I guess I never, that's not true. I was going to say I never worried about getting my ass kicked like I was some MMA fighter or something. I did worry about getting my ass kicked, but I guess. I was really good at kind of talking my way out of it.

Yeah. And so, yeah, it just, I just felt like it was better to surround myself with people that thought like me than to try to join some other group. Yeah. Yeah. So that kind of has been how I've continued my life. It's just not necessarily join groups, but keep one going myself. It's interesting.

I think that comes up a lot on my show, like the concept of outsidership, because I think, you know, a lot of times, when you're like a weird kid, either you try to conf- you kind of try to like pare down all your sharp edges to fit into the group that's there or you kind of wander off on your own.

Did you feel like that was an intuitive move for you? Like, I don't want to be a part of that group over there. Or were you just like... I guess I knew from a young age like what the good comedy was and the people, because I watched Saturday Night Live when I was a little kid like five and six from like my brother's bedroom.

You know, I would sneak in there and watch it with them. And so at that very young age, I was already like, okay, I don't get like 90%. I don't get like all of it, but I get most of it. And so I kind of had my idea of like, I just got to get out of this whole system and then I'll be able to do my thing. Right. So I had that from early on. Like high school, I, you know, I got along and I enjoyed myself socially. But the whole, you know, the whole thing of being good at school and studying that, I didn't feel that at all.

That wasn't your jam. It wasn't my jam. I wish I would have maybe paid a little more attention. But it was a Chicago public school already, so I was already kind of behind the eight ball. If you know anything about the Chicago public schools. But then, you know, but then it just made me go out and get my own education, which was a lot of PBS. For real. Yeah.

And yeah, and so comedy, as far as comedy as something that I studied, yeah, there was no limit. I was pretty much a straight-up comedy nerd, and I knew exactly what was good and everything else kind of just... Really? Yeah. From what age did you have this, like, crystal clear sense of, like, what was funny

and what wasn't funny? I think about, like, seven or eight. Really? And it was because I would make my brother's girlfriends laugh. Yeah? And other friends, too, and they kind of got jealous and stopped having me hang around

because I was really, like, this funny little kid. Right. But also, again, PBS, it's a big commercial. commercial for them. They need it, bro. They could take any advertising. I mean, I know they're selling out Sesame Street and stuff. Sesame Street's doing commercials for McDonald's. That'd be awful, right? Brought you by Chevron, the letter C. Elbow for Man Santo. Yeah, so it didn't like a PBS was, PBS was literally Monty Python, the two Ronnies. You can watch Benny Hill on Channel 32 because Benny Hill was a little too.

Dude, do you remember how confusing Benny Hill was to you as a kid? Like how you knew it... Well, it must have been to you. It was really... A little more, as a woman. Well, also, no black people. But no, I loved Benny Hill, but I didn't know why I loved it.

It felt like super risque, right? Like he'd be chasing the little maid around and paddling her on the butt. And he was a disgusting, old lecherous. Literally, he was like a child of You don't know what you mean? Yeah, he was. But the 11-year-old was like, man, that dude's cool.

He slaps every girl's butt. He was like, eh, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, he'd be like, this is wacky. I watched every episode of that show. Yeah, and, yeah, so English comedy was a big influence, the two Ronnie's and all that stuff that was on when I was a kid on Channel 11, PBS. And SNL, like, I've still maintained, SNL is, is the best, is one of the greatest, comedy voices that this country musters up. Well, I want to talk about SNO a lot later in the show, because I think what I think is very unique about a career like yours,

and I think what can be unique about something that's an institution like that, is to love a show as a child and then be on it as an adult. But I want to put that a pin in that, because I want to ask you what that was like being so obsessed with comedy as a child. Did your family, was your family supportive of that? Did they recognize that in you? Or were they trying to kind of steer you in a different direction? No, my father was, as I found out later, performed radio plays as a child.

Whoa. So he was in Chile. So he was already kind of had the bug that I didn't really know how deep he was into it. Did he keep it from you? Not really, but I just didn't really know. And then later, as I was doing plays in Chicago and entering into Second City, you know, he would be very supportive. Yeah. And when I made the decision that I was going to start doing improv

and my goal was to be in television, I quit college. Oh. And I had to tell him that. And that was like really hard. But he was always like, always had the arts around. Always played classical music and took me to museum. So, you know, he kind of made me a well-rounded boy. I mean, I've just been engaging in one like flimsy American stereotype.

after another this whole time, but I'm gonna do it again, which is I think that, and I don't think it's just Latino families, I think immigrant families tend to be, like, really practical in their approach. So, like, great, if you wanna do that for a hobby, but like, we moved here so our family could have a better life, and we want you to get a degree, we want you to be a doctor or an astronaut,

or like, I don't know, like, Attorney General, do you know what I mean? Like, I didn't walk all our shit here in a bag so that you could fucking be a clown. Exactly, exactly. regimes are crumbling behind you we did leave all those bodies in that killing field so you could fuck around making shit up on a Friday night

with a bunch of hippy dirty pit you know what I mean? Yeah yeah Did you get that from your family at all? Not really because my dad loved that I was performing but he was really disappointed when I decided to quit college But I told him I go well at this point to stay in college is to admit that I need a backup plan

Right. And you felt very much like you wanted to, you, it sounds very strategic, like I've got a leap. But you know, yeah, I always say like you have to either have confidence or faint it and like really go for what you want. And you can't have like backup plans, in my opinion. I guess you, if you really, really know that that's what you want to do in it, I guess to a certain point I was kind of deranged in what I thought I could do, then I really didn't have to worry about that school. That school would have really slowed things down. Were you in school in Chicago? Yeah. And is that when you decided to move on and do Second City? Well, I was in Chicago when I quit even before Second City.

I quit when I was at Improvillimpic. There you go. I quit way prematurely. I was like, I wasn't even had a real thing. I mean, I went for like two or three years, but I knew at the time that it was so much fun and it was so good for me that I knew that I had to keep going. Was there a crystallizing moment? Was there some day you woke up and like, I can't do this? anymore. I've got to leave school.

No, well, you know, there's a lot of drinking involved in comedy, as you know. Yes, there is. I mean, what? I don't know. And so we like to celebrate every laugh with a drink. Right. Every, no triumph too small. No triumph too small. When you're starting out too, it's all about the party. Like, oh yeah, yeah, the show is good,

but what a party. Oh, yeah. And so that's kind of like you that was just a side effect of hanging out with really smart, funny people, was it you're going to stay up late and you're going to get drunk and you're going to ruin the next day. So I knew already that I couldn't sacrifice that for college. Right. Right. It's so interesting how, and I don't think that it's unique to comedy, but it just maybe the way expresses itself as unique to comedy,

that like the idea of being around like-minded people, like how engaging that is. Like, you know, it's almost like an iceberg, right? 10% of your time on stage and 90% of your time off stage thinking and talking and being about comedy, that that becomes your whole world. You know what I mean? And I'm sure that doctors sit around and go like, did you see that? Explain what? But there's a new heart on the market. Yes, dude, I just, there's this stent. Take a look at this stent. Oh, that's a beauty. All right, woo. I can't even look at it directly. It's like a diamond. But I, but I do think that like, especially when you're a young comedian, there's something really

meaningful and important about being around other comedians all the time, right? And like-minded. Yeah, like-minded. comics, right? Even when you're not doing comedy. Now, this group of people that you're hanging out with, they were all improv people. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And then these guys were people from the UCB, Matt Walsh, and. Oh, yeah. And Polar. Besser and Polar and Adam McKay. So, I mean, these are like really smart, funny people. And to, I never heard of any of them. Out of that. So it really does make, I really do, I am proud of that decision to stay with those people. And I also say that that's a big part of beginning and stand up and improvising. just go to the nearest people that are funny, hang with them, and hopefully you get along. Right.

But, yeah, the idea of killing and then being with people that aren't as good as you is not going to help the career. But you also gravitate towards like-minded people. I mean, I think that, like, I remember when I was a baby comic, there were other guys that thought were funny, but maybe not my kind of funny. But you do end up kind of pooling around the people that all kind of go your way. Yeah, and you kind of still do that now, right? Yeah, yeah. If you're becoming good friends with somebody, you know, and then you're like, you like that, let's change that.

Let me talk to you out of it. I'm going to wear you down. Right, right. And I guess this is just a stupid question, but it's very much a comic, a stand-up question, which is our improv comedians as full of assholery as stand-ups are when they're together. Do you know what I'm saying? No, so for people who are in comics, there is this, like, kind of self-perpetuating, like, bit trying out shit

that happens with comics where they just start to, all of a sudden, it's like everybody's doing bits, bits, bits, bits, bits. Do improv people do that when they're around each other? Yeah, yeah, and it's not, but it's, but I've been, I've been into the stand-up world, and it's kind of like, you know, it's kind of like, I'm going to show you that I'm funny. Right. And that's what's going to happen first.

And then you better show me that you're funny. Right, right, right. There's that kind of like one-ups and shit. It's just like a sword, like a sword fight. If you can get to a point with your friends where you've decided everybody's funny, and then you're just doing bits with each other that are fun, it's early on where you're like, buddy, are you working out your material on me right now? Because I'm not your girlfriend.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so I wonder if impot people are like that. No, it's filled with assholery in improv too. Right, yeah. It's just a, it's probably just done in a different way. And I think it, this is important. for the world to know too. I think that stand-ups and improvisers are

kind of like mimes and clowns. I mean, I don't know, no, that's not right. I was so with you, though. Come on, let's do it. Okay, what I'm trying to say is that I think that stand-ups think that improvisers are kind of full of shit, and I think that improvisers think that

stand-ups are a little full of shit. I think that's fair. Right? I think that's fair. I totally think that improvisers are full of shit. Because I think, sure, and I think stand-ups think are full of shit because they say the same jokes over and over again. No. Or we're professionals who hone our craft to a razor fine point, I don't know.

Or professionals that don't need to do that. This is so fun. Oh my God, this is like, this is the most combative my show's ever been. No, but you brought up a point, and I thought it's cool to let the audience know that we do have that kind of thing. Like, there is still, I mean, obviously,

when we get together and people, are funny and people are funny that are funny then you don't have to prove it. We know there's like, you know, but definitely there's a little like... It's a little half-filled in McCoy. So here's what's interesting about this particular dynamic, right? Because I've had this conversation about people who

just do improv or who have tried stand-up and I've had friends who are like, I, like, who come from improv and they're like, I get bored if I do the same material 10 nights in a row and I'm sick of it. But I envy a comic who can build a bit over time and adds to it and adds to it and cut things away.

build something that is kind of, right? Like, you know, okay, this is going to land every time. And I think for comics, we all want to be better improvisers. We want to go up with an idea and a structure and then fill it in with magic every night that feels a little different to us and feels a little different to the audience. And at least that's how I work.

I'm like, well, I have a plan, but my hope and expectation is this set won't be like any other set previous or any other set following. You know what I mean? That you try to find that hybrid. Right, and I think that improv also wants to be a little more, it wants to have a more professional shine to it. Well, you know when you see improv where people are just like,

they just empty their pockets and throwing fucking paper clips and lint and shit. Like, please God, let something work. Exactly. Yeah. No, I think there's a little bit of like, I don't do that well, so I'm not going to like it. Exactly. On both sides, for sure. But it's also like a beginning of training too.

If you start, your whole world is improv and coming up with new things, to copy yourself and to copy others is like the first thing that'll get you ostracized. Right, right, right. So when we get, so when we built up and our skill set is at a certain level, to do stand-up really takes a shift in the brain that's hard. Yeah, totally. Because I'm on one side here, I'm constantly trying to make up something different and interesting for an audience and kind of keep them off, you know, keep them off on their toes,

off balance. And here I'm just kind of like, these are jokes that I've crafted, God damn. You better like them because there's no. excuse. Here's an excuse. I just made this up. Right. And then you can be like, oh, well, it didn't work because I just made it up. So, yeah, exactly. And that's why, you know, improv is not great on television. And stand-up is because it's like, you know, it is a performed, perfectly, like nicely timed act. But you don't want to be a robot. You know what I mean? Like from a standard perspective, I think the idea is to not, at least for me, like I remember I used to really love Mark Marin because it felt like he was making it all up, but he was going along. And then most of the time he was, and he was also high on Coke. But I remember thinking, God, I want to be like that.

I wanted to feel like a conversation every time. But that was also an artful, you know, he was artfully building that thing out. So it looked and felt like it was natural. And then now, you know, I work on a show where I work on whose lines is anyway. And I know they're making it up as they go along. But I also know that, like, sometimes I think, God, that bit was so fucking funny. It's so sad that they never get to do that again.

Right. Like I'm just watching their little baby sail down stream. I'm like, man, There's somewhere down, there's rushes with like 3709 infants waiting for somebody to pick them up, you know what I mean? Do you ever, ever done something where you're like, fuck, I wish I could do that bit again? Well, you know, I treat bits like gum packages that are in my pockets, you know, just like. Slinging them, just swing them. There you go.

Just flinging them. Ladies. No, definitely. Well, I mean, it's not so completely, you know, clean. You know, we all, if a bit works like that, I'm sure it's going to be used again. It's just going to be changed up a little bit. See, that's the thing now. Let's just dig in now.

We're going to get into how the sausage is made. Yeah. I think improvisers, and I'm not saying bad ones, I'm saying good ones, recognize when something works so well that they can find a way to keep it and then, like, adjust it and use it again. Sure. Sure, absolutely. I don't know how well this works, but whenever I play someone who has been brain damaged

by their own hand. Because, you know, if you just make fun of a brain damage person, and it's mean, but if the guy did it by, you know, doing somersaults in a boat, you know, then it's okay. So my go-to is jet ski accident. So if I just say any kind of, I'm just like, I don't think so good no more. Jet ski accident last summer in Wisconsin. And then people like, what a douche? People are like, what a call.

Yeah, yeah. And so like jet ski maybe is funny to people. And that's kind of where I get lazy. And I'm like, yeah, it's going to be jet ski. But you know what's great about just ski is you could go snowmobile. You could also go water skis or hoverboard. Like there's like a bunch of ways you could go, right? I don't know about you, but I'm not the kind of guy that likes to like every weekend.

Let's just go out and sail, you know, parisail and let's jump from a plane. No, not that person either. I don't. I don't like thrills, but I just think that when you take, when you make that contract to do some insane shit like that, if you fall and die on camera, It's okay to laugh at you. I will say in so much as I recoil slightly from watching, from laughing at somebody

die by their own hand, I feel no remorse at laughing at somebody like falling like crotch first into a bar. Like, you know what I mean? Like, I will admit, like, openly I love America's Funnies Home Videos. I just can't get enough of somebody getting hit

in the nuts. I can't get enough. You know, because it's always their fault. Now, if someone runs up and punches the guy in the nuts, That's like 50% funny. It's still funny, but it's not. But if a guy's like climbing on a roof and then the snow falls on him and then he, right? And then the ladder goes into his anus, hilarious. And his own fault, right?

Your own fault. The perfect example is when bullies get hit. Yes. Right? So we totally love when bullies get hit in the head with a shovel. Yes. But what is that? I mean, that's not a cool thing to be.

Justice, bro. But justice. We all feel it as justice. Yeah. Yeah. Or like when the deer gets. on his hind legs and fucks up the hunter. I can, have you seen that video?

I mean, I know, that's an oldie but goody. That's like your mom being like, I love those spinners in the tops. But I'm telling you, when the deer fucks up the hunter, you're like, yeah, that's what you get. When I hear that an elephant has escaped zoo, I'm really looking for that body count to go higher and higher.

Yes. Yeah. We deserve it. We're a terrible species of people. There's an old video of like an elephant that went crazy and just broke into like the tired, Department of Sears. It's one of the loveliest things. His most strategic move.

No, well, he's an elephant. He's like, Jesus. I'm breaking out of the zoo after 100 years of torture. Now I'm at Sears. That's like a Jean-Paul Sartre novel. Hell is the tire department at Sears. So you know this about yourself, which I think is so exciting. And I said this before on the show, how much I envy people who have, like, clarity about what they want to do.

at a really young age, because I didn't have it. I didn't figure it out until later. So I'm always like, God, it must have been so great to have known for such a long time. I love comedy. I want to do comedy. You quit college and break your parents' heart. And surprising, to let your brothers are probably like, ah, ha, ha, I knew he was going to be a jackass.

And you go off, and now you're a full-time comic. And you're doing UCB at the time? I was doing, yeah, I was doing improv at UCB. Well, Improv Olympic, and then we kind of, from Improv Olympic later, We formed UCB. Formed UCB as a team. And you said that even at that time, and nobody knew who any of you were, you had a sense

that like this was going to be like a magical thing. Not a magical thing necessarily, but definitely like we do shows at coffee shops and then we'd get the good reviewer to come and if he loved it and it was in the reader, which is like, you know, the cool newspaper in Chicago. If it was in that that we were like the critics pick, we're like, okay, we're the best those lights off. Why is it the end of the night? The lights just came on in here. It was like, I don't think there's anything more upsetting than either being in a bar at two, right?

No, that's sad, yeah. God, I want to murder. Whoever is closest to me when you're in a bar at 2 o'clock in the lights, come on. Just like, ah! That is how I just felt when lights came on. And then, like, you know, Cuado comes out. Hey, open your mind, Clay. Anyway, the lights have gone.

back down, we're back to normal. I like these spotlights better. The spots are better, just you and I. It feels like I'm trying to enter Arizona. What do you have in your trunk? So you're doing these shows and you're getting these great reviews. I mean, it's... So we were already like, we're the best in the city.

What's next? What's next? You know, and so we were already like... And then a few of us went to Second City and a few of us went to New York. And so everyone had their own path. but at the time, before we started being paid, you know, we were already kind of like,

we know kind of where we need to go, and we were pretty confident in that. Like expecting to be, at that time, expecting to be on TV, that still wasn't a thing. But I was definitely thinking, well, we can keep doing shows and maybe at some point have our own theater and be able to do shows and not have real jobs.

Yeah, yeah. But I definitely thought that we were in, I had no second thoughts that we were like one of the best in Chicago. Oh, God, that confidence is really exciting. No, no, it's like it's, well, yeah, it's weird, but it's, it's exciting, you know, because I also feel like you don't want to be so overconfident that you think everything you do is awesome because then you're probably not doing very good work.

But there is something very exciting about knowing, like just knowing yourself as an artist and being like, okay, like, I like what I do and I believe I'm good at it. It gives you a certain kind of bravery that's different. Do you know what I mean? I think it kind of, you become more creatively radical. You know what I mean? Because you're like, I'm going to trust my instincts. I'm going to do this thing.

Yeah. How far can I push this thing to make it interesting? Yeah. I've been trying to do, and I don't want this whole thing to be about how Horatio, oh, he's so dark. But I do, I like it. I do as a craft. Mysterious. Thank you.

As a little kind of thing I try to do is make 9-11 funny. Oh, yeah, totally. Because I don't love the power. I was there, and I don't love the power that that has. I don't like people saying don't forget and all that shit. You feel like it just. drops a pall over everything. Yeah, it's also just like every year

we got to, you know, let's give the guys the Emmy for the worst terrorist attack. Remember this? And they show all the clips. That's interesting, right? Like we've given these guys power over how we feel every year, right? That they make us feel shitty and the whole kind of, like the curtain drops. Yeah, okay. And everybody using it

for ratings or using it to get sympathy or using it to, like, politically, that's all gross. So my point is, just make fun. of it because it's like what's coming from it is funny. Okay. What happened isn't funny. The people are suffering without their family members is not funny. And I never really hit those people.

I think it would be insane to do so. But as an event and how this, as an event, as an act of terror, whatever you want to call it, it's like I hate reminding myself and I hate that society reminds us every year. Like, it's important to think about that. Right. And I'm like, no, it's important to think about how like we as humans are like not doing that kind of thing.

How we, you know, how we are going to be better than that. Right. You know, I don't know. I just don't like it. I was in New York, like, a couple of years ago on 9-11. I remember my mom was like, oh, you know, oh, that's scary to be there. And I literally used, like, the most, like, the most glib pablum, but I actually meant that. I was like, mom, if I stop flying on 9-11, I mean, I know this is glib.

I'm sorry, but I really did feel this way. I was like, I stopped flying on 9-11, the terrace is one. Like, fuck them. I'm going to get on a plane. I'm going to go to New York. I love this city. Why am I sitting at home wondering what's going to fucking happen? Like that is a way in which that act.

Intentionally, their intent was to affect how we move about the country, how we think about our lives. And I don't know if you guys remember this. Okay, this is also glib, but stick with me. The Justin Bieber roast. There was a guy who's on SNL right now. I can't think of his name. He's a young cast member. Davidson.

And he lost his father. He did lose his father in the Twin Towers. And he made some of the best jokes about 9-11. And one of them was something along the lines of, it was about Snoop Dog. It says, Solplane is the worst thing to happen to me that related to airplanes and my dad died on 9-11. And I had to lie down on the fucking ground.

I had never heard anything so insane in my life. And I remember, I don't know if you remember this, we were talking about making 9-11 funny, Chris Rock and went on some talk show kind of right after, and it was the whole conversation like, had we ever funny again? Is comedy dead? Da-da-da-da-da.

And he was saying essentially, like, like we can't let this act take away our power to, like Gallo's humor is the most powerful comedy that we have. It's the thing that kind of flays open all of our fears and exposes them and deconstructs them. and actually renders them powerless against us, right? And so sometimes people may say, well, you're being insensitive or you're being glib,

but I do think that, like, Gallo's humor has been the thing that's undone so many cruelties over time, you know? Yeah, yeah, I think it's fair to say that calling stuff out and being afraid of being offensive has pushed many agendas forward and good ones. Right now, we're really big fans in this country of being like, I'm offended. You're so of some self.

Which is, and you know, I'm a little older, so like I remember when that was, when the other side of the coin was that you can just do that stuff and it was cheap. Right, right, right, right. But now you can't even touch it. No, no, now they run you out of town, right? Yeah, and it's not, it's like almost like they don't give you the time to think about what you're saying. They just hear it and then it's like, nope, I don't want to get in there. Right, right. Because they're afraid.

Right. Because they're afraid they're going to be racist if they hear a racist joke. Well, they are racist, though. Let's just call a spade as spade. Some of them are racist. Sure. Sure. I mean, how do you feel about that? No, I mean, like, I, this is interesting. Ooh, I don't know if it's just because I've been drinking.

I feel like this is a pretty deep conversation. I, so I will do things where I will say, like, even though I'm offended by this person, I defend their right to be offensive. And I think that art isn't advanced by everybody, like, running it up the middle. Do you know what I mean? Like, everybody kind of being soft. Let's talk about puppies and how married people don't have sex and what's up with planes and, you know, yogurt's crazy.

You know what I mean? Like, that's not. And so there may be these people at the fringes who are just abominable to listen to, right? And maybe not even funny, but, like, that radicalism, that, like, let me articulate this better. the idea that even bad art is meaningful because all art is meaningful. It has to be. It has to be, right?

Yeah. I don't think anyone could say, I mean, it seems like a very deep question, but I have no right to say that this person's outfit is an art to her. It is. She thought it took time for her to think about it. She has on Hounstooth mini shorts.

I think you look super foxy. That's just me, though. Yeah. He seems to like you as well. I just used an example question directly in fun of me. I wasn't making funnier outfit. But yeah, like even bad art or even art by serial killers. If I just moved into that real quick.

Right there, like a shot, express train to what the fuck. You know, John Wayne Gacy made a lot of interesting art in his life before he was executed. For the murder of 33 or 34 boys in Chicago. Which was its own act of art, his execution. It was its own strange performance. of his art. You could argue that the murder of 34 boys was a very strange art piece that he perpetrated on

Chicago in 1916. You could argue it. It definitely altered my life as a child growing up in Chicago. This act of crime made me not leave my house at night. Were you a child when that was happening? Oh yeah, I was in the thick of Gacy.

Wow. See, we could take that statement a lot of ways. I was in the thick of Gacy. I wasn't in his like basement working on like, you know, woodworking with him. Mixing up his face paint. No, but creepily enough, my brother Carlos and Steve, they both

went to a roller rink in the area, and it's known that Gacy would go there and look for guys to get summer jobs. So, very close. One of my brothers could have been a victim of Gacy. And I'm not like I'm keeping my fingers crossed. It's just never going to happen.

But back to Gacy, I defend Gacy's art. You have to. Interesting. If Gacy's drawing, for a time he took up drawing Disney characters. Now, if you think of the, just the person that he was to kill all those people, and then now it's just like, I'm going to express and then paint Disney characters, there's merit to that art.

Is there? So what that's so interesting, I'm not saying there's not, I'm just saying it's, so it's curious, right? It's curious that this person had its complexity. I think just someone has to say, this is my expression. of what, you know, I want you to look at that and think about it. Right. And it's art because I did think about it. Okay.

I'm going to throw something back at you and you're going to throw it back at me. But you can say fuck it. No, no, no, no. When I said it is there, I'm not saying no. I'm thinking about it. And I'm sorry, guys, this is not self-promotional, but you're just making me think about it. I play a character on a show I'm doing right now, and I'm a psychologist and I profile serial killers.

And part of the way that I came into this character was I decided that as a doctor, a doctor, she wasn't about seeing what was bad in all these people. She was about trying to find what was human in all of them, right? Like that was the thing that she was trying to understand, even though they were all kind of terrible people, very damaged and had exerted, inflicted terrible pain on the world, that she was trying to find the humanity in them because that was her way of organizing and structuring the world, right? That, um... Because if not, you'd say, you know, throw these people away. Yeah, fuck it. Yeah, fuck it. Burn them alive, right?

And so, but it's very hard to try to find humanity in someone who's a serial killer or, you know, in Gacy's case, you know, murdered a bunch of children and sexually assaulted them and was a monster. And you're not trying to say, well, I found the humanity him and therefore, like, let him out. But you are trying to say, like, because finding humanity in somebody else is finding the humanity in yourself, right? It's trying to rely or mine whatever bit of compassion you can, right, for somebody who's done some terrible, terrible things. And obviously for someone to do the terrible things that Casey did, he had to be in pretty insane pain, pretty fucked up. And so, yeah, right? And so maybe the art is an expression of that complexity, and the art lets you understand who he was and why he did these terrible things. Or his art is the expression of the one good thing that's still left in his control.

The one aspect of humanity that's still available to him, right? And so to burn Gacy's art or to buy it and destroy it, it's up to you. But it's all it's, it's, it's, it's akin to burning books. Right. It's like, who are you telling me what, why are you telling anyone what they can't look at? Right, right. Or like the idea of like the ACLU defending, say, the Nazis right to march and everybody's saying, well, the Nazis are terrible people. Well, they are. They all have cavities. They're all terrible people and, and they're really bad taste in fashion.

But, but if we can't defend their right to speak, like, that becomes a sliding scale. And who else's ideas aren't. I guess then it becomes like, well, what is the intent of this march? They want to have people rise up and, you know. They all got new boots. Always have nice boots. Shine them up. And they're like, everybody look, Doc Martins,

we just bought up all of Doc Martin's inventory. Right. God, this got super heady, did it? Whoa. Ideas. So you moved to New York to be a comedian. Yeah. So did you move to New York from Chicago to be a comedian?

I moved to New York from Chicago. I was living with my parents. I was 28 years old. Time to get some pussy, my friend. Get out. I was really trying. I was trying hard, really. You can't. Ladies aren't coming home to failure to launch.

I mean, like, oh. A few did. That was weird. Oh, your mom's making tea. Panties dropping. Like, yeah, my dad would offer him juice and stuff. Oh, God. No.

What are your intentions for my son? Basically, what I'm trying to say is I was going to be at home. Nothing was changing necessarily. I was 28. I was at home, and I was taken and I audition for S&L and got to go to New York. So I went from my parents' house to... In Chicago? No, no.

They invited... Well, the producers came to Chicago to watch Second City, my show at Second City. And from there, I was invited to audition. And you went to New York. Now, now we're going to do S&L, the S&L thing, because I've had a couple of other S&L cast members on the show, Chris Barnell. and Jay Moore. And I'm always really curious

about how this feels to somebody because it's not like you did a pilot and then you're hoping the pilot hits and it ends up being modern family. You already know SNL is a show that you've loved since you were a child and it's a big fucking deal. How do you feel when you fly to New York?

Are you urinating yourself repeatedly? Well, I was very, you know what you think? You're very excited and you're thinking, I'm going to make it better. I'm going to make the show better? Ooh, hubris again. I love it. And I'm like, if we get the right people in here, we can make some moves.

Normal people are thinking, I'm not good enough, and I'm going to crap myself in front of a bunch of people in suits, and then go home and have a Starbucks. No, I thought I might not be good enough on this show just because the parameters that it puts on actors, but I wasn't going to lose my judgment of myself. Yeah, because you went in feeling good. You were super confident.

I felt going in great, and a lot of, A lot of my frustrations was not being able to make that happen as fast as I wanted to. Really? Yeah. So what was that process like? You go and you, who do you audition for first? I'm sorry, what? Did you go straight to Lorne?

How did it go? To audition? Yeah. Oh, they tell you to come to New York and they put you up for a couple days. I asked if they could put me up for a few weeks. No, not a few weeks. I asked for a week and I said, just give me what you can, a cheaper hotel, but I want to be there a week because in the past, when I'd been in New York, I was overwhelmed.

And it just moved so fast, and I just didn't want to get on a plane, run through my stuff, and then audition the next day. So I took a lot of time, and I kind of, like, got in my space and auditioned. And I rehearsed a lot in my hotel room. Did you? Talking to yourself? Talking to myself, putting my stuff on a mirror, looking in the mirror, making sure I didn't look too weird. And so I over-rehearsed to a point where, you know,

because of improv and sketched, I've never really rehearsed that much on anything. So I was surely going to make my, I put my best foot forward when I auditioned. And if it didn't happen, I would be like, okay, but at least you really tried. Yeah, yeah. Because I couldn't say that about anything, really, at that point. That you would have really tried on anything? Right. Because I had auditioned for, like, Roseanne had a sketch show and even, like, the later years of In Living Color.

And I wasn't, I just didn't feel like, that's the show I wanted to be on, or that's the show I would be happy at. So when I did get Est and I'm like, okay, well, that's the thing I've been thinking about. since I was five. Right, right. So do the best you can hear. Not sweating bullets, though. Are you sweating bullets? Well, of course you're slaying bullets a little bit.

Help me feel better about myself. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, no, no. Yeah. But specifically to answer your question, like, yes, was I nervous? And like, holy shit, S&L, like my favorite show. Yeah. Yes, I was, but I also, I was old enough at 28.

I'd missed a round of SNL auditions. They came to Chicago when I was about 24 or 25. And they missed that. I missed that, so no one saw me, so I wasn't invited to audition. I was on the road. But I always feel that that was a lucky break because at 28, I was very confident in what I was doing, whereas 25, I may have not had a good time at SML. Right, right. You were more prepared mentally.

I was more prepared mentally. So I was definitely, like, I was confident in what I was going to do. Being there and auditioning for SNL, like, I mean, it's impossible not to think of all the people and all the people at home that are like, ah, are you going to do it? Yeah, right, yeah. Like all the people that have been asking me since I was like from, since I decided to be an actor publicly until I was 28, I just had to tell people like, what do you do for a living? I'm like, I'm an actor.

Oh yeah? You can be on Saturday Live? Like, I'm going to try to. And this one of my friend's brother would always be like, oh, you're going to get on a Saturday Live? I think he was like the second person I called when I got it. I'm not on Saturday Live, motherfucker. My favorite thing is when you say to somebody,

I'm an actor. This happens to me on planes a lot. And they'll go, what do you do when we get an actor? Have I seen you in anything? Like that wouldn't make you an actor otherwise. Like, if I haven't seen you in stuff, then you're lying.

You know what I mean? And I'm like, your dreams, you prick. That's where you saw me. Your dreams tonight when you're masturbating. So you think, when you guys go up to someone who you know and love, just don't pretend that you went to high school with them. Just tell them, hey, I like that thing you did.

Yeah. Because that's what you're talking about as people like being like, wait a minute. Or just being like, or they don't know you, they don't recognize you. And when you say you're an actor, they don't believe you. Like, you know, because acting is not a real thing. So you, like, someone doesn't recognize you.

And you say, well, I'm an actor. And they go, well, that's not a real job. So what do you actually do to pay the bills? You know what I mean? Like occasionally. I mean, most of the time people I know you. And I go, well, that's because I work at your Starbucks. I don't want to have any conversations about my work.

But when you have the one guy, like, I have one guy on the plane. And he was like, what have I seen you in? And it felt like he was saying, like, porn. You know what I mean? I'm like, bitch, I'm in first class. You think that makes this much money? Fucking strangers? Come on.

Maybe business class, but not first. But, so, and I guess there is something interesting because it is so pie in the sky saying you're going to be an actor. There's probably no other field, except for maybe being an astronaut. Even if you said, I'm going to be a doctor. No one would say, no, you're not.

You know what I mean? They would be like, that might take you a lot of time and money, but no one's going to like poo-poo you wanting to be a medical doctor. But when you say you want to be an actor, people are like, that's not going to go well for you. That's not happening.

Right, yeah. Come on. Yeah, it's just such a weird thing that it is real. Like I kind of had to know that it was real before I could even have the confidence to try to get there. Like I had known people that worked there and I was like, oh, well, it happens. Yeah, it seems like it's a thing.

Yeah, I went to watch my brother do it playing college and I was like, well, I mean, people are actually showing up to this theater to watch someone act. Yeah. And you don't necessarily in my neighborhood where I grew up, there wasn't any of that. So you kind of just feel like that doesn't happen here. Right, right, right. Right. Right. Right. It doesn't happen to these people.

Yeah. So it's kind of cool that, you know, you just take that one little step and you meet people and you're like, oh, it does. I do belong here. I do belong here. And that idea of like, I do belong here is so important. In anything you go for, you have to own that and be like, yeah.

whenever I touch something here, it gets better. Right, and a sense of, because that sense, I think, is actually like retroactive, like it works backwards. If your sense of yourself as an artist or whatever it is that you do is that I add value, right? It emboldens you to be better at what you do. But I think there's a timidity that comes with, like, I don't know if this is going to wrong out, that makes you not trust your best instincts. You know what you mean?

Like, I don't know if my ideas are good, rather than, like, I know my ideas are good, rather than like, I know my ideas are good. Not everybody else may agree with me, but I'm going to follow my instincts and see where they lead, you know? Yeah, because if not, you're putting out a bunch of stuff that it's not protected. Right, right.

Or you're not putting out anything at all because you're too timid to kind of advance your ideas. Yeah, that's a thing I see a lot in people is that they're just like, they don't want to touch greatness so they don't do anything. Because they feel of failure. I don't want to touch greatness because I fear I'll fail. And so I'm not going to put myself forward

for fear being shot down. rather than like, hey, you guys know I've talked about this lot, let's just see how this fucking goes. You know what I mean? Like, I'm just going to put it out there. I might get shot down. But, you know, I mean, fortune favors the bold, right? Or the overly self-confident asshole as well, if we've seen, which we're seeing in this political cycle. Did you get, did you know you got SNL during that week in New York, or did you hear pretty much? Yeah. Yeah, I didn't get the official, Lauren, Warren, I think, wanted to have me sweat a little bit.

So he never tells you then. So when I got home, I got the call. Oh, okay. Back in Chicago. And were you sweating? Were you sweating bricks? No, I really felt good. I just thought it was going to happen.

I don't like your confidence level. It's not... I'm sorry. It's not for me. I'm sorry. I don't like. But, you know, I see, you reminded me of something of, like, just like, I know that I have a contract with you guys

and people that click on my radio show or anything or watch the video of me. I know that the contract is, I'm watching you so you be funny. So if I can do that, if I'm already there and I can just now take you and go like, well now I want you to laugh at something that you normally wouldn't.

And it's because I think I'm having fun and as an artist it's making me feel more expressive if I take you to a different little weird place. So I kind of look at comedy that way. Like if you think I'm funny and you like me,

okay, you're going to get that, but I'm going to take you somewhere else and hopefully you'll still like me. But if I don't do that, then I think as an artist, we're not really going forward. Right, right, we're not pushing. And I think there's also something exciting about saying, I was just reading an article. I'm trying to think of who it was.

Oh, it was Edward Burns and David Simon who created The Wire. And like, because I just, he hasn't posted yet, but I'll have, um, Andrew Royal who played bubbles on the wire on the show and what he said was that first season it was so intellectual like people didn't

get it and he was like we need to have more shootouts and there needs to be driving and running and you know hey you know down the ground and David Simon was like I'm not dumbing this show down for people they'll catch up eventually and I think it's the same thing with comedy like you what you

the contract is I'm going to be funny for you but hopefully there's a reciprocal contract with the audience was like you trust me so come along because I believe that you're smart enough to reach above what's pedestrian and accessible typically in comedy, right? Like,

I believe that you're smart and I want to trust you guys to come along with me. Do you know what I mean? Like that, it's a two-way contract. And it's also, I mean, it's also great that these, you know, these people assembled in this, in this hotel. In this very warm, sweaty hotel. Yeah, they're already on our

side. It's not like you and I in front of the shoe barn across the street Oh the shoe barn There's no mic at the shoe barn on Sunday Don't miss it It's negative three dollars to get in So already Our audience is elevated already

So that's why You know we also feel like We can be a little more honest Because we're not like I'm not auditioning for us in all right now Or I'm not trying to like Make people laugh at the improv or something And and you know

That goes back to the idea that when you were a little kid you found your own tribe. Like, you know, you found your own group of people that got who you were, you know, rather than trying to conform to what you thought people wanted you to be or some idea that you, you know what I mean? Kind of find popular bullshit. Yeah, yeah. Like, yeah, about being popular.

I mean, we never lose that. You still want people to like you as many people as you can take. Bottomless whole of need, all of us comedians. Please like me. So, let's talk about us, Anil. And then we're going to run out of road, and I want to do a little Q&A at the end, and we have to do self-inflicted wounds. But here is a popular preconception about SNL that I've asked everybody who's ever been on the show,

and so I want to ask you because I feel like everybody's perception is different, that it was this, like, adrenaline-fueled shark tank where everybody was in a constant state of panic about getting their shows on the air, and people were, like, vomiting in corners, and, like, dying of fear, and everything. And, yeah, and, like, self-medicating on every. level and, you know, constantly like in a constant state, like, if I don't get shit on the air, if I don't get shit in the air, I'm going to get fired. Did it feel that way when you were there? Yeah. But I hate to compare myself to an Olympic athlete, but it's a lot like the Olympics. The people

that are, the, not, it's not all. The people that are there, you know, when you watch the Olympics and you're like, how in the hell can this person take the pressure of doing a perfect jump? Right. In front of the world. The world. The world. The world. Your whole life has been built up for that. And I think it's the same thing with people that get Tesonel. They've been preparing her whole life for that moment. And so when they get there, they know it's strong. They know it's hard.

They know they feed off that. They're very aware, right? It's not like later they're going to look back and be like, ooh, that was exciting. They're like, in the moment, oh shit. In the moment, yeah. It's all very, it's very huge emotions. Like, yes, I got on the show. That's huge.

Fuck, I didn't get on the show. Fuck those guys for getting that shit on that's not worth it. Right, right. You know, it's very, and we're all very passionate that same way. And it's no accident that Lauren finds us at a point where comedy is the number one. Right. Like if you're married and have kids and you show up on SNL, it's rare that you'll make it. Right.

Because you've got other shit. You got other shit in life. And then, like, but if you're just honed in straight, like, you know, crystal clear into, I'm going to make this show better. I'm a comedian. That's all I do. You know, then you take these disappointments and it's like a game. It's like a competition. Like I respected everyone I worked with.

I liked, even ultimately, I liked most of the people I worked with. But I still, we all had a competition and we all knew like, hey, this is just part of war. How did that play out? Were you constantly pitching? Were you constantly going to writers and going like, write for me, write for me, right for me? And then there's a table read, right? There's like a table read on like Thursday or something? Wednesday?

Yeah, Wednesday. Where essentially things make it in or don't make it in. And how? And your placement, like if you write it, a sketch that you really think is funny and they put it at the end, that's tough. So then you got to kind of have to go and be like, I need my sketches forward a little bit next time. So it's a constant political situation. And I'm sorry, what was the question?

No, I don't know. I'm just listening to how nerve-wracking that must have been. Did it get easier? But you know, but it's like when you're doing well a little bit, you know, at that feet, like you know what it's like to win. a game. And in the SNL, you know what it's like to hit a home run. Right, right. Everyone knows it. And it's like people are like, when's you going to do it again? Can he do it again? And then maybe you don't convert, right? Maybe you have a week where you destroy and then the next week, nothing. Next week's nothing. And then, you know, two weeks go by, you haven't done anything.

And then what happens is the more you're on, you know, three, four years later, people like you on TV. They're like, well, I like that guy. He's always doing kind of a decent job. and then, you know, Jimmy Fallon will write a few scenes that'll get, that'll be recurring. And so then your job becomes less hard because now Jimmy and someone else is writing a scene and then you're going to come in on that day and improvise jokes. And it's a bit or a character that you've done before. People like you, they know you.

Yeah. And then Lauren's like, yeah, and then that scene will come back a couple more times. And so then you start feeling like, oh, I can, I feel fine. I'm confident here. And that's kind of the saddest realization. and now you'll hear this all the time, is when you get comfortable, it's like time to go, kind of.

Right. So you led into the question I was going to ask you, which is that SNL's the American Minuto, and they cannibalize their young, right? And as soon, like, you know, I mean, part of it is they want new blood, new blood, new blood, but when somebody's established there,

also they start to make more money and then they eventually get, like, thrown into the street. Yeah. Well, like, I like to explain, like it really didn't make sense to keep me on for a ninth year. were with the money that they were spending, they could probably hire three new people.

Yeah. Who weren't going to complain or need a dressing room. They probably slept on the floor in the hallway and ate scraps from Lauren's fecal matter. Exactly. And then everyone, and then of course that's the show too. The show you enter is you know that most people don't stay there nine years, ten years.

You know that it's up for... You were one of the most long-running actors on that show. Yeah, I was pretty lucky and I guess I got along enough with people that they kept me around long enough. But you kind of go in there going like, yeah, that's part of the game. The young people have to come in, you know, like, you know, 15-year-old kids need to laugh at new stuff. They're not necessarily going to laugh at what 35-year-old guy is doing anymore.

So it's all a very natural thing. 35-year-olds are hilarious, by the way. It's like what's up with mortgages, bowel movements. Have you guys tried chia? You know what I'm saying? Like, just crazy stuff. So the show does have that thing of it. It's very much like a baseball team.

You know, you get old and you got to get, you got to move on. You made that Olympic analogy, and I think that's a good point. It is like that. It's like you age out, right? And you're aware of it going in that you will age out. Yes. Did you have that sense? You're like, okay, I know I'm not going to be forever.

The good thing for me is that I see that I have a very big separation from the show because I was a different person as far as drinking and as far as like medicating and my weight and my, like I really did think I was going to die like any day. You, I read online that. you said at one point you didn't weigh yourself the whole time you were at SNL because you did think you would die although I don't know why it was like the seeing the number on the scale was going to give you a spontaneous

heart attack? No no not like I was going to die by getting out of scale like zoing spunk well no because it's just you know I mean anybody knows how depressing it is when the scale it's when the numbers are higher and higher and then but like to see the actual number is over 300 you're like that really would send you into like a a dark place so I didn't even want to deal with that anymore.

I think people think people who haven't ever been like truly in a like truly overweight, right? Like, you know, I've never been truly. I probably was maybe 60 pounds heavier than I am now. Like that's the heaviest I've ever been. My sister was in the 200s. And I think most people who have never really had a real problem in their weight think, oh, if you see that number, it's going to like galvanize you into action. But I think typically it just depresses the fuck out of you and you kind of fall back into whatever behavior.

Yeah, and then it's harder to do anything when you're in that place of disappointing. Yeah, yeah. So for me, SNL, I'm very happy that I still, when I watch, if it's on TV, I'll watch it. I'll watch myself and I'll still laugh at myself. But it's a different human being. That level of that hubris has never gone away. He's like, oh my God, I was so funny, I'm so funny. Well, I guess I kind of see my brain, it's my brain is the brain that created it, so it's still going to feel like, yeah, that was a good choice, buddy.

Ten years old and still good. But you, when you left that show, and I'm going to compress time here, because we were going to run out of time here, I'm going to compress time here. After you left the show, you kind of went underground for a while, and then you came back and you were like a totally different person. You had lost a bunch of weight. You kind of changed your entire life around. You'd stop drinking. Is that true? Was that a misrepresentation of what happened?

I hit a perfect storm of sads. I lost my job. I had broken up with my girlfriend. We both broke up. I don't know whose fault it was. It was her fault. And I lost my job, lost my girlfriend. Oh, and I had surgery.

What kind of surgery? I had sleep apnea. I had sleep apnea, so they did the surgery where they remove matter from the back of your throat and your tonsils. Oh, my. And so you were in pain after that? I was in pain, and then it wouldn't heal, so I had to go back and have it, like, coterized. Oh. It was just a whole awful thing.

And that affects the way you can't eat and stuff like that when you're going through that shit, right? You're like, your throat. No, you can't eat. But at that time, I was just like, oh, well, this is, I got to change. I got to change something. Right. And so I stopped drinking and I just worked out. And I tried to just work on me, which is a good thing because I didn't really do a lot in those years.

I mean, I still improvised and went to UCB. But I didn't do a lot in those years, but I really was really just like giving myself a break to be like, just get better. Right. Just stay alive. Yeah, that's a good goal. Don't die. Yeah. Don't die.

That's my goal, not to die. And also, well, an article came out in New York Times that said I had the most dangerous job in the world because all the chubby comedians in us and I'll die at 33. Jesus. So I had that, you know, that most definitely in the back of my mind. And was it, and did they cite, like, Farley and Belushi?

Yeah. And then, like, essentially, in like a New York Times article version of the film, you're next? Yeah. It's terrible. It's terrible. It was just a simple interview on like, what it's like to be a new S&L guy?

And then they turned it into that. And so I was like, well, yeah, when I'm 33, I guess I'll have a doctor traveling with me 24 hours a day. You and rush me off. So you joke it off. Yeah, you joke it off, but it's definitely something that's in your, it's a tragedy that kind of made me anyway, you know. Yeah.

Like I'm from that. I'm from loving Belushi and wanting to be like him. And I was friends with Farley's brother. Chris? Kevin. Kevin. I'm friends with Kevin, but Johnny and I. Johnny, Johnny Farley and I.

We toured together. And so I would meet Farley a few times, and he was really in trouble when I met him. And so there's always been like that tragedy of, you know, maybe I'll die. But here we go. Let's do our best. And let's, you know. Can I ask you a quick question before we go? We'll do self-elected ones and then we'll do Q&A.

And the question I have for you is there, is there something inherent about the experience of doing SNL that fosters or supports the kind of self-destructive behavior that, like, killed Farley and killed Belushi? Or was it just that they were guys who were already prone to it and then they came into like a kind of a crucible? I think that Farley was probably, emulating Belushi and kind of thinking that that would be the way he'd go out to.

I think for a while I thought maybe if I make that deal, I'll go out the same way, but, you know, you kind of, in some weird way, you negotiate it. But I think that when you get to SNL, it just becomes, it just becomes more. You know, you're like, oh, I'm more nervous now about this, and that thing's making me nervous. So, oh, the cast is going out for drinks. Let's go out. And so everyone's going out and kind of dealing with the pressure their own way.

Right, right. So I think with guys like that, they're going to do that if they're racing cars or if they're, you know. Having sex with hookers. Having sex with hookers or if they're roofers or if they're anybody, if they're just, if they feel that they're not at peace and that there's like they need to push things. That S&L is definitely not the place to take that. Right. But I don't blame the show necessarily for anybody really going crazy. And I wouldn't blame the show.

And I guess that, well, I just was if there's something unique about that, just unique about that experience. because there's no resting on your laurels at SNL. There's no like, I killed it last week. There's never that. There's never like, man, I destroy it. I'm on fire. The stakes are really huge for as far as an actor. It's like either you, like to be fired by SNL after like six months.

I mean, that must be so. And it happens to a lot of people. It happens to a lot of people. And they end up doing great. So it's not that. But when you, you know, when you want to play baseball as a little kid and you get, and you be able to, when you're playing for the Chicago Cubs, you know, it's so huge because

it's not only everyone's watching everyone everyone's watching that show even if it's only like once a year or something you know that everything you've been working on it's judged right now in this month and like you're going to see some new I call them kids

you're going to see some new performers in October and to think of those people like here we go SNL and how hard it's been now because they they've been firing kind of like the newer cast Oh, they've got a sighed out. They're just mowing them down.

It's been harder and harder to kind of get your foot there. So it's just... And you see these guys for a... You see them on a Saturday, and you're like, eh, it didn't work. But right, you're not seeing, again, the iceberg of that kid wanted to be on this show since he was five. And he worked up all these bits,

and he honed all these characters, and then this is his shot, and then it didn't land. And then you didn't go to college. Yeah, and then you quit college, and you broke your parents hard. and then all in that three minutes or whatever it is on that one night. Yeah. And it's like the thrill of being in front of a live audience.

I guess at the time that I was on, it was probably like 9 million people, 10 million people watching at once. Now there's like 7 people watching. There's probably like 70. If you add like the 3 plus days for DVRs, like 11 people watching. Yeah, it's true. The problem with my show, well there's so many, is that there's like a million things

to talk about with Horatio because he's done so many things since Saturday Night Live and he has a podcast and it's called Horatio, the Horatio is it called The Horatio or just Horatio? What do you think? It's a little homophone for your name, isn't it? Horatio.

You're clever. So we can't talk about all the millions of movies and things and things and things he's done and you're on a series right now. I think we should have a part two. We should have a part two. Fuck yeah. Done.

That's done. We're doing a part two. But you're on a series right now. I'll put links up, right? I'm not on a series right now. I just saw that you guessed it on some series. Oh, yeah. I guessed on Modern Family.

I was on Kimmy Smith. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I'm on Drunk History and stuff like that. Drunk History. I'm dying to drunk history. You really should do drunk history. I would love to do drunk history.

Because, by the way, I have the first part of that title. Down. Oh, no. Derek Waters. You heard it here first. So why don't we do, and I'm going to do something about slavery, because, yeah, I'm going to make everybody super uncomfortable. Do you have a self-inflicted wound?

We chatted it out in the back. Do you have something you want to tell everybody about a story that you like to share? Well, this has been fresh on my mind, and it has to do with the film boat trip. Mm-hmm. With Academy Award winner, Cuba Gooding Jr. Yes. Not Cuba, by the way, it's Cuba. Cuba Gooding Jr.

Yeah, it's Cuba. And my childhood hero, Roger Moore, 007 in the 70s. Double 70s. And, you know, it was one of those things. It was, this is going to sound like I'm apologizing for this movie, but I just want to explain something very funny about it, which is there was a writer's strike looming,

and I could only make a movie. There's only a few months in a year as an SNL cast member where you can go out and make a full movie. So, you know, this thing was looming, and I was like, can I rewrite it? Can I have someone help rewrite it? It's just like, the timing of it was like, this is the movie you're going to make, and it's going to be this much money, it's a lot of money,

and then you go back to us now, and we'll figure it out next time. But I always had problems with it, and I was like, I shouldn't do it, I shouldn't do it. And the night before I decided, I was like, let me sleep on it. Abraham Lincoln came to me in a dream. Now, I realized I created Abraham Lincoln in my dream. I don't think that a ghost of Abraham Lincoln would take the time to make sure I made the right role.

He has a lot going on. Yeah, Abraham Lincoln is, I'm going to go, how does Abraham Lincoln talk? I'm going to go down there and talk Horatio out of making this movie. So Abraham Lincoln said to me, me in my dream, don't do things for money.

Oh. And I woke up the next day and I said, well, sorry, Abe, I got to do it. And so I did do this movie and I tried very hard to make it good and I think there's still parts of it. You know, people are like, it's good if you're high. Oh, good, thank you.

No, there are people who still like it, but I do, it did change my life in the fact that I did, I do, I do remember me coming to myself as Abraham Lincoln saying don't do things for money and it kind of has driven my life and I've been very happy since. Yeah? So that was your self-inflicted boom but the takeaway it was after that you didn't do things for money after that or you continued to do things for money and you stopped having feelings about it. Yeah and I wanted to say when you said self-inflicted wounds I didn't want to really talk about like you know being drugged out or and I wasn't drugged out but

being too drunk or making some kind of mistake that way. But, you know, I thought that that was something that I could share. Yeah, that was fair. What do we always say about something like that movie? Your story is your own. Absolutely. And I think that's instructive also because I think a lot of times when people are watching who aren't in the entertainment business, they're thinking like, oh, why would you

make that movie? And what they don't realize is, except for everybody but like Tom Cruise, we're We are just fucking trying to work and pay the bills. And so sometimes something going in, you think, well, I could make this good or I'm going to try to make this good or I'm going to do my best. But also you're like, who's going to pay the mortgage on this stupid house that I bought when I had a job at a TV show? Right.

So I say, that's very great that you say that my Abraham Lincoln advice to myself, if you have, if you have enough money and you're living comfortably, then I would say don't do things for money. But if you're struggling and you're trying to pay bills, of course, obviously, do things for money. Do everything for money. That's the overarching reason to do things is for money. But Tom Cruise, don't do things for money. Tom Cruise.

Come on, Tom. Tom Cruise is just trying to save the world. Leave all the subtexts sitting there. All right. So we have just enough time for 10 minutes of Q&A, so we're going to bring the house lights up now. And we have a hand up in front from a man with extraordinarily groomed facial hair. and my assistant Jerry is coming here with a microphone so that people at home can hear what you have to say

this is all going to go wonderfully right here this guy right here with this special face so I'm curious what characters from SNL do you miss the most and can we have them visit today? Oh no that's very fun well I guess I don't do Carol anymore

Carol was an outrageous drunk heavy lady who loved sex. Well, who doesn't, though, guys. Come on. Is there anyone out there that doesn't like sex? No, they all like it. Just as you surmised. Look, we can't come together as human beings on much. But I think we can all agree.

We love to bang. Boom. I guess I just don't really miss it. Oh yeah, they're loving it. I miss improvising kind of like on air kind of like with Saddam Hussein. I would,

any of those guys, I got free reign to kind of improvise and just say crazy stuff. You were a corpster, by the way. Oh, yeah. So corpsing is like breaking. I think like your thing was that you, the corpser on that show.

You were always in a low like a 10% for it. Yeah. Yeah, you and Jimmy. Yeah. And, uh, I like to say that it wasn't on purpose. It wasn't.

It wasn't totally on purpose. No, it really wasn't. I mean, it was on purpose to make each other laugh. We tried to, and we would trick each other to make each other laugh. But definitely it wasn't like, okay, at minute 3.50, let's start laughing at each other. I just feel like I would watch you

and you would just always be, like, everything you did was like 90% character and 10% like don't fall apart. You know what I mean? Like, you'd always be like, ooh, see, oh, there's goals. But there's also 10% of like, I hope shit gets fucked up. I hope things go off.

I hope that the balls fall off the set. I read or heard that Lorne didn't like it when people broke, but it's very apparent to me that the audience loves it when you guys break. Like that's their favorite part of any sketches when you guys fall apart. Well, you know, I had to come up with a lot of excuses for it. One of them was just to see, you know, like there's no better way to share a joy of that show than by seeing them not be perfect.

Yeah, or that I'm enjoying it. I'm really enjoying what I'm putting forward. I haven't just rehearsed it and put it in a nice package for you. And people may not like that, but it was always with the intent of having fun. And so I would put myself, even if I was exhausted, I would kind of like, you know, the horns would come out a little bit, seeing what kind of danger we can create. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, it wasn't done with the intention of tricking people into laughing.

Thank you for your question. Tricky, tricky. All right, who else would like to ask? a question. Oh, hello. Hi, the microphone is coming towards you. I'm the same age as you are, so I grew up watching SNL as well. What made you want to do improv and not go the stand-up comic route because so many great comics came out of SNL or already were? Like what was the deciding factor for you? I think being in Chicago and being kind of closer to to Second City physically, just being, I used to go there as a kid too and not really go to any stand-up shows. And the

I was so obsessed with the show in the beginning with Belushi and Akroyd. Those guys were from Chicago as well, so I'm like, oh, I can do it. So it was mostly just like proximity. If I'd grown up next to, you know, broader, you know, danger fields or something, it may have been a different thing altogether. Who else would like to ask a question? It can be any question. Be brave.

Come on you, people. All right, we'll go there and then we'll go here. There's my number one fan over here. I met him. Hello, sir. How are you? Let him go, okay, we'll go here first, then we'll go back. Oh, no, no, Jerry, right here.

Yeah, okay, perfect. This is a question more for Aisha. Finally. Now that you've been working on whose line, do you have a greater appreciation for what improv does as compared to stand-up? That's a great question. So I've two answers to that. The first one is that I actually started out doing sketch and improv in high school.

So I've always loved it, and I've always had an appreciation for it, because I feel like improv performers have the most nimble minds. They're really present in a way that sometimes comedians aren't. I mean, I think we can definitely get up there and be like, I'm going to do this bin, then I'm going to do that bit, and hey, where are you from?

And then I did that bit, and then my wife won't have sex with me. You know what I mean? So I've always wanted to be a comic who had something unexpected happen every time I got on stage. Doing whose line, what I have learned is how much more awesome at improv those people are than me. And for people who know the show and for people who are doubters of that show, I remember getting there and thinking, well, they must know something. And I remember, first season, I saw all the cards before everybody else, but the cast wouldn't.

And I was reading out like a setup for a bit. And Ryan was like staring at me like this and he looked furious. And I realized I was reading, because I'd already read the cards, I was reading them too fast. Because I knew what they said. and he couldn't hear what I was saying. And I was like, oh, if he doesn't know what I'm saying, he's not going to be able to do this bit because he has no idea what's about to happen.

And that was when I realized that the show was like 100% purely improv. And I've seen Wayne get a suggestion, which was like a topic for a song and then sound like the girl with the big bottom, what's her name, Nikki Minaj. And then 10 seconds later, he sounded like Nicky Minaj and was dancing on Nick McNage

and was making up a song about a topic he had never heard before I'm making it rhyme. And he's a ninja. And so I have an incredible amount of respect for improvisational actors. I think they have the hardest job in the world because they actually don't know if it's going to be funny.

They think it's going to be funny, and they want it to be funny, but they actually have no idea what's going to happen. Whereas I go out, and I got bullets everywhere. I'm pulling them out of my side pockets, and I got one hit in my butt. I'm like, something's going to work. You know what I mean? So I do. I definitely have an appreciation for it.

It's a very unique talent, and not everybody can do it, for sure. For sure, for sure. Back there. Thank you, Ms. Tyler, for another inspiring, smart, and heartfelt season for a long guy. Thank you. Thank you. You're very sweet.

I do have a question for you, Mr. Sons, but in the spirit of being brave and of your birthday, Happy birthday! Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I wish your time. Glad, thanks, jump to the end. Yes. Happy birthday, too. you. Yeah. Thank you. It's very sweet. Super happy. I'm not dead. Thank you.

What's the question for? Oracio. I was doing my best Marilyn Monroe. Very sexy. Many of us in the midst of mid-career change, even in the same field. So what is the greatest thing you've learned in your newer things after leaving and then going into the newest phase of your career, what would you identify as your greatest learning? My greatest learning? Learning? Learning? The greatest things you've learned?

Greatest learning items? Tools. Oh, I just, I mean, these are all simple things I tell people often, so hopefully this isn't boring, but I really do believe that you should make yourself laugh before anybody else. And if you can't get past that point, I don't know how you could expect anybody else to really like what you're saying. So part of that confidence was like, I know I can construct a funny sentence. And so here it goes.

So I would say if you're just believing what you're doing and look at it objectively also and just go, okay, this is good, this is good, and I'm getting better. And like even if you're getting a little bit better every month or whatever, it's good enough. Just don't go backwards. Yeah. Yeah, that's good advice. Don't go backwards. Don't go backwards.

I'll let your mind tell you to go backwards. But we talk about that on the show a lot, right? Like just satisfy yourself first, because you honestly cannot satisfy everybody. That is an impossibility. And if you satisfy yourself first artistically or creatively or professionally, whatever it is, you will eventually find some people who,

for whom that's meaningful. But trying to kind of figure out what people want is like a total waste of time. And we'll render your life empty and joyless. Are you have a question? We have time for one more question, so be brave, except don't sing me happy birthday. That one's very sweet, actually.

One more, there's got to be one more out there. All right, yeah. Hold on, here comes to the mic. Here comes to the mic. Jerry's working hard today. Here we go. Thank you. So this is my question, is that what I love about your show is that I feel like,

like you just say you didn't know one another, and by the end of the show, like I'm totally, I was about to stay going out for a drink, but I hope you don't do that. But, you know, I imagine, they feel like you're your friends. He's worried about your surprise. Yeah, I am. Thank you. I am. But I feel like people really become your friends by the end of your show. So like in my head anyway. But so I'm wondering

like, is there, who's that one interview that you really think they're probably going to be a dick, but you still would love to do a show with them? That's a good one. That is a good one. I can't tell you who in the past I thought was a dick and they softened. Because that's just unfair to them. But I have it a of interviews where people were, it took a little while to kind of like break them down.

God, who do I think is going to be a dick besides Donald Trump? Huh? I don't want Donald Trump on my show. I want Donald Trump to go away. Who? I had an idea. That wasn't helpful. Oh, if I say someone is going to be a dick, then I will. Okay, I get it. That, why am I? This is where my, my, my, my, my, sleep deprivation just kicks in. Well, here's what I will say about that. I feel like, and Hershey, you can weigh in on this as well, I feel like almost everybody in the world loves to talk about themselves.

And that the best way to get someone to not be a dick is just to be really curious about them and what they've done in their lives. So I don't have anybody on my show who I think is going to be so much of a prick that I can't interact with them. You know what I mean? There are some people who I'm like, well, that person might be a good interview, but I don't want to be alone with them in a room for 90 minutes. You know what I mean?

So, but there have been some people who, okay, you know, I'll give it this show posted a while ago. Oh God, brain freezing, having MIRC, MIRC, Chef, Top Chef, yes, Michael Vittagio. So I didn't know Michael Vatagio before he was on the show. If you've watched Top Chef, you know, he won his season by beating his brother, Brian. He's dead inside.

And he was infamous on the show for being a total dick. I was really curious about him because I'd eaten at his restaurant. I'd met him and he was nice to me. And his food's amazing. And I asked him right out. I said, you were pretty much a dick on that show. And he said, I know that's how people saw me. But here are all the reasons why.

And it was very interesting to kind of unpack someone who had been made a villain. You know, those shows are very much about kind of creating villains and heroes. But he didn't apologize. He wasn't like, well, I was misunderstood. He said, look, I am self-made. I didn't go to chef's school. I killed myself to get here. and I really wanted to win

and I wasn't there to make friends. And I thought that was fair and I actually really liked him by the end because I thought he was very forthcoming. Aisha? Yeah. It's been a pleasure being on your show. Yeah.

I'm about to explode. I have to pee so bad. Ladies gentlemen, Arracio Sands! Thanks for coming out. I love me. That was Horatio Sands. I hope you guys enjoyed that. I did.

I enjoyed making it. I enjoyed recording it. As you could hear, I was on about four hours of sleep that day. But it was still a joy and hopefully I was mostly coherent and intelligible. If there's an abelogia for this episode, it's that the show went up late.

But, you know, it's not the first time that's happened. And, you know, I'm human. And so are you. So what I entreat you to do as we move into season 5 of Girl and Guy is to both strive to be your best self and also give yourself a fucking break. All right, you're not a robot. So on that day when maybe you need to finish a report, maybe stop and have an ice cream cone first, right?

Is anybody going to die? I don't think so. Now, if you stop in the middle of the highway and have that ice cream cone, somebody could die. So, you know, stop in a safe place under some kind of constraints of safety and barriers around your being that will prevent you from being hit by a car or are you hitting a car when you enjoy aforementioned ice cream. But the point is, have some fucking ice cream, all right, because life is short. And I want you to enjoy it in all in every way possible. Go out there and kick massive ass, and I cannot wait to talk to on the next one. Late.

Girl on Guy is a production of Hot Machine, blowing shit up since 2009.