Hey Riddle Riddle - #338: Fiddler On the Dune! w/ Elliott Kalan

Episode Date: January 8, 2025

We're joined by the marvelous musical mind of Elliott Kalan! Check out his new podcast Clueless on the Smartless network and jam out as we solve riddles, talk New Jersey and hear what's possibly the next Tony award winning musical!Starring:Adal RifaiJohn Patrick CoanErin KeifGuest Starring:Elliott KalanEditing by: Casey ToneyTheme by: Arne ParrottLogo by: Emily Kardamis & Emmaline MorrisWant more? Get Weekly Bonus Eps on Patreon!JPC's Guided Meditations Volume 1, available now at our Patreon digital store!Want merch? Visit our TeePublic Store! or pins, buttons & printsWant to mail us something? Hey Riddle Riddle 6351 W Montrose Ave #267Chicago, IL, 60634Want to leave us a voicemail? Call (805) RIDDLE-1 or (805-743-3531)Want to advertise on the show? Check out Hey Riddle Riddle via Gumball.fmSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is a HeadGum Podcast. And the worst thing Friday One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six

One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six One, two, three, four, five, six We forgot, ASMR's our mother's love. Thumbs up, ASMR's our mother's love. Zander in us, Zander in us, Zander in us, New Orleans rise. Please welcome the wickedly talented, one and only, Adelazine. Happy New Year everybody! Welcome to 2025.

You didn't think we'd live this long, did you? Did you? Welcome to 2025. You didn't think we'd live this long, did you? Oh! Oh! Oh, Erin, are you okay? God! Erin, are you okay?

Erin are you okay? Yeah, this is just on the soundboard now. This is on the soundboard. You hit your head so hard on the microphone Oh Head over to our patreon if you want to know why those noises are playing 2025 it's a brand new year and a brand new crew not Not the same old stuff, it's gonna be all new stuff. I will drink the cup of my own piss. Okay, well... Same old stuff. That's JPC, that's Adol over there. Adol, wave!

There he is. He's really waving. That's really sweet. And I'm Erin. And who's this gorgeous 10 out of 10 knockout blonde? Oh, that's me. I dyed my hair. But we do have a guest. Blonde. Oh, that's me. I dyed my hair, but we do have a guest. Our guest today is Emmy Award. This might be our first Emmy Award winner. Emmy Award winner, former head writer of The Daily Show, head writer of the show Mystery Science Theater 3000,

creator of a delightful comic and also spooky maniac of New York and one of the cohosts of spooky maniac of New York. And one of the co-hosts of the Flop House podcast, please welcome Elliot. Is it Kalan? I never know how to say your last name. It's Kalan. That's our band's name. I always wanna say Kalan.

Nobody knows. It was Kaplan until 1951. And then my grandfather changed it right before my dad was born. So this is a name that proudly goes back three generations now, including my own children. And everyone thinks it's Kalan or Kalan, but it's pronounced Kalan

because my family is dedicated to finding the least common, least accessible ways to spell and pronounce things. My name is spelled with two Ls and two Ts. My dad's name is Mark, spelled with a C at the end of it. Wow. So, your family has a mess of consonants. Yes, yes. Do you think at any point down the road in the whole, in the family lineage,

do you think you'll ever add the P back? Or is the P gone for good reason? That's a good, I mean, it's not good for gone for good reason, it's gone for a bad reason, which is antisemitism, but you know, and the desire to avoid it, but the- Oh, okay, good, woo! Oh my God! We're too worried people would think we were, anti-Semitism, but you know, and the desire to avoid it. But the okay, good.

Oh, my God. We're too worried people would think we were that we were Jews or not. No, but at this point, we're so obviously Jewish that we might as well replace it. But I like the way it sounds. Kaplan is like, yeah, it's like a dime a dozen name at Kalan. It's so it's so exclusive. Nobody even knows how to pronounce it. That's how beautiful it is. Yes, that's it is it is like being part of a, I kind of have the opposite problem

because my last name is Cohen, but it's C-O-A-N and I'm not Jewish. So it's like, I'm kind of reclaiming some of that anti-Semitism for myself. I'm taking it off of the shoulders of the Jewish people and proudly display it. Thank you for absorbing some of that. Really display it. Inadvertently ally. Thank you for dropping some of that.

Really appreciate it. I guess an ally, that's a good word. I've never heard it put that way before. I guess so. I'm an inadvertent ally, yeah. I have a very similar thing with my last name. It's K-E-I-F, which grammatically makes no sense. It's Keef.

But it's because my great grandfather had such bad handwriting and on the census, they couldn't read the K-E-E-F-E and so they had to change it to K-E-I-F. Really? That's the sort of Irish in me. Yeah, they couldn't read it. They were just like, too Irish, make it something else. And I have just the boring old Missouri standard Adle Shokie reply.

You must be so tired of people not asking you how to spell or pronounce or where it's from your name. Yeah. He loves when people call him Adam. He loves it. My favorite is when I'll be talking to someone and someone will be like, what's your name? And I'm like Adel and they'll go Abdul.

And I'm like, you heard it. Like, it's not like you read it, you heard it. No, it's like, I'll write my name on like a medical form and I'll get the printed form back and it'll say Kaplan on it. And it's like, I know my own name, just do it the way I wrote it. Like, I didn't make a mistake. Yeah.

I thought you were gonna say too many Ls and too many Ts. Well, they do say that sometimes. I was, every time I get into the country, I have to spell my name with one T and smuggle the other T in. In the next step. A delightful last name, a nightmare of a Wheel of Fortune puzzle. Elliot, we know all about your name now.

What is your, what we wanna know now is what is your history, what is your relationship with riddles, puzzles, lateral thinking problems, even something like escape rooms? I, well, I have a, I have a, I have not an interesting relationship with them, but a checkered or at least a complicated

relationship because there's certain types of riddles I love. I love logical word riddles. I love your old fashioned kind of what a goblin would tell you if you're trying to cross a bridge type riddle. Like I love those. I'm not necessarily good at them, but I love them. Whereas something like an escape room, like a physical thing

is something I find so incredibly threatening. There's almost nothing worse I can imagine than the idea of deliberately putting myself in a room I cannot leave. I need to know there's an, I don't even like, I don't like sleeping in the side of the bed that's too far from a door, you know? Because I want to be able to get out.

But as a- This is true, you're recording in a space where it looks like there are a dozen doors behind you. There's many doors and cabinets in this in this room. This is it's called it's good. I live in the riddle verse. Choose a door you see what you find behind it. And but I but I'm also I'm now the newly the host of a puzzle podcast myself on the smartless network called Smartless Presents Clueless,

where I host and Sean Hayes, along with a guest of his choosing, usually his husband or one of his friends, are the contestants every single time. So Sean is always the contestant, I'm always the host. And it's a little bit like, that's the kind of thing that you would find in like a play about like a torturer and a captive, you know,

like where they spend years together and they come to know each other intimately. It's not quite like that, but it's more fun than that. It's kind of like that, but more fun. So I feel like I'm steeped in puzzles and riddles now more than I used to be. And I have a son who loves games and puzzles of all kinds. He has a persona that we invented a couple of years ago

named PJ Puzzle Wiz, who is just like the master of puzzles. If we're going to do a puzzle or like either one of those logic puzzles where you mark off squares or even just like a jigsaw puzzle or something like that, he'll just turn into go, PJ Puzzle Wiz is here. We might have to come back to the archives to see if we invented PJ because that sounds like something. It sounds like something. It's possible.

But so now I, so I grew up always liking riddles, but now I feel like I'm, I'm in the puzzle world much more than I once was. That's fantastic. Uh, the name of that show again is smart list presents clueless. Smart list presents clueless is available on wherever podcasts are. You know, go to the Smartless Presents Clueless feed somewhere. You know, you'll find it. A fellow Illinois State University theater grad, Sean Hayes.

He's done great things with that degree. He's got an Emmy, he's got a Tony. As I said in a recent episode that will be coming out in a little while, he's got an Emmy, he's got a Tony. As I said in a recent episode that will be coming out in a little while, he's got an Emmy, a Tony and a Scotty. Scotty is his husband. But yeah, he's been great to, he's a great, he loves puzzles.

I mean, he lives for puzzles and he's a great contestant on it because he's really good at it but also sometimes he gets really stuck because he's thinking in a specific type of puzzle logic way and not necessarily in the way that it works. And I like it when we can catch him, when we can trip him up every now and then.

Well, send him our way and we'll really break his heart. Yeah, we'll really trip him up. Put the screws to him. Well, Elliot, let's get into some of these riddles that you may enjoy, you may loathe. We'll have to see your reaction, but here's our first one. This will be sort of a warm up. And I say it's a warm up just to make you feel bad if you don't get it right. OK, thank you. This is positive to all three of you.

What is the main cause of dry skin? OK, Maine is spelled M-A-I-N-E. So obviously, we're in the Pacific Northeast. Lobster lobster. I said it first. What is the main cause of swamps, bogs, dry skin? Yeah, they have cranberry bogs, huh? Are all the words spelled like we would expect them to be spelled at all?

Yeah, I believe so. I hope so. So wait, so what does that mean? So it is the, well, let's see, if Maine is spelled M-A-I-N-E, the Maine cause of dry skin would be flames from a boiler explosion on the USS Maine? I think so. Remember the Maine, I don't remember it.

So do we have the Spanish-American War on the board? We do not, I'm so sorry. Oh, I'm so sorry. Oh, nevermind. The board explodes. Um. Ah, boy. Um. What is the main cause of dry skin?

That's the question, huh? Yeah. Is this gonna be like a pun? Is this one of these like pun answers? It's not, no, it's not really a pun. I think it's- Is the answer like towels? Oh my God.

Elliot, my God. There must be some PJ puzzler in you, I think. Is that the name, PJ puzzler? PJ Puzzle Wiz? Puzzle Wiz. RJ Grunts. There must be some PJ Puzzle Wiz in you because it is a towel.

The main cause of dry skin is a towel. Yep, okay, that makes sense. See, that's the kind of riddle that I liked, that I fit with is the one where it's like, oh, this is not as complicated as it sounds like. You know, the joke of why did the chicken cross the road to get the other side, you know, you hear that when you're a kid,

and you're like, that's boring. And then eventually there came a point where I was like, this is a good joke. It's about chicken dying. You expect there to be a reason. Yes. And there's no reason. This chicken just needs to get over there. I do wanna see a good joke. Like, you expect there to be a reason. And there's no reason. This chicken just needs to get over there.

I do want to see a quick scene. So, Aaron and Elliot, you guys are going to be like football players on the sidelines. And Adel, you are the towel boy, and you're going to be like delivering them towels, except you're also kind of like a little goblin, and you want to make them do riddles before you give them towels. Huh, okay, so I have to burn some of my riddles in this scene? Yeah, I guess so. Well, then I made the right guy. I made the right guy.

The little riddle goblin, I guess. That's a good name for a goblin, Riddle Burn. Riddle Burn. Ooh, it is unseasonably warm. I'm dying out there. Yeah, this is the hottest Thanksgiving game we've ever played. This is bleak. I am... Excuse me, can I grab a towel from you really quick?

No, but I can hand you a towel. Never grab, always hand. Yeah, good game, good game, good game. But before you receive this towel, you must answer me these questions with vowel Allen vowel. Yeah Riddle burn I really I really don't have the time for this. I gotta go back out there and play defense What is on all fours then on twos then back to fours? fours then on twos then back to fours a goat it's not it well it's not a goat a Carl did you have a guess I it's just so hot I'm so sweaty it's hard for me to

it's hard for me hard can you repeat it yes what is on all fours then on twos then back to fours? If I asked you for a smaller towel, like- Then you'd get a smaller riddle. Could I get an easier one? Okay, um, one plus one. Two. Yeah, here you go.

Oh, thank you. That didn't end with a question mark in your voice inflection. This is a very small towel, but I can dab away with it. That's good. I got half my forehead. Maybe if you gave me the towel first, then I could answer your riddle? No. Many a player has tried to trick me in that regard. What is on all fours, then twos, then back to fours?

A human. Yes, but what type of human? A human. Uh, yes, but what type of human? A human doing what? Uh, burpees. Uh, yeah, I mean yeah. That works. What the hell is going on over here? I told you guys to get on the field like two minutes ago.

It's your son, Riddleburn. He won't give us the towel. Riddleburn? Father, I'll leave them alone if you answer me these questions on a phone. God damn it. God damn it, Riddleburn. Next up. Scene.

Aaron, the answer to your riddle was the offensive line. Oh, it was a football riddle. The same. I had the same problem with that riddle that I have at the scene, which I don't know anything about football. So I was just groping for terminology. You knew what happens on Thanksgiving.

That was a really good detail. Don't start yourself short. I know what other people in my house are doing on Thanksgiving that is annoying me, because I'm not interested. I know there's the goddamn lions who can't throw for shit. Boy, yeah, Elliot, we're already getting emails about you referencing a tiny towel.

Those don't exist in football, so this is, we'll cut that out. Well, the people are so big. That's so true, all the towels are tiny. Let's go to our next. Normal towels like a handkerchief to them, yeah. Our next riddle here. What is higher than a king or queen?

What is higher than a king or queen? An ace. Aaron, great guess. That's not the answer I have in front of me. That is an answer, but that's not the answer. That's a good answer. That's a really good answer. That's a good answer.

Thanks. Is it a joker? It's not a joker. That's also a very good answer. Okay, okay it a joker? It's not a joker, that's a very good answer. Okay, okay. What is higher than a king or queen? A feeling. Yeah, that's a good one.

Now, you overshot it, but this is a good guess. Oh, see, I would have undershot it. I would say in monarchical mythology, it would be God. But my guess is that this is a riddle and you're not a genuine question about how divine monarchy works. So... Well, the king and queen is a vessel for God, so they embodied... So then God would be lower than this thing, because it's higher than... Where's the pope in this? The Merovingian family.

Oh, the pope makes me think crown. Is it crown? JPC. Bingo, bingo, hot-a-ta. It is a crown or the crown. Aaron saying Pope made me think of that big hat of I said, oh, the big hat. That's basically what's on top of a king or a queen. Now, Elliot, I feel like you would know this just because you're a very learned, well-read man. What is the name of the Pope's? In certain things, yeah, not football, but you know.

How many yards did Walter Payton? What is the name of the Pope's hat? In certain things, yeah, not football, but you know. How many yards did Walter Payton? What is the name of the Pope's hat? It's a mitre, right? Miter. Oh, I didn't know it had a name. Trust the mitre touch. Yeah, that's the jingle for that. That's where his carburetor is?

Yes. Remember when the Pope hit that woman? I think about it every day. Huh? Remember he hit her hand? Oh, okay, yes. But she was trying to steal his hat. That was the thing.

Yeah, his mitre. His mitre, yeah. Yeah. I think about it every day. Huh? Remember he hit her hand? Oh, okay, yeah. So she was trying to steal his hat. That was the thing, yeah. His mitre. His mitre, yeah. Yeah. Because gas is so expensive.

Yeah, and he said, I'm not gonna pay a lot for this mitre. He said the pope is mightier than the hat thief. I'd like to see a seed. Elliot, you are a king, and GPC and Adil, you are people in the kingdom who are like coming to him with problems to solve. I'll throw myself onto your marble tiles. To beg of you, please, the kingdom has ruled against me having two dogs. Might I please have two dogs?

May I ask? And yes I may, I'm the king. Can do whatever, but I'm trying to be polite. Rhetorical, rhetorical, rhetorical. How big are the dogs? Uh, one dog is half the size of the other. I'm gonna say no. Uh, one dog is half the size of the other. Eh. I'm gonna say no. I'm worried you're going to try to insert one dog into the other dog. The way you answered that question.

Hey Wood! Hey Wood! We've seen him do it! Such a wise king he is! They're doing it in Russia. They're called Russian nesting dogs. Alright, thank you. Thank you, Chris. Next question, next question. One dog, you choose which one you want. Malish, Malish, I have a dispute with this woman here. Both of us were on our way home from the mines when we stumbled upon a baby.

Now I said, I will raise this child as my own. She said, I will raise this child as my own. We're not together anymore. And neither one of us, you know, owns quote-unquote this baby. Who should keep the baby? I have two questions to start with. One, who- which one of you stumbled across the baby? We did it at the same time. We were coming from- In unison.

We were coming from separate minds and both of our feet kind of hit I see it doesn't I want it make clear either one of us kicked a baby this is what I was getting at I would immediately disqualify whoever literally tripped over a baby with their foot this is my second question my second question does the baby show a preference to either one of you or to neither of you? Now we don't know we don't know that that's me That's true the baby could be using guy in a sort of New Jersey sense unisex way It does seem like it could be a New Jersey baby

Speaking of speaking of King. Hey hey, Angelo Dantonio. Listen, King, listen... He cut in line. As the ambassador from New Jersey, he has the ability to do so. Thank you, King. Grab my crown right fucking here. I got your crown right here, lady. This is a show of respect where he's from. Hey, the 48 merges onto the 92 in such a way that I can't get my fucking caravan into the right-hand lane.

Is there anything we can do about that construction-wise? Well, what eggs are you trying to get to on the turnpike? I guess I want to get to the 22 if possible. I think we can do something about that. We're turning to the baby. I will award the baby to whichever dog the man does not choose to keep. That's fair. That's fair.

What a fair king. Okay, good king. Good king. Question time is over. I have to take a very long bath now. The king was a child. Now, Adol, how did you get all those New Jersey specifics in there? Listen, I've been to New Jersey once, so I thought back to my one visit and I said,

I think there was a 48 onto the 92. As a as a as a native New Jersey, and I lived there for 17 years of my life. I found the numbers you were choosing to be delightfully imaginative. I think I've also only been in New Jersey once. And I think that the thing that my impression of New Jersey, well, there was two things. They pump your gas for you in New Jersey. Yes, in New Jersey it is illegal

for it to have a self-service gas station, which is very frustrating. Why is that? Lobbying by the gas station attendance union or something like that. It's a it's all just a business giveaway. Otherwise, it's a great state. Great state. I was an adult when I was there. Conceptually, I think I knew that they did that. But what I wasn't prepared for was that it

would just be some guy I thought like someone would be like an official uniform. No, it was a guy in a t shirt. And he just started pumping the gas. And I was like, this, everything from my life experience felt like scam. Like, next he's going to be like, hey, sorry, we get new cards. It's only cash. Oh, you gave me a 20, I give you a 10 and then the five pack. And I'm like, that part was very throwing to me. Yeah, you have to have a lot of trust in New Jersey.

We trust each other a lot. That's the thing. Because yeah, it's not like the old days. You drive up to a Texaco, the man in the Texaco uniform comes out. Oh, hello, good day, sir. How do you hear about the war? Oh, we'll get those we'll get those Jerry's, you know, and then a dipstick on his arm, like, like it's a wine bottle. Yeah, exactly. Hmm. Let me let's kind of check the air

pressure. Okay, some selections from the store. No, it's just a literally just a guy doesn't even talk to you Just walks up to the pump and puts into the car They want to talk to you as little as possible We want to talk to them as little as possible But uh, it's but then when it means I live in California now and when I go Driving with my family and we use the my wife's car which has a gas pump in it. Mine does not mine is entirely Electrical because I care about the planet but the when when it will stop somewhere and I'll just sit there and let her get out and pump it because I care about the planet. But the, uh, when, when she will stop somewhere

and I'll just sit there and let her get out and bump it. Cause I never can do it quite right. Like I just can't, it's been years and I still can't every time I try to pump gas, it stops early and I don't know what I'm doing wrong. And I just can't, I don't know how to do it. To me, that's adorable to your wife.

That must be maddening. I think it's very annoying. Yeah. Very annoying. When you, as a guy like walk up to a urinal and you think, what happened here? Did someone just not understand how this thing works? Surely someone got the concept and they just failed at the execution, right? I went to reunions at Princeton with my wife, and Princeton was delightful. And then I was like, I want to go to my favorite sopranos

episode is the Pine Barrens. That's like, I want to go to. Yeah, it's so good. I want to go to the the things like a little forest called the Pine Barrens. And my wife was like, I think the Pine Barrens takes up like a third of the state or so. Is that true? Yeah, it's it's massive. Here's what people don't know about New Jersey. New Jersey is bigger on the inside than on the outside.

So if you look in the map, it looks like a small state, but when you're there, it's a massive and so much of it is woodland. The North, that's your city part of New Jersey. The South, that's your woodland and farm part of New Jersey. I grew up in the North near New York city, the like sophisticated half. And it's like, it's like a, New Jersey is like a little microcosm of the entire United States, cause you go to South Jersey and it's like, well, well, yeah, this is where the forest people live and the bog farmers. And you go up you go up north and everyone says they live in New York City, you know, smart.

I was kind of blown away. That was the second thing about New Jersey just driving through and being like there are so many trees here. I thought by the year 2024, I thought these would all be gone. I thought we would have taken these down by like 1826. Like it's crazy that they're still there. What my mom always used to tell me was she said there was more trees per square mile in New Jersey than any other state and that it was the most densely populated state with people. And I was always like, even as a kid, like that can't be both true. We have the most people per mile and the most trees per mile. Are we double counting? Are we counting people's trees and trees as people? Trees with like faces and mustaches.

I think that's a person. Let them vote three times for Democrats. Trees that look like the cast of the Jersey Shore. Yeah. Now, Elliott, we asked- The ads on those trees are amazing. Yeah. Sorry, Adele, you're saying.

Elliott, we ask all of our guests, have you ever ran into the Jersey devil? I've never ran into the Jersey. I mean, I've been around the garden when the, when the New Jersey devils are playing the Rangers there, but it's yeah, the I've never seen the Jersey devil, but I certainly grew up wanting to wondering, I heard all the stories. It's a baby that was malformed and flew off into the night. It's a kangaroo that escaped from a sideshow.

I've heard all the stories and I've come to the conclusion that it's not real. It's just not there. Say it ain't so. When I was a kid, I wanted to believe in every made up thing. So like the Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot and aliens and things like that. And it was a sad moment when I was probably about 26

when I was like, you know what? I can't fake it anymore. I just don't, I don't really believe these things are around. Held on longer than I would have thought when the story started. My cousin texted me like a week ago and her son finally asked about Santa

and was like, hey, is Santa real? And she was like, no. And then he was going down the line of like tooth fairy Easter bunny. And then he looked out the window and saw the mailman and went, is he real? Like he completely gave him an existential crisis. What can I take for granted?

Am I real? Am I just a story my parents tell me? Adel, when you were talking about the Jersey Devil, you were talking about, let's see, Google some famous people from New Jersey. Nathan Light. Meryl Streep. I'm pretty sure she's from New Jersey.

Let me look, I don't know. Probably. It doesn't say it right here. The town next to where I grew up, there was a diner there and they shot a scene for the movie One True Thing with Meryl Streep there. And for many years, there was a Post-It note on the wall above the booth that they shot it in

that just said One True Thing booth. They never bothered to make a sign, it was just a post-it note. It was out there for years. And then one day I was there and it was not there anymore. And I don't know if it fell down or what, but they cared enough to mention it, but not enough to like memorialize it, you know, I'm not really a person who wants to steal something, but I would steal that so quickly that posted note that post. I'm like, this is hilarious.

This is mine. Now I'm putting this in my purse. That was at the Maple Leaf Diner in Maple Leaf, New Jersey. No, I don't see Meryl Streep. I do see Martha Stewart from New Jersey. Elliot's old boss, John Stewart. John Stewart. I mean, it was a huge people asked me, I've been asked many times, what is it? Do you ever feel like you had kind of entitlements or a leg up? Do you have an unfair advantage in your career? And they usually want me to say as a white person,

which is true. But it's like, yeah, well, I spent a lot of years working for a Jewish guy from New Jersey and I'm also a Jewish guy from New Jersey. And for a while, my other boss on that show was a Jewish guy from the same town over in New Jersey where the Maple Leaf Diner is. So that was-

Oh, he's from that booth. He was born in that booth. Yeah, that was the old post in note. They took it. But it was a, so I really, yeah, he's from that booth. He was born in that booth, yeah. That was the old post in note. They took him. But it was a, so I really, yeah, he's from New Jersey and it really helped me a lot because when he would speak like a New Jersey person, which is to say without using proper words for things

and instead just saying like this or the thing or that thing, I could understand what he was talking about. So. Now, Elliot, here's a riddle just for you. John Stewart, John Stewart was your boss. Yes. Both from New Jersey.

If you're from New Jersey, if this, if this is the right, if this is a denigratory to him, I will not accept it. He is, he's done, he did a lot for me and I, and I owe him a much, you know, it is, it is not what I was going to say. No, he's from New Jersey. Jon Stewart was your boss, but to see if you're truly from New Jersey, who is both your boss and Jon Stewart's boss?

Well, there's really only one boss in New Jersey. The boss. Jon Bon Jovi. No, not at all. No, Jon Bon Jovi. Jon Bon Jovi is more like the assistant manager. And that is a commercial break week. I think I heard Bruce Springsteen in there. I heard Jon Bon Jovi. John Bon Jovi is more like the assistant manager. And that is a commercial break. We... I think I heard Bruce Springsteen in there.

I didn't. I heard John Bon Jovi. Why don't we take a quick break? We're gonna listen to Slippery When Wet and we'll be right back with more Hey Riddle Riddle. One, two, three, four, hey, riddle, riddle. Hey, riddle, riddle. Hey, riddle, riddle. Where's John Bon Jovi from?

I think he's from New Jersey. Also Jersey? I think Bruce is like the... But Bruce is. Bruce is the... I mean, he's the eternal poet laureate of the state. Him and Walt Whitman, basically. I was going to say mascot, but poet laureate is much more elegant.

All right, but speaking ofate is much more elegant. All right. But speaking of Bruce's from New Jersey, Bruce Willis also from New Jersey. So maybe you could give the boss a run for his money. No, but I mean, if he is a harmonica, well, now you're talking about Bruno, Bruce Willis is all three. When he's at house of blues. No, that's it's so funny. Cause when, when you asked who is, who's at House of Blues. Yeah. No, it's so funny because when you asked who is the boss of New Jersey, who's the real boss, it was like, it didn't even occur to me

to have to name him. I was just like, well, the boss, that's who it is. It's tough, my family is a big Bruce Springsteen, I'm actually the least Bruce Springsteen-y in my family. And my dad is a huge Springsteen fan, my brother is a huge, my brother has flown to Iceland to see Bruce Springsteen, someone he's seen multiple times in concert before in New Jersey.

So it's, they're really, they'll go all out for Bruce Springsteen. I saw, he did a Broadway show maybe like 2018 or something. My brother saw that, yeah. It was so, so good. I heard it was amazing. I can't remember the name of it, but I saw it with, with a, What was it?

I would I would pay $700 That's not a bad idea. Why not do that? Yeah, sure, yeah. Let him do, just let him do a week of that. Let him be Alphaba. Oh, he could be. Oh, he'd be a great Alphaba. Every single one of those shows would see the best sales.

I mean, they're all, you just sell up the theater. But yeah, he could do, I'm overcoming gravity. No, Defying Gravity was the song. I don't remember. It's Gene's t-shirt, fully green skin. Erin. Instead of on a broom. Can you do the Alphaba sound, Erin? Can don't remember. It's a jeans t-shirt, fully green skin. Instead of on a broom.

Can you do the Elphaba sound, Aaron? Can you do the Elphaba sound as Bruce Springsteen? Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo Cats so clever-ous, you know? Okay, you, uh, uh, I've never, my heart just exploded in my chest. You went right to cats. You went right to cats. One day more, another day another destiny. How does a pastor open the door of a whore? I am the model of a major general. Tomorrow, tomorrow, him is in. Turn the tail, swing your tongue.

Now, Elliot, of course, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh,

uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh, we will, uh in. Turn the tail, swing it on. Now, Elliot, of course, we will, afterwards, we'll have you stick around for six to 12 hours and we'll record a picture on Spring Scene, Sing Broadway. So on my other podcast, The Flophouse, I did do an entire episode, a mini episode, where I was playing a character I routinely play

on that show, which is Tom Brokaw, world's greatest Dune fan, who this is a character I've been doing for years and years now, long before the movie, that Tom Brokaw is just all he cares about is Dune. And we did one where he's pitching his adaptation of Fiddler on the Roof, but it's all Dune themed. And I wrote a bunch of Fiddler on the Roof songs about Dune. And I remember one night I was sitting with my wife preparing for this and I wrote a bunch of Fiddler on the Roof songs about Dune. And I remember one night, I was sitting with my wife preparing for this, and I couldn't stop thinking of them. I kept running over to my computer to write them down, and I was like, it writes itself!

And my wife was like, I don't think it does. I really don't think it does write itself. BLAIR How deep into Dune lore were you going with this character? Are we going into like the, where his kids started writing the books and you're doing well so next and so bro so Tom Brokaw he he believed this my version of Tom Brokaw again about the real time or maybe it is he's he loves those original Frank Herbert books he's read them so much at times he's he's spoken on the podcast about how

hosting the nightly news was kind of the anchor that kept him from just losing himself in that world of Arrakis and just making that the real world for him that he lived in. The books that his son wrote, he doesn't consider those completely canon. They conflict with his head canon a little bit. But his knowledge of Dune is much greater than my knowledge of Dune. As someone who has read the first couple books, read the first book probably six times, I love it. But each time I try to push forward through the rest of the series, I lose a lot of steam, even in the second book.

There's a reason for that, they say, and it's that the other ones aren't very good. That's just kind of the working theory. That's the working theory among the kind of the proletariat. Yeah, I once heard it described as, with each book he had less to say and he spent more time saying it. Now Aaron's book is so amazing. It's so rife for Fiddler on the Roof music.

Finishing the hat. Aaron, can we hear Bruce Springsteen doing the dune sound? the dune sound. I want to know what some of your Fiddler on the Roof dune songs were. Do you remember any of them? I'll have to look up the lyrics. The I'm trying to the the. If I were a Spice Man, well, it was if I were a you know what? I'm going to look up the lyrics while we're talking.

Thank you so much. But before I do that, I'm also going to say there's one more Bruce Springsteen musical song I want to do. There's one more Bruce Springsteen musical song I want to do. There's another hundred people just got off the train. Company sounds like a Springsteen album, yeah. Nebraska Company, it sounds like they could be. Actually, after Addle did a Dune one

and I did a Dune one, I think that your wife actually might be wrong. I think they do kind of write themselves. I think that you are onto something with this and they keep working at it. Oh, very quickly, I want to say, so I went and saw this this Springsteen on Broadway and at one point he mentioned New Jersey it's like the first time in

the show he mentions New Jersey and it's maybe 20 minutes in and as soon as he mentions Jersey you know it's a house of 1200 people we'll say 800 people like scream and go woo and yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. And then Springsteen goes, you know, I invented that shit. And people are kind of laughing and he goes, I'm serious. He goes, before when you mentioned Jersey,

people would boo or hiss. He goes, I made Jersey cool. And then everyone screamed and yelled. And I'm like, I think he really did. I think he brought like a Jersey pride where before it was maybe Frankie Valley had something to do with it. I think there brought like a Jersey pride where before it was maybe Frankie Valli had something to do with it. I think there's a, I mean, there's a,

New Jersey was always, has always been a punch line. New Jersey is kind of like, it's up there with like the Bronx in some ways. Where like, in like the 40s, if you have a joke and you want to, you like mention one of those two things, people are like, I know that that's funny. That's a ridiculous place. But he, yeah, he did make it cool.

The weird thing is, so he made it cool. This is something that John Stewart would talk about. He made it cool by romanticizing the things that are terrible about it. Like how the dead end life of a certain kind of person living in New Jersey, making that feel special. So there's something really beautiful about that. Anyway, I found these dune lyrics.

I'll read them for you. Really quick, I found these tune lyrics. Are you? Really quick. I remember as I grew up in Massachusetts and I remember as a kid growing up, the joke that people would tell was New Jersey welcoming you with open legs. And I was like, are we calling a state slutty? Are we implying that New Jersey is slutty? I've never understood that joke.

That's like the, is it, where is it, Newark? I can't remember where there's the, where there's the bridge that just says across it, Newark makes the world takes. And I feel like that was like the, I think it's, no, no, maybe it's Hoboken. I can't remember.

It's that, they actually wrote my New Jersey card. But like this idea that like that's the feeling in New Jersey is like, we do lots of stuff and no one likes us. Just take our stuff. That's so funny. I'm so excited for these dude. We're always like, you know, Buzz Aldrin is from here.

You know, there's important people here. He went about so bad, he went to space. That's true. Went to the moon to go away to the moon. Tried to get as far away as possible. These are all so dumb. Let's see. Reading over something that you've written and being like, oh, wait a second,

I've made a horrible mistake. Except at the time I love them, at the time I love them. But out of context, not as the, so here's the thing, I also performed these to annoy my co-hosts. I don't want to annoy you, you nice people. But this is, I'll do the beginning of this part here. This is just the beginning of the play. So excited.

So the name of the play is a balisette player on the siege. Uh, you can also call it Hitler on the dune. So I'm not going to do it in my Tom Brokaw voice because I'm getting over a flu and I don't, I can't do it anymore. Okay. So that'll do it as if I'm Javier Bardem being still garb, being Tevye. Yes, please. Yeah. The easier route. Go easier. Let's work. Yes, please. Yeah, the easier route. Go easier. Let's work. A balissette player on the siege?

Sounds crazy, no? But you could say that each of us in our city of Arrakeen is a balissette player on the siege trying to eke out a simple rendition of the prophecy without being swallowed by the maw of Shayhalud. Why do we stay here? We stay because after a lifetime on Arrakis, we are addicted to air that contains the spice melange.

But how do we keep our balance? That I can answer in one word. Because we're Fremen! Dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun! We're Fremen! That goes on for a little bit. We're Fremen! Then there's more spoken word stuff.

We'll skip that. Actually, I'll say this part. Now you've got me. There's no way I'm not stopping. Our knowledge that the Kwisetz Haderach is coming has allowed us to keep our balance for many years. Because of the prophecy, we always know how to do everything. How to walk on sand.

How to suck water out of the bodies of our enemies. How to wear clothes. For instance, we always wear our steel suits. This shows our constant devotion to not wasting our urine. You may ask, when is the quisset's hadaract coming? I'll tell you. I don't know. But the beniges retellus he is and that we better be ready for him. Who day and night must ride on all the sandworms, calibrate the thumpers, say his daily prayers, and who has the right as master of the siege to speak at the southern council? The Stilgar! The Stilgar!

Then there's a verse about the Bene Gesserit. I'll go through the end of this one. This song is not so there's no song. Who must know the way to spread a prophecy for centuries, we Benny G's. Who must use the voice to silence blasphemy so Paul is free to be the haderach, bum bum bum. Reverend mother, the mother.

No sir. At three I lived on Caledon as a teen I came to Dune. I hear I'll spark a bloody jihad I hope I don't. Maudine. I have the demographic for this. Yeah, and then at the end. This is right in the pocket for me. Thank you, good.

The instigator goes, the ways of the Fremen, without them we'd be as shaky as, as as as a balisette player on the seat and then if this was the movie it would immediately pan to the fiddler on the roof silhouetted and he would go and the credits will go on for about seven minutes and that's why we always fast forward through the credits to get to the rest of the movie. This is a movie we watch thank you this is a movie I mean the I grew up on the original cast recording, Zero Mustard, the author as Yenta, the matchmaker, you know, but my wife grew up on the film cast recording with Topol.

And we watched the movie multiple times a year, but we always watched the first half at Rosh Hashanah, the happy half. And then right as I know there's the exact moment when you see the close up of the rabbi dancing at the wedding, you got to stop it right there. So you don't see any of the cossacks coming and then you save that second half for Yom Kippur and that's when you watch the sad half. Oh, that's perfect. That's when they sing the sad songs. Yeah. What's your favorite song from the show? My favorite song for the I mean, it's so hard.

There's so many good songs. It's such an amazing show. There's so many good songs, but I think there's a, the song that I think is my personal favorite because it's the one you don't hear as much, but it's so beautiful is, far from the home I love. I was gonna say that. It's so beautiful. That or To Life?

To Life is an amazing song. I love it. Yeah. Yeah. It's a, what did I do? I didn't do, let's see. Now let's see if I did one for, which ones I did for either of those. Oh, to fight, so mine and Dune, it's to fight, to fight Sardaukar. Sardaukar, Sardaukar.

I'm sorry. And, oh, so wait, I gotta do, okay, hold on a second. And I'll do, I'm eating up all of our time, I apologize. I'm telling you, this is exactly what the show has been leading towards. Okay, good. So, how far from the home I love, that was for the scene where he's tested by the

reverend mother at the very beginning of the book. And I just read that scene aloud to my older son not too long ago and I was very excited. So this is my version of it. How can I hope to make you understand? Don't you move your right hand. it in that small box or I will land on your neck with my Gong Ji Bar. Yes!

It goes on like that for a little bit but yes it's one of the it's such a it's such a it's such a great show like it's such a great the actual fiddler not my dumb. Well I think we need to see your version at the La Jolla Playhouse or something. I would love it. If you can book me at the La Jolla Playhouse to do by one man, Tom Broca sings Fiddler on the Dune for one night only.

I would be in the front row. I think the thing that I like most about Fiddler on the roof being combined with Dune is if you got deep enough into Frank Herbert's Dune books, which I don't advise that you do, he does eventually bring like Jews into his books. This is why I've always been trying to try to chase to finish the series because I know they show up and I want to see how he handles Jews in the future, you know. No!

No! You don't need to. I think his portrayal of how he handles Jews in the Dune books is like if he watched Fiddler on the Dune It was like this is Jews. I get Jews I think I got Jews from here There's a lot of American Jews where they watch they watch Fiddler on the roof and they're like that's pretty much it, right? That's how it happens That's what's going on

As long as as long as he handles Jews better than JK Rowling handles them where she makes them goblins that run a magic bank Oh jeez But Nellie you have to admit, she handles the Chinese very well. Everything else, she's really, really careful with. To be fair, she handles it all pretty badly. Yeah, I think, I don't know, I think JK Rowling has a pretty great track record

with pretty much every minority group. I can't really think of one that she's- Oh, JPC hasn't been on the internet since 2014, just to help. Oh, that's why that's what I- I logged off the internet when I Googled Frank Herbert Jews, and then I said, uh-oh, I gotta get the fuck outta here. This isn't good.

New Jersey's own Frank Herbert, I don't know where he's from. Should we dive back into some more riddles? Yes, riddles, riddles. Oh, sure, sure, yeah. At some point, Elliot, I realized when I was on the Flophouse, I wanna say you sang as Randy Newman for 20 minutes.

Oh, I know, about 20 minutes for a while, yeah. But it was amazing. But I'm like, I think I've heard Elliott sing more than I've heard him talk. It's possible, I mean, I love to sing. Yeah. Just like that old song from a cartoon. I love to sing it.

I love like the moon and the June and the spring. But yeah, cause Randy Newman's easy cause he just sounds like he's swallowing his own tongue the entire time. Look, I'm losing. He's kind of like Bruce Springsteen, Bruce Springsteen was kind of jaunty. I looked up the, I liked the singer song during COVID

cause I like, it was stuck in my head and I couldn't remember what it was. And I looked it up on YouTube and I remember one of the comments being like, wow, this guy really likes to sing. And it made me laugh for like three weeks. Absolutely. I'm gonna read the next one just very, very quickly,

just for Elliot as a tip of the hat to Elliot I do have to say Ready Newman singing What does a dog do that a man wears Pants. It is pants. Pants. Okay, let's talk about musicals. Let's dive back in.

I'm just saying women can wear what a dog does also. Yes. It's like when I was a kid, I was born just long ago enough that I could still enjoy the, the doctor was a woman riddle. That was still something that shocked people and now it's not, it doesn't work anymore. Well, our theme song is a bunch of,

it's a list of all of those common riddles. And the first one is the doctor was the mother. Yeah, it's one that I remember that was a real, it was a real surprise. But now it's now that, now that women have overtaken men rightfully in professional intelligence, it's no longer, now it's no longer seems strange.

What, Aaron, is that true? Yeah, sorry. But men could be doctors too. That's okay. Don't say that, Aaron. That makes me feel bad that I didn't make it as a doctor. Dr. J, the rest. What letter comes next in this sequence?

D-R-M-F-S-, SLT, and then blank. SLT, what are we talking about? New Jersey? Salt Lake, salt lake, Danny. DRM. Oh, state's a slut. No, it's lovely. New Jersey's so beautiful and great seafood,

underrated seafood. Okay, Aaron, so that's gonna be beautiful. What the fuck are you talking about? A valuable place to winter your revolutionary soldiers if you need to, you know. Yes, that's true, underrated seafood. Okay, Aaron, so let's get beautiful. What the fuck are you talking about? A valuable place to winter your revolutionary soldiers if you need to, you know? Yes, that's true, that's true. Grounds for sculpture, beautiful place. Can you read that again, Adel?

I'm so sorry, just the letters. Yes, what letter comes next in the sequence? D-R-M-F-S-L-T, and then blank. And I will say the reason I'm reading this, Riddle, is because it pertains, or tethers to something we were doing not too long ago. Bruce Springsteen impressions. Cocaine? But didn't you say don't talk about that? Don't talk about it. DRM FSLT. And this last one, I believe, completes it.

So we were singing. Oh yeah. So I'll say this does relate to singing. Do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti, D, D is next. D is in Do. Yes, the letters represent notes on a musical scale. The last one is D for Do.

I could not shake D for drive, R for reverse, no matter how much I told my head, there's no M, there's no F on any of those. I do wanna see a scene. Erin and Elliot, you are a married couple that teaches driver's ed. JPC, you are the one student who's enrolled in this class. And you two teach driver's ed through song

to whatever degree you're comfortable. Right. through song to whatever degree you're comfortable. Right. Buckle your seatbelt, look in the mirror, make sure you can see all the mirrors. Sorry. Sorry. Look in the mirror. Wait, for a second.

Sorry, we just got into a really big fight before we got in the car. Just give us one second. We can be professional. We can be professional about this. I be professional we can be professional about this i can i can be professional about this let's review the gear change order oh what will i need will i need that because this is isn't this an automatic or you never know what you're gonna draw i'm sorry no i'm now i'm just singing everything and i can't no it's okay we're gonna wait wait i i was fine and then you mentioned what happened before and then I wasn't fine sorry I'm sorry you take off your

wedding rig leave it on the nightstand then your co-worker won't know you're married sorry sorry I'm just thinking what's in my head you're gripping my hand really really really hard. Am I? Your nails are kind of clawing into the back of my hand. I'm sorry. Why don't we change? Why don't I, you get in, honey, you get in the back seat.

I'll get in the front seat. Okay, so call me honey. I guess that's nice, that's nice. Okay. You make one mistake multiple times over the course of years. And it's- and no- no- someone can't let go. Here- here- here- I can pull over. You guys don't have to do this while I'm driving.

No, no, no. Keep driving. Keep driving. Keep driving. Oh, I really just don't feel comfortable. I should just pull over. If we reach- if we reach a curve, just don't- just don't turn. Just go straight. Just go straight. Okay, just keep going straight? Okay. Just keep going straight. We'll outrun this. We'll outrun something. You something. I'll be able to outrun something in my life Just keep going just go. No. Yeah, okay Yeah, honey, we can get out of this car if this is this is let's pretend this car is our marriage You can get out anytime you want to but I'm not so I'll get hurt. We're going like 60 miles per hour

That's because are we sorry I have no idea is this too much. No keep going keep going faster You're faster on when you change lanes, oh my god allowed to go a little bit above the limit That was Randy come on every driver's ed teacher I had in Boston was the most cartoonish Boston person ever. They all had like the thickest Boston accents and were like drinking iced Dunkin' Donuts coffee in the middle of winter.

Just so mad at me the whole time. Now, Erin, does a Bostonian driver's ed teacher, do they avoid saying the word park or park the car because they don't wanna to get laughed at? No, they lean in. Okay. Oh, they only make you practice in Harvard Yard. Yeah.

It's the only place. Exactly. Adel, with that last riddle reminded me, I just got back from seeing my wife's family for the holidays and we were hanging out with my brother-in-law and he was telling us about how he had invented, I think he used the word invented,

which is not the word I would have used, a new way to order the alphabet because he didn't think that the alphabet made sense in the order that it was in, which is a thing, to be fair, I've never thought about. I think other people have tried that. He showed us his reordering of the alphabet and he began to like say what his reasoning was

and his reasoning like collapsed like 10 letters into the alphabet. But it started with, he was like doing it by strokes, like how many strokes it took to write letters. So it was like, it starts with I, then it goes to L, and then it goes to T, and then it goes to J. And we were, from there it just became untenable. But we were singing for the whole weekend,

we were singing, now I know my I-L-T's. And now that's all, that's all, whatever. When you were like listing letters off, I was like, now I know my I-L-T's. I love it when it feels like that's a deep human need to take an arbitrary system that everyone's agreed on and maybe Like this needs to be done. It's more scientifically and then come up with a different arbitrary way to do it Yeah, it's like with them

They're like a anytime someone's tried to create a universal language where they're like the great thing about this language is anyone can learn it And it's easy to use and it's like well I mean you could say that really about any language, put the time into it. Like it's, you still have to learn it. There are real problems we could be solving with that brain power. What are we doing? I do appreciate the impulse though to see something that is arbitrary and think like, well, that's arbitrary.

Like that's that because that is the thing that does channel us to like solving societal problems. But it's also the thing that channels us into nonsense. You've done, you've wasted a day. You've made nothing. This is nothing. Sorry. It turns out my shelf didn't need to be organized

by the color of the spine of the book. All right, that was a day wasted, yeah. Someone could apply that to gun violence and be like, okay, you actually did a really good job. You did somehow fix this, but this is just a fucked up alphabet. This is nothing. This is just a fucked up alphabet. This is nothing. This is just a fucked up alphabet.

Speaking of a fucked up alphabet. Oh. When is L larger than XL? When is L larger than XL? I just say alphabet because those are all letters in the alphabet. Can you read it again? I know X and L are both for like Roman numerals, but is L a higher Roman numeral than XL?

L would be more than XL. Yeah, you're right. L is 50 and XL is 40? Yeah. Is that really? Yeah, XL would be L minus 10. Yeah. Yes, because it's on the left side.

This is Super Bowl football stuff, so I don't know anything about this. I are, I like how you stumbled into the answer that I never was gonna get, but then I could back it up and explain it. Yes. I feel like that's, you were the genius that has an insight, and then I'm the mediocre mind that comes later that is like, hmm, here's the math

that proves that Einstein's right. I feel like I can get like X, I, and V Roman numerals easy, but when you start working with L, I'm like, okay, there were that many Romans? I think not. It is like- When the Super Bowls had to start using L, it did make it seem less classy.

Like it was very classy when it was Roman numerals. And then once the L came in, it was like, oh, now it looks silly. Yeah, for the Heathens. It is funny that they're like, football's the most like, grunting male smash beer, me fight. Like it's the most animalistic thing in our society

is like professional football. And then they're like, let's use Roman numerals for the, to quantify our Super Bowls. Cause I guarantee you, no male watching the Super Bowl knows Roman numerals. It's also one of those things that's like, this is a solved problem. Yeah. We just had, we aren't, by the time we were playing football,

we had 50, we could just say. We didn't need to. Just start there. Now, very good job, JBC. Elliot, I'm a little disappointed because I believe you hosted a podcast called iClaudius. I hosted a podcast called iPodius. iPodius, it was about iPodius.

It was about iPodius. It was about iPodius. That's true, no, you're right. I should have, and I did a lot of research aboutius. iPodius. It was about the show. iPodius. That's true. No, you're right. I should have, and I did a lot of research about ancient Rome at the time and everything. Oh, what a show. So it's punishment.

I said, I said, Filler on the Roof was the greatest show. It's the greatest Broadway musical. iPodius, great miniseries. Wonderful miniseries. I did that, yeah. John Hodgman and I, we watched every episode and then talked about him. Which one is iPodius?

From Maine, right? Is that the HBO one? He lives in Maine a lot of the time. I, Claudius was a BBC series in the 70s. And it is, the sets and the costumes look so cheap. At times it feels like you're watching just like filmed community theater, except for the fact that the writing and the acting

is some of the greatest that television has ever had. The writing is amazing. The first episode is a little clunky because there's a lot of history that they have to get out, but there's a scene in, I think the fourth episode where a character dies. I don't want to spoil it, even though it's all based on real Roman history. So like you can, it's easy to look up what happened. I mean, it's based on the books by Robert Graves, which are based on this most

scandalous take on Roman history, where a character is dying and he's on camera the whole time, was listening to a monologue from another character who is speaking to him about why they have killed, they're revealing, this is why I killed you. And his face is almost still the whole time. And at the same time, you know everything he's feeling and you can pinpoint the moment he dies.

Like the actor somehow is able to make the light go out of his eyes and he dies in that moment. And like the Sean Phillips who plays Livia, the main female character who's like the, she's always poisoning people left and right so that her son can become Roman Emperor. She's so amazing in it. You know, it's such, it's a, it's such,

it's an amazing movie and you just have to sit through the fact that it takes place in like three different rooms that have been rearranged slightly, you know, I do hate to do this because I hate to like burst anyone's bubble because obviously it seems like you like the show, but in the 1970s they didn't have the same like laws. So they would just kill a lot of the actors. What? I do want to see a scene based on this. I do want to see a scene.

What? All three of you, JPC, Erin, and Elliot, the three of you are Romans. And this is like evening time. The three of you are at some sort of watering hole, public gathering, whatever it might be. And you've just heard news that Brutus has murdered Caesar and you're just sort of unpacking this information.

Oh, yikes. Yikes, it is unseasonably hot. I could get a towel. Yeah. Oof. A towel's for sale. A whole towel's for sale. Uh, we're good, Palladius. We're good, Palladius. We're good, we're good. That's a Palladius.

What's Palladius' kid? Palladius the Younger. He is... not doing well. I don't think anybody is right now. Wait, sorry. I feel like I'm just processing the news. What did that little kid that was coming up and said, hear ye hear ye say? What did he say? I- wait, are we talking about Palladius? No, no. Before that. No, no, the news kid? Newsius?

Newsius. Newsius, that's right. Oh yeah, I mean he said Brutus killed Caesar. That can't be right. He may have said that Caesar died brutally. Honestly, I feel like the headlines they're going for too much zazz and it loses the message, you know? That's so true. That's so true. But that couldn't possibly happen because we checked for knives

when we agreed each other with our arms. Yeah, that's why we grab each other's arms and shake it so forcefully. But I get I mean they were so close. They were so close that maybe he didn't check. But at the same time, why would he do it? They were so close. You know what I think we need to do? I think we need a better system to check for knives.

I think we need to do like, oh, totally, totally like we all have towns. Sorry, no, we're good. We're good. Yeah, had to try. Had to try. I was talking to my friend, T.S. Adius, and he was saying that if we take the back of our hands and run it down the front of the legs and then across the crotch.

Yeah, but T.S. Adius is a real pervert, and he loves to yell at people real early in the morning. Oh, that's clicking for me now. He says he wasn't keeping those scrolls where he drew what people looked like under their clothes. You know he was keeping them. He was keeping those scrolls. T.S. Idias, yeah.

You're never gonna keep knives out of people. People want knives bad enough, they're gonna bring knives. There's no way to do it. You know, it should even try. Not even worth bothering, you know. I don't know, I don't know. Yeah, you know what? Caesar's dead now, so what does it matter, right?

Like he's, he's... Ah, I keep forgetting he's dead, that's so weird. That was the one guy we didn't want stabbed. Which so crazy, that thing is like, I want it every day. I get up and I'm like, ugh, can't someone just kill Caesar already? Can't they just? But now that happened, it feels weird. It feels like the world got pulled out from beneath me, which can happen since it's not round. Yes, exactly.

You guys were also saying the same thing about kill Caesar? Because I was secretly kind of on the down-low, like, god, I wish somebody would kill Caesar. I think we were all I mean We can you couldn't say that loud, but you could think I mean you never want to wish death on anybody But I know like really sick well, maybe palladius. Yeah, maybe palladius. Oh hi palladius. Hey palladius Hey guys, you might want towels. No still no no we're all good. There's stopping wet palladius There's the wettest house we've ever seen Did you hear about Caesar? Yeah, we just heard. We did.

Yeah, he beat Brutus in a game of Battleship. Yeah. Oh. Oh good. E2 Brutae? Okay. Sunkist Battleship. Very good, Palladius.

Seed, seed, seed. Addle! No! No, not good. No, Addle. Little old me was sitting here being like, oh, I have a joke, but the scene, and then you guys called me in, I was like, you fuckers messed up.

No, you're like, now it's gonna happen. Now it's gonna happen. Half my brain was on the scene, and half my brain was trying to come up with, what is the unhelpful New York Times headline about Brutus? Yeah. It's like, at the Roman Senate, a surprise and greeting,

or something like that. What? Differing expectations for Caesar's appearance at the Senate, neither borne out. You know, like some kind of vague thing, we were like, what are you even telling me? Yeah, probably parsed through this. Elliot, thank you so much for coming on our Riddle Show. Let us know again about your Riddle Show

and anything else you wanna plug or promote. You got it. This is great plugging time, I really appreciate it, thanks so much for having me. This was so much fun, I'm so excited to do it. Thanks for doing this, of course. And it was, let's see, so I'd love to plug, Smartless Presents Clueless, it's a new puzzle podcast.

I host it, Sean Hayes is the contestant every single episode with a special guest of his, a friend or a family member. The first episode it's him and the other two smartless guys, Jason Bateman and Will Arnett, and it should be a really fun, funny show. And the episodes are like 10 to 12 minutes long. They're super short. So it's something you can eat. It's a popcorn-sized snack of a podcast. I've got my main podcast, the Flophouse podcast, where we talk about bad movies. I've been doing that for almost 17 years now. And I'm gonna keep doing it, I think, till I die.

I'm just gonna do it for a long time. So, and other things that I'll... Maybe the movies will get better. No, no, they only get, it's kinda like this in Dazed and Confused when Metaphonetic is like, I get older and the girls stay the same age. We keep doing it and the movies stay bad. But for bad movies.

The, and just a few other small things. I'm writing the monthly Harley Quinn comic book from DC Comics. Pick that up. It comes out once a month on Wednesdays and I'll be writing that for a little bit while. I have a children's picture book coming out next year called Sadie Mouse Wrecks the House. I had a couple other children's picture books out but but this is a new one. And I actually have some other stuff coming out later next year, but it's so far in the future, no one will remember by the time they listen to this. But maybe I can come back sometime

and promote some more stuff. Yes, please. And of course you'll be also on our Springsteen on Broadway Patreon, which we're recording in a little bit here. We gotta do it, definitely. We gotta do it for sure. OK, Adel, anything to plug?

Actually, yes. In fact, I do have something to plug, which is the three of us and our fourth host, Janet Varney, will be at SketchFest Saturday, January 18th from 4 PM to 5 30 PM at Gateway Theater in San Francisco. So if you're in the area, please see us, Hey, We're the Real Live with Janet Varney, Saturday, January 18th, 4 p.m. Gateway Theater.

Erin Keefe, do you have anything to plug or promote? Yeah, I host a monthly show in Los Angeles at the Lyric Theater called Quality Time. So if you wanna go follow that on Instagram or message me to get maybe a comp ticket to come see us. It's a true variety show. We've had a high school history teacher come in and teach us a quick lesson. We're having care. We had Carolers last month in our Christmas show. So like just come in and enjoy. Oh, come and

enjoy that show. It's I'm really proud of it. JPC anything to plug? Yeah, I got something to plug you. Speaking of shows that you can come watching, come watch enjoy. That show, I'm really proud of it. JP, do you have anything to plug? Yeah, I got something to plug you. Speaking of shows that you can come watch, you can come watch World News tonight. Saturday nights at the I.O. Theater in Chicago. News start time, we're now starting at 7.30. We're at 7.30 in the New Year's. So it's, God, I have so many years of me saying that the show is at 8 o'clock. Ugh, Casey, would it be too much if you go back to all the previous episodes where I

said that the show was at 8 o'clock and let people know that the show is at 730? Thank you, Casey! Thank you, Casey! No. Ah, well anyway, that's all I have to plug. Of course, Bruce Springsteen, from New Jersey, but famously was hatched from an egg that was shot here from another planet. Is that true?

Yeah, so what I'm seeing on Wikipedia. Oh, sorry. That's what I'm seeing. Yeah. This is Psychopedia. JPC, congratulations. Your website got off the ground. Jupiter.

And we need money. So please, if you ever considered donating to Psychopedia, we can't do it without you. And it doesn't even have to be money. You can send us a potato. You can send us a lemon with a hole drilled into it. You can send us a thought that you've had. Like if you've ever thought about donating to Psychopedia, we can't do it without you. And it doesn't even have to be money.

You can send us a potato. You can send us a lemon with a hole drilled into it. You can send us a thought that you've had. Like if you've ever thought about donating to Psychopedia, we can't do it without you and it doesn't have to be money You can send us a potato you can send us a lemon with the hole drilled into it You can send us a thought that you've had like if you had a crazy fucking thought that you don't think it's safe to tell anybody Send it to us. It could be something for us. We can put on psychopedia M-O-E-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M-O-R-I-N-A-M- by joining the Clue crew for $5 a month, or start your 7-day free trial, or the Review crew for $8 a month. Plus, you get those ad-free episodes. See you there!