How To Destroy Everything - Pilot Episode: Meet Richard Jacobs

Episode Date: May 24, 2023

The first episode of a wild journey into the world of a narcissist. Meet Richard Jacobs through the eyes of his son and his son's childhood bestie, who follow the clues and put together the pieces of Richard's destructive life. You know, a comedy. Instagram: @how_to_destroy_everything Twitter / X: @HowToDestroyPod Support us here: https://www.patreon.com/HowToDestroyEverything/about If you have any stories about Richard Jacobs or just want to drop us an email please contact us here: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Forecast cloudy and windy and cold this morning, warming up a bit this afternoon with a few sunny breaks and... Sorry, can we just go through it again? Sweetie, we've gone through it like a million times. I know, I know, I just... One more time, please, I'd feel better. Okay. Okay. When's your birthday?

Change the subject. What's the name of your best friend from high school? Oh, gosh. I had so many, it's hard to pick just one. And where do you bank? You really think he'll ask that? Honey, do you have any idea what will happen if you slip up here, if you give him one iota more than he needs? Well, yeah, you said he might, like, sleuth or whatever.

But so what? No, no, no, no, yeah, you said he might, like, sleuth or whatever. But so what? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Not just sleuth, okay? I mean, you give him your birth date and phone number, and he'll find out your social security number. Next thing you know, he's opened up bank accounts in your name. He's buying real estate using your credit score. He's making photo collages, celebrating events he's not even supposed to know about.

And not just that. He's hacking into your phone, listening to our conversations, reading your emails, and for some ungodly reason, he's sending you jade plants every single goddamn year for your birthday. And if and when you decide to do something about any of this, if you decide enough is enough, and you ask him to back off,, God forbid, you call the authorities, he will sue you into oblivion. As a lawyer, he will represent himself, forcing you to spend your life savings on attorneys. And in court, he will reference arcane British case law and submit literally thousands of motions to delay and obstruct.

And you will end up not only penniless, but emotionally bankrupt. and obstruct and you will end up not only penniless, but emotionally bankrupt. So, I'm going to ask you this again. Are you sure you're ready to meet my dad? My name is Danny Jacobs, and I'm a writer, director, and performer living in Los Angeles, California. And what you just heard really happened, as best as I can remember. It was the day I was introducing my soon-to-be wife to my dad. Everything, actually, that you're about to hear really happened, unfortunately.

See, when I was growing up, I always knew my dad was different. At the time, I didn't know why. I knew nothing about his narcissistic personality disorder. But what I did know as a kid was that my dad's behavior always filled me with shame. Literally, every time we left the house. He was arrested multiple times, several of which were right in front of me. He argued with, harassed, and sued people into oblivion. He was disbarred for stealing documents from a federal courthouse.

He was fired from the Securities and Exchange Commission for illegally accessing a classified database. My father was a man who destroyed nearly everything he touched. A marriage, a family, a legal career, other people's lives and livelihoods, my childhood. And over the years, I have tried to wrestle with all this in every way that you can imagine. I've tried therapy, I've tried forgetting, hell, I've even tried exploring it in my work. I'm sure in some ways, I landed on writing and performing as a career out of an attempt to unpack and understand the man that was my father. But none of it worked. And that is frankly why I'm here.

I have a lot of questions. And through this podcast, I'm hoping to get some answers to relive, and yes, probably reopen some old wounds. I don't know quite what to expect here. I'm not sure how this will go, but my dad still follows me around like a ghost. And even though he died in 2015, I sometimes think I literally see him out in the world, still watching me, tracking me, and in a way he is, and always will be. Unless I can find some closure. Thank God I don't have to do this alone.

Hello. Is this, is this where I come in? World, I'd like to introduce you to Mr. Darren Eugene Gradsky. Happy to be here, Danny Aaron Jacobs. Darren, in addition to being my best friend, is also my writing and directing partner. So we have been together pretty much every day for over 30 years.

And it feels like 50. 60. Oh, I was going to say 60. Wow. I guess it's been a little more pleasant for me. Yeah, I guess so. And Darren is truly the perfect person to join me in this ride, holding my proverbial hand as I wade into what I think are

truly terrifying waters. Let me clue you in a little bit more context. Danny and I have been best friends since we were six years old, growing up on the hard, scrabble streets of suburban St. Louis, Missouri. Ooh, tough place to grow up. Tough, tough place. And by tough, I mean not tough at all.

And the 90s, too. A real soft era. What I'm saying is we're soft. The first descriptor, I think, if someone were to look at us and say, describe them in one word. Soft. Yeah, for sure. What this means, aside from us both being soft, is that I have been with Danny every

step of the way. I mean, he lived to this childhood, but I observed it. My parents even went to high school with his dad. They graduated in the same class. And of course, you and I have hitched our wagons together professionally as writer directors. So the ties run deep and long. Anyway, so some of what you're going to hear on the podcast is this drivel. Some of the other stuff you're going to hear in this podcast has become kind of the stuff of lore between Danny and me and our families. But the thing is, is a lot of it expands into the greater St. Louis area where we grew up. Your dad had quite a series of concentric circles of impact.

Right. I mean, even beyond the greater St. Louis area. I mean, remember, he also won a Supreme Court case that changed the American legal system. Yes, how could I forget that? But some of what we're going to get into is also going to be information that we're learning for the first time, like in real time. Yeah, and that, I have to admit, is just a little bit terrifying. I mean, because one discovery always leads to more questions, right? Discovery always leads to more questions, right? So, for example, when my dad died, one of the things my brother and I found out was that he controlled 60 phone numbers under various pseudonyms.

Jesus. I mean, why? What was he doing? What was he doing? So there's a lot to get into. I think then we should really introduce the world, as you call them, to your dad, Richard Jacobs. Richard Jacobs. Richard Jacobs. So Richard had narcissistic personality disorder. We always say that.

Yeah. But I don't know if I've ever asked you, was he actually diagnosed with that? He was, right. During the custody trial after my parents' divorce, he was forced to meet with a psychiatrist. And that was the diagnosis. Of course, years later later my dad had somebody else reverse that he found some like psychiatry student who said that that was not the case but regardless you know i think it's fairly clear that he he had that and like many people that

have narcissistic personality disorder he was never treated right because they all they're narcissists and so they think that they uh you have anything. It's never their fault. Right, right, right. And now what that meant, though, in my dad's particular case was that he was fueled by slights and grievances, right? That's classic. But he also didn't understand any kind of personal boundaries. Like he broke into my email account when I was a kid. He broke into my email account when I was a kid. What?

I never told you that, did I? Yeah, he broke into my email account. When did he do that? Maybe not when I was a kid. What? I never told you that, did I? Yeah, he broke into my email account. When did he do that? Maybe not when I was a kid. That might not have been true. It might have been like when we were in college or soon thereafter, whenever Google Gmail came out. When did he did that? Did he do it once? I didn't tell you because, you know, well, I am rageful right now. I'm angry as if he's here again. And this is what is what I mean actually about him being around like a ghost the wounds are fresh enough that when I hear something that I didn't know

like that I feel the same kind of sense of immediacy in terms of my hurt and anger that I did right when he was alive if it makes you feel any better it's been a few years and I'm over it I'm just sort of still processing

that. So basically, my dad pissed off everyone within a 250 mile radius, right? And as I mentioned, he got arrested several times. But it is important to note that he never spent a single night in jail. Yes. If you had observed his shenanigans, you would be very surprised

at that until you remember that he was an upper middle class white dude in the second half of the 20th century. So he pretty much had carte blanche. Right, but there were consequences. When he and my mom moved from D.C. back to the Midwest after he got fired from the SEC, someone he pissed off

called in a fake bomb threat on their moving van. What? That's ridiculous. There's no bomb in my van. Can someone please turn the sirens off? The police swarmed their van. It was totally nuts. I'm just trying to move my family. And when my parents were dating, there were multiple times, not one, not two, but a few, when they would come out to find the tires on my dad's car had been slashed. Didn't you also have memories when you were a kid where he would, like, pull over suddenly because he thought

somebody was following you guys? How long has that guy been behind us? Yeah, we'd be coming home from dinner or whatever. Hey, boys, do me a favor. And my dad would... Keep an eye on that Pontiac back there....think the car behind us was following him. Boy, that guy's a little close. He would pull over to the side of the road. You know what? I'm just gonna pull over and let him pass.

And I always thought it was crazy, but... Oh, Oh, no reason, boys. Just seems like he's in a hurry. Knowing what I know now, I understand that it's possible that he had angered somebody so much that they were following him home. That was a real possibility. So there's a lot to get into. There is. Now, let me put a pause on this for just one second.

Yeah. All kidding aside. Okay. I don't like to put kidding aside. I know, because that's sort of the point that I'm about to get into right now, which is that we're jesting. We're having some fun. But this is really going to be for real uncharted territory here. I mean, you and I, we play in the waters of fiction all the time.

You're a performer. You improvise. You play characters. You've been improvising and playing characters, frankly, since I've known you, since you were six years old, as a means of coping with all of this, I assume. And so now we're going to open all of that up and get into all of that.

I don't know what we're going to discover about your dad, your mom, your brother, you and me. I mean, this, I don't know. Like, is this a good idea? We've both become fathers the last few years, right? And like, I found, one of the things I've found is that as a dad, a lot of this stuff has been bubbling to the surface

a little bit more. You know, I look at my kids and I just have this pit in my stomach that comes up where I'm like, are they okay? How so? Do they have what my dad had? Oh. Right? And so on one level, doing this, I don't know, maybe I feel like it can help me prepare for that if that's the case. I mean, I don't see that. I don't see that in them, but from every indication hearing about my

dad, like he started behaving the way that he did from a very young age. Um, and so I think that's part of it, but I also think that there's something else I think that may be even more important when I really kind of get down to it which is that my my childhood was was filled with a crazy amount of chaos and pain right and every day there was something and I I think that I just, I just, I think I need that to be worth something more than just that pain and chaos. Like I think I need it to have some benefit to myself or somebody else. Some, somehow I think I needed to have some value beyond just causing tears, anxiety, and self-doubt. And I think that's what I'm trying to do here. I'm trying to find my own meaning in this, in what is an otherwise unbelievably harmful event. That's a far better answer than I could have imagined

and a pretty strong directive I think for us. I'm on board. Let's do this. Let's see where this goes. Alright. So let's go back now to the way we opened the podcast which was that scene with Katie, your now wife.

Because I have a lot of questions about it and I know that it was a really big deal. It was. I mean, I was introducing him to the woman I was in love with who I knew I was going to marry. And in this moment you felt like you actually had to prepare her as if she was about to engage in an interrogation. Oh, yes.

And so, okay. So you did that. I did. And then what happened? Well, we were meeting for dinner and I desperately wanted it to go well. I mean, I was anxious about this for days. And by the way, when I say I wanted it to go well, it's not like I was worried that Katie would make a bad impression or anything.

I wasn't worried about her at all. I just wanted my dad to be a normal human being. You wanted him to be a dad. I wanted him to be a dad. And at first, it was, I mean, it was going great, honestly. Like he was smart and funny and charming and we were getting along. And because he could do that, by the way, if he wanted to. He could turn it on.

And so I'm sitting there thinking, thank God. I mean, it's going to be okay. All that worry was for naught. It's going to be okay. And then I went to the bathroom. Oh, dude, you should have held it in. I do not have what you might call a robust bladder. No one's ever accused you of that. So when I came back, like two minutes later, my dad's got this notebook.

Okay, so that's your birthday. And what about your phone number? No, I think Danny can... You know, you know, just in case of an emergency. 555-4742. And your address? Oh, I'm not sure Danny would want me to... No, no, no. Don't worry about Danny. He's very uptight.

Paranoid, even. I'd love it just to have it, so I can send you a gift or a card. 1-3-0 North Hamilton Avenue. Oh, I meant to ask, do you like jade plants? Danny! Now look, look, look. My wife is from the South, okay? So she's got this kind of genteel, I don't want to upend the apple cart kind of thing going on. I don't know that our Southern listeners are going to go along with that idea that they're all spineless.

I'm going to go on the record saying, Southerners, I think you've got some backbone. Yeah, I also don't know if I've correctly used the phrase, upend the apple cart. I don't think you have. So anyway, what I mean is that no matter what I said to prepare her, she was just not going to create a ruckus. It was not in her DNA. Totally. I mean, look, I think any of us, your meeting potential in-laws here, are you really going to say, no, I will not give you my phone number? Of course not.

You're going to go along with it. You're not going to, what was it again? Upend the apple cart, Darren. I'm going to stand by it. That's our new phrase. So, yeah. So, I see this. I'm going to stand by it.

That's our new phrase. So, yeah, so I see this, and, like, I see this happening at the table as I'm walking back in, and my heart just sinks. Dad, give me the paper. Oh, don't be ridiculous. Dad, just give me the paper, please. Katie, I'm sorry you have to see this. Danny sometimes can be very— Why do you need her birthday anyway? So I can send her flowers.

It's a nice gesture, but you wouldn't really know that because you haven't really thought... And I knew it. I could just feel everything going south. What about her phone number? Danny, Danny, I am not entertaining your paranoia. Just tell me what you need her phone number for, and I will... Well, I might need it to contact her if there's an emergency, okay? Okay.

Now, you're acting like a child, so please sit down. Let's have a nice dinner. Dad, give it to me. What? No. No, that's ridiculous. Please, Dad, please. No, I'm not going to give it to you.

Give it to me, Dad. I already said that I told you. Give it to me. No, Danny, I am not engaging. I am talking to Katie now. Dad, now. I want you to hand it to me now. No, so, Katie, what other plans do you guys have here?

Then I tried to grab it from him. For how, Danny? And then it escalated, and he pulled away, and I tried to grab the notebook again. I am not giving you the paper. No, Danny. Go with the paper, Dad. Danny, you are making a scene. We're going to have a nice dinner.

Oh, my God, Dad. Just let go of the paper. We're going to sit down and have a nice dinner together. And we got into this kind of little scuffle. Did you get the notebook? I did not. Oh. Yeah.

And after this happened at the Booth house, I was on the plane with my girlfriend about to travel back to Los Angeles. And my dad called me when the plane was about to take off. And I didn't have a chance to listen to it then, and so I listened to it when I landed. I assume you'll be getting this upon your return to California, but I wanted you to know how disappointed I am at you, Danny. What an embarrassment.

And I'll have you know that because of your shenanigans, I suffered a heart attack and was taken to Barnes-Jewish? I could have died today. Additionally, I've secured the surveillance footage from the restaurant and have spoken to the sheriff's office, which has put out a warrant for your arrest. Now, none of that was true, but it just goes to show you the kind of power he had over me that it took me a bit before I kind of realized that none of it was true. I mean, I'm 99% sure my dad didn't even have a heart attack, did not go to the hospital.

But the thing is, with my dad, you never actually know. What a sad, sad day, Danny. To think it all could have been avoided if you only decided to act like a decent human. But you're not interested in that. Apparently all you're interested in is playing games, and I'm sure that this incident will cause some problems for you and Katie. I can't imagine she would be interested in continuing a relationship with someone so irrational. You need to really start rethinking your life choices, Danny. Irrational.

You need to really start rethinking your life choices, Danny. You need help. You should consider therapy. If not for you, then for your relationship with Katie. I love you. So we get back to the car after the boathouse thing. And all this emotion just fills me. And I just started to weep.

Because I knew that something fundamentally had changed. And what that was, was that, you know, look, on one level, I knew that we were going to have to change my wife's phone number because I didn't want him to have it. Because he's going to do stuff with that. Right. Identity theft. Exactly. going to do stuff with that right identity theft exactly but you're saying that this was more than just getting that information back yeah it was in that moment that I realized you know my whole life I had been dealing with my dad on my own I mean yes it was my mother and brother, but I knew how to deal with him. I knew at least the best way I could how to handle his thing. But in that moment, I was like, oh, my God, I'm bringing somebody else into this.

And she is not equipped, nor should she be, to be able to handle this person. And I knew in that moment that I would have to make a decision, a choice between my dad and my girlfriend, who I knew was going to become my wife. And I chose her. And I never spoke to my dad again. Did he try to reach out to you at all in those intervening years? Yeah. He would try to infuse himself in my life in all kinds of ways.

He would call, he would show up, he would send these 10-page long, you know, typed letters in mostly all caps. Dear Danny, you are going to be responsible for overwhelming substantial litigation trouble of sending you a very nice jade plant. And you're not even considerate enough to say thank you. What have you become? Recognizing when you failed. But that was it. After all those years, you never went back. That was the last straw.

Yeah, he died a few years later. And now you're completely and utterly psychologically healthy about all of it. Totally. Totally. This is why you need closure. The last time you saw him, it was a fight. Right. And then you ignored him for the remaining years of his life. Maybe what we're doing here in this podcast can give you, on some level, what you never actually got to have with him. I mean, that would be amazing.

And cheaper than therapy. Sure. Although I suppose with a tad less privacy. You're assuming we have listeners. You're right. I shouldn't make that assumption. If it's just you and me. Yeah, yeah. I could be your therapist.

Yeah, that's true. So look, what I'm wondering is, this is a little uncomfortable. You have some Richard Jacobs-like elements. So I'm sort of like, et tu, Brute? Like, are you concerned that that's, you know, we don't tend to get less extreme as we get older. Do you worry at all that you might turn more and more into Richard Jacobs? It's my greatest fear. It is.

It is. I, uh... I mean, look, thankfully, I think I was saved by this moment of clarity I had as a kid that makes it so that I don't... I don't really think that I'm going to turn into him. I can remember this moment super distinctly, okay? I was six years old, and I was walking to the bus stop, and some weird shit had happened with my dad that morning, of course. And I remember just having this thought that popped into my head that was like,

Oh. Oh. He's sick. That was just like this message from somewhere that bubbled to the surface. And it helped me realize that he was separate from me. Right. He was suffering from a mental illness and you were not going to catch it. Yes, exactly. But look, I mean, I still grew up with this bizarre, complicated monster.

And an upbringing with someone like that is going to have repercussions. Oh, yeah, for sure. Like I have issues with authority. You? Yes, yes, yes. No, I've only seen that every day of my life. But that's because I grew up with this authority figure who was totally irrational. I think, though, I want to make sure that we do cover the other side.

At this point, we've painted a mostly negative picture of Richard. But the truth is, he was more complicated than that. Yeah, he was. I mean, when he died, I gave the eulogy at his funeral. And one of the things that I said was that my dad was someone that loved very, very deeply. He just didn't know a healthy way to love. And that was particularly true for my brother and I. I think that's one of the most interesting aspects about him because, yes, he was a narcissist, but he wasn't like abandoning the family and going off and doing his own thing.

He desperately wanted you guys in his life. We were extensions of him. You were. You were. So there was a narcissistic tendency there, but he was ostensibly, from his perspective, doing what was best for you, even if it wasn't necessarily wanted by you. Yes, look, all the time he was aggrieved on behalf of himself, right? But sometimes, sometimes it could have the ancillary benefit of helping others. Right, like broken clock twice a day kind of thing. Exactly. So the problem was that there was no controlling him, so he could turn on you at any second. Absolutely.

You know, he's always railing against somebody that got in his way and often institutions. And on occasion, those institutions, they deserved it. Sure. And he was a hero for us in that regard. The example that's coming to mind is Bristol's. Oh, please. Let's talk about Bristol's. So Bristol's was this very snooty, I say very snooty, it was not a very snooty, but it was an upscale seafood restaurant in suburban St. Louis. And my dad was so excited to take us there.

Welcome to Bristol's. Three for lunch? Uh-huh. Right this way. Whoa, they have a fish tank! Those are lobsters for eating, dummy. Okay, okay, you guys want some? Yeah. Aren't they super expensive?

Probably. Whoa, you're the best, Dad. Hi, folks. How we doing? I'll be your server tonight. Are you ready to order? Yeah, my boys will have two each, and why don't you bring me four? Four. Four what? Four what?

Lobsters. Wait, they aren't very meaty, are they? I'll take five. This is awesome. Yeah, I know, boys. I know. So, nine lobsters. You're right.

Make it an even ten. We'll get a doggy bag. Whoa. All right. So, I love it. it you're 110 lobsters yes we are um all right like a quick okay wait wait stop stop stop stop so i'm just trying i'm i'm i'm watching this 10 lobsters yeah okay what are you thinking i'm terrified i mean i know something bad is gonna happen right but the thing is with dad, the way that bad things would happen would always be unpredictable. So I was filled with dread.

And you're eating these lobsters, which I believe is one of your favorite foods. It is. It's in the top three. But you're not really enjoying yourself, right? I mean, you're just, like you said, you're filled with dread about what's about to happen. That's correct, yes. So, okay, the bill comes. The bill comes, and my dad's like, Ha, just give me a minute.

And he leaves the restaurant. So now my brother and I are sitting there. The waiter's there. Time must have slowed down. Oh, time has slowed down. And then it all becomes clear. So it turned out, okay, I didn't know this, but it turned out that this restaurant, Bristol's,

had a promotion surrounding Earth Day where if you bring in a wine cork, you could get a dollar off your meal. Okay. So weeks before this dinner, my dad starts stopping at all these wine stores in and around St. Louis. I'm now filled with the very dread

of what you talk about here, of what's to come. And I never went in with him, so I didn't know what was going on. I'd stay in the car. He'd go into the wine store. Five minutes later, he wouldn't come out with a bottle of wine. He'd come out with a garbage bag. And I didn't know what was in that garbage bag.

Eventually, I looked in it, and I saw that it was filled with literally thousands of wine corks. Oh, God. So then we're in Bristol. He comes back in carrying two of these garbage bags full of corks, and he throws them onto the table, and he's like, well, I guess this meal is free. It's like this is a $200 meal and he's he's got 200 wine corks. Yeah. Yeah. The waiter's probably just like, what am I supposed to do with this?

The waiter gets the manager and the manager is like, so, yeah, I was informed that you were trying to pay for the entire bill with a bag of corks. Is that right? Surely you didn't think that you could come in here and order every lobster we have and pay for it with corks. What is your dad's response to this? Well, so he pulls out the ad and he shows it to them. I surely don't think that I was misrepresenting what I see on the coupon. Thing is, he's right. Like, they did not include a maximum number of corks that you could use to get dollars off your meal.

And so he's like... I mean, show me on the coupon where it says it. Right. So, I mean, at this point, at this point, Richard is right. Bristol's fucked up. They just need to honor their mistake and give this man a free meal. Yeah, yeah. And so the manager says...

I understand. But it's the spirit of the promotion. Oh, your dad does not believe in the spirit of promotions. Yeah. And so my dad, now feeling wronged, is not letting it go. This is uncalled for, and now you're making personal attacks, and I don't appreciate it. It is uncalled for, and I don't appreciate this. Please do not.

Did you guys just see that? He assaulted me. And you're doing what exactly? Well, I'm just sinking further into my seat. Like, my whole body is filling with shame. Right, because this is now a scene. This is when Richard goes too far. People are watching. Like, my whole body is filling with shame. Right, because this is now a scene. This is when Richard goes too far. People are watching. Yeah, it's a total nightmare.

And then it starts to get physical, which would often happen. Someone would put a hand on my dad's shoulder. He would overreact. Oh, God, I remember those moments. He assaulted me. Did you see that? Did he put his hand on me and assault me? Okay, all right. I'm going to sue the entire establishment. But I do want to say it's important to know that my dad

never was the physically aggressive part of it. No, he would never initiate. No, he would never put his hand on somebody or push somebody or anything like that. My dad's power was in the use of his words and the law and the threat of the law and the patriarchy to make sure that he was protected. So, okay, what happens?

So we get kicked out. My dad is banned from Bristol's for life. Okay, you know what? Just leave. Just leave. Thank you for your service. It's on the house. Have a nice day,

and please don't come back. Come on, boys. Richard can't go back to Bristol's. Richard can't go back to Bristol's. God, you know, I'm not even sure who wins here. Well, I mean, you're assuming that that's the end

because my dad now has thousands of extra wine corks. Our house is filled with garbage bags full of them. Wait, he's got multiple garbage bags? What was he going to do? He was going to eat free meals at Bristol's for weeks? Oh, no.

I'm 100% positive that was his plan. He must have been so excited. He was accumulating those wine corks. He was like, I'm going to have lobsters for days. He was Adam Sandler in Punch Dunk Love realizing the loophole in the coupon. So he's not just going to throw these away. He put a lot of effort and time into this.

He went all around St. Louis getting these wine corks. So he decides... Excuse me. If I could have everyone's attention. Yeah, over here. Guess what? It's your lucky day. You see, I've lined up some garbage bags here,

and inside of the bags are wine corks. And if you take those corks over to Bristol's on Olive Street Road, you'll be able to exchange them for a hot meal. Yeah, I know. You're welcome. So the next few weeks, this fancy suburban seafood restaurant is overrun by homeless people looking to score free lobster. My God, that's fantastic. I mean, it's kind of beautiful. It's a fuck you altruism courtesy of Richard Jacobs. You know, it being so food related, it reminds me of my dad, Shiva.

Oh, oh, my God. Yes. You need to. You should tell this. Yeah. So so my dad passed away. This is like 20 years ago. And again, my parents did go to high school with your dad, but they weren't they weren't friends. No, they only really got to know each other through you and I becoming friends. And so we're sitting Shiva, which is, you know, several days. You have this period of mourning and people come over with food. Everybody's telling stories about my dad, remembering him fondly. You're trying to explain a Shiva for those non-Jews out there. I'm assuming there are a couple people out there who might not know what we mean when we say Shiva. So your dad comes to the funeral and then comes to the first day of Shiva and he stays there all day.

And then he shows up the next day. My mom and I are like, oh, that's kind of odd. OK. Richard, so nice of you to come. Of course. It's a huge loss. I mean, I don't know how you're dealing with. And then he shows up the next day.

Richard. Just happy to be here. So nice to see you again. During this difficult time. But then he shows up the third day. Richard. Just happy to be here. So nice to see you again. During this difficult time. But then he shows up the third day. Richard. Wow. I mean, thank you.

Do you have any mustard? And then the fourth day. He came more often than you did. And pretty soon we realized, you know, he's not actually talking to anybody. He's actually hanging out alone. By the bagels and the cold cuts. He is just stuffing his face all day. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

It's amazing. I wonder if my dad, do you think he ever went to somebody's shiva that was somebody he didn't know? Maybe the true sequel to The Wedding Crashers ought to be The Shiva Cracker. It's about your dad. It's a decidedly darker theme. I think we could get Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn to do that. I think to really explore who your dad was,

we need to understand what kind of a woman would, you know, willfully enter into a marriage with a man like that. I mean, like, how does that even happen? Why don't we ask her? I'm right here. Hey! Hey! Mom, why don't you say your name and say, you know, who I am to you.

Hi, this is Sandy Jacobs, and I'm Danny's mom. And then give us one fun fact about yourself. Okay, my name is Sandy Jacobs, and I spent about nine months in Israel about ten years ago. Nine months ten years ago, Sandy. That is a very fun fact. Very specific. So, Mom, we've got a ton of questions for you, but we want to start with this. What do you remember about the first time you ever met Dad? I didn't think much about him.

I mean, he seemed like he was older, and he had a girlfriend at that time. And do you remember anything about your very first conversation? Well, I remember that he when he like was starting to date me, I remember he was going to have a party at his place. And and I decided to go to it. But he asked me if I would go with him, you know, it's like his date. So I said, Okay. So he wanted me to come over and clean his house before he was having this party. And, and I didn't want to do it. But I just didn't feel like, like, I didn't want to tell him, you know, I didn't want to do it. I don't know why. So he had the impression I was going to do it. And then I just didn't show up. And I didn't do it.

He had the impression I was going to do it. And then I just didn't show up. And I didn't do it. And I came to his house at the time the party would have started. And so he was really mad at me. Over the year that I was dating him, when he was in Chicago, he started having me clean his apartment every time I came in to visit him in Chicago. Finally, I said, I'm not coming anymore if I have to clean and you're going to have to hire somebody to clean it for you. So I did stand up to him on that eventually.

I have got many questions. Okay. Yes. You go first. So you're telling me that some guy that you go on a few dates with is suddenly like, I'm going to have a party and I'd like you to come early to clean my house. Yes. And that was not a deal breaker for you? No, I just didn't want to do it. And in fact, you apologized to him for the miscommunication? Yeah.

Help me understand why that was okay. I don't know. Maybe by then, by that time, I was, when other stuff happened it was actually worse. Like what? But I kind of overlooked it. Always worse. You know. Well, hold on. If there's worse stuff than that, maybe we should

wait until the next episode. Oh, you think so? Yeah, that's okay. You know, to really dig in. I wasn't even planning on listening to the next episode, but I guess I will now. Alright, Mom. Well, in that case, I guess we don't really need anything else from you today, but thank you for being here. Okay. All right, I love you.

I love you, too. Love you. Yeah. Okay, I'll see you soon. Bye. Bye. Bye. How your dad ever successfully courted your mom is something I definitely have a lot of questions about.

And how she managed to leave him. Right. And then after that, you know, she kind of went on this. She had been on a winding journey for a long time. And that winding journey continued after their divorce. Yeah, she was dealing with this litany of lawsuits from my dad. Not to mention he was breaking into her house. He was tapping her phones.

He was brainwashing my brother into believing that she was kind of an antichrist. She also heavily, heavily became involved in the Ross Perot campaign for president. I forgot about that. Yes. In 1992. You know, look at my map. Wait, is that supposed to be Ross Perot? Darren, I'm a professional performer.

Didn't you leave the podcast off saying that? We'll cut that for sure. Okay. Oh, and then she also became obsessed with this TV show called The Fugitive. A QM production. The TV show, by the way, not the movie starring Harrison Ford. This is the show that inspired the movie, and the show stars David Jansen, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Harrison Ford is sacrilege.

Right, right, right. So this show was in the 1960s. It ran for like three seasons. My mom became president of the Fugitive Fan Club. She wrote fan fiction, and she helped organize national conventions all over the country where they would go to a city where they shot an episode and, no joke, recreate the scenes from the show. In fact, she even changed her license plate to read Fugitive, which kind of looks like Fug-tive. It sure does. That license plate, I believe, is still Fugitive?

F-U-G-T-I-V. It is still her license plate to this day. It is still her license plate to this day. And so one day I asked my mom why she was so obsessed with this old TV show from 30 years ago that nobody remembers and nobody cares about. And this was at a time when my dad was breaking into her house, was suing her constantly, tapping her phones, etc. And she had this really interesting answer. I did finally figure out what what it was about about the fugitive that I liked so much. And once I figured it out, then I wasn't so worried about why am I so obsessed with it. The reason was, is I felt like, I felt like a fugitive in my own life. And I just was depressed about it. And then just this idea that somebody can do good or somebody can live, have a life and still have a problem of somebody chasing them all the time. So that's what it was.

That was the effect that your dad could have. Yeah. After he died, my brother and I were going through his house. Which, by the way, his house, I should just note, is the kind of place that would make most hoarders look organized. His bed, there was like only just enough space for him to sleep. The rest of it was completely covered in piles of papers. There was a man-shaped crevice in his bed that would be where he would sleep. Barely, like on the edge Of his bed

Yeah Anyway his house You were saying You went through his house Yes yes yes We're going through his house And we discovered That if two doors

In the house Were open to the same angle At the same time A secret compartment That my dad had built Above the bathtub Would pop open That's quite the discovery

Yeah well so inside We found a forgery station, a stolen notary stamp, all this paperwork relating to bank accounts and credit cards and my name and my brother's name. My God, what was your dad up to all those years? That, that, that is the question I have been asking all my life. Like, trying to get a handle on exactly how much devastation he left in his wake. trying to get a handle on exactly how much devastation he left in his wake. You know, after she left my dad,

my mom got this call from a woman that she did not know in St. Louis who invited her to join a support group. And so my mom shows up at this lady's house. Everyone, everyone, I'd like to introduce you to Sandy Jacobs. Yes, that's Sandy Jacobs, right? Sandy, meet everyone. Hello, how are you? Thanks for having me. Hi.

Why do I feel like they're all staring at me? Well, there's one thing I didn't tell you. This isn't a support group for divorcees. What do you mean? I thought that you said... Everyone is here because of Richard. Oh, oh. We've all been sued and harassed by that menace. That's what this is. A Richard Jacobs support group. Oh, gosh. And Sandy, I hope you're with us because we're going to fight back. Oh, gosh. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait, that's crazy. Wait, this was actually a support group

that was dedicated entirely to people who had been sued by your dad? Yeah, they had regular meetings. They had a newsletter. There were dozens of them. And once my dad's law license was suspended, which is a whole other story, they set out to make sure he was permanently disbarred. Okay, well, I mean, clearly we have got to hear more about that in our next episode, I mean, clearly we have got to hear more about that in our next episode, which is when we're going to find out from Sandy Jacobs if Danny's dad really did destroy everything. No, no, no, no, no. Darren, we're not going to do it.

All right, let me try again. How to destroy everything. No, no, you don't have to say the name of the show. What are you talking about? I thought that was the end. No, it isn't. This is the end. No, it isn't. This is the end. How to Destroy Everything is written and directed...

Wait a second. Start over. You're doing great. How to Destroy Everything is written, directed, and created by Danny Jacobs and Darren Grodzki and produced, edited, and music supervised by Joel Pissig.

That's wrong, right? It's Paisic. Paisic. Starring in alphabetical order, Danny Jacobs, Carolyn Jania, Jonathan Kaplan, Kyle Kennedy, Shana Lawson. No, it's Shanae. Okay. Shanae Lawson, Jamie Moyer, Roxanna Ortetega Emily Pendergast That's wrong

Let's start over Bruce Wexler Harrison Wexler Hartley Wexler How to Destroy Everything is a production of Aileron Films Thanks for listening

Okay so when are we going to do another episode?