Jordan, Jesse, GO! - Ep. 100: Old Home Week

Episode Date: June 1, 2009

Guest Chris Hardwick joins Jesse and Jordan to talk about The Bonnie Hunt Show, Jesse's high school reunion, and more.

Give a little time for the child within you, don't be afraid to be young and free. Unto the locks and throw away the keys, and take off your shoes and sex and run you. I'm Jesse Thorne, America's radio sweetheart. And I'm Jordan Morris, boy detective. And this is Jordan, Jesse, Go! Icicles, tricycles, ice cream, candy, lollipops, popsicles, licorice sticks, Salmon, friendly, maggoty, maggoty, twiddle, Jesse, go. We're joined by the great Chris Hardwick to discuss the Bonnie Hunt show.

More Twitter talk. Plus my high school reunion. Let's go. It's Jordan, Jesse, go. I'm Jesse Thorne, America's radio sweetheart. I'm Jordan Morris, boy detective. Oh, wonderful guest with us today, Jordan Jesse Goh. I am Jesse Thorne, America's radio sweetheart. I'm Jordan Morris, boy detective. Oh, wonderful guest with us today, Jordan. Wonderful guest. Why are you giving me the silent treatment? You gave me this look like, wonderful, I don't know.

No, it's because you said it too sexual. Oh, well, he is a pretty sexual guest as well. I mean, he's got one of those kind of essential stubble. He's got some product in his hair. Either that or it's just unwashed. It's possible it's unwashed. Lean and mean. My hair's full of sex.

It's greasy with sex. Just rub a handful of sex in before you leave the house. That's right. Am I allowed to start talking now? Yeah, absolutely. No, you are probably allowed to start talking. Chris Hardwick. Hello.

Yes. Chris Hardwick from Hard and Firm's stand-up comedy, Nerdist.com, the internet's most popular Twitterer for some reason, and also from the television program Web Soup, which is coming up. It's not yet on television. It's about to be on television. Yeah, it'll be on Sunday, June 7th. June 7th.

At 9 p.m, and then Sundays thereafter. Forever! This is fantastically timely, then. This really worked out well. This is people are ready for WebSoup. People have been emailing me for months. When is there going to be a show where Chris Hardwick, the great Chris Hardwick,

makes a little joke about a dumb thing that happened on the internet? And those emails have been answered. They're digital prayers, really. That's how I like to think of emails. Digital prayers. Were you equating yourself with God at this point? I guess I kind of am. You're on deep cable and you've already gone mad

with power. Yep, that's right. You have a God complex. That's the G in G4. Oh, you know what? I'm totally, I'm thinking of the wrong emails. I've been getting a lot of emails where people were asking, when are they going to do a show where that black lady who replaced Greg Kinnear for a while on TalkSoup makes fun of internet jokes? But I don't know if that's going to happen. Yeah.

Because she's getting, she's actually getting a talk show. Is she really? What's that lady's name? Aisha Tyler. Aisha Tyler. Oh, I should have said Hal Sparks. That would have been funnier. Totally missed that opportunity.

We'll never have that moment again. Did you know that Conan O'Brien, this week, is returning to The Tonight Show? I read this profile of him in The Times Magazine. And Conan O'Brien, there were people who were ready to fire him uh during his first two years on nbc like to the point where at one point they tried to get him on a week-to-week contract oh that sucks isn't that horrible a week-to-week contract well i remember that show you know having a little bit of problem have a little bit of a problem getting off the ground and then finally they hit their stride and it really was like about season three i think yeah and they and they he ended up on a month to

month contract which is only a marginal improvement and the reason according to this uh new york times magazine article that he didn't get fired was that greg kinnear told nbc that he had decided he was going to be an actor and not a late night host because they wanted to fire Conan and replace him with Greg Kinnear. Oh, and you just know that? I mean, this business isn't hard enough. First of all, it's hard enough to get jobs. Then you start getting jobs

and you're shooting pilots and you're like, well, I don't know if these are going to get picked up so I don't feel comfortable with that. Then they get picked up and you're like, well, am I going to be replaced? And then you don't get replaced

and then you're like, well, this is probably going to get canceled. You never... I don't think it's until the... Because even three because even, like, three seasons isn't quite enough. Like, Arrested Development, three seasons. If you get into four or five seasons, you're probably okay. But by that point, then four or five years have gone by of just, oh, am I going to get fired? Yeah, like, who can just kick up their feet and relax in show business?

I guess you have to be on CSI. I guess maybe those are the only people who have a good night's sleep in hollywood or you have to be an explosion and know that michael bay is always going to be there and that you all you always have work the only person who can truly relax in show business is gary sinise that guy knows he's gonna be fine He's living the life. Right? Yeah. What show is that guy on? CSI New York.

CSI New York? Which I've not seen an episode of. I've never seen a single episode of any CSI, I have to admit. I saw one episode of CSI, and it was a CSI that I did, and that was the episode I saw of CSI. What did you do on CSI? I played a guy who you think might be the killer. I was the red herring. Oh.

But then I turned out not to be a killer, just a jerk. Oh. I just turned out to be a jerk, not actually a killer. But there was actually a murder. There was a murder, yeah. Now that you've branded yourself, do you always go in for the role of the guy with square glasses who presses the button that says enhance? Enhance 30 times. Enhance.

Enhance. There, you can see it. Yeah, when you go in for an audition, what are the other guys sitting around you like? Oh, I don't audition that much theatrically anymore, but there was definitely a collective of guys that I would see, like Ken Marino, I would see at auditions all the time. Theatrically, when you say you don't audition much,

you're talking about Broadway shows and off-Broadway shows. No, no, that's where Hollywood has bastardized the word theatrical. So we're talking about like Cats, Joseph and the Amazing, Technicolor Dreamcoat. Television theater. Television and film theater. Eugene Ionesco. Well, yes. Theater of the Abscoat. Television theater. Television and film theater. Eugene Ionesco.

Well, yes. Theater of the Absurd. That's right. Okay, great. Any of that stuff. Anton Chekhov. Chekhov or, you know, Tier 2 Cable. I've heard that there is a script for Uncle Vanya, the TV series.

Really? I've heard, and I've heard that it's good. Oh, yeah? Really? Is it going to be Wallace Shawn? He that it's good. Oh, yeah? Really? Is it going to be Wallace Shawn? He played Vanya. That's appointment television, right?

Wallace Shawn comes to visit once a week. Thank you very much. We're talking about important things now. Did you know Wallace Shawn is extraordinarily rich? What did he invent? He is an heir. Annoying voices. He's an heir to a huge fortune. I don't remember what kind of fortune it is,

but he's super rich, and that's why he is like one of Broadway's most acclaimed high art theater writers. Because he's so wealthy. Yeah, because he can just do anything he wants. He's also apparently a brilliant playwright as well.

Right, right, right. Yeah, so his life just bounces between three things. Writing an art theater play that plays off-Broadway, being extraordinarily rich because he inherited something from something, and being a sight gag in a movie. Listen, kids, this is

a big lesson. Inherit a fortune, and then you can do whatever the fuck you want. No matter how brilliant and multi-layered his stage plays are, people will still get to go to him and go inconceivable i i did a nickelodeon show and i based a whole character around wallace

sean where i did we did i did a cartoon called the x's and uh i did a character that was loosely based on this and like that was the character i'm like i just want to do wallace sean and i got hired and then i realized after the first episode, this is murdering my throat. Why did I? Now you know the hell that Wallace Shawn lives in every day. And he only has his millions of dollars to give him solace. If you really think about it, Wallace Shawn inherited two fortunes. One was the millions of dollars from whatever industry his parents were in,

and the other is his his million dollar look. That's right. Yep. That's his face is his other blank check. He got his first role. He got his first role in a Woody Allen film because Woody Allen was casting for someone who could be a sight gag. The basis of which was someone who looks even funnier than woody allen and that went out on a breakdown and someone's like hey i think that might be i always and someone was like you

know who would be perfect for this high-minded playwright wallace sean character actors really they they really have to be comfortable i remember even before i was that familiar with how the business worked when i was watching total Recall. And then there was... In the theater in 91 or whatever came out. I like the idea that before you really know about show business mostly you just watch a lot of Total Recall. You just watch Total Recall.

And then you try to figure out, is it a dream? Is it not a dream? How do I make it? At no point during Total Recall did I think it was a dream. Is that a popular theory about Total Recall? But at the end, you don't know because he says, how do I know if this is a dream or not? And she says, you better kiss me before you wake up. How do I know that?

I swear to God, I've not seen that movie in a decade. But anyway, there's this scene where there's the giant woman trying to get into Mars. And then her face opens up and it's Schwarzenegger. There was a breakdown that went out. And it says, we were looking for an actress who was so large that Schwarzenegger could conceivably fit inside you. And someone was like, I'm comfortable with that. And

she got to be the two weeks lady. Not just I'm comfortable with that, but like hey! Yeah. I'll do that. I'll jump at that chance. But not too far because I'm big and fat. My ship just came in. I did an audition recently and they sent me the sides, which is the little bit you have to read in the room. You lost me.

Sorry. Yeah. Sorry to get you inside. Sorry to get you inside baseball with you, Harvey. Jordan, I couldn't follow that. Should I just go watch Total Recall again? Yes, that's probably best. Okay.

Anyways, they sent the side, and they sent the whole script, and I didn't bother to read the whole script. I just read my sides, and it was kind of the character was kind of an uppity bartender at a wedding who wanted to be called a mixologist and had all these kind of complicated drinks that he wanted to make and wouldn't pour anyone a beer. want to make and wouldn't pour anyone a beer um anyway so i read the sides and i went in and uh in the room kind of waiting to audition it's me and the tallest most handsome black man you've ever seen it's just me and all these really like great looking super cut muscle shirt black man uh-huh um and then i realized oh uh this is an african-american movie and i will be playing the nerdy white guy like i'm the i'm the uptight white guy who won't give them i thought their drinks at the bar i thought maybe that you that the the issue was that like that the casting call actually was supposed to go out to gordon morris the tall

handsome african-american guy or phil morris uh who was invented cigarettes no that's philip Paul actually was supposed to go after Gordon Morris, the tall, handsome African-American guy. Or Phil Morris, who was... Invented cigarettes. No, that's Philip Morris. Okay, sorry. Phil Morris was on, I think it was I Spy, maybe? No. He was on one of those 60 spy shows, and then he had a son, and his son, Phil Morris, played the Johnny Cochran character on Seinfeld. Oh.

Is it too late to say something about Garrett Morris? Might be. Maybe. Yeah, what about Morris Day? Can I bring in Morris Day at all? I think it's just about time. What time is it? Would someone please bring me a mirror?

You've been listening to African-American performances throughout history, mainly just 1981 to 1988. Involving the name Morris. That's very specific. Yeah, that is an incredibly... I feel like we did a pretty good job. Did you know, actually, did you know that Elvis Mitchell is making an HBO documentary about that? Interesting.

Yeah, a lot of people don't know that, with a famous African-American photographer. Yeah, a lot of people don't know that. With a famous African-American photographer. It's called African-American Performers Named Morris Throughout History, but primarily through the years 1981 to 1989. You don't even have to write a treatment for that. The pitch is in the title. You can't figure it out after the title. Yeah, exactly.

You're going to sell that in the room. Yeah, well, Elvis Mitchell can sell it in the room. Look at me. Look at my gravitas. Look at this gravitas. I'm huge. Look at my gravitas. Look at this gravitas. I'm huge. Look at my dreadlocks. And here's a check.

Here's a big novelty check. Are you saying that Elvis Mitchell has to pay people to make his movie? No, no. That's HBO walking out and then making a deal and taking a photograph. I think Elvis Mitchell is so rich that he goes to HBO with and that's how he closes the deal. He just shows up. He just no, he just shows up. He tells them what the picture of the project is.

They say, well, that sounds pretty good, Elvis. And he says, will this seal the deal? And he brings out the novelty check. Wow. So I feel like we're all on different pages as to where the novelty check fits in to this to this uh right so in my opinion in my opinion elvis mitchell for some reason pays networks to harris programs and he pays with a giant novelty check in my uh in my version the novelty check was his friend and could talk and in chris hardwick version, it was like your version, but he spoke with the voice of Wallace Shawn.

Ah, here, I'm from Elvis Mitchell. Sign on the back of me. Oh, that feels good. We'll be back in just a second on Jordan, Jesse, go. Love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, don't feel like you have to be married to a person just because you kind of said it in an emotional moment. I mean, I know that you were... Take the rest of the show and think about it. And really think about what might... I know you were running hot just now.

Yeah. So, you know, if you want to... Oh, I should just be Nerdist. Chris Hardwick Nerdist. Sure. Yeah, because that promotes your website. Right. Yeah.

Unless you want me to be like... How did you... Electric seafoam. Are you on the secret Twitter people list? or are you just on TV and also charming? Because I remember once in a while you can't remember. Somebody wrote something, and you're like, I can't remember what that was. And so you click on their thing to look at their Twitters that they sent out. I used Twitter just on the web.

look at their twitters that they sent out i'd use twitter just on the web right and and somehow you seem to have spontaneously gone from 20 000 or so to 350 000 or something 400 000 yeah i i think they um yeah i think you're on that secret list because steven johnson this author who was on the sound of young america great author really wonderful writer, he was on some kind of list of people that they suggest or something when you sign up for Twitter. And he went from – and a great guy, but he just Twitters about his daughter's – I mean genius level guy, brilliant, brilliant writer. But he just Twitters about his daughter's softball game. And he has 300,000 followers or something like that. I think I might be on the suggested users list. You're also on, I mean, you're on the attack of the show regularly.

I blab about Twitter on everything. Like, I'm so gay for Twitter. It's crazy. You went on the, if you talked about it on the Bonnie Hunt television program. You've been back on the Bonnie Hunt I did not talk about

a Bonnie Hunt. Did I tell you about how much I enjoyed your appearance on the Bonnie Hunt show? Is this unironically appropriate? Yeah, completely.

I watched it on your website. You posted it on your website. I did, I did. And I watched it and I enjoyed it. I thought Bonnie Hunt was really charming and funny. Can I just get a brief

description of what you did on there, the Bonnie Hunt show? Was it for tech expertise? It was for techness,. Can I just get a brief description of what you did on there? The Bonnie Hunt show? Was it for tech expertise? It was for techness, yeah. I just brought on a bunch of gadgets for... Gadgets that the ladies might enjoy. Bonnie Hunt hit on him a lot?

Like a dildo. Yes, I brought on a dildo. One of the latest 09 dildos. I brought on the iBod, which is a vibrator that hooks up to your iPod. Chris is an expert on dildonics. Yeah, which is just a fancier way of saying electronic dildo, which I guess technically is a vibrator, but these have Wi-Fi. Right.

Why are we not making these, guys? We are sitting on a fortune. Why aren't we making them? Literally. Literally. Well, the one I'm sitting on doesn't have wi-fi yet so it's not worth it we're gonna be wealthier than wallace sean but it was great i i told you think i'm making fun of you for going on the bonnie hunt show but i am sincerely saying i

thought it was really funny i thought it was really cool how bonnie hunt hit on you and you hit on bonnie hunt you hit on Bonnie Hunt. Yeah, there was a little bit of flirting. There was a little bit of flirting. There was some chemistry, and she was really funny. I've never seen the Bonnie Hunt show before, so I can't speak to it. Well, it's funny because when I watch it with my girlfriend Janet, whom you both know. Sure, television's Janet Varney.

That's right. So I said to Janet, like, oh, before you see this, you've got to know I was flirting with Bonnie. And she was like, I don't care if you fuck her. She's really funny. You get a pass. Bonnie Hunt is my sex-ception in any relationship. It is kind of neat. It's definitely kind of neat. Hers is Josh Hartnett. Hers is

Bonnie Hunt. I think Rosie O'Donnell is... I'm not comfortable asserting that she's a net positive in American culture. But one thing that she has, you know what I mean? When you do the Excel sheet. Yeah, I mean, like, you know, she's done a lot for gay families. That's great.

She's not funny, so that's bad. You know, like you have to balance one thing against the other. Jesse, are you putting a league of their own into this spreadsheet? Yeah, a league of their own. I like a league of their own. This used to be my playground. That would be a fun song to do in a coffee house, but real seriously.

People would be into it. But one good thing that Rosie O'Donnell has done for the world is she said, hey, what if a daytime talk show was funny? And I think that it's great because daytime talk is like, obviously, it's always been the province of women. Like it's like 75% female audiences and that kind of thing. And so it's like, oh, you can, a daytime talk, it's a place where you're allowed to let ladies be funny. You know, they won't let a lady host one of these late night talk shows. They won't let a lady host basically any other thing.

And it's nice because, I don't know, I mean, the Ellen DeGeneres show, Jordan used to work on the Ellen DeGeneres show back in the day. Not for me, obviously. It's like a cute little kid doing a cute thing, and then, you know, something like that. And then a dog attacks the kid. It's a lot of what went on. Like, you know, they have a child guitar prodigy, and then just out of nowhere, a dog would run in.

Just a mauling. Yeah. Now, that seems like a show I would want to get on board with. Yeah. What's the problem? Yeah, well, you know. Although they didn't allow me in the studio a lot, so I'm just kind of cobbling together What I think was going on

Just from sort of hazy memories But you know Ellen DeGeneres is really funny You know what I mean Genuinely funny Super funny She's like one of the funniest people You know what I mean She's a really top funny person

Who really deserves to have a show I think her show was a failure But Megan Mullally is really funny like she's a really funny lady like good for her that she gets to have a tv show right nice that there's a place where ladies can uh make lady jokes to each other and and laugh at them are we on madmen because that's what this feels hey i think it's great that ladies have a i think it's great that the girls got a place to talking about other, talking about dress shields and whatever it is they talk about. But I mean, seriously, not for me.

But, you know, like I'm sure that like maybe maybe I don't know what a good example is. But you were just the other day on Adam Carolla. I think probably Adam Carolla's audience is probably 70 percent male and 30 percent female. It's probably a safe guesstimate. probably 70% male and 30% female. It's probably a safe guesstimate. And there are things on Adam Carolla that I feel like I get that my wife might not get just because she has a different perspective on things because she's a lady and I'm a fella. You know what I mean?

And there's always been room for that in the world of comedy. Sure. And so it's nice that there's room for the other thing. I agree. It is nice. There was because daytime television for so long was dominated by the Jenny Jones show. Right. And just all those really crappy...

Except for Montel. I like Montel. Really? You're a Montel fan? One time Montel was on XM when I was working on XM. And just the nicest guy. Oh, was he a nice guy? So nice and classy for a guy who did something that was so completely without class.

Maury Povich, on the other hand. No, no, that guy was totally... You know who was on that? They would book... When I was working on XM, it was like right at the very beginning of XM when no one listened to it. And so they kind of had to trick people into coming on by saying XM. Because there were still people who were excited about the possibility of xm like at this point i think most of the media world has figured out oh that's a failure that no one cares about

but at the time at the time it was still like oh this is a national platform right so the big bookings the summer that i was on xm like so one cool thing was i could just when when i got to book people and and like randomly host shows and stuff as an intern because they were so understaffed um i just got to book whoever i wanted basically okay but the when their big bookings of these two producers who ran the entire channel uh you know 12 hours a day of programming the huge bookings were uh the guy who talks to the dead what's that guy john edward john edwards i think just john edward yeah john edward had an entire hour-long special a special interview that we promoted for a week on xm and i

got in a lot of trouble uh because i was on the air before him making fun of the idea of having a guy on who talked to dead people. So you're saying XM had no sense of humor about itself. Not at all. And the other big one was the guy who hosted Blind Date. Oh, Roger Lodge. Yeah. That, like, changed. That was like.

Wow, I could have been in that arena. That's sad. Exactly. You could have been on there in an instant. During themates era that was shipmates era yeah i mean this was this was the things that like these were like game changers as far as these people were concerned like oh my god we we got lodge you know it's funny people who are so people who are so and i i mean i've i've worked in radio for a long time and i feel I feel like I've been lucky enough to work in a lot of different areas. Yeah.

And you always see that in each medium, they all – a lot of them are baffled by how other media works, and it's just so insulated. I mean, you know, if I'm working in radio, where they just kind of feel – I remember when I worked at a radio station here in L.A., and I was doing a TV show at the same time. I remember when I worked at a radio station here in L.A. and I was doing a TV show at the same time. And I'm like, oh, we should do some sort of thing because I'm on television. And they were like, we don't really care about that. But television. You're like, TV. People watch television.

They just like radio. They just kind of think radio is the most important thing. was this amazing thing that uh uh corolla said in one of the first episodes of his podcast that um uh one of our listeners colin transcribed and emailed to me and like changed my life which was that the radio industry of course the radio industry is completely in the tank because for some reason they are completely unable to understand the idea that uh they don't make anything right that they are just a distribution network, and it's a distribution network that's becoming obsolete. Yep. So, which is why they fired Adam Carolla.

Like, oh, here's a star, the only star in all of FM talk. Right? Fuck him. We changed formats on one station. We should get rid of him. On all stations. Yeah.

Exactly. But I gotta say say i think his podcast is a much better forum anyway oh no it's much it's definitely better i think it he was he was a he was a moderately awkward fit in in morning radio format which is like a tremendously crazy difficult format to be in and uh and and they kept sort of putting things from that format into his show like danny bonaduce right and that would just horrible danny bonaduce specifically right i mean i don't know if he's a bad person or not but i'll die i'm not i'm gonna go probably i mean does anything point to the contrary no he's not a bad want to do? She's not a bad person? I don't think so. What about the time he said...

I'm not... But he's so buff. No, okay. I don't know much about the man. All I know is that I tuned in a couple times to the Adam Carolla show when he was on it

and I just couldn't believe that he was a professional entertainer because he was so horrible. He was such a nightmare. But the thing that Adam said that I thought was so amazing about radio was he said it was like it was like I can't even remember what the metaphor was. It was a really great metaphor. It was it was basically that. Oh, it was that everyone in radio were beavers and beavers only know how to build dams. And beavers only know how to build dams.

And it was as though everyone in radio was now on, I think, on top of the Empire State Building. And they were like, how should we get off? Oh, we should build some dams. And like that is, I think, even more than any other medium. That's really funny. And especially commercial radio, but also some other parts of radio to some extent as well. It's amazing. It's true. Like when I worked on a morning radio show that was a pretty good morning radio show as far as that goes in San Francisco, very briefly.

And I was amazed by that. I was amazed by how closed in and specific their world was and i think you know a lot of people forget that television and radio was really just an excuse to put ad to put advertising in front of people like that was just the whole it was it's all you know so when people i mean and i'm one of them like you know when you hear what do you mean arrest developments getting canceled you know fuck you america this you don't deserve this great show And I'm one of them. When you hear, what do you mean Arrested Development's getting cancelled? Fuck you, America. You don't deserve this great show.

And you're like, well, but if they can't... It's just designed to keep people's eyes on a box so that they can watch advertisements, so they can put money out into the economy. So I don't know. I don't know. Well, it's nice. One nice thing about 2009, and it's what you see on the Corolla Show, or we'll see eventually on the Corolla Show, is that the internet means that there's other ways to get some money to make something.

Like, whether it's like us and we're asking for donations. By the way, is this our first show since the pledge drive? I think maybe it is. Yes. Thank you so much to all the people who gave. Tons and tons of people gave during our Pledge Drive. As did I. I was very happy to support this.

Chris did indeed. Thank you very much, sir. To support this house of awesomeness that is... That's why he's on the show today. He bought his way on. I bought my way on. Folks, buy your way on. Normally, we wouldn't let anybody this handsome, professional, and funny

within 10 miles of our program. It should just be exclusively our college buddies. But I bought my way on. Yeah, you buy your way on with a generous donation. Or it's like Jimmy Pardo can sell his thing. And he can say, it's worth a dollar. Pay, give us a dollar or 67 cents or whatever it is. Do you ever have the moment where you sit around and you think, if I were my age 20 years ago, 30 years ago, what the fuck would I be doing?

I would be so fucked. What would I be doing? What could I possibly be doing? For me, I have this really sort of fun, lucky kind of career where I get to do a lot of part-time jobs that I really like. But 30 years ago, there were no niche cable channels like G4. I think your career is really amazing because right at the end of the era where you could only do something famous was also exactly right at the beginning of your career.

And you got a super high-prof profile gig or at least high credibility gig and then you you've been able to use your talent to do things that you like through you know 15 years since i think i think it was just i wasn't getting hired on other stuff like you know you know we were talking about auditioning for for sitcoms and whatever. I fall into this weird category where it's like, well, you know, because from like 99 to 2004, it was you're either the sidekick who's Jack Black. Right. Or, you know, you're fucking, what's his name? Joey. You know, like you're super handsome.

And I feel like I fall in between there. you're super handsome and you know and i just i feel like i fall in between they're pretty handsome i mean so this guy pretty handsome guy right well that's you guys are nice but uh and i mean that i mean that a lot jordan i like your feet and uh and so i think you know it was just a cut like two two years ago i kind of just went why am i not pursuing things that I like? I felt like I had to pursue whatever was available – not available, whatever was handed to me, which were sitcom auditions I wasn't getting, the few three lines in a movie or whatever. And I was like, I love science. I love tech.

I love comedy. Why am I not pursuing all of these things? And then things just things got a lot better and i just felt more in control what was going on so yeah you know this is actually this this idea of you know what the fuck would i be doing 20 years ago um it's a little bit of a source of anxiety for me um because like i i feel like i i look at like the careers that i would want like you know uh you know uh there you know, those kind of consummate stories are like, Eddie Murphy was on SNL by the time he was 17.

Oh, my God. I know. That's the crazy anomaly, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally. But, you know, I guess if there was a guy whose career I would say, like, oh, that's the career I want to be like Robert Smigel or something like that. You know, just a guy who gets to – yeah, anyways, just –

Just write a funny thing. Just write – yeah. Show up on something. Just be in the room with a bunch of other really hilarious guys and make hilarious stuff. You know, I kind of look at that or I look at the other careers that I'm like, oh, that's something I would want to do. And as much as I love my job doing kind of, you know, humorous product related goofs on deep cable TV, I'm like, well, who the fuck did I that I looked up to, you know, like, what am I supposed to do after this? Like, who do I know made the move from hosty goofs to writing for Conan O'Brien or something like that?

Well, I think what's great about now is that there aren't as many rules anymore. It used to be, like in the 80s and even well into the 90s, it was sort of like, if you're a host on television, you can't ever do movies. You can't ever do acting, theater. And then when the internet – well, if you're an internet person, you can't do television. Like everything was very compartmentalized. And then that just – like those boundaries just kind of eroded. And it's like, no, because everything – like media is all connected. And you can –

You know who broke down the walls? Especially internet to television. I was going to say Kinnear. I was going to say the Dancing Baby. Dancing Baby broke down the walls for sure. Dancing Baby was on Ally McBeal. That's right. That was what really started the sea change, I would say.

And now there's a Dancing Baby in every house. I mean, Dancing Baby is a household name. There was a Flying Toaster pilot, wasn't there? Yeah, I believe there was a flying toaster pilot briefly thereafter. But only if you didn't touch your TV for an extended period of time. Did you know I met the people... You leave it on after you fall asleep. That's right.

When I was working on West Coast Live, I met the people who invented the flying toaster. I can't remember what that software company was. After Dark. Oh, After Dark, yes. So the After Dark, the people who... It sounds like probably also the company that made leisure suit larry i don't think they did make that was sierra online oh sorry um so anyway king's quest jesse uh so all games i played the um i used to play a lot of front page

sports football so look at this i played king's quest Quest in college. My roommate had like a 286, and you could run it at 11 megahertz. But then there was a turbo button where in bursts you could kick it up to 22, and then we'd play King's Quest and put it in turbo mode, and then he would walk like twice as fast. Awesome. This is raw computing power! 11 megahertz. The people who invented flying toasters, they made tens of millions of dollars from flying toasters,

and they founded movehon.org. That is spectacular. Isn't that unbelievable? Yeah, it's invented by the people who invented the flying toaster. There's a nice lady from Berkeley. I swear to God, I met this lady. I mean, listen, you know, like the flying toaster?

Totally thinking outside the box. How do we preserve our screens, you know? Well, you just have a kind of a low-impact thing come on to save your screen i remember when my the computer lab at my middle school uh moved from uh moved from uh from like uh apple 2gis to uh the first color max um i don't remember what kind of max they were and then they they had the flying toasters on them. And the computer lab with like 10 computers all with flying toasters going at the same time blew my fucking mind. Oh, my God. I could not believe how amazing that was. When I was in grades, when I was in, you know, because the chess club was in the same as the computer lab.

So that's where I spent all my time. And in grade school, we had Apple IIe's. Only because there was no professional level bowling club. No, there wasn't. Which was another thing that you did as a child. I would have fucking dominated that. Probably wouldn't have dated as I did not. Would not have influenced your dating.

Still wouldn't have happened. Yeah. But, you know, we had the Apple IIe's with kind of the light green text on it. And so we had to play text games. Like Zork was a big game. No screensaver. You would just see the little blinking cursor burned into the corner of the screen no matter where you were. Because we didn't have screensavers in those days. Oh, man. We're having fun, huh, Jordan?

Reminiscing? Yep. Speaking of reminiscing. Talking about business models. Hey, have you guys been to your reunions? Talking about school? You know what, Jordan? Somewhere in here, there's a professional broadcaster, and it's not me.

I went to my 10-year high high school reunion while while we were uh while we were away from the microphone we took we were we were gone for what two weeks or so uh yeah because uh one week jordan was out of town working and one week i was in san francisco going to my i had a weekend in san francisco that involved a baby shower, a baby shower that we skipped, a 10-year high school reunion, and a 300-person at the Four Seasons wedding, black tie wedding. Damn. I know. Right, exactly.

How was your 10-year? Because I didn't go to mine. Okay, so I went to an arts high school in San Francisco, School of the Arts, as it was appropriately called. 100-person graduating class. I had assumed that there would be no high school reunion. There were no sports teams. There was none of these high school.

There's no alumni association as far as I know. I just assumed I can't remember who the class president was and I was student body president. So that's the kind of operation we were running at school of the arts and um but this girl just decided she was going to organize it her name's sari thanks to sari she organizes it right and um that's very school of the arts community-based oh yeah she's she's just going to put it on. A hundred people in our class. Total attendance, 20. 20 people at the reunion.

Where was it? Now, originally, Jordan, it was scheduled to be held at our school, which had moved since we went there. So it was basically, in our opinion, at someone else's high school. since we went there. So it was at, basically, in our opinion, at someone else's high school. Which, you know,

you only got 20 people coming to your reunion, but you have to plan for maybe as many as 100 might come. Plenty of refreshments left over for everyone. So, you know, what are you going to do?

It's fine. It's at the high school. So you got to take home a lot of bags of Trader Joe's trail mix. Yeah, so there's a rule at the school apparently you can't have alcohol on the campus even in the evening so i'm thinking this is going to be yeah

i know what is it all pot yeah yeah only mushrooms mushrooms is the only thing that's allowed um so i am i'm like i you know i don't drink but even as a non-drinker i can recognize that it's a bad idea to have a high school reunion with no alcohol at all. I don't drink either, and sober reunion sounds ridiculous to me. It sounds like a terrible idea, right? Then you have to stand around and try to find things that, what have you been? Oh, God, I wish there was booze. Anybody seen Star Trek?

Precisely. But luckily, unluckily, I don't know. As it turned out, we couldn't afford to hold the reunion at the gym of our old high school. Are you serious? We couldn't afford it. Apparently the fees for using our own... This is the fantastic grasp that San Francisco School of the Arts has on alumni fundraising. that San Francisco School of the Arts has on alumni fundraising. You'd think that maybe just because you guys went to the trouble, they'd throw you the – they'd donate the space.

Exactly. Maybe just write in modern dance rehearsal and let you guys go at it. Exactly. So two days before the event is going to take place, So two days before the event is going to take place, I get an email that says, unfortunately, due to a high fees situation, we will not be able to hold our reunion at School of the Arts on the Eugene McAteer campus. It will now be at TGI Fridays. Which we also can't afford, unfortunately, so it's now a tailgate. It will be near the dumpster by TGI Fridays. And so the high-class catering for this event

was to be provided by a cafe on Ocean Avenue in San Francisco, a very cold street in San Francisco. And at the last minute, they agreed to host us. So I had my high school reunion at a cafe. Open mic night was also going on. So that was a little distracting. So the entire class got up and did three to five. Sure. It was literally, it was that kind of cafe. It was that small, that whatever. There was, you know, the food, there was like a couple of, you know, it's like spaghetti in a pan. And it was, there was also just so bizarrely, there was a table of people, the cafe was closed for the event, but there was a table of old people and I don't know who they were. I heard a rumor that they were friends of the owner of the cafe.

Or was it your future selves who had come back to laugh at the predicament? These people, I'll tell you what these people looked like. They looked like people from a sanatorium in a movie about the USSR in the 1970s. Okay. Like 70-year-old, bold- Crazy eyebrows.

Crazy eyebrows. Not acting crazy, but shouldn't be there and not normal. Not spouting nonsense. This is not an insane asylum, just a sanatorium where people go when they need a rest. You see what I'm saying? Did you make jokes about them? Like, wow, Wayne and Barbara look terrible. Yeah.

They did not age well at all. And what was amazing about it was we really needed them there to fill out the room. Like this tiny room. You just needed seat fillers for your reunion? The seating area was barely bigger than this room that we're recording in right now, the second bedroom in my apartment. And we needed some extra people to fill out the space. There were two performances.

Jordan mentioned open mic night. There were a couple of performances, of course. This being School of the Arts, people were happy to share some performances. This one guy, Cyril, went to my high school. Well, that's a very arty name already. Well, not if you're're this man's a dandy right not if you're not if you're russian if you're russian it's just a normal it's a normal name it's like being named bert but this is america if he was american this guy would be

named bert okay um cyril is really big uh he's sort of like um you know like again if i can go back to like a 1970s depiction of the ussr yes um if you imagine somebody who trained a bear in an american movie about the 1970s ussr she was wearing like a unitard singlet yeah yeah exactly basically in one of those russian fur hats and a big mustache yeah um there's no mustache or any of the accoutrement. But besides that, yes, exactly like the guy you're thinking of. Okay. But really friendly. And Cyril went to our school.

He was in the instrumental music department at School of the Arts. And Cyril was one of those guys. That sounds like special ed for some reason. He was in instrumental music. Yeah. Well, I mean, I'm getting to that part of the description. Cyril. Just lock him in a room with an oboe cyril was that he doesn't murder anyone he was one of these dudes who he was the sweetest guy in the world and he did not have strong english skills

he was russian and didn't have strong english skills for some reason just this one period in my life there was just like i think it was just like people who came to the united states in the years after uh russia became uh capitalist you know the kind of like 1992 or three to like 1997 or eight there was a lot of people russian people came to san francisco and there was a lot of russian kids in my school who were recent immigrants you were saying they were russian to come to america would you use that term i wouldn't but you already have so there you go somebody had to drop it bob's your uncle and there was an old uh there's an old nes game um and the arcade version of this nes game called Russian Attack. Oh, I remember that.

It was you flying in over enemy lines and stabbing a bunch of Russians. I think when it came to the Nintendo, they, I guess, had problems with that. So it was Rush, comma, in Attack. Rush in Attack. Rush in Attack. Anyway.

So this guy Cyril didn't really speak English that well. But there were lots of, there were plenty of people. I mean, it was a public school in San Francisco. There were plenty of people at the school who English was their second language, didn't speak English well. But Cyril had that particular didn't speak English well where you weren't...

And he had this kind of bear-like quality and was very sweet. Jesse, that's racist. It's like saying a Mexican has a bean-like quality. Jesus Christ, dude. And you really... I mean, in all sincerity, you did not know whether or not he was retarded. Just because he just had kind of a retarded-y thing about him and also didn't speak English well so he really couldn't express himself very well what it sounds like you're getting at is a game show on your program called russian or

retarded and that's really that's really fucking kind of racist yeah no it's not me i'm just i'm i'm extrapolating the bones of what i want what you were saying i want to be clear that there were plenty of other russian american students in my school who I did not wonder whether they were retarded. Cyril was very specific. And I saw, seeing Cyril again 10 years later now, right? So we were 18 then. We're 27, 28 now. And I figured out I did not get an answer to the question.

Because number one, his English is still about the same. get an answer to the question because number one his english is still about the same um and he still has a vaguely developmentally disabled quality about him but he might be very articulate in his language but check this shit out right here check this shit out he just got his master's degree from san francisco state university was it in retard studies was it in blocks block fun blocks now here's the thing is that a tetris reference oh no it's not but i was thinking of something a retard would i major in tetris so i can sing all three songs so cyril has a master's degree in music performance in violin which was the instrument he played when we were at school of the arts and he is a good violinist um but he played um uh uh the the he he was like okay i'm gonna play a song for everyone and uh for one thing volunteering to perform was a little bit

questionable but what can you do and then he he going to play a song and we're like, okay. I think when I find out he's going to play a song, I'm like, okay, well, he's going to play something that's so intricate that at least I'll know he's a savant. You know what I mean? At least I'll have that to know about cyril and again cyril is just the sweetest guy in the world but he plays hopefully not a listener to your show at this point i don't think he has the english skills i'm gonna be honest with you okay he'd have trouble following it but he plays the song that goes uh lullaby and good night you know that song yeah i don't know what the name of that song is lullaby

and goodnight and he plays that that was his song that he played which when you think about it is the song that a developmentally disabled person who is a savant at playing the uh the violin might choose to play so i think the answer is not that i think he's developmentally disabled but i 10 years later i thought i was going to get an answer and i did not at all no you thought he was gonna you thought he was gonna throw you a bone by playing something slick yeah and then it left more questions i thought either he would be working at McDonald's and have the same language skills. And the language skills weren't because he was a relatively recent immigrant. It was because he struggled with language skills because of a diminished capacity.

It sounds like what you're describing is a retarded version of It's Pat. Where you can't tell. That's exactly the situation i was in i thought it would either be that or it would be that 10 years later he had developed plenty of like language skills so he was able to express himself much better the worst possible name for that show would be it's tard you should definitely not name the show you should definitely not name it that. That's very offensive. And I also wonder, were you dropping hints like, okay, coins are great for currency or fun to suck on? What do you think? Really nummy.

I also want to be clear, too, that I sincerely like Cyril, and I was happy to see him. Clearly. Yeah. Sounds like you guys were fast friends. No, I mean, he was just a really sweet guy you know like he was just a really nice guy you know what i mean and like he was just really nice and uh but i really felt like i needed to know because you're it's a it's just different in your mind to know i'm not buying i'm not buying this you like him thing like oh and then and then there

was my other good friend from high school the guy who smelled like diarrhea what a great guy i'm not saying this pie i'm not saying this okay let's be clear i'm i would i'm not saying that this guy is for example the girl who wrote the who read the sex poem about elvis the pelvis stoico in class and did the monologue from Double Dragon the movie. We've talked about her before. She was not at the reunion. I did not like her.

Okay. But I am talking about a guy who he was, everybody liked him. He was well liked. He was well liked, but he didn't have friends because he, you know what I mean? You know the difference that I mean? Like, it's not like people totally didn't make fun of him. You're not describing liking him. You're describing people either pitied him.

Yeah. Or they didn't. Or tricking him into saying things so they could laugh at him. Or he didn't do anything that made them hate him. So it sounded like, you know, like, it sounded like everyone's reaction was, he's a fairly benign individual. Yeah. Well, yes. He's pleasant.

He had a sweet temperament. He surprised us all by not murdering a girl because he just wanted to touch her hair which was great and for that we liked him yeah for that thank you for not killing any of us

thanks for defying our expectations and not bludgeoning anyone if I was going to use a different metaphor to describe him other than Russian bear trainer, it might be George from Of Mice and Men. A very gentle man. Thank you for not... Thank you for not punching anyone in the head with your chimp strength.

But I feel like it was... We liked him. I feel like it was a real situation. I feel like it was a real situation. I feel like it was a real problem, even for teachers. Because you can't teach to him as though... You can't just teach him as one would teach a developmentally disabled individual. He might have just been a quiet guy, Jesse. He might have just been a quiet guy.

I tried to... That's the thing. I tried to talk to him at the thing, i because i wanted to kind of know the answer have you known a lot of russians maybe culturally and also because he was sort of like you know he was kind of peripheral and no i i like i said i have known a lot of russian there were a lot of russian kids at my high school and there were kids who talked to each other in russian cyril did not talk to them in russian okay um which is evidence for um him being different even to them in Russian, which is evidence for him being different even to them. In fact, one of the people I was really excited to see was somebody who I found out and was

totally blown away by this fact. I mean, a casual acquaintance of mine named Andrew in high school, who I knew, I mean, I knew that Russian was his first language and he was a Russian immigrant. But he mentioned to me as we were talking that when he started at our high school, he didn't speak any English. And he had been in the United States for three months.

And that blew me away because he was, I mean, the guy's a super genius and just learned english through you know brute force it you know because 14 is like it's not it's like that's pretty old for learning english by immersion uh just naturally like a four-year-old does you know what i mean like 14 is a is a point in your life where you have to in order to learn a new language you have to work at it and have some facility with languages and be smart. You know what I mean?

See, kids, don't be a Cyril. Learn your languages. Anyway, so there was, it wasn't just, but at the same time, like, Cyril has relatively bright eyes. And will engage you. It just sounds worse. The more you try to disclaim it, just the worse it makes him sound. Yeah.

He had soft hugs. I don't know what to say. Yeah, the guy had soft hugs. I don't know. So there was 20 people at my reunion and that was really, really strange. Was it worth it? Do you feel like it was worth it to go?

Well, you know, here's the thing. I mean, my high school was... was i mean there's a certain extent to which i think um high school is just fundamentally traumatic in some way um just because you're adolescent and adolescence is traumatic um but i love i really enjoyed my high school and it's not because i was like a cool kid or a popular kid or something like that like i don't think i mean i i was gonna like i don't i wasn't like a guy that got picked on but like frankly at school of the arts in san francisco the people getting picked on community is pretty tiny right like you have to really like the only person i can think of people who don't have uh high enough arches for dance class yeah well the jocks get picked on the dancers were you going to

play football the dancers would the dancers were you going to play football the dancers would the dancers were probably picking on people to each other as they stood outside smoking cigarettes and having really severe haircuts um but uh you know generally speaking it was not a big pick on any kind of high school and uh a really great like really creative like full of really cool awesome people like i was had a really great, like really creative, like full of really cool, awesome people. Like I had a really great high school experience. So I was really happy to go and see people that I hadn't seen in a really long time. Hardwick, you alluded to kind of a lack of dating in high school, a chess club, a computer club. A Latin club.

Oh, wow. Wow. Would you say that you saved Latin? No, still a dead language. Okay. Is there, do you have an instinct to... Chris was also in the Rushmore Beekeepers. I was in the Rushmore.

Any, do you have any kind of instinct to go back and lord success over people? Does that sound appealing to you? Does that appeal to you? Because you had a nerdy high school experience. And in college, you became a television celebrity, right? You were still in school when you started on MTV? I was still in college when I started.

I guess I probably, in all honesty, and it's not like, I don't know. It's weird because we're not talking about Clooney success here. We're talking about basic cable recognizability, which is different than being a superstar. But I'm going to be real with you, Chris. You're two levels of success above me for a high school reunion purposes, and people were pretty impressed by my success. I don't know. You know, it's funny because I went to three – my family moved, so I went to three different high schools in three different states.

But where I grew up for... It was elementary school and junior high that I did have the society to be like, Fuck you guys. Because I was mercilessly tortured. And I guess rightfully so. You had it coming. For being a... I mean, any kid who brings Atari 2600 cartridges to school, you can't play them at school.

Why would you bring them? You can only show them. Just to hold them if you feel afraid. Just to have them in your bag. That's the security blanket. Atari 2600 cartridges do, based on the cover art, seem like they would be a lot cooler than they actually are. Yeah, this is like graphic

novel type art, and then, you know, It's a square shooting at a triangle. Yeah, shooting lines. Yeah. So, I mean, you know, there was definitely in grade school, I was mercilessly tortured. And, of course, wanted to kind of go back and be like, fuck you guys. Yeah. And then.

I should clarify, too. When you say fuck you, you're doing a complicated fuck you gesture, not the traditional one. It's one where you kind of jab sideways and then turn it up. It's a scoop. And then scoop it up. The truth of the matter is most of them, even if I had done that, probably would have been like, I don't fucking care. I don't think anyone would have cared. And then probably around 2001, I had tracked down. I tried to, you know, whenever I'd go back to visit my dad in Memphis, I would track people down that I went to school with and try to get –

Knife them. Knife them in the face. Give them the old Russian attack. Yeah. Right? Who would believe the guy from Singled Out would stab people in the face and bury their dissected bodies? So, you know, and I tracked this girl down that was... Someone might think of that of the guy from Shipmates, to be fair.

Right, but not the single out guy. Yeah, no. Shipmates guy for sure. He was angry. But, um... But, so, and so I hooked up with I met up with this girl that was probably like the bitchiest girl to me in school, and she was like, you know, I have to say, I was

I had such a rough childhood. I was really a bitch to you and i'm so sorry and i was like kind of like best case scenario you know what i it's you can't hold people accountable when they're kids and everyone's scared and trying to figure shit out and you know and you know and you look back and you think the people who are the biggest assholes to you it's because they were the most unhappy in their lives it just all of a sudden became instantly pointless so did you did your did any of your high schools invite you to a 10-year reunion um one of them did the school that i grew up because i came out to la my senior year of high school and that school invited me to the 10-year and that would be here in los angeles yeah and i still didn't go so easy i know and i, and I blew it off. Jordan, you grew up in the same place

where you went to high school. Yes. Were you in one of those things where you went to high school with the people that you went to middle school and elementary school with? Yeah, for the most part. Yeah, that sounds about right.

Because that's definitely something that I think is... Like, my high school being a... It was a public school, but it was a magnet school, so you had to, like, apply to get in. So it's like my high school being a – it was a public school, but it was a magnet school. So you had to like apply to get in. So it's people from all over. So not that many of the people like went to middle school with each other.

Yeah, I think it would have been different if I had actually – the one I probably would have wanted to go to was back in Memphis where I had spent the most time with people. The one in L.A. I just sort of felt like, yeah, I mean I was friends with a couple people. I wasn't really that connected to anybody. It didn't really, it just didn't really make any, I just didn't really care. I mean, and I went to All Boys Catholic School. I'm like, I don't want to go sit through a mass, you know, just to tell people what's, say, hey, what's up. There's a mass at the reunion? I think there was, yeah.

I think there was. That's kind of bullshit. It was a little bullshit. On the plus side, there's plenty of sacramental wine. There was at the time. And the time I would have imbibed. Yeah. But now.

Jordan, you've got only like a year, like you're a year out because you're a year younger than me. Yeah, yeah. I guess mine will be, I guess I graduated in 2000. So it'll be, probably be next year. Now, you were prom king of your high school. Homecoming king. Homecoming king. Excuse me.

And I guess this is probably the 18th time I've told this story on the podcast, because you bring up my homecoming king-ness a lot. I just think it's really neat. I was elected homecoming king and then found out a couple years ago that a guy I knew who worked in the office rigged it so I would win. Oh, my God. That's amazing. It was actually kind of the... It was kind of bullshit though, because he only found out later. Were you appreciative or angry? No, I thought it was kind of cool. It's kind of even

better than actually winning, is being part of a con. Of an inside conspiracy. Yeah. So, anyways. That's pretty cool. Now, did you touch the boobs of the homecoming queen? That's what you do. That'scoming queen? Did other students perceive you differently because you had gotten this post? Yeah, you know, I don't know. I think I certainly probably raised your profile a little bit. Yeah, no, it was... I'll bet you were like a guy that people really liked in high school, like a funny, outgoing dude.

Yeah, no, you know, I thank god never really had a lot of problem with picked on itness um yeah i never really felt i mean you know i certainly was you know i certainly was was you know called drama faggot a few times right uh but to be fair you were one yeah i mean i was definitely mincing around like a real queen so uh yeah no i was in play i was dressed like royalty in a cape full of dicks. I'm going to be honest. If somebody wanted to start calling people faggot at my high school, it just never would have ended. The faggotry went on for miles.

It would have been a compliment. It would have been fantastic, absolutely. Yeah, no, no, I enjoyed high school all right. I was definitely, I don't have any ill will. And, yeah, I'm kind of looking forward to the reunion, actually. I think it'll be fun. Were you high profile in high school all right. I was definitely, I don't have any ill will. And yeah, I'm kind of looking forward to the reunion, actually. I think it'll be fun. Were you high profile in high school? I didn't realize at the time that I was high profile.

But now, like, people will, like, my wife Teresa and I went to high school together. And it has happened to us where people from our high school have come up and talked to me as someone who went to our high school and not realized that she also went to our high school. Oh, that's weird. And it's totally not because of any kind of later experience with me, like notoriety from my marginal success as a public radio programmer. It's because I was somehow high profile and i was i know i was i feel like in school i was negative high profile and they say any press is good press and i i would say that's not true because i my i feel like i was it was much easier for me in high school because then i went to you know i went to these new high schools and so i could kind of start over but

still you know my personality always caught up you know like you can only fake it for so long when i first moved out to la the the first group of kids my senior year that i fell in with was all like the smoking hot cheerleaders and the football team or whatever and that lasted about a month you know like when you're sitting with like you know these freaking cool california cheerleaders smoking pot and you're like did you see the bobcat goldthwait special you know these freaking cool california cheerleaders smoking pot and you're like did you see the bobcat goldthwait special you know on hbo i can't wait for shakes the clown to come out and then you start quoting it then they're then they're like not so much so then i i you know then i found the group that i i was supposed to to be with you know it was a couple of my best

friend in school was an amazing artist and you geek I just found my fun art geeks and then settled I was like ah this feels right the other thing was not right do you think Jordan the people are going to go to your high school reunion yeah no yeah I think so definitely knowing

knowing what I do it was in Orange County so yeah it seems like I think probably a lot of them I'm going to guess grow up? It was in Orange County. Oh, okay. So yeah, it seems like I think probably a lot of them... I think Orange County is... I'm going to guess a lot of people stay in Orange County. Yeah, it seems to be

definitely kind of a comfy nesting area. Not a lot of... I don't think there's a lot of people who feel like, I'm getting the fuck out of here! You know, just because it's nice and suburban and comfortable.

Right. Weather's good. Yeah, weather's fine. Plenty of skateboarding shoes. Absolutely. Tons. Not going to run out of skateboarding shoes. You can cruise around in your giant pickup truck.

A lot of sublime records you can buy. Absolutely. A lot of sublime cover bands at bars. Oh, that's great. So, yeah. Wow, that's fantastic. You know what? They do requests.

Stop playing. Me another band. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah. I think it'll be fun and pleasant and uh yeah i'm gonna fuck all kinds of chicks all right hell yeah double all kinds all kinds distance five i thought 40 people would show up to my technically that was 10 jesse i know sorry um i ain't got can add. I just got overambitious. You got too excited.

I said something, and I got really excited to high-five Jordan because he's such a great pal. Yeah. You know? And then I just ruined it. I made that great fucking declaration. Anyway, I went to that. I went to a wedding at the Four Seasons.

Had some great hors d'oeuvres. I do not... A lot of people love weddings. Why? Jesse, no. Who loves weddings? Nobody loves weddings. Like certain women do. People love weddings. Wedding crashers love weddings. Yeah. Yeah, the wedding crashers. They love weddings. They did. Vince Vaughn.

Owen, they fucking love... They'll crash... I don't give a shit. They'll crash any wedding you put in front of them. Can I ask you a question about... And then after they're done, they'll be in another separate movie that's attached to that first movie can i ask you a question jordan yes you you sorry have you seen the movie the uh the hangover yet i've not seen it but um you know obviously uh you know uh like a zach alphanakis and i know zach and and i i played poker with Bradley Cooper about a month ago, and he was just the nicest, most charming, funny guy. Very handsome.

And so because I'm a fan of everyone who's in the movie, I'm genuinely looking forward to seeing it. I enjoyed the movie a lot. I'm hoping it's looking like, I mean, we'll see. It's always a knock-on wood type situation, but it looks like I could try and get Todd Phillips on this show. Oh, great. Who I'd love to get because, you know, there's not a lot of people who make funny comedy movies when it comes down to it, you know what I mean? And I

enjoyed the movie. It's definitely will be every douchebag's favorite movie forever. It might. I mean, it might. Even more than and I'm not saying this is because it's bad. It's actually because it's it might. Even more than, and I'm not saying this is because it's bad. It's actually because it's good. But even more than, to some extent, old school is every douchebag's favorite movie now.

Well, this could be a new generation of them. Yeah. And it also has significantly more things that douchebags will love and significantly fewer weird things. more things that douchebags will love and significantly fewer weird things. You know what I'll say about it is that it's not, it doesn't seem like the formula of just like, yeah, we'll just put some dudes in the movie and try to make them be funny.

Zach has a really strong voice that you know will bleed through. Bradley is funny and Ed Helms. Oh, and it does. And so they'll all bring that to the... I think all of those things are totally the case. That baby. Sunglass baby. Of course, Mike Tyson's in and he's very funny. Sunglass baby now because dancing baby was for the douchebags, but all of those things i think all of those things are totally the case the baby's amazing baby uh of course mike tyson's in and he's very funny sunglass baby now because dancing baby was for

the douchebags but now sunglass baby is taking over it's amazing though how you can look at it and just you can see people you you i i was sitting in a totally packed movie theater here in los angeles the douchebag capital of the world and And I could see people just as the film unfolded. And again, I want to say again, I really liked it. But as the film unfolded, you could see people just reacting to it completely differently. And you could just feel people reacting for completely different reasons. It's so great that you say that because when I saw Tropic Thunder here in LA,

the theater was... People were falling down laughing. And then I went back to Tennessee and it was my dad. I'm like, oh, I gotta take you to see Tropic Thunder. And we went and watched. People didn't react the same. They didn't laugh as much and they laughed

in totally different parts like the opening of Tropic Thunder where they show you the trailers from the different things that all the characters in the movie were doing people really thought those were he just said pussy like 50 times but it still

they did not get it at all and it was so interesting to see the cultural difference of like oh yeah yeah you like blue collar comedy where uh you know a hick drops his pants or whatever teresa teresa said to me teresa said to me on the way home they would have that i kind of like i just think when you say that like oh you like comedy where he's just like i like to that like oh you like I like to see somebody just coming on stage dropping his pants

and then everyone standing on stage that's the whole set right there and then guns are shot up into the air Teresa said to me on the way home

that was that was funny because the things they did were so horrible but two thirds of the people in that theater were laughing because they thought the things they did were so horrible, but two-thirds of the people in that theater were laughing because they thought the things they did were so fantastic.

But I think that's a good comedy, though. Do you really think that the majority of people who went to see Steve Martin in the 70s were like, he's satirizing comedy. They liked the first level of it, and then that'sirizing comedy. You know, like, they just, they liked the first level of it. Yeah. You know, and then that's the best comedy where... And he didn't even have Mike Tyson in his, which was a big bonus on this one.

That's right. Well, they yanked him out of the trailers now because his daughter just, yeah. What happened? His daughter died. Died in a treadmill accident. I mean, like, just a couple of days ago. Wow. And so the last couple trailers I've seen for the movie, he was not to be seen. Oh, wow.

Well, I'll tell you one really great thing about this movie. Zach Galifianakis does Zach Galifianakis-y stuff in it for the length of the film. I would say it's not a full-strength Zach Galifianakis thing, but it's Zach Galifianakis playing to his strengths, and he's fantastic. And he's going to be a movie star now. i think that's really smart of todd phillips i mean that's a good director who will who will recognize hey you're funny for this reason you're but you just do what you do and we'll make that's a really that's a really special thing that i think uh i i think is like one of the reasons that to some extent we're living in a golden age of comedy is that is, you know, I think that's one of the greatest strengths of, you know, of the Judd Apatow world as well is really seeing what's great about performers and even performers who, you know, like, I mean, I think just for example, I think Seth Rogen is really amazing. Just for example, I think Seth Rogen is really amazing, but he also has these certain specific skills that if he was just making, I don't know, Adam Sandler, you know, Happy Madison movies, they wouldn't play to his skills and it would just fall flat, I think. And I think in the context of this, of somebody who's really nurturing the things that he does so well, he can not only be hilarious doing the thing he does that he's hilarious at,

but he also can grow as a performer in a way that he wouldn't have, I think, if he was just doing the kind of movies that Rob Schneider does. And I think that's when you have actual comedy people writing and directing films, that's the difference difference as opposed to someone that's like, you normally do horror movies. Come in and direct a comedy, and then that person does what they think. I've liked your commercials. A comedy is, as opposed to the performer, director, or writer who understands. And they just figure maybe somebody like a Bill Murray will just think of some funny stuff to say.

Yeah, exactly. And he will. Yeah. And it'll be great. And it'll be so much better than what you could have written for him. Yeah, but when you're putting together these... I think that's really something special that Todd Phillips has done in his movies. I mean, I think of something like like uh uh like uh craig kilbourne

in old school wasn't it old school that craig kilbourne was yeah and craig kilbourne is like perfectly cast in that movie he's so funny in that movie i mean he's fantastically funny it really like it's really a perfect distillation of his greatest comic skills and i i mean i like i actually like cra Kilborn okay as a comedy performer overall. That makes one of us. Yeah, exactly. So I think Craig Kilborn's moderately funny.

But in that movie, I think he's fantastically funny because they really found the right place for him. I was watching, I Netflixed Hot Rod recently, and I was watching that last night, and Will Arnett plays kind of the Craig Kilborn role in that. He's the waspy, jerky boyfriend. I'm like, it was so like, and just does such a great job, and I'm like, man, that's an archetype that I will love to play,

but I'm having to just convince myself that it'll just never happen. Yeah. Like there's no universe that I would be good at being the waspy, sweater-about-the-shoulders boyfriend. It's the world of Chevy Chase. Yeah, sure. It's the world of Chevy Chase. Only Chevy Chase is the one who could make it almost appealing or palatable, almost relatable.

Right. That was his magic touch, was the ability to take that horrible character and bring it just close enough there's something about him that people could actually kind of like him like in fletch or something like that he's just going around 400 times acting acting mean and weird and crazy and saying nonsense things god that's funny you can't write that movie like you i mean maybe maybe a lot of that i don't i'd be interested to find out if fletch was like how scripted it was yeah and how much was was just the yeah we'll just let chevy just you know like throw in some chevy isms i mean

it just it was such a that movie was such a connect for me as a kid yes and especially when yeah well i'm not you start me talking about how much I love Chevy Chase. It's going to be a long conversation. Community. You might talk about it almost as long as you talk about whether or not someone is retarded.

Shut up, Jordan. We'll be back in just a second on Jordan Jessico. La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, I'm getting a lot of sponsorship inquiries. People like this. That is great. People like the... That's a nice thing to do. I invented a name. Lately, we've been having all these personal announcements on the sponsorship. That's called our Jumbotron-style announcement. That's when you pay $100 to get an announcement about somebody.

You know, somebody has a birthday or somebody graduated from something. Jumbotron. It's like the Jumbotron at the baseball game. Will you marry me, Sheila? Exactly. We would love to have somebody pay us $100 to have us make their wedding proposal for them on this thing. But anyway.

I guarantee you that's going to happen now. If it is, it's going to be awesome. I'm all on board for it. My friend of mine, Dr. Sean Wiley, recently defended his dissertation successfully and became a doctor. And not a medical doctor, obviously, a doctor of social science. And he went to the baseball game with his dad.

And his mom paid for a thing that said, congratulations, Dr. Wiley, to come up on the Jumbotron. And I was like, yeah, that's fucking awesome. That's pretty sweet. The Jumbotron is great. That's a great thing. They really got a great hustle going. Obviously, radio, not a visual medium. No.

So this is the equivalent. If your person listens to, when I say it's like the Jumbotron, I mean I'm assuming the people go to sporting events and listen to Jordan Jesse go during the game. Right. So in that case, it is sort of like that. So what's on the Jumbotron this week? Ah, we have a great commercial announcement this week.

It is VGgkids.com. This is a screen printing business. Kids with an S, kids with a Z, which is it? That's kids with an S, my friend. VGKids, they're sponsoring us all this month, Jordan. They're really awesome. I talked to the guy, James, who's the owner along with his wife. It's one of these awesome kind of like screen printing businesses

that people who are really cool and artistic do because they want to be able to make a thing. You know what I mean? They make all kinds of beautiful, amazing stuff. Anything that you can screen print, but that includes not just, I mean, they'll print stickers, T-shirts, that kind of thing, the kind of things that you would expect.

But they will also print business cards, stationery. They're seriously, they just, he told me they're just about to start with printing stationery. And like, if you're like a, like stationery at this point, you really mostly need, unless you're a, you know, a big business that sends a lot of business correspondence for times when you need to be classy. I feel like screen printed stationery, perfect for times when you need to be classy. But in a world where people, where emails don't take a lot of time, if you write

a handwritten note on professional looking stationery to someone, it will blow their freaking mind. Especially if it's screen printed instead of being offset printed or something like that. It's artistic. It says, I'm creative and amazing. That's like something you would get from something you bought off Etsy.

You'd get a screen printed handwritten thank you card. Exactly. Plus, let's just say you want to make 300 stickers. They'll do it for $57. That's another additional advantage of VGKids.com. And above all that, I talked to James. I said, you're going to sponsor us for a month. Jordan Jesse Goh's listeners, they need to print stuff. They need a printing discount.

So the printing discount, 15%. All you have to do is mention Jordan Jesse Goh when you place your order. They will give you 15% off right off the top from VGKids.com. So our special thanks to VGKids.com. Of course, if you want to sponsor Jordan Jesse Go, you can. Just email me at jesse at MaximumFun.org and we'll set it up from as little as $100 a program for a personal announcement. And if you're thinking of proposing to someone... Oh yeah, we will ruin that.

We will ruin that up. There is no podcast on the internet more romantic than Jordan, Jesse, Gal. What you just demonstrated to me is that you would propose to someone with a series of throat clears. Yes. That was Morse code, but I don't think you... Yeah, I'm sorry. I guess you don't speak Morse code.

Oh, right. I guess you never got your ham radio license, Mr. So-called Nerdist. Sorry, war veterans. Too busy with your Latin. That's right. We'll be back in just a second on Jordan, Jesse, go. Love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, love you, That was good. Nice. I like that. You know why Chris can do that kind of thing? Hmm. He's a pro. This guy is a professional. I'm a professional talker.

This guy has been a professional broadcaster since he was in college. It's true. He's funny, handsome, came over at the last minute when our other guest canceled. That's right. Got a television program. You're our Tony Randall. How does that feel? I'm going to have a kid when I'm 75 and gay.

You're going to be pumping them out, my friend. Pumping out the babies. This was a nice, like, today's been my first day off in a while, and it was like I had to fly to San Francisco yesterday just for six hours and then fly home to cover something for G4. Jeez, Louise. Okay, so we had asked you to come on the show before the pledge drive, I think, maybe.

And then at the last, like something came up, Jordan had to be out of town or something like that on the day that we were hoping to plan. We had to cancel on you. And then I was scared to ask you back because you have been in that intervening four weeks or whatever it has been since that day when you were going to come in here and we canceled on you.

You went from unemployed nerd gadfly, semi-employed nerd gadfly, doing your various gigs on the Bonnie Hunt Show and Attack of the Show, other ladies' daytime television talk programming. Right. Filling in for a Sprinkles, Kevin Sprinkles Pereira. Right.

Doing a field report on something. Making a blog post on Nerdist.com. To being over-employed by virtue of the fact that you got a hosting job on your own television program. It's true. And it's not just your own television program, because hosting job on your own television program. It's true. And it's not just your own television, because you've hosted your own television program before. People have heard of a little show called Shipmates. A few people have. People know about that.

The people who were actually on the show and then a handful of other people. And you're no stranger to the world of hosting. I think a few months ago you hosted a network television pilot. You're an accomplished television... I did, I did. ...hoster. I did that. No doubt about that.

But this is not just any television program. No. This is not just any Chris Hardwick's television program. This is like if you took... made a list of things that Chris Hardwick would be a great show host of and then added them all together, you would get this new television program.

I hope so. I don't know who in Hollywood is making that spreadsheet. That's how people get jobs. That's what Robert Zemeckis does now. That's right. He works on that spreadsheet. It looks like... Oh, Judge Reinhold.

All right, well, spreadsheets don't lie. We better get Judge Reinhold. Maybe we should take a second look at that. Nope. It says Judge Reinhold. Yeah, it says it. It says Reinhold. All right, well, spreadsheets don't lie. We're going to get Judge Reinhold. Maybe we should take a second look at that. Nope. It says Judge Reinhold. Yeah, it says it. It says Reinhold. Reinhold.

So your new television program, Web Soup, this television program is part of a franchise of television programs. Yes, part of the soup franchise. What are the soup-related... You got Talk Soup, of course. Well, just the soup. Talk Soup was the old version. St just the soup. Right, Talk Soup. Talk Soup was the old version.

Starring Greg Kinnear, if I'm not mistaken. No, I think you're thinking mid-'90s, Jesse. Yeah, right. Talk Soup now is hosted by Joel McHale. Right, Talk Soup with Greg Kinnear. That's right, Talk Soup with Greg Kinnear. Gotcha. And then there's sports...

That's on After Conan, if I'm not mistaken. I think you might be mistaken. Yeah? Yep. Okay, I thought it was on... I was under the impression that it was on opposite opposite maybe it was on opposite tom snyder no tom snyder has retained his time slot and he's on before byron allen okay gotcha so now everything's everything's everything's in place gotcha gotcha gotcha and then morton downey jr will be the late night

fantastic fantastic where does where does the don imus show fit into all of this? It doesn't. It doesn't? No. No? It doesn't really fit in. What about his late night talk show? No? No, I don't think his late night talk show fits in.

What's that? Uplate with... Can we just end this? The GM mystery hour on the Dumont Network. Okay. Can we just stop this bit and go on? There you go. Night flight.

Can we watch night flight? this bit and go on? There you go. Night Flight. Did you watch Night Flight? So there's Sports Soup is a sports version of the soup on a channel called Versus. That's not even a real channel.

No, it's a real channel. I don't mean to offend the Viacom Corporation, a powerful... It's Comcast. It's not Viacom. Comcast Corporation. Whichever corporation it is

that owns the Style Network. Style Network has the dish, which is like Lady Soup. Okay. There you go. Back to Versus real quick. I know that you're probably not entrenched in this.

You're not entrenched in this. It's just kind of part of your peripheral television family. But you created this. You created Versus. I created the Versus channel. I was like, me, Chris Hardwick, I don't understand anything about sports. I would like to create a channel devoted to sports. Well, I think the original concept about sports I would like to create a channel devoted to sports

well I think the original concept was that it would be about child bowling yeah and then of course then when the network gets its hands on it childhood bowling

is the first thing that gets polled your flagship show for that network was what ball does this go to that's right and they didn't like

that for some reason they didn't like it for some reason I was just going to say maybe the mistake made the kind of confusion with Versus. I know Versus as a Japanese movie where the Japanese mafia fights zombies. This is not a channel devoted to that.

No, no. It's more sports. Is it just about the zombies or just about the Japanese? It's about zombie bowlers. Right. But it's regional. It takes place in New England, so it's candlepin bowling. Uh-huh. Which, listen, people

love zombies. They love candlepin bowling. Right. So my point was, why not something for everyone? An entire channel, 24-7, of zombie candlepin bowling. Right. And then, you know, as you go through the process, like I said, the network kind of changes stuff, and then instead they put on sports soup.

I like sort of like radioactive monsters and lawn bowling. Is there any? We're on the same. Listen, you're preaching to the choir. I don't run the channel anymore, so I can't do that. Okay, I'm not trying to.

Look, I understand that your power, while vast, is nonetheless limited. Yeah. Can I just close this out by saying vampire lawn darts? Yes. I'm just going to go ahead and then just put a cap on this. Vampire lawn darts yes i'm just gonna go ahead and then just put a cap on this vampire lawn darts so anyway so you know now you've got so the the common element of all these programs

is they show a little clip of something and they make a joke about it that's right and joel and yours so there's there's the entertainment daytime talk show reality shows on joel joel does that joel mckale does that beautifully. Oh, he's fantastic. Very funny guy. So they look at this and they said they wanted one with spiders. No, I mean, yeah, there might technically be spiders at some point if they appear on the internet. So you started a spider one.

Or all arachnids. It's not all arachnids. There might be some arachnids from time to time. Okay. It's lycanthropic curling. Uh-huh. Great. Man, I thought that discussion was over.

I was dead wrong. Listen, you put a werewolf on ice. Yeah. It's good stuff. Yeah. Well, it turns out you left some runners on base, and Chris Hardwick had to knock them in with a Grand Slam home run. Sure.

Some runners on base. So,wick had to knock him in with a grand slam home run. Sure. Some runners on base. Not all spiders all the time. It's a fun format. It's a natural format. I guest hosted TalkSoup in the early 2000s when they were in between Hal and Aisha.

I loved doing it then and then when when joel who actually i had known joel before he got cast on the soup and when he got it my first thought was ah fuck i really want i didn't even audition for it like i really wish i had done that show but then you know joel's joel's super funny so he's like all right i get why they put him i mean at least at least they didn't give it to someone that you're like, really? I mean, you know, Joel was a pretty natural fit for that show. I'll tell you this about that Joel McHale. I don't like, I hate reality shows.

I also am uncomfortable with making fun of them. But that Joel McHale does a really kick-ass job. He's great. He's very funny. He's really great. And so, you know, it's sort of i mean of all the of all the soup franchised shows i feel like you know web soup i just don't want people to think oh you're trying to do a joel mckale voice i i'm doing pretty much the same

thing that i've done for 15 years and i mean ultimately what you're trying to say is that joel mckale is stealing your ass i'm saying his whole career is based i'm saying that he has done he's done the suit format so beautifully shipmates that i hope there is room in people's hearts for web soup well i think there is room in people's hearts because there's things happen on the internet that need to be mocked yeah do you will you be wearing the nice suits that Joel McHale wears? No, I'll probably be wearing a lot of what you're seeing me wear right now, which is a t-shirt and jeans. Self-promoting t-shirt. Well, this is a self-promoting t-shirt, yes.

How come you're allowed to wear your own t-shirt? I'm told that I'm not allowed to wear my own t-shirt. I've been told by certain people. I'll tell you why. I'll tell you why, because, and this is coming from a person who has a box full of singled-out crew jackets that never touched my body. You just wore singled-out crew jackets around. Now it might be funny. Yeah, that would be really good. When I was at the movies watching that insider screening of The Hangover, there was this kind of like old disheveled guy

wearing a crew jacket from Midnight Run. Oh, man. And you know he worked on that. Yeah, he totally did. Here's, I think, something you see in L.A. that you don't see in any other city in the world is when you go into a poorer neighborhood, you see kind of poor kids walking around in growing pains. Yeah. Yeah.

Or, you know, like something more recent, like like you'll you know, like you'll see a, you know, a chubby Latino kid in the proposal T-shirt. Yeah. I saw I was at the I was at the Goodwill the other day and I it took me about five minutes to decide not to buy an Andy Barker P.I. baseball cap. You always you know i find out that a lot of the stuff you buy at the thrift store ends up going back to the thrift store you think it's going to be funny and it's it's a circle but uh i feel like it's okay for me to wear it's something that's attached to my blog because i don't make any money from that and it's not really a thing it's just sort of a goofy personal so i sort of feel like maybe it's maybe it's not really a thing. It's just sort of a goofy personal. So I sort of feel like maybe it's okay.

So it's good to make a t-shirt of it. I mean, here's the thing. I'm obviously not wearing this expecting people to be like, hey, you have the Nerdist blog? Like, I don't think really most people don't know what it is. You're not wearing the shirt to get laid. Exactly. And I think that's the great divider. You know, like if you were to wear something and think, this is going to get people to notice me, no one is going to have any more idea of who I am because I'm wearing this T-shirt.

Here's the thing. We printed Jordan Jesse Go T-shirts on these really nice blank T-shirts. And I always open my drawer on a day. I'm not a big T-shirt wearer. But when I open my drawer on a day when I just want to wear a t-shirt, I look, I always think I should go for that Jordan Jesse Go t-shirt. And I think, uh, I think, uh, I can't, because Jordan convinced me that it was, I just shouldn't do it.

It does have your name on it, though. Yeah, it does. Which could be a little weird. It does have my name on it. I think you could totally wear a Sound of Young America shirt. Really? Yeah. Because your name's on that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is that the rule? There's no name on it? It's weird to wear your name on your body. It is. Unless you work at a gas station. It's like something a five-year-old does. So, okay.

Let's go back to web suit because that's what we were talking about before I derailed it with this important conversation. That's all right. On the topic of what t-shirt you can wear. Okay. So, you got this web suit. You just made the first one yesterday, right? Friday.

We made it Friday. How did it go it was so much fun i mean listen this it's probably the most fun job i've ever had because i'm really involved in the process and uh and i like everyone on the show and it's and like at the core of it it's just fun so i hope let me ask you this this you had two you had you hosted these two shows that uh that are that are family roots of this show you're making you've done a lot of hosting on attack of the show which does a lot of tech stuff has a segment that's sort of like uh here's some web videos and here's some jokes about them right um you've hosted uh uh the soup uh which which was obviously literally the forefather of this program. Yeah, I hosted TalkSoup like eight years ago for an episode or two. Okay, but you've done both of these kinds of television.

Yes. So when you're making this new show, what turned out to be surprising and or difficult or unexpected? Well, I mean, the difficult thing is just getting rights to clips. You know, it's just like Jordan and I were talking before about just tracking people down who put stuff on online and say, hey, can we give you a little bit of money to sign over so we can air this? That's sort of – I mean we can't just put on everything we want. You have a week as a news media type show. You can run anything you want for about a week because you can claim that you're reporting on it it's fair use rather than showing

it as entertainment right and then after that then you then you kind of then you need to have the rights to stuff so you know it's just it's it's it's just playing in that ballpark and like okay here's what we can get and then just sort of you know writing jokes about that but what but i love about the format is that it's it's very similar-up. I mean, it feels very stand-up-y to me, which I love doing. Stand-up with a little visual aid. Stand-up with a little visual aid, because there is a live... You know, I mean, the original...

Obviously, the original TalkSoup was literally just the crew in the studio. And... But now, like, the soup in our show, we actually have an audience. And if you want to be in the audience audience and you're available on Fridays at 2, you can email Web Soup at – oh, no, that's not it. Shoot. What's the – oh, I think it's Soup Audience.

Oh, crap. Go to Nerdist.com. Go to Nerdist.com. It's up there. We'll also put it on the forum discussion of the show. Right. Okay. So anyway, it feels very much like stand-up to me, which is a lot of fun.

Yeah, that's awesome. I'm excited to watch this program. I hope people like it. I mean, I... And by watch it, I mean steal it from the internet. No offense. I don't know people. That's fine.

That's fine. Yeah, but I imagine there will be clippage and bits and boops online after the show airs and stuff. They tend to... I assume there will be. They tend to do that with G4 shows. They'll podcast them. I mean, AOTS gets podcast. And they put a bunch of the clips on the G4 website.

There's going to be gags, yucks. Gaffaws. Chuggalugs. Chuggalugs. No, sorry. be gags yucks guffaws chuggalugs chuggalugs no sorry every time after midnight by eric clapton comes on my girlfriend janet and i always double over with laughter at after midnight we gonna chuggalug and shout which is one of the lines of the song it was a line that someone wrote down looked at and was like yep I'm going ahead with this. Thumbs up.

You want to edit that? Nope. Nope, this is going on my rock album. That's not going to seem ridiculous in 20 years, but no. It doesn't seem ridiculous now. Why would it seem ridiculous in 20 years? People are going to be chuggalugging forever. And shouting right afterwards.

I'm Eric Clapton. Slow hands. And chuggalug doesn't even seem like a particularly british phraseology like i don't even know what chug-a-lug well maybe maybe what chug-a-lug is is something like if if like an uh an old-timey mississippi guy grew up in england he would have a fucked up understanding of both of those things and come up with a nonsense phrase like we're going to chug-a-lug. Well, surprising that the song had that much more appeal than just to the Mississippi Brits. Maybe it's satirical. Maybe it's kind of a Randy Newman-esque character piece that he's making fun of.

I feel like what it was was a temp lyric. Oh, yeah. I feel like it was a temp placeholder lyric when he was making the song and then they were just like He was gonna punch something in later. Ah, fuck it. So right here would be something like, we're gonna chug along and shout.

Of course we'll change that to something that makes sense. Alright, I've written a really great line that I'd love to go back in and change. We just released the... What? What? I'm sorry. You didn't fucking keep Chuggalug on there, did you? That was a fucking placeholder! And then we have Chuggalug and Shout.

After midnight. That's why they call Eric Clapton Chuggalug. You should never Chuggalug before noon. If you do, you'd seek help. Sure. After midnight, always. After midnight is the only time you can Chuggalug and shout. Okay, so when people are going to want to watch this television program,

it starts probably shortly after you listen to this podcast, if you listen to it in a timely fashion. It'll premiere June 7th. It's a Sunday at 9 p.m., and then that'll be its time slot. Sunday's at 9 o'clock. At least in the immediate future, yes, Sunday's at 9 o'clock. So you can watch it after you watch The Simpsons, And then that'll be its time slot. Sundays at 9 o'clock. At least in the immediate future, yes. Sundays at 9 o'clock. So you can watch it after you watch The Simpsons. And what comes after The Simpsons?

Family Guy or King of the Hill? King of the Hill got canceled, didn't it? Not familiar with Fox's animation domination block these days. I'm trying to encourage people to watch Web Soup. Sure. I think after The Simpsons on Fox, you just get the Indian head. Right. And the national anthem.

And the full spectrum. And then the color bars. And then that's it. There's like an airplane landing or whatever. They cease broadcasting until the next broadcast morning after The Simpsons, which is a perfect time to go over to G4. Only because they canceled House of buggin though and malcolm and eddie no no no that actually that was upn that was on the upn i think you could have said culture clash the tv show drexel's class you know oh you beat me to drexel's class damn it oh

gotcha you got me on herman's head got me i was about to say something something i only i and and if you don't have G4, I feel like... I think it is part of a channel package for most people. But I think it's... But G4 has a pretty full-bodied web offer. I think G4 is worth the money. You know, like X-Play is a great show,

but Video Games Attack of the Show is nerd CNN. With our friend Kevin Sprinkles-Pereira, one of the most beloved guests on this program. Kevin's phenomenal. I love Kevin Pereira. And he's a super smart, cool, this program. Kevin's phenomenal. I love Kevin Pereira. And he's a super smart, cool, funny guy. He's great.

Sharp tack. Super sharp. Great host. I mean, not to imply that Twitter is some sort of contest, but you are beating him as far as followers goes, right? You've physically beaten him as well, right? I mean, you beat him up. Yeah. Kevin's a buff guy. Yeah, he is kind of buff.

I think it might be tough to take him down. He's kind of buff. He's one of those nerds that works out a lot. Yeah, he works out. I mean, I exercise regularly, but he really works out. And, you know, he's somehow managed to... He's a nerd with abs. So I don't know how that happened, but it did.

No one who knows that much about Power Stone should be cut. But it seems that's an anomaly. That's the way it works. That's an anomaly. No one who has a customized game cabinet in his house is in that good of shape. But Kev is. But also, they'll show reruns of Lost with the little pop-ups on and Cheaters is on G4. pop-ups on and cheaters is G4.

I feel like any time I walk past a TV that has G4 on, I'm like, oh, maybe it's Kevin Sprinkles Ferrer or Chris Hardwick, my friends that work on G4, and it's cheaters. No, I don't get some sort of a quotation middle nickname. Well, when he came on the show, when he came on our show, his nickname was Sprinkles. Because he brought us donuts. He brought you donuts.

How nice. See, that's the kind of guy Kevin is. He's a fucking class act. That's the kind of guy Kevin is. Not that you aren't a class act. You're the class act who came here on 20 Minutes Noted. Please. That's fine.

Anything to support Maximum Fun. Anything to support Maximum Fun. I'm looking forward to frigging Max Fun Con. Max Fun Con is going to be pretty sweet. We're all going to be there. I'm looking forward to frigging MaxFunCon. It's going to be pretty sweet. We're all going to be there. It's really awesome. A listener Twittered the other day, ResilientRabbit on Twitter. She Twittered a webcam of Lake Arrowhead, and I retweeted it. Just so everyone can check out Lake Arrowhead, make sure everything's cool between now and MaxFunCon.

To make sure the lake is still there. You just want to double check that shit doesn't pop off. No, I'm not. Don't make sure a werewolf just runs by the camera. You're like, oh shit, maybe I shouldn't go. I'm not a geologist. Right. But it is a lake full of arrowheads?

Yeah, exactly. Okay. Yeah, I mean, obviously you're not a geologist. That's a well-known geographic or geological feature. Okay, I just want to make sure. Yeah, so it has to do with the pressures of the Earth's core. You're not supposed to swim. No, definitely don't dive in.

Magma, Earth's core, Native American ghosts. Well, when the Native Americans went corporate in the late 50s and developed disposable arrowheads, that was the landfill that they got pitched into. Exactly. Well, I mean, that's one of the reasons that it's such a, that's one of the reasons that it's such a bargain for us to do it there is most people prefer a water lake. Right. Oh, it's better for boating, skiing, you know, water skiing, jet skis, swimming, fishing.

I can't think of any lake activities that are better with the Arrowhead Lake, actually, now that I start listing the activities. I know there's a new sport called extreme maiming, which is great for a lake full of pointy arrowheads. Aquapoking. Boat ruining.

Okay, we'll be back in just a second on Jordan, Jesse, go. Okay, we'll be back in just a second on Jordan, Jesse, go. Jordan, Jesse, go. I'm Jesse Thorne, America's radio suite. Jordan Morris, Boy Detectives. Chris Hardwick, Nerdist.com. All right.

That was like the Ornette Coleman version of the intro. I want people to know that we did not even agree on chord structures ahead of time before we busted that out. That's like word jazz. Absolutely. Are you a jazz bow? Was that character a jazz bow, would you say? That was a jazz bow. I like the beret, by the way. Thanks.

Thanks a lot. In fact, I'll show some appreciation for it. You're supposed to clap it. You're supposed to snap it different times. That's just snapping. Shut up! This is beating applause. Okay, look.

We have not mentioned it thus far in the program, but it bears mentioning. This is Jordan Jesse Go's 100th episode. 100 years of Jordan Jesse Go. So you do one episode a year. A century of Jordan Jesse Go. So you do one episode a year. A century of Jordan Jesse Go. The last time we were barely in the Edwardian era. And by the way, just on that tip,

I think you guys might qualify for Vampire Lawn Darts, being that old. Yeah, exactly. I was into Vampire Lawn Darts, but then they signed to a major label. Kind of, you know, sound got kind of watered down. Overproduced. Yeah, exactly.

Vampire Lawn Darts misses the mark with new album. Yeah. That's the pitchfork title. Nice. These world music influences are no longer surprising and fascinating to me. Ajimbe? Really? Vampire Lawn Darts? music influences are no longer surprising and fascinating to me ajimbe really vampire lawn darts um look i mean you know this is i don't you know i'm going to put you on the spot here but i'm sure you probably have some favorite jordan jessico memories you want to share there was the other

time i was on the show right that was really great that was good and then you were on the show two other times i was on the show two other two. Two other times? Once alone and once with Mike? Yes, that's true. That's true. Two other times. Mike and Chris were one of our first ever guests. We had just invented the name Jordan, Jesse, Go, I think. I think that's right.

That does sound exactly right. Yeah. And I really love the new space. Yeah, we got this new apartment a year ago or so and chris is that's how old school chris is you should call it a living facility i got this new living facility um that makes me sound like i i can't take care of myself like i'm incontinent and i need a full-time nurse um so it's our 100th episode he says he says she's his wife she's just a nurse mom pays her to come today and wipe up his

shit just like cyril yeah chris you don't think i could get a girl that pretty to actually marry me do you oh i hadn't even thought of that before i'm using my public radio money nurse theresa um so i want to do something to celebrate the 100th episode of jordan jesse go okay. This was an all talk Jordan, Jesse go, because I'm going to be frank. I couldn't get the CD player to work this week. Um, but I have a really special announcement, something that I think is going to be really magical. Um, that's the return of the high five contest. The high five contest is coming back.

It was one of our, uh, flagship endeavors, the high five contest, but we've, uh, we've grown a lot. So there's a lot more people lot more people who probably are available to participate in this. Absolutely. I think the idea has had some time to take seed in people's minds. This is what we did. Towards the very beginning of Jordan, Jesse, Go, we challenged people to take pictures of themselves high-fiving each other. It's a good contest. Now, they post these pictures on Flickr, and there is a point system.

Here's the basics of the point system. You get a point for a picture of you high-fiving someone, and you have to high-five a different person in each picture. It can't just be you and the same person high-fiving in every picture, because then you could just take a million pictures of you and a friend high-fiving. That's bullshit. Are they posting their own their own flickr accounts or do you have an account that we've we of course have a flickr tag uh for it so you're posting to your own flickr account but you are tagging it i think we're gonna we're gonna do it uh high five oh nine

okay high five oh nine um all one word high five oh. So when you post it to Flickr, you tag it HighFive09. And there is a point system. So one point is just straight up a high five. Okay? Two points, there's bonus points for the following. Number one, if you're high-fiving a famous person. Now, this is based on our reconnaissance. How famous?

Do you decide if the person's famous? I'll give you an example from last time. Have you ever heard of mr yaoming the tallest high fiver in the world i i guess i he he plays superstar basketball legend yaoming well somebody high-fived him they did yeah just barely they had to stand on their tippy toes i'll bet they did yeah he's a tall drink of water he is um so uh plus one for a celebrity plus one if it's in front of a notable landmark. Now, we're defining this. This includes local landmarks, but it should be a landmark that at least to some extent people outside of the place where you live have heard of. So we're talking about Golden Gate Bridge.

We're talking about Mount Rushmore. Space Needle. We're talking about a famous donut place in Portland or Seattle. We're talking about, to see all of these things, local landmarks. An important statue of a town leader. Okay, these are important local landmarks. That's a bonus. And then also, from time to time, Jordan and I will make up a new thing that gets a bonus point.

Those are the two primary bonus points. You post them up to uh high 509 you upload them to flickr tag them high 509 and uh we're gonna time limit this well i haven't decided can i make a suggestion for a bonus point okay please if you can get uh if you can get yourself high-fiving someone on television and then take a picture of the television set yes that sounds sure that's a bonus but it doesn't count if you can't videotape yourself and then put it on and then take that picture. Like if you're on a news show or if you're in an audience or whatever,

it's an existing program and you can high-five on it and then take a picture of the set and then put that up. Yeah, absolutely. I agree. I agree. That's a bonus. Okay, cool. Right there.

And we'll be adding bonuses as things go along, and I think next week on the program we'll probably announce some kick-ass prizes. Sure. Frankly, I haven't thought about it much yet. No. I'm going to be honest with you. I haven't even picked an end date for this thing.

This is pretty devil-may-care at this point. I'm going to say probably it's going to be about 60 days, somewhere in the 60 days range. That's, I think, what we did last time. It worked out quite well. I had a few people. I really had some hundreds of high-fives. great job fantastic you know what i mean i think this is going to be i think this is really going to be nice don't you why wouldn't it i know tell me

about it 206-984-4FUN if you want to add to the uh uh unbelievably enormous pile of calls that i have yet to screen because the cd player is broken um uh you can always email us at JordanJesse, JJGo at MaximumFun.org, JJGo at MaximumFun.org. Our theme music is Love You by The Free Design, courtesy of Light in the Attic Records. Our thanks to Light in the Attic Records. It's off of...

I love Free Design. I know. They're great, right? I've got a Free Design song on my phone. There you go. Kites Are Fun, the best of the Free Design, is the CD that you should go out and buy

because I recommend it, Jordan recommends it, and none other than Chris Nerdist Hardwick recommends it. It's a common mistake. People say hard dick a lot. Do you want to go ahead and host the show from here on out, Chris? You know, they say it, sometimes they'll say it like I've never heard it before, and then

if I'm like, oh, I get it, then they don't understand, understand they're like oh i guess i really got under your skin it's like no that's just i've heard it a million times when i made a television program uh they insisted on naming one of the segments thorn in my side which is not only a thing that i've heard a million times, but he's so lame, so spectacularly, monumentally lame. Like, hard dick, at least it's vulgar. Right.

You know what I mean? Right. Thorn in my side is just something every grandpa says to you. It's an Andy Rooney type. Oh, boy. Anyway, so great to have you. We've already been prattling on for far too long,

but you've waited too long. We'll be back next week with uh more of jordan jesse go goodbye