Mike Birbiglia's Working It Out - The Old Man and the Pool: Spoilers Only

Episode Date: December 4, 2023

Mike welcomes back three-peat guest Joe Birbiglia to celebrate the premiere of Mike’s new Netflix comedy special The Old Man and the Pool. Mike and Joe discuss the four year development of the show, share memories about the Worcester, Massachusetts YMCA pool, and share the funniest jokes that didn’t make it into the special. *Should* they have made it into the special? Joe thinks so. You be the judge. Plus, Mike answers listeners’ questions about the special.Please consider donating to Rhode Island Community Food Bank

I had a joke about wrestling that's on the cutting room floor, which is that I would say like we'd be doing push-ups. Yeah. And our team didn't have a gymnasium, so we practiced in our school's theater. Yeah. So the whole time I'm lying on the mat and I'm looking up at the stage and I'm thinking, I should be up there.

Yeah. Like, I'm not meant for this. I should be up there. Yeah. Like, I'm not meant for this. I should be up there. Get me off the wrestling team. Please do my hair. Please do my hair. I don't know how that ever got cut. I really like that.

And then at the end I go, send in Burbiggs. Welcome back to Working It Out. This is Mike Birbiglia. That was the voice of my brother, Joe Birbiglia. This is a very unique episode because it is spoilers only. To continue listening to this episode, you must go to Netflix and watch The Old Man and the Pool. I'm going to be talking to my brother Joe later in the show, talking about the behind the scenes and the creation of the show.

So it's a very unique episode. And thanks, everybody. It's end of the year, the time where we reflect on what we're thankful for. And I'm very thankful for all of you supporting the special, putting it in the top 10 on Netflix, which is unbelievable. I just can't even believe it. And supporting the new tour. We're about to announce in a couple of weeks,

another 20 cities for fall 2024. So stay tuned for that. Join the mailing list on burbiglia.com. So before we get into the episode and my conversation with Joe Burbiglia, I'm going to answer some of your questions. I went out to you. I've never done this before on Instagram stories today. I said, do you have any questions for me about the old man in the pool? And here are the questions and I'm going to answer them. First question is from Kalexis. Kalexis. I don't know what the pronunciation of that is.

I apologize, Kalexis. The question is, what was the process like coming up with the breath-holding pit? Great question. Okay. I have to say, I've done five of these solo shows now with my director, Seth Barish. The first one was called Sleepwalk With Me, and then My Girlfriend's Boyfriend. Thank God for Jokes. The new one, which was at the Court Theater on Broadway, and this one was just called The Old Man in the Pool.

And we've had a different process for really all of them. And a lot of our process has to do with, and Seth is a brilliant theater director, actor, writer, musician. But a lot of our process has to do with like figuring out like what the main event is of the show. In the case of Sleepwalk With Me, the main event was like jumping through the second story window. It's like this major thing that occurs. And then from that, there's some kind of, you know, revelation or epiphany or thought, new thought. In the case of My Girlfriend's Boyfriend, it's like there's some kind of, you know, revelation or epiphany or thought, new thought. In the case of my girlfriend's boyfriend, it's like, there's a car, it was a car accident. I was hit by a drunk driver and made to pay for the car.

And in some instances with these solo shows, it's super obvious what the main event is. And with this show, it was a little bit less obvious. Like, I was, like, really fixated on, like, death. But this show, it was a little bit less obvious. I was really fixated on death. And I was doing a joke one night, working out the show at the Cherry Lane Theater. And the joke was, I'm at the YMCA pool, and I see this sign.

It's a true story. I see this sign that says, no breath holding. And I was genuinely curious. When I saw this sign, I was like, in real life, I said to my swim instructor, what does that mean? No breath holding because I thought that was part of, you know, being a human and everything. It was breathing. And she goes, well, there's these two guys taking turns holding their breath like as a competition and one of them died.

So anyway, and I had a bunch of jokes about that. And, you know, like one of the jokes was like, who won, you know? And like there's just like a bunch of jokes about that. And one of the jokes was like, who won? And there's just like a bunch of jokes I had on that. And what I found was, when I was working out the show at Cherry Lane Theater, people would laugh at this bit so much that it was too much. And I don't mean too much, but like it was, let me put it this way. It was surprising how much people were laughing at this super dark topic.

Like it's crazy in real life to have a conversation where you say, hey, what's that sign? They're like, oh, well, there's these two guys who died. You know, one of them died. And then you relay that to someone else and then they manically laugh. And so then I stopped the audience. I go, hey, I'd appreciate it. I think that was maybe too much laughter.

And then what I found was that the more that I told them not to laugh, the more they laughed. And then it became this kind of like scolding bit where like I was scolding them for laughing. The more I scolded them, the more they would laugh. And I just thought, oh, that's really cool. But anyway, that's how that formed. And it was Seth's idea.

It was Seth said to me one night, he goes, hey, you should try that at the end. Like what if the whole show built towards the man who died holding his breath in the YMCA pool? And that's sort of how it happened. And we tried like all different variations on it. And that was sort of how it happened. And we tried like all different variations on it. And that was sort of what we landed on. Okay, this is from Ryan underscore Mersel.

And it says, what has been your parents' response to the special? Okay, you're not going to believe this. My parents have not seen the special. I talked to them the other night. They said, we got to figure it out on our TV. I love my parents. I believe they love me. I'm guessing.

But they don't have, there's no pressure for them to watch my special. REE117 has asked, can you talk about how you came to have your wave pool as a backdrop for Old Man in the Pool? Great question. I want to send a shout out to Beowulf Barrett. Beowulf is a two-time Tony Award winning designer who designed actually all five of these solo shows that Seth and I have worked on together. And he's just phenomenal. He's just a wildly, wildly creative person,

just a deeply creative person. And a year before we went up on Broadway, Seth and I started to loop Beowulf into like, what are we thinking about? You know, what is the show? And I would, you know, I'd send him audio of the show. And early on, it was this kind of thing where I thought there should be a pool.

It's insane. Early in the process, I was like, I should, when people come in, wouldn't it be cool if I was swimming in an actual swimming pool on stage? And Beowulf, to his credit, he actually designed this. Not only did he design it,

he designed how much weight the water would be in the pool and how we'd get the set into the theater and all this stuff and then at a certain point um i think i was in denver and i came off stage and you know there's no when i do the concert version there's no set and there's no lighting design and i came came off stage and I was like, oh, the audience is getting it without there being a pool. And I called Seth, my director, and I go, I think we don't need a pool because I think it would tip over the concept of the show. So maybe we could do something that's kind of a reflection of that. And Beowulf came up with this unbelievable design that merges just kind of graph paper. I mean, if you've seen it, you've seen a graph paper and it's a wave and it's a pool and it's all these things in it.

And Hana Kim did the projections and Aaron Kopp did the lighting design. Aaron Kopp has done four of my shows. He's incredible. And Hana's incredible. It's just the team is extraordinary. just the team is extraordinary. And while we're at it, Tony Leslie James did the wardrobe and Kai Harada did the sound. So the design team is just, we're wildly lucky to have worked with this design team. The next question is from Appenzellagram. All right. I don't know. I'm sorry. Epizennalogram. The question is, what made you decide to slide down the wall and did it ever not go as planned? This is a great question and kind of speaks to like, I don't know, the process of all these shows. So like I said, Beowulf designed the set. And what I didn't know until we were in Los Angeles at the Mark Taper Forum was that the wave would be strong enough to hold my weight.

So I showed up, and I think it was Beowulf was just like, you know, Mike, you can run up the set. You can actually run up it. I was like, what do you mean? He was like, strong enough to hold you. I'm like, it's strong enough to hold me? Like, I never thought when you look that way that you could do that. So I just went nuts. Like, I was at rehearsal. I started running up it, running down it, sliding down it, like doing everything. So Seth and I just started talking about like, well, what can we do in the show that uses this? And it was just literally in rehearsal of like, well, what if I slid down, you know, when I was talking about all the health stuff? And we tried it and then it became this kind of weird thing where people were like, how'd you come up with the sliding thing?

It's like, well, I don't know. It was just like a thing that happened when we were there in rehearsal. So it was just a lot of, I mean, so much of what we do with these shows is trial and error. And that was a trial and success, I guess. At H. Ronsa wrote, I love how you ended it. Was that always the plan?

It was one of the plans. Most of my shows usually have about two or three endings that I'm trying and failing or succeeding with for like a couple years. And with this one, it was like what I want to tell my parents is, you know, and cut to black. And it was an idea that I came up with when I was workshopping the show in New York City at City Winery. And there were a handful of people along the way who gave us notes about the show. And this is gonna be a big name drop,

but it is who gave me the note. One of my favorite directors on earth from Pixar, his name is Pete Docter, and he directed Up and Inside Out and Soul and a bunch of other brilliant, brilliant movies. And he gave the note to me and Seth when we were at Berkeley Repertory Theater. He had a note about the final few sentences of the show.

And I think the earlier version of the show was something where I'm basically saying is like, all we have is this moment and then it cuts to black. And it was, he made this point, which is like, it would be nice if the final sentence or final few sentences were a little bit more narrative-based and causal. So in other words, like, we ended up changing it. Seth and I ended up changing it to what I want to tell my parents is, and then they cut to black. And the difference between that and then the other version, which is like all we have is this moment, is one of them is like me expounding on kind of an opinion or a feeling or a sentiment. And the other one is essentially like building up momentum for an action. So in other words, it's either like, you know, it could have been an action or it could have been like momentum for an action.

And the momentum for an action, what we found was that when Seth and I were like, oh, that's interesting. And when we tried it, we were like, oh, that's better because it feels like something is about to happen. Like in other words, I'm not postulating about something.

I'm not spinning my wheels about like my philosophy on life or this or that. It's like literally like, I'm gonna postulating about something. I'm not spinning my wheels about like my philosophy on life or this or that. It's like literally like, I'm gonna do this thing. I'm gonna tell my, and there's something about that that was more moving because it gave the audience the Wemo experience. It gave the audience the experience

of what would that be like if we were invested in the action and in the middle of the action? What if that's just cut out? What does that feel like? And I have to hand it to Pete, doctor, for giving us that super, super generous note. And the final question is from Chell.k18. How important was working it out on the pod to the development of the special? Well, the thing about the podcast is that it was a pandemic baby. We started doing it in the middle of the pandemic and it was because I couldn't perform

in front of audiences. And so it allowed me to have this kind of excuse to reach out to friends like John Mulaney and Pete Holmes and then people who I had met but maybe didn't know as well like Natasha Lyonne or Hannah Gadsby and just be like, hey, do you want to come on my podcast? And it was really interesting to hear

a lot of these things reflected back to me from people who I really respect. So like Natasha Lyonne was on the show and she's one of my favorite guests of all time. And I ran a bunch of jokes by her and she was kind of like laughing a little bit. And then she's like, this stuff is all like fine, but like what I love about your shows,

what I love about Sleepwalk With Me, my girlfriend's boyfriend, is that like the guts of it, like where you go there about things that are kind of uncomfortable. And I started to tell her a few of the things on my mind about death that I was kind of afraid to talk about. Like one of them was about, you know, a close friend of ours who passed away and another person who's, you know, another memory from childhood that was really challenging about death.

who, you know, another memory from childhood that was really challenging by death. And she was like really locked into that. And it was, there was something about being in a one-on-one conversation with an artist who I respect where you can feel them being locked in to the thing that's not getting laughs per se and isn't like a crowd pleaser per se, where it forced me to reflect on,

oh yeah, actually what people take home from these shows the most often are the emotional parts. And that's sort of, I think that's one of the things that the podcast did for me. So today on the show, we have my brother, Joe Birbiglia. He's a frequent collaborator. He contributed writing and was a producer on this show as he was with all of my shows and my movies.

And enjoy my chat with the great Joseph Birbiglia. Yeah. with the great Joseph Birbiglia. We're working it. Just to give context for everybody, you and I have worked together professionally for 17, 18 years, maybe? Yeah, yeah, I think it's 17 or 18, sure. But it's funny, like, I go back in our experience working together to 2004

when you self-published this album, Dog Years. Oh, yeah. And it was funny because, you know, that's like the history, I think, of the company, is just making stuff and then pushing it out there and seeing how it goes. Yeah. But I always laugh because, remember, you had an opening night party at the Comic Strip. Yeah. I was at Upper East goes. Yeah. But I always laugh because remember you had an opening night party at the comic strip. Yeah.

I was at Upper East Side. Yeah. And Mitch Hedberg came in. Yep. As a favor. Mitch Hedberg flew himself in for it. Yeah. And you did a double,

double headlining show. Yeah. And everyone who came got a copy of the album. And I, the story I always sticks with me after that is that um so this other comedian was observing it and goes up to like lucian hold the the now past uh manager of the club and it's just, you can do anything. Right?

Oh, I love that. It was such good advice, right? Like, you can do anything. It may not work, but it's a nice legacy for him. That's a great piece of wisdom. You can do anything. It might not work. So to prep for our interview today, I looked up some of the jokes that are cutting room floor, but that I think are really funny. They just like didn't quite fit. This is

one you wrote, which is on the signs in the wall. One of them is strong swimmers, confident kids, which is probably true, but I appreciate a sign that says weak swimmers will do your taxes as adults. That's funny. Oh, this is something you wrote about which I thought was funny but it did make it in the show which is could there possibly be more warnings on the bathing suit spinning machine

in the YMCA locker room? Whenever you see that many warnings on a machine you know there have been a lot of accidents and a lot of lawyers. Do not use the bathing suit spinning machine if you're wearing a necktie or have a ZZ Top beard. Do not

put your face directly over the bathing suit spinning machine or you may be killed by electrified water droplets. Do not place your fingers more than four inches into the top of the bathing suit spinning machine, even when it is unplugged.

There's a lot of water and electricity in that device. My favorite part of that joke is even when it's unplugged. Yeah. And it's funny because I'll go to the Y and I'll spin my bathing suit. And every time I do, I'm like, whatever happened to those damn jokes? I had all these jokes about this spinner.

You know, I think every time I swim and I see the swim bathing suit machine, I think of you. Because those, I think those are, for real, no, in a good way. No, because I love those jokes. The thing that I think relatively specific to my process of creating these shows, Sleepwalk With Me, My Girlfriend's Boyfriend, Thank God for Jokes, the new one, and now The Old Man in the Pool, is that what it starts off is like a ton of jokes, a ton of stories, a ton of stuff. And then essentially you chisel it down to what tells the story, and then you can hang jokes on the story along the way. And so like the bathing suit machine is as, I think as funny as any of the locker room jokes. Yeah.

Other than maybe a hundred penises, a hundred vaginas. But it just like didn't fit. It was just confusing. Some people were like, wait, what? What machines? And I was like, ah, it doesn't matter. It's a little bit of a niche product. Just a little. So you'd really like that joke or you'd really

kind of not know what you're talking about. And that's what touring is all about. That's what's so funny is like, I'm going on this like 25 city tour right now for Please Stop the Ride. And a lot of it is like going to Florida and Texas and finding out, hey, y'all think this is funny

because this is what i think is funny and then you find out you go okay great good to know good information well one of the more challenging parts about trying to pitch on your shows sometimes for me because because i like to focus on jokes on like high points of like laugh laughter and and fill them in is when you're that's what you're into you're into jokes that's my thing yeah but i mean often you're like dramaturgy and you're figuring out the story and the tempo yeah right is the funny feedback it's like that's really funny but we don't want to laugh we don't want to laugh there it's like oh okay it's true no because there's a musicality of the show.

That's what it is. The shows have a rhythm. And it's like, sometimes you want to bring the show down at a point where you're ruminating on like a philosophical thought. And then you launch into like the wrestling story again or whatever it is. Which by the way,

this is like a thing I left out of the show because it kind of serves no story point, which is you convinced me to join the wrestling team, which I talk, I tell the whole wrestling story. I was the worst wrestler ever. Do you have any funny wrestling stories? Well, it's interesting. I don't know if I've told you this before,

but my grades used to go up a lot during wrestling practice because wrestling, between wrestling season because it was so hard to do the practice so that I would be home with my calculus and stuff like, oh, this is easy. This is fun compared to how difficult wrestling practice is. It's a pleasure.

I had a joke about wrestling that's on the cutting room floor, which is that I would say like, we'd be doing pushups. Yeah. And our team didn't have a gymnasium, so we practiced in our school's theater. Yeah.

So the whole time, I'm lying on the mat and I'm looking up at the stage and I'm thinking, I should be up there. Yeah. Like, I'm not on the mat and I'm looking up at the stage and I'm thinking, I should be up there. Yeah. Like, I'm not meant for this. I should be up there.

Get me off the wrestling team. Please do my hair. Please do my hair. I don't know how that ever got cut. I really like that. And then at the end I go, send in Burbiggs. This is a run that I really like that. And then at the end I go, send in Burbiggs. This is a run that I thought was funny,

but it was too much of a digression in the wrestling thing. And maybe it'll end up in the next show. I mean, that's the thing. When I have jokes that I think are funny or ideas, a lot of times they'll just end up in a different show. They'll end up in two or three specials from now. Totally. Because I haven't quite cracked what the funniest thing is about it.

But I say, what's painful for me about being a bad athlete is that I'm very competitive. Which is my Achilles heel. I'm a fierce competitor who loses. Yeah. But I feel like the loser is the unsung contributor to sports.

Without him. Yeah, exactly. Without him. Yeah. Someone has to lose. Yeah. And I've been willing to do it for about 45 years and it's not easy. You have to get out of bed every morning and put your pants on one leg at a time. And then the first leg doesn't go on because you folded it weird and so it's the leg part inverted but then you push your leg through so it's like uh and then you try to put on the other leg but you realize that that that one has a pen in the pants pocket so that leg is like blue and splotchy and then you put on a shirt but it got shrunk in the wash and so your belly is protruding, which is sort of a metaphor of the wrestling match you're about to lose. And then I said, losing doesn't happen in a moment.

It happens all day. You need to know when you see a kid lose a wrestling match, he also missed the bus. This is one last one. I think this has a shot somewhere. Losing is a lifetime commitment. You can't just half-ass it. You have to put your whole ass into it.

And then you get pantsed by your teammates and tied to a flagpole and made to eat a bowl of dirt in a bucket labeled chocolate and then knocked by your team as well as the other team. This only happened once, but it really stuck with me. That's funny.

I think that's, I saw anyway, that's a good example. Like that has a shot, I think somewhere. Yeah. So I'm going to go to some swimming jokes, Joe,

if you're good with that. And if you have any swimming stories or anything, jump in. Swimming always freaked me out as a kid because it's like this activity that if you stop doing it, you die, right? Yes, yes. But what's cautionary about that,

we always have to be cognizant of this as comedians, is like Demetri Martin has a joke that's almost that exact joke, which is like swimming is a confusing sport because sometimes you do it for fun and other times you do it to not die. And when I'm swimming, sometimes I'm not sure which one it is. That's a great line.

Dimitri's great at economy of words jokes. That's like a really, really good solid one. But like, that is one of the things that like every now and then I'll go on tour and with a new really good solid one but like that is one of the things that like every now and then i'll go on tour and with a new hour and someone will be like oh hey someone else has a joke like this and i'll i'll look it up and i'll watch it and then i'll just be like is it too close that's right you know and then you have to make a judgment call i know dimitri by the way dimitri if you're out there if you're anywhere, 2024, we really want you on the podcast.

There you go. Do you have any memorable swimming stories? Any conflicts at the pool? Oh, actually, I do have a funny story. Sorry, if I can do it. Go ahead. Yeah, yeah. So my friend Mel had a pool.

And I was hanging out with him this summer at a party. had a pool and I was hanging out with him this summer at a party. And his sister, Christina, reminded me of a story at the pool where she was very small, much smaller, right? Let's say she was eight years old or seven years old and I was 17. And she reminded me, and I totally knew this story, that I had jumped on a float on the pool that she ended up going under, like it was going to kill her. It was very frightening. And she's like, so you did that, but then you immediately jumped and saved my life.

So you were kind of to blame, but you also acted heroically and rescued me instantly. So thank you. That is so funny. Pools are crazy like that though, right? No, I know. It's just so high risk. Yeah.

It's so funny because you're talking about Mel Ciaceroni's pool. And I used to go there when I was a kid too because Maria was the same age as me. And they had the sign, the famous sign that has the joke, welcome to our ool. Notice there's no P in it. Let's keep it that way.

Yeah. And I proclaim to this very day, that is the best joke joke I saw as a child. Like it was the first time I saw a joke and I'm like, yeah, that's funny. That's a really funny turn of phrase but it's funny you say that because our neighbors the Ashworths they had a sign

that said we don't swim in your toilet don't pee in our pool which also struck me as a very brilliant piece of writing that pool supply store is cleaning up with those signs. Oh, my God. That's a great industry.

That's a burgeoning industry. The more people pee in pools, the better that industry does. Now, wait a minute. Did the joke stay in there about the coffee maker that also makes soup? Or was that cut? No, that's a great joke. That or was that cut no that's a great joke that's a late cut that's a great one that was what i was that was the joke was i'm gonna try to remember it uh i'm gonna look at describing the ymca yeah um so then okay so the line you're referencing is i feel like we all have something from our childhood where even as a child, we think,

I'm never going back there. And for me, it was the YMCA pool. I don't know if it was the chlorine smell or the half-blown-up basketballs or the snack machine room with a coffee maker that also makes soup or the rowing machine that's also a fan that seems to be powering the entire building.

I'm pretty sure the whole YMCA power grid is based on a 75-year-old man and a V-neck. Yeah. Honestly, I love that joke. Yeah. I think at a certain point what happened was we were like, how long can I talk about the damn YMCA pool? That's right, yeah. At a certain point, happened was we were like how long can i talk about the damn ymca pool that's right yeah at a certain point people are like wait are you gonna do an hour on the ymca pool

yeah the ymca shrunk i think in general as a piece i think that's right i think that's right um but this this is another line that cutting room floor but from the y which i thought was really funny good observation i always had an intense fear of drowning in the pool and i'd reach for those blue and white balls that separate the shallow end from the sudden death area and those balls will not support you unless you weigh the amount of a rope those balls are like, look, Mike, I'd love to help, but I got my hands full with all this rope. I thought that was super solid. And I think the blue and white balls that separate the challenge and the sudden death area are fun.

I remember that YMCA. I once took a karate class there. Did you ever do that? Like karate. No, I never did that. At the Greendale YMCA. I once took a karate class there. Did you ever do that? Karate. No, I never did that. At the Greendale Y. No. Want to talk about something I was terrible at? You take like two classes, do some tumbling.

Do you remember, did you get your ass kicked or was it okay? Just did some rolling around and stuff and then it's like, do you want to buy the karate outfit? It's $175. And it's like, eh, I'm good.

Well, you know what's funny is like, to your point about this could tag onto your karate thing. I didn't take karate growing up, but I did recently try kickboxing. Yeah. And at the end of the lesson, this is a joke that I did a few times. At the end of the first lesson, the instructor said to me, she goes, if you ever do

this again, I go, if I ever do it again, I'm pretty sure I'm going to do it again. I just purchased a six-pack of lessons from you moments ago at that desk. I think I'm going to try it again if you ever do this again. That's a true story. That's how bad I was at kickboxing. I'm not cut out for the martial arts.

Yeah. I did kickboxing here in Providence and injured my knee for weeks yeah one kickboxing class that I don't know I kicked too hard or something get injured the point is you can injure yourself if you're not careful with a lot of these things oh yeah um I'm gonna do the the joke about mom uh at the YMCA pool so I actually used to I did a joke on Thank God for Jokes is that I was raised by late people, my parents are ladies when I was a kid my mom used to pick me up

from my swim class at the YMCA 90 minutes after the class would end she was like the cable company like I will pick you up between the hours of 2pm and 6pm I was a 10 year old child standing on a street corner dripping wet bathing suit and flip-flops.

My mom wasn't on the way. She was at the book club talking about the color purple. I was like, Mom, I am the color purple. She was so late for pickups and, like, coming home and all sorts of things growing up. As a child, I don't want to say I was traumatized, but I would really worry about her. Like, maybe she got in a car accident.

Like regularly, like two plus hours, two to three hours late for things. I worried about it all the time. Right? I feel like I constantly worried, are our parents okay? Yeah. But maybe that's an 80s thing. Maybe that's not our parents. Maybe all the 80s parents were late.

Yeah. Did you notice that we weren't an I love you family growing up? Because that's one of the big themes of The Old Man and the Pool. Right. Did you notice it growing up? Did you ever think like, this is odd? Oh, absolutely. I mean, it's definitely something I clocked.

You just sort of internalized that, right? Yeah. Do you say I love you to your kids? Yes. Yeah. That's nice. So the trauma doesn't continue generation to generation. I try to end the cycle.

But as a result, I'm not going to get any comedians and comedy writers out of the deal. No, I know you're right. That's right. That's right. You never know. Maybe there will be clowns. Well-adjusted. Yeah, well-adjusted. Guilt-ridden, you know. Yeah. that's right that's right you never know maybe there may be clowns well adjusted yeah well

adjusted yeah guilt-ridden you know yeah no it's um it's so funny because i always have this thought that i'm gonna end up on the phone with mom and dad and they're gonna see the special and they're gonna say i love you like i i just feel like that's in my future somewhere but i don't i don't know when closure yeah yeah i'll tell you one thing that i i left out of the special but it is i think kind of a funny story which is that literally when i was in high school i said to mom and dad i was like why don't you tell me you love me? Because I really did clock it. And mom goes, we do wub you. I was like, ah, that's not the same word. I love that.

You said W-U-B. That's closer to rug than it is to love. Oh my gosh. We do wub you. That was in an earlier draft of the show too. I can't believe you dropped that. It was in, yeah, no, no, I did that for a while. I like that a lot.

I know, it's a fun one. I mean, honestly, like maybe some of this stuff will come back in another show, but that's nice. That's nice you say I love you to Henry and Merritt. That's good. Do you have any other kids? Not that I know of.

Oh. Jesus. Hey. Jesus. Hey-oh. One of the things, you know, whenever I do these specials, I always have to make a decision about when I have people in them,

whether I use their real name or their fake name. Yeah. And usually it comes down to do I know and love the person still? Right. Because if I don't know them anymore, it's kind of like, I don't know. Yeah.

But the one that we kept the same was Mr. Naples. Yes. Because we really, he was a beloved person in our family. Sure. And it felt weird to me. I used fake names a few times and i was like no i think he'd think this is very funny the doorbell like bing bong oh yeah he would really that would make him roar yeah yeah i think you really he had a great sense of humor for sure

he was a riot he was like genuinely like a very funny person. He's one of the first people who let me on grown-up jokes. When I say that, I don't mean dirty jokes. I more just mean snarkiness. Like when you're with your friend and you make fun of something and you don't treat the person like they're a 10-year-old. You treat them like they're a grown-up. You know what I mean? That's right.

I think kids really appreciate that. I know Merritt appreciates that with some of my friends. He has said as much. grown up you know what i mean that's right i think kids really appreciate that i know um merit appreciates that with some of my my friends and he said said as much i mean that's i hope i hope uh merit and henry feel that way about me because i treat them like they're grown-ups i don't treat them like i think they feel that way yeah yeah yeah i feel that way about all my nephews and nieces like i'm just like i i don't know. Maybe that's a wrong impulse, but I feel like for Mr. Naples, I always had a sense of like, no, he's respecting me and he's treating me like I'm a person instead of like a kid.

And I always appreciated that about him. Yeah, 100%. I have to say for the studio here, the podcast studio, I'm thinking of for the outside of the door, getting a doorbell where we have the chimes go off, ring, ring, ring, ring, in the office. It would be super easy to do that, yeah. Does that even exist?

Of course. In fact, yeah, if you just bought any doorbell, you can just select that one now, right? So cheap. No, but I'm saying actual chimes. I'm saying actual chimes. We don't have the square footage in that office for those chimes. That's true. No, you're right, you're right. Joe's the voice of reason in my life. I'm a actual chimes. We don't have the square footage in that office for those shots. That's true. No, you're right. You're right. Joe's the voice of reason in my life.

The grown-up in the room. It was really great to see your show, you performing the show, Old Man in the Pool, in London. But some of it, I was just, I had never spent that much time in London before. And it is a little bit surreal to walk, I mean, what did it seat? 700 people? We were doing eight shows a week.

Yeah, like something like, yeah, 800 or something. And I just sat down the first night. Like, I mean, no offense, but it's like, who are all these people? No offense, but who are all these people? It's like, I'm in London. How do they know? You know? And so I chat up the people next to me, right?

This couple. It's like, you know, are you very familiar with Mike? You know, that kind of thing. And they say, oh, yeah, you know, I listen to him. His specials over the years on Netflix and at university and whatnot. And I say, oh, I'm Joe, Mike's brother. I'm here with him. I work with him.

And they said, the woman said, oh, you're Joe from the podcast? I was like, people listen to that thing? No, it is funny, right? Like, you create this thing. We just thought we t-shirt can and did into a forest. Right? And you're like, oh, it really gets out there. So it was very gratifying to the entire team

of producers who work on this and yourself as well that was pretty gratifying and fun I hope you're not insulted I thought who are all these people because I'm in London I think it every day every time I show up

and the people are like I guess we're going gonna keep doing this right i always say to my audience like if you guys keep showing up i'll keep writing shows but when they stop i don't know yeah um how do you feel about the special coming out does it feel different from the other specials yeah i mean i think it's great. It looks fantastic. I think that, you know, that it was, we were able to shoot it in that Lincoln Center Theater, I think really made all the difference because the set is just, was fantastic.

And I think you're getting, you know, for you, I think you've come a long way. Like you're getting more comfortable with, you know, shooting for these, the stress, the whole production of it. And so I think this one was really clean with how it came together and it looks great. And I think people are going to really enjoy it around the world. And I don't, I'm excited about it.

Let's finish it off with working it out for a cause. Is there an organization that you want to contribute to? Yeah, I always like to go out to the Rhode Island Food Bank where Rhode Island is a small but mighty state and does have a lot of food insecurity. And so I always like to support the Rhode Island Food Bank and I think they appreciate it and I think they really know how to stretch a dollar.

Yes, I always say that about food banks. I contribute to a lot of food banks of cities I perform in and so I get all the literature. And if you read the literature, you see how much, you know, $20, $50, $100 can go in the hands of a food bank. It's incredible. So we will contribute to them.

We'll link to them in the show notes. Thank you, Joe Birbiglia, for episode number three. And if people liked number three, go back to two and one. They're both fun too. I always enjoy coming on. All right. Well, thanks, Joe. Working it out because it's not done.

Working it out because there's no hope. That's going to do it for another episode of Working It Out. I always love talking to my brother Joe Berbiglia the old man in the pool is on Netflix now thank you for everyone who watched it and shared it it means the world to all of us

who worked on the show check out berbiglia.com to sign up for the mailing list I have a bunch of I basically announced 24 tour cities of Please Stop the Ride. And I'm about to announce another 20, probably in the next like four weeks for the rest of the year. So it's going to end up being like 44 cities across America. So join the mailing list. You will be the first to know.

The producers of Working It Out are myself, along with Peter Salamone and Joseph Birbiglia, associate producer Mabel Lewis, consulting producer Seth Barish, assistant producer Gary Simons, sound mix by Kate Balinski. Special thanks to Marissa Hurwitz and Josh Upfall, as well as David Raphael and Nina Quick. My consigliere is Mike Berkowitz.

Special thanks to Jack Antonoff and Bleachers for their music. They have some new singles out right now that are fantastic. Special thanks to my wife, the poet, J-Hope Stein. You can follow her on Instagram, at J-Hope Stein. Her book is called Little Astronaut.

Special thanks, as always, to my daughter, Una, who built the original radio fort made of pillows. Thanks, everybody, for watching many of these episodes. This one today is not on YouTube, but the last one, the Pete Holmes one, is on YouTube. The full episode, the Joe Firestone one, is on YouTube.

We're having a lot of fun with that. Seems like people dig it. Subscribe to my YouTube channel for more of those clips. Thanks most of all to you who are listening. If you enjoy the show, rate and review on Apple Podcasts. That helps.

Tell your friends. Tell your enemies. Like maybe, for example, you've started a swimming regimen at the local public pool or YMCA

and you bump into someone in the walker's lane. Don't splash them. Don't get in an argument. Just let them know, hey, if you enjoy swimming here, maybe you'd enjoy

this Netflix comedy special by Mike Birbiglia that's not about swimming, but it thematically ties to swimming and has kind of a swimming metaphor to it. And then if you like that, check out the podcast that he has called Working It Out where he talks about the creative process of coming up with jokes and stories. And sometimes he does it with his brother Joe. And then you won't have that enemy.

You'll have a new swimming buddy. Thanks, everybody. I'll see you next time.