Podcast: The Ride - Matt Gourley Presents: The Adventures of Conan: A Sword and Sorcery Spectacular & The Wild West Stunt Show

Episode Date: November 10, 2023

Matt Gourley (Conan O'Brien Needs A Friend, Keys to the Kingdom) returns to the show to talk about his new theme park podcast and some classic Universal Hollywood stunt shows! Haunted Car Wash with Eva Anderson episode up at The Cemetary Gate: Patreon.com/PodcastTheRide Listen to Podcast: The Ride Ad-Free on Forever Dog Plus: http://foreverdogpodcasts.com/plus FOLLOW PODCAST: THE RIDE: https://twitter.com/PodcastTheRide https://www.instagram.com/podcasttheride BUY PODCAST: THE RIDE MERCH: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/podcast-the-ride PODCAST THE RIDE IS A FOREVER DOG PODCAST https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/podcast-the-ride Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Forever Dog. for a muscled-up look at the Universal Studios stunt show The Adventures of Conan, a sword and sorcery spectacular by Krom. It's podcast, The Ride, which could be considered a stunt show in that it's a show where the hosts are emotionally stunted. I'm Scott Gardner, joined as always by Mike Carlson. I'm here. I don't want to laugh at that also because I'm withholding in my laughter and my sorrow and my empathy. But that is a good joke. I want to say that is a good joke.

Hey, thanks. Thanks. Very funny. Somehow not made in other stunt show episodes. And then I also was like, let me Google the definition of emotionally stunted to make sure that's right and what the results were like. It can also be called Peter Pan syndrome. Oh, we got that. People not growing up.

Yeah, yeah, yes. That's definitely there. I knew we were right on when I saw that. Now, I use that phrase joined as always by Mike Carlson. We take this phrase for granted sometimes because actually today we are not joined by Jason Sheridan. Some last minute stuff came up for him. He sends his apologies to our guest

and presumably to you, the audience. I think so, yeah. I would, he didn't specifically do it, but I imagine that he would. But hey, luckily there will be no shortage of great theme park conversation because we are joined by a theme park performing graduate, a Disney and Universal veteran turned prolific podcaster. Joining us for the second time from Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend from With Gorley and Rust and from his new podcast with Amanda Lund, Keys to the Kingdom, Matt Gorley.

It's good to be back, guys. Thanks for having me back. So glad you could. Really happy you reached out and excited to talk about Keys to the Kingdom, your new project, which should be of interest to our audience. I think already is to some of our audience. I've seen some chatter already. Oh, good.

People are finding it. It's the buzz of the town. By that, I mean Main Street, USA. You walked so we could run. we're merely standing on your shoulders sister podcast hardly hardly just gussied up a little bit more to disguise its same sort of emotional stuntedness okay you know um well well yeah indeed i mean like i i've i've listened to to some of it and you definitely do like I mean I've just the one that came out today as we're recording this I heard some like Disney adult conversation some Disney adult like defining what that means and I feel like maybe you avoiding wanting to be

to get that label as many people do Disney adult I feel like you were like defining yourself as more of a Universal person, apropos of today's topic. Yeah, I think I always was. I went to Disney quite a bit as a kid. And then of course I worked there and also Universal. But for my birthdays, when it was my choice, it was Universal Studios, stunt shows, movies. I was so into that.

My wife and I on the podcast, the podcast is just like an eight episode exploration of what it's like to work at theme parks as a character, as a performer, the good, the bad, you know, the dishy, the gossipy, all that stuff. But I think I'm a little bit more cynical about it than she is.

In fact, it's very true. We talked about this in the podcast. It's no spoiler. And then once we talked about this in the podcast it's no spoiler and then once we factor our young daughter into it that really complicates things because that i see it through her eyes and it changes my perspective a bit and so there's a slight personal journey thread through this but most of it is interviews with people that have had interesting stories or experiences at the theme park sure sure um and just like well is is any cynicism that entered your perspective on it from working there like did it like

enhance uh amanda's magic working in that world because she was like part of the magical end of it as a as a princess yeah and you were doing uh i don't i don't want to say improv uh improv shows at california adventure are less magical than being a princess you're already flattering it more than it's it's worth i think it did but it wasn't the shows or much the interaction with guests it was more the workplace environment there and the kind of like for lack of a better term i use this with some hyperbole but the cultish cultish aspect of working there and the kind of like not that there was ever a fear of being drawn into that cult but the kind of way certain employees and a good number of them would look at you like well why would you ever doubt this and and why won't you use all this terminology that we have to use and, you know, cult speak and stuff.

And so I both, like, loved it, and I don't hate it is a strong word. It was just funny to navigate through it and kind of look, you know, just look at it from an outsider's perspective, which a lot of people there don't do. Yeah, yeah. Well, and you did it younger in your in your life and like not clearly with that not being the end game because there's a lot of people in those worlds who like this is it i like this i'm staying here and then you and and that's more the type that'll start committing to the the

terminology yes um but that you were like this is a this is a a stop on the way to other things we talk about this and for a full episode just on the union performers in keys of the kingdom called the professionals i don't know when this is coming out but this will probably be out by the time this episode november 10th so yeah you'll still be in the run like yeah kind of in the middle that's the next episode as we record this and we talk to people especially the union performers who it's a real kind of uh like blessing and a curse because i started doing union performing there in my 20s and was making close to 30 an hour in the early 2010s and i had disposable income i could save for a house wow but then it's great and then but if you want to have a family and you want to live i don't even mean

wealthy but just you know comfortably it really puts you on the borderline of is that going to happen and so certain agva union employees either you got to get out or you got to just knuckle down and go this is what life is and we speak to both versions of that basically me being the one that's like i had to get out yeah yeah sure into podcast the most secure more universal um that's great well the so um to that universal and um well first of all the last time you joined us we we talked about we did a a double header yeah of uh old school Universal stunt show. That was A-Team and Miami Vice, both the precursors to Waterworlds

and then to the Purge. The Purge show. Dark Waters show. I have not seen it. Do you know anything about it? I know a little bit about it, yeah. In fact, someone tipped me off that it was happening before it was announced.

I don't know where that gets me, other than to say I would like to be known as the world's foremost universal studios theme parks action stunt spectacular enthusiast and an insider i would say oh i mean i can tell you that the water performers sit in a hot tub when they're not performing. Oh, that's great. That's big news on this show. I've seen that first hand when I worked there, yeah. That's nuts. Well, it's nice you can own these titles and say facts like that and get a lot of like, wow, as opposed

to if you said any of this on Conan Needs a Friend, the mockery you would receive for 15 straight minutes. I'd be pilloried, but I'd still do it. I'd still do it. If it came up, I'd do it. It's your role yes you have to you have to give uh the the cat toys to to play with to bat around yeah um but yeah um so that's what that's what we're attempting uh here today is to cover um kind of a double head and i realized

that you you gave us with the shows that you wanted to talk about you gave us two of the most mealy-mouthed titles ever to exist uh uh in like okay if we were to do the full titles in our episode title that is the adventures of conan a sword and sorcery spectacular and the wild wild wild west stunt show yeah except it's the wild west stunt show i don't mean to like split hairs we're all about splitting hairs okay maybe this may be on me maybe i didn't describe it i hope you didn't do a bunch of research on the wild wild west stunt show although we can certainly talk about that too oh love this look we are all about uh micro topic dissection and you know what even jason knowing that this is what we're going to be talking about he seemed a little like well i do want to talk about the wild wild wild west because

i saw that in florida so you know what actually we maybe you're okay perfect so come back yeah yeah okay so we'll take some wilds out of there how many what wait you said two wilds is there there's a three wild three which is actually what i knew and i think when it when the show one wild i can i can bust this out. So the original stunt show there of all time was called the Wild West Stunt Show, and it had different permutations, but it existed for years. It was the three-man cowboy stunt show.

My favorite of all time. Wow. Just three? That's pretty like, that's them doing it. You're not relying on like a power trio. It's streamlined. It's streamlined.

It's the rush of theme park action spectacles. Then they closed it down and opened what would become the Wild Wild Wild West stunt show. But first they called it the Riot Act, right in time for the LA riots to hit. And then they had to change the name to the Wild Wild Wild West stunt show. And then that's a stunt show that involved, think what like five or six people many of whom i knew at the time and i don't know why i didn't like work it to get in this thing but i think i thought myself too puny to be a stunt man though there's like a comic relief role that's kind of would have been you know up my alley sure but still requiring probably comfort with falls and crash pads yeah which i was i would have been excited to do but i just sold myself short and

said like there's no way that i think i thought i was too young too and i probably was so you were still you were working at universe you crossed over with before this thing closed which was like 2002 no i i worked at universal studios for one summer in 2011 okay and disney i worked at for like over a decade oh most of the 2000s okay okay yeah okay so the thing was gone you were just like why did i not try yeah i was sad and i still go to where that thing was performed specifically the original wild west stunt show which for a long time was like where they did the Grinch Whoville thing. Oh, yeah. And now it's just like a horror night.

It's just like an alcohol pavilion. Yeah, there's just different booths and stuff. Yeah, but I still stand there and go, the greatest stuntman of all time, comedian Bob Rochelle, wants spit teeth out here day after day after day. Wow, wow. Okay, wait, so you've dropped the name because before we started recording you were alluding to somebody who had a big influence

on you and their role in this show would you like to talk about bob influence wow wow bob rochelle was he was of the three people in this stunt show he's like the comic relief and like specifically so the other two are heels and straight men right and he's like bugs bunny relief and like specifically so the other two are heels and straight men right and he's like bugs bunny and daffy duck all rolled into one bright red tight curly hair kind of long beard often i don't know there's just something so warner brothers about his timing his perfect timing and i don't know what it is because I saw these videos pop up during quarantine. And it just came on YouTube. My algorithm was like, this guy likes stunt show videos.

But I had never seen one from the old version before. And it came up and I just like shivers went through my body going, I know this guy. I saw this guy so many times when I was a kid. I went home and acted like him. I put stunt shows on in my backyard for neighbors, all based on him. And then I realized this was the guy that inspired me to kind of want to perform or do comedy and things like that.

And I saw it and realized, I didn't know you could make a living spitting out fake teeth and falling in wells and getting whipped and do comedy. Wow. So it unlocked it. He wasn't with you for decades. No.

All of a sudden you were like, oh, whoa. Yeah. It was like, you know when people have horrible revelations about something they've blocked out? This was like the opposite of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, oh, wonderful. Why have I been blocking this out?

Then I went into a deep rabbit hole of discovery on this guy thinking should i look into this i mean what performer in the early 80s in a theme park is like gonna come out you know smelling like roses but he he he seems to have been i can only get so far and i've talked about this on my with gorley and ross podcast for so many episodes it's gross he turns out he was an extra in like the presidio with sean connery not even an extra he was he had a small role and he did all these like really schlocky stunt and b-movie films one about the universal studio stunt team that goes out camping and comes across a drug gang that they get into a life and death battle with martin landau's in that because his daughter's in it and so he just does a couple scenes as the

ruler of the drug lords wow and that's like an official branded universal movie no no they were able to just go shoot like early mornings on the set or something that's's how I figured. No, it is a gorilla movie. Wow. It's like the Escape from Tomorrow. Yeah. Oh, yes. Except it would probably like tacit permission as opposed to just pure gorilla. Good way to get production value, though, is to steal it. Yeah, that's where they make the real movies. Yeah, yeah.

But I've been trying to find out what kind of guy he was because then he also died in 2008. But he ended up moving to vegas and i don't know if it was to perform he worked at a hotel turns out i went to high school with his stepdaughter he lived in whittier when i lived in whittier and i am no closer to knowing anything about the guy's personality this guy that i have now imagined in my brain is the single most responsible person for my entire happiness in life and well-being wow maybe for the best because there's that don't meet your heroes thing and maybe like if you know if it's if the influence is like what he was to you the image of him and

then maybe it's irrelevant if if he was cool and nice or uh grizzled and weird i suppose so i don't know i think you should look into it more i kind of am compelled yeah i really am and i've i've reached out to people mostly who've posted these videos on youtube say you you clearly had some access to these shows to have this tape what was this guy like and all i've ever gotten is he was great oh he was nice he was great that's a good knee jerk yeah i'm now discovering what because like one of the top google results for bob rochelle stuntman is you and your the reddit for with corley and rust and there's this post i don't know i thought maybe i'm breaking this to you i don't know if

you've seen this but all right i'm getting more and more sure that the saga of bob rochelle is going to end with Amanda ripping off a Mission Impossible mask and revealing that she's been a grizzled old stunt guy this whole time. Oh, that's hot. That's erotic. Custom fan fiction for your marriage. Alright, so this has been

seeded then through, if this is being discussed on Reddit. Sometimes we'll ask a question on the show and then sometimes we'll never get it. We'll ask a question like, does anybody knowdit yeah sometimes like we'll ask a question on the show and then sometimes we'll never get it like we'll ask a question like does anybody know whatever and then we'll get a listener that'll say they know and then sometimes it's just crickets and then sometimes we'll get a email that's like eight paragraphs long explaining so let's cross our fingers that someone listening i had a bit of that happened to me Where a guy was a Skip tracer Like bounty hunter And he sent me

Civic and personal Records I did not Wow Ask for these things And they were like Ninety hundred pages Of things

And I still was no closer To understanding the man Other than his credit history And his like Medical history Everything was Above board Like he didn't have

Arrests or anything Like that Or you know What was his average blood pressure? Was he a calm guy? Depends on whether it was during the show or not. Eye color. Do we know his eye color?

Well, he seems like a knots guy, too. That makes sense. He was a train robber. He was the first person ever to be hanged in the hanging. The first ever hanging. He was originally a knots guy. So people have done great work on my behalf where they've sent me archival footage that's not for the public on the original knots stunt show which is another stunt show i adored sure yeah and he

was in that and he played multiple parts in that wow okay oh gotcha oh interesting i mean because those those fit very well together and knots stillott's still has a Western Stunt Show, correct? I have not seen it. I've been there and it has never been playing, so I don't know if it is a seasonal thing. Although the last time I saw it, it was rough. Ah, sure. That's the one over by what the roller coaster calls.

That's some of the roughness of it. I forgot the name of the coaster. Is it Jaguar that goes over there? It's not Ghost Rider. It's the name of the coaster. Is it Jaguar that goes over there? It's not Ghost Rider. It's the one I did. We did it, yeah. I'm embarrassed to say I did it about four days ago

and I can't remember the name of it. It's not Montezuma's Revenge. No. No. It's kind of something that any coaster could be called. I did it front row and my legs are dangling,

which I don't like. Oh, yeah. And the whole thing freaked me out a little. Yes, yeah, yeah. That one, I don't like. And it freaked, the whole thing freaked me out a little. Yes. Yeah. That was that one. I have to admit purely was like, I like, I think regularly that coaster would have freaked me out and I wouldn't have done it. I had, I'd had enough drinks at that knots event that like, let's go. We're going.

I remember I was like rounding up everybody. No time to discuss. It's happening. I kind of don't know if I would do it sober 11 a.m. Yeah. No, I was shocked when you said it. Yeah, yeah. Well, I was so happy to be back also.

Have I ever said on the show how, or have I said many times somehow, that when it was my first time back post-pandemic, and it was a thing we got invited to, so I was happy about that, and then some free drinks, and I'm really happy about that. And then I'm on the log ride. I think solo. I didn't make you guys listen to this but so I'm alone in a log rounding

the corner and I just started yelling I love Knott's I love Knott's I like Knott's too pure love in that moment that makes me stand by it yeah being back oh boy that might have been the best maybe that was better than returning to Disney

I don't know Silver Bullet okay yeah anything could be called that right and it's not like western oriented Oh, boy. That might have been the best. Maybe that was better than returning to Disney. Silver bullet. Silver bullet. Okay, yeah. Anything could be called that, right? And it's not like Western-oriented. No, and it's not. It's like yellow, and it's like, why wouldn't it be just silver or something? Yeah, good point.

They didn't even have to paint it, probably, if it was just steel. Yeah, very true. But that's funny. I was thinking about that, about how that is the universal one went away a while ago at this point, but that tradition is is still there and i forgot that the train robbers too which is the reason i can't take my train crazy son on the knots train because he i think he would be pretty freaked out by the robbers three and a half yeah yeah yeah because he doesn't he's not gonna know the reality of that i don't think that It scared me.

I remember that. I think the same deal. My parents thought it was like a gentle little train ride like Disney. Didn't know fake guns would be in play. Yeah, and they would fire the guns when I was a kid. I don't know if they still do. They weren't like super loud, but they would shoot blanks in their guns. And those guys were all over that Calico Square.

And I ate it up. I loved it. I'm sure I crossed paths with bob rochelle there as well i just probably yeah young to be around you uh your your whole life your guardian angel i mean we were spending time in the same city we're probably shopping at the same music plus for all yeah yes yeah so he was like obi-wan kenobi yes yes oh mike i can't he made me so happy he was he was yeah yeah the revelation is going to be greater than you ever imagined yeah because he died in 2008 i could have been struck down by some kind of stunt lord that you know was like a rival stunt lord that's

a common way for them to go so yeah yeah it makes sense and there's never been any like hinting that your parents aren't your real parents right oh my god here it is you're putting it all together i look just like my dad and i don't have tightly curled red hair okay but yes and you have all of your teeth you haven't spit any out while we've been recording um Well, that's magical, Bob Rochelle, this whole story. So, yeah, that, I mean, well, this is great, Jason. We will save Wild West and the Florida iteration for Jason. So save it for you. But we can talk a little about, yeah, this was like a fixture, I think.

It seems to me like I get foggy on the on the tour history and i think they were always doing little tours at the studio even in like silent movie days but i think the tour as we know it with trams and the stops and little shows it seems like 1964 was kind of the advent of it and i think from then there was this the i guess the the three-person show i think it might have happened like on the back lot somewhere without seating and then it ended up where the universal amphitheater ended up and in the same configuration where it's kind of like a little half dome and right terrorist and then they so the amphitheater grew out of that so i think i think that's correct so you got that like sweeping view of uh of burbank and the pictures of it are amazing because it

didn't have as much of a like uh amphitheater wall thing that it did eventually so you would see that vista behind it that was incredible just killer it makes that to this day it makes that kind of like nothing Harry Potter coaster. What's that called? Flight of the Hippogriff? Hippogriff, yeah. That is really enhanced by the first – that all the drops look like they are 2,000 feet drops because you're up on top of it. Oh, right, yeah. Yeah, it's a cool thing about the the property but yeah um that was it was consulted on when it opened i guess by

or maybe at some point by hal needham i didn't know that really yeah i thought what you yeah you mentioned his name before we started recording i think he did somehow contribute oh my god this is making it even more precious for me because i'm a huge hal needham filmography wow wow which is okay so smoking the bandit and cannonball runs and all the it was like he's burt reynolds biggest yeah and also mega force and uh hooper which is about burt reynolds yes yeah i would put adam weston hooper correct he does have a small part yeah he's he's who burt reynolds is doubling for is a stuntman for yeah right yeah um yeah wait and and the movie i realized i said his name in the context of the film rad at one point in time which i've never seen i think so

yeah i think he directed did he i believe so um this like motocross yeah i remember it movie with talia shire and sparks i've never heard in it or the song is in it or something because when you think motocross you think think Talia Shire. And she's not a mom in that, right? She's just the most competing BMX biker. Maybe. No way. I don't know the content of Rad.

They should see it. I love the name. I was going to say that's your favorite word. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Named a character Rad in a show. Also, in looking up howl needham there was like a there was a toy you could get i've seen the howl needham western movie stunt set it's incredible wow wow have you seen it in person or just like listings for it no i've just seen

instagram postings and i've grabbed a picture of it it's a it's amazing it's like a saloon set where they can you can bust through windows and do high falls and stuff this is what i was doing with my gi joes i would build sets oh yeah the miami vice set and built little like fire contraptions that you could press a button so they'd like fall in this little shack and then the roof would go like like that and wow really so into stunt you would break falls for your carry you wouldn't even make them go through like a horrible event no i would have little mattresses in there and stuff like that it was like i was playing stunt show not not actual fighting wow i love this like uh this like major within theme the the university of theme park interest this is like a such a specific cool like yeah lane that you have pathetic we like this is this is the audience for it um but uh what do you wait what and then what were your like backyard shows

like oh i did two that i remember and the first one was because i had no experience putting on a show or understanding how to do that i just had bob rochelle in my mind i didn't remember what his name was so i called myself stinky stew and i was him and i got my neighbors kelly and christy grunager mike regan and jeff carson and we just i i remember us having rehearsals but when action was called everything went haywire and there was like a sandbox you could jump in off a big tall bench that was like the high fall. And I made something called the paper punch, which was I had an old knockoff lightsaber and a little bar taped like an L frame. And I just put notebook paper that was about like three by two feet so you could bust through it. Wow. But that didn't work it all fell apart and i remember being a little depressed that it didn't go over well so

the second one we scripted and worked harder on had some comedy beats and stuff and that would be something i'd be comfortable showing today where the first one you know i don't want to talk about it sure sure did you was there anything d anything very dangerous or mildly dangerous you were doing or no? Well, not for those, but then that led me to doing two fairly dangerous things. When my mom would leave, I would pull my twin mattress out in the backyard, and we had a detached garage, and I would jump off my garage onto the mattress as a high fall. And just a twin. I know.

Yeah. That's really precise. Would you do the fall? No, I'd fall on my stomach i was too afraid i think to do like a belly flop yeah okay and then i spent a good amount of time figuring out how to do electronic squibs blood packs oh wow and i've told the story before but i figured it out the day of my eighth grade graduation dance which i then didn't go to because i was like i figured it out i'm gonna stay home and burst squibs all day i guess i didn't go to prom i was gonna say skipped but there was more and i asked somebody and didn't work out but i ended up uh

senior prom night me and a friend blew up a building for a movie that never got finished oh that's how i spent it felt like a good like mad like i understand fuck all that fuck the mainstream i'm gonna blow up a building instead it was fun i think i did have more fun probably you did on that note how many because i probably started and stopped so many films that never got made or animations and things that like yeah that was just a career path well that and also it's not a good strategy to like start with okay so we have the explosion now what is the rest of the idea of what it is exactly yeah it starts with the story this is what we know today yeah of course

that is honestly how they start most marvel movies that's true i think we know we want to pull up a cool building and then like what else happens yeah and pre-visits are worked out a year before the actual director is signed on 100 percent um uh bob rochelle got the name check but i'd like to name check one that i i said before we started recording which is uh a longtime guy there at universal lance rimmer yeah and he has quite a pivotal history in the stunt show do you know about this i don't think i do i just saw him interviewed and was like that's the coolest name ever and he's a cool dude he's got like an eastwood quality to him oh sure yeah he's the guy i'm thinking of is it lance vernon i think is he the one that like had kind of piercing blue eyes no facial hair is it that guy you know what i wish i wish i I could tell you, but I was just staring at the lower third with his name.

That's what was piercing to me. So I may not have like looked the man in his eyes. I can't expect you people to have gone as pathetically deep as I have. As I understand the story, this three person show existed in like the Universal Amphitheater space and whatever. And then Lance R rumor was kind of either brought in and he was an actual maybe film stuntman or something and he said let me retool

this a little bit and add an actual script and comedy and the guy that was kind of the head of it before was like whoa whoa whoa what are you doing here this is a stunt oh it's more of a like actual breaking the fourth wall stunt demonstration prior to that oh yeah yeah and he said let me put in the story and the guy got really pissed and then i think universal said let's run them like give them each three week runs and see how they did and then the the one with the comedy in the story far exceeded the others in terms of reception wow wow yeah yeah uh yeah i saw some compressed version of that in a video and i forget the uh maybe theme park express was the source of it but the uh jay stein was the uh universal universal executive who's

considered like the guy who got the modern tour off the ground in the park that we know and he was the one who like whoa whoa whoa and i say that because that factors into the other show and the same dynamic is at play which i guess it's there's something about the dna of universal where they i think they had a hard time and still do sometimes have a hard time moving on from no what we are is you're on the set of something and you are learning about the making of something. It's the arc of almost everything at Universal. Yeah. That's where it starts, where it's like, we're going to explain it to you. And then they're like, but actually people want to be in it.

They want to pretend it's real. They don't want to know. And just for stuff to happen instead of like, we need three volunteers. Okay. Now this is a facade. We've talked about that with the last time I was here that both, I think the A-Team and Miami vice and even waterworld have that kind of like cut element to it yes yes yeah direction spectacular here we throwing you know the john wayne punch and instead i guess waterworld doesn't quite do that but they're still breaking the fourth wall but there was a stage manager role in the miami vice when

yeah that's right and slacks yeah yeah there were so many i feel like when universal florida opened up there must have been like 11 shows with cut cut cut i'm the director here it was like every single one like six flat like the six flags batman show i saw when i was little it was the same thing that's right and there was a fake plant in the audience yeah like and they he like jumped from the audience onto the like itself, which I thought was real at the time, of course is not real. All I remember about that was that they had clearly purchased the helicopter from Miami Vice

for that. And then the Indiana Jones show has a kind of like stage director, like first assistant AD role. Oh yeah, that's entirely like filming scenes from the films that have been out since the early 80s we're doing the boulder scene which makes less sense than just like you go and watch a show you've i know seen a play before knots i think was the first big cowboy stunt show and they don't do that they i mean they're they're presentational and they're doing a stunt

demonstration but then a story takes over they bring in the the Beaumont bear from Hollywood is the big Hollywood stunt man to come teach these berry pickers how to do it. And they have a plant in the audience too. Got to the point where every time when I was a kid, I'd look for the guy in the Hawaiian shirt sitting with a woman. They're on their honeymoon. Where are you from? Where do you work?

I don't want to say, come on Disney world. Oh no, I'm going to punch you. Wait, I just had a taco. All tourists wear Hawaiian shirts. I guess I do typically wear Hawaiian shirts. I think the audience thinks I only wear Hawaiian shirts because I post pictures from theme parks where I exclusively wear Hawaiian shirts.

Have you ever accidentally gone up because I think you're the plant? You there. That show is actually really good and i don't think there's any online like video of the original three-person show at knots because the plant played it straight for quite a while and you actually really think he's a plant and then he's the one that gets shot by a shotgun and does the high fall right at the end and that's the only time you really realize especially as a kid right it. It's good, yeah. Wow, wow. I can send you links.

Yeah, yeah, please, yes. Well, and it'll be good research for when we do the micro topic of the other, the split off, the Wild Wild Wild. Anything else to say about this? Because thematically, I think there's a lot of things

that tie into the evolution of the Conan the Barbarian show. But anything else Wild West story? It's weird. There were certain tropes in Wild West stunt shows that I have to believe maybe started with knots because I don't know if there was, I'm sure there were other stunt shows prior

or concurrent to that, but that was the big one. And the one thing that I keep seeing repeated was axe handle fights. And they have the same choreography where it's not an axe, it's just like an axe handle. They do it in the Wild West stunt show. They did it at the Knot stunt show. There was like a Marine World stunt show up north

that had a Wild West stunt show in it. Oh, Marine World Africa USA. I think that's it, yeah. The bizarrely named park up north. And it had a Western stunt show. Wow. But on a really cheap saloon set. I want to say maybe there was an orangutan in it.

Oh, I hope. And it has some actors that went on to do actual legit. I think one of the guys who played Jason Voorhees was in it maybe. I can't remember. But they would do this bit where they would hit axe handles together and they would like lock the axe handles and they do it like back and forth pushing and then one of them would step away and take a breath like very bugs bunny daffy duck while the other person kept going and it just killed with the audience and then spitting teeth into a spittoon

was a big one just a mouthful and bob rochelle if you watched any of his videos on youtube in the stunt show he's the best because he just his timing on how to like when to release a few and when to release you know dozens of them oh yeah yeah yeah so he would like vomit teeth that at one one time you do one and then he would do like a puke yeah and then and then somehow continue on he he wow was he holding it in his mouth like the whole time no well see he has this bit where he and his the the tough guy that he's kind of sidekick to come out of a saloon and the tough guy comes out and slams the saloon door back in his face so he's put them in immediately before that but then he just kind of hobbles over and just it's just

like perfection how he drizzles them out because you you know even if you don't do that well it's going to be get a laugh but he gets like four or five uh-huh at different times oh he like he's able to extend out the bit via timing and then i would imagine there's a good just like there's a ton and then you think it's done and then beat and the one more yeah or maybe a couple of those. Sure, sure. I just love how similar some of this stuff is because I love pro wrestling. And one of the big things you do in pro wrestling is you just have gum in your mouth the whole time.

And so you take a big kick maybe later in the match and you spit the gum out. And if it's white, it looks like you lost a tooth. Yeah. And then so it's like a big like you really want to sell the impact of something. That's what you do. Yeah. I love like there's all like all the same like carny tricks and stuff where when you cut yourself. Oh, right.

There's wrestlers that spray mist at each other. Yeah. And they have to like go under the ring and you don't see them do it. They are kind of carny tricks in a way. Yeah. Yes. And stuntmen and professional wrestlers in my experience, there's lot of similarities mostly because they'll uh take abuse yeah but still i love all the tricks there's a there's a thing he does where he gets whipped and and uh scream i can i play it i almost

yeah of course because it's just i don't know there's something, no one's ever going to find this as funny as I truly do, but there's something about the timing of it that is. I like, like, you know, we haven't, we've never done an episode on him, but like you're hearing like Wally Bogue, who's the guy who was at the Golden Horseshoe, and like Steve Martin was very influenced by him, and he was just a legendary Disneyland guy.

And like, I like hearing about these like legends that were not widely publicized essentially yeah but in that in some in the like he was pre-internet time somebody who who go who you go to see and who performs in front of lots of audiences every day yeah looms pretty large i would imagine and like and also for for a steve martin then we where like there's no stand-up clubs exactly. Like you're maybe a stand-up in some cabaret like general show that you could. So there aren't like a lot of stand-ups to go be influenced by. So to him like I go up to Anaheim and see this guy just demolish and be silly.

It makes a lot of sense. I don't know if this is more visual than audio, but you should be able to hear. He gets whipped, and then it's his response. Jump, jump! You missed! Oh, that works. I know, and his physical part of it is very you know kind of 70s campy on the edge of like i don't know about this you know it wouldn't fly today for sure

but i think it's more innocent than all that you know sure sure well that's the type of pay play into the rafters what all this is and that worked off of a phone yeah onto a microphone that we weren't even looking at like oh yeah that that timing's funny regardless um that's that's that's awesome love learning about bob um and yeah i don't know that this is like a whole like it is more of a tentpole of theme park world than you realize the western stunt show and that they all have some of the same stuff and you usually probably got some like dynamite is thrown into a well and then either it's water it's like confetti the modern yeah the modern day theme park is built off of the wild west i know that's just like the ground for almost everything that was yeah yeah laid upon and this

one had quicksand in it too it had a had a quicksand pit. Oh, that's funny. That was just another obsession of mine as a kid that I didn't even need to go into. When you guys are really hurting for topics, we'll do quicksand at theme parks. Wow. Oh, wow. Because I think this may be the only one. Wait, wait. What is another? Don't give it away, but what is another iteration of quicksand at theme parks?

I can't think of a single one. Is there nothing at disney like even in like was there ever some a sign indiana jones or anything yeah like on big thunder or even the jungle cruise of like danger quicksand or there's not yeah i don't know or like the old mine train through nature's wonderland i don't know i don't i'm not off the top of my head somewhere there's also something my let me shout out a kind of local one not local to here but like a regional one uh i remember going to a place called old tucson in arizona when i was a kid that my mom talks about a lot still because i must have been really lit up there that i think was a like behind the

scenes of movies thing despite being in tucson and it's behind the scenes of westerns despite it's the 90s and nobody makes westerns anymore but i think that thing's still kicking i had some of it so there maybe there's somewhere else that had a quicksand component or at least some of these other things that we're talking about yeah like an old tucson i feel like i actually do remember something on the old 80s tour. Oh, man. Like right when you get on the tour around the lagoon area where they had filmed, they'll tell you like Gilligan's Island and McHale's Navy.

You're like, what did they film there? One establishing shot? I don't know. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's an old school tour thing that I love is just all the I think it's I think it's what became the

Battle of Galactica Battlestar Galactica yeah yeah and what probably now is where the Badge of the Future Simpsons ride is but

but it was just like you just go by a hill basically and I think they just release a bunch of boulders and would just fall down the actual hill that sounds great

and get caught right before they hit you. That whole tour originally started off with just so much random stuff, a burning house. Then when they put the Battlestar Galactica thing in, I remember there was also a Battlestar Galactica, like Cylon, shooting a flamethrower at the house, which they added. Then they added Hannibal animatronic

in a Jeep flamethrowing the house from A-Team. Oh, really? Wait, at the same time or when you replaced it? It replaced it. Because that would be great if they were teaming up. Hannibal and Asylum. That is how Universal does it. Yes, which we can get into at this other.

Well, yeah, let's talk a little. Let me really pronounce. I'd be correct to say Conan the Barbarian to separate from your current collaborator. It took me a real time to go from Conan to Conan, and now I can't go back. Go backwards. Yes, yeah, yeah. Because it's like two dominant phases of my life. Yeah, right?

Yeah. Yes, yeah. What loomed largest in your childhood? Yeah. And Schwarzenegger was recently on Conan's podcast. Oh, yeah, right. Conan and Conan, and all of our heads were spinning. We didn't know, none of us knew what to do.

What did he call Conan O'Brien? Oh, good question. Because I feel like his regular accent would lead to Conan. I think he said Conan. He did say Conan, but I actually think because with the German, you'd say like Conan here, but you go Conan. Conan.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or Austrian. Yeah. I'm not entirely sure, but I think he got it right. Yeah, yeah. Credit to Conan O'Brien for taking over the name

pop culture. There was probably a while there where still he's having television success, but he's not the primary pop cultural Conan. Yeah. But at this point, of course he is. My mom still refers to him as Conan.

As Conan. And I think we talked about this on the show that he had finally eclipsed Conan the Barbarian, but the singer Conan Gray was getting more Google results than he was. And like, were we in, like, are we on the cusp of a third oh no well there was there was the scare of detective conan the anime is that what am i right i think so yeah yeah so maybe internationally that has taken over but uh conan nolan was like a reporter for a while too but that that never so whatever market he was in that might he might have usurped him but conan the barbarian conan the barbarian a sword and sorcery spectacular this thing was

what a name i yeah absolutely and i was so glad you brought this up because nobody has and uh i can't imagine you got to do it, Mike. No, never. But it was still there. This ran from 83 to 94. It ran to 94? Yeah, yeah. So I got to see it as a kid, and it left a huge impact on me. Because that's one of those, like, I had a really formative one for my birthday when I was seven, which would have been in there. And to be that close, not to give it away, but to be that close not to give it away but to be that close

to a big fire breathing dragon and to have done disneyland and like disneyland's nice but it's gentle and like oh universal is a whole other ball game yeah it's dangerous it's gonna send you right into puberty what you need for the transition Mike, do you watch this and like, oh, God, if only I could have. Could have become a man watching it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would have been less stunted today. Yeah, I like all this stuff. I was not a Conan kid.

I wasn't either, actually. Yeah, me neither. And I've never seen either film still. I guess I should. I probably, right? They're good, right? Yeah, I haven't seen them in years either it was more just like same thing with water old and even miami vice but once they

were stunt shows it was like i'm in you know yeah yeah it does not matter yeah yeah yeah and well some of the stunt shows was like the perfect that's the best version of the ip yeah yeah yes because it's live in person in your face but it's's all, yeah, this is very, like watching it, you're like, this is all like the nonsense that I like. That's so true. Like people are jacked people and dragons and fire and just a guy talking like this and all of that. So yeah, I think I would have been pretty into it. I would also have been very scared watching it. Yeah, I definitely was.

Which I'm sure was happening yeah yeah what you can't get from watching it on youtube though is the first of all you you enter through what used to be the it's the facade of a giant castle because it was a dracula's show comedy kind of like special effects show and they're prior to this yeah but what you don't get is the damp smell because there's like a water rain curtain that was amazing so the whole thing when you're sitting down there's a steady rain that's happening that's like opaque and you can't see through it and then when the show begins that parts like a curtain oh wow they turn it off in succession so it just opens from the center and so there's like that wonderful theme park water smell like you know from splash mountain or the log ride or very et i feel like i yeah i god you're like unlocking that obviously

because universal had et and then city walk used to have this like rainforest store that had the same smell and water everywhere and must yes and i didn't realize this too yeah it's all over there and you're sitting on and this was the same for all the stunt shows to this day even water world these kind of like um ridged aluminum benches that have a sound and a feel and you know and yeah like the animal actors benches yeah like yeah just regular yeah you're seeing a little kid's baseball game yes or no you're on like bleachers yeah exactly yeah and there's you know there's wonderful stereophonic sound that you don't get anywhere else even in the movie it was never quite this clear and there's lasers already happening because lasers are so big in the 80s and lasers factor pretty heavily in this show

and like um there's a lot of we'll discover as we talk about it i think there's a lot of theme park first certainly universal firsts but i like just doing a big recent property i think was a big deal at the time and kind of not exactly what they did and thus that involved a custom score by uh basil paul adores oh yeah who did the movie yes yeah the music was awesome in this yeah the robocop too so like that's pretty i don't think that had been done that like you get the actual people yeah who did the movie to do this and there's a big sense of anticipation i should have mentioned this with the wild west stunt show too that there's always some kind of pre-show entertainment and in the cowboy one it was a guy named samir kamoon who's

still alive and he would do charlie chaplin bits oh yeah and i'm trying to remember what the conan one was yeah i don't know yeah some like there's usually yeah some like there's like a v impy guy it's like a gestury type guy was it yeah i mean there's a video i saw of it i'm not sure exactly where the main show starts and maybe that was actually part of the main show but there is like a gestury kind of guy who's like kind of goofing around a little bit before the show but there's similar to the that you don't realize it's happening in the plant in the audience there's always yeah you you're you're anticipating what it's going to be and then maybe you don't catch second one of the like comic relief guy coming out yeah so you're like only like 45 seconds in you go

wait something's happening i don't really know because it's like laughter's moving through the crowd because it's happening in a specific part of oh yeah yeah so it's got to hit you and maybe there's a delay that's a magical little feeling and there's something about this one being indoors where none of the other ones really were. It was climate controlled and it may be a little too cold. Yeah, yes. You know what's weird?

I discovered, much like the amphitheater, which started outdoor and then got enclosed, this venue, I think the seating was there. So when you were there still as of a couple years ago, it's probably still the same seating setup that was outdoor pre-1980, which strangely was for a makeup demonstration show that happened outside. Really weird. So they just built the building around it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

A castle was built. We got the seats. Now let's just build it again. Did that save that much money? I don't know. We got the seats. Now let's just build a castle. Did that save that much money? Yeah, really. I don't know. So that's not to be confused with, they had an early special effects show

that you could volunteer in and purchase a VHS copy of back in the days before most people even had VHS and it was like really expensive. Right. Yes, insanely expensive takes. Like an airplane crash movie that they would shoot all these scenes from

and then see it by the end. Yes. Was that, have we ever talked about that before? I've always, I've just like in lists of everything they ever had seen. I think it was based on airports. It was because volunteers would jump into tanks of water and things. Really? Yeah.

And I remember being. That's kind of aggro to make a theme park goer do. I think they swapped it. I don't remember but I wanted to be in that so is the last thing they did like that the Star Trek thing where they would you would get like a VHS of like yeah maybe dad looking like an idiot wearing an outfit

yeah I think there's no more of those left this this space turned into the special effects stages show. Yeah, which my wife did. Oh, really? Did we talk to her about that? Wow. She hated it.

Oh, really? There was so much to memorize and she did it so infrequently that she'd have to re-memorize it every time. Oh, my God. Yeah. And then, actually,

on Keys of the Kingdom, Mark McConville comes on and he talks about a night where a very wealthy couple from Asia bought out Universal Studios. Presumably, he thinks because Disney wouldn't let him. So he could propose to his fiance or his hope, his soon to be fiance. They bought out the entire park. Every element of the park had to be on standby, including Waterworld.

If these two people wanted to come just two people and do it, but including the special effects show, which he pointed out is an absurd prospect because if the two of them came in the way that the show works is that they need a volunteer. The volunteer has to disappear backstage for almost 30 minutes. So that would leave this fiancee seated in the theater watching it by herself wow did it make it to them i don't believe so no i don't believe they ever went to a lot of it yeah oh my god that's crazy but yeah that that was where that that's what

it was just kind of inexplicably in a castle theater yeah and now the castle theater finally is gone it's been there since 1980 and just got taken out this year right for the fast and furious coaster yeah that's oh that kills me yeah sorry to tell you sorry to break technology yeah fast furious no less it looks really it's gonna be awesome oh yeah you know what i shouldn't speak because i could couldn't couldn't i can't stand the transformer movies but that transformer ride is awesome yeah there we go really i don't think i like it i like we've had an on we've many times gone into the the war of is that better than rise of the resistance the new star wars right the point yeah you know that is, that's a good question. You might be the first person to say it's a good question. Everyone thinks I'm insane,

but my argument is just that the Transformers ride, even though I'm not a fan of the movies, gives you everything you would want from Transformers, and Rise of the Resistance leaves me wanting. Mike, I might have to agree with you. I know that's blasphemous because people adore the rise of the first time this anyone said this i've agreed with me uncanny with rise of the resistance that left me cold where transformers is cold from it except for

when you're in the spaceship with lieutenant beck that's the only warmth i feel on the ride i agree i agree and there's something about transformers being uncanny valley like the definition of uncanny valley and that they're machines but they're not trying to be humans i was really thrown by rise of the resistance when you get into that first room of all the stormtroopers or you're in the little shuttle and they've empowered all the regular disney ride operators to be imperial commanders but like still have a disney name tag which how they don't see the irony of the evil empire of disney and it's like yeah like in the movie it's always like lieutenant hucks or something but here it's just you know commander chad from maine yeah yes whose favorite

favorite movie the rescuer yeah that's no joke and that took me out in like actually to disney's you know probably it ruined the magic for me i hate to use those terms but i kind of want i want some old craggy man or woman playing these parts get an agva union performer instead of letting i don't mean letting because like it's great that the regular performers or the cast members get to do that but when they're just kind of like just doing a workaday job where they're just like all right everybody over here and then some of them get too into it and it feels a little like actually dangerous in a way you know like what kind of hurt me in there i will be entrapped yeah that's true you know uh uh and i i know i know jason uh would agree on the union front that that the um i mean that's a lot of the weakness of galaxy's edge as a whole is that the choice that like sure

no the regular cast will get to do all of the we don't need to pay for stunt shows for example to happen in all of these empty spaces that were built only for stunt shows to happen. It's like a huge shell of disappointment each time you feel like you're being set up with something and it doesn't come. Yeah, yeah. I remember having a real moment. This is the first time, yes, anyone has agreed with me on this.

Okay, I'm with you. I don't think Jason would tilt the scales. I think he's more on my side, but also on the side of chaos. That's true. He loves chaos as well. This is a very chaotic opinion. It is, but I think he's more on my side but also on the side of chaos that's true he loves chaos well this is a very chaotic opinion it is but i think there's some behind some of my chaos there's some logic going on i see it yeah and it's not just that i don't get to see my friends from the movies

i like more meaning what like i'm like the whole thing is just based around the new movies yeah that's three which i'm like why wasn't it all nine? Like, why can't we include all of it? But I'm just saying there's a heart that's missing from it. If it's the ultimate Star Wars ride, which I don't think there ever will be a more expensive, bigger scale ride, they're missing something. It's missing something from it. I think maybe this opinion relies on a harder star wars fandom than i have it's possible there's a low bar to meet i'm not a super yeah i am too and

maybe that's why i'm yeah because if they went they took such pains to make that whole land kind of free from the the settings of the movies batuu doesn't exist in the movies or anything like that. But then you have to land so hard on this and then have nothing of the original trilogy in there. It's weird. Well, and it's also, all the movies and the lander, it's also like, we want you to think about Tatooine. Yeah.

We made a bunch of sand planets, but none of them are Tatooine. And then Batuu is not Tatooine, but it looks like it. And you're like, well, what? Well, it's not, it can't are Tatooine. And then Batuu is not Tatooine, but it looks like it. And you're like, well, what? Well, it's not. It can't be Tatooine because they need big cliffs to block the freeways and parking structures. Yeah, Beggar's Canyon. I mean, come on.

There's places on Tatooine that could have like elevation. Yeah, you're right. I don't know. I don't know the full topography of Tatooine. Mos Eisley area, you're thinking, yes, there's like one story, two stories maybe. But then again, they're looking at Mos Eisley down from some perch of a giant canyon at one point when he says he's scum and villainy. Right. Look, Disney, I mean, just we're here.

Yeah, but this is it. It's not never getting anything new there. Yeah, yeah. That's it. I mean, mainly, I know that mainly what you bring into any discussion like this is a dexter jetster bias i know how much you want dexter wouldn't that that what what would be better though would it be just sort of the general sand planet or at least having like a weird like coruscant style like fake not fake uh future 50s yeah thing with a diner and a big robot that had an apron and it would be nice if he got into the booth with you but i don't think that's possible but that's what he

does since haunted car wash you want proximity now you want people that intimacy i always talk about it's what i'm stinky guys yeah steaming cup of jawa juice i want him in those three movies the big promise for me of the sequels was going to be that now we could see han solo and wado or dexter jetster interact is that's what you wanted yes okay you are losing me i'm on record with this you were wait you thought you thought there was a chance of wado in force awakens how i tan solo well i don't know that i thought it was a chance but i thought that's obviously what I want. But the world's coming together,

and I've gotten more fond of the prequels as I've gotten older, but I was obviously a little disappointed with them. But to me, you go, okay, that stuff happened. Let's make that stuff cool now, because there's a lot of cool ideas in those movies. So it's fun now to put them all together

and see what you could kind of come up with. With better tech, without the CGI that holds people back. Without the sleepy director and the green screen. Yeah. So you go, okay, let's see. As one of our friends has said, no, no, no, it's minimalism. Yes.

That's the excuse for why everything's kind of like plotting. So yeah, when they completely ignored the prequels and the sequels, I was not a fan of that either. But there's a lot of fun stuff. There's a lot of fun stuff you could do. Yeah. And no. But again, to tie it back, I guess I've always had this thing, like with Waterworld and Conan the Barbarian, where the theme park attractions come first. And I know it's insane that that's the case with Star Wars for me, but it is, which is why Rex is the top Star Wars character in my mind. Oh, wow.

I come at it from the literally, I went on the ride and fell in love with the ride before the movies. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, interesting. get it for the movies yeah oh really yeah yeah yeah interesting no just the weird i mean because they're you know we're uh i must have done star tours before like special edition re-releases were out so uh rex got to me first what can i say yeah uh so those other those side characters luke and leia they're okay they're fine they fill in this um but this thing i mean i i loved this despite not knowing the mythology then not knowing it now it's uh it's it's very exciting um and and you also get i mean

you feel like real danger you feel real heat and maybe in more ways than one because this is a little bit of a sexy show yeah yes if i could read from a newspaper review at the time i love this um youngsters youngsters will identify with the heroic conan fathers will appreciate the near nude statuesque red sonia father like this pushes you into puberty you know this show this made a man out of me this is clearly and wakes your dad up from a sleepy day yeah it's oh yeah yeah um and then i actually when i took this screenshot i didn't realize how condescending the next stint sentences so fathers near nude red sonja mothers will enjoy the choreography come on you've got the most built man of all time, Conan the Barbarian, and the mothers can't enjoy that?

Yes. That's hilarious. Let a mom enjoy that. Let a mom enjoy a beef. Most moms are not going home to a beefcake. No. Let them get it here. Now is a good time for me to talk about something I mentioned early on in that I scoured and

scoured looking for it today. I hope it's not been taken down, but I couldn't find it. It is a YouTube video that someone took on their home camera, and it was like a mom, like a middle-western mom, in from out of town. Conan, the guy who plays Conan, comes out in full costume after the show, not as part of his job, just to get a hot dog at one of the stands in the park, and he's just talking to this mom.

So he's just talking to camera, like, where are you from? Okay. Where are you? Where are you this? Where are you that? And you can tell he's kind of out there to get a little attention, but he's, you know,

she's like, well, well, what do you do? I'm an actor and you know, blah, blah, blah,

blah. And he's just there, oiled, tan, little leather straps around his biceps and the full wig and everything. Just talking, putting ketchup on a hot dog out of a little packet. If I remember it correctly, it's been a long time since i've seen it and i feel like this is how i did when i was a kid with the movie halloween is that i've dreamed about it and

it's changed in my mind that this may never even existed for all i know but i'm no i'm certain it existed i don't remember all the details you can find it find the video send it i'll look again when i get home because it was hard to find on my phone and I'll also send a link to the best Bob Rochelle video too if people want to see it. Yeah, yeah, please. Yeah, yeah.

We'll post it. We'll keep getting the word out. He deserved to get recognized though so I understand that instinct. Yeah. It's like, yeah, because we've talked about like anytime people do voices

like for a living, I feel like they do the voices constantly and I think part of it is because like, I do the voices, you i think part of it is because like i do the voices you need to know because and i get that because you're like right yeah i am so faint i should be so famous i agree that i i do a little bit of work in that realm and and i've been doing these zoom table reads for a show and all of those regular actors when we get on we have to do tech checks and they just are just doing their voices back and forth to each other unasked for.

Yeah. It is like almost compulsive where I just kind of sit there going, wow. Yeah, it's amazing. I don't know if this is great or not. It's amazing. But I think, yeah, I think part, in my mind, part of it is just because like

we do it and people don't know. Yeah. So it's like, gotta, I gotta do it. And it's like, I'm just a normal looking man or woman. And then I can do this insane magic. Yeah.

Showing people like, at least does their eyes expand and at most like cry depending on the character. Yeah. Well, now speaking of magic trick, the whole show starts off with Conan, Conan, speaking of magic trick the whole show starts off with conan conan speaking of

being like just a puny little comic sidekick kind of character coming in and he turns he's you don't need to know the movies at all for this show he gets transformed into conan the barbarian in the beginning of the show is that not a thing from the movies is that made up here that a little guy becomes big conan i think he's just raised i don't think so but they they do do this amazing transformation where the little kid and there's like a wizard with him or something and he steps on this pedestal in the in the kind of downstage area and fog shoots up all around him in a tight circle and it gets so opaque and by the time it goes away he's conan the barbarian with the big sword and that's so great and you know like the best thing about

theme park stuff like this too is when the fog shoots all you can hear there's music blaring but all you hear is the like pneumatic and you smell the fog and it's like when the explosions go off you feel the heat and it smells like gasoline and yeah it's great yeah that's the thing i hope never fully goes away from universal is the gasoline smell and something i liked about doing the tram tour was like every every time really hit you in jaws like oh my god yeah it's just real and at night it was nuts yeah like god that if it was a cold night the fire is so hot and it's so smelly it's so weird that there's there's no underselling how nostalgic that is to me i will feel that or smell it or see it and i am immediately transported back to my youth and in the most wonderful way you know like there's good

nostalgia and bad nostalgia and that is harmless wonderful just healthy nostalgia that i love yeah close to an explosion controlled explosion what more insane thing could you do as a kid and it must have made you like want to be on film sets and like just like this tactile yeah stuff the stuff which is like increasingly less and less in movies and it would never be as satisfying as this thing that's pre-packaged for you they shot masters of the universe in the 80s in my town of whittier and i went to see them film a little bit and it was weird part of it yeah in uptown whittier and one of this was should have been like on paper thrilled me and it was one of the like bad soldiers getting shot off a crate and they just it took so long and when you finally see it and then the sound

effect was just like and he just kind of fell back into some boxes and it was so boring but that's why universal studios is so amazing because they just they glitz it up yeah yeah oh sure yeah yeah really spectacular in the moment um that uh film i believe directed by yes it is the person who put this show together a person who we try like to avoid talking about named Gary Goddard look it up bad googling to do director of Masters of the Universe also was had more of a theme park career and was responsible for a lot of Universal show Jurassic Park the ride T2 is a figure whose name has to be mentioned once in a while but as there's a very bad thing associated with the guy unfortunately but so uh but he he did he was part of putting this together and the name jay stein who i mentioned earlier i think kind of a more traditional

uh executive a real cigar chomping kind of guy who was set in his ways. And the ways at the time, to go back to the Wild West Stunt Show stuff, Universal's ways at the time were volunteers come up from the audience and you learn about movie making. And that is not the show that anybody wanted to do with this. I think they were picturing what became the model of this kind of thing forever, which is you're just fully immersed in the universe and there's no breaking of the fourth wall. It's a live blockbuster happening in front of you.

So apparently what happened was either that guy or some sub executive, I think somebody said a very like the notey kind of move. It's like anticipating the note that then doesn't come or the guy thinks the opposite. Basically, they were told like this show, this is OK, but they're going to want something where like volunteers come up. So make sure you get that in there. And then the executive, Jay Stein, is reading their proposal and hearing about it. And then he's like, why are there people coming up from the audience? It has nothing to do with any of this.

I don't want that in there. And they're like, well, we put it in because we thought we had to for your sake. But that was, this was a real like universal, like a real theme park, uh,

juncture point where like, Oh, we can start departing from those things and just do a movie live on stage. Um, and I think there was a lot that was tough about convincing people to do this because there was a lot of money that needed to be spent. Literally, another old cigar chomping Universal guy, Lou Wasserman. Oh, yeah.

Personally weighed in and said the finale of it was supposed to be three giant snakes. And then it was costing too much money and it became one giant snake. And then Lou Wasserman himself said, people don't like snakes. Everybody's afraid of snakes. snakes and then it was costing too much money and it became one giant snake and then lou wasserman himself said people don't like snakes everybody's afraid of snakes don't put a snake in there and they said um the same size but it's a dragon yes go do it oh my god yeah weird odd calculation yeah people don't like snakes but isn't that what you and that is scare them with them and also from the movie yeah wouldn't you be scared wouldn't you be scared of a dragon? A giant snake isn't something you encounter.

The dragon is also as close to a snake as it could be. The point is to not like snakes. It's the scary villain at the end. He must not have liked snakes. I know. Or he was like Indiana Jones has taught the world that they don't like snakes. Yeah, he had just seen the movie maybe. Oh, yes.

That was recent enough, I guess. guess yeah raiders had just happened um but i think in general also with with all these guys with the cigar chompers it was like um i literally they they said why should we spend all this money on this what could be a fly by night like is this sure conan did okay recently but like nobody's gonna remember it and you know what we have already are these monster properties and we have a perfectly good castle dracula show with the monsters why don't we do some stuff with them or make a new show about the monsters and they had to convince them like, well, what's more exciting? Hey, we made this Dracula show a little bit better or we have a new show based on a very recent big hit movie.

Another big like universal juncture point, I think. Yeah. That kind of bit them in the ass with Waterworld where now the show has far exceeded the movies. And yet, but it's like, it almost is the main form of, I mean, guaranteed more people have seen that show than the movie. Yeah, probably.

I suppose when we talked about this recently, they're building new shows. Like, Waterworld is overseas. They're building new Waterworld stunt shows. Is that right? Yeah, that's how popular it is. Where it's an entire land. Yes, yes, it's a land

with a restaurant where in china beijing i think yeah yeah so there's like the world of harry potter and then there's water world presented as equals um but anyway but let me now having said all that let me bring up a little about this castle dracula. Yes, very exciting. Which you saw. You said you, or just were aware of it? No, I did see it as a kid. I don't remember virtually anything. I feel like I remember someone being stretched on a rack, like a volunteer being brought in

and they had a special effects rack where someone was tortured and stretched. Whoa. Does that ring a bell? Not that I saw, but there's not a lot of material. I don't doubt that that was. There's a lot of like, there's like a YouTube video that has a little video and then I saw, but there's not a lot of material. I don't doubt that that was.

There's like a YouTube video that has a little video and then stills, but I don't. I never looked into this one. That's what I'm going to do when I get home. Apparently, there was no, a lot of the info I'm getting about the history of Conan is from the book Universal versus Disney by Sam Ganaway, which is a great book. But so, and I think i'm getting this from that book as well that nobody made any bones about it was just like um do you think you can uh help the castle dracula show people went to go see it they said this show stinks this is a terrible show uh it only ran for two years all told i think came out of the gate uh a stinker very bad what years do you know 80 to 82 yeah i

would have certainly gone okay okay yeah um i some things that we know about this show you read there's only like uh five seconds of footage right um i'm not sure which part you're gonna bring up but i um do you know the celebrity component not the character who shows up who's unexpected because i'm talking yeah i like the character who shows up who's unexpected. Because I'm talking about, yeah, I like the character. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe I don't know what you're talking about.

Let me say my thing. This is kind of weird. Okay, so one thing that sounds okay about the show, there's a live Dracula and live monsters and stuff, and then also some animatronics. There was a Phantom of the Opera

evidently in this, but described as rudimentary. And I know what this is. Okay, yes. Yeah, yeah. At least when this attraction opened, the Phantom of the Opera was voiced by Paul Lind. Oh, my God. Oh, that does ring a bell.

I was looking for it. Wow, does that take you? Do you remember that unmistakable voice faintly in your head? They said that went away quickly, though, because it was so recognizable. Really? Pulled people out of it. To Paul Lind-ish. Yes. He couldn't couldn't really hide they replace him with someone else known uh i think just a regular maybe yeah just a regular monster a regular person wow but there you go i

might have gone to the small window of time when paul lind there was paul lind in a theme park attract you had the the dream of yours i got so excited when I read this, yeah. Yeah, sorry I missed it. And sorry nobody filmed it, seemingly. Yeah, is that his only theme park presence? There's a, on Spotify at least a couple years ago, there was something called Castle Dracula narrated by Paul Lind. Oh, weird.

And he would just be like, Renfield, Renfield. And it was like played straight. It wasn't like he was doing a comedic version of it. Oh, I want to hear that. I feel like it was like Played straight It wasn't like He was doing a comedic version Oh I want to hear that I feel like it was like 12 minutes long And he was just like Reading the story

And doing the dialogue That's amazing Yeah Renfield you old devil He has the Halloween Special of course Which we have yet to cover On a full episode

Of the show Inexplicably Have you just revealed That you follow Paul Lind on Spotify Yeah Do you get emails about any updates of paul and i think i posted on social media years ago that that was one of my like top like listens with paul lind on spotify because it was really lining up with you here today yeah

it was kids it was just his performance of kids from bye bye birdie okay yeah and then castle dracula well maybe something from charlotte's web i don't know well you'll probably like bob It was just his performance of Kids from Bye Bye Birdie. Okay, yeah. And then Castle Dracula. Wow, wow. And maybe something from Charlotte's Web. I don't know. Well, you'll probably like Bob Rochelle's performance. Sounds like I will. Oh, ah. Yes.

It's not quite, but. That's an endorsement. Yeah. Yeah. But the other thing, I assume what you were going to bring up is that the character gets involved because you've got, it's Dracula, it's the Phantom, it's all of Universal's great monsters, including the Incredible Hulk.

The Lou Ferrigno-style Incredible Hulk. You know when your mind is like, I don't trust my mind that I would have never in a million years thought you'd say that, but then when you did, I can't tell if it's power of suggestion or I'm going like, yeah, that does sound familiar. I don't know. I'm not sure.

And it's funny in the old like 8mm video, you just see a figure staggering out really far away and blurry. So you're like, Frankenstein, right? No, no, no. Incredible Hulk. Can you send me that after we're done? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. We'll do a link exchange for sure.

I bet whoever played the Hulk just went right on to play Conan too. Oh, probably. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. They'd have the bot, absolutely. That's so insane. You talk about property chaos, especially given the marvel of it. There was a time where Frankenstein and the Incredible Hulk would be hanging out. And I guess they were like, well, they're both monsters, so.

Green monsters. Yeah. So I guess he's scary and misunderstood. He's not unlike a Frankenstein. That makes me so happy. We're going to have to, in an episode with Jason, make sure that we say that out loud because we know we'll get a big high laugh out of him on that one.

We talked about this briefly before we recorded, but that universal is the grab bag of intellectual property where there was a point where you could get lucille ball shrek and harry from harry and the hendersons within a 10-foot radius yeah you know walking around yeah yeah yeah um not not to summon uh a guy who everybody should talk about less, but do you know that photo of Trump promoting the apprentice with a lineup of characters that all dressed like him in his signature too big of tie? No. And it's this like absolutely insane.

Some of the characters we've just mentioned, they're all doing a, you're fired gesture. And it's a Frankenstein, the, a mummy, the mummy, Shrek, and Curious George. Oh, my God. What a lineup, huh?

That says it. That's the vibe. It's the mummy wearing khakis. Yeah. No one else is wearing khakis. Oh, you're right right you're absolutely right yes I wasn't looking at the detail it's a suit and a jacket and tie on top of bandages

I wish Lucille Ball was in that photo though I know that would be the only way I don't keep Lucille away you're right there was also like Groucho and Harpo for a while and Charlie Chaplin I wish that they would do this with just like current actors, just that a guy is not playing the character,

just playing Chris Pratt. Like younger actors. I'm Chris Pratt, hello. Now that's probably legal because when you're a public figure, it's not intellectual property to just walk around as Chris Pratt. I'm surprised they don't have lookalikes. You know, like on Instagram, there's like a jack nicholson and a oh yeah willis who are just just living off of you're talking about sunglasses jack yeah it must be sunglass jack yeah why don't

they just hire that guy i think that's a good idea yeah there was a when i uh the like graduation party when i uh got to officially become a tour guide, there was a lookalike of the new host of the Tram Tour videos, Whoopi Goldberg. And there was a moment where she was introduced. And initially, everybody thought, did they get Whoopi to come to this party? And then after two seconds, oh. And then you're just at the party and like i don't want to talk to what am i am i gonna go talk to a whoopi goldberg lookalike what do we do now and she seemed to be like by herself mostly that's really weird crossroads what do you do um very

strange uh um but anyway yeah incredible hulk in this show and then here's some things i'm gonna pull this is from that book uh mentioned, Universal vs. Disney. Maybe the most insane aspect of this show. And they say this show was bad, that it had to be taken out. For the climax, Jay Stein wanted bats to fly over the audience members' heads. But that was deemed too dangerous. So a guy, Winnick, I'm not sure they're referring to, hired Ray Berwick to train a flock of little green parrots to fly over the audience's head who would be painted black using a special dye. That's not good.

Special is a... Special dye. You're very special, Parrot. You get a very special dye. It's called spray paint. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, line up. After three months of training,

it was time for a final run through. At the proper moment, the cage door was lifted and all of the Parrots flew toward the stage, took a hard left, and flew out of the arena, never to be seen again. Good. Good.

Good job escaping. Wait, are those the famous green parrots that live in the island beach? In the Burbank area. In Pasadena, they're there all the time. I see them weekly. Yeah, yeah. Oh my god, I love to think those are the descendants of the Dracula's castle black parrots.

They might be. That was the rebellion. That was the Planet of the Dracula's Castle Black Parrots. They might be. That was the rebellion. That was the Planet of the Apes rebellion. Oh, my God. Next time, I'm going to pick up my daughter and go, look, Glenn. Theme park history. They were very abused in the 1980s, but they're free now. The only way that could have been better is if the parrots attacked the spray painter

and then you ought to win it all. Ate the spray painter to death i mean and then managed to get a hold of the can spray it into his eyes and ate him to death in a nod to his was the birds universal picture oh yes right in the tradition of the property well then but then then the addendum to the story berwick started over using pigeons oh and i think that happened because in the little clip I saw, I saw little creatures go by and I thought, did they have bats fly around? I think that they ended up, now, did they have to be sprayed? I guess they would, right? Because they'd otherwise just read as pigeons. I think they did spray paint some fucking pigeons.

Even black pigeons aren't really going to read as bats. So white pigeons or gray pigeons ain't going to work. The body shape is vastly different. They just look like crows. At best. At best. Now everybody's like, oh shit, crows. Yeah, they should just unleash crows on the audience.

Aren't they also the smartest birds? Yeah, although they're too smart to be stuck. They would have turned, they would have killed the guy earlier. yeah and that's the entire initial audience yeah um so yes this had to be removed this sounds like one of the worst shows ever put together i wonder if anyone has a video somewhere that's the thing is they have a whole thing there has somebody has it yeah and it's just sitting there waiting. There's like live, we got, I wonder if it's like, there's, what was it, was it UCLA where we got an email

from somebody, we did an episode about something called King Koopa's Cool Cartoons, which was a local, like kind of bozo show hosted by Koopa from Mario. Illegally? No, licensed, officially licensed. Not illegally, but cheap Officially licensed. Not illegally but cheap. Cheap and shitty looking where you'd show cartoons

but there's only a little bit of footage online. But we got an email that at the UCLA campus, there's a couple episodes in the library that you could go and see. So we have to drive to the library physically.

We haven't done this yet. You get to. You don't have to, you get to. Yeah, but I wonder like, is there any other archive for like stuff like this or internally at Universal? Do they have anything? That's the thing is that the guy,

we have this researcher for With Gorley and Russ podcast and he, I think it was him, I'm sorry. He found archive footage of all the Knotts stunt shows through the Orange County Register. Oh, right. So maybe there is. But you have to know that Universal has archive footage of that whole thing.

You would think so. I'm always impressed with Universal seemingly not being as together as Disney. Oh, for sure. In that way. Having worked at both. And there were pluses and minuses, but mostly pluses to working at Universal because they were just like sure cool to whatever you said

yeah that's great that's nice to hear yeah i uh let's uh give a little bit of love to this uh this giant dragon because that i mean it that's the star i really i i like i like remember my seat i remember my perspective on it despite being very young it's it's an incredibly compelling uh visual uh 18 feet tall and had to rise up from 42 feet below and it comes out of this yeah the centerpiece pit yeah after the bad guy turns in to this guy yeah i forgot that part yes the, the evil wizard, Taras Mordor. Taras Mordor. Taras Mordor.

So he gets killed because above the pit is a giant, like, double staircase up to this thing, if I remember correctly. And Conan, they do this cool trick where he stabs him in the neck, basically, like with the big sword. And the guy just kind of leans his head over the sword so it kind of looks like it's going through his neck and he pulls it out and then that Taurus Mordor does a high fall flip

into the pit and you think, and then flame comes up, I think. Yeah, yeah. And then you think he's won, but no, he's turned into this giant dragon. Then they do this amazing coordination where the dragon shoots lasers he also appears out of like a laser cloud or something and so conan has to be at certain

points on the stage for that laser to line up and hit a pyrotechnic so that he can run away from it that's the other thing i love about these stunt shows is all the not the like dance or stunt choreography but the kind of blocking that has to be precision for both safety and reality, but is always done by someone who's done it too many times to really care.

So they phone it in slightly. So they have to do exact precision placement, but their acting is not there, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yes. But I remember Conan being kind of energetic

because also all the voices are dubbed, so no one has to like phone in and acting performance vocally. Oh, right. So it felt a little bit more vibrant and still somehow very false. That initial cry,

by the power of Krom is really great. I apologize for saying this, but I had to rewind this. It was on my computer so the speakers weren't very good. I kept not hearing the R when he kept saying that. By the of calm yeah yeah i rewound it three times i knew he wasn't saying that i'm not crazy but this is a sexy show yeah i guess like he didn't

say that he might as well it sounded like he said and i've heard crom before yeah so i didn't know that but i was like what did he say? There is a great behind the scenes video on the Conan's stunt spectacular. You get to see them kind of like below the stage and stuff like that

kind of breaking character. Yeah, and the little cubby that kind of, that you have to fall into and like getting lifted up initially. Yeah. Yeah.

Must've been such a cool, I mean, it's what you were chasing, like making little stunt shows at home. Like the idea of this little like town or in this case a temple where there's like lots of this hidden stuff and little tricks and contraptions and that one is produced there's some um like personal behind the scenes video of the wild wild west stunt show where you get to see inside all that

facade and everything i want like okay i know that it's because it's a water show why the Waterworld cast all goes into a jacuzzi between the shows. I really wish this happened for all of them. I know. Because they all need rest. Jacuzzi feels good. Yeah.

With any amount of physical activity. I wish there was just always a jacuzzi. Even Norman Bates on the tour, he just, when he's not coming out, he gets to sit. There's nothing, you can't see what's in the house. a hot tub in there for that guy every eight minutes has to get out and towel off get a fresh suit yeah like whoever's playing woody woodpecker just

without the pants part on yeah first part of the the suit is still on dip in there rest your legs yeah that would be great yeah no this thing's so cool and also and then and then you guys then you think about it um that the the the finale of this it's like a human-sized villain who you think dies and then but then no no no turns into a giant dragon at the end and there's flames and lasers this is phantasmic before phantasmic right and it's even the same dialogue uh the line from the wizard is you must face me and all the forces of hell which is from that's literally from sleeping beauty and this was a thing like, we'll put this in as a nod. Are they going to allow the word hell to be said?

And they recorded it with and without and nobody noticed at Lawless Universal. So hell was mentioned. So it got this extra kick of edginess. I remember that. And I remember as a kid kind of going, whoa, we got a Disneyland, Matt Gourley. You are grown up.

This is it. This is the puberty show. This is stripping away childish things. It's hardcore. I learned a lot there. Where you became a man. You know, they do. I was at Disneyland not long ago, too.

But Donald is still wearing a little devil outfit. And I was kind of impressed by that. Yeah. And people, I was at Disneyland not long ago too, but Donald is still wearing a little devil outfit. Wow. And I was kind of impressed by that. Yeah. And people, I don't know. Disney acknowledges Satan too. Yeah, but it's a cute version of hell. Yeah, I feel like in the old days that would have been,

they would have moral quandary, and now they're just like, Disney seems happy to piss off the right, you know? Maybe. Maybe they're trying, they're sticking it to DeSantis with Donald's little outfit. Yeah, which always brings me back in Disney's corner. Every time they lose me, they get me back in something.

Yeah, I know, because during the strike, you're like, yeah, fuck Iger, the worst, which is correct. That's correct. That's the right opinion to have. But then he starts then separately is the other issue where you're rooting for him against DeSantis.

That's crazy. Confusing time. That's the Disney legacy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. From the beginning, always good stuff and bad stuff. The most melodramatically perfect place is probably the most complicated company in American history. Yeah, yeah. Maybe next to Ford.

I don't know. This is not the time to bring this up but I will bring it up uh uh there's somebody online who is sort of like insinuating that Bob Iger actually screwed Michael Eisner over and that there's secrets that haven't been revealed oh really like back to 25 years ago is that how he got to his place of power so that's what I that's what I'm reading into from these tweets so I'm very interested to see what he like stabbed his back he maybe he helped get him out the door when he was kind of ousted. Yeah, yeah. So I'm wondering.

How much do you guys go into Disney conspiracy stuff at all? Do you- It depends what it is. You're probably the conspiracy guy more so. Yeah, to some degree. Is there one on the top of your head? Off the top of your head? Not necessarily.

Okay. We cover it a little just that you can't be pronounced dead in Disney. It's not true. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of it's just not true. There was one of the Disney podcasts I was just actually going through

and they were listing all of these off and saying most of them aren't true. But yeah, those things like those, I don't feel like I'm gonna talk about those that often. These aren't conspiracies, but recently there's been a wave of things that are kind of accepted online vaguely as fact but aren't sourced such as michael eisner being the golfer in soren if you've heard that one oh no i know uh yeah that's one of those that's and i believe i i and

that's the thing i would say to people you know that's credible for sure i mean yeah yeah but then i just started thinking about it and there's no real proof of it. And when you think about, like, he's not going to wait around while they do helicopter flybys. And that's like a whole day of coordination. He doesn't like golf either. He would have talked about it, too. Yes, yeah, yeah. The fact that there was no actual, he would have, yeah, he would have talked about it a ton. That's a guy who loves the camera.

I like the little ones that are even more maybe germane to this podcast, like the turkey legs or emu legs. These were all, by the way, these were all addressed on this podcast I just listened to. And that's not true, right? Not true. Not true. I mean, they look like it, but they're not true. The other recent one has been that Space Mountain doesn't go that fast and that it's simulated via fans. Well, it doesn't go as fast as you think.

I think that's for sure but we're trying to figure out exactly what where this came from and what it means because there's no fans blowing like right next to the can't see you see with the lights on there are no giant fans this much we know but we're wondering is there some other jason's really here to represent very fast you're more feeling like the centrifugal force in that right than you are and the darkness itself is making you it's 35 miles an hour i think to fight to read amidst the centrifugal force those fans would have to it's got to be heavy duty fans yeah i don't think air conditioning is gonna do it well yeah it would be have to be heavy duty air condition listeners have heard these things we're just yeah yeah these are we've talked about this before yeah

our micro talking i am certain it's my own conspiracy theory, that Goat is holding an actual live stick of dynamite with just a really, really slow fuse. It has yet to go. We haven't addressed that before. Less than a microscopic amount. But one day, perhaps in like 27 years, it'll actually blow.

It's the longest game of Russian roulette or musical chairs chairs of course well we just need to keep an eye on it then if it ever goes even an inch there's a problem um i anything else about this uh about this show it's so aladdin to me too yeah oh yes going after the special item the the dragon's eye isn't there like also like a voice that's kind of yes the cave of wonders is in this. And then it's the same as like the live Aladdin show and the movie where it's like the bad guy turns into a big, not a snake.

Well, Jafar turns into a snake, but this is a dragon. So it was almost exactly the same. That's true. As Aladdin as well. It is exactly Aladdin. Yeah, yeah. There's a real Disney borrowing, Universal borrowing, Disney borrowing cat chasing its own tail thing here.

Yeah, definitely. You have to room you two. I feel like generally things like this, I think this helps kick off, as I was saying, recent blockbusters and you're feeling the heat and it actually seems a little dangerous. It's not a little kiddie thing like disney and they start disney starts doing a little more in this area and that that feels like it has to come from universal carving out that path as what universals feel is yeah because they around this time too nazis really getting the hanging going too and they're probably losing a lot of teenagers and adults right yeah i mean yeah seriously like i remember being was born and raised here and you love disney but you hit an age where you're kind of like disney's for kids like yeah yeah

not universal and magic mountain right when you're in high school and stuff that was the destination sure sure well and then and then knots like had like a teen dance club and then disney was like we're doing it and then disney's was like Tamer and worse a little bit. Videopolis or was that what it was? Yeah, Videopolis. Yeah, and Studio, did you ever do Studio K? That's what I was, yeah, Studio K. Yeah, in fact, Studio K was preferred. Oh, yeah.

My sister was more of that age. She was three years older and they would go there, yeah. Oh, wow, wow. The rumors are true. This, yeah, this thing seems so cool. Vibrant memories of it. Also, and then one other thing, just the set is like immaculate. And they kind of kept it.

They kind of, other shows, I think Beetlejuice, this was replaced essentially by Beetlejuice's Graveyard Review, which had been at more of an outdoor venue and they moved it inside. They didn't really change the set. I think the special effects stages had some of the set too. We've seen all these other things also that were filmed in this venue because it was giant just flashing onto something really what it was on that note i forgot so you said that this went to 94 yeah in 94 i was on a game show called shop till you drop oh yeah shot inside and i remember going oh my god this is the conan conan castle what really it was in

there it wasn't supermarket sweep it was the one that was on right after it people often oh yeah all my wife's very fond of it she'll be so excited it's yeah they may recreate the mall the mall and that was inside the castle now that i think really when we finished our episode we were just like typical universal like okay you're done and we just went into the park wow really sweet wait a minute and was that so was it just built in front of was that like uh i don't like all the or was the conan stuff gone i don't know i don't remember because that set was so high and you it's it's a game so so they're very particular about you being in the green room and when they brought you to set you took a very clear path so i i can't remember if i saw the conan set there or not but it definitely was in there but that is

it is like a double decker set on that show right yeah yeah okay so that made sense as like a yeah it's got like established seating and you can build high yeah interesting how'd you do we we did really well. Wow. Normally, it was like a couple man and woman, and they did a Battle of the Sexes week, and it was me and Jeff Davis, who you might know from Whose Line Is It Anyway, and actually, he's on Keys to the Kingdom.

Oh, wait, in The Office, too? That guy, or I think it was somebody else. Was he on The Office? I don't think he was on, maybe. But he played Harry and the Hendersons at Universal in the nineties. Also worked at Disney. And he and I went on there and just like with, I say this with no pride, we just obliterated

the poor other people. Wow. One, we got, we went on a trip to Rome together. I got red leather shoes and a handbag from my grandma. We just won everything you could possibly win on that show. Geez. I'm kidding. I didn't know that you could pay taxes on it, so we surrendered a bunch of it.

I think I was confused. I think there's a Chip Davis. Now I recognize Jeff now. Oh, wait. It's not Davis at all. Okay. I'm totally wrong. I've seen Jeff before.

Oh, gotcha. Oh, cool, cool. Geez. Wow. To walk the hallowed halls of the hallowed mall. I've seen Jeff before. Oh, gotcha. Oh, cool, cool. Geez, what a... Wow, to walk the hallowed halls of the hallowed mall. I love that game show too. Yeah, yeah. Incredible.

I have that on VHS still to this day. Oh, wow, wow. Wait, and you do mall walk in another podcast? So that ties right into this. Did you have the mall interest then? And did that make you want to get on that show no i think because there was no you didn't need to declare your interest for malls because they were just everywhere and that was just it wasn't a thing

yeah yeah so i guess i did but i didn't know until it took they took it away like probably most people feel yeah yeah yeah a piece of your your heart is missing um geez well uh yeah great great history in this place. Multiple great sets. The other, really quick just to tie it together too, perhaps part of a link exchange also, we did a thing on our Patreon. We were alerted to something called Cybermania 94.

That was in this, right? I believe so. Yeah. This was like an award show for VR and CD-ROMs and cyber stuff. And it was hosted by... It's unbelievable. I say that with no hyperbole. Yeah, jeez.

The celebrity lineup is... Yeah, it's all on there. It's all online. Okay, here's what I need you to send me. The Dracula show backup stuff, this thing. I'll send you a Bob Rochelle video. And if I can find that Conanan one of them just talking to some lady yeah yeah yeah yes please um cyberman 94 is is unbelievable if the listeners if you

haven't heard this on our patreon what if it was absolutely blew our mind when talking about it and it was filmed in here so it's all spooky setting but it's all but then it's all host leslie nielsen talking about the cyber wave and the hackers are the wave of the future is it on the conan set or just in oh my god um which i love because it's mostly a huge pit they just yeah or what they might use it it's somebody might fall in a pit i'm not sure but then there's one part where he goes outside he's like i don't know doc brown shows up i actually don't remember why doc brown has anything to do with it basically he ends up then going into he has like a gun battle in the wild west stunt show set and he does the big finale where the set falls on

the buster keaton thing where the window is perfectly uh over him and he doesn't get hurt so there is this magical weird award show that ties together both of our topics today, as well as Leslie Nielsen. These stunt shows would show up in so many random places. There is a kids singing talent show in Australia that then visited and did a whole musical number on that set, and then Bob Rochelle's in it. Oh, wow. There was a show called Out of This World

that was like a syndicated show. Do you remember? It was like a girl who talked to her alien dad. She got lost on the Miami Vice stunt show set. There would always be these episodes of people getting lost on these stunt shows or whatever. Yeah, well, because then you could just do all the gags

and you can just run, you know, Big Fat Liar was on the Flash Flood. Well, Big Fat Liar just does every trick on the Universal back line. I think it might have been Days of Our Lives, a soap opera that did like a whole week on the Wild Wild Wild West stunt show set where they got married on there or something.

There's Thunder in Paradise where Hulk Hogan did the Indiana West stunt show set where they got married on there or something. There's Thunder in Paradise where Hulk Hogan did the Indiana Jones stunt show essentially. Oh my God. That's right. He just does the whole thing. God bless these.

That's a little micro area. Sitcoms just doing a stunt show. Yeah, yeah. I'm like, this is so much better than whatever dumb story they would usually tell. Show me the stunts.

Well, geez, this has been such a blast to talk to you about this. It's given us some homework. Well, there'll have to be some work to do. The list keeps growing out of this world. But we'll figure all that out off air. But for now, let me say, Matt Corley, you survived Podcast The Ride. What a fun chat. Let's exit through the gift shop because i know you

definitely have something to plug let's talk a little more about keys to the kingdom oh i don't know what else there is to say yeah you talk i guess thank you guys for uh having me on and and we talked about that show already and it's right up your listeners alley um you have me on saying i survive but i think i thrive I leave with wind in my sails talking to you guys so I don't know why we haven't done it more often it's really fun anytime please hit us up if we do do a

second season of Keys to the Kingdom I don't know if we will but if we do we need to talk to you guys yes please absolutely I will dredge up whatever I can I don't have anything that scandalous from my transfer time but I could fit in there I don't. I feel like I don't have anything that scandalous from my transfer time. But I could fit in there. I'm sure you can.

That's not everything. I don't know why I didn't think of you in the first place. We had some really strange development process because it was originally an Amazon Audible show. And we got this deal done. But the deal took longer than a television show. And we had this exec who really got it and knew of us. And then he disappeared. And our exec we replaced was with his former nuclear arms specialist.

Who's like giving us notes. And then ultimately we got out of that, did our own thing with it and ended up better for both versions of it. Kind of tightened us in a little bit, but also we went back and loosened it up. Oh, wow. So we, like I said, now that it's kind of more on our plate we would really come look for things like this to talk about yeah yeah please i would love to when you've had great people on too i just

heard taryn killam was great we just got to meet on here and uh molly hockey's so funny oh yeah fantastic uh great story yeah yeah, yeah. Please listen. She plays my stalker. Yes, yeah. I was trying to remember if you brought that up on our show. I might have. I think you might have. Yeah.

Yes, your story of giving a friendly wave to somebody who came to see you do improv at California Adventure, and then it becomes your nightmare. Yeah. So scary. Yeah, great stories on Keys to the to the kingdom oh i also was gonna say if we oh wait so tell us so this should be called the wild west stunt show i believe so wild why okay yeah that's just single wild yes it still makes it a very long title and i was i was thinking how we i we i think we could maybe just go for the record of longest title

yeah but then I don't want to bury your name at the end with that with credit oh so I think because I think you want it right up first I'm going to declare here I think

maybe the episode should be called Matt Gorley presents the adventures of Conan a sword and sorcery spectacular and the Wild West stunt show so listeners you already seen that title

okay if you sign off Jason will check with later it's like this spinoff of your show, basically. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good, yeah. You produced it from the mind of Hal Needham. Oh, you flatter.

Well, thanks so much for being here. New episodes of Keys to the Kingdom still coming out. As for us, three bonus episodes every month on Podcast to Ride The Second Gate, or get one more bonus episode on our VIP tier Club 3. You'll find all that at patreon.com slash podcasttheride. Jason will be back next time. And if you're listening to this episode as it drops on Friday, November 10th,

perhaps we will be seeing you tonight in Orlando. Yeah. Our live shows this evening. It's going to be fun. I think we've got fun surprises. As of right now, we have fun surprises. I hope everything is there. Ron DeSantis?

Duh! You spoiled it! No, only to fight him! To go axe to axe with him. I'm here to talk about Mr. Toad's wild ride. Thank you, boys, for giving it to me. I know a lot of guests

wanted it, but... You've promised me Toad, Space Mountain, and Pirates to talk about. We're going to rip through them all in one 90-minute session

along with what's wrong in woke America. You're welcome. Forever. Dog. This has been a Forever Dog production. Executive produced You're welcome. foreverdogpodcasts.com, and subscribe to our shows on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keep up with the latest Forever Dog news by following us on Twitter and Instagram,

at Forever Dog Team, and liking our page on Facebook.