SmartLess - "John Oliver"

Episode Date: March 18, 2024

An unexamined life, a thirst for danger, and the Dalai Lama. In the words of John Oliver: “if I’ve got a microphone at the end of my arm and they’ve got a fist at the end of theirs, there’s definitely room to connect.” Welcome to SmartLess.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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the the Put the fucking book down. Okay. No. Oh good. So now it's down. Now he's just closing his eyes and he's thinking. Now he's just memorizing. Can February, March? No, but April, May. Oh God. And you just came up with that. I just came up with that.

Unbelievable. I just came up with that. All right. Welcome to Smartless. I'm often down here in your whisper booth. My whisper booth listening to music when I get down here a few minutes early and I'll listen to music as I'm kind of setting up. Sitting sideways in your chair today, looking all sexy, oh, because your leg still hurts?

It still hurts. Yeah, man, it's a real. Sean, don't you have, from your list of 25 doctors you see on a regular basis, can you give those ones? I'm seeing Sean's guy. Yeah, so Jason, how did Maple's basketball game go? She has found a real stride. She had a tough first game and then the second game,

she hit the kid's version of fuck it and just started taking what was hers and driving the lane and raining threes. Raining down threes, I was gonna say, was she raining threes? She was. And all the kids, had a fat fantastic game She's got all this confidence and then went out the next game did it again next game did it again now

She's like one of the stars super star you make it in time yesterday because I know that we were on a call Were you a little bit late? No, no, I was I was fine And and and and and listener if you haven't heard or been bored by it yet. She is She plays on the boys team and she's the first girl in the history of the school, that's 30 years, to ever play on the boys basketball team. That's awesome. It's really cool.

Is there a girls basketball team or no? There is, yeah. Wow. That's awesome. She's a pretty remarkable kid that may. I love her. Yeah, she really is. And she's got an old soul.

Yeah, I connect. She's super smart. She's super funny. Here comes a butt. Hit, she really is. And she's got an old soul. She's super smart. I connect, I connect. She's super funny. Here comes a butt. I mean she's more mature than Sean. Yeah, there you go. I will say, by the way, also I want to say, Jay, I know you're an apology because I said at the end of our call,

right when we got off, I said, I said, hey, I like you in the crew, but I prefer you in a V neck. And that's not true. You look great in a crew neck. I literally, when I was putting on this crew neck this morning, literally, I was looking through my sweaters,

and I swear to God, on my kid's life, I was looking at the V-necks, because I remember what you said. Knowing it was a joke, but I was like, yeah, but you know what, he might be right. I can't wear a V-neck only because since I was a kid, my brother used to call me ET, because my neck is so thin and long.

He's an asshole. Yeah, I find that. I always wear crew necks. You know what, I can't wear turtlenecks because of my fat chin. The turtleneck, squeeze it up, and I will cascade my neck skin over the top of it. I can't pull off a turtleneck either.

What about a mock? Could you ever find yourself in a mock? Let me tell you something, Richard Erlich can wear a turtleneck. Dick Erlich can get himself into a mock. Richard Ehrlich, let me tell you something. Richard Ehrlich can wear a turtleneck. Dick Ehrlich can get himself into a... Old tricky dick. He's just unfair for other men. But I don't want to gloss over the mock turtleneck

made popular by goaltenders in the NHL in the 80s. Would you ever find yourself, Sean, I bet you wear a mock turtleneck. I bet you there's a photo. All the time. I used to work at Limited for Men, Limited Express for Men, and I'm colorblind, so women would come in and say, could you put an outfit together for my husband?

I'm like, sure. And I'd put like mustard yellow with greens, like I wouldn't know what I was putting together, but I would always put a mock turtleneck with it. I feel like I've heard this about you before, that you're colorblind, but I've forgotten it, but now that I'm reminded, it does explain a great deal. Really bad.

Think about it, just on the surface, it's not a viable thing, it's mocking the turtle neck. Do you know what I mean? It's making fun of, we get it. It's a half a turtle. But now in hockey, speaking of hockey, with the new neck guard there to prevent cuts, that it does look like the mock is back.

Yeah, it does. And by the way, I'm not opposed to those neck things, but I think if you look at the numbers of actual people get cut, I don't have the numbers ahead in front of me. It's rare, but it's worth the fix. Somebody wake up the guest, because we're coming to them.

I know, fuck. Here we go. Guys, today's gonna be tough for you, because our guest this morning is a truth teller. I know it's difficult for you two to deal with. The truth, given that you both act for a living and show business, couple of professional liars, couple of coastal elites,

but a hard-hitting investigative journalist like myself looks for treasures like this man. He was born in Birmingham, England. His father, a school headmaster, and his mother, a music teacher. He's got two Peabody Awards. He was named to Times Magazine's 100 Most Influential. He created his own church.

He started the first hospital to treat chlamydia and koala bears. And he has his own sewage plant in Connecticut. He also has 19 Emmy Awards. Guys, it's John Oliver. Wait a second. Oh, you have it down! Gentlemen.

Wait a second. There's the reveal. I've moved my paper over the camera. Like there's someone jumping out of a birthday cake. That's very good. Here's the crazy part. You said he's from Birmingham, which is maybe potentially true. I don't know if that's true.

It is. It is true, Will. I immediately was going to say, oh, he's a fucking... No, he's a fucking... We got a Villa fan on our hands. No, I thought he was from Liverpool oh, he's a fucking, no, he's a fucking, we got a Villa fan on our hands. No, I thought it was Liverpool. And I never would've guessed it, because I know that you're a Liverpool fan,

because you did start to spew out the starting 11 of Liverpool, and you know that I'm a fellow massive Liverpool supporter, and it was the best speech of all the speeches, because he's like Big Verge, fucking Trent Alexander, Arnold, I forget who else you... How far did you get? Let's hold on to our listeners just for a few more minutes before we lose them to a soccer talk.

Okay. Okay? Or football. Football. Soccer is an English term, by the way. I don't want to get into the origin of the word. Yeah, originally it's in English. He knows that. Anyway, John Oliver! John Oliver! What a pleasure to be here. What a lot of turtleneck talk I had to endure there. Anyway, John Oliver! John Oliver! John Oliver!

What a pleasure to be here. What a lot of turtleneck talk I had to endure there. It's our Regis and Kathie Lee morning patter, you know? John, why don't you have a podcast yet? I mean, you know, you got time. You're only working once a week, right? I think it's enough. I think a TV show

is enough. For me and definitely for everybody else. I think a TV show is enough. For me and definitely for everybody else. I'm primarily thinking of other people. Speaking of, congrats on the Emmy. You just won the Emmy. And well deserved. Very exciting. Thanks very much. Again. Really cool.

Again. I love the bass in your voice there, Jason. Again. No, again. I mean, but I'm saying, but it is an incredible accomplishment. And you know what? I mean, it is all writing, right? I mean, you don't stop talking for 30 minutes. It's insane and incredible. And I don't think I've ever seen you make a mistake. This man has got to be the best teleprompter reader in the world

or the best memory in the world. Other people can do it better. No one can do it faster. That's the promise. I will speed read a prompter. All right, now where do we find you today, John? Where's home? Home is the office today, so I'm in the office.

That's New York or Los Angeles? New York. New York. John, you know, I watch your show all the time last week tonight, and I'm a big fan, and when you first came, when I first heard of you and the show, I was like, who, like, hopefully you don't take offense to this,

but I was like, wait, who is this guy? And the second you started talking and the show, I was like, oh my God, I'm in, I love him, and it's funny and it's clever. And where did you come from? Ricky Gervais. Does Ricky Gervais deserve the, did he not recommend you to Jon Stewart? Does Ricky Gervais deserve the...

Did he not recommend you to Jon Stewart? Yeah, he did. Yeah, he did. The Daily Show was looking for a new correspondent. I didn't know Ricky. I'd never met him and he said, oh, you should look at this guy in England. He was floundering on the standup circuit. And that helped a lot.

Yeah. I didn't know that. That's cool. I did not know that at all. And you still love doing standup, yes? Yeah. Oh yeah, I love it. It's cool. I did not know that at all. And you still love doing stand-up, yes? Yeah. Oh yeah, I love it. It's the only way to relax. Really? It's relaxing for you?

I know that sounds insane. That sounds like a medical problem. But the only way I can truly calm down is doing stand-up. I mean, that says so much about your confidence and your self-image. And God, I want some of that. So you're totally comfortable getting up in front of a bunch. Now you've got stuff that's worked out, or do you kind of like to kind of riff it a bit

when you're up there? No, I mean, I like to have stuff that's very worked out and then I like to be distracted. Right, now how do you decide which part of it you will dedicate to stand-up and which part you will put on your show? How do you... Sometimes you're like... Oh, they're so different.

This show is so narrow in terms of the stories that we're attacking the way we're doing it. There isn't a way really for one to cross over into the other. So it's much easier to keep the two apart. Right. So the stand-up is more sort of stuff in life, in any area, your family life, yada yada, and then the show stays... Much, much looser than, like you say, taking a deep breath and then exhaling after 30 minutes.

Oh, that's so good. So how did a young man from Birmingham all of a sudden find himself a stand-up comic? What was that? Walk us through that a little bit. Well, I went to university and started writing comedy there, and then started writing my... started writing shows with another guy there. We really loved doing that.

You didn't happen to go to Cambridge, did you? I did. Yes, I did. I wrote with a guy called Richard Ayoade there. And so we were in a sketch group, and then we did shows, two-man shows together. Really loved it. And then after leaving... You could say you started as a compere. I like when people talk about starting as a compere.

But anyway, keep on. And he starts as a compere. No, but you're right, it would have been a better story. I started as a compere, just welcoming people to the evening. What's a compere? Like an emcee sort of. Like an emcee. Just a very fancy way to say emcee. Okay.

Who will be your compare tonight? I got it, got it. So you started writing with him. Yeah. Then left university and tried stand-up and really loved it. So that first experience was successful, yeah? First experience was successful. That's often the case. It seems that many people have a similar story.

They do a first gig, it goes well, they really like it, then you're chasing that high for the rest of your career. Normally the second gig is terrible. It definitely wasn't my case. I've heard other people say that, yeah. Yeah, so it's the same thing. You get too confident, you think, I can do this, people like it when I do this.

And then a second audience says, this is a second opinion. You can't do this and we don't. That is generally what happens. Now, if somebody gets lippy in the audience, is that something that throws you off or do you kind of lean into that? I love it. You do love it.

Of course you love it. You're a masochist. What's the worst one? What's the worst one? No, because if you're smart, then you can fucking cry. Yeah, go ahead. They're all good. The thing is, once you do it, it hurts at first, I will say.

Once you've bombed a hundred times, no audience retains the capacity to harm you anymore. There's nothing left for them to take. Right. Right. Dignity has been removed surgically by a hundred failures, you're left thinking I'm now... I could do anything. Was your stand-up always politically focused or no? No, I think for a couple of years it was just basically trying to make people laugh and not to leave the stage to the sound of your own footsteps.

That was basically it. So it's just an exercise in survival. Then once I kind of learned the fundamental tools of how to do stand-up, then I wanted to talk about the things that I cared about, which were kind of political issues. So then it became trying to learn a second time. It was throwing away the stuff that worked and running towards the things that didn't. But it's hard figuring, I mean, that process of going through this, finding the stuff that works, I mean, that's an arduous process

because obviously there's a lot of stuff that bomb you. You might write a joke, you might go like, hey, a lot of people say ballet is hard and I say just don't do it. Oh, Jesus. Like, somebody might write a joke like that. That doesn't sound like a joke, I know. But...

John, that was one of my first jokes I ever wrote. I was like 23 years old. It always works. Did you do that on stage? Or is this mirror work? I know, I really said it. Did you go in front of people expecting entertainment, possibly promised entertainment,

and lean in with that? Oh, here's another one. We haven't even heard the first one. There's not even a first joke. What do you mean, another one? Oh, that was your opening joke? I will say, I've come 180 degrees around to loving the fact that you went on and brought up ballet

to get an audience on site. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Now I like that a lot. Yeah, for sure. And another bad one, and this is gonna be real cringy. This is gonna make you come out of your skin. Because there's no joke here. And that's how bad I was.

I didn't know you actually had to write a joke. And so I would say, you know what's really weird? Boy, great opener. You ever wonder why? Let's have it. You know what's really weird is when you're at a dog park and you hear people call the name of their dog for the first time out loud.

So you know, you'll just be there and someone will go, mustard, come here mustard. That was the joke, I said there's no joke. It was so bad. The beauty there is you've identified something that I really think isn't weird. Hearing them say the name of their dog for the first time in a dog park, isn't weird. That's to be expected. Yeah

Should have been prepped for that one Sean. I Told you it was cringy. There's no joke. I This sounds like an absolute banger of a stand-up set. Yeah. Thank God we found you know what people say about ballet It's it's you're kind of like the signfold of like observational company, but the things you observe are totally normal expected Unusual you ever notice when people turn the corner they when they're in their car They turn the wheel of their the steering wheel direction. They want to go So alright so you're doing you're doing stand-up in in England and you're having a good time and you're finding some success and then Ricky Gervais either hears about you, sees you,

mentions you to John, John says, come on out and within a day or two, you're on television. Have I overly truncated the first half of your life? Within a single day. I flew to New York and then they put, I think looking back it was a standard tactic that they would get you on TV straight away so you didn't overthink it too much.

But I was jet-lacked. So I had just landed the previous night, then I'm on television. And then the crazy thing was in the audience that night was J.K. Rowling just watching, just sitting in the audience. Not a guest, just sitting there. So I did my bit, turned, looked straight at her, and it really felt like I must be having

some kind of medical episode. So I was so tired, so confused about what was going on. And there's J.K. Rowling saying, "'Oh, congratulations.'" That was very good. How bizarre. J.K. Rowling saying, oh, congratulations. That was very good. How bizarre. Wow. Now, were you comfortable in front of the camera?

Was that the first time you were in front of the camera? I think I was so tired, I was actually fine. Wow. And we will be right back. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. You know, if I have a free hour in my day, sometimes I like to go for a run or I take a nap or, you know, the question is time for what?

If time was unlimited, how would you use it? How would you decide what is important enough to make time for? Therapy can help you find what matters to you so you can do more of it. Now I have chosen therapy with some of my available time and it's, you know, I'm sure some of you have as well. It's undeniable that it's even just talking to a friend, that that's therapeutic. So that's not really up for debate.

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See show notes for full disclaimer. And now back to the show. So then the appearance on the Daily Show goes well enough to have another one and another one and even eventually hosting while John was directing his movie and you did that for eight weeks. It went so well, they said this guy deserves his own show perhaps, you start talking to them, but then HBO comes

around the back door and says how about with us and you can do whatever the hell you want. Cause we're not. I love that you've been able to put his whole answer and explanation into a question so he can just agree with a yes or a no. I'm trying to brag about my ability to do research on my guest.

Yes. John, thanks for joining us. This was great guys. Yes, that is correct. Do I have that right? Yeah, comedy central was very much not My own you know, I think I'm right. Yeah They what what John and I wanted them to do was let me have the summer so that he could leave each summer But they were not keeping that idea and my contract was up at the end of that year

So then HBO said would you like to do a show on Sunday nights? And I was talking to John about it. He said, you would be crazy not to do it. Yeah, it's so good. You're so good. Really? Now, are you one of those people that, do you seek out other comedies or stand-ups, or do you go to live shows?

Are you like, you know what, I do it for a living, I don't wanna go experience it? It used to be my favorite place to be. I've got kids now. So my wife, understandably, it got to the point favorite place to be. I've got kids now. So I got my wife, understandably, it got to the point of having a conversation. Do you need to go and do this? Or is this something that you want to do?

But I mean, like, do you seek it? Like, do you watch comedy specials? Are you a comedy? Okay, got it. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, I love it. It's one of my favorite things to watch and to do. So yeah.

You have a fave? Do you have a fave that's out there now? I just saw Jacqueline Novak's Get On Your Knees. That was fantastic. The new Netflix special. Maria Bamford is probably my favorite stand-up. God, she's crazy. Yeah, she's really funny. She is so brilliant.

If I could only watch one more stand-up in my life, I think it would probably be her. Oh, wow. That's so cool. Yeah, she's so unique. Have you ever seen the show that Mitch Hurwitz wrote for? Really good. No. stand up in my life, I think it'd probably be her. Oh wow. That's so cool. Yeah, she's so unique. Have you ever seen the show that Mitch Hurwitz wrote for? Really good.

No. Yeah, really, really good. What's it called, Jade, do you remember that? When he wrote that show for Maria? I don't. Really good. It wasn't called It's Maria. Is it like something like that?

No. All right, now before you got to do the HBO show. Lady Dynamite. That, that's it, Lady Dynamite. Lady Dynamite. Oh, you have a Wi-Fi connection, good for you. Oh, sorry, I should have mentioned, I gifted, I gave Sean for Christmas,

I gave him Google for Christmas, yeah. And by the way, I haven't said thank you, thank you. Of course, dude. Now you were, weren't you out like a roving reporter for The Daily Show? You'd interview people, did it ever get contentious? Were you brave with them? Anything weird ever happen with your interviews?

Oh yeah, it was constantly tense. Ever get punched in the face, shoved around, insulted? I don't think I ever got physically attacked. We definitely got threatened a bunch, but it never actually came to physical violence. And the problem is that the tension generally showed that things were going well. So I would luxuriate in that tension.

I could take a bath in those long, awful silences. Right, that meant that you were successful at what your objective was. Yes, exactly. Rob Riggle was a correspondent when I was there. Well, Rob can handle himself. Yep, which is the crazy thing is he couldn't stand those silences. So he can physically handle himself and he couldn't bring himself to inject that kind of tension. I can't physically handle myself and I loved it. But that's also because you had a six foot microphone

and a long lens on the camera, right? You were standing very far away from your subject. Not always. Sometimes it's just the length of an arm. If I've got a microphone at the end of my arm and they've got a fist at the end of theirs, there's definitely room to connect. Right.

But what you were doing and what they do on The Daily Show and what you've continued on your show is this great blend between satire, but also very important political issues that you bring to the public's attention. Is that something that was always, well, I guess you said, when you were doing your standup in England,

it was part of what you wanted to start to infuse into your comedy, yeah? Yeah, the thing with those interviews though, was that they're always tense for The Daily Show, because you always want to embody the counter-argument. So you are going to be really rough with the people that you agree with, and you are going to pacify and encourage

the argument that you don't. Yeah, whoever's saying the dumb stuff, keep them going. Exactly, then you just say, please tell me more. Say more about that. Yeah, of course. How did you hone, like I don't have that skill, news flash. How did you hone that? Like is that something that developed in college or after college? Or was there a person that influenced you as like,

you know what, I want to be more like that because I like how they approach this thing. For those interviews, you could only hone that by watching the edit. Going through the edit, watching your own failures. That was the way to sharpen that particular tool that you would watch yourself on screen think it would have been really helpful if I'd said something at this point that was funny. I literally hadn't edited a turn around to me at one point and say, hey, Paustin said, you know what would have been really helpful if I'd said something at this point that was funny. I literally hadn't had to turn around to me at one point and say, hey, Paust and said, it would have been great,

just any kind of funny remark from you at this point I could have used. Yeah, you're right. Really? I'll try to remember that. But that ability to be uncomfortable in those moments and ask uncomfortable things and obviously being provocative, right? You're provoking people to try to get,

to elicit a response that's gonna be hilarious because it's so misplaced, their views are misplaced or whatever. It takes a lot of, I mean, actually I was talking to another Cambridge grad who was at the dinner last night, our friend Sasha Cohen, and I was asking him about the second Borat movie and all that kind of stuff. I was saying like, fuck the balls to do that shit.

And he does it in the movies, and he does it really well, but you did it as a day to day because it was your job to go and do that kind of shit. I guess you tell me, you get better at it or you get less... You definitely get better at it. Does he, what's his answer? Does he disassociate as well? Because my head is always half in the edit. I'm barely there in the room. While you're present, while you're doing it, you mean?

Yeah, I'm just thinking the edit nonstop. So it means that I'm not really emotionally engaging with what's happening in front of me at all. Well, he's just, right, and he's got his, I guess it was a version of that, which is he's got his eye on the prize and he just wants to get the thing that he wants to get. He wants to get them to that point.

And so everything else is kind of noise until you get them to reveal themselves, right? Yeah, I felt that way about this. The craziest example of that was, I felt that way with the Dalai Lama. I flew to India to interview him, and I was starting to feel tense, right? Because you're driving up a mountain, there's monks there,

and I've taken two flights to fuck with this guy. I'm thinking, oh boy, oh boy, I think I'm on a slightly different page than everyone else on this mountain. And he talks for like ten minutes at the start, and I am literally kind of nothing. I'm not listening to any of this, I can't do anything with this. It's only when I start kind of needling him that he opens up and think, okay, now we're doing it.

Literally, you don't need to transcribe the first 10 minutes of that. Wow, wow. Right, because you're just trying to get that thing. Yeah, I'm not sure that fit that. I'm not sure he as an individual has ever been listened to less than I listened to him in the first 10 minutes of that. Nobody. But so, but through those efforts, and then, and also on your show, you're exposing and

enlightening people to certain issues, but even all the way up to and including affecting legislation, yes? I mean, there are... Well, I don't know. Well, but you'll be very humble about this, but please don't. And tell us, tell us what it, tell us something that you might be really proud of that you got done through very clever satire

and basically making the medicine go down easy. Well, I don't know about, yeah, I don't know about the legislature, making the medicine go down easy, that is something that we can do, right? So even in that AlarmR interview, what I wanted to do was get him off balance so that we could communicate what was actually going on with him and with the succession problem that he and Tibetan Buddhism has.

The same is true with when I went to talk to Edward Snowden. Incredibly smart guy, right? Not a great communicator to people that don't have the technical understanding that he does. So it felt like what we could do was facilitate the important information that he had into a form that people could understand. Right. Were you ever worried that like interviewing Eric Snowden that you're subjecting yourself to potential hacking and destruction of your life? Oh yeah.

It was terrifying. That was legitimately terrifying. We were being followed the entire time by the Russian Secret Service. They were angry that we were there. We knew that the American government were going to be angry that we'd gone. We hadn't told HBO that we were going.

It felt like, but I will say, it's the same kind of feeling as when you're bombing or drawn to a tense situation. I was so happy, so giggly, just thinking, oh, everyone seems really mad at us. Yeah, giggling until... Everyone is the Russian government, the US government, and my employer.

But by the way, like, it's all fun and games and you're just getting a good bit and a good comedy bit until you're in fucking Moscow and you get a case of window cancer. And you know what I mean? I will say. It's funny you say that, because it's completely false sense of security that you get there thinking,

oh we're doing bits, it's fine. No one minds the jester. And they're following us the whole time. There's a guy drilling in my room. Is that true? The ceiling, 2am. Yeah, I'd hear this like zzzz, 2am in the morning. I'm talking to the ceiling saying, I'm sure you're trying to intimidate me.

It's job well done. Let's both get some sleep. Wow. I'm leaving to the ceiling saying I'm sure you're trying to intimidate me. It's job well done. Let's both get some sleep I'm leaving here tomorrow. Your your your wife I'm sure can provide some Some security for you and some and some proper guidance. She's a war veteran. Yes I mean like that's it. That's a pretty interesting combination there that you combination there. Yeah, she can provide perspective. That's not all it was, a hard perspective. Oh, it was so dangerous over there, was it? Was it?

Was it dangerous? When you say she was a war veteran, what did you mean? She was a combat medic in Iraq. Wow. She was, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow, fucking awesome. I'd love to hear those stories.

She nearby her? In the US Army. Yeah, in the US Army, that's right. Yeah. She wasn't there. So at any point was she like, hey dummy, let's just do your little stand up sets down at the comedy cellar, whatever it's called, and stop messing around, leave that stuff to the adults like me.

Yeah, I think a little bit. I think she sees a different side of me come out, because I'm probably a natural coward, and then I'll become utterly fearless whenever it's I think she sees a different side of me come out because I'm probably a natural coward and then I'll become utterly Fearless whenever it's in this inside a comedy bit. I know you've got the US Army behind you if things get hot It's kind of like the it's kind of like in hockey like a like a skills guy who feels tough because he's got an enforcer On his line, right? mean? That's exactly it. Talk a big game, but that's only because Vladimir behind me is going to take over as soon as your gloves come off.

Yeah, but is there like a thirst, there's obviously a thirst for this danger side of the correspondence and not just Russia or the Dalai Lama or whatever, where does that come from? Where does the, you know what, I like to live just on the edge, I wanna almost get in trouble, but I get out of it. I don't know, I live an unexamined life, Sean. I don't know where that comes from.

I'm sure, I've never looked inward. That's the most honest thing anybody's ever said on this show, by the way. Unexamined life. Can I guess, you're a smart person that is able to see all the inequities and injustices around the world and you have a platform and you're able to say something about it but you can skin it in a way that is also kind of entertaining.

Or you saw that we're idiots and you want to come get some of that sweet American cash. It's got to be one of the two. Two things can be true at the same time. Little Colin B. A couple of my, two of my favorite battles that my Wikipedia page has told me about that you've had. Will you explain to the audience, let's start with the Russell Crowe back and forth. How did that, what is that, how did it come about,

and how did it end? So that was just a stupid bit that we were doing. The true joy is where bits get out of hand and they get added to once they've left our building. So with that example, he was staging a divorce auction. So he was selling. A divorce auction. Yeah, he was selling up all the memorabilia and stuff.

Exactly. Wait, wait, he was divorcing somebody and selling all of her stuff? No, that would be less charming. He was selling lots of his memorabilia. He was selling T-shirts from like, the gladiator boots and stuff. 30-odd foot of gr people. T-shirts from like the gladiator grunts. 30-odd foot of grunt concert t-shirts and stuff. Got it.

Exactly. And so we bought his jockstrap from the movie Cinderella Man. Sure. And we sent it to the last remaining blockbuster in Alaska as a kind of way to try and keep it open. He found out about it. And I wasn't sure. It didn't feel

to me at the time that Russell Crowe was well known for his enjoyment in Bon Ami. He seemed like a rough-edged soul. Then we get the message that he is using the money that we've spent on his leather Cinderella Man jockstrap to start a Koala Chlamydia ward in my name at the Sydney Zoo. I can't tell you how much joy that put in my soul. Of course. It's such a good joke. First of all, is chlamydia a thing with koala bears? Huge. It's a huge thing.

But truly. Yes, it is a massive problem. Come on. Did you not know that? It's the perfect joke. They all have chlamydia. I didn't know that either. Why, how?

What are you talking about? Are they ill? Do you really not know that? Because they're fucking each other nonstop. What, they do? Yeah. They're like bunnies? They're diseased tiny bears.

So then the bears have this STD. Yes. Yeah. And Russell Crowe sets up a specific ward at the animal hospital and puts your name on it. In your name. Yes. God bless. In your name, yes. God bless.

It's a perfect joke. I've got all the time in the world for shit like that, for him doing that. Yes, it's a perfect, he elevated our joke. He handled it perfectly. He also managed to highlight a very real, albeit very funny issue among the Koala community. It was staggered by how good that joke was.

And was that the end of it? Or did you go down there? No, the beauty was, this is how good that joke was. And was that the end of it? Or did you go down there? No, the beauty was. This is how good it was. Go host a benefit. That's the only way. We shut down the show the next week. We were kind of, you can't, this show's finished.

Nothing better than this can ever happen. Then we were going to start the next show with a bit that he'd done. I kind of wrote to him, hey, here's the idea. He said, yeah, I'll do it. I'll be honest, I don't think, I'm not sure you're elevating the joke anymore. And the brutal thing was he was completely right.

Huh? Russell Crowe, the comedy doctor. You're right, yeah, fuck, you're right. Eventually at the end of the year, he came back and he did something, first of all, the big movie parody, and we returned it to him. But at that moment, it was a really solid comedic note from Russell Crowe.

God bless him, man. That's fucking funny. What a funny dude. All right, now take us to the Connecticut sewer plant. Again, another perfect example, right? We're trying to do a story about, I think it was jury selection. And very dry, very dry story.

And so one of our writers, Owen, wrote a drive-by joke just shitting on Danbury, Connecticut. Literally put no thought into it whatsoever. Just bang, Danbury, Connecticut's getting it. Because they were tilting the jury selection away from perhaps a diverse community they weren't paying attention to. Yeah, that was the large story.

Just a sideways joke, throwing an elbow on Danbury, they didn't deserve it. The town of Danbury does not respond to this well at all. They're up in arms and the mayor then goes on camera and says, as a response, we have a brand new sewer plant here and we are going to call it the John Oliver Memorial Sewer Plant. And again, the fact it's the Memorial sewer plant. Add memorial there.

John Oliver sewer plant, that's already your shit talking me with a shit processing plant. To call it Memorial. You're like, you've done it. You've done it. But by the way, they didn't do it on purpose. That's the worst part. They don't understand. I don't think they get the memorial part. I don't.

I really don't. I really don't. I think that they didn't get it until after and you go, what a brilliant joke. And they go, yeah, thanks. Yeah. We'll be right back. We're brought to you in part by ZipRecruiter. Daylight savings is right around the corner and for most states that means we're going to have more daylight from March through November. By setting your clocks forward it may feel like there are more hours in the day, but if you're hiring it doesn't necessarily help you find qualified candidates for your roles any sooner.

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slash smartless or text smartless to 500-500 to try Audible free for 30 days. Audible.com slash Smartless. And back to the show. Okay, so you start of your own church, Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption. Well yeah, is this true? That's true, so that was in our first season. Perpetual Exemption.

That's genius. We were was in our first season. That's genius. We were doing something about televangelists. And we got one televangelist on it. So we were writing back and forth to him for seven months. I think kind of sending him money. He would send us more things back saying, please put your hand on this piece of paper and pray and send me another three dollars.

Okay, three dollars. What are you going to send us now? Please put this little bit of plastic in your hand. Yeah, I remember this. And it'll curl up and that'll tell you which direction you should press. It went on and on and on until we eventually called him and said, hey, we've been talking to you for some months, we're going to do a show about it.

You got any comments? And he, I've forgotten this. He said, no, no comments, that sounds fine. And then left our researcher, like at 2 and a half, it was about 2.30 a.m., left her a voicemail that was very much a comment. Very much a hard comment about what hell was and when we were going there. So then to show how tax-exempt churches are, we then started a church and got people to send us money and offerings. And unfortunately they did both of those things.

And keep going, so what happened? Well they sent tens of thousands of dollars. Tens of thousands, yeah. And then various offerings and we're pretty sure two cups of semen and that's when we shut the church down. It's the second cup of semen. But that's amazing to me the church down. It's the second cup of semen. But that's amazing to me that you can just do that and it be legit.

By the way, I knew I could see Sean's face and I could see the fucking wheels turning in there. I saw both hamsters get on the wheel and he was like, wait, if I do it, can I be tax exempt and then I can buy my own plane and I can buy a mansion and it's all the, did you not a little bit? No, no, the reason, because I'm fascinated by religion and I'm fascinated by- And you hate money? No, I am and just like, naming other religions, I mean there's

thousands of religions in the world. Every single thing in the world is invented right? Even religion is invented. How dare you. You just, what's that? How dare you. And even you just, so with that little stunt or whatever it's just proved that you can, I'm just, that's fascinating to me that you did that and it worked. Yeah, with some stories, it feels like it helps sometimes to show, if a problem is that there is a very low bar of entry for something, sometimes it feels the best way to prove that is to clear that bar.

So that's why we have sometimes done things in practice as well as telling people what's possible in theory. Right, right, right. And that's where things can get a little legally dicey and very, very fun. Yeah, yeah. I love it. You will oftentimes cover multiple issues in the 30 minutes. Sometimes you will dedicate

the whole 30 minutes to one. How do you... Well, first of all, how did you come up? What was the genesis of the format for the show? Oh yeah. That changed a lot actually. Because we didn't have an idea of what really we were going to do other than there were a couple of stories that we'd done that some of the jobs away. That it felt like The Daily Show wouldn't normally have done. One was about aluminum pricing and one was about

the city of Detroit I think. And it felt like oh we could do more things like that. So we did two test shows but we had a guest area built in because I thought that you just had to have guests late night shows so that one note that HBO had for us was you don't need to have guests if you don't want them you can just add to the time of the story that's great and yeah we couldn't have bit their hand off fast enough I didn't have to get up and say, this person is here now. Yeah, but I mean, huge credit to you and your staff.

You don't need anything else other than the results of your research, the shaping of that opinion, and your delivery of it. It feels like it's better to live or die that way. And I think we're very, very lucky because we don't have to take ad breaks. And I do think what we need is a trapped audience. Because it's not like you can hold people's attention,

say, OK, we're going to let Twix tell you how delicious it is for three and a half minutes. Then you need to remember, we're coming back into this story about facial recognition technology, exactly where we left off. Also, the fact that there is no ad support on HBO, you don't need to worry about offending any brand. So you'd set free reign.

That's a huge deal. That's a massive, massive deal. You get to build your own momentum. One of the things I like, when you get on a subject, you get to drive the momentum, and you don't have to take those breaks where you lose it. You can keep doubling down and compounding the energy and the focus.

And as you get sharper and sharper by the end of the thing, and you actually get more animated and more into it. And that's part of the allure of what you're doing, is that, you know, making that point of shedding all the shit and getting to it. If you were to have ad breaks, it would take away that energy. Yeah, it'd be tough.

I think that's one of the reasons I talk so fast. It isn't just that we're racing the clock. Sometimes it is that energy of, you don't leave, don't leave yet, don't tough. I think that's one of the reasons I talk so fast It's just that we're racing the clock sometimes it is that energy of you don't leave don't leave don't leave I know this sounds bad. Yeah, yeah, we're talking about the lethal injections, but please don't leave Go go go go go and we've been lucky to HBO sometimes gives us more time if we realize this can't fit into the show anymore We're not actually a 30 minute show anymore. We're 35 minutes Oh, that's and sometimes we're 40 or 45 minutes if If we say to them, can we please have 10 more minutes because there's stuff I can't cut out of this.

Yeah, that's nice. Because you'll time your monologue, right? Yes, oh yeah, down to a second. Got it. Yeah, well I remember they did the same thing. Sometimes in entourage, they hadn't finished telling the story that they needed to tell and they would go over. You know, they'd have something really important.

They were like, they were gonna go for lunch on Fairfax. And like, they didn't have time to get to that. And I'm so glad you brought that up. We are standing on the shoulders of Dark Ellen and Entourage. We couldn't have done what we'd done unless they, thank you for giving the comment. We're all standing on those shoulders, believe me. Now, what is your process of finding these stories?

Is it, does it take many shapes and sizes, as little as you just finding something interesting in a magazine, all the way up to including what? And not just me, it's just the whole staff can pitch stories, and then if something is interesting as we'll give it to a researcher, they'll take it away for a week to work out if the story stands up, if it's been reported accurately,

if things are changing that might mean that now is not the right time to talk about it. If it gets through that first stress test, we'll give it to a footage producer as well to see if there's any footage through which we can tell the story. Only at that point would we have writers to have them just write an outline of a story

without any jokes, literally just how would you tell this story? Then we combine those outlines and only then do they start drafting and that's about a six week process. Wow. For each story, so we're doing six stories at once constantly.

Oh, that's amazing. And then it's always susceptible to total derailment based on the topical stories of the day. Yeah, we try to contain that at the top of the show the most of the time. It rarely will be that actually we have to hit pause on everything and just crash the show in a week That does happen, but we try not to have that because you are alive. Yes No, I mean or take delay you're on the same day. Yeah. Yeah, but but will you so when you're working on You know sort of six, six weeks in advance,

so is it like Monday we're working on the thing, or is it all kind of combined? It is. So Monday is that thing, then Tuesday is that, and it's all color-coded days? Yes, exactly. It's a complex web of things that we need to do to the point that just after we've taken the show,

literally just after, we come back over the road from the studio and read the drafts that have just been logged for the next week's show. And then, yeah, the first day back, we'll be going through the outlines that have come in. So we'll only then revisit the show that we're doing next week three days later. So it's a lot of plates to keep spinning,

but it's the only way that we can do it. Wow. Now, in your hobnobbing around the political elite, as I'm sure you have an opportunity to at times, have you gotten your pocket stuffed with a bunch of cards and numbers for deep sourcing if you need it? It's a serious question. I know, I just like your phrasing.

Do you have some deep throats out there? Like that are really highly connected that can give you say, hey, listen, this is a real big issue and we love the way you make a mess and go down easy. You might wanna talk about this and I'll give you some choice. No, I'm not a hobnobber. Especially in the circles you're referring to there.

So I don't have any, I think we've annoyed enough people that we're generally not welcome for some reason everywhere. God, if I worked for the government, I'd have my number. You don't think your nub is welcome by some deep throats? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha The excitement in the pause, where, hold on, I've got all the pieces for this sentence, everybody be quiet. I know, I know, I know. I love it, I love it.

And by the way, it was messy at best, it was just, it was an opportunity. I took the shot. You tee it up, he'll hit it. I didn't have a great look at the net, but I had enough that I thought that fuck, I might, it might go in. I'm turning around before it even hits the bed.

John, I know you've done a lot of acting too in your life. Do you miss that? Do you want to do more of that? Or you're like, no, I'm good. Sean has a script. Not really. I haven't done a lot of acting and I think when I have done it, I'm not sure I would call it acting. Or...

Yeah. I remember I did these NBC sitcom community, I remember what Jonathan Banks, legitimate actor, came up to me before a scene and said, I just wanted to talk about you know what our characters are doing before this and I had to say, oh Jonathan I'm just gonna say these words in the funniest possible way. These words here with the yellow marker over the top of them? It really was. You know when actors act opposite a tennis ball, I will be that ball for you. I've never, yeah, that's funny.

In scripts, I've never highlighted lines because I just figured when it says my character and there's a line under it, that's when I talk. Like, I don't need to highlight when I talk. I just look for my name. They do it for you. Yeah. There's no reason to be confused as to what lines are yours. Right. Yeah, and you don't need to make a big deal. I mean, I used to do, I've done thousands of scenes with Jason and at a certain point they were like, do you want Jason?

I go, no, just tape his headshot to a C-stand and I'd rather do it to that, you know what I mean? A lot of early days for me. We did this one piece with Warren G. Harding's wax statues and we got Laura Linney, Jason, to act opposite that Warren G. Harding and no offense, watching those takes he realized, oh, she's been carrying actors for her entire career.

She needs nothing, yeah. She doesn't need anything. Literally a wax statue wobbling in front of her and she's in tears, oh, yeah, you're a one man band. She is incredible, you are absolutely right. Now, how are you shutting off from all of your hard, hard work and intelligence and, do you do anything stupid, John?

Not really, no, I've got kids, so I guess everything that kids do is fundamentally stupid, so I'm stepping to their level right now. Right, you're getting on your knees and making funny faces and making dumb noises. That's right, I'm pretending that I understand the rules of Pokemon and I'm also pretending that they understand them. So uh... Wait, how old are they, John?

Eight and five. Eight and five. Wait, three and five did you say? Eight and five. Eight and five, so you're out of Paw Patrol, John? Eight and five. Wait, three and five, did you say? Eight and five. Eight and five, so you're out of PAW Patrol, you're not in the Mighty One. Yes, I'm out of PAW Patrol.

Now, is a lot of your day spent, especially these days, wondering who's gonna come back first, Thiago or Simikas? I mean, where are we at with that? Oh yeah, I mean, it's not gonna be Thiago. Here we go, we're back on Liverpool. It feels like that guy is an absolute Rolls Royce of a footballer, but I'm just not sure his body can stand up to the Premier League.

Rolls Royce of a footballer. I love it. Now where does soccer come from? Is that true? That's a British term? Yes. Sorry, you can explain it, John. You know. No, no, go for it. So like in the way that like a lot of people call rugby rugger, right? It was called rugby football, I think. Rugby football. Yeah.

And the same thing, right? Soccer came from the association football. The association football, yeah. Soccer was not what we know as soccer was called association football to distinguish it from rugby. And so instead of they shortened the association to sock and they call it soccer. The English football. So instead of, they shortened the association to soccer, and they call it soccer. The English football. Oh, that would be genuinely how I'll relax,

is watching Liverpool. Yeah. How are they doing this year? They're doing really well. They're doing well, I mean, this is gonna be a little delayed, but they had a nice draw yesterday, put them in the final of the Carabao Cup against Chelsea, who are, who the fuck knows how they got there.

But they're doing great, aren't they? Yeah, they're very good. Are you all sports John? Are you like just sock just sorry I like all sports John. We're gonna go together We're gonna go over there together and And we're gonna go look at this. I showed the guy the guys know this oh Yeah, that's me and you're again. Oh,, yeah. Jurgen, you're gonna get it from... That's pretty good, dude. You're gonna get it. I gotta be honest.

That's pretty good. It's high level. Yeah. I might make a donation to the Chlamydia Foundation and now in your name for that joke. Mr. Oliver, this has been fantastic. Yes. Such a pleasure. Thank you, guys.

You're very, very nice to do this with us. I mean... Such a pleasure. Thank you, guys. You're very, very nice to do this with us. I know you're busy. You're welcome. And you're much smarter than us. You dumbed it down for us. We appreciate that. Thank you.

We love it. We love you, dude. Keep doing what you do. Honestly, it's funny and it's fun. I love it. I watch it all the time. It's educational. Yeah. Thank you. As you're talking, I'm going to put the paper back over.

Back into hell. So you can keep talking and I'm going to leave. I do not like compliments. Farewell. Thank you, John Oliver. Thank you, great John Oliver. Bye, pal. Bye-bye. Go Reds. That's a great guest.

This is a great guest. Really good. Had you known him, Jason? Really good. No, I've circled him a couple of times at things we've both been at, but never. Doesn't sound creepy. Had the opportunity to touch him.

You've just, wait. You've just kind of roamed near him and like sniffed him? Tighter and tighter circles each time I see him and never gotten close enough to put my hand out and say, hi. Hi. I did a couple, I've done over the years, I've done a few V.O.s for some of his bits for his show.

Oh really? He's been kind enough to reach out, yeah, that were like sort of semi-serious things and I've always been very kind of honored that he asked me, honored with a U. I really do, very nice. I do appreciate him or anyone else that is able to, whatever side of the political spectrum you sit,

I like that people are able to get info to us, facts to us, in a way that is not overly preachy or, I mean it's just like, we need that because we don't know where all the honest stuff is nowadays, because all the, you know. Honestly, it's as long as, you're right Jay,

no matter what side you're on, as long as you can, or where you fall, forget side, where you fall, as long as you don, or where you fall, forget side, where you fall, as long as you don't take yourself too seriously at the end of the day, then fucking great. And it's the moment that your position is unassailable and that there's no way that you can, then you've lost it.

Except when you're talking about facts, as long as everyone just agrees what what what are provable facts Then you can have your own opinion and stuff. But anyway, he's Another one that's I feel maybe overstated but he's doing a service, you know But you know, you know what? It is also I think part of I think that what's effective is is because he is English and he's not from here. He can kind of funny No, it's true and he can come here and here and have an outsider's perspective in that sense. Like somebody who's watched,

it's the same thing with Canadians. We're like really, I always say that Canadians, we grew up, we're very similar culturally, et cetera, and geographically, of course, but it's almost like we grew up against the glass and to make a hockey metaphor, we're right there, and we get to see it all. So you get to understand and see

what works and what doesn't work and you can have a point of view that is informed but not necessarily have a dog in the fight personally. And I guess that it's just a byproduct of being so foreign. It's a a by-product of being so fucking important. It's a by-product. You can deliver some facts just by doing a drive-by. By-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y SmartLess. SmartLess. SmartLess. SmartLess is 100% organic and artisanally handcrafted by Rob Armgerve, Bennett Barbicoe, and Michael Granteri. SmartLess. If you like SmartLess, you can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple podcasts.

Prime members can listen ad free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at Wondry.com slash survey. Hey, listener, it's Sean Hayes. Do you know when Crystal Pepsi was discontinued or what was in Al Capone's vault? If not, then you haven't spent enough time on Wikipedia. But that's okay because you can learn all about it on the new podcast, Wiki-hole, from all of us here at Smartless Media. Discover the craziest rabbit holes on Wikipedia with host Darcy Carden and her favorite comedian friends as they bring the cyber frontier directly to your tympanic membrane. And if you listen to WikiHole, you'll learn that's the sciency

term for eardrum. WikiHole is the wild, wild west of Wikipedia. Starting out on one Wikipedia page, they go from link to link to link to link, careening through trivia, oddities and unexpected connections until everyone wonders, how the hell did we get here? Follow Wikihole on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Wikihole ad-free by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts.