SmartLess - "RZA"

Episode Date: June 16, 2025

Enter the 36 Chambers but grab your dash candle en route; it’s none other than The RZA. Wu Tang slang, the tongue as the sword, the first NFT, and the game of chess. Laughs rule everything around me, stream in the funny, hollers that fulfill, y’all… on an all-new SmartLess. Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ to listen to new episodes of SmartLess ad-free and a whole week early. Start a free trial now on Apple Podcasts or by visiting siriusxm.com/podcastsplus.

Alright, so guys, this is the start and we need a good solid cold open. Anybody have any interesting or funny something to say? Get our listener excited to... Or surprise them. Like yeah, well it's surprising that it rained a lot yesterday. No, it will. Anything? Can you help?

No, we're still going to be digging ourselves out of a rain yesterday hole that Sean put us in. yesterday. Oh hi. Oh hi. It's OJ. I'm wearing a hat that says oh hi. I told you guys last time I was in Ohio yesterday. I just got back last night for Kevin's birthday, my friend Kevin's birthday. Oh man, what a story. You were in Ohio? Oh. Do you like it there? For whose birthday, Kevin Hart Kevin's birthday. Oh man, what a story. You were in Ohio. Do you like it there? For whose birthday, Kevin Hartz? Kevin, Kevin Neustadt, it's a friend of ours.

He doesn't pay attention, he doesn't remember. You mentioned Kevin and Carrie a million times, he has still no idea who they are. That's right, you've met them. Well, why would I know who they are? Because you sat and talked with Kevin for a few hours. You talked to him for a few hours, but he's not working at Netflix or show business. Do you know how many people? Because you sat and talked with Kevin for a few hours. You talked to him for a few hours, but he's not working at Netflix or any show business.

Do you know how many people you guys have sat and talked to for hours that you have no idea who they are? You can't remember them. JB, I remember you used to be somebody years ago, I won't say the gender, because I don't want to give it away, but there was somebody who you kept introducing yourself to over years and finally they got mad at you and you were like, hey, F you.

Really? You think I fucking remember it? Do you remember that? No. And eventually you're like, hey F you really you think I fucking remember it. Do you remember that? No, and eventually you're like, I don't fucking know you Well, I can't I mean I'm certainly not unique to being you know bad at remembering No, no, no, no, you're not unique. No, no, no the same same right? Yeah. I'm great at dates. You're incredible I'm good at dates, but then the names and stuff. No, no, no, same. Same. Right? But you're great at dates. You're incredible at dates. I'm good at dates, but the names and stuff, no. Yeah, dates is weird.

I don't know what that is. And also, and I have particular trouble, guys don't typically change their look often. Present company excluded. Right. So it's not difficult for me to remember a dude's face over the course of a few years. I've had like two hairdos my whole life.

But you know, women get to change the color of their hair all the time and the cut of their hair and they accessorize. You've had a few hair don'ts too, I mean let's be honest. Oh, they're all online, you can enjoy. It is one of the worst things I ever did was, years and years and years ago, we remodeled our house and I walk out the front door and there's this girl running,

I may have said this already, there's this girl running down the sidewalk right towards me jogging. And she goes, hey Sean, and I'm like, hey. And she goes, you finished? Meaning to the house? And I'm like, yeah, how did they even know I was remodeling? And she goes, I'd love to see it sometime.

And I'm like, wait a minute. What? That's just girl jogging randomly. And I'm like, do I know you? And she goes, it's Julia, your neighbor for the past 20 years. Oh, how bad did you feel? And I said, I said Jay, I go,

the worst thing you could ever come back with, I said, which was, did you change your hair? It was just terrible. It was horrible. Last week when I was in New York and I was riding a bike through the village, I'm riding along and this girl goes, Will! You're shooting additional photography for Flate?

No. And I go, and I'm riding, F you bro. And I'm riding my bike through the village and this girl goes, Will. And I look over and she goes, hey. And so I turn over, like I steer the bike over to her and I go, hey, what's going on?

And I'm like, who? And then she goes, I get right up closer and she goes, you don't know me. And I go. Love the show. Yeah, and so I go, okay, see you later. So then I go by, right? So then I go and it's a city bike

and I park it in the thing and I'm walking down a block later. I'm walking by and there's this girl and guy sitting outside this place and she's wearing a baseball cap and she looks up at me and she goes, kind of waves like, hi, and I go, hey, and I keep going. I get home, there's a taxi

and it's this friend of mine, Emily, and she goes, did you not know that was me? So I thought I recognized the person who was a stranger, and the person I knew, I blew off. So is it just, is it just that? It's face blindness, it's face blindness. I swear I have it. Or are we just rude dicks, or are we just getting old

and we're losing our minds? I think I've always been like that. I think it's all of it. Yeah, I think it's all of it too. Wicked combination of all of it. Yeah, but I'm terrible. I... Yo, you're the worst at, what's the subject?

Yeah, can we fill in the blank? Yeah, can we? Let me go first. Can I go blanket on that? You're just the worst. I kind of think everybody looks the same. I swear, I think I have a little bit of it, like face blindness, I really do.

No, but that's a real thing. I know one person that's like that. Right, I think we know the same person. Yeah, I think we have a little bit of it, like face blindness, I really do. No, but that's a real thing. I know one person that's like that. Right, I think we know the same person. Yeah. Oh, yeah, I'm blanking on their face. That's a bad bow. Wonderful will. Okay, listen, listen, listen.

Wait, wait, but I asked that guy really quick. I asked that guy, I was like, so if I walk out of the room and come back, because he has been diagnosed with face blindness, I go, if I walk out of the room and come back, because he has been diagnosed with space blindness, I go, if I walk out of the room and come back in, you won't know it's me? He's like, no. I'm like, really?

And this guy's making six figures a year. I know. By the way, again, not to go too far, there is a documentary that came out in the 80s about this guy in England who had a memory of seven seconds. Poor fellow, he had an injury, head injury. And it's crazy, and his wife would like... She eventually lived on his own, had to be taken care of.

But she would go out of the room, he'd come in, she'd come in, she'd go... He'd go, hi! Oh my God! He'd hug her, hug her, hug her. She'd go to make a cup of tea, she comes back and he'd go, hello! Oh, the most annoying man to ever live with. She was the only person that he remembered. So it's on YouTube. It's fucking crazy. Can you imagine having face blindness and the seven second memory? Dude, it's the craziest, craziest thing ever.

Anyway, speaking of my crazy, we have a crazy talented guest on the show today. I've been looking forward to having this guest for so long. This person is, he's a true, he's a visionary. He's done everything in music and film. He's ventured into horror core. He's produced solo albums. He's made a mark in film and TV. He's scored a lot of great films.

He's scored Ghost Dog, The Way of the Samurai. He scored the Both Kill Bill movies. He starred last year in a award-winning comedy, Probol Mista. He's just wrapped his own film, One Spoon of Chocolate. He's a published author. He released a classical album last year, A Ballet Through the Mud, which is unbelievable.

Guys, he's a titan of everything, not just the industry. He's a founding member of the Wu-Tang Clan, not only shaped the genre with their groundbreaking debut album, Enter the Wu-Tang, but he's also crafted a sound that's booming beats and chilling samples and influenced countless musicians. It's the one and only RZA, you guys. Oh, RZA!

Whoa. Yeah. I guess I'm going to take off my camera here. There it is. Oh, boy, I have to take off my camera here. There it is! There it is. Oh boy, John Hileman's going to be thrilled. This is so cool. Hello, good morning.

Good morning, good afternoon. I'm actually on the East Coast, so it's good afternoon. Happy lunch. Oh yeah. Good afternoon. Oh man, thank you for joining us today. What an absolute thrill to have you on the show today, man. Oh, My pleasure.

And I will start off by saying, I have a great memory, all right? Yeah? We're the same age. Exactly. Will you remember for me right now what it was like to score both Kill Billz? I mean, that's like, was that the only film that you,

the films that you've scored? No, that was, no, that you've scored? Did you do- No, I went on to score maybe a dozen after that in some TV shows, et cetera. Do you love that? Yeah, scoring is the ultimate, one of the ultimate expressions of art, right? You're trying to tell a story and compliment a story

with your music, yes, I love it. Yeah, but sometimes the cues have to only be 10, 20, 30 seconds or do you feel like you're boxed in with that? Yeah, I think to be quite frank, you may have a cue that's just a cymbal. That's your cue, right? Yeah, yeah.

But you may have one that's a whole Nutcracker suite, you know what I mean? Whole big sequence. So, I mean, that's the beauty of music. You think about, I mean, one of our great composers, John Williams, he was, do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. And that's just a few notes. Yeah, yeah.

That's so awesome. So was Ghost Dog Way of the Samurai, was that your first one that you did? Yeah, so Jim John Moose brought me in to score that film. I never scored a film before, I was pretty, I didn't know what it was to be honest with you. I didn't know, when you make a movie, you gotta edit, you gotta do all these things, right?

And Jim used to want the music, and he'd be like, come to the editing room, which is basically, the editing is a nine to five job, maybe a nine to eight. I'd be coming like midnight, you know what I mean? Everybody'd be gone, but at those days, we had the music on the DAT, so I would just have it on the DAT player,

pull up to the place and give him the DAT, so he'd be like, you know, it's midnight. I'm like, well, you know, here it is. Why is that? Why is it historically, you know, music studio sessions late in the night? What is that? I don't understand.

Beats so high. Yeah, musicians, yeah. You guys have like a different clock. Yeah, I mean, my musician clock was ridiculous. I mean, it was embarrassing to be quite frank. I remember as I'm scoring movies, I started sampling some music from one of John Woo's movies, The Killer, which one of my favorite, The Killer,

a hard boil, great. Yeah, great movies. Great titles by the great director, John Woo. And we became friends and he came to New York and he's like, you know, I want to have, let's have dinner. And I said, cool, let's have dinner. So I meet you at the restaurant, you know, 630 in Manhattan. And at the time I was in the studio

that was like an hour away and I just got caught up in the studio. And then it's like nine o'clock, they're like, wait, you're supposed to be at dinner with John. And I'm like, okay. Yeah, you kind of get sucked into it and it's like this, like, yeah, my husband, Scotty, he also composes scores and stuff for us.

And he'll be back there in like eight hours fly by. You don't even know if, you know. But John was such a gentleman, showing that I got there around 11 and he held the restaurant open and he sat down and had a great meal. Oh, that's amazing. And he gave me some wisdom about time. Well, I was going to say, some wisdom about time,

I like that expression. About time, which is so funny, because all music is in time. Is all time. And we're all late. So it's funny, Rizzo, when I think about it, because I was asking about the first film that you scored, which was Ghost Dog, and I was going to say, how did you get into it? But it makes sense, because I was asking about the first film that you scored, which was Ghost Dog,

and I was going to say, how did you get into it? But it makes sense, because you mentioned John Woo's films being a huge influence. I mean, there's a cinematic influence in the Wu-Tang music, right? I mean, that's part of your origin story. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Yeah, I mean, my aspirations at the time of making music was trying to make a movie, trying to make my album play like a movie. In New York, a lot of us kind of would drive to DC, to the Howard Homecoming, or to Morgan State College, or go off to Connecticut. That's the weekend thing to do, right? That's where the chicks are at. Yeah. And my idea was to make people who are driving that journey,

to listen to my music and to get a movie in their head and pick up some game, pick up some slang, pick up some visions. So I was always trying to make movies and on my first five albums, if you listen to them, they always start with a beginning, there's a theme. There's an album we did called Cuban Links, which is really a mafia movie.

It starts off with three guys, one for you, one for me, one guy cheating on them. It's like, you know the old thing, one for you, one for me, two for you, one, two for me, three for you. And it goes on, and the way the album plays out, it's like these guys are going to pull a heist, somebody's going to die, like once upon a time in America. The other two guys are going to go grab the rest of the crew, the Wu Gambino's, bring them back,

and then pull a bigger heist for two million, and everybody's going to ride off into the sunset. And that album was so influential that hip hop began to change their names. Like we was the first ones to change their names, like from Wu-Tang to the Wu-Gang-Binos, and every artist started following that trend. Wow.

Wow, wow, that's so cool. I mean, so you guys, so I mentioned in the intro that in 93 you guys released Enter the Wu Tang and that kind of changed the game. Certainly must have changed your life in a big way. You had already been making music for years, right, with those guys? Yeah.

But that was the first big release that went kind of crazy. Must have, what was that experience like? Yeah, it was, I tried to enter the industry before just as a solo artist, Prince Rakeem, sold about 10,000 records, got a couple of shows and a couple of groupies. Right? That was at that age, 19 years old, that's not a bad start. But yeah, right.

Couldn't pay my rent though. But I went back to my crew and I was just like, we have this thing in the neighborhood called the Wu Tang Sling. And we was all big kung fu movie lovers. And I just called it inspiration that we should take with our childhood love, take the concept of Asian cinema from Hong Kong or from Japan. And since our lyrics are from your mouth and your mouth is like a sword, right?

It says that in the book of Revelations. It says, out of the mouth comes a double edged sword. So I was like, if we take our tongue and make it our sword and the best sword style ever filmed was the Wu-Tang style and we become the Wu-Tang clan, we could go into the industry and chop everybody heads off. You know, my brothers was like, sounds good to me.

Yeah. Well, that was my question because I'm a dumb, soft white guy from Los Angeles and I not know about... Well, you know, I'm not... No, that's very true. That's a really apt description of you. I'm not, as the you know, I'm not. No, that's very true. That's a really apt description of you. I'm not, as the kids say, I'm not down. I'm not hip to it all.

And so I'm not clear on Asian cinema, on Kung Fu, on the genesis of the title of the band and stuff. So I was going to ask you about that. How, so how did your love of Kung Fu and Asian films, and how does that start? Because you wouldn't necessarily put hip hop with Asian cinema in the same group, right? Typically?

I mean, you kind of have to, if you think about it, right? If you go back into hip hop, according to hip hop history, it says it started in 1973, in that summer. But in that same summer, Bruce Lee Enter the Dragon hits 42nd Street. And that same summer, Fred Williams and Black Caesar hits. And also The Godfather is in the theaters. Mean Streets, right? So the art of the cinema is still cohesive

with the art of the music. There's actually a thread because most of us are in those theaters. And then when we go back to our neighborhoods, the things that we are gaining from cinema is finding its way into our art. If you look at some of the early breakdance moves, you'll see that some of those moves were seen

in a martial art film, and then of course took it to another level. Yeah, that's amazing. I didn't think of that. That's so true. Of course you didn't think of that. But you're dumb. You're dumb.

You think about a lot. What do you know, dude? You don't know anything. Listen to the rhythm and learn, okay? That is true. Break dancing is, yeah, you could duck a lot of punches, yeah. And kicks down there on the floor. So then, so that makes sense.

And so then you guys do, you produce and you form Wu-Tang and you release some records and just a huge, like massively influential but also what's interesting to me is and tell these guys and educate all of us a little bit about Not only were you guys doing Wu-Tang but then as you're doing I mean you're doing all sorts of solo projects under a bunch of different names, right? And you mentioned Prince Rakeem, which was your uh that you released before, but also some stuff after, right, as well, and also, but also other guys from Wu-Tang, you produced their stuff.

Like oftentimes people leave a band and go and do something on their own, on their own, on their own, but you were still producing everybody's music. Is that true? Yeah. I was with, so since the martial art world or the Shaolin philosophy was so embedded in us,

we took it and applied it to our lives. So for instance, Staten Island, my hometown, we renamed it Shaolin. You know what I mean? That's why you see Pete Davidson has a Shaolin tattoo of course. Oh wow. He's from Staten Island, but we renamed it Shaolin. So Shaolin is considered the temple, the well, they would say, from which all martial arts springs from. It's the strongest philosophy place that even before Zen made it to Japan, it was developed in Shaolin.

And so in Shaolin, they had the monks, but the leader of the monks was called the Abbot. And so my Wu-Tang brothers called me the Abbot. You know what I mean? So now, as the Abbot, it's my job to make the best decisions, the best direction of which way we go. And as the producer, I went on to produce, of course, the first album, 36 Chambers, it went platinum. So going platinum, of course, is a bong bong, right?

So then after that, of course, is a bong bong, right? So then after that, of course, I became a sought after producer. But what I did was to keep my energy contained within my crew. So I went on to produce Method Man's first album, Double Platinum, Freak Ron Platinum, Old Dirty Bastard Platinum, Jizzah Platinum, Ghostface Platinum. So he said- That's unbelievable. Yeah, so I might have did about seven platinum albums

back to back. I don't think too many people probably did that. So that's a blessing. But it was a contained energy, you know what I mean? I remember talking to Seth Rogan when they had their breakout. He made a joke because him and his crew who were listeners of the Wu-Tang Clan,

they called themselves the Ju-Tang Clan, he said. Right? And he said they all lived together, and him and Evan and everybody. They actually took that concept and did the same thing, and continued, hit after hit. And I think that's a great thing for any group of artists

is if you could combine that art together and then direct it as a brand, you will increase your fan base of course, but also give each one of you a chance to go through the same tunnel. That is so cool, I love that. There's a sort of like, sort of like a,

you harness the power of the collective a little bit, and you don't let it dissipate, you kind of keep it, and you all kind of move, and then all boats rise, right? You know what I mean? What would we call our little clan here? Like the Chin Chin clan. The Smart Clans.

Yeah, I don't know. By the way, you mentioned. I really like Chin Chin. Well, Chin Chin went out of business, did you see that? Well, no, they just shut down the sunset. They just shut down the one on Sunset. They did, they shut down the one on Beverly Hills too. Sorry, Sean.

Get through the interview and oh my God. You'll get your sodium somewhere else, don't worry about that. And we will be right back. And now back to the show. So you talk about Shaolin, I didn't know any of that. That is such a cool concept, dude. I'm so blown away by it, I'm like riveted.

And you guys recorded your seventh album was Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, right? And you made one copy. Do you guys know about this story, Sean and Jason? Do you know about this? No, no, no, no, no. Can you tell these guys a little bit about it? Because it's one of the coolest stories in art history.

Forget music. Oh wait, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so, it's so bad. And then that guy did with a controversial purchase of it, correct? I don't know this, I don't know this. Yes, a very controversial purchase. Please, please tell me.

Will you tell these guys what happened, what that album was about, and why you did it all? Okay, first, you know, once streaming took over music, you know, music went from being worth two cent of record spend on your radio to being worth zero, zero, zero, zero point four. Okay? And so it was totally devalued

and a lot of artists were suffering because of that devaluation at this time. And for me- Napster. Pardon? Napster. If you think about Napster, that was the foundation of that devaluation at this time. And for me- Napster. Pardon? Napster. If you think about Napster, that was the foundation of- He'll bark out moments of knowledge every once in a while.

You're like my grandmother in the other room, and you're like, Napster! Napster! Wait, I know that! That was the first one, yeah. After everything got devalued, we tried to figure out a way to bring value back to music. And the idea was music

is art and it should be treated as such. And it's not something that, it's not just a privilege, right? Because the creation of it is such a process. Like for a Wu-Tang album to make it, you got to get nine to 20 people together, the engineers. And it's an endeavor, like a film, right? It costs a lot of money, right, to make it. And then the goal is to sell it so you can continue to make it again. You know what I mean? So anyway, it got so devalued that we was like,

well, let's make an album that will make one single copy, treat it like it's a Mona Lisa or an Egyptian scepter, something like that. It belonged in a museum. And the only way that you can now get it, you have to go to it. You have to go see it. This is amazing.

Oh, that's cool. And we auctioned it. The funny thing is when we auctioned it, we auctioned it to a guy named Mike Scarelli. Yeah. Now, Scarelli, at the time when he bought the album, I gotta confess this, because I don't talk about this a lot,

at the time I shook his hand, he wasn't known yet. Like I met him, it was a few different billionaires that was going to buy this album from this Sotheby's, Padaway auction type of thing. And he was probably the poorest amongst them.

He only worth about 200 million at the time. But he was into it, right? And he told me, he said, I'm going to buy the last Enigma machine. I'm going to buy the churning papers. And I'm going to buy your single album all in one week. And I'm going to take this and I'm going to create something that's going to, for him, he's going to become like a new supervillain or something. He did say villain though, but he was like, he's going to take these elements and he's

going to create something crazy. And he went and formed this company, the turning company, et cetera, et cetera. And I shook hands on him. In that same company, a few months later, before we announced the purchase and everything, because we had a scheduled date of closing, is that how we call it, a few months later, before we announced the purchase and everything because we had a scheduled date of closing, is that what we call it, a few months later, this guy shows up on the news as the evilest man in the world.

Yeah, yeah. He took the price of a medicine that was maybe $15 a pill. Oh, that guy, that guy, whoever that guy. And he turned it to $2,000, $4,000 a pill. And the saddest thing about it was that this pill was for our citizens who have HIV. Right, I remember that, yeah. It was a dire need for this pill for them.

And so basically, he was burning down a village, I mean you could put it to that analogy, that he's burning down villages by this price gouging. But he had already purchased that album, so now. Yeah, so now you're stuck. So now I have to, he sells it. And then I did say this to him though, I said, listen, sorry his name was Martin Scrutty.

I said, listen Martin, you do a lot of bad things, bro. The Wu-Tang is good, okay? If I was you, I would take this album and do something good with it, meaning he could give it to the people. It can't be sold because we made an 88 year non-commercialization law for it, so he can't sell it. Right, he can't sell it. Right?

He can't like make mass producers. I know it's so cool. That is amazing. But he didn't decide to do nothing good. He went, he doubled down on his darkness and he got into a big fight with Ghostface Killer and all the other Wu-Tang brothers. And then he, you know, he took Hillary's hair

and whatever, he just went all the way down until he went to jail. And then the government seized the album and they kept it. And then, so he paid two million for the album. So at the time it was the most expensive album in history. But when he went to jail, the government now needed to pay all of his liens or default judgments, whatever he had on him And so the government now gets to auction this album as a personal asset of his okay

All right, they auction it and someone buys it for four million dollars. Wow way Okay. Okay. Yeah, what do you know? So who's got it? And where is it? It was a group of people called the pleaser Dow Okay Right now, so who's got it and where is it? There's a group of people called the Pleaser Dow. Okay. So they have it now and they're just, hopefully they will take the advice of showing it to the people, putting it in museums. Yeah, didn't they do an exhibit or something, they took it to somewhere like Tasmania or something?

Is that true? Yeah, they took it to Tasmania and exhibited it. You're right, yeah. And people flew in for that. So has the public been able to hear it? So far, maybe about 600 people have heard it. Dude. That's amazing.

Like how do you, that's an incredible story. How do you protect the person who owns it from copying it and kind of, I don't know, it just got leaked or, you know, they, and then they act, you know, in this kind of. Well, there's a contract. There's a, it's, this particular album is on a macro level considered the first NFT. Ah, very good, I understand.

So if you understand, yeah, so that's the situation with it. And so it's like a smart contract built in, you know what I mean? And this was your idea. I mean, it's such an incredible forward-thinking idea. I know, I know. It's brilliant. Me and my student Silverings, I won't take all the credit,

it was a combination of ideas that led to it. Yeah, and would you ever do it again? I don't know. What about what Radiohead did something was where they made an album and they put it up on the internet for free, basically said, pay whatever you want. And that kind of freedom made me, I think I ended up paying like 50 bucks for it

or something like that. Like just like, if you tell me I don't have to do anything, then I'll do it. That was the perfect thing. You're the perfect sucker, man. Exactly. You know what I mean? That's why your nickname is DJ Sucka.

Ding bet. Hey, hey. I mean, God, that is such a, you're right. Sean, like you said, it's so forward thinking. And you've, I mean, God, that is such a, you're right, Sean, like you said, it's so forward thinking, and you've, I mean, you constantly have looked for different ways to express yourself as an artist and kind of do things outside the box. You've acted in, I was looking it up, I mean, I don't know,

50 things, 60 things as an actor? You just, tell us a little bit about your film that's coming out that you directed. Thank you. First let me say this to y'all gentlemen. First of all, Jason, big fan of yours. Come on. Yeah, there we go.

Your timing, your style. Nice man, you. I watch, I watch. Hey. I've seen almost everything you do and so just want to let you know that. That's very nice. You got a fan on this side of the microphone.

Thank you, pal. And for myself let you know that. You got a fan on the side of the microphone. Thank you, pal. And for myself, you know, I got a chance to study underneath Quentin Tarantino for about six years. And I caught the directing bug and understood what it could be. And I did my first film, of course, in 2011. Came out 2012, called The Man with the Iron Fist. And I realized that directing movies

is actually the epitome of expression art because you have to be lyrical in the words, colorful in the production design and costume design. Music is a part of it. The storytelling element, the energy of getting other people to portray an idea that's written and describe it, it's like the total use of my brain, for me. And so I became in love with it.

And now this is my fourth directorial film. It's called One Spoon of Chocolate. Wait, this is your fourth film? This is my fourth one, yeah. Wow. And this one, probably my boldest one, pretty bold. Yeah. To kind of take a chance like this. And it took 13 years to get to this point. Like once I finished Man With an Iron Fist, I wanted like, so, you know, Universal gave me the money to make the movie, and it was like, you know, when it came out the first week,

I think Hurricane Sandy hit. And so, the East Coast was kind of fucked up for me. And so, I didn't hit the numbers we wanted to hit. I think we probably ended up around 30 million total in box office on a, sorry to talk numbers, that's when they kind of get me. We ended up about 30 million total in box office on a movie that cost about 17 million, right? Pretty good.

Not, well, okay, not for Universal. For Universal, that's even. I paid the lights that day. We paid the lights. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. But I waited till it recouped before I went back and sat down with the executive who was in charge of gave me the green light, which is Mr. Adam Fogerson.

And I sat down and he said, you know, okay, you broke it. You did cool. Nobody's over here, you know, we're not jumping up and down nor are we sad, right. I said, okay, I got it now, I like to try another one. And so he said, okay, let me hear some ideas and I pitched the ideas and one of them was one spoon of chocolate.

The other ones didn't really gravitate, but he said, that one seems like something you could chase. And then I started writing it, and I got writer's block, page 40. And it took almost, you know, this would be 13 years from the day of me starting it to it now being available. And it just kept taking time and time and time. And it didn't fully materialize until two summers ago,

I'm on a tour bus with our Nas and we're doing the New York State of Mind, we're traveling across America, and my pen just started flowing. And so I wrote the whole movie. My wife was right beside me, just sitting right there. And we got home and I said, okay, I got a movie written. And we had a chance to, we had home and I said, okay, I got a movie written.

We had a chance to, you know, we had some good economics blessings in our lives. And so I said, well, she was looking at another house, so she likes to get nice houses and shit. That's kind of her thing. And so I said, well, I wrote the movie. You want to get another house or you want to make a movie? And she said, well, what do you want to do?

I said, to be honest, I really want to make a movie, like, with no interruptions, like, just go ahead and do it. And she said, okay, she gave me the green light, she's the producer of the film. Wow. Self-financed. Yeah, so she's, yeah, self-financed from, you know, leveraging some assets. And we did it. And we shot it in Atlanta,

we finished it and it's going to premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival on June 8th. I'm super excited about it. That's awesome. And so are you going to be looking for distribution at that festival or have you already sold it? Yeah, it's going to be the first time we show it and we're looking for distribution,

so I hate to use the word hopefully, but hopefully. What's it about? What was the pitch you gave to Adam? And did it remain the same once you got past the page 40 or did it morph into something else? You know what? It actually, I guess without giving a spoiler,

it morphed into 200 pages. Oh wow. Exactly. Yeah, for the listener usually a movie script is about 110. Yeah, it morphed into about 200 pages, and I think I got about 110 pages that we'll see when we look at this thing. That's amazing. And now Kill Bill was famously, what, 200 and something,

and so you had to split it up into two parts, right? Yeah, I actually read the 220 page Kill Bill. Yeah. Which, like I said, Tarantino is my professor. I call him my godfather of film. He's incredible. Love to have you on the show, Quentin, if you'll listen. Yeah, he's incredible.

He's amazing. He's got to come to have you on the show, Quentin, if you'll excuse me. Yeah, he's incredible. He's amazing. He's got to come to us. He's got to. Yeah. But in other words, I'm always amazed when people like us, meaning that artists are in the entertainment business or whatever, that create the stuff like your films and music

and everything else and us, TV shows, films, whatever we do, and that at some point in your life, you became aware of the business side of it. And what was that point, or who was that person where you're like, because when I was on the set of Will and Grace, it was a TV show I did a long time ago. Yeah, yeah, sure, sure. It's just something.

It's a lot of laughs, it's a lot of laughs. Hey, a masterpiece, a masterpiece. It took about five, six seasons for me to kind of look around. For it to get funny? Yeah. For me to look around and I was kind of like, wait a minute, I was really young and I was like, how did this all happen? Because I was just an actor who memorized my lines and showed up and went home.

And then I was like, wait, how did this come together? Like, whose idea? And then the phone call. Then I got really interested, I was really young. I got interested in the business side of how to produce something and make something. So what was that moment for you? Or was there a person you were like, wait a minute,

how did they do that? And then it kind of snowballed from there. Yeah, I think it was a couple of points for me, you know first in music of course, right as a producer No, you could control Let's just say like I said making an album. Maybe it's 20 people right, but when I was composing films The thing would kill bill is that I wasn't no wasn't going to be the composure. Let me

just be clear. Me and Quentin just used to watch movies together and he gave me that script and when I read the script of Kill Bill, it was just such an amazing script. I just said, yo, anything you may need from me, I'm here. I said also, I would love to see how you're going to bring this to life. At the time we were just buddies, film buddies. And he was like, yeah, sure. You know, if you show up on set, you know, you go be the guys, the eyes and ears behind me.

And now they were shooting in China and Beijing, but I showed up. And then I'm watching him, I'm watching Rob, Robert do the DP, and I'm the guy who's there with no job. So I got to study every job. I'm just chilling, hanging, watching the study, and I've realized that this was- And how old are you then? Oh, no, I'm a man, yeah. This is to kill Bill, I'm 32 at least, right?

30. So I'm a man. But I mean, I'm not a kid, meaning I was evolved as a, I guess you're going to say this too, Sean, right? You said after five or six years, right? You're not economically thinking about those problems no more, okay? Love is good in life most likely, right?

Right. And the art is starting to really feel fulfilling, like a different type of fulfillment, almost a calling, right? So that's what's happening to me. My love life is good, my economics is good, and my art is insatiable though. It wants more, it wants more. And so that's what led me down that path. And then of course, as a businessman,

I think, you know, if you go back and look at Wu Tangas, you know, from the beginning, we was entrepreneurs, you know, from opening up our clothing stores to video games, like all those things was just part of it. And then the last lesson for me, and I'll just share this with your audience, why that, you were saying, why the heck would you self-finance a film,

which is probably, everybody says don't do that. That's like in the book, there's a book on that. Okay. Right, right. It's the first chapter, yeah. Exactly, right. But, I got the chance from the year of 2018 to 2023 I got the chance from the year of 2018 to 2023 to be the show runner of my own TV show. Right?

Which one? It's Wu-Tang of the American Saga on Hulu. So during that show, it's just like, okay, the best way to do it is to do it. You know what I mean? The best way to do it is to do it. You know what I mean? The best way to do it is to do it. And so I'm in that philosophy. Because me spending a dollar may take somebody else $10 to spend that dollar because they don't know

how to spend a dollar. All right. We'll be right back. And back to the show. You know, people who are as accomplished as you in as many different skill sets, it takes an enormous amount of not only ambition, but concentration and focus and discipline.

Where, what would you say to the listeners who are trying to get their feet under themselves and really find that gear that it's gonna take to hit the passing lane and get past the folks that they're competing with? What is that special sauce for you and from whom did you learn it from or what happened that gave you that spark

that you tap into that has fueled so much incredible accomplished work? I will show anybody the first thing is mastery of something. If you master one thing and you mastered it, then you'll understand the relation of all things. Right? Because. And for me, you know, of course,

the first thing is going to be my lyrics, right? And I've been writing lyrics since the age of nine. So by the time, and you know, I'm the guy that finishes schoolwork first, so I can write another lyric. So mastery of your passion, I guess, should go together. Master your passion. That's great. And if you master your passion, I think that when it's time for other disciplines to come

amongst you, you're going to have a foundation because you'll be able to apply it. And I think we all can agree, us here, all of us artists right here, that we can say that it is, the artist has, I use this word, artistry is a wavelength, right? It's like, if you got a, so let's take a trumpet, right? And let's call the trumpet the artist. Whatever plays through that trumpet though, it could be jazz, soul, rock, pop, doesn't matter. It's going to come through that trumpet to turn it to music.

But when the artist knows the wavelength, he knows what to pass through his vessel. You know what I mean? Can you see that? You got cheese, man. I know. That's really cool. I know.

Yeah, that's kind of amazing. Yeah, that's really cool. What if it's a piano? Just kidding. Uh... Sean's really cool. What if it's a piano? Just kidding. Uh. Sean's an accomplished pianist. I don't know if you knew that.

He is. He really is. My favorite instrument, Sean. Okay, there you go. Yeah. We'll jam. How many can you play? How many different instruments?

Yeah. I mean, I play, you know, I'm a producer, so producers a lot, technology, but I play guitar, drums, of course guitar and bass is no problem. I can blow some notes on my trumpet, and I spend a lot of time on the piano too. But I'm very shy on the piano, meaning mostly my wife gets to hear me. I got to be nice to play in front of an audience. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sean's very coy on a piano. He's very coy. It's funny, you mentioned different instruments and stuff. You've done so many different, and you've done a lot of collabs in different genres. I remember you did that. I love that record you put out with Paul Banks from Interpol, Banks and Steel. I love Paul, yeah. I mean, dude, that was so rad, that record.

Talk a little bit about that experience and how you guys got together. Let's shout out Paul Banks first and the whole Interpol family. I put an Interpol song in Black Rabbit coming out. Well, congrats, man. Aw, that's dope. Yeah, thank you, thank you, thank you.

And Paul's getting married this summer. Oh, is he? Oh, yeah? Yeah, I mean, this one of the coolest basslersachelors, I was married while he was making that album. He wasn't, you know what I mean? Yeah. And all the girls always scream for him. He's a cool dude, man. Oh, I mean, I don't know him, but I'm such a fan.

Yeah, talk a little bit about that experience. Well, we met because he, I guess he had, he listened to some of my music and he was making it, he used, I guess one of his articles, he used me as a reference to something he was striving to do as an artist. And I think my manager read it and was like, oh, my manager's a fan of Paul. And he's like, oh, Paul is a fan of yours and he kind of quoted something about you. You guys are both New Yorkers, would you hook up?

I mean, he's not a native New Yorker, but he was living in New York at the time. He said, maybe you guys could hook up and chop it up. And we hooked up and we both were chess players. And so we would just play chess at the time. He did drink tequila. We met at a tequila bar. And that's tequila and chess.

And that built the friendship and maybe a couple of years later, I think Warner Brothers approached us and was like, would you guys be interested in kind of collaborating on something together? We just think you guys are just too cool motherfuckers just to be quite frank, was the slang they used. And we was like, yeah, whatever, yo, we hang anyway. Like you want us to do music too? Cool. You want to pass, hang up. I used that single, actually, as a temp track in my show.

Chasen, you mentioned quite drolly Flake the other day, but we couldn't afford it. But we used it as a temp in the show. So I was a big fan. Oh no, anytime you can't afford show, so I was a big fan. When you... Oh no, anytime you can't afford something of mine, just hit me up. I'm gonna hit you from now on.

Yeah, I discount so many things and one dollar gratis. If it gets to my desk, it gets easier. If it don't get to my desk, they don't smack it. I'm gonna take you up on that. I'm coming. Hey, did you score your four films that you directed? No, I scored two. I scored the first one with my buddy Howard Drossin.

The second one, Richard Gibbs, me and him collaborated on the second one. The third one I passed over to Danny Harrison, good friend, George Harrison's son, him and his crew did it. And on the fourth one, I actually combined with Tyler Bates, which is, I think Tyler's an incredible composer, just bold and brave in his sound selection.

So the fourth film is me and Tyler together. Wow. I wanna see that film. I know, me too. Yeah, go ahead, Jason, you had a follow-up. Well, I was unrelated, but one thing that I keep forgetting to ask, what about- Oh, sorry, this is our new segment we're doing called Unrelated, go ahead, Jason, you had a follow-up. Well, I was unrelated, but one thing I keep forgetting to ask. Oh, sorry, this is our new segment we're doing called Unrelated.

Go ahead. Yeah. I like it. What about martial arts for you? Are you an accomplished martial artist or is there any crossover there? That's a big word, accomplished. Look, no, I wouldn't say that. I don't know, right?

Of course, I practice martial art. You do, okay. Yeah, but my philosophy is mental martial art, cultural, artistic martial arts. You know what I mean? It's, you know, just to give you a little bit about the Wu-Tang philosophy in the martial world. So the Shaolin philosophy is known to be external, right?

You train your body to be hard as iron, right? In the Wu-Tang, you train your body to be soft as cotton. The Shaolin martial artist would roll a thousand punches a day. The Wu-Tang martial artist would sit still and contemplate the thousand punches in his mind. So, exercising the mind is known as, because it's kind of Taoist,

so it's known as that's the Wu-Tang way, but exercising the body is Zen or Buddhist way. So, being a Wu-Tang abbot, I'm going here. And so that's why my lyrics or my art is always formulating. Now somebody was a step to me now. Okay. Okay.

It's a mistake. Yeah, yeah, so Shaolin's going to jump up out of me. You know what I mean? Dude, dude, I am entranced. I am now, this is like unbelievable. This is so. I'm going into a. I am now, this is like unbelievable. I'm going into a Wu-Tang cave when this interview's over. I've been into Wu-Tang, we were supposed to record

a little while ago, I've been into Wu-Tang, just absolute cave for months now. Hey, speaking of Wu-Tang, and just your music in general, do you see, you guys have been so, like I said, you're so influential on other musicians for the last over 30 years. Can you see, can you like catch glimpses of your influence in music now when you listen to hip hop?

Yeah, definitely. I mean, it's a blessing, right, to be able to inspire anything or anybody, right, after getting inspiration from life yourself. But yeah, it's, you know, constantly, you know, Some of our greatest artists, they are not shy to give us a name drop. I mean Drake named the song Wu-Tang forever. One of Kendrick Lamar's first samples was a RZA sample, which I cleared for free. Nice, nice, nice. Very good, very good. Nice, nice, nice.

Very good, very good. You're welcome, man. You guys did so much sampling over the years. I mean, you guys were like the masters of it. Was there ever a sample that you couldn't clear, that you wished you could have gotten and you were not able to get? What was, no, the worst, no, I want to say that I,

let me see, yeah, there was a couple. Because some people would like become born-again Christians become born again Christians and they wasn't letting hip hop go. But one of my biggest glitches was this, and I don't mind sharing this with your audience, is that there's no floor or ceiling when it comes to sampling and interpolation rights. And I totally disagree with that. The reason why I disagree is because if you sample a song, say you sample a James Brown song and you got Bootsy on bass, but you got all these different people playing Maceo,

they all playing, the publisher will come and could potentially take 100% of that song away from you. Right? And say that because you're copyright infringing. And even though your song could be almost unrecognizable from their song. And then the musicians who, you're probably more into the musicians than the song itself. Like if I sampled a little bass part from here, a little horn from this guy, a little snare from this guy, and me, I'm the type of guy that had Peter Pan records, so I may get a string section from that,

you know what I mean? And make a track. So it's like, what about those musicians? They never get compensated. It's just the publishing company. And then I said this last, to me in my opinion, that it should be a floor and a ceiling. The ceiling should be 50%.

That should be the ceiling. You should never take more than half, because you got the lyrics, you got the talent, you got everything else that the other person is building to make the song, right? And then the floor should be then prorated by how much you took versus what the song is.

But with a ceiling, so the floor could be, I'll put the floor at even 20% to be merciful. 20% floor, no matter what, if you put my record on, you take something, give me 20% for that inspiration. But most I could take from you, it's 50%, and we'll measure how to get to 50%. I got a situation where I did sample Marvin Gaye and Tammy Terrell's All I Need, and it was a double platinum selling song. Juan DeGrammy, Method Man, and Mary J. Blige. It was a Coca-Cola commercial of the summer, And all we received is 10% of the song.

They took it all. Wow. Yeah, and that song made, yeah. Every time it made a dollar, they only gave us a dime. No way. Look, and one, I could argue back, they said it was ours, you took it.

But also, I could then argue back, but no, we didn't know. We didn't know that that was a law or, cause hip hop started from a guy with a turntable and he's scratching beats back and forth. We rapping over it. Then they made a sampler. The sampler says, sampling instrument.

Okay, that's my new instrument. And now I'm sampling sounds and records from my collection and I'm making my own thing. We didn't know that it was going to be a law or some type of thing that was going to stop us. And eventually hip hop got slowed down because of sampling and interpolation laws. Because of lawyers.

Yeah, and then all those fees were assessed retroactively in all of those songs that were created with some samples and stuff. Once the law went into effect, then they reached back and charged, oh wow. You got some songs now, I got a song of mine that is totally wrong, two or three of my songs, because they thought that it was it, and it wasn't it.

Wow, wow. And it's like, hold on, that's not Roger Troutman. What is? I didn't even, I wasn't a Roger Troutman fan. Right? I was a Thelonious Monk fan, but I wasn't a Roger Troutman fan. I love that. I love your floor and ceiling idea.

I think that that's something that should take root. Hopefully, I think that that makes a lot of sense and seems really fair. Really, really fair. So I hope that works out. All right, before I let you go, I want to talk a little bit about a ballet through Mud because you released a classical album last year.

I can't, I did not know this. I want to hear this. It's unbelievable. Like every time there's like something else that you did, talk a little bit about how that came about and your ambition with that. And where we can see it. Will it ever be done again?

Well, the ballet was performed a few times already, and so we don't know if it's going to, if I'm going to do it again, like perform it again, but we did perform it in L.A. We did in Colorado, which we, I wrote it for Colorado. I was part of this artist in residence where for three years I would create something to take to the Colorado Symphony Orchestra and perform. So it was during the pandemic, of course, that I found this notebook of old lyrics. And then inside these lyrics, these are like my high school lyrics. So this book is so old, my buddy Ray Quar made a joke,

said that book is growing hair, man. Like, it's that old, right? But in it is all of the ideas from ninth grade up into graduation. Right, so you could hear, you could see the first blunt, the first weed, you could hear the early sexual ideas and everything, and you could also hear the imagination growing.

And so when I found the book, I said, I can't rap these, what should I do? And then I eventually decided, talking to my wife about it of course, that what if I composed it into a ballet or something? And so she thought it was a great idea as well. And I kind of went into it. The funny thing is that,

let me share one of the lyrics that led to it, okay? So one of the lyrics was about these six teenagers who are exploring life, right? So Sue was this girl who was really quite fly, and Brad was real cool, he was her guy. Lisa was freaky, she loved to have sex. Her brother name was Dexter, but they called him Dex. His girlfriend name was Monica, she was a verge.

And Joe, he was their friend, and he was a nerd. Brad bought the beer, Sue bought the smoke, Lisa had sheets, Dexter had coke. Joe was the type who didn't get high, nor did Monica, but she was willing to try. So Brad lit a blunt and passed it to Joe saying, come on man, smoke it. And Joe said, no.

What's wrong? Are you scared? Was asked by Sue. Oh, you were just a nerd. Joe said, that's not true. Monica said, come on Joe, just have a taste. And she poked on the joint and blew smoke in his face. Now on Monica, Joe had a crush. He didn't want to do it but felt that he must.

Like many we know, love made him a fool so he smoked the joint to prove he was cool. Then Lisa was like yo forget about Joe. Then say hey Dex, where the heck is the blow? He pulled out two grams, said it's all that I bought. Well it's more than enough and they proceeded to snort. Now with this time, Joe had finished two beers, and Brad was like, here, have another, you queer.

And Joe said no while holding his stomach, and while facing Monica, he suddenly vomited. She screamed, oh my God, shit, how I've served. And everyone laughed and said, Joe is a nerd, Joe is a nerd, Joe is a nerd. Joe felt embarrassed, so he did the bird. They chased him, he ran. They screamed and they laughed into this abandoned house

and with the sound of this crashing glass. And it was dark in there, so Brad had to get a light to check to see if Joe was all right. But when they found him, he was laying on his back with quarts of red blood spurting from his head. And Monica said, oh my God, Joey is dead. And they started to run and they never mentioned this incident again to anyone.

So. Wow. That's beautiful. That is amazing. And I turned that to a ballet. That's unbelievable. Oh, gotta see that. Just riveted.

How in the world do you remember, not only remember that, but remember everything that you make? I mean, it's unbelievable. Oh, I've gotta see that. Just riveted. How in the world do you remember, not only remember that, but remember everything that you make? I mean, it's incredible. It's so good. Yeah, God, man, we can talk for hours. We've taken up way too much of your time. What an absolute, like I said at the beginning, what an absolute honor to have you, man.

I'm such a fan. Yeah, it really has been. It really has been. You're such a creative juggernaut, dude, in every way. So just continue to success. Thank you. Thanks for coming. And I send all respect, and I just say now,

I'm a fan of all you guys' work as well. Thank you for what you contributed to my life. It's just, you know, I've watched you, I've watched as a fan, you know, the things you guys create, whether in the theater or in front of my TV set, and got my laughs, got my inspiration, and probably took something from your tree here and there, because I'm hip hop, so I sampled.

Yeah, you sampled us, you sampled us. I sampled, yes, indeed. I appreciate it. Right back at you, you've touched all of us, millions and millions around the world, too, so thank you for what you do. You really inspired us today. Well, thank you, RZAzo for your time, man.

Thank you guys. And yeah, spoonful of chocolate. All the best luck with it, man. Can't wait for it. We'll be watching. Respect. Peace. Thank you.

Peace. Bye, pal. Wow, Willie. That was, I didn't think you had it in you. You know, you always talk about them. You've talked about them forever. We looked in climate and had them. And I wanted to have them on for a long time. And I'm so, I'm like, I knew the bar was high.

I was like, oh, he's gonna be inspirational. He's gonna be cool. And I can't believe how he just exceeds expectations just as a creative, right? It's just unbelievable. It's like an endless well of creativity. Yeah, and also like just philosophies and like, yeah, I mean, spiritual, like, I love the thing

you said about the trumpet, like where the artist has to connect the energy to the vibrations that go through the thing that makes the sound, like whatever that was, but that was really cool. Yeah, we're like trumpet, Jay, you're more like a Waymo, you know what I mean? You're just like a automated car with nothing inside. So, an empty vehicle that goes from just

destination to destination, but that's fine. That's fine, and we still love you. But honestly, yeah, he had so many, you're right, he had so many cool philosophies. I mean, I could be. By the way, the whole Shaolin approach that he does and the way they created that community and kind of like there's just,

and he produced all those records for all those guys, for Ghostface and for all those dudes like Method Man, it's insane. It is wild. I want to be in the music world a little bit. They all just seem like they just, they kind of got it all together. They're super chill.

Yeah, no one's running. They're just, you know, they're just doing their thing. I'm really excited for him. I knew Jay, you'd be excited that he's directing. I didn't know he'd done four films, but I saw the trailer for his new film. It looks really, really good. Yeah, yeah.

So I'm excited for that and how cool. And it makes sense that he'd be a good director because he has been sort of the Abbott, as he says, of the Wu Tang for so long and does so many, and wears so many hats and Jays, you know, as a director, that's what you have to do. Pulling on all those different levers, yeah. And just a great leader.

I've spent a lot of time on Abbott Kinney when there's a gay bar in Abbott Kinney. You know, funny story about that gay bar, it's called the Roosterfish. The Roosterfish. I think, I think, I think. How do you guys know that?abor. It's called the rooster So when I When I I like all about in the back alley behind anyway forget

I used to live right around there and When I first moved into my house me and my buddy went down went down like, well we gotta find our local bar, right? If we're gonna be living down here. And this place is, at the time, I don't know if it still is, it was painted this really cool turquoise blue. And we're like, well this place looks kinda cool. Walked in there, sat at the bar, and ordered a couple of beers,

and just started talking to each other. And I get a little tap tap on the shoulder. I don't think the guy had like a gag ball in his mouth but it seemed it was something was it was very clear that we were in the wrong spot. Yeah. Almost immediately. Right, right. We finished the beer and we shook hands.

Sure, you got another one. Yeah. So we only had three more beers. I only had three more and then I was out of there. By the way, I forgot to mention that, for Rizza, that they're on tour this summer, right, the Wu Tang final tour, so I also wanted to mention that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we should go, we should really go.

How fun. Why didn't you mention that during the interview so we could lock up some tickies? I know, I forgot, we can still lock up tickies. Please don't say tickies. Why do you fucked up do you got? Yeah, why didn't you mention that during the interview so we could lock up some tickies? I know, I forgot. We can still lock up. Please don't say tickies. Why little tickies? Look, he picked it up from Roosterfish.

Why do you have to do that? He picked it up from Roosterfish. That's the way I would have phrased it with him, too. I say, hey, any chance we get some tickies? You know, and it would have been uncomfortable. Ambush him in the interview live. You know, he would have had to give us those tickies. That would have been uncomfortable for anybody, dude.

Okay, now say it is. The way you sort of infantilize everything is so gross. I wanna, by the way, I feel like that Rooster Fish story isn't over, but well, it can be for now. I'll tell you the ending after we come through, after we shut down. That was the day that you discovered that you weren't gay,

but that maybe you were gay adjacent. Bye! There he is. Smart. Less. Smart. Less. Smart. Less.

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