Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 48: John Mulaney, Comedian Turned Broadway Star

Episode Date: November 30, 2016

John Mulaney, known for his stand-up comedy and his work on "Saturday Night Live," first turned to meditation while filming a short-lived sitcom that bore his name, "Mulaney." He now has a daily meditation practice, which he often practices in a dark dressing room before he goes on stage for "Oh, Hello," the two-man Broadway show he co-wrote and stars in with fellow comedian Nick Kroll. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Before we get started with today's episode, let's talk about summer. Even in the sunshine or on vacation, many of us struggle to enjoy me time or even worse, we struggle to stay present during us time with friends and loved ones. To learn how to actually unwind this summer, check out the Relax and Restore meditation pack in the 10% happier app. Meditation can help you become more mindful and relax no matter what you're doing, whether you're chilling out on the beach, catching up on your favorite show or having a deep conversation.

Download the 10% happier app today, wherever you get your apps and get started with a free trial, now on with the show. Oh, we're not rolling. Are we rolling? We are rolling. Yes. Okay. Good.

We're rolling. All right. I'm John Mulaney. Just said there's some so people tell our voices. So we've done a lot of amazing podcasts, but this guy is among our most delightful guests. John Mulaney is a comedian. You may have seen him in some of his specials that have been on Comedy Central. He wrote for Saturday Night Live. He had a short-lived sitcom on Fox, which was canceled, which caused him a lot of emotional tumult and it was during that period that he turned to meditation. So we're going to talk about that, and as you'll hear, he's really raw and really honest about that period in his life. he has bounce back really well though uh... with uh... more standup uh... around the country and specials and he now has uh... hit show on broadway a two-man show that he co-wrote and uh... co-stars in with his fellow comedian and old friend knickroll it's called oh hello i've seen it it's amazing uh... it's going to be running on broadway at the licey m theater through january

full disclosure as sometimes happens on the show, John is, as is the case with some other guests, a personal friend of mine, so don't expect a lot of journalistic objectivity, but do expect a really interesting and very funny conversation. So here he is, John Malini. From ABC, this is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris.

When did you start meditating, how? Why? I started meditating after I read, oh, this is such a plug. After I read your book, 10% Happier by Dan Harris, who is you. I knew the answer to that. I was in OHI. I got your book.

I had... Is it weird to get a book by like a dude you actually, you know, no? I wouldn't want to actually read my friend your book. I had a weird to get a book by like a dude you actually you know know I wouldn't want to actually read My friend's book I find it kind of an interesting you had an interesting life with many pockets of which I had not ever spoken Yeah, that's that's I guess I never knew how much you did as a war correspondent as a foreign correspondent I never knew about any of that but I, I remember trying to cram everything I wanted to say about the book into either a tweet or some... No, you sent me a very long email. Well, there was that, but then I was either,

no, I think I had to like do a Wall Street Journal was like, what are your favorite books of the year? And I had like one sentence to sum up 10% happier. And I was trying to say like, you could approach this as a news junkie or as someone who likes the memoir of a foreign correspondent or whatever, like there's so many ways in. And I came at it just from knowing you personally,

which is good. But I was just gonna say, I go to your stuff, but you're actually performing and making me laugh. You know, if I go see you're doing stand-up or you on a TV show or you on a talk show or your current Broadway show. It's not like I have to sit there listening to you tell me about like every corner of your personal life. Right, but I'm not interested in people making me laugh.

Yeah, because you're bored of it because that's what you do all day long, but that's a particular disease. Kind, that's a particular disease. Many comedians watch so many documentaries. There must be, it's a true, like, we want sad realism. So anyway, no, it was the exact kind of candid memoir that of also an interesting life. There's lots of candid memoirs of uninteresting lives. Yes, that is true.

Anyway, thank you for saying that. So you're at Ohio and you read the book, we don't really need to talk about the book but I'm more interested in what was going on in your life that that the idea of meditation was not Repelant to you and then how soon you acted on it. Um, so I was I did this show for Fox that did not go well in the end I mean, it was a long long journey and the end result was that it didn't work out that well In the end, I mean, it was a long, long journey and the end result was that it didn't work out that well. This was a show called Malaney, which is my name.

So we had, which I don't recommend. So we had six. We should have agreed the name. Oh, well, I have always wondered if I should have taken a stage name because sometimes I'm saying something and I'm like, you grandfather doesn't need to pay for this. You know, these people came over from Ireland to escape a fam and now you're on stage just selling everyone out.

It's terrible. Fair enough. And would I be able to disassociate who I am from the comedian that I am? And is that even a good idea? I don't know, but I thought about that. You talked a sting about it. Or people who have have stage real name.

I have no idea. Yeah, good. See, because you can go, I hate Sting, and he can secretly think, well, that's cool, because I'm not Sting. Yeah, or I hate him too, he might think. He might think I also just like Sting. Bono Sting, a lot of people have these names.

I think Bono likes himself, but yeah. I wasn't referring to his self-esteem, I was more referring to the fact that he can separate in the way that you're Rapsodizing about now. Yeah, but sometimes when people are like John Mulaney sucks, I'm like, well, that's not fair to like that 11 year old kid that was John Mulaney. Because he didn't do all these things. Right, he made a suck though in his own special way. Oh, yeah, he sucked hard.

But, but like what a sensitive, I mean, if he read that in print at age 11, he would have been very upset. People say, John Malady sucks, like you've actually seen that in print. Oh sure sure sure, of course, of course, of course. Really? Of course, you're so likable.

Thanks. That, thanks. It's a good, I'm glad, appreciate it. I get a lot of very nice compliments and nice feedback. I've been very lucky. I've been, had many, many paths on the back. Yeah, no, because I've been in large rooms with people like freaking out about over you, where people are.

What are these rooms? Carnagee Hall. Oh, that stuff. I was picturing board rooms. No, not board rooms. I like picturing board rooms. I went to see you at Carnagee Hall and I was just in Schubert Theater on Broadway the other day

with a whole hell of theater. The Lysie, well, so it's a Schubert on the other side. The Schubert-owned theater. Beautiful place by the way. And everybody loves you. So who's calling you? Who says you suck? Oh, well, just, I mean, I've gotten,

I've gotten great reviews. I've gotten ad reviews. I've gotten mean tweets. I've gotten tons of nice tweets. None of this is complaining. I'm just saying we were specifically talking about the stage name stuff. Yes.

And I always wondered like, I have to be, when I'm like at the doctor, sick, I'm like the name's Mulaney John. So I'm sort of like, should that name be separate from the name that you can say, so? So that's too late now either way. Well, I'm Johnny Star now. With two Rs.

That would, yeah, of course it through Rs. That would probably not go over one. In fact fact other people have tried it and it doesn't work who's tried it mid-guard Brooks he tried it make a career member he had a whole separate persona boy Brooks did a whole side come on Dan you don't know about this he had a small soul packed people are nodding in the room with us they know about it if anyone knows I'm not opposed to it, they're like, it was like, it was like Chris,

Chris Gaines, nice. Nice. Someone who's been dying to say one of our photojournalists in the room knew the answer. So okay, so but clearly didn't go well, I haven't heard of it. Exactly.

Exactly. It was not well received, putting on a wig in a sold patch and saying, you have a different name. It didn't go well after haven't heard of it. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. It was not well received, putting on a wig in a sole patch and saying you have a different name. It didn't go well after years of being famous as Garth Brooks. Okay, anyway, so when I read your book, I was working on this Fox show. We did six episodes, then we had almost three months of not shooting while we waited to hear if we'd make more episodes, And then we made seven more episodes. So in between those two, I was reading the book.

And I was probably at peak stress, but peak ambition. And on some level, just not at all liking the balance I had. And kind of feeling like, feeling like I was on like Mars. I was like living on Mars and I wasn't comfortable there. Yeah. I think some people are comfortable on Mars. Matt Damon.

Matt Damon? Oh, because he lived on Mars in movie. Sorry, thanks for giving the joke a little bit late. I thought you were like, oh, that guy's basically it. I don't know. But he literally was in the movie. He was uncomfortable on Mars. He wanted to do it.

He wanted to do it. There were a few triumphant scenes, like what was wrong, potatoes and stuff like that. Yeah, I know, but what happened to that potato farm? I don't think we'll ever get over. So I was like, this is weird air to live in. And I don't know if I like it that much. And I was, but I had the feeling that I could not be introspective or I would lose momentum,

which I think was a good, because there are many things in your book, but I think the idea of like, you can live in an urban environment and hustle and work hard or you can be in an ashram like staring at the wall. False dichotomy. Yeah. So that was just the start of it, I guess. There's many things I don't want to reduce the book to just one thing or my reaction to it to just one thing or what meditating's done to just one thing. But that was definitely a jumping off point.

And so you're in Ohio, you actually start meditating there? Yes. Did exactly what you did. Try it for a few minutes and hated it. And then I went to Chicago right after it. And my parents have, like, we still have like, there's just a big house because there were a lot of kids. So there's a lot of empty rooms.

There's a lot of good places to try meditating because it's like one of my parents who are at work is just an empty house. And I tried it more and more while I was there for that week, which was when I emailed you, I think. I started doing it for about just out of ambition. I started trying it for 15 minutes. That's pretty good.

Yeah, it was for going from three minutes to 15 was pretty good. Yeah, big jump. And I think I had maybe four or five days of doing it. And in the middle of that, I got some email regarding an edit of an episode that normally would sort of spike my anger levels out of control. And I remember reading it and I was able to kind of process it.

And I was also able to separate the good experience of shooting the episode from the difficult experience of what was going to get edited down in the episode and go that that does not. I just remember thinking like that does not change the fact that you had a good time making this, which is again not in your book. But no, but that's a great example of the rubber hitting the road pretty quickly. I mean, you've done just a little bit of meditation and here you are faced with an unpleasant data point. And instead of just letting it yank you around, you actually, there was a moment of reflection. There was a moment of reflection and I was having anger for the first time, like, out loud

while working on the TV show. Previously. Yeah, before that, I'd lost my temper. Not on the set, I'd over the phone. Wow. I actually have a hard time picturing that. Yeah, and it's so do I. And it was weird, and it felt like out of body,

and it felt like uncontrollable. Well, just by way of context. So you're career leading up to that. And I'll make some statements you correct me where I've gone wrong. But you were largely a writer and a standup comedian. So you were doing a ton of traveling as a standup comedian. But you're also one of the senior writers

on Saturday Night Live. And this was a huge development for you. Fox came and said, we're gonna give you a show. You called it Malaney. It had been at NBC and it was a pilot there. you. Fox came and said we're gonna give you a show. You called it Malini. It had been at NBC and it was a pilot there and then they passed on it and we took it to Fox. So that was kind of its own coup as well. I'm just, I'm just, I'm just building up

the amount of confidence. Yeah. Because that really, that does really happen. Because you do, if a network passes, and I'm not an expert in this stuff, but if a network passes on a sitcom or puts in, it's good. Yes. So you were able to bring it to Fox. This was a very heavy time and I don't blame you for getting I can only imagine how stressful it is. It's your first show. It's got your name on it and

That pressure can make you snappy. Yeah, pressure plus No context for anything, you know like am I am I supposed to walk around going? Am I supposed to ever say the words excuse me, but my name is on the show or do only monsters say that? Or do you sometimes have to have an ego or should you never have an ego? Right. I said I'm going to write a tell all about how it was the worst boss ever running a show. It was the best boss ever running a show. Yeah, at what point do you put your foot down and what point do you get angry?

No one was quite, maybe I was also not asking for that advice, but also I didn't feel like I had a grid for that. I wouldn't even know where to start. And so I just blew up on a phone call. And it was like not, it didn't help, it was not good. Rarely does. It really didn't help. And I just felt bad.

And I also then apologized for it, which I felt, in retrospect, it was like, well, in apologizing, I tried to concede what I'd fought for on the call. It was just a mess. But I'm visceral memory of being on the phone and feeling like I have never yelled this much before in my life.

Wow. Yeah. So I've never yelled in this way. The way someone does in a movie. Right. You're just like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, hold on a second, because you just said this.

But then last week you said this. So were you lying then? Or are you lying now? You know that kind of thing. No, I just explain it to me. Explain it to me. That kind of thing. My heart rate is rising.

Yeah, I'm stressed out just thinking about it. So I'm not just thinking about it, just for the reason. I'm not, you're actually re-enacting it. I'm re-enacting it and enjoying it and I'm afraid of it. So, okay, so this is the, this is good emotional context here. So then you start meditating and here was this email that might have enraged you, and then all of a sudden actually it was obviously not awesome, but your reaction was less heated than it otherwise would have been.

It wasn't just blanket seeing red. And also, I do have a tendency to go, I got mad about that email, air go the whole experience. I can taint an experience, but like, what a great party, but at the very end, someone said, saying to me,

that pissed me off, so it was a bad party. Right. And so did you keep meditating from there? I tried to and didn't. I didn't. We went back into production. Very common, by the way. Yeah. Then people fall off. I tried to, but didn't. We went back into production. I made a lot of promises to myself about doing it and then totally didn't do it. And when and why did you start back up?

Okay, so the show was very poorly received by all humans and canceled. So not by all humans. Okay, but it's not the margin of people. It didn't even win the popular vote. It was fully, it was canceled, lost the popular vote and the EC and the amount of people that voted for it was it was the Gary Johnson

of TV shows. Okay. Okay. So it was you felt some people voted for it. But I'm not being I'm not like self-flagulating saying that. I think it's a healthy thing to look at it and go that did not work by most all metrics. You feel a show didn't work or it was just poorly received? Well, that's a whole other question.

Yeah. You know, which I can't say I know the answer to have fully unpacked, because when you have saying that you did so many jobs on and we're so front and center on, and then people dislike it, you want to learn lessons from it and you want to move on, right? And you want to move on too fast. That's the first move. It's like, well, let's just do something else. But you can't do it. And I sort of hit a wall. I went on tour.

It was canceled. And I went on the road four days later, thinking like, I'm just going to leave this behind me and go back to being a stand-up. And I've totally processed this experience. Well, I mean, we were talking a little bit during that time and you were definitely working on processing it. I mean, you were definitely willing to talk about it and work it through. I hit a wall fast realizing I couldn't outrun it. Yes.

I had to go through it rather than, you know, around it. And so, and that period, did you, is that when you started meditating again? Yes. In Sacramento, I think. Which is the first city I went on to you know, around. And so, and that period, is that when you started meditating again? Yes. In Sacramento, I think. Which is the first city I went on to. Oh, sorry, that was the first city I went on to. Okay, I was going to say it's a... It was like...

Oh, hi, I always drive to Sacramento. It's again, my spiritual quest. It is the capital, after all. No, I was doing shows in Sacramento, and every bit of anxiety I'd ever had just came like crashing down. I was just sitting in the hotel being like, oh man I'm done. And was your wife with you? No. Oh that's unfortunate. Oh yeah. It was it was bad. Just so everybody knows your wife. And I'm ready to tell her mine. I didn't know whether it was okay to say that. I guess she's a public figure. She's a public

right. She's written, she wrote a very cool book called The Daily Face. The Daily Face. She's about her makeup expertise. She does the makeup for Oh Hello, which she does. Yeah, she does the special effects makeup and is our wig supervisor for Oh Hello. She makes beautiful, beautiful Victorian lampshades.

She does, if you can follow her on Instagram and you can see those lampshades. And she's also just this I can say with a real authority, a wonderful human being. So wonderful human being. And she's a real, yes she is. The reason why we know each other. And she also is a real sort of, this I also can say with confidence, a big source of strength and comfort for you personally. And that's why I asked whether she was in the room with you in Sacramento because you really should have been. No, I'm not blaming her. I'm saying it would have helped. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it would have helped. It would have helped. So also in the period where I started meditating that break between episodes I got married.

So it wasn't like we got anna and I got married. I didn't just get married. So it wasn't like it wasn't a time with no activity. Right, right, right. Yeah. Although, let's just be honest, she did do all of the work. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Sorry. Did I say we were planning the wedding? I was occasionally checking in as my wife planned a perfect wedding.

So I started meditating. The biggest thing that got me back into it was I was having like a lot of episodes of panic, which is which you can totally relate to. Yeah, but I didn't know that that you I knew you were feeling anxious and depressed, but I didn't know you were actually, it was actually, yeah, it was on stage panic or just, occasionally. Wow. It was, you know, it was like, it wasn't always the complete shortness of breath. I don't enjoy physically feeling this way.

It, it, um, it got to that point a couple times, and it still, you know, I've still had to breathe my way down over the years from some kind of just flood of adrenaline or anxiety like that. It was more like I would feel very anxious all day before a show, and it was kind of, and this is something you've been doing for, for a while.

That was the other thing, because I'd done it for at that point eight, eight years. And it was like my favorite thing in the world to do. So walking around being like, does everyone hate me? Have I totally ruined my life? Have I totally ruined my careers? Are there any coming back from this? There's probably no coming back from this. This is one of those things there's no coming back from.

Having all those thoughts alone and in a hotel room in Sacramento is just, it's so uncomfortable, it's so physically uncomfortable for me anxiety, that it kind of ruined, ruined the whole experience leading up to a show. And then on stage sometimes I would be standing there thinking like, well, it was actually a lot more before.

Sometimes I would have tightness on stage, but it was kind of residual. It was just this like ball and anxiety all day. And so how did meditation help with any of that? Yeah, completely, because it was like, it didn't always help in the moment and it didn't always help that day, but I was very committed starting around December

of that year to doing it every day. And I think the cumulative effect of that was very, very good. But I really did, I've had days where I'd meditate for 20 minutes at the hotel, then I get backstage and I meditate for like seven minutes, just to kinda ground, just to be like, I also like, now I'm in this theater, now I'm in this space, this is gonna be great,

there's a ton of people out there, but just somehow to do it in the space, I was about to perform and help, but I'd still be on this, like, you know, I'd stop that meditation, it was my it in the space, I was about to perform and help. But I'd still be on this, I'd stop that meditation, it was my second of the day, I'd put my shoes back on, and I'd be like,

ooh, I'm still flooded with all these thoughts. But it definitely became a cumulative thing. That totally jobs with my experience of the thing. That totally jabs with my experience of the thing. It doesn't fix your problems. All it does is just equip you to better handle them. Oh, in the beginning it fixed my problems. The anger and then the first few times I meditated

after that, it was almost like, oh, I've calmed down. Got you. All the cobwebs are gone. Interesting. Life is up, but that didn't last at all. And the actual effect of it became long term, it became like a long term drug, as opposed to a short term drug.

Yes, yes. What I was going to say, you know, in fact, one of the things that can get in the way of it working is you expecting it to do a certain thing because expectation is a hindrance. I mean, like that's right from the Buddhist scriptures. Desire for some to feel different through meditation will get in the way of whatever is supposed to happen. All that's supposed to happen really is that you're supposed to see clearly whatever's happening already.

And that actually is magic because once you see, oh yeah, I'm feeling all these things or I'm thinking all these things and it's manifesting this way in my body, that actually is enough distance so that you aren't yanked around by it anymore. It's the magic. To going in expecting, look, I want to come out of this, blissed out and zen down is, in my view, and in my experience, like a recipe for disappointment. Totally. I think I first went back to it, thinking it was going to be like

when you sob as a child. You know when you sob as a little kid, and then after you felt great. Yeah, well, I never did that, but I hear. You know when you sobbed as a teen, publicly. No, it was like, you know, like, very cathartic, like, wow, because I wouldn't, you know, it was one of those things where like, I wouldn't have been breathing all day.

It was the first time I'd even taken a deep breath. So it was very like, blissed out feeling, right? And then I had to get, but then it's like, it didn't end in Sacramento. I had to go to Denver, I had to go to Chicago, and just kept going. And like, the feelings didn't go away. And I wasn't done processing that I had this big

professional failure. So it was like, it just kept happening, and I kept meditating. And there were failure. So it was like, it just kept happening and I kept meditating. And there were many weeks that it was like, this is pointless. So did you quit? What was the move? No, I was, it was physically,

on, I guess it was physically uncomfortable, the anxiety, enough that I would always be happy to exercise or sit down and meditate. Gotcha. But it was a really like, I was very focused and I was on this tour and it was a really like monastic existence. It was kind of perfect for it, but it's also set it up. It was not a clear test run for meditating in life. Hey there listeners! While we take a little break here, I want to tell you about another podcast that I think you'll like. It's called How I Built This, where host Guy Razz talks to founders behind some of the world's biggest and most innovative companies, to learn how they built them from the ground up. Guy has sat down with hundreds of founders behind well-known

companies like Headspace, Manduka Yoga Mats, Soul Cycle, and Kodopaxi, as well as entrepreneurs working to solve some of the biggest problems of our time, like developing technology that pulls energy from the ground to heat in cool homes, or even figuring out how to make drinking water from air and sunlight. Together they discussed their entire journey from day one, and all the skills they had to learn along the way, like confronting big challenges, and how to lead through uncertainty. So if you want to get inspired and learn how to think like an entrepreneur, check out how I built this, wherever you get your podcasts.

You can listen early and add free on the Amazon or Wondery app. Can I say a few things about my view of you during this period? Maybe imagine something to say nice things. But I think you can tell a lot about somebody by how they handle adversity. And I thought you handled it just from my vantage point. We only had a few conversations about it on email and in person, incredibly well. I will thank you. Bad things happen to all of us.

Or, and sometimes we let it make us into monsters. And you did the exact opposite. And I mean, there were a few things that stand out in my mind. One, just talking to you about it. you were so like forthright and just clearly like holding the thing up and looking at it from every different angle. But then the moment on Kimmel which I'm not gonna be able to recreate because I know you know what you said where he asked you how the show went what was your line again? I

think I said well none of the critics liked it, but fortunately the audience didn't like it either. Yeah, something I would personally, we had low ratings, yeah, before. Something along those lines was very, very funny. And then your bounce back, my view was like, really triumphant, because you then not long thereafter went and performed a Carnegie Hall.

And it was amazing. Oh, that was incredible. And I mean, your first line, when you walked out on stage, you was well, back to stand up. And it was amazing. That was incredible. And I remember your first line when you walked down the stage, it was, well, back to stand up. Oh really? And it was great. People loved it. It was sold out.

It was really fun. That was the other thing. Okay. So now, you could have put, oh I guess what I'm saying, you could have put your head in the sand. You could have just let it make you into a total jerk or a quitter. And you didn't either of those things. And you worked through it even though it was really hard. So I think that's all really awesome as all of this.

Well, thanks. That's a huge credit to Anna, my wife, who without whom I don't know if I would have gone through it as much. I think I would have absolutely tried to go around it or bury it or but you can't be going through that and come home to someone with whom you're honest and talk to and not and go, yeah, everything's gonna be great. I think I'm gonna repitch and you can't just,

I don't know, or at least I'm very grateful like we don't have that relationship at all. There was no, it was like coming home, like having gotten my ass kicked, there was no way to pretend it hadn't happened. And she didn't pretend it didn't happen. No, not at all. And she also was very protective,

but was kind of like, this is survivable, you know? I remember, I said to her like, I don't know what this is or something. And she was like, oh, you were never made fun of as a kid. She's like, you've never been unpopular before. And I was like, oh, and she was like, yeah, a lot of people go through this. You're usually in high school.

Yeah, that's a pretty wise thing to point out. I mean, she was just like this is not i mean she wasn't sorry implicitly there was the underlying thing of like john you are playing carnycaw were married and were really happy and were really lucky you can't hit

zero you can hit five but you can't hit zero you you know. So in terms of self-pity, I was not going to be able to have too much in a good way. And yet at the same time, we weren't pretending it wasn't happening. Sounds like the exact right mix. And sounds very good. Well, it's very good. So did it get better? How did it get better? It's just time. Yeah. I mean, I still will have anxiety that I need to like, you know, if I've been off meditating for a while, I will hit, you know, I'll hit a day where I'm like so mad about something insignificant or significant, but it's, I'm a cumulative person. I'm very polite and nice day to day,

and a lot of things get shelved away. And then I get really mad. My dog got sick. She's fine now. She's always just been a little sick and then his bounce is back and that's great. But she was sick at one point, maybe a year after the TV show or something and I was

Talking to someone and I was like I don't understand much is that she has acid reflux and there's no But and I was going on and on and I was like this whole city and they were like whoa Oh, how does that I was Los Angeles to blame for this and I was like I don't know. I'm really mad about a lot of things And I was like, I don't know. I'm really mad about a lot of things. And that still happens. So what's your meditation practice like now? So I do 20 minutes a day. I try to do it at the theater, at the Lycium Theater.

So we've been doing the Oh, Hello on Broadway Show which you saw. And one thing. And it's amazing. Thank you very much much and we were just talking off mic about When you're doing the same thing over and over again now we're in a show that is we improvise a lot but When you're saying the same lines and I felt this way was stand up to when you're saying the same lines over and over again Your mind as we were saying has a tendency to wander. Yes, it does. And that's totally natural.

That's scary. But scary and jarring can be slightly unnerving, and you're also in front of an audience, so the adrenaline and the stakes are high. So you're kind of playing with a few different elements that can really throw you. So I have tried to do it closer to the show at the theater. There's lots of dressing rooms upstairs that we don't need because it's just a two-man show. We're not like the cast of a musical.

So there's all these empty dressing rooms and I pitch black when you shut the door and I'll just sit in there and do 20 minutes then. And what is your practice? What does it look like? What are you actually doing in your mind when you're doing it? Oh, the one thing I do that's, the one thing that I didn't take from your book

is that you don't have to sit, twist it up on the floor. You actually do sit. I sit, load us on the floor. That's great. Yeah, but I don't need to. I think I'd sit straighter if I didn't. I don't tell people not to do it.

I'm just saying if you can't do it as because I can't, it's okay. But you know if some great Asian master were in the room, they would, in fact, some great Asian masters are really dogmatic about, hey, you really do need to sit in this way. So if you can do it, that's great. Yeah, I have weird legs and they kind of twist and bend. And so I can do it. Nice. It's not a perfectly quiet environment. Like a hotel, you hear people coming and going, I've really tried to embrace that.

I'm like, that is our sound guy walking up the stairs. That is a pipe. Like that is the sound of a pipe again. Just relax. You know, like I've had really controlled environments a lot, like, you know, our house is kind of quiet and this is good because it's, I don't know, orient me to the environment. So you're feeling your breath coming in and going out and then when you hear a noise, you notice that and just go back to your breath. Is that the...

Yeah. I really just try to go, that's Linda walking down the hall. Breathe in. That is that pipe again. Breathe in. Does your wife meditate? Yes. I don't know if she is currently. That's a good question. So it's not a topic of discussion between it too.

Oh, that's maybe one thing I need to work on is saying I'm going to go meditate. So what do you say? Does she think you're just spending a lot of time in the bathroom? No, I say I'm going to go lay down. Interesting. Does your co-star slash co-writer slash long-time friend Nick Crowell meditate? I believe somewhat. Yes, because, well, do you consider it meditating if you take yoga and they do that thing at the end?

Yeah, I guess, but I mean, I think a lot of people use that as like nap time or like planning what they're gonna do next. Everyone uses it to plan what they're gonna do. Yeah, so that, yeah. So I, generally, in that. It's one of the great meal apps. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, whatever. I, Shavasana as meal planner. I think then it's probably, if you're affirmatively like planning your meal, then you're definitely not meditating. That is totally true. Nick, everyone's open to meditation. There's no reason to lie, but I do say I'm going to go shut my eyes or lie down. Sometimes I say I'm going to meditate, but I definitely don't say it out loud that much. So is that because in some part of you suspects

that either your wife or your good friend slash partner will be like, he's a weirdo? Yes, it must be. Yeah, I'm just... No, I still have that too. Yeah, I still have it too. Like the word is like, it's just one of those words that I grew up with as being like,

what like a funny hippie on a TV show does. Yeah, no, I get it. Even around the office before I anchored nightline during the weekdays, I'll meditate in my office, or we actually have a meditation room around the corner from my office, which interestingly enough, I had nothing to do with setting up. Oh, yeah. That's kind of happened organically within the company. And I don't tell people that that's what I'm doing.

I don't know why. I think it's the same kind of weird reason that you're going to. I go to acupuncture every week and I tell people I'm going to the doctor and to the extent that something. That's even weirder though, to go to the doctor every week.

Not a new. Yeah, apparently not. Yeah, maybe not. That seemed to me I was like, I hope, well, they'll probably be intrigued just to why I'm constantly going to visit them. So, you think acupuncture is in the same category of meditation in that way?

In that I lie about it. Well, in that, yeah, I guess I didn't expect to get to this, but yeah, now that we're talking about it, I disguise those sides of me. So does Anna not know that you're good? Well, she doesn't want to. She knows I'm going to acupuncture. She goes every week too.

Okay, we go to the same guy. Okay, so other people you're lying to, not your wife. I'm lying to other people. Yes. I also like, I get so many benefits from acupuncture that I kinda can't miss it. However, it's really hard to be like, I absolutely cannot do that meeting because I from acupuncture that I kind of can't miss it. However, it's really hard to be like, I absolutely cannot do that meeting

because I have acupuncture. You're a TV star, you could say whatever the hell you want. I'm on Broadway right now. Okay, you're a Broadway star. Thank you. So you could say whatever you are on the spectrum of crazy things that prefer to say from like Chicago and you know

we're like Irish Catholic people. Fair enough. I like that about you. You don't feel fully comfortable being a complete monster. I like that about you. I think it's a good thing. I don't feel comfortable being a complete monster or a whole person who goes to the acupuncture

and meditates because that makes him feel good. And that's his system. Yes, okay, you've seen it more holistically than I was saying it. So tell me about, oh hello. Oh hello is, myself and Nick Crowell doing two characters. Nick plays a character named Gail, I play a character named George. We've been doing these guys for about 10 years. 2006 we started doing them as sketch comedy characters.

We hosted a show down in the East Village. There are two guys from the Upper West Side of Manhattan, like deep 70s in Columbus, not far from where we are now. Gill is an also ran actor, George is an also ran novelist. They wish they were Richard Dreyfus and Philip Roth. They're a hundred percent not. They're obsessed with the kind of man Alan Alda is, turtle neck and a sport coat a learned writer actor that he is the peak for them and also someone that in the narrative of their show they

stock and they're just tote bag guys these are guys with strand tote bags or these people that you've observed in nature like where did this come from yes we saw them at we saw what we saw these two guys that were the jumping off point at the Strand Bookstore, which is in downtown, those. Downtown, yeah, not the pop-ups in Times Square, downtown. I guess one I was saying is, so how did you place them in the deep 70s on?

Oh, that was more kind of like the Woody Allenness of it, you know? It's an Upper East Seagate. Wait, is he? Yeah. Well, I like that you put them deep 70s. Maybe part of it, you know? It's an Upper East Seagate. Wait, is he? Yeah. Well, I like that you put them deep, so I'm just gonna- Maybe part of it, I mean, no, I mean,

I was about to say part of it's that I'm an outsider to New York, so I, but no, Upper West Seagate sounded right. It is, it feels absolutely right. It's 100%. I used to, I mean, we are in Lincoln Square right now, but so not far from this part of the world that you're talking about,

but I used to live up there And like you've nailed a certain type. Oh great. There are many in the West Village. There are many in Albuquerque, Berkeley, Chicago, everywhere Boston do people who fit this stereotype older men who are like your character relevant. They don't know they're irrelevant. No, no, no Do they did they see themselves in what you guys are doing? No, no one thinks they're losing. Because I didn't see anybody. No one thinks they're losing.

I didn't see anybody who even fit that demo in the audience the night I was there. It was all, well, let me be careful how I phrased this. We have people around the same age as George and Phil. They enjoy the show a lot. I mean, the show is about these guys looking back on their life in New York in the 1970s and the 1980s, and Ed Koch and Steely Dan and Rent Control Departments.

And it's about a lot of, it's a very silly show. We also are basically just muppets, but it's a very silly show grounded in a realness that we really appreciated as like fetishizers of 1970s New York. And I think other people who experienced it also appreciate. There's a lot of the show is written by two men in the 30s, but we wrote it in an altered state where we were two men in our 70s. I'm just curious for you as like an Irish guy from Chicago. Like why would you be interested in this?

I don't know. I don't know, but I like it so much. It was all because you were at an event at the Strand Bookstore. No, so we saw these, well, we saw these two guys at the Strand Bookstore. At the time Nick and I were trying to figure out a way to host this standup show in the East Village. We saw these two guys and they were each buying a copy of Alan Alde's autobiography, never have your dog stuff. And they were each buying hardcover copies, okay?

And they looked like Bert and Ernie, like in the sense of the relationship, like they looked like two platonic friends who might share an apartment together, but they were also selfish enough to each buy a copy of the book, like they looked joined at the hip, but also, you know, as Nick says, they wouldn't share a copy of the book, but they probably share a Murphy bed. So we followed them and they had that. You actually followed them. Yeah, yeah, we had nothing to do.

We were like 23 and 26, and we had nothing to do which is wondering right. And they had that kind of cadence of like, Jens Stewart, you know, like that type of, that very assured wrong pronunciation. There's a lot of that in the play. It's confident, confidently pronouncing words wrong is a big part of a hello. And it was at that time where like the New York Times had just discovered John Stewart

and how like we get you remember when for like two years you could sound smart by saying kids get their politics from the daily life. Yeah. It was peak time for that. It was just a lot, there was a, it was a great, these men were authorities on everything. And did you learn this because you followed them

along enough to actually hear them talk? No, they were just a, got it. And it set off like a bunch of associations for both of us, Nick having grown up in Westchester, New York. Myself having sort of fetishized New York from afar and watched a lot of film in the 70s, set in New York. And that kind of like weird, tanka, tan, tan khakis, brown brown turtleneck, brown jack, just kind of an awful look where a guy had hair like oatmeal, any wore high waisted corduroy, and he was an architect,

and this was like a bachelor that all women in the film are in love with. That type of thing was just very interesting and very, very familiar to both of us. And we wanted to play those types of guys. And so you then started hosting this event in the East Coast? We would host a stand-up show at a place called Brithifee. And we would come up and say, like,

we really wanted to get into the hot, dintown scene. And we're gonna bring up some of you young comedians. And we would interview them, and we were just... It was kind of what... I mean, it was very quickly what it is. It was these two liberal intolerant men who, you know, talked down to people but are just clearly life's losers. Life's glorious losers.

And did you think, do you have any inkling that this was gonna be such a long-running, Stick? I didn't see what would ever stop it because we liked doing it so much. I remember I had a list of things I wanted to do in maybe 2008 when I was a writer at Saturday Night Live. And one of them, I still have the list. I mean, it's like I wanted to do a stand-up special and I did that. And the next thing I wanted to do was an oh-ho-ho party album. It was like a party record is what you call

like a comedy record in the 60s, like sort of like for adults to put on at a cocktail party. The 2000 year old man is an exactly a party album, but it was kind of that vibe. I was like, oh, we should record an album like that. Or like, these guys think they're doing sophisticated or bane humor, but it sucks. And we never did that, but we ended up doing the characters on Crowl Show.

When Nick got the show on Comedy Central, we very quickly started doing these short, more like, filmic pieces with the characters. Then, in the second season, we started having them host a prank show called Too Much Tuna, which was a bit we had talked about downtown a lot, that we had a show called Too Much Tuna, which was a bit we had talked about downtown a lot, that we had a show called Too Much Tuna where you're interviewing someone and then there's Tuna serves and everyone, everything grinds to a halt because that's too much tuna. So that was kind of in the air. We all remember that time when that was in the air.

The Too Much Tuna really connected with people. They were always characters that comedy people liked, but we maybe couldn't get a lot of traction with. We were turned down by the Aspen Comedy Festival. They said the show was too old. They're like, where's the young festival and you're playing old guys? And we were like, okay. Did I ever think it would run this long?

We always thought like, oh, this kind of maybe too specific. But somehow too much tuna, broken wider. And we started getting tweets and Instagrams from like, you know, 14 year old girls in Dallas, who would be like, too much tuna, and somehow it just, yeah, they were just like, oh, okay, these guys are like tuna fish.

They like tuna salad, I get it. It was somehow, it was like, sometimes you just need like a hook, and ours was had a tuna on it. It was really just like, oh, I get it. These guys, these guys are losers of a prank show called Too Much Tuna. For some reason it crystallized it. And this was after the Kroll Show stuff.

Yeah, the Kroll Show both as a platform obviously and Nick Lighting is it on the show, it was like it broke it to a wider audience, but also it somehow broadened it in a nut, like when you can go broad in a weird way, it's the best thing for comedy. When like what's weirder about your thing makes it go wider? Yeah, it's a great thing. So how did you get the point where you were writing a play? Because you were any number of things

you could have done with it after the Kroll Show stopped, including nothing. Including nothing. And by the way, we were getting tweets, but the public wasn't being done on a dorm. But we did appreciate that. It had kind of a wider appeal than we thought. We really did appreciate that it had kind of a wider appeal than we thought.

We really did appreciate that. So then my show's canceled. Nick decides to stop doing crawl show after three seasons. Why? And he really completed what he wanted to do with it. And he really saw, I mean, it was very admirable thing to watch. It was a very cool thing to watch where he was like, I've done what I want to do with this.

And I'm going to walk away rather than just keep making for the sake of making. Very, I mean, you know, I don't know if he meditates, but he's very centered. So then we did an event to promote the third season at the 90 Second Street Y in character interviewed by Apologies Willie Geist. This is what happened, Dan. No apologies. No, sir. I think Willie Geist is amazing. It's okay, it's a rival. You know Alan Alda. What? He's no Alan Alda.

Well, no one is. Anyway, we were interviewed and we did an audience Q and I, and it was like the first time we had done them live in like seven years. We'd done them on film for Comedy Central. And it was so, it was like, it was an hour and a half, we prepared so little. And by the way, we thought we'd prepared.

But we'd prepared like three jokes. We just kept talking at the hotel about other stuff and like what we should order before the show to eat. And we just never wrote anything down. And then we got on stage and we really did like 90 minutes. And it was so fun. And after that, someone asked us what we were going to do next And then we got on stage and we really did like 90 minutes and it was so fun. And after that, someone asked us what we were going to do next and we said, oh, hello on

Broadway, which was a joke that we immediately knew we would do. Wow. Or that we would try to do. And so you started not on Broadway. No, we started off Broadway. Yeah. It'd be very hard to start on Broadway. Yeah.

And it's insane that we're even on Broadway. It is kind of insane, but like in a really good way. In a great way, but it is totally bizarre. Did you think, because you started, where was the 30th century? You started at the... You were at Cherry Lane, yeah, okay, I'm a netta. Yeah, did you, you guys at a limited run there,

did you think, okay, or this is the end, we'll do this, and then we'll go off and do other things, or... No, I can't pretend that we hadn't already talked about Broadway. We'd both been big theater fans, and we both saw a lot of theater in New York. I don't know if we thought, oh, I don't know, we didn't know that much about the space. And I don't know if we thought like within the next two years we'll be in that space. So we were a little ignorant of the steps. And I think that sort of initially helped our confidence because we were like, all the

way to do Broadway's to do Broadway first. So we did this run at the Cherry Lane. And we'd both been on television and we'd done the show. We'd done a crawl show and we'd done these characters. We sold out our run in like eight hours, which was great. Great, great, way to do it. And we just had to do the show.

We just then did the show. And we just had to do the we just then did the show and we got some nice reviews and and then from there we we were still thinking about going bigger in New York. It still just been the most fun thing we ever did. It was still just like there's nothing more fun than this. We both have other things going on but let's make sure we let's tour it this year. And that was the first step. We took it to Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, Washington, DC, Montreal, San Diego, bigger and bigger theaters, which was good for scale, because we went from doing it to a 179-seat theater off-broadway to like, thousands-seat theaters. And that was just like, let's, what's it like for these guys to project more and scale up and have the set and have the show be a bigger experience.

And then, look, the unbelievable break of it all was we got interest to come to Broadway and we're able to do it. And we're able to do it a year after doing off-Broadway. calendar, the very fact that it exists, all of it is astonishing. The more I've learned about the theater world, we're very, very flattered and lucky to be in that space. I have to admit though, I think some of our ignorance helped our initial, you know, dive in. Yeah, absolutely. I think ignorance actually in some rare cases can be bliss or at least foolish motivation. Yeah, sure. Yeah. So the original idea was that you guys were going to stop the show when.

I guess you weren't sure. I'm trying to think back now and I don't know if I remember exactly because we were sort of like, okay, we just did off Broadway. That was awesome. I think we thought about a week at the beacon. I think we thought about, there was a lot of demand to see this show in New York, so we were like, how do we capitalize off that?

What's a fun way to do that? A theater and union square? That's 300 seats, as opposed to 200, and we do like a longer run. We just didn't know what pieces would fall in which order. So we decided to go on tour and I think it was going on tour and the nice reviews we got off Broadway that helped people and our producers maybe see it in that light. And though they had been interested since off Broadway.

And now though, but now though the show keeps getting extended, you're running through January 22nd, right? Yeah, but I don't know when this airs, but yeah, we're running through January 22nd, right? Yeah, I don't know when this airs, but yeah, we're running through January 22nd. I think so. And what beyond that? Do you have any sense what you're going to do beyond that? Oh, I'll be going on tour doing stand-up after that. And we do have more we'd like to do with the characters. Movie?

Oh, well, we'd like to film this show in some regard. The show we're doing. And then, yeah, we'd like to film this show in some regard. The show we're doing. And then, yeah, we're open to anything. I'm not being cagey, we don't know. But yeah, sure, we'll do a movie. If people want to learn more about you, where can I go? Is there a website?

I have a website. It's nice. I don't think there's much on it. You've got a Wikipedia. I have two specials on Netflix. I like those. It's just me the whole time. And then, you know, I have Twitter and those things.

And so I'm off it now. Where do you're off Twitter? I deleted it from my phone. Why? Just in the past 48 hours. What happened? Just overload. Overload.

Is this post-election stuff? Yeah. Okay. and did you If people want to learn about oh hello, is there a website for that or just go on? Oh, hello Broadway.com. Okay We've had a lot of guests, but you are among the tippy top most delightful guests. I can't believe that It's absolutely true. I've listened to the show. You've had great guests the guests have been amazing But you've been amazing. It's really I mean that's it's really well

Thanks for writing the book, you know, it you've been amazing. It's really, I mean that's a series of really fun. Well, thanks for writing the book. You know, it was really helpful to my whole life. And I don't think I could have approached it without someone who is a straight-laced guy. So thanks for being uptight and also meditating. It helped me, even though I lie about it. Okay, there's another edition of the 10% Happier Podcast. If you liked it, please make sure to subscribe, rate us, my lie about it. podcast and really do pretty much all the work. Lauren, Efron, Josh Cohan, Sarah Amos, Andrew Calp, Steve Jones, and the head of ABC News Digital Dance Silver. I'll talk to you next Wednesday. Hey, hey, prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and add free on Amazon music.

Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and add free with 1-3-plus in Apple podcasts. Before you go, do us a solid and tell us all about yourself by completing a short survey at 1-3-dot-com slash survey.