The Adam and Dr. Drew Show - Classic #147: Adam Carolla Returns Pt. 1

Episode Date: August 5, 2025

Adam and Drew are back together after Adam’s long hiatus to shoot his independent movie ‘Road Hard’ and promote his new book ‘President Me’. Adam recaps some of his trips with Drew and they discuss how the influence of the Trial Lawyers Association of America has made getting things done in Washington a virtual impossibility. They also examine the tragedy that recently struck the Santa Barbara area and look at some of the societal ills that have developed in recent years and how they could be contributing to tragedies such as these.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

All right, time for throwback. This is number 147 from May of 2014. We are back together, Adam and I, after Adam's long hiatus to shoot his movie Road Hard and also promote his book President Me. Adam will recap some of trips, particularly the ones that he and I have taken together. We discussed the influence of the Trial Lawyers Association and how it has made it possible to get things done in Washington. A very interesting perspective from a historical standpoint, given where things are now. Enjoy this throwback episode. Recording live at Corolla One Studios with Adam Corolla and board certified physician and addiction medicine specialist Dr. Drew Pinsky.

You're listening to the Adam and Dr. Drew show yeah get it on Got to get it on no choice, but to get it on mandate get it on I'm back everybody Dr. Drew did a fine job of holding down the fort Brad Williams Adam Ray Sklar brothers Mike Catharwood all that all that good solid Admiral good solid hitters they did yeah they did a good job all of them yeah monkey with the mic what's that good part right on right on fix it off the air like every other human being all right good we've oh Pat O'Brien too but you know what all guys that I've said interesting topic to

get into and thank you guys for hanging with us. I'm back. I'm done with the movie. I'm done with the book tour. And I'm here. Big picture. Jesus fucking Christ. It's amazing you lived through that. I know how you love to work. You know, as I think about it, you can't go, well, you don't like the work, you work a lot. We all know you kind of do what you do, you know. What I don't like is incompetency and waste, and then I realize that there's a lot of work encompasses incompetency and waste, which is... Waste of time, mostly. Yeah, and just waste of everything, but waste of time, mainly. I don't think anyone's... I do not believe I've ever begrudged doing the podcast or doing

a podcast or even doing someone else's podcast. I never go like, I gotta go do my podcast. I don't have it because it doesn't feel wasteful to me. Right. I get here in nine minutes from where I live. We start the second I walk in the door and then as I'm, it ends as I'm walking out the door, right? So it's work, but I don't seem to mind. Right. Because there's no waste involved. Now, when you go shoot a television show, it's, you know, call time, 7am, you look at your watch,

it's 7.49 and you haven't moved a muscle yet. Right. Then it's, you know, hair and makeup, and then there's a lot of discussions on what shirt you should be wearing. Then there's an argument about the shirt, and then there's a continuity discussion about the shirt, and then they wanna go pick up some things, some OTF things, some on the fly thing that you already did, and you know you already did a good version of it, but the network said they wanted it a little bit louder,

and with more energy, but you know they're gonna use the first one, or they could've used the first one, and then you gotta get into some building montage, but're gonna use the first one or they could have used the first one and then you got to get into Some building montage, but you've seen the shown You know, they only show 18 seconds of the building montage for the guys like get up on the scaffolding Let's just get a little more of the building and you're like you're not gonna use this. You're never gonna use this Then it becomes waste and then I don't want to be involved. You know, that's my problem

I don't have a problem with any other facet of Life, I really don't I just don't like the ways to say used to say you didn't like doing anything That wasn't what you wanted to be doing in that moment. You know, I mean You say I've gotten over that. Okay, good. All right, but I've also understood that the only way you can Shoot an independent film that where you're in every scene is just to go at it.

You just have to go at it like you're a badger trying to root something out, a fox out or something. Just a badger, honey badger shaking that snake. You know what I'm saying? But you know, the only way to go is just to go at it. Yeah, you know that that kind of stuff otherwise That shit can take years. Yeah, I mean I talked to people it's always sad But you know when you talk to people they're like I've been working on an independent film and you're like when you start 1994 I think that's a you and I hate worse than anything which is inertia and not getting shit done

You know, I mean if you're gonna do something just just do it. I can't stand talking about it plain. That's waste again. Right? Both you and I have a thing about that. Well, we have a thing about the bullshit factor of it. I don't care if somebody says, we're making a movie, we need to have a pre-production of three weeks where we need to discuss right locations and clearances and permits that's making the movie that's different right but this I want to talk about it it bothers me yes and I again I'd rather hang around the person that said well my life's goal is to get hold of a 12-pack of tequila because they stopped making them But they make them in Mexico

So I'm gonna get that and then I want to just sit in inflatable pool my backyard and masturbate like I'd rather talk to that guy than the guy goes I got an idea. That's you isn't yeah, you're talking to yourself then That's clear. Yeah, no, I have an idea for a reality show. Except for you're never gonna pitch it, you're never gonna do anything, you're never gonna storyboard it, it's just you wanna discuss it. And you think magically, if you tell someone like me you have an idea for a reality show

that somehow I'm just gonna rub my. Do you get a lot of that shit? Well yeah, I think everybody in show business gets a lot of that shit. But I think the reality thing has made it even worse though. Because everybody thinks, well I'm interesting, so let me tell you about it. Well what reality, the problem with reality is reality television is essentially like this.

It's like you turning on the TV on a Sunday and you going, who's that playing free safety for Seattle? That's Burt. I work with that guy. He's a smoker. What's he doing out on that field? Shit, look at him. He's out there in the field. Oh, the crowd's going nuts. Look at him out there. Holy shit. And then you switch the channel and you see, you know, it's the NHL or the basketball playoffs and oh, there's Tom. It's another guy's, guys, guys, 80 pounds overweight. What's he doing starting for the Cavaliers? What's he doing out there? So TV used to be the realm of you'd turn it on, you'd see Robert Yurick and

Kathie Lee Crosby and you'd go, I don't fucking look like Robert Yurick. Look at that guy. That's the antenna. Right. That guy's fucking tall and his teeth are straight and he's okay. Dimple in his cheeks. And I don't look like that. No fucking, you know, you just turn on the TV.

You'd see heart to heart. There's Stephanie Powers. there's Robert Wagner. I go look at my dad and my mom. Oh, God. Stephanie Powers and Robert Wagner would never stop throwing up if they saw my mom and my dad. Like, I look at my mom, I look at my dad, and I go, okay, those two are on TV. Those two can't even own a color TV. That's what, but it was a simple math.

Now if I turn on the TV now and I see Honey Boo Boo's mom, and then I look over at my mom I'm like, oh shit, my mom's eight pounds lighter than that. Not only that, she's kind of more interesting. Yeah. I went too far with that. But the point is is now you turn on TV and you go, oh, and then you look in the mirror and you go, oh, I look like shit in my underpants too. Why not?

You know what I think about? You know who I blame? Madison Abner. Tell you why. They used to, it's funny, somebody showed us a Burger King commercial from like 1975, everybody on TV was good-looking back in the day. Reality TV really started with reality commercials. Yeah. Commercials, it didn't matter if the guy, you know, if the chick was a, if the chick worked at a car dealership or the chick

worked at a dental office or the chick but work behind the counter at a Burger King they were 21 year old white models you know you go as a fucking Fox working at that Burger King then at some point somebody said no no no no no no we got it we got to make it a little slice of life I gotta work dr. Cheryl was the Burger King girl Cheryl Cheryl Arrett? Really? Yeah. Pull it up, Gary. We got to work some reality into this. We can't just have good-looking white models in there.

We got to have everybody in there and some of them are going to be a little rounder than others. And at a certain point, you start watching these commercials and you started going, that was our first sort of reality, that's like our first like, hey this isn't a model on TV. Up until then everyone was just, you know, was Charlie's Angels. One was was better looking than the next. We saw the Have It Your Way Burger King commercial with another hot chick behind the counter. This is where she was the head of the Burger King Burger King girls they're all hot 19 year olds right there she is oh yeah you recognize her by the way can I say this too

By the way, can I say this too? The Whopper used to be a huge hamburger. Yeah. The meat part. Not the bread part, the meat part, right? Well, it was just... Alright, thanks for breaking my joke in half and stepping on both pieces. Go ahead. Stop. A Whopper was called the Whopper.

It meant huge. Big, yes. Whopper was called the whopper. It meant huge. Big, yes. Whopper means big. You catch a fish, you go, it's a whopper. It's a big fish. The Big Mac had the word big in it. I think. Yes.

Right in the title. Yeah. Big Macs and whoppers are not considered big hamburgers anymore. They're average. Oh, you're right. It used to be- Just compared to what that was out there. Rodney Allen Rippey would be

holding the jumbo jack. Yeah. All right. Hold on. Preemptive sniff. I rarely throw the sniff in front. There are three major players. Is it a jack in the box? They had a jumbo Jack McDonald's the big man. Don't say it like a black guy McDonald's I own McDonald's And Burger King and Burger the Whopper the Whopper so with jumbo Big yeah and whopper. Yeah, okay now Pedestrian yeah, they're all average sized burgers Nobody says well, I got that Whopper, you better

be ready to eat. You can't get that Big Mac unless, I mean, you finish half of it today, then you finish the next half next week. You know, it's like, no, no, no. We now have the triple with the bacon wrapped at the thing stuffed with the ostrich meat. I mean, it just keeps going and going. The man versus food burgers. With the fries on it. With those things that are as tall as your head. So what I mean, like, this is 25 years ago, these were the biggest offerings the fast food world could dream up. And they were called, they were sort of novelty. Yeah,ty huge. There's a picture of Rodney Allen Rippey,

who is like a brother from another mother from Maxipata over there, cute little black kid, was holding that whopper and it was like, he could barely get his hands around that thing. Too big to eat. It's too big to eat. That was the thing, remember? It was too big to eat.

Wasn't that the thing? Something, yeah, I think that- Too big to eat, right? I think that was- That was his thing. That was too big eat wasn't that the thing something yeah, I think that I think that I think that was that was Ronnie Allen Ripley, but now that we're big and fat ain't no big You wouldn't say to you know 12 year olds well a Big Mac now Are you sure you know were you wandering the desert for a few years, and you haven't eaten Amelia? It's just the Big Macs what you what you There's Rodney, by the way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He's a cute kid.

Cute. All right. Shame. I have no idea what happened to him. He's out and about. We had him on a show once. He's out. He's not about. Didn't you and I have him on a... It seems like it. Yeah, we had him on a radio show years ago or something. It seems like it. All right, I want to thank you guys for buying my book and they're going into a second printing and when I say second

printing I mean they're printing up another batch. I don't know I don't know exactly. It's not another edition it's just more. Not another edition. They're they're printing up they're printing up more and so I appreciate you guys going out there and supporting that and getting president me and clicking through Amazon and doing all that good stuff and this is an ad by BetterHelp and if you ever try getting real mental health advice online it feels like feels you don't know where to turn there's so much coming in one day it's say get cold plunges and there's so many things look I look you you of course don't know what's right. You also don't know what's

right for you specifically. And you need professional help oftentimes, not chasing trends and not diagnosing yourself or treating yourself. That's the worst thing you can possibly do. I mean, you can try stuff. If you're having trouble functioning, well, better help is there with over 3,000 licensed therapists and 5 million people helped worldwide. Sessions get an average of 4.9 out of 5 stars from the more than 1.7 million reviews. Easy, no longer stigma, you're not in a waiting room, you just click and connect with a therapist whenever, wherever it works for you. And if you want actual professional support, rather than overload of information, give BetterHelp a look.

Right, Daphne? As the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise. Talk it out with BetterHelp. Our listeners get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com slash Adam and Drew. That's better help.com slash Adam and Drew. Adam and Dr. Drew show.com. That's the link through Amazon and Book Market. Get the book and do all that. Subscribe via the PayPal. It's nice. Keep the lights. And

during this time of year, the air conditioning on around here. Me doing live podcast Irvine tonight, eight o'clock, and at the improv, come on out and say hi if you like. And you can help us fight the patent trolls. I didn't tell you, Drew, but I went down to Congress and I talked to some junior, junior, junior people about this. You went to DC? Well, I was in DC, and while I was in DC, they were just getting ready to have a vote on this legislation for this patent reform patent role reform

Fantastic. Yeah, so I gave an impassioned speech and then I got in the car and started driving to Richmond, Virginia And phone rang about ten minutes later and Leahy shot it down. It had bipartisan support, but He did one of those We recognize that patent trolls a big problem, but we'll vote on it next year. Not now. Yeah. Where's he from?

This is, he's from Vermont. Are you sitting down? He's a Democrat, trial lawyers association, not a big fan of that legislation. So went away. But it's a problem. It needs to be addressed. Just, we'll do it in a year. Vote the guy out. Vote him out. It's insane, right? So you got the trial lawyers paying for him and he magically says, yeah,

yeah. I mean, his speech was just sort of like, his statement was just sort of like, it's a very important problem. It's a very important issue. It's got bipartisan support, but not now. We'll do it later. So's a very important issue. It's got bipartisan support, but not now. We'll do it later. So moving on. Wow. Yeah. So you have to go fight it. Yeah, I do. But at a certain point, it's so fucking paper thin. It's so transparent.

I thought the idea was you guys were bought and paid for by big whatever, but in the past, you didn't act like it. Now you're just like, fuck it's obvious let's do it with impunity yeah it's really sad it is it is sad that you go to Washington you think there's gonna be some change everyone's telling me oh this bill has bipartisan support where did you where did you give your speech the picture was up there I don't know it's like a chamber like one of the actually in the Congress? It was in, it was like mini, mini, mini Congress. You know, it's a decent size room, as Mike August would call it.

He said we get 70% of the door. Now look at the kids in the foreground here. Those are the people that run Congress. Other than the guys that are bought and paid for, the actual people doing the work are these 26-year-olds. It was in the Russell Senate office building, but it was one of the oldest and nicest out there. Oh, you're in the Senate building. That's pretty good.

So those aren't 26-year-olds, they're 32-year-olds. 32-year-olds run the Senate, 26-year-olds run the House. It's nice to know that even when you go to a Senate building the security still treats you like assholes. Oh of course. No different than LAX. When you go through the metal detector they don't say step forward please, they just move their hand lazily.

Like come on, I don't give a shit. Fucking Abe Lincoln could come back and walk through, well maybe not Abe. Thomas Jefferson. You know what maybe not Abe. Thomas Jefferson. You know what I'm saying. Thomas Jefferson. Thomas could go through there and he'd get a lot of attitude tossed his way. Yeah. All right. So that's good. If you'd like to help us, you can go to FundAnything.com. We'll beat back the patent trolls. Yeah, I got something. You must at least be aware of this if not having already had seen this. Penn has a documentary out.

Penn and Teller. I've not seen the documentary. Tim's Vermeer? No. It's fan-fucking-tastic. Let's hear about it. Best document I've ever seen. It's breathtaking. It's funny, you saw my documentary a week ago. Well, yours is the best one. Oh, very interesting timing. Well the truth comes out. Well the truth is yours is the second best. This one, this is more my kind of style. Yours was excellent. Well to be fair, your wife was talking, your dogs were jumping on us the entire time. The whole fucking time. But yours is, listen, people believe me, people will enjoy yours when it comes out

That's a fantastic fact. I talked to my mom about it. I said I said you remember Well, hold on. We'll get let we'll get into my doc and you're viewing me stepping your dog shit He she that wasn't his shit as your dog shit. No, it's Molly shit. I dust it for shit now Let's let's talk about pens.'s doc for a second here. Now first off, I've not seen it, I've not even heard about it, so where is it? I saw it on a plane, and I watched it, I was on American, it's on American, and I watched it going out to New York, and I watched it again coming back. And that guy, if you look on our website now, you'll see the picture of the guy's face or part of his face

guys a Genius he taught himself piano at seven. He Developed 3d stuff for video and you know, I'll just see sort of a polyglot does everything right? You're gonna say something Tim's Vermeer I'm gonna get to it with two Tim is I'm telling you Tim but it what's Vermeer me Vermeer is a famous painter, a very famous Dutch painter. He has – I don't say very famous, it's shaming. Well he's – I mean to shame you, I don't know about everybody else, but he is considered really sort of the pinnacle of the style of painting.

Right, and I was just trying to get the context. I didn't know Vermeer was, Tim's Vermeer. Right, okay, so Tim is who I'm trying to describe to you first. And then Vermeer is a famous painter who did these exquisitely detailed paintings that no one could figure out how he did them. Because they look like photographs, but like better than photographs. And there's, you know, there's tapestries and maps and... Sure, sure. The real art, the shit you appreciate, not the fucking bullshit that the assholes are doing today with the giant orbs.

It's unbelievable. And there's only like 24 of them in the world. There's very few left or known. And he, this guy who's like invented, you know, flies a helicopter and invents, you know, electrical moths and just... Tim. Tim decided, he just went and just does shit. He just, he's got, it reminds me of you a little bit, he's just gonna do stuff. And he goes, I'm gonna paint a Vermeer. I'm not a painter. But he read a book about how these Dutch painters use a lot of optics to try to recreate, they use trickery, you know, so to speak, in order to make some of their paintings. And no one's really, it was all very secretive

back then, no one really worked out how they had done it. The Dutch masters. The Dutch masters. And so he figured, well, shit, I can, I wonder what the Beelight does. He seeks out, there's the famous Vermeer painting, the milk look up the uh... the music lesson that's the one he actually does okay he paints every without being a painter paints over figures out a way to paint a vermiere

it's unbelievable but but it's it's what we what we always talk about which is let's just give elon musk whatever whatever the job is, give it to him. Give it to this super smart, motivated guy. This guy, in doing this painting, had to, if you put up the music lesson there, and you'll see, he had to rebuild the room, handcraft the furniture, make the pottery, figure out the grind, the pigments for the painting, build the lenses that were sort of age specific for the 16th century, create the glass, you know, and the lighting. He did it all himself. He doesn't

build furniture. He built that harpsichord. He built the fucking harpsichord. But let me say, let me say this. You see it? And tile the fucking floor. I see the harpsichord. To me, it's like, it was unbelievable. I took my breath away Paul Newman won an Academy Award and four driving championships and his own racing team, but I learned the point is this Drew and I've been talking about this for a long fucking time. It's it's finally dawning on me as As I as I see my kids and get up there

Everyone is so including you drew everyone is so fucking caught up in training, training. Where's your training? What about this? What about that? What about, you know, remember people used to say to me all the time, well, you know, Dr. Drew can dispense advice. So what about you? What do you got? I know this guy speaks to you very loudly. So go ahead. There's two things. You have to have a certain kind of intelligence and then that has that certain kind of intelligence Is like an exquisite dining car on a railroad and then that has to be hooked to a locomotive Yeah, if you hook that to a locomotive you're going somewhere then you got something the two apart Yeah, don't really do you too much.

The locomotive dragging nothing behind it, I do know a handful of guys that have a motor, but there's nothing attached to their locomotive, quiet. Then once in a while there's the exquisite dining car, but it's just sitting there on the tracks, just kind of blowing with the wind, not moving one way or the other But you hook the motor up to that that brain that intelligence and the motor then you have you have Tim

That's what you have and Then there's nothing that's out of reach because you can go I'll teach myself how to do this I'll teach myself how to play the viola. I'll teach myself how to do this. I'll teach myself how to play the viola. I'll teach myself Japanese I mean, by the way, he went to Holland and taught himself Dutch and read in Dutch everything that Vermeer did back in the day I'll also show you for every one of these guys. I'll show you a woman that is nowhere near them It's not you don't get this you can't do this when you have Your wife and your kids and your what-have-you. He has all daughters and they're grown. I'm guessing and mostly hopefully Hopefully out of out of the house, but the point is is

Smart guys when they're properly motivated can just go out and do anything they want. I mean, that's my I Think I would argue that there's a certain kind of brain that is... it's different than just smart and intellectual way, like be able to read and discourse on a book or learn math. It's a problem-solving building kind of mind that's a little different. It's a little different. And that's extra crazy intelligence, I think. I think that's sort of a... That's stuff you can't make in the lab. You're just born with that. You can develop it. You can develop... The problem-solving mind, the mechanical problem-solving mind, which I have, does get worked on like a muscle.

It's something that you first have an interest in. You have to have an interest. You have to go, how'd that get there? How's that work? I wanna build me one of them. But it's a muscle that keeps getting worked and then applied to almost any application. And it also has just a general problem solving application.

What it basically does is it says, at least in my mind, what are you asking this thing to do or not to do? What are you looking for out of this? Whatever the problem is, what are you trying to figure out? Whether you're hanging a big-screen TV or you're building a house or you're building a rocket ship. The first thing is how do you do it and then you start deconstructing it and you figure out what you're asking each component to do and then you can start sort of seeing it in a almost 3d version in your in your mind. Yes, yeah that 3d thinking I think is part of the deal and

I ain't got that myself but he basically what I'll tell you what you want to know what his sort of primary insight was was was that these people used something called camera obscura, which is just sort of a way of projecting stuff onto a wall, and people thought maybe they traced over it and used colors. Well, it turned out he figured out that they put the camera obscura up to a plate and then had a tiny little mirror off that plate, and then he would look at the mirror and go back and forth looking at his palette or at his what do you call this the evil yeah whatever the thing he's painting on and when the edge of the mirror would disappear with whatever color he was putting in or shade that's where he knew

he had done the right thing it was sort of painting by color painting by number and he did a whole thing by this. There's many, many, many, many problems. I'm gonna watch it. Yeah, you gotta watch it. You'll love it. Podcasting isn't just about talking, it's about growing, engaging, and monetizing, and that's where Podcast One Pro comes in. Whether you're an independent creator or a major brand, Podcast One, gives you the tools you need to take your podcast to the next level. We're talking about premium hosting, advanced analytics, dynamic ad integration, and expert distribution,

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