The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - South Beach Sessions - Lewis Black

Episode Date: December 19, 2024

Lewis Black has finally had enough… There’s a lot for the modern comedy icon to look back on (and look forward to) - Lewis gets to the root of where all that anger he has on stage comes from in real life (he learned some of it from watching his mom yell at the TV), and how he channels it. Dan and Lewis also walk through his career– from years of playwriting off-off-broadway, to getting big break after big break, to finally deciding to retire from a life on tour. Lewis and Dan also share stories about their brothers, and get into the spirituality of feeling someone’s presence after they’ve passed on. Don’t miss your last chance to see Lewis live on his “Goodby Yeller Brick Road, The Final Tour.” Visit lewisblack.com for tickets and tour dates. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Now's a good time to remember where the story of tequila started. In 1795, the first tequila distillery was opened by the Cuervo family. And 229 years later, Cuervo is still going strong. Family owned from the start, same family, same land. Now's a good time to enjoy Cuervo, the tequila that invented tequila. Go to Cuervo.com to shop tequila or visit a store near you. Cuervo, now's a good time. Trademarks owned by Bekley, SAB, the CV.

Copyright 2024, Proximo. Jersey City, New Jersey, please drink responsibly. Hello and welcome to South Beach Sessions. I'm particularly excited about this one because this man is a giant, a titan in the comedy industry. You usually don't get to do it for close to 40 years. Usually you age out, something happens and it's hard to keep up. But he's got his present tour, which he claims is the last one, I do not believe him.

Goodbye Yeller Brick Road, the final tour. You can find tickets at LewisBlack.com. I wanna see if some of these numbers are right, because you have done in some years 250 shows in a year. Well, close to that, but 200, yeah. Okay, so if I say 40 plays, three best-selling books, 12 comedy albums, 14 specials, two Grammys, what am I missing?

And about 20,000 shows in a lifetime? I don't know what the number is, but all the other numbers were kind of around the right place. Okay, what are you proudest of in there? Like if I tell you there, you can only choose one of those things to hold up as the best part of your legacy,

what do you assign the greatest worth to? It would be stand up because I wanted to be a playwright and along the way, I kind of, because I was doing that and I was at a drama school, I learned from the actors there. So I started to perform more and be in plays more. So I mean, but you know, so it was, I was writing plays and then acting in shows.

And I thought, and I never wanted to direct, but that was the thing about stand-up. I was writing, I was performing. It was all of them. It was everything. Well, did you want to be a thespian, or did you want to be like when, if you're going and studying drama

and deciding what your dreams are, are they written or are they performed? I wanted to write. That's really what I wanted to do. And why did you stop doing it in the traditional way of writing plays? Not that you have stopped, but somewhere along the path you decided to go stand up. I was working my way up the ladder of theater, and theater, I started to notice more and more was like an abusive orphanage where you would go in and you should be treated awfully.

And it was like, you know, I mean, you'd send a play in and then you'd send the play and then they'd say, oh, we didn't, you wouldn't hear for a year. You poured your life into the fulfillment of writing in lonely spaces. You give it to the world and then there's no applause. Yeah, it takes me years. I used to say about it, you could put, you'd be better off as a playwright. I'm talking to you playwrights out there now,

that if you took the play, put it in a bottle and threw the bottle into a large body of water, that someone would pick that bottle up faster and pull the play out and read it. It would all occur quicker than it ever did in any theater that I visited. So it would cross an ocean. It would have to cross an ocean first,

because, so you weren't getting any, you weren't getting the fulfillment that would come with just laughter, telling a joke to an audience, getting the immediate feedback of laughter. just laughter, telling a joke to an audience, getting the immediate feedback of laughter. It's the opposite of that. Yeah, I mean, it was, you know, you waited and waited,

and then you had to work with people, which was great. I mean, all of it was really what I wanted to do and really kept thinking I was gonna do it. And I was doing it until I was 40 and that was the turning point. I'd gotten to AAA Ball, which is like a, you know, a repertory theater that's in the community that's really well known.

So this one was in Houston and it's the Alley Theater and been there forever. And I thought, you know, I made it, you know, I finally made it and that's the step I wanted. If I could get there and have my plays done at those types of theaters, great. And I was, then I could maybe get some teaching work and all of this stuff.

And so I go there to do this and it was, it was everything they kind of told me was a lie and it was just this horrible experience. And I went, I've kind of aspired, now I'm finally getting to where I wanted to get and it was awful and I was supposed to stay on and work with people that work with them on the play and they said, I said, well, you know,

you're gonna put me up and I was broke, okay? So now I'm like, we had to actually take money, my friend, it was a musical that we wrote and I had, in order for us to get another actor, because we wanted a number of actors from New York, and they did not hire the actors, the amount of actors from New York that we requested. So I had to take money out of my salary,

he did too, in order to pay another actor. And when you say broke, you're talking about from 20 to 40 you're broke? Oh yeah, I mean I had, I was making enough money that I was fine day to day, everything fine, moving along, but no health insurance, no nothing, ridiculous, it was like crazy, but I ran a space in New York City from about 30 to 38, 40, that was a theater

that a ton of people worked at, everybody worked at. It was a small downstairs theater, which had a bar in it, and that was kind of the way we supported it. Had it, it was in a restaurant, the guy is a very close friend of mine and it's becoming over time. We went downstairs and we just started doing shows. And then people like Aaron Sorkin showed up

because there was nowhere to get anything done when we were there. This was the 80s into the 90s, it was nowhere. It was, so people, very talented people, Edie Falco, Aaron Sorkin, Alan Ball, who wrote True Blood, he wrote that and a number of other successful pieces. We had all these people coming in and doing really great work. But are you thinking at this point of giving it up because it's not really a career

or you're making enough so this is good enough because this is triple A and I'm not gonna be a major league player but maybe I can still keep fighting from here and become a playwright, become more of a playwright, a more successful playwright. But then you didn't or then you chose another path. And I think, correct me if I'm wrong on this,

I don't wanna be presumptuous, but in what I've read about you and what the producers of this podcast are trying to do, I lost my brother recently, and they've asked me to explore grief, and you tie your career change to the loss of a brother, correct? Yeah.

You made that jump somewhere spiritually around whatever you learned about mortality and grief there? Or he opened a spiritual door for you? He literally, as far as I'm concerned, this is, will sound, unless you've kind of gone through it, I'm minorly psychotic, but there were doors that were not opening, and I had agents. I had all of the things kind of in place that would say, you know, even as a playwright or as an actor, I'd started to do, you know,

little bits and pieces in performance. And my brother passed away, and I was just kind of got my foot into comedy. I mean, I was starting to... I had left theater and was starting to become a... I was committing myself to being a comedian. And my brother passed away then. And I, um... I found that, like, I couldn't...

All of a sudden, like, I got a one-man show in New York City. That came along. These stories just started literally, like, bam, bam, bam, bam. like I got a one-man show in New York City. That came along. These stories just started literally like bam, bam, bam, bam. And between whatever my attitude was, and I really believe it was him. He was pushing people around going, come on, let him do it.

After life, you're saying. You're saying that he was doing this for you. Yeah. How close were you two? We were really close. You know, he was, and he had been really supportive of my career, huge. I mean, I couldn't have survived without him.

I would think that most people would think you too cynical to be that spiritual about afterlife and your brother opening doors from the beyond for you. It changed the way I looked at things, that in part. I wrote a book, It's Me of Little Faith, in which I kind of went through all of the experiences that I'd had in terms of religion. So I've always kind of, in spirituality, I've always kind of had that kind of thing. That's super interesting to me,

because I will tell you, and this part is hard and it sounds like lunacy to speak it out loud, but there are times that I just feel something from my brother pushing me in a more joyful direction because it's what he wants for me. That's the deal, I believe. I mean, I think, I think because... The cynic in me doesn't want to accept it. The cynic in me does not want to accept that I know so little about the unknown that I can believe in something so syrupy. Yeah, well, it seems syrupy, but it's also like, it's so obvious, if it happens. It can't be unfelt.

When I feel it, it can't be unfelt because it melts all the cynicism in me. It will make my eyes water to believe it. I want to believe it, and just have a lot of trouble with the trust to believe it. I want to believe it. I just have a lot of trouble with the trust of believing it. Yeah. Well, because there's nothing, you know, we don't, there's no kind of, it's like the, we have a, I believe that the sense of humor is a muscle. Okay? It's a muscle that we don't,

we don't work on the way we work on all our other muscles. And no one really teaches humor in school. In the same way, in terms of whatever that, there's religion, you read the prayers, you read this, you read that. There's no one really opening that door for you. There's no one kind of going, you know this might happen. You kind of hear about it and some 60% to 70% of what comes out from people around is like, what?

The dog spoke to you, no. And it sounded like no. And that's, and so- Your mother visited you in the form of a cardinal or a bird of some sort. Yeah, the silliness of it. Yeah, and but that's what we're generally exposed to. And then when it actually... Because I felt... I mean, I don't talk about this much. When my brother passed away, I was at home. I just saw

him. Left, went home, he had passed away. I went back on the subway to, I wanted to be there, and the doctor had said, now it's an hour he's passed or so, and they had said to try to resuscitate him. And so I'm sitting there trying to resuscitate my brother and knowing this is, I'll do it, but this... Same, same, I did this a couple of times with him. Did you?

Yes, no, it's horrific. And also out of body? Yeah. And out of body. And then the thought that stopped me was, if I wake him up, if I bring him back, he's gonna be so pissed. And that's really what I, and I felt him in the room. And that followed, it's, that has,

now this is, phew, almost 30 years ago he passed. This is almost 30 years ago he passed. So it's about 30. And I've kind of lost that sense with him, that feeling of him being there. In part, I think, because he kind of went, okay, we did it, I'm done. You can go be happy now or to the degree that you can be happy around all of our human dysfunctions.

Exactly. And did you feel laughter in the room with him? Like, did you feel that while you're resuscitating him, he's going to be mad at me for getting the credit of resuscitating him? That's funny. That's one final joke from him at the end. Yeah, there was that.

And then there was that. And then there was also the sense of like a blanket. Like he kind of enveloped me in the sense that you talked about. I could feel him beside me. And that it gave me a sense of, and I had not had that sense before. I mean, I've thought about the fact that, you know, is there some place that we go? And it... This is your proof more than anything else? More than anything else, the proof is the feeling that

you would find fundamental, and no, I felt my brother's presence here from a different place. And furthermore, he changed my life path. And people who hear that and say, he's crazy, what is he talking about? How do you dissuade them of that because you've lived it? Fuck him. That's my feeling. I'm not gonna argue it. I wouldn't argue it with you.

I think if you feel it, you feel it. You and I are two people that no one would expect you would feel this. I would stun my audience, I think, with the feeling and I would say it with conviction too. There've been some things that have happened that are so gentle, but I was extraordinarily close to him

as it sounds like you were extraordinarily close. So why did you lose after, why do you lose, you say you lose the connection because now, why wouldn't he still be enjoying it with you if you're still enjoying the success and the fruits of your career at 76 when no comedian gets to do that? I don't know.

I think in part, I mean where I can trace it to your career at 76 when no comedian gets to do that. I don't know. I think in part, I mean, where I can trace it to is my mother passing away. And this is what I thought immediately is now, now that she's there, she's chasing him around. Well, you lost your parents, they were both in their hundreds, right? Like your father at 101 and your mother at 104.

And when I read the things that you say about them, I can't believe how normal and loving your environment was. I expect comedians to come from something different than that. Yeah, no, that was really completely, it's not, you know, were you this, were you that? I was, and especially in terms of the playwriting, it was interesting. My mother had, my mother was, if you're not going to be, look, I know you're not going to be a doctor.

Here's the next best thing. And this is before I'm going to grad school in terms of theater. And my mother says, you're not going to be a doctor. So the next best thing is you should run. Get into health insurance. That's where the big money is going to come. And I went, what? I'm not going to do that.

Oh, yeah, no. Do that. That'll be a really. And so that's where she was coming from. My father. Safer. Oh, yes. Much safer.

Because she couldn't believe that I, the fact that I got into a major drama school. I went to the Yale School of Drama, so that had a big, that's a big who, and so that didn't have any effect. She still didn't believe it. My father was like all in, great. You wanna do this, do it. Don't worry about her.

It's, you know, basically it's your life. Mine was the reverse. My father's an engineer from Cuba, an exile. Is that right? Yeah, he wants me to go into engineering and I'm coming and saying I wanna write. And so he's come and gotten freedom. He's going and sending me to a private school

that he can't afford, and I want to write. It's like, what are you doing? And my mom's like, you got to let him chase the stuff that he dreams about. That's funny. And my father was an engineer, a mechanical engineer. Well, let me read to the audience here what your relationship was with them. So Sam Black, you say, a great father and an extraordinary man. I was very lucky to have him in my life for so long. He was everything a man should be, loving, considerate, humble, for so long. He was everything a man should be, loving, considerate, humble, kind, giving,

a mentor, a man of fierce integrity, an artist with a vision. His smile was like sunshine and it has sadly gone out. I am blessed he was my father. He knew the path we should follow. The world is less of a place without him and none of this is bullshit. It's true.

What was he doing that would make him a man of fierce integrity? This is a remarkable story. My father was a mechanical engineer. He worked for the government, the federal government. He didn't go, when World War II came, he had just graduated from college. Instead of being drafted or conscripted, they took him into, they wanted him to work for the Department of the Army, designing, or the Department of the Navy.

He was gonna go to the Department of the Navy and design weapons, undersea weapons, but mainly sea mines. And then he did that and the war ended and he wanted to get into design, you know, other, you know, washing machines, anything that, you know, that we were producing. And he would kind of go to these places. And at that point there was, as you, your family may have experienced here, you know, there was, there was an anti-Semitism.

So he would go in for the interview and, uh, cause he doesn't, the name is not, Sam Black is not a, uh, you know, you don't go, you know, it's not like Steinowitz. So there was no tip off. And he would go in, do an interview, the interview would be great, and he wouldn't get the job. And he just kind of went. It was the early 50s, so it was a tough road to hoe then. And so he stayed with the government.

And he felt comfortable about sea mines because they're a weapon that you can, that defends you. It's not an offensive weapon. And he worked on defensive weaponry. And then- Protect instead of attack. Exactly. So, you know, even in the war, he's finding the morality. Yeah. And so he comes out, you know, and we're involved in all sorts of things and we would, you know, the whatever the whatever wars were up and but we you know, it was about mining harbors for people to protect themselves. So he and my mother have a huge argument about whether the Vietnam War is legitimate.

Is this really a legitimate war? Are we, you know, they keep referring to the Geneva Accords. And so my father sits down, and it was the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, it was based on the Geneva Accords that were signed and whatever. And he says, I'm going to find out if this is legitimate. So he reads this little... Nobody read the Geneva Accords that I knew of anywhere. We talked about it in school, but nobody. And now I'm in college and he reads it. And he closes it and he said,

there's no legitimate reason in here. This is immoral war. This is nonsense. This is bullshit. And he, um, then we mine Haiphong Harbor. So we take our sea mines and use them as an offensive weapon. And I remember, I can't remember if I was there when they, you know, at what point, but we were sitting around and he said, I'm going to be leaving my job, I can't do this. Just for moral reasons. For moral reasons. The shirt you're wearing is one of his designs, correct?

Yeah, it is, yeah. And he became an artist? Yeah. And so was it a thing where he's going from something that's rigid, he's disillusioned, and then he goes into the arts, and that births the openings that would be there for you later in life to pursue the arts as well?

Well, it really gave me the sense of, you know, of the, you know, commit to the things that you care about. I mean, it was, nope, I mean, all of this stuff, I'm gonna leave, I'm gonna go to Canada, I'm gonna do this. And it was like, in my own house was somebody who said, no, we're not doing this. I'm not doing it, I don't have to do it. And he goes and becomes, he works as an apprentice

to a guy who does stained glass, so he does stained glass for like three or four years. And then he would make these things for my friends. I'm going, you know, you spend like four months building like the Victorian mirror. I said, and you're charging him 100 bucks? What the fuck's the matter with you? And so I'm giving him the advice, I'll sell him.

And he did that and at the same time, he started to go to the junior college where you could go for, as a senior you'd go there and he took free classes and he took art classes for 20 years. And the great part of the story there was that he, they did an exhibition of about three or four years after he'd been painting there and they did an exhibition of about three or four years after he'd been painting there. And they did an exhibition of the students and put them up in some sort of a museum

that they had at the school. And somebody broke in and took two paintings, my father's paintings. Stolen. They stole my father's paintings. I said, does that make you feel better? He goes, no. He said, finally, a criminal with taste.

Mr. Gattier, I want to tell you a story. I'm serious here. My wife and my two daughters, they begged me to buy a Peloton. So I bought a Peloton and then I watched that Peloton sit in my office and stare at me. So you know what I did one day? I looked at it and so I decided to get off my ass and I jumped on the Peloton because no one else was using it and I paid for it. I mean so why not? Then I realized eventually that they bought it for me and I gotta tell you way more challenging than I could have ever imagined. Peloton coaches are walking the walk. I love the coaches. I do the Grateful Dead one. It's fantastic. They have a sub three-hour marathon runner, military trained athlete, a former college basketball player,

and so many other well-rounded coaches on their team. All this experience really shows in their classes which are never short of challenging, especially for me. So I jumped on it that first time, it was challenging, more challenging than I thought, then I wanted to beat the bike and so I kept jumping on it and I absolutely love it. I mean I'm the only one who uses it but again they got it for me. I mean, I had no idea. That's a little passive aggressive, don't you think? Find your push, find your power with Peloton at onepeloton.com.

You say of your mother, Jeanette. Yes. She died as she lived. It was on her own terms always. She was one of a kind. There will never be anyone like her. Fierce about her belief that the world could be a better place, that all children are our children. She was a of a kind. There will never be anyone like her. Fierce about her belief that the world could be a better place,

that all children are our children. She was a brilliant teacher. Wanted to be more than a teacher. She was hard on my friends because she didn't want the world beating us up. It didn't. She was a ferocious angel. When I perform, you can hear her from time to time.

Sarcasm was her sword. We were all lucky that she mothered us. I won't miss her. She's always here. I can't thank you enough for giving her your attention. It made her very happy. It took the sting out of her not living her dream. Through you, she was living?

No, she was, in part, yeah, through me. You know, I mean, I got her out there. I would quote her. I would, you know, gave her her due. She was the one screaming at the television when you were young and arguing with the newscast or arguing with the state of the world. The state of the world, the newscast, the news itself,

whatever it was. You know, we sat there with, you know, it's that stupid joke. You know, I thought that Walter Cronkite was a part of the family. I know, it's that stupid joke. You know, I thought that Walter Cronkite was a part of the family. I mean, it was night after night. Because you're just yelling about the state of America. It's what you're doing now, is it not?

And it keeps getting worse somehow. It seems it keeps giving you fodder, keeps giving the family fodder. It's worse now somehow than it was 70 years ago. Well, because I said people go, you know, people will heckle me from time to time. I go, you're acting like I have any effect on anything, you idiots. I said the bottom line is I broke into this business and was doing standup for the past 40 years. And guess what? Nothing not only has nothing changed, it's gotten worse.

It's gotten, all of this input that I've had, that you think I've had this extraordinary effect and changed things in my direction, no. No, it's just gotten worse. Can you tell me about how it is that she influenced you and how they shaped love for you, relationships for you, because the world that you have chosen to work in is not a friendly one to relationships.

It's not conducive to recreating whatever love it is that you had in your household. Yeah, no, I kind of couldn't, my mother, my mother's effect on me was sarcasm. I mean, I really picked up, you know, and a sense of humor. She had a great sense of humor. At times, though, her sense of humor is so dark. You know, across so many lights.

But my father had a real good sense of the soft and the gentle. So he knew, I learned from her, you know, to, you know, how to use the, your words as a knife. And from my father, I learned that you don't stab someone with the knife and that's really what because my father's the one who said In his effect on me was he said he was reading catch-22 I couldn't have been more than 14 and he was laughing and you don't really normally see your father laugh And I said, what is it? He goes this book. It's really it's it's very funny. I said should I read it? He said yeah, it'll tell you everything you need to know about working in the real world.

And it was huge. It had a huge effect on me. All of a sudden I kind of, I went, oh, this is why high school is like. Well, you manage, though, somehow, usually angry comedy isn't something that doesn't have a knife that'll slice somebody in the face. Like, you managed to walk the line pretty well

between anger and not being cruel. Yeah, I tried. And also, it's because the, um... I, uh... There's one thing about being angry, which I will at times flip out on stage and then have to tell the audience I think I've gone too far. and then have to tell the audience I think

I've gone too far. But 95% of the time I'm acting it. It's the only way you can do it. You have to act it. You have to have this sense that you're in part kidding, that you mean it but you're kidding. Because I used to to it took me a long time to learn to yell on stage I just thought this is you can't yell at people and I would be on stage especially in the small club in New York City that we worked you know where I was working I would turn around when I was gonna yell some I turned to my back to the audience and yell at the wall. Well, but you're not acting, right?

I mean, you're just turning up your 8 to a 10. That's the only thing. The anger's real. You're just turning up the character to make him the lovable comedian. Let's get back, though, to what I was asking you that I veered away from. What did love look like in the household to you?

And as someone who doesn't have kids and has devoted himself to this lifestyle, where does love inform how difficult it is to have relationships with the kind of career that you have had? Well, it was, you know, for them, there was a real bond. I mean, those two really had that kind of real love thing. really had that kind of real love thing. I mean, they were very much in love.

I mean, it was, you know, and not, you know, not syrupy, not just to, you know, like, you know, my father comes home and says he's going to leave his job, and my mother doesn't panic. Whatever you want to do. She, I think, I mean, as I I grew older I began to realize that she had been kind of, she would have preferred, I asked her, she's 60, we were having, I was 60, we were having lunch in Vegas, I said, I never asked the question, I said, what you was, what you wanted kids and my mother goes, pointing at my father, he did.

She said, because if it was up to me, I wouldn't have had children. And I was like, well, I'm glad you waited till I was 60. You didn't tell me that when I was a boy. Well, she could have had her own life and done big things outside of just raising you because of wherever America was in the 50s that made him the earner and put her in her place. Exactly. and she never got over that, I don't think.

I mean, I think that was her frustration. Well, she gives up her entire life for the kids and does it very well, it sounds like. Yeah, and gave it up more so in some ways for the kids in the neighborhood, because I've just, as we've grown older, friends of mine have said, you know, your mother saved my life.

Your mother did things for me that were hugely important. Your mother, in a sense, was a surrogate mother. I mean, there were three or four good friends of mine who never, I knew that they really appreciated my mom. I didn't know her effect on them. She didn't have that with us. I mean, I think that in part it was kind of like, okay, I'll show you. I don't know where it came from, but it made me happy that, you know, I knew she had that instinct.

Oh, it didn't translate as necessarily warmth or affection toward you guys? Well, it would make sense if she didn't want you. Yeah, I know, wouldn't it? I know. I mean, if she's like dying of resentment because when she sees in your face is you get all your dreams, she doesn't get any of hers. I don't know what she imagined being. What was she denied?

I mean, I think she wanted to be something in the doctor realm, I mean, or something within that. Anne could have done it, sounds like, and probably would have done it, if not for the interference of you guys. Yeah, and was enraged that she had, what would have been by the end of it, she graduated, she went, got into college at 15,

so by the time she was 21, she had started to amass master's credits, which she then at some point announced to us that she was going through something where she was going, you know, son of a bitch, I had enough credits, this should have been, if I had these credits now, it would be a doctorate. So that's why she's yelling at the television, right? Yeah, that's part of it.

But you don't know it as a child because it's concealed from you, but it doesn't show itself necessarily in warmth. The world being, you know, the world was unfair. And so how does this affect or illuminate your relationships going forward as someone? First thing was I thought, and I've heard of other people where I thought, being in that household, and your mother's yelling not only at this, but at you about stuff,

and the decibel level in the house was high. My father was very quiet. She's like yelling away. And so in one of the first relationships I had, I'm yelling. And I still even now I'll be yelling at somebody and they go, God, you're yelling me. I'm going, no, I'm not yelling. You don't even know what yelling is. This is what and I didn't because I thought it I said, you know

What I always thought was because I was yelled at all the time that yelling was love That's so interesting that you trust somebody enough that you can yell at them and they and they're going to that's love and communication Because that's what you had pattern for you in your home. Yes, but not just that you're not merely but not just that, you're not merely yelling. Also, your character as a yeller is getting rewarded and getting identity in every corner of the place that you're measuring success. All your dreams are coming true because as your last tour, final tour, allegedly, I don't believe it,

goodbye yeller brick road, like this became your identity and your career and a path to happiness is chosen through your late brother. Yeah and that been a path to happiness for me because it was something that gave me great satisfaction and over time I began to realize because I couldn't, it just, I was traveling so much and finally had a chance to really do, you know, you know, I had a creative place where I could, now I could write a book and now I could act in something and people were coming to me to do certain things

and all of that. So all of a sudden this career that just exploded and that I could really enjoy it and realize that I would be hard pressed to share that with someone and especially hard pressed to share it with a child. That it would be about, because I felt it was about me. Oh, it was feeding so many of your vanities

and making, and feeling so much like warm love that you didn't even need anything else. It didn't feel like warm love, but I didn't realize until the last, until I was kind of in the last, one of the last specials I did, where I kind of was standing in front of the audience and I kind of went, you know, I,

you've been my primary relationship. I come on stage, it's more than just the laughter and all of that. I mean, people talk about that. And I mean, and when it's rolling, it is really quite something and really is an endorphin high. Seinfeld says you don't feel your feet, right?

You're hovering above fight or flight so much and you're killing it that that is the most joyous, creative space. Yeah. Most fulfilling. Just you're buoyant. The laughter, it's the best that a comedian can feel. It's almost the best a human can feel, according to your definitions of feeling things.

And then at times, because I don't, I'm writing on stage, there have been times that I'm kind of doing, I'm kind of figuring out something in my head and talking to them, and then they respond and that gets me to another level and then they respond again. And then it's like this really weird kind of like, I don't know where I begin and they, where I end and they begin or where they end and I begin. The best feeling you've known?

It was, well, sex. Okay, all right, but I, thank you, but I thought it was, it was in the realm, it was in the realm of that, I would think, that if I gave you the choice of the next 30 years, you live as long as your parents, and what you get for the next 30 years is great sex the rest of the way,

or that laughter the rest of the way for the next 30 years, I think you're choosing the latter instead of the former. I'm gonna have to cut a deal. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Because the way that you guys talk about that is the way that athletes talk about being in the zone, but you were married for 10 months in 1974, right? The reason some of this is so interesting to me

is because I got great fulfillment from reaching what I thought were all my professional dreams and desires, but because I was doing it alone, it was a little bit lonely. I wanted to be sharing it in a way that had some depth and some connection. And not until falling in love in my late 40s

did I realize that something, there was something else available to me other than the just feeding forever the selfish narcissism of isn't it great that everybody, you know, whatever, applauds me or laughs at me because that, and then I get to make a career this way. 250 nights on a road feels like a dream

for somebody who's a performer, who's a thespian. I'm making a living performing and making people laugh. It seems like joy. And I was making up for time, because I'll tell you, if I hadn't left, because of general circumstances, what was happening in the club, and also that I was kind of moving into doing stand-up,

that I was as happy in that club making literally what would be $500 a week as I've ever been with the success that I've had. Because it really is about the doing it and the feeling good of the instantaneous laughter, the money and all the other stuff, the fame, the specials, that stuff is nice, it's great to make a living, but it's not the reason you do it.

No, but the reason I did it was is I had, down in that basement, we had a remarkable community. So somebody, you'd work with somebody like, let's say, let's for example, like an Alan Paul who brought us, he shows up with this whole group of kind of a sketch comedy group is where he starts. And so you're watching his writing, but you're also,

I get 12 other actors coming in with them and then they show up with stuff And you start to watch all these people kind of expressing themselves. There was a real joy of being able to be the guy with two of my close friends, be the guy who says, you know, here's the space, use it. And then sit at the back and go, that's really good. A courtside legend is born.

The Raptor Chicken Nacho Poutine from McDonald's. Our world famous fries topped with seasoned chicken, gravy, stringy cheese curds, tortilla strips and drizzled with nacho cheese sauce. Get your claws on it. For a limited time only, I participate in McDonald's restaurants in Ontario. So which is the long term relationship for you if you could only pick one? Is it with the audience or is it with the art? Wow.

Wow. That's really, that's like, I need to think about that for a week. That's a really good question. And I hate to say that, because people say that all the fucking time now. Boy, that's a good question. I'm really glad you asked. It's a stall tactic, but you are thinking about it.

And you've devoted your life to this thing. That relationship that you have had that doesn't make it lonely, that makes it shared, is both with the audience and the art. But you're saying you'll do it in a basement with the 12 people who are your friends who are sort of your audience, but that's not really what you're talking about there.

And so I'm asking you, I've made career choices so that I'm working with and around the people whose company I enjoy to make the things. But I'd have a hard time answering that question as well. As someone who doesn't have kids and just recently fell in love and by falling in love because i want to talk to you about anger gave me real access lubricants that i needed to feel because i'd always

repressed my anger and so i've i've had anger uh... over the last seven years you know in a way that uh... has been surprising me because there's been sort of a flume release on my emotions since I've arrived at my 50s and given myself over to somebody with all of those vulnerabilities.

So it wasn't just the fact that she irritated you and you snapped. No, it's never that. But I have just done some real learning around some of the things that you're talking about. I'm interested in your anger because I just recently like sort of got access to it. I'm just now learning to treat anger as information,

as data, as stuff that is informative to me that I don't have to react to emotionally if I can just observe that I'm doing it when I'm doing it. That's tough, initially. That's not the way rage works generally. No, no, but you can learn. The consciousness of that has been a real learning tool.

I'm still not good at it, but to see in retrospect where it is my anger has gotten me because I haven't treated it as information, and then I just spill over emotionally and then behave in a way I shouldn't. Wow. Yeah. But you've seen in your,

but you've had a relationship with anger since you were a child. My parents always pushed that down. I never saw any of that. I never saw, what passed for love in my house never had anger, and it was concealed from us. My parents had to show a unified front, so I didn't have, I've told this story before,

I was 30-something years old in the back of a car and I saw my face in the rear view mirror the first time I saw my parents argue and I just was reduced to like a four-year-old. Wow. Yeah. It was just funny to see my head shrink and become a child in the back seat because I didn't have any, I didn't,

it sounds like you had at least an honest, an honest appraisal of feelings in your household. Well, there was, you know, I mean, it was a spectrum between my father who, my father was like Buddha. I mean, we, you know, some of my friends said, it's like he must be watching a dirty movie all day. But not because he's been beaten down

by an angry woman, right? No, uh-uh, no, he came to the table with it. And I think that kept her calm and kept her kind of focused. Good teammates. All you saw was actually good teammates. Yes. And they really, and she was in a boot, she was coming to my school teaching, and she was a substitute teacher. So now she's wandering around and people are coming up and going, you won't believe what your mother said in the class today.

So she's like getting rave reviews as a comic, the stuff that was coming out of her mouth. Well, some of the stuff she could have been, if not for the time and the place, correct? Yeah. And so do you feel them at all? coming out of her mouth. Well, some of the stuff she could have been, if not for the time and the place, correct? Exactly, yeah. And so, do you feel them at all? Do you feel your parents in the same sort of way that you felt your brother in the opening

of doors, or is that different? No, different. I feel them more as, I don't really feel, I never felt them, they were there for so long, it was almost really another land. You know, as I, in my act I now say, you know, if it was, it's the equivalent of, you know, if I get a sense of what it's like to have a parent live that long and then, and how come maybe

I don't feel it, I shouldn't have been having an argument with my mother when I was 70 years old. Okay, because I mean, I would say, can we drop the act? Okay, you know, I'm already. She's 100 years old. She's 100 years old and still treating you like a child at 70.

Why aren't you retiring? What is the matter with you? You keep working, even toward the end, as she was kind of drifting into the, like at 102 she's screaming at me about this. I'm going, what are you, I don't need to argue with you about this. And we had a literally had an argument about when I should take social security.

I'm going, this is not sane. There's nothing sane about me discussing when I take social security. What is the answer to her question, why aren't you retiring? Because you're alleging you are in this special Good-bye Yeller Brick Road. I don't believe you. The final tour.

That's fine. I don't believe you. I will. What I'm saying is I'm not touring anymore, which means I'm not doing getting on the bus and roaming from Village to Dell, as I like to call it. I'm not doing that anymore. You'll open when Kreischer's got a theater that's easy work. Exactly. when getting on the bus and roaming from Village to Dell, as I like to call it. I'm not doing that anymore.

You'll open when Kreischer's got a theater that's easy work. Exactly. OK. So you're retiring from having to carry the whole economy on your back, which can be hard for a comic. Well, partly that. And then there's other stuff.

When you asked the part of the answer to that question about art, what attracts me, the art or my relationship to the audience? Part of what it is is that I feel like that relationship, I breach the conclusion of that relationship with my audience. That means in terms of week after week after week, and so that I have freed up time so that I can go back to just the art, just sitting in a room and writing another book

or writing a play. Where touring is, is that it used to be because I was kind of one of the people, one of the few people doing it back then. It was like George Carlin and that, then they asked me, do you want to tour theaters? I went, yeah, this is like George Carlin and that, you know, and then they asked me, do you want to tour theaters? I went, yeah.

This is like my whole life now. Everything is coming together. I could be in a theater. So you know, that was huge for me. And I don't care how I get to the theater. I'll get to the theater however I get to theater. Do I need to MC an open mic? Right.

So they gave me that opportunity to work in theaters and I thought that was really, that really has always been a pleasure and it's really, but it's the mechanics of it. It's the going, you know, it used to be we would pick, we're going to go to these three cities. But now we're finding that, you know, a lot of this past tour was as it would be, you'd go, where we would go, A, like that running up and down was not going to be bad. That's easy. But we find ourselves doing where, you know, we're going, start in Fort Lauderdale, go back up to... So you're just talking logistics,

the logistics of touring have become a giant pain in the ass. They are huge. It's much more problematic than it was. And then going into towns where I did it because part of the reason that I loved doing it was I got to see America. I mean... Oh, what a great way to travel and see America. It was. Sure. Like, funded by your art? Like that's the dream, well that's the dream.

It was, it certainly was a dream, and it really, it was huge, and it was why the bus, and why I kept going, and I can go to Bismarck, I can go to Boise, are you kidding me? I could go, I went through Canada three times. Do you have like a pinch me gratitude moment, or moments that are the landmarks of where it is you'd be most emotional because

you'd be like how is this my life or here's my brother with me providing something I'm sharing with him because I've arrived well beyond where my dreams resided? Yeah, have I had those? I still have it, you know, I still, you know, I've had it constantly, you know, when I, you know, Inside Out 2 became, that I did, became a blockbuster. I mean, it's like, I mean, come on. That is not, that was not even in the cards, okay? And that was like a complete and utter, this is crazy.

You were the voice of anger. You got to voice anger as a theater guy. Yeah, and have kids love my character, which really made me happy. You made anger palatable, not beyond palatable, lovable. Well, that's career legacy stuff. Yeah, that's really. Like that's, I mean, I'm not gonna say it's who you are,

but it's who your character has been, no? Yeah, it's true, it's making that, it is. And that comes, I hope, from something I think is important with any comic that I like is humility. There has to be a certain humility when you're up there. I mean, you're acting like you're in charge of everything, but you're also, you can't be, you acting like you're in charge of everything but you're also you can't be you know you've got to be humble about it. Well can you separate, can you help me see the separation between the real you

and the costume that you have put on for 40 years because you are in character as someone who's always wanted to be an actor? Wow run that body, Bob. The real you, no, that's okay. The real you versus, I understand that on stage is the real you, but like I was saying, it's the eight turned up to 10. You've, this character that you have

of rage, bile, not cruel, funny, lovable anger, I don't know if that's what's in your kitchen at night eating dinner. Like, you might get angry about thing X, but I don't know that the characters on stage who has had all the success you are is the you at home. It's, I, as I said, if I was like that all the time, I'd have been dead by the time I was 40.

I mean, I'm not like that all the time, I'd have been dead by the time I was 40. I mean, I'm not like that all the time. But it will start. I will pick up a paper. My comedy begins with anger. I'm funniest when I'm angry. That was the tip. That was when I figured it out.

I went, oh. That's your muse. Yeah. Turning around and yelling at the wall didn't help. That people, I am funniest because I'm stumbling around looking for words. I'm like, I am, as kids would say, you know, you're really, you know, you're like my father, only you're funny. I've got that ability to express that kind of- But all of that is refined. What I'm saying is your costume is very refined

as a thespian, who, Jezelnik, whoever, I don't know who you admire these days for wearing a costume and being a character. Well, because you're not that angry, but because you've gotten so much of your identity, profit, success, rewards from being on stage, as if you are that kind of angry. I could see where your identity might get like merged

between the two human beings because one of them is bringing you all the rewards. It's the one on stage. Yeah, but I don't, that's really, I've literally put on my sport coat and in a nice shirt and now I wear wear jeans and walk out on the stage. And that 50 feet from the time I make that cross, I've become... And what's weird is, and this is the...

What happens is, once it's over, when they're applauding me, all of that drops and it's like very... There's that strange moment of like the fuck is what's the big deal you know I didn't I don't deserve this he deserved it but he's he left now he but he said good night this is the the show ended and now I've got to do the applause thing and but I really does I I just, it goes away. Bumble knows it's hard to start conversations. Hey, no, too basic.

Hi there. Still no. What about hello, handsome? Who knew you could give yourself the ick? That's why Bumble is changing how you start conversations. You can now make the first move or not. With opening moves, you simply choose a question to be automatically sent to your matches.

Then sit back and let your matches start the chat. Download Bumble and try it for yourself. You've been doing it so long. The reason I asked the question the way that I did, you've been doing it for so long and done so many reps of it. You've got more than the 10,000 hours of expertise that I can imagine that the walk from the dressing room to going on stage is you putting on some sort of armor

that you've been putting on forever so that you can go do the thing that brings the intimacy between you and the audience that you might not be brave enough to do as the real you. You're the real you might have too many insecurities to connect with the real you. You're the real you might have too many insecurities to connect with your audience there. That's why it takes, the hardest thing is you get,

there's the person who you sit with, I mean, they, you know, the guys you work with, they're guys who are extremely funny that you work with. Would they, what would they, you know, people go, you know, you should really do comedy. And there's, and they, they're not gonna be, there's a big difference between the guy sitting here, and I've said it in, a number of times when I teach,

you know, a bit of like, about stand-up, that 10 feet to getting on the stage, you're funny here, but can you do it 10 feet and you're on stage? The expectation of funny is totally different. I will tell you that throughout my career, one of the best producers I had when he put me and my father on television,

he implored the producers of that show, he was telling them, do not place the expectation of funny on them. Let them be funny as human beings, let them overachieve because there's not the expectation of funny on them. Let them be funny as human beings. Let them overachieve because there's not the expectation of funny. The reason I admire comedy so much is because the expectation of funny

makes it that only 300 to 500 of you can make a career at it every year with. Because the expectation of funny is a terrible burden. It's brutal. And that's what makes it difficult for many people to do that 10 foot walk. Because it's just by the time they get there, go, what know, and that's what makes it difficult for many people to do that 10-foot walk, because it's just by the time they get there, they're going, what the fuck was that?

They paid for you to make them laugh. They expect to laugh. That's what makes you, you can fear it, if not in the costume, that you've perfected over the years that can tame it. Yeah, but finding that that costume using that word finding that persona is is the roughest part I think of there's some comics who were really you know I have that instinctually you

know they just have it from the get-go and they know why they're you know They may not understand yet why they're funny, but they are it's part of their their toolkit and they've got it already That's like 2% of the comics I've ever met I did a lot of Open my you know these you know are been in lineups with comics and kind of gone wow this is This person is really gonna be good if and when. Watching Jim Gaffigan grow as a comic was great because it was like, all of a sudden, he'd been rolling along, he was doing well,

and then he found that little voice that comments on what he's doing. And I went, wow, he really, that's a huge breakthrough because it's finding those things. It's finding out how to go out there with maintaining the armor and not showing the armor and being and trusting. And a lot of the times, what is the most personal to you is the thing that makes you the funniest. And so to say, oh, I'm gonna show this, I'm gonna show my anger.

God, they're gonna love this is crazy because what if they don't like it? Then they don't like me. Well, this is what I wanted to ask you about how you carve likeability, how you curate it, how formulaic you are about knowing, as many stand-up comics do, what needs to be tapped into so that you can maintain the right side of likable, I guess?

How, after 40 years of doing this and sculpting this, how did you arrive at your comfort with voice around anger? Where was the breakthrough there? You get to it at 40 years old, and then how much stumbling around do you do before you realize, okay, this is who my character needs to be, this is what my voice is? Well, it was the first time was a comic

that I named Dan Ballard, worked out of Michigan, and it came into the club I ran. And we would do a, when I first started doing standup more regularly, it was on Saturday night, we'd have a free show, I'd host it. Hosting allowed that kind of freedom you have. What hosting allows is that there's no expectation you're gonna be really funny.

So I grew from that into being funny and then he came up one night and he was just visiting. I hadn't seen him in a while and he said, and he'd been performing and he goes, when you go back on stage I want you to yell everything. Just yell it. He said, you're angry and you have reasons to be angry and you're on stage, you should be yelling about it about it. Said I'm yelling all the time on stage nothing that I say

it's everything I say is goofy I shouldn't be up there yelling you need to go up there and yell just go do it. How long had you been doing it at this point? I'd been doing it off and on for since I was 21, but not committed. Do it, forget about it. But for 20 years, okay, but and so now how long are you in? You have now decided to dedicate, some door is opened, opened by your brother and you're now looking for what does the costume look like? Well, what happens there when to finish the, what happens when I go on stage and yell is I went, oh wow, this is it.

That obvious. It was, I was like, what up? And it was like, how did it take this long? But I see it in everybody else that I've watched and really whose work I've thought is terrific. You know, you watch them grow and you, I kind of went, wow, that's the door. And that, then everything was about modulating it.

Everything was about how do I use this? How do I use what I've got here? How do I use this thing that is funny and that I know makes me funny? How do I do it? And then apparently for a while I had no idea. I just, I would do, I'd come on stage full bore yelling and then get louder.

I mean, I was crazy. My friend Kathleen Madigan, who's one of my favorite comics on earth, and we'd been close for a long time, she and I met on the road and she said, it was, you know, after years, she said, you know, when I first was watching you on stage, all I thought was, he can't possibly make it.

They don't let... I don't know how he's doing it. They're not laughing for seven minutes. They are scared to death of you. And she said, but I was afraid to tell you that, because then after seven minutes, you finally broke him. And then they started laughing. And I didn't notice it at all. At all. And she said, but I was afraid to tell you that, because then after seven minutes, you finally broke them. And then they started laughing. And I didn't notice it at all, at all.

I didn't know that people come up and go, you know, how'd you learn that thing? I didn't even know that I did the fingers. So this is a bit out of body for you here. The entire experience, like you, it's fascinating to hear you describe going to this place visiting it occupying it living in it and then leaving it yeah what is that it's called in in in sane cultures it's called schizophrenia but this is just

acting it's just it's one of the things that draws you to acting is the fact that you can, that you're performing as a robot whose features you're all controlling. Yeah and then also that you're doing, you're going up there, I mean 60% of what I do on any given night I've done before. I did, I'm working on whatever my special is going to be. So it's like 50 or 60 percent is coming. That's all stuff you know works, right? Largely from audience to audience, no matter where you are, that 50 or 60 percent is going to give you 50 or 60 percent of the confidence you need to try and push it to 100%. Right, and that's exactly it. And then, 60% what I found was that I was really able to,

you know, I put this, that I have to, the one thing where you're acting chops come in, and you see it with Seinfeld, but every comic does this, every great actor, that it's really literally, I'm doing this, especially actors on Broadway. I mean, it's I'm doing this for the first time.

You're the first people hearing this. It's gotta be sound, it can't sound rote. It can't sound like you've said this a thousand times. It has to sound completely fresh. Well, that's Seinfeld, one of Seinfeld's many gifts, is that he is able to deliver it as if it is fresh and also conceal what is the very real disdain he has for just people in general.

Yeah. That his anger is more substantive than yours, and nobody knows it. That it anger is more substantive than yours, and nobody knows it. That it's hidden behind an act that is just meant to conceal that he openly loathes you. And he's conquered comedy in a way that doesn't have a whole lot of precedent, either.

So who are the craftsmen and craftswomen that you most admired? I know you grew up with Pryor and Carlin, and those are the guys who tend to formulate just about everyone's shaping about your age. But Bruce. Bruce was really big. Willing to get arrested for his work. Yeah, and also the level of his work was,

I mean, you can see how it really affected George Yeah, and also the level of his work was, I mean, you can see how it really affected George and his work, because George went down, I think George was there one of the nights that Lenny was busted and went with him to the police station. And Lenny kept going, what the fuck's the matter with you?

You know you don't need to be here and and but Lenny it really did that There's a thing called anybody really if you if you like comedy There's a thing called the Carnegie Hall album, which was is is a double album That he did a Bible of, a manuscript of scripture of sorts. It is. For me, and I kind of kept pushing it away because I knew if I really, until I trusted whatever was, and this is way early, I'm like in my 20s, my early 20s.

And I was doing stand up just because I was fascinated by it. And I didn't really want to, I wasn't going to do it for a living at all. So I always kind of did it to kind of see, you know, to get some writing out there and just to see how it worked. I was just looking at the mechanics of it. And I thought, if I listen to Lenny Bruce, I'm just going to imitate him.

So I waited to the point where I felt, I'm figuring out, but I mean rudimentary. And I listened to the Carnegie Hall thing and that's just mind boggling. I read the books that he wrote and listened to the other albums. All the other albums are just clips of his work. This thing is.

So you feel like you're looking at a sculpture by a foremost artist and it's a masterpiece. And even now you would look at it as such in your 70s. You would still look at it. Oh yeah, no, it's spectacular. You know, that he comes in there, that he's shocked. And from the beginning to the end, and he had a, and something that I've always been attracted to,

I don't write my act. So I basically work it out on stage. I am writing it. You vent it. You vent it a little bit. You summon it. You're forever crafting it on stage, tapping into the anger so that it fuels you. Yeah.

And then just to tell a story. Sometimes it's not angry. It's just you won't believe what just happened to me. Da-da-da-da. All of my specials, I've always kind of done in the hopes that I was telling a story through it, even if somebody didn't even under, if somebody didn't understand the through line, they essentially got it gut-wise. And so I've always been, but it's that writing on stage and having an audience, and that's I think in part that my relationship

with the audience was so important because they're the ones who told me what was funny. They're the ones who kind of were guidance. You ended up going through a back door to get to all the things you wanted from the plays. Like you just didn't, you went a different route. You went through the back of the theater to get to all of the things that whatever it is you were dreaming about.

It was more constipated the way that you were doing it before your brother ended up allowing for a laughter. And you would phrase it that way, right? That your dead brother, your late brother, excuse me, opened the doors for you to be happier so that you could have a more fulfilling existence with your work. Yeah, and that he allowed people who... he gave me the opportunity to be seen, which I wasn't being seen. How

would this have all changed over the last four years if not for the pandemic? What was the punctuation of your career going to look like? Well, first off, ladies and gentlemen, and this is an important lesson that I must, the five-year plan is bullshit, okay? Anybody says to you, what's your five-year plan? You take a shit on their desk. Okay, very good, that seems extreme, but okay.

Wasn't it? I mean, yes, but that's okay. It's not extreme. Can we not say that? Yes, no, of course you can say that. I was playing you straight, man. Of course, I'm all for shit on the desk, yes, but that's okay. It's not extreme. Can we not say that? Yes, no, of course you can say that. I was playing your straight man. Of course, I'm all for shit on the desk, yes. I would have imagined.

We're gonna do, that's how we're gonna end this right here. But you and me are gonna take a big shit on the desk and we're gonna be ta-da, South Beach sessions. But it's nuts. So that's where I was. I had a five-year plan before the pandemic hit. I was gonna do two more specials. I was gonna continue to tour.

And about four to five years from the time the pandemic hit, I would be done. And that would be it. And I would do a wrap-up. And I wanted to do the last, I thought I had two more specials in me and the pandemic blew me out of the water. The pandemic was brutal for me.

Because of how alone the alone was? Yeah, the alone was, it was not only that, it was, I was 12 weeks alone. And I learned that there's a reason that we put people in solitary confinement because it drove me crazy. Because your brain will only play with you for like, brain gets really excited for like a day because this is going to be great. We're going to have so much fun.

All the things we can do, this will be the best thing ever happened. Two days later, my brain is completely fed up and it's gone through everything 60 times and now it comes after you. You blew this, you fucked up that, you completely screwed this up. Why didn't you have children? Why didn't you? I've never had this discussion with myself already

and I'm kinda going, I don't need to discuss this again. Oh my God, that sounds like the comedy around deathbed remorse. If you can't be around the laughter and you're totally alone, isolated to all the choices you make, how soon before you just eat yourself up with ravaging doubt? I know. And it was the worst period I've ever experienced. I'd never experienced anxiety, never experienced depression. And now it was just fueling all the time.

I was, and where I really learned, this was an amazing moment in terms of the last five years of comedy that I've done. I did a thing on stage where I talked about how I flipped out during the pandemic. And I started after the, after the, you know, after we had a kind of an all-clear signal, I went out and I started talking to the audience. So I thought as a placeholder, what I'll do is talk about

how I reacted to the pandemic. I don't care what your choices were. These are my choices, which made some of the audience angry because you're not supposed to. It's like, this is me, you schmucks, not you. I'm not telling you to do this. So I'm out there on stage and I'm kind of going through it and I'm realizing they're really laughing at this stuff. I mean, obviously everybody went through this in one way or another.

And then I get to this point that I thought, and the first night I did it this point that I thought this one and I did the first Night I did it was about How I destroyed I went through you then you had this relation you've destroyed that and you fuck this up And I do a litany of how I screwed up all the relationships in my life And and what a piece of shit I am and I just bombard myself for a minute I take I do just take direct action, direct anger at myself.

And I finish and I think, in my brain I'm going, well, we're gonna have to cut this. And the audience is screaming with laughter. And I thought, wow, wow, I really thought it was just me. I mean, everybody gets this. And it was just a withering examination of all of the choices you have made in your life, including to not have children

and to self-loathingly judge those just because you had the time in the pandemic to remove all the distractions and be alone with your lonely truth. Yeah. I mean, yeah, it sounds awful and not funny, but you made it funny. I mean, yeah, it sounds awful and not funny, but you made it funny. That doesn't sound terribly funny to examine your life

with remorse and anger and then be really mean to yourself on stage. And they went nuts. And I thought, good God. And I realized then that- We're all going crazy. We're all, and we have not, and this is something I continue to tell the audience,

we haven't come out of it yet. LewisBlack.com, let's shit on the desk right now together. The last tour, goodbye Yeller Brick Road. The final tour, I don't believe it. LewisBlack.com is where you get your tickets. Thank you, sir. Appreciate the time, appreciate the comedy, appreciate the honesty. Oh, thanks. It was really a pleasure.

Now's a good time to remember where the story of tequila started. In 1795, the first tequila distillery was opened by the Cuervo family. And 229 years later, Cuervo is still going strong. Family owned from the start, same family, same land. Now's a good time to enjoy Cuervo. The tequila that invented tequila. Go to Cuervo.com to shop tequila or visit a store near you. Cuervo. Now's a good time. Trademarks owned by Beclet. SAB, the CV.

Copyright 2024, Proximo. Jersey City, New Jersey. Please drink responsibly.