The Three Questions with Andy Richter - Jon Gabrus

Episode Date: January 12, 2021

Comedian Jon Gabrus chops it up with Andy about his Long Island origin story, trying to carve a career out of improv, and the joys of being alone in a hotel room for 48 hours.

Hey, everybody. Guess what? It's your favorite time. My podcast, once again. It's the three questions with Andy Richter. And I have a very funny, very talented, just a ball of goodness, Mr. John Gabrus. Putting the ball in ball of goodness over here. No, I mean, I didn't mean that in any way. No, I wear it proudly. It could be a cube of goodness. Even better. Right.

And just some kind of goodness. So how are you? I'm wonderful. Happy. You know, we're back into the real world. It feels like I mean, back into the real world. Of course, I'm referring to the new real world that has been established as of, you know, April 2020. Yes. So holidays during a time like this feel insane you know i just came around from my first uh la christmas ever my first christmas in an apartment that i was living in in my entire life and i'm almost 40 because like we don't have kids so we always have to go to our family's houses and this year we were like and i was upset about not seeing family but i'll tell you when that day comes around where normally you're packing up for like 12 days of sleeping in your childhood bedroom with all of your shit and your dog and you have a 5 a.m. flight at LAX.

When that day. Yeah, out of the fucking airport at Christmas time. That's the thing. The airport at Christmas time. I honestly, I would rather throw myself off a cliff. My mom is so frugal that she i can't get and this is the one that i wish you i'm like it's eighteen hundred dollars for me and my wife to come home for christmas and that's just flying and it sucks and this year when that day passed i'm like when i

said to my wife i was like babe do you know this morning we would be already like shitting i'd be shitting at the lax like delta lounge being like oh i got a six hour flight with the dog and i'm not gonna hang out with my mom and my brothers and the fact that none of that was there we bought our mom's amazing christmas gifts and sent them home like the most amount of money i ever spent in my mom and we still ended up prof like it would have cost us more just to go home and live yeah and yeah i'll tell you what i feel fucking great i can't like and i feel awful i haven't seen my mom in you know almost a year now but not traveling home for christmas was wildly freeing and i know most people who are almost 40 know that but like for me well kids just change things you know like when we had kids

when my ex-wife and i start you know had kids and we started entering that age we made the decision okay now it's time for our christmas you know because you just don't want and also it's just like i don't we didn't want the where you went to their house last year and now you got to come to our house this year. All of that. Oh, that's a whole game in and of itself. And yeah, my thing is, my family's in Long Island. My in-laws are all in Westchester, New York.

So they're close enough that every one of them is a double dip. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And also Long Island to westchester blow yes there's no if you want to take public transit it's like four transfers and it's insane uh and so i'm 35 years old and me and my wife are getting dropped off in nyack to wait for her mom to pick us so we're standing with our luggage in nyack and i'm like we're adults who make money we can afford cars but it's like i'm not gonna're adults who make money we can afford cars but it's like i'm not gonna pay for a rental car over christmas so on christmas day i'm racing to get to

my in-laws so i'm in time there for fondue despite leaving my mom's christmas breakfast everyone's mad at you and now everyone's equally mad but me and my wife got to do whatever the fuck we wanted for the first time a couple years ago we blew off to europe for christmas and that was our the best christmas i've ever had and then i gotta say no offense to my family and my in-laws my second favorite christmas was this year and we just watched yeah an awful movie and ate amazing chinese food and it was the best christmas i've had in years. Mine was fine. I mean, my ex-wife and I are on very good terms. And so we still have Christmas morning at our old, I live in a separate house now, but we still have Christmas morning with everybody opening presents.

And I hung out there for a few hours. And this is my second post-divorce Christmas. So it's, the last year's was awful was just plain old off the first one sounds like on paper sounds like it should be very hard and difficult i had i i wasn't i it surprised me a little bit because at that point i had i had moved out on like 10 months prior but i so i was kind of like well i'm used to this but it's i wasn't and the fact is is i'm not i'm still not used to i mean it's it's going on two years now and it's i'm still not used to it i still there's still like fucking abscesses of sadness

that i just come across in my every day then i'm like, oh, wow, all of a sudden I'm real fucking sick. Oh, yeah. You're like, oh, what is fundamentally different about this experience than it was? Oh, fuck, yeah, that's what it is. Oh, man. Oof, I knew this felt different, and now it feels awful and different.

Yeah. But this year, you know, I was over there. We made breakfast and hung out. But, you know, like mid-afternoon, I came back home and I did the exact same thing, maybe created our own tradition and like we're not really planning on having kids right now so it's like we're gonna be hard-pressed december 2021 to tell my uh catholic italian widow of a mother uh yeah i don't think i'm gonna come home for christmas again because chinese food is good and it's so much better than flying my mom will fucking jump in front of a fucking train because all of you people are a lot of work yes like she got like heartbroken two years ago when i went to europe and she was like

well i just love having you here and i said it doesn't feel like that considering that when I get there, I am not treated at all like a guest and you don't have anything in the fridge. I have to like make the bed that I'm staying in. I feel unwelcomed in my own childhood home, Joanne, I said to my mom and she was like heartbroken and i think she also then realized she's like yeah shit i never did anything to make him like excited like my wife when we go to visit her mom she's like i know you love sauv blanc i got you the gin you like uh there's uh pizza rolls in the freezer and tiffany's like oh thanks mom yay you thought of me coming here my mom is like you gotta help me move the couch from the basement to upstairs.

And your brother's laundry is all over the house. And also the gutter's a mess. I miss your father. And it's like, what the fuck am I doing here? Yeah. My mom, when I got married, too, we started to, when we would go there, stay in a hotel. Like, because it's like, it just, it wasn't, there wasn't really like good room for us.

And I don't want to like, I don't want to share a bathroom with anybody. You know what I mean? How's your mom about that? Cause we looked into Airbnb. It broke her heart. Exactly. And I'm like, mom.

But I had to to i had to be like mom i'm a grown man i make a living i want my own bathroom and what i had to leave out of it was i need some breathing space i need just like i need a safe zone to go back to to just decompress because i'm not used to all of this you know i tried i'm like mom i haven't lived here in 20 years it's difficult for me to come home and like there's layers to it for me too like because my dad was on hospice in the living room for like six months and it was after i lived moved out so my own my most recent experience with home is like my dad dying where the christmas tree is now jesus christ there's

that layer and then on top of it i it's the in-law layer too for my poor wife where i'm like my family is intense and i need a break for it so god only knows how you feel and it's like how much can a hotel around christmas cost like we looked into airbnbs we've done it before because and my mom and we'd absolutely shatter my mom and i'd be like yeah but i'm coming over in the fucking morning you go upstairs and and make phone calls and watch dr phil for like 14 hours while i'm over which is completely fine you have to yeah oh now we're stumbling on something else that bothers me we have to drop everything in our lives to fly home for 13 days to do a few days with my mom

a few days with her mom and then we do usually like a little city weekend with our friends like since we used to live there just an adult like let's get a airbnb and fucking get blasted and cook food and watch the ball drop but when we get home everyone in my family everyone in my wife's family they're all working and have plans and it's like my mom's a nurse and she's like i have to work tuesday wednesday and thursday it's like you know i'd rather be at home if i'm gonna just be hanging alone it's like i don't need to like go to my old dunkin donuts for a fucking nostalgia trip i'd rather be walking to my bougie ass coffee shop in my neighborhood and smoking legal weed and not sleeping in my fucking full bed that i slept in 20 years ago yeah yeah yeah and i can't

it just can't come across for some so and around christmas me and my wife are childless both of us have two younger brothers who both all have children so when we go home it's about them which is so exciting but trying to visit your own family around christmas there's so much shit built into christmas that when you go to visit your mom like your brother's in-laws are there and then like when you go to visit your mother-in-law your brothers-in-laws in-laws are there and you're like i'm spending christmas day with someone i'm like three levels removed from and i have to be nice to them and i it's like if it's my own family, I could be like, Uncle Mitch, shut the fuck up, dude. But when it's my my my brother in law's mother in law, I'm like, oh, thank you.

Yes, it's much better than being in Paris with my wife alone. Yes. Thank you. Yeah, that I mean, it's what kind of person you are you know it's just like and i i find even though i'm in this the business of kind of making an ass of myself in so many different ways i'm kind of shy like i don't want to i'm not like somebody like i work with somebody conan o'brien who's genuinely thrilled to meet new people yeah what's wrong with that dude? I know, I'm like, what the fuck are you talking about? New people? I work with this dude is a very funny way to talk about Conan.

Yeah, I work with this guy, this red-headed guy at work for three decades. But thank God he has that, because that's what has kept the whole ship afloat, is his desire to get attention from other people. I have that too.

But he generally loves it. When we go places, he's like, I want to go out and meet people. And I'm like, I want to go to my hotel room and hide. What are you talking about? I want to get high and bring takeout or room service into my room, watch two movies, and not interact with anyone. Right, right. Yeah, I want to take off all my clothes for a day and a half. I want the air conditioner.

I want the front desk to be like, hey, is everything okay up there? You've been running it at 68 degrees for 48 hours. Yep, that's me. I'll get the bedspread off the other bed and put it on myself and crank the AC just so I get that feeling of like freezing room. Love a two-bed hotel room. One for cranking off and one for sleeping. Time to move beds. Just come in a huge bath towel, throw it on the floor and jump to the other table.

Huge bath towel. Wow, you're younger than me well that's more about like feeling like a king of just you know right right using an italian throwing it on the floor putting a five on the nightstand yeah yeah i'm not using my sock this time yeah i don't have to worry about flushing this toilet paper before my wife gets home yeah but uh you say you were kind of friendly like you are kind of like i am kind of like that i have that for sure i have what i've been referring to as talk to me face i have a face that other people see and go i should probably just start talking to this dude and i'm like oh no and my wife thinks it's because i have like a big expressive face like i'm up the same reason

why kids gravitate to me when i'm like when they're on their mom's shoulder they always look at me and are like whoa what is that face yeah yeah i think i get that with the bigger the freak is and i use the term freak uh colloquially like i just mean in general like weirdos i they look at me and they go i better go up to this guy and just start talking about something. Like we've been having this conversation for years. And it's like, I just have that. And I don't mind meeting new people, but I also have like what you're talking about where it's like, I have sometimes just get in my head where I'm like, I don't get to talk to my best friends this much.

So stranger, I have to cut you off here. Like I get a little bit of it and I'm like there's a part of me i love meeting new people but there's a part of me that's like when your life flashes before your eyes are you going to be happy that i talk to like 80 people outside of the fucking uh boston improv theater or whatever like like that yeah i'm gonna be like i can't believe like it always comes back and it's like i should have asked my grandpa more questions about world war ii instead here i am yeah instead i spent three hours talking about fucking autobots and decepticons with some guy who's just getting me to sign his comedy bang bang poster or some shit right i'm talking to my cousin's boyfriend exactly you know paintball you know uh yeah no and i you You know, people are, I think, I mean, like if I ever bitch about it online, like I remember once I bitched about, I can't remember what city I was in, but every Uber driver was the chattiest motherfucker I had ever met.

And, you know, I'm sorry, I don't, like small talk is kind of work you know what I mean like it's kind of like I get paid to talk and have small talk so and it's not that like oh I don't you know I'm late it's like I'm off the clock like I just just let me be just let me sit here

and not but you know and I and I people fucking were like oh well must be nice to be able to make fun of people trying to make a living and who are just trying to be personable. People are dying for an excuse. It's like, OK, pal, then you get on the fucking Uber chat line and talk to your fucking local Uber drivers. People say that shit. They're like just looking to fucking be mad at people. I hate because I know you're like i'm not spitting

on the guy as he drives by i'm paying him and tipping him well i just want it to be quiet i just want five minutes of quiet which i would get if i paid for like a car service which is what uber is supposed to be replacing and all that and i just think a lot of people have these jobs as like networking uh like things oh and in outside of major cities too i feel like when i'm in like vegas and my uber driver is just like a 60 year old woman she's just like i'm retired and looking to chat with people you know and you're like yeah i'll give them the benefit of the doubt every once in a while but after like you're never in a uber for more than like a half hour in vegas but like get an airport uber and the person is chatty and then you get to traffic

and you're like oh no and we're just like now they don't have to focus on the road and they could just fucking grill you oh that sounds fun what and then it's like i'm picturing it's you it's like and what what show is that and you're like well it's it's called conan it's like yeah what channel is that on it's like okay you know what it's okay if you It's like, yeah, what channel is that on? It's like, okay, you know what? It's okay if you don't know it, but like, now I got to go like, you're going, he's really tall, red hair. There's, I'm the guy who's like,

I'm like, one time, and this is maybe where this humiliation comes from. One time someone said they recognize me and I was like, oh, and they're like, what was it from? I'm like, I don't know. I have not done anything that's, I don't have one singular credit it's like that's my favorite thing that people ask what do i know you from i don't know what am i fucking imbb and and your past all combined into one database like i don't know i had a person say like and i was like oh this is

humiliating i'm like maybe this and they were like no so now i'm list i'm like five credits deep on myself and i only have four like i'm like i'm already like i was like like i was literally at like maybe you know me from college humor sketch videos and that guy's like no and then he goes did you go to Meppam High School? I was like, yes. And he's like, that's where I know you from. And I'm like, oh, I look like such an asshole. I listed my TV credits. And it's just some asshole I went to high school with.

Come on. That's not fair. That's not fair. I know. But that hit hard when I was like, you are a Hollywood douche, dude. Where do I know you from? It must be MTV2's Guy Code. No?

Weird. Can't you tell my love's a-growing? Now, growing up on Long Island, because my experience with Long Island is from having lived in Manhattan. Yes. So, you know, Long Island is the suburbs of New York. But there is, from my Midwestern perspective, a very like Long Islanders are different than people in other places. Just in terms of like I remember being around and it's New Yorkers, but it's Long Islanders to being around Long Islanders, having a conversation and thinking, why are they fighting? Yeah, that's, that's just base. Yeah, that's, that's just exchange of

information. Yeah. It sounds like, like, what the fuck is wrong with you? You know, ordering a sandwich and a coffee on Long Island sounds like you're starting a fight it's like let me get a bacon egg and cheese and a coffee and two milks one sugar hey two milks one sugar and the guy's like all right and you're like wait that's just a conversation yeah yeah it's a weird fucking place you said long islanders and new yorkers and that's when you said that it kind of pinpoints what's up with long islanders live we live a half hour or more or even less to away from a city one of the number one cities in the world where people fly from you can just say the number it is people fly from all over the world to visit new york city and long islanders are like i got a thai restaurant right

here in east Meadow. Like, I don't need to go to the city. And it's like that attitude that kind of, in my mind, encompasses Long Islanders, where it's like, we got the beautiful island right here. It's like, well, you're a half hour away from maybe the cultural epicenter of the planet Earth. And they're like, we got a fucking beach. We got a nice Italian restaurant in town. We're set.

And it's like, okay, I get like so many Long Islanders dislike the city. Yeah. The city as we call it growing up. Well, I think that there's something to that because there was the same thing in Chicago. Like my barber, when I lived in Chicago, had a shop on Irving Park Road, which is 15 minute drive to downtown. And I was getting my haircut one day and he mentioned that he hadn't been downtown since the last time he had to renew his barber license in person. And that was 35 years prior. That's great. He had not been downtown, like not to a Bears game, not to, you know, I don't even think like a Cubs game. That's great. He had not been downtown. Like, not to a Bears game.

You know, I don't even think like a Cubs game. He's just like, nah, I like to stay in the neighborhood. And that's, there's something, but that's Chicago. I think there's something about denying the most metropolitan cultured city on the planet, arguably, but not that big of an argument right but to deny that to be like that's fuck that yeah i went i went once the cradle of civilization i went once in 94 we went to ellis island for a field trip i get it i got the city like that's like the attitude is like we got restaurants here we got broadway shows here you know every long islander like the moms in the upper middle class long island are like we're going in a broadway show here you know every long islander like the moms in the upper middle class

long island are like we're going in a broadway show and then we're having dinner at carmines and then the rest of like everyone else is like bro you go in there they'll fucking mug you i'm not getting on the subway with the terrorists and shit and you're like who are you referring to right right uh this black lives matter uh shit popping off watching that reaction on long island where i thought it would be bad and then seeing like the types of people i grew up with and seeing the counter protests and reading about how scared of antifa so many people around long island are i was like fuck yeah that's a different it's a fucking weird place. I've heard it referred to as like a half hour away, 30 minutes and 50 years away from the city.

Yeah. Yeah, that's true. Now, were you, as a, as a young kid, were you aware of this? Did you start to get itchy to get out of there? I definitely was itchy to get out of there. One thing I've always been is kind of open-minded and curious, like down to talk to different people about different things. I remember it like killed me. My mom didn't fly in a plane in my entire life until I was like 20 something. I went on like one flight without her, drove to Florida every winter for 10 years. Yay. But like she was afraid of flying and it didn't matter to a lot of my family and i was like but don't we want to go places like don't we want to go to like a tropical place like when you're a

kid the only thing you could think of in vacation is like beaches with like coconuts and scuba diving yeah yeah but then as i got older i was like we weren't poor we we were very poor for a long time but then we like my mom got a nursing job and my dad was uh iotsy in new york uh one of those stagehand guys yeah that's a stagehand union in new york for people that don't know yeah and uh they're exactly the kind of guys you think they are they're like sort of uh they're like very blue collar but they're in the entertainment industry but so i was always a little close to like he worked in at the news so i was always a little close to news and tv and entertainment so i kind of always knew a little bit and that to me was just like the world is bigger and i was always a movie fan and then you would hear like martin

scorsese blah blah blah he made this movie and you find another and i always wanted to know more and i kept wanting to find more and more and then i started to realize how limiting like my little circle was and like that's when i started to feel it when i was like okay yeah i guess i'll go to blockbuster and rent a movie and then you're like watching a movie and someone's going to like a you know single run theater and you're like oh that would be a cool thing to have here and long like and all of also in your, I just kept finding myself like wanting more and more out of my life just from having watched movies and hearing stories of like cool older people who have done things like, yeah.

Like I remember meeting someone whose brother was in the military and I was like, that's so scary. And he was like, it's scary, but I got to go to Japan for free. And in my head I was like, Oh,

that's a goal. That's an interest. I want to go to japan for free and in my head i was like oh that's a goal that's an interest i want to go to japan this guy is so cool to me and he wasn't cool at all but he had gone to japan and that meant so much to me that i was like oh that's something i'm definitely gonna do and like i've just always been like that and it sort of was the marker for to get me to like to eventually i didn't like get hit with like the marker to get me to eventually... I didn't get hit with the, I got to get the fuck out of here until I was in my 20s. I was kind of coasting high school, college, whatever.

I just want to get through this and figure life out. I just want to get fucked up and try to get jerked off in my 89 Buick Century custom. And then eventually in college, I started to meet more people. And even the non-diverse people that I was meeting, the other upper middle class, white, tri-state area kids who went to my college, they were at least also into different things. And I met my first gay person, my first gay friend.

I knew some gay kids in high school, but I wasn't friends with them. And engaged on an adult 20-something level about homosexuality and talking. And I just was like, oh, holy shit. And then I got an internship in New York City at I Love the 90s Part Deux. And again, not super diverse. Right. The internship and PA world of MTVtv networks of the early 2000s but smart different people from all over who are now living in the city too and so now i'm getting an

idea of like hey we go to coppersmiths on tuesdays it's buy one get one free burgers and beers and i'm 21 in college and i'm like these 28 year olds get together and talk about tv and movies and drink beers and eat burgers. And that's when I knew I was like that, whatever that hipster lifestyle is, that's what I want from life. It's like, it hit me. I was like, I, my now wife was my girlfriend at this time in college. And I came home and I was like, we have to move to the city after school. We have to get jobs in the city.

The city is where everything they have. Cause I was doing short form improv. And I was like, they even have like improv schools in the city the city is where everything they have because i was doing short form improv and i was like they even have like improv schools in the city like i couldn't like my mind was blown by it and i was like we gotta go and and new york city to me was and then i moved to new york city and then i was like now i have to see the world like new york city teaches you a little bit about the world and you meet people from all over the world and who've gone all over and that just kicked me off on a way i'm like i'm still not done yet this is like i just want to see and do i truly am like a box checker guy if someone's like have you ever done blank and i haven't it goes in my head where

i'm like eventually i'll do this i've like tried every organized sport i've done a bunch of the extreme sports shit that a lot of people are afraid to do. I've tried everything and I intend to continue to try everything. As a matter of fact, I'm like trying to get in shape and live longer just so I could try more dumb, dangerous stuff. Like my doctor's like, you have high blood pressure. I'm like, well, I got to take care of that because I really want to get into scuba diving. He's like, OK. Have you bungee jumped?

I have not bungee jumped, but I have skydived uh yeah because i uh with bungee jumping and zip lining i think i'm too heavy i just think that like they don't make that for people my size no i definitely am i also was too heavy to skydive in college and lied that's how dumb i was yeah i was 235 they said you had to be under 225 so i said i was 220 i was like they gotta have 10 to 15 points of uh 10 to 15 pounds of wiggle or else it's too dangerous and my friends were like you think this is a good idea i'm like i didn't drive all the way up to the fucking new paltz to not skydive let's go yeah i think there's something to people that just want – they like the way things are. They look around.

Everybody kind of looks like them. They're pretty good. They can count on people kind of thinking like them. And none of that's going to be that challenged. And they like that. And I'm in the same way from I don't know why, but I was always like, I don't like that. I like to be around different people. You know, it's exciting to be around.

It's funny to me sometimes if I say something political on Twitter, like about homelessness or about race or something. And there's people who will be like, yeah, well, would you want them living in your neighborhood and the answer is yeah sure they already do you know like syrian refugees bring them on you know like ethiopian refugees i'm fine yeah who's coming you know who's ending up on the shores of greece they can come to burbank you know i'll tell i'll tell them all about, you know, about the Talleyrand. Well, now, what did you I mean, what did you when you were going off to college, what did you want to do with yourself? Did you have any kind of idea coming out of high school what you wanted to do? Yeah, I wanted to be an FBI agent, which is like, oh, really? I was. Why? Why that? I mean, I can kind of see.

really i was why why that i mean i can kind of see i mean aside from the j edgar hoover stuff but definitely crime fighting and solving crimes and shit sounds pretty cool and there's plenty of movies that make the fbi look pretty cool so you know 38 year old lefty gabrus is like you fucking scum are you gonna work for the state busting young black guys put plant and crack in a house you know it's like all of a sudden I'm immediately the worst I hate. But to give you a little background, I wanted to be a Navy SEAL my whole life because I'm a child of the eighties and nineties. So I grew up just watching like action movies.

So I wanted to be in the military. And then like around 14 years old, 15 years old, I gained the power of self-awareness. And someone was like you know you know how you like do everything in your power to get out of the mile running gym you might not make it at hell week at baby seal training it's like okay okay and then that's where my brain flipped to okay and my dad who was not a very friendly engaging guy but he was more mature than my mom you can

like i can't have any conversations about the future with my mom without her just it's like well you got to be careful fbi jonathan that's bad you got to be careful i'm moving to california earthquakes jonathan you got to be careful my dad would have like a little more of a serious non-parental conversation so we were talking and he's like johnny all these guys though they're idiots they're jocks they're studs but they're not necessarily that bright you're smart figure out your way and then that's where i landed on like oh i'll join the fbi where they have like a because i have also been reading non-stop tom clancy i'm maybe the only 12 year old that had read 10 different books that took place during the Vietnam war where I was like,

point man, chief James Watson, uh, launches the first, uh, Navy SEAL team. And I'm like, why am I at 12 year old wondering like, Oh, you got to wear a pajamas so that the VC take a second look at you before you blow them away on a hooch destruction mission and my family's like what are you talking about go play fucking t-ball dude why do you have dad taste yeah yeah i truly had dad taste and i still do but so yeah when i decided to i was like oh i'll do the fbi i started taking i was in all these ap science classes and i was like I'll back my way in via science. I'll work in like forensics or psychiatry.

So I took AP psych and AP bio the next year. Cause I was like, I'm going to, and like my AP psych teacher, I'll shout her out. Miss Maitland. She said to me, um, you don't want to work for the FBI. I'm like, yeah, I do. She's like, you should work in entertainment. And I'm like yeah i do she's like you should work in entertainment and i'm like no i think my sense of humor is actually makes me good on my feet which will help me as an fbi agent like that's where i was i would later win a scholarship from the

school for like 150 for a student looking to go into the performing arts and uh my ap psych teacher is the one who signed me up for that and i'm like she's like just you wait and i said to her i'm like i'm gonna prove you wrong. And then here I am not working in either industry. Really? Yeah. But solving a lot of crimes. I'm planting a lot of guns on minorities.

So I went away to school as a science major. I went away to school as a bio major to pre-declared. And then two weeks in of just like you know i had made out with like three girls prior to college i had had sex with one and by my first week of college i was like oh i need to do everything in my power to be able to hang out and party here and i was like switch my major to tv and film and just took all film classes and art classes and it was like join the short form and sketch improv troop and i was just like fuck yeah completely bailed on law enforcement and now i'm arguably anti-law enforcement in some way it's like what a wild

ride it's been from now okay so you you started at ucb is that um that – how do you come to UCB? I was interning at – oh, this is actually interesting. Home for a summer in college. Some high school buddies are like, we're going to go into the city to go to a Knicks game. Do you want to – and again, these are my three sort of hip friends that would be interested in going to the city. It's like we're thinking of going in at the games at six we're thinking of going in at two and going downtown and getting seen if our fake ids work in new york city and i was like fuck yeah this is my dream come true so yeah we're walking around downtown i'm two years into school

or three years into school at this point so i am in doing improv i own a dvd player i'm one of like the earliest adopter of a dvd player at my because it's 2002 and i'm 20 and i have a stack of dvds because i'm a budding movie buff and bad with money so i owned i own the upright citizens were great box set because i liked the comedy sketch comedy show so i bought the box set and i was watching these sketches and loving it. And then we're walking down, which I guess at the time was either 22nd or 23rd street. And I saw 22nd,

I saw the fucking deli grate that was painted with the 3d glasses, you know, that had like, and I went, Oh man, that's the TV show. What do they have this year for? So when I went back to home to my mom's house i it was pre

google i alta v stood uh the upright sister game and i found that they taught improv and i was like whoa and the old website used to say like level one improv slash gorilla tactics and it was like it had like bits written in it so it was like you will learn uh you know the basic tenets of ucb style chicago improv foundations of the harold and camouflage and assassination tech you know it was always like like a joke tag and to me i was like oh this seems anti-authoritarian it seems like these guys take comedy seriously which was all i was looking for was for people that took comp who wanted to be, wanted to make comedy, who wanted to do comedy for the rest of their lives.

So I saw it signed up my in between my junior and senior year of high school. I was a Jones Beach lifeguard on Long Island. Uh, and then one day a week I would have the early shift leave, get on a train and ride the train in to take level one improv and i was a 21 year old with like blonde hair fully tan because i worked 48 hours in the sun and i would i would be in like board shorts and flip-flops and in hindsight after i taught level one for six years eight years at ucb i think if i had a kid in like who had like clearly come straight from the beach i'd be like i fucking hate this kid and i definitely in hindsight was all that and cocky and yeah yeah potentially one of the better people in the class too just on like raw charisma not bragging it is

a world's tallest little person competition i'm talking about level one improv in 03 right and so i came in, I was cocky and getting laughs. And in hindsight, I must've just been the absolute worst person, but that was the first time I ever rode the train into the city, like multiple times for by myself. And that was just like a real grow up moment where I was like, well, Wednesday nights, I take the train. And I remember the first time someone from my class was like, they lived, you know, most of them lived in the city. And he was like, Hey, some of us are going to get a beer after class. If you want to take a later train, I was like, and I was an alcoholic at the time, obviously, and I was doing improv. So clearly

I was like, Oh, and my mom was like, you got home late last night. I was like, I went out for drinks in the city with some friends from class. And I remember thinking that sentence is insane. I'm home. I'm home for the summer. I'm going into it. My mom's like the city. Where'd you go? I go, I don't know.

It was a place near. Where is the class? Oh, I come out of Penn Station. I make a right. I go two blocks. I make a left. That's all I could remember. I didn't know addresses then and stuff.

So I was like – in hindsight, I was probably drinking at, like, Mustang Harry's or Mustang Sally's, one of those, like, Penn Station bars. Now, Wendy, you start doing the UCB improv, which you get such a good attitude there and such a good like sort of philosophy. And it's like you said, reading that thing about, you know, we also will teach you guerrilla tactics and assassination and stuff. And you said it's because they're serious about comedy. And yes, it is serious, but it's also fucking fun. fun you know like they're also like to say that it's like to get in part like yeah no we're serious about this but also the bottom line

is to have fun like if what's the fucking point of this if we're not having totally totally i was learning from the guys from the people who learned from unfortunately mostly guys uh from the people who learned from the ucb4 so i was like one stage removed my little improv yoda was uh michael delaney for me who was two things for me that made that made him really like he took a very intellectual approach to it or at least yeah in hindsight seemed like he did i mean who knows really but the way he like overanalyzed everything i really appreciated because it was like oh this is starting to feel like comedy class and also yeah he was a tough laugh and it was just like the teacher thing where it's like well if i'm gonna laugh from someone who's a tough laugh it means that much more and it's important yeah also delaney a few times

said things that just unload like unpacked me in a way where I'm like, I think I'm starting to get improv better. And one of the things he said early on, which is the ultimate way to get me to do what you want. He complimented me and took a dig at me with a constructive criticism turn in there. He like psychoanalyzed. He was like, see, when you have someone like Gabrus in a scene who can just be funny if needed, that ends up being a weakness because you'll never dig and you'll never try to find the really interesting, funny nugget, the real unusual thing. And I was like, in my head, I'm like, so you're saying like like don't go for like the easy laugh necessarily and

he was like yeah exactly and i was like to me getting that but the fact that he said a guy like you can get a laugh in a moment and to me i was just like that was all the power i needed to continue you know that was my yellow belt test i was like i am hooked on your forms i'm gonna study this martial art forever but i'm i'm i feel like baptized in the fire there and i what i like about that too is that um it is it's not about you know the easy laugh is the easy way to boil it down but there is a lot of comedy out there that's like a laugh is a laugh if you can get a laugh get that fucking. And there's a lot of improv. You know, I think a lot of like what West Coast improv was is, hey, if you've got a funny character with a funny voice, use that motherfucker up. Do it as much as you want.

Whereas from Adele Close School, it was like, if you do something once, you can't do it again. Yeah. You know, you can't do that. You can if you want. But, you know, people are going to think you can if you want but you know people are gonna think like no no you were lazy you know like you went for it and i mean and then there's also sometimes where you're just like you're in the middle of a scene and you got to get out and let's just get a laugh and move on right or you're like on a call at a college gig and you're like who gives a fuck

i'm leaving this town right after let me do yeah yeah it's me plumber johnny a guy i did 11 times and i know this voice kills every time yeah i'm basically joe pesci but you know i call myself the plumber uh wait richter you're you're saying something here that i i don't need to get into the weeds about comedy taste and all that but something you're saying here is there is something about the UCB style the Dell the Harold style which is sort of antithetical to success in Hollywood which I don't yes which isn't a bad thing necessarily but I think that's where people realize the wrong because even when I was younger I could like when I was first coming up and people would be like you know don't lean into your strengths. You know, Gabrus, you play a lot of characters like this.

Try playing characters like this. And then you would watch people like, and this is no shots against them. These are some of my favorite performers, but people like Rob Riggle and Horatio Sands and Jack McBrayer who kind of do their thing very well. They know themselves. Yeah. Yeah. do their thing very well they know themselves yeah yeah and they don't abuse it on stage necessarily but that's how they get vaulted into career success and that's not and i feel like that was the lesson that was just sort of missing for me and i had to like take it upon myself i had to learn it the hard way like eight years in was like oh you know being good at the harold being a good

one-eighth of a harold team member is more of a skill set like being good in a writer's room. Whereas it's not necessarily you're not going to get cast because like, holy shit, Richter set up that fucking meta group game in the second. That kind of really brought home the thematic element of a protest. You know, it's like, yeah, no one's like, bring that guy in for SNL. Like, you know, it's like Andy Richter does that Chicago baker who doesn't know

what a kolache is. And it's like, that's the guy that, you know, that makes you a million dollars over five years or whatever. Well, there's a difference between it being a transaction

and it not being a transaction. You know, like, if you say to somebody, you can get the easy lap, but you should, and that's a detriment, you should work like if you say to somebody, you can get the easy lap, but you should, and that's a detriment. You should work harder. That's like saying, think about the art of it. And you're not thinking about the art of it just for yourself. You're thinking about it for the audience too. The audience, whether they know it or not, they want, you know, they're coming to

see an improv show. They're not going to see Dane Cook, you know, they're, they're, they're coming to see an improv show. They're not going to see Dane Cook. Right. You know, they're coming to see something that's a little bit challenging that they might have to be patient for. Could potentially be bad. Yeah. It could be bad. It could be bad, you know. So that's why the ticket's never that expensive. Yeah. Right.

the analogy I want to throw out here, which just came to me, um, it's sort of like, uh, say doing IO style, uh, UCB style Harold's or whatever is Kung Fu. You might not want to do Kung Fu in a street fight.

You might need to, you might be able to bring some Kung Fu elements in to protect yourself, but really it's about survival. And just like, that's kind of what UCB is to Hollywood where you're like, this is a good skillset, where you're like, this is a good skill set, but you're not going to win street fights doing crane style. Yeah.

And people will pay to come see you do crane style because it's beautiful and esoteric and interesting art. But don't try to do crane style at UFC. Like UFC play by their rules. You know, I never thought of it like that. But it's like, and this happened to me later on in life when i first moved to la i kind of like diversified myself from ucb when i was like i was a big fish in a little pond in new york then i moved out here and i was a little fish in a big pond but also i noticed more ponds and that is something i didn't pick up on in new york

i was like i could have been doing stand-up in my 20s when I had infinite energy and uh free time yeah but to me I was like I gotta focus on improv but it's like five nights a week versus two nights a week in the long run you know yeah yeah yeah exactly so when I came out here I was like it's not just UCB for me I'm gonna do stand-up and I had done a few gigs with other stand-up people who were kind of like they have no idea what's going on at UCB and UCB people had no idea what was going on in mainstream stand-up and I was just like oh shit there's definitely something to be learned everywhere so that's kind of where I fell into that of like I'm gonna diversify and so I guess long story short I did not learn my lesson of like I need to uh focus and get my figure out what my Jack McBrayer, what my John Gabrus bookable archetype is or

whatever. Instead, I'm like, keep diversifying. Try more stuff. Is it podcast? Is it Twitch? Is it stand up? Is it improv? Is it sketch? Is it acting? I just keep throwing shit and go full circle here. I think that's part of what I don't mind looking dumb. I'm very curious and I, and I chase experiences. So of course my career is at this point where it's like, yeah, I've been on wild and out and comedy bang, bang, like two spectrums of like the comedy world where,

and it's like, I don't have major success in any of the worlds, but I'm enjoying the fact that like my experience has been diverse, like, uh, and not diverse in the hiring practices of a Hollywood writer's room way. I just mean like from a different, I wouldn't refuse to engage with other races.

I'm just talking about other ideas. can't you tell my loves are growing the video game analogy i always use is like i love those role-playing games like skyrim and stuff like that are like dnd adjacent and i'll have eight level 20 characters rather than one level 80 character you know like where it's like i finish the game it's like i keep i don't know if i should be a mage maybe i should be an archer no i should do i swear i should use a sword and shield and that's like where i'm at where i'm like i don't want to dedicate too much more time in case this isn't the right and then that's where i'm in my own head about that shit so i'm yeah yeah i'm past i'm past all that i'm really really settling into like this sort of like quasi retirement energy.

It's crazy to say it's almost 40. I've said it all the time. I feel like I'm fucking retired. I sit around the house all day. I mean, like, you're probably one of the few humans I'll speak to today. Honestly, let's take a moment to say thank god for podcasts in this quarantine I'm like my my wife works a full-time job so I would just be in this room trying not to bother her like that would be my day-to-day and the fact that I get to like

chop it up with for an hour and 90 minutes two hours with different friends and different people I barely know even it just feels good to have that injection of i'm doing strangers podcasts just to be like ah yes i can still talk to someone who i haven't been living with for like like i'm worried and serious question are you worried at all that you're like losing chops in any way i'm a little bit concerned um i performed live at least once a week if not multiple times a week for 15 16 years this and now i haven't stood up in front of a live crowd in like nine months yeah i miss it will i be good at it again can i emotionally handle bombing like i don't know like i i don't feel as into and I think that's just a matter of like rustiness where it's like, wait,

pass me the ball. Okay. Yeah. Actually I still have some moves here. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. But I'm dying to find out. I still have the moves. You know what I mean? Oh, it'll be, I'm sure it'll be fine. Yeah. But it might be, you know, the thing too, is it might be weird. You might do it and kind of feel like, you know what? The thrill is gone and you know i i don't know you know that's i yeah i i mean that's that's my fear and i you know for me it's less about you know because i'm still doing the conan show as it is well yeah which is you know i mean you

know i'm sitting the audience 40 feet from him and still crack wise. And that's kind of, you know, and that's kind of the idea behind it. And I still am involved, not as much involved as kind of like just the production and the writing of the show as I would be on a regular day when there were regular rehearsals and regular scripts coming down. Now I kind of show up and it's like, oh, this is what we're doing. regular scripts coming down now i kind of show up and it's like oh this is what we're doing um but yeah it's i it's uh it that part i'm okay with but it is like the the like am i going to be able to like write something like can i can i write a sitcom anymore can i write a you know like i don't know you know it's it's and i got time You know, it's, it's, and I got time to do it. It's just, you know, a couple of things you said triggered a couple of things for me. Uh,

today my writing partner and I were meeting earlier and he said something to the effect of like, what do you think would have happened? Like we've been working together on and off for like 15 years. It's like, what do you think would would happen if when we were 25 and you were a waiter and i was a temp and we were trying to do comedy in new york city i had three roommates and you had six roommates what do you think would happen if the pandemic hit then like what would that be like for us right now we're able to like well we still have this development thing we have to work on thank god but back then and we were like would that have made us say do we even want to do comedy i wonder how many young people who maybe wanted to do comedy are so destroyed by this or the timing of this where they're like now i want to work in public health or now i want to not live in a city

at all or i want you know my my entire plans have changed because being 20 something broke in new york city sounds fun when it's not a fucking global pandemic so yeah yeah i'm very curious about that and then the other smart thing i overheard recently was heather ann campbell very smart person very funny person she said i wonder what our like great depression habits like this generation and the younger people even more like everyone had that grandma that's like she keeps all her cash in the nylon in her drawer she refuses yeah what saves every shopping bag yes exactly what's gonna be hard like 600 shopping bags right yeah a kid like maybe you know uh a 20 a 19 year old now is someone who whose grandkids

would be like yeah my grandma wipes down the grocery delivery still i guess it was something from when she dealt with covid19 like i feel like what is going to be that because you you made me think of it when you said it might feel weird doing comedy again i might be on stage doing ass cat and look at the crowd and just picture that cnn graphic of red and blue droplets shooting out of the crowd's mouth and be like no i'm gonna just do podcasts and live streams from here on out like yeah it's possible and that scares me because like in-person shit is like is exciting is thrilling but not driving to franklin village two nights a week. Also fun. Yeah.

Positive end there. We're not in this yet. But yeah, I'm looking at the clock here. It's getting time to wrap it up. I wanted to know, is there a dream project for you? Is there something that you really are dying

to do? Or is there something you're dying to something that you really are dying to do? Or is there something you're dying to do that doesn't have anything to do with comedy? You know, living on a houseboat or, you know, I will say my goals used to be very career oriented. And now my goals are very lifestyle oriented in a way where it's kind of like, I'm ready for retirement. And I'm also ready to live like a monk in retirement. If it means it starts sooner. Does that make sense?

Like I don't want to cush life. I just want to relax. I want the beach to be a major part of my future. So, but if I had to get like a dream project to throw out there, it would be something that pays me to collect experiences. And that is sort of like the way it works now is i make money doing my career and then i spend it on experiences experiences if i could do some sort of middleman

thing where i got a travel show or like uh yeah yeah those are the best truth or dare with gabrus you know what i mean like some shit where it's like i dare you to shoot a sniper right i dare you to jump out of a helicopter into the to jump out of a helicopter into the jumping out of a helicopter into the ocean is very high on my list of things I want to check off. I want to do it so badly. And then in Seinfeld's newest stand up special, he himself jumps from a chopper into like the East River. Yeah.

And I'm like, holy shit. That's so funny. A guy who I've been watching since childhood, who ostensibly we work in the same field to violently different levels. But I'm like, it's funny that Jerry wanted to do that too. Like, it's just funny that he did the thing where he's like,

well, now I have a budget for a special. Why don't I jump out of a helicopter? And it's like, it just made me feel connected cosmically to like this guy is like a Long Island comedian who wants to jump out of a helicopter and it's like it just made me feel connected cosmically to like this guy who's like a long island comedian who wants to jump out of a helicopter just feels cool that it's someone else's goal too there's there's a documentary about one of the scions of the he was a he was like a jet set playboy I can't remember his name right now. But he was the Fiat family, you know, the Italian car family. Yeah.

And after World War II, you know, like there was this huge boom and he had all this money and he just basically did cocaine and hung out in the Riviera. Oh, fucking yeah. Every morning would have a helicopter drop him into the ocean and he would swim back and have breakfast like when he was in wherever it was i don't know whether it was you know monaco or wherever or on the you know can or wherever the way you're talking about the location every day all i'm picturing is talented mr ripley which is also what i picture when i think about my post-work life is like yes yes short shorts and negronis as I like watch young European women bathe.

Yes. And a healthy dose of like obsession. Yeah. Potential murder. Homoeroticism. Yeah. I want all that bubbling. Of course.

Fake IDs. Yeah. Gotta have all that. Well, now do you, you know, is there one major lesson you've learned that you could impart or is there just kind of like an attitude thing that you – I mean it kind of sounds – you're getting away from specific things and more into kind of situations. Yeah.

Two phrases come to mind when you say like anything i've learned and i think everyone has learned this these are just two things that i took aggressively to heart and i kind of not mantras i live by but these are two things that i insist on like living by and force other people around me to deal with like one is when in rome do as the romans do like that is something that i have and i think that is part of my open-mindedness my curiosity okay here in the yukon is where you do a shot of liquor with an old frozen toe in it all right fine like i want to participate i want to do the thing i made a promise you know my wife doesn't eat beef or pork anymore and i eat way less of it but i said to her i'm like you know i'll never say i won't eat something

because if someone makes me something i will always eat it if someone yeah no matter i think i might be allergic i don't know if i can handle that i'm full it's too spicy i have to go running after this i will never turn down someone has made me something i will always try that and then this one is from my dad who i never really got along with but we lived he he said this to me when i went to my first like new year's eve party when i was like of drinking age which on long island in the 90s was 14 and he was like johnny act like you've been there before and apparently it was like a famous giants coach expression when someone got a penalty for celebrating in the end zone the coach was like hey that's the end zone act like you've been there before and it was just the attitude of like

chill out you're at a party don't fuck you don't have to be the guy who's like whoa look at that you know and my dad like kind of taught me that of like just act like you've been there before and it's been very helpful and it is sort of an anti-anxietal mantra of like if you're in like a meeting or a scary situation that is not scary but in like you're talking about a cautious situation yeah if you just in your head go you've been here before just do act as though you've done this before and that's kind of gives you that false sense of confidence that can be misconstrued as actual confidence by someone else and it's like that has worked for me for a long time is doing it when in rome and act like you've been there before yeah then that's that's one of my favorites is fake it till you make it yeah yeah similar similar kind

of thing like oh they oh these people want me to come in here and do this thing i mean it'd be rude to act like i don't i couldn't yeah they think i can so i better do it it's a great counter to the imposter syndrome what you're describing is just like well you know what this is what i'm supposed to do so fuck it let's try it baby, it's like, maybe they don't know what they really want. Maybe I'm the one who's going to show them what it's supposed to be

and I'm wrong for even second-guessing myself. Yeah. Well, John, John Gabrus, thank you so much for spending some time with me. Richter, this was a fucking blast, dude.

Oh, good, good. I'm glad, I'm glad. Thank you so much for having me. Sure. And hopefully I'll see you on one. Matt Besser, uh, from UCB has,

uh, occasional little four 20 zoom. Uh, yeah, the requirements are be at youngest age 40 and willing to smoke weed on camera with friends. I love a situation where I'm the young guy and those are all my best situations.

Cause we've always been buddies. He's like, come on with me. And I'm like, I love being young. I feel so out of touch everywhere else and here i'm like ah you mean woke af no he just he'll occasionally just send an email to you know five or six of us that's like doing four and it is at 4 20 on whatever friday or something and i've been to a couple of them and it is it's again it's so it's just like it's delightful you'd think like oh it's a it's a lesser quality interaction to be on zoom with your friends but it's like no no it's pretty fucking great it's pretty good

it's a low bar for what counts as like an uh a strong interaction with your fellow man these days yeah yeah it's like oh like i'm gonna ride off the energy of just me and you talking like we've known each other for a long time but we haven't had this much of a guy this to me is like i had a wonderful day today i talked to a person about heady things a person who i have a lot in common with so it's so exciting it's like this the bar and that no offense but the bar is so low it's like yes andy gave us look we're connecting it feels so fucking good and the screen shit the podcast part of it all washes away and i'm just happy to be engaging and laughing and making another person laugh it's

just yeah the bar is low and i appreciate you just letting me come on here and fucking chop it up i'm happy to do it and i'm I'm glad for all of you out there listening. And thank you for tuning in. And we will be back at you next week with more Three Questions. Fuck yeah. I've got a big, big love for you.

The Three Questions with Andy Richter is a Team Coco and Earwolf production. It's produced by me, Kevin Bartelt, executive produced by Adam Sachs and Jeff Ross at Team Coco and Earwolf production. It's produced by me, Kevin Bartelt, executive produced by Adam Sachs and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Chris Bannon and Colin Anderson at Earwolf. Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair, associate produced by Jen

Samples and Galit Sahayek, and engineered by Will Becton. And if you haven't already, make sure to rate and review The Three Questions with Andy Richter on Apple Podcasts. This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf.