wellRED podcast - #8 - W. Earl Brown!

Episode Date: March 29, 2017

W. Earl Brown is one of the most hard working, talented, and beloved character actors of our time. Most know him as Dan Dority on Deadwood, Teague Dixon on True Detective, or of course as Cameron Diaz's mentally handicapped brother Warren in There's Something About Mary. The three of us, however, are lucky enough to just know him as our buddy "Big Earl"Brown was born and raised in western Kentucky. Realizing early in life that he had aversion to manual labor, he knew that farming life was not for him. The first theater he ever attended was on his grandparents' front porch, where, in following family tradition, they would entertain themselves after a day's work with songs and stories. He was much better suited to that part of Kentucky farm life rather than the fields and barns.In addition to his television and film work, Earl co-starred in Sony's The Last Of Us, 2013 Video Game Of The Year. He also writes music and records with Sacred Cowboys, an LA based Americana band. As if our southern roots weren't enough to make us pals for life, Brown will also be starring in Showtime's new series 'I'm Dying Up Here', produced by Jim Carrey and based on the booming stand up comedy scene in LA during the 70's. The series premiers Sunday, June 4th.  On this episode we discuss growing up in the south, our mutual love of comedy, the fears that come with being a professional entertainer, DEADWOOD, and what Larry David is like in real life. Not gonna give anymore away because we had too much fun and want you to hear it for yourselves!SUBSCRIBE AND TELL YER BUDDIES!! wellredcomedy.com for our tour dates, newsletter, and for our book The Liberal Redneck Manifesto: Draggin Dixie Outta The Dark.

And we thank them for sponsoring the show. Well, no, I'll just go ahead. I mean, look, I'm money dumb. Y'all know that. I've been money dumb ever, since ever, my whole life. And the modern world makes it even harder to not be money dumb, in my opinion, because used to you, you like had to write down everything you spent or you wouldn't know nothing. But now you got apps and stuff on your phone.

It's just like you can just, it makes it easier to lose count of, well, your count, the count every month, how much you're spending. A lot of people don't even know how much they spend on a per month basis. I'm not going to lie, I can be one of those people. Like, let me ask you right now, skewers out, whatnot, sorry, well-read people, people across the skewniverse, I should say. Do you even know how many subscriptions that you actively pay for every month or every year? Do you even know?

Do you know how much you spend on takeout or delivery, getting a paid chauffeur for your chicken low mane? Because that's a thing that we do in this society. Do you know how much you spend on that? It's probably more than you think. But now there's an app designed to help you manage your money better, and it's called Rocket Money. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions,

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Also, a fun one, I'd said it before, but I got an app, lovely little app where you could, you know, put your friend's faces onto funny reaction gifts and stuff like that. So obviously I got it so I could put Corey's face on those two, those two like twins from the Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland movies. You know, those weren't a little like the cue ball looking twin fellas.

Yeah. So that was money. What was that in response to? What was that a reply gift for? Just when I did something stupid. Something fat, I think, and stupid. Something both fat and stupid. But anyway, that was money well spent at first.

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dot com slash well read today that's rocket money.com slash well r e d rocketmoney.com slash well read and we thank them for sponsoring this episode of the podcast they're the well well well howdy there how are y'all doing welcome to another edition of the well red podcast I am Trey Crowder and here with me as always is oh wait no it's just me it's just me this week I murdered

both Corey and Drew outside of Albany New York about 56 hours ago so you know I don't think they'll be missed too much I'm certainly not missing them right now I'll tell you that now that's not

true none of it's true unfortunately including the missing them part I'm a it's a it's a whole other thing doing this on your own when you're used to doing it with your you know your partners in hijinks your partners in monkey shines as it were but sometimes because we record the the first part of our podcast is recorded the week of to try to you know keep as current as we can sometimes if Corey and Drew and I are not together during that period then I will it falls to me to do it alone which is fine but you know it's not as fun I'm not going to lie but you know hell

I have no trouble rambling on and on so I believe we'll get through it and if you've been listening to the show then you know that I've this is the second time that it's worked out this way and that I've had to do it like this so you know we survived the first one I believe will be all right on this round too we've got what I think is an awesome show today during the interview portion later on a good friend of mine and an absolutely fantastic character actor W. Earl Brown who's actually much more than just a character actor. Now I'll get into some of that later on but first let's see what's going on. I was at the comedy store last night doing a show and that for the first time. Not only that I'd done a show at the comedy store,

but that I'd even been to the comedy store. And that was on purpose. You know, I've been in L.A. for going on three months now, and I would have made it a point to go to the comedy store by now, if not for the fact that when I had been here like three or four days, a friend of mine and podcaster extraordinaire, David Smalley, who is the host of the very popular. atheist or you know

religious-based podcast dogma debate where he debates religion and other just social and political issues with other experts in those respective topics oftentimes it's someone who stands diametrically opposed to him David is an atheist

sometimes it's a lot of times it's preachers you want to have you it's a great show he's had me on there at now after last night I've been on the show three times. It's always a good time. And he told me I had been, again, I'd been here not even a week, and I went to record the second episode of Dogman Debates. And when I was there, he said, you know, we're doing a live taping of the podcast at the comedy store at the end of March. Would you be interested in doing some stand-up before that? And then, you know, being part of the taping, too. And immediately I was,

you know, of course, absolutely. I'd love to do that. So, whatever, you know, stupid reason in my head, when he, once that was established, I decided that I was going to hold off on even going to the store and I was going to make it where the first time I set foot in the building would be to do comedy there again. I, you know, I don't know exactly why. It just, that's how it entered my silly brain. And so that's what I did. And we went there last night. awesome place and also you know if people listen to this that aren't like big into comedy I guess maybe it might I feel like even

any casual comedy fans realize that the comedy store in LA is one of the most storied comedy clubs in America I mean you know easily top three I would say and so that's why I was you know kind of a big deal to me as a comedian

and we I get over there and the show was you know David did time up front, and then Jay Moore was on the show. That was my first time meeting. Jay, he is a sweetheart of a fucking dude. Insanely nice guy, Jay Moore. And, you know, very, very funny, obviously. And then after that was Steve Hill, who is a fairly well-known, again, atheist comic originally from St. Louis.

I hadn't met him yet either. Also a great dude. Also very funny. And then, then me and then the taping. And the set was great. The crowd was awesome. It was just a fantastic time. So shout out to David again for having me on that show.

And, yeah, you know, listen to this podcast first, obviously. But if you're looking for a new one to add to your, you know, your podcast DVR equivalent, whatever the hell you can be list, you know, that is a word, Trey, you're an idiot. But, yeah, your podcast playlist, your backlog, definitely check out, dogman debate with David Smalley. Very, very good. Let's see. That was awesome. Also another thing that was cool that I did yesterday.

So today, as I sit here, it's Sunday, March 26th. And when you're listening to this, it will be, well, if you're listening to it on the day it comes out, it would be Wednesday, March 29th. So this show was yesterday, Saturday. And yesterday during the day, I also had the very, very cool opportunity for me to speak to this year's class of the NBC Universal Late Night Riders Workshop, which is the thing they do every year. And this is either year, I think this is year five. And I did the workshop. And it's really cool.

It's a cool program. It's open to literally anybody, you know, anybody open call to submit writing packets for it. And that's usually, you know, you can Google it, Late Night Riders Workshop, NBC, and if you're interested in this. And the submission period is usually around like January or so, December, January of every year. You know, again, if you want to check it out. And they get something like a thousand or more. At this point, it could be way over that. I'm not sure, but it's a lot.

of packets that they get from all around the country. And they usually take like six to ten people. And in 2015, I was lucky enough to be one of those people. And I got to go up there. First time I've been in New York ever. And I was going there to do this, you know, fairly competitive writing workshop for NBC. The classes were at 30 rock every day. I mean, it was really cool.

really awesome and when I first got to New York I took a train into Manhattan and walked up out of the subway platform for the first time and it was snowing right and I'm in you know midtown Manhattan and I you know I was kind of struck by it I really was man this is kind of this is kind of magical you know and then within an hour of that I was just like why the fuck is it snowing it's almost April what the hell you know because again Southern boy man I never even been up there I don't deal well with the cold so I got over it pretty quick but the rest of the week was awesome though the entire workshop great experience great opportunity I learned a lot from doing it and you do a whole lot of things at the workshop a lot of exercises a lot of homework a lot of writing I mean you know as makes sense I remember when I did it I was staying with Drew who lives in Queens he lived in Queensland and still does now and I was staying with him in his basement when I was in the workshop and me and him We would stay up till, I mean, three or four every night I was doing my homework and he was helping me with it. You know, by bouncing things off of them and giving me tags, you know, like comics do.

And so, you know, it was pulling late nights and it was a lot of work and pretty intensive, but in a really good way. And so that was two years ago that I did it. And then this year, it's happening right now. Yesterday was the first day, and this year, the people that run it, the awesome people at NBC. Shout out to Karen, Breita, and Grace. Love all three of them to death, and they reached out to me and asked me to speak at this year's iteration of it,

which was very cool, very flattering for me, because that's another thing they do as part of the workshop every day. There's at least one, oftentimes two speakers, usually writers but sometimes producers sometimes managers or studio executives or just whatever but they asked me to speak at it yesterday via Skype and so that was a very cool thing for me to do you know I was very very flattered that they asked me to do that so yeah any aspiring writers listening right now I do recommend looking that up looking into that if it sounds like something that you might be interested in because it's a good time.

So with that, see, I feel like there was something else that I did. Oh, yes, okay. So segue into the primary topics I'm going to talk about on this week's intro. I also, earlier this week on Thursday, I went to the offices of attention media, and that's A-T-T-N. I've done some stuff with them in the past, and I've gotten know their owner and a lot of their staff. and I really, I like what they're about.

You know, they're a really cool new media company. And I just, you know, I'm down with it, basically. And like I said, I've done some things with them already, and they had contacted me. This week I said, hey, what would you think about doing a couple of, like, you know, humorous but mostly informative but brief videos about, you know, certain political topics. and I was, you know, I said, well, you know, that is kind of my thing.

You know, and they were like, yeah, yes, of course, but, you know, maybe a few less cocks and chits and fuck yous in hours if you don't mind. And I said, well, count me out. No, I told them, okay, yeah, sure, I'll come over there. And so I did two videos with them, one of which is out already, and the other of which will be out soon, if it's not out by the time you are listening to this. and you can just find them on ATTN, attentions, Facebook page and other social media outlets. And, you know, I think they turned out good. I'm happy with them.

And, you know, so go check those out. And the two topics that we did were the work requirement for Medicaid that was added to Trump care, which has since not passed that's a time that had not happened yet and secondly a new Republican

piece of legislation that allows states to drug test people on unemployment right so I want to go into because again

those videos are very brief if you watch them you know they're like 90 seconds or less and I just wanted to I'm a verbose idiot so I like to ramble, I could talk for days on something if it interests me.

And so because those are so short, I thought I'd use my very own podcast, my, you know, my own platform to go into a little more detail on those two things. So first of all, we'll start with the drug testing people on unemployment. This is something that has always bugged the shit out of me, the support for the, for this from frankly anybody, any American. And I do mean that. But of course, specifically with me, you know, it's conservatives that I know, friends of mine, you know,

some rednecks, some not, but people that I know that support it, I'm always just utterly confused by it. You know, I don't know how anybody that claims, to be down with freedom and liberty could ever possibly support something like this. You know, like to me, it's not even a partisan issue, but it very much so is in reality. And I know so many, right, so again, it's just, it's a Republican piece of legislation that

allows states to drug test people on unemployment or applying for unemployment. And see, my home state of Tennessee, they've been doing this for years, but it's welfare recipients. They started drug testing welfare recipients, and I want to say 2014. And they're not alone in that. There's, I think, seven other states who have similar programs. So this has come up before in my social, you know, circle, if you will, social media, especially. because when Tennessee was doing it you know I saw so many people

some of which very good friends of mine some of which people you know that I know well but we're not super close or whatever but I saw so many people that were supporting it when Tennessee was doing it to a man conservatives right

and their their whole thing was well most of them it usually came down to something along the lines of, well, man, shit. That's how we start our arguments back home usually. Well, man, shit. But they'd say, well, man, you know, I mean, I get drug tested in my job where I'm subject

to drug testing, you know, and that's for me to work and pay the bills. I mean, they want free money and they can't be drug tested while the hell with that. We don't, we, the taxpayers don't be paying for their drugs, man. that ain't right, you know. And so there's usually this thing of, because it happens to me, why should they, why should they be treated any differently,

particularly when I work and they don't, right? That's kind of what the mentality that I usually have run into with this argument boils down to. And every time I get in these conversations, I tell them, I say, man, if your boss came over to your house tonight

and he said hey Jimmy evening, how's it going? Listen, if you don't mind just need you and the family just step out here on the front yard for about an hour or two and we're just going to know we're going to go inside there. We're going to go through your

closet and your cabinets and your drawers and stuff and it won't take long we'll be out of your hair. Okay, thanks buddy. If your boss tried to do that, you would tell him to fuck all the way completely off

without a moment's thought, right? You wouldn't even think about it you'd just flip him the bird ton to go fuck himself because of course you would who wouldn't

that's completely unreasonable that he has no right to do that right? And nearly every time I've yet to have that conversation with anybody, conservative or otherwise, who disagrees with that?

Like, people hear that scenario and immediately they say, well, yeah, I know. That, hell no. That's insane. Well, my whole thing is, I have never understood logically how the contents of our bladders and our bloodstreams and what have you are any different than the content of the contents of our property, our homes, vehicles, and whatnot. Why is it treated differently? I've never understood this, and I still don't.

And I'm sure, you know, I'm not a lawyer at all. I'm sure I'll probably get some messages from people who have some kind of like legal rationale for that for why it's different, you know, I'm assuming because otherwise I genuinely don't understand how it's not considered literally unconstitutional. I mean, that's the Fourth Amendment. Unlawful searches and seizures. How is it not? How is that not applicable? I genuinely don't understand. And further, what I'm saying is, even if there is some legal rationale or reasoning for why it is different and is treated differently, even if that is the case, that still doesn't make me, understand why anybody would support it. Because there's plenty of things that

legally is the government can do and does do, but that doesn't make them not bullshit, right? And so to me, this would be one of those things, even if there is some legal foundation

for it. And here's the real kicker with the whole thing. And this, This is one of those things, man. When I first found this out, it really blew my mind. And even though, honestly, in retrospect, it shouldn't have blown my mind because it's kind of par for the course with American politics and American politicians. But still, when I first ran across this a few years ago, I was just floored by how overtly bullshit it is.

And what I'm talking about is there was a Supreme Court case in 1997. and I don't remember the name of the case, whatever, but you can Google it. Google 1997 Supreme Court drug testing. You'll find it easily. And what they found was that it is literally unconstitutional to randomly drug test candidates for public office. Right. And so now, and this is also one of those things where my interpretation may be. a little bit off. But the way I interpreted was, yeah, it says candidates for public office,

but the point of that is that that's the very beginning for a politician. That's where they start is by running for office. And from the very beginning, it's illegal. It's unconstitutional to subject them to random drug testing. And they don't get drug tested ever. Congressmen are still not drug tested. Right? So these same people that are subjecting people who are down on their luck, less fortunate, poor people, right? Subjecting welfare and people in unemployment, subjecting them to random drug testing are not themselves subject to random drug testing and cannot be, according to the United States Supreme Court. How, I mean, how much more egregiously we don't even give a fuck, hypocritical can something be? You know what I mean? Than that.

It's so in your face. It's just, I found that when, so I've talked about this before, but for the first six years of me doing comedy, and only in year seven now. So, I mean, this is basically up until the videos went viral. went full time as a comedian. Before that, my day job that I paid the bills with was working for the United States Department of Energy, right? Which was just, that's just the job that I found. You know, that's just how it worked out, but I ended up being there for six years. And we were subject to random drug testing.

And I've always thought this was bullshit. And again, the whole time I worked there, you know, I mean, I smoke a little bit again now. But the whole time I worked there, I had nothing to fear from a drug test genuinely. It wasn't about that. It's just, I don't think it's fucking right. And so, as I was working there, I started researching it because I had these, you know, I was fresh out of college and I was and still am fucking delusional in a lot of ways. So I had these big grand ideas that, you know, I was going to go in there. I was going to win one for the little guy.

You know, I was going to take the system down. I was going to go to the union or whatever. and I was going to notch a victory for freedom when it comes to random drug testing. Of course, none of that ever happened. Turns out a union consisting of federal employees in the deep south not super keen on going to bat for people getting high, basically. Because that's the thing is that's how a lot of people hear it.

You know, that's the whole anytime, you try to make this argument, so many people they immediately assume right off the bat, okay, well this, my fucker just wants to get high clearly. It's generally, you know, first of all,

who gives a fuck, none of your fucking business. Secondly, though, no, it doesn't have to be, it's the same, you know, it's no different to me than my support for equal rights for

LGBTQ, the LGBTQ community. You know, I'm not any of those letters, right? But that doesn't mean I don't care. It doesn't mean I can't give a shit about it. And that's the way it always was with the drug testing thing for me, too. I always thought it was bullshit. And so when I still thought I could actually do something about it,

I started researching it, and that's when I found that Supreme Court case. And it was even worse for me because, like I said, I worked for the federal government. So I genuinely don't see how that's any different at all because at the top, the entity that's doing the drug testing in either scenario, federal employees or public officials, it's Uncle Sam. It's the federal government. And it goes, according to the Supreme Court, it goes against the American Constitution for Uncle Sam to drug test one of those factions, but not. not the other one. What kind of fucking sense does that make? And of course, with these particular programs,

welfare and unemployment drug testing, I don't see how that's any different either. Ultimately, it's the government who's doing it. The Supreme Court has already determined that it's unconstitutional for the government to randomly drug test people, but only when those people are trying to be politicians or are politicians.

How much more fucked up? Man, it's such bullshit. And by the way, their reasoning was, and you read this, and I'm paraphrasing, but it's pretty close to this. They said, excuse me, they said that they didn't see how it was it was important enough to justify. the invasion of the person's privacy. Yeah, no shit. That's the entire thing. And they found that and applied that to politicians,

but not to the rest of us. It makes no fucking sense to me. Because, of course, outside of the analogy I already made of, you know, with the Fourth Amendment and all that, I also just don't see how it's anybody. these fucking business. You know what I mean? Again, that's freedom to me.

That's supposed to be what America's all about. As long as it's not impacting their job performance, then who gives a shit? What right is it of anybody's to know what somebody does in their free time as long as they're not hurting anybody else? And if you're an employer and it's impacting somebody's job performance negatively, that's completely different. That has to be addressed, right?

And that's the way it works for searching people's homes and property and stuff. If you have a reason, you get a warrant, and then you can do that. That's all I'm saying. This should be treated the same way. If you have a reason, then yeah, fine, drug test them. No problem with that at all, if there's a reason. but this doing it randomly shit it's never made any sense to me and still doesn't

I genuinely don't understand how anybody supports it and it comes back to like the ideology behind it comes back to that same fundamental misunderstanding that false assumption that American conservatives tend to

have, which underlines so many of their economic policies. And that assumption is that poor people are inherently lazy and worthless and shitty human beings, right? I mean, that's what most of these types of things are really saying. If you strip it down to the skeleton of the thing. because the attitude behind drug testing people that are on employment to me is, well, I mean, they ain't working. Got to be a reason for it.

And it can't possibly be just, you know, terrible misfortune or living in a place where your skills, there's no market for them or whatever, something like that. No, clearly the reason for someone to be out. of work must be because they're smoking the doobies, right? Clearly that's it. It's the same thing with drug testing people on welfare, right? It's, well, by God, you want free money. I know what you want to do with it.

You won't go out and get fucked up with it. Well, I'm not on my watch. No, I may not can make you work, but I can make you miserable. God damn it. Fuck these assholes. But that is what's at the core of all these types of things. And they, because they think part of the logic is we'll save money. We're wasting money on freeloaders and moochers and drug addicts.

And if we start drug testing them, we'll catch them. And they'll, we'll take them off the teat. and we will save money that way. Because, of course, obviously, it goes without saying that so, so many of them are owned drugs, we'll probably wipe out over half of the welfare base with this. We all know they're strung out. Just look at them.

Sorry asses. That's the attitude, right? Well, here's the fucking reality. in my home state of Tennessee, since they instituted that drug testing of people on welfare program, they have drug tested, and again, it's random drug testing rights, so it's not like everybody's on welfare. That's kind of the crux and all things. It's random. And they, since the beginning of the program, they have drug tested approximately 30,000 people. and of that 30,000, 55 have failed.

55, which is something like 0.19% or something like that. You know, not 19. In almost 2 tenths of 1%. Something like that, you know, I ain't good with, I'm sort of number dumb. But anyway, it's something like that. It's bad. It's low. It's hugely low.

And so what they found was they spent more money, significantly more money, administering that program and giving those drug tests to people than they saved by suspending benefits for people who failed. And guess what? Literally every single other state that has a similar program has found the same thing. every single one of them to varying degrees in terms of the actual dollar amounts. But that central finding of it ends up costing them money across the board, across the board. And what they've also found across the board is that the incidence of failure for a random drug test is,

far, far lower for these people, for people on welfare and the people that are being drug tested by these programs. They failed the test at a far, far lower rate than the general public at large. You buy a lot. The failure rate, just the overall average failure rate for random drug tests in America is somewhere around 8%. And again, in these states, the highest, most of them are not even 1% if that so it's much much lower

so they don't work on top of being just bullshit and un-American and anti-freedom and classist they don't fucking work in the first place

they're inefficient they're costly they're fucking pointless they're big government I mean, aren't these supposed to be central tenets of American conservative's philosophy is to avoid being inefficient in big government and costly and, you know, not effective? Isn't that supposed to be sort of their thing? So every single thing about that particular piece of legislation

is complete and utter fucking bullshit. I genuinely cannot imagine a counter argument for it that would convince me otherwise. I don't understand how, if you are a fiscal conservative in this country, I don't understand how you reconcile that with programs like this. Which leads me to the second thing, because it's very, very similar in a lot of ways.

So Trump care, again, which is since, failed, at least this iteration. You know, they ain't done fucking with shit yet. Believe that. But Trump care was adored by literally no one. I think even the people that drafted

and wrote it and presented it were doing so holding their fucking noses. You know, nobody likes this fucking thing. And for a whole lot of reasons, but even a lot of hardcore conservatives, Republicans in Congress didn't like it. And for a lot of them, it was because it

wasn't draconian enough for those fucking lizards, because of course, that's how they felt about it. So the people behind Trump care, one of the olive branches that they offered to that particular contingent of Republicans to hopefully sway them some was they threw in a work requirement for Medicaid recipients, so basically, if you're able-bodied and receive

Medicaid, you have to work. And, you know, just like the drug testing thing, it comes back to that fundamental bullshit assumption that they have of these lazy, sorry-ass poor motherfuckers who are wasting our goddamn money and are a drain on society, we have got to do something about that. God, if they think they're going to get free health care in this country, they are going to work. I don't care if they got to dig, ditches or what. They ain't going to sit on their asses and get free health care. We're not on my watch, by God.

Very similar reasoning to the drug testing thing. Well, guess what? The facts tell a very similarly opposing story to their narrative, which is that statistically, 87% of able-bodied Medicaid recipients, and if I've been saying Medicare, I meant Medicaid, but 87% of able-bodied Medicaid recipients already work. They're not out of a job. They don't need you pointing the finger in them

and making sure that they get up and go earn a living every fucking day. These people are, God, it's such fucking bullshit. it's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist right and just like the previous subject it's all it is all of the things that republicans ostensibly stand diametrically opposed to inefficient pointless big government and costly because that's the thing with this one too the health insurance companies they didn't like that they came out and in opposition to this work requirement. And they said, because, look, if you do this, somebody's going to have to enforce that. Somebody's going to have to ensure that they're meeting the work requirement. And that's probably going to be us. And that's going to result in administrative cost, which is going to drive up cost across the board.

So it's going to end up costing people money. and not do anything useful at all. But it makes them feel better these kinds of things because in their mind they think, well, but we're getting these freeloaders. We're getting them where it hurts, taking away their drugs, letting them die on the couch.

That's the thing also that I've never, I've had so many arguments with so many, conservative friends and acquaintances of mine over the years about health care, right? And this is true for like welfare and food stamps too. For me, the argument is kind of the same. And what I'm talking about is when it comes to health care, we'll reach a certain point. And they start going into that rhetoric of, well, Tray, man, these people that don't work, they don't do nothing. and then they get hurt somehow,

and they go to the doctor and they can't pay for it. Well, who pays for it, man? Me and you, the taxpayer, that's who pays for it. Are you okay with that? That's all right with you. It's not my place to pay for their health care. If they want health care, they can get a job and pay for it themselves. It's not my responsibility.

And I listen to that. that kind of thing. And my response is always, well, dude, if you stop right there like you're doing, like if that's where you end, your train of thought is right there, that's as far as you ever get, then yeah, I basically agree with you. Now, I do also believe that it's the right thing to do to do to help people who need it. I'm not always going to be, you know, somebody that's really sick and is less fortunate, I'm not necessarily automatically going to jump to.

Yeah, fuck them, I ain't my responsibility. Let the goddamn church figured out. I don't know. I ain't going to do it, you know. I don't automatically jump to that, first of all, because that's kind of shitty and lacks empathy and a bunch of other things that I ain't really on board with. but even if when you're talking about just the true the true pieces of shit out there and to be clear I've never I have never once tried to act like or argue that those people don't exist

the actual freeloaders the shitty ass people who just take advantage of the system at every single opportunity have kids just to get more benefits things like that that absolutely reprehensible shit that in my opinion there's no defense for those people absolutely do exist and in this argument if you even if you specify that you're talking about just them you're talking about just the people who genuinely are shitty mooching ass people even them my response is yeah i agree with you it is bullshit that is fucked up we shouldn't have to pay for it but What is the alternative? Turn them away?

Just literally let poor people die. Right? That's the alternative. That's what I'm hearing. Is that what you're saying? And every time. And I say that in the discussion. I put the question to them exactly that way.

And every time they start backpedal. And like, no, that trade. No, I'm not. I'm not suggesting we let people die. Okay, but aren't you though, man? Like, at the end of the day, ultimately, isn't that pretty much what you're saying with that argument? Because what happens, like I said, you end the argument there. It's not my responsibility to pay for it.

And most reasonable people would probably pretty much agree with you on that. but that's not where the story ends. That's where you end your argument. But that begs a further question. Okay, then what? Then what happens to them? And they're just, well, I'm just saying my responsibility. That's all I'm saying.

Yeah, that is all you're saying. And so what you are also saying is let them fucking die. And I'm sorry, I'm not on board with that. the country that is ostensibly the most powerful country in the world, right, the leader of the free world, should not be allowing people to die. You know, that just shouldn't fucking happen. And it doesn't, and I'm glad. But if they agree with that, if they say, yeah, of course, of course, we shouldn't let people die.

Well, then my response is, okay, well, that's the way that it's worked for years. And it has fucked us over terribly. We don't turn people away. We don't let people die and we shouldn't. But when those people can't afford to pay for it, you know, they go to the emergency rooms or whatever, that drives cost up for everybody. And you end up with a system that's as fucked as ours. That's the whole, that's how we got in this problem in the first place. Everyone agrees that shit wasn't working.

Everybody. And that's basically what your argument boils down to, unless you're willing to man up and have the balls to admit, you think, you think. think we should let them die. And if that's not what you're saying, then basically you're arguing for what we had pre-Oabomacare, which, as I said, I think most people on both sides of the aisle agreed. It was time for shit to change because it wasn't fucking working. And I mentioned earlier, I feel the same way about welfare and about food stamps.

It's kind of the same argument in that, first of all, I talk about this in the book. I'm pretty open with this kind of thing. But, like, I grew up, you know, I survived on food stamps as a kid. I mean, I ain't food bought with food stamps or what we call back. I don't know if they're called this everywhere, but commodities is what my family always called them, which what that meant was like, you know, like Second Harvest, like food bank places, donations. We got those every month. And we had food stamps too.

and I I lived my whole childhood eating that food, right? So it would be so so hypocritical of me and so shitty of me to be one of those people. It's like a fucking food stand

and lazy ass, freeloaders. I'm never going to be that guy. Just for no other reason than my own personal experience. And by the way, I feel like I'm a pretty shining example of how those programs can be fucking effective.

Right? I mean, it worked for me. It kept me alive. And then ultimately, I, you know, I have since paid, absolutely paid my fair share of taxes, man. By the time, by the time they bury me, I will have given the federal government far more than it ever gave me, right? So, fuck all that, number one. But number two, as I was saying with the Medicaid thing, or the health, insurance thing, even if you restrict the argument to just the truly shitty freeloader people, the quote unquote welfare queens that they like to throw that term around right, those people, those mythical fucking beings who, again, that's not, mythical's not accurate. Those people do exist. Of course they do. Of course they do. And it sucks.

It's shitty. It's not okay. But that shit's on them. my argument then goes to okay do they have kids most of them do so what what about the kid

it's not the kid's fault like I said man I was that kid well my dad my dad was not shitty wasn't one of those people but anyway it's not the kid's fault are you talking about literally letting children go hungry and if you're not what are you saying take the kids

away from their parents so we do what? Give them to the government to raise and cost way more money, child? Because to me, that's the only two options. Let poor children go hungry or take

them away and put them all in homes, which is, I think everyone would agree, a fucking terrible idea. Because if that's not, if you're not advocating for doing one of those two things, then you have to give these people food stamps, man. You

do if for no other reason than the kids right so that's my argument with both of these things is yeah there's a lot of things about it i don't like a whole lot of things about it i don't like it's not a perfect system it does they do get abused absolutely they get fucking abused and that's not that's not cool but i don't see the alternative right and i've digress quite a bit here from just the work requirement for Medicaid, but it's all tied into that same that same fucking nightmare scenario that they're all running in their head

of just poor people just suck in their fucking scaly udders, right? Just living off their dime and doing nothing and that's all they want to do is nothing and just lay around and be sorry and fucking mooch.

And it's just not the reality, man. most poor people do work most poor people don't do drugs most poor people love their kids most poor people want to not okay excuse me all poor people want to not be fucking poor

man and these kind of predatory programs like this they're just they're fucking they're cruel they're fucked up and and they're expensive and they're pointless and just fuck them to death

man. See, this is why I meet a lot of people, has met a lot of people over the years that are, you know, I'm especially younger Republicans. So I've got a lot of really, really good friends who fall under this umbrella, which is I'm socially liberal, I'm fiscally conservative. And that's kind of become, to most people, I think, in most people's minds, that is, that is, well, those are the reasonable ones. Those are the reasonable Republicans. And I agree. They are. Especially as compared to the fucking other end, you know, the goddamn tea party and the Trumpets and the Ted Cruz motherfuckers. Yeah.

Good Lord. Absolutely. These are the reasonable Republicans compared to that fucking shit show. But I still, I still, I mean, if I'm being completely honest, man, like when I get, when I really get down into, you know, the nitty gritty of many of those arguments, I just can't get down with it. You know, I still just think a lot of those stances and viewpoints and policies and what have you, you know, kind of shitty ultimately. and I'm just not I'm not on board with them

and obviously it's all made so much worse by the fact that many of these programs that go to help poor people or go to help the elderly or whatever most of these programs are just with the exception of you know Medicaid

Medicare and shit are a drop in the fucking bucket compared to our defense budget right and fiscal conservatives and not all of them. I mean, a lot of them who truly do fall under that,

you know, they'll, you know, they'll keep it real when it comes to the defense budget, but so many of them, though, don't, you know, that, no, no, no, no, no, we need that. Got to have that. And look, man, I'm not a complete, I'm not a complete dove in that way. I mean, I'm on the record as saying, you know,

especially compared to most of my contemporaries, I'm relatively pro-gun. I mean, I'm all four closing the gun show loopholes, and I'm all for background checks and all that. Just reasonable measures, of course, absolutely. But I'm not, beyond that, I'm not really a big gun control guy, just because of how I was raised in the culture surrounding it and everything,

and I just don't really have a problem with it. And that kind of carries through to the military stuff, too. I don't really have a problem with us having, you know, the number one military on the globe and being like kind of indisputable as the big swinging dick in that arena, right? Not to say we couldn't be taken down a peg. I hope we never are, not while our, you know, not. Anyway, I mean, I've got kids. I don't want us to go to war.

I have to prove that shit. But I'm kind of okay with us being the fucking, you know, the big bad motherfucker when it comes to that kind of stuff. I don't really have a big problem with that. but that we could do that we could maintain that status with 20 well I don't know I'm pulling this number purely out of my ass but what I do know with certainty is we could slash the defense budget a lot and still hold that title by a fucking mile right so it You know, when those people don't support any kind of defense cuts at all, and then act like it all is about the money and being financially responsible and getting our budget in line and all this shit, and that's why we have to let poor kids go hungry and let sick poor people fucking die in their homes or whatever.

And, you know, like I said, that's not what these people will say, but that's what I hear ultimately. You know, when they say that kind of shit, I just, that's why I'm pretty well liberal across the boards like fiscally and otherwise I just don't can't get with it but anyway that's enough of that I just want to get into those two particular subjects and of course I turned it into a whole goddamn discourse because that's what I do um but but moving on to the interview this week's interview like I said awesome uh I think it's one one of the best ones we've done.

I love Earl as an artist and as a dude. W. Earl Brown, he's from Murray, Kentucky, originally, Southern Boy. And we met, I'd seen Earl and said, he's a veteran character actor. It's been in all kinds of stuff. I guarantee you, if you don't know his name, you are familiar with his work. Probably either as, you know, Warren from there's something about Mary, my favorite of his roles and probably a lot of people's favorite of his roles just because of how how great it is he was dan doherty on the inimitable HBO prestige western profane shakespeare drama

deadwood one of my all-time favorite tv shows fucking unreal good and earl is unreal good in it as dan fucking crushes it every single week and was part of one of my favorite fight scenes ever committed to film in the third season of that show. Seriously, if you have stuff and seen Deadwood, please rectify that situation. Fucking too sweet, man. But anyway, was familiar with Earl's work already, but didn't know him from Adam, right, on a personal level. Moved to Burbank, I did, and in January, and Pat, Anderson Hood of the drive-by truckers, who it's still kind of wild to me to say, but who is also a friend of mine now.

We've gotten to know each other over the past year, and we keep in touch. He texted Earl, unbeknownst to me, he texted Earl because they also are friends and said, hey, I've got a buddy who's new in town in Burbank. He don't really know a lot of people, and he's a southern guy. and, you know, I just wondered if I could give him your number. You kind of show him the ropes or whatever. And Earl was like, yeah, oh, yeah, what's his name? And Patterson said, you know, Trey Crowder.

And Earl, he has since told me was like, holy shit, really? You know, I love that guy. I've seen his videos, whatever else. That's awesome. Of course, yeah, yeah, hook us up. So Patterson did. We always change numbers. Me and Earl got together for beers or whatever.

And since then, I mean, that was in January. And since then we've hung out multiple times. I watched the Super Bowl at his place. He's a really good dude and such a fascinating and fucking talented guy, man. He also plays in a band, the Sacred Cowboys. He plays multiple instruments. In the band, he plays guitar. But I'm saying in life, he can play multiple instruments and play them well.

He can sing. He has all these paintings in his house that he himself did. And I mean, they're fucking good. Like, he's a Renaissance man, you know. And again, cut from the same cloth. He and I, him being, you know, a progressive from southwestern Kentucky. So, yeah, I love Earl of Death. He's an awesome guy.

And he hosted me, Drew, and Corey at his place here in Burbank in his garage, which is he has converted into a bitch in man cave. We went over there, met up with him and recorded the interview that you. you're about to listen to and this could have went on for, we say in the interview that we're going to have to do a round too and I believe that we, well, I know that we will because we barely even scratch the surface of the awesome stories that Earl can tell. And it's just all, you know, it's, we talk about comedy, we talk about acting and he gives us a whole bunch of, you know, great, great Hollywood stories, super, super interesting

shit and he's a super interesting and great dude. So I really think that you all will enjoy this one. please I hope you do and come back and see us next week and yeah enjoy W. Earl Brown and rejoin us next week when I will be back. I'll have the band back together. You want to have to listen to me ramble on and on by myself for the entire first portion of the podcast. Corey and Drew will be back in the motherfucker next week. So come back but first listen to us. shoot-to-shit with my man Earl Brown. Thank you all very much.

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Have you seen my wiener? For those of you who didn't immediately recognize that, that was our guest this week, W. Earl Brown playing his infamous role of Warren, and there's something about Mary. Have you seen my w. It's just character acting at its finest, as only our buddy, W. Earl Brown can do. I know Trey dug into this a little bit more, but this is a super fun episode, hanging out in Earls. I don't know if you, I don't know if Man Cave is the right word. And I say that due to, A, I just don't know if that's what he considers it.

And B, I don't know if we're allowed to call something a Man Cave anymore. Everyone's included. Everyone can come in the Man Cave. but we had a blast doing the episode. It was super fun. But I'm here, as usual, for the weekly tour schedule update. Let's see. Just a couple tickets remaining on April 2nd in Bentonville, Arkansas.

This weekend, we're in Oxford, Mississippi, but it is sold out. But you can still come see us at the Oxford Conference for the book. We're going to be there on March 31st, along with some other great authors, talking about our book, which is one of the sponsors of the show, the Liberal Redneck Manifesto, Dragon Dixie, out of the dart. Also, April 13th, we're going to be back at Largo in Los Angeles. We're super pumped. We were just there last month, classic venue.

We were able to sell it out, and I believe there's a couple tickets remaining for this show. But by the time this podcast launches, I don't know, but I hope you can get them. And remember, get all tickets at well-read comedy.com, spelled just like this podcast. W-E-L-R-E-D-Comedy.com. We're also going to be in Richmond, Virginia, Virginia, Beach, Virginia, Huntsville, Alabama, Brooklyn, New York, Providence, Rhode Island, New Brunswick, New Jersey, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, Indianapolis. A little caveat to that.

On April 28th, the two shows on Friday will be all three of us, but on the 29th and 30th, it'll just be Trey and Drew, because I have to go to my future brother-in-law's wedding because as we mentioned on the last episode, I now have a fiancé and if I don't go to her brother's wedding, she will stab me. So I got to do that.

Added some more tickets for Columbus State on May 1st, May 2nd in Columbus is sold out. May 3rd, though, you can get tickets for Dayton, Ohio because our May 4th in Liberty Township is also sold out. So if you want to come see us in Ohio, you're going to have to haul ass to Dayton. We also

just added two theater shows we're moving up to theaters baby in Boston and Chicago finally we've been trying to get Chicago we haven't been ignoring you I promise it's just not worked out so Boston Chicago the cheaper the tickets are

cheaper the earlier you get them so so do that but other than that that's all I got I'm gonna keep it short and simple just go to that well readcomedy.com get t-shirts tickets to shows and also you know subscribe to the podcast to your friends

to subscribe and leave us a review. That seems to help bump us up. And we really like that because we want to keep doing this. So anyways, y'all have a good week, and I'll talk to you next week or see you out there on tour. Hopefully see you in Mississippi this weekend. Say what's up. We love you. Well, well, well.

We did Grand Canyon. We did Cheyenne. We did. South to North. Yeah, we went to the Grand Canyon and then went up, went over to Denver. and then up to, we went to the Bluegrass Festival, Tell you, Right. Yeah, tell you ride, Bluegrass.

Then we went up to Cheyenne. We stayed at some Buffalo Ranch. And then we went from there to... You stopping Cody? Cody. We spent the night in Cody and went to the rodeo. Oh, that's cool. I'm going to go through Cody. Cody is awesome.

That rodeo every night. Oh, they do? I've been to that rodeo three nights in a row. It was great. We went to, what was Buffalo Bill's wife's name? Irma. Is it? Irma is the name of the big bar there.

Irma. Who he's writing to? Yeah. Irma's, I think, is the bar there. And they've got really good breakfast potato. Well, yeah, Shinerbox. Breakfast potatoes. Let's close that door.

Sure. And kill some of those ugly lights or at least turn them down, if not off. Y'all wants to smoke? Anybody? I'll do it later after we're done. If I do you know. Yeah, it might get a little weird. I might. I'm saying

going. Does everybody sound good? Yeah, I think it sounds good. Yeah. Levels are pretty evil. Is that the light switch over there? Yeah, over there in the corner. Sorry, buddy. I sound like you said corny. Did you call on that?

We just need to make it prettier in here. Make the mood better. The ambiance. Not this blue light. So, just turn it. There you go. That's good. That lava lamp.

So Earl. I love my lava lamps. Yes. what I knew about you before we met was that you were an actor and had been active for a while now. Also, you were from Kentucky because I think Patterson Hood of the Drive-Buy truckers, our mutual friends, told me that. Yeah. Introduced us. And I knew that you had been Warren, and there's something about Mary and Dan Doherty on Deadwood.

What I didn't know was that you were such a. self-professed comedy nerd, right? And also that when you first, when you first really got into theater, you got pretty heavy into the comp, not stand-up, but the, you know, like sketch and improvise,

comedic acting scene to the point that you've got a pretty good story about that. Well, Saturday Night Live was when I was in seventh grade, sixth grade, seventh grade, SNL came on. And I love Richard Pryor. idolize Richard Pryor and George Carlin blew my pubescent mind. You know, I remember...

It was 77, right? Yeah, that was a yearabouts, yeah. I remember getting class clown and the first time hearing it. And just, you know, those things you didn't talk about. And, you know, when you're 12 and you've grown up in a Baptist church and you hear some guy tell a joke about, you know, I was talking about going to Catholic school. And I had questions for the nuns.

The nuns hated me. Like, hey, can God make a rock so big that even he can't. can't move it. Right. And like when I was 12, just, oh my God, I never thought of that. You know, I so wanted to ask the preacher on Sunday to see them squirm. Anyway, Rich was on, prior was on SNL, the third or fourth episode. That's when I tuned in.

And that suddenly became it for me. And Belushi was my hero. Did you have friends that knew about it and liked it too? Did you talk about it with people? Well, after, yeah. But I was kind of the first in my group today. discover it. Like I remember when Steve Martin did the let's get

small, that was kind of big for everybody. And that was around. I think that was the first season of the show. Would have been first or second. Yeah, and that was when everybody else had kind of started to discover it. But it always kind of felt like my thing, you know, because I'd watched it first. That's how about comedy in general in high school. And you were in Murray

Kentucky, right? Yeah. I'd probably also had something to do with it, do you think? I mean, I'm saying that it seems like it's not surprising it would take longer for Saturday Night Live to permeate into Murray, Kentucky than everywhere else. Yes, of course. You're one of the first people on board with it. And, you know, but I'm just talking of my immediate group at East Calloway Elementary School of the seventh grade, you know. And I would watch that and I would watch SCTV.

It was in syndication and I think Channel 12 in Cape Girardo had it. But it was in syndication on one of the channels that we could get on our antenna, and I would steal the jokes. And I used to watch Make Me Laugh. It was a game show of where they would have comedians and they would have a contestant, and you had 30 seconds to make them laugh. I think they put it on TV land, and I watched it when I was on. That was like the Apollo for white people. Well, I would steal the jokes, and I would go to school and do them as if they were mine. But, yeah, I said the first theater I ever attended was my grandparents' front.

porch because my grandmother who was she was in a wheelchair she was handicapped her whole life she loved to sing my granddaddy was a raconteur storyteller non-parallel so i would sit on their front porch and that's how they would entertain one another you know and so then i discovered george carlin and richard prior and then not long after that i got my first kiss album and that kind of became my thing but it's kind of my rebellion that they all liked country music and horses well i liked heavy metal punk and motorcycles. Right, yeah. But it was the,

I think the story you're alluding to, I'd gone to Murray State, I was the first of my family to even go to college. I had no fucking clue what I wanted to do in my life. And I took an acting class on a whim in my second year, and it was like a fish being dropped into water

when he didn't even know water existed. Well, the second city came through. I knew the story of everybody on SNL and almost all of them were second cityers, which was an improvisational company theater out of Chicago. That's where I started, actually. I didn't actually do the theater, but my interest in comedy peaked. I wanted to be a stand-up comedian.

I knew that. And Saturday Night Live was like, well, you do that, and then you do this. And I found out, I was like, well, Farley did this, Belushi did this, Dan Akroy did this, and I went to Chicago, and I took a two-week training course. And what I found out was that I am too selfish to do impromptu. problem. So I just said, you know what? Stand up it is. So go on. I never even, honestly, I never even really considered, like it was always stand up for me the whole time. I guess because of that, like, you know. We knew ourselves. Well, it was 100% always stand up. I mean, I knew that's

what I wanted to get to, but I was like, you thought you could do both. I thought I could do both. And you're like, this is going to block me from being a good improviser. Well, I want to give up the joke or whatever. Yeah, I mean, I was a good. good improviser, but because I was, I thought that that so much, I was fucking it up for everybody else. And I knew that. I was very aware of that early on. It's a level of trust. When you've got a team of people that are at your level or better than you. Yeah. And you can trust them to, you know, I learned that lesson. It kind of all ties in the story with the, when I was going to, the touring company came through and played Murray State.

Okay. The Canadian, Canadian. No, out of Chicago. Okay. And it was a new company. They had started a second company. And the director happened to me on the road with them. And I had seen them the year before when they came. They'd play Murray like every year. So the second year, I'm like, this is what I'm, it was germinating in my head. This is what I want to do. Well, the director happened to me on the road with them. It was Don DePolo. And at that point, Donnie was the only teacher.

There were three classes at the second city, and Donnie taught them all. It was before it became a huge school and money-making. Corporation. Yeah. So Donnie took a shine to me. This is the summer of 85. Before you boys were probably born. You're after I was born. I was still in the nut. Well, Donnie took a shine to me. He gave me his personal number, his home number.

But how did he even interact with you? I went backstage after the show. I went up. It was in the student union building. I knew my way around. So I went up. Rick Hall, who's now my neighbor? He's our neighbor. He lives near here. commercials. No shit. Yeah, and grew up on a pig farm in southern Illinois, which I found out, you know, since he's been out here, but I went up to Rick Hall. He doesn't remember this, but, because I've told him this story. He said, I remember that tour because it was the very first time I'd ever toured. But I said, how did you get started?

And he said, well, our director is actually on the road with us. So that was how, and I just went up and introduced myself. So the summer of 85, Donnie made room for me. There was a, he gave me his number. I called him. He said, we have a six-month waiting list. But I got a good feeling. I'm going to make room for you. So the summer of 85, every summer, every Saturday for six weeks, I drove Chicago and back, 840 miles. And I took the first level of Donnie's class. And Donnie would keep me around.

I would do level one, and then he would keep me for levels two and three, and stick me in. So I knew, okay, he likes me. Well, that was my plan was I was going to get into the second city. I was going to go to Saturday Night Live, and I was going to spend, you know, a few years. there and then I was going to get in movies. Jesus Christ, we have so much in common. Well, there. I'm just old enough to be your daddy.

And look, neither one of us are on Saturday Night. And neither of us made the Second City, but that's another one, too. I can tell you some more stories of who all didn't make Second City. So I auditioned for and got into the graduate program at the Goodman Theater in Chicago, and the Theater School of DePaul. And I was going to get my MFA. Well, it was my excuse to move to Chicago and get formal training as an actor. So I'd been there, I was in my first quarter, and Donnie calls me, and he goes,

you want to join our touring company? Yes. You know, you'd have to have a second job. You can't just, I said, I'm giving a shit. That's what I want to do. And he said, yeah, well, okay, we're hiring a new big guy for the touring company. I'll talk to Joyce, Joyce Sloan, who was the producer. He goes, I'll talk to her and I'll take care of it. But you do need to go through the formality of the audition.

So just be there Saturday morning. Unfortunately, my wife and I were out of town. I can't be there. Last thing he said to me, he goes, I'm not directing this show. Del Close is coming back from the Improv Olympic, and he's got this kid over at the Olympic that he's just crazy about. But never mind that. Just be there Saturday. I'll take care of it.

Guess who it was. Well, now that you said Del Close, I can't even imagine because Del Close is... What year was that? Hold on. Del Close literally taught everybody. And there's about to be a movie Mike Myers. Mike Myers is playing Del Close in the movie. Okay, what year was this?

Big guys. It was Farley. Me and Chris were the auditionees. Me and Chris were the auditionees. Boy, you didn't lose. You got beat. So that was my first big lesson in showbiz. I think I've shared this one with you, Trey. A few years ago, I spoke to this group of kids that were graduated

from North Carolina School for the Arts. This kid really earnest, he says, I have a question, Mr. Brown. How do I best prepare myself for a career in showbiz? Now, these were all behind the scenes, you know, want to be producers or directors or whatnot. And I said, it's what you want. He goes, more than anything in the world, this is all I've wanted since I was a kid. I said, all right, well, the first thing, you'll need a little help. I said, get like 10 or 12 of your buddies, people you trust that you know.

And you ask them to help you out. You have them all come over to your place one afternoon, and you line them up, one right after the other. You stand in front of them with your back to the wall, facing them. Spread your legs ever so slightly and have each of them kick you into nuts as hard as they possibly can. If you get through all 12 without being a ball of tears, you're ready to get started. Sure. So that was my first kick in the nuts because it's like, and conversely, had it been Don's show,

I was Donny's boy. Right. You know, Chris was Del's boy. But the producer was going to go with who Dale wanted. Yeah, because it was Del's show. Del just to cast his own show. Of course. And just to think if Dale had known you before, who knows, you know?

Who does? Wow. But it was my first big kick in the nuts. Actually, it worked out best for me in that I went back to school. And I became, I had a lot more skills from going through that program than I would have had. And then as everything turned out, when the Fairleys were doing something about Mary, the studio wanted a name and a face in that role. Chris was at the top of their list. he was pretty much unhirable at that point because of his problem.

That was right before he died. He died while we were doing the moment. I was about to say that was 95? No, that was 97. Or 97, yeah, he died 97. November or 97? Yeah, you're right. I was 10.

Which was almost 10 years from the time that we were both there auditioning. I remember where I was when I found out sitting in Granny Baines living room. It's fucking criss-crossed apple sauce, as they say now, watching the TV. And it crushed me. That was my dude. I was in the hotel room in Miami, doing Mary. And the Fairley's argument with that was they had to have an unknown. The audience had to believe the character was mentally handicapped, or otherwise the humor wouldn't work.

Oh, I was thinking, like, I can't imagine Farley not being Farley. Yeah. You know what I mean? And that was a character role. But he was that, man, on Second City, I saw him do a strip tease bit. I went to see him at Second City three or four times because he wasn't in touring company no time, but he was on the main stage. Yeah, undeniable. And he had that same kind of energy.

that you couldn't, like Belushi had, you know. But he worshipped John to the degree that he had to live and die the same way, you know, sadly. Right. But it's not like, I cross paths with him a lot in Chicago. But I can tell you who else was there at that time, who was a bus boy at the second city, John Favro. Yeah. John never got in the company at all. And Dave Kekner never, he was in the suburban company.

He never got in the city company, you know, in Kekner's career. I've got his actual big year right up. As soon as the liberal redneck action figures come out, you guys got to give me one. Sure. Do you know, Kekner? Yeah, no, because I've heard literally, I think three or four dudes that have done like just sketches with him out here, so he's the greatest dude in the world. Like he's always wanting to do another sketch as soon as the sketches over.

He's like, what else? He's on Superior Donuts. Based on Tracy Letts his play. Tracy that were actors together. Jermaine Fowler, who is hilarious. He's also a nice guy. First dude, he was nice to me in his. New York.

Judge Hirsch, right? Just the old guy. That's based on a Tracy Let's play. Jermaine was super nice to me, like, day five in New York. He was like, where you from? Man, this is going to be hard. You need to get a hobby, like, all this stuff. And I was like, because at the time, his big connection was like he dated someone on S&L.

He's the man. When did you go to Chicago or New York? I moved to New York with my wife about three years ago. She's an actor, and it's funny. I'm listening to you. Tell your stories. What we do is a lot of rejection. But one thing that we always could hold on to is, if I can go in that room and make those people laugh, I know I did that.

You know, she can go and have a great audition and never know why she didn't get the part. It's a different type of sort of unknown rejection. There's a lot of rejection in the comedy world. There's a lot of people who are great and hilarious and funny and they're not going to get everything that they want, but they know they're funny. and they get validation on being funny by the laughter. And with her, it's like if I don't get a role, I don't get a do. See, you develop, she has to develop that inner sense of when she knows she's in the moment. Right.

When you know you're there and you know. That was all, once I got over that hump and I realized the only thing I control is that brief amount of time that I have in the room. Right. And if I can make that connection and create that moment, I've got to let all the rest of the shit go. I just had an email from this young guy, A.J. Rivera, who I met, he texted me today. Have you ever been to network and not gotten a show? A lot. Yeah, probably more than you've gotten one.

Because he just had his first network session and found out today he didn't get it. And he's fucking crushed. I mean, I'm not wrong on that. More than you've gotten one, you've been there and didn't get it. That happens. The best actors. Like I read with commercial auditions, it's like one in ten, like the best guys. So the best guys bat a hundred, you know?

Right. It's like the only thing that's harder than batting. Uh-huh. Yeah, right. Batting 300 or 40 when you're in the Hall of Fame. Yeah. Well, you just maybe feel really good to say that too because the last four or five months or so, like the last audition she had, she came home and said, I'm not going to get it.

And I said, oh, I'm sorry. She goes, no, it's fine. I crushed. And I was what? She goes, I murdered that. audition. The casting director was super impressed and I know she'll call me in for something I'm better for. But that's the way you have to look at it. That's a new thing. That's a seed. You know what I mean? And it's a seed you plant. You know, I've worked with people. There's a cat. She's a

big cat. She heads casting actually for one of the studios now. I audition for her 10 times. And it was the first audition that I had that went to, I'm not, won't go into that story, but it went to a really well-known star, big star, who decided he wanted to broaden his horizons. But that was the seed. I made such an impression. And that 10 more films later, I got one. But, though, I wanted to bring this up anyway, but it's relevant to this discussion. So I know you've had your fair share of kicks in the nuts for sure.

But on the other hand, though, you were getting work, like real work before you ever even left Chicago, right? Did you play the, like, the antagonist in some, like, 80s action movies? excessive force. How dare you not know that time? Did you also do the voiceover? Coming to summer, excessive force, me, excessive force. It was everything its title implies. But what I'm wondering is, did that experience, you know, because yeah, you were the villain in this movie, you know, I know you did some other things in Chicago, too, like actual work from there.

When you came out here, did you, like, was that a kick in the nuts? Did you expect it to be easier that... Did you expect it to be easier than it was? It wasn't about what you, you know. I was sent out. I did, because you guys were little boys then. Rookie of the Year, the kids baseball league. I'm his catcher.

I'm the bullpen catcher. Oh, yeah. Holy shit. I got like two, three lines. Originally, he was supposed to be the comic relief. He was the catcher of the team, but he was overweight, and they were trying to make him lose weight. Danny wasn't supposed to be in the movie.

and the studio demand, Danny was just going to direct the movie. And about a week before it's going to start, the studio, nope, this is home alone on a baseball field. You have to be in it. So he's making up gags for that, you know, the batting coach that Danny played, Danny Stern, Daniels. Yeah, fucking Gardenhouser. Yeah, he was young.

I saw if shit was made up on the spot. You know what might be funny. Okay, if I get stuck in the equipment cage, let's do that. So what was my part originally was supposed to be a funny role, got deemphasized because they had to, you know, Danny was the guy. Because Daniel Stern came in and crushed. Yeah. But that was actually the residuals on that movie were the down payment on this house. That is fucking awesome.

Yeah. That movie, that is. See, but that's this crush to me of like realizing how fucking old I am. Yeah, but I mean. I came out here. I was 29. Dude, I cannot wait. I can't wait to watch that movie again with that knowledge.

I didn't say that movie in a while, but I've seen it. I've seen it as an adult and it holds up to me. I fucking love that movie. I think it's great. It was one of those. It was not a pleasurable shoot. Oh, really? You know, movies are, you're going to find out.

There are sometimes you're on a film or a TV show and you wake up like, oh, fuck, I can't wait to get there. This is awesome because it's that thrill, you know? Yeah. And there's some of them that are, you wake up, go to work. Oh, it's awful. And that was not a happy set. We had, there was a lot of pressure on Danny. from the studio and it was his first directing effort.

And then we were supposed to... I didn't even know until you just said that that he even directed. Yeah, I did, but I had forgotten it. Yeah, I had no idea. And then we had Busey as a lead. Bucie's fucking crazy. That's not a pretend. That's not an act.

He's fucking crazy. And so he caused some problems. The Rocket. He was the Rocket in the movie. That's his name, right? The Rocket. And you laughed, which is appropriate completely, because it's funny to think about it. But then you think about action.

working with BUC. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, and that was nine. I got along fine with him, but he was, that was 1980, no, 991. Yeah, okay. I did that, let's see. And he seems to have gotten exponentially crazier.

Well, you know, he doesn't, he doesn't work. Yeah. Word spreads. When you're difficult, you know, if you're. Internet age, I guess. Okay, if you're a big star and you put asses in the seats, you can get away with all kind of crazy, you know. There's some comedians who became big movies.

stars whose behavior yeah you can tell Slater when I'll tell you yeah I know who it is whose careers died over crazy behavior so

so you know if you're a decent guy and easy to get along with people will give you a little little more leash so but so how was

the overall experience of coming out of coming out of here from Chicago under the circumstances you did was it yeah it was I was staying busy in theater. I had a play going all the time, you know, and

I'd start, I had eight TV film things under my belt. And with excessive force, there was a known star whose career at that point was hot. It's kind of disappeared. I don't want to say. Oh, yeah? Well, our listeners can look it up. Well, he's not in the movie. It was offered to him. Oh, okay. Well, they couldn't afford him, basically. They couldn't afford him. Somebody hot in the 80s that's not doing shit now?

Tom Barringer? I'm not going to say. I'll give you a hint. He smiled at me, Gale. Figure it out. Okay. Well, they wanted him for the movie, and they couldn't afford him. So they hired me locally, and I got paid scale.

And I knew then that, okay, this is as good as it gets if I stay here. Scale for those, you know, there's minimum wage for actors. Right. And it's through the union, but there's a minimum wage, and that's what I was making. And I knew, okay, this is the glass ceiling for me, because I'm a supporting lead in a, it's a new line. It was a $6 million budget, I think, which is, at that point, was not a, you know, not a cheap, cheap movie. And I'm the bad guy, and I'm making scale. So I knew that was the time to come out here.

I came out on my own. My wife was still, she had a job in Chicago. We're high school sweethearts. we broke up when I moved to Chicago to start acting school, but after a year, 14 months, who counted, we got back together. I'm the one that counted. Thank you very much. So, anyway, I came out here to try it out, and I had luck right off the bed. I'd been here two weeks, and I got a pilot in New Orleans.

And then I came back here, and I got a TV movie with Steve Lang. I had like four scenes or something, not a major role, but a role. I called Carrie, and I went, we have to move out here. is low-hanging fruit, babe. So we moved. The pilot didn't get picked up. And then you didn't work for five years. Seven months. And it was the longest since I'd gotten out of school, seven months. And then this is, I don't think I've told you this one, I got sent this script.

The casting director who did the pilot, Gary Zucker Broad, is working on this feature, and he wants to see you for this. So is 180 pages. Most scripts are like 100, 110 pages. This is 180, like, page. I couldn't make heads or tails of it. I'm reading like, this doesn't fucking make sense. So I read it that night, and I read what I'm auditioning for. Read it and bed. The next morning, woke up, and Kerry goes, what?

What are you reading for today? I'm going, I don't know how to describe. What's the role you're playing? I don't think you want to know. So I go to the audition. I had not seen this director's first movie, Reservoir Dogs. So I get there, and I'm in a room that's about half the size of this office, space that we're sitting in now.

I was Maynard, the hibbilly. Yeah. You know, get the game. Yeah, yeah. So it was between me and Dwayne, who I know, he's still around. We were there. And so that was my first big audition here. I didn't get it.

They hired Dwayne. And then, so that was not long after that. Gosh, what was it? Oh, it was the same casting director, Gary. I owe so much to him. He was casting Wes Craven's new nightmare. And I love the first nightmare on Elm Street. I still think it's a classic film, and I did not like the sequels.

At that point, I didn't realize Wes did not make the sequels. So when I found out that it's Nightmare 7, I'm like, oh, fuck, I don't want it. Then I read it? Oh, my God, it's so clever. and then West kind of took me underwing and he was the first known director filmmaker. I had one scene, I'm the

coroner when her husband is killed in the car accident but something's happened. His body's shredded, you know? So she comes to see his body and I take her to see her husband's dead body. We had like a two-page scene or something. And it was, God, we finished two or three in the morning. And I'm in the honey wagon, which are the little mini dressing

rooms, you know, where you have a toilet and a bench. That's the only contract writer I have now. I will not be in a fucking honey wagon. I don't care. I'm not going in a honey wagon. It's a trailer that's got like

probably eight dressing rooms in it. Basically, it's a door. It's a shotgun room with a bench and a toilet and a mirror. Like you have a closet. Yeah. You're basically. You're basically in a closet. So what I'm going to live in when I move out here in a couple of months.

Yeah, yeah. Nothing like taking a dump looking at yourself in the honey wagon mirror. Self-reflection. Which is what Billy Bob said. That's where he came up with Carl Childers sitting in the honey wagon staring at himself in the mirror making faces. Yep. Hey, can I ask you something real quick? Because you've mentioned casting directors two or three times.

Do you know who Allison Jones is? Do you know that name? Yeah, absolutely. Does she cast everything? A lot of. In the TV comedy world, she's toward. I see her name more than literally fucking, like, I recognize her name more than anybody's. And, like, I don't know another casting director.

You know what I mean? That's how much I see her name. A TV comedy, she does a bunch of them. It's unfucking believable. I just had that question. I was like, is it just me that keeps saying this? But, like, she does everything. Follow a question.

Do you know Allison? I'm sorry. I literally, I just needed that for myself. I was like, is it just me that's like, fucking I only see her name? I found that we were, I did, I'm dying. up here, the showtime show about stand-up comedy in 1970. Jim Carrey, right? Yeah, Jim. Yeah, Jim Carrey.

And there's one. Did she cast that? No, we were shooting. My club, I'm basically playing a fictionalized the improv. Bud. Led Friedman? I'm a fictionalized Bud Friedman. Fuck yeah. Melissa Leo is a fictionalized Mitzie Shore.

I'm her competitor, Bud. My club, Allison's office is across the parking lot because one of the actors goes, oh, I'm going to go say hey to Allison. So I haven't seen her in several years. But yeah, so my club is right there next to her office. Okay. That's coming out soon?

It comes out in June. And there's one where you never fucking know. Is Carrie In it or he just produced it? He just produced it. Okay. But there's several known comics. Al Madrigal. I just ran into Al at the bank.

Al is a writer on it and plays one of the main characters. I know. I met Al three, four years ago. DJ did the, it was a great, we hung out. It was Al Madrigal, and I can't remember who his producer was, but we hung out in a barbecue restaurant parking lot and filmed this southern piece for the daily show. And he was a nicest dude.

Oh, great guy. He was such a nice guy. It was when Georgia and Tennessee were fighting over. Yeah, they're fighting over water. And we probably shouldn't reveal all this. They put our buddy DJ out. They acted like he was just a person, but, you know, he was. Well, what had happened was, it was really funny how it happened.

There was a, like, an article got shared, And DJ just went on there and went in on some motherfuckers. And the producer for the Daily Show saw him going in. And then, I think, clicked on his picture and was like, what? Look at this guy. And they're like, do you think you could say that later? And he was like, yeah, buddy. Yeah, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yeah.

So then they did that. He's a writer and plays a character. Eric, last name escapes him. But there's several on the show that are standing. Andre? I can't remember. last name. I don't think it's Andre.

Big dude, like 6-3, maybe he said. Black guy, light-skinned black guy. I think that's Eric Andre. Well, Eric Andre, he ain't big. He ain't 6-3. But he ain't big, though.

He's a comedy store regular. I know that, because I follow them on Twitter. Anyway, there's a lot of stand-up comics that are in the show. Not all of them are. About half are actors. He's dating Rosario Dawson right now.

Yes. So I want to, we're coming up on about the 30 minute mark and I know these guys want to and everybody will want to hear some of your awesome music stories but I don't want to do this and not talk some about Deadwood.

Okay so I want to shift gears to that. Hey man you're sitting right there next to Doherty's knife. I saw that. And Warren's earmuffs. Yeah man Warren's earmuffs are here. When we're done I want to see Warren's earmowers. So what I've warned, we've talked about Deadwood some

but like did you know, and not just you, but all y'all, did you know, I don't know how special that show was, like immediately or, if not, when,

did you know, how pumped were you to be on it? After seeing the pilot. After seeing the finished product? Yeah. We knew we had something that no one had really seen before. Right. And we knew that it worked on so many levels.

Yeah. You didn't have to have a degree in comparative literature to get it. but if you did there's layers of meaning in the thing that you can pick up on you don't see you do now now it's more common but you didn't see a lot of like

allegory deep allegory no well it's also another thing that you see more now that you didn't really then that it does really good is it's like the word cunt it's at once super super crass and also super literary

which you know that's some shit that I try to do so obviously The political dick joke is my favorite. So obviously that's Shakespeare. That appeals to me a whole lot, and that's one thing that Deadwood does, like, on an unparalleled level, really. Well, we were written in meter. I worked on the writing staff seasons two and three.

I can't take a lot of credit. I mean, David's a genius, and David rewrote. Episode 10 in season three is mine. My name's on it. There might be seven or eight lines that I wrote actually right here where we sit. But David rewrote. That's how I found. So many of us.

My wife showed it to me because it's written in media. Yeah. And she didn't know anything about it. Just, oh, there's a thing written in meter. I'm interested in that. But see, that's why I was so drawn in stand-up to Carlin. Because the way he was like a jazz musician. The way he used language.

We saw his last two tours. He would open, I don't know if it was the very first show, but it was early because he often had his notes that he played here at Universal Amphitheater that became those last two HBO specials. Right. And the way that he was so many. meticulous about his language that he created this rhythm, this comic rhythm. There's one. I don't know if we've had this story of understanding the minute differences between acting and comedy.

I did Seinfeld. Who did you playing Simonville? I played Al Netchie. Hold on. What episode was that? Season three. I was the guy. It's one big scene at the time.

of the show on a bus. I've run them to George and Jerry, and I set two storylines in motion. George is going to break up with his girlfriend because she's boring, and then I see him, and I go off camera and tell her George Costanza's a loser. He finds out Al Nettys said it, so, and then I

tell Jerry, I said, have you seen Fulton? Huh? I'm seeing you right now. Fulton's in the hospital. I was a lot younger. The hospital. Younger and thinner. But I got, I had been in God, I was up for putty. I was up for, there's a Mark Herschfeld, another casting director that brought me in.

That was the third or fourth time I had auditioned for Seinfeld. So anyway, he's Patrick Warbart and right? I got cast. Who's crushed. Yeah, Patrick's putty. So, anyway, I get hired to do the show. They had just won the WGA Award for Master of My Domain, which I think next to Vitamita Vegerman is the most cleverly written half hour of comedy ever on TV.

I can't disagree with you. That's my favorite show, so I'm kind of biased. But that episode is great. Totally starstruck by, oh, come on this. Because I watched it religiously. Yeah. You're on the best show. Yeah.

So I get on it. So we rehearsed for the week. Now, the girl that was playing George's fiancé was originally a stand-up. Well, name names. But she knew George and Jerry back from the New York comedy scene. Susan was a stand-up? She was replaced. They replaced her in the middle of the week.

Okay. so they hired another actress. Well, I'd never run into Larry. I was just working with Tom, the director, and, you know, the cast. So we have a run-through. We're going to film my scene on the bus in an actual bus, but we're going to do that before the audience comes in. And then we're going to recreate it for the audience.

We're basically going to go, okay, imagine Jerry's apartment is a bus. The couch is the side bench, and so we've recreated it for the audience, so we'd get their laugh track and let them understand the story. we're going to pre-film the bus. So we're rehearsing, and Larry's there. We go through it, and Larry walks with me, and you've seen Kirby's enthusiast. Oh, yeah.

And he says that's an exaggerated part of his personality. No, that's pretty much him. It's pretty much, yeah. That's what I've heard from the lot. No, that's it. So he comes with me, he goes, Earl, Earl, right? Yeah. Scene's not working.

Come with me. So he takes me down to the other side of the sound stage. Now I'm pretty confident in my skills, and I'd had some luck, you know, so I was pretty like, I know what I'm doing. So we get down there, and he says the scene, it's not going on. Let's do it. I'll be George and Jerry, you be out. So we do it.

And he has this annoying habit of shaking his head, no, as we're doing it. We do it like three or four times. I say most of his habits are. Yeah. Which he does incur all the time. Yeah. And he says, I, again. So we do it.

And he goes, all right, look, let's switch roles. I'll be out. You'll be Georgia Jerry. Okay? So we do it. Was that like sort of offensive as an actor? Well, I mean, this guy just won the WGA and he. I would as a writer.

So I'm sitting, like this, I idolize this guy's, this guy's comedic mind is extraordinary. So had it been anybody else... But he wasn't giving you notes. He was going to show you how to do it. However this guy needs to get to here. We do it. He plays my part. And he goes, all right, switch back.

So we switch back. I start doing Al. He starts shaking his fucking head no again. And I'm at the end of my rope. And I said, I don't... So what's my beat at the entrance of this scene? I mean, I'm thinking the intention. And he's looking at me with this kind of cock-eyed...

cocked his head look. And that's when it dawned on me. He doesn't think like a dramatist. He doesn't think in terms of beats and intentions in the course of a scene. He thinks in terms of comic rhythm. It's all comic rhythm with him. And that's, I'm like, okay, okay, fuck it. Let's do it again.

So I basically impersonate him playing my role. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so we get called down to the bus. So they're taking me into the bus. And I'm still, I'm like getting off my game. God, they fired the leak. The top guest star in this, I'm going to get fucking fired. No, no, I got this.

I got this. So we get on the bus. Well, I'm too tall. The lights, I had to squat in the most unnatural position. On camera, it looks normal. But when you're shooting it, I'm squatted down. I have my head up. I'm not actually looking at George and Jerry.

Chin press forward. Yeah. So Larry put himself in the scene. He's the man in the cape. Yeah. He put the cape on. He puts himself in the scene as an extra. He's sitting right in my periphery.

He's at my right elbow. I'm looking to my left to do the scene with George and Jerry. So I get on camera. I'm sweating bullets because the lights are right on my face. I'm squatted down, so I get in the camera frame. And action. And we start doing the scene, and I can see the bald head out of the corner of my eyes shaking his head.

No. Man, you could have put a chunk of cold in my ass cheeks and you'd have had a diamond in 15 minutes because I guarantee you. So I was thinking, oh my God, I'm going to be replaced. He's going to be on the phone to ever. I'll never do half hour again. Comedy's out of the quest. I'll never get another comedy ever.

So I had about a half hour of that sitting in the bleachers before they're going to do the run-through for the rest of the show. So they start the next scene in the run-through. And I'm sitting right above him, you know, in the bleachers. He didn't see me. And I see him called Jason, Jason, come. here, come here, Jason, come here. Jason comes over, and he goes, that opening, that when you enter the scene, that, that first line, that's not, that's not working. That's not, let's, let's do, and Jason's just kind of nod, it's okay, okay, Larry, okay, all right, so I can see with

Jason, okay, it's not just me, it's everybody. He's that neurotic, sure, and controlling about everybody, and if he's, if he's, if he's that working that way with Jason, who's already proven himself as a comic genius in this role. Absolutely. So that's when I realized, oh, it's not me. I told Jeff Garland this story because I know Jeff from Chicago, you know, back. That shows you why that show is so good. Well, Jeff goes, trust me, if he hadn't liked you, he would have fired you and recast it.

So it's just, well, just on that real quick, just that, any performer and the pride that you have and what you do, and then someone you respect. I can just, I can only imagine you sitting there and that moment of, only. Almost relief of, well, all right. Yeah. I mean, he's shitting on Jason. Right. Yeah.

It's almost like, oh, well, that means I'm one of the people. Like, that means I'm respected. The fact that he talked to me the way he's talking to Jason and didn't fire me. Or at least also Jason fuck up. Like, yeah, you know, either way. But I know. He had fucked up. It was just Larry's seen.

But he's that meticulous. Yeah. Which again, that's why that show would crush. When he left that, you know, when he said, I think it was the entertainment weekly, when he said, I just can't let it go. I have to, every moment, it causes such anxiety for me. They're like, yeah, yeah, it does. So that part, it's not a pretend.

That's really him. I read a story one time that was some dude walked up to Larry David. It was like, at a golf term or something, they were like, Larry, I'm such a huge fan. He was like, hey, how are you doing? How's it going? And then they started another sentence. And he goes, ah, eh, eh, I think we're done here.

Yeah. And the guy was like, I've never been so honored to be Larry David. I told you that story. You did, didn't you? Because it's one of my favorite. I read it out of Trey's mouth. Anytime I ever hear a celebrity interaction story that goes in like a just like archetypal way. The best way you want it.

If you're just, you know, some dude on the street, that's how you want an interaction with Larry David to go is exactly. That's Larry David's Bill Murray. You're never going to believe this when he eats the fries off people's plate. Like that's how you want it to happen. I ran into Jeff. I hadn't seen Jeff in several years. I ran into him on the street back several months ago. But he does, I know, he does a weekly show here at Flappers. On Sunday night, he goes up, does an hour 15.

And he says, it's basically how I recharge my batteries. So I ran into him on the street, and we were catching up about Chicago and this, that, and the other. He invites me to come to the Flappers show. And he goes up with nothing prepared, nothing. He just gets on stage and starts. For an hour of 15? Uh-huh. And so that night, he just thought, anybody got any questions?

Let's just talk. We've got some questions. And someone said, what's the most outrageous Larry David's story you have? Because I knew this on him. He said, as far as Larry interpersonally, I'm telling Jeff's story. But I knew the background. Jeff was up for he had a development deal with CBS, I think it was. And they got down to the wire of the network choosing.

And they decided to go, they had this other show built around a heavyset stand-up, the King of Queens. So they went with King of Queens instead of Jeff's show. So I knew what show he was telling the story about. He said, I had this development deal, and I had a show with a network here. They unfortunately went with another show. And he said, my office, my writing office, was right across the hall from Larry David. And so I had this idea. And I walked over and I'm not going to go.

I said, Larry, can I talk to you for a minute? and I laid out what was that. See, I've been in development health for, you know, like a year on this show. Larry makes a phone call within weeks. We have a show at HBO. It's Curb Your Enthusiasm. Within weeks. Larry just goes.

Yeah. There you go. Yeah. And he said, so I had not, he goes, we haven't done a show in five years. We just announced, we've just gone back into production. When it was announced that we were doing shows, we were on the front, I think it was New York Times. But he said, we were on the front page of major newspapers. including the New York Times, Larry David returning to HBO, more curb.

He said, so that's my wildest story of something that was literally, I'm crushed, you know, kicking the balls. I'm crushed. My thing's not happening. How about, you know, Larry is so unique. How about if we, and he goes then in a matter of days, suddenly it's a show, and here we are a decade later, and we decide to make more of them, and we're on the front page of papers. That's my wildest Larry David's story. The wildest made my career.

That's my wildest story. That's great. Well, Larry David's entire career is wild as hell. I don't say. In that way. I've heard the stories about him on stage in New York. He'd berate the audience. Or he would just, there was the one where he would literally walk out and he would look around and he would go, eh, eh.

And he would just leave. He just got, not, not tonight. And it's wild being up there. And I don't know how it is here. I know you haven't been here very long, Trey. But there's people, and I'm not going to say they're Larry Devils. David's level of genius, but there's people where you look at them and they're hilarious sometimes, and you go, oh, like if Larry had never met Jerry, I mean, he'd have probably

figured that out, I'm not trying to despairs the guy, but like, you can't walk off stage regularly in your career. No, no, no, no, no. But, like, absolutely not. If Jerry Seinfeld, who's like, the Rising Star goes, you're the funniest one here, please come work for my show. If that happens to you and you're Larry, then you get that big career. Yeah, absolutely.

He met, I mean, Jerry was getting the development. and Larry was a guy that Jerry's like, this guy's really... Sure. And it goes back to that... It's just the same with me, you and Trey. Sure. I mean, the email I got from AJ about getting...

Not getting his first network session. I said, you know, it's the old improv adage. Yes, and. Right. Because that's the major, you know, don't say no. Yes, and. If it's out there. And you move forward.

Yeah, if it's out there, it's out there. Yeah. And that's what you have to do in this. career sure so tell us quickly about the um and then because i do want to get to some of the music stuff yeah god damn the ending of dead wood and how y'all from from your perspective as somebody was such a huge part of it we okay the in my professional life the worst day i don't be hard pressed for anything professionally to get worse um we i had a show a movie called province of night, which eventually got made, the movie Bloodworth.

We were in pre-production for, um, um, in North Carolina. And Deadwood was Deadwood. We were on, like Sopranos became Sopranos in its third season. And it felt like everything's on course for us. Like we had third season, um, we, I feel like we're about to break wide open. Here comes the freight train. Right. People don't realize what it did.

We were in a casting session for Bloodworth. and I left and I turned my phone back on. I had a message from David Milch. Earl, it's David. I hate making these fucking phone. Look, just give me a call at the house when you get a chance. So I thought, call it. He doesn't like to be bothered at home.

And my first thought was Dority's, because the real Dan Doherty was murdered in 1886 on the US. I thought, I bet you Dan's going to die next season. You thought that was the bad news. I got to deal with being killed all. So I called David. I was in my pickup truck in Venice, California. I had a tattoo appointment that night.

And I was on my way. Oh, damn, everything about that story hits for me. On my way to get a tattoo. In your pickup truck. Yeah. L.A. might be all right, Trey. Hell, I'm not going about here. So I was in Venice.

Hey, Earl, it's David. He had me calling home. So I call him. I'm still driving. Talk to him on the phone. Yeah, Earl. Yeah, yeah, thanks for calling. I hate these phone.

We're canceled. Huh? Yeah, we were offered two movies or six episodes to wrap up the... That's not the way we tell our fucking story. We're canceled, no more show. Hang on a sec, Dave. I pull over to the side of the street. I went, what did you just say?

Well, we're canceled, so he explains things. I'm stunned. I'm thinking, because we had a deal for seven years. We had a story for five, and I knew what the story was. Dave's plan was after five seasons, he was going to move on. Without Dave, we didn't have a show. So I was skeptical that without him, we would have anything worth anyone watching. But so I go to the tattoo appointment.

I don't know if you ever had a tattoo, but they fucking hurt. And what you do is you take your mind elsewhere. You don't focus on the pain. So all I'm thinking about is Deadwood's been canceled. So I get my tattoo up here. All I'm thinking is bleed, sting. hurt, burn, motherfucker, take my mind off this.

So the next morning, here, where we sit now, I came out here and I called our unit production manager on Bloodworth. We had to have these guitars for the movie. At that point, we did not have Christopherson. He was not available. And we had an offer out to somebody else. So I said, I need to check cut to Gibson.

If we get, like Chris or somebody, they'll give us the guitars, but I need to check because we need these guitars. I can't cut a check. Why can't you cut a check? You need to talk to our line producer. Long story short, we lost the money.

So within a 12-hour span of time, I go from, I'm Dan Doherty and I'm a writer on the best thing in the history of television. And I have the first movie I've ever written is funded and in pre-production for $5 million in Wilmington. And within a 12-hour span of time, they're both dead, dead in the water. Jesus Christ. So I got a tattoo to remember. I didn't all by. Big old kicking the nuts.

That's the biggest one. Yeah, I damn it'd have to be. What was the deal with that, though, from their perspective? Was it too expensive or something? Before you talk about that reason, just so I clarify, I think I'm clear, because I think I'm clear, but they offered you to wrap it up quickly. They offered David, they wanted to cut the budget in half. And he said, go fuck yourself. They were, the head of the network at the time, they had made a billion dollars the year before him,

And they loudly built, no, just in the network itself. A billion profit. They were the first. NBC at the height of Seinfeld and Friends had done 750 mil. And that was a big deal. Well, HBO made a billion dollars. So it's all over the trades everywhere. Well, the next year, they're bleeding red ink.

They want to make that billion mark again. So he's desperate to cut his bottom line. Several things happen. Some things within his control. some things were not within his control with other shows. So we were not his baby. We were developed before him.

And he was a comedy guy. His background was comedy. And he didn't really like our cussing dirty Shakespeare. So David, knowing that his job was on the line and knowing we didn't have his... I was about to say, because that shit is hilarious to me. Well, he, you know, David made an all-in poker move. and, you know, the CEO of the network, he's got the ace up his sleeve.

Right. He ended up getting fired. He got in some trouble. Smacked around his girlfriend in public after a drunken fight in the streets of Vegas. It's not as satisfying as what I thought you meant, but okay. Well, at that point, I had a notebook here. I had a yellow legal pad. We're sitting in my office for whoever's listening.

Also, whoever's listening, that is legal in Vegas. My garage in my house converted to an office, but I had a notepad Because I thought, man, all the horses are out of the barn, but I grew up on a fucking farm. I can get all the horses back in the barn because I've done it. So I had a notepad and I kept track of who was doing what. And I had written on it, Tim, an F, it originally was called Lawman. Tim, a lawman, an FBI show set in Kentucky. It became justified.

Anna, Anna Gunn. a meth show. They're shooting an ABQ. Breaking Bad. So I was keeping track of who was doing what. Because I thought, we had 22 characters. I counted them that had parts of the story. I can get all the horses back in the barn. Or I can get most of them back. So it took me 14 months to quit beating the dead horse to give up. Sean Bridgers and I, Johnny Burns, we met. They were shooting John from Cincinnati up there at our lot.

They were using our soundstage. And we met. We had not gone to visit because we didn't want to be on John because we felt like, you know, that was, we should have been on the air. So we went, we sat there on the lot, we walked down to the steps of the Shia of me and we sat there for half an hour. Didn't say a word. We just sat there like grieving, like sitting at graveside, man. And after that I let go. Like, all right, stop beating the dead horse. I came home and I tore up the piece of paper, threw it away.

I wish to God I'd kept it. You know, now there's talk of a movie. Dave has actually written the movie. It was turned in in November. He's gotten notes back. So maybe at some point we'll get to write our final chapter. Right. But who knows?

I mean, we're all on board. If it happens, we all want to be a part of it. If you need a drunk bus boy to get murdered at some point, I could probably do that. Well, I had a bunch of musicians on the show. So we could have... Oh, speaking to comics, Franklin Ajai used to be one of the regulars on Make Me laugh. So when I brought up some of his comedy bit, I have his comedy album, it's in the house.

One of his comedy albums. And he couldn't believe he said, you watch Make Me Laugh? I'm like, dude, I stole your fucking jokes. You and Gary Mule Deer, who's from Deadwood, South Dakota. That's awesome. God, who else? Tim Thomerson, Bruce, what was the guy who used to wear it? Come out with a diaper on Bruce.

Oh, Bruce, hold on. He had long, bald hair. Yes, yeah. Long hair bald guy. On a celebrity. Bruce, Baum. Bruce Baum? I think it was.

It was Bruce Baum. I got a question for you guys. I asked this of Reap, and I just, it blows me. I love John Reap's the buddy. John's been, we did one of his podcasts here. Oh, I talked to him yesterday. He's a great guy. He told me that y'all knew him from.

Yeah. Oh, yeah, man. Well, Reap. I was a kid, the Southern comic, we had the eight, my grandpap, my dad's daddy, had the eight track of Mississippi talking. Jerry Clow. Jerry Clower. You all know Clower.

Oh, my God. Are you kidding me? He was the only one you were allowed to. listen to when you were younger. Our mammas would let us listen to, Cloud. You could listen to me. Knock him out, John. Yeah.

And what was his buddy? Shoot this thing. John, I can't shoot up there. I might hit you. Well, I shoot him amongst us because one of us has got to have some relief. What was his buddy's name? It was like a. Marcel Ledbetter.

Marcel. Marcel. Ledbetters. Marcel, Arnell, Raynell, W.L. Bernel, Claude and Clovis. Marcel Ledber. Every good. And I can do, I can do.

It was football from Andy Griffith. I can do that one. Oh, yeah. Every good comment from that era had, like, their character, and his was Marcel Ledbetter. Whoopi had Mudbone. No, that was Prior. Prior had mudbone,

and Whoopi had one that she kind of copied from, it was her mudbone. But his was Mudbone, too. But his, Marcel Ledbetter, 20. Come up from Mississippi Grove would tract up here. And then when he went to see, what was the name,

what was the voodoo woman? A voodoo woman? Yeah. I don't remember her name. Oh, man. I know. I'm thinking of Ms. Cleo. That's not what it was.

Yeah, yeah. Boodoo lady. She had a tattoo on each titty. She had a big eye on one titty and a pear lips on the other. I'm sitting there on my knees looking at that eye looking at me. Looked like it winked at me. And I'm just praying to God. I ain't got to kiss that pair of lips.

The first joke I ever remember getting, like, like, young. Do you remember the story Cloward told about the boy on the moped? I know this one. The moped. Which one was that? His daddy worked, was a truck driver, and he would go to the lumberyard to pick up the truck. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the guy had the chainsaw.

And he let him ride his moped, the guy who owned the lumberyard, and he saw a dude with the convertible, and he leaned in to his car, and his suspenders got hooked on the rearview mirror of that convertible. And the guy takes off to show off for the kid, and then he sees a speck in his rearview mirror. He can't be that boy on that moped. it is that boy in that moped how's he keeping up with me and he goes by him

and he comes back and he goes by him and he smashes into the car at the end and then the punch line is he goes back to see if he's okay he's like are you okay as anything I can do for you what happened I don't even how are you going that fast do you need anything what can I do to help you and he goes yes sir

if you can please unhook my suspenders from your rear I was like six or seven killed you and I got it that was the first time I knew why it was fun you know what I mean when you're six or seven it's like all fart jokes. Oh, sure, sure. I got, like, I followed up, and I- You understood why it was funny.

Yeah. Can I ask you a question that I can ask you, too, because this was when we were kids, but you grew up in the South. Did Mark Lowry destroy you when you were a child? You know who Mark Lowry is? I don't know really know him. He's a, you know, the Gaithers? You would have been old-off. The Gaithers, the Gossip Quartet? Yeah, yeah. He was, he was in the Gators. But he was in Bill Gaithers' Quartet. But I think he would have been old enough. So I remember Wendy Bagwell.

I know, dude, but, and I, I, I know. know what you're saying. Do you remember Wendy? Wendy Bagwell, who was a gospel singer who became a storyteller? Yes. Ralph Bennett's Voteswagon. I got all Wendy's records. The reason I say that is because I have gone back and looked at all that stuff that used to hit for me as a kid. As a comedian, it stands up. I love all of it.

I think there's some, I went back. I got an old Junior Samples record. Yeah, Junior Sample from He-Haw. Yeah. We're in the shirt right now. He-Haw. We're in a shirt. Previous to He-Hawd, you know, Junior had a, he had several comedy albums.

I bought one. found it on eBay. That shit's not funny at all. It's very dated. It's very, it was of its time. Yeah. You know,

Carlin's stuff holds up. But that's why Carlin's stuff. And I said, I told the guys, holds up, though. I have a phrase for you, for really what the three of you do. It's corn fed Carlin.

Because it's smart. It's smart. It's thought-provoking. And it speaks to my history, you know, on how I grew up. And I said, that's the thing, when I realized I'm old enough to be y'all's daddies.

My best friends, Mickey and Ben, their oldest son. So I see, Ben 5 is 32 and Bradley's 31. Y'all's age. Well, it's funny to talk about that, speaking to the history, because Patterson, which is how you and Trey met Patterson, who's the reality. He was talking about the movie, The Accountant, Ray McKinnon, and how, when he saw it.

Yeah, go ahead. I got to tie him with that from an email today from Chris Offutt. Okay. When he saw the movie, he was happy, but also not sad, but just like, damn, someone did what I've been trying to do my whole life. And I told Patterson later on that night after we saw the show and I had a little bit of whiskey. I mean, I got my courage up. I said, man, Ever South on the new record, I know this sounds weird, but because of what you said about the accountant, I feel comfortable saying it to you, that's what I'm trying to do, just in a completely different genre.

Everything you did in that song, the history of your people, all the way to a love story about your wife. See, unreal. I totally agree with that, obviously, but, like, for me, I was cognizant of that before I ever even started doing comedy. You know what I mean? Like, I've always felt like... We've always felt like... We've always felt like... I want to do what the truckers do, but in comedy, like, I've always felt that way.

We've always talked about that. Patterson was talking about almost, not a sadness, but just like watching a piece of art and going, damn, somebody did what I've been trying to do. Not, we're trying to do the same thing. You did. Well, see, that's what I fucking did. That's what I felt like when I heard you guys the first... I saw his videos, saw Trey's videos first. And then I got the book, right, when it published, because I love the videos so much.

And I'm, well, hell, I reached out to you on, Corey, on Twitter. I'm literally reading the book. You made me cry. Well, I started crying. And I had reached out to Trey. I think I told you the story. Trey, I knew, because I'm watching the videos, I'm like, holy shit, if I had ever done, if I'd ever had the balls to follow stand-up, this is what I would have attempted.

And he's successful at doing it. because I'd seen a couple of videos and I saw you on Marr. And that was when it all coalesced for me. And that's when I started watching everything. You sent me a message and I have a buddy who's a huge Deadwood fan. And we were talking and he was making fun of me because he's conservative. And so he was giving me shit. And I mentioned, I said, hey, we were watching Deadwood together.

I said, you see that guy? I made him cry out with something I wrote in a bug. And that was one of the greatest moments of my life. And thank you for that. Thank you. Reading it, it was like, you know, my mom was there with my grandmother, Morel, the one that was handicapped, the one that sang on her front porch. The picture that you showed me earlier? That is, that would actually have been her, her grandmother.

Okay, but on that same side. Yeah, my great, great grandmother. There's a photo hanging in my house of my great grandmother who died saving her 10-year-old daughter. My grandpa witnessed it. He was 12. No, he was 10. And his sister was younger, and she died in front of him. Her daughter caught on fire, and she was trying to put her out, and they both died.

So that would have been her grandmother. She was that for me. And I read the story about your grandmother, and I'm bawling like a fucking baby. I had already tried to find Trey. Because when I'm watching the videos, I'm like, dude, I got to meet this guy. I got to meet this fucking guy to talk to him. So I knew you were doing the thing with Isbell coming up this spring. So I texted Jason.

And I said, man, could you introduce me to this liberal redneck guy? And he said, well, I don't really know him. We're just, we just text an email. He's going to do a show with me. Come down to Anaheim for the show, man. We'll all hang out. Great. So within a week, I get a text from Pat.

He says, I got a, they were out here to do Conan. And he said, I got a buddy that's just moved here. And he's living in Burbank, him. He's got a young family. They don't really know anybody. Would it be cool if I just, like, give them your number? and I said, absolutely, man. Any friend of yours is a friend of mine.

And followed me, went, you ever heard of the liberal redneck those videos? His name's Trey Crowder. Dude, I've been trying to find him for a fucking week. I was going to just going to call his manager and put on the, Don't you know who I think I am? So I'm in the book. A day? No, the text, I had reached out to you on Twitter.

God damn, it had to be within the same day. within 24 hours of me reaching out to you. Yeah. Because I want to go, hey, I heard Tray's moved out here, introduced me to it. Dude, I thought you, I thought that, like, you were a hacked account. When you messaged me, I was like, well, this isn't the real. Because, like, you know, you came in with like, hey, I read the book, yada, yada, yada. And I was like, well, that's not actually.

And then I was looking, I was like, no, he's verified. This is the whole thing. Okay, fuck yeah. All right, right. If I could just say real quick, and I know you read this probably, but. to like brag on Corey a little bit in that regard. You know, she, she passed during all that.

Yeah, while I was writing. While you're working on the book. Yeah, while I was writing at a harsh deadline, and this was, you know, our first big break. And, you know, Tray had gotten the attention. And when the people came to watch us who, they're the king makers or whoever they are, they were like, God damn, y'all are towns.

And we're like, yeah, we know. We've been fucking telling it anyway. And all that happened, you know, Trey and I sort of talked privately, and I've told you this before. It's like, man, is he going to be able to keep. doing it, should we take over? And he's like, no, I'm fine, I'm going to sew drawn to what she would have wanted. I'm a dedicated part to her and all that.

And just to know that that affected people. For me, I couldn't be prouder of you. Oh, no, well, thank you. It was tough, you know, to watch as your friend. I can only imagine doing that. I think the consensus. I mean, I think it's the best work I've ever done in my life, and I hope that's not how I have to continue getting my best work. I know, just from being our shows and just anecdotally or whatever, that part is the part that gets brought up the most by the most people. Corey's part, that part in particular.

And that has less to do with me than it does to do with, like, everybody has had a great-grandma. You know, like, I don't take, whenever I hear that, I don't, like, never, I don't swell up with pride. I swell up with it. Because it's genuine. Cool, she's, you know, she meant something. It comes off the pages of that.

I feel like I could have wrote anything. Now, I do think I did a good job, but I'm like, that's because everybody had a grandma, not because I did some fucking really good literature here. But see, but that's what you strive for as an artist. You don't strive to present yourself in all of your life's rich pageant glory. You strive to reach to an audience where they can bring their story to your story. There's a commonality and humanity.

And when your material will reach that level, and you can move some people, you can move them emotionally with a story like that, You can move them with an idea, you know, that takes them out of their comfort zone. Well, fuck, I never thought of it like that, you know. And so that's, you know, that's both the drug because it connects everybody. Oh, that's the drug. And that's the balance in all of this shit that we do. And it's a constant struggle for me because I've got an enormous ego.

You know, when I started in the, you got to have a fucking ego to have some success. Yeah, you have to drive you to. fuel you. My goal, I wanted to have a comfortable life. I wanted to raise a family, and I wanted to do it, doing what I love. My kid's in college. She's grown. We've had a great time. My wife's been my biggest fan and supporter. And so, you know, I achieved the goal. And I never, I always naively thought that you do something special, you know, it breaks wide open and great things happen. You know, when Mary happened, paid barely over scale for that movie. And it led to nothing.

Nothing. You know, eventually as the years passed, and people realized that it was me, you know, of course it's a feather in the cap. But as far as like breaking it open and making me a big star and making me rich, no, that didn't happen. Well, and yeah, I think that's part.

And I didn't expect that kind of old breaking open, you know, the open of the flood. bloodgays type thing because of how many times I've heard, you know, stories like that or whatever. Like I've tried to keep my head on straight about it all or whatever, but I'm realizing that it, you know, that it's never going to feel that way. Right. Yeah, exactly. I think like the, the, like the, it's going to be what it is. While you're in the moment, your perspective is of from where you are and what you're doing. You know what I mean? And it's always going to be, like you said, a series of kicks in the nuts.

And also really fucking awesome, surreal moments where you're like, holy shit, I made the right choices in life. And that whole thing, that's never, that's never, ever going to go away. And, you know, that's all right. But you can't lose touch with the impulse of you hearing that joke for the first time, the Clower story. Oh, my God, my mind. Okay, I know why that's funny. I know how that's funny. you know, and then the first time you perform and sharing your story and feeling that connection.

It's real damn easy in this, you know, to have all the money. And I said, I may have said to you, Trey, before, but you can die in this business of anal cancer from all the smoke that gets blown up your ass. Sure, sure. And then it ties back to the clower thing. Okay, after something about Mary happened, I got a call, the head of casting at 20th Century Fox wanted to meet me. I'm sitting there in the waiting room, waiting to go in her office when it came on CNN. the end that Jerry Clower died. So I kind of have this like passing of the torch.

Like, holy shit, this feels important. Right. I go and meet this woman. She tells me how brilliant I am, how awesome I am. It was five years before I ever even auditioned for another fucking Fox movie. And I've never done one. Right. So, you know, I think, all right, here we go.

Something about Mary happened. Here we go. I think we're more than money. We all, like, we were talking, we talked, you and me talked about this at one. me, Drew, yeah, in Athens. More so than money, we as people want first. And when you get that first, and when you realize you'll never get it, you never will get it back, that's kind of a, like, you know, we've, me,

Trey and Drew, we have a lot more that we want to do in our careers. But there's so many things that have happened where we're like, I'll never feel that innocent again. And that's good that we're here, but that's kind of shitty. We were in Athens, and we were backstage with the truckers. And it was one of the best rock shows. And not just because we were their guests, it sincerely was just, I've been to a lot. When those guys are on, they're on, there ain't a better band on the planet.

Earl, it was their homecoming show. And they sent, they sent us the audio from that show. I'll send it to you as soon as we get on this podcast. It was one of the best rock shows I ever been to fucking absolutely aside from the fact that we were backstage and we'd had dinner with them. two or three hours before. But Drew looked at me, and he's like, he goes, this will never happen again. And I naively, I looked at him and I go, I go, fuck yeah, well, I said, what better shit, man? This will happen all the goddamn time.

And like, he didn't say shit. And like 30 seconds later, I realized what he meant. And I go, oh, you mean we'll never be this excited about this again? Because the next time we're backstage for the truckers, it'll seem like business as usual. And that sucks. And it's also cool. Oh, fuck, yeah. Oh, it's cool as shit.

But it sucks. Oh, no, no, no. He was like, you're right. That sucks. I was like, no, it'll still be cool. But it was what you were talking about was like the money, nothing to do with it. It's all about experiences. And like when you get done with a lot of your first, I think everybody's chasing it first.

And when you get old, you run out of first. You're like, fuck, how can I make it? No, you don't. Yeah. There's always something new to learn to discover. We got a little bit. Right. No, we need to do.

Yeah, I was going to say, and I, well, speaking of music. I hope that, I hope you'll let us do this again because I want to, we're, dude, we're neighbors. I can just walk over there. I know if I'm saying, we're going to have to tease, we're going to have to tease the music edition of this conversation. It's going to have to be later because I know, I know we could do a whole other podcast just on the music stories. And we do. We need to wrap it up. Yeah.

But I wanted to get, yes, okay, you have a question. Then I wanted to give you the opportunity, Earl, to, like we talked about, earlier if there's anything you want to promote or mention or whatever, you know, anything you want to put out there for people and then we'll put a bow on it. Now, this is going to take at least five minutes. Is that okay? That's fine. Oh, yeah.

We got time. We got time. Well, so you know what we do and what we're about. So I have to bring it up. The election, politics, general, how have you been feeling? Coming from Murray, Kentucky and then living out here for so long, you know, sometimes in New York, I see people. Everyone's acting like the house is on fire. And there are times where I'm like, yeah, it is.

Damn, this is fucked up. We're going to have a dictator soon if we're not careful. And then there's other times where I'm like, man, come on, y'all. We got more grit than this. We're not going to let a fucking, you know, Cheeto with a toupee kill us. Come on. We're better than that. And then you remember you're white.

Well, yeah, being a white male also helps me with my perspective, sure. Well, you know, you know. Here. You're sitting right. We're sitting in my office. sitting at my desk right next to you. Let me show you two books. He's grabbing books.

He's away from the mind. He's that one. He's handed me Mankamp. And then that one. The Hitler Ascent. Volker Ulrich, which is the authority. I haven't read it yet.

I'm going to take that to the beach this summer. That's going to be my summer beach. Yeah, a little light reading. I think we've got a lot in common. You and I, Earl, we like to stare into the abyss when we're on vacation. That's really funny because you see. That's what you started reading when all this happened. I started reading Kingsley Amos,

the Drinking Chronicles. That's like my thing. So we're very, we are the same, but we're different. You're better than me. Well, I started this afternoon, He'll Billy Elegie. It's like y'all's book. JD Van. We interviewed him on our series show.

Lord, it's so good. It's a great book. I had a third into it. 24 times. I started counting after five because I was like, well, this is different. I got it. I got it on audio, and it's great. I was just saying how good book was.

You know, politically, I grew up, my family, my grandfather, the one I talked so much about that I was so tight to, was a dyed-in-the-wall F-R Democrat. Pro-union man, he would not wear clothes if they weren't made by a union. That was my memo. He would not buy a product if it was not union-made. So I grew up with that. And so I always thought, pro-union, unions, everything. thing. Well, I got a good friend who I grew up with. We are sitting here, we are drinking single barrel Jack Daniels. One of my close friends who I've known since we were kids is the

assistant general manager of Jack Daniels. I'm proud as can be of, I had a group speech and debate team, and we live all over the country, and there's some highly successful individuals. You know, Danny runs that. But Danny and I've had, he's a conservative. We've had numerous talks. I'd stay at his house. We'd go to Bonner. Root because he lives right by the... I know. I know that. I've been to the last four. Missing it. We there last year? Yeah, was there. Do we there for Pearl Jam?

Fuck yeah. Well, I did me and him. I did mushrooms and had the best God down. Well, Danny, my kid's still in college. She can't be there, so I can't go without Anna. But Danny and I've had a lot of serious conversations about politics. And he's somebody I really admire. I admire

the way he views the world. I admire of what he's done with his career. And Danny, he didn't bring me over to the other team, but he did open my mind up to ways of thinking. He goes, man, I sit on the other side of the table now. And, you know, he told me some stories of dealing with unions and some things that weren't really fair and just. And so it opened my mind up to the degree to realize

that there is no perfect political system, there is no perfect economic system, There is no perfect anything because human greed, human, the seven deadlies will always enter the picture. So just as the same is capable of a political party to be corrupted by its own power. So can the same thing happen to a union. And I feel like if we're union workers and I am a union worker and I own this house, I owe this house to the fact that I'm a union actor. but we owe it to the employers to be the best damn employees that they could possibly hire.

You know when you hire a union workforce, you're getting the best. That's not always been the case. And the more I read, the more I've been exposed to is I realize that unions can be corrupted by the same greed and power as the political party can. So while I'm still firmly on the side of liberal Democrats, Everybody's got a point of view, and there's legitimacy to everybody's point of view. Sure. My problem with this guy is I did, I read chapters of mind comp. I've never read the entire book back to front, but it's coming up soon.

Number eight is the back. I recognize the shit that he pulled in communicating with people. I saw what he did. I don't think he's very bright, but I think he's wily. Yeah. And he's completely able to tap into, and I almost compare it to you, and this is my viewpoint, but it's like the abused wife, well, yeah, he may cheat on me and he may beat me, but at least he pays attention to me.

Battered wife, Senator. Yeah. And that seems, you gas lights. Totally. And I don't believe, you know, if he told me it was fucking raining, I wouldn't believe until I stepped out with, you know, to check and see. Well, yeah, that's what, hell, that's what happened literally on inauguration day, wasn't it? He said it didn't rain. Yeah, right.

He literally stopped. He literally fucking did that. I'm watching it. I saw it. It was raining. Are you worried about him? Worried? A long run, not short run.

Depending on the day you ask me, you know, our system of checks and balances is definitely being tested. Right. I have my own feelings of what I think is going to unfold. You know, I think once that they can use him as a smokescreen to get. through the things that they want. And that's the other thing of, and this is part of my conversation is with Danny. My buddy is,

everything is a line in the sand. And the problem with our way of communicating now is everybody talks absolutes. Everything's either black or it's white, and there ain't no in between. And it's a bit you did on one of the recent liberal redneck videos. You know who you rednecks to get along with? Isis.

Y'all love the same shit, driving around. pickup truck waving you flag, shooting you fucking guns in the air? Let me ask you this. Can you go on the road with us? Because you do a great try. He would prefer to sleep. We can't afford to.

So, yeah, but it's all of that. And that's the problem that I wish would go by the wayside. You know, I have de-friended or blocked several people that I grew up with who, you know, you bunch of damn Hollywood, like what somebody said you don't know you don't know what it's like how average people live and I said how on average do you think I am right right I got news for you up until 2003 we live fucking check to check right you know I had a house and I worried if I was going to be able to make my goddamn mortgage payment

then and you know it's not like I'm mr. money bags now but I make a comfortable living I still think it's fair I see this I haven't read it, nor did I read all of the ACA, but I'm going to save some big money if that new health care gets going through. Meanwhile, people I'm related to are very likely going to lose their health care. I don't think that's fair. I don't think that's right. And the problem that we run into with some of my liberal brethren here,

I can't speak for you guys, but is when we deny, when you deny that there's welfare cheats, when you deny that there's lazy-ass fucking people that are going to, you know, I read something in college that stuck with me, and I think it was Milton Friedman, Milton Friedman, who was a conservative economic guy. But he said that he believed, if you took all of the world's wealth,

and you divided it evenly among every denizen in the world, everybody gets an equal share, that within the course of a couple of decades, a generation or so, that the wealth would be redistributed in the same percentages, maybe not the same people, but the same percentages, because there are people that are going to work and be industrious and save and invest, and they're going to build money. There are people that are going to lie and cheat and steal and take the money. They're going to be people that just want to live day to day and have a normal life.

There's going to be people that are going to be fucking lazy. And with their handout, well, that's true. And I believe that. So I think we do ourselves a disservice when we sit with this ideal of economic equality. You know, we've had, Trey and I've had a couple of talks about Salina and what happened with, you know, with the Oshkosh factory. And I, there, my wife's here. Oh, she's coming to the door. I think our other guests.

Oh, Wieler's here. Fuck you. Come on in, man. It's the next one. Hell, he didn't have to bring no fucking guitar. I got 17 of them here. Oh, yeah, we're just doing this other one. Hey, Carrie, my wife's home.

We're podcast. We talked earlier when I was taking a whiz. Well, I'm... You're going to smell pot a little bit later. Yeah, very. So anyway, that's... I'm going to go to the sidetrack row. But we have everyone talk about it.

I, for me, like I agree, because my whole thing is, I've never denied the existence of people that's for hands. I've always denied that that's the top of our fucking pro. Yeah. Because the amount of money that spent on that is next to nothing compared to what's spent on other things that I don't necessarily agree with. But that's what I said. With my conversations, this is some social media post I made recently, there's two guys. I have a friend who's a security specialist.

He was a force recon Marine, and he's arch-conservative. He works for a huge country music star. He's his security guy. And I just think the world of that guy. And it interests me his view on the world because I think it's fair and it's just, the same way as Danny, who I grew up with. And we've had a lot of conversations about that, and I talked about my granddaddy and how he wouldn't wear clothes and everything.

Danny said, yeah, but that was in a time when he was, working the coal mines and organizing the unions. That wasn't a time before there were federal work safety standards. But he said, but I'm not naive enough to think that there aren't people in my party that would do away with all of those. Right, right. Which is, you're talking to a fair person in other ways. Yeah.

So anyway, we do ourselves a disservice on both sides of the aisle when we don't fucking listen. When everybody is, by God, it's my way or the highway in anybody. Of course, that's easy for us to say, four Hollywood liberal elites sitting here drinking very expensive whiskey in Hollywood, California. Which I'm starting to enjoy. People go, you, all you, those liberals, those liberal elites that live in their bubble, and I'm like, I won't get inside that bubble.

That seems like fun. They get to have award shows and everybody just jerks to set her off. It sounds great. I want to do that. Keep those things are boring. I'm sure they're boring, but they seem safe. I hadn't seen one story yet. We got to wrap it up.

We do, yes. So you got, I'm dying up here. It comes out in June. I'm dying up here. comes out in June. What else you got? The Wayland Jennings tribute that I hosted at ACL comes on CMT starting in April. And I'm going on Saturday.

Maybe next fall we can do this again when I have a big hit TV show. I'm doing the new Mark Cherry show with Reba McIntyre in Atlanta. I'm a little P in New York. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you so much, Earl. Seriously, we're going to do a round two. Absolutely, you know me.

I can sit and talk all night. I know you can. All right. Say y'all let it. Well, well, well.