WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 1459 - Alex Winter

Episode Date: August 7, 2023

Alex Winter was an actor for much of his young life until he realized it wasn’t his preferred way to tell stories. Now, the man many people knew as one half of Bill and Ted is an accomplished documentary filmmaker. Alex talks with Marc about his new film The YouTube Effect, as well as his other work on the growth of online communities and his doc about Frank Zappa. They also question whether show business as we knew it is finished and examine how Keanu Reeves handles his global superstardom with grace. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Are you self-employed? Don't think you need business insurance? Think again. Business insurance from Zensurance is a no-brainer for every business owner because it provides peace of mind. A lot can go wrong. A fire, cyber attack, stolen equipment, or an unhappy customer suing you. That's why you need insurance. Don't let the, I'm too small for this mindset, hold you back from protecting yourself. Zensurance provides customized business insurance policies starting at just $19 per month. Visit Zensurance today to get a free quote. Zensurance. Mind your business.

Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the

fuck new yorkers yes what's happening? I'm Mark Maron. This is my podcast WTF. Welcome to it. Obviously, I am broadcasting from another place. I am not at home. I am not in the studio. I am in a hotel room in New York City. I've been here before. You've heard me from this location before. I just came to New York. I got to be honest with you. This has probably been the best trip I've had to New York in years, and I'm trying to figure out why. And I think one of the reasons is I didn't really have any business.

I had no real reason to come here other than I needed to go to New York. I just, I needed to, something about the city, not only does it invigorate me and get my brain going, but it actually relaxes me somehow. And I had to sort of deconstruct that. Yeah. I mean, I had to sort of like, you know, why, what is it about it? What is it about me that where I come to this kind of the, one of the busiest cities in the world. And it's just kind of, I'm, I, I feel relaxed. I feel myself, I feel connected, but I'll figure it out in a second. Let me,

let me try to, uh, set up the show here. Alex winter is here. Now, a lot of you people know him as bill from the bill and Ted movies, but he was an actor since childhood and lots of stage and film credits, and now he's a prolific documentary film director. He's made docs about Napster, The Dark Web, child actors, Frank Zappa, and now he has a new one called The YouTube Effect. Now, I've watched the Zappa doc, and I thought it was great. I thought that it was a very big subject to kind of put into context and really create this sort of interesting portal or context to understand kind of where we're at culturally and what we're engaging with and how not only the world works and information works and transactional culture works. But with YouTube, it's interesting what it says about show business and what it says about what people watch and what it says about sort of how people's attention spans are exploited, how algorithms kind of work. I don't know. It seems as important as a conversation I had with Robert Guffey about sort of the overview and history

of conspiracy theories. Later this month, I'm not sure where we'll post it, but I'm going to record a talk with Jeff Charlotte about Christian nationalism. So every once in a while, you know, I do these shows that are more informational and more, I wouldn't say investigative, but sort of shedding some light on the cultural undercurrents and certainly the, they're not even undercurrents, they're actually tidal waves that are kind of redefining culture for better, for worse. So, but I talked to Alex too a little bit about his life and what he did in the past and in and the regular stuff but it was really one of these things where once i engaged with the material i was like holy shit i didn't know any of this and it's like it really dictates a lot of the world we live in so uh i was excited that's that's all i'm saying so okay so let's let's break it down like Like, what am I experiencing? Because I talked to you, I think, about

maybe wanting to try to have a place here or to live here, and then sort of I go waffle back and forth. It's very expensive, and I have an anxiety problem. And look, this is a luxury issue. But yeah, I might eventually move back here altogether. I don't know what it is about me in the sense that some part of me is like, well, yeah, maybe I should retire, which I kind of want to do at some point. I don't know. I just have a kind of a working class brain around retirement. There does seem to feel to me like, why wouldn't you want to stop eventually? I thought about going to New Mexico and then I just never know what I'm going to do. But I just got this feeling like, I have to get out and I need about going to New Mexico and then I just never know what I'm going to do.

But I just got this feeling like, you know, I have to get out and I need to go to New York. It wasn't, I don't need to go to New Mexico. I don't need to go to the islands. I don't need to go to the desert. I don't want that meditative experience. I'm in my head enough. I'm sitting at home. I'm trying to write jokes. I'm doing interviews. I'm writing whatever it is that I write. I'm taking in movies. I'm listening to music. But I don't need more time in my head. And I think one of the reasons that I like to go to New York, and I realized this last week, it has of levels off. It kind of plateaus into something that feels not as noisy, not as tweaked, not as anxiety ridden. And it's like Ritalin and you feel kind of relaxed. And I think that's what happens when I come to New York City. I've lived here

enough times and long enough to sort of interface with the city effectively. I'm very comfortable here. I have a part of the city that part of my brain and heart lives in down here on the Lower East Side. But I really think that when I get here, something just gives way and I completely relax. There's something about being, and I believe I've talked about this probably every time I come to fucking New York, that it's just sort of like I just level off and all the noise in my head stops. And then it really becomes the external noise of the city. And, and that just sort of replaces it. And somehow or another, I'm like, oh man, that's a load off. I don't have to make, I don't have to generate all that noise in my own head involuntarily. It's all happening around me.

There's just no matter where you go, you're picking up bits and pieces of conversation. You're seeing full lives pass you by. There's just thousands of people everywhere. And I've always thought, and I still feel every time I come here that it's, it gives me hope somehow for humanity when I'm in this city, because there are so many different types of people, all kind of, you know, butting up against each other. And there's a certain level of tolerance and excitement and electricity and just humanity to the whole thing. So there's that. But then I started to think like, what is life made of? And I've been talking about this a bit otherwise in different ways in terms of interacting with other people. Like I had some fucking great days and they were just loaded with conversation. That wasn't part of my job.

Literally hours of conversation with friends. And it was easy because when you live in New York, as opposed to LA or as opposed to a suburb or as opposed to maybe where you live in order just to hang out, well, it depends. I mean, you might have a habit of it or you might have people you meet for coffee once a week or whatever. But in New York, it's literally, you could just text somebody. It's like, hey, man, I'm four blocks from your place. Do you want to have coffee? That's, for me, that's code for talk for two hours. But, and it's sort of that easy. It's all very accessible. It's not a big lift. It's not a big drive. It's not a, you know, you don't have to invest your entire day in it. So there's immediate interaction with people that are in the area that doesn't require much planning. And it kind of, I realized this morning that,

you know, that would sort of expand your, or my sort of social life, my engagement, and just sort of, you kind of, that connection and kind of sharing stuff and building your brain. It was just, I don't know, man. I also went to the Whitney to see the Jane, quick to see Smith. I'm not sure if it's Jane or Juwan, but this is a native artist that, it's amazing. It's a full retrospective.

And I knew her name because I believe when I was a kid in New Mexico in the 80s or 70s that she was just coming up. She was living in New Mexico at the time. And I can't remember. I have to ask my mother. I think that we might have had a print of hers in the house. So it was all sort of connected. And I got excited about that, about seeing all the native art, about going to the Whitney, about going to that, just that structure and being among those paintings. And I guess I could get this in LA, but I don't. I don't do it.

So why should you care about this? I don't know. Maybe I'm just talking and I'm just excited. And New York, outside of anything else, somehow gives me, it just feeds my soul.

It gives me hope and humanity. This city gives me hope and humanity. It gives me hope for democracy functioning. It gives me hope in humanity. This city gives me hope in humanity. It gives me hope something that we're running very short on and it's running out and it's going to be the collapse of this democratic idea is tolerance, living alongside your fellow human beings no matter who they are. There's a thought I've always had and it's a reality about New York

that I've always kind of talked about is when you're on the streets in New York, if you're not, like, if you're in trouble, like if something happens, if someone goes down, you know, there'll be chaos for a minute, but there's always going to be somebody that's going to step up and go, oh, what's going on over here? What's the matter with her? All right, well, don't, get out of the way. Let me take care of this. I'm a fireman. Whatever the case, you know, somebody will step in selflessly and handle it. I mean, granted, there's a lot of, you know, profound problems with homelessness and there are people laying on the street here and there. So the engagement's a little different. It's like, go see if that guy is, uh, is he breathing? Is he all right? Why don't you put, give him that water. All right.

But, but it happens and it, and it happens in a second nature kind of way, in a way that is fundamentally who we are as people in terms of taking care of other people, you know, in our species. And that's exciting to me. You know, it's just, I don't know, it makes me feel good. If you are in these cities, I'll be at the Salt Lake City Wise Guys this weekend, August 11th and 12th for four shows. Helium in St. Louis, September 14th through 16th for five shows.

Then I'm at the Las Vegas Wise Guys on September 22nd and 23rd, also four shows. And then October, I'm at Helium in Portland, Oregon on October 20th through 22nd. A couple of those shows are already sold out. Go to wtTFpod.com for tickets. Oh, it was funny because I went to see that Quick to See Smith show and she's a very prolific native artist and I got excited and I wanted to share it with somebody. So I texted Sterling Harjo and I'm like, hey man, have you seen this show? Like it's like that in my mind like i i didn't know if it was weird or or or or relevant or or just correct that i'm like i'm going to share this native artist with the uh with one of the few natives i have a relationship with i was like this is my native outreach and harjo

hadn't heard of her or seen her work you know know, he's over in Tulsa. They just, I think Reservation Dogs, the final season just started. And so I said, I can't believe it. It's amazing stuff. And I bought him a catalog, had it sent out there. Got him a little present. All right. So look, Alex Winter is, this was a great conversation. And it's right up my alley in terms of sort of understanding the nature of the reality and the way we take in reality and what is reality and what, you know, how are our brains being fucked with and what is entertainment and what is sort of, it just is one of these all-encompassing conversations that really engages everything that we're up against. And what really turns out to not be reality, but

what is sort of taking control of our behaviors and our mind. And one of those things is YouTube. So the YouTube effect, which is this doc that he's directed, is available starting tomorrow, August 8th, on the digital on-demand service of your choice. This is an independently produced documentary, and Alex was not promoting it on behalf of any struck companies. But I still want to point out that we recorded this on July 6th before the SAG strike, so that's why there's no discussion about that. This is me talking to Alex Winter. That's why there's no discussion about that. This is me talking to Alex Winter. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence.

Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly.

This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. Death is in our air. To be continued... When I die here, you'll never leave Japan alive. FX's Shogun, a new original series streaming February 27th, exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. You've done a lot of things. Speaking as someone who has done a lot of things. Speaking as someone who has done a lot of things. Oddly, I watched the Lost Boys recently. Oh, wow.

I don't know. I'm not sure why I did necessarily. Yeah. But I really like the music in the Lost Boys. Yeah, it was a fun soundtrack. Right? Yeah, especially that Echo cover, which is amazing. Yeah, yeah. It's all like, and then I was like, I wonder how that Lost Boys. Yeah, it was a fun soundtrack. Right? Yeah, especially that Echo cover, which is amazing. Yeah, yeah.

It's all like, and then I was like, I wonder how that holds up. Yeah. You know, like it was an important film that I wanted to see. Like, is it still relevant? Right, yeah. But it was kind of, it kind of is a good movie. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's a fun.

And all those, like Jason Patrick, when everyone was younger and relatively normal seeming. Exactly. That's right. Yeah. Before everyone went off the rails. I mean, that was as everyone was literally about to go off the rails. Right. Everyone was sort of like perched on the balcony.

Yeah. And then they just jumped after that. Yeah. And now the arc, there's been this arc, because you're about my age. Yeah. Where I'm starting to realize like, Jesus Christ, I'm older than everybody all of a sudden. Right. But all those guys from your generation of actors, whether they went off the rails or not, they're just old guys now.

Exactly. Yeah. It's kind of freaking me out. For me, I guess because I'm one of them, and I'm sure you can look at your life this way as well in terms of the things you were doing at that age. Yeah. I'm grateful for it. Yeah. Like, because some of us didn't make it right quite a few of us didn't make it at all like the guy in people in that movie yeah like cory haim is gone and and brooke mccarter is gone and and you know the cory felbin too right cory felbin's around no i know yeah i don't i

just i get through the wars you know i get reels occasionally of him dancing in an odd way. Yes, precisely. It's a very succinct way of putting the Corey Feldman thing. Do you talk to that guy? I mean, I don't. I'm in touch with Jason. I'm in touch with Kiefer. I've seen Corey once, I think, in 25 years.

Was he in that doc you did? He wasn't. No. I really wanted to focus on people who I felt had kind of been through the whole thing, kind of landed in a sort of relatively normal place, and wanted to speak kind of more from the other side. Oh, not in terms of like, you know, I'm still. Yeah. Corey's really in the thick of it.

And, you know, it's not like I fault him for that, but he's really working through stuff right now. And because my story, because it was kind of an autobiographical story without being in it. Yeah. It was the one doc. I watched a couple of it, three of them. Yeah. But I'm not in it. I just intentionally.

Yeah. But it sort of tells my story through other people because all of our stories are the same. Traditionally, but it sort of tells my story through other people because all of our stories are the same. But was your experience, like there are some people that were, like I don't associate you with a major television exposure for many years as a child. No, but I started on Broadway as a child. I was 12, 13. Now, like, so where'd you grow up? I grew up London, St. Louis, New York City. Yeah.

I was born in London. My mother ran a dance company there, so I was born there. So you grew up in the dance world. I did. Modern dance, yeah. The snooty end of the dance world. Is that snooty? I thought ballet was snooty.

I thought modern dance. Maybe it's snooty just to justify its existence. Exactly, yes. Maybe it's snooty just to justify its existence. Exactly, yes. It's snooty in that way that certain factions of post-punk rockers and New Yorkers, you know what I mean? Sure, sure. No one knows we exist.

It's not all of you. Right. It's not our fault you don't get it. Exactly. That's the kind of snooty. Not the kind of super high class, we're going to the Met to watch Swan Lake. Well, how are you with modern dance? I mean, is it something that you've integrated into your appreciation spectrum? I love watching it.

When I was three, my parents both made it clear that I was terrible at it and was absolutely not going to continue. Thank God. Yeah, which was a blessing and not a curse. It was just a blessing and a blessing. You could be one of those guys now, like, running a small company. Yes. I could have been in a unitard right now. Well, you wouldn't be interviewing me at all.

So, no, I was not going to do that. But I enjoy it. I mean, I like watching it. And I grew up with my mother's company was pretty successful. So we grew up with a lot of them. In England. Yeah, like Merce Cunningham and Twyla Thorpe and people like that were around my childhood. What is the basic premise of modern dance?

I don't mean to press you on something that's abstract. Yeah, that's abstract in that I'm going to caveat I am not. I mean, I know a lot about it. It's only because I think generally when I see people doing live things that seem to take a tremendous amount of risk and vulnerability, I'm moved by them. I don't always know why. Right.

And I think modern dance, there must be a series of steps and a kind of context that these are the things that you do. These are the things that you expect. Yeah. Do you know what they are? Yeah. I think that the mindset of a modern dancer is almost like the avant-garde end of jazz. Okay. You know, came up in the turn of the century, not that jazz did in the same way, but it came up turn of the century at a time where a lot of artists were trying to find new ways of expression.

Yeah. And, you know, you had Isidore Duncan leading into Martha Graham. Yeah. And people who were really foraging for breaking out and away from the kind of classical, classicist forms. Right, right, okay. So that's really, it's really an avant-garde form of dance. So is there a lot of improvising? Yeah, there's improvising, and then there's a lot of sort of

kind of abstract expression through movement. Yeah, yeah, I get that, yeah. So that's kind of what tends to draw people to it. And that's why it's also very, you know, I grew up with none of my friends understanding. Like my parents were like beyond weirdos. They were like, they were just like these weird. Like there's no level of making them understand what and why your parents did it. Yeah.

They're not just, you can't say they're hippies and like, oh, I get it. They're hippies or they're communists or something. Yeah. They're just in this weird communists or something. Yeah, yeah. They're just in this weird other nether region. Yeah, and I think the reason why modern dance is tricky is it rides that line of ridiculous. So it's very tricky to transcend the ridiculous. Yeah, I mean, there'd be times when I would go to Merce Cunningham concerts, not even that long ago, maybe 20 years ago at BAM and it would be packed.

And I've been around modern dance since I was born. I feel like I get it pretty well. And people would be like, oh, he would like do this move with his wrist. People like, oh, oh, oh. I was like, I guarantee you that wasn't a joke, guys.

Like, I don't think the wrist thing was a joke. They thought it was cute and... No, I just think they have no idea what they're watching, but want to feel like they... Get it? People know that they know what they're watching. Wild.

So there's a lot of that. So then just by virtue of them being in show business, you found yourself in show business? Yeah, kind of. I came up dancing and I was training from a really young age, dance and vocals. Singing? I liked singing.

I liked all of that stuff. I started making films when I was really young, like seven, eight years old. Shooting them? Yeah, with a Brownie camera. Oh, okay. Yeah, and reels and cutting them and things. And so I loved the movies and I loved theater. So film was always kind of there.

Yeah, it was always there and I enjoyed it. They didn't push me into it because as modern dancers, they had sheer contempt for the sort of commercial end of the entertainment industry. Commercial, but you were doing avant-garde short films. Eventually, they liked those, yes. But I came up doing TV commercials. Oh, acting in them. Yeah, and Broadway musicals.

You're speaking like they had no say in your life as an 8-year-old. You're like, you know, what are we going to do with this kid? He just keeps doing commercials. Yeah, I mean, or that they had any presence whatsoever. Absentee dancer parents? Yeah, there were latchkey kids, and then there's modern dance latchkey kids. Yeah, but what were they off doing? I mean, they had companies, and they they were performing and they were choreographing.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Did you, like, hang around the theater all the time? I did, yeah. That's how I ended up on, my mom taught dance at Wash U in St. Louis. And I would get thrown on stage and then they realized I liked it. And then they realized I was okay at it. Yeah.

And then that turned into professional work. For musicals. Exactly. Went on from there. And then you were on Broadway as what? I was Lewis and the King and I with Yul Brynner for a while. Yeah. And then we did it on the road and came out to Pantages.

Pre-cancer, Yul Brynner? Pre-cancer, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, when I was 13. And he did smoke like an absolute chimney. Really? Yeah. That's something you remember?

Yeah. Well, he had this, he had this most beautiful Basso voice. And you're like, I got to smoke five packs a day. I want that voice. and then he died yeah uh and then i went right into peter pan with sandy duncan playing john darling with the top hat and glasses oh yeah did you fly i flew yeah yeah so that's a good show a week yeah for like three years pretty much like all through all of high school was peter pan so uh then i did some off broadway and then I quit to go to film school. Where at?

I've quit acting like nine times over the course of my life. Well, yeah, because it seems like if you look at your resume, it does seem pretty film directing focused now, or at least balanced. Oh, it is, yeah. No, it's mostly. I've done, other than Bill and Ted 3 and a couple of other things, I've been almost completely focused on it. Bill and Ted 3?

There's a 3? There is a 3, yeah. Yeah. It came out during COVID. Oh, really. I do not fault you for not knowing about it. It did do very well, but it is a- Well, people love that movie. They do, yeah. What is the relationship? Now, maybe I'm completely out of my mind and I get things confused, but is there a relationship of Bill and Ted to O.C. and Stiggs? I don't know. I actually knew I knew a couple of the guys in OCN Stiggs. Because that was based on a Lampoon thing. It was, yeah. And I think Robert Altman directed the first one.

Yeah, no, Altman is OCN Stiggs for sure. I remember when they made it. In fact, I auditioned for that. Is it a similar thing or am I making that up? No, it's only similar in that it's two guys. It's really, Bill and Ted was really came out of two writers doing kind of stand up as the characters. It was really kind of its own thing. But it came out at a time when it was in the ether.

I think we're like, you know, you can get Osi and Stiggs and Spicoli from Fast Times. Right. And sort of other, you know, even Dobie Gillis, other cultural characters like that. Really? A Dobie Gillis reference. Yeah, sorry to throw that in. Go all the way back. I think it's all in the ether. So that was what was going on.

That was what bro culture looked like. Yeah, that's what it looked like. Then. It was more harmless. There was more hacky sack and cargo shorts. Yeah, but we drove into it. I mean, Spicoli does too, but I think you had Wayne and Garth, which was much more of an SNL wink and a nod at the audience.

Sure, sure. But that seemed to be a riff on the idea of local access and rock dudes. Yeah, exactly. I think it's quite a different thing. I think it would seem that Bill and Ted and Spicoli was a California thing. Yeah, exactly.

And Wayne and Garth definitely didn't seem California. They seemed middle America-ish. Yeah. And we're just two dopes who are very close friends. I mean, it's really conceptual. In real life? Well, we are. We became really close friends because the audition process was like a torture test.

Really? It went on for so many months that we- Just for the first one? Yeah. That you and Keanu became close during that time time long before we knew that we had the part we just we both rode motorcycles we both played bass guitar so we both would jam on bass together which is kind of parodic unto itself if you think about it how's he doing good really good yeah he seems to have like really survived in the biggest of ways you know he works i, you know this from being within the business.

It's, it's. Barely. I'm just on the perverse. No, that's, that is not true. Yeah. The people who do do that, like I've noticed from having been around a long time. At that level? At that level are unrelentingly hardworking.

Like they, he's very, very hardworking. I just watched River's Edge recently. So good. It is kind of good. One just watched River's Edge recently. So good. It is kind of good. One of my favorite performances of his, I think. Yeah. It must be like his first one. So it's a couple in, but yeah.

And like, it's sort of odd to watch it after having it affect me when I was younger. Yeah. I think I've been on a mild Dennis Hopper kick again. Oh, well, you could do much worse than that. But it's just interesting to sort of assess Crispin Glover at that point. Yeah. And what he was doing was crazy.

I mean, people were freaking out. I knew Crispin pretty well back in the day, and we all had enormous admiration for him. Yeah. But no one really understood what the hell he was doing. I think he's maintained that.

He has, yeah. I mean, like I haven't talked to him in a decade. I interviewed him, but he's one of those child actor in a way that sort of went into this zone which is almost like modern dance. Yes, exactly, yeah. Like, you know, this sort of esoterica, mystical, kind of gothic trip that he's on. And it's authentic to him, which is what I like about it. It's really who he is.

Yeah, I don't know that anyone would pretend to do that. It's not like... Well, maybe it's a shtick for a minute, like that weird Joaquin Phoenix documentary he made where he tended to be a rapper. Like that kind of thing, when an actor... No, he seems pretty committed to it. Yeah. Yeah. No, he seems pretty committed to it.

Yeah. Yeah. But, yeah, Keanu, I don't, you know, it's just one of these dudes that he seems pretty accessible, but he's bigger than the world. Yeah. Yeah, it's trippy, and I think it's probably trippy for him, you know, because there is the duality of your public life and your private life. I realized that one time, who was I talking to? Jeff Kahn. And I've noticed it when I was younger at the comedy store that you get to a certain level where you may have a few good friends, but generally you can only hang out with people at that level. Yeah. So there are these weird pairings. Yeah, that's right.

You just see people hanging out. It's like, why is Lance Armstrong hanging out with Keanu Reeves or whatever? Yeah, it's true. Because like, where else are you going to hang out with? Where can they go? Jeff was in Freaked. He was nosy in our movie Freaked. Jeff Kahn? Yeah. How's he doing? I think he's a teacher now. I think so, yeah. I haven't seen him in a long time. He's really good in that though.

He has a giant headpiece on the whole thing. He's a funny guy. He is. Really funny. So, with the acting, what is it that makes you go in and out? I like... Is it not satisfying? No, it's very satisfying, but I like the creative expression of actually telling stories. I love crafting stories in film, primarily. And that's just immensely satisfying for me. I love research.

I love writing, but on the docs, I love the topical aspect of it and the research aspect of it and, and telling stories with, with real people. I mean, you know, something you get from, from the work you've done with this over the years is it's, there's really nothing like talking eyeball to eyeball with a really interesting person. if you give them enough time you know it's you can what what i've noticed over the years is that you know people like if you give people enough time even if they're obfuscating uh you you get a sense of who they are well that's exactly it with docs and and that's why i don't make gotcha docs like even the one i just did on youtube is you know not only do i have a kind of a base level maybe to a fault compassion for pretty much anybody unless they're just a monster

and i'm not usually interviewing monsters yeah um but also they're going to reveal their their non-answer is a great answer right or even their even their lies. I was about to say, or their flat-out untrue answer is a great answer. Right. I like revealing that. You might linger on them and let the audience sort of sit with a non-answer

or a false answer. Yeah, yeah. I think there's a lot of power in that. Oh, of course. And then when you juxtapose it against the other side of things, I think that the doxie-doer,

and people will argue with me, and I've argued with doc makers, that, you know some people believe it is a an auteur's genre whereas the other side of the journalistic approach is that it's not yeah and i think that that my argument on it right or wrong is that i think it's actually more artistic and more i wouldn't necessarily say auteuristic because i because docs are very collaborative they just are are. I mean, you're building them with your editor. But a lot of doc

directors will integrate themselves into it in a big way. I intentionally do not do that. Right. To me, that's more journalistic. Right. That's true. Yes, that is true. I'm going to go get the story. Right. Whereas these guys are like, I'm going in. Yeah.

I think you want to keep things fairly balanced i think the art of it or the truth of it comes out of not slathering it with your point of view i think you get more there's more nuance there sure well i mean then you let the story unfold and then if you could sort of end it like even the new one or not the new one what i watch i watch a youtube one but i noticed in the the deep web one is that right at the very end you know you sort of you you really see both sides of it but you also understand both sides of it and it becomes a little tricky to pick sides right that you know the complaint of the limitation of the defense's ability within the context of the trial was really just straight up.

You know, that that was just trial law, really. Yes. kneecap the defense by denying them a certain type of of questioning with the prosecutor's witnesses yeah was was within the context of of legal understanding yeah and and then you're sort of like well well he did something yeah of course he did yeah yeah and that's my favorite kind of doc ideally and my favorite kind of subject that's why why I liked Zappa, because it's not, it is polarizing, but not in a kind of gimmicky way. Well, I talked that doc up, because I've been sort of fascinated with Zappa

over the years, and I dated Moon for like six months. Who's amazing, yeah, and I heard Dweezil on your show as well, which was great. Right, but that caused problems. You know, obviously, I had Dweezil on, and then Amit's like, what about my side? I'm like, I don't, you i'm not in a war i don't want to be in the zappa war exactly 12 people care about that's why you'll notice there's none of the kids are in the talk because i didn't want to step into that fracas but you got you got a permission right oh yeah

we had complete permission from everybody and most importantly from gail and the trust and i had so you started that before she started away? I started before she passed, yeah. And do you know how all the kids felt about it? I don't know what Dweezil thought about it, but Moon sent me a really lovely email saying how much she liked it, which actually was very heartwarming for me because I've been an admirer of hers

since I was very young. Right, yeah. And then I know that, you know, Ahmet and Diva loved it. But I, you know, I don't know how Dweezil thinks about it. I didn't, I lost touch with them when Gail died. As the world know that, you know, Ahmet and Diva loved it. But I, you know, I don't know how Dweezil thinks about it. I didn't, I lost touch with him when Gale died. As the world now knows, you know, there was a very disruptive break within the family based on things going on within the estate.

Yeah. And so I lost touch with him at that point. I was talking to him up until then. And I don't, look, I get it. Part of why I made that film was I grew up in a very you know i said this to moon very at the very beginning and when i started working on it was like this was very similar to my upbringing and insulated and weird weird and the world yeah its own world and the parents your parents are super interesting but maybe not the most present parents and you kind of are fending for yourself and you love them, but they're also problematic. Yeah.

And it was a way for me to kind of reconcile my own childhood a little bit. Well, do you find like in that childhood, because I think about my childhood, not in show business, but in dealing with selfish parents, did you feel that they, you know, drop the ball in terms of like taking care of you or protecting you? Not to quote your own recent show, but one of my parents is still alive and we get along very well. I don't know how deep I want to go into it while she's around. My father passed many years ago. Yeah.

And the short answer is yes. Yeah, yeah. Now that I've caveated the hell out of that. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, well, I mean, it is odd. It's tricky, right? Making art and the question of I'm going to make art and all that that takes and the pressure and the stress and the challenges. And, oh, I've got kids.

Yeah. And I love them, but. But you do it. Yeah, but I have, I won't put a butt in front of it. I do do it. And I have arranged my life specifically to be there most of the time. But I think that. Which takes work. But I think that at the time of your parents and certainly at the time of Zappa, you know, these were people that believed, and I think rightfully so, that they were forging some

new frontier of form and art that was probably true. Because you really think about even the context of modern dance, its evolution, its creation happened in your parents' lifetime. So there was this urgency to it. An urgency, and I have to say, and this is what I dug into with Zappa, I had nobody was above my parents in my admiration. Like, nobody. I just was blown away by what they were doing. My mother had the first modern dance company in Europe at like 19, 20 years old. And my dad created the first modern dance company in the Midwest. And then

would tour around the Midwest when in States where, in cities where movement was illegal, it was like footloose. Right. And my dad was really interesting and he was gay and he was like when did that happen i mean prettier my parents divorced when i was seven eight years old yeah and he came up in an agrarian australian family where that he would have been taken out back and murdered yeah i knew um so uh so they were really they were they were champions in my so that did your mom know all along i think it became more i think it was like again it was the 70s they were modern dancers so there was a lot of fluidity you know now we're in this world we're like oh trans i'm like i grew up with trans all

over around and yeah gender fluidity was not uncommon in my household and childhood yeah um so i think it was like oh this is all groovy until it wasn't groovy. Yeah. You know? Yeah. Well, right. Yeah. The crash. Yeah.

You know, the whole, I think the entire, the weird thing is, is that, and I don't think it's really covered specifically in your doc, but it seems to be, you know, just under the surface in culture is that, you know, the crashing of that mindset in the sixties, whatever happened in the sevents, right? Yeah, that did it. That's what that's all about. It is. And also Manson and Altamont are sort of like culturally in terms of how it was represented in what was the news then.

And the irrefutable death of the dream. Like there's just no going back. Yeah, and it was really drugs that did it and egos but ultimately what's happening in the country now is is still it's the arc of the desired pushback against that yeah against the new deal and against um you know what was seen as socialism or or free thinking yes yeah that time yeah and that and and now we're in fascism. We are on the cusp of it because of that. It, it, it, it offended so deeply the conservative movement that their entire agenda for the last 30 years is to sort of like nip that in the bud. Yeah. Stack the court with justices that will do their bidding. I mean, that started back with Atwater and Roe. But it was all the hippies in the new deal. This is what they're still pissed off about.

It is, yeah. Alito is like this little baby who just from the get-go, because he's a boomer. So right in the 60s, he was like, fuck these hippies and gay guys. Yeah. What the hell's going on? And now he's a guy. I know. Yeah. Top of the world, Ma.

It's crazy. It is. It's terrifying. But going back to sort of like also the ideas of what you grew up with and then coming into these docs, like, well, the Zappa thing, why did you take that one? Because it really represented, oftentimes I get pulled to docs either by an incredible personal affinity for it,

like Napster, which was my first doc. Yeah. This kid, the Sean Fanny kid, I was around very deep into Napster when it blew up. You thought it was amazing. I thought it was amazing. I knew it had ethical issues. I wasn't an idiot. Ethical issues business-wise. Yeah, obviously. And artist compensation-wise. Exactly. Yeah, and I'm an artist, so I was affected by it, so I wasn't snickering about it, but it was an amazing

thing. That snicker is important because it is a subtext of all the other later docs the snicker of the nerd that wins yeah is sort of it is yeah but yeah it's true but it's but that's not necessarily always a good thing but no no yeah it's a bad thing yeah yeah but fanning was such a sweet uh you know he came from a terrible childhood and like you know dss around him and living in motels and like very dickensian upbringing and just wanted to bring he was wanted to bring community together and he did it in a way that completely changed the world uh and then was just completely vilified and hit in the public eye and i've just related very much to like getting public scrutiny too early

when your sort of childhood doesn't really prep you for it. And also having some sort of emotional trauma. Exactly. Yeah. Like driven by, like I deal with this stuff a lot now and I don't know what your personal investigations are, but I'm at an age where I'm not looking back nostalgically, but I'm trying to answer questions in terms of, you know, why am I like this still? Oh yeah. Yeah.

No, it's like that involves, for me that can involve a couple of different therapists a week, but yes, agreed. Yeah. So, you know, it's, it's kind of a reckoning. Well, how do you stand? Like, where do you feel about that? Because I'm, I'm like, just in a personal sense that they're like the one thing you don't seem to be. And, and, and I think it is something about determination or something about the good things we got from our parents is that either you live in a victim mindset or you live in a mindset that has assimilated or repressed whatever it is that you came through, but you never once, you know, let it undermine your entire life emotionally otherwise. Yeah. I think that, you know, you hit your late fifties and you've either done a bunch of and are still doing, hopefully, but you've done a bunch of work on yourself.

Right. You haven't. Right. And I think that if you haven't, it can be very tricky because who doesn't have childhood trauma? Who doesn't? Well, that's an interesting thing. Right. And also, like, I'm starting to believe that most of the cultural and problems of humanity are primarily from unresolved trauma.

And the thing is, is that, you know, what is trauma? And to some people, what is psychology? Right. That's right. Yeah, it's true. It's a good point. Right. So, you know, psychology is just a template for understanding.

Like when you really think about philosophy, psychology, theology, it's like there's no science to to any of that shit. Yeah, that's right. And you have to have faith in it. I mean, you have to find the strands of like, you know, cognitive, uh, behavioral therapy seems to be like the one that seems scientific almost. Yeah. It's like, don't do that. That's right. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. You're hurting people. You're hurting yourself. Maybe don't do that. Practice not doing that. Exactly. On a hurting people. You're hurting yourself. Maybe don't do that. Stop dead. Practice not doing that. Yeah, exactly. On a regular basis. And maybe that voice will become louder.

Yeah. Than the other thing. Yeah. I mean, it's habit forming. If you do start to do the work, it does form habits, but it's work. That's right. Of course. Yeah.

But the scary thing to me is that like with the onset of fascism is that, you know, that whole conversation is gone. Like I'm trying to work on this bit on stage where I'm like, it used to be once you acknowledge or realize that you're an asshole, that was a proactive step to maybe stopping it. Right. Now it's just sort of like, Nope.

Yeah. Off I go. Yeah. Thank God I know who I am now. It's free speech. I should be able to be who I want to be. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. It's kind of, there are laws protecting this. Yeah. Yeah. I can be, I'm going to double down be. Right. Yeah. There are laws protecting this. Yeah, yeah. I can be, I'm going to double down on the ass on this. There's nothing wrong with me. Yeah. You put a gun in the Second Amendment with that and then you're off to the races. Oh my God, man. I can't, like

sometimes I really can't, it's very tricky because we live in this thing and I'm trying to put into place some sort of plan yeah to where i can avoid you know showing up in another country as a refugee yeah and maybe have some rite of passage yeah i have a british passport and and even though uk is a mess right now as well i'm still like well i could go to scotland but but the the thing about the weird thing about the uk is that it's an ancient mess. It is. It's true. Like, you know, like when you think of America, it's like we're barely born.

Yeah. But, you know, like, you know, you go to England or anywhere in Europe, it's like this wall is from before Jesus. That's true. Yeah. Yeah. And they're all fairly resigned and sort of, eh, we can live with this. Kind of for a while. Yeah.

We can survive this. You know, we don't have that kind of optimism. But in getting further down the line into some of the other docs, you start to realize, well, we'll get to that. So what you're saying is that what engaged you about Zappa is that it was, again, a way, not unlike showbiz kids, to sort of play out your own experience. what you just said that like it came at a time in my life in my 50 early 50s when i was dealing with a lot of unpacking my childhood and my parents and my own trauma and my own upbringing and zappa and i love them and i was like what made them tick like like they were so intent on doing the art they were doing at a time when eventually you had reagan killing the arts and killing the nea and it was you know anathema to be,

I mean, an artist, much less a modern dancer. And then Zappa had always intrigued me because he was paradoxical. I liked some of his politics. I didn't like others. He was, you know,

sexually craven. And yet he was really forward thinking. He had these kids who he seemed to really love and spend time with. And yet he didn't. And so I found so many... It felt like they were all hostages. Exactly. In this house where, like, I remember,

like, he would pipe that music that he was doing in the basement through the house, like, all day long. And the cigarette smoke. But yeah, exactly. So, I mean, and that was like, all the pictures I have of myself as a child either with my mother pregnant with me,

she has a cigarette in one hand, a glass of whiskey in the other, five years old cigarette, seven years old cigarette. Right. But getting back to the idea that, you know, as a grownup, I imagine you and not so much me, I didn't come from, you know, my mother painted, but she wasn't on the cutting edge of anything. Yeah. You know, it's irrefutable that, you know, the community that your folks were involved with and Zappa in and of himself and whatever he was sort of spearheading was truly revolutionary. Yeah, that's the thing is I had utmost admiration for them and I had a lot of admiration for Zappa. So it allowed me kind of a way in to try to get my head around what made people like that tick and also their own trials and tribulations at that time like the real granular challenges of of trying to forge ahead in the arts at that period of time well yeah and like you know i go like when i was trying to wrap my brain around

zappa and you know it's ongoing yeah because you know there there's something about the mystique of frank where you're sort of like you know every one of these albums has got to be a genius thing. And like, he was really doing something, but ultimately, you know, it's, it's a lot of noodling, but it's a lot of, you know, he was writing, you know, he was a composer and there's, there's just sort of this arc to it all, but it is sort of a, a, a deep, I always wondered, I i remember years ago i asked a friend of mine who's in music management i'm like is zappa like does do they make money yeah because like does anybody like zappa and my my friend said look if you have a bin at the record store with your name on it you're making you're making money yeah yeah and he was always experimenting i mean he was

i think that like that's what i discovered when i I saw the vault, which we started to digitize and preserve. And then went down the stairs? Yeah, went down the stairs. The old studio? It went on and on and on, floor to ceiling, massive, very well organized. I was so lucky to go to that house once. Oh, it was amazing. That place was so great.

The only problem is I was given a tour of it by Moon and it was me and Moby, which kind of was a buzzkill. Moby was a buzzkill. He kept touching everything. Oh, God. Anointing everything. Yeah, yeah. He'd get on the drum set. I'm like, dude.

Yeah, have some respect. Get off the piano, man. Yeah, yeah. But I realized when I was working on The Vault that it was, even his archive, it wasn't his ego thing. And it wasn't like, I must preserve. It was an act of conceptual art unto itself. So I think he was like Prince. I think he just always was creating.

So obviously everything wasn't going to be great. I wish I was like that because me, I'm cooking, I'm fixing a thing. And I know that the energy could be going elsewhere. Exactly. But it's something, sometimes it's just not as satisfying as making some beans. Yeah. I'm with you. And there's something compulsive.

I don't want to take away from those people, but there's something compulsive. I don't want to take away from those people, but there's something compulsive about, like, I must make music 24-7 day in, day out. Yeah, man. I mean, it's like Hendrix, too.

Yeah. I mean, you know, like, it's like every year there's new Hendrix material. Yeah. Like, the guy died at 27. Yeah, it's ridiculous. What the fuck was he doing?

Yeah. Like, never sleeping and just playing all day? Well, I think probably, yeah. But that, but, like, you know, it's one of these things, like, I've been noticing lately, too, was he doing yeah never sleeping yeah playing well i think probably yeah but but that but like you know it it it's one of these things like i've been noticing lately too about going back and like i said not being nostalgic but realizing that a lot of my opinions were were were put in place when i was too young to really understand what i was talking about yeah and i was arrogant

and and pseudo-intellectual yes so so So, like, I have to go back. Every single interview of me up until I had about 40. But, yeah. It's excruciating. But now I'm sort of, like, reassessing things. Yeah. Or really assessing things for the first time. Yeah.

Thanks to Criterion Channel. Yeah. Which I think is, like, a great tool if you were, like, a snooty film nerd in your 20s. Yeah. To sort of, like, did you really get that movie? Yeah. And I go back and I watch them. Like, I didn't even know what it was about. Yeah. of like, did you really get that movie? Yeah. And I go back and I watch them like,

I didn't even know what it was about. Yeah, no. I probably slept through half of it. Yeah, or had these opinions that were ridiculous. But Zappa,

the genius of him and also the reckoning with him is that it never ends. Yeah. And his commitment to things, like some of the footage

of him conducting later in his life was kind of like really spectacular because I don't know that he gave a fuck if anybody liked it. No, I really, truly, truly do not think he did. I think it's a real error to assume that he wasn't commercial because he was afraid of commercial success, which is a theory some people had.

No, but he, like, he kicked that, like Joe's Garage was huge. It was huge. And if he went on tour, he was playing massive. I mean, he was, as you know, like, when I was a kid, everyone had a poster of Zappa. Zappa Crappa. Yeah. The one on the toilet. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Right. But, like, I think he was just, like, this mythic being. Yeah. He had a look. Yeah. But he also had, like, an army of true nerds. He did.

Who dug, like, you know, who dug him. Yeah. And knew every single guitar did. Who dug him. Yeah. And knew every single guitar solo on every single track. Right. And I think, and Dweezil does too. Yeah, he does. I've watched Dweezil do an entire album. Yeah.

That's his bag. Yeah. But also the hits were goofy. And I'm sure that on some level he resented the people that came in because of Sheik Your Booty more than he liked them. Yeah, for sure. I'm sure he did. Dancing did dancing fool yeah you don't get it you know right but you listen to like you know like ruben and the jets yeah like you know that thing he does where he basically apes all of the laurel canyon oh that or like was that i think it was that wasn't on ruben where he

literally does he does that a lot like uh Like whatever was going on down the street from him, like Crosby, Stills, and Nash are the doors. Yeah, he hated all that. Yeah, and he just mocks it, but he mocks it perfectly. And it's like, oh my God. Hated Bill Graham, hated the hippies, hated the San Francisco scene. And people lumped him in with them, but it was not his trip, man. Yeah.

And he was not a drug guy. No, that's the thing. I saw that VU documentary and they're talking about him. I know it's Mo Tucker who'd lost her mind by then anyway, but talking about him not a drug guy. No, that's the thing. I saw that VU documentary and like, they're talking about him. I know it's Mo Tucker who'd lost her mind by then anyway, but talking about him being a hippie and it's like, it's just betrays such a complete lack of understanding. No, he was like literally in his own weird way on the other side of the spectrum from a conservative saying, get these hippies out of my yard because they're in his house. Yeah.

But he didn't have a tolerance for it. No, none. I mean, and there's a famous story of him going to New York in the late 60s and being at a show where Nico was playing piano. Yeah. And when she got up at the interval, he got up and mimitated her entire set, almost note perfectly, but then just making fun of her voice and parodying her. Yeah, he was brutal. Yeah, they hated him. But I didn't know all that stuff about them having that residency in the theater and stuff. Yeah, it's amazing, isn't it?

Yeah. The Derek? Yeah. Yeah, it's amazing, isn't it? The Jarek? Yeah, man. And also, like, the whole, like, I get really obsessed with the sort of beefheart Zappa feud. Well, it wasn't a feud, but it was clearly to me, you know, after learning the history before your documentary, that

Van Vliet, is that his name? Van Vliet, yeah. Van Vliet, what's his first name again? Don. Don. Don Van Vliet. But they were friends. They were Van Vliet. Yeah. Van Vliet. What's his first name again? Don. Don. Yeah. Don Van Vliet. But they were friends. They were like childhood friends. Super close friends. And Zappa, in terms of what informed his music later, the humanness of his sense of humor

and also the goofiness, I think was all because of the relationship with Van Vliet. There's no doubt in my mind that that's true. And I've actually thought about trying to do a doc on, if not just Beefheart, in terms of that relationship on the both of them. There's no doubt in my mind that that's true. And I've actually thought about trying to do a doc on, if not just Beefheart in terms of that relationship on the both of them, but the two best friends who formed their musical interest and passion together. Literally. Because like, he was like,

you know, when you see like Zappa's influences and all the, the sort of noise music weirdos and, and, and him playing earnestly playing a bicycle on the Steve Allen show. Yeah. Like, you know, if I believed that that was a prank,

I would be like, he was way ahead of it. But I think he was sort of serious. I think he was too, yeah. And it took Beefheart, you know, the infusion of Beefheart and the infusion of sort of this goofy, you know, blues sensibility to inform Frank to sort of like, dude, you know, get down on the ground here with some. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, play for the people. Yeah, 100%. I think that there's no Zappa without Beefheart, no Beefheart without Zappa. And I also think that while the feud is all you hear about, that they actually- I don't even know about the feud. Well, it's really rock nerd. It's deep dive rabbit hole rock nerd land. But I think they really did love each other all the way through their lives.

And they just had a problematic relationship. They were very problematic people in their own right. Yeah. So you put them together and it was just like dynamite. Well, I just love that they grew up there out in the desert by that Air Force Base. I think their dads were both engineers or something. Yeah. I can't remember.

Yeah. Well, I think Don's dad drove like a bread truck or something. But Zappa's dad was. And they just spun records, listened to blues and drank, you know. Because all those early hours. The Beefheart records, like the first two, it's just the Howling Wolf record. Yeah, that's really. And that's his voice.

I know. It's just a pure replication. And just a goofball thing of it. Yeah. And it's so funny because when I got to know Moon, she's like, Don taught me how to drive. Oh, really? That's terrifying. It's great though. Yeah, it is. Yeah. So, okay. So that was the, I thought you did a really good

job with it and it was very informative. And to me, you know, given like, you know, what we're seeing, you know, as we move through the other docs, the YouTube doc in particular is that, you know, once context is destroyed and that the context becomes the platform yeah and that you know like i did a joke years ago uh and i still sort of do it that you know that you're going to hear eventually hear some kids say like hitler was the guy with the mustache right right oh god yeah right it's true yeah right so and and that's what happens when you don't have a historical narrative or historical context that putting zappa into context for anybody who wants to take it in is important because all this stuff gets lost as art becomes irrelevant culturally.

Yes, that's right. And it's a problem. Yeah. But then sometimes I'm like, is that just a generational thing? Yeah. Or was this shit really important? You know, I don't know. I think that certain things are important,

and I think certain things in the current climate that we're in are really hard to grasp because the noise floor is so loud. And there's so much stuff. And you have access to all of it, and everyone has access to all of it. And that's why I wanted to do this doc, because this is really the primary portal

through which everyone accesses everything all the time yeah which is is unto itself insane and chaotic yeah i thought it was uh it was it was informative and in in like certainly i didn't know the history of it but it is a story of a tech startup yeah that that became this thing and that a behemoth yeah and there was a couple things that that i learned from it i don't remember which doc i think it was the doc it was the new one where um where the the kid who was stuck in the alt right yeah that's caleb yeah caleb cane that's in the new doc like he said the thing there's a couple things that were said uh that that struck me that when he said you know what we risk here is people's ability to be human yeah that that the

destruction of empathy uh through um i don't know if it's objectification or what the word would be but this idea that you know when you're online and when you're taking this stuff in and when the algorithms dictate what you do and think is that, you know, you're, you're removing, there's no community of touch. So, so what happens is everything becomes some sort of almost, I don't want to trivialize it, but it's not a video game, but there's a distance between humanity and what's going on in some guy's head in his house. Yeah. That's completely the problem. There's so much talk now, which I somewhat understand about the algorithms or the algorithm, the algorithm all the time. And it's not really about an algorithm. It's really a human societal issue. And it's really, like you just said,

it's a, an empathy killing issue and the problem, you know, and there's great things about these platforms and great things about YouTube, obviously, in terms of some of the things they've done, but that parasocial component of feeling like you're talking to someone who, you know, but like you said, having no real connection to them whatsoever. I deal with that all the time because of stuff. I was doing live Instagram feeds during pandemic and I was dealing with a lot of lonely, you know, frustrated, scared people and they would start interacting me through DMs as if I were FaceTiming them. Yeah. And these are not dumb people. Right. Yeah. And it's like something breaks in the brain. It really impacts the brain. And so it can cause, I mean, when there was the Christchurch shooting in 2019, I think for a lot of us, that was the kind of tipping point when we realized these platforms were actually going to cause real world harms and real world violence. And people say, oh, it's just talk on the internet. Don't be a snowflake. But people were actually going to get

hurt. And that was kind of for me when I wanted to start telling a story around this. Well, also the idea that it's unintentional self-radicalization because, you know, sometimes you're not savvy enough to know why you're being fed what you're fed. And that's, I guess, where the algorithm comes in and how it was exploited by people with, um, propagandistic and, uh, ideological intention. Yeah. There's a couple of things that work though, because to be fair to YouTube, they did a lot of work on the, on the recommender algorithm and it is much less likely you will get straight up rabbit hole that way where you go on looking for fuzzy slippers and then end up with a Glock and part of a neo-Nazi group. But by the same token, that, that parasocial aspect of like feeling like Steven Crowder or like, you know, Candace Owens is in your living room. If you're susceptible to my biggest nightmare.

Exactly. You're susceptible to rhetoric that's really extreme and intense, which almost everybody is, whether they're because they're emotionally stifled. Exactly. Yeah. And that that can lead you into dangerous territory. So what was the like? Imagine that the dark web, I mean, Napster too, but there is a zone that you're kind of with these docs on the periphery of, which is this kind of like, you know, beyond good and evil, you know, free zone of thought and barter and ideas that exists behind the wall of the mainstream internet. Yeah.

Yeah, that's been fascinating to me since the 80s. Like, I got online in the 80s before the web during the Usenet BBS era. Yeah. And that's immediately found that there. There was the sort of alt-rec movement, which was rock and roll and sex and philosophy and literature and everything. And a lot of community there. But it struck me then that there was this community growing that was kind of beyond the basic confines of society in a way. Yeah.

But not fully. This is where the mistake happens. Not really fully liberated from those confines. Right. And that's what we saw really blow up during 2016 to 2020 when you had these like Bernie supporters who went full Trump. Right. You know, they were like, you know, F the government, like full liberation. Right.

We want to be free. Then you're like, no, we're just going to put on a MAGA hat and like start stomping people's heads. Yeah. That fantasy that you're sort of living beyond the confines of society can very quickly turn into kind of a fascistic thing. fantasy that you're sort of living beyond the confines of society can very quickly turn into kind of a fascistic thing well yeah but that but but they're like this is the thing about what was interesting in i guess it was probably in the deep the deep web one is that you know char you know

charles schumer who's you know no wizard yeah but you know was brought to attention with his like kind of base you know basic understanding of the Internet as an old man. Yes. Was sort of like, this is a problem. Yeah. You know. Yeah. They're just getting drugs.

Yeah. The kids are just getting. Yeah. Click a button. Yeah. But that was what facilitated the investigation. It was, yeah. So, and not unlike, you know, there is a generation of these older guys, you know, on the wrong side of things.

Like, it seems that most of these tech giants are, well, I can't say most, but at least a couple of the important ones are unrepentant fascists. Yeah. You know, in the guise of libertarianism. That's right. Yeah. And they know that, you know, fascism in and of itself, they don't really give a fuck, and this is the empathy thing. Yeah. About, you know, what the masses are up to. Yeah.

As long as they have the freedom to conduct business as they want without regulation and without it. And they're willing. Like, you know, it's I just was thinking about this this morning, even with Netflix. Yeah. Because I had a conversation with somebody, you know, about Robert F. Kennedy. Right. You know, and this idea that, you know, he's sort of like, he's not anti-vax. He was a guy that was looking for legal rights for people that were affected by vaxes to fight back against the government, which that's all horseshit.

Yeah, it's nonsense. But the thing I started to realize, and this I realized this a while ago, even about Netflix and how they reacted to the issue of trans protests around jokes was the fascist brain is going to say, well, look, there's only a few of them. Right. And most people don't give a fuck. And then there's these other people that want them dead.

But ultimately, we're going to stay in the center of this and let them just play their little game out and not give a fuck about the future of the damage of trans rights or whether or not they're going to be in bigger trouble as well. We'll go to where the money is. Right. And if it's, you know, if we have to change it to, you know, you know, Nazi flicks, you know, we can work with that. Right. Yeah. We'll still have an audience. That's right. Yeah. And I think that in tech, you'll find sort of two different, there's a Venn diagram where they connect, but you find people who are straight up fascist, which I think is what we saw with the with the purchase of Twitter, where Elon came in with an agenda.

He was just like, I'm anti-democratic. I'm anti-trans. I'm literally just going to trumpet this stuff all day long. But he's like, but he is a unrepentant fascist at this point. That's what I'm saying. I'm saying he's on that side. Yes. He's the clear unrepentant.

And Thiel too. And Peter Thiel, like who's I'd say is like his evil dad. Yeah. Right. He really mentored him. Right. repentant and feel and then and peter teal like whose i'd say is like his evil dad yeah right he really mentored him right and teal has more power than elon even though elon has i guess more money but then on the other side you have just the capitalists right who aren't necessarily fascists um i think this is where a lot of the google youtube folks lie where oh we're monetizing hate speech and and the rise of the right, and people are getting killed, but we get a lot of money from ad revenue by doing that.

And so, you know, capitalism is more important than ideology and values. And so we're going to keep going. But alongside that, and I kind of dropped this thing about the YouTube thing, is that there are calculating tech savvy. It seems like all the, like whatever Bannon did when he realized that the Gamergate was a portal to sort of, you know, radicalizing these sort of isolated, angry young men into real action. You know, whether they saw it that way or not, they liked the game of it. Yeah.

And I think that was really the beginning of modern, you know, kind of grassroots radicalization. Completely, which is why we we focused on it in the doc because it's there's a it's very easy to once you have your arms around a huge group of people it's very easy to exploit them so steven crowder maybe who is still on youtube with millions of followers he may be being dismissed by youtube as well he's just like you just said you know who's he really gonna hurt he's just yakking his nonsense to like a calls himself a comedian. That's what bothers me.

Yeah. Right. And, well, he's like, yeah, he's like a failed actor or whatever, but- Failed a lot of things. Yeah. I think so. Failed human being with a soul. But then it's very easy to exploit that group, that huge community that he's addressing.

It's funny because Bannon's a failed showbiz guy too. Yeah, I know. Well, yeah, but that's, they're all fucking grifters. as is it's a huge grift totally yeah but but so what one though it pays dividends I guess but like you know there is also that moment where and I don't know if you did it I think you might have put it in the YouTube where you know to get these these these these guys mostly yeah you know out into into the real world, into real action. Yeah. You did cover it.

January 6th is a good example, Yeah, that's what it leads to. Yeah. But early on, you know, when, you know, Milo Yanatopoulos or whatever his name is.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Was sort of this strange kind of, you know, had a sexual component. Yeah. But he was pulling these guys out of their houses into action.

And when you see video of these guys, you're like, they don't know how to be outside. This is like almost like a cosplay thing where they're like sort of like we're doing it and it's not registering as reality to some of them. Yes. Yeah, they don't really know how to function in reality. It's kind of, yeah.

I mean, Jan 6 was like that. I mean, you see it in their eyes. It's just like they're almost not even sure why they're there and yet they're committing acts of violence. And you see it in their eyes. It's just like, they're almost not even sure why they're there. And yet they're committing acts of violence. Well, you know, and you see it in all these MAGA interviews. It's sort of like where they contradict themselves, but they, that part of their brain doesn't process it that way. Yeah.

And all right. But, well, this is like a different conversation. So the, the, the incentive or the, the, the, uh, inspiration for the YouTube thing, how does that happen to you? Like, what was the, well, I've been working on the growth of online communities for the YouTube thing. How does that happen to you? Like what was the, well, I've been working on the growth of online communities for a long time. I've been watching,

I was working on a doc about QAnon, which I was about to drop in and do. I was going to go and install myself into families that had been radicalized around the country. I was getting a little nervous about it because I'm Jewish and QAnon is essentially an antisemitic cult, like at its root. So I just did an interview with a guy who wrote uh Operation Mindfuck oh okay yeah of course yeah that guy Robert Guffey yeah and yeah the it's it's straight up anti-Semitic yeah so

I was like is this you know I've got kids and a family like is this the like you know at one point am I crossing my own lines like do I need to be the guy telling this story yeah so I was kind of hesitant to start that and then COVID made it happen, made it difficult. And frankly, the producer Gayle Ann Hurd reached out to me about. I interviewed her. Yeah. She's amazing. Yeah.

She's been so great as a partner, but she had some connections with an access within YouTube and was like, she'd seen my other tech docs and she thought it made sense. Yeah. And I was like, A, I'd love to work with you. And B, I also have a lot of access within YouTube and Google. And I think we can get to big people here. And I think like, A, I'd love to work with you. And B, I also have a lot of access within YouTube and Google. And I think we can get to big people here. And I think they will talk. And so it felt like the right time after 20, I was very concerned after 2016 about technology's role in the rise of the far right.

Yeah. And I felt like nobody was talking about it. And everyone was talking about Twitter and everyone was talking about Facebook. No one was talking about YouTube. Or 4chan. And Google. Exactly. Twitter and everyone's talking about Facebook. No one was talking about YouTube. Or 4chan.

And Google. Exactly. So here you have the largest tech company on the planet with more eyeballs on it by an order of magnitude than any other that's just completely under the radar. Yeah. And they've done a lot of great things. So I really wanted to focus on, like we were saying before, it's nuanced, right? These are tools. The tools that can be used for good or they can be used for evil. But there is a question of account. Same with the deep web. Yeah, same with the deep web. So I came at it in a very open way in that way. But I did want to look at the implications of a company that big at this time in history and its impact on history.

Well, I thought the threads that you followed, it's just sort of like it's a weird thing when you talk to the people that are smart enough to know what's up, but still keep their sort of idealism in place. Like, you know, in the deep web doc, you've literally got, you know, silhouetted guys saying like, look, all we're trying to do is to get good heroin to responsible users. It's like, what? Yeah. Yeah. Everyone should have that right. Yeah. Without the, it's a, I mean, it was a bumper sticker. It's kind of hard to argue with that and you know

so there's those guys whose idealism is confused with this you know this type of illegal transaction yeah then it's like

you know that has real world consequences right but it's cloaked in the ideas it's like better than they get shot in the streets trying to buy dope

or get a bad hit of fentanyl like you know we've got the good shit. Yeah. And, you know, no one's going to bother them. Yeah. And we're a community, so we'll tell you how to shoot up and we'll help you get on methadone and we'll all be in it together. We'll take you through the whole process right until you OD.

Exactly. Yeah. Hold your hand to the end. But also you talk to these guys, you know, these well-intended tech nerds who created YouTube who seem like good guys. Yeah. well-intended tech nerds who created YouTube who seem like good guys. Yeah. And then they were bought out early on, so they have the luxury of being like,

well, that wasn't really what we intended. Right. You know. Which is what you often see in the tech docs, like just somebody who's like cashed out, bagging on whatever's going on. Yeah. From the safety of their house in Aspen. Yeah. But the other thing that I found, you know, very compelling,

and we all knew it was happening that I found, you know, very compelling and I kind of, you know, we all knew it was happening is that, you know, show business as we know it is finished. Right. And that, you know, the numbers that people are talking about of influencers and people who just sort of set up shop is above and beyond anything you or I could have made on a TV show. For sure. So that whole, like, we're just watching that die. Yes. You know, outside of, fortunately, I think the profoundly talented people

who want to work in a collaborative environment with other profoundly inspired people are still, you know, working within the ecosystem of show business and of Hollywood and that. But guys who just sort of want to build their own worlds yeah and make you know millions and millions of dollars can do it and have done it especially in my business yeah you know but but comedy once you do that doc next the tribalization of comedy yeah that's dark yeah it's it's kind of dark but it's pretty straight up that you know

all these kind of dum-dums who are like you, fighting for free speech are so easily co-opted by, you know, right wing propagandists that, you know, they barely even know it. Yeah. Yeah. They're just serving a purpose.

Yeah. Totally. Yeah. And it moves the crowd. It's not, you know, it moved the crowd. I'm like,

well, yeah, but look at the crowd. Yeah. Yeah. Who wants to play for those guys? You're not, you're not a comic.

You're a tribal warlord. Yeah. You know, you know, telling guys to, you know, eat organ meat in the morning. Yeah, yeah.

But most of those people are, let's be honest, are not the brightest bulbs. No, but they've been convinced that they know what comedy is or they're comedy fans. Yes. But they have an ideological sort of point of view that was given to them by somebody else and there's no nuance in it and there's certainly not much humanity in it. No, none and no empathy. Well, that is the biggest problem is that, and I've said it before on the show that without tolerance, democracy can't function. And without empathy, humanity can't function. So the more that these people live out in these worlds, like even these guys, these psycho-libertarian wizard kids that created the Silk Road

or kind of navigated past the barriers that enabled them to get into the dark web, you know, are idealistic, philosophically-minded coders who I don't know that they live outside of their head. Yeah. I think that their ideas and the application of those ideas

do not take into consideration the bulk of humanity. Well, that's why I made the doc. I mean, there's a point at which the keyboard collides with reality, and that's where the trouble happens. Same with YouTube. Exactly.

And with YouTube, that's writ large because now you're dealing with propagandizing giant chunks of the, you know, the Silk Road was tiny. Yeah. I mean, in the scheme of things, like they called Ross a kingpin, which was ludicrous. He was not. And they charged him based on being a kingpin, which was really unfair.

Well, there were so many pictures of drugs. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So look at this list. Look at this list. They could show us. Look at this. They got Benzos.

They got Mollies. It's amazing. Yeah. But with YouTube, you're dealing with just giant chunks of the global population. So that becomes a real problem. Yeah. But also it's like, you know, nobody I know watches TV anymore in that way. No.

And, you know, I think that, you know, with YouTube and certainly with, you know, Instagram and some of the other ones, but like YouTube a lot that, you know, you are you see everything in segments. Yeah. That that that, you know, narrative are, you see everything in segments that, that, that, you know, narrative arc or, or, or sort of context is not important. Yeah. So it's all driven by, and you cover this too, this, you know, the, the kind of, uh, focused dopamine charge of, of clicking and clicking, right? That's right.

Isn't that in there? Yes. Yeah. A hundred percent. You got it all in there. Yeah. Well, that's primarily what's driving you more even than an algorithm in that way is the stimulation of just constant, constant content in your face. And you know all that.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you sort of, they know what I mean. Yeah, they know it. You know it. But that's what, it's ad-based, right? So because it's ad-based business model, its whole purpose is to keep you pinned. But that's the fucking amazing thing about it.

model its whole purpose is to keep you pinned but that's the fucking amazing thing about it after all is said and done and there's all these new technologies and new billionaires because of of entrepreneurship yeah the entire model is still run like fucking radio this is what i keep saying that's the whole problem like it's so it's forward thinking in so many ways and so backwards and so many others and their problem is based on that their business model so antiquated like why don't the influence come up with a better business model? Influencers, I mean, they were doing that

on the Milton Berle show at the beginning of television. Yeah. You know, the, you know, what is it, like,

like Chevron brings you the so and such theater. You know, it's, that's always been the bag. Yeah. It's really old school in that way.

It's just like, it's like, it's like Pulitzer and yellow journalism. It's just like, keep, you keep pumping really provocative stuff at people and you'll keep them engaged and you can sell stuff to them.

But, but that's the weird thing. It's so, it's a little devious because like, I don't really respond to commercials. I don't think so. But, but if like,

I don't know, all of a sudden, you're like, I think I got some cool boots. And then, you know, you realize that everyone's got those boots. I'm like,

how the fuck did that happen? Exactly. Yeah. I don't know how that happens. boots. And then, you know, you realize that everyone's got those boots. I'm like, how the fuck did that happen? Exactly. Yeah. I don't know how that happens. Yeah. Do you? Yeah. Where there's 4 billion people watching this content every day, then, yeah.

But they slip the boots in them. They do. They slipped them in. Yeah. They got it right into my brain. I don't know. Why am I wearing Uggs? Yeah, yeah.

I didn't like Uggs. Yeah, yeah. So, where, like, what do you come out, like, what did you learn? I mean, what do you? I mean, I learned a bunch of stuff. You always do. You don't go in at all with all the answers, right? And I didn't realize how much YouTube was really just a function of Google because it's really kind of presented as a very.

They paid a lot for that. Well, they did, but they presented as two separate companies with two separate campuses and different owners and everything, but it's really Google's media front end. And I think that that has implications in terms of the power of Google. I think it tells us a lot about the issues we face with big tech right now, where you just have a very small group of companies running everything. And everything is really all of the information, all the entertainment, all of the data, all of the media, all of the news for the entire planet is essentially being run by three companies. And I didn't, I kind of guessed that there was some aspect of that, right?

But the level of monopoly is sort of, and the scale, the size of these companies and the profit, like that was sort of jaw dropping to me. So do you think that that Congress essentially as a regulating entity is far behind the understanding of how these companies work? Yes, I think they're they are at the risk of sounding really flippant. They're clueless, to be honest. around how the information was seized, you know, was a real issue. But it becomes sort of nuanced and a little wonky to just the layman. But to those who fight those constitutional battles and are sort of moving to get beyond government regulation, it's a very important thing. But it seemed that the law enforcement agencies

are pretty fucking up to speed. The DEA is up to speed. Child Protective Services, super up to speed. They're probably doing more good than anybody on the internet in terms of protecting children online. The government, when we talk about the government, because obviously that's a generalization, right? If you talk to Adam Schiff, Adam Schiff is pretty educated.

And his team is like... Yeah, but they're insulated too. It's weird. You talk to Adam Schiff and you're like, are you going to fix it? He's like, well, but they're insulated too. It's weird. You talk to Adam Schiff and you're like, are you going to fix it? And he's like, well, wait, we're, I'm working on this one thing. That's exactly what I was going to say. That's the problem is the, is getting those, those things to come together.

So sort of the government, the big G government is clueless in the sense of, of they don't really understand the, the full implications of what's going on. They don't exactly know how to fix it. They don't work together. There's no mechanism by which to get them to work together. And there's an entire party that all it wants is to exploit. And there's a very powerful other party that's a majority that is preventing them. And not only that, but the tech companies have so much money.

When you look at a company like Google, they're paying off the left as much as they're paying off the right. So there's very little legislation, very little regulation, very little antitrust coming their way. So whenever I talk to individuals, sometimes you get heartened within Congress or whatever, and then you walk away and realize, oh, well, they can't do anything. So it doesn't matter how smart they are. Nothing's going to happen. That guy can't save the world. Yeah. So people kept saying to me when they watched the doc, because it's pretty intense, like, well, what's the solution? It's like, well, kept saying to me when they watched the doc is it is pretty intense like well what's the solution it's like well the the good news is i think eventually people will come up within government

who are who came up online and really understand the nuance of these platforms the bad news is we've got you know a fascist takeover coming in this country that's only going to get worse like things are going to get worse before they get better i think how's it going to time out and also like how do you get those people that you're talking about interested in government? I mean, because of the nature of things, you know, people don't even want to be doctors anymore. Yeah. You know, there's a real kind of, like,

employment problem with getting, you know, righteously-minded, civic-minded people involved in government in a way that, because everybody, I think, one of the other symptoms of what you're documenting is that everyone feels there's an entitlement and a self-centeredness that it just has naturally evolved. Right.

And everybody thinks that they, you know, have their own show somewhere. Yes, that's right. And, you know, why would they want to be part of a civic collective that, you know, is ultimately in the short term ineffectual when they can have more self-serving. I think that's true. But I think that, that my, my own optimism comes from the belief, which may be, I may be on my deathbed and go, well, I was wrong about that.

But, but the belief that, that humans will do the right thing when they are stripped of all of the things that they care about. But the problem is, is that that stripping is very elaborate and engaging. That, you know, they might have been stripped, but they no longer, you know, think along those terms. They are acting, they are thinking in relation to how they're being defined by this cultural input, which is nonstop. I think that's a hundred percent true, but I think certain watershed moments like Dobbs is a game changer. Sure. I think that when something like Dobbs happens and women on both sides of the political aisle, which is why I really thought Trump was

done, done when that happened, like everyone's freaking out about him. Like that guy to me is, is cooked. It doesn't mean there isn't DeSantis and Holly and a million evil versions that we have to worry about because we do have to worry about that. But I think that when something like Dobbs happens and women on both sides of political dialogue go, Oh my God, my rights are gone. Like all of my rights are gone overnight. Poof, they're gone. I think that that's very activating. And I think that even if it isn't like, Oh, suddenly they're all hitting the streets and they're, they're fighting. I I think that even if it isn't like, oh, suddenly they're all hitting the streets and they're fighting, I do think that is activated people who are going to be civic minded that say, you know what, I've got to get into civic politics or law. And that's why one of the reasons

I make docs is people say, isn't it demoralizing if you make something and like a billion people don't see it or it doesn't change policy or something and i have this kind of i don't call it humble because it sounds falsely modest um but i'm like look if one person watches one of these things and goes i'm going to be a an antitrust lawyer like that's job done like it's like anything that gets people engaged in some way yeah i just i i just always wonder and i and i think that's true. And again, I have a hard time judging what the fuck is really going on. Right, we all do. Because I'm at the age I'm at, and I don't do a lot of things. I'm not in the mix, per se, of what's really happening culturally. I mean, I don't know music. I barely know the movies. I can't keep up with TV shows. And there's, there's part of me, I don't know that anyone can because we're not kids and it's sort of dictated by kids. But,

but there's also this, the idea of like, I believe what you're saying is true, but there's also the fear is like, how do you hold people in the frame without them, you know, feeling, you know, defeated and then hence, you know, seek more entertainment or more distraction to sort of, you know, sedate their powerlessness in the face of climate change or fascism. Yeah, I think that I agree with you. And I think that that is why in the short term, the very least, we're going to see more of all of this destruction, because I think people are anesthetized. I think there's complicity on the side of tech companies and other forms of news that are happily anesthetizing people for dollars. So that is going to continue. That is not going away.

I just, I don't like it. That's the one thing that I, every day I wonder how, like, I really have these weird questions because like, you know, look, I, I, I feel, uh, uh, I'm, I'm hard on myself over everything. And I feel shame and guilt about, and guilt about everything that I perceive as my failings. I don't know how these fuckers can live with themselves. They must operate in such a strange, blind-spotted bubble or they actually

aren't able to conceive of empathy, which I think is a corporate problem in general. But when you see what's unfolding, I don't know how, do they just sort of like, well, this is my job and I'm not,

they rationalize it? Yeah, I think they rationalize it. I think the further up the food chain you go, as you know, the more people you have not telling you all of what's going on and kind of- That's why you hire them.

Exactly. Sloughing off accountability. Like, well, look, there's always going to be bad apples. Like, I think if you look at YouTube, they do a lot of good things. I'm not that not that bad yeah like look at all of our diversity initiatives look at all the positives we do they focus on that they're we're making enormous profit you know their board their shareholders are happy their board is happy and so if like someone says

well the christ church shooter said he he killed all these muslims because of youtube and only because of youtube and if it wasn't for youtube he wouldn't have ever done it because what do you what do you think of that and they say, there's always going to be bad apples. Like we can't account for all of society, right? Right. And it was three guys on YouTube. Yeah. That he did it because of.

That's right. Basically. Yeah. Yeah, the bad apple problem. It's sort of like, well, it seems like the bad apples are starting to really get together. Yeah.

There's a lot of apples. Yeah. And they're popping off everywhere. Yeah. And they tried to hang the vice president and they killed people and a few bad apples. But that gets back to that thing. It's like if you perceive them as a minority

that eventually will either become irrelevant or dictate your bottom line, that's like a plus plus. It's a gamble they're willing to take. Yeah. You know, fuck it. I also think that their mechanisms are in place that don't allow them to

change unless they, I think you can't police yourself if you're a publicly traded company where a shoulder shareholder could frog march you out of the building. If you change your profit mechanism to make less profit. Right. Right. If they say, Oh,

you know what? This is bad. Our ad based model isn't working. Cause a lot of people. And that's the other thing is like shareholder responsibility is negligible because most of it is just rich people with money guys who are, you know, who are kind of investing in a broad spectrum of things for a portfolio. Yeah. So fucking 90 percent of the shareholders are sort of like, how's how's my money? Exactly. Yeah. So the target of accountability keeps getting diverted. That's right. further and further away until there is none anymore. And also the institutions in place, I think you brought it up about, you know, that there was that stuff. I guess it was probably in the dark web one about how, you know, all of these institutions, whether they're within the government like the FBI, have a lot invested in, you know, the money that comes in to fight whatever they're fighting, even if it's ineffective.

And they're not going to change their ways because they don't want to change their budgets. That's right, because they'll lose money, and they're afraid of losing their jobs, which is why the Silk Road, which was basically this tiny little corner of the internet, was blown up into this massive, like bigger than a cartel thing. Yeah, and I just don't, like, it's not that I don't have hope necessarily, but but it is hard to, you know, it just I just don't understand people as much as I thought.

And like we started this conversation talking about the thing about, you know, talking to people like you and I are talking or doing it in the documentary ways that you do see people for who they are. it in the documentary ways that you do see people for who they are. But when you really think about the number of people and the possibilities that they have in their life on, you know, in any second to engage in God knows what, uh, that to fill their brain with. And there's just millions and millions of, of these, you know, isolated, you know, or not even isolated, just people walking around with this shit in their hand and in their head. Yeah. It's very daunting to try to figure out what the humanity is because this idea that you say that most people that eventually will maybe do the decent thing. It's like, I don't even know if people are engaged as humans anymore that much. Yeah. I have hope that my general belief is that, yes, the events all the way through COVID have shown us that, you know, if given the choice,

many, if not most humans will take the wrong one. I mean, COVID was just such a demoralizing, you know, to live. Even my kid, like a kid at the time, he went from eight to 12 during COVID. He was just like, what's wrong with people? Like he was utterly flummoxed by the sheer inanity and heartlessness of the way people were dealing with the pandemic. The anger. Yeah. Over public health protocol.

Yeah, over throwing a mask on or whatever. It was just insanity. But that's what politics has become on that side. Yeah. I mean, the fact that they were able to make that an insanely successful wedge issue was crazy. Yeah. I mean, it's sort of like it's gonna go away you guys yeah we're just trying to make it go away yeah quicker yeah hopefully yeah yeah so that

your grandmother or your dad doesn't die it's like it was like what are you doing yeah yeah why why would the government want to kill all the people yeah i don't yeah yeah well so i mean i think that's the thing is that my hope comes from the fact that it doesn't it doesn't take over the course of history. It's never taken a lot of people to create positive change. And so I know there's a there are is a fair amount of people who do think well and are going to take action. There's a lot of people in science, people at JPL right now working on climate change and different Caltech and different places around the world. I live next door to a biochemist who put my mind at ease at the beginning of COVID because he was like, I've never seen, he was working on the vaccine. And he's like, I can tell you it's going to be a minute and I'm not going to belittle it. You should take it seriously. But I've never seen so many international university communities come together. They're usually competitive to battle this thing. And we are going to get a vaccine and we are going to save people's lives. And that was very invigorating. Well, yeah, because that's the world that none of us are in touch with the people doing the quiet, real work, just getting stuff

done. Yeah. Like, cause we're all caught up in this. Even if you don't want to be, you're caught up in this sort of clickbait, you know, talking, yeah, that's exactly right. But there's plenty of people. And I know, and even in, in, in a weird, not necessarily great way, even law enforcement. I mean, that was the to things. And so, you know, there has to be better communication and there has to be better accountability, but that's a capitalism problem more than it is an algorithm. Yeah. I don't know if I'm detached or like whether I don't give a fuck or what, you know, cause I don't, I don't spend much time at all on YouTube, you know, occasionally, like I like the idea that I can watch, you know, a lot of Rodney Dangerfield appearances on Johnny Carson. Yeah.

But aside from that, it's not a go-to place for me, nor is Facebook. Yeah. But if you're 25, like all three of my boys, two of whom are out of the house already, they all came up on YouTube and use it for everything. All their music, all their TV, all their news. It's their search engine. It's literally the portal for everything for them. All of entertainment and all of the internet is through YouTube. Yeah. They're not even really on social media like that's where people get confused youtube isn't really social media it's literally the portal to everything right right um

because some of my little one was maybe on discord or something but they're mostly on youtube there's just where they get everything that's where they get everything yeah yeah and that's generational sure but is it is weird for you and i who came up in sort of old school showbiz yeah it's like it's it's really kind of collapsing it is absolutely yeah i mean look at the strike i'm knee deep in it right now i'm in all three of those unions and i'm doing a lot of stuff around it because it's really important but it's you know people are talking about AI and all these other issues. And I'm like, well, yeah, but these issues have been brewing for a while. And they're like labor crisis issues. And it's a much worse sea change than just like about AI or a new technology or something.

And that's been creeping up for a minute. Yeah, I wonder what's going to happen. Yeah, I don't know. Things do feel a little bleak there as far as show business is concerned. Sure. But, you know, it's like, but, you know, but there is this idea, like, you know, because I know a lot of comics who are releasing their specials on YouTube. And I'm just, the only reason I won't do that is because I don't want to be disappointed by the engagement. So, like, for me to have a benefactor like HBO or something, I'm sort of like, well, there's a context and it's curated.

Yeah. And a lot of my fans are kind of my age. Yeah. And when it works, it works. Yeah. Yeah. We did showbiz kids on HBO was great for us. And we had a huge audience and like, you know, you want it, you want it to work. Yeah. Cause it does work, but it is being broken. But yeah. But also, you know, in order for YouTube to work, you've got to put the time in. Yeah. And you don't really care about that. You have to have a passion for that got to put the time in. Yeah. And you have to really care about that. You have to have a passion for that platform. Yeah, for self-promotion.

Yeah. Well, great talking to you, man. You too. Yeah, it was really nice. Nice to meet you. Yeah, thanks, Mark. There you go. That puts it all in perspective, right?

The YouTube Effect is available starting tomorrow, August 8th, on the digital on-demand service of your choice. Hang out for a minute, folks. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations,

how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. It's a night for the whole family. Be a part of Kids Night when the Toronto Rock take on the Colorado Mammoth at a special 5 p.m. start time on Saturday, March 9th at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton.

The first 5,000 fans in attendance will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of Backley Construction. Punch your ticket to Kids Night on Saturday, March 9th at 5pm in Rock City at torontorock.com. New bonus episodes are happening twice a week on the full Marin. Tomorrow we're posting a new mark and kit on movies where we talk about Suspiria. This is the kit indoctrinating me into the world of horror. And last week on the Friday show, Brendan and Chris paid tribute to Paul Rubens. And I was also thrilled when he announced that he was going to do the show, the, like the original Peewee Herman show, which is what got him famous in LA,

he was going to do it for a Broadway run. And so I go to see that. I was so excited. And I was sitting next to Eddie Brill, by coincidence. Eddie Brill is a comic. And at the time, he was the comic booker on Letterman. Like if you saw comedians on Letterman, Eddie was the one booking them.

And he'd been on WTF at that point, like we had, we had like maybe a year into doing the show and Eddie had already been on. And so he comes, he sits down next to me. I'm like, Oh, Eddie Brill. I, you don't know who I am, but I'm Mark Maron's producer. Oh, okay. And they, you know, we talked about him doing the podcast and I said, Oh, that's so cool that you came to see this. And he's like, Oh i wouldn't miss it and i'm like well i yeah me this is my childhood like massively important to me and he's like well me too like i mean i wasn't a child but i definitely watched it like i was one and uh and we were sitting there and you know they did the whole show just like he used to do it on stage and the stage show essentially became Pee Wee's Playhouse. It was very similar in a lot of ways.

And they had the secret word of the show. What was it for you? I think it was show, if I remember right. Okay. Because they need a word they say a lot. They need to start getting a lot of screams. And I just remember that every time they did it, me and Eddie Brill screamed.

There were no self-conscious choices being made. It wasn't like, oh, I should play it cool here. No, no, no. Everyone was screaming with the show. And yeah, he did exactly what he set out to do was like create a magical time. A thing that was timeless. Like a friend of ours pointed this out that like Peewee's big adventure.

It's just seems like it's so perfectly magical. It could exist at any time, anywhere. You could put that on today and somebody make this today. Like that's how it would feel. And, uh, yeah, what an amazing unique dude if you want all the bonus episodes plus every episode of wtf ad free sign up for the full marin by clicking the link in the episode description or by going to wtfpod.com and clicking on wtf plus this guitar here at the end uh may sound familiar but it's different than it was originally we got this track

from a musician and producer named David Chamberlain. He took my riff on the Jim Gaffigan episode and added to it. You can check David's stuff out at recordla.com. Here's the jam. We'll be right back. boomer lives Bucky and LaFonda cat angels everywhere I know I screwed it up once in there

there's a I know I know