WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 572 - Brian Koppelman

Episode Date: January 28, 2015

Brian Koppelman is a writer, a director, a producer and a podcast host, but his most life-defining event occurred two decades ago in an entirely different field... the music industry. Brian tells Marc about the person who changed everything for him, way before he wrote Rounders, before he directed Solitary Man and before he hosted The Moment. 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.

Calgary is an opportunity-rich city home to innovators, dreamers, disruptors, and problem solvers. The city's visionaries are turning heads around the globe across all sectors each and every day. They embody Calgary's DNA. A city that's innovative, inclusive, and creative. And they're helping put Calgary and our innovation ecosystem on the map as a place where people come to solve some of the world's greatest challenges. Calgary's on the right path forward. Take a closer look at Calgary's on the right path forward.

Take a closer look at how at calgaryeconomicdevelopment.com. You can get anything you need with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get an ice rink on Uber Eats. But iced tea and ice cream? Yes, we can deliver that. Uber Eats. Get almost, almost anything.

Order now. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. Lock the gates! Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fuck buddies? What the fucking ears? What the fuck nicks? What the fuck in ears what the fuck nicks what the fuck aholics i am mark maron this is wtf i appreciate your uh your listenership good day to you i hope you're doing okay i am squirrely as fuck i've been shooting all day that's what i've been doing and i've bitten my lip three times in the same fucking place and it's driving me nuts and every time i do it every time i hit it again i just want to punch myself in the fucking face because it's like what is that about

i understand it's because the the part that you bit gets a little bigger and so it becomes a natural target for whatever is going to bite it my teeth so i just hit this place three times in my mouth then i hit the other side once it's like when is it going to stop when i can't talk i got shit to do i'm on camera i'm talking to you i'm recording stuff i can't be all bitten up in my mouth then i start worrying well shit maybe i'm going to get a cold sore now because it's all bitten up and i can't have a cold sore because i got to tape my show the weird thing about making television about having a production schedule is that there's no sort of like yeah i'm gonna take a sick day i'm in every scene of of every show pretty much give or take a minute and we're making 13 shows i'm not complaining it's just like i get panicky about shit i don't know what to tell you

man brian koppelman's on the show today and this is sometimes a thing that i don't always appreciate or understand or know what i'm supposed to do with uh brian koppelman is a film director and a screenwriter uh he also has a podcast he's uh he's. He wrote Rounders, and he's the director of Solitary Man, which I believe he also wrote. He's the host of the podcast The Moment. He's a guy I met years ago. Says he's always been a fan of mine, and he started his podcast because I inspired him.

A lot of people seem to be doing things, and they find me inspirational. That makes me very happy. I'm humbled by it. But I don't always take it into, you know, I don't always really realize how profound that is. I don't know what I'm doing here. I don't have some sort of process or mode of operating. I don't have some sort of process or or or mode of operating i don't i don't have a system yeah okay granted some of you guys listen to a lot of these and you're like no you sometimes you

you kind of do have a system yeah i have a style i guess but i i didn't plan anything but you know it's very flattering that people that people uh are inspired by me all right so let's let's just lay it out okay today let me tell you who i've been working Flattering that people are inspired by me. All right, so let's just lay it out. Today, let me tell you who I've been working with on the show. Dave Anthony's back on Marin this season. We shot a bunch of stuff in the rain last night. That's always great to be out in the chilling rain at night.

I know some of you were in a blizzard the other day, kind of. Some of you were anticipating a blizzard. Didn't happen. It rained a little here, but we're okay. Thank you for for asking so we had a little rain we're doing some shooting we're driving and shooting very exciting me and dave anthony uh today i worked with uh with andy kindler i worked with eddie pepitone today uh tomorrow we're gonna we're shooting a big day of who else oh eddie pepitone again i'm not gonna tell you all the uh people playing themselves on the show because i don't want to spoil anything but it's going well it's going well uh i'm not thrilled

about my hair and uh most of my pants are fitting well and the shirts uh i'm happy with i've got new shoes that i don't love because they're a little tight and i might have fucked up but that's the way life goes now let's go to a cat update. Look, I tell you this because people ask me, folks. Monkey and La Fonda are fine. Okay? All good. Ever since I've been giving them the monkey the prescription food.

His bladder's been better. He's got all his energy back. He's not sick. Fonda's getting a little fat. But she been better. He's got all his energy back. He's not sick. Fonda's getting a little fat, but she's fine. She's not biting me very much, and she seems chipper. Now, the outdoor situation is not great. I don't know what happened to Deaf Black Cat. Have not seen that guy in a while.

Might be dead. It's happened before, but it feels like he was making weird noises with his face the last time I saw him. There's nothing I could do about it. So I don't know. I don't know what those noises meant. Maybe he's around. Don't know.

Scaredy cat, the striped cat that's been coming around for about a decade. He was coming around in back and he was doing fine. Getting fat. Wild cat. Fat wild cat. You know, a couple of people are feeding him up the street and i'm i'm just another sucker making him fat so then all of a sudden some other cat that looks exactly like him only a little smaller exactly like he had he just broke off a piece of himself and it grew into another thing

couldn't be a kitten because scaredy cat's been fixed for a while but he looks exactly like him so i got these two identical striped cats and they'll get the little guy push the fatso out into the front because i don't he's freaked out he's only in out front and this guy's eating him back some sort of weird changing of the guard of these striped cats i don't know if scaredy cat number one is on his way out and scaredy cat number two is coming in but they they look identical so that's weird i don't know what's ripping apart my lawn out front i might be skunks might be raccoons that's the update from around here things are fine with my relationship so far have not fucked it up and uh i'm keeping uh i'm keeping

i'm keeping cool in other words i'm repressing a lot of negative emotions and I'm calling that cool. I'm just locking down some bullshit. I'm just keeping it to myself and letting it fester and cause tumors inside of me so as not to cause trouble for other people. Perhaps I should communicate better as opposed to give myself cancer. Good idea. I'll work on it. Thank you for all the presents. Thank you for all the kind letters. Thank you for all the emails. I'm going to start reading some emails again. I know people want it. It might be an easier thing to do while

I'm shooting occasionally to read the emails. I feel stories brewing. I'm just a little burnt out. It's a tough schedule, my friends. Tough schedule. Let's talk to Brian Koppelman. It's hockey season, and you can get anything you need delivered with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So, no, you can't get an ice rink on Uber Eats. But iced tea, ice cream, or just plain old ice? Yes, we deliver those. Goal tenders, no.

But chicken tenders, yes. Because those are groceries, and we deliver those. Goal tenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes. Because those are groceries, and we deliver those too. Along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details.

Death is in our air. This year's most anticipated series, FX's Shogun, only on Disney+. We live and we die. We control nothing beyond that. An epic saga based on the global best-selling novel by James Clavel. To show your true heart is to risk your life. When I die here, you'll never leave Japan alive. FX's Shogun, a new original series, streaming February 27 27th exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required.

T's and C's apply. And now. Like, I don't really know, you know, how people do things. Yes, I believe you. I know what that means. Like, how do you really know, you know, how people do things. Yes, I believe you. I know what that means. Like, how do you at 50 years old? Right. It's like, okay, like, it's still really, I know that all I have to do really is spend

a couple hours, make a couple of calls, and I could have everything cleaned up. I could have my driveway fixed. I could have the wall fixed. I could do all that. I just have to engage. I could have this guy, I could hire contractors and go live somewhere else for a while and just be like, well, that's happening. You know, they're doing my house.

But it's so overwhelming, the anxiety of it, that that's what's holding me back more than anything else. Because success, and actually successful is a word. I don't even like that word. It's just your anxiety. Because you were successful before. Even if I bought a house, like, oh my God, how do I make the right choice about decision making?

But there is some part of me that doesn't quite know how other people see me. Because successful or no successful, still, whatever I do, I come here, I do this. The only tangible way that I know that success is changing is that there are people coming to see me. There's more people that come. And even that's a little weird. Of course, you'd find it weird because you so, my, it seems like you so identify yourself still, you know, as the opposition as opposed to as the seated. I don't know if it's the opposition because I know that I'm seated in my world. But it's, I don't know if it's the opposition, but certainly someone who's on the outside.

Sure, yeah. But not the opposition. Fine. Well. But yeah, because I still, I am, I am's on the outside. Sure, yeah. But not the opposition. Fine. Because I still am. I am still on the outside. But I could make decisions and live my life a little more on the inside if I wanted to. And you could accept that it's not all disappearing. Because all I mean by successful is that it's not all disappearing.

I don't know about that. But that's the work you got. Isn't that the work you want to do? No. Why? Because it can't all disappear. Anything could disappear. Well, we could die. Well, we could die.

Yes, we could die. I could get sick and it could disappear. I mean, it's not. That it's not, yes, but that it's not going to, other than, yes, what people would say, other than acts of God, or yeah, you could get sick, a boulder could fall out of the sky, sky but uh but you are no longer going to uh self-destruct and uh and even if you it weirdly you would have to do a whole series of uh very dramatic things to reverse the course of all this stuff you just got picked up for the third season of your own tv i did but i but it's still like congratulations thank you i i don't know if it would take that many steps uh and and

i don't i don't worry about self-destructing. I just, and I don't really pay attention to money that much. I just keep going. What I'm really concerned about is, you know, not having, you know, not having a family, not having dependents, not, you know, having these things. Like, I don't know what the hell to do with myself. So it's really like, I would rather not do anything, to to be honest with you and people don't believe me when i say that but i really think that like i could occupy myself with you know i i've done yeah you could

write you could play music i need to write oh you don't even want to write no i don't what do you how would you so okay if you're not writing yeah you don't you don't uh you play guitar yeah i like to do that i'm not sure what I do. It's a fantasy. Yes. I mean, you live that out even for a life. It's just anxiety. It's not even, I don't think it's all going to go away necessarily.

I'm saving money and stuff, but I just don't know what it all means sometimes, buddy. Well, no, I get that. The family, yes, it's funny, driving up here, I was thinking about that no one can ever tell anybody else, certainly about the family stuff, but gosh, it's so easy to picture the way that you would change and the way that it would just light up so many things for you to do it. Yeah, I guess so. I'm a little cynical right now. But you, what, how long have you been married?

I've been married 20, 22 years. No problems? Dude, I'm like, I mean, no, that thing has been the luckiest thing in the world for me. That's the most important decision that you make. And I was just fucking lucky because I was 25 when I got married. Yeah. And I just married the right person. And that's luck, largely luck.

But you don't strike me as a guy that's about to lose it, do some stupid shit. I don't strike you like that. No. Right. I'm not. I know. You seem like a pretty- I married the right person.

We have these great kids. But part of it is that the person I married, and I'm the same towards her, we were just from the very beginning really on each other's, like completely on each other's missions. So when I was 30 and ready to, and miserable about what I was doing with my life, you know, and we had just had a little kid. Amy cleared out the storage area underneath the apartment we were living in. Amy. And she cleared out the storage area and was like, you're going to do this. And I'm going to handle, you know, this first year of Sammy's life.

If you have to write in the morning and then go to work and then go out and research, because, you know, it was about poker and I was like playing cards. She was like like you can do this and it's when you were writing rounders yeah and she was like with my best friend dave she cleared the space and dave and i met every morning but the but the point of it is she said uh and from the beginning we had this thing with each other that um we were just along for the we were there for like whatever this right she didn't want to she didn't want to be married to a guy that was whining about not having done something for the rest of his life. Sure. Maybe that's the thing. Maybe that's all it was.

Well, there's nothing worse than living with a guy like, ah, I should have married, finally. But a lot of people, as you know, would be, would, would douse the dream as opposed to stoking the dream. Well, let's go back so this was in new york anywhere yeah new york you grew up in new york i grew up an hour out of new york grew up long island so you grew up on the island what town i grew up first in westbury and then in a town called roslyn roslyn long island yeah and big house oh yeah big house pool yeah when i was uh 13 we moved into a big house. Before that, we lived in a neighborhood, in a fine house in a neighborhood.

Jewish kids, Italian kids, Irish kids, stickball on the street, basketball. My dad was someone who made a lot of money and then would spend it all. He had, in the first sort of like 11 years, what was great is he never let us, my sisters and me, know that it sort of was in flux. But when he, at a certain point,

like when I ran when I was 13, it became apparent, oh, he did well. We moved into this big, ridiculous house. No more Italian kids. No more stickball. And it was just the Jews.

No, but it was. No, I would, no, we'd send the driver to get him to come over and play stickball. But was it the jews no but it was no i would no we'd send the driver to get him to come over and play stickball but was it it was i'm kidding you know no uh how many sisters you got i have two sisters and your dad's like a big deal yeah my dad was uh i mean he discovered the love and spoonful john sebastian who people say i look like him uh yeah my dad my dad was uh you know he was a kid never finished college, and he was a record producer. But where'd he grow up?

New York City? Queens. Yeah. So he was part of the, like, what, in the 60s? Yeah. I mean, he had a hit record as a singer, a novelty record called Yogi. Yeah. It went to top 10 when he was 18.

So he was a music business guy. In, like, 58. Yeah. He was a music business guy. Was he a musician? Nah, not really. He just wrote a hit record? Yeah, he wrote a hit record guy. In like 58. Yeah. He was a music business guy. Was he a musician? Nah, not really. He just wrote a hit record? Yeah, he wrote a hit record and sang a novelty record.

But he had great taste in knowing, he was able to identify what songs were going to be hit songs. He always kind of knew that. And when he was very young, he met Don Kirshner playing basketball somewhere. Before Kirshner was anything no kirshner had just sort of been on the rise as uh like a public as a before way before dr rock television yeah but it was when kirshner was uh he had this big publishing company yeah and he that's where the money is right music publishing Music publishing. Yeah. Well, he hired my dad to be a songwriter. And so my father was writing in one cubicle with this guy named Donald Rubin, his best friend and partner.

And then in the cubicle next to them was Carole King and Jerry Goffin. And next to Carole King and Jerry Goffin would have been like- Lieber and Stoller? Sadako. They were in another floor. Oh. But essentially every person there- aren't you in that building uh yeah i will yeah sometimes i record in the brill building they were in that one and one next door and then one day kirschner kirschner will

call them in and say hey what do you think of this song what do you think of that and then finally called him in one day and said listen uh you are the worst songwriter i've ever put under contract but you really know what hit songs are and And by the way, I'm selling my company, but I have to stay here. You become the president. He made my dad, when my dad was like 24, the president of his publishing company. Of a music publishing company.

And said, stop being a songwriter. You're the guy who's going to pick songs from now on. And so that's what he did. And where did he go from there? He did that, and then he and his friend Donald left at a certain point and started their own company with that, where they signed Tim Harden, the great folk singer and songwriter, and The Spoonful, and the guys who wrote the Turtles hits, and they made those records. So they did all that sort of like 60s pop rock stuff.

And then he had a long, incredible career in the music business. He was very focused on pop music after a certain point. So he made a lot of Barbra Streisand's records. He made them in that he produced them? He was the executive producer of them. He would pick the songs with Barbra, sit there in the studio with the producers. The big records? Yeah, a lot of the big, like the Barry Gibb record.

All those records. But I mean, he produced in the studio. He's the guy who produced If I Were a Carpenter for Bobby Darin. Hands on the knobs. Yeah, for Bobby Darin. If I Were a Carpenter, which was written by his songwriter tim harden and bobby darren talks about in a special how he convinced him he and his partner to do it but so my dad the life i lived i grew up a lot in recording studios no hollywood no showbiz so we wouldn't go to any parties uh we had a very- It is showbiz though. Oh yeah, but he would only,

he was very clear and my mom was too. My mom would always say to me, who knows if any of this or anything is going to be left. You better figure out how to do it on your own and you better not count on any of this being here in any way. But also- But did he still own the publishing of some songs?

No, at a certain point he didn't. sold them i mean no he did he did fine uh he was huge oh dude he was a gigantic he was he became like he was one of the biggest independent music publishers who built their own thing and that's where all the money is in music oh yeah i'm not yeah he did he my dad did great there's no question how's he now he's awesome he's 75 i think or 74 what's he doing i talk to him like every day what's he up to well when he was like uh 50 years old i think he got fired his last job was running emi north amer America and he got fired and, uh, and had a, I think he was,

he got fired, you know, paid out and all that stuff. But everybody who runs a giant record company, especially then they all got, you know, you get, that's one of those jobs you get fired basically. And he reinvented himself over the course of five years and ended up like

running companies that had nothing to do with entertainment. So, uh, I mean, it was 25 years ago, you know, uh, he ended up like running companies that had nothing to do with entertainment so uh i mean it's 25 years ago you know uh he ended up like running martha stewart's company oh yeah i'm another board of that company yeah he's done all sorts of sort of a ceo guy consultant board member likes to work loves to work and you know still i I mean, it's the greatest thing. He's the most practical, quick answers, no bullshit person, no errors. I mean, he really is a guy who, you know, was a Queens kid, couldn't get through college because he was like gambling and fucking around went to the coast guard so that his parents wouldn't know he failed out of college you know gotten almost got basically court-martialed out but has a very very clear eye an incredible bullshit detector and really at the time uh he had these great years he He just knew. Yeah, some people have that.

He just knew. So you grew up around this music business, and you grew up around the enchanting nature of the music business and also the business itself. Yeah. And you were sort of like, your dad was this big mocker, which he was. Yeah. And you grew up with money out on the island.

Yeah, and it was, I'll tell you, it was, something in me hated it. I was like, I never talk about this, so it's good. I'm happy to do it. I said, I'm the way up here. You hated what, music? No, I hated living in a big house. I hated when I would have people come over that we lived that way. I know that feeling.

I know that feeling to a certain degree because you know you go to school depending where you go to school you got friends and like uh you know my parents that no it was not comparable money but we had a big house and we had a pool and there was something it there was uh it was embarrassing in some way yeah i mean i love obviously i loved and as i i i uh what an incredible gift it was that I never had to worry about where my meals were coming from or how I was going to pay for college. Did you think about that then? My mother was good at, my mom was very good at, she died six years ago, but she was incredibly good at pointing that stuff out. But what did you hate?

out but what were you what did you hate oh yeah i hated um the value kind of that was i hated like the big i hated the bigness of it and i hated the grandiosity of it because i hadn't done anything to earn it so it wasn't mine so you got a car oh yeah i got a car like a car will car what was your first car i i oh dude i got uh you know like whatever you wanted yeah it didn't well no not like they weren't gonna give me a porsche but i but it was weird too i'll tell you because starting at a very young age i think partially in reaction to it partially because my dad was so good at from a super young age he would have me like come in anytime i wanted to the city i could sit in any meeting right he would do this great thing even when i was 11 12 years old you know let's say he was having a meeting with some uh some people who wanted to uh play songs for him or a producer who

wanted to produce an act yeah or an artist yeah he would have me sit in the meeting and i was always a pretty good talker and he would say uh listen guys you can say any fucking thing you want in front of the kid he would say you know he's heard it all this and and he would say, listen, guys, you can say any fucking thing you want in front of the kid. He would say, you know, he's heard it all. And he would make me a participant. He would bring me to the recording studio at 2 in the morning. And I knew all the studio players. I knew every bass player, like every drummer. Those were the cool guys, right?

Yeah, I mean, that was the greatest. How old were you? Starting at like 9. Yeah. And I guess they would put away the joints when i showed up until i was like 14 then sometimes they would still get my dad would never but those guys would still get would get fucked up around me but they didn't when i was really little who were these guys which albums were you talking about i mean it was like the guys a bunch of the guys who became Toto. So it was like, you know, David Hungate and Steve Lukather and Jeff Porcaro

and Skunk Baxter. Yeah. And I mean, those guys were all super cool to me. David Foster, who, you know, was, when Josh Groban was in here, he was talking about how David Foster was this giant music guy. So, but at a young age, at 16,

I started doing things that um helped make a lot of money for my father and uh and that was great then i felt like all right i was you're earning i was like helping like um i was managing these folk acts and i had 16 yeah and i was this kid named okay so this kid named ethan hurwitz, which sounds like a start. He was a good songwriter. So you were this precocious kid whose dad was this big deal, and you kind of got music because you were living in music, and you knew what your dad did, so you're like, I'm going to manage bands,

which means what? Yeah, and I started managing bands young, like getting them gigs and trying to get them recorded, people to record them. Were you using your dad's name? I mean, I wasn't, but I had a last name that I'm sure it helped. But also, it's so funny to have a 13 or 14-year-old kid calling and being serious that I'm sure people were humoring it. Bookering them at clubs?

So here, I'll tell you this. So for instance, when Eddie Murphy was in his first year as a featured player on SNL, he had a gig at a club near my house. Now, this was a club that was called my father's place it's a legendary place on a long island all the bands played it yeah uh and i had made a deal with the guy there this guy named epi epstein who owned that club this he was a giant guy uh there would be pictures of epi in hot tubs with girls of indeterminate age i'd made a deal with him i'd promote concerts on the weekends for kid bands playing for kid audiences.

During the day? Yeah, like on a Saturday afternoon. So you were a wheeler dealer. Well, yeah. So as a result, when Eddie Murphy was going to play at this club, I had a folk singer kid open for him. And the folk singer kid got booed off the stage. I was 16, 10th grade.

And the folk singer got booed off the stage. And it was a horrible night for him. Eddie came out and destroyed. And I snuck backstage afterwards. And I went up to Eddie and I said, listen, you should be making albums. Yeah. And at that time, I guess Lorne Michaels didn't own everything. Right.

That the guys on SNL didn't. Eddie was only a featured player. He hadn't yet fully exploded. He was still just playing a little club. Right. And I found his manager backstage. And I said, Eddie should be making records. Was it the guy from the comic strip wax and i ended up working it out that my i woke my dad up in the middle of the night and i ended up working it out that they

all met up the next day and eddie's first three comedy albums were like on my dad's thing really yeah and so at that point i then then started feeling like, okay, well, I'm in some way contributing. So you think this is my ticket. This is what I'm going to do. I'm going to be my dad's guy. Yeah, that's what I always figured. I always figured I was just going to end up being in the music thing. Like I figured, oh, I'll be a record producer.

I'll be an A&R person. I know what this is. Well, you just did A&R with him. That's all it takes to do A&R, right? Basically, that's it. And then you get points, right? Yeah, you get points. Did you get points on the Eddie movie?

Not on Eddie, but later I did, but not on Eddie. Why didn't your dad throw you a bone? Well, what did I just tell you? 16 years of living in the big, giant house and everything. What am I going to do? I put a lot of food on the table. He took me to Don Pepe's a lot of Sunday nights for pasta. I'm not going to-

That wouldn't have been ballsy if you ask him. I didn't ask. Yeah, well, you give me my points. But you know what, man? You know what was so great about being 16? I mean, I got to then go to the Delirious show, right? Right. And go sit there in the front,

and I knew Eddie, and I got to bring my friends back. Was that your first experience with comedy? Yeah, maybe. I mean, I love... No. My first experience with comedy, David Steinberg and my dad were really good friends.

David knew that I liked, I loved comedy. I loved Steve Martin. I loved comedy as a kid. And that's probably why I was set up to get how different Eddie was in a way or like what a star Eddie was because I knew a lot. I kind of like was around a lot of comedy. But when I was 14, David Steinberg said, hey, I'm going to bring you to New York City tonight. There's a guy performing at Caroline's, and he's either going to be incredible or horrible.

Caroline's the one downtown. Yeah, the original. The supper club. He's either going to be incredible or he's going to be horrible, but either way, he's a genius, and you're going to see something. It was Gilbert. And it really was like one of those things.

Like seeing that made me understand the whole world entirely. Because I mean, the first time I met you was with Havy. Yeah. Well, yeah. At the comic, at the comedy cellar.

Yeah. Like, I don't know, six years ago, maybe. Was it? You were upstairs and you were like this guy hanging around with Havy. And I was like,

kind of a dick to you. Probably. You were asking me about, well, yeah, you were, you were asking me about movies. Like he was like,

oh, my friend Brian's a screenwriter and director like oh really what movie really yeah what what what kind of movies and then the worst thing is when i said ones that were actually successful movies that was worse for you yeah first you were skeptical and it went from skeptical to why the fuck does he get to do that yeah that was that what you read is that it was hilarious is that what you said from me i had met you before but uh because i was there that night that you and havey had difficulty with one another when you went long.

Yes. So I saw Gilbert, and then I was around comedy, and then I was someone who wanted to be a comic and couldn't quite get up the guts to do it. You never tried it? Later, I did. I did it for a year and a half. You did stand-up?

Yeah, for a year and a half. When was that? How did I miss that? I did it like eight years ago man after I'd already made all the like tons of movies

you tell me you did it at like 40 yeah that's when I did it what are you nuts I did it for a year and a half not on the weekends but I was working during the week at stand up

how'd your wife feel about that was she supportive she was like finally fucking do it for god's sake oh so you did have one of those things Nevada was like

go fucking do it because Havy and oh so you did have one of those things you know that i was like go fucking do it because havey and i had nothing to lose then uh now you know that to get up on those stages no i don't want to hear about it you were comfortable oh that's really you think that's what you think i think that like all right so you made you made your money you always had a few bucks there was nothing on the line and you know you got over the stage fright and you wrote your jokes and what did you really think you were going to tour uh you know it's really i really had a moment here's what happened i was really blocked writing solitary man i was like halfway through it and i was super blocked i watched it i thought yes i know i liked it thank you ballsy movie thank you yeah it took me fucking four years to write it it's a ballsy movie though thanks man yeah no and i felt you'd relate to it somehow yeah i did and like i felt you'd relate to it on both sides

really i felt you would relate to it as the son like as the you know you'd relate to it from jenna's perspective and from uh michael's perspective well let's go let's before we get to this i mean you know i'm glad you did stand up and i'm glad you got out but i uh but because you know you don't want to be that guy do you what do you want to do it helped you like get some courage i got through it helped me really break through a bunch of shit right and it was huge to do because you know i'm singing i i couldn't i wanted to sing publicly for my whole life and i was petrified but you have to back you have to back up at it i know i heard you talking about that the other day when you were talking to someone on your podcast on the show about um how you're uncomfortable singing

in public but you've done it you've done it on the podcast right but it's all very recent it was a terror like i i just broke that cherry like three years ago on greg barron's show where i just you know but it was an amazing thing to do like because if you have this fear and you have this desire to do something through your entire life and it's something in your heart but there's just it's really just basic wall of fear that if you just break through that wall and you're like no this is no this is i'm here now and then it never goes back the wall never goes back well yeah i mean i was a horribly that's the thing i was a crushingly blocked person until i was 30 that was really the thing when i had to to do to when you

went downstairs go downstairs and start but what were you doing you were in the music business yeah and i had i had uh i had done fine in the music business you know where do you go from eddie murphy so where'd you go to what'd you do you're 16 you you help sign any murphy's deal your dad's a big shot and where do you end up going yeah i want to say you know and it was largely my own choice because the thing you even said about being you know you were made these movies you had some bucks in your pocket you always did i mean the truth is that because i made money for myself when i was 21 which i'll tell you um i didn't at that time i didn't take i didn't have money from anyone but myself my wife and i that was another like another piece of it you know

when you ask your choice yeah my well my choice my father's a generous person but i think it's you get to be you're an adult uh i mean it doesn't mean my dad's never said hey come on a family vacation or he wouldn't offer that whatever but i mean um i my wife and i have like lived on what we do the whole time and it was really you got to be really important me, no matter what, to live that way. Especially when you come from a lot of money because that kills people. If you don't have a personal value system around that, who knows how the hell you turn out.

You don't have to do anything. I knew I would hate myself, essentially. I would hate myself if I didn't, from a young age, just go and figure it out. But the battle... So yes, I went to college. I would hate myself if I didn't, from a young age, just go and figure it out. But the battle... So yes, I went to college. I was always... I was never a great student, but I did a lot of different stuff.

So I went to a good school, not an... I went to Tufts, which is a good college. I lived over there. In Somerville? Mm-hmm. I lived on Cottage Ave. No, you didn't. I did.

That's hilarious. I think I lived in a house that tracy chapman lived in she lived i believe you i mean i remember the how she lived at the end there so i mean that was the the thing you know when i went to college um i will say that the long island part of my life was just an incredible bubble right even when you ask that question like i did have an awareness uh and i was um i had friends from every socioeconomic group the whole time but you are in a bubble when you grow up in the north shore it's very specific man it is it's a very specific thing and did you have to lose the accent yeah it always mattered to me not to have it even at a young age he's surrounded by like uh i always was a reader you

know like i always read everything. So I never- You don't read as a Jap. Right. You know, I read everything. But you must have run from being a Jap. I'm sure there are pictures of me wearing fila and you know, all that stuff.

With the Apollo shirt turned up, the collar turned up. No, but then Vanna, I mean, it doesn't, this is all, but no. No, it's important. I wore capizios, man. I went to the whole other place. But in college, I became very, as people did, you know, I'm sure you remember the divestment movement.

From South Africa? Yeah, because the colleges were invested in companies doing business in South Africa. So a bunch of us, especially these Northeastern liberal arts colleges, felt it was unacceptable. So I kind of was one of the two or three people who led that movement at my school. And in doing that, meaning I organized like all campus boycotted classes to protest it, got speakers to come in. I was really like at the front of that with, I don't know, maybe there were five or six of us who really like did it. probably even a bigger group of um really radicalized people who fought uh protested everything i really only was in involved in in that that was the one that mattered to me because that just seemed egregious right uh but in doing that a friend of mine a guy named pete zizzo who i grew up with and also went to tufts uh said you know there's a

folk singer you should get to play at this rally you're organizing. And that's when I saw it. That's when I went to this little coffee house that was on campus and saw Tracy Chapman play. And that was a truly epiphanic moment. My entire world shifted on its axis, man. It was like in a movie, I was crying, everything changed. The entire focus of my life up to that point was one thing. And from the moment she walked on that stage and started singing,

for the next three years, the only thing I cared about was that. You know, everything changed. So you were a guy that was a socially active, political, radical leader. And then you saw Tracy Chapmanman i remember going up to her i remember going up to her and saying uh and we were never friends by the way and uh same years barely two years older i could bear it she's two years older i could barely talk to her you know she was she was everything i mean if you think about it uh she was every single thing that i knew deep in my soul like i could never i could never have lived

or understood really the life's you know raised by a single mother black cleveland poor race riots started around her when she was a little girl like the totality of what led to that and then just the extraordinary talent the ability to then uh you know the mind that she had and the voice that she had and the ability to translate uh that experience into these songs and i really did i i i remember sitting there and um it's interesting to me because you come from this like you know your father's focus and was post the 60s folk thing but like everything it seemed that he was doing came out of that but the relevance of folk music was gone but you knew the history of it i did for sure right so so somehow or another you were transported to you know 1965 yeah and you were in the middle of a of a political

struggle in a way and it it was like you were given the gift of a liberal Jewish catharsis. Yes. No, you're totally right. I was. And yet, and I will say, and it became, it was just immediately clear to me that she was among the most gifted people walking the earth. And I could not understand how, I remember I stayed up all night. I walked around.

I went up to her and I said, listen, I'm here because i want you to and it's funny we had met we were in a class together that some moron taught and we were sitting we would sit next to each other but we never spoken i said hey um you have to come play this rally here's what we're doing she said okay i will yeah and i said but uh and i remember exactly what I said. And I said, I've been managing bands since I was 13 and producing demos and working in record companies every summer. And I really have worked, I said, I really have worked to be my own person. But you're so extraordinary that I really think that my dad can help you too and that we should find a way to do something together. And she said, I'll play the rally. That was it.

And I spent two years following her around. I mean, I, so I, I immediately went. She was unrepresented. Oh yeah, unrepresented and didn't want, wasn't ready at first. Said like, I, you know, I think she was, she was maybe a senior and I was a sophomore. I was a sophomore for sure.

And she said, she played the rally the next day, which was my, you know, the sanity test, right? Because I basically had stayed up. Then I watched her the next day and it was even better.

I couldn't believe, I mean, honestly, Mark, it was talking about a revolution. It was those songs, not Fast Car, but it was talking about a revolution and Baby Can I Hold You Tonight tonight all those songs from the first album

half the songs from the first album and how the crowd respond they well that's the thing that the it taught me i'll say this some of those valuable lessons of those those three years taught me things that to this day uh give me an incredible amount of strength because um she wasn't interested in in all this at first and my dad wasn't interested because i wasn't a great student uh and i was so easily distracted by all this stuff and he was like uh i'm sure she's great to go to school you know i don't want to hear about this bullshit i'm sending up to college he didn't graduate college i'm sure he was scared to death i wouldn't graduate college he really wanted me to graduate college yeah He had to, yeah. But so I did

a real record business thing which was I went, I'd heard that Tracy had recorded for copyright purposes songs at the radio station at Tufts. And I had a friend of mine

walk me to the radio station and he distracted the DJ. Yeah. And I stole the cart that she, you know radio carts? Yeah. I stole the cart. They look like 8-tracks.

I went in the back. I copied the cart onto a cassette and I put the cart back. And then I had a cassette of Talking About Revolution. Of acoustic. So you did a little dirty business. I did. I did. And I took that back to New York. I flew back to New York.

And I... In a panic? Were your father like the next day or what? Very soon. Yeah, because I had the tape and I listened to it. I mean, you know what you're like at that? I just listened to New York. And I. In a panic? Were your father like the next day or what? Very soon. Yeah, because I had the tape and I listened to it. I mean, you know what you're like at that. I just listened to the tape a hundred times, right? And then I remember exactly where I was. I played it for him.

And he just, you know, to my dad's credit at that time. I mean, the records he was making then were, you know, Here You Come Again, Dolly Parton and Samantha. So he was making real pop records and was so far away from this and what she did. And he heard it and he immediately said, you're right. She's, you're correct. She's that good.

But it still took years. I would go and follow her. She would play these lesbian clubs all across New England. And I would go alone and I would get mocked mercilessly by my friends at college, you know? And I would say, who's going to come with me?

And they would go, we're not going with you to New Hampshire to see. and i would walk into a room and i'd be the only guy and it would be you know 200 women staring at me and i'm sure that i was still you know i wasn't quite in the capizios but i looked like a douchebag and uh and eventually over time were you talking to her during this time yeah she would see well she would see me i mean she'd be like she would kind of smile like are you really you're really here like uh and again let me say i could barely talk to her we were never friends uh but she understood that i um was messianic about her that i was telling everybody and trying to find a way to

bring more people but when you look back at it, what was the combination of being your father's son and looking for a hit record and being moved by the power of this artist? What was the ratio? Well, no, I mean, the question is great because it's all what led to me leaving the music business was ultimately all my sympathies uh all my sympathies were with

the artist and i had to become i i instinctively every part of the process other than the moment of discovery and making records uh was i felt like uh dirty and gross and involved and lying and uh the business did not exist in any way to serve these artists. I got Tracy. What's interesting, you know, because like innately my perception of you, which was off, was that this guy likes to be around talent. Oh, you mean the night you met me?

No, I'm just saying, well, yeah, but whatever. That like, you know, that somehow or another, and it makes sense because of your father, talent oh you mean the night you met me no i'm just saying well yeah but whatever that like you know that somehow or another and it makes sense because of your father that you know whatever the message is that your appreciation of it was was was very personal that you know like if somebody could express themselves you know in a complete way in a unique way that you know either you didn't feel like you had that or you you you know you you just needed to be around that to feel like whole or to be part of something well yeah i mean my books and music and movies were the things that i and comedy those things were the things that i gave a shit about right that's what it's a it sort of made you feel connected

yeah but it was also the you know the thing about, the shadow artist in the artist's way, which is that... But at that time, I didn't... Like, at that time, if you would have asked me, I would have said, I'll never be the person who's going to create the stuff. Right, that's what I mean. At that time, there was no way that I thought that... I thought that the people who could do that were touched and special and that uh no matter how much uh i wished i could express it i couldn't that's what i'm saying yeah that's who i was then and it was

that's torture by the way yeah but there's but like like if i read it there's still some party that feels that well no i would say no no there's no part of the stand-up there's no part of it where i feel like um i mean i think i've written directed or produced 13 movies right so i'm doing i mean i do it so you're all good i don't know i mean all good no every day i just wish you no no i wish i were every day this is true i wish i were better at it every day but you said that you know in that process with her over those three years that you learned something. I'll tell you. I'll tell you.

That guided your entire life. That there was a wisdom. Well, a huge, yeah, because it's something that's repeated itself, which is that when we, so finally I got them together. We all met. Who, you and your father? My father and Tracy. How did you explain to Tracy Chapman?

Did you keep it a secret that you had the tape? No. No, I told her. I told her. What did she say? She just, I mean, she was a woman

of few words. Right, but she also probably didn't believe your bullshit for a while. The whole time she didn't believe, I mean,

the whole time. Who's this Jewish kid? Yeah, I mean, I don't even think, she wasn't like, who's this, she's like,

who's this fucking, what is this? What does he care about this for? But eventually, I do believe that uh well i know eventually we got together and then i uh went into a studio with tracy and recorded acoustic demos like 20 songs 22 songs and after you met with your father yeah yeah then we uh said can we record demos what was the moment where she finally

relented yeah i mean it was did your dad have to fly up oh she flew down yeah he flew up to see her he flew up to see her for sure um and she liked him i think immediately and probably more than she liked me you know because he was not conflicted like the thing you're talking about is he was definitely unconflicted and uh uh he was like we can make a record we did this you're a great artist and we'll make a record i was like uh you're this you know on the one hand you're gonna save the world save the world and on the other hand but sign on the you know like sign on the i was sign of the dotted line because i see i mean it was a real split right for me. Though I didn't know that then. Then I would have said to you and I would have meant it.

It was only about her. Yeah, but there's also this interesting psychodynamic that, you know, like this was, you know, you had this passion and commitment for a musical artist and your father was a vehicle. But this was also, you know, you're on your father's turf and you're doing a big thing well yeah but yes but to me you're gonna make a hit record but to me this really big thing but you have to remember where the world was then when we made these demos and then tried to get her signed to a major label right because my dad had at that time a publishing company and a small production company couldn't, didn't have, didn't know how to, couldn't distribute a record. Couldn't,

uh, wouldn't, didn't pay to record an album. Uh, we did demos and then went and shopped her for a label deal. And these, you and your dad. Yeah.

These, well, for me and my separately and together we were, cause I had worked because, uh, I was so interested in it. Like every summer I worked, I was always out watching bands.

I knew people at every label because my father was, it's funny, you know, the way in which he was incredibly generous to me, although he would certainly like have been and paid for college and law school and all that stuff. But the way was he would always, a lot of guys who are successful, they want to smother the people around them and he would always like if i was going into a room or into a world like go do your thing man make it happen like you were going to law school i later i went to law school yeah i did a lot of shit i graduated law school but i never practiced um and uh but that was later that was for a whole different reason that was when i was knew i had to leave music and do something that was later. That was for a whole different reason. That was when I knew I had to leave music and do something that was like real and I was going to go,

I want to practice civil rights law. That was what I was going to do. I read Morris D's book, A Season for Justice, and that book blew my mind. And then right away I lost my mind. Well, this isn't the way to effect change. But I was already in and I just finished. I went at night.

I was working full time and I went at night. But the Tracy lesson, to get back to the thing that I felt was ultimately such an empowering lesson but miserable at the time, these A&R guys would come up and women would come up to Boston.

Tracy would perform in front of 300 people going crazy because she had built a real audience for herself in New England. She would play all those songs with that voice. They would stand up and give her four encores. The A&R person would almost have tears in their eyes,

and they would say to me, can I please meet her? I'm so blown away by this. And I would say, yeah, so come back, meet her. I'd walk into their car, and they would say, you know I can't sign her. And I'd say, what do you mean? What does that mean? They does that mean they said well i mean no one's going to play it no one's going to buy it it's amazing you this this woman is the real deal but i would like a copy i'm glad i have the demo they all passed except for one person the guy at electric records the president of electric records bob krasnow and even bob we so then senior year college making the

record uh that summer before senior year uh me and one other guy figured out who should produce the record got rejected by tons of producers i still know a bunch of these guys i would take them out and try to convince them and they all said like this is never gonna happen and how can this work and no one cares about this kind of music and we got this guy david kirschbaum to produce it and every day they were fedexing me we were he was recording that album in la i was in boston they would send me every day the basic tracks and i'm a senior in college getting these tapes of this album being made and giving my notes a cry and i was the one doing it now it's weird i never talked to tracy during that process i only talked to the to kirshenbaum but like what is your your what is your credit on that record executive producer and i had a that i had a point on that album

so that okay so you get that's when i had the i mean on that album i asked for and got a point so but so what you so you're a senior in college you're getting these records and what's the lesson well no the lesson was that uh every we finished the album and go and present it to electra and they say this is great and i remember it was a huge conference table and every single person stood up and said i can't get it played on my format and none of the stores i sell till we'll buy it and i remember my dad stood up and he said you guys all love it personally and they said yeah i play my wife loves it my husband loves it and he said then you're all out of your minds like what the fuck have you bought

into go sell the record and the president of the record company the guy who walked us back my dad's office like around the corner and he walked us back and he said your father's insane brian uh if you sell 50 000 albums you've won and started a career and done something important and beautiful and never forget that and uh you know the thing sold 13 million albums worldwide and and it just the experts i realize the experts don't know any better than i do everyone's afraid and they're all scared and they are especially when something touches that special place in them their instinct is to run from it but that's it's weird because what that means is that they're instinctively false instincts about what they think people want the public and that they're somehow insulated and

unique in their emotions like if because all they do is look at the market what's selling what's selling what's selling that has repeated itself so over and over and over again movies too i mean and i've i've told this story before but uh i mean you know i the stuff we're talking about now i mean this is deep history i'm 48 i, this happened when I was 21 and 22. And I left the music business at 30. So the last 18 years have been far away from it. But I will say, you know, Rounders was rejected, that script, by every single agency in Hollywood. And the day that then Harvey Weinstein bought it, they all called us and all wanted to sign us.

And they all rejected us and said, it'll never be it's not and then it becomes this really important cultural lesson is what the experts are fucking wrong all the time they don't know the gatekeepers the gatekeepers um they're just concerned about keeping their job as the gatekeeper yeah but it's as you know that as the person doing the thing um it's very hard to not let it penetrate you it's very hard for it not to be wounding when because especially when you uh invest so much in creating it's very hard and especially for young artists who are trying and those are people i try to talk to all the time it's like uh it's very easy to turn back and to change fundamentally what the thing is that you do and to believe that their judgment is right because on her business card, it says vice

president or on his, it says general manager. But in fact, most of the time, they don't fucking know. And also, it's relative to your expectation as well. I mean, it's like if you're just passionate about what you're doing, it doesn't necessarily mean it's like, this has got to sell to everyone in the world, but it is worthy. Well,

yeah, I would never have said to you, Oh, this album is going to sell 10 million, over 10 million copies. So what happened to your relationship with her? What happened to her career? Well,

she ended up, I mean that, you know, a couple of years later, she had that huge song. Give me one reason. That was a song we had demoed together. Did you do all records no my dad's i'm sure my dad had i only was involved in the first one yeah um all those songs that she and i had recorded and like that i'd helped choose

which ones ended up being on some subsequent records no man uh we did not have any relationship really i mean i i saw her she definitely when she was recording the second album i went to the studio once the producer the same guy called me and i the last time i saw tracy was then so i was probably 24 that's interesting and no was there gratitude was there you know it's i will say. My gratitude to her is so enormous because my entire life changed. And the last, what I said to her, I feel that I think she felt she had lawyers and everybody made sure of it. But I think she felt somehow that why didn't she own her song? You know, why, why was there a publishing deal why did we

have points on her you know i think she felt uh though never articulated this to me i never understood exactly i've had to intuit what her uh story is and i've tried a couple years ago to reach out to her uh and say like hey let's meet and And I still very much want to. Because I have incredibly high regard for her. I was absolutely hurt by it, for sure. That I had spent so much time and energy in trying to get her music to the world. get her music to the world i never i don't think she ever knew that um how deeply involved i was in the making of that first album the musicians know and the producer knows but i don't think she ever knew because i and it's my failing uh i thought she was so many leagues and levels beyond me in terms of depth intellect experience authenticity experience that i can

never talk to her really other than to sort of uh in a very inchoate way say like oh you're you know i understand what you're doing and um it's really important and i want to help you so that all definitely that's what i could communicate but i don't think she knows that like you know when they recorded talking about a revolution uh they recorded it uh you know 10 beats uh a minute too slow and and i you know got them all on the phone and had them redo it and resend me the track or the mixes or the secret like there's no way because i was too scared to talk about it. I was 20 or 21 years old. I couldn't figure out how to. And she never responded to you?

Someday. I'll run into her somewhere. The last time I saw her was at the studio in the parking lot. And she rolled down her window and she smiled at me. And I said, it was out here. And I said, thanks. I said, listen, you really, no matter what, you know, my life's forever changed for having seen you,

and I'll be forever grateful. And she said, listen, we changed each other's lives, and I feel the same way about that. So we had that moment. That's good. Yeah, you know, it was a long time ago, and I know that whatever the narrative she has, and her narrative may be correct. You know, I can't, I will say that having been there to help do that, and she would

have found her way in some way without me. I mean, who knows what her way, what her idea of it was. Yeah, but I do, and it was, and in so many ways, because ultimately having done that released me from having to compete with this idea of what my dad did in that business

and that I had to do it. And it was, enabled me to go, okay, that happened. I did it. Uh it was enabled me to go, okay, I, that happened. I did it. Uh-huh. And I, you know,

had a few more of those things, but like, so there in so many ways, uh, but if you're asking me is, uh, is a part of me, is there a part of me that's still heartbroken about what I can't understand that,

uh, what happened? Sounds like that parking lot thing could be enough. Yeah. What exactly do you expect? I mean, some of you said she didn't talk much. That as a grown-up, I guess I expect that as a grown-up person now, I would love to know the ways in which I let her down, right?

I would like to know what part of that wasn't communicated properly. Yeah, but that might just be your own desire to confirm something that is a fundamental element of your personality of not thinking good enough. Sure. Maybe there isn't any of that. I mean, gratitude is a big deal. If somebody is genuinely grateful and even in that moment she expressed that to you and you felt it, maybe she's transcended whatever the hell you need to feed yourself loathing. Sure. Sure.

I'll buy all that. I like that you're doing this because I always do this exact thing for people. But yeah, that's possible. But then also just on a human level, this thing did happen that was a really significant thing. And I have, you know, I have, it's one of the only things about which I have very unresolved feelings. Because I've, throughout my life, because I've always tried to, like, own it wherever I was, I've tried to, like,

you know, square accounts. Yeah, okay. It sounds like it might be square. Okay, great. You know, I mean, whatever, like, whatever, accounts yeah okay yeah it sounds like it might be square okay great you know i mean whatever like whatever like a lot of times our emotional needs can't be met because you know you you might be making something up yeah maybe she just didn't give a shit i don't know yeah who knows you maybe like whatever you you what you whatever your assumptions are about what effect you had in a negative way or where you you failed her they might be your projections you're running on no evidence the way it sounds like the last

exchange you had with her you shared like you know a mutual moment of gratitude yeah and and but you're sort of like no but i must uh well yeah well yeah yeah no i guess it's the uh desire you know you know what it is it's the desire if it's either the the desire to yes to confirm worst uh worst self-opinion or uh it's the desire to be seen you know it's the desire to be sort of like seen yeah and but i i also think that you might be you know the way you're talking about your initial relationship with her even though it was one-sided i mean you were consumed with this person yes that's so so so so i mean whatever it was, you know, heartbreak is relative. I mean, those feelings that you had, you know, they were unrequited in a way. Oh, yeah.

Yes, for sure. They were. And then, I guess, Norm, and then the fact that, I guess it's this, right? The fact that everything I said to her would come true, came true. And so then I would, some part of me wants to be able to just understand that on balance, like on balance, was this bad for her? Like on balance, was this bad for her? Or was it good for her?

What would your dad have done? Oh, I mean, he would say, they always break your heart. Yeah, move on. Yeah, move the fuck on, man. They're going to break your heart. They're going to break your heart. But I'm built slightly differently than he is.

So you were in the music business for another eight years? Nine years? Yeah. What'd you do? Like, quickly? A&R for different labels. So you where the guy

went out and found the things yeah and i found a couple of them like things that became hits i was sometimes ahead of it so like i signed david gray to his first american deal i signed five for fighting to their first american to their like a deal john and drowsing and five for fighting this guy josh caddison sold a couple million albums that i signed and then uh and then as i wrote you know kind of like um advanced up the ranks um this guy who i brought in brought d'angelo to me and we signed him together and that was a big deal thing it's a tough business because like you know these a and r guys they have their run so if you weren't gonna gun him for executive or you know some it's brutal because but no the part that's bad is that especially then the artists

were treated so shittily and that it was what it was impossible uh from it was really difficult to marshal the forces for me to uh to um get them all to understand what was really special about these uh artists so like david gray who then you know two years later sold five million albums um to him i couldn't keep my word because i told him i flew around the world to to sign him i'd heard his little record that he'd made in england and uh spent a year and a half like going hey when you're gonna get out of this little deal come make a record in america and then i couldn't keep my word to him because i couldn't get them to put the records in the stores right i couldn't keep my word to him because I couldn't get them to put the records in the store. Right. I couldn't. So, but, but I mean, what started to happen, Mark. Yeah.

Was that the, when my son was born, which was really when I was almost 30, when my son was born, I realized that I wouldn't, this, it's good. I journaled a lot then. So like, I actually know this is what I was thinking. It sounds almost too pat. But what I realized was I'm miserable. I don't want to be the guy telling somebody to rewrite their course

and then helping them rewrite the course. And then, you know, telling them, oh, that bridge is really the second verse, and the second verse is the bridge. I realized that I would not be able to tell my kids that they could follow whatever their dream in life was if I wasn't. And I knew that if I didn't find a way

to become somebody who did it, who wrote and made movies, that I would have I would never get over it what was your dream but that was the dream initially yeah so the the music thing was just sort of like all right dad all my friends were right what I realized was every person it wasn't it's not the thing you said about talent all my friends were writers I just wanted to be around people who wrote and I was that I was the guy who people would give their stuff to to make better

and oh hey where sir how should I fix it what should I edit but um I was the guy who people would give their stuff to to make better. And, oh, hey, how should I fix it? What should I edit? But I was a horribly blocked writer. I couldn't get five pages. You know, I'd write five great pages, and then I couldn't write anything else. So, in essence, the opportunity, like the Tracy Chapman event was innate because you grew up in it. And it served a lot to sort sort of honor your father honor yourself level the playing field you did what you had to do and and you know you realize you couldn't be

your dad on some level even though that business was your business and then you found this you knew this other thing was going on i did i i realized uh i just realized i was miserable like i just hated myself i went to law school because I felt like oh all these people in the record business are you know a bunch of fucking idiots and also I'm wasting my talent and I'm wasting my brain and nobody reads and nobody's knows what's going on in the world and they don't care and even when so I went to law school where a lot of great people I was at night which was awesome at Fordham at night because you have a lot of cops who were trying to better themselves like you have a great crew of people

at night and it's a great law school so uh but uh still i had this other thing that was like eating me alive i never smoked cigarettes in my life i've never had substance you know luckily no substance issues i started fucking smoking at 30 start smoking at 29 yeah i remember sitting in my office in the record business smoking a cigarette fat miserable i you know knew this artist had called me from the middle of the country the records weren't in the stores they're playing in store without the records there oh you were dealing with that shit oh yeah because they i would you know you give your word to these people. Come and sign, and I'll protect you, and I'll, and then you can't, and it's helpless. But all that was the sort of like outer layer stuff.

I knew that I had to see if I was the thing or I wasn't the thing, and that I would never be happy if I couldn't figure it out. And if I didn't chase it, I would never forgive myself. And is that 30 or 40? 30. 30. So that's when I didn't chase it, I would never forgive myself. And is that 30? Or 40? 30. 30. So that's when he said to your wife, I gotta do this. Well, she'd been saying it to me for years. She was like, you're supposed to be writing and making movies and making

television. You're not supposed to do this. Not getting fat and smoking, heading for a heart attack. Yeah, what are you doing? Worrying about records. He was like, yeah, why? And I went to my best friend, who has been my best friend since we're 14 years old. are a year and a half older. Uh, and he had been, uh, writing and trying to do it. He had written a novel that later got published. He knew he would send me screenplays sometimes of people. And I said, I really, let's do this thing. Let's figure out how to write a movie. And he said, all right, we're going to read these things. You know, read the art. He gave me the artist's way.

He said, do the artist's way. No Sid Field? Well, I hate that shit. None of that. He said, read the artist's way because that'll help you get unblocked. And then I had also started playing poker all the time. But in LA, I walked into a poker club in New York, looked around, and it was the second one of those, like, moments. Like, like i looked at it i called him in the middle of the night and i go really the third

thing like that professionally i walked in looked at the poker room it was this illegal poker room i heard the way the people were talking i saw how they dressed yeah and i was like this is a how has no one made the movie right and so dave and I just met every morning and wrote that script. Did you have a poker problem? Almost. Any other gambling is really bad for me. Yeah. If I start to play blackjack or craps, I'll lose everything. I'll ask you for your money.

I have to go take my, I'll max out my thing. If I only stick to poker, everything's fine. There's a little skill set to poker. It's different. Yeah. But I became obsessive about it. And so, you know know then we did have this miraculous thing of uh you know it got rejected but we were rounders yeah and that but you know

it getting to make that movie which really did start there've been documentaries about it it really started the poker boom and although the movie wasn't a hit in theaters you know it became a real cultural thing that matters to a group of people sort of like you know men 45 and under right really really give a shit about that movie and then i you know was able to to do this thing um that got you as a writer that was 18 years ago and then you wrote a bunch of other movies yeah then wrote other movies and produced and directed well no i know but like these some of these are big movies like when you do a movie like walking tall yeah how much time do you spend with the original no walking thought was a four-week rewrite oh that was it and uh no

but like oceans 13 that's a real you know that dave and i wrote that movie yeah uh we're on set of that movie every day right and yeah that wasn't I mean that was that's a big movie yeah that was an incredible thing to be able to be a part of and to do and you know how that opportunity so what was that the third in the series at the second third so it's a franchise already you know the guys it was huge it must be fun to be able to write for the characters as they stand giant pressure writing it because the only you know know, we would have, if we didn't write a script that they wanted to make, we would have been,

everyone would have just blamed us. Was that your first real big money movie as a writer? Well, in what way? You mean getting paid a lot of money? Yeah. No, we got, started getting paid a lot soon

after Rounders. Yeah? Yeah, because you start getting hired, the way Hollywood works, if you write a movie that uh people regard and that has like cool swaggery dialogue in their mind hollywood's mind then they'll ask you to do that well then they want you to do that on their big movie but even do a pass you get some money right half of our yeah but i i i will say that this is um i don't know that this is good or bad this is just true uh half the movies we

made are indie movies and we i'd say a few different times sort of like i was able to amass some savings and then use those savings to like so that my family didn't have to change their quality of life while making a movie for free for two years so like a few different times a couple times we went and and in order to be able to make a movie had free for two years. So, like, a few different times, a couple times, we went and in order to be able to make a movie, had to not make any money, you know, go from making a lot of money to making no money for a year and a half. But you had everything in order.

It wasn't like you were... No, I mean, no, at the end of those... No, it's very scary at the end. At the end of that period of time, a couple of different times, we had to, like, scramble to go, like, okay. Like, I know, at the end of that period of time um a couple of different times we had to like scramble to go like okay like i know at the end of solitary man i had no say you know i had some retirement my money uh in my kids college accounts that you couldn't get yeah but i had no savings left

after that movie that was like because you know uh you you gotta live well but but there's also like but you you're passionate enough it an amazing thing to commit to a movie. Because when I hear people talk about it, I don't have the nerves for it. To have a vision, to execute the vision, and then to stay in it for the years that it takes to make the vision a reality, to me, is daunting. And it causes anxiety just to think about it. To have the fortitude to commit to it. causes anxiety just to think about it, to have that much, to have the fortitude to commit to it. Yeah.

I'll say that the committing to it, to be able to get lost in doing that is the greatest. It's like such an incredible reward. I guess at every step of the way, especially with something like Solitary Man, you got the idea, then you got the story, then you got the script, and then you get somebody like Michael Douglas attached to it. Then at every turn, there's juice. But I mean, writing it took four years, and I was miserable in the middle of it and i couldn't figure it out and well can't you figure out i was still a couple things i want to say which is one the thing you said before you said

two things that i think are are not exactly true uh one which really is annoying is that uh that there was nothing at stake when i was doing stand-up because that for you to say that when all you judge people on is whether they've actually done it or not is bullshit because there's nothing else in the world as you've said it doesn't matter what the fuck you have if you're standing on that stage and palming and i did it four nights a week like i did it every night well what i meant by that and i don't want you to misunderstand me is that there there's a difference between you know and and as you did with the music business not necessarily quite the same but when you go all into something and there is nothing behind you is different but i didn't know i will say this i was that i was so i'm i lead all the time and

that's why as you know i do this podcast now uh the moment and i just don't calculate so i just lead by like when you think about going into a movie like i would never think about the ramifications of it all i think about is uh the whole pursuit for me is to be authentic and to be comfortable in my skin every part of the way has been a journey to get to like you know are you okay is to get to like, am I okay? Am I being exactly what I want to be? To be yourself. Yeah, am I being what I want to be? Yeah. And so, until I did stand up and knew and put in like 18 months of really doing it,

I didn't know. Like I had to know, could I do it? Could I actually hang? Could I follow Todd Lynn? And could I follow Chris Rock? And could i follow chris rock and could i stand it when todd lynn was in the back of the club watching me knowing that he thought he's the guy look at this well because you know he was like look at this dylan and then when he came up to me and you know he's the and that guy was so difficult yeah and came up to me and he was brilliant and so

fucked up and brilliant and you know he was like oh you could fucking do this i hate you you could really do it yeah and that's how i became friends with gallman and dan soda and all those dudes uh was because like soda tells the story uh that he was sure i was a construction worker until because i didn't talk no one they didn't know at first what i did yeah he sort of was like i thought you were a construction worker the first three months i knew you well i i get it i i get the warrior uh approach and i get that you had something to prove to yourself and others. And I understand. I had to, like, go and do it.

I understand. But no, but I remember. But it's still hard for me not to look at you as a weekend warrior on some level. I'm glad you did it. Yeah, but first of all, anyone who actually, no, a weekend warrior is somebody who went to three open mics and a couple of bringer shows. All right, all right.

No, isn't there, tell me something. Is there not a difference between showing up Wednesday at 1210 at Boston with nine drunks, three of them Scandinavian, in the audience and having to figure out how to get through that

with like your dignity? Yeah, but there's some part of you that wanted to beat the shit out of yourself in order to find yourself and that was a fine venue to do it. Yeah, but every, anybody who's done comedy wants to do that. No, I i'm not trying to i'm not taking away your experience but i mean the way you're framing it is that you know because the terror i guess this

is what a point is the battle for me to actually get to being and and the reason i talk about it is i hear from people every day who are sitting in whatever their job is and they have this fucking dream that they don't chase down because they think I'm the dilettante. But this wasn't your dream. This was something you had to do. If you talk to Havy, he would say to you that when I was like, I would go with him to the fucking cellar when I was 22 years old. Right.

So I was doing A&R. I would go with Havy to the cellar every weekend for a year, certainly for like a year and a half. Yeah, but you just told me that your dream was to be a movie writer well it was yeah but the to be actively creative and okay living it no and then it no what it came to was yes i have to i have to be able to do this thing and write movies but i'd written all these movies with a partner my best friend dave i hadn't written a movie alone and still had the question could i really could i really get in there and write this thing because it was that movie was super important to me to write and when i was at the point in the middle of it where i couldn't solve it something said to me

um you're still scared and the reason you're still scared is the thing that you've been the most terrified of in your life in all this stuff is can you stand on a stage with a microphone and get through it? And I was like, fuck. And I had to fucking do it. Okay, that's fine.

No, no. And I respect that. I'm not taking your experience away because it's hard. No, but what I'm saying is like, you know, I did morning radio for a year and a half.

I would never call myself a radio guy. You've never heard me say year and a half. I would never call myself a radio guy. You've never heard me say I'm a comedian. I would never say that. I agree with you. I would never say I'm a comedian. Yeah, but you needed to do it. I'm glad you did it.

Yeah, that's it. But was that to like, not only because it seems to me in watching the film that in order to garner any sympathy for that character, that it had to be so true. And the thing that you're talking about the fearlessness in the face of of failure to the point of almost sociopathology that was instrumental in that character that you know somebody who is who is was fearless to the point of uh denial and in on ability inability to change oh yeah well that that character in that movie i mean came out of some people that i knew and out of anger you know i started writing it out of anger and

what do you mean anger um i started writing it out of anger because uh someone i know very well their father is very much like, not my dad, is very much like that guy and did the thing at the opening of the movie, which is he was going to meet his grown-up daughter. And his grown-up daughter said, hi, dad.

And he said, don't call me dad in public because it makes it too hard to pick up women. And when I heard that story, I got so enraged that a man would say that to his daughter and like hurt her in that way.

Deny his, you know, deny his own daughter because he'd be called dead that I wrote the first 20 pages in almost exactly as they are in the movie, just in a fever the next morning. And then had these pages staring at me uh and

knew that if i could get that character going for a whole movie it could really be something but but in order to do that the weird thing about it is is that even me and the familiarity with that character i mean whether it was your friend's father or not that character is that character, that character on some level is every man if he had game. So the thing is, is that innately that character is sympathetic and should not read that way to me anyways. And I think that the challenge that it seems to me that you were up against was making that guy human. Yes, for sure. Being able to have him talk in a way that you would take the ride with them dave and i and dave and i directed it together uh and you know we were incredibly

lucky that michael said he'd do the movie because michael has so much charm and is able to put that across he's only gotten better and you know i guess part of it also was mark parts of the movie had to be funny and maybe i just had to get up on stage to know that i could make it funny no look you had to get up on stage to break through a wall for yourself yeah just to know that the rejection just to know that um i could live through that rejection sure the rejection of nine people at 12 10 in the morning for some reason it takes a very it's very uh in those moments it seems all important to the entire world so now why is that somehow worse than watching because like yeah though i once but i once bombed in front of like 300 people at caroline's early and it was not nearly as bad as the nine like well you think you

should be able to manage that you know yeah i mean christ if you can't charm nine people right yes the nine people you go one by one yeah you just can't you just can't fathom that you have that little ability to connect but sometimes yeah i mean it's easier to bomb in front of a big audience i think because like you know it's easier to gauge because you got all these people it's like that's not quite enough laughter for a room this size with nine people you you almost feel your heart connecting to them so you know they're right there yeah it's not a more it's not this big you know and it's a fascinating thing too because it's fascinating how quickly you can turn mean on it's just a fascinating thing connecting yeah but it's not a more it's not this big you know and it's a fascinating thing too because it's fascinating how quickly you can turn mean on it's just a fascinating that's connecting yeah but it's

fascinating thing to do to see you know the places that you'll go the places you'll go in desperation but that's the thing about stand-up it's like you can do whatever the fuck you want to and certainly you know at a 12 10 spot on a thursday or tuesday it's like who's going to tell you the door guy who wants to be a comic that you're doing something wrong you can literally go up on stage and look at people and go fuck you fuck you right and you know you might get hit but you could do it no and the amazing thing is that when uh the people that i that you know then that i knew then that i did open mics with and that then you know they're two sane people in the open mic who became i mean you really like the the connection you have with the

people who were in those clubs it's like a very intense well yeah it's all it always is even if it's only for a day there you know because it the life is so specific and you know and the the commitment to it and the sort of the connection of the weird selfishness of all of us uh and yet we're all so close in some weird way it's very it's an intense you know it's an intense um an intense thing and so the other thing that i that you said that i think is not uh is only half right when you said that i struck you someone who wanted to be around talent uh and i know what you mean by talent um the way people the business use that term. It's actually more, it's simpler and more innocent than that, which is that I am always searching out like genius.

And I want to, I want, I am constantly in, in trying to push myself to be better. And also, um, when someone's work re it's not talent. I, you know, I, I, I don't, uh, I don't give a shit about fame, about meeting famous people or about meeting people who are regarded by the world. Uh, I care about, uh, if I think that that they're special great and that their work is amazing that i want to be around because i want to like learn from that i want to look at it uh i want to uh engage in some way and be able to talk about that's why i do my podcast uh because i mean the whole premise of it is that uh you know i'm fascinated by how like remarkable people process big moments bigger you know good or bad really not remarkable people that it's people who accomplish remarkable

things like how do they handle crushing disappointment or huge success and move forward i'm just fascinated yeah but what is it why What do you feel like you're lacking? I don't know what I'm lacking. What am I lacking? I don't know. I am... When are you going to know? You never know, man. You know, all you can do is try to keep going, right? Like, how can you really know what it would be like to do something really beautiful? Mm-hmm. And then I realized, just do the work.

Like at a certain point, I realized, well, just do your best. Like do the work. Don't worry about that. But I still like having the conversations. I still like hearing it. I still, part of me probably still thinks, you know, it kills me that David Foster Wallace, I met him twice, but it kills me uh uh that david foster wallace i met him twice but it kills me that he died i feel you know and i never got to really like hear it from him like what did you feel what does it feel like to be that you know what does it really feel like to be the smart you

know to be that deep and that smart apparently it felt a little too much but i don't know that pursuit is still enormous i mean that's what you when you're a writer you're and you create characters even you're trying i mean i don't think about what it is i'm trying to work out and that stuff but it's you're trying to touch some experience uh in a way that's different than you experience it or understand it well i'll tell you that movie solitary man took a couple of turns i didn't see coming and they were very bold but uh you know the ending as ballsy ending yeah thanks i i remember writing the ending of it and knowing uh it's not good i was never going to change it and there might have been one day it was great because dave levine my partner

is like one of the greatest guys on i mean, to me, the best guy I know. And right before we started- Did you look at that ending and go like, well, not a lot of people are going to see this movie? No. When people were refusing to make it, when people were rejecting it, if I would have changed the ending, I would have had a big deal for the movie. I know. But we said no over and over again. And then I remember standing there soderbergh who

produced the movie and helped us and got michael douglas he said don't shoot he wasn't going to be there when we shot the end of the movie and he said listen you're going to have a huge uh instinctive pull to protect yourself and shoot an ending that's different from that you're going to want to cover do not if you shoot another ending someone's gonna force you to use it Don't do it And I remember being there on the day and the assistant director coming up and going do you guys want to just have him and? I'll tell you my insecurity rose up and I almost did it and Levine just said no fucking way There's the ending you wrote this is the ending we're shooting. That's it. Yeah, and that was it. That's all that we did

Because man, I know I just knew that that's it yeah and that was it that's all that we did uh because man i i know i just knew that that's where that had to uh sit and then i got really well protected by my partner uh and um and was able you know was able to keep it that way but uh i i did i will say i i felt like from I felt like you would get something out of it. You know, it's not a movie for everybody, but I felt you would

get something out of it. Well, I do, and we're not going to have any, this is the end. Mark, man,

listen, so, I got to say, I'm happy to be here. This has been, I love the show, and you've done a real good you know you've done a really good thing thanks man did you how was your experience is it all right with it how

i feel doesn't matter but it matters to me right now no didn't you say it doesn't matter how we feel it only matters that we did it no but i know that you wanted to do it and you know it's a and i and i inspired you somehow but what was your WTF experience? It was really good. Are there any coffee mugs? Do you have any more souvenir mugs? All right, all right. That's it. I just think the souvenir mug.

All right, all right. Good talking to you. All right, see that? He's got his podcast. I got my podcast. He started to interview me a little bit. It was interesting. I like that guy.

He got along good, I thought. Anyways, go to WTFpod.com and get on that mailing list because I'm going to be, got something coming up. Might want to share with you. Get some JustCoffee.coop over there. Leave a comment. Get the app. Upgrade to the premium app.

Stream all the stuff. Whatever. Right? Get the app, upgrade to the premium app, stream all the stuff, whatever, right? guitar solo Boomer lives! 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 5 p.m. in Rock City at torontorock.com. Calgary is a city built by innovators. Innovation is in the city's DNA.

And it's with this pedigree that bright minds and future thinking problem solvers are tackling some of the world's greatest challenges from right here in Calgary. From cleaner energy, safe and secure food, efficient movement of goods and people, and better health solutions, Calgary's visionaries are turning heads around the globe, across all sectors, each and every day. Calgary's onaries are turning heads around the globe, across all sectors, each and every day. Calgary's on the right path forward. Take a closer look how at calgaryeconomicdevelopment.com.