WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 580 - Kevin Allison

Episode Date: February 25, 2015

Kevin Allison found life after The State with his storytelling show RISK! In the garage at The Cat Ranch, Marc gets a full load of Kevin's stories that track all the way back to his very early sexual ...awakening right up until his recent BDSM exploration. Plus, Kevin throws in some stories about The State for good measure. 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.

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Starting point is 00:00:32 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 bestselling 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 27th exclusively on disney plus 18 plus subscription required t's and c's apply Lock the gates! I know it's still cold. I know it's still snowing. How are you? Welcome to the show. This is WTF. I am Mark Maron. I'm coming to you early in the morning. Some of you might be actually up and listening to this early in the morning.
Starting point is 00:01:31 But I have to get ready to go to set. Today on set, we're going to be doing an episode with ex-professional wrestler CM Punk. He's going to be playing himself in another episode of Marin. I believe that his pal Colt Cabana is coming out as well to do a little part in the show. It should be fun. Hope I don't get hurt. Hope I don't get hurt today.
Starting point is 00:01:59 That's all I'm going to tell you about that episode. Yeah, we got some good ones, man. Again, I know it's uh disconcerting for many even myself that uh i'm having a good time every cell in my body seems to not want to acknowledge that because it is a lot of work and i know some of you think like is it a lot of work mark is it being on your own television show well yeah, yeah, actually, it kind of is. It is a little taxing. It is real work, but obviously it's very rewarding.
Starting point is 00:02:30 It can be very fun. Acting is a blast, but you repeat things. Here's usually what happens. I familiarize myself with a script at night a little bit with the sides. I have to read in the morning sides or the pieces of the big script that I'll be acting in the scenes the next day. And then in the morning sides are the pieces of the big script that I'll be acting in the scenes the next day. And then in the morning, I mark my script with a marker and then I go scene
Starting point is 00:02:51 for scene. Before the scene, I start running the lines with the other actors over and over again until I get them in my head. Then we knock out the scene four, five, six, seven, eight times. And then we move on to the next scene, the next location. We just do that for 12 hours. And having coming into acting later in life, having always kind of done it here and there, but not at the level I'm doing it now, I'm still, you know, obviously still learning. I think that through the first two seasons of Marin, I was okay.
Starting point is 00:03:20 I think I got better in the second season and I think I'm doing good now. I'm looking at the dailies. Well, I'm not even looking at dailies, man. I'm looking at full director's cuts as they go down the line of cuts. And they look good. I'm okay with it. What am I trying to get at? I'm trying to convince you that I have a real job.
Starting point is 00:03:39 I do. I have several jobs. I'm acting in the show. I'm doing this right now. I'm doing comedy later. And those are my jobs. I'm acting in the show. I'm doing this right now. I'm doing comedy later. And those are my jobs. I know they just seem like a blast, but I am exhausted and working hard. How are you guys doing? You all right? Kevin Allison is on the show today. Kevin and I, there's a little backstory in the sense that, no, we didn't sweep together.
Starting point is 00:04:06 But Kevin had come in to do a WTF a couple years ago, I think. And somehow or another, it was just fucked up. There have been a few in the history of the show that got fucked up. For reasons that are still unclear to me. But now I do a backup. There was just a noise. Kevin had one of the ones where, for some reason, was all in uh like robot noise it was just lost it was garbage there's been a few that have been fucked up sound wise i think we've tracked it to maybe
Starting point is 00:04:34 cell phones but it still doesn't add up with clicks and weirdness but now i back up twice i got this going into the garage band i got it going into a zoom i'm not gonna lose it so you're gonna hear hear Kevin Allison today. And I always like talking to Kevin. He's very nice. He's very funny. He's very filthy. And I say filthy with love and compassion and a little perverse excitement.
Starting point is 00:04:55 Because it's fun to listen to people talk about sex stories. And, of course, Kevin does a podcast called Risk that is pretty popular. People enjoy it. It's a storytelling show. So Kevin will be here momentarily. Anyway, anyway, the sun is pounding into my face through a window, and I don't. God damn. All right, I'm going to just sit like this.
Starting point is 00:05:23 So the Marination Tour, you can check those dates at WTFpod slash calendar. I'm doing like 17, 18 dates in different cities, but I know that Toronto is sold out and I believe we're adding a new show. I will be able to confirm that for you on Monday. I would check over the weekend. In Seattle, which is sold out, I believe we're adding another show at the Neptune. And Boston at Wilbur, another show has already been added. So that's happening. And I appreciate you guys hammering me to add those shows. Now, all right, I'm not going to let my insecurity drift into this.
Starting point is 00:06:04 The second shows, we'll see what happens, right? It's all new to me, selling tickets, people. Pow! I just shit my pants. Just coffee.coop, available at wtfpod.com. That's a classic plug. Don't do them that often. There you got one.
Starting point is 00:06:20 It's actually not coffee. I'm drinking tea, but I felt like doing the plug. I'm still not drinking much coffee. I'm still off the nic I felt like doing the plug. I'm still not drinking much coffee. I'm still off the nicotine, but God damn, am I shoving food into my face like my soul needs nourishment. I would like to say this. I am, as I mentioned in the pre-show plug on tonight's episode of This Is Not Happening. It's a storytelling show. I believe I'm on with Ms. Pat and Steve Rve ren is easy and my buddy ari shafir
Starting point is 00:06:45 hostess show and i tell a story that you've heard in some version probably on this show about my uh visit to the uh to the neurologist and onward into the mri machine uh which is sort of also a backdrop of uh of one of the marin on i the marin ifc shows this uh this season but but it's interesting because there's another story I told that I think I've told you here as well. And I believe I wrote about it in my book. There's certain stories that kind of stay with me, obviously. The story on the Comedy Central website for the This Is Not Happening that they have is
Starting point is 00:07:19 not the one on the TV. It's about Frankie Bastille. And it's very interesting how everything works now, because I just got an email from the woman that Frankie Bastille was living with when that story took place. When I knew Frankie Bastille, who's now dead, you know, he was this junkie comedian, but quite a character. And he he he was with this woman, Karen. She just wrote me an email saying, like, you know, I heard that you talked about Frankie. I got so many Frankie stories. And she reminded me of this. Like, I was just such a dumb little young comic even though i thought that i was a you know the real deal that i was that i was hard and that i knew shit and that
Starting point is 00:07:54 i'd been there and and i was the dark wizard and i he she just reminded me of this story where where they called me from mystic connecticut and i was living in boston and they had totaled their fucking car and he wanted me to drive down to mystic connecticut to pick him and karen up and i was a young comic and i didn't have shit to do and i'm like all right i'll just bring my notebook with me and drink coffee on the way because that's all i'm doing here so i drove down probably smoked a little weed and i drove down from boston to mystic to pick them up and he was like you know i need to go to new york to uh you know i got him uh you know who the hell even knows what he said but he told me he needed to go to New York to pick something up and I'm such a dumb little shit I didn't even know at the time that
Starting point is 00:08:34 they needed to cop dope but I'm like all right man if you need help he probably told me he had a you know he had to do a spot or something but I ended up driving down there he ended up he's like I know Jimmy Tingle lives around here. Jimmy Tingle, who's a sober guy, a solid dude, who was living in the Lower East Side at the time. And so, you know, I take Frankie to go, you know, he goes, he says, pull over here. And he runs up out somewhere. And then he comes back into the car. And within five minutes, he's covered in sweat and manic.
Starting point is 00:08:59 And, you know, his eyes are jacked. And then he's like, let's go by Tingle's. So we go by Tingle's. He was on his way out to go do a show. And Frankie's like, hey, man, can I shower? And Jimmy was like, what's happening? I'm like, I don't know, dude. I don't know what's happening.
Starting point is 00:09:13 I'm sorry. And so Jimmy, you know, let Frankie shower. And then I drove both of them back up to Boston completely on the nod. But for some reason, not quite putting it all together until that email came yesterday because I was a naive little man. Ah, the life. Huh? Let's talk to Kevin Allen. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode
Starting point is 00:09:52 where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly.
Starting point is 00:10:21 This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. 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 on the right path forward. Take a closer look how at calgaryeconomicdevelopment.com. listen so you had him though yeah yeah i got bed bugs and you know what the thing it is like we do so much traveling yeah that it, because the person right below me in the apartment below
Starting point is 00:11:26 got them at the same time, but I'm pretty sure it was probably me. And the fact that I have boys over constantly. I know, but what do you, I would think that bed bugs would be the least of your concerns as to what the boys are carrying in. I mean, like,
Starting point is 00:11:44 you know, I would think that, that you know giving your apartment building aids is a much smaller threat than the actual i'm worried about the bed bug bites on their nice you know uh tender skin you're concerned about their uh their bodies i don't want blemishes on them. Your little clean boys. Here's the thing. They're all Asian, which is something that for the longest time I was like, should I see a shrink about this? About Asian boys? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:12:23 Why Asian? Is that the question? I think it's... Yeah, like, at what point in my career, in my life, did I become... You know, I remember
Starting point is 00:12:32 when we were at MTV, Michael... Ian Black, there was a circle chart on the wall that MTV execs had put up. And it was 50-50. And Black erased whatever the demographic things there were.
Starting point is 00:12:48 And he said, Puerto Rican and Asian. And then wrote it that the graph was who Kevin wakes up next to. So it's been going on a while. It has been going on a while. But then the Puerto Ricans just dropped away. Yeah. Were they too much? Maybe they were too much trouble in terms of emotional.
Starting point is 00:13:06 I think so. Emotional trouble. I think there was a little bit too much. Too fiery. Too fiery. Yes, exactly. Uh-huh. These Asian guys barely talk.
Starting point is 00:13:14 They're very, you know, agreeable. Yeah. If that's what you're looking for. Agreeable. Agreeable and clean without blemishes. Exactly. That's all you require. And chores.
Starting point is 00:13:26 You should be able to do some damn chores. Is that part of the fantasy? Is that part of the sexual routine? Do you sit there in a chair and go, could you get me my slippers? It's actually not erotically interesting to me. It's that I really, I'm like you. I could really need someone cleaning up after me. And it just so happens like in the kink community, there's a real thing for that.
Starting point is 00:13:50 I know a straight guy who would go to dominatrix's apartments and pay them. So he could clean up? Exactly. Was there toilet licking involved and that kind of stuff? Oh, no, no, no. It was like purely I'm just cleaning your house. Did he wear an outfit? Well, maybe sometimes, but I think it was mostly pretty straightforward.
Starting point is 00:14:10 Was it straightforward? Yeah. But sometimes the outfit, what outfit? Sometimes he'd knock something over and get a good thinking. Oh, okay. I see. There's a little more to it. Oops, look what I did.
Starting point is 00:14:22 No, I don't want that. I don't want to go through the rigmarole i just want the toilet cleaned right no it's not part of the uh so let's go back kevin to uh to when when all this started i'm not gonna okay let's go back before the state now you got a reunion coming up i mean this was this will post after that but it'd be interesting to to talk about how do you anticipate this will all go when was the last time everybody was in the same room i think everyone was in the same room about five years ago and and my experience is it'll be we're gonna have a week this week full of laughs and then there will be a couple of moments where there's just rage and tension being bottled up.
Starting point is 00:15:06 No, there will probably be a moment or two of some people having to leave the room and being like, Jesus, he's still like that after all. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The state has always- Almost everybody is working. Almost everybody is sort of still- Oh, yeah. We're actually- I was the biggest problem child, I think, in terms of like.
Starting point is 00:15:27 What happened after. What happened after. Yeah. Yeah. David Wayne wrote to the group about a year and a half after we broke up. And so that was around 96 when we broke up. And he wrote, oh, let's work on another project again. And at that time, I was so drunk and so penniless and so just beside myself because I felt like my
Starting point is 00:15:47 life had gone down the toilet. After the stage? Yeah. Yeah. And I was just so full of fear. I made the mistake of not going out on stage every night. All of a sudden, I thought all comedians were mean. Well, we were.
Starting point is 00:16:01 Yeah. Especially to you guys. And by that, I don't mean gay guys i mean steak right well we probably deserved it because we were mean to everyone else but yeah i i was i was just kind of fearful and you know what it was was i i was afraid of my own i was afraid i was mediocre i was afraid you know i didn't i remember watching you at luna lounge all the time and thinking wow i do not want to become a stand-up comedian don't want to be that guy he's got problems no no no not that you had problems but that it seemed to take so much courage to be able
Starting point is 00:16:38 to get up there and be right right damn raw and vulnerable so he so he wrote you all a letter oh no he he said hey let's all get back together and i wrote him back a letter and it said i don't think i can do that anytime soon because there was a cancer of arrogance and greed that tore this group apart and that was just poetic that was me lashing out you know how did he respond to that? He responded by sharing it with everyone in the group. And then everyone in the group was like, yeah, we can understand how he feels that way. And then a year later, they're like, how is Kevin?
Starting point is 00:17:18 Exactly. Is he in AA? Has anyone talked to him? It's been a couple of years since we wrote that letter. Has anyone talked to... It's been a couple years since we wrote that letter. Has anyone talked to Kevin? Yeah. You were that guy. I was that guy, yeah.
Starting point is 00:17:33 For 12 years, I just didn't know what... I was getting up on stage and doing funny characters telling stories. But where'd you grow up? I grew up in Cincinnati, which is... That's like the most boring place. It's the most Republican town north of the Mason Dix. A lot of people say you don't realize it, but once you're south of Columbus, you're in Kentucky. Right.
Starting point is 00:17:54 No, I get that. And I've had good shows there, and I like some of the people there. There's a good comedy club there. But definitely when you drive into Cincinnati, you just feel like you've driven into the heart of sports and right-wing politics. Absolutely. And I don't even know what the sports are, but there's something that city feels like sports. And you have spaghetti with chili on it that you got to eat. Yes, you got.
Starting point is 00:18:14 Well, I love the Skyline Chili, but everything else I'm not a big fan of. You love Skyline Chili. Yeah, I do. I do. I think, you know, I don't know many people who were raised there who don't like it. Yeah, it's an acquired taste. You get the spaghetti with the chili and the onions and and cheese yeah yeah it's a strange combo yeah it's uh it is but you know you love it that's good yeah yeah is it should bring back childhood memories it does it does and there are places
Starting point is 00:18:40 in the state there are places in new york that will sell it at certain you know like a bar somewhere in tribeca actually serves it. We'll give you some Skyline. Cincinnati expats, the three of you. I had to come in. Feeling lonely. Need some chili and spaghetti. But the foundational thing for me psychologically is that I knew i was gay as soon as i was like conscious
Starting point is 00:19:07 about things yeah well was your parents where you come from a republican family no no no my parents were staunch democrats i mean you know like my dad marched in the civil rights movement and all that sort of thing but when it came to sex they were just 1950s cath. Oh, right. Catholics. Super, super, super Catholic. And I was hook, line, and sinker. I have stories on Risk about believing I was seeing the Virgin Mary when I was a boy and going down to Peru to help the poor.
Starting point is 00:19:39 Did you go to Peru? Yeah. It was either I was going to go into the performing arts or become a Jesuit. But I think that's a normal thing. But you, but you, but you didn't feel like this is before you were out? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So did you feel shame?
Starting point is 00:19:56 Oh, God. So I'm about three and a half years old when I'm looking at this statue, this Hummel statue of a boy with his pajama bottoms falling off. And you can see his butt. Yeah. And thinking, oh, my God, I grabbed that statue and started running around the house saying, look at this. You can see his hiney. Yeah. And my brothers and sisters laughed.
Starting point is 00:20:21 And then I thought, well, the neighbors, they ought to know about this, too. So I start running out of the house to be like, look, look, you can see us, Heine. And all of a sudden I feel my mom grab my collar from behind and bring me back into the house. What they didn't realize is you were coming out. Yeah, like three and a half. You can see us, Heine. Oh, God. She said, that's good's good i'm just gonna take
Starting point is 00:20:46 this and put it where it'll be safe yeah and it was gone it was never to be seen again yeah and i could just tell from the that was proactive on their part they're like he's overreacting to the hiney yeah yeah absolutely you could see a look at you you felt like she knew then oh yeah i could see a look in her eyes that was like fearful and this put the kibosh on this how many brothers and sisters you have four so i'm i'm uh the fourth of five children yeah and there's how many what's the breakdown uh two boys uh a girl me and a little girl and um so i was the space cadet the black sheep the the the you know the gay kid in the family but what did they do things to to try to curb it yeah yeah my brother peter was like he he has better he has got to sign up for football or he's going to become a fucking fag
Starting point is 00:21:42 to my mom and so second, I'm eight years old, and I'm taking football practice. And here's the thing. After like eight weeks of practice, or whatever it is, the season's about to begin, and I still don't know how football is played. I asked the coach, I was like, excuse me, before we have this first game,
Starting point is 00:22:02 could you just lay out on a chalkboard, like, how does this game work? And he said, look, it's just, excuse me, before we have this first game, could you just lay out on a chalkboard, like, how does this game work? And he said, look, it's just, you know, one team is trying to get the ball to this side of the field and the other to that side of the field. I was like, that's it? Like, I really thought, because I knew my father loved opera and football, and he would take my brothers to the football games and take me to the operas. Oh, so see, he was. And so I just assumed that football was as meaningful,
Starting point is 00:22:29 and if you understood it, it was going to be like understanding Wagner. Yeah. I think it is to some people. Apparently. I think there is probably direct similarity between, other than the competitive nature, but more opera and wrestling, I think, is probably more similar. But that's's interesting those are the two sides of your father yeah yeah yeah so he's a really really interesting guy i mean he he loved catholicism but what he loved
Starting point is 00:22:57 about it was michelangelo and leonardo and hondel and all that stuff so the pomp and circumstance and the art yeah in the cathedrals yeah so wait but he was a believer yeah he was a total believer and a sweetheart yeah whereas my mom was a real puritan you know a real kind of like uh no i'll go back to when i was about when i was about five yeah i was exactly five i convinced the boy next door who was about five, yeah, I was exactly five. I convinced the boy next door, who was also five, to take off. I said, here, wouldn't this be funny if we took off all our clothes? And I had this all planned out. If we took off all our clothes and ran around your basement listening to Walt Disney's Cinderella soundtrack. That was your big idea?
Starting point is 00:23:44 That was my biggest. So the song like cinderella cinderella oh boy yeah and then at one point i said wouldn't it be funny if you so you did that bent over i said if you bent over and spread yeah i don't know how i put it but spread your butt so i can see what's inside there and that moment was like a holy grail moment for me. White light. Exactly. Exactly. Oh.
Starting point is 00:24:11 Come on. Really? I swear to you. It was like. How old were you? Five. And you felt. You didn't know what you felt, but you felt what?
Starting point is 00:24:20 Well, he turned around and I had an erection. Yeah. And I did not. I was not familiar with that. We were both, he was pointing at it laughing. I was like, oh my God, what the hell is this? And soon after his mom came down and discovered us. And?
Starting point is 00:24:33 And I was not allowed to hang out with the kid next door. So no humble figures, no neighbor kid. Yeah. You're becoming a problem in the neighborhood. This guy's got an ass issue. Totally. The priest, after I went to Peru when I was in junior year, a priest called my mom and said, Kevin is such a wonderful student and was such a great contributor to our trip, but I think he has an anal fixation.
Starting point is 00:25:02 How old were you? That was when I was 17. I guess he was putting it nicely yeah what led to that comment just me always bringing that word into my jokes and oh really yeah yeah yeah all right so okay so now the name the neighbor kid you're not allowed there and the humble character has been put away football is a mystery to you at that moment where the coach and that was after eight weeks you still hadn't so you were just there what rooting people on oh i quit i quit i i i went home and said look this isn't working because i couldn't face it you
Starting point is 00:25:37 know in truth i i i told myself oh it's that the game is not as profound as i thought it was going to be now that i understand it but But no, I was terrified of it. I imagine the dudes that were into it were not nice. No, I grew up with this terror of male competition. And, you know, it was when I was right after that incident with the boy next door when I was five. I remember just dreading thinking I'll be six next year which means I'll be going into kindergarten which means I'm going to be surrounded by kids all the time who might pick up on the fact that I'm gay and you were thinking that I was
Starting point is 00:26:17 thinking that I knew the words gay and fag and I knew that they were terrible things and I knew that that was a reference to what I was. So I grew up really with this inside horror and terror about that. And, of course, being raised Catholic, I thought that it meant that I was ultimately going toward a life in hell. But you believed in Jesus? Oh, yeah. You had to, I guess. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:26:43 How did you explain this to the priest? When do you start going to confession and whatnot? Well, that's the thing. When I was 12, I came out to myself after seeing the movie E.T. That did it? Yeah. Well, it's the story of a boy who wants a best friend, and the friend feels like a freak because the friend is from another planet so i felt like
Starting point is 00:27:06 i was a brown alien you were the alien yeah in love with this body uh well but ultimately i also just thought henry thomas was cute yeah yeah so uh yeah after that i just broke down and said out loud for the first time i am gay and i thought to myself to myself I thought... How old were you then? 12. Yeah. And I thought, how am I going to tell... When exactly am I going to tell mom and dad, but especially mom? And I remember that very week, I'm playing Marvin Gaye had the big hit, Sexual Healing. Sure. She came in and she took the ghetto blaster that we had and she said,
Starting point is 00:27:49 when this song comes on, and she pressed the button and said, the radio goes off. And I was like, well, it ain't going to be any time soon. was my way in kindergarten and grade school of letting people know that there was weirdness inside of me and letting you know it's okay that there's weirdness inside. But how were you behavior-wise? I mean, you're pretty butch. No, no, no, no. I didn't have stereotypical gay whatever yeah ways of acting or but um but i had but but i was so horny all throughout my childhood and i was just afraid
Starting point is 00:28:34 that if people found out that i would lose my family and friends you know you might have well the first two people i came out uh, it was the end of those really. My very best friend from first grade through seventh grade, I attempted to say that I was more interested in the young leading guy in E.T. than most people. He kind of got the gist of that and stopped talking to me for a year and a half. It was the the enemy ship. Everyone called it. And for a year and a half it was the the enemy ship everyone called it and uh for a year and a half we weren't talking and everyone in school knew it and we knew why well they didn't know why but we ran against each other for school president in the eighth grade and he started putting stickers around the school saying kevin allison is a
Starting point is 00:29:21 bisexual uh it was a smear campaign he was just saying bisexual to hedge his bets yeah that was actually the nicer way to do it you didn't say fag you didn't say homo it's a bisexual like david bowie yeah it's like a toothless smear campaign. Like, you know, he's being a pretty polite kid, actually. But I won. It didn't work. Yeah. So, you know, and right in there. So you were popular.
Starting point is 00:29:54 Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I think that a lot of what risk is about is I'm a person who's gone through his whole life obsessed with the idea of coming out about whatever it is, whatever it is that you feel like, oh God, can I talk about that to other people in mixed company? You know, your, your drug problem, your, the, the way you never got over the death of someone, whatever it is, can you come out about it? And I feel like it really is a reaction for me. It's all this perverted gay craziness mostly, but I feel like it, it,
Starting point is 00:30:32 it, it's a reaction against my mom on some level creating this podcast. And, and thank God she's 75 and has no idea how to get an email, much less download. Oh really? So she's completely out of the idea how to get an email much less download oh really so she's completely out of the loop yeah well maybe if you called the the podcast fuck you ma she would have gotten figured out how to listen to it no she knows she says i have heard that the podcast is rather raw.
Starting point is 00:31:08 And I've said, yes, it is. But I've said, listen, mom, I've had people write to me. Hey, I was able to get my son off of heroin after he heard the under the influence episode. And people write in. I was suicidal. And then I started hearing people sharing these stories and I was like, wow, I'm not such a freak or other people have been through really rough. That's a great feeling.
Starting point is 00:31:32 People kind of feel less alone and they know how to talk to a kid that they didn't know how to talk to and they realize that if we're not careful, he's going to end up like that guy. Yes, exactly. Right, right, right. Maybe we should be a little more open-hearted about this.
Starting point is 00:31:48 Lest he have this need to be. There was another thing. Like I said, outbursts of craziness were what I thought was the way to show that there was weirdness inside me as a kid right well right right right because you had all that energy and and you wanted that type of attention but you couldn't clearly uh meet your desires yeah so so you lose a couple of friends all your siblings know you're gay basically yeah i mean i i came out to them officially once i was in college but they they all sensed it.
Starting point is 00:32:25 I think so. Yeah. But what's interesting to me and your father, what was he sort of passive in this whole? My father was when I said, were you surprised? He said, no, you have five children. He said, I just thank God none of you guys wanted to go into the military. He's fine. That's kind of hilarious.
Starting point is 00:32:51 But your mom just couldn't. I understand on some level I can be empathetic to. I think they're usually just frightened for you. And like your safety and I guess in the case of being Catholic, your soul. Yeah. So she's, your soul. Yeah. So she's a real believer. Yeah. She did a lot of crying when I did.
Starting point is 00:33:09 When I came out to Mom and Dad, it was when I was 18, finally. After Peru? Yeah, after Peru. So wait, what was this Peru thing? Now, were you trying to un-gay yourself? No, no. I was trying to see how it was that I could do good. So you're trying to negotiate with God.
Starting point is 00:33:29 It's like, I know I'm gay. I'm going to go do this good stuff. And maybe that'll get me points. Maybe if I do enough good stuff, I'll just go to a more fun gay hell. I guess so. Now that I think of it, I guess that a lot of, like in the same way that when I get up on stage now, I will be like, see how friendly and nice I am. All right.
Starting point is 00:33:48 Now I can tell you how I just tied my shoes to my balls the other night. So, yeah, yeah. I think I think I probably at that time thought that I could pull one over on God to like, see, I'm doing good stuff. So I hope you don't mind that I'm shoving hairbrushes up my butt. Well, that is an interesting line or a balance to keep. Because if you see yourself as perverted or that your desires are unique and you attach some moral significance to that that struggle like because your desires don't necessarily have anything to do with your heart yeah do you know what i mean like like i want to be a good person but can i be a good person if i my shoes are
Starting point is 00:34:38 hanging off my ball yeah yeah yeah yeah i mean i think on some level you could say like not only am i a good person i'm a clown clown. Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. But I don't know the heat of fetish. I don't know that. Well, I think that, you know, there are some fetishes that I now have that I don't talk about on Risk because I'm like, damn, that really is too fucked up for most audiences to hear about. is too fucked up for most audiences to hear about and i and i've talked a lot to friends about it and realized you know what part of this fetishistic stuff is it's chasing after the tremendous shame i used to feel as a kid because there used to be a process of getting all wound up and horny yeah masturbating and then feeling like oh my my God, you know, like shaking,
Starting point is 00:35:26 like where am I? What's going to happen to me? What did I do? I'm garbage. Yeah. Yeah. So that dynamic, now I can sometimes play it out every now and then again by doing something where I'm like, whoa, that was really fucked up.
Starting point is 00:35:41 I hope I don't get any more into that particular fetish or kink or whatever it is and then that's what becomes kind of attractive about it well so okay so it's almost an addictive process so that like see the thing is at some point you're not sated yeah like yeah i mean you can come and that's not enough like for me uh good come i'm good yeah yeah yeah i don't like you know i don't need to elaborate too much yeah but but then again i never felt the compulsion to sort of like i'm gonna try this you know life is short why don't i tie my shoes to my balls or whatever you did right you know i don't think that i don't know what those feelings are but i and i i don't think i necessarily have
Starting point is 00:36:20 the courage to to role play right because to me i don't know how you don't go like, this is silly. Look what we're doing. Right. Because you've got to commit, right? You absolutely have to commit. And what I've learned is I can commit 100% in role playing if I'm the submissive, if I'm the guy who's bowing on the floor. Right.
Starting point is 00:36:38 But when I'm the dom, the nice guy thing is good. I've tried to, we were talking before in the kitchen about I've tried to have house boys before and I would love to have one again. But the first guy, he left after a month and a half. He was a student at Parsons and he was from Malaysia and everything. He was interning for you. Yeah. Sexual intern. Exactly.
Starting point is 00:37:00 And he left after a month and a half because he was like, you're just, there's no sadism in you whatsoever. You're just too nice. Yeah, yeah. I was like, so I created a class. And then you hit him. Like, how dare you? So I created a class called Secrets of a Sweet Dom. Whenever I feel like I don't have something that people want sexually, I'll just create a class on it and start teaching it.
Starting point is 00:37:27 Where do you teach these classes? There's a place called Dark Odyssey. It's a kink camp that I ordinarily go to. That's getting ahead of ourselves again in the history. All right. So, okay. So you come back from Peru. Your priest says you have an anal fixation.
Starting point is 00:37:42 What did you do down there? You fed some people? What did you? Yeah, yeah. Well, it was another. Now you realize looking back, it's like, oh, we weren't doing anything to help. I mean, we were supposedly building a school for some kids. Right.
Starting point is 00:37:56 And we would show up at the ditches we were digging every day. And the people were, this is like really, really the uh in the desert slums outside of the city of arequipa in peru they would use these ditches as toilets right so every morning we'd have to dig their poop out of the ditch to continue with our work so they were literally shitting on you they were like whatever we have a better use for this than whatever you guys think right yeah thanks for the toilet. Want to see what almost became a school down the street? Right, exactly.
Starting point is 00:38:33 So, yeah. But I was still very devout. I told a story in front of the 1,300 students at my high school. I went to a Jesuit high school about the experience of going down there to Peru. And I guess I should have recognized at that moment that true storytelling was a thing for me. What was your relationship with your priest? Oh, he was a closeted gay man who was, you know,
Starting point is 00:39:03 like so many of those guys are closeted gay man who was you know like like so many of those guys are closeted gay men no i i talk to the about this to catholics all the time i think that there is a community sort of um pressure when they recognize a gay kid absolutely get him into the priesthood to save his soul my mother the week before i came out to her we're doing the dishes together i'm dry and she's washing or vice versa and she starts crying and i'm like what what what's up and she said well i'm just thinking of your uncle jay who's a priest yeah and i was like well what's what's what are you upset about she said well he'll never have you know a romantic partner to like share everything with and i just sometimes that just makes me terribly sad and i was like oh all right then a week later i come out to her
Starting point is 00:39:51 the next day we're doing the dishes again and she says have you seriously considered being a priest as an option get your mind off the cock. I won't mind crying while doing the dishes about you, as long as you're in the priesthood. Not doing that other thing. But were you out to your priest, though? No, no, no, no. So confession wasn't even functioning?
Starting point is 00:40:21 Oh, no, no, no. I couldn't. What it was was when I was around 12 and I first came out to myself, I was like, I'm going to fix this. I'm going to go to hell uh or should i do the right thing and turn him in the right thing in society and he says you know what all right then i'll go to hell and it seems like it's just a funny throw-off moment but it's pretty profound you know that he thinks he's really choosing hell over turning in his friend. Right. So I kind of felt at a certain point like, no, you know what? If I'm going to hell, I'm going to hell because this just feels so natural to me.
Starting point is 00:41:16 There's no getting around this. Right. Yeah. So, all right. So now you're out. You came out to your parents before you go to college and your family. How did the siblings react? They were all totally fine.
Starting point is 00:41:27 Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. It's just a generational thing. Do you still get along with all of them? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:41:33 That's good. Yeah. We're all, you know, my parents call every week crying about why aren't you all closer? You know, like, why don't we all stay in better touch with each other? But, you know, relatively speaking, we all get along. yeah yeah it's hard you know i got a brother we're tighter now you go through periods yeah for sure for sure and you've got nieces and nephews and yeah it's like the biggest problem is that occasionally a sibling marries someone who's insane you know yes they marry something something doesn't set well yeah you don't have any control over that no it's gonna watch the the train wreck unfold yeah yeah so all right so you go off to
Starting point is 00:42:18 college and that's where you meet the guys yeah what what it it was was I got to NYU, and I saw Joe Latrullio walking through the hallways of school. And I thought, holy crap. I was like really thought he was really hot. Joe. Joe Latrullio. I know. Isn't that funny? Little Joe?
Starting point is 00:42:37 Yeah. And he came straight from Fort Lauderdale. So all his clothing was just as Miami Vice as it could be at that point. And I remember, so one day I'm walking down the hallway and I see he's in a, he's waiting to drop ad with a counselor. And I said, all right, I'm going to sit down when he goes into the drop ad and eavesdrop, find out what class he's getting into. Then I can get into a class with him.
Starting point is 00:43:04 So I was kind of stalking him. Got into a class with him. The very first movie he makes, it was a movie class, was about just how much he loves his girlfriend. So I was like, all right, forget Joe. But then he said, my comedy group is going to be doing a show tonight. Now, wait, did you ever try girls? No, no, I didn't.
Starting point is 00:43:22 I kissed a girl once and i and here's the thing i was so terrible i tried to it's the comedian thing i tried to make a joke out of our budding relationship that we were this was in the fifth grade so i don't know i don't even what's that 10 or something yeah i think so. And yeah, one day I was like, I got something for you. And it was a ring box. And inside was just like a mound of mustard and some coffee grounds.
Starting point is 00:43:57 What is that? I don't know. I just always like doing bizarre jokes rather than. How'd that land? That did not land well at all. But you kissed a girl and it was not for you i kissed her and in my mind's eye i was like oh this is that was like kissing a dog's nose you know just being dramatic because i wanted i had put a lot of pressure on the moment it was the first spin the bottle game in the fifth grade uh first alcohol party and um i had wanted there to be fireworks like bobby brady on right on whatever the brady bunch and it wasn't and then that night
Starting point is 00:44:33 i woke up from a dream where i got stuck in a revolving door with the boy next door again who's now 10 although still discouraged from hanging around me and and we kissed in the dream and it was so powerful that it woke me up now when was the first time you kissed a guy gosh well i started i started using my wiles of uh wouldn't it be funny if we took off all our clothes on a on my best friend in roundabout when we were 11 or 12. Right. So we started streaking and he's, you know, he's just a straight guy. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:45:11 Who, you know, I think a lot of young guys that age are just like, well, we're not doing anything with girls yet. Let's do a little experimentation. And he probably was not aware of just how manipulative I was being. Yeah. So we did a lot of taking off all our clothes and rubbing up against each other and not actual sex or kissing because that would be gay. Yeah, yeah.
Starting point is 00:45:34 You don't want to be gay. You want to have some fun time rubbing. Yeah. So I look back very fondly on that whole experience. But I wonder if... You Facebook friends with that guy? I was for a while. And you have to wonder if you approach that person today and said,
Starting point is 00:45:54 do you remember that? They probably would not say yes. Yeah, they might not say yes. I want to thank you for rubbing on me because that really helped me in my development. I don't know if you remember that, but it's pivotal for me, the streaking and rubbing we did. Did you talk about that on the podcast, the rubbing? No, I haven't yet. I should explore that.
Starting point is 00:46:12 You always have to invent new names for people. Of course. Yeah. All right, so you got a crush on Joe Atrullio. He's got a girlfriend, but then he says, I got a comedy group. Yeah, and I went to see the very first show that the state ever did that night at uh this little black box theater in nyu and what struck me was that as soon as that show started there was this energy in the room that i i just assumed i
Starting point is 00:46:40 was like wait a minute we're all like freshmen here. How long has this group been around? Because the audience was so lit up and the group was so lit up. And there was just this feeling of this is a really happening creative entity. And it was their first show. And there was like, what, 12 of them? Yeah, there was like literally there was like 16 when the group and and then five disappeared before the first show started. But most of the core group was there in that first show. And I remember saying to my friends that I went to see the show with my brand new college buddies, I want to be in that group.
Starting point is 00:47:23 And I remember them saying, you? Because that was my thing. I was always bland, nice, Midwestern Catholic boy until I would get drunk and start being really funny. So that became my plan. I'm going to get into more and more classes with those guys, hang out with them afterwards, get drunk, take off all my clothes in public and start to impress them that I'm crazy. And it worked. So you got in a group by just like stalking all of them. Yes.
Starting point is 00:47:59 Yeah. Yeah. I've had that feeling. I mean, I've done that when I was in high school and stuff or even later where you're like, well, those are the cool guys. Those are the guys. They're doing something I want to be part of. Oh, absolutely.
Starting point is 00:48:09 And I'm just a needy, too much information kind of draining guy. Yeah. How do I wedge my way in? Yeah. Well, you're at NYU. You're like, Jesus, we're only here for four years. You only live once. Let's get into the group that's making the funny movies.
Starting point is 00:48:25 What was the moment that impressed them? We were all out at this. So I had gotten into a film crew with Joe and Michael Jan. And we went out with the rest of the group one night to this bar called the dugout on second avenue in the east village it was like a sports bar and uh i got very drunk and i went into the bathroom there of this bar and realized that i was standing in about an inch of uh urine water yellowish water on the floor there at this bar and i took off all my clothes except for my boots and headed out into the bar, totally naked in a East Village bar,
Starting point is 00:49:09 and lifted a glass of beer and started improvising a whaling song, which all I remember of it was that it started, standing in an inch of urine, well, becomes the sailing man. And then it went on from there, and everyone's like, we've got to get this maniac in the group.
Starting point is 00:49:27 Yeah. That was your audition piece. Yeah. That was your showcase. And they let you in. They let me in based on that. And that was, what, the end of freshman year?
Starting point is 00:49:41 That was sometime in sophomore year. So I started contributing written pieces to the group and then that was sometime in sophomore year so i started contributing written pieces to the group and then it was sometime in junior year that i became a full-fledged member but um but it was really rough and hard because the group was from the very beginning super competitive um and super you know there there's there was that roasting sense of humor. I always joke around in my stories and say that everyone would poke at each other's egos in order to make sure no one's ego got too big. But my problem was my ego's always been too small.
Starting point is 00:50:18 Right. So I was always kind of the nice guy who would often just end up low on the totem pole because of it in terms of what does that mean low on the totem because if you wrote something then you got to cast it right right and there was a lot of tension all the time about who's getting more roles or not and is this fair and is this democratic who was running the group? Well, that's the thing. No one was officially running the group, but there were several people like Tom Lennon and Ben Garant and Michael Black who were just writing sketches so consistently. Show Walter and Wayne?
Starting point is 00:50:59 Show Walter and Wayne, definitely. But Wayne was the person that I should have looked to as my greatest inspiration throughout the whole process. Because he was a lot like me. He was the guy who would make everyone laugh in the writer's room. And then everyone would say, we ain't doing that. Yeah. You know, that was really funny.
Starting point is 00:51:17 But you're ridiculous. You're too silly. I would get that same reaction. And, you know, like Meloks used to have to deal with that on your show of shows right like we all loved that but we can't put that on tv but who was deciding that the rest of the group yeah it was always it was always a vote it's so funny because we all have mellowed out like like like black really was a could really be a snarky asshole to you back back in the group. I remember him once just like filling his mouth with water from a from a bottle and just spitting it all over me for no reason.
Starting point is 00:51:58 Yeah. What the fuck was that? Yeah. But I think we've all really mellowed out black is the guy who most inspired and helped me with the whole idea of starting risk really because when we went to end mtv i was the one who proposed my ideas were usually shot down and i here's the thing i could propose an idea to the group and people would say no no no no no and then someone else could just reword it right and everyone's like that's great right so the when we got to mtv i suggested look we rib
Starting point is 00:52:35 each other all day long can there be at least be like a half hour at the beginning of the day where we just like drop all that and and and tell each other how we're really feeling, which is funny because that's kind of like risk, you know? And so at the beginning of the day, we would have check-in. This was an idea of mine that the group actually liked. And what happened was because everyone in the group would hang out with each other 24-7, except for me, because I was the gay dude who wanted to be going out at night, you know. Being gay.
Starting point is 00:53:10 Yeah, in some sub-basement in the meatpacking district. Did you do that stuff? Oh, God, yeah. I mean, I was always going to orgies and sex clubs. In college? Yeah. And that's what my first stories on risk are all about the misadventures of a young midwestern friendly guy who's you know in central park at four o'clock in
Starting point is 00:53:32 the morning you did all that old school yeah i always say to people i think i'm basically a 1970s queer you know what i mean i i should have the hanky out of my back pocket. Yeah, young guys today with all the, oh, we're so precious. We want to get married. We want the white picket. But also there's just tender. There's no reason to, or whatever the gay version is. What is that one? Oh, Grindr.
Starting point is 00:53:56 Grindr. Like there's no, it doesn't seem like the mystery and the weird secretiveness and sort of like there's that area where you got to go and wander around the bushes. I imagine it still exists, but now people are meeting there on purpose. Like, I'll see you at the thing. People go to gay bars and you'll see them on Grindr being like, oh, I'm on the other side of the room. Right. Like, oh, I'll take my head out of the phone for a second to nod at you. Yeah, so all the mystery and excitement is...
Starting point is 00:54:31 And also a lot of the community. Like gay bars, many, many, many less gay bars today than in the 90s. Because they're no longer necessary? Yeah, yeah. People are just hooking up via these things. And I think that there needs to be a lot more talking about what we're all about. Because people treat each other online terribly. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:54:53 You know? The famous Grindr line, no fats, no fems, no Asians. It's like, could anything be more rude to have as your regular profile? Anyway. So you were running around. You were going to the meatpacking district in basements, finding yourself in interesting situations with several people. Yes. And then I would show up at MTV the next day and I'd tell my story at check-in.
Starting point is 00:55:19 And Lennon and Black were always like, geez, Kevin always has the best check-in. and Black were always like, geez, Kevin always has the best check-ins. So Black was like, you should get up on stage and share this stuff. And I thought, no, wait a minute. Hollywood is not going to like that. That's not going to get me a role on a sitcom one day. Yeah, right.
Starting point is 00:55:41 So I just said, it just seems too risky. So for the 12 years after the state broke up, I was just doing bullshit on stage and being totally fearful and hiding behind characters. And it wasn't until Black came to one of my shows. I did a show in 2008 called F Up about five characters who had fucked up their careers. Obviously autobiographical. But it still wasn't really connecting with people. But at that time, were you devastated when the state broke up? Totally.
Starting point is 00:56:13 The night that we were, the day that we were fired from CBS, because we quit MTV, because we thought we were going to hit the big time on the networks, thought we were going to be on ABC going up against SNL. Right. And then they pulled that out from us just as soon as we had quit MTV officially, I think. And then we went to CBS instead and did one special. And Les Moonves was coming into CBS at that time.
Starting point is 00:56:39 Changing the guard. And he was like, I can't wrap my mind around 11 kids sketch comedy. Just get rid of that show for now. So we were just immediately fired after one special. Who would speak for the group usually in those situations? We had two managers who did not get along with each other and it was messy. Why did you have two managers? One was a former agent, a William Morris kind kind of guy and another was an mtv producer
Starting point is 00:57:07 or you know freelance producer at mtv and the two of them would not share all the details with us a lot it wasn't we didn't even know i think that mtv had actually offered us before we quit uh five more seasons so that would have been like, I don't know, triple the amount of episodes we'd already done. And we also didn't know that MTV was just about to be in 25 million more homes.
Starting point is 00:57:36 So we really, really should have stayed put. Yeah. But we tried to go for something that we thought was going to be bigger and made the same mistake with movies we had an independent producer who did kids and who did Citizen Ruth and a bunch of big indie films
Starting point is 00:57:51 he wanted us but we were like no no no we're going to go to the Walt Disney Corporation who strung us along for a year and a half until we were starving so some misstepping and then was it did that cause infighting? yeah totally the morale of the
Starting point is 00:58:05 group just just fell into the toilet and it seemed it was one of those cases where it's like it's kind of like a marriage where you're like oh geez no matter what we're doing this is this is just crappy now yeah yeah and so everyone goes their own way? Was there rifts that were unresolved? There was an unspoken, unofficial thing. None of us takes on a job that is going to seriously take us away from being able to work with the group, from making the group our main thing. This is after everything falls away. Yeah, after CBS and everything, it was still kind of that situation.
Starting point is 00:58:44 You could take little freelance jobs or whatever, but not something that was going to take over your whole career. away yeah well yeah after cbs and everything it was still kind of that situation right you could take little freelance jobs or whatever but not something that was going to take over your whole career and a few of the guys went over to comedy central to pitch viva variety yeah and comedy central took it and so all of a sudden about three or four members of the group three or four or five members of the group were there and the rest of us were carrie ben tom uh yeah and uh black right um and the rest of us were kind of out in the wilderness and so yeah there was some very very serious uh tension at first because i remember they invited us to their first live taping and we got there. It was our makeup people, our lighting people, our old sets and everything. And it was just everything except like five of us.
Starting point is 00:59:33 That's horrible. So there was just a feeling of, you know, like that really ended up breaking it all up. And there was a lot of tension around it. But here's the thing. That really ended up breaking it all up. And there was a lot of tension around it. But here's the thing. In retrospect, I really came around to see that those guys were just doing self-defense.
Starting point is 00:59:57 You know, those guys were doing what anyone would do. You know, you got to eat. You got to find the next job. And the group, no one could deny that the group at that point was just completely dysfunctional and demoralized and just having a hard time agreeing on anything so i really can't blame them but because of your particular lifestyle you know you you probably you felt completely set adrift i imagine oh god yeah go on what were you gonna i'm just saying because your whole identity and and everything you had worked towards emotionally was built around this group and you were already uh sort of an and not an outsider but you were the gay one yeah who had
Starting point is 01:00:36 a hard time controlling his impulses and his drinking so i imagine when everything got hard, you just, God knows what you did. I just, yeah. I did. I really lost my mind. And that's about the time that I also discovered Fire Island. You know, I was now at the age where I had friends who were able to get their hands on serious drugs. You know, like serious party drugs and stuff like that so yeah i was and also i became obsessed with this idea of the survival job you know i started doing cater waitering and really
Starting point is 01:01:15 so you your confidence didn't enable you to really perform at all yeah i was i i would get up at luna lounge um you know once every two or three months or three months, and that was me continuing to do work in the business. Just all character work. Yeah. You didn't have the courage to sort of get under that. Yeah. I mean, if I had had the sense to, I should have gone right to UCB and started taking classes, you know, because they were just starting at that time. And that would have been crazy seeming because here's a guy who was on this big hit TV show now taking classes.
Starting point is 01:01:51 But that would have been a hell of a lot smarter than just hiding in my apartment most of the time. But who the hell knows if that would have worked? I mean, it seemed like you were like that, that your identity outside of your gay identity, which was evolving. But your professional identity was completely locked in with those guys i mean yeah you probably had you know what you needed to move on but you just didn't have the confidence or the you know your shame was too great or something yeah and i was i was too i i should have stayed in much better touch with everyone else i was i isolated was what it was and you were drinking a lot i was drinking a lot and uh you know i would have some even like some suicidal moment that's when i started taking
Starting point is 01:02:31 antidepressants yeah so so yeah those were just really rough yeah years those were years of like going from one survival job to another and being recognized all the time catering yeah catering i remember having to like carry a tray up to doug herzog at a ballet fundraiser once who was the president of i guess he was the president of comedy central by that time and mtv yeah yeah yeah and just handing my tray to the waiter next to me and saying, I am not going up to that table. I don't wonder. I wonder why you chose to do that. You know, it's so demoralizing. But sexually, you like that. It's a submissive position. Oh.
Starting point is 01:03:15 You know, it's funny because Joe Latrullio did it for a week. And then he was like, you know, because he was like, I need some money too. And I said, well, there's this thing I do. So he did it for a week. And then he was like i need some money too and and i said well there's this thing i do so he did it for a week and then he was like kevin no one with any self-respect can do that and i was like yeah i know i'm gonna keep doing it for a while i think but it's interesting how that that that you know plays itself you know in your emotional script sexually as well,
Starting point is 01:03:48 that there's something about the comfort of that shame. Yeah, and acting out. Because when I was catering, I would be the guy, huge line of waiters walking out of a kitchen into the Metropolitan Opera House. I'm the guy with the bottle of wine in his hand who is literally dumping it into his mouth as he's walking out on, you know, before anyone can see. I would I remember, you know, throwing up in a fucking tuxedo right in the, you know, in the yard of some, you know, Connecticut wedding. I remember blowing another waiter at some big like she,
Starting point is 01:04:27 she wedding. Oh God. Yeah. It was, it was, those were messy years. Not your, not your shining moments.
Starting point is 01:04:40 Those were not the best year, but it's, but it is kind of odd. odd the this sort of this war against shame yeah that like that the podcast risk you know is you know really on some level about yeah because the only thing outside of you know general appropriateness it stops people from speaking their their heart or sharing those moments that that could be liberating and not just for themselves or others the only thing that stops that uh if it you know like i said outside of it being the appropriate time to do that is shame yeah and
Starting point is 01:05:16 shame is is so powerful and it's what holds so many people in that weird stasis of you know not being able to take action of not being being able to make their life better, because shame runs so fucking deep that it just, it feels like home to a lot of people. Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. I think it's, you know, that is a place of comfort. And, you know, the guilty feeling, like I have a running monologue in my head all day long of oh you you
Starting point is 01:05:47 should be ashamed of the fact that you don't keep the house tidier it just goes from one thing to another just beat yourself up all the time yeah you're never never it's never right never good enough never like i'm always but but it's weird though because you like when you sexualize that does that get you any relief uh you know it it's really strange because it's in the times that, like I said, when I've had those BDSM experiences where I am 100% committed to being almost like a slave serving someone on the floor, there's real comfort in that because it's giving up all control and there's no reason to beat yourself up because someone else is and there's a context and it's you know it's safe but to a degree yeah yeah you can't that situation can't really work unless you the sub have respect for the dom, right?
Starting point is 01:06:45 A lot of people think domination is, oh, I'm going to be brutal and yell a lot and all that. No, a sub is going to react to someone that they feel like this person is smart and sensitive enough to know when they're going too far with me or that sort of thing. So now how did you get involved with fetish and, and, and kink in general?
Starting point is 01:07:08 Because when risk started, I, I kind of lost a marriage at the, at the very beginning of risk. It went on when I was 31, I entered into a relationship that became a marriage. We literally got married. And in fact,
Starting point is 01:07:24 we've never divorced because we're like, ah, it's $500 to get divorced. Asian guy. Yes. And, and see, that's,
Starting point is 01:07:31 that's the thing. I mean, once, once I was married to a Filipino guy for nine years, then that was the turning point of after that, I was just not interested in anyone else. I mean, any other ethnicity or whatever.
Starting point is 01:07:47 So, yeah, it was an open relationship, but it was open with very strict parameters. There was no actual romance allowed to be happening with other people. Just you could casually have a hookup with someone or go to a sex club or something. So that worked for us for nine years and it wasn't the open part of the relationship that ended up ending it it was that after nine years we felt like we were more like brothers or friends and and the romance was kind of gone and we felt like god we we just don't feel like we're lovers anymore so we went our separate ways and we're still friends which i'm proud of actually
Starting point is 01:08:25 i think that's a good thing when you can make that happen yeah um but anyway part of the breakup was that i started risk and i realized oh this is going to become to be doing a weekly podcast and starting to travel and do shows and then i was starting to try to create a school too i have a school called the story studio um how's that going it that's going well that's the thing that pays most of the bills i do a lot of corporate workshops especially and you know i have to explain to people you know we tell x-rated stories or any kind of stories on risk but storytelling translates into any realm you know you just make adjustments for the context um so that's the story studio is going great but anyway in those for in that first year
Starting point is 01:09:14 and a half he was like you're not making any money on this and it has become your full-time job i can't hang around anymore you need to get a full-time job i said if i get a full-time job i can't hang around anymore you need to get a full-time job i said if i get a full-time job then that's the end of risk and risk is the first thing that's worked for me artistically since the state broke up yeah so we just agreed that that that was going to be it yeah um and i can't blame him either yeah you, I, we both understood where we were coming from. Although I did say to him, listen, hang around a couple of years and this is going to like start taking off. And indeed it has.
Starting point is 01:09:51 Yeah. So anyway, yeah. Oh, so all of a sudden I'm 41 years old. I've got this podcast and I'm telling people, take a risk, take a risk. And so people started challenging me to take risks. So a guy came up to me once after a show and he said, I'm going to this kink camp in a couple of weeks. You should come with me. And I said, oh, I know I've told stories about doing crazy shit in my 20s that were sexual, but I really don't know anything about bondage and discipline and sadomasochism.
Starting point is 01:10:24 That was just me going to clubs and stuff as a kid and he said no kevin take a risk so i go to this kink camp and this became the most famous story that's been done on risk it's like a two episode story called kevin goes to kink camp and I show up and there's no gay men there. I hadn't realized that, oh, this is like mostly straight, even lesbian and bisexual people. But here's the thing. I kept telling people at the camp,
Starting point is 01:10:58 people are like, well, there's plenty of bi men here. And I'm like, no, no, no, you don't understand. A guy who grew up like me. I can't just poke someone on the back and say, Hey, you want to like, I have to know that everyone in the room is a gay man and it's totally safe. Otherwise I'm afraid you're going to kill me.
Starting point is 01:11:19 Could turn very easily. So I just couldn't get over that conditioning i couldn't get over that you know this is in fact a safe space so at the end of it i ended up but just for having my first sexual experience with a woman who uh now it wasn't me stooping her it was she got out a strap on her name was strap on joe so that was a hint of where it was all gonna go. Right. So that was your first sexual experience with a woman. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:11:51 Getting fucked. In a sling, yeah. In some grungy back room of a... Now, is King Camp in the woods? It is. It's a former Boy Scout camp. Oh, isn't that ironic? Yeah.
Starting point is 01:12:06 Yeah. So was it that experience that sort of started you on this strange fetishistic path? It did. But at the time, it was this sort of eureka moment where I felt like, because in my early 20s, I felt so connected to the gay community because we were still dealing with the AIDS situation at that time. So ACT UP, there was a lot of activism and there was just a lot of like, oh, we are the new sexual revolution. Right. But by the time I was done with my marriage, the new gay thing was marriage.
Starting point is 01:12:43 Like, you know, let's try to fit in to the rest of heterosexual society as best as we can. And all of a sudden I couldn't relate to most of the gay community anymore, as far as I could tell. So here I was in this kink environment. All these people are straight and bi people who are basically taking all their notes from things that they've learned from gay culture in the 50s and 60s. Right. It's a little behind the curve. Yeah. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:13:13 Maybe these guys had something going. Yeah. And the Internet makes it all possible. You know, FetLife is like Facebook for kinksters. And people just share and share all these ideas of things you can try you know there's a group for every fetish and it's crazy what fetishes have stuck with you i mean like which ones did you like i'm not gonna i never thought i'd be that guy and now you're that guy yeah well exactly like when i had my the the the second story that i did on this subject was called Beyond Kink Camp, where this Asian guy wrote to me one night on FetLife.
Starting point is 01:13:51 And he said, hey, I understand you're into Asian guys. I'm into mature guys. Yeah. And you're like, I guess I can do that. Yeah. And his handle was something like little China boy. So I'm like, all right, this works. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:14:10 But as we got to know each other, he's a 25-year-old college student, super smart, who knows the ins and outs of BDSM because he's been studying it online for years you know i'm like completely out of the loop he's having he would we would get on the phone and do role playing and he would be like we did we had we didn't meet for the first five weeks it was all on the phone or texting and he would say stuff like should i crawl on my hands and knees with my tongue out and wagging my ass for you like a little bitch daddy. And I'd say, yes, you do that. Because otherwise I'd be like, actually, I have no idea what I'm doing here. Right. You know, so eventually he had these midterm exams.
Starting point is 01:15:04 Right. So eventually he had these midterm exams, right? And it had gotten to the point where he was so mentoring me. He was teaching me this, that, and the other. So finally one day his midterms were over and I knew, oh, he's going to be, he can talk to me again because he's finally done with all his studies. So I called him and I said, are you exhausted? And he said, get on your knees. That'll make me feel better. And I was like, whoa, he's turning the tables.
Starting point is 01:15:28 And I realized that I had like an instant erection. Yeah. And he keeps talking to me like this. And I asked him if I could masturbate, if that was okay while we were having this conversation. He said, okay. He said, but isn't this humiliating for you that I'm telling you I'm spitting in your face and telling you to lick my ass? And I said, yes, but I feel like I would kiss the ground you walk on right now. And he said, then you're ready. And he said,
Starting point is 01:15:58 Friday, you're going to get a text from me, but keep Friday night open. so friday i get a text from him and it's this long list of instructions duct tape the front door of your apartment building so that it won't lock duct tape the door of your own apartment or just leave that you're putting everyone in the building for your fantasy this is someone i have never seen. And he's like, I want you naked, bowing on the floor blindfolded for when I arrive. So it's this weird thing where I'm like, well, he'll be here sometime in the next hour, you know? And I'm naked and blindfolded on the floor.
Starting point is 01:16:40 And you've taped the doors. Yeah, and your mind just starts to go, you know, when you're staring into blackness like that. But the last thing he texted me was, oh, by the way, those images I've been sending you of me these past five weeks, those are actually of me. So as I'm there blindfolded on the floor, I'm starting to think, why was that the last thing he said? It hadn't even occurred to me before that those might not be him. Might this not be him? And then I start like thinking, wait, is he already in the room?
Starting point is 01:17:18 Is that his breath right near my ear? You just start flipping out. But you're committed to it. But I'm committed. You don't pull the blindfold off no and he comes because you know he's got this sort of i don't know um energy over me at this point so finally i hear he does enter the room and he starts talking to me and now here's the thing on grinder in the several weeks, I had also been flirting with this black guy.
Starting point is 01:17:47 This guy was like a Ph.D. and was very knowledgeable about cinema, about foreign cinema. So we were talking about Fellini and Bergman and all that kind of stuff. And I finally decided with the black guy, you know, I'm I don't know. It's I've got to focus elsewhere right now i'm i don't think this is going to work and he the last thing he texted to me on grinder was oh you're not going to get rid of me that easily so when the young man comes up to me and pulls my you know pulls me by the hair once he's actually in my apartment. And I start like feeling around. Eventually we got to the point where he had tied my hands behind my back
Starting point is 01:18:28 and he was making me take his underwear off with my teeth. And when I felt his cog hit me in the face, I was like, this is not a five foot three Chinese guy. I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa whoa whoa whoa wait a minute this guy feels and seems much taller and he smells like a burly alpha man i was like i think this is the black guy from grinder yeah so so i start to just like go into it he's's making me call a master. Well, you don't know the voice? No, I knew the voice from the phone, but I still, you know, maybe the guy on the phone was just fucking with me.
Starting point is 01:19:13 So he put on this different blindfold on me. And at a certain point, he could tell that I was gone, that I was kind of like going into another, you know, energy because I was freaking out about who the hell is this guy and so he said i'm gonna open a sliver of this blindfold so that you can see so i'm kind of like searching with one eye around to the room just do oh there's a light bulb there and then i see these asian eyes yeah and i was just euphoric because I was like, oh,
Starting point is 01:19:46 that was all in my head. Yeah. Like he just had that, that effect on me. Yeah. So, he started skull...
Starting point is 01:19:55 Yeah. He started skull fucking me and now I was just totally like relishing it. Yeah. And, and you were asking before, what's something, you know, where you didn't think that would ever happen before? He would do these things to me.
Starting point is 01:20:13 Like at one point he was like, I got to go get something here. Just stick your face in my boot for a while. So he shoves my face in his boot and I'm smelling this smelly boot and finding that there's this tremendous comfort in this act. Yeah. Like, I'm like, I feel like a kid, a baby with his blankie all of a sudden. Yeah. And then when he's doing the skull fucking thing, I start to really gag. I'm not used to, I wasn't even familiar with the fact that some people get off on making
Starting point is 01:20:44 a really choke. Yeah. So at one point, I pulled back just out of natural. But then I felt his cock kind of jump in my mouth and heard him go, ha, ha, ha, ha. And realized, oh, he really likes that when I start to be in pain and gag on it. So I started just doing it again and again and again, like deliberately hurting myself in order to give him pleasure and kind of loving that.
Starting point is 01:21:11 And so that was really a moment of what's going on here. I've never like felt this before. And finally I started to have this realization that there is this thing about Asian guys where, you know, I know that they feel so alien and weird and considered in American society to not have all the prowess and the sexual. They're not the sex symbols and all that sort of thing. the sexual they're not the sex symbols and all that sort of thing and i know from being a little boy and feeling so alien and feeling like so afraid that i'm so weird and different that i remembered seeing the king and i when i was eight years old weirdly enough it was sarah jessica parker that took me yeah one and only time i've ever seen that person why she just happened to be the best friend of the girl next door and they had extra tickets
Starting point is 01:22:13 so sarah jessica parker took me to the night that i saw the king and i and the birth of a fetish how old were you then it was about seven or eight. Sarah Jessica Parker? Yeah. How old was she? I don't know. She's like four years older than me, maybe. So your kids? Yeah, tiny little kids going to see the king and I. Well, with the next door neighbor's parent.
Starting point is 01:22:36 Right. Right. But anyway, I remember seeing the king and how the king was so magnificent and how he would whip people and stuff like that. And I remember feeling like, oh, my gosh, I want to bow down before a guy like that. So here I am with this guy who's got me blindfolded and my arms tied behind my back thinking, I know what it is. I see Asian guys on the subway and I look at them and think, you think you're weird. You think you're an alien.
Starting point is 01:23:08 You think you can't talk about what's inside you normally out in public. Or sing. Exactly. Or dance. But I know that inside you is a king, you know, and I want to bow to that. So it's at that moment that I'm having this little bit of almost like an out-of-body remembrance of that and realization of what's going on here that I throw up water all over the floor because I've finally gone so far with the gagging. So you're getting, you know, mouth fucked and you're thinking about the king. I saw a musical.
Starting point is 01:23:56 Sorry, you throw up all over the place. I throw up all over the place. And then I said, sorry, master. And again, I said i i felt it again i felt you know because earlier i was not able to say master when i thought he might be someone else so that was the big breakthrough that was kind of a breakthrough and the thing of it was i was always searching i've been searching for that since you know yeah the thing about these kinky sort of things is people always say oh now you're on the beginning of your
Starting point is 01:24:25 kink adventure but i've had mostly disappointments since then you know um there are many times that i feel like oh yeah it'd be nice to just settle into a perfectly normal well maybe that'll happen i mean i don't think i think you have to just be open to all of it yeah yeah yeah is that something you want uh yes i do i well i would like not not monogamy i've never wanted monogamy um but but yes i would like to have a primary partner you know who you know kind of like my husband back in the day, but I could still explore and experiment. And I think that when you're with someone for an extended period, you fall into patterns.
Starting point is 01:25:12 Sure, of course. You know, I would not want to be with someone where every night it's like, all right, let's string you up and pretend you're... Here we go again. Right. Hoisting you up with an elaborate pulley system. Yeah. But yeah, who knows what the future holds?
Starting point is 01:25:31 I think that I am feeling my age lately. How old are you? You know, I'm 44. And I did start drinking again. Yeah. About, well, in February.ary yeah how long had you not nine years be careful yeah yeah i've i've i've don't get sad again well i've succeeded that's the thing i've succeeded at the literal uh whatever you call it, moderation of it to a certain extent.
Starting point is 01:26:07 You know what I mean? Not as much as I would like, but it's the sadness. You know? It just feeds itself. And guilt. And guilt. I think I'm more addicted to guilt than anything else. Shame.
Starting point is 01:26:21 Yeah. It's like guilt. There's a moral component to guilt but it seems like you you've got a shame core yeah so if you do things that you feel guilty about it's just gonna feed that monster you're better off you know getting skull fucked and becoming a drunk again yeah words to live by thanks for for talking to me, Kevin. I'm so happy for your success. Check out the show at risk-show.com.
Starting point is 01:26:51 All right, buddy. All right, folks, that's our show. I love Kevin. I thought that was wonderful. Go to wtfpod.com for all your WTFpod needs. Do what you got to do over there. It's a little early for me to jam out of my guitar here in the garage. I know some of you are going to be like, oh, thank God.
Starting point is 01:27:18 Thank God. Saved. Now I can just ease into my day without Marin in a very needy and demanding way blasting his okay guitar improvisations into my head. Not today. Go look at the tour dates at WTFpodslashcalendar. Go post a comment. Do what you got to do. Buy some merch. Give me more posters coming.
Starting point is 01:27:45 Thank you all for the tour art. I will get back to you personally when i have time to sit down i've chosen uh almost all the posters that i'm going to be using for the tour and i can't stop fucking eating just sit at craft services all day grazing shoveling things into my face at different Shoveling things into my face at different speeds, sometimes desperately, sometimes casually. But sometimes I eat hard. I eat hard, folks. Boomer lives! We'll be right back. Order now. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. 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,
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