WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 811 - Joel Hodgson / Jonah Ray

Episode Date: May 14, 2017

Joel Hodgson took his Midwestern sensibility, his interest in theater of the absurd, his standup comedy experience, and his robot assembly skills, put them together and created the beloved comedy institution Mystery Science Theater 3000. Joel takes Marc through the process of making MST3K, from its start on a local UHF station to its revival on Netflix. The new MST3K stars Marc's neighbor Jonah Ray, who also stops by to talk about being in one of his all-time favorite shows and doing the new season of his own show Hidden America. 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.

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. You can get anything you need with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get snowballs on Uber Eats. But meatballs and mozzarella balls, 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! all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fucking ears what the fuck sticks what's happening i'm mark maron this is my podcast wtf welcome to it some of you know me some of you maybe you're just tuning in for the first time because you're a big Joel Hodgson fan. Yeah. Joel Hodgson. You know what? I think my ability

to speak is deteriorating. It's not senility. It's not Alzheimer's. I just think that my tongue and my ability to enunciate is just giving up. It's giving up. Joel Hodgson is here today from MST Mystery Science Theater 3000. They're doing it again. It's happening. And coincidentally, also on the show today, someone who is on the new MST3K, Jonah Ray, to promote something else. But we got a little bit in for the other thing. He's my buddy.

He's been on my TV show. He lives down the street from me. Always nice to see Jonah. So big doubleheader here today. So I'll try not to go too crazy talking about my own shit. But welcome to the show if this is your first time. If it's not, nice to have you back how you holding up are you okay uh i'm out of town still i you know i've been at it man i have been

at it but uh in all honesty the the two real tour has concluded my tour dates are done but look if you still want to see me live i'll be at book con saturday june 3rd in new york city come hear me talk about the uh the new wtf book waiting for the punch with my producer brendan mcdonald you'll get an advanced copy of the book and we'll sign it for you what do you think of that you can go to thebookcon.com for tickets so i've been out i've been around I've been pushing the limits with the stand-up. As many of you know, I taped that special. I guess it's going to be a couple weeks ago now in Minneapolis, and we got to cut that.

Lynn Shelton and myself, she directed it. All the dates that were from the two-reel tour, beginning with Carnegie Hall, even a little. It was actually before Carnegie Hall. I did some club dates and then moved into the theaters. And it was all sort of converging on that, on the special. Been doing a lot of stand-up. And last weekend, which would have been the day before yesterday,

last Friday and Saturday, it was kind of, it was pretty crazy. Because I think the last time I talked to you guys, I was in New York doing the glow junket, doing the press for the gorgeous ladies of wrestling but then I did a lot of running around leading up to the final show of the tour at uh at the Warner Theater in Washington DC so I was in New York and on the Thursday I went down to uh I took the train took the train down to DC now, you know, I'm not an elitist in any way. And, uh, you know, I don't, uh, I don't like making a big deal about things or, or being ostentatious, but I'll be honest with you. Brendan and I had to go down to DC

on Thursday to do some business Friday morning. We had somebody we had to talk to. And, uh, I got, I got his first class tickets on the Acela train from New York to DC. It's about three and a half hour run. The Acela is already a fast, you know, in terms of Amtrak, it's a little more pricey. It's supposedly an all business class train, but I figured, hey, let's live a little and do the first class thing. But you know what, you know what it really comes down to is, I don't know if you've ever had to get on a train in one of the major metropolitan areas like Philly or New York or DC, but the, the panic, the panic of boarding is, is something I wanted to avoid. And apparently I was willing to spend a few dollars to do it. Just that sort of, you don't know what track it's going to be

on. If you're a Penn station, you're just sitting there like in, in starting position, you're, you're in starting position. You got one foot in front of the other when it's coming down to the wire on on your time of departure and just looking at that board and when they drop that track number you got to like wait you try to familiarize yourself with the architecture of the situation and figure out where all the tracks are and maybe you know that if you do it regularly i don't but then you're just right you're just waiting to bolt waiting to bolt with everybody else just that panic of 50 to 100 people just like ah the track seven and uh i don't know i wanted to avoid that and it was worth the a few dollars extra to avoid that you sit in the first

class on a train it's not like an airplane but you do recline a little bit and they do give you some food and uh and it was nice give me a time to talk to Brendan, catch up. And we didn't have to go through the panic, the bolting panic of boarding a train. So we went down to D.C., and then Friday morning we did the thing. Then Brendan went back home. And then I went up to Philly to do the Miriam Theater with my buddy Nate Bargetzi. And the Philly crowd was great. It was a great night

and uh we did a nice tight show I wasn't feeling great but I didn't I didn't I didn't make a big deal out of it I just did my job and the set is so goddamn tight right now I didn't uh it wasn't like I walked through it or slept through it but I I did my job I was a little compromised physically and then somehow or another we managed to get a uh roast pork sandwich in with the broccoli rob and the uh provolone uh mine was sitting in my dressing room the guy who the stage manager over at the miriam had set us up i didn't get over to john's or denix didn't have time there was no time coming up from dc getting settled getting my shit together then uh we do that show eat the roast pork crash next day up take the train back down to D.C.

And you know what? From Philly to D.C., I did it again. I got first class. I'm living it. I'm living large, getting first class on the Amtrak. That's where I'm at. So now I'm going back down to D.C. And, you know, I spent some time in D.C., Washington, D.C., which, of course, is the focus of all of our attention,

all of our anxious attention, all of our anxious attention, all of our terrified attention, depending on which side you're falling on. Some of you are, I guess, a couple of you, you're just thrilled with every minute of spontaneous horror. But those of you who have listened to this show for a while know that I like DC. I like going there. It does still and always has represented something, probably a dream.

And it's seeming more and more like a dream of a country to this day. But I still like walking around D.C. So I get to D.C. and, you know, I'm nervous because I'm not hiding the fact that I'm sort of terrified, as our democracy seems to be barely holding. I didn't know if I would witness the carnage that was addressed in the inaugural speech. Like, what is D.C. like now? I had not been there since this administration took control. And I am happy to report, at least on this level, that D.C. was thriving and diverse and exciting

and there was all kinds of things going on with all kinds of different people. I look around at all the people and they're okay. They're getting through it. These people were designed to endure. Americans were designed to hopefully fight for what's right whenever we have the opportunity to do so, but it just felt like America still in Washington DC kind people nice people polite people of all kinds going about their day enjoying the nation's capital and and engaging whatever events they were doing the museums were all open the carnage was not present but it was a different experience for me in this in that you, I've been there and whenever you go there, whoever was ever president doesn't matter, no matter, don't matter who it is,

you look at the White House and you're like, holy shit, there's the White House. And there, there is always a sort of, I believe, maybe I'm unique as an American, a sense of awe to the, to the, the buildings of government. But this was the first time. Like, you know, I just remember going. I've been there many times over my life, and you're always sort of fascinated with it. Why do I project? I'm always sort of fascinated with it.

But this was, like, this time it was more of a disturbed and perverse fascination. Like, this is the first time I stood in front of the White House and thought, is he in there? Do you think he's in there? Is he just, what's he doing in there? Is he just yelling at things? Is he in there, that guy?

Is that guy in there right now? And then there's this other thought, like, you know, if I just, you know, if I showed up with a bucket of KFC and maybe some cheeseburgers, do you think that maybe I could go in and chit chat with him and see where his head's really at? You think he's in there? A sort of weird panic, apprehensive feeling standing outside the White House, which I've had before in different forms.

I've been there for several different presidents, both Democratic and Republican. But this time it was beyond party. It was just like, do you think he's in there? Is he? And I had not had that feeling before. But I will report that, you know, even with whatever tremendous tension and discomfort that some of us are feeling, that the nation's capital still seemed to be a vibrant representation of a diverse country. I did not see the carnage. There was one building that was partially demolished, and I was wondering, is this a construction site,

or is this the actual beginning of the carnage? I don't know. Jury's out on that. Jury is out on that. So let's now talk to my friend Jonah Ray. Jonah is entering season two of Hidden America. That's his show, Hidden America with Jonah Ray. It's now streaming on CISO.

You can also watch him in MST3K, The Return. That is now on Netflix. This is me and the lovely Jonah Ray back in the... You can get anything you need with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get an ice r 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. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category.

And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. Brach. So, Jonah, you seem to have landed on your feet. It's a real touch and go there for a bit.

I landed on one foot and one ankle. Stayed balanced for a while, then got the other foot planted somehow. Yeah, I guess so. So I literally haven't talked to you for a long time, and're neighbors and i guess we just can't find time to hang out i understand that yeah well we we text about music and and then and then there's a couple complaints and that's it yeah let's we should do something okay yeah but it's really it's really about busy it's about being busy and about the fact that i don't really hang out with anybody. Do you not do anything? No, dude. I don't do much of anything. I don't know.

Maybe I'm old. It might be it. Did you expect this of yourself? I never did much. It's a lot to get me out to a show. It's like I'll go do comedy. I'm working a lot. But that's like doing comedy.

That's faux social behavior. No, it's like doing comedy that's like that's faux uh social behavior no it's no it's not faux it's real like if i need to you know touch base with well but it's like if you're in a if you're in an office all day you're like i have tons of friends that i talk to all the time well but no but like doing the road stuff that's the work but like if i want to just keep you know keep in shape or but like if i want to socialize like if i feel like you know i haven't talked to a bunch of dudes in a while. Just talk about chicks and whatever. Exactly.

Yeah. Or whatever it is, a comedy or what. Like I'll go to the comedy store. You know, I'll go early. I'll stay a little bit after my set and I get all caught up. Yeah. I get all the dude energy I need. I get all this sort of like who's doing what, you know, see who's doing what, you know, kind of where they're at joke wise.

And I like seeing people. So it works as sort of a clubhouse when i need it that's true yeah i guess but that's also like i guess a thing that like old guys do they join country clubs i would call the comedy store so a country club by any stretch of the imagination well that's more of a vfw hall for vietnam vets like a country club in hell yeah it's just i don't know if i'm old let's not go crazy with it you said it i'm just yeah but that wasn't an invitation oh okay clobber with you know clobber me with it say it again say it again you're old you're getting old i think i'm getting older no mark no come on you got so much life to live so all right i also want to talk about mst 3000 we're talking about the travel show right yeah yeah i uh just uh last

when we wrapped up the third season of um of the meltdown yeah uh we were also uh wrapping up writing and we were shooting also mystery science theater 3000 and i was writing the second season of hidden america all around the same time now what was the uh what was the uh inception of hidden america what was the pitch how did it all come together uh well i just i i love bourdain and i love his show uh and i love how how awesome it looks and also i i like sketch comedy a lot and i kind of found that you can kind of do a sketch show uh that's also just a uh like a parody of bourdain right and have it be a secret sketch show within it but it's a real travel show though well we go to real places but everyone i talk to is fake uh-huh like it's everyone's playing a character right so it's you know i got

uh yvette nicole brown from community like she's playing uh a dea agent uh that i talked to while coked up in miami uh really coked up uh no no no but i i from experience i was able to uh good bring a lot draw draw from your experience i was able to no draw from experience of me being stuck in a bathroom with a guy talking about tom petty and the heartbreakers oh that's not a bad topic i mean i've had much worse topics in those situations at least something you can that's something you can really lean into yeah it's It's a lot like the topics of our conversations. Like, I think I might have come inside that girl. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, that one can go on for a while. Because that can always trigger like, oh, there's this one time. And you're like, I don't know. We need to do it. Go that far into it. No. But petty.

Why not? Let's go down the rabbit hole. I love it. I'm a big petty fan. So you're coked up. You're talking to a fake DEA agent. So we got like a ton of like you know like we have i go to nashville and i talk to jared logan who like plays like uh uh you know pentecostal preacher

and a tent revival but you go to the places we go to the places sometimes we'll fake it out here just if it's easier but what if you're in the place don't you talk to any indigenous people yeah we talked to some indigenous people uh some local by that i mean locals yeah i don't want to misuse that word if all as much as i can all cast local people for uh parts as much as i can because uh like in last year we did um we did new orleans and so i had sean patton uh play a part and sean pat was able to bring a ton of local uh perspective to the part and same with uh chris true who's an improviser guy down there had him on and it's just people are able to bring a lot of that local flavor to it but why the choice ultimately like uh what stopped you from just doing a real travel show because i only want

to be involved in fake things when i when i did the bing commercials it's like i got a ton of offers i was just like hey there's like a science show where you go around talking to people doing homegrown science projects. I was like, no, I don't want to be me. Yeah. I don't want to do things that, like, I want to try and make the things that I liked when I was growing up. Right. And I never really liked any of those shows.

The real things. Yeah. You might as well do a riff on it, like Spinal Tap It. Yeah, exactly. They got to be in a band yeah yet yeah they also got to have it be fake but let's talk about this mst thing because for me like when i was at comedy central hosting short attention span it was sort of there at the same time and it was like i knew it was a like uh had a very dedicated cult following and it seems like and i talked to joel too it seems like one of those things where those people never left they're just now in their 50s and they're very excited but

there's a whole new generation of people that have watched it over the years that when it's been available yeah yeah yeah or dvd or just tapes but it's definitely one of those things where people know every episode yeah yeah i'm a huge fan of the show and a lot of my friends were too growing up when you're a kid yeah when i was a kid i i of the show, and a lot of my friends were, too, growing up. When you were a kid? Yeah, when I was a kid. I loved the show. I wanted to be on it.

Let's say, you know, I would watch. It's like, you know, I watched everything on Comedy Central. Right. So essentially, I was watching your show, Short-Temped Cement Theater. Were you really? Yes, I was. Huh.

Yeah. Me in my bad outfit, my hair looking awkward in that set. It was a weird set, though. Yeah, yeah. You were set up to fail. Okay. Always, though? No, you had some good stuff.

It was just weird because I had seen you do stand-up on TV. Yeah, and you're like, what? Yet you were hosting clips of stand-up. I know. No, it was mostly promotional clips of movies and TV shows. Weird pack. Like, stand-up, stand-up was really the stand-up. That's right.

That was the... Mine was sort of like pieces of movie promotions that we could build you know themes and things it was ridiculous yeah nothing we pay for nothing like you know we like when when the the dvd box set or the videotape box set of the carson's greatest moments came in we're like great we can build a whole show around carson and act like we made decisions around what we're gonna put put on. It was fucking nuts. And they just give you the EPK. Yeah, and it was just nothing was paid for. It was all, you know, and then we'd have these dumb themes.

Today's theme is the color green. That was terrible. But it was like, but there wasn't that much on Comedy Central. So it was like, I was watching you, Stand Up, Stand Up, Mystery Science Theater 3000, Kids in the Hall was on all the time. Yeah, yeah. Python and Ab Fab. Exit 57 briefly.

That was not, Exit 57 came about after the end of Kids in the Hall. Right. Because remember, after Kids in the Hall was done, it was Vacant Lot and Exit 57. Well, Vacant Lot was Nick McKinney. Yes. Mark's brother. And Exit 57 was- And Paul Greenberg.

Oh, yeah, yeah. That's right. Yeah. Exit 57 was Amy Sedaris, Colbert. Paul Dinello and Colbert. And Mitch Rouse. Oh, yeah, yeah. That's right. Exit 57 was Amy Sedaris. Paul Dinello and Colbert. And Mitch Rouse. Yes. Yeah.

What I loved, like... Jody Lennon. That's right. Mm-hmm. But what I was always thinking about was the opening of Vacant Lot might be the coolest sketch show opening of all time. The running? Was it...

No, no. It's like they're sitting in a dilapidated house and then Pretty Vacant by the Sex Pistols starts playing. And then wind starts blowing. And then the entire house, there's like, just falls out down around them. Yeah.

I was like, it was like a fucking sex pistol song. And this cool set piece for you. It was like, ah, yeah, it's that Venn diagram where you find yourself in the middle of it. And that was always the thing about watching MST too.

It's like, you know, they throw out references to Zappa while you're a kid. Like that's starting to get into music, starting to into comedy yeah and everyone starts to kind of yeah there's a portal it's a portal yeah portal into another world yeah exactly yeah well it's like these people like the same things i do that's a huge thing like what's that that guy likes it i gotta check it out yeah yeah yeah exactly so you're the main guy i'm the new uh test subject yeah i'm the joel mike than me yeah it's uh you know that's what how how'd you feel when you got it like that You're the main guy. I'm the new test subject. Yeah, I'm the Joel, Mike, then me. Yeah.

It's, you know. How did you feel when you got it? Like, that must have been like, you're like, what? Well, when he asked me, it was still like not a real thing. It's like he wasn't, the Kickstarter was long, long before that. He was still kind of thinking about, like, Joel was like, he's like, yeah, I'm thinking about bringing it back, but I want to start slowly, maybe incubate it at a theater in Philly. Really? So I'd want you to move out to Ph it at a theater in philly really so i'd want you to move out to philly is he in philly he's outside of philly no i didn't know in

pennsylvania and um and i was kind of like oh that's weird and it just just kind of was this thing where he wanted me to do and i was like we weren't sure what it was going to be but then as it started he got the rights back and then the kickstarter he was like he's a good guy so i had known it that i would be the guy for a while yeah and then you didn't know if it was going to happen yeah yeah and i was it was nice to kind of know for a while before it was announced just so i could steal myself from all the uh you know nerd anger and rage uh-huh uh oh yeah yeah of course yeah of course yeah i i'm a you know i'm a hipster looking dude. Yeah.

You know, a lot of like, it's a, you know, the, the, the meanest comments I get on the internet, I'll look at their profiles and they usually just kind of look like me, which is like, it makes me believe it's like, oh, they hate me because they are me. Yeah. And I'd be doing the same thing probably. Yeah. Because I remember when Mike took over for Joel, there was a lot of, a lot of anger towards Mike.

And then there was like. From these, like this from this subculture. Yeah, yeah, definitely. But which is weird, because it's like, me and my friends, none of us care, like, we're just like, it's still a show about a guy with some robots, and Yeah, but like, they should be happy the show's coming back. Yeah, a lot of people are.

These purists are like, it's not gonna, it's gonna be different. Yeah. It's funny, every once in a while, like, I'll see a guy go, I don't like Tom Servo's new voice, is baron vaughn doing it i'm just kind of like baron vaughn's like one of the like the most talented like voice guys voice guys and he's he's a great singer he can do impressions and then like and the guys oh no it just seems like kind of it's like i mean why is he why does he have to be black i go oh there it is there it is right now flag yeah you've dismissed you've dismissed anything you've ever said.

Yeah, but it's great. It's been overwhelmingly positive for anything I've done before. A lot of people seem to really dig it. So how's the new house? It's great. It's a constant source of frustration. Our front door doesn't seem to want to open up or close now. Oh, really?

Yeah. From the rain. We're on a clay lot yeah so everything shifts around yeah well that's what happens to houses you know you could do what i do just let it all fall to shit yeah but that's i like it you you want your house to represent you as a person oh boy yeah is that it no but you know i'll get a new door yeah yeah like that when completely necessary i get a new door and it's got windows. So that is progress. That is progress.

You're not keeping things out. That's right. Yeah. When it gets ugly, when things start to really like, I got to do something, I'll do something. That's where I take the evolutionary step. It's a matter of anxiety and dread and just sort of like, oh, it's going to be a pain in the ass. But then when I have to, I do it. Yeah.

I take the step that's life though i think it is i gotta ask you uh you've had glasses for a long time i have uh i just got lasik okay uh did you ever think about that yeah you can't do it no i mean it's like why i mean how are you feeling about it weird yeah i mean like weird. I like my face okay, but it's just as jarring to me as to anyone else without glasses. Yeah. No, that's what I'm dealing with right now. I still like I'll be walking down the street and I'll catch a reflection in a storefront and I'll be like, I don't like that.

You have your glasses at home. Yeah. It is really, I'm really odd. The whole thing is that if there's an earthquake and i lose my glasses i'd be i'd be fucked oh so it was practical in your practical yeah and when the end comes i did i can't be hanging on to those things yeah i don't want to yeah i won't be able to see when i'm running i don't want to like i didn't like last year i was shooting a horror movie and it was at night and had to be like running through the brush and right when they called cut i stop

i put my glasses on there was these i almost ran into these like dead branches like just broken branches sticking straight out oh my god i would have gone right into it with my oh my god i okay so i understand the practical elements but it did it work i mean can you see like 2020 like i don't know if it's 2020 because i don't know really what that would be yeah um it's things are a little blurry the halos at night while driving are a bit much, like big, you know, bright halos around lights.

Is that a common? That's a common thing that goes away after a little bit. But like, the fact that I can, you know, see that that says Rolling Stones,

I wouldn't have been able to tell that that says Rolling Stones. Right. Or that says Rolling Stones. Or you got a lot of Rolling Stones stuff everywhere. Come on. Everything is like.

Come on. Where's the other one? You're making that up. That's a big poster over there. Yeah. No, I can read anything. We all die alone. Everything. Come on. Where's the other one? You're making that up. That's a big poster over there. No, I can read anything. We all die alone.

Everything. Where does it say that? It's in that second set. Portraits. We all die alone. Aphrodisia. Those are graphic novels. That should be exciting for you to see.

Oh, don't do that. What? Don't. Just. Oh, you'd love it. Like, I remember when the Star Wars episode one came out, I was working at a record store. I was store guys like hey how about that new star wars like i didn't see he's like what you oh come on surely you if anyone in this room you yeah you know me and my self-esteem it really is teetering on the brink yeah uh you know i it's uh i'm the type of guy that uh seeks out youtube comments yeah oh god, I can't.

Do you look at comments? Do you look at stuff like that? Not really. Sometimes, like, I don't do Facebook hardly at all. I mean, the show, I have a Facebook fan page, and I'll go look at them occasionally. Yeah. But there's no other comments I would look at.

I'm not writing for Twitter anymore. Yeah. I don't do it. Yeah, save it. Yeah, and that's weird. It's like, you know, once I, it really happened after the election where i was like i don't want to make jokes and i don't want to fight with nazis yeah so that was like it just took me out of it and i kind of stayed out and it was like this isn't bad

yeah i'll occasionally like turn it off or take it off my phone i took it off my phone but i still go through the web you know like i don't have the app on my phone anymore that's good it is good but i'll still look i'll go through the browser and it's a little harder yeah it takes i do the same thing i don't need this app on my phone yet i'm signing in yeah but i scroll through like it doesn't separate things yeah so you're like where's one thing about me yeah there was a it was funny when you know i i think i think bourdain's show parts unknown is so good and i think it gets better and better yeah um but like he he's he's in hidden america and he posted a clip from it

on his facebook page yeah and there was a couple you know there's a couple comments about the actual clip but a lot of it were just people going your show sucks now to bourdain yeah not that he's gonna see he's not gonna look at his fucking facebook fan page you don't think but you'd be surprised who does. That's a good point. You know, like, you make these assumptions about certain people. Like, that guy, he's above it. But, like, everyone's got a spare hour.

I remember. They want to do some emotional cutting. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. The only guy I know who probably doesn't do any of that is Louie. Really? Yeah, he's off Twitter. He won't do it. It's principle with him.

I think people who know they're compulsive, they know the time suck of it, but he's just sort of like, fuck it. I mean, when something breaks in the news or there's some bullshit out in the press world, it gets back to him, but he doesn't do any of that other shit. Yeah. I mean, there's sometimes a little bit inside of me that makes me go oh man i want to get to a point where i don't like i just do the work and i don't care about the social aspect right well that's what i tried to do that this last tour

i just wasn't gonna be that guy tweeting dates twice a day yeah i'm like fuck it if the theater tweets it i'll retweet it and i just not going to get hung up on that. You know, Facebook, you know, like I put all the dates on Facebook on the fan page and just sort of like, that's it. And I would retweet the theaters and sometimes go like, come on, there's a few more tickets left. But I didn't get into that cycle of like two or three times. I just like, fuck it.

If he, you know, like I got the podcast, you know, if they're going to come, they're going to come. Yeah. And it worked out. Yeah. Yeah. And if, do you feel felt you feel better? Like, is there not doing that?

Well, like, no, just like, not like just, not just that, but do you feel that there's less anxiety? Well, yeah, because like, you know, the, the, the downside of Twitter is you really don't know how many people see what you tweet, depending on how many people they follow or how compulsive they are about looking at their feed. Your number of followers in the big picture doesn't really add up to much. And, you know, it's like you may be able to remind people. Because a lot of times people get on and I realize they don't listen to the podcast in order or whatever.

And they may not hear about it. But, like, literally the day after I do a place, after I tweeted it 90 times, someone from that place was like, what are you doing, DC? I'm like, fuck, I was just fucking, and it's like, fuck this. Like, you know, go old school. Go get the venue promoted. I'll do a radio show if I have to, but like, you know.

Yeah, I think that's good. And then, you know, I like that idea of just doing the work. And a lot of people aren't on Twitter. No. That's the weird thing i think my producer told me that 79 of adults are not and there's part of me it's like why can't i be part of that majority yeah do you know what i mean aren't aren't we allowed though like to say there

was so much in in comedy in the past you know 10 years it's there's so much been put on the social media aspect because of some people succeeding off of it because of dane cook's myspace page a long time ago yeah it's a long time ago and i i i like to think that we can all disconnect i you know i wish twitter would shut it off for a fucking week i wish zuckerberg and whoever's in charge over twitter were just sort of like we're taking or taking a week off just to like let the president sit and fester in his own garbage for for a week and let you give the country a rest yeah give the country where's that where's the uh the uh hiatus of social networking platforms yeah we should start

instituting like a summer a spring break yeah that'd be amazing that'd be real nice everyone's like spring break everyone go outside yeah Or just at least those two platforms. Just Facebook and Twitter. Shut them off for a week. See how people, let people start talking again. Yeah. In real time. Yeah.

I do still like Instagram, though. Still a fan of Instagram. I got on it, and I go through flurries of it, but then I'm like, no, I don't fucking want to take a picture of that. Do I got to take a picture of my sandwich? No, no, you don't. Right. I like making videos and putting music to them and putting them up and

stuff like that i don't i don't use my time correctly i guess for me it's like it's uh i i'll like do videos and put music on it like and like edit it on the phone like an iMovie app on the phone and i do that as like it's almost instead of playing a video game or going on twitter yeah or reading like you know so You feel like you've done something. I feel like I made something. It just kind of, it's almost like a little morphine drip of, you know, creativity being like, hey, you did something. Yeah.

No, I appreciate that. And I just don't, I don't know. I don't budget time well. I always feel like I'm chasing my own ass. And when I sit down, sometimes I play some guitar. That's nice. Cause that's all your thing. That's why I started a new band just cause because I wanted to have kind of a meditation.

Yeah. I like playing drums because it's like you're using your creative brain in a different way than you normally are with writing. Yeah. And there's no more now zen kind of feeling then because you're just doing the thing you're doing right then. You can't really do anything else. Right. Because you're just thinking about the next hit, the next strum, the next lick. Well, the thing I do that's so stupid and old school, God forbid I learn how to use GarageBand for something other than just talking on these mics, but on my phone, I'll tape

sets on my phone, and then I'll come up with a lick in a very raw form, and I'll be like, I better record that. Here's the thing about GarageBand. You already know how to use it if the interface is so is so easy that like if you know how to do this you just kind of you you go okay press record i can i can show you if you need oh let's do that that's for years since i got a macbook i've been making songs on garage band like it's the best it's it's so much okay let's do that now we done talking about your shit yeah yeah let's do it okay thanks Jonah that was me and Jonah season two of Hidden America with Jonah Ray now streaming on CISO and the new MST3K The Return on Netflix

love talking to Jonah Ray now Joel Hodgson oh my god Joel Hodgson how is that so hard Joel Hodgson it is hard it's hard for me that name Joel is uh somebody I've known about and known of for many years because back in the day when I was hosting a show on the old Comedy Central, when I was slowly putting short attention span theater to bed after many years in 92, 93, maybe 93, 94. I don't remember when the hell it was, but I was in house over there and MST3K, the original run was still going

on. So I always had clips of Joel. I always saw Joel stuff around. I always knew that MST3K was popular. I didn't watch it at that time. Uh, I've watched a bit of it, but I, I mean, I just knew that Joel and I worked for the same entity and I saw a lot of Joel's face and I knew he was around, but I'd never met him before. And I knew that MST3K was a brilliant thing but I'd never met him before and over time I realized I'd heard that you know he's a genius that he's he used to do stand-up I knew all these things about him but I'd never met him and I was pretty uh I was pretty excited to get an opportunity to meet him you know the creator of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and you can watch classic episodes

on netflix plus the brand new 14 episodes with jonah patton oswalt felicia day baron vaughn and a lot more people they've restaffed the original characters but there's also some other new stuff going on so this is me and the uh and the great, uh, Joel Hodgson in the garage. So Joel, I think that, you know, we were, uh, you're older than me, but I, I certainly obviously remember the first iteration of mystery science theater 3000 and then but like i knew like i didn't know who you were and you were one of those guys that everyone talked about like uh this guy's beyond you know he's at another level creatively well know what you were i mean that people love that show and and i i i wish i'd

watch more of it but i think that you know i was more concerned with drugs and and music than i i feel like and you knew kinnison and i want to talk about kinnison too so but this is the thing like i don't know how many people know that you know you were hammering away at uh at comedy but also i don't know if how many people that. How much did you raise on this Kickstarter for the new one? It was like altogether over $6 million. And because there was like whatever the nerd culture was now, you found them then. Like there's a very specific type of sci-fi kind of like, you know, robot kind of nerd guy.

You should see the look on his face when he's describing this he seems like actually i'm just doing color commentary am i wrong no but you seem genuinely happy when you describe that well nobody i'm just so happy that so many of them are like i'm gonna give joel money to make more and they've got to be my age yeah right yeah i mean you grab them between like but there's a lot of them that are 35 so that's like 35 and up right like they were 12 when it came out right there's a lot of them like that right when when people know me from short attention span theater i'm like you must have been a child yeah it's a little weird makes you feel old i don't feel bad about it yeah no but but

i'm sure they appreciated it oh yeah they it was like really important to those people i think the reason why i was bitter at that time was that you know short attention span theater mystery science theater like people would get some things confused but also you were doing this brilliant thing and you know i was you know hosting a clip show based on promotional material but But listen, I got to tell you something, though. When they hired us, I think they thought we were going to do that. I think it's a huge misunderstanding that they even really let us do Mystery Science Theater.

Was that with Comedy Network pre-Comedy Central? It was Comedy Channel, and then Comedy Channel merged with HA for like nine or ten months, and then it became Comedy Central. So we were in Comedy Channel, Comedy Channel HA, Comedy Central. And I really think when I first met those guys, they were really treating it like this is going to be MTV with comedy. Yeah. And I think they thought, oh, we'll just get Joel and these robots to host clips. And I think that's what they were thinking.

And then we refused to come to New York. We said, we're not coming to New York to do the show. We have to stay in Minneapolis. You can't afford to pay us enough. And the studio was too small. And we said no. And then they had to rethink us. But I really think they thought, like, you know how it was when Higgins, Boys & Gruber, Tommy Sledge, Rachel Sweet, everybody was doing that.

And then they started to develop programming. And the last remnant of that was short attention span theater. But I believed when they started, it was all based on an MTV model. And they thought, we'll have VJs who host comedy clips all the time. Yeah, I think that's true. They really thought that. And that was also the mystery of you is that like, where are they coming from? Because I just looked at the dates, you were in the middle, you were in the prime of it

when I was hosting that show, but you were never around. Like in that building, I was at HBO downtown. Yeah. It wasn't even a real studio. It was an office space. The ceilings were- Like this, like this low. It was crazy to shoot in. Yeah, they had't even a real studio. It was an office space. The ceilings were... Like this. It was crazy to shoot in.

They had to hang lights from the ceiling. But you were the mystery man. It's like, oh no, that's all made in a lab in Minneapolis. It really, in some ways, it really served us. In other ways, it really hurt us because we weren't really in the culture of show business.

But that's better. They could kind of ignore us on certain things. But look at it. You just raised $6 million from 35 to 60-year-olds who are excited to see the puppets come back, the robots. That's right. That's right, yeah. But let's go back because the thing that, like I wasn't mad at you or anything.

I was sort of mystified by the whole, because I was new to show business other than being just a sweaty stand-up. I was a child in a lot of ways. Didn't you start in San Francisco? Not really. Really? Where did you start?

After college, I did maybe twice in college. In 1986, I moved out here and became a doorman at the comedy store. And I got all fucked up on drugs. And by late 87, I moved back to Boston where I went to college. And that's really where I started. That's a good town to do stand-up in. Yeah, it was great. I came in second in the riot.

And I started working, doing all those one-nighters. And then in 89, I moved to New York, and I was going back and forth making money. And then like 92, after hitting the wall on losing my sobriety again, I scrambled out to San Fran. But yeah, it was like it was San Francisco and Boston, L.A. and New York. And Minneapolis, Chicago. That's how I looked at it. I think it was sister cities were the really pretty hot comedy scenes. That's true.

But like you started, so what, you come from, how big's your family? There's five of us, three kids and two adults, yeah. And you work with your brother sometimes? Yeah, we did for years, not anymore, but yeah, we did for years when I used to live out here. We had a production company together. But when did you start?

So like what business was your old man in? Oh, my dad was a teacher and my mom was a teacher. My mom was a nurse and then taught nursing and my dad was like a teacher pretty much his whole career. Like high school? He taught like, he started out grade school. He was like my actual principal when I was in kindergarten. And my friend Billy Crescian went up to him He started out grade school. He was like my actual principal when I was in kindergarten.

And my friend, Billy Crescian, went up to him and he said, Hey, I know your little brother. And he thought we were brothers. And yeah, so he was pretty much involved with education like his whole career, either selling curriculum for some companies or teaching. He taught at college. Selling curriculum. Yeah. You know, like SRA, do you remember SRA? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The interdisciplinary like- Oh, yeah, yeah.

You know, kind of colored thing. It was kind of during the worst time in education in the country's history and they could sell stuff like that. These little boxes that the kids read, these little pamphlets and then got tested on. Oh, right. It was all individual. So was that like a commission sales gig or was it so yeah interesting yeah but they're noble people they they work with the children he really actually he was an educator and he really cared about it so he was in it you know he was really living it and i think he was happy i think he liked it yeah and you're the oldest or the middle i'm the middle kid yeah so where does um where did like where does the interest in in show business come from where how did you i don't i don't know how to i don't even know how to explain it because man from the time i was can remember yeah i was like fascinated with it like um who in particular well

i can remember being in kent in nursery school right and they'd sing do you know the muffin man and i'd go let's sing do you know the mask man like i i had gone into a novelty shop and in madison the moon fun shop and the walls were lined with like don post monster masks yeah and i was like going holy holy shit, that's incredible. And so I was in, I was five and I'm going, masks. Like, I want to be a mask man. I want to know where those masks are. I want to dress up. Yeah.

So from the time I remember it, I just was like, you know, it's one of those weird things where it's possible that you just decide super young that that's who you are. Like I got to, I was just fascinated with it, but I didn't know how to get to it because I was in. But it was masks. I was in Southern Wisconsin, but that's all analogous, I think, because masks, costumes, movies.

Yeah, the whole thing. But for some reason. It's the oldest. Yeah, for some reason I'm sitting there going, yeah, I got to get near those masks somehow. I got to get part, I have to find out about them. Yeah. I want to sing about them. Yeah.

I want to sing about being the mask man. Yeah. And then I remember I could hardly say it. When I said masks, I kept going, masks man. And they kept going, what? Masks man? Do you know the mask man yeah it was so yeah but even that was when i was five and that was like the earliest memory so anytime i'd see and back then

you know show business was so i mean media was so dull and intimate there was only you only had a few options yeah like three channels yeah but when something on, like the Muppets were on Ed Sullivan, it is electrifying. Like, oh my God, it made my day. There's a guy with a puppet on TV. Oh, so you're always a puppet guy. Yeah, it's like puppets, magic, ventriloquism. Who was the first man? Oh, yeah.

I had a ventriloquist dummy. Really? Yeah, I had, you know, they had Charlie McCarthy and Edgar Bergen available at some time. And I had, I think my brother had the Edgar, not Edgar Berg, Mortimer Snurd. That's the one I had. Mortimer Snurd. Yeah. The goofy one.

Yeah. And all the other kids, even then, all the other kids had Danny O'Day. And I felt like, I'm not going to do Danny O'Day because the other kids have Danny O'Day. I got to, I have to break out. Which one's Danny O'Day and I felt like I'm not going to do Danny O'Day because the other kids have Danny O'Day. I have to break out. Which one's Danny O'Day? He's the most classic looking one. He looks like a smaller version in the Juro Novelty

doll ventriloquist figure Parthenon. Yes. You've got Danny O'Day which is the smallest one who looks the most like a ventriloquist dummy. Then you have Charlie McCarthy who had a monocle and a little slit there and a top hat. Then you had Mortimer Snurd. Then later they rolled out, oh, shoot, who was the black guy? Oh, Lester and Willie?

Lester and Willie, Tyler and Lester, yeah. So anyway, that was like a big thing. And I remember thinking to myself, if I'm going to get into ventriloquism, I mean, in fourth grade, I had a teacher who identified like I was really interested in it. And she started playing this record in school, instant ventriloquism. And we'd practice ventriloquism in her fourth grade class. And there were like four kids who had dummies and we'd bring our dummies in and practice like she was unbelievable it's unbelievable and i was there i was like so in my that year my my um my my picture for my class picture is me with my ventriloquist dummy i brought my ventriloquist dummy to get it i was thinking that's how i'd get an eight by ten yeah all right my class picture so i'm sitting there and i'm smiling so you could so i and the dummy's mouth is open and i'm like saying see i'm doing ventriloquism because i could actually talk with the dummy so you had that weird smile yeah i had the weird smile and it was all like i'm smiling hi hey how's it going joel this is

fantastic and um the um and you'd think somebody would have stopped me right like some adult would have gone right like no you really want to do that we're taking this class picture put the doll down put down the toy put the toy yeah i'm i'm shocked man they let me be though those that's what's lovely about the midwest is that is that's right nobody got everybody liked it everybody was like that's amusing i mean i remember i i was carrying in the neighborhood i was carrying my ventriloquist dummy over to my friend's house and his mom opened the door and she goes someday you're gonna go really far you're gonna go really far with that. With the dummy. Yeah.

With Edgar Bergen's dummy. She just was smiling. Yeah. And no one said, you're wrong. You know, this is wrong. You're wasting your time. I never, I don't think I ever heard it. Well, that's interesting about the teacher too.

That idea that like, well, if these kids are excited about this, it's harmless, and they're excited, and they're engaging. Yeah. Let them do it. Yeah. It was really bizarre, but I don't know how it happened. I'm 57. So you're a little older than me.

So, you know, ventriloquism, for most practical purposes, was not a lively art form at that time, really. It was sort of the end of it. Yeah. Right? Yeah. But it was sort of fascinating, because I remember being fascinated with it. And I don't know what the idea of throwing your voice or the idea, like, I don't even know that I saw a lot of ventriloquists when I got that dummy

and I didn't really commit to it like you, I had it and I tried it kind of, but I wasn't in. We're at that age where you're like trying to find a sign, assign an identity. Yeah. And that was a big part. Like, I'm not interesting enough, but if I held this thing and I could make him appear like a character, Right. then I'm interesting. Yeah.

Then I have a place to be, you know? Sure, sure. And you kind of can divert a little of the attention off of you because you're insecure onto this thing. So if you just had the skill and it's like clark can't it's like uh it's like uh bruce wayne yeah because you're like i'm i'm really doing all this but you can't tell right right i'm really clever but i'm acting like i'm

not it's like it's a confection right you know social confection in a way like yeah yeah well that's it well you know you talk to a lot of guys and it's like it was a the the popularity thing about being insecure feeling like an outsider when you're comic or somebody's prone towards that you know you either do it in a way that's pleasant or you disrupt everything and it's really about yeah well what did you do what happened i'm just a smart ass well what were your what were your parents like well socially like what is well how did they behave were they like they were kind of like you know self-involved hipstery you know they were kind of contemporary uh you know always they're both from the east coast my dad was a doctor but we lived in new mexico so they were

graceful socially right they not really they were embarrassing not really really they were a doctor and not socially skilled no he's just inappropriate like he was socially skilled but he was always the guy like oh what's he gonna say you know like he wasn't you know he wasn't that and my mother was always embarrassing they're very vain but this is going on too long but they were um they were sort of ice storm parents gotcha gotcha you know right and not not the uh joan allen but the sigourney weaver and kevin klein yeah i i love that reference yeah that was the time have a key party yeah yeah there i think they were at one of those that's great you know i get that feeling okay yeah i get it so not midwest so you wanted to be funny but you weren't exactly queuing off I think they were at one of those. That's great. You know, I get that feeling. Yeah. I get it.

Not Midwest. So you wanted to be funny, but you weren't exactly cueing off them the way they behaved. Or were they maybe showing you the wrong way to be funny? Well, I think I was fighting them. I think that they were so self-involved that I needed to get attention elsewhere. Yeah. That was the thing. And I always was trying to undermine structures innately.

Like the teacher, if I was bored, I'd fuck with the teacher. I made a few Hebrew school teachers cry and I got kicked out of a private school just because of my dumb mouth. Wow. Yeah, that's what I come from. But you seem to do it a little nicer.

Yeah, no, my parents were really good socially and my dad was like really funny and I cued a lot off him, but I didn't really realize it at the time. So he actually was kind of building, he actually was kind of making a little path, but I don't think he ever thought like, it was all by example. He was kind of just doing it. He never said, hey, Joe, why don't you do this? It was almost like firewalled. And later I realized, wow, it's kind of just doing it he never said hey joe why don't you do this it was it was almost like firewalled and later i realized wow it's kind of similar to what some of the stuff my dad would do but also like i i imagine that they were uh uh selfless enough and responsible enough being teachers to afford you the space but also give you uh uh the you know you learn the value of education and all that in doing your shit, right?

You know what's weird is they never presumed I should go to college. That wasn't even in there. The only reason I went to college was- Those are interesting educators. Yeah. I think they're worried about the money or something, but it was like, I remember going to college and it finally dawned on me like, this is fantastic. These women are beautiful. I geted on me like this is fantastic these women are beautiful i get it yeah this is what yeah this is fantastic yeah like we're gonna listen to records with really

cute girls it's gonna be great you know like and it was it really was but it was exactly the right thing for me to do i was still i think in my point in college i was still sort of looking for the identity thing so i i kind of moved into a kind of beatnik, kind of outsider arty thing. And that's great. Hanging out and listening to records with girls was part of it, but I was more involved with smoking cigarettes

and reading books with the angry dudes. I didn't do that till like right at the end of college. That's when that all happened. Oh yeah? Yeah. Yeah, we would drum. Do you remember drum? Do you still smoke?

No. Do you remember drum cigarettes? Oh, yeah, you roll them up. So great. Buglers were the old school ones. Oh, yeah, right. Drums were a little more exotic from Belgium, I think. Beaties, the little tiny Indian ones with cloves.

Yeah, I never liked those. Yeah, that was intense. They were the Jarum clove cigarettes. Oh, yeah. I was smoking Marlboro Reds from when I was in junior high, so I was pretty connected to that. You should have just gone all the way and smoked Kool's. Yeah, Kool's were more of a blues man thing.

Yeah, the mentholated ones. I tried them, and I tried rolling my own. You'd smoke those when you're sick. Sure, yeah, mentholate, open up the lungs. I just remembered something, though, Joel. When I was a kid, rolling my own. You smoked those when you were sick. Sure, yeah, mentally. Open up the lungs, yeah. I just remembered something, though, Joel. When I was a kid, when I was in third grade, I did some stage work. Like, I was able to recite all the presidents in order,

and I did that in front of the class in third grade. And then I put together skits with this kid, Jerry, Jerry Graves, and he played Grover, and I was the setup guy. We did a comedy team thing with this kid Jerry, Jerry Graves, and he played Grover and I was the setup guy. We did a comedy team thing with this. And so it must have worked, right? Well, it was something. You know what I mean?

It was sort of an impressive skill. I'd learned the precedence from a coin collection booklet and I didn't have the coins, like a commemorative coin collection book, but I didn't have the coins. I just had the book and I just memorized them in order. That's great. It's easy to kill with that and I just memorized them in order. That's great. It's easy to kill with that.

You just got to nail it. No laughs expected. Just get them all and have the teacher go, yep. That's awesome. That's awesome. So when did it evolve into something that you were serious about? And what was that? Well, listen.

Okay. A lot of my stuff came came um like i said from my dad we were like in a big part of this is the church like we were in the like method evangelical church in the in the midwest you were christians yeah oh and so that has a lot to do with what i do because first time i heard live music was in church. First time I saw like a movie projected was probably in church. First time I saw magic show was in church. It's like they were always kind of like a little bit suspicious of

entertainment on the outside world, which is rightly so, you know, and they would entertain horrible influence. Well, it's hard to every part of it is, you know, part of it is, but it's like, but part well it's hard every part of it is you know part of it is but it's like but part of it's awesome and so it's like they were a little bit like suspicious and and so that that was a big there's a big emphasis on being able to

entertain so there was like a pocket that i got swept into like right hey you do ventriloquism great do this father-daughter banquet i was was like doing gigs, making money, like in the church, like seventh grade. I had a magic show. I'd do birthday parties. I was a clown. I like rode the unicycle. So you were a clown, magic, ventriloquist guy. Yeah, yeah.

Anything I could do. Anything I could do. Those are the all ages fair. Can't lose. Yeah, right. From three to 30. Yeah, I was doing that. And there was a lot of places to play.

How good was your magic? How good were your chops? I was pretty good. Like right away, I was capable, but I understood that about being funny. Like that was a really cool thing. And so I started to do that more and more and so i was like working a lot and there was a magic club in green bay that i'd go to and we'd like learn about magic so you're like 13 yeah 13 14 i got just embedded i was that like kid magician

that was kind of my identity right and you so you had business cards yeah a picture yeah uh yeah and let me ask about the evangelical evangelical church at that time in the midwest this is not these aren't born again christians these are sort of grounded they're born again but this is before they got kind of commandeered by the republicans in a way right they were it was a lot more like the Jesus story is very apolitical, really, when you look at it. So it was kind of like, this is before they got kind of swept into that. And so it was a lot more, it was a lot different. And it was just like, again, my experience there overall with the Midwest is people were

very nice and very encouraging. So that's kind of where I was at yeah they were just enthused at what I was doing and thought it was a charming or something sure sure are you still there with the Christian yeah oh yeah I am held up I'm a believer held up I mean you know it's like anybody it's faith so vacillate right sometimes I don't believe it. Sometimes I do. But I'm like, I believe, I'm really grateful for the culture of it. Like I'm kind of explaining, like, I kind of got to be in there, and it kind of accelerated my growth in a way, like doing what I wanted to do.

And everybody was really nice to me about it. Well, I tell you, if you're not fighting that battle, if you're not fighting against God, there's a relief to it. That's right. Yeah, right? That's covered. What's that Gary Painter song, I Fought the Lord and the Lord Won? Ralph Records? Ralph Records.

Sure, Ralph Records. So you held on to your faith. It gave you a good foundation, and it gave you your early opportunities to perform and also take in uh entertainment product no matter how compromised it may be by the jesus but um that's great that's great i gotta remember that but uh but but you know it was in you knew you wanted to be up there yeah i, I struggle with it so much. Like, that was a big thing in college. I went to a Christian college.

Oh, really? Which one? Bethel College, Bethel University. So you really only were playing records with girls? What do you mean? I mean, like, how, like, what was the sex? You mean, did I swing with dudes? No, no.

I mean, like, like you know it just seems like a christian college maybe i'm projecting that maybe it wasn't a lot of drugs and fucking was there or was there more i think uh what what it was is it wasn't decreed that thing that was great is it wasn't decreed you're in college you have to drink and fuck right right everybody kind of had to go on their own and go on walkabout uh-huh kind of figure out for themselves so it happened walkabout on campus yeah sexual walkabout yeah we lost that guy yeah so um so i think uh you know there's a lot people don't get about it i i like about what about christian college and what the kids are doing. Because they're really, the people that I found did so much for me for critical thinking

and just like ideas. People or teachers? The kids I was hanging out with. Right. The kids I found at that school who were kind of outsiders, but they really, you know, they kind of, yeah, we were like doing the bohemian thing towards the end and reading cool books and smoking cigarettes and having a drink. Well, no, it has to happen eventually. But like, I'm not anti-Christian. moral foundation or spiritual foundation or or the the this at least to have those questions

answered and and allow that to happen uh it's not terrible it's a struggle it's a struggle if you really want to think about it really make make really try to find your way regardless of what you believe everybody's got to kind of do that right and so that was just the that was just the the hand that I was dealt. And I have to say, it wasn't that bad. Now, ultimately, there's things that you don't like about it, because there's, by and large, a lot of people that could be kind of mindless and just accept it and are kind of towing the company line about it. I'm not really talking about those people. And I think that once the dubiousness of righteousness

is where I think it runs into trouble. I mean, fanatics are not fanatics. But that's not the Jesus story, the righteousness thing, right? No, no, no, I know, I know. But like anything you're using, because I thought about this this morning. Like how many of my principles

are principles based in a moral foundation? Or are they just things that I think and do to make me feel like I'm better than other people? Right. Right. And sacrifice, too. Like, what does sacrifice mean? Right. Is it just a game?

Right. Do we really have to sacrifice? A selfish game? Yeah. I mean, to make ourselves feel better, like I sacrificed, I'm owed this. Well, that's a difference between selfish and selfless is that when it comes down to being, you know, progressive or a liberal or somebody who identifies with that team, you know, the real question is how much do you care about people that have nothing? How much

do you care about poor people in your heart is really what's going to determine your moral foundation. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. It doesn't, I don't know. Yeah, it doesn't matter. But it is part of my story. Yeah. And I really want that to be clear that a lot of that came from that.

Yeah. How do you actually be really funny if you're christian how can you do it there's not much room there pete holmes has given it a good run yeah yeah right yeah you think he's funny i do i think he's annoying but i think he's funny yeah there's something you know pete is like a very proficient comic and he and he's a very funny guy in a very sort of a palatable way um but he but he's a guy that you know a very sort of palatable way. But he's a guy that has, same with Nick Thune. I know a couple of Christian dudes who are real solid, like youth pastor type of Christians who had a crisis of faith.

And I think both of them did. And I think that both of them came through it still with faith, but with a more personalized version. And I think that the fact that they struggle makes it compelling. Yeah, that's right. I think that was a really cool movement that happened, and I think it's part of, for me, it was embodied in that kind of hipster Christian movement,

like, well, you know, we're kind of born to fail. It's not like, you know. There's no perfecting the machine. Yeah, and the Jesus story is kind of like you fail it's not it's not like you know there's no perfecting the machine yeah and you don't and and the jesus story is kind of like you don't have to do that and it would be wrong for you insist other people do it you know what i mean well i've always been fascinated with the idea of the sins and that they they weren't designed to uh to perfect the the the human they were designed to as warnings and as a way to judge and and and seek redemption for your inability to stay you know uh to to to to be consumed by them like it wasn't a template for for the perfection of humanity that's a cool way to look at it it

was a it was a template for the the sort of flawed nature of human beings to regulate that, not to fascistically perfect it, to eradicate it. Right. I guess the idea of grace is you're really pretty much off the hook. Let's just admit we can't do anything to be perfect. Let's just accept that there's this grace that we're given and it's a free gift right and there and i think where we run into problems is when we get boxes that we got to check like i did this this and this ergo i'm a good person i've got ergo i'm better than you right but um the other thing i was going to say is like i like you know it's just uh it's Passover, man. Are you being observant? No.

What did you do? Did you go eat anything? I haven't done anything in a long time. I sort of, I don't have a community of friends or Jews. And, you know, I sort of have relieved myself of, you know, even the kind of annual rituals. I don't know why, really. But I don't miss it. The religion never really functioned for me as a religion.

It functioned for me as a cultural identifier, which I think is really the weird difference between mainstream Christians and Jews in a lot of ways. I kind of like anybody in a way who's in their own way trying to be obedient to God. And then the only time I don't like it is when they're trying to be obedient and they want to kill me.

Right. And that's where I... That's where you draw the line? That's where I say... Murder? Check, please. Good for you. That's a...

You really... That's a... I was really trying to do a joke and I couldn't do it. That's my only joke for this whole thing. Which is? I'm... Okay, so let me... You draw the line at murder.

Let me... Yeah, now you're fixing my joke and you're actually making it better and more powerful okay that's what i should have done so first i started out segue from the seder yeah people being obedient to god yeah uh i'm for that except when they want to murder me but i should have just wrote it down or something right right but i was really like it's a bold stance to draw the line and i started laughing i completely screwed it up no you didn't all right i was just i was we can fix that on post sure i took it seriously all right i thought you were yeah i thought it was a reasonable observation i guess it's true too but i felt

proud like i constructed kind of a joke but it's's really not. Almost a joke. Yeah, it's there. It's getting there. Got the setup. If I worked on it this afternoon, I'd get it together. Sure, absolutely. You want to come back? Sure. All right, so I like the, you know, after we've had this conversation about grace,

I like the idea of grace. But more importantly, that was a context for you that you were like i am christian i identify christian i believe this is my community now how do i be funny uh and and stay within my my comfort zone in a way of uh of faith yeah and i spent a lot of time working on that because we would talk about this all time all the time because in and my friends at the call and at this christ my friends at this Christian college. At that time, you're still doing magic and stuff. Yeah, and then there's, what the funny thing is, is there were these, there were regular bands that were awesome.

And then there were Christian bands that weren't that good. But they would. Some things never change. But they would package them like famous bands. Like there was a super tramp. There was a group called Servant, and they marketed them as super tramp. Their logo was like super tramp. They sounded like super tramp.

The photos were like super tramp. So you're going, it smells like super tramp, but it's Christian. It's okay for me to listen to. But then all of a sudden- I didn't think that Super Tramp was really pushing the envelope of moral- Yeah, exactly. We'd have to break that down. Breakfast in America, when do they-

Oh, demonic. Take the long way home. You know what he's saying. He's asking you to be a sodomite. Yeah. So you think you're a Romeo? Yeah yeah that's an indictment of our lord Romeo is as anti-christian

that's Shakespeare so anyway that was kind of a struggle but we knew there were these great records that weren't Christians that were people living their lives and telling their stories and then there were these great records that weren't Christians that were people living their lives and telling their stories. Yeah. And then there were these kind of lesser bands

that were Christian, but they weren't as good. Right. So there's this struggle, and we spent a lot of time talking about it. Well, that's part of grace. You just put up with the mediocre band. Yeah, accept it. Yeah, like just put the, yeah, you,

that's just part of your, that's, yeah, that's the penance of it, the suffering. You have to listen to shitty music the rest of your life. And they do. There's a lot of them who do. So anyway, the thing I wanted to say was I got to my thesis for my senior paper, which was about this. And the premise was, and this will kind of tie it all up in a bow for you.

Good. We'll be able to move off of this. I won't have to tag it? No, you won't have to tag it. So basically I did a thesis paper based on meaning and people finding meaning in your art or your performance. And basically my thesis was, people are used to finding meaning in your art

if they're used to finding meaning in other things. Interesting. And so basically, I realized I didn't have to worry about it. I didn't have to. It's not art if you're saying, I'm a Christian. Right. And if you're building your, like, that's fake. That's not art to kind of be blunt and go, I'm a Christian, so you know this is okay.

Yeah. There's no interpretation, right? It strips the most beautiful part of art out, interpretation. And so that was when everything kind of fell into place for me when I go, I don't have to worry about it. I can just do my thing, whatever I think, and they're going to find the meaning. It's not my job but also like there's the faith in the fact that your shit is right that you know I'm right in the sense of you know my you know my spiritually I'm fit so like I don't need to pay lip service to that right that's fake right fake it's like just be me it's like an artist who stands next to his painting and says

let me tell you what I was trying to emote. And you realize that. And that was what was bugging me the whole time I'm in college. Like, where's the art in this? Like, what's going on? Are Christians not artists? You know, what's going on? Does that mean if you say you're a Christian, then it's done?

Where's personal expression in this framework? And where's, how do you, if you're the viewer, how can you build up any trust if you don't trust that they'll figure it out and find meaning? And so you write this senior thesis, and when do you decide to, like, you know, what was the art at that time?

And this is the same time you're listening to Ralph Records, or is it later? Yeah, yeah. So that's coming in. It's right in there. So, like, you're saying, like, well, these guys. Yeah, it's right in there. There's this whole world of great music, and there's tons of stuff yeah tons of great things so what do you

decide to do with this well what i what i realized and then you know what's really weird is um i happened they taught a theater the absurd class at the college and i took it and i realized wow this is like um like ianco? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Pinter and Harold Pinter and all that. And it was like. Beckett. Yeah, it was all, it was all, it was cool because the absurd gave you this,

this fail safe thing for comedy. Like you can't fail at being absurd. Right. There's no wrong. Yeah. And that's right when, when Andy Kaufman was happening. Right, right. And it was like, that was the when um when andy kaufman was happening right it was like that was the greatest thing that i've ever seen freedom what he was doing right what he was

he was actually creating this canopy that was above entertainment yeah and kind of manipulating all of us the show was all of us yeah and there was something way above us that was observing it right you know what i mean and that's when that those things those things all came together and and then i was kind of free and then i did started stand up and that's what and then and my thing was all kind of about inventions like i was really fascinated with being an inventor and so i would invent these things i was trying to get them patented. And I'll tell you another example. I built, I invented this thing called the frisbat, which was like a bat you could hit frisbees with. So I built this thing. I get this friend who's really good at throwing the frisbee and we go

down to the gym at the college. And I had somebody set up a video camera because I'm testing it and he's throwing the disc and I'm hitting it and it's flying back across the gym. It's working. And I'm walking back and someone goes, what is that? And I go, it's a frisbat. And he laughed at me. He laughed really hard at me, this kid walking by. And I understood that who I am is really funny.

I got it. Like I just had to kind of pursue it and it would be okay. It's a friz bat and he just laughed his ass off at me. Like just a kid I didn't even know, right? A friz bat. And that was kind of it

where I just go, oh, I'm like already manufacturing all this and I just have to let it happen and I just have to show it to people. Not take myself seriously. Yeah, if I just show them what I'm thinking and not. And the other thing I did was I guess, you know, I'm like slow. I mean, I don't talk really fast.

It's like I'm not really energetic. And somehow that kind of worked in my act. And I didn't really understand this until I read Steve Martin's book. Did you read that? It's great. Yeah. I hear it's good it's unbelievable and he he really describes how in a really lucid way how comedy works and it's kind of I'm paraphrasing but obviously a super smart guy and it was like he talked about tension and how you create tension and how the audience kind of rushes to figure out a way to release the tension. And he kind of was using that theory. And my age, Let's Get Small came out when I was like a junior or sophomore or junior in high school. And it was like the biggest thing

in the world. Yeah, I was in junior high. Yeah. Yeah. It was like the biggest thing in the world. It was like the Beatles of standup in a way. so i i didn't really understand that but that's what was going on as i was actually like doing this thing and it was weird and it would create tension and then the audience started to find ways to pay it off and then i started to pay attention to what they were paying off and started building on that so so that's what stand-up is right you learn your stage self right yeah yeah it takes it can take a long time like you must have gotten figured out how to get to that like a few years ago it took me like 20 years really i mean i was effective but i wasn't popular in any way and i i'm not sure i was my truest self it took me a long time to figure out like

you know how to be me in the best form up there and i've been i've manifested a lot of different angles i was angry and sweaty and provocative and and then like i always knew i was funny but it was almost like most of my stand-up career was acting against that so you like rested and let it happen and well yeah the. It's a fear thing. The fear goes away. Like, if you're funny because you're defensive or hostile, and it's just how you deal with the anger or fear, you know, that might not be the best

night out for everybody. Well, the other thing I gotta tell you is I noticed just being here you have a pretty strong aesthetic sense. Like, that's usually pretty unusual for guys that are comics. Usually they don't, they don't like gravitate to those things,

but that's like really obviously a big thing for you. Like pictures, instruments, records, like you got to reflect. You're always getting these like beautiful things reflected back. Yeah. And that's like not,

that's pretty unusual. I got to say. So, but I know where that came from it's similar to you in the experience of masks you know like this was like when i was a kid my grandmother's neighbors the nuriks you know they had a bunch of kids who were older than me like they were like you know in their teens in the late 60s you know maybe 20 years old in the late 60s so when i was like five or six you know i go

over there and i go into carrie's room this dude and it was just posters everywhere and pictures everywhere and records and records everywhere and i just sort of like what the fuck this is the best place in the like it was the same feeling as seeing those masks yeah like you go this is like it's actually really great because this is waiting for me. Like I get this one day. Right, right, yeah. Yeah, so. That's really,

it's so important. It's so important. The first mind blowing. Invitation. Yeah. Invitation that this is going to be okay or this is going to be cool at a certain point.

And that's like so important that, well, how did they treat you? Were they like cool? Were they nice to you? Oh yeah, they were great. They babysat us. So it's like,'s the best one when there's an older kid who's cool and likes you yeah it's like means so much it's been my whole life because it's also because my dad was sort of absent emotionally and physically because he was working all the time so i was

always sort of in that search and i didn't have an older brother but all the dads were pretty absent back then i I guess so. Back in the day. And also- My dad was a pretty good dad, but he was pretty busy and pretty like working the whole time. Right. They did that. Yeah.

But like also the late 60s, because I was like in 69, 70, I was six and seven years old. So culturally, that was what's coming at me. You know, like Mad Magazine and just the news. I remember seeing Vietnam on the TV, the protests like that. It's frightening. It was frightening, but I was like, those are the ones. You know, those are the people who, they have the, they know who they are somehow or another.

They seem to be like there was a raw, wild, mystical trip going that that resonated with me. It wasn't the control guys. You know, I didn't go control guys you know i didn't go for you know team military you know innately i was like the chaos people that those emotionally fit what i'm into yeah yeah and that stuck and that's ultimately playful too yeah no definitely child also goes i don't want to ever grow up like it seemed to me like adults all they ever did was like uh read stuff and talk on the phone and it's like you're sitting there going what the hell this seems terrible you know what i mean and i gotta talk

on the phone excuse me i'm gonna write a check and then i'm gonna read a bill you go to bed now if we're really good we'll watch the news if everyone's really good yeah we're gonna sit down and watch walter that doesn't look like a good life no that's the last thing you want even now yep so so what so your comedy act beginning so you started doing it in like 81 82 that's right uh basically um yeah exactly 81 i was in college as my junior year of college when I started doing stand-up, and I was right at the cusp of the comedy scene. And Minneapolis was really right for it. There were a lot of rooms. There were a lot of good comics. And it was just- Like, who was your crew? Joe Hanson? And it was just- Like who was your crew?

Joe Hanson? No, Louis Anderson. Yeah. A guy named Alex Cole. Yeah. Jeff Cesario. Yeah. He was a Midwest guy?

Yeah. He came from Kenosha, Wisconsin. A guy named Scott Hanson, who was kind of the impresario in there, who ran all these rooms. Those were the guys, and they were all at Mickey Finn's. Wild Bill Bauer, they were all at Mickey Finn's. That was the place. And I remember being in college, a guy named Roman DeCare

that was a really, really funny, cool guy. But they were very hostile. They had this attitude, the guys at Finn's. I went in one night when I was in college and went and saw a show, and I didn't like the vibe. It was kind of mean. Yeah. Mean shit.

And then all these other rooms started opening up, the Comedy Cabaret and then the Comedy Gallery, and they were a lot more open, a lot more nice. And it was kind of infused. It's a big improv town because of Dudley Riggs. And so it's kind of a mix of improv. And the Comedy Cabaret had everything. They were trying everything yeah it was very wide open and very nice and there was no alcohol it was like a coffee shop so right

it was a good place for me to like start figuring out my stuff but because i'd been performing since i was like in fourth grade i had chops yeah so i could i i knew how to end my act i knew how a good opener i like knew how to routine i had. I knew how a good opener. I knew how to routine. I had timing. Were you bringing the inventions on? Because I remember- Yeah, it was like a mix of a lot of retro stuff. I'd use Rock'em Sock'em Robots and Etch-a-Sketch and-

Rock'em Sock'em Robots. And what were you doing with them? What was the angle? I mostly just was demonstrating them. i mostly was just showing them i i felt like i was kind of shocked um that they were like psychic darts it was kind of like basically i figured out that there was a i mean this this doesn't sound meaningful at all now because it's so in the culture but back then people were like electrified when i'd pull out these toys and it was like um it was like it was weird and i'd sing the commercials so that was another weird thing because other comics were singing like gilligan's island right

but i was doing commercials from the 60s and people were all remembering them. So a lot of it was these kind of psychic dart things where I was going, just kind of remember this and people were really reacting to it. Right. And then I did like inventions and I had like bad magic and stuff like that. So it was kind of like, and I didn't really get that it was a lot. At the time, Steve Martin was so huge in my life he really was like the beatles that i didn't really understand i was like aping or doing a thing that was very similar to steve but there was a couple of guys that were doing like uh like prop oriented stuff it wasn't

unusual yeah but but you know it seemed like your take on it was a little different. It wasn't... Gallagher was like super, like had a lot of energy and he's feisty. But you were me, like you were constructing things as well as you're bringing out toys. Yeah, I was making things. I was showing things. I can remember that.

And so it was kind of a mix. It was a mix of stuff. It was just a mix of showcasing things. So when did the first wave of success come as a standup? You did Young Comedians, right? Yeah. What happened was when I got done with college, I did a brief tour through the Midwest,

went through Kansas City and, you know, I can't remember, St. Louis, I think. I just kind of did a loop through. And then my friend and I drove uh, drove to LA and we went and lived in LA and I, and I, and I auditioned, uh, I,

I already kind of had an in, I got, I got booked at the magic castle. So I, that was like kind of my place. I did the magic castle a ton. Like, so you were,

you got real good at it. Yeah. And it was like, they liked me cause I wasn't especially good at it like i was a calm i was like valentine yeah it was like kind of bad magic and bad weird bad props weird weird things yeah it worked really good because i didn't threaten anybody it was really outside of that and that was another thing that really helped me as a stand-up is I was pretty different than anybody else and so I worked people really good comics didn't mind me opening for them so I would meet guys like got to be good friends with Shanling and Jerry Seinfeld and those guys so it was like they liked me and helped me out so basically about two months in, I landed Letterman. I got Letterman.

When you were out here, you mean? Yeah, there was like this guy who, it was really weird. Mysterious guy stopped me one day in the Magic Castle, and he says, did you know Tony Giorgio's brother-in-law is Barry Sands, who produces Letterman's show? And I said, no. And he goes, yeah, and he's coming. You should talk to Tony about showcasing.

You should go on Letterman. And so Tony Giorgio was the guy. He's like a character actor and always played mafioso. So it was like he's in The Godfather, and he's the guy who puts the knife in the guy's hand. Yeah, I remember that guy, yeah. And he was a really good,'s a great like pickpocket a really good card guy and he got me uh i got a showcase at the comedy magic club for barry sands and tony giorgio set it up for me and um and i got the gig so then two months in i was 22

i got on Letterman. And that changed everything. So suddenly I went from unpaid regular at the comedy store at Westwood to paid regular at the comedy store in the main room. Oh, yeah. And then I was doing Letterman, so I was doing The Road. And then I started – and then it kind of went dead for a while. I think Letterman didn't have me back on.

And then I got the Uncomedian special. And- That was the 1230 show, Letterman, not the daytime show. Yeah, it was the night show. So you flew to New York to do it. Yeah. Yeah, it was exciting. Yeah, it was great.

And Dave's a Midwesterner. You must have hit it off. It was great. It was great. Yeah, he was really nice and it was super cool. And then we did the young comedian special and then everything kind of turned around after that and then i got and then i became a regular on letterman and a regular on saturday night live for like i was going back and forth like an episode on letterman episode on snl so i did

in like a year i did eight of Yeah. And then they started to go, you got to decide you're going to be on Letterman or SNL. Right. You have to decide. Yeah. We, Letterman wants you exclusive. And so by that time I was kind of burning out on it and I didn't really have. Were you touring as well? Yeah. I was traveling. As a headliner? Yeah. I was headlining and just doing a lot of shows. It was great, but it was kind of like it was starting to lose its meaning for me. And I was like, I didn't know what I should do next. I was like. Well, how was the environment?

Like, you know, you're hanging out with drug addicts and freaks. I didn't really. I think I got spared from that for a lot of things. Like, there was a fair amount. I mean, I was smoking pot back then. Yeah. But it was like, and drinking a little bit. But they were all pretty nice. I mean, I was smoking pot back then. Yeah. But it was like, and drinking a little bit,

but they were all pretty nice. And I stared, I wasn't attracted to the danger, I think, the way you were. I was kind of more like scared of it. Right. So it was kind of easier for me to avoid that. I ended up really gravitating towards the guys who are really into the craft. Like I love Shanling.

Shanling, like, he like mentored me kind i didn't understand at the time but he'd have me come over and we i'd bring my notebook and he'd be writing and i'd be writing and we did that like fairly often and he'd like watch my set and he talked to me about my sight lines and go joel you gotta why do you look in one spot you look your gaze is in one spot you gotta you gotta run your eyes over the audience. And I go, but I can't see him. He goes, yeah, but they can see you. You got to like run your eyes over him.

And it's like, I go, oh, that's like really smart. Yeah, I still have trouble with that. After I did that, I just always do it. And it's kind of fun. He, yeah, he mentored, you know, he was a very giving guy. Yeah, I didn't get it at the time. I just, I'm really frustrated that he's gone and I didn't like, you know, I haven't talked to him in 10 years, you know.

And he passed. Yeah, I'm frustrated about that. And I like, I remember coming back and this is after I had moved back to Minneapolis and I brought him a robot. I was making these robots out of found objects and I brought him one as a way of thanking him and he put it on his set like for it's Gary Shanley so there's one of my robots on his set yeah but um and same with Seinfeld too it was the same kind of relationship too but that was kind of we kind of got to be friends after I was doing stand-up and then um and we started like writing

together I started writing for him on a couple of things oh yeah yeah I wrote on his HBO special his first HBO special and and I helped him write the like kind of interstitial stuff and yeah we're still friends he's on the new mystery science theater he does a cameo and oh that's great and I did comedians in cars with them but yeah he's still a friend of mine he's great well that's nice yeah right there's a bright spot so what happens when the meaning drained out it's because you're doing it you're at the top of your game the comedy boom you're a letterman regular yeah the only unique guy yeah the i i the stress was kind of getting to me to have to create create more and more material and build things and build

stuff yeah and then and travel with it and um and there i didn't want to be on a sitcom i don't back then the only thing you could do is be on a sitcom or write on a sitcom right and and i didn't like anything i didn't even like cheers like i was i they brought me in to read for that part of Woody on Cheers. And at that time, I didn't even think it was any good. Like now I think it's awesome, but back then I just thought, this is a sitcom. It's stupid. Yeah, you were the anti-sitcom.

So that was where your pushback was. You wanted to stay in the art. Yeah, yeah, I didn't see myself. And on top of that, I didn't fit in. I'm not like that. My stuff's really conceptual and I'm not like a joke writer. Right. So it's not like I was a great joke writer.

Like I could plug into a sitcom and be that guy in the corner. Yeah. It wasn't that. And then I just decided, oh, yeah, it's like maybe I should quit and just see what happens to me. Like what is it going to feel like if I stop? You know, who am I? Right. Yeah. So I went back to Minneapolis and did like a big show to try to make money. And then I like auctioned off all my props. On stage? On stage. Yeah. At the end of the show. And then I just kind of sat and was like trying to listen to myself. Just like, well, what am I supposed to do now?

Who am I now? And so that was just kind of- Did you ask God for help? That's interesting. I don't remember. It's not that clear to me. I don't know if I did. I'm not sure.

That's not part of my story, but I'm putting it in. The day Joel asked God. That's always the great thing man I got to tell you one thing that reminds me I was like my family's from Cornwall England right and there was this family legend like they had a ship and they go up from Cornwall to the North Sea and they'd get all this Norway pine and bring it down. And supposedly the family legend was there was an incredible storm and your great, great, great grandfather prayed to God to stop the storm. And if he did, if God stopped the storm and they lived, they'd become farmers in Wisconsin.

And that's the story. And it turns out, like, I ended up going to Cornwall, talking to some people, and they said, oh, when did your family leave? And I said, oh, like the late 1800s. And they said, oh, that's right when there was a huge recession, everybody left. Right? Right. So it was like everybody dresses it up with the God story, right? Yeah. And they were giving away land in the American Midwest to Russian immigrants. They got 500 acres for free just because they went there and put stakes in the ground.

Well, they had a real issue with actually farming in the terrain. So they needed people. They brought in a lot of these people that I can't remember who they were, but that were kicked out of Russia. That's where you get the winter wheat. The American government didn't know what to do with that land but they knew that somebody could figure it out so they let people like go ahead take it yeah well wisconsin

is super it's kind of a glitch because it's super fertile because the glacier moved through there so it's like the best farmland in the world so somebody screwed up i'm thinking about minnesota somebody screwed up giving that away. So, all right, well, you corrected that. Now we're switching your story to you asked God for help and he made you take some jobs and then he delivered you robots. He dropped Mystery Science Theater on me. And it was like so cool.

Which is weird because there is sort of an omniscient element in the way it's structured oh my god geez um well yeah so i could tell you the story of that but did you like how long were you in the wilderness man yeah i don't know it seemed like um it seemed like a couple years but um it was great because my friends were still hanging out and having this cafe society. I was only in LA for like three years, so I had all these cool friends who were in bands and living in houses. And that's when we were reading Jacques Allul's The Technological Society, and I got into

Marsha McLuhan and all that. Right. And they were reading The Sacred Canopy and all these, you know, theology books and talking about it. And so that was like an unbelievable great time. The replacements were happening. It was like Husker Du. Yeah.

It was like the – it was Soul Asylum. It was all like perfect. That's great. And so I got to be in on that and it was Soul Asylum. It was all like perfect. That's great. And so I got to be in on that and it was so, I appreciated it so much. But anyway, so yeah, so I'm back in Minneapolis and I started doing this thing where I started making these robots out of found objects

and it was very instinctual thing. As art? Yeah, it was like kind of like, you know, at the Walker Arts Center, there's this great sculpture that Picasso made where it's super simple, but it looks like a gorilla, but it's like a Volkswagen Tonka toy. Right. And he also would do that with handlebars like racing bike and bike seats.

The bullhead? Yeah. And so I saw that, and it really spoke to me in a weird way because i realized like how primitive he was and like you know he could render stuff beautifully but then he'd kind of alternate and do these really primitive things that were real like he it just spoke to me because all it was is hey it kind of looks like a it kind of looks like a gorilla head when you turn it this way. Yeah.

And so that was part of it. And also, you know, there was some information out. Like I think I saw a documentary about Star Wars where they talked about kit bashing and how they made all the vehicles and stuff out of, you know, model tank parts and stuff. So then that kind of inspired me. And I went to the Sal army and because i was always at the salvation army like getting books and records and clothes and clothes and and and stuff that i would usually make into my act that's where most of my act came from it's just super cheap stuff from the salvation army that i'd repurpose and so there's all this brick brack so i bought a

shopping cart of it cost me 10 bucks i got a glue gun, and I just started trying to collage these robots out of found objects. And they look pretty cool. I was pretty capable. I could put them together. Yeah, yeah. They look nice, and there's this shop in Minneapolis called Props, and they started selling my robots. So I sold like 50 robots. I got pretty good at it.

Somewhere along the line, I guess I was starting to feel like I wanted to get back in show business. I was kind of like growing out of thinking about it. And I had this idea like so long ago. Like this happened in high school. Like you remember that Elton John record, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, right? Yeah, I love that record. It's great. long ago like this happened in high school like you remember uh that elton john record goodbye

yellow brick road yeah i love that record it's great and funeral for my friend and uh love lies bleeding yeah love it right oh right that guitar comes in for love lies bleeding it's great i used to do a magic trick to uh funeral for a friend and um so anyway um with each song there's these illustrations right and in one of them there's these illustrations, right? And in one of them, there's a song called I've Seen That Movie Too, and it's an illustration of a Clark Gable movie. And there's theater seats, and there's two people watching them. And in high school, I looked at that, and I said,

oh, that would be a great thing for a show is like run a movie and then have these silhouettes and have these guys talk. So that was that. And then when I started thinking about it in Minneapolis, I started to go, well, I should do like a local TV show. I should do just something that's cheap. What's a cheap movie I could do? And there was this other idea I had in college where there's this movie called The Turkey Awards. The Medved Brothers did this book called The Turkey Awards

where they basically did the opposite of the Academy Awards where they'd have the worst movies in the world. And that's where I found out about Plan 9 and Robot Monster. And I remember being in college saying, why isn't somebody making a show with these? These are like adorable. These are funny and great. Like why isn't anybody

figuring out anything? And so during that period, I had the robots, I had the idea with the silhouettes, I had the idea with the movies and I started to go, you know, I think these movies are like public domain. I think, I think, I think Robot Monster, Plan 9 from Outer Space are public domain. And I could do this movie like on a green screen. I could do this show on a green screen. And so the first iteration was this thing called You Are Here. And it was like a zombie apocalypse. I based it on The Omega Man.

Remember that movie? It's Charlton Heston. It's a zombie movie. And there's a scene, this great scene, where he goes to a movie theater and he watches Woodstock. And I based it on that. But I had, so it was me. I was going to be like Charlton Heston.

And then there was a robot companion, Rex. And we were, that was the theater seats thing. And we were like, we were held up in a TV studio and we were watching movies in a TV studio, and we were watching movies hoping it would attract who's ever survived. So it was like a zombie apocalypse TV show. Right. And that was kind of where it sat for a while.

It was called You Are Here. And then I started thinking about it and going, eh, I don't know if I can make it funny with zombies like it's a little it's an apocalyptic comedy show i don't know if i can do that right so um so then i started thinking about it and i realized oh i've always loved this douglas trumbull movie silent running do you remember yeah yeah yeah yeah these three robots. I go, oh, that's it. I'm a guy. I'm trapped in space. I'm having to watch these bad movies.

And I got like Huey, Dewey, and Louie from Silent Running. I'm going to have three robots. So I basically used that as a template, right? Yeah. And then that was it. That was pretty much the idea. And then along the lines of that, when I when I had, I had a warehouse space, uh, the colonial warehouse and in that space where these guys were making this like slasher movie called

Bloodhook. And I met one of the guys and it was Jim Mallon and he was like the director of it. And, um, and he started to like talk to me, I think maybe this is like six months later and he had quit doing that. He was working at this UHF channel. He was like managing it. And he approached me and he said, Oh, we want to do a show with comedians.

Like, it's kind of like he pitched me like the gong show with comedians. And, um, I, I just was like so fed up with comics. I didn't want to go back in the clubs. I didn't want to work with the clubs or the comics.

And I just said, oh, get to know Scott Hanson. He knows everything you need to know. Just go do that. And I'll build a trophy for you because I make stuff. I'll build you a funny trophy. But I didn't want anything to do with it. It just seems so pedestrian. Right.

And so, but then I got home and I go, shit, this guy's got a studio. I got to pitch him my idea. Yeah. And so I sat down with him. I always have kept notebooks since my freshman year of college. And I showed him my notebook and it was basically the doorway sequence, the theater seats with watching a monster movie with the guy and a robot or two. I had some designs for robots. I was trying to think conceptually, but I really actually collage

the robots. So I kind of work with them. So I don't really design them and then build them, but I was just trying to show, here's an idea for a robot, here's an idea for a robot. And then, and I think that was kind of it and then he liked it and he said well we should we should do a pilot we should shoot like a 15 minute pilot and so we set to work working on it and um kevin murphy was the editor there so he he people know mystery science here they know he became tom servo over a couple of years yeah and. And we started doing it. We started doing it at, and I, to do the creative stuff with me, I hired Trace Bull U and J. Elvis Weinstein.

And J. Elvis Weinstein was Tom Servo in Gypsy and Trace Bull U was Crow. And we started making these shows and, you know, that's kind of it. And we started really slow. I mean, if you watch,

I mean, I- Were they public domain? Well, actually, once we got to the TV's channel, they had already licensed all these movies, and they happened to have some crummy movies that we could use. So they were already licensed. So we didn't have to use public domain. That was a local TV station.

Yeah, the public domain thing was just my justification because I go, how am am i gonna riff on how am i gonna like say shit about people's movies without them suing me is this against the law yeah could i get in trouble so the public domain thing kind of helped me get kind of get into it yeah so that was kind of it and then we did like 22 shows locally the whole idea was to uh sell it to cable right and then and then just around the same time i like i said i worked during that time i worked on seinfeld's first hbo special and i met stew smiley there sure and stew smiley was the executive at the comedy channel right and so i had a friend there and we i pitched it to him we made a eight eight minute

cell tape and that's it that's the story how many episodes did you end up making uh a total of almost 198 total that's insane yeah so you do all these and frank connett's involved and yeah well after we got rolling you know we did the shows locally we got to go to know, we did the shows locally. We got to go to Comedy Channel. We finally got paid to do it. And that's when we started writing it. Before that, we were just sitting. It was like watching us riff at a party. Right. Just kind of talk.

Yeah. We just started to figure it out. But the big thing was the thing that really canonized the show for me was when we cut together like an eight- cell tape and we used our funniest bits and i go oh i get it the whole show's got to be like that rapid fire riffs and so when we went to got paid to do it we started writing it and that's when everything changed like if we would have tried to improv it would have been stupid right but we wrote it and it worked so and people loved it it was so special and so important to so many people but it was very specific and you know it's it makes total sense that now would be the time to to to sort of reintroduce it to the world and you know and

you've got all this new talent and and new technology i remember there was a point there where you developed a show because i remember being asked if I wanted to be part of it somehow or something. What was it called? The Box? TV Wheel. The TV Wheel. It was first called the Xbox. Right.

And then it became TV Wheel. It was like a revolving set. Yeah, it was built on a 32-foot turntable. There was a lockdown camera in the middle, and it's all done in one shot. So it was a sketch. It was like Laugh-In or like a sketch show. It was kind of like SNL, but you... I think there was auditions for it at some point.

It had total context, though, because you understood there's a camera, there's a 32-foot turntable, and we have to do this all in real time. There's no cuts. There's no pre-produced pieces. So the premise, all I was trying to do is just make something really live feeling. Right.

Because SNL was like rolling more and more pre-produced films in. Yeah. And I was just going, it doesn't feel live. This is live. It was just a pilot, though. They didn't pick it up. Right. Well, I'm happy for you, Joel.

Thanks, man. Sorry I've been handling this wicked-ass knife. Whatever you got to handle. Yeah. This just feels so good in my hand. It's a nice weighty knife. Yeah. I think someone left that in an apartment that I was living in, or that I'd subletted

to somebody, and there was stuff, and that was one of the things. You got so many, like, it's really nice in here. Thanks, buddy. I wonder, what is it like when you're not don't have this stuff i think about it all the time like because i think like what happens to this stuff how much of it is really important to me you know like i've often thought about cleaning it out and and making it different i just don't want to get dusty because it's starting to some days it feels like it like you know when those roadside attraction museums that are uncapped with freak shows and babies in jars and stuff, but there's always layers of dust on all the displays?

I don't want it to become like that, so I have to stay on top of it. It hasn't got that vibe yet. You kind of have a place for everything, so it doesn't. Yeah, not yet. But there's a lot going on here. Yeah, it's cozy in a chaotic way. Yeah. Well, all right.

Well, I'm going to watch. I'll get caught up. Thanks so much. I really appreciate being here. I'm a fan. Thank you. That was me and Joel Hodgson in the garage. What an amazing guy.

Great story. Good dude. Solid. I'm very excited that that show is back. In the Garage. What an amazing guy. Great story. Good dude. Solid. I'm very excited that that show is back. You can watch the 14 brand new episodes and the old episodes now streaming on Netflix of Mystery Science Theater 3000. No music today. No music today.

Oh my God. I need a break. Boomer lives! We'll be right back. Lollaballs. Yes, we can deliver that. Uber Eats. Get almost, almost anything. Order now. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed,

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