Penn Jillette | Club Random with Bill Maher

Speaker 2 If you're a smoker or vapor, ready to make a change, you really only need one good reason. But with Zin nicotine pouches, you'll discover many good reasons.

Speaker 2 Zin is America's number one nicotine pouch brand. Plus, Zin offers a robust rewards program.
There are lots of options when it comes to nicotine satisfaction, but there's only one Zin.

Speaker 2 Check out zinn.com/slash find to find Zin at a store near you.

Speaker 2 Warning, this product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical.

Speaker 3 This is Marshawn Beastmode Lynch. Prize Pick is making sports season even more fun.
On Prize Picks, whether you're a football fan, a basketball fan, it always feels good to be right.

Speaker 3 And right now, new users get $50 instantly in lineups when you play your first $5. The app is simple to use.
Pick two or more players, pick more or less on their stat projections.

Speaker 3 Anything from touchdown to threes. And if you're right, you can win big.
Mix and match players from any sport on PrizePicks, Prize

Speaker 3 America's number one daily fantasy sports app. PrizePicks is available in 40 plus states, including California, Texas, Florida, and Georgia.

Speaker 3 Most importantly, all the transactions on the app are fast, safe, and secure.

Speaker 4 Download the PrizePicks app today and use code Spotify to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup. That's code Spotify to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup.

Speaker 4 PrizePicks, it's good to be right. Must be present in certain six.
Visit PrizePicks.com for restrictions and

Speaker 1 Don't street show guys like that make a lot of money? The amount that I made would knock you over. Then why were you living in the alley?

Speaker 1 I just told you I changed my mind

Speaker 1 of you, and you just said you should change your mind. Oh, good.

Speaker 1 Oh, look at you.

Speaker 1 Standing. Good to see you.
Wow. You look like you lost a lot of weight.
Oh, only about 120 pounds. Really? Yeah.

Speaker 1 And I know it wasn't Ozantic.

Speaker 1 No, no, it wasn't. Right.
I'm not a big fan of that. But it's been now, I mean, I just haven't seen you often.
It's been like

Speaker 1 nine years I've been down there. Yes, really? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, my God. And also, that brought me around to

Speaker 1 a point of view of yours that I thought I would never share. Oh, good.
Which is it brought me around to being,

Speaker 1 I'm afraid I'm a pretty hardcore vegan now.

Speaker 1 Have been for nine years. I'm not a vegan.
I know, but here's what happened. You see, when you...
But I'm a

Speaker 1 medical skeptic. Well, animal rights, yes, but also a medical skeptic.
Well, in the broad sense.

Speaker 1 I started out

Speaker 1 stopping animal products for my health. And it turns out.
Yeah, I don't agree with that. You don't either.
I'm not sure. I think the science is completely out on that.

Speaker 1 I mean, the science may very well be that people or some people

Speaker 1 need to be at optimal health animal protein. That may be the case.
I know that's not what PETA wants to hear, and I love my friends at PETA,

Speaker 1 but I'm sorry, the truth always comes first, and the science is out on that.

Speaker 1 Yeah, and I've heard many, many doctors say,

Speaker 1 all my patients are vegetarians.

Speaker 1 They don't look good. I disagree with that because I know vegetarians who do look fine.

Speaker 1 I'm not sure. I'm not sure you do, but I'll give you that the it's a but what I was saying was

Speaker 1 what's really interesting is when you give up having to resolve your cognitive dissonance with factory farming and so on, once you no longer have to do that,

Speaker 1 it's one of those things that I don't think you can find a person that will do anything. I don't think you can find reasonable people who would go into a factory farm and say, I feel good about this.

Speaker 1 This is the way we should be. But there are definitely people who, even if they saw it, wouldn't care that much.
That's right.

Speaker 1 But that's different. It's different.

Speaker 1 I mean there are some people it's it's I always compare it to me and babies not that I would ever want to hurt a baby but like you can show me humans in fact but babies you're like in a movie and bad things are happening to them it won't actually make me cry but an animal

Speaker 1 yeah it's just some people are fur people and

Speaker 1 there's a there's there's you know that's uh I believe that's a cultural thing you know how we how we start to function that way I'm not sure that's built in yeah Oh, I don't know about that.

Speaker 1 A cultural thing to like just have a thing for animals? I think

Speaker 1 our culture is moving in that direction.

Speaker 1 What culture hates animals?

Speaker 1 Well, you would say America.

Speaker 1 America? Well, yeah, but not like, but only mostly because they're more like the, you're right about the fact that if most people saw it, they would be appalled.

Speaker 1 But they just want to do the out of sight, out of mind.

Speaker 1 It's one of the amazing things about freedom of speech in this country you can't show the inside of a slaughterhouse ag gag rules yes big ag how does that happen it's and you know what this is all coming to this is all going to come to the fore again i tried to make it a case when covet happened with you know i said when you torture animals it's going to come back on humans we kept keep doing it yeah it's not even it's not the torture it's putting

Speaker 1 a billion of these things in close quarters well that's torture you're torturing them but i'm saying it's a byproduct of the torture. It's not the purpose of it.
But

Speaker 1 the sickness that you're putting into the animals by torturing them comes back to make us sick.

Speaker 1 I'm not going to go into all the details of how that is. This is not a science show.
Don't bother because we agree. Right.
No, no, no. Right.
But just for people listening.

Speaker 1 For people listening? No, not really. I thought this was the first honest conversation we'd ever had.
Well, it is the most honest conversation you'll ever have anywhere in the media.

Speaker 1 I'll guarantee you that. But what I was going to say is this is all going to come back in a much bigger way now with bird flu.
Oh, yep, it's all bird flu.

Speaker 1 As a matter of fact, with COVID, we got really lucky. The first thing we get that's bird flu related, it's really bad.
I mean,

Speaker 1 the coming plague, as the book said, or the epidemic that's coming, is going to be really, really bad. And our hope is maybe we can be dead by then.

Speaker 1 That's what we're clutching on to. Well, no, that cannot be.
we got to find a better way to look at it than that pandemic.

Speaker 1 One thing, you know, is if you cut down animal products a lot, you would help things a lot. But you, what was, I remember you and the potatoes.
Yeah, well, that.

Speaker 1 What is the potatoes? The potatoes was, I'm a glutton, and I was completely on the SAD, which is, you know, standard American diet. Right.
And

Speaker 1 a friend of mine,

Speaker 1 who's

Speaker 1 pretty pro-science, worked at NASA and all that shit, said to me, you know, you got to knock yourself out of your head. So people tend to say it back in an oversimplified way.
That's why I'm asking.

Speaker 1 That you just started to eat potatoes. And the fact is, I did for two weeks.
Right.

Speaker 1 And what that did for me, I'm not saying for anybody else, what it did for me is it taught me what it felt like to be hungry, which I didn't know. You know, you've never been fat.

Speaker 1 No. But learning

Speaker 1 fat.

Speaker 1 Learning not to be a glutton and not to fall for all the social cues, you want to knock yourself out of it for a little while. And two weeks of eating nothing but potatoes, I was thinking differently.

Speaker 1 And I started to taste food differently and started to feel differently. Yeah, I mean, I've there could have been anything.
Potatoes weren't mad.

Speaker 1 It was just a mono diet for long enough to say, I'm not going to see those ads the same. Just something to disrupt.
I mean, when you think about most people who

Speaker 1 never do a fast, for example, I mean, you're just,

Speaker 1 they would never really think, and I never really thought for year after year, anything other than I eat three meals a day. Right.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 I never skip a day because it's eating for fuck's sake. And then, you know, you get older and you have health issues.
And then you're doing things like, I mean, I've,

Speaker 1 I think, for about five years now, a couple of times a year, I do do that pro-lon fast. It's like they call it the fasting-mimicking diet.

Speaker 1 I've done a tiny bit of food, but it's. I've done just water for two weeks.
Just water. See, I can't do that.
I tried the hardcore. I can't.
But remember, I still have.

Speaker 1 I mean, for one time, I was down much lower than this, and probably to where you are in terms of body fat, but I'm not there now. I could easily go three weeks and whatever.

Speaker 1 But what the fast does,

Speaker 1 especially if you do it regularly,

Speaker 1 it does, again, retrains you to how much food you need. And

Speaker 1 then you can go to what I did was two meals a day instead of three, because compared to the fast, two meals a day is joyous. I do one.

Speaker 1 One. Yeah.
One. And like a dog.

Speaker 1 I eat very carefully and

Speaker 1 it's all vegan, but I take the supplements. The thing that I didn't really understand

Speaker 1 is that how much of

Speaker 1 the way we live our lives lives is based around food. Of course.
I can now talk to somebody without eating. It used to be that's all I did was eat when I do eat.

Speaker 1 Well, when I do the fast, I can't talk to anybody because it is social. So I have to stay home.
I mean, some people can work through a fast. I'm amazed.

Speaker 1 I can't be social. I don't want to talk to you on the phone.
I just have to be alone. And that's okay for five days.
It's actually a nice reset.

Speaker 1 Reading and certainly can't do any pot. When you come back from doing a fast and you go into Hollywood meetings and it's 10 o'clock and they have bagels and donuts and you say, who's hungry right now?

Speaker 1 Why do they have this food? Who came to the meeting going, wow, I'm wicked hungry. Wait, you go to Hollywood meetings at 10 a.m.? I have, I have.
Really?

Speaker 1 Even though they know, no, but I mean, a few years ago.

Speaker 1 I was just going to say. I'm from Vegas, so I'm not really supposed to be up before noon.
Right.

Speaker 1 What time do you get up? I usually get up actually about 10, 9 or 10, because I go to sleep about 2. So how many years have you been at the Rio?

Speaker 1 I should interject here, because you might be interested, the longest running headliners in Vegas history. Fuck you, Sinatra.

Speaker 1 We have now gone, I only say that because he's dead.

Speaker 1 23 years we've been playing.

Speaker 1 Conveniently named Penantella Theater.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 1 I've been to it. Do you remember that I did a trick with you guys? Yeah.

Speaker 1 What was that for?

Speaker 1 It's funny because, you know, I don't know what year this is. I'm guessing the 90s.
Yep. Okay.
We would have been on Sin City Spectacular. Okay.
And we called in a favor.

Speaker 1 I remember, I was happy to do it. I was honored.
The name of the

Speaker 1 trick was Blood from a Stone. Oh, yeah, yeah, with the hand.
And I remember what? With the into the hand, the razor into the hand, yeah.

Speaker 1 No, there was a stone. Yeah.
But it turned into a faux expose

Speaker 1 that had people cut in their hand. I don't specifically remember that.
I don't remember much. Of course, it's the 90s from a pothead.

Speaker 1 Well, but what I do remember, I remember the name of the trick, Blood from a Stone. And I also remember afterwards thinking, oh my God, that's so cheap when you get up close to it.
Well, thank you.

Speaker 1 Like, really? This is what's fooling all these people. It was just like

Speaker 1 a magic shop rock. that

Speaker 1 yeah that was the first part there was the second part we paid off okay you were the setup oh i was the setup yeah okay there was a payoff later um but uh yeah uh it very often you know we have

Speaker 1 we do fool us so we have to come up with 20 new tricks a year right and most magicians do 25 in their lives so we are writing a lot of material and it's really fun you know and i'm gonna bet you that's fun because that's new yeah What I can't wrap my mind around is the amount of shows you do.

Speaker 1 Like, I couldn't do that.

Speaker 1 We do a lot of shows. Do you do two a night? No, not anymore.
We're doing, but you also go on the road. How many weeks a year?

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 1 52 if you count on the road. Like, for instance, next year.
What? You never take a week off? No. Next year, we'll be doing

Speaker 1 Australia and England. It's the 50th anniversary.
Oh, my God. But I don't,

Speaker 1 I

Speaker 1 a day or two off every two or three years.

Speaker 1 I just love to work. Humans are so different.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 I mean, the thing, I mean, just the, you're not bored when if you're doing the same act, like I don't do the same act. We have to do different stuff on the road than we do in Vegas.

Speaker 1 We put different tricks in it. So from Thursday to Friday, it's a different show.

Speaker 1 This week it will be way different. Yeah, from Thursday to Friday.
But you just happen to get lucky on that question.

Speaker 1 The best living magician is a man named Juan Temeriz, who's from Spain. And we have a bit in the show called Español, which we wrote with a great Spanish magician named Hondro.
And

Speaker 1 he's a student of Juan Temeriz. So we were going to pull that out of the show and a bunch of other stuff to put new stuff in.
But Juan's coming from Madrid to see our show.

Speaker 1 So we're keeping in the stuff we want him to see.

Speaker 1 That may be unprofessional to say, tonight's show show is for this guy. And your partner feels the same way about all this work or are you dragging him? No, he's happy to do it too.

Speaker 1 Yeah, we intend to die in office.

Speaker 1 We have no plans of retiring. I mean, Teller is seven years older than me.
So I am, you know, three score and nine, and he's, you know, he's

Speaker 1 76.

Speaker 1 Three score. Now, for the kids out there,

Speaker 1 I can only explain this to you in terms of the Gettysburg Address. Kids, you remember four score and seven years ago? That's 87 years.

Speaker 1 That was the time from the American Revolution to the Gettysburg Address. Score means a period of 20 years.

Speaker 1 And only people who are three score or older would ever use it.

Speaker 1 And certainly not to get laid.

Speaker 1 But you're married, right? But I believe we're

Speaker 1 married. I've been married,

Speaker 1 oh, geez,

Speaker 1 20 years.

Speaker 1 20 years. A score.

Speaker 1 We have two children. We have two children who are 19 and 18.
Do you like them? I do. Okay.
I do, and

Speaker 1 that's fortunate. Although I will tell you that there isn't a study that will tell you that I'm happier than you because of having children.
Wait. They all say the opposite.

Speaker 1 What do the studies say that you're happier if you have children? No. Oh, that if you don't? No.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Well, first of all, it's so stupid because we're all individuals. What makes me happy isn't what makes you happy.
So we're comparing apples with not even another type of fruit. What'd you call me?

Speaker 1 Well, again, I've heard rumors. Yeah, well, they're all true.

Speaker 1 Right. What were you, like a gay when I'm drunk kind of guy? I've never been drunk.
You know that. Oh, that's true.
You were drunk. So what was your excuse?

Speaker 1 Full moon? You know, that's one of the things that

Speaker 1 these two people have differently. I don't even drink caffeine right i i've never had a puff of marijuana i don't think that's true for you well you're gonna get one tonight

Speaker 1 and uh you know i don't drink alcohol but i have had um

Speaker 1 you know what they've referred to as medicinal drugs like morphine and stuff when i was wicked sick and i got to tell you i really enjoyed it morphine of course and a matter of fact it's opium you know trey parker Well, now I don't know him, but I know who he is.

Speaker 1 Well, Trey used to say,

Speaker 1 probably still does. I haven't talked to him in a while, that my biggest flaw was never being high.

Speaker 1 You personally? Oh, I see. Yep.
So he said he wanted to be with me when I was high. So I had gone to the dentist, and they had made a mistake.
and given me

Speaker 1 much more than they should have of like some powerful painkiller. Good for them.
So I said to

Speaker 1 my wife, I said, call Trey Parker.

Speaker 1 So he flew in and spent an evening talking to me and said, I was right. You're a lot better high.

Speaker 1 Well, look, some people literally are better high. I think I am in some areas.
I love to write high.

Speaker 1 Stand up. I can do high and often have.

Speaker 1 Real time, no. That would be a disaster.
That's not the kind of thing you want to be high for. There's too many elements going on, too many important people.
Got to keep the clock.

Speaker 1 We're on a big network. It's not the same thing.
In this show, I can go, oh, what were we talking about? Or, you know, fuck you. Or, you know, are you gay? Or whatever it is.

Speaker 1 Just, I'm not going to, that's just a different kind of thing.

Speaker 1 High is right for something. I've never been an everyday smoker.
I've said this many times. I'm a situational smoker.

Speaker 1 And that's how I, I know it sounds counterintuitive to say I'm not addictive to marijuana. I could have quit any time in the last 45 years that I've been smoking it, and I just didn't.

Speaker 1 But it's actually kind of true. I think when I do the fast,

Speaker 1 I don't miss it. It's like I know I'm not going to smoke during a fast or on a Tuesday night or whatever night I'm not smoking.
And my body doesn't go, come on, let's do this.

Speaker 1 When I was on cigarettes, my body was saying, come on, let's do this. There's no, there's very little evidence of addictive qualities of marijuana by almost any definition.

Speaker 1 You know, I'm not, I'm someone who doesn't smoke marijuana, who has been on the cover of High Times magazine. Well, that's great.
I have been

Speaker 1 very, very pro-legalization

Speaker 1 of everything.

Speaker 1 Because I just think that if you don't have the freedom to smoke dope, I don't really have the freedom not to.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 1 And I think if you ask most men on the street, women on the street, whoever trans on the street, I don't want to leave anybody out. Whoever happens to be on the street.
Any life form on the street,

Speaker 1 Pendulette, first they would say magic, and of course they know that. Second, I think they would say is libertarian.
Yeah, which faded a little bit for me. I got that tag, too.

Speaker 1 And look, you know, I'm, I think we're probably similar in this. Some things I am libertarian about.
Sure. But where it makes sense.

Speaker 1 You once said to me,

Speaker 1 I think,

Speaker 1 that libertarians were, you know,

Speaker 1 conservatives wanting to smoke dope.

Speaker 1 Some of them are.

Speaker 1 And the formal party. Party's come to be more true.
The formal party takes it too far. Like the actual libertarian party, I mean

Speaker 1 they're the ones who I think of saying, you know, well,

Speaker 1 seatbelts? No, they restrict my freedom and I want to soar like an eagle right through the windshield. Well,

Speaker 1 the other thing is that

Speaker 1 for me,

Speaker 1 a lot of what gets forgotten is the responsibility. Libertarianism only really works if people are taking more responsibility than many people want.

Speaker 1 And the fact that I seem to want responsibility,

Speaker 1 you know, it's that mistake. that's made with the do onto others thing that we've been hitting again and again.
I cannot treat you like I want to be treated because you want different things,

Speaker 1 you know, and that is the problem

Speaker 1 with extrapolating from your own desires that everybody else wants. I don't understand that.
Of course you can treat me like

Speaker 1 we're talking about things we have in common, like we treat each other like I'm polite to you. Of course, but

Speaker 1 I can't use the

Speaker 1 solipsism of thinking that you have the same desires I have. No.

Speaker 1 And that's what makes the world go round.

Speaker 1 It's a good thing. It is a good thing because

Speaker 1 or else we'd all be competing more so for the same things. I mean, we are already competing for a lot.
You know, people, I mean, this is a capitalist society.

Speaker 1 We're all trying to get ahead and get rich or die trying.

Speaker 1 But at least we're not competing like

Speaker 1 on other levels, like for pot and liquor.

Speaker 1 And widows. That's all you bet.

Speaker 1 That's all you bet. Right.
I mean, I think the marriage, not marriage thing is, to me, the clearest divide as to how people are just built differently

Speaker 1 and have different DNA and different needs. Part of it is psychological, of course.
Part of it is physical. Some people just have a very high libido.

Speaker 1 But I was very anti-marriage, as was my wife, which is an odd thing to say.

Speaker 1 And I did not think that the solution was gay marriage. I thought the solution was no marriage for anybody.
Made contracts. But

Speaker 1 we talked to several lawyers and we couldn't get anybody to tell me 100%

Speaker 1 that if we had children and my wife died, custody would go to me. I see.
And

Speaker 1 we tried to write up an elaborate contract that would do that. And the lawyers finally said, get married.

Speaker 1 Save yourself some money.

Speaker 1 Because we, I think that all the stuff that comes with marriage and saying that there's one way or a broad way that people uh interact with each other is is madness it's insane but uh they've put up so many roadblocks because i would not want and i trust my wife's family completely but i don't want to be in the situation where she would have a car accident of course this is now academic question because my children are you know over 18.

Speaker 1 but when they were 10 my wife wife has a car accident and someone in her family decides to take me to court over custody.

Speaker 1 I don't want that to happen. And when you're married, there's no doubt you're the father of Zim.
Boy, you think about this more than Biden.

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 1 Cub Random is brought to you by the audio marketing gurus at Radioactive Media. Summer's here, and a lot of businesses traditionally slow way down.

Speaker 1 This year, why not get a leg up on your competitors while they're out on vacation and explore a new marketing angle by utilizing the power of audio by partnering with shows like mine?

Speaker 1 You'll be fishing in a new well-stocked pond for your customers.

Speaker 1 The team at Radioactive Media will make sure your message will stand out and lure new customers your way using the power nationally on podcasts, terrestrial, satellite, and streaming radio.

Speaker 1 Radioactive media has been partnering with Club Random since the beginning and they can create a customizable campaign for your company's needs so you you can cast that net wider to attract new and qualified customers.

Speaker 1 Radioactive believes so much in the power of audio marketing they put their money where their mouths are by using it themselves right here, right now.

Speaker 1 You'll be hooked once you experience the power of audio marketing utilizing the strength of text messaging which can generate an ROI as high as seven to one.

Speaker 1 Radioactive Media has an exclusive deal to promote your product or service on club random with me and save up to 50%.

Speaker 1 Just lock in your first campaign this year. To find out all the details and receive a few club random goodies thrown in, contact Radioactive Media.

Speaker 1 Put an end to the summertime blues and go to RadioactiveMedia.com or text the word random to 511-511.

Speaker 1 Discover how audio marketing can surpass your current strategies with new and innovative ways that sound better. Go to radioactivemedia.com or text random to 511-511.

Speaker 1 Text RANDOM to 511511 today to save up to 50%.

Speaker 1 Terms, conditions, message, and data rates may apply.

Speaker 1 I think every single guy I know would like to look better without having to think about it, but because they do have to think about it, most guys still walk around looking like they threw on the first thing that fell off their closet shelf.

Speaker 1 There just has to be more stylish, functional, business, casual menswear that is both high quality and durable that can withstand your day. And finally, we've found it.
The solution is Roan.

Speaker 1 Men's closets were due for a radical reinvention and Roan did it. Roan's commuter collection is the most comfortable, breathable and truly versatile set of products known to man.

Speaker 1 They have products for every occasion. We're talking about the world's most comfortable pants, dress shirts, quarter zips, polos and blazers.

Speaker 1 Roan's signature four-way stretch fabric is breathable, flexible, and works everywhere from your commute to work to the 19th hole.

Speaker 1 Roan's commuter collection features wrinkle release technology and is 100% machine washable. Looking good is that easy.

Speaker 1 And it's so nice never having to change from work to the afterwork hang and even lounging at night. The commuter collection can get you through any workday and straight into whatever comes next.

Speaker 1 Head to roan.com slash random and use promo code random to save 20% off your entire order.

Speaker 1 That's 20% off your entire order when you go to rrhon.com slash random and use code random it's time to find your corner office comfort

Speaker 2 if you're a smoker or vapor ready to make a change you really only need one good reason but with zin nicotine pouches you'll discover many good reasons zin is america's number one nicotine pouch brand plus zin offers a robust rewards program there are lots of options when it comes to nicotine satisfaction but there's only one zin check out zin.com slash find to find zin at a store near near you.

Speaker 2 Warning, this product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical.

Speaker 1 This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game?

Speaker 1 Well, with the name Your Price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it at Progressive.com.

Speaker 1 Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law.
Not available in all states.

Speaker 1 About

Speaker 1 six weeks ago, I cracked. And I just said,

Speaker 1 I can't take in any more news. I can't read the Times anymore.
I can't watch Bill's show.

Speaker 1 My closest friend, as you may know, is Lawrence O'Donnell. And I would watch his show.
You did not know that. And I...
I wrote to Lawrence and I said,

Speaker 1 I got to stop watching the news. And that includes your show.

Speaker 1 And I said, make me one promise, Lawrence. If things change enough that I should vote for Trump, send me a text.

Speaker 1 Other than that, I'm not watching the news. So I'm a little bit self-conscious because I used to have a pretty good idea what was going on.
You should know.

Speaker 1 You see the clip from Friday of Jiminy Glick on my show. Okay.

Speaker 1 You will die. I'm just sitting there.
I'm just a prop. But you know, Jiminy Glick.
I mean, he did it for me, and it was just,

Speaker 1 I mean, I've never had reaction like that. It's really I mean he's just a genius.
He is absolutely.

Speaker 1 But

Speaker 1 you're not the only one. I mean Sam Harris famously got off Twitter about a year ago

Speaker 1 and talked about that and said like he was so much more clear after that. Like

Speaker 1 it's really I mean I know I don't get it because like

Speaker 1 I want to say to these very smart people like you and him, why did you ever go down this stupid rabbit hole to begin with?

Speaker 1 I'm not a genius, but I saw from a mile away that this is a stupid thing to do, to engage with the whole world on everybody's complaints 24-7. Really? You thought that was a good question?

Speaker 1 But also, there's this other thing that's happened. I believe, and maybe this is simply getting old, and

Speaker 1 that's a possibility. And if that's the answer, then that's the answer.
But I believe that some people were talking about issues in our lifetime.

Speaker 1 And I believe that now it's become nothing but team sports. Well, it is.
And I would watch

Speaker 1 Lawrence O'Donnell and go, how's Trump doing? He's going to be okay.

Speaker 1 And I just can't do that. Yeah, but to be fair, that's not what I'm doing.

Speaker 1 That is not what I'm doing. And the reason why my show and my career in general are doing better than ever, my book went to number one, is because I'm not doing that.

Speaker 1 Because I am the one,

Speaker 1 I'm not going to say the one guy. I don't monitor everybody else, but people come up to me all the time and say it to me.
You are the one guy who is not playing this partisan game.

Speaker 1 I get that you're center-left, but you are not afraid to go after your... Right.
You never have. You are not afraid to go after those.

Speaker 1 I was the person who was on the first week and the last week of Politically Aggression. Is that right? Yeah.
Really? I'm the one who was on both. Oh, my God.
You knew it at the time.

Speaker 1 Did you get Shmilkus when you saw the sign behind you there when you walked in?

Speaker 1 I will tell you. Isn't that a perfect spot?

Speaker 1 Yes. I mean, and you had to put a strapper pole in front of me.
May I tell you my favorite Bill Maher story? Oh, please. Because I love him.
I was on Politically Incorrect, and they were

Speaker 1 the seats there. I don't know.

Speaker 1 Yeah, 90s. Long time ago.
And there was your seat. And for some reason, this didn't often happen, but it was just the two of us on the set.
And I had the list. of the people who were on with me.

Speaker 1 And I forgot who it was. It was some drug czar for Clinton and and someone else and so and so

Speaker 1 you know it was these people. And I said to you, and it was probably

Speaker 1 your kindest moment in your life.

Speaker 1 I looked at it. I mean, I was sincere.
I was not setting you up for a joke. I said,

Speaker 1 this is a weird list, Bill, because you always have one nut. You have one person in the nut share, and you always know who the nut is.
And you went,

Speaker 1 that's all you did and i went oh it's me

Speaker 1 and you went well you know we have all different people on and i i said i'm in the nut chair and then you kind of looked at me like you always are penny you're always in the nut chair that's hysterical but your look is a look that they've never seen bill maher give which was the look of i'm kind I care for you, but there's a truth I have to tell you that might be a little tough.

Speaker 1 Well, I was more fond of the nutchair. I didn't even know we had one, but yes.
Yeah, now it's coming back to me. Right.

Speaker 1 I mean, I wouldn't call it nut, but like somebody, of course, the nutchair was where you were probably going to get the lion's share of the good stuff that came out of the show because the nutchair is somebody who's voluble and probably interesting with unpredictable ideas.

Speaker 1 And that's what I always wanted.

Speaker 1 And that was the, you know, I always say about politically, it was a designed train wreck

Speaker 1 of four different people who have nothing in common, but we all get to vote, so we should all get to talk. And there were some people who were on that show, like musicians, a couple of them.

Speaker 1 I won't say the names. I think I can remember at least one of them, who sat there for four segments and said nothing.
Like they just had a good seat for the show.

Speaker 1 Like the whole show went by, and they did not make a word come out of their mouth. The only show

Speaker 1 of, and I did your show a bunch of times. The only show that I shouldn't have done and I didn't enjoy was right after my mom died.
And this is not your fault.

Speaker 1 I was on the show with a psychic who talked to the dead.

Speaker 1 And it was the one time I've been on your show that I couldn't mitigate my grief and my anger

Speaker 1 and my uh outrage

Speaker 1 i couldn't temper with any sort of um comedy and i remember after because you thought he was a phony

Speaker 1 no i'm asking yeah that's it because you're the musician yeah but also but the point was my mom had just died so i had no i should have called up and said my mom died two weeks ago i shouldn't be on your comedy show especially with that guy life after death and afterwards uh you just went uh Yeah, your mom just died.

Speaker 1 I'm so glad we got onto this because you're the guy to ask about this.

Speaker 1 All

Speaker 1 acts who do like a psychic thing, they're all phonies. Is that what you're saying? I have.
Because sometimes I don't.

Speaker 1 I have

Speaker 1 looked very, very hard, sincerely. trying to find something that seems supernatural, and I haven't been able to.

Speaker 1 And that's as far as you're going to get out of me. Every single person that I've experienced has been phony.
Okay. And every single person.
I don't know.

Speaker 1 I don't remember the name of this guy, but and I don't see this a lot because I don't seek it out. But

Speaker 1 I do seek it out. Okay.
That's why I'm asking you.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 Barbara Streisand. I don't know if she's.
I think she exists. Oh, yes.
And is a very good friend of mine.

Speaker 1 And I love her dearly. And she may be right.
I don't know. To love you? Well, she's definitely right to love me.

Speaker 1 But she has someone who comes out in her act, at least when I saw her the last time live. And this is going back, you know, not that long, but maybe eight years.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 it's somebody she presents in the middle of her show who does a psychic act and does things, you know, like

Speaker 1 somebody in the audience. And

Speaker 1 you can tell when someone is not a plant in the audience. No one is that good an actor.
I agree with you on that. Okay.
So, I mean,

Speaker 1 and then, you know,

Speaker 1 writes on a whiteboard the name of their high school boyfriend or whatever it is. That is like,

Speaker 1 it's like, no, I know I don't know how magic tricks work, so I'm saying maybe there is a way, but it is, it is befuddling to me how someone could do that trick.

Speaker 1 What could possibly be the means by which you get into this

Speaker 1 person's head. You just described a trick, you just happen to have.
You described a trick that's trivial,

Speaker 1 that is easy, but there are other ones that are harder.

Speaker 1 Easy, how do you do it? Well, I don't know if, first of all, I wouldn't necessarily be right. And that's what makes me hesitant.

Speaker 1 I'm not protecting magic secrets, but whenever you postulate this is how a trick was done, you could be wrong because I don't know all the details. But you can.

Speaker 1 It's pretty easy to get information off a whiteboard. It's pretty easy to get information off a chalkboard.
No, no. If you you write something down, I know it.

Speaker 1 No, but he's, I don't understand. He's writing it down.
Oh, he's writing it down. He's writing it down.
Well, he's... He's saying,

Speaker 1 he's talking to somebody in the audience who just,

Speaker 1 again, unless they're the most brilliant actor or actress in the world.

Speaker 1 I don't see acting. I see, no, I've never met you before.

Speaker 1 And,

Speaker 1 you know, and then I'm writing something down that is in your head that only you would know. Imagine they're telling the truth on everything.

Speaker 1 Who's telling us? What do you mean by the time? Imagine the person in the audience is telling the truth, as you said. I'm agreeing with you.
Yeah. So you have to different quality.

Speaker 1 The person is blown away.

Speaker 1 They're destroyed. Rob Schminkis was my

Speaker 1 eyes goes. Exactly.
Or the guy got the name wrong by one letter or something. And it's like, it's like, come on.

Speaker 1 I just, I can't explain it.

Speaker 1 I can.

Speaker 1 Please. But

Speaker 1 it takes a long time. There's a thing called pre-show work,

Speaker 1 which is is much more brilliant than you think it would be. And

Speaker 1 there's also something called dual reality, which is really, really important.

Speaker 1 If I'm doing a trick for you and the audience is watching, if I do a trick that will blow you away

Speaker 1 and you're amazed, it may be a different trick. than what the audience thinks.

Speaker 1 I don't see this as a trick. A trick involves a prop, like blood from a stone.
No, okay. No.
This is just mental telepathy. But you're making, you're making,

Speaker 1 I think, I don't know.

Speaker 1 You're making a

Speaker 1 mistake

Speaker 1 that

Speaker 1 is pretty important. Okay.
While you

Speaker 1 were going to college, while you were doing all the things you were doing, learning to be funny, learning to write jokes, learning to deliver jokes, other people were working on other things.

Speaker 1 You know, I will bump into

Speaker 1 the college you go to to learn how you could ever learn how to do that.

Speaker 1 I'm sorry, but maybe I do know.

Speaker 1 If you want to learn to do that, I can point you where you need to go. Just give me a little something to hang it on.
Like, like, again, a person.

Speaker 1 What you're asking me to do, Bill, is you're asking me to tell you in two and a half minutes how to go out and do an hour stand-up show. No, it's not the same.

Speaker 1 It is exactly the same.

Speaker 1 No,

Speaker 1 because I know how my stand-up back got in my head. I want to know how

Speaker 1 what's in that lady's head in the audience.

Speaker 1 If you can control the question, you don't have to worry about the answer. They're making

Speaker 1 this.

Speaker 1 They're making you ask a different question, which is how they got in that head.

Speaker 1 And that's, they've already lost the battle. What I'm saying is

Speaker 1 maybe,

Speaker 1 maybe

Speaker 1 the only time this has ever happened happened when you saw it with Barbara Streisand. I'm just saying I've seen that same effect and I've seen it.
Because it's another guy who has this,

Speaker 1 if this is what it is, but it's not.

Speaker 1 Well, you say it's not, but you're not giving me anything. If you say it is, then you're not giving me anything.
I'm not saying it is.

Speaker 1 I'm saying my mind is open, which I'm sure is some disappointing to some people who are like, well, Bill, you made religious. I thought you were like logical.
I am logical. That means open.

Speaker 1 And in religionist, by the way, I don't say there is no God. I say I preach the gospel of I don't know.
I don't think there is.

Speaker 1 The most important three words in science. I don't know.
I don't know. Exactly.
And that is what makes science. Before

Speaker 1 science starts, I don't know is never said. Kings don't say I don't know.
Exactly. Religious figures don't say, I don't know.
I don't know are the three words of the key to everything. Absolutely.

Speaker 1 And that's the brilliant thing about your dealing with religion. And that is, by the way, what atheists say.
Right. But like, I don't know how this guy does this trick.

Speaker 1 And again, maybe

Speaker 1 are we clear at what he's now? Again, I'm remembering this from like eight years ago and very vaguely, but he is on stage with a whiteboard. He talks to someone in the audience.
Hi, we never met.

Speaker 1 Absolutely not. I'm convinced of that.
And you've been feeling whatever lately. Okay, anybody could be.

Speaker 1 I'm getting a, I'm getting a, it's about a, a, a, a friend. Yes, it's a male.
Yes. It's high school.
Yes.

Speaker 1 And then he writes the name down. I mean, I don't know.
I don't know where he's, where this trail begins for him.

Speaker 1 You're not helping me with that. The fact that you don't know how something happens does not make it supernatural.
I agree. Explain to me how a refrigerator works.

Speaker 1 I could, though.

Speaker 1 I absolutely could. I could study up.
And you can study up and learn this. I took physics for poets my sophomore year in college.

Speaker 1 And by the end of the term, there was one great shining day when I could derive for you E equals M C squared. It took the whole semester to get there, but I understood it as we did it.

Speaker 1 I couldn't remember one thing about it now. Let me tell you something

Speaker 1 that might illuminate this that I do know because I I wasn't there and I can't talk you through.

Speaker 1 I don't know who it was, but I can tell you this, there was faith healers who were doing a lot of faith healing.

Speaker 1 And there was one trick they were doing, and I will use that word, that amazing Randy, you know, my dear friend of

Speaker 1 the great debunker, could not figure out, no idea how to figure it out. And that was the healing people in wheelchairs.
Get people up on stage with wheelchairs. He would say, get up, dance.

Speaker 1 That's the power of, I mean, like. No, I'm going to tell you the trick.
I'm trying trying to explain it to you.

Speaker 1 When you arrive at the theater,

Speaker 1 they had

Speaker 1 50, 25

Speaker 1 non-matching wheelchairs.

Speaker 1 And when someone came in who was limping or with a cane or their family was helping them, a very, very nice person said to them, would you like to sit in a wheelchair? Would that make it easier?

Speaker 1 And they wheeled them down toward the front. Okay.
And when it came time to heal, all the things you say about that. Okay,

Speaker 1 the world is full of charlatans, we agree. And many, much of this

Speaker 1 would be charlatans. There's nothing is lying.

Speaker 1 Right?

Speaker 1 Have you ever danced like that before?

Speaker 1 Throw that wheelchair away. Do you need that wheelchair? No, I don't.
I get, but that's okay, but

Speaker 1 it's a very different thing. Yes, that exists in the world.
It's nothing to do with the thing I presented. Yes, it is.
It's exactly the same.

Speaker 1 It's not at all.

Speaker 1 Let me tell tell you.

Speaker 1 That's a cheap trick that

Speaker 1 is understandable, and the other thing is not understandable. And you can't to it.

Speaker 1 Well, if it is to you, again, you're giving zero. Okay, let me give you more.
And maybe that's because you're protecting the magic.

Speaker 1 But I get it. I don't think it's really a magic trick.
Do you want more? But it is, and I can tell you more. Tell me how he...
Okay. Yeah, how he does it.
Okay.

Speaker 1 He has never met that person before. Right.
Ever. One way you you could do that that gives you the exact effect you're talking about is for a nice usher

Speaker 1 to say to people,

Speaker 1 you know that the psychic is going to be performing tonight.

Speaker 1 What kinds of things are you concerned about? And you're done.

Speaker 1 And it works. And they will never, ever admit that because it's not part of their reality because they have.
Down to the boyfriend's specific name.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 1 Okay. I feel like he would have gotten busted by that, like the lady would have said the magician,

Speaker 1 the psychic. Who's going to bust him?

Speaker 1 The girl who said. She believes it.
Okay, but she could, if it was me, I would have said after the show to somebody, oh, well, you know, I did tell that to the usher.

Speaker 1 And what is the forum you say that on?

Speaker 1 I don't know. Penn.
There's no place anyone could put out material these days if we only had some sort of internet or

Speaker 1 some sort of social media where you could and it would be out there

Speaker 1 and it is out there

Speaker 1 I've never seen I've never

Speaker 1 looked for it that's true I haven't believed it okay maybe find these people busted every maybe that's right but I'm not saying that's how they did it because there's a bunch of other ways okay yeah so but but okay but at least you gave me something what you're saying to me is he does need some Confederate

Speaker 1 not necessarily but in this particular story yes I don't see how I you have okay

Speaker 1 you can also do for instance you can also do people filling out forms that they keep with them

Speaker 1 that's a very common thing filling out forms you can just say to somebody

Speaker 1 to help focus your thoughts write it down this piece of paper don't let me see it cover it up I'm never going to look at that keep that in your pocket hold it close to your heart and you're done

Speaker 1 What about, okay, let's move on to ghosts.

Speaker 1 Goats? Ghosts. There's the fainting goats that I.

Speaker 1 No, I know many

Speaker 1 very intelligent people who are not religious. Why do you say intelligent in this at all? That doesn't mean that.
Because, well, okay.

Speaker 1 Well, because they are. But anybody can make a mistake.
Okay, I'm just, let me get to the question. Okay, let me get to the question.
So, I mean, there are

Speaker 1 many, many people over the years who, again, not drunk,

Speaker 1 not stupid,

Speaker 1 say,

Speaker 1 have some sort of

Speaker 1 experience like with what you would call a ghost. Like they moved into a house and they just,

Speaker 1 you know, it would be an odor or a little rush of air would go past them. Certainly there are places who

Speaker 1 people who say they see furniture move across the room, you know, the comedy store supposedly haunted and that.

Speaker 1 What's that?

Speaker 1 I have no idea.

Speaker 1 But

Speaker 1 why are you jumping?

Speaker 1 I'm not jumping, I'm asking. But if you take ghost out of that and tell me that someone went into their home and their furniture moved,

Speaker 1 why are you giving an explanation? Why aren't you stopping and I don't know?

Speaker 1 I am saying I don't know. Okay, then we're done, right?

Speaker 1 When you say people have seen ghosts, you're making this jump. Well, they've seen

Speaker 1 some some sort of experience.

Speaker 1 Sometimes it is visual, but I've certainly have heard it more to be like something like

Speaker 1 a brief brush. I mean, I know someone who once said they moved into an apartment and they would feel this odd,

Speaker 1 and it wasn't, and very often these presences don't seem to be particularly malevolent.

Speaker 1 They just live there, and she said,

Speaker 1 one day she just went, get the fuck out of here. And she yelled at the ghost and she never felt it again.
but I don't know but see

Speaker 1 the problem is your question contains the assumption if you say to me someone was feeling something rubbing against their head they felt when they moved into this apartment they felt it over and over again they yelled get the fuck out of here and you say why did that happen and I say I don't know you're the one who said that was a ghost thing

Speaker 1 I'm just saying, let's call it phenomenon. No, let's call it.
There's a phenomenon that the vernacular would be ghost, some sort of spirit, some sort of something.

Speaker 1 I personally have never experienced any. But you're also clumping those things together.

Speaker 1 I'm just saying it's odd to me that people who are otherwise,

Speaker 1 let's use that proviso for you,

Speaker 1 otherwise intelligent. And

Speaker 1 under cross-examination, we'll tell you,

Speaker 1 I know I wasn't dreaming,

Speaker 1 and I certainly wasn't drunk, and

Speaker 1 is it a hallucination? No, there's no,

Speaker 1 we don't know. There's nothing you're saying that I disagree with, even slightly.
And if you say, can you explain these? My answer is no.

Speaker 1 If you say, can anyone explain this? My answer is no.

Speaker 1 My only moment is when you say, well, then it was a ghost. How about you say, well, then we don't know.

Speaker 1 I'm going to be a ghost. That's all I know.
Okay. When I go,

Speaker 1 I don't know if I want to be cremated because, you know, if they just keep your something around, they could maybe bring you back with AI in the future.

Speaker 1 Not that maybe that wouldn't be. Although you're trivial on AI, they've got plenty of you talking recorded.
They've got what? They've got plenty recorded of you talking. So they don't need me.

Speaker 1 They don't need you.

Speaker 1 They can do an AI, Bill Maher, like that. You know, we're doing an AI of Gilbert Godfrey that we've been playing around with.
It's pretty fast. That's his painting there.
I know.

Speaker 1 I miss him all the time. That was Jerry.

Speaker 1 That was Scott Carter got that for me from the Jerry Lewis telethon. That was outside Jerry's door.

Speaker 1 Isn't that awesome? Jerry's. And it's certainly true.
It's so Jerry. Jerry needed time to dress, think, and rest.
There's just no doubt that he did.

Speaker 1 He needed more time

Speaker 1 to dress, think, and rest than

Speaker 1 so Vegas.

Speaker 1 Not that I don't, I was just there. Did you ever do the telethon? Yes.
And I have to tell you, I probably shouldn't even say this because I get canceled. But okay.

Speaker 1 My opening joke was that I parked in the handicapped spot.

Speaker 1 It could have all ended for me that night. I mean, it was like.
Well, it has all ended for you three times. I knew that.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I know, but talk about.

Speaker 1 I don't know. If you charitably, you would say balls.
Uncharitably, you would say, what a fucking idiot. I mean, talk about not reading the room.
And it's also,

Speaker 1 those two things are often indistinguishable.

Speaker 1 What? Balls? Oh, absolutely. Yes, yes.
No, absolutely. It just depends who has to be talking at that moment.
That's and how it's taken.

Speaker 1 Jerry, I mean, he could have been worse, but I just figured like everyone's always sort of tiptoeing around them. Yeah.

Speaker 1 You know, just they probably want to laugh too. I was wrong about that.

Speaker 1 But that's what I think. Sure, sure.
That's the thinking.

Speaker 1 That was the thinking that went into it. And then I saw a ghost.

Speaker 1 No.

Speaker 1 Hey, I'll be at the Offrium Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota on July 13th, on the 14th at the Riverside Theater in Milwaukee, July 26th, the MGM Music Hall at Fenway, Boston, Massachusetts.

Speaker 1 July 27th at the Toyota Oakdale Theater in Wallingford, Connecticut. Come out and see me and laugh your ass off.

Speaker 1 It's really interesting

Speaker 1 to feel evolutionary love.

Speaker 1 Such a great way to put it. I've never heard it that way.
That really, I mean, again,

Speaker 1 it's not moving the needle on me, but

Speaker 1 it's such a great way to put it. There's no reason you need to.

Speaker 1 Evolutionary love, right? You are.

Speaker 1 It's not a decision. I get it.
And that's fascinating. You mean you're compelled to do it.
It's a calling.

Speaker 1 Well, no, it's just, it's like hunger. There's no control over it.
You care about these beings a tremendous amount. Right.
Yeah. Well, because they're, as you say, evolutionary.

Speaker 1 They're an extension of you in a way no other person can be. Right.
And we would not have survived this far if our children were able to get us to kill them.

Speaker 1 If what? If our children were able to get us to kill them, we would not be here. Because they're so annoying? Yeah.

Speaker 1 I mean, they try, they try, and we have this love group into us that we can't control. Right.
But believe me, if we could control it, it would be the end of the race.

Speaker 1 Because they're that annoying. Sure.

Speaker 1 Of course, I agree.

Speaker 1 That's why I don't have them.

Speaker 1 I just, my hat is off to any parent today, really, because I think it's never been harder because you're not allowed to boss them around the way you, you know, and you should be able to boss around children because they're children, because they're just stupid like...

Speaker 1 Well, I'll just tell you, if you want really clear advice on raising children,

Speaker 1 you have to talk to someone who doesn't have children. Really? You have to.
Because anyone that has children.

Speaker 1 That's what I'm saying. You were just giving advice, and I was commenting on that by saying the fact that you have an understanding means you don't have children.
People that have children go, ah,

Speaker 1 well, the polling always says, and it's kind of depressing, but it does say what people say, at least Americans say,

Speaker 1 is

Speaker 1 I love my children, but if I had to do it over again, I wouldn't,

Speaker 1 which I feel is kind of an indictment on your love of your children.

Speaker 1 There's no doubt about it.

Speaker 1 It's a very, very

Speaker 1 complex situation.

Speaker 1 I think that's more of a comment on Americans are, you know, we are such a successful civilization for all the problems we have and the complaining that goes on and i understand a lot of it but a lot of it is just a lack of historical perspective at how bad things could be how bad how much worse they were for almost everybody who ever lived well you just fell into that trap when you said it's harder to raise children now it was harder with polio It was, but harder in the sense that people just expected it to be hard.

Speaker 1 Also, hard. And now people have children and they're like, oh my God, I can't go to the club.
I've got this

Speaker 1 this muling brat that I have to take care of yeah I think a lot of it is that life got so cushy and children interrupt that children children children do interrupt that

Speaker 1 it's

Speaker 1 it's it's it's interesting that you have this

Speaker 1 complete love and yet it's a it's a

Speaker 1 difficult difficult task. It's a very difficult task.
It is. And

Speaker 1 you've made the decision for whatever reason that you want to take on this task. And that responsibility is overwhelming and crushing.

Speaker 1 And I think that when you start to realize that, you're going to have moments, especially when the pollster is interrupting you, going, yeah, I wish I didn't have you. Fuck, fuck.

Speaker 1 Because there's a lot of parenting that is spent going,

Speaker 1 right? I'm sure there is. And

Speaker 1 that's okay. You know, we choose all the time to have life experiences that

Speaker 1 are awesome now because you're almost at the end of the.

Speaker 1 Well, no, I have friends who have children that are 40 years old, and it's still hard, you know. Well, that's bad parenting then.
Yeah, sure. They should either.
You've got to prepare them.

Speaker 1 But here's the thing, Bill, that this was an argument.

Speaker 1 One of the things that Americans have done is turned having children into a narcissistic experience. Because

Speaker 1 you think

Speaker 1 even when you said that's bad parenting

Speaker 1 my responsibility for my children is keeping them alive feeding them and loving them beyond that I have very little control and this argument right it's poetic it's not a deep intellectual argument this argument changed my whole view on everything if parents are so important to their children Why don't immigrants' children have access?

Speaker 1 Say that again.

Speaker 1 When someone comes over here, first generation American,

Speaker 1 their children are born, they have heavy accents, they don't speak English well, the children do not have accents. Right.
And yet they're learning the language from their parents.

Speaker 1 Supposedly they're learning all the words from their parents. And yet it doesn't.
But they're also in American society. It's a school.
So the bilinguals. But they get both.
They're bilingual.

Speaker 1 My point is.

Speaker 1 Well, they're not all bilingual.

Speaker 1 Most second generation are because, again, as you say, they hear the old language. But this is Italian to everybody in the home from the parents.
And they don't have the accents.

Speaker 1 And that really shows you how important society is.

Speaker 1 And so,

Speaker 1 you know,

Speaker 1 they did huge,

Speaker 1 a lot of information on

Speaker 1 Dylan

Speaker 1 flee ball,

Speaker 1 Colorado

Speaker 1 trench coat murderers in the very Columbine.

Speaker 1 the very first school shooting.

Speaker 1 Yeah, not actually, but yes, the one we know about and the one we talk about.

Speaker 1 And they've done a lot of research, and those parents were really good.

Speaker 1 They're really good.

Speaker 1 Everything we heard about the Columbine

Speaker 1 school shooting was wrong at first.

Speaker 1 Like,

Speaker 1 they were not unpopular. Right.
You know,

Speaker 1 it's much more of a befuddlement

Speaker 1 why why they did that. Well, that's the fact is anyone that says anything about school shooters, we know is lying because we don't have enough data points.
If you have 100 people out of

Speaker 1 a sample of 350 million, you can't know anything.

Speaker 1 The brain is just not. in a good place when you're that age.
It's just, it's amazing more shit doesn't happen. Well, I'll tell you something.
It's just so stupid. And I think that's just what that is.

Speaker 1 They just, you know, weren't really like thinking ahead.

Speaker 1 That's just, you've got to be aware of that. Really, I mean, it is amazing.

Speaker 1 And women, of course, much better at this. Like, the difference between a woman of 19, 20, 21, and 25 is night and day.
And believe me, I know. I've done extensive research on this.

Speaker 1 Whereas for a man, 20 to 25, almost the same idiot. Almost.
And even up to much higher years, I hate to admit, but true. And we can also speak not only of statistics, but also of personal experience.

Speaker 1 Oh, I mean. I mean, I was

Speaker 1 still am, but I was quite a knucklehead.

Speaker 1 We all must, I certainly know I was. And for

Speaker 1 many years past, when you think, oh, you should be mature by then. I mean, I remember being, I was in a long,

Speaker 1 the longest relationship I've had in my mid-30s. And when I got out of it, I was 37.

Speaker 1 And I remember thinking, oh, gosh,

Speaker 1 I'm too old to date.

Speaker 1 You know, it was like, no, you're just, you're not even ready to date.

Speaker 1 You're still such a dick. You know, not a dick, but like just

Speaker 1 doing stupid things, just still not really getting how to be around women in the best way

Speaker 1 for them.

Speaker 1 But also, you have, you know,

Speaker 1 as a friend of mine said, no matter how bad high school was for you, when you go through it the second time with your children, it's worse. Really?

Speaker 1 Yeah, it's a really tough time. I mean, as much as you remember how tough 17 and 18.
It can't be anything like it when we were in high school because there was no social media. There was no phones.

Speaker 1 But that doesn't

Speaker 1 have to change everything. Everything.
But

Speaker 1 the

Speaker 1 gangst

Speaker 1 is

Speaker 1 what's causing it, what you think is causing it changes. But it's a tough time to be a human being.
Oh, I had so much more anxiety from, say, well, from birth

Speaker 1 to, you know,

Speaker 1 I don't know, mid-20s.

Speaker 1 But especially school.

Speaker 1 There was no day where I didn't go off to school without a knot in my stomach, I seem to remember.

Speaker 1 High school, grade school, you know, just if you're not like one of the cool, you know. And yet we find out as we grow up and when you talk to those cool ones, they weren't having a good time either.

Speaker 1 I don't know about that. I think the cool kids in my school were having a great time because they were the cool kids.
I mean, I don't know how they got there.

Speaker 1 I guess some of it was they were better looking or I don't know. They're just richer.
They were better looking than you, but

Speaker 1 richer. What made some sort of confidence that just human beings just sort of sense and they make that the alpha? Certainly I didn't have that.

Speaker 1 I had no confidence, super shy and like just trying to survive, you know, and sometimes not.

Speaker 1 But the cool kids, I think they were eating it up. I mean, they should have been.
I don't know.

Speaker 1 What were you in high school? Were you not the what? I don't know. What group were you in? When I was in high school, I was in, you know, I was

Speaker 1 quite an, I had the longest hair. I was the, I was the goofiest.

Speaker 1 And I was also the worst thing you could be in high school. I was a juggler.

Speaker 1 You were in the nut chair. I was in the nut chair.
I spent all my time rung.

Speaker 1 Put me in the exact right chair.

Speaker 1 Were you popular with girls? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yes. Listen to that.
Well, I wasn't.

Speaker 1 And if some girl liked me, I was too shy to do anything. I was talking.

Speaker 1 I'm still friends with my high school girlfriend. We were talking about that.
And we were saying. I wish I was.

Speaker 1 We were saying to each other, we were saying, why was everybody else having trouble getting laid?

Speaker 1 Really? We had each other, yeah.

Speaker 1 Correct. And all of high school? Well, no, they were different girlfriends, but, you know.
Different girlfriends. Oh, my God.

Speaker 1 I had one,

Speaker 1 and when she dumped me, I've not to this day ever been sadder

Speaker 1 to this day. So that's that's why it's you know that brain that you have, it's just your brain is so bad

Speaker 1 and you have you have access to adult things is the problem.

Speaker 1 So I mean, I feel like I can't, I remember in college.

Speaker 1 You're pushing back adolescence. I mean, really, just 200 200 years ago, at 15, you'd be raising a family.
I mean, that's the insane thing. 200 years ago.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 We pushed adolescents back.

Speaker 1 Yes. Oh, God, yes.
I mean,

Speaker 1 we treat people.

Speaker 1 I mean, we're now going to directly contradict what we were just saying before.

Speaker 1 The other problem is.

Speaker 1 One problem is that people stay children until they're 27.

Speaker 1 The other problem is we treat people like they're children until they're 27. So we're contradicting ourselves.
No, I think both are true. No, I don't think so.
We indulge it.

Speaker 1 We really indulge it. We indulge it, and it's not good.
It's funny because it's not good for anybody.

Speaker 1 It ruins the parents' life because now you've got to worry about, and you should be free after 18 years.

Speaker 1 And it ruins the kids' life because they're not able to function on their own. Funny story about,

Speaker 1 oh, I don't know, six, seven years ago, a young lady I was seeing once said to me, and it just made me laugh out of the chair, she said, we'd kind of gotten into a really serious discussion about our passage.

Speaker 1 She said, I ran away from home when I was 18.

Speaker 1 I'm so glad you were president.

Speaker 1 I said, honey, you cannot run away at 18. You're supposed to be gone by then.

Speaker 1 And that, I felt like, said it all. And of course, she said it without irony.
I mean, she really meant that.

Speaker 1 I believe I understood this story.

Speaker 1 I don't even need it annotated in the least. You're so right.

Speaker 1 And the hint was how hard I laughed at the exact right time. I know.

Speaker 1 You're right.

Speaker 1 But

Speaker 1 I don't know. I'm glad you're happy.

Speaker 1 You seem like you're very happy. I'm doing okay.
I'm doing all right. You know,

Speaker 1 I

Speaker 1 left,

Speaker 1 I graduated on a plea bargain from high school.

Speaker 1 Didn't really graduate. Really? And right after that,

Speaker 1 I left hitchhiking and I lived on the street,

Speaker 1 juggling homeless for two years and called my mom and dad every day.

Speaker 1 Called them collect every day. What do you mean living on the street?

Speaker 1 You had no home? I had no home. I could have gone home to my parents at any moment.
Any moment I could have gone to home. Now that's the difference between

Speaker 1 our generation.

Speaker 1 I don't have quite nearly as dramatic a story as that, but I was miserable when I went off to college.

Speaker 1 Just wanted to put my tail between my legs and go home every day.

Speaker 1 I mean, I was ostracized in the dorm,

Speaker 1 you know, and so the, so the... Whatever, it's so funny.

Speaker 1 I remember going off to college and you're thinking, again, in your stupid brain of 18, you're thinking, oh, I'm going to a completely new place where I can be a completely new person.

Speaker 1 I was loser in high school. I'm going to be James Bond in Ithaca, New York, because,

Speaker 1 and there was one kid who was going to Cornell from my high school, and I thought, hmm, I'm going to have to kill him because no one can be at Cornell who knows of my past, because now I'm James Bond.

Speaker 1 And of course,

Speaker 1 you have left nothing. And I mean, I wasn't there a month and I was ostracized again, which happened in high school.
So I was miserable and I so desperately wanted to get out of there, but I didn't.

Speaker 1 Because again, not to pat our generation on the back, but the pride

Speaker 1 of not going back home to the nest was even stronger than the misery. What was your relationship with your parents like? Fine.
And they would have been fine with me.

Speaker 1 I mean, I think they would have been disappointed.

Speaker 1 But I just, what I'm saying is we had something in us that was a little sterner, which is funny because when we were kids, it was like, oh, you kids are so soft.

Speaker 1 But compared to these kids today, we're the fucking Marines. Yeah, you know, I used to,

Speaker 1 I don't even understand it because I was, you know, I was, you know, sleeping in alleys and I was juggling to make money and I was.

Speaker 1 I didn't have any place I lived. And yet I would call my mom, dad every day and say, I'm doing great.
And they were okay with me doing it. Where did you go to the bathroom?

Speaker 1 Public restrooms or behind trees? Behind trees? Well, were you in the city?

Speaker 1 I was all over this great country of ours. I hopped trains.
Here's the problem, Bill. Like a hobo? Yes.
With a stick and a

Speaker 1 bundle. I had a tied to the end of the stick.
I had a backpack from LLB,

Speaker 1 but I hopped a train. See, here's the thing.
I was a huge Bob Dylan fan. I read about Bob Dylan.
That's no excuse. I wanted to be like Bob Dylan.
I didn't find out for two years.

Speaker 1 I didn't find out for years later that Bob was lying. When Bob said he worked in the carnival, he was lying.
I worked in the carnival. When Bob said he hopped trains, he was lying.
Really?

Speaker 1 I hopped trains. Yeah.

Speaker 1 So the Bob Dylan, if you take that two years of Bob Dylan's life that talked about in the press releases when his stuff came out, I lived it, not Bob.

Speaker 1 Bob was from Hibbing, Minnesota. I like to think of it as you lived it for Bob, did you? For Bob, yeah.
And then I also made Bob not alive because somebody did it.

Speaker 1 Wow. So why did Bob lie?

Speaker 1 Because the story of I grew up in Hibbing from a dad who owned an appliance store and then went to University of Minnesota and dropped out and then went to New York and now I got famous in 15 minutes.

Speaker 1 You know, because it was instant that he got he got successful

Speaker 1 It wasn't very interesting. Well, also, I must say, and again, these are people, let's put this in perspective.

Speaker 1 I love Dylan. I'm sure you love Bob Dylan.
We're not trashing him. I really love John Lennon.
There's a picture of him somewhere around here.

Speaker 1 But he also had an embroidered history.

Speaker 1 He's the one who wrote like Working Class Hero. He's a rich kid from Liverpool.
He's not rich. Well, he was close for Liverpool, he was.
He was richer than the others. Yes, he had a great...

Speaker 1 That's what rich means. No, it doesn't.
I don't think so. I think rich means rich.

Speaker 1 You're rich now. You were poor then.

Speaker 1 No, I mean, it was. He was well off.

Speaker 1 The others were real working class, like the lowest sort of kind of

Speaker 1 lowest kind of housing that you could have. And he had a much more middle class.
They weren't rich. It was a little cottage house.
But yes, it was more like in the suburbs.

Speaker 1 And he wasn't a working-class hero. No.

Speaker 1 There was, you know, Elvis Costello had the wicked line about him in his great life. Was it a millionaire? Yeah.
Was it a millionaire? Oh, you know it was a millionaire.

Speaker 1 Yeah, who imagine? Wow, you know your Elvis Costello. Well, I just

Speaker 1 know the song? I do. What song? What is it called? Oh,

Speaker 1 The Other Side of Summer. Oh, it is.
The Other Side of Summer? The Other Side of Summer. Perfect for this time of year.
Yeah, I might have.

Speaker 1 What a poet. This first line: the sun struggles up.

Speaker 1 Another beautiful day. The sun struggles up.
Like, not all lyricists in rock and roll

Speaker 1 are poets, you know, like they don't write quite like poets. That's, yeah, was it a millionaire who said, imagine no possessions? A poor little schoolboy who said, we don't need no lessons.

Speaker 1 That's a shot at Pink Floyd. It certainly is.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 And we don't need no education. I beg to differ.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 1 But so you were

Speaker 1 a corny and a

Speaker 1 bum?

Speaker 1 I would go, I would get hungry and I would do shows to try to get money on the street by juggling.

Speaker 1 And I would do stand-up and bars and anything I could do.

Speaker 1 But all I needed to do was make, you know, five bucks a day. And you can do the street juggling.
So hapless civilians who encountered you would

Speaker 1 give you small chains to make you go away? Well, I was actually did a pretty good juggling show.

Speaker 1 By the time I got to be 20, I had a really great street show. I was just going to say, don't street show guys like that make a lot of money? The amount that I made would knock you over.

Speaker 1 Then why were you living in the alley? Because that was two years after when I learned to do that. Oh, I see.
Then I was living in a great place.

Speaker 1 See, at least when I.

Speaker 1 When I went, I was working streets in Philadelphia down at the

Speaker 1 Head House Square, and I was juggling for money, and I was making a lot because I was doing $300 to $500 a show, and I was doing five shows a day, and I was working Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Speaker 1 So I went to an accountant, tax guy, and I said to him,

Speaker 1 I said to him, you know, I.

Speaker 1 I'm making all this money and it's all in cash. Shouldn't I be paying taxes? And he said, How much money are you making? And I was a,

Speaker 1 I kept notes and everything. Still have every dime I made at every street show is written down.
I showed him all that, and he said,

Speaker 1 This is the amount of money you say you make juggling on the street?

Speaker 1 I said, Yes, it is. He said, if you bring this to the IRS, they're going to think you're a drug dealer.
And then he paused and said, I think you're a drug dealer.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you need a stripper accountant. Exactly.

Speaker 1 They can tell you how to hide cash.

Speaker 1 I just had, I had so much fucking cash. I mean, I was absolutely in the stripper market.
I mean, we just had boxes of cash. Oh, my God.

Speaker 1 I did not. I mean, my version of you were living on the.
Well, you were a drug dealer. I was a drug dealer.
Exactly. I was a drug dealer.
Well, a pot dealer.

Speaker 1 In college, we sold whatever our dealer had, which was, quite frankly, everything except heroin. I never dealt heroin, and I'm proud of that.
But

Speaker 1 when I got to New York, I mean, I also... Me neither.
I also would have been on the street, except

Speaker 1 I got a rent-free situation, which was you could find this in the back of the village voice, and you were did something for somebody.

Speaker 1 The first two interviews I went on, I realized after way too long, I was being interviewed by an old queen who wanted me to do something that I did not want to do.

Speaker 1 And I finally got a place on the Upper East Side living with an ambassador. And I had to fucking be the basic au pair for his kids.
And I fucking hate kids.

Speaker 1 It might have been better to be on the street, but that's what I did. I took the fucking kids to school.
Who would hire

Speaker 1 the fucker this ambassador? I mean, put him in jail now. I know.

Speaker 1 No, I was a good actor, I guess. I mean, I convinced them, and I was supposed to speak French to them, and I didn't really do that.

Speaker 1 But I brought him to school, I picked him up, I took him to their stupid activities. I was supposed to be, look, it didn't, nothing bad happened, but they were, I think, a little disappointed.

Speaker 1 They were expecting someone who was going to be more engaged with the kids. But they wanted someone who was...

Speaker 1 with the kids.

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 1 let me take that in first. But they wanted a guy because they wanted someone who could bodyguard them.
You know, they didn't want. When I think bodyguard, you're the top of the list.

Speaker 1 Whether, I'll tell you. Hey, those kids were never kidnapped.
I respect you. And this was a controversial country.

Speaker 1 I respect you as much as anybody, but I would never hire you as bouncer, bodyguard, or au pair.

Speaker 1 Those are three jobs you will not get from pen gillette okay if you are completely destitute and you call up your buddy pen i might be able to give you some coin right i might be able to hire you but those are not three jobs you will get got it you're so right write it down you're so right no you're so right i am i could add a few more but we'll stay with those three i'm not a bodyguard and i wasn't an au pair but they wanted uh i guess a man uh to you know take their kids and watch over them.

Speaker 1 And they were never once kidnapped or killed.

Speaker 1 I mean, and this is New York City. And I was always there,

Speaker 1 even though it was very early in the morning and I had barely gotten to sleep yet, coming home from the clubs. But it was on the Upper East Side.

Speaker 1 I could walk to the comic strip and I could walk to catch a rising star. And I did.

Speaker 1 And I was like the Lincoln of comedy. I always

Speaker 1 would walk miles to borrow a a joke.

Speaker 1 But, you know, I don't know.

Speaker 1 Would it be great to be young again? Yeah, but not to deal with that shit, to deal with the things we dealt with. You have to be young.

Speaker 1 I mean, then why do you think they put them in the army? You need someone who

Speaker 1 is able physically and mentally to put up with just really rough conditions that we, I mean, we wouldn't survive at this time in our life are you telling me that you and i wouldn't do great in marine boot camp is that what you're claiming or living or sleeping in an alley or dealing with children i couldn't get him to disagree with me too much on go so i'll go this weekend go into boot camp thing see if you'll disagree with me there so what what do you think what do you think you're gonna your 70s are gonna be like what do you think like you're 69 i by the way i'll be 69 next year, so we're very close.

Speaker 1 And it's funny, this has come up a couple of times in conversation. Whenever you say 69, everybody has the same reaction, like, oh,

Speaker 1 you know, elbow in the ribs, as if anyone ever really did 69. It's the most overrated sex position.
It's the fucking beta max of fucking. Everybody tried it once.
They didn't like it.

Speaker 1 It's impossible to do.

Speaker 1 I tried it, you know, and

Speaker 1 I couldn't do it.

Speaker 1 I could stick up for it a little bit. I've enjoyed it many times, yeah.
I've enjoyed it. Yeah.
Well, once again, you have qualities I lack.

Speaker 1 I have enjoyed it. It's different for me because I'm taller than you.

Speaker 1 Well, I wasn't suggesting we do it together. I'm just telling you it would be different because I'm taller than you.

Speaker 1 I mean, I remember asking some guest, some woman guest I had here, I can't remember who it was. I said, if a guy is doing the alphabet, can you tell? Like, can you tell what letters? he is?

Speaker 1 This is Kafka's in the penal colony, right? Kafka's short story in the penal colony. I know the story.
The prisoners don't know what crime they've committed until they etch it into their back.

Speaker 1 So you could. Till they what? Till they etch it with needles in the prisoner's back.
That's how they find out what they're guilty of, is being able to feel it in their back.

Speaker 1 So what you're saying is, this is the oral sex equivalent. You can do messages that way, probably more efficient than needles in the back.

Speaker 1 Anybody who can make that analogy to Kafka does not belong in the nut chair. That's all I'm going to say.
So I'm going to change your chair. That's all you have now.

Speaker 1 You only have the nut chair.

Speaker 1 You have devolved.

Speaker 1 Right. Who wants anything but the nut chair? I know.
I know.

Speaker 1 The whole story is not about the nut chair. It's about the kindness in your face.

Speaker 1 But I mean, one thing about you, you were always just interesting. Like, well, that's an interesting guy.
That's why we wanted you on the show. You know, like,

Speaker 1 this is a guy who's always thinking about stuff. I don't have to agree, but mostly I do.
I mean, I feel like we really have come around to very similar ways. I mean, we're both atheists.

Speaker 1 Yeah, but when you come, when you're able, the idea that I would even entertain animal rights 10 years ago was.

Speaker 1 Really?

Speaker 1 Totally outside. What would you have against animals? Nothing against animals.
I just thought, I mean, mean, the very simple answer, if you'd asked me for a facile answer to that, I would say, first

Speaker 1 have every child on earth fed, clothed, sheltered, and eating, and then we'll all work together on the mountain gorillas.

Speaker 1 That's no long. No, don't say shut up.
I did shut up. I've just told you I changed my mind from this point of view.
And you just said you should change your mind. Oh, good.
Okay.

Speaker 1 You've already won there sorry sorry sorry

Speaker 1 me too

Speaker 1 me too

Speaker 1 you never got me too did you

Speaker 1 only only by the grace of god i did

Speaker 1 no

Speaker 1 you're a nice guy you never did bad with women no no i didn't i didn't realize you were such a uh a cathode in the pussy beaker when you were young You know,

Speaker 1 I'll tell you, I will now give you the secret to getting laid in high school.

Speaker 1 It's a little late, pal. I know, I know.

Speaker 1 Fuck smart girls.

Speaker 1 I could have.

Speaker 1 I wish I could have had the courage, yes, to at least just react to the girls. There was a couple of girls who were sweet on me.
Like,

Speaker 1 if I could have just reacted to it, I couldn't even do that. We are about the same age.
Yes. It was the girl with the baggy black sweater and hair parted in the middle, carrying around Henry Miller.

Speaker 1 Believe me, under that sweater, everything was beautiful.

Speaker 1 No, there was a girl. There was a girl so long ago in eighth, was it eighth grade?

Speaker 1 And there was a Sadie Hawkins dance, which you asked them, and she asked me out to this thing, and I still couldn't say yes. Yeah, well, that's,

Speaker 1 yeah, boy, that's sad.

Speaker 1 All I'm doing today is agreeing with you. I made up for it, but I mean, it is, I mean, youth is just so hard.
I mean, I understand like why

Speaker 1 people in many cultures for most of human history and somewhat into today

Speaker 1 have many, many children because they anticipate that

Speaker 1 a fair number will not make it.

Speaker 1 Because they're just so fucking dumb. In agriculture, the more children you have, the better it is.
Because three of them are going going to get kicked by a horse. But also, they help around the farm.

Speaker 1 Once you get out of agriculture, children are just a liability. Right.

Speaker 1 I've always said that children are just

Speaker 1 a liability. Because you're not a farmer, is that correct? I am not a farmer.
If you were a farmer, you might see it differently.

Speaker 1 I've got one crop out there that I think qualifies. I'm not really the farmer around here, but it is growing well.

Speaker 1 But,

Speaker 1 yeah.

Speaker 1 So when you're like married with kids, I always hear about like date night.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Is that a thing

Speaker 1 that

Speaker 1 you hear about a specific?

Speaker 1 We try to do that a little bit, but the truth is

Speaker 1 I am

Speaker 1 always working.

Speaker 1 We grab what every time we can.

Speaker 1 My other question about marriage is always like,

Speaker 1 how do you know when to do it?

Speaker 1 Like if you can always do it.

Speaker 1 Like for me, sex always had to be an event. Like, how can I always had trouble with that? Like, how can it be an event if it's ever present? You know, like, how do you know when to throw down?

Speaker 1 I think we, we really,

Speaker 1 I was thinking about if I built a time machine, killing Hitler, buying Microsoft. Now I think it's going back and talking to you in eighth grade.
I think that, I think that is what I would do.

Speaker 1 I think that from the future, Pebb would appear and say, listen, Bill, let's talk about the Sadie Hawkins dance because this is going to have repercussions for the rest of your motherfucking life.

Speaker 1 Butterfly effect. Yes,

Speaker 1 possibly. You get me laid in high school, and I'm telling you.
No problems in Gaza. Bird clothes now.
Wiped out the whole world.

Speaker 1 Or no problems in Gaza. Yeah.
It could have happened. We don't know.
So

Speaker 1 that's what I would do now. Let Hitler live.

Speaker 1 Go back and help Bill. I did a joke in last week's monologue.
I thought it was like such a combination of the old and what's the newest.

Speaker 1 Like, because I'm always doing Johnny Carson in my monologue. And I don't usually do, it's so hot, but it was the first day of summer.
You know, so that was some funny one.

Speaker 1 So hot yesterday that Jew haters. were protesting without the mask.

Speaker 1 It's like a Johnny beginning and then an ending he would never do. You don't think Johnny would do that? Jew haters, no.

Speaker 1 You did that, Joe. Was that tonight show all that?

Speaker 1 I have a story that's sadder, sadder than your story of eighth grade Sadie Hawkins. Oh, my God.
It's horrible. It's terrible.
Tonight Showstory? What's that? A tonight show story? Yeah, it's terrible.

Speaker 1 Johnny Carson asked us to go on the tonight show, or we were, you know, Fred, whatever, asked us to go on the tonight show.

Speaker 1 And we were going to do the water tank where I'm doing a card trick and Teller drowns in the water tank. I think I've seen that.
Yeah, yeah. We did it billions.
Right.

Speaker 1 So it's a great trick. We did it first on Seven Night Live.
So we're going to do it on Carson. And to me,

Speaker 1 because I was an idiot, the most important part was leaving Teller dead. So I can't find the card.
I can't find the card. It's a signed card.
And then Teller drowns. I turn around his dead body.

Speaker 1 And then on his face is the signed card. Miracle.
And he's still dead. So we said, I'm going to say Johnny, but it wasn't a direct conversation with Johnny.
We said to the Johnny people,

Speaker 1 we'll leave Teller dead and go to the brick.

Speaker 1 And they got back to us and said, Johnny says

Speaker 1 he wants you to open the tank.

Speaker 1 Teller comes out. He waves.
We go to commercial break. I said, it's not funny if Teller isn't dead going to commercial break.

Speaker 1 And they said, Johnny does not want to go to commercial brick with Teller Dead. I said, Teller's not dead.
It's a trick. And he's a magician.

Speaker 1 Johnny Carson's the most famous. I started as a magician.
He just said for

Speaker 1 this show,

Speaker 1 we don't want to go to commercial with the dead guy. So we said,

Speaker 1 we don't, he said,

Speaker 1 this is my show. And we said, this is our trick.
Wow. So then they say,

Speaker 1 Johnny says he he really wants you on the show. He really doesn't want that on his show.
So here's what he said to do. Jay Leno

Speaker 1 is

Speaker 1 filling in, hosting. Come on and do the trick exactly the way you want.
So you have your integrity and I have mine. Great.
And we said, fabulous. And then we did it with Jay and changed the trick.

Speaker 1 We changed the trick. We did a different trick because we couldn't ship the water tanks.

Speaker 1 We did a whole different trick that would have been fine with johnny and johnny we became friends after he retired he's a magician he loves it yeah and he's also he was a skeptic and although i think it's safe to say now you could say he was an atheist and uh i don't know but he seems like the type he said it to me he did you know many times so you were you were friends with him yeah that's awesome i called him up and uh well he called me up because he was a real fan of bullshit he liked our show

Speaker 1 i was too and he called me up and he said

Speaker 1 he said, I just want to tell you, I think bullshit is the best show on television. And I said to him, that's awesome.

Speaker 1 You know, Johnny, I don't know if you knew this, but the tonight's show was also on television. And that was a better show.
And from there, we became, I have

Speaker 1 another sad story that you can think about when you're lamenting the eighth grade. So we did the movie called The Aristocrats, which were

Speaker 1 and Johnny Carson loved the joke and we were talking. And when we were working on the movie, I was calling Johnny and talking about the movie, which he would not be in because he was retired.

Speaker 1 And I didn't even know, I never even asked him. Yeah, yeah.
And Johnny said to me, would you do me a favor? You're going to go to Sundance.

Speaker 1 When you're done at Sundance, do you have a couple days? Can you fly down to LA?

Speaker 1 And can you and Paul of Provenza, can you show me the aristocrats in my home? And I said, Johnny, I can't think of a greater honor. And Paul and I were over the fucking moon.

Speaker 1 We're going to do Sundance. We're going to fly down and show it to Johnny.
Man, how beautiful would that be?

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 we did Sundance. It was very well received.

Speaker 1 The next morning, Provenz and I met at a Starbucks to have a hot chocolate to celebrate because he's working with a child, so we don't go out drinking like grown-ups should do.

Speaker 1 So we're having a hot chocolate. And my phone rings.

Speaker 1 And I was going to just ignore it. And it was Randy, Randy, amazing Randy.
And I said to Paul,

Speaker 1 it's amazing, Randy. He doesn't call me often.
This might be important.

Speaker 1 And I pick up the phone, and Randy is sobbing, uncontrollably sobbing. And I say, Randy, what is it? And he said, Johnny

Speaker 1 died.

Speaker 1 Johnny's dead.

Speaker 1 And I said, fucked up your weekend. I fucked up my weekend.
And I said to Paul,

Speaker 1 Johnny Carson died. And Provenzai didn't say another word.
He just went and added to the end of the movie for Johnny Carson.

Speaker 1 You know, next time a starving homeless guy asked me for change, I'm going to tell him that story.

Speaker 1 I'm going to say, buddy, we all have problems, and yours are not the worst.

Speaker 1 I bet you Johnny was such a fan because, you know,

Speaker 1 he melded.

Speaker 1 magic and comedy, which they not all do, which you guys probably did more than anybody. I got, I got, I got.

Speaker 1 I mean, you were always, I mean, that's why you have these records in Las Vegas, is like because you did something, you put a dimension to it and, you know, a wit to it. Well, thank you.

Speaker 1 That, like, I don't know if you want to like talk about other magicians. I mean, I play in the David Copperfield Theater

Speaker 1 when I play at the MGM Grand now. I play in the Penn and Teller Theater.

Speaker 1 Just so you know. I understand.
Just so you know. No, I do understand.
Right.

Speaker 1 It's easier to find when your name is on it. But I've heard some of these magicians really phone it in.
Huh, have you?

Speaker 1 And I'm sure. Do you have a club? Like, do you, do you, you know, like, oh, we all get together.
You must. Come on, because only you can kind of understand

Speaker 1 really like every night you and Jon Stewart and Dennis Miller just get together. Yeah, that's that's the threesome.

Speaker 1 Well, that's a threesome you just suggested with me. I understand.
I know, I know, I know. And I even could map those three.

Speaker 1 What do you do? Like, I could never live in Las Vegas. I love it for a weekend.

Speaker 1 I was just there. I don't gamble.
I don't drink. I don't smoke.
I go home and read. So it doesn't matter that I'm in the...
It doesn't matter where you are. It doesn't matter.

Speaker 1 I care less about where I am than you. How far is your commute from 22 minutes? 22 minutes.
So you live out in Henderson?

Speaker 1 Actually, the other side of Summerlin. Whatever it is.

Speaker 1 I could talk all night with you, but

Speaker 1 it's been too long.

Speaker 1 It was been too long, and it's also been never.

Speaker 1 I know. Because I never really, this one

Speaker 1 reason I love this thing

Speaker 1 is I get to talk to people and request people to come here so that I can get to know somebody. I just had Ray Romano here.
Same thing. Somebody I should have been friendly with.

Speaker 1 There just wasn't enough time. They said, You've known Bill for 33 years.
Right. Right.
And

Speaker 1 they said,

Speaker 1 how close are you to Bill? I said, I think we've talked, not on camera, 45 minutes.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 And I say this also to many people who've been here recently. Jerry Seinfeld and I just said the same thing.
But it's just the truth. Like, when do you talk to people? When you're working.
That's all.

Speaker 1 We have to, you just said it before.

Speaker 1 I work all the time. Like,

Speaker 1 what compels us?

Speaker 1 what motivates us, what gets us to be in this situation, which we would love, gotta be working, which we would love anyway, yeah, is that there's a camera in the wall, and I'm gonna be.

Speaker 1 Okay,

Speaker 1 great to see you. Good to see you, bro.

Speaker 1 Thanks, you're out of the nutshare. Oh, good, I'm good, but I'll be back in it another time, I hope.

Speaker 5 At the University of Arizona Online, we bring a top-ranked education to you. We offer 150-plus programs, 100% online.

Speaker 5 Expand your career opportunities by earning a degree that meets you right where you are. Learn from the same faculty and earn the same degree as on-campus students.

Speaker 5 Build your future with Arizona Online. Classes start every seven and a half weeks.
Apply today and make your tomorrow amazing.

Speaker 1 Be our guest at Disney's enchanting musical, Beauty and the Beast. Experience this timeless, classic tale brought to life like never before.

Speaker 1 Fill your heart with joy and Disney magic at this dazzling and beloved production.

Speaker 1 Coming to the Orpheum Theater July 14th through August 9th. Tickets on sale now at BroadwaySF.com.