Billy Bush | Club Random with Bill Maher

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You never did that to get to the top.

You.

Did you?

No, I never even.

You paused.

What's your status?

Are you married now?

Are you...

Why?

Asking for.

Andrew and I are quite happy, Bill.

Billy!

Billy!

You know, they used to call me Billy.

I bet they did, Billy Mars.

10 fucking years old.

That's ridiculous when you're an adult.

I'd stand for you.

But, you know, when I'm in the middle.

You want me to sit down?

No, please.

Yeah, when I was 10, you know, I even had an uncle one call me Willie.

Can we call you Willie?

Yeah, I had a, my father called me Willie.

Willie, I want to talk to you.

Yeah.

That's a

many reasons.

I don't like, I mean, the name itself is like the most generic name in the world.

Yeah, I like William, though.

I thought, you know, when I started doing like, you know, the Today Show and things, I thought, you know, Billy is to, maybe I should be Bill now.

Bill is a...

If I had ever gotten confirmed like I was supposed to

right before my father quit the Catholic Church,

I would have been William.

I would have been what my father's name was and his father, which was William Aloysius Moore.

Aloysius?

Aloysius is a very Irish, very, you're a fucking wasp, so you wouldn't know this.

There's nothing waspier than a bush.

And just, I know I know this, but just, and I know you're not.

Walk me through.

I know you're not in the muscle end of the family, Tom.

But tell me again, your George Bush, the president,

is your uncle?

Which one?

The first one is my uncle.

The first one's your uncle.

Believe it or not.

The second one's your cousin.

43, George W.

is my first cousin.

First cousin.

So meaning you share a

so who's who's well you're the reason everyone thinks he's my uncle because he's 25 years older than me.

So out of 16 first cousins, George W is the oldest at 78 and I'm the youngest at 53.

So my father is the younger brother of George H.W.

Bush, 41.

I'm so sorry I asked.

I still don't get it.

You get it.

The old guy's my uncle, but he's like would be 104 or something if he was alive today.

Right.

And I thought you didn't drink.

Who fucking told you that?

I thought you were just a weed guy.

I'm both.

I barely.

Do you eat?

You look so skinny.

Yeah.

I barely drink.

I mean, it's so sad.

One reason I love Wednesdays,

not just because I can get to talk to some interesting person free form for as long as I want, but it's the one day I kind of allow myself a drink or two.

Really?

So you drink one day a week?

That's basically, yeah.

I don't think I, yeah, very often that is the case.

I mean, you can't when you're when I'm 70.

You can't fucking drink when you're this old.

70?

You know, you are, you're ageless, Bill.

I was thinking about that today.

I said, I wonder how old Bill Maher is.

I think he just looks the same for the last 30 years.

You're just Bill Maher.

Yeah, what's going on with the tincture?

Now, wait a minute.

What are you doing so many things?

I can't do this every week.

What is happening?

No, I don't blame you.

Everyone is wondering what Jing, I drink it.

It's this thing.

It's young.

Yeah, that's what it is.

It's the Jing.

It's tiger blood.

That's the answer to it.

The Jing.

It's the Jing.

That's what.

I'm actually aging in reverse.

I have tiger blood.

I'm Benjamin Budden.

I don't know what the fuck.

Where's my...

Oh, this, yeah, okay.

But

so, okay.

But, you know, as a Bush,

did they ever give you shit about it?

Like, because, I mean, we're such a politicized country.

I never seemed to think anybody really held that, you know, the super-liberals are like, oh, we can't listen to Bush give them celebrity news.

No, you know,

you've got your power libs, right, in town.

I'll never forget when I first did the Oscars.

I was doing the red carpet

and I was living in New York at the time and I was having fun on Access Hollywood as the correspondent.

And so I did the Oscars for the the official red carpet show and I'm there and I and I it's a long drawn-out show as everyone knows.

And so I find myself in the hotel in the in the lobby bar

and I've never met Julia Roberts before but you know I'm I'm I knew of her of course

and

she was sitting right there at the bar.

And it looked like she was alone and I pulled up and I said, you know, can I order a drink or whatever?

And she turns and she says, Billy Bush, you're the new guy

on IXS Hello.

And I said, and you're obviously Julia Roberts.

Hello.

And we got talking for a little bit.

And she said,

so are you going to buy me a drink?

Can you believe they don't give them free in the lobby of the Oscars?

Holy shit.

And I said, sure, of course.

I'd be honored.

What would you like?

And she turns to five friends and she goes, hey guys, Billy Bush is buying.

What do we want?

Boom, I got hit for a huge bill right there.

And we talked politics for a minute.

She's like, how could you be a Republican?

Really?

And then you got like people like, there was like, you know, Rosie,

you know, you'll get some shit from Rosie, but so what?

But other than that, I think people, you know,

HW, everybody loved.

People had, you know, thoughts about W.

But now they love him.

Now he's America's grandfather.

If you see him in Gen Z, thinks he's everything he does.

I would never be a Republican either.

But I find, I'm, and I love Julia Roberts, but I find that obnoxious.

I just do.

To say to somebody, how could you be?

You know, you could say that to a lot of people about a lot of things.

It's just, it's just that.

And of course, that attitude has only gotten worse in this country.

I mean, we're at a terrible place, don't you think?

I mean,

the political violence and just the hatred and the, you know, no one listens to the argument if they hate you so much to begin with.

Your argument, I know this from stand-up, because when you're a stand-up comic and you start out and you suck,

some people handle it, I handle it among the worst, which is you then insult the audience.

You blame them for not laughing.

Now they hate you.

Now, you could say the funniest joke in the world, if they hate you, they're just going to stand.

They're not going to give it up to you.

And I feel like that's exactly where we are in politics.

Each side is like...

an audience that has been insulted by the comic and they're just not going to give it up.

Even if it hurts them in some way, they will, what's the saying?

Cut off your nose to spite your face?

They will fucking do it.

And that's where we are.

I don't know how we can.

But even Julia didn't understand is how do you know I'm a Republican?

Just because my last name is Bush, you feel like that's the, you get the, you inherit the card and that's it.

And, you know, I mean, I've certainly voted that way, you know.

plenty of times, but I would call them, I'm a registered independent now.

I don't have a party.

I can't, I mean, they're so polarized that I just don't, I wouldn't be able to identify with either one.

So I'll look at the person and take the person.

Yeah,

right.

And you know what?

You don't have to apologize if you are.

I mean, half the country is.

And,

you know, again, not my cup of tea.

I could give you the list of reasons why I wouldn't be, you know, starting with they're too religious and they're fiscal hypocrites and right, and now they don't believe in democracy anymore and blah, blah, blah.

But I also would like to think I have things more in perspective, including, you know, Trump has put your cousin, George W., in perspective for me.

I mean,

nobody would.

I miss him.

I don't miss him.

You miss him terribly.

I can see it.

I don't miss him, but.

You would love him.

You should have him sit right here.

You should bust your ass together.

Can you make that happen?

He is so funny

and just easy hang that.

You would love it.

I would.

I would.

And he would paint you.

Hey.

And he would put a little portrait on the wall of.

Dude, I'm the guy who went to the White House and had the three-hour dinner with you.

I remember.

And got him to sign all the insults he said about me.

It's right there.

Oh, my God.

That is so great.

Oh, it's the greatest.

Bill, you caught so much shit for that, and I thought it was one of the great

moves.

And I was actually rolling the picture on my podcast, and Chuck LaBella, your booker and producer, great friend.

He's a friend of Future of Day Apprentice.

He booked a celebrity apprentice forever, so he books Club Random.

He's a terrific guy.

I look at the picture.

A terrific guy.

I sound like

Regis.

Larry David said that to me.

He sounded like Regis.

He says, you were, he goes, you know what you are?

I said, what?

Larry David said, you're a cross between Jason,

Costanza,

and a little Regis.

Yeah, there is a little Regis.

But when I get excited.

And you've got that.

I get up.

Yeah, you get up.

And I say, Bill, I can't believe it.

Joy, where are we going?

We're going out to dinner tonight.

I was there last night.

Bill Maher was in the dinner.

That's perfect.

And you've got the hair.

He's got a little bit of the nasal.

I misread it.

It's terrible.

And you got the hair.

He has great hair till the end.

Great hair.

So do you.

Just like Reed.

No, not like you're.

Not as full of you.

No, not like me.

But you can't.

Not true.

Not like me.

God's fair.

But can I?

You don't believe in God, but I do.

And God's fair.

He doesn't give you everything.

He gave me hair.

Can I pass a message from you to George W.

Please?

Okay, first of all, I was very hard on him.

I should text him right now.

No, no, no, no.

No, no, no, no.

Wait, I can do a very good thing.

No, I do it right now.

Okay.

But,

you know, I was hard.

I'm not taking it back.

I wasn't for the invasion of Iraq.

Or, you know, I mean, just the basic Republican policies that he championed were not exactly my cup of tea.

But I also have things much more in perspective.

He should know

that, yes, I probably looking back, could have been more reasonable.

It shouldn't have always been just everything.

Like, for example, and I have defended him on this, he had an idea to privatize privatize social security well you know if you look at where money goes over over a century now you don't live quite a century but you live half a century when you're at least when if you're of a normal lifespan um

where you put

money if you look the stock market even with its dips and recessions The chart is like this.

It goes quite a bit up.

You know, it just makes more money.

Whereas if you leave it in the bank, which is what we do now,

it crawls along the bottom.

Okay, it is safer, but it wasn't like the worst idea.

The idea that everybody has to like jump on something because it came from the other team.

That's exactly.

I've also mentioned many times that, you know, to contrast him with where we are now, when Obama won,

he was in office.

He had him in there.

He stood with the other president's experts, and he said, we want you to succeed, which is something you can't imagine Donald Trump saying.

He doesn't even know.

Let alone attending the innocent.

Well, he doesn't concede the election.

He's not going going to say, Amy Klobuchar, good luck with the office.

It's just not.

We're standing behind you.

We also gave him credit for, I mean,

Dick Cheney's boy was Scooter Libby, and he did not do the wrong thing when Scooter Libby got in trouble.

He was like, Dick Cheney almost broke up with him over that.

And he was like, no, it's not the right thing.

You can't outspies and whatever he did.

So like, and he just was, it was just a different era where we were Republicans, Democrats, liberals, conservatives, but it wasn't at this horrible place we are now.

And

he was in line with the traditional Republican way of doing things, which, you know, it's not 100 to zero, you're terrible and the others.

It was more like 60, 40, maybe, in my view, 70, 30, something like that.

Whereas now it's just off the rails.

We're missing nuances.

Maybe he will hear that.

And I'll tell you this.

My friend Michael Kivas went to his house once.

I think he knew Jenna.

He knew Michael.

Yeah, great guy.

And they got, my name came up.

Michael Kivas went to George's house.

Yes, I think he was friends.

He's in every house.

He may have been dating Jenna or one of the Bush

girls.

I think he was, or at least he was friends with him.

That's why he was there.

He was at George's house.

Maybe Barbara.

She's a little bit more.

No, no.

And

my name came up, but he said Bill Maher was over.

And George Bush said, you let that man in your house.

Laura, get the cat off of me.

You let that man in your house.

So that's where he is with me, maybe.

No, I don't think so.

I think I...

Well, he was then.

Then.

He's such an easygoing cat.

He does not, you know, participate in anything.

He was of his father's belief that you step out when you step out.

I would love to talk to him.

I really would.

You'd have to give him one of those, see if he'd enjoy one.

He would not do that no i don't think so

but uh all right so we've cleared up your family history what about your future

because i don't well i don't see you anymore i used to see you and then tmz there was a perfect

i'm done with access

i mean i'm done with extra which was the last one um why because it's just i'm

just shrinking yeah it's just like you can't say anything it's but it's it's it's not a show for saying no i want to say things bill i like what you do.

I want to say things.

That's why I did

a podcast.

What do you want to say?

You know who I got a problem with?

Yeah, yeah.

Look, I love you.

I love watching you.

I love watching,

you know,

the podcast universe to me is fantastic.

I should have done it years ago.

But, you know, I started this hot mics podcast, which is a nice wink to the...

to the history and like the mics are hot and now we know they're on.

Now we know they're on and

it's fantastic.

I get all kinds of people coming in.

I talk about whatever I want to talk about.

And I don't worry.

The head of HR is me.

Man.

It's great.

You are, I mean, among a fairly now long list of people

who America, wow, the way they just jump to something and then like a few years later, sometimes even one year later,

it was like, okay, you know, do we have to judge everybody by their least perfect moment on a bad day?

Or just, you know, it's just, I hope we're over that time because it's so obnoxious.

I think we are, but I also think like we, it's right now, I think it's about the algorithm, right?

So someone hears something, like someone will watch what I say with you, and they'll wait for maybe either one of us to say something that could be missed.

And then they'll take that, they'll clip it, they'll put it out.

And

isn't this terrible?

And if there are any bites, no bites, eh, shit.

Okay, we tried.

To try to get it going.

I always said somebody should do a show if they were realistic about who they really are called, Is this something?

Yeah.

Is this something?

Master Bedroom?

Is this any?

Could I?

No, I'm not catching on.

Okay.

You know, and that's exactly right.

And that's all they fucking care about.

That's exactly right.

The scalps on the wall.

Yeah.

Scalps.

Can I say scalps?

It's beyond true.

And if nobody bites, they move on.

And then it's amazing, like, what actually does stick.

I've seen people give groveling apologies over absolutely nothing.

I love to rate apologies.

But, I mean,

to be just the guy who was, you know,

at worst, just

trying not to offend somebody who is

in the pecking order of show business, someone you don't want to offend.

Like, who is it hurting that, like, you were going to change Donald Trump if you had said, sir, I will not stand for hearing a language like that?

It's just not what people do.

You hear things that you don't exactly approve of, and you don't have to, at every moment, take that moment and that opportunity to say, no, sir, that will not suffice.

You know, it's just

thing, life is full of like moment after moment.

Some of them just let flow by.

Not me.

I've now changed entirely.

If drunk Uncle Larry says something I don't like at Thanksgiving table, I'm all over.

Larry, that is beyond inappropriate.

I will not sit here at this table.

I don't remember a Larry Bush on the political table.

We had one.

And who's Jeb?

That's also your honor.

So Jeb's my cousin.

He's George's brother, so he's also my cousin.

Okay.

And how often do you see them?

Just saw them recently.

My brother is running for governor of Maine.

Maine?

Does he live in Maine?

Yeah, he's got to do that.

Yeah, he lives in Maine.

Well, you don't got to do that.

People have, are you kidding?

You can't see.

You have to live there at least five years in Maine.

They've got it around it.

Roller.

Let's live there five in a day.

I'm kidding.

We're a Maine family forever.

Hillary Clinton.

Well, that was a great

live in New York.

Can you say carpet bag?

Yeah, yeah.

Is this any

something?

Robert Kennedy,

not the current one, not the guy who eats bears.

His father was the senator from New York.

Yes.

Okay, they're the most famous Massachusetts

family in the world.

It's like they don't fucking care.

Mitt Romney was the governor of Massachusetts.

He's a Mormon from.

God, yeah.

They don't care.

He went back to the motherland and became a senator.

That's exactly right.

So where should I go?

Maybe I should be a politician.

Give me a nice, I think I could win Rhode Island.

What do you think?

So small.

I could just campaign very well.

You don't have a connection to Texas like the other Bushes do, do you?

Everybody thinks

because the George Bushes are Texas, but they're the only ones.

Where did you grow up?

Manhattan.

Manhattan?

Manhattan.

Wow.

Bella.

Upper East Side, right by the mayor's mansion, Carl Schurz Park.

Do you know it?

Carl Schurz Park?

86 between York and East End.

Carl Schurz Park is where the Mayor's Mansion is on the East River.

I used to,

after the clubs closed at 2 a.m., we would eat eat at the VN, which on 86 on the Upper East Side.

Yeah, because the comic strip was on 82nd and 2nd.

Catch a Rising Star was on 78th and 1st.

The VND was open 24 hours.

Oh, those were the days.

Sit with the comics.

The fuck.

Yeah, the fuck.

Smoke cigarettes, have coffee.

Smoke cigarettes, probably in the diner.

Then you could.

Oh.

And on airplanes.

Yeah.

So when they say Trump wants to take America back, I just want to go back to the diner.

Like,

I don't want to go back with all the other bad shit.

Just the diner where I could have any food at any hour and smoke cigarettes.

But yeah, it's probably better that we don't.

I love the fact that you're a comic, though.

I think that takes a lot of.

The fact that you got through

getting your ass kicked a few times, you said when you suck.

I mean, that's when I would have quit because I just don't know if I could handle it.

You just took it until you broke through.

Man, I have...

I respect that.

It's funny.

I've been

going

to the comedy store every once in a while, or the improv, although the improv has been like closed at midnight on Saturday.

Again, how the mighty have fallen.

But the comics, the comedy store on Sunset, where I never really ever worked, I was not her cup of tea.

But it's open, it's bigger, and it's like they do a midnight show.

So sometimes, like, after you know, a dinner or something, I don't want to go home.

Hey, let's go to the comedy store.

I love it.

But boy, I watch these comics up there, and it really takes me back to,

wow, if only I could have had an angel on my shoulder, or I guess I could have been a nice guy and told these comics after the show.

If you just didn't do this, my God, your life would be so much easier.

But I guess it's just something you have to learn.

Will you drive down and go do

that comic comic thing?

No, I'm not doing stand-up.

I stopped doing stand-up at the end of last year.

Did you ever do stand-up not prepared?

Never.

Oh, well, not such a thing.

Just riff on a stage, or did you know what you were doing?

I mean, you know, when you.

It's always a combination of having a structure.

Yes, I was always that organized.

I would have a structure.

But sometimes you forget it.

And then, yes, if you know where you're going, if you know you can get back to the island, then you can drift off into the waters and explore.

Sometimes you find great stuff out there.

As long as you can always get back to where you know you have safe harbor and you can always get the joke.

I mean, I'm sure there are comics who

do it.

They just, let's just go out on the limb and see where it goes.

A lot of them who you think did that really did know where they were going.

Of course.

They had a lot of stuff, you know.

I mean, we started with a lot of guys who would talk to the audience.

And of course, if it's the first time you're seeing it, you'd think this guy's a genius.

But actually, the same answers come up from the audience all the time.

So he's got this.

Sir, what do you do for a living?

Nothing.

How do you know when you're done?

And he's like, this guy's a genius.

He came up with that.

He can remember that five years ago.

He says it every fucking night because somebody says that every night, you know.

I bet you've had every situation, but the worst has got to be you get lost or you forget like you're at an impasse.

And I bet you've had the situation where from there you went down and tanked and or the situation where from there

you actually recovered because you saw something or someone did something, and you got the wheels going again, and it turned out to be a home run night.

That's

too much chance in that.

I mean, I did, you know, it's called called putting in your 10,000 hours.

I mean, I did so many zillion sets, everything happened.

But the worst, the kind of thing I think you're talking about that's the worst for me, anyway, is sometimes you had to do two shows, often had to do two shows on the weekend.

And

if you forgot a joke that you thought you hadn't done in the second show, but you had done, you thought you only did it in the first show, but you actually did it in the second show.

And now you do the same joke, and the audience just, you're usually expecting a laugh, and the audience just looks at you like, what a fucking fraud.

And that it only happened to me once, because I was so paranoid about it.

What a fraud.

And then there was...

And that strikes too much.

Sometimes you do three shows in a night.

And there was this cognitive dissonance when you're on stage because you memorize your set in order because you don't want this to happen.

So like you'd be in the religious section of the third show and you're like, wow, part of my brain is telling me, I did this joke because you just did it in the second and first show.

But the other part of your brain is saying, no, no, no, no, you didn't.

Just do it.

And it's so hard to commit to it with your full

because if you don't go all in, I mean.

And you got to.

So it's just,

it was, and as soon as I could, I told my agent, I will never do a second show.

And I didn't.

With Amy Poehler, I mean, she's to me one of the funniest people because she commits.

And if there is silence or she, at the Golden Globe, she did some act where she pretended to be Michael J.

Fox's son or something.

And she was in this bit as a little boy.

I can't remember the exact, but it started to get like, this is not working.

She didn't give a shit.

She went right through, right through to the other side.

People started laughing.

They started laughing when anyone else would have dropped out.

And it was a home run.

That I love.

I've always been a huge fan.

I think she's brilliant.

She lives across the street, and I can't get her to do this podcast.

Could you talk to her after you talk to George Bush, please?

I will talk.

Let me first talk to George.

Okay.

Let's get the order going.

Literally across the street.

You know who I ran driving here to your house.

I passed her ex-husband on a walk, who's a great friend.

Will Arnett.

Will Arnett on a walk with his new girlfriend?

I pulled over the window, had a nice.

He looks very thin and fit and tan.

Oh, he's got a new girlfriend.

He's got a hot green girlfriend.

Who's the girlfriend?

She modeled.

I think it's Carolyn Murphy.

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

Is she a current model?

Age-appropriate, the whole thing.

Age-appropriate.

Like, not a 27-year-old girl.

Will's my age.

Okay.

Oh, I'm not going to judge.

I know you, yeah, Bill.

No, no, no.

You've dated some younger ladies before.

I'm not going to judge either.

It's too young for me.

My daughter's just 15 years older than your oldest child.

I said,

my girls have rules for me on that.

Say that again?

She said, my oldest daughter said,

you can't date anyone younger than 15 years older than your oldest child.

So if she's 27, that puts me in.

That's why I don't have kids because they make fucking rules.

Kids shouldn't be making the rules.

You'd be a great father, Bill.

I always thought that I would not.

You really the one that got away.

I've said this many times.

I'd be the first, people say to me all the time, Bill, if you had one of your own, it would be different.

No, I'd be the first guy to look in the crib and go, still nothing.

It's true.

That's enough tincture for you.

I never liked kids when I was a kid.

You took the tincture thing out and poured the bottle in.

You're supposed to use the dropper.

Take it as a compliment, Bill.

I just, I'm enjoying myself.

so much.

I'm taking it right from the head.

It's the jing that keeps me young.

I keep coming up with slogans for these people.

It's the jing that keeps me young.

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Try a glass of

try a glass of this.

What do we got there?

Tequila or something?

Yeah, tequila.

I switched.

I used to drink Jack Daniels, but, you know, it's a little healthier, this stuff.

No, it's not.

That's what we tell each other.

We all say.

No, it is.

It is.

The agave, sure, everything is.

Everybody has a way of reasoning.

I don't know.

No, no, no.

I'm not saying it's health food.

If you stick to one day a week, you're good.

That is true.

That is true.

But it depends on what you make it out of.

I mean, you can make booze out of almost anything.

I mean, vodka is potatoes, right?

And many other things.

You can make vodka out of potatoes, out of grapes.

Sirok vodka, the one that Diddy used to have, that's out of grapes.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

Rice, I mean, anything.

Right.

You can make it out of anything.

The agave plant apparently is a little more healthy to begin with, but you're right.

It's, look, it's poison is poison, and you are always making trade-offs.

Sometimes we need a little poison, Bill.

Exactly.

Especially these days.

You're always, except for Brian Johnson, we are always making trade-offs with our future self.

You're saying, you know, if I smoke this, will it cost me five minutes at the end of my life?

I'm good to go with that bargain.

You've lived a great life.

You've accomplished a lot.

Well, let's not say that.

But you're also, you're frozen in time.

You look the same age.

It's incredible.

I'm sitting up here very close to you, and I'm saying, I don't know if you have a great dermatologist or something, but you look young.

The lines aren't really

extreme.

I think it's not having children.

And I don't mean that as a put-down for children.

I just mean that there is something psychological and of course also something physical that takes a lot out of you not to mention the old bank account.

But there's something about the psychology of

I am

not passing this along.

I am it.

I'm still it.

Until I have another mini me,

I'm still sort of the last one and I have to keep this going and I have to be the young one.

And then when you have the younger one, I can understand that.

The psychology is different.

It's like you're passing through this other person, and you're more or less likely to have the eye of the tiger.

In Hollywood, there's two stages of fathers, right?

I mean, the little, you know, the school I went to with my kids, you know, James Kahn was a father in the class with me.

So I would have great times talking to Jimmy Kahn, but he was on his second lap.

You know, I mean,

if you imagine you, Bill Maher, at almost 70 years old, at Carpool.

I mean, that's

embarrassing.

It would be.

That's Bill Maher.

Look.

Oh, my God.

First of all, I'd have to do it from a stretch limousine.

And

which is very out of style.

Nobody uses a stretch limousine anymore.

They're like the unhipest thing in the world.

Have you ever seen a celebrity in the last 10 years get out of a stretch limousine?

It's all SUVs.

It's all SUVs.

And yes.

We got to bring back the stretch.

Oh,

you don't have to ask me.

I'm there.

I love it.

I do tid.

I do TID.

I do TID to do that.

I did too.

I don't know.

Either the pot or your personality is getting to me.

No, I did too.

I used to love the old stretch limousine.

And that's how I would deliver my kids to school.

I don't want to be seen.

It's embarrassing.

It's like being seen on the subway.

Wow, Bill Maher, I thought you were doing well.

What are you doing on the subway?

You know, sometimes they get celebrities on the subway because they think it gives them cool cred.

Wow, Mark Ruffalo, you're on the subway.

You must be like a regular person.

And he is.

And a nice guy, and I love his work, blah, blah, blah.

Great work.

Whoever, I could have picked anybody.

I just happened to be a good person.

No, you picked a good one.

You really know you did.

Ruffalo's a perfect one.

He looks like a homeless guy walking around New York.

I don't know.

He wants it that way.

Show his solidarity with the, you know, I get it.

It's fine.

I hope he's still my friend.

He did the show once.

I liked him.

I still like him.

What do you mean, I hope he's still my friend?

Did you say something?

Well, I just said something.

We just used.

Mark is very forgiving.

I know all the celebrities, Bill.

I've dealt with them.

I've kissed every one of their asses.

I know everything.

I know what they taste like.

Smell.

Yeah, you really have talked.

Well, you certainly have talked to every

A-lister.

Whereas sometimes people say to me, it's so funny, you know, do you know, and then it's like somebody who I,

do you know Tom Cruise?

I'm like, no, of course I don't fucking know Tom Cruise.

You know, do you know?

We have the same trainer.

You know, and it's like, no, I don't know these people, but you do.

Well, I don't know them.

I mean, some I know.

They've become friends, but I have interactions.

You've had interactions with all of them.

I've had no interaction.

Well, except for the ones that come on the show.

That's very, well, certainly real-time has very, very, very few interactions.

A lot of rights.

Celebrities and people.

Pundits.

Governors, Senate.

Congressmen, people who...

Yes, exactly.

Me, I've been on there.

Yes, but most people are, you know, the show people, this is not the show for them.

You know, I'm putting them down, but you have to like know shit.

And celebrities mostly do not feel the need to know shit.

And then there's many who like don't know shit, but it doesn't stop them from speaking.

Because you can't just be known for memorizing words that someone else wrote and spitting them back into a camera.

It's got to be something more.

And I think a lot of them get into trouble that way.

Well, I mean, I say this a lot in this show, and they probably hate hate me for it in Hollywood, but they hate me anyway, so who cares?

But celebrities are just, some of them do, yeah.

They do.

They'ren't the smart ones.

But like celebrities, they're just a different breed.

It's just like they're loaded with talent.

Talent is different than, you know, knowing things

and, you know, thinking ain't their best thing often.

Now, that's many, many exceptions to that.

There are many very smart people.

And I always say, in this business, any asshole can get get five good years doing something, but the cream rises to this top and usually stays there.

There's a reason why if you take the 20 greatest or most successful directors or the ones who are, they're all great directors.

I mean, you don't get to be that by being a fuck-up and not having a vision and not knowing what you're doing and not being able to deliver on time and on budget.

You're managing this.

$200 million enterprise of hundreds of people.

And, you know, this is a job.

The mediocre people just are not going to make whatever, Dune, or whatever fucking movies they're making.

Avatar, James Campbell.

Avatar, sure.

Yeah, but all of them.

The one that's on,

I'm anxious to see the DiCaprio movie out now.

People are raving over it.

I watched the trail.

It's called what?

Another

day.

Oh, shit.

Another way.

Another terrible bad day.

Another

bearded Leo.

White Lambert.

He's very distraught.

It looks good, though.

It looks great.

And it seems to be about something,

you know, which is

a lot to say for a movie.

But really, I mean, most movies are spandex and shooting rays out of the end of your fingers.

And, you know, I mean, that's fine.

But, like, it's great to see a movie that's an original story, and he's an original director.

And I'm saying this guy, he did...

What do you do?

You know, what's the porn one

with Mark Wahlberg?

Dirk Diggler.

Dirk Diggler.

Why can't I?

Boogie Knights.

Boogie Knights.

Baby.

And there will be blood.

I mean, he's a major director.

And again,

that cream rises to the top.

People like that don't get to their job just by, you know, who you know and who you blow.

No, that's a little different in the.

I would be right at the top if there are no problems.

Who you know and who you blow.

Well, you never did that to get to the top.

You.

Did you?

No, I never even.

You paused.

You paused.

I did not.

No, what I was going to say is I never even accepted the blowjob when I was the MC at the comedy club because, you know, there were singers.

And once in a while, it was

put out there that stage time,

you know, maybe I could help myself with stage time.

And I had enough integrity.

to like not

go for that.

Now that's a terrible thing.

Yeah, no, it is a terrible thing.

Unless, well, here's here's a good philosophical question.

Is it a terrible thing if the woman wants to do it?

Well, I asked a very,

very high-profile agent in town, a guy with whom I play some golf here and there.

And I said, when the Weinstein thing was happening, I said, how many,

and he represents big stars, and I said, how many

people do you think,

you know, did it?

And they're like right now going, oh, I'm sure.

I mean, you know, and got a nice bump out of it.

And he said, a lot, tons.

Where, you know,

I'm going to bang Harvey Weinstein.

It's going to be a horrible experience.

But you know what?

Right.

I'm going to get something out of this.

And from there, I'm going to parlay and boom, on to the next thing.

I happen to know.

Is it the worst thing?

No, I happen to know from reliable, very reliable sources.

As much as Harvey Weinstein is also absolutely, in my view, maybe I have to say, because I don't know where the legal thing is now.

no

a definitive rapist who belongs in jail there also were instances of where it was a transactional of course I think I can get an Oscar out of this man and is that worth a blowjob it absolutely that's their that's their decision I had early in my day a

A female executive when I was a very young man ask me to give a little spin.

It was all part of a joke.

It was all, give me a little spin, look at you, you're so cute and young.

I love all that bushy hair.

Look at you, give me a spin, the whole thing.

I could totally see that happening to you.

And I was a pig and shit.

I thought it was funny.

I enjoyed it.

But at the end, I could have, man, I could have made it.

Well, I mean, I could think of two instances when I was young and dumb when I first lived in New York, and I was hit on by a gay man in two different instances that I could think of.

And

sadly, that's it in my life.

Like,

I would have hoped I was more attractive than to own, but like twice.

You're an acquired taste.

You're very attractive.

No, and it was great because...

Not traditionally.

I remember the second time I did a set at the comic strip.

And I got off stage, and there was this guy, and he was like sitting at the bar, and he's like, he's just telling me he thought I did a great set.

And of course, you know, you're young and you're hungry for any sort of adjunct.

You know, finally a fan, you know, somebody like, and it's like, great.

And I'm just like completely oblivious that this guy is gay and wants to fuck me and picking me up.

And

he's like talking, and we're talking.

It's like nothing.

And then he's like, you know, you want to grab a bite?

And I was like, again, still stupid.

Like, no, I got to go and do another set at the other club, which I did.

And come with, sure, one of them

comes with.

And then like we were eating at the club after the show.

And

like the second time the subject of homosexuality came up,

it went bing.

Oh my god.

Wow.

This guy is bringing up the subject of homosexuality.

And just out of the blue, like we could talk about anything.

Art history.

Sex with me.

Sex with men.

I mean, anything, whatever.

Furniture, literature.

And, you know, ancient wisdom, any of that,

assholes, whatever, just whatever subject.

And that's when I was like, oh, I'm on a date.

I see.

I'm on a date and I don't know it.

Yeah, you're being a little bit more.

And then I knew it and I was nice about it.

I had the craziest thing happen to me in New York.

You remember the four seasons on 57th Street?

I don't know if they reopened it, but 57th and Park or whatever.

I remember staying there.

You always stayed there.

And I was staying there for work and I was out, you know, shopping or whatever.

And I walk into the lobby and I go, they didn't check cards back then.

They didn't check your room key.

I just went right to the elevator.

I get in.

This guy gets in.

That's your white privilege, asshole.

Okay, well, this other white man gets in behind me, and he's, you know, in the elevator with me, and he's talking.

He goes, Aren't you Billy Bush?

I said, oh, yes, yeah.

He goes, oh, I see you on TV sometimes.

That's well, thank you.

I push 12.

He doesn't push a number.

We get to 12.

The doors open.

I get out.

He gets out.

And I'm like, oh,

you're on 12.

You know, we're on the same floor.

Have a great time.

I take a left.

I go down the hall to the right.

I go to my room.

He goes to the left, goes down the hallway the other way.

And he's like, okay, good to see you.

And I'm like, okay, bye.

And I get into my room

about

three minutes later, two minutes later.

Uh-oh.

Yeah.

And I had the latch on.

I don't know why.

I never would put the latch on, but I had the latch on.

And I said, hello?

Because it had a weird feeling.

And he says, hey, Billy, it's me.

It's Andrew from the elevator.

Change names?

Whatever his name was.

But you already knew that from the me from the elevator.

From the group, from the small walk.

Small detail, Bill.

No, no, no.

It's not a small detail.

Okay, we were.

You changed names.

Well, he knew mine because he saw from the electronic colour.

But that was different.

You're a celebrity.

And he said,

you said Andrew.

Whatever his name was.

It could be Phil.

Phil from the elevator.

I'm the guy from the elevator.

Oh, I said.

And you're changing your story.

This is a legit story, guys.

I know it is.

You don't want to relate.

It's important whether you knew his name before he came to the story.

He said Andrew.

I'm going out as Larry.

I go with Larry.

Okay, but that means that you had a conversation that.

I'm not interested in the story anymore.

I'm not telling you.

And there's a big finish.

I'm not telling you.

I'm very interested.

But you have to admit, that's an important detail.

Because it implies

a level of intimacy that would give him a little more

purchase to knock on your door.

Okay.

Did I say to him in the elevator, oh, what's your name?

No, I wasn't engaging in conversation.

He might have thrown it out.

I'm using a standard default name.

I'm done, counselor.

I usually use Larry.

But anyway, he knocks and I

open the thing a little bit.

I go, yeah, can I help you?

And he goes, hey, I was just wondering,

do you want want to

maybe have a drink or something in the bar downstairs?

And I said, you know what?

I got to go meet my mom for dinner.

Thank you so much.

No, I can't.

I'm really.

This was not at the end of the night.

No, this is right there in the middle of the day, four o'clock.

This guy, he liked to get it done early.

And I said, no, that's good.

He goes, well, would you like to just maybe have a quick,

quick drink?

Oh, wow.

And I went, a quick drink?

Like, we're just going to do shots or something.

And it's going to, I said, no, really, I'm so sorry.

I really don't want to keep my mom waiting.

Thank you.

Oh, good.

And he goes, then do you want one of these?

And he looks down at my crutch and he goes, do you want one of these?

Oh, so you had opened the door?

Oh, I had it like this.

And I'm in my little robe.

I'm going to take a shower.

And he goes, do you want one of those?

And I was like, that means a blowjob.

And I went, that definitely.

I said, no, thank you, though.

And I closed the door.

I actually thanked him for the offer, closed the door.

That's shit.

And I go right to the phone and I call down the desk and I said, hey, there is a guy on my floor.

He lives at the end,

one of the rooms, 12 down at the end, and he just propositioned me and you need to get him out of here.

And they looked at him and they said,

Mr.

Bush, I don't think the guy's on your floor.

He's not staying in this hotel.

And I went, oh my God, the guy followed me in from the street the whole way, tracked me to the elevator all the way up.

Kind of a flex.

It's kind of a flex for you.

Well, I mean, I'm going to track you.

You are.

I was in good shape, then I was, you know, gay men follow you.

Thank you.

And they don't even know you're gay.

I guess they...

But I wonder what his hit ratio is.

Like, how many times does that work?

10% of the time?

I got to say, if that was me, I wouldn't have narced the guy, though.

Bill.

I wouldn't have.

I would have just...

Bill, he's on my floor and he's propositioning me.

I'm absolutely calling and at least moving myself to another floor.

You cannot do that to someone staying in a room.

Yes, you can.

No, you can't.

And what was he going to do?

Get a battering ram and knock your door down?

Maybe.

I mean, he, look, the poor guy is lonely.

Are you defending this guy?

I'm.

What the hell?

What is in this?

Let me have one.

Seriously?

Yeah, no, no, no, no, no.

I am not defending him.

I'm just saying I would have handled it differently.

I just would not.

have narked on.

Agree to disagree.

Yeah, absolutely.

Okay.

Absolutely.

Because everything I did, I stand firmly by.

And I do it again.

Hey, this is not nuclear disarmament.

It's just, it's a small.

I'm just saying, I wouldn't have narced the guy because I would feel bad for him.

I would feel like.

You would feel bad for the guy that followed me in from the streets.

You know what?

I remember when I couldn't get laid.

And I remember how.

There it is.

I remember when taking the, you know, the measure of myself and screwing up my courage to ask a girl out was like the hardest thing in the world so I'm not saying this is like exactly like that but it must took a lot a lot of courage to knock on a stranger's door well not a stranger apparently you had a conversation where you exchanged names

and and then this is an unbelievable re-litigating

it's just it's just it it's just from his point of view i mean and again what do you were you really worried you were going to get raped

You don't have to go to raped.

That I was being stalked in my room in a hotel.

Bill, it was very uncomfortable.

Take it as a case.

I like to be comfortable when I'm in my hotel room on the road.

Yeah, I do too.

That's why they put the lock on the door.

At no moment were you really uncomfortable, physically uncomfortable.

I was uncomfortable as can be.

My skin crawled, and I realized I was followed down the street into my hotel.

And I believe they put in the key card.

They had a security guy checking actual cards to see if, you know, they match people's room.

So I guess this is a bad time to ask if you want to have a drink in my living room after the show.

He's a terrible, too soon.

Although I can handle you.

He was a big guy.

You I can handle.

I'm sure of that.

He was a big guy.

He was a bigger guy.

So he was a bear.

He was a bear.

Was he a bear?

I know what that is.

I know.

I'm sure you do.

You're a sophisticated gentleman.

I know a bear when I see him.

I know, I know.

But was he a bear?

He was a bigger man than me.

A bigger man.

I wouldn't call him a bear.

A bear is really a great big guy.

Well, if you hadn't

narced on him, I would say you were a bigger man than him.

You know what, Andrew?

I'm so sorry.

Yeah.

Could have been something.

Andrew, again, we seem to be sorry.

I think it was Andrew.

I don't know why that feels right.

I feel like it totally was.

I've tried to wipe my memory from him.

Well, apparently you didn't do it.

You're now cementing it in my memory for a while.

You do a good job because Andrew lives on in your mind.

I mean, you remember his name after all these years.

Are you sure there wasn't something more going on?

I don't believe that I deserve this here.

This is very random.

It's very random.

Hey.

You know, I've told this story before, but I think it's worth repeating.

When I used to do Hawaii every year, and we would stay at the Pour Seasons in,

I think, the most beautiful hotel in the world there in Maui.

And the promoter was a gay man, and, you know, Tinder was a thing and as a thing.

And

you know where there was a lot of active Tinder?

You mean grinder grinder grinder you know where there was a lot of active tender activity

the men's room of the lobby at the hotel wow because it's married men who are going down and having gay sex in the lobby bathroom of a five-star hotel while their wife is sleeping or getting a massage or something.

What is that?

What is that?

It says, I want to go down there.

I need to.

It's gay sex.

It's guys who are married who are really gay or gay when drunk or I don't, you know.

Gay in Europe.

I was never tempted like that.

You know, like I never understood that, you know, in the middle.

I've been a single man for a long time.

Have you ever used the apps?

In the

Tinder?

Oh, God, no.

Because those are like, you know, there's the nice app and the Tinder.

I just wouldn't know how to get on one.

I wouldn't know how to get on one if I wanted to and I don't want to.

You've never done the Raya, which is the celebrity

people?

Absolutely not.

No.

Absolutely not.

First of all, I don't think you can ever understand who you're meeting if it's on a screen.

Also, who could possibly trust the pictures?

True.

I mean, people put their pictures.

People be like, this guy thinks he's Bill Maher.

That's so funny.

People put their pictures on lots of things now.

It's like right on your phone, like if it's the contact or whatever.

And like, I know these people.

And I look at the picture and I'm like, okay, but I know you.

This is not you.

And so like, why would I do that in a dating situation?

And then, of course, being famous, it's not a good look.

I mean, I've seen celebrities who got embarrassed being on Raya because people take a screenshot.

And then you just,

you don't want to look like some schmuck who's, and you'd see how he's, you're fucking

hitting on someone.

You know, it just, it just, everything about it is, is a red flag to me.

And again, I just don't think you can get the measure of a human being through a screen.

You have to sit close to them.

You have to be able to look in their eye.

You have to see their facial movements.

All of this is communication to the part of your brain that may not be, it may be unconscious, but it's all going in there and it matters and it's everything.

And you have to literally smell them.

Not, you're not aware of it, but pheromones.

Oh, a smell is great.

The right smell is, you know it.

When you hug.

Well, you can tell.

And the laundry.

I don't like any smell.

How's your laundry?

Is your laundry smell good?

You have good laundry smell in bed.

You've been with someone's clothes, they don't smell.

Yeah, I.

Someone's clothes smell great.

Again, I feel like there's no need for smell anywhere in laundry or humans.

Like, I don't remember any

perfume.

I don't wear cologne or anything, and I don't like it when a woman does.

Really?

Yeah.

I mean, if you're.

I don't like unoverwhelming, but a whisper

of the right thing is great.

No, it's saying, I mean, it feels like you have to cover up something not good.

Right.

I mean, isn't that a lot of why people perfume themselves?

I have a fantastic cologne.

I'm not wearing it now, but it's a nice little light spritz.

It's a spray and a pullback.

It's so faint.

I hear it really worked on Andrew.

I feel like I mean.

He caught the backdraft and he followed me right in.

I mean, I feel like he was almost entrapped.

Considering your column.

Now Andrew's the victim.

Bill has turned this in.

Consider Andrew is the victim.

This is incredible.

Considering your cologne.

What is this meeting?

This is a case of entrapment.

But no, I mean,

Hollywood is just full of

people who were married and then,

you know, at a certain point, midlife, shall we say,

became gay men.

I mean, some very prominent agents, managers, you know, stars less because they don't like it out there sometimes.

I mean, we all know there are certain stars who are.

We all know, we all know.

We all have a list, a short list of the ones we can't say.

Of the ones we can't say.

And then there are others who are.

You go first.

You name one.

I'll go.

I'm not doing it, Bill.

I'm not doing it.

I'm not going to do it.

That's a terrible suggestion.

I would never do it.

But I will say this.

There are stars who they say it about who are not gay tom cruise they say i don't think tom cruise is gay no he's a scientologist it's different it's even weirder not that being gay is weird i'm just saying it's it's less than the majority uh but scientology uh that's that's his

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You know, I did a big interview with Tom Cruise.

We never ever, back in the day, 2005, we never wiped the format of Access Hollywood.

It's always story, story, story, news, news.

But for Tom Cruise, I wrote him a letter and I said, Tom,

you know, whenever we interview you, we ask, you know, who are you dating, whatever.

It never goes anywhere.

You always talk about Scientology.

So I thought, let's talk about it.

And I said, I'd love to sit down with you.

I thought he didn't want to talk about it.

No, this was back when he did.

And then it didn't go well.

And so he stopped.

But it all began with my interview with him.

And then it went to Oprah's Couch and to Matt Lauer.

You're being glib, Matt.

You're glib, Matt.

That started.

The first one was with me.

And I did a half an hour interview, Tom.

His people got back and said, if you want to interview Tom, you have to go to each of the four Scientology centers in Hollywood, and you have to see them all and understand you can't just.

There's four right in Hollywood?

Well, there's the Celebrity Center, and then there's the Narconon, or the whatever, the Narcotics Center, and then there's the Human Rights Museum, and there's one other.

They have a good cleanse.

Maybe the other one's a sauna.

I don't know.

Did you know that?

They have a good cleanse?

Scientology.

I mean, the rest of it is so batshit.

I mean, I can't even explain.

What's the cleanse?

Like a drink or like a steam?

Like it, no, like a full cleanse.

Like, if you really want to, like, get rid of the toxins in your body.

I mean, more than just a day.

Like a real, it's like a month-long cleanse.

But, like, you know, if you want to, I haven't done it, but I know people who have who are not Scientologists, but the cleanse is good.

Yeah.

After that, the whole thing goes off the rail.

Goes off the rails?

I'll try the cleanse.

But the cleanse is good.

So it's just saying there's goodness in everything.

That's all I'm saying.

The point is, I sit down with Tom for a half an hour.

We talk about everything under the sun, and that's where, you know, everybody picks up on stuff.

We talk about psychotropic drugs, which he doesn't believe in.

And I said, well, you know, you worked with Brooke Shields, and, you know, I mean, she took this Paxel, you know, the drug for postpartum depression.

He's not completely wrong about the big idea.

Well, it was not time to say it because he said, oh, yeah, where's Brooke's career now?

And then that went off.

And then Matt Lauer followed up on that.

And then they had their falling out.

And it was, but Tom thought the interview with me went great.

He wrote me a beautiful handwritten note and sent me an $800 bottle of wine.

Billy Bush, you are an upstanding man.

That was an incredible interview.

You're way too good for these entertainment.

You're terrific.

You're the

and I was like floating on a cloud with Tom.

And then two days later, the couch, and then Matt, and

boom,

he never talked about it again.

But I will say this.

You can judge Scientology.

It works for him.

Like different things work for different people.

The guy was dyslexic.

He couldn't read a script.

He couldn't memorize anything.

That somehow connected to him and made him the most prolific actor there is.

Okay, that's like saying.

That's a good point.

Yeah.

You'll give me that.

But, well, I can't really, because it's like saying the kingdom of Saudi Arabia works for the king of Saudi Arabia.

Yeah, it does.

Well, you can say that.

It does.

It does.

And Scientology, there's a lot of evil shit that goes on in Scientology.

I mean, people seem to disappear.

You might disappear.

They see.

I know.

They seem to be imprisoned.

They seem to be subject to horrible things like scrubbing floors for years.

And I mean,

it's just, there is,

I mean, and they're very litigious.

And also they go after people who leave.

I mean, look at Leah Remini and all the stuff she's exposed.

So the fact that he's, you know, at the apex of this organization, yes, it works for him.

And I say that all

adding, I'm a huge fan of his work.

Of his work.

And also.

But he wouldn't be able to do his work without.

I would love someone to be able to ask him about this.

Like, Tom, everyone loves you.

You're such a nice guy.

Everything you do is right and perfect and blah, blah, blah.

You must be aware that this is going on in this organization that you're a part of.

I mean, don't you, don't you.

No one's getting close enough to do that.

Right.

And, but he's, he could stop that.

He has the power.

I mean, he, it's not David Miscavige, it's Tom Cruise who's really the head of this.

But Tom doesn't appear with Miscavige anymore.

He doesn't go to the.

I think he's a passive member.

I mean, at this point.

I'm like, I mean, you know anyone who's a high-profile member?

Okay, but if you're aware of this shit that's going on, and you, I mean, you know, look at those shows that Leah did.

I mean, you know, people having to escape from it like it's

a concentration camp in North Korea.

I mean, it's just crazy.

But it holds him together.

What holds you together?

It's not religion.

So what's like the, is it the universe?

What is the constant that centers Bill Maher?

It's a great question, Regis.

And the answer.

Because you know what?

You look like you might need some centering, Bill.

Centering.

We're going to center you.

You are.

That is dead on.

But

no, I am centered.

I mean, I think that's a lot what holds me together is I never like really go too far either way.

Yeah, you seem even-killed.

Even-killed, you know, it's being a comedian, I think, helps with that because, first of all, it gives you perspective.

You laugh at everything.

Second of all, you never have that kind of like, you're not like a musician who gets on this level that's like people are just treat you like a god.

They don't treat comedians like a god.

They like them.

Comedy's king.

But you're not like, you don't live in this.

I mean, some of the musicians, you've interviewed musicians.

I mean, they live in a bubble world of God knows.

I mean, because there is just such adulation that they don't have to live in reality.

So I never had that, which is great.

And I also try not to get too low about the bad times.

Yeah, that's the key.

And, you know, I also am very aware that I'm basically lucky.

Good parents, stable upbringing.

Never enjoyed being a child, but it wasn't a nightmare.

Were you an only child?

No.

Why does everyone ask me that?

I know, you feel like you...

I don't know.

No, I have a lovely older sister who's going to come out and visit me soon.

And, you know, she still lives back east and where we grew up in New Jersey.

Where in Jersey are we?

Bergen County, New Jersey.

Sure.

She lives in the city the Republicans will be interested in that Richard Nixon retired to after he was president, Park Ridge, New Jersey.

Wow.

Yeah.

I lived in Jersey a little bit.

You did?

Three years in New Jersey.

Oh, yeah, because you grew up in the area.

But I was out in Chatham, New Jersey, by Morristown.

That's so waspy-bush.

Oh, no, it's not.

Chatham.

No, these are simple.

No, it's not Westchester.

It's not Westchester, which is what.

This is Chatham is really good,

like simple, normal people.

It's not Tony.

You're thinking of Summit Short Hills.

Now you're thinking that chatham is really good people yeah salt of the earth and yet you had a a two polo pony garage i understand three

did you ever play polo no no no i was a real athlete bill polo that's not a riding on that would be too frustrating i was a lacrosse player a hockey player where do you live now i live uh in l A

for some reason, still.

I'm not going to die here in L.A.

When I get away at some point, I'm going to get out of L.A.

I'm an East Coast guy.

Really?

Yeah.

See, I don't think most people think that about you.

Well, I've been here 21 years.

I mean,

I know from my friends who now, a lot of them, the millennials, are moving back to New York.

And they tell me, they say,

LA,

it's lovely with the weather and all that stuff.

Compared to New York right now, it's so dead.

And I think that's probably true.

I think it is.

I mean, it's your, it's a, what, now for my age where I'm dug in here, I love it.

I do, the weather is the most important thing.

I ain't going anywhere.

But they do say, you know, any night, if it's 11 o'clock at night and I want to do something and go out, I can call people and they're out and I can go places and they're out.

And that is just not L.A.

That's not.

But that's also not my age.

If I was 40, that would appeal to you.

But you can walk out on the corner and get a cab and go, or Nawa Wemo.

And go wherever you want to go

in a second.

Yeah.

LA, it's like, hey, we're going out to dinner.

I'm not going over there.

But then you have to live in New York with its shitty weather, and you have to live in a building.

You can duck into a little pub.

You can go to a little diner like you like.

This is a little pub.

I mean, that I don't know.

Well, I can't just duck into here.

I mean, this is scheduled.

I'm cleared with the security of the whole thing.

But it doesn't work tomorrow.

There's no place you can just duck into it.

I'm going to come by tomorrow, Bill.

I'm going to come by tomorrow.

We're going to have a little coffee or a little hang.

Do you?

I mean, I had drinks a week ago after the show at the

oh I love that.

Yeah.

A lot of professionals in there building.

A lot of hookers

I was with two young ladies who were good friends of mine.

How young?

They were like I was like I just want to have a drink for the show the week had been a real bear and not the kind Kennedy eats, just a real bear.

Or the kind that shows us my dad.

I need a fucking drink.

You know,

where are we going to dinner?

I was like, we're not going to dinner.

We're going to drink first.

And then they were telling me, yes, I had, and I had known this, but that is like, and I was like, oh, I want to see the horrors.

They were, it was like, it was like, it was like a theme park, or like, I want to see the horrors.

Yeah.

Because I had heard of that.

And I've never, I don't normally go there to drink.

The little lobby bar off to the left.

Yes, no, that's what we're at.

But we were there too early.

And it was like, there were no horrors.

Terrible horrors.

It was like when you go to the zoo and the polar bear won't come out because he's sleeping inside of his egg wheel.

It's like, come on, I came all the way to the zoo.

Can I not see the fucking polar bear?

But we had to go to dinner before.

What we're watching is the best.

Bill, I grew up in New York City.

I'd call my, when I was a little boy, I was probably 12 years old, 14, 13.

I'd call my friend in the building and I'd say, let's sneak out.

The parents would go to sleep.

12.30, we'd go down the elevator, right out on 86th Street, and go up and watch.

the hookers work.

It was fascinating.

What did you see?

We would just see see them with the shorts and the very tight little short dresses picking up guys on the street, and we'd just watch

ladies of the night, knowing that they were going to go have sex in a car or something.

Right.

Or behind the dumpster.

That's true.

Were you able to hear what they were saying to the prospective customer?

Yeah, occasionally.

You know, as you got used to it, you could go up and listen to some of the lingo by a dime bag.

I remember when I used to walk from my

shitbox apartment on

8th Avenue and 55th Street down to the Improv, which was the third club in New York when I started on 44th and 9th, that was the original

showcase comedy club.

That's Bud Friedman.

Started that in 1962.

And that was the theater district.

All the other comedy clubs, the comedy store, Catch a Rising Star, the Comic Strip, they all came.

Bottoms up, Bellies Up.

What was it called?

The Belly Room?

Which is the one done?

The belly, the bottom, the.

No, the belly room is in the comedy store.

That's for the, that's like just women in the belly room.

I'm sure there's something wrong with that, but don't blame me.

I didn't invent it.

Interesting.

But

I would walk from 55th down to 44th along 8th Avenue, and that was prime hooker territory.

And it was always,

again, the naivete.

Rare sightings.

The naivete of the 22-year-old, like the first time the hooker was like, you want a date?

And I was like, a date?

Where are we going?

Frankie and Johnny's?

You know, a date.

Should we

go into a duet of some sort of a city?

It's like what Andrew said to me in the hotel, you want a drink?

And there wasn't a drink.

A date?

Well, you know, I've got to do a set, but, oh, I see.

Oh.

You know.

One of those clubs, I interviewed Jerry Seinfeld down there when I was young.

It was my most humiliating, like, yeah i was probably a year into the job and being a new yorker i wanted jerry seinfeld to like me i'd say i mean i just wanted to be liked by jerry and i cared like crazy and i just and i went down to interview jerry and it was downstairs in a comedy club the comedy started with a be the comedy seller seller he was promoting his in greenwich village maybe the comedy seller yeah

still there and very famous and it was not there when i first started but soon after i did sets at the comedy Cellar.

It was there in the early 80s.

So, yes, it's been there forever.

It's where Chris Rock and Louis C.K.

and lots of guys go when they want to try out materials still.

And maybe Jerry still, I don't know.

But yeah, it's a great club.

He was very,

it was, it was his place.

He knew everybody.

Jerry was wearing a white t-shirt with a sweater over.

And I'm wearing a button-down shirt, like very thin button-down shirt.

And so Jerry's clearly warmer than I am.

But I am so nervous.

And the lights are on, and it's two cameras, and it's me and Jerry.

And

I'm so prepared, and things are going great.

And the interview is rolling.

And then I start thinking about how it's going great.

And

another voice comes in, and I'm so young.

And then I talk myself out of the fact that it might be going great.

And broadcast news occurs.

I'm sitting with Jerry and I start to sweat.

And a little, it's like the map of Rhode Island appears on my chest.

And I'm like,

and then I'm thinking about it.

I'm like, no, this can't happen to me.

It's going so great.

Jerry fucking likes me.

This is working.

Rhode Island becomes Massachusetts.

All of a sudden, we've got New England and fucking Africa just shows up.

And Jerry finally goes, are you going to be okay?

And I just,

he loved it.

And for the rest of time, he brings it up.

Are you going to be okay?

Well, I could have saved you all that.

I've known Jerry for a very long time.

He's one of the greatest humans, you know, obviously other than comedy, but like I started with a lot of people and know a lot of comics, but

Leno and Seinfeld are the two best humans in the, that I know from the business.

But the idea that Jerry Seinfeld would give a shit about whether he liked you or not.

Way off the bat.

No.

He might,

but what you're doing.

Whatever you were trying to do to make that happen, couldn't make it happen.

It would either come for what it was or it wouldn't.

And he would not apologize if he didn't like you.

Well, because I sweat so much, he ended up really liking me.

That's great.

And so we became great, you know, and then I forever time and that's great.

So do you still want to be in the interview game?

Yeah, I mean, I'm doing my podcast,

which you're promoting right now, Hot Mike.

Oh, good.

Hot Mics.

And, you know, we have all kinds of people in, including you, I hope.

Sure, absolutely.

That would be wonderful.

And by the way, Chuck, you're, you know, works in the same building over at Howie Mandel's place.

Right.

Become great friends with Howie, and he built a whole new studio for us because it's going great.

And I love that.

And I love, you know, so we have lots of people in.

And

I'm doing it for myself.

We got, you know, sponsors and stuff, and it's about the same money as TV.

Do you think TV's money, not yours?

Is essentially dead?

I mean, like, no.

I mean, obviously it's still thriving because they, I still read every year in May they have the up fronts, which is Christ, they did that when I was doing sitcoms in the 80s where they sell the ad dollars to the people who are advertising on TV.

And somehow it's still like $9 billion.

Yeah.

Because there's a lot of people who are still watching CSI.

And whatever the fuck they got on the show.

Oh, they're still milking every last bit of it right now.

They're putting out new CSIs and ncis and things and people watch my show on youtube and lots of other places but people still have hbo and uh you know so it's not quite dead yet but obviously we saw recently with colbert and kimmel now obviously there was politic politics involved in that but there were also shows that were losing money there's no doubt about that of course there's no doubt that that that form

I thought it was anachronistic for years.

I mean, the idea that people in this age would like sit there at 11:30 at night and wade through the commercials,

and they don't.

They watch the clips, you know.

Of course, but I would think that your YouTube money that you make on real time is probably significant.

I mean, people watch New Rules, they want to see your monologue, and so they put it out in 15-minute form, they put it out the whole episode, they put out the shorts.

I bet you monetize more than you probably know.

I'm sure they do.

I'm just saying, obviously, this business is changing.

That and streaming, you know,

are the two biggest things.

And TV, it's almost like,

well, why would you want your job back in TV?

Because TV is sort of the past.

I mean, I'm going to hang on to mine as long as I can.

But again, it's on different forms.

I never worry about the

way the industry changes because I'm content.

They will always need content.

They could beam it from the moon off my ass.

They will still need content.

They're going to change how they show people shit, but people still just basically want to watch shit because they don't.

You'll go longer than anyone else, and most people, and I'll tell you what.

I already have.

Right, but you are the, you're also like a boutique.

It's nice to have in the portfolio.

David Zaslov of Warner Brothers loves having Bill Maher in real time in his portfolio, just like he loved Curb Your Enthusiasm and Larry.

And he begged Larry to do another season because those are like,

they give him great pride to have those in there.

So

you're good for another 10, I see.

80-year-old Bill Maher.

Again,

what I'm selling, you can do for a long time because I'm selling comedy and wisdom.

And yeah, you can do that at 80.

If I was, you know, Benson Boone, I can't at 80.

You know, I don't know.

I don't know Benson Boone.

I don't know him, but I know he flips on stage, and that's not an 80-year-old thing.

But what I'm doing could be.

I mean, my thing was built for longevity.

It's true.

Like I said, you don't have that musician thing where you're like, you know, the flavor of the year and you're just, everyone's just like, like, sucking your jog.

But you have longevity that, I mean, very few musicians are relevant past 40.

Some past, not past.

And athletes, models, they're all done by mid-30s.

Well, You've been doing this forever.

Yes.

I mean, I only got started in mid-30s, but that's the nature of it.

You know, I had a talk show that was going to go on when I was 29, and they never put it on the air, and they were probably right.

It's like, don't send a boy to do a man's job.

It's just not the kind of thing you can do without some gravitas.

It's not a job for a 29-year-old.

That's still true.

Still politically incorrect.

I mean, you have it on the wall there.

I mean, I was on that show way back in the day.

I don't know if you remember.

Oh, I was on that that show.

How could you remember that?

Everybody was on that show.

I was on that show, and I was on real time.

So I've been on your...

You're now here, the trifecta.

I mean, I've got the trifecta.

That makes us friends.

If you have three hangs, you're friends.

That's it.

I've always

loved the way

the show business part of it.

if done organically, can lead into friendship.

But it has to be organic.

You can't be the talk show host who's, you know, meet somebody once and right after the show, can I get your number?

You know, you can't be that.

It has to happen so that 20 years down the road when someone sees you in a bar together and they say, How do you guys know each other?

You just go,

I don't know.

I don't know.

You know, I just feel like I always knew him, but yeah, I know I didn't.

But somewhere along the way, we just became and that.

I'd like to be in your mentor program.

I'd like to meet Andrew.

what do you what's your status are you married now are you why

asking for andrew and i are quite happy bill we don't have room for you

asking for a friend

i'm a single man i'm a single man you are yeah but you were married for 20 years yeah

great woman we're still very close three great daughters I just heard Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban 20 years.

I know.

You say it like you really care.

I love the look on your face.

I mean, come on.

We, the celebrity community, really suffered a loss.

I mean, boy, people think there's problems around the world,

Middle East and so forth, but what about this?

No, I mean, it's sad, but like, it is amusing to me the way when a couple breaks up and everywhere in the media sphere, they are all speculating.

What could it be?

What could it be?

You know, was it the

she's she's on the set with kissing other men or is it it's like it's always the same thing they're fucking tired of each other humans weren't meant to spend every fucking day together and they do and after a while it's just like i can't do it anymore it's not like i don't love you anymore i do but i've just seen you too much and i'm tired of you have you ever heard of the french sex therapist relationship therapist esther perel

she's a sounds vaguely familiar Yeah.

Big, you know, TED talk on YouTube.

Millions and millions and millions.

I, when I was separated and wondering, can we put this back together?

I booked a $1,200 an hour session.

She's probably $15,000 now.

This was a while back.

But she said to me something interesting.

She said,

Everyone will have two to three great loves in their life.

And some people will choose choose to have that with the same person,

which I thought was interesting, meaning,

you know, 20-year installments would be like a really good run.

And I would have loved to have gone on, but I think it just, you change, you become different people, you got to re-up.

So it's like a re-signing.

I mean, that's a very interesting statement to me,

having reached this age, because it's almost exactly right in my life.

As far as like someone who was perfect for me,

I feel like that did come around twice.

Roughly 30, 60, and I ain't waiting until 90.

Okay.

Are you dating now?

Let's not talk about that.

I want to know.

No,

I didn't talk about that.

I'm very happy.

Very happy.

I mean, that's as I can't.

I'm happy.

Yeah, good.

I'm happy.

I'm happy.

I'll say that.

But you're single.

Yeah.

Oh.

I think I'm ready for this.

Let's go to the

hey.

I'm going to say, you know, I've got plans, but I'm available.

Gonna sue me for this.

I mean, it's like, I'm kind of saying that at the hotel where you get whores, they may give me a bonus.

I don't know.

Maybe I'll get free drinks.

There are professionals, work escorts working in Los Angeles.

And all the nice of us.

And there should be.

Yes.

I mean, it's.

It's your prerogative.

You're traveling, you're a businessman, you're on the road.

If that's what you want to do, that's your right.

Bill's a libertarian.

You don't even have to be traveling or a businessman.

You just have to be a human being who,

you know.

You don't have to be a businessman.

You don't.

There's a wide range of where we are as far as, and that's my symbol for a wide range, of where we are on the scale of companionship.

I mean, there is like ultimate true love.

Great.

That's what we're all maybe aiming for.

But we fall short sometimes.

And there's every, I mean, friends with benefits.

I mean, what's that is it should we judge that i don't i don't know i don't think we should but okay but it's it's somewhere on the scale between absolute true abelard and eloise love and over here the whore that's over here where you don't even like go to a room okay that's over here that's and then let's call that completely transactional oh okay and then there's like maybe the maybe the escort you know thing i i was just watching this wonderful movie i think it's called madame x X with Jacqueline Bissett and Linda Hamilton.

It's terrific.

I'd never heard of it.

And it's about this magazine writer who goes over to talk to Jacqueline Bissett in Paris, and she runs this sort of agency for escorts.

And, you know, Linda Hamilton thinks, oh, this is just a nice way of saying they're a bunch of whores.

But no, it's more like courtesans.

She's training these women to be sophisticated and they meet these well-to-do gentlemen.

Look, there's an element to that in it, but there's an element to that in life.

And it's just very sophisticated, sort of Parisian-flavored movie.

I thought it was terrific.

And it, you know, gets at something real, which is there is a certain amount of horse trading before we get to absolute true love.

And, you know, I don't really think we should judge anybody wherever they are on that journey to it.

But I'll tell you what.

I mean, I know some friends.

The courtesans, it's an active thing.

Los Angeles has a very thriving escort business.

It does.

Have stars ever confided that in you?

No.

No, I wouldn't tell me that.

No.

Right.

Why would you tell me?

No, that's true.

Dumb question.

Dumb question.

Yeah.

Never.

So you're single.

And you don't rather be a married person?

That suits your personality?

I will tell you this.

You know, I've been single for a while.

The whole thing had a nice.

I would say now

I think a nice,

yeah.

so I don't want to die alone Bill I want a nice partner and it will be the I won't but I won't do the one night stand thing I'm too fucking old for that by the way you can't be 53 hooking up like with people well

but but can I just comment on one thing again this lovely agree to disagree relationship we have

you are gonna die alone

I promise you when you're dying someone be holding my hand yeah but they're not coming with you no you're gonna die alone That's true.

You're going to die alone.

I mean, it would be nice to have a hand.

To me, I feel like I'd almost be more upset, and I hopefully will be holding a hand.

I mean, I know what hand I'll be holding, I think, but

I think it would make me even sadder because it's like, oh, wow, I do have to let go of you now.

And

I'm not going to see you in three weeks

or ever, but you know, maybe our pets are up in heaven together.

So to me,

that argument, which I've heard a lot, I've also heard the argument of when you get old, who's going to feed you the soup when you can't, like, I don't want someone to feed me the soup.

If I'm at that stage, I'm not feeling sexy.

You know, it's hard to go from feed me the soup to let's get freaky tonight.

So I just think if I'm that far gone, no, I don't, it's like when I'm.

I I don't want you alone in a room.

See, I've got three daughters.

They're going to be there.

They're going to be there.

My daughters are going to be there.

Sons, if I had them, probably not.

The daughters will be there, Bill.

That's going to be a beautiful thing.

All that money I spent on them through the, and they're going to usher me out.

I was with my dad when he died.

And you may not believe in God, but I'll tell you what, you believe in something.

You believe in energy in the universe or something because.

I believe there's a universe.

When he left the room, Bill,

I was on Instagram or something because he hadn't talked in three hours and he was in the twilight.

Wait, wait, wait.

Go back.

You're talking about this is your father's deathbed?

My father in 2021.

You're at his deathbed.

I am in his, yeah, it's in Florida in his bedroom.

And

my mom's in the kitchen.

You knew he was dead.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

No, we were in the hospital two days before he had a heart condition where they...

So they sent him home because...

We're going to pump his heart full of this fluid.

It's probably 48 hours max.

Right.

And dad said, or we can keep him going in the ICU.

Oh, you want to die?

You want to die at the Take me home.

There's a moment.

Yes.

Bill, talk about a beautiful death.

The nurses got him in his golf shirt.

They combed his hair.

Mom, dad, me, the three of us, my brother, his wife is giving birth to a child in Boston.

So

he can't be there.

By the way, same name.

And they went in and out the same day.

Bill, it's getting more religious.

And we're sitting in the room and we have a martini toast.

Dad has a very small martini.

mom, a middle one, and I have a few.

And she was able to even sip a martini?

Yeah, we have a martini toast.

And he said to me, I want to do, you know, I really would like to do one thing with mom that doesn't involve her taking care of me, like some kind of like a hand of cards or something that I could just.

And so mom tried to sit there and play cards with him.

We had a martini toast.

And

the next day he starts to go.

And I'm sitting in the room.

Mom's in the kitchen.

And I'm on my phone because he hasn't spoken in, you know, three hours, but I'm with him and he's still breathing.

And all of a sudden, I feel this tremendous energy lift and I went, whoa, whoa.

It was profound.

And I look over and just then he had died.

His spirit left the room and I felt it all over me.

And I went, oh my God.

Mom.

He just left.

And she comes in and she goes over and holds his hand.

She says, yep, he did.

And that was an energy shift I will never forget.

So whatever it is, it was powerful.

Think about when you leave the room.

What a personality.

Woof.

It's an earthquake.

You know, the problem is sometimes when you do that, you also fart.

And then it's like, you're...

My dad would have laughed.

He would have laughed at me.

The goodness of, you know, being raptured up there, but then the fart.

But no, but look, I'm not going to poo-poo that because I've known too many people, smart people, intelligent people, not drunk people, not religious people, who have had some experience, not at that moment of death.

This is the first I've heard of that, but it's the same kind of thing, with

what can only be called ghosts.

He went somewhere.

Because the shell looked different.

As soon as that happened, he looked like a heart and shell.

I don't know what the answer is on that, but

I'm always in the school of, I don't know.

I don't know.

I always have to.

I have no dogmatism about it.

I don't think it's Jesus dying on the cross 2,000 years ago has a lot to do with it.

But

is there some sort of energy transference or something?

I don't know.

Again, I.

All this that's in there, it goes somewhere.

The shell that you're in is just a shell, but the thing, the Bill Maher, is in there.

It's an energy and it's going somewhere.

Or possibly not.

That's also possible not.

But again,

I can't.

Well, I know because I witnessed it, so I know it for a fact.

I mean, I know that you.

You know something happened.

Something majorly happened and I went

sat up like a broken.

You felt it physically.

You felt it physically.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

No, I'm.

Good testimony.

You know, I don't know.

Nobody knows.

But I don't discount the idea that something does go on beyond.

I don't know what it would be and where I fit in and

if there's a bar.

Have you ever done a psilocybin journey?

Of course.

I just turned out mushrooms.

I just did no like a real five-hour journey with a guide and the whole thing where you see a fucking guide.

I was in college.

Who is a guide?

You were at the sphere.

You were at the sphere.

You put them in a blender and ate it.

Okay, that's different.

I did that too.

Tripped our brains out to five hours.

I'm talking about a real

exception.

It's five hours.

Oh, I'm talking about a journey.

A journey.

Yeah, it was a journey.

It was a laugh journey.

I'm talking about on the ground, blanket,

eye mask.

Were you laughing?

With the music?

No.

Then you weren't on mushrooms.

Yes, I was on psilocybin, sassafras, and whatever.

Mistletoe.

This is from Peru.

Mistletoe.

What?

Mistletoe is a real thing.

Oh, I'm not saying that.

These are real plants, four capsules, and deep down a slide and like

off into a five-hour journey of the most emotional experience I've ever had.

I'm crying.

I'm seeing my dad and everyone.

I saw you for a minute.

I mean, it was powerful.

It wasn't, you know, true atmosphere.

That's a little different.

But can I offer one?

But it's healing.

Can I offer one suggestion?

I think if Andrew, instead of playing it the way he played, had knocked on your door.

Like a man.

Like a man.

Not a cow.

You opened it and it's got the crack, not all that dialogue about drinks and this which is bullshit that you can smell if he just said nothing but unzipped his fly took his dick out and and held the mistletoe

mistletoe it might have worked out better over your dick i mean to me that's elegant

it is well at least it's funny it's clever yeah he's clever it's clever yeah you're saying you know it was december i think i'm a straight man i don't really want to suck this dick but that's good

maybe it's me and maybe i'm missing something

well i hope you find uh happiness in the romantic realm i believe so because as freud said you know there's really only your work and your love life those are the two things that determine whether you're happy or not and and um

you know some people are unlucky and they don't have either Some people get lucky and you have both.

I've certainly had times in my life when I've had neither.

I've had times in my life when I've had one, times in my life had both.

And if you only have one,

you're kind of like walking around on one leg.

Right.

You know?

Yeah.

Whichever one it is.

I've known what it feels like to be in love, but my career is in the shitter.

Or my career is in love.

Has your career ever been in the shitter?

Of course.

Really?

No.

You were out of business for a minute, but then you went right to the new show.

Okay, well, I started as a comic in the early 80s.

I'm talking about like real once you're on TV.

Well, that's my life.

So that was very important to me.

Okay.

Okay.

This is the most important part.

So, like, when I started, we all wanted to get on a sitcom, come out to California, do the tonight show, get on a sitcom.

I did all that exactly as you're supposed to.

Got on a sitcom, got on another sitcom, got on another sitcom.

But after three sitcoms, that kind of like played itself out.

And yes, then I was like wandering in the wilderness for about five or six years before I got politically incorrect.

So that's very common in show business.

You have that era where you are just sort of, oh, I thought I was well on my way, but then I wasn't.

Even Frank Sinatra had that.

Remember From Here to Eternity was his comeback movie because he was like the biggest thing in the world, and then he couldn't get arrested.

He was opening supermarkets.

I mean, that, you know, show business is not a steady climb usually.

No.

I've been very fortunate, yes, since.

Was it your idea politically incorrect?

Yeah.

You brought it, pitched it.

Of course.

Right.

That's the move.

But, you know, I've been again, like I say, comedy, you don't get the skyrocket to the moon, but it's steady.

It's steady, and you can work till 80.

Or with AI, who knows?

I mean, I could be out doing my show on the moon.

Hello.

I'm AI.

Bill Moir.

Beamed off your ass.

I'm an Ivory.

No.

Computers are the greatest.

Imagine if I was pimping for fucking AI and

it was really just the AI me, and I was trying to sell the audience on how great AI was.

Ugh.

I hate AI.

I don't want it.

I want EI.

And I saw you have one drink.

Yeah.

That's your limit.

No.

No.

So you drink.

Yeah.

Okay.

And just because you were mentioning mushrooms.

I like a little of everything.

No, the mushrooms was a

soul-searching sort of a real, you know, in place of the therapist.

Like Aaron Rogers.

I fired the therapist.

Like Aaron Rodgers in ayahuasca.

Yes.

Okay.

So you would like an.

But I don't like the throwing up part.

The ayahuasca, this stuff is, I'm not there to purge.

So what did the mushrooms teach you?

Incredible things.

I had a nice connection with my father that I needed because my father was old school, you know you get married and you work through it and that's it and you don't ever get divorced and that he was really and i had

i never the the the guilt and the shame that i carried from from the divorce was very much what do you feel from my beloved dad who i love a wonderful man of morals and integrity what are you guilty about what are you fame for i just feel like ah you know i should

i dad

you don't know it it's hard to explain but the old man was such a great guy and i I just felt like I was a divorce.

I wish I could explain why you felt bad about getting divorced.

I mean, things happen in life.

That's true.

People change.

Love dies.

It's unfortunate.

It doesn't have to, but it's not.

Yeah, but for him, he was so disappointed.

And when you see your old man who loves you so much disappointed, it's hard.

He was sad about getting damaged.

See it.

But I always want to ask people, but what's so what?

Okay, so I'm a bad guy

because I was married for 20 years.

Well, I'm not a bad guy.

No, no, I'm just hypothetically.

I'm saying, I'm not saying me either.

I I was never married, but like, this is how people think.

Like, because society makes you think this way.

I'm a bad guy because I was married for 20 years.

And then, okay, I dumped my wife.

Oh, my God.

And I even got with a younger woman, maybe.

This is, you're just the worst person in the world.

Okay, granted, worst person in the world.

My question,

as opposed to what?

I'm not happy.

We're in a dead relationship, but I should just suck it up for the rest of my life.

That's your alternative.

Just suck it up because that's bad.

So I don't know.

I agree with that.

I agree with that.

But for me, it was, you know what it was?

It was

letting go of everything in the past.

What the journey did for me, what this psilocybin journey did, was

everything is two feet in the future.

There's just, don't spend a minute on the old stories or the old things that you tell yourself.

Right.

Fucking let them all go and keep two feet in the future.

And that is what I came out of it with.

And

that's it.

Fired that therapist right away because what?

I give him 400 bucks a week and we have the same conversation.

You fired who?

My therapist, the psychiatrist.

I would go and sit on the couch like this.

And I fired him and I said, you know what?

We're having the same conversation every week and I pay you the same.

And well, I don't want to see you next week and have the same conversation.

Yeah, I could have told you that.

I had the answers.

Oh,

I had them.

Just needed needed to get over the wall, Bill, the scarred tissue.

I mean, I'm not saying

therapy doesn't help some people and it's valid sometimes.

But, I mean, for somebody like you,

to me, this was always just bullshit.

I mean, you don't need a fucking therapist.

And also, the idea that mushrooms did a better job than therapy, I kind of love.

Yeah.

I kind of love that.

Bill, I'm going back.

I'm doing it again.

Doing what?

This is

another journey.

Oh.

I love it.

It's the most...

You access emotions you have in you,

but you can't get them just in the middle.

Okay, but this is very interesting to me because I've done mushrooms many, many times, but this was not the experience.

The experience of mushrooms, and not just me, everybody when I did them was you just laugh your ass off.

So they must be doing something different with the mushrooms, adding something to it that makes it much more of this introspective experience.

Yes.

Because for me,

the mushroom experience, it wasn't introspective in that way.

What was different than every other drug was every other drug makes me horny and mushrooms made me think about sex and go,

why would I put a part of my body

inside a part of your body?

That was like the funniest, most ridiculous thing in the world.

I'm going to put this thing and it's going to get bigger?

First of all, that was 10 10 minutes a left.

And then I'm going to put it in you, in you, like you're another person.

I'm going to put something in there.

This date is over.

This is a crazy idea that a part of me goes in a part of you.

What are we, Legos?

You know?

And that's what mushrooms did to my mind.

Yeah, but you didn't do the journey.

You ate a little, you ate some caps and stems and you did that.

These are capsules of, you know,

plant medicine from Peru.

This is just a harder routine.

And you, two capsules, a walk in the garden with these people at their home.

They're both in their 70s.

They've been doing this for 20 years.

They're incredible people.

All stemming from a conversation I had on an airplane with a guy who was a big private equity guy.

And he's like, I don't drink, I don't smoke, but I'll tell you what, psilocybin saves the world.

I said, we talked for two hours straight.

I go to these people that he sets me up with.

We,

two capsules, walk in the garden, come back, I said, I'm feeling something.

And she said, okay, two more capsules.

And they're going to lay you down right here, blanket, eye mask, music.

And I'm sitting there going, I'm going to tell her I need more.

It's not working.

We've all done this with edibles, right?

And then

down a slide,

off the end of the slide.

And I'm floating in this journey.

Bill,

I see everybody.

I see my mom and dad's relationship.

I see my daughter's.

I see my ex-wife.

I see my brother.

And I see, you know, what he wanted as a little boy, and he didn't get the attention.

And all the little traumas get addressed.

And I see everybody I want to see.

And I feel, and I understand, and everything goes in its place.

It's over.

The music is playing, and the journey follows the music.

And I take the mask off when it's over, and I say, how long was I down?

Thinking it was an hour.

He said, five hours.

And I went, wow.

I think you might have really set me on the right path.

I did not want to leave.

It was incredible.

You saw all these people from your family, like, in the past?

In present and past.

My dad,

my mom.

I saw their relationship.

I understood their marriage better.

Can you tell W not to go to Iraq?

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay, so.

He's not going to do your show.

Oh.

He just texted me.

You know what?

I've also said.

He said Bill was doing great until then.

I've also said in the spirit of like keeping a completely open mind, there is every chance, I would even bet on it, that in 20 years or 10 or 5, I don't know, somebody will put out an article talking about how smart it was to go into Iraq.

Because one thing you can always count on is revisionism.

I'm not there yet, but you know, the Middle East is a very fraught, weird, dangerous place where the world could end for a number of different reasons.

And it's fucked up in a lot of ways.

And, you know, again, I wasn't for it,

but we don't know what the future will hold and how it will make things in the past.

We don't know what the balance will be.

I mean, it was a very Texas reaction.

You know, it was like, they kicked us out, kicked our ass.

We're going to kick their ass.

Somebody's ass is getting

war.

Where?

I don't know.

I'm not a detail guy.

You figure out where.

Nah, you know, he would.

No, it was the wrong country.

It was a country that did not attack us.

But let's not get into that.

No, let's get into that.

That would be really fun.

Iraq did not attack us.

That's why it was crazy.

It was like, it was like...

Did you see the pitch at Yankee Stadium?

Did you see that pitch?

Did you see that?

The country comes together on a pitch.

One pitch.

And he can pitch.

He could pitch.

I could do that too.

What a moment.

I saw 50 Cent pitching again.

Oh, my God.

He's the worst.

Terrible.

Terrible.

The Cubs game.

Well, there was one he did like five years ago that was just way beyond embarrassing.

And then he did one that was just better, but still awful.

I could pitch, I could throw a ball to the home plate.

I'm not saying I can get batters out, but it would look like a major league pitch.

Can you throw like a...

Oh, fuck yes.

Yeah, you can throw like a man.

I mean, Aaron Rodgers was here.

We went out here.

You and Aaron?

Yeah.

Out the door after the show.

And I picked, there's this fruit tree out here.

And I don't know even what that fruit is, but it's hard as a fucking rock.

You couldn't eat it even if you wanted to.

And there was a tree.

It's like 50 yards down.

And like, I'm always, whenever we walk up there, I always say to my girl,

I can fucking hit that tree.

And it's a long way and a hard piece of fruit.

And I dead center it every time.

And you did for Aaron Rodgers.

Yes.

Earned his respect.

Probably had it before.

Are you a Giants fan because of Jersey?

Totally.

Me too.

Never stopped.

Jackson Dart.

No.

Me neither.

Well, let's wait.

It's one game.

Malik Neighbors is gone.

We're in trouble there.

That's a terrible thing.

As Dart gets going, Neighbors goes out.

I mean, you know, I was a Mets owner for 10 years, right?

Oh, yeah.

I was a minority owner of the Mets.

You know, my great-uncle owned the Mets.

Who was that?

Wilpon?

No, sold it to Wilpon and Doubleday.

Doubleday?

Is your uncle?

No.

G.H.

Walker.

owned them and sold the Mets to Doubleday.

Oh, is that right?

I mean, he was great-great-uncle, so I didn't know him.

Do you have any money from the Bush family?

You know, no, but the.

Can you give me some?

You have a very, I'd like you to cut me a check.

Just a little bridge.

A little bridge, Bill.

You're doing fine.

I'm okay.

Yeah.

No, I.

You know, that's funny.

People think the Bushes are rich.

You know,

it's the speech givers, you know, that were president that have a lot of those.

Yeah, they're not.

They're not really rich.

They're not like the Kennedys.

No.

Right?

No, they never were.

I made more money than my father for years when I was on a roll.

Well, there's no industry you can think of that's associated with the Bushes, right?

I mean, it's like the Kennedys, Joe was famously a bootlegger, and then they owned Marshall Fields in Chicago.

Yeah, there's no Bush family.

There's no like railroad or it's not that kind of like, you know.

I mean, H.W.

did a little oil, and George W.

did a little oil, and then they.

But not.

big-time Hunt family oil or Boone.

Do you have any sort of

Sympotica relationship with any other like nepo-political babies like RFK?

Chris Cuomo, I like a lot.

He and I, Cuomo and I talked about we talk daily stoic.

We talked about both Stoics.

I text with him all the time.

He'll text me, where have you been?

Stoic.

Well, we read the Daily Stoic.

We read

Stoic Philosophy.

Really?

Yeah.

Stoic philosophy.

He wanted to start a group.

I really like Cuomo because he's got a lot of fighting.

Oh, I love him.

Stoic philosophy, meaning, I mean, a Stoic when people think of Stoicness.

Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, Epictetus.

Yeah, right.

I'm sure everyone's real familiar with their shit.

Well, they're familiar with the tenet, the basic tenet.

Yes.

You cannot control what happens to you.

You can only control how you react to that.

And Stoicism would say

by not reacting at all.

I mean, Stoicism is like, no, when you say someone is stoic, it's like you're getting nothing from them.

You know, also is non-reactionary?

That's Scientology.

Just letting you you know.

But I mean, that's what you want to be, a stoic.

You want, yeah, you want to be able to just, like you are.

You are a natural stoic.

You said it earlier.

You don't ride the highs too high and you don't ride the lows too low.

You kind of try and stay in the middle.

That's basically stoic.

Really?

Yeah.

You react to things that are going to, you're not going to give a shit about in two days.

That's so true.

Yeah.

Right.

Like this show.

Yeah, like who cares?

I got to go back to it.

i gotta get back to my day you gotta take a leak

so do i we're old guys

good time me too thank you uh all right so our friendship will progress it's only one step the next step is you know where organically organically not don't yeah don't force yourself from me

I'm not saying where I'm going Friday night.

I'm just saying if I see you there, act like you don't know me.

We'll assimilate them.

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