W. Kamau Bell

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You want those kids in all those schools to be as smart and prepared for the world as possible because they're going to be adults someday and you're going to run into them.

So you want all the kids

to be as smart as they possibly can be. Helping those kids is a selfish act.

Welcome back to Where Everybody Knows Your Name. Today I am talking with W.
Kamau Bell.

And I have to say, it was very hard for me during this podcast not to just, you know, totally go to church around him because I have so much admiration for what he does in the world.

And he makes me laugh and he astounds me with his courage. Kamau is a stand-up comic activist and TV host.

He was the host of the United States of America, which ran for seven seasons on CNN and won five Emmys. Check out his book with Kate Schatz, Do the Work, an Anti-Racist Activity Book.

Anyway, let's get into it. Meet W.
Kamal Bell.

All right, first off, let me just get over it, and we can cut this part out, whatever.

I am in awe of you. I have so much respect for what you do.
So I'm a little nervous, but I'll get over that pretty quickly. I promise.
Okay.

Now let's get over this part.

You are one of the defining,

like as a kid watching television, saying, I want to do comedy. I want to be in that business.

Sam Malone was one of my like heroes as a kid. Wow.
So like it was like, and me and my mom watched it cheer. I mean, so

this for me, like, and I don't know how you'll feel about this, but like, I'm excited to like, I want to call my mom at some point and be like, wow!

And the only other time I've ever had that was Alan Alda. So I don't know if that makes you feel good or really good.
My mom, I did an Alan Alda's podcast.

I was like, I have to let my mom know that talk to Alan Alda. So, one of my heroes.
Yeah. So, like,

in that era of television, yeah, you're, yeah, you're the best. And then the good place, it's just like, and that was like me and my wife bonded over.
It's just, yeah. So,

are your kids old enough for the good place or not? My oldest is about to turn 13. And I just had the thought recently of like, yeah, you're about to, I think, she watched Ted Lasso.

I feel like that's a good segue into the good place. Yeah, definitely.

Ted Lasso keeps her pretty, but yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
A part of who I am in this business and how I am is because of like watching so much Ted Dancing as a kid.

So well, first off, thank you for just telling me that because I, my blood pressure just went down a couple notches. And I just thought, oh, he complimented me.
I'm all right.

They told me they compliment him right away, even if you don't mean it. And I was like, okay,

I just Googled him.

I am the person that asks for a compliment, gets it, and chooses to believe it, even though I force them to say it. So, yeah, that works for me.
That's fine. That's fine.
I don't know.

My wife, Mary Steenburg, and I I don't know if you know who she is.

Did he just do that to me, everybody, back here? My wife, Mary Steenburgen. I don't know if you know who that is.

I've read.

Okay. The tabloids.

You guys are always in the tabloids. Yes, we are.

You guys are always doing something. Kicked out of a restaurant or starting a fight.
Yeah, I've followed you on page six in PerezHolton.com.

Anyway, as I was leaving, she said, please give him my respect. Huge amount of respect.
But then he said, he's a lovely, lovely man. Mary and I were talking about your courage.

Now, I don't know if it feels courageous to you, but from where we sit, it is courageous what you do. I mean, I think I'll say this.
I think I get too much credit for.

There are times where I do feel like, here we go. Come on, Kamal.

But I think I get too much credit for that. For the most part, I'm just a super curious person.
And so for me, it's like my curiosity overwhelms my common sense. I would say that.

So there are things where I've done, my wife is very aware of this. Like I'll get halfway through a project and be like,

why did I do this? And she'd be like, I told you, this is what you do. This is like, I get so far in that I can't, that I sort of need to finish it.

So like, I just, but my curiosity overwhelms my common sense. So like the famously on the first episode of United Shades, I went to the Ku Klux Klan.

There's a certain amount of courage in that, but then I also try to keep some perspective of like, I chose to do this. So it's not like I,

you know, the number of people who run into the clan in this country where they don't choose to, like, that's real courage to deal with that situation. Yeah.
I'm with a camera crew.

Like, so I sort of try to keep some perspective.

My, my current running joke is every time I feel like I'm being overwhelmed by my life choices, the ghost of Harriet Tubman shows up like, oh, is this hard?

Oh, is it hard to direct and to be in television? That's hard. Yeah.
So I try to, I, I'm, I think I'm pretty good at keeping perspective. Certainly I have an ego.

Certainly I wouldn't be in this business without ego, but I, I think even the fact that like I didn't sort of make it whatever that is until I was a little bit older, I'm more connected to the person before I made it than the person who has quote unquote made it.

So yeah, I'm more like

that person who who was like, didn't know that he would ever have a career. Who was like, I don't know what I'm doing.
I tell these jokes. Sometimes they work.
Sometimes they don't.

I want to try to make it. I want to try to make an impact, but I don't know how to do it.
Like that guy, I'm still, I'm more. And when did that I want to make an impact hit you?

It's funny because I I'm the Saturn Live generation. So Saturn Live has been here not my whole life, but most of my life.
I've been saying it hasn't been funny since the first cast.

Like I'm the guy who's like, ever since Lorraine Newman left, it just hasn't been the same. So I'm like, I've been.
So,

you know, I would have been like, I want to be like when Eddie Murphy's on Saturday Night Live, I remember that. And he looked at me the same age as me.
So that was what I wanted to do.

I want to be on Saturday Night Live. At the same time, my mom is like, you know, she was born in Indiana in 1937, went to the entire civil rights movement.

So when I'm born in the early 70s, that's like black America is having like a, what do we do now moment? And so I'm hearing all these conversations. I'm an only child.
My mom takes me everywhere.

So I hear all these grownup conversations. So there's always conversations about racism and the movement and how do we do this and dah da da.
And can we achieve our way out of it?

And I'm just a kid who likes comedy, you know, and comic books. And so I just would have thought I was going to become a comedian.
And whatever my mom and all that was talking about was over here.

But as I got older, it's like I just got. whatever I was doing in comedy kept pulling me back to the stuff that was like in my house, you know? So it didn't,

you know, I didn't really like, I would have not told you when I was a kid, I would have been this kind of comedian. I would, I would not have thought I'd been some, whatever this is.

And also, I think there wasn't this kind of comedian in the same way when I was a kid. I couldn't have been like, I hope to become a comedian, get a TV show on CNN.
Like, that's not, that's not a,

so the world opened up and I just had more opportunities. But yeah, I just wanted to be funny.
I wanted to be like my comedy heroes, you know. Do you still consider yourself comedian first?

That's my, I would say that's my like operating system. So even if no matter what I'm doing, the operating system is like based on like

being a comedian. Well, let me tell you about comedy acting and comedy, Ted.

No, but it's about like building connection. Different.
Yeah, yeah.

I work with writers who are really talented and funny. You're up there on your own, which is part of that courage thing.

Well, that's the thing. I think it is about like building connection with people.
So if you're a comic and you go on stage in front of an audience, you have to build connections.

So the fact that like no matter whatever interview I'm in or talking talking to somebody, I'm always trying to build connection with them. And humor is a great way to build connections.

So it can relieve tension. It can let people sort of like have a moment of rest in the middle of a hard story.
So yeah, I think my operating system is that of a comedian.

And I'm always thinking about jokes and ways to like make people laugh because it just sort of lubricates the conversation. So yeah, yeah, even though I.
I started doing stand-up again.

I haven't done stand-up like five years and I started doing it again this year because I feel like I want to be a comedian again, but we'll see. Okay.

So you bump into a lot of you in difficult situations you you bump in purposefully into people who don't think like you or seem una

unreasonable unapproachable whatever

what do you do with your anger

this i mean is there there's gotta be a ton of anger i'm laughing because there's a ton of anger no i you know it's funny i think it i well you know i think one of the reasons that some people become comedians is to deal with their anger or their disappointment or their sadness or their shame.

And so certainly there's a tremendous well of like, sort of like,

I don't even know, melancholy that's inside of me that I use comedies for get out of. And, but

when I'm in the moment with those people, I'm very actively aware that like this conversation isn't really about me and you.

It's about me giving you the space to talk so the people over here can see what's happening. So it's not about me debating you, it's a, which people think it is.

It's about me drawing you out so that the audience watching can hear things they weren't going to hear. So it is very rare that I would be in a conversation and get angry with somebody.

I did see in that first

KKK episode. Now, this is just purely my impression, but there was one moment when the grand whoop-de-doo said

something

just,

you know, just out and out. Yeah.
Horrible. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And

this is me putting myself into your shoes. There was such a sadness

in there was a moment of just

your game face just dropped for a second, but it wasn't anger and fuck you.

It was this deep

sadness. There is that episode.
There is a deep sense of like, this is really what it is. Yeah.
This is really what it is. And also, like, I don't spend a lot of time with the Klan.

So to see it that close up, it's more like, oh, man. Look at it.

I was hoping for something. Oh, man.
I was hoping you had a good argument. I was hoping maybe I'd walk and be like, you've made some good points.

I was hoping that there was something I could hang my hat on and be like, well,

okay, I don't agree. But no, there was no, it was just like, you're really that guy.
It's interesting in that episode.

One of the things that I asked to do, which we did do, was there was a kid in that episode, if you remember, and the family signed off. He was like the grandson of the grand whoop-de-doo.

And the family signed off so that we could put his face in it. And I was like, we're blurring that kid's face.

Like, I just did, because I was like, I don't know what that kid's going to grow up into right this is i feel bad for this kid even if his family doesn't i'm gonna let i'm gonna

so i do have empathy for people even those who don't have empathy for me a lot of times where do you think that came from family kid

mother father

do i hear father in there or is it mother mother i mean no i so uh i i i grew up with my mom mostly my dad lived so my mom lived all over the States. My dad spent his time in Mobile, Alabama.

He's from Mobile, Alabama. I would see him every summer.
So my dad was in my life. I lived there for two and a half years when I was in eighth grade and high school, freshman year high school.

But I definitely was like raised by my mom. I am a mama's boy,

much to my dad's chagrin. He just can't be too mad because he was actually a mama's boy too.
But so even though he would wish I wasn't, it was like, well, it's really the only way to go.

That's what you got to do. Not be a mama's boy.
Yeah. So I.

Where did the empathy come from? I think, I actually think that a lot of it came from because I was with my mom and I moved around a lot.

And so I sort of understood very early on that there were lots of different types of people out here.

And I think, I think traveling, and I remember talking to Bourdain about this when I was on his show, it's really a way to make you think, oh, the world's bigger than me. Yeah.

Oh, even people think you have to travel the country. I don't think in America, if you just travel around America, because we're like 50 different countries, that you feel the world's bigger than me.

And the way I do things is not the way everybody does things. I think it really was like seeing lots of different people in lots of different situations from a very early age.

I just learned that like the world was not all about me, you know? Right. And so, which is what I think.
Can you say that again slower? Yes, sure. So seeing.
Wait, it's not? True. Exactly.

Yeah, the world is not all of. And I think if you don't move around a lot, if you're sort of stuck in a routine and not everybody has the privilege of traveling.

You sort of just start to think your version of reality is the version of reality. Even if you don't like your reality, you think this is the way it is.

And then when you hear about something over here, you're like, well, that's wrong because that's not what I'm doing. But the more you travel around, the more more you start to realize that like

every, everybody's on their own separate track and everybody's doing the best they can. Even the people you don't agree with generally are doing the best they can.

And so. And CNN doesn't always have it right.
CNN doesn't always have it right, which is that new slogan.

CNN, we don't always got it right. Yeah.

And that there's, there are certain things that I'm not going to like certain things that like with the, like when I was with those clan members, I could see like, I don't agree with any of your race things you say, any of the racism, but I also see a bunch of people who live in an economically deprived area who don't have access to good jobs good education yeah good city services good social services and somebody has weaponized that into the clan which is that's where the word evil is on the tip of my tongue yes not the people who live in hard hard hard times not the people who may look at the west coast east coast and go well that's stupid i get up at four and work a farm and da da da da da yeah but the people who then make use of that fear and anger.

Who

step into that hole that these people haven't filled and fill it with evil. Yeah.

So I'm not down with the evil, but I am down with the fact that like, I do wish you had a better job so you just had less time to be so racist.

Like, I do wish you had, I wish your community was better so that you could, so that you could have a better life because I think it would sort of lighten up your

political perspective. you know and also living in the bay area when i moved to the bay area when i was 24 and just the bay

still, but not maybe not as much use because it's so expensive now. But like the Bay is just, there's just so many different types of people stumbling across each other.

And if you take advantage of being in those positions, you just can't help but be like, wow, I've never seen that before. Okay.
All right. Guess that's how the world is.

It just like you start to, it just opens, it opened up my perspective a lot. And I got to learn from that point.

that there were many times I'd be in conversation or in rooms of people having conversations that had nothing to do with me. And the best thing I could do was shut up and listen.

So living in the Bay Area, Oakland, Berkeley, San Francisco,

I just was always around. I was be hanging out with comedians.

My girlfriend now wife was a modern dancer.

And we'd go to these performance art shows where people are like, you know, like literally the things you see in sketch comedy about performance art, you know, like blood and my head's a television and whatever.

And then I would hang out with like my, with my friends who were like, you know, the, the, my, my East Bay lesbian friends and they'd be talking about the patriarchy.

And I'd be like, I have an opinion about, oh, no, you're right. I should just listen.

You're right. I should just probably sit this one out.

And just hanging out with lots of different types of people and just learning that like these things, we can have disagreements, but we don't have to pull in opposite directions

really helped a lot. Yeah.
Yeah.

I grew up. I was.

I grew up. My father was an archaeologist, anthropologist.
He was the director of a museum in Flaxthep, Arizona. And my best friends were Hopi, Navajo kids and ranchers, sons and daughters.

And we lived outside of town. So I would go to the Hopi Pueblos and watch where they had lived.
The Hopi never went to war with the United States.

So they are still in the villages that they've been in for a thousand years. And

you'd see them celebrate their gods in the dirt plazas, you know, every weekend. I'd go up and play.

And I wasn't conscious or educated or, you know, you could read a book about the Hopi and probably know more than I do factually, but in my heart, I got hopi.

Then I'd go back on Sunday to the Episcopal Church, and it was all the same.

And my parents didn't, I don't think they encouraged it. They just lived that, that it is all the same.
We are all, we all worship differently. We're all different colors and shades and

cultures. And it wasn't even taught.
It just kind of was how I grew up. So then when you go out into the real world and you and you bump into people,

it feels to me like, and this is a cynical thing to say, that they're, all right, sorry, I'm rambling. In race,

I probably should be quiet and sit and talk, listen to other people talk.

But I can do the same conversation with the environment, with social justice, with people who refuse to believe in climate change. And

I've gotten to the point where I'm going, I don't think I should be wasting my time trying to convince somebody.

I don't mean chalk them off as whatever, but don't get into the conversation to convince them that they're wrong.

Because I don't know that I ever could, you know, if they're that,

you know, entrenched.

But, all right, let's go, let's not talk about climate change, not even say those words, but let's talk about your neighborhood that just had 400 more tornadoes rip through it or more floods or more drought or more.

What do we do?

How can I help you figure out how to not suffer quite so much by what's happening with our weather? Sure. Is there a, I don't know if there's a correlation.

No, no, when you say that, I think about the fact that one,

I think there's an, there,

there's a time in our lives where we are in the debate when we're like, I need to debate. And I think a lot of that is with youth.

Like, I just learned this thing and I want to tell you about this thing. And if you don't know, and I think that's, thank God, there's new young people every day to do that.

So like, and there's a time in our life where we're like, what's, that's not my role anymore. My role, I said this is my, my role is not to fight in the comments anymore.
That's not my role anymore.

And my role is to really know.

what is the best, what is my best use of my time and my energy and just put it there and then and give myself some grace around like not fighting with people in the comments anymore.

Cause you feel like I should probably fight with that person who said that ignorant thing.

And you just start to realize, I am too I'm not that guy anymore right somebody is that person and they can go fight in the comments but I'm so I think there is a connection I think the other thing I would say about what you said is like when you say

talking about race I should keep my mouth shut I think that might be true unless you're with a group of white people yes then you need to be because then you're the black guy

because you know something that maybe a lot of white people don't know yeah so yeah so that and that's what i would do with my friends i would hear like my east bay lesbian friends having all these conversations about like patriarchy and male privilege and da-da-da.

And I would be quiet. And then I'd be in a conversation later with some of my male friends and be like, well, actually,

then I'm that asshole. You know what I mean? So I think that's what we should learn: like in conversations we have where we don't know anything, listen.

But if you don't take that knowledge somewhere else, then you're not, then you've wasted that time. Yeah.
Yeah. It's not good.
I'm glad I know that now. No, it's not about that.

So I think you're doing the right thing. I think that.

But then you, here's what happens to my brain. Oh, you you're you have some cowardice working here.
You know, you're not being courageous.

You're not, but I have to admit, I had a moment where I could have done something like we're talking about, and I realized I'm not Jane Fonda. Exactly, yes.

You know, at 86, she's leaping onto the ramparts

and tearing down the walls of ignorance. And I'm not her.
No, you're not. And I have to, with humility, accept that.
I like that humility. I'm humble enough to say I'm not Jane Fonda.

That's a good thing. It's a big moment for you, kid.
I'm glad we got to a break.

She is one of my heroes. No, Jane Fonda is great.
I'm unbelievable. But I think that we also have to understand, like, I see friends of mine who are really good at engaging people in debate.

And people would sometimes get mad at me with the United Shades on my CNN show that I wasn't like yelling at the neo-Nazi. And I was like, that's not.
And I'd be like, should I be doing that?

But I was like, that's not my role here. I don't think that's my job skill.
I'm not the, I'm not the debater. I'm more the, listener and the, and the, and the, like poking holes in the thing.

Like, well, what about, are you sure? And also, I'm the person who's there to draw you out again so other people could hear.

For example, if I got on my, when I go back to Oakland on Saturday, if I get on my Southwest flight and a Klansman is sitting down next to me, I'm not going to talk to that guy because there's no TV cameras around.

I'm not, I'm not like trying to have that conversation all the time.

But if there's a productive way to have it, if it's going to be for somebody else, if it's going to be a way we can take this conversation and show it to people, then I'm that guy.

and i think that we get caught up in like i try not to get caught up in what i think i'm supposed to be doing well if if i was like and really get zeroed in what am i actually supposed to be doing and perhaps have some degree of effectiveness yes yeah what where's my best where am i you know we have limited resources especially the older we get what's the best use of my resources right and also i'll sometimes give myself some grace like come out don't forget you still have three daughters who are like 13 6 and 9 like they need some of of your time too.

So you can't be like out fighting in the comments all the time. Are you home a lot or is your job just?

I mean, I'm, they think I'm gone all the time. I don't.

Well, I mean, even check that out. Coming here,

I was like, I got to go for, and I said an hour, but I was, you know, it's more than an hour. I was like, I'll be back in an hour or so.
And my six-year-old was just like, no.

And I'm like, you know, and so there is a narrative in my house that I'm always gone.

I am gone a lot, but I'm not gone as much as like, but it means that I like, can't even like take a walk around the block sometimes. You're leaving again.

So, and I respect it and I don't want them to feel that way.

So, yeah, I am, I do travel a lot, but it also means that like if I come to LA, I'll come, I'll go up and back in a day sometimes if I, if I can just, so I can be home, you know? Yeah. Yeah.

So you do have, you do get enough time more. I mean, not to please everybody, but you do take time.

Yeah. I mean, I could, I, I mean,

the, you you know the problem with sort of my career too is that i'm basically like

with cnn people thought i worked there full-time but i was basically a seasonal employee so there's never time that i feel like i i'm there's never an off time for me so i'm always like

i'm always like ideating on the next thing because i don't know how if the last thing is really you know it's just you're always like you know how it is so it's it's a little bit like an actor's life but it's even more so because i have i have to be the writer too generally i have to be the person who comes up with the idea

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Do you write everything down or do you give it a treatment kind of this is where I hope it goes?

I'm a big external processor, so I will like.

And then because I'm a stand-up comic, eventually the things that stick stay in here, and then I will go write it down.

And I'm also surrounded by, like, you just met Kelly, who's my production partner. Kelly's great at like gap.
Like, if I'm just like,

she's great at like, let me just put this down on paper for you. So, yeah.
But I'm not a lot, I'm not a real longhand, long-form writer. I'm a big Google Doc person.
I like John and Google Doc.

One of the bullet points here on your catastrophizer.

Now, is that your, did someone label you with that, or is that your own kind of

sounds like something I would have done? It sounds like my use of words.

I'm just trying to remember where that came from, but catastrophizer.

I mean,

which means,

give it a definition.

Someone who doesn't doesn't soar away from catastrophism. Someone who's always for who's always thinking through the worst case scenario and always preparing for the worst case scenario.

So

yeah, but I'm not a pessimist, but I am like, how badly could this go? Right.

What's the worst that could happen here? There's something that I find peace in that. I kind of do that.

And because it's like, is this the worst that could happen? Yes. Could you live with it? Yeah.
Yeah. And then I can relax and go, it doesn't mean I'm planning for that or I want them.

No, I don't want the worst. Or attracting it.
That's why I'm not a pessimist. I want the best that can happen.

But if I sit around and think about all the great things that'll come out of something, that's pretty much guaranteed to like be bad news for me.

If I sit around and think about all the worst things that had happened.

Then usually those things don't happen and I can be pretty happy with the results.

Oh, it didn't go as badly as it could have gone. Good job, everybody.

For me. I thought I was going to be banished from society after that project, but I still live in society.
Our little defense mechanism at night will watch CNN or MSNBC or, you know, our guys

until we're just thoroughly depressed and fearful. And, you know, they've done their work.
Yes.

And if you're not depressed, you're like, I don't think they did their job today.

So immediately change to HGTV and watch somebody build a house and there's a big problem that they overcome and then they're all very happy. That's how we go to sleep listening to that.

What do you, what do you do? Because you do.

I'm not trying to pick on myself here, but I do

prefer to have joy and happiness and gratitude in my body because not to be a goodie tushus, but because my body feels better

that way. For sure.

But then there's the real world. There are things, there are oil companies who want to drill a hole right next to the people who have no money to fight them and their kids get cancer.

And on the other side, they want to build a highway on the other side of their house. Yeah.
Yeah. Because they don't have enough money to fight them.

In my community, we keep oil companies out because we have enough money.

Well, that's actually how I got involved

trying to keep Occidental Petroleum from digging slant drilling into the bay here in Santa Monica. And we won.
But anyway, sorry, enough about me. Where was I going? You were talking about

who's your co-producer again? Because she seems really good. Kelly.

Could Kelly come in and remind me where are we going? Actually, she's watching right now. She probably couldn't tell you exactly.

If you ask two members, she will come in here. I mean,

she's very good at that. How do you keep love, joy, hope in your heart when you're really way more than me bumping into hardcore, hardcore issues that bring so much suffering and sadness?

How do you do that? So one, I actually,

I do really joy, I do really enjoy joy and happiness and laughter. I think one of the reasons you become a comedian is because you want to be around that more.

So, I'm not a person who's like looking not to be around that. I do get weighed down by the issues of the day sometimes.

But one thing I do, and this is something it's important for me with my kids is before they go to sleep at night, if I'm putting them to bed, I will ask them, tell me three things you're grateful for from today.

That's great. And it's the thing we've been doing for like their whole lives.

And it's just a way, it's ostensibly for them, but it's for me to heat, to like practice like every day something good is happening.

Every day something happens where you're like, ooh, like that was pretty lucky. Ooh, they just brought me this watermelon juice.
I didn't even ask for this watermelon juice.

So just like thinking about, it doesn't have to be big things, but ways. So I'm always trying to be aware of like.

of like the little things that make life easier that happen that I'm not responsible for. And I'll say to my kids all the time, like, we didn't deserve that.
We just got that.

So we should be grateful for it. So I'm always thinking about that.
I'd say that my news diet is opposite of yours. I do all my heavy sad news in the morning.

Smart. So by the end of the day, I'm in like YouTube videos watching like, you know, somebody

get their impacted ear drained or something.

Like, I'm done with new. I'm, I'm way off of that by the end of the day.
So I'm dying to know if you ever did see an impacted ear. I did have seen that.
Yeah, yeah.

I talked about this Conan. Like, I'm a big YouTube person.

And you can find, you know, there's like YouTube videos of people in like other countries like making their, like, there's like somebody runs like a food truck and you'll watch them and it shows them show up at like three in the morning and make all the food for the food truck.

And you watch it for like an hour and it's just somebody making like, like breakfast burritos. Yeah.
And they're not, there's no talking. There's no words.

You just watch and you just sit there like, look at them getting that chop done. Yeah.
Just making breakfast burritos. It's HGTV.
It is. It is.
It's just like, it just slows you down.

It just, it just calms you down. So I'm a big fan of like random youtube videos where like

people cooking food or people built like there's one where this guy's like look how rusty this knife is i'm gonna i'm gonna clean it up and you just watch a guy clean up a rusty knife for 20 minutes i i at 76 i'm just discovering youtube and my kids will look at me when i go i don't know how to put this thing together and they go youtube you know everything is literally everything is yep everything how do i put this together you can just say this and your phone will be like i know exactly what i'm talking about you don't have to say what it it is.

No, I told Conan, I taught my daughter how to ride a bike based on a YouTube video. I was like, how to teach a kid to ride a bike quickly.
And YouTube's like, here you go.

Yeah. So I'm a big fan of like, I'm, like I said, I'm, I was an only child.
By nature, I think that makes you more curious because you have more time with your thoughts. And so.

I'm a big like following a rabbit hole to its illogical conclusion. It's just that generally that work doesn't like, like I, I, there's lots of things I'm interested in.

I just, when it's time to do the work of my career, those things tend to not be the ways, generally, how I do the work of my career.

And the other thing I do is when you ask, like, how do you keep joy in your life? I do try to keep perspective of like, I made these choices.

Like, I didn't, nobody assigned me this career. It's not like I was like, man, I was so close to getting assigned Kevin Hart.
Like, that didn't, you know.

So, when something, so if I'm ever going to go, man, I wanted to be like on Saturday Night Live, like Eddie Murphy. I never auditioned for Saturday Night Live.
I was never in that track.

So, I have to be like, relax.

Like, you were were at CNN, you know? So I try to keep perspective because it can't be easy to be frustrated.

And just, but yeah, I'm also like,

spend a lot of time. I'm in therapy.
And I'm like, I've been, you know, and it's time to get. You've been in therapy from a young age.
Oh, yeah.

My mom, my mom was like a Shirley McLean person back in the day. So I've been in therapy since high school.

Like she was, you know what I mean? But like when Shirley McLean was like past lives.

I was right there. Yeah, no, so I was right there by default because I was my mom's kid.
So I've been, I haven't been in therapy consistently since I was a teenager, but I have been in therapy.

You know, one of the world's greatest luxuries.

Yeah, no, it's a super, and, and, and yeah, I feel like it should be, you know, I feel like one of if we're going to start to talk about reparations, I think black people getting free therapy would be a great, just a great place to start.

It's not the end of it. I would like cash, but also that would be a great way to start.
It would be a great place to start.

My, my, one of my go-tos, which which sounds so,

sorry, I just out of the corner of my eye, saw Nick's signal that my hands in my face. This is how I talk to people.

This is me on television. Ted, take your hand.
Wait, I don't want to talk about it. They call him the Ted Dancing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Everybody does the Ted Dancing.

I just look

at my go-to is

And then you die. Oh, Ted.
Yeah. So it's not like if you save save the ocean single-handedly, that you get an immortality card or if you solve this problem or whatever.

No, and then you die. So give it your best shot.
Give it your best shot. Stay happy and joyful and do as much as you can.
There was a great phrase

in somewhere in the good place.

Just try to do better every day. Yeah.
Yeah.

I mean, that's, yes, yeah. That just try.
Yeah.

I, you know, I do, I mean, so yeah, there's two, there's, there's my two versions of Ted Dancing are the cheers, which was like taught me about comedy and just taught me about good times.

And then the good place, which really was like, how did this show get on television?

No.

How did this show get on? And it's still on and people are watching it. Yeah, yeah.
So can you imagine the pitch to NBC?

Yeah, I just, I can't. I mean, yeah.
So thank you for all that.

But I do think part of that show, which is what I was so appreciated, was just the fact of like, it's life is good. I do except life is going to be hard.
Yeah.

Nobody's promised, most of us aren't promised anything. And you have to do the best with, with what you can.

And I'm also very aware that like wherever my career is at, I've attained a level of privilege that I should appreciate and then use.

And sometimes use means like, try to make sure you're helping other people who don't have this level of privilege. And I try to engage in that a lot.

And the other part of it is like, your kids want to go to Universal. Email your manager and see if you can get free tickets to Universal.

If you're famous enough to get free tickets, and Universal said, we'll give you some tickets, put posts on Instagram. Fine, Universal.
You know,

so I, by the way, I got charged up the wazoo for Universal. I hadn't thought of that.

You should have, I mean, that's, but see, that's, I'm trying to like, I forget about the good side sometimes because, like I said, I live in Oakland, so I'm not in, but even in Oakland, like people are like, hey, come out.

People feel like they know me because I've been there for a long time. And sometimes you get a free cup of coffee and you're like, this is good living.
You know what I mean? So

I do try to remember that like, I did fight for this career, whatever it is. I do feel better when I am engaged in the big conversations of the country than if I'm not.

And I don't begrudge other comedians who are not. I think there's all kinds of ways to live this life.

But for me, I feel like if I'm not actively engaged in one of those big conversations, then I'm kind of wasting my skill because that's where my skill is at.

You know, so, but I would pref, I would, you know, like I saw the trailer for Beverly Hills Cop 4 and I was like, oh, I didn't like it. 13 year old.
Yeah. Yeah.

I was like, 13-year-old me is pretty mad at me right now that I'm not in Beverly Hills Cop 4.

13-year-old me doesn't want to hear about any of this other stuff. Maybe you didn't ask.
All you had to do was ask. I know.

13-year-old me is like, you didn't even audition? Like, you didn't even, I just would have thought I would have been in Beverly Hills Cop 4.

I just would have assumed if you'd said you will be a somewhat famous comedian by the year 2024 and Beverly Hills Cop 4 is coming out, I'd be like, well, clearly I'll be in Beverly Hills Cop 4.

So it's funny. I have to understand that, like, that's not the path you're on.
Do you notice yet the water you swim in? Meaning, do you, the people that, when people see you on the street,

do you notice the expression on their face? I can see people seeing me before they realize I see them seeing me. I'm sure you have this too.
Where you can see somebody be like,

and you're not even looking, or I can feel it. Yeah.

And then you sort of have to feel like, how do I engage with this? Yeah. Generally, I will engage with it because, again, I'm more connected to the guy who wasn't famous, whatever fame.

I feel like sitting across from you, it's funny to call this famous. But anyway, known for, before I was known, than the guy who is known.

So I will, yeah, my, my kids are sort of like, come on, dad, we got to go. But I'm generally want to engage those people.

But is the, I mean, when I, when I walk around, people smile at me because they're remembering a funny joke that I was, our moment that I was part of. Or several.
Or near even. Yeah.
Yeah.

I learned early on in cheers. You don't have to have the joke.
Just be in the two-shot with the joke and you'll get all the credit in the world. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Just be, just be around the laughter.

Yeah, yeah. Exactly.

But they smile and that's an amazing

water to swim in. I'm so blessed to walk around with that.
And I'm just wondering what you

feel you're swimming in.

I noticed it used to be, there's like eras where it was like every time I ran into somebody, be like, oh man, you're coming out, Bill. I love that.
And And I'd be like, don't say clan. Don't say clan.

Don't say that episode with the clan. And I was like, oh, man, I've done a lot of things, but that is my, I'm the clan guy.
Yeah. At some point, it's not that I don't hear about anymore.

It shifted to thank you for your work. Yeah.
Which I actually appreciate more because it means there's like a body of work that they've engaged with.

It's not just the fact that the crazy guy went and talked to the KKK.

And I really appreciate it. And so it's very much like people will sort of say, they'll look me in the eye.
They'll shake my hand. They'll lean in like, thank you.

Like it's a very sort of like, uh, and so I really appreciate that because it's hard to know where it's landing all the time. And then the thing I get, which is like, thank you for your work.

You need to do a story. And they start telling me what I need to do.
Just like,

because you can make a better. Yeah, I can make, and sometimes it's about like, I think you need like a city councilman.

I'm not that like, you know, we had, we need help building this thing and there's not in the

media. And it's like, I think you've confused.
I'm not that guy, you know, but, but yeah, so I'll get that a lot. Like, you need to do a story about blah, blah, blah.

And it's like, I don't even have a job right now, but thank you for that. You said your mom's alive, right? Yes, very much so.
Yeah. She must be tickled pink.
Come on.

There's, I mean,

she loves, well, she loves this moment. She has this moment a lot.
She'll be around people and they'll be, and especially happens in the Bay in the Bay Area. Oh,

what do you do?

Do this.

I'm here. My granddaughters live nearby, my son.
And then at some point, like, I'll come up and be like, hey, mom. They're like, wait, that's, why didn't you tell me? And she just be like, ah,

you didn't tell me that was your son. So, yeah, she loves.
And like I said, it was just the two of us. My mom was my best friend when I was a kid.
So she's really living her best life.

I don't even mean the fame. I mean, you have, you are.
Sorry if I'm

Ted Dancing on. I'm going to apologize to me again.
Okay. All right.

I'm walking out.

All right. Good.
Good note. Good note.
Seriously.

But you're going to

feel that way.

Your kindness. You have a kind face.
You walk in and there's kindness in the room. That's what I meant about your mom.
Must be really kind of proud of who she raised. Yeah, yes, 100%.
Yes.

I think she was cool. I think she, my mom always had great belief in me.
She thought, you'll figure something out. But to see what has happened and to see how, and see how,

yes, she's very like proud of the type of person that I am and the type of dad that I am too. I think it's I was about to say, do you see yourself passing that? I love that you'll figure it out.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a wonderful thing to pass on to your kids.
For sure, for sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think

I tell that to my kids all the time. It's very clear, like,

this is about your journey. So my teacher said, uh-huh.

What do you, I'm not worried about that. Let's figure this out.
Yeah. Yeah.
We're not, I don't want you to think that I'm ever worried about what your teacher said, you know?

So it's about what, what do you need? So, yeah, I, it's really important to me that my kids, my mom was clearly like my friend.

Now, she was my friend who paid the rent, so I had to respect her, but she was my friend, so I could tell her anything. And I knew if I said, Mom, I need help with this, she was going to be there.

And it's very with my kids, it's very important to me that they feel like if I call my dad into a situation, he's got my back, right? Yeah,

God, I'm checking myself every time you say something. Did I do that?

You did it.

Yeah, you're not. I mean, you're Ted.

Be the best Ted dancing you can be. It's turned out pretty well.

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Are you church?

As a kid, I was. I'm not.

What were you, if I may? Was it Alabama church? It was a little both.

Cause it was like Northern Church with my mom and then Methodist church with my mom and then AME church with my in the in the south of course much more fun yeah yeah a lot more fun yeah a lot more yeah yeah a lot a lot better choir southern church is going to be scary as shit or joyfully astounding i mean my grandmother's church was the kind of church where every week a big black woman would catch the holy spirit and pass out and have to be carried out of the church every week yeah i don't know if it was the same woman but every week there was a woman who would catch the holy spirit in the middle of the sermon and have to be carried out into the church how old were you when you were watching that?

Six, seven, eight, nine, ten. You know,

you're just sort of like, whoa,

whoa, every week. It's like it.
So yeah, it was like very fire and brimstone. Yeah.
You know, basement where they served

fish after funerals.

You know, it was very like, yeah, it was, I'm really happy with the fact that, because even, because, you know, most of all black people in this country who are, could trace their lineage back to time of enslavement, we came through the South.

But a lot of us are disconnected from it. So we don't spend time in the South.

I'm really, as much as it annoyed me now as a kid, I'm really happy that I've spent so much time in the south so I know how to speak southern, I know how to be in the south.

And I'm not, it's again, like we said earlier, I have empathy for the south in a way that, like, people who don't go to the south sort of just condescend to the south.

Yeah, from states that are far worse. Yes, I mean, you, Little Rock, Arkansas, Mary's from North Little Rock.
She has the north parts important because that was called Dogtown.

She was on the wrong side of the tracks, but she's very proud of.

But because of the high school there in the 50s, no, but 60s,

yeah.

You had to choose. There was no, no one was on the fence.
You either bought it and went with it,

or you, at an early age, went, nope. Yeah.
That's wrong. You know, she, she was about to go to first grade or second grade or something when

the first kids, black kids, integrated. Integrated the school.
Yeah. Yeah.
And she, people were throwing stuff at them and yelling. And she was watching TV and she would not go to school the next day.

She burst into tears. I don't want to go to school.
I don't want people to throw rocks at me or something. But you didn't have a choice.

And now, when you go to Little Rock, it's not true all over Arkansas, obviously, but when you're in Little Rock,

you're eating dinner with more black people than you do in Westwood. I'll tell you that's exactly it.
You know, you are side by side, and they, you know.

There's an expression from the civil rights era that, or even before, and it's about black people would say to each other, in the north, they don't care how high you get as long as you don't get too close.

In the south, they don't care how close you get as long as you don't get too high.

So in the south, they're fine to eat dinner with you, but they don't, they don't want a black doctor.

In the north, you can be a black doctor, but don't come over to my house. You know,

a version of you, all right, you can be my president, but I'll be goddamned if I'll do what you do. Exactly, exactly.
Yeah.

So it's very much like, I'm, and my daughters have spent time in the South, especially my oldest daughters.

And I'm really happy that they will have had that experience so that they don't feel like cut off or intimidated by the South in the way that a lot of people do. Yeah.

I know that's silly that I was sitting there when you came in reading your workbook.

I prepared myself

for you to have a copy of my book. But

I think it's brilliant.

You know,

I will take the thank thank you or the compliments for the whole team of people that put that together, especially I got to remember, remember, I got to mention Kate Schatz, who's my co-author, who

we really collaborated.

I mean, it's a dialogue with you guys. For sure, for sure.
But what's great is it doesn't matter where you are on the spectrum,

if you're white. Yes.
You are on the spectrum. Yeah, it will meet you where you're at.

That's what we really wanted to make the book and push you. Yeah, and in a gentle, kind way so far.
I haven't gotten to the end.

Nowadays, I mean, I feel like I always thought of that book like a book that tells you that a book that tells you how to do sit-ups, it's not going to help you unless you do the sit-ups.

But also, if you're, if you already have good abs, it's going to, you sort of just do more of the sit-ups. But if you don't, you can start at a low, you know what I mean?

So it's like, I really feel like it meets people where they're at.

And sort of like by making it interactive, we just found during 2020, after George Floyd's murder, there was just a lot of those books, a lot of the anti-racist books went to the top of the bestseller list.

And a lot of those are great books, but they're tomes. They're really sort of analytical.
And we felt like, but do people know what to do next? Yes.

Like after you read those books, do you know how to like enact what it taught you in the world? Yeah.

And coming from a background in the community of activism, I need you to do, I need white people to do things.

I don't need people to know. I don't need you to, if it's between knowing something or doing something, I'd rather you do something than just, I know it, you know.
Yeah.

All right. I'm a racist.
No, you're a racist. No, I'm not.
Yes, you are.

But even if you solve that little conversation, the thing is,

what are you going to do? There's still a public school across town that's mostly black that doesn't have enough resources.

Can you help them?

Is there some way you can help them?

What is the name of the? Sorry.

Didn't I just tell him not to apologize? No, I didn't apologize to you. I was apologizing to Nick.

All right. Okay.
I'll write that one down. That's one Nick apology.
But you only get two to Nick.

What is the name of the not foundation, but organization, non-profit, donors choose. Donors Choose.

Tell me about that a little bit. So Donors Choose is an organization that helps teachers and classrooms raise money for whatever their resources they need in their classroom.

It could be books, like we need books so the kids can read. It can be like

hygiene supplies because some kids don't have that stuff at home. So it could be, or it could be a trip to D.C.
or it could be musical instruments.

But the way it is set up is that you can just put in a zip code. So put in your zip code and it'll tell you all the schools in your area and what they need.
And it's for public schools.

Oh, that is brilliant. So yeah, it's really great because it makes you, to me, it's like a, it's like a video game that helps people because you feel fun.
Like, and also some teachers need $5,000.

Some teacher needs $40. So it's like, it's really like it doesn't, you can help in whatever way you can, you have, you can.
It's like the micro grants.

Yes. Micro loans.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You can do all over the world.
And you can find a teacher who's like, oh, they're, they need a tuba, but they're $40 away from completing the tuba.

I'm going to put them over the top.

And then if you want, the kids will, the teacher will have the kids send you thank you cards and things and so it's you really i think right now especially right now people are like how do i help what can i do and i think sometimes what can i do is a check but you're like i just and i am with the aclu but like you send the aclu a check it just sort of like goes and you tend to wash your hands yeah yeah yeah yeah you're just sort of like okay i did that yeah i gave but you but this it's like literally i know that the thing i'm doing is going to impact this which will help you to keep doing it tell me the name again donors Choose.

Like, donor, like someone who donates something. Donors Choose.
Don't or donorschoose.org. Yeah.

And it's just, I find, like, especially if you're having a bad, if you were like reading an article about how bad America is,

you need a little dopamine, a dopamine rush to feel better, just help a teacher on donors choose. You'll be like, okay, I helped a little bit.
Yeah. Yeah.
I crawled out of the hole.

I don't know if everyone knows, they probably must, that

most schools,

the teachers are taking out of their meager paycheck to deliver books to their children.

The percentage is, you know,

it's well over 50% of teachers who go into their own pockets to get this, to support the students. Like they can't not do it because they want the kids to have what they need.

I mean, it could be pencils. It could be erasers.
It could be crayons. And teachers would rather go into their own pockets generally than have the kids go without.

So this is a way to let the teachers keep whatever meager income they're making and to get the kids something extra because it's also about like,

you know public school can mean a lot depending upon your community and your zip code some public schools look like basically function like private schools and some public schools don't have enough for the kids to like have the supplies they need and so this is to help until our government closes that gap this is the what we have to do It's really brilliant.

I'm sitting here thinking about,

well, you said it. You can write a check, but the tendency is to wash your hands.
With this, you're going to get engaged. Yes.

And if you, and if you stay engaged, you'll hear from the teachers and the kids and the and you'll and you know you can give to whatever school you went to when you were a kid or whatever schools in your neighborhood that you walk past every day and don't know what's going so it's not even about like whether or not you have kids in the school district i think it's more important for people with who don't have kids in school right now to think like you want those kids in all those schools to be as smart and prepared for the world as possible because they're going to be adults someday and you're going to run into them so so you want all

to be as smart as they possibly can be helping those kids is a selfish act i think we think of this stuff as being some sort of like, I'm a good person.

So, no, no, no, I want you to be smart and to be prepared and to be well-fed because I'll be running into a happier adult. Yeah.

I know greed is not going to go away, but there's smart greed in this

stupid greed that'll come back and bite you in the ass. Yeah.

No, this is the kind of greed that's like, I selfishly, I want everybody to have everything they need because then that means I have everything I need.

So that I think of it that way.

Yeah. Yeah.
You don't want to walk around with a bunch of people pissed off. No, you don't want to walk around with a bunch of uneducated, hungry people.

Like, it's not a good, it's not a good society. With each one with two or three guns.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Who never learned which is the good end, which is the bad end.

So, yeah, like, I think it's important. For me, this is where a lot of the activism comes from.
It's like, I actually just selfishly, I want a better community. I want a better world, you know.

And when I think about my mom, like I think about my mom's parents, the racism they suffered is pretty much unimaginable to me. Right.

And then when I, my mom tells stories sometimes, I'm like, that is almost unimaginable to me. I hope, and I think of it as a baton.
So my grandparents handed my mom the baton.

It was lighter than when they got it because

their parents were enslaved, you know? And then you go another generation, my mom handed it to me. It was way lighter than when she got it.

But now I think about my 13-year-old daughter and I'm like, when I hand it to you, is the baton going to be heavier or lighter? Oh, yeah. Because America's in a special place right now.
And

that baton might get heavier because of what we're about to go through. Yeah, so it's my job to do everything I can to make sure at least hope the baton weighs the same.

So, that's that's where I sort of am at now.

Like, it's really important to me to think about, like, because whatever my kids do, I think I have done the same job my mom did, where it's like, like, my oldest daughter wants to be a singer and is a singer.

She's still going to be engaged in this work somehow because that's what we do.

Batons.

You're not a baby boomer, right? No, no, no. I'm a baby boomer.
And baby boomers don't pass the baton. They just keep holding on.

They drop it and don't realize it and keep running.

I'm a Gen Xer. Hey, can we get the baton, baby boomer? No, I can't find it, but I don't want you to have it.

No, I'm a proud Gen Xer who was called a slacker his whole generation. And now we're angry.
Wow.

This is such a cool.

conversation for me. I really, really appreciate it.

You know,

it's been absolutely one of the thrills of of my whole career to be able to sit across from you and have this conversation.

When I got the invitation, I was like, I mean, everybody who was with me when I got it was like, yeah, of course you're doing that. Like, there was no,

yeah. So, just so you know, I'm always in character.
I went, why is he coming here? Why?

Why would you invite me? Why did he come here? Did you know you invited me? Did somebody else?

Okay, okay. I didn't know.
Sometimes people like, it's like a blind podcast date, but

no, I was super, I have been a fan from as long as I can remember. I've been invested in your career and your, and I've, I've followed you.

I was so happy for every, every time I see you, it makes me happy. We're going to have to FaceTime my mom after this is over.
I hope you're okay with that. Okay, because that's my God.

That's what I need to do. If I can't do that, then I take back everything I said.
But no, it's,

it's, you know, and, and just to be clear, part of this is about the fact that like

you are a white person in the world, white man in the world, who I see giving a shit and who I have seen give a shit. And I've seen make mistakes and bounce back from them.

And I've seen, like, thank you for that. Yes, yes.
And I've seen you like use your privilege for good.

And so, even if I hadn't met you, I just felt good about you. And you're a talented performer.
And it's, and the thing that whatever, even though I did not end up in Beverly Hills Cop 4,

I still get to talk to you makes me feel like I did the right thing. Somehow, I haven't made too many mistakes in this career.

Gonna have to get up and hug you again.

Mission accomplished.

Thanks. Thank you.
Yeah.

That was the amazing W. Kamau Bell.
It really means a lot to me that he was here. So thank you, Kamau.

To help support Kamau's important work with schools, visit his Donors Choose page at donorschoose.org slash Kamau.

That's it for this week's show. Special thanks to our friends at Teen Coco.

If you enjoyed this episode, send it to a friend. Subscribe, rate, and review.
And you can always watch full episodes of this podcast on Teen Coco's YouTube channel.

If that's your thing.

I'll be right back here next week, where everybody knows your name.

See you soon.

You've been listening to Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Dance and Woody Harrelson. Sometimes.
The show is produced by me, Nick Leo. Executive producers are Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross, and myself.

Sarah Fedorovich is our supervising producer. Our senior producer is Matt Abadaka.
Engineering and Mixing by Joanna Samuel with support from Eduardo Perez. Research by Alyssa Grawl.

Talent booking by Paula Davis and Gina Batista. Our theme music is by Woody Harrelson, Anthony Gen, Mary Steenbergen, and John Osborne.

We'll have more for you next time where everybody knows your name.

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