Episode 1637 - Jessica Kirson

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Lock the gate!

All right, let's do this.

How are you, what the fuckers?

What the fuck, buddies?

What the fuck, Nicks?

What the hell is happening?

How are you?

What's going on?

Where are you at?

Well, look, you know, today, this is a great episode for me.

I don't know what difference that makes to you, but I imagine it makes some.

But this to me is one of my favorite conversations in a long time.

I'm not saying they're not all great in some way, but emotionally and

connectivity-wise and just funny-wise, this episode was a relief and a treat for me to do.

I'll try to explain it to you.

Well, today I talked to Jessica Kerson.

She was on the show back in 2019 on episode 1076.

If you want, you can go back to that episode to hear about her start in comedy and her personal background.

But she came back just to kind of hang out,

have a few laughs, and you know, talk about her new comedy special on Hulu called I'm the Man.

Now, Jessica

is

somebody that I'm always

happy to see

for a very, very specific reason.

There is

a Jewish thing,

okay?

And look, I'm at an age now.

I'm 61 years old.

Now, a lot of times,

no matter what is happening in the world or how preoccupied you are with everything happening or what's on your phone or what's in your life or just like when you really realize how much time you spend just

pummeling your brain with all kinds of bullshit distractions and things in your life, that the idea of

really connecting with somebody, I don't know if you notice it happening or you take it for granted or it doesn't happen.

I don't know.

Look, you have people in your life, you have your kids, and everything becomes a pattern.

Everything becomes a way of, you have a way of interacting with most people.

Sometimes you connect in moments of crisis or you occasionally have a few laughs or whatever, but to really kind of have some historical

connection with someone that transcends your relationship with them is kind of an amazing thing.

And, you know, when I was younger, there was a period there where you always thought you kind of knew all the other Jews.

There was just a way about Jewish culture that just kind of like connected you all.

And I feel that to a degree, but now I'm an old Jew and I'm of a different time.

But with Jessica, Jessica's not that much younger than me, but she's about, you know, she's about five years younger than me or so.

But there's just something about her, and I knew it immediately years ago.

There was just this

kind of,

look, we've both got, how should I say it in Yiddish, spilkis.

We have chronic spilkis, her and I, and that's just sort of a like a state of anxiety, impatience, agitation, restlessness.

It's, you know, I'm taking medicine from my spilkis, to be honest with you.

But the point I guess I'm trying to make is that at my age, it's not even nostalgia.

There's something at the core of all of us that we come from historically, a family of origin stuff,

that

it doesn't go away.

It kind of defines who you are.

But how often do you really kind of dig into the roots of it?

Not even on purpose.

And this conversation I had with Jessica was beautiful because I think her and I, people in their 60s,

I mean, we're probably the cutoff,

there was a generation of Jews that sort of defined what American middle-class Judaism

was.

Most of these people are either first generation or second generation of immigrants.

Like my grandma Goldie was born in Poland, as was her brother Georgie.

And then they came over when she was like three or four years old.

My grandpa Jack, Jacob, her husband, was born here, but his parents were not.

My grandpa Ben,

my father's father, his father was born in Russia.

My grandma Eleanor, I believe she was born in Poland, or no, maybe she was born here, but her parents

come from,

they might have been here a little earlier.

None of my

grandparents, you know, left

Germany because of the Holocaust.

Most of my family was here before that.

But the point I'm making is that there was a,

once the immigrant experience moved on, the next generation after the Lower East Side,

you know, and then they spread out and sometimes they didn't even go to the Lower East Side.

They ended up in New Jersey or, you know, some of them ended up in, you know, New York, the Long Island thing.

But there was a generation of Jews that sort of defined, you know, what American Jews were.

And it's very familiar to me, and it used to be very familiar culturally.

But now maybe not.

Maybe it's sort of a stereotype.

But like, you know, somebody like Larry David is a little older than me, but like his parents' generation would have been what I'm talking about.

And I think he, like more than anybody else publicly, kind of represents that type of Jewish character or that type of Jewish history or that type of Jewish sensibility.

But I grew up with it.

Like I grew up with my grandparents.

And this is like a generational thing.

You know, my grandparents were of that generation.

You know, where you got, we were in New Jersey before we left Jersey when I was like, you know, six or seven, but I always went back there.

You know, my grandmother would have, you know, these, these afternoon dinners where everyone would come over.

You'd have, you know, Goldie and Jack, my grandparents, Goldie's brother,

Georgie, his wife, Bertha, their daughter, Phyllis, and her husband, Marty, my grandma's cousin, Sylvia, and her husband, Ellis, my grandma's sister, Gussie, and her husband, Sam, and their son, Harold, my aunt Barbara, my mother, like it was like, I know this just sounds like, well, what's the big deal?

It's just a barbecue or whatever.

It's not.

It was a bunch of Jews of a certain type that existed in a time and that time is gone.

You know, people wonder like, why are there no more delis anymore?

Because everyone who used to eat at them is dead.

And it's a novelty thing now.

Like I still go to Cantors

deli here, but like whatever, the only thing that's there is your sense of nostalgia and the structure of the place and what's in that deli case.

But the people that used to populate these places on the on the on the daily

they're all gone, most of them, unless there's a generational thing where like people my age go back.

But you can't eat that way all the time.

We all knew that, and we know that now, and that's why you know some of them might have died, but they enjoyed themselves.

But the thing about

Jessica

Kerson is that like she comes from this too.

And we are wired that way.

There is a voice within us that speaks this language of what we grew up with in New Jersey with the generation of our parents and their parents more specifically.

Like my parents were already kind of like had enough of it on some level.

You know, they went to New Mexico.

I'm not, her parents were around, but that generation was sort of a little different.

They were, you know, they had their own thing going, but they were the generation that kind of went through the 60s and 70s and whatever, however that changed culture.

But the bedrock of this thing, you know, were these old Jews.

And I don't believe that I would be the person I am without, you know, my grandma Goldie, because my parents were kind of self-involved.

And my grandma Goldie just thought I was the best thing ever.

I was the first grandkid on both sides.

So I got a lot of attention.

My father's parents, Ben and Eleanor, I spent time with them and my cousins a bit, but my grandma Goldie, if I went to to New Jersey, I was at Goldie and Jack's house.

Goldie would sit in her recliner and do the crosswords.

Jack would lay on the couch on his side with his arm up in the air for some reason.

Might have been circulatory.

He'd watch sports.

He'd love to watch the Three Stooges, you know, the Marks brothers,

the Bowery boys.

You know, it was just this thing.

And my grandmother loved comedy.

She used to tell me stories about going to see Buddy Hackett in Vegas.

You know, when I was a little kid, she goes, I love Buddy Hackett.

He's filthy, but he's very funny, very funny.

I don rickles, I enjoy, you know, he apologizes very nicely after the show.

You know, these were, this was, this informed me.

I was an old Jew before I was, you know, a teenager.

And I had a kind of reverence for it.

And like, even when I was in college, I did Don't Drink the Water.

I played the patriarch and I did the whole thing with this and that and the whatever.

And I would have become that had I not pushed back on it.

I mean, even when I was in college, I worked at a place called Gordon's Deli up in

Pottingham Circle in Boston.

It was a Jewish deli in Boston.

One of the last ones.

The guy who ran it was Shelley.

I talked to Jessica about this.

I don't want to ruin it for you.

But I was so at that point.

I'm like, I want to immerse myself in this.

You know, I want to know that deli case.

I want to cut the corned beef.

I want to serve the sandwiches.

And I want to sort of immerse myself in that generation's culture.

And because it is part of my heart, you know.

But like I remember going to Vegas,

we grew up in New Mexico.

We'd meet my grandparents in Vegas, you know, when there was some sort of convention.

They'd go out there once a year.

We'd be at the MGM Grand.

And, you know, I remember asking, I must have been in college.

I remember asking my grandmother, do you like coming to Vegas?

And she said, you know, it was nicer when the boys ran things.

This was the generation who knew Vegas when the boys ran things.

And there's such a

joy

for me, and it just doesn't happen that often.

I can't remember the last time it happened, to reminisce about that,

to reminisce about that childhood around those people and what that world looked like and how we see it now.

And it just happened organically in this conversation with Jessica.

You know, it just happened.

But

even though I never talked to Jessica, and you know, when I see her, I'm always excited, but the connection is crazy.

And it's such a gift.

And it just, as when I was younger, I noticed it more because, you know, I was around more Jewish kids here and there, whether it was my cousins in New Jersey or you go to New York, there was a familiarity to the whole thing.

And now, like, I haven't been around that in a long time.

You know, whatever anyone thinks about Hollywood, there may be a lot of Jews here, but culturally, I'm not hanging out in that world where, you know, we have these conversations.

And there's something so specific about the Jersey Jewish conversation here

that it was just such a,

it's not even nostalgic.

It was like reconnecting with your fucking roots.

It was deep.

I don't even know if it'll translate to you people how much we were laughing at this shit, but it was so, it was so grounding.

Two crazy fucking, you know, 50-something and 60-something year-old Jewish

doing this thing that it wasn't about comedy.

It was about our roots, our core,

what defined us, what we came from as children.

You know, my parents were married in Jeff Ross's family's catering hall.

We found that out recently.

His family owned a catering hall in Jersey.

It was a very popular place to have events.

And my parents were married there.

I remember going into fucking Patterson with my grandmother.

I think the place was called Paytax or something.

We used to have to drive for 45 minutes to buy fish, smoked fish.

And it was, we'd go to the Pompton Queens diner.

It's like it all has to do with Jersey, man.

Diner culture, deli culture, buying smoked fish culture, you know, catering hall culture.

I mean, it's all gone.

It's all gone.

And when and And after talking to Jessica,

I realized what a fucking gift it was to grow up in it.

Because I really think we had to be the last generation that did in a general way.

Sure, everyone's got, you know, having grandparents that spoke Yiddish when they didn't want you to understand things.

You know, and I've had these Jewish conversations with people before, but usually there's something about the Orthodox community that have maintained this.

But this is not, we were not Orthodox.

We were just sort of, you know, middle class, culturally Jewish.

We did the thing, got the bar mitz, went to temple when we were supposed to, but it was really a cultural thing.

So it wasn't immersive in a religious way, but culturally it was very specific.

And

it was just,

you know, it was like enriching

and

sort of emotional.

to have this hilarious connection and conversation with Jessica on this episode.

And like, oh, look, there's been plenty of Julie episodes, but

it was almost like you're looking in the mirror or you're looking at your sibling or you're looking at somebody that went through something with you.

And you come from the same communal identity that goes back, you know, to the beginning of time.

It's crazy.

I'm at Dynasty Typewriter here in LA this Saturday, April 26th, and again next Tuesday, April 29th.

Toronto, I'm at the Winter Garden on Saturday, May 3rd for two shows.

Burlington, Vermont, I'm at the Vermont Comedy Club for two shows on Monday, May 5th, and one show

Tuesday, May 6th.

Portsmouth, New Hampshire, I'll be at the Music Hall on Wednesday, May 7th.

Then I'm in Brooklyn for my HBO special taping at the Bam Harvey Theater on May 10th.

Two shows there.

Go to wtfpod.com/slash tour for all my dates and links to tickets.

I'm currently

my inner self is trying to

completely take down my outer self before the special.

This is something that always happens around a couple weeks before.

We're almost there where I decide that the shirt I want to wear is too tight, that my haircut stinks, that I'm too fat to do it, that

I'm not very good at what I do.

There's some part of me, no matter how much cognitive work or just acting as if I've done, and no matter how professional I am out in the world and capable and doing a great job, when I'm converging on something important to me, my inner self is like, well,

we're going to take you down.

You're going down, buddy.

We just want to make it as challenging as possible.

There's no reason to be comfortable with yourself as you enter this important day where you do your new work.

We're going to just, it's already, you know,

a big task.

and an exciting one, but you know, you know, it's a big job.

We just want to make sure that you're as destabilized as possible when we get to the day.

So now, fortunately, I'm on to that, but it's happening.

Okay, so you're ready to lock in with a couple of

very

anxious but excited

middle-aged Jews laughing their asses off, talking about their childhood.

Well, it's about to happen.

Jessica Kerson's Hulu special, I'm the man, premieres tomorrow, April 25th.

But enjoy this, will you?

Enjoy us talking.

We did.

I just, for some reason, I just'm a little emotional.

Do you ever watch?

I don't know what the fuck is wrong with me.

You're emotional?

I'm very emotional.

What happened?

Have you ever seen that

clip?

It's a Graham Norton-hosted thing where he had all these Adela impersonators.

No.

That's fucking ridiculous.

It's like, it's all these women and one drag queen who are Adele impersonators.

And before the contest,

they got the real Adele and they put a fake nose on her makeup.

And she's one of the impersonators, right?

Oh, that's so funny.

And all these ones, they all go up there, all the different ones.

You know, there's like five or six of them, and they're fine, they're good.

Yeah.

You know, and they're all talking backstage to the real Adele who's like, I'm nervous.

You know,

that's great.

And when she comes out at the end, and they're all sitting there, there's just like seven or eight of them watching this woman.

And they, you can see them realize it because they don't recognize her, but they hear the voice, and there's these moments of like, like, like it just goes and

it just made me cry.

It's made me cry three times.

Really?

I didn't watch it all three times today, but every time I see it, it just came up.

What makes you cry about it?

That's a good question.

I don't really know.

There's something about singing in general that I find very moving.

Yeah.

But I think it's these, you know, these women

who love her and spend their life trying to be her out of this peculiar fandom and talent, having that moment of seeing their idol.

And you just see, like, they don't even know what to do with it.

Like,

you're shocked.

To see it computing because

they're still not sure.

But one of them, right when she hits the first note, she's like, you know, like that.

And I just think that, the, you know, I guess it's just a, I don't know if it's empathetic or I don't, I just, the feeling of that, it makes me, it tears me up.

Because they love something so much and it's a happy moment.

It's beautiful.

Yeah, it's happy, but completely surprised.

Right.

Like never in their wildest fucking dreams.

Right would they ever think they'd even meet her?

And they spend their lives being her, you know, out of, out of homage, out of love.

And just to see them have that moment is pretty human.

Yeah, it is.

I know, I'm not going to watch it.

It sounds too moving.

What, you don't cry?

No, I cry.

Sometimes I put on music to make myself cry because I'm having emotions and I can't get there.

I didn't cry for years as a kid.

This is horrible, but I really didn't because my father did not have an easy time when I cried.

Yeah, I think I'm trying to remember.

I seem to cry.

Well, that's interesting about the music triggering the tears because I'm doing a whole, my closing bit sort of about that.

Yeah.

About that.

Like,

not on purpose, but, but there are some things I'll listen to on purpose and they'll tear me up.

But like, but never, it never seems to be the appropriate moment to cry.

It's always like a movie or a commercial or an animal video.

But when I'm in a relationship,

everything makes me cry.

No, I just like,

I don't know.

You know, I'm just, I'm not wired, right?

So what's going on?

Oh, God.

You are what?

I mean, I'm never great.

I watched a special.

You did?

I did, yes.

Very funny.

Oh, thank you.

Filthy and mean and

charming.

It's very charming.

Thank you.

You know, I am happy with it.

I feel like you're the kind of comic.

Tell me if I'm wrong.

Do you watch your sets or listen to them?

You do, right?

No, I don't.

I can't.

I record everything.

I've got 900 sets on me and I'm doing I'm building an hour and like there are definitely moments where I'm like I should listen to that I don't me either do you know that you can read it

you can read it yes someone showed me the other day I'll show you from your recordings on your phone yes you don't have to listen to you I don't have to listen to my horrible voice I don't really mind that it's just to me it's sort of like I got to find the thing I know it's a

yeah you know but you can read the whole thing it can transcript it right on your phone yep listen to me I'm like 90 on the phone on the phone you can

read it?

I don't tell me what breast

button takes.

Where's the button?

Where's the button?

One time I took my mother's boyfriend back before he got lost somehow.

What do you mean?

He just walked away?

No,

his daughter

took him away.

He was losing it.

Oh, okay.

But he gave me his phone once to do something.

There was like 900 open apps.

I know, they never close.

My mother has 460,000 emails on her phone.

Do you know, I have OCD with that, so I can't even be

near her phone.

I erase text so that I don't have too many on my thing.

I don't do the text, but I don't like the emails.

I don't like the number.

Yeah.

The number that causes me anxiety.

The number causes me anxiety too.

That's so funny.

So then I do the select all, mark is red.

And one time, this is just like a couple of weeks ago, I opened up my phone.

I'm like, what the fuck?

All my emails are gone.

I'm like, what the fuck happened?

And I'm looking at Google and I'm looking at everything else.

But when you do the select all,

and then it says mark, the other option right above mark is red is moved to junk.

So I moved everything and it was a panic.

I was about to call.

Who do you even call?

How do I call Google?

Yeah.

Hello, Google.

I moved my emails.

I don't know where they are.

To my Florida house.

Yeah, my mom, when she sends me emojis, but she can't see anything.

So she just taps on random things.

Like she'll send me like a squirrel, a rainbow, and like a gun.

I'm like,

what's happening?

If I show you the picture from my mother's,

you will die.

From her what?

You know, when sometimes I don't know how it happened or what the mistake was.

But you know, do you have a picture for your profile?

Yeah.

Like when they call you, it comes up.

Yeah.

Is it her profile?

No, it's just like a picture of her shoe.

Right?

And then

on the picture, it just says pizza.

I don't even know.

Wait a second.

Are you kidding?

You have no idea how it got.

She must have been fucking around with it.

It's not her picture on her name.

It's when they call you.

Yes.

Something happens.

Do you understand how funny that is?

It's just a shoe.

It's just a shoe.

What kind of shoe?

A slipper?

Yeah, something.

Well, she was just holding it.

And then it says pizza on it.

And I don't know what the fuck that is.

That is so funny.

I got to take a picture of it when she calls, but she barely.

Do you ever FaceTime with her?

Because my mom, I just see her forehead.

literally i'm like could you move the phone down

she's

hi can you see me i'm like no i see your hairline

my mother doesn't face time and i i don't i don't it's getting worse and worse in terms of what i have to say to you me too like the yesterday what yeah no i'm going through that also i understand but it's not like she's not she's my dad's losing his mind she's not losing her mind i just don't think she ever had anything to really say

About what?

About anything?

Yeah, not much.

You know, because like now, like my brother, I call my brother.

He's like, I'm at lunch with mom right now.

You know, she's in Florida and they put her, of course.

He put her in a place down there.

And she, and I go, he goes, you want to talk to her?

I go, yeah.

And she goes, hi, Mark.

And I'm like, hi.

She goes, what are you doing?

I'm like, well, you know, I'm home.

I'm working.

And I go, how's everything with you?

And she goes, you know, everything's, I'm okay.

I'm good.

And she, and I go, that's good.

And she goes, I guess that's it.

Do you know who that reminds me of?

Why I'm laughing?

My grandmother.

Yeah.

She goes, so how you doing?

I'm like, I'm good.

She's like, okay, good.

Like, there's no, she, I know.

Yeah, she never listened.

I used to do a bit that she answered her own question.

You're going to relate, like, how you doing?

Good?

Yeah.

Yes.

We're good, good.

Like, I wasn't even in the conversation.

It's some sort of, I don't know, it's a defensiveness.

I don't know what it is.

It's how they stay sane.

Yeah, I don't know.

My mom just tells me like health stuff.

I mean, I know this is like a running joke with people, but it just happened yesterday.

I'm like, what's new with you?

She's like, well,

I have

something on my back, but Herb's daughter, her boyfriend's daughter, is a skin doctor.

And she said, you know, they should take a sample.

And Herb's okay.

His heart is doing well.

We're going to Italy.

I just hope we are okay there.

I just, it's like all negative.

I don't know.

My mom's not negative.

I just, sometimes I think that my entire life,

you know, when you realize that, but you probably don't, maybe yours are different.

I don't know how

actually sophisticated they really were or whether they were ever really big thinkers.

You know, my dad was a doctor.

My mom painted and stuff.

She knew things, but conversationally, my dad just likes to start shit.

My dad was, wow, he was.

I do a joke now on the stage because my dad's got dementia, but his wife's kind of like a Christian Trumpy person.

Really?

A little bit, yeah.

And when she goes out of the house, she just sits him in front of you know Fox News, right?

And he's never really been that political, but he does like to, you know, start shit, but he it doesn't go in right anymore.

Like I call him up and I go,

you know, what's going on, dad?

He goes, what do you think about these blacks coming into the country?

Oh my god.

And I said, I said, I think you're conflating two separate racist ideas.

The Arabs brought COVID-19 into the, yeah.

I don't know what that is.

Well, my dad would only watch Fox News and Trump when he was dying.

So I'm watching him die.

He's like, I'm going to watch him.

I'm going to watch Trump.

If you don't want to fucking be with me, you don't have to be in the room.

But I'm not turning it off.

And he never did before?

He did, like when Trump came along.

He cared about money and he cared, you know.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He was always a Democrat.

Yeah.

And then, like a lot of people, a lot of Jewish people, he turned.

Yeah.

Well, yeah, because

they had all sort of gotten away or maybe were never really on board with this sort of progressive Jewish thing, you know, like the Jewish people.

Yeah, my mom is, but yeah, you're right.

My dad.

And then they realize it's like, they're taking how much?

And then it's sort of like, what are they doing to Israel?

And that was it.

It's both.

Yeah, you're right.

That's it.

My money and Israel.

It's exactly what it was with him.

Yeah.

That's what it is.

And now look what happens.

Now look where we are.

Oh, we're in a great place.

It's going to be awesome.

Yeah.

I'm just, I'm hot.

I'm so glad it's just starting.

You know, like we're not, well, we're not three or four years in.

Like, it's just all.

Oh, yeah.

We got everything to look forward to.

Yeah, yeah.

I feel really safe.

Yeah.

Authoritarianism.

It's so exhausting.

It's like I don't have enough to worry about on my own.

Are you kidding?

My head is a war zone.

I can't, by the way, I can't.

I don't, I don't think about it a lot anymore, and I can't watch the news.

I can't.

Like, I'm one of those people.

Since yesterday?

Yeah, since this morning.

I can't.

I'm giving it up.

I've turned my phone off.

I just turned my phone off.

I'm over it.

Yeah.

When?

Two hours ago.

Yeah.

Right when we started talking.

Is this the first, this is your first special?

No.

No.

My first special was on

Comedy Central, and now this one's on Hulu.

So that was a while ago?

It was.

And you're going to, this is amazing.

It was on once.

I mean, can you fucking believe that?

All the money, all the time.

They put it on one time.

I hate it.

I missed it.

I'm shocked that you weren't on Comedy Central that one hour.

That's the fucking worst.

That one was called Talking to Myself, which because I turn around and have those conversations with myself on stage.

I don't even know if you've seen me do that.

I saw it on the special and you brought attention to it,

how creative it was.

I love saying that because some people are like, what the fuck

just happened?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

yeah.

And it was on once, and then they put it to the paper, like, you had to pay for it.

So, one person watched it.

And then

so fucking

the sort of you know, the levels of rejection available.

You know, you spend all your time trying to get over your own personal fear of rejection, then you finally get that, and then you get opportunities that don't go anywhere, and then you get rejected.

And then, literally, you do a thing, and you're like, Finally, and they're like, Where do I find it?

And you're like, I don't know.

We lost it.

Yeah.

It's gone out of the planet.

Yeah, we deal with a lot of, you know, that's part of why stand-up worked for me in the beginning because I'm like, this is familiar.

It's a horrible feeling.

I believe for me

that

because my parents,

my mother specifically, was so embarrassing to me.

So was mine.

That I feel like one of the reasons I got into comedy was to transcend embarrassment.

To have control over it.

Power.

Yeah, that makes sense.

Yeah, but the journey there is so embarrassing.

It is horrible.

It's the most embarrassing thing

to be up there and just not doing well.

And it's just like

to yourself.

Exactly.

That's what I'm saying.

It's self-inflicting abuse.

That's why I can't usually go to the comedy cellar.

Because for me, trying to get into that place, you know, when I was younger and doing the kind of comedy I did, it was always hard.

Yeah.

And they were always judgmental, you know, SD and Manny.

And I used to tell the other comics to leave the room so I could get some work done.

Yeah, I get it.

It's a worst thing when comedy is like that.

When you go on stage at the comedy cellar and it tells us sitting there, I'm like, can you just go?

I mean, it's late.

Let me just try to figure out how to do it.

Please.

Yeah.

But I think one of the reasons I didn't go there that much is it's like going to where the trauma happened.

It is.

You go upstairs to the table and you're like, I'm going to be abused here.

Well, I don't mind that.

It's just not doing well on that fucking stage.

Yeah,

I was auditioning for Conan once at Stand Up New York many years ago.

And there were comics in the corner talking and laughing at me like they really was being horrific.

And in the middle of my audition, I said something.

I'm like, you guys are disgusting.

yeah like your other comics I'm up here like I addressed it I just have to do that sometimes I can't

it's like I can't there's nothing we can do

that's a fucking problem it's a sensitivity we're sensitive oh my and we all are yeah right but but the good the the well I want I don't want to say good but some people have more success at killing the sensitivity that they have yeah because like even now like you know just adapting to like uh internet comments or trolling and all that stuff it's like you've got to have a callus to it, but it all goes in.

It all goes in.

And you're like, I don't really care, but that takes two hours.

I have a great story about that.

I sang in a car.

I used to sing in the car and do like silly singing.

I didn't even tell a joke.

And it was on Facebook.

It went viral.

It was like one of my first videos going viral years ago.

And someone wrote.

Someone wrote, I hope she hits a tree and dies on impact.

And it was liked by like 65,000 people.

Like they all were happy.

It's just, it's like,

you know, it's the same thing everyone says.

You could have 5,000 amazing comments in that one,

you know, negative.

What is that, though?

Because it's like,

it's a physical feeling.

It's very hard.

But you feel that, that, that hurt in your whole body, which is like hits you.

So there must be some twisted fucking thing that

that is a tangible feeling.

And it's something that, you know, we're obviously used to.

Yeah, for me, it's historic.

Like it's from my past.

I can feel it.

I know it.

It's from

having a full body for you.

From now on, like you just want to fall into a hole.

I know.

You want disappointment.

Horrible.

Horrible.

Every day.

Every day.

When you wake up.

No, I get it when I,

yeah, my whole day.

I feel like that.

No, from videos, I get, you know, because my videos are all over.

So.

So, oh, you mean when you look at the comments?

Yeah.

No, I mean, I don't, like, I'll just, it'll come up.

Like, sometimes I just go on it and it'll say the comment.

Yeah.

If I look at something.

So the first special was how many years ago?

Was that like the first time you were on here, like six years ago or something?

May have been, yeah.

Wow.

I know.

And this one,

but no one can watch that one.

Or it's on YouTube.

No, you have to pay for it on Comedy Center.

It's a fucking nightmare.

They showed it once.

You know, I get it back.

I just realized

I get it back this year.

Oh, good.

It was like a six-year deal

that we get it back.

I'm really excited about it.

How's the stuff?

Is it all different stuff?

Yeah.

And it's like, and you're not like timely.

No, no, no.

It's nothing.

It's all like family stuff.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, this one I thought was really funny.

And that audience was so fucking good.

They were amazing.

I mean, it's a lot of gay men.

They're the best.

That's a huge.

What do you think?

I was trying to figure that out about like, because I noticed it with

Lampinelli used to have big.

You know, I think, first of all, they've made a lot of female comics, if you think about it.

Like,

Saranger Bernhard, Marlon.

It's a specific type, though.

You got to be dirty and angry and aggressive.

You have to be up.

Yes.

And you have to be powerful because they don't get threatened by a powerful woman.

They love it.

Yeah.

And they feel understood by me and accepted.

And I understand their culture because I've spent so much time around gay men, doing gay cruises, like everything.

Yeah.

So,

you know, they feel like I have their back.

I've thought about that before and I've talked about it before.

I don't know.

I don't think I talked about it with you.

That it seemed to me that there was a time in gay culture

where

it was, you know, kind of singular.

And like it was mostly gay men.

Yeah.

But because the women were gay as well, they kind of had a.

Yeah, yeah, that's true.

Like, you know, you've got these like tough butch lesbians that are like, guess we got to go hang out with those guys.

What is she wearing?

Those guys.

I'll become friends with her because I need things fixed in my house.

Yeah.

It is a weird combination.

Right?

It is.

It's real.

Yeah, it's real.

I,

you know,

older lesbians have a thing about some gay men now that they were there for them during AIDS.

They really showed up.

And they feel, I think some of them feel like, you know, gay men don't support them.

Oh, really?

That's the older generation.

Yeah.

I've heard that a lot.

Yeah.

I once saw a sketch, it must have been at the Aspen Comedy Festival that I thought was one of the best sketches about gay culture that I've ever seen because it was really, it was about these gay couple who were the older generation.

And they were just all sitting around with their leather hat.

Ha!

Right, yeah.

And they're having a younger couple over, and these guys were dressed in dockers.

Right.

And just

the comparison of that first generation of Stonewall gay dudes.

That's really funny.

And then the younger generation who are just trying to pass in life.

Right.

It was hilarious.

I wonder what happened to that guy.

John Regi.

He was kind of a genius.

He's a writer.

He's a comic kind of, but he's so funny.

Yeah, I love that kind of stuff.

Because when I travel all over the country, the gay men are different, of course, in certain places.

It's hysterical.

Like you'll go to Oklahoma and some of them are in cowboy hats.

And I'm like, you're really trying to pass for straight.

It's dangerous.

Is that true?

Well,

I don't think they're trying to do it, but it's just, well, I think it's more, obviously more acceptable for them to like walk around Oklahoma, not be so.

And I wonder, I think, it seems to me that even in this sort of authoritarian shit show, that the gay men,

it doesn't seem to be as targeted.

You know, it's all about trans people.

All about trans.

And it seems like, you know, gay people just, there is an integration there.

It's not as stigmatized as it used to be.

Is that true, do you think?

I do.

I think think that

when it comes to kids, though, and stuff, it could be, you know, that's an issue.

But I also think because, you know, Trump is so, like, wants to be liked, a lot of gay men not, I mean, yeah, there's a big handful who supported him.

Well, there's a bunch of Republican gay guys.

That's what I'm saying.

So I think he's like, well, we can lay off them for a while.

Yeah, they got money.

Some of them have money.

Right.

And they like me.

Probably the money more.

Right, you're right.

I'm starting to be concerned that he's not caring as much as he used to about people liking him.

Yeah, Yeah, that's a big concern.

Because then he'll just do anything.

Yeah, if he doesn't give a fuck.

But, I mean, a lot of those tech guys are half gay.

I love that you just said half gay.

Their left side is gay.

Is that wrong?

Did I just say something wrong?

No, I always say that kind of thing.

I think so many, yeah, they're...

Well, I do a whole joke about the young sort of Nazis being kind of like, and gay guys don't like when you make that association, that the reason they're like that is because they're latent or, you know, know, closeted.

It's like, we don't want them.

Yeah, but you're right.

And a lot of them are adorable.

Totally.

It was like, I saw pictures.

I saw pictures, but like,

you know, from like one of those ones, the Charlotte, the one that had

too.

I know.

Oh, my God.

There is so much gay face.

And are they dressing up?

Is this camo drag?

I mean, what is fucking happening?

Is this a March for Equinox?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And now like,

it was crazy.

And some of these guys are getting jawbone implants.

And they're like, what, just come out?

I know.

Well, they probably are.

And they're enraged or scared.

Whatever.

It's all, what's happening?

This is a very specific place to poke.

But yeah, nothing good is happening.

Yeah.

So, but I don't know that the last time you were here, you must have had the kids, but we don't remember talking about it.

I think that I, no, I had an old, so I have one daughter with my ex, Sherry, and then I have three with my ex now, Danielle.

Yeah.

But I was still married when I was in the last time, and I think I had one with Danielle.

Wow.

So, but you had them all from

fresh?

What does that mean, fresh?

They were all babies?

Because it seemed like a bad thing.

Yeah, so what happened?

I'm very open about it.

So

with the first, my first daughter, we used a donor, and Sherry got pregnant.

And then with the next three, with Danielle, used a different donor, of course.

And those, and she got pregnant with three children.

Oh, at the same time?

No, she had Isabella.

And then

three years, yeah, three years later, we had twins, which was not as in vitro.

Oh, yeah, so that's why you didn't even have them then.

I didn't have them.

You just had the one, but you just

when I talked to you after how old's that kid, the oldest?

She's at University of Delaware.

She's a freshman.

She's 18.

Oh, my God.

So if you talk about that in the special, just sort of

kind of having to deal with somebody that age.

Yeah, it's a lot.

I mean, she's the best kid in the world.

She's so good.

But like, she talks like this.

Like, oh my God, when are you coming to visit?

Yeah, yeah.

You know, it's a lot.

My anxious head.

But is that an affectation or is it?

They all talk like that.

Right, that's what I mean.

Yeah, that's bizarre, right?

Yeah.

Yeah, it's a lot.

It's really like

not.

like

present.

Like it's not centered.

Like they're all on their phones.

I thought that

everyone's talking like an influencer.

Right.

But I've talked to people, like I did a movie with some woman who is in her 20s, and they're using phrases and terms.

I don't even know what they're saying.

I have no idea what she says at the time.

Except for cringe.

She calls me cringe sometimes.

And I'm like, you know.

You're cringe.

Yeah.

Well, it's not a bad thing.

Yeah.

No, it's not.

I feel like sometimes I want you to lean into the cringe.

I do it sometimes when people don't want me to.

I don't like being told I'm a comic, so I don't like feeling suppressed or having people tell me what I can and can't say or do or anything.

But I think there's like with this phone inter, like I'm starting to realize just from having done radio in my life that the frequency that people operate in in terms of engaging with people who are talking to them from their phone, it's almost like a mania.

It is mania.

Yeah.

It's like addictive.

It really is.

And you catch it and you talk.

You don't think it.

You just like, you just plow through.

You know, you don't yeah uh kind of like you're not thoughtful right unless that's your particular brand yeah it's not it's not present that's what i mean it's like i don't know what it is but it's it's not uh connected right that's what i mean i i i mean more it's not connected at all yeah yeah but what's she studying does she know what she wants well she's an actress and a singer she's been doing it since she's four i know it's crazy and she's incredible like a broadway singer yeah she was in a movie with de niro and bobby carnaval i forgot how to say his his name.

Nicestic.

Carnavali.

Yeah, when Bobby, he played a comic.

It was like a year or two ago.

I saw that movie.

Oh, yeah.

She called the Autistic Kid?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

She played

the daughter that they went to stay with.

Yeah, I saw that movie.

Yeah, yeah.

She's stunning.

She really is.

And she was like, you know, played.

And you know De Niro, right?

Yes, very well.

Yeah.

Yeah, I worked with him side by side for months.

He saw me at the cellar.

It's crazy.

Yeah.

What did you work with him on?

The movie The Comedian.

Right, that's right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But you guys are still friends?

We haven't talked in a while, but we got very, very close.

I mean, if I reached out to him,

he would talk to me right away.

Did you see him when your daughter was on the movie?

No,

because I was on the road every five.

I mean, it was crazy.

I thought he was great in that movie.

I love seeing him in small parts.

Like, I prefer it these days.

Do you know that when I met him, literally Trump started running for president the first time, and I would be in his trailer with him.

That bunker?

That traveling bunker?

That's unbelievable.

I know.

Unreal.

I did one scene with him in The Joker, and I'm sure he has no recollection of me because I was just

probably a day player to him.

But we had a thing, and it was the day that they had found bombs.

Remember, there was a bomb threat, and there was one at his office.

Yes, yes.

And one

at Hillary Clinton's house or something.

It was a threat.

It wasn't real, but it was that day.

Wow.

So he was managing that situation.

That's crazy.

It was crazy.

Yeah, he would be in his trailer, and I would come in.

He'd be getting his makeup done.

So he would just have, he wouldn't have a shirt on.

He has tattoos everywhere.

Like, it's crazy.

I never expected him.

Really?

Yeah, he has tattoos, and he has an amazing body.

Yeah.

Like, for someone who's my mom's, I mean, it's crazy.

Well, it goes up and down with it.

He'll, he's.

Yeah, that's true.

He's a fat fuck.

Anyway, so he, no, he was watching CNN in the trailer, and he's like, what the fuck, this guy?

Like, it was starting then.

Well, people who live in New York and have had to put up with that guy forever,

they hold it.

They have a history with him.

Sure.

They've hated him since he was just an annoying put.

I've heard so many stories from people that have been in business with him.

Really?

Yeah.

Like, he didn't pay.

He did this.

They're suing him.

Yeah.

I can't, you can't even wrap your brain around it.

So how old are the other kids?

So I have a nine and a half year old and I have twin almost six-year-olds.

It's crazy.

It's a lot.

I'm in love with them.

Do you live with them?

Now I got divorced.

Second time?

Yeah.

But

the first relationship wasn't legal because it wasn't legal at the time, legal marriage.

So

I've technically been married once.

And I live in an apartment 10 minutes from them and they live in the house that I lived in.

Where?

So they are on Long Island.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

So you live in that.

You have an apartment in Long Island?

Like in one of the Jewish towns?

No.

I mean, there's Jews, and we're all hiding, but I'm joking.

No, it's not in one of the Jewish towns, because there's some people might not know, but there's some towns that are really Jewish.

But now they're not like what I grew up with.

They're not like my mom Jews.

No, no.

Persian Jews.

And they're also very religious, some of those towns.

Very.

And isn't some of them Persian?

Yes.

I'm fascinated with the Persian Jews.

I don't know anything about them.

I know nothing.

But it's like, it was almost like, were they always here?

They were, I think so.

No, they just came.

Yeah, aren't there a lot in LA?

Yeah.

Beverly Hills, I hear.

And you go to some store, like a coffee shop over there, and you're like, what the fuck is happening?

I don't know what it is either.

It's like, you know, it's very high-level

fashion, money, but like, it's a thing.

Yeah.

When I was a kid, it was just, you know, Japs, you know, just George Japs.

Me too.

Just

great necked, you know, like, or whatever.

Yeah.

And she's like, hi, how are you?

And now it's like this.

Why do you get in the cam?

Where'd you get that trunk?

I need to get Alex a trunk, and I didn't know where to go.

What's the theme of your bar mitzvah?

Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna hire a band for four hundred thousand dollars.

I'll give you the reference.

That is what I grew up with, yeah.

Not four hundred thousand, no, of course not.

Yeah, but I did grow up with that too.

I grew up, I was bar mitzvah before themes,

me too

Before themes.

Yeah, there's so many themes.

Oh, my God.

It's unbelievable.

I've been to some.

Oh, my God.

It's like, are you kidding me?

What the money they put into these Star Wars or

everything.

Or the wicked.

Who knows?

That actually, they fly in on a brew.

The stars.

Yeah, yeah,

to the pulpit.

Here she comes with her hat.

Wait, um.

It's okay, you can do it.

I just want my gifts.

Oh, God.

I'm trying to remember.

Remember going to them in like the musical chairs, like the boys and the girls.

Like, it was such a thing.

It was.

All I remember was like my bar mitzvah was like

we had had a

for the we did friday night and saturday morning so did we yeah that was like now people do like a like a half hour with another kid yeah

right i know on friday two other ones yeah there's three of them up there it's like what the fuck happened there's 14 kids what's this racket how is this happening they don't have time

i know same thing and i did friday night saturday morning and then we did like a kids party an adult party that's right you did the party at the synagogue my parents were getting divorced so they did not spend a lot on the

parties.

No, it was fine.

I had parties, but it was like the adult party was like after the bar mitzvah.

There were bagels and

at the synagogue.

Yeah, the whole, every synagogue smells like sturgeon.

Yeah.

And then there's the one Holocaust survivor who's putting things in her purse.

And no one says anything.

It's like, it's okay.

Just in case they come again.

You just had the one.

It was so heavy.

My grandmother would take rolls from every single.

She had a lot of money.

And even if I remember one time it had a bite out of it.

There was a roll that had a bite out of it.

And I'm like, yeah, she took it.

It had a lipstick around it.

She's like, I'll cut around it.

Do you remember the place?

Did you ever go to Fort Lauderdale?

Yes.

Do you remember Wolfie's?

Yes.

I used to go, both grandmothers, of course, lived in South Florida.

And you'd go to Wolfie's, and then they could take the bread.

It was like the big, the whole basket.

That's how everyone went.

They bring the basket of Danish and rolls, and they're like, you can just take them.

If somewhere has good bread, every Jew will go.

Like,

it's really a reason.

You know what's amazing about the Jewish, I don't know what's down there anymore.

I don't know if they've run them all out, but that whole culture of Jews in the restaurants is that I realized that, like, my buddy, my buddy, my mom's boyfriend, all a Jewish man wants when he gets to a certain age is to be able to walk into a restaurant and the guy at the restaurant goes, there he is.

That's what their whole life is.

That is so funny.

John, how are you, John?

We got the table you like.

And that's it.

That's the big payoff.

Yeah.

So how are you, my friend, today?

Yeah.

That is so funny.

Where's your favorite?

And they get there at three o'clock for dinner because it's cheaper.

And the thing is, is like none of the restaurants are good.

Oh, they're horrible.

They're all horrible.

Yeah.

It's like, and they always get fish.

My grandparents always got like filet assault, amandine, and they shared it.

They had a whole thing going on.

Tupperware, the whole thing.

It's just a social thing that like, you know, they all think they're like, this is the best one.

Yeah.

What do you mean?

Yeah, they love me there.

Yeah, they love me there.

My grandmother would wake me up at five in the morning and ask me what I want for dinner when I went to Florida.

Where do you want to go for dinner?

I'm like, what?

She's like, do you want

Italian or a diner?

I'm like, I don't even know where I am right now.

Just like, and then breakfast, she would just give me like half a grapefruit because I always had a little weight to lose.

So she would feed me.

Like, do you really think I'm not going to get food somewhere else?

Yeah.

I could go eat it anywhere.

It's just so funny.

Because like it digressed with John,

he like was a regular, I think the IHOP.

I love that he was a regular.

It sounds like he's a comm, like he's a.

But that's what he did.

He's like, he goes over there.

They give me the thing.

It's like, you mean the thing everyone else gets?

No, I get a little different.

It always has to be a little different.

You can't just get the breakfast.

It's like, well, you know what I like with the potatoes.

No, they know me very well.

They give me the hash browns, not the French.

But, you know, well done.

Yeah, well done.

Everything has to be well done, by the way.

Every omelette, every Jew eats a well-done onelet.

I mean, the lox, eggs, and onions, but the onions have to be black.

Who else would eat lox, eggs, and onions?

Yeah.

It's the best, though.

It's the best.

We grew up on the same thing.

Lox, eggs, and onions.

I remember the first time I had that, I was like, this is the best thing in the world

in the the world.

Yeah.

And well-done onion.

Yeah, we love well-done onion.

I remember one time I was so,

to the point where I'm traumatized by it.

I worked at a Jewish deli in Boston.

It was like, and Boston Jews are different.

Like, there is a...

You know, and I grew up with Jersey Jews, but, you know, I was in New Mexico.

It doesn't matter.

But I was an old Jewish man when I was 10.

So, but I get a job.

I think it was in the 80s, summer when I was in college at this place, Gordon's Deli, and and it was a real Jewish deli in Boston.

But Boston Jews, it's a different thing.

They have like five, four different kinds of rye bread.

Oh, wow.

It was very interesting because they had sissel rye, which was seeded.

They had light rye.

They had seeded.

Yeah, they had light rye, no seeds.

They had pumpernickel.

Right.

Pumpernickel.

And then they had dark rye, which was just a little darker than the light rye.

So there was four.

It was kind of crazy, but it was real.

It was the real deal.

It was so good.

I mean, you know, they still had kishka.

Who the fuck eats kishka?

It is so disgusting.

It's kind of, I remember the first time I tried it.

I'm like, what is it even?

I know.

I can't even.

It's like stuffing in an intestine.

Oh, God.

I know.

I've tried all of that.

So, of course,

I ate all of it.

But so one time

a guy orders a lock eggs and onions, and I'm making it.

And we had this one pan that was an old, you know, a cast iron pan that we had the cooked onions, right?

And these onions were black.

They were perfect.

And there was just what I assumed was enough left for a good Leo, good box, eggs, and onions.

So I just mix it all in there with the oil from the onions.

I thought, this is beautiful.

Right.

And I make that thing and

they serve it and the guy brings it back.

He says, too many onions.

I'm like, what the fuck?

Well, how could you even tell me that?

Because a lot of them just have to complain.

I know.

I know, but it was like, I had, I would, oh my God.

I remember one time, like, I served something at the counter, and there was a guy, the cook, who used to make the briskets and and the corned beefs and the puddings and stuff.

So good, right.

Well, you know, some guy, I asked the guy who was eating at the counter, this old Jew, I go, How is it?

He goes, It's good, you want to try something?

And I took a bite off his plate.

I've never heard that before.

You work in a restaurant.

I just was like, All right, so I took a bit.

And the cook pulls me into the kitchen.

What the hell are you doing?

I've got a whole plate.

I've got a whole platter back here.

You're eating off of their plates?

The fuck is wrong with you?

I can't believe

Sonny.

That was his.

Of course, his name was Sonny.

We had a Sonny's bagels in my town growing up.

Yeah, and then there was the fucking owner.

His name was Shelly.

Shelly is such a Jew.

People would not know that, but Shelly is such an old Jewish man.

Or Shep.

He was Shep.

He was this old guy.

Shelly.

He wasn't even that old, but he was obese.

And he owned it with his wife,

who he hated.

And it was just a fucking nightmare this sounds like a sitcom and there was a chinese place next door yeah so shelly would sit in his fucking deli in the corner booth with a with a with a plate full of boneless spare ribs from the chinese place and just

like and just shoveling them into his mouth this is so i can picture this entire thing oh my god

it's crazy but like there were a lot of guys old guys

like there was like old jewish cops there was a jewish like you know gangsters would come in and I was like oh we're doing that too now you know but we've always been doing that then there was one guy they used to come from the hospital yeah like they'd have the fucking thing on the tape

you know they have the fucking tape from the blood test they're about to die they're about to die

yeah they're like I shouldn't

I shouldn't

give me that what do you got give me a potato pan yeah yeah exactly there's nothing better than a potato pan I mean a good one with yeah no it's the best.

Yeah.

Do you make them?

Yeah, but they take a long time to make.

Do they?

Yeah, you put onzooks.

And you got to sweat them.

And then you put matzo meal.

Yeah, and you cook the onions.

Yeah, yeah.

I used to make, I used to, I made kasha varnishkas with schmaltz once.

Really?

Old school.

Yeah.

Sounds great.

It was great, but you got to figure out how to get schmaltz.

You got to cook a chicken.

Right.

And then you got to get the, because if you cook the onions and schmaltz, it's like a whole fucking other thing.

Yeah.

And then, yeah, yeah.

Do you want to know the first time I was in my 20s, I made matzo ball soup?

I called my mother, I don't know what's happening, but it tastes like water.

It's literally, there's no taste.

She goes, what did you put in it?

And I said, breasts of chicken.

She goes, Jessica, you have to put a chicken.

I literally cut up breasts of chicken and put it in.

And to make the broth?

Yeah.

Oh, no.

I got real hung up with the soup.

You got to get bones.

I know.

I was saving bones for a while.

Yeah.

And to get it with flavor.

My fucking grandmother, who I love, Goldie, she would just put the instant.

Really?

Yeah, she bulk it it up.

She made pretty good.

I love the name Goldie.

My great-grandmother's name was Sadie.

Ike and Ida were my great.

Yeah.

I have Jack, Jacob.

That's Jacob, Jack, Goldie, and then Eleanor.

And Ben.

Yeah, these are, my grandparents were Beatrice and Irving.

That's my mom's parents' name.

Then there was a woman who I think for my entire childhood, when I go to my grandmother's house for whatever parties,

there was a woman that seemed to be like 100 years old.

And she would just sit.

She would be the only one that would sit in the plastic covered furniture.

And I'd be like, who's that?

And she's like, that's Tanta.

Tanta, yeah.

Tanta Schandel.

And it was my grandmother's aunt, Tanta.

Yeah, Tanta.

Didn't speak English, really.

What did she speak?

Yiddish?

Polish.

Oh.

A little bit.

But I don't remember ever having a conversation with her.

Yeah.

Some of them don't want to talk to you.

Yeah, yeah.

They're just like done.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, there was, and then my grandfather played cards with these guys.

Oh, they all played.

My grandmother, Mahjan.

My grandmother played Mahjong every day.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

They had the Mahjong there.

The wives played the Mahjong.

And then the guys would play the Joe Suskind.

Joe's a good player.

A very good player.

Yeah, my grandparents belonged to a club, you know, a golf club growing up.

I hated going there.

I used to say, I used to like go in the kitchen and be nice to the staff.

I felt bad for every single person that worked there.

And

there was a room where women were allowed to go in.

You could not step foot in the room if you were.

This was when I was a kid, when you were, if you were a woman.

And if you got divorced, the woman couldn't be a member anymore.

Yeah.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

That's crazy.

Yep.

Joe Margolis.

Wait, wait, wait.

I got more.

I have good ones too.

Gershon

Eisenberg.

Gershon.

They call him Gert.

Julie Lairhoff.

That's my uncle's name.

My grandmother.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

And Seymour.

Julie and Seymour were my grandmother's brothers.

Oh,

Sylvia.

You, Sylvia.

That's your go-to.

Yeah.

My great-grandfather was Ike Lairhoff.

Oh, that's good.

Ike.

Yeah, Ike's good.

Ike's good.

Ike's a great name.

Yeah, I like it.

A lot of those names just don't.

Yeah, Sandy.

It's like Dyke.

Sandy.

Sandy's a great name for a Jewish guy, too.

Sandy was great.

Yeah.

These are like names that are like, I guess they had female kind of names.

It's interesting.

Do you remember when you met your first Ari and you're like, what the fuck is that?

Yeah.

Because that was our next generation.

Yeah.

Those are like, oh, this is an Israel thing.

It always felt like an Israel thing when I met someone like Ahuva.

My brother's kids are all Jewish names.

Really?

But they're like biblical.

Matana.

Oh, is he very religious?

No, I think he's gone, had his moments where he was.

Yeah, he had to.

He might be Jewish.

They got Matana, Eden, and Shai.

Oh, okay.

They're all Jewish.

Jewish-y.

Yeah, they are.

Yeah.

So

you see your kids all the time?

Oh, yeah.

I mean, that's why I never

get along with Danielle.

Yes, we do.

We do.

I mean, listen, it took a minute.

Like, it's very hard.

I know you went through it.

It's like

it's very, very difficult when you have kids.

And

I really wanted to keep everything together because I came from parents who had a really bad divorce and they ended up getting along and they were fine with each other for years.

And really, I was lucky.

But the thought of leaving the house

for me, because when my dad left, it was horrific for me.

How old were you?

Oh, bad age.

I was 12 when they got separated and 13 when they got divorced.

But they were not happy forever.

I mean, like, they were not happy.

So I killed, it killed me.

It killed me to leave my kids.

I had a little bit of, and this is just being completely honest, they have two moms.

Yeah.

And now they have one mom moving out.

Like I just felt, I couldn't not project my stuff onto them.

I had to work on that a lot.

Yeah.

Because it really, it wasn't true.

Like they're okay.

Yeah.

But I thought I was damaging them forever.

Right.

I think it's a little different too with a certain amount of self-awareness.

I think

our parents' generations didn't give a fuck.

I mean, they did, but they cared about themselves more.

Yeah.

They did so narcissistic.

Right, right.

If they'd go away, they'd come back and they wanted to make sure you liked them.

That's so true, Mark.

Yeah, not that you felt.

That's true.

So, I mean, I talk about that all the time.

Yeah.

That's it's all like my dad with my kids would always be like, they're not laughing at me.

They're not, they're not excited to see me.

I'm like, because you are scary with a toupee and you yell.

Like,

you know, he was always concerned about how much they loved him or wanted to be around him.

I'm like, they're two.

It's crazy.

My father doesn't even really have a relationship with my brother's kids.

Yeah, it's weird.

I've because

my brother didn't really want it.

And at one time, it was like,

I've done this on stage.

The selfishness

of that generation, it was, I mean, I can't generalize, but

I can't even generalize it with Jews.

I mean, some people had okay.

Of course, yeah.

But my friends did.

There is a type

that create people like us.

You know, my mom was involved in EST.

We've talked about this before, the forum, landmark.

My mom was not.

I think they were, I don't know.

I think they were both kind of, I don't know, they're very vain.

My mom was painting and whatever.

They were never really.

My mom's an art therapist.

When you said she's a painter, I was like, that's interesting.

But my dad,

it was for one of my brother's kids, bar mitzvahs.

And, you know, my parents were divorced, but it was later.

But I had to go get my dad, right?

So there was going to be some sort of lunch or something for the kid.

And I go over to my dad's hotel and he goes, what are we doing?

And I'm like, I guess we're going to go to the thing with the, don't you want to go see the kid?

He's like, yeah, you know, some people get something out of that.

I don't get anything out of that.

Yeah, that's amazing, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah.

And I'm like, all right, what do you want to do?

He goes, you remember those mustard slacks I used to have?

Mustard.

Yeah.

So

we went to the mall to try to find pants.

Incredible, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It was very telling.

Yeah, it's, it's, uh, it, it's not easy because Danielle, first of all, my parents were older.

She is nine years younger than me.

Her parents were very involved.

Oh, okay.

And that's part of the reason why, no, that's part of the reason why I stayed on Long Island because I'm on the road a lot and she, you know, her family's around.

Oh, good.

So it's important.

They help.

They're great.

I don't think I would have survived without my grandmother.

Right.

Right.

They're so helpful and I love them.

Goldie saved my life.

Yeah.

Because I think she genuinely loved me unconditionally.

Right.

I didn't think anyone did when I was growing up.

I really felt that way.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So it's better now.

And I see them all the time.

I mean, every time I'm home, I don't, like, I used to go into the city and do spots all the time.

I don't.

I just spend time with my kids.

Well, that's good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, I think about it all the time.

Like, even as I get older, you know, that these, the repercussions of, you know, whatever parenting we got.

You just, you can't get out from under it.

You can't.

Well, I don't I always say I don't think it it never goes away.

Yeah, but it's like I'm not angry at them.

I'm not either, but I'm I the feeling that I have internally

Like that's to my bones, especially with my mom because she wasn't around a lot when I was growing up.

There's really no way of like filling that hole.

It's real when you grow up without a mom present, it's it's it's hard.

It's constant work.

It's not something I think about every day, but like I was around her in Florida

like two weeks ago.

Really?

Yeah.

And I stuff came up for me.

And I'm looking at me.

I'm older.

Like,

but I'm not angry at all.

Well, that's what I don't like when people say, when are you not going to be angry at your parents?

I'm not.

Yeah, I'm not angry.

I'm not, but, but, but I'm still dealing.

You're traumatized by certain things.

Well, I was in Florida.

This is like in the last decade.

Yeah.

And it was, it was amazing.

Like I'm having one of these conversations or whatever they are with my mother.

And my mother was very sexual.

So like I literally used to bring girlfriends

to Thanksgiving just to run interference.

She's coming at me with the arms, you know, like

the weird touching.

So,

but you know, pretty wait, pretty woman.

So we're sitting there.

I'm like, I used to cook Thanksgiving dinner for everybody.

And I'm like prepping.

I'm cutting carrots or something.

My mother's sitting there with the paper or whatever.

And just out of nowhere, she goes, you know, Mark, when you were a baby, I don't think I knew how to love you.

that is amazing and passing, and I'm like, well, that's it then.

Yeah, that's the answer.

I mean, thank you.

I feel validated.

Go back to my therapist and be like, we're done.

I got it.

That is so unsee, my mom, my mom.

I talk about my mom always did therapy with me,

which is not good.

No, how?

So she would be like, you seem angry.

Draw a picture of your feelings.

And I'll analyze it.

But I'm like, you're the one I'm at.

I said, well, you sit still.

But it's like,

it's not great because i never felt like i could just process my feelings like she tried to fix it i know well that's also it's that fucking thing like they were so needy they were so they needed so much attention and they needed and it's like it yeah it was never just about me ever i i'm i'm i'm in a relationship now where someone's like very like giving and and cares about my feelings and i'm like oh my god this is it was very uncomfortable

i don't know how you dealt with it i didn't trust it.

No, I don't trust it at all.

I know, but you learned,

if you constantly communicate about it, which I don't like doing sometimes, but talk about your fears, it really helps.

Yeah, but how do you deal with the fact that,

you know,

sadly, that being loved in a genuine way is profoundly uncomfortable.

It's very uncomfortable.

But I think

I got to the point, because my ex loved me.

It just, we were not right for each other.

And it just got worse and worse.

And I, you know, there was things that happened.

But I am older now and I'm thinking like, I'm done.

Like, I need to be treated well.

I deserve to be treated like,

you know, like the best.

I deserve that.

I've been through enough hell, like I know you have, in relationships.

I'd rather be alone for the rest of my life.

And my biggest thing was finding someone who's kind and who will work on themselves.

Those were the two, everything else is a plus, is an add-on.

Yeah, but when, so it's very hard to get around when they're kind.

I think you have to be ready for it.

No, I don't.

But when they're kind and then there's party, it's like, you're fucking with me.

Right.

I have that sometimes.

Yeah, yeah.

What do you want?

Like, this is not going to, this is going to end someday.

You're going to switch.

You're going to turn.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I can't trust you.

It's, it's all.

I think also watching someone with other people.

Yeah.

Because she has kids too.

Yeah.

So watching how she is with her kids, that's a big thing.

And also like the priorities become different.

You know, certain things things relax.

You know, you don't give a fuck about certain things as much as you used to.

And you realize, I imagine that companionship and...

It is companionship, friendship.

Yeah, yeah, that it comes down to that.

And it's hard to meet people.

Like, where do you even meet people?

Where do you meet people?

They come up to me.

Yeah, I had a feeling.

I mean, you're so adorable.

You are.

And you're so honest.

I was thinking about it before for a second when you were talking, like, about your mom being sexual.

Like, I just, I'm always impressed at how deep you get like how you look at this stuff and you're so honest it's so funny though it's really beautiful I talk about it here you know and I don't I don't always think about it and

certain things I knew were odd

you know that I know there's elements of my personality that I don't fall I'm not easy to put into a box you know some people like he's cranky Jew it's like I'm not really but if that's what the part you want to see I know and that's what you can connect to that's fine you know but my issues are are very weirdly specific and you know the things I like and how I was brought up.

And because when you have a vacuum at your center of self,

you know, you have a different kind of life because you spend most of your life trying to be something and liking things that other people like.

Right, right.

So you get, I get all these different facets of my personality.

Like we do this thing where they ask me questions to fans and someone goes, What are your favorite, you know, sort of deep-cut Leonard Skynyrd songs?

I'm like, oh, I've got a lot of them.

Like, well, how did I get that?

Well, it's because I wanted to be like, you know, a regular guy.

yeah and like you know

so but the the mom thing like i don't even i think i don't even like i know my dad and his insanity and the depression and the you know the narcissism and all that but i think that my mother is really at the core of it and i don't even want to touch it i know i had i always like i had my dad was not was great he was the funniest person i knew but he was verbally abusive very

um but he was more like you you see it like exactly what you're saying like you just know he has a temper yeah he's charming yeah he's inappropriate at times um he's a great businessman but with my mom it's so deep yeah it's so i know the same thing but they were the diminishers yeah like you know you the yelling the emotional abuse that that's annihilating right but my mom was cutting i know i know it's very underlying it's very and it's very um

it's for me it's so intense because it's mom like it's someone who gave birth to you there's such a connection yeah you know it's it it's different it's just so weird I used to do a bit about you know like how people in my age had living parents and they're they're like you know I talk to my mother all the time and I'm like why

you're like well I ask her for advice I'm like oh my god yeah I would never ask my mother for anything is it just you and your brother yeah oh yeah Yeah, so he has a similar thing

definitely.

Yeah.

But he's like, he's, he's fought it.

Like, I gave up something.

You know, he, he was like, I'm I'm going to be different.

I'm going to do it different.

Yeah.

I'm not, you know, but he, he's also one of those guys that he's a searcher.

I'm not really a searcher like that.

Yeah.

Spiritual, psychological.

Yeah, me either.

He does all the things.

My poor brother, when he was like a kid, do you remember Leo Buscalia?

Yeah.

The hugging psychotherapist he was.

So my brother was like, you know, maybe 12, and somehow he got hold of a Leo Buscalia book.

And the poor kid was just running around hugging everybody.

Oh, that's sweet.

I mean, that's sad, but it's.

Yeah.

So he's like from early on, he's wanted to resolve

this thing to get to.

I stopped.

I stopped a while ago because I'm like, I accepted that people are who they are, especially our parents because they're older.

It's like, what are they going to all of a sudden change now?

I mean, it is what it is.

Yeah, now my dad's losing his mind and like, he's all, you know, soft and, you know, kind of like, you know.

That's so interesting.

Well,

it's just, but

the thing that I identify more than anything else is that they weren't really capable of any sort of selfless love,

but they were filled with worry and panic.

Like that was the love you thought of.

That's right.

I mean, you thought of it.

And it was all about them.

Like, I had this realization.

Dad, yeah.

Yeah, mine too.

I had this realization that they're sort of like, make sure you call if you're going to be late.

But not because they care that you're going to

be able to do that.

They're just like, how would I feel if something happened to you?

Right, right, right.

Yeah.

It would make my life terrible if something was happening.

Well, that my dad could not handle when we were sick.

That's why I said he couldn't handle when we cried.

Like anytime you were vulnerable, he'd be like, great, you have a headache.

This is all I fucking need.

Business is bad.

I got to fucking work on what you're probably sick.

Something's going to happen.

Like it was so dramatic.

It sounds like I'm joking, but it was so dramatic.

And it was all about him and how it affected his day.

My dad was a doctor, and it was just the worst.

It would be the other way.

My mother can't handle sickness.

Really?

So that's, it's a mom.

Like, that's that's not, that's.

My mom just like, if you're, you're sick, she's sort of like, well, maybe you could live at someone else's house for, you know.

Well, maybe if she just killed herself, you wouldn't be sick.

Go outside.

But go get fresh air.

But then my dad was a doctor.

So like, you know, I swear to God, and I tell this story sometimes, like,

Because doctors, they overcompensate.

Yeah, yeah.

And they know other doctors.

I swear to God, when we moved from Jersey, or I think we were in Alaska, my dad was in the service, we came to New Mexico.

And we had been there maybe a month or something.

And I had like terrible stomach pains.

And my dad knew

one doctor because he'd only been there a little while, this guy named Dr.

Chester.

And I only say this because I want the picture

to be thorough.

This guy was this heavyset black man with like, you know, these big sideburns, right?

So I'm complaining about these horrible gas pains or these pains in my stomach.

And my dad's like, I'll call Chester.

He'll come over to the house.

So now I got, you know, my dad,

they do,

I think this might be,

it's not out and out abuse,

but this guy, Chester, does a rectal exam on me.

Yeah.

How old were you?

I must have been 10.

Oh, my God.

In the bathroom of our house that we just moved into.

While my dad is standing there.

Yeah, this is traumatizing.

Yeah.

Very traumatizing.

And then he decides I have appendicitis.

And within a week, I'm in the hospital.

And this guy,

yeah, my dad doesn't know.

They takes my appendix out, doesn't do it right.

The scar is not correct.

And time will tell that this guy might not have been the best doctor in the world.

He wasn't even a doctor.

Can you imagine?

He was the principal.

But the truth is, I probably just had gas.

Oh, my God.

This is so.

But the thing that I guess where this came from with the point was like when you have a doctor in the house, like you want to get attention from them.

So I was a hypochondriac.

I understand.

But you never know, you're going to end up at their friend's house getting a proctological exam.

At a vet.

Yeah, at a vet.

Like I could go to any doctor and I would go.

I would go.

I think I got it.

That's very traumatizing.

I did it with my mom with emotional stuff because if I talked to her about

having something wrong or I was in trauma or something's happening, that's when I got her attention because she would want to do therapy with me.

And

the same exact thing.

Right.

And that was the only way you could get the focus.

Yeah.

The negative attention.

Well, they gave me attention for weight stuff and eating, so I blew up

when I was younger.

Yeah, because it's the only way I can get to the patient.

Well, you talked about then, the special, the fat camp thing.

Yeah, I went to fat camp.

My mom was anorexic, and she always thought I was fat.

There was nothing.

Where are the husky?

Where's the husky section?

I do that in my act now.

I can't believe you just.

My grandmother would be like, Where's the section for the heavy children?

Yeah.

In Bloomingdales.

Should we go to get a fitted sheet?

She's huge.

Where's the husky?

They were so aggressive and loud and inappropriate and boundaryless that that whole generate, like, oh my God.

My mom wasn't really loud, but she was like, she picked her mama.

She was pretty funny.

So she thought you were heavy.

Yes.

Because there's Jewish heavy.

It's 10 pounds or something.

That's right.

Five or ten pounds.

That means you're enormous.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, no.

And she would like, she would like, you know, when I'd go see her, and she'd hug me and she'd pinch my.

side.

Yeah.

Touching with the fat.

Yeah.

She, there was a, sounds like there was a lot of physical

deepest issues are this, the body issues.

It's amazing you take such good care of yourself.

How am I not?

Right now, I'm like, I haven't been to the gym in three days and I'm like, I don't deserve to live.

Yeah, but Mark, you could have gone the other way.

I mean, you could have really not taken care of yourself physically.

And you always, it seems to me, since I've known you.

Yeah,

I'm pretty compulsive about it.

Yeah.

I think we've achieved a lot during this session.

Me too.

I feel much better.

What are you doing for anxiety?

I don't do enough, but I do, of course I'm in therapy.

No, madam.

And I'm sober.

No, I do.

I am medicated, but on a small amount, but I need to be.

I just started one.

Yeah, I have to.

For the first time in my life.

Really?

Yeah.

Wow.

How do you know?

I did Prozac years ago for a month or two, but no, this is like, I got tired of the,

I,

the guy said I have obsessional anxiety.

That's how I am.

And I know I keep saying where we're very similar.

I have the catastrophic thinking, and then I just, I spend the day with it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I was like that before I was on the current exact same thing.

Now I'm not, I'm on,

um, what's it called?

Tessinflaxine, which is,

oh my God, you don't even know what I'm on.

Yeah, I'm trying to.

I take trezonone at night, which is not addictive to help me sleep.

I tried, I'm on, I'm trying the Busporin.

Yeah, I've done that.

It's good.

Yeah.

Yeah, because it's not, it's not.

It's not like a total brain number.

It's not.

No.

Prozac, when I did Prozac when I was in college, I didn't didn't feel a thing.

I'm not even kidding.

I was like a vegetarian.

It's like a ghost.

Everything becomes a phantom limb.

Yeah, I did not.

I didn't cry.

I didn't laugh a lot.

Your brain knows you're supposed to be, but it's just sort of like, no, I guess, I don't know.

Yeah, when I'm on, I feel my emotions.

I cry, I can laugh.

How long have you been sober now?

I've been sober four and a half years back.

I relapsed during COVID.

Oh, really?

Was that fun?

No, it was never fun.

I know you've never relapsed, but that was not my first relapse.

And it's just a nightmare.

Yeah.

I tell people because I'm like, don't do it.

There was no enjoy.

First of all, I did not do it to get high.

I did it to knock myself out.

Meaning I just, I took, I smoked like tons of

pot and took ambien.

Yeah.

Oh, really?

That's the only thing I, not, not the only thing, but meaning I took a ton of ambien and I just wanted to knock myself out.

Because you were so stressed out.

I was miserable.

I was very upset about my career, like with COVID.

I was not happy in my relationship and I was stuck home, not on the road.

And then my dad passed away during COVID.

So I was done.

Yeah, I, it's, uh,

well, it's, it's interesting that with the awareness you had that the relapse had intention, you weren't lying to yourself.

You weren't like, I can do it.

You're like, no, I want to do this to do, get this effect.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You weren't like, you know, I can control it or anything like that.

No, I, I know.

I, there's never been a time when I'm like, I can smoke a little pot.

That was a long time ago.

I'm like, I love when people are like, why can't you smoke a little pot?

I'm like, cause I'll end up eating out of the garbage and like fucking every friend when they don't even want me to.

Like, I'm out of my mind.

I'm a complete animal addict.

Yeah.

I can't just have a hit of pot.

I know.

I know.

I know.

Like, well, now I'm on these nicotine things.

I say it on stage.

I'm like, look, I've been sober a long time and you just need a little something.

Yeah, of course.

You just need a little something to keep the big empty away.

I know.

That's, I

mom's inappropriateness.

I need a pouch.

She's coming at me.

Yeah.

Oh, the vacuum.

So

what are you promoting?

I love that you just said that.

I have a special on Animal Planet called Moo.

You can't get unless you have the premium.

Yeah.

No, the special is so funny.

It's called I'm the Man, and

it's on Hulu.

It's coming out April 25th.

And I'm really proud of it.

Like, I really had to watch it.

I

was watching myself.

But you were great, though, how you felt all right about it.

It's interesting when you finally do it.

You're like, oh, that's me.

I did because of the way that we edited it for a long time.

And like, just, it's fast-moving.

Yeah.

People don't need to think a lot.

I'm just, I do a lot of characters.

I appeal, which I've always been conscious of to straight men.

Meaning, like, it's not like a female comic smell.

You're like an old school, like, you know, pounder.

Yeah, that's exactly how I feel.

Good, you know, a lot of good, dirty jokes, a lot of good personal jokes.

This one's a little dirty.

This one's dirty.

You know, like half of it, but the last one I did is not at all.

And the next one won't be.

It's just for some reason, this one.

You got to get it out.

Yeah, I feel like I wanted to.

What do you mean the next one?

I'm working on material, meaning like whatever I put out.

How's it different?

It's really not about sex or it's more like stuff that everyone goes through kind of thing.

You know, like going to weddings.

Oh, okay.

So it's about

experiences that people have in common, but it's you

doing it.

Yes.

It's about having kids and different funny things that I'm experiencing.

It's more.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, good.

Well, I thought it was great.

I always like talking to you.

I love talking to you.

You're amazing.

Nice to see you.

You too.

There you go.

Jessica's special, I'm the man, is on Hulu.

It's streaming starting tomorrow.

Yeah, hang out.

Hang out.

Hang out for a minute.

Folks, we posted a new bonus episode this week covering a bunch of things.

My upcoming episode with David Cronenberg, my talk with Mike Berbiglia, and my mouth, which has gotten me into trouble my whole life.

The difference between my engagement around this stuff

and around speaking my mind,

that I is part of me and and it is something I do and it is important.

But there is another operative part of me of like, you know, oh man, you know, now I've caused all this trouble for myself.

I've caused other people trouble and, you know, now I have to sit with that or try, you know, I've gotten better at that because you got to do some things that are going to come back at you in the form of

attacks or trolling or, you know, judgment.

And, you know, it's just life.

But I'm very aware of the decision making around doing it.

Well, one of the things that I always take to heart,

and I remember hearing this from one of Letterman's producers, that Letterman told the producers of the show, your job is to protect me from myself.

I've always taken that to heart.

And I don't mean that from the sense of like, I've got to censor you.

I obviously do not because like we, you know, have a pretty connected relationship on that.

It's literally protecting me from myself.

It's not censoring, but that's why, like, you know, when I think about doing things, I'm like, got to run this by the brain.

That bonus episode is available for Full Marin subscribers.

To sign up for the Full Marin and get bonus episodes twice a week, go to the link in the episode description or go to wtfpod.com and click on WTF Plus.

And a reminder before we go, this podcast is hosted by ACAST.

Here's some

guitar feels.

Boomer lives, monkey and the fonda, cat angels everywhere.