#180 - Robert Smigel

Robert Smigel joins the podcast to discuss his new podcast HUMOR ME, the origins of Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, trying and failing to become a dentist, the formidable Jewfro he donned until his mid-30s, how he could have wound up a Reddit guy if things went differently, and much more. Robert and Stav help callers including a man who wants to get tattoos to attract goth chicks but is scared his grandma will write him out of her will if he does, and an escort whose favorite client betrayed her trust. Tune into Robert Smigel's new podcast HUMOR ME: https://www.youtube.com/@humormersaf https://www.instagram.com/humormersaf/ Follow Robert Smigel on social media: https://www.youtube.com/@TriumphTheInsultComicDogHQ https://www.instagram.com/triumphicdhq/ https://x.com/TriumphICDHQ Thanks to our sponsors!! Twisted Tea - https://www.twistedtea.com/locations Keep It Twisted!! Cash App - Download Cash App Today: https://capl.onelink.me/vFut/wyx330el Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App’s bank partner(s). Prepaid debit cards issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC. See terms and conditions at https://cash.app/legal/us/en-us/card-agreement. Cash App Green, overdraft coverage, borrow, cash back offers and promotions provided by Cash App, a Block, Inc. brand. Visit http://cash.app/legal/podcast for full disclosures. ☎️ Want to be a part of the show? Call 904-800-STAV and leave a voicemail to get advice! 🎟️ See Stavvy live on the Dreamboat Tour 🛥️💕!!! https://stavvy.biz/ for tickets ‼️ Bonus episodes every week! Unlock exclusive, Patreon-only episodes at https://www.patreon.com/stavvysworld

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Stavros Halkias?

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• 0:30Speaker 01

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• 1:01Stavros Halkias?

  Opah, welcome everybody to Stavi's World, 904-800-Stavi. Call in, we'll solve your problems. We have an incredible episode. Robert Schmigle is here, a hero of mine, one of the funniest guys. But, but he, one of his friends, a very high-profile friend of his, he, he, he will not stay for the whole episode, but he did have some things he wanted to get off his chest, so very quickly, like, whoa! Triumph, the installed comic dog!

• 1:29Speaker 02

  It's Stavi baby, yes! What a thrill!

• 1:33Stavros Halkias?

  Thank you for being here Triumph.

• 1:34Speaker 02

  Thank you, aren't I a good actor?

• 1:36Stavros Halkias?

  You're incre-

• 1:37Speaker 02

  I'm so excited! No, Stavi baby, yes, it's so exciting. Everyone calls you Stavi baby, am I correct?

• 1:45Stavros Halkias?

  That's right Triumph.

• 1:46Speaker 02

  I, I, I understand that's because you look like someone rolled an infant around the barber shop floor. Am I right?

• 1:53Stavros Halkias?

  That's actually not right.

• 1:54Speaker 02

  That's not correct?

• 1:55Stavros Halkias?

  No, no, no.

• 1:55Speaker 02

  Oh, okay.

• 1:57Stavros Halkias?

  It's just kind of a-

• 1:58Speaker 02

  That sounds like some kind of joke that was pre-written then.

• 2:02Stavros Halkias?

  No, no, that's just, yeah, just, I don't know, a nickname. Has nothing to do with me being a, an infant rolled on discarded hair.

• 2:09Speaker 02

  Okay, alright, I, I'll take your word for it. Well, let me ask you this, you know?

• 2:13Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:14Speaker 02

  You started the show with the "Opa", which implies that you're Greek.

• 2:18Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 2:19Speaker 02

  A hundred percent Greek, I understand.

• 2:21Stavros Halkias?

  Hundred percent.

• 2:21Speaker 02

  And yet, the god that you're most associated with is Buddha.

• 2:27Speaker 02

  Because Buddha has a huge stomach and this gentleman to my right also well you get the idea you have eyes but you know I'm kidding I kid I kid you're so likeable that's why you're a hit you know you have this magnetic personality and not just because your body has its own gravitational pull you're like me you know you're foul mouthed you're politically incorrect liberal it's okay don't do it in the middle of my jokes you do it maybe after the punchline you know boy

• 3:06Stavros Halkias?

  I'm sorry Triumph

• 3:07Speaker 02

  Have you learned nothing from Conan watching him all these years it's okay it's okay he's still talented folks I assure you now you have this wonderful magnetic personality did I already do this joke

• 3:22Stavros Halkias?

  I have my own gravitational field

• 3:27Speaker 02

  my god

• 3:29Stavros Halkias?

  What about what else

• 3:30Speaker 02

  I mean I am like 700 years in human years at this point so I'm entitled to a little abyssal Alzheimer's okay you're like me you're foul mouthed you're politically incorrect liberal who few people realize is an actual human being you're just like me you see no let's go but let's go through your incredible career that led you to this show in this incredibly shitty apartment you started

• 4:03Speaker 02

  you have low standards and it's okay you know you need to have low standards when you look in the mirror okay you became famous on come town am I right and I'm not referring to your beard

• 4:19Speaker 02

  Come down. Now that was known as the Flag Shift Podcast of quote unquote, "The Dirtbag Left."

• 4:26Stavros Halkias?

  I suppose. Sure, some people have called it that.

• 4:28Speaker 02

  Coincidentally, that's also what everyone says when you leave a room. "The Dirtbag Left."

• 4:37Speaker 02

  But honestly, I'm a huge fan. Now this is a good time to-

• 4:40Stavros Halkias?

  Now's for a good time for the cigar.

• 4:41Speaker 02

  Put the cigar back in the mouth. Yes. There we go. Now honestly, I'm a huge fan.

• 4:48Speaker 02

  I mean, honestly, you are as funny as you are gross. Now, that's not fair. That's not fair at all because a gross is 144 pounds and you look much closer to 315, 320. Did you have a nice Easter?

• 5:02Stavros Halkias?

  I did, I did.

• 5:03Speaker 02

  Tell me, what colors did the kids paint you this year?

• 5:08Speaker 02

  See, now we're unpleasant subjects, the holidays. By the way, I know you're not Jewish, but you might want to, may I suggest celebrating Passover? Just to go a week without bread for once.

• 5:21Stavros Halkias?

  I'll keep it in mind, Triumph. Thank you.

• 5:24Speaker 02

  I deserve mine.

• 5:25Stavros Halkias?

  You deserve a cigar.

• 5:27Speaker 02

  Okay, but no, you're wonderful. You're, you know, look at this guy. He's, you're so down to earth, you know? Fame hasn't changed you one pound. And it's great, not today, but it's great that you like to still wear Hawaiian shirts, even though Hawaiians are constantly trying to roast you on a stick. You see, again, because of, now that's an either or with this joke, so you and editing can decide. You know, I know you've been eating, I understand you've been eating better lately.

• 5:58Stavros Halkias?

  A little bit, sure.

• 5:59Speaker 02

  Nuts of fruits and vegetables, even though every time you have an apple in your mouth, people think they're at the luau. You see? Okay, so that's an either or with the premiere.

• 6:09Stavros Halkias?

  I think we keep them both.

• 6:10Speaker 02

  Whatever you say, you know? I don't, maybe, we don't want the kids to see how the sausages are made or eaten.

• 6:20Speaker 02

  Now, you're wonderful. He's so much more than a fat podcaster, honestly. I am really simplifying the complex sight that you have before you. For example, this is an actor. I loved you in Begonia.

• 6:36Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, thank you.

• 6:36Speaker 02

  It's like you were born to play a child molesting cop.

• 6:42Stavros Halkias?

  I think there's a little more to it than that, but yeah, thank you.

• 6:46Speaker 02

  More to it than that with the aliens and all that.

• 6:50Speaker 02

  No, you know what? By the way, I read you inspired another movie. I read that the writer Andy Weir got the idea for aliens eating the sun in Project Hail Mary after seeing you at the breakfast buffet.

• 7:04Stavros Halkias?

  That kind of metaphorically inspired him.

• 7:07Speaker 02

  Not, pretty much metaphorically.

• 7:12Stavros Halkias?

  You think I could literally eat the sun? Try him? Is that what you're accusing me of?

• 7:16Speaker 02

  Why are you putting yourself down like that? Dream big. Come on, Stavi, you're doing great. He's in a Napa Town movie and he's worried about eating the sun. You can do it.

• 7:33Speaker 02

  I understand he's in Napa Town. He's, he's everywhere. You're also on tires. Because a regular couch can't support you.

• 7:42Speaker 02

  That's a thinker. That's a thinker.

• 7:46Speaker 02

  And people love your film, Let's Start a Cult. You know, that's where it all began. You shot that movie, I understand, for under a million dollars.

• 7:54Stavros Halkias?

  Yup.

• 7:54Speaker 02

  Despite a $900,000 craft service budget.

• 8:01Speaker 02

  Yes. No, it's about, uh, the name of that movie should have been not Let's Start the Cult, Let's Finish Those Cold Cuts.

• 8:13Speaker 02

  But people love this man. People love you. Because even though you're still anti-woke, you lean heavily to the left. But then sometimes you also lean to the right. The point is, you need to lean on something in order to stand up for more than a couple of minutes.

• 8:34Speaker 02

  I know you've been through a lot in your life. I don't want to joke, you know, not long ago, things looked much darker and you were kind of falling apart and all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put you back together again. That's gonna bump with the earlier egg joke.

• 8:48Stavros Halkias?

  I think you've got it confused with Humpty Dumpty.

• 8:52Speaker 02

  Well, I'm worried about the earlier egg joke, you know, again. It's gonna step on it. So that's again, up to the editors.

• 8:59Stavros Halkias?

  Sure. We don't, I don't know if you're familiar with the program Triumph. We don't do a lot of editing.

• 9:03Speaker 02

  Oh, my goodness. I forgot.

• 9:06Stavros Halkias?

  For you, we can, bud.

• 9:07Speaker 02

  No, no, no, no. I respect your lack of professionalism. No, this is a great man. All kidding aside. The fuck was that? Even trucks fart around this guy. They want to fit in. No, you're a wonderful man. And, you know, I want to say, you know, we can joke all we want, but this is a truly, this is at heart, a very serious and selfless man. I mean, this man helped elect Mandani, Mam Dany, just so that he could give New Yorkers free rides on buses, even though he himself can't physically fit in one. And with that, I rest my case.

• 9:56Stavros Halkias?

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• 10:41Stavros Halkias?

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• 11:26Stavros Halkias?

  So you could stay ahead of the season. I'm loving AG1. You know, I'm back in, I'm back at it with the health. Stavi gets ripped is coming back. AG1 is now, now they're a nice building block to me. Keep checking back, folks. Let's see how it's going. I'm feeling more energetic. I'm ready to go. And I will say, other little vitamin, I've tried a lot of stuff. The taste of AG1 is pretty delectable while you're getting healthy. Go to drinkag1.com/stavi and for a limited time, get a free immune support bundle, including a bottle of omega-3 fish oil and a bottle of vitamin D3K2 with your first subscription order of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro. That's drinkag1.com/stavi.

• 12:11Speaker 02

  Hi, what just happened?

• 12:13Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, yeah, your, your friend came. He was actually pretty rude to me.

• 12:16Speaker 02

  What an asshole.

• 12:17Stavros Halkias?

  What's going on with that guy? You guys go back, huh?

• 12:21Speaker 02

  Wait, I gotta.

• 12:22Stavros Halkias?

  You need a second.

• 12:25Stavros Halkias?

  There we go, hold on. I put, I make them extra hard just to alpha the guests.

• 12:33Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, fuck, that was. Now I have to chug it down. Yeah.

• 12:40Stavros Halkias?

  One of the gayest waters.

• 12:47Stavros Halkias?

  Robert, thank you for being here. Get hydrated, baby. Ah, that was, uh...

• 12:52Speaker 02

  God, you have an audience.

• 12:53Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, we have a stadium. There's 15,000 people watching us out on that side. Uh, thank you for, thanks for being here. Uh, Triumph.

• 13:03Speaker 02

  Holy shit, Knicks and Nets.

• 13:05Stavros Halkias?

  What's that about? You're, you're...

• 13:06Speaker 02

  I like the logo. It's a really pretty logo.

• 13:09Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, it's just, it's just the graphic design.

• 13:11Speaker 02

  Space age, basketball. No, this is the Nets when Jason Kidd.

• 13:14Stavros Halkias?

  Yes, I remember that team.

• 13:15Speaker 02

  I love that.

• 13:16Stavros Halkias?

  That was a cool team.

• 13:17Speaker 02

  I love the Knicks now.

• 13:18Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, sure, sure.

• 13:19Speaker 02

  I mean, that's really my team, but...

• 13:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Jason Kidd team was cool. Jason Kidd team, they had, uh...

• 13:25Speaker 02

  Kari Kiddles.

• 13:26Stavros Halkias?

  Kari Kiddles, of course.

• 13:27Speaker 02

  They drafted instead of Kobe Bryant.

• 13:28Stavros Halkias?

  Yep, yep. That was a big one. Uh, they had, uh...

• 13:33Speaker 02

  Keith Van Horn.

• 13:33Stavros Halkias?

  Keith Van Horn, the Great White Hope, of course.

• 13:35Speaker 02

  Richard Jefferson.

• 13:36Stavros Halkias?

  Young Richard Jefferson, fly, high dunking. He was awesome. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 13:40Speaker 02

  Now he, uh, is just an annoying commentator.

• 13:42Stavros Halkias?

  Now he's an annoying commentator, yeah, now. Now, uh, he looks like a claymation dinosaur, uh, in, I believe, in, in his retirement. He's got that kinda going for him. He's got some, teeth-wise, he's got little dino teeth.

• 13:54Speaker 02

  Kari Kiddles also had sort of a Gumby claymation's head.

• 13:58Stavros Halkias?

  They were a very claymation type team. And then Kenyon Martin, very not.

• 14:02Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 14:02Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. He was awesome. He was the man.

• 14:05Speaker 02

  I was there when they were swept by the Lakers. My dad managed to get tickets somehow.

• 14:10Stavros Halkias?

  Really?

• 14:11Speaker 02

  For the finals. And it was, uh, yeah, no, but they, they were a great team, but they didn't have anybody who could guard Shaq.

• 14:17Stavros Halkias?

  I mean, that's what happened. They would get, they would come out of the East, and then they would just get rolled. Yeah. Spurs, then the Lakers.

• 14:23Speaker 02

  The Spurs and the Lakers, yeah. What are you gonna do?

• 14:25Stavros Halkias?

  So, welcome back to the 2000's Basketball Hour, folks. But this is very dangerous, because I would talk about this for an hour.

• 14:31Speaker 02

  I know, I know. Sorry. I saw the, I saw the Knicks hat, and I go...

• 14:36Stavros Halkias?

  We're good. That's interesting, though, because as a, you, now, wait, you grew, you were born here?

• 14:40Speaker 02

  I was born in Manhattan, yeah.

• 14:41Stavros Halkias?

  You were born in Manhattan, okay. But you did go, I mean, all your, like, I think of you as a Chicago guy comedically.

• 14:47Speaker 02

  Yes, that's correct.

• 14:49Stavros Halkias?

  So it's interesting, I didn't, I had just assumed you were a Chicago guy, but, uh, we're talking, you were born...

• 14:55Speaker 02

  I take that as a compliment.

• 14:56Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, oh, yeah. So you were born here, and then how long did you just...

• 15:00Speaker 02

  And you probably assumed I wasn't Jewish, which is even more... Strange, even more credulity.

• 15:08Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, this is one of those.

• 15:09Speaker 02

  Just a Chicago. I thought of you as an Irish cop son from Chicago.

• 15:15Speaker 02

  No, I lived in Chicago for a couple of years after college. College was a disaster for me.

• 15:19Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, really?

• 15:20Speaker 02

  I was trying to be a dentist.

• 15:21Stavros Halkias?

  You're trying to be a dentist?

• 15:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, my father was a really talented dentist. He developed like tooth bonding.

• 15:27Stavros Halkias?

  Whoa, yeah, yeah. My mom worked at a dental lab.

• 15:30Speaker 02

  If he saw you right now, he'd be like, I could close that gap. It would take me a half an hour.

• 15:36Stavros Halkias?

  I love the gap.

• 15:37Speaker 02

  It's the course.

• 15:38Stavros Halkias?

  They asked to.

• 15:39Speaker 02

  The gap's meant to don't ever close that gap.

• 15:41Stavros Halkias?

  Thank you. So he invented tooth. So you were trying to be a dental nepo baby?

• 15:45Speaker 02

  I didn't think I could be in commerce. Who thinks they can actually succeed in this, you know?

• 15:50Stavros Halkias?

  So you went, so you, but you went fully. You finished college as like a dental student?

• 15:53Speaker 02

  It took me literally five and a half years and transferring. I started at Cornell because I was a good high school student. But then I, science was the hardest thing for me. I tried to take pre-dental courses and they're just fucking weed out courses.

• 16:07Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 16:08Speaker 02

  They just go extra fast to just separate.

• 16:10Stavros Halkias?

  Who's too fucking stupid?

• 16:12Speaker 02

  You know?

• 16:12Stavros Halkias?

  That's my favorite. When you get to college day one and you meet a bunch of idiots who are like, yeah, I'm pre-med, pre-law. You know what I mean? Pre-led, pre, I got a, I got a Spanish minor. Like they think they're going to be like the first ever doctor, dentist, lawyer combo. And then they fail out of biology 101, you know, instantly.

• 16:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, I didn't have anywhere near that confidence. I was just like, I better do this because what else am I going to do? I had no ambition to do anything but be funny.

• 16:40Stavros Halkias?

  So you just assumed, all right, my dad's a fucking dentist.

• 16:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:44Stavros Halkias?

  I'll just be a guy who laughs, who makes, you know, gets fucked up and roasts my friends.

• 16:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:50Stavros Halkias?

  And be a, and be sad picking at people's teeth, being in a sad existence.

• 16:57Speaker 02

  Well, bonding's more, tooth bonding, like that side of dentistry is more fun than drilling cavities and shit.

• 17:03Stavros Halkias?

  Interesting.

• 17:03Speaker 02

  People were really grateful, like, hey, you closed the gap.

• 17:06Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 17:06Speaker 02

  Thanks, I like it.

• 17:07Stavros Halkias?

  So you wanted to be a niche, a niche dentist?

• 17:10Speaker 02

  A niche dentist.

• 17:10Stavros Halkias?

  You couldn't even see yourself as like a broad? You can't, you just.

• 17:14Speaker 02

  But that's the thing in college, in pre-dent, you have to go through all that shit. Like my dad was like, this is such a pain in the ass. I could teach you what I do in a couple of weeks. You don't have to learn any of this shit.

• 17:27Stavros Halkias?

  So he looked at it like caulking a leaky faucet.

• 17:29Speaker 02

  A little bit.

• 17:30Stavros Halkias?

  He didn't really look at it.

• 17:31Speaker 02

  There was like an artistic element to it for him.

• 17:34Stavros Halkias?

  I get that.

• 17:35Speaker 02

  He hated being a dentist until he figured that out.

• 17:38Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, interesting.

• 17:39Speaker 02

  And then he loved it. And I thought, you know, this is a great way to make a living and then I'll just be funny on the side. Like I was in high school.

• 17:46Stavros Halkias?

  Right. Oh, you were like a, you were like a little class clown?

• 17:49Speaker 02

  I was a such a pain in the ass.

• 17:50Stavros Halkias?

  Really?

• 17:51Speaker 02

  I made fun of my teachers. I drew cartoons of my friends. I imitated everybody. And in a way, like, that's, sometimes I like, kind of miss that. Like, just being funny for funny's sake.

• 18:02Stavros Halkias?

  It was pure.

• 18:03Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 18:04Stavros Halkias?

  I feel that.

• 18:04Speaker 02

  I would draw in the margins of my notebooks. I'd draw cartoons. And there's a part of me that misses.

• 18:09Stavros Halkias?

  Totally.

• 18:10Speaker 02

  Just being, just totally from inspiration, whenever, when you're not supposed to be doing it.

• 18:15Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Instead of commodifying it? Instead of calling, yeah.

• 18:18Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 18:19Stavros Halkias?

  Part of my job, my, my best, just calling my best friend an idiot has become part of my job every, every week.

• 18:25Speaker 02

  And every time you think of something funny, it's like, okay, how does that translate into financial reward?

• 18:30Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right.

• 18:31Speaker 02

  It's like, you know, you can't just fucking laugh and enjoy it. It's like, wait, is that something I can do on, on, you know, Colbert? If he ever fucking stays on the air long enough to acknowledge me?

• 18:46Speaker 02

  Have you been on any of those late nights? I bet you've been on Fallon.

• 18:48Stavros Halkias?

  No, I've done, uh, no, I did, um, Seth Meyers, which was so fun.

• 18:53Speaker 02

  Oh, that's great.

• 18:54Stavros Halkias?

  That was a really fun one. No, I haven't done anything.

• 18:56Speaker 02

  You don't need those shows anymore.

• 18:57Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 18:57Speaker 02

  To be a success.

• 18:59Stavros Halkias?

  The reality is you really don't need it. Like, even that stuff is like, for fun.

• 19:04Speaker 02

  Right.

• 19:04Stavros Halkias?

  Like, I'm like, I want to do this because I grew up imagining being the guy who does this. But having four good YouTube videos?

• 19:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 19:13Stavros Halkias?

  So much more important.

• 19:14Speaker 02

  It's way more important.

• 19:15Stavros Halkias?

  Than like going on The Tonight Show or some shit like that. But I still would love to do it, obviously.

• 19:19Speaker 02

  And it's like, uh, it's a pain in the neck for me because like. I did Triumph until Conan moved from New York to LA.

• 19:28Stavros Halkias?

  Hmm.

• 19:29Speaker 02

  And Saturday Night Live too, I did the cartoons there.

• 19:32Stavros Halkias?

  Dude, TV Funhouse, so fucking awesome. And if anybody, by the way.

• 19:36Speaker 02

  Thanks, everybody.

• 19:37Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I do want to take a second and say.

• 19:40Speaker 02

  Show of hands, who liked the ambiguously gay duo?

• 19:42Stavros Halkias?

  This is very funny. You're literally watching this podcast. You're watching how entertainment has degraded over time. Because, because.

• 19:50Speaker 02

  This is more popular than real entertainment.

• 19:53Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, for sure. We're aligned here. You cannot, you will not hurt my feelings. I also know this is a mistake of history. What my life has become is a mistake of history. Because you're used to podcasting as opposed to like, you know, you did the fucking cartoons on TV Fun, check out TV Funhouse if you haven't, if you haven't, the ambiguously gay duo is.

• 20:13Speaker 02

  Right.

• 20:14Stavros Halkias?

  It is so, so much of like, I mean, so much of what you did, you can just see in how comedy has gone, truly. Like Triumph in and of itself, it's like roasts. Understanding there was something people, you actually had an angle. It was funny. It was like, it was actually doing like, you know, this character, why the fuck would a dog, you know?

• 20:34Speaker 02

  It kind of started where the joke was entirely on Triumph.

• 20:38Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 20:38Speaker 02

  The first time I did it, his punchlines, like three out of four punchlines were just, "For me to poop on."

• 20:45Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 20:46Speaker 02

  Just the shitty switcheroo of complimenting you and then just saying, "For me to poop on."

• 20:50Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, you know what? It does break my heart. I didn't get a "for me to poop on." I will admit that.

• 20:55Speaker 02

  I'll get it back. By the end of the show, it'll happen.

• 20:58Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, just call Triumph's people, please. Let's see if we can, let's see if we can get them in.

• 21:02Speaker 03

  I'll see what I can do here.

• 21:03Stavros Halkias?

  At the end of the episode.

• 21:05Speaker 02

  He's already in a limo.

• 21:06Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 21:07Speaker 02

  On his way to, you know, Rumsen, New Jersey.

• 21:10Stavros Halkias?

  On the way out. Yeah, yeah.

• 21:12Speaker 02

  There's a lot of, a lot of dog piss in this neighborhood.

• 21:15Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 21:16Speaker 02

  Couldn't wait to get out of here. No, but it was, yeah, the joke was entirely, almost entirely on him. And then it was like, we quickly realized we could bring it back. Because Conan, as a talk show host. Was unbelievably funny, but he liked to make fun of himself more than other people.

• 21:36Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

• 21:37Speaker 02

  And but we would have shitty, not shitty, I don't want to put these people down, but.

• 21:41Stavros Halkias?

  I will do it shitty. You were on the late, you listen, you were the 1230, the second guest 1230.

• 21:47Speaker 02

  No, no, the first guest sometimes. And we would have people like, we'd have people like John Tesh on.

• 21:52Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 21:53Speaker 02

  Who was like, you know, the audience is dying.

• 21:55Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 21:56Speaker 02

  For Conan to make fun of him in some way, you know, or William Shatner.

• 22:00Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 22:01Speaker 02

  Or Paulie Shore.

• 22:02Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, yeah, oh, yeah, of course.

• 22:04Speaker 02

  We would have people like that, David Hasselhoff.

• 22:06Stavros Halkias?

  Yes, of course.

• 22:07Speaker 02

  And Triumph became this cathartic outlet for the audience.

• 22:10Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 22:11Speaker 02

  Like, he would interview David Hasselhoff, and then he'd say, we've got a very talented,

• 22:16Speaker 02

  you met him at the Westminster Dog Show, and here he is once again. And, um, yeah, and then he would rip the shit out of.

• 22:23Stavros Halkias?

  So great.

• 22:24Speaker 02

  David Hasselhoff, and the audience would be, finally.

• 22:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But what's beautiful about it is like, it's distilled. It's like, you get a nice shot of exactly what you wanted, bang, bang, bang, machine gun jokes. It was awesome. I mean, I loved it. And it is, yeah, so much of it is like, so much is roast, what's, what does well is like, sort of like, roast humor, or, you know, really good character base. I mean,

• 22:49Speaker 02

  Right.

• 22:49Stavros Halkias?

  The fucking, the Bears guys. I realize I've, I've been ripping you off by doing a Baltimore version of.

• 22:56Speaker 02

  Somebody told me that. You know who told me that? Uh, and it didn't bother me, but he said, I don't know if you know this guy. He, he's the president of the Minnesota Timberwolves.

• 23:05Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 23:06Speaker 02

  You know, Tim Connolly?

• 23:07Stavros Halkias?

  I loved him.

• 23:07Speaker 02

  He loves you. He was the first guy.

• 23:09Stavros Halkias?

  Cause he's from Baltimore.

• 23:09Speaker 02

  Yeah. Oh, that's right. And he turned me on to you. He turned me on to you. Uh, he said, you gotta, you gotta check this guy out. He's hilarious. And, um, but yeah.

• 23:20Stavros Halkias?

  I basically, I just want to say, thank you, because I'm realizing how much of your shit I've completely ripped off. The ambiguously gay duo is essentially come town. I mean, I mean, that is, the jokes are like, we're gay, or are we? You know what I mean? We basically, we even got paid a lot more than you did off of that, probably, you know what I mean?

• 23:38Speaker 02

  Good for you, good for you.

• 23:39Stavros Halkias?

  Of that concept, you know what I mean?

• 23:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 23:42Stavros Halkias?

  And then just, you know, shitting on each other, and then the bear, you know, the, the super fans sketch.

• 23:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:47Stavros Halkias?

  I basically just did a Ravens, and obviously I wasn't trying to, it was just, you grow up with these things, and you want to make fun of them, but it's just like.

• 23:54Speaker 02

  Universal sports fanaticism and stuff. I mean, that's a much less direct ripoff than.

• 24:01Speaker 02

  Like, um, not to name drop, but I actually got Letterman on my podcast.

• 24:06Stavros Halkias?

  Wow.

• 24:07Speaker 02

  And, uh, I wanted to ask him this and I was afraid to. I didn't want to get into Jay Leno.

• 24:11Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 24:12Speaker 02

  Letterman did something.

• 24:14Stavros Halkias?

  Ask it here. We'll, we'll ask him.

• 24:15Speaker 02

  Well, no, we did something on, I was, I wanted to talk about.

• 24:18Stavros Halkias?

  I'm kidding. I'm, they don't.

• 24:19Speaker 02

  How different.

• 24:19Stavros Halkias?

  I'm friends with Letterman. It was a joke.

• 24:21Speaker 02

  Letterman would run for the hills.

• 24:26Speaker 02

  If he was within 10 feet of this man. And that's on Letterman because he's missing out. I'm not saying that Letterman is right.

• 24:36Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 24:37Speaker 02

  To be thoroughly repulsed by the concept of this man, much less his physical presence. I'm just saying this is what he would do.

• 24:47Stavros Halkias?

  Yes, yes, yes.

• 24:48Speaker 02

  That's why I'm here to just talk about him. Because he's never gonna talk.

• 24:52Stavros Halkias?

  No, no, no.

• 24:53Speaker 02

  Unless he does like five Apatow movies.

• 24:55Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a couple more Oscar nominated movies away from being able to do, to do season four or five of, you know, my next guest.

• 25:05Speaker 02

  Needs no introduction, yeah.

• 25:06Stavros Halkias?

  Which, they had a couple of standups for a while and then he was like, all right, let's get the fucking energy.

• 25:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, he's really.

• 25:12Stavros Halkias?

  Now it's next level.

• 25:13Speaker 02

  Highest tier.

• 25:14Stavros Halkias?

  So you're, you've got him on, and what's the pod called? By the way, it's launching this week.

• 25:18Speaker 02

  Humor me.

• 25:18Stavros Halkias?

  Humor me.

• 25:19Speaker 02

  And I'm not the type of person, thank you.

• 25:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, they're, they've, they've already know about it.

• 25:23Speaker 02

  Some of them have heard about, that's great. No, I, I'll talk about that in a minute because it doesn't, isn't really like a conversation. It's more like a stunt show. But Letterman, uh, I wanted to ask him about, I was telling him about how everything that he had done on the late night show, I would not let Conan do when we took over that show.

• 25:41Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 25:42Speaker 02

  To the point where I wouldn't even let him do fucking remotes, which is like, Conan's the best ever at that. And I'm like, no.

• 25:49Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 25:51Speaker 02

  Anyone who's copied, I've seen people try to copy Dave.

• 25:54Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 25:54Speaker 02

  And do that and they look terrible. Dennis Miller did it.

• 25:57Stavros Halkias?

  Right.

• 25:57Speaker 02

  Pat Sajak did it.

• 25:59Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 25:59Speaker 02

  And I'm like, if Sajak couldn't pull it off, how dare you think you could? What the fuck was I thinking?

• 26:04Stavros Halkias?

  Vietnam veteran Pat Sajak couldn't do it. You can Harvard boy? I don't think so.

• 26:09Speaker 02

  No, but I, I, the very first bit we did was like the reverse of a Letterman bit. Louis CK came up with it. It was called Actual Items. And it was like Letterman did Small Town News where you just pulled up funny headlines. Oh, you're right. Leno did rip that off. And then Leno stole it from him. Yeah. And I wanted to ask Letterman about that. He did just straight up rip that off. Yeah. And then if you ask him about it, it's like, what Dave invented headlines all of a sudden? Dave invented the news?

• 26:37Stavros Halkias?

  It's like, kind of.

• 26:38Speaker 02

  Excuse me?

• 26:39Stavros Halkias?

  In this context, yes.

• 26:42Speaker 02

  What else can we joke about? The polio vaccine? Did Dave invent the polio vaccine?

• 26:49Speaker 02

  It's like, no, it was such a blatant rip off.

• 26:51Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 26:51Speaker 02

  And I wanted to ask him about it, but I didn't have the balls, but.

• 26:54Stavros Halkias?

  Well, hey, you told me about wanting to ask about it, so that's almost as much.

• 26:59Speaker 02

  Six percent as entertaining as if I had done it with Letterman.

• 27:02Stavros Halkias?

  Six is high.

• 27:05Speaker 02

  Fair enough, fair enough.

• 27:06Stavros Halkias?

  But I liked it.

• 27:07Speaker 02

  I'll bring back Triumph whenever you request it.

• 27:10Stavros Halkias?

  No, no, no. I, it, um, uh, that, the, wait, what was Actual Items? And it was ju- cause I remember this bit.

• 27:17Speaker 02

  Louis came up with it and it was basically like, would you believe, you can't make this up, folks? And then it was totally made up.

• 27:22Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, yeah. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

• 27:24Speaker 02

  Look at this headline. I mean, look at this ad for waterbeds. And then look over here though, in the corner, it says.

• 27:32Stavros Halkias?

  I actually remember this now.

• 27:34Speaker 02

  You know, and I don't remember what the joke, but it would have been something like, look at over here in the corner. Hitler would have never.

• 27:43Speaker 02

  Just some random thing about it.

• 27:45Stavros Halkias?

  Just complete absurdism.

• 27:46Speaker 02

  Not approved by Adolf Hitler or something. Like, why? Why would they put that in? We don't need to know that. That's an assumption.

• 27:52Stavros Halkias?

  Well, who knows? Maybe the remotes, I know what you mean about, you know, it's when you're starting a show, you want to be fanatical about what the tone is.

• 28:00Speaker 02

  What it did was it forced us to put our own stamp on that time slot and we did, and so.

• 28:05Stavros Halkias?

  Definitely. The characters, the like absurdist stuff. I mean masturbating bear.

• 28:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Or just interviewing celebrities by doing their photograph and cutting out the mouth. Yeah, like that's, and Triumph actually came out of that because. Letterman had been doing Westminster dogs, like running up and down the aisles, like real Westminster dogs.

• 28:25Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 28:26Speaker 02

  Behaving like crazy dogs.

• 28:27Stavros Halkias?

  That's funny.

• 28:28Speaker 02

  And it was funny.

• 28:29Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 28:29Speaker 02

  But my wife had just given me a bunch of dog puppets because we were newlyweds and we were at a, we were at a furniture store that had a rack of these

• 28:40Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 28:40Speaker 02

  Dog and other animal puppets and I, they were so realistic looking, like Triumph's face and, um, and I just grabbed one, put it on my hand and immediately sniffed her ass with it in the middle of the store.

• 28:53Stavros Halkias?

  Ah, ah, ah.

• 28:53Speaker 02

  You know, and she thought it was funny because, you know, this is the perfect woman for me.

• 28:57Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 28:58Speaker 02

  And then she surprised me with like seven of them and then like two weeks later, I'm watching this Letterman Westminster bit and Westminster really was coming to town.

• 29:06Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, wow.

• 29:06Speaker 02

  And that's what made me think of that whole bit.

• 29:08Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, look at that.

• 29:09Speaker 02

  And then I didn't do Triumph till like four months, four years later.

• 29:12Stavros Halkias?

  Fuck, yeah, dude.

• 29:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 29:13Stavros Halkias?

  That's cra- yeah, I mean.

• 29:14Speaker 02

  We had other Westminster talents, like a dog, you know, two dogs did dueling banjos and another dog lit his own farts and another dog, this was my favorite, another dog was like a, uh, an impersonator. And so you know how Triumph had a fake paw?

• 29:29Stavros Halkias?

  Mm-hmm.

• 29:30Speaker 02

  Like, so we would give this dog the fake paw and he would put his head, he would put his head, paw on his forehead, like Jack Nicholson, hacky impersonator.

• 29:38Stavros Halkias?

  Right.

• 29:39Speaker 02

  And he'd be like, I am Jack Nicholson.

• 29:41Stavros Halkias?

  Ah, ah, ah.

• 29:43Speaker 02

  You know, just the hackiest.

• 29:44Stavros Halkias?

  Maybe Schwarzenegger in there too.

• 29:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 29:47Stavros Halkias?

  But you gotta give the whole.

• 29:48Speaker 02

  Every Jack Nicholson impersonator put their hand, you know, they would do the hand over the forehead.

• 29:53Stavros Halkias?

  Kind of get the balding.

• 29:54Speaker 02

  Yes, exactly.

• 29:54Stavros Halkias?

  Cause it was kind of like a, yeah.

• 29:55Speaker 02

  I'm Jack Nicholson.

• 29:57Stavros Halkias?

  You show the bald, you make yourself look widow's peak.

• 30:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, me and you don't have to take a lot of, do a lot of work to do that.

• 30:03Stavros Halkias?

  No, we're headed up.

• 30:04Speaker 02

  That's exactly, exactly.

• 30:06Stavros Halkias?

  Were you a hat guy instantly when, when you'd started going? How quickly did you go to hats?

• 30:11Speaker 02

  Um.

• 30:12Stavros Halkias?

  And what age? Were you in dental school?

• 30:14Speaker 02

  Ah, ah.

• 30:14Stavros Halkias?

  Or you went?

• 30:15Speaker 02

  No.

• 30:15Stavros Halkias?

  Cause I, it went fast for me. I was like 20.

• 30:17Speaker 02

  I had a Jufro, pretty healthy Jufro until I was in my mid 30s.

• 30:23Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, that's not bad.

• 30:24Speaker 02

  And then I still like, didn't quite realize how gross I was getting.

• 30:27Stavros Halkias?

  Ah, ah.

• 30:28Speaker 02

  You know?

• 30:29Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 30:29Speaker 02

  And then by the time I was.

• 30:31Stavros Halkias?

  What, in the Conan writers' room?

• 30:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly.

• 30:34Stavros Halkias?

  The grooming standards weren't high?

• 30:35Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 30:36Stavros Halkias?

  In the two, early 2000s Conan writers' room?

• 30:39Speaker 02

  I was like a seven in that room. It's like when they talk about a midwestern 10.

• 30:45Stavros Halkias?

  The Conan writers room.

• 30:47Speaker 02

  It's like seven, six digits.

• 30:51Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, that was, I mean, I can't ima- I mean, that is a, that's a fucking, you do have like, you, like a legendary run of, you know, even when you're going to Chicago to start.

• 31:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:02Stavros Halkias?

  You're, you were like in an improv group with Odenkirk, right?

• 31:05Speaker 02

  Not quite.

• 31:06Stavros Halkias?

  Or no, what was it?

• 31:07Speaker 02

  I met early on, but he was doing his own thing.

• 31:09Stavros Halkias?

  Okay.

• 31:10Speaker 02

  And.

• 31:11Stavros Halkias?

  But you're playing at the Player, yeah, tell me.

• 31:12Speaker 02

  I went to this place called Players Workshop, which is also where Bob had started. And it was nice, it wasn't like Second City where it's like, okay, you're gonna learn how to like, you know, F. Scott Fitzgerald.

• 31:23Stavros Halkias?

  Right. Improv people love to pretend what they're doing isn't bullshit.

• 31:28Speaker 02

  And to the, what?

• 31:29Stavros Halkias?

  Improv people love to pretend what they're doing isn't bullshit. They love to put like real rules, the, like, the Second City, the like, when I did like a UCB class and it's like.

• 31:37Speaker 02

  And the Herald and all that.

• 31:39Stavros Halkias?

  Fucking.

• 31:40Speaker 02

  There's the 10,000 yard stare about improv.

• 31:42Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 31:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, sometimes when you get the Herald going and you're just like, you're just out of bo- it's out of body, man. No, I could never do that. I could never improv like that. And I also felt I would watch it, even, even the corny stuff, like where it's a game, like, okay, you're in a proctologist's office, and it's 1929, and F. Scott Fitz, you know, you're right, it's a Shakespeare theme.

• 32:07Stavros Halkias?

  Yes, yes, yes.

• 32:08Speaker 02

  Whatever, those kind of games.

• 32:09Stavros Halkias?

  And that's the shit they were doing at Second City?

• 32:11Speaker 02

  That was the early shit. And then they got into the more sophisticated stuff you're talking, the Del Close stuff.

• 32:16Stavros Halkias?

  So what was the Players thing like?

• 32:18Speaker 02

  I would watch this and I'd be like, this is, um, I want to do stuff that's funny because it's funny, not because it's off the top of my head.

• 32:26Stavros Halkias?

  Right.

• 32:27Speaker 02

  You know, it's like, this is, like, if that was a sketch, I don't think I'd find it as funny. I'm just like, it's like a magic trick.

• 32:34Stavros Halkias?

  Right.

• 32:35Speaker 02

  I wanna, so I thought improv was a very useful tool.

• 32:38Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 32:38Speaker 02

  And that's how I started using it. At Second City, what they did that was really interesting, they would do their Second City show, and then they'd have a set afterward that kids could go, you could go for free. You didn't have to pay for the show. They would let you sit in the back or stand in the back and watch great. Improv performers and they weren't doing the game shit. They were working out sketches. They would pretend, they would say, they would take suggestions from the audience and shit. And then they would tailor it to a sketch they were busy working on. Based on your suggestion of Nixon, here's a restaurant in Washington DC or whatever.

• 33:17Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 33:18Speaker 02

  But you could see, and they're really talented, amazing people like, uh, the most famous that I got to work, uh, watch work was the guy who ended up being, uh, Dan Castellaneta.

• 33:28Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 33:28Speaker 02

  Homer Simpson's voice, he was there. And a lot of amazing, uh, Mike Haggerty, you may be familiar with him. He was in a lot of John Hughes movies. And these guys were so funny and it was really inspiring to see them just work out sketches.

• 33:43Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 33:43Speaker 02

  In front of an audience. So it's like you have a premise, but you're improvising off the premise.

• 33:49Stavros Halkias?

  And that was, that was always the interesting thing about Second City because like, like you, I kind of feel the game stuff is not that useful, but I liked how they would kind of, almost like stand up. They'd have a sketch and they'd just work on it for different audiences to get it to feel right.

• 34:05Speaker 02

  Yes, and the best ones were the type of sketches that you didn't see much on SNL because a lot of times when we were on SNL, we would write like one joke premises.

• 34:14Stavros Halkias?

  Right.

• 34:15Speaker 02

  Where it just builds and builds. Cause you don't have time to like work on it and give it real texture.

• 34:20Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 34:20Speaker 02

  Like these guys did, or the kids in the hall were like that too. They always worked on their stuff and it, there were so many jokes beyond the premise and that was really cool.

• 34:29Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I could, I could, so what was the, cause I've, the, the group you were doing in, in Chicago, what was their sort of philosophy? What kind of, was it just?

• 34:39Speaker 02

  I wouldn't give us the credit for having a philosophy.

• 34:41Stavros Halkias?

  It was just guys trying to be funny.

• 34:43Speaker 02

  It was just people like, you know, just guys who, uh, and girls who would watch these guys. And we'd just come up with our own premises and, and work on them and, um, develop them. And I was a little more of a TV guy. I had more TV parodies than Second City usually did. Uh, just cause I was a TV nerd and, and, but it actually ended up lending itself to writing for SNL. Cause when. So I I got SNL because a guy in my comedy group got into a movie that Al Franken and his partner Tom Davis back then were starring in.

• 35:20Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, nice.

• 35:20Speaker 02

  And it was shot in Chicago. And so they came to see our show.

• 35:24Stavros Halkias?

  Wow.

• 35:24Speaker 02

  And they really liked it. And Franken was like, you're like, you remind me of a mixture of Harold Ramus and Albert Brooks. And I was like, so I'm Jewish.

• 35:36Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 35:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 35:40Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, that's it.

• 35:40Speaker 02

  No, but he was great. And they took us out for beers. And that was it. We thought that was the end of it. We felt like some validation.

• 35:47Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 35:47Speaker 02

  They liked it. But then like, three weeks later, like, Saturday Night Live had this gigantic turnover where Lorne Michaels came back.

• 35:55Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, that was, that was the timing?

• 35:57Speaker 02

  It was that summer.

• 35:58Stavros Halkias?

  Get the fuck out of here. Because people did like, he did this insane, or he left. And they did, they put out a book cast, which, when you look at the people, the talent was incredible. The eye for talent was absolutely correct. Because it was like, yeah, like you said, Cusack, Quaid.

• 36:14Speaker 02

  Robert Downey Jr.

• 36:14Stavros Halkias?

  Robert Downey Jr., fucking Elaine.

• 36:17Speaker 02

  Michael Hall, who was fucking hilarious in all those John Hughes movies.

• 36:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, Julie Louis-Dreyfus.

• 36:23Speaker 02

  Well, then, no, that was.

• 36:24Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, that was later?

• 36:24Speaker 02

  That was previous.

• 36:25Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, that was previous. Okay, never mind.

• 36:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, that wasn't that good. It's okay.

• 36:27Stavros Halkias?

  Okay. But that, but that crew, I remember seeing that, the crew that failed or whatever.

• 36:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 36:31Stavros Halkias?

  And I was like, all those people are.

• 36:33Speaker 02

  They became superstars in different ways.

• 36:36Stavros Halkias?

  Whoever like, casted that was great. The rest, the rest of the infrastructure.

• 36:40Speaker 02

  You know, they just weren't necessarily sketch performers.

• 36:44Stavros Halkias?

  Uh huh, yeah.

• 36:45Speaker 02

  I mean, Joan Cusack's still one of the funniest people I've ever met.

• 36:48Stavros Halkias?

  So funny.

• 36:48Speaker 02

  And she.

• 36:49Stavros Halkias?

  School, yeah.

• 36:50Speaker 02

  School Rock is one of the funniest performances I've ever seen.

• 36:54Stavros Halkias?

  And then making her horny for the bass player at the end.

• 36:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 36:57Stavros Halkias?

  And it clicks. It's like, of course, that character's so repressed. And this is exactly her guy. You know what I mean? It was that, she's all, she's like boiling over that whole fucking movie.

• 37:07Speaker 02

  Oh, I know. That whole scene where she's talking about Stevie Nicks and.

• 37:10Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 37:11Speaker 02

  You know, I'm fun.

• 37:12Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 37:13Speaker 02

  Just trying to convince Jack Black that she's, and like, anybody who can turn Jack Black into a straight man.

• 37:20Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 37:20Speaker 02

  Has got skills.

• 37:21Stavros Halkias?

  Totally, totally. An energy you don't see when someone is completely singular.

• 37:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 37:26Stavros Halkias?

  And you're like, fuck. People have gotten close to that, but they've not exactly nailed it that way.

• 37:31Speaker 02

  You know who reminds me of her a little bit and who just made Jack Black a straight man? Do you watch SNL?

• 37:36Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, yeah, I watch it.

• 37:37Speaker 02

  Oh, SNL, well, Ashley Padilla, have you heard of this?

• 37:39Stavros Halkias?

  She's really funny, yeah. I don't, I mean, I have some friends on it and I don't watch it as much. And I didn't know, and so usually I'm kind of aware of people who come, I'm like, oh, fuck, fuck yeah. You know, whatever, Marcelo got it. Sarah, Sarah Sherman is a big fan, she's been on the show a hundred times. She's one of my, you know, a good friend of mine. Uh, but I didn't really know Ashley and yes, she has that kind of like, exactly that, a little Cusack that, that midwestern and she can tap into that mania.

• 38:08Speaker 02

  And she doesn't mug.

• 38:10Stavros Halkias?

  Doesn't mug.

• 38:11Speaker 02

  She just plays weird people. Yeah, it's understated, but a crazy person on some level, like just like 10 degrees crazy.

• 38:17Stavros Halkias?

  Totally, totally.

• 38:18Speaker 02

  And incredibly original.

• 38:20Stavros Halkias?

  Well, I mean, my favorite, I, yeah, I mean, the guys who, who really fucking turn it up. It's like Connor O'Malley, Tim. They like, they, they, uh, Tim Robinson is fucking.

• 38:29Speaker 02

  So funny, my kids, I have like, uh, they were like 12 years old when that show came on the air. And I, they never had any interest in SNL. Like I would occasionally, they, they knew what I did and they wanted to see some of the stuff I did. But they never wanted to watch the show.

• 38:44Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 38:45Speaker 02

  But Tim Robinson's show, they watched every episode, every season. They fucking loved it.

• 38:51Stavros Halkias?

  That's fascinating.

• 38:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, they got, cause it was more human comedy.

• 38:55Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 38:55Speaker 02

  That just connected with them.

• 38:57Stavros Halkias?

  It, it, there is like a base, sort of like primal element to like Tim Robinson and Connor too, where it's like, some of it is guttural screaming.

• 39:07Speaker 02

  Right.

• 39:07Stavros Halkias?

  It's just like literal guttural and it fucking, they found the context to make it work. Uh, but yes, Ashley, I don't know her, but she's so, so fucking funny. And yeah, they have some good, there is some, there's some talent on the, it seems like a nightmare job though. Seems like, I mean, I know.

• 39:23Speaker 02

  It was, uh, scary as hell, especially my first year.

• 39:27Stavros Halkias?

  Especially, cause now, so the context of you coming on the show is there, they had this huge, uh, turnover.

• 39:34Speaker 02

  I would never have gotten hired if they hadn't.

• 39:36Stavros Halkias?

  Wow, holy shit.

• 39:37Speaker 02

  I was like, they turned the entire staff over.

• 39:41Stavros Halkias?

  And this is what, what was the year?

• 39:42Speaker 02

  1985.

• 39:43Stavros Halkias?

  Okay.

• 39:43Speaker 02

  Years ago.

• 39:44Stavros Halkias?

  Hell, yeah.

• 39:45Speaker 02

  And, uh, they turned the entire staff over and then I actually, back then the Writers Guild would let you hire people at below scale.

• 39:54Speaker 02

  No, seriously.

• 39:55Stavros Halkias?

  The fucking, our own fucking guild, the, the union.

• 40:00Speaker 02

  It was a good thing.

• 40:01Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, it's a good thing, okay, okay.

• 40:02Speaker 02

  Being on the production side, as I was later in life, like, it's like, you have a budget.

• 40:07Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 40:08Speaker 02

  And there's nothing you can do. This is your writing budget. And what they were trying to do-

• 40:11Stavros Halkias?

  The huge conglomerate that gives you the budget could give you a little more money.

• 40:15Speaker 02

  They could, but if they don't-

• 40:17Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know what you mean, yeah, yeah, sure.

• 40:20Speaker 02

  Back then, I was like, what the fucks with NBC? And then I realized, no, this is the budget Lorne has, and he's making the decisions, because he's got to with the money he has. But me and two guys from Kids in the Hall, Bruce McCullough and Mark McKinney-

• 40:34Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, wow.

• 40:34Speaker 02

  Were all paid like, two-thirds of scale.

• 40:38Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 40:38Speaker 02

  And it's like, otherwise, one of us wouldn't have made it.

• 40:42Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 40:43Speaker 02

  You know?

• 40:43Stavros Halkias?

  If you give that person the option, all three of you are saying, yeah, yeah, fucking pay, pay me nothing.

• 40:47Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 40:48Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 40:49Speaker 02

  It's not like they were gonna do it in perpetuity.

• 40:51Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 40:51Speaker 02

  I didn't, it didn't happen my second year, but, but I wouldn't have gotten the, one of us wouldn't have gotten the opportunity.

• 40:57Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 40:58Speaker 02

  You know, and I think there's a logic to that, if people are just starting out.

• 41:02Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 41:03Speaker 02

  You know?

• 41:03Stavros Halkias?

  For sure, as long as you can't do it- But you said the key word, perpetuity. Because what'll happen now is, they'll be like, oh, well, I mean, we, we signed you onto that, and then, year three, they'd be like, so you're good with that number minus 5%? You know what I mean, like-

• 41:16Speaker 02

  Well, now they just like, bring a young writer in, okay, so we're gonna scan your brain.

• 41:20Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 41:23Speaker 02

  We're gonna pay you scale to scan your brain.

• 41:27Stavros Halkias?

  And every time you think, we get a little notification.

• 41:29Speaker 02

  Every time you think, from here on in, even after you've left the show, we own it. And that's okay, you know? Oh, yeah, fuck yeah.

• 41:35Stavros Halkias?

  We have a year option, we have a year option on all your thoughts.

• 41:37Speaker 02

  I'm down, I'm down. And my name's on the show, yeah, for a week, yeah. Yeah, but you can always say, you know, you've got that screen cap.

• 41:45Stavros Halkias?

  That's right. We'll get you a keychain, we'll get you a picture on the stage, that's all you need.

• 41:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, and, you know, in your obituary, 70 years from now, you know, so-and-so, former SNL writer-

• 41:57Stavros Halkias?

  That's right.

• 41:58Speaker 02

  Died penniless.

• 42:01Stavros Halkias?

  Obviously, there's no pension. I mean, you know that.

• 42:03Speaker 02

  No, of course not.

• 42:04Stavros Halkias?

  Um, but that must, I mean, so this is so, I mean, it's nerve wracking to get that show as an accomplished comedy performer, writer, whatever. But you're talking about, you're fucking four years out of fucking-

• 42:15Speaker 02

  Not only that, but I was like, I grew up with that show and I think I was really the first fanboy. Like SNL fanboy.

• 42:23Stavros Halkias?

  Eighty-five, yeah, sure.

• 42:24Speaker 02

  So when I was a teenager, we would stop our high school parties to watch Saturday Night Live. You know, and I just remember like-

• 42:32Stavros Halkias?

  Must have been a lot of pussy getting got at those parties.

• 42:35Speaker 02

  Believe me. You're like, what's pussy, what's pussy?

• 42:41Speaker 02

  Andy Kaufman's on, are you?

• 42:44Speaker 02

  You want me to care about a vagina? Look at him, he's the foreign man. He's so funny.

• 42:50Stavros Halkias?

  He's fucking got his hair combed weird. You want me to think about tits?

• 42:53Speaker 02

  He's talking with a funny accent. That's all I needed at that age. I mean, I, we were, I went to like the nerdiest school too, like just mostly Jewish kids on the Upper West Side.

• 43:06Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 43:07Speaker 02

  But, um, but yeah, every, every party would, would be stopped.

• 43:11Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 43:12Speaker 02

  For SNL. So when I got there-

• 43:13Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, so you were fucking-

• 43:14Speaker 02

  Not only was I like nerdy about Lorne Michaels and writers, I fucking knew people on the credits. Like, you know, there's like this woman, Audrey Perdickman, that I would always see every week and I'm like, yes, I know you. You're the production coordinator and like a fucking set designer. Cause there'd be like Rolling Stone articles that I would memorize. It's like, yes, Akira Yoshimura, you do the sets, but you were also spectacular as Sulu in Michael O'Donoghue's legendary Star Trek NBC sketch.

• 43:46Stavros Halkias?

  So are you happy that you weren't born, you're lucky you weren't born with the internet? Cause you might just be a Reddit guy that never leaves his house. You might be running the SNL message board instead of actually being on the show.

• 43:58Speaker 02

  It's a miracle that I got hired, cause I know a lot of funny people.

• 44:02Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 44:02Speaker 02

  A lot of funny people that never did anything.

• 44:05Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, totally.

• 44:06Speaker 02

  And so I'll never, I never take it for granted, you know, and, um, I, I guess I just, um- The only person that, and I was so in awe of the place that I wouldn't, like a lot of people get there and they're like, I'm gonna get you in, I'm gonna get you in. I couldn't do that, even with my, for people that I love.

• 44:23Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 44:24Speaker 02

  The only person that I ever recommended was Bob Odenkirk.

• 44:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 44:27Speaker 02

  I got him in because he was the funniest person in Chicago.

• 44:31Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 44:31Speaker 02

  We all agreed.

• 44:32Stavros Halkias?

  Totally.

• 44:33Speaker 02

  That he was just mind bogglingly ahead of everybody, in my opinion.

• 44:38Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 44:38Speaker 02

  I had a better career at SNL than he did, but.

• 44:40Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 44:41Speaker 02

  He was, he was a fully formed comedian.

• 44:45Stavros Halkias?

  Totally, totally.

• 44:46Speaker 02

  Uh, you know, I was like, like you say, I was out of dental school just figuring it out.

• 44:50Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, happy to be there.

• 44:51Speaker 02

  Not dental school, out of pre-dental.

• 44:52Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. Couldn't even get to dental.

• 44:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was just trying to figure out how to write comedy and Bob was just way more advanced and that's probably why he didn't succeed at SNL more because he didn't care.

• 45:05Stavros Halkias?

  I could see that. When you have your own voice.

• 45:07Speaker 02

  He wasn't in awe of the place.

• 45:09Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 45:09Speaker 02

  And like I was.

• 45:10Stavros Halkias?

  He's just trying to score. He's trying to pour some buckets.

• 45:12Speaker 02

  And he inspired me in a way because I think I got more free with my comedy writing even, and I was more confident having been there a couple of years and I'd had a lot of success. And then, but I started writing sillier stuff because I saw Bob and then Conan got on the show and he also.

• 45:28Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, yeah.

• 45:29Speaker 02

  He, he really wanted to succeed, but he inherently had less, um, he was less in awe of the place as well.

• 45:37Stavros Halkias?

  Hmm.

• 45:37Speaker 02

  You know, he was like a more of a Monty Python guy or SCTV guy.

• 45:42Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, wow.

• 45:42Speaker 02

  Loved SCTV, but I was like a kid from Manhattan and to us, Saturday Night Live being the coolest show on TV and, and have being a New York show.

• 45:51Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 45:52Speaker 02

  It just meant everything to me. Johnny Carson had left the Tonight Show to move, I'm getting really nerdy for.

• 45:58Stavros Halkias?

  You are, and I love it.

• 46:00Speaker 02

  People who are like, weren't, uh, didn't, if you didn't serve in the Vietnam War, I apologize for all the references.

• 46:07Stavros Halkias?

  But there was no marquee show on, in New York anymore is what you're saying.

• 46:12Speaker 02

  No.

• 46:12Stavros Halkias?

  That it was like, SNL was all we had.

• 46:15Speaker 02

  And New York was like a shithole.

• 46:17Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 46:17Speaker 02

  Like, I loved it.

• 46:18Stavros Halkias?

  Totally, totally.

• 46:19Speaker 02

  Like, my favorite movies are The Wizard of Oz and Taxi Driver.

• 46:22Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 46:22Speaker 02

  Taxi Driver.

• 46:24Stavros Halkias?

  Similar themes.

• 46:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, but I just love the way New York was shot. It was so grimy and but real.

• 46:33Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 46:33Speaker 02

  You know, and so I loved, I thought I was the coolest kid living there.

• 46:37Stavros Halkias?

  Totally, dude.

• 46:38Speaker 02

  But, uh, but I really, when SNL like had that opening montage celebrating New York City.

• 46:44Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 46:45Speaker 02

  It just meant everything to me.

• 46:46Stavros Halkias?

  Totally. I mean, I get that when I, growing up, I was a comedy nerd.

• 46:51Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 46:51Stavros Halkias?

  To me, New York, the first times I visit, it feels like fake. You're like, I'm really here? I meant the, the famed comic strip. You know what I mean? Like, I got, I got barked into the, I get barked, when I'm 14, I got barked into a 5pm at the comic strip. And I'm like, wow.

• 47:08Speaker 02

  I didn't know they had 5pm.

• 47:09Stavros Halkias?

  At that era, they did.

• 47:10Speaker 02

  What year is this? The 90s?

• 47:12Stavros Halkias?

  This is, this is no 2000s. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is probably 2000.

• 47:17Speaker 02

  Who went at 5 o'clock?

• 47:19Stavros Halkias?

  It, moron, children who don't understand New York.

• 47:22Speaker 02

  Younger morons.

• 47:23Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah. It were very, it was like me and like, you know, it's exactly what you think. Getting barked into it, it was probably a 6pm at, at, at the comic strip. It was me and five people and, you know? And it's one of those things where you've done a horrible show where you're like, who are these fucking idiot tourists? They, they barked into this.

• 47:40Speaker 02

  I give you credit, man, for having the resilience to, uh, stick with it because I couldn't. I tried stand up.

• 47:46Stavros Halkias?

  Really?

• 47:47Speaker 02

  I, well, like, what changed my life really, when I was a struggling, whatever, pre-dental idiot. I was, I had already transferred to NYU. I didn't live on campus because my parents lived in Manhattan and back then NYU hadn't bought the entire village.

• 48:02Stavros Halkias?

  NYU was a piece of shit back then, right? No disrespect.

• 48:05Speaker 02

  That's how I got in, yeah. No, I mean, it was not, it was not what it is now.

• 48:09Stavros Halkias?

  It's just very funny because I, you know, you read about NYU.

• 48:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:13Stavros Halkias?

  And it's this, you see a mark shift where it's like, a lot of your heroes went when it sucked. And then there's like a general, yeah, yeah. And then like, for me, when I moved here, the kids that went to NYU were like some of the most high achieving.

• 48:28Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 48:28Stavros Halkias?

  It was like, it was basically, it was almost like entertainment industry Ivy League, basically. Cause it's Like that and maybe USC or you know, whatever.

• 48:38Speaker 02

  Yes, that's a great school.

• 48:39Stavros Halkias?

  But like NYU, like now, it's fucking, those kids go in there. And I mean, like half the, even the kids from like on SNL right now, they're like, please don't destroy kids.

• 48:48Speaker 02

  Oh, they're, yeah.

• 48:49Stavros Halkias?

  They were NYU and they had a bunch of fucking, all the, there were so many people that came out of there.

• 48:53Speaker 02

  Oh, and there's so much more comedy going on now. Like, there's like improv groups, many improv groups that are happening in the school.

• 49:01Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. But yeah, so that's, I just wanted to, cause there is a, cause the NYU we, we know now, it's like, New York in the fucking seventies, eighties was not, you know.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  No, no.

• 49:09Stavros Halkias?

  So you're living at home.

• 49:10Speaker 02

  I'm living at home because they wouldn't let me live in a dorm. So I don't know. I know the kids in my classes, but, and I'm struggling, like I said, like I had.

• 49:19Stavros Halkias?

  It's funny cause you grew up there too. So it's like, you should have a social circle, but they all left for college.

• 49:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, went to college.

• 49:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 49:26Speaker 02

  So they have, I find out they're, they're throwing a con, a stand up contest.

• 49:31Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, nice.

• 49:31Speaker 02

  And I'm like, and I'd always seen, you know, should I ever try stand up on a Monday night at catcher?

• 49:37Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 49:38Speaker 02

  Comic strip. And I was like, what if somebody I know sees me?

• 49:41Stavros Halkias?

  Hmm.

• 49:41Speaker 02

  At NYU, I was like, no one's gonna know me if I eat it.

• 49:47Stavros Halkias?

  It took being so socially depleted that bombing could have no negative impact. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 49:52Speaker 02

  So I wrote an act.

• 49:53Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 49:53Speaker 02

  I just wrote an act over like a week and I just did it and I tied. I was like one of three winners.

• 50:02Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 50:03Speaker 02

  And.

• 50:03Stavros Halkias?

  And where was this?

• 50:04Speaker 02

  It changed.

• 50:04Stavros Halkias?

  At NYU?

• 50:05Speaker 02

  It was at the like, the student center.

• 50:07Stavros Halkias?

  Cool.

• 50:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, big room and they, you know.

• 50:10Stavros Halkias?

  Wow. That was the first time you ever did anything comedic or performed?

• 50:13Speaker 02

  I, no, I'd done, I, I'd been funny in front of my kids. I mean, my.

• 50:17Stavros Halkias?

  Friends and stuff.

• 50:18Speaker 02

  And I was like in the lead in the school play or that kind of stuff.

• 50:21Stavros Halkias?

  You act, you did, you did some school play?

• 50:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I loved, I was in summer camp.

• 50:25Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 50:25Speaker 02

  Jewish summer camp. I would do funny things, but never in front of strangers.

• 50:31Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 50:32Speaker 02

  Never made strangers laugh in my life.

• 50:34Stavros Halkias?

  And that made you think like, all right, I could fucking do this.

• 50:37Speaker 02

  I was like, what the fuck?

• 50:39Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 50:40Speaker 02

  It's possible. And then I, I never left my brain after that. Maybe I could do something, you know, and then it was really, I still finished pre-dental. Cause I was like, now it was like damage control.

• 50:53Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 50:54Speaker 02

  What am I gonna get out of college?

• 50:55Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 50:56Speaker 02

  So I still finished it, but. So I, I, that contest led to another college, like the winners, we got to compete against other colleges at the comic strip.

• 51:08Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, sick.

• 51:09Speaker 02

  Like at a normal hour.

• 51:10Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 51:11Speaker 02

  And I did a similar act, but I modified it. I had a lot of NYU humor in the first one. Like, this is my campus?

• 51:19Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 51:20Speaker 02

  Try showing your ID at the, you know, Webster Hall and getting it, whatever, those kind of jokes.

• 51:26Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 51:27Speaker 02

  But I also, so then I went to the comic strip and I added this bit about Reagan trying to keep his dick down while fucking Nancy.

• 51:36Stavros Halkias?

  Good stuff.

• 51:38Speaker 02

  And it was like, and he's like fucking her and he's like, you know, instead of a baseball or whatever, he's like, social programs. Children eating vegetables.

• 51:52Stavros Halkias?

  Giving the poor a fair shake.

• 51:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, all that kind of shit.

• 51:56Stavros Halkias?

  Treating AIDS.

• 51:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. It was all that kind of stuff.

• 52:00Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 52:01Speaker 02

  So that was my closer and it murdered.

• 52:03Stavros Halkias?

  As it should have.

• 52:06Speaker 02

  And then I can't remember what, what ended up making him come spontaneously.

• 52:11Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 52:12Speaker 02

  He slipped into something that, I don't know if it led to Jodie Foster or something. I don't know. And then, but then, so I won that contest.

• 52:23Stavros Halkias?

  Wow.

• 52:24Speaker 02

  And then I got a spot.

• 52:25Stavros Halkias?

  Wow.

• 52:26Speaker 02

  At the comic strip.

• 52:27Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 52:28Speaker 02

  And then I did the, and they gave me a 9:30 spot on a Thursday and I did okay.

• 52:32Stavros Halkias?

  Not a bad spot.

• 52:33Speaker 02

  I did okay. And then the manager, you know, gives me, you know, your material is top notch. You just gotta get used to like, you know, hey folks, how you doing? You know, be a regular person, you know? And I'm like, okay, regular person.

• 52:46Stavros Halkias?

  Little did that guy know who was about to take over standup comedy. Little did they know in the seventies, it would be nothing but dorks who can't make eye contact.

• 52:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, right.

• 52:56Stavros Halkias?

  Doing standup comedy for the next 40 years.

• 52:57Speaker 02

  This was like 1982.

• 52:59Stavros Halkias?

  Even like, they had no idea.

• 53:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:02Stavros Halkias?

  At post, post fucking sport coat.

• 53:05Speaker 02

  Right.

• 53:06Stavros Halkias?

  It was hoodies and no eye contact.

• 53:07Speaker 02

  But my heroes were not, you know, regular standups. My heroes were like Steve Martin, Andy Kaufman.

• 53:12Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right, right.

• 53:13Speaker 02

  And so like, I would start the act. Fucking dressed up as an orthodox, uh, you know, synagogue patron. I had, I literally went to Coney Island. I went to Coney Island because you couldn't get cotton candy anywhere else back then. Now you can order it on Amazon. Back then, I like took a fucking subway all the way to Coney Island. Got like tons of cotton candy and went on stage with a fucking cotton candy beard. Incredible. And I just did this Andy Kaufman thing to start the show where I just like, be like the old men in my synagogue. Just pull out a, pull out a prayer book and like no, didn't

• 53:54Speaker 02

  give a fuck about the audience. Just started turning pages with his, with his finger. And then I would do it as long as I could until they started laughing. And then I would keep going until they started to stop laughing. And then I started eating a piece of my beard.

• 54:12Speaker 02

  And then I would get laughs. And then I can't remember how I segued out of it, but then I, I did a lot of conventional stand-up after that.

• 54:19Stavros Halkias?

  That's beautiful though. From an artistry standpoint, the fact that you had to, that bit cost you six hours of your day, probably. Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? It's like, oh, that's

• 54:30Speaker 02

  nothing. I'll take six hours. Just the other day, Letterman was my guest. Yeah. And I wanted to, it was the day after his birthday or a couple of days after his birthday. So I wanted to give him something as a present. So I don't know, again, the people who served in, you know, Iraq.

• 54:46Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 54:48Speaker 02

  He would like have a bit where he would talk to the audience and after the audience would do some testimonial about a brush with a celebrity called Brush with Greatness. He would like, we have a gift for you. It's the late night ham. Yes, of course. So I had, I, I got a, I, you know, we had stickers with the name of my show, Humor Me. So we gave him a ham with late night. But then I also had seen an episode where he's like, and here's a special gift for you. Stationery from the office of Tom Brokaw. It's like shitty NBC stationery. So I was like, oh, that's too funny. Yeah. So I literally like.

• 55:28Speaker 02

  How do you get stationery? I went to Walgreens. I couldn't find stationery. I, I just wanted plain fucking stationery. I finally went to that store, Michael's.

• 55:37Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, the art store, sure.

• 55:39Speaker 02

  And like I got a box of like, you know, plain stationery with just, and, and envelopes. And then I came to, went to my house and I like matched the font uh from the desk of, I made it Lester Holt. Cause that's just a name that I knew would make him laugh.

• 55:57Stavros Halkias?

  Yep, that's a good one.

• 55:57Speaker 02

  And I figured out how to, and then I'm like, god damn it, how do I load these? This isn't eight by ten.

• 56:04Stavros Halkias?

  Your type setting.

• 56:05Speaker 02

  I'm typesetting, I'm doing this and like, I'm putting it in the fucking printer and it's saying it doesn't match the size. And I literally took hours and hours to give him this stationery.

• 56:16Stavros Halkias?

  For the last bit, yeah.

• 56:17Speaker 02

  This is 40 years later and I'm still.

• 56:19Stavros Halkias?

  I love it though.

• 56:20Speaker 02

  Like to get it right.

• 56:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, you gotta get it.

• 56:22Speaker 02

  I don't give a shit. I'll do whatever it takes.

• 56:23Stavros Halkias?

  And there's something about the effort, put it, it's, there's a metaphysical.

• 56:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:29Stavros Halkias?

  You gain something from the more of your soul that's in the bit. I really believe that, that it will, if somebody handed you that.

• 56:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 56:37Stavros Halkias?

  You wouldn't be saying it with the same verve.

• 56:40Speaker 02

  It's true.

• 56:40Stavros Halkias?

  You wouldn't be, you wouldn't be like, this is my moment. You wouldn't have to connect.

• 56:44Speaker 02

  It meant more to, it meant more to me that he liked it because of all the work I put into it. And on the other hand, I'm like a father. I have children in my house.

• 56:53Stavros Halkias?

  You have someone who could do it.

• 56:54Speaker 02

  Daddy, I need help with my homework. God damn it. Letterman must be pleased.

• 57:01Stavros Halkias?

  I need to see a wry smile or you're fucking dead. You hear me kid? If Letterman doesn't give me a wry smile, you're sleeping on the fucking streets.

• 57:11Speaker 02

  I, I, I'm sorry you got a C plus, but wait till I show you a copy of Letterman's wry smile.

• 57:19Stavros Halkias?

  You put that on the, on the fridge? You take down your kid's A plus? You put a fucking Letterman smiling at your Lester Holt.

• 57:25Speaker 02

  Cover the C plus with a smile.

• 57:27Speaker 04

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• 57:40Speaker 01

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• 58:10Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, that's fucking great. Was there a moment, you talk about how, how intimidating and stuff as getting at SNL. What's the moment, not the first thing you got on, but what's the first thing that you were like, this is me. You know what I mean? Where you're like, this is, I'm in my element. I mean, tell me the first thing you got on that you're, I'm sure you were pleased with that too. But I mean, like, was there a moment where you're like, oh yeah, this is the type of shit, I finally cracked doing my thing because.

• 58:34Speaker 02

  You know what? I don't know if I ever had a thing. I think one of the reasons I was successful there was because I was versatile in terms of like what made me laugh.

• 58:44Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 58:44Speaker 02

  You know, like I've done everything from incredibly broad comedy with Triumph to really subtle stuff in, in some of the movies I've written for. It was really hard to get subtle stuff on SNL though.

• 58:59Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, I could see that.

• 59:00Speaker 02

  Like there's a sketch, I, I would say the sketch that was the most me that I submitted didn't get on.

• 59:06Stavros Halkias?

  Hmm.

• 59:07Speaker 02

  And it was like something that Jim Downey loved.

• 59:10Stavros Halkias?

  Huge fan, he's the man.

• 59:12Speaker 02

  Man, yeah, one of the great writers in the history of the show and he was the head writer that first year and from a number of years after that and.

• 59:19Stavros Halkias?

  The Billy Madison speech he gives.

• 59:21Speaker 02

  Oh yeah.

• 59:22Stavros Halkias?

  When I, when we were kids, I mean, I had, I, I probably still, if you gave me like eight minutes, could come up with it from memory. I had no idea, like, that's, that's what I'm, that style of humor just pervade, it was so fun to see this absurdism. But anyway, so you're, he's-

• 59:36Speaker 02

  Performer, like, he wasn't even a performer, but he has like three popular memes.

• 59:40Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 59:41Speaker 02

  That one and the Jeffrey Epstein thing.

• 59:43Stavros Halkias?

  The Jeffrey Epstein thing went crazy, it's fucking insane. He's so fucking funny.

• 59:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, but I submitted this sketch called, um, It's a Wild, Wild, Wild, Wild Kingdom. And the joke was that it was, uh, there were a lot of hidden camera shows, you know, the original was called Candid Camera, but there were other ones, practical jokes on people. And so I wanted to do a show where they played practical jokes on animals. And, um, so it's called It's a Wild, Wild Kingdom, Wild, Wild, Wild, Wild Kingdom. And, and it was jokes like, you know, we would have a goat, we would shoot a goat from, you know, a surveillance kind of camera. And it would be next to a mailbox and that was like an old staple of like these shows.

• 1:00:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 1:00:27Speaker 02

  Get a load of the goat's reaction to the moving mailbox.

• 1:00:33Speaker 02

  What's he, what's going on with that mailbox? Look at the goat's face and it would just build to like, we told this turtle that it was gonna meet Burt Reynolds.

• 1:00:46Speaker 02

  Watch his face when he realizes that it's a Burt Reynolds impersonator. And there's just a snap zoom on a turtle.

• 1:00:55Stavros Halkias?

  So fucking funny.

• 1:00:56Speaker 02

  Downey loved this so much that I submitted it like twice and Lorne Michaels was like, what the fuck is he doing?

• 1:01:04Speaker 02

  And Lorne Michaels said something really profound, like my second week there, he said, if you make the cast look good, you'll look good. Cause he was already worried about that cast, like, somebody's gotta help Anthony Michael Hall.

• 1:01:16Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right, right, right.

• 1:01:18Speaker 02

  And, but, it was really smart advice.

• 1:01:22Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:23Speaker 02

  To be an SNL, right? Cause SNL really is about letting the performers shine.

• 1:01:27Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:01:28Speaker 02

  And that's how, you know, I figured out how to- How to work there for the most part. Like I said, like the first few years, it was really just trying to

• 1:01:37Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:37Speaker 02

  Come up with the smartest ways to do stuff that'll make the performers look good.

• 1:01:42Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. Well, they put you on camera a little bit too, though. You got to be on there, you know?

• 1:01:46Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, actually, the very first week, I was a backup singer to Madonna. Madonna was Madonna was the first guest.

• 1:01:54Stavros Halkias?

  That's crazy.

• 1:01:55Speaker 02

  Biggest star we ever had on the show.

• 1:01:57Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:01:57Speaker 02

  This is like peak material girl.

• 1:01:59Stavros Halkias?

  Totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Holy shit.

• 1:02:01Speaker 02

  And she was the host and I wrote a sketch where and I got on, I got a sketch on my very first week. It was a Spanish. It was a, it was like a Sabado Gigante.

• 1:02:12Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:02:13Speaker 02

  Kind of parody.

• 1:02:13Stavros Halkias?

  Sabado Gigante, yeah.

• 1:02:14Speaker 02

  So I just thought of, this was before La Isla Bonita, but I just looked at her and I just thought she'd be a great, her face is just perfect to play a Spanish variety show hostess. So I wrote this sketch with the two Canadian guys, the Kids in the Hall guys.

• 1:02:31Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, wow.

• 1:02:32Speaker 02

  And I wrote a mashup. The beginning of it was a mashup of Take On Me, the Aha Song, and La Bamba. And somehow I created this mashup where she did it with a Spanish beat. And Damon Wayans, John Lovitz, and they needed a third backup singer, so it was me. I'm just, it was just so fucking surreal that I'm just living in a cot

• 1:02:57Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:57Speaker 02

  in Chicago two weeks earlier.

• 1:02:59Stavros Halkias?

  Literally two weeks before.

• 1:02:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, I shared an apartment with two other guys and we'd alternate. One of us has to live in the living room and sleep there, you know, on a couch.

• 1:03:07Stavros Halkias?

  Of course, wow.

• 1:03:07Speaker 02

  And then like three weeks later, whatever, I'm Madonna's backup singer.

• 1:03:12Stavros Halkias?

  That's fucking wild, man. Well, what about, okay, so what about Conan? Was there like a thing? I mean, at that point, you were, you already were so locked in with Conan, where, I mean, just like

• 1:03:21Speaker 02

  The actual, when we started that show.

• 1:03:23Stavros Halkias?

  The actual shows, the actual bits, was there like, I mean, obviously Triumph has outlived everything.

• 1:03:27Speaker 02

  That was, yeah, but that was years later.

• 1:03:29Stavros Halkias?

  That was much, yeah, yeah.

• 1:03:30Speaker 02

  Like I said, with Conan, it was all about like coming up with shit by not doing what Dave did.

• 1:03:36Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:03:37Speaker 02

  And like that was, even going back to before Conan got the gig, I was like dreaming of like, what would it be like? Cause Letterman was, we knew Letterman was leaving and they, first person they asked was Dana Carvey. And so immediately I was like, we could do sketches. We, nobody's ever done that.

• 1:03:54Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:55Speaker 02

  Like a sketch kind of format where you play characters and

• 1:04:00Speaker 02

  You know, Steve Allen had done a little of that, this guy Steve Allen.

• 1:04:04Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 1:04:07Speaker 02

  Before I was born.

• 1:04:08Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:04:08Speaker 02

  But I just knew about him and, um, but when Conan got it, that's what led to like, yeah, we can do a lot of performance oriented stuff.

• 1:04:17Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:17Speaker 02

  And we, and the philosophy was we're gonna make shit up.

• 1:04:20Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:04:20Speaker 02

  Letterman did found humor with stagehands and people on the street. We're gonna make shit up.

• 1:04:25Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:26Speaker 02

  And, um, so that's what we did and, uh, we, but we like, I had so much confidence back then.

• 1:04:33Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:34Speaker 02

  Cause I had, was coming off like eight years of SNL.

• 1:04:37Stavros Halkias?

  Totally. Banger sketch after banger sketch.

• 1:04:39Speaker 02

  Really cocky and, you know, it was a little stressful because Lorne had, was the brilliant mind who realized that Conan might be able to do this.

• 1:04:50Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:04:51Speaker 02

  But Conan and I.

• 1:04:52Stavros Halkias?

  Pull, yeah.

• 1:04:53Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:53Stavros Halkias?

  Especially when you see the first year of doughy ass Conan, you know what I mean? He's kind of, he kind of looks kind of chubby too. He looks like a little kid.

• 1:05:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:05:00Stavros Halkias?

  And it's just how his face is, he's obviously not a fat guy ever, but like, but he just looks young.

• 1:05:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:05:05Stavros Halkias?

  And he's so nervous.

• 1:05:07Speaker 02

  Yeah. And he's setting up bits for like 10 minutes. You know, so we thought what would be the best thing to do, you know?

• 1:05:15Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:15Speaker 02

  And, uh, no, he was scared and, but before the show started, he was just this guy who made us all laugh.

• 1:05:23Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:05:24Speaker 02

  In the, uh, in the office and I was like, he's gonna be fucking so fucking big from the start. Between these bits that we're coming up with and him and Lorne would say, does anybody, do you think, what if he doesn't? Yeah, we got it. That's, we really were like that. It was like, really? Does he have to?

• 1:05:42Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:44Speaker 02

  This is my time, man. Cause it was like, for us, it was like, this is gonna be our playground where we can do all the silliest shit.

• 1:05:52Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:05:53Speaker 02

  That we wouldn't dream of doing on Saturday Night Live.

• 1:05:55Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:05:56Speaker 02

  You know?

• 1:05:56Stavros Halkias?

  And you got to fucking do it.

• 1:05:57Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:05:58Stavros Halkias?

  And now, now you're in the mud. You're in here with the, in the podcast space and you got, you got your own podcast. Tell people about it.

• 1:06:06Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:06:07Stavros Halkias?

  Cause you are, you're here in the slot with the piggies now. You used to be TV film legendary bit after legendary bit. Of course, let's not forget your star turn as the chemistry teacher in Billy Madison. I've already, I just talked about, you know, Downey's.

• 1:06:22Speaker 02

  My.

• 1:06:22Stavros Halkias?

  chlorophyll more like borophyll.

• 1:06:25Speaker 02

  Got to be in a lot of Sandler movies. It was fun. The guy who got thrown through the door.

• 1:06:30Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 1:06:31Speaker 02

  In Happy Gilmore.

• 1:06:32Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 1:06:34Speaker 02

  Wedding singer, you know, a lot of people only know me from these like five 30 second cameos.

• 1:06:40Stavros Halkias?

  It really is the iceberg thing where it's like, people might know you from, you know, this cameo. Like, oh, that's a guy who I get, I guess that's a struggling actor who could only book these things. And then they see you have the fucking largest comedy writing career of all time. It's like the iceberg peaks this much.

• 1:06:56Speaker 02

  Fun acting I ever had was doing Curb. I got to do Curb and I got to play this foul mouth. Uh, baseball. I was a mechanic who sponsored his softball team. And Larry Charles, the director was like, you know, brought me on as like, I want you to do a pregame speech. And I was like, can I be dirty? And he's like, please.

• 1:07:17Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:07:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, that was, that was the best.

• 1:07:20Stavros Halkias?

  That's fucking awesome.

• 1:07:21Speaker 02

  But, um, but yeah, in terms of, uh, fuck, what was I thinking about here?

• 1:07:26Stavros Halkias?

  The pod?

• 1:07:27Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:07:28Stavros Halkias?

  What's going on with the pod?

• 1:07:29Speaker 02

  So, you know.

• 1:07:30Stavros Halkias?

  Where can people find it?

• 1:07:31Speaker 02

  In my 60s and I'm, I'm clearly past my prime now.

• 1:07:34Stavros Halkias?

  I don't know.

• 1:07:35Speaker 02

  So I was like, time to do a podcast. I mean, that's what so many, you know, so many people I admire. Some of my colleagues, you know, everybody from Ted Danson to like, you know, practically the whole cast of The Office.

• 1:07:51Stavros Halkias?

  Every fourth lead on any big sitcom now.

• 1:07:53Speaker 02

  I love the ones where it's like.

• 1:07:54Stavros Halkias?

  Does a rewatch pod?

• 1:07:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, we're gonna do, yeah, rewatch pod. Let's talk about, you know, episode. I love that, like, I love Susie and Jeff and I love Curb Your Enthusiasm.

• 1:08:03Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:03Speaker 02

  It's one of my favorite shows ever.

• 1:08:05Stavros Halkias?

  One of the best shows of all time.

• 1:08:05Speaker 02

  So I was excited. Oh, Susie and Jeff are doing one. So when they get to season 11, uh, I'll get to be on. And I saw like, uh, Susie, the like, uh, about a year ago and I was like, so what, what year are you up to? Oh, we, it got canceled.

• 1:08:23Speaker 02

  He made it to like season three and a half.

• 1:08:27Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, the secret is they have to be sort of famous, but not famous enough that it gets in the way of stuff.

• 1:08:32Speaker 02

  Or people just don't want recaps that badly.

• 1:08:35Stavros Halkias?

  They, yeah, well, what it start, I think the one that really did it was the Sopranos recap.

• 1:08:41Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 1:08:41Stavros Halkias?

  And that was Imperioli and Sharippa. But Imperial, and it was during the pandemic.

• 1:08:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:48Stavros Halkias?

  And I think The Sopranos is so good.

• 1:08:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:50Stavros Halkias?

  And Imperial, and those two guys have such a, Sharippa's just the man, he's just like classic.

• 1:08:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:56Stavros Halkias?

  Tri-state goo, you know, awesome hospitality, just classic what you want. And then Imperial is such an interesting, he's got the, he's such a, you know, specific actor, obviously he's, you know.

• 1:09:08Speaker 02

  And also there's no pressure on them to be really funny.

• 1:09:10Stavros Halkias?

  No, none at all.

• 1:09:12Speaker 02

  The expectation is much lower than when Susie and Jeff, like, you know, or anybody from a sitcom.

• 1:09:17Stavros Halkias?

  You're right. That's a great point. They have to, that's a really great point is.

• 1:09:22Speaker 02

  It's like, it's not as funny as the show.

• 1:09:23Stavros Halkias?

  If it's a comedy, exactly, you're right. You can do, you can do a rewatch on a drama.

• 1:09:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:29Stavros Halkias?

  Cause then being funny is fun and it's a change of pace. That's a great point. The comedy ones are never gonna work.

• 1:09:34Speaker 02

  And there's also like a mystery to like, what was Javid Chase thinking at this point?

• 1:09:39Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 1:09:39Speaker 02

  You know, whereas Curb, it's like, well, wasn't he fucking funny? Oh my God, Odenkirk killed it.

• 1:09:45Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, he really did kill it. Yeah, he really did kill it.

• 1:09:49Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:50Speaker 02

  We'll be right back with, guess, when we come back, guess who else killed it?

• 1:09:55Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. Exactly, yeah, it's a good point. But this is not like that. Your podcast is not like that.

• 1:10:02Speaker 02

  My podcast was my wife's idea, actually. So during the pandemic, actually, what I did have a lot of fun doing. I was, I got this opportunity to do a sketch show again. I never wanted to do sketch again. I did this show.

• 1:10:15Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:16Speaker 02

  Where, it was a terrible idea in my head. It was like, Fox wants to do something like Spitting Image with the fucking live puppets. And I was like, oh, that's terrible. There's already Saturday Night Live. I'd much rather see humans.

• 1:10:29Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 1:10:29Speaker 02

  Do their take on politicians than some fucking inanimate puppet that can't blink or change expressions.

• 1:10:36Speaker 02

  And I'm having this conversation with my manager and I said, you know, the only thing that would be funny is if they interacted with humans. And then I stopped and like, oh, that would be fucking funny.

• 1:10:46Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:46Speaker 02

  If I got like an Alec Baldwin puppet to yell at paparazzi.

• 1:10:49Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:50Speaker 02

  It's like real paparazzi.

• 1:10:52Stavros Halkias?

  An Alec Baldwin puppet to call his daughter puppet a rude little pig. You know, that would do really well, too.

• 1:10:58Speaker 02

  No comment.

• 1:11:01Speaker 02

  Alec's a friend.

• 1:11:04Stavros Halkias?

  No one funnier on 30 Rock. This is the funniest thing of all time.

• 1:11:07Speaker 02

  It's alright, you dug your hole.

• 1:11:08Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:11Speaker 02

  He's never gonna, he's never gonna lose.

• 1:11:12Stavros Halkias?

  He's not coming on stop, he's real.

• 1:11:13Speaker 02

  Or he'll come and say, thanks a lot.

• 1:11:16Speaker 02

  What the fuck's the matter with you?

• 1:11:19Stavros Halkias?

  Actually, that would be, that would be great podcasting. Getting dressed down by Baldwin for 90 minutes.

• 1:11:26Speaker 02

  I'll bring the Alec Baldwin puppet on next time. He'll just do 30 minutes on, yeah.

• 1:11:30Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:31Speaker 02

  You think this is entertainment? Anyway, um, so, uh, yeah, so I, I had a writer's room on, on Zoom and we just had so much fucking fun. And I like had forgotten how much fun it is. The most fun part of doing comedy is coming up with this shit.

• 1:11:51Stavros Halkias?

  Totally. The riffs, the, yeah.

• 1:11:53Speaker 02

  Again, it's like not for, it's not what I want to do. It's ironic because I said improv is, you know, but

• 1:12:00Stavros Halkias?

  riffing, yes.

• 1:12:01Speaker 02

  Riffing is fun. And so I was like, what if we did a show like, we call, we call it the not a show and we're just coming up with sketch ideas for a show that's never gonna happen.

• 1:12:11Stavros Halkias?

  Of course.

• 1:12:11Speaker 02

  And that seemed fun, but

• 1:12:15Speaker 02

  my wife was like, I don't think, I don't know if that's gonna sell. You know, it's just a bunch of old white men making each other. She said, but what if you make it interactive?

• 1:12:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:26Speaker 02

  And it's like, what if somebody, you know, you have a call in line and people want help, like somebody's got to make a speech at a wedding or somebody's got a job interview and they want to come off funny or somebody wants to write somebody a fan letter.

• 1:12:39Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:40Speaker 02

  And wants to impress that person. And then you and your comedy friends will punch up, you know, or come up with ideas and like that really is a lot of fun.

• 1:12:50Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:12:50Speaker 02

  Not only, because even if we come up with bad ideas that are funny because they're inappropriate somehow.

• 1:12:55Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:56Speaker 02

  And so that's what we've been doing. And I have like all these funny people on. I'd love to have you on.

• 1:13:00Stavros Halkias?

  Anytime. I'm so down.

• 1:13:02Speaker 02

  Um, and we would. You know, we've had like a guy from an a cappella group came on and he's like, we really need help with our banter in between songs. And that's actually such a hilariously ridiculous premise. So I had like Mikey Day and his writing partner, Streeter. They're like literally two of the best writers who've ever been at the show. They're amazing. And we just had a great time talking to this a cappella guy. But then we, they did a show and we had people like bring cameras and we saw what they incorporated that we used. So we have like an epilogue. So we also have an epilogue to find out if our, any of our advice took.

• 1:13:45Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:46Speaker 02

  Kind of like, you know, it's a one, it's a This American Life kind of does.

• 1:13:50Stavros Halkias?

  The callback episodes. Yes, yes.

• 1:13:52Speaker 02

  So, so yeah.

• 1:13:52Stavros Halkias?

  Where are they now?

• 1:13:53Speaker 02

  Yeah. What happened? We have epilogues and we bring the person back and they tell us how they did. And we, if they're, if it's an audio thing, we, or you know, or if it's video, we, we show clips.

• 1:14:03Stavros Halkias?

  I love that. That's great. I mean, again, that's just a, you just have done more, you're doing a better version of this show, basically. Cause what we do.

• 1:14:11Speaker 02

  You do advice.

• 1:14:12Stavros Halkias?

  We do advice. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I love that you're actually catching up with them. And when we get a callback, that always is a, that always is a thrill. So why don't we, why don't we fucking?

• 1:14:21Speaker 02

  We're gonna give, this is.

• 1:14:22Stavros Halkias?

  Let's give some real advice.

• 1:14:23Speaker 02

  I would do that. I mean, I'll, I'll do my best, but this is, I'm terrible at this.

• 1:14:27Stavros Halkias?

  This is great.

• 1:14:28Speaker 02

  I mean, every, every problem they'll have, I'll just try to punch it up.

• 1:14:31Stavros Halkias?

  Please. No, no, Joe, that's the, we don't have to help anyone here.

• 1:14:35Speaker 02

  Oh, good.

• 1:14:36Stavros Halkias?

  We don't have to actually help anyone.

• 1:14:37Speaker 02

  Cause I'm not a.

• 1:14:38Stavros Halkias?

  No, no.

• 1:14:39Speaker 02

  Healthy, normal person.

• 1:14:40Stavros Halkias?

  We can roast them. That's, you know.

• 1:14:41Speaker 02

  Oh, no, I don't want to do that.

• 1:14:42Stavros Halkias?

  We, we've done that.

• 1:14:43Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:14:44Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. They know what they're signing up for.

• 1:14:45Speaker 02

  Okay, good. We'll just.

• 1:14:47Stavros Halkias?

  And tell the people, what's the podcast called?

• 1:14:49Speaker 02

  Oh, it's called Humor Me with Robert Smigel and Friends. And it's gonna be available, it debuts May 8th.

• 1:14:56Stavros Halkias?

  It's available right now. What is it? What's today, Aldous?

• 1:14:59Speaker 02

  People like May 8th. They like that idea for a date.

• 1:15:01Speaker 03

  I think it's the week after May 8th.

• 1:15:03Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:04Speaker 03

  Is it May 15th?

• 1:15:05Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, it's either May. Yeah, it's, it's May. It's, it's either out or it's about to come out.

• 1:15:10Speaker 03

  I think the show's out right now, everyone. Check it out.

• 1:15:13Speaker 02

  What a producer. This show starts, is on.

• 1:15:15Stavros Halkias?

  It's on Mondays.

• 1:15:16Speaker 02

  So it'll be, yeah, it's already available.

• 1:15:18Stavros Halkias?

  It's available, baby.

• 1:15:19Speaker 02

  Through iHeart or wherever artists are exploited.

• 1:15:26Speaker 02

  Spotify.

• 1:15:30Speaker 02

  Apple Music. You name it.

• 1:15:32Stavros Halkias?

  Wherever it is.

• 1:15:33Speaker 02

  If we're getting pennies on the dollar. We're there.

• 1:15:39Stavros Halkias?

  Elvis, play us a call, baby.

• 1:15:43Speaker 05

  What's up, Stav, Elvis, esteemed guests? So I got a little bit of a dilemma. So my grandma has said since I was a kid that if any of the grandkids get tattoos or piercings, that we get cut out of the will. Now, as things stand, it's just me and one of my cousin still in the paperwork. My grandpa was a farmer all his life. They ended up finding some oil on his land. So I'm pretty sure that there's a nice check waiting for me if I hold out.

• 1:16:19Speaker 05

  Now, I don't know if she was bluffing or not, but I really want to start getting some tattoos. I'm into, you know, more alternative goth girls. And I think getting added might help me clean up a little bit more in that area. My grandpa passed about five years ago and I was waiting for my grandma to, you know, before I started getting them.

• 1:16:42Stavros Halkias?

  This is incredible.

• 1:16:42Speaker 05

  And I figured, you know, after grandpa died, she wouldn't stick around for too much longer. But she keeps on kicking. And, you know, she's had some heart problems here and there, but she's not stopping. Now I'm 27. My biological clock is starting to tick.

• 1:16:58Stavros Halkias?

  Your biological clock for your grandma's death?

• 1:17:01Speaker 02

  Yeah. For to get tattoos, you have a biological clock?

• 1:17:04Stavros Halkias?

  This guy's on the phone with his fucking grandma's cardiologist. He's like, buddy, look, this tattooer's in from fucking Vancouver. If I don't get goth Chucky, if I don't get Hellraiser on my back, how am I going to get pussy from Latina baddies, goth Latinas, you fucking asshole? That's so funny.

• 1:17:22Speaker 02

  If that's the only way you're going to get laid. By having a goth tattoo. I don't know. I just, I would maybe just. I would hit on your grandma, maybe. Might have your best shot there.

• 1:17:36Stavros Halkias?

  That's a good point. How can we get grandma to die faster in a positive way? Maybe you get somebody to dick her down. You know, maybe you're both, maybe you could both, or you know, have grandma go out on a high note, maybe. Uh, is there more to this call, Aldous?

• 1:17:53Speaker 05

  Biological clock is starting to tick and I don't know if I should just pull the trigger on these tattoos and disrespect my grandma, or if I should hold out, hope she wasn't lying about cutting us out of the will. I don't know. Maybe I just get some tattoos you can't see. I don't know. She's like 88, so like.

• 1:18:13Speaker 02

  Could go for a while.

• 1:18:14Speaker 05

  I don't know. What do you think?

• 1:18:15Stavros Halkias?

  My grandma's 94.

• 1:18:18Speaker 02

  I would think of some other way to attract women. Than the tattoo, like maybe, you know, develop a personality. You know what I'm saying? I feel like there's other ways beyond tattoos.

• 1:18:31Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, sure. And listen, by the way, you could get tattoo, buy a goth a tattoo. Now we're talking, you know what I mean? Get her some tattoo, get, and by the way, you could wear.

• 1:18:43Speaker 02

  Grandma a tattoo?

• 1:18:43Stavros Halkias?

  A goth woman.

• 1:18:44Speaker 02

  Oh, buy her a tattoo.

• 1:18:46Stavros Halkias?

  Well, how about the, if you're trying to fuck a goth baddie, why don't you take the 500? Well, I mean, I don't know how much money you have for this tattoo. Beca, pretend you're like a, some kind of goth sugar daddy situation. You know what I mean? And by the way, what's stopping you from wearing a all black suit and getting a little eyeliner? You know what I mean? Why, why does this have to be?

• 1:19:06Speaker 02

  There's other ways to be goth.

• 1:19:07Stavros Halkias?

  Let's be goth other, what about some black leather pants? Oil yourself up, get into some of those, you know what I mean? Um, tattoo, now what about, can you try it on? Can you try on some, uh, henna tattoos? You know what I mean? Are you going on vacation?

• 1:19:21Speaker 02

  That, grandma won't know the difference. She's too old. Can't get away with a henna tattoo. I assume this man, if, if she's taking it that seriously, he might be Jewish, cause that's like a.

• 1:19:33Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, you know, allowed in the cemetery or whatever.

• 1:19:35Speaker 02

  Cemetery and that's any grandmother's dream for her children is that they get to be buried in a Jewish cemetery.

• 1:19:44Speaker 02

  It's like a priority.

• 1:19:45Stavros Halkias?

  At their feet, uh, you see, most grandmothers want to be buried with you like you're their dog, like their king tut. She wants you in the mausoleum with you, with her. So I would say, get Goth in other ways. Get Goth, you know, be Tobey Maguire in Spider-Man 3. Grow out your bangs. The Venom, the Venom.

• 1:20:06Speaker 02

  That was the worst Spider-Man.

• 1:20:07Stavros Halkias?

  Not, it wasn't good, but he is emo, he's Venom for a sec. You know what I mean? Channel him. I would say, don't, you can't, and by the way, you thinking you're not disrespecting your grandmother because you're, you've, you've launched a when will my grandma die timer? The way perverts had like a when will the Olsen twins turn 18 timer going?

• 1:20:26Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:20:27Stavros Halkias?

  You're, you perversely wanting your grandmother to die so you can get a tattoo is disrespecting her.

• 1:20:35Speaker 02

  It's problematic, yeah.

• 1:20:36Stavros Halkias?

  You're not, you're not not being disrespectful right now. You're literally rooting for your grandma to die.

• 1:20:41Speaker 02

  Also, I'm pretty sure that Goth will go out of style before your grandma dies. Like, you know.

• 1:20:50Stavros Halkias?

  I don't know. I think it's here to stay.

• 1:20:52Speaker 02

  Goth is finally here to stay?

• 1:20:53Stavros Halkias?

  I think it's here to stay. I don't know. You know, I've been doing a lot of touring the Midwest. Goth sort of like the way fashion kind of goes to the middle of the country and everything is like 10 years behind, or it just kind of stays.

• 1:21:06Speaker 02

  Goth started in like the 90s.

• 1:21:08Stavros Halkias?

  Goth is, Goth, Goth is in small towns now. Like you go to a regular town and like the barista or the lady at Walmart is a little Goth. Goth is mainstream. I bet this guy isn't even calling from the, I bet this guy isn't even a coastal elite. Elders, give us a, let us know where his area code is from. Don't dox him fully.

• 1:21:25Speaker 02

  He's gotta be from, yeah. Not, not, huh?

• 1:21:29Stavros Halkias?

  We'll bleep it, but it's, ah, I mean, see, I'm 100% correct here.

• 1:21:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:21:35Stavros Halkias?

  Okay, so this buddy, look, grandma's not fucking around. She's from.

• 1:21:40Speaker 02

  Don't blow the inheritance.

• 1:21:41Stavros Halkias?

  The oil, start, yeah, get some fucking, get some eyeliner, oil, slick your hair, you know, get a bowl cut like Toby, uh, get bangs, get like bangs you could fucking do over your eyes. And then when you see grandma, clean up nice. But right now, focus on trying to get head without the help of tattoos. That's what I would tell you.

• 1:22:04Speaker 02

  There's gotta be another way.

• 1:22:05Stavros Halkias?

  There's gotta be another way.

• 1:22:07Speaker 03

  I feel like, I feel like it would be like more gratifying if he just learns how to get pussy normal too, because it's like, you also don't want to be like a lame tattoo lady bloomer.

• 1:22:17Stavros Halkias?

  That's true.

• 1:22:18Speaker 03

  I think he said he's 27, which is kinda there, but definitely like, you know, especially when you're in your 30s.

• 1:22:25Stavros Halkias?

  His real problem.

• 1:22:26Speaker 02

  At some age, it's not gonna help.

• 1:22:28Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:22:30Stavros Halkias?

  It gets really depressing when you get the divorced double sleeve, when you get the divorced back tat, dude, that's a fucking problem. So that's his real issue. It's not, okay, so to give him some grace, it's not that he wants his grandma dead, it's that grandma's life is, happens to be coinciding with his prime tattoo years. So, and I do agree, i-if you're in your 30s getting decked out in tattoos, and you, you know, and there's not some reason for this, you're not, you didn't beat cancer and you're celebrating, you're just a 30 year old lame guy who was, who now thinks you're cool, that's not gonna

• 1:23:10Stavros Halkias?

  work, bro. I fucking promise you. Um, so yeah, get, like I said, you can, what are goths into?

• 1:23:18Speaker 02

  Uh, Dracula fangs?

• 1:23:20Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:20Speaker 02

  I would recommend that. You know, I'm, you know, I'm kind of an old guy, but.

• 1:23:26Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, sure, sure.

• 1:23:27Speaker 02

  When I was into, no, but I was, uh, uh, back in the 90s, uh, the girls loved fangs, so I imagine same thing now.

• 1:23:36Stavros Halkias?

  They liked fangs in the 90s.

• 1:23:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:23:38Stavros Halkias?

  I didn't know that.

• 1:23:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:23:40Stavros Halkias?

  Well, you weren't a goth guy. Elvira though, I'm sure you must have beat off to Elvira. You know, you're, you're.

• 1:23:46Speaker 02

  My sons are listening. I can't talk about, you know, I'm not gonna.

• 1:23:51Stavros Halkias?

  Wow, so your sons listening, so you want them to know their dad's a liar, but you.

• 1:23:56Speaker 02

  No, my dad's taking the fifth, that's all.

• 1:24:01Speaker 02

  Elvira.

• 1:24:03Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:24:04Speaker 02

  She was pretty far down on the list.

• 1:24:05Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:08Stavros Halkias?

  We have different tastes.

• 1:24:11Speaker 02

  No, Goth, uh, yeah, it's, he's gonna be fine. He just needs to, he just needs to find something out. What if he just like, you know, what, what, what are, are there Goth activities?

• 1:24:25Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 1:24:26Speaker 02

  That would inspire a Goth.

• 1:24:28Stavros Halkias?

  Here's what you do. Maybe you could say, uh, I opened up this makeup store, wholesale. I have this makeup store. They got me all this black lipstick I can't use. I'm giving away black lipstick. And then you, you put your address. Now you put it on a bowl. It's like the Goth girls are coming trick or treating for Goth, for black lipstick.

• 1:24:48Speaker 02

  But then when they show up and it's like, what's with this guy? He's not tattooed.

• 1:24:53Stavros Halkias?

  Well, that's where I thought the henna might come into contact. Maybe pretend you're a supplier of Goth, of black lipstick.

• 1:25:01Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:25:02Stavros Halkias?

  And that you got, they got too much at the factory.

• 1:25:05Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:25:05Stavros Halkias?

  Or if you, and, and get your henna tattoo.

• 1:25:09Speaker 02

  And your Dracula fangs.

• 1:25:10Stavros Halkias?

  And your Dracula fangs. Uh, and I think that ought to do it. I think if you give away black lipstick, you should be able to get some pussy from Goth's. If I had a gavel, I would smack it and I would say, next question, Eldis. Where'd you get a gavel?

• 1:25:28Speaker 02

  Miss Pat will come for your ass.

• 1:25:29Stavros Halkias?

  Or Hulk hands. Maybe I could smash Hulk hands together. Not a bad idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:25:37Speaker 04

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• 1:25:49Speaker 01

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• 1:26:20Speaker 05

  Hey, Stav, my name's Sam. A big fan for a long time. Uh, I hope you guys are doing well, you and the guest and Eldy. Uh, just got a question for you about dealing with some neighbors and/or my wife.

• 1:26:35Speaker 05

  Uh, we are married with two little kids. I have a two-year-old and a seven-month-old, both girls. And, uh, our next-door neighbor has two kids also, a little bit older. I think the older one is, uh, three years old, not quite four. And he has started peeing outside the house.

• 1:26:57Speaker 02

  Mm.

• 1:26:57Speaker 05

  Like on the side of the house where my wife and my daughters could potentially see it.

• 1:27:02Stavros Halkias?

  The neighbor's kid. The neighbor's three-year-old boy is pulling his dick out and pissing.

• 1:27:07Speaker 02

  It's a kid peeing?

• 1:27:08Stavros Halkias?

  (laughing)

• 1:27:09Speaker 02

  That's what he's worried about?

• 1:27:10Speaker 05

  Side of the house where my wife and my daughters could potentially see it.

• 1:27:14Speaker 02

  Oh, come on, man. It's a little kid.

• 1:27:15Speaker 05

  So my wife has brought it to my attention that I need to go and talk to his dad and tell him that this isn't appropriate and it needs to stop.

• 1:27:25Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 1:27:26Speaker 05

  Uh, I'm a little uncomfortable about that. I don't want to start trouble with an otherwise good neighbor for something that I think little boys just kind of do.

• 1:27:36Speaker 02

  Hell, yeah, brother.

• 1:27:37Speaker 05

  So I was hoping you could give me some advice on how to, uh, start this conversation.

• 1:27:40Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:27:41Speaker 05

  All right. Thanks, man.

• 1:27:42Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:27:43Stavros Halkias?

  Hmm. You're now gonna be able to do this.

• 1:27:45Speaker 02

  This guy has, the neighbor has sons. It could be so much worse than

• 1:27:49Stavros Halkias?

  (laughing)

• 1:27:50Speaker 02

  a three-year-old peeing.

• 1:27:52Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, I mean, look, dude. Yeah, absolutely. Three-year-old peeing is like

• 1:27:56Speaker 02

  Adorable.

• 1:27:57Stavros Halkias?

  What are we doing here? Humanity? What's humanity? We, you know what I mean? It's like, eh, people piss. Now, if it's his dad, if the dad is pissing at the side, but even, can I, honestly, if the dad is pissing off the side of his porch?

• 1:28:12Speaker 02

  No, that would, that would be fair to, you know.

• 1:28:15Stavros Halkias?

  Listen, I'm just saying.

• 1:28:17Speaker 02

  Only

• 1:28:18Stavros Halkias?

  My own backyard, I want to be able to piss on my fence every once in a while.

• 1:28:22Speaker 02

  I get that, but if, if a little kid is seeing it.

• 1:28:25Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right. That's true.

• 1:28:26Speaker 02

  That's the only difference.

• 1:28:27Stavros Halkias?

  If the dad is pissing with his dick pointed to your window, that's a big problem. I'll give you that.

• 1:28:33Speaker 02

  If you could just turn, you know, five degrees to the left so that your dick, even, even the silhouette of your dick, it's just, I don't want that.

• 1:28:44Stavros Halkias?

  If you do it around sunset, so it really, so we really see it. Uh, oh, that, yeah.

• 1:28:50Speaker 02

  The shadow that your dick is casting.

• 1:28:54Speaker 02

  It's just, it's not during sunset. It's so long.

• 1:28:58Stavros Halkias?

  It's too long.

• 1:28:59Speaker 02

  My daughter can't miss it.

• 1:29:02Stavros Halkias?

  And it's making me insecure. I know it's just a shadow, but I don't like seeing a dick that much bigger than mine outside my own home.

• 1:29:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's a whole other issue.

• 1:29:10Stavros Halkias?

  That's a whole other can of worms.

• 1:29:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, what if this kid, what if this little kid has a big dick and that's just making the dad jealous?

• 1:29:18Stavros Halkias?

  That's a big.

• 1:29:18Speaker 02

  I can tell he's gonna have a bigger dick than mine. You know, his dick's already kinda dangling.

• 1:29:24Stavros Halkias?

  Calls his mom.

• 1:29:25Speaker 02

  It's kinda dangling already.

• 1:29:26Stavros Halkias?

  Hey mom, what did my dick look like at three?

• 1:29:27Speaker 02

  Did it dangle yet?

• 1:29:30Stavros Halkias?

  How much hang time did my dick have at three?

• 1:29:32Speaker 02

  Fucking kids like dangling almost as far as his balls and I'm sorry, I don't want my daughter to see that.

• 1:29:39Stavros Halkias?

  Something so obscene, such an obscenely large penis that goes almost down to your whole balls.

• 1:29:44Speaker 02

  Yeah. Where there's smoke, there's fire. It's usually about, my experience when people complain about their neighbors' kids dicks. Scratch the surface and the guy's got insecure dick issues.

• 1:30:00Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, so it seems like you've got a little ass dick, man.

• 1:30:04Speaker 02

  And that's okay.

• 1:30:05Stavros Halkias?

  And that's fine.

• 1:30:06Speaker 02

  It's okay.

• 1:30:07Stavros Halkias?

  You can have a very.

• 1:30:08Speaker 02

  Unless your wife is the one, your wife's instigating this, so maybe she's, maybe she is like trying to.

• 1:30:14Stavros Halkias?

  Let you know.

• 1:30:15Speaker 02

  Let you know that.

• 1:30:16Stavros Halkias?

  You gotta step it up. She knows. She's like, it's making me really uncomfortable having someone with the same size penis as yours pissing outside of their yard.

• 1:30:26Stavros Halkias?

  Alright, so let's.

• 1:30:28Speaker 02

  I don't know. I, I just like.

• 1:30:30Stavros Halkias?

  I don't think.

• 1:30:31Speaker 02

  I think the wife needs a talking to.

• 1:30:33Stavros Halkias?

  There is a little bit of that. There is a like, cuz I think, I guess my question is how often has this happened? If this is a thing where the kid is out there, you know, three times a fucking day or something weird, okay, but if, did this happen a couple times? Has it gone to the level that you have to say something?

• 1:30:55Speaker 02

  He makes it sound like it's happening a fair amount, doesn't he?

• 1:30:59Stavros Halkias?

  Did he, did he really specify? Not really.

• 1:31:02Speaker 03

  He didn't really specify. He just said the kids like.

• 1:31:03Stavros Halkias?

  Talking to him like you're the producer. I have to tell you that.

• 1:31:05Speaker 03

  The kids recently started doing it.

• 1:31:08Stavros Halkias?

  This is fucking insane. Recently started, okay, so I would say, keep tabs on it. If it raises to the level of something to say, where you have to say something, first I would talk to your wife and be like, look, I get it's a little weird, he's a little fucking kid. Let's not, let's not be crazy about this. If I were to have a conversation with my neighbor, I would, I would just kind of be jokey and be like,

• 1:31:31Speaker 02

  Exactly, this is kind of a humor me situation.

• 1:31:34Stavros Halkias?

  This is super humor me.

• 1:31:35Speaker 02

  Like, make, be light about it.

• 1:31:37Stavros Halkias?

  Fully, be like, oh, picked up a new habit.

• 1:31:39Speaker 02

  Your kid is like, uh, is that like, how, uh, well, now I'm thinking, now I gotta think of something funny.

• 1:31:48Speaker 02

  Just think of something funny.

• 1:31:49Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, think of something funny. Don't you have people you could ask who professionally do this?

• 1:31:53Speaker 02

  Dialogue it in, that's what we used to say.

• 1:31:58Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, dude, just go in there.

• 1:32:00Speaker 02

  It's like, uh, what's he gonna do when it snows, he's gonna, you know? Is he gonna pee, then we'll know he's done it, I don't know.

• 1:32:09Stavros Halkias?

  I mean, you just gotta go into them and be like, oh, your boys, literally just be like, my man's out there, oh, I see my man's out there pissing on the fence, or just, oh, I, I know that move, like, whatever.

• 1:32:19Speaker 02

  Just gentle kinda like.

• 1:32:20Stavros Halkias?

  Just be like, what's up, and just talk to him about it, cause it'd be like, is that like a new phase? Like, what's he, cause by the way,

• 1:32:25Speaker 02

  Innocently like.

• 1:32:26Stavros Halkias?

  The parents don't, you think these parents want their kid pissing outside?

• 1:32:29Speaker 02

  Well, who knows?

• 1:32:30Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, I guess that's true. Also, we got a little, not to be, you know, again, a coastal, I did hear a little twang on, on our callers, on our callers' voice.

• 1:32:39Speaker 02

  That's alright.

• 1:32:40Stavros Halkias?

  But I think ultimately, I'm with you, it's not that big a deal. Talk to your neighbor like it's a kind of a fun thing, and be like, oh, I see what's going, I remember, I used to piss outside all the time, it's like, well, oh, he just started doing that? Did he just fucking, did he just learn about pissing outside, or whatever, whatever? Like, when my, if my nephew got into a pissing outside phase, we would joke about it. You know what I mean?

• 1:33:01Speaker 02

  Makes sense. And then the guy, he'll probably be like, what the fuck are you joking about?

• 1:33:05Stavros Halkias?

  You looking at my fucking kid's dick, you fucking pervert?

• 1:33:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're looking at my-

• 1:33:08Stavros Halkias?

  You know my son pisses outside? Why the fuck are you looking at where my son pisses? Meet me outside tomorrow, and so, yeah, you could be in a duel at high noon, for all we know. But, you know, I say, keep it jokey.

• 1:33:19Speaker 02

  But it's better to joke about it than to confront him in a serious way. Hey, man, we gotta talk.

• 1:33:27Stavros Halkias?

  Everything okay?

• 1:33:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's about, um, it's about the, your son and his tendency to, you know what I'm talking about. I think you know what I'm talking about.

• 1:33:40Stavros Halkias?

  Imagine hearing that about your toddler. Someone take that tone. Um, my wife's a little worried my infant children might see your son's penis. That's the other thing, your kids are small too. Who fucking cares? Who gives a fuck?

• 1:33:53Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:33:54Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, fuck it.

• 1:33:55Speaker 02

  It's kinda healthy not to be. No, but seriously, you don't wanna introduce shame at that age.

• 1:34:04Stavros Halkias?

  That's a great point.

• 1:34:05Speaker 02

  Right?

• 1:34:05Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, and it does feel like your wife is coming at this from some type of propriety thing. And it's like, guess what? Little kids do inappropriate things all the fucking time. He's a three-year-old, it doesn't matter. As long as this kid isn't pissing outside his hole in a year. All right, I think we really clearly solved that guy's problem. Next question, Eldis. Yeah, chill.

• 1:34:26Speaker 02

  So far, so far neither people had a serious problem at all.

• 1:34:30Stavros Halkias?

  No, that's the beauty of the show.

• 1:34:32Speaker 02

  They're just drama queens, okay.

• 1:34:33Speaker 05

  Savi and Eldis and guests, um, basically what I wanna ask is, so I am a sex worker and escort in particular. So I just wanna thank you for your support for sex workers on the podcast and we appreciate that.

• 1:34:55Stavros Halkias?

  We're very pro hoe on this podcast.

• 1:34:57Speaker 05

  I have a question because I have this client and he is really hot and married and cheating on his wife. The normal MO. And basically the last time that he came to see me, he admitted that a couple of appointments before, he, the condom broke while we were having sex and he ended up coming inside of me.

• 1:35:29Stavros Halkias?

  Eldis, why did you pick this for fucking Robert, man?

• 1:35:33Speaker 02

  This is the first real problem. This is the first one that's an actual problem. I'm, I'm, I'm good. I'm not gonna have good advice, but I'm, I'm interested in hearing it.

• 1:35:43Stavros Halkias?

  It takes a wholesome twist.

• 1:35:45Speaker 02

  Oh, it does?

• 1:35:46Stavros Halkias?

  Okay, keep going.

• 1:35:48Speaker 05

  That he knew the condom broke, like last time I saw him. And I-

• 1:35:54Stavros Halkias?

  This is the fuck it, this is the pretty woman reboot. This is the gritty reboot.

• 1:36:00Speaker 05

  No, if it were any other client, I'd cut him off for pulling some shit like that.

• 1:36:06Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, brother.

• 1:36:06Speaker 05

  But he's like, really hot and really good at sex.

• 1:36:10Stavros Halkias?

  Stop dude, stop. What are you fucking talking about?

• 1:36:13Speaker 05

  Best pussy eating I've ever had. And I don't really want to give him up as a client. And my question to you is-

• 1:36:19Stavros Halkias?

  You must.

• 1:36:20Speaker 05

  Do I have to?

• 1:36:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 1:36:22Speaker 05

  Do I have to never see him again? Is that like really, really fucked up?

• 1:36:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 1:36:27Speaker 05

  Or can I just like be more aware-

• 1:36:30Stavros Halkias?

  No.

• 1:36:31Speaker 05

  In our sessions while I'm seeing him?

• 1:36:32Stavros Halkias?

  Are you out of your fucking mind, dude?

• 1:36:34Speaker 05

  Kind of just like get over it, because I like to see him.

• 1:36:38Stavros Halkias?

  No, stop.

• 1:36:39Speaker 05

  That's my dilemma. Um, thank you for listening. Let me know what you think. Bye bye.

• 1:36:44Speaker 02

  I'm more torn than you are, I'm sorry. I mean, when you think about it.

• 1:36:51Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, sure, sure, sure, sure.

• 1:36:52Speaker 02

  These people are performing a service. Like you say, you're, you claim to be pro hoe.

• 1:36:56Stavros Halkias?

  I am, I am, I am.

• 1:36:57Speaker 02

  This is a woman who's actually deriving a modicum of real pleasure.

• 1:37:03Stavros Halkias?

  Real pleasure, yeah.

• 1:37:04Speaker 02

  From one of her clients.

• 1:37:05Stavros Halkias?

  Right.

• 1:37:06Speaker 02

  And, you know, most of the time, she's just taking it for the team as a quarter.

• 1:37:11Stavros Halkias?

  Of course, of course, of course.

• 1:37:12Speaker 02

  Taking it for the team.

• 1:37:13Stavros Halkias?

  Yep.

• 1:37:14Speaker 02

  Sucking it for the team. Taking it from the behind for the team.

• 1:37:19Stavros Halkias?

  Yes, yes, yes. Servicing the team in a number of ways.

• 1:37:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Or fucking worst of all, just whacking it for the team.

• 1:37:27Stavros Halkias?

  Whacking it for the team.

• 1:37:28Speaker 02

  Here, I, I don't know. There's a part of me that's like, it's not like being a sex worker is the safest job in the first place.

• 1:37:38Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, sure, sure.

• 1:37:39Speaker 02

  So it's like, oh, you might get pregnant. I, I mean, I, I'm assuming that the guy, um- I mean, he confessed.

• 1:37:47Stavros Halkias?

  Would raise it, of course.

• 1:37:48Speaker 02

  First of all, he confessed.

• 1:37:48Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, would marry her and raise it, of course.

• 1:37:50Speaker 02

  Oh, no, I'm not.

• 1:37:51Stavros Halkias?

  I'm kidding.

• 1:37:53Stavros Halkias?

  Would make an honest Christian out of her.

• 1:37:55Speaker 02

  So I guess she didn't get pregnant.

• 1:37:56Stavros Halkias?

  I guess so, yeah.

• 1:37:57Speaker 02

  So maybe the guy's shooting blanks.

• 1:37:58Stavros Halkias?

  Ooh, it's possible.

• 1:38:00Speaker 02

  What if she?

• 1:38:01Stavros Halkias?

  I'm sure she's got to be triple first control up.

• 1:38:04Speaker 02

  What if she tells the guy, you gotta get a vasectomy?

• 1:38:08Stavros Halkias?

  He'll be like, yeah, I just did. And then be like, oh, good news, I actually got one yesterday, so can we keep going?

• 1:38:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, right.

• 1:38:16Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, that's a good point. I would say, ultimately.

• 1:38:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:38:22Stavros Halkias?

  It's still your job. And let's say you worked at Subway and one of the people there, uh, was really hot.

• 1:38:32Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:38:33Stavros Halkias?

  Sorry, yeah, she was rea- you're sexy.

• 1:38:36Speaker 02

  Accidentally jizzed on, on, on, on, on the credit card that he handed her?

• 1:38:42Stavros Halkias?

  And as soon as you made the best Italian BMT of your life, he nuts all over it, doesn't tell you, and you take a bite.

• 1:38:50Speaker 02

  I have a confession to make.

• 1:38:53Speaker 02

  I mean, I did, I did press 25% for your tip. But I don't know if you noticed, but there was jizz all over my credit card.

• 1:39:04Speaker 02

  Probably clogged up your machine. And you're like.

• 1:39:08Stavros Halkias?

  The tap to pay's not working.

• 1:39:09Speaker 02

  I can't, I can't risk my machine getting clogged up again.

• 1:39:15Speaker 02

  But he gave me a 25% tip. I don't know.

• 1:39:19Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, okay, ultimately, I think you should make a principled stand here because this is your job and you have to set baseline standards. And if you start letting this motherfucker nut in you, next thing you know, he's doing weirder shit.

• 1:39:35Speaker 02

  Well, wait a minute, who says he's gonna continue to nut in her? He's, he's, what if he's like, I swear to God, you know, you can inspect the condom before we, you know?

• 1:39:44Stavros Halkias?

  I really don't think.

• 1:39:45Speaker 02

  Just create that kind of bullshit standard.

• 1:39:46Stavros Halkias?

  I think she's, she's not in control here at all. He has the ability to get, to control her, clearly.

• 1:39:52Speaker 02

  That's fair.

• 1:39:52Stavros Halkias?

  And so I think.

• 1:39:54Speaker 02

  I don't, I mean.

• 1:39:55Stavros Halkias?

  And I'm gonna guess, the psychology.

• 1:39:59Stavros Halkias?

  Of, you know, if you're, if you're an escort, a lot of people I've met who, who are sex workers, there's a psychological component to what attracts you to that, why you're good at it, whatever, whatever. That I think this guy's probably tapping into some problematic shit in your, uh, you know, in your sex worker psychology.

• 1:40:18Speaker 02

  But.

• 1:40:18Stavros Halkias?

  But he does.

• 1:40:19Speaker 02

  What about the fact that he confessed? Like, think about it.

• 1:40:23Stavros Halkias?

  Sure.

• 1:40:25Speaker 02

  If he saw he fucking broke a condom, he'd be like, how many other guys have, could have jizzed, uh, you know?

• 1:40:31Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, sure, sure.

• 1:40:31Speaker 02

  Like, I don't have to tell her.

• 1:40:33Stavros Halkias?

  It's also.

• 1:40:33Speaker 02

  I don't have to, she doesn't have to ever know that it was me.

• 1:40:36Stavros Halkias?

  It's also a little worrisome that as a professional, you're not keeping tabs on who nuts in you and who doesn't.

• 1:40:42Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, that's.

• 1:40:42Stavros Halkias?

  The fact that he had to confess is a little wor- is a little worrisome about the OSHA standards.

• 1:40:48Speaker 02

  She must be really into this guy.

• 1:40:50Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, she was in the moment.

• 1:40:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly.

• 1:40:53Stavros Halkias?

  When, when your whole day is me, you and Eldis, and then some fucking, some fucking hot guy walks in, you're like, ooh, nice. So I get it. I get why you're swept up in the moment. But I would say you have to set boundaries. And here's the other thing. Talk to more professional sex workers, obviously, uh, who, who know about this kind of shit.

• 1:41:12Speaker 02

  Funny podcasts.

• 1:41:12Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But reach out to people who, who are, cause my hunch is that I get why, I get the, I get the reason you want to, you don't want to do this, but I think you must set a standard for everybody to keep you safe, to make sure that this guy is, you know, who knows? Maybe this guy confessed, maybe he's a good guy. Maybe he's also playing mind games here. Maybe he likes having control over this person who maybe at first had very strict boundaries, but the more they get to know each other, they're loosening, and he's seeing how much can I get out of? I'm, I'm, this is pure speculation.

• 1:41:45Speaker 02

  I like to see the best in people.

• 1:41:47Stavros Halkias?

  I like to see.

• 1:41:48Speaker 02

  It's just, you know.

• 1:41:48Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:41:49Speaker 02

  It's just been my, you know, standard for, as a comedy writer.

• 1:41:53Stavros Halkias?

  I get that.

• 1:41:54Speaker 02

  As a dog puppeteer.

• 1:41:56Stavros Halkias?

  When it comes to philanderers who nut in sex workers, you like to see the, you like to see the best in them. I get that.

• 1:42:02Speaker 02

  I'm more of an Ellen DeGeneres kind of comedian, you know?

• 1:42:05Stavros Halkias?

  A Cosby DeGeneres type.

• 1:42:07Speaker 02

  A Cosby.

• 1:42:08Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:11Stavros Halkias?

  And our worry here is that this guy ends up a real Cosby type.

• 1:42:14Speaker 02

  We're feel-good comedians.

• 1:42:15Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, I see that.

• 1:42:16Speaker 02

  No, you're right. He could, I, I just, I don't know enough about the guy.

• 1:42:23Speaker 02

  We have the guy call in.

• 1:42:25Stavros Halkias?

  That's a great, I would actually love to talk to him as well. But, that's what I'm gonna tell you, reach, talk to like some, some more experienced sex workers. That unfortunately is my, and by the way, make sure you're double checking and seeing who's nutting in you and who's not. Cause you're in a dangerous line of work for multiple reasons. You don't wanna get some kinda weird, you know, disease or whatever, so.

• 1:42:47Speaker 02

  Sounds like most guys, she's just, it's just a job and that's like all she's thinking about.

• 1:42:51Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, she's at the factory.

• 1:42:53Speaker 02

  And then this one guy.

• 1:42:55Stavros Halkias?

  She's in the zone.

• 1:42:56Speaker 02

  She's in the zone.

• 1:42:56Stavros Halkias?

  I get it.

• 1:42:57Speaker 02

  You know.

• 1:42:58Stavros Halkias?

  I get it, she getting her pussy ate nicely.

• 1:43:01Speaker 02

  Kinda feel like, you know, you want her to be in the zone once in a while.

• 1:43:05Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:43:06Speaker 03

  Perks of the job.

• 1:43:07Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah. So look, at the very least, okay, reach out to them, reach out, talk to people who are more experienced. At the very least, have a real like, if you ever do that again, you're fucked. Conversation, set a real boundary, but my hunch is you must maintain boundaries when you're doing a job like this.

• 1:43:24Speaker 02

  And, and, you know, you know, we're doing the best we can, but I just wanna offer a disclaimer, I'm a fucking idiot.

• 1:43:33Speaker 02

  Let's just make that clear. I have no idea what I'm talking about. And, you know, so just, uh, take that into account.

• 1:43:42Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, Robert's like, I've never cheated on my wife with a sex worker. Don't ever listen to me at all.

• 1:43:48Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 1:43:49Stavros Halkias?

  And it is true, it is true. I said that in a jokey manner, but we all, I think we all know that that is true.

• 1:43:54Speaker 02

  I got excited by the set designer at Saturday Night Live. This is as nerdy as it gets.

• 1:44:00Stavros Halkias?

  This is an earnest man.

• 1:44:01Speaker 02

  It takes a nerd to make fun of nerds.

• 1:44:03Stavros Halkias?

  That is true, that is true. And we've got.

• 1:44:05Speaker 02

  It's an affection.

• 1:44:05Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, we've got a nerd pervert over here, we've got a classic nerd over.

• 1:44:09Speaker 02

  I'm not saying I'm not a pervert. Don't pigeonhole me.

• 1:44:14Stavros Halkias?

  I'm sorry, you're right.

• 1:44:15Speaker 02

  Just because I'm straight laced and, you know, nerdy doesn't make me not a pervert.

• 1:44:21Stavros Halkias?

  Jesus. And that's fucked up that I would assume that, man, and I hope you'd accept my apologies.

• 1:44:27Speaker 02

  Again, my sons are listening.

• 1:44:33Stavros Halkias?

  They're pissing out in the backyard as we speak.

• 1:44:37Speaker 02

  I would have let them. I don't know. Again, I just like, there's nothing wrong with.

• 1:44:43Stavros Halkias?

  Shame at that age, yeah.

• 1:44:44Speaker 02

  Shame at that age. And, and like, you know, shame is, shame is a plague.

• 1:44:53Stavros Halkias?

  I think it is.

• 1:44:53Speaker 02

  In many ways, it's a plague. And this, this lady as a sex worker shouldn't have shame.

• 1:44:59Stavros Halkias?

  She shouldn't, but the John who nutted in her without telling her.

• 1:45:02Speaker 02

  Well, but he did tell her.

• 1:45:03Stavros Halkias?

  That's right. You're right.

• 1:45:04Speaker 02

  I mean, so he exhibited some shame.

• 1:45:06Stavros Halkias?

  Isn't there a place for forgiveness in this world?

• 1:45:09Speaker 02

  Again, if Triumph were here, he would say the same.

• 1:45:12Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. I think Triumph is very pro sex worker, if I had to guess.

• 1:45:17Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 1:45:17Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:45:19Speaker 02

  Triumph helped Frank Sinatra bury hookers in the desert.

• 1:45:24Speaker 02

  He's got a long history of, back when you could call them hookers.

• 1:45:28Stavros Halkias?

  Of course, of course. That's back in the day, folks.

• 1:45:32Speaker 02

  Now we would call them.

• 1:45:33Stavros Halkias?

  Men, women, baby.

• 1:45:36Stavros Halkias?

  Hit is just another word.

• 1:45:40Stavros Halkias?

  What else we got, LD?

• 1:45:41Speaker 03

  And eldest and guests. I am a bartender. I have some regulars who come in probably like five days a week, four or five days a week. Every time they.

• 1:45:55Stavros Halkias?

  They nut the beer without telling you?

• 1:45:57Speaker 03

  Three beers and three shots before they go to their bartending jobs. And then they tip me like 30 or 40 bucks.

• 1:46:07Stavros Halkias?

  Nice. Respect.

• 1:46:08Speaker 03

  On that 30 or 40 dollar bill every time.

• 1:46:12Stavros Halkias?

  That's alcoholism for the love of the game, by the way.

• 1:46:14Speaker 03

  Kind of.

• 1:46:15Speaker 02

  So he's torn because they nutted inside him. And I want to keep this going.

• 1:46:22Speaker 02

  After three or four drinks, they want a fucking nut inside me. And sometimes because they're drunk, they forget to use a condom. And I don't want to give birth to a, you know, a female turd.

• 1:46:37Speaker 03

  That is what 70% of the calls on this show amount to.

• 1:46:41Speaker 02

  It's true.

• 1:46:43Stavros Halkias?

  Come back, there will be another nutting inside you question, for sure, I promise. Sorry. This is hilarious. So, respect to these, I love when you see a bartender. When I'm in a bar at happy hour and you see a guy come in, you just see a guy come in, put fucking 20 on the thing. The guy serves him, it's exactly this situation. Usually you see beer and a shot, and the guy leaves immediately. That's one of my favorite things to watch. Just as an addict, real addiction. This motherfucker is so, it's so about ritual, because these are bartenders. They, I guess they don't want to seem, you know, but they could sneak getting fucked up at their job if they wanted to. If they really wanted to, they could drink for free. But going there, supporting another guy, supporting the whole ecosystem of drunks?

• 1:47:24Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:47:24Stavros Halkias?

  I love seeing shit like this.

• 1:47:26Speaker 02

  You should see that.

• 1:47:26Stavros Halkias?

  It's like, see, it's like, you know, being a fat guy, just getting an ice cream cone on a hot day. For, just for, just because, you know, you know what? It's dessert time. It's time to support my local ice cream truck. Yeah, I have ice cream at home, but I'm getting them fucking Mr. Softy here, because I want to help the fat ecosystem.

• 1:47:43Stavros Halkias?

  Let's finish, let's see what else they have to say, Aldous. End of worried, like, I know I can't afford to do that. Should I ask them to stop doing it? That sounds crazy. I don't want to fuck my own money up. No. But like, they don't need to be doing that. If they just left me like 10 bucks, that'd be fine. I don't know, I feel like.

• 1:48:04Speaker 02

  How many bartenders, um, really?

• 1:48:06Stavros Halkias?

  Like, ask them to stop. Pay it forward? I don't need it, need it. Do you know the career of Kevin Spacey? Have you ever heard of Pay It Forward? That's the only thing I know him from. He's a great actor and a great guy, from what I can tell from the character there. I think it's, I think it's based on.

• 1:48:22Speaker 02

  I haven't heard much about him.

• 1:48:23Stavros Halkias?

  I think it's actually based on him as a guy, from what I can tell, because I'm not really familiar.

• 1:48:27Speaker 02

  Kevin Spacey?

• 1:48:27Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, I think he's, I think, yeah.

• 1:48:29Speaker 02

  I'd like to do more research on him.

• 1:48:30Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah. I don't know much except Pay It Forward.

• 1:48:33Speaker 02

  I understand he's very, all I've heard is that, um, he's, um, very warm and giving with children.

• 1:48:40Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, he's kind of like, he's really, he's a big mentor for people in, in the community. I, you know, just in general.

• 1:48:46Speaker 02

  And he has, uh, he is, uh.

• 1:48:51Speaker 02

  Conducted, um, events in, uh,

• 1:48:54Stavros Halkias?

  Mixers.

• 1:48:55Speaker 02

  Parks.

• 1:48:55Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:58Speaker 02

  At night.

• 1:48:58Stavros Halkias?

  Networking events.

• 1:48:59Speaker 02

  Yeah. Networking events in public parks. Uh, often late at night.

• 1:49:04Stavros Halkias?

  Cause people work, people work days.

• 1:49:06Speaker 02

  Of course.

• 1:49:06Stavros Halkias?

  And if you want to, you know, you don't have time for self-improvement unless it's off hours.

• 1:49:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. And this is when, you know, he waits until people have already had their, you know, their day and they've gotten all their activities out and maybe they've seen a movie. Now they're tired, their resistance is low.

• 1:49:23Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right, right, right.

• 1:49:25Speaker 02

  I don't mean resistance to getting nutted. I mean, their resistance to.

• 1:49:30Stavros Halkias?

  Sure. Changing their life.

• 1:49:31Speaker 02

  Not wanting to have a good time.

• 1:49:33Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right, right.

• 1:49:34Speaker 02

  In a public park in the middle of the night.

• 1:49:36Stavros Halkias?

  Their inhibitions are low.

• 1:49:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, their inhibitions are low.

• 1:49:38Stavros Halkias?

  Uh.

• 1:49:39Speaker 02

  You know, anyway, he's a facilitator.

• 1:49:41Stavros Halkias?

  He's a facilitator.

• 1:49:42Speaker 02

  He's like a party facilitator.

• 1:49:43Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah. So I would say, can you be the Kevin's? No, no, this is great. Be the Kevin Spacey you wish to see in the world, you know?

• 1:49:50Speaker 02

  Oh, the pay it forward.

• 1:49:51Stavros Halkias?

  The pay it forward thing.

• 1:49:54Stavros Halkias?

  So you're getting tipped out of control. Instead of telling these people, fuck, you know, you could, look, you could have a conversation with them, sure. Why don't you go tip a fucking even poorer bartender than you a little bit? Or give a, you know?

• 1:50:07Speaker 02

  I mean, again, I'm a nerd. I don't do a lot of this stuff.

• 1:50:10Stavros Halkias?

  Sure.

• 1:50:11Speaker 02

  How many bartenders do you see who really take it on, take on that role of like, this guy's a mess? He's gotta stop.

• 1:50:20Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:20Speaker 02

  Are they pretty consistent?

• 1:50:22Stavros Halkias?

  I think that's an old fashioned archetype.

• 1:50:24Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:50:24Stavros Halkias?

  I don't really think you see that anymore.

• 1:50:26Speaker 02

  You don't see that anymore.

• 1:50:27Stavros Halkias?

  The guy polishing the glasses as they come in. Hey, what's going on? Life isn't cheers. You know what I mean?

• 1:50:32Speaker 02

  No, I know. I understand.

• 1:50:33Stavros Halkias?

  But, but I think this.

• 1:50:35Speaker 02

  That's why I'm asking.

• 1:50:35Stavros Halkias?

  But, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Yeah. No, I think, I think though, this guy's saying it is cheers. It's kind of cheers for them though. Cause he sees them all the time, five days a week. So they have some relationship.

• 1:50:47Speaker 02

  But they're functional. They're not, obviously they're going to work after work.

• 1:50:51Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right, right, right.

• 1:50:51Speaker 02

  So they're not even, it's not like they're making a fuss in the, uh, they're not making a, a scene in the bar.

• 1:50:57Stavros Halkias?

  No, no, no. He's just, he just is being the guy.

• 1:51:00Speaker 02

  Just concerned for them.

• 1:51:01Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, that you're saying, who even is this guy? This guy even exist? This guy wants to be the caring bartending archetype.

• 1:51:07Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:51:07Stavros Halkias?

  Which is cute, but I also think-

• 1:51:09Speaker 02

  But on the other hand, you're a bartender.

• 1:51:11Stavros Halkias?

  You're a fucking bartender. And they're bartenders.

• 1:51:14Speaker 02

  And they're bartenders, yeah.

• 1:51:15Stavros Halkias?

  These aren't like, these aren't like college kids. Like, I remember when I, when I went to college, my scholarship just put the money in my account? And I was like, what the fuck are you doing? Like, and I did damn, like, there were times where there'd be like a thousand less than I needed to pay for school, because that, for like, two weeks, I saw the account, it was, so these aren't like, you know, college kids who can't afford it.

• 1:51:38Speaker 02

  It's kinda like telling a coke dealer, dude, I'm a little worried, you're going a little.

• 1:51:44Speaker 02

  Are you, are you snorting?

• 1:51:46Stavros Halkias?

  Dude, I'm a little worried. What's up with this turquoise pinky nail you just got installed?

• 1:51:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just, you gotta, you gotta pull it back a little bit.

• 1:51:54Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:51:55Speaker 02

  From the dealing? No, no, from the, from you, I'm worried about you.

• 1:52:00Speaker 02

  One step at a time.

• 1:52:02Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right. Well, it's like a crazy-

• 1:52:03Speaker 02

  Call before you walk.

• 1:52:04Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:52:05Speaker 02

  Let's take care of you.

• 1:52:05Stavros Halkias?

  No, I'm still gonna deal, I just-

• 1:52:07Speaker 02

  Of course, you gotta make a living.

• 1:52:12Stavros Halkias?

  You can't, listen, they know, by the way, these are probably older bartenders than him, right? I think this guy, this is the circle of life. This guy's like, these guys can't afford it. He's in his twenties. These are thirty-seven-year-old bartenders, they're broken down, you know what I mean? They have nothing. They're about to get, I, I have a buddy who was talking, who's like, about to get divorced. And he's like, on vacation now, because he's like, that fucking bitch isn't getting half, she's like, I'm dwindling this shit down before she gets shit. These guys could be spending their ex-wife's future settlement money for all you know, right? These guys are down, dude. They're coming every fucking day and getting three shots and three beers. And you think a little talking to from a fucking twenty-seven-year-old bartender is gonna change their lives?

• 1:52:55Speaker 02

  They're not gonna listen to him.

• 1:52:56Stavros Halkias?

  They're gonna be like, that's cute, honey. And then they're gonna, worst-case scenario, they're like, oh, thanks, man. They will never come back.

• 1:53:02Speaker 02

  They'll never come back.

• 1:53:03Stavros Halkias?

  They'll be like, fuck, it'll go to the bar next door.

• 1:53:06Speaker 02

  They obviously think they're, they've got it under control, if they're able to work.

• 1:53:10Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:11Speaker 02

  Any, you know, seven-hour shift after that.

• 1:53:13Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, exactly. They got, they got their system. And speaking as a man who- For like, there was three years of my life that are a complete fugue state, right? Where I was just like so addicted to mostly food, but also pills and drugs and whatever the fuck at the same time. They're probably doing a great job. They're probably, I'm, I was in the fucking zone when my addictions were completely controlling me. Because that's how you get away with staying addicted. You have to stay good at your job. And so, look, there will be a rock bottom for them. There is for everyone. You ain't the motherfucker that's taking them out of it. Enjoy the extra fucking $240 a week. You're fine, dude.

• 1:53:54Speaker 02

  Or if you feel guilty, um, give the money to a methadone clinic.

• 1:53:59Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. Yeah. Keep, listen, yeah, I think the beautiful halfway point here is donate a little bit of it if you really, you know what I mean?

• 1:54:08Speaker 02

  You know, rehab center.

• 1:54:10Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah. Totally, totally, totally. Yeah, yeah. Fucking go to a, go to a, buy all the stale donuts and coffee for a fucking 12-step meeting or some shit. You know what I mean? You'll figure it out.

• 1:54:20Speaker 02

  It's like one of the dumbest things that there was a trend. I don't know if it's still happening. Do you remember this when? And I'm a tree hugger.

• 1:54:27Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, sure.

• 1:54:27Speaker 02

  Liberal pussy.

• 1:54:29Stavros Halkias?

  Sure, me too, of course.

• 1:54:30Speaker 02

  Nerd.

• 1:54:31Stavros Halkias?

  Yep.

• 1:54:32Speaker 02

  Fan of Saturday Night Live, whatever I am. I'm so many bad things. Jew. That's, yeah, whatever people.

• 1:54:39Stavros Halkias?

  Old piece of shit. You want me to keep going?

• 1:54:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, ugly, receding hairline.

• 1:54:46Stavros Halkias?

  I'd say fully bald, but sure, receding hairline's fine too. All right, all right.

• 1:54:55Stavros Halkias?

  The crowd disagrees with me. All right, I've been proven wrong.

• 1:54:58Speaker 02

  He has some hair. He has some hair.

• 1:55:07Speaker 02

  I forgot what my point was. I'm a piece of shit.

• 1:55:10Stavros Halkias?

  Tree hugger, liberal.

• 1:55:11Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. Do you remember when, um, so this is like the having it both ways?

• 1:55:17Stavros Halkias?

  Yes, yes, yes.

• 1:55:18Speaker 02

  Like donating to a methadone clinic. Remember when people, um, there was this thing that was going on where if you were environmentally conscious,

• 1:55:30Speaker 02

  They would figure out your carbon footprint.

• 1:55:32Stavros Halkias?

  Hmm, yes.

• 1:55:33Speaker 02

  So you wouldn't have to sacrifice anything like.

• 1:55:36Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 1:55:37Speaker 02

  Your gas guzzling car or the insane amount of heat or air conditioning.

• 1:55:44Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right.

• 1:55:45Speaker 02

  It's a million things that we all live with and half the, you know, people complain about cars and all our fucking,

• 1:55:52Speaker 02

  all our VCRs and televisions are like on all the time. They've got clocks and that kind of shit. Just as bad. But anyway, I remember, I'm not going to say who, but a comedy writer who was an activist was like, you gotta do this. It's great. You know, they figure out your carbon footprint and then you have to make a donation.

• 1:56:10Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, and that fixes it, huh? Isn't that convenient?

• 1:56:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:56:14Stavros Halkias?

  All I have to do is give some random guy.

• 1:56:17Speaker 02

  And this, and we're talking about like, you're fucking polluting the environment. You're speeding up.

• 1:56:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 1:56:22Speaker 02

  The death of the planet.

• 1:56:23Stavros Halkias?

  What if you made that?

• 1:56:24Speaker 02

  But I gave money.

• 1:56:25Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:25Speaker 02

  To people who are gonna, you know, protest. People like me, you know? This, this allows them to, you know, break up meetings with Chevron corporate, corporate speakers and, and, you know.

• 1:56:41Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:42Speaker 02

  They walk on stage and they say you're, and, and we, you know, so.

• 1:56:45Stavros Halkias?

  Throw some paint on them, some old school. Throw oil on an oil exec, that's not bad. If you guys, I'm, my, I take the do domestic terrorism. We have two different opinions here. I'm saying fund it and, you know, but you could do both.

• 1:56:58Speaker 02

  There's fun domestic terrorism.

• 1:56:59Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:57:00Speaker 02

  Look what happened. I mean, some of it works. Like, nobody wears fur anymore.

• 1:57:04Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 1:57:04Speaker 02

  That's pretty fucking great.

• 1:57:05Stavros Halkias?

  That's what I'm saying, yeah.

• 1:57:06Speaker 02

  I mean, it's, it's.

• 1:57:07Stavros Halkias?

  But I know you're saying where it was like, it was a, it was kind of like the thing where the Catholic Church is like giving you dispensations or whatever.

• 1:57:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:57:13Stavros Halkias?

  Where it's like, oh yeah, you can keep sinning, just give us 80 bucks.

• 1:57:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:57:17Stavros Halkias?

  So it's like, yeah, it's.

• 1:57:19Speaker 02

  It's like, you're, you're, you're making up for what you're. For the damage you're doing.

• 1:57:23Stavros Halkias?

  And by the way, you're not, because you could just do both. You could actually, you know, not pollute and give money if you really wanted to make a fucking difference.

• 1:57:33Speaker 02

  I'll give money, but only if I can, you know.

• 1:57:36Stavros Halkias?

  It's the breaking even. You're basically just like, well, breaking even, that's the highest form of, of activism I could possibly think of.

• 1:57:43Speaker 02

  Make progress.

• 1:57:44Stavros Halkias?

  No, how about, yeah.

• 1:57:45Speaker 02

  Want to move the needle, not move it and then move it back.

• 1:57:47Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, but you know what? Listen, buddy, you're not fixing the, no, no, you're right. That shit is fucking dumb. And it's like, look, you're not gonna, you can talk to them in the way that they're regulars and you got, you can have, you can have a rapport. And I think that's fine, but don't ask them about their tipping. They know what the fuck they're doing. It's not about you. If it's not you, it's somebody else. Uh, and yeah, you know what? That's a good point. Don't even bother fucking donating any money. Use it on, to buy it on cool shit. Get sex workers and use a condom the whole time. And tip them well. There you go. Everybody's getting fed in the Stavros world ecosystem this way. You know, and maybe subscribe to Robert's new podcast.

• 1:58:25Speaker 02

  You've accomplished a lot.

• 1:58:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. Eldis, you have something fun for us to go out on here, little buddy?

• 1:58:31Speaker 05

  Hey, Stav, hey, Eldis, hey, guests. I hope you're all having a wonderful day. Um, to keep it short, I'm planning a little Euro trip with my best friends for the summer. And we're gonna be bopping around, going to a couple of different places. And one city that I'm super excited about is Amsterdam. Cause I've never been before and as with probably every other stoner on the planet, it's been like a lifelong dream to

• 1:58:57Stavros Halkias?

  So funny.

• 1:58:57Speaker 05

  Eat some space cake and do mushrooms at a cafe in Amsterdam. So I really, really want to.

• 1:59:02Speaker 02

  Even for non-stoners, it's a dream.

• 1:59:04Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so funny when you go there and it's like, cause it is awesome. But the, but I hate to, now I'm being a fucking pothead hipster where I'm like, sister, it's not what it used to be. Where it's like, when you went, dude, the first time you went and weed is illegal here. And you smoke weed there. It feels, it's, you're doing something illegal in broad daylight. You're like, now, I mean, I have, I have like probably $800 worth of different weed that I've forgotten just in this. I went, I bought weed with a fucking debit card. You know what I mean? Like, but. Not to be a dickhead, sorry to, it still is pretty fun. When you can't, when you hit at a cafe and you do the whole thing.

• 1:59:47Speaker 02

  It's like gambling in Las Vegas. Like you can do it in your fucking basement now.

• 1:59:51Stavros Halkias?

  Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

• 1:59:52Speaker 02

  But there's a glamour to doing it.

• 1:59:53Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 1:59:54Speaker 02

  In this town where everybody does it.

• 1:59:56Stavros Halkias?

  Where so many people have killed themselves. That's the thing I can't get out of my head when I'm in Vegas hotel, the nice hotel. I'm like, thousands of people have killed themselves in here. I'm at the fu- I won't say a real name, but man, you're just in one of those and you're like, 10% of the rooms in here have seen death.

• 2:00:14Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:00:14Stavros Halkias?

  Easy. And that's the worst. They've seen a lot of other shit too. You know what I'm saying? But still, the glitz and the glamour still does get you when you're on, when you're on that strip, baby.

• 2:00:24Speaker 02

  Well, Vegas isn't what it used to be either.

• 2:00:26Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, that's true.

• 2:00:27Speaker 02

  Everybody's dressed as like you.

• 2:00:28Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:31Speaker 02

  When I was like 14 years old, my parents took me to Vegas.

• 2:00:34Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, wow.

• 2:00:35Speaker 02

  Which they were very cool parents, you know?

• 2:00:37Stavros Halkias?

  That's awesome.

• 2:00:37Speaker 02

  And, but we had to like wear a fucking jacket.

• 2:00:40Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:00:43Speaker 02

  We, we like, uh, and I had to wear like a jacket in the casino.

• 2:00:48Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:00:48Speaker 02

  You know, and somehow they let us play. Back then, it was, you know, all Mob Run and nobody gave a shit. So I played blackjack. It was so exciting.

• 2:00:58Stavros Halkias?

  As a 14 year old in a fucking, in a big lapel?

• 2:01:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, oh, a super wide lapel. It was probably brown, my suit.

• 2:01:04Stavros Halkias?

  Fuck, yes.

• 2:01:05Speaker 02

  It was the seventies.

• 2:01:06Stavros Halkias?

  Fuck, yes.

• 2:01:07Speaker 02

  But yeah, um, so I get the, you know.

• 2:01:11Stavros Halkias?

  But that's actually a great point.

• 2:01:12Speaker 02

  I wonder if Amsterdam is just like filled with cargo short kids now.

• 2:01:15Stavros Halkias?

  I think it kind of unfortunately is. It is now it liter- it's not guys that dressed like me. It's literally me. Now everybody goes to, like, I love Amsterdam, you know what I mean? And I'm in a fucking floor, I'm in a Hawaiian in shorts, you know what I mean? Like I, I'm not, but I think, I don't know what it was back in the day, but still Vegas is a great point. Is a great comp. Cause it's like, yeah, it's not what it used to be, but they're still, we, we play a lot of casinos. It's not Vegas, you know? The other casino, they're fun, but when you're in Vegas.

• 2:01:44Speaker 02

  Vegas is so much more cool looking than in the daytime.

• 2:01:46Stavros Halkias?

  It really, it really is.

• 2:01:46Speaker 02

  I mean, so is New York actually, but, but there is something at night with all the, the neon and.

• 2:01:51Stavros Halkias?

  Totally, totally. No, they tapped into that.

• 2:01:54Speaker 02

  Suddenly you can't see the cargo shorts at night.

• 2:01:56Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:01:56Speaker 02

  It's just, everything's, uh.

• 2:01:59Stavros Halkias?

  Um, okay, let's finish our, let's finish our call.

• 2:02:01Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:02:02Speaker 05

  The problem is my friends who I'm. Going with doesn't really do drugs like that like she will she'll partake a little bit but it's just overall not really her thing so If I wanted to go you know eat some space cake or like smoke some weed she likely would come with me but just not Like do it herself

• 2:02:22Speaker 02

  Okay

• 2:02:23Speaker 05

  And it's not really fun to you know be stoned or on mushrooms by yourself while your friend is sober next to you

• 2:02:30Speaker 02

  Make friends

• 2:02:30Speaker 05

  But I also don't know if I'm ever gonna get a chance to go to Amsterdam again So my question is should I just Do drugs anyway like by myself

• 2:02:41Speaker 02

  For sure

• 2:02:41Speaker 05

  Um or should I

• 2:02:43Speaker 02

  Easiest questions

• 2:02:44Speaker 05

  Be mature and forego

• 2:02:46Speaker 02

  Mature

• 2:02:47Speaker 05

  Enjoy some quality sober time with my friends

• 2:02:49Speaker 02

  Twelve says the word mature

• 2:02:51Speaker 05

  Hope and pray that I make it back to Amsterdam one day what do you think

• 2:02:55Speaker 02

  This is so easy

• 2:02:55Stavros Halkias?

  Come on do drugs what are we even talking about here do the drugs and by the way I'll say I Me and elders have actually benefited from this we have been we have a friend Friend of the program straight George who does not really do drugs you know and so we've had

• 2:03:13Speaker 02

  As long as your friend isn't judging you

• 2:03:15Stavros Halkias?

  Yes exactly as long as you I would say it's about the dynamic because I have I would actually say if you're with a really close friend Who you trust and like having them be sober is a positive Someone now is ma- Google mapping because I me you know I've been fucked up I'll have plenty of days where I'll just kind of get fucked up beyond you know I'll take a hundred milligrams of edibles and I'll walk around And I'll be trying to get dinner for six hours because I'm just confused I'm like I should go here dude oh fuck I'm on the wrong train Whereas like we had a be one of the best some of the best memories of my life for me and elders

• 2:03:54Stavros Halkias?

  Stoned out of our fucking minds on mushrooms and straight George driving us down the fucking we were on where was it uh

• 2:04:02Speaker 03

  Was was it uh

• 2:04:04Stavros Halkias?

  The P C yeah Mulholland Drive we yeah we went up we went to the P C H it was fucking awesome

• 2:04:10Speaker 02

  Could he handle that like a whole week in Amsterdam like would it get old

• 2:04:15Stavros Halkias?

  But I think he gave us one awesome day right we had that one great day that it was all about getting fucked up But I would say for her

• 2:04:24Speaker 02

  Yeah

• 2:04:25Stavros Halkias?

  Like, smoking a little weed, that doesn't count as getting fucked up to me. That's like having a couple beers, right? Like, I, if you're-

• 2:04:32Speaker 02

  Is that all she said she wanted to do?

• 2:04:33Stavros Halkias?

  She wanted to take mushrooms.

• 2:04:34Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:04:35Stavros Halkias?

  Well, I would say, you don't do mushrooms, you do mushrooms once in the week. I don't think you would, you're not doing mushrooms twice in a day.

• 2:04:43Speaker 02

  Five times a day.

• 2:04:43Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, that's fucking, and by the way, we actually knew an insane guy who was addicted to mushrooms. And that should have been the tell that this guy was gonna lose his mind. Uh, people, when people move to New York and can't ha- stand-ups when they move here, they start doing shit like getting addicted to mushrooms.

• 2:04:58Speaker 02

  Oh, god.

• 2:04:58Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, and making weird, anyway, uh, so, I would say, tell your friend.

• 2:05:05Speaker 02

  I think it really depends a little on the friend. Just wanna make sure that the friend can handle it.

• 2:05:10Stavros Halkias?

  That's fair.

• 2:05:10Speaker 02

  Because, okay, again, my sons are watching, so I shouldn't-

• 2:05:14Stavros Halkias?

  Sure.

• 2:05:15Speaker 02

  -talk about this as if it's cool.

• 2:05:16Stavros Halkias?

  Right.

• 2:05:17Speaker 02

  But, you know, they, they have, they're in high school, they have friends who are doing all-

• 2:05:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yo, I'm sure they don't know about drugs.

• 2:05:23Speaker 02

  No, no, but one of my, one of my sons has a million allergies and immune, immune issues, so he can't drink, he can't do all kinds of shit. And he has a good time, he's like, uh, he's amused by his friends-

• 2:05:38Stavros Halkias?

  Yes.

• 2:05:39Speaker 02

  -at parties, he's like, he's used to it.

• 2:05:41Stavros Halkias?

  Totally.

• 2:05:41Speaker 02

  But I don't know if he could handle like a whole week of it.

• 2:05:44Stavros Halkias?

  Totally.

• 2:05:45Speaker 02

  In Amsterdam.

• 2:05:45Stavros Halkias?

  But here's the thing, it's a, this is a conversation, right? Does your friend wanna do something kinda boring that you don't really want? Can we do a little trade, horse trading? Where it's like, you wanna go to some museum I don't give a fuck about?

• 2:05:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:05:57Stavros Halkias?

  I'll give you your boring museum, although I will say the museums in Amsterdam are great.

• 2:06:00Speaker 02

  I'm sure.

• 2:06:01Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, is there something you can do for your friend? And you can also say, by the way, look, if you, if you and your friend were going to fucking Rome, and she was like, I wanna spend, I wanna see the Colosseum one day, and you're like, "I'm not going, you dumb bitch." You'd be like, "Oh, that's kinda rude."

• 2:06:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:06:16Stavros Halkias?

  You're going to Amsterdam.

• 2:06:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:06:18Stavros Halkias?

  You were going, "Hey, I wanna do mushrooms one day and walk around the parks."

• 2:06:21Speaker 02

  I mean, of course.

• 2:06:22Stavros Halkias?

  That's what you fucking do, so, I think it's really reasonable to have a middle ground.

• 2:06:28Speaker 02

  It sounds like her friend would probably be cool with it.

• 2:06:30Stavros Halkias?

  Your friend knows you, right?

• 2:06:31Speaker 02

  That's all that you can ask, as long as the friend's not judging you, doesn't have-

• 2:06:35Stavros Halkias?

  Totally. So is that, that's my question is, is your friend somebody who's cool and can do, and again, we're not talking a week, because a week, if you're talking about like, being around somebody who's fucked up for a week while you're sober, that's hell.

• 2:06:47Speaker 02

  That's what I'm saying.

• 2:06:47Stavros Halkias?

  But one day could be kinda fun.

• 2:06:49Speaker 02

  Well, is, how long did she say she was going?

• 2:06:51Stavros Halkias?

  She went for a week.

• 2:06:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, a week.

• 2:06:53Stavros Halkias?

  Again, as the resident mushrooms expert, I don't even thi- I don't even think you're, is this a put on for your sons anymore. I think you just really don't know, uh, you know, how to do hard drugs. Not that mushrooms are hard.

• 2:07:03Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:07:04Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, you're not doing mushrooms. She wants to do it one day when the weather's nice, go outside, walk around. You also wanna, they have a specific kind of mushroom. I will say this, you have to chew a lot. They're fresh mushrooms, they're not dried. So there's less drugs in them. The dried ones are much more potent, so you have to chew a horrible, weird tasting mushroom for a long time. Those are some ba- yeah, yeah, the, the tru- they call them truffles there. Uh, either way, and here's the other thing, they have different strengths. So you could do some mild, and we did some mild little mushrooms. One day, my buddy, I've, cause I've gone to Amsterdam twice with the same friend, uh, Straight George, and, uh, he, he, he, the first time he did-

• 2:07:46Speaker 02

  Is that all he's known for? That he, that he doesn't do? Weed and mushrooms?

• 2:07:52Stavros Halkias?

  Pretty much. He is kind of the-

• 2:07:55Speaker 02

  An absence of a personality is just, that's his thing.

• 2:07:57Stavros Halkias?

  He, yeah, he's sort of the only guy who's a real person in our friend group.

• 2:08:01Speaker 02

  Oh, good.

• 2:08:01Stavros Halkias?

  He's got a real job. He came to, he came on the tour-

• 2:08:03Speaker 02

  I see, I see.

• 2:08:04Stavros Halkias?

  He came on the tour just to kinda make sure we were eating vegetables, and he did like laundry. He's the man. He's one of our, one of my best friends. But, yeah, find the right thing, figure it out. I think you can get away with one day of mushrooms with this friend. It might, and, and a little toking every once in a while. Going to a cafe and you smoke a joint and your friend gets coffee?

• 2:08:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:08:26Stavros Halkias?

  That's fine.

• 2:08:27Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:08:27Stavros Halkias?

  They do that shit at Amsterdam all the time, so- It's really about the friend. You're right.

• 2:08:32Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:08:33Stavros Halkias?

  Is she the right friend?

• 2:08:33Speaker 02

  And also about her. Is she, does she have a mature

• 2:08:37Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right, right, right.

• 2:08:38Speaker 02

  approach to going to Amsterdam, or is she like such a geek that she's like, I gotta get high all the time?

• 2:08:43Stavros Halkias?

  Right, right, right. Is it that kind of thing? Don't be corny about it. Don't, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Don't come with your own fucking reggae, fucking drug, like that. You got a fucking hat, you got the big Bob Marley hat and fake dreads. You're like, whoa, man, it's 4:20 somewhere! You know? You don't want to be doing that shit.

• 2:08:59Speaker 02

  No, no. Everyone will point and laugh.

• 2:09:02Stavros Halkias?

  If you're just...

• 2:09:03Speaker 02

  And they'll bond with your friend.

• 2:09:04Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, absolutely. But yes, you're going to Amsterdam. She knows what the fuck it is. If you're, again, if you're going to Hawaii and your friend's like, I'm not that interested in the beach. They're an asshole. You know what I mean? Like, you can get at least one beach trip, but anyway.

• 2:09:19Speaker 02

  I want to see the museums in Hawaii.

• 2:09:21Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:09:24Stavros Halkias?

  But yes, that's a very long answer to a short, do the drugs is the, is the, is our, is my advice. Robert's is a little more nuanced.

• 2:09:34Speaker 02

  Oh, just, just make sure your friends, you know, respect your friend's tolerance for it.

• 2:09:39Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, I agree.

• 2:09:39Speaker 02

  Uh, and your friends should respect your desire to have some fun.

• 2:09:43Stavros Halkias?

  Your lifelong dream, absolutely.

• 2:09:44Speaker 02

  And find, meet, meet them halfway and talk about it in advance.

• 2:09:47Stavros Halkias?

  I love, boom, done and done. You're good at it. What are you talking about? You're good at advice. You just nailed it.

• 2:09:52Speaker 02

  I once played a rabbi, uh, at a comedy club.

• 2:09:55Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:09:57Speaker 02

  Cotton candy beard.

• 2:09:58Stavros Halkias?

  Cotton candy beard, making a comeback. Good bit, good bit.

• 2:10:02Speaker 02

  I actually have played like rabbis in like four different movies and TV shows.

• 2:10:07Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:10:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:10:08Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:10:09Speaker 02

  It's my thing now.

• 2:10:09Stavros Halkias?

  You're great.

• 2:10:10Speaker 02

  I actually have grown out this beard because I'm about to play a rabbi.

• 2:10:14Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, really?

• 2:10:15Speaker 02

  In a show that, I can't say what show.

• 2:10:17Stavros Halkias?

  That's awesome.

• 2:10:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:10:18Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah. Were you, what was your character in, uh, Punch, Junk, Love? Were you a...

• 2:10:23Speaker 02

  I was a dentist.

• 2:10:24Stavros Halkias?

  You're a dentist?

• 2:10:24Speaker 02

  That was an inside joke that he, he made me a dentist.

• 2:10:27Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:10:27Speaker 02

  I got to know him at SNL.

• 2:10:29Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, cool.

• 2:10:30Speaker 02

  He was a huge SNL fan.

• 2:10:31Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, interesting.

• 2:10:32Speaker 02

  God, I love doing that movie.

• 2:10:33Stavros Halkias?

  I love that fucking movie.

• 2:10:34Speaker 02

  I love that movie and that scene. Was crazy because we shot it once and then he like, and he was very happy. And then months later, I hear Paul wants to rework the scene where I can't remember the characters Barry smashes through the glass.

• 2:10:51Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:10:52Speaker 02

  When he wants to restage it. And so that means we're gonna have to restage that scene. So we do the exact same scene again where Adam, you know, makes this confession to me and he starts crying, but he added this one element where Adam starts making this funny noise when he cries.

• 2:11:10Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:11:11Speaker 02

  He's like just saying, you know, I sometimes I feel like I can't whatever he said. And then he's good.

• 2:11:19Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:11:19Speaker 02

  And we laughed. We could not get through a take.

• 2:11:23Stavros Halkias?

  It's incredible. Yeah.

• 2:11:25Speaker 02

  And he was so fucking mad at us.

• 2:11:28Speaker 02

  Cause it was like, we have time. It's the end of the day. I think we can get this scene. I think we can get this. It's one shot. They know their alliance. We're gonna get this. And then we're just anticipating the moment where he's gonna go.

• 2:11:43Stavros Halkias?

  That high pitched.

• 2:11:45Speaker 02

  And one of us would laugh and we were reduced to like five year olds. We would giggle and we'd be like, that was your fault. You did it. Meanwhile, there's this fucking serious Paul Thomas Anderson crew.

• 2:11:59Stavros Halkias?

  Don't give a fuck at all.

• 2:12:00Speaker 02

  No. Believe these fucking children.

• 2:12:04Stavros Halkias?

  They're mad.

• 2:12:05Speaker 02

  And then somebody told me he ended up using take three.

• 2:12:08Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:10Speaker 02

  And I asked him about it years later. He's like, no fucking way. It was like 14.

• 2:12:14Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Great. I love. Yeah. You were great in that. Love that movie.

• 2:12:19Speaker 02

  But usually nowadays it's Rabbi.

• 2:12:22Stavros Halkias?

  Anyway, we're we're plugging Punch Drunk Love.

• 2:12:27Speaker 02

  Catch it. I believe it's on Amazon for $4.95, but it's worth it. It's not one of his most highly regarded movies, but it has a cult following.

• 2:12:38Stavros Halkias?

  I love it.

• 2:12:39Speaker 02

  I love it too.

• 2:12:40Stavros Halkias?

  If you're, but truly if you're a comedy fan of like Sandler, your generation, it was the most, I love that movie because it takes the Sandler character from Billy Madison, the early Sandler character, and it makes, it's like, how could this person be real?

• 2:12:57Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:12:57Stavros Halkias?

  And Pete Anderson, he was like, I love that because he's clearly such a fan of Adam Sandler.

• 2:13:03Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:13:03Stavros Halkias?

  That he put all his, one of the greats, one of the great filmmakers decided, I'm gonna solve this puzzle of how can we make Happy Gilmore a real guy in a drama?

• 2:13:12Speaker 02

  And find the source of his rage.

• 2:13:14Stavros Halkias?

  And it feels real.

• 2:13:15Speaker 02

  Oh, so real.

• 2:13:16Stavros Halkias?

  It's incredible and he's such a, and Sandler's, those early characters are so important to me and so, but they're so, they're cartoonish in many ways and to find like real humanity.

• 2:13:26Speaker 02

  I think that's still his best performance.

• 2:13:28Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah.

• 2:13:29Speaker 02

  He's amazing in that movie.

• 2:13:31Stavros Halkias?

  He's so good and that's not taking anything away from fucking Uncut Gems.

• 2:13:35Speaker 02

  No, no, or a number of movies he's been great in.

• 2:13:37Stavros Halkias?

  But it's also because it's his thing.

• 2:13:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:13:40Stavros Halkias?

  In such a different context where you never get to see that. You never get to see someone, and not only that, they, a genius puts you in a position to do your thing in a completely different way.

• 2:13:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:13:51Stavros Halkias?

  It's such, and you're right, it's such a, it's, I think it is his greatest performance because it's a very hard thing to do to do it that well.

• 2:13:57Speaker 02

  To be that guy and it's just, you feel so hard, you feel for this kid so much, so many times throughout the movie, your heart breaks for him.

• 2:14:07Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, oh my god.

• 2:14:08Speaker 02

  In a way that's like not remotely manipulative or formulaic.

• 2:14:12Stavros Halkias?

  No.

• 2:14:13Speaker 02

  But it was not well received by Adam's fans back then.

• 2:14:18Stavros Halkias?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:14:19Speaker 02

  They were like, we just saw the water boy.

• 2:14:21Stavros Halkias?

  What the hell is this?

• 2:14:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And his fans and Paul's fans didn't. Receive it well at first either because they were like, what the fuck's Adam Sandler doing? Cause Adam didn't have the respect he has now.

• 2:14:33Stavros Halkias?

  But see it now, you see what a fucking genius both of those guys are.

• 2:14:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:14:37Stavros Halkias?

  We're fast forward and it's an incredible piece of art.

• 2:14:40Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:14:40Stavros Halkias?

  And, and the fact that they could see that in the context of let's keep doing, cause Waterboy was a huge hit.

• 2:14:46Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:14:47Stavros Halkias?

  What was, I don't remember what Paul Thomas Anderson did before that.

• 2:14:50Speaker 02

  He did Magnolia before that.

• 2:14:52Stavros Halkias?

  I mean, come on, that was, yeah. So it's like, I get why it wouldn't be well received and still that makes it even more impressive to me, but we literally, I joked, but we did just spend 15 minutes talking about how awesome.

• 2:15:03Speaker 02

  This has been at the movies.

• 2:15:04Stavros Halkias?

  It's been the, it started as a basketball podcast and it ended as a shitty movie podcast.

• 2:15:10Speaker 02

  Shitty podcast, not shitty movie.

• 2:15:11Stavros Halkias?

  You're right.

• 2:15:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:15:14Stavros Halkias?

  You're right, you're right, you're right, you're right. But this was incredible, truly, Robert, this, I mean, seriously, dream come true. I've been a fan. I've told, I told you before, since I was a child and I feel sorry that I have to say that to you because of how I look now. I was once a, a blushing boy, uh oh.

• 2:15:34Stavros Halkias?

  I was once, I was once, oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 2:15:37Speaker 02

  No, I'm very touched by everything you say.

• 2:15:39Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, thank you.

• 2:15:40Speaker 02

  And you know, I didn't know what to expect. I mean, I, you know, I, I mean, I come from a totally different generation, but I really had a great time and this is an incredible show. Form me to pull ban.

• 2:15:52Stavros Halkias?

  Oh, no.

• 2:15:56Speaker 02

  Because it's not the good after all.

• 2:15:59Stavros Halkias?

  Fuck. Oh, triumph.

• 2:16:03Speaker 02

  Okay, there we go.

• 2:16:04Stavros Halkias?

  That's beautiful. We're ending on that. We'll cut there. Robert, thank you so much. You're the man. Watch the podcast, folks.

• 2:16:12Speaker 02

  Or listen to it.

• 2:16:13Stavros Halkias?

  Listen to it.

• 2:16:13Speaker 02

  If you can't handle my face, I understand.

• 2:16:15Stavros Halkias?

  Listen to the podcast. Yeah, listen. I'm, this again, you're the man. This was so fucking cool. Come back anytime. I'd love to do the pod whenever you'll have me.

• 2:16:24Speaker 02

  Yes, please, yeah.

• 2:16:25Stavros Halkias?

  Uh, listen, go listen to the podcast. Come, uh, I don't think we have anything else to plug. I think we're actually done. Special coming soon, folks. More, more about that very soon and we'll talk to you next time. Bye.

• 2:16:56Stavros Halkias?

  WNBA, how stars like Wemby and Luka Doncic are dominating the NBA. Or maybe you just want the tea on this week's most viral sports moments. Don't worry, we'll keep you updated on all of it. So grab your popcorn and come hang with us. Courtside, you can listen to Courtside Club wherever you get your podcasts. Oui et ah.

• 2:17:17Stavros Halkias?

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