Ari Emanuel | Club Random with Bill Maher

Hollywood power broker Ari Emanuel drops by Club Random, which is convenient, since he’s also Bill’s agent. As Bill points out, maybe once the book tour is over, Ari can go back to thinking about him! Ari takes Bill from the mailroom to the boardroom, revealing the hustle, grudges, lucky breaks, and unaffordable Lakers tickets behind the rise of Endeavor. There’s the Jay Leno/Conan O’Brien shake-up, a 16-hour flight to China for a lunch that never happened, the real man behind Entourage’s Ari Gold, and a courtship strategy that sounds suspiciously like a hostile takeover. The calls have been rolled. Now let’s hug it out, bitch. Bill has questions. Ari has stories. Neither has an indoor voice. Somewhere between the earthworm supplements and angry mogul aerobics, things get serious: dyslexia, loyalty, revenge, Donald Trump, Israel and Gaza and why Ari believes talking to people you disagree with still matters. Subscribe to the Club Random YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/clubrandompodcast?sub_confirmation=1 Watch episodes ad-free – subscribe to Bill Maher’s Substack: https://billmaher.substack.com Subscribe to the podcast for free wherever you listen: ⁠https://bit.ly/ClubRandom Support our Advertisers: Ready to take control of your cholesterol? Head to https://dosedaily.co/RANDOM or enter RANDOM to get thirty-five percent off your first subscription Go to https://120Life.com and use the code Random25 for 25% off. Ready to reach your goals? Visit https://hims.com/ClubRandom to get personalized, affordable care for weight loss, hair loss, sex, testosterone, and more. Ready to have an AI that can tackle real work? Try Claude Cowork today on any paid plan at https://Claude.ai For free and unbiased Medicare help, dial 984-217-3643 or go to https://askchapter.org/billmaher Buy Club Random Merch: https://clubrandom.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices ABOUT CLUB RANDOM In Club Random, Bill Maher unleashes his comedic wit on an unpredictable lineup – from Bill Burr and Jerry Seinfeld to Quentin Tarantino and Neil deGrasse Tyson – digging into everything but politics. It’s Maher in his familiar element: one-on-one vibes, unfiltered laughs, and the kind of freewheeling banter only he can deliver. ABOUT BILL MAHER Bill Maher was the host of “Politically Incorrect” (Comedy Central, ABC) from 1993-2002, and for the last 23 years on HBO’s “Real Time,” Maher’s combination of unflinching honesty and big laughs have garnered him 41 Emmy nominations. Maher won his first Emmy in 2014 as executive producer for the HBO series, “VICE.” In October of 2008, this same combination was on display in Maher’s uproarious and unprecedented swipe at organized religion, “Religulous.” Maher has written six bestsellers: “True Story,” “Does Anybody Have a Problem with That? Politically Incorrect’s Greatest Hits,” “When You Ride Alone, You Ride with Bin Laden,” “New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer,” “The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody But Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass", and most recently "What This Comedian Said Will Shock You". FOLLOW CLUB RANDOM https://www.clubrandom.com https://www.facebook.com/Club-Random-101776489118185 https://twitter.com/clubrandom_ https://www.instagram.com/clubrandompodcast https://www.tiktok.com/@clubrandompodcast FOLLOW BILL MAHER https://www.billmaher.com https://twitter.com/billmaher https://www.instagram.com/billmaher Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Your credit card company is hoping you don't hear this. They're charging you 21% APR interest, making it hard to pay down your balance. A home equity loan from Rocket Mortgage could cut your interest rate by more than half. So you could wipe out your high-interest credit card debt with the equity you've built in your home without touching your current mortgage rate. See how much you could save at rocketmortgage.com. Rocket Mortgage LLC licensed in 50 states. NMLS consumeraccess.org number 3030. Call 8004-ROCKET for full program details.

• 0:30Speaker 01

  This fall, discover why there are two sides to every pancake story at Cracker Barrel. The edgy side, created by the golden crispy edges. And the softer side, made up of those warm fluffy centers. So slow down, make time to bring in the family, day or night, and try the new Sweet Cream Caramel Apple Pancakes. Three of the world's best buttermilk pancakes topped with fried cinnamon apples, caramel drizzle, and sweet vanilla cream. Then dig in and write your own breakfast story. Welcome home to Cracker Barrel.

• 1:01Speaker 02

  Starting a business can seem like a daunting task, unless you have a partner like Shopify. They have the tools you need to start and grow your business. From designing a website, to marketing, to selling and beyond, Shopify can help with everything you need. There's a reason millions of companies like Mattel, Heinz, and Allbirds continue to trust and use them. With Shopify on your side, turn your big business idea into... Sign up for your $1 per month trial at Shopify.com/specialoffer.

• 1:29Bill Maher?

  Well, I've been doing this a long time and the technology never really changed. It was always paper, panic, and a producer who reads fast. Then Claude showed up. And now I have to admit, the machines are pretty useful, which is a terrible thing to have to say out loud. Claude is the AI for problem solvers. It's the collaborator that understands your entire workflow and thinks with you, not for you. Whether you're debugging code at midnight, building a financial model, or strategizing your next business move, Claude extends your thinking to tackle the problems that matter. For problems worth solving, get started with Claude at claude.ai/random. That's claude.ai/random.

• 2:12Bill Maher?

  And check out Claude Pro, which includes access to all of the features mentioned in today's episode. Claude.ai/random. I don't know about you, but I'm a big fan of Green, in all its forms. Get it? And for fellow lovers of, well, Green, the Club Random merch store has you covered. Grinders, papers, and Zippo lighters, all designed to support your relationship with Green, wink, wink, whatever, and whatever philosophy comes with that for you. Head to clubrandom.com and bring home some random. His own agent just talked to him on Monday.

• 2:54Speaker 04

  Listen, this is your stick with him.

• 2:57Bill Maher?

  I know, but it's his own agent. There's a way to talk to Donald Trump. You know, I don't like the war. Tell him.

• 3:05Speaker 04

  You can tell him.

• 3:06Bill Maher?

  You can tell him, and I will. And is the author here?

• 3:13Speaker 04

  I'm here. I signed that book for you.

• 3:16Bill Maher?

  I read that book. Hello.

• 3:19Speaker 04

  Hey, buddy.

• 3:20Bill Maher?

  Boy, do I have a lot to talk. Oh, boy. No, no. Well, first of all, before I get too stoned and forget why we're here, which is to plug you, because you're an author, you know, we have a lot of riffraff on the show here, Ari. We have like actors and fucking agents, shit like that. But a real author? That's a special day for it to be.

• 3:39Speaker 04

  Thank you very much.

• 3:40Bill Maher?

  But first of all, the cover, it is the most badass picture. I thought I had a badass picture from when I was a pot dealer in college, holding up my pot. This is a...

• 3:51Speaker 04

  So you know where that was? It's 25 years ago. Mark Stewart Letterman at the Ed Sullivan.

• 3:58Bill Maher?

  Who is?

• 3:59Speaker 04

  Wahlberg.

• 3:59Bill Maher?

  Mark Wahlberg.

• 4:01Speaker 04

  Four.

• 4:02Bill Maher?

  We don't know all... I know who your clients are, which you never get on this show, by the way. Thanks for that. Go ahead.

• 4:10Speaker 04

  Okay, man. They're laughing outside.

• 4:13Bill Maher?

  Well, we may return to that theme.

• 4:15Speaker 04

  We'll come to that subject later. So he's doing that, he was doing that movie Rockstar with Jennifer.

• 4:21Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I remember. I liked it, it was cute.

• 4:24Speaker 04

  It was right around, it was, I think, 9/11. It was right at 9/11. It was the like weekend before he did it on Thursday. A guy takes that photo. Never saw the photo. All of a sudden it popped up. I love the photo. My wife sees that photo. The publisher does the whole print of it. My wife doesn't like it. Stod, who is my wife, you know, she says...

• 4:48Bill Maher?

  Sarah.

• 4:50Speaker 04

  Well, everybody calls her Stod.

• 4:51Bill Maher?

  That's terrible. She's a lady. Call her by your name.

• 4:54Speaker 04

  That's... She likes it.

• 4:55Bill Maher?

  I know. Your first wife was also called Sarah. You have a type.

• 5:00Speaker 04

  At least on a name.

• 5:03Bill Maher?

  You're so cheap, you didn't want to change the towels.

• 5:09Speaker 04

  So she then does that with this guy Rodrigo, who is like a genius at book covers. He's up in San...

• 5:16Bill Maher?

  That is a genius book cover.

• 5:17Speaker 04

  And he did a great job with my, with my wife Sarah.

• 5:21Bill Maher?

  It also reminds me that the people, maybe they were misled by the picture on the cover, they all are missing the point, as the media always does. It's, I know, yes, you talk about rage. It's not really a book about rage. I mean, you have your anger spilling over, that's just you. It's also really funny. I mean, your ghostwriter did a great job.

• 5:43Speaker 04

  This guy JR?

• 5:44Bill Maher?

  I was kidding. It sounds like you. It really does. I don't know how much he contributed, but I mean, it's so you.

• 5:51Speaker 04

  Yeah. We spent 10 years doing it.

• 5:53Bill Maher?

  Okay. Well, it's really funny. And, but yeah, it's not about rage, it's about honesty. You know, it's, it's a guy who just does not have two fucks left to give. I mean, you did it all, from the mailroom to the boardroom, and now, you know, when you're mad at somebody, it's just honest. You just, you...

• 6:11Speaker 04

  I hope, here's what I have from you, which is actually important. I hope you laughed a lot.

• 6:16Bill Maher?

  I was shaking with laughter sometimes, really, because just sometimes you caught in the act of being yourself. Sometimes a brilliant phrase, a line, this funny line where your first wife is pregnant with your first kid, and, but you've, you know, has always taken on too much to chew. And you're like, but now people are depending, maybe, depending on me. People in the office, people in Sarah. Did you write that line, or did the...

• 6:42Speaker 04

  He did. JR did.

• 6:44Bill Maher?

  That's why, well, you were smart to hire him.

• 6:46Speaker 04

  You know, did you ever read Shoe Dog? The Phil Knight book?

• 6:49Bill Maher?

  No, what's that?

• 6:50Speaker 04

  He wrote this great book about Phil Knight, incredible. And then I read the one he did on Andre Agassi.

• 6:57Bill Maher?

  The Nike guy?

• 6:58Speaker 04

  Yeah. He did the Andre Agassi book, which is, I think, his greatest book. And then he wrote Tender Bar, which is his story about him and his family. And once I read those, I was like, this is my guy. And I met him 2016, the day Trump gets elected. And he says yes.

• 7:17Bill Maher?

  But I must tell you, like, the first 200 pages of this book, I'm thinking to myself, wow, if I had known all this about this fucking maniac, I would have never signed with him. Are you kidding? And the last 100 pages, I'm like, geez, I hope he's still a maniac. He sounds like he's kind of mellow now. And I thought I hired an animal.

• 7:40Speaker 04

  Why do you think that I mellowed?

• 7:41Bill Maher?

  You say it in the book.

• 7:43Speaker 04

  No, here's what it is.

• 7:44Bill Maher?

  Ari, as a client, it was a little nerve wracking hearing like, do I still have it in me? It's in the book. And like, I don't know how much longer I want to do this. Why didn't you tell me that before I signed up?

• 7:55Speaker 04

  But listen, here's what it is. I realized the following. And Sarah Stod, however the fuck you want to call her, right? She said to me, and another person said to me, he goes, when you're on the field working, whether, with any of the businesses that I do, you got to be on the field. When you're off the field and we decide to go on vacation, not that you can't work, but you got to give yourself some time. That's kind of what I was referring to. I never did that before. I was always on the field, playing chess about every client. It was insane.

• 8:30Bill Maher?

  The amount of suffering you did, I was, it was shocking. It was one of the many things I learned that I didn't know what was going on. When I, before I was with you, I knew you and friendly and, you know, always trying to get me to sign, and, but I had no idea you were doing as bad as you were doing sometime. I thought you were always like a mogul. And then I read like, oh, we're, you know, I'm a middle seat on the flight to Hawaii and, you know, like your office smelled like hamburgers, because, you know, but...

• 8:58Speaker 04

  Well, you remember, we didn't have anything. There was, there was four agencies. CAA, ICM, William Morris, UTA. And then we started. And ICM, when we left, we were four little guys. They blew it up on the New York Times. Also, we became an agency. And we had no money. Nothing. To buy the tickets, the Jeffrey Kastner story, the $500,000 to buy those basketball tickets were like, they were like the billboard on Sunset.

• 9:29Bill Maher?

  The Laker ticket.

• 9:30Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 9:31Bill Maher?

  See, this is your genius here, because again, I thought you were this big mogul because you had the Laker seats.

• 9:36Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 9:37Bill Maher?

  It was brilliant. Because that picture says everything. But really, what I find out is behind the scenes, you're like, you know, scraping.

• 9:45Speaker 04

  We're rubbing nickels.

• 9:47Bill Maher?

  And also killing yourself to get it done.

• 9:50Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 9:50Bill Maher?

  So, so that guy, is that, I mean, part of what I do love about the book is it is a love letter to the job of agenting, which of course gets a bad reputation. I mean, I could tell you many, I'm sure you know all the agent jokes, you know, the agent, the guy who...

• 10:07Speaker 04

  Here's my, here's my belief. I was, Rick Rosen was really the guy with Conan O'Brien. This is, in my opinion, one of the great agent stories. Jeff Zucker makes a mistake. He thinks he makes a mistake with the Jay Leno. Jay didn't have an agent, he had a lawyer. And Rick Rosen and me, we do our job for our client. And Jay was out.

• 10:32Bill Maher?

  I've told this story from my view, which is the same view, and what I've said is-

• 10:37Speaker 04

  And that's called, that's called being an agent, and Conan's incredibly talented.

• 10:41Bill Maher?

  When I have counseled people who ask me about the business, young people, you know, they want to be mentored very often.

• 10:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, and they listen, they listen a lot.

• 10:49Bill Maher?

  At least until they stop being a stripper. No, I'm kidding. Anyway, so like, one of the things I tell them is, you absolutely have to have someone talking for you, whoever it is. It can be your Aunt Mildred, it just can't be you. So, agent, manager, and I said Jay Leno's problem was, he didn't have an agent, and though, they fired him for the crime of being number one, because what NBC had, in lieu of Jay's agent talking to them, was this snake named Ari Emanuel, who was in the ear, saying, "Don't you want to look to the future? Jay's getting old, he's only number one. For how much longer? Don't you want to get ahead of it?" And that worked.

• 11:32Bill Maher?

  I mean, that was one of your, I thought, big successes, although I thought it was really stupid on the part of NBC. I mean, they fucked up the whole thing.

• 11:39Speaker 04

  Well, I, we can go through the history of-

• 11:41Bill Maher?

  No, let's not.

• 11:42Speaker 04

  Yeah, but that's what, our job is to-

• 11:46Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 11:47Speaker 04

  Is to package, put things together, make sure people get along, and try and navigate that, that situation.

• 11:53Bill Maher?

  There is a, there is a, no, again, agent jokes, sharks, yes, but there is a type. My manager, Mark Gerberts, is this type. I'm pretty sure you're this type. They just really want to be somebody's protector. Okay, so every January, I watch people announce the 10 pounds they intend to lose, they buy the skinny jeans, and download the new health app, and by February, that app is tucked in a folder called "health" that nobody opens. Willpower versus your metabolism after 50 is not a fair fight. That's where weight loss by Hims comes in.

• 12:32Bill Maher?

  With access to FDA-approved GLP-1 medications, including the Wegovy pill and Penn, Wegovy is the first-ever GLP-1 weight loss medication in a pill. So you've actually got options. In clinical trials alongside diet and exercise, people lost an average of 14% of their body weight at 64 weeks, up to 20% overall. Complete an online consultation at hims.com to see if a prescription is right for you. Plus, you get nutrition guidance and 24/7 care team messaging. Ready to reach your goals? Visit hims.com/random to get personalized, affordable care for weight loss, hair loss, sex, testosterone, and more.

• 13:16Bill Maher?

  That's H-I-M-S dot com slash random. Hims dot com slash random. Individual results may vary, and stopping treatment may result in weight regain. Weight loss by Hims is not available in all 50 states. Wegovy is the registered trademark of Novo Nordisk AS. To get started and learn more, including important safety information, Wegovy clinical study information and restrictions, visit hims.com. You know, you're on this publicity tour, and I see you're out a lot, and it's like, you know, I had your brother on the show, I had your other brother, now I'm plugging your book. Am I your agent, or are you mine?

• 13:54Speaker 04

  Thank you, I appreciate you. You're doing a great job. You're an unbelievable protector.

• 14:01Bill Maher?

  But it is, you have this instinct, call it. I don't think you care about this, but famous, and you don't want to be the star. You always wanted to. And yeah, and I think, you talk, it's very charming, like you say, they're the bumblebees, they spread the agents. You know, you need somebody to put those things together and to spread the whatever, even with all the bullshit.

• 14:25Speaker 04

  I think representing people that are incredible artists, there is a business aspect that is an art form.

• 14:36Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 14:36Speaker 04

  And if you do it well-

• 14:37Bill Maher?

  It is.

• 14:38Speaker 04

  If you do it well, and you have taste, you can be very-

• 14:43Bill Maher?

  So are you still that?

• 14:44Speaker 04

  Oh my god, yeah.

• 14:45Bill Maher?

  Okay.

• 14:46Speaker 04

  I mean, today, today was Aaron Sorkin, I mean, his, his movie that's coming out on Facebook, it's Pete Berg's movie, that he's got coming out, Mosquito Bowl.

• 14:57Bill Maher?

  Any other clients on your list today?

• 14:59Speaker 04

  Well, you're asking me, but today was, those were two movies coming out, that was working on it, and it was Sean leaving.

• 15:06Bill Maher?

  I mean, I can't bust your balls too much. I came, I have a job.

• 15:09Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 15:09Bill Maher?

  I've had it for a long time, you know, and I'm not looking for another one.

• 15:13Speaker 04

  We're looking for one more. We're looking for voiceovers and animation.

• 15:15Bill Maher?

  Oh, you didn't, you didn't forget.

• 15:17Speaker 04

  Actually, I actually sent Mr. Gerberts last week a whole thing about it.

• 15:22Bill Maher?

  People, would I not be great as a cartoon villain?

• 15:26Speaker 04

  Yes, you would be.

• 15:27Bill Maher?

  I would be.

• 15:30Bill Maher?

  But they probably won't do it because of politics.

• 15:32Speaker 04

  I think you're wrong. I think they're gonna do it.

• 15:33Bill Maher?

  Great. That's what I love about you, your optimism. I mean, you do, you do have this love affair with the business, starting at the, by the way, we have some things in common, like, I also was a delivery boy before GPS with a map-

• 15:49Speaker 04

  Did you have the-

• 15:50Bill Maher?

  In the dark-

• 15:50Speaker 04

  Did you have the Thomas guy?

• 15:51Bill Maher?

  Cursing people for not putting a clear number on their house.

• 15:55Speaker 04

  How about this? How about there's no streetlights sometimes?

• 15:58Bill Maher?

  That's what I'm saying. It was the very dark, this was, I was the delivery boy for Westwood Corners Liquor and Drug-

• 16:05Speaker 04

  When you were doing stand-up?

• 16:06Bill Maher?

  When I was 16, when I was in high school. Yeah, I don't think you're even supposed to do that, have a 16-year-old deliver liquor.

• 16:12Speaker 04

  You're definitely not.

• 16:13Bill Maher?

  You're definitely not.

• 16:14Speaker 04

  The only job at 16, I'm gonna mow the lawn, or I'm gonna take the snow, and I'm gonna shovel the snow.

• 16:19Bill Maher?

  From 7 to 9, every weeknight, I would go there, and I would, you know, the liquor store-

• 16:24Speaker 04

  How much would you make? Tell me. Please tell me. Please tell me I made more than you.

• 16:29Bill Maher?

  $2 an hour. So at the end of the week-

• 16:32Speaker 04

  I think I made more than you.

• 16:33Bill Maher?

  Yeah, okay.

• 16:34Speaker 04

  I made 50, I made a base of 200 in the mailroom, plus 15 cents a mile.

• 16:43Bill Maher?

  Well, I mean, look, we all like money, and, you know, you had some line in there about, there are times when the only thing in my eyes was Visine and dollar signs.

• 16:54Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 16:55Bill Maher?

  But I also saw you do things, I have to think about this book. It made me think you're even more of an animal than I thought you were, but also more of a human. Because you, like, there are moments, like, where you do, I think it's because we have the same kind of parents, brought up by liberal parents.

• 17:12Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 17:13Bill Maher?

  You know, punching, never punching down. You fight with a lot of people, but it's always punching up. And when Kanye was anti-Semitic, you know, there was money on the table with Bill Gibson-

• 17:27Speaker 04

  Who's a client.

• 17:28Bill Maher?

  And Khashoggi.

• 17:29Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 17:30Bill Maher?

  So, the journalist in Saudi Arabia with his head cut off, so, you stood up for the Jews, you stood up for an hour. You know, I gotta give you, you know, props for that, for, you know, you, you, there's a human in there. We're still looking.

• 17:46Speaker 04

  Somewhere, we're still trying to find it on occasion.

• 17:48Bill Maher?

  We're looking. But also a crazy person, yeah, I mean, like, wow, I mean, some of the tirades and the-

• 17:56Speaker 04

  Which ones?

• 17:57Bill Maher?

  Well, I mean, again, nothing everybody doesn't do. You just do it openly.

• 18:03Speaker 04

  When I walk in the room, you know, you know where I stand.

• 18:07Bill Maher?

  Yeah, and you're not afraid to tell somebody, "Go fuck yourself." I mean, just as a hello, like, practically, I mean, you know, you, you don't like to lose, you know, you know what? You are the perfect example of, you know, if you, I'm sure you've read a million scripts, and you had to. Like, I took a script-writing course once, and, like, here's the main thing I took from it. The character needs a desire and a need. They're different.

• 18:40Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 18:40Bill Maher?

  When they come together at the end, that's like-

• 18:42Speaker 04

  If it comes together, it's perfect.

• 18:44Bill Maher?

  Like Rocky, his desire is to win the fight. His need is to be loved, even if he doesn't win the fight. So he, at the end, he loses the fight, but gets Adrian. Spoiler alert for those who have been caught up in-

• 19:00Speaker 04

  If you haven't seen, I am Rocky, here's what happened.

• 19:03Bill Maher?

  1976.

• 19:04Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 19:05Bill Maher?

  So, I feel like you are the character who, like, is all this desire, and the book really is about, but is looking for the need.

• 19:16Speaker 04

  The need is- Is. Listen, I had incredible parents like you had middle parents. Um, they taught me so many great things just by their actions. But there was Zeke, the smart one, Ram, the artist, and then there was you're the third one. And it was a desire to get an identity in this in business that we have entered. Had all the makings for me to get an identity and I would have. As I said, the peak bird. I didn't have plan B. I only got plan A. I was gonna do anything to make plan A work. And I would have gone as in the book. To sickness to get the plan A.

• 19:55Bill Maher?

  Yeah, but what makes the book interesting to me, besides the stories and stuff, but some of that is because I'm in this world. So I know these people it is, but it would be interesting to anybody. Um, but the fact that you have this, this burning desire and yet over and over again, there's some line. On the order of, you know, but the high never really last.

• 20:21Speaker 04

  Don't you think that business is always?

• 20:23Bill Maher?

  But you're interrupting me when I'm quoting you.

• 20:25Speaker 04

  Oh, I'm sorry.

• 20:26Bill Maher?

  What an asshole. Because it's a great line. It's about like, uh, it, but this, it's another, some merger you pulled over. But it didn't hit the spot. Wherever the spot is, it remains untouched. I, you know, I just thought that is a certain type. I'm somewhat that type, but you have that to an extraordinary degree like. Why, how come every time I achieve this thing that I so desperately wanted, I find out it didn't make me happy? That's an interesting character.

• 20:58Speaker 04

  But that's.

• 20:59Bill Maher?

  And that's desire versus need.

• 21:01Speaker 04

  Yeah. And you know something? I'm, I'm trying to get better at it. I don't look in the rearview mirror. I don't know if that's my upbringing or this need to constantly prove myself.

• 21:12Bill Maher?

  You're, you're obsessed with digestion. You eat worms.

• 21:15Speaker 04

  Right here for you. I brought them for you.

• 21:17Bill Maher?

  Oh, please.

• 21:18Speaker 04

  I did. I brought them for you.

• 21:20Bill Maher?

  What form do they, you're not talking about like, just like a fucking bird or a fish.

• 21:25Speaker 04

  I'm gonna show you.

• 21:26Bill Maher?

  Don't eat it now.

• 21:27Speaker 04

  No, I'm not gonna do it now. I'm giving them to you. I've already done mine in the morning.

• 21:29Bill Maher?

  They're made into pills?

• 21:31Speaker 04

  No, it's a liquid form. It's a liquid. It's microscopic. You just swallow it.

• 21:35Bill Maher?

  I see. Okay. That's less gross than I thought.

• 21:37Speaker 04

  Okay, good.

• 21:38Bill Maher?

  So anyway.

• 21:39Speaker 04

  It's for you.

• 21:40Bill Maher?

  You're obsessed with digestion and your whole life. You have made yourself miserable up until recently. Because you constantly eat something you cannot digest. You couldn't, William Morris, you, it was, you wanted it, you ate it, you swab, but then it made, because you, oh my God, if you don't get bigger, we're gonna die. And you're going through it. And then it was IMG or AAMG, whatever this fucking alphabet soup of thing. And I gotta go public. I gotta get wrestling. Every time you do, you're, you're driving yourself almost to death.

• 22:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 22:15Bill Maher?

  Like, like no sleep.

• 22:17Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 22:17Bill Maher?

  And flights you don't wanna be on, working through pain like, you know, you're on the phone with Obama and you get a needle in your back. I mean, just like crazy shit. But you, because you're not digesting because you ate this thing.

• 22:31Speaker 04

  Cause I'm having the worst.

• 22:32Bill Maher?

  Then you, then you can't, you have to. And but then, but you eventually did find a way to digest them all, didn't you?

• 22:40Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 22:41Bill Maher?

  Yeah. You know, folks, half of modern work isn't work. It's 6D browser tabs, a wall of sticky notes and remembering where you put things. That's not a career. That's a scavenger hunt with health insurance. Now our team hands that to Claude, lets it run in the cloud and does the actual job. Claude is the AI for problem solvers. It's the collaborator that understands your entire workflow and thinks with you, not for you. Whether you're debugging code at midnight, building a financial model or strategizing your next business move. Claude extends your thinking to tackle the problems that matter. Built by Anthropic, Claude features powerful tools like deep research.

• 23:26Bill Maher?

  Instead of surface level search snippets, it analyzes dozens of sources at once, delivering thorough, fully cited reports in minutes. The club random team used it to build custom internal trackers on the spot just by describing what we needed. Zero coding required. It makes you realize how much time you are wasting doing things the hard way. For problems worth solving, get started with Claude at claude.ai slash random. That's claude.ai slash random. And check out Claude Pro, which includes access to all of the features mentioned in today's episode. Claude.ai slash random. But along the way.

• 24:11Speaker 04

  It was a messy soup.

• 24:12Bill Maher?

  I can't believe you think it was worth it. I mean.

• 24:15Speaker 04

  Definitely worth it.

• 24:15Bill Maher?

  Really? You describe a lot of misery.

• 24:18Speaker 04

  It's, it was a lot of craziness and it came out at the end, a beautiful story. Even though at the time I didn't believe it was gonna be, cause it was, as you know, it's all over the place. Physically, emotionally, but it, it turned out okay.

• 24:37Bill Maher?

  Well, it turned out great. I mean, you know, obviously, yeah, I mean.

• 24:42Speaker 04

  During it, it was hell.

• 24:45Bill Maher?

  I mean.

• 24:47Speaker 04

  Well, how about the flight to China? And he didn't book the lunch.

• 24:52Bill Maher?

  That really, of all the things, but you know, like you.

• 24:56Speaker 04

  16 hours? I got on a flight right back. I, I wanted to kill him.

• 25:03Bill Maher?

  No, I, I get, I know, and you probably did or almost.

• 25:06Speaker 04

  Well, he wasn't, when I landed, he wasn't, he wasn't, he wasn't working.

• 25:10Bill Maher?

  People don't know that you were, your agents, your, your assistant said you had a lunch in China, but didn't confirm it. So you flew all the way to China.

• 25:18Speaker 04

  Well, he didn't tell me he didn't confirm it.

• 25:20Bill Maher?

  I, I understand. But, but if that was me, first of all, I would never fucking get on a plane to China for, you know, you, you would fly. Yeah, just flying. You're right. Flying is very bad for your health. I, I'm so glad I stopped.

• 25:34Speaker 04

  You stopped?

• 25:35Bill Maher?

  Touring.

• 25:36Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah. You can't, I mean, it's, it's, it, it just kills you.

• 25:40Bill Maher?

  It's one reason I didn't need CIA anymore.

• 25:42Speaker 04

  Yeah, it just, you get up, you're done working on Friday and you get on the plane.

• 25:46Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 25:47Speaker 04

  Oh, my God.

• 25:48Bill Maher?

  No, I miss, if they could just beam me there, it'd be the perfect world, but they can't do that. Maybe, maybe they'll have a hologram of me. But I, I feel like there's, you know, you, you both. Collect people in the book and, and also like, uh. You know, cut off a lot of heads. You know, like when you, when you're done with somebody. You know, but there's also this theme of like, you, you keep meeting these people. Who, it's sometimes you're just, cause you read about him or something and you wanted to meet him, you know, you think, you say that's, and I get it. It's a great perk of the, the business that you can, you know.

• 26:26Speaker 04

  Well, it was a perk of being Ari Gold, my brother in the White House, kind of the company's starting to get hot. And if I read an article about Mark Andreessen.

• 26:36Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 26:37Speaker 04

  I could call him up when he was nobody. And I met him and that led to Egon Durbin, who became my partner in all my events.

• 26:45Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 26:45Speaker 04

  It's crazy.

• 26:46Bill Maher?

  Yeah, but, yeah, and some other guy, you said he's the brother you never had, but you met him late in life.

• 26:52Speaker 04

  Mark Shapiro.

• 26:52Bill Maher?

  Okay. I don't know who these, these people are, but I mean, you know. And but then like you also, boy, if you're, if you're dead to me, I mean, you're, well, when I didn't know you that well, it was always you and Patrick Weifel. That was, it was like Batman and Robin. I'm like, you couldn't say one name without the other. And I remember, this is like back in like, when I was like out on the clubs and that shit, like the nineties and like. Girls were very into Patrick Weifel.

• 27:21Speaker 04

  Oh, he was the man.

• 27:22Bill Maher?

  He what?

• 27:22Speaker 04

  He was the man.

• 27:23Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I, I mean, I remember this girl saying, oh yeah, he's finer than his clients.

• 27:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, he was, he was. One of the most incredible agents of all time, of all time. I mean, he might be on like Mount Rushmore, but then.

• 27:39Bill Maher?

  Sounds like he represented a lot of erections also.

• 27:44Speaker 04

  But then, you know, we became a company that owned businesses. We owned UFC, we owned wrestling and it wasn't just an agency.

• 27:54Bill Maher?

  He said the things you were eating that you could not get down.

• 27:58Speaker 04

  I got them down, but they took a lot out of me.

• 28:03Bill Maher?

  You were like the snake who eat, again, you're the snake. I'm saying agents are snake, just cause that came up twice, but like that eats the giant thing and you see it, but they know how to do it.

• 28:15Speaker 04

  Well, I've been doing it for so many years.

• 28:17Bill Maher?

  You, you're a human. You don't know how to do it, uh, but you did it. I mean. But I, I certainly hope you're still at it because I definitely, uh, I'm not done.

• 28:28Speaker 04

  I'm not done.

• 28:29Bill Maher?

  Okay, good.

• 28:30Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 28:31Bill Maher?

  Yeah, and I do, I, look, at the end of the day, I tell myself, I know this guy pretty well. And what I said before, I think is the truth. You have this very deep thing in you that good agents and managers do. They do wanna protect, they do wanna be that, that person out front.

• 28:47Speaker 04

  And they wanna protect the client.

• 28:48Bill Maher?

  You know, and like you said, like agenting, that is a talent.

• 28:52Speaker 04

  I, I think it's, I think it's an art form like you do in, in your standup and the conversations that you're having.

• 28:58Bill Maher?

  Well, my standup is better than agenting, but okay.

• 29:01Speaker 04

  No, but, but, but getting you to where you get to do your thing.

• 29:06Bill Maher?

  Yes.

• 29:06Speaker 04

  At one financially and two kind of, that's the job. That is a, and it's a, I think a, a redeeming job.

• 29:15Bill Maher?

  So after the book is out, you'll go back to thinking about me and not you.

• 29:19Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 29:22Speaker 04

  Only you.

• 29:23Bill Maher?

  But you know, you're happy. I'm very glad to see you're happy because like, uh, boy, fuck, you know what I learned from this book? Not that I didn't know what dyslexia was or that people suffered from. And I didn't realize that it was like this very large colony within the country, you know, it's, it's almost like an identity group.

• 29:44Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 29:44Bill Maher?

  Uh, who really understand each other in a way that everybody else kinda can't, but...

• 29:48Speaker 04

  But if you look at that...

• 29:50Bill Maher?

  Lot of, lot of people.

• 29:52Speaker 04

  They're, they're either people because you have great parents that you become a Rhodes Scholar, you become really successful, or like, like, I don't know what the percentage is, a big percentage are in jail.

• 30:06Speaker 04

  Because, you know, you, you, you just can't make it. If you don't have

• 30:10Bill Maher?

  I mean, that...

• 30:11Speaker 04

  Family members that can really get you through it.

• 30:14Bill Maher?

  Right. You certainly had characteristics that would...

• 30:18Speaker 04

  Could put me in jail.

• 30:18Bill Maher?

  Of course. You just fly, you, you, you make enemies. You, you, you're constantly in...

• 30:25Speaker 04

  Oh my god, they're gonna make me choke.

• 30:27Bill Maher?

  You're constantly in feuds that sometimes they're, you know, it's like that, that Wayne's Brothers book, The Hundred and Fifty Ways to Know Your Ghetto, and one of them is, you jump into fights that don't involve you.

• 30:42Speaker 04

  I only jump into fights that involve me. I protect people, I, I'm a ride or die guy. Clients, friends, myself.

• 30:50Bill Maher?

  Well, unless it's time for them to die.

• 30:52Speaker 04

  No.

• 30:53Bill Maher?

  No.

• 30:54Speaker 04

  If, if they do something that's bad, or you think that they've double-crossed you, yeah.

• 31:00Bill Maher?

  Well, Patrick didn't exactly double-cross you. He seemed to lose interest in the business.

• 31:06Speaker 04

  Then, at the end, he went behind my back, as he had made a lot of money.

• 31:11Bill Maher?

  Oh, he did.

• 31:12Speaker 04

  To my financial partner and my partner, and he said, you know, I'm gonna, after we made a deal, everybody was gonna, here was the deal, I'm doing this and I'm doing that, you're gonna do this. And then he said, after we went and announced we're going private, it would endeavor, he then said, nope, I don't, I, even though we then announced it, we all agreed to it.

• 31:35Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I'm not even arguing with what you are talk, what you do. I'm on the same page. People kinda have to earn their wings, not every day. If someone has been your friend for a long time, you give them a lot more rope than someone who, you know, if someone's late the first time you're supposed to meet them.

• 31:54Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 31:55Bill Maher?

  You're dead. Right? You're, you're gone. Like, the first time, this is your...

• 31:59Speaker 04

  Somebody you've met before, yeah.

• 32:00Bill Maher?

  Yeah, but if it's somebody you've known for 10 years, and you, you'll, you'll give them a pass, even though we hate, both of us hate waiting.

• 32:05Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 32:06Bill Maher?

  We also both don't like, you don't say goodbye?

• 32:08Speaker 04

  No.

• 32:08Bill Maher?

  I don't say hello.

• 32:09Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 32:10Bill Maher?

  Like, when I, I was like, unless I haven't seen someone in a long time, but like, at the office, like, I saw you yesterday. Why am I saying hello again? Like, what happened in the last 14 hours of your life and mine?

• 32:21Speaker 04

  I agree with that.

• 32:22Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I know. But, uh, no, I, I think the idea, and you, you talk about it eloquently, I thought, this thing about happiness is not breakups, breakoffs. I, you know, thing, not everybody stays the same, and you don't have to feel bad about, um, refreshing the friendship.

• 32:49Speaker 04

  You know, all these things, whether it be a marriage, whether it be a friendship, you, you have to be a participant. You can't be an absentee person in, in any of them. You have to, and if you don't want to be, okay, I'm good. I'm, I'm good going, I, I, I'm, I'm comfortable that way.

• 33:10Bill Maher?

  So, look, five minutes of the news these days, and you can feel your blood pressure climbing. That's not an accident. That's the business model. You can't fix any of it. But you can't keep an eye on your own numbers, so head into the holidays, already doing something good for yourself, and try 120 Life, a once a day functional drink with ingredients that support healthy blood pressure. It's simple. Drink it, check your numbers, see if it's working. If your numbers don't improve, you get your money back. No hoops, no awkward emails, no fine print. It tastes great. It's a blend of super fruit juices, and the powdered version has one gram of sugar. Smart if you're watching Blood Sugar

• 33:51Bill Maher?

  2. And listen, this deal is only happening this week, so don't wait. Go to 120life.com, that's one-two-zero-life-dot-com, and use code RANDOM25 for 25% off, or even easier, text RANDOM25 to 511511. Try it risk-free for two weeks. If your blood pressure doesn't come down, you get a full refund. That's 120life.com, code RANDOM25, or text RANDOM25 to 511511 before this 25% off deal ends at the end of the week. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended

• 34:35Bill Maher?

  to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Message and data rates may apply. It was quite eye-opening, Ari, I must say, to find out from your book that, like, for years, like, I knew you for years, you would call me quite often, when are you gonna leave that dumb agent of yours? You would, you were like Trump. You unnecessarily insulted him, he's a great guy, uh, but just, you know, trying to get me to sign, and then have to find out, you do that with everybody. That's how you did it with your, both your wives. You are just, you, you just don't stop.

• 35:08Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 35:09Bill Maher?

  You're like Yoko.

• 35:10Speaker 04

  Wait, Yoko?

• 35:12Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I, I, I did this.

• 35:13Speaker 04

  Yoko!

• 35:14Bill Maher?

  Well, listen, I did, a few years ago, the New York Times asked me to do a book review for this book about the Beatles. I guess it's known I'm a Beatle.

• 35:21Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 35:22Bill Maher?

  Nut. So, like, it was good. It was called 150 Glimpses of the Beatles. I could have lived with 100. But, okay, so, it put some light on details or instances I thought I knew about that with new details, that was a good part of it. And one of them was that, I did not realize that Yoko, you know, it wasn't like a chance meeting with John Lennon.

• 35:46Speaker 04

  Really?

• 35:47Bill Maher?

  Yeah, she...

• 35:49Speaker 04

  What happened?

• 35:49Bill Maher?

  According to this book, she used to jump into the car, like, he would follow him, play, she wrote him a letter every day and got it to India, uh, when they were in India, you know, she...

• 36:00Speaker 04

  She love-bombed him her way.

• 36:01Bill Maher?

  She, she wanted to get her a Beatle. First, she wanted Paul.

• 36:06Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 36:07Bill Maher?

  And first, Linda wanted John. You know, when you want a Beatle, we don't...

• 36:12Speaker 04

  You don't care which one.

• 36:13Bill Maher?

  We can't always board everyone's first choice. Just eat the chicken.

• 36:22Bill Maher?

  So, so, the fact that she was just so, he's very funny telling me how persistent she was, you know, and I'm, I don't think, oh, Yoko's the dragon lady, I like Yoko, but, you know, I think she, she...

• 36:37Speaker 04

  She wanted a Beatle.

• 36:38Bill Maher?

  She wanted that guy, and, and, uh, and she was just what he needed at that time. She kinda knew how, she was older than him by low, she wasn't a kid, she knew how to,

• 36:49Bill Maher?

  you know, inscrutable Asian ways of getting something. No, but, uh, but you...

• 36:55Speaker 04

  She wrote him a letter every day?

• 36:56Bill Maher?

  Every day when they were in India, like, kind of, I, I'm not sure how she made sure it was delivered, I don't know, maybe some

• 37:03Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 37:04Bill Maher?

  Connection in the East.

• 37:07Speaker 04

  That's incredible.

• 37:07Bill Maher?

  I know. But that's you, Ari. You, you're just like...

• 37:10Speaker 04

  I'm relentless.

• 37:11Bill Maher?

  You, like, and

• 37:12Speaker 04

  I'm relentless.

• 37:12Bill Maher?

  I was laughing out loud when you talk, when you were talking about how, uh, Stod, no, I'm sorry, she's too much of a lady.

• 37:23Speaker 04

  Sarah.

• 37:24Bill Maher?

  Sarah the second. Um, but when you, when you were trying to get with her, and you're very desperate, it's very funny, uh, either you or the guy wrote a funny line about you, a guy calls you up and says, I want you to meet someone. Who? A woman. I like her already.

• 37:40Speaker 04

  That's true. I said that.

• 37:42Bill Maher?

  You said that. See, there you got one for yourself. Okay.

• 37:47Bill Maher?

  But it's, it's funny. So, and of course, she Googles you, uh, sees that you're 55 or something.

• 37:55Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 37:55Bill Maher?

  She's 28, and she's, you know, I, I know Sarah quite well now, she's awesome. But yeah, she's like...

• 38:02Speaker 04

  She thought William Morris was a cigarette company?

• 38:04Bill Maher?

  No.

• 38:05Speaker 04

  Swear to you. Swear to you. She thought it was a cigarette company.

• 38:09Bill Maher?

  Well, to be fair, at the time, it was.

• 38:14Bill Maher?

  And a Halloween story.

• 38:17Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:19Speaker 04

  But I didn't stop.

• 38:20Bill Maher?

  No, I mean, she's and and she was a girl who knew what she wanted. I mean, it would make actually a good movie because, you know, movies, rom coms have to depend on, I mean, you got ninety minutes to fill. Going from one place to another, they can't like each other at first, you have to hate each other at first. She didn't exactly hate you.

• 38:41Speaker 04

  No, she was indifferent. She did say that you're too old.

• 38:43Bill Maher?

  Like you were not in the pool of men who are able to court me.

• 38:47Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:49Bill Maher?

  And this was just not gonna fly.

• 38:51Speaker 04

  Well, I don't think she knew what she was up against.

• 38:54Bill Maher?

  I know, but when you wrote, so it made me go into signing mode. I was like, wait a second.

• 39:01Speaker 04

  I did.

• 39:02Bill Maher?

  I see what happened to me.

• 39:04Speaker 04

  I did, I went there.

• 39:05Bill Maher?

  I see what happened to me now.

• 39:07Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 39:08Bill Maher?

  All those years, I said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, and next thing you know, we're being married by Larry David and where were you married, somewhere?

• 39:17Speaker 04

  In Saint-Tropez.

• 39:18Bill Maher?

  Saint-Tropez.

• 39:19Speaker 04

  That's where.

• 39:20Bill Maher?

  Excuse me.

• 39:20Speaker 04

  So we had the second date. She says she's going there for the summer because her father has a place there. I said, I'm gonna be in Europe, I'm gonna come take you to dinner. And cut to, she goes, no, I said, I'm gonna show up. You'll either and I'm gonna text you that and then she shows up and

• 39:39Bill Maher?

  And this is after she said no to you a million times.

• 39:42Speaker 04

  Yeah. So I had to fly to Saint-Tropez.

• 39:45Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I mean, I mean, I, why were you so sprung on this, Jake? Without knowing her that well.

• 39:51Speaker 04

  Well, the minute you see her, you realize how beautiful she is.

• 39:55Bill Maher?

  Oh, she's a, she's a done.

• 39:56Speaker 04

  Physically beautiful woman and and emotionally, she is well put together.

• 40:02Bill Maher?

  You're right for each other. She wouldn't be right for me.

• 40:06Bill Maher?

  But

• 40:06Speaker 04

  Is there a woman right for you?

• 40:08Bill Maher?

  Oh, yeah, you know.

• 40:08Speaker 04

  I love her.

• 40:09Bill Maher?

  Yeah, okay, so, um, I'm set. And they're, what they, what those two have in common is they're the two most self-assured.

• 40:20Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 40:20Bill Maher?

  So self-assured and not afraid or not, yeah, so that's

• 40:26Speaker 04

  They got their shit together.

• 40:27Bill Maher?

  Confident and so there's no, uh,

• 40:31Speaker 04

  And you can't rattle them.

• 40:33Bill Maher?

  And and you don't want to.

• 40:34Speaker 04

  No. No, you cannot rattle them and and exactly scared to rattle them. Or try to.

• 40:41Bill Maher?

  I am not scared.

• 40:42Speaker 04

  Uh, she is as and I've seen it in her business, she is as tough as it comes.

• 40:48Bill Maher?

  Yeah, that's not my type.

• 40:49Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 40:52Bill Maher?

  I'm saying, that's for you because you wanna challenge all the time. And you're gonna take over this, and you're gonna take over that and what three letters are left that I have been taking over?

• 41:01Speaker 04

  I want all the alphabet.

• 41:03Bill Maher?

  I want BLT. I'm taking, yeah, that's it, Ari. Take over bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches.

• 41:09Speaker 04

  Are they buyable?

• 41:13Speaker 04

  Oh, God, yeah.

• 41:15Bill Maher?

  So are you done buying things? Why don't you?

• 41:18Speaker 04

  No, probably not.

• 41:20Bill Maher?

  What what is this latest one you got?

• 41:22Speaker 04

  So there's the Niederlanders.

• 41:24Bill Maher?

  The Nieder, the the theater people?

• 41:26Speaker 04

  And then there's the Schubert's.

• 41:27Bill Maher?

  Of course, we're talking about Broadway now.

• 41:29Speaker 04

  And then there's this company called ATG.

• 41:32Bill Maher?

  ATG?

• 41:33Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 41:33Bill Maher?

  Sounds like a government agency.

• 41:35Speaker 04

  They're the largest footprint in in the in the theater space in New York, London and all over the world.

• 41:42Bill Maher?

  Oh, they're bigger than the Niederlanders and

• 41:44Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 41:44Bill Maher?

  What a shame.

• 41:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 41:47Bill Maher?

  The Schubert's.

• 41:48Speaker 04

  I gotta be able, I gotta open the mouth, but I gotta swallow them.

• 41:51Bill Maher?

  You're doing it again. You know how many fucking worms you're gonna have to eat? Well, I guess now, now it's easier because you got all this money behind you. Like before, it was like, you know, you were just on a limb. Um, but geez, the Niederlanders. You know, I did a, I got a Tony nomination. Uh, part of my anti EGOT, I've lost all the awards.

• 42:18Bill Maher?

  And I was nominated for a Grammy, spoken word, you know, all of them, but, uh,

• 42:25Bill Maher?

  Broadway, when I was there in two thousand and three, Niederlander, Schubert, those were the names and they had been for a hundred years, right?

• 42:34Speaker 04

  Right.

• 42:35Bill Maher?

  And now, now fucking

• 42:37Speaker 04

  ATG.

• 42:38Bill Maher?

  You come in with your

• 42:39Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 42:40Bill Maher?

  Oh, Jesus.

• 42:42Speaker 04

  Why do you say it in that way?

• 42:44Bill Maher?

  No, you're right. I mean, change happens.

• 42:46Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 42:46Bill Maher?

  You know? This is again, you either, you're either a new friend or a dead friend.

• 42:53Speaker 04

  That's not true.

• 42:55Bill Maher?

  No?

• 42:55Speaker 04

  No. No, with most of the people, something transpired. And I'm, and I take a lot of responsibility for some of them.

• 43:05Bill Maher?

  You know what?

• 43:07Bill Maher?

  As I said before,

• 43:10Bill Maher?

  when I flip a coin on you, it does always come down on the side of your parents. You had the same kind of parents, I punching up, not down. That kind of thing.

• 43:23Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 43:24Bill Maher?

  So folks, let's talk about Medicare for a second. I know, nothing gets a room going like Medicare, but seriously, are you or a loved one still on the same Medicare plan you signed up four years ago? Well, know this, plans can change every year and most people never look again after they sign up. It's like a software update, something changed, nobody knows what, and we all agree just to hit agree. But being on the wrong plan can mean doctors and prescriptions you thought were covered aren't. Luckily, there's a smarter way called Chapter. No more guessing whether your plan still fits, no more wondering if you're overpaying.

• 44:06Bill Maher?

  They'll compare every Medicare plan nationwide for free in about twenty minutes. People who've switched saved on average eleven hundred dollars on healthcare costs. The plan you never check is the one that ends up costing you. Click the link below to get started or call Chapter at nine eight four two one seven three six four three. That's nine eight four two one seven three six four three. So I do basically trust that when you make these changes, you know, it's like, it's inevitable, the change is inevitable and

• 44:46Bill Maher?

  you know, hopefully, it's not just for revenge, although you do have a thirst for revenge often. I mean, this, I seem to remember something you were buying where you, it was hundreds of jobs and maybe thousands and billions of dollars on the line. But you said to you, the most important thing was wiping that fucking smile off some guy's face and another guy who laughed at you. You really don't like it when people laugh at you.

• 45:16Speaker 04

  That was William Morris.

• 45:17Bill Maher?

  William Morris, it was like, it was very funny.

• 45:20Speaker 04

  That was Jim Wyatt in Nervous.

• 45:21Bill Maher?

  This guy was laughing that big important him was gonna buy a little old meat. And then you bought them.

• 45:29Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 45:30Bill Maher?

  See, that's the thing, the people you hate, I don't, I, I, I mean, I don't know Jeff Katzenberg well, you seem to hate him more than anybody. And many people do, but I, I don't know. Twice he's called me to have first lunch and dinner, I think first, and then we had lunch, this is like fifteen years apart, maybe twenty years apart, but out of the blue and seemingly with no agenda. No, a little

• 45:54Speaker 04

  Hello.

• 45:55Bill Maher?

  But, you know.

• 45:56Speaker 04

  I should get you coffee instead of tequila.

• 45:58Bill Maher?

  But they tell me that like he has like three breakfasts every day. He just talks to a lot of people. So I was like, sure, I mean, Jeff Katzenberg, he's a legendary guy and, you know, and, but you fucking hate him, I mean

• 46:10Speaker 04

  Well, here's what happened. It's pretty simple. You know those basketball tickets that we couldn't afford and they were like the billboard on Sunset Boulevard where we started, made us look big? He went behind my back, we had a contract and he tried to take the tickets. And I wasn't gonna permit that.

• 46:25Bill Maher?

  And you would never do that to somebody?

• 46:26Speaker 04

  No, definitely not.

• 46:28Bill Maher?

  Because you do say at one point

• 46:29Speaker 04

  I definitely would not.

• 46:30Bill Maher?

  Something about like you, I think maybe you were leaving one agency or plot, you know, the

• 46:36Speaker 04

  The plot.

• 46:36Bill Maher?

  Okay, what, this is

• 46:38Speaker 04

  On Endeavor, yeah.

• 46:40Bill Maher?

  But this is like a plot, no pun intended, that plays out constantly with agencies. A bunch of agents within the agency become a plotting nest to start their own agency and you say like it gets to a point where you're thinking, um, are they gonna, you know, abandon and stab me in the back or am I gonna do it to them? So it's not

• 47:04Speaker 04

  No, but that's different.

• 47:05Bill Maher?

  You admit that it's in your mind.

• 47:06Speaker 04

  That's different. That was like where we're starting, it was, we had these tickets, they became the hot tickets, we owned the tickets. He goes behind my back, tries to up the price, we could barely afford them as they were. Fine, I got them back, he calls me. Then there was another incident with him. Fine, he did something that was bad. Then the last piece

• 47:26Bill Maher?

  As much as we can say about

• 47:27Speaker 04

  No, no, no, I'm gonna say the last, the last piece that put me over the top.

• 47:32Speaker 04

  My brother works for the Obamas. He's a chief of staff, right?

• 47:35Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 47:37Speaker 04

  I know Joe Biden through my brother. He says, I can get you a meeting with Joe Biden, a million dollars, I said, do you think I need to give you a million dollars to, so you can tell Joe Biden that I gave you a million dollars to make meet with Joe Biden? Okay. He goes, I have all the relationships with Joe Biden. Wait. Then as, as you've said and I said, a year before, Ruth Bader Biden, you know, we're all saying, okay.

• 48:01Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 48:02Speaker 04

  And I'm calling him like, hey dude, you say you got his ear.

• 48:06Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 48:06Speaker 04

  You're the man. You're talking him all the time. After that last, I said, you gotta get him out.

• 48:15Speaker 04

  Silence.

• 48:18Speaker 04

  Then, the election's over, he loses. I washed my hands of politics. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not in it anymore. I'm, I'm, I'm moving on. He gave us Karen Bass. He gave us this, and now he's just moved on. When you sit there and you say, and most of the things he does is not about the situation. It's about Jeffrey and the situation. He's first and foremost. That shit I don't like. I do not like it. And he did try to fuck us over twice. Fuck you.

• 48:49Bill Maher?

  I mean, I could give a fuck about all of this.

• 48:52Speaker 04

  But get high. You asked me.

• 48:55Bill Maher?

  But I know, but it's funny in the book. I mean, it's funny when you're, uh, there's that moment where you get back together with Sarah. After, oh, by the way, here's a little something that caught my eye.

• 49:07Speaker 04

  You mean the breakup with, with Stott?

• 49:09Bill Maher?

  Yes. Breakup, okay, so you're very mad at certain point.

• 49:14Speaker 04

  No, I was depressed.

• 49:15Bill Maher?

  Wait, no, no, no, let me finish my sentence.

• 49:17Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 49:17Bill Maher?

  You didn't hear my sentence. You were very mad, uh, that, I guess it was William Morris sent Harvey Weinstein, of all people, as their errand boy to tell you that they were gonna buy you, right?

• 49:31Speaker 04

  Well, it was.

• 49:32Bill Maher?

  Wasn't he the messenger?

• 49:34Speaker 04

  Yeah, no, we were like a month old, I think it was.

• 49:36Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 49:37Speaker 04

  He calls up the peninsula. Shirt, food, everything upside down. And he goes, you're making $10 million, you're going, I've sold the company, you're going over. We've just started the company. You're going over to William Morris, each one of you, you're gonna make $2.5 million.

• 49:52Bill Maher?

  Why him?

• 49:52Speaker 04

  I don't know.

• 49:53Bill Maher?

  Exactly, he's not part of William Morris.

• 49:56Speaker 04

  No, he was, he was at Merrimack's.

• 49:58Bill Maher?

  So why him?

• 49:59Speaker 04

  I don't know.

• 50:00Bill Maher?

  Okay. So you're mad that he is this errand boy out of left field. But then when you break up with her, you have your own therapist do it.

• 50:08Speaker 04

  I was a pussy.

• 50:10Bill Maher?

  You didn't.

• 50:10Speaker 04

  I was, there was the one time.

• 50:12Bill Maher?

  That's like worse than the Harvey Weinstein move.

• 50:14Speaker 04

  Horrible. Bet she got back together with me, she's insane. I was so depressed. Not that this.

• 50:20Bill Maher?

  Why, why did you do it to begin with?

• 50:22Speaker 04

  Cause we didn't go public, I turned 60, COVID was going on. Everything just seemed like the whole world, my whole, everything I'd worked for.

• 50:30Bill Maher?

  Wouldn't you wanna cling to the one good thing?

• 50:32Speaker 04

  I, I just, I didn't know where I was. I really kinda was lost. That, that period in COVID, I was lost. And then six months later, I realized, fuck, this girl, I miss her.

• 50:43Bill Maher?

  The liberals overdid COVID. They really did. And that's a good example of it. Look how much it, it was not necessary to be this fucked up about.

• 50:53Speaker 04

  There's a lot of things.

• 50:54Bill Maher?

  It was a dangerous thing that could be. Wouldn't it be for you with your earthworms? It sure wouldn't have been for you. So you should have had.

• 51:03Speaker 04

  I never got COVID.

• 51:04Bill Maher?

  You should have had, of course not, because you fucking do cold plunges and earthworms. And what else do you do? Crazy shit that you do.

• 51:11Speaker 04

  Right.

• 51:11Bill Maher?

  You're up at 3 AM like doing crazy.

• 51:13Speaker 04

  Crazy shit, yeah.

• 51:14Bill Maher?

  I'm, I'm like barely turning the light off at 3 AM.

• 51:18Speaker 04

  Right.

• 51:19Bill Maher?

  Okay, so you're gonna.

• 51:20Speaker 04

  Yes, and there were things that they did wrong. It had never, it was a novel, it was, it was a first time virus. They didn't know what they were doing, and there was a lot of mistakes made. However, do I, did I, did they need to close the beaches? No, okay? Dude, I think that mass at the time, what they knew, they were doing the best that they could. Okay? Was there a lot of screw ups? But on the other side? They did get to a vaccine that, I shouldn't say, a, um, a shot? That you had to take on a quarterly or yearly basis?

• 51:56Bill Maher?

  You know, Jonathan Swan was on Real Time the week before, and he was saying like, Trump, who always is the luckiest motherfucker. The one thing that is so consistent about his life.

• 52:09Speaker 04

  He's good, he's lucky.

• 52:10Bill Maher?

  Is great luck. Just the inside straight he pulled to win in 2016. Everything. And Jonathan Swan, and I think he's totally right, says, how lucky to have lost the 2020 election? You know? Because, yeah, all the shit hit the fan. And he could bliss blame it on Biden and say, oh, look, were things really that? Because most of his term wasn't with COVID.

• 52:36Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 52:36Bill Maher?

  You know? So.

• 52:38Speaker 04

  But, I mean.

• 52:39Bill Maher?

  By the way, speaking of the president, who you talk to a lot.

• 52:43Speaker 04

  I talked to him on Monday.

• 52:44Bill Maher?

  Okay. And you say some things in the book that are almost word for word, things I've said. I'm not saying you're stealing from me, although you'd be wise to. But just words like, um, I can't beef with half my friends, and I don't wanna hate half the country. That's almost exactly what I said in my last special. And, uh, you know, talking is my religion, keep talking.

• 53:10Speaker 04

  That's what I'm taught of me.

• 53:11Bill Maher?

  It's so interesting to me that Larry David, like, I'm the devil, because I talked to him. But his own agent just talked to him on Monday.

• 53:19Speaker 04

  Listen, this is your stick with him.

• 53:22Bill Maher?

  I know, but, but, but you must recognize the hypocrisy there. Somehow, when it's his own agent doing the exact same thing, then, then we don't play the Hitler card. We don't hate it, play the Hitler card. Just admit that. It's true. Look at how we do health in this country. You turn 40, you go in for a checkup, and before your pants are back on, there's a statin in your hand like it's a mint at the end of dinner. Nobody asks about your life or explains anything. They see one bad number and ship you to the pharmacy. And the pill usually only goes after your LDL, your HDL, your triglycerides. Nobody's looking. So you're taking a daily pill for a fraction of the problem, and you do it because you think that's the only option.

• 54:07Bill Maher?

  Dose for cholesterol is a clinically backed supplement made with plant powered ingredients shown to have positive impacts on cholesterol, blood work markers, HDL, LDL, and triglycerides when taken twice daily. And for once, it's medicine that doesn't taste bad. The club random team is partial to the mango. It uses eight powerful ingredients to help maintain healthy cholesterol, including CoQ10, pomegranate, peel, and turmeric. Ready to take control of your cholesterol? Head to dosedaily.co/random or enter random to get 35% off your prescription.

• 54:45Bill Maher?

  That's D O S E D A I L Y dot C O slash random for 35% off your first month subscription. It's a crazy hypocrisy.

• 54:57Speaker 04

  You should have this conversation with Larry. I would actually, cause you guys are so similar on so many things. I wish you guys.

• 55:03Bill Maher?

  And that's what I hate about the purist left. Purity, it's the easiest thing to be. And by the way, you know you're not a political sophisticate when you immediately go to the Hitler card. That's just one way. There's a few others. But yes, purity, I just can't take it. I can't, more than anything, I can't take it. And you and I are on the same page.

• 55:23Speaker 04

  I'm having the conversation with him.

• 55:25Bill Maher?

  And I'm having dinner with him again next week, by the way.

• 55:27Speaker 04

  I'm having a conversation with him about this, about this rebate that I think needs to happen for California and for the country. And I think it's gonna be a good thing, and he's on board with it. He called me about it first, and I said to somebody.

• 55:40Speaker 04

  And it's true. He's 80 years old, this guy, and I don't know if you felt it, he's a workaholic.

• 55:47Bill Maher?

  He.

• 55:48Speaker 04

  He's, the guy works like.

• 55:49Bill Maher?

  Well, in his way.

• 55:51Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 55:51Bill Maher?

  He's, and a lot of that work is toward things we don't approve of.

• 55:55Speaker 04

  Correct, oh, no, no, no.

• 55:56Bill Maher?

  Okay, you know.

• 55:57Speaker 04

  And we'll, we'll tell him.

• 55:59Bill Maher?

  Right, and we'll tell him. You see, I'm, when he.

• 56:03Speaker 04

  I've told him.

• 56:04Bill Maher?

  It's so weird, you know? After the first dinner, he was, I went back to doing what I do, and, you know, for people who, like, don't want.

• 56:11Speaker 04

  He probably screamed it, he said, you're low rating.

• 56:13Bill Maher?

  Of course, yeah. Well, it never stops. Tried to stop me from getting the Mark Twain Award.

• 56:18Speaker 04

  He said, Ari, you only call me because you're the president. I said, yes, that's true, you're the president, I gotta, I gotta get things done.

• 56:23Bill Maher?

  But then, like, he just, out of the blue, let's have dinner again. I was like, great. And, and he was like, uh, really nice, like, I promise I won't say bad things about you like I did the last time. And I texted back and I said, you know what? You're the President of the United States, say whatever the fuck you want. I'm just glad we're talking. It's just that, it's like being called a hockey puck by Don Rickles. It's just what he does.

• 56:46Speaker 04

  Hopefully, you can have this. Hopefully, you can have this much of a, the last conversation before a decision gets made.

• 56:53Bill Maher?

  Correct.

• 56:53Speaker 04

  I agree.

• 56:54Bill Maher?

  This, I guarantee you get nothing from not, not talking. If the odds are low from talking, they're still in the realm of possibility.

• 57:03Speaker 04

  But there are some people you won't talk to.

• 57:05Bill Maher?

  Yes.

• 57:05Speaker 04

  There's some people I won't talk to.

• 57:06Bill Maher?

  But they're not the President of the United States.

• 57:08Speaker 04

  Yeah, but there are people that you say to yourself, that's a bridge too far.

• 57:12Bill Maher?

  It blows my mind that there are people in this world, and lots of them on the far left, who just, um, would turn this opportunity down, a private dinner in the White House with the president, just a few people, say whatever you want. You know, I've heard people say, well, you know, I don't like the war. Tell them.

• 57:34Speaker 04

  You can tell them.

• 57:34Bill Maher?

  You can tell them, and I will. I keep telling people, he needs more people like us.

• 57:40Speaker 04

  I agree with you.

• 57:41Bill Maher?

  Not less.

• 57:41Speaker 04

  You need to talk to him.

• 57:42Bill Maher?

  I will.

• 57:43Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 57:43Bill Maher?

  And you do too.

• 57:44Speaker 04

  I, I talk to him.

• 57:45Bill Maher?

  And I'm sure you do, and I'm sure he listens to you, and, you know, not if you like call up the phone like you're talking like a Karen on the complete department hotline, not like, hey, the thing you did, no. But like, there's a way to talk to Donald Trump. There just is.

• 58:01Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 58:02Bill Maher?

  And he's.

• 58:03Speaker 04

  And that's okay, the way you have to talk.

• 58:05Bill Maher?

  Well, I've heard people, when I did the first one, I heard people say, well, you're humanizing him. Okay, he's a human. I get it, he's a very flawed one, as, as we are all under Jesus.

• 58:16Speaker 04

  Can I ask you, when you say, I'm just thinking about this, when you say the far left, who are you referring to?

• 58:20Bill Maher?

  Woke? Like what, I mean, what do you, what, what do you?

• 58:24Speaker 04

  Are you saying, is it, is D, for you, is DSA far left?

• 58:28Bill Maher?

  Of course, doesn't get any further left than that.

• 58:31Speaker 04

  Right.

• 58:31Bill Maher?

  People who, people who.

• 58:32Speaker 04

  I, I, you got, I don't think they're Democrats.

• 58:35Bill Maher?

  They're not.

• 58:36Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 58:36Bill Maher?

  And Rahm makes the same point.

• 58:37Speaker 04

  Yeah, I don't think they're Democrats. I think they wanna be, DSA wanna beat Democrats, and Democrats wanna beat Republicans.

• 58:43Bill Maher?

  Gaza is a genocide, is a lie, that they are making everybody say, if you, if you, if you say that, that's far left, you don't know history, you don't know facts. I proved it on my show one.

• 58:56Speaker 04

  Do you think they know who came up with the word genocide?

• 59:01Bill Maher?

  Whoever came up with any side.

• 59:03Speaker 04

  So genocide is created 1944 by a Jew that went through the Holocaust. And he came up with the word to kind of, because there was no word for what it was. And then it was approved by the, I think it was the UN. And in forty-eight. And it was a word for what happened to the Jews. There was, I think, four million Jews in Poland, ended up forty-four thousand.

• 59:30Bill Maher?

  Three million, yes.

• 59:31Speaker 04

  Three million.

• 59:31Bill Maher?

  Forty, yeah.

• 59:33Speaker 04

  That is a genocide.

• 59:34Bill Maher?

  That is it, that's exactly what I said.

• 59:35Speaker 04

  And I think they want the word genocide, because it's such an evil word. They're trying to take a word that was for what happened to Jews. And they wanted to put it on Israel.

• 59:47Speaker 04

  So that they're a bad country and people. So that it becomes a nonexistent thing.

• 59:56Bill Maher?

  It gives, if you believe someone is guilty of genocide, it gives you permission to hate them. Who wouldn't hate a genocidist? But.

• 1:00:04Speaker 04

  And I think you've done an amazing job laying out the facts.

• 1:00:07Bill Maher?

  The facts.

• 1:00:08Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:00:08Bill Maher?

  I mean, three percent of the population, it's terrible. It's not a genocide.

• 1:00:13Speaker 04

  We can have the conversation.

• 1:00:15Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:15Speaker 04

  About the situation.

• 1:00:16Bill Maher?

  You can hate Israel, you can hate not Jews, you can hate Netanyahu. Just don't change the meaning of the word, because the word has.

• 1:00:22Speaker 04

  That was created by a Jew.

• 1:00:23Bill Maher?

  Tremendous power.

• 1:00:24Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:00:25Bill Maher?

  I mean, just go through what side always means. Fratricide, kill your brother. Homicide, kill yourself. Matricide, kill your mother. Patricide, your father. Genocide, a whole people.

• 1:00:36Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:00:37Bill Maher?

  And if they wanted to kill a whole people, they certainly have the means to do it. And most of the people who died were because they are an enemy, not like many other enemies. Where they use their own people as shields.

• 1:00:51Speaker 04

  Well, I would say the following, you know. I, I think, I, you know, I think you think this, like. And I've said this, I gave a speech about Netanyahu. So my brother gave a speech.

• 1:01:02Bill Maher?

  Oh, I saw that in the book.

• 1:01:03Speaker 04

  And my point of view is, guess what? I think they, we should free, you know, Gaza, it should be free of Hamas.

• 1:01:11Bill Maher?

  From Hamas?

• 1:01:12Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:01:12Bill Maher?

  Yes, when they say free Palestine, like, who do you think is oppressing it, you morons?

• 1:01:17Speaker 04

  My father was born in Palestine, before he was a Jew.

• 1:01:19Bill Maher?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:01:20Speaker 04

  So all of it was Palestine. And the UN made it.

• 1:01:23Bill Maher?

  Palestine, when you said Palestine in that era, people thought you were talking about a Jew.

• 1:01:27Speaker 04

  Jew. And it was through, through, through Jordan. And when the UN decided

• 1:01:34Speaker 04

  to give this strip of land.

• 1:01:38Speaker 04

  They said, don't fight. Then they captured land. Who, who gives back land? If, if, if, if, if in Ukraine.

• 1:01:46Speaker 04

  They get

• 1:01:48Speaker 04

  a plot of land, you can, you know, wherever you want the Ukrainians to win a plot of land. You think they're gonna give it back in a war? No, but the Israelis has, have to get it back.

• 1:01:57Bill Maher?

  They are consistently asked to do things nobody else is ever asked even to do. Like, when you're in the middle of a war, feed the enemy.

• 1:02:08Speaker 04

  Give them polio shots.

• 1:02:08Bill Maher?

  Drunk. I don't, I don't remember, uh, any other enemy doing this. You know, you're in a war.

• 1:02:17Speaker 04

  And I think what they're doing in the West Bank. Netanyahu is disgusting. It's disgusting what they're doing.

• 1:02:24Bill Maher?

  Yeah, the West Bank is terrible.

• 1:02:25Speaker 04

  It's, it's a terrible.

• 1:02:26Bill Maher?

  You're right.

• 1:02:26Speaker 04

  And I said that.

• 1:02:28Bill Maher?

  It's bullying.

• 1:02:28Speaker 04

  It's, it's, it's more than bullying.

• 1:02:31Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:31Speaker 04

  It's what happened to Jews.

• 1:02:34Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:34Speaker 04

  In Poland. And we're doing it there.

• 1:02:36Bill Maher?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:02:37Speaker 04

  It's disgusting.

• 1:02:37Bill Maher?

  I agree.

• 1:02:38Speaker 04

  And so, let's all get off this word, because that was a word that Jews created. Stop trying to label.

• 1:02:45Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:02:45Speaker 04

  And let's have the real conversation. As you said, let's have conversations that are from a place of, and I'll have it with anybody.

• 1:02:53Bill Maher?

  Yeah, but the problem is.

• 1:02:55Speaker 04

  Did Al-Sayed come to your show? Is he?

• 1:02:57Bill Maher?

  You know, he said he was going to, but we have not been able to, as he had, get a yes. Like an actual.

• 1:03:03Speaker 04

  I think that would be a great conversation.

• 1:03:04Bill Maher?

  Oh, I do too. Oh, I can't wait to have that conversation, because the truth is that when we talk about these issues, it gets very nitty gritty in the details. And we kind of miss, I'm sorry, but the big picture, which is forgetting the Islam of it all. I don't know if you're going to convince people who have a religious fervor behind their beliefs. Um, of ever really wanting to come to the table. It is a doctrine in Islam. I mean, many believe the whole world needs to become Muslim. But certainly any land that used to be Muslim has to be reconquered. Spain. Many still refer to it as Andulesia, El Andulesia.

• 1:03:49Speaker 04

  Really?

• 1:03:50Bill Maher?

  Yes. I'm talking about Islamists. Because that's what it was when it was Muslim for seven hundred years. Before it was.

• 1:03:58Speaker 04

  I didn't know that.

• 1:03:59Bill Maher?

  Oh, really?

• 1:04:00Speaker 04

  Yeah, I didn't.

• 1:04:01Bill Maher?

  Well, when the Muslim army that swept out of the desert after Muhammad's death in the seventh century. They conquered the whole world in a hundred years. And you don't do that with pamphlets.

• 1:04:12Speaker 04

  No. Yeah.

• 1:04:13Bill Maher?

  And they got as far as the Pyrenees. They went all through North Africa, then through Spain. And so Spain was Muslim from basically seven hundred to fifteen hundred. So, you know, there is a belief that that needs to become.

• 1:04:28Speaker 04

  Returned.

• 1:04:28Bill Maher?

  Returned. And I think it's the same thing with places like the West.

• 1:04:32Speaker 04

  I think we, you and I agree on one thing.

• 1:04:37Speaker 04

  Religious extremists.

• 1:04:42Bill Maher?

  Are bad.

• 1:04:42Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:04:43Bill Maher?

  But it's not equal how many religious extremists there are in each religion and how extreme they are. They are more extreme in Islam, and there are more of them. That is just a fact. There are absolutely extremist Christians and extremist Jews. Yeah, but there's only fifteen million Jews in the whole world.

• 1:05:06Speaker 04

  True.

• 1:05:07Bill Maher?

  We're talking about one point six, one point eight billion people. Who live in societies that have rules of behavior and often law that are completely incompatible with the West. Like, women as equal citizens. Homosexuality sometimes being illegal.

• 1:05:30Speaker 04

  Yeah, in the Jewish constitution, homosexuality is cool. Not in Hamas, not in Gaza.

• 1:05:35Bill Maher?

  In the Jewish constitution?

• 1:05:36Speaker 04

  And, you know, in, in our, in our, in our religion, it, it, you know.

• 1:05:40Bill Maher?

  Yeah, I mean, the Orthodox in your religion still don't let the women in the same part of the temple, right?

• 1:05:46Speaker 04

  That's true, you have to separate, you separate at, at the wall.

• 1:05:49Bill Maher?

  No, all religions have it.

• 1:05:51Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:05:51Bill Maher?

  Just, but it's just, it's just disingenuous to say, well, because they all have some of it. It's equal, it's not an equal problem. Yes, there are really weird things that the Jews do, like until recently. A fucking rabbi sometimes bit the end off of a baby's dick. And would give him the child herpes.

• 1:06:11Speaker 04

  Oh, that I did.

• 1:06:13Bill Maher?

  What? That's true. We'll be right back.

• 1:06:18Bill Maher?

  After a word from Cheerios.

• 1:06:22Speaker 04

  So, yeah.

• 1:06:25Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:06:25Bill Maher?

  Did you ever think, this is where, like ten years ago, for a podcasting was like everybody, did you ever think this would be like?

• 1:06:33Speaker 04

  As big as it is?

• 1:06:34Bill Maher?

  Yeah. People like to hear people.

• 1:06:37Speaker 04

  Here's what I'd say, I, I talk about it in the books, I, I read this book, Life After Television by George Gilder. And he talks about distributions can expand and content's can expand, different forms of content. It just went from so, this is just part of the continuum of where content has gone. And you're now in, you have these things called micro dramas. You know, these one-minute dramas that mainly for women, you know, and they're, they devour it.

• 1:07:03Bill Maher?

  So.

• 1:07:03Speaker 04

  So I think this is just part of it, and how, how it's gonna evolve with AI and everything else, who the fuck knows?

• 1:07:11Bill Maher?

  That's, that's still like very interesting to you, like where the business is going. And to stay ahead of it.

• 1:07:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:07:16Bill Maher?

  Because when you stay ahead of it, you can make money out of it.

• 1:07:18Speaker 04

  Yeah. I have this whole thesis about live. And this is like live. I think live entertainment is the opposite bet of where AI is going.

• 1:07:27Bill Maher?

  Right.

• 1:07:27Speaker 04

  And I do also think the movie and television business is gonna explode. Because costs are gonna come down because of AI. And the movie and television, there's gonna be more free time. You know, my son Leo, my, my youngest, he's twenty-three, twenty-four, he works at Polly Market. He goes, you know what they call Thursday, Dad? No, what do they call Thursday? Thursday? No, it's called Baby Friday. And people now, it's four-day work weeks. Thursday night, they're going out, they're booking restaurants, they're booking hotels, they're leaving town. And he goes, I bet you very soon, Dad.

• 1:07:58Speaker 04

  Wednesday's Baby Thursday.

• 1:08:00Bill Maher?

  Really?

• 1:08:00Speaker 04

  Yeah, and so you're just gonna have more and more time. You're gonna consume more content, content is gonna be podcasts, content's gonna be books, content's gonna be movies, television. Micro dramas, live entertainment.

• 1:08:11Bill Maher?

  Imagine if we did this live?

• 1:08:13Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 1:08:13Bill Maher?

  If I did this.

• 1:08:14Speaker 04

  People would go crazy.

• 1:08:15Bill Maher?

  But like with a good guest?

• 1:08:18Speaker 04

  People would go crazy.

• 1:08:19Bill Maher?

  Why don't you book it?

• 1:08:20Speaker 04

  That's weird. One of the, one of the things, one of the things.

• 1:08:24Bill Maher?

  Isn't that what you're supposed to be doing?

• 1:08:25Speaker 04

  One of the things we're doing, when we, when we officially close ATG. There's a dark night on Monday.

• 1:08:30Bill Maher?

  We have to wait for the.

• 1:08:31Speaker 04

  No, no, it's six, it's six months old. ATG, right?

• 1:08:34Bill Maher?

  ATG.

• 1:08:35Speaker 04

  Okay, so, they're dark on Mondays. They're dark Mondays, you know, because, right?

• 1:08:40Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:40Speaker 04

  And our whole thing is.

• 1:08:41Bill Maher?

  Theaters are dark.

• 1:08:42Speaker 04

  We're gonna, on Mondays, we're gonna book stand-ups, podcasts, et cetera. Because I agree with you.

• 1:08:47Bill Maher?

  I see.

• 1:08:48Speaker 04

  Yes, you'll come in. And you'll do it, because I think people are gonna wanna see, they, they would love to see this live.

• 1:08:55Bill Maher?

  I did ATG in college, it just made me fall asleep. But, um, okay, okay. ATG, all the way, man.

• 1:09:03Speaker 04

  But I think, don't you think people are gonna, in the theater business, wanna see a live podcast? I do.

• 1:09:07Bill Maher?

  Well, it depends on the one. But this one is not like other ones. And you have to like.

• 1:09:12Speaker 04

  Hello?

• 1:09:13Bill Maher?

  Get that word out there.

• 1:09:14Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:09:14Bill Maher?

  It really isn't. I, and I spent a lot of money putting this together in such.

• 1:09:18Speaker 04

  There's cameras all over the place.

• 1:09:19Bill Maher?

  And we never feel like there's anybody else here. That's just not the feel I get from any other podcast.

• 1:09:24Speaker 04

  No, every other, they're right in your face.

• 1:09:27Bill Maher?

  It's just a talk show. It's okay, that, I'm not putting them down, I'm just saying.

• 1:09:31Speaker 04

  Would you do this live?

• 1:09:32Bill Maher?

  If I only had someone to sell this.

• 1:09:33Speaker 04

  Would you do this live?

• 1:09:34Bill Maher?

  Somebody who was like promoting me.

• 1:09:36Speaker 04

  Who cared?

• 1:09:37Bill Maher?

  Protecting me, thinking about me.

• 1:09:40Speaker 04

  Would you do this live?

• 1:09:42Bill Maher?

  If it was the right, uh, person, yes. And, uh, it's.

• 1:09:47Speaker 04

  You mean the right guest?

• 1:09:48Bill Maher?

  The right guest. It's, it's, um. It's a fifty-fifty for me, because.

• 1:09:53Speaker 04

  Don't you think it would change with an audience?

• 1:09:54Bill Maher?

  Exactly. That's the whole reason why I love this. Is because it is just the most intimate, it is what I've tried to do from the very beginning in my career. How do I get the most real conversation?

• 1:10:08Speaker 04

  That goes anywhere.

• 1:10:09Bill Maher?

  I mean, somebody said on, on our anniversary show, he gets the green room conversation on the show.

• 1:10:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:10:17Bill Maher?

  Okay, I'm glad I, people think, I wanna go even further, that's what this is. This is further. This is no different than if there was no camera.

• 1:10:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, you're sitting at home and you and him are talking.

• 1:10:25Bill Maher?

  I, I can't think of one thing I said to you. Or you said to me, which is the definition, I'm a great guest, that we wouldn't have just said.

• 1:10:34Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:10:34Bill Maher?

  Because we did forget. But, like, yes, would that, of course, for the same reason why Margaret Mead said when she studied native tribes. Like, just the act of studying them changes their behavior.

• 1:10:48Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:10:48Bill Maher?

  You know?

• 1:10:49Speaker 04

  So the act of, if, if you had this and you had the audience, it would definitely change this?

• 1:10:54Bill Maher?

  That I know for sure. But...

• 1:10:57Speaker 04

  Hopefully you would have a guest that would go for it.

• 1:10:58Bill Maher?

  But could it retain eighty percent? I think it could. I think it could.

• 1:11:04Speaker 04

  Hey, you know, if the money was right, you would take the eighty.

• 1:11:08Bill Maher?

  You are talking to the last two guys in America who care about money.

• 1:11:14Bill Maher?

  I love the liberals out here. Did you go to the George Lucas Museum opening? What? Oh, you have beef with him too?

• 1:11:22Speaker 04

  No, I just would never do that.

• 1:11:25Bill Maher?

  Okay, why? Well, I mean, of all the things to get the, to get the...

• 1:11:29Speaker 04

  I've never seen, I've never seen one Star Wars movie.

• 1:11:35Bill Maher?

  I, I feel like...

• 1:11:36Speaker 04

  Have you seen a Star Wars movie? Be honest. Be honest.

• 1:11:41Bill Maher?

  Officer, could I just please make my case?

• 1:11:43Speaker 04

  Yes, please.

• 1:11:44Bill Maher?

  Because I feel bad about this. Because I think George Lucas is a great guy and he may have said a nice thing about me once or twice. And unlike you, I have tried to watch Star Wars and I just cannot. I, I don't get it, but I so, like, give respect to success. You know, there's lots of things that are massively successful and, uh, let's just say it's my flaw.

• 1:12:12Speaker 04

  How about this? I think, it looks amazing.

• 1:12:15Bill Maher?

  It does?

• 1:12:16Speaker 04

  The museum, the museum looks amazing.

• 1:12:19Bill Maher?

  I know.

• 1:12:20Speaker 04

  Right? It looks incredible.

• 1:12:22Bill Maher?

  It does, it does. And I'm sure it is incredible. I just always think when they do something like that, and I think it costs like two billion dollars, and it's every liberal in town, I'm like, aren't you the people are always talking about how the poor people need more? But yet we have the money to build like this monument to how great an artist we are. I mean, I'm sure it's geniusly done.

• 1:12:43Speaker 04

  It looked incredible.

• 1:12:44Bill Maher?

  But like, what actual change and positive change in life is it gonna bring? Yeah, maybe it inspires someone to be an artist, but people in show business are so full of themselves about how important art is. It is...

• 1:12:55Speaker 04

  One of your greatest lines, I think you were going to the...

• 1:12:58Bill Maher?

  Go on.

• 1:12:59Speaker 04

  Going to the Golden Globes and they were wearing the pin.

• 1:13:02Bill Maher?

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 1:13:05Bill Maher?

  Yeah, that's...

• 1:13:05Speaker 04

  That was gonna change something.

• 1:13:07Bill Maher?

  Well, it's like, I mean, it's like MAGA hats for liberals, you know?

• 1:13:13Speaker 04

  Yeah. But I, I had, I just never, that's not my type of movie. And Marty Scorsese told me great stories about when he was writing it, George. It was incredible to hear. I just, it's just not my type of movie, so I've never seen it. So, you know, I'm not sure I'd ever go to the museum. I don't know. I do wanna go to the Geffen Museum, the new Geffen Museum.

• 1:13:36Bill Maher?

  He's someone you're not beefing with.

• 1:13:37Speaker 04

  No. He was, he's been incredible with me.

• 1:13:40Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:40Speaker 04

  He, he, he, he is always, one of the great things about David is, like, you ask him a question and he just distills it down to like, the, the right answer.

• 1:13:53Bill Maher?

  He has one of the great lines, I mean, I've been told this line, I think, like, in this business, you pay for loyalty and sometimes you get it.

• 1:14:01Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:14:03Bill Maher?

  And that would be...

• 1:14:04Speaker 04

  That's true.

• 1:14:05Bill Maher?

  Yeah, true.

• 1:14:06Speaker 04

  Almost every business.

• 1:14:07Bill Maher?

  And these people, but again, back to punching up, like, the people you beef with, I never feel bad for them. That is what really is the saving grace of this book, of a guy who's, you think is so full with rage, and there is a lot of rage. Um, but it's funny rage. But like, I don't care, like, Jim Wyatt, I think I may have been with ICM when Jim, well, maybe when you were there, in the nineties, weren't you there for a minute?

• 1:14:32Speaker 04

  I was there...

• 1:14:34Bill Maher?

  Didn't you go there from...

• 1:14:35Speaker 04

  I was there ninety...

• 1:14:37Bill Maher?

  Yeah, it could have been, I could have, that could have been my...

• 1:14:39Speaker 04

  Ninety-three, ninety, ninety-two, ninety-three to ninety-five.

• 1:14:42Bill Maher?

  Because Bernie Brillstein's daughter was a, Lee Brillstein, was it? Right?

• 1:14:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, I was there when she was there.

• 1:14:49Bill Maher?

  Okay, well, then, then you were, you were there when I was there, I think, because she was my age.

• 1:14:52Speaker 04

  Well, I was about this big, because I was in...

• 1:14:55Bill Maher?

  I know, well, so was I.

• 1:14:57Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, so was, yeah.

• 1:14:59Bill Maher?

  This is the nineties.

• 1:15:00Speaker 04

  And you were just on the road?

• 1:15:02Bill Maher?

  No, I had done sitcoms, uh, in the eighties. You know, I came out here in eighty-three and I did a Tonight Show, here's a new performing monkey and...

• 1:15:13Speaker 04

  And then he'd wave you, he'd wave you.

• 1:15:15Bill Maher?

  And, uh, all that bullshit seems like from the Civil War era. I mean, you know. To this day, if I hear like a, a band, you know, like a old, the kind of band he had, na, na, na, na, I start sweating. Because I just go right back to standing behind the curtain, you know, like, waiting for the curtain.

• 1:15:35Speaker 04

  How nervous were you when you...

• 1:15:36Bill Maher?

  Well, of course you're nervous, because it's a Tonight Show and Johnny and...

• 1:15:39Speaker 04

  Do you remember what your act was?

• 1:15:40Bill Maher?

  One time I fucked up real bad and they were real mad at me. I did jokes about Reagan and Fred Decord, who I thought he was Reagan's best friend. And I got yelled at after the show and I thought my career was over.

• 1:15:51Speaker 04

  Did Johnny not like it? Did Johnny not like it?

• 1:15:54Bill Maher?

  Johnny, I'm sure, is the one who saved me. Because they were mad at me, the producer and the segment producer, and I think he was the only one who could have stepped in and said, well, you know, comics, young comics, I remember when I made a joke about...

• 1:16:11Speaker 04

  What was the, what was the routine that you did when they said, okay, this guy, we wanna bring him?

• 1:16:16Bill Maher?

  It was, and he had been shot, I guess I thought that was funny. And, uh, I don't know, they had, they cut, had to cut two minutes out of the show.

• 1:16:26Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 1:16:26Bill Maher?

  Yeah. It was okay, Pete Barbooty did an extra number.

• 1:16:35Bill Maher?

  Did you still watch, like, religiously? It was, it was everything.

• 1:16:39Speaker 04

  I remember, you know.

• 1:16:39Bill Maher?

  It was everything.

• 1:16:40Speaker 04

  When we, we, we would jump in my parents' bed, all three boys, and, you know, when they let us stay up late and...

• 1:16:48Bill Maher?

  Oh.

• 1:16:48Speaker 04

  And you would, of course, you would watch Johnny.

• 1:16:51Bill Maher?

  We, I, we had the same experience without the bed.

• 1:16:56Bill Maher?

  It's a little weird.

• 1:16:58Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah, my parents are now gonna get arrested. We turned out so badly.

• 1:17:04Bill Maher?

  But I do, yeah. But I do remember, uh, gathering around the Magnavox TV.

• 1:17:10Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:17:10Bill Maher?

  For, like, when...

• 1:17:11Speaker 04

  It was that thick.

• 1:17:12Bill Maher?

  Like, yes, it was a piece of furniture.

• 1:17:14Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:17:15Bill Maher?

  The TV was a piece of furniture.

• 1:17:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:17:17Bill Maher?

  Uh, and...

• 1:17:18Speaker 04

  And the antennas.

• 1:17:19Bill Maher?

  I remember, yeah, with the antenna, and like if Don Rickles was on, like, it was a big thing in the summer. Because in the summer, you could stay up late. And in the summer, Johnny took the show out to California. Remember that?

• 1:17:32Speaker 04

  I don't remember that.

• 1:17:33Bill Maher?

  Oh, yes, like in the early seventies. So...

• 1:17:36Speaker 04

  No.

• 1:17:36Bill Maher?

  The show was still in New York.

• 1:17:38Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:17:38Bill Maher?

  Until, I think, seventy-two. But they would go to California for three weeks, you know, the guest list, of course, it was great. You get all the stars who you couldn't have in New York. And then, of course, he did it.

• 1:17:48Speaker 04

  I loved, at social, seeing those old clips and the old stand-ups and the people in the, I mean, it, it was just, it was it.

• 1:17:56Bill Maher?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:56Speaker 04

  It was, it was...

• 1:17:57Bill Maher?

  But I remember watching, like, if Don Rickles was on, I have that memory of like, come on, he's coming on, you know, like, you got, everybody was, okay.

• 1:18:06Speaker 04

  Gather around.

• 1:18:07Bill Maher?

  You know, got, you know...

• 1:18:08Speaker 04

  I know.

• 1:18:08Bill Maher?

  Or like, I remember when Bob Hope would have a special, because my parents are World War II era and both were in it. So, like, he was the World War II comic and they didn't like the way his politics got conservative, but it was still Bob Hope. And when he did a special, which he demanded to do four times a year and NBC was like, his, you know...

• 1:18:29Speaker 04

  Oh, no, that was a whole...

• 1:18:30Bill Maher?

  I mean, Johnny fucking hated him. For that rea, oh, yes.

• 1:18:34Speaker 04

  Because he took, because he took him off?

• 1:18:36Bill Maher?

  No, because I remember being on the show with Bob Hope as a guest and Johnny bitching to me backstage before the show went on. Might be my fondest memory of it.

• 1:18:45Speaker 04

  About, about?

• 1:18:46Bill Maher?

  About Bob Hope. About, you know, what it, because he was an eight-hundred-pound gorilla at NBC. He was the only thing that was bigger than Johnny. So he didn't ask when he could be on the Tonight Show.

• 1:18:57Speaker 04

  He just sent him on.

• 1:18:58Bill Maher?

  And he didn't do any preparation. His appearances were actually terrible. He was just lazy and old and wouldn't, you know, like, it was just terrible. I've told this story before, but like, one time, this time I was on with him and Johnny was like, okay, we gotta do something to get something out of this guy. He just had a bunch of stills from his career. You know, here I am in, uh, Road to Rio, here I am in Vietnam. And one of them was Pope, Bob Hope in a sketch dressed as the Pope with the big Pope hat. And Johnny shows it, looking to Bob for comment, and Bob goes, yeah, there I am as the Pope.

• 1:19:40Bill Maher?

  Thank you, Bob.

• 1:19:42Speaker 04

  I couldn't notice that.

• 1:19:43Bill Maher?

  Insider story that adds so much.

• 1:19:46Speaker 04

  You know, in in Pete Berg's movie Mosquito Bowl, which you're, I hope you see soon.

• 1:19:50Bill Maher?

  Is it out?

• 1:19:51Speaker 04

  It's coming out on Netflix and.

• 1:19:53Bill Maher?

  That's your oldest friend, that's your boy. Peter Berg.

• 1:19:56Speaker 04

  Cause it's.

• 1:19:57Bill Maher?

  Couldn't even get him on this show.

• 1:20:00Speaker 04

  I think he's coming on this show or the show, or the show. He, he wants to come on the show. So there's a, there's a clip of Bob Hope when he went to, to Japan and.

• 1:20:12Bill Maher?

  Japan?

• 1:20:13Speaker 04

  When they go during the war, you know.

• 1:20:15Bill Maher?

  Vietnam?

• 1:20:15Speaker 04

  No, Japan in World War Two.

• 1:20:17Bill Maher?

  Oh, World War Two.

• 1:20:18Speaker 04

  Yeah. And it is incredible. He takes, gets the live footage of Bob. It's crazy.

• 1:20:24Bill Maher?

  Crazy good?

• 1:20:25Speaker 04

  Crazy. Yeah, you can't believe that.

• 1:20:27Bill Maher?

  No, he was, he was, in his day, he was good. Oh, yeah.

• 1:20:30Speaker 04

  And he went to all these guys and, I mean, it was just eerie.

• 1:20:34Bill Maher?

  He lived to be, I think, a hundred.

• 1:20:36Speaker 04

  Oh, really?

• 1:20:37Bill Maher?

  Yeah. I mean, he was, you know, phoning it in, but he was so legendary those last 20 years.

• 1:20:42Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:20:44Bill Maher?

  Reportedly, I'm saying reportedly, don't sue me, but I've read it, got a hooker every night. Like he was, he was on the road every night.

• 1:20:54Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 1:20:54Bill Maher?

  Doing like charity gigs that he was paid for. It wasn't like charity.

• 1:21:00Speaker 04

  He was getting paid?

• 1:21:02Bill Maher?

  Well, I've gotten paid for charity gigs. People will pay you and they'll make more money. You know, they'll still make a profit, I think.

• 1:21:10Speaker 04

  But he was then getting hookers every night?

• 1:21:12Bill Maher?

  I mean, this is what I.

• 1:21:13Speaker 04

  Alleged?

• 1:21:14Bill Maher?

  This is alleged. But yes, I think that's, you know, he was a hound right up until the end. The one thing I liked about him.

• 1:21:24Bill Maher?

  No, but, I mean, we shouldn't gossip. I mean, he's an American legend and he, my parents, you know, had mixed feelings about both him and Frank Sinatra because they were the two World War Two guys. And then they both became Reaganites.

• 1:21:40Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:21:41Bill Maher?

  And my parents.

• 1:21:42Speaker 04

  Personally, rather than.

• 1:21:43Bill Maher?

  I'm sure it was the same in your house.

• 1:21:45Speaker 04

  Oh, my God.

• 1:21:45Bill Maher?

  Nixon, Reagan, no, not, no.

• 1:21:49Speaker 04

  Yeah, but was there anybody more powerful than Sinatra and at the time, you know, Johnny Carson? I mean, those two guys were, and I mean, they were.

• 1:22:00Bill Maher?

  Unbelievable.

• 1:22:01Speaker 04

  Unbelievable.

• 1:22:01Bill Maher?

  I mean, at his height, I think Johnny got 17 million.

• 1:22:08Speaker 04

  Then?

• 1:22:08Bill Maher?

  At 11:30 at night. But, I mean, that just bespeaks of how much the world has changed. Of course, there was no video games. There was no internet.

• 1:22:17Speaker 04

  No, there was three networks.

• 1:22:18Bill Maher?

  And three, there was nothing else to do if you weren't asleep.

• 1:22:22Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:22:23Bill Maher?

  You could watch him, you could watch the other guy who was always a sacrificial lamb, who was gonna not succeed. Dick Cavett, whoever they put up against him, Alan Thicke, you know, lots of people, talented people, not so great ones. Jerry Lewis, you know, anybody, Joan Rivers, whatever. And Johnny would just easily dispatch them all, you know? He had his thumb on all of America. He was like.

• 1:22:47Speaker 04

  Oh, and he was incredible.

• 1:22:48Bill Maher?

  Well, he was cosmopolitan in a way that very much appealed to.

• 1:22:52Speaker 04

  What do you think? He was from Kansas? Where is he from?

• 1:22:54Bill Maher?

  Nebraska.

• 1:22:54Speaker 04

  Nebraska, yeah.

• 1:22:55Bill Maher?

  But he was cosmopolitan in a way that appealed to the coasts, you know, and the hip people.

• 1:23:01Speaker 04

  And his jokes were just touching the line sometimes. They were great.

• 1:23:05Bill Maher?

  But he was a Nebraska kid, so that, he spoke to the whole country. That's what they don't do anymore. That's what I keep still trying to do is speak to the whole country.

• 1:23:13Speaker 04

  The whole country doesn't want to speak together.

• 1:23:15Bill Maher?

  A lot of them don't.

• 1:23:16Speaker 04

  And then they, they could, they could handle it together.

• 1:23:20Bill Maher?

  But lots of people from both camps still want to talk to me. And that's not true of a lot of people anymore.

• 1:23:27Speaker 04

  No.

• 1:23:27Bill Maher?

  You know, and, you know, as I said before, we're on the same page there. You gotta talk to people. And it's just, it's exhausting hating, isn't it?

• 1:23:38Speaker 04

  Well, here's what, here's what I.

• 1:23:39Bill Maher?

  Who would know better than you?

• 1:23:40Speaker 04

  Here's what I would, it is exhausting.

• 1:23:42Bill Maher?

  It's exhausting.

• 1:23:43Speaker 04

  Yeah. I mean, it's one of the things in the book I talk about. There was a period of time when I realized I cannot keep on going with rage. I can't keep on going with hate. I can't keep on going. There's sometimes I, like, I have to do it and I go after Kanye or other people. But I can't keep on doing it if I want to get, if I want to grow and get bigger and, and feel better. And so, you know, I was on a path to kind of try and do that. And so, I, I didn't, I'm not there. You gotta keep on working on it.

• 1:24:09Bill Maher?

  I don't want you to be there yet. If you're still working, you've got to be somewhat rageful. No, I mean, somewhat. You know, it's like, one of the funniest things I gotta say in the book is, it's a little, it's a book within a book, really. It's, or it's, it's something. It's, deserves more than just the space you give it about when you are first portrayed as Ari Gold, the character from Entourage, which is, of course, and everybody, even the people in Nebraska knew it was based on you. You're Ari, it was Ari. And then this mental thing that you go through where, like, wait.

• 1:24:51Bill Maher?

  Am I more this character than the one, I'm imitating the guy on TV who's imitating me?

• 1:24:59Bill Maher?

  Is that me?

• 1:25:00Speaker 04

  Was it leading?

• 1:25:01Bill Maher?

  Did it take, did it take a TV show for me to see who I really am? This very weird, weird thing, right?

• 1:25:08Speaker 04

  It was really weird.

• 1:25:09Bill Maher?

  Like, and the real Entourage guys, like the one that the characters were based on, would actually hang around your office?

• 1:25:15Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:25:16Bill Maher?

  That's so crazy.

• 1:25:17Speaker 04

  I would, I said to Doug Allen.

• 1:25:20Bill Maher?

  The creator?

• 1:25:22Speaker 04

  Yeah, the creator showed, did I bring a phone into my family? He goes, no, that was me. I was like, cause I didn't realize, which, what, did I talk to you about this or? And then people would ask me, hug it out, bitch. And I was like, okay, I'll hug it out, bitch. And like, it was leading, I was following, I was following.

• 1:25:38Bill Maher?

  Right. You don't know whether your character is more real than.

• 1:25:42Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:25:43Bill Maher?

  You.

• 1:25:43Speaker 04

  But it did help in, in my business.

• 1:25:46Bill Maher?

  I noticed that too. You were, at one point you said something like, you wanted to get this deal or something, you know, like, I, I, like a performing monkey. I did my best Ari Gold.

• 1:25:58Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:25:58Bill Maher?

  But, you know, that's the worst thing you ever did. I mean, it's like, you know, yeah, you took advantage of.

• 1:26:05Speaker 04

  It was part of the shtick.

• 1:26:06Bill Maher?

  It's like a pretty girl taking advantage of being pretty. I mean, they get so much hate. Have you noticed that?

• 1:26:11Speaker 04

  What?

• 1:26:12Bill Maher?

  Pretty girls, like, it's like almost politically incorrect to be pretty anymore in America. It's like, what about the girls who aren't so pretty? How's this, how, you're gonna make them feel bad? You don't feel that way?

• 1:26:24Speaker 04

  No.

• 1:26:26Bill Maher?

  Watch, watch TV late at night. You know what, you know what I want to see late at night, like before I go to bed? Cause I always watch TV before I go to bed.

• 1:26:33Speaker 04

  What are you watching this, these days?

• 1:26:35Bill Maher?

  Well, I, you know, many things, like a movie that came, that was in the theaters recently would be my first choice. Cause they come on, Voodoo, I guess that's Fandango, whatever it is. It's like, I love that. I used to do that in hotels when I was on the road. You know, a movie that was out three, I'll keep waiting for The Odyssey to come on, but maybe that'll have to be a little longer. But most of them come on, or something I don't even know. I, I never even knew about it, but they made it. Somebody gave money for it and I watch it and it's like, oh, this is pretty good, you know? I like this. I could see why the public, it wasn't their thing, but I liked it. It was a historical thing. I just watched one about the peasants revolt of 1381. Now, I could, Andrew Garfield's got quite a cast.

• 1:27:18Speaker 04

  Is it good?

• 1:27:19Bill Maher?

  Yeah, for me. I mean, but most people are not me. I see 1381 and I say, you have my money now. You know, that's, you.

• 1:27:28Speaker 04

  You gotta tell me so I don't know and I'm gonna learn something.

• 1:27:30Bill Maher?

  I'm hard already, 1381. But, yeah, it's, it's, if you like.

• 1:27:35Speaker 04

  So where's the, where, where is it, where, pretty women, where am I, what am I watching?

• 1:27:40Bill Maher?

  So, but before, so like I'll watch, I watch more than one thing. I've had a great attention span. So I got like about an hour, maybe an hour and a half to watch TV. It's the last thing before I shut out the light, not the way you're supposed to do it. I know, I understand. Blue blocker glasses, maybe that helps a little, maybe it helps nothing. But anyway.

• 1:27:57Speaker 04

  Aren't they supposed to be red?

• 1:27:58Bill Maher?

  It's when I'm.

• 1:27:59Speaker 04

  Is it blue?

• 1:28:00Bill Maher?

  Yeah, blue. We'll lock out the blue. Okay. Whatever it is, I'm gonna do it. Because I like to watch TV. It's the, you know, the passive time of the day. So, yeah, there's always, I mean, they talk about this town dying, maybe the town is dying. But not the entertainment industry. There's more shit than ever on streaming.

• 1:28:18Speaker 04

  And it's gonna be more and more and more than it's ever been.

• 1:28:21Bill Maher?

  It's crazy how many things, I have not lack for things to watch. Or I could go back, I'm watching.

• 1:28:26Speaker 04

  Where is this place where pretty women are getting killed?

• 1:28:29Bill Maher?

  Okay. Nowhere. And that's the problem.

• 1:28:34Bill Maher?

  If you go through, like, this, so like I watch one thing and then I watch another thing. Okay, now I want to go to sleep. The last thing I want to see before I go to bed is a pretty face. Now, maybe that makes me a pervert, but it is, fuck you, I don't care. I like to see pretty women. I like them. I'm a heterosexual. There you got me. So, like, there's five, there's 50 movie channels. From 501 on my thing to like 555. If I scroll through all those, very often I cannot find one pretty face.

• 1:29:05Speaker 04

  Really?

• 1:29:06Bill Maher?

  Yeah. It's like, they just, you know, and then, you know, it's like, sometimes you do, oh my God, there's Karen Knightley in, uh, what's the one, uh, with the, the classic one she did, the, you know, with Mr. Darcy. Pride and Prejudice. So good.

• 1:29:25Speaker 04

  Yeah. And you think, you think, you think now there's potentially.

• 1:29:30Bill Maher?

  Yes. I see so many parts. It's like, really? You couldn't put a cute girl in that one? Would that kill you? It's just wrong.

• 1:29:40Speaker 04

  I'm gonna now pay attention. I'm gonna do that tonight. I'm gonna do that tonight.

• 1:29:46Bill Maher?

  Don't tell the wife.

• 1:29:47Speaker 04

  No, she won't be watching it. You know what I saw last night? Norm's, you know. They did a documentary on.

• 1:29:55Bill Maher?

  Norm MacDonald?

• 1:29:56Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:29:56Bill Maher?

  Oh, I loved him.

• 1:29:58Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 1:29:58Bill Maher?

  What?

• 1:29:59Speaker 04

  It was last 15 minutes I haven't got to. It was kind of crazy. I didn't know him that well. I mean, I watched all, you know. Wow, what a life, what a comedian.

• 1:30:08Bill Maher?

  Oh, yeah, but what about the life? I don't know.

• 1:30:10Speaker 04

  I mean, it seems like it was.

• 1:30:11Bill Maher?

  It's very secretive.

• 1:30:12Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:30:13Bill Maher?

  So I just.

• 1:30:14Speaker 04

  And you can never figure out, like, I didn't realize it. I didn't graduate high school. I didn't go to college, but he did go to college. There's all these things that, like, there was a curtain around him.

• 1:30:25Bill Maher?

  Look, most comics, we know each other, you know. Maybe we didn't.

• 1:30:30Speaker 04

  Yeah, you're hanging out before you go up.

• 1:30:32Bill Maher?

  Not always, like, he and I know. We didn't start exactly at the same time in the same city. But over the years, yeah, you get to sort of be, it's very quick. It's like two cops meeting. They know what the world is.

• 1:30:42Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:30:42Bill Maher?

  So for each of them, and same with comics, him, I have no idea. I don't think I remember a long conversation. Just, it was just all about the work and who are you?

• 1:30:54Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:30:55Bill Maher?

  He, I know.

• 1:30:56Speaker 04

  I could tell.

• 1:30:57Bill Maher?

  Could be Batman.

• 1:30:59Speaker 04

  And I didn't understand the whole thing that he got very heavy.

• 1:31:02Bill Maher?

  What? At the end?

• 1:31:04Speaker 04

  Yeah. He got, like, from where I knew him to.

• 1:31:07Bill Maher?

  But maybe that was part of a.

• 1:31:09Speaker 04

  Of a thing.

• 1:31:10Bill Maher?

  Treatment he was on?

• 1:31:11Speaker 04

  I don't know. I haven't finished the last 15 minutes. I fell asleep. I'm gonna finish it tonight. But that was, you have to see it. It's on Netflix.

• 1:31:19Bill Maher?

  So why do you think the worms do it? Because, like.

• 1:31:22Speaker 04

  So here's your life.

• 1:31:24Bill Maher?

  Unpasteurized goat yogurt, I think is probably.

• 1:31:28Speaker 04

  Here's what it is. You, um. To stay healthy, you need less and less inflammation in your body.

• 1:31:37Bill Maher?

  There's an answer to that. That's not exactly that, which is inflammation is a symptom. Yes, it can be very bad, but why do you get inflammation? Because there's some place your body wants to get more help too. Inflammation is widening the road so that you can get more of the good stuff.

• 1:31:57Speaker 04

  Reduce the time by which your body is inflamed.

• 1:32:01Bill Maher?

  If you don't need the road to be widened, that's the goal. That you don't need it. It itself is not the problem.

• 1:32:09Speaker 04

  No, I agree with that.

• 1:32:10Bill Maher?

  Okay.

• 1:32:10Speaker 04

  So the vagus nerve does not go from the brain to the gut. It goes from the gut. The vagus nerve.

• 1:32:16Bill Maher?

  Vegas?

• 1:32:19Speaker 04

  So there's a nerve that travels from your.

• 1:32:22Bill Maher?

  Named after Vegas? It's like, just like the town?

• 1:32:25Speaker 04

  It's not spelled that way.

• 1:32:26Bill Maher?

  How's it spelled?

• 1:32:28Speaker 04

  I'm dyslexic. You're really actually asking me to spell it? Okay, so it goes from your gut to your brain. And the problem in our lives right now is our guts are too. Everything around us is just a little bit too clean. Like, everything that we eat, everything is a little bit too clean. And what we eat.

• 1:32:48Bill Maher?

  Clean?

• 1:32:49Speaker 04

  Clean. Our bodies are a lot cleaner. And we have started to, with all the things happening in our gut, kind of the body's starting to kind of eat itself because you're too clean. You have too clean.

• 1:33:02Bill Maher?

  This is a very, very different theory than I've ever heard, that we're too clean?

• 1:33:07Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:33:07Bill Maher?

  Even the people who eat McDonald's all the time?

• 1:33:10Speaker 04

  Actually, all those foods. That's the one thing Kennedy is doing right. Trying to get rid of all that, I think, food that has all those.

• 1:33:18Bill Maher?

  But how can those people be too clean? How can even?

• 1:33:21Speaker 04

  Because it's just, it's just not healthy for your gut.

• 1:33:24Bill Maher?

  I know, but why too clean? I think of this as too dirty, just from what I'm breathing in the air, just stuff I can't even avoid. The world is toxic, no?

• 1:33:34Speaker 04

  No.

• 1:33:34Bill Maher?

  The world is not toxic.

• 1:33:36Speaker 04

  Well, the world is toxic, but how our bodies are.

• 1:33:42Speaker 04

  There's constant cleaning of everything. We're just, you need, you need your body not to eat at itself. Eat at, at, at, at things that are not healthy for you, that they, that they go after, that are not clean.

• 1:33:56Bill Maher?

  That's the worms?

• 1:33:57Speaker 04

  Yeah, and the worms kind of create, instead of a.

• 1:34:00Bill Maher?

  Yeah, because your body's like, this idiot ate a worm. I've got to go kill this thing.

• 1:34:04Speaker 04

  So the body kind of doesn't have to eat it at itself. It actually takes care of all the things that are not proper in it. You don't want a leaky gut. Do you have a leaky gut? You don't want one. It's what you eat that causes a leaky gut.

• 1:34:17Bill Maher?

  Well, I won't eat that.

• 1:34:18Speaker 04

  Those are things that cause inflammation and cause a problem. So what you want to do is kind of.

• 1:34:25Speaker 04

  Like, keep your body healthy in the way that the things around us are not permitting us to do.

• 1:34:31Bill Maher?

  Okay, but you know, you could literally spend every minute of every day doing something for your health.

• 1:34:37Speaker 04

  I spend about three hours doing that.

• 1:34:40Bill Maher?

  Okay, to me, that is a lot. See, that's just a different choice from two different.

• 1:34:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, but I feel good about it.

• 1:34:46Bill Maher?

  I, I, I know you do. And it includes cold plunges and.

• 1:34:51Speaker 04

  Yeah, saunas.

• 1:34:52Bill Maher?

  Saunas, yeah.

• 1:34:54Speaker 04

  Light, light beds.

• 1:34:55Bill Maher?

  Light beds? What's that? Oh, a bed with light?

• 1:34:59Speaker 04

  Yeah. That reduces inflammation also.

• 1:35:03Bill Maher?

  You're really big on this inflammation?

• 1:35:04Speaker 04

  Yeah, I am.

• 1:35:05Bill Maher?

  Well, you look very healthy.

• 1:35:07Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 1:35:07Bill Maher?

  I mean, you do.

• 1:35:09Speaker 04

  So, and, and I agree with you. You need about, you try and get about seven to eight hours of sleep.

• 1:35:15Bill Maher?

  You do?

• 1:35:16Speaker 04

  Yeah, hard. I, I don't know. Can you get through the night?

• 1:35:20Bill Maher?

  No.

• 1:35:21Speaker 04

  Yeah, hard.

• 1:35:22Bill Maher?

  Yeah. When you say get through the night.

• 1:35:25Speaker 04

  So I'll get to bed at like 10, 10 o'clock. I try to get to, to, to five. Not easy all the time because I get.

• 1:35:33Bill Maher?

  Get to 5:00 AM?

• 1:35:34Speaker 04

  Yeah. 4:30.

• 1:35:36Bill Maher?

  Oh, but that's when you get up?

• 1:35:37Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:35:38Bill Maher?

  No, that's, well.

• 1:35:40Speaker 04

  You go to bed at 3:00.

• 1:35:42Bill Maher?

  Well, I go to, I try to get into bed at 1:00. That's when my, you have one of those mattresses that cools.

• 1:35:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, and then you do the hour of TV.

• 1:35:50Bill Maher?

  Then I, then I watch TV. Yes, I mean.

• 1:35:53Speaker 04

  But you don't get up until 10:00 or 11:00?

• 1:35:56Bill Maher?

  It's that. I mean, well, I think it's important, if you can, and we're very privileged people, to get up without an alarm. That's what I.

• 1:36:05Speaker 04

  I never get up without an alarm.

• 1:36:06Bill Maher?

  Really?

• 1:36:07Speaker 04

  Never.

• 1:36:08Bill Maher?

  Never? But you also wake up when you're supposed to?

• 1:36:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, I get up at 4:30, 5:00.

• 1:36:13Bill Maher?

  Holy fuck. Okay, well, I have to sometimes set the alarm for noon.

• 1:36:18Speaker 04

  Could you sleep past eight hours?

• 1:36:21Bill Maher?

  Well, in bed past eight hours because it depends on how much time I need in bed to get that sleep. That's the problem. It can easily take me an hour to fall asleep. And then get up in the middle of the night and not even.

• 1:36:35Speaker 04

  How do you do the show, this, read all the books you have to read? How do you do all of that?

• 1:36:41Bill Maher?

  Well, I mean, first of all, I'm not on the road anymore. That, that, I have way more time than I ever used to. This takes only the time I'm doing it. Do I look like I'm prepared?

• 1:36:51Speaker 04

  No, but I mean, but you have to, if it's a book, you have to read the book. If it's for your show, there's always people around with a book you have to read, and you've read all those books.

• 1:36:59Bill Maher?

  No, there's a lot of reading and a lot of writing. It's, I do it all week. I, I don't go out in the week. I mean, I'm working all the time. I just work different hours. You know, I may, I may get up at 11:00 or noon, but you know, I'm gonna put in a full day. I mean, look, the one good thing that happened after COVID was I only go into the office one day a week, which I love, that we stay, stay connected that way, but we don't need. We have one Zoom meeting and the rest of it, I do at home.

• 1:37:26Speaker 04

  You do your shit here.

• 1:37:27Bill Maher?

  We send stuff back and forth to the writers and, you know, we got it down to a fine oiled machine. But, you know, I, I put in the time and I love.

• 1:37:36Speaker 04

  No, I know you do.

• 1:37:37Bill Maher?

  I love it. I mean. Look, there's careers and there's jobs. We've both had jobs, like delivering shit without GPS in the dark with a fucking map on your lap.

• 1:37:50Speaker 04

  Job.

• 1:37:50Bill Maher?

  I once was looking at the map and drove off the road. I could have, I'm lucky it wasn't into a telephone pole, but it was definitely right off the road. And, but then careers, you know, people who have careers are lucky because that means, sure, you work, you work hard, but you like it. A career you like, a job you have to because you like.

• 1:38:11Speaker 04

  It's bringing you, I say to somebody, somebody always said, I said, would you have a, a, a life of purpose and meaning or a life of pleasure? I'd rather have purpose and meaning that actually gives me pleasure. And, you know, this whole thing about I just want a pleasurable life, but no. It's not pleasure, just hanging out.

• 1:38:30Bill Maher?

  All right, we have a clip of your next beef.

• 1:38:34Bill Maher?

  Who would you like to, would you like to, before you.

• 1:38:37Speaker 04

  I don't need any help. I can figure that one out. I can figure that one out.

• 1:38:40Bill Maher?

  Before you go, would you like to plug hating anybody? Who would you like?

• 1:38:44Speaker 04

  No, I'm good. There's a long list.

• 1:38:46Bill Maher?

  It must be promoting. I hate him.

• 1:38:49Speaker 04

  I should get in the ring with the UFC.

• 1:38:50Bill Maher?

  I'm telling you, all these guys who you didn't like, the Jim Wyatt's and they just all seemed like boat shoe wearing. You know, just the kind of, I don't know, they just, the way you portray them. Eisner and Mr. Ovitz and just, just these pompous. I mean, you can be an agent and it makes you a great person. It could also just pump you up to be such a prick. I mean, a lot of what you're talking about doing in the early part of the book is like you wanted to change the agency culture.

• 1:39:21Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:39:22Bill Maher?

  You think you did?

• 1:39:23Speaker 04

  I think I did. Yeah, it's not perfect.

• 1:39:25Bill Maher?

  So your place isn't full of those types?

• 1:39:27Speaker 04

  No, I, I wouldn't put up with them.

• 1:39:30Bill Maher?

  All right, well. I hope you're not planning to hand me off to any of them.

• 1:39:35Speaker 04

  No, I, do I not, I text you and I, hopefully enough, I'm seeing you on Friday, to how much I love the show.

• 1:39:41Bill Maher?

  All right. All right.

• 1:39:43Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 1:39:43Bill Maher?

  All right.

• 1:39:49Bill Maher?

  That was fun. Did you have fun? It looked like a head. Yeah. Who could act that?

• 1:39:58Speaker 01

  This fall, discover why there are two sides to every pancake story at Cracker Barrel. The edgy side, created by the golden crispy edges, and the softer side, made up of those warm fluffy centers. So slow down, make time to bring in the family, day or night, and try the new sweet cream caramel apple pancakes. Three of the world's best buttermilk pancakes topped with fried cinnamon apples, caramel drizzle, and sweet vanilla cream. Then dig in and write your own breakfast story. Welcome home to Cracker Barrel.

• 1:40:29Speaker 05

  The real cost of a break in isn't your valuables, it's the feeling that your home stopped being safe. Simply Safe keeps danger away from your family with three layers of protection. One, smart AI cameras and live US-based agents help stop intruders before they break in. Two, we sound the alarm at points of entry. Three, our agents request emergency response. Plan starting around a dollar a day. Right now, get 60% off your new system with professional monitoring at simplysafe.com/spotify.

• 1:40:54Speaker 06

  Outdoor deterrence plans start at $49.99 a month. Visit simplysafe.com/licenses for alarm license information.

• 1:40:59Speaker 02

  Starting a business can seem like a daunting task, unless you have a partner like Shopify. They have the tools you need to start and grow your business. From designing a website to marketing to selling and beyond, Shopify can help with everything you need. There's a reason millions of companies like Mattel, Heinz, and Allbirds continue to trust and use them. With Shopify on your side, turn your big business idea into. Sign up for your $1 per month trial at Shopify.com/specialoffer.