Eric Goode (documentary filmmaker)

Eric Goode (Monsters of God, Chimp Crazy, Tiger King) is a filmmaker, hotelier, and conservationist. Eric joins Armchair Expert to discuss growing up in an animal-filled home, surviving Northern California’s New Age movement, and befriending Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring in 1980s New York. Eric and Dax talk about creating legendary nightclubs and hotels, directing Nine Inch Nails videos, and stumbling into Tiger King while investigating reptile smugglers. Eric explains why obsession can give life purpose, why conservation requires talking to people you oppose, and why there is rarely one clear bad guy. Thank you to our presenting partner Lilly. Lilly’s Foundayo™(orforglipron). Advertisement Disclaimer: Please see Indications and Safety Summary with Warnings for Foundayo™(orforglipron) at https://www.foundayo.lilly.com/risk Start your 2 month free trial today: https://youtube.com/premium . Terms Apply. Cancel Anytime. Check Allstate first for a quote that could save you hundreds: https://www.allstate.com/ Take printer ink off your to-do list with HP Smart Tank | http://www.hp.com/SmartTank See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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

• 0:00Dax Shepard?

  Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert, Experts on Expert. I'm Dan Shepard and I'm joined by Monica Padman.

• 0:05Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 0:06Dax Shepard?

  This guy is, uh, among the most interesting human beings I've ever spoken to in my life. Uh, Eric Good.

• 0:15Speaker 01

  Colorful character.

• 0:16Dax Shepard?

  He, immediately what you'll know is he, he directed Tiger King and we all saw that. He also directed Chimp Crazy.

• 0:22Speaker 01

  Oh, a favorite of ours.

• 0:23Dax Shepard?

  A huge favorite, Tonka. And, uh, his new documentary is on HBO. It's streaming now called Monsters of God. I love it so much. And I thought we were just gonna talk to a documentarian. No, no, no, no, no, no. Eric's had 26 lives before being the biggest documentarian. Uh, he owns all your favorite hotels in New York City.

• 0:44Speaker 01

  It's wild.

• 0:45Dax Shepard?

  Um, crazy history with nightclubs. Uh, biggest turtle conservationist probably around. Uh, this dude has done every single thing. He's so punk rock. I loved him. Please enjoy Eric Good. We get support from Quince.

• 0:59Speaker 01

  I have to say, I am so ready for fall. I want sweaters. I've been craving a true crisp morning where I actually need a jacket. I can't wait.

• 1:08Dax Shepard?

  I'm fully there. The second it dips below 70, I'm like, this is my season. Give me the layers, give me the boots, give me a reason to wear something other than a T-shirt. And honestly, that's why I love Quince. Because fall is when your wardrobe actually has to show up. And everything at Quince is 50 to 80% less than similar brands. We're talking 100% Mongolian cashmere sweaters, starting at $60.

• 1:31Speaker 01

  $60, $60 for cashmere that you'd expect from a luxury brand without the luxury price tag. It's amazing. Gets me every time. It really shouldn't be real, but it is because they go straight to the factories. They skip the middlemen and they just hand you the savings. The stuff isn't trendy. It's the kind of pieces you grab over and over because they work every time.

• 1:49Dax Shepard?

  The 100% Mongolian cashmere sweaters for me are it. When I look at Steve McQueen, this man owned a couple of sweaters he wore all the time and he looks iconic.

• 1:58Speaker 01

  It's a uniform.

• 1:59Dax Shepard?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:00Speaker 01

  And Quince isn't just about the clothes. They have hotel quality bedding, cookware, bath essentials, thoughtfully designed furniture. You can really go there and outfit your entire apartment or house. So if you're in need of any kind of fall refresh at home too, same quality, same attention to detail for every corner of your life.

• 2:17Dax Shepard?

  Find your next fall favorites at Quince. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was Armchair Expert. It's the best way to support the show. This episode is presented by YouTube Premium. YouTube was already great, but premium supercharges it. If you like YouTube, you'll love premium. Try YouTube Premium for two months free at youtube.com/premium. Trial eligibility varies, terms apply, cancel anytime. Now let's get into today's episode.

• 3:14Dax Shepard?

  How many hours have you been here?

• 3:15Speaker 02

  I've been here for about two hours.

• 3:17Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 3:17Speaker 02

  So, so it's okay, fashionably late.

• 3:19Dax Shepard?

  You acclimated to the space?

• 3:21Speaker 02

  I was just asking about the set decorating and Monica's grandmother.

• 3:24Dax Shepard?

  Oh, isn't she beautiful?

• 3:26Speaker 02

  I thought it was Monica. You have Indian descent or what are you? Yeah, yeah.

• 3:30Speaker 01

  I am.

• 3:30Speaker 02

  Cause your last name is what?

• 3:31Speaker 01

  Padman.

• 3:32Speaker 02

  Padman.

• 3:33Speaker 01

  Which is not, that's a shortened version that my grandfather did.

• 3:37Speaker 02

  Uh-huh. Okay. I spent a little time in India.

• 3:41Dax Shepard?

  I emailed you print.

• 3:42Speaker 01

  Oh, it's happening again. This happened yesterday.

• 3:46Speaker 02

  What? We're having a, what is it, a wardrobe malfunction?

• 3:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. So there's been a nip slip.

• 3:52Speaker 02

  Is it a mechanical malfunction, Rob? Uh, Gmail email malfunction? Where are you from in India or are you from India?

• 3:58Speaker 01

  I was born in Georgia.

• 3:59Speaker 02

  Georgia, US, Georgia. Not Georgia, Eastern Europe.

• 4:02Speaker 01

  I wish. That would make me way more worldly, but no, my family's from Kerala.

• 4:07Speaker 02

  Oh, Kerala. I was in Kerala in the Western Ghats. I don't know, when was that? A couple of years ago, running around in a tiger preserve where I'd given some money to help the tigers.

• 4:21Speaker 01

  They have so many exotic animals there, so I bet.

• 4:25Speaker 02

  Well, I was there, not for the tigers, but yeah, I know that part of India.

• 4:29Speaker 01

  I know, I've only been once when I was, it turns out five years old. I thought it was four. I've been saying four my whole life. My mom corrected me the other day.

• 4:37Speaker 02

  You've only been back to the homeland once.

• 4:40Speaker 01

  Well, no, and then we went with Bill Gates a couple of years ago.

• 4:44Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 4:45Speaker 01

  But we didn't get to go to Kerala.

• 4:46Speaker 02

  Oh, that guy, Bill Gates.

• 4:47Speaker 01

  That guy.

• 4:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 4:48Speaker 01

  That guy.

• 4:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:49Speaker 01

  We went with him for his foundation.

• 4:50Dax Shepard?

  I'm so glad you guys didn't talk too much because I have the most exciting things to reveal to Monica about you. And I want to start this by saying, we don't generally interview directors. I can't say why. We've had a handful, but in general, we don't.

• 5:04Speaker 02

  Well, I'm a fake director, so keep going.

• 5:06Dax Shepard?

  But I was so obsessed with Chimp Crazy. I can't imagine I got back to you, but I bet that's all I talked about for the entire time it was on, on this show. Of course I love Tiger King and I loved them so much that I was like, I actually want to meet this guy because these docs are so crazy. And I want to talk about animals. And then when I started reading about you today, I was like, oh my God. You're one of the most interesting human beings in the world. I would wanted to interview you anyways. You've had like 25 lives and some of these lives are gonna make Monica's head explode. It's very exciting.

• 5:37Speaker 02

  You must be talking about someone else, someone sitting over here, maybe.

• 5:40Dax Shepard?

  No, no, no, no.

• 5:41Speaker 02

  A new guest coming in.

• 5:42Dax Shepard?

  No, faux humility. But let's start at the beginning. And when she hears these, I mean, this is a very exciting.

• 5:48Speaker 01

  What, like you like were on Friends or something?

• 5:50Speaker 02

  First of all, don't believe what you read on the internet, Wikipedia, Google. Even peer review is inaccurate. I'm just saying, even scientific peer review is not accurate. So let me hear this fiction that you've read about me.

• 6:02Dax Shepard?

  We're now throwing up peer.

• 6:03Speaker 02

  How many years I did in prison? What did you read?

• 6:07Dax Shepard?

  Well, let's start. You have the best birthday in the world, our daughter's birthday, December 19th.

• 6:11Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 6:12Dax Shepard?

  1957?

• 6:14Speaker 02

  Oh God, you must be talking about the wrong guy. I was born in 77.

• 6:18Dax Shepard?

  Okay. And you were originally born in Rhode Island, but then you grew up in New York City till eight?

• 6:23Speaker 02

  My four bit of years, mostly Northern California, in California. But yes, I had a stint in New York.

• 6:29Dax Shepard?

  And was it zero to eight?

• 6:30Speaker 02

  I was born in Rhode Island. I left when I was so young, I don't remember. And then we went to California, then we went to Westchester, New York, not New York City.

• 6:38Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 6:39Speaker 02

  My father was a teacher and he moved around a lot because he couldn't hold jobs very well.

• 6:43Dax Shepard?

  He was an artist as well?

• 6:44Speaker 02

  He was an artist and not terribly successful, but I learned a lot about art from him, yeah. And then I grew up high school years and a bit earlier in Marin County and Sonoma County in California.

• 6:54Dax Shepard?

  And for folks who have not been, it's on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge. It's Redwoods. It's so beautiful.

• 6:58Speaker 02

  Very privileged part of the country.

• 7:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:00Speaker 02

  I moved to New York in 1977 and spent over 40 years in New York City.

• 7:04Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 7:05Dax Shepard?

  Okay, but mom was a naturalist and a conservationist in what capacity?

• 7:09Speaker 02

  Listen, you know this, you know this probably, everyone has crazy families. I always think mine's the craziest, but it's not. I had a eccentric mom who taught me to love creatures, no matter how small. If someone squashed a bug in school, I would tell them to eat it because don't kill something unnecessarily. My father was an artist and a professor.

• 7:30Dax Shepard?

  A professor?

• 7:30Speaker 02

  And gay, which I found out much later in life. So I had this kind of father that was like anti-sports. He started his own high school. It was very artsy fartsy. And I didn't really find out about his sexuality until very late in life. My parents had a very odd relationship.

• 7:45Dax Shepard?

  As a result of the hidden.

• 7:47Speaker 01

  Did she know?

• 7:48Speaker 02

  She didn't know until very late in life. My mom just was attracted to guys that had kind of an effeminate side.

• 7:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:55Speaker 02

  Like art and museums and botanical gardens.

• 7:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, those guys are great.

• 7:58Dax Shepard?

  I think all girls are attracted to those kind of guys.

• 8:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:02Speaker 01

  That's why you guys have girl best friends.

• 8:04Speaker 02

  What's not to like? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 8:05Dax Shepard?

  I think that's what all.

• 8:06Speaker 02

  Maybe the SCX wasn't too exciting.

• 8:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, that part lacks.

• 8:10Dax Shepard?

  But he was able to sire five of you.

• 8:13Speaker 02

  I think he just wanted to keep my mom busy so he didn't have to engage in that kind of stuff. I don't know. It was the 50s and 60s.

• 8:20Dax Shepard?

  That's a very hard time to be a gay man.

• 8:22Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 8:23Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 8:24Speaker 02

  Stonewall happened and that was one of the big gay breakthroughs in New York. But yeah, you couldn't say you were gay in those days.

• 8:31Dax Shepard?

  You said your mother was eccentric. Can you elaborate a tiny bit on eccentric? That can take a lot of shades.

• 8:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, I always sort of compare my family to the Royal Tannenbaum's or something. Cause we grew up with a lot of animals in the house, tropical fish, rats, snakes, lizards. You know, dog, cat, five kids, dysfunctional, fighting all the time. I went to this thing called EST when I was really young, you know?

• 8:53Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, that's a precursor to landmark.

• 8:55Speaker 02

  In the 70s, exactly, when I was 16. So, you know, new age.

• 9:00Dax Shepard?

  Can I quickly ask what you thought of that EST experience, right? Cause their proprietary approach was like confrontation therapy, right?

• 9:07Speaker 01

  It's a self-help organization.

• 9:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, but the guy, Warner Earhart, was like a used car salesman, you know, probably from Detroit or somewhere near there. And then had an epiphany and he said, I'm gonna indoctrinate this thing. And used car salesmen can be pretty convincing. And so then with EST, he was pretty convincing and he had his minions. And my mom thought, oh, my brother and I are fighting. We're 15 and 16. You gotta go to EST in San Francisco and spend two days listening to this guy. I didn't know what the fuck I was listening to.

• 9:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:35Speaker 02

  All I remember was at the end, they say, get on the floor. Everyone gets on the floor, this big giant auditorium. And they say, relive your birth. And I'm lying on the floor with my brother and then we hear everyone agonizing yells and screams. We're like, this primordial ooze, like, you know, we're like, what the fuck is going on here? And we left and then they say to you, did you get it? And we go, I don't know. And they said, you got it. And that was EST.

• 10:00Dax Shepard?

  But did it carry your brother in you? In that you had a shared moment where you're like, oh, they're crazy, we're not, I guess we, you know?

• 10:05Speaker 01

  It were.

• 10:06Speaker 02

  We didn't know what was going on. You don't have that kind of intellectual or I didn't. I was dyslexic, I was bad in school. I was like, just going through the motions at EST. Although today I might even do a doc about EST, comes full circle.

• 10:19Dax Shepard?

  Did you watch The Americans?

• 10:20Speaker 02

  No.

• 10:21Dax Shepard?

  Incredible show on FX with Matthew Reese and Kerry Russell, where they're playing Russian operatives in.

• 10:28Dax Shepard?

  America in the early eighties and she falls in love with Est.

• 10:32Speaker 02

  Oh, really?

• 10:33Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, so there's lots of scenes set in Est.

• 10:35Speaker 02

  I mean, Est, they always keep wanting you to go back. It's like Scientology a little bit, like it went from Est to actualization to the forum.

• 10:43Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, landmark forum.

• 10:45Speaker 02

  And they keep wanting you to get to the next level. I did it once. I grew up in such a new age crazy world in Northern California in the seventies. We had Joseph Campbell come and speak at our ranch. We had everyone you can think of in the new age moving at that time. And so I kind of rejected it.

• 11:01Dax Shepard?

  Sure.

• 11:01Speaker 02

  Cause I was just so indoctrinated.

• 11:03Dax Shepard?

  Saying my dad was sober and he was into Course in Miracles and all this stuff. And I was like, what the fuck's going on? Did mom go to Esalen?

• 11:10Speaker 02

  Oh, my God. Esalen used our ranch every summer. So Esalen, the first time I think I ever had sex was the kid of one of the Esalen leaders. But yes, of course, Esalen, you know, all of that stuff. Jim Jones was in San Francisco at the time, but I didn't drink the Kool-Aid.

• 11:25Speaker 01

  Thank God.

• 11:25Speaker 02

  But there was Synanon, there were all the communes. It was what I grew up in. Yeah, but of course Esalen.

• 11:31Dax Shepard?

  Did you watch that doc, the Synanon doc?

• 11:33Speaker 02

  I did watch some of the Synanon doc. I do remember vividly when the head of Synanon put the rattlesnake in the mailbox to try to kill the journalist unsuccessfully. And of course, anything with rattlesnakes perks my ears. So yes, I lived in California when that happened.

• 11:50Dax Shepard?

  Okay, so you end up going to two different art schools, right? You go to one in San Francisco and then you ultimately go to Parsons?

• 11:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, I got kicked out though.

• 11:58Dax Shepard?

  There's already a vibe here, right? And I find it fascinating that you are a documentarian and interview people. You're reminding me of Keith Morrison, like you don't want to talk. Yeah, but whatever. Yeah. No, but huh. Right? A little bit?

• 12:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's a little bit of that.

• 12:13Dax Shepard?

  These are all interesting things.

• 12:14Speaker 02

  I mean, listen, takes one to know one over their decks. Cause you have an unorthodox career path, if I may say so myself.

• 12:20Dax Shepard?

  For sure.

• 12:21Speaker 02

  Just looking you up very briefly.

• 12:23Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 12:23Speaker 02

  And going from Detroit suburbs and the car world into anthropology and studying that. And how the hell do you land where you are right now?

• 12:31Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 12:32Speaker 02

  So we all have a weird.

• 12:33Dax Shepard?

  Well, no, we don't all.

• 12:34Speaker 02

  Well, some of us do.

• 12:35Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, some of us do. I'm always very interested in folks because there's a lot of underlying things within that, right? I too was dyslexic. I've come to learn. I'm probably ADHD.

• 12:45Speaker 02

  Probably me too.

• 12:46Dax Shepard?

  I get passionate about things and then if I've done anything for a while, I'm like, okay, what's the next thing in life I can do before I am off this planet, which is coming quickly. But you do go to Parsons.

• 12:56Speaker 01

  Which one did you get kicked out of Parsons or the first one?

• 12:58Speaker 02

  Both, both.

• 12:59Speaker 01

  Oh, nice.

• 12:59Speaker 02

  I was really gonna get kicked out.

• 13:00Speaker 01

  Congratulations.

• 13:01Speaker 02

  Well, I got kicked out of my father's high school, which was called the School of Arts and Sciences for cheating on a geometry test. My father's. He started the school. It was an alternative high school. It was called the School of Arts and Sciences. Thank God for that, because I know you've had Malcolm Gladwell on, but thank God. Cause I could achieve in that environment, because I excelled in art and I sucked in academics. I got kicked out of my father's school. I got kicked out of Parsons after the first foundation year. Cause I was going to nightclubs in New York and that's where the art scene was really sort of germinating at the time.

• 13:32Dax Shepard?

  What was your infraction?

• 13:33Speaker 02

  At the art school, I just think I wasn't good enough because there was a certain level of academics you had to take in foundation year. And I was studying more Studio 54. And not nightclubs, at the Mug Club. These are places that predate you guys, but they were big clubs in New York at the time.

• 13:48Dax Shepard?

  This is where we start with the mind blowing stuff.

• 13:51Speaker 01

  Ooh, he's excited.

• 13:52Dax Shepard?

  This is incredibly exciting. So Eric founded with a couple of other folks, right? Or just you?

• 13:58Speaker 02

  I like to say everything's just me, by the way.

• 14:02Speaker 02

  Never give credit to the others. It was all just me.

• 14:05Dax Shepard?

  You were a founder of, or if not the only of Area, this nightclub that fused or conflated nightclub life with art. And among the collaborations at Area, it was like wildly popular for four years. Is that how long it was going?

• 14:21Speaker 02

  A little less, but yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 14:23Dax Shepard?

  A Warhol collaboration, Basquiat collaboration, Keith Haring.

• 14:27Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 14:28Dax Shepard?

  Is this contemporary to Studio 54?

• 14:30Speaker 02

  Host, the real part of Studio 54. My two friends that owned Studio 54 unfortunately went to prison. And when they got out of prison, Area basically opened in 1983. Studio 54 from like 76 or seven to 1979 or whenever they went to prison.

• 14:47Dax Shepard?

  Yes, okay.

• 14:47Speaker 02

  And they got out of prison and they really helped promote my club. Cause they were like, we're fresh out of prison. What do we do? What's the new club?

• 14:55Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, they're like gangsters that got out. They're trying to figure out like, what's the next? Pice, add JFK.

• 14:59Speaker 02

  But you know, in New York nightlife, success, I guess, if you measure it, four years, three years is like dog years. So that's like 50 years. Clubs are ephemeral in New York. So if you have a run, that's three years, you're done pretty well.

• 15:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:12Speaker 02

  Cause none of them last in New York City at least.

• 15:14Dax Shepard?

  Okay, so I'm trying to do the math on your age. What age were you around that?

• 15:19Speaker 02

  I was in my twenties and we were all in our twenties back there. Andy was, Andy Warhol was kind of like the older statesman in the art world. But Jean-Michel Basquiat and I used to do our birthday parties together.

• 15:29Speaker 01

  Oh, my God.

• 15:32Dax Shepard?

  Well, by the way, we're not to the part that's gonna make your head spin.

• 15:34Speaker 02

  Well, Keith Haring, Jean-Michel, all of us were young kids in New York trying to find our way.

• 15:39Dax Shepard?

  Had you met at Parsons or just around the village?

• 15:41Speaker 02

  Everyone I met was in the nightclub scene. There was no cell phones, no internets, no social media, no nothing. The only way you could connect with people is go to a place where the people were. And it was sex, drugs and rock and roll and art. And they were kind of like laboratories, these clubs for ideas and exchanging ideas and cross pollinating. And so I met Jean-Michel and Keith and all of us met in the late seventies. And we just started trying to figure out how to make our mark, like everyone. Madonna was a bartender back then at this place called Lucky Strike. In New York, a different Lucky Strike than the one you may know of. But we all would come to New York because we're misfits from, you know, all over the country.

• 16:20Dax Shepard?

  You seem to have done some research on me, so you're aware of the fact that I'm an addict, right?

• 16:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, but I was an addict too, and I'm still an addict in a different way.

• 16:26Dax Shepard?

  Oh, yeah, right. So when I read this little passage about Area, all I can think about is how many drugs? Was it a wash in drugs?

• 16:34Speaker 02

  The drug scene always kind of morphs and changes. In those days, it was cocaine and quaalids and heroin were the three. Meth was more of a rural drug. It wasn't an urban drug as it is today. And it wasn't like what it's become. But yeah, it was those three drugs and alcohol.

• 16:51Dax Shepard?

  And were you participating in them?

• 16:52Speaker 02

  I was a late bloomer with addiction. In the early days, I had no money and so I was just survival mode. And so I would do it opportunistically, but really I was so focused on trying to be able to survive in New York City. And New York City was a very different place back then, much cheaper, but nevertheless.

• 17:10Dax Shepard?

  Was Area not hugely profitable? It sounds like it would have been.

• 17:13Speaker 02

  Clubs are rarely hugely profitable. I'd never forget when Andy Warhol said to me on Andy Warhol TV, he goes, you know, gee, Eric and Andy way, what are you gonna do with your money? And I said, I'm gonna get cool tortoises I could never afford. He was like, what? But you know, listen, we made money, we poured the money back into the club because we had these elaborate themes and we would just try to outdo ourselves.

• 17:35Dax Shepard?

  Your production was expensive.

• 17:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, so in the end, we walked away with not a lot of money. But we walked away with confidence that we could do it. Gave us that thing when you're young and you get that confidence.

• 17:45Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 17:45Speaker 02

  And it's a success. Fuck yeah.

• 17:47Speaker 01

  Cash shade.

• 17:48Dax Shepard?

  It's like Michael Jordan winning the game shot in college. He does that. He'll always be able to win the game when he's.

• 17:53Speaker 02

  Speaking of Michael Jordan, you have a talent that he has. You can talk and chew gum at the same time, but he has one other thing. He could, he could stick his tongue out and dunk. Cause I saw Michael on the floor at the Garden one time, talking trash to everyone at the Knicks.

• 18:08Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 18:09Speaker 02

  His tongue wagging out, his gum still in his mouth and dunking. I was like, how the fuck does the gum stay in?

• 18:14Dax Shepard?

  Well, he's a coordinated human being if we know anything about him.

• 18:17Speaker 02

  Unbelievable. He scored 50 points in that game against the Knicks. When he came back from baseball, but anyway.

• 18:23Dax Shepard?

  Were you at any of those Pacers games back in the day?

• 18:25Speaker 02

  I was at that one Michael Jordan game because Naomi Campbell took me. We sat on the floor and I just remember.

• 18:32Speaker 01

  What is going on?

• 18:33Dax Shepard?

  I'm parsing this out for you.

• 18:34Speaker 02

  I remember being able to listen to every word Michael said. It was amazing.

• 18:39Dax Shepard?

  Okay, I'm gonna get right to it. If you had to pick your favorite place to be in New York City.

• 18:45Speaker 01

  The Rose Store.

• 18:46Dax Shepard?

  No, no.

• 18:47Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 18:47Dax Shepard?

  Oh, man. No, no.

• 18:48Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 18:49Speaker 02

  Don't do that to a poor mom.

• 18:50Dax Shepard?

  No, no, she's gonna pass this. What is your favorite place to post up and be and spend time at in New York City?

• 18:57Speaker 01

  I mean, I spend a lot of time at the Bowery.

• 19:00Dax Shepard?

  This motherfucker started the Bowery.

• 19:01Speaker 01

  You did not.

• 19:03Dax Shepard?

  He started the Maritime, what?

• 19:05Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 19:05Dax Shepard?

  Maritime?

• 19:06Speaker 02

  I'm just staying quiet.

• 19:07Dax Shepard?

  Okay, no, you were shaking your head and I didn't know he didn't move.

• 19:09Speaker 01

  Cause he's embarrassed.

• 19:10Dax Shepard?

  The Maritime?

• 19:11Speaker 01

  He's incredible.

• 19:12Dax Shepard?

  The Waverly? The Bowery? Dude, I was at the Maritime when I shot Baby Mama, I think it was the summer of 2005. The restaurant downstairs, I'm gonna bore you with this.

• 19:23Speaker 02

  2005, okay.

• 19:24Dax Shepard?

  Okay, I want you to know how your things actually have touched people. It seems like you don't do well taking that kind of compliment, but I'm gonna tell it to you.

• 19:30Speaker 01

  It's good. I'm glad your ego isn't what it should be.

• 19:34Dax Shepard?

  Well, we'll try to get it there over the course of this next two hours. Okay, so I had been with a girl for nine years. We broke up. I was very in this doldrums of like, man, I just, I don't even know what my life is. And we were supposed to have a baby. I go to this movie, Baby Mama. I barely worked in Baby Mama. I have to work one, two days a week. And I just developed a bunch of New York friends and I'm staying at the Maritime Hotel. And I go down by myself and I'm at Lobottega? What is it called?

• 19:56Speaker 02

  Lobottega, yeah.

• 19:57Dax Shepard?

  Lobottega.

• 19:57Speaker 02

  God, you're a good memory. Yeah, Italian restaurant.

• 19:59Dax Shepard?

  Italian restaurant with outdoor seating. It's summer of oh five, I think, in New York. And I'm sitting out there and the weather's perfect and I eat this fucking beautiful meal. And I have this wave come over me. It's such a strong and visceral feeling that I remember so much. And I was just like, fuck, you know what? Life is fucking good and I'm gonna be okay, man. And let's have some fucking fun in New York City this summer. I had this moment. I left that restaurant. I was like, we're gonna have a great time in New York City this summer. And we had a great time in New York City.

• 20:31Speaker 02

  That's nice to hear.

• 20:32Dax Shepard?

  Yes, it was a big part, the environment, the context that you created and the taste of the food and the weather. And I was like, yeah, man, fucking, life is still gonna be good.

• 20:42Speaker 02

  That's cool. Yeah, it's funny how I never thought owning clubs and restaurants and hotels that that would somehow give me an advantage making films. And the thing that I realize now, it all kind of weirdly connects. Cause there are people that I've met through the years that were involved or stayed at my hotels or ate at my restaurants. I have a rolodex. And then there's people like Ted Danson, who lives right across the street from me.

• 21:06Dax Shepard?

  In Ohio?

• 21:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 21:07Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 21:07Speaker 02

  But he also did a film in the Maritime Hotel where they shot this film. And it's just funny that one degree of separation and the connective tissue that later helps because I can pick up the phone and call Alan Cumming to be in Chimp Crazy.

• 21:22Speaker 01

  You know people.

• 21:23Speaker 02

  I know people.

• 21:24Dax Shepard?

  One more Maritime story. I'm staying there. Every morning I wake up, I want a coffee, right? And so every time I call, the operator answers and then I have to give her my order. She then talks to the kitchen, right? So one of these mornings, I've been there for three weeks, right? And I say to this woman who I've not talked to every single morning, I say, listen, I just want you to know, I think it's bullshit that you have to deal with my order. And then I can't call directly to room service. And she goes, oh, you think that's bullshit? That's just the. Beginning, I go, what do you mean? She goes, I'm in a fucking basement right now. I go, no shit, you're in the basement? We start chatting for a very, very long time. And then she goes, this is fun, but I gotta go. I wanna have my cigarette break. I go, okay, I'll come down and join you.

• 22:08Dax Shepard?

  I go out in the front of the hotel. I start talking to this woman and I learned she's a writer for Vice. And she tells me she has a book. And I get the book, it's called Dear Diary. And then her hero is Amy Poehler. So I bring her book to set on Baby Mummy. I give it to Amy, that becomes a connection. She then ends up writing on girls. She then created her own TV show on Netflix. This woman, Leslie Arfin, who's incredible, who was the operator at your hotel? Who I developed this lifelong, it turned out we were both sober.

• 22:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 22:39Dax Shepard?

  And, uh, yeah, another crazy.

• 22:41Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, I had Zoe Casavetes working down there. John Casavetes' daughter for a while. Yeah, it's funny how that works. And they are working in a basement. Yeah, it's really, I'm so inhumane to my staff. That hotel offices are also in the basement. Well, for real, it's a premium.

• 22:58Dax Shepard?

  Okay, sorry, let's talk about the Bowery.

• 23:00Speaker 01

  Oh my God, I just, I love it so much. I was just there. A couple of weeks ago, I was just there. That's my hotel.

• 23:05Dax Shepard?

  That's her home base.

• 23:06Speaker 01

  That's my home base.

• 23:07Speaker 02

  Well, I can hook you up next time, Monica.

• 23:08Speaker 01

  Oh my.

• 23:09Dax Shepard?

  Oh, we had a whole, we have a whole. Okay, great.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  Okay, so I have to apologize to you, I suppose.

• 23:14Dax Shepard?

  Sure.

• 23:15Speaker 01

  I have an apology to make, an immense. So the keys at the Bowery are amazing. They're legendary. Yes, exactly, the fobs. For people who don't know, they're this big tassel. Your number, hotel room numbers carved onto the brass. It's beautiful, okay?

• 23:32Speaker 01

  I like items.

• 23:33Speaker 02

  So you stole the fob?

• 23:34Speaker 01

  I didn't, I didn't, I kind of did. Okay, so I was in room 1111. Very, very auspicious, very, very. That's my lucky number. I'm always seeing 1111, I get that room. And I was like, I have to have this tassel. Like, I don't know how I'm gonna get it, but I have to.

• 23:52Speaker 02

  Now be careful, because what happens at the Bowery stays at the Bowery, Monica. So don't say anything too.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  Well, I've already said it.

• 23:58Dax Shepard?

  Unfortunately, this whole story is known to all the listeners.

• 24:00Speaker 01

  Unfortunately, everyone already knows. I'm not good at keeping secrets, but I'm also not good at stealing. So I did go up to the front desk and I said, how do I have this? I will buy it, I would like to buy it. How do I do that? And they're like, they're not for sale, but if they are taken, we charge this amount.

• 24:18Speaker 02

  Some ridiculous number.

• 24:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I was like, thank you for telling me that news.

• 24:22Dax Shepard?

  This is the last you'll ever see of this key.

• 24:24Speaker 01

  And I took it.

• 24:26Speaker 02

  We try to trick people into taking them so we can charge this enormous. So it's a real way we profit on the Bowery.

• 24:32Dax Shepard?

  That's where the margins at, isn't that key?

• 24:34Speaker 02

  I'm shameless right now, plugging my other hotel. I have a hotel in Ojai called Hotel El Roblar. And we have these brass cowboy hats on the fobs. And everyone wants the brass cowboy hat. And they do take them all the time and we do have to charge.

• 24:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm gonna do that.

• 24:49Speaker 02

  You have to.

• 24:50Speaker 01

  I do wanna go there.

• 24:50Speaker 02

  You have to.

• 24:51Speaker 01

  That's been on my Instagram algorithm.

• 24:53Dax Shepard?

  I was looking at it this morning and it's gorgeous. And my wife has stayed at your tortoise place.

• 24:57Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 24:58Speaker 01

  Oh, the conservative.

• 24:59Dax Shepard?

  Right? Is that not yours?

• 25:01Speaker 02

  It is.

• 25:02Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 25:03Speaker 02

  I have a hotel for tortoises as well. In Ojai as well. And I'm much better at tortoise hospitality than human hospitality. They get pampered really well.

• 25:12Speaker 01

  You are not, the hospitality at those hotels are incredible. I can't believe this, this is very.

• 25:17Dax Shepard?

  This is great.

• 25:17Speaker 02

  But let me just tell you one last thing about hotels. Owning hotels, the thing that you learn is what do you do in some commit suicide? What do you do with all these weird things that happen in hotels? So there's this whole thing we don't talk about when you own hotels. When do most people have sex? It's Friday afternoons when people are cheating on their wives. And between the hours of like 8:00 PM and midnight, you can hear the cacophony of sexual activity when you walk down the hallway. And so there's all these sort of things that we, and I shouldn't be saying it.

• 25:48Speaker 01

  No, this is fantastic.

• 25:49Speaker 02

  I'll keep my mouth shut about what happens in hotels, but it's very interesting.

• 25:52Dax Shepard?

  My grandparents owned the roadside motel on the border of Indiana and Michigan growing up. And I would go there for the summer. It was called the Colonial Motor Inn. My sweet, sweet grandmother, who was very tiny, the amount of dead bodies she found in her tenure of running the Colonial Motor. Like, every time I saw my grandma, I'd be like, how many dead bodies have you found since I saw you? Because people do go to hotels to end their lives.

• 26:15Speaker 02

  And it's a whole thing, by the way, because your housekeeping won't go into those rooms until you have someone come, usually a priest, and bless the room and cleanse the room. And there's a whole thing about, you know, the shining, kind of like that kind of thing. Like, oh, is this hotel haunted? You can get that rumor of a haunted hotel, the maritime.

• 26:34Dax Shepard?

  Maritime, I was just gonna say.

• 26:35Speaker 02

  And it's like.

• 26:36Dax Shepard?

  I'm staying there for like a couple of weeks. And people just start telling me these ghost stories about the maritime. And one of them was a woman woke up and a ghost was having sex with her.

• 26:45Speaker 01

  Oh my God.

• 26:46Dax Shepard?

  I said, what was your reaction? She goes, I was terrified. And I'm like, I would be so fucking delighted if I woke up.

• 26:52Speaker 02

  Well, that's one of the amenities that we offer. That's a maritime. The ghost sex interaction is one of the most popular.

• 26:59Speaker 01

  Wow, what a life.

• 27:01Dax Shepard?

  So yeah, that chapter was pretty long. What are the borders of that chapter where that was your full focus? Before you really start getting into conservation and stuff?

• 27:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, like you said earlier, I like to figure something out. And you know, you kind of crack the code and you do it. And then you don't wanna just keep doing the same thing over and over again. So the progression was, the hotels were great. It afforded me resources to do other things. I made some money. Clubs are ephemeral, I didn't really make money, but it was fun in my youth. And after a while, I had a few hotels. And then I started thinking, what's next? You know, life is short. And I kind of always was a closeted reptile guy and turtle guy in New York. And never really spoke about that love affair that I would have.

• 27:44Dax Shepard?

  Did you have a bunch in your apartment?

• 27:45Speaker 02

  I did, and girlfriends would always be kind of like, oh my God, what are you living with? Why is most of the apartment filled with these reptiles and tortoises?

• 27:53Dax Shepard?

  And do you not think there's a little bit of a smell when you have those aquariums?

• 27:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, it started feeling a little bit like goats at the apartment. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Tortoises were big and they grew. But listen, that was an indelible love affair since I was a kid.

• 28:05Dax Shepard?

  Did you have any hijinks? Like, did any reptiles get loose ever?

• 28:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, of course, yeah, it's their nature. I mean, listen, I don't recommend this to people, but in the early days, you know, we had themes at this club I owned in the early eighties. And we would have natural history theme. Any chance I got, I would try to figure out how to incorporate animals into the club. I had a great horned owl, I had bats, I had a 15-foot python that escaped under the floorboards. I only found it years later when we took the club apart, the skeleton.

• 28:32Speaker 01

  No.

• 28:32Speaker 02

  No, no, I shouldn't even admit that.

• 28:34Dax Shepard?

  No, you're honest, I like your honesty.

• 28:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'll regret it later. But snakes escaped in my life. You know, I used to sleep with a lizard when I was in high school. Called it Tegu, a big black and white South American lizard. It wasn't the best creature to sleep with because it couldn't control itself. You know, its bowels.

• 28:51Dax Shepard?

  They're in common.

• 28:52Speaker 01

  Oh, boy.

• 28:53Speaker 02

  Anyway, anyway, but yeah, I did the hotels, I still have them. They just opened one in Ojai last year.

• 28:59Speaker 01

  Open one here, please.

• 29:01Speaker 02

  In LA?

• 29:02Speaker 01

  LA needs better hotels.

• 29:04Speaker 02

  I'm old friends with Andre that owns the Chateau Marmotte, and that's a whole nother story.

• 29:08Speaker 01

  We love that, but that's far away.

• 29:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, if you know of any, Monica, just tell me. Tax, and I would maybe like to get in the hotel business again.

• 29:14Dax Shepard?

  Yes, I think we could really.

• 29:16Speaker 02

  Diversify.

• 29:16Dax Shepard?

  We could have a fun little, another chapter. Not for you, but for me.

• 29:21Speaker 01

  Side hotel, I'm putting that out there.

• 29:23Dax Shepard?

  Oh, then just quickly, because you said, but did you have a little addiction? Did it ever get a little questionable?

• 29:28Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, in my life? What are you talking about? I'm like, living in New York City, I like the dopamine rush of everything. Career dopamine rush, drug dopamine rush, the euphoria of having a success. And then the, you know, then why do you always want more and more and more? Of course. And I think my father was really an alcoholic, to be fair. I think it runs in the family sometimes.

• 29:50Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 29:50Speaker 02

  You know, look, Jean-Michel died of a heroin overdose. He was Jean-Michel Bosque. I was with him the night he died. And I've seen a lot of casualties along the way, obviously.

• 29:59Dax Shepard?

  It's like the opposite ends of the spectrum, in the most dramatic way possible.

• 30:04Speaker 02

  We always have euphoric recall, right? We forget the bad stuff, right? And then we go back and then we forget, oh, this shit. No, it's definitely taken a toll on certain periods of my life, for sure.

• 30:15Dax Shepard?

  So then you must love Monsters of God. I mean, we're getting to deal with a lot of drugs, which is fun, because we haven't had that in your first couple. Well, no, that's not true. Tiger King was very meth-heavy.

• 30:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, I try not to go deep into the meth. But yeah, there was a lot of meth I kind of didn't include as much as I could have.

• 30:31Dax Shepard?

  But it's, it would be crazy not to acknowledge, but it's such a powerful.

• 30:34Dax Shepard?

  Force within the stories we're witnessing. It's like when you wonder, well, why is Joe Exotic got these young guys? What's the leverage? That needs an explanation and the explanation is drugs.

• 30:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, it's a little like that horrible saying, a little pooch gets you a lot of cooch. A little tiger gets you a lot of boys. Nothing better than a little tiger. Sorry about that. But you know, like the little baby tigers were a good gateway drug into getting boys for Joe. And then sprinkle a little meth in with the tigers and then you have a threesome and a foursome.

• 31:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:10Speaker 02

  You've got these cute little monkeys on top of it that you can sugarcoat everything. He had a pretty good trap to get.

• 31:16Dax Shepard?

  Yes.

• 31:17Speaker 02

  His victims.

• 31:18Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 31:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, for sure. But all of that was going on. It was a cocktail of baby tigers, baby animals, meth and boys.

• 31:25Dax Shepard?

  But I guess what I'm saying is I think it's helpful. Like we'll go into 7-Eleven, me and my family. And we get back in the car and they're a little bit like, what is going on with blank, blank, blank? And I'm like, okay, so that dude was on meth for three days. That dude was nodding off from junk. I know what's going on immediately. I know what the fucking scenario is. And I think that is a useful skill set when navigating a world like that.

• 31:49Speaker 02

  I have offices next to Moncarthur Park.

• 31:52Dax Shepard?

  Oh, yes.

• 31:52Speaker 02

  My hotel's on the Bowery in New York. I can tell when I see someone walking across the street, barely able to stand. I usually go like, oh, I want to feel like that guy. I know what that feels like. Barely teetering, he's on dope. And then the meth addicts are over there. I don't know if I want to feel like that. I'm an anthropologist. I can tell what's what, an urban anthropologist. Yeah, I can tell who's on what.

• 32:16Speaker 04

  Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare.

• 32:21Dax Shepard?

  We are supported by Allstate. Checking Allstate first could save you hundreds on car insurance. Not checking your teeth before walking into a meeting? You smiled at six people in the hallway confidently, full teeth? You felt great about it until you caught your reflection and realized you'd been carrying a piece of spinach like an accessory since lunch. Yeah, checking first is a good idea. So check Allstate first for an auto quote. It could save you hundreds. You're in good hands with Allstate. Potential savings vary, subject to terms, conditions and availability. Allstate North American Insurance Company and affiliates, Northbrook, Illinois. We get support from our presenting sponsor, YouTube Premium. Now you already know I'm a big YouTube person.

• 33:03Dax Shepard?

  It's incredible on its own, but premium makes the whole experience feel enhanced. Like you don't realize how much better it can get until you try it. The biggest game changer for me, background play. I love long, two hour deep dives. You name it, motorcycles, travel, cars.

• 33:21Speaker 01

  Cooking shows for me.

• 33:22Dax Shepard?

  Cooking. Listen, with premium, you don't have to keep the screen open. So I can lock my phone, slide it into my pocket and listen to a podcast while I'm folding laundry or working out. It's also completely ad free, meaning when a narrator is building up to the climax of an insane story, there's zero interruption. And for travel, offline download saves the day. I love this one. Relying on airplane wifi can be a gamble, so I just download my favorite videos before takeoff. And with smart downloads, premium will automatically download new videos from channels you actually follow without having to lift a finger. I'm covered if I forget to download a video I want to watch, or even if there's no service. And the home run for me is that YouTube premium remembers exactly where I left off

• 34:04Dax Shepard?

  and lets me continue watching on another device from right where I stopped. So I can start a video on my TV while brushing my teeth and pick it right back up on my phone on my morning walk. So yeah, YouTube was already great, but premium supercharges it. If you like YouTube, you'll love premium. Try YouTube premium for two months free at youtube.com/premium. Trial eligibility varies. Terms apply, cancel anytime. We get support from Superhuman. I'm someone who wants to do big, meaningful work, but the small stuff eats up my day before I even get to it. The endless emails, docs, scheduling, follow ups that pile up. By the time all that's cleared, there's no energy left for the ambitious stuff. Most AI tools promise to fix that, but they require opening a new tab,

• 34:48Dax Shepard?

  re-explaining everything from scratch every single time. A week later, it's just another thing collecting dust in the browser. Superhuman, from the makers of Grammarly, is different. It's already embedded inside the tools people are using, email, docs, browser. It's not waiting to be found. It's already there, working alongside, clearing what's in the way. So the focus stays on what's actually worth doing. A thought partner that's already up to speed, no catching it up. It knows the style, the workflows, and it backs people up without getting in the way. At your service, not after your job. That's the difference. Give it a try for yourself. Start streamlining your workflows with Superhuman. Try today at superhuman.com.

• 35:31Dax Shepard?

  We get support from Instagram teen accounts. So we talk a lot on this show about how the world is different now than when we were growing up. And one of the biggest differences is obviously social media. And I think a lot of people wonder, okay, what's actually being done to make it safer for teenagers?

• 35:47Speaker 01

  Which is a fair question.

• 35:48Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, so Instagram has got something called teen accounts and they come with automatic protections built in by default. So anyone between 13 and 17 is automatically placed into this experience. They get age appropriate content settings, contact limits, so that by default, only people they're already connected to can message them. And time management tools, daily time limit reminders, and also sleep mode that mutes notifications from 10:00 PM to 7:00 AM.

• 36:14Speaker 01

  Sleep mode is genius.

• 36:16Dax Shepard?

  Right? And here's the thing, for anyone under 16, a parent has to give permission to change any of those settings to be less strict. The guardrails are on and Instagram keeps building new safety features to create age appropriate experiences for teens.

• 36:31Speaker 01

  I am really glad Instagram's helping to give parents peace of mind with teen accounts.

• 36:35Dax Shepard?

  Learn more about teen accounts and Instagram's ongoing work to protect teens online at instagram.com/teenaccounts.

• 36:49Dax Shepard?

  I think it's a great skill set for navigating in the doc world because you're dropping into these things. You're getting the fast pass to what's really going on.

• 36:57Speaker 02

  Docs, I was filming in Vegas, another project I'm doing with Netflix right now. And we were filming this guy who was smoking fentanyl and meth. And my cameraman is sober and he blew it right in his face. And contact high, you know, I'm okay for.

• 37:15Dax Shepard?

  Freeman by a cameraman.

• 37:16Speaker 02

  Literally absolutely had to take a pause, a timeout. But we've been filming a lot of people that are in that state.

• 37:22Dax Shepard?

  Would we call that a hillbilly speedball? Meth and fentanyl?

• 37:26Speaker 01

  I think we call it like death, right?

• 37:28Speaker 02

  Well, apparently it's a good blend for a lot of people.

• 37:32Speaker 01

  Really?

• 37:32Dax Shepard?

  What's a speedball?

• 37:33Speaker 01

  I don't understand fentanyl then. I thought if you had just a little bit, you died. So how are people doing it? And.

• 37:40Speaker 02

  It's insanely, insanely powerful, but you can get the right dosage. You're getting it at the hospital. They know how. No, they did it great on 60 Minutes when they, they had an expert on and they had this little kilo. And then they had a penny and on the penny had a little amount of fentanyl. And said, this is enough to kill a 10,000 pound elephant. And then the little bag that was next to it said, this is enough to kill like the village or something, you know?

• 38:03Dax Shepard?

  It's insanely powerful, but it obviously could be as the doctors do dosed correctly.

• 38:09Speaker 02

  But a lot of these people, they're even smart enough to have Narcan. A lot of the people just have it already. So if you go into a drug den house, which I've been in recently in Vegas, where there's 20 people in there doing meth and fentanyl and everything, they have Narcan. But yeah, Narcan doesn't always.

• 38:24Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 38:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:25Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. Okay, so you also dabble in the nineties. And again, this is so exciting research in you today. You did the Nine Inch Nails video.

• 38:34Speaker 02

  Pinion.

• 38:34Dax Shepard?

  Pinion.

• 38:35Speaker 02

  I did two Nine Inch Nails videos, but they were more like making short films in the early nineties.

• 38:39Dax Shepard?

  I see, oh, he directed a video. I wonder if I ever saw it. And the second it starts like, oh my God, this is one of the most like indelible. You know, this is a very memorable video. It starts with these three toilets, black and white, in clearly like a New York bathroom. It's not inviting. You follow the swirl of the water down a pipe. You're going through all the pipes in the city, following it for a while. There's machinery. All of a sudden, the pipe is linked to a person in a rubber BDSM outfit. And it's just filling up. I mean, what a visual.

• 39:08Speaker 02

  It was funny, in between clubs and restaurants in New York, I thought, it would be fun to make some music videos. Someone came up to me on the street and said, if you want to write something for Nine Inch Nails. I didn't even know Trent Reznor. I didn't know Nine Inch Nails. And I wrote a treatment, that one. And they said, we love it. I did some drawings and I made that. Short film, they gave me 10,000 bucks to make a music video. And this is when David Fincher and Mark Romanek and all these guys were doing music videos, before they were big movie directors. And we were all sort of writing for the same artists, Black Crows and Nirvana and et cetera. But anyway, I thought it was really fun because the band wasn't even in the music video. So I basically could do whatever I wanted and make a short, weird, boon well film.

• 39:52Speaker 02

  So I did a second one called Help Me, I'm in Hell with a guy in a padded cell, eating a steak dinner with shaved head with just hundreds of flies flying around and landing on him, and landing on his fork, and that was it. And then it goes down a little bit of a dark rabbit hole.

• 40:08Dax Shepard?

  You're almost like artsy John Waters.

• 40:10Speaker 02

  Oh, you know, John and I are old friends.

• 40:13Dax Shepard?

  You are?

• 40:13Speaker 02

  He's coming to Ojai in October.

• 40:15Dax Shepard?

  Oh, okay.

• 40:15Speaker 02

  John, I'm talking about you. I've known John Waters for 40 years. I love John. I interviewed John in Baltimore at his house not so long ago for a different project. But yeah, it was like making short films and making those music videos.

• 40:28Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 40:28Speaker 02

  It was fun.

• 40:29Dax Shepard?

  Okay, so you do the hotel thing, and I was like, what next? It's conservation first, then into docs, right?

• 40:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, I reached a point, like I said, where I was successful with the hotel world and restaurants. And I had the resources to start thinking about other things and maybe things that were more important to me. And maybe also things that were going on with the world at the time. And this was in the early 2000s, late 1990s, when I became more aware of the extinction crisis, a serious topic. And there was a great book by Elizabeth Colbert called The Sixth Extinction, which is the first man-made extinction ever, which is also called The Anthropocene. The current extinction we're in right now is because of us. Climate change, us, you know, the impact on the planet. Eight billion people on planet Earth. When I was born, there was two and a half billion people. All the things that we've done have created this extinction crisis we live in today.

• 41:21Speaker 02

  And so primates and turtles and tortoises are the two vertebrates that are the most threatened with extinction. Because over half of each group is threatened with extinction. So I said, I want to do something about that. I want to help with these turtles that I love. So I started getting involved with turtle and tortoise conservation, with conservation in general, working with different groups around the world.

• 41:41Dax Shepard?

  It's interesting because I'm watching last night with my family, episode two. You know, of course, my wife and my children are horrified. There's some very horrific things about these very, very rare animals dying. And I'm just admitting my own shittiness. I don't have a major connection to reptiles, right? So it's not hitting me. I'm more fascinated by the culture of the dudes. And then there's a bit of footage where they're talking about like, oh, yeah, he had everything. How do you get a baby gorilla? Now, my specialty or my focus was primates when I majored in anthropology. That was my interest, right? And I'm immediately like, I'll tell you how, motherfuckers. They killed all the family members of that little baby gorilla. That's what happened. That baby gorilla represents six probably dead adults. And I was like, fuck, fuck these motherfuckers.

• 42:23Dax Shepard?

  And I was like, oh, yeah, that's just the power of, that really affects me. And I've done the gorilla track, the majesty of those things.

• 42:31Speaker 02

  No, no, the old school way of getting menageries into zoos, where you go to wherever and you shoot and kill the adult hippos and you bag the baby. Because you're not going to be able to get a giant hippo onto a boat or onto a plane. And so the old way was you shoot the adult elephants and you get the baby. The gorilla, you shoot the silverbacks and you get the baby. That was what menageries did back in the day. And so it was really horrific.

• 42:53Dax Shepard?

  What are menageries? Are these traveling like animal shows?

• 42:56Speaker 02

  Getting a collection of animals.

• 42:57Dax Shepard?

  Oh, okay, that's called a menagerie.

• 42:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, so to get all these animals into zoos, they would do precisely what you just said. They would shoot the adults and grab the babies. Today, that's not the case. Gorillas now are being bred in captivity and we're not going and killing adult gorillas to get the baby.

• 43:12Dax Shepard?

  But definitely in the Diane Fossey days, that was an epidemic.

• 43:15Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:16Dax Shepard?

  Okay, so you start first, I guess, the turtle.

• 43:20Speaker 02

  The Turtle Conservancy, shameless plug.

• 43:23Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, no. You donate $30 million of your own money to this.

• 43:27Speaker 02

  Probably more at this point.

• 43:29Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 43:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, we're right now, this comes out after the show series, right? So I can, no spoiler alerts, right?

• 43:35Dax Shepard?

  Yes, right? There's only three more weeks, right? Yes, yes.

• 43:39Speaker 02

  No, but at the end of Monsters of God, there's sort of an optimistic ending after a lot of dark, you know.

• 43:45Dax Shepard?

  History.

• 43:46Speaker 02

  Well, and yeah, just things that'll be really surprising when you see the, all five episodes of Monsters of God, there'll be things that you would not expect. But at the end, we successfully breed at the Turtle Conservancy, the rarest tortoise in the world that's never been bred before in the Western world, ever, in any zoo. And it was auspicious that when we basically finished Monsters of God, we got our first hatchling of what's called a ploughshare tortoise, which is a tortoise that's functionally extinct in the wild in Madagascar. Only comes from a tiny part of Madagascar. But we're sending our young, now we have 30 young baby ploughshare tortoises back to Madagascar. So there's this kind of optimistic, really cool ending. Two Monsters of God, that's sort of beautiful.

• 44:27Speaker 02

  And it was just, like I said, really auspicious because we've worked with this species for over 20 years. And I gotta give a shout out to Leonardo DiCaprio right now. Because he's helped us with some funding and he's doing this thing right now with Bezos. That's incredible. That's helping us basically save a lot of really, really endangered species right now.

• 44:45Dax Shepard?

  Oh, wonderful.

• 44:46Speaker 01

  He should probably come on and talk about.

• 44:48Speaker 02

  Leo?

• 44:48Speaker 01

  We should probably, he should probably just.

• 44:50Speaker 02

  Well, I gotta just say, people always say that actors shouldn't be doing anything other than acting and they shouldn't do philanthropic things.

• 44:58Speaker 01

  They shouldn't have any opinions.

• 44:59Speaker 02

  They shouldn't have an opinion. They shouldn't be political. People always say, Sean Penn, stop, you know, doing anything but acting. Stay in your lane. And I know Sean, and I have to say, Sean, you went and met with Chapo Guzman. That was fucking unbelievable. And I felt like that when I met with some of the characters you're going to see in Monsters of God. Like, it's dangerous. And Sean, he understands, you know, drugs. And he understands that just putting Chapo in prison isn't the answer. And he went to Mexico. And I gotta give Sean a lot of credit for that. But anyway, I'm sort of digressing or diverging. But I will say, just because of the community you're involved in, it's great when people speak out and do something, whether it's political or conservation related or whatever it is, whatever your thing is.

• 45:42Dax Shepard?

  You're pretty busy, I would imagine, doing that work. And then how do we get to directing Tiger King?

• 45:47Speaker 02

  A friend of mine, Fisher Stevens, who won an Oscar for the film The Cove with Luis Cervantes. I was talking with Fisher about doing something on the reptile world. And there was a book called The Lizard King, written by a friend of mine, Brian Christie. And I said, Fisher, read this book, it's a great story. And we met at the Barry Hotel at JAMA one day for lunch. And he said, I read the book, it's really good. But how do you make this documentary without getting killed? And that kind of discouraged me because there's a lot of scary people in this story.

• 46:16Dax Shepard?

  My favorite character of the whole thing is Mario.

• 46:18Speaker 02

  Mario. Well, wait until you meet Anson Wong in Malaysia, who's the kingpin. He's the Pablo Escobar of the, you know. But anyway, I was discouraged. I was in like 2012. And then Fisher did a film with Leonardo DiCaprio called Before the Flood about climate change. And he was trying to sell it to CNN and CNN passed. And then Fisher goes, well, you know, my friend Eric Good has this footage of this weird guy, Joe Exotic. And then I did a CNN pilot. They were interested in that.

• 46:48Dax Shepard?

  Really quick, how had you met Joe?

• 46:50Speaker 02

  I just started filming reptile people in the beginning with these guys, the Safdie Brothers, that you may know. Josh Safdie, who just was up for an Oscar with.

• 46:59Dax Shepard?

  And he's a producer on Monsters.

• 47:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, so 12 years ago, we started filming in South Florida. We were filming some reptile people, Mario, Josh and I, and his brother. And one day, a guy drove in with a snow leopard in his van. And we were like, wait a minute, you can just buy a snow leopard? So that got me focused on big cats. I got off reptiles. The CNN thing didn't work. Jeff Zucker, who was running CNN at the time, didn't want another old Anthony Bourdain. Anthony Bourdain was still alive. So our CNN pilot didn't work, which was about our relationship with animals. Anyway, but I got into Tiger King accidentally because I just fell into it.

• 47:35Dax Shepard?

  You followed that snow leopard.

• 47:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was really doing a story about reptiles.

• 47:39Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 47:39Speaker 02

  Tiger King got in the way, Chimpanzee got in the way, finally finished Monsters of God. But yeah, Joe was a lot of fun and Oklahoma was a lot of fun for me.

• 47:48Dax Shepard?

  So this is my question about Tiger King. I'm not conflicted. I don't mind loving bad people. I think I grew up with a lot of bad people that I love, right? So I am at both times judgmental, obviously, of Joe Exotic's terrible treatment of animals. And I don't think people should have any of his animals. But also, I am very attracted to him. He's a very compelling person and I'm attracted to him, right? And I do wonder what your tension is when you're making these. Do you fall in love with some of these people that obviously you condemn their behavior? But do you fall a little bit in love with them?

• 48:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's a lot of lovable things about Joe Exotic. And you know, all of us have our good parts and bad parts. He had some really bad parts as well.

• 48:27Dax Shepard?

  I think him being gay really helped me. That's a rough road in Oklahoma where he grew up. And he's kind of twisted now because.

• 48:34Speaker 02

  That gay, extreme narcissism was really interesting with him. But you know, I think what I'm interested in is often we think about New York, LA, London, Paris, whatever. These are the places where everything's happening. And the truth is, in flyover states, Middle America, places that you don't think anything interesting is happening, in fact, there's a lot of interesting, weird shit going on. And if you start turning over the rocks and looking, you find these really interesting characters. And you mentioned John Waters, or you think of Errol Morris and Vernon Florida, a really great film he did in the Panhandle of Florida. Or you think of Todd Solon, so another director who kind of looked at that landscape. He did that film, Welcome to the Dollhouse.

• 49:16Speaker 02

  But I'm really interested in worlds that aren't so obvious to all of us. So Joe Exotic wasn't really what people were thinking about. Same with monkey moms. Who knew that there were all these monkey moms across the country? Women that need and want to have a baby forever. And it becomes a monkey. And so, yes, back to what you said earlier. I think that it's the characters that are really important. But in the end, watching these stories, the silver lining is, of course, can we do something to prevent having a chimpanzee incarcerated in a basement in solitary confinement when they are complex social animals and you know about primates? You know, can we do something about that? Can we make change with people keeping 200 tigers in a zoo and basically killing off the adults because they are expensive to keep?

• 50:00Speaker 02

  Because you have to feed them a lot of fresh meat.

• 50:02Speaker 01

  You walk the line so well.

• 50:04Dax Shepard?

  Tiger King got a lot of criticism, but at the end of it, what's this act that was passed? The Big Cat?

• 50:08Speaker 02

  Big Cat Public Safety Act, which banned people from having big cats in the private sector.

• 50:12Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 50:13Speaker 02

  And creating big cat puppy mills.

• 50:15Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. And so this movie that had its critics did get legislation passed. And changed.

• 50:22Speaker 02

  I never thought in a million years Tiger King would be what it was.

• 50:26Dax Shepard?

  No one on the planet. Thirty-nine million people watched it in the first ten days.

• 50:30Speaker 02

  But who could have imagined that COVID hit right when it hit?

• 50:33Speaker 01

  It was good time.

• 50:33Speaker 02

  I had a captive audience watching captive tigers. When you have something like that, there are always going to be criticism and jealousy and all these kinds of things happen. But in the end of the day, it did change a really important piece of legislation. Or that legislation was passed to stop this abuse of tigers and big cats, lions and jaguars, et cetera. And we also donated money to tiger conservation in India. And that's why I was in Kerala not so long ago, a lot of money. So there was a lot of things that I think came from that. And of course, more importantly, and it's a cliche to say this, but you don't want to make films that just preach to the converted, right? Because why make a film that everyone already knows the issue and I'm going to show it to a small group of people and we can talk about tigers?

• 51:17Speaker 02

  You need to cast a wide net and obviously preach to the unconverted. And I think Tiger King did that to some extent.

• 51:22Dax Shepard?

  That's why I think you're a very special face of conservation, because I don't find you to be preachy or saccharine or pretentious or sanctimonious. And that is what's off-putting about a lot of these movements. We need a lot more, I think, level centrist-y people attacking these issues because the other mouthpieces are just very polarizing.

• 51:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, for sure. And I was on a call yesterday with someone from an animal rights group that wants me to speak, do a keynote at a big animal rights conference that's going to take place actually in Mexico City. And I was saying to them, listen, you're not going to want me speaking because I'm not as polarized as you guys. I'm more of an animal welfare person. I kind of walk the line of trying to get everyone together. I work in a lot of red states.

• 52:10Speaker 01

  Thank God, we need that.

• 52:11Speaker 02

  But I have to talk to everybody.

• 52:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 52:13Speaker 02

  And if I walked in and just was like, I hate what you do. Don't do what you're doing. You're fucked up. You're morally repugnant. No one's going to talk to me.

• 52:20Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 52:21Dax Shepard?

  Because listen, I'm watching Monsters of God and it's like, again, what they're doing is terrible, clearly. But I'm also seeing a story of manhood unfold too. I'm seeing Tommy who starts this reptile pet shop and all of a sudden bikers are hanging out there. And all of a sudden, he's getting invited with the big boys to biker stuff and he's feeling like a man. And a lot of these guys, it was their pathway to feel like a man that the nerdy guy who reaches out to Tommy, the reptile dude. And he even says in your doc, he's like, that's the second time I had sex on that trip. I'm also quite empathetic to like this masculinity journey that kind of directionless men are feeling. And whoever embraced them, yeah, they ran towards the motorcycle gang and they ran towards the drug dealers because they were invited.

• 53:05Dax Shepard?

  And so there's a lot of stories being told and I'm very, very empathetic and sympathetic to those men and their weird journey of trying to be a man. There's a lot of sadness I have for them.

• 53:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, nothing is black and white. When you continue with the series, you'll start to see that a lot of best intentions, a lot of laws that are out there about what you can keep in this country, pythons or this or that, a lot of them actually don't work. So there's a lot of unintended consequences from best intentions. The Endangered Species Act doesn't fit all. So there's species right now on the Endangered Species Act that should not be. There are species that should be added on. They need to be. But US Fish and Wildlife Service in this country is understaffed, undermanned. They're trying the best they can, but it needs to be better. The zoos need to be better.

• 53:56Speaker 02

  I've gotten a lot of criticism from Monsters of God, from the zoo community, that I showed some of the skeletons in the closets that the zoos have been responsible for. You know, the Bronx Zoo in nineteen, I don't know, fifteen, twenty, had a human being in a cage in the ape house called Atabanga. They had a human, a guy that was captured in West Africa, you know, sort of a small indigenous pygmy with these teeth that were carved like shark's teeth. And they put him in a cage in the ape house at the Bronx Zoo. There were people that were kept in zoological institutions on exhibit in Europe. There were Native Americans in tents at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago in the 50s. So we've exploited humans and animals and zoos have a long history.

• 54:38Speaker 02

  But we, as a culture, have a long history that isn't very good when you look back. And women couldn't vote and gay rights and you mentioned all these things. So anyway, zoos have evolved and they need to get better even still. But we show some of the skeletons in the closets, but not just with zoos. We also show law enforcement's not perfect in this story. And you'll see something really revealing in the fifth episode. And so the conclusion at the end of Monsters of God is we're all complicit. There isn't necessarily one clear bad guy.

• 55:06Dax Shepard?

  But let's walk through it a little bit because I think a lot of people will have not yet started Monsters of God. So in a nutshell, we meet these two guys who are pretty infamous reptile traders and they're mostly in the 80s, right?

• 55:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, Tom Crutchfield and Hank Molt.

• 55:19Dax Shepard?

  Right. And Hank, he's a very specific archetype and he's a very intelligent guy. And by my non-expert judgment, he seems a little sociopathic.

• 55:26Speaker 02

  No, no, for sure.

• 55:27Dax Shepard?

  So Hank kind of starts this thing, right? He publishes this list and you can buy these different reptiles and some of them are super rare. And then some of them become endangered, which ups the value enormously. And he's willing to travel the world and gather these things. Most of his heavy paying clients are zoos, the San Diego Zoo, the Detroit Zoo. So we're in a murky territory, right? These zoos want these animals and who's going to go get them? The zoo doesn't have anybody to go do that. And so this guy fills this niche and he starts making a lot of money and he's now hiring people. And this Tommy guy is fascinated and he then gets into it. And so that's kind of working out. And then what happens though to Hank? How's he go to prison?

• 56:09Speaker 02

  There's a shipment that comes in from Southeast Asia, big shipment. And the customs agents at the time, it's sort of before US Fish and Wildlife was really doing this stuff. You know, were like suspicious of that shipment. And then ultimately one thing led to another. It was illegal animals coming in. A law had just been passed called the Endangered Species Act. And another law that was called CITES, the Convention of International Trade in Endangered Species. They both happened around the same time. So he was in trouble and he did some time for bringing in animals without getting obviously permission. And those laws were in effect, that went into effect in 1973. So Hank started a little earlier, before the 80s, and then Tommy came into play in the early 80s.

• 56:51Dax Shepard?

  So when Hank goes to prison, Tommy just picks up basically his price list. Now he's the Hank and Hank hates him for it. So now we have the Carol fucking basket and Joe exotic war, right? Which I don't know how you keep stumbling into these crazy feuds. But this is one of them. And so they kind of hate each other. And then Tommy becomes incredibly successful. And it's funny because he just starts doing the exact same thing Hank did. And now he kind of gets rich, relatively rich in his world.

• 57:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 57:25Dax Shepard?

  So that's simmering so far. That's, episode one's kind of simmering.

• 57:29Speaker 02

  Then Hank gets revenge on Tommy and puts Tommy in prison for the Fiji Island iguanas. And then episode two, yeah.

• 57:35Dax Shepard?

  So episode two, we meet Ray Van Nostron and Mario. Tell me about those two guys for a second.

• 57:43Speaker 02

  Mario was born in Cuba. His father was in the Bay of Pigs and worked for the CIA.

• 57:49Dax Shepard?

  CIA operative.

• 57:50Speaker 02

  They migrate to South Florida when he's very young. Mario has this affinity and love of animals that his family doesn't embrace. And of course, you do what your family says no to, and he gets into the animal business. But he also starts to realize that the skills that his father learned in Cuba from the US government, what do you do with those skills? And they became very valuable.

• 58:11Dax Shepard?

  A lot of the famous 80s Miami cocaine cowboys had been in the Bay of Pigs.

• 58:15Speaker 02

  And they hated John F. Kennedy at that time because he didn't go through with what he had promised. And the US backed out and left these guys high and dry. Anyway, they turned that skill into smuggling drugs. And so Mario was part of that culture. His father obviously had those skills. In Little Havana, they own a jewelry store where everyone would hang out and drug dealers like jewelry, as you see in the show. And Mario got into both bringing in animals, parrots, monkeys, snakes and drugs, cocaine and marijuana mostly. And ultimately at the time, Janet Reno was, I think, the district attorney of Florida before she went up to DC. And they basically were looking at the big drug kingpins in Florida.

• 58:56Speaker 02

  Mario and his father were part of a group that was bringing in tens of millions of dollars worth of drugs. They targeted him and he got away a few times. And then he made a fatal mistake of killing an undercover informant, tried to bury him. But in South Florida, all you hit is coral, you can't dig. So they burned the body and that's what started everything. And ultimately Mario did get caught, sentenced to a hundred years in prison.

• 59:21Dax Shepard?

  And Mario's life, the footage of this guy's life in the 80s before he gets arrested, he has this compound that probably would only be rivaled by Pablo Escobar's down in fucking Medellin.

• 59:32Speaker 02

  Or Scarface.

• 59:33Dax Shepard?

  Yes. He's got lions and tigers at his house and he's got monkeys running around and he's got all these crazy reptiles. And he even says in this doc, my addiction is animals. I sold drugs to fuel my addiction for animals.

• 59:48Speaker 01

  And you're talking to him in this doc?

• 59:50Dax Shepard?

  Ultimately, he's warned the whole doc, right? He's talking to this DEA agent, he's like, just even be careful the way you're talking. And every- When he interviews about Mario, a husband will walk in and be like, hon, don't say more about that. It's clear from the beginning. No one wants him to talk about Mario at all. He's still very dangerous. The DA guy said, he's the only person I still fear. Don't even talk about him. And Eric goes to his fucking house and sits with him.

• 1:00:16Speaker 02

  You know, it's funny about, I don't know anything about profiling and law enforcement, but I was told to call his lobbyist in DC. These guys have lobbyists to make sure they can keep their animals off the roadside. So I called this guy. He had an Italian name, Frank, something, Perillo or something. And he said to me, there's a hundred reasons why you shouldn't talk to Mario. And he listed some of them. I can't think of any reason why this would be positive for Mario. So I struck out and then I finally ambushed Mario one day and just went in there and got my foot in the door. The first thing he said to me, and I was with Josh Shaftey, actually, the first time we went in with Mario. And Josh, he put on these spy glasses that were so obvious. Wow, Mario was showing us that

• 1:00:58Speaker 02

  was filming. Of course, in the end, of course, in the end, the footage didn't even work. But the next day we went, Josh goes, oh, fuck, Eric, I gotta wear the glasses for continuity. He's gonna think it's weird if I don't have the glasses. So he had to put the glasses on again. They're not even working. And Josh is like, wearing these glasses. But Mario, it was almost like the cliche of that film, Analyze This with the mafia guys and what's his name, place the shrink.

• 1:01:21Dax Shepard?

  Billy Crystal.

• 1:01:21Speaker 02

  Billy Crystal. It was almost like that in real life. Mario, first time I went there, I kid you not, because maybe we're similar age and I'm not really a journalist, I had nightclubs. He confided with me the first day and he says to me, you know, I go to a therapist once a week or twice a week, but really, I'm screwing this girl that works for me and went go to a motel down the street. And his wife's standing right over there. But he confides in me and we had this sort of this simpatico situation. He would tell me the most intimate things. And we got on this level that was so unbelievable, way beyond just someone coming in and filming. It was almost cathartic for Mario to have someone to talk to. And there was a certain sadness with Mario. So I had this very mixed

• 1:02:04Speaker 02

  feeling about Mario to this day. There's honor among thieves and he has this certain moral code. That's really unbelievable. He has principles. It's really interesting.

• 1:02:13Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah. Well, all the guys, one guy's like, I'll steal the animals, but I don't want to do guns. I'll do the drugs, but I won't, you know, they all kinda.

• 1:02:19Speaker 01

  Everyone has their boundaries and limits so that they feel okay doing it.

• 1:02:22Speaker 02

  He saw episode two, though, and at first he was pissed because he was like, I didn't ship cocaine in with a Cobra. And we were like, Mario, we're not really saying you necessarily did it, but people did. And then at the end of the show, he goes, I loved the sex scenes. I love that I'm still such as, you know, such a dude, a hero. But he loved that.

• 1:02:41Dax Shepard?

  Yes, of course. And also, Monica, you're watching, it's like, he got sentenced to a hundred years. He's out in 12. This is a big mystery. It's one of the only things he doesn't want to talk about. He says something very innocuous, like, you know, sometimes the government needs people who, so you get the sense that they've let him out to do this. I don't know. Who knows what would happen?

• 1:03:01Speaker 02

  No, that's crazy. How you can get out of prison if you have information.

• 1:03:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:05Dax Shepard?

  I'm always fascinated, like, these guys have insane amounts of money, right? Did you ever read Killing Pablo, that great?

• 1:03:11Speaker 02

  No, no. I'm terribly illiterate. But keep going.

• 1:03:14Dax Shepard?

  If you're ever gonna read a book.

• 1:03:15Speaker 02

  I should be much better at that.

• 1:03:16Dax Shepard?

  That would be the one. You know, these guys, they're burying money. They forget about it. Rot. Their big problem was the cash. They couldn't ever convert it. And you always wonder when these guys go away, it's like, well, surely they had some somewhere. And when I at least see your doc, I'm like, yeah, somehow that guy still has, he's still in a big compound driving a Jeezy.

• 1:03:31Speaker 02

  It's so interesting, because when I had nightclubs in the eighties, it was cash. There was no credit cards.

• 1:03:36Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:03:37Speaker 02

  It was a cash business. I remember having so much cash at a certain point in my life.

• 1:03:40Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:41Speaker 02

  They didn't have cash machines back then. And counting millions of dollars in cash is so tedious. And Mario used to tell me, again, confiding with me, like, you know, 10 million dollars in cash, and to count it and to figure out where you put it. And you know, back in those days, you're trying to get banks to take.

• 1:03:57Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, you can't really use it.

• 1:03:58Speaker 02

  I buried some cash one time. It was the biggest mistake of my life. I came back eight years later and it turned into mud. I never want to touch cash again in my life, even though it's so fun to have cash. But when you're making that much cash, it's a liability.

• 1:04:13Dax Shepard?

  This is Pablo. It's like, he had no problem getting the cocaine in and out of places, but he couldn't do anything with his fucking cash. It's this weird, paradoxical.

• 1:04:22Speaker 02

  You know, South Florida in the eighties and nineties really was like that, by the way. The only time in my life I ever was shot at, randomly shot at with guns, was in Florida, in Miami, in 1993 or something. I was going to a nightclub at night in a rented minivan with some friends. We didn't have cell phones. We got lost. We were trying to call Fab Five Freddie, who was telling us to go to some club in New York. Freddie, where's the fucking club? I say to one of the girls I was with, go and call at this phone booth. And the next thing I knew, these two guys were walking at night towards us and started shooting at our van, blew out the back window, blew out the side window. And I suddenly, I was like, listen, you guys, we're going home. Went back to the hotel. I had long hair back then. I woke up in the morning with all that little glass ice cubes

• 1:05:05Speaker 02

  from the, you know, in my hair and everywhere. But South Florida was like the wild, wild west. People were shooting everybody. The emergency rooms were insane.

• 1:05:15Speaker 04

  Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.

• 1:05:21Dax Shepard?

  We get support by Peloton. You know that feeling when you're spiraling over a problem and you just can't figure it out? When that happens to me, I need a change of pace. And I've found that running is the best way. It takes my brain out of the driver's seat and I come back with a fresh perspective. Running can be freeing and cathartic and Peloton helps you feel all of that. And now that feeling fits wherever you need it with the new Peloton Tread Flex. It's movable and foldable, designed to fit your life. So next time you feel stuck, you can go for a run literally anywhere, whether that's in your office, living room, or even the attic. Plus, they have classes with expert instructors and programs to meet you at any level and keep you moving. Let yourself run. Explore

• 1:06:06Dax Shepard?

  the new Peloton Tread Flex at onepeloton.com. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. If you've thought about trying therapy with our long-term partner, BetterHelp, insurance options may now be available nationwide with an average copay for eligible members of just $23 per session. October 10th is World Mental Health Day, but you don't need a day on the calendar to give yourself permission to talk to someone. I've been in therapy for a long time and the stuff rattling around in my head always just quiets down the second I say it out loud. And it doesn't have to be some big life crisis. Maybe it's a work thing that's taking up too much space or hard relationship moment, or just a feeling that something's off. That's enough. That's worth talking about.

• 1:06:48Speaker 01

  You know, I love therapy more than anything. Gets me through. Often I'll want to cancel because I'm like, I don't really have anything to talk about. And then I'll go and I have some major revelation.

• 1:06:59Dax Shepard?

  You know, I was just talking to a friend who has just started it. And I said, one of the most powerful elements of it is just hearing yourself say out loud the thing that's been ruminating in your head and how different it sounds once it's out into the world. You gain perspective immediately just by hearing yourself say it.

• 1:07:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, you do.

• 1:07:15Dax Shepard?

  If you've been waiting to start therapy, BetterHelp works with more than 125 health plan networks and eligible members have an average copay of just $23 per session with insurance. Don't have insurance or live outside the US? You can still get 10% off your first month. Do yourself a favor and just try it. Future you will be grateful. Visit betterhelp.com/dax to explore your payment options. That's better H E L P dot com slash DAX. We get support from our sponsor, Lilly. For adults with obesity or with excess weight and weight-related medical problems, it's time to find out about Foundo or for Glee Pro. Foundo is a once daily prescription GLP-1 medicine used with a reduced calorie

• 1:07:58Dax Shepard?

  diet and increased physical activity to help adults with obesity or some adults with overweight who also have weight-related medical problems to lose excess body weight and keep the weight off.

• 1:08:08Speaker 05

  Foundo should not be used with other GLP-1 receptor agonist medicines. It is not known if Foundo is safe and effective for use in children. Don't take Foundo if you're allergic to it, or if you or someone in your family had majorary thyroid cancer or multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type two. Stop and call your doctor right away if you have an allergic reaction, a lump or swelling in your neck, or severe stomach pain. Serious side effects may include inflamed pancreas and gallbladder problems. Tell your doctor if you experience vision changes, if you're nursing, pregnant, plant to be, or taking birth control pills, and before scheduled procedures with anesthesia. Taking Foundo with an insulin or sulfonylurea may cause low blood sugar. Side effects include diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, which can cause dehydration and may cause kidney problems. Once Daily

• 1:08:49Speaker 05

  Foundo is available by prescription only in 0.8 milligram, 2.5 milligram, 5.5 milligram, 9 milligram, 14.5 milligram, and 17.2 milligram tablets. Learn more at foundo.lilly.com or call 1-800-LILY-RX. Now is perfect to talk to your doctor about Foundo.

• 1:09:06Dax Shepard?

  This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace. We've talked before about Rob building our website on Squarespace and I bring it up again because it's a perfect example of what they do well. Rob had all the pieces, the content, the vision, the ideas, but he needed something to actually take all that and make it public facing. And Squarespace was that bridge. Maybe you're in the same spot. You've been developing something, a business, a skill set, a body of work, and it's been private. It's been yours. But at some point, you're ready to put it out there. And that transition from private to public can feel like a huge leap. Squarespace makes it feel like a step. Beautiful templates, built-in SEO, email campaigns, scheduling, analytics, everything you need to go from, I've been working on this, to

• 1:09:49Dax Shepard?

  here it is, come find me. All in one place, no code, no stitching together a bunch of different tools. So if you've been sitting on something and waiting for the right moment, this might be it. Head to Squarespace.com/dax for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code DAX to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

• 1:10:18Speaker 01

  I'm gonna make a weird observation. Maybe if it comes off bad, I still wanna go to the battery. But in all your docs, we're following people and we're like, "These people are crazy." But you're a little crazy. Like, you are a little crazy to be going to these people, to put yourself in these positions. The danger is so high. And do you get, like, off on it? What's the draw to the danger?

• 1:10:47Speaker 02

  The honest answer is, I'm not like some tough guy by any stretch. And the honest answer is, it's like back to Sean Penn meeting Chapo Guzman in Mexico. Bad guys kill people for a reason. Drug routes are a big deal, and they kill over drug routes. They kill if you stole their drugs, or whatever. I'm walking in, I've done nothing to these people. So I'm not really worried about someone coming and killing me unless I wrong them. Where it gets scary isn't when you go in and first meet these folks. People just start killing you unless there's real reasons. And so it's when they've watched the show.

• 1:11:19Speaker 01

  Of course.

• 1:11:20Speaker 02

  And then Mario sees, "Oh, you passed a law. That means I can't have my tigers anymore." "I need my tigers to make a living at my zoo."

• 1:11:28Speaker 01

  Or they feel used.

• 1:11:30Speaker 02

  So that's when I've talked to law enforcement and people about, "Are the people that are really threatening me online over and over the ones to be careful with? No, it's the ones that never say anything." I'd be stupid, and I'm probably stupid even saying this right now, but yeah, it's more later down the rub when you impact their life.

• 1:11:47Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:11:48Speaker 02

  Not when you walk in the door and are interviewing. Because they don't know.

• 1:11:51Dax Shepard?

  They're not serial killers. They don't get off on just murdering people. That's not the incentive.

• 1:11:55Speaker 02

  I'm not interviewing and talking around with serial killers.

• 1:11:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:58Dax Shepard?

  Back to the crazy part is like, I often say this about when I was smoking crack, which is like, a lot of it's crack. It's great, but a lot of it's going downtown. I have to interact with this seventeen-year-old dude who's got a handgun, and we gotta go into this house. Like, that is very dope, I mean, rich. It's half of what's going on and the addiction to it.

• 1:12:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, of course. That's kind of what I wonder, like, when you're walking up to the door to ring the doorbell.

• 1:12:25Dax Shepard?

  And everyone's told you, "Do not go near this guy."

• 1:12:28Speaker 01

  Is it a high?

• 1:12:30Speaker 02

  I mean, it's a high to get in and then get that comfort where you realize you did it.

• 1:12:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:35Speaker 02

  It's nerve-wracking getting to that point of ringing that doorbell. Once you're in and you have the fluency that takes place, whether it's drugs, or whether it's my knowledge of reptiles, and they realize you're one of them, takes one to know one, then you get a comfort. But you're sure it's a high to get the access. Because documentaries, at least the ones I make, it's all about access. And so people think, "Oh, I'm gonna go out and make a doc." Good luck getting to that person. It's not so easy.

• 1:13:01Dax Shepard?

  Okay, so I can't wait to watch the next episodes because I would have begged for you to let me join you meeting Mario, right? Like, that's a no-brainer for me. The person that I probably don't ever wish to meet nor be in his world would be Anson Wong.

• 1:13:16Speaker 02

  Anson Wong is kind of this mythical guy, sort of the Pablo Escobar of the wildlife trade. He's in Malaysia, Penang. He has been operating for thirty, forty years at least. He used to come to the United States and be able to go to the Bronx Zoo and all over the country. And people knew him. Tom Schultz at the San Diego Zoo knew him personally, the curator of reptiles at the San Diego Zoo. So Anson Wong had access to everybody until he was wanted for smuggling into this country. Then he became bad guy number one in the wildlife trade. He became this sort of mythical figure. He was not allowed back in the country, or he'd get arrested. Ultimately, he was arrested. They managed to get him, which happens in the story.

• 1:13:59Speaker 02

  Did one of the longest sentences for a wildlife crime ever in the nineties. I think he did seven or eight years in prison, which was a big deal back then. But Anson Wong, the government spent millions and millions of dollars to get him, five-year undercover operation to get Anson Wong. They finally did. He was released, went back to Malaysia, never to return to the US, not allowed to. He got arrested again in Malaysia for smuggling reptiles, which was really incredible because he had connections to the royal family, you know, he had high-level connections. Getting him and knowing who he was, I have pretty good access in the animal world and know people. I knew people that knew him. And I would try to get inroads to Anson Wong in a number of ways and failed. Ultimately, COVID became a problem.

• 1:14:42Speaker 02

  I couldn't travel to Malaysia when I was filming this. When COVID broke, I literally just went there.

• 1:14:48Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 1:14:48Speaker 02

  I couldn't get to him. And I had these fixers in Malaysia that I was trying to use to get access to Anson Wong. And they kept saying, "Oh, you know, we know his cousin, his brother, this person." When I finally got to Penang in Malaysia, I realized, "Oh, they never really even wanted to reach him because they were scared to death." And so when I said to them, "Hey, can you call Anson?" And I got his phone number with a Malaysian number because he's not responding to a US number. They were like, "We're not calling Anson Wong for you." And then I realized, okay, everyone's scared of this guy.

• 1:15:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:18Speaker 02

  So I just kept calling and calling and calling. And one day, you know, I was in a weird place in Malaysia, and he answered the phone, and then I got access to answer.

• 1:15:26Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 1:15:27Speaker 02

  But yeah, it was scary. And he says something in jest when we were driving all the time about how his driver was killed. And he says it in such a nonchalant way because his driver turned on him, and he obviously made sure his driver isn't with us anymore.

• 1:15:41Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:41Speaker 02

  So, you know, he's a heavy guy.

• 1:15:43Dax Shepard?

  Well, man, I just think you've made like three of my top

• 1:15:46Speaker 01

  Oh, my God.

• 1:15:47Dax Shepard?

  ten favorite documentaries of all time.

• 1:15:49Speaker 01

  Chimp.

• 1:15:50Dax Shepard?

  We were obsessed with Chimp Crazy. We actually, just so you know, again, how your hotel affected us.

• 1:15:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:55Dax Shepard?

  Tell Eric.

• 1:15:56Speaker 01

  You gave us a gift. Tonka is a huge part of our lives. We talked about Tonka nonstop on the show. And mainly, just like, we loved him. And you know how he would throw poop at his cage?

• 1:16:07Dax Shepard?

  She'd be like, "Clean it up." And he'd try, but it's made it worse. We were obsessed with that part.

• 1:16:12Speaker 01

  We were. And then...

• 1:16:14Dax Shepard?

  Somebody had a little...

• 1:16:14Speaker 01

  Okay, there was an incident. There was a unauthorized evacuation incident by me.

• 1:16:22Dax Shepard?

  While driving a car.

• 1:16:23Speaker 01

  Okay, well...

• 1:16:24Dax Shepard?

  That's important.

• 1:16:25Speaker 01

  Yes, that's important. It was a bad situation.

• 1:16:28Dax Shepard?

  And Monica didn't wanna actually say what she did.

• 1:16:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was so demoralized, but I had to share, right? I had to tell Dax, and then I also, I guess, had to tell everyone. I was like, "I'm an animal, I'm Tonka." Like, I felt like him, just like disgusting, just animals. We're all just animals. I'm Tonka. So now if anyone poops in their pants, we say they Tonka'd.

• 1:16:52Dax Shepard?

  And the listeners know, like, people write in the comments like, "I fucking Tonka'd at work." So now it's become a verb.

• 1:16:59Speaker 01

  It's a verb.

• 1:16:59Dax Shepard?

  For shitting your pants, and I just want you to know. Well, we just wanna thank you for giving us that.

• 1:17:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, we do wanna thank you. It's the cutest way to say it.

• 1:17:07Dax Shepard?

  I couldn't start Chimp Crazy because that's my obsession, right? Is primates. I knew I couldn't police myself. I would, I've gone too hard.

• 1:17:14Speaker 01

  Some people do have, they're like, "I can't watch those because I love animals too much." It's like, then you should watch them, I think, even more.

• 1:17:21Speaker 02

  Well, we try to not show too much suffering or battering of animals. Because otherwise, people turn the channel. We try to keep a balance, but if we go too into that realm, and we could, we don't. And we try to keep it fun, even though there's serious shit going on. Just because people don't have the stomach to watch brutality.

• 1:17:40Dax Shepard?

  I would say because I know so much about them, this weirdly parallels, Monica and I have talked about this several times. Us addicts in recovery, we have a very specific way that we feel and react to when other addicts die. And for the non-addicts, it's this crazy heartbreak. And then sadly, and this isn't nice, but for us, it helps confirm, "That's right, man. That's what happens when you're not in the past." So for us, it's weirdly a little bit of like...

• 1:18:10Speaker 01

  It's a reminder.

• 1:18:11Dax Shepard?

  It's a reminder, and it's a moment of gratitude. And it's a moment of like, "All right, that's right, man. And thank you for that reminder, because that's where we end up. We're dead, institutionalized, or incarcerated." And so when it happens, it's like, check. We have a different feeling about it. I would say in the same way when I was in Afghanistan, and you know, I watched the soldiers deal with people that were getting killed around them. It's like, you see it a bunch of times, and certain predictable patterns happen, and there's a way, and it's just kind of like, yeah, and that's, and when you light a cigarette, that's happened, you know? It's weirdly comforting to go, "Right, that's how it works." I don't know. But similarly, from the second it started, I'm like, "Well, I know where this goes. I know what happens when a male chimpanzee gets fertile."

• 1:18:48Speaker 02

  What a lot of people don't know, when we were doing Chimp Crazy, I was communicating with some of the world's top primatologists about Tonka. Craig Stanford, who's here at USC, and a good friend of mine who's actually in Madagascar right now, working with me. Russell Midemeyer, I don't know if you know him. Now that we don't have Jane Goodall with us anymore, bless her heart. Russell Midemeyer has described more species of lemurs than anyone in the world in recent times. And so, anyway, I was communicating with them about this chimp and asking them, you know, "Should I do something now? Or is Tonka okay? Or can I wait?" And the reason I waited, a lot of people don't know this, is because I thought Tanya Haddix, who's now in prison, would lead me to more chimps, which she ultimately did. But it's sort of like drugs.

• 1:19:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:30Speaker 02

  We wanna just get the little guy with five ounces of cocaine. I wanted to get the source. And so I kept waiting. A lot of people thought, "Oh, I'm exploiting her. I'm not doing anything about Tonka in the cage." But of course, we were very sensitive to Tonka's well-being when we were doing Chimp Crazy.

• 1:19:46Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:19:47Dax Shepard?

  The craziest part of that entire doc is when those knuckleheads fucking drag that cage up the stairs at a holiday. Like, a lot of times, you look back on your addiction, like, the times where you go like, "This is the most absurd I ever got." It's like, if they're looking at their weird addiction, it's like, the time they drug a fucking chimp upstairs in a cage at a holiday. Like, they must go, how did I end up in this situation?

• 1:20:08Speaker 02

  Keeping these animals and hoarding and the obsession. And by the way, I like the word obsession. I don't think being obsessive is a bad thing. I think you wake up in the morning, you have something to do. People that have no interest, I worry about. But when it goes into addiction mode.

• 1:20:22Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:23Speaker 02

  Addiction isn't only drugs, alcohol, you know, sex addiction, gambling. It's also shopaholics. And in this case, it's wanting these animals so badly that you'll do anything and ruin your life. And what happened to Tanya after Chimp Crazy wrapped, you know, she went and got another chimp in her basement. And now she's in prison for it. And I really worked with her after Chimp Crazy, trying to counsel her, help her to sort of just have some contrition. Don't keep doing the same thing.

• 1:20:51Dax Shepard?

  The owner of Travis tried to get a baby monkey.

• 1:20:53Speaker 02

  Well, she did.

• 1:20:54Dax Shepard?

  She did?

• 1:20:54Speaker 02

  She did get another chimp.

• 1:20:56Dax Shepard?

  I mean, how on earth?

• 1:20:57Speaker 01

  It's so deep. It's so deep. I mean, that's like the sadness of it. It's really trying to fill a void.

• 1:21:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, for sure.

• 1:21:06Dax Shepard?

  Yes.

• 1:21:07Speaker 02

  And whether it's like she was never loved, it's like, I'm the chimp lady, look at me, gives you some kind of self-worth.

• 1:21:13Speaker 01

  Purpose, yes.

• 1:21:14Speaker 02

  Purpose, validation. But another day, if you come up to Ojai, we can trade crazy drug stories. Cause drug addiction, the shit you do, when you just said that, oh my God, the shit you do.

• 1:21:24Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:25Speaker 02

  Like the stuff I've done, crawling on the floor, trying to get the crumbs, or trying to snort the floor, or whatever, the stuff you do. We can go down a drug rabbit hole, but it is crazy. But the stuff you do, even these animal people, they're addicted.

• 1:21:39Dax Shepard?

  You know, every using dream I have is the exact same. I've had over the last 22 years, many, many using dreams about cocaine. And all of it involves me getting the coke out of the carpet. And there's so much fucking lint and carpet in the coke. And I'm deciding, do I snort all the lint?

• 1:21:51Speaker 02

  I have those too. Why do we still have those dreams?

• 1:21:53Dax Shepard?

  I don't know.

• 1:21:54Speaker 02

  But why? And they're panicking dreams.

• 1:21:56Dax Shepard?

  Yes, yes.

• 1:21:57Speaker 02

  I'm like.

• 1:21:57Dax Shepard?

  It's there, but I can't get it, but it's.

• 1:21:58Speaker 02

  I can't get it. But why still do we have those dreams?

• 1:22:01Dax Shepard?

  Yes, yes.

• 1:22:02Speaker 02

  Those are indelible.

• 1:22:03Dax Shepard?

  Yes.

• 1:22:04Speaker 02

  I want to shake those dreams.

• 1:22:06Dax Shepard?

  Every using dream is that dream.

• 1:22:08Speaker 02

  I wish my using dreams were about getting a rare tortoise or like, you know, I used to have basketball dreams, hoop dreams. Of like me being able to do things like Michael Jordan. But the drug dreams, it's hard to shake those.

• 1:22:20Speaker 01

  But maybe it's good for you. It's like, cause then when you wake up, you're like, oh, I'm so glad I'm not doing that.

• 1:22:26Speaker 02

  Oh, my God. Waking up is the best part of that dream.

• 1:22:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:28Speaker 02

  The dream Dasha said, waking up, you're like, oh, my God, thank God, cause they're really intense.

• 1:22:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:33Dax Shepard?

  They are. I'm so glad I agreed to interview a director.

• 1:22:38Speaker 01

  This was fantastic.

• 1:22:39Dax Shepard?

  Oh, Eric, I love meeting you.

• 1:22:41Speaker 02

  I don't know what I am. I just fell into it.

• 1:22:44Speaker 01

  You're a lot of things.

• 1:22:45Speaker 02

  I'm the biggest dilettante ever.

• 1:22:46Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:22:47Dax Shepard?

  I think you're everything.

• 1:22:49Speaker 01

  I can't wait for you to keep doing more of these, cause they're really important, I think, but also so entertaining.

• 1:22:56Speaker 02

  I have a really crazy one that we're just finishing. It's three episodes. You'll love it, I think.

• 1:23:01Speaker 01

  Oh, I can't wait.

• 1:23:02Dax Shepard?

  I probably have the same feeling about you as I have about us. It's like, I don't know, we're 1100 in or 1200 in. I keep thinking, why aren't we gonna run out of famous people? And then someone sits down, I'm like, I guess there's another famous person. I'm like, when I watch your shit, I'm like, what's left? A guy with a dolphin he's making love to?

• 1:23:16Speaker 02

  Oh, that's not so bad.

• 1:23:17Dax Shepard?

  We're fascinated with that.

• 1:23:18Speaker 01

  We know about those guys.

• 1:23:20Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, the scientists that fall in love with the dolphins.

• 1:23:21Speaker 02

  There's people that have fallen in love with a horse, have lived with their horse, have fallen in love with their dolphin.

• 1:23:26Dax Shepard?

  That's more of an A and E's show. Fatal Attraction.

• 1:23:29Speaker 02

  You're really good. Both of you, you really work well together. It's really cool.

• 1:23:33Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:33Speaker 01

  We appreciate that.

• 1:23:34Speaker 02

  Sorry, I hog so much of the oxygen today.

• 1:23:36Dax Shepard?

  No, that's your job.

• 1:23:38Speaker 01

  It's to take up the oxygen.

• 1:23:40Dax Shepard?

  If you haven't watched Monsters of God, you must. I know you've already seen Tiger King and Chimp Crazy, of course, is great. You're so talented and I certainly hope you'll come back. This was so fun.

• 1:23:51Speaker 02

  Thanks.

• 1:23:51Dax Shepard?

  All right, let's take care.

• 1:23:52Speaker 02

  Thanks for having me.

• 1:23:52Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 1:23:54Speaker 06

  He isn't our care expert, but he makes mistakes all the time. Thank God Monica's here. She's gonna let him have the facts.

• 1:24:05Dax Shepard?

  I would like to officially introduce you to a new friend of the studio. His name is Peter.

• 1:24:12Speaker 01

  Peter loves knowledge.

• 1:24:14Dax Shepard?

  And Peter's a crow.

• 1:24:15Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:24:16Dax Shepard?

  And Lincoln made this.

• 1:24:18Speaker 01

  It's beautiful.

• 1:24:19Dax Shepard?

  Isn't it great?

• 1:24:20Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:24:21Dax Shepard?

  Doesn't Peter look friendly? Somehow my kids, when they draw pictures, I don't know how it happens, but they're able to, they always look friendly.

• 1:24:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:30Dax Shepard?

  Right? Doesn't he look like a particularly friendly crow?

• 1:24:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's really, I can't really see him that well.

• 1:24:35Dax Shepard?

  You can't see?

• 1:24:36Speaker 01

  Cause now your head.

• 1:24:37Dax Shepard?

  Oh, now my head is there.

• 1:24:38Speaker 01

  Yeah. But he, you can tell he has really pretty feathers.

• 1:24:42Dax Shepard?

  Uh huh. Yeah. And he's holding cherries.

• 1:24:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, she's very good at drawing.

• 1:24:46Dax Shepard?

  It's kind of crazy how good she is at drawing. She did a glass the other day, like a pencil drawing of a glass, like a pint glass.

• 1:24:54Speaker 01

  Oh, nice.

• 1:24:56Dax Shepard?

  And I'm like, I don't, how did you get all like, you know, it's 3D.

• 1:24:59Speaker 01

  She's really good.

• 1:25:00Dax Shepard?

  And she just lets it rip.

• 1:25:02Speaker 01

  It's cool.

• 1:25:02Dax Shepard?

  Oh, there's a really funny thing happening. Do you know Delta's new life path?

• 1:25:06Speaker 01

  Well, I know she was learning sign language yesterday.

• 1:25:09Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. So on her own instigation, she said, I'd like to learn sign language. And Kristen, through Disney, of course, as an employee of Disney, she knew that Disney had this project where they had used a lot of ASL consultants. So she reached out to that production, found this teacher. He came over. He's so sweet.

• 1:25:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:25:29Dax Shepard?

  She's learning it at the craziest speed. I can't, even he is like, this is bonkers. He gave her a card on like maybe their fourth session. And it said, Delta, welcome to the ASL community. We've been expecting you.

• 1:25:47Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:25:47Dax Shepard?

  Isn't that so sweet?

• 1:25:49Speaker 01

  That's really sweet.

• 1:25:51Dax Shepard?

  So she's, Bonkers is good at it. I keep, she knows like 300 signs already.

• 1:25:55Speaker 01

  I have a question about her teacher.

• 1:25:57Dax Shepard?

  Yes.

• 1:25:58Speaker 01

  Is he deaf?

• 1:25:59Dax Shepard?

  He's deaf.

• 1:25:59Speaker 01

  Okay, okay.

• 1:26:00Dax Shepard?

  Which became its own funny hijinks. Cause when he very first came to the door, Kristen kind of opened it. She was in the middle of 19 things. And she has her back to him. She's like, oh yeah, come in here. You can sit over here, but I mean, she's realized she's just giving this whole stream of things. And then she just hears a noise come from the door. And she's like, oh, fuck, of course. Why wouldn't I have? I assumed he was deaf.

• 1:26:21Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:26:21Dax Shepard?

  So then she turned around, you know, and made it very clear what she was saying. And he can read lips. Great. I've talked to him.

• 1:26:28Speaker 01

  I know. So yeah, yesterday I walked in the house during the lesson, cause I wanted to say hi to the kids. And I then didn't know what to do.

• 1:26:37Dax Shepard?

  Right. You know, you just have to look directly at him and like speak, don't mumble your words, you know?

• 1:26:42Speaker 01

  I was like, is it rude for me to be trying to talk to someone who, like, I don't know if he can read lips, but he can. Okay.

• 1:26:50Dax Shepard?

  He can. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So at any rate.

• 1:26:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's great.

• 1:26:55Dax Shepard?

  It's just this bizarre, I mean, I've really not seen anyone learn something so quickly. I'm like, wow, this is fucking. And by the way, before this, and I think the reason she wanted to learn ASL is she loves miming. I can't stand it. She'll be in bed and she wants to like mime what she needs. And I'm like.

• 1:27:12Speaker 01

  Like charades.

• 1:27:13Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, like some version of, and then in some weird way, her and Kristen have worked out, they have know a lot of hand signals that they just made up. So she just really wants to communicate that way.

• 1:27:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:27:23Dax Shepard?

  So we're driving in the car the other day and she's just talking about how much she loves it. And I'm like, yeah, maybe you should do something career-wise with it, you know? And then we're talking about the different things you could do, like, you know? You can sign at events, you can sign, you know, DTF, you could sign on the news. And then her other thing is she wants to be a therapist.

• 1:27:46Dax Shepard?

  So then we put it together. And so now her new dream in life is to be an ASL therapist for kids.

• 1:27:53Speaker 01

  Great.

• 1:27:54Dax Shepard?

  And she told her teacher this and he said, that would be so great. There's not a lot of therapists who can sign.

• 1:27:59Speaker 01

  I think that would be amazing.

• 1:28:00Dax Shepard?

  That's so sweet.

• 1:28:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, great job.

• 1:28:02Dax Shepard?

  I was such a piece of shit. Like I want to glory at her age. I wanted to be Evel Knievel or, you know, like I wanted to be some kind of world-renowned hero.

• 1:28:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:28:13Dax Shepard?

  And she wants to do sign language therapy for children.

• 1:28:17Speaker 01

  Well, I hope she does.

• 1:28:19Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:19Speaker 01

  Cause she'll be great at that.

• 1:28:20Dax Shepard?

  But anyways, yeah, they're both, it's so fun to watch them both have these crazy skills.

• 1:28:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's so awesome. Your sister taught them sign language, both, when they were little.

• 1:28:31Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, her and Kristen really learned sign language and they could talk to the babies. I learned like this, I brought this up in my defense yesterday. Cause I said, I'm scared I'm not gonna be able to communicate with you guys. Like you, Kristen's also learning it pretty quick. And they're talking a lot. And I'm like, I'm afraid I'm gonna be like left out.

• 1:28:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:28:50Dax Shepard?

  And then Kristen said, well, you could learn. And I was like, I, I mean, I don't think I can. I'm not trying to be lazy about it. I'm not lazy. But remember, we, I put a lot of effort into learning when they were kids and I knew like five things.

• 1:29:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:03Dax Shepard?

  You know, more and water and stuff.

• 1:29:05Speaker 01

  I knew some of that too.

• 1:29:06Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, you knew some. You picked it up about as good as I did.

• 1:29:09Speaker 01

  Well, no, by the way, no. I came in when everyone had already learned. And I was like, okay, I guess some of this is happening.

• 1:29:19Speaker 01

  But yeah, so maybe their brains are like, since they've been doing it since they were really little, maybe they're more like adept.

• 1:29:27Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. And if I were listening to this and I didn't have kids and I was in my twenties, I'd be like, why did you teach your, why wouldn't you try to teach?

• 1:29:35Speaker 01

  A lot of kids do that. I mean, parents.

• 1:29:36Dax Shepard?

  Right. So this is the thing that I doubt if you had kids you wouldn't know about, which is like, they can't, they're not gonna develop their speech for a long time. But they can learn signs much quicker. And it alleviates so much of their frustration when they're babies, when they want to tell you they want water, but they don't know how to ask for it. And they can, or they want more of something or no more.

• 1:29:58Speaker 01

  All done.

• 1:29:58Dax Shepard?

  All done. Yeah. All dones make you sad. Remember Kristen took Lincoln to Universal and they were on the tram. And they, she didn't realize it went through like, you know, like a gorilla, like a King Kong exhibit. Yeah. And she was just a baby and she was doing all, no more, all done, all done. Yeah. So sad.

• 1:30:17Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:30:18Dax Shepard?

  Um, but yeah, I mean, I've, I kinda. Maybe this is an excuse, but I think it's in the, it's in like the foreign language department for me. You know, as, as you know, I had to take it at like four, three different college, three, three different colleges to pass.

• 1:30:34Speaker 01

  Yes, we've discussed this. We both, I had to struggle. Taken eight, I took eight. I took four years of in high school and eight.

• 1:30:44Dax Shepard?

  Four in college?

• 1:30:45Speaker 01

  Semesters, semesters, four eight semesters.

• 1:30:48Dax Shepard?

  Four quarters?

• 1:30:49Speaker 01

  I had to do a lot. For the theater department, they required you to do a lot of foreign language, which like, okay, I guess. Anyway, I was very bad at it. I was very bad at speaking. I was good at reading it.

• 1:31:03Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:31:04Speaker 01

  And I could write it, like, like make sentences.

• 1:31:06Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:06Speaker 01

  Cause I got to choose the words to put in.

• 1:31:09Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:09Speaker 01

  But the communication, I just could not do.

• 1:31:12Dax Shepard?

  This will not surprise you, but I was okay by the end at saying some stuff. But once people were speaking to me in Spanish, I was like, I don't know what they're saying. It sounds so fast.

• 1:31:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is so fast.

• 1:31:25Dax Shepard?

  I also think I'm just uniquely bad at that. Like I was telling Ryan, we were in Nashville for Labor Day. And my very favorite song of all time, which is, um, this is the place slash naive melody by Talking Heads.

• 1:31:39Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:31:40Dax Shepard?

  I have listened to this song more than any other song in the 10,000 range. There's been weeks where it was on repeat. I don't know one word of that song.

• 1:31:49Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:31:50Dax Shepard?

  And I'm like, how could this be? Like, I can't hear what he is saying.

• 1:31:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, same. I have, we, we, again, we have discussed this.

• 1:31:56Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, we know this.

• 1:31:57Speaker 01

  We have holes in that part of our brains.

• 1:31:59Dax Shepard?

  Weaknesses.

• 1:32:00Speaker 01

  That's a big weakness.

• 1:32:02Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:02Speaker 01

  Knowings, lyrics, um, and language. And I do think they're in the same space in the brain. I've just decided that.

• 1:32:10Dax Shepard?

  I think they are too.

• 1:32:11Speaker 01

  And it makes sense that they would be.

• 1:32:13Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. Yeah. Symbols, converting symbols into whatever.

• 1:32:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's like auditory, but you're good at auditory because you like audiobook, like you, you retain audiobooks.

• 1:32:26Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, I retain whatever I do here.

• 1:32:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:29Dax Shepard?

  Also, I'm great at like rap lyrics and country song lyrics. If they talk slowly.

• 1:32:34Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:32:35Dax Shepard?

  I can get it and then it's in there pretty, pretty deep. Yeah. I gotta tell you, we had, uh, the greatest four days in Nashville.

• 1:32:43Speaker 01

  Tell me.

• 1:32:44Dax Shepard?

  It was crazy hot too. I just keep going from heat bubble to heat bubble.

• 1:32:47Speaker 01

  It's hot.

• 1:32:47Dax Shepard?

  All summer I did it and now I just did, it was, it was blazing hot. There was like 98 and you know the humidity.

• 1:32:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:54Dax Shepard?

  But we were on the boat mostly the whole time and what I discovered, my pontoon boat, swimming under it early part of summer this year, and I could see I had LED light strips under the deck of the pontoon.

• 1:33:09Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:33:10Dax Shepard?

  But I don't know where any buttons are for this thing. Thank goodness Ken Kennedy was visiting and he likes nothing more than going through the menu of a screen. And lo and behold, he figured out, I have disco lights on my pontoon boat.

• 1:33:23Speaker 01

  Fun.

• 1:33:24Dax Shepard?

  So now we're in a habit of going swimming at night with the disco lights on and, and

• 1:33:29Speaker 01

  Fun.

• 1:33:29Dax Shepard?

  Loud music. Oh, is it fun? And you're floating in your diaper, which is an upside down life jacket.

• 1:33:37Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:33:38Dax Shepard?

  And it was just boating after boating. But the thing that I most want to talk about, uh, do you have a favorite breakfast spot in America?

• 1:33:47Speaker 01

  In America?

• 1:33:48Dax Shepard?

  Cause like I have so many favorite lunch spots and dinner spots.

• 1:33:51Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:33:52Dax Shepard?

  Um, but I have only one favorite prior to this breakfast spot. It's in New York, Bubbies. You ever been to Bubbies?

• 1:34:00Speaker 01

  Yes, I've been to Bubbies many times. Love it.

• 1:34:02Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:34:02Speaker 01

  Love it. I don't, I mean, I guess I don't know. Are you about to say Waffle House?

• 1:34:08Dax Shepard?

  No, that's fine. I love Waffle House. It is, it's, it's nostalgic. It's fun. It's damn affordable.

• 1:34:14Speaker 01

  Hash Browns.

• 1:34:15Dax Shepard?

  Yes. Weirdly, they built one in about five seconds by my house recently. Um, but I discovered this through chat.

• 1:34:24Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:34:25Dax Shepard?

  Last, right before I left for the end of summer, I, I discovered a place in Mount Juliet. In Monica, this is my favorite breakfast spot I've ever had.

• 1:34:34Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 1:34:34Dax Shepard?

  Anywhere in the world.

• 1:34:35Speaker 01

  What do they have?

• 1:34:36Dax Shepard?

  Oh my God. They have this thing called Piggy Benedict.

• 1:34:41Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:34:41Dax Shepard?

  It's a biscuit, freshly made biscuit, a big round sausage patty, poached egg, hollandaise and gravy.

• 1:34:52Speaker 01

  Nice.

• 1:34:52Dax Shepard?

  Fuck. Then they have a chicken and waffle.

• 1:34:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:34:56Dax Shepard?

  That will put it up against Roscoe any day. It's unreal. They have this banana bread that is like bananas foster almost. It's impossibly good. And then you get like the basket of mini biscuits.

• 1:35:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's yummy.

• 1:35:12Dax Shepard?

  I don't think it's a low caloric.

• 1:35:15Speaker 01

  Doesn't sound like it. But I guess we should tell people you're eating gluten again.

• 1:35:19Dax Shepard?

  I've been eating gluten again. Yeah, yeah, I have. Uh, post that, um, Akkermansia, uh, probiotic.

• 1:35:28Speaker 01

  The, the one that Pendulum, we had an episode and she, she gave.

• 1:35:33Dax Shepard?

  I'm not endorsing anything. I'm not a doctor. I'm not saying it'll work for you. I don't know. I've been eating gluten.

• 1:35:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:35:38Dax Shepard?

  And it's been going well.

• 1:35:39Speaker 01

  That's amazing.

• 1:35:40Dax Shepard?

  And I enjoy it.

• 1:35:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:35:42Dax Shepard?

  Boy, is it fun to eat biscuits. But we were only there for four mornings and we went twice.

• 1:35:47Speaker 01

  Nice.

• 1:35:47Dax Shepard?

  And fuck, just.

• 1:35:49Speaker 01

  What's it called? You wanna shout it out?

• 1:35:51Dax Shepard?

  Paper mill.

• 1:35:52Speaker 01

  Cute name.

• 1:35:53Dax Shepard?

  This town is so tiny and it has in it now my favorite breakfast spot I've ever eaten at Paper Mill. And then the best Thai food I've ever had in my life, Smiley Thai.

• 1:36:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:36:03Dax Shepard?

  This is crazy.

• 1:36:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's great. You're meant to be there.

• 1:36:07Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:36:07Speaker 01

  Meant to be.

• 1:36:08Dax Shepard?

  Motorcycle rides at night. There's a little mix up. I know he's listening. It was really sad. Ryan had a little mix up. On, on the dirt bike.

• 1:36:18Speaker 01

  He fell?

• 1:36:18Dax Shepard?

  He had a fall.

• 1:36:19Speaker 01

  Oh, sorry.

• 1:36:20Dax Shepard?

  We're out in the go-kart and the dirt bike and he really let himself have it over it. He really, really abused himself. He was so mad that it had happened.

• 1:36:29Speaker 01

  Oh, I'm glad we're talking about it then.

• 1:36:31Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. Tore up his hand pretty good.

• 1:36:33Speaker 01

  Ow.

• 1:36:34Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:36:34Speaker 01

  That's, it's dangerous. It's okay that he fell.

• 1:36:38Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. They weren't dangerous. They wouldn't be fun.

• 1:36:41Speaker 01

  That's not true. Spades isn't dangerous and it's super fun.

• 1:36:44Dax Shepard?

  I'm not saying something has to be dangerous to be fun.

• 1:36:48Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 1:36:48Dax Shepard?

  But what makes motorcycles fun is that they're dangerous. You have your adrenaline up and you know the stakes are high.

• 1:36:54Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:36:55Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:36:55Speaker 01

  That is why I don't like.

• 1:36:57Dax Shepard?

  That's why you don't do a lot of motorcycling.

• 1:37:00Speaker 01

  I wanted to say, Shailene Woodley from Paradise, season two, which we talked about.

• 1:37:07Speaker 01

  She won the Emmy.

• 1:37:08Dax Shepard?

  Well, she did.

• 1:37:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I had put in my endorsement on this podcast for her to win.

• 1:37:13Dax Shepard?

  Might be why. Can you explain the Emmys to me?

• 1:37:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't know what happened this year. I'm, I am confused.

• 1:37:21Dax Shepard?

  Emmys last week, but then they're also next week.

• 1:37:23Speaker 01

  Creative Arts Emmys were last week and then this week.

• 1:37:28Dax Shepard?

  But doesn't Paradise, like getting, winning for best supporting actor or whatever, that feels like that would be in the normal Emmy.

• 1:37:35Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 1:37:35Dax Shepard?

  Maybe because the TV has expanded so much.

• 1:37:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:37:39Dax Shepard?

  It's too much for one show now.

• 1:37:41Speaker 01

  I think they've always had Creative Arts Emmys as a separate day, but I do think some of the categories got moved over.

• 1:37:48Dax Shepard?

  Right?

• 1:37:49Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. They all felt more production wise, but

• 1:37:52Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:53Speaker 01

  Now, I don't know. Anyway, she won. Congrats. She deserves it.

• 1:37:57Dax Shepard?

  Incredible performance.

• 1:37:58Speaker 01

  Incredible performance. But yeah, the real Emmys, I mean, the.

• 1:38:03Dax Shepard?

  Oh.

• 1:38:06Dax Shepard?

  The traditional Emmys.

• 1:38:08Speaker 01

  Other Emmys.

• 1:38:08Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:38:09Speaker 01

  Emmys part two.

• 1:38:10Dax Shepard?

  The Monday night Emmys.

• 1:38:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, or on Monday, which is also weird.

• 1:38:13Dax Shepard?

  That's weird, right? Wasn't it? Isn't it normally on Sunday?

• 1:38:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:38:16Dax Shepard?

  What have they done? I, um, I present every year, I know the Emmys are coming up because I present every year at the Prop Master Awards.

• 1:38:25Speaker 01

  Oh yeah. Are you doing that again?

• 1:38:26Dax Shepard?

  Of course.

• 1:38:27Speaker 01

  When is it? Saturday?

• 1:38:28Dax Shepard?

  I go support my best friend Jeff. Um, they're Saturday evening. Yeah.

• 1:38:32Speaker 01

  Oh, that's fun.

• 1:38:33Dax Shepard?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:38:34Speaker 01

  Wow, cool.

• 1:38:35Dax Shepard?

  He said, um, how about for a bit, you carry me out because we carry you actors all the time. And I said, I'll carry you anywhere you want me to carry you.

• 1:38:43Speaker 01

  Lift him up?

• 1:38:44Dax Shepard?

  I'm gonna carry him out on the stage.

• 1:38:46Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:38:46Dax Shepard?

  We usually do a bit, Jeff and I.

• 1:38:48Speaker 01

  Oh, you do?

• 1:38:48Dax Shepard?

  Yes, yes, yes.

• 1:38:49Speaker 01

  Who's Jeff?

• 1:38:50Dax Shepard?

  Jeff was the prop master on Parenthood is where I fell in love with them, but then he was the prop master on Chips.

• 1:38:56Speaker 01

  Oh, fun.

• 1:38:57Dax Shepard?

  My movie, which was so fun. He's the greatest. I, I've any crew member I've ever met. I just love Jeff.

• 1:39:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, you like a lot of people.

• 1:39:06Dax Shepard?

  And I think he's the president of the Prop Masters Union or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:39:10Speaker 01

  How big is he?

• 1:39:11Dax Shepard?

  Seven feet tall.

• 1:39:13Speaker 01

  No, how big is he? Cause you have to carry him.

• 1:39:15Dax Shepard?

  He's not a large man. He's, he's a good sized man. He's probably six feet.

• 1:39:19Speaker 01

  Or you're gonna carry him like a baby?

• 1:39:21Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, like a baby. Right?

• 1:39:23Speaker 01

  Or on your shoulders.

• 1:39:25Dax Shepard?

  That's cumbersome because I gotta get him off while we're on stage.

• 1:39:27Speaker 01

  Do a bit. You bet, you might as well go all the way. Yeah.

• 1:39:30Dax Shepard?

  I come, what if I had him on my shoulders and I came out on a pogo stick?

• 1:39:33Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 1:39:33Dax Shepard?

  Now that would be.

• 1:39:35Speaker 01

  That would really be something.

• 1:39:36Dax Shepard?

  Legendary status.

• 1:39:37Speaker 01

  So it would make sense.

• 1:39:39Dax Shepard?

  We would have a prop.

• 1:39:40Speaker 01

  That would make sense. Um.

• 1:39:42Dax Shepard?

  Last year he was making a speech and I had his prop bag.

• 1:39:46Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:39:47Dax Shepard?

  Like I'm his, it was a role reversal.

• 1:39:49Speaker 01

  Like that amazing speech that Julia Louis-Dreyfus made, like she won an Emmy, probably an Emmy ding ding ding for Veep and then Tony Hale went up with her.

• 1:40:01Dax Shepard?

  Whispered in her ear the whole time.

• 1:40:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was so good. That was so funny.

• 1:40:07Dax Shepard?

  Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare. This episode is brought to you by Service Now. Look, I have my dream job. I get to talk to folks I admire like crazy and ask them virtually any question that I want to. I can't imagine a better way to spend my time. But even dream jobs have some not so dreamy parts. The stuff that gets in the way of the actual work. Now that's where Service Now's AI specialists come in. They don't just tell you what you should do about your busy work. They actually do it, start to finish. Cases closed, requests handled, no extra work for you.

• 1:40:48Dax Shepard?

  So you and your team can focus on what matters most, which for me is, are they obsessed with male bodies on the same level as I am?

• 1:40:55Speaker 01

  They never are.

• 1:40:56Dax Shepard?

  To learn how to put AI to work for people, visit servicenow.com.

• 1:41:08Speaker 01

  Um, I do wanna say, I don't know if this was a wink, but Tonka was awarding connections some days ago.

• 1:41:16Dax Shepard?

  It was. Interesting. And was it in reference to the, or we don't know?

• 1:41:21Speaker 01

  No, we do.

• 1:41:22Dax Shepard?

  Tonka trucks?

• 1:41:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:41:24Dax Shepard?

  Oh, cuz was it truck toy related or some toy related?

• 1:41:27Speaker 01

  Toy, yeah, toy brand related, sort of.

• 1:41:30Dax Shepard?

  I wanna do that one.

• 1:41:31Speaker 01

  Well, now you know. This happened to me. Jess always spoils things on accident. It's like his

• 1:41:37Dax Shepard?

  Superpower?

• 1:41:38Speaker 01

  How is, yeah, but a hor- it's not a superpower. It's a, it's a, um, kryptonite. It's like

• 1:41:44Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:41:45Speaker 01

  Achilles' heel. Evil power, yeah. It's so bad. He cannot help but spoil things.

• 1:41:53Dax Shepard?

  Wow.

• 1:41:54Speaker 01

  And, um,

• 1:41:55Dax Shepard?

  What'd he spoil?

• 1:41:56Speaker 01

  Well, he spoiled that. But then, you know, cuz he plays connections at the gym with his trainer, and then we were in line.

• 1:42:02Dax Shepard?

  That's not what you should be doing with your trainer.

• 1:42:04Speaker 01

  I know, but whatever. He does, but, listen, I don't know.

• 1:42:07Dax Shepard?

  He's a master of distraction.

• 1:42:08Speaker 01

  In between, they do, um, connections sometimes. Anyway, and so we were in line for a restaurant, and he was like, have you done connections today? I said, no, I'll pull it up. And they said, but don't tell me. He was like, no, I only did one. And he was like, starting to, I know. I was like, Jess, stop. And then he was saying, like, no, it's just, and I was like, don't say any other words.

• 1:42:32Dax Shepard?

  That's me in the F1 races, when people wanna start talking. I'm like, I haven't watched. And they're like, oh, yeah, yeah, no, I know. Um, but, and it's like, no, no, there's nothing more to say. If I've said I haven't watched.

• 1:42:42Speaker 01

  Some people just love to spoil. They don't even know they're doing it. It just is happening. It's happening. Anyway, he spoiled the Tonka, he spoiled Tonka for me. And, uh, it was exciting to think that maybe when I had Tonka'd that bike, you know?

• 1:42:56Dax Shepard?

  Maybe she was letting us know.

• 1:42:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, she was communicating with us.

• 1:43:00Dax Shepard?

  Bottom of my pants, top of mine.

• 1:43:01Speaker 01

  That's right, that's right.

• 1:43:05Dax Shepard?

  Speaking of F1.

• 1:43:07Speaker 01

  Uh huh.

• 1:43:08Dax Shepard?

  There's a very exciting thing happening right now in F1. I know I've already talked about him, but Kimi Antonelli.

• 1:43:13Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:43:14Dax Shepard?

  He just turned 20. He's won seven races this year for Mercedes. I think their record is Lewis winning maybe 11 in a season, so he has lots of season left. He could break at 20 years old, this Lewis Hamilton record.

• 1:43:27Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 1:43:28Dax Shepard?

  And Lewis's car was actually more dominant over the competition, that iteration of the car, than Kimi's is. And Kimi last race, last weekend, he had to start at the back of the grid because he had an engine penalty. So he started in 19, and he won the race.

• 1:43:46Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:43:47Dax Shepard?

  This is like a Max Verstappen drive. This is impossible. And his teammate is up there in the lead, in the exact same car, and he makes his way through

• 1:43:56Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 1:43:56Dax Shepard?

  18 other cars, passes Max Verstappen in third, and, uh, and wins the race. And he's 20 years old, and he couldn't be cuter.

• 1:44:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, and he's so nice, too.

• 1:44:07Dax Shepard?

  And it was the Italian Grand Prix, and he's the first Italian to win the Italian Grand Prix in 60 some years.

• 1:44:12Speaker 01

  Oh, that's such a happy story.

• 1:44:15Dax Shepard?

  It's a really triumphant season of F1 right now.

• 1:44:18Speaker 01

  I love.

• 1:44:19Dax Shepard?

  I'm gonna be really conflicted when Max has a comparable car. Cuz obviously Max is my deity. He's my god. But I love this Kimi kid. Oh, do I love him. Have you seen him?

• 1:44:32Speaker 01

  Are you gonna flip-flop?

• 1:44:33Dax Shepard?

  Uh, it's gonna be tough, man. I don't know what I'm gonna do. Cuz I love Kimi, but Max is dangerous. You know, if they're in the same, okay, that's enough.

• 1:44:43Speaker 01

  I just don't know what you're gonna, no, I just like.

• 1:44:47Dax Shepard?

  Have you seen him? Have you seen him talk, Kimi?

• 1:44:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, you showed.

• 1:44:49Dax Shepard?

  Look at him.

• 1:44:50Speaker 01

  You showed us the video.

• 1:44:51Dax Shepard?

  Oh, yes, of he and Lincoln talking.

• 1:44:54Speaker 01

  He's so cute.

• 1:44:55Dax Shepard?

  He's so cute. He's got a great body, too. The summer, on the summer break, he posted a lot of photos of him doing different water sports.

• 1:45:02Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, he was with, um, Toto and Suzie. Suzie had a great bathing suit on in those pictures. I was served them. I did not go looking.

• 1:45:11Dax Shepard?

  Oh, really? That came across?

• 1:45:12Speaker 01

  Probably because it knows I've posted about them.

• 1:45:15Dax Shepard?

  Oh, maybe.

• 1:45:16Speaker 01

  Algorithm is very smart.

• 1:45:17Dax Shepard?

  We came up with a good idea yesterday that we should urge, and it'll happen again in the episode, but I wanna get it out there as quick as possible. We think you should be able, like, you can send your playlist to people.

• 1:45:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:45:31Dax Shepard?

  Like, your liked songs, you can do that. We wanna be able to send our algorithms back and forth.

• 1:45:37Speaker 01

  Exactly, yeah.

• 1:45:37Dax Shepard?

  On Instagram.

• 1:45:38Speaker 01

  We do.

• 1:45:39Dax Shepard?

  It'd be fun to be able to use other people's algorithms for however long you wanted to.

• 1:45:44Speaker 01

  I agree.

• 1:45:45Dax Shepard?

  But I'd really enjoy having your algorithm for a couple days, cuz it's just, it's clothes, right? Is it just clothes, clothes, clothes?

• 1:45:52Speaker 01

  Should I tell you what I see right now?

• 1:45:54Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, what's that?

• 1:45:55Speaker 01

  It has clo-

• 1:45:57Dax Shepard?

  Suzie in a bathing suit.

• 1:45:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, has Suzie, okay, first thing that pops up is Megan Fahy, then Aziz. I'm just gonna read everyone, okay?

• 1:46:06Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:46:07Speaker 01

  Then Aziz, okay, now see, because I just said I, oh, I just said Shailene Woodley.

• 1:46:15Dax Shepard?

  There you go.

• 1:46:16Speaker 01

  I gotta pop up.

• 1:46:17Dax Shepard?

  This is about Aaron Rodgers?

• 1:46:19Speaker 01

  Okay, listen, it is. And it's a Page Six. I don't follow.

• 1:46:23Dax Shepard?

  Uh huh. I know, I don't like when they serve me, um, gossip.

• 1:46:27Speaker 01

  Tabloids.

• 1:46:28Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, it's almost irresistible to not read.

• 1:46:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just read it.

• 1:46:32Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:34Speaker 01

  I didn't click it, but I hate that.

• 1:46:35Dax Shepard?

  So I don't like when they put threads in my timeline. Cuz threads is all trash. It's all like

• 1:46:40Speaker 01

  Threads is-

• 1:46:41Dax Shepard?

  It's all sticky gossip. It's all inflammatory. Yes, it's just like Twitter. And they never deliver, too. When I get suckered into clicking on a threads thing, and it takes me to that frickin' app.

• 1:46:52Speaker 01

  I don't have it.

• 1:46:52Dax Shepard?

  And I read it, and it's never as good as the first two sentences, and it almost negates itself immediately.

• 1:46:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:46:58Dax Shepard?

  There's, I mean, they figured it out.

• 1:47:00Speaker 01

  I know.

• 1:47:01Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, they, you can have AI go like, make me a very sticky sentence, and it can do it.

• 1:47:06Speaker 01

  I know. We're all so-

• 1:47:07Dax Shepard?

  We're so predictable.

• 1:47:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, we are. That's why you just like, kinda can't have it. Cuz if you have it, we're clicking it.

• 1:47:16Dax Shepard?

  Or also, if you enjoy it, that's great, too. I get a hangover from it. I go like, I read like, three, cuz then that app's open, everything is terrible, right? And then I get sucked into four or five of them.

• 1:47:29Speaker 01

  I know.

• 1:47:29Dax Shepard?

  And then I'm just like, ew, I don't, I don't like how I feel when I consume this.

• 1:47:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:47:34Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:36Speaker 01

  It's pretty good to have during Fashion Week, though.

• 1:47:38Dax Shepard?

  Is it?

• 1:47:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, cuz I can see a lot of fun stuff.

• 1:47:40Dax Shepard?

  Fun stuff.

• 1:47:42Speaker 01

  Um, anyway, all right, let's do some facts.

• 1:47:44Dax Shepard?

  Yes.

• 1:47:45Speaker 01

  Okay, facts for Eric Good. Great episode, just fun guy.

• 1:47:50Dax Shepard?

  I mean-

• 1:47:51Speaker 01

  Wow, we loved it.

• 1:47:52Dax Shepard?

  I have to put him at the top of the heap. For most interesting person we've ever interviewed, and I'm, I'm just obsessed with him. I think I told you, I sent him a text that was like, hey, next time you're getting into any kinda tricky situations, and you need a co-pilot, I'm there. Whether that's for work or just otherwise, like, bring me along.

• 1:48:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:48:13Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, he's getting into all the tricky stitches.

• 1:48:16Speaker 01

  He really is getting into the tricky stitches. Um, I don't think he can bring you along to some of them, because I think it's gonna do the opposite of what he is hoping to do, which is kinda just be under the radar, and be one of them, and be kinda, you know?

• 1:48:32Dax Shepard?

  I'm not that famous. I mean, most people-

• 1:48:34Speaker 01

  Even if you're not famous, you're large.

• 1:48:37Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:48:37Speaker 01

  You have a large voice, and a lot of tattoos, and stuff, so like, I don't, I don't think people-

• 1:48:45Dax Shepard?

  Are at ease if I'm there?

• 1:48:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:48:47Dax Shepard?

  Interesting, okay.

• 1:48:48Speaker 01

  At first.

• 1:48:49Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:48:49Speaker 01

  At first.

• 1:48:50Dax Shepard?

  I'm pretty good at winning people over, though.

• 1:48:52Speaker 01

  There's no time for that in some of these situations. He's gotta get in, and like, you know?

• 1:48:58Dax Shepard?

  I think I would've done great with that drug trafficker, Mor- uh, Mario.

• 1:49:03Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, but you even said you didn't wanna meet Anson Wong. You said that in the episode.

• 1:49:07Dax Shepard?

  I don't wanna meet him. You have to be low status.

• 1:49:10Speaker 01

  That's exactly what I'm saying.

• 1:49:12Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, but how status is determined in that world, which is all toughness and intimidation, really. So it's like, an actor is just like, this guy, he's not threatening at all.

• 1:49:23Speaker 01

  An actor, it's not like, okay, well, I almost said someone, and I'm not gonna say it, cuz I was mean.

• 1:49:29Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:49:30Speaker 01

  It's not mean. He's a very, um-

• 1:49:32Dax Shepard?

  Good actor?

• 1:49:33Speaker 01

  He's a great actor, and he is E. He puts people at ease. Everyone can just guess who I'm thinking about.

• 1:49:40Dax Shepard?

  I don't even know, and I'm-

• 1:49:41Speaker 01

  Steve Buscemi.

• 1:49:42Dax Shepard?

  Oh, my God, no one would.

• 1:49:44Speaker 01

  It was obvious. I don't know.

• 1:49:48Dax Shepard?

  I don't even know how you, how he crossed your mind just now.

• 1:49:51Speaker 01

  This is what I'm saying. Okay, whether you're an actor or not, you have a presence.

• 1:49:56Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:49:57Speaker 01

  And that, that shows status. Like, how many times do I have to say it? You're big, you have tattoos.

• 1:50:04Dax Shepard?

  Well, what I'm saying is, in the drug trafficking world, they're like, an actor, he pretends to be tough. It's so easy to write me off. Like, they're, they've been in gun battles. Like, it's just a different sitch.

• 1:50:16Speaker 01

  But I just don't think, okay. Ding, ding, ding. This is funny. The other, uh, yesterday at dinner, I don't remember how it came up, but we were, I think, discussing, maybe we were discussing the incident in Palm Springs, maybe.

• 1:50:34Speaker 01

  And we were talking about how everyone reacts differently in these situations, and confrontation, and blah, blah, blah. And Jess said he's, didn't mean it in the way that it's gonna sound, but he was like, yeah, no, the only reason you're super successful is because you would fight with Dax in the kitchen. And what he meant was, I'm not afraid to have a debate or, or meet someone intimidating.

• 1:51:03Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, you and Lincoln.

• 1:51:04Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:51:07Speaker 01

  You should be, you should be grateful. You know, one time, you don't, you probably don't think this anymore, but at one time when I was babysitting, you did tell her, you said, "I hope you grow up and you're like Monica."

• 1:51:17Dax Shepard?

  No, well, she, yeah, I feel that way and she is.

• 1:51:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, so when she's being a little rascally-

• 1:51:24Dax Shepard?

  I'll tell you, she's not intimidated by at all me.

• 1:51:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's good.

• 1:51:28Dax Shepard?

  Which, of course it is. That's what I want.

• 1:51:30Speaker 01

  I know.

• 1:51:30Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:31Speaker 01

  So anyway, so-

• 1:51:32Dax Shepard?

  That's what I hope to raise, some, a woman who's not afraid of anyone.

• 1:51:35Speaker 01

  Of her dad.

• 1:51:36Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, and I'm a, as you, the aforementioned size and this and that.

• 1:51:41Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:51:42Dax Shepard?

  And she could give a fuck and I love that.

• 1:51:44Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 1:51:45Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, so that's sort of what Jess was saying.

• 1:51:48Dax Shepard?

  So easy for me all the time, but, uh-

• 1:51:50Speaker 01

  I know, that's part of the cost. That's part of the cost.

• 1:51:53Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:53Speaker 01

  But yeah, he, um, so he, all to say, I am not like those drug dealers. I don't find you intimidating.

• 1:52:01Dax Shepard?

  I know.

• 1:52:02Speaker 01

  But, uh, they do. Or did we tell people that we do have an answer to the fact that, remember when you pretended to be dead on the railroad tracks? Or passed out and I was trying to move you off the railroad tracks?

• 1:52:13Dax Shepard?

  In your dream.

• 1:52:14Speaker 01

  No, here, you were laying down-

• 1:52:16Dax Shepard?

  On the ground, we were, we were role playing.

• 1:52:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:52:19Dax Shepard?

  If I were on railroad tracks.

• 1:52:20Speaker 01

  If you're on railroad tracks and you were dead weight, passed out, would I be able to get you off the road, railroad tracks? And I said I would get superhuman strength.

• 1:52:28Dax Shepard?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:52:28Speaker 01

  But we, we can't practice superhuman strength.

• 1:52:31Dax Shepard?

  And it's dangerous to rely on the notion you'll have superhuman strength when you need it.

• 1:52:35Speaker 01

  I know, but then we got the answer because I had to end up breaking into my house. And it required a level of strength I probably would not have had on a regular day.

• 1:52:47Dax Shepard?

  Why, did you have to do a pull-up or something?

• 1:52:49Speaker 01

  No. Joe, my, um-

• 1:52:51Dax Shepard?

  Uncle?

• 1:52:52Speaker 01

  Uncle contractor, he was very impressed.

• 1:52:57Dax Shepard?

  Okay, great.

• 1:52:58Speaker 01

  He was very impressed that I could do that. And then I was like, "Oh yeah, I can definitely roll Dax off of the tracks."

• 1:53:05Dax Shepard?

  Right, despite, yeah, our-

• 1:53:07Speaker 01

  You can't practice.

• 1:53:08Dax Shepard?

  You can't practice, yeah.

• 1:53:09Speaker 01

  Um, all right, now, is the creator of EST, Warner Earhart, where was he from and was he a used car salesman? Um, yeah, he-

• 1:53:21Dax Shepard?

  All of the above?

• 1:53:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, he worked as a car salesman and encyclopedia salesman before creating the self-help program EST. Which like, tracks.

• 1:53:30Dax Shepard?

  You know, I bet a ton of people got a lot of great stuff out of EST. It couldn't have been so successful.

• 1:53:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm sure. He sold both new and used cars in Pennsylvania and California. Ooh, sometimes using the alias Jack Frost.

• 1:53:42Dax Shepard?

  Oh, fun, nipping at your toes. Put you in a nice Chrysler Imperial, low mileage, all highway. This thing's never been on a arterial road.

• 1:53:51Speaker 01

  Ew.

• 1:53:53Dax Shepard?

  My dad told me he used to sometimes stand in front of dents when he was just-

• 1:53:56Speaker 01

  Dents?

• 1:53:57Dax Shepard?

  Fur starting off, yeah.

• 1:53:58Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:54:00Dax Shepard?

  And he was a large man, so he could-

• 1:54:05Speaker 01

  When he, when he was a used car salesman, you're saying?

• 1:54:07Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, when he first started.

• 1:54:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. Oh, no.

• 1:54:10Dax Shepard?

  But then he graduated, and I know I've told this before, but he graduated to, you know, he, he was the best car salesman at Avis Ford. He, he won this, he won two free cars. There was like a national, whoever could sell the most Ford trucks, he won that. Incredible salesman.

• 1:54:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:54:24Dax Shepard?

  And he kinda got so good that he had a helper who turned out to be my first stepdad. Carly's dad, he worked at the dealership, and so-

• 1:54:32Speaker 01

  So wild.

• 1:54:33Dax Shepard?

  Basically Greg would set up the deals and my father would close them. And he mostly closed them across the street at the bar.

• 1:54:43Speaker 01

  Oh, he said like, "Let me take you to get a drink?"

• 1:54:45Dax Shepard?

  Exactly.

• 1:54:45Speaker 01

  Ah.

• 1:54:46Dax Shepard?

  And, um, on a couple different occasions, this is in the seventies.

• 1:54:50Speaker 01

  Sure, where my book takes place.

• 1:54:52Dax Shepard?

  The people who bought the new car got so drunk with my dad at the bar that when they pulled out of the lot, they got broadsided and smashed their brand new car. That happened a couple different times.

• 1:55:00Speaker 01

  That's really bad. So this is before your dad got sober, obviously?

• 1:55:05Dax Shepard?

  Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:55:08Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 1:55:09Dax Shepard?

  Yeah. No, this is, that was the seventies, that was when I was a kid. How big was my father?

• 1:55:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:55:14Dax Shepard?

  Like, probably six one and always two fifty or more.

• 1:55:20Speaker 01

  Okay, and how, how tall is your brother?

• 1:55:24Dax Shepard?

  I think my brother's six one as well.

• 1:55:26Speaker 01

  Okay, you're a little taller.

• 1:55:27Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:55:29Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:55:30Dax Shepard?

  Couple inches taller.

• 1:55:30Speaker 01

  I'm writing that down.

• 1:55:32Dax Shepard?

  You gonna have a suit made for him?

• 1:55:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. Um, okay, you said in The American, she falls in love with EST, um, but it wasn't her, it was Philip who got really into EST.

• 1:55:44Dax Shepard?

  Sorry, big mistake.

• 1:55:45Speaker 01

  It's a big mistake, but it's okay. Philip is the Matthew Reese character.

• 1:55:49Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, they both just slayed those performances.

• 1:55:52Speaker 01

  They really did. What is the most profitable club ever? Nightclub, okay?

• 1:55:58Dax Shepard?

  Okay.

• 1:55:58Speaker 01

  XS nightclub at Encore in Wynne, Las Vegas is widely recognized as the highest grossing and most profitable nightclub ever. Routinely pulling in between a hundred and three million dollars and a hundred and five million dollars in a single year.

• 1:56:13Dax Shepard?

  Ooh, wow. But they have big expenses. They're paying those residencies to those DJs and stuff?

• 1:56:19Speaker 01

  Definitely.

• 1:56:20Dax Shepard?

  Studio 54 had to be a cash cow, cause those guys, one of them had like the top two or three floors in the San Remo Tower. In New York, very expensive piece of real estate.

• 1:56:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:56:31Dax Shepard?

  That I think now Bono owns.

• 1:56:33Speaker 01

  Wow, that's funny, when I was just in, when I was in New York, my friend Maddie and I were taking a walk and she knows, she was just pointing out all the buildings and she knows everything. New York real estate is a real like, interesting niche.

• 1:56:47Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:56:48Speaker 01

  I liked it. Um, what is a hillbilly speedball? Generally refers to a slang or colloquial term for a combination of illicit or prescription drugs, typically substituting a rural accessible stimulant. Like meth or prescription amphetamines and a downer like a prescription opioid painkiller in place of the classic heroin and cocaine.

• 1:57:11Dax Shepard?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:57:13Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:57:14Dax Shepard?

  So yeah, fentanyl and meth, I'd call that definitely a hillbilly.

• 1:57:18Speaker 01

  Do not-

• 1:57:19Dax Shepard?

  We could call it a hillbilly highball instead of a speedball. That's got more of a, it's more marketable. Hillbilly highball.

• 1:57:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm gonna get flagged for sure, but-

• 1:57:28Dax Shepard?

  What do you-

• 1:57:29Speaker 01

  How much fent- I, oh no. This was really bad.

• 1:57:34Dax Shepard?

  Also, this is so person, person specific.

• 1:57:36Speaker 01

  Right, I said, "How much fentanyl can you survive with?" First thing that comes up is speak with someone today, 988 Suicide and Crisis Life. I like that they did that.

• 1:57:45Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, yeah, cool.

• 1:57:46Speaker 01

  But I'm gonna say it's for a fact check.

• 1:57:48Dax Shepard?

  Oh, boy.

• 1:57:53Dax Shepard?

  Please call this number, we've heard that before.

• 1:57:56Speaker 01

  Even more reason.

• 1:57:57Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:57:58Speaker 01

  Oh, it's really searching, it's thinking. It probably can't ethically answer this, this is interesting.

• 1:58:04Dax Shepard?

  Well, also, it's, there's no way they could give you, uh, they could give you a range, it would be humongous.

• 1:58:11Speaker 01

  All right.

• 1:58:12Dax Shepard?

  Like, are you already addicted to opiates? Do you have a million receptors, you know, are you me?

• 1:58:17Speaker 01

  But when we're talking about the penny?

• 1:58:19Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:19Speaker 01

  Like, I'm just like, that can kill an elephant, then I can't have even one-

• 1:58:24Dax Shepard?

  Micron?

• 1:58:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:25Dax Shepard?

  You can though.

• 1:58:26Speaker 01

  Really?

• 1:58:27Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, when you, they, they administer fentanyl at the hospital.

• 1:58:29Speaker 01

  That's what I don't get.

• 1:58:31Dax Shepard?

  The nasal spray and intervening.

• 1:58:33Speaker 01

  I know, that's what I really do not understand.

• 1:58:35Dax Shepard?

  Well, just the issue, of course, with it is, is they mix it perfectly, it's diluted perfectly. Every bit of fluid in the vial has the same amount of fentanyl.

• 1:58:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:47Dax Shepard?

  But when they're mixing these batches of fentanyl in a, in a 55 gallon drum in, in Mexico, some portion of it may have 10x of some other portion, you know, that's, that's the issue with black market manufacturing.

• 1:59:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, it says, "Fentanyl is an extremely potent synthetic," oh, it says, "Disclaimer, information is for general knowledge and should not be taken as medical advice." Um, "Fentanyl is an extremely potent synthetic opioid and ingestion of even a miniscule amount can be fatal. Because there is an exceptionally narrow margin between a psychoactive amount and a lethal amount, there's no single safe threshold. And individual outcomes depend heavily on factors such as body size, personal tolerance, and history of opioid use."

• 1:59:32Dax Shepard?

  Yeah, you can give a redhead that whole penny.

• 1:59:34Speaker 01

  No, don't, don't do that. Oh my God, it's 50 times stronger than heroin.

• 1:59:40Dax Shepard?

  There's one now more powerful than fentanyl.

• 1:59:43Speaker 01

  The one where the crank?

• 1:59:44Dax Shepard?

  No, that's trank.

• 1:59:45Speaker 01

  Oh, trank?

• 1:59:46Dax Shepard?

  That's a different drug altogether. That's not an opiate.

• 1:59:48Speaker 01

  Oh, but those people are so hunched over.

• 1:59:51Dax Shepard?

  Fuck, are they.

• 1:59:52Speaker 01

  Oh, it's so upsetting.

• 1:59:54Dax Shepard?

  They're a terrible advertisement for the drug. It does not look like they're having any fun.

• 1:59:58Speaker 01

  They're a perfect advertisement for it, cause it makes, I mean, they are the face of dare.

• 2:00:02Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:03Speaker 01

  You know?

• 2:00:03Dax Shepard?

  Yeah.

• 2:00:04Speaker 01

  All right, that's it.

• 2:00:05Dax Shepard?

  That's all.

• 2:00:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:00:06Dax Shepard?

  Fuck, I loved Eric.

• 2:00:07Speaker 01

  Me too.

• 2:00:08Dax Shepard?

  What a dude.

• 2:00:09Speaker 01

  I can't believe he owns the Bowery.

• 2:00:11Dax Shepard?

  And the best hotel.

• 2:00:13Speaker 01

  Best hotel.

• 2:00:13Dax Shepard?

  And the biggest turtle conservationist, like, what a-

• 2:00:16Speaker 01

  And it was really, I, I did say it in the episode, but I didn't put too fine, I didn't like scream it or emphasize. I've been wanting to go to the El Roblar Hotel in Ojai for a while.

• 2:00:26Dax Shepard?

  And we drove by it, uh, on the way to the wedding. And I was like, "Fuck, do we have time to swing in there and have a tea?"

• 2:00:33Speaker 01

  Oh, a tea, that's nice, yeah.

• 2:00:35Dax Shepard?

  We didn't though.

• 2:00:36Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 2:00:37Dax Shepard?

  All right, love you.