Ryan Hamilton & Santino Find the Funny in Everything | Whiskey Ginger

Welcome to Whiskey Ginger a Wave series. Andrew Santino sits down with comedian Ryan Hamilton for a hilarious conversation about stand-up, life's unexpected disasters, finding the funny in terrible situations, and what happens when the universe decides to hit you with an actual bus. Ryan's brand-new Netflix special, This Just Hit Me, takes one of the craziest experiences of his life and turns it into comedy gold. After being struck by a bus and facing a long recovery, Ryan somehow found a way to make the whole thing funny. Because apparently surviving a bus accident wasn't enough he had to write jokes about it too. From growing up in rural Idaho to performing on some of the biggest stages in comedy, Ryan has built a career with his uniquely charming, observational style. He's opened for Jerry Seinfeld and Nate Bargatze, appeared on The Tonight Show, and continues to prove that you don't have to be the loudest guy in the room to get the biggest laughs. Watch Ryan Hamilton: This Just Hit Me, streaming now on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/82023208 Check out Ryan's upcoming shows, tour dates, and more: https://ryanhamiltonlive.com Follow Andrew Santino: https://www.instagram.com/cheetosantino Follow Whiskey Ginger: https://instagram.com/whiskeygingerpodcast #WhiskeyGinger #AndrewSantino #RyanHamilton #ThisJustHitMe ============================================ This episode is sponsored by: TEMPO BY HOME CHEF GET 60% OFF YOUR FIRST BOX! http://tempomeals.com/santino LIQUID IV USE PROMO CODE: 2026WG FOR 20% OFF YOUR FIRST ORDER http://liquidiv.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 1:03Andrew Santino?

  Hey, welcome back to Whiskey Ginger, a wave series. Whiskey Ginger fans, I am going to be playing Sloan Park. Sloan Park, October 18th, that's where my Chicago Cubs spring train with Dave Chappelle. You might have heard of him, David Chappelle, famous stand-up comedian. I'm opening for Dave Chappelle at Sloan Park in Mesa on October 18th. I'm so very excited. And also, Whiskey Ginger fans, I got a ton of dates. We're slowly leaking them out. We're playing Vegas on March 27th at the Cosmopolitan. And I'm lining up 10 or 12 other cities right now. So go to Andrew Santino dot com for those tickets and be on the lookout for the new dates that we're dropping in 2027. Andrew Santino dot com. I'll see you in Arizona, October 18th with Dave Chappelle.

• 1:42Speaker 02

  In here, we pour whiskey, whiskey, whiskey, whiskey, whiskey.

• 1:48Speaker 03

  Who's that creature in the ginger beard? Sturdy ginger. Like their house, the ginger gene is a curse. Gingers are beautiful. You owe me $5 for the whiskey and $75 for the horse.

• 1:59Andrew Santino?

  Ginger's, oh hell no. This whiskey is excellent. Ginger, I like gingers. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to Whiskey Ginger. My guest is one of my favorite people on earth. They say that for all my guests, but I mean, once again today, it's Ryan Hamilton. And This Just Hit Me is out on Netflix right now.

• 2:16Speaker 04

  That's right.

• 2:17Andrew Santino?

  And please go watch it. If you haven't seen it, I think I, did I text you and tell you how much I liked it?

• 2:21Speaker 04

  I think so.

• 2:22Andrew Santino?

  I either texted you or I told you when I saw it.

• 2:23Speaker 04

  Yes, yes.

• 2:24Andrew Santino?

  I think, um, you are, uh, I don't like giving compliments, but, um,

• 2:30Speaker 04

  Sure.

• 2:31Andrew Santino?

  You're one of the funniest people that I'm, uh, have been lucky to get to know later in my career because we didn't really know each other. Then we met in New York.

• 2:39Speaker 04

  Right.

• 2:40Andrew Santino?

  And I was a fan from afar. I did hear you, or saw you, rather, the last time I was at the Cellar, thumbs down a few of my jokes. It's a good gauge, you know, of what you like.

• 2:50Speaker 04

  Basically, I'm thumbs down until something's good. So it's just like that. And then once in a while, but it's fast.

• 2:58Andrew Santino?

  I never got full. I got like a little baby.

• 2:59Speaker 04

  You might get something. I'm very tough critic, very tough.

• 3:05Andrew Santino?

  No, you are. You're a great comedian. I loved watching you work too, because I think I got to see a lot of this. The last time I spent a bunch of time in New York, I had to see a bunch of this stuff. And then also, uh, watching you get mad at a Late Cellar crowd is maybe one of my favorite. You just got a little, you got a little snappy at someone who's being rude.

• 3:23Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 3:23Andrew Santino?

  And it's perfect because it was well-deserved. It wasn't like a where do you work, fuck you scenario.

• 3:27Speaker 04

  Right.

• 3:28Andrew Santino?

  Which I'm very much not a fan of.

• 3:29Speaker 04

  Right.

• 3:30Andrew Santino?

  I think you're on the same page.

• 3:31Speaker 04

  Sure.

• 3:32Andrew Santino?

  I just don't like the what do you do for a living and then they are mean to them. It's like, you asked.

• 3:36Speaker 04

  I know. You started this.

• 3:38Andrew Santino?

  Yeah. If they yell something rude, yes, fine.

• 3:41Speaker 04

  That's how it was. We had, we had this skill. We would handle these scenarios when they came up.

• 3:46Andrew Santino?

  Defense mechanism.

• 3:46Speaker 04

  Right.

• 3:48Andrew Santino?

  It was never like a targeting, look at what this idiot is wearing. It was never that. And then when the idiot says something mean and they kick them out, then people clap. I'm like, it's very odd. It's very like, it's antithetical to like what a show should have been.

• 4:00Speaker 04

  Right.

• 4:01Andrew Santino?

  But whatever, it is what it is. But anyway, you have a new special on Netflix. It's fantastic. People should go watch it. Pause this right now, go watch it, come on back, or put them both on in the background. That's what millennials do.

• 4:12Speaker 04

  Oh, is it?

• 4:13Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, have two things playing at once is nice.

• 4:15Speaker 04

  With the captions. I know they like the captions.

• 4:17Andrew Santino?

  They love the cap. We're going to caption this entire show.

• 4:19Speaker 04

  Perfect.

• 4:19Andrew Santino?

  This will all be at the bottom.

• 4:21Speaker 04

  Perfect.

• 4:22Andrew Santino?

  That way people don't need to relieve. And it's cool to have the captions and the closed caption on that YouTube provides.

• 4:27Speaker 04

  Right.

• 4:27Andrew Santino?

  So it guesses what we're saying.

• 4:29Speaker 04

  Which one? Maybe we should just have all silence and really throw them.

• 4:32Andrew Santino?

  Stare at the camera?

• 4:35Andrew Santino?

  I'd love to see what it comes up with down below. Where did you shoot this special?

• 4:39Speaker 04

  Seattle.

• 4:40Andrew Santino?

  Love Seattle. Wait, let me take a wild guess.

• 4:43Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 4:43Andrew Santino?

  Moore Theater.

• 4:44Speaker 04

  Neptune.

• 4:45Andrew Santino?

  Damn, damn. One of the two.

• 4:47Speaker 04

  Yeah. Um, I love Seattle. It's a great comedy town.

• 4:50Andrew Santino?

  I couldn't agree more. I, I did a bunch of, we started all West Coast stuff because I've lived out here for 20 years. We used to just like tour the West Coast the way that you guys do bop around, you know?

• 5:00Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 5:00Andrew Santino?

  And I used to love going up there. They used to have an old club called, um, The Parlour Live, and I think it's long, long gone.

• 5:07Speaker 04

  I heard of that. I remember that.

• 5:08Andrew Santino?

  It was great. The only problem, like the room was amazing, but you had to go through like a nightclub. So it really checked your ego.

• 5:14Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 5:14Andrew Santino?

  Because they would like ID you at the nightclub.

• 5:16Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 5:17Andrew Santino?

  And you're like, mm, I'm going in the back to perform. And they're like, I don't care. Give me the.

• 5:21Speaker 04

  I'm doing the thing that doesn't make the club any money. Can I, can you let me through?

• 5:26Andrew Santino?

  You know how this club is supplementing the comedy in the back? I'm going to do the thing that, the welfare in the back. Yeah. And I would go do that and the room was so fun. But that was always hard to go up there because I was like, it's a, it's an ego test. Especially back then, you weren't, I wasn't selling that many tickets. And you're like, I'm going through a packed nightclub of like hot, young.

• 5:46Speaker 04

  Right.

• 5:47Andrew Santino?

  People partying.

• 5:48Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 5:49Andrew Santino?

  To go in the back to like, you know, retirees who got free tickets.

• 5:52Speaker 04

  These people are all free to come in. They're all available right now. They're right next door. They are as close to customers as you can get.

• 6:00Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 6:01Speaker 04

  And not, and still, not there.

• 6:02Andrew Santino?

  Just not enough.

• 6:03Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 6:04Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 6:04Speaker 04

  That's tough.

• 6:04Andrew Santino?

  But Seattle's great though.

• 6:05Speaker 04

  I lived there for a year when I first started comedy.

• 6:08Andrew Santino?

  Wait, where were you born though?

• 6:09Speaker 04

  Idaho. I don't know why I stuttered there.

• 6:13Andrew Santino?

  You said it like it was a.

• 6:13Speaker 04

  I was born in Idaho.

• 6:14Andrew Santino?

  Like it was a heartbreak. Idaho. Where, Idaho? Boise?

• 6:18Speaker 04

  Uh, a little town called Rexburg, which was like a 30-minute drive from where I actually lived. That was like the nearest hospital at that time.

• 6:26Andrew Santino?

  What, what is Mormon?

• 6:28Speaker 04

  I grew up in a Mormon community. I grew up Mormon.

• 6:30Andrew Santino?

  You did, but you let it go.

• 6:31Speaker 04

  I, yeah, I'm not practicing. I'm, I'm, yeah.

• 6:34Andrew Santino?

  At one point are you done practicing and you've become a professional?

• 6:39Andrew Santino?

  When does Mormon go from practicing to professional? I am curious.

• 6:41Speaker 04

  I don't know. It's really hard to go pro.

• 6:43Andrew Santino?

  It's hard to go pro.

• 6:44Speaker 04

  It's a hard religion to make money in.

• 6:46Andrew Santino?

  It's a, it's ironically, I don't know if that's true. I feel like there's a lot of money. They are like the, the largest, we were talking because we have in my family, uh, people that were past Mormon, you know, grew up.

• 6:58Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 6:58Andrew Santino?

  And we were talking about the largest, here's some trivia. The largest, uh, what do you guys call it? Do you call it a temple, Mormon temple?

• 7:07Speaker 04

  Yes, there are temples.

• 7:08Andrew Santino?

  By landmass.

• 7:09Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 7:09Andrew Santino?

  Outside of Salt Lake is where?

• 7:14Speaker 04

  Uh, I don't know. San Diego? I have no idea. Oh, right here in Los Angeles.

• 7:18Andrew Santino?

  Right here.

• 7:19Speaker 04

  Oh, I should have known that. Yeah.

• 7:20Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, I kind of laid it up for you a little bit, but that's all right.

• 7:23Speaker 04

  The one in San Diego is kind of famous because you come around the freeway and it looks like this. It's just like, I don't know if you've seen it.

• 7:29Andrew Santino?

  Oh, yeah.

• 7:29Speaker 04

  You just, it's like a pierce. Yeah.

• 7:31Andrew Santino?

  They did it deliberately like right as you pass over a hill.

• 7:34Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 7:35Andrew Santino?

  It's like a huh, and they do play music, huh, outside.

• 7:38Speaker 04

  Right.

• 7:38Andrew Santino?

  So if your windows are down.

• 7:39Speaker 04

  Right.

• 7:40Andrew Santino?

  No, the one in LA is in, uh, I guess it's the West LA is what we call it. I don't even know. It's like near the West Side, but it's unbelievable. Like, and during Christmas and they light the whole thing up.

• 7:50Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 7:51Andrew Santino?

  Very attractive marketing.

• 7:52Speaker 04

  Yes, they're very good at that.

• 7:54Andrew Santino?

  They're so good at marketing.

• 7:54Speaker 04

  They're very good. It's very organized.

• 7:56Andrew Santino?

  Very organized. It is the epitome of organized religion.

• 7:59Speaker 04

  Yeah. It's an organized, organized religion.

• 8:02Andrew Santino?

  Right. Catholics are a little bit disorganized.

• 8:04Speaker 04

  Disorganized religion.

• 8:04Andrew Santino?

  A lot of slip-ups over there.

• 8:06Speaker 04

  You grew up Catholic?

• 8:08Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, yes, yes, yes. But we kind of removed ourself of the Catholic Church. My parents got split when I was a kid. So like, we did go for a while as a kid, my whole family was.

• 8:18Speaker 04

  Right.

• 8:19Andrew Santino?

  But I think because of that, we kind of scurried off into the woods.

• 8:23Speaker 04

  Right.

• 8:23Andrew Santino?

  And, uh, then I, then we bopped around, then Presbyterian when I was a teenager.

• 8:28Speaker 04

  Oh, okay.

• 8:28Andrew Santino?

  It's like diet Catholic.

• 8:30Speaker 04

  Oh, right.

• 8:31Andrew Santino?

  It's like the Coke Zero of Catholics.

• 8:32Speaker 04

  Right, yeah.

• 8:33Andrew Santino?

  Where they're close, but they're like.

• 8:34Speaker 04

  No guilt?

• 8:35Andrew Santino?

  No guilt. And also the pastor, the preacher pastor, whatever you want to call them. They're allowed to be married. They're allowed to have families.

• 8:42Speaker 04

  Oh, right.

• 8:42Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, there's no restrictions towards their.

• 8:44Speaker 04

  Right.

• 8:44Andrew Santino?

  Freedoms.

• 8:45Speaker 04

  Right.

• 8:46Andrew Santino?

  Uh, so that was, like we had, when I was a kid, we had the pastors were husband and wife. And I remember asking, I was like, I thought that couldn't be. And my dad's like, that's not, that's.

• 8:55Speaker 04

  That's another thing.

• 8:56Andrew Santino?

  That's the old team.

• 8:57Speaker 04

  That's the disorganized guys.

• 8:58Andrew Santino?

  We're with the new team. Here at the new team, they can do whatever, you know what I mean? They can have full families in the church. It's great. It was great. But yeah, I grew up around it and then, um, slithered away from it.

• 9:08Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 9:08Andrew Santino?

  And now I find myself, uh, I've talked about it a little bit, more, um, more interested in faith lately.

• 9:15Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 9:16Andrew Santino?

  More than ever.

• 9:16Speaker 04

  Okay, yeah.

• 9:17Andrew Santino?

  I don't know, just interested in checking it out again. Yeah, because how old are you? You're 32? See me wink at him? Did you catch the wink?

• 9:24Speaker 04

  I just turned 50.

• 9:25Andrew Santino?

  No way.

• 9:26Speaker 04

  I'm 50 years old. I'm revealing everything I never wanted to reveal, but this is the spot.

• 9:32Andrew Santino?

  And what do you do, what do you do with your skin at 50 years old?

• 9:34Speaker 04

  What do I do with my skin?

• 9:35Andrew Santino?

  You must, do you have a Korean spa at home?

• 9:37Speaker 04

  I try to take care of myself, but.

• 9:39Andrew Santino?

  You look younger than me. I'm 43 this year and you.

• 9:42Speaker 04

  You look great.

• 9:43Andrew Santino?

  Brother, cut it out.

• 9:44Speaker 04

  No, you do. You look great.

• 9:45Andrew Santino?

  Ryan, stop. It's not even nice at this point. Don't be, don't patronize me. 50 is amazing.

• 9:49Speaker 04

  Oh, well, that's very nice. Thank you.

• 9:51Andrew Santino?

  Wow. Well, that's also no, never married, no kids.

• 9:54Speaker 04

  Never married, no kids.

• 9:55Andrew Santino?

  That helps.

• 9:56Speaker 04

  And I've been real conscious of it the last, I don't know, five years. Ever since my accident, I really started taking my body serious. Is that a weird thing to say?

• 10:08Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, because it's so vague if people have no idea. It's like, they're making it up in their minds at home right now. What happened?

• 10:14Speaker 04

  I'm sorry.

• 10:14Andrew Santino?

  Well, people that don't know, he was, for a short stint in his comedy career, decided to leave because it wasn't going the way he wanted. He drove on the Nuremberg. He was training to be an F1 driver. And you crashed a, uh, you crashed a Porsche GT3, GT2 RS, I believe, going 148 miles an hour, flipped it 17 times. Oh, no, that's not, is that partially true?

• 10:35Speaker 04

  I can't remember a lot of it.

• 10:37Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, because you blank it out.

• 10:38Speaker 04

  Right. But, um, yeah, something like that. Something like that. There was definitely, um, an automotive element.

• 10:46Andrew Santino?

  There was an automotive, but it wasn't the Nuremberg.

• 10:48Speaker 04

  It was, not that I recall. I think it was, um, LAX.

• 10:54Speaker 04

  And I think it was a shuttle bus.

• 10:56Andrew Santino?

  It's a shuttle bus.

• 10:57Speaker 04

  And I don't think I was driving it.

• 10:59Andrew Santino?

  Not your fault.

• 11:00Speaker 04

  No, not my fault for sure.

• 11:05Speaker 04

  And that's, that's it.

• 11:06Andrew Santino?

  You didn't get a Tracy Morgan check out of it, though.

• 11:09Speaker 04

  No. The bus, shuttle bus company went out of business the week of the accident.

• 11:14Andrew Santino?

  Convenient?

• 11:15Speaker 04

  My attorney said, "This is not a coincidence."

• 11:20Andrew Santino?

  That's incredible. The week that they, they're like, "You know what? We hit a guy." They're like, "Well, we're moving. Moving to the seashells. We'll be moving to an island where they can't get us." That's crazy.

• 11:32Speaker 04

  It's crazy. I mean, they still had insurance and whatever, but it was, you know, it was, this was not a life-changing situation financially for me.

• 11:39Andrew Santino?

  It helped pay for the medical bills.

• 11:41Speaker 04

  Yes. I basically, you know, I kind of broke even, I think.

• 11:45Andrew Santino?

  Such a funny way. I got into a terrible accident, but I broke even out of the whole thing, so that's good.

• 11:50Speaker 04

  Yeah, you know, you win something, you lose something.

• 11:54Andrew Santino?

  I went to the casino with a couple grand, I went home with a couple grand, that's kind of how it went. And very, in a lot of pain.

• 11:59Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 12:00Andrew Santino?

  You still do rehab and stuff like that, or no?

• 12:02Speaker 04

  Kind of. I mean, I had this physical therapy that was pretty intense, and I just kept it going in terms of like, uh, training. But it's not like specific physical therapy.

• 12:10Andrew Santino?

  Sure.

• 12:10Speaker 04

  But I think of it that way, because I'm always trying to get stronger, work around my injuries.

• 12:14Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 12:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 12:15Andrew Santino?

  It's nuts.

• 12:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 12:17Andrew Santino?

  And I think it helped you, though.

• 12:18Speaker 04

  In some ways, it did. It was really hard to accept that, because that's what people tell you when you're going through it, is in therapy is everything. You're, this, this is a bad thing, but good things can come from bad things. And you go, "Well, I just want my life back, really." That's all I want. Can I just have my life back? But eventually, I, I think like I am stronger now, physically and other ways, probably.

• 12:38Andrew Santino?

  Up here.

• 12:40Speaker 04

  They said no head trauma. I think the jury's out, but, um...

• 12:44Andrew Santino?

  Watch the special on Netflix and let us know, guys. Comment down below if you think the head trauma did transfer over into the taping.

• 12:49Speaker 04

  Right, I'd love to hear.

• 12:50Andrew Santino?

  Now, how many shows do you do? Two?

• 12:52Speaker 04

  Two in one night, yeah.

• 12:53Andrew Santino?

  This is always the argument. I've, I just talked to Kelsey Cook about this, whether or not you do one one night, one another night, you do two one night. I did four, this last one in Minneapolis, just because I wanted to really like change the set a lot.

• 13:05Speaker 04

  Really? Changed the set? That's why you did it?

• 13:08Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, the order of, yeah.

• 13:09Speaker 04

  Why? Why, why?

• 13:11Andrew Santino?

  I just, the experiment was kind of fun, for some reason.

• 13:12Speaker 04

  Interesting.

• 13:13Andrew Santino?

  Because the other two that I did, I did traditional two shows like that.

• 13:15Speaker 04

  Uh huh.

• 13:16Andrew Santino?

  And, um, this one, I was like, "Look, I've got a little bit more money in the budget to play," and they already kind of gave me the theater. And I was like, "I might as well have fun with it, I guess." I don't know. It, it, I don't know if it mattered a lot, because I ended up using 75% of one show.

• 13:33Speaker 04

  Right.

• 13:34Andrew Santino?

  Which is as it goes.

• 13:35Speaker 04

  Right.

• 13:35Andrew Santino?

  But, I don't know, it was more fun for me to feel loose on a couple of things that I just didn't care as much about, because I knew they were locked. So it kind of was just like an insurance thing, you know?

• 13:43Speaker 04

  I get that, but changing the order sounds really crazy to me.

• 13:46Andrew Santino?

  I'm a psychopath, yeah. I'm also not as astute of a joke writer as you, so I need to just like trick them a little bit. No, I need to, if I can't, if I can't do Three Card Molly with the jokes, you know what I mean? I like to move it around a little bit, just because sometimes if I said a joke before something, order-wise, it changes the dynamic of the rest of the set. And so, I kept playing with it on tour, and then I was like, "I think I want to do that when I do the taping."

• 14:08Speaker 04

  Right, because that's what you got used to, is moving things around a little bit.

• 14:10Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, I always moved it around. I never was the same, which there's no, I have no comment about that. I think it works for a lot of people, do the exact same... You know, that's sort of like Sari Seinfeldian, where you're like, exactly the same every single time, right?

• 14:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think, you know, I do, I end up doing that, because like you said, sometimes it works better if you, I... This set, I ended up flipping entirely. That's why I was interested in this, because I had all of this bus accident material uh, at the end, originally. And then I ended up flipping it shortly before, which was this huge task in my head, just because I wanted people to see it.

• 14:43Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, you're like, "Put it up front."

• 14:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, which is a weird consideration to make, that you just go, "Hopefully, people finish this thing." But if they don't, then they're getting the, what I want them to see.

• 14:52Andrew Santino?

  Right. Well, I think Louis, maybe Louis said that. Somebody said, um... I feel like it was Louis, that was like, "When you're really kind of working it out, put your closer at the beginning and see how well you do after that, when you're working out." Which I thought was kind of interesting, like, "Start with your closer."

• 15:06Speaker 04

  Right, yeah, just to see what happens.

• 15:08Andrew Santino?

  But that's so hard to do. He's like, "Well, that's, see what it does."

• 15:11Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 15:12Andrew Santino?

  And, and I think I tried it, and I was like, "Nope."

• 15:16Andrew Santino?

  Back to the old ways, we'll do it. So I'll just, I'll use that for the good night.

• 15:19Speaker 04

  Forty-five minutes of like, "Well, this is going to be underwhelming in about half an hour."

• 15:24Andrew Santino?

  Also, ending a, ending an hour that you're doing at a live, you know, club, working out, ending it with, uh, "How you guys doing tonight?" That's a tough...

• 15:31Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 15:32Andrew Santino?

  To end with a beginning. What's this guy, what do you do for a living, man, at the very last?

• 15:36Speaker 04

  Yeah. Let's see, what's next? "Goodnight, everybody. Thank you so much."

• 15:40Andrew Santino?

  Let's see. What do you want, what do you want me to talk about? That, what do you, so what do you guys want to talk about? Ask them, they, let them decide what you want to talk about.

• 15:47Speaker 04

  You guys are fun. That's my favorite one. You guys are fun. If you hear a comedian say, "You guys are fun," you know that something's wrong.

• 15:53Andrew Santino?

  Yeah. Yeah, when you hear, "Oh, you guys were have, you guys are this great."

• 15:58Speaker 04

  You guys are great.

• 15:59Andrew Santino?

  Unless it's, uh, uh, Dusty Slay, doesn't he say, "We're having a good time?"

• 16:03Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah, "We're having a good time."

• 16:04Andrew Santino?

  I love, "We're having a good time."

• 16:05Speaker 04

  "We're having a good time."

• 16:06Andrew Santino?

  Because it's, it's, it's, it's mocking, at the same time, let's complimentary. Because he's being genuine.

• 16:11Speaker 04

  Right.

• 16:11Andrew Santino?

  But he's like, "We're having a good time."

• 16:12Speaker 04

  Yeah, this is just it.

• 16:13Andrew Santino?

  Just letting them know, like, "This is what it is."

• 16:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 16:15Andrew Santino?

  If you're not in, you're going to be, it's going to be way worse.

• 16:18Speaker 04

  Right.

• 16:18Andrew Santino?

  So please, just get into this whole thing. So, wait, you lived in Seattle for a year? That was your, that was part of the reason you were like, "I need to shoot here."

• 16:25Speaker 04

  I get, yeah, it was part of the reason that I was pretty confident in it, in, and, uh, it was just, they had the right date. That venue, it had some really great shows in.

• 16:33Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 16:34Speaker 04

  A lot of people shot in that venue. It's like, uh, an easy venue to shoot in, they're used to it, it's pretty cheap. There's just a lot of things that people don't think about, that you're like, "Okay, this is, let's do that."

• 16:44Andrew Santino?

  I know, they all think that we're Chappelle and Rock, where you can literally throw a dart and be like, "I'll shoot there."

• 16:48Speaker 04

  Right.

• 16:49Andrew Santino?

  That's just not the case.

• 16:50Speaker 04

  Right, and, "And when hadn't I been there last?" And all these, yeah.

• 16:53Andrew Santino?

  I know, that's, it, it all goes into the math

• 16:56Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 16:56Andrew Santino?

  of like, how this can work. And, I've talked about this, but, you know, and my, and when I was in Minneapolis, Shane played where the Timberwolves play basketball.

• 17:02Speaker 04

  Sure.

• 17:03Andrew Santino?

  And, um, and Kevin Hart played at one of the amphitheaters, so it was great timing for me to shoot a special.

• 17:07Speaker 04

  The same night?

• 17:08Andrew Santino?

  Same weekend.

• 17:09Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 17:09Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, it was awesome.

• 17:10Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 17:10Andrew Santino?

  It was all thanks to my agents.

• 17:11Speaker 04

  Wait, where was that one? Oh, the Minnesota?

• 17:13Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, Minneapolis, yeah, Minnesota. So, uh, you know, my team is on it. I remember like, uh, emailing and texting and being like, "Guys, this seems like a, a gross miscalculation of the tour." Like, you didn't check with anybody else? And they were like, "This happens all the time." I was like, "To me, to me it does."

• 17:32Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 17:32Andrew Santino?

  I feel like to me, it happens a lot, but... Whatever, it is what it is.

• 17:36Speaker 04

  It was great, though, right?

• 17:37Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, no, it was awesome. I, I had a lovely time. They showed up, we sold out four shows, like, it was awesome, but it didn't help my anxiety.

• 17:45Speaker 04

  No, sure, of course.

• 17:45Andrew Santino?

  When you're on your way, you're like, "Oh, this is not fun."

• 17:48Speaker 04

  No.

• 17:48Andrew Santino?

  Shane's like, "You're going to be here?" Texting him like, "Let's get lunch."

• 17:52Speaker 04

  It's the biggest night of my career, but sure, I'm here.

• 17:57Andrew Santino?

  I'll come look at the stadium before I go play the little club around the corner. It's so funny. To like, walk down, you know, like, we were walking during the day to go do, um, sound the day before we filmed. And then I look over at, like, where the Timberwolves play.

• 18:09Speaker 04

  Isn't that wild?

• 18:10Andrew Santino?

  Yeah. And I'm like, "That's where they, that's where he..." You know, they're rigging cranes and stuff for him. Mine's a couple of guys smoking out back, they're like, "It's all ready to go, man." We had to do nothing.

• 18:20Speaker 04

  You want to go early?

• 18:22Andrew Santino?

  They're like, "Wrap this up, we want to go see Shane, if you don't mind." The entire crew is like, "We got to cut early, so..."

• 18:27Speaker 04

  Yeah, we got to.

• 18:27Andrew Santino?

  No problem, whatever you guys, whatever you guys want to do. No, but that's great. Seattle, Seattle underrated. I, I love that city.

• 18:33Speaker 04

  Absolutely.

• 18:34Andrew Santino?

  One of the best days of my life. I had an, uh, Alki Beach, I've talked about it on the show. Alki, Alki Beach, I had a little great day with an old friend of mine.

• 18:42Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 18:42Andrew Santino?

  And it imprinted in my mind. You have these where like, you have, you just feels like kind of a regular day, and something strikes you, you're like, "This is one of the best days I've had, and I don't even know why." Just like, a few things lined up perfectly.

• 18:54Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 18:54Andrew Santino?

  Like, I met up with a friend at a good time, it happened to be this thing, we went to the thing, then it was like, there's a dinner party afterwards. Let's go to this guy's house, I just met, warm, it just kind of, everything slotted.

• 19:04Speaker 04

  I know, exactly what you're talking about.

• 19:06Andrew Santino?

  You know? You have one of these? You've had one of these recently?

• 19:08Speaker 04

  I mean, I don't know, recently, but it's, I know what you're talking about. Sometimes things just line up.

• 19:12Andrew Santino?

  They fall into place.

• 19:13Speaker 04

  And you're like, "This is..." And it reminds you of, uh, you know, maybe every day's good, and I'm preventing it from being good.

• 19:22Andrew Santino?

  That's probably very, very true. Every day is incredible, we're just doing our best at being like, "Well, this sucks."

• 19:28Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 19:28Andrew Santino?

  This is annoying.

• 19:29Speaker 04

  Maybe I got rid of my block that day, and that's what happened.

• 19:33Andrew Santino?

  It finally cleared out of your head. Are you on anything?

• 19:39Speaker 04

  Life, man.

• 19:40Andrew Santino?

  He's on life, dude.

• 19:42Speaker 04

  No, I, uh, you know, I started taking, um, oh, no, I did take some, uh, I took some lion mane, lion's mane?

• 19:50Andrew Santino?

  Lion's mane mushroom's great.

• 19:51Speaker 04

  I just started...

• 19:52Andrew Santino?

  Good for, good for the noodle.

• 19:53Speaker 04

  Yeah, I was just walking around the grocery store, and I thought, "I'm doing a bunch of podcasts, let me try this. I need that."

• 19:58Andrew Santino?

  And?

• 19:59Speaker 04

  I don't know, how am I doing?

• 20:01Andrew Santino?

  Very lion-esque.

• 20:02Speaker 04

  Right?

• 20:02Andrew Santino?

  Lioness, sorry, like a lioness. Yeah, lioness, which actually is the one that owns The Herd, you know?

• 20:08Speaker 04

  Okay, but it is a female.

• 20:09Andrew Santino?

  Does that matter in this day and age?

• 20:11Speaker 04

  I feel like it matters a little.

• 20:17Andrew Santino?

  Now, you're very lion, you're lion-like, yeah.

• 20:19Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 20:19Andrew Santino?

  You're lion-like.

• 20:21Speaker 04

  No one's ever said that.

• 20:22Andrew Santino?

  No one says that about you?

• 20:23Speaker 04

  No.

• 20:24Andrew Santino?

  Nobody goes, who, Ryan? Ryan the Lion?

• 20:25Speaker 04

  Ryan the Li- well, it rhymes, but I don't know if that's enough to get me there.

• 20:31Andrew Santino?

  Well, it should. Everyone online, please start calling him Ryan the Lion and use a little emoji when you tag on his Instagram and stuff. Let's see if we can start a revolution.

• 20:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think it's gonna be hard for people to latch on to that, but I'm, I'm, I'm willing to try.

• 20:43Andrew Santino?

  Listen, you got a whole new fanbase called The Pride? Ryan's Pride?

• 20:47Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 20:47Andrew Santino?

  I mean, I think I'm...

• 20:49Speaker 04

  This is pretty good.

• 20:49Andrew Santino?

  I think I'm doing all the marketing for you.

• 20:51Speaker 04

  You're pretty, you're kind of like, uh, this is, it's like you're natural at marketing.

• 20:54Andrew Santino?

  Maybe I should join Mormon.

• 20:57Speaker 04

  Join Mormon?

• 20:58Andrew Santino?

  Join Mormon.

• 20:59Speaker 04

  I think you should join Mormon.

• 20:59Andrew Santino?

  Time for you to go Mormon! I could, you know, I really could. I really, I, what I should join for at the very least is to get rid of alcohol. The soda intake is higher than I thought. They love soda.

• 21:10Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah, well, they, yeah, they, um, they supplement in other ways.

• 21:15Andrew Santino?

  The, the, the amount of soda consumed blew my mind the first time I was, like, exposed to the-

• 21:21Speaker 04

  A lot of sugar and just in general desserts, and soda's wild.

• 21:26Andrew Santino?

  So much. Like, soda more than, you're like, I'll just grab a water, and they're like, well, there's Coke, Dr. Pepper, Mountain, you're like, oh, any one of those.

• 21:32Speaker 04

  Yeah, they have, they have now these soda shops that are crazy there where you'd like mix and thing. I've never been in one of those. That's like, all became big after I left.

• 21:40Andrew Santino?

  After you left. They were like, finally, he's gone.

• 21:42Speaker 04

  Right, but now we can do that.

• 21:43Andrew Santino?

  Now we can party, yeah. Wait, last time I was in Salt Lake, if you have any sort of reference to Salt Lake, I had one of the best deli sandwiches I've had in years. We waited forever. It was like a German deli. Why can't I remember the name of it?

• 21:56Speaker 04

  Oh, the one by the club?

• 21:57Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, what is that called? It's fam- it's super famous.

• 21:59Speaker 04

  It's, um, Colin Quinn's favorite deli.

• 22:03Andrew Santino?

  Siegfried's?

• 22:03Speaker 04

  Is it Siegfried's?

• 22:04Andrew Santino?

  Siegfried's is right. Siegfried's was right, yeah. And Roy's shut down unfortunately after the accident. Um, bad joke.

• 22:11Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 22:11Andrew Santino?

  Terrible, terrible joke. I apologize. Well, you know what? And we'll leave it in just to show how bad of a joke that was. Yeah, Siegfried's.

• 22:16Speaker 04

  I'm surprised you didn't tie it into the lion thing somehow.

• 22:19Andrew Santino?

  I tried for a second. I thought you'd pick, I thought you'd help me out on that, but...

• 22:22Speaker 04

  That should've been me. I'm sorry I dropped that.

• 22:24Andrew Santino?

  Left it on the ground, you just left it. No, yeah, Siegfried's. We waited for a couple hours, but it was so good. Cause there was-

• 22:29Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 22:30Andrew Santino?

  The lion, you know, do the lion to take to go sit down?

• 22:31Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 22:32Andrew Santino?

  And it was next to the theater, so everyone that was going to the theater was going. Oh, my god.

• 22:36Speaker 04

  There's some good food there now.

• 22:37Andrew Santino?

  Salt Lake's great.

• 22:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's a great town.

• 22:38Andrew Santino?

  Every time I go, I'm like, this place is phenomenal. And you could land a 747 on any of their roads at any given time. They're like nine-lane highways, you're like, this is incredible. Crossing is hard. They give you 58 seconds, I feel like.

• 22:49Speaker 04

  They have the little flags there. You take a flag and you're supposed to, which I now appreciate, actually.

• 22:54Andrew Santino?

  Well, that's all because for a long time in your career, you were one of those Chinese tourists in Times Square. You would hold up the flag and give guides through Times Square.

• 23:01Speaker 04

  Yeah, a lot of people don't know that, but I did that for a long, long time. Years, years I was a flag holder in Times Square.

• 23:08Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, in fact, you live above the M&M factory, yes?

• 23:10Speaker 04

  Yes, I do now. I do now. I just, I don't know. I got used to the neighborhood and it's, it's, it's noisy.

• 23:18Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 23:18Speaker 04

  But it's, I have access to everything kitsch.

• 23:22Andrew Santino?

  Everything kitsch is there.

• 23:23Speaker 04

  Yeah, and that's what I want.

• 23:27Andrew Santino?

  How lo- how many years is this for you in New York now?

• 23:30Speaker 04

  Uh, let's see, 18 or something like that.

• 23:33Andrew Santino?

  Wow, that's like, I'm 20 here, yeah.

• 23:35Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 23:36Andrew Santino?

  And is it time or are you still comfortable?

• 23:37Speaker 04

  I don't know where else to go.

• 23:39Andrew Santino?

  I know.

• 23:40Speaker 04

  Um, I like New York. I'm, I, it feels, I used to get a lot of anxiety going back to New York. Just, I love it there, but it was never my default setting. I'm from this tiny place in Idaho.

• 23:51Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 23:51Speaker 04

  So it was like, hard to, to just get used to it. But, you know, I love it now. Now my, my friends are there.

• 23:59Andrew Santino?

  You're planted there.

• 23:59Speaker 04

  I'm planted there and-

• 24:01Andrew Santino?

  What's your escape pod, though? Like, what's a place where you're like, when, when you're done really doing the thing?

• 24:06Speaker 04

  I mean, I have a little land in Idaho, back home.

• 24:08Andrew Santino?

  Lovely.

• 24:09Speaker 04

  I think about that. It's just like in my head, like, it just makes me comfortable to go. It's there if I ever want to just go there.

• 24:16Andrew Santino?

  Is there, there's a house?

• 24:17Speaker 04

  There's not a house, but there could be.

• 24:19Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, there will be at one point.

• 24:21Speaker 04

  And, um, you know, I'm comfortable there.

• 24:24Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 24:25Speaker 04

  But, I don't know. I, I spent a summer upstate in the Catskills.

• 24:30Andrew Santino?

  Very cool.

• 24:31Speaker 04

  And I rented a house up there just to see what that was like.

• 24:33Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 24:34Speaker 04

  And, um, did a lot of fly fishing and just this beautiful little spot way up in the mountains. And it was fun, but alone, it's tough.

• 24:45Andrew Santino?

  Tough.

• 24:45Speaker 04

  I don't know if I can have an escape pod unless you're married.

• 24:49Andrew Santino?

  Yeah. Well, we don't have children, so for us, it's also like, what is the, what is the end game? Like, where is that spot?

• 24:56Speaker 04

  Right.

• 24:57Andrew Santino?

  It's hard to pick. Kids dictate most people's lives that have kids.

• 24:59Speaker 04

  Right.

• 25:00Andrew Santino?

  And so they, they know, my friends with kids know, more than anyone on earth, exactly where they want to be when they're done. Like, you talk to people with, with kids, and they're like, we have the, we have the place. We know exactly where we want to go. Cause, you know, I, I think after they've paid their dues and they've done their time with their children, they need like a, now we get to go here finally.

• 25:20Speaker 04

  When everybody's 18, they're like, this is, that's our finish line. We don't have that.

• 25:23Andrew Santino?

  No, we don't. Yeah, we're, we're just running a forever marathon.

• 25:25Speaker 04

  We're just in a for, a never-ending collapse at one day.

• 25:31Andrew Santino?

  Our legs are shaking. It just never goes away. Yeah, I met a couple at the airport. They, that's what they said. They had moved, they find their kids. We were in line to check bags yesterday when I was flying home and this guy was just chatting with me cause we were waiting forever and he's like, where are you going back to? You know, da-da-da, and then he says, yeah, we're, um, recently retired. Our kids left and we just retired. I said, good for you. He's, and I said, we're either from Minnesota and they moved out to the desert. And they were like, it's fantastic. Yeah, he was like, no more winters. I was like, good for you, man.

• 25:59Speaker 04

  Okay, great.

• 25:59Andrew Santino?

  He's like, uh, what about you? And I say, oh, we live in LA. He's like, you gonna be there forever? I was like, I, I don't know if I have a choice. I'm not, I don't know where else to-

• 26:06Speaker 04

  Right.

• 26:07Andrew Santino?

  Are we allowed to leave?

• 26:08Speaker 04

  Not with this career.

• 26:09Andrew Santino?

  Nah, can't do it. Well, we were on the road some, I mean, are you touring right now?

• 26:14Speaker 04

  Yes, yes. I mean, I might just announce the actual tour, which I, in my head, starts in November. But I have club dates and stuff going on in preparation. That's how it's working.

• 26:24Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 26:25Speaker 04

  In my mind.

• 26:25Andrew Santino?

  November's theaters.

• 26:26Speaker 04

  The theaters, some clubs, yeah.

• 26:28Andrew Santino?

  You mix them in.

• 26:29Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 26:29Andrew Santino?

  I like how like, and they, they, the agents try to like, get you to do one or the other. They're like, do some theaters to prep for the, or do some clubs to prep for the theaters.

• 26:36Speaker 04

  I know.

• 26:36Andrew Santino?

  And then when you sprinkle it in, they, they're like, well, I mean, we can. They make you feel bad about everything.

• 26:41Speaker 04

  I know.

• 26:42Andrew Santino?

  I don't know what, they're so good at that.

• 26:43Speaker 04

  Right.

• 26:43Andrew Santino?

  And then you check your entire, like, everything gets checked in your mind. You're like, well, is that bad, is that a bad idea? Who, do other comics do that?

• 26:50Speaker 04

  Right. This is what, is this is, it's like, no, this is how it's done. And you go, oh, well, I've been doing it a while, never did it like that.

• 26:58Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, they make you feel, they make you, uh, meanwhile, they're at their house with their family, enjoying their lives. And you're sitting in, you know what I mean? You're sitting in Toledo, about to go to the next spot.

• 27:06Speaker 04

  Yes, yes.

• 27:07Andrew Santino?

  That's just how it goes.

• 27:09Speaker 04

  How it's done.

• 27:09Andrew Santino?

  Yeah. So November starts at the tour.

• 27:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, and this is my first time ever doing like a named, actual tour.

• 27:15Andrew Santino?

  What's the name of this one?

• 27:16Speaker 04

  Making Good Time?

• 27:18Andrew Santino?

  Making Good Time?

• 27:19Speaker 04

  Making Good Time. In my head, it has this double meaning. That it's, you know, it's positive and we're making progress, but we're also making a good time every night.

• 27:27Andrew Santino?

  We're making a good time.

• 27:28Speaker 04

  It's so hard to do this. I know as I'm saying it, it's like, because what they force you to do is like, um, I feel like that scene in, in, uh, Jason Bourne where he's like, "This is what they make us do." Do you remember that?

• 27:41Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 27:42Speaker 04

  And he's dying in the field. "Can you believe what they make us do?"

• 27:46Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 27:47Speaker 04

  You see in the flashing lights? "This is what they make us do." They make us name the thing and, um, before we have the material.

• 27:55Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, get a graphic designer, name it, put it all together, and that must be it. And it's gonna be put on every website and everything.

• 28:03Speaker 04

  Yes, because they go, you have to ride the momentum of the special. The second the special's out, we gotta start promoting the new tour. It's like, I don't know what it is yet.

• 28:12Andrew Santino?

  We're not there yet.

• 28:12Speaker 04

  Yeah, and they go, well, just, that's why everybody's tour name, I realized, is like some innocuous-

• 28:17Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, it's meaningless.

• 28:18Speaker 04

  It's like, it's just a general thing, cause they're like, uh, here we go.

• 28:21Andrew Santino?

  And they're always like, you gonna name the special after that? And you're like, I don't know.

• 28:24Speaker 04

  I don't think-

• 28:25Andrew Santino?

  I won't even know till-

• 28:25Speaker 04

  I hope not.

• 28:26Andrew Santino?

  An hour before we post the special. Netflix is calling about the art. They're like, what is it? You're like, I don't know!

• 28:31Speaker 04

  Yes!

• 28:32Andrew Santino?

  It's, that's why I always was jealous when, years ago, you should be just like, live from, blank. The specials were always like, live from the, you know, Minneapolis, live from Florida.

• 28:43Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah, right.

• 28:43Andrew Santino?

  Live, live from whatever.

• 28:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 28:45Andrew Santino?

  It's way easier to do. We should all be live from.

• 28:47Speaker 04

  Yes, no, it's gotta be a whole thing.

• 28:49Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, and it's gotta be incorporated into the art, in the background, in the lighting, in the thing. It's anxiety that I feel like comics never knew they had to deal with.

• 28:57Speaker 04

  No, yeah, we are so many things now. We are, I, I've been an art director all week, putting out this tour thing. You gotta be a meteorologist just in case your flight gets messed up.

• 29:08Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, you have to be, you have to be your own, like, even if you have help. He is the greatest. He helps me tour. But it's still, is like, we still have to delegate-

• 29:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 29:16Andrew Santino?

  What's gonna work out timing-wise. Like, this is all, people at home are like, who cares?

• 29:21Speaker 04

  Are they?

• 29:22Andrew Santino?

  No.

• 29:22Speaker 04

  Okay, I don't know. I don't know.

• 29:24Andrew Santino?

  They like it. No, it is hard. It's just, I think there's so many more pieces that go into the anxiety of putting together a tour versus like, show up, hang out, tell jokes. It's like, it's the last thing we get to do is tell jokes.

• 29:35Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 29:35Andrew Santino?

  You get paid to travel, that's what I always say.

• 29:37Speaker 04

  That, I see, yes, I see.

• 29:38Andrew Santino?

  Jay Moore one time in the parking lot of the store said, um, he was going somewhere. I go, that might be fun, like, whatever city it was. He goes, picking up a check, kid. And I was like, all right, well. I mean, he was being bluntly honest. He was like, yeah, he's like, sometimes I'm just picking up a check. He's like, I've been there 10 times. I'm just going there, working out stuff, trying my best. I'm, I was still green and I was like, "How great is that?"

• 30:00Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 30:01Andrew Santino?

  "You get to go there." He's like, picking up a check.

• 30:03Speaker 04

  It's one of those things that's stuck in your head.

• 30:05Andrew Santino?

  Picking up a check.

• 30:06Speaker 04

  That's a real thing.

• 30:07Andrew Santino?

  I know.

• 30:08Speaker 04

  Yeah. But it's still the greatest, you know?

• 30:11Andrew Santino?

  It's the best.

• 30:11Speaker 04

  It's like, everything's gotta have something. It's still the greatest.

• 30:14Andrew Santino?

  Now, what do you do in your downtime when you're on the road? Are you like in the hotel, like, work out or sleep all day or like a-

• 30:20Speaker 04

  I try to do something physical just for my mental well-being. I'll try. If, even if it's just walking, you know?

• 30:25Andrew Santino?

  Through the town?

• 30:26Speaker 04

  Yeah, just go for a walk, whatever, get around some sort of nature if I can.

• 30:31Andrew Santino?

  Get out of the hotel.

• 30:32Speaker 04

  Get out of the hotel.

• 30:33Andrew Santino?

  What about your, uh, feature or host or whoever's with you?

• 30:35Speaker 04

  I mean, it depends. Sometimes I'm traveling with someone. Often, I just have a local person that I don't know, so I'm sometimes just out there alone.

• 30:42Andrew Santino?

  Yeah. Why don't you bring somebody?

• 30:44Speaker 04

  I, I, sometimes I can't, sometimes it doesn't make sense.

• 30:47Andrew Santino?

  Financially.

• 30:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's just like, it, I, I, it just seems like, we'll see how it go, how many tickets I'm selling.

• 30:54Andrew Santino?

  Please buy the tickets, uh, so he can bring someone that he likes. Well, when I, I mean, I do- I do sometimes, you know, just because I'm like, I just want someone with me for the pain ride.

• 31:05Speaker 04

  It's great.

• 31:06Andrew Santino?

  It's so much more fun if it's someone you love.

• 31:08Speaker 04

  Yes, it's a huge difference.

• 31:10Andrew Santino?

  It makes you feel better. I always feel like my sets are better than when I have a local. Because sometimes I don't know the locals and then you're the outcast, even though you're the headliner.

• 31:18Speaker 04

  Right.

• 31:19Andrew Santino?

  And you're like, God, I feel so not a part of the machine.

• 31:22Speaker 04

  Right.

• 31:22Andrew Santino?

  But back then, I used to go, because I'm a big baseball fan, I would tour a baseball season, I would just go watch games during the day.

• 31:27Speaker 04

  Oh, that's good.

• 31:28Andrew Santino?

  I used to kind of plan it around that. My agents were like, why here? I'm like, well, there's a couple of home games, so maybe I can go pop two.

• 31:33Speaker 04

  That's great.

• 31:34Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, and I would use to offer it to the local comic. I'd be like, hey, I'll buy you a ticket if you want to come with me. Fifty percent of the time, I get a yes.

• 31:40Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:40Andrew Santino?

  Then the other half would be like, I don't like baseball. I'm like, that's not what it says.

• 31:43Speaker 04

  This is, that doesn't, it doesn't matter.

• 31:45Andrew Santino?

  Nothing to do with this. Do you want to just go hang out for the day somewhere? Like, you don't have to watch the game. You just get food and a beer.

• 31:52Speaker 04

  There is an art to being an opener, which is not just what you do on stage.

• 31:56Andrew Santino?

  Right.

• 31:57Speaker 04

  It's part of the hang.

• 31:58Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, it gotta be the hang.

• 31:59Speaker 04

  And it's fun, if you really.

• 32:00Andrew Santino?

  I loved it.

• 32:01Speaker 04

  I loved it too.

• 32:02Andrew Santino?

  I thought it was so fun. And you did fifteen, then you got to just fart around?

• 32:05Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's great.

• 32:06Andrew Santino?

  That's why some people fall into the opener for a long time spot, because they're like, it's pretty easy, making good money.

• 32:10Speaker 04

  It's really fun.

• 32:11Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, the pressure is zero. You can go smash for fifteen minutes, and then you're like, have a good night.

• 32:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 32:16Andrew Santino?

  Okay, next, Ryan, I guess. Who is it? Ryan? Ryan Hamel? Hampston? He's here.

• 32:22Speaker 02

  In here, we pour whiskey.

• 32:25Andrew Santino?

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• 33:08Andrew Santino?

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• 33:50Andrew Santino?

  Even if you don't sweat or exercise, this is superior hydration. I do love that. It tastes great, and this is the sugar-free, which is huge for me, because I'm trying to cut out my sugar intake. That's the lemon lime, and they got the green grape, which is also very, very good. And of course, everyone's classic favorite, that strawberry watermelon. But they just, they taste great and they hydrate you without having a ton of sugar, which is no bueno.

• 34:16Andrew Santino?

  The flavor that bites back is Liquid IV, and I'm telling you, it's hydrating. And they've also got Blood Orange to resurrect your hydration with a Shaka Citra flavor. And it's scary fast hydration, no matter what it is you're doing, whether you're exercising, working out, or you just want to hydrate and boost yourself up and feel a little bit better. You gotta get yourself some Liquid IV immediately. If you've never had it, you must try it. They're delicious, and they are great. Not sure which Liquid IV flavor to try? Shop the Sugar-Free Hydration Multiplier Variety Pack. You can try Liquid IV's new limited edition Hydration Multiplier Blood Orange. Tear, pour, live more. Go to liquidiv.com and get twenty percent off your first purchase with code 2026WG at checkout.

• 34:58Andrew Santino?

  That's twenty percent off your first purchase with code 2026WG at liquidiv.com.

• 35:09Andrew Santino?

  Have you ever been screwed by an opener, giving you just a shit set in front of you and then not bringing you up well?

• 35:13Speaker 04

  I'm sure. Nothing comes to mind right away.

• 35:16Andrew Santino?

  Nothing slammed? Oh, man, I had one in fucking Tempo, yeah. This older comic, you know, he was a younger headliner, older guy, local guy.

• 35:26Andrew Santino?

  You know, just like a very disrespectful, like, who cares? Why are they here to see you type of thing? Already, your ego is in check, because you're like, well, I don't know, I'm trying my best.

• 35:35Speaker 04

  Right.

• 35:36Andrew Santino?

  I don't know why they wanted to see me.

• 35:37Speaker 04

  I had a guy one time, just, it was like, you know, the thing I say to them is like, you gotta be clean. I'm clean, because my audience expects it.

• 35:45Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 35:45Speaker 04

  I don't care, do whatever you want to do, but I'm telling you, it's gonna be weird if you're not clean.

• 35:49Andrew Santino?

  Sure.

• 35:50Speaker 04

  And he went up and he was like, closed with this impression of a goose doing a blowjob.

• 35:57Andrew Santino?

  Did I open for you? Where was that? That's my bit.

• 36:01Speaker 04

  Is it?

• 36:01Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 36:02Speaker 04

  Are you serious?

• 36:03Andrew Santino?

  No, Ryan!

• 36:05Speaker 04

  You're really good. You're really good at that.

• 36:07Andrew Santino?

  The goose giving a blowjob. I am thinking about it as you said it. It sounded like, the idea is quite funny. I just don't know if it lands.

• 36:14Speaker 04

  Well, it kills.

• 36:16Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, it does well.

• 36:17Speaker 04

  It kills. It kills really hard.

• 36:22Andrew Santino?

  But your audience.

• 36:23Speaker 04

  You know, and I'm like, this was, it was like, at a club, a mix of people. And I just remember, the only reason I really remember it is because he came up and I was like, and he was like, I didn't say F anything.

• 36:36Andrew Santino?

  Right.

• 36:37Speaker 04

  And I was like, that's, no, that, it's like, wow, I don't even know. Like, we're living in different worlds as to what.

• 36:46Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, what's your rule of clean? Yeah. I don't have, my only rule for my openers is, no gratuitous filth. If it's a good joke, it's a good joke. But you can't, I was like, no gratuitous, just for the sake of.

• 36:59Speaker 04

  Right, right, right.

• 37:00Andrew Santino?

  And also, do material. I always say that.

• 37:03Speaker 04

  Material's helpful.

• 37:04Andrew Santino?

  I always say do material, no crowd work.

• 37:06Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 37:07Andrew Santino?

  I think it's a good test, if someone's young, and you're like, you don't need to do crowd work, don't do it.

• 37:11Speaker 04

  Right.

• 37:11Andrew Santino?

  Write as many jokes as you can.

• 37:12Speaker 04

  Right.

• 37:13Andrew Santino?

  And you get to a place where you need to do crowd work, then do crowd work, but, and they all kind of respect it. I've had no one fight me on it. They've all been like, okay. And in fact, some of them have been like, it's way better for my joke writing.

• 37:23Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 37:23Andrew Santino?

  Because then you, they can do two different fifteens if they have, you know, twenty, twenty-five minutes. And it helps them. I'm like, just do that, just that.

• 37:30Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 37:30Andrew Santino?

  Say hello, chat with them, warm them up, but like, don't get into the whole thing, because then it's gonna distract from you getting work done.

• 37:37Speaker 04

  Right.

• 37:38Andrew Santino?

  Then it's almost like you just went and played and you didn't get anything done.

• 37:40Speaker 04

  Yeah, I've been thinking about this. You know, when I started, it was like, I remember hearing a lot, and we would talk a lot about how valuable stage time is.

• 37:48Andrew Santino?

  Oh, yeah.

• 37:49Speaker 04

  You know, that was it. It was just like, how, we would talk a lot about that. I was like, wow, I really need that five minutes, or whatever. And I think we got away from that a little bit.

• 37:59Andrew Santino?

  Nowadays, I think it's just different, because of the internet now.

• 38:01Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's because it's just all, everybody's posting everything, so it's not even about the stage time, it's about the content or the clip or whatever.

• 38:09Andrew Santino?

  Did you start in New York?

• 38:10Speaker 04

  No, I started in Utah.

• 38:12Andrew Santino?

  You did?

• 38:13Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 38:13Andrew Santino?

  Wow. Not a lot of clubs out there to start at, though.

• 38:16Speaker 04

  There was one club at the time, and it closed, and then Wise Guys opened six months later.

• 38:21Andrew Santino?

  And there's three Wise Guys? Or two? Ogden?

• 38:24Speaker 04

  Let's see, there's Ogden, Salt Lake, there's one in Jordan Landing.

• 38:28Andrew Santino?

  Jordan Landing, that's right.

• 38:29Speaker 04

  Yes, and he's got one in Vegas that's really great.

• 38:33Andrew Santino?

  Oh, yeah, I've never done that. I've only done his Salt Lake Club.

• 38:37Speaker 04

  Uh-huh.

• 38:37Andrew Santino?

  And he's always been so wonderful, and every time I've gone down there, I've had an absolute great time at that club.

• 38:41Speaker 04

  And I think the Salt Lake Club has three different rooms now.

• 38:45Andrew Santino?

  Does it?

• 38:46Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:46Andrew Santino?

  God, I only remember being one.

• 38:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, he has the main room, he has a small room, and then he has like a mid-sized room.

• 38:52Andrew Santino?

  He's just a basement.

• 38:53Speaker 04

  It's next door, like, it opened up, it's really nice.

• 38:55Andrew Santino?

  The space next door?

• 38:56Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:57Andrew Santino?

  I do know this. I feel like last time I was there, they talked about opening up a, yeah, that is awesome. No, that was, I mean, that place is always great when I go, but yeah, that's gotta be tough when it's a city with one club. It's there or nowhere.

• 39:07Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, that's why I went to Seattle, actually. I was just like, I didn't feel confident in New York or LA, but I went to Seattle for a year, and it was one of the most productive years of my life.

• 39:17Andrew Santino?

  Did you ever think about coming south and going to LA then, because you were in the West Coast?

• 39:20Speaker 04

  I thought this is where I would end up, really. My dad was from Southern California. The Comedy and Magic Club saw me really early and was like, just live here, and we'll just, you get spots, whatever you want.

• 39:31Andrew Santino?

  You would have run that club.

• 39:32Speaker 04

  It would have been, it was really tempting to come, and I was like, and then I did a TV spot. My first TV spot ever was in New York. I'd never been there. I did Live at Gotham.

• 39:43Andrew Santino?

  Oh, wow, yeah.

• 39:44Speaker 04

  And it was Amy Schumer's first television spot also.

• 39:48Andrew Santino?

  Wow.

• 39:49Speaker 04

  And she came up to me. I was first, I'd only performed in like four states in the West. I'd never even been to the East Coast, really. The Northeast, and Amy came up, and I had a good set, and Amy, somehow, and Amy came up to me right after and just, I'd never met her, had no idea who she was, nobody knew. She just goes, I'm Amy, you're gonna, we're gonna live together, we're gonna get an apartment together, and you're moving here.

• 40:13Andrew Santino?

  Really?

• 40:13Speaker 04

  I don't know why, but she just had this confidence, like, she's like that.

• 40:17Andrew Santino?

  And this happened?

• 40:18Speaker 04

  We never got an apartment, but we did.

• 40:20Andrew Santino?

  She's a liar. Amy, you lied.

• 40:22Speaker 04

  We did Last Comic Standing like two months later together, and she just skyrocketed.

• 40:26Andrew Santino?

  Sure.

• 40:26Speaker 04

  But I did, it put it in my head, and I moved there, and she did. She looked out for me and really.

• 40:31Andrew Santino?

  That's so nice. Did you ever tour with her ever, or no?

• 40:33Speaker 04

  I did. I ended up, I think, just hanging out with her on the road a few times when we crossed paths. She was always trying to get me to do things. I was never the fit for her audience, but she just started to get joy when she had that Comedy Central show. She would call me all the time. She knew how much anxiety it would give me to turn things down, because I really needed them.

• 40:52Andrew Santino?

  Right.

• 40:52Speaker 04

  But she would go like, do you want to do this sketch? It's called Nutter's. You have to wear prosthetic balls, and I'd be like, Amy. And she'd be like, come on, you know. And I'd be like, I'm torn up saying no to this, but she just was really great. And whenever she could put me in something, she would.

• 41:09Andrew Santino?

  That's, she's like, it's either that or a KKK member, but you choose. It's wide open. It's whichever one you think fits you more.

• 41:15Speaker 04

  Whatever you want to do.

• 41:15Andrew Santino?

  Yeah. And no pressure, but just, it is hard to say no to your friends when they ask you to do something.

• 41:20Speaker 04

  It's hard. I mean, I wanted to do it, but I just, I knew that, you know, I carried around all of this kind of like questioning about, what's my audience gonna think? Like, all this stuff is really big to me, you know, really big.

• 41:32Andrew Santino?

  It worked in the long run.

• 41:34Speaker 00

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• 42:10Speaker 00

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• 42:23Speaker 05

  Kayak searches and compares hundreds of travel sites. But unless I repeat the word kayak, Kayak thinks you won't remember that. So Kayak asked me to say kayak as many times as possible. Kayak. Kayak. Kayak. Kayak kayak kayak. Kayak. Search and compare travel deals with Kayak. Got that right.

• 42:44Speaker 04

  We'll see, we'll see.

• 42:45Andrew Santino?

  I think we're seeing it. Well, you cultivated an audience that like respects, appreciates your style. I mean, of the, I hate to say clean comics, but you know, you do live in that echelon now of guys that are notoriously clean comics. And that's a good place to be because there's, most comics aren't. You know, like most guys, you know, work blue or whatever the old guys used to say. And I always remember being young, seeing cleaner comedians and being jealous, just being like, damn, and they do NACA. Remember NACA doing college stuff? Cause I was like, I never could get those. I could, they were like, can't do. And that wasn't necessarily ever filthy, but I was never clean. I never worked. I just never, it was never in my, you know, the way I grew up.

• 43:29Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 43:29Andrew Santino?

  We just don't come from clean people.

• 43:30Speaker 04

  Oh, okay.

• 43:31Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, I just think the language that I grew up around was always very like free and dirty and dirty jokes were always funny jokes, you know?

• 43:39Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's, I kind of feel like it chooses you more than you choose it. You know what I mean?

• 43:44Andrew Santino?

  Hundred percent. But I have heard you cuss on stage.

• 43:46Speaker 04

  Yeah?

• 43:47Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, I've heard you cuss.

• 43:47Speaker 04

  I'm not surprised. My audience might be surprised.

• 43:50Andrew Santino?

  June 18th, 2022, you did it for the first time at a 958 spot. Yeah, I wrote it down and it was probably the hardest ass shit I've ever heard. The shit that you, it was just heavy. You don't though, ever. In this special, you don't cuss.

• 44:05Speaker 04

  No, not at all.

• 44:06Andrew Santino?

  Not once, yeah.

• 44:06Speaker 04

  I mean, every, you know, I'm a, I'm a, I am not like some sort of robotic person, you know? Occasionally in my life, I have language, you know? But people may be shocked to hear that. I don't know if they're upset if they hear that, but you know, I feel like if you're 95% something, be a hundred percent that thing on stage really.

• 44:26Andrew Santino?

  Oh, that's good.

• 44:27Speaker 04

  Because it's like, in a certain point, this is something that, you know, you have to cultivate and over iterations, you're like, this is, this is what I want to present. And this is what I think is great. This is what I've thought through. And that's what it ends up being.

• 44:41Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, it's great, dude. I mean, you're honestly, it's, I think about, every time I wrote a dirty joke and my, you know, someone from my family would watch it. And I was like, oh gross, my mom has to see that. I thought about that all the time, like my grandmother had to watch some of that stuff.

• 44:53Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 44:53Andrew Santino?

  She's like, we can't wait to see you. I'm like, I really want you to see this.

• 44:57Speaker 04

  Well, great comedy can happen all across the space. There's no, you know, it's like, it's, it's great.

• 45:02Andrew Santino?

  But saying a fart joke in front of your mother is always odd.

• 45:05Speaker 04

  I'm sure.

• 45:05Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, but she liked it. She actually, that's her favorite joke.

• 45:08Speaker 04

  That's her one? That's the one? I'm sure.

• 45:10Andrew Santino?

  That's by far. So what is your, so just cause I'm curious, so what is your getaway? Like what is your, away from comedy, what's your favorite thing to do just to get away? To feel like a normal human being?

• 45:21Speaker 04

  I know.

• 45:22Andrew Santino?

  Instead of a workhorse?

• 45:23Speaker 04

  You know, it's, I like to get out in nature if I, any way that I can.

• 45:26Andrew Santino?

  You're a hike guy?

• 45:27Speaker 04

  I'll go on a hike. I would like to get into like backpacking.

• 45:32Andrew Santino?

  Really?

• 45:32Speaker 04

  I would like, I've never, I used to, as a kid, we would go out camping and we'd do like, um, horseback trips with my friends and stuff like that, you know? And I grew up fly fishing a lot, just going out after work in the summer and just standing in a river for a couple hours.

• 45:48Andrew Santino?

  You like that?

• 45:49Speaker 04

  I, it's just part of who I am. It's just like, I grew up looking at the mountains every day, growing up around fields, working in farms. And it's, I miss it. It's just like, it's just kind of, I need it.

• 46:02Andrew Santino?

  Like a Bruce Springsteen song.

• 46:03Speaker 04

  Am I?

• 46:04Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, working in the fields, fly fishing in the evening. Going to the city at night.

• 46:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, that's good.

• 46:12Andrew Santino?

  It's very much like a Springsteenian, like in a river, mountains.

• 46:17Speaker 04

  My life, I feel like, when I describe it to people, it's like, did you grow up in the 50s, you know?

• 46:23Andrew Santino?

  You do sometimes have that feeling of a, they time machined you here.

• 46:27Speaker 04

  Yes, and I feel like that. I mean, my little town, it was like that. I mean, I rode my bike to the city drugstore to get a malt that my grandmother used to work in at the fountain when she was a little girl, like, you know, it's like.

• 46:42Andrew Santino?

  The fact you said drugstore, like that's just an obvious, it's the drugstore.

• 46:45Speaker 04

  The drugstore, you know? Yeah, I slept in my treehouse. My cousins and I would drive our bikes and then we'd go to grandma's house. It was like.

• 46:53Andrew Santino?

  Pie, pie was always around.

• 46:54Speaker 04

  Sure, pie or cookies, whatever.

• 46:56Andrew Santino?

  Pie or cookies, yeah. What a life. And how'd you, why did you leave it for this treacherous life of New York City? Of like stabbings and poop on the subway? This is what you wanted?

• 47:04Speaker 04

  There was something in, my dad was from Southern California and I just connected to this outside culture.

• 47:10Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 47:10Speaker 04

  And there was this show, A and E's Evening at the Improv. And that was the thing.

• 47:15Andrew Santino?

  Bud Friedman's show.

• 47:16Speaker 04

  Bud Friedman, and I didn't even really put together, even though it said Evening at the Improv, I didn't understand it was in LA. I just knew there was this club where there was like funny people who weren't famous, hung out.

• 47:27Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 47:27Speaker 04

  And I was like, what is that place?

• 47:29Andrew Santino?

  Oh my God, did they ever? When I first moved here, the improv was still, I mean, that was years after what you're talking about, but even still, it was bustling in 2006. It was like.

• 47:38Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 47:39Andrew Santino?

  I mean, you, the people that would be hanging out at that improv bar was, it was mind bending.

• 47:43Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 47:44Andrew Santino?

  And we would sit at the others, we'd walk in as young comics and walk to the other side of the bar in the corner and just stare, because there used to be like a platform, almost like a, a six inch raise in the floor and the old wood was there. And it was raised up and it had kind of these banisters surrounding the tables and much like how the cellar is where there's a table in the corner and they used to have all these cool, the photographs, you could see some of the photographs are upstairs in the offices of like, you know, Seinfeld sitting with Leno.

• 48:11Speaker 04

  Right.

• 48:12Andrew Santino?

  Chatting and then just like a slew of people around, like Sandra Bernhard, like just like comics from different time periods. And you're like, God, that used to just be a, now everyone's like, goodbye.

• 48:21Speaker 04

  Bye.

• 48:22Andrew Santino?

  I'm gonna go home, goodbye. The moment that you're done, you never would hang out. I mean, just, even when I come to New York, I go hang out upstairs, but most people are gone because they've got another spot or they're out of town.

• 48:32Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 48:33Andrew Santino?

  I feel like it was just a moment in time where comedy used to hang out a lot and now it slowly dissipated.

• 48:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's kind of a bummer.

• 48:39Andrew Santino?

  Who did it? Whose fault is it?

• 48:41Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 48:41Andrew Santino?

  Blame one person.

• 48:42Speaker 04

  Blame one person?

• 48:43Andrew Santino?

  Or a group of people, because I know I've heard some of your stuff. Blame a group, go ahead if you feel like it.

• 48:48Speaker 04

  Um, I'm gonna say, um, I don't know. I guess it would have to be, um, I don't know. I can't, I'm not gonna target anybody.

• 48:56Andrew Santino?

  I slipped, I was like, go ahead, take one of these. Pick a card, any card. I try, people who have one foot bigger than the other, that's who I kind of blame it on.

• 49:05Speaker 04

  Oh, good.

• 49:05Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, 11 and a half to 12, you know, one of those guys.

• 49:08Speaker 04

  You're very good at this.

• 49:09Andrew Santino?

  Can't trust them.

• 49:09Speaker 04

  You're very good.

• 49:11Andrew Santino?

  Well, I sit at night, all night, thinking about odds and there, no, my brain just works in a very gross, weird way. I think I just think about, um, I think we're allowed to see weird things and comment about it and hope that everybody gets it. That's the whole, it's like, I hope everybody gets it. You know, like I thought the other day at a baseball game, do you whistle or do you clap after the, um, National Anthem?

• 49:35Speaker 04

  Clap.

• 49:35Andrew Santino?

  Clap? But there are whistlers, there's whistlers abound.

• 49:39Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 49:39Andrew Santino?

  When you turn around, that guy, he does not clap, he whistles.

• 49:43Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 49:44Andrew Santino?

  And I always thought, I was a little stoned, if I'm being honest.

• 49:46Speaker 04

  Sure.

• 49:47Andrew Santino?

  But I thought, am I a whistler or a clapper? Cause I've done both.

• 49:50Speaker 04

  That's a very comedian thought.

• 49:51Andrew Santino?

  But I am a clapper. I'm very much a clapper. Yeah, yeah. But I don't think, and I commented that to a friend and they were like, what are you talking about? And I was like, mm shit, I think that's our.

• 50:00Speaker 04

  Really? Your friend said, what are you talking about?

• 50:02Andrew Santino?

  He's like, what do you mean? Who cares? I was like, I don't, I guess.

• 50:05Speaker 04

  I could talk about this for the rest of.

• 50:07Andrew Santino?

  I know. Well, that's because we see these stupid little things and we find, I think every comic has, um, what is that? ADHD? No.

• 50:17Andrew Santino?

  Is that good?

• 50:17Speaker 04

  That's great.

• 50:18Andrew Santino?

  I think we have those things where you just, you see something stupid and innocuous that nobody cares about.

• 50:22Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 50:23Andrew Santino?

  But you really care about.

• 50:24Speaker 04

  I always thought as a kid, I was very quiet and people, you know, you must've been a class clown. And I go, no, the thing I was, was observant. I was just sitting back going, if I was that guy, this is what I would've said.

• 50:38Andrew Santino?

  I would say I was partially a class clown, but also just a, um, I was a goof around. All I wanted was to have as much, as much fun as possible.

• 50:46Speaker 04

  So you were that? You were kind, I mean, it, it is.

• 50:49Andrew Santino?

  I was disruptive in a way where I just wanted everybody to have a good time. I wasn't like, say something rude to get in trouble with a teacher. It was more like, how could I make the most fun of the thing that I got up to?

• 50:58Speaker 04

  I get that too.

• 50:59Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, cause I really wanted to have fun. I hated being bored, boring. Sitting through monotony was like, that was hell on earth for me.

• 51:08Speaker 04

  Right.

• 51:08Andrew Santino?

  I was like, why can't we go do something?

• 51:10Speaker 04

  Yes, I get that too.

• 51:11Andrew Santino?

  Any interactive class was huge. Uh, group work, loved a good group work.

• 51:15Speaker 04

  Oh, cause you could just entertain and yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 51:17Andrew Santino?

  You get in the group, you get to riff and it just, it just gives you some space to actually be creative. I, I think that's really what it was. Kids who really are creative have such a tough time in, in school. Cause the pa- they don't like strict pattern and organization. It does, that's why I changed my set for four times in the first. I just couldn't do the, I don't like, I don't like.

• 51:37Speaker 04

  It kept you fresh and it kept it interesting.

• 51:39Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, I think so. And that's also why I was very bad in school.

• 51:42Speaker 04

  Right.

• 51:42Andrew Santino?

  Very bad in school.

• 51:43Speaker 04

  Were you? Okay.

• 51:44Andrew Santino?

  I was a CB student.

• 51:45Speaker 04

  Okay, well, that's not very bad.

• 51:48Andrew Santino?

  Comparative to what I should have been, I could have been a very good student.

• 51:51Speaker 04

  It was the format and.

• 51:52Andrew Santino?

  Hated it.

• 51:52Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 51:53Andrew Santino?

  I just miss, I mean, did you go to college?

• 51:55Speaker 04

  I went to college, but I had that experience in my first job, I would say, out of college. I worked at an advertising agency.

• 52:01Andrew Santino?

  Right, every day.

• 52:02Speaker 04

  I was, I thought, oh, this is great. I worked really hard. I did an internship at this creative agency. I worked in public relations and I thought, this is gonna be fantastic. I used to work in newsrooms when I was young.

• 52:14Andrew Santino?

  What do you mean newsrooms? Like, like local news?

• 52:16Speaker 04

  Yeah, I worked, when I was 14, I worked for the local NBC affiliate. I would shoot sports. They just called me and asked because I had a column in our county newspaper in Idaho because.

• 52:27Andrew Santino?

  This is 1947.

• 52:28Speaker 04

  I know.

• 52:29Andrew Santino?

  You're literally saying 1940.

• 52:30Speaker 04

  This is what I'm talking about.

• 52:31Andrew Santino?

  I found it in the paper that morning?

• 52:33Speaker 04

  I wanted to be a newspaper humor columnist. There was a guy named Dave Barry. I don't know if you're aware of him, but he had a syndicated column. And it would run every Sunday in our local paper and I, we didn't have a newspaper, like a school newspaper. So I called the county newspaper and they said, yes, you can have a column. We'll pay you $10 a week. And I did that all through high school.

• 52:52Andrew Santino?

  Wow.

• 52:53Speaker 04

  And then the, the NBC affiliate was like, are you interested in journalism? What's going on? Do you wanna learn some stuff? And I go, yes. So I shot sports and every Friday night I would drive around and shoot. Uh, football games, basketball games. They taught me how. I had a camera that they would just let me keep at my house.

• 53:11Andrew Santino?

  Were you on camera?

• 53:12Speaker 04

  No, I would shoot, but once in a while they would say my name and the sports guy was a funny guy. And he, and, and he taught me how to edit on reel to reel. I would drive back to the station. Mark in, mark out, the machine would go.

• 53:26Andrew Santino?

  I remember those.

• 53:27Speaker 04

  Yeah, and, and we would write copy and here we go, this is our local cameraman, Ryan Hamilton. And this, you know, it was, I have old VHS tapes of this and it was just like, I loved hanging out. I was 14, 15 years old. You can drive when you're 14 in Idaho.

• 53:41Andrew Santino?

  14?

• 53:42Speaker 04

  Yeah, cause of all these.

• 53:42Andrew Santino?

  Cause of tractors.

• 53:43Speaker 04

  The farm kids.

• 53:44Andrew Santino?

  Right, that's right.

• 53:44Speaker 04

  So I was doing that and I just loved hanging out. I loved that, that like you said, this like, everything's going on all at once. There's not a dull moment.

• 53:53Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 53:54Speaker 04

  And it's a fun environment, you know, that you're under deadline. We gotta get this done right now.

• 53:59Andrew Santino?

  Right.

• 54:00Speaker 04

  Get this tape to the right person. Where's your edit? And it was just fun.

• 54:04Andrew Santino?

  The pressure was good.

• 54:05Speaker 04

  Yeah, the pressure was great and it was creative and, and, and it was like, I was interested in standup, but I had no idea how to get there. And this was like clo- close.

• 54:15Andrew Santino?

  It was some, it was entertain, it was entertainment based.

• 54:17Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 54:18Andrew Santino?

  So you understood like, uh, feeding the people. You're like, I can feed the people this way.

• 54:21Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 54:22Andrew Santino?

  What's the first set then? Where, where'd you get the balls to do it?

• 54:24Speaker 04

  Well, I had a little radio show in college at a little junior college, uh, and I was studying broadcast. And for our radio station, a few of us were interested in comedy, never been to a comedy show, never even been to one. We produced some comedy shows for our radio station and I, I got on stage a few times.

• 54:43Andrew Santino?

  What was the tag for the, what was the radio station's, uh, call?

• 54:47Speaker 04

  Okay, I can't remember what the tall letters were.

• 54:50Andrew Santino?

  It's Ryan Hamilton in the morning.

• 54:52Speaker 04

  It was a student station. We kind of had freedom to do whatever we wanted with our hour, you know?

• 54:56Andrew Santino?

  That's a little dangerous, college kids just giving them all that freedom. But you weren't, you weren't a, you weren't a screw up, so they trusted you.

• 55:03Speaker 04

  No, I was a very good kid. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 55:05Andrew Santino?

  You never had a lapse, huh? Nothing ever hit you where you, where you became a little mess up? You never got into drugs or alcohol or anything?

• 55:11Speaker 04

  No, never. I mean.

• 55:12Andrew Santino?

  But you'll have a cocktail here and there.

• 55:14Speaker 04

  I drank for the first time in my life when I was 45 and I probably haven't had a drink in, I don't know, over a year. I don't drink. It just wasn't, it did, I wanted, after my accident, I, I started going, I'm trying things in life. I've, this is, I'm very late in everything, very late.

• 55:30Andrew Santino?

  Yes.

• 55:31Speaker 04

  And it's just kind of natural. That's how my whole life was and it felt like, okay, it took a near death experience for me to. Figure out that I can do some things that, I just try some things.

• 55:42Andrew Santino?

  Maybe that's God being like, try, Ryan, come on.

• 55:44Speaker 04

  It might be.

• 55:46Andrew Santino?

  He hit, he hit you out of your shell.

• 55:47Speaker 04

  He was like.

• 55:48Andrew Santino?

  Used a bus to get out of your shell.

• 55:50Speaker 04

  I know we have rules, but this is ridiculous.

• 55:52Andrew Santino?

  Break some of them.

• 55:53Speaker 04

  Yeah, this is, yeah.

• 55:55Andrew Santino?

  So you do have like a little freedom, a freeing moment of like, alright, I'm gonna, I'll try some stuff.

• 55:59Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think it was that. I just got a little more brave and like.

• 56:03Andrew Santino?

  Like dating and stuff too? Like just stretching out a little bit?

• 56:05Speaker 04

  A little bit, yeah, yeah, because I just, I don't, you realize life is very short and you just realize everything's right now. And the things that you thought mattered absolutely don't really matter.

• 56:16Andrew Santino?

  What matters?

• 56:18Speaker 04

  Right now.

• 56:19Andrew Santino?

  Right now.

• 56:19Speaker 04

  You and I in this moment and, you know, the people that you care about.

• 56:26Andrew Santino?

  That's good. Outside of that, it's pretty slim, huh?

• 56:29Speaker 04

  You, it's so easy to forget. My dad died right before my, a year before my accident. And it is like 10 year situation. And I remember having this thought like, well, I've never experienced anything where, um. Everything fell away except one problem. Never had that in my life. Everything fell away except one problem. And then I thought, this is a really good lesson to remember forever. And then a year later, I was in the hospital going, um, wow, I only have one problem. This is, and I remembered that feeling and going, that was just a year ago that I had that feeling for the first time and I already forgot about it.

• 57:13Andrew Santino?

  Wow.

• 57:14Speaker 04

  And then I went, it's so ea- that's like the human condition to me now is like remembering, just remembering that. Really nothing matters.

• 57:25Andrew Santino?

  It's true.

• 57:25Speaker 04

  Except the, the important things, like the things that we get so wrapped up in and it's so hard to just remember that those really aren't that important.

• 57:34Andrew Santino?

  No, they're mi- they're pretty minute.

• 57:35Speaker 04

  Yeah, and it's so hard to remember that, but.

• 57:38Andrew Santino?

  It is hard. I guess, you know, not to be woo wooey, but also because we're quite privileged. We live a very good life. We get to do what we like for a living. So yes, I think it's also very hard because it's, it's happening. So when you're in it, it's hard to, you know.

• 57:52Speaker 04

  And that's the only way, I mean, you have to get through life like that. Like, you know, there's joy in the process and joy and work. And you have to provide for yourself and what else are you gonna do but be productive?

• 58:03Andrew Santino?

  Right.

• 58:03Speaker 04

  But in that time, you, it's so easy to slip out and forget why.

• 58:09Andrew Santino?

  What re-centers you then, when you're like going in the thing? Do you have anything?

• 58:12Speaker 04

  It's a great question. I don't know. I mean, I think, you know, just remembering the thing, going through it and.

• 58:17Andrew Santino?

  Is there a person or a place that does it for you too?

• 58:19Speaker 04

  When I go home to Idaho, I think I feel I get reconnected. I think wherever home is for you, there's something about that, you know?

• 58:27Andrew Santino?

  Now, is your childhood home still there?

• 58:29Speaker 04

  It's still there. We just recently sold our family home where I grew up. Yeah, but it's okay. I mean, I just went back and it's all the same. I mean, I was there for our 4th of July parade.

• 58:39Andrew Santino?

  The malt store is still there, yeah?

• 58:41Speaker 04

  Oh, yeah.

• 58:41Andrew Santino?

  God, that's so funny. What, did you say the name of the town? You did.

• 58:45Speaker 04

  It's Ashton. I don't, people know now, but, um, you know, it's.

• 58:50Andrew Santino?

  Now are you, do they have pride for you there?

• 58:53Speaker 04

  I think so, yeah.

• 58:54Andrew Santino?

  Have they given you the key to the city?

• 58:57Speaker 04

  There, I don't think we do that, but.

• 58:59Andrew Santino?

  I feel like they need to. If it's such a small town, you know what I mean? Like, somebody makes out of a small town and you're like, reward this guy. That's.

• 59:05Speaker 04

  They do, I mean.

• 59:06Andrew Santino?

  How, how many people have come out of Ashton that have had some sort of success in a public, in the public space?

• 59:11Speaker 04

  I don't know. There are, I guess, I'm sure there are people, but.

• 59:15Andrew Santino?

  There's not, you'd know. There's not. You'd, is there any alumnus, famous alumnus from Ashton, Idaho?

• 59:22Speaker 04

  Fame? No, but.

• 59:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, there's only a thousand people in this town.

• 59:27Andrew Santino?

  Okay, so give him the key.

• 59:29Speaker 04

  But they do in their own way. I mean, like, we have this little, um, marquee in our old high school. The high school's gone now, but this marquee was like, you would just drive by, everybody drives by it and you would get community events. It wasn't even just about high school. Years after I'm gone, 20 years after I'm gone, the marquee will say, watch Ryan Hamilton on The Tonight Show tonight.

• 59:51Andrew Santino?

  That's beautiful.

• 59:52Speaker 04

  Isn't that amazing?

• 59:53Andrew Santino?

  No, that's bea- that's amazing to me.

• 59:55Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 59:55Andrew Santino?

  Like, because, you know, the pride of a small town. I mean, my dad comes from a small town, so like I know how important small town.

• 1:00:02Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:00:02Andrew Santino?

  You know what I mean? Like, they talk about people like they're, they're, they still have lore. Small towns still have lore for people. They're like, you know what, you know what ended up happening to him?

• 1:00:10Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:00:10Andrew Santino?

  He went on, he owned about 14 Burger Kings. I mean, it's like, you become this like, you become like this, this, this, a store. Which doesn't happen in places like Chicago where I'm from or New York. It's like, too many people embody this place. It's impossible to have any pride. I mean, Chicago treats me great when I go home. Like, you know, Cubs organization is incredible. Like, there's things that I get to do now. Because they're like, yeah, you're hometown kid. So that's cool. But it's never like, uh, that's a big point of pride to me. When a small, when someone comes out of a small town, cause I would imagine statistically, it's impossible. Most people don't wanna leave. Why would they? And I'm not saying they should stay or leave. I'm just saying.

• 1:00:48Andrew Santino?

  That's most people's life. That's where they're from. But to branch out to go try something, pretty brave. So I think, I, today I'm giving you the key. On behalf of the city, I'm giving you a key and I'm gonna go erect a plaque. I'm gonna go there and I'm gonna get a plaque done. Imagine I get fined for putting up a sign. That's illegal here, pal.

• 1:01:05Speaker 04

  I mean, you know, there are so many people there who probably don't know who I am anymore. It's been a long time. But I, my family goes back there so long that it's, you know.

• 1:01:14Andrew Santino?

  Is there a Hamilton store there?

• 1:01:15Speaker 04

  My grandfather had a store. It was my mother's maiden name, was the Lion's Store. Really? That's, that's so interesting.

• 1:01:21Andrew Santino?

  Always have a store, yeah.

• 1:01:22Speaker 04

  So interesting.

• 1:01:23Andrew Santino?

  If the family, if the family has history there, they owned a shop, they had to have a shop.

• 1:01:26Speaker 04

  It was all farm, farmers. We were one of the only families that weren't farmers, but we had what we called a variety store. That I worked at until I was 14 and was around. But my great grandmother opened it, who I knew very, very well actually. And my grandfather and took it over and.

• 1:01:43Andrew Santino?

  Variety store, meaning?

• 1:01:45Speaker 04

  That's what we call, it was like, it was like appliances, clothing, shoes.

• 1:01:50Andrew Santino?

  Like a department store almost?

• 1:01:51Speaker 04

  Yes. I guess you would call it a department store that you can imagine in a small town.

• 1:01:55Andrew Santino?

  Sure. Mini maces.

• 1:01:57Speaker 04

  Yeah, it was like.

• 1:01:58Andrew Santino?

  What was it called?

• 1:01:59Speaker 04

  It was called Lions. That was my mother's maiden name, Lions. And.

• 1:02:04Andrew Santino?

  Can we not? Can we?

• 1:02:06Speaker 04

  Oh geez, really?

• 1:02:07Andrew Santino?

  Ryan, connect the dots. I mean, for crying out loud. Is it L Y O N S?

• 1:02:13Speaker 04

  L Y O N S.

• 1:02:14Andrew Santino?

  And this still plays into the whole thing?

• 1:02:15Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:02:15Andrew Santino?

  You're good with words, you understand, come on, man, I mean, we just, we put it together.

• 1:02:19Speaker 04

  That's pretty good, we did.

• 1:02:20Andrew Santino?

  The lion's den, the lion, the lion's pride, I mean, you can do so much of this.

• 1:02:25Speaker 04

  Sometimes you need someone from an outside perspective to really tell you.

• 1:02:30Andrew Santino?

  Just turning your shoulders towards the light, I just want you to find your light. I think you've done a fine job. But the lions, you're just giving me so much, I mean, I'm, we know the name of the next special, don't we? We really do. Shot from the Sahara, yeah.

• 1:02:45Andrew Santino?

  Ryan Hamilton, live from, from the Sahara. Surrounded by lions. The whole time, having a fueled panic attack.

• 1:02:54Speaker 04

  I don't know why I'm here, but this is funny.

• 1:02:56Andrew Santino?

  Travel Channel presents, Ryan Hamilton, live from the Sahara.

• 1:03:02Andrew Santino?

  I see, I literally see how comical this could be, and how there's a, there is a producer somewhere that's like, we could do that.

• 1:03:10Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:03:10Andrew Santino?

  We can actually do that if you want it.

• 1:03:12Speaker 04

  I could see how you in school was like, like, really, uh, smart, excelled, super creative, and it was difficult for you.

• 1:03:23Andrew Santino?

  I was just annoying, I just was like, I hate this class, I didn't want, like, math was just, what are we doing?

• 1:03:30Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:03:31Andrew Santino?

  I just never wanted to sit around, I just, I think, I think I pissed off enough teachers by being like, can you explain to me the practicality of this in the real world?

• 1:03:38Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:03:39Andrew Santino?

  They would be very annoyed by that.

• 1:03:40Speaker 04

  Yes, and you want to know.

• 1:03:41Andrew Santino?

  Don't be a smart ass.

• 1:03:42Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:03:43Andrew Santino?

  And I was like, I just don't know when I would ever need this.

• 1:03:45Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:03:46Andrew Santino?

  I just, I'm being genuine.

• 1:03:47Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:03:47Andrew Santino?

  Like, all I saw, my dad was in sales, my mom was, um, in marketing for, for property management. My, my biological father was in construction, I was like, I just don't see if any of these jobs, I don't know when I would need any of this stuff.

• 1:04:01Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:04:02Andrew Santino?

  And they try to trick you.

• 1:04:03Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:04:04Andrew Santino?

  They're like, no, you use geometry every day, you know, they do this game, and you're like, what? Stop sign, stop sign is geometric, you know? It's like they pull these, and then as a kid, you, you, you drink it, because you're like, well, maybe I'm stupid, and maybe cursive will be a make or break situation.

• 1:04:20Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:04:21Andrew Santino?

  Where if I didn't do cursive.

• 1:04:22Speaker 04

  Cursive is make or break.

• 1:04:23Andrew Santino?

  I'll go to prison, or, you know what I mean, like, they make you feel as if, well, I guess I'll die if I don't understand.

• 1:04:29Speaker 04

  Exactly.

• 1:04:30Andrew Santino?

  And so, yes, in classes I excelled in, was theory and practice and media production, I remember in college was one of my favorites. Stuff like that, I was like, this is cool.

• 1:04:36Speaker 04

  Practical, comedians are practical.

• 1:04:39Andrew Santino?

  Well, they want to know the application to real world, how do I, how can this be what, I mean, if you're speaking to the masses, you're, the idea is, make up something funny that most people, or a lot of people, would either find funny or interesting, or go, I know, that's, I know!

• 1:04:54Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:04:54Andrew Santino?

  You know, I mean, that's what we saw as a kid, like, Seinfeld, or, you know, guys like that, that took mundane things, and then that spun it that way, versus like, uh, you know, someone like, uh, you know, um, like Pryor, who was more like, real life stuff of his world being like, this is what it was like growing up, this dark, which I was always kind of more attracted to, but when I saw the Seinfeld world of comedy, of like, isn't this insane, I was like, oh yeah, I see that stuff a lot. But I could never, I was not as good, obviously, that's not my style of organizing, because most of my stuff is like, you know how this is, and most people are like, what are you talking about? I'm like, never mind, I'll tell you my experience, and it's funnier if I just tell you,

• 1:05:36Speaker 04

  No, it's great.

• 1:05:37Andrew Santino?

  how it's weird for me, you know?

• 1:05:38Speaker 04

  The specificity is everything, I mean, yeah, that's how we get there.

• 1:05:42Andrew Santino?

  It's the one, right?

• 1:05:43Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:05:43Andrew Santino?

  No, yeah, school was tough, school was always, you know, and my teachers hated me, my teacher said to my mom, is your son on medication? And my mom, for the first time, like, defended me, it was amazing. She's like, no, why, only should be, and she's like, I don't think you should tell people what they should do.

• 1:05:57Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:05:58Andrew Santino?

  She's like, I think you should focus on teaching. And then my mom also, you know, I like stood up for me, I was so happy on the way home, she was also like, stop fucking up in school. So the two things were happening at once.

• 1:06:08Speaker 04

  Right, that's a lot of pressure on you.

• 1:06:10Andrew Santino?

  Well, I just think they knew.

• 1:06:11Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:06:12Andrew Santino?

  It's also when I left, uh, you know, Chicago and to go to school, they knew, they were like, he's gonna go, try to be a goof for a living, in some way, because I had written it in my senior paper, I was like, God, I wanted to just.

• 1:06:24Speaker 04

  Really?

• 1:06:25Andrew Santino?

  Well, I wanted to be Jim Carrey.

• 1:06:26Speaker 04

  Really?

• 1:06:27Andrew Santino?

  Ugh, so bad, he was my god.

• 1:06:29Speaker 04

  So it wasn't, was it him doing standup, or was it him?

• 1:06:32Andrew Santino?

  The idea of a standup comedian that could be an act, that could act in comedic films.

• 1:06:36Speaker 04

  So standup was in the mix?

• 1:06:37Andrew Santino?

  Oh, it was kind of, it was the thing, but to me, I, I always thought, um, he was like the shining example of like, you, you could do, but also because as a kid, I got to watch like, you know, Pryor was a comedian who, who acted in comedies.

• 1:06:50Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:06:50Andrew Santino?

  So I thought that was fascinating.

• 1:06:51Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:06:52Andrew Santino?

  I was like, you could be your own kind of magician alone, and then they'll put you in funny stuff, with other funny people.

• 1:06:58Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:06:58Andrew Santino?

  That was my, you know, I was like, that was my North Star a little bit.

• 1:07:02Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 1:07:02Andrew Santino?

  Jim, Jim, Jim the most, because he got to just literally become a goof character, and transform, I was obsessed with that, and then it never came to fruition, so.

• 1:07:14Speaker 04

  What are you talking about?

• 1:07:15Andrew Santino?

  Well, I mean, you just don't get to be in a movie and create such a wild character anymore, that's not a real thing.

• 1:07:19Speaker 04

  No, that's not a thing, but you're doing it the way it's done now.

• 1:07:22Andrew Santino?

  Sure, I just, the dream of that, like, like Ace Ventura, or even like Cable Guy, it's like, stuff like that, I was like, God, I wish that, that's what I loved as a kid, because you got to just, uh, transform, I thought that was really it.

• 1:07:35Speaker 04

  What about writing your own scripted stuff, are you really into that?

• 1:07:38Andrew Santino?

  Tried, tried, they're not interested, yeah, they're not interested, and they've said no a thousand times, thank you Hollywood, I, we really want to work, you've, you've had this, where like, we want a Ryan Hamilton project. And then you give it to them, and they're like, we hate this, and you're like, great, I gave you the one I thought. Like, have you done the pilot run, where they give you your own pilot and all that?

• 1:07:55Speaker 04

  Yeah, I used to come out here for the pilot season, you know, before it was all on tape, and do all those, and, uh, studied acting for a while, and, it was always on the side, though, I always felt like I never gave it a full chance, I put it on me more, where it was like, standup, I gave it everything, you know, and I never, well, that's nice, but I never, I never did that necessarily with the scripted and the acting stuff, it was like, it's around, if you throw me an audition, I'm gonna try to nail it, see what happens.

• 1:08:25Andrew Santino?

  Right.

• 1:08:25Speaker 04

  But it wasn't like, how am I gonna get my next audition, kind of thing, and, you know, I think that's what it really takes, to do something like that.

• 1:08:32Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, but I mean, the difference is like, you're failing live with standup, and that's part of the reward, right, is that you're failing as you're working. Whereas in, in, in the acting world, you're just failing.

• 1:08:42Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:08:43Andrew Santino?

  And that's it, it's just a no, no, no, until there's a maybe yes.

• 1:08:45Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:08:46Andrew Santino?

  And the maybe yes is a big maybe yes, heavily emphasis on maybe. With standup, it's like, the no is still a yes, that's the, that was the great irony of standup, it's like, even when you were eating shit, at bars, you're still getting something.

• 1:08:59Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:09:00Andrew Santino?

  It was still rewarding.

• 1:09:01Speaker 04

  We're so lucky that way, that we can just work.

• 1:09:03Andrew Santino?

  That's why I loved it, I used to go, go to show, when I first moved here, when I was scared to, to get into mics, I would just go to shows, and sit in the back by myself.

• 1:09:10Speaker 04

  Yeah, for sure.

• 1:09:11Andrew Santino?

  And just, just see how, uh, see how they did it.

• 1:09:14Speaker 04

  Yeah, oh, it's so, I mean, you can learn something from every, everything you watch, every moment.

• 1:09:19Andrew Santino?

  I watched a lot of, um, guitar, piano, a lot of keyboards back in the day, people were really getting into the music thing in, in the early 2000s, it was like a.

• 1:09:27Speaker 04

  This, and comedy, comedy music.

• 1:09:29Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, it was huge for some reason, it was like a lot of, well, especially alternative shows, where a lot of experimental shit, and it was always like, oh, that's so fascinating, like, Galifianakis did Live on the Purple Onion with a piano on stage, which kind of like dictated the art of the,

• 1:09:43Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:09:43Andrew Santino?

  And I was like, oh my God, you get to just try stuff?

• 1:09:46Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:09:46Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, that's what I, that's.

• 1:09:47Speaker 04

  Were you doing the alternative scene and all of that, were you getting into those rooms?

• 1:09:51Andrew Santino?

  Funny, I did a lot of east side stuff out here before I ever went to the Comedy Store, I was so scared of the Comedy Store.

• 1:09:55Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:09:56Andrew Santino?

  And then, so yeah, we would do mostly east side shows, most guys I came up with were east side people. Because that's where you could get up.

• 1:10:03Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:10:03Andrew Santino?

  Couldn't get up at the clubs.

• 1:10:04Speaker 04

  Couldn't get into the clubs.

• 1:10:05Andrew Santino?

  Clubs, that you, they were like, what are you here to buy a drink?

• 1:10:08Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:10:08Andrew Santino?

  Also, that was the other thing, it was like, you'd go to the club, you wouldn't get on the, um, open mic, and then, um, you'd hang around, until you were like, well, I guess I'll just go try to,

• 1:10:18Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:10:19Andrew Santino?

  get on another mic somewhere else, and you'd have to do that five, six nights a week, he was with me back in the day, Carlos, Carlos was around back then, it was just, that's what we did, and you, you weren't really like, welcome, you were kind of there.

• 1:10:29Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:10:30Andrew Santino?

  You were just a bo, a warm body.

• 1:10:32Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:10:32Andrew Santino?

  And then you would have to go back, so most of the shows were east, east side, yeah, until the clubs kind of blossomed, and they started to let people in, young, young people in, you know, very restrictive, I mean, is that what it was like, cellar?

• 1:10:44Speaker 04

  When I moved to New York, I was a full-time comedian, but I couldn't get on stage anywhere, really, I mean, because it was, at that time for me, the way I saw it was like, there's this very tight, kind of, alternative defined world, and it was like, these are alternative guys, these are club guys, it's not like that anymore, but it was like that.

• 1:11:01Andrew Santino?

  It used to be that way here.

• 1:11:02Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, and I couldn't, I wasn't, I was like, a club road comedian, and I was new in New York, and I would go to the alternative rooms, and everybody was cool and nice, but it was like, I never got like, momentum in there, and then I would go to the clubs, and they'd be like, we don't care about you.

• 1:11:21Andrew Santino?

  We don't, uh, we don't care about you at all, just want to let you know that.

• 1:11:24Speaker 04

  So.

• 1:11:24Andrew Santino?

  No, I know, trust me, I feel it.

• 1:11:27Speaker 04

  I was in New York five years, and I was ready to move.

• 1:11:30Andrew Santino?

  Where, you know, back west?

• 1:11:32Speaker 04

  I was gonna come out here, actually, because I was like, at least, in LA, the weather's good, and I can have a bigger apartment.

• 1:11:38Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:39Speaker 04

  And I'll not get on stage in LA.

• 1:11:42Andrew Santino?

  Right.

• 1:11:42Speaker 04

  And I'll still go on the road, and I'll be closer to home.

• 1:11:44Andrew Santino?

  What kept you in LA, in New York, I mean?

• 1:11:47Speaker 04

  Amy, actually.

• 1:11:48Andrew Santino?

  Schumer kept you in New York?

• 1:11:49Speaker 04

  Amy and Anthony.

• 1:11:53Speaker 04

  Amy, like, just one night, I was just hanging around, I would go, I would give myself one night where I would go sit at the bar, at the Cellar, and I would eat, and I wouldn't really talk to people, but people knew who I was, and I was just like, I'm just gonna go to this once, one night a week, I won't bother anybody, but I just want to be around, and, um, I knew lots of people, everybody's super nice. But one night, Amy just texted me, said, where are you? I said, I just got home from vacation, she said, come downtown, so I came downtown, and she met me out front, and she goes, we've been talking about you, and I want you to come in in like, five minutes.

• 1:12:31Speaker 04

  I don't know if I should tell this story for Amy's sake, but I went in and, and Estee goes, "Yes, I've seen you around. Would you like to go up?" I'm like, "Tonight?" And she goes, "Yeah, it'll be like one in the morning." And I just thought, I was on the road the next weekend and I thought, "Yeah, I'm just gonna do it, cause like, who knows if this will happen again." And I hadn't been on stage in like 10 days, cause I just got home from vacation. Like, I never did this. Never. And I was rusty. So I ran around and did the little rooms around the block, and tried to put my five minutes together. And I went up at like, really late. I followed Russ Maniev, Dave Attell, who I knew a little bit, because I'd

• 1:13:13Speaker 04

  done a guest set for him at La Brea Improv for some reason, years ago. And he said, "I'm gonna come down and watch you." And I was like, "I'm terrified, right now."

• 1:13:21Andrew Santino?

  Wow.

• 1:13:22Speaker 04

  And...

• 1:13:23Andrew Santino?

  And you did great.

• 1:13:24Speaker 04

  I did okay. And I started getting one spot a week. And maybe if someone canceled, I would get another spot. And that was enough. And I said, "Okay, I'm not gonna move." And I stuck around.

• 1:13:36Andrew Santino?

  That's pretty beautiful.

• 1:13:37Speaker 04

  It was pretty, yeah, pretty cool.

• 1:13:39Andrew Santino?

  Like, right at your very end.

• 1:13:40Speaker 04

  I was, I was really like...

• 1:13:42Andrew Santino?

  Packing your shit. She's like, "Where are you?" Like, you're like, "I'm, uh, almost, I'm on my way out." You, as you had the suitcase, did you turn around to an empty room? You're like, "Goodbye apartment." "Where are you?" Uh, "On my way." When you say downtown, where'd you live? Did you live on that?

• 1:13:57Speaker 04

  Oh, I was, uh, where did I live at that? I bounced around. At that time, where did I live?

• 1:14:02Andrew Santino?

  Like, Upper East Side?

• 1:14:04Speaker 04

  No, I did live Upper East Side.

• 1:14:06Andrew Santino?

  You did? Yeah, cause when you said downtown, it's like, when a comic's like, "Get down here, man. It's gonna take you a minute. So get here now."

• 1:14:11Speaker 04

  I, I think at that time, I actually lived, did I say downtown? I, I was bouncing around, but I think I lived in Astoria at that time.

• 1:14:17Andrew Santino?

  Okay. A lot of comics...

• 1:14:19Speaker 04

  Rough apartment.

• 1:14:20Andrew Santino?

  A lot of comics lived in Astoria.

• 1:14:21Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:14:21Andrew Santino?

  Gillis and all those guys lived over there? Stavros, yeah?

• 1:14:24Speaker 04

  When I moved, I was like, comedians were like, a lot of people lived there. I go, "Okay." So I lived there for a while, but, yeah, I bounced all over the place.

• 1:14:32Andrew Santino?

  And now, for people that wanna know, Joe, my editor, please put up his home address right here. He actually lives on the, uh, at the top of the Empire State Building, which is very, very cool.

• 1:14:41Speaker 04

  It's cool. I just said, you know, the M&M's store, the top of the M&M's store was nice, for a while.

• 1:14:46Andrew Santino?

  You had to move.

• 1:14:46Speaker 04

  Yeah, I just thought, "This is more iconic."

• 1:14:51Andrew Santino?

  What's more New York, baby? That's so, I mean, well, I'll say this. That is incredible. Thanks for sharing the story. I'm sure Amy would like that. You said as if it was a...

• 1:15:01Speaker 04

  I, I just didn't, you know, she said, "Meet me out front." Yeah, I'm sure she...

• 1:15:04Andrew Santino?

  It's a beautiful thing.

• 1:15:05Speaker 04

  It's a beautiful thing. And Estee's always goes, "I remember who brought you in, and I remember how that happened."

• 1:15:09Andrew Santino?

  It's cool. It's cool to help people. I, I, then, then it's on you to then pass the buck.

• 1:15:14Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:15:14Andrew Santino?

  And then help someone else out and do the right thing, by someone you find that's...

• 1:15:18Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 1:15:19Andrew Santino?

  That's what I do to the people that open. I try to find people that I think are, um, you know, can sneak through and are doing really well, that I can be like, "Hey, look at this. Just watch this, watch this person."

• 1:15:29Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:15:30Andrew Santino?

  If I can.

• 1:15:30Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:15:31Andrew Santino?

  If they're not annoyed with me.

• 1:15:32Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:15:32Andrew Santino?

  And they're like, "Stop suggesting people." Which I've got, I've, I'm pretty good lately. My track record's been pretty good.

• 1:15:37Speaker 04

  That's great.

• 1:15:38Andrew Santino?

  For the most part, I do try to be like, "I'm doing pretty good."

• 1:15:41Speaker 04

  It's great. I mean, people, it's such an interesting world of comedy. I mean, I'm really proud of comedians in general, because we really help each other. Like, if you think about your career, I bet it's the same as mine. So much of what I get is from comedians, ultimately.

• 1:15:55Andrew Santino?

  Always, yeah. It's not from the machine. No, it's usually from a comic doing right by you. By being like, "Oh, you gotta..."

• 1:16:02Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:16:03Andrew Santino?

  This, you know, you have to...

• 1:16:04Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:16:05Andrew Santino?

  "This is what you do, this," and they point you in the right direction. It's almost, yeah. If you didn't have, if we didn't have each other, and not, not all of us, you know what I mean? A lot of it's me, me, me, but I mean, you know. It is so funny, when I come to The Cellar every time, I, I wanna give you another compliment. Um, and I've had enough, by the way, of complimenting you, I've just realized. But every time, you do say hello to me in a way that's, um, a warm, uh, welcome. Instead of, sometimes when I go, the funniest phrase I hear, people are like, "What are you doing here?" I'm like, "What do you mean? What am I fucking, what do you, get, I'm bowling here. What do you think I'm doing?" "I'm fixing the lights. What do you mean, what am I doing here?"

• 1:16:39Speaker 04

  That's a tough open. That might be the third question. "What's going on? Why are you in town?"

• 1:16:43Andrew Santino?

  Yeah, no, no, they do that, cause they are, it's also like, "Are you taking spots from, who you, who's, who's spot do you got?"

• 1:16:47Speaker 04

  Right.

• 1:16:48Andrew Santino?

  That's more, I, that's more the vibe, I think. There's comics that are like, uh, "Wha, where are you going? Are you going on? What are you going on?" They wanna know what spot they don't have anymore. It's like, dude, I, I'm not there enough for it to matter. You know what I mean?

• 1:17:00Speaker 04

  No.

• 1:17:00Andrew Santino?

  People do get...

• 1:17:01Speaker 04

  See, it doesn't matter anyway.

• 1:17:02Andrew Santino?

  But, but you've never, you've always been very warm. There's...

• 1:17:05Speaker 04

  Oh, good.

• 1:17:05Andrew Santino?

  You've always said hello. Usually you're eating. Always eating. Always eating.

• 1:17:10Speaker 04

  I don't know what that is, I guess.

• 1:17:11Andrew Santino?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:12Speaker 04

  You know, it's part, it's just part of life.

• 1:17:14Andrew Santino?

  Sustenance, yeah.

• 1:17:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:17:16Andrew Santino?

  You're always eating.

• 1:17:17Speaker 04

  Am I breathing, too?

• 1:17:18Andrew Santino?

  No.

• 1:17:18Speaker 04

  No, I don't breathe.

• 1:17:19Andrew Santino?

  It's very shoveling. Very inhaling.

• 1:17:22Speaker 04

  Well...

• 1:17:23Andrew Santino?

  And P, and I always say, "Where's Hamilton?" They say, "He's a fatty." They call him Fatty. They go, "Fatty's eating in the corner."

• 1:17:28Speaker 04

  Yeah. I block it out. I haven't heard it in a long time, but I know it happens.

• 1:17:33Andrew Santino?

  They write in chalk on the table, "Fatty's table." Thank you for coming on the show. I appreciate you very much. I could talk to you for five more days, but I...

• 1:17:41Speaker 04

  This is really fun.

• 1:17:42Andrew Santino?

  I, uh, I wanna tell you how great you are as a comedian, how good you are of a man. Better comedian than man, by the way. And we'll try to get those both equal, but...

• 1:17:50Speaker 04

  I don't, I don't know which one I want, but...

• 1:17:52Andrew Santino?

  Doesn't matter.

• 1:17:53Speaker 04

  Doesn't matter.

• 1:17:53Andrew Santino?

  You already achieved. Uh, please go watch the special, out right now on Netflix. Also, uh, go see him on tour, whether it's now or in the fall, that's a big theater, but big boy tour. Uh, I imagine the, it's gotta be at Ryan, RyanHamilton.com.

• 1:18:06Speaker 04

  RyanHamiltonLive.com.

• 1:18:08Andrew Santino?

  Jesus Christ. You couldn't find the other one?

• 1:18:10Speaker 04

  Remember when we used to do, name our specials live? It's like an homage, is what I'd say.

• 1:18:15Andrew Santino?

  It's a really good homage.

• 1:18:15Speaker 04

  It's an homage.

• 1:18:17Andrew Santino?

  RyanHamiltonLive.com, uh, and watch the special as well. And go see him, because he's, uh, one of the best working comedians and best humans that I've been lucky enough to know on this earth. Uh, we end the show the same way. You look into that camera right there, and you're gonna say one word or one phrase to end the episode. It used to be a phrase. It used to be a word, then it became a phrase, and then I let people choose. So if there's a, imparting words of wisdom, or if it's just one word that you wanna leave. Uh, you can think about it for a second.

• 1:18:46Speaker 04

  A phrase?

• 1:18:47Andrew Santino?

  Or a word. It could be one singular word that you think defines, um, something to you.

• 1:18:52Speaker 04

  The thing I'm gonna think about, let's see, uh, um, there's, whenever, did, recognize those moments in your life, when everything falls away and there's one important thing. That's the thing I'll take from this conversation. Yeah.

• 1:19:05Andrew Santino?

  Go see The Lion Live, please.

• 1:19:08Speaker 02

  In here, we pour whiskey, whiskey, whiskey, whiskey, whiskey.

• 1:19:13Speaker 03

  Who are that creature in the ginger beard?

• 1:19:16Speaker 06

  It's dirty and ginger.

• 1:19:17Speaker 03

  Like vampires, the ginger gene is a curse. Gingers are beautiful.

• 1:19:21Speaker 06

  You owe me five dollars for the whiskey, seventy-five dollars for the horse. Ginger, oh hell no. This whiskey is excellent.

• 1:19:29Speaker 07

  Ginger. I like gingers.

• 1:19:34Speaker 00

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