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Hello boys and girls. This is Tim Ferriss. Welcome to another episode of the Tim Ferry show, where it is my job to deconstruct, world-class performers to tease out the routines habits Etc that you can apply to your own life. You will get plenty of all of that in this special episode which features an interview for my 2017 TV show Fearless. The less is in parentheses because the objective is to teach you to fear less not to be Fearless. Fearless features in depth, long-form conversations with top performers focusing on how they've overcome
Fears and made hard decisions and bracing discomfort and thinking, big along the way, it was produced by Wild West Productions and I worked with them to make both the video and audio available to you for free. My dear listeners to thank you all dressed. You can find the video of this episode which is gorgeous. I think they did an incredible job on youtube.com slash Tim Ferriss. Remember two r's, two s's youtube.com slash Tim Ferriss and eventually you'll be able to see all of the episodes for free at youtube.com.
Tim Ferriss, so you can swing over there and see what is currently up before we get started, just a little bit more on Wild West spearheaded by actor, producer and past podcasts guest, Vince Vaughn. Wild West has produced a string of hit movies, including the internship Couple's, Retreat for Christmases, and The Break-Up in 2020, Wild West produced The Comedy. The opening act starring Jimmy o Yang and Cedric the Entertainer in addition to Fearless, their television credits. Include undeniable with Joe Buck ESPN's 3430 episode about the
Bears. And the Netflix animated show F is for family. Wild West is also produced the documentaries, give us this day, game changers, subtitle dreams of BlizzCon and wild west comedy show. And now, without further Ado, please enjoy this wide-ranging. Conversation from Fearless.
I'm Tim, Ferriss author, entrepreneur, angel investor, and now TV host. I've spent my entire adult life asking questions then scouring the globe to find the answers on this show. I'll share the secrets of pioneers who have faced their own fears will dig into the hard times. Make mistakes tough decisions and how they got through it. All. The goal isn't to be Fearless goal is to learn to fear less.
Fearless. I'm your host, Tim Ferriss and on this stage will be deconstructing world-class performers to uncover. The specific tactics that they've used to overcome doubt tackle hard decisions and ultimately succeed. So imagine yourself all alone on stage in front of 14,000, people staring directly at you. For many of us. Probably, most of us that be a complete nightmare, but for my guest, tonight is just another day at the office. The man, you're about to meet is one of the most prolific and respected comedians in the world. He's done five hour long comedy.
Host, one of the most popular podcasts of all time and is the co Creator and star of the Animated Series F is for family. Please welcome to the stage Bill Burr.
We're going to be out here talking about artificial intelligence or something. We might lose really creeping me up. Oh yes, just very sterile. All
right. I've wanted to sit down with you for so
long. Yeah, we've been texting trying to get it going. Yeah.
Here we go. And here we are. Welcome to my home.
Yeah. And I thought a fun place to start might be with Philadelphia. So we have a video to show and as contacts and feel free to
correct me. And we can add more afterwards, but
at least some, or all of the comedian's have been booed off stage up to that
plan. Now, that's the that's the urban myth. That if you remember Sky got booed, okay? And the lineup was killer and we were just playing these outdoor like a theaters. So it's like, you know, kind of made
Music and and we got down to Philly and I don't know, they were all wearing like Eagle jerseys and tailgating and throwing the football. It just seemed like they were ready for a playoff game and it was still light out and there's something about chokes. They don't work when there's lights on like it has to be seedy and that. So Not only was it was like, daylight, it was sunlight and half the people were still out in the parking lot and there was like it just like maybe like 2,000 people just Milling around walking around so he basically
Got thrown to the dogs, but what happened is, they booed him off stage and it kind of set the tone. But then, you know, everybody was kind of doing their thing. I mean, it was crazy as it Patrice O'Neal. Tracy Morgan Ralphie May Bob Saget. I mean, Bobby Kelly, Jim Norton da Myra. I mean, we just Murderers Row so, but you could just feel like there was something people were surviving and I saw a few people who always went long. Went short that night, I'm not going to say who, but one, who always burn the land wasn't Patrice.
Nice. It was somebody else. I remember he was literally mid joke and just stopped and said, was you guys who great, good night. God bless and walked up. And that's when I started thinking like oh it's like if that dude who always goes long just pulled up. He's supposed to do 20 minutes. I don't think he did. I don't think he did 14. And at that point, I didn't want to do the show and I wasn't nervous at all. I just kept thinking like I could have just been in a funny bone if out of 40 people who gave a shit and wanted to come to the show. And so then I wasn't nervous at all and then I knew I was probably looking
Backup probably knows in trouble because I wasn't nervous. And I went out there and I was like oh shit. And I did my first joke which I didn't realize they were playing in the advertising on the radio so everyone already heard it and nobody nobody
laughed.
And I was like, literally, I was like already neck deep and it was so long ago and then I just remember, I went to another joke and I just bailed halfway through his like, you guys aren't going to laugh at that and then they booed, and let's maybe you should roll the tape. I don't want to see
this. I think you guys want to see it.
Rocky cities built around a fucking guy who doesn't even exist, just slapped. You on the back of your sit, infested fucking shoulders and you're awful mantid tank top seven minutes left.
One minute left in the period.
Still fucking hate you. People, I've never seen that. Are you serious? I've never
That
enough really know.
So you did you decide to do the countdown before you went out? I mean, is that something you
know, know what happened was luckily I had been booed before so it wasn't a new thing. So the first time you get booed is a, you know, it's a hell of an experience because you have what you want, but it's the exact opposite of motion. You have the entire crowds Focus except there's no love. It's just hate. So the first time that happens it's really don't know what to do. But I also I remember just after
Words thinking about it going like, why didn't I let that fat guy bumi? I let that chick with the weird glasses. Like, why didn't I say something? I just remember thinking I was just mad at myself, don't like, all right, you got booed, you know? They didn't think you were funny but you sat there and you know, it was a variety show, they had like a contortionist and somebody with a snake and the somebody saying saying like Pour some sugar on me and whether these leather pants and then they bring a comedian out, it was just it was a complete shit show. So I just remember afterwards.
I just remember being like upset at myself that I was like, dude, you could at least throw one punch. You should have done that but but, but then I didn't think of it again. I didn't think of it again because you know, you don't plan on something like that happen. It's so I don't know why I did that. I just started doing it and that they had the clock was there.
And I was just looking at it and I just, I don't know. I think in that moment I decided I wasn't going to leave. So I think the countdown was kind of for me like you're doing cardio, you know that and you're like, I'm not going to look for one song, you know, and look. Alright, another 3 minutes went off. So here's a funny thing. So we still had one more date on that tour. Something was telling me don't do the last one and then I went to Cleveland and it was like, as I walked out on stage, everybody booed because they wanted me to trash their
city,
so then it became this things like I can't do this again.
Or then this is my act. This is like Gallagher smashing, the
Watermelons. I got to come out
and read about all your sports teams and shit. So that was the one I freaked out about it, because I thought it was like, I thought my career was over. I was like everywhere I go, I'm going to get booed and blah, blah, blah. I'm glad that people enjoyed it because I was definitely, I was embarrassed. That the whole thing happened, you grew up in Mass, right?
What was your childhood like growing up Massachusetts?
I was sort of like, you know, this shy kid. I had like orange hair. I mean, I was just like, I was a marked, a second. I walked in the room, everyone.
Was on me like everyone time. It was my birthday. My mother got me. This parents got me like this little cowboy outfit. I was like four years old. You had like 2 hat. There was a little vest and then I had like, like the belt with the guns and supposed to be like the mother of pearl handles, but it was like plastic, so she sends me all. I even had like the little bandana, she tied it around and she just sent me outside and I don't even think I made it to the end of my driveway and like these big kids came by and they just took the guns out of my holster and just smashed him on the ground and ice.
At it looking, I just was like, crying. They left it just walked away and then I picked him up and I walked home and walked back into the house. My mother who did that? Who did that? I was like big kids and she's like, I can remember. She just like made me a sandwich that was kind
of it
but it wasn't like a big deal back. Then I remember you would just do shit. The neighborhoods and parents just watched. They just figured out what you did. I mean we threw rocks in this kids pool.
And before I even got home, my mother already knew what happened and there was a lot of that stuff going back. They were building new homes and you'd go down there and you would steal shit for to make a tree for you. Just vandalize him for no reason. When did comedy enter the picture for you? I always made. I always got kids to laugh and I moved around a little bit when I was a kid and just making kids laugh was a way to get people to stop beating the shit out of me or bigger kids you know, wailing on your whatever. So that's how I would make friends though.
Just I would just make people laugh and I remember making people laugh in the, in the in the classroom, you know, I'd get that made you feel good, you know, made the pretty girls care about who you were hopefully, you know, it was just an attention thing I guess.
Which people influence do in your Academy were there particular comedians that you gravitated towards or memorized, anything like
that? I watched all this, my all the stuff, my dad used to watch all the things that they now sell on TV all the, those Dean, Martin roasts Foster Brooks, I loved.
Remember Bob Hope my dad would always laugh and I never got the jokes. There was always some obscure references and then as I started to get older Cheech and Chong and I remember buying Richard, Pryor's album, not even know who he was. I just knew he looked funny. I'm not going to say the name of the album but it's the one when he's like that, it's got the N word in it, George Carlin. Yeah, I just started buying. I remember buying the Eddie Murphy record when he had the rose in his ear. I bought that just because he was a black guy and I knew that Richard.
Was funny and I was just a little white kid going. Like, with this black guy was black, guys are funny. And I know that sounds like just bought it and I had no idea. We was.
Did you memorize any of their bits
or how did? Yeah, this is how out of touch. I was with what I wanted to do and I used to do my paper route and I would be doing the bits. I missed to Eddie Murphy's got hit by a car, a bit. I would be doing that out loud to myself as I was riding through the snow where pretending I was in front of the school doing it. And everyone was laughing thinking, I
I was great but it still didn't dawn on me at that moment. That maybe I wanted to be a comedian. I don't know why. It just everything just seems I think for kids today that's hard to understand because they can just shoot something Instagram and whatever the whatever the hell we do YouTube it on the internet, whatever the hell it is. And but back then it was a zillion miles away. It was a zillion miles away, like it didn't like even like thinking about becoming a comedian. I thought you had to like move to Hollywood to do it. Like I had no idea.
Yeah, there's like three channels. You had no
idea in high school. What did you think you were going to be when you grow up? You have any idea.
Now I was failing miserably but like I did great in school. I did great in school and right until it counted. I did great write up to eighth grade. And when I opened my freshman year, I was going and I was like, I'm going to go to Notre Dame and I'm going to become a lawyer. And by, like sophomore years, it's like, I'm going to be a construction worker and go to Wentworth. I'll drive a truck.
Yeah, I just, I don't know. I think somewhere along the line. I just wanted to have a fun job. I wanted to have a fun job. I didn't know that because you know I hated everything else. I didn't like carpeted areas, I didn't like wearing suits, like I liked working in warehousing. I'd like to play, I like having a job where I could walk away. Walk away from an area. I always just remember seeing people who had to sit in cubicles like they just had to be there and if you're not there and immediately they know that you're screwing around like you know like where is he supposed to be right here, he's not getting what he's supposed to.
It done. So if you work in warehousing, you could be on like a forklift or unloading, a truck, a cutting up boxes, or just doing something as you as long as you're in this giant area, they were all right with it and like, warehousing is great. It's all class clowns. Musicians like addicts. Alcoholics and shit. I remember this, dude. Yeah, I remember this dude coming into work. You came in like three hours late. It was like 90 degrees out and his hair was soaking wet from a shower like dripping down. He's like, oh yeah, the traffic.
The traffic
was brutal. It's
like, dude. Yeah, it's still wet from the shower and I remember, yeah, he had a major Coke problem and he beat why. I remember my boss had a Coke problem. Remember getting that job in the first day I saw me, was this guy was like probably 64 and couldn't have weighed more than a buck 60. He was just just wired and they had this pallet jack that was like electronic and they're like yeah let me take you over to meet the boss and he saw me he was just so good just geeked out. He was just like,
Driving it towards the dock back and forth. Going to let her drive it off. The dock and just coming back from break lifting, his licking, his lips and shit. And I was just like, okay, this is gonna be my boss and I, I worked the third shift and it was all people like me working our way through college. Like if, you know, if you didn't get student loans or whatever, I got laid off from that ship because there was this this fat fuck used to come out from the he was fat and he was a
fuck.
So he would come walking out,
he come walking him and he said, wear short sleeve dress shirts. And you know, those guys so fat he had to really swing the arms
to get out.
We just come walking out and he looked around and all these badass, dudes. All of a sudden would be grabbing boxes and pretending to work. And I just said that thing, maybe it's a stand-up comic thing. When that thing you just like I was like, you know, fuck this guy, fuck this guy and I just look at them like a what's going on? Like I'm not I'm not doing this.
Oh fuck, I'm working out here. I don't want to fucking extra work when you come out here. Fuck you. Why don't you pick this up? Your tub of shit. That's what I was thinking. So then I ended up
Right? After that moment like an idiot. I then asked the other the coked-up guy for a race and and then then I think the fatty was just like to hell with this guy. So then I got laid off from that. And then I was collecting unemployment, which I had never done. And I felt what I felt like a piece of shit doing it. Because my parents work so hard and it was a bad economic time and I couldn't get a job, and I just decided that I wanted to be a comedian because working in the warehouse, I was working with this guy.
Who was hilarious. And he wanted to be a comedian, and he was the first guy that said it. He said, you know, one of these nights, I'm going to take a shot of Jack Daniel's and just go on stage and then and all of a sudden it wasn't on TV once again. You know, we didn't have YouTube. So it was sitting next to me, I was thinking, well, if he can do it I can do it. So I knew that I was a baby step kind of guy so I had rather than just doing it. I transferred to Emerson which was more of a performance school. So and then I just went there and I just
Class. I could get up in front of the class, I would do it. No matter how nervous I was, and I was a really shy withdrawn, really, withdrawn kid, and I just forced myself to do that. And every time I did it, even if it didn't go, well, I felt good that I did it, and then I started to like it and I started doing radio because radio was a good baby step between performing and being funny to like a live crowd because it was like I was on a microphone, there was an audience but I couldn't see him. I couldn't.
I hear him and I remember I did this shift 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. on 640 a.m. wec beef and all it did was broadcast to the dorms. Nobody was up, nobody was listening. If they were there listening to a better radio station and I just remember and I'd always be, I'd always be on like the thing going, like, you know, whatever the some that was dinosaur jr. If you have any requests, give me a call, no never call. And finally, I just said, Jesus, I go somebody just call in. Tell me you hate me. I don't care. And then the phone lit up.
And I picked it up in. This guy goes, I hate you and then hung up and I just remember just being like in a total panic. I was I was mortified and then he called back and he apologized said, hey, goes my girlfriend's work in the next shift. I just happened to be listening. She told me to call back and apologize, but like I felt like such a nerd and which I was I was a nerd, I commuted to school, I didn't know anybody. I just walked in with my stupid book bag and I would do this the things, whatever. And then I would just go home and I would go to work like
I kind of had a job. Once I have my paper in third grade, I had a job ever since I've been working. So did you have any particular at that
time? I'll have to remember. But when you were shy, how did you was there any particular Milestone appoint? The you remember when that changed when you became more
comfortable no just slowly got better but I still in certain situations. I am sort of weird because what I do but I am also a very like I'm one of those guys. Like the second the show is over if nobody knew who I was.
Would be that is that is the ultimate that would be perfect like before the show I need to know who I am. So you buy tickets. You know are also would be screwed but the second it's over. Like I don't need it to keep going. You remember your first
open mic gig? Getting
on stage. Yeah. What was it? Keep walking because I signed up for a talent contest at Emerson because I made a New Year's resolution in 1992. This is how scared and shy I was about doing this. I was like I made a New Year's resolution that at some point.
In the calendar year of 1992, I was going to go on stage. I gave myself a year to do it and I was gonna do it and then that was it my baby step way into it because I knew if I said I'm doing it next week I go into a panic and I might not ever do it so I said that January 1st and literally three weeks later, the emersonian newspaper, they said, Nick's comedy stop was having a talent contest find Boston's funniest college student, which was just this total scam too.
Jacket with college kids watching their drunk friend, go up there and bomb. Then they make all this money. I meant was a contest and I didn't on any level try to win it. My whole goal was just having the balls of when they called my name to walk up there and start talking. That's all it was. I remember sitting down trying to write material and it's just like, and I've been funny my whole life but then all of a sudden to sit down and like sort of artificially create the moment where it's like, if you and I are hanging out socially and you say something that's like you don't even think and then you just sort of and then I say that but
Blah blah blah. But now it's like with the stand up, I have to create that moment bring the crowd in to the world. Create that moment and then say it and I had no idea how to do it. So I remember I can't even what I wrote, I basically I had some sort of ideas and I went up there and I remember taking the mic and it was the only time I've ever felt having an out-of-body experience. Where I thought I was watching myself was probably this Panic thing where you know, the emotional me just left me. Like we want to be, we don't want to go on this ride. Let's see what happens. So, I'm
Taking the mic out of myself, man, with the mic look like and this guy Billy Martin was hosting was now like this big shot on Bill Maher show. I just want, I've completely forgot what I was going to do and I just started talking and I went into the middle of what I was going to do, then I went to the beginning and then to the end it was like a Tarantino movie, you know, like with Travolta walking by in the background and the diner Scene, It was kind of like that, but I saw it, it was able to do, all right? And I think, I only did like, three minutes, I'm supposed to do five and I got off stage.
Age and I didn't I didn't care about anything and I remember that was it. I was like, this is what I'm doing and I tried construction, I was at warehousing, I tried sales, I remember. I got a health insurance license. I even passed the test. I got certified to take X-rays. I was working in a dental office. I did all of this shit and none of it, like, none of it. Like I didn't care about any of it, and this is the thing I just did it. I was just like, that's it. This is what I'm doing with the rest of my life, but that night after I did it even though somebody else
I didn't care. I just remember driving home in my truck. Listening to Motley Crue. Kickstart My Heart. All right, son. Yep. And literally screaming that was so psyched that I did it, I don't. And I was only like I was middle of the pack. I was nowhere near even remotely the funniest person. What was it about
that experience? That made it click for you.
One of those little things in life that you don't have to think about. It's just it was what it was. It was awesome. And I was just like, why wouldn't I want to do this? Like, my first
Thought was like, I'm doing that for the rest of my life then I did. My next show is at this Comedy Club stitches and that one went. Okay. And then my third show that was my first. What's called a hell room to room. What? Yeah, it's not a doesn't sound good. Yeah, it's not a comedy club. It was a bar. The people there were eating, they had no idea there was going to be a show. They turned off the Bruins game and then they bring you up and that was my first time experiencing a crowd watching a show.
That didn't want to see a show. And I just remember, I remember doing my first joke, my first joke that really just got nothing and feeling that punch in the chest of something bombing, and then having to regroup, and I had nothing to regroup with. And I remember I bomb so bad. I got halfway through my time in this guy, Jack Lynch was the host and I said on the microphone, I said Jack I'm bailing I'm bailing and I got off.
And I was so embarrassed. I didn't want to walk past the crowd or The Comedians and I sat down in the first empty chair. And I just sat there like this scolded child for like two hours waiting for the show to go end and I wanted to leave, but I always so embarrassed. I just sat there, it was horrible, and I just remember, and then what suck back then was, there was so much time between your shows, you know, there was like weeks between shows, if you had a good show you could ride the higher that. But if you bombed, that was one of those things. Like I got this thing like when I went
Embarrass myself. For some reason, it comes out to me like when I'm in the shower and I have to like shout the memory out, you know like I'm in the shower and just think about it. I just feel like I just like hectic noises just these noises of like humiliation like oh my God I did that or I said that I still do that in the my car. I like I'll think of shit that I just did or something. I did ten years ago and it's this thing up. Just like as I don't want to think it. And, you know, there's a self-loathing about it that, you know, that I never knew that kind of never.
Got past those teenage years that oh God I'm such an idiot. Like I never kind of never got past that. I mean I knew I was going to bomb, it's inevitable. It's like if you fight if you fight long enough somebody's going to come along a little faster than you're going to get caught and it's like it's Stalin telling jokes, that's it's inevitable. It's going to happen. And then it's just something you have to get good at you have to get good at bombing. Yeah. And I had enough experience of doing it, you know, that you eventually.
You get good at it then it doesn't, it doesn't hurt you anymore. And is it just exposure as it like getting a
flu shot? Every season is just about the number of repetitions. You can adjust exercise
yourself to. Yeah, you just keep doing it and you know, bombing is this something hilarious about it? There's something like image. If you, what, what the turning point for me with bombing was was seeing how fun it was being able to buy more time. Just being on stage and I was bombing. And I just pictured all my friends watching me laughing at me in the in the back.
And then that got me to laugh at myself. And then I just started thinking, how much can I get these people to hate me? And I just left my act and I just started trying to annoy them and I didn't get them back. They still hated me. But I had such a good time that was like wow, what was that? That was that was just new areas of stand-up that you know, I didn't know existed,
the clean and not so clean kind of before. And after Bill Burr, I find really fast. Thanks we actually have a video that this shows, the contrast
A little bit. I love my dad and he's hilarious. He's such an emotional guy, you know, I know my dad was his funniest. So was whenever you like broke something because my dad, my dad was totally flip out, right? But the words he used you would actually thought it was a good thing. You know? I mean like you break a window. She be like
nice real nice. Beautiful.
Hey, why don't you break them all do? There was an epidemic of
gold Diggin whores in this
country.
And every night I put on the news, and I'm waiting for someone to address
it.
Every night never see it you know and every night I bring up gold-digging whores and the whole crowd pulls back, like, I'm up here talking about Bigfoot. All
right, like I'm saying, the moons made out of cheese or something talking about horse people, they're everywhere.
How many?
How many more great men are going to get chopped in half
before? We do something. Why is it so quiet in here goddamn? I don't get it.
So when did you go to opening up to more of? I'm not going to be profanity. Just being yourself, may be
failing by just failing, just trying to do what they died. I thought they wanted whatever they were responding to and then that just morphed into, well, if I'm gonna fail, I'll fail doing what I want to do in this business and then that led to me starting to succeed and
Text artistic succeed, doing what I wanted to do, my view of the business changed. We write, then looked at it, rather than like it's this thing I'm running towards it was like no, I'm in it. So this by just look at the business like it's a giant mall and I have a little store, right? Probably like those ones that are in the middle that you walk by. Not the actual, yeah, little kiosk. And I just, I have what I do, this is what I do. You come in, right? This is what I do. Okay, if you want to buy something great, if you
don't, you know, you keep going. But this, this is what I do, and rather than I used to view it, like, oh, they're selling sure I should sell shirts. And I got to sell candles and I got to pick, you know, do nails and have like this one. Stop Walmart thing and it's just like that just didn't work for me. I just, I do a podcast. I told jokes. I act when they let me, you know, because like you have to audition the base, you know. But then I also just found with, you know, the people I grew up didn't talk like that. The stories I had to tell people weren't liking
That very volatile and they use colorful language as they say. And there is this thing with comedy purest with their act like, okay. If you were clean, you know, then that's pure comedy. That's, that's real comedy because you didn't say any bad words but you know, which I do understand because you can definitely use curse words to, you know, sort of steroid up your stuff. But I've also find what, you know, when people say, they want somebody to work clean. It doesn't just mean
Don't say any bad words. It also means don't have any opinions that will make people uncomfortable because I could I could easily work totally clean in this groups of people that you could completely piss off and wouldn't want to pay you just by your opinions on things. So I just felt like it was a limited thing and I've always liked the rawness of, with everything with music with film with comedy of just going off.
More. The realness of that rather than this totally polished thing which I had to completely have an appreciation for but the amount of times I've heard comedians go like say something so funny in the green room and be like yeah but not that's gotta be like dude you gotta do it on stage you can do on stage like nah man that's not me that's not me. It's like it is you just fucking said it whatever you're doing up there. That's not you. That's you on stage and that's what happens with comedy is like this. It's big black mystery thing about you got to find you.
Moisten who is just who I am? Is that who I am? And I have this theory that you walk in with it as an open, my car and then you go on stage and the weirdness of looking at people and talking you become this is me on, stay all. I'm holding a microphone and just becomes weird, it becomes weird and then you spend I don't 8 10 12, 15 years trying to get back to who you were when you walked in who is this guy who is making people laugh in the bars because like you just walked into
To a bar and something happened, then you just riffing on it. But you work, you will comfortable, then you go on stage and it's just like, oh shit. Everybody's looking at me and I have to handle all of this. What am I doing with my hand? How do I get this out of the stand? And it just becomes this whole you know, just looking at yourself and then then that who you are goes, right out the fucking window, a lot of folks, consider you the
comedian's comedian, right? I mean a lot of comedians look up to you know like Bill Bird can not only talk about anything.
Willing to talk about anything but he'll this is a
self-employed. You can't get you can't get too into this business. Yeah. If you get too into this business then you fucked and then you become that guy. You mean just having contracts and relationships with people. You can get in business with people but that's not your only thing. Like I'll never stop doing stand-up and I have my podcast so I can and I don't live a lifestyle Beyond those. I live way behind those. So no matter whatever happens, whatever fucking slap on the wrist, I'm ever going to get from the the
Social media, I'm still going to be fine. It's when you you know it's when you just go into this business if you're just an actor on a show or you just host something or whatever it is that like all of a sudden like if you just did this you didn't have your podcast or any other way to make money. If all of a sudden you know this some bullshit Rumblings. If the people above you go you have to go out there and apologize. You're in a situation of like arouse I can become homeless. Yeah. So then you have to go out there and even if you
Sorry, you have to say you're sorry, and I think that, that's that does it look like a fun thing because I've seen people going out there, squirming. Yeah. Trying to, like, how do I apologize without apologizing to the 40 drunk soccer moms, who all tweeted at the exact same moment. So this became a thing for eight seconds, yesterday that I now have to address. So having said that, if I'm an asshole, I will say, sorry, but I'll say it to the person.
Yeah. You know, like I don't get, I don't get this whole thing.
We're
somebody secretly videotapes you at a comedy club and then they upload it on the internet. And then you have to now apologize to people who weren't at the show. Yeah, it's like, you weren't at the show and you decided to watch. So, why don't you get mad at the kid who fucking filmed it? Like, that's it. I am guilty of being a comedian in a comedy club that tried out a joke that didn't work. Right. Yeah. I don't know. It makes sense to me and my head, everything makes
sense.
So, the podcast, so your podcast is a very early influence for me. I love your podcast and
I see you've gone past me.
Well, that's a coincidence. You got that front.
Well I think there's there's one thing that arguably you do better than anybody else and I'm sure it's one of many but I want to listen to some of your ad spots. So we're going to pull up some audio, God of a couple of your sponsor reads and I think I think we'll pull up Sherry's Berries.
First this might be mother favorite name of anything I've ever advertised here other than one wipe. Charlies, Sherry's Berries, for my listeners, double the berries.
For just $10. More is the only way to get this special 1999. Sherry's Berries
offer, call 866 fruit. I'm sorry. What the fuck am I selling that? I approve this. This is fucking ridiculous. Who the fuck is gonna buy this shit? This is the funniest call it.
Extinct screwed everybody.
Oh punch truck. Oh please spell out the words. Oh by all means
berries. Be ER IES
berries, click on the microphone on the top right corner and type in Burr and you can't spend it by some Cherries Berries because I'm going to get in trouble for
that fucking read and I'm not changing it because that was hilarious.
When did you
do that? From the very beginning with b, with the host reads? Did you start kind of taking the piss out of sponsors from the very GetGo with the podcast? And because you really, I mean, early early Pioneer, this is
2007 or so Robin is
early. This is way back in the day. So you were one of the first kind of long form, guys. Did you have standard sponsored reads for a while and
then why did it for years without doing sponsorship? So when I started doing reads, it felt weird to be this guy just saying whatever I was thinking and being
And all that to all of a sudden be like, you know, the Chrysler Cordoba blah, blah blah blah blah, just felt weird. And I was just like an people are going to have the ability to just fast-forward through this and skip it. So I didn't feel like the comedy should stop and so I always, you know, I'll just throw in a Boston accent. I'll just do something to get them to listen. And with the Sherry's Berries thing that I did, I hadn't read the copy and it was so like homophobic yet. Homo erotic the whole thing, it just was so rude.
Dick ulis to me. Like I couldn't believe it was true. So I legitimately started laughing and I remember they were calling us saying, take it down, take it down, and I was just like that. Tell him you didn't get to me. Like I'm I'm not taking it down, thats hilarious. And I don't give a shit because I got all this other stuff, you know, the once again one of those moments I'm self-employed. So you know I don't need some chocolate-covered strawberries people to pay my rent. I didn't put myself in that position which I very easily could have. I didn't say, I said, I'm not taking it down but what they learned.
Because they are cool company. What ended up happening was, people ordered this stuff because I said I was going to get in trouble and then it turned out evidently, they were delicious and they sold a bunch more. So, what ended up happening was? Was companies that were younger and kind of understood it's like, oh, this guy's, he's making fun of us, and he's singing songs and he's cursing and all this type of stuff, but people are listening and they're buying this stuff. So it kind of became one of those but there's been others that haven't had this sense of humor. Like I remember NatureBox came out when I
For some reason was reading, it is Nature's box
and head
and I was, you know, and I was like, joking around, I'm like you going to go down on Mother Nature, right? Just just fucking
around,
but I also think it was just this weird sort of stupid thing where they were going to like bring you a banana at like 3:00 in the afternoon. It's like I can't fucking do this by myself. Like I need you to put, like, if they are really stupid, I will say it and because I just look at the pockets whatever money I make offer is just gravy. Anyways, like I can live.
Off my stand-up money, you know what I mean? Like I said I lived. Well, within my means because I I've been in debt and I didn't like the way it felt. I just would be waking up at night going. I all these people, this fucking money. How am I going to get out of this? My car is breaking down. That's going to be more and so I've avoided that stuff.
I know a lot of comedians have trouble going to TV, developing TV shows. How did you find your way to
F is for family? I don't know all my live action stuff that I wanted to do and I'll live
Jim means is just this regular people. Everything that I wanted to do that, I really wanted to do. They would just be like, oh, that's like, you know, that's sexist, that's homophobic. This is what it's going to say to kids. This is mean the dogs and they just would d-ball the whole thing and then it would suck. But yeah, I did, I did a pilot. They shot it down and then like two weeks later like hey you want to do another show with us and I said yes and it was with another comedian and then we did it and we we all got together.
There we were just like hey let's just give them exactly what they want. Let's just do exactly what they want and we did that and they still shut it down and then that was it. That was it? I just went off the reservation. I was just like, fuck, trying to develop a TV show, I'm not doing it. All right, I'm just going to be a comedian that sells tickets. Hopefully and if that's all I am, who gives a shit I'm telling jokes for a living. I'm killing it. That was it. I didn't have any ideas and then one day, I opened for this comic, Steve Byrne, and he knew Vince Vaughn in the guys at Wild West and Vince was in the crowd. He liked what?
I did. So I took a general meeting with them and they were like, so, do you. Got you got any ideas for TV shows? I was like, no, no, I got none. I'm all out of them. They never fucking work. Nobody ever picks him up. I'm just sick of it. There's always like, I'm always pitching to a woman. They always say women. Don't run the business. I haven't got to that fucking level. And this I'm always going in just pitching. And there's always some woman that going like I don't think that that's kind of fucking Wild
Hogs.
Hey, what if the guy's a complete fucking moron and doesn't know how to dress himself but his wife does. Oh that I like that's a good
one.
Yeah, so
it's because you're a vagina doesn't mean you can't be you know, in the wrong sometimes. So anyway so then I just I was on my way out of the meeting. They were just like you know what else what are you don't have any ideas? I was like look I know you guys are doing movies with Vince. I'll play some a waiter in the background. I'd love to do something with you, but no, I got nothing. So, as I was walking out, I remember Peter Billings, you sort of walk me out. I was like, well, you know, I do kind of have this idea. This cartoon idea, whatever. And he's like, we want to do an animated show.
Sit down and it basically stemmed from my childhood stories that I told on stage as a young comic and everybody got it. But as I became the older comic and this new generation came up that had playdates and helicopter parents and they wore helmets. When they rode bicycles like they were in a fucking race or something. They didn't laugh at the jokes, it started because everything was labeled like, oh, that's bullying. That's, you know, that's mental, abuse, physical abuse. And I would love to be staying on stage going, guys. This is funny. This happen to me.
My mother was right. I was telling me stories, like so, anyways, I just stopped telling the stories on stage and then one day I was walking my dog. I thought, what if I just made animated shorts on my website I could do that. That would be cool and I could wrap it up and it be animated kids and no one would give a shit. And but of course, I never did it. But then when I ran into them and they're just as force in nature, then they ended up hooking me up with the great Mike price from The Simpsons who's done like 300 plus episodes over there. So and we came up, we've just flushed out those little. So I was just going to do a little
It's like, you know, we go to get a Christmas tree or somebody buys a new bike, they turned it into this whole world, we helped develop this whole thing and then we pitched the cartoon and I think they were just like this is a weird choice for a comic in 2010, but they just saw that's Vince Vaughn. All right? We'll give you six bills, a little pussy
Christ, he falls apart, if you just look at them, all right, he's got no spine. You got to rub his
back toward war movies. He's
Give me think, gee, I wonder where he got that from
Susan, what do you mean? Get the from me? You caught up too much and you know it, you know, I work hard to keep this family. Happy I gave everyone everyone from killing each other. Well, today, I would actually welcome it.
I hate you, baby.
All right.
Great family oriented show. So
I got a feeling you'll get you're going to ask me what everybody asks me, which is, did that
ever happen? You know, I was just going to leave it open and just saying, yeah, and he comment now, it's like
that. Show is like, Loosely based on all of our childhoods. So it's an amalgam, it's an amount. He showed it, I didn't
make it. It's an amalgam
of, like, all our dads, like, I wanted, like, my family to be able to watch this and not be like mortified.
I think I have a big respect for the fact that I decided to put myself out there and especially it gets weirder every year with technology and everything. So like, I didn't want them to watch it like this elements of the show, right? That my dad will be like, all right. I'd like I'll put you through that fucking wall. He used that was his catchphrase. What would you do that? Fucking wall. Used to say that, right. He never did it. He just you know it's just an empty threat, you know, but but they do other stuff is like, right? A room stuff. Like that was just like, okay, what if, what if, you know, they started having sex and it just, it seemed like they had
this big huge fight and he says his mean stuff about his son and he doesn't always there and it's just like, well how do we get out of this comedic lie? How do we defuse this? What if they have sex? So it's that that aspect of it was like a like a writers room thing,
who drew the balls are very photo-realistic. I actually,
I actually met the woman who drew it, I was doing a gig in Ottawa. Canada, big jump is the animator up there and I just happened when I had the gig to come over and meet them, I just happened to be in town and they were animating that scene.
She literally had like sketched three different ball bags that you think they look like little speed bags that she was going to make and just
so you guys know, you were mentioning bombing and then just turning it into an opportunity to vent being like. Well, not sure what that was, but that was fun. I enjoyed that. So, I was talking to the team about whether to use this video or not. Now it's like least. I can say, I had a pair of animated balls that I forced an audience to watch so we get her out. So you're welcome. There you go. I thought we could give a lot of questions from the audience, so,
We would throw it on the audience to those and we have some in studio. We also have some from the internet who have been kind enough to chime in, as well. So the first one is from Facebook. This is Joseph suam. So effectively, how do you generate ideas? And what is your process? Do you still write stuff down? What are the key components of where you start when you're developing? Well, I used
to write it all out and then I don't write it now. I just I just treat it like how I used to treat, like if something funny that happened at
If I was going to go tell my friends, I wouldn't write it all out and memorize it. Rehearse it in front of a mirror. I would just go up. And and I would just tell them the story and I would act out all the characters and all that the way I did. But what happens is when you go on stage is like, you know, you know, it just is, you know, you can bomb, you can have a bad show, there's all that self-conscious stuff. So I guess the process was trying to become as comfortable as I was in a bar shooting the shit with my friends, being that comfortable on stage and I took a while long.
I'm what are the key components of where you start when you're developing,
it was when you started
meaning, where you start with say, if you were going to your starting right now to do a special?
Well, usually it's just, I'm walking around. I see something or hear something, that'll get me going, but if I'm in a writer's block, which is a big thing, for a comic, how to get out of it? I find is I try something new or I'll just I'll be in an airport and I'll grab a magazine that I would never read. I'll grab like Cosmo.
To get different point of view because you your brain can get bored. And when it gets bored it goes into autopilot and then you just stopped seeing shit. And yeah, I'll just do stuff like that. And I also when I'm building a new our I take all rules of hack. Like, this is hacking material. I'll do an o.j. joke. I don't give a shit, I just going on stage, just anything just to be saying something new, something different, and that will eventually lead into something that's worthy of keeping, but I definitely.
Definitely right on stage. But if something happens like out just usually just make a mental note, but sometimes I'll just write down like a word, I'll just write down like iPad, you know, or you know, whatever boots or something. I just but I know what that means. Like if something and I know that means something like you know, somebody stepped on my foot that day and blah blah blah. And that's the cue. Yeah. And so on and then I just sort of right on stage
writing on stage, meaning you are taking notes as you go
through. Yeah, your people say right on stage, what it really means is you just go
Just wing it. You just the same way you would cut. Like I said earlier you come home if something funny if you saw a car accident you'd come home and just tell the person you're with you wouldn't have to write it all down. So I've done stand-up long enough where I'm comfortable enough to do it and all the great people that I see them all the great men and women that I see doing stand-up today. Most of them do it that way but some people want to do a little bit of that a little bit of writing its, but I would say for that person is you got to find what works for you.
Just kind of be open to all of it. And then as you through trial and error, just sort of streamline it into your your so-called process. So if you
met let's say, 25 year-old 20 rolled you can pick the age who you seem you seem to think had some promise as a comic and they wanted to be a stand-up comic and they had the same commitment that you did at one point which was at some point in the next year. I'm going to get up there on stage and do a set. I guess there are two questions. How would you
If someone could stand a chance and then how would you train that person? I mean, our or, or have them
practice. I do, you know, it's weird. I can watch somebody young and everyone's like, you'll just see somebody be like that person. If they do everything they need to do, could be great at this and it's like a, it's a uniqueness that's just something they'll say or something, they do or something. The way they handle a situation, you just see, it's like, it's like being a, you know, like an NFL scout you
Just see them, you know, make a throw or something like that. That's an NFL arm right there. We'll see if if, if he, or she develops it or whatever but
I don't tell I would never tell somebody what to do because like, how my brain works everybody's unique. So what I would do though is go out of my way to encourage that person. Like if I saw somebody young and they were funny, I would go out of my way to make sure that I said that because they need that I realized you know you got to do that. So this is from ANA Clara or Tony her
question, begins with some people just don't have a sense of humor and how do you relate to her deal with these types of people? And I'll just leave
General like that. So whether it's you get trapped with them at a cocktail party or in general crowd, whatever might be
no cocktail party overdub, we just walk away. Yeah, if I'm doing stand-up yeah. Now man, I shouldn't. This is another one that I probably this is some inside shit. All right, this is what I would do when there would be somebody like it killing everybody in there was just that one person. That's just an they're not laughing and they're not laughing and they used to always bugged me like that bugs a comic. You disliked, it couldn't fucking get that one person, it will ruin that night.
Like you'd let him. I started realizing how stupid that was. I was like, if I was a president and this was my approval rating, I would be fucking killing it. So I find decided I'm going to have fun with this person's. What I would do is like you can't see the people who are doing it in the back, what was the people who are up front? So they would be like right there and they just like me if you can feel the energy. So what I would start to do would I would overcome it to my jokes act even sillier and I would send all of them right out over their head and the best thing would be if they were close in the front row I would be standing right up on them and my
Favorite thing to do would be make some sweeping gesture like over their head. Like I would love to be like a my dad says to me and I'm just totally just living my dream like right in their face, right? Over them. And it would just drive them up the fucking wall and then I would keep throwing in like I you guys are great. I am having such a great time up here and it was all that was the show within the show for that one fucking asshole. And like I learned all of these, these those types of things through years of doing it through basically, am I going to take this as a negative or a positive and realizing I have the
Power to decide like I can let this guy ruin my night. I'll let this woman room and I or I can, I can have fun with this. It's the same thing. Like, if you ever do like the late show and only like eight people showed up. I made the mistake of coming out with eight people energy and it sucked and then one night I was just like, you know what, fuck this. I'm going to go out and just try to kill these eight people enough that they bring eight more. And then I went out with this positive thing and then I that's so got ingrained into my work ethic like the other day.
Body mind is on his way up going like he was going to do it. He goes, you know, the all Club not just told me that we only got thirty four people on The Late Show tonight. I literally felt like this joke, going through me, like just like a fucking destroy them, fucking destroy them. And make them bring 34 more because if you're not the guy, which I wasn't, I was never the whatever the fuck they were looking for. That's the only way to do it. You just gotta catch you with
So we saw you babbling Philly in the beginning and you ended up at one point at Madison Square Garden and I mean, they're only a handful of modern Comics who can play that been your have played that venue. What was that? Like, okay, walk us through what that
experience is. Unbelievable. Yeah, it was awesome. And what I ended up doing, look at that. That
was and I had
I enjoyed every single second of it,
every step, every single second, I enjoy made. Sure on that one. And I hear you got a rent that thing out. Okay, which is not cheap. So, most of the money you make that night goes right out the window. So I was like, well, I rented it for the day, right? They like yeah. So I'm a big Led Zeppelin fan and, you know, they shot Song Remains the Same there. And that's also where Robert Plant said, does anybody remember laughter, which was the name of the show? So I rented a drum kit and
some amps and all that. He had made a bunch of my friends came down in an empty Madison Square Garden. We just jammed, in played all this cock rock from the 80s and some, you know? Yeah. All that all that shit that we used to listen to all the hair, metal stuff, some Black Sabbath Guns, and Roses Motley Crue. We just had the best time and it kind of in like what was cool. Was the union guy setting up the chairs? I was like, is this going to bug them? And, like now, they used to band rehearsing and stuff. And they kind of I could say had an appreciation that we had an appreciation for
What it was and they ended up putting us up on the, the screen they did, the lights in the end and now I had everything, my agent played guitar and I got him up there and all these comments came down Josh, Adam Meyers Ben, Bailey and all these guys. We just had the greatest time but what was cool was. It took away the scariness of doing that place and it we just kind of came in there and got our stink on it for a little bit. And then I remember I went home
Went to the apartment and my wife was there and I was waiting for it to get ready and I was drinking a beer, she's going drinking a beer, you never drink a beer, you never know. I said, don't worry about this one. Don't worry about, I just knew it was awesome, it was awesome.
What do you think when you're on stage, when you were finally up on
stage? Well, the best thing was Joe DeRosa for pulverizing Joe, DeRosa open for me and Joe were like, this old lady like looking knitted sweater and sometimes one of your friends just dress,
Since such a certain way you're like willing the crowd to Heckle mm, which you usually don't you usually root for the comic and nobody Heckle them so like annoyed me. So when I went on stage I was like yeah. Keep it going for Versi enough but Joe DeRosa and his fucking Golden Girls sweatshirt and everybody started laughing. And I just stood this shitting on him for like 10 minutes. And then I just felt like I was in a comedy club. And no, I just knew, I knew. When I was like, they had 90 minutes and I did 90. I did the whole us.
Hi, I'm doing the whole thing. I'm totally taking this in, I recorded and I'm only going to put it out on vinyl because there's too much overlap between that material and my next special. So it's just, it's just something who for total nerd of whatever I do. And it was like, yeah, it was awesome. I never talk shit about, you know, I killed, but I fucking killed that night. I
definitely. That was, that was a good one. Yep. If you could have any
Billboard you wanted Nan advertisement but just a message. You want to get out to the world. What would you put on it?
First thing in fandom was go fuck yourself. Go
fast. Kidding, I'm kidding.
I maybe I would. I just I just have. No, it isn't.
No, it isn't. No, it
isn't no so much that people don't know what the fuck they're talking
about and they just soak so much time
getting you into this fucking panic and then this is going to happen that and just spread that not not, is it
You got to be fun. All right so even if you're not going to be fun, isn't it better to just exist thinking, you're going to be fine until it's not fine and then when it's not fine, then you can just fucking handle it. Then
there's no sense to ruin right now, right?
Great.
Hey, guys, this is Tim again, just one more thing before you take off and that is five bullet Friday with you. Enjoy getting a short email for me every Friday. That provides a little fun before the weekend, between one and a half, and two million people. Subscribe to my free newsletter, my super short newsletter called five bullet Friday, easy to sign up, easy to cancel. It is basically a half page that I send out every Friday to share the coolest things. I found or discovered or have started exploring over that week, kind of like my diary
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