Who's Your Band? - Episode 164 - Comedian, Actor, Writer, and TV/Radio Personality John Mulrooney
Who's Your Band Episode 164 with hosts Jeffrey Paul and Sean Morton, and special guest comedian, actor, writer, tv and radio personality John Mulrooney!
On this week's episode of Who's Your Band, we're diving deep into the world of comedy and music with comedian, actor, writer, and tv/radio personality John Mulrooney, who takes us on a wild ride through his experiences in the stand-up scene, from the gritty clubs of Brooklyn to the bright lights of Hollywood. We chat about how the New York comedy scene, his adventures working at the infamous Pips club, where mobsters mingled with comics, and how a chance encounter with Fred Trump led him down a different path. We also touch on his current projects, including his podcast "The Great Awakening," and so much more.
Transcript
Welcome, everybody, to who's your band?
Speaker A:I am Jeffrey Paul.
Speaker A:I am joined by comic Sean Morton.
Speaker A:How are you, Sean?
Speaker B:Fantastic, Jeffrey.
Speaker B:I just saw the list of upcoming concerts from pnc and there was one show that I decided that there was no chance in hell that I'm ever going to go to, but I guarantee that you're going to be at it was Sticks with the singer from REO Speedwagon and Don Felder.
Speaker A:Yeah, I've seen.
Speaker A:I've seen all those acts.
Speaker B:Well, I'll.
Speaker B:You can wave.
Speaker B:Wave when you drive past the Parkway.
Speaker B:Wave past 125.
Speaker B:My ass will not be at that concert.
Speaker A:Not only.
Speaker A:Not only have I gone to those shows, okay, I have also had backstage passes.
Speaker A:I've had VIP in the front row for those shows.
Speaker A:My wife loves Sticks, you know, and they put on a great show every time I've seen him, so.
Speaker B:So you made fun of me for waiting online to meet Mariah Carey, who is a gorgeous woman, but it's okay for you to spend 800 to meet the guys from Sticks backstage is what you're telling me.
Speaker B:I'm the.
Speaker A:I'm gonna give you a tip here before we bring on a guest, okay?
Speaker A:You make your wife happy, you're gonna have no problems with.
Speaker A:With that corny sentiment.
Speaker A:All right, our next guest.
Speaker A:All right, he is comedian.
Speaker A:He is.
Speaker A:He was a television personality.
Speaker A:He's a radio personality.
Speaker A:And I.
Speaker A:If I'm not mistaken, and he, He'll.
Speaker A:He'll.
Speaker A:He'll correct me if I'm wrong.
Speaker A:I believe he has worked or currently works in law enforcement.
Speaker A:The one and only Mr.
Speaker A:John Mulrooney.
Speaker A:How are you, John?
Speaker A:Why?
Speaker C:Are you guys up to something?
Speaker C:No.
Speaker C:Good.
Speaker A:Listen, I'm formal.
Speaker A:No, not at all.
Speaker C:Oh, where'd you work?
Speaker A:I used to work in Staten island.
Speaker A:And what I did was if you were in violation of your probation.
Speaker A:I worked field services.
Speaker A:I went out and arrested you.
Speaker C:Oh, dude.
Speaker C:Okay.
Speaker C:Yeah, we used to work with them all the time.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I would say there's nothing more than interesting your wife.
Speaker A:There's nothing more dangerous than a guy who knows he's going back to jail.
Speaker C:Yeah, that's true.
Speaker C:Yep.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:But I want to talk about John for a second.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:John, you grew up in Brooklyn.
Speaker A:What part of Brooklyn did you grow up in?
Speaker C:Grew up in Flatbush.
Speaker C:Went to Brooklyn Tech.
Speaker C:I went to Brooklyn College.
Speaker C:So a lot of Brooklyn back.
Speaker C:Background stuff.
Speaker C:Yep.
Speaker A:So you're.
Speaker A:You're in.
Speaker A:You're in Brooklyn and this is.
Speaker A:I guess this had to be Like, I guess the 70s, early 80s.
Speaker A:Were you part of that whole Pip scene at all?
Speaker C:Oh, dude, that was my club.
Speaker C:That was the.
Speaker C:That was the place.
Speaker C:That was where I started out that, you know, Seth Schultz, the owner of that place, used to say, pips, where the mobsters meet the lobsters.
Speaker C:And he wasn't kidding.
Speaker C:And that place, dude, I mean, we rubbed elbows with the guys that you see in the movies today, you know, Richard Kuklinski, Roy Demeo, Tommy Karate, who used to practice his karate right outside the.
Speaker C:Right outside the club during the show.
Speaker C:Paul Castellano came in one night, did this.
Speaker C:Did.
Speaker C:Did.
Speaker C:Hung out for the show.
Speaker A:Actually, he went up and did some time.
Speaker C:Hey, all right, baby, work it out.
Speaker C:He came in.
Speaker C:Actually, the night he came in, there was.
Speaker C:There was no audience.
Speaker C:He.
Speaker C:He.
Speaker C:He was next door having dinner at Randazzo's.
Speaker C:And I don't know.
Speaker C:I don't know why he stumbled into piss, but he came in loaded, and everyone was standing around the service bar talking about whether or not they were going to do a show.
Speaker C:And he goes, I want to see your show.
Speaker C:And he pulls off a 50 to this guy, a 50 to that guy, 100 to the bartender, and everybody was like, okay.
Speaker C:And they scrambled to, you know, put some kind of a show on.
Speaker C:And just like in.
Speaker C:Just like in a movie scene, a couple of gangsters came in with their hands in their jackets going, paulie, what are you doing in here?
Speaker C:Like, what's going on?
Speaker C:He's like, I went to the can.
Speaker C:I wanted to see a show.
Speaker C:And they were like, get out of here.
Speaker C:So he came in, literally sat down for, like, two minutes, tipped a bunch of people to get a show started that he never saw.
Speaker C:And then his boys hold him on out.
Speaker C:I mean, it was.
Speaker C:It was.
Speaker C:It was quite a place, Pips.
Speaker C:It was.
Speaker C:It was.
Speaker C:It was no joke.
Speaker C:If you could work there and make people laugh, you knew that you.
Speaker C:You could go anywhere and do comedy.
Speaker B:That's a story.
Speaker B:I feel bad he didn't see the show.
Speaker B:I hope.
Speaker B:I hope he was able to make.
Speaker B:Make the rent that month.
Speaker B:If they waste all that.
Speaker A:Yeah, Paul Castellano had no problem making the rent or anything.
Speaker A:Who would do with.
Speaker A:Over there?
Speaker C:Oh, dude.
Speaker C:Name it Dice.
Speaker C:I remember.
Speaker A:Was this before or during when Wheels Parisi used to host?
Speaker A:I think it was the dude when.
Speaker C: I first started going, it was: Speaker C: ,: Speaker C:And so Wills Parisi probably wasn't even born yet.
Speaker C:I mean, and Dice was.
Speaker C:He was same age as me, I was 20, 21, and I saw Seinfeld coming in there, working out on the weekends.
Speaker C:Paul Reiser, the big dog on the porch back then was David Brenham.
Speaker C:David Brenham was the guy, and he was the guest host of Tonight show at the time.
Speaker C:But he would come in regularly and work out at Pips.
Speaker C:In fact, he paid to have Pips remodeled when I.
Speaker C:The year.
Speaker C:Right, right.
Speaker C:Right before I started working there.
Speaker C:He paid to have the whole place gutted and remodeled into the classic arched window place.
Speaker C:That.
Speaker C:That was Pips right up until the day it closed.
Speaker C:Before that, it was like a coffee shop that was for, you know, singers and I guess you could say comedians.
Speaker C:And much to the chagrin of Bud Freeman.
Speaker C:Bud used to say all the time that his club was the first comedy showcase club.
Speaker C:I respect the hell out of blood out of Bud, and never going to say, speak ill of the dead, but Bud, you were wrong.
Speaker C:Pips was there before the improv, because I was there.
Speaker C:I was on stage doing.
Speaker C:Doing the do.
Speaker C:And then the improv opened up like six months later in the late 70s.
Speaker A:So you go up at.
Speaker A:At Pips.
Speaker A:Now, is Dice known at this point, or is he kind of like a guy like you?
Speaker C:No, Andy.
Speaker C:Andy.
Speaker C:I watched Andy Kaufman there.
Speaker C:People didn't know who he was at the time.
Speaker A:What'd you think when you saw him for the first time?
Speaker C:The first time I saw Andy Kaufman was at the improv and in New York.
Speaker C:And he pissed me off.
Speaker C:And I'll tell you why.
Speaker C:He did stuff that I thought was really fucking dangerous and everyone, oh, he's a genius.
Speaker C:He's this, he's that.
Speaker C:He's not a genius when he's.
Speaker C:When he's doing shit that can hurt people.
Speaker C:He went up on stage one night and he starts reading from A Tale of Two Cities.
Speaker A:And yeah, that was a famous bit of his, right?
Speaker C:And he was reading out of this book and he starts reading, and I didn't know where he was going with it.
Speaker C:And he was getting a couple of chuckles and there was probably about 20, 30 people in the room.
Speaker C:But it was late at night.
Speaker C:And after a minute or two, people started heckling and then getting a little more aggressive.
Speaker C:And then finally, like within four or five minutes, they're screaming, do a joke, do something.
Speaker C:And he flips to the back of the book and he pulls out a little starter pistol that he had cut out in.
Speaker C:In.
Speaker C:Into a niche.
Speaker C:And he starts shooting the starter pistol into the crowd.
Speaker C:And people were diving over tables to get Away from it.
Speaker C:They thought it was a real gun.
Speaker C:And then he ran out the door and ran up, up, up.
Speaker C:What is it, 44th Street.
Speaker C:I could still remember hearing him laughing as he was running up 44th Street, Manhattan.
Speaker C:And I thought, dude.
Speaker C:And he wasn't famous.
Speaker C:He became famous shortly thereafter.
Speaker C:But I was like, what a fucking asshole.
Speaker C:I never really liked what he did, to be quite honest with you.
Speaker C:Never really dug it.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker A:That I did.
Speaker A:See, I knew about the Tale Two Cities bit.
Speaker A:I.
Speaker A:Because I wound up having like a whiskey with Zamuda, Bob Zamuda, who's his partner.
Speaker A:You tell me some of the stuff he told me about the, the famous improv story when he goes up and you know, remember the bit, the heckler?
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:That was Zamuda in the audience and.
Speaker C:And Pat Benatar's family was sitting in the back.
Speaker C:I just.
Speaker C: mention that because that was: Speaker C:It was the 10 year anniversary.
Speaker A:That's right.
Speaker C:Catch.
Speaker C:Rising Star.
Speaker C:And he almost prompted some gangsters to get up and actually hurt him.
Speaker C:They had to be walked back and talked of the.
Speaker C:I just, I just saw it.
Speaker C:I was in the city when that was going on.
Speaker C:But you couldn't get into Catch at the time.
Speaker C:It was, it was, you know, closed show.
Speaker A:I'm, I'm glad you confirmed that because that's exactly the story that I heard that in fact, there's a guy, he said, if you watch it, because that's still on YouTube, that there was a guy and he's coming up to the cop and he had to be intercepted and he had a gun on him.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:And they had to tell me, look, this is all part of a bit.
Speaker A:And they had to calm him down.
Speaker A:And they, you know, I think they comped him his drinks and his, his food for that night.
Speaker A:But the guy was pretty irate because he thought he was ruining the show.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Yep.
Speaker C:Wow.
Speaker C:There was a couple of those where it went.
Speaker C:It went to a point where people almost got hurt.
Speaker C:And to me, the humor goes out the window when, when the blood starts flowing.
Speaker A:I met you a couple times.
Speaker A:We worked together up with Larry D.
Speaker A:And I think you were telling me you had brothers and you guys were like pretty competitive, right?
Speaker A:Sports guys.
Speaker C:That was not my thing.
Speaker C:My older brother was a great athlete.
Speaker C:He was great athlete, great student.
Speaker C:And I really never touched.
Speaker C:I never got into sports until I got older.
Speaker C:Boxing and racquetball was my thing.
Speaker C:And those were two sports my brother never played.
Speaker C:He was.
Speaker C:But competitive no, not when it came to stuff like, not, not when it came to sports.
Speaker C:I mean we were brothers.
Speaker C:We, we, we were competitive in that regard.
Speaker C:You know, we, we fought like brothers, but it never on a, on a sports field.
Speaker C:In fact, I never competed against my brother in, in anything.
Speaker C:Tell you the truth.
Speaker A:I think the like, the hardness did that give you like the chops, the, the, the confidence, the, you know, the ability, I mean to go into Pips to be like a 20 or year old guy, to face that type of like.
Speaker A:I heard the crowds could be very, very rough.
Speaker A:It could be, could be kind of, it could be hard if you weren't good to have like, kind of like the balls to go up and, and be able to, to, to do it, to get up on stage and then to come back.
Speaker A:Where did you, where did you get that from?
Speaker A:Because early on, I mean, Sean, I'll tell you, there are comics that they don't do well, man, they'll, they'll take months off, they'll.
Speaker A:Or they'll quit.
Speaker C:Honestly, I can only say that.
Speaker C:I can't say that I felt like I was hard about it or tough about it.
Speaker C:I loved doing it past the point of reason.
Speaker C:You know, after you get kicked in the nuts a couple of times, ego wise, you would think it'd be smart to step down from there.
Speaker C:But I loved making people laugh so much.
Speaker C:I love the rush of it that I didn't care about standing up there and I was good at it.
Speaker C:You know.
Speaker C:That was the one thing about doing comedy when I first started doing it, that propelled me all through my career.
Speaker C:There was a guy who I used to study, his name was John demartini.
Speaker C:He did, he, he made his life's work studying what he called life's prince universal principles.
Speaker C:And one of his principles which I actually found very early on was he said when the whys get big enough, the hows take care of themselves.
Speaker C:When you figure out why you're doing something, how you're going to do it becomes secondary.
Speaker C:And that was me with comedy.
Speaker C:When I got on stage and it was at Pips for the very first time to do comedy, I was struck.
Speaker C:It was like being struck with lightning.
Speaker C:I will never forget it.
Speaker C:And I suddenly knew why I was doing what I was doing.
Speaker C:I just loved it.
Speaker C:And nothing was going to stop me, nothing was going to get in my way.
Speaker C:And in fact that night it was such a profound experience.
Speaker C:I went home.
Speaker C:My parents used to stay up very late at night and I remember walking in the door late that night after I passed the audition and I said, mom, Dad, I found out what I'm going to do with the rest of my life.
Speaker C:And they got real quiet and they leaned forward and I said, I'm going to be a stand up comedian.
Speaker C:And my father said, I'm going to bed.
Speaker C:And that was, that was the beginning of it.
Speaker C:But yeah, I just knew nothing was going to stop me.
Speaker C:Once, once I got, I got, I got bit with that bug.
Speaker C:I was all in.
Speaker C:There was no, there was no second guessing and that was very early on.
Speaker C:That was within weeks of getting on stage.
Speaker A:And what was your first taste of success like?
Speaker A:What was the first break come from?
Speaker C:You want, you know what the very first taste was?
Speaker C:Getting paid $5 at Pips for going on.
Speaker C:I'll never forget it.
Speaker C:When I finally passed the audition and I was now a regular, I was walking out the door one night and Seth Schultz said to me, hey, hold on a second, Johnny.
Speaker C:And I stopped and they had this giant old school brass cash register with the big keys that had the big $1 flags.
Speaker C:They came up $1.50.
Speaker C:And he went and he pulled out a $5 bill and he snapped it open and he said, he goes, all the regulars get cab fare.
Speaker C:And he handed me $5.
Speaker C:And I will never forget it.
Speaker C:I wanted to take that five bucks and frame it, but I needed it to get home.
Speaker C:Yeah, that was the first time I went.
Speaker C:I just got paid for telling jokes.
Speaker C:It could have been 500,000.
Speaker C:I didn't care.
Speaker C:I got paid for telling jokes and that.
Speaker C:I was, I was in, I was all in.
Speaker C:There was a couple others along the way.
Speaker C:I remember get.
Speaker C:I remember the first time, you know, selling out a place and taking the door and looking at bricks of, you know, dirty club money and going, holy shit, that's mine.
Speaker C:And walking out with it in a burlap bag and a gun in my, in my pocket.
Speaker C:That was pretty, that was pretty hip too, you know, and I wasn't the only one.
Speaker C:Everybody was doing it.
Speaker C:I was working with, you know, Drew Carey and Tim Allen and, and guys.
Speaker C:We were all basically kind of on the same level.
Speaker C:Richard.
Speaker C:Jenny was my roommate and everybody was taken off in different phases.
Speaker C:We, we were working constantly.
Speaker C:There was that, that was the good news.
Speaker C:The bad news was there was so much.
Speaker A:Where were you working?
Speaker A:Were you working New York?
Speaker C:In New York alone?
Speaker C:The work in New York.
Speaker C:Back in those days we called the, you know, the bridge and tunnel clubs and it was stuff Jersey, Jersey Shore in the summer, the Hamptons was big.
Speaker C:In fact, you dig this.
Speaker C:Donald Trump's father offered me a job once.
Speaker C:I was working out at the East End Comedy Club on Long Island.
Speaker C:It was a seasonal club that was attached to the east side Comedy Club, which Richie's, Richie's Place.
Speaker C:So there's a guy sitting up front and he's dressed in a perfectly pressed blue linen jacket and white linen slacks.
Speaker C:And you know, linen, when you look at it, wrinkles.
Speaker C:This guy, he was perfectly pressed, waxed handlebar mustache, bottle of Dom Perignon and an ascot scarf on his neck.
Speaker C:And I remember thinking on a lot of people that would look pretentious.
Speaker C:But it worked on him.
Speaker C:And I didn't know who he was yet.
Speaker A:Sounds like, dude.
Speaker C:He was, he was, he was Mr.
Speaker C:Howell, but he was a complete gentleman.
Speaker C:And again, keep in mind, I didn't know who he was, but I go up on stage, he was sitting by himself and this guy was laughing at setups.
Speaker C:I will never forget it.
Speaker C:So I had a field day with this dude.
Speaker C:And I get off the stage and the owner, club owner comes up to me and he said, john, that well dressed gentleman sitting up front, I said, yeah.
Speaker C:He goes, oh, that's Fred Trump.
Speaker C:That's Donald Trump's father.
Speaker C:He gave me his business card.
Speaker C:He wants you to call him.
Speaker C:And I'm going, holy shit.
Speaker C:I'm thinking Trump was talking about building a casino in Atlantic City.
Speaker C:I'm thinking, casinos, private parties.
Speaker C:His yacht was always docked on the East River.
Speaker C:So I wait till Monday, right?
Speaker C:I think, I don't want to call too late, don't want to call too early.
Speaker C:11:00 should be good.
Speaker C:And I'm thinking, he's going to blow me off.
Speaker C:I call and I got his secretary and I said, hi, John Mulroney calling for Mr.
Speaker C:Trump.
Speaker C:And she goes, oh, Mr.
Speaker C:Mulroney, he's been expecting your call.
Speaker C:And I'm like, holy shit, how old.
Speaker A:Are you when this is happening?
Speaker C: This was: Speaker C:So I was 25, 24.
Speaker C:And he goes, he goes, he picks the phone up right away, John, my boy, how are you?
Speaker C:I said, oh, I'm good, Mr.
Speaker C:Trump.
Speaker C:Oh, don't call me Mr.
Speaker C:Trump, call me Fred.
Speaker C:I said, okay, call me Mr.
Speaker C:Mulroney.
Speaker C:So we had, we had a couple of jokes, a couple of laughs to each other, and he goes, john, my boy, do you know what you are?
Speaker C:And I'm thinking, oh, boy, here it comes.
Speaker C:He goes, you are a natural born salesman.
Speaker C:Have you ever thought of selling Real estate.
Speaker C:And I just went, oh, no, you.
Speaker C:And I just.
Speaker C:I'll never forget looking at the phone going, I'm a comic.
Speaker C:And he kept on pushing it.
Speaker C:He goes, now I could start you in a junior company.
Speaker C:I could show you the ropes.
Speaker C:I said, I'm a comic.
Speaker C:I wish you would really listen to me for a second.
Speaker C:Don't say no just yet.
Speaker C:I said, I'm a comic.
Speaker C:I said it three times.
Speaker C:And he finally said, well, hold on to my car.
Speaker C:Don't throw it out if you change your mind.
Speaker C:Maybe I should have changed my mind.
Speaker A:Do you still have a card?
Speaker C:No, but, you know, the interesting PS to the story is I told this exact story to my family the very next Sunday dinner that we all had together.
Speaker C:And everybody was at the table, there was like 20 of us, and the whole family went, oh, with the exception of my old man, who went, wait a minute, wait a minute.
Speaker C:Fred Trump offered you a job and you turned him down?
Speaker C:Give me that goddamn car.
Speaker C:And he actually, I.
Speaker C:Because I still had it.
Speaker C:He actually took the card.
Speaker C:And I don't know what he ever did with it, but I.
Speaker C:Within years after that, I was making a pretty good living doing stand up, so it didn't really matter.
Speaker A:You did very well because I remember watching you on television.
Speaker A:I don't know if you remember this, Sean, because, John, I have a little bit older than you.
Speaker A:Joan Rivers used to have a show on Fox.
Speaker A:I think this is a show that kind of got her in a little bit of hot water with, With Johnny Carson.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And when Joan Rivers was replaced, John is the person who took over that show, if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker C:Yes, I did.
Speaker C:Yeah, I took it.
Speaker C:It was my show for several months before it cycled into something else.
Speaker C:But that was, that was just like everything you can imagine about being in Hollywood.
Speaker C:And that whole a star is born vibe, like, you fly out, you want to be, you want to become recognized, you want to become famous, and suddenly you are.
Speaker C:It was everything you can imagine and more.
Speaker C:I mean, it was.
Speaker C:I'll give you, for instance.
Speaker C:And I see why people get so suckered in and sucked into the whole Hollywood machine, because when I went out there and I got.
Speaker C:I first got the show.
Speaker C:Oh, this is an interesting.
Speaker C:P.S.
Speaker C:the night I auditioned for the show and I got it, my opening act was Ellen DeGeneres.
Speaker A:Oh, shit.
Speaker A:Were you working on, On.
Speaker A:On the Joan river show as maybe.
Speaker C:What happened was I was living in Hollywood and I was.
Speaker C:I heard they were looking for a host.
Speaker A:Did you go to Hollywood.
Speaker A:Why'd you go from Brooklyn to Hollywood?
Speaker C:I went out, I want, I got, I got, I went out to do Star Search and I lost the first, I lost the first episode to a female comic by the name of Sue Kalinsky.
Speaker C:But they saw me doing warm up while I was out there, so they asked, they, they hired me as a warmup guy and I actually became a writer on the show.
Speaker C:On the show.
Speaker C:And I, and I, and I got.
Speaker A:A Rivers or on Star Search.
Speaker C:On Star Search, on a couple other things out there.
Speaker C:But I was, I did warm ups on Star Search and I got a talent development deal with ABC which, which paid me a modest stipend and covered my expenses to move out there.
Speaker C:So it was like a no brainer to go.
Speaker C:And Richard, Jenny wanted to move out at the same time and we just, we, we found an apartment and lived together for the first couple of years that we were out there.
Speaker C:So I went out to do Star Search and I was making the rounds in the clubs doing my thing and I heard they were looking for a host.
Speaker C:Everybody knew it.
Speaker C:And I couldn't get arrested by these guys.
Speaker C:They wouldn't return any calls or anything.
Speaker C:And did you have, what's that?
Speaker A:Did you have an agent?
Speaker C:I had a manager.
Speaker C:I had a manager, but not an agent.
Speaker C:So I'm hanging out at the Improv one night and there's this woman by the name of Karen Fox who worked for Fox in the accounting department.
Speaker C:And she said she saw me, she knew what I could do as a comic.
Speaker C:In fact, I just finished doing a set at the Improv and she said, why aren't you being auditioned for this role for this host's gig?
Speaker C:I said, the guy won't return my calls.
Speaker C:And she said, I'll tell you what, I work across the hall from him.
Speaker C:I'm going to walk your tape in.
Speaker C:If you get the gig, you got to promise me a spot on the show.
Speaker C:I said, sure.
Speaker C:So she did.
Speaker C:And the guy didn't want to give me the spot.
Speaker C:You know why?
Speaker C:Because he saw an audition tape of mine and I was wearing short sleeve shirt and that was his reason for not wanting to even give me a look.
Speaker C:But she convinced.
Speaker C:Yes, I know, dude, this is welcome to, welcome to the business.
Speaker C:She convinced him to change his mind.
Speaker C:She said, I don't know what it was about the short sleeve shirt, but you got to watch this guy work.
Speaker C:And I put on a suit and a tie.
Speaker C:And when I put on the suit and a tie and he put me on reluctantly, he put me on 13th of 12 other people auditioning, put me on last as like a, as like a courtesy.
Speaker C:And I destroyed the place.
Speaker C:And he said, wow.
Speaker C:He goes, I need for you to audition for.
Speaker C:And it was the guys who ran Fox.
Speaker C:It was Barry Diller, Rupert Murdoch.
Speaker C:The very next day, I was appearing, I was doing a showcase in front of them.
Speaker C:And it's a long story, but Ellen DeGeneres was the opening act.
Speaker C:I got a standing ovation at this show with all, with all the industry insiders.
Speaker C:And when I, when I was about to turn and get off the stage.
Speaker C:You remember Harvey Corman from the Carol Burnett show?
Speaker A:Of course.
Speaker A:I loved Harvey Corman.
Speaker C:Yeah, Harvey Corman jumps up on the stage and he grabs me by the arm and he pulled me back to the microphone and he said, he goes, how about a hand for this kid?
Speaker C:I think we just saw the next Robin Williams.
Speaker C:And the next day I had, I had the.
Speaker C:I had the job.
Speaker C:I had the gig.
Speaker A:Now the funny thing is, Ice, I was able to see that, that tape.
Speaker A:And I know what was wrong with the shirt.
Speaker C:You.
Speaker A:Were we.
Speaker A:A Harris waltz shirt at the time?
Speaker C:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:I was very prescient, even back in the day.
Speaker A:Well, you saw things coming, so that's, that's kind of amazing, man.
Speaker A:So you wanted to.
Speaker A:Who did you interview on the show?
Speaker A:Any.
Speaker A:Anything, anyone's kind of stand out.
Speaker A:Was it a good show?
Speaker C:There was a lot of people that stood out.
Speaker C:You know, Jesse the Body Ventura, Chris Lemon.
Speaker C:Do you remember Chris Lemon, who was Jack Lemon, son?
Speaker C:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:Do you remember the big thing was the Aramis man back then, Anybody who.
Speaker C:Yeah, anybody who became the Aramis man suddenly became a huge star.
Speaker C:The one before Chris Lemmon was Tom Selleck.
Speaker C:So Tom Selleck was, was, was the Arabic Aramis man.
Speaker C:And next thing you know, he's got a writer, Magnum PI and all these big movies.
Speaker C:Everybody who had been picked, I think Harrison Ford was an Aramis man.
Speaker C:So he was on the block to be the next big star.
Speaker C:And I remember sitting there talking with him about the different colognes that our fathers wore.
Speaker C:And I said, yeah.
Speaker C:I said, at my house, the only thing that was ever in the.
Speaker C:In the medicine cabinet was Old Spice and high karate.
Speaker C:Do you remember high karate?
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:The worst smelling swill ever.
Speaker C:And he goes, he goes, yeah, my old man used to wear that shit too.
Speaker C:And I was like.
Speaker C:And we're joking back and forth.
Speaker C:And in the middle, I'm really, I'm going, his old man's Jack Lemmon.
Speaker C:It was like, oh my God, like, am I actually sitting here talking about dads to Jack Lemmon's kid?
Speaker C:It was surreal.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:But I think, I think it sounds like your, your New York experience kind, kind of like again, I keep using the expression toughened you up, but we really, where, you know, some, most people or some people would be overwhelmed, starstruck, you know, not be able to be comfortable and be themselves.
Speaker A:When you're putting in the chair and the camera's on you and the show relies on you and you're interviewing all these famous people and here you are like, I don't even know if you were 30 years old at the time.
Speaker C:And you're handling it, handling it.
Speaker C:But it, all of those things did happen.
Speaker C:I was intimidated.
Speaker C:I was starstruck.
Speaker C:All of the above.
Speaker A:You always seem very natural to me.
Speaker A:You always remind me of Jim Carrey.
Speaker C:Well, thank you.
Speaker C:I mean, it was, it was, you know, a good 10 years of being on stage in front of very demanding New York audiences that allowed me to, you know, to hold, you know, hold my position, hold the line without folding.
Speaker C:It was all of that training and it paid off.
Speaker C:So I fooled you.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I remember, I remember watching you on tv.
Speaker A:I remember thinking you were really funny.
Speaker A:You on some stuff too, right?
Speaker A:Didn't you, did you start Solid Gold?
Speaker A:Like there were a whole bunch of these 80s shows that just kind of like blend together.
Speaker C:Yeah, there was a bunch of them.
Speaker C:There was obviously Evening at the Improv, Comedy on the Road.
Speaker C:Yeah, Comedy All Stars.
Speaker C:There was always comedy something or other comedy.
Speaker C:Caroline's was another one.
Speaker C:I did a couple of comedy tonight, which we did back in God.
Speaker C:It was the first syndicated show we ever did.
Speaker C:83, 84.
Speaker C:Out of the then Metromedia Studios, which became Fox.
Speaker C:And yeah, dude, I caught the wave right at the perfect time.
Speaker C:I feel bad for anyone who, who, who came after that because it really was a golden era of standup.
Speaker C:It was magnificent.
Speaker A:You, you.
Speaker A:I remember you were big man.
Speaker A:Did you ever go back and watch any of those?
Speaker A:It was like these young comedian specials and you would have like Kinison on it and Bob Nelson.
Speaker B:Yeah, I grew up watching those things.
Speaker A:That's what made you want to be a stand up.
Speaker B:Oh, absolutely.
Speaker B:I mean, I always used to say that whenever I would buy a record, like, you know, whatever kind of music it was, I would always buy a stand up set too.
Speaker B:I would buy.
Speaker B:I had tons of Red Fox and Howie Mandel and Dice and Lenny Bruce every, you know, I had tons and tons and tons of tapes.
Speaker B:I always had it ingrained in me.
Speaker B:But those shows growing up in the.
Speaker B:In the 80s for me were phenomenal.
Speaker B:Even, like the MTV one, the half hour Comedy hour was a big one for me.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:But the thing is, John was a big part of it.
Speaker B:I know.
Speaker B:I remember.
Speaker B:I mean, he mentioned, you know, being roommates of Richard Jenny.
Speaker B:He was one of my favorite comics growing up.
Speaker A:He was just.
Speaker C:Yeah, I remember.
Speaker C:Jenny was.
Speaker C:Jenny was a pro, a prolific writer.
Speaker C:I would awaken sometimes in the middle of the night.
Speaker C:We were on opposite ends of the schedule.
Speaker C:He.
Speaker C:I mean, we.
Speaker C:We were comics, so we were real night guys.
Speaker C:But I like to get up early and get out, go to the gym and do my thing.
Speaker C:Richie loved to stay up until dawn smoking cigarettes, working on bits.
Speaker C:And I remember so many nights I woke up in the middle of night and I swore he had people in the apartment.
Speaker C:And it was just him working on his stuff.
Speaker C:And he would take a bit and just pound it, pound it, pound it for hours, over and over again.
Speaker C:Take a tiny little seed of a thought.
Speaker C:And within, you know, five, six months, he had three, four minutes of some really golden, you know, magnificently written piece.
Speaker C:And I.
Speaker C:I really, like, admired that because I.
Speaker C:I just.
Speaker C:Not that I didn't.
Speaker C:I could have wrote like that if I.
Speaker C:If I had discipline.
Speaker C:But I was more.
Speaker C:My, My.
Speaker C:My focus was more extemporaneous.
Speaker C:If it wasn't in the moment, I didn't want it.
Speaker C:You know, I mean, I could pull material from memory and do it, but it had to work.
Speaker C:It had to blend within the moment of.
Speaker C:Of.
Speaker C:Of being on stage.
Speaker C:And I.
Speaker C:I got labeled as somebody that worked the crowd, which is not completely untrue, but it was only to set up what the bits I had ready for them in addition to stuff that was truly extemporaneous.
Speaker C:And the combination of those two, that's where I did my writing.
Speaker C:I didn't do it at home like Richie did.
Speaker C:I did mine on stage because there was so much stage time to be had by everyone.
Speaker C:It'll.
Speaker C:I was on somewhere every night of the week for at least an hour at a time.
Speaker C:It was great.
Speaker B:There's a lot of people when I was growing up, and I could look back on this now, being a comic for so long, too, not knowing anything about comedy as a kid, but knowing the differences in the style of comedians.
Speaker B:So when I brought up Richard Jenny, like, I knew as a kid how that was funny, but how it was smart on top of it.
Speaker B:And I knew the Differences between, like, you know, just for ex.
Speaker B:Like, just I'm saying name Carrot Top.
Speaker B:I knew the differences between prop comics and how they were funny in a different way.
Speaker B:And then, you know, more of your slapstick or.
Speaker B:Or like, you know, even vulgar guys like Dice.
Speaker B:And now being a comic now I realize it's so hard to be a great writer.
Speaker B:You know, it's really hard to be.
Speaker B:Everybody could tell jokes and stuff, but when I see guys like Richard, it just makes me think of some of the, you know, the guys that are out now who I think would be.
Speaker B:He would be on their level.
Speaker C:Yeah, great, great writers and great comics are an anomaly.
Speaker C:You're usually one or the other.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker C:You know, but.
Speaker C:But to have.
Speaker C:To have both to be a great.
Speaker C:Be a great comic and a great writer is.
Speaker C:Is pretty rare.
Speaker C:But it's out there.
Speaker C:I mean, it's.
Speaker C:It's.
Speaker C:I mean, Seinfeld, I think, is a great writer, but for Seinfeld, he doesn't write for other comics.
Speaker C:He writes great for him.
Speaker C:And there's.
Speaker C:We were hanging out at the Improv one night, and there was a standing offer from Rodney that if you could tell him you could write a joke for his act, he would pay you 50 bucks.
Speaker C:And this guy that, a good friend of mine, we used to go to other clubs, said, Lenny comes up to me and he goes, man.
Speaker C:He goes.
Speaker C:He goes, I just made 50 bucks.
Speaker C:I said, doing what?
Speaker C:He goes, he goes, I sold Rodney a joke.
Speaker C:I said, what's the joke?
Speaker C:And he tells me the joke, and I cracked up.
Speaker C:I said.
Speaker C:I said, you wrote that?
Speaker C:He goes, no, it's his.
Speaker C:I said, what do you mean?
Speaker C:He goes, it's from his first album.
Speaker C:I just.
Speaker C:I went up and just said it in front of him to make him laugh, and he said, hey, that's funny.
Speaker C:Can I buy it?
Speaker C:I said, sure.
Speaker C:He sold him his own jokes.
Speaker A:John, what did you find, like, the biggest difference between being a New York comic and an LA comic?
Speaker C:The New York comics for sure, could handle anything.
Speaker C:You know, the LA guys, I think the.
Speaker C:The LA vibe was a precursor to the whole woke nonsense.
Speaker C:You know, I remember them being dismissive and.
Speaker C:And condescending to crowds.
Speaker C:You couldn't do that in New York.
Speaker C:You would get your ass kicked.
Speaker C:I mean, literally, you would.
Speaker C:You would.
Speaker C:You would get torched on stage.
Speaker C:And I remember seeing them work in different.
Speaker C:In different venues and talking down to the crowds and dismissing them and.
Speaker C:And lecturing them for not laughing at their brilliant material.
Speaker C:I mean, they were not as Sturdy, let's say, as not even the New York guys, the Boston guys.
Speaker C:The Boston guys were.
Speaker C:Were.
Speaker C:They would stand in front of anything.
Speaker C:Boston comics said that that was a very, very great.
Speaker C:That was a really tough circuit to.
Speaker C:To be involved with.
Speaker C:Those.
Speaker C:Nick Depaolo, Lenny Clark, all of those guys were.
Speaker C:They were aces.
Speaker C:And you never messed with them.
Speaker C:You would never want to mess with those guys because those are the guys.
Speaker A:That came out of that Chinese restaurant.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Oh, my.
Speaker C:I forget the name of it.
Speaker C:Everybody played it.
Speaker C:I played it once, too.
Speaker C:I can't.
Speaker C:Only once.
Speaker C:I can't remember the name of it, but yeah.
Speaker C:Kevin Meaney, Stephen Wright.
Speaker C:Stephen Wright.
Speaker C:Not as much, but yeah.
Speaker C:Guys like Depaolo and Lenny Clark.
Speaker C:Sweeney.
Speaker A:Oh, Sweeney did it.
Speaker C:He.
Speaker C:Sweeney.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:He never wanted to mess with Sweeney.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:What was the other guy?
Speaker A:The big Boston comic?
Speaker A:Dennis was name.
Speaker C:Oh, yeah, Dennis Leary.
Speaker A:Dennis Leary.
Speaker C:I keep Larry.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:All those guys.
Speaker C:Yep.
Speaker C:Yeah, they didn't play.
Speaker A:And then comedy started, I guess.
Speaker A: , would you want to say early: Speaker C:Even earlier than that?
Speaker C:I mean, back.
Speaker C:I would say 90, 95 ish.
Speaker C:95, 97.
Speaker C: And by: Speaker C:I mean, you really had to dig in and find there was still a couple of old holdouts.
Speaker C:But all the.
Speaker C:All the great clubs were gone.
Speaker C:Rascals was gone.
Speaker C:The Eastside Comedy Club was gone.
Speaker C:Governors has.
Speaker C:Has managed to stay in the game after all these years, but.
Speaker C:And the brokerage.
Speaker C:But all of those great clubs from out here on the east side, on the.
Speaker C:On the east coast, gone.
Speaker C:Yeah, Pips gone.
Speaker C:Pips was never a great.
Speaker C:Pips was one of those clubs.
Speaker C:Like, you didn't go there to make money.
Speaker C:You.
Speaker C:You went there to.
Speaker C:To get good.
Speaker C:That was the thing with Pips, you know, it was.
Speaker C:It was.
Speaker C:It was such an icon.
Speaker C:It was such a.
Speaker C:Amazing place to be in a very.
Speaker C:It was.
Speaker C:It was.
Speaker C:It was a real anomaly that it was the island of misfit toys.
Speaker A:And then you hop on a plane and you tour to Israel.
Speaker C:Yeah, I went all through Israel, went through the Middle East.
Speaker A:How did you make that turn?
Speaker C:Dude, I get a call one day out of the blue from Avi Lieberman, and he said, we're doing this benefit for a.
Speaker C:It was called Crossroads.
Speaker C:It was an outreach program to, believe it or not, heroin addicts in Israel.
Speaker C:It was being funded by Jerry Seinfeld.
Speaker C:They were keeping it real quiet because they didn't want people to.
Speaker C:The world to know What a problem heroin is.
Speaker C:Apparently they have all of these villages that were abandoned during multiple skirmishes, and it was just agreed upon in peace settlement.
Speaker C:All right, this is going to be like a no man's land.
Speaker C:And all these junkies moved into it, and they were living in these abandoned apartment buildings, you know, getting high and doing things that, you know, heroin addicts do.
Speaker C:And they were.
Speaker C:This program called Crossroads was a.
Speaker C:Was an outreach program.
Speaker C:And.
Speaker C:And it was me.
Speaker C:The first time I went.
Speaker C:It was me, Avi, Mark Schiff.
Speaker C:And there was another.
Speaker C:Was a local Jewish comic.
Speaker C:I can't remember.
Speaker C:I was the only goyim on the bill.
Speaker C:And the fact that I was there and I wasn't Jewish, oh, my God, they just loved me for it because they were like, oh, you know, you don't have to be here.
Speaker C:Why are you here?
Speaker C:And I was like, well, it's good money, so I guess I am one of you.
Speaker A:Did you grow kind of like a little bit of an attachment to Israel?
Speaker C:Not to Israel.
Speaker C:I'll tell you what I really grew an attachment to was the troops in the Middle East.
Speaker C:When I went off through, you know, Iraq and places in the Middle East, I'm not even quite sure where we were.
Speaker C:They wouldn't tell us.
Speaker C:Some of the times they were just, you know, we just get up in the morning and they'd say, get on that helicopter, and when we land, you're going to do a show.
Speaker C:And so they wouldn't tell us where we were going or where we were when we got there, other than the name of the base.
Speaker C:So.
Speaker C:And I did that twice.
Speaker C:That was, without a doubt, the most amazing experience I ever had in my life as a comic, because you just can't imagine an audience more appreciative of what?
Speaker C:Of you being there.
Speaker C:I mean, I would have done it for free.
Speaker C:And I remember at the end of the first tour that I did there, one of these generals came out to shake our hands and wish us well.
Speaker C:And I said, hey, listen, I don't have anything that I can't cancel.
Speaker C:I would love to stay and keep working for you guys.
Speaker C:And he was appreciative, but he said, you know, that's not how the military works.
Speaker C:And I said, okay, but I just had to put it out there because it was just such a great experience to be in front of a crowd that, you know, would die for you, you know, in an instant.
Speaker C:And some of them actually did while we were there.
Speaker A:Well, you still do stuff like that.
Speaker A:You're constantly raising funds for Military, Military families.
Speaker A:You're still doing that type of work?
Speaker C:Yeah, I still do it, but when you're actually in a zone where people are getting killed, like the first night we got there, the first night we landed, we couldn't do a show because they needed the sound system for memorial service.
Speaker C:And that's when it hit me.
Speaker C:Like, holy shit.
Speaker C:I mean, it just got real, you know, it was pretty wild.
Speaker C:One night we were doing a show in an afternoon show and the, the chow hall was, had now been called the defac, which stands for dining facility.
Speaker C:And it was a kid sitting up front like 22.
Speaker C:And he was, he was gripping white, knuckling the barrel of his, of his weapon.
Speaker C:And I was joking with him a little bit and you know, trying to, he had that thousand yard stare.
Speaker C:I was trying to draw him into the show, but he never snapped out of it.
Speaker C:And after the show I, I said, I went up to the first sergeant and I said, hey, is that kid okay?
Speaker C:I mean, he looked like he was, you know, in a fog.
Speaker C:And he goes, hey, just lost a couple of his guys.
Speaker C:And I said, holy shit, I'm sorry, I didn't know.
Speaker C:And the sergeant said to me, fuck him.
Speaker C:He's got to snap out of it.
Speaker C:We all lost guys.
Speaker C:And that just threw me back because I realized, oh my God, he's right.
Speaker C:Like, this kid doesn't have the luxury to even grieve his friends.
Speaker C:He's got to refocus and get his head back in the game.
Speaker C:And this first sergeant was actually drilling down on him for that.
Speaker C:And I, I felt really bad about the whole situation, but I thought, no, he's right, you know, he can't, he can't be zoning out now.
Speaker C:I mean, he's going to lose more guys.
Speaker C:It was very intense, dude.
Speaker C:It was very intense.
Speaker C:And, but, but the, but the love that the troops had for us being there to break that up in whatever manner we could was not like anything I'd ever experienced as, as a, as a human being, much less a comedian.
Speaker A:It puts everything else into perspective, doesn't it?
Speaker C:It really did.
Speaker C:Yep, it really did.
Speaker C:It truly did.
Speaker A:I mean, you really, I mean, even out of comedy, you kind of like.
Speaker A:I mean, it's a cliche, but you don't sweat the small things anymore.
Speaker C:You.
Speaker C:Well, try not to.
Speaker A:So what are you doing now at the top of the show?
Speaker A:I mentioned that you, you did something in law enforcement.
Speaker A:Are you still doing law enforcement at all?
Speaker C:I am actually at the moment, though, ironically, I got hurt three years Ago, we were trying to, we were trying to take in a woman who was having a psychiatric episode and it, it turned into a melee and I went, I went down trying to, you know, trying to restrain her.
Speaker C:And I had to have surgery on my arm which led to a second surgery and a replacement which is now going into a third surgery.
Speaker C:I just found out.
Speaker C:So I've been still, you know, registered and on the books, but I'm just, I'm getting unemployment in workers comp while I'm, I'm getting over this injury.
Speaker A:So how do you make the move from being on tv, you know, being out in LA doing touring, doing stand up and then working in Hudson Valley doing law enforcement?
Speaker C:Dude, I didn't make any of those moves.
Speaker C:They just presented themselves and they felt like the right thing to do.
Speaker C:I was doing morning radio.
Speaker C:This is how this came back, was doing morning radio.
Speaker A:Another thing that I forgot about, right.
Speaker C:Up in upstate New York and a big case broke up there.
Speaker C:There was a local cop that saw some guy from America's Most Wanted walking on the street and he said he recognized him and he went to make the arrest and the two of them went through a plate glass window.
Speaker C:The cop had like 110 stitches in his face and it was national news.
Speaker C:So I called the local PD to get the public information officer on the line to first statement.
Speaker C:And I call him up and he goes, he goes, hey Mulroney, never mind that guy, bring me on, I'm funny.
Speaker C:And I was.
Speaker C:And he was funny.
Speaker C:In fact, I had dinner with him last night and his name was Dave Dean, he was an old school homicide detective and we became really good friends.
Speaker C:In fact, I turned it into a regular segment called Ask Officer Dave.
Speaker C:It was, it was like a law enforcement segment on the show.
Speaker C:So after about a year of having him on and he saw how much I love police work, he said to me, I don't know, it was kind of almost casual.
Speaker C:He goes, he goes, hey there, Mulroney.
Speaker C:He goes, I see you love this cop stuff.
Speaker C:He goes, I know a department that's looking for guys.
Speaker C:I said, looking for guys?
Speaker C:I was 50 at the time.
Speaker C:I said, what are you talking about, 50 years old?
Speaker C:He goes, yeah, it's not like that up here.
Speaker C:It's a right to work state.
Speaker C:It's not like civil service.
Speaker C:He says, if you pass the requirements, physical requirements for 50 year old, they guarantee you a part time job.
Speaker C:You make up your own hours.
Speaker C:I said, what?
Speaker C:He goes, I'd never heard that before.
Speaker C:He goes, yeah, yeah, it's it.
Speaker C:He goes full time department with Paul, part time guys.
Speaker C:And I was like, what?
Speaker C:And he introduced me to the chief.
Speaker C:And a year later, I was driving fast with a gun.
Speaker A:You learned how to shoot and you qualified and everything?
Speaker C:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:I'm a good shot.
Speaker A:I.
Speaker C:Actually, I.
Speaker C:I did.
Speaker C:I trained to the point where I could train, train guys in it.
Speaker B:Now, next year, maybe I'll move upstate.
Speaker C:Come upstate, dude.
Speaker C:We'll put you through.
Speaker C:We'll put you three paces.
Speaker C:We'll get you in shape past the physical.
Speaker A:Sean, you slipped in your bathroom, okay.
Speaker A:And almost broke your back.
Speaker A:You're gonna go do Lauren fist enforcement.
Speaker A:Stop.
Speaker B:You want me to show you something, Jeffrey?
Speaker B:I want to.
Speaker B:I'm going to shut Jeffrey up live on this podcast because we're gonna mute him.
Speaker B:He's an.
Speaker B:You'll.
Speaker B:You'll learn this for the camera to see.
Speaker B:Today I ran seven miles.
Speaker B:Can everybody see this?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Seven miles.
Speaker C:Whose phone is that?
Speaker B:Mine.
Speaker B:So I burned 4,000 calories today, Jeff, you know, how is seven.
Speaker A:Seven miles?
Speaker A:What?
Speaker A:Ten days?
Speaker B:Seven.
Speaker B:That's today, Jeff.
Speaker B:That's today.
Speaker B:Seven miles.
Speaker C:And just remember, no one.
Speaker C:No one outruns the radio either.
Speaker C:So you don't really have to worry about that.
Speaker B:That's true, too.
Speaker A:Before we let you go, and we say this all the time, this is a music show.
Speaker A:We have not spoke one ounce of music.
Speaker A:Johnny, are you a music guy at all?
Speaker C:I do it.
Speaker C:I'm old school.
Speaker C:Rhythm and blues.
Speaker C:I mean, anything.
Speaker C:Al Green, Earth, Wind and Fire, Four Tops, Temptations.
Speaker C:That's my jam.
Speaker C:That's always been my jam.
Speaker C:Calling the gang.
Speaker C:Yeah, I saw, yeah, Casey in the Sunshine Band.
Speaker C:I mean, that's what I grew up with.
Speaker C:The Bee Gees.
Speaker C:Disco.
Speaker C:I love.
Speaker C:I love Donna Summer.
Speaker A:Great.
Speaker A:You talk about, you know, stuff that kind of like, that stays with you forever, right?
Speaker A:My first job out of college, I worked for CBS Records, okay?
Speaker A:I worked in BlackRock on the 11th floor.
Speaker A:That's where everything happened.
Speaker A:That was A and R.
Speaker A:And I went.
Speaker A:And my job was.
Speaker A:I was really the go between between the artists and our accounting department.
Speaker A:So if you were recording an album, all right, bills were sent to me.
Speaker A:I set up a file number.
Speaker A:So those little numbers that you see on the side of an album, I assign those.
Speaker A:And I kept track of how much an artist was spending.
Speaker A:And until the company recouped what it put out, an artist wouldn't get signed.
Speaker A:One day I come back from lunch and there's a message on my desk.
Speaker A:Maurice White called.
Speaker C:Oh.
Speaker A:And it's like, you know, here I am maybe 22 years old and the leader of Earth, Wind and Fire calls me up and couldn't have been nicer to me because I can get paid faster.
Speaker A:And it's just like, you know, holy shit.
Speaker A:I mean, this one, they had fantasy.
Speaker A:They had September out already.
Speaker A:And then it was just like, oh, my God.
Speaker A:Like, you know.
Speaker A:And I love that kind of music too.
Speaker C:That's my jam.
Speaker C:That's my jam.
Speaker B:Well, I flew out to Los Angeles to officiate the wedding of my friend who plays bass for more.
Speaker B:Stay in the time.
Speaker B:There's my contribution.
Speaker C:You didn't run there.
Speaker B:No, no.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:He's like Forrest Gump.
Speaker A:He just kept.
Speaker C:You know what?
Speaker C:I just found out, you know, that Jim Hanks is Tom Hanks younger brother.
Speaker C:And he looks so much like him that he.
Speaker C:He and sound like him.
Speaker C:He actually did the voice for Woody in Toy Story 4.
Speaker C:But he did all the running scenes in Forrest Gump.
Speaker C:The Jim Hanks.
Speaker C:Jim Hanks running?
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:That's Jim Hanks running in the movies.
Speaker C:I don't know who Jim Hanks is.
Speaker C:Tom's younger brother.
Speaker C:I'll tell you.
Speaker C:I'll tell you a great quick story.
Speaker C:He was an.
Speaker C:He was a waiter at the Improv.
Speaker C:And one night we were sitting there talking and he was, you know, complaining about, hey, so hard to make it in Hollywood.
Speaker C:Imagine, you know, what it is being Tom Hanks younger brother.
Speaker C:He goes.
Speaker C:Everywhere I go, I'm just Tom Hanks younger brother.
Speaker C:So shortly thereafter, we were both on a cattle call somewhere.
Speaker C:I remember I was walking in as he was walking out, and I said, hey, what's going on?
Speaker C:Blah, blah, blah.
Speaker C:And we chatted a little bit, talking about what the audition was about.
Speaker C:And I said, you're going to be at the.
Speaker C:At the club tonight.
Speaker C:He goes, yeah.
Speaker C:I said, okay, I got a spot.
Speaker C:I'll see you later.
Speaker C:So I walk in and there's this over the top gay casting director.
Speaker C:What is the prize?
Speaker C:And he.
Speaker C:On his desk is a stack of 8 by 10s.
Speaker C:And he picks up the 8 by 10 on the front, on the very top.
Speaker C:And he goes.
Speaker C:He covers the name and he goes, who does that look like?
Speaker C:Who does that look like?
Speaker C:And I said, it looks just like Jim Hanks.
Speaker C:And he went, oh.
Speaker C:And he put it down.
Speaker C:And I went into the.
Speaker C:I went into the improv and I saw him that night.
Speaker C:I told him that story and he went, bank.
Speaker C:Somebody recognized me.
Speaker C:Thank you.
Speaker A:John.
Speaker A:What do you have Going on.
Speaker A:How could people follow you?
Speaker C:I'm doing a.
Speaker C:I'm doing.
Speaker C:I'm doing a podcast now called the Great Awakening.
Speaker C:Consciousness, comedy and conspiracy, and it's up on YouTube.
Speaker C:It's also on my Facebook page.
Speaker C:I'm also doing it through streamyard.
Speaker C:And I try to put up one every weekday.
Speaker C:Sometimes I'll do one over the weekend, but I try to do up at least one every weekday.
Speaker C:And it's about current events, politics, consciousness.
Speaker C:I love doing deep dives into the whole conspiracy thing.
Speaker C:I'm fascinated by it, all the QAnon theory and all that other stuff.
Speaker C:I think it's amazing.
Speaker C:So, yeah, that's what I'm working on now, creatively.
Speaker A:You're gonna watch any of this speech tonight at the.
Speaker A:With the joint?
Speaker C:Absolutely.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:I'm.
Speaker C:I'm really curious because the timing of all of all of these things is so bizarro.
Speaker C:You know, he kicks Zelensky out on Friday, and here, right before he makes this joint State of the Union address, Zielinski, apparently they've.
Speaker C:They've penned a deal.
Speaker C:In theory.
Speaker C:Yeah, he's.
Speaker C:Oh, he's got it, dude.
Speaker C:He's the master troller.
Speaker C:You want to hear some interest?
Speaker C:Something interesting?
Speaker C:You know the YMCA song that he's always doing?
Speaker A:Of course.
Speaker C:Do you know why he does that song?
Speaker A:Well, didn't he have a problem with the Village People?
Speaker A:The Village People had a problem with him in the past.
Speaker C:Originally, they asked him not to do the song, but he paid for the royalty, so.
Speaker C:No.
Speaker C:But the reason he sings the YMCA song is because the only YMCA that was ever in Cuba was Guess where.
Speaker C:Gitmo.
Speaker C: From: Speaker C:Excuse me.
Speaker C: To around: Speaker C:And he was knocked down in a hurricane.
Speaker C:So when he says it's fun to stay at the ymca, that's why he's singing that song.
Speaker C:Because the only YMCA that was ever on Cuba was at Gitmo, and it's.
Speaker C:That's why they call it the spa.
Speaker C:And so he's trolling the people that are going to ultimately be in the spa.
Speaker C:And if you notice, that's why Pete Hegseth is heading down there.
Speaker C:And they said, oh, we opened it up for 30,000 immigrants.
Speaker C:I don't think so.
Speaker A:I know we got Gitmo after the Spanish American War.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:We wound up.
Speaker A:We wind up protecting Cuba for about 40 years.
Speaker A:And while we give Cuba its independence, we had made sure that we kept a military base, not so, you know, want to make sure Cuba didn't do anything.
Speaker A:Stupid and enter.
Speaker A:You know, any type of.
Speaker A:Get into any type of agreement with.
Speaker A:With a country, that could be a problem.
Speaker A:But the thing is, they're only like less than 100 miles away from the coast of Florida.
Speaker C:Yeah, 90 miles from Key West.
Speaker A:That's right.
Speaker A:So that's, I think, one of the main reasons why we still maintain a base down in gmo.
Speaker A:So, I mean that it's so funny how this stuff just doesn't go away.
Speaker A:But the thing is how people try to make you forget that any of this ever happened.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:There's another one of those bases in Greenland, by the way.
Speaker C:Remember, Remember all the.
Speaker C:All the hoopla over Glean is another one.
Speaker C:I believe it's called Camp America, but it's another Gitmo style detention center.
Speaker C:What a great place.
Speaker C:You stick that in the middle of the tundra.
Speaker C:You don't even have to put a fence around it.
Speaker C:Nobody's going anywhere.
Speaker A:You know, John, we could.
Speaker A:We could talk politics and everything else longer.
Speaker A:The speech is going to come on shortly, so I want to thank you so much for coming on, man.
Speaker A:You're a really interesting guy.
Speaker A:Good luck with your surgeries.
Speaker A:They got coming up.
Speaker A:And guys, follow his podcast.
Speaker A:Hit up John Mulrooney.
Speaker A:Very, very funny guy.
Speaker A:Thank you so much, man, for your time.
Speaker C:All right.
Speaker A:All right, guys, we have more stuff coming up, so keep subscribing, keep following us, okay?
Speaker A:And big announcements to come in the next couple of weeks.
Speaker A:Take care, everybody.
Speaker A:All right?
