December 12, 2025 • 40 mins
We kicked off the program with four news stories and different guests on the stories we think you need to know about!
Love Johnny Carson: One Obsessive Fan's Journey to Find the Genius Behind the Legend.
Guest: Mark Malkoff - author/comedian who over 12 years interviewed 400 individuals about Johnny Carson and his Tonight Show
What should we expect from the release of the Epstein files? & Why does it matter?
Guest: Eric O’Neill - former FBI counterintelligence operative and national security attorney
You'll Shoot Your Eye Out!: Life Lessons from the Movie A Christmas Story
Guest: Professor Quentin Schultze
Holiday movies offer mental health benefits, experts say
Guest: Dr. Patrick Porter – expert in brain health - author/speaker and the founder of BrainTap
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's nice eyes with Dan Ray. I'm going in lazy
Boston's News radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Got a great idea for everybody to start the weekend.
Just stay right with us here on Friday night from
eight until midnight. We will get you all the way
to the weekend, which is of course Saturday morning. About
minute or two before midnight, we at the next four
hours at less a few minutes here, we've got a
great show lined up. We're going to talk with four
(00:26):
interesting people this Hour're going to talk with me and
I just wrote a book about Johnny Carson. Going to
talk with a former FBI count of Intelligence operative and
national security attorney about the expected release of the Epstein files.
And then we will talk with a professor journalism, professor
Quentin Schultz out of Michigan, who has just written a
(00:48):
book on the movie A Christmas Story, which was written
by Gene Shepherd, a great radio voice for the past.
We'll talk about whether on holiday movies offer mental health benefits.
Doctor Patrick Porter will join us and during the program tonight,
as we work our way, we're going to talk with
(01:09):
a woman who has formed a new high school hockey
opportunity for young girls. Again, you know, we have big
supporters of girls in sports, both at high school and college.
And this is for a lot of girls who want
to play hockey, and there are as many high schools
that have hockey for girls as boys. We'll explain that
(01:31):
unfairness and what's being done directified, and they will talk
with Professor Greg Stoller, Boston University's Question School of Business,
sort of an economic check in bad day on the
stock market, want to talk a little bit about the
Trump tariffs and what they are actually achieving or not achieving.
And then their twentieth hour today, I'm going to ask
you what your favorite what you must watch TV show is?
(01:52):
You know, I want the one that you just make
sure you watch. I have one. It's every Sunday night.
It's called Tracker. I think it's a great show and
I'd like to introduce you to it. But I also
hope some of you might suggest during the twentieth hour
your great show. So now, my name's Dan Rayam, the
host of the show. Rob Brooks, my partner in time,
if you will, is back in the studio. He is
(02:13):
the producer of this program. He'll begin to take your
calls right as the nine o'clock hour after the nine
o'clock News. But first off, let's get to our first
guest this hour. He's an author, Mark Malcoff. Mark has
written a book, Love Johnny Carson, One obsessive fans Journey
to find the Genius behind the legend. Great title, Mark Malcoff, Look,
(02:37):
you yourself have been a comedian, but you have done
really an amazing book on Johnny Carson and the Tonight Show.
And I got to tell you, in these divisive times,
I wish there was another Johnny Carson out there, someone
who we could all end our day with after Night's
side obviously Monday Friday. I don't want any more competition
(03:01):
eleven o'clock hour, But guy like Johnny Carson. Will we
ever see his likes again?
Speaker 3 (03:09):
I don't think you're going to see somebody for thirty
years that dominated late night in the American culture and
just had the influence that this man had, launching everyone
from David Letterman to Jay Leno. You know, I talked
to over four hundred people, even people that I didn't
know what.
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Jimmy Buffett said.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
Mark, You're the first one that's ever asked me about
Johnny Carson. And it was the biggest break of my career.
So it was just a collection of all these stories
of the most influential people that were launched by Carson,
and I just thought it was important to tell the stories,
and it was.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
It's a lost art. What Johnny did? I mean?
Speaker 3 (03:42):
He was still to this day, all the late night
hosts still talking about Johnny. Whenever they do poll's Greatest
Late night Hosts of All Time, it's always Carson. I
don't think we're ever going to see him again in
someone of that magnitude.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
I mean, the Babe Ruth of Date, the late knight
show host. But he didn't start as a late night show.
He started as sort of a game show in New
York City, if I'm not mistaken. But his sidekicking Trent
Man was with him from the beginning. A Boston guy
Ed McMahon, Boston college guy by the way.
Speaker 4 (04:10):
Yeah you know, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 5 (04:13):
They get.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
They were on a game show Who Do You Trust?
On ABC which now is the Helen Hayes Theater, and
they would go to Sarti's in between shows and sometimes.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
Have a little too much to drink.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
But Johnny was a game show host and when you know,
he got offered.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
At the Tonight Show.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
He turns it down because nobody in television wanted the
gig to follow Jack Parrk because he was like the
biggest star, one of the biggest stars in TV. So
Johnny's wife is the one that really talked him into it.
And it took for me a little bit of time
to really win the audience over there like a game
show host. But you know, I got to sit down
with someone like mel Brooks. It was on Johnny's very
(04:47):
first show October first, nineteen sixty two, and just hear
these stories and it was just incredible just to see
that Carson just dominated the television. I mean, by nineteen
eighty he got ownershi of his show, which was unheard of,
and he was twenty five percent of NBC's profits. And
in nineteen sixty nine, the Tiny Tim wedding forty five
(05:09):
million people, second to the Moon landing in terms of
people tuning and in it's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Well, he broke so many I guess I don't know
barriers he would do something like that. I remember the
tidy Tiam wedding. I mean, he was like this guy
who had no talent at all, but somehow he became
a national phenomenon only because on Johnny Carson Show. Probably
not the only one who you could put in that category.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
Yeah, I mean there were definitely people with strange talents,
and I would talk to him. There was this guy
who was a practicing lawyer in Michigan and he could
play songs with his hands, kind of manipulating his hands
with the air in his hands. And he went on
Johnny five times and he told me that, and I
verify this.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
He was able to quit his job as a as.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
A lawyer in Michigan and make more money in Las
Vegas playing songs with his hands because he went on
Johnny Carson. These are the stories I got, people that
were unknown with quirky talents traveling in the world. There
was that woman, the Potato Chip Lady. She was an
inspector of potato chips in Indiana. Sixty five year old
Myrtle Young goes on Carson Show, Carson and his Brilliance,
(06:19):
and she's showing these different potato chips and objects. Has
ed mcmanthistractor and then he bites down on a chip.
She has a heart attack, almost thinking Carson ate her act,
and Johnny shows that he had his own bowl of
potato chips. Brilliant joke. But my point is she traveled
all over the US and went international because of Carson.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Now, the other thing, which is interesting, we don't script
questions here, so if I ask you a question, you
kind of answered yeah, correct me if I'm wrong. But
when people went on the Johnny Carson Show, they were
going on it for a few dollars. They weren't being
paid a lot of money, but obviously he was launching
the potential to lot's right careers.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
Correct, that's right.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
I mean back in the day when KR since first
ten years in New York, it was three hundred and
twelve dollars something like that.
Speaker 4 (07:04):
It was scale.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I mean people were going for the for the publicity,
for the launch. Someone like a Flip Wilson goes on
Carson is an unknown, Suddenly he has his own show,
he's doing Geraldine and he's winning Emmys. Flip Wilson said,
nobody gave people more if a chance than Carson, and
it was routinely the people would want to go on
with Carson. Sometimes you get guest hosts. It was always
(07:25):
funny like Arnold Palmer, Joe Namath or Lauren Green from Bonanza.
You always wanted it to be Johnny, but you'd have
these people that would try the guest host, like Kirk
Douglas and they couldn't do it. Once in a while
you would get a really good one like Joan Rivers
or McClean Stevenson. But Johnny made it look easy, but
it was far from easy.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Well that's the point. Carson would come out and he'd
just kind of look around and he had that he
wasn't He would deliver the lines so subtly. It was
my recollection. He was a little bit before my time.
I mean I didn't really appreciate, uh, you know, I
was in high school and college and we weren't watching
Johnny crosson to night. But he just came out. He
(08:07):
was himself. That was I think the guest to his success.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Yes, that was that you're you're right on the money.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
The people that knew him the best, his friends, would
all say that he was It was a small group
of people that really loyal to They said that he
was the same, almost the same person on and off camera,
which went against what the media said. The media said
he's cold and aloof and he has no friends and
you know. They said he was a kind of like
a JB. Sallenger, greta Garbo recluse. In retirement, he went
(08:36):
out with his writers, having lunches. He was out with frenzy.
He played in a poker game for decades up until
he passed away. It was Neil Simon and Steve Martin,
Carl reynerd Chevy Chase, and he loved his poker games.
So yet that was who Carson was.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Wow, and you are young enough that I'm sure he
was retired. How did you get how did you decide?
You spent what a dozen years here, interviewed four hundred people.
I mean, was a this was a truck?
Speaker 6 (09:10):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (09:11):
You know, Dre. How was it that you kind of
either decided or fell into this task?
Speaker 3 (09:18):
My dad got me into Earth Commedy when I was
a kid, like five years old. Kids on the playground
are talking about Mickey Mouse, and I'm talking about Buddy
Hackett and Don Rickles and Jerry Lewis. My dad just
got me into Stanley Kramer's.
Speaker 4 (09:30):
It's a mad, mad mad mad mad band world.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
Jonathan Winners. It was just this different world. But Johnny
Harrison was the party.
Speaker 4 (09:37):
He would do.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
Primetime anniversary shows and I record them on VHS. She
was funny, with kids, with animals, with comedians, with a
list movie stars, and there were just I had so
many questions about what went on behind the scenes, and
there were really these stories that were captured. I figured
I talk to a few people maybe, and just everyone
wanted to tell me the story. I was with the
(09:59):
guy who helped the curtain open for Johnny for twenty years,
and I always wanted wondered what went on behind the
curtain before the show, and I got my answer.
Speaker 4 (10:08):
So those were the stories that I really want to do.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
What was the answer? I'm assuming he just standing to day, relaxing.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
He was smoking a cigarette, telling jokes up until Ed
McMahon said here's Johnny. He'd be just around, joking around.
Because some hosts like David Letterman would need complete silence.
Everyone has a different process, but Letterman. But Carson would
be smoking one of his pall malls, who would smoke
two packs a day, unfiltered pall malls. That did him
in unfortunately the emphysema. But yeah, he would he was.
(10:36):
That was him before the show.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Just you mention Buddy Hackett. One story about Buddy Hackett,
He's playing golf, hits a golf ball into the woods,
strips naked, comes running out of the woods holding his
golf club, screaming Locus Locus.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Buddy Hackett was one of the best. There were certain
people that they would do pre interviews, but they would
throw them out, like Buddy Hackett, Wrickles, Steve Lawrence was
another one where they just never would get to the
pre interview because these guys were so funny and such
a good report with Johnny and and surprise is what happened?
Like really crazy things would happen. The show would go
(11:12):
off the rails with Burt Reynolds or Dom deubloids. That
stuff doesn't happen anymore.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Question Mark the big question. I realist. I'm having so
much fun. I'm running out of time. Actually, I've run
out of time. I've had so much froulem with you.
How can they get the book Amazon?
Speaker 3 (11:24):
I'm sure, right, right, that's right, Amazon, Barnes Andnoble dot Com.
I did the audiobook on over five days Audible. If
you love Johnny Carson, if you want to know what
was it like behind the scenes and Carson from his
friends and the people that worked for him.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
This is the book, Malcoff, Thank you so much. I
really indetted to do me some night. We'll have you
back when you and hour and take phone calls and
we can spend more time talking about Johnny Cars and
be honored.
Speaker 4 (11:49):
I really like that. Thank you. Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas,
whatever you celebrate.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
I'm a Christmas guy. What do you do you celebrate?
Speaker 3 (11:56):
I celebrate Christmas, Christmas, Christmas.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Thanks. All right, coming back on the other side of
the right, here got Eric O'Neil what we should expect
for the release of the Epstein Epstein files. Back on
Nightside with former FBI counterintelligence operative Eric O'Neill.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
It's night Side with Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Delighted to be joined by Eric O'Neill, former FBI counterintelligence
operative national security attorney.
Speaker 6 (12:25):
Eric.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Welcome to Nightside. How are you, sir, Dan.
Speaker 5 (12:28):
I'm doing well. It's good to be back on.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
Nice to talk with you again. So there's been so
much smoke and speculation about the Epstein files. As I'm
sure you know, there were nineteen photographs released today. I
don't know what they showed other than the fact that
Epstein knew a lot of people. What do you think
will be at the end of the road where the
(12:54):
Epstein files have been basically digested by.
Speaker 5 (12:58):
Everyone you know looking at this case, and you know,
and what's going to eventually come in And I think
it's just seven days from now should be the first
release or requests perhaps from the DJ for more time.
It's not what we'll see. I think it's what we
won't see. I think the story of this will be
and what is we adapted and not released, because that
(13:20):
will show that there are additional ongoing investigations. And that's
what I'm really keen to see. Whether the DOJ and
FBI is pursuing other people, the people that actually trafficked
or harmed some of these young girls in this devastating case.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, now statutal limitations, has a lot of that been
told at this point, meaning you know that they that
they have stopped the statute from running.
Speaker 5 (13:47):
So no, because some of these cases, if it's a
sexual assault case, depending on the jurisdiction, and much of
this is in New York, would not be told by
that because of their particular laws. So there could be
additional criminal cases, for example, brought in New York for
some of this, But what will be really interesting is
(14:08):
to see, you know, not only the information in those files,
but the DJ has also gone to grand jury. The
judges in three separate sports, two in New York and
one in Florida to ask that the grand jury records
the information behind that has been unfiled, and all three
(14:30):
judges to sign the orders to allow to be unfiled.
So we don't normally see grand jury testimony that's almost
never revealed, and and here it will be.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
So my question is this the allegations against Epstein, and
some of them have been proven, some of them have
not been proven, was that he provided underage girls to
some of his friends, some of his influential friends, up
to and including flying people to so called Lolita Island.
(15:08):
I would assume that if there was some records of
that at this point, that people would have been indicted
forgetting on an airplane knowing that they were traveling with
young girls to Lolita Island and they were going to
have their way with the young girls. Whether the young
girls did it consensual, they were all they seem a
(15:31):
lot of them are underage. What has caught what has
prevented some indictments from coming out because I got to
assume that a lot of this information, flight logs, et cetera.
People know who was on these planes, and were there
young girls either on the plane or on so called
Epstein's island?
Speaker 5 (15:53):
Right, Well, that is the one hundred million dollar question,
and that is the question that has led to countless
conspiracy theory as to why only Epstein and Glenne Maxwell
his associate were prop touted. You know, either there's no
information in there that points to any individual, or this
is one of the most bizarre cover ups between two
(16:17):
different administrations. Because remember this that started and Biden has
continued into Trump and I think I don't agree on anything.
So either we're going to see that there are ongoing
investigations and these have been happening and the FBI has
been pursuing them and not talking about them because that's
proper when you're investigating, or nothing, and I would be
(16:38):
very surprised to see nothing.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
Again. I don't want to put you on the spot here,
but do you think that the people who are at
greatest risk are people who were merely prominent individuals or
prominent individuals who have held high elective office.
Speaker 5 (17:00):
Why who asked the question that way right exactly.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
I'm not asking you Eric the name names of speculate.
I'm just saying two categories prominent people and people can
figure out who that is, or people who have very
high elective office.
Speaker 5 (17:17):
Yes, I think that those individuals who are going to
have the most scrutiny or whose names are going to
show up, are all going to be prominent individuals who
have influence because what Epstein was essentially was an influenced tedler.
He made a lot of money, but they're getting very
close to people in power, whether it was in business
or industry or government, and in using that influence in
(17:41):
order to make deals. And part of that apparently was
flying them to his island. You know, what's been called
the Lalita Islands. What's caused a lot of people at
quite a bit of concern and what something that I'm
going to be very interested to learn once the story.
Testimony is unsealed in the Florida case to Epstein was
(18:07):
they perceive him for sex trafficking underage girls, but he
was allowed guilty to escape solicitation charges and involving a
single underage girl, a single underage victim, and then got
a secret non prostitution agreement with the federal government. That's
what's led to the numerous conspiracy or so I'd like
to really see behind what led to the government's decision
(18:31):
just to charge them with that one count and let
them off on other things.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
What was the date of that agreement do you recall?
Speaker 5 (18:38):
I don't recall. This was prior to twenty nineteen, and
then I remember he was also all of that information
was available to federal prosecutors in New York who charged
Epstein with sex trafficking in twenty nineteen, which was a
much stronger case, and much of those underlying materials most
(19:00):
likely emerged over New York. To then the sentence, he
was bought up on civil suits by many of his victims,
and at that point I think he decided to just
take his life because it was looking pretty grim for him.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
Okay, last question, Lolita Island, which I keep hearing reference to,
was that in the Bahamas?
Speaker 5 (19:21):
What jurisdiction was that, you know, I don't exactly know
where that island was, Yes, I couldn't tell you, but
I'm sure he placed it somewhere that had extra jurisdictionally
reached from.
Speaker 4 (19:35):
The United States.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Did or did not have.
Speaker 5 (19:40):
I don't know the answer.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
No.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
What I'm saying is, if he was that smart, he
would have tried to pick an island, which was Yes.
Speaker 5 (19:45):
He would have tried, didn't have You certainly wouldn't have
had it in any territory of the United States.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Where was that Ryan producer Little Saint James. I know,
but that's not a country, right, so we'll get that information.
I should have had that information for this interview, and
I apologize for that. Eric O'Neil for FBI Counterintelligence Operative
National Security Attorney. Have you, I know you've done a
lot of interviews on this. Have you written a book
on this? Tell us what so something people can get
(20:17):
in touch with you if they have information? What is
the benefit of talking with us tonight?
Speaker 5 (20:24):
Yeah, Dan, I haven't written a book on the Epstein tasee.
I think if there will be many books on it,
especially after this next dump of information, which should be
the largest dump of information comes out. I have written
a book called Spysfis and cyber Crime, which is a
pretty thrilling book about how you can protect yourself from
the growing trend of cyber crime, which reads like a
(20:48):
spy knowledge novel, and will teach you counter intelligence tactics
I learned at the FBI.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Okay, that is okay. The Little Saint James, which is
lowly the island is in the United States Virgin Islands,
so it's a territory in the States.
Speaker 6 (21:07):
So and.
Speaker 5 (21:10):
There, yeah, yeah, and and kind that took place there,
you could be possibly be. I don't think it would
really matter. If the victim is a is a United
States citizen. Then many of the young girls, all of
whom who would be taken to that island and they
can't give consent that they're underage.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
Sure, okay, so it is it's part of the Virgin
Island US Virgin Islands. Look that one pretty quickly. Eric,
thank you very much. Nice to uh, nice to talk
with you. We'll keep you posted. We'll have you back
as as developments. Courth thank you, sir good always.
Speaker 5 (21:44):
Good to tuck down and seven bootes. We're going to
learn a lot more than we know now, all right.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
I suspect we'll be having you one shortly after that
knowledge bubbles up to the surface. Thanks again, Eric. When
we get back, when we talk with Professor Quentin Schultz,
a retired journalism professor who who worked with the great
humorist Jeene Shepherd. Actually they co talked together. But Geene
Shepherd has written a movie that I have never seen.
(22:09):
It's called A Christmas Story. I mentioned it today to Marita,
our producer, and she says, oh, Christmas Story. I love
that movie. So we'll be talked with Professor Schultz right
after the news break at the bottom of the hour.
Speaker 4 (22:23):
It's Nice.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
I'm delighted to be joined by Professor Quentin Schultz of Michigan.
Professor Schultz, how are you tonight?
Speaker 7 (22:36):
Just great and call me Quenton. By the way, you
like this. As a Latin school guy, I got the
name Quentin Latin. I was a fifth to one in
the family.
Speaker 2 (22:44):
WHOA that's a great that is a great name. I
have a great friend, former State Treasurer of the Comwealth
of Massachusetts, Robert Quenton Crane. So you're the second Quentin
that I know, maybe more along the way. So you
have written a book which is about the movie. You'll
(23:05):
shoot your eye out life lessons from the movie A
Christmas Story. I intend to watch A Christmas Story this weekend.
I probably am the only person in this audience who
has never seen a Christmas story. I mentioned it to
my thirty year old producer today, Marita, and she was like,
over the Moon, Oh my god, I love that movie.
(23:26):
That's her favorite movie and her husband's favorite movie. Written
by Jeane Shepherd, who is someone who you co taught
some classes with in college and also a great storyteller,
rack On Tour whatever you like to call him. Tell
us about the movie for those few of us who
(23:46):
haven't watched the Christmas movie, and I will correct that
deficiency this weekend. About the life lessons, some of the
life lessons that are wrapped in this movie that has
been around now for almost fifty years.
Speaker 7 (24:01):
Yeah. Great, Dan, So good to be on with you. Well,
here's the deal. I was a communication professor back in
the late seventies early eighties. I had listened to Gene
Shepherd on the radio in New York from Chicago late
at night, just like I can pick you up at night.
And he was a fantastic storyteller. And I was a
new professor, and I wanted to learn storytelling. And I
(24:23):
was also a Ham radio operator and Gene Sheppard was
a Ham radio operator. I looked him up in the
FCC database, sent him a note and said, I want
to learn storytelling from one of the best. And he
was rather stunned to gell a letter from a professor,
But at any rate, we formed the friendship. We co
taught storytelling together and we went through most of his
(24:43):
stories across many different media. A Christmas Story the movie
is made up of a number of different stories that
he had written for a publication in different places, from
Playboy magazine to a book that he came out with
in other places. It's all about a kid he wants
a Red Rider BB rifle for Christmas, and Jeane Shepherd
(25:04):
told stories in order to get across his view of life,
his worldview. He had a whole philosophy of life, and
it came through and everything. Once I learned that about him,
that really what he was doing is telling parables, I thought,
this is stunning. I had no idea. I knew his
stories were funny, but when he would tell me something
like this, he'd save me. One day he called me Quinn.
(25:25):
He said, hey, Quinn, you know that leg lamp, that
famous leg lamp in the movie.
Speaker 5 (25:30):
I said yeah.
Speaker 7 (25:31):
He said, well, you know that's a trophy wife. I said, what,
It's a trophy wife. He says, yeah, he said, he
said men men are that way. Men fall in love
with things. And if it's not a woman, it'll be
something else. It'll be a car. The old man loves cars,
and he loves a variety of things. And Ralphie falls
in love with this rifle that he has to have,
(25:52):
and he said, men get obsessed with these things. So
the old man wins this award. It's a major award.
He says, it's a leg lamp, you know, not worth anything.
And he brings it home and right away Mom can
tell that he's in love with this thing, and he
wants to put it in the front window to turn
on the neighborhood. And so she's got to figure out
a way to break this thing, and she does it.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
Not the affairs, I think the book he wrote it
was like Eve weeding the garden.
Speaker 7 (26:24):
Yeah, yeah, very few people know this, but Gene used
all kinds of biblical motifs too, And so what he
did is Mom has these plants that she's growing in
the front window. Uh, you know, and a lot of
people like to grow plants indoors and all just great.
And so when the character the old Man takes the
(26:45):
lamp out of the crate to set it up and
turn it on in the front window. He puts this
totally unnatural thing and this idol that he's fallen in
love with, he puts it right in the front window,
right among the plants, so he's secretive the garden of
Eden that the mom is growing there. This is the
way Gene thought about all of his stories, these deeper meanings.
(27:08):
And so what I did with the book was to
write a book for people who love the movie, who
are going to be blown away by all of these
things that they they'll see it. Once they see the
movie again, after they've read my book, they're going to say,
I can't believe it.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Well. My understanding is the books available as most books
out to Amazon, but you also have a website which
you can direct people to as.
Speaker 4 (27:29):
I just yeah, let me let me do it the
easy way.
Speaker 7 (27:33):
Sure, I've it's the easy way, just for for you tonight.
I put it right on my main website. If they
want to get the book for me and they want
it signed, I can sign it for a friend of
theirs and say, you know, uh, don't shoot your eye
out or whatever. It's just Quentin Schultz q U E
n t I N q u e n t I
n Schultz Schultz has an E on the end. It's
(27:56):
s c h u l t z E c h
u l t z E Quintin Schultz dot com. And
I put a link down there a few hours ago,
and you can order a book for no more than
what you would pay on Amazon, and it'll come shipping
free and I'll sign it anyway you want and fantastic
Christmas present.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
That'd be great. It was interesting you said that Shepard
was a ham radio operator. I guess he got into
a little bit of trouble. He was living what on
Santa Bell Island down in Florida, off the coast of Florida. Yeah,
Santanna was a little too high for the neighborhood, for
the O no, the HOA, the Homeowners.
Speaker 7 (28:36):
Associe H Dean didn't like rules.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Yeah, a lot of journalists don't like rules. Actually, yeah,
there you go. And I think because we're often trying
to work around to get to the truth of the story.
Uh uh. Professor Schultz, always great to talk with you.
I will watch this movie over the weekend. That's one
of my homework assignments to myself. I get the book,
(29:02):
you go, and we'll have you on again in longer form,
and maybe we'll take some phone calls from people who
remember Jean Shepherd, who again great humorous storyteller and rock contour.
There you got it. Very few like him in the business.
So we'll make an effort and get this get you
back on before Christmas.
Speaker 7 (29:21):
Okay, wonderful, Thanks so much, Dan.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Thanks Professor Quentin Schultz. And again it's Quentin q U
E N t I N easy to spell Quintin Schultz
s c h U l t z E with an
E on the end. Dot Com you'll shoot your eye
out Life lessons from the movie A Christmas Story. I'm
how I missed that movie. I don't know, but I
will corral it by this weekend when we get back.
(29:45):
We have one final guest here in our nine o'clock
hour on Nightside, and we hope that you will stick
with us. We're going to talk about the mental health
benefits of holiday movies with doctor Patrick Porter, coming back
on Nightside.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
You're on night Side with Dan Ray on Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Delighted to be joined by Dr Patrick Porter, an expert
in brain health. Doctor Porter, welcome to Nightside.
Speaker 6 (30:13):
Hey, thanks for having me back.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
You're an author, speaker and founder of a location, a
website called brain Tap. We'll talk about that in a second,
but I think you are going to tell us that
Hollywood movies are for mental health benefits. Experts say, my
favorite Christmas movie is Bad Santa. What does that say
(30:39):
about me? Only kidding, just kidding you.
Speaker 6 (30:42):
Well, you might want to be living out some fantasy
a Christmas time or something.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
My son, who's an adult, loved the movie, and I
have come to appreciate we drive other people crazy by
watching Bad Bad Cent with Billy Billy Bob Thornton. So uh,
let's talk about the legit. We just talked with an
author of a book about the movie a Christmas story
that I'm sure you're familiar with, and I think of
(31:10):
Home Alone and all sorts of you know, Christmas movies.
What is it about Christmas movies that provides us with
I guess some mental health benefits.
Speaker 6 (31:22):
Well, it's nostalgia really, I mean, you're you're thinking about
the past, but you're also longing to be in the past.
They've done neurological studies where they've taken people back and
actually played their same music, put them in cabins like
they're in the nineteen sixties, and they actually could track
to what they call telemera testing that they actually aided
slower and actually aged backwards. So when we're in when
(31:43):
we're experiencing these experience these kind of movies, our brain
goes through basically we're disassociated from all the real stress
and we're able to get into the kind of a
bubble at least for that two hours of the movie.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
That's that's that's very interest. Is this an area that
you have studied or is this an area that you
have just happened to come upon.
Speaker 6 (32:06):
Well, we've been studying the brain and what things happen
to the brain and what causes the brain to stress
or distress for over forty years, and what we find
is that most people don't take enough time to do that,
you know. And the nice thing about the holiday movies
is most we've seen them all before. So maybe we've
seen them even thirty times, forty times, but we still
(32:27):
watch them like Christmas Vacation or whatever the movie is.
Like you said, the Bad Sannah, They've become part of
a ritual and that ritual is releasing to us because
all those other memories, it's like beads on a string.
We're not just having that one memory. We're pulling on
all those other memories, the memories with Graham and Grandpa
and brothers and sisters, when you're still playing and not
(32:49):
worrying about making car payments and house payments and things
like that.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
So, is that what makes that set of movies, the
movies that are perhaps nostalgic ever different from other non
Christmas movies is that it's the sounds to me like
it's the nostalge nostalgia of Christmas, and which was always
such an important holiday to people when they're very young,
(33:15):
when when they they had the ability to believe, they're
no longer cynical. It's probably a better time of life
when one thinks about it.
Speaker 6 (33:27):
One of the one of the worst moments in child's
life is when they find out there is no Santa Claus.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
What you're telling me this all that kind of oh
no way to say, no no ways, you're going too far.
Next thing, you're going to be telling me there's no
tooth theory. Please, doctor Porter. I know you've studied this,
but there are children listening. Remember that.
Speaker 6 (33:45):
Yeah, No, that happens in the brain. The brain has
a cascade of different When you get one new idea
in the brain, neuroscience says you have to rewire the
whole brain. So imagine, up to seventy eight years, you
believed in Santa Claus. You believed there was this guy
running around in to slay all day long. Then then
you realize somebody tells you, it's like my daughter did
to my son. Unfortunately, she said, Alex, there's no Santa Claus,
(34:08):
it's Dady Clause.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Well, there's all there's always one kid. What I found
when my children were young, there was always one kid
who had like a couple of older brothers, and this
kid would be like in the first or second grade,
and he would come in with complete certitude, uh and
and and express his skepticism. I think all of us
as we get older, we realized there are a lot
(34:32):
of Santa Clauses in the world. If you get my
drift y. One of the things that I will never forget.
When our kids were young, and my son was probably
he's going to be embarrassed by this story, six or seven,
and it was kind of you know, on the edge there,
and uh, we had a couple of neighbors who were
(34:55):
always willing to come in through the front door, which
I would leave unlocked, and they would stomp around downstairs
and they would have, you know, bells and stuff. So
you know, from an acoustical audio point of view, it
was pretty good. So it's about eight thirty nine o'clock
at night, and all you have to do is take
your child to a window and stars sparkle, particularly on
(35:16):
a cold winter's night, and normally you can see Santa
Sleigh if you look up at the sparkling stars, and
that is very confirming in the minds of a young
person and particularly powerful. A few minutes later, you happen
to have You're there in the room helping them to
(35:39):
go to sleep, and they they hear Santa downstairs with
the jingling boots. I thought he was going to have
a heart attack at the age of seven.
Speaker 6 (35:52):
Those moments are magical because we have to keep our
mind open to infinite possibilities. If that we have neural
pruning and life just gets terrible. I mean, we have
to have those moments of on wonder. I mean, if
you could wake up every morning like Christmas boarding, or
like yeah, first day at school, or you know that
that something wonderful is going to happen today, Your life
will change in ways you can't even imagine. Well, we're
(36:15):
so beat down with all the stress. So how these
gives us a chance to be that person?
Speaker 2 (36:19):
Well, Professor Brian Green of Columbia, who we've had in
the program, he has a view. He wrote a book
called Parallel Universes, and essentially his argument is if the
concept that infinity exists, in which he believes it exists,
that somewhere out there, far far away, there's a radio
(36:39):
talk show host talking to a the equivalent of doctor Porter.
Someone whose name is doctor Porter. Looks like doctor Porter,
has the same background as doctor Porter. It's a little
bit beyond my intellectual capabilities, but I'm telling you there
are you can check them out. Doctor Brian Green, Columbia University.
Speaker 6 (36:59):
Yeah, that's great. There. Yeah, they're talking about that we
don't we don't render reality. We perceive reality. That's one
of the theories. So there's an infinite number of them,
and we can, depending on our beliefs and background and experiences,
we kind of render the reality that fits us. And
it's kind of scary, but neuroscience is proving that we
render ninety two percent of what we see. Anyway, we don't.
(37:21):
It's not really what we see, it's not really what's
out there. Our brain actually renders it because it's happening
too quickly.
Speaker 2 (37:27):
How did you get this is a fascinating field. I
assume you're in effected neuroscientist? Am I correct that?
Speaker 6 (37:35):
Well, well, I'm a I'm actually a psychologist. But what
happened was when in my early days, we were working
with helping people get out of pain. So we're using biofeedback.
There was no neuro feedback back then. This is in
the eighties, and so we were using skin temperature, respiration,
heart rate, these things that you could measure with the
biological system. And then all of a sudden they came
(37:58):
out with LEDs and we could change change the frequency
because you can you can meditate to a candle. A
lot of people would do that or put candles around
and they relax. The reason that's happening is every cell
of your body has a mirror neuron, and so that
mere neuron is going to match the environment. So the
candles burning a Tenhurst frequency that happens to be alpha.
That's a relaxing state. So that's why you have candles there,
(38:19):
and like when you're praying and things like that just
put you into the mood. It's kind of like music
and puts you into the mood. And then what we
couldn't move the candles, the fireflame we can't change. But
when LED's came out, we could take that flicker effect
they call it frequency following response. And we started noticing
the lab at lights On Research that we could change
the brain. We started a whole industry. Nobody was doing this,
(38:40):
and now we know that we can train the brain,
just like training muscles.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
In a gym.
Speaker 6 (38:44):
We can train the brain using lights on and vibration
and we can regain that youthful brain because our brain
was not designed for the life we're living right now.
This is too stressful for us. And two hundred years ago,
one thousand years, ten thousand years ago, nobody worked past
two o'clock, right.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
I mean you were dealing at that point with with
wild animals and all of that. Different a different type
of stress. Now it's traffic, doctor Patrick Porter. How can
folks either get in touch with you or follow you
a little bit. What's your website. I think there's gonna
be a lot of people gonna want to check it out.
Speaker 6 (39:16):
Yeah, if they go to brain tap dot com, they'll
see there's a free trial there. You just hit to
put your credit card in. But if you don't like it,
if you cancel within the fifteenth day, you will not
be charged. I would I would suggest downloading it, and
when you do that, you actually get a link to
download one of my books called Thrive It Overdrive brain.
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Tap b r A I n t ap dot com. Great,
we'll have you back. I always enjoy talking with you.
Thank you, doctor Peter Porter. Peter, thank you, Patrick Porter.
Excuse me, all right, doctor Patrick Porter a brain tap
dot com. I'm rushing. Whenever I rush, I make mistakes.
That's stress. Thank you, doctor Porter. Have a great night.
(39:55):
Here comes the nine o'clock news. After that, we're going
to talk about girls hockey, subject we've never talked about here,
but it's very important. You'll understand. Why stay with us
if you're a young athlete,
It's nice eyes with Dan Ray. I'm going in lazy
Boston's News radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Got a great idea for everybody to start the weekend.
Just stay right with us here on Friday night from
eight until midnight. We will get you all the way
to the weekend, which is of course Saturday morning. About
minute or two before midnight, we at the next four
hours at less a few minutes here, we've got a
great show lined up. We're going to talk with four
(00:26):
interesting people this Hour're going to talk with me and
I just wrote a book about Johnny Carson. Going to
talk with a former FBI count of Intelligence operative and
national security attorney about the expected release of the Epstein files.
And then we will talk with a professor journalism, professor
Quentin Schultz out of Michigan, who has just written a
(00:48):
book on the movie A Christmas Story, which was written
by Gene Shepherd, a great radio voice for the past.
We'll talk about whether on holiday movies offer mental health benefits.
Doctor Patrick Porter will join us and during the program tonight,
as we work our way, we're going to talk with
(01:09):
a woman who has formed a new high school hockey
opportunity for young girls. Again, you know, we have big
supporters of girls in sports, both at high school and college.
And this is for a lot of girls who want
to play hockey, and there are as many high schools
that have hockey for girls as boys. We'll explain that
(01:31):
unfairness and what's being done directified, and they will talk
with Professor Greg Stoller, Boston University's Question School of Business,
sort of an economic check in bad day on the
stock market, want to talk a little bit about the
Trump tariffs and what they are actually achieving or not achieving.
And then their twentieth hour today, I'm going to ask
you what your favorite what you must watch TV show is?
(01:52):
You know, I want the one that you just make
sure you watch. I have one. It's every Sunday night.
It's called Tracker. I think it's a great show and
I'd like to introduce you to it. But I also
hope some of you might suggest during the twentieth hour
your great show. So now, my name's Dan Rayam, the
host of the show. Rob Brooks, my partner in time,
if you will, is back in the studio. He is
(02:13):
the producer of this program. He'll begin to take your
calls right as the nine o'clock hour after the nine
o'clock News. But first off, let's get to our first
guest this hour. He's an author, Mark Malcoff. Mark has
written a book, Love Johnny Carson, One obsessive fans Journey
to find the Genius behind the legend. Great title, Mark Malcoff, Look,
(02:37):
you yourself have been a comedian, but you have done
really an amazing book on Johnny Carson and the Tonight Show.
And I got to tell you, in these divisive times,
I wish there was another Johnny Carson out there, someone
who we could all end our day with after Night's
side obviously Monday Friday. I don't want any more competition
(03:01):
eleven o'clock hour, But guy like Johnny Carson. Will we
ever see his likes again?
Speaker 3 (03:09):
I don't think you're going to see somebody for thirty
years that dominated late night in the American culture and
just had the influence that this man had, launching everyone
from David Letterman to Jay Leno. You know, I talked
to over four hundred people, even people that I didn't
know what.
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Jimmy Buffett said.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
Mark, You're the first one that's ever asked me about
Johnny Carson. And it was the biggest break of my career.
So it was just a collection of all these stories
of the most influential people that were launched by Carson,
and I just thought it was important to tell the stories,
and it was.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
It's a lost art. What Johnny did? I mean?
Speaker 3 (03:42):
He was still to this day, all the late night
hosts still talking about Johnny. Whenever they do poll's Greatest
Late night Hosts of All Time, it's always Carson. I
don't think we're ever going to see him again in
someone of that magnitude.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
I mean, the Babe Ruth of Date, the late knight
show host. But he didn't start as a late night show.
He started as sort of a game show in New
York City, if I'm not mistaken. But his sidekicking Trent
Man was with him from the beginning. A Boston guy
Ed McMahon, Boston college guy by the way.
Speaker 4 (04:10):
Yeah you know, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 5 (04:13):
They get.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
They were on a game show Who Do You Trust?
On ABC which now is the Helen Hayes Theater, and
they would go to Sarti's in between shows and sometimes.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
Have a little too much to drink.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
But Johnny was a game show host and when you know,
he got offered.
Speaker 4 (04:26):
At the Tonight Show.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
He turns it down because nobody in television wanted the
gig to follow Jack Parrk because he was like the
biggest star, one of the biggest stars in TV. So
Johnny's wife is the one that really talked him into it.
And it took for me a little bit of time
to really win the audience over there like a game
show host. But you know, I got to sit down
with someone like mel Brooks. It was on Johnny's very
(04:47):
first show October first, nineteen sixty two, and just hear
these stories and it was just incredible just to see
that Carson just dominated the television. I mean, by nineteen
eighty he got ownershi of his show, which was unheard of,
and he was twenty five percent of NBC's profits. And
in nineteen sixty nine, the Tiny Tim wedding forty five
(05:09):
million people, second to the Moon landing in terms of
people tuning and in it's unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Well, he broke so many I guess I don't know
barriers he would do something like that. I remember the
tidy Tiam wedding. I mean, he was like this guy
who had no talent at all, but somehow he became
a national phenomenon only because on Johnny Carson Show. Probably
not the only one who you could put in that category.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
Yeah, I mean there were definitely people with strange talents,
and I would talk to him. There was this guy
who was a practicing lawyer in Michigan and he could
play songs with his hands, kind of manipulating his hands
with the air in his hands. And he went on
Johnny five times and he told me that, and I
verify this.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
He was able to quit his job as a as.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
A lawyer in Michigan and make more money in Las
Vegas playing songs with his hands because he went on
Johnny Carson. These are the stories I got, people that
were unknown with quirky talents traveling in the world. There
was that woman, the Potato Chip Lady. She was an
inspector of potato chips in Indiana. Sixty five year old
Myrtle Young goes on Carson Show, Carson and his Brilliance,
(06:19):
and she's showing these different potato chips and objects. Has
ed mcmanthistractor and then he bites down on a chip.
She has a heart attack, almost thinking Carson ate her act,
and Johnny shows that he had his own bowl of
potato chips. Brilliant joke. But my point is she traveled
all over the US and went international because of Carson.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Now, the other thing, which is interesting, we don't script
questions here, so if I ask you a question, you
kind of answered yeah, correct me if I'm wrong. But
when people went on the Johnny Carson Show, they were
going on it for a few dollars. They weren't being
paid a lot of money, but obviously he was launching
the potential to lot's right careers.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
Correct, that's right.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
I mean back in the day when KR since first
ten years in New York, it was three hundred and
twelve dollars something like that.
Speaker 4 (07:04):
It was scale.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I mean people were going for the for the publicity,
for the launch. Someone like a Flip Wilson goes on
Carson is an unknown, Suddenly he has his own show,
he's doing Geraldine and he's winning Emmys. Flip Wilson said,
nobody gave people more if a chance than Carson, and
it was routinely the people would want to go on
with Carson. Sometimes you get guest hosts. It was always
(07:25):
funny like Arnold Palmer, Joe Namath or Lauren Green from Bonanza.
You always wanted it to be Johnny, but you'd have
these people that would try the guest host, like Kirk
Douglas and they couldn't do it. Once in a while
you would get a really good one like Joan Rivers
or McClean Stevenson. But Johnny made it look easy, but
it was far from easy.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Well that's the point. Carson would come out and he'd
just kind of look around and he had that he
wasn't He would deliver the lines so subtly. It was
my recollection. He was a little bit before my time.
I mean I didn't really appreciate, uh, you know, I
was in high school and college and we weren't watching
Johnny crosson to night. But he just came out. He
(08:07):
was himself. That was I think the guest to his success.
Speaker 4 (08:11):
Yes, that was that you're you're right on the money.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
The people that knew him the best, his friends, would
all say that he was It was a small group
of people that really loyal to They said that he
was the same, almost the same person on and off camera,
which went against what the media said. The media said
he's cold and aloof and he has no friends and
you know. They said he was a kind of like
a JB. Sallenger, greta Garbo recluse. In retirement, he went
(08:36):
out with his writers, having lunches. He was out with frenzy.
He played in a poker game for decades up until
he passed away. It was Neil Simon and Steve Martin,
Carl reynerd Chevy Chase, and he loved his poker games.
So yet that was who Carson was.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Wow, and you are young enough that I'm sure he
was retired. How did you get how did you decide?
You spent what a dozen years here, interviewed four hundred people.
I mean, was a this was a truck?
Speaker 6 (09:10):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (09:11):
You know, Dre. How was it that you kind of
either decided or fell into this task?
Speaker 3 (09:18):
My dad got me into Earth Commedy when I was
a kid, like five years old. Kids on the playground
are talking about Mickey Mouse, and I'm talking about Buddy
Hackett and Don Rickles and Jerry Lewis. My dad just
got me into Stanley Kramer's.
Speaker 4 (09:30):
It's a mad, mad mad mad mad band world.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
Jonathan Winners. It was just this different world. But Johnny
Harrison was the party.
Speaker 4 (09:37):
He would do.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
Primetime anniversary shows and I record them on VHS. She
was funny, with kids, with animals, with comedians, with a
list movie stars, and there were just I had so
many questions about what went on behind the scenes, and
there were really these stories that were captured. I figured
I talk to a few people maybe, and just everyone
wanted to tell me the story. I was with the
(09:59):
guy who helped the curtain open for Johnny for twenty years,
and I always wanted wondered what went on behind the
curtain before the show, and I got my answer.
Speaker 4 (10:08):
So those were the stories that I really want to do.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
What was the answer? I'm assuming he just standing to day, relaxing.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
He was smoking a cigarette, telling jokes up until Ed
McMahon said here's Johnny. He'd be just around, joking around.
Because some hosts like David Letterman would need complete silence.
Everyone has a different process, but Letterman. But Carson would
be smoking one of his pall malls, who would smoke
two packs a day, unfiltered pall malls. That did him
in unfortunately the emphysema. But yeah, he would he was.
(10:36):
That was him before the show.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Just you mention Buddy Hackett. One story about Buddy Hackett,
He's playing golf, hits a golf ball into the woods,
strips naked, comes running out of the woods holding his
golf club, screaming Locus Locus.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Buddy Hackett was one of the best. There were certain
people that they would do pre interviews, but they would
throw them out, like Buddy Hackett, Wrickles, Steve Lawrence was
another one where they just never would get to the
pre interview because these guys were so funny and such
a good report with Johnny and and surprise is what happened?
Like really crazy things would happen. The show would go
(11:12):
off the rails with Burt Reynolds or Dom deubloids. That
stuff doesn't happen anymore.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Question Mark the big question. I realist. I'm having so
much fun. I'm running out of time. Actually, I've run
out of time. I've had so much froulem with you.
How can they get the book Amazon?
Speaker 3 (11:24):
I'm sure, right, right, that's right, Amazon, Barnes Andnoble dot Com.
I did the audiobook on over five days Audible. If
you love Johnny Carson, if you want to know what
was it like behind the scenes and Carson from his
friends and the people that worked for him.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
This is the book, Malcoff, Thank you so much. I
really indetted to do me some night. We'll have you
back when you and hour and take phone calls and
we can spend more time talking about Johnny Cars and
be honored.
Speaker 4 (11:49):
I really like that. Thank you. Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas,
whatever you celebrate.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
I'm a Christmas guy. What do you do you celebrate?
Speaker 3 (11:56):
I celebrate Christmas, Christmas, Christmas.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Thanks. All right, coming back on the other side of
the right, here got Eric O'Neil what we should expect
for the release of the Epstein Epstein files. Back on
Nightside with former FBI counterintelligence operative Eric O'Neill.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
It's night Side with Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Delighted to be joined by Eric O'Neill, former FBI counterintelligence
operative national security attorney.
Speaker 6 (12:25):
Eric.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Welcome to Nightside. How are you, sir, Dan.
Speaker 5 (12:28):
I'm doing well. It's good to be back on.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
Nice to talk with you again. So there's been so
much smoke and speculation about the Epstein files. As I'm
sure you know, there were nineteen photographs released today. I
don't know what they showed other than the fact that
Epstein knew a lot of people. What do you think
will be at the end of the road where the
(12:54):
Epstein files have been basically digested by.
Speaker 5 (12:58):
Everyone you know looking at this case, and you know,
and what's going to eventually come in And I think
it's just seven days from now should be the first
release or requests perhaps from the DJ for more time.
It's not what we'll see. I think it's what we
won't see. I think the story of this will be
and what is we adapted and not released, because that
(13:20):
will show that there are additional ongoing investigations. And that's
what I'm really keen to see. Whether the DOJ and
FBI is pursuing other people, the people that actually trafficked
or harmed some of these young girls in this devastating case.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, now statutal limitations, has a lot of that been
told at this point, meaning you know that they that
they have stopped the statute from running.
Speaker 5 (13:47):
So no, because some of these cases, if it's a
sexual assault case, depending on the jurisdiction, and much of
this is in New York, would not be told by
that because of their particular laws. So there could be
additional criminal cases, for example, brought in New York for
some of this, But what will be really interesting is
(14:08):
to see, you know, not only the information in those files,
but the DJ has also gone to grand jury. The
judges in three separate sports, two in New York and
one in Florida to ask that the grand jury records
the information behind that has been unfiled, and all three
(14:30):
judges to sign the orders to allow to be unfiled.
So we don't normally see grand jury testimony that's almost
never revealed, and and here it will be.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
So my question is this the allegations against Epstein, and
some of them have been proven, some of them have
not been proven, was that he provided underage girls to
some of his friends, some of his influential friends, up
to and including flying people to so called Lolita Island.
(15:08):
I would assume that if there was some records of
that at this point, that people would have been indicted
forgetting on an airplane knowing that they were traveling with
young girls to Lolita Island and they were going to
have their way with the young girls. Whether the young
girls did it consensual, they were all they seem a
(15:31):
lot of them are underage. What has caught what has
prevented some indictments from coming out because I got to
assume that a lot of this information, flight logs, et cetera.
People know who was on these planes, and were there
young girls either on the plane or on so called
Epstein's island?
Speaker 5 (15:53):
Right, Well, that is the one hundred million dollar question,
and that is the question that has led to countless
conspiracy theory as to why only Epstein and Glenne Maxwell
his associate were prop touted. You know, either there's no
information in there that points to any individual, or this
is one of the most bizarre cover ups between two
(16:17):
different administrations. Because remember this that started and Biden has
continued into Trump and I think I don't agree on anything.
So either we're going to see that there are ongoing
investigations and these have been happening and the FBI has
been pursuing them and not talking about them because that's
proper when you're investigating, or nothing, and I would be
(16:38):
very surprised to see nothing.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
Again. I don't want to put you on the spot here,
but do you think that the people who are at
greatest risk are people who were merely prominent individuals or
prominent individuals who have held high elective office.
Speaker 5 (17:00):
Why who asked the question that way right exactly.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
I'm not asking you Eric the name names of speculate.
I'm just saying two categories prominent people and people can
figure out who that is, or people who have very
high elective office.
Speaker 5 (17:17):
Yes, I think that those individuals who are going to
have the most scrutiny or whose names are going to
show up, are all going to be prominent individuals who
have influence because what Epstein was essentially was an influenced tedler.
He made a lot of money, but they're getting very
close to people in power, whether it was in business
or industry or government, and in using that influence in
(17:41):
order to make deals. And part of that apparently was
flying them to his island. You know, what's been called
the Lalita Islands. What's caused a lot of people at
quite a bit of concern and what something that I'm
going to be very interested to learn once the story.
Testimony is unsealed in the Florida case to Epstein was
(18:07):
they perceive him for sex trafficking underage girls, but he
was allowed guilty to escape solicitation charges and involving a
single underage girl, a single underage victim, and then got
a secret non prostitution agreement with the federal government. That's
what's led to the numerous conspiracy or so I'd like
to really see behind what led to the government's decision
(18:31):
just to charge them with that one count and let
them off on other things.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
What was the date of that agreement do you recall?
Speaker 5 (18:38):
I don't recall. This was prior to twenty nineteen, and
then I remember he was also all of that information
was available to federal prosecutors in New York who charged
Epstein with sex trafficking in twenty nineteen, which was a
much stronger case, and much of those underlying materials most
(19:00):
likely emerged over New York. To then the sentence, he
was bought up on civil suits by many of his victims,
and at that point I think he decided to just
take his life because it was looking pretty grim for him.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
Okay, last question, Lolita Island, which I keep hearing reference to,
was that in the Bahamas?
Speaker 5 (19:21):
What jurisdiction was that, you know, I don't exactly know
where that island was, Yes, I couldn't tell you, but
I'm sure he placed it somewhere that had extra jurisdictionally
reached from.
Speaker 4 (19:35):
The United States.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Did or did not have.
Speaker 5 (19:40):
I don't know the answer.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
No.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
What I'm saying is, if he was that smart, he
would have tried to pick an island, which was Yes.
Speaker 5 (19:45):
He would have tried, didn't have You certainly wouldn't have
had it in any territory of the United States.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Where was that Ryan producer Little Saint James. I know,
but that's not a country, right, so we'll get that information.
I should have had that information for this interview, and
I apologize for that. Eric O'Neil for FBI Counterintelligence Operative
National Security Attorney. Have you, I know you've done a
lot of interviews on this. Have you written a book
on this? Tell us what so something people can get
(20:17):
in touch with you if they have information? What is
the benefit of talking with us tonight?
Speaker 5 (20:24):
Yeah, Dan, I haven't written a book on the Epstein tasee.
I think if there will be many books on it,
especially after this next dump of information, which should be
the largest dump of information comes out. I have written
a book called Spysfis and cyber Crime, which is a
pretty thrilling book about how you can protect yourself from
the growing trend of cyber crime, which reads like a
(20:48):
spy knowledge novel, and will teach you counter intelligence tactics
I learned at the FBI.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Okay, that is okay. The Little Saint James, which is
lowly the island is in the United States Virgin Islands,
so it's a territory in the States.
Speaker 6 (21:07):
So and.
Speaker 5 (21:10):
There, yeah, yeah, and and kind that took place there,
you could be possibly be. I don't think it would
really matter. If the victim is a is a United
States citizen. Then many of the young girls, all of
whom who would be taken to that island and they
can't give consent that they're underage.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
Sure, okay, so it is it's part of the Virgin
Island US Virgin Islands. Look that one pretty quickly. Eric,
thank you very much. Nice to uh, nice to talk
with you. We'll keep you posted. We'll have you back
as as developments. Courth thank you, sir good always.
Speaker 5 (21:44):
Good to tuck down and seven bootes. We're going to
learn a lot more than we know now, all right.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
I suspect we'll be having you one shortly after that
knowledge bubbles up to the surface. Thanks again, Eric. When
we get back, when we talk with Professor Quentin Schultz,
a retired journalism professor who who worked with the great
humorist Jeene Shepherd. Actually they co talked together. But Geene
Shepherd has written a movie that I have never seen.
(22:09):
It's called A Christmas Story. I mentioned it today to Marita,
our producer, and she says, oh, Christmas Story. I love
that movie. So we'll be talked with Professor Schultz right
after the news break at the bottom of the hour.
Speaker 4 (22:23):
It's Nice.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
I'm delighted to be joined by Professor Quentin Schultz of Michigan.
Professor Schultz, how are you tonight?
Speaker 7 (22:36):
Just great and call me Quenton. By the way, you
like this. As a Latin school guy, I got the
name Quentin Latin. I was a fifth to one in
the family.
Speaker 2 (22:44):
WHOA that's a great that is a great name. I
have a great friend, former State Treasurer of the Comwealth
of Massachusetts, Robert Quenton Crane. So you're the second Quentin
that I know, maybe more along the way. So you
have written a book which is about the movie. You'll
(23:05):
shoot your eye out life lessons from the movie A
Christmas Story. I intend to watch A Christmas Story this weekend.
I probably am the only person in this audience who
has never seen a Christmas story. I mentioned it to
my thirty year old producer today, Marita, and she was like,
over the Moon, Oh my god, I love that movie.
(23:26):
That's her favorite movie and her husband's favorite movie. Written
by Jeane Shepherd, who is someone who you co taught
some classes with in college and also a great storyteller,
rack On Tour whatever you like to call him. Tell
us about the movie for those few of us who
(23:46):
haven't watched the Christmas movie, and I will correct that
deficiency this weekend. About the life lessons, some of the
life lessons that are wrapped in this movie that has
been around now for almost fifty years.
Speaker 7 (24:01):
Yeah. Great, Dan, So good to be on with you. Well,
here's the deal. I was a communication professor back in
the late seventies early eighties. I had listened to Gene
Shepherd on the radio in New York from Chicago late
at night, just like I can pick you up at night.
And he was a fantastic storyteller. And I was a
new professor, and I wanted to learn storytelling. And I
(24:23):
was also a Ham radio operator and Gene Sheppard was
a Ham radio operator. I looked him up in the
FCC database, sent him a note and said, I want
to learn storytelling from one of the best. And he
was rather stunned to gell a letter from a professor,
But at any rate, we formed the friendship. We co
taught storytelling together and we went through most of his
(24:43):
stories across many different media. A Christmas Story the movie
is made up of a number of different stories that
he had written for a publication in different places, from
Playboy magazine to a book that he came out with
in other places. It's all about a kid he wants
a Red Rider BB rifle for Christmas, and Jeane Shepherd
(25:04):
told stories in order to get across his view of life,
his worldview. He had a whole philosophy of life, and
it came through and everything. Once I learned that about him,
that really what he was doing is telling parables, I thought,
this is stunning. I had no idea. I knew his
stories were funny, but when he would tell me something
like this, he'd save me. One day he called me Quinn.
(25:25):
He said, hey, Quinn, you know that leg lamp, that
famous leg lamp in the movie.
Speaker 5 (25:30):
I said yeah.
Speaker 7 (25:31):
He said, well, you know that's a trophy wife. I said, what,
It's a trophy wife. He says, yeah, he said, he
said men men are that way. Men fall in love
with things. And if it's not a woman, it'll be
something else. It'll be a car. The old man loves cars,
and he loves a variety of things. And Ralphie falls
in love with this rifle that he has to have,
(25:52):
and he said, men get obsessed with these things. So
the old man wins this award. It's a major award.
He says, it's a leg lamp, you know, not worth anything.
And he brings it home and right away Mom can
tell that he's in love with this thing, and he
wants to put it in the front window to turn
on the neighborhood. And so she's got to figure out
a way to break this thing, and she does it.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
Not the affairs, I think the book he wrote it
was like Eve weeding the garden.
Speaker 7 (26:24):
Yeah, yeah, very few people know this, but Gene used
all kinds of biblical motifs too, And so what he
did is Mom has these plants that she's growing in
the front window. Uh, you know, and a lot of
people like to grow plants indoors and all just great.
And so when the character the old Man takes the
(26:45):
lamp out of the crate to set it up and
turn it on in the front window. He puts this
totally unnatural thing and this idol that he's fallen in
love with, he puts it right in the front window,
right among the plants, so he's secretive the garden of
Eden that the mom is growing there. This is the
way Gene thought about all of his stories, these deeper meanings.
(27:08):
And so what I did with the book was to
write a book for people who love the movie, who
are going to be blown away by all of these
things that they they'll see it. Once they see the
movie again, after they've read my book, they're going to say,
I can't believe it.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Well. My understanding is the books available as most books
out to Amazon, but you also have a website which
you can direct people to as.
Speaker 4 (27:29):
I just yeah, let me let me do it the
easy way.
Speaker 7 (27:33):
Sure, I've it's the easy way, just for for you tonight.
I put it right on my main website. If they
want to get the book for me and they want
it signed, I can sign it for a friend of
theirs and say, you know, uh, don't shoot your eye
out or whatever. It's just Quentin Schultz q U E
n t I N q u e n t I
n Schultz Schultz has an E on the end. It's
(27:56):
s c h u l t z E c h
u l t z E Quintin Schultz dot com. And
I put a link down there a few hours ago,
and you can order a book for no more than
what you would pay on Amazon, and it'll come shipping
free and I'll sign it anyway you want and fantastic
Christmas present.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
That'd be great. It was interesting you said that Shepard
was a ham radio operator. I guess he got into
a little bit of trouble. He was living what on
Santa Bell Island down in Florida, off the coast of Florida. Yeah,
Santanna was a little too high for the neighborhood, for
the O no, the HOA, the Homeowners.
Speaker 7 (28:36):
Associe H Dean didn't like rules.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Yeah, a lot of journalists don't like rules. Actually, yeah,
there you go. And I think because we're often trying
to work around to get to the truth of the story.
Uh uh. Professor Schultz, always great to talk with you.
I will watch this movie over the weekend. That's one
of my homework assignments to myself. I get the book,
(29:02):
you go, and we'll have you on again in longer form,
and maybe we'll take some phone calls from people who
remember Jean Shepherd, who again great humorous storyteller and rock contour.
There you got it. Very few like him in the business.
So we'll make an effort and get this get you
back on before Christmas.
Speaker 7 (29:21):
Okay, wonderful, Thanks so much, Dan.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Thanks Professor Quentin Schultz. And again it's Quentin q U
E N t I N easy to spell Quintin Schultz
s c h U l t z E with an
E on the end. Dot Com you'll shoot your eye
out Life lessons from the movie A Christmas Story. I'm
how I missed that movie. I don't know, but I
will corral it by this weekend when we get back.
(29:45):
We have one final guest here in our nine o'clock
hour on Nightside, and we hope that you will stick
with us. We're going to talk about the mental health
benefits of holiday movies with doctor Patrick Porter, coming back
on Nightside.
Speaker 1 (30:00):
You're on night Side with Dan Ray on Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Delighted to be joined by Dr Patrick Porter, an expert
in brain health. Doctor Porter, welcome to Nightside.
Speaker 6 (30:13):
Hey, thanks for having me back.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
You're an author, speaker and founder of a location, a
website called brain Tap. We'll talk about that in a second,
but I think you are going to tell us that
Hollywood movies are for mental health benefits. Experts say, my
favorite Christmas movie is Bad Santa. What does that say
(30:39):
about me? Only kidding, just kidding you.
Speaker 6 (30:42):
Well, you might want to be living out some fantasy
a Christmas time or something.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
My son, who's an adult, loved the movie, and I
have come to appreciate we drive other people crazy by
watching Bad Bad Cent with Billy Billy Bob Thornton. So uh,
let's talk about the legit. We just talked with an
author of a book about the movie a Christmas story
that I'm sure you're familiar with, and I think of
(31:10):
Home Alone and all sorts of you know, Christmas movies.
What is it about Christmas movies that provides us with
I guess some mental health benefits.
Speaker 6 (31:22):
Well, it's nostalgia really, I mean, you're you're thinking about
the past, but you're also longing to be in the past.
They've done neurological studies where they've taken people back and
actually played their same music, put them in cabins like
they're in the nineteen sixties, and they actually could track
to what they call telemera testing that they actually aided
slower and actually aged backwards. So when we're in when
(31:43):
we're experiencing these experience these kind of movies, our brain
goes through basically we're disassociated from all the real stress
and we're able to get into the kind of a
bubble at least for that two hours of the movie.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
That's that's that's very interest. Is this an area that
you have studied or is this an area that you
have just happened to come upon.
Speaker 6 (32:06):
Well, we've been studying the brain and what things happen
to the brain and what causes the brain to stress
or distress for over forty years, and what we find
is that most people don't take enough time to do that,
you know. And the nice thing about the holiday movies
is most we've seen them all before. So maybe we've
seen them even thirty times, forty times, but we still
(32:27):
watch them like Christmas Vacation or whatever the movie is.
Like you said, the Bad Sannah, They've become part of
a ritual and that ritual is releasing to us because
all those other memories, it's like beads on a string.
We're not just having that one memory. We're pulling on
all those other memories, the memories with Graham and Grandpa
and brothers and sisters, when you're still playing and not
(32:49):
worrying about making car payments and house payments and things
like that.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
So, is that what makes that set of movies, the
movies that are perhaps nostalgic ever different from other non
Christmas movies is that it's the sounds to me like
it's the nostalge nostalgia of Christmas, and which was always
such an important holiday to people when they're very young,
(33:15):
when when they they had the ability to believe, they're
no longer cynical. It's probably a better time of life
when one thinks about it.
Speaker 6 (33:27):
One of the one of the worst moments in child's
life is when they find out there is no Santa Claus.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
What you're telling me this all that kind of oh
no way to say, no no ways, you're going too far.
Next thing, you're going to be telling me there's no
tooth theory. Please, doctor Porter. I know you've studied this,
but there are children listening. Remember that.
Speaker 6 (33:45):
Yeah, No, that happens in the brain. The brain has
a cascade of different When you get one new idea
in the brain, neuroscience says you have to rewire the
whole brain. So imagine, up to seventy eight years, you
believed in Santa Claus. You believed there was this guy
running around in to slay all day long. Then then
you realize somebody tells you, it's like my daughter did
to my son. Unfortunately, she said, Alex, there's no Santa Claus,
(34:08):
it's Dady Clause.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Well, there's all there's always one kid. What I found
when my children were young, there was always one kid
who had like a couple of older brothers, and this
kid would be like in the first or second grade,
and he would come in with complete certitude, uh and
and and express his skepticism. I think all of us
as we get older, we realized there are a lot
(34:32):
of Santa Clauses in the world. If you get my
drift y. One of the things that I will never forget.
When our kids were young, and my son was probably
he's going to be embarrassed by this story, six or seven,
and it was kind of you know, on the edge there,
and uh, we had a couple of neighbors who were
(34:55):
always willing to come in through the front door, which
I would leave unlocked, and they would stomp around downstairs
and they would have, you know, bells and stuff. So
you know, from an acoustical audio point of view, it
was pretty good. So it's about eight thirty nine o'clock
at night, and all you have to do is take
your child to a window and stars sparkle, particularly on
(35:16):
a cold winter's night, and normally you can see Santa
Sleigh if you look up at the sparkling stars, and
that is very confirming in the minds of a young
person and particularly powerful. A few minutes later, you happen
to have You're there in the room helping them to
(35:39):
go to sleep, and they they hear Santa downstairs with
the jingling boots. I thought he was going to have
a heart attack at the age of seven.
Speaker 6 (35:52):
Those moments are magical because we have to keep our
mind open to infinite possibilities. If that we have neural
pruning and life just gets terrible. I mean, we have
to have those moments of on wonder. I mean, if
you could wake up every morning like Christmas boarding, or
like yeah, first day at school, or you know that
that something wonderful is going to happen today, Your life
will change in ways you can't even imagine. Well, we're
(36:15):
so beat down with all the stress. So how these
gives us a chance to be that person?
Speaker 2 (36:19):
Well, Professor Brian Green of Columbia, who we've had in
the program, he has a view. He wrote a book
called Parallel Universes, and essentially his argument is if the
concept that infinity exists, in which he believes it exists,
that somewhere out there, far far away, there's a radio
(36:39):
talk show host talking to a the equivalent of doctor Porter.
Someone whose name is doctor Porter. Looks like doctor Porter,
has the same background as doctor Porter. It's a little
bit beyond my intellectual capabilities, but I'm telling you there
are you can check them out. Doctor Brian Green, Columbia University.
Speaker 6 (36:59):
Yeah, that's great. There. Yeah, they're talking about that we
don't we don't render reality. We perceive reality. That's one
of the theories. So there's an infinite number of them,
and we can, depending on our beliefs and background and experiences,
we kind of render the reality that fits us. And
it's kind of scary, but neuroscience is proving that we
render ninety two percent of what we see. Anyway, we don't.
(37:21):
It's not really what we see, it's not really what's
out there. Our brain actually renders it because it's happening
too quickly.
Speaker 2 (37:27):
How did you get this is a fascinating field. I
assume you're in effected neuroscientist? Am I correct that?
Speaker 6 (37:35):
Well, well, I'm a I'm actually a psychologist. But what
happened was when in my early days, we were working
with helping people get out of pain. So we're using biofeedback.
There was no neuro feedback back then. This is in
the eighties, and so we were using skin temperature, respiration,
heart rate, these things that you could measure with the
biological system. And then all of a sudden they came
(37:58):
out with LEDs and we could change change the frequency
because you can you can meditate to a candle. A
lot of people would do that or put candles around
and they relax. The reason that's happening is every cell
of your body has a mirror neuron, and so that
mere neuron is going to match the environment. So the
candles burning a Tenhurst frequency that happens to be alpha.
That's a relaxing state. So that's why you have candles there,
(38:19):
and like when you're praying and things like that just
put you into the mood. It's kind of like music
and puts you into the mood. And then what we
couldn't move the candles, the fireflame we can't change. But
when LED's came out, we could take that flicker effect
they call it frequency following response. And we started noticing
the lab at lights On Research that we could change
the brain. We started a whole industry. Nobody was doing this,
(38:40):
and now we know that we can train the brain,
just like training muscles.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
In a gym.
Speaker 6 (38:44):
We can train the brain using lights on and vibration
and we can regain that youthful brain because our brain
was not designed for the life we're living right now.
This is too stressful for us. And two hundred years ago,
one thousand years, ten thousand years ago, nobody worked past
two o'clock, right.
Speaker 2 (39:00):
I mean you were dealing at that point with with
wild animals and all of that. Different a different type
of stress. Now it's traffic, doctor Patrick Porter. How can
folks either get in touch with you or follow you
a little bit. What's your website. I think there's gonna
be a lot of people gonna want to check it out.
Speaker 6 (39:16):
Yeah, if they go to brain tap dot com, they'll
see there's a free trial there. You just hit to
put your credit card in. But if you don't like it,
if you cancel within the fifteenth day, you will not
be charged. I would I would suggest downloading it, and
when you do that, you actually get a link to
download one of my books called Thrive It Overdrive brain.
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Tap b r A I n t ap dot com. Great,
we'll have you back. I always enjoy talking with you.
Thank you, doctor Peter Porter. Peter, thank you, Patrick Porter.
Excuse me, all right, doctor Patrick Porter a brain tap
dot com. I'm rushing. Whenever I rush, I make mistakes.
That's stress. Thank you, doctor Porter. Have a great night.
(39:55):
Here comes the nine o'clock news. After that, we're going
to talk about girls hockey, subject we've never talked about here,
but it's very important. You'll understand. Why stay with us
if you're a young athlete,
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