June 16, 2025 • 64 mins
Before you assume that the MVP quarterback moonlighted on Boy Meets World, let’s clear things up - this week we’re talking to a very different Steve Young. And believe it or not, he’s not even the only TV writer named Steve Young!
This Steve wrote season 2’s “I Am Not a Crook” and season 4’s “Uncle Daddy,” two fan favorite episodes that stood out during our podcast rewatch.
Steve was on set for his first episode and reveals what happened to Danielle when she kept flubbing a line…and she doesn’t remember it at all.
Plus, Steve shares stories from his life as a comedy club owner, and the full-circle moment of going from booking Jay Leno…to writing for him!
We’re going for a comedy touchdown on this week’s Pod Meets World!
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
I went to soccer games.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
What sports professional professional like MLS.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Get this my third LAFC game. Three soccer games. Yeah,
it was. It was super fun. Like soccer is the
only sport that I really enjoy watching. I don't keep
up with it, but I do enjoy watching it. And
I guess it's maybe because I played it as a kid.
You know, up until I was like, up until Boyne's World,
like twelve or thirteen, I played soccer every year. My
(00:48):
parents actually coached my team and stuff, so I was
really into it. But yeah, so I saw about like
two years ago, a friend invited me to an LAFC game,
and it was so much fun. They have like a
whole cheering section which is basically like a permanent dance
party going on. They never stop moving there, and they're
(01:09):
drumming and they're chanting. They never stopped moving the whole game,
and it keeps the audience's energy up so high. And
the stadium where LAFC plays is it's very small, like
compared to most stadiums, so you can no matter where
you're sitting, you can see their players' faces in the game. Yeah,
so so yeah, So a friend took me a couple
(01:30):
of years ago, and then I took some friends after
that and then yeah, I had friends in from out
of town and their kids love soccer and they play
all the time.
Speaker 4 (01:40):
So we were like, let's go to l A f C.
What does l a FC stand for?
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Sorry, La Football Club Los Angele Football Club.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
So it's a team, it's an MLS team, and they're great.
They're really good. They're like probably one of the best
in the MLS. I think, I'm told. But anyway, it
was so, it was, Yeah, it was super fun. India
was not into it, still still not into sports. Yeah,
so I was like, maybe maybe you'll get into soccer. No, no,
but you know, I guess he just takes after me.
(02:07):
But yeah, it was. It was super fun. So I
went to a sport a sports ball event. Wow, that's
really great again, Yeah, do you.
Speaker 5 (02:13):
Stand in the cheering section? Are you part of the
cheering section?
Speaker 1 (02:16):
No?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Know, how you get in that? I mean they're like
they're all wearing like yeah, no, they like know these chants,
they have all these rituals and they're like so into it,
and but god, I would be exhausted. They're like for
ninety minutes, they're dancing the entire time, like you know, everybody,
it was. It's really fun. It's a great one. It
was a draw. Yeah, it was a really exciting game.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Like why they got to play for ninety minutes to
go and nothing happened and nothing happened in ninety minutes.
Speaker 4 (02:45):
It's like, what the hell was the point of that?
Speaker 2 (02:47):
It should be like quidditch, just play until somebody scores.
Speaker 4 (02:50):
If it takes a month, it takes a month.
Speaker 5 (02:51):
It looks like that LAFC might be in the eighth
team like out of nine noe. So what does that
mean like ratings? Yeah, like where they following the raidings?
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (03:05):
Ok, no, it looks like it looks like Vancouver is
in first place, Portland second, third is Austin, fourth, Minnesota fifth,
Colorado FC, Dallas is sixth, San Diego seventh, LA FC eighth, ninth, Seattle, ten,
Salt Lake, eleven, San Jose, twelve, Saint Louis, thirteen, Houston,
fourteen Sporting CAC and fifteen the LA Galaxy.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
So no East Coast teams, Well, those.
Speaker 5 (03:30):
That's the Western Conference in dot you got in the
Eastern Conference.
Speaker 4 (03:34):
Okay, so there are there's.
Speaker 5 (03:35):
Yeah, and I guess I don't know about, like how like.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
The see this has when my eyes start lacing over
and I go, I don't have time for sports because
now I would have to like investing keeping track of
the stats and who's traded for what. And I'm like, Nope,
too much time, too much mental energy.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
No.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Yeah, but going to a Gabe showing up and watching
them kick the ball around super fun. I had a
good time.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
They're also incredible athletes.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
I mean I I joke that you nothing happens in
ninety minutes, but they run essentially for an hour and
a half.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Yeah, it's crazy to watch. It really is crazy to watch.
Speaker 5 (04:07):
We went to a King's playoff game, King's hockey game.
I got to I got to bang the drum. So
at the end of every period.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Wait, wait a minute, wait, like what do you mean
what is banging the.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
Drum the end of every period or at the so
I think they do it before the game too, So
before the game and after every period there's a big
drum and somebody gets to bang the drum, going, go Kings, go,
and to get the whole crowd fired up.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
And you got selected because your topanga. Of course, of course,
because ever go.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
To anything and have a normal experience. She goes to concerts,
She's on stage within thirty seconds exactly.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
I was playing drums for Rolling Stone this weekend.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Just picked up the guitar and jam to the sphere and.
Speaker 5 (04:59):
It was It was a lot of fun. Mostly it
was fun because Adler was very excited about going with
me to bang the drum. And my kids then were like,
why do you get to be on the big TV?
Why can't be on the big question?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
I've been asking since two thousands.
Speaker 5 (05:23):
My kids had so much fun. Adler is such an
athlete and such a jock. He doesn't care what the
sport is. He's just in it and he wants to
know all about it. What are they doing now? And
why are they doing that? And so what's that? What's
a power play? And why is he in there? And
like we taught him about time out, the timeout and
the penalty box and uh, and he just sits there
the whole time, watching the entire entire thing. It got
(05:45):
to be pretty late and I was like, you know,
we have to go, and he was really bombed. He
didn't want to go, but it's a school night and
I'm like, you can't be out until eleven New Yours,
not even six.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
It's such a change, though, from when he used to
bring in places and he like even sporting events, where
he was like, it's seven thirty, we gotta go.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
We gotta go.
Speaker 5 (06:02):
Is it getting dark?
Speaker 4 (06:03):
I need to go now.
Speaker 5 (06:04):
Now he thinks he's like real mister independent and he
didn't want to leave. But we got home. The game
still wasn't over, and I woke him up the next
morning for school and he went did the Kings win?
Speaker 4 (06:15):
Just immediately needed to know.
Speaker 5 (06:17):
It was so much fun.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
So you guys had fun at sporting events. I had
like the best sandwich that was great?
Speaker 5 (06:24):
Where from?
Speaker 4 (06:25):
Oh I made it? Okay, okay, I wasn't gonna leave.
Speaker 5 (06:28):
What was in it?
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Peanut butter and jelly, no complicated ham, A little bit of.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
Ham from new hot honey, uh swojo. We got it,
We got it, We got Is he not the best,
it's the greatest.
Speaker 5 (06:41):
It's it's incredible, the hot honey sour dough.
Speaker 4 (06:44):
Yeah that was my night. So okay, pretty happy, good for.
Speaker 5 (06:48):
You, Pretty happy. Welcome to pod meets World.
Speaker 4 (06:50):
I'm Daniel Fishel, I'm right or Strong, and I'm Wilford.
Speaker 5 (06:53):
Doe Oh, Welcome to today's episode. We are very excited
about our guest today. One of the more confusing parts
for us while recapping the show so intensely weak after
(07:15):
week has been the surprising string of additions and subtractions
from the writer's room in the later seasons, a musical
chairs of sorts. And because of this, we've heard a
bunch of names we don't remember, forcing even Will to admit, uh, nope,
can't place him, which is very hard to do. Before
the podcast, we would have thought we knew everyone who
(07:36):
wrote an episode, but now we know we are wrong,
which happens a lot like when we didn't remember that
episode that Love is Blind guy stole his quote from
We Got Your Many Many Emails. We have already recapped
that episode back in season three, so.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
We got to the podcast.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Weirdcast every week will just be us listening.
Speaker 5 (08:05):
To and then god, I think it was season three
episode one, and okay, so the trainy episode movie Theater
I'm Exploding your Head part five, that's that's season.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
Three episode one.
Speaker 5 (08:17):
Yeah, wow, jeez, there we go.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
Get the big brain on, Brad, you know you.
Speaker 5 (08:23):
Know, Okay, Well, enough of that. This week we are
introduced or maybe reintroduced to a writer with two very
important scripts to his name, season two's I Am Not
a Crook and season four's Uncle Daddy. He started his
career in the world of stand up comedy, surrounded by
some of the biggest names in the field, and then
(08:44):
transitioned into TV, writing not only for Boy Meets World,
but Sybil, Smart Guy and Michael Jacob's less known title.
Maybe this time he'd also end Jay Leno's Tonight Show
Writer's Room, a gig suited for his on stage experience,
all as he was still also performing stand up and
even owning his own legendary club in Philadelphia where he
(09:04):
booked some of the biggest legends to ever tell a joke.
The former professor and radio host also now finds time
to be an author, releasing a handful of books, including
his newest, a meta novel about Larry David with a
main character apparently different than the Larry David we all know. Okay,
that's just one of the things we need him to
(09:24):
explain the other. Why do we only kind of remember you?
He may not have ever won a super Bowl, but
today he's our Pod meets World MVP. It's time to
talk to Steve Young.
Speaker 4 (09:38):
I can't wait to talk h about the Super Bowl.
Speaker 5 (09:40):
I know he's gonna love him.
Speaker 4 (09:42):
Amazing Number eight, number eight.
Speaker 5 (09:44):
I did hear that? He there's another writer named Steve
Young and their checks used to get crossed. Oh my god,
I want to ask him about that. I want to know.
Did you ever you know, wouldn't it be great to
get your checks mixed up with Steve Young?
Speaker 4 (09:58):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (09:59):
The quarterback?
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Yeah, well it wasn't Steve Young the quarterback.
Speaker 5 (10:03):
Darn it. I know you said it was Steve. I
listened to another podcast you did, and I heard that
story and I thought, Man, if only it could have
gotten mixed up with the quarterback.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
Huh, yeah it was. It was Steve Young who wrote
for Letterman and I wrote for Leno, and so it
got switched a lot, and hid, believe me, I would
rather have his checks.
Speaker 5 (10:26):
Oh how are you?
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Oh, I'm wonderful. I just took my mother to breakfast
and I couldn't get back to my place fast enough,
So I'm now at my lovely daughter's house doing this.
And right away, by the way, you would know the
name of my daughter if you watched any of the
shows I wrote, because anytime you brought on a character
(10:53):
who is not a regular cast character, I named them
after my kids.
Speaker 5 (10:58):
Tell us your kids' names Kelly.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
And Casey, until Bob Young, the executive news here at
the time, said stop, you cannot dan for your kids.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
That's right, Uncle Daddy. Wasn't her name? Her name was Kelly,
wasn't it? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (11:17):
And Kelly is here today.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Oh that's so cool.
Speaker 5 (11:23):
Okay, well, thank you so much for joining us. We
are collecting Boy Meets World writers like Pokemon, so you
got to catch them all first. Let's get a little
into your origin story. How did you find yourself doing
stand up?
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Oh? Stand up? I can't. I couldn't do anything else,
I mean really, yeah, that was it. I started actually
when I was twenty twenty one standing in line at
the troupe door. That was the only place you could
(11:59):
do comedy at that time. And later on, when I
there was no comedy club, I came back to Philadelphia
and there were no comedy clubs, but there was a
group of people who were doing comedy, me included, and
I was the only one that could wear a three
piece suit and talk, and so I opened up a
(12:22):
club where actually I met Bob Young and Bob Meyer,
and I ended up managing them at the time, and
we all did stand up for years at that club.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
What was the name of the club?
Speaker 5 (12:36):
Tell us tell us.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
About the club, the Comedy Works. It ran from about
eighty to ninety three, and we were fortunate enough we
came out at the time where I could book on
a weekly basis. Leno, Jim Carrey, signed Felt, Eddie Murphy,
I mean, everybody who they were, the young Gun. Yeah,
(12:59):
and at the time, although I will tell you that
Bob and Bob, Bob Meyer and Bob Young were is
good or better than any of them, I don't know.
Mostly your familiarity is with them on you know, just
on a set. But actually, if if you look on
the wall or the outer wall of the Comedy Store,
(13:20):
there's Bob Myern, Bob Young.
Speaker 5 (13:23):
So you you did you own the club or you
were just running a club?
Speaker 1 (13:28):
I owned it, Okay, So you.
Speaker 5 (13:29):
Owned a club and then you were also a manager.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I was also a manager, and I couldn't see. The
thing is I couldn't do anything well. So what I
tried to do is a little of everything right.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
And you were also a comedian, so you owned a club,
you managed other comedians, and you yourself then performed at
your club.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
I'm assuming yes, yes, yeah, they wuldn't allowing me you
to perform. There's a restraining order at other clubs.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
My favorite thing in the world is going through the
list of the big comedy clubs what they're called. They're
always like Chortle and the Haha House, right and all
like so just to hear comedy works is yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
So let's well, let me let me backstory. When about
a week before we were going to open up, a
number of people, uh, we were at a restaurant trying
to decide on the name of the club, and we
had had a few extra Uh. We were loaded dollars
(14:34):
dollars and we were we were uh, we were sitting
around and I came up with I thought the best
name would be Comedy Shmamedy. And the reason would be
if people would call information for the name, uh, you know,
to the club, what's the name, and the person would
say the operator when they had operators, would say what's
(14:54):
what's the name? Uh, and and the person would have
to say Comedy Shmamedy, And it would be pretty hard
not to laugh, right, right, just for saying it. And
the radio person who was at that dinner, who's going
to promote for us, thought we stuck with that name.
But we did get sober. And when we got sober,
I actually I actually had to get sober because this
(15:16):
is a true story. I walked into an Olive Garden restaurant.
I thought it was an Italian restaurant.
Speaker 5 (15:25):
Well, I guess we could say goodbye to Olive Garden.
Speaker 4 (15:33):
Endless breadsticks and laughs. That's what I'm telling you.
Speaker 5 (15:36):
I mean, so out of everyone who came by comedy works,
who do you think had the funniest set? I know
you said Bob Young's pretty great. Who who had the
funniest set?
Speaker 1 (15:48):
There were? First of all, Leno was you have to
see Leno in the club, not uh Leno. There was
a comedian named Bob Nelson who's still around and a
killer act. Mac and Jamie were a comedy team and
and wonderful. But I could go down, Oh, Jim Carrey,
(16:12):
the microphone went out and we it was sat three
hundred and fifty people. The microphone went out. He ended
up doing the set where he would tell the joke
and then the audience would roar and then shut up
immediately because they knew they had to shut up to
hear the next joke. He would tell the next joke
and roar and then shut up immediately.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
It was.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
It was a brilliant night. Jim Carrey as no one
is better. There might be people that say, but no
one was better in terms of the guys that came
through in the last forty so years. Wow, man, except
for Buddy Hackett. Because he just saw that Buddy Hackett
was one.
Speaker 5 (16:52):
Another world alone.
Speaker 4 (16:54):
He was exactly That's what I know.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Yes, yes, because he could not get Sandy. And the
thing is, the thing is I didn't know that. I mean,
I love Buddy Hackett. I saw that. Oh my god,
I was ready to show that Buddy Hackett actually appeared. Okay.
Speaker 5 (17:10):
Yeah, So as a manager and then club owner, did
other comedians start to see you as a suit Was
it hard to stay like one of the boys.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yeah? Actually, when I went out to Los Angeles and
I auditioned for Mitzie Shore at the Start Start. Yeah,
my friend and comedian who started our club, Judy Toll.
I don't know if you remember.
Speaker 4 (17:37):
I loved Judy so much.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
She was so so I mean, Judy was the best
and I, you know, from from Philly, and I still
think of her whole time. Uh. So Judy sat with
Mitzi and kept Mitzi's head pointing towards the audience because
Mitzie could care less about what's on state. I mean,
she was looking at uh the stage with her help,
(18:03):
Judy's help. And it was a night that I actually
I just blew the audience away. And Mitzi said to Judy,
how come I don't know about him and all? And
she would not tell him that I was a club
owner because her and over at the improv. But Freedman,
it was bad to say you were a club owner
(18:24):
because we're in fact. Marjorie Gross, who was a brilliant
comedy writer and a comedian, Yeah, uh, she sat was
sitting on the balcony of my club one one night
during the show, and she turns to me and she said,
you don't seem like a club owner. And it was
the nicest thing anybody ever said to me. I really
(18:45):
took that as quite a compliment.
Speaker 5 (18:46):
Yeah, you're like, thank you. So when does the idea
of TV writing cross your mind? How does how does
that enter your world?
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Oh? I guess we all we all wanted to be
writers like on SNL or Mad TV not Mad TV,
well yeah, Mad TV, or or as the second Citty,
you know, you know the great sket shows. And I mean,
I love I watched Johnny Carson every night. I fell
(19:28):
asleep to Johnny, you know. And the first person on
the show was always a comedian at the beginning, and
I lived and died with every comedian that went on there.
If he did good or bad, it was I mean,
my mother had a stack of comedy albums that I
(19:48):
would listen to, the ones I was allowed to listen to. Yes,
back then, you weren't allowed to listen to until they
went out, and my sister and I would listen to them.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
So wait, so it was Is it true?
Speaker 2 (20:00):
There was an entire like a system on Johnny Carson
if you were a comedian of how you were treated
by Johnny would dictate how your career would go or
how you did that night. Where it was like if
he invited you over to the couch, you were made
right after yours.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Absolutely that was a different time. If you did Carson,
it was a big deal number one. But if he
called you over to the couch or he gave you
a wink and did this, Yeah you were you were
made Stephen Wright his first, his first set there. He
wanted him back within the week. We booked Steve Wright
(20:39):
that week because his agent called me up and said,
he just said Carson and he just killed. We have
no place to put him. So I ended up putting
them on for ten minutes in Philly. I paid him
two hundred and fifty dollars for four shows after he
killed on Carson and I couldn't. I had already Professor
(21:00):
and Corey uh Wayne Cotter, the legendary with another the
show was full of people who kill them and so
to have him come on, but because the point is
like Paul Prevenza, Blue Bleu, Boway.
Speaker 4 (21:18):
Freddy Prince, Freddy Prince when he went to his whole life. Yeah,
I mean that was incredible.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
If you if you had a good set there, everybody
in the industry knew about you.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Stephen Wright has one of my favorite jokes of all
time where he just says, I have a decaffeinated coffee table.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
You can't tell by looking at it. That's such a
good joke.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
Actually actually did one the other day I met. I
actually gave him credit, but it was, Uh, you can't
have everything where we did put it right.
Speaker 5 (21:51):
So what are a few of the major differences between
the LA and the Philly comedy scene.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
Well, back then, the philadelph comedy scene was great. I
mean those people who were Tom Wilson, they they were
amateurs basically when we started, and they were good when
we started. And Myron Young and Mike and Dwayne Cotter
(22:17):
and these people. When New York Comics or LA Comics
came in, accustomed to be the headliner and just blow
everybody away, had to work really hard because when you
were working every night at the three hundred and fifty
night seat theater, you had to be good. And it
was quite a mixed audience, so you can't just walk
(22:38):
in like Dennis Miller I had the middle Eddie Murphy,
I middled because the Philadelphia acts were better than the
headliners were good, really good, but just the laughter would
bounce off the walls and just sound like a roar
(22:58):
every night. That's what the FULLY comics expected and pretty
much that's what they did.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
And did you discover anybody, did you? I mean, in
your in your club? Is there anybody from Philly that
you were like? This is the guy or the woman
that then became somebody huge.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Oh I guess the closest that is Tom Wilson. Yeah,
you know, but I mean Tom did it on his own.
But Tom what Uh? He worked my steps. So we
were on the third floor and he his big job
was saying stay to the right, stay to the right. Stay.
That was it. That was his opening act. And then
when uh, he wanted to go on stage, I said, okay,
(23:33):
five minutes, five minutes, I'll give you, and he went
on stage early, five minutes killed.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Then within i'd say a month and a half he
was headlining. You couldn't help but headlining. He's so charming,
so funny, and and a good looking guy and obviously
a very good actor.
Speaker 5 (23:53):
Yeah I got to direct him. I got to be
his director.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Really.
Speaker 5 (23:58):
Yeah, he was unbelieve the ball.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
And a really nice guy. And are you familiar with
Ralph Harris. No, Ralph actually had a show on one
of the primetime networks and he played every character, most
every character he could do. That was part of his act.
And Ralph worked on the Steps for me too, and
(24:21):
then got his own TV show and I'm not sure
but network, but it was one of the three primary networks.
So there were a lot of guys who came through
who aren't weren't necessary that next day they became a star.
But I would say most anybody who came through, if
you would ask the comedian that play back there, they
(24:42):
will say they loved the club. It was. It was
just the audience was great, the shows were always great,
the number of acts that were on there, and and
we were we always were inmates running the aside. We
never felt like we were the corporate part of it.
We always felt that we were we were we were
(25:03):
all comedians too, and in effect we were all comedians.
Speaker 5 (25:08):
So your first TV writing credit is on a show
called Me and the Boys, which was an ABC sitcom
starring Madge Sinclair and Steve Harvey. Did you did you
know what to do in the writer's room or did
you just slide in and learn as you go?
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Well, this is this is funny.
Speaker 6 (25:27):
I yeah, So I pitched and as an outsider, and uh,
back then you had I don't still have to hire
these two freelancers a year and I wrote the script
and I thought it was pretty good, and uh in the.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
Writer's room where I sat, but I really was not
part of the writer's room here because I was an
outside of bringing the script and excuse me. I came
to the reading and uh, I didn't hear a word
that was mine. And I actually at the end, you know,
(26:08):
nobody left, nobody left, and I was sitting there, you know,
in the network thanking me for writing the script, and
I was thinking, I'll never I'll never work again. It was.
It was so bad. And it's not anybody particularly fault.
This is what it ended up being. And the uh,
(26:29):
I the next time I came into a writer's room
or a reading, I would always sit down and say,
please take a look at a page twenty five, third
line down, the second conjunction, and is mine.
Speaker 5 (26:47):
Right?
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Yeah? It was. It was. It was tough, but the opportunity,
excuse me to do it was wonderful.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
Okay, So I want to get to eventually you are
in nineteen ninety five. You are now a part of
Boy Meets World, but you also have credits on another
Michael Jacobs show, maybe this time with Marie Osmond and
Betty White. How did you end up in the Michael
Jacobs orbit.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
I really didn't end up in the Michael Jacobs he
was great. But it wasn't the Michael Jacobs. It was
the Bob Yo Bob.
Speaker 4 (27:19):
Yeah, yeah, we keep hearing that more and more.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Yeah, and Bob, first of all, he still is. I mean,
he's a wonderful guy. He's been a friend for years
and you know we all started together, and just a
sweet guy. He really did not belong to TV.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
He was too too kind.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Yeah, yes, always too kind. And every time I get
a residual check, especially from Boy Meets World, I always
hold it up say thank you. Bob.
Speaker 5 (27:47):
Oh, did you know what Boy Meets World was before
you wrote your first script? How did it work out
that you so? Okay? I have to know? Were you
also a freelance writer for Boy Meets World?
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Ah? Yeah, yeah, I think no I knew about Boyne
was great. You guys were terrific. I always tell people
the reason Boy Meets World was great, Well, they had
good writers and Michael Jacobs and all, but this was
a perfect cast. This the cast makes the show. And
you guys were easy to write for because the first
(28:22):
script I ever wrote was a cheers and it uh it.
I said, I can't write it Cheers It's it's way
too good. How can I write it. When I started writing,
it was easy because the characters were so well defined
that if I put the character's name down, it's said
that character said, that character would say. And I just
(28:44):
my fingers just followed the characters. I you know, I
didn't feel it was me boy meets World, Uh, same thing.
Although there was a particular point where I felt really
bad because I'm not going to use your name. Topanga
started crying on the set because you couldn't get the
(29:09):
line the way Michael Jacobs want.
Speaker 5 (29:12):
This is what this is what I will remember, Yes,
you will remembered this. When we did the recap of
the episode, he was like, Danielle, don't you remember this?
And I was like, what are you talking about? And
he was like, you cried in front of everybody.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
I felt so bad, like you know, you know, it's
like I killed her.
Speaker 7 (29:31):
I they may have been your words, but I don't
think you were the one insisting I say it exactly
the way you wanted it, right.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
I think it was Michael, yeah, push pushing it at
that time. I don't know what you know, he wasn't directing, But.
Speaker 5 (29:52):
There's a fine line between the director and Michael Jacobs.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
But you still you still you're a writer. As a writer,
you stay back, you don't participate. I remember when I
did maybe this time, and Marie Osmond is the sweetest
person in the world. Betty White was just the consummate pro.
Speaker 6 (30:17):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
I remember standing on seid. I would always write in
lines for myself that I could do off screen, like
a radio broadcast or something like that, because I could
get scale, you know, for just doing it. And Bob
Yam also told me stop doing that.
Speaker 2 (30:36):
So just doing voice over the whole time, just saying
Kelly and Casey over and.
Speaker 3 (30:41):
Over again, pretty much pretty much.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
And luckily I didn't have any more kids, because you know,
I wouldn't have to stay writing the Uh. Marie asked me.
I was standing to the side when I was doing
during rehearsal where I would I would do. I think
it was a race. There was a horse race, and
I was doing the character of the sportscaster. Uh and
(31:08):
play by playing and uh, Marie come Ben's talks to
me on the side. She leans over and she said,
how should I say this LINEH to a writer who's
working there. First of all, you'd never tell anybody to
set how to say rhyme. That's really all horrible. But
the director was watching her talking to me and I
(31:31):
got and I didn't answer. I didn't answer. I think,
should you know, uh, you could talk to Bob you know, whoever.
Speaker 5 (31:38):
Whoever was directing.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
Yeah, yeah, but that was an interesting experience because that
was a great cast too at that point at the time,
they really I forget who the young girl's name was
on that. I love her. She did a lot, a
lot of work. But the Johnson job.
Speaker 4 (32:02):
I just spoke to Ashley not too long ago. She's wonderful.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
Oh, if you ever run into her again, I love
her mother or sister. I mean, just you know, great, great,
that's the thing when you do a show, you and here,
you know, I'm a writer. I'm not down on the set.
I'm in the writer's room. But there still ended up
being some sort of familyness that forms with everybody. And
(32:30):
you know that show that that show had, you know,
it was quite the family. Even though we you know,
the first of all, the title was horrible. It was
made for critics. Maybe this time, you know what I mean,
just it was we tried to change beforehand. Can we
get up with a better uh name? But that's what
(32:51):
we ended ended up with. And you know, I mean
this show. I mean it was going opposite Jack and
you know, I I don't know if it would have
lasted anyway, but it was a really nice experience because
people friends of Betty would come in all the time,
and you know, Carol Channing calling me over. Oh man,
(33:12):
I still have the script. They all signed it. She
knew that I wrote the script and she started talking
to me about, you know, the script, and it was
funny and all that. And all I'm thinking is Carol
Channing sounds just.
Speaker 5 (33:26):
Like herself, so much like Carol chan Yeah, I couldn't.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
I mean, it was so I never got over being
in awe of these great people who were around. There
are plenty of people I have disdained for, but I'm
talking about just the experience, experience that you know the
people when you run into these people. And Betty became
the reason that I published my first book.
Speaker 5 (33:58):
And which was what's the name your first book?
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Great Failures of the Extremely Successful Why. I interviewed many
high profile people on the traumas they went through in
their life, and overcame them, uh Arn Brockovich, Teddy Pendergrass,
uh Tony Curtis, John Wooden, I mean, but but it
(34:23):
was her, Larry, Larry Gilberts exactly. He became a mentor
of mine. He sent me over to his publisher and
I'm not going to go into the long story, but
it was something I wrote, wrote for Written by magazine
that he thought was a book. I said, and I'd
never written a book. I don't know how to, you know,
(34:44):
I don't know anything about He said, I'm sending you
over to my publisher. And I did not have a
what I wrote. They said, well, we're looking for something
that's a little more uplifting and you know, hopefully some
you know, that can help people. And I said, I
have an idea, and I interviewed Betty White. I said, Betty,
(35:05):
would your mind if I would interview the subject? And
they bought it right on her chapter. And so I
became an author, you know, basically, you know, because of
Betty White.
Speaker 2 (35:17):
I'm sorry, I have to so my friends here, my
fellow co hosts, know how addicted I am to mash
It's one of It's basically the reason I became an actor.
Speaker 4 (35:27):
So can you just what was it like working with
Larry gelbart.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Well? First, of all, I wrote an article. It's written
by magazine still out there. You know it's the Writer's Guild.
Uh yeah, magazine, I think ye. Actually, okay, I was.
I was contributing editor there and I wrote I wrote
a story. Uh you know, as I was getting older
and you know, there was ages, and so I wrote
an article that, uh, I'm not a young television writer,
(35:56):
but I played one on TV. It was all. It
was a chapter from a book called You'll Never Write
in This Town Again, And in it I gave examples
of how to fool executive producers into thinking that you
were younger. And I would say, like, when you pitch
an idea, and make sure you do it laying on
(36:16):
the floor so the moose skin from the front of
your face would fall to the back of your head.
And always always be close enough to the desk that
you could sit like this as you're discussing, so they
don't see your neck. The idea, the idea was. It
was all farce. I put nobody's name in there except one.
(36:36):
I said, never put any award that was prior to
two thousand on your resume, Oscar, Emmy, Tony, whatever, unless
you're Larry Gilbert. I did that because I knew Larry
would read it, and he did get in contact with me.
And let me just tell you, I teach a lot
of business classes and leadership and all. I talk a
(36:59):
lot about mentors. So I talk a lot about Larry
because I heard him speak at at a w G
A thing and I went like, he's great and I
want to get to know him. Uh. He gave his
time to me all the time. It was such, he
was such a manch so and the fact that he
was here, I'm going to age it out here because
(37:20):
he was part of the Sid Caesar legacy. Your show,
Your show shows and and and all the brilliant writers
that were on that show mel Brooks and and Neil
Simon and uh even Woody Allen was writing there one year.
To me, it was like, oh my god, that's you know,
(37:41):
I'm so close to genius here. Uh. Not not that
I was getting closer. I just meant I was physical proximity.
So yeah, he's a wonderful He was a wonderful person.
Speaker 4 (37:54):
Amazing.
Speaker 5 (38:07):
Getting back to your time on Boy Meets World, you
were on set for the tape night where I burst
into tears in front of everybody. Did you get to
spend the entire week in the writer's room, because we've
we've interviewed some other writers that were freelance writers and
they never even made it to set at all. Did
your relationship with Bob give you the opportunity to be
inside the writer's room?
Speaker 1 (38:27):
Yeah? I got to be in the writer's room. I've
got I got the pitch during the show, I cheated
and Bob cheated. That's so great and letting me be
part of it, and down for the table read and
the and the end going up for the rewrites and
(38:47):
you know, you know, even you guys did the show,
uh that I wasn't part of, and I was on.
I came in and I just you know, was on
the stage and there was one discussion and I mentioned
the line to Bob. I said, why don't you try this?
And he actually put it in the show, and you know,
(39:09):
and so I didn't get paid for.
Speaker 5 (39:11):
That should retroactive.
Speaker 1 (39:14):
But the line was, oh, I can't remember what the
line was, but I was going back to if you're
talking about line uh the book that I wrote about
learning from failure and mistakes, etcetera, etcetera, And and if
you want to do something, If you have a passion
to do it, you should do it, no matter what
parents say, no matter what coaches saying. Oh, this is
(39:34):
a true story. When Beethoven was just a young child,
he was told that he could never play music because
he was deaf. But did he listen? I feel like
I feel like I'm on your couch. I don't know
if he listened. It was a long time ago.
Speaker 5 (39:56):
I did writing for a family sitcom hold any weight
among your comedy peers? Or did you try to hide
that job?
Speaker 1 (40:11):
You know, it seems like I'm kissing up here constantly.
But you guys, such a It's a great show and
a wonderful cast. And by the way, I thought Ben
Savage was going to become the next Albert Brooks. I
really thought his delivery and a lot of deadpan and
(40:32):
all that stuff. He seemed to have that sense that
Albert Books was one of my is one of my idols.
So you know that it didn't feel like a family show.
It felt like a classic show. So I mean, what
did I watch? I had to watch a lot of
(40:52):
shows because I was going to end up writing, because
I wrote a lot of family shows, and that would happen.
But my my thing satire and political humor and and
you know, really things that you I wrote. I wrote,
was it me and the boys? Oh no, it was
(41:16):
the smart guy. I wrote a smart guy. And every
time I would come into a show, I would pitch,
usually that the one of the kids got drunk, or
one of the kids was found with a gun, or
one of the kids. I always always pitched basically.
Speaker 5 (41:32):
You wanted to write a very special episode.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
Exactly, And I pitched this one where Taj, Yeah, Taj
got drunk at a party.
Speaker 5 (41:44):
I mean, here's the episode.
Speaker 1 (41:46):
Never too young, Yes he was either twelve or thirteen
years old and all that stuff. And everybody went, no, no, no,
we're not going to put Taje in that situation. I
get a phone call at the beginning of the next
season that's remember that pitch that you made, come in,
We're going to do it. And it was. It was
(42:06):
because the I don't know if it was a Biden administration,
but whatever they wanted ANTII drinking, anti gun type messages
and they would pay the networks for it. And uh
so I got called in to write the script and
an actual edgy script, and I won the not the
(42:30):
amount I was nominated for you man a tanas You
didn't pronounce it right, okay, but you said, but you
used all the letters there exactly humaniti something like that.
I was nominated for that, and I and I won
(42:51):
another award for writing that because it was you know,
real life uh stuff, So I got to write, you know,
other things than just faun and I wrote for Sybil.
And I don't think that was a family show. Yeah,
that was more of an you know, adults get to
(43:13):
watch the shows too.
Speaker 4 (43:14):
Can I.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
When you were doing Moreman World, how old were your
kids were they of of t G if watching age?
Speaker 1 (43:22):
No, they were younger than that. That's why I could.
Speaker 2 (43:26):
You know.
Speaker 1 (43:26):
I once put them and my whole family on eBay, uh,
to sell the family. Yeah, and I took them, by
the way. I pitched that as a show too.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
But we actually the dad sells his family on eBay.
Speaker 1 (43:41):
Yes, I did that too, And it was back when
people weren't doing that, and they were like four and
five at the time, so they couldn't really figure out.
And that's about this time. Uh okay, they they didn't
know except today it's like there's a picture of my
(44:03):
daughter when she was an infant in Betty White's arms
and she never thought anything about it. She said, when
she went to college and she showed it, everybody went crazy.
It was a great conversation starter because I think Betty
ended up doing SNL and they did that commercial where
she changed into another person by eating a certain candypark. Anyway,
(44:27):
so they were younger. But believe me, she can't wait
to tell all her friends I'm doing this.
Speaker 8 (44:34):
Oh oh, So as a big comedy nerd growing up,
you watched Carson's Tonight Show religiously and then you end
up writing the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.
Speaker 5 (44:45):
That must have been quite a moment for you.
Speaker 1 (44:49):
It was kind of cool. First of all, Jay worked
for me for a number of years, so I guess
it was a little bit of you know, payback.
Speaker 5 (44:57):
Yeah, a little full circle swittering exactly.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
And the thing is it was monologue writing, so it
was really what happened that day or whatever, and you know,
you give about you pitch about five hundred jokes and
they go that one's good, you know. So it wasn't
exactly where you sit there and go, hey, this is
(45:21):
just a wonderful environment where my creativity is looked on
as broken it was. And as I said before, what
you had to write for Jay is nowhere near as
funny as he was. And yeah, in the club person
you would be double over for an hour and a
such a mechanic. He just knew. He still knows how
(45:44):
to make it work. On the tonight show, he was
working to a very watered down audience. Yeah, and that's
what you're supposed to do.
Speaker 4 (45:51):
But you're still doing.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Man, you're starting just I'm thinking comedically, every single night
is a new five minute bit. Yeah much for them
on I mean that's oh yeah crazy, that's when you're
you're thinking about it from a comic standpoint, that's just nuts.
Speaker 3 (46:06):
And how big would the writing stuff be? How many
how many writers would be sitting around right now?
Speaker 1 (46:10):
Well, there are a lot of inside outside writers. When
when I was writing, I was an outside writer, and
I would, you know, every day, be sending the stuff
in and he would go over his house with a
bunch of people and go through all the material and
see what they would use. So you know, they were
about twelve writers. Twelve writers at any time, I mean
(46:36):
with you guys, there were about ten writers. Yeah, you know,
and still you figure all those writers and all those rewrites,
you would figure something good would come out of it.
Speaker 5 (46:45):
Yeah, such a shame.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
By the way I looked, I did a little cheating.
So I went back and looked at shows, and then
I looked with somebody had put I think you guys
did one hundred and fifty six shows something like that,
and I think Uncle Daddy is like twelve or something
like that rated. So I felt really good about that.
Speaker 4 (47:08):
Yeah, people loved it.
Speaker 5 (47:09):
People love that episode. It's a great one.
Speaker 1 (47:12):
It was so real, and it was based on I think,
you know, in part about my life. You know, you
date somebody with kids, and you know you have to. Hey,
so how you doing there, buddy Pale? You know, right right?
And so you tried to in this case, you tried
to write it the way it should be, not the way.
(47:36):
But it was wonderful right up to the last second
that the kid could have been murdered. But you know,
everything up to that was just so sweet, just so right,
exactly what you should do. And I really did, you know,
I didn't get along. I like the kids better than
I like the girl, you know, I mean, when you
meet them, it's kind of it's kind of fun to
(47:58):
play with the young kids and all. And yeah, I
made a lot of a lot of it. I had
a lot of experiences with children as part of a
you know, a family that wasn't your family.
Speaker 5 (48:14):
Did you end up also, did that relationship end and
you decided that it wasn't for you to have kids
at that time?
Speaker 1 (48:23):
Oh? At that time, Oh yeah, I mean I I
was not taking so off. I was stressed over everything.
I've been sober for thirty five years. Not that I was,
you know, it's horrible drunk or anything like that, but
I drank and it wasn't doing any good. And so
(48:44):
at that time I was not making commitments to anybody.
I could be charming, or at least I thought I
was right. You know, when you're drinking, you don't exactly
know if you're charming, right, you think you are. But
at the same time, later on I stopped drinking, you know,
and everything, and that's when I ended up getting married
(49:04):
in and and reversing the visecond.
Speaker 4 (49:10):
And then you had children or you just bought your
family anybay.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Yeah, well I would have done that if I would
have known. That saved a lot of money.
Speaker 5 (49:18):
So when did you decide to start writing books?
Speaker 1 (49:21):
Well, it was when when our show Maybe This Time
was we got the word that it was going on
affair and and uh, I said to somebody. Somebody said
you should write a book, and I said, I do
not write a book. They said you would write what
you know, and I said, well, I'm really good at failure.
(49:41):
I've practiced it for years, I know. And and that
became you.
Speaker 5 (49:46):
Know, that became your first book, Yeah, Betty.
Speaker 1 (49:49):
Then there were a couple of children's shows I pitched
and did not sell. Oh when I saw the Disney channel. Uh,
and they gave it back to me after they ruined
it by giving it to an executive producer who didn't
get it. It was about a boy who could go back
in time, but only fifteen seconds. That's all he could do.
And sometimes he would go back in time the watch
(50:13):
he was where and would do it without him. No,
fifteen minutes, I'm sorry, fifteen minutes, go back in time.
And I wrote it as a book, sold it to
HarperCollins because we weren't able to make it there. Then
I wrote another book for HarperCollins, and then I had
a thing with Larry David and U show. No. It
(50:34):
was a conversation with Larry David that we were I
was going to do an article on him, and it's
too long the story to tell. But I ended up
writing it into a book and it's called the Larry
David Code, and it's how Larry Saves the world.
Speaker 5 (50:52):
But I mean, and that's the Larry David we all
know and love, or is this a different version of
Larry David.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
That's interesting because if you would read the preface of
the book, it does explain that there is a Larry
David who was very successful, very popular, very attractive man.
This is not this Larry. Uh. This Larry David is
very similar to that Larry David. But it's not that
Larry David. And I have written notes to all of
(51:21):
my attorneys to let them know.
Speaker 5 (51:23):
Let them know it's a totally different.
Speaker 1 (51:25):
And I didn't. I didn't. I put in my drawer
for years, and I showed it to Richard Lewis, who
was a friend, and he said, you gotta you gotta
publish it. I said, well, Larry might get upset it
screw Larry, you know.
Speaker 4 (51:42):
And wasn't he Larry's best friend too?
Speaker 1 (51:45):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (51:48):
Richard Lewis.
Speaker 1 (51:50):
Oh, yeah, it wasn't different. Richard Lewis too, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (51:53):
Very another very good looking, very successful.
Speaker 1 (51:56):
Yes, yeah, there are there are. There are plenty of
them in the book, and coincidentally, all with similar names to.
Speaker 5 (52:03):
Some very I mean, we've named three Steve Young's on
this podcast alone, and there are others.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
My son represented Steve Young, a country singer. Oh and
I got a check of his at one time too.
Speaker 5 (52:19):
And did you want to be you or did you
want to be him?
Speaker 1 (52:24):
He was better than me.
Speaker 5 (52:25):
Yeah, you wanted to be him.
Speaker 1 (52:26):
They're all better than me.
Speaker 5 (52:30):
So you have also taught writing at Temple. You were
a political radio host. You are a bit of a
renaissance man.
Speaker 1 (52:37):
I was a political on air America. And keep in
mind how well America did so I'm sure that both
of my listeners were devastated when we ended. But yeah
I did that. I was political editor of National Lampoon
for a while. That was fun. That was because National
(52:58):
Lampoon was a big deal for me when I was
when I was a kid. But yeah, I told you,
I did as much as I could because I couldn't
do anything well. And it was really you know, as
it came in front of me, because like, I flunked
out of four different colleges without ever getting a credit,
so that was a lot.
Speaker 5 (53:19):
How does one do that?
Speaker 1 (53:21):
Well, it's interesting. I flunked out the first year and
then I went and they said, you have to go
back to night school to uh to get back into
the day school. And people said, you can't flunk night school.
That's like a possibility. So I took it as a
challenge and I ended up flunking out.
Speaker 4 (53:43):
Were you just not going? I mean, that's the only
way to flunk out of night school.
Speaker 1 (53:47):
I went and I took a public speaking course and
I funked it there. I I found out later that
I had a learning disability and so I couldn't retain
any information and that that was it. Then I went
in the army and I and I flunked out of
the army. They said, I think we would be better
if you would.
Speaker 3 (54:07):
You would not be here anymore, and so I went
back to the surge country by getting out of the army.
Speaker 1 (54:18):
So yeah, So, by the way, that's why the book
learning you know, Great Failures, That's what popped up in
my mind because there were so many times that things
didn't work, and then it led to something else. I
mean even that. I wrote a movie that some very
heavyweight producers took around town. Did not sell, but my
(54:40):
agent called me up and said, there's a scene in
there that I think would make a great, uh sitcom
for kids, and we sold it to the Disney Channel.
So there it is. The movie didn't work, but we
sold the TV show. TV show then didn't work. They
gave it to me. I wrote, it is a book.
The book. The actually book worked, and somebody bought it
as a play, you know. I mean, it's just what happens.
(55:01):
If you're just doing and doing, you end up running
into something that you would have never expected if you
didn't take the action. Oh look, I'm lecturing.
Speaker 4 (55:10):
That right, and I already funked out. I already flunked
out of your fund.
Speaker 1 (55:17):
I'm going to send a magnet that put on your refrigerator.
Speaker 5 (55:24):
Our last question for you. You have had a very long,
fulfilling career in so many different fields. Is there still
anything out there left that you want to do?
Speaker 1 (55:35):
Oh? Let me tell you, I discovered a stand up
approach after all these years, about eight or nine years ago,
nobody at the club owners tell me. Nobody has ever
done it. I've never seen that I've done. Many other
(55:56):
comedians have told me. But it's something that I do now,
and I'm better than I ever was. So I'm in
my seventies and yet I now can get on stage
as a headliner and literally kill because they're not. What
I do is I watch every other comic and then
(56:18):
I do their material again because I say, I say
at the beginning, I wrote material for tonight, but theirs
is so much better than mine. I'm just going to
do theirs again. And what I've done during the night
is watch them and change their the jokes. I change them.
I make them really absurd and just totally off the wall,
(56:42):
but I use them as the starting point. And I've
only gotten I've only gotten beaten up a couple of times.
Speaker 4 (56:48):
Yeah, I was gonna say that. Said that, I bet
comedians love that. That's what they're known for. It's like,
you know, my favorite thing is when I tell a
joke and then another comedian tells the same one.
Speaker 5 (56:57):
A little bit better and different than somebody.
Speaker 1 (56:59):
You know, what I like to do is tell it
before they go on. That's smart. There is only a
couple comedians who I've ever said, Uh No, it's it's
because I think it's a fun thing. And it's because
I'm not making a lot of money on their material.
And I tell them, if you like what I did
with it, you take that that's yours. Oh you know,
(57:20):
it's just so fun to do. And I sit there
and I sit there every night and I'm writing, and
you know, I'm at the beginning it's like it's not
gonna work. It's not gonna work. And then all of
a sudden, but I spend most of the time turning
them my girlfriend and saying, what do you say?
Speaker 5 (57:37):
I can't hear.
Speaker 3 (57:41):
I think this is really that's really cool. It's it
makes it that it has to be live. That's what
I like about it, is like, that's why the audience
on the audience must love it because they are you
clearly couldn't have written this ahead of time. And so
it's like getting back to what stand up should be,
which is a live experience. And we do this with
our live shows too. The less we play, the more
we just walk out on stage and engage with our audience,
(58:03):
the better at night.
Speaker 1 (58:04):
It is.
Speaker 3 (58:04):
So that's such a cool it's like a cool tightrope
walk that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (58:08):
I really and thank you And isn't it when you
do things live when the audience is with you, don't
your minds move faster?
Speaker 3 (58:17):
And doing this is why you go out and you know,
that's what we want from comedy. In today's world, everything
is you know, online or you know. We're all isolated
in our own little doing meetings like this, you know,
so the idea of like getting out into a room
and listening and being a part of a group is
just getting lost on us.
Speaker 1 (58:32):
At the same time, I cannot send out a tape
of mind and anybody would know what I was doing, right, right, right.
I have my own too, and that's fine too. But
the thing that makes me different is doing the other
people's material, and unfortunately that puts me in a hole.
But you know what, I'm at a point in my
(58:54):
life where I'm not sitting there and going, oh, let
me get on failing, right, right.
Speaker 3 (59:00):
Right, get invited to the couch.
Speaker 4 (59:02):
That's the best.
Speaker 2 (59:02):
Well, when you when you also when you when you
write your book about failing part two, I hope you
start with us.
Speaker 1 (59:11):
Well, I will agree the show that Danielle did and
thank you got for the tears. I wish I could remember.
I know you were making a speech.
Speaker 5 (59:20):
It's at the very end.
Speaker 3 (59:21):
It's the tag running for class president or something.
Speaker 1 (59:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (59:25):
No, it's like Corey is running for president. You end
up taking over the debate or something. I forget what.
Speaker 1 (59:29):
Everybody was running for president.
Speaker 5 (59:32):
Yeah, it's the tag. It's the very last scene of
the show. So if you go back and watch it,
and Will even I mean I said I wanted to
rewatch it because Will said he could even see it
in my eyes.
Speaker 4 (59:42):
I can't. I can see that I've been covering.
Speaker 5 (59:44):
Yeah, my husband said he could see it too.
Speaker 1 (59:46):
Yeah that's great. It's not so great, but.
Speaker 5 (59:49):
No, it's great. I love it. Steve, Thank you so
much for coming and spending your time with us. Thank
your daughter Kelly for letting us use her house and
her name, and Casey, I really have enjoyed spending a
bit of time with you. It makes sense now that
we didn't really get to know you because you were
only on our set for two weeks, so it's been
a pleasure to get to know you a little bit now.
Speaker 1 (01:00:11):
Yeah. Well, I'm glad, you know. I'm so pleased that
I was part of it because when people talk about
what are you show? I wrote something for Hbolay is
very proud of for little kids. But your show is
the one that I always think when I get introduced
it is a writer for Boy Meets World. That's the
first credit that they give. And now a lot of
(01:00:34):
the audience is, I don't remember that show.
Speaker 5 (01:00:37):
I'm too old for that.
Speaker 1 (01:00:38):
Yeah, oh yes, my parents told me.
Speaker 4 (01:00:42):
Yeah, that's where we are.
Speaker 2 (01:00:43):
Ye.
Speaker 1 (01:00:44):
I give you as the credit. I'm tolled that I
could have been part of it.
Speaker 5 (01:00:47):
Where can people find you so they know where to
go see you in a city near them.
Speaker 1 (01:00:52):
The Larry David code dot.
Speaker 5 (01:00:56):
Com Great the Larry davidcode dot Com.
Speaker 2 (01:00:59):
To find Steve David, I'll find a different Larry David
different by the way.
Speaker 1 (01:01:05):
I do not. I'm really that on up keep, so
a lot of my appearances in two thousand and fifteen
and sixteen may still be on there. So I don't
know it. You know, Okay, check the date.
Speaker 4 (01:01:21):
Check the date.
Speaker 5 (01:01:22):
Okay, before you buy tickets, check the date at the
Larry davidcove dot com. Thank you Steve for being with
us today.
Speaker 3 (01:01:29):
Guys, appreciate good to see you.
Speaker 1 (01:01:30):
Bye bye.
Speaker 5 (01:01:33):
It's so great that he for doing when he did
the two episodes, actually got to spend the entire week
on zet unlike a lot of other freelance.
Speaker 3 (01:01:40):
Are funny because he actually has more memories than some
people who are on multi.
Speaker 2 (01:01:45):
How about some confirmation for you, Birsty.
Speaker 5 (01:01:48):
Well, I didn't need it. I knew for sure. If
we'll remembered it, it happened, and writer remembered it vaguely right.
Speaker 3 (01:01:54):
It was like, yeah, once you pointed out, I was like,
that's right, and I can tell you because I remember
the fact that we changed the credit and all that
was in a way.
Speaker 2 (01:02:01):
Yeah, he's also the people that he's worked with, I mean,
just the names that he's spouting out there. I would
also officially like to ask that we try. It'll never happen,
but we try to get Jim Carrey to come on
the podcast.
Speaker 5 (01:02:13):
Why would you Carry come on our podcast?
Speaker 2 (01:02:16):
Let's find out why would My dad always says the
worst thing people can say is no, you might as
well just ask.
Speaker 5 (01:02:21):
Then find him.
Speaker 4 (01:02:21):
Well, I don't know how to find Jim Carry come
on the podcast.
Speaker 5 (01:02:26):
The Jim Carrey dot Com to the Jim Carrey Jim
Jim to a.
Speaker 3 (01:02:31):
Very interesting moment the last couple years on Well, then
let's find out if maybe it's interesting in this sort
of like Buddhist present tense constant. He's like a very
interesting guy lately, so let's try to get him on one.
Speaker 5 (01:02:43):
My favorite, my favorite recent Jim Carrey quote was they
asked him why he was coming back for Sonic, and
he was like, I spend a lot of money.
Speaker 4 (01:02:51):
Yeah, we can get it. I'm telling you, we can get.
Speaker 5 (01:02:54):
We can get them.
Speaker 3 (01:02:54):
Okay, I just know how hard so many of our
writers had to work like these stories. It's just the
constant hustle. It's like, yeah, and like you have to
manage the club or own the club, even to just
get your own five minutes, and then you have to
just hang out. Like I mean, the way that he
must have spent every night of his life backstage with
a group of comedians trying to make each other laugh,
(01:03:15):
trying to maintain enough of an impression to get paid
to get hired the next It's like such a hustle.
Speaker 4 (01:03:21):
It's so much work. He's also running a business. He
also owns the club. That's what you got that so
much work.
Speaker 3 (01:03:28):
I just you just have to have that, like I'm
always going to be making people laugh and I can't stop,
Like I just always you know, like what an engine
to always have inside of you. I just it's crazy.
Oh my god, it's so cool.
Speaker 5 (01:03:40):
Well, thank you all for joining us for this episode
of Podmeets World. As always, you can follow us on
Instagram pod Meets World Show. You can send us your
emails pod meets World Show at gmail dot com, and
we have merch.
Speaker 1 (01:03:51):
We hear it.
Speaker 2 (01:03:52):
Podmeats World would like to personally apologize to the Olive
Garden merch.
Speaker 5 (01:04:00):
Also a reminder, we the kids still want to jump.
We are on tour. You can go to podmeetsworldshow dot
com for merch and tickets and to see the calendar
of all the dates. So we hope to see you
out there. We love you all. Pod dismissed. Pod Meets
World is an iHeart podcast produced and hosted by Danielle Fischel,
(01:04:22):
Wilfridell and writer Strong Executive producers Jensen Karp and Amy Sugarman.
Executive in charge of production, Danielle Romo, producer and editor,
Tara sudbachsch producer, Maddie Moore engineer and boy Meets World
superfan Easton Allen. Our theme song is by Kyle Morton
of Typhoon. Follow us on Instagram at Pod Meets World
Show or email us at Podmeets Worldshow at gmail dot
(01:04:44):
com
I went to soccer games.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
What sports professional professional like MLS.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Get this my third LAFC game. Three soccer games. Yeah,
it was. It was super fun. Like soccer is the
only sport that I really enjoy watching. I don't keep
up with it, but I do enjoy watching it. And
I guess it's maybe because I played it as a kid.
You know, up until I was like, up until Boyne's World,
like twelve or thirteen, I played soccer every year. My
(00:48):
parents actually coached my team and stuff, so I was
really into it. But yeah, so I saw about like
two years ago, a friend invited me to an LAFC game,
and it was so much fun. They have like a
whole cheering section which is basically like a permanent dance
party going on. They never stop moving there, and they're
(01:09):
drumming and they're chanting. They never stopped moving the whole game,
and it keeps the audience's energy up so high. And
the stadium where LAFC plays is it's very small, like
compared to most stadiums, so you can no matter where
you're sitting, you can see their players' faces in the game. Yeah,
so so yeah, So a friend took me a couple
(01:30):
of years ago, and then I took some friends after
that and then yeah, I had friends in from out
of town and their kids love soccer and they play
all the time.
Speaker 4 (01:40):
So we were like, let's go to l A f C.
What does l a FC stand for?
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Sorry, La Football Club Los Angele Football Club.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
So it's a team, it's an MLS team, and they're great.
They're really good. They're like probably one of the best
in the MLS. I think, I'm told. But anyway, it
was so, it was, Yeah, it was super fun. India
was not into it, still still not into sports. Yeah,
so I was like, maybe maybe you'll get into soccer. No, no,
but you know, I guess he just takes after me.
(02:07):
But yeah, it was. It was super fun. So I
went to a sport a sports ball event. Wow, that's
really great again, Yeah, do you.
Speaker 5 (02:13):
Stand in the cheering section? Are you part of the
cheering section?
Speaker 1 (02:16):
No?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Know, how you get in that? I mean they're like
they're all wearing like yeah, no, they like know these chants,
they have all these rituals and they're like so into it,
and but god, I would be exhausted. They're like for
ninety minutes, they're dancing the entire time, like you know, everybody,
it was. It's really fun. It's a great one. It
was a draw. Yeah, it was a really exciting game.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Like why they got to play for ninety minutes to
go and nothing happened and nothing happened in ninety minutes.
Speaker 4 (02:45):
It's like, what the hell was the point of that?
Speaker 2 (02:47):
It should be like quidditch, just play until somebody scores.
Speaker 4 (02:50):
If it takes a month, it takes a month.
Speaker 5 (02:51):
It looks like that LAFC might be in the eighth
team like out of nine noe. So what does that
mean like ratings? Yeah, like where they following the raidings?
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (03:05):
Ok, no, it looks like it looks like Vancouver is
in first place, Portland second, third is Austin, fourth, Minnesota fifth,
Colorado FC, Dallas is sixth, San Diego seventh, LA FC eighth, ninth, Seattle, ten,
Salt Lake, eleven, San Jose, twelve, Saint Louis, thirteen, Houston,
fourteen Sporting CAC and fifteen the LA Galaxy.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
So no East Coast teams, Well, those.
Speaker 5 (03:30):
That's the Western Conference in dot you got in the
Eastern Conference.
Speaker 4 (03:34):
Okay, so there are there's.
Speaker 5 (03:35):
Yeah, and I guess I don't know about, like how like.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
The see this has when my eyes start lacing over
and I go, I don't have time for sports because
now I would have to like investing keeping track of
the stats and who's traded for what. And I'm like, Nope,
too much time, too much mental energy.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
No.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Yeah, but going to a Gabe showing up and watching
them kick the ball around super fun. I had a
good time.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
They're also incredible athletes.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
I mean I I joke that you nothing happens in
ninety minutes, but they run essentially for an hour and
a half.
Speaker 4 (04:05):
Yeah, it's crazy to watch. It really is crazy to watch.
Speaker 5 (04:07):
We went to a King's playoff game, King's hockey game.
I got to I got to bang the drum. So
at the end of every period.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Wait, wait a minute, wait, like what do you mean
what is banging the.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
Drum the end of every period or at the so
I think they do it before the game too, So
before the game and after every period there's a big
drum and somebody gets to bang the drum, going, go Kings, go,
and to get the whole crowd fired up.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
And you got selected because your topanga. Of course, of course,
because ever go.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
To anything and have a normal experience. She goes to concerts,
She's on stage within thirty seconds exactly.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
I was playing drums for Rolling Stone this weekend.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Just picked up the guitar and jam to the sphere and.
Speaker 5 (04:59):
It was It was a lot of fun. Mostly it
was fun because Adler was very excited about going with
me to bang the drum. And my kids then were like,
why do you get to be on the big TV?
Why can't be on the big question?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
I've been asking since two thousands.
Speaker 5 (05:23):
My kids had so much fun. Adler is such an
athlete and such a jock. He doesn't care what the
sport is. He's just in it and he wants to
know all about it. What are they doing now? And
why are they doing that? And so what's that? What's
a power play? And why is he in there? And
like we taught him about time out, the timeout and
the penalty box and uh, and he just sits there
the whole time, watching the entire entire thing. It got
(05:45):
to be pretty late and I was like, you know,
we have to go, and he was really bombed. He
didn't want to go, but it's a school night and
I'm like, you can't be out until eleven New Yours,
not even six.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
It's such a change, though, from when he used to
bring in places and he like even sporting events, where
he was like, it's seven thirty, we gotta go.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
We gotta go.
Speaker 5 (06:02):
Is it getting dark?
Speaker 4 (06:03):
I need to go now.
Speaker 5 (06:04):
Now he thinks he's like real mister independent and he
didn't want to leave. But we got home. The game
still wasn't over, and I woke him up the next
morning for school and he went did the Kings win?
Speaker 4 (06:15):
Just immediately needed to know.
Speaker 5 (06:17):
It was so much fun.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
So you guys had fun at sporting events. I had
like the best sandwich that was great?
Speaker 5 (06:24):
Where from?
Speaker 4 (06:25):
Oh I made it? Okay, okay, I wasn't gonna leave.
Speaker 5 (06:28):
What was in it?
Speaker 2 (06:28):
Peanut butter and jelly, no complicated ham, A little bit of.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
Ham from new hot honey, uh swojo. We got it,
We got it, We got Is he not the best,
it's the greatest.
Speaker 5 (06:41):
It's it's incredible, the hot honey sour dough.
Speaker 4 (06:44):
Yeah that was my night. So okay, pretty happy, good for.
Speaker 5 (06:48):
You, Pretty happy. Welcome to pod meets World.
Speaker 4 (06:50):
I'm Daniel Fishel, I'm right or Strong, and I'm Wilford.
Speaker 5 (06:53):
Doe Oh, Welcome to today's episode. We are very excited
about our guest today. One of the more confusing parts
for us while recapping the show so intensely weak after
(07:15):
week has been the surprising string of additions and subtractions
from the writer's room in the later seasons, a musical
chairs of sorts. And because of this, we've heard a
bunch of names we don't remember, forcing even Will to admit, uh, nope,
can't place him, which is very hard to do. Before
the podcast, we would have thought we knew everyone who
(07:36):
wrote an episode, but now we know we are wrong,
which happens a lot like when we didn't remember that
episode that Love is Blind guy stole his quote from
We Got Your Many Many Emails. We have already recapped
that episode back in season three, so.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
We got to the podcast.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Weirdcast every week will just be us listening.
Speaker 5 (08:05):
To and then god, I think it was season three
episode one, and okay, so the trainy episode movie Theater
I'm Exploding your Head part five, that's that's season.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
Three episode one.
Speaker 5 (08:17):
Yeah, wow, jeez, there we go.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
Get the big brain on, Brad, you know you.
Speaker 5 (08:23):
Know, Okay, Well, enough of that. This week we are
introduced or maybe reintroduced to a writer with two very
important scripts to his name, season two's I Am Not
a Crook and season four's Uncle Daddy. He started his
career in the world of stand up comedy, surrounded by
some of the biggest names in the field, and then
(08:44):
transitioned into TV, writing not only for Boy Meets World,
but Sybil, Smart Guy and Michael Jacob's less known title.
Maybe this time he'd also end Jay Leno's Tonight Show
Writer's Room, a gig suited for his on stage experience,
all as he was still also performing stand up and
even owning his own legendary club in Philadelphia where he
(09:04):
booked some of the biggest legends to ever tell a joke.
The former professor and radio host also now finds time
to be an author, releasing a handful of books, including
his newest, a meta novel about Larry David with a
main character apparently different than the Larry David we all know. Okay,
that's just one of the things we need him to
(09:24):
explain the other. Why do we only kind of remember you?
He may not have ever won a super Bowl, but
today he's our Pod meets World MVP. It's time to
talk to Steve Young.
Speaker 4 (09:38):
I can't wait to talk h about the Super Bowl.
Speaker 5 (09:40):
I know he's gonna love him.
Speaker 4 (09:42):
Amazing Number eight, number eight.
Speaker 5 (09:44):
I did hear that? He there's another writer named Steve
Young and their checks used to get crossed. Oh my god,
I want to ask him about that. I want to know.
Did you ever you know, wouldn't it be great to
get your checks mixed up with Steve Young?
Speaker 4 (09:58):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (09:59):
The quarterback?
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Yeah, well it wasn't Steve Young the quarterback.
Speaker 5 (10:03):
Darn it. I know you said it was Steve. I
listened to another podcast you did, and I heard that
story and I thought, Man, if only it could have
gotten mixed up with the quarterback.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
Huh, yeah it was. It was Steve Young who wrote
for Letterman and I wrote for Leno, and so it
got switched a lot, and hid, believe me, I would
rather have his checks.
Speaker 5 (10:26):
Oh how are you?
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Oh, I'm wonderful. I just took my mother to breakfast
and I couldn't get back to my place fast enough,
So I'm now at my lovely daughter's house doing this.
And right away, by the way, you would know the
name of my daughter if you watched any of the
shows I wrote, because anytime you brought on a character
(10:53):
who is not a regular cast character, I named them
after my kids.
Speaker 5 (10:58):
Tell us your kids' names Kelly.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
And Casey, until Bob Young, the executive news here at
the time, said stop, you cannot dan for your kids.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
That's right, Uncle Daddy. Wasn't her name? Her name was Kelly,
wasn't it? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (11:17):
And Kelly is here today.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Oh that's so cool.
Speaker 5 (11:23):
Okay, well, thank you so much for joining us. We
are collecting Boy Meets World writers like Pokemon, so you
got to catch them all first. Let's get a little
into your origin story. How did you find yourself doing
stand up?
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Oh? Stand up? I can't. I couldn't do anything else,
I mean really, yeah, that was it. I started actually
when I was twenty twenty one standing in line at
the troupe door. That was the only place you could
(11:59):
do comedy at that time. And later on, when I
there was no comedy club, I came back to Philadelphia
and there were no comedy clubs, but there was a
group of people who were doing comedy, me included, and
I was the only one that could wear a three
piece suit and talk, and so I opened up a
(12:22):
club where actually I met Bob Young and Bob Meyer,
and I ended up managing them at the time, and
we all did stand up for years at that club.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
What was the name of the club?
Speaker 5 (12:36):
Tell us tell us.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
About the club, the Comedy Works. It ran from about
eighty to ninety three, and we were fortunate enough we
came out at the time where I could book on
a weekly basis. Leno, Jim Carrey, signed Felt, Eddie Murphy,
I mean, everybody who they were, the young Gun. Yeah,
(12:59):
and at the time, although I will tell you that
Bob and Bob, Bob Meyer and Bob Young were is
good or better than any of them, I don't know.
Mostly your familiarity is with them on you know, just
on a set. But actually, if if you look on
the wall or the outer wall of the Comedy Store,
(13:20):
there's Bob Myern, Bob Young.
Speaker 5 (13:23):
So you you did you own the club or you
were just running a club?
Speaker 1 (13:28):
I owned it, Okay, So you.
Speaker 5 (13:29):
Owned a club and then you were also a manager.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I was also a manager, and I couldn't see. The
thing is I couldn't do anything well. So what I
tried to do is a little of everything right.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
And you were also a comedian, so you owned a club,
you managed other comedians, and you yourself then performed at
your club.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
I'm assuming yes, yes, yeah, they wuldn't allowing me you
to perform. There's a restraining order at other clubs.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
My favorite thing in the world is going through the
list of the big comedy clubs what they're called. They're
always like Chortle and the Haha House, right and all
like so just to hear comedy works is yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
So let's well, let me let me backstory. When about
a week before we were going to open up, a
number of people, uh, we were at a restaurant trying
to decide on the name of the club, and we
had had a few extra Uh. We were loaded dollars
(14:34):
dollars and we were we were uh, we were sitting
around and I came up with I thought the best
name would be Comedy Shmamedy. And the reason would be
if people would call information for the name, uh, you know,
to the club, what's the name, and the person would
say the operator when they had operators, would say what's
(14:54):
what's the name? Uh, and and the person would have
to say Comedy Shmamedy, And it would be pretty hard
not to laugh, right, right, just for saying it. And
the radio person who was at that dinner, who's going
to promote for us, thought we stuck with that name.
But we did get sober. And when we got sober,
I actually I actually had to get sober because this
(15:16):
is a true story. I walked into an Olive Garden restaurant.
I thought it was an Italian restaurant.
Speaker 5 (15:25):
Well, I guess we could say goodbye to Olive Garden.
Speaker 4 (15:33):
Endless breadsticks and laughs. That's what I'm telling you.
Speaker 5 (15:36):
I mean, so out of everyone who came by comedy works,
who do you think had the funniest set? I know
you said Bob Young's pretty great. Who who had the
funniest set?
Speaker 1 (15:48):
There were? First of all, Leno was you have to
see Leno in the club, not uh Leno. There was
a comedian named Bob Nelson who's still around and a
killer act. Mac and Jamie were a comedy team and
and wonderful. But I could go down, Oh, Jim Carrey,
(16:12):
the microphone went out and we it was sat three
hundred and fifty people. The microphone went out. He ended
up doing the set where he would tell the joke
and then the audience would roar and then shut up
immediately because they knew they had to shut up to
hear the next joke. He would tell the next joke
and roar and then shut up immediately.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
It was.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
It was a brilliant night. Jim Carrey as no one
is better. There might be people that say, but no
one was better in terms of the guys that came
through in the last forty so years. Wow, man, except
for Buddy Hackett. Because he just saw that Buddy Hackett
was one.
Speaker 5 (16:52):
Another world alone.
Speaker 4 (16:54):
He was exactly That's what I know.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Yes, yes, because he could not get Sandy. And the
thing is, the thing is I didn't know that. I mean,
I love Buddy Hackett. I saw that. Oh my god,
I was ready to show that Buddy Hackett actually appeared. Okay.
Speaker 5 (17:10):
Yeah, So as a manager and then club owner, did
other comedians start to see you as a suit Was
it hard to stay like one of the boys.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yeah? Actually, when I went out to Los Angeles and
I auditioned for Mitzie Shore at the Start Start. Yeah,
my friend and comedian who started our club, Judy Toll.
I don't know if you remember.
Speaker 4 (17:37):
I loved Judy so much.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
She was so so I mean, Judy was the best
and I, you know, from from Philly, and I still
think of her whole time. Uh. So Judy sat with
Mitzi and kept Mitzi's head pointing towards the audience because
Mitzie could care less about what's on state. I mean,
she was looking at uh the stage with her help,
(18:03):
Judy's help. And it was a night that I actually
I just blew the audience away. And Mitzi said to Judy,
how come I don't know about him and all? And
she would not tell him that I was a club
owner because her and over at the improv. But Freedman,
it was bad to say you were a club owner
(18:24):
because we're in fact. Marjorie Gross, who was a brilliant
comedy writer and a comedian, Yeah, uh, she sat was
sitting on the balcony of my club one one night
during the show, and she turns to me and she said,
you don't seem like a club owner. And it was
the nicest thing anybody ever said to me. I really
(18:45):
took that as quite a compliment.
Speaker 5 (18:46):
Yeah, you're like, thank you. So when does the idea
of TV writing cross your mind? How does how does
that enter your world?
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Oh? I guess we all we all wanted to be
writers like on SNL or Mad TV not Mad TV,
well yeah, Mad TV, or or as the second Citty,
you know, you know the great sket shows. And I mean,
I love I watched Johnny Carson every night. I fell
(19:28):
asleep to Johnny, you know. And the first person on
the show was always a comedian at the beginning, and
I lived and died with every comedian that went on there.
If he did good or bad, it was I mean,
my mother had a stack of comedy albums that I
(19:48):
would listen to, the ones I was allowed to listen to. Yes,
back then, you weren't allowed to listen to until they
went out, and my sister and I would listen to them.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
So wait, so it was Is it true?
Speaker 2 (20:00):
There was an entire like a system on Johnny Carson
if you were a comedian of how you were treated
by Johnny would dictate how your career would go or
how you did that night. Where it was like if
he invited you over to the couch, you were made
right after yours.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Absolutely that was a different time. If you did Carson,
it was a big deal number one. But if he
called you over to the couch or he gave you
a wink and did this, Yeah you were you were
made Stephen Wright his first, his first set there. He
wanted him back within the week. We booked Steve Wright
(20:39):
that week because his agent called me up and said,
he just said Carson and he just killed. We have
no place to put him. So I ended up putting
them on for ten minutes in Philly. I paid him
two hundred and fifty dollars for four shows after he
killed on Carson and I couldn't. I had already Professor
(21:00):
and Corey uh Wayne Cotter, the legendary with another the
show was full of people who kill them and so
to have him come on, but because the point is
like Paul Prevenza, Blue Bleu, Boway.
Speaker 4 (21:18):
Freddy Prince, Freddy Prince when he went to his whole life. Yeah,
I mean that was incredible.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
If you if you had a good set there, everybody
in the industry knew about you.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Stephen Wright has one of my favorite jokes of all
time where he just says, I have a decaffeinated coffee table.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
You can't tell by looking at it. That's such a
good joke.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
Actually actually did one the other day I met. I
actually gave him credit, but it was, Uh, you can't
have everything where we did put it right.
Speaker 5 (21:51):
So what are a few of the major differences between
the LA and the Philly comedy scene.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
Well, back then, the philadelph comedy scene was great. I
mean those people who were Tom Wilson, they they were
amateurs basically when we started, and they were good when
we started. And Myron Young and Mike and Dwayne Cotter
(22:17):
and these people. When New York Comics or LA Comics
came in, accustomed to be the headliner and just blow
everybody away, had to work really hard because when you
were working every night at the three hundred and fifty
night seat theater, you had to be good. And it
was quite a mixed audience, so you can't just walk
(22:38):
in like Dennis Miller I had the middle Eddie Murphy,
I middled because the Philadelphia acts were better than the
headliners were good, really good, but just the laughter would
bounce off the walls and just sound like a roar
(22:58):
every night. That's what the FULLY comics expected and pretty
much that's what they did.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
And did you discover anybody, did you? I mean, in
your in your club? Is there anybody from Philly that
you were like? This is the guy or the woman
that then became somebody huge.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Oh I guess the closest that is Tom Wilson. Yeah,
you know, but I mean Tom did it on his own.
But Tom what Uh? He worked my steps. So we
were on the third floor and he his big job
was saying stay to the right, stay to the right. Stay.
That was it. That was his opening act. And then
when uh, he wanted to go on stage, I said, okay,
(23:33):
five minutes, five minutes, I'll give you, and he went
on stage early, five minutes killed.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Then within i'd say a month and a half he
was headlining. You couldn't help but headlining. He's so charming,
so funny, and and a good looking guy and obviously
a very good actor.
Speaker 5 (23:53):
Yeah I got to direct him. I got to be
his director.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Really.
Speaker 5 (23:58):
Yeah, he was unbelieve the ball.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
And a really nice guy. And are you familiar with
Ralph Harris. No, Ralph actually had a show on one
of the primetime networks and he played every character, most
every character he could do. That was part of his act.
And Ralph worked on the Steps for me too, and
(24:21):
then got his own TV show and I'm not sure
but network, but it was one of the three primary networks.
So there were a lot of guys who came through
who aren't weren't necessary that next day they became a star.
But I would say most anybody who came through, if
you would ask the comedian that play back there, they
(24:42):
will say they loved the club. It was. It was
just the audience was great, the shows were always great,
the number of acts that were on there, and and
we were we always were inmates running the aside. We
never felt like we were the corporate part of it.
We always felt that we were we were we were
(25:03):
all comedians too, and in effect we were all comedians.
Speaker 5 (25:08):
So your first TV writing credit is on a show
called Me and the Boys, which was an ABC sitcom
starring Madge Sinclair and Steve Harvey. Did you did you
know what to do in the writer's room or did
you just slide in and learn as you go?
Speaker 1 (25:25):
Well, this is this is funny.
Speaker 6 (25:27):
I yeah, So I pitched and as an outsider, and uh,
back then you had I don't still have to hire
these two freelancers a year and I wrote the script
and I thought it was pretty good, and uh in the.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
Writer's room where I sat, but I really was not
part of the writer's room here because I was an
outside of bringing the script and excuse me. I came
to the reading and uh, I didn't hear a word
that was mine. And I actually at the end, you know,
(26:08):
nobody left, nobody left, and I was sitting there, you know,
in the network thanking me for writing the script, and
I was thinking, I'll never I'll never work again. It was.
It was so bad. And it's not anybody particularly fault.
This is what it ended up being. And the uh,
(26:29):
I the next time I came into a writer's room
or a reading, I would always sit down and say,
please take a look at a page twenty five, third
line down, the second conjunction, and is mine.
Speaker 5 (26:47):
Right?
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Yeah? It was. It was. It was tough, but the opportunity,
excuse me to do it was wonderful.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
Okay, So I want to get to eventually you are
in nineteen ninety five. You are now a part of
Boy Meets World, but you also have credits on another
Michael Jacobs show, maybe this time with Marie Osmond and
Betty White. How did you end up in the Michael
Jacobs orbit.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
I really didn't end up in the Michael Jacobs he
was great. But it wasn't the Michael Jacobs. It was
the Bob Yo Bob.
Speaker 4 (27:19):
Yeah, yeah, we keep hearing that more and more.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
Yeah, and Bob, first of all, he still is. I mean,
he's a wonderful guy. He's been a friend for years
and you know we all started together, and just a
sweet guy. He really did not belong to TV.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
He was too too kind.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Yeah, yes, always too kind. And every time I get
a residual check, especially from Boy Meets World, I always
hold it up say thank you. Bob.
Speaker 5 (27:47):
Oh, did you know what Boy Meets World was before
you wrote your first script? How did it work out
that you so? Okay? I have to know? Were you
also a freelance writer for Boy Meets World?
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Ah? Yeah, yeah, I think no I knew about Boyne
was great. You guys were terrific. I always tell people
the reason Boy Meets World was great, Well, they had
good writers and Michael Jacobs and all, but this was
a perfect cast. This the cast makes the show. And
you guys were easy to write for because the first
(28:22):
script I ever wrote was a cheers and it uh it.
I said, I can't write it Cheers It's it's way
too good. How can I write it. When I started writing,
it was easy because the characters were so well defined
that if I put the character's name down, it's said
that character said, that character would say. And I just
(28:44):
my fingers just followed the characters. I you know, I
didn't feel it was me boy meets World, Uh, same thing.
Although there was a particular point where I felt really
bad because I'm not going to use your name. Topanga
started crying on the set because you couldn't get the
(29:09):
line the way Michael Jacobs want.
Speaker 5 (29:12):
This is what this is what I will remember, Yes,
you will remembered this. When we did the recap of
the episode, he was like, Danielle, don't you remember this?
And I was like, what are you talking about? And
he was like, you cried in front of everybody.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
I felt so bad, like you know, you know, it's
like I killed her.
Speaker 7 (29:31):
I they may have been your words, but I don't
think you were the one insisting I say it exactly
the way you wanted it, right.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
I think it was Michael, yeah, push pushing it at
that time. I don't know what you know, he wasn't directing, But.
Speaker 5 (29:52):
There's a fine line between the director and Michael Jacobs.
Speaker 1 (30:01):
But you still you still you're a writer. As a writer,
you stay back, you don't participate. I remember when I
did maybe this time, and Marie Osmond is the sweetest
person in the world. Betty White was just the consummate pro.
Speaker 6 (30:17):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
I remember standing on seid. I would always write in
lines for myself that I could do off screen, like
a radio broadcast or something like that, because I could
get scale, you know, for just doing it. And Bob
Yam also told me stop doing that.
Speaker 2 (30:36):
So just doing voice over the whole time, just saying
Kelly and Casey over and.
Speaker 3 (30:41):
Over again, pretty much pretty much.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
And luckily I didn't have any more kids, because you know,
I wouldn't have to stay writing the Uh. Marie asked me.
I was standing to the side when I was doing
during rehearsal where I would I would do. I think
it was a race. There was a horse race, and
I was doing the character of the sportscaster. Uh and
(31:08):
play by playing and uh, Marie come Ben's talks to
me on the side. She leans over and she said,
how should I say this LINEH to a writer who's
working there. First of all, you'd never tell anybody to
set how to say rhyme. That's really all horrible. But
the director was watching her talking to me and I
(31:31):
got and I didn't answer. I didn't answer. I think,
should you know, uh, you could talk to Bob you know, whoever.
Speaker 5 (31:38):
Whoever was directing.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
Yeah, yeah, but that was an interesting experience because that
was a great cast too at that point at the time,
they really I forget who the young girl's name was
on that. I love her. She did a lot, a
lot of work. But the Johnson job.
Speaker 4 (32:02):
I just spoke to Ashley not too long ago. She's wonderful.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
Oh, if you ever run into her again, I love
her mother or sister. I mean, just you know, great, great,
that's the thing when you do a show, you and here,
you know, I'm a writer. I'm not down on the set.
I'm in the writer's room. But there still ended up
being some sort of familyness that forms with everybody. And
(32:30):
you know that show that that show had, you know,
it was quite the family. Even though we you know,
the first of all, the title was horrible. It was
made for critics. Maybe this time, you know what I mean,
just it was we tried to change beforehand. Can we
get up with a better uh name? But that's what
(32:51):
we ended ended up with. And you know, I mean
this show. I mean it was going opposite Jack and
you know, I I don't know if it would have
lasted anyway, but it was a really nice experience because
people friends of Betty would come in all the time,
and you know, Carol Channing calling me over. Oh man,
(33:12):
I still have the script. They all signed it. She
knew that I wrote the script and she started talking
to me about, you know, the script, and it was
funny and all that. And all I'm thinking is Carol
Channing sounds just.
Speaker 5 (33:26):
Like herself, so much like Carol chan Yeah, I couldn't.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
I mean, it was so I never got over being
in awe of these great people who were around. There
are plenty of people I have disdained for, but I'm
talking about just the experience, experience that you know the
people when you run into these people. And Betty became
the reason that I published my first book.
Speaker 5 (33:58):
And which was what's the name your first book?
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Great Failures of the Extremely Successful Why. I interviewed many
high profile people on the traumas they went through in
their life, and overcame them, uh Arn Brockovich, Teddy Pendergrass,
uh Tony Curtis, John Wooden, I mean, but but it
(34:23):
was her, Larry, Larry Gilberts exactly. He became a mentor
of mine. He sent me over to his publisher and
I'm not going to go into the long story, but
it was something I wrote, wrote for Written by magazine
that he thought was a book. I said, and I'd
never written a book. I don't know how to, you know,
(34:44):
I don't know anything about He said, I'm sending you
over to my publisher. And I did not have a
what I wrote. They said, well, we're looking for something
that's a little more uplifting and you know, hopefully some
you know, that can help people. And I said, I
have an idea, and I interviewed Betty White. I said, Betty,
(35:05):
would your mind if I would interview the subject? And
they bought it right on her chapter. And so I
became an author, you know, basically, you know, because of
Betty White.
Speaker 2 (35:17):
I'm sorry, I have to so my friends here, my
fellow co hosts, know how addicted I am to mash
It's one of It's basically the reason I became an actor.
Speaker 4 (35:27):
So can you just what was it like working with
Larry gelbart.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Well? First, of all, I wrote an article. It's written
by magazine still out there. You know it's the Writer's Guild.
Uh yeah, magazine, I think ye. Actually, okay, I was.
I was contributing editor there and I wrote I wrote
a story. Uh you know, as I was getting older
and you know, there was ages, and so I wrote
an article that, uh, I'm not a young television writer,
(35:56):
but I played one on TV. It was all. It
was a chapter from a book called You'll Never Write
in This Town Again, And in it I gave examples
of how to fool executive producers into thinking that you
were younger. And I would say, like, when you pitch
an idea, and make sure you do it laying on
(36:16):
the floor so the moose skin from the front of
your face would fall to the back of your head.
And always always be close enough to the desk that
you could sit like this as you're discussing, so they
don't see your neck. The idea, the idea was. It
was all farce. I put nobody's name in there except one.
(36:36):
I said, never put any award that was prior to
two thousand on your resume, Oscar, Emmy, Tony, whatever, unless
you're Larry Gilbert. I did that because I knew Larry
would read it, and he did get in contact with me.
And let me just tell you, I teach a lot
of business classes and leadership and all. I talk a
(36:59):
lot about mentors. So I talk a lot about Larry
because I heard him speak at at a w G
A thing and I went like, he's great and I
want to get to know him. Uh. He gave his
time to me all the time. It was such, he
was such a manch so and the fact that he
was here, I'm going to age it out here because
(37:20):
he was part of the Sid Caesar legacy. Your show,
Your show shows and and and all the brilliant writers
that were on that show mel Brooks and and Neil
Simon and uh even Woody Allen was writing there one year.
To me, it was like, oh my god, that's you know,
(37:41):
I'm so close to genius here. Uh. Not not that
I was getting closer. I just meant I was physical proximity.
So yeah, he's a wonderful He was a wonderful person.
Speaker 4 (37:54):
Amazing.
Speaker 5 (38:07):
Getting back to your time on Boy Meets World, you
were on set for the tape night where I burst
into tears in front of everybody. Did you get to
spend the entire week in the writer's room, because we've
we've interviewed some other writers that were freelance writers and
they never even made it to set at all. Did
your relationship with Bob give you the opportunity to be
inside the writer's room?
Speaker 1 (38:27):
Yeah? I got to be in the writer's room. I've
got I got the pitch during the show, I cheated
and Bob cheated. That's so great and letting me be
part of it, and down for the table read and
the and the end going up for the rewrites and
(38:47):
you know, you know, even you guys did the show,
uh that I wasn't part of, and I was on.
I came in and I just you know, was on
the stage and there was one discussion and I mentioned
the line to Bob. I said, why don't you try this?
And he actually put it in the show, and you know,
(39:09):
and so I didn't get paid for.
Speaker 5 (39:11):
That should retroactive.
Speaker 1 (39:14):
But the line was, oh, I can't remember what the
line was, but I was going back to if you're
talking about line uh the book that I wrote about
learning from failure and mistakes, etcetera, etcetera, And and if
you want to do something, If you have a passion
to do it, you should do it, no matter what
parents say, no matter what coaches saying. Oh, this is
(39:34):
a true story. When Beethoven was just a young child,
he was told that he could never play music because
he was deaf. But did he listen? I feel like
I feel like I'm on your couch. I don't know
if he listened. It was a long time ago.
Speaker 5 (39:56):
I did writing for a family sitcom hold any weight
among your comedy peers? Or did you try to hide
that job?
Speaker 1 (40:11):
You know, it seems like I'm kissing up here constantly.
But you guys, such a It's a great show and
a wonderful cast. And by the way, I thought Ben
Savage was going to become the next Albert Brooks. I
really thought his delivery and a lot of deadpan and
(40:32):
all that stuff. He seemed to have that sense that
Albert Books was one of my is one of my idols.
So you know that it didn't feel like a family show.
It felt like a classic show. So I mean, what
did I watch? I had to watch a lot of
(40:52):
shows because I was going to end up writing, because
I wrote a lot of family shows, and that would happen.
But my my thing satire and political humor and and
you know, really things that you I wrote. I wrote,
was it me and the boys? Oh no, it was
(41:16):
the smart guy. I wrote a smart guy. And every
time I would come into a show, I would pitch,
usually that the one of the kids got drunk, or
one of the kids was found with a gun, or
one of the kids. I always always pitched basically.
Speaker 5 (41:32):
You wanted to write a very special episode.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
Exactly, And I pitched this one where Taj, Yeah, Taj
got drunk at a party.
Speaker 5 (41:44):
I mean, here's the episode.
Speaker 1 (41:46):
Never too young, Yes he was either twelve or thirteen
years old and all that stuff. And everybody went, no, no, no,
we're not going to put Taje in that situation. I
get a phone call at the beginning of the next
season that's remember that pitch that you made, come in,
We're going to do it. And it was. It was
(42:06):
because the I don't know if it was a Biden administration,
but whatever they wanted ANTII drinking, anti gun type messages
and they would pay the networks for it. And uh
so I got called in to write the script and
an actual edgy script, and I won the not the
(42:30):
amount I was nominated for you man a tanas You
didn't pronounce it right, okay, but you said, but you
used all the letters there exactly humaniti something like that.
I was nominated for that, and I and I won
(42:51):
another award for writing that because it was you know,
real life uh stuff, So I got to write, you know,
other things than just faun and I wrote for Sybil.
And I don't think that was a family show. Yeah,
that was more of an you know, adults get to
(43:13):
watch the shows too.
Speaker 4 (43:14):
Can I.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
When you were doing Moreman World, how old were your
kids were they of of t G if watching age?
Speaker 1 (43:22):
No, they were younger than that. That's why I could.
Speaker 2 (43:26):
You know.
Speaker 1 (43:26):
I once put them and my whole family on eBay, uh,
to sell the family. Yeah, and I took them, by
the way. I pitched that as a show too.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
But we actually the dad sells his family on eBay.
Speaker 1 (43:41):
Yes, I did that too, And it was back when
people weren't doing that, and they were like four and
five at the time, so they couldn't really figure out.
And that's about this time. Uh okay, they they didn't
know except today it's like there's a picture of my
(44:03):
daughter when she was an infant in Betty White's arms
and she never thought anything about it. She said, when
she went to college and she showed it, everybody went crazy.
It was a great conversation starter because I think Betty
ended up doing SNL and they did that commercial where
she changed into another person by eating a certain candypark. Anyway,
(44:27):
so they were younger. But believe me, she can't wait
to tell all her friends I'm doing this.
Speaker 8 (44:34):
Oh oh, So as a big comedy nerd growing up,
you watched Carson's Tonight Show religiously and then you end
up writing the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.
Speaker 5 (44:45):
That must have been quite a moment for you.
Speaker 1 (44:49):
It was kind of cool. First of all, Jay worked
for me for a number of years, so I guess
it was a little bit of you know, payback.
Speaker 5 (44:57):
Yeah, a little full circle swittering exactly.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
And the thing is it was monologue writing, so it
was really what happened that day or whatever, and you know,
you give about you pitch about five hundred jokes and
they go that one's good, you know. So it wasn't
exactly where you sit there and go, hey, this is
(45:21):
just a wonderful environment where my creativity is looked on
as broken it was. And as I said before, what
you had to write for Jay is nowhere near as
funny as he was. And yeah, in the club person
you would be double over for an hour and a
such a mechanic. He just knew. He still knows how
(45:44):
to make it work. On the tonight show, he was
working to a very watered down audience. Yeah, and that's
what you're supposed to do.
Speaker 4 (45:51):
But you're still doing.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Man, you're starting just I'm thinking comedically, every single night
is a new five minute bit. Yeah much for them
on I mean that's oh yeah crazy, that's when you're
you're thinking about it from a comic standpoint, that's just nuts.
Speaker 3 (46:06):
And how big would the writing stuff be? How many
how many writers would be sitting around right now?
Speaker 1 (46:10):
Well, there are a lot of inside outside writers. When
when I was writing, I was an outside writer, and
I would, you know, every day, be sending the stuff
in and he would go over his house with a
bunch of people and go through all the material and
see what they would use. So you know, they were
about twelve writers. Twelve writers at any time, I mean
(46:36):
with you guys, there were about ten writers. Yeah, you know,
and still you figure all those writers and all those rewrites,
you would figure something good would come out of it.
Speaker 5 (46:45):
Yeah, such a shame.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
By the way I looked, I did a little cheating.
So I went back and looked at shows, and then
I looked with somebody had put I think you guys
did one hundred and fifty six shows something like that,
and I think Uncle Daddy is like twelve or something
like that rated. So I felt really good about that.
Speaker 4 (47:08):
Yeah, people loved it.
Speaker 5 (47:09):
People love that episode. It's a great one.
Speaker 1 (47:12):
It was so real, and it was based on I think,
you know, in part about my life. You know, you
date somebody with kids, and you know you have to. Hey,
so how you doing there, buddy Pale? You know, right right?
And so you tried to in this case, you tried
to write it the way it should be, not the way.
(47:36):
But it was wonderful right up to the last second
that the kid could have been murdered. But you know,
everything up to that was just so sweet, just so right,
exactly what you should do. And I really did, you know,
I didn't get along. I like the kids better than
I like the girl, you know, I mean, when you
meet them, it's kind of it's kind of fun to
(47:58):
play with the young kids and all. And yeah, I
made a lot of a lot of it. I had
a lot of experiences with children as part of a
you know, a family that wasn't your family.
Speaker 5 (48:14):
Did you end up also, did that relationship end and
you decided that it wasn't for you to have kids
at that time?
Speaker 1 (48:23):
Oh? At that time, Oh yeah, I mean I I
was not taking so off. I was stressed over everything.
I've been sober for thirty five years. Not that I was,
you know, it's horrible drunk or anything like that, but
I drank and it wasn't doing any good. And so
(48:44):
at that time I was not making commitments to anybody.
I could be charming, or at least I thought I
was right. You know, when you're drinking, you don't exactly
know if you're charming, right, you think you are. But
at the same time, later on I stopped drinking, you know,
and everything, and that's when I ended up getting married
(49:04):
in and and reversing the visecond.
Speaker 4 (49:10):
And then you had children or you just bought your
family anybay.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Yeah, well I would have done that if I would
have known. That saved a lot of money.
Speaker 5 (49:18):
So when did you decide to start writing books?
Speaker 1 (49:21):
Well, it was when when our show Maybe This Time
was we got the word that it was going on
affair and and uh, I said to somebody. Somebody said
you should write a book, and I said, I do
not write a book. They said you would write what
you know, and I said, well, I'm really good at failure.
(49:41):
I've practiced it for years, I know. And and that
became you.
Speaker 5 (49:46):
Know, that became your first book, Yeah, Betty.
Speaker 1 (49:49):
Then there were a couple of children's shows I pitched
and did not sell. Oh when I saw the Disney channel. Uh,
and they gave it back to me after they ruined
it by giving it to an executive producer who didn't
get it. It was about a boy who could go back
in time, but only fifteen seconds. That's all he could do.
And sometimes he would go back in time the watch
(50:13):
he was where and would do it without him. No,
fifteen minutes, I'm sorry, fifteen minutes, go back in time.
And I wrote it as a book, sold it to
HarperCollins because we weren't able to make it there. Then
I wrote another book for HarperCollins, and then I had
a thing with Larry David and U show. No. It
(50:34):
was a conversation with Larry David that we were I
was going to do an article on him, and it's
too long the story to tell. But I ended up
writing it into a book and it's called the Larry
David Code, and it's how Larry Saves the world.
Speaker 5 (50:52):
But I mean, and that's the Larry David we all
know and love, or is this a different version of
Larry David.
Speaker 1 (50:58):
That's interesting because if you would read the preface of
the book, it does explain that there is a Larry
David who was very successful, very popular, very attractive man.
This is not this Larry. Uh. This Larry David is
very similar to that Larry David. But it's not that
Larry David. And I have written notes to all of
(51:21):
my attorneys to let them know.
Speaker 5 (51:23):
Let them know it's a totally different.
Speaker 1 (51:25):
And I didn't. I didn't. I put in my drawer
for years, and I showed it to Richard Lewis, who
was a friend, and he said, you gotta you gotta
publish it. I said, well, Larry might get upset it
screw Larry, you know.
Speaker 4 (51:42):
And wasn't he Larry's best friend too?
Speaker 1 (51:45):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (51:48):
Richard Lewis.
Speaker 1 (51:50):
Oh, yeah, it wasn't different. Richard Lewis too, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (51:53):
Very another very good looking, very successful.
Speaker 1 (51:56):
Yes, yeah, there are there are. There are plenty of
them in the book, and coincidentally, all with similar names to.
Speaker 5 (52:03):
Some very I mean, we've named three Steve Young's on
this podcast alone, and there are others.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
My son represented Steve Young, a country singer. Oh and
I got a check of his at one time too.
Speaker 5 (52:19):
And did you want to be you or did you
want to be him?
Speaker 1 (52:24):
He was better than me.
Speaker 5 (52:25):
Yeah, you wanted to be him.
Speaker 1 (52:26):
They're all better than me.
Speaker 5 (52:30):
So you have also taught writing at Temple. You were
a political radio host. You are a bit of a
renaissance man.
Speaker 1 (52:37):
I was a political on air America. And keep in
mind how well America did so I'm sure that both
of my listeners were devastated when we ended. But yeah
I did that. I was political editor of National Lampoon
for a while. That was fun. That was because National
(52:58):
Lampoon was a big deal for me when I was
when I was a kid. But yeah, I told you,
I did as much as I could because I couldn't
do anything well. And it was really you know, as
it came in front of me, because like, I flunked
out of four different colleges without ever getting a credit,
so that was a lot.
Speaker 5 (53:19):
How does one do that?
Speaker 1 (53:21):
Well, it's interesting. I flunked out the first year and
then I went and they said, you have to go
back to night school to uh to get back into
the day school. And people said, you can't flunk night school.
That's like a possibility. So I took it as a
challenge and I ended up flunking out.
Speaker 4 (53:43):
Were you just not going? I mean, that's the only
way to flunk out of night school.
Speaker 1 (53:47):
I went and I took a public speaking course and
I funked it there. I I found out later that
I had a learning disability and so I couldn't retain
any information and that that was it. Then I went
in the army and I and I flunked out of
the army. They said, I think we would be better
if you would.
Speaker 3 (54:07):
You would not be here anymore, and so I went
back to the surge country by getting out of the army.
Speaker 1 (54:18):
So yeah, So, by the way, that's why the book
learning you know, Great Failures, That's what popped up in
my mind because there were so many times that things
didn't work, and then it led to something else. I
mean even that. I wrote a movie that some very
heavyweight producers took around town. Did not sell, but my
(54:40):
agent called me up and said, there's a scene in
there that I think would make a great, uh sitcom
for kids, and we sold it to the Disney Channel.
So there it is. The movie didn't work, but we
sold the TV show. TV show then didn't work. They
gave it to me. I wrote, it is a book.
The book. The actually book worked, and somebody bought it
as a play, you know. I mean, it's just what happens.
(55:01):
If you're just doing and doing, you end up running
into something that you would have never expected if you
didn't take the action. Oh look, I'm lecturing.
Speaker 4 (55:10):
That right, and I already funked out. I already flunked
out of your fund.
Speaker 1 (55:17):
I'm going to send a magnet that put on your refrigerator.
Speaker 5 (55:24):
Our last question for you. You have had a very long,
fulfilling career in so many different fields. Is there still
anything out there left that you want to do?
Speaker 1 (55:35):
Oh? Let me tell you, I discovered a stand up
approach after all these years, about eight or nine years ago,
nobody at the club owners tell me. Nobody has ever
done it. I've never seen that I've done. Many other
(55:56):
comedians have told me. But it's something that I do now,
and I'm better than I ever was. So I'm in
my seventies and yet I now can get on stage
as a headliner and literally kill because they're not. What
I do is I watch every other comic and then
(56:18):
I do their material again because I say, I say
at the beginning, I wrote material for tonight, but theirs
is so much better than mine. I'm just going to
do theirs again. And what I've done during the night
is watch them and change their the jokes. I change them.
I make them really absurd and just totally off the wall,
(56:42):
but I use them as the starting point. And I've
only gotten I've only gotten beaten up a couple of times.
Speaker 4 (56:48):
Yeah, I was gonna say that. Said that, I bet
comedians love that. That's what they're known for. It's like,
you know, my favorite thing is when I tell a
joke and then another comedian tells the same one.
Speaker 5 (56:57):
A little bit better and different than somebody.
Speaker 1 (56:59):
You know, what I like to do is tell it
before they go on. That's smart. There is only a
couple comedians who I've ever said, Uh No, it's it's
because I think it's a fun thing. And it's because
I'm not making a lot of money on their material.
And I tell them, if you like what I did
with it, you take that that's yours. Oh you know,
(57:20):
it's just so fun to do. And I sit there
and I sit there every night and I'm writing, and
you know, I'm at the beginning it's like it's not
gonna work. It's not gonna work. And then all of
a sudden, but I spend most of the time turning
them my girlfriend and saying, what do you say?
Speaker 5 (57:37):
I can't hear.
Speaker 3 (57:41):
I think this is really that's really cool. It's it
makes it that it has to be live. That's what
I like about it, is like, that's why the audience
on the audience must love it because they are you
clearly couldn't have written this ahead of time. And so
it's like getting back to what stand up should be,
which is a live experience. And we do this with
our live shows too. The less we play, the more
we just walk out on stage and engage with our audience,
(58:03):
the better at night.
Speaker 1 (58:04):
It is.
Speaker 3 (58:04):
So that's such a cool it's like a cool tightrope
walk that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (58:08):
I really and thank you And isn't it when you
do things live when the audience is with you, don't
your minds move faster?
Speaker 3 (58:17):
And doing this is why you go out and you know,
that's what we want from comedy. In today's world, everything
is you know, online or you know. We're all isolated
in our own little doing meetings like this, you know,
so the idea of like getting out into a room
and listening and being a part of a group is
just getting lost on us.
Speaker 1 (58:32):
At the same time, I cannot send out a tape
of mind and anybody would know what I was doing, right, right, right.
I have my own too, and that's fine too. But
the thing that makes me different is doing the other
people's material, and unfortunately that puts me in a hole.
But you know what, I'm at a point in my
(58:54):
life where I'm not sitting there and going, oh, let
me get on failing, right, right.
Speaker 3 (59:00):
Right, get invited to the couch.
Speaker 4 (59:02):
That's the best.
Speaker 2 (59:02):
Well, when you when you also when you when you
write your book about failing part two, I hope you
start with us.
Speaker 1 (59:11):
Well, I will agree the show that Danielle did and
thank you got for the tears. I wish I could remember.
I know you were making a speech.
Speaker 5 (59:20):
It's at the very end.
Speaker 3 (59:21):
It's the tag running for class president or something.
Speaker 1 (59:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (59:25):
No, it's like Corey is running for president. You end
up taking over the debate or something. I forget what.
Speaker 1 (59:29):
Everybody was running for president.
Speaker 5 (59:32):
Yeah, it's the tag. It's the very last scene of
the show. So if you go back and watch it,
and Will even I mean I said I wanted to
rewatch it because Will said he could even see it
in my eyes.
Speaker 4 (59:42):
I can't. I can see that I've been covering.
Speaker 5 (59:44):
Yeah, my husband said he could see it too.
Speaker 1 (59:46):
Yeah that's great. It's not so great, but.
Speaker 5 (59:49):
No, it's great. I love it. Steve, Thank you so
much for coming and spending your time with us. Thank
your daughter Kelly for letting us use her house and
her name, and Casey, I really have enjoyed spending a
bit of time with you. It makes sense now that
we didn't really get to know you because you were
only on our set for two weeks, so it's been
a pleasure to get to know you a little bit now.
Speaker 1 (01:00:11):
Yeah. Well, I'm glad, you know. I'm so pleased that
I was part of it because when people talk about
what are you show? I wrote something for Hbolay is
very proud of for little kids. But your show is
the one that I always think when I get introduced
it is a writer for Boy Meets World. That's the
first credit that they give. And now a lot of
(01:00:34):
the audience is, I don't remember that show.
Speaker 5 (01:00:37):
I'm too old for that.
Speaker 1 (01:00:38):
Yeah, oh yes, my parents told me.
Speaker 4 (01:00:42):
Yeah, that's where we are.
Speaker 2 (01:00:43):
Ye.
Speaker 1 (01:00:44):
I give you as the credit. I'm tolled that I
could have been part of it.
Speaker 5 (01:00:47):
Where can people find you so they know where to
go see you in a city near them.
Speaker 1 (01:00:52):
The Larry David code dot.
Speaker 5 (01:00:56):
Com Great the Larry davidcode dot Com.
Speaker 2 (01:00:59):
To find Steve David, I'll find a different Larry David
different by the way.
Speaker 1 (01:01:05):
I do not. I'm really that on up keep, so
a lot of my appearances in two thousand and fifteen
and sixteen may still be on there. So I don't
know it. You know, Okay, check the date.
Speaker 4 (01:01:21):
Check the date.
Speaker 5 (01:01:22):
Okay, before you buy tickets, check the date at the
Larry davidcove dot com. Thank you Steve for being with
us today.
Speaker 3 (01:01:29):
Guys, appreciate good to see you.
Speaker 1 (01:01:30):
Bye bye.
Speaker 5 (01:01:33):
It's so great that he for doing when he did
the two episodes, actually got to spend the entire week
on zet unlike a lot of other freelance.
Speaker 3 (01:01:40):
Are funny because he actually has more memories than some
people who are on multi.
Speaker 2 (01:01:45):
How about some confirmation for you, Birsty.
Speaker 5 (01:01:48):
Well, I didn't need it. I knew for sure. If
we'll remembered it, it happened, and writer remembered it vaguely right.
Speaker 3 (01:01:54):
It was like, yeah, once you pointed out, I was like,
that's right, and I can tell you because I remember
the fact that we changed the credit and all that
was in a way.
Speaker 2 (01:02:01):
Yeah, he's also the people that he's worked with, I mean,
just the names that he's spouting out there. I would
also officially like to ask that we try. It'll never happen,
but we try to get Jim Carrey to come on
the podcast.
Speaker 5 (01:02:13):
Why would you Carry come on our podcast?
Speaker 2 (01:02:16):
Let's find out why would My dad always says the
worst thing people can say is no, you might as
well just ask.
Speaker 5 (01:02:21):
Then find him.
Speaker 4 (01:02:21):
Well, I don't know how to find Jim Carry come
on the podcast.
Speaker 5 (01:02:26):
The Jim Carrey dot Com to the Jim Carrey Jim
Jim to a.
Speaker 3 (01:02:31):
Very interesting moment the last couple years on Well, then
let's find out if maybe it's interesting in this sort
of like Buddhist present tense constant. He's like a very
interesting guy lately, so let's try to get him on one.
Speaker 5 (01:02:43):
My favorite, my favorite recent Jim Carrey quote was they
asked him why he was coming back for Sonic, and
he was like, I spend a lot of money.
Speaker 4 (01:02:51):
Yeah, we can get it. I'm telling you, we can get.
Speaker 5 (01:02:54):
We can get them.
Speaker 3 (01:02:54):
Okay, I just know how hard so many of our
writers had to work like these stories. It's just the
constant hustle. It's like, yeah, and like you have to
manage the club or own the club, even to just
get your own five minutes, and then you have to
just hang out. Like I mean, the way that he
must have spent every night of his life backstage with
a group of comedians trying to make each other laugh,
(01:03:15):
trying to maintain enough of an impression to get paid
to get hired the next It's like such a hustle.
Speaker 4 (01:03:21):
It's so much work. He's also running a business. He
also owns the club. That's what you got that so
much work.
Speaker 3 (01:03:28):
I just you just have to have that, like I'm
always going to be making people laugh and I can't stop,
Like I just always you know, like what an engine
to always have inside of you. I just it's crazy.
Oh my god, it's so cool.
Speaker 5 (01:03:40):
Well, thank you all for joining us for this episode
of Podmeets World. As always, you can follow us on
Instagram pod Meets World Show. You can send us your
emails pod meets World Show at gmail dot com, and
we have merch.
Speaker 1 (01:03:51):
We hear it.
Speaker 2 (01:03:52):
Podmeats World would like to personally apologize to the Olive
Garden merch.
Speaker 5 (01:04:00):
Also a reminder, we the kids still want to jump.
We are on tour. You can go to podmeetsworldshow dot
com for merch and tickets and to see the calendar
of all the dates. So we hope to see you
out there. We love you all. Pod dismissed. Pod Meets
World is an iHeart podcast produced and hosted by Danielle Fischel,
(01:04:22):
Wilfridell and writer Strong Executive producers Jensen Karp and Amy Sugarman.
Executive in charge of production, Danielle Romo, producer and editor,
Tara sudbachsch producer, Maddie Moore engineer and boy Meets World
superfan Easton Allen. Our theme song is by Kyle Morton
of Typhoon. Follow us on Instagram at Pod Meets World
Show or email us at Podmeets Worldshow at gmail dot
(01:04:44):
com
Hosts And Creators
Will Friedle
Danielle Fishel
Rider Strong
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