April 8, 2025 • 54 mins
Who isn’t a Paul Reiser mega fan? The dramas like Stranger Things! The comedies like “Mad About You”! How about the action/adventures with The Boys! And who could forget him in Aliens! ALIENS! And now after a 32-year hiatus he’s back on the road doing stand-up comedy again. Really, no Really!
Comedian, actor, television writer, producer, author and musician Paul Reiser is one of Hollywood’s most prolific creatives.
Voted by Comedy Central as one of the Top 100 Comedians of All Time, Reiser – who came up alongside folks like, George Carlin, Robert Klein, and Jerry Seinfeld.
His most recent standup special – his first in 30 years – Life, Death, and Rice Pudding, was released late last year.
***
IN THIS EPISODE:
- Comedian or actor? Which is it?
- Why can’t robots recognize crosswalks and bicycles?
- Why the 30+ year break with stand-up?
- How do comedians decide what to wear on stage?
- Jason’s feet are smaller than you can possibly imagine.
- Can couples switch which side of the bed?
- How a comedian bagged a role in Jim Cameron’s Aliens.
- When Paul realized Mad About You was a hit.
- Jason pushed Helen Hunt into accepting Mad About You!
- How Paul cowrote a book with Doobie Brother’s frontman, Michael McDonald.
- Columbo’s Peter Faulk was… difficult.
- How’d “The Problem with People” get written?
- Is Paul Broadway bound?
***
FOLLOW PAUL:
Comedy Special: Paul Reiser: Life, Death, & Rice Pudding
Stand-Up: Comedy & Magic Club/Hermosa Beach/April 17
Website: paulreiser.com
X: @PaulReiser
***
FOLLOW REALLY NO REALLY:
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Really now, really, really.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Now, really hello, and welcome to Really Know Really Jess,
Alexander and Peter Tilden, who remind you onequivocally that subscribing
to the podcast is a truly stand up thing to do.
And speaking of stand up, actor Paul Reiser began his
illustrious career back in the seventies as one of the
hottest young stand up comedians of his generation. What quickly
followed was breakout acting roles in films like Diner, Beverly Hills,
(00:32):
Cop and Aliens. That was followed by television stardom and
series like My Two Dads, Stranger Things, The Kaminsky Method,
The Boys, and his highly acclaimed series Mad About You,
which he also produced and wrote. But then last year,
after a thirty two year hiatus from stand up comedy,
Riser returned to his comedy roots with his special Life
Death and Rice Pudding, and suddenly he was a stand
(00:55):
up again.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
Really no really, Today.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
The guys will chat with him about the twists and
turns of his amazing career and what called him back
to take up the microphone and comedy clubs once again.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Here's Jason and Peter.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
All right, let's say.
Speaker 4 (01:09):
Should we actually begin, but.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Rolling why I just want to I want to go.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
What is so important that I had to race over
to this side of town? What is how?
Speaker 4 (01:17):
He's interrupting? Apparently we're trying to start a show and
roll in and do introductions and the.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
Guests I thought i'd come in aggressive.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
Has decided to come in like you know, like it's
like it's his show.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
You know what that means. He's a little bit nervous,
he's uncomfortable. He wants to try and get in and
feel the.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Yeah you put me in my place nicely. Good for
you for you know who did that?
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Remember who did that? Same thing? Same thing?
Speaker 3 (01:41):
He's gone.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
No, he's still with us.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
You know what comes? I love you, Remember I love
obscure things. I was gonna say, Lance Wrens, No, just
to see.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
If Shatner started the interview, started interviewing, what's the show? Why?
Speaker 3 (01:55):
No?
Speaker 4 (01:55):
Now I'm doing sign But yeah, Shatner started the.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Same always takes over. You go to lunch with him
and we say we're not going to have desert, and
he goes everything and then you gotta get it. Yeah, so.
Speaker 4 (02:08):
We'll pretend that we had not been interrupted. Are you
excited about our guest today.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I am really excited to because oh, this is like
a nine and a half ten, and he's gonna say
why not?
Speaker 4 (02:18):
Why not immediately?
Speaker 1 (02:20):
All right, that's it because the Orson Walf is dead.
I'm a huge How are you not a huge man?
I mean you grew up watching him? And also he's
taking jobs away from me, nomadic actresses your way from me.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
I still like them.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
It's dramatic, it's action adventure, it's the boys, it's stranger things,
it's it's met about you. Reduct you know, comes back.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
For a guy with an every man's face and a
really you know, I'm not saying he doesn't have talent.
I'm saying it's not a to Z you know what
I'm saying. He's not Brando, but.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
He llow he's done up singing comedy with the thing
he did with that monitor lizard. Oh my god.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
Yeah, but no, Paulie, Paulie is he's done at all?
Speaker 1 (03:10):
And what the really no really is thirty two years
he waited to do stand up the thing?
Speaker 4 (03:16):
Now here's the thing because I haven't done the deep dive.
I know paul primarily as an actor because I first
remember the first time I remember remember seeing Paul's work
was in diner, right, you're with me? So I didn't
know him as a stand up prior to that, and
I kept here on a stand up standing stand up.
And so for me, I go, it's even more of
(03:38):
a really no, really, because I go, you never did
stand up? Why we Why now you're going to do
stand up? But it's a return to the roots. What
balls would it take? Yeah, drove all the way here
from wherever? Yeah, and we never we just did this,
We just do this what he did? Just talk about
him in front of him. Yeah, and speculate what his
answers might be.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
They'll be fine with me to watch two people talk about.
Speaker 4 (03:59):
Please welcome to really no, really the great and I
do mean that one of thank you gentle men out there,
and and a lovely human being. Nobody by the fact
that he's willing to come down to the van Night's airport.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
And by the way, not knowing from comedy anybody or
under what thirty probably thinks you're dramatic from aliens on, thanks,
you're a dramatic act my favorite thing.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
And I hear this a lot. His friends will say
that their kids their teenage kids will go, what the guy,
the doctor from Stranger Things is going to try to
be funny and I go, okay, first of all, tell
him I'm not a doctor, right, really, and I'm actually
a stand up but you know, and I did take
twenty years off doing stand up, not intentionally but just
(04:40):
as it turns out, so it's understandable. But you know,
I think of myself as a stand up for But
as you were talking, we were in an acting class
together for a brief with Larry. Yes, that's right, that's
where I first met you, and it would be it
was way before you would be probably eighty. I remember
(05:02):
just two three big locks of hair. Yeah, that would
have been a while ago.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
You're confusing us. It happens all the time. But seriously,
because I never asked you this, because how often have
we chatted about this stuff? So when you were a kid,
you weren't thinking actor. You were thinking come yeah, yeah,
you know they were sort of meshed. I don't think
that you're in fourth grade thinking I want to do
(05:30):
a fellow but performing. So it was like the blanket performing.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
So in elementary school, you'd write an essay, a composition,
a story and my recollection is you could read it
aloud if you'd like, and I would go and I
would volunteer because I wanted the laughs of the eighteen
twenty kids. And even then, this is how dumb and
ill advised. I would put in subtle jokes that only
(05:57):
one guy would get and the rest of the class
would go. But like, I was always working the back
of the room, which is death is silly, but it
made me happy. So it was always performing and getting
laughs was the thought. But you know, you'd be in
a school play. I remember in college I did Guys
and Dolls and I was not in the theater department.
(06:19):
It was like the dorms putting on a silly thing.
And I even fell into that by accident because some
guy dropped out. And I loved getting the laugh. I
was like, and I love the excitement, and I loved
getting ready, Well we got a show. It's only nine
more hours to a showtime, you know that. But I
knew there were four solid laughs that I would get.
(06:41):
That made me realize, yeah, that's what I like, and
we'll get through the dancing and singing and stuff.
Speaker 4 (06:46):
But the reason I find it interesting because I talked
to Jerry about this too. Jerry said, I assume it's
still true that his preference, by a landslide is stand
up because he loves the thrill or the challenge of
working in one. Yeah, And I find like I talked
(07:08):
to Kevin Pollock about that too, and he likes that too.
He likes the he likes working in one. I went
into acting because I spent my life in one and
I wanted to have a community, and so it was
always the communal aspect of being in a show or
being in a film that drew me to it. I
find that a lot of comedians I talked to are
(07:30):
very intimidated by the community work of being an actor,
or vice versa. My actors won't go near.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
It's ironic because one of the things, yes, you're working
in one, but one of the things that I loved
when I did my little you know, theater experiences, but
I also love in stand up is in fact the community. So, yes,
you're working in one, but you're all hanging around that,
you're all chiming in with hey, you know, it would
(07:56):
be a great line after that, and you're with the
other it's you know, like, oh, these you know, the
brothers and sisters. So I think there really is a
strong community. And it's interesting. I never felt comedians were
really competitive professionally. I mean you might say, oh, you know,
jump on the line. You're an actor. There's eleven guys
go into the audition. One of you will get it,
(08:19):
the other ten will not. Just stand up. There's a
great gig, you'll do it this week, you'll do it
next week. So it's not a zero sum game. So
to that effect, there really was a community. There is
a community and stand up which I still love. Well.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
You also, you were that part of the Best Buddies
thing with Cherry Too, right, did you Mark Schiff, Larry
Millwer didn't you do the New Year's.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
Michael Lampton Ky? Yeah, yeah, we were, you know, five
idiots who said it's New Year's Day, we got nothing
to do, nobody has a girlfriend, let's go eat lunch.
And then that became a tradition, you know, we'll get
through the New Year's Day thing. I did it for
like twenty five years or something.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
And did you guys compare notes? Did you guys always
fell comedy for like a mont grow.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
We wouldn't talk. No, in fact, almost not at all,
but but it would just be sprinting and having ridiculous laughs.
You know, we were the guys that everybody else is
going to led Zepplendon, We're going to see Robert Klein.
So when you find that community, you know, and and
I remember one time in fact, that group was Larry
(09:21):
Jerry and myself and Mark Shift and we were eating
out in a restaurant and wait, just said something silly
and there was an opening and almost like we all
went around instantly and did the same joke but a
little different went Wow, that's that was your take. That
was your take and uh, and we just laughed at that,
(09:42):
the fact that we had the same idea and we
all went a little bit different way.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
So may I bring up so I watch a comedy
special not before you were even booked.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
That is really appreciated.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
And the thing that I single out one thing, not
that everything else wasn't brilliant, one thing that was got broken.
I'm a lot more healthy than so the thing that
got me though, that was so broken. And you get
to that point when you're logging in and says, are
you a robot?
Speaker 3 (10:07):
I love those tests because there's so few things that
I'm good at and those one I I crush them.
I go, I know I'm already in, but give me
another one.
Speaker 4 (10:15):
I know, because there's always like a piece of one
in the corner of a blank.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Yeah, And I go, do I click on that cross one?
Speaker 3 (10:24):
Yeah? Yeah, you're either a robot or Jason Alexander.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
That's right. Yeah, but you're not getting it.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
There was when I go someone that I try to
trick you up, palm tree.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Palm Well it could be a focus, right, hey, not
so fast that yes, yes, but it's it's it's interesting
with the technology that advance, the one thing that stops
a robot, we cannot attemptify a chimney.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
You put a chimney in with debt.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
Now, you say you took a twenty year break, but
were you and you were writing and running some of
the other things as well, But were you keeping sort
of a here's a.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
Little journal note I should make no real No, I wasn't.
I think the brain's always putting doing that anyway, like
that's funny. But I wasn't keeping it because I I
had never intended. There were a lot of comics who say,
you know who just actually got into stand up because
they want to get discovered and then they'll get a sitcom.
And then they advanded it my our group of guys,
(11:22):
we just loved stand up.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
That was the goal.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
So I never wanted to get out of it. And
I only got out of it because I like, when
Mad About You started, I was I don't know Jerry
managed to do it, others did it. I was like,
that's a full time job and my brain is dead,
and if I have a month off, I'm going to sleep.
So and then I got really comfortable, and then we
you know, the show was over, and I said, I'm
going to take a year off, and and I didn't
(11:47):
always wanted to get back, but I didn't want to
just dig dust off the old act. So I just
kept waiting and waiting. I said it's time, and I
just started really from scratch. I had three minutes of
stuff in's you say, what's relevant? I'm not smart enough
to make anything up and I can only I'm going
to tell you what happened in my house. See if
(12:08):
this is funny, and most people go, oh, that happened
to my house, and lot George Colin used to call it,
oh yeah comedy, like oh yeah yeah. So but you know,
you find out that what you're going through is really universal.
What was nice about coming back after all those years
and now this is post mad about you, so audiences
now they know you and they feel comfortable. It really
(12:30):
felt like getting together with old friends. It's like, we
know what's happening. Those babies that we had, they're growing
up now, right, Well, they's funny. So it was was
it was way overdue. I wish I had I don't
know wish, but I wanted to and I only was
procrastinating because I wanted to do it well. And what
(12:53):
I found was it was exactly going back when I
was sixty or whatever, felt exactly the same as when
I was eighteen. I went on audition night. It's like
just as excited, just as nervous. It's just as challenging,
and there's no shortcut, like you can't you're not automatically better. Lo,
you got to go up every night. And then a
(13:14):
year I felt it was a year before I said
I can maybe try to sell a ticket. No, even
the first club date I wait to the I would
just go to eight club and do fifteen minutes or
four minutes, and then eight minutes, ten minutes, I think
I can do it. At the first club date manager
booked it was like two shows with two shows in
one night. No, I'm in pajamas at eight thirty. That's
(13:37):
not gonna I can't do that. And to my surprise,
so we negotiated down to one and then of course
when it was over, I went give me another show.
I realized I missed this. Wow, well it was great.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
Can I ask you that dumb question that I've never
just came to my mind? Thought, Jason's gonna call me
for asking Spust, how do you decide what to wear?
Whenever I watch a comedy special, I go, if you're
wearing the wrong thing for now and your stomach and
your thing, and it's going to be bad. How do
you test out what you wear? Because you were a
very nice outfit that worked. The shoes, worked the pants.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
But it's not a dumb question because it took me
while to realize.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
You test out what you wear because you were a
very nice outfit that worked, the shoes, worked the pants.
Speaker 3 (14:31):
It's not a dumb question because it took me while
to realize, I only feel comfortable with these shoes, and
I like to gee I don't like to wear a suit.
It looks nice, but I don't feel comfortable in a suit.
And and so I found a shirt. I went, let
me give me a lot of these shirts. And I
got a dozen of the same shirt. And then was
the special. I actually had a meeting with a wardrobe person.
(14:53):
I said, well, this is not just me chilling it chuckles,
I have to and they go, but you want to
be comfortable, I said, I'm just gonna wear exactly what
I wear. And uh, and if you need those shirts,
by the way, we'll watch the shirts.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
I like the blue monitor. I'd like the things good.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
But there is there is a thing.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
As we've all gotten older, and I would imagine you
found this too. You find a uniform, whether it's for
home or for work. I was like, let me do this. A.
It's comfortable. B. I don't want to think. I remember
Obama talking about that that one of the things like
when he got busy, is like, I'm going to cut
out all wardrobe decisions except one day I'm gonna wear
(15:30):
a cream colored suit. But that he stepped out of
the zone and then he got he got in trouble.
But it's like, yeah, you know, just gonna here's what
I wear, Here's what I do. So is this it
is this the ni No? This is my Jason Alexander
put on a sweater. No, but yeah, yeah. Basically I'm
always wearing jeans in the sweater and if I step out,
(15:52):
it's wrong.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
If you still have clothing you wear from Matt about
your for God's sake, because I'll tell you what you
want him. He's wearing two items right now from Cipher
and we just talked about.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
By the way, if you're a constant listener, we talked
about this in the last episode as well. So when
the show went down, what do you take? I don't
know what to take, so I took all my wardrobe.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
I remember, Yeah, but us thirty years now.
Speaker 4 (16:16):
Look at his shirt.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
It's a classic. It's like a hemingway.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
You don't throw.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
I remember the when you're doing a show and we're lucky,
we're privileged to be working on a show, and they
dress and slowly you start dressing just like your character
is you. Let's just close that gap. And then while
you're doing a show, Well, I got to do it
tonight show. I need a suit, get your suit. You
doing a thing? I have a wedding can give me
(16:44):
cut to afterwards, I went, I haven't been in a
store now it's nine years. I don't know how to
do that, and so I got to get a show
so somebody can buy their pants and somebody go take those.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
In when I shoot something. That's when I got closed.
I have an insane foot. I have a five and
a half d so it's five five and a half.
I wear a six shoe, but five and a half.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
It was like those those little boxing dummies with the
little plastic feet that correct. So really, yes, shocked that
you can support your body weight.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
If you're listening the first time, this is my foot,
and my foot ends here. My foot ends here.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Your parents and they felt to see if there was
room in the shoe.
Speaker 4 (17:30):
One hundred and four episodes of the Sign Felt program
right there, these shoes still looking good brush suede.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
I always, I always. I always found it a bit sad,
little melancholy that you grow when you're growing as a kid.
You you hit your final shoe size, but you don't
know it. And if I knew it on that day,
I would have liked to celebrate. I'm a six, I'm an.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Eight, I'm a nine.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Oh no, it's staying then, but you don't know it
till you're twenty four.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
So that was it.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
I'm a nine and a half.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
The other the other observation this is this is, oh,
come on, I'm having a senior moment. Everybody loves Raymond
ray it's raised joke. But his joke is I didn't
know the first time I slept with my wife that
I was choosing my side.
Speaker 3 (18:16):
For the rest of our time. To get that, which
is so true. It's these decisions you never realize is
the decision. Here's a phenomenon that I and my wife
cannot figure out. We have our sides, and if we
move to another house, it's the same. But when we
go to a hotel, we switch it and not delivered it.
Not like, hey, let's freshen things up.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
My wife gets the side closest to the bathroom.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
That's why there is a slight element of macho. I'll
have the closest to the door so I can protect you. Yeah,
so as first to go out, she's the first.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Yeah, yeah, I just feel feel I never say it
that way, but the really hotels do change up.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
And we'll go interesting. We switched we didn't know why.
Speaker 4 (19:03):
Yeah, but you're some of your biggest I mean really
some of your home runs are in really serious stuff
like does that surprise you or did you go nope,
I got this, no problem.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
I know it surprised me. I didn't really think too
much about it. I remember, I mean it was really
Aliens was the first thing. And it wasn't that it
was dramatic so much.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
It was.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
It was certainly non comedic, but I looked at it
more as like this is gonna be a huge this
is like oh absolutely, yeah, well Alien. The first one
was Jim Cameron had done, Done, terminated. I wrote, well,
that's my home run right there, and then I read
the script and go wow yeah. And so I remember
reading it thinking, hey, I have no business being in
(19:44):
this movie. But it was I've never had this experience
since I was out of breath reading it goes oh
really yeah. It was just and it was written sort
of like haiku, you know, bam slam metal on Metal Dog,
and it was it's just visual. You could see it
and hear it. And to my mission statement for myself
(20:07):
was just be do whatever you have to do so
that when you're on screen the film doesn't come to
a grinding halt.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
That was the bar.
Speaker 3 (20:17):
I said, just if people just go all right, he's
in a movie, you know, so what does that mean?
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Okay, coach?
Speaker 4 (20:22):
But did you have to go get it or was
it an offer?
Speaker 3 (20:24):
No, it wasn't an offer. No, Im I met with
Jim Cameron. I don't know that I read. Maybe I did.
And then it was a long period of months because
they had to they had to look at every actor
in the UK. They shot it in London and apparently
there is no one on the continent there the can
(20:44):
do what I did. So they came back and so
what I had kind of forgotten about it is like
you're usually here in a week. This is months. And
then I was shooting some the thing and my manager
shows up, you got it? What alien?
Speaker 1 (20:58):
So?
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Really so I knew it was. I mean, I was anxious.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
I was.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
I was nervous. I want them to do well an
interesting thing that you will certainly appreciate as an act.
As it turns out, the first week or two of
my shooting of the schedule, I was in scenes, but
I had no lines. So as a comic, as a
performing you know, what do I do? But it made
me think deeper. For the first I was what are
(21:31):
you doing? What do you and you don't want to
telegraph on you know, but so how do you be
so that anytime that they get you, you're And by
the way, maybe absolutely nothing is the right choice. But
I never had to think at that level because like,
usually you can skate on your performance, on your lines,
it's like.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
Right performance, but you show up and you sell likable
and trustworthy, and then when you reveal that you're not, Yeah,
that's fast. I mean Stranger Things is kind of the
same mae.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Of the things that I think they were trying to
ride off of that image of like, we don't trust
this guy and he's replacing Matthew Modin and he was terrible.
You know, his character was evil. So who turns out
maybe not so much evil, But it's funny. I remember
Jim Cameron saying that he wanted someone who the audience
(22:24):
didn't really know, you know, wasn't gonna be a big star,
but it was also somebody that would be amiable and
you'd like him, and you wouldn't you wouldn't be suspicious.
My recollection is that people in the minute I showed
one that's wrong. Something's not right with this guy. Because
also the people were so trained to not like corporate people,
the corporate weasel. And it's sort of like the guest
star on Star Trek Ugly he's gonna be dead, yes, right,
(22:47):
shirt guy. Yeah, one of these things is not like
the other.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
But you do sell it. I mean you do sell
it like you and in a big way. And obviously
they looked at eight billion people Games Town could have
a casting list that forever forever to decide, Yeah, you're
the right thing. It's pretty amazing, right it was.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
It's you know, there is a life to that movie
that I never I mean, it was a big hit
and people would often remember recognize. But there are conventions
that are you know sci fis and comic cons and
that I've been to and I'll meet people. Go, I
watched that movie every Saturday for the last thirty six years.
Get out of the house, do something, get a job,
don't tap.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Paper by the way, somebody does, Well, who shows up?
Do they have someone? Did people dress up as the yes?
Speaker 3 (23:35):
Oh yeah, they dress up in aliens, they dress up
on the full stuff and they bring in props that
I'm going is that from the actual movie. Its like
some of them they are, Yeah, it's and it's I
mean it speaks to the success of that of what
a good movie it was, and it still holds if
you you know, I'll catch up. Wow, it's and so
many movies after that sort of stood on the show.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
It's amazing being something that's that iconic. And I'm wondering.
So you're you're at home writing stuff and you're doing
stand up and then you do Mad About You. There's
no guarantee it's going to be a hit. How many
episodes in and you went, whoa, this thing is got
some heat. Was it immediate or would it take a while?
Speaker 3 (24:11):
Well, there's a there's two different ways to look at it.
I knew immediately it was going to be good, and
I knew the minute. I just Helen Hunt came over
to my house and we read it in my house
before she even agreed to audition, and I just went, ah,
this feels special. And then we did the pilot. Well
(24:32):
everybody and the audience are like, yeah, this is working.
Is it going to be a hit that you don't know?
And because we didn't, you know it was actually initially
we were paired and the timing was it was we oh,
Jerry's show was just beginning to take off, so like,
oh New York Jewish comic in New York, and what happened,
And but we weren't guaranteed anything like a second season.
(24:56):
They go, you should have a baby, went no, no, no,
that's no good to get. And I think it wasn't
really till the end of the second season when they go, Okay,
we're gonna go but the first season, like you know,
you do twelve and then we'll pick up the back
nine and second season they was still trying to but
by the third season they would take their hands off
(25:16):
and say, you guys obviously know what you're doing.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
And did you have to take notes from network or
did you do much like Larry where you said I'm
quitting if you try and give me a note.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Oh, I just I just had lunch with Helen Hunt
and were laughing. She said, you have a real allergy
to notes, like, yeah, I can't. Can't so much so
that when we did the the revisit five years ago,
Helen and Peter Tolan itself and we were like it
was really a well oiled trio. But it was like
(25:46):
you guys do the meeting. I can't.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I can't.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
I'll soil myself. I said, they'll give you twenty things.
If three of them makes sense to you, let's talk
about the three, but don't I can't hear the other ones. Yeah,
I just it's just how was it in the initial
run though?
Speaker 4 (26:02):
How do you could you push back against it or
did you have to?
Speaker 3 (26:06):
It was? You know, I had a partner, Danny Jacobson
and Danny Danes, and often he would, you know, vet
them and so here's a good one. And sometimes they
were good and sometimes often they're just execs who feel
like they have to, yeah, put their fingerprints on it,
Like what if you do remember one it was a
network guy?
Speaker 1 (26:25):
What if?
Speaker 3 (26:25):
What if Paul? What if what if your character was
chewing gum? He could what if he had toast? How
does that help you? Is that a better show? Is
there a Toast demo that you're trying to get? But
they also you know, but we knew early on. I
think it was this. Certainly in the first season we did.
(26:51):
We knew that the success of the show. We wanted jokes,
we wanted laughs, we wanted you know, fun, but it
was the small stuff that people would tuning into and
and we did. And I've often talked about this is
that we did a the highest concept show. You always
saw a siphoned it's a show about nothing, and we
always say wow. Show was about the small things, the
(27:12):
little things, a little thing. And then we had the
biggest concept ever. It was I invested in a virtual
reality thing. But the issue was I invested our money
and I didn't speak to her, didn't check it with
the wife. And we come back when in bed and
we're just it's just a two shot, the two idiots
sitting up in bed, and I said, you're not trying
to talk them into I said, you can do anything.
(27:34):
You could. You could you could ski, you could you
could climb a mountain, you could water, you could go
in the ocean. And she's warming up, she does, what
did you pick? I said, I got a massage from
Christy Brinkley, and Helen just cocked her head ever so slightly,
and I got a huge laugh and went yes, because
the show is about not what you did, it's like
(27:56):
what the other person feels about. When she cocked her head,
I went, hm, hmm, this is gonna work.
Speaker 4 (28:02):
But can I if I'm the man, I think I
may have delivered Helen Hunter, because as she was considering
the show, I think she had already. I think she
had the offer on it. I found myself doing a
short film that she was producing, and she was in
and we were having lunch, and she said, I think
(28:35):
I may have delivered Helen Hunt here because as she
was considering the show, I think she had already. I
think she had the offer on it. I found myself
doing a short film that she was producing, and she
was in and we were having lunch, and she said,
would I like doing the sitcom? I said, well, what's
the sitcom? She said, well, it's Paul Riserd.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
What what I mean? What is it an audience?
Speaker 3 (29:02):
She's yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:02):
I said, it's the best job you're ever going to have.
Are you on the writing team? She said, I don't know. No,
it's the best job you're ever gonna have. Why wouldn't
you do it?
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Are you?
Speaker 4 (29:12):
Is it ensemble? She said? What's two hands with Paul?
Speaker 1 (29:17):
Of course?
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Well, of course, Joe, thanks.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Well, you know her.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
She was starting at that It was ninety two and
she was starting to get some heat in movies. She
worked as a teenager and done a lot of teen movies,
and she was really on a roll. And I met
her because my wife and they had a mutual friend.
And we met at a little dinner party and I went,
while I was writing it, I'm going, and she didn't.
(29:43):
It wasn't at all. Doesn't look like my wife was
not at all what I was picturing. But I left home.
She's really intriguing. She's funny, she's lovely. She's just the
right amount of goofy and neurotic, just the perfect amount.
And I remember I turned to Paula and I said,
what do you think of her? As you she want
it'll be good. But Helen's fear was that it was,
(30:06):
you know, going to be the wife in Gabe Cott
and Welcome Back. Got her Yeah, like you know that
you ever hear the one about the money. But but
we were so saying. She came to my house, he
had read the script and then we I said, well
let's read it together. And then at that very first meeting,
before she had even said yes, we talked about I said,
(30:29):
I want to do a show.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
We have to do.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
You know, we had somewhere in this relationship story, one
of them has to have an affair or the threat
of an affair, and I said, and I figured who
said it first, But we each had the same idea,
like we have to do one shot, how about a
one whole episode of one shot? And we're like yes,
and we tried and it wasn't until year five we
found a story that could do that. But we had
(30:53):
the same show in mind. So thanks for pushing her
over the fence. Now it was it was just kismet.
I got to do a guest on the reboot. You
did us an honor.
Speaker 4 (31:05):
I had a great time and Michael And that's the thing,
because we were going to say Mike, Mike was shore, right,
Mike Richards.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
Mike Richards did an episode. Yeah, yeah, it's always Jerry
did an episode two?
Speaker 4 (31:16):
Did he really?
Speaker 3 (31:16):
We shot for a summer Yeah, we did.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (31:21):
We did a shot in New York and it was
literally a cameo.
Speaker 1 (31:25):
We walked by and.
Speaker 3 (31:27):
My character had taken a viagara and it was very
pronounced and you never shot below here, but you could
tell something something wrong. And I said, hey, Jarry, walk
on the street.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
How you doing.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
He's like, basically there was that.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
And then you lead the weird but big fan. The
weird and interesting thing I remember in launching it was
Lisa Cooper being on two shows. Yeah, which was fascinating
that how did that happen that she could stay on your.
Speaker 3 (31:53):
It's like how did Michael McDonald be on The Dobie
and the Doobie Brothers and Steely Days.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
We're gonna talk about.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
But Lisa Kudrou Somewhere in the first season we did
a flashback, like you know, to before I met Jamie.
I was having I hated blind dates and I had
the worst blind date. It was with Lisa Kudro and
we just cast on. It wasn't that much on the page.
She was so funny. She as we know, but I
(32:20):
mean her line readings. We were just having this stilted
conversation on a first date and blind date and.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
What do you what do you do?
Speaker 3 (32:28):
Oh, I'm a documentary filmmaker. She goes, Oh, that's so funny.
I'm a banker. I'm like, why why did you hit
that so hard? That doesn't make sense? She was, and
we said we have to get her back, and so
we made her not that character, but we brought her
a back as she was the waitress in the place
and I remember the day she said she's going to
audition for another show because we only had it for
(32:50):
like a few episodes. It was no, we didn't have her,
And I said, what's the other show? It's like six
friends and they all live in New York in the
same building with that's not going anywhere. And then they
embraced it. So they made her twin sisters. That yeah,
but she she had such an odd, delicious delivery.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
So you mentioned Michael McDonald, You right, it's one of
those things that go to Michael McDonald has done my
book with Paul Righter. Okay, how does that? How does
that happen?
Speaker 3 (33:22):
That's the most natural thing in the world, Peter, you
know it's it's not the first comedian a musician uh
to write a book. Luciana Patti and carrat Top.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Did I love that? That was which was the musician
He was going to prop opera at that time, and
Carrot Top said, I can help you, okay, all right,
all right, by the way a book.
Speaker 3 (33:50):
Yeah, Leonard Burnsneine and Emo Phillips. So I was a
huge fan of Michael McDonald and we met at a
silly a party that I was invited to he was performing.
It was in somebody's house, and we walked into this
Michael like, this guy's doing well, he's got Michael McDonald.
(34:12):
Is that his house guest musician? And I just went
over to him and started chatting, and we became friends.
And I would always ask him these things like exactly that,
like I don't understand what you could be in two bands?
Don't don't they want to hold on you? And so
I would ask him these questions over the years, and
then I'd forget the answers, and I said, you should
write a book so I don't have to bother you
(34:34):
every time I have a question. And he said, you know,
I've been approached. I don't know if I even have
a story. And I go, you have a story, because
I don't know how to write a book. I said,
I've written books. I'll help you. So it was it
was literally March twenty twenty COVID lockdown. We had nothing
to do and we had no jobs, and we both
had to figure out how to work zoom.
Speaker 4 (34:53):
It was like then is you can see each other technology?
Speaker 3 (34:56):
And we just we didn't even meet for three years.
We just would He spent about a month talking like this,
and I'd take the tape, I'd record it and type
it up. So it's his story and I just helped him.
But it was interesting because he would go, I don't
think that's interesting. I go, trust me, that's really interesting.
And then other times he goes, this is so fun
I go, it is funny. Does not in the book.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
It's fascinating when telling your story, I guess, did you
have revelations as you've written books, you've written best sellers,
the stuff happened when you're writing a book. It's like
when you're writing a script for the first time, and
it's like an out of body experience. Something gets written
and you go, I didn't know I had that in me.
Speaker 3 (35:34):
I didn't.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
I didn't know.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
I fired that. Yeah, well in this, in his case,
you know, there was new. We were just doing it
on spec Let's see IF and I and the safety net.
I said, I said a minute, you don't enjoy this,
Well stop, I said, doesn't have to.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
You know this.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
It costs us nothing to sit and have a coffee
on zoom. But what he discovered is that by the
end of it, he said, oh, I do have a
story tell Because he is very humble, and he he
felt that his greatest stories were having worked with all
these different people. I go that in itself is you
know who else can say that? I worked with Ray
Charles and Quincy Jones and you know everyone else. But suddenly,
(36:15):
as the more he talked, these through lines come up
where he It was sort of an exercise for him
of realizing how did he get here? You know? Seventy two?
And he started working professionally at fourteen in a band,
in like eighteen piece band. He's fourteen and I said,
tell me there's a tape I want to hear fourteen
year old who? He said, now sadly deadly? The tapes
(36:39):
were in a jacket that was martinized. You know what
that's wrong?
Speaker 1 (36:41):
Oh? I remember markin Wow.
Speaker 3 (36:43):
Do you know what that joke is? Hun from the
in Laws? Tch flies with beachs? Yeah, did you get picture?
They were left in a jacket that was mutt and
you bos worked with Peter Falk?
Speaker 1 (36:55):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (36:56):
What did you do with peterful?
Speaker 4 (36:57):
I did a play with a two persons play with
Peter at the I saw it.
Speaker 3 (37:00):
I was there, Okay, here's a magic night.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
It was great.
Speaker 3 (37:04):
And he makes his entrance from the back of the theater. Right.
So here's this magical night. I grew up a door
at Peter Fork, Peter Fock. He I just I loved him,
and I had this idea for years I've been sitting
on and would take a stab at I got to
write a movie where Peter Fox plays my father. I
don't know what the story is, but Peter Fowk is
(37:24):
my father. That's a story. That's something I gotta do.
I see you in that play and I loved it.
I loved you, loved Peter. I go backstage, I guess
to say a lot of you. I didn't know him,
and I went and at that I was, you know,
I'm mad about you know. I was doing commercials and
so Peter says, I love you. I go, he goes,
(37:47):
and he goes, I love everything you do. I love
your show. He says, I love what you write. And
I go and I'm just like, think you think, And
he just makes a point, goes, I love what you write,
like made it like you said it twice someone, thank
you God. Like. I literally went home and I said,
I got to write this thing. If Peter fo I mean,
it was such a moment of the sky's open up.
(38:11):
I said, here's the guy I've been wanting to write for.
He doesn't know I've never discussed it, and he's saying,
go write it. And then I wrote it pretty quickly
after ifter sitting on it for years, it came out
pretty quickly. I dropped it off at his house. Somebody
gave him told me, Joe Montagna goes, here's his address,
and I called him and said, I'll read it. He goes,
I'm a slow reader. I said about it. I dropped
(38:34):
it off on his at his house and I sid
by the phone and he said, I'm going to read
it right away. And by eleven o'clock at night, I
got I take the dog out, the dog come back
phone on the answer machine and I go, I missed it,
and I listened to the message, and it's just Peter going, well,
(38:56):
we got to.
Speaker 1 (38:57):
Make this thing.
Speaker 3 (38:58):
I went and I and that would have been enough,
you know. I was like, I don't have to make it.
The fact that he read it, he said it and
it was the greatest was.
Speaker 4 (39:09):
Do you have a good time with him.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
He's not the easiest guy, but he took a shine
to me. He somehow knew how much I loved him,
so I was in a little zone of safety. He
chewed to spare the director and anybody else. But I
found I imagine you found this true. All he was
he was not an ass.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
He just was really.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
Cared about the work, and he wanted to do his
best work.
Speaker 4 (39:34):
I found, I absolutely, I believe that's true. I would
also go so far as to say, and this might
have come with age, because I worked, you know, we
worked with him. He was he was getting up there.
I thought there was like much like my dad, who
would who and they would have been contemporaries. They were
(39:56):
not allowed to say, you know, I'm nervous or I'm scared.
So it so in Loua of being able to say
that everything else was wrong, everything else was not right,
The set's not right, the director's wrong. The story is
the thing that dad dad, And if you took the
time to go, well, what would you like to do?
(40:16):
How would you like to fix it? How should we
address it? He couldn't articulate. That's how I knew it
wasn't those things. Because he's very bright, and he was
an artist. He was a beautiful painter, and you know,
so he knew about details. If he knew something was wrong,
he would have spoken to it. And I found him
to be fearful. And there was a complete personality change
(40:40):
in him after our first audience. Once he knew that
he knew what he was doing to display and it
was reflected back to him, he became a totally different.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
That makes sense.
Speaker 3 (40:54):
There was a documentary about Brando and and I love
this story that uh that street car on the waterfront,
the famous Rod Steiger scene that could have been a contender.
Brando didn't want to do the scene right well you
know the story I heard it from Stiger you win, no,
no please, But basically he didn't want to do the
(41:15):
scene and he couldn't articulate it, couldn't articulate it. And
Eliot Kazantz was the thing. And he goes, oh, he's
got the gun and he's pointing at me, like, I
don't know if I wouldn't do all that if the
gun is at me, And the director goes, well, what if,
like after the first line, you pushed the gun away
and Branda goes, okay, it was that simple. The fix
was that he is but throw out the whole scene
(41:37):
because this.
Speaker 4 (41:37):
Doesn't work and then he didn't stay there to do
the coverage Fortier.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
So I'm up one night and we talked about this.
Prior to I watched this movie is a problem with people.
I had no idea what to expect. And I'm laughing
out loud, but what a sweet movie. But reading about
you talking about it, if I get this right, you
your premise is the people's default or default are at
(42:04):
the anger, any discomfort.
Speaker 3 (42:06):
Any two people will put them in a room, they'll
find some reason to argue, argue. It's like that all
the joke you see that that ano the synagogue, I
wouldn't go to. It's that.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
So that was and then and then you work through
it and find out if you do hang with each other,
you're more like that person.
Speaker 3 (42:22):
They're not well I think you know, I always, I never.
I'm not. I haven't read and I'm not well read
enough to know the difference between all the religions, and like, okay,
but if you take the head of Sunny and you
know and she it, so what what is the difference,
So the Presbyterians and Episcopas, the difference is.
Speaker 1 (42:43):
What like what?
Speaker 3 (42:45):
And I remember, you know, part of the impetus The
impetus for the movie was the Problem with People is
the name of the movie. You can find it on
iTunes and Amazon Prime. I just wanted to go to
Ireland because I loved Ireland and I and I had
seen Local Hero, which was in a nod to it
in the movie. But I never had a story and
(43:07):
I couldn't come up with it. And finally I said, well,
what if there's a And I wrote it with a
buddy who I never met but somebody suggested him as
a writer, and we came up with there's got to
be a reason conflict. So what are There's two relatives
who've both grew up not liking the other one just
because their parents told him not to. It's like, okay,
that sounds rich, and how do they come together? So
(43:32):
but one of the impetuses that moved me I remember
reading a story over ten years ago in Israel. There
was a school that was literally down the middle and
half of it was Orthodox and half of it was Sectarium.
But they shared in the yard. They shared a sandbox,
(43:53):
so the little two year old Orthodox kids would be
sitting in the sandbox would do non religious and religious
people made a line in the sandbox, so the kids
shouldn't meet. And I thought, okay, you know, you're afraid
that your two year old will enjoy and that's why
the end of the movie is children in the Sandbox.
(44:14):
But yeah, I think at bottom line, what do people want? Oh,
I'd like to not get shot and I to not
blow up me too. I'd like my children to be safe.
Speaker 4 (44:25):
Same here.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
All right, so we got that covered. What's the you know?
And then but we get stuck on your grandfather said
something about my grandfather. You know, I had my family,
my mother for years with sort of bad mouth one
of my relatives older and I never knew why. And
I said, what is the thing? She goes, Yeah, she
(44:47):
said something I didn't care for. I said when was that?
She goes nineteen forty seven. I went, okay, let it go.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
But what do you so?
Speaker 4 (44:55):
I'm asking for all kinds of reasons, both selfish and not.
But what is next for you? And what do you
want it? You've I hate to be one of them.
You've done it, Paul Rosie, you've done it all. But
what do you Is there something that you go? Boy,
before I hang this up, I'd really like to do
that that kind of a role, work with that kind
of person, go back to the stage, do another series.
Speaker 3 (45:17):
What do you think? What do you like? I really
I'm a big fan of doing nothing and nothing makes
me happy. And they do another I won't see you
though as a sitting star. Yeah, but I really love
like on a given day. And I've really gotten into
last couple years reading, like reading and buying books like
(45:38):
if I live to be one hundred, I'm not going
to finish the books. I why are you buying? Will
buy because I might not like that one. But I
sometimes I'll have an idea and I don't have a
burning passion to do something. There's a part of me
that still thinks I want to do my music, and
I've never really somewhere I believe like I have one
piece of music or some music that I want to
(46:00):
put out. I've done, I've written songs with people, but
I think, oh, i'd love to you know, when I
hear a great instrumental soundtracking and going, that's the thing
that lasts forever, Like Okay, you know he already wrote
Cinema Paradiesel, But maybe I could write something that would
make you pull over and weep. So that's like a
sort of wish, But I don't sit at home thinking
(46:21):
where I wanted. I mean, I'm happy to go out
and do stand up. It's like I would love that
to take off. I would love to play a little
bigger and more frequently, but until something comes up, like
I'm actually writing a show with my son that we
actually sold and I went, okay, this is this, and
that it was somebody else came to me. They not
the idea, but just the invitation. We'd like you to
(46:43):
do a show. You want to write a show with me? Yeah, okay,
and we so that even if it goes no where,
it's like, all right, I'm gonna write.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
But by the way, for somebody who likes to do nothing,
I write a show. As you said, write a show
is starting. You got the Boys coming out, you got
stranger things coming out. You're probably writing some screenplay that
you'll I mean, you're really busy, but you don't think
you're busy.
Speaker 3 (47:07):
I you know, I'm gonna let you behind the scenes
a little bit. On one hand, you know, you do publicity,
and this is this isn't even publicity because I'm not
promoting anything. We're just chatting. But du perlicicity. You want
people to run out and see the things, and and
oh he's so busy. You got to go see this guy.
The Boys I did four days a week ago. Stranger
(47:30):
Things I did two years ago. It's not like, oh
we watched it all on one week. Yeah, but I
did it over three years. But you're also stand up.
Speaker 1 (47:39):
You see it.
Speaker 3 (47:40):
They see it like somebody's t shirt. Like in the back,
here's the sixty cities they're doing every other weekend. I
go somewhere for two days, like, I'm not hurting anything.
Speaker 4 (47:49):
If I sent you the right thing, would you do
a show in New York?
Speaker 3 (47:52):
Maybe, because I'm kind of itching to like go to
New York to live in New York. Yeah, every time
me when I'm there for like a few days and
nice to be. I think at this point in life,
to spend the six months what a show? A Broadway show?
Speaker 4 (48:06):
Yeah, my life has moved sort of to directing for
the theater.
Speaker 3 (48:11):
That was the premise of your episode on the Mat
about You. That's right, because like Jason, he goes, I
have to get Sigourney Weaver and and so, and he's
watching Helen's sister's dog and Sigourney, I forget what it was.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
We remember, Sigourney Weaver was, yeah, we got to run.
Speaker 1 (48:28):
But look at this. The whole purpose of the show
was to get you on Broadway and have this thing.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
I understand. I I you know, I never say no
to anything, but I mean I never said no to
the possibility or something. I can't imagine doing a show. Uh,
it's I want to work. And Larry, they gotta be awake,
you gotta be limber or wait one.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
Day I will write down because it's a it's a
great story. Where and Peter was with me Larry David
when he was gonna go do the play that he
wrote in New York. He called and Larry and I
don't socialize all that much. He called me saying we'll
take it lunch. And I go to lunch and I go,
what is this going to be? And he goes, so
I'm doing the play. Am I gonna like this? And
you go, what happens? How does this work? And I
(49:09):
literally walked him from day one of rehearsal through all
the rehearsals, how it would go, what previous would be like,
what tech would be like, good Opening night with that
would be like what a bad opening night?
Speaker 1 (49:21):
What that would be like?
Speaker 4 (49:22):
And then the next week and the next week and
the next week until I said, about six weeks after
you open on a Thursday afternoon, around one o'clock in
the afternoon, as you sit in your apartment and you
know that you got to leave in four hours to
get to the theater, you'd rather drive a nice pick
through your own eye. There's no way you want to
go down there, and that you would have I had
it wrong.
Speaker 1 (49:39):
By about two weeks.
Speaker 3 (49:41):
He he called me four weeks you got to come in.
Speaker 4 (49:45):
And I wound up replacing him in the show because
he it drove him out of his mind.
Speaker 3 (49:49):
I kind of feel that not panicking, but like my
agent will callim was something I'm going, I'm gonna look
at it like ah right shoots and well, you know,
I don't want.
Speaker 4 (49:59):
To go there, like or Michael Kaine school of picking
up what I mean?
Speaker 3 (50:04):
I stand up, I go, hey, we got it's a
great theater. I go, is it two flights to get there?
I don't want the two flights.
Speaker 4 (50:09):
I have my personal appearance, so I don't like to change.
Speaker 3 (50:12):
Yeah, I want to change playing.
Speaker 1 (50:13):
It's a whole William William H. Macy said, there's three
stages in my career. The first and when you're younger,
Oh my god, this could make my career. The second
is how much does it pay? In? The third is
do I have to get wet? Thank you?
Speaker 3 (50:30):
Grateful? You know what?
Speaker 4 (50:35):
At least they're talking about us, right, that's right?
Speaker 3 (50:38):
Is it? Don't do that? That'll be the end?
Speaker 4 (50:39):
No, you know what, Normally we wrap up after the show.
I've got nothing left to say, right, do you have
anything you want to add with?
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Paul leaves behind your back like I loved you more
than the blue pants you wore on your special. Thank
you very much. Good.
Speaker 2 (50:54):
Now that's another episode of Really you know, Really comes
to a close. I know you're wondering what comedians had
hit television shows more or less based on their real
lives or stand up backs. Well, all, Jerryrigan answer for
you in a moment. But first let's thank our guest
Paul Reiser. You can follow him at his website Paul
Reiser dot com or on x where he's at Paul Reiser.
His latest comedy special is Paul Reiser Life, Death and
(51:17):
Rice Pudding, available for streaming on Apple TV. Find all
pertinent links in our show notes, our little show hangs
out on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and threads at really No
Really podcast And of course you can share your thoughts
and feedback with us online at reallynoreally dot com. If
you have a really some amazing factor story that boggles
(51:38):
your mind, share it with us and if we use it,
we will send you a little gift.
Speaker 3 (51:43):
Nothing life changing, obviously, but it's the thought that counts.
Speaker 2 (51:47):
Check out our full episodes on YouTube, hit that subscribe
button and take that bell. So here updated when we
release new videos and episodes, which we do each Tuesday.
So listen and follow us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple
podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (52:02):
And now the answer to the question what.
Speaker 2 (52:03):
Comedians had hit television shows more or less based on
their real lives or stand up acts. Well, First of all,
the transition from comedian to television comedy star was never unusual.
Early TV got its greatest boost from the best comedians
of the day like Milton Burle, Jack Benny, Jimmy Durante,
Jackie Gleeson, and countless others, and television has managed to
build huge successes by grabbing great comics and creating a
(52:26):
show around their real life experiences and or their.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
Stand up bacts.
Speaker 2 (52:30):
Prime examples include Home Improvement, which builds a whole show
around comic Tim Allen's bits about men and tools and
the machismo they inspire. Roseanne, which offered a fictionalized version
of Roseanne Barr's off stage life and initially borrowed heavily.
Speaker 3 (52:44):
From her working class comedic rips.
Speaker 2 (52:46):
Everybody Loves Raymond starring Ray Romano, which took his jokes
about family life and turned them into a hit sitcom.
The Bernie Max Show, which took the real life experience
of Bernie fostering his sister's three kids and turned it
into a television hit. Everybody Hates Chris was a fictionalized
version of Chris Rock's tumultuous and hysterical childhood. Comic great
(53:06):
Gary Shandling's show was so much of a television transfer
of his life that the show was titled It's Gary
Shandling's Show. Comedy rapper Dave Byrd aka Little Dicky, found
television's success by turning his travails as an up and
coming white rapper into comedy gold. In his show Dave.
Before finding talk show fame. Ellen DeGeneres hit it big
with her sitcom Ellen. That show was such a reflection
(53:28):
of her life that her character came out as gay
on the show. At the same time, Ellen truly revealed
herself to be a gay woman, and though short lived,
comedian John Mulaney also played himself on his self titled
show Mulaney and I'm leaving out many like NewART Cosby Chappelle,
Jamie Fox, Louis c. K, Robin Williams, and Moore because
the list is long and formidable, But I have to
(53:48):
go out on probably the most successful show ever to
feature a stand up comic playing more or less himself,
Jerry Seinfeld. In Seinfeld.
Speaker 3 (53:55):
By many measurements, it is one of the most.
Speaker 2 (53:58):
Successful half hour shows in televison in history and earned
multiple Enny Awards for each of its cast members. Wait what, oh, oh, sorry,
I'm just being told that one of the cast members
actually was nominated seven times but never actually won. Well
that is embarrassing, but don't feel bad. That guy probably
is a podcast and.
Speaker 3 (54:17):
What more could anyone ever really want? Really, it really
is a production of Blaise Entertainment.
Really now, really, really.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Now, really hello, and welcome to Really Know Really Jess,
Alexander and Peter Tilden, who remind you onequivocally that subscribing
to the podcast is a truly stand up thing to do.
And speaking of stand up, actor Paul Reiser began his
illustrious career back in the seventies as one of the
hottest young stand up comedians of his generation. What quickly
followed was breakout acting roles in films like Diner, Beverly Hills,
(00:32):
Cop and Aliens. That was followed by television stardom and
series like My Two Dads, Stranger Things, The Kaminsky Method,
The Boys, and his highly acclaimed series Mad About You,
which he also produced and wrote. But then last year,
after a thirty two year hiatus from stand up comedy,
Riser returned to his comedy roots with his special Life
Death and Rice Pudding, and suddenly he was a stand
(00:55):
up again.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
Really no really, Today.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
The guys will chat with him about the twists and
turns of his amazing career and what called him back
to take up the microphone and comedy clubs once again.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Here's Jason and Peter.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
All right, let's say.
Speaker 4 (01:09):
Should we actually begin, but.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Rolling why I just want to I want to go.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
What is so important that I had to race over
to this side of town? What is how?
Speaker 4 (01:17):
He's interrupting? Apparently we're trying to start a show and
roll in and do introductions and the.
Speaker 3 (01:23):
Guests I thought i'd come in aggressive.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
Has decided to come in like you know, like it's
like it's his show.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
You know what that means. He's a little bit nervous,
he's uncomfortable. He wants to try and get in and
feel the.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Yeah you put me in my place nicely. Good for
you for you know who did that?
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Remember who did that? Same thing? Same thing?
Speaker 3 (01:41):
He's gone.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
No, he's still with us.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
You know what comes? I love you, Remember I love
obscure things. I was gonna say, Lance Wrens, No, just
to see.
Speaker 4 (01:48):
If Shatner started the interview, started interviewing, what's the show? Why?
Speaker 3 (01:55):
No?
Speaker 4 (01:55):
Now I'm doing sign But yeah, Shatner started the.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Same always takes over. You go to lunch with him
and we say we're not going to have desert, and
he goes everything and then you gotta get it. Yeah, so.
Speaker 4 (02:08):
We'll pretend that we had not been interrupted. Are you
excited about our guest today.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I am really excited to because oh, this is like
a nine and a half ten, and he's gonna say
why not?
Speaker 4 (02:18):
Why not immediately?
Speaker 1 (02:20):
All right, that's it because the Orson Walf is dead.
I'm a huge How are you not a huge man?
I mean you grew up watching him? And also he's
taking jobs away from me, nomadic actresses your way from me.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
I still like them.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
It's dramatic, it's action adventure, it's the boys, it's stranger things,
it's it's met about you. Reduct you know, comes back.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
For a guy with an every man's face and a
really you know, I'm not saying he doesn't have talent.
I'm saying it's not a to Z you know what
I'm saying. He's not Brando, but.
Speaker 1 (02:59):
He llow he's done up singing comedy with the thing
he did with that monitor lizard. Oh my god.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
Yeah, but no, Paulie, Paulie is he's done at all?
Speaker 1 (03:10):
And what the really no really is thirty two years
he waited to do stand up the thing?
Speaker 4 (03:16):
Now here's the thing because I haven't done the deep dive.
I know paul primarily as an actor because I first
remember the first time I remember remember seeing Paul's work
was in diner, right, you're with me? So I didn't
know him as a stand up prior to that, and
I kept here on a stand up standing stand up.
And so for me, I go, it's even more of
(03:38):
a really no, really, because I go, you never did
stand up? Why we Why now you're going to do
stand up? But it's a return to the roots. What
balls would it take? Yeah, drove all the way here
from wherever? Yeah, and we never we just did this,
We just do this what he did? Just talk about
him in front of him. Yeah, and speculate what his
answers might be.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
They'll be fine with me to watch two people talk about.
Speaker 4 (03:59):
Please welcome to really no, really the great and I
do mean that one of thank you gentle men out there,
and and a lovely human being. Nobody by the fact
that he's willing to come down to the van Night's airport.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
And by the way, not knowing from comedy anybody or
under what thirty probably thinks you're dramatic from aliens on, thanks,
you're a dramatic act my favorite thing.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
And I hear this a lot. His friends will say
that their kids their teenage kids will go, what the guy,
the doctor from Stranger Things is going to try to
be funny and I go, okay, first of all, tell
him I'm not a doctor, right, really, and I'm actually
a stand up but you know, and I did take
twenty years off doing stand up, not intentionally but just
(04:40):
as it turns out, so it's understandable. But you know,
I think of myself as a stand up for But
as you were talking, we were in an acting class
together for a brief with Larry. Yes, that's right, that's
where I first met you, and it would be it
was way before you would be probably eighty. I remember
(05:02):
just two three big locks of hair. Yeah, that would
have been a while ago.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
You're confusing us. It happens all the time. But seriously,
because I never asked you this, because how often have
we chatted about this stuff? So when you were a kid,
you weren't thinking actor. You were thinking come yeah, yeah,
you know they were sort of meshed. I don't think
that you're in fourth grade thinking I want to do
(05:30):
a fellow but performing. So it was like the blanket performing.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
So in elementary school, you'd write an essay, a composition,
a story and my recollection is you could read it
aloud if you'd like, and I would go and I
would volunteer because I wanted the laughs of the eighteen
twenty kids. And even then, this is how dumb and
ill advised. I would put in subtle jokes that only
(05:57):
one guy would get and the rest of the class
would go. But like, I was always working the back
of the room, which is death is silly, but it
made me happy. So it was always performing and getting
laughs was the thought. But you know, you'd be in
a school play. I remember in college I did Guys
and Dolls and I was not in the theater department.
(06:19):
It was like the dorms putting on a silly thing.
And I even fell into that by accident because some
guy dropped out. And I loved getting the laugh. I
was like, and I love the excitement, and I loved
getting ready, Well we got a show. It's only nine
more hours to a showtime, you know that. But I
knew there were four solid laughs that I would get.
(06:41):
That made me realize, yeah, that's what I like, and
we'll get through the dancing and singing and stuff.
Speaker 4 (06:46):
But the reason I find it interesting because I talked
to Jerry about this too. Jerry said, I assume it's
still true that his preference, by a landslide is stand
up because he loves the thrill or the challenge of
working in one. Yeah, And I find like I talked
(07:08):
to Kevin Pollock about that too, and he likes that too.
He likes the he likes working in one. I went
into acting because I spent my life in one and
I wanted to have a community, and so it was
always the communal aspect of being in a show or
being in a film that drew me to it. I
find that a lot of comedians I talked to are
(07:30):
very intimidated by the community work of being an actor,
or vice versa. My actors won't go near.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
It's ironic because one of the things, yes, you're working
in one, but one of the things that I loved
when I did my little you know, theater experiences, but
I also love in stand up is in fact the community. So, yes,
you're working in one, but you're all hanging around that,
you're all chiming in with hey, you know, it would
(07:56):
be a great line after that, and you're with the
other it's you know, like, oh, these you know, the
brothers and sisters. So I think there really is a
strong community. And it's interesting. I never felt comedians were
really competitive professionally. I mean you might say, oh, you know,
jump on the line. You're an actor. There's eleven guys
go into the audition. One of you will get it,
(08:19):
the other ten will not. Just stand up. There's a
great gig, you'll do it this week, you'll do it
next week. So it's not a zero sum game. So
to that effect, there really was a community. There is
a community and stand up which I still love. Well.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
You also, you were that part of the Best Buddies
thing with Cherry Too, right, did you Mark Schiff, Larry
Millwer didn't you do the New Year's.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
Michael Lampton Ky? Yeah, yeah, we were, you know, five
idiots who said it's New Year's Day, we got nothing
to do, nobody has a girlfriend, let's go eat lunch.
And then that became a tradition, you know, we'll get
through the New Year's Day thing. I did it for
like twenty five years or something.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
And did you guys compare notes? Did you guys always
fell comedy for like a mont grow.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
We wouldn't talk. No, in fact, almost not at all,
but but it would just be sprinting and having ridiculous laughs.
You know, we were the guys that everybody else is
going to led Zepplendon, We're going to see Robert Klein.
So when you find that community, you know, and and
I remember one time in fact, that group was Larry
(09:21):
Jerry and myself and Mark Shift and we were eating
out in a restaurant and wait, just said something silly
and there was an opening and almost like we all
went around instantly and did the same joke but a
little different went Wow, that's that was your take. That
was your take and uh, and we just laughed at that,
(09:42):
the fact that we had the same idea and we
all went a little bit different way.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
So may I bring up so I watch a comedy
special not before you were even booked.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
That is really appreciated.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
And the thing that I single out one thing, not
that everything else wasn't brilliant, one thing that was got broken.
I'm a lot more healthy than so the thing that
got me though, that was so broken. And you get
to that point when you're logging in and says, are
you a robot?
Speaker 3 (10:07):
I love those tests because there's so few things that
I'm good at and those one I I crush them.
I go, I know I'm already in, but give me
another one.
Speaker 4 (10:15):
I know, because there's always like a piece of one
in the corner of a blank.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Yeah, And I go, do I click on that cross one?
Speaker 3 (10:24):
Yeah? Yeah, you're either a robot or Jason Alexander.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
That's right. Yeah, but you're not getting it.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
There was when I go someone that I try to
trick you up, palm tree.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Palm Well it could be a focus, right, hey, not
so fast that yes, yes, but it's it's it's interesting
with the technology that advance, the one thing that stops
a robot, we cannot attemptify a chimney.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
You put a chimney in with debt.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
Now, you say you took a twenty year break, but
were you and you were writing and running some of
the other things as well, But were you keeping sort
of a here's a.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
Little journal note I should make no real No, I wasn't.
I think the brain's always putting doing that anyway, like
that's funny. But I wasn't keeping it because I I
had never intended. There were a lot of comics who say,
you know who just actually got into stand up because
they want to get discovered and then they'll get a sitcom.
And then they advanded it my our group of guys,
(11:22):
we just loved stand up.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
That was the goal.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
So I never wanted to get out of it. And
I only got out of it because I like, when
Mad About You started, I was I don't know Jerry
managed to do it, others did it. I was like,
that's a full time job and my brain is dead,
and if I have a month off, I'm going to sleep.
So and then I got really comfortable, and then we
you know, the show was over, and I said, I'm
going to take a year off, and and I didn't
(11:47):
always wanted to get back, but I didn't want to
just dig dust off the old act. So I just
kept waiting and waiting. I said it's time, and I
just started really from scratch. I had three minutes of
stuff in's you say, what's relevant? I'm not smart enough
to make anything up and I can only I'm going
to tell you what happened in my house. See if
(12:08):
this is funny, and most people go, oh, that happened
to my house, and lot George Colin used to call it,
oh yeah comedy, like oh yeah yeah. So but you know,
you find out that what you're going through is really universal.
What was nice about coming back after all those years
and now this is post mad about you, so audiences
now they know you and they feel comfortable. It really
(12:30):
felt like getting together with old friends. It's like, we
know what's happening. Those babies that we had, they're growing
up now, right, Well, they's funny. So it was was
it was way overdue. I wish I had I don't
know wish, but I wanted to and I only was
procrastinating because I wanted to do it well. And what
(12:53):
I found was it was exactly going back when I
was sixty or whatever, felt exactly the same as when
I was eighteen. I went on audition night. It's like
just as excited, just as nervous. It's just as challenging,
and there's no shortcut, like you can't you're not automatically better. Lo,
you got to go up every night. And then a
(13:14):
year I felt it was a year before I said
I can maybe try to sell a ticket. No, even
the first club date I wait to the I would
just go to eight club and do fifteen minutes or
four minutes, and then eight minutes, ten minutes, I think
I can do it. At the first club date manager
booked it was like two shows with two shows in
one night. No, I'm in pajamas at eight thirty. That's
(13:37):
not gonna I can't do that. And to my surprise,
so we negotiated down to one and then of course
when it was over, I went give me another show.
I realized I missed this. Wow, well it was great.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
Can I ask you that dumb question that I've never
just came to my mind? Thought, Jason's gonna call me
for asking Spust, how do you decide what to wear?
Whenever I watch a comedy special, I go, if you're
wearing the wrong thing for now and your stomach and
your thing, and it's going to be bad. How do
you test out what you wear? Because you were a
very nice outfit that worked. The shoes, worked the pants.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
But it's not a dumb question because it took me
while to realize.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
You test out what you wear because you were a
very nice outfit that worked, the shoes, worked the pants.
Speaker 3 (14:31):
It's not a dumb question because it took me while
to realize, I only feel comfortable with these shoes, and
I like to gee I don't like to wear a suit.
It looks nice, but I don't feel comfortable in a suit.
And and so I found a shirt. I went, let
me give me a lot of these shirts. And I
got a dozen of the same shirt. And then was
the special. I actually had a meeting with a wardrobe person.
(14:53):
I said, well, this is not just me chilling it chuckles,
I have to and they go, but you want to
be comfortable, I said, I'm just gonna wear exactly what
I wear. And uh, and if you need those shirts,
by the way, we'll watch the shirts.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
I like the blue monitor. I'd like the things good.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
But there is there is a thing.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
As we've all gotten older, and I would imagine you
found this too. You find a uniform, whether it's for
home or for work. I was like, let me do this. A.
It's comfortable. B. I don't want to think. I remember
Obama talking about that that one of the things like
when he got busy, is like, I'm going to cut
out all wardrobe decisions except one day I'm gonna wear
(15:30):
a cream colored suit. But that he stepped out of
the zone and then he got he got in trouble.
But it's like, yeah, you know, just gonna here's what
I wear, Here's what I do. So is this it
is this the ni No? This is my Jason Alexander
put on a sweater. No, but yeah, yeah. Basically I'm
always wearing jeans in the sweater and if I step out,
(15:52):
it's wrong.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
If you still have clothing you wear from Matt about
your for God's sake, because I'll tell you what you
want him. He's wearing two items right now from Cipher
and we just talked about.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
By the way, if you're a constant listener, we talked
about this in the last episode as well. So when
the show went down, what do you take? I don't
know what to take, so I took all my wardrobe.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
I remember, Yeah, but us thirty years now.
Speaker 4 (16:16):
Look at his shirt.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
It's a classic. It's like a hemingway.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
You don't throw.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
I remember the when you're doing a show and we're lucky,
we're privileged to be working on a show, and they
dress and slowly you start dressing just like your character
is you. Let's just close that gap. And then while
you're doing a show, Well, I got to do it
tonight show. I need a suit, get your suit. You
doing a thing? I have a wedding can give me
(16:44):
cut to afterwards, I went, I haven't been in a
store now it's nine years. I don't know how to
do that, and so I got to get a show
so somebody can buy their pants and somebody go take those.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
In when I shoot something. That's when I got closed.
I have an insane foot. I have a five and
a half d so it's five five and a half.
I wear a six shoe, but five and a half.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
It was like those those little boxing dummies with the
little plastic feet that correct. So really, yes, shocked that
you can support your body weight.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
If you're listening the first time, this is my foot,
and my foot ends here. My foot ends here.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Your parents and they felt to see if there was
room in the shoe.
Speaker 4 (17:30):
One hundred and four episodes of the Sign Felt program
right there, these shoes still looking good brush suede.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
I always, I always. I always found it a bit sad,
little melancholy that you grow when you're growing as a kid.
You you hit your final shoe size, but you don't
know it. And if I knew it on that day,
I would have liked to celebrate. I'm a six, I'm an.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Eight, I'm a nine.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Oh no, it's staying then, but you don't know it
till you're twenty four.
Speaker 1 (17:58):
So that was it.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
I'm a nine and a half.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
The other the other observation this is this is, oh,
come on, I'm having a senior moment. Everybody loves Raymond
ray it's raised joke. But his joke is I didn't
know the first time I slept with my wife that
I was choosing my side.
Speaker 3 (18:16):
For the rest of our time. To get that, which
is so true. It's these decisions you never realize is
the decision. Here's a phenomenon that I and my wife
cannot figure out. We have our sides, and if we
move to another house, it's the same. But when we
go to a hotel, we switch it and not delivered it.
Not like, hey, let's freshen things up.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
My wife gets the side closest to the bathroom.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
That's why there is a slight element of macho. I'll
have the closest to the door so I can protect you. Yeah,
so as first to go out, she's the first.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Yeah, yeah, I just feel feel I never say it
that way, but the really hotels do change up.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
And we'll go interesting. We switched we didn't know why.
Speaker 4 (19:03):
Yeah, but you're some of your biggest I mean really
some of your home runs are in really serious stuff
like does that surprise you or did you go nope,
I got this, no problem.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
I know it surprised me. I didn't really think too
much about it. I remember, I mean it was really
Aliens was the first thing. And it wasn't that it
was dramatic so much.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
It was.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
It was certainly non comedic, but I looked at it
more as like this is gonna be a huge this
is like oh absolutely, yeah, well Alien. The first one
was Jim Cameron had done, Done, terminated. I wrote, well,
that's my home run right there, and then I read
the script and go wow yeah. And so I remember
reading it thinking, hey, I have no business being in
(19:44):
this movie. But it was I've never had this experience
since I was out of breath reading it goes oh
really yeah. It was just and it was written sort
of like haiku, you know, bam slam metal on Metal Dog,
and it was it's just visual. You could see it
and hear it. And to my mission statement for myself
(20:07):
was just be do whatever you have to do so
that when you're on screen the film doesn't come to
a grinding halt.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
That was the bar.
Speaker 3 (20:17):
I said, just if people just go all right, he's
in a movie, you know, so what does that mean?
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Okay, coach?
Speaker 4 (20:22):
But did you have to go get it or was
it an offer?
Speaker 3 (20:24):
No, it wasn't an offer. No, Im I met with
Jim Cameron. I don't know that I read. Maybe I did.
And then it was a long period of months because
they had to they had to look at every actor
in the UK. They shot it in London and apparently
there is no one on the continent there the can
(20:44):
do what I did. So they came back and so
what I had kind of forgotten about it is like
you're usually here in a week. This is months. And
then I was shooting some the thing and my manager
shows up, you got it? What alien?
Speaker 1 (20:58):
So?
Speaker 3 (21:00):
Really so I knew it was. I mean, I was anxious.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
I was.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
I was nervous. I want them to do well an
interesting thing that you will certainly appreciate as an act.
As it turns out, the first week or two of
my shooting of the schedule, I was in scenes, but
I had no lines. So as a comic, as a
performing you know, what do I do? But it made
me think deeper. For the first I was what are
(21:31):
you doing? What do you and you don't want to
telegraph on you know, but so how do you be
so that anytime that they get you, you're And by
the way, maybe absolutely nothing is the right choice. But
I never had to think at that level because like,
usually you can skate on your performance, on your lines,
it's like.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
Right performance, but you show up and you sell likable
and trustworthy, and then when you reveal that you're not, Yeah,
that's fast. I mean Stranger Things is kind of the
same mae.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
Of the things that I think they were trying to
ride off of that image of like, we don't trust
this guy and he's replacing Matthew Modin and he was terrible.
You know, his character was evil. So who turns out
maybe not so much evil, But it's funny. I remember
Jim Cameron saying that he wanted someone who the audience
(22:24):
didn't really know, you know, wasn't gonna be a big star,
but it was also somebody that would be amiable and
you'd like him, and you wouldn't you wouldn't be suspicious.
My recollection is that people in the minute I showed
one that's wrong. Something's not right with this guy. Because
also the people were so trained to not like corporate people,
the corporate weasel. And it's sort of like the guest
star on Star Trek Ugly he's gonna be dead, yes, right,
(22:47):
shirt guy. Yeah, one of these things is not like
the other.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
But you do sell it. I mean you do sell
it like you and in a big way. And obviously
they looked at eight billion people Games Town could have
a casting list that forever forever to decide, Yeah, you're
the right thing. It's pretty amazing, right it was.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
It's you know, there is a life to that movie
that I never I mean, it was a big hit
and people would often remember recognize. But there are conventions
that are you know sci fis and comic cons and
that I've been to and I'll meet people. Go, I
watched that movie every Saturday for the last thirty six years.
Get out of the house, do something, get a job,
don't tap.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Paper by the way, somebody does, Well, who shows up?
Do they have someone? Did people dress up as the yes?
Speaker 3 (23:35):
Oh yeah, they dress up in aliens, they dress up
on the full stuff and they bring in props that
I'm going is that from the actual movie. Its like
some of them they are, Yeah, it's and it's I
mean it speaks to the success of that of what
a good movie it was, and it still holds if
you you know, I'll catch up. Wow, it's and so
many movies after that sort of stood on the show.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
It's amazing being something that's that iconic. And I'm wondering.
So you're you're at home writing stuff and you're doing
stand up and then you do Mad About You. There's
no guarantee it's going to be a hit. How many
episodes in and you went, whoa, this thing is got
some heat. Was it immediate or would it take a while?
Speaker 3 (24:11):
Well, there's a there's two different ways to look at it.
I knew immediately it was going to be good, and
I knew the minute. I just Helen Hunt came over
to my house and we read it in my house
before she even agreed to audition, and I just went, ah,
this feels special. And then we did the pilot. Well
(24:32):
everybody and the audience are like, yeah, this is working.
Is it going to be a hit that you don't know?
And because we didn't, you know it was actually initially
we were paired and the timing was it was we oh,
Jerry's show was just beginning to take off, so like,
oh New York Jewish comic in New York, and what happened,
And but we weren't guaranteed anything like a second season.
(24:56):
They go, you should have a baby, went no, no, no,
that's no good to get. And I think it wasn't
really till the end of the second season when they go, Okay,
we're gonna go but the first season, like you know,
you do twelve and then we'll pick up the back
nine and second season they was still trying to but
by the third season they would take their hands off
(25:16):
and say, you guys obviously know what you're doing.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
And did you have to take notes from network or
did you do much like Larry where you said I'm
quitting if you try and give me a note.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Oh, I just I just had lunch with Helen Hunt
and were laughing. She said, you have a real allergy
to notes, like, yeah, I can't. Can't so much so
that when we did the the revisit five years ago,
Helen and Peter Tolan itself and we were like it
was really a well oiled trio. But it was like
(25:46):
you guys do the meeting. I can't.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I can't.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
I'll soil myself. I said, they'll give you twenty things.
If three of them makes sense to you, let's talk
about the three, but don't I can't hear the other ones. Yeah,
I just it's just how was it in the initial
run though?
Speaker 4 (26:02):
How do you could you push back against it or
did you have to?
Speaker 3 (26:06):
It was? You know, I had a partner, Danny Jacobson
and Danny Danes, and often he would, you know, vet
them and so here's a good one. And sometimes they
were good and sometimes often they're just execs who feel
like they have to, yeah, put their fingerprints on it,
Like what if you do remember one it was a
network guy?
Speaker 1 (26:25):
What if?
Speaker 3 (26:25):
What if Paul? What if what if your character was
chewing gum? He could what if he had toast? How
does that help you? Is that a better show? Is
there a Toast demo that you're trying to get? But
they also you know, but we knew early on. I
think it was this. Certainly in the first season we did.
(26:51):
We knew that the success of the show. We wanted jokes,
we wanted laughs, we wanted you know, fun, but it
was the small stuff that people would tuning into and
and we did. And I've often talked about this is
that we did a the highest concept show. You always
saw a siphoned it's a show about nothing, and we
always say wow. Show was about the small things, the
(27:12):
little things, a little thing. And then we had the
biggest concept ever. It was I invested in a virtual
reality thing. But the issue was I invested our money
and I didn't speak to her, didn't check it with
the wife. And we come back when in bed and
we're just it's just a two shot, the two idiots
sitting up in bed, and I said, you're not trying
to talk them into I said, you can do anything.
(27:34):
You could. You could you could ski, you could you
could climb a mountain, you could water, you could go
in the ocean. And she's warming up, she does, what
did you pick? I said, I got a massage from
Christy Brinkley, and Helen just cocked her head ever so slightly,
and I got a huge laugh and went yes, because
the show is about not what you did, it's like
(27:56):
what the other person feels about. When she cocked her head,
I went, hm, hmm, this is gonna work.
Speaker 4 (28:02):
But can I if I'm the man, I think I
may have delivered Helen Hunter, because as she was considering
the show, I think she had already. I think she
had the offer on it. I found myself doing a
short film that she was producing, and she was in
and we were having lunch, and she said, I think
(28:35):
I may have delivered Helen Hunt here because as she
was considering the show, I think she had already. I
think she had the offer on it. I found myself
doing a short film that she was producing, and she
was in and we were having lunch, and she said,
would I like doing the sitcom? I said, well, what's
the sitcom? She said, well, it's Paul Riserd.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
What what I mean? What is it an audience?
Speaker 3 (29:02):
She's yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:02):
I said, it's the best job you're ever going to have.
Are you on the writing team? She said, I don't know. No,
it's the best job you're ever gonna have. Why wouldn't
you do it?
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Are you?
Speaker 4 (29:12):
Is it ensemble? She said? What's two hands with Paul?
Speaker 1 (29:17):
Of course?
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Well, of course, Joe, thanks.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Well, you know her.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
She was starting at that It was ninety two and
she was starting to get some heat in movies. She
worked as a teenager and done a lot of teen movies,
and she was really on a roll. And I met
her because my wife and they had a mutual friend.
And we met at a little dinner party and I went,
while I was writing it, I'm going, and she didn't.
(29:43):
It wasn't at all. Doesn't look like my wife was
not at all what I was picturing. But I left home.
She's really intriguing. She's funny, she's lovely. She's just the
right amount of goofy and neurotic, just the perfect amount.
And I remember I turned to Paula and I said,
what do you think of her? As you she want
it'll be good. But Helen's fear was that it was,
(30:06):
you know, going to be the wife in Gabe Cott
and Welcome Back. Got her Yeah, like you know that
you ever hear the one about the money. But but
we were so saying. She came to my house, he
had read the script and then we I said, well
let's read it together. And then at that very first meeting,
before she had even said yes, we talked about I said,
(30:29):
I want to do a show.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
We have to do.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
You know, we had somewhere in this relationship story, one
of them has to have an affair or the threat
of an affair, and I said, and I figured who
said it first, But we each had the same idea,
like we have to do one shot, how about a
one whole episode of one shot? And we're like yes,
and we tried and it wasn't until year five we
found a story that could do that. But we had
(30:53):
the same show in mind. So thanks for pushing her
over the fence. Now it was it was just kismet.
I got to do a guest on the reboot. You
did us an honor.
Speaker 4 (31:05):
I had a great time and Michael And that's the thing,
because we were going to say Mike, Mike was shore, right,
Mike Richards.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
Mike Richards did an episode. Yeah, yeah, it's always Jerry
did an episode two?
Speaker 4 (31:16):
Did he really?
Speaker 3 (31:16):
We shot for a summer Yeah, we did.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (31:21):
We did a shot in New York and it was
literally a cameo.
Speaker 1 (31:25):
We walked by and.
Speaker 3 (31:27):
My character had taken a viagara and it was very
pronounced and you never shot below here, but you could
tell something something wrong. And I said, hey, Jarry, walk
on the street.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
How you doing.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
He's like, basically there was that.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
And then you lead the weird but big fan. The
weird and interesting thing I remember in launching it was
Lisa Cooper being on two shows. Yeah, which was fascinating
that how did that happen that she could stay on your.
Speaker 3 (31:53):
It's like how did Michael McDonald be on The Dobie
and the Doobie Brothers and Steely Days.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
We're gonna talk about.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
But Lisa Kudrou Somewhere in the first season we did
a flashback, like you know, to before I met Jamie.
I was having I hated blind dates and I had
the worst blind date. It was with Lisa Kudro and
we just cast on. It wasn't that much on the page.
She was so funny. She as we know, but I
(32:20):
mean her line readings. We were just having this stilted
conversation on a first date and blind date and.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
What do you what do you do?
Speaker 3 (32:28):
Oh, I'm a documentary filmmaker. She goes, Oh, that's so funny.
I'm a banker. I'm like, why why did you hit
that so hard? That doesn't make sense? She was, and
we said we have to get her back, and so
we made her not that character, but we brought her
a back as she was the waitress in the place
and I remember the day she said she's going to
audition for another show because we only had it for
(32:50):
like a few episodes. It was no, we didn't have her,
And I said, what's the other show? It's like six
friends and they all live in New York in the
same building with that's not going anywhere. And then they
embraced it. So they made her twin sisters. That yeah,
but she she had such an odd, delicious delivery.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
So you mentioned Michael McDonald, You right, it's one of
those things that go to Michael McDonald has done my
book with Paul Righter. Okay, how does that? How does
that happen?
Speaker 3 (33:22):
That's the most natural thing in the world, Peter, you
know it's it's not the first comedian a musician uh
to write a book. Luciana Patti and carrat Top.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Did I love that? That was which was the musician
He was going to prop opera at that time, and
Carrot Top said, I can help you, okay, all right,
all right, by the way a book.
Speaker 3 (33:50):
Yeah, Leonard Burnsneine and Emo Phillips. So I was a
huge fan of Michael McDonald and we met at a
silly a party that I was invited to he was performing.
It was in somebody's house, and we walked into this
Michael like, this guy's doing well, he's got Michael McDonald.
(34:12):
Is that his house guest musician? And I just went
over to him and started chatting, and we became friends.
And I would always ask him these things like exactly that,
like I don't understand what you could be in two bands?
Don't don't they want to hold on you? And so
I would ask him these questions over the years, and
then I'd forget the answers, and I said, you should
write a book so I don't have to bother you
(34:34):
every time I have a question. And he said, you know,
I've been approached. I don't know if I even have
a story. And I go, you have a story, because
I don't know how to write a book. I said,
I've written books. I'll help you. So it was it
was literally March twenty twenty COVID lockdown. We had nothing
to do and we had no jobs, and we both
had to figure out how to work zoom.
Speaker 4 (34:53):
It was like then is you can see each other technology?
Speaker 3 (34:56):
And we just we didn't even meet for three years.
We just would He spent about a month talking like this,
and I'd take the tape, I'd record it and type
it up. So it's his story and I just helped him.
But it was interesting because he would go, I don't
think that's interesting. I go, trust me, that's really interesting.
And then other times he goes, this is so fun
I go, it is funny. Does not in the book.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
It's fascinating when telling your story, I guess, did you
have revelations as you've written books, you've written best sellers,
the stuff happened when you're writing a book. It's like
when you're writing a script for the first time, and
it's like an out of body experience. Something gets written
and you go, I didn't know I had that in me.
Speaker 3 (35:34):
I didn't.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
I didn't know.
Speaker 3 (35:35):
I fired that. Yeah, well in this, in his case,
you know, there was new. We were just doing it
on spec Let's see IF and I and the safety net.
I said, I said a minute, you don't enjoy this,
Well stop, I said, doesn't have to.
Speaker 1 (35:50):
You know this.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
It costs us nothing to sit and have a coffee
on zoom. But what he discovered is that by the
end of it, he said, oh, I do have a
story tell Because he is very humble, and he he
felt that his greatest stories were having worked with all
these different people. I go that in itself is you
know who else can say that? I worked with Ray
Charles and Quincy Jones and you know everyone else. But suddenly,
(36:15):
as the more he talked, these through lines come up
where he It was sort of an exercise for him
of realizing how did he get here? You know? Seventy two?
And he started working professionally at fourteen in a band,
in like eighteen piece band. He's fourteen and I said,
tell me there's a tape I want to hear fourteen
year old who? He said, now sadly deadly? The tapes
(36:39):
were in a jacket that was martinized. You know what
that's wrong?
Speaker 1 (36:41):
Oh? I remember markin Wow.
Speaker 3 (36:43):
Do you know what that joke is? Hun from the
in Laws? Tch flies with beachs? Yeah, did you get picture?
They were left in a jacket that was mutt and
you bos worked with Peter Falk?
Speaker 1 (36:55):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (36:56):
What did you do with peterful?
Speaker 4 (36:57):
I did a play with a two persons play with
Peter at the I saw it.
Speaker 3 (37:00):
I was there, Okay, here's a magic night.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
It was great.
Speaker 3 (37:04):
And he makes his entrance from the back of the theater. Right.
So here's this magical night. I grew up a door
at Peter Fork, Peter Fock. He I just I loved him,
and I had this idea for years I've been sitting
on and would take a stab at I got to
write a movie where Peter Fox plays my father. I
don't know what the story is, but Peter Fowk is
(37:24):
my father. That's a story. That's something I gotta do.
I see you in that play and I loved it.
I loved you, loved Peter. I go backstage, I guess
to say a lot of you. I didn't know him,
and I went and at that I was, you know,
I'm mad about you know. I was doing commercials and
so Peter says, I love you. I go, he goes,
(37:47):
and he goes, I love everything you do. I love
your show. He says, I love what you write. And
I go and I'm just like, think you think, And
he just makes a point, goes, I love what you write,
like made it like you said it twice someone, thank
you God. Like. I literally went home and I said,
I got to write this thing. If Peter fo I mean,
it was such a moment of the sky's open up.
(38:11):
I said, here's the guy I've been wanting to write for.
He doesn't know I've never discussed it, and he's saying,
go write it. And then I wrote it pretty quickly
after ifter sitting on it for years, it came out
pretty quickly. I dropped it off at his house. Somebody
gave him told me, Joe Montagna goes, here's his address,
and I called him and said, I'll read it. He goes,
I'm a slow reader. I said about it. I dropped
(38:34):
it off on his at his house and I sid
by the phone and he said, I'm going to read
it right away. And by eleven o'clock at night, I
got I take the dog out, the dog come back
phone on the answer machine and I go, I missed it,
and I listened to the message, and it's just Peter going, well,
(38:56):
we got to.
Speaker 1 (38:57):
Make this thing.
Speaker 3 (38:58):
I went and I and that would have been enough,
you know. I was like, I don't have to make it.
The fact that he read it, he said it and
it was the greatest was.
Speaker 4 (39:09):
Do you have a good time with him.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
He's not the easiest guy, but he took a shine
to me. He somehow knew how much I loved him,
so I was in a little zone of safety. He
chewed to spare the director and anybody else. But I
found I imagine you found this true. All he was
he was not an ass.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
He just was really.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
Cared about the work, and he wanted to do his
best work.
Speaker 4 (39:34):
I found, I absolutely, I believe that's true. I would
also go so far as to say, and this might
have come with age, because I worked, you know, we
worked with him. He was he was getting up there.
I thought there was like much like my dad, who
would who and they would have been contemporaries. They were
(39:56):
not allowed to say, you know, I'm nervous or I'm scared.
So it so in Loua of being able to say
that everything else was wrong, everything else was not right,
The set's not right, the director's wrong. The story is
the thing that dad dad, And if you took the
time to go, well, what would you like to do?
(40:16):
How would you like to fix it? How should we
address it? He couldn't articulate. That's how I knew it
wasn't those things. Because he's very bright, and he was
an artist. He was a beautiful painter, and you know,
so he knew about details. If he knew something was wrong,
he would have spoken to it. And I found him
to be fearful. And there was a complete personality change
(40:40):
in him after our first audience. Once he knew that
he knew what he was doing to display and it
was reflected back to him, he became a totally different.
Speaker 1 (40:52):
That makes sense.
Speaker 3 (40:54):
There was a documentary about Brando and and I love
this story that uh that street car on the waterfront,
the famous Rod Steiger scene that could have been a contender.
Brando didn't want to do the scene right well you
know the story I heard it from Stiger you win, no,
no please, But basically he didn't want to do the
(41:15):
scene and he couldn't articulate it, couldn't articulate it. And
Eliot Kazantz was the thing. And he goes, oh, he's
got the gun and he's pointing at me, like, I
don't know if I wouldn't do all that if the
gun is at me, And the director goes, well, what if,
like after the first line, you pushed the gun away
and Branda goes, okay, it was that simple. The fix
was that he is but throw out the whole scene
(41:37):
because this.
Speaker 4 (41:37):
Doesn't work and then he didn't stay there to do
the coverage Fortier.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
So I'm up one night and we talked about this.
Prior to I watched this movie is a problem with people.
I had no idea what to expect. And I'm laughing
out loud, but what a sweet movie. But reading about
you talking about it, if I get this right, you
your premise is the people's default or default are at
(42:04):
the anger, any discomfort.
Speaker 3 (42:06):
Any two people will put them in a room, they'll
find some reason to argue, argue. It's like that all
the joke you see that that ano the synagogue, I
wouldn't go to. It's that.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
So that was and then and then you work through
it and find out if you do hang with each other,
you're more like that person.
Speaker 3 (42:22):
They're not well I think you know, I always, I never.
I'm not. I haven't read and I'm not well read
enough to know the difference between all the religions, and like, okay,
but if you take the head of Sunny and you
know and she it, so what what is the difference,
So the Presbyterians and Episcopas, the difference is.
Speaker 1 (42:43):
What like what?
Speaker 3 (42:45):
And I remember, you know, part of the impetus The
impetus for the movie was the Problem with People is
the name of the movie. You can find it on
iTunes and Amazon Prime. I just wanted to go to
Ireland because I loved Ireland and I and I had
seen Local Hero, which was in a nod to it
in the movie. But I never had a story and
(43:07):
I couldn't come up with it. And finally I said, well,
what if there's a And I wrote it with a
buddy who I never met but somebody suggested him as
a writer, and we came up with there's got to
be a reason conflict. So what are There's two relatives
who've both grew up not liking the other one just
because their parents told him not to. It's like, okay,
that sounds rich, and how do they come together? So
(43:32):
but one of the impetuses that moved me I remember
reading a story over ten years ago in Israel. There
was a school that was literally down the middle and
half of it was Orthodox and half of it was Sectarium.
But they shared in the yard. They shared a sandbox,
(43:53):
so the little two year old Orthodox kids would be
sitting in the sandbox would do non religious and religious
people made a line in the sandbox, so the kids
shouldn't meet. And I thought, okay, you know, you're afraid
that your two year old will enjoy and that's why
the end of the movie is children in the Sandbox.
(44:14):
But yeah, I think at bottom line, what do people want? Oh,
I'd like to not get shot and I to not
blow up me too. I'd like my children to be safe.
Speaker 4 (44:25):
Same here.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
All right, so we got that covered. What's the you know?
And then but we get stuck on your grandfather said
something about my grandfather. You know, I had my family,
my mother for years with sort of bad mouth one
of my relatives older and I never knew why. And
I said, what is the thing? She goes, Yeah, she
(44:47):
said something I didn't care for. I said when was that?
She goes nineteen forty seven. I went, okay, let it go.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
But what do you so?
Speaker 4 (44:55):
I'm asking for all kinds of reasons, both selfish and not.
But what is next for you? And what do you
want it? You've I hate to be one of them.
You've done it, Paul Rosie, you've done it all. But
what do you Is there something that you go? Boy,
before I hang this up, I'd really like to do
that that kind of a role, work with that kind
of person, go back to the stage, do another series.
Speaker 3 (45:17):
What do you think? What do you like? I really
I'm a big fan of doing nothing and nothing makes
me happy. And they do another I won't see you
though as a sitting star. Yeah, but I really love
like on a given day. And I've really gotten into
last couple years reading, like reading and buying books like
(45:38):
if I live to be one hundred, I'm not going
to finish the books. I why are you buying? Will
buy because I might not like that one. But I
sometimes I'll have an idea and I don't have a
burning passion to do something. There's a part of me
that still thinks I want to do my music, and
I've never really somewhere I believe like I have one
piece of music or some music that I want to
(46:00):
put out. I've done, I've written songs with people, but
I think, oh, i'd love to you know, when I
hear a great instrumental soundtracking and going, that's the thing
that lasts forever, Like Okay, you know he already wrote
Cinema Paradiesel, But maybe I could write something that would
make you pull over and weep. So that's like a
sort of wish, But I don't sit at home thinking
(46:21):
where I wanted. I mean, I'm happy to go out
and do stand up. It's like I would love that
to take off. I would love to play a little
bigger and more frequently, but until something comes up, like
I'm actually writing a show with my son that we
actually sold and I went, okay, this is this, and
that it was somebody else came to me. They not
the idea, but just the invitation. We'd like you to
(46:43):
do a show. You want to write a show with me? Yeah, okay,
and we so that even if it goes no where,
it's like, all right, I'm gonna write.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
But by the way, for somebody who likes to do nothing,
I write a show. As you said, write a show
is starting. You got the Boys coming out, you got
stranger things coming out. You're probably writing some screenplay that
you'll I mean, you're really busy, but you don't think
you're busy.
Speaker 3 (47:07):
I you know, I'm gonna let you behind the scenes
a little bit. On one hand, you know, you do publicity,
and this is this isn't even publicity because I'm not
promoting anything. We're just chatting. But du perlicicity. You want
people to run out and see the things, and and
oh he's so busy. You got to go see this guy.
The Boys I did four days a week ago. Stranger
(47:30):
Things I did two years ago. It's not like, oh
we watched it all on one week. Yeah, but I
did it over three years. But you're also stand up.
Speaker 1 (47:39):
You see it.
Speaker 3 (47:40):
They see it like somebody's t shirt. Like in the back,
here's the sixty cities they're doing every other weekend. I
go somewhere for two days, like, I'm not hurting anything.
Speaker 4 (47:49):
If I sent you the right thing, would you do
a show in New York?
Speaker 3 (47:52):
Maybe, because I'm kind of itching to like go to
New York to live in New York. Yeah, every time
me when I'm there for like a few days and
nice to be. I think at this point in life,
to spend the six months what a show? A Broadway show?
Speaker 4 (48:06):
Yeah, my life has moved sort of to directing for
the theater.
Speaker 3 (48:11):
That was the premise of your episode on the Mat
about You. That's right, because like Jason, he goes, I
have to get Sigourney Weaver and and so, and he's
watching Helen's sister's dog and Sigourney, I forget what it was.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
We remember, Sigourney Weaver was, yeah, we got to run.
Speaker 1 (48:28):
But look at this. The whole purpose of the show
was to get you on Broadway and have this thing.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
I understand. I I you know, I never say no
to anything, but I mean I never said no to
the possibility or something. I can't imagine doing a show. Uh,
it's I want to work. And Larry, they gotta be awake,
you gotta be limber or wait one.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
Day I will write down because it's a it's a
great story. Where and Peter was with me Larry David
when he was gonna go do the play that he
wrote in New York. He called and Larry and I
don't socialize all that much. He called me saying we'll
take it lunch. And I go to lunch and I go,
what is this going to be? And he goes, so
I'm doing the play. Am I gonna like this? And
you go, what happens? How does this work? And I
(49:09):
literally walked him from day one of rehearsal through all
the rehearsals, how it would go, what previous would be like,
what tech would be like, good Opening night with that
would be like what a bad opening night?
Speaker 1 (49:21):
What that would be like?
Speaker 4 (49:22):
And then the next week and the next week and
the next week until I said, about six weeks after
you open on a Thursday afternoon, around one o'clock in
the afternoon, as you sit in your apartment and you
know that you got to leave in four hours to
get to the theater, you'd rather drive a nice pick
through your own eye. There's no way you want to
go down there, and that you would have I had
it wrong.
Speaker 1 (49:39):
By about two weeks.
Speaker 3 (49:41):
He he called me four weeks you got to come in.
Speaker 4 (49:45):
And I wound up replacing him in the show because
he it drove him out of his mind.
Speaker 3 (49:49):
I kind of feel that not panicking, but like my
agent will callim was something I'm going, I'm gonna look
at it like ah right shoots and well, you know,
I don't want.
Speaker 4 (49:59):
To go there, like or Michael Kaine school of picking
up what I mean?
Speaker 3 (50:04):
I stand up, I go, hey, we got it's a
great theater. I go, is it two flights to get there?
I don't want the two flights.
Speaker 4 (50:09):
I have my personal appearance, so I don't like to change.
Speaker 3 (50:12):
Yeah, I want to change playing.
Speaker 1 (50:13):
It's a whole William William H. Macy said, there's three
stages in my career. The first and when you're younger,
Oh my god, this could make my career. The second
is how much does it pay? In? The third is
do I have to get wet? Thank you?
Speaker 3 (50:30):
Grateful? You know what?
Speaker 4 (50:35):
At least they're talking about us, right, that's right?
Speaker 3 (50:38):
Is it? Don't do that? That'll be the end?
Speaker 4 (50:39):
No, you know what, Normally we wrap up after the show.
I've got nothing left to say, right, do you have
anything you want to add with?
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Paul leaves behind your back like I loved you more
than the blue pants you wore on your special. Thank
you very much. Good.
Speaker 2 (50:54):
Now that's another episode of Really you know, Really comes
to a close. I know you're wondering what comedians had
hit television shows more or less based on their real
lives or stand up backs. Well, all, Jerryrigan answer for
you in a moment. But first let's thank our guest
Paul Reiser. You can follow him at his website Paul
Reiser dot com or on x where he's at Paul Reiser.
His latest comedy special is Paul Reiser Life, Death and
(51:17):
Rice Pudding, available for streaming on Apple TV. Find all
pertinent links in our show notes, our little show hangs
out on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and threads at really No
Really podcast And of course you can share your thoughts
and feedback with us online at reallynoreally dot com. If
you have a really some amazing factor story that boggles
(51:38):
your mind, share it with us and if we use it,
we will send you a little gift.
Speaker 3 (51:43):
Nothing life changing, obviously, but it's the thought that counts.
Speaker 2 (51:47):
Check out our full episodes on YouTube, hit that subscribe
button and take that bell. So here updated when we
release new videos and episodes, which we do each Tuesday.
So listen and follow us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple
podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3 (52:02):
And now the answer to the question what.
Speaker 2 (52:03):
Comedians had hit television shows more or less based on
their real lives or stand up acts. Well, First of all,
the transition from comedian to television comedy star was never unusual.
Early TV got its greatest boost from the best comedians
of the day like Milton Burle, Jack Benny, Jimmy Durante,
Jackie Gleeson, and countless others, and television has managed to
build huge successes by grabbing great comics and creating a
(52:26):
show around their real life experiences and or their.
Speaker 1 (52:29):
Stand up bacts.
Speaker 2 (52:30):
Prime examples include Home Improvement, which builds a whole show
around comic Tim Allen's bits about men and tools and
the machismo they inspire. Roseanne, which offered a fictionalized version
of Roseanne Barr's off stage life and initially borrowed heavily.
Speaker 3 (52:44):
From her working class comedic rips.
Speaker 2 (52:46):
Everybody Loves Raymond starring Ray Romano, which took his jokes
about family life and turned them into a hit sitcom.
The Bernie Max Show, which took the real life experience
of Bernie fostering his sister's three kids and turned it
into a television hit. Everybody Hates Chris was a fictionalized
version of Chris Rock's tumultuous and hysterical childhood. Comic great
(53:06):
Gary Shandling's show was so much of a television transfer
of his life that the show was titled It's Gary
Shandling's Show. Comedy rapper Dave Byrd aka Little Dicky, found
television's success by turning his travails as an up and
coming white rapper into comedy gold. In his show Dave.
Before finding talk show fame. Ellen DeGeneres hit it big
with her sitcom Ellen. That show was such a reflection
(53:28):
of her life that her character came out as gay
on the show. At the same time, Ellen truly revealed
herself to be a gay woman, and though short lived,
comedian John Mulaney also played himself on his self titled
show Mulaney and I'm leaving out many like NewART Cosby Chappelle,
Jamie Fox, Louis c. K, Robin Williams, and Moore because
the list is long and formidable, But I have to
(53:48):
go out on probably the most successful show ever to
feature a stand up comic playing more or less himself,
Jerry Seinfeld. In Seinfeld.
Speaker 3 (53:55):
By many measurements, it is one of the most.
Speaker 2 (53:58):
Successful half hour shows in televison in history and earned
multiple Enny Awards for each of its cast members. Wait what, oh, oh, sorry,
I'm just being told that one of the cast members
actually was nominated seven times but never actually won. Well
that is embarrassing, but don't feel bad. That guy probably
is a podcast and.
Speaker 3 (54:17):
What more could anyone ever really want? Really, it really
is a production of Blaise Entertainment.
Hosts And Creators
Peter Tilden
Jason Alexander
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