September 1, 2025 • 60 mins
In this episode of Comedy Saved Me, our host Lynn Hoffman talks with comedian Raymond Orta, whose larger-than-life storytelling and razor-sharp humor have made him one of the most dynamic voices in stand-up today. Raymond opens up about the challenges he’s faced offstage—from personal struggles to the pressures of everyday life—and how comedy became his outlet, his therapy, and ultimately, his way through.
With honesty, heart, and of course a lot of laughs, Raymond shares how his unique perspective and bilingual punchlines not only connected him with audiences across the country but also helped him navigate some of the darkest moments in his life. His story is proof of how laughter doesn’t just entertain—it heals.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Comedy Saved Me. Oh my gosh, Raymond. First of all,
I'm so excited to talk to you. I wanted to
just say thank you, like Buzz just said to Romeo Vaughn,
because we had him on another podcast that I host
called Music Save Me. And I found out that we
had this podcast about Comedy Saved Me. He nearly fell
(00:24):
off his chairs, like you have to talk to Raymond,
you have to and we're like, okay, give us his info.
We're in so no.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
My my buddy Romeo man, he's I've known him for
several years and I actually ran into him going to
a show at the airport real randomly and he was
on his way to Nashville. I was on my way
to California and we were flying out to Austin to
a connecting flight there, and he was telling me all
about it. I'm like, bro, this is awesome, Like this
is and he's been doing some massive things for his
(00:53):
music career and I've been crushing it in the comedy
the comedy scene lately. I feel it was good to
catch up with him.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Yeah, maybe you guys down the road, you could do
like a comedy music show.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Oh yeah, that's definitely in the works for sure. He's
naturally funny too. Yeah, he really is. And I think
everybody in the valley where we're from has a natural
knack for being that that style of personality where we're
just like goofy and goofing on people and stuff like that.
It's a lot of fun down here.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
I love it. Well, thank you again for coming on.
And so I'm really excited. I read this thing. Let
me I'm trying to find where I wrote it down
this it says, this is crazy. Raymond Orta, a comedy
prodigy since the age of eight, delivers high energy, vivid storytelling.
(01:45):
His shows are so intense that he often leaves audiences
and hysteric, sometimes literally needing medical attention. Have you actually
had to, like clear, you know, bring someone back to
life at a show?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Yeah, that actually happened at this like outdoor Beach and
biker Fest is what it's called. It's like a like
a Harley Davidson rally out in South Pounder Island. And
I made this lady laugh and pass out and she
pissed herself, and uh they had to get her by
ambulance out of the whole place. It was pretty nuts.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Wow, all right, So that's why I was just wanting
to breakfast this for our listeners.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yeah, and one of my claim to fames is, uh,
I've made two people that I know of completely crap
their pants. And that's really hard to do in comedy.
That's that's Uh, that's really hard. That's like the mount
Everest of comedy. Besides making somebody die, making somebody poop
is up there.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
I have never ever heard that before, but I love it.
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
You gotta you gotta understand that. It's like the stars
having to align for that to happen. This guy had
to like the people that had that happened to him,
they had to like they were locking up their house
and they're like, man, I got it, I should probably
go to the bathroom. Was like, no, there's no time,
I'm gonna go out with one in the Chambert. They go,
(03:08):
all right.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
On that note, if you have to go to the bathroom,
you might want to go. Now we're going to go
take a break with some commercials and then we're going
to come right back with Raymond Orta.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
It's the time to do it.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Comedy Saved Me. Welcome back to Comedy Saved Me. The
show where we sit down with some of the funniest
people alive to talk about how laughter can be a
healing force that didn't just change their lives, but it
might have literally saved them and others too. I'm your host,
Lynn Hoffman, and if you're into inspiring stories of resilience, redemption,
(03:46):
and the transformative power of humor like this one, please
share it with your friends and maybe just lift them
up a little bit too, because that's exactly what we're
all about here on the Comedy Save Me Podcast. Sorry,
I get them confused sometimes. Today's guest is someone who
literally made someone poop their pants twice, as we learned
(04:07):
before we went to break, but he proves that comedy
can hit harder than a punchline at a midnight show.
He is a self described beacon of positivity and laughs,
which I absolutely love. A man who blends sharp wit
with hilarious storytelling, a performer who can take you from
tears of laughter to tears of recognition in the same set.
(04:28):
And I can tell you I'm already crying laughing during
the commercial break. I wish you could have heard everything.
If you've never seen him live, you know you are
not just at a comedy show. You are at a
Raymond Orta experience. So buckle up. Today we're talking heart, hustle,
and humor with the one and only Raymond Orta. Raymond,
Welcome to comedy Save Me.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
What an awesome intro. I really appreciate that. That was, Like,
I don't know where you got that Chad GPT knocked
out of the park or something that was really good.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
It's my LLM friend now.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
I was really really, really well done. That was so good.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Thanks so much. Well, what I want to know what first? Up?
First is what drew you to comedy? And like, when
did you realize that making people laugh was more than
just a hobby for you?
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Well, my first, my first taste of making somebody laugh
my was my mom. I made her laugh when I
was real young, and my dad was a super I
have plenty of stories in my show about him, but
he was not a very nice guy. He was super mean, abusive,
and my mom and him got divorced because she found
(05:39):
she found him cheating on her several times. And and
there was this one time where we're living out of
her car and I made her laugh and it was
such a good feeling for me. To make my mom
laugh when she was going through so much that I
really liked that feeling and it made me feel good
to be able to bring her some uh. And I
(06:01):
was I must have been like four or five, four
or five years old. I can't even remember what I did,
but I remember her laughing like big time when she
had been crying for for a long period of time
and I said something, I did something, and it just
it just broke the tension with comic relief. And I
just knew that that that was something that I really enjoyed.
(06:22):
And in school, I was always the class clown, always
looking to make people laugh. And in my my third
grade year in school, my teacher she came to me
with a poster and she's like, look look at this,
and it was a poster for a talent show. And
I remember the poster so vividly. It said like, you know,
(06:44):
can you sing? Can you dance? Can you do magic?
Can you do all these different things? And at the
very bottom it says, or even tell jokes? And she said,
you can tell jokes, You're super funny, and you should
you should try out for the talent show. And I
was like, oh, that sounds like like a lot of fun.
I definitely want to do that. And she's like, well,
you have to come up with a five minute routine
(07:06):
and you have to it has to be clean, and
then you can be in the Talent Show. And I
was like okay, And so I came up with a
five minute routine as a third grader and I remember
like going up in front of my student body, like
in front of all the elementary kids and the staff,
and I crushed it. I did five minutes of clean
(07:28):
mature that I wrote myself, and I won the Talent Show.
And I from one moment from that day like I was.
I used to be a chubby kid that was like
the always getting put in the friend zone, to now
I was the funny, popular kid that everybody knew, everybody
wanted to hang out with. And I was like, man,
this is this is what I want to do with
my life. I love love, love love this. I love
(07:50):
making people laugh. I love the popularity that brought me,
And from that moment, I was hooked. I've been passionately
pursuing comedy since I was eight years old, and when
people hear that, they're like, I like for real, Like
now it's like legit. I've been writing jokes and performing
them since I was in third grade.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
That's so impressive to me. And the crazy thing is
is that you remember that far back that you would
make your mom laugh during Well.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
I could still remember the jokes that I did in
my third grade talent show and I tell them to
people to this day. They're still funny. And I did
my third grade talent show, fourth grade, fifth grade, sixth, seventh, eighth,
and ninth grade talent shows and I've never lost a
talent show doing comedy.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Wow, that's amaz Well, it's obvious that you were paying
attention to listening to what you loved and translating that
into a career in comedy is a whole different ballgame.
But people usually do tell you to do what you
love and the money will come. But that's easily easier
said than done.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
I were real And the first time that I made
money doing comedy, like I saw like the Dollar Science,
was my ninth grade talent show. The grand prize for
first place was one hundred bucks, and I'll never forget
it because it was so I went on stage or
we're backstage at the at the gym, and there was
(09:16):
like this dance team, like talking smack to me, like
you really it looks it feels like one of those
Disney movies, right, you really think you're gonna win with
those cheesy little jokes of years like total mean girls, right,
And I was like, well, even if you guys win,
there's twelve of you guys and the grand prize is
one hundred bucks. You guys are gonna win like eight
dollars each. It's like what you're gonna get a waterburger
(09:38):
like combo, Like congratulations, that's it.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
What did they say? Did you say that to them?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, And we were like kind of talking smack,
And then they brought me up on to the gym
floor and I was I started making fun of like
the security guards that was that were working there at
the school, and I could impersonate them so like spot
So when I started doing their voices every like you
could imagine, all my fellow freshman friends are like, oh dude,
(10:07):
this guy's imitating guard. Like we had nicknames for other
security guards and one of the guys was named Garfield
and he had a voice it sounded like this, you
guys better get you better get off the grass. And
he was always telling us to get off the grass, right.
And then we had our principle. Our principal had a
super funny voice, real high pitched voice for a man,
(10:30):
and it almost like almost like muppet like. He had
a voice. It sounded it sounded like this. His voice
sounded like this, and his big thing, wash y'all hurry
up and get to class. Now, hurry up and get
to cliss. The kids nuts, oh, people were going nuts,
(10:50):
Like so, I'm making fun of the security guard and uh,
and and the principal at the same time, like, man,
the security guard's over here telling me, hey, get off
the grass, and the Principal's like, hey, get to class.
Let's get on the grass and get the class. And
so I'm going back and forth between these two and
the and the kids are losing it well at that time,
Like the security guards that were inside the gym watching us,
(11:13):
they're calling the security guard that I'm making fun of,
like they're calling him on the walking tark, like, bro,
you got to come over here and watch it, just
like ripping you up right now. And so so they're
like calling him and and man, like this guy couldn't
have walked into the gym at a more proper time,
like it was as if it was like like I
couldn't have scripted it any better. Yeah, Like like the guy,
(11:36):
the guy opens the door and you know, like those
those gym doors that are like metal and they're super loud,
and so you open the door like yeah, and he
just he pounded it open booking, and and everybody like
they had just finished laughing at me making fun of
this guy, and they look at the door and he's
standing there all like and they're like looking at him,
(11:58):
and they look at me like, oh, what am I
going to? Like you just got busted? And and then
I'm standing in the middle of the of the gym floor.
Then I looked down, I go, ay, sir, there's no
grass down here. So everybody's like losing it, right, And
then so I'm making fun of him, like uh. And
then at that time, they called the principle over, and
(12:20):
the principal walks it because he's hearing that I'm making
fun of him too. So and and this has already
taken up like most of my five minute segment that
I was supposed to do, right, So when the principal
walks in again, the crowd looks at the principal, and
they look back at me like, oh, what's he gonna
do now? And I go, well, I guess that's my
cute to go back to class and c the place. Yeah,
(12:41):
the place that rupted I was. I wasn't probably like
in front of like like about seven hundred kids, and
and the place was going nuts and and and there
was nothing that was gonna beat that. There's there was.
The dance team was like throwing down their pom poms. Right, No, no.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
You're described like a scene for mean girls, you know.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Like for that. It was. It was one of those
scenes where I was like and then they paid me
a hundred bucks, and I was like my, my, my gears,
and my brain started started spinning, and I'm thinking like,
man uh that was for five minutes. I just made
one hundred dollars and five minutes. And for me, that
was like mind blowing that I could make that kind
(13:23):
of money in five minutes. And so I started thinking like,
man if I could, if I could make up five
minutes slots and at one hundred dollars each in an hour,
I can make twelve hundred bucks, you know. Yeah, And
I started just thinking about about that, like like the
mathematics in my head, like, man, imagine making twelve hundred
dollars an hour, and I was like wow. Like as
(13:45):
a kid, I was that that was my mentality.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
And it makes sense that you realized you you could
make a career out of it at an early age.
You just had to figure out how to do it.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeah. And a buddy of mine, he was my best
friend in high school. He's still my best friend. We're
like brothers. His dad he owned a bar where we
would go and bust tables and kind of clean up
and pick up and take out the trash and stuff
after school and for extra money, you know, like five
ten bucks here and stuff like that. But his dad
was also a he's at the hand musician, singer and
(14:20):
the Hall of Famer, so he kind of like made
this bar so that he could have a place for
him and his friends to jam out, you know. And
so we were out there cleaning the tables and we
had already finished our work, and my friend's dad had
set up the PA system because his friends were going
to come over and they were gonna jam out. And
(14:40):
my friend goes, hey, man, you should go up on
stage and do some of the voices that you do,
because I was known for doing impressions and stuff. So
I'm like, oh, you think it's cool, and it's like, yeah,
go for it. And his dad started watching me perform,
and man, I was making all of his clients laugh
doing like Arnold Schwartzenegram President that he listened to me
command and you know Bill Clinton. He loved my Bill
(15:03):
Clinton impression and my George Bush impression and stuff like
that at the time. And so I had all the
bar laughing. Re mind you this this bar. I'm fifteen,
sixteen years old and I'm performing at a bar, like
a Mexican candina that's like super shady shanty place like,
and making these people laugh is like no easy task, right,
(15:27):
These are hardened like Mexican man just drinking beer, like
just wanting to listen to music and stuff. So I
did probably like forty five minutes of me just goofing
on the mic before the band got there. And when
I got off stage, my friend's dad he comes up
and gives me a fifty dollars bill and I tell
him like, hey, Dad, Like I tell him the THEO.
You know, uncle, hey, THEO. You gave me too much money? Like,
(15:50):
usually give me like five to ten bucks just to
clean up around here. And he goes, no, me, what
you did up there on stage. That's called show business.
And he goes, if you work on that, you'll make
a lot more money doing that than bussing tables. I'll
tell you that. And I'm like, man, he opened my mind.
He goes, you know what, every Friday before we would
have a football home game, they would go to his
(16:12):
bar and kind of go out to the game afterwards,
a little pre gamed up, you know what I'm saying.
So he goes, every Friday home game, if you want,
you can come and perform, and I'll give you fifty
dollars for your performance before the game starts. And I'm like, dude,
as a fifteen sixteen year old kid, I was like,
this is what I want, you know. So I was
I was super kind of like baptized by fire. But
(16:34):
I was ready for it at the time because I
already had a lot of material that I had been
writing since I was in third grade. So I was
just kind of like goofing on it. But another teacher
was super instrumental in my in my upbringing because I
was I was always the class clown and kind of
like interrupting people's teachers classes and stuff. And this English
(16:56):
teacher And if there's any teachers listening, I really highly
encourage them with this story because this teacher really showed
me what's up. And if there's anything that a teacher
can do for a student, what this teacher did for
me was everything. And she pulled me aside because I
was I was a straight A student. That was the
(17:16):
one thing about being a class clown that I always
got away with it because my grades were so top notch.
I was top of the class, perfect attendance. You couldn't
like all my meet the teacher nights were all filled
with like, well he's always interrupting the class and all
that stuff. And my mom would be like, well what
are his grades? Like, well, he's got a ninety eight GPA, it'said, well,
(17:37):
I'm not going to get mad at him. He's got
perfect attendants and an an iety eight. Like it's your
job to deal with that, you know. Well, this one teacher,
she took me aside and said, man, I know that
you have like a straight a GPA, but I know
that you're only giving me fifty percent of your work ethic,
(17:57):
like you're not even you're cruising in this class because
it's not even you're not even being challenged. You're you're
comfortable being where you're at because you're beating everybody else,
but you're not competing with yourself. You should be competing
with yourself and see what your one hundred percent is.
And she was right, one hundred percent right, And she
kind of pushed me to be like, you know what
(18:18):
if you give me one hundred percent effort and you
explain to your classmates why, like how you get it,
Like why do you understand the material the way you
understand it and they don't, if you can explain it
to them and help me teach them, at the end
of the class period, when everybody's finished over their work,
you can have whatever time is left and go in
front of the class and you can tell jokes. And
(18:39):
I was like, yeah, like game on, you know.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Wow, that was amazing, What a smart move that teacher
made do it.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
It was mind blowing.
Speaker 3 (18:49):
It was super super smart on her part because she
did exactly what I needed, Like man, and she goes,
but on one condition, the jokes that you write, they
can't be vulgar they have to be school appropriate and
uh and and.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
They that's it. You can't be cussing, you can't be
doing dirty stuff. It has to be clean. Which is
another great thing she did for me was make me
write clean material.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Yeah, you learned how to be universally funny without having
to use nastiness or vulgarity or yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Yeah, And for me that was that was so instrumental
in my upbring because now I was doing comedy in
her class, probably like three four times a week, in
front of for real, in front of it, in front
of my classmates, and they were loving it. Many so
all these kids would finish their work just because they
wanted to see me go up there and do some
voices and skits and stuff. And then it went on
(19:46):
over to she was in the teacher's lounge and these
other teachers were like, man, I'm having such a hard
time with Raymond for real, and she goes, are you serious?
Raymond turned my class around like this, all my kids
are passing now, and he's like, what like Raymond did this?
Like yeah, like I told him, like, if if he
helps me finish all their work, like if he helps
(20:06):
his classmates finish all their work. At the end of
the class, I just give him whatever time and I
get a chance to sit back and watch his kid.
He's funny. And so I had three other teachers take
the same mentality, and I started helping out the other
kids with their work. And I was doing comedy like
three four times a day in different classrooms.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
I'm in Orta in the teacher's lounge performing night late.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Yeah. It was. It was awesome, amazing. By the time
I got out of high school, I probably had like
like well over an hour of material of stuff that
I could do at bars and stuff like that. And
so I was, I was doing it and I got
into some to some bars, I got into some I
was I started calling in the radio stations because I
(20:53):
started making friends with DJs that that were working on
the radio, because I would do impressions and pretend to
be like celebrities calling in.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
You know, yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
They were. They were all about it. So it was
it was, Uh. I made friends with all those guys,
and it was really interesting because those DJs. Eventually I
started working on radio after that, and it was it
was a big time. Like I was doing voices on
morning radio for five years of my life. It was awesome,
It was it was really cool.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
That's very fun, especially when you get to hear yourself
on the radio. I'm curious who your comedy heroes are
growing up or were growing up, and did any of
their stories sort of inspire you ever? And there's so
many things I want to know. But okay, so start there.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Don't don't judge me by by my comedy influences because uh, okay,
because people never see my comedy influences, like uh when
when I tell them that, they're like really like what, like,
so do you are are you familiar with wrestling?
Speaker 1 (21:56):
I well, I was a big fan of wrestling growing
up as a kid.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
So me too, Me too. Okay, So one of my
biggest comedy influences in my life is Vince McMahon.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Oh really, yes, that's amazing. I mean now knowing looking back,
I get it, but like you know then, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Now we found out that he's all sorts of like
a sexual deviant and perpose but.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
A showman nonetheless, and you picked up.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
On this strange showman and for me, for me comedy
like man, I see, Vince mcman is like a big
time like for he's a Showman and I and I
and I took my hat to him in essence when
I didn't know what he was doing. Right. Let me
make sure that people know that when I was a
kid watching vincemc man, it's like you're gonna have to
(22:46):
guess my Yeah, it's fun.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
It was hilarious and me and Joe Green wasn't like
and he was a character and then it was all
the best of wrestling back then.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
For real and at the Attitude era was a big
part of my comedy influence because and then a lot
of the times I would do all these wrestling impressions
for my friends too, so they love the the voices
and stuff like guess yeah, the man Randy Savage, SI Gym. Yeah,
(23:20):
it's the cream with the group.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
That is so good that sounds just like him.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I would do. I would do all of like like uh,
and I was just I was just watching a Vince
McMann clip the other day, just yesterday actually, and just
made me laugh like he was funny man. But another
comedy influence of mine, and people don't see this one
coming either, is uh. One of my favorites is this
is really old school. To let you know that I'm
(23:47):
a student of the game. Dean Martin.
Speaker 1 (23:49):
Oh wow, Yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
Seeing Dean Martin like uh sing and perform and like
just oozing charisma. Yeah, and class was like, man, I
want to be like that on stage where it's like, man,
everybody wants to hang out with that guy. And and
that's how I kind of like molded my career. A
little bit of Robin Williams thrown in there, a little
(24:13):
bit of John Leguizamo and Vince McMahon.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
John and Vince McMahon totally. Oh my god, I'm.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Just watching Spectrum.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Yeah. John's in a new a show that I'm watching
right now and I can't remember the name of it.
I'll think of if I can think of it. At
the end. It's really good and he plays a great
character and it's not over yet. Speaking of that, you
give away all your videos for like, you don't monetize
your videos, do you.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
They're they're they're like, uh, well generate income, they're they're
they're like social media has been paying me money, but
I don't put any ads on them or nothing like that.
They just, uh, they're there for for for the watching
and amazing you.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Just go right. I love when you just go right
there and it turns on and you're not like bombar
with stuff, you know.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
Yeah, and I love making people laugh. Like, there's so
many messages that I've gotten of people that are going
through a bunch of dark stuff, man, and they go
to my videos they leave me long messages. I've gotten
so many messages from people that are going through some
depression and sadness, maybe they lost somebody, and they go
(25:25):
and leave big comments on my page saying like, man,
I'm really thankful that you put this video out there
because it's getting me through some trauma or some dark
times right now. And I'm like that that really that
really makes things worthwhile for me big time.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
That's for sure. I Mean, obviously your message is very
strong in the positivity and lifting people up and everything
that I've read about you.
Speaker 4 (25:47):
You will be right back with more of the Comedy
Saved Me Podcast. Welcome back to the Comedy Saved Me Podcast.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Do you ever use your comedy to address serious topics
and and how do you balance sort of like that
heart and humor when you go out on stage.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
So I I my serious topics that I cover are
like my own upbringing, you know, like uh, like having
my grandpa like passing away. I talk about him like
passing away, but in a it's such a funny, crazy joke,
and I do his voice, uh like super good.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
People freak out with the voice that I do because
he's he was an old Mexican man, so you can
imagine when I get into his voice. Oh yeah, mio
can't take paying a danger. And so when I get
into that voice, people are like, man, and I I go, Uh.
(26:53):
I tell a joke where he's in the hospital and
the doctor tells me, is like, uh, you know, your
grandpa's kind of like really in bad shape. I heard
him blink and I'm like what, and uh, He's like, yeah,
I heard him blink. Like, go talk to your grandpa,
and if you hear him blink, you'll know that he's
like you know, he's he's already towards the end of
(27:14):
his life. And so I do this whole bit about
going in to talk to my grandpa and I hear
him blink. I don't know if you'll be able to
hear it, but I'm gonna try to do it on
the microphone. He goes and I walked in and I'm like, man,
I heard my grandpa blink clear as day and I
and I and he's talking to me, He's like, oh
you me, and man, when.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
I wish people could just see your face right now?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
No, And when people see it on live, man, it's
one of the crowd favorites jokes. And then usually people
like they like how you did, like you kind of
like hold your laughter, and I'll call him out, like, no,
don't you hold your laughter in let it out, let
that laugh out. And I started, I started kind of
like picking on the whole subject. But uh, it's such
it's one of the crowd favorite jokes. And and I
(28:08):
do that little blinking sound every time he's blinking and
people are losing it like it's it's supposed to sound again,
and man, on a microphone, it sounds so like.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
Just moist.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
It's just like, h.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
Yeah, I knew today was the day that I didn't
bring the tissues.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Oh man, that's great.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
Can I just ask you what this feels like right
now when you see me literally with tears rolling down
my face, laughing hysterically.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
I live for that right there, man, I really genuinely, Uh.
I love love, love, love love love doing what I do.
And it feels like a superpower. I bet yeah, it
feels like a super super power. And like, for example,
I just did a show in Albuquerque a few weeks ago,
(29:07):
and there was this lady in the front row wearing
a mask and she was laughing so hard like she
what we in the business we call them shotgun laughs.
Shotgun laugh is like when it looks like somebody took
a shotgun and just blasted somebody in the head and
they throw their head back like And this lady was
(29:28):
letting loose like her whole for the whole hour that
I was on stage, she was laughing like that. And
afterwards she told my friend that opened up for me
that she was battling stage four cancer and that was
the hardest she's ever laughed in her life. And for me, man,
(29:49):
that means the world to me. Like, man, this lady's
going through some stuff. And I've actually taken a college
class on the medical benefits of laughter, and there's a thing, yeah,
and there's laughter therapy, and I want to and I
genuinely feel that. Man's like, she got some real good
medicine that night, like that laughter really really she needed that,
(30:11):
And for me, that's what my life is all about
I have. Even before I go on stage, I always
say a while back, before my son was born, I
had a near death experience where I died for a
few minutes and I got a chance to have an
encounter with the Father in heaven and I feel his love.
And every time I go on stage, I want to
(30:32):
exude that love that he has for us through with
the laughter. So I always say a prayer that the
love of the Father befell through the laughter that we brought,
through the talent that he gave me. And man, when
I go up on stage, I'm just letting him flow
through me in a way that's super powerful. And I
genuinely love what I do. Like it when people see
(30:52):
me on stage, they see somebody that's just passionately having
a good time and living what is purpose is meant
to be. You know.
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Wow? So I mean, would you would you say that
in a way, comedy saved you?
Speaker 2 (31:07):
Oh man, Comedy has saved me, Comedy has saved my.
Comedy has saved my family many times, Like I can't
tell you how many times I've been in a rut
or my mom needed several like a big chunk of money,
like all the taxes are doue or something she needs
like ten thousand dollars, like, mam, I got it. Don't worry.
I'm gonna go do a couple of shows. I'll be back,
give me a weekend, you know, and I'll come and
(31:31):
give my mom a big stack of a big envelope
full of cash. And she's just like, oh, man, like
thank you, son, Like wow. And it feels good to
be the son that that because she had me when
she was real young. She got she she was pregnant
with me when she was sixteen, had me when she
was seventeen, And it feels good to to have her
(31:52):
back like that because she's she's never been the one
to ever tell me like, no, you should go get
a job. You should. She's always men super sort for
supportive of my comedy and and it's and it feels
good that she's had my back, so I of course
I have to help her oute big time.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Wow, that's it's so inspiring your your I'd say, Raymond
orta medicine. Man.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
My mom wanted me for me to be a doctor.
And uh, and I genuinely you know what. One movie
that I really liked was Patch Adams. Did you ever
see that one?
Speaker 1 (32:25):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (32:25):
Yeah, of course, So Patch Adams was a big time
inspiration to me. Uh. Then I realized like how much
time people have to put in through medical school to
get to become a doctor. I was like, um, like,
is there a way to go around this?
Speaker 1 (32:38):
That's so much fun? We have that in common. Two
things that you said today. So number one, when I
didn't want to go to sleep at night, my brother
and I would do everything we could to make my
mom laugh so that we wouldn't have to go to bed.
She'd have to call my father Mark. The kids won't
stop and we'd been making like farting noises or something
or you know. But that and then Mom thought I
(32:59):
was going to be a doctor. And but then it
was the sight of blood in the cost of medical
school that was.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Real for real, man, Like like this and maybe this
one time my wife was in the hospital and she
was having this procedure done and they they were doing
like an IV line and they missed it and she
started like blood squirting. Man. I almost fainted, And I
was like, man, I'm glad they didn't get into the
medical field because that's the last thing you need. And
(33:26):
I'm a huge guy. I'm like six foot five at
sixty poundy I'm a big dude.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
So I walked out of the room and I just
I'm like looking at the nurses station, like excuse me, ma'am.
And this lady turns around. I was like four foot
ten and she's just like yes. I'm like I think
I'm about to fade, and.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
She's like, please don't fall on me.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Like the mountain of a man just falling over on her.
But luckily they got a chair for me, and I
sat down and gave me some water.
Speaker 1 (33:52):
Thank goodness. Let me ask you a question. You know
you are. You're so you're larger than life in many ways,
and you every time I've ever seen you, you've always had
a huge smile on your face. And it's obvious that
you love what you do and you love helping people
through your comedy to heal in myriad ways. How do
you take care of your own mental health? And does
(34:15):
comedy have you know any role in your self? Care
for yourself?
Speaker 2 (34:20):
My my family will tell you that I'm like the
last person that takes care of himself. I want to
take care of everybody else and and fix everybody's problems
before I take care of mine. I'll just whatever's bugging me,
I'll just eat it, you know. Yeah, I do that
a lot. I kind of like just eat it and
keep on keep on running, you know. Like And but
(34:43):
a lot of a lot of it has come down
to my mental health comes from a good, strong relationship
in the Lord Jesus Christ. And he's he's my savior.
He backs me up every time I go on stage,
every time I'm not on stage. I have a like
sincere relationship with him. I love I love helping people,
(35:05):
I love giving giving to people, and like it's one
of those things where having that foundation with him, I
really don't feel like things can be going bad. And
I never, like my mom says, like, man, the whole
house and the whole world could be burning, and I'm like,
it's fine, you know. I have a real strong mentality
with with with a firm, firm relationship with with our
(35:27):
creator and our father in heaven. And it's just that's
that's what really holds me over. And if there's anybody
that's that's listening to this that is, you know, suffering
from mental health problems or or or or depression, or something.
I really firmly believe that you're listening to this for
a reason, and I really would love for you to
(35:49):
for you to understand that there's a creator in heaven.
He loves you so much. He's created you from nothing,
created you in your mother's womb, Niche molecule by molecule,
so that you so that you can know him and
that he can know you intimately and have an intimate
relationship with you in a way where he's your best friend,
he's your dad, he's your he's he's your everyday companion.
(36:11):
And without him, I'm nothing. And without him, I can't
accomplish anything. I'm a piece of dirt. And uh, I
look at it. I look at myself that way. I'm
I'm a piece of dirt lucky enough to have his
breath of life in me. And that's that's the way
I carry myself every day.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
That's such a beautiful sentiment to share with with people,
and what an amazing way to live your life, just
you know, leave it up to up to a higher power,
like don't don't take any of that onto yourself. My
next question was going to be was there anyone in
comedy that gave you advice on how to you know,
stick it out in a in a business that's not
(36:47):
always very kind.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
Oh man, my, you know what, my my, my, one
of my best friends and uh, he's actually like a
mentor of mine. Was the guy that I worked with
the radio and he does comedy too, but he's he's
been a DJ for man probably like forty forty five years.
Speaker 1 (37:09):
Who is it what radio station where he's down.
Speaker 2 (37:11):
Here in South Texas. He's syndicated also towards Olpaso. His
name is rock and roll James.
Speaker 1 (37:18):
And he's actually seems I've known.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Yeah you ever. He's he's amazing. He's a he's a
real good friend of mine. And he's a lead singer
of a of a kind of like an outlaw country
band called Whiskey Bee.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
And I'm writing that down.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
Yeah, he's extremely talented, extremely talented, and uh, he taught
me so much about the business and not and not
necessarily comedy. He did see to me a lot about comedy,
but just marketing in general. Man, this guy's a marketing
genius and he's so good. Like he's he's he's a
(37:52):
high school dropout, but he's one of the most brilliant
people I've ever met. Like, he's book smart, street smart,
and he's like he knows the stuff man, and he
knows how to market. He'll sell, he'll sell you. He'll
sell you the close off your back and you'll buy
it from him. He's a he's amazing. He's really he's
really top tier talent. And I've never heard that. But
(38:15):
can I steal that one from you? Yeah? For sure,
for sure. And he's a real good friend of mine.
But in comedy, you, like you said earlier, it's not
so kind comedy. All these comedians feel the need that
they they got to keep their secrets to themselves. They gotta,
they gotta. You know, they won't tell you, like who's
booking what, they won't give you, they won't open any
(38:36):
doors for you or nothing like that.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
So I've made a big career on my on my own,
like kind of opening my own doors. You know. I've
done so many shows where I call a venue and
be like, hey man, can I do a comedy show
at your place? Just let me keep the door, And
they're like, well, okay, sure whatever, and they'll they'll uh,
they'll let me keep the door and I'll go over
there set up my own sound system, set up my
(38:59):
own lights, and I got a little spotlight right here
right now.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
I'll go and you have a hairlight, you need a hairlin?
Speaker 2 (39:08):
Yeah, yeah, I got I got it, I got it all.
I got my whole production that I can fit into
the trunk of my car. And man, I'll make a
couple of thousand dollars every night that I go on
stage and call it done. And but nobody taught me
that except that guy, my my buddy rock and roll James,
everybody else in the comedy scene. Like you said, it's
real cut through and super kind of like gatekeeper ish,
(39:33):
And I can say that is a word, uh And
and I'm and I'm not the type of guy that's
going to go over there and kiss people's butts. I
don't like to do that. So I I like to
open my own my own doors and and do my
own thing. And the people that are cool with it,
they're cool. And the people that are not cool, I
don't care.
Speaker 1 (39:51):
That's such a great attitude to have, honestly, and you
have to have that. The entertainment business as a whole
can just be so disruptive to a human's psyche big time.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
Anyone in actually actually like the scene in Hollywood, man,
you know, like that that whole thing about the dress
the dress culture and stuff like that. No, oh you've
never You've never heard about like the dress club.
Speaker 1 (40:11):
No tell me, I'm out of it. I'm I'm out.
Speaker 2 (40:14):
Okay, So this is this is gonna blow your mind
a little bit. So what you know, like dress culture,
the dress club, like you ever like think about it?
And in all the comedy movies that you've seen, how
many male comedians have you seen put on a dress?
Speaker 1 (40:31):
Well? Quite a few actually, Like I'm starting all the
way back at the Three Stooges and going forward and like, yeah,
I mean like Missus dellfire N Williams or Dustin Hoffman
more of an actor than comedian, but still funny.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
Yeah, John Leguizamos one of them. Yeah, Jim Carrey, all
the big time actors, they've all put on dresses. And
it's one of those like rituals that Hollywood does, uh
you oh yeah, And there's some dark stuff in Hollywood
that is real sinister. And I was offered a role
(41:09):
in a movie where they wanted me to put on
a dress, and I'm like, bro, look at me, I'm
a big I'm a big beard. Yeah, Like come on, bro,
I'm from Texas, Like I can't put on a dress.
And they were super adamant they had offered me kind
of like like uh, you know the movie Big Mama's House. Yeah,
so that's that's another one. Martin Lawrence puts on a dress.
(41:32):
And but the the record labels or the studios, they
kind of sign you into a contract where they make
you do these favors like of the sexual nature in
order for you to get these big contracts and big
movie roles.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Yep, and I now, now, now, I can't stop thinking
about all of them. Eddie Murphy like everybody wow.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
And they and they make you do stuff and that
when they put you in address, it's kind of their
way of letting their friends know, like in the other studios,
like hey, I own this person, like I made this
person my own property, you know. And it's the real,
real disgusting, like behind the scenes stuff that goes on
in order for these comedians to get these movie roles.
(42:20):
So I was offered a movie role in a role
that Estay gabrily Less has turned down. And it was
kind of like a spin off of Big Mama's House
called Dia Juana's House and it's it was a role.
When they told me that Gabriel Less has it turned
down kind of threw up some red flags for me.
(42:41):
And I'm like, well, why did you turn it down?
And he's like, oh, just they send me the script
and like check it out. It's it's super funny. You
could You'll be perfect for it. And I started reading
the script and I started and I saw the plot
of the movie was this nephew lives with his aunt Juana,
and she wins the lottery and she he has a
heart attack and dies, but he has to go claim
(43:03):
her her prize dressed as her like so he can
get the money for himself. And I'm like like and
I kind of told him, like, nah, man, I'm not
going to get into a dress. And uh, They're like, oh,
come on and be super funny, and I'm like, nah,
I can't. I can't get in. I can't get into
a dress, man, And they're like, oh, why not, Like
it's going to be super funny. And I told him like, look, dude,
I'm from Texas, Like yeah, I can't get an address.
(43:26):
I'll never win another argument ever. Again. You know, doesn't
matter what I'm saying, like, they'll just put up a
meme of me in a dress and it's like arguments over.
Speaker 1 (43:33):
You know at that time, did you know that's what?
That why they were pushing it you? So you knew
that you were trying to back out respectfully, so you
didn't burn a bridge or hurt your wife.
Speaker 2 (43:42):
I try to try to back out respectfully, but they
were still pushing my buttons like come on, it'll be
super funny, and I'm like, no, I don't. I don't
need to put on a dress to be funny. I'm
super funny by myself, Like trust me, like I'm funny,
and they're like no, come on, come on like you can.
It'd be a great role for you and all stuff.
And I finally just told him like, look, man, I'm
not going to get an address. It goes against my
(44:02):
religious beliefs. And as soon as I said that, man,
it was like waw, like doors closed, everything's like nah.
And they told me, well, you'll never get any work
around here with that kind of closed minded attitude. And
that was the last I ever heard from Hollywood. It
was crazy.
Speaker 1 (44:18):
But did that make you want to be more successful
than ever, just to prove them that you could do
it without them.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
That's what I've been doing ever since that happened. I've
been doing on my own terms, on my own rules,
ever since that happened, and it's it's been the best
decision I've ever made. I mean, granted, they're not trying
to put me on the big screen or anything like that,
but I'm super happy I've been doing theaters i've been.
I'm super humble to the effect I like to say,
(44:48):
I'm humble like Moses.
Speaker 1 (44:51):
I love that.
Speaker 2 (44:52):
Yeah, which is funny because Moses wrote the place where
he where he said that he's the he was the
most humble, but he's like the one writing this is
like really right? Yeah, yeah, well there was there was
no person humbler than Moses. You know, I'm humble like Moses.
Like this weekend, I'm doing somebody's backyard party and there's
probably like twenty thirty people that are going to be there,
(45:13):
and uh but man, if if people are willing to
pay money, just hear me tell jokes. I'm gonna do it.
Like I don't care. I'm not I'm not how you say, like,
I don't like the comedians that are like, Oh, I'm
not going to do this pool hall or I'm not
going to do this bar, this dive bar. Bro put
me up anywhere. I'm gonna crush it. I'm gonna I'm
(45:35):
gonna go out there and dominate and I'm gonna put
on a show. And I was raised in some crazy,
crazy bars like to starting my career. One of the
one of the bars that we used to do comedy
at was called Paradise Roadhouse and it was like a
mad house. Like you you're just seen that movie Pee
(45:56):
Wee's Big Adventure.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
Of course, one of my favorites.
Speaker 2 (46:00):
So you know when he steps into that bar, like uh.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
When he knocks all the motorcycles.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, So that was exactly what that
bar is like. Like when we're doing comedy, it's the
main people at the is the audience where the Bandilo,
motorcycle gang, the cartel, and the local valley gang all
together and none of them want to laugh because they
think laughter is weakness. So like if you can make
(46:29):
them laugh there, man, your jokes will kill anywhere. Wow.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
That sounds like it's like peoria in a bar.
Speaker 3 (46:36):
It was.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
It was so it was so such a hard, hard
place to do comedy. I saw so many veterans of
comedy going there and just tank, just eat a fat
plate of just fat plate of crap, and like it
was humbling for so many people. I was like, man,
and I would go over there and just routinely crush it.
(46:58):
I'm like, man, this is awesome. So anytime I would
go out of town and do like an actual comedy
club where people are there like applight and like ready
to listen, I'm like, oh, this is easy, it's going
to be.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
Have you ever bombed and had to like early on
and had to keep going throughout the whole show? Can?
Has it ever happened?
Speaker 2 (47:16):
Yes? All right, I love this story so much so
you're already laughing because it's so funny now. Because Okay,
from third grade, eight years old, all the way till
I was eighteen, I had never had a bad show.
Okay never. And then so I'm like I'm already doing
like bars and stuff like that. I've been crushing it.
(47:37):
I'm feeling confident, I'm feeling good. I'm like, yeah, man,
kick an ass out here. And I had this guy
that was like acting as my manager, and he goes Bro,
I got you a gig. It's going to be in
front of like two three thousand people, and it's going
to be at a boxing match. And I'm just like,
let's go, bro, I'm gonna crush this. Okay, let's do this.
(47:59):
And he goes all right, man, You're gonna go on
in between fights like like a ring girl with the
with the numbers. Yeah. But yeah, but like like you know,
when when one fight ends, there's like a like probably
ten fifteen minutes of break time before they bring in
another fight. Yeah, I was gonna perform in that time
during during the intermission of the fights, right, So I
(48:22):
go on on the ring and this is the I'm
performing outside in a park, and outdoor comedy is the hardest, okay.
The laughter just goes up into the air and you
can't hear anything. But then this was the first time
that I was performing in a full three sixty like
I had used to be performing, Like the stages is
over here, the audience is over there. But this is
like the first time after performing a circle, which I
(48:44):
was not used to. And then I was using a
wireless microphone outside and this microphone every time a gust
of wind would come by, it would cut off the microphone, right, dude,
Oh my goodness, that's like setup, and then it would
take like three to five seconds to boot back on. Right.
(49:05):
So I'm there like, is this thing blow it in
the microphone? Hello? Okay, well, uh let me let me
finish this joke real quick. Oh It's terrible. It was
so bad, and I'm doing my show in a circle
and every time it seems like I'm gonna say a punchline,
the microphone was cutting off, and I was like, oh no,
and everybody's like like, what's this guy doing, Like we'll
(49:26):
get this. Who is this guy? And man, I'm like
just feeling like so bad, And I will never forget
it because I would. I would do a three sixty
and I'd see I'd come around and this lady would
catch my my my vision because she was sitting in
her own lawn chair in the park and she's wearing
this magenta like man, she looked like Job of the
(49:48):
Hut in a in a magenta tank top with magenta
biker shorts and just like a super white lady, pink
with heat, you know, like a humid, pink, frizzy hot mess,
just just oozing out of this lawn chair that's barely
(50:09):
holding on for dear life, and every time she sees me,
she's making sure to make eye contacted me and just
doing this.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Oh no, you remember that, like vividly you remember.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
I'll never forget it. I'll never forget it because it
was It was one of those things where I'm like,
I had never had a bad show. I had never
had a bad show, and that was the first time
that I had tasted like legit, just a straight up
bomb rejection. Wow. Yeah, yeah, like a straight up rejection.
I got off stage and it was like nobody was
(50:44):
like hey man, Like nobody that was just like look
at me, like what are you doing? Bro? Like, oh,
it's terrible. It was in front of so many people too.
It's like in front of oh man, it was terrible.
Like I really genuinely wanted to quit comedy, like I
wanted to I had never had a bad show. I didn't.
I didn't know how to handle that.
Speaker 1 (51:05):
Like how did you make it to the next show?
What did you have to work with yourself on?
Speaker 2 (51:09):
I have I have such a a hard headed nature,
ask my wife, uh, I asked, I have such a
hard headed nature that I couldn't end on a loss,
Like I had to get that out of my system,
Like I even if it was like, oh, go do
like a bar or like some cheesy open mic or something,
just to get that taste out of my mouth. Yeah,
And and I went to go do like a I
(51:32):
think it was like a club, like a lounge area
or something like that, where I got a chance to
perform and people were like losing, and I was like, nah,
this is still good at this. I'm good at this. Yeah.
But bombing is so funny to me, Like now nowadays,
I haven't bombed in so long, Like it's.
Speaker 1 (51:51):
It's a knock on the wood here, come on now.
Speaker 2 (51:54):
Oh yeah, no, I enjoy I enjoy them because like
all laugh. The last time I bomb was this was
this Christmas party that they hired me for. But this
it wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault though, Like
the the the people that were dou that were putting
on the party. As soon as they gave me the microphone,
(52:15):
they're like, oh, and by the way, the buffet line
is open. Everybody can get up and get their food.
And everybody just got out there. And I'm just like
like just left me there by myself. So I kind
of started like crapping on my own, like, well, this
is where my career comes to die, people like, you know,
just making fun of yourself, just making fun of myself.
So now I've learned how to like bounce it, uh
(52:35):
bounce it off and and and uh kind of make
fun of myself in the process where I'm still having
fun with it, you know. And I know that you
learn a lot more from bombing than you do from
doing good. So I've learned so much from from uh
from the bad sets that I really trained myself that
I'm never like I can handle almost every single situation
(52:57):
that has been thrown my way because I've I've done
so many shows you know where this is gonna happen
and this you know, this is what you got to do.
But like that that Christmas party that I did, I'm like, hey,
you hired me for an hour. I'm gonna do an hour.
Speaker 1 (53:10):
You're gonna get me, whether you like it or not.
Speaker 2 (53:13):
Yeah, that's you're gonna get These jokes, man, I'm gonna
I'm gonna keep slinging them, and even though nobody's listening,
I'm gonna keep slinging them and then I'll be like,
have you ever seen that movie Balls of Fury?
Speaker 1 (53:23):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (53:23):
Of course, So so I was like, I feel like
that guy, what he is, what he's like that daytime?
Casiit is that allay.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
Very much? Wow, I swear Raymond, you must be probably
one Romeo Vaughn, by the way, he was on my
other podcast, Music Saved Me, which we asked talked about
up front, he did you such justice. But now that
I'm getting a chance to talk to you and people
are getting a chance to hear you, I would have
to say that most everyone listening right now would agree
(53:55):
that you are probably one of the happiest human beings
on the planet that I've I've met.
Speaker 2 (54:00):
I love I love being so I love being a
positive like a positive force man, And like uh, Jesus said,
let your light shine before people so that they can
see the light shining within you. And I'm that person.
Like I love to man, anytime somebody's going through something,
(54:21):
I love to bring them up. And I love like, hey, man,
like you know, let's let's think of a way to
solve your problem. Let's think of a way to like
like overcome this. We could do this, you know, and
I I sometimes to a fault, might believe in people
more than they believe in themselves. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (54:37):
Oh, I definitely know what you're saying. You are. You
are a cheerleader, a fellow cheerleader for people who you
just want to see people succeed in life. That's your payback. Yeah,
which is pretty amazing. Wow, I got so lost in everything.
I almost lost my last question for you. I don't
know where it went. Oh, here we go to how
(54:58):
would you like your comedy to impact people and the
legacy that you hope to leave.
Speaker 2 (55:04):
Man, my fans that have seen me, they'll tell you
that that, Like, Man, they're they're they're hardcore fans. And
that's That's one of the reasons that I'm like super successful,
is that the fans that have seen me know that
you'll never You'll never see the same show twice. I'm
not a scripted robot. I'm not a person that you're
(55:26):
going to be like, oh I heard the same jokes.
I have like nine hours of material that I've written
so far, and like, I love coming up with stuff
on the fly as well, So you're never gonna see
the same show twice. So anybody that has as far
as like, what do I want my comedy to be
known as. I wanted to be known as a person
that goes on stage and genuinely gives like everything that
(55:51):
they got into what they love to do, and and
passionately pours into the people that are there. It doesn't
matter if there's two people in the crowd or two
thousand people or twenty thousand people. I'm going to give
you one hundred percent of who I am and enjoy myself.
I love to have fun on stage. I love to
(56:11):
be happy on stage because being I look at it
this way, people are going to these shows, you never
know who's in the crowd. You never know what kind
of problems they're going through. And I have this one
story of this guy that texted me one time for
Father's Day, and rather intense story. He texted me for
(56:34):
Father's Day. Hey, and I don't know how he got
how he got my number, but he just I got
a text for Father's Day and he said, hey, happy
Father's Day. You don't know who I am, but I
was at your show last night and for Father's Day,
I was thinking about ending my life because my wife
left me, she took my kids, and I wanted to
(56:56):
end my life on Father's Day so that every time
Father's Day rolls around they would remember me and be
like super hurt by it. And I was doing a
Father's Day show on the Saturday before before Father's Day,
and this guy just happened to walk in to the
show and he was walking I was performing at a
place kind of like a are you familiar with, like
(57:18):
Sixth Street in Austin, where there's like bars next to
each other, like like a long strip of bars and
clubs next to each other, and there's like a little
mini theater where I was performing at. Well, this guy
was just going from bar to bar, drinking himself to
the point where he was gonna end his life at
the end of the night. Well, he walked by the
theater that I was performing at, and he heard laughter
(57:40):
coming in from inside, and he walked in. This was
already like in the middle of the show, so there
was nobody even at the door to charge him or nothing.
He just walked in, heard the show, and had such
a great time that it changed his whole outlook on life.
And he texted me, this is like man like today
I'm alive because of the show that you put on
(58:00):
last night and I and I came to pick up
my kids to spend time with them instead of instead
of having ended my life. Yes last night, and I
just wanted to say Happy Father's Day to you, uh,
because because of you, I got to be a father
to my kids to day. Like right, you want to
talk about like making my day like like so amazing. Uh,
(58:22):
that's the kind of stuff that like any comedian lives for,
and any comedian worth their salt wants those kinds of
interactions with the people, not necessarily their fans. They did
the guy didn't even pay for the show, But I
just wanted, like to impact people on that level. Or man,
you say you're saving people's lives with jokes, like, that's
(58:43):
amazing stuff for me that that, for me is is
what I was made for right there.
Speaker 1 (58:47):
I don't think it gets any better than that, to
be honest, real, I mean, really, if you can do that,
then wow, the rest of life seems easy when when
you when you hear stories like that. And by the way,
your light is shine so bright. I need to put
on some sunglasses. Thank you so much, Raymond Orta for
sharing your incredible journey with us, and to all our listeners,
(59:10):
thank you for checking the show out. And to Romeo Vaughn,
thank you for introducing us to this wonderful ray of
sunshine that I hope we get to keep in touch with.
Thanks for coming on comedy. Save me Raymond, and keep
spreading your love and doing what you're doing because you're amazing.
Speaker 2 (59:25):
Hey, I appreciate you having me. And if I may
be so bold, may the Lord bless you, May he
keep you, May shine his face on you, and be
gracious to you. And may the blood of Jesus cover
us all. Oh, bless you guys. Thank you so much,
Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (59:35):
Oh one more thing, where can people find you online
to see your amazing comedy?
Speaker 2 (59:39):
Yeah, at Raymond is funny across all social media platforms.
At Raymond is funny pretty much everything. Facebook dot com
slash Raymond is funny, Instagram dot com slash Raymond is funny,
YouTube dot com slash Raymond is funny. The only one
that's different is TikTok because my Raymond is Funny page
got banned. Oh but I got Raymond out of the comedy.
Speaker 1 (59:59):
On TikTok and Raymond is fun.
Speaker 2 (01:00:01):
My TikTok's My TikTok's been blowing up lately, so that's good.
Speaker 1 (01:00:04):
All right, Well, go go, Raymond, go do your thing.
I didn't mean to keep you so long. You have
to go out.
Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
I appreciate, I appreciate the interview, and thank you so much.
You guys were lovely and I look forward to meeting
you guys at Romeo. Talked to some real good, real
good vibes about you guys.
Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
Oh my gosh, right back and let us know when
you're in our area, please,
Comedy Saved Me. Oh my gosh, Raymond. First of all,
I'm so excited to talk to you. I wanted to
just say thank you, like Buzz just said to Romeo Vaughn,
because we had him on another podcast that I host
called Music Save Me. And I found out that we
had this podcast about Comedy Saved Me. He nearly fell
(00:24):
off his chairs, like you have to talk to Raymond,
you have to and we're like, okay, give us his info.
We're in so no.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
My my buddy Romeo man, he's I've known him for
several years and I actually ran into him going to
a show at the airport real randomly and he was
on his way to Nashville. I was on my way
to California and we were flying out to Austin to
a connecting flight there, and he was telling me all
about it. I'm like, bro, this is awesome, Like this
is and he's been doing some massive things for his
(00:53):
music career and I've been crushing it in the comedy
the comedy scene lately. I feel it was good to
catch up with him.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Yeah, maybe you guys down the road, you could do
like a comedy music show.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Oh yeah, that's definitely in the works for sure. He's
naturally funny too. Yeah, he really is. And I think
everybody in the valley where we're from has a natural
knack for being that that style of personality where we're
just like goofy and goofing on people and stuff like that.
It's a lot of fun down here.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
I love it. Well, thank you again for coming on.
And so I'm really excited. I read this thing. Let
me I'm trying to find where I wrote it down
this it says, this is crazy. Raymond Orta, a comedy
prodigy since the age of eight, delivers high energy, vivid storytelling.
(01:45):
His shows are so intense that he often leaves audiences
and hysteric, sometimes literally needing medical attention. Have you actually
had to, like clear, you know, bring someone back to
life at a show?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Yeah, that actually happened at this like outdoor Beach and
biker Fest is what it's called. It's like a like
a Harley Davidson rally out in South Pounder Island. And
I made this lady laugh and pass out and she
pissed herself, and uh they had to get her by
ambulance out of the whole place. It was pretty nuts.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Wow, all right, So that's why I was just wanting
to breakfast this for our listeners.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yeah, and one of my claim to fames is, uh,
I've made two people that I know of completely crap
their pants. And that's really hard to do in comedy.
That's that's Uh, that's really hard. That's like the mount
Everest of comedy. Besides making somebody die, making somebody poop
is up there.
Speaker 1 (02:42):
I have never ever heard that before, but I love it.
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
You gotta you gotta understand that. It's like the stars
having to align for that to happen. This guy had
to like the people that had that happened to him,
they had to like they were locking up their house
and they're like, man, I got it, I should probably
go to the bathroom. Was like, no, there's no time,
I'm gonna go out with one in the Chambert. They go,
(03:08):
all right.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
On that note, if you have to go to the bathroom,
you might want to go. Now we're going to go
take a break with some commercials and then we're going
to come right back with Raymond Orta.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
It's the time to do it.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Comedy Saved Me. Welcome back to Comedy Saved Me. The
show where we sit down with some of the funniest
people alive to talk about how laughter can be a
healing force that didn't just change their lives, but it
might have literally saved them and others too. I'm your host,
Lynn Hoffman, and if you're into inspiring stories of resilience, redemption,
(03:46):
and the transformative power of humor like this one, please
share it with your friends and maybe just lift them
up a little bit too, because that's exactly what we're
all about here on the Comedy Save Me Podcast. Sorry,
I get them confused sometimes. Today's guest is someone who
literally made someone poop their pants twice, as we learned
(04:07):
before we went to break, but he proves that comedy
can hit harder than a punchline at a midnight show.
He is a self described beacon of positivity and laughs,
which I absolutely love. A man who blends sharp wit
with hilarious storytelling, a performer who can take you from
tears of laughter to tears of recognition in the same set.
(04:28):
And I can tell you I'm already crying laughing during
the commercial break. I wish you could have heard everything.
If you've never seen him live, you know you are
not just at a comedy show. You are at a
Raymond Orta experience. So buckle up. Today we're talking heart, hustle,
and humor with the one and only Raymond Orta. Raymond,
Welcome to comedy Save Me.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
What an awesome intro. I really appreciate that. That was, Like,
I don't know where you got that Chad GPT knocked
out of the park or something that was really good.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
It's my LLM friend now.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
I was really really, really well done. That was so good.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Thanks so much. Well, what I want to know what first? Up?
First is what drew you to comedy? And like, when
did you realize that making people laugh was more than
just a hobby for you?
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Well, my first, my first taste of making somebody laugh
my was my mom. I made her laugh when I
was real young, and my dad was a super I
have plenty of stories in my show about him, but
he was not a very nice guy. He was super mean, abusive,
and my mom and him got divorced because she found
(05:39):
she found him cheating on her several times. And and
there was this one time where we're living out of
her car and I made her laugh and it was
such a good feeling for me. To make my mom
laugh when she was going through so much that I
really liked that feeling and it made me feel good
to be able to bring her some uh. And I
(06:01):
was I must have been like four or five, four
or five years old. I can't even remember what I did,
but I remember her laughing like big time when she
had been crying for for a long period of time
and I said something, I did something, and it just
it just broke the tension with comic relief. And I
just knew that that that was something that I really enjoyed.
(06:22):
And in school, I was always the class clown, always
looking to make people laugh. And in my my third
grade year in school, my teacher she came to me
with a poster and she's like, look look at this,
and it was a poster for a talent show. And
I remember the poster so vividly. It said like, you know,
(06:44):
can you sing? Can you dance? Can you do magic?
Can you do all these different things? And at the
very bottom it says, or even tell jokes? And she said,
you can tell jokes, You're super funny, and you should
you should try out for the talent show. And I
was like, oh, that sounds like like a lot of fun.
I definitely want to do that. And she's like, well,
you have to come up with a five minute routine
(07:06):
and you have to it has to be clean, and
then you can be in the Talent Show. And I
was like okay, And so I came up with a
five minute routine as a third grader and I remember
like going up in front of my student body, like
in front of all the elementary kids and the staff,
and I crushed it. I did five minutes of clean
(07:28):
mature that I wrote myself, and I won the Talent Show.
And I from one moment from that day like I was.
I used to be a chubby kid that was like
the always getting put in the friend zone, to now
I was the funny, popular kid that everybody knew, everybody
wanted to hang out with. And I was like, man,
this is this is what I want to do with
my life. I love love, love love this. I love
(07:50):
making people laugh. I love the popularity that brought me,
And from that moment, I was hooked. I've been passionately
pursuing comedy since I was eight years old, and when
people hear that, they're like, I like for real, Like
now it's like legit. I've been writing jokes and performing
them since I was in third grade.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
That's so impressive to me. And the crazy thing is
is that you remember that far back that you would
make your mom laugh during Well.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
I could still remember the jokes that I did in
my third grade talent show and I tell them to
people to this day. They're still funny. And I did
my third grade talent show, fourth grade, fifth grade, sixth, seventh, eighth,
and ninth grade talent shows and I've never lost a
talent show doing comedy.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Wow, that's amaz Well, it's obvious that you were paying
attention to listening to what you loved and translating that
into a career in comedy is a whole different ballgame.
But people usually do tell you to do what you
love and the money will come. But that's easily easier
said than done.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
I were real And the first time that I made
money doing comedy, like I saw like the Dollar Science,
was my ninth grade talent show. The grand prize for
first place was one hundred bucks, and I'll never forget
it because it was so I went on stage or
we're backstage at the at the gym, and there was
(09:16):
like this dance team, like talking smack to me, like
you really it looks it feels like one of those
Disney movies, right, you really think you're gonna win with
those cheesy little jokes of years like total mean girls, right,
And I was like, well, even if you guys win,
there's twelve of you guys and the grand prize is
one hundred bucks. You guys are gonna win like eight
dollars each. It's like what you're gonna get a waterburger
(09:38):
like combo, Like congratulations, that's it.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
What did they say? Did you say that to them?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, And we were like kind of talking smack,
And then they brought me up on to the gym
floor and I was I started making fun of like
the security guards that was that were working there at
the school, and I could impersonate them so like spot
So when I started doing their voices every like you
could imagine, all my fellow freshman friends are like, oh dude,
(10:07):
this guy's imitating guard. Like we had nicknames for other
security guards and one of the guys was named Garfield
and he had a voice it sounded like this, you
guys better get you better get off the grass. And
he was always telling us to get off the grass, right.
And then we had our principle. Our principal had a
super funny voice, real high pitched voice for a man,
(10:30):
and it almost like almost like muppet like. He had
a voice. It sounded it sounded like this. His voice
sounded like this, and his big thing, wash y'all hurry
up and get to class. Now, hurry up and get
to cliss. The kids nuts, oh, people were going nuts,
(10:50):
Like so, I'm making fun of the security guard and uh,
and and the principal at the same time, like, man,
the security guard's over here telling me, hey, get off
the grass, and the Principal's like, hey, get to class.
Let's get on the grass and get the class. And
so I'm going back and forth between these two and
the and the kids are losing it well at that time,
Like the security guards that were inside the gym watching us,
(11:13):
they're calling the security guard that I'm making fun of,
like they're calling him on the walking tark, like, bro,
you got to come over here and watch it, just
like ripping you up right now. And so so they're
like calling him and and man, like this guy couldn't
have walked into the gym at a more proper time,
like it was as if it was like like I
couldn't have scripted it any better. Yeah, Like like the guy,
(11:36):
the guy opens the door and you know, like those
those gym doors that are like metal and they're super loud,
and so you open the door like yeah, and he
just he pounded it open booking, and and everybody like
they had just finished laughing at me making fun of
this guy, and they look at the door and he's
standing there all like and they're like looking at him,
(11:58):
and they look at me like, oh, what am I
going to? Like you just got busted? And and then
I'm standing in the middle of the of the gym floor.
Then I looked down, I go, ay, sir, there's no
grass down here. So everybody's like losing it, right, And
then so I'm making fun of him, like uh. And
then at that time, they called the principle over, and
(12:20):
the principal walks it because he's hearing that I'm making
fun of him too. So and and this has already
taken up like most of my five minute segment that
I was supposed to do, right, So when the principal
walks in again, the crowd looks at the principal, and
they look back at me like, oh, what's he gonna
do now? And I go, well, I guess that's my
cute to go back to class and c the place. Yeah,
(12:41):
the place that rupted I was. I wasn't probably like
in front of like like about seven hundred kids, and
and the place was going nuts and and and there
was nothing that was gonna beat that. There's there was.
The dance team was like throwing down their pom poms. Right, No, no.
Speaker 1 (12:59):
You're described like a scene for mean girls, you know.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Like for that. It was. It was one of those
scenes where I was like and then they paid me
a hundred bucks, and I was like my, my, my gears,
and my brain started started spinning, and I'm thinking like,
man uh that was for five minutes. I just made
one hundred dollars and five minutes. And for me, that
was like mind blowing that I could make that kind
(13:23):
of money in five minutes. And so I started thinking like,
man if I could, if I could make up five
minutes slots and at one hundred dollars each in an hour,
I can make twelve hundred bucks, you know. Yeah, And
I started just thinking about about that, like like the
mathematics in my head, like, man, imagine making twelve hundred
dollars an hour, and I was like wow. Like as
(13:45):
a kid, I was that that was my mentality.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
And it makes sense that you realized you you could
make a career out of it at an early age.
You just had to figure out how to do it.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
Yeah. And a buddy of mine, he was my best
friend in high school. He's still my best friend. We're
like brothers. His dad he owned a bar where we
would go and bust tables and kind of clean up
and pick up and take out the trash and stuff
after school and for extra money, you know, like five
ten bucks here and stuff like that. But his dad
was also a he's at the hand musician, singer and
(14:20):
the Hall of Famer, so he kind of like made
this bar so that he could have a place for
him and his friends to jam out, you know. And
so we were out there cleaning the tables and we
had already finished our work, and my friend's dad had
set up the PA system because his friends were going
to come over and they were gonna jam out. And
(14:40):
my friend goes, hey, man, you should go up on
stage and do some of the voices that you do,
because I was known for doing impressions and stuff. So
I'm like, oh, you think it's cool, and it's like, yeah,
go for it. And his dad started watching me perform,
and man, I was making all of his clients laugh
doing like Arnold Schwartzenegram President that he listened to me
command and you know Bill Clinton. He loved my Bill
(15:03):
Clinton impression and my George Bush impression and stuff like
that at the time. And so I had all the
bar laughing. Re mind you this this bar. I'm fifteen,
sixteen years old and I'm performing at a bar, like
a Mexican candina that's like super shady shanty place like,
and making these people laugh is like no easy task, right,
(15:27):
These are hardened like Mexican man just drinking beer, like
just wanting to listen to music and stuff. So I
did probably like forty five minutes of me just goofing
on the mic before the band got there. And when
I got off stage, my friend's dad he comes up
and gives me a fifty dollars bill and I tell
him like, hey, Dad, Like I tell him the THEO.
You know, uncle, hey, THEO. You gave me too much money? Like,
(15:50):
usually give me like five to ten bucks just to
clean up around here. And he goes, no, me, what
you did up there on stage. That's called show business.
And he goes, if you work on that, you'll make
a lot more money doing that than bussing tables. I'll
tell you that. And I'm like, man, he opened my mind.
He goes, you know what, every Friday before we would
have a football home game, they would go to his
(16:12):
bar and kind of go out to the game afterwards,
a little pre gamed up, you know what I'm saying.
So he goes, every Friday home game, if you want,
you can come and perform, and I'll give you fifty
dollars for your performance before the game starts. And I'm like, dude,
as a fifteen sixteen year old kid, I was like,
this is what I want, you know. So I was
I was super kind of like baptized by fire. But
(16:34):
I was ready for it at the time because I
already had a lot of material that I had been
writing since I was in third grade. So I was
just kind of like goofing on it. But another teacher
was super instrumental in my in my upbringing because I
was I was always the class clown and kind of
like interrupting people's teachers classes and stuff. And this English
(16:56):
teacher And if there's any teachers listening, I really highly
encourage them with this story because this teacher really showed
me what's up. And if there's anything that a teacher
can do for a student, what this teacher did for
me was everything. And she pulled me aside because I
was I was a straight A student. That was the
(17:16):
one thing about being a class clown that I always
got away with it because my grades were so top notch.
I was top of the class, perfect attendance. You couldn't
like all my meet the teacher nights were all filled
with like, well he's always interrupting the class and all
that stuff. And my mom would be like, well what
are his grades? Like, well, he's got a ninety eight GPA, it'said, well,
(17:37):
I'm not going to get mad at him. He's got
perfect attendants and an an iety eight. Like it's your
job to deal with that, you know. Well, this one teacher,
she took me aside and said, man, I know that
you have like a straight a GPA, but I know
that you're only giving me fifty percent of your work ethic,
(17:57):
like you're not even you're cruising in this class because
it's not even you're not even being challenged. You're you're
comfortable being where you're at because you're beating everybody else,
but you're not competing with yourself. You should be competing
with yourself and see what your one hundred percent is.
And she was right, one hundred percent right, And she
kind of pushed me to be like, you know what
(18:18):
if you give me one hundred percent effort and you
explain to your classmates why, like how you get it,
Like why do you understand the material the way you
understand it and they don't, if you can explain it
to them and help me teach them, at the end
of the class period, when everybody's finished over their work,
you can have whatever time is left and go in
front of the class and you can tell jokes. And
(18:39):
I was like, yeah, like game on, you know.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Wow, that was amazing, What a smart move that teacher
made do it.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
It was mind blowing.
Speaker 3 (18:49):
It was super super smart on her part because she
did exactly what I needed, Like man, and she goes,
but on one condition, the jokes that you write, they
can't be vulgar they have to be school appropriate and
uh and and.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
They that's it. You can't be cussing, you can't be
doing dirty stuff. It has to be clean. Which is
another great thing she did for me was make me
write clean material.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Yeah, you learned how to be universally funny without having
to use nastiness or vulgarity or yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Yeah, And for me that was that was so instrumental
in my upbring because now I was doing comedy in
her class, probably like three four times a week, in
front of for real, in front of it, in front
of my classmates, and they were loving it. Many so
all these kids would finish their work just because they
wanted to see me go up there and do some
voices and skits and stuff. And then it went on
(19:46):
over to she was in the teacher's lounge and these
other teachers were like, man, I'm having such a hard
time with Raymond for real, and she goes, are you serious?
Raymond turned my class around like this, all my kids
are passing now, and he's like, what like Raymond did this?
Like yeah, like I told him, like, if if he
helps me finish all their work, like if he helps
(20:06):
his classmates finish all their work. At the end of
the class, I just give him whatever time and I
get a chance to sit back and watch his kid.
He's funny. And so I had three other teachers take
the same mentality, and I started helping out the other
kids with their work. And I was doing comedy like
three four times a day in different classrooms.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
I'm in Orta in the teacher's lounge performing night late.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Yeah. It was. It was awesome, amazing. By the time
I got out of high school, I probably had like
like well over an hour of material of stuff that
I could do at bars and stuff like that. And
so I was, I was doing it and I got
into some to some bars, I got into some I
was I started calling in the radio stations because I
(20:53):
started making friends with DJs that that were working on
the radio, because I would do impressions and pretend to
be like celebrities calling in.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
You know, yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
They were. They were all about it. So it was
it was, Uh. I made friends with all those guys,
and it was really interesting because those DJs. Eventually I
started working on radio after that, and it was it
was a big time. Like I was doing voices on
morning radio for five years of my life. It was awesome,
It was it was really cool.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
That's very fun, especially when you get to hear yourself
on the radio. I'm curious who your comedy heroes are
growing up or were growing up, and did any of
their stories sort of inspire you ever? And there's so
many things I want to know. But okay, so start there.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Don't don't judge me by by my comedy influences because uh, okay,
because people never see my comedy influences, like uh when
when I tell them that, they're like really like what, like,
so do you are are you familiar with wrestling?
Speaker 1 (21:56):
I well, I was a big fan of wrestling growing
up as a kid.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
So me too, Me too. Okay, So one of my
biggest comedy influences in my life is Vince McMahon.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Oh really, yes, that's amazing. I mean now knowing looking back,
I get it, but like you know then, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
Now we found out that he's all sorts of like
a sexual deviant and perpose but.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
A showman nonetheless, and you picked up.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
On this strange showman and for me, for me comedy
like man, I see, Vince mcman is like a big
time like for he's a Showman and I and I
and I took my hat to him in essence when
I didn't know what he was doing. Right. Let me
make sure that people know that when I was a
kid watching vincemc man, it's like you're gonna have to
(22:46):
guess my Yeah, it's fun.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
It was hilarious and me and Joe Green wasn't like
and he was a character and then it was all
the best of wrestling back then.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
For real and at the Attitude era was a big
part of my comedy influence because and then a lot
of the times I would do all these wrestling impressions
for my friends too, so they love the the voices
and stuff like guess yeah, the man Randy Savage, SI Gym. Yeah,
(23:20):
it's the cream with the group.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
That is so good that sounds just like him.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I would do. I would do all of like like uh,
and I was just I was just watching a Vince
McMann clip the other day, just yesterday actually, and just
made me laugh like he was funny man. But another
comedy influence of mine, and people don't see this one
coming either, is uh. One of my favorites is this
is really old school. To let you know that I'm
(23:47):
a student of the game. Dean Martin.
Speaker 1 (23:49):
Oh wow, Yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
Seeing Dean Martin like uh sing and perform and like
just oozing charisma. Yeah, and class was like, man, I
want to be like that on stage where it's like, man,
everybody wants to hang out with that guy. And and
that's how I kind of like molded my career. A
little bit of Robin Williams thrown in there, a little
(24:13):
bit of John Leguizamo and Vince McMahon.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
John and Vince McMahon totally. Oh my god, I'm.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Just watching Spectrum.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Yeah. John's in a new a show that I'm watching
right now and I can't remember the name of it.
I'll think of if I can think of it. At
the end. It's really good and he plays a great
character and it's not over yet. Speaking of that, you
give away all your videos for like, you don't monetize
your videos, do you.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
They're they're they're like, uh, well generate income, they're they're
they're like social media has been paying me money, but
I don't put any ads on them or nothing like that.
They just, uh, they're there for for for the watching
and amazing you.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Just go right. I love when you just go right
there and it turns on and you're not like bombar
with stuff, you know.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
Yeah, and I love making people laugh. Like, there's so
many messages that I've gotten of people that are going
through a bunch of dark stuff, man, and they go
to my videos they leave me long messages. I've gotten
so many messages from people that are going through some
depression and sadness, maybe they lost somebody, and they go
(25:25):
and leave big comments on my page saying like, man,
I'm really thankful that you put this video out there
because it's getting me through some trauma or some dark
times right now. And I'm like that that really that
really makes things worthwhile for me big time.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
That's for sure. I Mean, obviously your message is very
strong in the positivity and lifting people up and everything
that I've read about you.
Speaker 4 (25:47):
You will be right back with more of the Comedy
Saved Me Podcast. Welcome back to the Comedy Saved Me Podcast.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Do you ever use your comedy to address serious topics
and and how do you balance sort of like that
heart and humor when you go out on stage.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
So I I my serious topics that I cover are
like my own upbringing, you know, like uh, like having
my grandpa like passing away. I talk about him like
passing away, but in a it's such a funny, crazy joke,
and I do his voice, uh like super good.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
People freak out with the voice that I do because
he's he was an old Mexican man, so you can
imagine when I get into his voice. Oh yeah, mio
can't take paying a danger. And so when I get
into that voice, people are like, man, and I I go, Uh.
(26:53):
I tell a joke where he's in the hospital and
the doctor tells me, is like, uh, you know, your
grandpa's kind of like really in bad shape. I heard
him blink and I'm like what, and uh, He's like, yeah,
I heard him blink. Like, go talk to your grandpa,
and if you hear him blink, you'll know that he's
like you know, he's he's already towards the end of
(27:14):
his life. And so I do this whole bit about
going in to talk to my grandpa and I hear
him blink. I don't know if you'll be able to
hear it, but I'm gonna try to do it on
the microphone. He goes and I walked in and I'm like, man,
I heard my grandpa blink clear as day and I
and I and he's talking to me, He's like, oh
you me, and man, when.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
I wish people could just see your face right now?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
No, And when people see it on live, man, it's
one of the crowd favorites jokes. And then usually people
like they like how you did, like you kind of
like hold your laughter, and I'll call him out, like, no,
don't you hold your laughter in let it out, let
that laugh out. And I started, I started kind of
like picking on the whole subject. But uh, it's such
it's one of the crowd favorite jokes. And and I
(28:08):
do that little blinking sound every time he's blinking and
people are losing it like it's it's supposed to sound again,
and man, on a microphone, it sounds so like.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
Just moist.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
It's just like, h.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
Yeah, I knew today was the day that I didn't
bring the tissues.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Oh man, that's great.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
Can I just ask you what this feels like right
now when you see me literally with tears rolling down
my face, laughing hysterically.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
I live for that right there, man, I really genuinely, Uh.
I love love, love, love love love doing what I do.
And it feels like a superpower. I bet yeah, it
feels like a super super power. And like, for example,
I just did a show in Albuquerque a few weeks ago,
(29:07):
and there was this lady in the front row wearing
a mask and she was laughing so hard like she
what we in the business we call them shotgun laughs.
Shotgun laugh is like when it looks like somebody took
a shotgun and just blasted somebody in the head and
they throw their head back like And this lady was
(29:28):
letting loose like her whole for the whole hour that
I was on stage, she was laughing like that. And
afterwards she told my friend that opened up for me
that she was battling stage four cancer and that was
the hardest she's ever laughed in her life. And for me, man,
(29:49):
that means the world to me. Like, man, this lady's
going through some stuff. And I've actually taken a college
class on the medical benefits of laughter, and there's a thing, yeah,
and there's laughter therapy, and I want to and I
genuinely feel that. Man's like, she got some real good
medicine that night, like that laughter really really she needed that,
(30:11):
And for me, that's what my life is all about
I have. Even before I go on stage, I always
say a while back, before my son was born, I
had a near death experience where I died for a
few minutes and I got a chance to have an
encounter with the Father in heaven and I feel his love.
And every time I go on stage, I want to
(30:32):
exude that love that he has for us through with
the laughter. So I always say a prayer that the
love of the Father befell through the laughter that we brought,
through the talent that he gave me. And man, when
I go up on stage, I'm just letting him flow
through me in a way that's super powerful. And I
genuinely love what I do. Like it when people see
(30:52):
me on stage, they see somebody that's just passionately having
a good time and living what is purpose is meant
to be. You know.
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Wow? So I mean, would you would you say that
in a way, comedy saved you?
Speaker 2 (31:07):
Oh man, Comedy has saved me, Comedy has saved my.
Comedy has saved my family many times, Like I can't
tell you how many times I've been in a rut
or my mom needed several like a big chunk of money,
like all the taxes are doue or something she needs
like ten thousand dollars, like, mam, I got it. Don't worry.
I'm gonna go do a couple of shows. I'll be back,
give me a weekend, you know, and I'll come and
(31:31):
give my mom a big stack of a big envelope
full of cash. And she's just like, oh, man, like
thank you, son, Like wow. And it feels good to
be the son that that because she had me when
she was real young. She got she she was pregnant
with me when she was sixteen, had me when she
was seventeen, And it feels good to to have her
(31:52):
back like that because she's she's never been the one
to ever tell me like, no, you should go get
a job. You should. She's always men super sort for
supportive of my comedy and and it's and it feels
good that she's had my back, so I of course
I have to help her oute big time.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
Wow, that's it's so inspiring your your I'd say, Raymond
orta medicine. Man.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
My mom wanted me for me to be a doctor.
And uh, and I genuinely you know what. One movie
that I really liked was Patch Adams. Did you ever
see that one?
Speaker 1 (32:25):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (32:25):
Yeah, of course, So Patch Adams was a big time
inspiration to me. Uh. Then I realized like how much
time people have to put in through medical school to
get to become a doctor. I was like, um, like,
is there a way to go around this?
Speaker 1 (32:38):
That's so much fun? We have that in common. Two
things that you said today. So number one, when I
didn't want to go to sleep at night, my brother
and I would do everything we could to make my
mom laugh so that we wouldn't have to go to bed.
She'd have to call my father Mark. The kids won't
stop and we'd been making like farting noises or something
or you know. But that and then Mom thought I
(32:59):
was going to be a doctor. And but then it
was the sight of blood in the cost of medical
school that was.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Real for real, man, Like like this and maybe this
one time my wife was in the hospital and she
was having this procedure done and they they were doing
like an IV line and they missed it and she
started like blood squirting. Man. I almost fainted, And I
was like, man, I'm glad they didn't get into the
medical field because that's the last thing you need. And
(33:26):
I'm a huge guy. I'm like six foot five at
sixty poundy I'm a big dude.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
So I walked out of the room and I just
I'm like looking at the nurses station, like excuse me, ma'am.
And this lady turns around. I was like four foot
ten and she's just like yes. I'm like I think
I'm about to fade, and.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
She's like, please don't fall on me.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Like the mountain of a man just falling over on her.
But luckily they got a chair for me, and I
sat down and gave me some water.
Speaker 1 (33:52):
Thank goodness. Let me ask you a question. You know
you are. You're so you're larger than life in many ways,
and you every time I've ever seen you, you've always had
a huge smile on your face. And it's obvious that
you love what you do and you love helping people
through your comedy to heal in myriad ways. How do
you take care of your own mental health? And does
(34:15):
comedy have you know any role in your self? Care
for yourself?
Speaker 2 (34:20):
My my family will tell you that I'm like the
last person that takes care of himself. I want to
take care of everybody else and and fix everybody's problems
before I take care of mine. I'll just whatever's bugging me,
I'll just eat it, you know. Yeah, I do that
a lot. I kind of like just eat it and
keep on keep on running, you know. Like And but
(34:43):
a lot of a lot of it has come down
to my mental health comes from a good, strong relationship
in the Lord Jesus Christ. And he's he's my savior.
He backs me up every time I go on stage,
every time I'm not on stage. I have a like
sincere relationship with him. I love I love helping people,
(35:05):
I love giving giving to people, and like it's one
of those things where having that foundation with him, I
really don't feel like things can be going bad. And
I never, like my mom says, like, man, the whole
house and the whole world could be burning, and I'm like,
it's fine, you know. I have a real strong mentality
with with with a firm, firm relationship with with our
(35:27):
creator and our father in heaven. And it's just that's
that's what really holds me over. And if there's anybody
that's that's listening to this that is, you know, suffering
from mental health problems or or or or depression, or something.
I really firmly believe that you're listening to this for
a reason, and I really would love for you to
(35:49):
for you to understand that there's a creator in heaven.
He loves you so much. He's created you from nothing,
created you in your mother's womb, Niche molecule by molecule,
so that you so that you can know him and
that he can know you intimately and have an intimate
relationship with you in a way where he's your best friend,
he's your dad, he's your he's he's your everyday companion.
(36:11):
And without him, I'm nothing. And without him, I can't
accomplish anything. I'm a piece of dirt. And uh, I
look at it. I look at myself that way. I'm
I'm a piece of dirt lucky enough to have his
breath of life in me. And that's that's the way
I carry myself every day.
Speaker 1 (36:27):
That's such a beautiful sentiment to share with with people,
and what an amazing way to live your life, just
you know, leave it up to up to a higher power,
like don't don't take any of that onto yourself. My
next question was going to be was there anyone in
comedy that gave you advice on how to you know,
stick it out in a in a business that's not
(36:47):
always very kind.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
Oh man, my, you know what, my my, my, one
of my best friends and uh, he's actually like a
mentor of mine. Was the guy that I worked with
the radio and he does comedy too, but he's he's
been a DJ for man probably like forty forty five years.
Speaker 1 (37:09):
Who is it what radio station where he's down.
Speaker 2 (37:11):
Here in South Texas. He's syndicated also towards Olpaso. His
name is rock and roll James.
Speaker 1 (37:18):
And he's actually seems I've known.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Yeah you ever. He's he's amazing. He's a he's a
real good friend of mine. And he's a lead singer
of a of a kind of like an outlaw country
band called Whiskey Bee.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
And I'm writing that down.
Speaker 2 (37:32):
Yeah, he's extremely talented, extremely talented, and uh, he taught
me so much about the business and not and not
necessarily comedy. He did see to me a lot about comedy,
but just marketing in general. Man, this guy's a marketing
genius and he's so good. Like he's he's he's a
(37:52):
high school dropout, but he's one of the most brilliant
people I've ever met. Like, he's book smart, street smart,
and he's like he knows the stuff man, and he
knows how to market. He'll sell, he'll sell you. He'll
sell you the close off your back and you'll buy
it from him. He's a he's amazing. He's really he's
really top tier talent. And I've never heard that. But
(38:15):
can I steal that one from you? Yeah? For sure,
for sure. And he's a real good friend of mine.
But in comedy, you, like you said earlier, it's not
so kind comedy. All these comedians feel the need that
they they got to keep their secrets to themselves. They gotta,
they gotta. You know, they won't tell you, like who's
booking what, they won't give you, they won't open any
(38:36):
doors for you or nothing like that.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:38):
So I've made a big career on my on my own,
like kind of opening my own doors. You know. I've
done so many shows where I call a venue and
be like, hey man, can I do a comedy show
at your place? Just let me keep the door, And
they're like, well, okay, sure whatever, and they'll they'll uh,
they'll let me keep the door and I'll go over
there set up my own sound system, set up my
(38:59):
own lights, and I got a little spotlight right here
right now.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
I'll go and you have a hairlight, you need a hairlin?
Speaker 2 (39:08):
Yeah, yeah, I got I got it, I got it all.
I got my whole production that I can fit into
the trunk of my car. And man, I'll make a
couple of thousand dollars every night that I go on
stage and call it done. And but nobody taught me
that except that guy, my my buddy rock and roll James,
everybody else in the comedy scene. Like you said, it's
real cut through and super kind of like gatekeeper ish,
(39:33):
And I can say that is a word, uh And
and I'm and I'm not the type of guy that's
going to go over there and kiss people's butts. I
don't like to do that. So I I like to
open my own my own doors and and do my
own thing. And the people that are cool with it,
they're cool. And the people that are not cool, I
don't care.
Speaker 1 (39:51):
That's such a great attitude to have, honestly, and you
have to have that. The entertainment business as a whole
can just be so disruptive to a human's psyche big time.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
Anyone in actually actually like the scene in Hollywood, man,
you know, like that that whole thing about the dress
the dress culture and stuff like that. No, oh you've
never You've never heard about like the dress club.
Speaker 1 (40:11):
No tell me, I'm out of it. I'm I'm out.
Speaker 2 (40:14):
Okay, So this is this is gonna blow your mind
a little bit. So what you know, like dress culture,
the dress club, like you ever like think about it?
And in all the comedy movies that you've seen, how
many male comedians have you seen put on a dress?
Speaker 1 (40:31):
Well? Quite a few actually, Like I'm starting all the
way back at the Three Stooges and going forward and like, yeah,
I mean like Missus dellfire N Williams or Dustin Hoffman
more of an actor than comedian, but still funny.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
Yeah, John Leguizamos one of them. Yeah, Jim Carrey, all
the big time actors, they've all put on dresses. And
it's one of those like rituals that Hollywood does, uh
you oh yeah, And there's some dark stuff in Hollywood
that is real sinister. And I was offered a role
(41:09):
in a movie where they wanted me to put on
a dress, and I'm like, bro, look at me, I'm
a big I'm a big beard. Yeah, Like come on, bro,
I'm from Texas, Like I can't put on a dress.
And they were super adamant they had offered me kind
of like like uh, you know the movie Big Mama's House. Yeah,
so that's that's another one. Martin Lawrence puts on a dress.
(41:32):
And but the the record labels or the studios, they
kind of sign you into a contract where they make
you do these favors like of the sexual nature in
order for you to get these big contracts and big
movie roles.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Yep, and I now, now, now, I can't stop thinking
about all of them. Eddie Murphy like everybody wow.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
And they and they make you do stuff and that
when they put you in address, it's kind of their
way of letting their friends know, like in the other studios,
like hey, I own this person, like I made this
person my own property, you know. And it's the real,
real disgusting, like behind the scenes stuff that goes on
in order for these comedians to get these movie roles.
(42:20):
So I was offered a movie role in a role
that Estay gabrily Less has turned down. And it was
kind of like a spin off of Big Mama's House
called Dia Juana's House and it's it was a role.
When they told me that Gabriel Less has it turned
down kind of threw up some red flags for me.
(42:41):
And I'm like, well, why did you turn it down?
And he's like, oh, just they send me the script
and like check it out. It's it's super funny. You
could You'll be perfect for it. And I started reading
the script and I started and I saw the plot
of the movie was this nephew lives with his aunt Juana,
and she wins the lottery and she he has a
heart attack and dies, but he has to go claim
(43:03):
her her prize dressed as her like so he can
get the money for himself. And I'm like like and
I kind of told him, like, nah, man, I'm not
going to get into a dress. And uh, They're like, oh,
come on and be super funny, and I'm like, nah,
I can't. I can't get in. I can't get into
a dress, man, And they're like, oh, why not, Like
it's going to be super funny. And I told him like, look, dude,
I'm from Texas, Like yeah, I can't get an address.
(43:26):
I'll never win another argument ever. Again. You know, doesn't
matter what I'm saying, like, they'll just put up a
meme of me in a dress and it's like arguments over.
Speaker 1 (43:33):
You know at that time, did you know that's what?
That why they were pushing it you? So you knew
that you were trying to back out respectfully, so you
didn't burn a bridge or hurt your wife.
Speaker 2 (43:42):
I try to try to back out respectfully, but they
were still pushing my buttons like come on, it'll be
super funny, and I'm like, no, I don't. I don't
need to put on a dress to be funny. I'm
super funny by myself, Like trust me, like I'm funny,
and they're like no, come on, come on like you can.
It'd be a great role for you and all stuff.
And I finally just told him like, look, man, I'm
not going to get an address. It goes against my
(44:02):
religious beliefs. And as soon as I said that, man,
it was like waw, like doors closed, everything's like nah.
And they told me, well, you'll never get any work
around here with that kind of closed minded attitude. And
that was the last I ever heard from Hollywood. It
was crazy.
Speaker 1 (44:18):
But did that make you want to be more successful
than ever, just to prove them that you could do
it without them.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
That's what I've been doing ever since that happened. I've
been doing on my own terms, on my own rules,
ever since that happened, and it's it's been the best
decision I've ever made. I mean, granted, they're not trying
to put me on the big screen or anything like that,
but I'm super happy I've been doing theaters i've been.
I'm super humble to the effect I like to say,
(44:48):
I'm humble like Moses.
Speaker 1 (44:51):
I love that.
Speaker 2 (44:52):
Yeah, which is funny because Moses wrote the place where
he where he said that he's the he was the
most humble, but he's like the one writing this is
like really right? Yeah, yeah, well there was there was
no person humbler than Moses. You know, I'm humble like Moses.
Like this weekend, I'm doing somebody's backyard party and there's
probably like twenty thirty people that are going to be there,
(45:13):
and uh but man, if if people are willing to
pay money, just hear me tell jokes. I'm gonna do it.
Like I don't care. I'm not I'm not how you say, like,
I don't like the comedians that are like, Oh, I'm
not going to do this pool hall or I'm not
going to do this bar, this dive bar. Bro put
me up anywhere. I'm gonna crush it. I'm gonna I'm
(45:35):
gonna go out there and dominate and I'm gonna put
on a show. And I was raised in some crazy,
crazy bars like to starting my career. One of the
one of the bars that we used to do comedy
at was called Paradise Roadhouse and it was like a
mad house. Like you you're just seen that movie Pee
(45:56):
Wee's Big Adventure.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
Of course, one of my favorites.
Speaker 2 (46:00):
So you know when he steps into that bar, like uh.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
When he knocks all the motorcycles.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, So that was exactly what that
bar is like. Like when we're doing comedy, it's the
main people at the is the audience where the Bandilo,
motorcycle gang, the cartel, and the local valley gang all
together and none of them want to laugh because they
think laughter is weakness. So like if you can make
(46:29):
them laugh there, man, your jokes will kill anywhere. Wow.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
That sounds like it's like peoria in a bar.
Speaker 3 (46:36):
It was.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
It was so it was so such a hard, hard
place to do comedy. I saw so many veterans of
comedy going there and just tank, just eat a fat
plate of just fat plate of crap, and like it
was humbling for so many people. I was like, man,
and I would go over there and just routinely crush it.
(46:58):
I'm like, man, this is awesome. So anytime I would
go out of town and do like an actual comedy
club where people are there like applight and like ready
to listen, I'm like, oh, this is easy, it's going
to be.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
Have you ever bombed and had to like early on
and had to keep going throughout the whole show? Can?
Has it ever happened?
Speaker 2 (47:16):
Yes? All right, I love this story so much so
you're already laughing because it's so funny now. Because Okay,
from third grade, eight years old, all the way till
I was eighteen, I had never had a bad show.
Okay never. And then so I'm like I'm already doing
like bars and stuff like that. I've been crushing it.
(47:37):
I'm feeling confident, I'm feeling good. I'm like, yeah, man,
kick an ass out here. And I had this guy
that was like acting as my manager, and he goes Bro,
I got you a gig. It's going to be in
front of like two three thousand people, and it's going
to be at a boxing match. And I'm just like,
let's go, bro, I'm gonna crush this. Okay, let's do this.
(47:59):
And he goes all right, man, You're gonna go on
in between fights like like a ring girl with the
with the numbers. Yeah. But yeah, but like like you know,
when when one fight ends, there's like a like probably
ten fifteen minutes of break time before they bring in
another fight. Yeah, I was gonna perform in that time
during during the intermission of the fights, right, So I
(48:22):
go on on the ring and this is the I'm
performing outside in a park, and outdoor comedy is the hardest, okay.
The laughter just goes up into the air and you
can't hear anything. But then this was the first time
that I was performing in a full three sixty like
I had used to be performing, Like the stages is
over here, the audience is over there. But this is
like the first time after performing a circle, which I
(48:44):
was not used to. And then I was using a
wireless microphone outside and this microphone every time a gust
of wind would come by, it would cut off the microphone, right, dude,
Oh my goodness, that's like setup, and then it would
take like three to five seconds to boot back on. Right.
(49:05):
So I'm there like, is this thing blow it in
the microphone? Hello? Okay, well, uh let me let me
finish this joke real quick. Oh It's terrible. It was
so bad, and I'm doing my show in a circle
and every time it seems like I'm gonna say a punchline,
the microphone was cutting off, and I was like, oh no,
and everybody's like like, what's this guy doing, Like we'll
(49:26):
get this. Who is this guy? And man, I'm like
just feeling like so bad, And I will never forget
it because I would. I would do a three sixty
and I'd see I'd come around and this lady would
catch my my my vision because she was sitting in
her own lawn chair in the park and she's wearing
this magenta like man, she looked like Job of the
(49:48):
Hut in a in a magenta tank top with magenta
biker shorts and just like a super white lady, pink
with heat, you know, like a humid, pink, frizzy hot mess,
just just oozing out of this lawn chair that's barely
(50:09):
holding on for dear life, and every time she sees me,
she's making sure to make eye contacted me and just
doing this.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Oh no, you remember that, like vividly you remember.
Speaker 2 (50:22):
I'll never forget it. I'll never forget it because it
was It was one of those things where I'm like,
I had never had a bad show. I had never
had a bad show, and that was the first time
that I had tasted like legit, just a straight up
bomb rejection. Wow. Yeah, yeah, like a straight up rejection.
I got off stage and it was like nobody was
(50:44):
like hey man, Like nobody that was just like look
at me, like what are you doing? Bro? Like, oh,
it's terrible. It was in front of so many people too.
It's like in front of oh man, it was terrible.
Like I really genuinely wanted to quit comedy, like I
wanted to I had never had a bad show. I didn't.
I didn't know how to handle that.
Speaker 1 (51:05):
Like how did you make it to the next show?
What did you have to work with yourself on?
Speaker 2 (51:09):
I have I have such a a hard headed nature,
ask my wife, uh, I asked, I have such a
hard headed nature that I couldn't end on a loss,
Like I had to get that out of my system,
Like I even if it was like, oh, go do
like a bar or like some cheesy open mic or something,
just to get that taste out of my mouth. Yeah,
And and I went to go do like a I
(51:32):
think it was like a club, like a lounge area
or something like that, where I got a chance to
perform and people were like losing, and I was like, nah,
this is still good at this. I'm good at this. Yeah.
But bombing is so funny to me, Like now nowadays,
I haven't bombed in so long, Like it's.
Speaker 1 (51:51):
It's a knock on the wood here, come on now.
Speaker 2 (51:54):
Oh yeah, no, I enjoy I enjoy them because like
all laugh. The last time I bomb was this was
this Christmas party that they hired me for. But this
it wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault though, Like
the the the people that were dou that were putting
on the party. As soon as they gave me the microphone,
(52:15):
they're like, oh, and by the way, the buffet line
is open. Everybody can get up and get their food.
And everybody just got out there. And I'm just like
like just left me there by myself. So I kind
of started like crapping on my own, like, well, this
is where my career comes to die, people like, you know,
just making fun of yourself, just making fun of myself.
So now I've learned how to like bounce it, uh
(52:35):
bounce it off and and and uh kind of make
fun of myself in the process where I'm still having
fun with it, you know. And I know that you
learn a lot more from bombing than you do from
doing good. So I've learned so much from from uh
from the bad sets that I really trained myself that
I'm never like I can handle almost every single situation
(52:57):
that has been thrown my way because I've I've done
so many shows you know where this is gonna happen
and this you know, this is what you got to do.
But like that that Christmas party that I did, I'm like, hey,
you hired me for an hour. I'm gonna do an hour.
Speaker 1 (53:10):
You're gonna get me, whether you like it or not.
Speaker 2 (53:13):
Yeah, that's you're gonna get These jokes, man, I'm gonna
I'm gonna keep slinging them, and even though nobody's listening,
I'm gonna keep slinging them and then I'll be like,
have you ever seen that movie Balls of Fury?
Speaker 1 (53:23):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (53:23):
Of course, So so I was like, I feel like
that guy, what he is, what he's like that daytime?
Casiit is that allay.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
Very much? Wow, I swear Raymond, you must be probably
one Romeo Vaughn, by the way, he was on my
other podcast, Music Saved Me, which we asked talked about
up front, he did you such justice. But now that
I'm getting a chance to talk to you and people
are getting a chance to hear you, I would have
to say that most everyone listening right now would agree
(53:55):
that you are probably one of the happiest human beings
on the planet that I've I've met.
Speaker 2 (54:00):
I love I love being so I love being a
positive like a positive force man, And like uh, Jesus said,
let your light shine before people so that they can
see the light shining within you. And I'm that person.
Like I love to man, anytime somebody's going through something,
(54:21):
I love to bring them up. And I love like, hey, man,
like you know, let's let's think of a way to
solve your problem. Let's think of a way to like
like overcome this. We could do this, you know, and
I I sometimes to a fault, might believe in people
more than they believe in themselves. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (54:37):
Oh, I definitely know what you're saying. You are. You
are a cheerleader, a fellow cheerleader for people who you
just want to see people succeed in life. That's your payback. Yeah,
which is pretty amazing. Wow, I got so lost in everything.
I almost lost my last question for you. I don't
know where it went. Oh, here we go to how
(54:58):
would you like your comedy to impact people and the
legacy that you hope to leave.
Speaker 2 (55:04):
Man, my fans that have seen me, they'll tell you
that that, Like, Man, they're they're they're hardcore fans. And
that's That's one of the reasons that I'm like super successful,
is that the fans that have seen me know that
you'll never You'll never see the same show twice. I'm
not a scripted robot. I'm not a person that you're
(55:26):
going to be like, oh I heard the same jokes.
I have like nine hours of material that I've written
so far, and like, I love coming up with stuff
on the fly as well, So you're never gonna see
the same show twice. So anybody that has as far
as like, what do I want my comedy to be
known as. I wanted to be known as a person
that goes on stage and genuinely gives like everything that
(55:51):
they got into what they love to do, and and
passionately pours into the people that are there. It doesn't
matter if there's two people in the crowd or two
thousand people or twenty thousand people. I'm going to give
you one hundred percent of who I am and enjoy myself.
I love to have fun on stage. I love to
(56:11):
be happy on stage because being I look at it
this way, people are going to these shows, you never
know who's in the crowd. You never know what kind
of problems they're going through. And I have this one
story of this guy that texted me one time for
Father's Day, and rather intense story. He texted me for
(56:34):
Father's Day. Hey, and I don't know how he got
how he got my number, but he just I got
a text for Father's Day and he said, hey, happy
Father's Day. You don't know who I am, but I
was at your show last night and for Father's Day,
I was thinking about ending my life because my wife
left me, she took my kids, and I wanted to
(56:56):
end my life on Father's Day so that every time
Father's Day rolls around they would remember me and be
like super hurt by it. And I was doing a
Father's Day show on the Saturday before before Father's Day,
and this guy just happened to walk in to the
show and he was walking I was performing at a
place kind of like a are you familiar with, like
(57:18):
Sixth Street in Austin, where there's like bars next to
each other, like like a long strip of bars and
clubs next to each other, and there's like a little
mini theater where I was performing at. Well, this guy
was just going from bar to bar, drinking himself to
the point where he was gonna end his life at
the end of the night. Well, he walked by the
theater that I was performing at, and he heard laughter
(57:40):
coming in from inside, and he walked in. This was
already like in the middle of the show, so there
was nobody even at the door to charge him or nothing.
He just walked in, heard the show, and had such
a great time that it changed his whole outlook on life.
And he texted me, this is like man like today
I'm alive because of the show that you put on
(58:00):
last night and I and I came to pick up
my kids to spend time with them instead of instead
of having ended my life. Yes last night, and I
just wanted to say Happy Father's Day to you, uh,
because because of you, I got to be a father
to my kids to day. Like right, you want to
talk about like making my day like like so amazing. Uh,
(58:22):
that's the kind of stuff that like any comedian lives for,
and any comedian worth their salt wants those kinds of
interactions with the people, not necessarily their fans. They did
the guy didn't even pay for the show, But I
just wanted, like to impact people on that level. Or man,
you say you're saving people's lives with jokes, like, that's
(58:43):
amazing stuff for me that that, for me is is
what I was made for right there.
Speaker 1 (58:47):
I don't think it gets any better than that, to
be honest, real, I mean, really, if you can do that,
then wow, the rest of life seems easy when when
you when you hear stories like that. And by the way,
your light is shine so bright. I need to put
on some sunglasses. Thank you so much, Raymond Orta for
sharing your incredible journey with us, and to all our listeners,
(59:10):
thank you for checking the show out. And to Romeo Vaughn,
thank you for introducing us to this wonderful ray of
sunshine that I hope we get to keep in touch with.
Thanks for coming on comedy. Save me Raymond, and keep
spreading your love and doing what you're doing because you're amazing.
Speaker 2 (59:25):
Hey, I appreciate you having me. And if I may
be so bold, may the Lord bless you, May he
keep you, May shine his face on you, and be
gracious to you. And may the blood of Jesus cover
us all. Oh, bless you guys. Thank you so much,
Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (59:35):
Oh one more thing, where can people find you online
to see your amazing comedy?
Speaker 2 (59:39):
Yeah, at Raymond is funny across all social media platforms.
At Raymond is funny pretty much everything. Facebook dot com
slash Raymond is funny, Instagram dot com slash Raymond is funny,
YouTube dot com slash Raymond is funny. The only one
that's different is TikTok because my Raymond is Funny page
got banned. Oh but I got Raymond out of the comedy.
Speaker 1 (59:59):
On TikTok and Raymond is fun.
Speaker 2 (01:00:01):
My TikTok's My TikTok's been blowing up lately, so that's good.
Speaker 1 (01:00:04):
All right, Well, go go, Raymond, go do your thing.
I didn't mean to keep you so long. You have
to go out.
Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
I appreciate, I appreciate the interview, and thank you so much.
You guys were lovely and I look forward to meeting
you guys at Romeo. Talked to some real good, real
good vibes about you guys.
Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
Oh my gosh, right back and let us know when
you're in our area, please,
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