Inside Soft White Underbelly with Mark Laita

On this episode, we sit down with Mark Laita, creator of Soft White Underbelly, to explore the stories behind his powerful portraits and interviews. Mark shares his journey from advertising photographer to documenting the lives of people on society’s margins, revealing the humanity in addiction, poverty, and trauma. We discuss the challenges, ethics, and impact of his work, and the importance of service, kindness, and truth in storytelling.

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Instagram: @Seanovenice

Website: https://www.shellvenice.com/

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm really fascinated with people's tendency to self destruct, right,

(00:03):
self sabotage. I'm just fascinated by that, and we all
seem to do it in one way or another.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
I'm Sino, Welcome back to the Sino Show. And I
believe the ultimate drug a choice is service and kindness.
My guest tonight has been serving in a different way
by witnessing. He sits people down on a simple stool,
no bells, no makeup, no spin, and he gives him
something the world rarely does, time, attention, and respect. Soft

(00:34):
White Underbelly is not a show, It's a mirror. It
asks us to see addiction, poverty, trafficking, mental health not
as headlines, but as human beings with names. Mark Lake
to thank you, brother for making space for stories that
save lives. Let's talk about the craft, the care, and
the cost. I'm telling the truth, brother.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Cool. Let's do it. Yeah, let's do it well.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
First off, I love you man, You're a special cat.
And if I understand you, you don't like to be
on this other side.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
No, I don't you do one a year? I told
you know, I do one of these a year, And
I'm okay, and I actually did one like beginning of
the year, like January. So here we are end of
the year. So I'm doing two technically this year, but
just not your thing. I just liked you guys, you
and Max Lucaver. This is not my thing. I figured
one one interview a year will get in the.

Speaker 2 (01:23):
You making the cut. Sure we start in Chicago, Stern dad, angel.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
Of a mom exactly. Yeah, you did some homework. I
did my homework. Brother. Yeah, my mom. My mom is
who really kind of molded me and saved me. But
my dad did a big thing too. My dad was great,
you know, giving this childhood that he came from. You
have to consider that because we don't consider those kind
of factors in somebody's makeup. It's like, he made you tough.

(01:48):
What's that he made you tough? Yeah, he made he
made you a man. Right, Having a dad like mine
turns you into a man. There's no you have no
other option, right. So I appreciate all the things my
dad did for him. But I am definitely my mom's kid.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
We want to talk more about your mom because she
plays a big part of the story.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
Fourteen.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
You got a camera in your hand.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
That's right. I asked my dad if I could. I
was always into art. I was always drawing and sketching
and doing all kinds of stuff like that. And then
at fourteen I found I saw my dad had a
camera and in one of the drawers under the stereo,
and I'm like, hey, can I borrow this? And he goes, yeah, sure,
And I fell in love with it instantly because photography

(02:28):
was this hybrid of art and science. Like a photograph
of you at this point is who you were at
this you know, in twenty twenty five, in November of
twenty twenty five, That's who you were, That's what you
look like, That's what you were wearing that day. So
it's a scientific document. But then you can also light
it in a way and shoot from a certain angle

(02:48):
and get you to express yourself in a way that
becomes more artistic. So I love that mix of science
and art. Mark is this right?

Speaker 2 (02:55):
Even at a young age, you were like fascinated with
the Drunks kind of that kind of character in Chicago.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
Yeah, because I grew up in a you know, solid,
you know, two parent household, and I had a sister.
You know, we were a tight little family. Everything was
cool and I was just fascinated with these guys that
lived this such a different life, living on the street,
drinking a you know, a bottle of liquor out of
a paper bag, and just sleep on a park bench
in the cold, right in the cold, in the cold.

(03:23):
It was crazy, and I just was fascinated by that
as a as a young teenager.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
Tell us a little fourteen at twenty six, any any
highlights you want to share.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
I always wanted to be a tennis player, but I
just didn't you know, it didn't start at four years
old like Andrea Agussy and a lot of others did.
So I just didn't have that background. I wanted to
be a tennis player. That's what I really would have chosen. Wow,
other than being a rock star, you either want to
be an Evan Haling, and to me, I wanted to
be Yvon Lendel. But but it was, uh, that's great.
The truth was I would come home after losing the

(03:54):
first round of every tournament, going, thank god, I'm good
at something else. I'd say that every single time tournament
and and and what that what that was was art
or photography? Oh that was that was your It just
came to me it's just it's like natural, like I
don't I don't have to try in order to create
beautiful photography. It's it just flows out of you. Yeah,
well I have to think about it.

Speaker 2 (04:15):
It's just soles to saund photograph because I love photography.
Was who are your biggest influences?

Speaker 1 (04:21):
Yeah, I'll say people like Irving Penn and Richard Avedon,
which is what every photographer of my generation would say.
But really, Dennis Monarchy. Dennis Monarchy was a photographer in
Chicago who shot advertising, but he also did a lot
of personal work, and I kind of molded my career
after that, whereas my personal work was as important, or
even more important, perhaps than my advertising work. But the

(04:41):
advertising work pays the bills. Photography has changed so much
now it's it's tragic how it's no longer what it was.
Photography used to be a photograph of whatever, of this building,
of view of the beach or whatever is a document
of what that is. Now it's like everything's manipulated and
retouched and it's just But I actually.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
Filled your show, buddy, and the portraits you take are
a great extension of all the people you mentioned though.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
Yeah, we'll see what I'm trying to do. Like, because
I worked in advertising, it became more just modified and
manipulated and retouched and perfected. I got sick of the
slickness of it all. Everything was so perfected and beautiful, beautified,
and everything was better than life. Right, whatever you're shooting,

(05:25):
a person or a product or whatever, car, everything just
looked so magnificently beautiful. And if you do that for
your entire that's your existence is creating that. It just
eventually you get sick of it at some point and
you just want something real and honest, right and raw.
And that's where this kind of came from self when
underbally came from just a reaction to that slickness of advertising.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
But one of the things I admire about you, man,
it is your tenacity. Yeah, and you just it's really something.
But I don't give you, know, you just all of
a sudden did become like this successful photigraph you came
out here. If I remember the story correctly, it was
not easy. A girl like broke your heart. You were
in despair, and your sister gave you some some savvy advice.

Speaker 1 (06:07):
My sister, who's probably one like the smartest person I know,
super bright woman and five years older than me. I
was just I was just heartbroken over my first love
and it fell apart and I just couldn't even get
off the bed and I was just crushed. Twenty six
years old, twenty seven And I remember my sister just saying,
you know, and I had long hair, long blonde hair,

(06:29):
and it was like, I was just I looked like
a beach bump, even though I was a kid from Chicago,
had nothing to do with the beach. But I didn't
look like a professional anything. I looked like a venice,
a beach bump maybe. And my sister said, you know, I
was talking with her on the phone and she said,
there's something really attractive about a successful man. And to
hear that from a woman that you really respect, which

(06:50):
was my sister, it really just hit me hard. Well,
of course, how the fuck am I going to become
successful with hair down to my ass and dressed in
jeans with holes in them, and like, I just don't
look like a professional anything. And I cut off my
hair probably to about a length like it is now,
or maybe even shorter. And I started wearing like suits,

(07:11):
probably not ties too often, but suits, which for LA
was probably like a lot of art directors and a
lot of people in the advertising industry would be like,
what the fuck is why is this kid dressed like this?
But I just didn't give a shit. I'm a nonconformist
and I always do things like if everybody's doing something,
I always kind of do the opposite.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
And you got some small, little campaigns right in the beginning.

Speaker 1 (07:33):
Yeah, I guess a few small ones. But the first
thing that really helped me was I got this Pepsi
regional Pepsi work from Tracy Locke, and that really kind
of helped me open some doors. The thing with advertising, probably,
I think the thing with a lot of things, whether
it's even social media or anything. The more successful you are,
the more successful you are. The more successful you are,
the more successful you are, meaning like, the more you work,

(07:55):
the more you work. Like an advertising because I was
doing all this Pepsi work talk and somebody was talking
to their friend who works at another agency, who you
guys been shooting with? Oh, we shoot with Mark lady
he's doing And then I'd get work from that other guy,
and then and then it just spread like wildfire, and
then eventually I started winning some awards and things like that,
and then it just blew up.

Speaker 2 (08:14):
And then he did some of those iconic Apple ads.

Speaker 1 (08:16):
Which, yeah, I started doing Apple. And when Steve Jobs
came back to Apple, right when he came back, I
started doing all the Apple work. And that lasted for
at least ten years, right, and pretty much not pretty
much everything they shot from about ninety nine until almost
everything they shot from ninety nine until twenty ten, Right,

(08:36):
I did Top of the Game. And then then the
fact that you're shooting Apple, Yeah, opens it's just you
don't have to open doors. People just fly out from
all over and just say we want you to shoot
with us.

Speaker 2 (08:46):
And you were how much that you were just all
the time jamming around?

Speaker 1 (08:48):
Yeah, it was awesome. And then it was everything I
wanted that that was my dream is to be successful at advertising,
and you were. Yeah. I became like the top of
the he I became like the top of the King
of the Hill. Yeah. Yeah, it was awesome.

Speaker 2 (09:01):
And then a lot of things changed. The market change
in the mother past, you got a divorce, Yeah, the
industry changed.

Speaker 1 (09:07):
Industry change, right. I no longer had this you know,
stronghold on advertising work because digital media and the internet
and just technology, Internet, digital photography. It just turned everything
on its head and they no longer needed the most
expensive photographer or the best photographer in the world. They
just need somebody who's good enough to because it's just

(09:27):
gonna be on a website. People are going to look
at it on their phones. It's going to be this big.
It really doesn't matter anymore. The quality was not just
you know what everyone was looking for, and you burnt out, right,
I was also burnt.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
Out to burn out, but I mean the passing your mom,
you going through divorce, right, yep, yeah, And you always
had the studio downtown though, right.

Speaker 1 (09:46):
I didn't always have it, but for a lot of
the time when I was doing advertising, I had a
studio here in Culver City on Main Street and Culver City,
and I would sneak away, like on a slow day,
I would just go to my I had a studio
down a skid Row, which was crazy, just right crazy
that anyone would even do this. And I had a
studio right in the heart of skid Row and all
these drug addicts, gang members, prostitutes, transgender everything, homeless, derell acts,

(10:11):
every every back. Then, what was the attraction? What was
it the same thing as the uh, the drunks in Chicago.
I just find these lifestyles fascinating. You know. I've never
I've never done drugs, I never smoke poppet, I've never
done anything right, you know, I'm a square that way.
So to me, it's like, if the fact that you're

(10:31):
going to do this and let it, let it unravel
your life, which is what it seems to do almost
one percent of the time, not always, you know. I
see people that do certain drugs and they can remain functional,
but you're running a risk, you know, of things getting
out of control real fast, real fast. I'm really fascinated
with people's tendency to self destruct, right, self sabotage. I'm

(10:55):
just fascinated by that. And we all seem to do
it in one way or another.

Speaker 2 (10:58):
And so you know that faster you're this very tall
white boy, yeah, in one of the most dangerous parts
of the world, a little naive. It helps being six
to four, but it's just rough and tumble down there,
and it's you know, and somehow you figure out give
this guy a few bucks he points in the right direction.

Speaker 1 (11:18):
People don't people don't understand about what I do and
I never really want to talk about it because I
didn't want people to just like, oh, well, let me
do what he did and here's the formula to do it.
But now that I've been doing it so long and
it's like I'm pretty established, I'm probably going to be
more open about how I did it. I spent Jesus,
I don't even know I had. I didn't add it up,
but it had to be close to at least two

(11:40):
or three million dollars on creating that network of people
that I know and knew and currently still know by
giving out money to this person, that person, this neighborhood
and just kind of laying down the ground, just the
network of people that liked me or they didn't like

(12:00):
me for real reasons. They liked me because I was
a money, you know, an ATM machine to a lot
of them. But what they did because I knew, I
knew what I was trying to do, it opened up.
It created this thing where people are just gonna they
know what I want. I'm not looking for sex from
the girls. I'm not looking for drugs from the dealers.
I'm not looking for All I'm looking for are interesting
people to interview.

Speaker 2 (12:21):
How did you decide, Okay, what's the right amount to give?
This guy is gonna.

Speaker 1 (12:26):
Paying Finder's fees. Finders to the people who brings me Monique, right,
and I'm paying Monique, and sometimes they have to pay
Monique's pimp. And then very often, after Monique has done
her interview, she calls me up three weeks later and said,
you know, COVID's going on and my kids are and
she has some excuse why she needs money. Probably that
money is for crack or for crystal meth or whatever

(12:46):
a drug is, or maybe it's for who knows what.
But sometimes I'll give it to them because I know
that greases the whole up the wheels and keeps everything flowing.
And to this day it's still I still get calls
every day from people like, hey, I got somebody you like,
and all of a sudden, send me a video, let
me talk to them on the phone, or send me
some photos at least, and then and then I'll see
if I'm interested. So when did it? And every day

(13:07):
there's just I get a thousand people right when I
pick out the gems. It's really just curating, that's trusting. Yeah, approach,
I've been approached by tens of thousands of But I've
interviewed ten thousand people roughly and I've only used about
twenty five hundred. That's amazing. So I'm curating. I'm taking
from all these interviews. I'll pick the best ones, but

(13:29):
walk the audience marked through winning. But I have to
pay everybody, right, like everybody, I mean. And now it's
changed because now my channel's gotten so big that people
will come to me and they don't They're not coming
out for money, They're coming out for the exposure that
a YouTube and a Facebook. I guess like seven million
on Facebook. I got six point seven million on YouTube.
So that alone, that that gets you some cachet. And sure,

(13:53):
that's that's a commodity now in our in our new culture,
very popular show. Yeah, so people like that. People want
to just be on the show. Why do people trust you?
I don't know, but I've always had this, I think.
You know, I was doing portraits in New York once
with my assistant Axel, and we were I was shooting
all kinds of people, just kind of like what I'm
doing now, but in New York it was it was

(14:13):
a wider mix. You know, people that have a respectful jobs, bankers,
all kinds of people as well as homeless people and
everything in the middle. I was there for a week
or so and just shooting all kinds of people on
the street. And you know, in Manhattan there's all these
really beautiful women. Some of them are models with Ford Wilhelmina,
Elite whatever, and they're beautiful women. And I would photograph
all kinds of people, but there really beautiful, really attractive

(14:34):
women would come up to the sixth floor where the
studio was with these two guys. What the like, no
woman should do that, but they would do it. They
would all say yes, and Axel and I were like
saying news, Like why are they saying yes? You think
they would just say no, thank you and walk away.
But they come up and I think what it is?

(14:54):
This is what I don't know for sure, but I
think what it is is I believe in what I'm doing.
I know I'm not there to uh get their phone number,
get or get anything from them. All they want to
do is photograph them. And now I'm doing interviews. But
it's the same thing. And they can sense that there's
nothing like the fact that I'm so open about it
and just like I come right up to them and say,
here's what I'm doing. Would you be would you be

(15:16):
interested in doing this? Right? Then they can trust me.

Speaker 2 (15:20):
People are in skid row. No one's paying attention to them.
You're paying attention to them. Yeah, and that's a big deal.

Speaker 1 (15:27):
Whether I'm interviewing the Queen of England or the president,
or a crack addict or a gang member, I'm gonna
treat them all exactly the same, exactly the same. Yeah,
that's true, no one, no one gets better treatment than
the other. Yeah. I treat everybody exactly the same. And
is that from your mom? That's from my mom.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
One of my favorite photographs of yours is of the
Hell's Angels. They're fucking incredible. But to get those you
drive out there. If I got the story right, you'll
correct me, right, you just fucking knock out the door.

Speaker 1 (15:56):
Yeah, you know that's that's that's something you can't arrange
in advance. No, I can't call up the Hell's Angels. Hey,
I like to photograph you guys next Thursday.

Speaker 2 (16:03):
Well that wasn't where you could pay somebody to get
There was no entry point.

Speaker 1 (16:05):
No, there's no nothing. All I can do is just
the fuck out. Go up there. Knock on the door,
nine thirty in the morning. I think it was I
knock on the door. There's a there was a buzzer,
and takes a long time, but somebody comes down. He
opens the door and there's just junkyard dog of a biker,
just mean as fuck. And he looks at me, what
the fuck do you want? And I'm trying to explain

(16:28):
to him, like get the fuck out of here, and
just shuts that, slams the door in my face. I'm
all right, that's that's not the way it's supposed to go.
But I'm really good at these situations. I wasn't always.
When I first started doing Crate Equal, which is the
first project that was really the That's that's how Soft
and Underbelly started. My first book, Create Equal, which came
out in twenty ten. Please do a reprint of that? Yeah,
I think s title is fucking good. Title's going to

(16:49):
do a reprint, are they? Yeah? They are? Oh man,
that's what I heard. Yeah, I'm really proud of that book.
But when I first started Create Equal, the first fuck
the first I mean, you get better at doing anything,
whether it's public speaking or playing tennis or whatever. You
get better after time. But I like, I'm very shy,
so I don't like being on camera. I don't like

(17:09):
being in I don't like being forced to do anything
other than just leave me alone. So this project forced
me to go up to strangers. I remember the first
trip I took was in Vegas, and I'm going up
to somebody in the casino. There was a character that
I saw that looked interesting. I said, hey, let me,
let me just ask him if he'd let me photograph him.
And you were terrified. Terrified. Oh man, that was so

(17:31):
hard for me because I'm bothering this guy. He's having
a good time, he's gambling, he's doing his thing, he's
with his wife. I wanted to photograph him and drag
him up to my hotel room where I had I
had a suite. I had a little studio set up
in the suite, and I dragged him up there and
I photographed him. He's like, God, that was such an imposition.
I felt like such an imposition on him, and I

(17:51):
hated doing that to him. But I said, you know,
if if I'm gonna ever do this, I'm gonna have
to just get over this and I kept trying, kept trying,
kept trying, and then by the time I did The
Hell's Angels, which is much later in that project, it
was a ten year project, I could walk up to
their door, just knock on it, get totally rejected, just
get the fuck out of here. I went across the
street after they slammed the door on me. There's a

(18:12):
Mecchan restaurant serving breakfast. I guess the same day. That's
just an hour, like twenty minutes later, the place opened
up and I got breakfast for a bunch of guys.
I don't know how many there were. I come back,
I knock on the door again. He opens the door again.
I said, look, I brought you guys breakfast and you
love that. And that opened the door that got me
in there. They started eating and we talked and I

(18:33):
told them what I wanted to do, and they like, really,
all I'm doing is honoring people, exactly. It's all I'm doing.
I'm just here to honor you. I'm not here to
make fun of you. I'm not here to do anything negative.
And I think they people can sense that.

Speaker 2 (18:46):
But this is what I love about you, man, this
is what what made you think Okay, these guys just
told me to fuck off. I'm gonna go across the
street and get some breakfast and come back.

Speaker 1 (18:57):
Where. How did that happen for you? It's a belief
in what you're doing. Okay, talk more about that, because
I think I think one of the most important things
an artist, or anybody, a lawyer, a cook, anything, a parent,
anything needs is to believe in what you're doing. Because
I'm not. I don't know that I'm a better photographer
than anybody else, But because I believe in what I'm doing,

(19:19):
I'm willing to give give it my all and more.
And even if you fail, you're going to just bounce
right back and try again because I believe in what
I'm doing. So if I believe in what I'm doing,
I'll be persistent as a motherfucker. Right, yeah, right, and
I'll just keep trying until I succeed. Succeed I want to, yeah, man,
so much. I want you. Take two artists. One is

(19:41):
somebody who really believes in this self, and another one
is somebody who doesn't know that they're good enough or
don't have the confidence in themselves. I can tell you
which one's going to succeeds.

Speaker 2 (19:50):
I think that's a great story because you start out
being terrified asking a guy in a casino, and you
work your way up and you went against your fear.
Now you're knocking on the doors of the elsa angels.

Speaker 1 (19:57):
No, that's the key. That is the key, probably the.

Speaker 2 (19:59):
Most famou one if you've ever done, is the people
naplationis right.

Speaker 1 (20:04):
Of the video type shot. Yeah, the Whittaker family, the
family in odd West Virginia, once again asking for a
police officer hipsheet of this family. Right, Yeah, I met
him in a Can you tell that story? Then?

Speaker 2 (20:15):
I want to tell something of what I think is
so value of Yes.

Speaker 1 (20:17):
So again, Axel, and I'm i assistant. We were in uh,
western West Virginia, super redneck, super backwoods hillbilly is as
as can be. You won't find the country, though beautiful,
one of the most beautiful parts of the US. Eastern
Kentucky and western western Virginia are some of the most
beautiful spots in the US. But you want to see hillbilly's,

(20:39):
that's that's the place to go. Better than Alabama, better
than anywhere. It's thick there and we're just driving around
hoping to make some connection look for something, and we're
at a truck stop in this or gas station, I
can't remember. It was a gas station and there was
a cop inside, and you know, I know cops know

(20:59):
the area much better on some city slicker from LA
or Chicago. So I just I approached him, told him
what I'm doing. He goes, oh, yeah, I could show
you some really great people. I'm like, that would be great.
I figured he's working all day. He's, well, I get
off at three o'clock. Maybe me here at three o'clock
and we'll I'll show you some stuff that'll that'll blow
you away. So we waste a few hours and we

(21:22):
meet him there at three o'clock. Make a long story short.
He took us to the whitakers eventually, and he goes,
you've got a video camera. I go, no, I don't
have a video camera. And he got really pissed that
we didn't have video camera. This is just photographer. Is
when I was doing Create Equal, which is only photography,
no video. He was really bummed out that I didn't
have video. And we go there. We're going down this

(21:43):
dirt road, just winding through the woods, and we come
around this bend and there's these two shacks. They look
like like dilapidated shacks, and there's people just rummaging around
like wild dogs. And they're all like their eyes are
going off and differ in directions. No one's got any teeth.

Speaker 2 (22:02):
One guy's actually making dog sounds.

Speaker 1 (22:04):
Yeah, one guy's barking. He's barking. Yeah, one's barking. You
can't distinguish the dog from it. And if and if
you talk to him, he would just run off or
not not him, Uh yeah, yeah, yeah, no, that was Ray.
You talk to him, he would just go running off
and go kick a metal garbage can and his pants
would fall around the ankles as he ran away. His
pants would fall to his ankles and he'd be shuffling

(22:24):
off to go kick a garbage can. And that that
was how we interacted. It was so hard to photograph though,
right there was just so wild. They were like like
getting three dogs to like, you know, there were three
brothers and or there's Timmy and Ray and Freddy. I
was just trying to get them to stay, all three
of them standing next to each other for a photograph.
It took me hours to do.

Speaker 2 (22:45):
What's what's the walk me through? You get out of
the car and you see them. What's going through your mind?
Because physically it's it's such a something people have not seen.
I've never seen anything like that.

Speaker 1 (22:53):
No, I've never seen anything like that either. What's going
through your mind? Man, that this is exactly what I
was looking for. This is it right? This is this
is the you're like, this is a shop.

Speaker 2 (23:01):
But also like, how do I approach these people?

Speaker 1 (23:03):
Yeah? So I'm good at that. And there was one
I think it was a relative who's spoken, you know,
he could speak, could communicate, and I told him what
I'm looking to do, and he said he's going to
try to help me communicate with everybody. And then I
went to the house across the road where there were
some people sitting inside. I go to the door and
told them what's going on, what I'd like to do,

(23:26):
and they said, sorry, we're not He just interrupted me.
It was Larry at the time, and he goes, sorry,
we're not interested. We had a death in the family.
We're mourning. No, thank you. And so after that happens,
I can't really I can't really push it. But I
took some time thought about it, and I said, hey,
let me you know, because I was shooting eight by
ten film was a big eight by ten camera, but
I also had an eight by ten polaroid, so I'm

(23:47):
shooting eight by ten polaroids, which which her instant, so
I can get an eight by ten print instantly. And
I said, hey, let me take a picture of the
guy who I was communicating with. I did that, had
a print of him, a really nice print. Went back
to Larry and his daughter and I think his sister.
They were in the house, and I said, look, I'm

(24:08):
sorry about the death, but if you'd like, I could
shoot the photograph the family and give you guys a
print like this that you could include in the casket
of your I think it was an ant or somebody
who passed away. And they kind of like that idea,
and they said, okay, if everyone wants to do that,
then we could do that. That sounds nice. So that's
how I was able to photograph everyone.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
Wow, once again, getting breakfast for the Hell's Angels.

Speaker 1 (24:32):
Yeah, on your feet. It was it was thinking fast. Yeah,
you gotta think fast. I'm good at that. You have
small windows. Well that's what you learned with age, Like
I couldn't have done this in my twenties or even
maybe thirties. I don't know, but as you get older,
you develop the confidence in knowing that I can handle
whatever comes my way. Don't know what's going to come,

(24:53):
have no idea what's coming around the corner, but whatever
it is, I'll be able to figure it out really quickly.

Speaker 2 (24:59):
Well, thirty three thirty four million people have viewed that episode.

Speaker 1 (25:02):
Well that that was something I shot like later, because
you came back right eighteen years later and I shot
that video right. What I just described was the photo
shoot I did.

Speaker 2 (25:10):
For the Credo shoot. Then I gotcha, got gotcha?

Speaker 1 (25:13):
Gotcha? So when I came back to shoot that video,
they already knew me, and it was they were uncomfortable
with me, they trusted me.

Speaker 2 (25:18):
So how did the show develop?

Speaker 1 (25:21):
So time we talked about this earlier, advertising kind of
imploded and I just got out and I was just
going to kind of like retire. I guess I don't
know what I'm going to do. I'm not going to
do advertising. I've never done anything else. It's all I've
done since I was a teenager. So I didn't know
what how I'd spend my time or make money or
do anything like do anything. I just figured I'd become
like sell real estate, like not sell real estate, but

(25:41):
like you know, sell my sell some buy some real
estate and make money and do it that do that.
I didn't know what I would be doing. I decided, like,
you know, that doesn't occupy enough of my time, like
I stay busy. So I decided when I was doing
those portraits that I described when I was doing when
I had my advertising studio, I had a studio and
skid Row, and I was doing these portraits down there,
and I started doing interviews at some point, but I

(26:04):
never did anything with them. So here it is. Whatever.
Nine years later, I'm out of advertising, and I just decided, like,
let me just start doing that again. I'll get another
studio down on skid Row, which I did, and I
started just photographing people and doing these video interviews, and
I started posting them on YouTube because that's the only
place you could post a video at the time.

Speaker 2 (26:25):
And just to put them on just to show people
your art.

Speaker 1 (26:27):
I swear, I swear I didn't think more than ten
or fifteen people are going to watch this shit because
it's so dark and so weird and different. I knew
it wasn't going to be a big hit, I guaranteed.
I knew that, and I started posting them and they
started taking off. They started growing quickly, and within a
year I had a million subscribers. Within a year with it, actually,

(26:50):
I think it was within like eight months, I had
a million subscribers. Wow, I think it was like December
or January. I had a million. And I started in
April of the previous year. And that was even before
the Wittakers. That was that was years before the Witakers.

Speaker 2 (27:04):
What's your head like during that time? Were you happy?
Were you lonely?

Speaker 1 (27:08):
Were you when I'm creating? I'm happy? When are You're not?
Simple as that? When are you're not happy when I'm
When I stopped creating.

Speaker 2 (27:15):
That's why I got to say, is that why you
stay on the move all the time?

Speaker 1 (27:18):
Yeah, And that's why that's why I ended up getting
a divorced because I had stopped creating for a while
after creat Equals came out, I was just thinking that
was going to bust my career wide open, and it
kind of didn't, you know, the uh what happened? I
think the banks all folded and we went through the
banking crisis, and uh, the book came out and nothing
really happened. It's out of print now and you can
get a copy for a few thousand, but at the

(27:40):
time it really became a kind of a flop in
my in my view, so that was hard for me.

Speaker 2 (27:46):
I'm going to talk about some of the interviews, but
I wanted to ask you this A question I wrote
is how do you gauge capacity and consent when someone
is intoxicated, disassociated, or an acute crisis.

Speaker 1 (27:58):
Ethically, it's probably not a hundred percent what you know.
A lawyer would probably say, they don't you're not getting
their full of consent. But when they sober up, which is,
you know, the next day or three days later, whatever
they if anybody asked me to take it down, I
always take it down. But the truth is they are
looking for the money, and I give them money for
these interviews, and my motive for these is not to

(28:19):
take advantage of people or exploit them. My goal is
to show people how bad things are and what's really
going on and why these things are happening, which is
why I ask the questions I do, which is, what
was your family like growing up? What were you going
through as a kid, you know what kind of crap
did you have to deal with as a kid. So
that I think is educating the world. Like I used

(28:40):
to drive through you know La and see homeless people
on the an intersection begging for money and just think like,
just just get a fucking job, right, just get a job.
And what this taught me was, No, you have to
understand their backstory. You have to understand what they went
through and why they're behaving like this, and why they're
on the streets and why they're escaping with drugs and
all that. And so that's what my video help people understand.

(29:01):
I think people still love to hate. They just you know,
people love to hate. I mean, the hate thing is
out of control in this country.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
How do you think the shows move the needle around
that kind of awareness.

Speaker 1 (29:10):
Well, I get emails all the time from people saying,
thank God you do these things that you've saved my life.
You've kept me on track. I watch your shit every day.
That's why I post every day. You know, it probably
helps my It probably doesn't help my views to post
every day. It becomes oversaturated, but I do it every
day because I believe my videos help people stay on
track right. So that's why I post every day, just

(29:33):
to keep it becomes a part of people's morning routine.
But but I've I've received Jesus thousands and thousands of
emails saying thank thank you so much for doing what
you do right. That's that's why I know what I'm
doing is the right thing. Yes, I'm exploiting Joe who's
on the street drunk or high on meth or whatever,

(29:53):
and he takes the hit in that interview. He looks bad.
I get it, there's no doubt about that. I understand that.
No one's harder on me than me, Like I understand
people criticize me, Oh, you're exploiting homeless people. Yeah, I
get it, I am. But I'm also informing a much
much much larger community right of people that are trying
to figure out why their son or daughter or brother

(30:15):
or sister of wife or husband is doing this shit.
So it's helping people understand, it's helping us learn how
to become better parents, teaching people. The importance of that
to me, the good that I'm doing far outweighs the
hit that Joe is taking for doing that interview and
looking like a drumk interesting right on. So, yes, I
understand there's a negative sid there's always a negative side
to everything that everyone anyone does.

Speaker 2 (30:37):
Have you ever been like, listen to Hell's Angel scary.

Speaker 1 (30:40):
I get it.

Speaker 2 (30:41):
Some of the other people like, boy, there's something back
could happen here right now.

Speaker 1 (30:47):
Have you ever heard that happen? Yeah? Yeah, I've had
that happen a lot. You just stay cool, You just
stay cool, and you believe it's all going to work out.
I had a guy, what was his name, Victor, pulled
a gun on me in the middle of an interview.
I pointed right at me. I don't know if it's
loaded or not. I don't know what you do. You
just stay cool. I just stayed cool. How did you

(31:08):
learn how to stay cool? Man? I don't know. As
a photographer, photographers do crazy shit.

Speaker 2 (31:12):
Well, there's one thing about shooting a model, and there's
next thing like some fuck gang members.

Speaker 1 (31:17):
Especially shooting models for Sissy's. Anybody can do that. Like
I like photographing people that are just like impossible.

Speaker 2 (31:23):
Well, I think it's interesting because so many people that
you interview are like adrenaline junkies in some ways that
you're kind of an a drinalinee.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
Oh for sure, I am right, for sure, I am
That's what I am. Like, you know, because my dad
used to say to me, you know, like, you don't drink,
you don't smoke, you don't do drugs, you don't chase women.
Like what what you got to do something? What's your vice?
My dad used to ask me this, like, I don't know.
I didn't seem to have anything, but I think I do.
It's it's that adrenaline of doing work that is just
like really compelling.

Speaker 2 (31:50):
I don't think you know this about me, but I
don't do it so much anymore because I actually got
scared and the world's different. But I was well known
for finding athletes, entertainers that were hiding out in dangerous situations.
They'd been on a run, prostitutes, the clock's going blah
blah blah, and I would find them somehow and get
them out and do a version of you.

Speaker 1 (32:10):
But if I'm rescuing.

Speaker 2 (32:11):
People, oh, I see cool, okay, And there's an art
to it and and you know, and I'll just tell
you one quick story here because I think he'll appreciate this,
because you know, junkies will lie and I get a
call saying I need your help, right, I got to
pay these guys money. Well, I also know that they
might be bullshitting, and just because blah blah blah, you

(32:32):
get it, I actually figured it was credible this guy
was trying to beat these girls on their money. I
fly out to Oakland. I know kind of who the
people are. I have some love out in Oakland and
I go in there and the guy's been beaten up.
There's three girls and panties with a pipe guy big
brother with a gun. He's in duck tape and you know,

(32:56):
the opening line is you know how much does he
owe you? And they said twenty five? And I said,
I'll give you five granded to kill a guy such
a fucking pain in the ass.

Speaker 1 (33:04):
They laugh.

Speaker 2 (33:05):
I get there's an art to that. But the reason
I tell you that, but then things have changed in
the world because that same neighborhood someone would fucking kill
me for two hundred dollars now and it terrifies me.

Speaker 1 (33:20):
And I know you're going to do your thing. Man.

Speaker 2 (33:21):
This is there's never been a moment where he said
is it worth going on?

Speaker 1 (33:25):
Figuaroa? Is it worth? Yeah? I've had things happen to me.
I don't want to get into too many details about it.
I've had things happen, but I don't know's I feel
like I'm like somebody's watching over me. Oh so you
feel protected? Yeah, I don't know why. I've got a mission.
I love risk. I'm not risk averse like a lot

(33:47):
of people are. Oh that's too risky, that's scary. You
don't do that. That makes you dive in, right, whether
it's a project, a photography project or building a house
and there's a project on a hillside or next to
a river, like, I like danger, whether it's a woman
or whatever, Like, I like them they're a little bit edgy. Yeah,

(34:08):
you know, you can find a nice girl who you know,
sells insurance and lives in the valley that no. I well, I.

Speaker 2 (34:14):
Mean that's a good maybe that's a good segue. What's
it like doing that and having How do you? How
do you meet people?

Speaker 1 (34:20):
Whatever? Your personal relationship has been like, well, my wife
was probably not cut from that cloth, but she was
an awesome woman still is. My wife and I were
like this, we're like best friends. We were married for
seventeen years, got a divorce about eight years ago, and
we still are, like you think, we're still married, still
really good friends, and we have two daughters and you know,

(34:42):
we're really like a family still. But ever since my divorce,
something opened up in me and I now I end
up with with crazy relationships. Okay, crazy, yeah, And that's
my doing. It's not I'm not blaming anybody. It's one
hundred percent my fault. And why do you keep my fault?
I enjoy?

Speaker 2 (35:00):
Why do you the savvy guy who's seeing.

Speaker 1 (35:03):
I had a great marriage, A great marriage right on
scale from one to ten. It was a freaking ten.
My wife would say the same thing. You know, after
a while, things just like we somehow grew apart or
whatever happened, and things fell apart at the last, at
the end. But seventeen sixteen years were awesome. I just
need to sew my wild oats, you know. I Hey, brother,
my twenties were really quiet. My thirties were pretty quiet.
Then I got married, so I never had the wild

(35:25):
times that a lot of people do in their twenties
and thirties.

Speaker 2 (35:28):
Are you comfortable talking about your last relationship.

Speaker 1 (35:30):
Uh with Kiara? The one that passed away? Sure? How'd
you meet Kiara? She brought me her mom. Her mom
is a schizophrenic, homeless crystal meth addict on the street,
and she brought me her mom to photograph, and I
did an interview with her mom. I ended up not
using I'd only use about one out of four that
I do, so just because somebody brings me somebody to
interview doesn't mean I'm going to use it. So I
never used it. She was a little too. Her stories

(35:52):
just didn't quite make sense, and a lot of it
there was some truth in there, for sure, but it
was a lot of it was just like it wasn't
It wasn't quite what I looked for, So I never
used it. But I took a liking to Kiara, and
we kept each other's numbers, and next thing you know,
we're dating and we started going out. And she was
like much much younger than me, which is crazy because
I didn't believe it, Like I even I even hired
somebody to like look up her info to make sure

(36:14):
she was. She told me she was twenty twenty, which
is a kid, but she behaved like she was thirty five,
and she looked like she was at least thirty, And
I'm like, I just couldn't believe she was so young.
She colorful past, She had a colorful past. Yeah, yeah,
but she comes from the streets. She came from the streets,
and that's what happens. Yeah. She had a terrible childhood,

(36:37):
like the worst you can imagine, the worst you can imagine,
and you fell for it and you try to help
her out. No, I people that come from that, my
heart goes out to him.

Speaker 2 (36:46):
Why, brother, Why what was it about it?

Speaker 1 (36:48):
I don't know. It's like, you know, because I had
such a great childhood myself, Like I want to help
people that came from crap. I just wanted to make
her life better. I did a great job of that.
I know. She told me this every fucking every other day,
that I'm the best thing that ever happened to her
and the best thing that ever will happen to her.

(37:09):
And I made sure she had a three year old
son when she passed away. And you know, we went
out for two and a half years and it was
it was a great relationship. It was magnificent. I loved it.
But there were some problems that I didn't know about
that eventually led to her death. Right, which was recent
just it was back in May, right, but this year
really sad. It was just like like, like you and

(37:31):
I see each other at the gym every morning. It's
like if I came over here one day and you
were dead in the bathtub. From what I had no idea.
You know, she's ADHD. So when people are ADHD and
they start doing these stimulants like cocaine or crystal meth,
they behaved differently than somebody Like like if I did
a drug like that, I would be hyper and I'd

(37:52):
be talking really fast and I'd be high energy. She
was mellow as can be when she was doing the drug,
so there was no sign of it. Didn't I didn't,
you know people say. I see people saying things like
how do you not know? After doing all these interviews
with how do you not understand that she was doing drugs?
She behaved totally opposite of what a cocaine would act.
Cocaine addict would would act like mmmm, that happened surprised me, Like, like.

Speaker 2 (38:18):
What was the most important thing you learned from her?

Speaker 1 (38:21):
What I learned from that relationship is the value of
just making someone's life better. Like I came home from
work every day and I go to her place we
didn't live together, and within you know, some of my
days are really rough, and I would come over and
within three minutes I was in a great mood. Every
single night, just the way she treated me.

Speaker 2 (38:41):
What does she do that took your mind off everything?

Speaker 1 (38:43):
She's just kind of stuff is safer, not stuff that's safer.
I got understood. But it was awesome, I got.

Speaker 2 (38:50):
She made you feel special, She made me made it.

Speaker 1 (38:53):
She was so warm and so loving and so kind.
I just love that. She was such a sweet girl,
really special. Wow. But she has some dark, dark problems. Yeah,
but you know, I don't know. We still still waiting
for the autopsy results. You know. Five six months later.
It is three women in her family, young women. I
think they're all in their twenties. All passed away from
heart failure. Oh wow, from myocarditis. Oh wow. So most

(39:17):
likely that's what I assume caused your death. She wasn't
a hot bathtub, and she was doing cocaine, so that's
going to tax your heart, right, But having myocarditis in
combination with the cocaine and the bathtub is probably a
recipe for getting your heart to stop. Wow. So something
like that. But haven you've had dinner with my current girlfriend,

(39:38):
who is cut from the same exact you know, not
cut from the same cloth, but just the same ability
to make her partner feel so great, right, Like the
woman I'm saying now is just amazing. Yes, she is amazing.
I hope you guys have a long run to go. Yeah,
it's been the most fun I've ever had in a relationship.
Why is that? Because she's just so full of energy

(39:58):
and love and just just a dynamite woman. How does
this I watched I have an act for finding really
great women.

Speaker 2 (40:08):
Yeah, I mean it's complete. Yeah, it's interesting.

Speaker 1 (40:10):
Man. Yeah. You have to be selective. You have to
be selected. Yeah, it's just cute. I'll take you have
to be super selected. You know.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
I watch you sometimes, man, and I think I'm goel, Like,
is he like angry?

Speaker 1 (40:21):
Like what's going on with him? But at the gym? No,
not at the gym.

Speaker 2 (40:24):
I mean I just I just see you. I just
just I obviously see at the gym. But like, does
this everything you do make it crupt your mind?

Speaker 1 (40:34):
Sometimes? Are you hardened all the rough things I see?
I don't. I don't think. I mean it must it's
some on some level, but I'm still like warm with
my family and my kids and my friends. I still
like to joke around all the time, like I have
a great time with you know, the woman that I'm with, Like,
I don't think it's changed who I am, but at

(40:55):
some point you do change from whatever you're doing. And
I know that there are things I've learned about these
kind of people that are in the streets that you
can't trust everything they do and say. Their motives are questionable,
and i'd become a little more street wise, So that
certainly has happened. But I'm not sitting there absorbing, like

(41:16):
you know, I get criticized sometimes, like she told you
she had three kids, and then you three, you know,
five minutes later you're asking her how many kids she has.
That's because I'm doing six or seven of these interviews
that day, and I can't listen and absorb and keep
track of everything that everyone is saying. So the way
I do it is I pay attention the way I
did when I was in high school, which is really

(41:36):
barely hanging on. I'm listening to you. I'm getting your story,
but I'm not getting every detail. If I did, I
would have quit two years into it right. So here
I am seven years into a ten thousand interviews. The
way I'm able to do that is by not paying
attention to every detail of every story. I'm just kind
of like coasting through and I hear your story, I

(41:57):
get it, but I'm not you know, my mind would
be over the trusting. My phone is already full of
with phone numbers that.

Speaker 2 (42:05):
I can only imagine. Yeah, it's crazy, I like, I mean,
I love stories. I love people's stories. That's what I
do for a living.

Speaker 1 (42:11):
Yeah, you're a grea storyteller. You just did a talk
with me just recently. That was incredible. That was great.
You did a great job, and you get front.

Speaker 2 (42:17):
Row access to amazing stories.

Speaker 1 (42:20):
Amazing ones.

Speaker 2 (42:21):
Yeah, like I got to wrote down some of these people,
like I would. I would love to go to what's it?
What's the the what the Pimp's ball? What's it called the.

Speaker 1 (42:30):
The player's ball? The player's ball? Yeah, I went to
what is that? In Atlanta? The one I went to
was in Atlanta. There's the bishop, Bishop Don Magic Wand
is having I think that his he was the one
who started, I believe, and he's having his final one
this December, his birthday is like December fourth. I think
he's having his final one this December in Chicago, and

(42:52):
he invited me to that the welcome guests there. Well,
I might just go. I might just go. What's it?
What is it like? Was it? Do you photograph people
there or you just there? More is just to say
thing I would I would. I would go there and
just hope to meet people and then I would fly
them out to LA to do an interview or maybe
I do interviews in Chicago when I was there. Perhaps
fascinating to me, I love that. I love that culture.

(43:15):
Like the people have to hate pips. People love to
hate pimps. I don't like the old the new age pimps,
but I love the old age PEPs. The seventies eighties
pimps are fucking magnificent, and they operate in a way
that is so foreign to guys like you and me,
especially white guys from the Midwest or whatever. They're just different. Yeah,
you know, because the pimp culture in Chicago is really strong.

(43:37):
But I grew up in Chicago and and like I
grew up totally different. I would just love to meet
these guys, and that's what that's what these projects have
given me the ability to do.

Speaker 2 (43:45):
Because it gives you entry to meet people that know one.

Speaker 1 (43:49):
I mean not that the words that come out of
their mouth is gospel that we should all use in
our relationships, but god damn it, if there isn't great
wisdom there right there just is. And for the people
that think it's like you're you're demented for thinking that
you're just closed minded, and it's going to affect your
ability to get along.

Speaker 2 (44:05):
With Do you remember any of the anything they dropped
Johnny that's stuck with you?

Speaker 1 (44:09):
Yeah, I mean like like like what what is what
did uh? Johnny Dollar said, Uh, go for the woman
that wants you, not the one that you want, because
your life is going to be miserable with the girl
that you want. The one that you want is gonna
just walk all over you and you're not gonna be
able to do anything about it because because she's got
you wrapped around her finger, the one that wants you.

(44:29):
You You not not that I operate this way, because
I don't, but it's it's really interesting. It's really interesting,
interesting thing to think about. I don't know, it's better
to love or be loved, you know, that's a that's
a three hour conversation. Tell the folks about the Cecil
Hotel downtown. A couple of hotels, but the Cecil is
the one that's probably the most famous legendary place. Yeah.

(44:51):
It's full of it's full of drug. You know, people
get housing there, they always have. They kind of either
they just barely scrape by money for a room. And
I think that people are even living there long term there,
but it's notorious for horrible things happening. Yeah, people jumping off,
jumping or being pushed off the roof.

Speaker 2 (45:13):
And there's a betting line at the restaurant.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
Yeah, yeah, I had heard this. I don't know if
for s that's actually true. Is it true? That's true? Yeah,
there was a chicken restaurant that's right on the corner
that apparently had a like a glass jar and you
could place your bet and you would pick the floor.
Yeah that the next death. And there were so many
deaths that this would happen a lot. You could pick
the floor that the person was going to it.

Speaker 2 (45:37):
I fact check that one. Yeah, I have my resource
down to Yeah.

Speaker 1 (45:40):
Yeah, that's a crazy story.

Speaker 2 (45:41):
Yeah, you know, people don't know the history of skid roll.
Skid row's been there's since eighteen seventy for the railroads.

Speaker 1 (45:46):
Is that right?

Speaker 2 (45:46):
That's when it starts a fifty square mile ultimately skid
rolls fifty block radius?

Speaker 1 (45:52):
Is that?

Speaker 2 (45:52):
And it started in eighteen seventy and kind of worked
its way up. It's where it is now. And the difference.
I used to speak at meetings down there, but you
it's lawless now. People don't understand it's it's not just drunk,
it's lawless.

Speaker 1 (46:04):
It's totally lawless. There. Cops will cruise by, Well, he's
smoking crack with his buddy.

Speaker 2 (46:11):
Why somebody's fucking, Why somebody's doing Why somebody's fencing, Why
somebody's dropping off dope while someone's just handing another guy
gun and there's gonna keep it.

Speaker 1 (46:18):
There's a girl that's getting raped by a line of guys.
They're lined up way outside of ten. Yeah, what are
you supposed to do? Hey? You guys shouldn't be doing that.

Speaker 2 (46:27):
Hey, fellows, you might want to consider. Yeah, it's like, no,
it's out of control. It's out of control. Have you
ever interviewed Faler Boil from Homeboy Industries.

Speaker 1 (46:35):
We've talked about it, but he's so busy we have
not yet connected, but I think that still might happen.

Speaker 2 (46:41):
That's somebody you should interview. Just yeah, because he's the
one person who's made it work. Okay, yeah, I think
it's the biggest gang intervention program in the country and
all that shit.

Speaker 1 (46:51):
He's done some amazing things. He's figured it out.

Speaker 2 (46:54):
Yeah, and he's because I always talk about who's going
to do something, he actually did something. He's an amazing guy. Okay,
let's talk about this guy.

Speaker 1 (47:02):
Mike Dowd. Oh, Mike Dowd. Mike Dowd is you know.
I've done so many great interviews and people asked me
which is your favorite, And for a long time, Mike
Dowd was always like, undoubtedly my favorite because he the
way Mike tells a story. I love when, like movies
or music or whatever, mixes so many different things that

(47:22):
or even an attractive woman, there's so many things going
on that your brain can't soak in or comprehend everything
that's going on, and it becomes overwhelming. When Mike's telling
a story, it's a fascinating story. The seven to five
documentary Doctor tell the audience who he is that Mike,
Mike dwd was was a cop in the seventy fifth

(47:43):
Precinct in New York City in I guess Brooklyn, right
or Bronx Brooklyn. I think it was Brooklyn, Brooklyn. This
was in the eighties when Crack was just coming out.
No one knew what crack was, but he was. He
was working when this happened, and they found about found
out about this stuff, and he realized how much money
was being made on the street. And he just kind
of like realized, and they're paying me nothing to do

(48:04):
this job. We're doing these busts and there's tens of
thousands of dollars just getting thrown away. So he realized
there's an opportunity for him to make more money, and
boy did he that he did. Yeah, So he made
a bunch of money. But he eventually got yeah, got
caught in incredible in prison time. But they made a
great documentary about it. And then he came on my channel,
told the story and the way he tells a story,

(48:27):
injecting humor, talking about how he felt as a kid
and his insecurities as a teenager growing up and how
that still played out in his life as an adult
when he was a cop, and the and the pressure
of like not having enough money, and then here's this
temptation of having all this money. Fascinating story. The way
he told it was beautiful, magnificent.

Speaker 2 (48:49):
People asked him all the time of my clients the
biggest breakthroughs, what story just cracked your fucking heart the most.

Speaker 1 (48:56):
There's a black woman named LaToya who's on skid row
still to this day. I see her all the time
and I'll slip her twenty bucks or whatever. Not every day,
but a lot of the time I'll see her and
I'll give her some money. I mean, she she told
this story about how I forget it was her dad
or uncle or somebody was raping her, Like I don't
even want to talk about it. You put the words

(49:16):
out there, and it's just it's just they're they're not
good to even speak. But the area between her vagina
and or her rectum got torn open and she had
to get as a young girl, as a little girl,
that got torn apart and had to be stitched up.
And that's the kind of shit that was going on
in her in her childhood. She's she's still around. Bona Fide,

(49:38):
who was a prostitute on Figuarreo Street, told a story
about having a child with her dad at like I
think eleven years old or twelve years old, she has
a son with her father. Wow. Yeah, so there's some
horrifying stories.

Speaker 2 (49:52):
What story inspired you the most?

Speaker 1 (49:54):
I mean Jerry, who was the black gentleman who somebody
just came up to him and stop signed and shot
him in the face, blew away half his face, Like
he's missing half of his face. His head is shaped
like a broken candalop. But the doctors put him back
together and he he can't his vision is shot. But

(50:15):
he is the most forgiving, loving, kind person ever. He
passed away a few years ago, but before he passed away,
I would go see him all the time and at
his room. I got him a room on skid Row.
I paid his rent for a long time, and he
he was just a beautiful human being. Didn't have a
lot of friends, you know, I was maybe his own.

(50:35):
It felt like I was his only friend. But he
was such a beautiful person, and it was just beautiful
to see how somebody who went through something that horrific
could still be kind and loving. I asked him in
one of the interviews, like what would you say to
the guy who shot you, and he said, I forgive you. Wow,
that takes a lot. Forgive us.

Speaker 2 (50:52):
It's a big deal, some forgiveness of everything. Man, Yeah,
why is forgive us everything?

Speaker 1 (50:56):
Because like, if you want your life to be better, right,
you don't want to hold anger against me. If you're
angry at me, am right, It's like you're not gonna
help you to be angry at me. Right. You got
to figure out why I did something to you that
that is unsavory or just uncool. And once you understand
why I did what I did, you're gonna forgive me.

(51:18):
That's going to give peace to you. It's going to
give peace to me. It gives me an opportunity to
heal and do the right thing next time. And you're
gonna be able to go to bed with a clear
conscience and just have peace in your in your life.
It's just a beautiful way to go. It's the only
way to go. Listen, you're very humble.

Speaker 2 (51:34):
You're very humble, but you help a lot of people out,
like that gentleman that was shot.

Speaker 1 (51:38):
I don't I don't try not to talk too much
about that stuff. And I get criticized all the time
because oh you're exploiting all these people. People don't see
this shit I do. Yeah, I know it's fucking but
I don't care. I know, but I don't want to
start promoting. Oh, I had these two under you know,
these teenage prostitutes, and I gave them a room because
they didn't have a place to stay. And it's like
it would just be an opportunity for people to criticize me, Oh,

(51:59):
what do you do with these teenage girls. I'm not
doing anything with anybody, not doing anything with anybody. I've
done ten thousand interviews. I'm smart enough to know that
if I ever did anything because I'm on social media,
you're just going to get crucified for it. Right, Not
that I ever did anything anyway. You know, I'm a
straight shooter. I don't do anything that's shady. I'm not
going to get in trouble with the law. That's not
ever going to happen in my life. The way I

(52:20):
do things is not something that's ever going to get
me in trouble. So when people sit, you know, I
see people making videos, Oh, Mark's doing this, Mark doing that.
Mark's not doing any of that shit. Right, I walk
a really straight line, and I've always done that my
entire life, and I'm not going to start changing that now.
Everyone in a while, I see somebody who was just
given no opportunities in life. There's a young girl, Trophy's.
She was thirteen the first time I interviewed her. She's

(52:41):
I think she just turned fifteen, like last week. She
has an IUD because she just got pregnant. She's getting
beaten up. She's just it's a horrific life. And I
can't take her in right, you know, I'm just like,
I don't see anybody helping her. I don't see her
family or child Services or anybody helping her. She's she's
working the streets right now. I think I've paid for

(53:02):
her room tonight. Wow, somebody should help out. Shouldn't be
Mark's responsibility to help out everybody? Right? Her videos get demonetized,
so I don't make any money off her videos. I
lose money because I'm paying her money all the time,
you know, you know, I give her money all the
time to survive. But she's also working the streets still,
and I don't know what the situation. I don't know
what the solution is, but the solution is not the.

Speaker 2 (53:24):
So what's right? You've seen it. We kind of know
how this goes. For one night, She'll be safe for
one night. She has a place to stay. And if
that's what I can do, that's all I can do.
Right now, it's enough.

Speaker 1 (53:34):
Yeah, I try not to become their ATM machine. I
get it. It must be tricky sometimes, Yeah, it's really
tricky all the time. I've learned how to say no, right,
And sometimes you don't want to say no, but you
just have to because otherwise it's like it's not helping them,
it's not helping me, and it's just it's just a
terrible you know, it's not a symbiotic relationship. It's it's
a terrible relationship to do. But but sometimes my heart
goes out and they're desperate and it's raining and it's cold,

(53:55):
and they're just they're screwed.

Speaker 2 (53:57):
I think you told me this correctly, if I understood,
you're moving off all the addiction stories.

Speaker 1 (54:03):
No, I still do them, I mean, right, but it's
I still do them, but but just just for my
own I'm not doing this for my audience. I mean,
the audience benefits by hearing these stories, but I just
do I do things I find interesting, right, so if
I find somebody who doesn't have an addiction story interesting,
I'll do it.

Speaker 2 (54:19):
Yeah, of course, But what's what's the future look like
for the show?

Speaker 1 (54:22):
What's what? What do you? What are you thinking? Just
whatever is interesting for you? Yeah, I mean, like, somebody
hooked me up with Brandon Novak, who was like, I
told Brandon, it's like this, You're the my favorite person
I've interviewed all year, right, because he's just such a
magnificent storyteller for some people who's a little too slick,
because I'm sure he's told a story too many times,
but Jesus, what a beautiful way to tell a story.

(54:43):
Special cat, He's amazing. Yeah, we hung out a couple
of weeks ago. Yeah, yeah, we did. We did. I've
done two with him, and I'll I told her, I'll
do as many as you want. Many times you want
to come in, I'll do it.

Speaker 2 (54:53):
Do you ever get word that you Tube might shut
you down?

Speaker 1 (54:55):
Yeah, all the time. I'm I'm actually operating in a
way that I'm trying. I need to get them to
shut me down. That was my goal. Because I have
a subscription channel that's ten dollars a month for Uncensored
content like sometimes I have to censor things out of
YouTube or certainly on Facebook, I have to censor things,
and Instagram and TikTok, you have to censor things. YouTube

(55:18):
has somehow started treating me. They did this early on.
I think they just liked what my content was and
what it was doing, and they started treating me with
kid gloves and just let me. They gave different rules
for me, I think than other people, because I hear
other people say, man, I can't get this monetized. I
can't do this. I can't do this because they took
it down. I've only had I think three or four

(55:38):
videos deleted by YouTube.

Speaker 2 (55:40):
Really what was this subject matter?

Speaker 1 (55:43):
One was a woman named Trixie who I reposted and
I took out some parts and it's on my channel.
This is early on on skid row and she can
we say anything here? Sure? She talked to I go,
do you what do you? You know? She's talking about
her lifestyle and just how pat that it was, how terrible,
and they go shout. I asked her how you make money?

(56:05):
She goes, I think she said something like swallowing come
and she said it was such a straight face.

Speaker 2 (56:11):
It was just like you know they passed the sense
of reboard.

Speaker 1 (56:15):
Unbelievable. No, no, it wasn't that. What did would you say?
She said something even wrong to her after that? But
it was just like so over the top, it was crazy. Wow.
So that got taken down. My last video, my previous
to last video with Rebecca got taken down. Rebecca's this
transgender almost transgender addict that I interview a lot people.
The rumor is that that Rebecca's dead. But I don't

(56:36):
think she's dead. Oh wow, Yeah, she was supposed to
see me on Saturday or Friday, but she disappeared. But
I think somebody people love to spread rumors about the
Whitaker family in West Virginia and now are about Rebecca.
Anybody that I turned into it like somebody somewhat of
a social media star, people will put out these rumors
that they're dead.

Speaker 2 (56:55):
Do you have a pre show ritual or do you
do anything before and interview? You just you get right
into it.

Speaker 1 (57:00):
I like to just bring people in. I don't know
anything of your story. Let's find out. I find out
with the audience basically.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
But you have so many people to submit things to
you now right, you do some kind of screen right.

Speaker 1 (57:11):
My assistant Noel screens everything that gets emailed in. She's great,
she knows exactly she's like, her taste is like mine,
Like she knows exactly what I want, right.

Speaker 2 (57:20):
You know, listen, obviously you have critics, but I thought,
I dare anybody do what you're doing.

Speaker 1 (57:26):
I would like to see something.

Speaker 2 (57:26):
It would be great, Like just shit the fuck up
and go out and get rolled random place for a weeks.

Speaker 1 (57:30):
How it feels. Yeah, I've been robbed. I had a
gun to my face more than once, you know, on
the street trying to not the guy who interviewed me
and did that, but people on the street who did
that and robbed me. Literally, like here's my wallet, take
it right. You know that that's happened more than once.
My equipment got broken. You know, people break into my studio,
steal my equipment. I got everything happen.

Speaker 2 (57:47):
Yeah, everything happened. But he keeps showing up.

Speaker 1 (57:49):
Yeah, it's like that's part of the game. I knew.
I knew that was going to happen going in. If
you don't know that, if you don't know, that's part
of the part of the deal.

Speaker 2 (57:56):
All getting a broken and she's gonna happen. God's gonna
write yeah, and you just keep trucking.

Speaker 1 (58:00):
No, that's more than once. More than once. I lost
camera bag with a one hundred thousand dollars with their equipment, uninsured, uninsured.

Speaker 2 (58:08):
What was that day?

Speaker 1 (58:09):
Like? Fucked? Yeah, just fucked. But you just you just
carry on, you know. I had everything replaced within like
a day.

Speaker 2 (58:16):
Pretty much has anything ever knocked you on your ass
so bad that you needed to take a break from work?

Speaker 1 (58:22):
It was just like I just needed I need to me.
Early on, when I started this project, I wasn't making
any money. I didn't monetize for three years. The first
three years I was doing it, I wasn't monetized. I
was just doing amazing and spending easily a million dollars
a year. Wow, think about that, So a million dollars
every year going out, nothing coming in. And then at

(58:43):
the end of that is when I got robbed and
lost one hundred thousand dollars with the equipment, Like, what
the fuck am I doing this? The fun? Why the
actual fuck am I doing this? But if you believe
in what you're doing, you just carry on. You just
carry on and believe there's something good is going to
come of it one day and then eventually, what my it? Guys,
why don't you monetize this stuff? Like I can't monitor
ties women talking about sucking their dad's dick. You're gonna

(59:05):
monetize that. I'm lucky. I'm lucky. YouTube isn't kicking me off,
So I'm now I'm going to try to make money
off it. Yea. So I still can't make money off
that kind of content, but some of the their YouTube
is pretty lenient with like the drug stories. As long
as they're not too racy, they'll they'll let me make
money on that. So I do make some money, but
the money flows out at a much faster pace than

(59:27):
it comes in, right, you know. And I'm not really
doing this to make money, So I'm not really watching
the spending. I never watched the spending. I just spend
whatever it takes to make this shit happen. And if
I happen to have a video that blows up like
a like the Tanya who talked about the p Diddy story,
or James Sexton, the divorce attorney in New York, is
is video did well. Or Johnny Chang who's a gang

(59:50):
member who is kind of like transformed by you know,
his religion, religious beliefs. Those videos made me some money,
so that kind of things. You never know what's gonna
really write. No use Johnny Chang's video, and it's probably
one of the best ones I've ever done. Wow, it
was just too religious for my tastes. Like I'm not
into religion stories, right, but I've done a few of

(01:00:12):
them now and Johnny Chang's was probably the first one
that was heavy on a religious angle and it was
a great story, so I decided to use it and
it blew up. I got like, I don't know, it
was seven eight million views. Wow. That's just on YouTube
and Facebook. My videos get even more views. Wow.

Speaker 2 (01:00:27):
Yeah, this has been extraordinary.

Speaker 1 (01:00:30):
Brother, cool. Hi do you feel good? Yeah? Yeah, yeah,
it's fun to talk about this stuff. Sometimes I never
talk about it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:36):
I know, I appreciate you, man, and I value what
you do as an artist.

Speaker 1 (01:00:40):
Well, you're you're in the recovery world, so you would
know better than anybody whether my content is helpful or not.

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
It's very helpful, yeah, because you know, I don't know
if you saw the sign. We have a sign on
the door here at Shells is No shame allowed. You're
exposing things at a very high frequency.

Speaker 1 (01:00:55):
Man. Well, I know for a fact whether I'm exploit
of devil or whether I'm doing some good for the world.
The one thing I know without a shadow of a
doubt is that by sharing these stories, these people lift
a load off their back. All that shame gets deleted,
gets taken off their shoulders, and they feel better. I've

(01:01:18):
had so many people come to me over the years say,
oh my god, when I did that talk, I feel
so much better. And I you know, a lot of
people I'm not saying this is I am definitely not
saying that what I'm doing is healing people who talk.
But I've had seven or eight people come to me
and say, I haven't used once since I came to
you and told my story. There you go. Man. So

(01:01:40):
I mean that that alone is all I need to hear.
And all these people that say I'm exploiting drug addicts
and all that, Yes, I'm sure there is a sense
of exploitation in what I am doing, definitely, but it's
also helpful helping the person who is unloading their trauma trauma,
and it's also helping the people listening, and it's educate
the world about the importance of being a good parent

(01:02:03):
and how dangerous drugs can be and all of that.
So I feel like I'm doing a lot of good
along with doing a little bit of exploitation of a
drug addict.

Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
Right on, man, Yeah, any final thoughts for the audience,
anything else you want to say.

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
No, that's that's cool, that's great. It was a fun time.
Thank you so much, Mark, Thank you, Cina.

Speaker 2 (01:02:19):
The Sino Show is a production of iHeart Podcasts, hosted
by me Cina McFarlane, produced by pod People and twenty
eighth av Our. Lead producer is Keith Carlik. Our executive
prouser is Lindsey Hoffman. The marketing lead is Ashley Weaver.
Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week.