Joel Bryant on Jumping Through Obstacle Courses and Comedy

There’s a belief that fitness and comedy are at odds with each other. We’ve seen many comedians get jacked and then they don’t appear to be as funny.

Carrot Top famously said he stopped bodybuilding because it didn't fit his style. Dave Chappelle put on muscle and started trolling trans people, and who can forget those awful Bud Light TV ads from the 80s where Joe Piscopo dressed up in drag and flexed his bulging biceps?

But even for all those comedic tragedies, Instagram is packed with muscle men who get the laughs and the lifts.

Let’s Grow Big Together, I mean, Welcome to Feast of Fun! The podcast that always makes you sore in all the right places.

Today comedian and obstacle course athlete Joel Bryant joins us to chat about racing, lifting and comedy.

When he’s not working as a comedy host or doing stand up, Joel is dodging giant foam blocks in an American Ninja style race or crawling through the mud in a Tough Mudder.

Listen as we pit Joel Bryant against the AI robot to see who is funnier, muscle man or machine?


JOEL BRYANT: https://joelbryant.net

Plus--
➤ The Feds issue new guidelines discouraging comedy from highway safety billboards and signs.
➤ The Smithsonian Institution releases over 4.5 Million historic images into the public domain,
➤ Rest in pudding Ron DeSantis’ political career.

Episode Transcript

(00:07):
There's a belief that fitness and comedyare at odds with each other. We've
seen many comedians get jacked and thenthey don't appear to be as funny.
Carrot Top famously said he stopped bodybuildingbecause it didn't fit his style. Dave
Chappelle put on muscle and then startedtrolling trans people, And who can forget

(00:27):
those awful bud light TV ads fromthe eighties where Joe Piscopod dressed up in
drag and flexed his bulging biceps.But even for all those comedic tragedies,
Instagram is packed with muscleman who getthe laughs and the lifts. Let's grow
big together, I mean, welcometo Feast of Fun, the podcast that

(00:51):
always makes you sore in all theright places. Today, comedian and obstacle
course athlete Joel Bryant joins us chatabout racing, lifting and comedy. When
he's not acting as a comedy hostor doing stand up, Joel is dodging
giant foam blocks in an American Ninjastyle race, or crawling through the mud
in a tough mutter. Listen aswe pit Joel Brant against the AI robot

(01:15):
to see who is funnier, musclemanor machine Plus, the FEDS issue new
guidelines discouraging comedy from highway safety billboardsand signs. The Smithsonian Institution releases over
four point five million historic images intothe public domain, and rest in pudding
Ron de Sentis' political career. I'mFustfernos, I'm Mark Fillion, and this

(01:38):
is feast I mean, let's growbig together. Matched up with Thesta Fun
because two flavas are better than one. Let's grow big together. And all
the fabulous podcasts made by Feast ofFun are made possible because of legendary listeners
just like you. For an adfree experience, as as our full catalog

(02:00):
of over three thousand shows on ourwebsite Feastafun dot com, slash plus,
or follow us on Patreon at Patreondot com slash Feast of Fun. Need
help with your bodybuilding? Hire meto consult with you to get to the
next level. Message me Fausto Fernansdirectly on Instagram and for ninety nine bucks,

(02:21):
I'll talk to you one on oneon the phone and answer every question,
every single question your heart desires.Hello, Hello, Hi? Is
this obstacle course racer and comedian JoelBryant. It certainly is. Wow.
Everybody always says when I say hello, that's amazing. Well, this is

(02:44):
kind of a little bit of hybridlet's grow big together our bodybuilding podcast and
feast of fun, because you asa guest sort of a very much married
into both the field of athleticism andphysique and also comedy. Yeah, yeah,
and as well. I mean Ilike to let's grow together, by

(03:04):
the way, because I haven't talkedto you guys, for you were just
one hundred and ten pounds last timeI really talked to you. Oh,
you were just a wisp of ahuman. You know. I got a
silver Everyone's like, shut up abunch of silver metal. But I did
get a silver medal first time inmy first bodybuilding competition. And the term
is a real long thing. Soit's the NPC Mid American Winter Classic second

(03:29):
place silver medal in Classic Physique Master'sdivision. Sure, wow, is there
an abbreviation for that? The silverfor silvers, silver for silver daddy,
silver for silver daddies. That's kindof sexy. Actually, well done,
thank you. Well. You know, when we first met you, we
were taken aback about your physique andit was at a podcast conference New Media,

(03:52):
New Media. They were calling,Oh my gosh, that's right.
Yeah, A long time ago,probably almost nineteen or twenty years ago we've
known. No, I think itwas probably about seventeen seventeen years ago.
Yeah, still significant. Yeah,I was always yeah, I was always
kind of a bit of a gymrat. That's kind of always been my
thing. Yeah. Yeah, nowand now as we get older, you

(04:12):
just try to maintain it and pretendthat you're still, you know, in
your mid twenties. It's working sofar. It's working so far. Between
that moisturizing, it seems to I'mholding off by the time. Pretty well,
Wow, I just don't tell mybody that I'm aging, and so
my body is really good at notlistening. Yeah, you know what,
I you know what's funny. Ifeel it more a little bit now,

(04:34):
you know what I mean. Like, you know how way way back in
the day, you used to beable to drink all night till like seven
am, then go to work andbe fine. And now it's like you
drink, it's like four days lateryou're like, oh my gosh, I
still feel it. I feel thatway with the gym a lot now because
I still work out like I usedto, but then it's like, immediately
like thirty minutes, I'm like,I need a nap. This is ridiculous.

(04:57):
That's when you get those gains.You take that nap off your sleep
after your workout. And I know, but I used to. I used
to not be able to get sotired from it, you know what I
mean. I feel like a littleachy and know a little painty here and
there, and I just you know, I could either nurse it, or
I could choose to ignore it,and usually ignore it just gets worse.
I remember how when I was eighteenyears old and I've been going to the
gym since i was in eighth grade, and I'm drunk for the first time

(05:19):
in college of course, right,and the next day I woke up just
fine. I said, I don'tknow what people have an issue with drinking.
I don't have a hangover at all. Yeah, yeah, I think
it's I know, right, Andyou'd like I used to like wait tables.
We'd like party all night until likeride about thirty things for our shift,
and we just go wait tables forlike nine hours straight. It's like
no big deal. And now Ithink metabolism slow down and everything else,

(05:44):
but the the the weightlifting journey stillcontinues. I think that, you know,
I don't I don't want to notbe fit, you know. But
like, even listening to your voice, Joel, you sound like a guy
who lifts weights. He sounds yeah, it sounds your voice sounds muscule.
I like that. I have avoice modulator on. I'm very high pitched.

(06:09):
I don't know, it's just like, I mean, that's just years
of you know, that's just growinginto it, and years of talking on
a microphone and drinking too much coffeeand too much whiskey and being a smoker
back in the day. I thinkthat's all kind of I don't think my
voice sounds healthy. When I realizedwhy it sounds this way, well,
that's kind of like Mark's voice too. You know, you have what it's

(06:30):
got, whiskey voices, cigarettes,years and years of cigarette smoking. Yeah
yeah, yeah. But I thinkit's like, you know, after a
lifetime of going at the gym,it's like your voice starts doing that too,
just grunting, years and years ofgrunting. Yeah, okay, yeah,
that's that's probably a better way tolook at it. And SIS will
lower your voice too, right,Yeah, yeah, yeah, if you

(06:51):
ejected run into your uvula, it'sit's called testosterone replacement therapy and quotations.
Yes, yeah, it's the doctorprescribed it. It's legit. Yeah yeah,
I mean the quote unquote doctor.I mean backstage of that bodybuilding contest,
somebody had the audacity to be like, are you guys all natty?

(07:13):
And everybody except like what everybody waslike start laughing, like the end of
a Scooby Doo episode. Really waswas? I mean it was somebody who
was who was just kind of visitingthe area and stuff. And and although
in terms of the body of thecompetition, I don't know if this is
for you when doing like tough Muttersor Ninja you know, warrior courses and

(07:36):
stuff like that, it's it's thatlike for us, it was very much
we were more of a team,even though we were competing for you know,
first, second and third place.There was more of like we were
a team together, camar camaraderie.Yeah. And whereas backstage you're stuck there,
you're wearing a bikini, you're naked, you know, why not open

(07:58):
up spread those legs? That wasthat was that your was that your move
on everybody. Hey, you guys, why not open? Come on fellas
know anybody, I'm not gonna liethere bunch of stuffcause that fucks up the
tan. Yeah. So everybody's likedoing fist bumps, you know, right
right? Yeah, So if youlook at really closely, all the on

(08:18):
the pictures, all the knuckles arekind of white and everything else is dark.
Just something, you know what.I think that's just as you get
older as well, right, LikeI imagine if you were on your weightlift
journey in your early twenties, youknow, and I think that there's just
kind of a little bit more ofa probably more of an ego, more
of a competitive thing, right.I mean, it's still competitive as you
get older, but I think yourealize the stakes are kind of lower because

(08:39):
it's not your career. It's moreof a passion absolutely, that makes sense.
Yeah. You know, like whenI go, like do an hopstole
course race, when I go there, I'm like, look, I'm not
going to beat this twenty four yearold in this race, right, And
so it's more of I do itfor the passion of doing it. It's
it's more of an individual, it'smore of an individual accomplishment and individual race

(09:00):
for sure, But I'm not youknow, you don't. You're not side
eyeing everybody. You're a mad dogand everybody and think about who you're gonna
beat, you know what I mean, unless there's someone who's really out of
shape and you're like, I shouldbeat this person. But uh, but
you're not. You know, youdon't. You're not sabotaging. We're whacking
their knee behind a tree stump.You know. But do you like go
meet everybody to like shake people's handsand say hey, good mind to race?

(09:24):
Yeah? Absolutely, yeah, Imean I've definitely come across the same
people over and over again. Thereused to be a group I used to
see almost every race in southern California, and yeah, we would all be
at the starting line together and justkind of like chatting like hey, yeah,
cool, you know, and justgood to see you again and that
sort of thing. And then wedo the race and we try to beat
each other, but we're not tryingto sabotage each other. And then when
it's done, we you know,like you said, you fist bump,

(09:46):
you like, good job, goodjob, and then you go up a
beer together, you know. Soit's I think all of us are very
realistic and knowing that we're not goingto make a career out of it,
you know, so I think thestakes are lower. It's more of your
individual you know, you're just tryingto get your your pr you know,
your your your own personal it's notyour own personal glory, I think.

(10:07):
And and you do different kinds ofobstacle courses. There's one called a tough
mutter. Yeah, there's tough mutter. I don't allow that exactly. I
know you've done one because I've seena photograph of you covered head to toe
and mud. That's mostly that's mostof the races tough mutter is. I
don't do that one as much becausethat's more they want you to uh.

(10:31):
They don't time you. Like it'snot a really competitive as as competitive race.
It's more like a recreational thing.So you're there with like all sorts
of levels of performers. They don'ttime you or anything. And they there's
there's a few obstacles where they justthey just say, hey, can you
make it through this? We're goingto try to hurt you. Like there's
there's one obstacle where there's they're hangingwires down that have shocks in them.

(10:56):
Yeah, and you don't know whichone's doing which ones don't, and it
really is just like a shock,like you almost go numb from the shock.
And to me, that's not anobstacle. That's more of a torture
device, you know what I mean. It's not like I don't know.
You can't train for that, youcan't work better to get over that.
You just have to run through it. I have some techniques that could probably

(11:16):
help you with with that. Well, look, those those should there should
not be an obstacles. Those shouldbe in dungeons in Berlin, shouldn't be
in Should you train to get electrocutedwith the exercise? You're like, well,
you get tied up in a basement, like you said, right right,
But the problem is then you getyou know, you get an erection

(11:37):
as soon as it hits you,and then it throws off your whole hyeah.
To be clear, though, whenthere are athletic events, because the
people were asking me that question too, it's like, what are you getting
turned on? I'd be so afraidto have a boner underneath that skimpy posing
trunks. And I'm like, no, one's getting a boner. You know,
we're so pressed out and exhausted anddehydrated. Yeah, it's like it's

(12:01):
not happening. It's yeah, it'shonestly the last thing you think about,
like, yeah, I've I've youknow, I've I can't say as I've
ever been turned down a while,I've been in the middle of a race
before. Uh No, it's true, you don't. I don't know.
It's it's your Your mind is somany different other places, and that's kind
of the beauty and zen of it, you know. So and also with

(12:22):
a tough motor race, you don'thave to do the obstacles, like you're
gonna approach it and you're like thislooks hard and then you just like walk
around and keep going. Oh really, it's like a stroll in the park.
It's completely recreational, which is fine. It's a nice entry level.
It's like and you come across likegroups of people like Bachelor of parties are
like, oh my gosh, it'sgonna be crazy, and you know it's

(12:43):
not. It's not like, youknow, you don't get you know,
you don't have either tiger plan throughyour head. You're just like, oh,
this is. It does remind meof like, you know, a
military training video where you're like,you know, you're going to disappoint your
father if you don't climb up thiswall. I can do it. I'm
going to make it to the Oh. Their marketing is great, for sure.

(13:05):
Yeah, their marketing is fantastic becauseyou know, and you do kind
of test yourself, and it's goodfor people who are just like this is
gonna be a crazy weekend. ButI remember I was running one to one
and I kind of have my owntimer going and there was this group of
the six people in front of meon this path, kind of walking shoulder
shulder, just like chit chat inthe day away and I was like,
oh, excuse me, and Iran around them. And as I'm running
away, one guy goes, youdon't have to run, buddy, I'm

(13:28):
trying to do well. This isa r This is like a marathon,
and half the people are like drinkingcocktails in it. Yeah. So it's
like I said, it's fun,it's recreational. I've done it like twice.
It's and then there's one moment wherelike you have to carry somebody.
But if you're racing by yourself,you know, so it's built for like
groups of people to come and doit and like, you know, cooperation

(13:48):
all this kind of stuff. Uhyeah, And I remember I came to
that part and there was like this. I remember the one I did.
I ran to that moment and theguy's like, oh, you have to
carry somebody ninety feet or whatever itwas, and there was no one there
except like and then then finally aslike little Asian kid came along. I
was like, can I carry you? And then he looked at me.
He's like, I can't carry you, and I said, I'll carry the
whole nineties let's just get through it. He goes, okay, I just

(14:11):
threw that. Sweet. Just ran. That's very sweet. What's like the
hardest obstacle you have to go throughon these kinds of things besides the electricity,
of course. I mean Spartans arealways pretty brutal. Spartan raises are
pretty tough. They really kind oftest you. Is it the climbing,
is it the falling or going throughmud? Yeah, climbing a rope is
always tough, and it also dependson the weather of the day. Like

(14:33):
I did a Spartan race when itwas raining outside, so it was probably
like thirty four degrees outside, andthere's a lot of swimming through the woods,
and there came a point where Ijust froze up and I just literally
could not jump over this wall forlike twenty minutes, Like my legs weren't
working and I couldn't just get overthis wall that I could usually do.
So a lot of it's the elements, right, and climbing rope and stuff.

(14:56):
There's always techniques you teach yourself thesetechniques, but uh, I would
say one of the tough ones Ido is called a terrain race. And
they start you off in an icecold pool. So that's the starting line,
like the corral. So you haveto get in this pool up to
your kind of up to your neck, up to your chest, and so
they don't start until everybody gets inthe pool. So it's like foury of

(15:16):
you in this ice cold pool,and that's the starting crowd, and they
go on your markets that go andthen everybody just jumps out of the pool.
Usually just like racing, shorts andshoes, that's it. You have
shoes in the pool, yeah,well swimming shoes, you know. Yeah,
No, just so the shoes areusing for the race, the terrain
the terrain race shoes shoes, andyou're just like completely it's offul and you're

(15:43):
completely iceed up and you have torun like a mile to the first obstacle,
and so the first mile is justyou're trying to thaw out while you're
trying to run. Yeah, that'spretty brutal. And then they start throwing
like marshmallows and putting an oil slicksand wiz i wizz, have you amazed?
And uh no, they don't doany of that good stuff. You
just get covered in mud, whichalways it's like mud, and you end

(16:06):
up being just muddy and bloody atthe end of it. That's what I
kind of like about it. Interestingif you had an actual obstacle course that's
like, you know, here's sewinghoxes, then you know, like the
broken yourself chalkboard of math on it. Yeah, you do. You know

(16:30):
some of the longer spartan races thatactually do make you do you have to
run by something, memorize a setof numbers and letters, and then probably
an hour into the course later on, you have to tell them what numbers
and letters are associated with your name. To move on. Like, so
there is like a it's a weirdmental test. Did you go home dirty

(16:51):
or do they give you like showers? They shower you. Sometimes they pull
out and this is I don't getpaid for this, but they pull out
a Doctor Browner's Have you ever heardof this? Yeah? Body washed?
They have this, like yes,yeah, it stings the butthole, doesn't
it. It depends on It dependsif you directed directly apply it. No.
If you ever go to like WholeFoods and pick up one of those

(17:14):
Doctor Browner bottles, it's whack.It's like it's full of Bible versus and
like cleanliness is next to godliness andall that stuff, and that castile soap
is like really bad for your skinin my opinion. You know, it's
like is it yeah, yes,read the bottle, it's on the label.
I never read the labels on anything. I don't. I don't see

(17:36):
labels stuff though. It's just likewhen you get it down there, you're
like, that's but it cleans you. They haven't. At the end of
races, sometimes you jump in thisbig glass booth with everybody and they spray
you down and it's kind of feelsnice. I mean it's just post race,
but they do a whole They havea whole camp at burning Man Doctor
Berner's like phone camp. Oh yeah, I mean it's popular with hippies.

(17:56):
Yeah yeah, and not be there. Yeah, like fairy gatherings. We've
been to. It's full of it'ssponsored by doctor Bonner's. This one was
surprised. That kind of like agod, a religious guy. If you
meet somebody that doesn't use deodorant oruses natural deodorant, they probably have that
in their bathroom too. Oh youcould smell it from a mile away.
You could tell. Yeah, youcould, you could. It's it's it's

(18:18):
like the modern day Petruli. Solet me just read to the audience what
it says here when we teach themorals ABC, all mankind is united,
brave, strong, just free forthe future will be better when we are
better. Times change when we change, Conditions will improve when we improve.
And if you and I corporate byfull truth accomplished them say we all sisters
and brothers. Is that from theBible? Well, then later on it's

(18:41):
like Matthew twenty four seven says blahblah blah blah, and it's just it's
just a of diarrhea. A wordsalad on the side makes true. It's
a little, it's a little,it's a little movement y, it's a
little bit. Yeah, it's alittle. It's a little wu. I
guess yes, but next to godliness, says doctor Browner. Yeah, so
when you get clean, you feellike I got yes. And so in

(19:04):
terms of like you know, comedy, then you know here and this is
something like when you know, throughoutmy life, I've like I've barely been
into bodybuilding, and people say tome, it's like, don't get too
many muscles, you'll stop being funny. And I said, don't worry.
I was never funny. Agreed,there's no funny. But when you think

(19:29):
about like Joe Piscopoe, like mostfamously like he was, he and Eddie
Murphy were like single handedly caring SaturdayNight Live, and all of a sudden,
and I said to this photo ofJoe Pisco with he was like in
bodybuilding magazines, oh yes, shredded. Yeah, I mean yeah, he
did. I mean a few comedianskind of go that route, like you

(19:49):
know, carry top, and Ithink even you know, Joe Rogan was
on that kind of path for alittle bit. I think it's like anything
else, if you make that yourperson finality, then then it overshadows what
you're trying to do, you knowwhat I mean, Like like Joe Piscopo
was an impressionist. She was afantastic impressionist. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

(20:12):
But if you get all shredded andyou get you know, thirty six
inch biceps, you can't really goout there and be like, here's my
Sinatra. People are like, youdon't look like him at all, Like,
uh, I don't know. Ithink I think that would be even
funnier. Don't you think she's likeI got jacked, Like, hey,
who loves your baby? But Ithink that becomes kind of like your whole

(20:33):
It overshadows whatever comedy he was doing, do you know what I mean?
Almost a Cara top to a degreetoo, Like people just talk more about
his muscles than his actual comedy.Yeah, you know, he said,
people find it super distracting any Yeah, and there could be like I think
you have to acknowledge you right,And I think I think comedians like keratop
are don't. They don't incorporate itinto their act, you know what I

(20:56):
mean. It's like a if acommedity goes out on stage and they're let's
just say, ridiculously obese. Andwe've seen a lot of them make it.
You know, they do it.They do well, you know,
one or two fat jokes at thestart, just to acknowledge, like,
look, I know what you're seeing. Let's get that out of the way,
and then let me tell you aboutsome other things. They don't make
it their whole personality. Well,Chris Farley was famous for sort of being

(21:17):
you know this, he was Iguess he was a former football player and
he you know, was a bigguy and ultimately died, you know,
from heart problems. But it's like, but he acknowledged it, you know,
he leaned into it versus versus likeignoring. You know, he wasn't
out there trying to do a FrankSinatra impression because he's like, I don't
look like Frank Sinatra. I'm justlike a kind of a big, fetty,
fat, sweaty guy, you know, And he kind of leaned into

(21:38):
it. And I think that's kindof the difference is if you make this,
you know, because visually you're judgedfirst right before you even open your
mouth. So I think you haveto acknowledge what people are going to see
visually and kind of uh, youknow, acknowledge it and use that as
part of like your persona on stage. If that makes any sense. Well,

(22:02):
it's like bodybuilders who wear hoodies tothe gym because they don't want to
draw attention to their bodies. AndI mean for you, like, you
know, you host corporate gigs anddo all kinds of comedies from improv to
stand up to everything, do youintentionally like try to hide your body so
people don't think about it? No? No, no, I think you
know, I know. I'm like, when I go on stage, I'm

(22:26):
perceived as I know, the initialreaction if I jump on stage, I'm
perceived as this kind of alpha maleex jock, you know, straight white
jock dude on stage, you know, and I do Europe, it's like,
oh, here's this big jockey,dumb American guy. So I kind
of lean into a little bit.That's kind of my point of view on
stage. It's kind of and it'sI think as a comedian you have to

(22:47):
be a bit self deprecating, soI do kind of lean into like,
you know, kind of dumb jockeyor naive American just to disarm a little
bit, let them know, like, look, I'm not you know,
this fit perfect alpha male dude.I'm kind of here's my Here's here's what's
self deprecating about me is I'm notvery smart about things, even though it's
not true. But I kind ofplay into that just to kind of take

(23:07):
just to be a little disarming onstage, and then that gets the audience
on your side. That makes sense, you know. So if you think,
like you know who Matt Rife is, Yeah, he used to be
hideous. It's got that episode ofThe Simpsons where they where Mo's fake Moe
got slammed into you know, hisface was broken and a plastic surgeon came

(23:29):
and made him beautiful, and theneverybody wanted his attention. So yeah,
and then at the end of theepisode he gets hit again and he turns
back to Mole. You know,he's just same old Mo. But I
like, you know, I didn'tlove Matt Rich's last special, and you
know, I know a lot ofpeople have been crapping on him in many
ways, but he broke big.I think his first kind of YouTube special

(23:51):
that kind of went viral was thisthing where I mean, he's obviously a
good looking guy. I think he'sgot talent, but he leaned into the
self awareness of I know, I'ma good looking guy, and hears how
that sucks being this good looking,you know, and it's a fine line
to walk. But he was like, look, I'm going to acknowledge what
you think of me right now.I'm going to make jokes about it.
Yeah, do you know what Imean? So he he he didn't try

(24:12):
to like hide the factor. Hedidn't try to come across the super swad.
And I think he's changed a littlebit since then now because I think
he's got a certain amount of youknow, following and everything else. But
I think his first kind of bidthat a bunch of people sent me that
kind of went viral was him talkabout, you know, how he tried
to hang himself when he his young, but his chin bones were too cut
and he's kept slicing the roll andthings like that. You know. But

(24:34):
like, you know, things likethat where you kind of like, oh
shit, you know you're good looking, You're very self aware, You're self
deprecating about it, you know.He walked, Yeah, he walked a
great line of kind of taking thepiss out of himself about being that good
looking. I thought it was areally brilliant take. You know. Well,
like you know, Ricky Gervais andDave Chappelle and even Joe Coy to

(24:57):
some degree are suffering from lack ofhumility and in some ways, and maybe
that's what's causing them to not shineas comedians and having to rely on trolling
trans people or whatever. Oh forsure, I think, I think,
I think you lose humility the biggeryou get, and then you kind of
get in this bubble of just playingto your audience, you know, because

(25:19):
you work. You work so hard. It's like musicians too, You work
so hard to try to make it, and no one's going to go see,
you know, a Joe Coy showuntil until he makes it and finds
his audience. And now Joe Koysells out arenas around the world, but
he's playing to his own audience.So he's in this bubble of like,
you came to see Joe Koy,So I'm going to play to you,

(25:40):
and I think you I think ata certain level you'd start losing humility in
it. Every community's done it.Dane Cook was huge for a while.
Now, Yeah, everybody thought DaneCook was sexy for five minutes. Yeah,
and then then he got too bigand lost his hunger, loss his
humility, stopped having to try toprove himself, and just kind of I
think you do lose humility and untilthe backlash starts and to bite you in

(26:02):
the ass and you fall from graceand then you get humiliated. Then you
get your humbleness back again. Buta lot of these straight guys are kind
of like gay men in the sensethat, like, you know, we
start out feeling awkward, and wedie our hair a weird color, and
then we you know, as weget older, then we hit the gym
and we build the muscles and thenyou know, like it's it's very similar

(26:26):
to like zac Efron, right,you know, so it's that same kind
of career arc. There's a bodyarc there, yeah, I think so,
yeah, yeah, because I thinkyou, I think you you have
to you have to use all yourtools to kind of prove yourself when you're
when you're younger, right, LikeI think all we're doing is just if

(26:48):
you look at the Animal Kingdom,we're just doing mating rituals throughout life.
The comedy is a mating ritual too. Yeah, for sure, absolutely thought
think that way. But you're rightto a degree. Yeah, because if
you think about every the comedians who'vemost comedians are kind of on the fringes
of society or some kind of uhput upon minority, you know, And

(27:11):
that's I mean, if you takeit away back, I mean the grid
the best old school comedians were allJewish, and you know, Jewish people
throughout time have been fairly persecuted.And that's not getting into today's that's not
trying to I'm not trying to correlateto today. But they were kind of
the fringes of society. So ableto deal with it, you have to
laugh at it, right, Andthat's where most comedians come from. They're

(27:33):
either the fat kid, the gaykid, the black kid, whatever.
So in order to deal with thepain, you have to laugh at it.
And in order to stand out ifyou're not the All American football quarterback
in school, you have to befunny to try to get laid, you
know, Yeah, you know,absolutely, absolutely absolutely. I mean it's

(27:56):
when I say mating rituals not justto get like, it's to be accepted,
right, you have to be funnyto be accepted because they're like,
oh wait, we don't we don'tlike your type, we don't know your
kind. Oh but he's really funny. Let's have him, you know,
Let's invite them to the party.He's funny, you know. And so
I think a lot of people,a lot of comedians, go through that.
And then when you start getting accepted, when you start getting an audience,

(28:17):
I start, I think you startlosing that drive to be accepted because
you're widely accepted by everybody. You'regetting lated, you're getting invited to the
parties, so that then I thinkyou start losing your humility. So,
like, what's your bone to pickwith the world. I was born beautiful

(28:37):
to a family, you know whatit was. It was. It's funny
because I do think about that.I I mean, we're super bro.
Growing up, I've never seen myselfand this is going to sound so pretentious,
but I'm going to say anyway,because it's true. I never saw
myself as like the good looking guyor anything else. There was always,
you know, people were more athleticor better looking than I are or what

(29:00):
ever. Growing up, I wasalways the funny guy. And I thought,
Okay, I'm going to use this. And I was never good with,
you know, hooking up with people, so I was like, let
me, let me use humor totry to you know, figure this out.
Like I wasn't some kind of ladiesman. So I never saw myself
person, never saw myself that waythat I'm like that guy. So I
always thought I would just get byon my humor alone. Well, you

(29:22):
know, I'm a really successful careeras a comedian, and you know it's
like like, you know, attimes, if you've told me about some
of the gigs you've had, Iwas like, wow, that's really impressive,
you know, And a lot ofpeople don't realize that, like you
don't have to be like on Netflixto make a living as a comedian.
You could be like what you dois going to events and you know,
corporate parties and meetings and hosting.Yeah, and I'm still absolutely I mean

(29:45):
there's so many different avenues and I'mstill humbled every day. I still,
you know, still don't think I'mthe best. I still don't think you
know, maybe it's a self esteemissue or something, but I'm still you
know, I still work at it. You know, I still I get
humbled every day. No I don'tget a lot of stuff just offered to
me. I still have to workmy ass off to get every gig I
do you know? Uh? Andto me, I kind of like that.
That keeps me hungry for it,That keeps me in, that keeps

(30:07):
me striving for it. You know, like when I go to Europe,
It's not like people are calling mefrom Europe to go to Europe. I'm
like, look, I'm gonna goto Europe for this month, month and
a half and I'm going to reachout to people and book my own shows
and do my own advertising and bookmy own travel. And to me,
I earn every gig I do,you know? And I kind of and
I like that that keeps me hungryfor it. You know, do you

(30:32):
like get or try to get gigswhere you're like hosting a football viewing party
and you're doing jokes in between commercialsor something like that, or Yeah,
I've done that before. I usedto do it, uh for the oscars
for a while. Yeah, Uhfor PwC. Who are who are the
accounts for the oscars? I wasdoing. I used to do this for

(30:52):
a little bit until until they fuckedup the best picture nominee. And then
they don't do the parties anymore.Oh they got fired because of that.
I think they still do it,but they don't throw parties anymore. They're
don't draw attention to themselves because ofthat. Yeah, it was kind of
fascinating. I had no idea thatit was such a big backlash against that.
Oh yeah, I mean they werereally. I mean it's you know,

(31:15):
it's there, it's their marquee event, and they messed up, like
one of their people messed up theBest Picture announcement. Yeah, it was
a pretty big, dramatic It wasa it was kind of fun to see
behind the scenes of it. Whenit was going down. It was like,
I guess this party's over. Imean part of it. With these
awards shows, it's like if thereis a train wreck, it's more interesting.

(31:38):
Because like I'm a fan of TinaFey and Amy Poehler, and you
know, when Joe Coy sort of, you know, failed spectacularly at the
Golden Globes, which I didn't thinkit was that bad, you know,
but he you know, it wasnot as well received as other hosts,
and so I started googling, likeAmy and Tina's Golden Globe and found this

(32:00):
porn site and then I found thevideo and I started watching it, and
then I was like, wow,they were really good and kind of like,
you know, not interesting because theywere so good, you know,
I mean, appeal is the failure, right, Yeah, when you drive
on the freeway, you're not slowingdown to look how well the other cars
are driving on the opsices side ofthe road. You're slowing down because you

(32:22):
see lights and you see a fireand you're like, oh, I'm gonna
slow down look at this. Yeahyou're not. You're not like, oh
my gosh, those cars are reallyefficient on it over there. Yeah,
it's the same, it's the samething. It's not going to hurt him
at all. I mean, Ithink if you know it's bad publicity,
it's great publicity. I mean theKardashians, they made a career on it.
Well, that's why I reached outto you initially, is because you

(32:43):
have friends in the industry, andyou know, with Joe Koy, I
was like, how is he throwingthe writers under the bus on stage?
That was bad. That was theone that kind of rubbed everybody the wrong
way. He just he panicked.He panicked on a huge on a level
that he wasn't prepared to adjust to, and he panicked, and he he

(33:06):
just completely deflected and that you know, you can and you can kind of
see. I mean, we've allas comedians, we've all had those moments
where we're just like, Okay,I need to deflect everything from me right
now because uh it's all going tofall on my shoulders and I'm bombing,
uh completely bombing right now. Yeah, And I think he just he panicked
and was just trying to deflect andtry to try to say some face,

(33:29):
you know, And I think inthe in the face of it, he
made a bad call by blaming thewriters. They were not happy about that.
Well, I was wondering if theyused AI to write the jokes until
he's blaming it was a whole writingstaff. They were so proud of it.
I know, I have one friendwho's on the writing that they were
so proud of it, that allfemale writing staff, and they were like,
it's the first all female writing staffwith the Golden Globes because the Golden

(33:51):
Globes has had like diversity issues,so they were like, it's the first
all female writing staff. And theywere all excited about posting on Instagram and
everything, and then uh, youknow, he goes out there it's like
the writers wrote the worst jokes kindof a thing. Oh women aren't funny,
there we go, Oh my god. So he kept that under rest.

(34:13):
Well, you know, props toJoe Cooy. They didn't say,
like all the all females writing staffwas so bad. Oh my gosh,
that would have been a career killerfor sure. But I mean it's not
gonna hurt him. He's gonna look, he's still gonna sell arenas and he
just got all sorts of new material. I mean, Ricky Gervais has made
a career off and making fun ofthe Golden Globes. Off of the Golden

(34:34):
Globes, you know what I mean. So, you know, and I
mean Chappelle makes jokes about how badhis jokes are received. Like it's just
kind of this uh you know,this self feeding kind of moment. You
know. So I thought, youknow, we started talking about this with
Jeffrey j and all all the comedianswhen I was reaching out to them,
like do you think they're doing AIand stuff? And they're like, you

(34:55):
know, so every comedian that weknow is like I want to come on
the podcast and have you pit theheadlines against AI. Wait, we are
we being replaced or compared? It'sfine, Well, it's a low bar.
It how good you do? Youknow, if you do good,
you won't be replaced. But youknow, if the AI is better,

(35:15):
it's you know, our new friend. Wait, I'm looking Wait, I'm
not getting paid for this right?Glory? Yes? Yeah, which is
a better currency. That's true.Glory lasts forever, whereas money just slips
right out of your hands. Glory. I feel like, I feel like
there's been like past warriors and kingswho have died thinking glory last forever,

(35:37):
and we don't remember them. Yeah, Ozzie Mandias there, but you do
remember him well because they wrote apoem about the futility of his glory.
Oh, I just know him fromthe Watchman comic book, not the superhero
Hazzi Mandias was that. It's apoem by Percival Shelley. It says,

(35:59):
behold, well the great Aussie Mandiasand all the left was nothing but sand
I mean, I'm paraphrasing the entireyou know, yeah, uh yeah,
I could. I'll go toe totoe with the machine any day. I
fought my cell phone earlier today,I too get out. I'm good,

(36:20):
what did you do? I wasjust bugging me. My cell phone doesn't
it's doing this thing now where itdoesn't ring when people call usually yah,
which is a horrible idea for aphone. And so I got another call
earlier and it didn't call, andI just kind of yelled at my phone
and threw my car I'll call youa carrier. I would, But then

(36:40):
you have to deal with a computergenerated tech people. That's the thing about
it is, it's like, youknow, it does feel like you're it's
it's a quiz show versus you andthe terminator. Yes, yeah, yeah,
I know they're doing like on chatstoo, they're like, you KNOWLP
dial in with this chat and thenyou dial in online and it's just the

(37:01):
same computer thing and you're like,I just want to talk to a person.
I actually wrote that to a chatto a text chat the other day.
I was like, can I talkto a person? It's like,
I don't understand the question. Iwas like, exactly, Oh my god
makes you want to scream. Ohyeah. So, so the most the
news items everybody's talking about, whichhappened just yesterday. Is Ronda Santa's not

(37:23):
the drag queen Rhonda Santis, RndaPantees. I love that. I've never
heard rand Santa. That's amazing.But Ronda Santas, Florida is a you
know, Republican fascist governor nicknamed puttingfingers and meatball by his rival Donald Trump,
dropped out of the Republican primaries toendorse his rival Trump. I'm shocked,

(37:49):
and I'm just kind of like,you know, it's kind of like
Ted Cruz, you know who Trumpsaid his wife was ugly and called him
the Zodiac killer and stuff. Well, they all fascinating. Yeah, they
all have to endorse Trump because they'reworried about being murdered by Trump's people,
because we see, we have seenthat happen. Yeah yeah, yeah.
We turned AI and asked them towrite a joke about it. Uh huh,

(38:14):
let's just let's just say it's notgoing to be good, Like,
write a joke with a meatball aspectto it. Okay, what what what
do you? What do you haveanything here? I don't have a I
don't have a meatball. I wouldsay, on the on the on the
on the heels, of Ron DeSantisbig movement of don't say gay His new

(38:35):
quote. His new movement is nowcalled don't say caves. Yeah, all
right, so the the I'm gonnado this as Lady Bunny or Fedo fred
Armison's character. Hey did you hearabout Ron DeSantis dropping out of the Republican
presidential primaries? Me? Apparently hedecided he rather endorses rival Trump, who

(39:01):
famously called him once meatball. Ican see the campaign slogan now making America
meaty again? Wait does this makedoes this make? Does this make Rendesstentos
some meatball sub? Yeah? Okay, you went human Winsay take that,

(39:25):
Chatt, Yeah, suck my dickchap GPT Yeah, eatballs, but yeah
with lots of sauce. So uh. The Federal Highway Administration has just released
new guidelines on traffic safety billboards.Mm hmmm uh, telling discouraging states from

(39:50):
doing humorous messages on the highways ifyou're so one one high One example is
like, are you visiting your eatinglaws? Drive slowly? Oh right,
yeah? Yeah. They have thosein Arizona all over the place. They
have some of those in Illinois aswell. I don't feel like they were
written by Ai too. Yeah,it's but you know, part of it

(40:10):
is, like I think it's youknow, at least it gets people to
notice and read them and reflect onit and talk about it. Whereas,
if you know, I want toI want to see the data that says
humor comedy makes people drive worse,not better. Uh yeah, I think.
Well, like when I go toa bar and they have to go
signs outside where it's like you women, drop off, your husband's here,

(40:36):
or something like that. You know, every bar has like a little chalkboards
out front. That seems kind ofappropriate. I feel like on the highways
though, it's a little bit groaney, don't you think? Well, I
don't know. I've heard over theyears that sometimes people like listening to the
podcasts are like, oh, yeah, you said something funny. I almost
read right off the road. Ithink, how many people of this pot
has this podcast killed? That's justthe people that write to you. The

(41:00):
ones that are dead don't write toyou. Yeah, do you have to
have stats on how many people whodied listening to your podcast? I don't
know, but I know that atleast a couple of people probably have because
we've heard from like their partners thatsaid it was like, you know,
usually they were terminally ill in thisand we're like, so the will says,
that's the most morbid compliment ever.That's like, that's like going on

(41:21):
stays like I killed last night.Be like no, Lily, I killed,
but it was just great. Likethat's that's a really, that's a
that's a double edge. That's atough one. Yeah, we're always like
waiting for you know, because youlisten to NPR and they're like, leave
us in your will, call usor blah blah blah to tell us you
know. Oh yeah, And I'mlike, why don't we do that?
A couple of people, people,especially people that make, you know,

(41:45):
dangerous choices with their lifestyle, youknow, things they do just dangerous things
or whatever. I'm like, hey, you know, you know what,
you can do it, but justmake sure I'm in the will. Okay,
But you have to coordinate. Youhave to core that with people who
have like a nice sum of moneyas well. Yes, you know,
because you can't get someone like somevan life or who likes to climb cliffs

(42:07):
because they're like I left you myvan and my will. You're like,
this isn't great. You have toget someone who like, does really high
end drugs and owns a yacht.Yeah, I would like that yacht.
I would like to bend the whaleof those people who went on the submarine
to visit the type tanic. Yeahright, someone like that. That's that's
the perfect x Y access. Willyou want to be I think one of

(42:27):
them was a billionaires. Yeah,they're all rich, rich enough to afford
the death trap they got in.Yeah. Yeah, that's who you want
to be on. That's who youyou got to. You gotta get friendly
with daredevils who have tons of cash. So do you have any jokes for
our federal highway administration? Uh?Yeah, Well it used to be so.
It used to be so fun toIt used to be so fun to

(42:50):
die while you're texting and driving,and now they're just trying to take all
the fun out of it. Youknow what it is. I'm more distracted
by amber alerts. Amber. WhenI see an amber alert, I spend
the next four to five minutes lookingat license plates on the highway. So
that's far more distracting. So Ithink we should get rid of amber alerts.
There's a new alert too. Iforget what I heard. Yeah,
I got one on my phone orwas it in Texas or was here?

(43:13):
I want to say it was asilver alert, I some other kind of
alert. I was just like Ididn't know what it Wasah, it's like
a hanky code. Now, Yeah, golden alert. That's amazing. Like
someone's giving blow jobs off the nextexit. Yeah about that, that's really
good. You have you have ittough here with chat JPT. They actually

(43:36):
did deliver a joke. That's prettygood. I'll go to lady. Okay.
So the Federal Highway Administration released newguidelines on traffic safety billboards and apparently
they're discouraging humorous messages they can't holdup to the difus of today like Jennifer

(43:57):
Hudson can. Yeah, scripts,I guess they finally realized, why did
the chicken cross the road? Wasn'tthe best distraction while you're trying to merge
on the freeway. Now we allget serious advice like buckle up and no
jokes allowed unless it's your driving skills. That one. But I think that

(44:22):
was pretty good, you know.So once the robot funnies, the funniest,
the funniest sign I ever saw,on the pre was a speed limit
sign. Okay, you got itback, I recovered good. The Smithsonian

(44:43):
Museum, Uh huh, so theyare the I didn't realize that the world's
largest museum period everything of culture mostlyyou know, they just released four point
five million historic images to the publicdomain. So you can t shirts with
photos of Albert Einstein, Jackie Kennedy'sgowns or photos of George Washington Carver.

(45:08):
Okay, so you can. Uh, I don't know. Well, it's
a big deal because basically it's liketaking uh you know, culture and making
accessible to the public to recreate culture, right, you know, which is
really cool. And no one hasto pay a fee to access those images
anymore. And there are three Dimages high resolution, like it's every there.

(45:32):
I looked for I searched for gayerotica. Nothing came up, and
then I canceled. I searched formuscle. Very little came up, I
know. And then I searched formale nudes and they have one, like,
they have one statue and it wasn'teven hot. They don't have like
any they don't have like a statueof David like a picture like I don't

(45:52):
think. So they have lots oflots of architecture and uh stained glass window
of Frank Lloyd Wright. I didfind. Oh I'm in the Smithsonian Did
you know that? Did you for? What? For photos I took during
COVID? Really, I have onehundred and thirty nine photos in the Smithsonian
Institution that they acquired after COVID.Is that crazy? Wow? That's amazing.

(46:15):
Did they pay you for it?No, they know it's a museum,
but Glory as soon as soon asI got paid in Glory again.
So what they did what they reachout to you and said, hey,
Joel, can I we have yourphotos for Glory. Yeah, yeah,
I'll give you the brief of thevery rebriefing office. But when COVID hit,
I was just traveling. I hadnothing. I got kicked out of

(46:35):
my plates because I was just travelingat the time. So I had no
house, no job, no careerbecause all I do is live events,
and so I literally had nothing,and so I just said, well,
I'm just going to drive around thecountry and take pictures and video of the
world shut down like it's never beenlike this before for the first couple of
weeks, and so I literally droveall over the United States. I took
a big loop and went to likethe Las Vegas Strip and a French Quarter

(46:57):
and like Times Square mall of America. I just took photos and video for
the first two and a half threeweeks of it, and just was doing
a blog while I was doing it. I mean, I was done.
About six months later. The SmithsonianInstitution reached out and they're like, we
saw your blog. We'd love toacquire your photos for uh in our for
archives in perpetuity because you're the onlyone who's You're the only person who captured
the full shut down all over Americain one collection. And I was like,

(47:21):
okay, So I had to writeup these write ups and everything else
and send them in. And Iwas like, I says, you know,
I just took them on my iPhoneright, And they're like, we
don't care. You took like youwin everywhere. It was great. Yeah,
I'm in the Smithsonian Institution. Ibecame a Smithsonian photographer during the shot.
So did you get tempted to sneakin like a dick pic or something
like Here's what I did on theroad, here's my dick during COVID pandemic.

(47:45):
No one noticed. No one's touchingit, No one cares. I
totally should have no breath, turninto a documentary and everything. And I
played like film festivals and stuff likeI raised money for like COVID relief.
Wow. Yeah yeah reading that,Yeah, I got no. I got
no money from that. Although therewas a museum in Chicago that paid for
one of the pictures for one oftheir advertising exhibits. But that's about it.

(48:07):
Oh, which photo was it?It was of Chicago. I think
it was of the river Walk shutdown. So I went through Chicago for
like half a day and I gotreally scared and left. You should I
should have. But you know,I stopped saying that to people because people
were just like, no, don'tcome by, you might have COVID.

(48:27):
So I stopped preaching out to friends. Halfway through my journey, we were
hanging out with people during the COVIDpandemic. We agree. We put a
like a we made like a backyardin our back porch and stuff and had
people coming over and stuff and it'snice. And then we taped an episode
of teen Mom during the COVID Yeah, of teen Mom. Yeah, but

(48:51):
that was well until August September.Yeah, so like the shutdown started in
March, right, Yeah, andthen in August we were uh screened by
viacom and isolated and we went toMichigan and we're part of an episode of
teen Mom where and I didn't haveto get anybody pregnant. What. Yeah,

(49:15):
that's the whole point that anytime thatepisode airs, like three or four
people like call me. They're like, teen Mom, did you get paid?
It was done for fun. Buthe did get his eyebrows done for
free. Yeah, micro blading.Yeah, so they made me look like
Millhouse on The Simpsons, a littlebit like Zuice, either Millhouse or Zeus

(49:40):
one of the Well it was veryuh forehead or very strong eyebrows, right,
but it looked good. Like thefirst couple of days, it was
a little intense, but then itit melded well into his like a haircutter.
So like during the your tours,what did you like? What did
you see? What's really struck outto you on your tour? Oh gosh,
Uh, you'll be the only personloneliness and it was wildly sad and

(50:06):
lonely. Uh, there was afew Being the only person in Times Square
was shocking. Yeah, it's hardto pick up a hooker there, right,
I know, right, that wasmy That was my first dick pic.
That the only driving down the FrenchQuarter because there was nothing like to
be able to drive down the FrenchCorner and have like no music or anything
like drive down Bourbon Street was kindof unnerving as well, because he's just

(50:30):
driving down an empty street like this, this abandoned you know, that's usually
kind of bustling of music and drunksand everything. So that was a little
shocking. And then the I'd probablysay the other one, probably Las Vegas
Strip was crazy because it was alldark because no one was in the hotels
and everything was shut down. Sodon't you have the lights going? No,
huh. A couple of signs werelit up, but for the most
part because no one's in the rooms, all the lights were off from the

(50:51):
hotels, you know, damn,So that was a little crazy. Yeah,
Anyway, we went off on atangent, but I just wanted to
here's what the said about what aboutthe Smithsonian's photos. M It's great that
they're sharing all these incredible images,but now I'm just waiting for someone to
turn them into NFTs. Imagine owningthe digital rights to George Washington's Teeth.

(51:15):
Now that's a collectible you can chewon. I'm laughing. It is bad.
I don't credit. Wow, it'sfascinating how it thinks, you know,
or lack of thought. You know. It's like right, it's it's
like, well teeth, nftsh let'sdo this. It just grabs onto a

(51:38):
rolls with it. And I'm like, I didn't say anything about NFTs,
but I guess it. You know, it wanted to confused creative comments with
n FTS. I don't get it. But you know, what'd be funny
if you did to do a fullstand up comedy set just based on trat
GPT and see if you could sellit and see what the response will be.
Well, that's why I thought,you know, Dave Chappelle, did
I mean with this last show?Was like I was like, like it

(52:01):
was like, you know, whenwhen The Crying Game went out in theaters,
and like my mom was calling melike you have to go see the
Crying Game, but I'm not gonnatell you why. And four seconds into
the movie, you know, thethe trans character pops in and you're like,
oh, he doesn't realize she's transsure enough, You're like, oh,

(52:23):
big revealed, don't I didn't realizeit until actually until we were about
to see the candy. Jay Davidsonwas the name of the actor who played
the trans character later on, wasin uh that Sci Fi Stargate, The
The Raw, the Sun God.That's right. Yeah. But so so

(52:43):
you know, when Dave Chappelle's like, you know, I went to studio
an actor opportunity to be somebody else, I'm like, let me guess this
is about trans people. You're like, yeah, well, he's he's really
obsessed with trans he likes, helikes he's he loves trans people. And
you know, I mean clearly someonesomeone told me he goes. I think

(53:04):
I think he might have gotten screwedover by someone that was trans one time
and now he's just really angry aboutit. Yeah, there's there's a lot
of transactivists out there or personalities thatsay that he seems like a client who
gets mad at some of the transwomen. So he's last. Yes,
that was that was kind of thetheory that was floated around. And then
there was another one that a transwoman was picking apart his makeup because you

(53:25):
know, these comanis they'll have towear makeup. You're on film, right,
And they're like making fun of likehis banana powder there, because you
know, black people use a lotof banana powder because they need some yellow
to reflect the light. Banana powderbecause it's yellow, because it's kind of
yellow. I know, but stillI know, but I mean they could
call it, you know, butterpowder or sunflower powder, yell or that's

(53:47):
just what that's what it's because it'scolored bananas and that's what it kind of
looks like. And so they useit like conchoing and whatnot. And they're
like pointing out you see where thebanana powder is like not done right here
and this, and then like heprobably has a t frans makeup artists.
They're doing him dirty thrown under thebus. Yeah, yeah, I don't.

(54:07):
I don't know if I have aSmithsonian joke. Well, you threw
a few. I mean, healso told us a story, but I
did, I did, I did, I tend I'm over of a storyteller
comic. I've been posting pictures ofmy wien are on dating sites for years
and no one's one of those onthe T shirt. I don't know,
I got nothing. Well, youthree out of four, ink bad.
You are the winner of this day. Take take that, Take that,

(54:31):
Google, Take one thousand. I'mcoming. I'm coming next for you,
Ao l you better get you better, You better buck up? Joe?
What what is your coming gigs?And uh are you training for? Like
an athlete athletic event. I wassupposed to do a Spartan race on Sunday

(54:52):
that I was training for. Buta film I did, a horror film
called Candlewood, is having his bigred corporate premiere in Connecticut on Saturday,
so I have to go to thatinstead, which sucks. It sucks making
movies and then going to premiere ishot. Well, I know, but
I spent all this time like trainingfor a race and I'm not gonna be
able to use this, so I'mgonna go fill premiere. So Candlewood is

(55:13):
going to premiere regionally on Saturday,and then the next race I'm going to
do Spartan race. I just movedthat date to end of February is my
next Spartan race. And then afterthat I'm going back to Europe for a
month and a half to go toa round to stand up comedy in Europe
again. Sweet how do you translateyour like material to like, you know,
a Swiss audience or that's what Ilove about it. It's the best.

(55:37):
I mean, it's all English standup comedy, so people know what
they're getting into. But I lovethe idea of it's it was hard to
make the transition because I have tofigure out, like, Okay, I
can't tell certain jokes there because theyjust don't translate. I can't talk about
oh, the road trip to Vegaswas crazy. So that's why I think
that's what I love the most aboutit is playing to an audience of like

(55:59):
fifty different nationalities with varying levels ofEnglish comprehension, and I'm trying to get
them all to laugh at the sametime while I speak English to them and
to me. It's so beautiful whenit happens. What I think, like,
is it like stand up comedy?Really kind of like an American cultural
phenomenon more than absolutely, But becauseof COVID, there was kind of this,

(56:20):
you know, in Netflix, peoplejust ran out stuff to watch,
so tons of people started watching standup specials overseas, so they get the
idea they know how to act instand up shows. You know what I
mean, they get, they getthe concept of it, and then you
know there's always you know, relationshipsare universal, and families universal and travels
universal. So I always come withthat, but a lot of it's just
figuring it out on the spot.And every city is different, Like you
know, people in France laugh atdifferent things than people in Serbia. And

(56:43):
that's why I love about it.I figure out I'll laugh about they're really
dark. They're really dark. Theytalk a lot of dark shit. It's
crazy. I mentioned Bill Clinton onstage and they just like, just got
this cold shoulder. Why are youguys so angry? And then afterwards one
of the Communians is, I can'tbelieve you mentioned Bill Clinton. I was
like, why he goes Kosovo NATOlate nineties. I was like, oh

(57:04):
yeah, so, but you learnthat stuff as you do it. That's
what I love about it, likein the moment and playing into what we
talked about Elier being that naive Americanand I can do it. I can
learn in the moment and make jokesabout it and grow with these people.
So it is kind of a Idon't know, it's it's sweet, it's
kind of we you're bringing comedy backto Germany because like Robin Williams one time
said, you know, why doyou think there isn't so much comedy in

(57:25):
Germany? He says, well,call it because you probably killed all the
funny people. Yes, yes,I'm bringing it back to the people,
back to doing it. I'm makingGerman's laugh again. Because we did a
theater festival there in ninety seven.It was a twisted version of Hansel and
Gretel. But the witch was MarthaStewart, played by me at one hundred

(57:47):
and nineteen pounds, and it wasand so it was really bizarre and psychedelic.
And there's a splashing scene. GoogleGoogle what that is. Kids.
It's like a sexual covered in foodand juices and stuff. And the East
Berlin audience was just fascinated but completelyconfused. They were like I kept hearing

(58:12):
vasus las vass sauce. Berlin's myfavorite city. I love Berlin. It
has the most eccentric, bohemian archymelting pot I've ever been to. I
love Berlin. And you can justwalk into a party and start helping yourself
to the food. We were like, we were doing that, like it
was of course it was ninety seven. It was you know, shortly after

(58:35):
the wall came down, the onlypeople that were living wanting to live there
were like, you know, hippies, bohemians and theater freaks and artists and
and they are all throwing these partieson the government dime and they had all
this great food and you were justyou know, crash a party and they're
like help billself to the to thehumus and you know, all vegans,

(59:00):
right, I guess the first timeI went there was the late nineties.
I loved it. I was like, just post wall, it was great.
Oh my god, it was somuch fun. Yeah, and I
still love it. It's like it'sgot that same energy now, but now
it's city wide. I kind oflove it for that that's freaky and dark
and interesting and amazing. And yeah, it's definitely one of my favorite cities
in the world. So I'm gonnabe spending about two weeks in Berlin when
I go next time, just forfunzies, any dungeon trips. There's a

(59:22):
lot of dungeons there. Uh,that's I think it's a whole different episode.
But I was there for my birthdayin October and it was a good
time, all right. A littlebit of that, mister Joel Bryant,
comedian tink Master to mutter O cR Obstacle Course racer Champion, how have

(59:45):
you actually won anything? Like?Because people ask me all the time of
like, did you win any moneyfrom your competition? I'm like, obviously
not. Yeah, I wouldn't behere talking to you. Yeah, exactly,
I'd be a professional. I wonI want I won two races.
It was just a metal smaller racesthat you know, and I think they're
in anymore. And then because ofmy advanced age, I'm in a great

(01:00:07):
bracket now where I just cross overto the next age bracket. So I
I do probably finish like top three, top five in the age bracket usually,
which is great. Is this overthirty five? Yeah, I'm under
eighty five over No, it's likeforty nine and then it depends on the
race. But forty nine forty eighth, she's just like a cutoff for a

(01:00:29):
lot of races. So I dowell because I'm the young buck in in
the new category. So oh,I got to tell you, man,
if you if you could do anyathletic race over the age of fifty and
you're halfway decent, you got it. Made. Oh yeah, for sure,
Yeah, I look at it.Yeah, So that's why I'm kind
of excited about turning. I turnedfifteen October, so I'm pretty excited about
jumping into a different age bracket forlike Spartan and stuff. So that's what

(01:00:52):
I'm hoping to finally achieve my dreamsat fifty. I'm fifty and I can
still kick it. I can kickand stretch and kick. Thank you,
Molly Shannon, and thank you forcorrecting the quote, by the way,
is the fact that is I canstretch, kick and stretch. I'm fifty,

(01:01:15):
do it all the time. Yeah, it'll be fine to see her
do that character when she's like eightyand be like, I'm eighty fifty.
That was one of the greatest contributionsto aging, was Molly Shannon's character.
Yeah, she made fifty seem doable. Yeah. Now now you're like,
God, that seems so old atthe time, but now you're like,

(01:01:37):
you're like, well, I gottawatch Yeah, now I gotta watch Golden
Girls from my next benchmark and belike, look like a silly cheese kick
and hang out with friends. Weren'tthey they were younger than fifth Now there
were fifty fifty five. I thinkmost of them. Some of them.
Yeah, they were like mid tolate fifties, Like they were the same
age as you are. Mark.No, if you really will well right,

(01:02:00):
that blew me away. Okay,I'm actually doing pretty good because you're
older than him. Now right,I am older than him. We're all
older than Wilford, Brimley and Cocoon. That's our that's our lasting legacy right
there. Our secret is glorious.What was the name of the Welch?
What was her name of the ConnieWelch, wasn't it the actress she was

(01:02:23):
Rokel Welch's daughter was in that movie. Welch had a daughter. Yes,
I lived in the same building whereRaquel Welch was lived in when she was
an infant. That's really yeah.When I first met Foster, that's the
building I was living in. AndI just found this out like a couple
of weeks, like a few monthsago. It's Tonny Welch, Tonny Welch

(01:02:44):
and Steve Gudenberg Stard in that movieTonnie Welch. Connie Welch had a kid.
She had a kid, Tony TonnieWelch. I like to name Connie
is good. We don't have tohave Connie Connie or Tony Tony t h
n E. You don't meet TonyKatine. I think it was the po
be the most that's spelled the differentway. But tawny like the color that
Tany is more sounds like a NativeAmerican name. How does she spell it?

(01:03:07):
T h A t h t Ah and e e. Oh yeah,
okay, that's that's that. Thatseems abrasive, Maureen Stapleton, Jessica
Tandy, I mean a lot ofDonna Michi. I'm pretty sure we're younger
than those folks, though pretty sure. I don't know. I don't know
the boy from Never Ending Story,Barrett Oliver. You know, we may

(01:03:30):
be, we may be. JessicaTandy's age from Jessica was old when I
was a child. Well, yeah, well we're definitely not gonna be.
We just need to find a swimmingpool with glowing pods in it. Everything'll
be okay. There was one inBerlin. I'll tell you about next time
I talk to you. Oh,I can't wait. I'll then isolation tech

(01:03:52):
exactly. But you're not isolated atall. Joel, thank you so much
for coming on the show and talkingabout all this. It was a real
pleasure reconnecting with you and good luckon the on all your future races.
All you too are absolute joys andI love this. This has been the
best time I've ever spent McDonald's parkinglot in Hollywood. Second bestie, don't

(01:04:17):
I send all the love out toyou all and love back to you.
Take care of bud it all right, Bye bye. Joel Bryant lives in
Hollywood, California. You can visithim at Joel Bryant dot net. Follow
my Instagram, Yes, sir,see his travels. He gets around that
guy. Yeah, it's racing aroundthe world. I know. He just

(01:04:41):
doesn't stop. He's like the roadrunner, Beat beep, road Runner, beat
meep. I want to ride.Folks that we can't do this podcast without
your support, So if you're nota Plus member yet, sign up today
at feastafun dot com slash plus orjoin us on Patreon for that ad free
experience at Patreon dot com slash Feastof Fun. Let's grow big together and
feast the fun. Are you know? Sibling podcast? This is being simultaneously

(01:05:05):
podcasting across two different shows, butwe do have exclusive unique shows on Let's
Grow Big Together and Feast the Funand so check both of those out.
But this is a this is apodcast that kind of fits in both fields.
So we're like, let's put itin both of those. Yeah,
muscles come, Yeah, hang outwith us, Yes, listen. If

(01:05:25):
you want to hire me as yourcoach, your consultant, or posing,
message me on Instagram. Let's GrowBig Together and I'm pretty affordable ninety nine
dollars for an hour. We talkabout anything you want to all your questions
answered about fitness and bodybuilding and buildingmuscle and if you want to practice your
posing, which is really important evenfor people who don't necessarily compete, but

(01:05:48):
to develop your body, message me. It's pretty affordable at Instagram. Foulsto
Ferinos, thank you so much forlistening. Bye bye bye as Popbations Part
Dons and Accubation p