Brian Regan & Bob Talk Writing Comedy, Being Willing to Fail, & Brian's New Special “On the Rocks”

hey it's uh it's me it's bob and it's the show that is titled bob saget's here for you talking in third person which is uncomfortable um i have a guest today uh who i just think the world of brian regan one of the best stand-up comics that exists in our world and he's just a universally special guy and he does what comedians are supposed to do which is speak for everybody it almost it excludes no one uh no matter who you are really that's my opinion and a lot of other people's opinions he's uh he's so great he's played radio city and carnegie hall and toured the country and in lots of the world and he he's an actor as well um recently in a peter farrelly series and he's just incredibly talented and incredibly prolific so uh we're about to admit him into the zoom room and in the meantime i must tell you to do what you do with this uh show you use rate and review it but subscribe rate and review it nicely i'm a very sensitive dude but i take notes i do um because i i'm always trying to better myself right now i'm always trying to butter myself and the other thing you can do is follow this and you can also call that number up top and i'll be calling people and i'll let you know on twitter instagram stories when i'll be calling you guys and see how you're doing um this is a really uh incredible craftsman of stand-up comedy and just one of the people that i look to as one of the best so here we are i'm welcoming brian regan [Music] thanks for uh for doing this of course thank you you know how i feel about you it's purely physical so where are you where are you now i'm in my home in las vegas and that is good right you love it there right yes i've been here 18 years now and uh you mean you've been in quarantine that long i've been in quarantine for 18 years i was o.j simpson's cellmate for a few years out here top or bottom bunk uh we we'd flip back and forth wherever he wanted to be i would go yeah that's fine yeah i mean he's got spies um i've actually seen him a few times out here he lives here and and vegas and he hits the nightclubs you know me i'm a big nightclub guy oh my god you've been partying forever i've been i'm i'm just mr party and um so i was in a club uh it sounds weird i'm in a bar you know a club doesn't i don't even i feel weird saying i was in a club like i'm like i'm 25 years old well it's you just walking around and he go ahead he walked behind me and put his hand on my back you know to just scoot by and that feeling of that's oh jay's hand i was in a sushi bar once it was right after the trial and he was a free man and um and we were my three daughters and i and and they'd been watching the news with me we'd all seen a lot and he was there with a date and i told them that in this sushi bar he had killed all the fish and i got a laugh from the oldest the other two looked at me like what are you gonna what are you gonna do to me dad this is really bad going to mess up my mind brian you're i just watched uh your new special on the rocks and um it's out tomorrow actually that's when this is uh coming out this pod okay so it is i don't want to say want your best but i mean you're all always great but it's really great thank you yeah thanks is it now you're so volumous not in metric weight but i'm saying how you're prolific was that how long did you roll that set or i mean just walk me through it well i i had a a two special deal with netflix this is the second of the two the first special came out i don't know three years ago yeah something like that thank you so once that comes out you know i start the process of trying to come up with a new hour you know i always say there's three simultaneous goals there's the individual jokes a little a bit and then there's the five minute spots you know for letterman or fallon or something like that those are a different animal and then there's the hour goal so all of those are happening at the same time but that this hour started about three years ago that that's uh that makes sense i'm on like a four hour i mean i mean i'm on a four year i'm on a four hour podcast now i'm on a i'm on a four year between specials trajectory you're i mean i know for a fact that you will do a special and you'll shoot like half the material is different than the other set we shoot two in one night is how you do it but you're you're pretty prolific what what do you think you credit that too well i hate that that sounds like an interviewer question because in your stand-up you're constantly talking and you have the the greatest dumb person character which you are one of them sometimes right but but you're learned you're a learned man thank you and you say you love words i appreciate that i i like for me i like to think that the comedy is coming from two perspectives it's from a guy who feels uncomfortable and inadequate and insecure but that guy is also aware of the world and can see stupid behavior and you know so i like both of those things happening within the comedy and i hope it comes across that way it always bugs me when people think it's just the dumb side it's like well that's only half the joke unfortunately we're living in a time where people are exuding quite a bit of that persona but you're being self-aware about it that's what's so brilliant about it you've always done that well that's what a great stand-up is is they look from the outside so that you're giving the full view for sure thanks man but to answer your earlier question the as far as prolific which i appreciate there was a time when i got lazy and when i first started headlining and first started getting a little bit of a following you know i was in comedy clubs and i was like wow people are coming out to see me which was very intriguing and then so the numbers went up audience numbers and then they started going down again and i remember hearing comments after shows where people go it's the same stuff but it's funny every time and like they think that's a compliment but to me i'm like wow i don't want it to be the same stuff so i realized that i needed to go back to when i first started doing comedy and go back to that fear of not knowing if something was going to get a laugh or not and stop relying on the sure laughs you know throw those sure laughs out and go back to the drawing board and that's when i started like really feeling like okay now i can come up with all kinds of stuff if i'm willing to try and willing to experiment willing to fail you know and once you get those sea legs it becomes i mean i know that you'll some i go to clubs to work out stuff so that when i'm doing hard ticket gigs i'm not screwing around i'll put new stuff in on in a theater gig but you i understand that you know you'll put in like 10 minutes 15 minutes of new stuff in a in a hard ticket gig which is yeah and you sneak it in you know you bookend it with stuff that hopefully you know will work and then put some other stuff in there that doesn't work and i found not by design but i find that if an audience sees a joke not work they're even more appreciative of the ones that do work then they you know what i mean like they go oh everything isn't a home run you know what i mean and i i feel like it it's a win-win do you do the i mean i do the carson backpedal johnny carson not carson daly you know if something i'm trying doesn't go anywhere i'll i'll do the you know what johnny did so well bill maher actually does johnny carson he admits it you know his stature and how if something doesn't work he'll blame it on the writers or he'll or you know well maybe it wasn't there do you do that kind of thing sometimes yeah you know i mean like i'll have a a couple of savers you know uh to get myself out of a bit that doesn't work and my stuff is a little you know i'm not doing one-liners you know like i i have to commit to a bit that's gonna last two or three minutes long and if it doesn't work it's glaringly obvious it isn't like well that was a line and now i can just move on so you know as long as i acknowledge it playfully i i'm fine you know what i mean crowds will always give you a foul ball they're willing to give you a foul ball right right and and people ask me and i'm sure they ask you when they don't understand what this is you know i heard actually bill maher talk about it the other night do you ever bomb and i i would say what's your answer to that yes yes of recent let's play pandemic no no i um i just did a private event about a week ago in front of a bunch of high rollers and a casino i got the feeling within the first 30 seconds they didn't really know who i was and yeah i mean they were polite but there's a difference between performing in front for me if i'm performing in front of people who have an idea of who i am and what i do or they've heard hey this guy's pretty funny that's one kind of audience but if i'm performing for a people for people who are assembled for another reason a corporate event or a charity event or it's a business meeting and they throw an entertainer on if they're assembled for another reason other than me it is a complete crap shoot how i'm going to do i would bet against me i'd bet against me in those situations i i they always say to me because my act evolves i'm a chameleon you know i could i could be clean as a whistle i and sometimes i just do what i do um i've always looked up to you for how amazingly funny you are and it's not your voice to curse because and i only had a shock value time with one special i had been trying to break out of a box for a while and then i just cursed if it felt like it was there it's just my vernacular um but you know you're one i'm telling you the truth you're one of the best living standups um oh man thank you there's thousands of dead ones that are better than you i i concur what what was it like you did before a four episode thing with with jerry jerry seinfeld um right yeah well he was kind enough it was on netflix it was a four episode series called stand up and away and it was a hybrid of my stand up that would then segue into sketch and uh seinfeld was just kind enough to spearhead it for me i mean he could not have been a a better executive producer like he likes my stuff which is a huge honor in and of itself he said he felt i should have a tv show and he wanted to help me have one i mean what kind of that's better than gold frankincense and myrrh i mean what kind of gift is that right so so he and i went to netflix and just used his clout to get me the four episode series but he was cool enough to not be over involved like he wanted it to be my vision he said i'll weigh in and say certain things but at the end of the day you make i realize i'm talking with my hands way too much here no it's perfect for this because some people will look at it on youtube it's like jeff dunham to them um i'm watching myself your physical community i can't tell a story with that oh really um yeah you probably didn't know but we'll get back to that so anyway he spearheaded it for me and kind of let me let the vision be mine and uh it was a huge honor that he helped get that in help get that going for me you know it's funny the meeting it's jerry seinfeld and me and netflix people and it was so comforting because no matter what they asked me you know like if they would go all right well how do you see this show progressing my answer could always just be that's jerry seinfeld [Laughter] so you're just farming the whole time yeah you need to know can't get over it he wants to do this so that's it it's the end of the story you know so what would you like to do uh not say no to jerry exactly well he did it with colin quinn he directed produced um because he knows the best people and you truly are exceptional i i and many people that are some very well known now kind of i'm sure you see them and go wow that's me isn't it that's a little bit of my way of functioning we all we all got it from somewhere um who were i hate asking this i sound like an old steve allen interview uh who i cause i really want to know because i see different shades of people in you but what what were your big influences how okay let's do the whole thing how did comedy first hit you how old were you when you started and were you in miami which is where you're from i grew up in miami i went to college in ohio small midwestern school called heidelberg college i went there to play football and i thought to become an accountant and after one year of economics i switched majors to communication theater arts and it was in that world i started doing plays and public speaking and that sort of thing and that's when i hit on that crazy notion of i wonder if i could be a comedian like like it was so fascinating to even have the thought you know like what year was that uh i was so i was supposed to graduate in 1980 so it was around 79 80 when i first started having these ideas and that's when the comedy boom started that's when i got to the comedy store and that's when it really was rock and roll i i got so fortunate when i first decided to be a comedian comedy had not quite yet exploded comedy clubs were still in new york and la so i was planning to move to new york i had to pick one of the two cities that was my plan i go back down to miami and in the miami herald there's an ad for the comic strip comedy club in fort lauderdale florida it was a sister club to the one in new york city oh yeah and it said open mic night on monday night i haven't come across an ad in my life that has changed me so much like i was like i can get there in a with a tank of gas like i was planning to have to move to new york i'm like i just got to get a tank of gas and i could get from miami to fort lauderdale and do this open mic thing and that's what uh that's how i got into the comedy club world how long were you there working out at that club i auditioned there five times uh when i passed my auditions they let me go on every night and i was there for about two and a half years i went on almost every single night for two and a half years before i then decided to go out on the road and that's when comedy started exploding around the country clubs started opening and all of these cities and i was so fortunate that i i was able to work every week not because i was any good they all these clubs needed comedians if you could stand on stage for 30 minutes and not melt you could get booked and uh so i just took advantage of that i gotta go back to the special that's out right now starting tomorrow and or whenever you're listening this is probably out right now but you do something that you do address incredibly serious stuff you're you know you do it in the whole at a party conversation thing with people um you're talking about people that are just saying nothing that drives you crazy and then so and then you talk about basically you get to the death penalty i mean you talk about you know crimes you you veil things in a general way but it's so cool how you do it because you you hit some hardcore topics but you wouldn't know it because you're so likable and real about it yeah i appreciate it man i like to talk about thank you i like to talk about mundane stuff but then i also like to hit with some real stuff and have it be a little bit of everything you know um i love being able to like the crime stuff i really am proud of that you know i like to talk about stuff like that and um you know it might be surprising to some listeners to go i thought he talked about donut sprinkles which i do but i also like to talk about the death penalty [Laughter] i mean most comedians are dark off they're dark offstage you know they get they get depressed and stuff and and they get upset with what's going on in the world but anybody from right or left or in between can watch especially the all of your uh stand up see you live if they're lucky enough or watch your specials which you've done seven one was a dvd and one was recorded and another and the other five were uh full-on film specials right am i right i have eight i have this thing i just did on the rocks that we're talking about is the eighth one hour that's out there a lot of them have been specials one was a self-produced dvd one was a self-produced cd um so they're not all specials but i have eight different hours of material that well our publicist michael o'brien who is one of the meanest people i've ever met in my life who's nine foot five uh he told me he's seven he told me seven and i went well he's fired he's fired he's that's right that's what this is about let's get him run out of town [Laughter] so judy do you yell at the news what goes on when no one's watching this delightful guy that wants to entertain as many people as possible it's a very good question because with stand-up comedy you have a a microphone and an ability to share things with people but it's a constant internal debate as to how much to decide how much to share and how much not to share because i do have thoughts and beliefs and that sort of thing and i like to hint at them or sneak them in a little bit but i don't like to over expose where i'm coming from as an individual i i try to be a little cagey with it you know i try to do the jokes that both sides would think i'm on their side you know you know oh he believes what we believe and the other side goes oh he believes what we believe um but yeah i've got i got feelings about current stuff but um i try to kind of stand on the sideline in terms of jumping into the cauldron of everybody shooting fireballs at each other you know well that whole thing you just lose the comedy there's not a lot of i mean i i'm a twitter guy i'm on instagram and the things that people are finding funny are just you know basically running old america's funniest home videos clips you know just running that and once in a while a tick tock but a lot of the time it's just anger toward politics in the in the world and you're needed so bad i am such i always feel like i am such a bad interviewee like like i love getting on stage and being able to share things that i've been able to put scaffolding around and come up with a beginning middle and an end but when i'm being interviewed i like being interviewed by comedians because they kind of get it but people outside of that world like i feel like i'm the lamest like like i feel like if somebody were watching me they would go not only are we not gonna buy a ticket to see this guy we have to call our friends who have tickets and tell them to cancel i wouldn't that's not my takeaway here this is more of a conversation though so i'm enjoying this but you're coming off well i would people are going to buy tickets and you're back out am i right you're going back out to half capacity places for safety now soon right yes well i only sell half capacity to begin with but now it looks like hey this place would have been full but i can't blame it there's a pandemic um yeah i'm out yeah i've been playing the half capacity uh comedy clubs and some outdoor venues i did two drive-in movie theater things which um might be the last two i'll do in this lifetime um you know but uh yeah what was that what was what was your experience with that because i was gonna do one but right when i was going to do it the hospital capacity in the california and orange county area was 115 so there was no way to get in and i went what if you know 400 people 400 cars are there and one of them gets in an accident coming to see me and they can't get in the hospital i caused that so that's how far neurotic i went so what was the driving experience like the first one i did i got on i forget how many cars were there and not people were in their cars but people were also out of their cars you know sitting in lawn chairs and stuff like that but it was so spread out and people were so far away that my biggest strongest laughs sounded like this [Music] i'm not joking like like like that was it and then 75 of my stuff was getting from my perspective silence there were people who were walking around who said no people are enjoying it they were at their that's what you want no people are enjoying it while i'm on stage it was like a uh a science experiment where i'm like all right i just have to try to pretend like i'm doing well and just see if i can give it the timing and the energy and the pauses that this comedy is supposed to have in a void in a vacuum and um so i i enjoyed it in a weird way because it was so bizarre but you know comedy ultimately is about laughs and if you take that away from the equation i mean talk about sucking the fun out of it for a performer you know so this show that you did that you're special that was shot uh pre-quarantined correct no no it was shot it was shot in october of this last year our publicist michael o'brien we got to get him on the phone and let him know what's going on um it looked full in the audience well it was it that was it was shot in um ivan's utah at an outdoor amphitheater everybody in the audience has masks on you can't they try to shoot around it but like if you look you can see that that area of the country was the least infected area or one of the least infected areas in the country in terms of kobit and then even with that they they had all kinds of protocols involved for us backstage and for the audience and uh but yeah no that was shot um in october that's amazing to me so it was uh i'm just happy that i was able to get a special out during these times because most people that are doing specials have to do these unusual venues and right you know what i mean and it's like i wanted this to look like it was a special that had nothing to do with cope you know that you accomplished that i mean you mentioned it at the top kind of you mentioned it and you also talk about it's in the promo so i'm not going to be uh teasing your hair but but you do mention that you uh stop the coloring and then amazingly hilarious observation of you buying hair dye or how guys do you every it's all so refined every piece of material you've always done that's why i just love watching you it's so thank you do you write it down um do what how did how does it function do you get up in the morning and do what a writer does or do you do what i do which is you get an idea write it down and then think of where would this go and then what's your process i'm not good at sitting down and creating comedy i just don't know how to do it i've tried to sit at a keyboard i've tried to sit at a blank piece of paper a blank piece of paper and me for an hour equals a blank piece of paper like nothing's nothing's coming out of me i have to go and i just learned that for me i'm just do what i would normally do i walk where i would normally walk i watch what i would normally watch and then every once in a while you see something in a weird way and you go hey that could be a bit and then you write it down and then um i'll have a version of it in my head and then i hit the stage i tape every show and i find a lot of the best writing takes place on stage you figure out in the moment to get at it you know that's how i've heard most people do it um i know jerry is meticulous about writing writing um even by his book that he had with all of the jokes from the beginning until the present it's it's there i mean it's in print and i know you work a bit in your head will you wrestle with it for like a long period of time just like and that's what i do i'll keep trying to get there with it yeah yeah that's to me i love the process you know i mean it sounds cliche or whatever but it's like the initial idea is one thing it's like okay this is a funny idea and then i love that night after night thing of trying to uh figure out the best way to convey it the lottery number bit no no i got everybody the lottery number bit okay it's it's brian regan on the rocks netflix the lottery number bit i've never heard anything like it i didn't know you you proved you were ocd it's so great go ahead sorry no thank you i like the bit because it it's not an exaggeration i've been around people who have told that very story telling me the the numbers that they picked like how can you possibly think this is an entertaining tale but in the performance aspect of it it's kind of a dangerous bit and that if people aren't riding the silliness from jump street it's a long way to go it's just a guy telling his lottery ticket numbers so i had to put some comedy helper in there after the two tickets i had to put in a little moment where it comes back to me going this is the story this guy's telling just a little just a little get him back on track and so i do one ticket two tickets and then i had to interject that moment and then third ticket and four ticket so it's little things like that where i used to just do all four tickets and every once in a while an audience would like okay we get it already so but you learn that from doing it night after night you know it's like okay this needs a little help here this needs a boost here drop this moment or add this moment i i love that i love learning things like that night after night yeah and it as it's theatrical to be able to do that it's you know it's like a lot of plays have you know the stage manager from our town i'm sure i lost everybody with that reference but you know you look to the audience and you explain you're in the middle of talking to these guys right it's it's an acting piece really which i wanted to segue quickly that you have played mugsy a recovering addict who is estranged from his family in the peter farrelly tv series uh loudermilk starring ron livingston and peter just called you out of the blue how did that come about he saw me perform at lucyfest you know and i forget the city western the western state of new york there's a comedy festival anyway he saw me perform there jackie flynn a friend of mine comedian knows peter fairley brought him to my show and then after the show peter fairley said he was working on this tv series i wanted to know if i'd want to be in it and i said i said well i don't know if i know how to act you know i said i've never been in anything and he said no you know how to act and i'm like uh well how do you know that he goes well i just saw your show and he goes because everything you're doing is acting you just have to take what you're doing and put it into a character so that kind of threw me you know like wow okay so anyway he cast me in this show and um we're hoping it lands in a new platform two seasons have aired the third season has been shot and uh i'm proud to be in it and let's see if i saw some of it you're really good i mean thank you you're clearly clearly an actor i mean just when you're having conversations in all of your stand-up all these years you know to have that other person who's very articulate have someone who's not as articulate for you to be self-aware about your own self-effacing ignorance and then also when you make that face i'm gone when you where does that come from does that this come from being out in the world and you see millions of people that act like that um i don't know i i the dumb the dumb the dumb fantasy guy me feeling dumb i like to you know exaggerate it as much as possible and it just feels goofy i don't know i don't know where it comes from it's wonderful i mean bill burr must have you know he's so brilliant and i would think he would be influenced by you just by i mean he's a we're all he's an original voice of course but i mean he does the thing where he's always doing the voice of countercult uh cl you know cancel culture it's like you know but you just said that you're you know why why'd you say that and he's always a whiny angry you've got the same you have just this voice this inner conscience now i appreciate it i uh i didn't realize until i don't know when i was new to the road i decided hey i better like put some effort into this craft you know so i i was trying to script out my act it's like i'm going to script out all my jokes and while i was doing it i realized these are mostly vignettes they're not jokes they're scenes yeah it's me and an eye doctor it's me and a flight attendant it's me and an inanimate object it's me in an ironing board it's being a microwave oven it's it's there are moments you know that are funny and so i have to for it to work i have to act it out you know what i mean and so it's fun to do so who are your influences because what you just what you described right before the break was some of our greatest comedians that ever lived uh bob newhart would always be him in a circumstance at the dentist um who are you who would you say influenced you the most when you're in miami were you watching tv with your dad mom when i was young i mean i i always enjoyed comedy as a fan but i never dreamed i would go in that direction you know but some of the names are then obvious names like richard pryor i just love watching richard pryor in fact i watched one who does specials recently it had it came on hbo and i was watching it and i literally sound corny i started crying like emotionally because i was watching art done at a magnificent level and it's like you know it's like i like to think wow i like doing stand-up comedy and to watch somebody like him do it in such a beautiful pure way and and talk about revealing you know it's nice to watch somebody do it at a level that is like through the roof so i used to love watching him george carlin for his you know work ethic and how much stuff he put out there i read both of his books george carlin's brain droppings and with napalm and silly putty it's the only books i've ever read where i was literally laughing you know hard while i'm reading a book and it's like because i can hear his voice in the words um and i was always a big fan of steve martin's stand-up comedy this is what i wanted to talk to you about because by the way those are the three people i see when i'm looking at you i see that i see the characters because richard would go into the characters he would just be gone and but his was of course his experience is different than yours he'd be a junkie or you know and then he would snap out of it and talk to the audience um and steve martin is that's where the physical comes from because i talked to you earlier and said you're physical and you went like you know you weren't sure for a moment but his whole thing was always fluid movement yes you know and and silly it's silly and smart double barrel like amen his character was ridiculously goofy but the comedian was incredibly smart and so you i'm laughing at both those things i'm laughing at the character but i'm laughing at the comedian i always think like buffoonery without smarts is just dull you know what i mean just like a goof you want there to be some smarts to it and steve martin had a like there was a for a force of smartness to the silliness and uh i just always got a big kick out of him i wish he would do stand-up again i really do but well it's interesting because i know that when he was out touring doing the bluegrass thing um i'd talk to someone who said well there's like 12 minutes of stand up if you if you shake the tree and just take out his talking to the audience and then him and marty kind of have those moments you know when they go out and tour and they're doing a show together which is really cool but he's probably one of the greatest that has ever lived also and then carlin what's different about you that i love so much is that you can get the poignancy out and you're not angry brian so why are you not angry i mean i don't exude anger on stage either unless someone says something that's wrong to say in a room full of people to me which i expect once i go out touring again will happen because people are have you had disgruntled people lately yeah i i have a lot of difficulty if somebody yells something mean-spirited um it doesn't happen that often you know but sometimes people you know we all deal with hecklers and stuff like that if i ever have to cross that line into being a disciplinarian from the stage it's it's very very hard to go back over that line to hey it's me again because the audience just they realized we just saw we just saw some anger there it's kind of hard for us to forget that whereas you know a lot of comedians who who are acerbic to begin with in their point of view can drill a heckler and get right back it's not the tone is no different but for me it's disarming to have to discipline a crowd from the stage you know it's uh very frustrating and then you have to go into power mode or and it changes the energy of what you do after that right right i've had a bunch of that um but i am equipped as you know from uh history right now with uh jewish lasers so i'm able to uh stun them wow because i have one in my eyes i i'm in the market i i'll be happy to to purchase one or two now have you been coveted do you go to the market i had covered i got the covet oh i did know that from our wonderful publicist michael o'brien he knows everything he does he does when did you get it i got it in december do you know how you got it no idea i mean you weren't lying in a home depot on the ground with your mouth open well i do i do that anyway but i didn't realize that was a way to catch coke i was supposed to do shows in florida i was going to be flying on a red eye took a rapid test during the day and then got the results like seven o'clock at night and it was sort of like wow okay so we had to do the whole public relations thing get the social media out that i had to cancel that weekend's shows and you know and then i i had no symptoms whatsoever though that it was at when i got it like that night i smoked a cigar and drank wine i'm like this is the weirdest sickness ever you know like uh i'm sick okay and then a few days later i started getting a slight cough and then it got worse and worse and worse and like i got it pretty rough actually you know um i didn't have to go to the hospital or anything like that but it was it was it was pretty intense and uh i don't wish it on anyone well really that would be a weird wish that would be well people did wish it on some people i guess people that didn't believe in covet but you can't wish ill on people that's a very hard way to look at things now because that's not where a lot of people are coming from i need to get out and do stand-up i need to be in contact with people because i want covet also i got the perfect places i'll give you my tour schedule and then just repeat it and you'll probably end up with it i will and i'll just out all my pauses i'll just have my mouth open i'll just you know instead of keeping it closed and strutting i noticed a lot in this special on the rocks you were and you not what's great is you're not aware of it because some people plan to move you know they're they should be accountants rather than just follow their natural way of doing their performance but you and and i've learned it over 40 years of stand-up that you walk the stage you figure out when it's a good time to move when you wanna and and it doesn't always stay the same but you you're very uh physical you really do act things out uh with your hands with your way you motion your body changes as an actor when you turn just can you do a dumb person talking to me just for a minute i would not ask you to prove know i don't know what you're talking about i don't even know if i can duplicate it i have to be in the i have to let me ask you a question is is it you as a dumb person or is it just somebody that oh this is a guy that um i'm talking to a guy that uh went to go see brian regan's show um what what what were your reactions did you like it sir i thought it was really funny but dude some of the stuff was like way over my head see so now that that's a compliment you're not taking this this guy's admitting his shortcomings i don't think people always say that that's like really that's like sweet there's no anger in that guy he's nothing he's just a good guy he's a good guy he just doesn't have all the stuff that would take to get all of your stuff [Laughter] so now you are gonna touring's your favorite thing right one of them i like being on stage doing the the comedy i don't like you know going to the airport and looking up and finding out that your flight is cancelled yeah and then you got to deal with you know that that whole deal i remember when i first started working with my manager rory rosegarden who's great i'm he's my friend i've loved him forever rory is great so we were you know i was a new client to him and i was at i was living in new york at the time i was at la guardia and i was supposed to fly to some gig and um they canceled the flight and uh there was a mob scene around the desk of everybody trying to like rebook their flights and get on other airlines and that sort of thing so i called rory this is before pay phones i called rory and i said hey listen i'm at the gate and uh they just canceled the flight there's a mob scene around the gate and so he goes brian here's what i need he knew me a little bit he goes here's what i need you to do i want you to hang up this phone i want you to walk to the front of that line you walk in front of everybody i want you to walk up to that reservationist and i want you to say i am a performer and i have a show that i have to be at tomorrow night you need to book me on the next flight immediately and i said uh rory i'm going home and he said okay so much for the aggressive attitude that he would have done yeah i mean that that's something you're comfortable with rory not me i'm sure there are people that have more pressing reasons to get to where this flight was supposed to go than me uh i have a show i have to do right i'm needed in calgary yeah okay so you've played the most hallowed venues in the u.s um [Music] uh all of them basically right radio city carnegie hall yeah um rocks amphitheater outside of denver that was amazing you know um what a beautiful place yeah i'm trying to think of what other uh kennedy center in washington um yeah it's pretty amazing to be able to you know walk on stage do you see the signatures on the wall of all these like amazing artists that have performed in these places and you know you look in a mirror and go what the hell how did this happen how did this happen that i'm going out on that stage you know i still wonder sometimes you know well michael i have two questions that one i'll finish with the venues what was the they're they're all a dream is it all like the best date ever in a person's life or is there one place or show or a couple shows that stand out to be like holy crap i can't believe this well it's hard not to you know like to do radio city or to do carnegie hall it's hard not to realize the magnitude of it you know to go man these places are iconic like everybody you could go into the into the amazon jungle and go up to people who have never been contacted before and go what's the most famous venue they go radio city you know well i performed there ah really all right we won't shoot a blow dart india so yeah it's it's it's it's amazing and it's humbling you know it's it's all that i i think it's because and i know you don't want to praise yourself but you work your ass off right i mean you're you're always do is it a strong work ethic that was instilled because it sounds like from what you were saying earlier that you acquired it after you realized i don't want to keep doing the same stuff every night i don't want to be that right correct yeah like i i mean i worked up until that point but in terms of hey i want to get out there and get booked in clubs and that sort of thing but i forgot about the comedy part of it and the creating part of it and then when i [Music] realized oh wait a second let's bring that back into the equation then i've worked on all of that i mean i i do like to work but i also have these i'm gonna be done fantasies you know like uh i like the idea of not having to work jerry seinfeld thinks comedians can't retire he he's like no comedians have to do comedy until they die i agree i don't know i don't know i mean i i like the idea of going all right i i did a body of work and now i want to learn how to fly fish and i'm done you know i don't know if i'll ever get to that point but maybe but you do get so much love from the craft i mean it's like i think it's i mean i was seeing don rickles in a wheelchair at you know and on stage in a sitting in a chair and um and it was still hilarious you went to pay tribute to the man and bob newhart will do an occasional gig mel brooks does a a talk back you know he'll sit and have someone interview him and then he does little bits in between it's fun to watch that i mean i can't see you know marty allen marty allen i've met him i don't know him i mean he passed away but uh a few of us went to go watch him perform in las vegas a very small venue this is like i don't know six seven years ago maybe longer than that and we had a little front table a little cozy little vegas nightclub and he came out on stage in his tuxedo older guy and he was getting laughs and i mean i'm sitting right underneath him and uh i could see the twinkle in his eye like like he was loving every minute of it and it this is contradictory to what i was saying before about retiring but it made me feel like it was very comforting to me like so maybe i could just enjoy doing this forever you know like this guy is an older guy he's probably in his late 70s or something and he's still on stage getting laughs and enjoying the hell out of it and it was very comforting and rewarding to be able to watch that you know yeah yeah i mean i don't want you to retire just because you're going to have more perspectives you have a lot of good i i have a lot of medical material it happens as we get older we just there's no one that doesn't have something about a colonoscopy or you know hits you you know but i mean it'd be really fun to watch you decay and do material events you know johnny carson when he retired one of the few interviews that he did somebody asked him uh you know what's it like being retired and he said for the most part he likes it but the hardest thing for him was thinking of something funny during the day and realizing that he he didn't have a stage that night to say it on and i was like okay that could be that could prevent me from retiring because you know when you think of something like i i always know if i think of something i can do something with it i can write it down and do it in a show somewhere but what if i'm done then what you know is that is that one of your fears that you feel like you're going to run out because you you literally seem like a never-ending uh waterfall of the material i couldn't come up with a better word than waterfall i was thinking of your bit where you turned the sink on look we have water um no i mean i i always tend to think of things but my fear is if i do choose to retire that things i think of after retirement day won't have i won't have an ability to share them anymore yeah that's the fear johnny carson was very nice to me and i was on his show one time and it was a commercial break and he said i'm sorry the audience was wasn't good tonight and i was just a panel guy because i never did stand up on the show but i was frequent as a as being panel with him and he said sorry they weren't good i said they no they seemed really good to me says they're not they're not good and i said well what do you do when the audience isn't isn't good he goes there's always tomorrow and so then the thought is well what if there isn't a tomorrow because he retired and right from what i heard it was you know he he'd lost his son it was a hard he had a hard disengagement from this amazing i mean there was only one johnny carson no one will ever command that big an audience on tv i used to love watching him uh even before i had any inkling of being a stand-up comedian i just you know when i could stay up late and watch him do a monologue and the way he interviewed people who's very smart like he knew a lot about a lot of things he could interview authors and you know scientists and you know and all of the interviews were smart and engaging and yet he could be very funny and he didn't get laughs at the guest's expense you know um the story i love to tell is the little old lady with the potato chip collection and uh it would have been so easy to mock it would have it would have been so easy to mock this woman but she came out with her potato chip collection she thought all these potato chips looked like different things yeah i remember and uh he you know he got laughs because it's a silly hobby but he didn't make her look stupid you know he made her look like a queen and i just loved that approach like that woman didn't have to go back to her hometown and be embarrassed and go wow that guy really made fun of you the other night i like that win-win kind of comedy you know it was like so beautiful to watch him be nice to that woman me too and and miss it sometimes it's up with people kind of thing yeah but we have it i mean you know um jimmy kimmel um stephen colbert they don't usually make fun of people that they have on you know they don't really have a lot of civilians on that that's what was also unique about johnny he would have just a nice lady with someone quirky or something they'd read about and he put him on first you know now now you open with tom cruise you know hey johnny who's got three surefire anecdotes that are already pre-planned like everything is bam bam bam you know yeah and tom cruise you know he's going to yell at you if you don't you know follow covert restrictions we're going to do one more break just for cleanup at the at last uh segment but i could talk to you all day but i know you're busy because you're promoting the hell out of this amazing special so we'll be right back probably something for mattresses or therapy you know you hear a lot of advertisements about stuff that can make you stronger help your body make you look physically better but not enough attention i don't think is paid to mental health and it's really important and i just want to make clear to you that this is a paid sponsorship and it's brought to you by better help it's interesting to me and it's necessary it really is for a lot of people because we're all under a lot of stress and so many of you out there don't have anybody to talk to and better help is a great solution so you ask yourself what's interfering with your happiness or is there something presenting you from achieving your goals you know what's holding you back a lot of times get out of your own way is what the therapist will tell you but it's easy to hear that but then again when you're in some kind of anxiety mode or a panic attack you need help and better help will assess your needs and match you with your own licensed professional therapist you connect in a safe and private environment online and it's very convenient and you can start communicating in under 48 hours from the moment you're hearing this from me this is not a crisis line it's not a self-help line it is professional counseling done securely online so it is private no one will hear this it will not get out there you can send a message to your counselor any time they're there for you you'll get timely and thoughtful responses plus you can schedule weekly video or phone sessions all without ever having to sit in an uncomfortable waiting room or one that you're not comfortable in because of what we're going through in our world right now better help is committed to facilitating great therapeutic matches so they make it easy and free to change counselors if needed it's more affordable than traditional offline counseling and financial aid is available the services available for clients worldwide find the particular expertise you need online don't limit yourself to counselors located near you licensed professional counselors who specialize in depression or stress anxiety relationships sleeping trauma anger family conflicts lgbt matters grief self-esteem anything anything you share is also confidential it's convenient professional affordable just check out the testimonials posted daily on their site and again this is not a crisis line this is actual therapy in fact so many people have been using better help that they are recruiting additional counselors in all 50 states in the u.s i want you to start living a happier life today and as a listener you'll get 10 off your first month by visiting better help at betterhelp.com bob and that's betterhelp h-e-l-p-dot-com bob join over one million people who have taken charge of their mental health again that's better help help dot com slash bob b-e-t-t-e-r-h-e-l-p dot com slash bob we're back they probably just heard something about mattresses or therapy i don't know and they go together yeah have you ever had therapy is that too personal you don't have to answer oh i have yeah sure same yeah a car needs a tune-up why not a brain why not have somebody smarter than me say hey maybe you should consider looking at it this way or that way i i see nothing wrong with letting somebody guide you to better places yeah you work out your body you want to um right work on different parts of yourself a lot of people pooh-pooh it they don't want to go in and i don't need it i'm just fine and a lot of times i think that they're doing themselves a disservice because we all have pressure we all have pain and that's why that's why you can't quit doing stand-up ever even if your acting career and you've got a great series because i have a feeling that this show is going to come back this this um uh ladder milk that there's you know there's some good words about it i think so too but thank you yeah and you're going to do more acting work because you're really gifted that's why you don't it was funny i was talking to bill burr and i turned 65 this year and i said to bill thank you how old are you 62 now you're a baby 62 reminds me of a rodney dangerfield on the tonight show with johnny carson and johnny goes how how old are you rodney i'm six i'm 61 but all the broads think i'm 60. that's how he got action that's a statue of him right there i got it from the east ah all right ucla and that's a picture of him with red fox right there yeah he's uh he was a friend he was he was so great so great and that's the one liner that's there aren't stories you're you can do both i mean you can throw in one-liners if when they're usually they're in the middle of a story with you you know where but but you do the creative thing that uh carlin always did so well and a lot of people do that are really really good which is you don't do a callback for the hell of it you do it because it's just a thing that's synchronicity it just happens perfectly to bring something back from 40 minutes before or four minutes before yeah thanks i always find it interesting you know when comedians like have a line for another comedian you know they'll watch your show and they'll go hey i got a line for you you go hey hey what's that and then they tell you your line go you can say it say it after you say that yeah okay so you're giving me my line that's very nice of you thank you just saying repeat it okay i understand i understand callbacks say it again later oh that's wow were you right for me all right i'll say it again later and then there's the person that says to you um you'll say i had a you know a great uh time off and their punch-up will be why don't you say vacation you know it's just all a lot of writers they just give you synonyms have you noticed that yeah that is another way of saying that yeah so that how does that change the joke well it's alliteration or it has a c in it you know yeah okay k's are funny i'll throw it in so now you're gonna be you're gonna spend the rest of this year touring is the plan depending on whatever acting stuff happens right yeah and they would go to brian regan.com they could go there yeah wherever they go you can go straight to hell that's that's that's my instagram page go to hell it's called straight to hell [Laughter] i don't want my tour schedule on straight to hell that'd be good to have that at the very last gig yeah all right you just have it fixed there it's not part of your schedule yeah you go oh well at the bottom he goes straight to hell infinity um yeah brianregan.com and then the normal twitter instagram facebook whatever all that people have to see you if you i'm telling you guys if you have not seen brian regan live everybody literally everybody do you get kids at your shows sometimes um thank you by the way for saying that it's very nice um i'm just telling the truth i mean honest to god i mean you're for a lot of people you're one of the holy grails of if you want to be a good comedian watch brian regan and then do his stuff verbatim and do call backs yeah um as far as the kids you know when i was doing comedy clubs there were never any kids in the audience and then when i first started doing like theaters i realized you know people said you know there's like some 12 year olds out there and like really so um i i've always resisted like i don't want people thinking it's a kitty show though you know what i mean like um it's not at all yeah it's like i don't mind if people bring teenagers or 10 year old or something but i'm not twisting balloon animals you know it's like there are going to be a lot of things that they're not going to get they're not going to be a kid is not going to be offended by anything that i do but they're not going to get everything that i do and what about have people um when you've done interviews in the past have they grouped you in and gone he's one of the few good clean comedians have they tried to do that to you yes it's always a challenging thing that word is such a double-edged sword to me double-edged sword is that the expression sword yes a sword sword do you say the w when i when i'm in the fjords everybody there's a company called fjords fjord sword yeah there's they're swords from the fjords swords swords from the fjords they're great swords i think the the swedish cooking chef and the muppets originated whatever his name was yeah um i forget what i was saying it's about clean labeling because i get labeled as being dirty and then i go well i i depends on the show i mean i i do what i find funny it really is a bunch of wiener jokes you know it's really like i'm ten and i don't do as graphic as i mean the aristocrats was probably what skewed people to think that i'm just a filthy fishmonger but i don't like that label because i also like doing family comedy which which doesn't sound safe it sounds like stranger danger but when you get labeled the clean thing what is that does it get your back up yeah yeah i know it shouldn't but i find the term diminishing i i i find it to be like they're putting me on the on a on the sideline it's like well he's a funny clean comedian and it's like i'd rather just be a funny comedian yeah um yeah i like to work clean but uh you know i'd like to think it's can make anybody laugh and that's the gift you have that is it's unbelievable it's such a to be able to talk to literally anybody well thank you and it's been something i've i've fought my whole career like we don't michael o'brien he knows that we don't put clean in any of our press stuff but like if i do a newspaper interview it's it's it's amazing to me i'll do the whole interview and like usually they'll bring up the clean thing and if they don't it's like okay great but the headline clean comedian brian regan coming to such and such it's like why why do you have to put that yeah i find just put comedian you gained like uh you know 200 more audience members and lost 50. or 300 i might have lost 300 you know that like who knows the a lot of people don't want to go watch a clean comedian whereas they want to lose right yeah where if they don't know one way or the other i'd like to think they'd come and have a good time but if if they saw a headline clean comedian they got i don't want to go see this guy right just when they say dirty or they say x-rated i'm like are you guys nuts i'm south park's dirtier than me if you dissect it you know so it's people love to pigeonhole you which is a filthy thing to do that's my that's my comedy right there you know the innuendo of pigeonholing that alone that's me in a nutshell which is another one that's x-rated you're doing x-rated stuff right now i'm so filthy but it's like they want to do that because people don't realize that funny is just funny yes and being who you are as an artist and as a human is who you are and when i watch you you know it's you could have it cursed it wasn't needed it's not needed in what you're doing but it's also you're tackling some mature subject matter that you have to be at least have lived some life to understand what ocd is and that's why i don't do newborn baby shows anymore because um i haven't lived enough life like i've tried them i've done the newborn baby circuit and i'm walking around amongst the bassinets going uh you know who here has ocd and they don't even know words yet you know what i mean like it's like i feel like they don't even understand me they just hear a like a peanuts cartoon just the sound but i've done a show with all uh women giving birth and that um i got applause i thought i was getting applause but it was the doctor slapping the behind of the baby and you thought you were like on a roll i thought it was crushing and it was all the babies were born at the same time and all this slapping was happening and here you are thinking wow i really got them and then the crying and screaming i thought were like people blowing like horns at a party at new year's i thought i was just killing so oh i was going to tell you what bill bird told me i don't know 12 minutes ago because i'm really an amazing interviewer i just like talking to you you know that's what that's why i love doing this podcast so you're nice you're nice don't you hate when you're nice we're so great when i text someone and i'll go thank you and they go thank you and it's just the texting won't end and you just try to end it you put a thumbs up right that's but not even you have to attach it to theirs so they know this is almost over here's something i thought of recently i'm going to try to throw it in my act but like when you're having a communication with somebody you know text communication or email communication but you really don't want to hear from them again you throw it instead of you throw in a whole season like so you go a good way to end it or to punt it is to go hey have a great have a great summer so that you're kind of hinting i don't need to hear from you for three months have a great decade have a great decade hey man text me from a hospital what i was going to say was because you're 61. i'm 65. i'm 62 62. oh you're young to me whatever something like that i think i'm an excellent listener so i said to bill burr i haven't and we were smoking cigars and it was uh during quarantine so i think we inhaled each other's non-covet and um i said you know i haven't even done what i've come here to do meaning work and movies and stand up and make a really good be the best stand-up i've never been be the make the best special i've never made kind of thing because i know i have it what i want to do and i was headed that direction so i said i haven't done what i've come here to do and bill looked at me and said well you better [ __ ] hurry up that was basically like telling me you're gonna die clock is ticking [Laughter] that's funny well brian i can't thank you enough for doing this i i just i'm so happy to talk to you my pleasure man thank you very much it means a lot to me that you like what i do i enjoy your humor very much as well you're filthy brand of i love all your dark twisted evil x-rated other side of the track jokes don't forget hedonistic hedonistic sacrifices see that in a marquee the hedonistic humor of bob saget they had this special about cursing which is on netflix and there and i didn't want to do it because it's like that's just like reinforcing the label um and it was good that my friends were on it and i was like oh maybe i should have done it but it's like i didn't want to i mean george carlin did it right by calling out those words and it's almost like how many more versions of that do we need he already perfected it yeah yeah i don't know i mean like i use those like i'm not filthy but i'm pretty dirty off stage you know with my friends and when i'm golfing and stuff like that it's right f this and f that and people who see my comedy first and then see me in real life i think they're a little surprised you know go why are these words coming out of his mouth you know oh yeah that's weird you know i'm like excuse me you're in my parking space you have a great confidence strut though it's hilarious because you're almost that's what steve martin is to me uh is that not not at all copying him but the fact that he had this this cocky thing of oh my god not just i'm a rambling guy but i'm just he's so super cool it's like the silliest james bond he's wonderfully funny but you have this other thing that is yours that is you're that's what's so delightful because you know who you are and you know who you are on stage and it's a real gift um what you think what you do so don't stop doing it do it as do it even to up to your last breath i want you to die on stage okay 102. that's a nice wish and they'll just put you on a mic stand it'll go up your ass and it'll just be like a scarecrow is that a sweet wish yeah it's a very sweet wish for me to die on well stage everybody needs to watch this special and i'm gonna talk about it after you're gone i do an outro so i'll keep talking about you but uh be safe do you have any scarring do you have any coveted residual stuff are you all back to healthy i think i'm back to 100 that that means that you it's unlikely you could get it right now correct i think i'm in that window where i'm pretty safe but uh i don't know i want to get the vaccination so i don't have to worry about it anymore but uh yeah i'm in that safety zone where i think you have a few months after you've had it where you probably can't get it again yeah i i i wanna they don't give them in the butt and i think that's wrong i think they because you pull up in your car and you just stick your ass out the window and that's right you got the shot right and then you go oh and then have you done i've done i've gotten tested a bunch of times right the one where they stick the big long there's one where i you have to put the q-tip in yourself yeah like the and they just keep saying uh you know no further back further back further back further back and you're like there is no further back it's your brain i'm as far as i can manage if this needs to go further back you need to put your hand on here and find a further back because i'm out of further backs no a little bit more a little bit more a little bit more a little bit okay there now twist it twist it i just think they want to see us tortured and then they found out as you know months later they just did the short swab so you didn't have to but because they all had all the old ones that were longer they didn't want to they didn't have the budget so they just had to use them up okay there's no justice there's no justice so you pull up and just stick the butt out the window yeah and pull up put my butt out the window they hit me with a shot and and then i kind of uh i i flatulate to say goodbye i tried that i you know i pulled up i stuck my butt out the window and i heard you know this is the burger king drive-through window right [Laughter] i did the same thing and i ended up with a whopper in my butt and by the way that was probably your experience when you were in a jail cell with o.j yeah that's right that's a callback you should use that from earlier from something that you said the thing you said earlier say later that's the key to comedy come up with one funny thing and then just keep saying it brian thank you man and and be safe out there and have a great great continued tour and everybody has to watch you're special because it's uh it's it's it's called a special for a reason i never knew that's why they call them a special because some are not special i don't want to say who's there who's or not but people know yours is all of your specials are uh they're insanely good and and you are uh please don't ever stop and uh stay safe thank you very much bob had a great time talking with you and uh hopefully we'll uh hook up again soon i would like that and one day i'd like to go golf cursing with you yeah man it'll be right after my very first tee shot it won't be good it won't be i i tend to top my tee shots they go to the left into a bush and then some horrifically loud four-letter word comes out of me i will pour a hole and then the next hole i will lie 17. it's so sad and i won't cheat so you'll see me you know people just go pick it up we can't stand this anymore put yourself out of this misery the lady's here with the hot dog cart oh okay well be well stay safe and i hope to see you in person so we can uh have some laughs at at michael o'brien's expense at his expense right at his expense one of the nicest people in my whole life all right man thanks for everything bob thank you for all the incredibly kind words uh all sincere thank you brian later man see you that is brian regan and if you have not seen him look at all of his specials listen to those uh lp i think it's an lp or it was a cd back in the day but uh he is so damn great and um it's a master class on stand-up and it's not like he's it just comes out of him he knows how to do it he's really one of the best so you want to watch his special on the rocks which is on netflix and when you're listening to this today it's out tomorrow the 23rd and if you're listening to it after that right now then it's on netflix right now and uh just go see him on tour bring your teenagers and your grandma he is universal he's just uh quite wonderful it's a it's refreshing for where we're at to see someone who um they're they're in a political show it's an entertainment show and he's doing what great comedians do which is bring out things that we're thinking about and uh be the outsider with observations and give a little bit of himself and personal insight of who he is so uh thanks to brian regan and go see him go to brianregan.com figure it out or as he said you can find him on instagram or anywhere so what i want you to do if you can is uh you know subscribe and then you get to listen but you just listened so subscribe you can download it you can follow it if that's how you get your stuff you can watch it on the youtube you can rate review you want to do that and do be positive i can't take no more negative i just can't i mean if i do something wrong i'll own it i swear i'm trying not to talk too much but it's a podcast and then um what else can i tell you i'm gonna call you guys at some point so uh just look on twitter or instagram stories and it'll say when i'm gonna call you and see how you're doing be well take care of yourselves and wishing you lots of good health as we get through this year this next crazy year and and come out the other side all the best everybody [Music] you

Channel: Bob Saget

Views: 18,248

Keywords: bob saget, bob, saget, bobsaget, bob saget youtube, youtube bob saget, bob sagets here for you, bob saget’s here for you, here for you, podcast, bob saget podcast, podcast bob saget, here for you podcast, podcast here for you, comedy, comedian, stand up, bob saget stand up, interview, interviews

Id: ctmrbNK-tIo

Length: 84min 49sec (5089 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 22 2021