Speaker 1: Caloroga Shark Media. Hither, I'm Johnny Mack with your daily
Speaker 1: comedy News, a daily briefing on stand up comedy comedians
Speaker 1: in the comedy industry. Jay Leno was on Judd Apatow's
Speaker 1: podcast and thanks Justin for sending this one in. They
Speaker 1: started to discuss the mount Rushmore of comedy. Always a
Speaker 1: fun topic, and I don't know what to do with
Speaker 1: it because I think people have a recency bias and
Speaker 1: get a little crazy and it'll be like we want
Speaker 1: to put somebody who's currently performing up there, or like
Speaker 1: sometimes a shooting star. You know, these things are hard
Speaker 1: and you only get four spots. So for me, George Carlin,
Speaker 1: Richard Pryor, and two I don't know's, And on any
Speaker 1: given day I might give you a different answer. Carlin
Speaker 1: is undeniable, including if you listen to the very very
Speaker 1: late George Carlin material, which at the time was described
Speaker 1: by people like me as angry boy as it aged
Speaker 1: will George Carlin is somehow the great profit of the
Speaker 1: twenty first century, So he's undeniable. And the other one
Speaker 1: who's undeniable is Richard Pryor. There are plenty of disciples
Speaker 1: of Richard Pryor starting with Richard Pryor cover act Eddie Murphy,
Speaker 1: who I love. But let's just be real about it,
Speaker 1: and you can see Richard Pryor descendants to today's comedy. Now,
Speaker 1: who you would put in the other two? I don't know.
Speaker 1: Like so part of it is how do you define
Speaker 1: the genre? Is Johnny Carson doing a monologue four nights
Speaker 1: a week for thirty years? Should he be in the list?
Speaker 1: Bob Hope for eighty years? And don't judge Bob Hope
Speaker 1: by what he did in his eighties and nineties. Go
Speaker 1: back and watch the Young Hope. Should he be there?
Speaker 1: Why aren't there any women on the mountain? Okay? Should
Speaker 1: we put say, Joan Rivers up on the list? I
Speaker 1: don't know, So Carlin Pryor, I don't know. I don't know.
Speaker 1: But Jay Leno gave his list. And listen to the
Speaker 1: name he uses for comedian number one. I've never heard
Speaker 1: anyone called person this other than Jay Leno.
Speaker 2: Okay, My four would be, uh, Richie. He was Richie
Speaker 2: Pryor when I know now he's Richard Pryor, But Richie Pryor.
Speaker 2: He would go on the car. He was getting ready
Speaker 2: to do Live at the Sunset Strip, the first filmed
Speaker 2: comedy special for theaters, not HBO. And I followed him
Speaker 2: every night because you couldn't follow Richie. And I realized
Speaker 2: I didn't have an hour worth of material. I had
Speaker 2: maybe eighteen minutes. But then I just realized, throw out
Speaker 2: everything that doesn't get a laugh.
Speaker 1: All right, Richard pryor Jay Lenno and I are aligned there.
Speaker 1: Let's see who Jay Leno had as number two.
Speaker 2: To Robert Klin, Because you have to understand, prior to
Speaker 2: Robert Klein, most comedians were men in their thirties or
Speaker 2: forties that grew up during the Depression that kids today
Speaker 2: with these hippies with the long hair, that was all
Speaker 2: that kind of stuff. Suddenly here was Robert Klein, middle
Speaker 2: class guy talking about things I would talk about with
Speaker 2: my friends because I couldn't do Depression era stuff or
Speaker 2: make fun of the music today because that was my generation.
Speaker 1: Interesting pick. I think Robert Klein has been largely forgotten.
Speaker 1: His name never comes up. Very very interesting, all right.
Speaker 1: At number three, Jay Leno, who do you have next
Speaker 1: to me? Bob Newhart?
Speaker 2: He was the close up magician of comedy, you know,
Speaker 2: new Heart had the great It was like a slider,
Speaker 2: like an inside fastball. He had a bit about the
Speaker 2: first astronaut to have extraterrestrial communication. So it comes down
Speaker 2: from you know, the thing lands, and of course he's
Speaker 2: the first. So all the presses are asking him questions,
Speaker 2: and our porta says, how far ahead of us are
Speaker 2: these aliens? And he says about six weeks, and you
Speaker 2: know it's two weeks is too soon. Six months is
Speaker 2: too far ahead head, but six you cannot catch up,
Speaker 2: you know, it's finding the right turn of six weeks
Speaker 2: is exactly rot.
Speaker 1: Not crazy again as time marches on mentioned a little
Speaker 1: less and less, a unique voice, one of the greats, Rushmore.
Speaker 1: And that's another thing, all right, Jay, who do you
Speaker 1: have for number four?
Speaker 2: And across Rodney Danefield, Rodney Dangeville was the economy of words.
Speaker 2: He could get to the joke quicker, I knew Rodney
Speaker 2: for forty years. I have no idea if he's a
Speaker 2: Democrat or republic. We never discussied. It was just jokes.
Speaker 2: It was it was the you know, like the joke.
Speaker 3: About one after another, the idea that my doctor said,
Speaker 3: I need a stool sample, a semen sample, and a
Speaker 3: urine sample, and I gave my underpants.
Speaker 1: That's an interesting take by Jay Leno. Not sure I agree. Again,
Speaker 1: I won't throw I want to say rocks and throwing
Speaker 1: rocks in the mountain. I won't throw rocks at any
Speaker 1: of these picks. But I don't know Lynn pryor, I
Speaker 1: don't know the conversation did go on. Jay Leno said,
Speaker 1: if he had a fifth pick, it would be George
Speaker 1: Carlin and I had. I don't know when I even
Speaker 1: saw this story, but I've just been sitting on it
Speaker 1: for an episode like today. Back at twenty fourteen, Jay
Speaker 1: Leno was on Craig Ferguson show. I don't remember that happening,
Speaker 1: but I believe everybody, and Craig asked Jay Leno if
Speaker 1: Jay's mind ever drifted when one of the guests was
Speaker 1: not all that interesting. Jay said, the classic examples I
Speaker 1: had on one of these reality stars, Trista, who apparently
Speaker 1: is Trista Sutter. Jay said, from one of those bachelorettes,
Speaker 1: and I'm looking at the side of her head. I
Speaker 1: couldn't be less interested. I've never seen this stupid reality show.
Speaker 1: You know what it was? And Jay said, to make
Speaker 1: it worse, Jay says he wraps up the show, he leaves.
Speaker 1: I go out on the parking lot. There's a woman
Speaker 1: standing next to me with a boyfriend. She says, can
Speaker 1: I have a picture? And I go sure. How you doing?
Speaker 1: She says good? And Jay asked her what's your name?
Speaker 1: It was like just the interviewed on the Tonight show.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. Kevin Nealan was on Icon versus Icon. He said,
Speaker 1: I learned from so many comments. I bartended the improv
Speaker 1: so I was there all the time, and I'd see
Speaker 1: these comics come that I really enjoyed and was a
Speaker 1: fan of every night to watch them perform and take
Speaker 1: it all in. That's how I learned by watching, and
Speaker 1: I loved it. It never even felt like work to me.
Speaker 1: There were comics like Jay Leno and Richard Lewis, so
Speaker 1: I watched closely. Andy Kaufman was a huge influence on
Speaker 1: me because he was so unique, so different, and so interesting.
Speaker 1: He played so much with the audience's mind, leading him
Speaker 1: in one direction, leaving people in sure of what he
Speaker 1: was doing, and really pushing boundaries. I also watched Seinfeld
Speaker 1: perform because we came up around the same time. More
Speaker 1: or less good advice from Kevin Neelan about the comedy industry.
Speaker 1: It's a business. You can't take things personally. I learned
Speaker 1: that a long time ago, and things don't really affect
Speaker 1: me that much anymore. Even think in regular life, I'm
Speaker 1: not easily shaken. I don't want to say I'm dead inside,
Speaker 1: because I'm not. But I've gotten used to a lot
Speaker 1: of rejection and disappointment, especially in the early stages. More
Speaker 1: from that Forbes conversation between Jerry Seinfeld and Nate Perghancy.
Speaker 1: Jerry Seinfeld was curious, what's it like touring for you
Speaker 1: these days in terms of workload. Nate said, it's like
Speaker 1: a gym. It's a muscle. You got to stay on
Speaker 1: top of it. When you don't go out for two
Speaker 1: weeks and then you get on stage and you're like, rough,
Speaker 1: I'm awful. Jerry was like, what about when your wife
Speaker 1: wants to go on vacation. Nate said he'll try and
Speaker 1: pop in somewhere to do one show to stay fresh.
Speaker 1: Jerry said, it's funny how fast it goes. I find
Speaker 1: not only can you not remember lines, but I louse
Speaker 1: your nerve the you should be even be doing this
Speaker 1: who am I talking to in front of all these people? Wow?
Speaker 1: Jerry Seinfeldt thinking that, Nate said, Yeah, there's a thing
Speaker 1: in your head that goes like, who do you think
Speaker 1: you are? You out to your mind? Nate continued, I
Speaker 1: had to work on my own mind wandering. I had
Speaker 1: to work on pulling my mind back to the story,
Speaker 1: the joke I was telling. Every time i'm telling it,
Speaker 1: I visualize it. I love it so much. And you're
Speaker 1: in front of a different crowd every night. Because I'm
Speaker 1: in the round, I'll pick like four people. It might
Speaker 1: be an older lady, could be a family further back,
Speaker 1: a woman with her husband. You keep an eye on them.
Speaker 1: It's a good way to keep a gauge, like, is
Speaker 1: it too harsh? You're picking four people to do the
Speaker 1: show for weirdly enough instead of a mass. Nate said,
Speaker 1: I like stand up in the arenas. It's really pushing
Speaker 1: stand up to this higher level. I've got big screens,
Speaker 1: a sound system. It's like watching a live special. It's
Speaker 1: about the community and everybody laughing. You want to give
Speaker 1: them a full show. When they all leave, hopefully they're
Speaker 1: very happy. Rob Riggle spoke with Clutch points. Rob said,
Speaker 1: Getting on Saturday Night Live was a dream come true
Speaker 1: with something I'd worked for for a long long time,
Speaker 1: and when it finally happened, it was hard to process.
Speaker 1: And then being on the stage when they roll credits,
Speaker 1: and I've watched it in my whole life when they
Speaker 1: roll credits everyone's on stage. To be on that stage
Speaker 1: looking back out to where the audience and in the cameras,
Speaker 1: it was surreal. Being on the Daily Show. Getting that
Speaker 1: job was a great, great moment. Get to do movies
Speaker 1: with people that I admire, get to do scenes with
Speaker 1: Tom Hanks or people you just love their work and
Speaker 1: appreciate them so much, and then you find yourself in
Speaker 1: a scene with them. I've worked with Rob, I think twice.
Speaker 1: I found out to be super, super awesome in person.
Speaker 1: What a great guy. Rob wrote a book, Grit, Spits
Speaker 1: and Never Quit. He explained, you get to a point
Speaker 1: where you tell enough stories and people go, hey, you
Speaker 1: should write a book, and you go all right, and
Speaker 1: you hear that enough times you're like, all right, maybe
Speaker 1: I should, And then I write down my goals every
Speaker 1: year at the beginning of the year. So I wrote down,
Speaker 1: I'm going to write a book, but it was the
Speaker 1: one goal that didn get accomplished. It just kept rolling
Speaker 1: and rolling over until finally I was ashamed of myself
Speaker 1: and I said write the book, and so I did.
Speaker 1: Took two years, and he explains, you got to remember now,
Speaker 1: it's not just like I locked myself in a log
Speaker 1: cabin and sat down a road. It's not how it works.
Speaker 1: I gotta go out there or eat what I kill.
Speaker 1: I'm out there for work every day, and if I
Speaker 1: get to show you get a movie, I gotta do that,
Speaker 1: and then everything gets put on hold. So it takes
Speaker 1: time to grind out a book. And Russell Peters told
Speaker 1: a fun story about NBA star Blake Griffin. Blake Griffin
Speaker 1: has dabbled with comedy. Russell runs into Blake Griffin and goes, hey,
Speaker 1: I'm a big fan. What are you doing here? Blake
Speaker 1: Griffin goes, I'm trying comedy. Russell goes, really, but you're
Speaker 1: a basketball player. Blake goes yeah. Russell says, well, what
Speaker 1: are you because you got red hair? Blake says, I'm mixed. Russell,
Speaker 1: where'd you grow up? I think you grew up in
Speaker 1: Milwaukee or something. Oklahoma. Gotta suck being a big half
Speaker 1: black kid with red hair in Oklahoma, No wonder you're
Speaker 1: good at it? And his face is like, what the
Speaker 1: F Russell says? I'm like, anyway, good luck, stupid, That's
Speaker 1: just how I am. So fast forward in time, Russell
Speaker 1: Peters is court side at the Raptors game Blake Griffin
Speaker 1: playing for Detroit. Russell Hills out Blake Blake, and Blake
Speaker 1: Griffin turns sees Russell Peters and he goes, ah, ef you,
Speaker 1: And that's your Comedy's for Today's Tomorrow