Awkwardness and Revelation

Jokes are coming, Folks!

I didn’t know if they would. They usually do. I never assume they will. They are. It’s always a wonder to me. 

I’m relaxed. My new zero fucks default position is in full effect. I love it. Just being funny. 

I forget I just have to wait. Not even that long. I get done with an hour of material and I get depressed. I feel burnt out, depleted, uninspired. I lean into mundane tasks. By lean into, I mean get hyper focused on. Cats, cooking, yard maintenance, laundry, shopping for necessities, going through boxes, cleaning, personal grooming, exercise, polishing shoes, fixing shit, etc. Staying engaged in my life is the bedrock of my creativity. I know this all just sounds like life but it is consuming. While doing all of those things I take time to feed my head. Read, watch movies, TV, learn new things, parse the news, watch my peers work. Eventually things start to shake loose creatively. 

It would be better if I just allowed myself the space and didn’t have a current of self-flagellation surging through me but that is what it is. I am grateful to earn a living with my creativity. The job is living and thinking. Festering and churning. Blurting and being embarrassed. 

That is the biggest part of my struggle. Transcending embarrassment. It always has been. It’s one of the reasons I’m a comic I believe. 

My mother embarrassed me constantly. It was the most paralyzing feeling through most of my childhood. It made me nervous and unstable but it was amazing training for standup. To literally stand in your embarrassment in front of strangers and squirm out of it with the funny. 

I was at Largo the other night riffing. I got into some personal stuff as I am wont to do. It was too revealing and weird. I left feeling exposed and embarrassed and judged and ashamed somehow (I was generating most of that). I HAVE FELT THAT SO MUCH when I process shit on stage. I guess it’s taking that risk that eventually defines what I do. I hone the awkwardness and revelation of me.

So, that’s where I’m at. Again.

Today I talk to Ray Romano about our almost simultaneous start in stand up and out almost simultaneous pursuit of serious acting roles. On Thursday I talk to the amazing Lily Rabe about her roles and life and theatre and the new show Love and Death, which is great. 

Enjoy!

Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!

Love,

Maron

A Targeted Ad.

Jesus, People.
 
Happy Easter, Jesus people. Happy Pesacccch, Jews. 
 
Once again, I did nothing. I have no family near. I apparently don’t factor into guest lists of peers for the holidays. I am not complaining. Well, maybe a little. I do this every year for every holiday that involves people being together. That’s most of them. 
 
I think there was a time when I would go to things. People would never invite me but they would invite the women I was with at the time. Couple stuff. I knew the people but I guess I’m unapproachable or they assume I won’t respond or they assume I won’t come. It’s hard to know. 
 
Every holiday I reflect on my lack of even casual friends that I can be casual with at a dinner thing. It’s weird. I guess I don’t do my part. I am a casual person. Casually intense. 
 
I do know I did nothing for Passover. I grew up doing something for Passover. A Seder somewhere. Four questioning, dipping the herbs, repeating the plagues, finding the cracker, the whole schmear. 
 
People my age are freeing up, wondering, dealing with new, old time. I’m at an age where many of my peers have kids who have left or are leaving. Many of them seem to be re-entering the circuit of work, play, free time. "Hey, man. I know it’s been about 18 years, but I have time now. Want to hang?”
 
It’s fine. I can’t talk about kids but I can talk about other people and health concerns. Those are biggies. 
 
I am reflecting as a means of remembering. I exist for the moment. I feed on it. It’s why and how I have done almost everything in my life. The problem with it is you don’t always experience what you are doing until it's behind you. I’ve been thrown into a personal research project by a targeted ad. I saw an ad for an app that makes pics out of old slides. I have hundreds of old family slides dating back to before I was born. I am searching through my pre-me past and early me to see what I was living through, how I was dressed, the looks on my face. 
 
While I was in my attic finding the old carousels I found a box of old journals. There are three full notebooks that I wrote in compulsively after my wife left me. The immediacy of journal writing when one is in pain and shock is a visceral read. It takes me back to the emotions immediately. Seeing the way my mind worked then is sad because it still works that way. The events were traumatic but the circuits are deep, seemingly unchanging. Behavior can change but the wiring is a closed circuit. A vibrating inner ouroboros that is the core of you. Or maybe the netting around the core. 
 
Time is running out. I hope I land on some prolonged peace of mind before I lose it or crap out. The shifting off. 
 
Today I talk to Steven Yeun who is one of the best actors working. Deep dude, too. On Thursday I talk to Alex Borstein. Also a great actor and intense Jew. We had an intense Jew off. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

The Early Days of You.

21,738 days, People!

That’s how many days I’ve been alive. Wild. 

I don’t know what compelled me to figure that out, which means Google Search it, but I was compelled. I think I have moments when I doubt my accomplishments or wonder how much time I have wasted in relation to time alive and awake and engaged. I guess it’s relative though. 

What is wasted time? 

It’s all gotten me here. To this moment. To this life. I don’t think I have regrets but I do wish I had a different brain sometimes. A brain that doesn’t feel compelled to figure out how many days I’ve been alive and how many of them were a complete waste of time. I wish I had a brain that could easily do the math required to break down, on average, how much time I was sleeping, high, masturbating, spacing out, working, eating, doing comedy, talking on the mic, having sex, driving. I just want to get a full chart of squandered potential alongside of what I actually accomplished so I can compare and rationalize my process and life’s work as not being possible to have happened any other way than how it did.

Which is true. 

I was just thinking about patterns and spirals and the unconscious circling back again and again to what defines my life and who I am and how I think. I believe it has evolved and changed a bit but that’s just the routing. I've aged out of some grooves and I’ve learned some lessons. 

I started thinking about it all because of this vegan thing. It’s been more than two months. I had this realization that I attempted it before. Once? Twice? Who knows. 21,738 days. Somewhere in there. It’s like a déjà vu type of feeling only it isn’t really that. It’s not a feeling that you have experienced something or been somewhere that seems new. It’s realizing you actually have been or done or seen something before in the early days of you. 

The strange thinking about getting older and adding up days is that many fade into the background and get pulled up as fragments and memories only when they are triggered somehow. Then you have to sit with it, work through it and figure out if it was a dream or not. If you were the only person involved it becomes hard to put it all together. 

I am not loving the vegan thing. I don’t feel better in any way. I feel bloated and gassy most of the time. The only good thing is that I know I am better than other people. 

Great talks this week! Today I talk to Brooke Shields about Brooke Shields and on Thursday I talk to Kelly Reichardt about her movies, all of them. 

Enjoy!

Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!

Love,

Maron

Art Talks.

Fermented, Folks!

So, after a long three weeks of anxious waiting and checking and pressing down upon, my cabbage has become kraut. I have to say, it’s pretty great. If you like that kind of thing. I am the savior of my own gut garden. I have a lot of it. Might have to give some away. It’ll keep though. It will continue to sauer. Not unlike me.

I’ve been into the art talks. I loved talking to Laurie Anderson. I recently talked to Kelly Reichardt which I will post in good time. I talk to Karina Longworth today. She’s a film critic and she hosts the You Must Remember This podcast, which I was familiar with but hadn’t listened to until recently. It’s great. It’s not quite film criticism. It’s the history of Hollywood and all that implies. So, it moves through film, production, celebrity, business, culture.

We got into talking about film studies and real film criticism. I minored in film criticism in college. She has a Masters in it. These kinds of conversations always make me a bit insecure. Intellectually, I never really think I know enough or really understand art and film in the right way. I can reference writers and movies but I generally feel like a fraud. I know there is no right way to appreciate art, but there is. There is a sophisticated, intellectual and critical approach to art and film that encourages a deeper understanding. I just don’t think I quite have it. I have something, but I’m generally winging it.

That’s not to say that my life and experience and education doesn’t inform my opinions and insights and they are relatively diverse and vast but I just think I fall short. I’ve done some of the reading. I’ve taken some of the classes. I’ve had the conversations of an excited student of film. That was a long time ago. I’ve picked up bits and pieces of ideas and theories here and there over the years.

I just don’t trust my understanding because I compare myself to the people who wrote the books I barely understood or taught the classes based on the writings of the people who wrote the books. AND I never feel like I’ve seen enough or read enough. So, I just beat myself up over not paying attention or studying enough or correctly 35 years ago.

When I do relax, I realize that I know more than I think and my insights are valid and some are even uniquely mine. That’s enough. Until they ask me to teach a class. Then I’ll just pretend to understand the writers that really no one understands and help create a generation of adults who doubt themselves.

I am once again having the conversations of an excited student of film. Today is one of those.

On Thursday I talk to comedian Cathy Ladman who I watched at the Comedy Store when I was a doorman. It was great catching up.

Enjoy!

Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!

Love,
Maron

A Different Space.

Oh, Superman.
 
I honestly cannot believe I got to talk to Laurie Anderson. She was pitched and I was amazed. She has occupied a place in my mind since freshman year of college. I had her first record, Big Science. I had never heard anything like it. Actually, I still don’t think I’ve heard anything like it. She is singular.
 
She is one of those artists I just assumed occupied a different space than the one I do. In a way she does. She is out there doing art of all kinds, all the time. Active. 
 
I wasn’t even sure where to start with her or what to do. I remember when she and Lou got married. Knowing what I thought I knew about Lou it was odd to wrap my head around but, in some way, made sense. She’s had a very long and full career as an artist but hardly any of it mainstream since those first few records. We just dived in and talked. 
 
I always like talking to artists who were in NYC in the seventies because it sounds like it was some kind of abandoned wasteland. Which it was in some ways. The way she talks about downtown and the artists who were around is kind of mind-blowing. I remember thinking that when I talked to Kim Gordon as well. 
 
The real surprise talking to Laurie came when I discovered she had a funny relationship with Andy Kaufman before anyone knew who he was, maybe even him. 
 
I had a great time in NYC working with Melissa McCarthy last week. It’s a small part in a Christmas movie but we had fun. We did some riffing. I’m going to embrace the clown more. My clown. I’ve said my piece. Now, I just want to do some goofy shit. Okay, maybe not always, but more. 
 
That said, I guess we’ll see where we stand Civil War-wise tomorrow if Trump gets arrested. Let’s see how many of his morons cause trouble. I would imagine not many. You have to be real dumbshit to still believe in that guy. A real follower/sheep/no-brain/needs-a-daddy type. I would assume the fear of jail time will stop most of them. We’ll see! Exciting times. American autocracy on the move. 
 
Today, as I mentioned above, I talk to Laurie Anderson. On Thursday I talk to comedian Nick Youssef who I feel like I’ve known since he was a child. I kind of did. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

Magic.

Oscars, People!
 
Obviously today you won’t hear me talk about the Oscars because we put together the show earlier. Maybe Thursday. I am about to watch them as I write this. I still get excited. Weird. 
 
Some part of me loves the spectacle of show business. Some part of me can’t stand it. That part is still smaller. As I talk to more actors and directors and people involved in the creative undertaking of making stuff I realize they are all just people but I’m still sort of in awe and feel smaller than the people on TV in the fancy clothes. 
 
As I’m watching I’m having a realization. It really is about art, creativity and yes, commerce, but it’s about making amazing things. I can be pretty dismissive about major achievements in cinema but I also know what it takes to make a movie and to deliver a performance. It’s fucking magic, really. For it all to come together, magic. 
 
I’m not sure David Byrne is hitting the notes as a watch right now. It’s okay. It looks cool. 
 
So much of my life, doing what I do, was fueled by being an outsider and having the luxury of spite. I think some of that was astute but much of it was petty. I can feel it now. Sometimes I talk shit and it’s correct. But is it necessary and is it a good thing for me to do? How does it make me look? I really need to keep the focus on my own creativity. Though some of it is still spiteful and fueled by spite. I’m a spite artist. It’s one of my colors. 
 
I am still kind of an outsider but I’ve sort of found my level and am able to work in a lot of different mediums. 
 
It has actually been a great honor to talk to some many of the people I respect in this business. I kind of take it for granted now or see it as just what I do. It is still exciting and I am excited to see all of my former guests in the room at the Oscars. Sure, I’d like to be there but only if I am supposed to be for one reason or another. 
 
Today I talk O’Shea Jackson Jr. about his dad (Ice Cube) and his life being that guy’s son and coming into his own. On Thursday I have a conversation with comedian Ashley Barnhill, who used to work for me, about the life-threatening accident that caused her to need a new skull. I also talk to Jason Woliner about his bizarre, provocative masterpiece that consumed years of his life, Paul T. Goldman.
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

Soul Dumpster.

Hello, Old Friends!
 
I am one of the new olds. It’s time to reckon and accept. 
 
I am flying back from New Mexico as I write this. I went to see my father who is actually holding relatively steady and in a slightly spaced state. He still knows who I am when I am there. He still knows who he is mostly. He is not really sure what happened at some points in his life. Mostly the catalysts of negative events where he either got taken or he got in trouble. I guess if you are going to forget some big chunks, those would be a relief to be done with. 
 
I spent many hours with him over the weekend trying to piece periods together with him. His memory is actually very thorough. The time lines are vague. I think that is a symptom of age. If you didn’t take notes, shit gets jumbled and events float untethered in your history of you. 
 
I have been trying to put my own timeline together. Almost six decades into this charade and having lived in five different cities, some twice, makes it tricky. I have no familial stability as markers. No kids. Though two wives explain about nine years of some consistency, at least around who was primary in my life. Other than that it was a few cats and a lot of interactions and engagements of many different kinds with many different people (yes, I’m being a little cagey). Much of this time I was an active drunk and addict and driven by fury to manifest my desire to be a comedian. That was always the priority. 
 
Through the course of that I did a lot of emotional damage to myself and others and have a somewhat vague recollection as to the catalysts of some of the more painful changes I went through. Just like my old man. I believe I can still excavate that timeline. 
 
I’m reflecting now because I was home and spent time with a couple of my oldest friends. The new olds. We are all around sixty and one of them puts a time limit on how much we can talk about physical health, blood numbers, poop, exercise, aches and pains. We were able to isolate that I was probably the biggest asshole when I was in my early to mid-twenties. Because I would come into town occasionally and be that. They didn’t really know me that well as I became a more evolved asshole in relationships. 
 
I’ve worked through most of this stuff. Sometimes with the people I hurt. A lot of it is sort of toothless now within me other than some shame residue. We all have broken hearts and broke hearts. 
 
I guess seeing my father this time trying to put it together for himself but ultimately landing on ‘I just don’t care anymore’ was profound. I imagine ‘I just don’t know anymore’ is soon to come. It will all go. 
 
So, I wouldn’t say I’m being nostalgic but I am on a psychological dig into my memory for understanding the impact of who I was on myself and others and hopefully finding some good stuff as well in the soul dumpster. 
 
Today I talk to Ronny Chieng whose specials I watched the day before meeting him. Great comic. Intense guy. On Thursday I talk to Bobby Farrelly about his work with his brother and his new film, Champions.
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

Get Noisy.

Good news, People!
 
Sometimes collective action can save lives. 
 
At the beginning of the month, I talked about an Iranian comic named Zeinab Mousavi. She was arrested in Iran for telling jokes about the government and the police, and she was sentenced to two years in prison after already spending a month in solitary confinement. 
 
We were told that the most effective thing anyone could do was raise attention about Zeinab, because the Iranian government doesn't like when things get noisy. 
 
Well, we were told last week that the government has thrown out Zeinab's prison sentence. And we were told that the only reason they did not put her back in jail was because of the media attention. 
 
She is still barred from doing standup comedy again, but she will continue to make videos on Instagram. 
 
Everyone who took the time to boost Zeinab's story on social media helped keep this woman out of jail. Something that only takes a moment of your time can be the difference in securing someone else's freedom.
 
There are still thousands of Iranians in prison for speaking out against the current regime. 
 
Two we were told about are Toomaj Salehi, a rapper who is in solitary and faces execution for his songs, and Fatemeh Sepehri, a women's rights activist who faces an 18-year sentence for saying the Supreme Leader should resign. 
 
Put their names out there. We will post them on our socials. And do this whenever you learn of political prisoners in Iran. Zeinab is proof that you can make a difference just by saying their names. 
 
On another note, I appreciate all the emails and tweets to me from Fermentation Fetishists. I know I was excited about making my own kraut but I don’t want to make a life out of it. I’m not planning on going down a rabbit hole of rotting vegetables but I did want to know how to do it. 
 
Also, I finally finished Tim Blake Nelson’s novel City of Blows and it was very satisfying and well written. He nails the ending which isn’t always the case with novels. It’s a great read about nasty show business. 
 
Today I talk to Austin Butler about being Elvis and having a hard time shaking the accent and other things. On Thursday I talk to Hong Chau about The Whale and feeling left out and other things. Great talks.
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monday and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

The Belz.

So many deaths, People.

I guess that’s what happens. Wait. I’m sure that’s what happens. To all of us. 
 
I’m at an age where I see a lot of the people I knew and looked up to in the generation or two before mine die. It’s a natural thing. It is the norm. It’s not as hard as seeing peers pass somehow but it’s sad and jarring when the news comes in. 
 
Richard Belzer, The Belz, is dead. He was 78.
 
Belzer was a like a mythological being to me when I was kid. In the early to mid-seventies when I was starting to become obsessed with standups and funny people I read an article. I think it was in Rolling Stone. It was about the original Catch a Rising Star, the club in NYC. It was all about the house MC, Richard Belzer. In my recollection it described him as an edgy, button-pushing, drugged up maniac of a comic. I was fascinated with anyone who was a drugged up anything. The article describe him doing a Mick Jagger impression and basically being a menace of a clown on stage in between acts. I was blown away by just the idea that this guy existed. I hadn’t heard of him or seen any of his comedy. It was kind of hard to come by. The concept of Belz was burned into my mind. 
 
At some point I saw the movie The Groove Tube and there was Belz in the cast with a pre-SNL Chevy Chase. He was in a sketch called The Dealers and to this day I think he actually vomited in the car. This just solidified him in my mind as a rebel and cool fuck up. 
 
After I started doing comedy and meeting some of the older guys I would hear stories here and there about him but he stayed the badass in that story in my mind for a long time. 
 
He was never a huge comic but he was The Belz.
 
When I got to LA in the mid-eighties and took the job as a doorman at The Comedy Store I was amazed and thrilled to find out that Richard was a regular there and doing spots. The Belz was around. I remember meeting him in the kitchen of the Store and just feeling beside myself. It was fucking Richard Belzer. The guy from that article. The myth. 
 
I would see him do sets all the time and I got to know him. I was busy losing my mind on cocaine but he understood. He never judged. He was one of the nicest guys I’ve met in this business. He kind of looked out for me a bit. He would drive up in his Eldorado and always wore a suit. Class act. We would get high in the back and talk and he’d tell stories sometimes. Because of that story I read when I was a kid I always felt like he somehow was part of the reason I did comedy. 
 
I didn’t watch Homicide or Law & Order so I don’t know him as Munch but I knew him as a sweet guy, a funny guy, a real mensch who I looked up to. 
 
We were in touch here and there over the years and I’m sorry we weren’t closer and I’m sorry he never did the show. 
 
I will remember Richard fondly and with love and respect. 
 
Today I talk to the formidable Michelle Yeoh about here amazing career and life. On Thursday I talk to the Daniels (Kwan and Scheinert) who directed Michelle in Everything Everywhere All at Once. Enjoyed both conversations immensely. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

The Rearview.

Coming in for landing, Friends!
 
It’s been a long haul but the premiere of my HBO special, From Bleak to Dark, is the end of this story arc. I’m trying not to feel it as the crashing of a wave. I felt that creeping, empty sadness after it aired on Saturday. It’s normal. 
 
I underplayed the night it premiered a bit. Not on purpose but it seems I do that. I remember my very first television appearance. It was An Evening at the Improv. I had flown to LA. I didn’t rent a car. I stayed in Santa Monica near where it was being taped. I bought a shirt that day at Stussy which looked nothing like anything I would wear. I wore it. After the taping I took a bus back to my hotel with my girlfriend at the time. Show business. The glamor. 
 
The other night wasn’t the same. I was alone in a hotel. I didn’t know if I could get HBO. I did an IG live trying to find my special on the TV in my room. I laid there and watched it. When it was done I packed my bags and went to sleep. 
 
I knew the entire build up and the experience of doing it would fade fast in the rearview. I mean, I’m excited it’s out there but when you worked towards something on many different levels for a couple of years and now it’s done it does feel like a loss somehow. I know it is out there being found and now I can see how people react to it. But now what?
 
I want to thank all of you for supporting me along the way. All the listeners, audiences and the plague IG crew, the girlfriends on the couch. It was a group effort getting here. 
 
I had fun in NYC and somehow remained vegetarian, even vegan, as far as I know. I have a feeling there may have been some animal fat in something I ate. Ghee, perhaps. Instead of corned beef and sable I had knishes and baba ganoush. Brendan and I ate at Dirt Candy and it wasn’t just amazing vegan food, it was just amazing food like nothing I ever experienced. 
 
I did the tonight show in my new suit. It’s always fun talking to Fallon. He’s a good listener, engaged. He asked me if I wanted to play with The Roots going out to a commercial. I said, ‘absolutely.’ Before the show we decided on a key and I put my pick in my pocket. All I could think about the entire time I was talking was nailing that first lick. I had less than a minute to land the riff. I was told Quest would count us in but they were already kind playing lightly in A. I strapped in, looked at Quest, laid out the first riff and he just picked up the groove from me and off we went. The most amazing thing was I was locked in and attentive enough to see him call the change to the 4 and I was able to land on it. Thrilling. 
 
I’m excited to get home to the three dummies. 
 
Today I talk to Marc Summers about starting out as a magician and being standup at The Comedy Store and then hosting TV shows. Also, OCD, cancer, car accidents and Burt Reynolds. On Thursday Tim Blake Nelson is back to talk about his new novel City of Blows. We talk about other stuff as well. The book is great. Great talks. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

Kraut Time.

Brining, People!
 
It takes me a long time to come around to trying things. I literally just recently took the low E string off my Les Paul Jr. and tuned it to an open G like Keef! I learned how to play two Rolling Stones tunes and they sound exactly correct. It’s wild. 
 
So, in the spirit of trying new things I should’ve done long ago, I ordered a ceramic crock. A kraut crock. I’m a cabbage addict. I don’t really know why, but I eat a lot of cabbage. I make curtido and red cabbage slaw almost weekly. So, now, it’s Kraut Time. I ordered weights and a lid and I have a few recipes. I am going to ferment. My gut garden is going to be perfect. Maybe it’s a change of life and passions. A new business. We’ll see. There’s probably already a ‘Kraut Guy’ somewhere. I’ll have to figure out a catchy name. ‘Gut Gardener.’
 
I’m still doing the vegan thing. Today is two weeks. Again, I am not committing to a lifestyle. I am conducting an experiment. I want to see the true effect diet has on my cholesterol verses genetics. I wouldn’t mind not being on a statin. 
 
There have been some odd side effects of not eating meat. I believe I am closer to my cats. I know, cats are meat eating animals. That is how they are wired. So, we feed them mush and pellets made of god knows what parts of what animals. It’s fine for them. Cats have no conscience. That is not the point. The point is, because I am not unnecessarily eating animals, I feel close to them as animals. Maybe I’m crazy but I think all the animals know that I am not eating them. The birds in my yard. The squirrels. The rabbit. I think we have a deeper understanding of each other and we are all pretty scared of coyotes. 
 
I’ve started creatine loading. I’m not even sure what that means. I know I’m taking it. My trainer lady suggested it. She said it might help my joint pain. I did some reading. I think it might make me ripped and it’s about fucking time. Finally, at 59, I’m going to be cut. Maybe I’ll start competing in whatever competition that old ripped men compete in. Maybe I can become a pro wrestler. The Gut Gardner. It’s all going to work out. 
 
So, I’m doing a lot of comedy. New comedy. I guess that’s what I do. If everything goes as planned I will be on The Tonight Show this Friday. I’ll also be doing a moderated talk with Josh Friedman at MoMA for the 92nd Street Y. You can get tickets at wtfpod.com/tour.
 
Today I have a surprising talk with Wayne Brady. You have no idea who he is, even if you think you do. On Thursday, we're airing a condensed version of the whole ‘Wrestling with Marc’ series. Good time. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

My Portal.

Clean slate, People. 

After my forced, jarring cleanse for a colonoscopy last weekend I’ve decided to go plant based for as long as I can take it. 
 
It’s not great. I don’t like the feeling. 
 
I’ve been at it a week. The shift into a vegan diet has been abrupt, I guess, but I didn’t think it would feel like this. I feel like a bag of beans. Maybe because that’s what I am. Literally eating too many beans. 
 
I’ve always had a healthy fear of carbs because in my mind and in reality, if you are not careful with them you will put on weight. The shift into eating a lot of them makes me a little crazy. Even though I’m eating whole foods like brown rice, beans, nuts it still feels gross to me. Protein seems difficult with this diet when I’m used to eating fish, meat and chicken. I feel bloated and gross and uncomfortable in my body. Which is not a good indicator that I will stay on this diet. I’ve done worse to alleviate that feeling. 
 
In the past, I’ve done coke, speed and started smoking to avoid feeling like that. Of course, in retrospect, those were excuses to do coke, speed and smoke. I know that now. 
 
I guess my body will adapt and I can do a little research into how to eat correctly while doing this. 
 
I eat pretty well in general. I was just slipping into habits that almost seem self-destructive. I had been on a meat run. I am genetically predisposed to high cholesterol and I already have a bit of the heart disease. I take a statin but still, I got into a ‘fuck it’ mentality and I was just eating a lot of meat. I know some people think cholesterol doesn’t matter but it does. I know people think clean meat is good, but it still clogs your heart. I was also eating a lot of sugar and I guess no matter how fit you may be that doesn’t mean you won’t get diabetes. I was just in a rationalization rut and I wasn’t pulling out. The colonoscopy was my portal. Clean slate. 
 
People always bug me about meat. They say things like, ‘how can you eat animals when you have cats?’ Well, I’m not going to eat my cats AND cats eat animals. They have to. We forget that because we feed them animal mush and dried animal bits that don’t look like animal parts. Also, I don’t have a pet cow or chicken or a salmon run in a moat around my house. I think that would make me feel differently. 
 
I’m not committed to a vegan lifestyle or point of view. I just wanted to feel it. I’ve done this before. Even though I feel physically uncomfortable I think it may be affecting my mind, in a positive way. I can’t prove that but maybe. 
 
My energy is better when I wake up for sure. I feel a bit lighter emotionally and a bit more forgiving. Could that be not eating meat or dairy for a week? No idea. 
 
Truth be told, my primary incentive for doing it is prep for a blood panel tomorrow. I want to see if it affects my numbers. I’m cheating, kind of. I’ll let you know what happens. I’ll stick with it for a bit. 
 
Today I talk to Radhika Jones about being editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair and the necessity of public intellectual discourse in the face of, and as a response to, the normalization of American fascism. On Thursday I talk to Dave Franco about his life and his new film which stars his wife and my old co-star, Alison Brie.
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

A Routine Test.

Welcome back, People.
 
That’s a reset. Old school radio stuff. Not hard to learn and totally unnecessary in podcasting. Just saying. 
 
I think I need a reset and today might be the day. As I sit here writing this on Sunday, I am fasting and just waiting around to go to the bathroom. I have a colonoscopy tomorrow which is today if you are reading this on Monday. It’s probably happening right now. You’re welcome for the image. 
 
The day before is the worst. Just drinking stuff to give yourself massive diarrhea. Waiting. The only benefit of intentional runs is you know it’s coming and you know why. 
 
Knowing it’s coming is something you want with your health. I think. Maybe not everyone but I do. I guess. That’s why I’m going in for a routine test. I want to know what’s up. Because you don’t want to die just because you didn’t want to get your routine tests or you just don’t get them because you’re scared or an idiot. We’ll see if everything is okay. I’ll get to see an exciting video voyage through my colon. If I’m lucky it will be clean and pristine. 
 
Sorry if this is too graphic. 
 
Knowing it’s coming. It’s a theme I think about because I need to change up my food routine. It has gotten away from me. I already have a bit of heart disease. I’m already on a statin. I just have been consuming so much meat and sugar lately. It's totally stupid and I know I’m doing it. There’s something about being an addict of any kind that makes your reward system totally destructive. Some part of my mind believes I deserve all the steak and cake. Because I like it. Food is fun and I want to eat whatever the fuck I want. That’s one side of it. The other side of is much simpler. ‘Fuck it. I’m going to die of something. Why not this?’
 
Meat-and-sugar-brain is powerful. 
 
I’m thinking that today my colon is clean. I don’t know if there’s something wrong with it yet but I know it's empty. I’m thinking I should start fresh and just put good things in there. Plant things. Maybe I’ll vegan it for a while to see if I feel better. I never feel great. I think it may be my diet. Maybe I’ll try to change it. It doesn’t feel like it will happen if I keep saying maybe. 
 
We’ll see. 
 
Today I talk to Sarah Polley about her amazing film Women Talking and sexual assault and her life. Thursday, I talk to Brendan Fraser about The Whale and sexual assault and his life. These are great conversations, heavy. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

A Real Band.

Rock, People!
 
Me and the fellas played Largo last night. I have to be honest. I never in my life thought that I would ever play with a band. I’d given up on that idea a long time ago. I never thought I was good enough and I didn’t want to have expectations about playing music. I didn’t want to put myself in a position to fail with music. If I screw up playing by myself, who cares? I’m just noodling on my couch. So, I never pursued playing with people in any real way. 
 
At the urging of Flanegan over at Largo, who set me up with Brandon Schwartzel on bass and Ned Brower on drums, I started playing with them. Then Jimmy Vivino came on board. It was all intimidating but not unlike when I got my own show on IFC, I knew I would suck for a while. I also knew that I was good enough to do it. There’s just no cutting corners with practice and adapting and just learning how to relax and do something that you are ready to do. 
 
All this is to say, the show was great last night. It felt like a real band. I’m comfortable with the rhythm section and we had a new guy on second guitar, Jason Roberts. I still fucked up a few times but I was comfortable. I never thought that could happen. So much of it has to do with a music-related trauma that I suffered years ago when I was 15 at a summer camp.  I’ve told the story before. I don’t want to tell it again. It was just a profoundly embarrassing failure trying to play music with a bunch of dudes. It was devastating. Over the last five or six years I’ve been trying to process the PTSD by playing and singing here and there to mixed results in terms of how I felt about it.
 
The other night marked the first time I was free from the fear in a real way. We did a bunch of covers like we usually do but a couple of them were actually kind of transcendent in the playing. A Tim Hardin via Crazy Horse version of If I Were a Carpenter and a fairly true version of Johnny Thunders' You Can Put Your Arms Around a Memory. We did other songs but those just felt just right. Although we did have to restart the Thunders because I fucked up. 
 
Now I just have to shut up about my fear and insecurity around playing in between songs and I’ll be recovered from the horrible music trauma of my youth. 
 
I guess the reason I’m telling you this is because I don’t like to try. I do it, but I don’t like it. I don’t like to fail. If you don’t try you can’t fail, but you also can’t feel what it feels like to possibly succeed. I don’t like to practice. If you don’t practice you can’t really get good or comfortable with expressing yourself. I don’t ever see myself as practicing. I just do the thing. If I love it or if it seems to make me feel present, I just keep doing it. It becomes my life. There’s only a few things I’ve done all my life and all the time. Comedy, playing guitar and talking to people on the mics. I just kept doing all of them but I never thought I would share the music. Too scary. Not anymore. 
 
I keep trying with all the things I use to express myself. It’s what being alive is for me. I just don’t register ‘practice.’ I just do. 
 
I don’t like to write either. I kind of hate it but I write this thing every week. For years now. I don’t even know if people read it. Again, I get on the page. I share the life to live. 
 
Today I talk to Todd Field about his movies and life. On Thursday I talk to Octavia Spencer about her acting and life. I liked talking to both of them immensely. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

Pictures.

Multitasking, People!
 
Or not finishing a lot of things simultaneously. Since I’ve been home I’ve been immersed in cleaning, fixing and organizing. I don’t think there’s an end to it on any level. Inside and out. House and self. There doesn’t seem to be any beating the slow breakdown of the structure. Frame or body. 
 
I can add things or take things away. I can repair or replace. 
 
I’m finally getting my tooth. I’m not even sure I need it anymore. It’s a molar and I’m doing okay without it. I’ve come this far though. I’ll add it to my head. 
 
Trying to honor my New Year's direction of actively trying to enjoy and have a life as opposed to just burning through days engaged but not appreciating. 
 
I’ve been really appreciating film noir lately. I’m not sure why. I’ve watched the ones I’m supposed to have watched being a ‘fan’ of film. I’m just not sure I appreciated it. It all seemed dated and hard for me to let in. I’ve watched The Glass Key, The Gun for Hire and The Blue Dahlia in as many days. William Bendix seems to be some portal to a continuum of me. 
 
When I was a kid I had a book called Immortals of the Screen. It was a book of pictures of actors and their bios. They were all from the black and white era going back to the silents. I was obsessed with the pictures of the actors. It was published in 1965. I knew all the old actors by their faces. It did not lead to an obsession with the films they were in. It was just a window into another time that I found fascinating. I remember William Bendix, Marie Dressler, Lionel Barrymore, Ethel Barrymore, John Barrymore, Slim Somerville, Bogart, etc. I could look at the pictures for hours. I don’t know why it did not lead me to the movies. I think I just wanted to know who the actors were. Weird.
 
Well, I now know William Bendix was amazing. I finally want to watch all the old movies that these faces appeared in 45 years after having the book and almost a century after the films were made. 
 
I went online and I found a copy of the book. It’s being sent. I will reconnect with the images that had a profound impact on me for reasons I can’t really understand and I will watch the films. I don’t know what this full circle means. I don’t know if receiving the book will be some kind of closure or a harbinger of my end. 
 
I do know that Alan Ladd was great and Veronica Lake is transcendent. I’m looking forward to engaging with these films, with feeling. Odd.
 
Today I talk to the singular Katt Williams almost exclusively about standup. On Thursday I talk to my To Leslie costar Andrea Riseborough about acting and her life. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

Big Plans.

Here we go again, People.

I’m sorry. I mean Happy New Year! Seriously, let’s make a go of it. 
 
In retrospect, last year wasn’t that bad. That being said, I have a hard time really knowing what happened and when and how much time has gone by. I think the pandemic permanently damaged my sense of time. Maybe not in a bad way. I don’t feel it passing in the same way. The markers are different. I don’t notice days or weeks or years as much. I remember events floating behind me. I remember emotional reactions to moments and unfoldings in my head. I remember being afraid and overwhelmed with anxiety. I remember loss. I remember spending time with people I care about. 
 
I just don’t have a handle on time anymore. Time passing. Time on the horizon. I do know my time is running. I do know that I can make choices about how I want to spend that time. I do know that I don’t have to be dragged by time or have time taken away from me by people, places and things I don’t choose to engage with. 
 
That’s a good start for the new year. Realization. 
 
Kit and I spent New Year’s Eve at a new friend’s house. I don’t even think I was really invited. I misunderstood something he said about cooking for friends on NYE before Covid and I said that was great. Then, in my head that meant I was going over there for dinner. I asked if it was happening then re-read the texts and realized it wasn’t really an invite, just a statement. I told him I was sorry I made it awkward but he said to come eat. So, we did. We had a great time with him and his family and some other people and their kids. It was just a full night of being a human among humans. Talking, eating, listening. I really hardly ever do that. Hang out with people and their families and my girlfriend, just having a nice night. He cooked great food. I baked a cake. It was a full day.
 
Then Kit and I split so we could make it to her place for the changing of the year and have an intimate moment. We did. Then I ran from it and drove home in the rain and passed out on my couch in my clothes. I did that without drinking. Thank you.
 
So, upon reflection of the evening. A couple of the things I would like to change this year are:

I want to spend more time with other people I like in planned social events. 
I want to get comfortable with intimacy.

Big plans!
 
Today I talk to Ben Foster. I’m a huge fan. I think he’s a great actor. I wanted to get to know him. On Thursday I talk to Colin Hanks about all the stuff.
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love,
Maron

The Skies.

Holidays were okay, Folks!
 
So far. I guess we’re almost out of the tunnel. I hope yours were good! 
 
I’m in New Mexico which can be pretty bittersweet as time goes on. As many of you know my dad and his wife are here. He’s begun his dementia struggle. I never really know where he will be at when I come out here. Fortunately he still knows me and was in pretty good spirits when I saw him. Engaged. 
 
I got him laughing pretty good. That seems to be the best indicator for me whether or not he still has deep self-awareness because I’m pretty relentless. It’s always been the goal. Making my father laugh, mostly at himself and what a pain in the ass he can be. I would say it’s where I developed some of my comedy style. It was out of necessity, a defense. 
 
It was good to see him. I’ve grown to appreciate these visits and not take them for granted. I appreciate the fact that not only is time limited but cognition is as well and that could go before he does. It’s a heavy matter of fact that I can trivialize or make jokes about, but in honesty I have no idea how that will affect me. I make jokes to preemptively disarm devastating emotional realities and upheavals. My brain wants to get a handle on them so I can feel ready and I do that with framing them funny. 
 
I also realize that it’s not easy for the people in his life on a daily basis. Mostly his wife, Rosie. When I’m around, all his energy goes into showing up as fully as he can to show me he’s ‘fine.’ I’ve noticed this with older podcast guests I’ve talked to who have all their wits about them. It’s an exhausting endeavor to focus. The people that deal with him daily deal with a lot. The ups and downs of confusion, memory loss, inability to perform simple tasks, emotional volatility and the diminishing of personality. It’s a truly horrible process and I have a tremendous amount of gratitude and empathy for his wife who has chosen to ride this thing out with him. I offer my help in any way I can but man, she’s the fucking hero in this war story. 
 
I usually get fairly melancholy when I’m here just because I have had some realizations about coming home in the last couple of years. I was half planning to find a place out here and spend part of the year living here. That fantasy has faded for a few reasons. It’s not that you can never go home again, it’s just that whatever you are looking for isn’t there. It’s within you. It needs to stay there or it will become tragic. Albuquerque is a beat-up city. It’s very different than the one I grew up in, I think. What do I know? I was looking at it as a child growing up with a perspective that is long gone. If I want that back I have to go there in my mind, in my heart. I can’t search for it on the streets, parking lots, restaurants, rivers and mountains of my youth. They can trigger the senses but I can’t go back. I guess that’s what it means to not be able to go home again. 
 
To be honest, it wasn’t that great a time, growing up. I do love the skies here though. It’s the consistency of the environment and vibe that stays true and moves me still. 
 
I talked Kit out of going to Chicago because of the horrible weather and she came out to New Mexico to hang with me. That’s been great. We’re having a nice time. Showing someone where your young life happened is a great way to be nostalgic. 
 
There’s a lot of eating going on too. Great but not great. I’ll reel it in. I think. 
 
Today I talk to Courtney Love and I have to preface it by saying it’s not an easy talk. She’s a unique, intense, fired up person. My role in the talk seems to be solely to guide it as best I can and just hold on. Hang with it. There’s a story there. On Thursday I talk to Eric McFadden. He’s a musician who I knew when we were kids back in Albuquerque but we didn’t really stay in touch. Since then he’s had an amazing solo career and also toured with the likes of George Clinton and Eric Burdon. It’s a unique talk about growing up in New Mexico and living the dream.
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live! 
 
Love, 
Maron

Triad of Doofuses.

Happy Hanukkah, Everyone!
 
In all honesty I didn’t know it had even started until midday yesterday. I guess it actually hadn’t yet but it was close. The liability of being a Jew alone, dating a non-Jew, with family that had other things on their mind. I had to be reminded by someone texting me their lit candles in NYC. 
 
It’s okay. Another day. An Amazon package came with some buttons I ordered to fix my overcoat. I’ll look at them as the first day’s gift. 
 
I’m not hopeful in any way but it does seem exciting that the three narcissists who tend to drive the vapid news cycle seem to be flaming out at the same time. Trump, Ye and Musk are all spiraling and it’s a beautiful thing. The singularity has clearly happened and the way the machines are controlling us is by making us all think that we need to give a shit about these globally consuming egoists. What a bunch of bores who aren’t even courageous enough to take their mental illness seriously. To see comedians and anyone who talks publicly feel like they need to address these windbags is so pathetic. 
 
There are probably more interesting people down the street from you. There’s probably a guy around the corner on the phone to a vets office concerned about his dog’s dick and that’s an infinitely more interesting story than anything being churned out by the triad of doofuses. There’s probably a lady knitting a hat somewhere that would be a better news story. 
 
Two of them are hopped up on speed and delusional and the other is an unmedicated bipolar person and also delusional. Though I must say that Trump hocking NFT trading cards of him as a superhero is exactly who that guy is. How do you feel about ‘your’ president now, dummies?
 
On a serious, emotional note I would like to say a few words about someone who passed. Silver Saunders Friedman was the owner of the original Improvisation club in NYC on 44th street. The first Improv. She got the club in the divorce settlement from her husband Budd, who most people know. When I got to NYC and was just starting out as a comic in the late eighties Silver was one of the first people to believe in me and give me work. The club was pretty beat up at that point and a lot of the acts there were old timers and hangers on but it was THE club. It was a historic place and she was the final word. She was a bit volatile and intense but had good creative input and the clubs was always welcoming to us younger comics. Her daughter, Zoe, is also in the business and worked as a booker for the Letterman show for a spell. She gave me my first Letterman spot. The two Friedman women changed my life. I went to the memorial for a bit to pay my respects but I just wanted to write something because she was very important to my development as a comic. 
 
RIP, Silver. 
 
Today I talk to Rian Johnson about his films Brick, Looper, Knives Out and Glass Onion among others and other things. On Thursday I talk to Scott Cooper about his films Crazy Heart, Into the Furnace, Hostiles, Black Mass and The Pale Blue Eye among other things. Directors are great to talk to. 
 
Enjoy!
 
Boomer, Monkey and LaFonda live!
 
Love, 
Maron