Stop Looking FOR Problems if You Want to GROW! - #1 Hollywood Director Judd Apatow

What does rejection feel like to you? Today, Jay sits down with legendary filmmaker and comedian Judd Apatow, known for shaping modern comedy with films like The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up. Judd opens up about the struggles behind the success, sharing how self-doubt, early failures, and rejection shaped him into the storyteller he is today. Judd talks about the risks he took, the creative experiments that didn’t work, and how those “failures” became stepping stones toward lasting impact. He reveals how therapy, mindfulness, and even family dynamics have influenced his work, and why the most meaningful measure of success is not box office numbers, but whether your work truly connects with people. In this interview, you'll learn: How to Find Your Creative Voice How to Balance Ambition with Presence How to Use Mentorship to Grow How to Push Through Self-Doubt How to Create With Authenticity How to Learn From Rejection How to Protect Your Flow State What We Discuss: 00:00 Intro 01:26 What Made You Laugh Out Loud? 04:12 Raising Children Without Pressure 07:16 Never Limiting a Child’s Potential 08:27 The Most Memorable Interview 10:00 Discovering a Personal Path 10:46 From Fan to Friend 12:16 Running a Show Together 14:43 Growing with Creative Peers 16:54 Why Failure Leads to Success 18:56 The Power of Putting Yourself Out There 21:23 Why Success Takes Time 24:17 Creating Something Original 27:56 A Sliding Doors Moment 29:10 Realizing the Power of Choice 31:17 Becoming Part of Another’s Success 32:35 Confronting Creative Blocks 35:01 Inside a Storyteller’s Mind 36:29 Choosing to Be Part of the Solution 38:56 Taking Creative Risks 41:29 Silencing the Inner Critic 44:24 The Real Formula for Comedy 48:20 The Pitfalls of Mocking Others 49:37 The Promise and Peril of AI 52:35 Letting Go of a Problem-Seeking Mind 55:08 Projecting Childhood Trauma at Work 58:42 Separating Emotions from the Work 01:01:05 Choosing the Right Collaborators 01:03:54 Learning to Lighten Up 01:06:23 What Leads to True Success 01:08:26 The Most Impactful Self-Help Books 01:14:03 The Pain Behind Comedy 01:18:09 Defining True Happiness 01:22:33 Exploring an Ayahuasca Experience 01:24:18 The Secret to a Lasting Marriage 01:28:05 Lessons to Share with Children 01:30:07 Being Direct Yet Constructive 01:31:48 Finding Drama in Good People 01:34:07 Why Mentorship Matters 01:38:09 Judd on Final Five Episode Resources: https://www.juddapatow.com/ https://www.instagram.com/juddapatow https://www.facebook.com/juddapatowofficial/ https://www.amazon.com/Comedy-Nerd-Lifelong-Obsession-Pictures/dp/0593595939 https://www.instagram.com/jayshetty https://www.facebook.com/jayshetty/ https://x.com/jayshetty https://www.linkedin.com/in/shettyjay/ https://www.youtube.com/@JayShettyPodcast http://jayshetty.me

Jay Shettyhost

Oct 15, 20251h 47mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

120 min read · 23,540 words

0:00 – 1:26
Intro
1. SPSpeaker
  I had to look at the failure as the path to success. I thought, "Well, every joke that doesn't get a laugh is teaching me what not to do."
2. JSJay Shetty
  Sometimes we wait for the result to make us believe that we're worthy.
3. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
4. JSJay Shetty
  But there's a moment that I think when you do what you love, you're like, "Oh, no, I can do this."
5. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
6. JSJay Shetty
  It's just a matter of time before people kind of figure it out.
7. SPSpeaker
  The number one health and wellness podcast.
8. SPSpeaker
  Jay Shetty.
9. SPSpeaker
  Jay Shetty.
10. SPSpeaker
  The one, the only Jay Shetty.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Hey, everyone. Welcome back to On Purpose, the place you come to listen, learn, and grow. Today on On Purpose, I welcome a true icon, Judd Apatow, one of the most influential storytellers in modern comedy and the filmmaker behind, just to name a few, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up, and Funny People. Together, we explore how to tap into your creativity, push through self-doubt, use humor to get through tough moments, and build the kind of resilience that lasts in both life and work. We'll be diving into Judd's newest book, Comedy Nerd, a visual memoir of his life and career. This book is epic, honestly.
12. SPSpeaker
  [laughs]
13. JSJay Shetty
  I've been, uh, flicking through it and taking moments out that I want to talk about today for the past couple of weeks, and I can't wait for you to grab it. Please welcome to On Purpose Judd Apatow. Judd, it's great to have you here.
14. SPSpeaker
  It's great to be here.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Truly, thank you so much for being here. I'm, I'm, like, I'm so fascinated by your career, your life, and I feel like there's so many directions with which we can go, and that's my favorite-
16. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
17. JSJay Shetty
  ... kind of person to sit down
1:26 – 4:12
What Made You Laugh Out Loud?
1. JSJay Shetty
  with.
2. SPSpeaker
  [laughs]
3. JSJay Shetty
  But the first thing I want to ask is, you have a book called Comedy Nerd.
4. SPSpeaker
  Yes.
5. JSJay Shetty
  You've made people laugh for decades.
6. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
7. JSJay Shetty
  What was the last thing that made you laugh out loud?
8. SPSpeaker
  Uh, there's a TV show on Hulu called Such Brave Girls.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Oh, I've not seen it. Okay.
10. SPSpeaker
  I, I just, I, I'll just recommend that to everybody. It's just-
11. JSJay Shetty
  You didn't make this show. There's no-
12. SPSpeaker
  I, I have nothing to do with it other than, uh, my daughter Maud said to me, "I think I've seen the funniest thing ever." And then we watched it together, and we went, "Yeah."
13. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
14. SPSpeaker
  That's, that's about it. And, and I've been catching up on The Righteous Gemstones, which I, which I was behind on.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Okay.
16. SPSpeaker
  That's been fun.
17. JSJay Shetty
  I've not seen that either.
18. SPSpeaker
  You got two good ones there.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Great two recommendations. I love that. I, I feel like you and your family just have such a sweet, fun relationship. Are you always watching shows together and-
20. SPSpeaker
  Yes
21. JSJay Shetty
  ... connecting and recommending? What does that look like?
22. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, I, I mean, when they're young, you're just, you know, watching The Iron Giant 800 times in a row-
23. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
24. SPSpeaker
  ... with them or, or Toy Story. And then at some point you go, "I wonder if they could enjoy the Blues Brothers."
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
26. SPSpeaker
  And you try to slip, you know, some Caddyshack or Ghostbusters in there, and, and maybe a third of them they like.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
28. SPSpeaker
  Like, you kinda can't get them to love the stuff that you love.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  But then every once in a while, I'll, you know... When they were young, I'd walk by their room, and they're, like, watching Anchorman or something.
4:12 – 7:16
Raising Children Without Pressure
1. JSJay Shetty
  parents struggle with that. Obviously, we all wanna be liked.
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
3. JSJay Shetty
  You wanna be liked by your kid.
4. SPSpeaker
  Yes. [laughs]
5. JSJay Shetty
  And this is the person you love more than anything else in the world, but for years they don't love you. Like, I always say, like-
6. SPSpeaker
  [laughs]
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... I feel like I was grateful to my parents when I was, like, 21.
8. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm, yeah.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Like, it took all those years for me to turn around and be like-
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
11. JSJay Shetty
  ... "Thank you, Mom and Da..." Like, in a deep, sincere way.
12. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
13. JSJay Shetty
  I may have said it before then. How did you deal with that? Like, it seems like you have a really great relationship with your kids, and how, how did you get over that hump of not them seeing you as cool and funny and all the rest of it when you'd achieved so much?
14. SPSpeaker
  Well, I think that they, uh, you know, I think we all got a kick out of each other.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
16. SPSpeaker
  Like, we always thought that they were really funny-
17. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
18. SPSpeaker
  ... and we enjoyed their personalities. And so even when, you know, you go through the rough middle school years, uh, you know, we're still having fun most of the time.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  And but I also think, like, we're, we're, like, the kind of parents who are like, "You know, don't go to college then. Leave me alone."
21. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
22. SPSpeaker
  Like, we weren't, like, the pressure parents.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  You know? We were trying our best to, uh, to say, "You know, just figure out what you wanna do."
25. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
26. SPSpeaker
  "And, you know, you know, chase your passion." And that, that's the main thing I realized later, which is people are always obsessing on grades or discipline, but the thing you're really hoping your kids have is some sort of fire to chase a dream.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
28. SPSpeaker
  And I had never thought about that before. Oh, I need my kids to have some ambition, some energy to take a risk and go after something. And so, you know, wh- when I saw that both of them did, you know, that was a great, great relief.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. How were you in school? Did you get good grades?
30. SPSpeaker
  I was, like, a very mediocre, [laughs] mediocre student. I went to school on Long Island, and they used to do this thing where they would test you, I guess, like, in sixth grade, and they would decide how smart you were, basically. And they would put you in track one, which was the smartest.
7:16 – 8:27
Never Limiting a Child’s Potential
1. JSJay Shetty
  with any of your, like, school or high school teachers or anyone else who taught you and you had any interactions with back then that you remember now? Have you-
2. SPSpeaker
  Well, you know, the, the, the man, uh, who ran the, the, uh, media program and the high school radio station that I used to interview comedians at was named Jack DeMasi, and we're still good friends. And he, you know, he was the first person to say to all of us, you know, "Treat this radio station like it's real and just, you know, use, use it." And so we would, like, call up and try to figure out how to get free tickets and free books and, and ca-
3. JSJay Shetty
  Live on-
4. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. We would just, like, use it. You know, people were interviewing politicians and sports people. My friend was interviewing bands like R.E.M. And, and then one day my friend was like, "You should try to interview comics," 'cause he knew I was into it. And then one day I got an interview with Steve Allen, and then I got an interview with Howard Stern and Sandra Bernhard. And, and that became how I educated myself about comedies. I did 50 interviews in high school-
5. JSJay Shetty
  Hmm
6. SPSpeaker
  ... uh, with, like, Seinfeld and Leno. And as I look back now, I go, it helped. Like-
7. JSJay Shetty
  Boy
8. SPSpeaker
  ... they did give me good information. And most importantly, they were nice to me, which I, I think made me feel safe trying to get in the business-
9. JSJay Shetty
  Hmm
10. SPSpeaker
  ... because I thought, "Oh, there's people like that-
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yes
12. SPSpeaker
  ... in there."
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yes. Yeah.
8:27 – 10:00
The Most Memorable Interview
1. JSJay Shetty
  What was the most memorable interview that you remember for yourself at that time? 'Cause you were 15 years old.
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Yeah, I was 15, 16 years old.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah.
4. SPSpeaker
  I mean, yeah, Martin Short I interviewed when he was promoting SCTV, and he was just so funny. I was always amazed when anyone would try to make me laugh, 'cause I was just a kid.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
6. SPSpeaker
  And I just thought, "Wow, this is the nicest person in the world. They're, like, really, like, going for it with me." You know, some people would seem like, "Oh, no, this is a kid. I don't..." [laughs] I didn't want to do this.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, yeah.
8. SPSpeaker
  And they'd be, like, fine, but a few people would be really funny. Jerry Seinfeld was hilarious and talked to me about how to write jokes and gave me examples of jokes he was working on.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
10. SPSpeaker
  And, uh, and that all, you know, s- you know, stayed with me forever.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. It's so subtle, I feel like, in those years, the things that you re-
12. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
13. JSJay Shetty
  ... learn and the people that you're around. And I, I, I wish everyone got work experience like that. I mean, that sounds amazing.
14. SPSpeaker
  Well, it was also a lesson in how to treat people.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
16. SPSpeaker
  Because, you know, I was just a young person, and I would go in to talk to someone. And, you know, for someone like Jerry Seinfeld to s- to say, "I'm gonna sit with you for 45 minutes and really take all your questions, uh, and seriously and thoughtfully."
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
18. SPSpeaker
  And that was a big deal.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. It's such an amazing experience and entryway into the industry, too, like you said, that, "Oh, if I become like these people-
20. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
21. JSJay Shetty
  ... then I can still be a good person and a nice person."
22. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Yeah, and, and I didn't realize that till, like, a few years ago.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  Like, oh, that was a big thing about how I try to handle myself in the business, was I saw these people like Harold Ramis, and they, they were just so kind and funny that I just thought that, oh, that's the vibration you wanna
10:00 – 10:46
Discovering a Personal Path
1. SPSpeaker
  go for.
2. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Do you... Did you ever worry about it? I feel like everyone has so many thoughts on the industry. Did you ever have a negative idea of the industry or worry or fear that it would change you or make you different or in any way change your path?
3. SPSpeaker
  I was just really excited by it. I think as a kid in the '70s and '80s, just variety TV, Bob Hope and Saturday Night Live and Richard Pryor, it seemed so exciting. And I also thought, there's not that many people in comedy.
4. JSJay Shetty
  Hmm.
5. SPSpeaker
  You know, back then it really felt like all of comedy was 100 people.
6. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
7. SPSpeaker
  So for some reason I thought, "I can get in there. I think I can get a [laughs] job in there."
8. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, yeah.
9. SPSpeaker
  And so I, I really was just determined to figure out how... you know, what is the path? You know, how do, how do you do it?
10. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. I, I heard an interview
10:46 – 12:16
From Fan to Friend
1. JSJay Shetty
  where you were talking about how you almost grew up in comedy with all these amazing other people that are all icons in their own right as well-
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... like Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler. And you were almost like, you were like, "We all grew up with our friends in our career."
4. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
5. JSJay Shetty
  And I was thinking, what was it that allowed you all to be friends and not competitors and not see each other as your arch rivals or your arch nemesis [laughs] in that sense-
6. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... and actually say, "Oh, no." You, you, you said in that interview, you were like, "I saw, saw them as friends." And I was like-
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... wow, that's, that's special. It's unique.
10. SPSpeaker
  I think it's different for everyone. Like, for me, I just thought, "I can't compete with Jim Carrey." [laughs]
11. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
12. SPSpeaker
  "I can't compete with Adam Sandler." I had an awareness that these were very special people. I mean, they were, you know, great friends and, and remain and, and are so nice. But back then, just as a fan, even when I was, you know, around Adam or Jim, I always thought, "Oh, that's the guy. That's gonna be the guy," you know? Like, it was like hanging out with Charlie Chaplin or something. And, and it just turned out to be true that they were the people who were gonna change everything.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Hmm.
14. SPSpeaker
  And so I never felt competitive. I f- I, sometimes I was depressed.
15. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
16. SPSpeaker
  Like I had lost the competition. [laughs]
17. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
18. SPSpeaker
  That's what really, what I thought was, "Oh, wow, I'm not built like that."
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  You know, if you're around Jim Carrey, you're like, "Yeah, I can't do that."
21. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
22. SPSpeaker
  I can't think that. I mean, I used to, you know, help him at writing jokes and punching up scripts and stuff, so that felt like the greatest thing ever, that, that he trusted me enough to be a part of his creativity in any way.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Wow. Well, that's,
12:16 – 14:43
Running a Show Together
1. JSJay Shetty
  well, that's a great point, too. Like, I was looking at it from the other angle, but I love, I love the lens you took it through, which is... Then how did you, how did you maintain your motivation and your drive when you're looking around and you're thinking, "God, this guy's ahead of me. This guy's gonna be the next big thing."
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
3. JSJay Shetty
  "Who am I?" How did you channel that feeling that could lead to depression and giving up to actually going, "Well, no, I, I still have something to say"?
4. SPSpeaker
  I think I just thought something's gonna, something's gonna happen. [laughs]
5. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
6. SPSpeaker
  I don't know what it is. I started out as a comedian, and I was studying screenwriting, and I didn't really have a vision of if I was gonna be an actor. I wanted to be a c- a comedian. I didn't, I didn't really think that much about being a director. I thought about being a writer a little bit. And everyone was jockeying to break in, and suddenly Jim Carrey was on In Living Color, and then Adam got Saturday Night Live. And I was beginning to write some HBO specials. I wrote for Tom Arnold, and Roseanne was one of my first gigs. And then I met Ben Stiller, and we created a sketch show, The Ben Stiller Show, together, and suddenly that was happening. And out of some weird fluke, even though I was very young, we both ran the show, which was weird.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
8. SPSpeaker
  We, we didn't really climb the ladder. We got a show on, on the Fox network, and so I was just trying to not screw it up.
9. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
10. SPSpeaker
  Like, how do... And Ben was a genius, so I was watching what he was doing and trying to figure out how I could help him run the show and, and not ruin this opportunity. And, you know, it got canceled after 12 episodes. [laughs]
11. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
12. SPSpeaker
  But, you know, we won an Emmy six months later.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
14. SPSpeaker
  And so it became this interesting-
15. JSJay Shetty
  How did it cancel and win an Emmy?
16. SPSpeaker
  It, it was a funny thing because I think comedy people really liked it. It was on at 7:30 against 60 Minutes. It was a very weird time slot, and Ben was really trying a lot of new things in comedy. You know, Bob Odenkirk and, and Andy Dick and Jane Garofalo were on the show. And s- so we, we knew this, the, the, the head of the network didn't like it, and so the whole time we were like, "Oh, this isn't gonna last long."
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  And six months later, we won an Emmy, and then people categorized us as, uh, people who were doing something interesting.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Right.
20. SPSpeaker
  Almost like an alternative rock band.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
22. SPSpeaker
  Like we were The Replacements or something.
23. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
24. SPSpeaker
  And I thought, "Well, that's pretty cool to be a failure who came-"
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, to be a rebel and like...
26. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, yeah, to not get ratings.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
28. SPSpeaker
  But, but certain people that I respect think what we did was great.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  And so that kept me going for a while.
14:43 – 16:54
Growing with Creative Peers
1. JSJay Shetty
  I remember reading Bob Iger's book, and he talked about how Steven Spielberg, Tarantino, George Lucas, that they would all premiere their movies to each other-
2. SPSpeaker
  Mm
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... and ask for feedback.
4. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
5. JSJay Shetty
  And when I read that, I was like, "Wow." And, and he goes on to talk about how they were so confident in their own style-
6. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... and they so trusted that every person had their own style that they never felt someone was gonna-
8. SPSpeaker
  Mm
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... steal something or take something off each other. And I thought, "Wow, that's an incredible, incredible..." And these, they're all young at this age.
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
11. JSJay Shetty
  It's not like they're... You know, they're adults, but they're not mature people with wisdom. And for them to have that at that point, and it sounds like you all had the same, where you're helping each other with jokes.
12. SPSpeaker
  Mm.
13. JSJay Shetty
  You're building shows together.
14. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
15. JSJay Shetty
  You're running together. Like, it almost feels like the comedy version of that.
16. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
17. JSJay Shetty
  If that was the film version, this is the comedy version.
18. SPSpeaker
  Well, I, you... When I was young, we would watch, you know, Saturday Night Live or Monty Python or Second City TV, and it was these groups of comedy people, these, uh, communities.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Where would you do this?
20. SPSpeaker
  You know, it would just be o- on TV. You know, you'd be home, and you'd watch. You know, Monty Python would be on PBS when I was a kid. And, and, uh, you, you would see them and think, "Oh," a- and maybe they weren't, but to me, they were all buddies.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
22. SPSpeaker
  Right? And so Saturday Night Live felt like a group of friends. I'm sure they weren't. I'm sure, like, a couple were, and these were-
23. JSJay Shetty
  But you were watching this with Jim and with...
24. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, so in my head, I was like, "This is so fun," that, like, there's a community here in Los Angeles of people trying to break into comedy.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
26. SPSpeaker
  And, and I realized, oh, that was the goal really, maybe more than even the work, was, like, to find that community of like-minded people to have fun with. Well, it's a miracle that anything works.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
28. SPSpeaker
  Because everything in comedy is an experiment. There's no precedent that lets you know this will definitely work.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
30. SPSpeaker
  So you're always on the verge of massive humiliation and failure.
16:54 – 18:56
Why Failure Leads to Success
1. JSJay Shetty
  What was the first moment you were convinced that, "I'm funny, I can write funny, I can do funny"? When did that happen in that journey and process?
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, I'm trying to figure out when I thought I was doing well because I was very comfortable not being good. Because when I did all the interviews, they all said it takes, like, seven years to find your voice. So in my head, I thought, "Oh, I started stand-up at 17, so when I'm 24, I'll be great."
3. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
4. SPSpeaker
  And so when I was 19 and I was terrible, I thought, "Perfect."
5. JSJay Shetty
  "I've got five years."
6. SPSpeaker
  "This is, this is where I'm supposed, [laughs] supposed to be right now." So I had this clock that was very aware that this was gonna take time and that I had to... I had to look at the failure as the path to success. And so I thought, "Well, every joke that doesn't get a laugh is teaching me what not to do."
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
8. SPSpeaker
  And then r- I'm trying to think of the first thing that I thought was very funny.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, that you thought. Not that the result worked. 'Cause I think-
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
11. JSJay Shetty
  ... that's a really interesting part, right? I feel like sometimes we wait for the result to make us believe that we're worthy.
12. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
13. JSJay Shetty
  But there's a moment that I think when you do what you love, you're like, "Oh, no, I can do this."
14. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
15. JSJay Shetty
  It's just a matter of time before people kind of figure it out.
16. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. I started writing jokes for comedians like George Wallace and Taylor Negron, and then I got hired to write-... jokes for Tom Arnold when he first moved to town. And everyone was like, "Who's this guy that's with Roseanne?" And he was trying to figure out his point of view in standup, and so I was a, a part of that. And then we did a, a bunch of HBO specials where he would try to solve the world's problems, like reality comedy specials. And we would write these, uh, setups for these reality pieces, which were filmed sketches. And R- Roseanne and Tom would get big people to be in them. Frank Zappa was in one. Fred Willard. I, I got Jim Carrey to do o- one of these intros and, and Stiller. And so these little intros were funny. And so maybe that was, those were the first things that they shot. Like, "Oh my God, I wrote a joke for Frank Zappa."
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  And it got a laugh.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  And that gave me-
21. JSJay Shetty
  That was it
22. SPSpeaker
  ... some confidence. Yeah.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  To see Martin Mull do your bit or-
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
26. SPSpeaker
  ... and just go, "Wow, he's my favorite, and I think I didn't screw him up. I think I gave him a good joke [laughs] there."
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, yeah. That's,
18:56 – 21:23
The Power of Putting Yourself Out There
1. JSJay Shetty
  I mean, the, the success, the failure to success piece is so interesting. I saw somewhere you said something like you heard that someone sold their 10th script.
2. SPSpeaker
  Yes.
3. JSJay Shetty
  And so you felt you could not sell nine, and-
4. SPSpeaker
  Exactly
5. JSJay Shetty
  ... it would take time. And I love that idea that you said, "Hey, I started 17, and it takes seven years to be a great comic." And so at 24, I think the reason why I'm picking those two things that you've said is today I feel like a lot of young people just feel like they have to be successful tomorrow-
6. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Mm-hmm
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... because there is a 16-year-old who has 100 million followers on TikTok-
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... or there is a 21-year-old that is a billionaire or whatever it may be. And so, and now you're aware of what everyone's achieving, not just your classmates or the people you're around. And I wonder if you've ever thought about, especially with your daughters going into the industry too, how, how do you help them reconcile that, that pressure and that timeline that's just totally shifted, where you can't take seven years to become an icon anymore? You should be an icon-
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
11. JSJay Shetty
  ... tomorrow.
12. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, I, I think that that must be tough on everybody trying to do anything, 'cause I, I look back at when I was living with Adam Sandler, and I, I always think no one was paying attention to us.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
14. SPSpeaker
  So we would go to the Improv every night, and Adam would experiment and do weird characters, do Cajun Man out of the blue, and just do all these weird things. And no one was judging it, no one was taping it, no one was commenting about it. So there really was this gestation period where you could be really weird and funny and take chances and really fail some nights, really kill other nights. And so the idea of people paying attention to that, where when you're really young, you feel the, the need to put yourself on the internet-
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
16. SPSpeaker
  ... probably is not great-
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
18. SPSpeaker
  ... for everybody.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  'Cause it's also really fun failing when no one's watching.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
22. SPSpeaker
  You know, it's fun to play a club at 1:00 in the morning in front of 30 people and just do something wild just to see if it would work.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And it's almost like you've gotta kind of, even if you are putting yourself online, you've gotta, you've gotta feel or remind yourself that no one's really watching right now.
24. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
25. JSJay Shetty
  And hey, people won't... They'll only watch my first videos after-
26. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
27. JSJay Shetty
  ... I get a following, which will be okay.
28. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
29. JSJay Shetty
  And so there's some of that that you can kinda take forward.
30. SPSpeaker
  And I, I, you know, I didn't direct till I was, like, 36, 37 years old, uh, a movie. I'd done some television before that. And I was better because I wasn't [laughs] given the shot earlier. I think I just-
21:23 – 24:17
Why Success Takes Time
1. JSJay Shetty
  I love hearing these stories, and that's why I love the book Comedy Nerd so much, is because for me, like, my first experience of Ben Stiller would've been Zoolander.
2. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Or, you know, I'm trying to think of the first Adam Sandler movie I watched. Click or maybe something like that.
4. SPSpeaker
  Mm.
5. JSJay Shetty
  And it's like you come across this work when... Or like with you, it's like Forgetting Sarah Marshall or like... And you're, you're g- talking about these huge hits that are, like, worldwide famous. Peop- you know, people talk about them, laugh for hours, and that's your first experience. Then you realize, wait a minute, this person had a TV show that had 12 episodes and got canceled.
6. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. [laughs]
7. JSJay Shetty
  And, and, and then they went on to do something else. And so I feel like it's so sobering to hear it, and I feel like for our community that are full of creatives, people who are entrepreneurs, whether you're building a business, whether you're launching a podcast, whether someone's trying to create their own brand or clothing line, it's almost like there's so much pressure to be first and for your first thing to be your thing-
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... today, I feel.
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
11. JSJay Shetty
  And to know that your f- your main thing that you do today that you're most known for, directing, happened, like, you know, took-
12. SPSpeaker
  20 years in
13. JSJay Shetty
  ... 20 years into you doing the thing-
14. SPSpeaker
  [laughs]
15. JSJay Shetty
  ... as opposed to two years in. And you've continued to build an amazing career from it. It wasn't, it wasn't like that was lost time even. You wouldn't say that from 17 to 36 was a waste of time.
16. SPSpeaker
  No, and there was, there were fun projects that we, you know, we all learned how to make movies while making. So, you know, I worked on a, a kids movie called Heavyweights.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  And that was the first movie that we shot. And, you know, at the time, it was a little $10 million movie that made $20 million. And, you know, Ben Stiller played the bad guy. Paul Feig was an actor in it. Kenan Thompson, uh, wa- was in it. And our friend Steve Brill, who I wrote it with, directed it. And, you know, we d- we didn't know what we were doing and made this kind of super weird Disney movie. And at the time, I guess considered a failure, and now 30 years later, it's on Disney+ right now.
19. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
20. SPSpeaker
  And it's, like, a big movie that kids keep watching. So even the things where you were learning, sometimes over time-
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
22. SPSpeaker
  ... you realize, oh, people love that one.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  Even, even the things that at the time were failures or people didn't quite get what your point of view was, and then, you know, 20 years later, people say, "Oh, I love The Cable Guy."
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  You go, "Yeah, I took a beating for that in 1996." [laughs]
27. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
28. SPSpeaker
  And so that's the other thing you learn, that it takes time for the world to really tell you-
29. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
30. SPSpeaker
  ... if you succeeded or failed.
24:17 – 27:56
Creating Something Original
1. JSJay Shetty
  Would you say, though, Judd, that you felt that way or you've felt that way over time? Did you... Have you always made stuff that you believed was funny and was made for you and your friends, or did you always put the audience at the heart of it, and it was their response that designed it? Because I feel like in creativity, there's these two versions, where people are like, "I don't care what anyone else thinks. I just make what I believe-
2. SPSpeaker
  Mm
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... is funny and what my friends would laugh at." And then there's like, "No, I'm listening and learning and taking all the outside notes, and then that's what I'm focusing on." What, what was your process in the days when it wasn't working-
4. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
5. JSJay Shetty
  ... externally?
6. SPSpeaker
  Uh, I... You know, the, the main thing is, do you like it? So as a comedy fan or just someone who wants to make things that are great, that's the main bar. Like, do I like it?
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
8. SPSpeaker
  Am I proud of it? And then the second question is, how many people would like it the way [chuckles] I like it? 'Cause you can make something and you know, oh, this is a very niche idea. There's gonna be a small crowd who likes it. And certain ideas, you're like, "I think this is great, but I actually think everyone will like it."
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
10. SPSpeaker
  Uh, and I was always a big fan of, of James Brooks from when I was a kid, uh, you know, watching The Mary Tyler Moore Show and broadcast news, and I got a chance to work on this show he did called The Critic. And I just saw that he really cared if the, if the audience l- liked it, and he would always say, "If the audience doesn't love it, you failed."
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
12. SPSpeaker
  Like, that's... It's as [laughs] simple, it's as simple as that.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
14. SPSpeaker
  If they, if they're not touched emotionally, if they're not laughing, you didn't do a good job. And y- you know, he was a big supporter of table reads and getting input from people and, and, and doing test screenings and seeing how people were interpreting the work. So it's, it's a weird process because on one level, you're trying to be an artist and stay true to what you believe in and what you like, but you're also having this conversation with the audience because if they don't get it, it, it's bad.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I, I think now creativity's become, in one sense, more difficult because the idea of a trend and everyone doing the same thing is-
16. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm
17. JSJay Shetty
  ... far more normal and common.
18. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Whereas in what you're talking about, there was a sense of uniqueness and ingenuity, and everyone's kind of doing that. Like, Jim Carrey's not doing the same thing Adam Sandler's doing.
20. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
21. JSJay Shetty
  You're not doing the same thing. If you're working with them on a project, that's different, but you're not doing the same thing they're doing, and it's, it's almost become harder to stand out, when one sense you could argue too, I'm easier to stand out because lots of people are doing the same thing.
22. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
23. JSJay Shetty
  But it's almost like creativity has very much become about what the algorithm rewards.
24. SPSpeaker
  Exactly, and I, I, I'm, I'm glad to have escaped that era.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  Uh, because I think that is really dangerous to, to doing something very unique.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
28. SPSpeaker
  Because the next great thing is the thing no one saw coming.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
30. SPSpeaker
  It's just the, the wild idea or a band that doesn't sound the way anyone else sounds, and so there's a, there's a lot of great stuff that all sounds the same-
27:56 – 29:10
A Sliding Doors Moment
1. JSJay Shetty
  what was your Sliding Doors moment or, like, moment of, like, if that didn't happen-
2. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... my life could have completely gone on a different trajectory or in a different format?
4. SPSpeaker
  I mean, there's so many of them. You know, I met Ben Stiller online at an Elvis Costello Unplugged taping, and, you know, we thought of this sketch show idea and pitched it two weeks later, and everybody thought we were old, old friends, and we had known each other for 14 days.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
6. SPSpeaker
  And suddenly we were just, you know...
7. JSJay Shetty
  And it was just natural from the moment you met. There was just-
8. SPSpeaker
  We just got along great and, and-
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
10. SPSpeaker
  ... and creatively w- w- were in sync. So if I didn't bump into Ben that day, I mean, that was, you know, a pretty big one. Um, I remember seeing Jim Carrey at a comedy club and, and thinking, "I think I've just seen the best comedian in the world." [chuckles]
11. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
12. SPSpeaker
  And I called my manager, and I was like, "You have to come see what Jim Carrey's doing." And, and that was a big moment-
13. JSJay Shetty
  Wow
14. SPSpeaker
  ... just to, to witness it. And in, in movies, yeah, there's... It's just like an opportunity. Steve Brill saying, "Hey, I wanna make a summer camp movie that's about a, a camp for overweight kids."
15. JSJay Shetty
  [chuckles]
16. SPSpeaker
  And I just said, "Oh, that's hilarious. If you need help, let me know." And just him saying yes-
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
18. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, changes your whole life.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah, it's... I, I
29:10 – 31:17
Realizing the Power of Choice
1. JSJay Shetty
  ca- I mean, was there anyone that you felt was so good but then, you know, didn't have the caree- Did you see people that you were like, "Oh my God, this person's amazing," but they didn't have the career that you thought they would?
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. There's so many comedians who are incredible, but they didn't necessarily transition to movies or-
3. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
4. SPSpeaker
  ... sitcoms, but they remained the best comedians of all time.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
6. SPSpeaker
  Or they were just road comedians who were just way funnier and better than other people. But some people never had that energy to go, "All right. How would I work in a movie?"
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
8. SPSpeaker
  I, I think it's a very specific understanding of yourself and story and what you do. Adam Sandler started writing screenplays for himself when he was right out of college when no one wanted him to write a screenplay for himself. No one was saying, "Hey, write a movie for you to star in." He just had this sense of, "Oh, this is a path I think that I, I could succeed in."
9. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
10. SPSpeaker
  And so even when no one thought you could be the lead of a movie, he sat in a room. W- I remember he sat with my friend Joel Madison. They just wrote a movie.And I was like, "Wow, you just sat down and wrote a movie? You can do that?"
11. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
12. SPSpeaker
  "You can just get out the computer and do that?" Uh, but not everyone had that belief in themselves.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Why did you feel that turn was so important, that connection between comedy and then becoming a writer and director? Why did... Why was that calling important to you? Where did that come from? Like you're saying, not everyone made that crossover.
14. SPSpeaker
  Well, when I was interviewing people, you know, some people like Harold Ramis said that he, uh, made a living by selling jokes.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
16. SPSpeaker
  And I just thought, "Oh, I don't have to make burritos?"
17. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
18. SPSpeaker
  "I could, like, sell a joke for 50 bucks a joke to somebody?" Or, uh, you know, 'cause I had, you know, worked in a restaurant for a long time. Was a busboy and a dishwasher. So some of it was just, "I need money."
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  And most comedians didn't wanna write for other comedians because they wanted to be famous.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yes. Yes.
22. SPSpeaker
  And I thought, "I think I can do it and still do my stand-up." And I think what it really was is I enjoyed hanging out with other comedians, and I enjoyed collaboration. Like, my desire to be successful solo wasn't very strong. I, I, I think on some level I thought, "Oh, this is fun hanging out with Ben, and I'm not looking to be isolated."
31:17 – 32:35
Becoming Part of Another’s Success
1. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. That's such a great sense of self-awareness. I love that. Like, I love hearing that for everyone who's listening because I think there's, again, like... And I'm just looking at thinking about our community that watches our show and listens to our show and has dreams and has aspirations, and how often by wanting to be the face or wanting to be number one-
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... in a certain way, you can lose out on, like, this-
4. SPSpeaker
  Yes
5. JSJay Shetty
  ... you know, tapestry of stories and-
6. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... experiences and amazing-
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... friendships and relationships where you're like, "Yeah, I just, I didn't really care about being the guy who was on the screen telling the joke. I was happy being the person who wrote and built these universes that these comedians played in."
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, I w- I mean, it was so fun. Like, I would go to Roseanne's house and just write jokes with her on Sunday.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
12. SPSpeaker
  Just go, like, at breakfast time, sit at her breakfast table with... She'd bring out legal pads. And to me, that was success. I, I mean, almost to the point of if it didn't get much farther than that, I was already pretty happy.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
14. SPSpeaker
  Like, wow, there are people that are the best at this who will let me be a part of their thing.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
16. SPSpeaker
  And so I, I was just so excited to be allowed in the room.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  And, you know, sometimes I joke that the only reason why I even wrote anything was to get to be allowed in the room.
19. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs] Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  You know? Like, I had to prove I was credible to, to have these relationships with everybody.
32:35 – 35:01
Confronting Creative Blocks
1. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. When do you feel most creative, and when do you feel most creatively blocked?
2. SPSpeaker
  I mean, I work so hard to try to figure that out. I think it's just an ongoing, uh, search for flow state. And so I used to never understand anything about how the brain works. And so, you know, I would... You know, when I was young, I would write... My, my process was I would sleep till noon. I would get up to write. I'd watch MTV, like Road Rules or some... [laughs] Like, I would just sit and watch TV for, like, six hours. And then at 6:00, I'd think, "I'm gonna write." Then I would eat dinner. And then after dinner, at some point, I'd slowly move to the computer. Now it's, like, 7:00, 8:00 at night, and then I would write till, like, 2:00 in the morning.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
4. SPSpeaker
  And that was, like, my, my fl- my flow. [laughs]
5. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
6. SPSpeaker
  And I realized, oh, so it's almost like a post-food relaxation, burnt out all my interest in TV and the world, and then my brain would just, like, get so tired, it would relax, and then stuff would come to me.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
8. SPSpeaker
  But then, you know, when you have kids-
9. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs] Yeah
10. SPSpeaker
  ... you can't work from 8:00 till 2:00 in the morning. And then you have to figure out, oh, I guess I have to almost set an appointment. Like, okay, from 9:00 to 12:00-
11. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
12. SPSpeaker
  ... I'm just gonna sit in this chair. And that's something I learned from David Milch, you know, who created Deadwood, who, who always said, "You can't think your way into writing. You have to write your way into thinking."
13. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
14. SPSpeaker
  So if you just start writing-
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
16. SPSpeaker
  ... your brain will eventually go, "Oh, we're doing this now."
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
18. SPSpeaker
  And that if you do it at a similar time, the second you hit the chair, your brain will go, "It's time to do the thing that we do."
19. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
20. SPSpeaker
  And, uh, I even took a class on flow states, one of those Steven Kotler classes.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
22. SPSpeaker
  And it just totally worked. Like, it was, like, kind of hilarious. It... And, you know, there were people giving advice about, "All right, get up. Don't have breakfast. Just drink a little bit of black coffee. Try not to eat lunch till noon. Don't let, uh, your office interrupt you." And then suddenly I realized, oh, I'm really getting a good four or five hours-
23. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
24. SPSpeaker
  ... done just by listening to s- some very simple advice about not being distracted.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  Because I could look at, like, the newsfeed on my phone and be in a bad mood for three days.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
28. SPSpeaker
  And a bad mood that will prevent me from being funny.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Right. [laughs]
30. SPSpeaker
  You know? Like, I won't be able to go to my world of imagination because I'm thinking about some problem in the world.
35:01 – 36:29
Inside a Storyteller’s Mind
1. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah. How do you balance that, then, in staying informed and then... And does that ever inform your comedy? Does that ever inform the messaging you wanna put out there?
2. SPSpeaker
  I, I mean, yeah. I, I... [laughs] As soon as the writing's over, I go deep down-
3. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
4. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, a terrible, uh, uh, rabbit hole of tracking everything.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
6. SPSpeaker
  And, and I have to, I have to, you know, be aware that it could just put you in a massive depression.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
8. SPSpeaker
  Because we know too much. Like, when I was a kid, we didn't really know what was happening in the world.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
10. SPSpeaker
  Like, I, like, I lived in New York, and I, I knew a little bit about what, like, Ed Koch was doing, and I knew they were trying to capture the mob. And occasionally you'd hear about some crime or, or a murder. I didn't really understand what was happening in Congress as a, as a kid. I watched the news all the time, even in, like, middle school.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
12. SPSpeaker
  And now I know the major terrifying problems of every country in the world.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
14. SPSpeaker
  And it's too much. It, it really is too much. And if you find it interesting, which I do... Like, I'm fascinated by how-
15. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm
16. SPSpeaker
  ... politics work, how people treat each other, all the, the problems of the world, the drama of crime, the drama of corruption.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
18. SPSpeaker
  I could really... I could read it forever.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  I just find it so interesting as a storyteller, too. Like, look, that person was in this position, and there's the choice they made.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
22. SPSpeaker
  They could have gone this way or that way, and they went this way. So-For me, uh, it... You know, one of my flaws is I'm looking at too much.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
24. SPSpeaker
  And when I'm in a good writing groove, it's usually because I've found a way to, to limit it so that I can go in my own head-
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
26. SPSpeaker
  ... and see what's there.
36:29 – 38:56
Choosing to Be Part of the Solution
1. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah, I read a study that said we're exposed to more tragedy today in 24 hours-
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... than we were in our whole lifetime 25 years ago.
4. SPSpeaker
  Just today, I-
5. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
6. SPSpeaker
  ... there was like... It- it's the equivalent of today that there was 11 Pearl Harbors-
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
8. SPSpeaker
  ... in the last three days.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
10. SPSpeaker
  And y- so I was, like, depressed the other morning, and I thought, "How would you not be depressed just based on what you read this morning?"
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
12. SPSpeaker
  Like, it's a trauma response to all of that.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
14. SPSpeaker
  So, you know, for me-
15. JSJay Shetty
  What do you do with that? What do, what do you personally do with that?
16. SPSpeaker
  Uh-
17. JSJay Shetty
  'Cause I feel like that's an issue everyone who's listening can relate to.
18. SPSpeaker
  I mean, I try to find things that I can do to support people or organizations and, and causes that are fighting for values that I agree with. You know, I... You know, every month I do a benefit at Largo in LA, uh, for a different charity. You know, I... My first job was working for Comic Relief, this, the homeless charity.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
20. SPSpeaker
  And so I've always tried to, you know, be connected to philanthropy and, you know, then some part of your brain's like, "Okay, you're doing something."
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
22. SPSpeaker
  "You're doing something." And it never feels like enough.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  Uh, but, uh, I think everyone has to do something.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  And just hope that this collective, that the, you know, you know, moves certain causes forward and, and helps take care of people.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
28. SPSpeaker
  Because it is rough to hear about so much suffering.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Absolutely.
30. SPSpeaker
  Uh, and, and then, you know, the guilt response, like, "Should I be doing more?" So I try to spend, uh, some time every day thinking about it. And I remember I went and had lunch with Norman Lear, and Norman Lear had the newspaper out. And I said, "What are you doing?" And he said, "This is something that Frank Sinatra taught me," which is he would open the paper every day, he would look for somebody in a bad situation, and then he would get on the phone and, uh, write them a check. [laughs]
38:56 – 41:29
Taking Creative Risks
1. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. What was the biggest creative risk you feel you ever took?
2. SPSpeaker
  I don't think of any of them really as creative risks. I t- u- usually just try to only work on things that I think can be really good, that I care about. So it's not like there's any one decision. I just think I wanna be proud of everything I tried to do.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
4. SPSpeaker
  And if it fails, I'd like to feel like I understand why I thought it could work.
5. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
6. SPSpeaker
  And I, and I like for things to have a good heart and to say something positive.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
8. SPSpeaker
  I wanna be aware of what I'm putting into the world.
9. JSJay Shetty
  It's almost easier to deal with failure when you've really believed in what you were doing-
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, yeah
11. JSJay Shetty
  ... to some degree.
12. SPSpeaker
  Well, yeah.
13. JSJay Shetty
  'Cause if you didn't believe in it, and then it fails, then you're like, "Well, I didn't believe in it anyway. I knew it would fail."
14. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Well, it's a miracle that anything works.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
16. SPSpeaker
  Because everything in comedy is an experiment. There's no precedent that lets you know this will definitely work.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  So you're always on the verge of massive humiliation and failure. [laughs]
19. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
20. SPSpeaker
  And, and then that's just the spirit of it, like, "I g- I guess this will work." And sometimes things work for some people but not other people. You go, "Oh, this does work, but for way less people."
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
22. SPSpeaker
  And then some things, you know, out of the blue, like the entire world loves Bridesmaids.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
24. SPSpeaker
  Right? And, and it's the same efforts that everyone puts on-
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
26. SPSpeaker
  ... and then just sometimes things, you know, connect in a big way.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Such a great movie. Such a great movie. Absolutely. There's something you say in the book. You say, in your book, Comedy Nerd, you say, "When I stopped performing to pursue my writing career, on some level I betrayed myself. The truth was I didn't believe in myself."
28. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
29. JSJay Shetty
  So that's a part of that story too, was that there was a sense of-
30. SPSpeaker
  Sure
41:29 – 44:24
Silencing the Inner Critic
1. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. I love knowing, though, that you can be that uncertain, confused, and have some self-doubt and still find your way.
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Like, there's something beautiful about that. Like-
4. SPSpeaker
  I mean, it... Stand-up is very confrontational because every time you go on stage, you're, like, saying to people, "You j- you should listen to me. I'm worth hearing." And you're also saying, "I'm entertaining."
5. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
6. SPSpeaker
  Like, "This should delight you for 20 minutes." So there, there's a certain amount of confidence and arrogance to do it at all.
7. JSJay Shetty
  For sure.
8. SPSpeaker
  Some people do it out of neediness, like they so need the approval that even though they're terrified, they'll do it anyway-
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
10. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, to get it, like crack or something.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
12. SPSpeaker
  Uh, but it's like writing. Like, sometimes, like, when I don't wanna write, I realize, oh, I'm not writing today because I feel like I'm gonna find out today that I've lost it. [laughs]
13. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
14. SPSpeaker
  You know? Like, by, by, literally by t-
15. JSJay Shetty
  Do you still have that now?
16. SPSpeaker
  Uh, yeah, because every time you sit down to type, you're like, "This better be good, and I'm gonna find out how good I am right now." And that's the most unhealthy way to do it.Like, that's the opposite of flow state-
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
18. SPSpeaker
  ... is, like, that the critical voice is just there the whole time.
19. JSJay Shetty
  And you have the pressure to be good right now-
20. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
21. JSJay Shetty
  ... in this moment. What do you do with that thought?
22. SPSpeaker
  Uh, you know, sometimes I have to play tricks on myself. So if I'm gonna write a scene, the thing about, you know, y- you know, say you're using a program like Final Draft and it looks all pretty, and so when you type, like, it has to be good because it's so formatted.
23. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
24. SPSpeaker
  You know? It looks so beautiful.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  It looks like a screenplay. So sometimes I have to write without the format, so I'll just open up a Word document.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
28. SPSpeaker
  Now, if I'm gonna write a scene, I'll say, "Okay, take the next 15 minutes and just babble, you know, with no punctuation, ideas for the scene."
29. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
30. SPSpeaker
  And, and just keep going and, and maybe, like, do an experiment, like you're not allowed to stop typing for 10 minutes.
44:24 – 48:20
The Real Formula for Comedy
1. JSJay Shetty
  rules to good comedy, or there are no rules?
2. SPSpeaker
  I don't really understand any of it.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
4. SPSpeaker
  You know? Like, I'm not one of those people that can really lay out why things work or, or don't work. I, I, I tend to try to think pretty simply about if I write it as a drama, like if the, the construction would work if there were no jokes, then it won't be hard to figure out a way to make it funny.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
6. SPSpeaker
  So I try to not chase the joke.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
8. SPSpeaker
  Try to ta- chase the emotional story-
9. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
10. SPSpeaker
  ... and then look at it like, "How can I make it funny?"
11. JSJay Shetty
  Right.
12. SPSpeaker
  Because I think all the situations in life which are painful-
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
14. SPSpeaker
  ... are really close to funny.
15. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
16. SPSpeaker
  That's why, like, in movies, there's so many movies where it's just like someone's breaking up with you.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
18. SPSpeaker
  And it might be funny because you start crying.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  It might be funny because you start screaming.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
22. SPSpeaker
  It might be funny 'cause you run away.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  Uh, so I just trust that, you know, if I... that that sense of why things are funny that are challenging or awful, it'll just come.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  You know, so when I think about, like, Knocked Up and-
27. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
28. SPSpeaker
  ... Seth's trying to talk to Katherine Heigl and, and she wants to tell him that she's pregnant with his baby, and so the idea is before that she's just asking him questions about his life 'cause she doesn't know anything about him 'cause he had a one-night stand. And everything in his life sounds like the worst information if he was the father of your child.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  You know? He, he, he has five grand in the bank. He thinks it'll last two years. [laughs]
48:20 – 49:37
The Pitfalls of Mocking Others
1. JSJay Shetty
  I love that. What, what's a joke you could make 20 years ago that you can't make now?
2. SPSpeaker
  Um, I think y- I think people are sensitive to how we define people, how we goof on people. You know, when I re-watch the stuff, there's not, like, a ton where I'm like, "Oh, God. Why did we do that?" But there's a few where you think, "Yeah, today I wouldn't have done that joke." Uh-You, you making fun of people for just being themselves, what- whatever that is.
3. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
4. SPSpeaker
  But a lot of the times we were talking about people who get made fun of.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
6. SPSpeaker
  So, uh, when I worked on Superbad with Seth and Evan-
7. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
8. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, we were talking about how in every Marx Brothers movie, they would always have a really rich guy punch Harpo Marx in the face [laughs] like in the first 10 minutes, because then Harpo could do anything to them.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Right.
10. SPSpeaker
  And, you know, they represent rich people or power, but because they did something really mean to him, Harpo had free reign-
11. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
12. SPSpeaker
  ... to cause massive-
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
14. SPSpeaker
  ... chaos. And so when we were doing Superbad, they had, you know, one of the kids spit on Jonah, you know, by the, the 7-Eleven type place.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
16. SPSpeaker
  And that was it. Then you're like, "Whatever Jonah does-
17. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs] Yes
18. SPSpeaker
  ... I know where he is in school, I know how he's, he's, uh, treated great, and I kinda want him to succeed. I want him to, you know, have something nice happen to him."
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  You know, so I always look at it that way.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, I love that. What's
49:37 – 52:35
The Promise and Peril of AI
1. JSJay Shetty
  your take on, what's your take on the impact of AI and ChatGPT on writing-
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... creative block?
4. SPSpeaker
  Mm.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Are you a fan? Do you feel it's gonna be useful for writers now? Do you feel it's a hindrance? Where, where do you land on the-
6. SPSpeaker
  I think-
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... conversation?
8. SPSpeaker
  ... I think that the, the danger of it is it, it allows you to shut off part of your critical thinking.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
10. SPSpeaker
  And so if you really were into it, I think that you would be losing something while gaining something.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
12. SPSpeaker
  So if you think about GPS, and you go, "I kinda d- couldn't drive around LA, 'cause I don't know where anything is anymore."
13. JSJay Shetty
  That's me.
14. SPSpeaker
  Uh [laughs]
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
16. SPSpeaker
  Or, "I don't remember anyone's phone number anymore." I think that if you were asking a machine to do certain work for you, like, "Oh, fix my letter," uh, it seems kinda good, but at some point, if your ChatGPT went down, you, you might not be able to do the letter.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
18. SPSpeaker
  And so that's the thing that makes me nervous. I, I think it's very helpful for research. So-
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
20. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, I'm writing a movie that takes place in college, and I'm trying to think of classes to go, "Oh, what's a, what's an interesting class about music? What's a..." That is, like, really, really helpful.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
22. SPSpeaker
  But if you start going, "Write me the scene about the class" [laughs]
23. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs] Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  I think that you're in danger. And then you have to ask yourself, "Well, why do I do it?" You know, I mean, if you were just in it for the money, I guess you could use it as a tool. But if you're also in, in it to, to learn about yourself, and through creativity, uh, have some self-knowledge and, and it's an ex- an expression of you, you know, then you don't want it in, in your world that way.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. It's almost like how hard your hand hurts when you try and hand write now.
26. SPSpeaker
  Exactly, yeah.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Right? Because you're not used to it anymore-
28. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
29. JSJay Shetty
  ... and you're like, "Wait a minute. If, if I didn't, I've probably gotta write something now."
30. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. No, there's no cursive.
52:35 – 55:08
Letting Go of a Problem-Seeking Mind
1. JSJay Shetty
  Another line that stood out to me, Judd, in your book, you said, "I learned later in life through therapy that I had projected all of my childhood divorce drama onto the network executives who'd rejected or abandoned me."
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
3. JSJay Shetty
  And so I wanna dive into m- multiple parts of that. Let's, let's first start with, I think you've talked about how you've done therapy for, like, 20 years.
4. SPSpeaker
  Mm. Yeah.
5. JSJay Shetty
  It's been a big part of your journey.
6. SPSpeaker
  Mm.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Walk me through how the questions have evolved in therapy 20 years, 10 years, five years, zero years, today.
8. SPSpeaker
  I, it's, it's amazing how many new things you learn as you get older-
9. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
10. SPSpeaker
  ... that you didn't quite understand before. Because on some level you understand that there's a lot of projection happening in your life. But, you know, in maybe the last five years, I, I, I think I learned a lot more about trauma responses to things and, and the ways that we just change our whole way of dealing with everything based on trying to avoid past pain.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
12. SPSpeaker
  And I... That was something I didn't learn about for the first two decades of, of therapy. The idea that a lot of the time we're just in a, in a fight or flight or freeze response-
13. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
14. SPSpeaker
  ... to everything. You know, I had a therapist say, "You know, when you walk in a room, like say you're walking into a party, the first thing you do, you might get anxious, and you scan for threat, and then your brain assesses the threat," and they might go, "Oh, looks like these people seem nice enough. We can enter the party."
15. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
16. SPSpeaker
  And then he said, "The thing you're supposed to choose is opportunity," and, "Okay, I'm gonna actually go try to talk to that, that person. Maybe something nice would happen if I talk to them." And in some way, we're doing that all day long. We're, like, scanning. Where's the problem? Where's the problem? And I think that's something that has been very destructive for me as someone who's always looking to solve problems in a very OCD type way. Like, what's the problem? How can I solve it before it happens?
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  And then you realize that you're consumed all day long running potential problems.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
20. SPSpeaker
  And so that's been a big thing. Like, how do you let go of a mind that wants to look for trouble?
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm. How do you?
22. SPSpeaker
  It's, uh... I, I mean, obviously it's some, some version of mindfulness, some version of noticing the process and having some higher self separation to go, "Oh, I'm doing that thing again."
23. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
24. SPSpeaker
  "And can I connect that the, the, the one who's observing is me-
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
26. SPSpeaker
  ... and the rest is just kind of mental clutter."
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
28. SPSpeaker
  But it's really hard.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  You know? It's really hard.
55:08 – 58:42
Projecting Childhood Trauma at Work
1. JSJay Shetty
  square one. What was the particular aspect, the one that I quoted there, you talking about projecting all of your childhood divorce trauma onto the network executives. Talk to me about that exact-
2. SPSpeaker
  Well, I feel like there's always healthy and unhealthy reasons to do most everything.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
4. SPSpeaker
  And that's what's tricky, right? So on one level you're like, "I love to be creative. I love comedy." But in your unhealthy part, you feel like, "I want validation. I want to succeed. I want safety. Like, if I succeed I'll have, I'll have safety."
5. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
6. SPSpeaker
  "Maybe I'll have love." And so y- you have both this very pure, creative love for something, and then this trying to protect yourself through it. And so then y- you're, you're doing work. Let's say you hand in a script.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
8. SPSpeaker
  And then someone says, "I hate your script. The studio hates your script." So in your mind you could go, "Oh, are they, are they correct? Maybe I should read it again." Or you could go, "Why are they trying to murder me?"
9. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
10. SPSpeaker
  "Why are they trying to destroy me?"
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
12. SPSpeaker
  Y- w- and then you're mad at them because you've given them so much power.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
14. SPSpeaker
  And, and now you're irrational. You're just in, "They don't care about me. How come they don't see me? How come they don't understand me?"
15. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
16. SPSpeaker
  And then you have just that insecure, "What if they're right? What if I'm terrible at this?" And so you're projecting all these old wounds and needs onto a creative relationship. But I didn't know that because I was just a young person.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
18. SPSpeaker
  So w- you know, when people would give me notes that I didn't agree with, I really felt like, "Oh, you're trying to destroy me."
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  And, you know, to learn how to have those conversations in a healthy way, uh, took a l- a long time for me. There was literally a moment where I went, "Oh, I'm treating the head of the, of the, of the network like it's my mom."
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
22. SPSpeaker
  "I'm mad at her in the sa-..." I, it, I felt like-
23. JSJay Shetty
  Wow
24. SPSpeaker
  ... "I'm mad at her in the same way I'm mad at my mom when she's not there for me."
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  "And I need to take that energy out of this."
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm. Yeah.
28. SPSpeaker
  But it is a fight or flight response. "Oh, you don't like it? Well, if you don't like it I'm not gonna be able to eat, and now I need to fight you."
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  And [laughs] , and it's, and it's heated, right?
58:42 – 1:01:05
Separating Emotions from the Work
1. JSJay Shetty
  Can you with creative tasks? That's a great question. Like, can you... Because Freaks and Geeks was super successful because you pushed yourself to that limit.
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. And because we didn't give in.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Correct. That's-
4. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
5. JSJay Shetty
  That, that's, the give in part's so important.
6. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
7. JSJay Shetty
  And so I'm like, have you found that you've been able to not give in but not emotionally carry all that load and still create something that successful? Is that even possible?
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Yeah.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Okay.
10. SPSpeaker
  You can. And, and you realize it like, oh, I didn't get emotional, and we had a good conversation, and, uh, you know, it, it's... It, but it's, it takes a lot of years to see it.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
12. SPSpeaker
  Because what it is, it's a, because it's a trigger response, it happens fast.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
14. SPSpeaker
  Like your emotional reaction. So do you have that extra five seconds to go, "Oh, I'm getting heated," you know?
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
16. SPSpeaker
  And you still have those moments where you snap, and then, like, years later you'll wake up in the middle of the night, "Oh, I feel so bad about yelling at that guy," you know? And it just happens out of nowhere. And it's usually around the idea of are we about to ruin the work?
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  For me it's always about is the work gonna be good.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  It's never about, like, the release-
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yes
22. SPSpeaker
  ... or the success. It's always... My only thing that makes me crazy is if I think someone can get me to ruin it.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
24. SPSpeaker
  That really kind of freaks me out.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
26. SPSpeaker
  It, it, you know, and that's n- not healthy the level to which it freaks me out.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
28. SPSpeaker
  And I worked for people like Gary Shanling who, um, were so sensitive, and they really felt like, uh, "You're trying to destroy me."
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  And I always thought, "Oh, I feel so bad for them that that's how they experience this."
1:01:05 – 1:03:54
Choosing the Right Collaborators
1. JSJay Shetty
  like how do I realize what I'm doing is valuable, and at the same time embrace my insignificance.
2. SPSpeaker
  [laughs] Exactly.
3. JSJay Shetty
  And, and it's like it, it sounds beautiful, and it is possible, but I hear what you're saying. There's, there's a level of focus and due diligence that's healthy, and then it's only as healthy when it's matched with detachment-
4. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
5. JSJay Shetty
  ... as opposed to when it's so addictive. And we're, we're, we're going through our first set of TV and film projects right now that I've ever done in my life.
6. SPSpeaker
  Mm.
7. JSJay Shetty
  And I have that same feeling because I can... Everything you're saying, I'm like, wow, like I can so relate to it because up until this point, also a lot of what I've created has been fully... Like, it's never been funded by anyone else. We've never worked with a studio or a production-
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... company. It's all us. And so I've have a lot of... And as time has gone on, I've built more confidence and conviction in my intuition that I'm aware of what I believe will work-
10. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
11. JSJay Shetty
  ... and, and what won't. And, and I've sat with it for long enough, and I've done this for 20 years and all the rest of it, and then someone comes and gives me a note-
12. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
13. JSJay Shetty
  ... that I'm like, I, I, I know that's not gonna work.
14. SPSpeaker
  [laughs] Yeah.
15. JSJay Shetty
  And then we incorporate in the pilot, we make the pilot, and then the only feedback we get from the audience and everyone is, "We didn't like that bit."
16. SPSpeaker
  Exactly.
17. JSJay Shetty
  And I'm like, "I told you. Like, I knew it."
18. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
19. JSJay Shetty
  And so then what do you do with that? Because it's such-
20. SPSpeaker
  Um
21. JSJay Shetty
  ... a human experience of-
22. SPSpeaker
  Well, it's always picking your collaborators.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  I mean, everything in my career changed, uh, you know, when I started working with the Universal Studios and Donna Langley-
25. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
26. SPSpeaker
  ... because, uh, her and, uh, the executives there, Peter Kramer, Eric Byers, you know, they, they just got it.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
28. SPSpeaker
  And so then most of that goes away-
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
30. SPSpeaker
  ... because you have a good relationship, but also they get what you do and they understand your process.
1:03:54 – 1:06:23
Learning to Lighten Up
1. JSJay Shetty
  If, if, if fear and doubt would disappear from your life and mind tomorrow, what would you do differently?
2. SPSpeaker
  I don't know. I mean, what I would do differently is, is, uh, you know, just probably be happier. [laughs]
3. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
4. SPSpeaker
  Like, I don't know so much about, like, work-
5. JSJay Shetty
  That's a great answer. That's great
6. SPSpeaker
  ... but just, like, in life I would like to have, uh, lightened up.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
8. SPSpeaker
  You know, a, a few years ago, I, I was just feeling terrible, and then, then in my mind I just heard the phrase, "Lighten up." Just... And, and I thought to myself, "Wow, you're in comedy, and you're so heavy. Like, you just really need to lighten up. Why, why do you look at everything in such, um, intense terms?"
9. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
10. SPSpeaker
  And but that only works 'cause, you know, if I remind myself of it, I can lighten up. But what if I go, like, a year and go, "Oh, I forgot to say lighten up-
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
12. SPSpeaker
  ... [laughs] in the last year."
13. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
14. SPSpeaker
  "I forgot to re-..." You know, I'm, I'm one of those people, like, I'll write all these things down.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
16. SPSpeaker
  Like, like I'll have, like, a piece of paper and, you know, one of the things I, I wrote, write down a lot is, uh, uh, just try to do better today.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  Like, just look at today.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
20. SPSpeaker
  Don't look at the long arc of it.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
22. SPSpeaker
  Like, okay, what am I gonna do today? Will it be fun? Can I make it fun?
23. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
24. SPSpeaker
  And at the end of the day go, "That was a good day."
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  And if I think about the next year, I'm usually in meltdown.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm. [laughs]
28. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, you reminded me of this, uh, beautiful story where a student once asked the Buddha, "What do you gain from meditation?"
30. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
1:06:23 – 1:08:26
What Leads to True Success
1. JSJay Shetty
  Earlier, that's reminding me of before we started taping, you said something to me. You said, "It's, uh, it's surprising of the things we're not addicted to."
2. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
3. JSJay Shetty
  And, and then I asked you if you ever did drugs, and my, the reason for my question was I feel like there are so many people today who feel their creativity-
4. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm
5. JSJay Shetty
  ... is dependent on-
6. SPSpeaker
  Mm
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... something recreational-
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... or whatever it may be.
10. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Your life, as you explained it to me when before we started taping, was not like that.
12. SPSpeaker
  No.
13. JSJay Shetty
  You were scared away from drugs, and you can share that.
14. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Well, my grandfather produced the first Janis Joplin album, Big Brother and the Holding Company, andSo my entire childhood, they always talked about the fact that she was the best singer who ever lived, and she, she took drugs and died.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
16. SPSpeaker
  In fact, that's, yeah, that's why it's in Freaks and Geeks when Joe Flaherty says, "What happened to Janis Joplin? She's dead," you know?
17. JSJay Shetty
  Oh, yeah.
18. SPSpeaker
  Was because that was this mantra. And so all of that really, really scared me. And then the few times I did it when I was young, usually I would just get paranoid or... I never had, like, the great experiences that would make me go, "Let's do more of this." There was one moment where I did try to buy some pot, and my brother found out, who's older than me, and told the guy not to [laughs] sell it to me. But I always think, "If my brother didn't tell that guy, 'You better not sell pot to my brother,' maybe I would've found the, you know, the, the part of me that loves it."
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  So I got a good long run of that. I never loved drinking. I would always get tired and fall asleep. I d- I think it's just my chemistry doesn't get that kick out of it, where I, like, I know people who will say, "Oh, I wrote that entire series you love high."
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
22. SPSpeaker
  And I'm like, I, I literally can't write one joke.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
24. SPSpeaker
  Like, the second I'm high, I'm just like, "Let's just watch, you know, Great British Bake Off."
25. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
26. SPSpeaker
  You know? Like, I'm not in creative mode.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
28. SPSpeaker
  Um, you know, so, uh, but thank God, because that's just a random thing, because I think i- if I loved it, it, it would've been a, a real problem. But I was very aware, like, that I wanted to succeed, and I thought, "That's not gonna help me."
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  You know?
1:08:26 – 1:14:03
The Most Impactful Self-Help Books
1. JSJay Shetty
  said you read a lot of self-help books.
2. SPSpeaker
  Mm.
3. JSJay Shetty
  I was wondering-
4. SPSpeaker
  Mm
5. JSJay Shetty
  ... if you had to pick three-
6. SPSpeaker
  Mm
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... that have really had an impact on your life-
8. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Mm-hmm
9. JSJay Shetty
  ... and a lesson you've learned from each, what would they be?
10. SPSpeaker
  I mean, the three that I go back to all the time.
11. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
12. SPSpeaker
  One is called The Untethered Soul.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
14. SPSpeaker
  Uh, by Michael Singer.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Great book.
16. SPSpeaker
  And I'm always going back to that book, although there's tons of YouTube videos of him talking. They're all great.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm-hmm.
18. SPSpeaker
  And with anything really good, usually they're saying the same thing, just in a different way. It's o- it's one idea, and it's just kind of r- rewritten to, to find another way to get you to soak it in. And, and his thing is that he feels like people have these energy blocks, and, you know, something happens to you, you know, like, say, someone punched you in the face at a party, and so then you think, "All right. I guess I'm the guy who doesn't go to parties." And that by the time you get older, you have 100 of these or you have 1,000 of these.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
20. SPSpeaker
  And everything that you do is avoiding certain things, certain types of people you didn't-
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
22. SPSpeaker
  ... get along with once. And so he, he, I guess he described it as like, it's like if you had a thorn, and instead of pulling it out, you put, like, a metal thing around it, and then you realize you needed a bigger metal thing, and then you would go to the party, and you couldn't let anyone bump into it, as opposed to just taking it out.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  Uh, and to just, like, live with the pain of it and, and to let the energy, whatever that experience was, move through your body and-
25. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
26. SPSpeaker
  ... and, and see it. And I, I find that's really helpful.
27. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
28. SPSpeaker
  And, and those books are great. Um-
29. JSJay Shetty
  That's a great answer.
30. SPSpeaker
  The, I always read Pema Chödrön books.
1:14:03 – 1:18:09
The Pain Behind Comedy
1. JSJay Shetty
  it. Me too. I get that. It's... Yeah, you've gotta be selective and-
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... and focused on what you pick up. For so... I feel like there's always been this, I don't know whether it's a myth or it feels like something people have said for a long time, and therefore we feel it's true, and I guess you're the right person to ask, but comedy's o- often, or humor's often been seen as hiding something or-
4. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm
5. JSJay Shetty
  ... carrying a certain weight behind it-
6. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, yeah
7. JSJay Shetty
  ... or pain behind it or a coping mechanism. Is that true? And what is it for you?
8. SPSpeaker
  I, I... Over the years, what I've realized is a lot of times when I'm writing is I, I'm trying to figure my own thinking out.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Mm, mm.
10. SPSpeaker
  Like, what am I thinking about this? I'm just trying to explore myself, maybe a struggle, maybe a question. So I would... You know, some people say, "You know, you write the movie to figure out why you write the movie."
11. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
12. SPSpeaker
  And you're not even sure what you're working on. So, you know, in my career, I've been a person who's worked on projects about high school, and about college, and about getting somebody pregnant, and about maintaining a relationship [laughs]
13. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
14. SPSpeaker
  ... and about getting sick, and about... You know, so I feel like I hit these major life turning points because I feel like, oh, I really need to, to work this through. But when I'm doing it, I'm not conscious of that.
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
16. SPSpeaker
  And then maybe later I'll go, oh, I must have been thinking about these issues like friendship and the value of your work. When we were doing Funny People, uh, you know, my mom had been sick, and I noticed that when she thought she was gonna get better, she was happier than when, uh... When she thought she was gonna die, when she had cancer, she was always happier than when she thought the medicine was working and she was gonna get better. All her neuroses would come back. But when she thought she had no hope, she kind of dropped everything and became this very-
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
18. SPSpeaker
  ... much more serene person.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
20. SPSpeaker
  And so I thought, oh... So I started writing a movie. You know, it's an Adam Sandler movie about him having an experience-
21. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
22. SPSpeaker
  ... like that. But at the time, I didn't realize that's what I had done.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  It took, like, a while for me to go, oh, this movie isn't about me and comedy. This is about my mom and, and, you know, what she went through.
25. JSJay Shetty
  So you'd say that comedy heals pain, not hides it?
26. SPSpeaker
  Well, it certainly is a road to understanding yourself. Sometimes when I'm working with a writer, if I'm overseeing a writer, you know, I'll say, "I feel like a lot of these movies are about a problem, usually an emotional problem," and then you think, "What would have to happen to the character for them to hit bottom enough to make a change?"
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
28. SPSpeaker
  'Cause in life, usually you make a change 'cause something happens, usually something that's not great.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Totally.
30. SPSpeaker
  And so in a movie, there's usually some sort of bottom. Even in the silliest movies, someone crashes. And, and then I always say, "And what would health look like?" So if they figured it out and at the end they were doing better, what would better look like?
1:18:09 – 1:22:33
Defining True Happiness
1. JSJay Shetty
  Your movies have made people laugh, made people happy, made people, you know, rem- have great memories around them. Like, would you say... Are you happy?
2. SPSpeaker
  Am I happy? That's a [laughs] that's, that's, that's the right question. Uh, I mean, I think I'm always trying to figure out how to be happy, and I think I, I ebb and flow. I think I have periods where I get, like, really lost and caught up in my head and in things, and then every once in a while, like, it clears up for a little while, and I'm like, "Oh, yeah, I, I feel good about how everything is and what's going on." I feel in between tragedies. [laughs] You know, like, like, "Oh, this is a good period." But then sometimes I just lose it. Like, I lose touch with the thing that makes me feel like I understand where I am in the universe.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
4. SPSpeaker
  You know, 'cause sometimes, you know, especially now as everyone's talking about... computers and everything changing, and the world is changing, where we're like, "Is something happening right now?" I can really get thrown and, and just obsess on it all day long. Like, what's the point of all of this?
5. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
6. SPSpeaker
  Like, what are we doing? Uh, you know, to just, like, it's almost like feeling really happy and loose, in my mind sometimes feels like I'm not doing what I should be doing to make something positive happen.
7. JSJay Shetty
  Interesting.
8. SPSpeaker
  And that's not really fair on myself.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
10. SPSpeaker
  Um, but it is the feeling like I can't just be like, "Wee," because like, look, have you seen what happened today? [laughs]
11. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
12. SPSpeaker
  Like, what are we supposed to do about this?
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
14. SPSpeaker
  And it's, uh, you know, like a deep kind of guilt that is, again, some sort of fight or flight response and, and a childhood thing too. Like, you know, just stay on top of things, you know?
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
16. SPSpeaker
  Don't, don't let anything slip by you is a survival-
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
18. SPSpeaker
  ... strategy.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  So like actually being happy sometimes feels like a violation of my survival strategy.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
22. SPSpeaker
  And that's a big thing to like, can I let go of that? And sometimes I can, and then sometimes I totally can't.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, and it's so interesting how, thank you for going there, because it- it's so interesting how those things that make you successful and make you organized-
24. SPSpeaker
  Yes
25. JSJay Shetty
  ... and make you good, great at what you do-
26. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
27. JSJay Shetty
  ... they, everything comes as this double-edged sword of stopping you from-
28. SPSpeaker
  Sure
29. JSJay Shetty
  ... having an experience. And then at the same time, there's a beauty to how you feel because it's wonderful that you feel a sense of responsibility and-
30. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
1:22:33 – 1:24:18
Exploring an Ayahuasca Experience
1. SPSpeaker
  And, and then at the end, after this, you know, long experience, uh, you know, you're like, you're vomiting, you're, you know, you're, you're, you know, you're, you've gone through it. I don't recommend this to anyone, by the way-
2. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
3. SPSpeaker
  ... 'cause it's crazy, and I feel like, uh, I don't know if it's safe for people. Uh, you know, so it's not anything you can say to do.
4. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
5. SPSpeaker
  But at the, but the, but the end of it, like I had this like image of Jesus, which is weird 'cause I'm Jewish, and so it's not like the thing that I would think of. And suddenly I see Jesus on the cross at the end of this like eight-hour trip, and in my head I'm like, "Oh, I get what that is. It's, uh, he's there for us, and we should be there for each other."
6. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
7. SPSpeaker
  And the whole idea of it just like landed with me.
8. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
9. SPSpeaker
  And I thought, "Oh, I guess that's it. It's just like being there-
10. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
11. SPSpeaker
  ... for other people."
12. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
13. SPSpeaker
  And, and that's the one thing that I try to go back to.
14. JSJay Shetty
  Wow. That's beautiful. Where did you go to do ayahuasca?
15. SPSpeaker
  Uh, I did it in the state of California. [laughs]
16. JSJay Shetty
  Oh, okay. Okay.
17. SPSpeaker
  I'm pretty sure it's illegal.
18. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
19. SPSpeaker
  [laughs]
20. JSJay Shetty
  That's amazing.
21. SPSpeaker
  But uh, but it definitely was, y- you know, for me, very meaningful-
22. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
23. SPSpeaker
  ... experience.
24. JSJay Shetty
  Did you ever do it again? Oh, no, that was the only-
25. SPSpeaker
  Um, I had done it one time before, but I got really scared and took very little.
26. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
27. SPSpeaker
  And uh, which is a, a mistake because if you take very little, you're not having the experience, but the shaman is-
28. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
29. SPSpeaker
  ... because the shaman takes the ayahuasca also.
30. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
1:24:18 – 1:28:05
The Secret to a Lasting Marriage
1. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
2. JSJay Shetty
  That's, that's pretty powerful.
3. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. No, it, it, it really was, and I tried to take it seriously and, and, and hold onto it. And the funny thing was that after ayahuasca, for about six, eight months, I would wake up, and it was as if my mind had been working on problems all night, and when I woke up, it was like telling me what it had figured out.
4. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
5. SPSpeaker
  And so I would just like wake up to these like messages.
6. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
7. SPSpeaker
  And so I'd be like asleep, and then I would get up, and in my head I would hear, "You're not doing any of the things that you ask Leslie to do."
8. JSJay Shetty
  Oh. [laughs]
9. SPSpeaker
  Oh. [laughs]
10. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
11. SPSpeaker
  You know, things like that. You know, like-
12. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
13. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, all, you know, all that matters is love or, you know, what- whatever it was, but like it was different every day.
14. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
15. SPSpeaker
  And it really felt like I was stepping into a conversation, you know, that was happening.
16. JSJay Shetty
  Wow.
17. SPSpeaker
  And it, it, and then, then it finally faded.
18. JSJay Shetty
  And then you realized it was just Leslie saying-
19. SPSpeaker
  [laughs] Whispering in my ear.
20. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
21. SPSpeaker
  [laughs]
22. JSJay Shetty
  That's amazing.
23. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
24. JSJay Shetty
  What... You've been married for 28 years. I mean-
25. SPSpeaker
  27. Yeah, yeah, yeah
26. JSJay Shetty
  ... 27.
27. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
28. JSJay Shetty
  You've been married for 27 years.
29. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. Mm-hmm.
30. JSJay Shetty
  What's the secret to a 27-year marriage that looks happy and-
1:28:05 – 1:30:07
Lessons to Share with Children
1. JSJay Shetty
  wonderful. It's like-
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah. I mean, it's terrifying also because you, you put yourself out there.
3. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
4. SPSpeaker
  And so you, so, so if you go, "Okay, we're gonna make a movie as a family-"
5. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
6. SPSpeaker
  ... "and the kids too."
7. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
8. SPSpeaker
  On some level, it's crazy-
9. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
10. SPSpeaker
  ... 'cause it's like, well, if this goes bad, this is a worldwide humiliation.
11. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
12. SPSpeaker
  You know? So I would really feel the pressure-
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah, yeah
14. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, as the captain of it, to not make anyone l- you know, look terrible or-
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
16. SPSpeaker
  ... you know. And but I also think it made it better because I ju- I just cared at such a high level. They obviously cared and, and, and did an amazing job, but-
17. JSJay Shetty
  I think it did the opposite, yeah
18. SPSpeaker
  ... it really, like, focuses you.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
20. SPSpeaker
  And then you're having kind of an amazing conversation about what do we wanna say-
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
22. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, about life, about relationships, about marriage, about kids. And so, you know, for years we have common purpose.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
24. SPSpeaker
  And I think that was, you know, the best part about it, was really all of us as a family moving towards the same goal.
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. That's so special. I love seeing that. And I know you were recently... You know, just seeing your daughter-
26. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm
27. JSJay Shetty
  ... have, have her moment-
28. SPSpeaker
  Yes
29. JSJay Shetty
  ... both of them have their moments. It's like, it must be so fulfilling. What do you think was the most important lesson you taught your children when they were young that you see them mirroring today?
30. SPSpeaker
  Leslie and I tried to tell Iris and Maud that the most important thing is, uh, you know, to care about the work and be passionate about it and to be, uh, proud of what you're saying in it, and that all that matters is that, and that you shouldn't take any work just for your career. You shouldn't, you know, try to figure out how to get successful, that it'll, it'll always come because you have something to say and something that, that you wanna express, that you're, that you feel good about.
1:30:07 – 1:31:48
Being Direct Yet Constructive
1. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
2. SPSpeaker
  ... to them many times, like, "If this isn't fun for you..." Because it's, it is hard. It's hard on the people who have a creative life-
3. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
4. SPSpeaker
  ... because, you know, you can go through periods where you're like, "No one understands me anymore." [laughs]
5. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
6. SPSpeaker
  And, uh, and then suddenly it's better again. And, uh, it's, it's, uh, it's like being an adrenaline junkie-
7. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
8. SPSpeaker
  ... in a way, and you don't, you don't want them to experience it in that way. You want them to be proud of, of what they're contributing.
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
10. SPSpeaker
  But it's hard to explain that to kids. Like, you know, "It's all about you're making a contribution."
11. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
12. SPSpeaker
  They're like, "What?"
13. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
14. SPSpeaker
  You know? Uh, because it, like, took me decades to realize, like-
15. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
16. SPSpeaker
  ... you know, every once in a while someone will walk up to me and tell me they like something that I did, or it made them laugh-It's easy to not take that in. But, uh, but when you do and go, "Oh, that is the only reason why I did it."
17. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
18. SPSpeaker
  Because this person I bumped into has watched it 11 times.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
20. SPSpeaker
  And it's the thing they turn to that makes them happy.
21. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
22. SPSpeaker
  Like, that's actually the only reason to do it.
23. JSJay Shetty
  Absolutely.
24. SPSpeaker
  That and to be able to eat.
25. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs] Yeah.
26. SPSpeaker
  You know?
27. JSJay Shetty
  How do, how do you try and let people down lightly when you're rejecting them? I imagine people-
28. SPSpeaker
  Hmm
29. JSJay Shetty
  ... are pitching you crazy ideas-
30. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
1:31:48 – 1:34:07
Finding Drama in Good People
1. SPSpeaker
  is the worst idea."
2. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
3. SPSpeaker
  We'd go onto another idea, and he would go, "But what if this, and what if that?" And-
4. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
5. SPSpeaker
  ... and he never seemed annoyed. He seems fascinated by the thought and like, "Could it work if you did this? Does she have to be a that?" And, uh, I think when you do that to people, even when you say, uh, you know, "I don't wanna make your movie," but you give them, you know, the time to say, "Here's why I'm not passionate about it. Here's what's interesting about it." Uh, because the truth is, you know, I've turned down things that became big hits and-
6. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
7. SPSpeaker
  ... and that's happened to me. It doesn't mean I'm right. It just means that I don't connect to it.
8. JSJay Shetty
  Yes.
9. SPSpeaker
  You know? Someone else might.
10. JSJay Shetty
  What, what was one of the ones that got away that-
11. SPSpeaker
  Um
12. JSJay Shetty
  ... you may not have loved but went on to do something great?
13. SPSpeaker
  I don't know. I can't think of one off the top of my head. You know, usually, usually it's 'cause I don't move fast enough.
14. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
15. SPSpeaker
  Someone sent me a script, and it took me too many days to read it, and then they sold [laughs] it to somebody else.
16. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
17. SPSpeaker
  Yeah.
18. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. That's, uh... Yeah, I... But I like what you said, that it's not about... Because it's not about whether it's successful or not, it's about whether it's meaningful to you or not.
19. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
20. JSJay Shetty
  That is such a great metric, because if it becomes about what's successful, I mean, there's gonna be a million things that are successful, and you're gonna miss out on all of them because-
21. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
22. JSJay Shetty
  ... there's so many things that are successful every year. But if it's meaningful to you, you wanna be involved, and I think that's such a great lesson. I find when I speak to anyone who's creative of, you know, w- we had Rick Rubin in here, and, and it was talking about music in that way. And when I'm talking to you, I'm like, I feel like I'm understanding comedy-
23. SPSpeaker
  Mm
24. JSJay Shetty
  ... in a, in a different way because this isn't just... It, it's never been as simple as, "Oh yeah, we're just trying to, just trying to make that person laugh." It's like there's, there's so much more... There's just so much more deep intention behind what you're creating and how you're doing it.
25. SPSpeaker
  Well, I love Rick Rubin's book.
26. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
27. SPSpeaker
  Uh, and, you know, years ago, Garry Shandling said to me, "You should get to know Rick Rubin." Uh, he's like, "I think... I, I don't know, I think there'd be something there."
28. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
29. SPSpeaker
  And so I got to know Rick, and he would show me music, and I put some music from the band the Avett Brothers in This Is 40 that he had played for me. And then one day he said, uh, "They're about to do a new record with me. You sh- you might wanna do a documentary or something." I th- And, and I thought, "Well, I, I- maybe I should do it because Garry
1:34:07 – 1:38:09
Why Mentorship Matters
1. SPSpeaker
  said."
2. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
3. SPSpeaker
  You know, Garry was my mentor and, and I'm gonna follow that. I'm gonna follow that through as if it's like a, a message from Garry.
4. JSJay Shetty
  Hmm.
5. SPSpeaker
  And then I, we followed, me and my, my friend Michael Bonfiglio followed the Avett Brothers around for a couple of years and made this movie called May It Last-
6. JSJay Shetty
  Oh
7. SPSpeaker
  ... about them making a record with Rick.
8. JSJay Shetty
  Okay.
9. SPSpeaker
  And it was about two, these two guys, um, uh, who, uh, who are just good guys. [laughs] And it was a funny thing 'cause we were making this documentary, and we're like, "Where's the drama?"
10. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
11. SPSpeaker
  'Cause it's, like, two good guys making music-
12. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
13. SPSpeaker
  ... and working with Rick. Uh, and, um, and we realized, well, that's the point of the movie. It's almost like a meditation on creativity, and that, like, some people aren't assholes.
14. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
15. SPSpeaker
  Some people are kinda great.
16. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
17. SPSpeaker
  And then we thought, oh, that's kind of a beautiful thing.
18. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
19. SPSpeaker
  If we could figure out how to make this like, uh, you know, fascinating-
20. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah
21. SPSpeaker
  ... uh, about a band being good to each other.
22. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
23. SPSpeaker
  And so I, I, I always think about, about Rick.
24. JSJay Shetty
  That's so funny. I didn't know that. I, I loved what you said there, you talking about obviously Garry being one of your mentors. How, how important have mentors been in your life?
25. SPSpeaker
  Y- gigantic. I mean, the, the entire, the entire thing. When I, I look back, I'm, I'm so grateful, you know, that, you know, I bumped into Garry at a comedy club, and he asked me to write jokes for him for the Grammys, and then hired me at The Larry Sanders Show. Then he asked me to co-run it the last year. Then he asked me to direct it. I'd never directed before. And, you know, so he was like a real angel who just believed in me and kept giving me opportunities. And now I look back and go, "Wow, those are giant opportunities." I didn't know anything. He really taught me everything.
26. JSJay Shetty
  And how do you explain those? How do you make sense of that now when you reflect on those huge moments that he gave you when you were learning the ropes?
27. SPSpeaker
  I mean, I remember, like, he, you know, he wanted to hang out when, when I was young and writing jokes for him. And, and, um, he was living with Linda Doucett, and, and I would go over there and, like, just eat with them sometimes and just watch TV. And he was beginning to develop The Larry Sanders Show, and he would show me auditions and, and, and scripts. And I remember thinking, "Why is he doing this?"
28. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
29. SPSpeaker
  You know? Like [laughs] like it was hard for me to go, "Oh, he's just a, a good guy."
30. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
1:38:09 – 1:47:08
Judd on Final Five
1. JSJay Shetty
  Like, that seems-
2. SPSpeaker
  Yeah
3. JSJay Shetty
  ... to be something you live on.
4. SPSpeaker
  Yeah, and it's the fun part, too. I mean, it's, y- you know, I, I like to do it. A lot of it is from Gary, but also it's really fun to work with somebody who is very inspired and needs some help understanding what they're doing.
5. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
6. SPSpeaker
  But, you know, they're doing something amazing, and you can help them, and you go, "Oh yeah, just... I could give them some of the wisdom that I learned over the years, and this person can actually pull off the thing that they're trying to do."
7. JSJay Shetty
  Yes, yes.
8. SPSpeaker
  Like, they're good enough without me, but I can make this way easier if I say, "Watch out for this. Watch out for that."
9. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. That's beautiful. Judd, it has been amazing learning from you. I feel like I've gained so much wisdom about whether it's the comedy industry, whether it's about resilience, whether it's about breaking through barriers, believing in yourself even when you don't, uh, all the way through to just how much work that you've done. Uh, we end every On Purpose interview The Final Five.
10. SPSpeaker
  Mm-hmm.
11. JSJay Shetty
  These question have to be answered in one sentence maximum.
12. SPSpeaker
  Okay.
13. JSJay Shetty
  Although I break that rule often, so-
14. SPSpeaker
  Okay
15. JSJay Shetty
  ... we'll, we'll see how well we do. But Judd Apatow, these are your final five. The first question is, what is the best advice you've ever had or received?
16. SPSpeaker
  Don't live in here, live in here.
17. JSJay Shetty
  Mm.
18. SPSpeaker
  Ram Dass said that to me when I interviewed him for his podcast. He goes, "Here bad, here good." [laughs] Yeah.
19. JSJay Shetty
  Tell me about your interview with him.
20. SPSpeaker
  I- they asked me to interview him, and, uh, it was over Zoom. And in the middle of it, Gary Shandling-- I invited Gary Shandling to sit in, and halfway through he showed up, and the two of us were just trying to make him laugh, saying dumb jokes. You know? [laughs]
21. JSJay Shetty
  [laughs]
22. SPSpeaker
  We were like, "Are you mad at Eckhart Tolle?"
23. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
24. SPSpeaker
  "'Cause you're, like, the, the be here now guy, and he's, he's the now guy."
25. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah. [laughs]
26. SPSpeaker
  Like, you know? And he was just laughing. Um, but he also said, you know, "I am loving awareness." And, you know, he said a lot of things that were really reducible at that... Anytime I think about them, you know, deeply-
27. JSJay Shetty
  Mm
28. SPSpeaker
  ... affect me. And the other thing I noticed about it, I have a photograph of, of me and Gary. Uh, it, you know, it's like a still of our side of the Zoom.
29. JSJay Shetty
  Yeah.
30. SPSpeaker
  And in the, in the photograph, Gary looks purely happy.

Episode duration: 1:47:08

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