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The Joe Rogan ExperienceThe Joe Rogan Experience

Joe Rogan Experience #1249 - Donnell Rawlings

Donnell Rawlings is a stand up comedian, actor, and podcaster. He's known best for his roles on Chappelle's Show and The Wire.

Donnell RawlingsguestJoe RoganhostGuestguest
Feb 20, 20192h 44mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 1:41

    Going live & how social media is changing comedy

    1. DR

      Oh, shit. (paper rustling) Fuck.

    2. JR

      That thing fall off? Those pieces of shit.

    3. DR

      See, this is when you're too fancy, bro.

    4. JR

      Yeah, they don't really... Yeah, they get too fancy. Yeah, whatever.

    5. DR

      Oof.

    6. JR

      This one, we got another one.

    7. DR

      Oh, wow.

    8. JR

      We're live already? (laughs) Yeah. I hit it when you said go.

    9. DR

      (coughs)

    10. JR

      Whoops. Sorry. Uh, cheers, sir.

    11. DR

      Thank you.

    12. JR

      My pleasure. My pleasure. Hmm. (liquid pouring) Don't know, we were talking about, uh, the different kinds of comedians that there really are. Like, meme comedians, they're, they're comedians. They have a s- a special skill set. It's a different thing.

    13. DR

      They have a, they have a special skill set. In fact, one of my closest friends, Bearded Humor, he's like, um, I would say if he was a standup comic, he would probably be, be in my s- top five in terms of creativity, in terms of, uh, uh, talking about things in the moment and just all-out funny. You know, the skill set for a standup man, it used to be... (coughs) I started 25 years ago. It used to be the only way you proved yourself as a person with any type of comedic integrity while I was on stage standing flat-footed in front of an audience that you probably n- n- n- don't want you to be funny or know have, have no idea you're gonna be funny. But these meme, these meme people in Photoshop, especially 'cause our attention is so quick and so drawn to social med- media, people... I don't even know if people are as excited about standup as they used to be, and now it's excitement about what's gonna be the newest thing, what's gonna be the, what's gonna be the hottest photo to Photoshop and what's gonna be the hottest image.

    14. JR

      Well, that's the easiest to get, right? It's easier to get it on your phone. You get those images, the Photoshops and the memes that are funny that hit you immediately. But I think-

    15. DR

      Right.

    16. JR

      ... right now, I mean, it, especially when you go to The Store, don't you think there's, like, more people interested in standup now than ever?

  2. 1:41 – 3:23

    Comedy under a microscope: outrage culture, bloggers, and policing jokes

    1. DR

      Yeah. But it's so... We, we in a, we in a t- in a tricky place. Now, people are interested in it, but people are so... They're more critical of standup now more than ever, ever. There used to be a time when you could just say, uh, what you wanted and people say they, that person was outspoken, outrageous, but they were themselves. But now you tell one joke, uh, one blogger, one troller dissects your jokes and prints your jokes. Don't do the setup.

    2. JR

      Yeah.

    3. DR

      Don't do the callback. Don't do the tag. And next thing you know, you offended somebody.

    4. JR

      Yeah.

    5. DR

      But I think with a lot of events that happen today, uh, that are happening now, comedy's gonna start taking a, a shift back to people with honest voices.

    6. JR

      I think so, too. I think there's a direct backlash to, like, political correct thinking and the, the type of, uh, policing that you're seeing. You're seeing, like, police-

    7. DR

      And you're being policed. I mean, you're p- I under- I understand police and stuff in a Catholic church, police, p- police and stuff in a regular church. But you go to a comedy club to police, you're in the wrong place.

    8. JR

      Yeah.

    9. DR

      And nine times out of ten, people that go to a comedy show that walk out and protest, v- their mindset was to protest before they even went there.

    10. JR

      Yeah.

    11. DR

      They're just waiting for the trigger word just to be like, "Well, I never," and they leave.

    12. JR

      Well, it's a way to get a lot of attention. You know, being outraged at something, especially if you kinda have a point. Like, if you could, you could ar- articulate that point.

    13. DR

      Right.

    14. JR

      It's a great way to get attention. You know?

    15. DR

      With the people that are, the trollers and the people that-

    16. JR

      Yeah, I mean, there's a, there's a j- giant market for that. Like, if you think of, like, if you're a comic and you're a famous comic and you're outspoken, you know, and someone could take your bit and, and take it apart like they've done with Chappelle.

    17. DR

      Right.

    18. JR

      Many times, right?

  3. 3:23 – 5:32

    Chappelle as a free-speech bellwether & comedy as therapy

    1. DR

      Oh, Chappelle owns it so much.

    2. JR

      He owns it.

    3. DR

      I was just with him... And you, I've, I've never seen a guy that flips our sets over. Like, he just writes another five-minute bit.

    4. JR

      That's weird, right?

    5. DR

      But the thing, but the thing is now, I've watched some of his new stuff and things he's doing now. He's gonna lead the charge for comedians having a voice. I did a show with him at The Store recently. And at the end of it, he said, "Comedians, now more than ever, you need to grab your balls because it's our job to talk about the things that are bad in this world."

    6. JR

      Yeah.

    7. DR

      "And we are the best people for it."

    8. JR

      Well, it's the last line of free speech. It's the last real line of free speech because you don't have a real boss.

    9. DR

      Right.

    10. JR

      Like, when you go on stage, it's... No one's, no one gives you a single word of direction.

    11. DR

      Right.

    12. JR

      You know, that's, that's a very unusual place to be in in terms of entertainment. And it's something that reaches, especially with someone like Dave, millions and millions and millions of people. Every time he does a Netflix special, every time somebody... He does anything that's filmed, it's gonna hit millions of people.

    13. DR

      Yep.

    14. JR

      To have no one telling you what to do. No one, no one giving you any input.

    15. DR

      And then when they try to tell you what to do, you, you resisted and then you do what you wanna do.

    16. JR

      (sighs) He's a real comic.

    17. DR

      (laughs)

    18. JR

      He's a real comic.

    19. DR

      But you have that... I've been following you for a while. I've been in Comedy Store for years and I'm always in the cut. And I've seen you do some material, like, "How the fuck does he get away with this?"

    20. JR

      (laughs)

    21. DR

      (laughs) And I'm like, "I know how. Because he fucking owns it." And that's the whole thing-

    22. JR

      Well, I really believe what I'm saying in a lot of ways. Like, in other things, it's obvious that I don't really believe it, but I'm saying it 'cause I think it's funny.

    23. DR

      And the thing about the comedy is-

    24. JR

      Like, you know what I'm doing.

    25. DR

      ... for us, as much as people are like, "Oh, I need that la-" I think for comedians, it's therapeutic for us, too.

    26. JR

      Yeah, it is 100%.

    27. DR

      Can you imagine a situation, you have an argument with your wife or somebody and you can't go on stage that night just to talk about how pissed off she made you?

    28. JR

      Yeah.

    29. DR

      That's our outlet.

    30. JR

      Yeah.

  4. 5:32 – 8:34

    Trolls, vegan wars, and turning conflict into bits

    1. JR

      Like, I've had some, I had some conflicts online. One of them with, uh, a bunch of vegans. They, they-

    2. DR

      Conflicts so you entertain somebody. (laughs)

    3. JR

      (laughs)

    4. DR

      You try to be... You're like, "I don't got time for that. I'm not gonna entertain." But every once in a while, you just wanna punch a troll in the face.

    5. JR

      Well-

    6. DR

      Just hit them with a couple-

    7. JR

      I wouldn't read the comments. That was the problem, was that occasionally you'd read the comments and you're like, "Holy shit."

    8. DR

      (laughs)

    9. JR

      Like, people just want you dead because... Uh, you know, anyway, I had this whole, uh, thing in my act about, uh, uh, chasing down the #vegancat.Somebody wrote some mean shit to me, and it had this hashtag vegan cat. I was like, "What the fuck is that?" I went there and there's a whole community of people-

    10. DR

      (laughs)

    11. JR

      ... feeding their cats vegetables. And, but, but in, in, in doing this and, like, tracking this down, and cha-

    12. DR

      Uh-huh.

    13. JR

      And like, it, it makes you realize, like, "Okay, I gotta write a bit about this," 'cause I could just get mad.

    14. DR

      It's easy, it writes itself.

    15. JR

      Yeah. It writes itself. I could just get mad and be upset that someone's being mean to me.

    16. DR

      Right.

    17. JR

      Or I could turn this shit into fuel.

    18. DR

      Or you could just go fucking just destroy the whole vegan community.

    19. JR

      What's, there's nothing-

    20. DR

      You can do-

    21. JR

      ... it's not the v-... it's nothing wrong with vegans, it's just that the protest is the same shit-

    22. DR

      No, they haven't, they have something wrong with vegans.

    23. JR

      ... as every other group.

    24. DR

      I don't really know too many vegans that aren't assholes, bro.

    25. JR

      I know some vegans that aren't assholes.

    26. DR

      I don't know-

    27. JR

      My fr-... Rich Roll, he's a great guy.

    28. DR

      My friend-

    29. JR

      John Joseph, he's a great guy.

    30. DR

      Neal Brennan, he's a vegan, he's an asshole.

  5. 8:34 – 10:13

    Hunting logistics—and Donnell’s cultural commentary on it

    1. DR

      Elk. How do f-... where does one go to even shoot a elk?

    2. JR

      Utah. Um, Colorado has a lot of them. There's some of them in California.

    3. DR

      Now, how do you do that? How do you, how do you transport... Is there a laws? Can you transport your kill, or do you have to break it down wherever, wherever you kill it?

    4. JR

      You, uh, you have to have, uh, first of all, you have a tag. And then when you, when you have a tag, you're allowed to get a certain kind of animal. So say if it's like a... you have a, a buck deer tag, that means you can kill a male deer. And then once you kill it, then you break it down, and you either bring it to a butcher shop and they turn it into cuts for you, or you could do it yourself and wrap it up. But you have to have a tag, you have to register that you killed that animal, and you have to keep that, that res-... that... with you, that paperwork with you. So if you transport the, the meat across state lines and some game warden pulled you over and said, "Do you have a deer in your car?" And you go, "Yes, I do, sir," he's gotta see that you have the paperwork for it.

    5. DR

      I don't wanna sound, um, racist at all.

    6. JR

      (laughs)

    7. DR

      But I don't know a Black person that could (laughs) tell that story that you just told-

    8. JR

      (laughs)

    9. DR

      ... about killing, butchering up-

    10. JR

      Yeah.

    11. DR

      ... and transporting a dead animal.

    12. JR

      Yeah, that's what you have to do, that's how you do it. You, you gotta put him on ice. I mean, you have to, you have an obligation to try to save the meat, you know? You, you, when you, uh, have an animal and it's down, you wanna get it into, like, f-... a, a packaged form as quick as possible and you wanna break it down.

    13. DR

      Periods.

    14. JR

      Sometimes it's just... Dude, sometimes people hang things. They hang things in their garage-

    15. DR

      It's very... that sh-

    16. JR

      ... in the cold.

    17. DR

      (laughs) Too soon. You when-... you mention the word hang and all I think about-

    18. JR

      Oh.

    19. DR

      ... is Jesse Sum-... (laughs)

  6. 10:13 – 15:18

    Jussie Smollett fallout: victimhood, narcissism, and skepticism

    1. JR

      Oh.

    2. DR

      Sumrall. Oh my God! Crazy story. Talk about setting a whole bunch of people back in one interview.

    3. JR

      Crazy story.

    4. DR

      Interesting.

    5. JR

      Such a mess.

    6. DR

      It's a mess, and I think what's really awful about it, because his story, it was, it was, like, good and bad of it. The good of it was when people thought that he was violated and he was a victim of a hate crime. It wasn't just gay people that was, uh, rushing to support him, it was, like, thug dudes. You know what I'm saying? It was, like, some real motherfuckers that was like... I mean, I saw Xzibit make a comment. It was a community of people away from the LBG community that thought it was really fucked up.

    7. JR

      Yeah.

    8. DR

      And that's, that was the beauty of the incident, because it kind of brought people together. And, but the fucked thing about it, it was just a lie. And it's so fucking unfortunate. It's so unfortunate somebody would play on people's emotions-

    9. JR

      Yeah.

    10. DR

      ... for... or to benefit themselves. It's, it's awful.

    11. JR

      Well, there's a certain narcissism that exists in show business that I think you and I both know very well. You know, we- we've all seen it, and thankfully the people that seem to be the best, for whatever reason, they have the, some of the best handles on it. Like, Dave doesn't show any of that.

    12. DR

      Right.

    13. JR

      But there's some people that do. And that narcissism is weird, that, that wanting it to be all about them.

    14. DR

      Right.

    15. JR

      And they'll cat-... they'll, they'll do sneaky shit, like fake an attack. Like, that's, that's a symptom of that same kind of thinking, it just, it just got desperate and went in some crazy way.

    16. DR

      It was awful for some reason, because you have people, like, when that f- first went down, you had people that normally... people that you would look at, "Okay, that's my friend," or whoever you started having side eyes, and that's just, it's just-It's so messed up. And the thing also is messed up, as much as people rode for him when they thought that it was an injustice and everything, nobody's really talking about it. Nobody's adjusting it. Like, you know, this is our movement. These are things we- we're trying to progress toward, but this was an isolated incident and just... say how awful it was. You know?

    17. JR

      Yeah. You know, the beautiful thing is that people are way more tolerant than they ever have been before. The also beautiful thing is the attack didn't happen, right?

    18. DR

      Right.

    19. JR

      So we don't have to think of one more atrocious thing that people have done to another person for no reason.

    20. DR

      Right.

    21. JR

      So that's good. And it's also good that you get to see where that kind of stuff heads, where you're always looking to be a victim, to the point where you realize there's like some sort of a currency in being a victim. So people fake being a victim-

    22. DR

      Right.

    23. JR

      ... so they can get all this fucking attention. It's good for us. It's good for us to see, 'cause you see that, now next time a story comes around that's just a little fishy-

    24. DR

      You gonna start guessing.

    25. JR

      ... you gonna go, "Huh?" Yeah.

    26. DR

      Exactly. It's like the boy who cried wolf. And that's what's unfortunate about it because anytime someone says that they were a- a victim of such heinous crime like that, you wanna believe them. You want to believe them the minute they say it.

    27. JR

      Yeah.

    28. DR

      But with this incident, it makes you start second guessing thing-

    29. JR

      Yeah.

    30. DR

      ... and that's another thing that was awful about the whole thing.

  7. 15:18 – 19:01

    Mind-reading tech, brain threads, and the future ruining comedy

    1. JR

      Yeah. That's- that's a fact. Til we can read each other's minds, til we can find out for sure. That's gonna change the whole game.

    2. DR

      Be in everybody's mind?

    3. JR

      Yeah.

    4. DR

      That's definitely gonna eliminate a lot of street fights.

    5. JR

      Pfft. Most of them.

    6. DR

      I mean, you talk about your-

    7. JR

      Yeah.

    8. DR

      ... your imminent danger senses are gonna be up 100%-

    9. JR

      Yeah.

    10. DR

      ... if you could read somebody's mind.

    11. JR

      Yeah. Yeah.

    12. DR

      I don't know if I would wanna do that.

    13. JR

      I do. I'm in.

    14. DR

      I like having secrets.

    15. JR

      I'm all in. I like having secrets too, but I like going all in. I think all in. I think, I think it's just inevitable. We were talking about it in the last podcast about there's something they're gonna be able to shoot into your neck. Uh, what did he say? The way he described it?

    16. GU

      Yeah, like an injection that will take over, sort of.

    17. JR

      Well, t- but what, the way it interacts with your brain cells.

    18. GU

      It's a thread.

    19. JR

      Yeah.

    20. GU

      It's okay.

    21. JR

      Thread itself into your brain cells. So literally like having ... I think we're gonna have built in wifi internet systems where we're connected to each other's heads.

    22. DR

      So this what people request or it's like a s- a study they wanna try out on people? Or you could just go to your doctor and say, "Shoot me with the brain shit."

    23. JR

      I think eventually it's gonna be shoot me with the brain shit. First you gotta get it on a clinical trial. (laughs)

    24. DR

      Right. (laughs)

    25. GU

      (laughs)

    26. JR

      First you gotta be able to be a gu- be a gu-

    27. DR

      But who do you get for that? Like heroin addicts or crackheads?

    28. JR

      (laughs)

    29. DR

      Who do you get for that? Like, who is close to no brain cells and shit and that's the one we try it on?

    30. JR

      What- what was that movie? There was a movie where a dude got shot and they put some chip in his back.

  8. 19:01 – 23:59

    Stem cells, South Park, and why boundary-pushing comedy matters

    1. JR

      I had a conversation with Mel Gibson the other day on the phone. It was one of the weirdest things in my life.

    2. DR

      I'm just happy to know I have friends that could s- say that... See, you have a lot of sentences my friends can't use (laughs) .

    3. JR

      (laughs)

    4. GU

      Is that conversation-

    5. DR

      Yeah, you know how you kill a, you know how you kill a elk? (laughs)

    6. JR

      (laughs)

    7. GU

      (laughs)

    8. DR

      All right, here's the difference between a buck and so and so, you gotta trigger him one time.

    9. JR

      (wheel spinning)

    10. GU

      (laughs)

    11. DR

      And then it's like, oh, and it comes, yeah, so I'm on the phone with Mel Gibson the other day.

    12. JR

      He said, b-

    13. DR

      I was on the phone with Ray Ray the other day, bro.

    14. JR

      (laughs) 'Cause, well, I'd rather be on the phone with Ray Ray.

    15. DR

      More interesting?

    16. JR

      But it's not, it's not bad to talk to Mel Gibson, it's just, it's like, okay.

    17. DR

      Right.

    18. JR

      'Cause, uh, he's a regular... He's a dude, he's a guy. He's Mel Gibson, and-

    19. DR

      He's Mel Gibson.

    20. JR

      But, you go like, "Fucking for real?" Like, you're talking to me like, "For real? It's a real conversation with Mel Gibson?"

    21. DR

      Yeah, that would be, that would be very interesting. And I've never run into him.

    22. JR

      He's a super nice guy. He did a podcast to talk about the stem cell doctor that helped his dad.

    23. DR

      Oh, yeah?

    24. JR

      He came on for Dr. Neil Riordan, he's this guy in Dallas that, uh, treats people down in Panama. He's got this radical stem cell s- therapy that you can't get in America, and it fixed... Mel Gibson's dad was 92 and he was in a wheelchair, and b- now he's 100 and he's walking around. Like, he's-

    25. DR

      What's the issue with stem cells situation in, in America? 'Cause I don't hear too much... The last time, uh, I- I'm not probably as knowledge as you are, but wasn't, um, Christopher Reeves t- trying to, um, promote st- more stem cell research?

    26. JR

      I'm sure he was. Yeah, he had that spinal cord injury from the-

    27. DR

      Yeah.

    28. JR

      ... horse r- horse accident.

    29. DR

      Yeah.

    30. JR

      He was doing those horse jumps. Yeah.

  9. 23:59 – 32:11

    Chappelle’s Show behind the scenes: warm-up work, iconic sketches, exec resistance

    1. DR

      When they ended that shit, when, when we asked, "Why?" (laughs)

    2. NA

      (laughs)

    3. JR

      (laughs)

    4. DR

      "Why, after all these years, would you still..." So he was like, "Because she's a nigger lover."

    5. JR

      (laughs)

    6. NA

      (laughs)

    7. DR

      I was like, I was like, that was one of them, that was one of them joints. I'm like, "Wake up, everybody, no more sleeping in bed."

    8. JR

      (laughs)

    9. NA

      (laughs)

    10. DR

      I knew from that moment that this show was gonna be on the next level of shows.

    11. JR

      Yeah, well, it was f- he was free, you know.

    12. DR

      It was, it was so many mo... When we did... Funny thing, a lot of things I used to do, I was a warm up comedian for Chappelle Show. So whenever you saw a Chappelle Show episode, and if you noticed that whenever I came on screen, and I'm not being cocky, people would go nuts. They'd be like, "Oh, shit." And the reason was because I was the guy that warmed up the audience before Dave came out.

    13. JR

      Oh, okay.

    14. DR

      So, I knew if I go gut the room out at the beginning, people don't e- people don't even... They didn't, nobody knew who I was or anything. If i ripped that at the beginning, and then when they see me on the screen, it's gonna be like... It's gonna be big, you know.

    15. JR

      Of course, yeah.

    16. DR

      And that, and that, and that show, man, it was just like... It was just... A lot of, a lot of things happened on that show. People like the, uh, Rick James sketch. The day we played that during the wrap arounds, man, that shit hit so hard. I was like, "This shit is cr- is fucking retarded."

    17. JR

      Crazy, crazy.

    18. DR

      Funny thing people don't know is that Comedy Central did not like that sketch.

    19. JR

      (laughs)

    20. NA

      (laughs)

    21. DR

      Comedy Central, here's the deal, it's funny.

    22. JR

      Oh.

    23. DR

      Comedy Central didn't like the sketch, and Comedy Central didn't think Charlie Murphy was funny in it. And I watched...

    24. JR

      (laughs)

    25. DR

      We ran that shit six... Just to let you know the direction people think. I watched that shit six times, and every time... Man, every time you heard Dave say, "I'm Rick James, bitch."

    26. JR

      (laughs)

    27. DR

      It was guts, son. It was guts, son. Yo, what did the five fingers say to the face? Blaow.

    28. JR

      (laughs)

    29. DR

      When's the last time you had a sketch was getting kids suspended in school?

    30. JR

      Right, right.

  10. 32:11 – 51:20

    Reps, bombing, and the craft: following killers like Bill Burr

    1. JR

      How can I wear those and have a straight face? And then I had like some nice dress-up shirt on, and I just ate plates of shit. But it made me rethink my whole act.

    2. DR

      Yeah?

    3. JR

      Because it was s- it was so... such a humiliating bombing. And I... 'Cause I knew that they... the audience was right. I wasn't being funny, I was nervous and scared.

    4. DR

      But those are the moments... Think about it. Those are the moments that make you.

    5. JR

      100%.

    6. DR

      And like now, I, I, I see a comedy... Like, I go to some clubs, motherfuckers trying to do the lineup kind of soft, like, "Well, we can't put that person in front of that person because they won't be able to follow the..." blah, blah, blah. But there should be a point like when I... when I started, like, the baddest motherfuckers in the game, they went on stage.

    7. JR

      Yeah.

    8. DR

      And if you was a new jack coming up, how were you gonna have a defining moment in comedy?

    9. JR

      Yeah.

    10. DR

      You gotta go behind somebody.

    11. JR

      You have to go behind somebody.

    12. DR

      Anybody can do... If you got a s-... a hot room, everybody's doing good, but put that shit behind where you got a motherfucker like a Bill Burr comes in the room-

    13. JR

      Yeah.

    14. DR

      ... and just goes f-... and fucks it up. What are you gonna do?

    15. JR

      Flatlines it, yeah.

    16. DR

      You gonna stand up?

    17. JR

      Yeah.

    18. DR

      We did... I did a tour with him, Bill, and it's so interesting, 'cause I know they have one of those podcasts where the theme is, "Have you ever had to come behind and destroy?" I forget the podcaster that does it, but Chris D'Elia was-

    19. JR

      If you ever had to come behind...

    20. DR

      Uh, a story of coming behind someone that just demolishes them.

    21. JR

      Oh, going on after them.

    22. DR

      Yeah.

    23. JR

      Okay, yeah.

    24. DR

      And then Chris D'Elia... I saw Chris D'Elia do it once. He said me in it. But when we were doing Chappelle sh-... after Chappelle Show... f-... uh, the second year of Chappelle Show, we weren't really making a lot of money on the Chappelle Show 'cause the show s-... still hadn't been proven. You know how-

    25. JR

      Yeah.

    26. DR

      ... something you gotta... if you got a contract, you got a contract, that's it. It just so happened the con-... the, the show blew up before the contract was over, but that don't mean nobody's gonna renegotiate, so we had this popularity, but we weren't making money. And, um, I came up with the idea of doing a tour called the I'm Rich Bitch Tour.

    27. JR

      (laughs)

    28. DR

      And at the time, at the time, Charlie was, "Charlie Murphy!" Like, anywhere he goes... At the time, Bill Burr was, um, uh, a headliner probably at the time in B-rooms, you know what I'm saying? And this is no disrespect to him, but he was on the come-up.

    29. JR

      Right.

    30. DR

      But when you saw Bill, you knew this motherfucker was gonna be next. You knew he was gonna... he was gonna pop it. But we still wasn't getting no cash. Charlie had never told jokes. And I, I was like, "How the fuck you around all these comedians, you never been on stage?" So, I used to b- bully him. You know, he a tough ass motherfucker, rest in peace, but I was like, "Yeah, you so tough, motherfucker, but not with a microphone in your hand."

  11. 51:20 – 1:01:20

    Big specials, career-defining moments, and Bernie Mac’s legendary opener

    1. DR

      Man, if you're not out there, if you're not out there creating the type of material where it's old t- like, the, the ... I'm getting ready to do another special.

    2. JR

      Who you doing it for?

    3. DR

      Here's the tricky part.

    4. JR

      Mm-mm.

    5. DR

      I'm not on ... I might be on Netflix Radar, but I don't have a deal with them, but I'm gonna, not by myself, but Dave Chappelle has gave me a verbal commitment that he's gonna produce my next special.

    6. JR

      Oh. Damn.

    7. DR

      So, with that said ... I don't have a home, but I'm pretty sure the level I've been operating with my standup, you know when you ready, you know what I'm saying? It's like, I just know it, bro. I just know it. I think the energy that I'll bring to a special right now, and then the energy that he would bring to produce them for me, it would just fucking blow up. And this is not something like ... I'm not calling Dave up every day like, "Dude, you gotta do my special." Every time I work with him, he was like, "You gotta let me do your special." I'm like, "Let's go, motherfucker."

    8. JR

      Yeah.

    9. DR

      So, I feel good about that. I don't, I don't ... I'm not saying that I'm eyeing this place, I'm eyeing that place. First thing I wanna do is drop a, put a hour of material that, when it plays, it can change my life. You know what I'm saying?

    10. JR

      Well, I've been seeing you at the store, man. You're locked in.

    11. DR

      Thank you.

    12. JR

      You can tell, you can tell you're doing a lot of sets. You got a lot-

    13. DR

      I'm doing ... Yo, I'm, yo, I'm, I want reps.

    14. JR

      Yeah. That's what's up.

    15. DR

      How, how ... What do, what, what do you do, bro? I can't fuck-

    16. JR

      Reps.

    17. DR

      ... up and stay home for it.

    18. JR

      Gotta have reps, gotta have reps.

    19. DR

      Reps. Never catch a motherfucker off guard.

    20. JR

      Yeah. I, sometimes I'll do four sets in a night in LA.

    21. DR

      I did, I did, and I was so proud of myself, I got six sets in, in a night in LA.

    22. JR

      Wow.

    23. DR

      And I was so fucking happy, 'cause that's a normal night in New York.

    24. JR

      Yeah.

    25. DR

      But in LA, you gotta plan that shit.

    26. JR

      Yeah.

    27. DR

      You gotta hit the, you gotta hit sunset. It's gotta be like, "Boom, I'm out." But you feel like, you feel like you just can do whatever you want, 'cause then you, you know if you starting off with something new, on that first one, you got four more, by the time the night is over, (snaps fingers) you got that motherfucker.

    28. JR

      Yeah, it's ... When you're doing reps the same night too, when you hit that third set, it's almost like you're in this weird flow state where there's no resistance between you and the ideas. The material just comes out so loose.

    29. DR

      And then you know the thing you gotta do is, it, it's, it's one thing to have a joke. Anybody can ... Not anybody, but a motherfucker can write a joke, and that's why you see some motherfuckers, you can, you just tell that they, they're a good writer, but it's-

    30. JR

      Yeah.

  12. 1:01:20 – 1:07:00

    No excuses & reading the room: performance vs writing, comics who play it safe

    1. JR

      You gotta do reps.

    2. DR

      You gotta do reps. They not built for it. They got a motherfucking excuse for everything. You ever go to a motherfucker room and they be talking about, "How's the crowd?" Motherfucker, fuck the crowd. How are you? Oh, the ... Was the crowd lame? No, you were lame, bruh. It ain't they job, it's our motherfucking job.

    3. JR

      Talkin' about going hard in the paint.

    4. DR

      No, I'm just saying, it's our fucking job.

    5. JR

      You're right.

    6. DR

      And I've heard you in your podcast talk about no excuses. And I feel like the things you say about no excuses, yeah, it's easy to make an excuse, but at the end of the day, it's an excuse.

    7. JR

      Yeah.

    8. DR

      You got two excuses. You got a good excuse and you got a bad excuse.

    9. JR

      Well, you know what? You could have an explanation for failure with no excuse.

    10. DR

      What do you mean?

    11. JR

      You could talk about how you failed and-

    12. DR

      Yeah.

    13. JR

      ... why you failed. Don't have an excuse, but go, "I fucked up. I came out, I was flat. I didn't concentrate enough."

    14. DR

      I know what it was.

    15. JR

      Yeah, I know what it was.

    16. DR

      And don't-

    17. JR

      I fucked up.

    18. DR

      And don't, and don't use it.

    19. JR

      Yeah.

    20. DR

      Like I say-

    21. JR

      This crowd sucked. That's the wrong way to look at it.

    22. DR

      Man, any time I hear a comedian-

    23. JR

      That doesn't help you at all.

    24. DR

      ... say, "How were they?" No, I ain't never saying that, "How are you?"

    25. JR

      Yeah.

    26. DR

      Because, guess what? We don't know what's going to happen, bruh. We don't know if that motherfucker in the front row is thinking about a funeral.

    27. JR

      Yes.

    28. DR

      You, we don't know that. But it's our job to, like, you know, kind of, going back to what you said earlier, in a sense, we do, we read people's mind through their body. You can tell, you can s- watch a show, you can be like, "Oh, she was so upset because I said that." You can just look at the body.

    29. JR

      Yeah.

    30. DR

      You know, you know the posture, you know everything. And then we feed off of that. But who's gonna be fucking ready for that? And there's so many of these motherfuckers that are ta- and I'm not going off, but it's just ... Yeah.

Episode duration: 2:44:06

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