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The Joe Rogan ExperienceThe Joe Rogan Experience

Joe Rogan Experience #2116 - Kevin James

Kevin James is a stand-up comic and actor known for his roles in the television series "The King of Queens" and films like "The Home Team" and "Here Comes the Boom." Watch his latest comedy special, "Kevin James: Irregardless," on Amazon Prime. www.kevinjames.com https://www.amazon.com/Kevin-James-Irregardless/dp/B0CHH3V2H4

Joe RoganhostKevin JamesguestGuestguest
Mar 8, 20242h 27mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 2:15

    Shimmy, old-school hangouts, and the early-’90s comedy scene

    1. NA

      (drum roll) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

    2. JR

      The Joe Rogan Experience.

    3. NA

      Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day.

    4. NA

      (instrumental music)

    5. JR

      Let's go, Shimmy. Let's go, Shimmy. Shimmy, Shimmy, Shimmy. Most people don't know about Shimmy. Mm-mm. They don't know about your alter ego. No. Well, yeah, you were the one who brought it out of me. (laughs) You were, right? Well, we would do shows, we would do shows in New York and you would go full Shimmy. (laughs) I'd be on the side of the (laughs) side of the stage yelling out, "Shimmy!" Well, when we first started... By the way, we, we did the Joe Rogan Experience 30 years ago, right? Yeah. It just wasn't millions of people. Just hanging out. Not... Let's... Exactly. Just playing pool. (laughs) Um, you, you... I remember Sussman brought you into town. You started at Nick's? Was it Nick's or... I started at Stitches in Boston. Stitches. And then, uh, I was like two years in when I met you, and then, uh, I think we met at East Side. Mm-hmm. Which was awesome. Great club. What a great club. What a great club that was. I was just there. Shout out to Richie Mantervini. Yes. My man. He, he was... It was, uh, the greatest, the greatest place to go. I remember, uh, it would be a line around the block, two shows like on a Wednesday night. It was insane- Yeah. ... comedy then. That place was just jammed. The golden age of comedy at the time. 1990? Yes. Oh my God, it was incredible back then. '91-ish. I started at '89. I think I met you in... What is it? '90- '91 maybe? '90, '91. Somewhere around there. Yeah, somewhere in there. Uh, and I was, you know, I was following everybody. That was my thing. Like I, I was being the standup comedian with the, you know, the jacket sleeves pushed up and the- (laughs) ... the bolo tie. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah. (laughs) Just... Yeah. I was just that straight... And you came into town and we were like, "Who is this dude?" Like, you just didn't care about anything. And it was like, you've always remained the same and it was just incredible to watch. We were like, "Whoa! He just doesn't care." And that's what you were... You, you would work with me on that. You would be like, "Brother, you can't be like you're handing out a platter of food for these pe..." Like, "Do what you wanna do." And I was like, "I just gotta get good. Yeah, I gotta wrap my head around that. You're right." You know? (laughs) I just tried to... (laughs)

  2. 2:15 – 6:21

    Letting go of audience fear: confidence, anxiety, and impostor syndrome

    1. JR

      I would, I would, I would just try to make the audience so happy. Like, "Stop it, stop it." And, "You gotta let go," and you'd get me going crazy. (laughs) I'd get all fired up there. I'd be like yelling at people. They'd be like, "Whoa!" (laughs) It's like, "All right, maybe we bring it back a little bit," but it was different, man. It really was. It was... It, it really taught me to, mo- most of all to be comfortable in front of audience and not care about them. You know, it's... I still... I literally battle with it to this day- Yeah. ... that anxiety of, "Oh gosh, I get nervous and I, I start overthinking things." So, um, but it really helped me to say like, "Just do what you do." And, and it's almost like the... 'Cause the audience is like a dog, right? They'll, they, they sense fear. You know, they sense- 100%. Yeah. They're animals. Yes. Just like we are. Yes. We're all animals. That's right. And it's like they know when you know, and if you're comfortable, even if you're faking it, they'll go with you. You do a joke and you're confident, they'll laugh just because they think it's funny, you know. They look around and everybody's like, "Oh, it must be funny 'cause he's just got confidence about it." And you had that confidence always, man. You were always insanely intense and just never looked back, and way to go, man. Way to go for you too. You just always needed a hype man. Mm-hmm. You, you, you'd just need someone to like let you go. Like, "Give him the green light. Give him the green light!" Yes. It's so funny. You're right, you're right. Yeah, you just needed a hype man. You were the one who did it for me in Montreal too. Yeah. (laughs) Do you remember that? Yeah. Going to this place... (laughs) By the way, do you remember the beer we would drink? There were two kinds of this bee... I can't remember this Canadian beer. I, I've been racking my brain to think about it. It was like, there was like a gold version of it and like an, like an amber. Uh, and it was just the greatest stuff. And we get fired up up there and I loved it, man. I loved going to that Montreal Comedy Festival. Oh, it was the best. Yeah. Back when it was... I think it's gone under. I think they did... Just announced they're going bankrupt. Oh, really? Yeah, unfortunately. See, well, we should tell people what it was. Oh, yeah. So what it was during our time, then... When we were young, was the... Montreal Comedy Festival was where young comedians would go up and you could kinda, kinda get a deal. Yes. And that's where you got the deal to do the King of Queens. Well, I got the deal to do it at NBC. Right. Oh, yeah- And then, and then it turned in- ... and then it turned in- Yeah. Then once that failed- Yeah. ... that went in to, to CBS big time. But once you get in... The thing about... People should know, like in the '90s there was this thing that was happening where everybody looked at a comedian like this could be the next Roseanne, this could be the next Tim Allen- Right. ... this could be the next Seinfeld. So every time they looked at you, they're like, "What do you got?" Right. "What do you got for me?" And the agents would try to put it together as a sitcom. Yes. And they had this showcase called the Montreal Comedy Festival, the Just for Laughs Comedy Festival, and it was the most insane thing. You would go there and it would change your life. You could have one set, one 15-minute set, and all of a sudden you got a half a million dollars. 100%. You have one thing, one set that pops and people talking about, there's a buzz. Yeah. And it's like you're in, you're set. And they have bidding wars. Yes. So like CBS would be, Fox would be- (laughs) ... they would all be throwing in. And, you know, there's guys who walked... Do you remember Chicken? Chicken was the crazy guy? Yes. (laughs) Yes. Yes. Chicken got the deal that killed the deals. Yes, yes. He got like, uh, 800,000 or something. It was some crazy mon- or mil... I don't know what it was but- Some nutty amount of money. But he had no act, right? It was after that they thought he was- He just tricked everybody. He did. And I don't know how he did it, and I wonder if he had a hype man, if you could have kept tricking people. Yeah. 'Cause he- Like, maybe he just went off the rails with anxiety when success starts i-... 'Cause that's one of the things that does happen. And I've talked about it. I think everybody admits it. You... When it first starts happening, you think it's gonna go away, you get super anxiety ridden, you, you k-... You, you feel like an imposter and you, like... You can't beli-... Like you'd show up on the set and you're like, "Are they kicking me out? Like, I'm still here?" My bud, I'm telling you, I've...

    2. ... I still deal with that. I'm not even kidding.

    3. KJ

      Yeah.

    4. JR

      You obviously don't, and you haven't-

    5. KJ

      I do, though.

    6. JR

      Do you really?

    7. KJ

      I do, though. Yeah, I do. I just ignore it. I tell it to shut the fuck up.

    8. JR

      Well, that's what you gotta do, I guess.

    9. KJ

      Yeah.

    10. JR

      And that's what I don't do enough, because I start thinking. And I get thi- and I start overthinking both sides. I'm like, "Oh, gosh, what if this happens or this, that?" This means something, to this day.

    11. KJ

      Yeah.

  3. 6:21 – 12:10

    Corporate gigs from hell (and how to survive them)

    1. JR

      Like, if I'm doing a, like a theater and it's my people, you know, and I know that they're coming to pay to see me, I, I, I, I'm pretty confident. I feel like I'm gonna do well. But if I do a club that they don't know me or something-

    2. KJ

      Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

    3. JR

      ... it's a... Like, I did a, a corporate gig, uh, like a month ago, like in Miami. And I was like, you know, I was like, "Oh, boy." 'Cause corporate gigs, you know, they can go either way, and it's-

    4. KJ

      They can be horrible.

    5. JR

      Well, I get there. It's in Miami. Really good-looking people. Everybody... It's in a lobby of a hotel, and I'm go-... I thought this was in a theater. I'm there, and it's a good b-... And I'm, now I'm getting worried. I'm like, "I gotta do... How much?" And they're like, "You gotta do an hour."

    6. KJ

      (laughs)

    7. JR

      And then I find out nobody there wants to see me. The woman who was r-... The, the, like CEO of this company was, it was her birthday, and she liked me, so she brought me in to, to, for all her friends to see. Dude, I'm sitting in the lobby. I'm... And I'm finding all this information out-

    8. KJ

      (laughs)

    9. JR

      ... as I'm sitting there. And I started... I'm not kidding. I started... I've never had a panic attack. I start going, "W- w- what, what do you mean? She doesn't... Nobody else knows I'm here or this or that or they don't know..." And they go, "No, no, no. They don't know. You know, this is a company." And, you know, the... And I'm looking in the room. I... It's in the lobby. I can see through, like a little glass, uh, window, and they're drinking, they're having... They're talking a table... We're set up for comedy too, just like round tables, uh, booths, like not even facing you.

    10. KJ

      (laughs)

    11. JR

      And I'm on... I see a postage stamp of a stage that I gotta stand on, and I'm like, "Oh, my gosh." So I start hyperventilating.

    12. KJ

      (laughs)

    13. JR

      I really do. I go... I wish I was going... So I start going, "I, I can't, I, I can't do this." I'm talking to Skyler, my b- my assistant buddy. You know, he's, he's, he's helping me out here. And I'm like, "Hey, just tell them we, we can't do it." He's like, "What are you talking about?" I go, "Just tell them. Uh, we gotta give them the money back. We're just not gonna do it. We don't need to do this. I don't wanna do it. This is not gonna go well." And I started really panicking. And then they started going up. She's up on stage now, introducing me. And I go, "Oh, my gosh, we're going. Oh, my gosh." So I start f- freaking out.

    14. KJ

      (gasps)

    15. JR

      Heart is going like... Exactly.

    16. KJ

      (gasps) (laughs) I'll get so much anxiety.

    17. JR

      I've been doing comedy for 30 years, I've been doing stand-up. I go, "I don't need this." I'm ready to call Sussie and go, "I don't want to do this anymore." I don't want to do it.

    18. KJ

      Ah!

    19. JR

      I don't need... I get up there, and go, I go, "Just get them with that first joke." If you do, you settle it, 'cause if you don't... You know if they don't buy you on that first joke-

    20. KJ

      You're fucked.

    21. JR

      ... you're gone.

    22. KJ

      You're fucked.

    23. JR

      You're gone for an hour.

    24. KJ

      For an hour, you're gone.

    25. JR

      You know?

    26. KJ

      Oh.

    27. JR

      Oh, gosh.

    28. KJ

      Ugh.

    29. JR

      And they're not even listening, and they're loud when they bring me up. And when I came up, it wasn't even like they all turned and went nuts. But, uh, I got them with... I don't know what I said. I just said one joke about the lady thanking me, you know, w- thanking me for bringing me up. And, and, uh, I just won them over in one little sweet way. And, and they, they turned, and they clapped, and they laughed at one thing. And then I went into another joke very gingerly, just kinda going this, that, and they laughed at that. And I go, "Okay." I just settled in. I go, "I got them."

    30. KJ

      Whew.

  4. 12:10 – 17:50

    Arena comedy, performing ‘in the round,’ and the Chappelle surprise pop

    1. JR

      Sports, everything. But this is the thing. Like, I have, uh... I'm playing a first... My first arena coming up, and I'm freaking out. I've never done that before.

    2. KJ

      Have y-... Are you doing it in the round?

    3. JR

      No.

    4. KJ

      That's the way to do it.You know why? This is a-

    5. JR

      A little late for that.

    6. KJ

      This is, this is okay, you'll still have a great time. They're still great. The, the arenas are great, they're fun. It's a wild experience, but the round is the best, because it's actually intimate, in the strangest way, because-

    7. JR

      I've done the Westbury Music Fair, yeah.

    8. KJ

      ... because everybody's fa- facing everybody.

    9. JR

      Yes.

    10. KJ

      So all the people see each other-

    11. JR

      You-

    12. KJ

      ... and they're all in it together.

    13. JR

      I love that. I love that idea. But, and does the, the stage, does it turn?

    14. KJ

      No, you walk around.

    15. JR

      I used to do the one, you know, the Westbury Music Fair-

    16. KJ

      Oh, it walks, it spins for you.

    17. JR

      It would spin for you, and you wouldn't even know where the hell you are, and then you have to walk off.

    18. KJ

      (laughs)

    19. JR

      It's an awkward walk off, where you-

    20. KJ

      You don't know where the stairs are. (laughs)

    21. JR

      ... you don't know where they are. It moves-

    22. KJ

      (laughs)

    23. JR

      ... and everybody shifted, and you don't know who you're looking at.

    24. KJ

      You have to get, find some distinctive person in the audience-

    25. JR

      Yes, marker. That's, that big guy is my marker right there.

    26. KJ

      Yeah. The one in Phoenix spins around too. What's that? The Celebrity Theater?

    27. JR

      I didn't, I've been-

    28. KJ

      You can turn it on or off.

    29. JR

      Really?

    30. KJ

      Yeah. That's a good one too, that's a... 'cause it's a comedy club, but it's in the round.

  5. 17:50 – 22:17

    Inside the Austin comedy ecosystem: club operations and building a killer lineup

    1. KJ

      But that's the thing. It's like... But I do that all the time. You know, when I'm at the club-

    2. JR

      Mm-hmm.

    3. KJ

      ... I'll have five, six guys who are going on in front of me, and they're all headliners.

    4. JR

      See, that's why-

    5. KJ

      I'm doing, I'm going on stage an hour and a half into the show.

    6. JR

      I would... Again, my theaters, um, I'd be comfortable. Your club, I would be afraid. I'd be afraid 'cause you got such heavy hitters and I come up and I'm talking about-

    7. KJ

      No!

    8. JR

      ... weird little observational stuff.

    9. KJ

      No, no, no, no.

    10. JR

      And it's like, whoa.

    11. KJ

      No.

    12. JR

      It would get in my head. It would.

    13. KJ

      It... No, there's a lot of weird observational comedians kill there. It's a fun place. Like Duncan kills there. And, you know, and we're... it's all just... it's all great. It's all a bunch of different com... But for me, it's like to, to have a... I want the audience to get the best possible show they can see. So they're, they're gonna see Ron White.

    14. JR

      Wow.

    15. KJ

      They're gonna see Shane Gillis and Tony Hinchcliffe and Brian Simpson and-

    16. JR

      That's insane.

    17. KJ

      And all these monsters that come into town. Like in any given week, it's Chris Distefano or fucking Dave Smith or... It's like there's so many killers.

    18. JR

      How, how, how often during the week are, are you there and how often like are guys working out their stuff there? Are there different nights?

    19. KJ

      Well, it's open seven nights a week.

    20. JR

      Seven nights a week.

    21. KJ

      Seven nights a week, two shows each night in each room.... except for, uh, Mondays and Sundays, which are open mic nights. So open mic night, there's, uh, a show in the small room, there's only one show, but then there's, uh, at least one show in the main room that's a regular show-

    22. JR

      Right.

    23. KJ

      ... like regular comedians. (sniffs)

    24. JR

      Wow. That's incredible.

    25. KJ

      Yeah. And it's, um, two shows a night in each room, so four shows a night.

    26. JR

      Uh, how, how big are e- e- each room?

    27. KJ

      One's 250 and one's about 110 to 120.

    28. JR

      Is there a... Do you feel a difference, or no?

    29. KJ

      Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, the little one's super intimate. The little one is like, um, if you remember the Belly Room at The Comedy Store, it's like the Belly Room and the original room had a baby, and that's the little room.

    30. JR

      Wow.

  6. 22:17 – 27:49

    Writing and performing craft: momentum, structure, and staying ‘fresh’ in old bits

    1. JR

      I do a lot of writing while I have a tour, like if I have a tour in, in the theaters, you know, where I'll try to... If I have a set theme set, I'll try to add some stuff in there-

    2. KJ

      Mm-hmm.

    3. JR

      ... for the next one. Have you ever done that?

    4. KJ

      Yeah.

    5. JR

      Do you ever...

    6. KJ

      Yeah.

    7. JR

      Yeah.

    8. KJ

      When you're doing a lot of shows it's, it's great.

    9. JR

      Yeah.

    10. KJ

      'Cause you kinda get a sense of where you could stick stuff in and you start saying-

    11. JR

      You always have the safety net of I can go here if it's going nowhere.

    12. KJ

      Right. Yeah, yeah.

    13. JR

      'Cause that's my problem. That's what I do too. I'll, I'll write a huge chunk on something and won't know when to bail on it, if it's not going... Like, you, you know, it's-

    14. KJ

      Mm-hmm.

    15. JR

      ... dependent on this thing... I gotta follow through with it now.

    16. KJ

      (laughs)

    17. JR

      And if they're not in... if they don't buy in right away, I'm like, "Wow, I got three more minutes of this stuff."

    18. KJ

      Oftentimes I, I realize it's because I didn't buy in.

    19. JR

      Right.

    20. KJ

      That's what it is mostly with me. If I'm i- entering a bit like, "Oh, I didn't wanna be talking about this. I wish I shouldn't, didn't bring this one up." Like, if I ever get to that place, like, you just have to fight off that thought. There's this thought that comes into your mind like, "Oh, why did I bring this up? I don't wanna do this bit." But you can't, but you can't say, "You know what? Fuck that bit."

    21. JR

      Yeah.

    22. KJ

      'Cause then the audience will be like, "What?"

    23. JR

      Yes, yes.

    24. KJ

      No, so you just have to never let yourself get to the mindset where you're like, "I don't wanna do this." So you gotta remember w- there w- there was something, whatever the subject is, there was something about that subject that when you initially started writing a joke about it, it was resonating with you.

    25. JR

      Right.

    26. KJ

      And you were like, "What the fuck is this?"

    27. JR

      Right.

    28. KJ

      But if you hear it too many times, it's like anything else, you get tired of it, you, it loses its luster. But that's just a mental weakness. You just have to realize or just, like, get your h- your head wrapped around that you can't allow yourself to think that way. And surely this thought originally was valid, because that's why you're so excited about it and that's why you wrote a bit about it. The audience doesn't know that you've said it 100 times over the last year-

    29. JR

      Right.

    30. KJ

      ... or more. They, they just wanna hear it.

  7. 27:49 – 30:35

    Mitch Hedberg, heroin’s shadow, and the cost of creative brilliance

    1. KJ

      That was a guy, like, the, he just didn't wanna kick heroin.

    2. JR

      Yeah.

    3. KJ

      They were trying to get him to kick heroin. He's like, "Uh-uh, I like it."

    4. JR

      Is that what it was? He just-

    5. KJ

      Pshh... He liked it. He just wasn't gonna kick it. He, uh, was hospitalized while we were on The Man Show. And Doug Stanhope and he and, and Mitch were very close. And I, you know, I admired him deeply as a comedian.

    6. JR

      Oh...

    7. KJ

      He's a, he was a great comic, man. And, uh, that was when he was, uh, I think he was hospitalized with gangrene.

    8. JR

      (sighs)

    9. KJ

      Yeah, 'cause he was shooting it, uh, you know, allegedly.

    10. JR

      Geez.

    11. KJ

      It's, um, heroin is a scary one-

    12. JR

      (throat clear)

    13. KJ

      ... because it seems to touch this part of people that makes them very creative and ver- They're like, the, it resonates with people. Like, so much music that's great was made on heroin. But, G- God, what a curse. What a curse. When you watch someone who gets caught in the opiate web, it's so terrifying. It's so sad to see.

    14. JR

      Yeah.

    15. KJ

      And when you have someone who's just like this... I mean, imagine the kind of, uh, bits that Mitch Hedberg could have come up with.

    16. JR

      Oh.

    17. KJ

      Over all these-

    18. JR

      What a talent, man.

    19. KJ

      ... decades after that.

    20. JR

      What a talent.

    21. KJ

      Yeah. And he was all non sequitur. He was all-

    22. JR

      E- every-

    23. KJ

      ... one bit leads into the next bit.

    24. JR

      I love it.

    25. KJ

      DoubleTree Hotel (laughs) .

    26. JR

      Yup, I love it. I love it.

    27. KJ

      Yeah.

    28. JR

      I love that humor, man. Just he was, he was amazing.

    29. KJ

      (clicks tongue) Yeah, he was. He was. It's just, um, you know, that guy had, uh, a hard time in the beginning because people didn't know what he was doing. So he would go on after, like, these high energy, like, music acts.

    30. JR

      Yeah.

  8. 30:35 – 41:58

    Modern stand-up business: social media fame, crowd work clips, and ‘soft’ acts

    1. JR

      Well, you see a lot of these guys now that are developing an act because they did something on, like, Instagram or what, whatever. Like, they, they develop these audiences-

    2. KJ

      Mm-hmm.

    3. JR

      ... that, you know, they, they get popular.

    4. KJ

      Yeah.

    5. JR

      And then they put together an act, they go and they, and the clubs are like, "Well, let's put this guy up," you know?

    6. KJ

      Yeah.

    7. JR

      And, um, uh, they sell out like crazy because, you know, they, they, they, they, they got a big following-

    8. KJ

      Yeah.

    9. JR

      ... but it's not like working your standup, man. It's a different game.

    10. KJ

      Well, there's also a lot of guys who do crowd control, like they do crowd work stuff. Like, it's like, uh, just fucking around with the crowd, and that's most of these clips. You're seeing a lot of guys who put up clips of crowd work 'cause that way they don't have to, uh, crowd work 'cause you don't have to burn your material. You're just talking to the crowd.

    11. JR

      Right.

    12. KJ

      You just talk to them.... it's fine.

    13. JR

      That can go bad.

    14. KJ

      It can go bad, but if you do it enough and you get some funny moments-

    15. JR

      And you get good at it, right. You get your shapeness.

    16. KJ

      Like Andrew Schulz has a lot of great moments-

    17. JR

      Right.

    18. KJ

      ... so he's really good at it, and you take those clips, and that way, you're putting shit up, but you're not burning any of your jokes. The problem is, some of those guys can only do that. Schulz is a great comic, like he could do-

    19. JR

      Right.

    20. KJ

      ... great bits. He could do great... I mean, he can do anything.

    21. JR

      Right.

    22. KJ

      But some of these guys are only good at talking to the audience, and then when they have to do, "Did you ever notice?"-

    23. JR

      Right.

    24. KJ

      ... everybody's like, "Whoa." (laughs)

    25. JR

      (laughs) "What's this?"

    26. KJ

      'Cause th- the audience can feel the shift-

    27. JR

      (laughs)

    28. KJ

      ... when I go back to my own material-

    29. JR

      Yeah.

    30. KJ

      ... they go, "You wrote this." "Yo, what is this wack-ass bullshit-"

  9. 41:58 – 46:43

    How they write: Word vs Scrivener vs Notes—and the chaos of organization

    1. JR

      How do you write? How do you ... Do you ... Are you even the guy sitting down every ... I mean-

    2. KJ

      I sit down in front of a computer and I just write. I just ... I don't write like, "This is exactly how I'm gonna say it." I just like spill my thoughts out. It's 'cause I feel like it takes me a lot longer to write the words than it does for me to think about things. So, the more time that I'm actually just writing the words, it's extra time thinking about the thing where you're kinda like locked into it.

    3. JR

      Do you speak into a computer? Do you talk into it? Voice-

    4. KJ

      No, I, I just type.

    5. JR

      Really?

    6. KJ

      Yeah, I type. And I just ... Whatever the subject is, I'll ... Like, there's this one subject that I'm doing right now where I've written it, written about the subject four times. So, I start a whole new Microsoft Word file four times and just r- completely revisit it. Just one more time. Let's look at it this way.

    7. JR

      What pro- what program are you using? 'Cause I'm nuts with that, too.

    8. KJ

      I just use Word.

    9. JR

      You use Word?

    10. KJ

      Just use Microsoft Word and I go into, uh, there's, um, Focus mode. Have you seen Focus mode?

    11. JR

      Yeah. It's uh, it blocks everything else out, right?

    12. KJ

      So, I used to use ... Yeah. I used to use Write Room. I'll still use Write Room.

    13. JR

      I did Scrivener. I d- like, I'll s-

    14. KJ

      Yeah. Yeah. I use Scrivener. Yeah. I use that, too.

    15. JR

      But I'll find one thing about it and then I'll go, "I don't like this, that. It doesn't ... It sets my bits up this way." Or, "It can't do this."

    16. KJ

      Mm-hmm.

    17. JR

      Or, "It can't transfer that." And then I'll spend the whole day looking it up for apps, for the perfect app.

    18. KJ

      (laughs)

    19. JR

      And, and I'm not, and I'm not writing. See, it's like-

    20. KJ

      Yeah, you're distracting yourself.

    21. JR

      Of course, of course.

    22. KJ

      Of course, yeah.

    23. JR

      It does, uh-

    24. KJ

      Yeah, I try to avoid that. But Scrivener, what I do with Scrivener is I make each individual bit. Once I have it kinda boiled down, then I put it in the columns, so it would always give Scrivener set up, you know, whatever the subject is.

    25. JR

      I love Scrivener. The only thing it didn't do, it didn't transf for- transfer to my phone or, or the other ... You know, when like, when I'm at a gig-

    26. KJ

      Right.

    27. JR

      ... and I wanna look it up quick. You had to go to like a Dropbox or like a, that ... You know?

    28. KJ

      Right.

    29. JR

      And it was like, it was annoying.

    30. KJ

      Right.

  10. 46:43 – 52:28

    Memory, prep rituals, and supplements: index cards, Alpha Brain, and creatine

    1. JR

      Yeah.

    2. KJ

      If you write it by hand, you remember it better. That's proven. So if I do an arena... I got this from you, by the way.

    3. JR

      What?

    4. KJ

      I got this from you.

    5. JR

      All right.

    6. KJ

      Because, uh-

    7. JR

      'Cause I'm not doing it anymore.

    8. KJ

      No, no, no.

    9. JR

      I need to do it.

    10. KJ

      No, this is, this is what I got from you because I didn't have a rider 'cause I'm lazy. So when I would go do theaters, they would just use Kevin James' rider. So when I would... 'Cause we have the same manager. Get outta here. Yeah, so we had the same manager. I was like, "What shit am eating?"

    11. JR

      Right. Oh, did you see that?

    12. KJ

      Yeah, it was, like, all normal stuff and, like, whatever... Like, maybe I added whiskey to it-

    13. JR

      Right.

    14. KJ

      ... or whatever it was. But, uh, one thing you had was index cards.

    15. JR

      Yeah.

    16. KJ

      And Sharpies. I was like, "Oh, that's a great idea." So every time I do an arena now, I set up index cards and I will get there an hour early and write out all my bits, write out all, like, the, the, the key points of the bits, all the things I wanna talk about and set that there. And the next bit, set that there. And so I have this coffee table and I've got all these things, the index cards laid out.

    17. JR

      Why don't you do a prompter or something like that? You don't wanna do a prompter?

    18. KJ

      No, no, no, no, I don't need that. Uh, uh-

    19. JR

      You-

    20. KJ

      I'm fine. Once I, once I write it all out, I've been doing it every night.

    21. JR

      I know.

    22. KJ

      Every night. It's like, I just like to do that as an extra little detail. Just an extra little... Just, just really dotting all your Is and crossing all your Ts.

    23. JR

      Yeah.

    24. KJ

      So I feel good when I get out there.

    25. JR

      I, I don't know if it's, uh, I'm losing my memory, uh, you know, whatever it i-... But it's like I need a, I need bullet points up there. It's, it-

    26. KJ

      Let me get you some of this. Do you take any-

    27. JR

      Homeboy, you have to-

    28. KJ

      ... nootropics?

    29. JR

      I take nothing and-

    30. KJ

      Okay. This is what you're gonna get. Um, I'm gonna give you this. Just take this one and I'll get you some more. I'll send you some more. That's Alpha Brain. That's, uh, Onnit-

  11. 52:28 – 1:21:43

    Health struggle and discipline: diet, community, and the ‘boss voice’

    1. JR

      I'm... You gotta help me with that working ou- I'm telling you. I am literally right now, I feel like I am on the cusp of either, you know, uh, being that athletic guy, you know, go back into where, you know, I get in shape like crazy, or I'm wearing-

    2. KJ

      Either way.

    3. JR

      ... cardigan sweaters and, (sniffs) literally, you know... Grandpa?

    4. KJ

      (laughs)

    5. JR

      (smacks lips) Am I good?

    6. KJ

      Well, just get a trainer.

    7. JR

      I can't. I, I, I'm doing a documentary right now.

    8. KJ

      Yeah.

    9. JR

      And I started it in January. I'm assembling the best guys, like, like, uh, Dolce is gonna help me out with this thing. (smacks lips) He's awesome. We already did one. We already did a documentary. I did it on, uh, it was called Cheat Day, where I thought you could work out, like, six days a week and just have one day to eat what you, you know, you, you want and just do it that way. And I had Dolce come in and, and, and, and be on, uh, be, be in it with me, and, and work me out, and do it, and he kept going, "You're not, you're not gonna be able to do this." And I go, "Why?" "Because," he goes, "your one day is gonna destroy everything." And he ju- he said, and I remember this, he goes, "You can't outwork a bad diet." And he was right. It was like, I would crush it so hard. Like, people don't know what I can eat, like, you know?

    10. KJ

      (laughs)

    11. JR

      I'm s- You know what I'm saying? You know, like, when people go, "Oh, I'm a foodie," you know? Like, it's like you have no idea how much I can crush food. And that one day would just destroy it for the rest.

    12. KJ

      Yeah. The, the food thing is... You can't outrun a bad diet. You just can't.

    13. JR

      You can't.

    14. KJ

      You can't. It's the best phrase. It's real. That's, that's where it all comes from.

    15. JR

      Yeah.

    16. KJ

      It all comes from food, and we're all addicted to food. And it's the craziest thing if you're addicted to food, because y- you have to eat it. It's not like heroin. Like, if you're-

    17. JR

      That's right.

    18. KJ

      ... addicted to heroin, like, "Oh, I've got a heroin problem. I'm gonna take a little bit of heroin."

    19. JR

      Right.

    20. KJ

      No, you're gonna go full bore again. You're, you're gonna be fucked. It's like-

    21. JR

      Right.

    22. KJ

      ... it's one of the very few things where you're addicted to it, and you gotta not be addicted to it anymore, but yet you still need to eat it.

    23. JR

      Well-

    24. KJ

      What? That's crazy.

    25. JR

      Yeah.

    26. KJ

      That's a crazy conundrum, and most people's minds can't really process that.

    27. JR

      That's right, and I, I, I can't. I just, I can't 'cause he, he'll... Uh, Di- he's given me the diets, Dolce. "You know, just do this, this, and this, and this," you know? It's formula... It's very simple. I mean, by the way, does every... Who, who needs some, uh, another grown man to tell you what to eat? You know by now.

    28. KJ

      Right.

    29. JR

      You know seriously. You know. An- and same thing with working out. You don't know, move your body. Whatever-

    30. KJ

      Yeah.

Episode duration: 2:27:53

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