Shownotes Transcript
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living like a local with all the space, you know, hotels can be a hassle room service. And then the housekeeper keeping, it's a hassle. So then you go to Airbnb and you can get whatever you want, a little cottage, this and that. It's fantastic. You have your own separate space. So it's a great product for people who travel, David. Yes. I have friends doing one of these right now. If you have a home, you can Airbnb it. It's fantastic. I mean, um,
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David, Felipe Esparza is a great stand-up comedian. Our guest today, flat on the wall. Good dude. I actually was quite entertained by him. He had a great story. And that was one of the ones I have to say I'm not tight with, but I think you had met him. And I was introduced to him through you as far as his comedy. And then when I looked him up,
I thought, oh my God, this guy has been around doing great. And it's just one of those blind spots when you're not in the same places as people, but he has a huge career. Huge, huge following. His story is so interesting because he came to the border illegally years ago with his mom and his brother. And I think his brother had to be dressed up as a girl or something, but anyway, his stories of how we got to America, uh,
and how he started his career in America and how he's become so successful. It's just a great, great ride.
And he's funny and charming as well. I think you're going to really like him. Yeah, I had a great time talking to him. He's a good looking dude. If that matters to anyone, does to me. He looks very young for his age. He has a great head of hair. We couldn't get over it. Yeah, cool hair and a good attitude. And I had a lot of fun with him. So hope you like it. Here he is. Felipe. Felipe.
I just thought of a rich person's metric or people have a little extra money. Either you go to a salon, you go to a barbershop to get a haircut or the haircut or person comes to you. It's the first sign of having a couple extra bucks in your pocket. Also, depending on who you're working with, too.
Because in Comedy Central, they'll have like a hairstylist. But when you're working with like BET or Def Jam, there's like two barbers there from the hood. There's a barbershop on the set. You don't even know what's going on. You sit down and you hear the comedian go, give me a Chicago fade. I've heard that. And I'm like, give me... I'm like, I have long hair. Give me...
Give me a cholo number five. Yeah. Cholo number five. You don't get any kind of food product with that. You just get hair done. There's no sense of any sort of food with that. A cholo. My hair was really short, like a gang member. It was really short. And then, you know, I should get pulled over on the way home. So I just started letting it grow. And I just let it grow on it.
I haven't cut it yet. What length is it past gang member? Yeah, when does the length of the hair reduce being pulled over? Oh, man, you're going to be like Blue Bird. Yeah, officer, I wasn't fucking speeding here, all right? I'm going to the fucking comedy store, all right?
He's aggressive. That Bill. Listen, give me some pickles. Yeah. You know what drives me out of my fucking mind? Meter mates. Get a fucking car. I don't need a golf cart. Give me a parking ticket, you fucking meter mate. Anyway, that's kind of Bill Barber. I used to do that. I used to do this East Coast standout. But so for our audience, why don't we just quickly go through? Where you came from and who you are is extraordinary. So,
We've never had a guest quite with your story. So don't be shy. Yeah, don't be shy. You grew up in Mexico and you made your way to America. And, you know, you're incredibly successful. You played giant places, have a huge amount of fans. So it's just kind of an American dream, would you call it? Or a Mexican dream? Or what is it? How are you processing it? I got here when I was like four years old or five.
my brothers and I with my mom, we came here illegally. My father was already here living in America. And so were all my dad's relatives. They were working for Warner Brothers. It's funny, they all had jobs putting the record inside of the cardboard. They were at the record pressing company. Fascinating.
Someone has to do it. Yeah, man, I'll be in luck, man. Dude, it's not bad. I'm telling you, Felipe, I used to work when I moved to LA, tried stand-up. Of course, I wasn't doing that well because I'm in Glendale, Portland.
putting the A-team dolls in boxes in a warehouse to send to anyone who ordered one. But it was kind of boring. But every day I'm like, did they want the A-team actual figure? They also want the headband. Nope, they didn't order that. So I'd have to figure out from the order what they wanted. Tape it up physically. So I'm with you, dude. Jeez, I'm just going to say it. I pity the fool. You pity me for sure. Mr. T. I used to work at the back office.
of North Broadway where the Broadway warehouse used to be and I used to separate all the clothes hangers the plastic ones oh yeah you gotta keep them separated so I was in a room full of hangers bro like the whole room was hangers and my friend and I would just get high during lunch and start grabbing hangers all day yeah
Okay. Those type of jobs are just mind numbing. You have to do so. We used to take Dexatrim to wake up. It was like so stupid, but anything. Did you ever grab your friend by the scruffies of his neck and say, we got to get out of here, man. I can't hang here no more. I don't know. Good night. I can't do it. I can't hang. I can't hang here.
So when you came across the border, okay, illegally, I'm not going to judge, you know, came across illegally. How hard was that? And how old were you? Were you scared? You had your little brother with you, right? Was it scary? We were kids. I don't remember being scared. I remember being caught. Because we made it through the border, like the, what's it around, San Ysidro? The border? San Ysidro, okay. We made it through there. But...
there was another, uh, checkpoint. Like, I guess there were, there were medic men or something or, but there was like the, the sheriff, the San Clemente sheriff department or somebody had a, there was an extra checkpoint that the, that city made. Oh, they were randomly stopping cars that were in a, on the five South and the five North. Right. Right. I guess. So they stopped us and our driver was, uh,
He was a Mexican travel agent, you know, a wild coyote, a coyote. He was a coyote? A travel agent coyote? My friend Rodrigo said, yeah, man, it was a Mexican travel agent. So he was American. They let him go. And my mom and my brothers and I, we got arrested. And my mom was released to go back to Mexico. And then we were released like three hours later. And we crossed the border and we stood there another month.
figure out plan B. Then we borrowed our cousin's passports.
And it was two boys and one girl on a passport. And my mom looked at my little brother and said, well, I guess you're going to have to be potty. So what did you do to make him look like his passport photo? Oh, man, he had to wear a dress for a whole week just to get in character. Get in character. Get in character. Yeah, man, he went all into it, man.
And when we got to a border, they had like makeup on him and a little dress. And they asked him, what's your name? He goes, my name is Patti. And he's gay now, but you know what? He took work for the team. That was nice. Okay. That's a whole other podcast. He's gay now. Nothing wrong with any of that. He's a hard top, by the way.
Did you, I mean, you're looking at your mom as the adult and she's like sinking. Are you reading her feelings at that moment? You know, like, Oh shit, we're getting caught. But then really determine a month later you go back and then you do this thing and now you're in America. Yeah. And yeah. When do you figure out like you've got this gift of gab for laughter and
Took a while. We didn't know everything we did back then was bad. Nobody sat us down and said, hey, everything you did was bad. Don't do it again. And we didn't know we were illegal, man. I remember...
Calling kids illegal, and I was illegal. I was telling kids, go back to El Salvador, or go back to wherever you came from, and I should be going with them. When you come out of school, don't talk to strangers, don't talk to anybody, just run home.
Jesus. No matter what you're doing in life, just run back home after. Scary. Wow. How long did that go on? That kind of fear? When did, when did it turn for you? I mean, I don't know. I guess, um, when we were, we were, we were in America for a while and we went back to Mexico to, uh, take care of some paperwork. And then we crossed the border and we went to, um,
We went back. We crossed the border and we went to the section for illegal immigrants, but not the deported ones, I guess. And we had Mexican IDs and we filed for green cards right there. How scary. So you went in, it was almost like admitting it. So you're like, here, we're going illegal. It's hard to get back second time. Yeah. So we had a bunch of, I don't know what we did to, I know that we had to leave. We had to, um,
We self-deported, I guess, what we did first. We went back to Mexico on our own when we went back. And then, I guess, a week later, we all came in illegally. How scary, though, to go back and go, we know once we go back, that could be it. Yeah. I forgot that part. I never mentioned that part about our voyage, that we actually...
self-reported ourselves. Yeah. And then we decided to come back in the legal way. And what, growing up in Mexico to that age, and then what was your vibe of America? And I kind of want to know, did you go to Disneyland? I mean, what did you, what was it like? Oh, man. First of all, when we got here, the coolest thing was that the bathroom was inside the house. Our bathroom was an outhouse.
Yeah, an inside bathroom. An inside bathroom, believe your mind. Okay. Yeah, man. And we could flush the toilet. Do you ever miss an outhouse? We could flush toilet paper inside the toilet. We couldn't do that. And some houses in Mexico, they'll tell you, hey, don't flush anything in the toilet.
Literally anything, not even poop. Anything, bro. Put it in your pocket. Yeah, that's funny. When did you kind of sort of feel American? What was that? We were in kindergarten. We went to elementary school, kindergarten, and all the kids were speaking English, and I was the only one who didn't speak English well, but I caught on fast.
I started watching American shows. That's how we watched. And we didn't know how to pronounce a lot of words with like, they had like a K in the middle for some reason. Like we didn't know how to say bionic.
or binoculars or any word with a C in the middle like that. It was hard for us to pronounce because my brother would call bionic woman, b-lion woman. So what were you watching? I'm sorry. What shows? We would watch...
We will watch other shows that were on CBS for some reason, man. That channel would come in looking good. We have no antenna. So whatever channels look good, I guess it was Channel 9, Telemundo, of course. Telemundo, you could break your television.
Unplug it and Telemundo will still come up. - What about, people say they learn from watching TV. I've been overseas, I don't learn anything from watching a foreign language, but it must be easy, I guess, to pick up phrases, or how do you do that? - Yeah, we watch a lot of movies. My dad, he liked watching movies, so we would go to a driver's a lot, and he liked Clint Eastwood.
and steve mcqueen and charles bronson yeah charles bronson
But they were wearing the beanie just like him, even though he was not a vigilante. And he would look at us and go, oh, you're impossible. Charles Bronson. I saw it. Yeah. Charles Bronson used to be a big impression to do in the clubs in the 70s. I can't. I never. There were some good ones. You couldn't do it, of all people. Well, I didn't get excited about it. I just, I took, by the way, I took basically Spanish for like eight years. And all I know is Donde Estala Biblioteca. Yeah.
Como esta? Y tu? Me bien? Gracias. Mucho trabajo. That's mucho. We work with a lot of people from south of the border. We have skilled gardeners, all kinds of people. I wouldn't take their Spanish for granted because my dad, he dropped out of school in the 6th grade.
So his Spanish is pretty much basically as good as any American speaking Spanish. Is it Spanglish? Is that a real thing where it's like sort of a mix? I don't know, man. And where I grew up, they call it Chicanx. It's a mixture of Chicano and English. Ebonics to Chicanx. Chicanx. Hey, man, like, hey, man, hire the radio. Hire the radio. Yeah. Or they say, oh, it makes English and Spanish. Oh, right now I have
Grande, yeah. I know some, look at that. Being bilingual and working in both languages, which we get to it, first one to do a special in both languages,
What can you tell us about English and Spanish? I mean, is one more romantic? Is one easier, lands harder laughs for you when you do your set in Spanish? Or is it just something we have no experience with? In one language and they kill the other language. The phrasing and the timing in English and Spanish is different, right? I mean... Well, what happened with me was that a lot of the words that I was speaking in Spanish...
were chic conics. You know, like words that Mexican-Americans in the Southwest have used as Spanish. But when I went to Mexico, those words don't even exist in the Spanish language. Like when I was saying, I was saying, fix my brakes in English. And in Spanish, I would say, I would add an A-S. Arregla mis brecas.
And Breca is not even a Spanish word. Oh, it's like a fake word for breaks. I don't know how to say breaks in Spanish, apparently.
I was just saying, like, I know that white people, they had an O after every English word when they can't, don't know what to say, like, your son-o is not doing his homework-o. Yeah. I did that in Italy. Yeah, people do that. We had AS in the beginning when we don't know English, we're like, Esprite,
you know, or, excuse me. So then I had to go to Mexico and, and, um, I started, I actually started off open mic in, in Spanish first. And I started building up a set. So I got to one hour when I was comfortable in Mexico. So in Mexico, you're doing a Spanish set basically of things, um,
everyone can relate to there and then you come over after you got it that's an hour's a lot yeah i um i i translated my jokes first of the of the hour in english into like um in their language they could understand okay except some words were play on words so i had to get rid of the whole joke yeah for sure and by the way this is on netflix right now it was done 2020 bad decisions english spanish versions
translate this and let's call it malas decisiones. Malas decisiones. When I was in Tijuana, Mexico, a lot of the audience were people that were deported by all the previous presidents.
There's people there that were deported by President Obama. There were people there deported from Bush. People deported from Clinton. A lot of Clinton guy members. Was that like a thing? Hey, I'm a Clinton, man. I'm a Clinton that deported me. Did you hang out with the people that were deported by your president?
Yes. And I was hung out with a bunch of military Marines that were deported during the last administration. There's a whole neighborhood with nothing but deportee military people, like people from the fighting Korea, people who fought in the Gulf War, people who fought in Afghanistan, Iraq.
But somehow they got deported. And then get deported after they do that. That's horrible. Well, some of these guys have PTSD, so they never really fixed their papers. And some of them are not with it. But they were not born in America, but they were promised citizenship. Sure. And some of them, they didn't go file. I know one guy that I spoke to, he's 74.
He got pulled over in Echo Park because there was a shooting in Echo Park. And he was coming out of the grocery store where they're getting a milk. And the police, they pulled everybody to the side in that area. And they were checking everybody's IDs. And he didn't even know. He had a deport on site on his ID. So he went straight to Mexico. He didn't call his family.
Oh, man. He was 74? Yeah. 74? And he thinks he's done with all that. And then they just deport him. He didn't seem like the danger is still there. What's your advice for people in the South Florida border? Now with Trump in there, stay away, come in, try to come legally. Oh, man, if you're going to be here in America illegally, first of all, don't hang around with no gang members.
Don't hang around with anybody with a bald head, anybody with a low rider, go to work and go straight home. Straight home. Tell your kids, dude, don't hang around with bad people. Just do your job and just live like a normal citizen. And, you know, if you're going to be driving with no driver license, man, I will stop at every red light and look both ways.
Even the green ones. So just be boring, be boring and be simple. Be boring and they won't deport you. Right. I mean, ideally, the idea is to get really horrible troublemakers out. Yeah. Yeah. I could see getting caught in a crossfire of just... Say again? I became a U.S. citizen in October. Really? Oh, good job. Wow. After all the specials and all the successes still, they held you out, you know?
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One thing that was kind of interesting, I don't know if you want to go in this direction, but at some point you were kind of seduced by gang life or went in a gang and went through all that. So what was that like? Was it hilarious? Oh, when I was a kid, I hung out with a bunch of kids that were into breakdancing at the time. And we would go to Venice Beach and compete with other kids. But they were good at...
break dancing but i was good at shoplifting you know me too i was i was like in charge of merch so i was in charge of stealing all the white gloves for people and i was silent to them i used to carry the cardboard in my break yeah man group so um after break dancing died out and then crack cocaine moved into our neighborhood yeah all my friends got into the same gang
except me and then they were all like 16 years old 17 and i avoided them forever till i turned 19 i was 20 years old i was too old to be the guy but they still jumped me in oh you know it's funny because in this movie bus boys when we join
To be a busboy, we get jumped in. And then one time I quit for an hour and I had to get jumped in again. I'm like, I quit for one hour. And they're like, that's, you know, the rules. Spade's doing a movie. I thought about it. I had a joke about that when people were leaving California and then somewhere else.
I said, you live in California. You should get jumped out first. Yeah, see, Dana, we know all the lingo. I know all the lingo. His movie with Theo Vaughn is you guys flee to Mexico or something, right? No, we get stuck at the border on the way to Mexico. We try to go to Mexico, but we can't get across. So we work at a little restaurant on the border of America.
And we want to be waiters, so we get Jabba's busboys first to move up in three days. But it takes years because we're not any good. But yeah, everyone there is Spanish. I mean, most of the cast because we're right there by the board. Should have had Felipe in that movie, man. We should have, actually. We should have, man. He's too busy.
So you could have turned it down. It would have been great. So wherever you want to go, but I mean, you're in gang stuff. You get to America. I mean, I just like, when did you do your first, first set in America? Where was it? Oh, it was, um, it was a 1993 probably or 94 at the natural fudge theater. And, um, it's on fountain Avenue and, um, silver Lake theater. Yeah.
From that church that Tom Cruise goes to. Oh, yeah. Scientology. Scientology. I know it well. Yeah. Yeah. That huge building, you mean? That monstrosity, huge monster. Yes, right across the street from that is a theater. It's called the Fountain Theater now, but it was called before it was called the Natural Fudge. Fudge Packer Studio. It was a vegan, vegetarian coffee shop. I have no idea that it was vegan until after I left.
It was an open mic on Monday nights with punk rock music. Two comedians go up and then when the comedians are performing, the punk band is behind them setting up their band. Oh my god. Two bands will perform punk music and then while they're taking their shit down, three more comedians were performing. For the punk audience, which is probably not the best. Yeah, they're not punk.
Hollywood Runaways, a lot of kids. I think it was 18 and over. I met Jamie Kennedy there. Jamie Kennedy, yeah. Great comic. I met Jamie Kennedy there, Alonzo Bowden, Brian Holtzman. Met a lot of people there. Do you remember that first set? Do you remember what line killed? Did you have a bit that worked or were you humiliated or what was it like? I had a line that killed, but it was it was oh, I said that
This is Romeo and Juliet. If it was shot in my neighborhood. And then I pretended that I pretended Romeo was like a crackhead. Like I was shaking, you know, with my elbow. I was acting like a crackhead, you know, and I was biting my fingers and I was looking at the floor.
Like a crackhead does, take two rocks, give the real. And then I would say, and I would tell, I would yell out, Julia, you fucking bitch. We're going to fuck your pipe. That sounds like it would get a big laugh in a rowdy club that's high energy. Yeah, you got a laugh there from the people that were homeless. And then the owner of the place, his name was Johnny Roberts.
He had a local access show at Tuesdays at 10 p.m. on Channel 3.
on some cable network. It was just a free public access show, and I didn't know what public access was. I didn't have cable. He was such a good kid. It was amazing. I want you to be on my show. We tape every Wednesday morning. It's a big comedy show. I thought I'd made it, right? I thought I was going to be one of those. You thought it was evening at the Apollo? It was local access, and
And I looked at the way other comedians were dressed. And I went to a thrift store and I bought like a 80s coat, a jacket. And I was trying to find a tie to wear like an 80s comic. But I couldn't find anything. And then the guy at the thrift store, he said, I don't have a tie, but try this on. And I didn't know what it was. I remember somebody told me it was called, I don't know what it was.
Bobo or I don't know. Bolo tie. Yeah. Yeah. It was like a metal thing. I look like Fosse Bear if you're Native American. That's a good look. But that sounds like a big deal though. You're on a TV show. So it's not a big deal, but in your head, it's a compliment. Like, hey, I did a set. They're asking me to come on this show.
We all did that era. You should have a show called Loco Access. Loco Access, yeah. It's not bad. So I met these guys there, and then they told me to go to another place that does comedy on Saturday nights called Waldo's Comedy Station. And then that was right on Highland. Back then it was called Hollywood Hotel.
So we did comedy there, and then I finally made it to the comedy store. How much longer? Oh, to do audition for Mitzi? How'd that go? The original room? Was it Mitzi back then? Yeah, it was five years later. I think it was like 98. Oh, shit. Or something. Mitzi's still there in her booth. The comedy store is huge. What happened? The comedy store is huge, but not that many people are going to the comedy store back then.
Not like now, in our way? Not like now, who's dead. Those comedians, they should bring their dogs on stage. I mean, back then, man, it was like, if you wanted to be a comedian, like, if you stuck around those days, you're probably doing well right now because I remember it was like so many people were getting bumped when I first started off, like, really bumped. Like, um,
I remember there was a big showcase and a bunch of comedians that were supposed to be seen by Mitzi Shore and she didn't show up. So the showcase was canceled. But there were a lot of people who actually made that trip from other parts of the country. I'm an evangelist, man. I only took one bus and nobody knew what I was doing. But those people left from Jersey, they called their parents and then...
The Dice Man shows up and does five hours on stage. They didn't even get to go up. Dice? Dice? Oh my god. Oh, I put the stick around on the rise. Oh yeah. Five hours on stage. Five hours. I was waiting. I didn't leave. I'll go up. After four, he does four hours. Who?
Eddie Griffin. Oh, Eddie Griffin. Is this a fucking marathon? Four hours. So it's a nine hour show. You've seen two comics. Okay. Who's next? Yeah. And then at 1.45 in the morning, bro, I go up at 1.45 right before Robert William of Adia. Did you say, I only have two and a half hours of material because I'm new.
Yeah. Dude, let's do a side note, Dana. For the people listening, it's not crazy to
To think, because I was from Arizona. And if someone said, Mitzi, we'll see you this Monday, I would fly out. It's too important to have someone in the business see you or Bud Friedman at the improv. So that's a really, really big deal. I understand why everyone came. And if she casually didn't show up, what a heartbreaker. And also, we all got bumped up in San Francisco where I started. You know, they'd say Robbins here, the great Rob Williams. And I thought I was going to maybe have a...
9 30 spot and then robin would do three hours oh i can't believe it oh her someone's like oh look oh spaceship look oh it's a frisbee but anyway he was brilliant and he would he would let i call it levitate the room he would kill so hard that you're like fuck i gotta work harder did you see someone early in that time and went damn that guy's or woman is at another level you have somebody who kind of blew you away and made you want to get better right
I saw, what's his name, Dane Cook. Dane Cook and Dane Cook World when he became kind of at his height. He was doing Sufi. Okay. Whatever it was, Sufi. I don't know the bit, but it looks funny. I like it. He's flipping you off. He was saying a bit about, you know, I don't know how to do it, but he'll be like, you know.
how people, they flip you off. Oh, I see. They go, fuck you. That's right. But fuck that. It should be a super fuck you called Sufi. Oh, yeah. He think he told us about this, Dana. Yeah. Something like that, right? Yeah, yeah. He did that. He would storm around the stage. He was super physical, hyper confident, really clear with his jokes. And yeah, he's that...
highly skilled to follow that, you know? Yeah. And I remember people would have a tattooed, women would have a tattooed on their, on their back of their butt, like a, like a cramp stamp. Oh boy. Oh, interesting. I didn't remember any of those. Did you have women trying to hit on you or what? I know you're happily married now. We don't want to go into it, but some women love funny, funny men. Yeah.
Hell yeah, man. I had people tattooing my name on their back. I'm not even famous. You had a young lady. You look, yeah. By the way, he looks young. I thought you were like 28 or something. I had a woman in Las Vegas. She told me to autograph her arm. And she was like 21. And I was like 40. And I tattooed her. I wrote my name.
floppy on her arm, right? She had a little chubby arm, you know, against my pen was getting stuck. Sure, it's hard to do. Yeah, so I wrote Felipe on it. And then later on, she sent me a photo of her in a thong with, um,
Not showing her boobs, but showing her ass and then her arm. And she had tattooed right there. She tattooed over your autograph. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That's, that's something people do. I like that. You want to bring her home to mom. That's somebody, you know, especially with her next boyfriend.
So also, so then you're at least 40. That's good. You're 45. Uh, you look, you look 27 now. Yeah. You do look, um, I'm not 45. I'm 55. Get out of town. I just told Dana, you look so young. I don't know. Black don't crack. Beige don't age. And white ain't right. Also, I don't drink. So that helped too. Yeah. That, yeah. The booze face, it can really age you, you know? Um,
So, so now, I mean, just because we, we have limited time, you really, you're doing, you're doing the clubs. Once I just curious, when's the first time it became your job? Like, okay, I'm, I'm a standup and that's how I earn money. I don't, I don't need any side hustle. How long? Um, well, um,
I had child support. They were coming after me and they were garnishing my paycheck. So I was making half. So that kind of helped me decide to quit my regular jobs. And I wasn't making no money anymore at my regular job. So I just went straight to doing stand-up. And then like in 96, they were doing this big stand-up show in San Antonio, Texas. Some guy named Jeff Valdez and the owner of the
the River Center Comedy Club, Kyleen and Jeff Orsha, I don't know their names. But they produced a show for Showtime called the Latino Laugh Festival hosted by Daisy Fuentes and Paul Rodriguez. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Because they try to grab all the Latino comedians they can find.
and i was one of the younger ones that actually auditioned for the show and got it i met comedians there who didn't know were latino like greg giraldo and john mendoza what's gerald i didn't know those guys yeah yeah i didn't know i was very shocked to see john mendoza because i always thought he was irish but i guess he's puerto rican and irish and he was one of my favorite comics
And Paul Rodriguez was the original Latino comic, at least at the improv. You know, he was for the story. It was. The American Express card. What did he bring? A knife with him? Paul Rodriguez always starts off his sentences with a big word. So they're going to be like, you know, consequently. Yeah.
Consequential That's a huge over their head You can, that's the first one I heard Say stuff like that, you can laugh now But my cousin Julio is stealing your hubcaps Yeah That brought down the house at the improv in 1985 Yeah man, I remember The first time I saw him Was in a glimpse of television Before I wanted to be a comedian My dad was like He would change the channels from CBS, Deuce and Hazard
all the way back to the UHF channel 34. But he could go left, just go left and boom, he's there, right? Yeah.
He's there. Boom. He'll be at channel 34. Yeah. He'll let you mess with us and he'll turn the knob off to see all the channels so he can see everything we're missing. So, I was like Leonardo DiCaprio in that movie pointing like this. Whoa, whoa, whoa.
Wait, wait, wait. Don't change it. Mexican on TV. And Paul Rodriguez, he was doing his set on that show, A.K.A. Pablo. He said the bit was, he goes, I remember when my family came over from Mexico, it was 17 of us in an inner tube. And we were singing, ain't no stopping us now. We're on the move.
Yeah, he always killed. So, so, um, last comic standing, you make your way, you're going through the clubs, you're doing well. And then something happens. It's a big move. Big moment, right? Winning. Oh yeah, man. When I won that comic standing, it was $250,000. And my son's mom fought for child support the next day.
Oh, they wanted a little slice wet the beak. We came to last baby mama standing. Dude, she's like, we won. Yeah, man. Daddy's funny. We're going to get a swimming pool. Finally, he's responsible. Yeah, well, that's a big one to win that. And then last comic standing.
Is that the one, I think, Todd Glass? You don't remember this, but... Yeah, man. Shout out to Peter Ingalls, the producer of Last Comer Standing and Saved by the Bell. He passed away, I think, a week ago. Oh. Okay, well, get that shout out to him somehow. And also, so you get that. Now, what are you? Are you immediately a headliner or were you already a headliner? Yes. As soon as I went to Last Comer Standing, we go on an 80-city tour all over America.
Yeah, so. That's tough. We're hitting. And you headline? Inglewood, Pennsylvania, bro. Places I only hear in songs. Yeah. Traffic reports. So you, wait. Yeah, how do you do it? Do you go with some other, like, runners up and you're like the headliner? Yeah, all the way. All the people that were on the show, I think it was Mike DiStefano, Roy Woods Jr., Mike Kaplan, and
um the other guy who was second place tommy john again we all went on tour we all were doing 20 minutes on stage for 80 80 cities on a tour bus was it a bus okay a bus wow those guys are good too does anyone start getting too good on the trip like or do they rotate you or you always know everybody it was the order how we won so i was the last
Shit, that's tough. Literally the last comic standing. Yep. Did anyone kill before you? And as you're crossing onto the mic to close the show, they just kind of say to you, follow that motherfucker. Did that ever happen? Yes. You know what? What was saving me from that was there was an intermission. Oh, okay. Yeah. So my sister Fano, he was murdering. He passed away also. God bless him. He had HIV and
On the show he had HIV also and he was an ex-heroin addict so he was all messed up. I thought he was my biggest competition because he was likeable on stage and his type of comedy is very popular now. So he was doing a lot of dark comedy back then. That's kind of acceptable now. And he was likeable.
And I really thought he was going to win. But this guy was murdering, bro. Like, he will... When we did San Francisco, we did the Fillmore. I remember him saying... I knew there was a lot of gays in San Francisco, but goddamn, I tripped over a dick on the way in here. You know? And everybody's going crazy. Ah! Yeah. He would say stuff like... He would say stuff like... Stuff like, oh, man, I got into a fight with a water modeling guy. And he said, fuck you. I'm not water modeling.
He goes, I'm Puerto Rican. Listen, motherfucker, I'm not an anthropologist. I don't know what the fuck he's saying. When you go on these tours, so you get $250,000 to win. And do you get a set fee every night as part of your deal to tour? Or is it part of your $250,000? Because you guys should make some money. We had, it was $250,000 for winning the show. Plus, yeah.
Whatever they were giving us to headline was $3,000 for me. Some show $3,000 for one show. $3,000 a night? So you're playing pretty big rooms. That's pretty good. You're playing theaters. Yeah. Places that are normal comic headlining by himself will probably make $52,000 maybe. Oh, shit. Yeah. Some of the places were 3,000 seaters, 4,000 seaters. They're all sold out.
And you're only getting three, but so they're going to make some money too. Yeah. Normally you'd make a lot. That's another 240,000 on top of the two pre-tax. You're looking just South of 500 K. Yeah. And also I had a, I had a development deal with NBC that went nowhere. Oh, but you get paid up front for that, right? Yeah. That's nice. It's nicer if they find a show for you, but yeah.
That's for the people at home. They give you money up front to hold you for a year to maybe find a show for you, something like that. Yeah. I had a TV deal with a comedian named Dustin Ibarra with ABC and they made a money. It's funny. I never thought they'd pay you money not to work and pay you money for saying no. Yes. They call it a holding deal. They take you off the field. This episode is brought to you by Ring Cameras and Doorbells.
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I like nighttime is better because just to look calmer. I don't know. I can't just be in the starkness of day, just raw dogging into a barbecue, but they are fun. So I'm not going to take that away from people's fun because I have had them. They're fun. This is where Omaha Steaks comes in. You know, when you're grilling or see the weather's getting a little nicer now, I feel like it's time. Easter, people come over. What better way? Throw some steaks on. You know what I mean? Yeah. You got some comfort food.
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Jonah Hill movie. Jonah Hill. Yeah. And Eddie Murphy, we're like, like in a stripper scene in Hollywood, a bunch of strippers. And, uh, man, one of those strippers, one of those strippers in the movie, an actual stripper,
She's going to give me somebody a laptop for two grand on the set. Nobody was around. Horny ass bitch. Horny ass bitch. That's a special name. That's your next special. Eddie Murphy walks in and he looks right at me and he goes, man, you're a funny motherfucker, man. Oh, man, just shit in myself. And I had one line in the movie and I forgot it when he told me that.
Oh, so he knew you. That's great. Yeah, he's cool. And then the next day, Jordan Hill comes up to me. Hey, man, wasn't that rad the way Eddie Murphy told you you were funny in front of everybody? And then, yeah, that was cool. Wasn't that rad? And then Andrew Schultz, he mentioned on his podcast that that was cool. And the director of the movie came up to me and said that was cool. And then the next day he comes back to do the same scene.
And he tells me hello only. Not everybody. Just telling me hello. Whoa. And then the next day, same thing. Then I'm getting paranoid. You know, I'm like, okay, man, you're trying to get everybody in this set to hate me now. Yeah. I'm not liking you already because of this. Eddie, could I get a, you're a funny motherfucker just to start the day. I, you don't have to do it, but if I could get a, Hey, you're a funny motherfucker. No, you go tell this guy. He's okay too. He has like three people that look like him on a set. I don't know. Like,
You're going to be nice to everybody. Really? Because of fear of being shot or something? He's got lookalikes? Yeah, he has. Like stand-ins and wide shot guys. When you read the lines to Eddie Murphy, he really lies to you.
But when it's your turn to get the camera, he leaves. And then you get a stuntman. Oh, you get the other guy. Oh, really? That's kind of a movie star move. Catch you all later. He gets to do that. So now we're at a point where this is pretty... You've done a lot since 2017. These four specials in seven years. The current one on Netflix right now. Raging? Raging Fool. Cool.
And by the way, I just want to ask you something stylistically and when it started, because I really liked the way you move on stage. Like you're, you're telling jokes and you're moving forward. Yeah.
And then you're moving backward. And then you're moving. A lot of guys go side to side or just stick to the mic. But there's this little kind of physical thing you do, almost like a boxer. You kind of back up. You come in, you land it. And then you do this move back. It's pretty cool to watch. It's a little bit like you're dancing up there. So when did that come in? Or was it just someone pointed it out to you or you just do it organically? Yeah.
I was nervous before. When I was on the last comment standing, I had a coat with a little tiny tie and I had a pocket and I used to always hold on to the pocket
And movie like this, you know, the way Rodney Daniels. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was an ugly baby. I tell you, when I was born, the doctor slapped my mother. Hey, we love him. So from nervousness, you did that. And now that you're confident, you sort of kept it as a as as a signature in a way. Yeah. Yeah.
And also, I try not to do it so much because I feel like if I know the joke is funny, I start moving fast. Like a pitcher giving away his knuckleball. Yeah. Yeah, we all have our way. David's funny when you got a bit in your act that you know is going to kill or you think it is. You give a big wind up, it doesn't work. You go, what the fuck? I think you stay quiet.
You slow down when, David, when your punchline is going to come. I feel like when a big punchline is going to come, maybe with your perfect timing, you do your stand-up timing. But I noticed that you start to get a little quiet and then there's like a big explosion. David will modulate that way and he's never thirsty up there, as the people would say. No. I remember watching your Young Comics show when you're doing the special.
You said you saw U2 and you had little bullshit seats right here, but you were gray over there. You didn't even know what the fuck they were saying. Oh, he was yelling, no war. No war. I didn't know what he meant. There's so many, like, oh man, as a comic, there's so many tags left. There's more to the show you could have done. Oh yeah, I kept going. He takes the shit out of stuff. Oh man. Oh man.
A woman, she has a sharp pain in her hand while she's doing dishes. Six miles away, her daughter is giving somebody a handjob. A handjob. Oh, my God. That was Time Life Books. A woman doing the dishes feels...
A cramp in her hand. I feel like you may have been. That's great. That's a great memory. Good job. I mean, you're kind of maybe influenced by Dave in the sense that you have a high ratio of laugh points and punchlines in your stories. Like boom, boom, boom, consistently, you know, and David does tell a story, but just subtly starts building all the, all the punchlines.
The masseuse bit you're doing. If you can have little tent poles in it before you get to like the big ending, it keeps them around. That's the hard part though. Like I have one of my specials because I remember I saw a woman with a tattoo and she had a Ouija board tattoo. Like a Ouija board tattoo and her back was very dark and I could just, I was like, oh man.
Imagine being like, who am I? What's my name? You got to hold her back. Like, all right, let's find out, bitch, who the fuck you are. Why does it have to be, bitch, who the fuck you are? Hi, ma'am. Let's check this out. But yeah, that was so...
good lord i don't know look at this i'm looking at me well you did a lot it's nice to meet you finally uh and uh this is great and uh thank you for coming on look at you got so much four specials is a lot i remember um you um when i'm when i'm when i i remember like um when i was bummed out about oh man then i fucking hell i mean oh you know when you get when you
when you go to the 12 year mark when you see all your friends making it you're not headlining oh yeah can i remember you said david that um you had to leave the tempe improv and go make it so dan muir could headline you ah god the old ticket i'm from tempe it was even more embarrassing yeah yeah sometimes you just don't but sometimes you know you think you have longer
material and it's not as good you know it's you think you've got an hour and other people like i don't think you do and so
Or you have to be pretty, you have to be a little harder on your material. So you go, I got a good, because you can do a great hour and the next time you can do your set and it's like 46 because you didn't get as many laughs. You're like, oh shit, I don't think I have. And the waitresses are putting down the checks and you're like, oh, I got one minute left. They're doing math during your closer. It's horrible, the fucking checks. 20%, give it to me, I'll do the math.
Checks go out right toward the end of your act, and then you get a built-in lull while they try to figure out who's paying for the potato skins. That's a hard one. You got to get past that when you're a headliner. You're like, shit, I got to stay alive during this. Jesus. On the comedian before you, you bring an opener that's a killer. Oh, yeah. They give you an opener and a middle that kills. When you do good as a middle, that was my problem. I was doing good as a middle going, I could headline.
And you get, and then I'm following a good middle, which is hard. And also you've got the checks to deal with. And you're like, oh shit, I don't think I'm ready. You realize you picked up on more checks as a middle hanging out by the bathroom than a headliner. Oh, that's true. You just got to hang out. You stand by the door when everyone leaves. Hey, did you like the middle?
All right. Well, thank you, Felipe.
and he's someone with uh he sort of plays a sad sack character and after each line you know um i lost my identity or someone stole my identity now they can't get laid so let me give you your what's your how do you do it how do you do his man my mom there's another one i forgot how he says the um
I don't know. I can't remember his jokes right now. There's another guy that that's friends with him. He's from Minnesota. And the other kind of like, he's more darker. His name is Chuck Bartel. And he's dark. Opens up for Tom Papa sometimes. Oh, Tom Papa. Yeah. But this guy, Chuck Bartel, he has no social media. Like you can't even find him, but he has very dark humor. He has a joke where he says that, um,
What did they say? Oh, I got kicked out of a Chinese restaurant for it. Oh, I forgot my reading glasses. And I went to a Chinese restaurant. They kicked me out for squinting.
Chuck Bartell dot com. Check him out. Yeah, fine. So anyway, I took him with me to I took me with with me to to open up in Hawaii at the Blue Note. And the whole time we were there, he had a hernia. Well, he still has the hernia. He's afraid to get surgery. But I'll be with a hooker anytime. Yeah.
I got a mernia. All right. Thanks, Felipe. Thanks for having me. This has been a presentation of Odyssey. Please follow, subscribe, leave a like, a review, all this stuff, smash that button, whatever it is, wherever you get your podcasts. Fly on the Wall is executive produced by Dana Carvey and David Spade, Jenna Weiss-Berman of Odyssey, and Heather Santoro. The show's lead producer is Greg Holtzman.