Tony Hinchcliffe
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It's on Prime. From streaming to shopping, it's on Prime. Visit Amazon.com slash Prime to get more out of whatever you're into. Amazon.com slash Prime. Yeah, Dana, I travel all over and sometimes, you know, you're on the road. Sometimes I get stuck.

with a hotel I don't love. And, uh, what happens is you think you see a few pictures, we look online, then you get there. And sometimes I was like, I should have tried to do an Airbnb on this one, you know? Yeah. I was on a road trip to Montana and we stopped in Winnemucca, Nevada and Winnemucca, uh, uh,

There's a toddler in town. Let's just say there wasn't maybe the best choices in Winnemucca. So an Airbnb would have been a much better choice, but I still had a good time in Winnemucca. Don't want to badmouth the town. You know, people can also take their houses and make them Airbnbs. That's the other flip side of that. You know, you go stay at nice ones, but if you have a place...

It could be big or small. You know, you never know. Yeah. And while you're away, your home could be an Airbnb. Yeah. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com slash host.

Here we go. Tony Hinchcliffe is on today and, you know, he does Kill Tony. A lot of people know him from that. Started the comedy store, moved to Austin, the mothership, and they have a great, hilarious, maybe it's called a variety show. What would you call it? I think it's a new way variety show. Postmodern. New form. Yeah. And he breaks down. He's the brainchild of Kill Tony. Yeah.

He breaks down all the different ways it operates for him. He really cares about it. I mean, he's 13 years in and it's highly thought about. It's not, and made to look like people just showed up and they shoot the rehearsal. It's really a fun show. Do you think our fans would know about it? I think they would. I think a lot of them know about it already. I've done it once. I think you're going to do it in the future. It is fun. It's a total crazy shit show. It's a lot of laughs. They bring out, they have a,

panel. They have a great audience that a slow build over the last 13 years. And now it's huge. They play Madison Square Garden. They are on Netflix. They're on YouTube. They do well everywhere, but there's a panel and they usually have a guest comedian or someone, Shane Gillis, Kyle Donegan. We talk about that. And we also talk about how he accidentally got inside the 2024 presidential election and was for a while talked about as the person who might've

- Tilted the election. - Derailed, yeah. - In a different way. And that's a really interesting story. - He did a Puerto Rico joke. That's how some people might only know him, just from hearing about that. - From the Madison Square Garden thing with Hulk Hogan and everything. He was in that, made a joke. It trended for weeks and it was, it was scary for him. - Got a lot of attention and then, you know, and he'll tell you all about that. We won't give it away. But so here we go. We got Tony Hinchcliffe, very funny guy. Look at that fucking chair.

I know. Yeah, we're...

Is there an explanation? I love it personally, but are you on a set? No, this is the middle of my home, actually. I finally made money after a decade and a half plus of really, really struggling. And I decided, you know what, if I'm going to buy stuff for my home, I'm going to do it crazy in the way that I've always imagined in the wildest dreams. Solid gold chair, first order of business. Yeah.

Yeah. I like that idea. Championship belt. That is so... I know. Is that UFC Dana White? That's pro wrestling. That's WWE, the World Heavyweight Champion. So we're catching you at a time because we ask people a lot sometimes because I'm curious about celebrity net worth and things like that. But...

the first time you make a million dollars or this is your first really grandiose grabbing something in this house. Is this the first time? Yeah. Yep. First time. And it was not easy. It's in the middle of Austin, Texas. Yeah. Nice city. Nice house. Love it. It's kind of fun when you can actually go look at something nice like that. You never even thought

you could look at. It's the wildest thing. There were all these real estate agents. When I moved to town, I think they all thought that I already had a lot of money, but I didn't really. I got it here anyway. We'll break that up. Yeah, I don't want to push everybody away. No, no, no. We understand that there's...

A, it comes with a price. I mean, you're famous and you're wealthy and there's stuff that happens. It's not a complaint. It's just an observation. But I'm just curious what would... Like when I was coming through, I don't know, I got it for a little bit, then I didn't, but whatever. I wanted like a movie theater, recording studio, swimming pool, a half-court basketball. Jesus. I'm just clicking off things that I would be... A really good swimming pool, like a great... I didn't realize...

I thought you were a comedian and comedic actor. I didn't realize you were a rapper, Dana Carvey. Yeah, he has a rap album. Oh, I can rap? Give me a word. Lays down some beats. Give me a word or anything. Pepper. Pepper. Pepper. Yeah, Pepper. See ya, leper. What you gonna say? Are you on an upper? Take yourself downtown. Don't wipe off that frown. Come on, man. You're like a biff. You're like Tony Hincliffe. Yeah. Oh, Jesus. I gotta jump off.

I know it's terrible, but I had so much fun and I liked your moves. Tony, you could put him right up on Kill Tony with that.

I would love that. Dana comes out. I'm already planning. I'm planning because I want to come on as a character. I loved, you know, obviously Shane and you have Kyle on there with his intense prosthetics. He looks with Elon Musk. Yeah. So-

And he switched during that show. He went back into the prosthetic chair and turned into RFK Jr. halfway through the episode. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's Kyle Dunnegan. Do you provide a guy or a woman that does this? There's a whole team for these ones now. It used to be just a rubber mask many years ago. Good luck. Sure.

And now there's a whole truck and multiple people that it's like a nightmare back there. You're putting some money back into the production. I like that. Right. Make it nice. I actually went there, Dana. It is nice. They treat you right. You go back there, got some good black and white shots of me and Tony walking around. And I think those ones, like I see clips all over the place, but.

Which is great. Those clips have to help. They're just floating all over and they're always funny. And I think a great addition is when Shane comes in and does... Now, what does he do as Trump? Does he put anything on or he used to not? Now he puts a little...

I think it's just a little bronzer and a powerful wig. I don't think it really... Oh, and a wig. Okay, yeah. I don't think it takes much. It's nothing crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm just saying it's just the voice is so funny anyway, and he's got his mannerism. So that's always fun. It really works. What I like what you've done is the show has gotten so big

But it still feels like, in a way, it's made for a dollar. That would be the first worst thing is some idiot somewhere would say, you got to get in a fancy studio, man. The club ain't working. And I was like, so that's...

That was part of the actual demands that I made was we got to keep it real. We got to keep it raw. And in fact, my note post, the first one post this newest release today, I was talking to the production team and I said it was a little too...

It seemed like the people coming out were on the other side of the curtain. Like we need to get back to a little more like the gaps, pauses. Yeah. Rough on the edges. Yeah. Bad intros. I mean, awkward. Just get coming on the stage. Kind of feels like they're not ready to come on. Kind of mess ups. You need that. You need that. Those mess ups. I only know it from my one experience. This we're talking about kill Tony. We're talking to Tony Hinchcliffe.

So we're like on the radio. Now we're back from a commercial. We're talking with Tony. On KFOG 105. And, you know, I didn't know much about it in full disclosure when I went. I knew about it. I knew about it at the comedy store. I'm never up past 9, 915. So I didn't even do like roast battle, which isn't this, but...

All these things pop up and I think a lot of people are copying you now in a way of going, let's do some sort of different thing than just stand up. I'm sure you're aware of that. And it was interesting because I didn't know how many people in Austin would come

I don't know if it was that way at the comedy store, but it's obviously bigger in Austin. And then they wait. Is it in a restaurant or something? It's at a bar right next door. Big, dingy, hollowed out, you know, barely a bar.

Barely a bar. It's really just a bartender. Barely anybody has the money for drinks. You know what I mean? It's a lot of tap water, a lot of water coolers and people waiting and a lot of broke, struggling artists and people that are doing Uber Eats and Postmates and all these side gigs to make extra money.

It's a real vibe. It basically took the place of the front patio of the comedy store, which is where people used to kind of be camped out. Just camp out and hang out and look for, they made it to LA. Now what? They just go there and go, I got to be around what I've always thought about comedy store this. And now with mothership and Joe's place, people want to be part of it somehow. And this is actually a good way to cut the line because it's,

You know, if you're not a big headliner, if you don't know Joe, it's very hard, I'm sure, to get into the comedy mothership and just do a week. So these people, I think, Dane, you can explain what it what is actually the breakdown of the Kill Tony show for the people aren't familiar.

Well, the show is basically, you know, people want to perform on stage. They get 60 seconds. It's all random. There's a bucket in which over 200 names are on the inside of it. There's so many people that want to do it.

Sometimes it's over 300. It's been up to 350 at times when, yeah. And in the arenas that we do and stuff, it's the same thing. And we try to fit as many of the signups as we can into a seated section in the arenas. But yeah, at the mothership, there's a big dingy sixth street, nasty, gritty bar next door. And if I pull the name out of the bucket, a producer goes, runs behind the headset. Yep.

out the back door with a headset and yells, you know, Jeremiah Smith. And everybody goes, hey, Jeremiah. And Jeremiah walks out. And then they bring them right backstage. And then when the person before them is done,

I call up Jeremiah Smith and then they get 60 seconds uninterrupted, completely uninterrupted. You know, a lot of the ripoff shows, like you were mentioning, they just don't get that part. They just can't wait to possibly be funny. And yeah,

they jump in at any point trying to get their own laughs in. And, uh, but the format is pretty critical to the show. Cause then, then, you know, wow, did they make the most of their 60 seconds or did they kind of bomb and they know what they're signing up for? You know, the show can be pretty ruthless. Uh,

If they do really poorly and didn't prepare. And so it's kind of like it could be a roast or it's a real make or break because they, they can really score in two, three jokes or one joke that you can win. And there's a panel, let's say it's you, it's always you. And who else is it always? Or, and then you have like extras, right? There's my cohost, Brian Redband, who mainly focuses on sound effects and making sure that everything's being recorded.

Yeah, exactly. 60 seconds. The sound of a cat plays and there's not a buzzer. It just goes meow. Yeah. Just a little something to let them know, like last chance to wrap it up because seconds later, a giant overwhelmingly loud bear roar happens, which completely cuts them off.

And then I conduct an interview with them for an unlimited amount of time. If I find them completely interesting, actually only a couple weeks ago, I think we had the record holder for all time longest interview. So I think it was 23 or 24 minutes total on his first interview. The guy just had the most unbelievable answers to every what was that guy's name?

Alex Tarshun. Oh my God. His shoes were falling apart. He works at a pizza joint. He has eight dogs. Turns out he was on the next week. We found out that he got kicked out of his apartment because the people found out because of his appearance on Kill Tony that he has eight dogs. He makes cartoons. He's just, it was just hilarious. And, you know, the interview parts, um,

to me, that's the secret main part of the show. Everybody's like, Oh, a minute to make it or break it. But really it's the eight minutes in the interview part where people can play along and tag along and you get an idea of how they can improvise or if they're naturally funny. Sometimes there's so much funnier in the interview part than they even want.

were with the mint part. Yeah, it saves them. And also, you're good because you're the guy that interviews them and you have to extract the right questions to make them funny or just stumble into something. And when you do, well, my experience, I was there, you would come into something and then we would find out something and then everyone yells and then it's like, oh, we hit something. Now let's jump on that. Exactly. And they can use that as material in their future and whatnot. And that's kind of what I'm digging for. I'm using...

my, uh, my gut instincts to try to like feel where there's something missing. Is it in their childhood? Is it in their dating life? Is it something they do for work? I used to, uh, I was just telling somebody this the other day and it kind of hit me where this thing comes from. Cause I was telling them, um,

Yeah, actually it was, uh, it was carrot top. We just had on and I was talking to him about how I used to fall asleep as a kid watching Letterman. I would sneak, I would put a towel under my door so that my angry, furious single mother wouldn't yell at me. Uh, and I would watch Letterman as a little kid. I would fall asleep to Letterman and I would stay up extra late and I would wake up extra

extra early to listen to old school Howard Stern on terrestrial radio. So this interview thing is it's only, and here I am 40 years old, 12 years into the show and it's starting to hit me now. That's where it's kind of molded out of my interview style comes from the preparedness and calm coolness and comedian style of Letterman, but mixed with the chaotic, uh,

craziness and naughtiness kind of, of old school Howard Stern. It's just what raised me. I didn't really have a dad in my life growing up as a kid. And these are the things that I looked up to was Letterman. It,

late at night, stern first thing in the morning and pro wrestling throughout the evening and days if I got to do it. And if you look at those three exact things and kind of mix them together with my job as main job as a standup comedian, the show kind of just, it is exactly kind of that, you know? Wow. Well, for people or just some of our listeners, it's a phenomenon.

And it's fascinating to me that usually every movie I've ever done, not many, but the behind the scenes was better than the movie. And you guys keep it like it's like the green room. I mean, there is no... And it's fascinating to me how you casually put this together, but it seems to really come through you completely. The sensibility and all the decisions. I know you have partners and other people, but it seems to be...

You and I love it because an old school show business, the only thing we have is the gong show that was like this. I don't know if you ever saw that, but it's not like your show, but it would be like an ancestor of it. And Letterman deconstructed late night in his own way, for sure. And then, of course, the sarcasm at Howard Stern's brilliance of that and then being really curious, I think.

When you're in that mindset and the person's there and you know, this is now a vulnerable thing, maybe 13 years ago, but it's a big thing to be on Kill Tony and talking to you. And so I just was talking to David earlier. We walkie talkie. And I said, you just have a real likability to you, even though the show you'd say, oh, it's mean or this and that. But there is a sweetness to the show. If you were not a nice guy, it wouldn't work.

Right. They can sense that. So that's all I wanted to say. I'll see you guys tomorrow. Those are some of the best parts for me is making the magical or not making, cause you can't even make them. It's almost like deep sea fishing. And you're just hoping sometimes that a buck, a perfect episode, uh,

like Monday's episode that we just taped, right? Let me just take you through this one because it's kind of a perfect example. A few months ago, here I am getting stoned at my place in the afternoon thinking, where are we going? What's the next, right? What's something that'll throw off the fans that have watched 730 episodes of this? They watch it every week. They see me and my homies doing it quite often. What's something that I could throw into the mix?

And somehow, someway, one of the many messages that I've gotten recently from somebody's assistant or friend or friend of an assistant or whatever is that, hey, Carrot Top might be interested in doing the show, who I've met a couple times before. So I'm like, hell yeah, that's perfect. This sounds crazy. Let's try it. So we exchange numbers and we talk on the phone. He's on his boat off the coast of Florida at the time. And naturally, just like anybody,

anybody or anything. We all want everybody to like us, right? Isn't that really the secret? We all want to have a mutual respect for one another. So here he is. He's got nothing to gain, right? He's on a fucking yacht off the coast of Florida. Yeah, he rakes in cash. Falling out of control. Yeah. Life is good. He doesn't need anything. But, you know,

People want to be part of the fun, modern show. So there I am talking to him and he's going, you really want to have, and I go, yeah. And you know, what about, what if you brought like a trunk of props and kind of did some of your famous prop stuff throughout the show?

And he's like, really? You sure? Like, I don't know. Like, I could just be a normal comedian and sit there. I go, yeah, you could. But we always do that. And our video and our cameras and everything is so good now. And we're at such a high level that we can really capture this. I think it could be great.

And, you know, we set it up and he, you know, is kind of, I can feel the weariness at the time, right? Naturally, like really? Props? Is he setting me up? This and that kind of, I mean, he doesn't say that. I just kind of feel it. You feel it like 4%. And as it gets closer, there I am last week looking at my schedule going, wow, I booked Carrot Top solo.

Right. Like anything can happen here. One thing that I've learned from doing this show so long is that egos can be the trickiest part. Right. If I give a comic that I started with, you know, 18 years ago, the seat next to me, they're happy to be there. They're looking to sell tickets. They're going to be funny, this and that. But I have to make sure that the guest really feels special and wants to be there and this and that. So last week I'm like, holy shit.

Am I crazy? Because this could just be a nuclear meltdown. I've never worked with Carrot Top before. What if he goes out there and doesn't like something about what I said? Which is funny either way, almost. Right, exactly. Almost. Until someone goes, yeah, I don't want that episode.

Right, right.

And basically I called the guy a pedophile in the moment. It was a joke that worked perfectly fine. No one in their right state of mind would have been offended. And he goes, I don't like it when people make fun of people that donate their time. I'm out of here. And I thought he was kidding, but he left, ended up being one of the big highlights of the show's history. Cause people love the fact that drunk Ric Flair walked off. But anyway, cut to Monday.

And it ends up being an unbelievable episode. And I mean, Carrot Top, right after the first comedian says they work at a restaurant, he busts out a fork that has chopsticks attached to the back side. And for white people that might not know how to use chopsticks, you'll love this. It's a fork on this way and the chopsticks are just clacking together. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Comically hilarious. And that was just the first thing that he pulled out of this trunk.

it's smart he's waiting for a spot and then he puts it in which is smart oh so genius that that's killer and that's the thing being able to make it you know refillable and fun and i make it entertaining for myself hoping that the fans of the show are with me kind of you know what i mean just on the adventure to see something kind of different because you guys know all these shows you have you

you know, pre-interviewed guests and everything's kind of a lot more set up than a lot of people think it is. So this whole thing being improvised, it's a huge risk, huge reward, huge risk. Millions of people are going to catch it and you don't know what's going to happen. And I, and the,

And in closing with this Carrot Top thing, just using it as an example, if they gave Emmys away to podcasts, I think this would be an episode that would win an Emmy. Carrot Top on Keltoni out of nowhere, almost like what in, and I'm not dissing Carrot Top here, but it feels like I'm introducing a whole new era. Sure, you've got a whole big crowd. 15 to 35 year olds to the mystique of Carrot Top. Yeah, what's old is new again. When you were telling this story,

In my brain, I'm going, oh, that's going to destroy because it's I don't know the word silly. It's abstract. It's a guy who made these props and comes out one at a time for a new audience of young people. This is revolutionary. It's not a guy with the elbow on the thing going. I jacked off in front of my cat today. It's just no, I'm going to be balls out funny. And by the way, I've heard Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Rock.

Sing Carrot Top praises. Sure. Because who else is doing his act? And he's a nice guy too. I mean, I went and saw him in Vegas just to, I think it was the Luxor. We were there at night early. I also go see Carrot Top. No hate or anything. Just like, let's go see. I haven't seen him. And I just hear, and people like to use him as like a punchline.

But you go, something's working. And we fucking laughed our asses off. He's playing at a toilet. It's so ridiculous. He's talking into a toilet. I'm glad someone's doing this. Yeah, because I can't think of this shit. I think that was brilliant. I mean, what a great thing to have him and understand. And of course they wanted to see all the props in his job. They don't know they want to see him. They don't know what he does. And they're like, oh shit. Because they're also...

waiting for you who's the boss to say oh like this guy and if they go okay they give him a chance and then hopefully he comes through which jumping in when it kind of fit in the story is really great yeah yeah yeah

And then it's like, Oh, is this out now? It's coming out in two weeks, two weeks. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I got to see that one. That sounds hysterical. And it had everything. It had, uh, it had people bombing, which is what people love. It had people doing good, which people love. It had great interviews, which people love. And we had a guy win a golden ticket, this amazing, uh,

cool, obese black man came out with children's books for adults that he had written and he brought them out. It was so unbelievably funny that I realized this guy's probably going to make tens and tens of thousands of dollars just from me letting him give the shout out because the

front page the first page was so funny i think the name of the children's book for adults was man fuck them kids yeah and the first page he said he goes just read the first very first page and it said like sorry to all the pedophiles that bought this book thinking it was something else man fuck right fuck these kids um

But he ended up winning a golden ticket, which is a super rare thing. What does that do? Which means that you can come back on the show anytime as long as there's not another golden ticket winner already scheduled. So you basically just get to come back without having to worry about signing up and waiting at the bar next door in the bucket. You get to kind of like, that's a tough way because I think when I did it, we, how many do you get through on an average night? 20. Hmm.

No, it seems, it feels like that probably about, uh, uh, with the regulars altogether, probably about 12 or 13, nine bucket pulls, three regulars. Right. Because it's not just one minute. It's a bunch of bullshit. And then maybe we'll talk for a second and then I'll, you know, it's organized chaos because before I went out, I think, I think it was me and David tell, and you said, let him get through it. Like you told me, you know, like you said just now, and then,

I'll probably start and then you guys jump in. And it's a mixture of that. Like, I'm sure we got greedy. We want to jump in while you're doing an interview, but it all worked out. Oh, it's always great. It's always organically different. And the people love it being different. If someone goes on a run and they take over for a bit, that's great. If they're quiet for 15 minutes straight, that's totally fine. It's just the moment and the difference and the vibe and the

energy and it's kind of what makes it its own thing. The fact that it's unproduced and doesn't have network notes is the reason why it survives. And thank God, yeah, thank God Netflix got that. I couldn't believe. I think Ted is smart about that. It's unpolished and you just, luckily if they just go in somewhere like that, Dan and say, Oh,

okay, whatever this is works, pull this, put it somewhere else, but let's just get it exactly the same and don't spruce it up and make it Hollywood. It's the thing everyone hates. You know what I mean? They go, oh, they ruined it. They ruined it. And in fact, we, like I said, we accidentally organically did that for the Netflix, for the first Netflix taping. And it was on, and it falls on me. You know, it's my note to myself is like, oops, we did what,

they would have wanted to do accidentally. Little more chaos, little more improvising on my part instead of going to what I have next on my little notes. And don't let the Netflix of it all get to my head. Oh, wow. That's really hard to do. Especially, it's Netflix. You know,

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I found a kid who swings a golf club like a dream. I'd like to try to qualify him for the US Amateurs. Coming to Apple TV+. What's your name? I'm not into older guys, but I'm flattered. A new comedy series, Stick. I don't want to go on this trip. Your mouth's saying one thing, but those eyes are saying something else. From the home of Ted Lasso. Is he your shot at redemption? This is your mulligan? Owen Wilson. This game takes and it takes. The game's finally giving me something better.

You know Arnold Palmer? Iced tea, lemonade, mix it. I'm missing a nap for this. Streaming June 4th on Apple TV+. It's just very interesting to me that this new digital media, and it's been around for a while, but this show, it had to happen. If you weren't, I mean...

It's so entertaining and so real. And the numbers, I don't know. I mean, Bert Kreishner was the first one on the podcast and he kind of said it not, you know, Bert's such a sweet guy, but he's like, well, I get way more numbers, more people than the today show or any of these, any of these television shows. What are your numbers? Meaning YouTube, right? YouTube numbers, playing arenas, just, just all this energy around this podcast.

I don't know who is in this new, I don't call it a rat pack. There is sort of like there's Shane and you and Bert and Tom and the last seven, eight years creating their own ecosystem, their own universe. Yeah.

It's very cool to watch from someone who came from the 60s, 70s. It's a whole interesting world we're living in because something that isn't applied to even just the simple numbers is the amount of shares, the amount of the length watched, for example. Like even back in the day, if The Tonight Show had

let's just say 4 million people watching it. Well, what are those real 4 million is 200,000 of them hospitals and nursing homes and is a million of them, you know, grandmothers falling asleep or, you know, who's exactly watching. Whereas with like a kill Tony, for example, um,

A hundred percent of the viewers are comedy fans or at least 98, the 2% that might be watching it for the first time because they went down a weird rabbit hole might be there, but they're going to get hooked too. You know, I'm joking about moms and grandmothers, but they are, they 100% love the show. Everybody always says to me, I had my mom glance at it and I can't believe that she loves it.

But they love the fact that they can't believe that they're watching someone get a magical opportunity to have a chance that they literally were just on the street, not knowing if they had a chance. And now they're trying to make it.

So there's really something for everybody. But my point is, is also, you know, a huge factor is, yeah. So if there's 4 million people watching the tonight show, how many people actually make it to the standup comedy part, which is what after two interviews or whatever, and a whole monologue and this and that. And also, um,

And also, oh, the length. It's two hours and 15 minutes long, whereas grand total, what is The Tonight Show if you take out the commercials? 45 minutes, 55 minutes or something? I have no idea. 42, probably. Yeah.

Still an hour. It's an hour, yeah. So when you think of the overall engagement and the locked-in-ness of these shows, they're there. It's a destination. They get used to it. It becomes a weekly habit. And yeah, so it's a whole different level. I just want to ask one quick question. So the guy who got the golden ticket, did he tear up or is it kind of emotional in that moment? So that's another...

frequency you're hitting on the show that you can also change there's a reality component to this at times like america's got talent like the same people like that you know because seeing people that night i'm a little not as rough as like a tell a tell is a sharpshooter so he's probably the worst person i could sit with because he can he's a crowd work guy he can say anything about anything

And I also don't want to go for the jugular on these guys because I'm part of the people that go, fuck, I can't be a dream killer. But then, of course, I get caught up in it and want to get laughs. But some people that do great

It's a big deal. Some people get crushed and that's just the rough world they're entering. And they can sign up again and totally go in and flip it around. Yeah, I know what they're signing up for and they can sign up again. One of my favorite features of the show is when I notice, and this happened on Monday as well, is a comedian came up and crushed and I go, you look familiar. You've been on the show before, right? And he goes, yeah, two years ago.

I go, it didn't go that good two years ago, did it? He goes, hell no, it didn't. And so you're watching the actual growth in real time. He thought of that for two years. And not only to answer your question about the golden ticket was did he tear up? Not only did we see him wipe a tear, but again, I'm talking about this guy is literally like six foot four, 350 pound aggressive black man. So you're watching him grow.

like that and it hits so much harder than someone that looks like a low testosterone white guy like the three of us. Also, we put even in that movie Busboys that Theo and I did, we brought in three guys

from your show so that's to play these these guys that work with us dana but uh i don't know if you know them but they know them from the show and they came in and they were cool i think one was on when i was there but they all do well and they all have a following and it's just fun to pepper in stuff like that because the people that know will know and it's just another layer in there of

tapping into what's going on and that shows going on. Yeah. And those regulars that you had on, you know, these are, this is a very special thing that gets into the territory where nothing like it's ever been done before. Um, because yeah, there's an America's got talent element. Yeah. There's a little bit of a letterman, Easterney interview element. But one thing that this show has, that's never been done is exactly that. The, the,

the three, four, five regulars that are doing a new minute almost every single week, people are watching them come up with everything. And it's a high pressure situation. Honestly, I, I,

I would be scared to death if I was them. Here I am controlling the spaceship calmly. Meanwhile, I look at them like sheesh again. Granted, I might be writing ballpark about give or take a minute every week naturally on stage from performing multiple nights a week. But these guys are

are doing it publicly in front of millions and millions of people. And when those people go and buy their ticket, they're going to see the more refined version all together, their hour of the stuff that they watched them debut. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Kind of like watching someone write a hit

on an acoustic guitar and sing it to you acapella. And then you get to see how it comes out in the studio kind of the, when they really work on it. So people are literally watching these guys grow and make a career in front of their very eyes. Like Cam Patterson is like a Eddie Murphy, Dave Chappelle type, Chris Rock, young, young, young, you know, only a few years in 25, 26 years old. And they're

they're getting to watch this freak of nature become a superstar in real time. He just booked a huge movie with Kevin Hart and, uh, is going to be out for multiple weeks. And, you know, it's like a main character, main, big role. And, uh,

and people have gotten to watch his process, not just see a star, right? You're right. So it's, it's not, it's not exactly like, but you might be a little bit like a new Lorne Michaels. Yeah. But,

You know, I'm sure we could fit a stadium full of people who have such gratitude for the experience and the feedback and then coming back, doing better. And how many of you launched? When you see Eddie Murphy, Dana, like the first time we see him, it's for me, it's delirious or it's raw. It's a full polished hour. So that you're like, holy shit, this guy's good. But if you can see he's good in one minute and then he comes back and he's good again, it's,

And then you're like, oh, is this a fluke? It's like writing a hit song over and over. It's hard to do even a minute, you know, probably harder. Yeah. And let me remind you, some few with like a Cam Patterson, for example, very few, maybe one out of every 10.

20 or 30 minutes is kind of rough. And immediately, as soon as the cat meows and he's, that's my time. He goes, fuck, I hated that minute. That fucking sucked. I go, no, it's not bad. He goes, no, that fucking sucked, man. So they get to see it.

That makes it real, right? It's like, oh, yeah. Right after they bomb, they're able to with you guiding them going, oh, I just I just fucking sucked. When you're playing open mics back in the day, they didn't get that opportunity. Exactly. And the millions of people watching get to go, holy shit. Every week he works so hard. It's not easy to kill. He makes it look easy. And then you have a rough day.

you have one rough week and it's like, oh, it's real. This could all go off the wire. Like, yeah, it's kind of like Lorne Michaels, but at the same time, even SNL has its own writers and producers and everything, a bunch of people clanking their heads together. To help make a star. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. These guys are out there sinking or swimming online.

on their own. So it's really exciting. I get kind of nervous every time I bring up a regular because I do want them to do good. You know, I want them to shine. Cam's a nice kid. Danny's, he's a good looking kid. He, I saw him at the improv the other night. Surprised to see him at the improv in LA, but I guess he comes out here. And,

But all those guys do well. The one guy, the tall guy, was on Cameo. They make money, too. Yeah, they're doing good. William Montgomery is one of the highest paid people on Cameo. Casey Rockets, all over on tour, nonstop work ethic, running around, super physical. Ari Maddy from Estonia is just destroying. One of truly the best stand-up comedians in East Asia.

you know, still kicking out a new minute every single week. In fact, he does this thing where he flexes on everybody because we let the regulars go as long as they want. They're not just limited to a minute. So he does a thing where he like on Monday dropped two minutes and 30 seconds just for the sake of how long he wrote that bit. So it's really crazy what's going on.

It's exciting because I get to be a fan of your show. You're right there. I just have to insert this at this point. I've just learned a hell of a lot about your show. Yeah. And I admire it on all and how many frequencies I started using again or metrics it operates on and feeding into why it is such a success. You go, oh, they go up and these comedians bomb and they shit on them. I don't know. You know, it's just completely comprehensive. I just want to say that I was in Vegas.

I was at the Wynn Hotel. I was playing a private date. And across the way, out the window, I was way on a high floor. Every 10 minutes, early in the evening, I would see you 100 feet tall. Oh, the whole side of the...

Resorts International. I don't know how big a room, but you were just playing there, right? So just for a second, how's your stand-up career going? It's a whole other side thing. You're playing at big rooms? I've never had more fun. All the stuff that I've worked on, and I joke about it now in the hour, is like...

I always, when everything was kind of, I've always liked to, how do I say this in a non-corny way? I like, I like corny. Yeah. I like the idea of pushing the crowd away and then having to win them back over and touch on really, really, you know, racial issues and, you

you know, sometimes what would be considered stuff that could get someone in trouble. And I focused on that throughout the entire process.

pandemic you know when i found out i could move to texas and be back to performing indoors rather than you know outside in los angeles with cars six feet apart from one another that's supernova gig that one oh yeah magic castle yeah yeah terrible and um and i focused on all this even though it looked like netflix and a lot of things were going cleaner and more you know uh

if you want to be successful, you got to be mainstream or whatever. And I really doubled down and focused on what I wanted to talk about. And even the stuff that happened with the Trump rally a few months ago, it's all applied now. And it gives me kind of

it feels with my standup to really, really, really finally after 18 years, talk about the type of stuff that I want to talk about. And they kind of know what they're getting. Even that Trump thing, which did you ever think if he lost somehow that people would be coming after you for that? Oh yeah. They do.

Oh, I know. I actually found out from the administration a few days before the election. I was in communication with them the entire time. And on the Sunday morning before the election, I woke up to a text message that said, call me when you can. And I looked at the time it was, it was sent at 6 15 AM from the guy that booked me for the Trump roast, a high level advisor in the camp. Like that's at all the meetings and everything. Um,

And I just knew it wasn't good. And I called him and he goes, hey, man, just to let you know,

uh, because the press writes their stuff up before it happens before the election, they write it up. This is what we're going to put out. If Trump wins with the actual statistics, this is what we're going to put out of Kamala wins with the actual statistics. And he goes, just to let you know, the press already has it written up. If Trump loses, they are totally 100% going to blame you and I.

Now, I work in politics. My career is going to be totally over. I don't know how it's going to work for you as a comedian. And I'm literally like, oh, fuck. Because now what? Now I've lost basically everyone, the Republicans and the Democrats. I'm stuck with literally the 6,000 people in the country that truly don't give a fuck about anything at all. You got that crowd still. Yeah.

I remember this well. I'm glad you brought it up because I wanted to talk to you about it. And you kind of, I understand it now, but it was like for about two, three weeks, your name was really everywhere. Yeah.

New York Times, they're tying this to me, a very benign, just silly joke, please, people, about Puerto Rico and floating garbage, whatever. And they ran with it politically. But I just thought there was a period of time where you were sort of going to potentially from that joke reorientate how America tilts in the presidential election. I don't think any comedian ever

that I could think of in the history of comedy has been in that position and now getting the confirmation that that's how they were going to write it, that that whole rally was a trip. I mean, but you were, I just thought it was fascinating what happened with that. Yeah, the plan was to just go out there and kind of have fun and be part of this wild gang of kind of, you know,

You know, I don't know. I'm sure a lot of people aren't going to like any part of what I'm saying. But don't worry. What could possibly... What do you mean? The Hulk Hogan of it and the Bobby Kennedy? Yeah. If you're on the left, it would be the rogues gallery of misfits and...

anti-status quo rebels you know basically yeah and it was it wasn't exactly how I expected it to go they had me cold open right after the national anthem which if you know anything about my comedy style literally I don't even open I don't cold open anyone's show in

mine, nobody's. That would be crazy to do, especially at a political rally, especially with the lights all the way up, which isn't exactly for some reason how I pictured it.

And I mean, audience completely lit all the way to the Raptors. Madison Square Garden. You're like in a grocery store, basically. Oh, yeah. You need to dim it down. I don't want to see after the front row. But you go, oh, so this is... The lights are staying like this. Okay, I go on now. All right. And the audience was not mic'd for comedy levels. It was for pure rally levels, which turns out is hot death if you're listening to a clip of comedy. Because in the room, I'm telling you, there's...

tens of thousands of witnesses that were there. It was a success. I swear. It was wild. There was nothing but high fives and stuff right afterwards.

And then it didn't take long. It was so live. Before you go, wait a second. Oh, yeah. Some narrative developed that you bombed or something? Was that what happened? I was backstage looking at the monitors. There's like a whole crew of, you know, it's literally, it's like Hogan walks by Dr. Phil's fucking fist bumping Rudy Giuliani. It's Donald Trump Jr. next to me. And I said to him, I go,

To Don Jr., I said, man, I think this is becoming a news story. They're focusing in on this one joke I made about Puerto Rico. And he goes, does it seem like they're outraged? And I go, yeah. He goes, welcome to the team.

and I realized right then I'm like oh yeah they've been bashing Elon Musk calling him a Nazi and all of this crazy stuff for a guy that yeah it's free Wi-Fi to the poor parts of the world builds electric cars for 100% of everybody and this and that and everything nicest people that I've never seen anyone help more people in the world than Joe Rogan and meanwhile he's a Nazi that's

racist, a racist, a right wing, far right wing. And I'm like, Oh my God, I'm that now. This is crazy. I'm a pot smoking pro-choice anti-war centrist. There's no way. They really throw Nazi around. It loses a little of its luster when you just use it every single day. You start to go, wait, what is it again? It used to be a real stab. And now you go, I guess people just use it. Kids use it now. Yeah.

Now, according to a lot of people, 53% of the popular vote of the country is Nazis, I guess. So what a world we're living in where 53% of the people can be labeled Nazis.

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Go on the record. I don't think you're a Nazi at all. Me and Dana aren't. I don't get any Nazi vibe from you.

There's other vibes I get? No, I'm just kidding. It is a fascinating world. I always say this. We got the wheel. We got fire. We got the printing press. We got this. We got nukes. We got nothing prepared for social media. If the world does end and they're digging through the rubble, they'll find a little box and all they'll hear is a voice go, Zuckerberg! Zuckerberg! Zuckerberg! Zuckerberg!

Not literally him. It's all social media. The news comes from social media now. It happens there first. The news was reporting outrage about a joke because of the tweet that

that came out that said racist speaker at racist rally had this to say about Puerto Rico, not comedian speaker, not joke comment, the way they label these things. And if you don't know me, you're, it sounds, that's the first, a lot of people saw of you. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. But the people that didn't with that said, and this is kind of where I think this backfired for, uh,

the mainstream media and whatnot, where it backfired is I don't think they counted on because I'm not at the time, especially wasn't considered a mainstream guy. You know, I don't think they factored in the power of kill Tony, the millions and millions of people and the millions and millions of people that watch the most watched program of the year last year, which was the roast of Tom Brady. So when they called me a speaker and said that I had racist comments, I'll

I think a lot of people, and I know for a fact, a lot of people go, wait a second. This is, I think a lot of people realize the news can be extremely tilted by this exact instance, because a lot of people are like, wait, I saw him be more racist on the roast of Tom Brady. He called a black lesbian and a da da da da and a this and a that and a whatever, you know, it's kind of what I go for. And they're like, that's what he does. So, you know,

It's the same thing. The news cycle has changed and the networks and the traditional outlets had monopolies and then they could cancel someone and shit on them and there was no place really to go. And now immediately you can go on Joe Rogan or wherever and

And set the record straight. Yeah. I taped another episode of kill Tony less than 24 hours after that rally. And I was the news at that point. I mean, it was me all day. My guests canceled on me that day. I had no guests that came in from Los Angeles for it. And, uh,

And yeah, it's it. But I, again, you know, the, the real comedians here, the real standups can't wait to be on that episode. And it ended up paying off big time for them because it was an extra episode. Cause tune in and also the people hear the joke go, well, he's doing a joke, even though it's race related. There's a lot of jokes out there that are just poking fun of stuff. Yeah.

There's Puerto Rico. There's pollution in the ocean. It was just a connection of a joke. It wasn't like, I got to make a joke about Puerto Rico. I hate that. Yeah. And the thing that happens when someone puts a, when they focus in on a single clip is that you're missing out on the fact that, oh, I totally 100% made a point to make fun of

everybody, Latinos, whites, blacks, Israel, Palestine, my own mother, strategically, that was part of the tone of the thing. It was supposed to be about free speech and how we can make fun of everything. And that's another thing that kind of happened is a lot of people saw, oh, wow, this campaign might be the one with kind of a sense of humor.

Did you have a dogs are different than cats bit in your back pocket? I have one I can lend you. Just in case.

No, but I did have one about eating dogs and cats, and I'm not even kidding you. That was actually in it too. They're eating the dogs, they're eating the cats. Of course you have a pen. I love the freedom. I'm not in the world. My brand is something very different in what I do, but I laugh my ass off at your stuff. And when I'm behind the scenes with comedians, we're all doing stuff like that.

The only way to make comedians laugh behind the scenes is something shocking, something so foul or incorrect.

that you just laugh. And of course in the room, everyone knows there's nothing behind it. It's just because you're not supposed to say it. And so, um, I, I, even in a good comedy crowd, if you're in a good comedy club and that's like a secret place to do all this stuff, you can even get ooze and Oz and, uh, but they still think it's funny. They, but outside of that safety net,

it seems weird that people can take it wrong or pretend to take it wrong and really go after you. Right. Exactly. And we all get it. We get it. A politician or a,

lawyer or someone like that doing that, yeah, that's outside the parameters of their thing. Like them doing that would be kind of crazy. Sure. Well, for me, I could only do for a while Western European white males, you know, as far as voices like Swedes or French or whatever. And I couldn't do South America or Asia or India, but I'm working my way east and

doing some Mediterranean accents and working my way slowly back toward India. And I will eventually, on this podcast, I do do a Japanese man suffering an earthquake. And that's been okay. Do you want to show it to them real quick? Yeah, what does that sound like? Actually, this is fly on the wall. Yeah, do it. Japanese man on the phone when an earthquake happens. Be like, I don't have a phone. Oh, no, it's true. Oh, it's all the video though.

Oh, it's a bigger one, I think. So anyway, I know it has nothing to do with Japanese people, but I just know that that sound and rhythm

makes my brain happy. So that brings me so much joy. Yeah. Making someone a comedian laugh. I know he's the guy to do that one too. That's funny. Um, that could be your minute, Dana. That would have been part of your minute. You'd have like another 20 seconds. Yeah. You have to bring your laptop up on stage. Yeah.

When I can think of something to do on that show, I would love to come on. But I would confer with you. But, you know, there's certain impressions you just feel like doing with prosthetic makeup. And there's just SNL and kind of you guys now. And it's fun. I mean, I thought Adam Ray's Biden was really, really a funny take on it. His whole scared attitude and everything. Yeah.

Yeah, he's fantastic. We put that together in six days. I texted him on a Tuesday morning. I said, Hey, do you have a Biden? Because he's always done Dr. Phil and it's always been a wild success on the show. Guest of the year 2023. And it's like just one of the

biggest pops you could ever hear is dr phil coming out on a kill tony show i mean people just said he starts swearing and stuff yeah it's such a funny take to bring out dr phil in 2025 and have a kill it's kind of like really adam and then you see it's killing go ahead yeah and so i hit him up on a tuesday afternoon saying hey do you have a joe biden impression

And he goes, I just do five seconds of it in my stand-up act. I've never been in character as Biden before. Mm-hmm.

And I go, what are you doing Monday? He goes, oh, let's go. Let's do it. Because like at the time they were having debates and stuff, Biden and Trump. And so I knew he was going to be Biden. So I hit up Shane, who's a big, obviously huge Kill Tony fan and fan of Adam Ray's Dr. Phil and his in character work. And I go, hey, Shane, I got I got.

Adam Ray doing Joe Biden on Monday. And he goes, shit, I'm supposed to go to fucking Philadelphia to write the next season of tires. Um,

but I'll extend my, I'll stay here an extra day. I have to do Trump with Biden. And so it's so fun how these things come together. It's literally like they want to be there. They want to do it. They want to collaborate with each other. It's not, it's not like a job at all. It's like a jam session. It's fun. Shane's such a home run hitter too and go out there and,

Perfect to have them both. I'll tell you, the purity of it, because they're seated side by side and they're facing out to the audience. You didn't build a set. There's not movement walking. It's just they're in character, just going forward. And again, it feels loose. They kind of wait to have something funny to say. They wait. And then if they have something, they jump in. What do you think of that, Trump? I mean, that's hard to do. It's hard to...

Be funny, be an impression and ad lib off what's going on right that second. It's just, you know, they were, they were having so much fun and it was, uh, yeah. Shane is second to none. He sees things on multiple levels, like nobody else. There's a guy during that episode. I go, what do you do? He goes, I work at trader Joe's. He goes, that's what we call this guy. Trader Joe. And it's like, everyone's putting that together going, Oh shit. Good one. Oh yes. Second.

I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's, he's, he's great. He's like that all the time, by the way, we all live here in Austin, Texas now. And I mean, Oh,

Oh my God. Offstage on stage at a bar next door here at his place and the swimming pool everywhere. He can just lay you out all the time. Incredible. Yeah. I'm jealous. That sounds fun. Yeah. Just swimming sounds fun. Yeah. Um, anyway, anything else for this young man, Dana? I think we, uh, no, I thought it was very, uh, interesting. Uh,

uh, interview, I think for a lot of people who maybe only know you from the Madison square gardens, we'll be like, Hey, um, just all I can say is, you know, really, um, congratulations. I know it sounds corny, but it's, it's not easy, uh, you to, to make it in show business, not easy to take control and create something like this and buy a house that I did get it online. I mean, it's,

1100 square feet, which is shocking to me. That's all. It does not have a pool yet. He's waiting. But anyway, um, just, just, just, uh, congratulations. It's an incredible achievement and you're just in the pocket and no one's fucking with you and no one's telling you what to do. So, Hmm.

Well, thank you. Obviously as a, as a 40 year old, I have been looking up to you guys and been a super fucking super huge fan my entire life. I don't know how when mentioning Letterman and Stern and the pro wrestling influence, how I could possibly leave out. I guess I felt it goes without saying how powerful SNL and your guys' movies were to me. And so let it be known that, you know, I'm,

I wanted to do this to hopefully be able to get you guys eventually on an airplane to Austin, Texas to do the show together. It would be monumental. That would be fun. We definitely, we, yeah, we're going to, yeah, we would love it. I,

I can't wait. I'll be, I'll be bothering you guys for that. And Tony, my, my waitress this morning had just seen you brought you up organically, did not know anything about this. And I think maybe the Honda center, maybe she just saw you somewhere. I don't know where, but she had high praise. So good job on just doing stand up on top of doing everything else. Yeah. And we'll see you soon, bud. Thank you for coming on guys. A real honor and a pleasure. Have a great day. Thanks. All right. Take care guys. Nice to meet you, Dana.

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.