#2280 - Peter Berg
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The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast.

Those are a lot. Is this too much? They're delicious. Am I making a rookie mistake? No, I love them. They're too good, though. There's a lot of sugar in them. They're trying to make one with no sugar. They're pretty close. But right now, that's got a ton of sugar in it. But damn, it's good. Yeah, they taste good. We did the full thing today, dude. Thanks for the workout. My pleasure. It was fun. Thanks for the workout. You're a beast. For anyone that doesn't know, you are a fucking beast.

And I suspected you would be, you know, that's why I wanted to work out. And I was smart enough. And I told you right away, I'm not going to keep up with you.

But, man, you go hard. You did a lot of the things, though. You did all the stuff, you know, like in stuff that you'd never done before, like windmills. Yeah, those windmills were like you could really get in trouble with the windmill. Yeah. For people that don't know what that is. You certainly can with heavyweight. Yeah. It's something. But it's all those things like the pushups and bodyweight squats. It's all just you have to build to it.

I love the way you warm up, you know, because I'm the same way. I do a long warm up every day. And my buddy Ari got me into it and just try and stretch absolutely everything. And I was telling you, I got thrown off a horse in Africa a month ago. And when I was in the process of getting thrown off and I was like in the middle of the air.

And I'm about to come down and I'm like, oh, shit, this is going to be a problem. And I thought about those warm-ups and I landed and rolled and didn't hurt myself. So I think those are really smart. Yeah. If we could just appreciate when your body works well without having to be injured, it would be so nice. Right. Because you really only think about your – oh, God, I hope my body heals when you get injured. If you get fucked up, then you think, God, I can't wait to get healthy again. Yeah.

But if you just appreciate – and the best way to appreciate your body working well is to keep it working well. Yeah, man. Is to work on it. Like stretch out, work out, lift weights, get some cardio in. Do the stuff that's uncomfortable like stretching. I like that you started off your workout with a nice long stretch. We had a good stretch. Yeah. And a good ice bath, man. Yours is colder than mine. That blue cube is brutal because it's always running. It's like a flowing river. Yeah. That's hard. Yeah.

Great. It was a great way to start. Appreciate it. It gets you fired up, man. And also, like we're saying, your workout's done. Your day can – you're free. You don't have to think about doing it. Just get it out of the way early. You're good. Well, and the sauna and the way you approach – the way I think you approach all of it is kind of a meditation. Yeah. And I know that that's probably really an important part of your creative process. It is of mine when I'm writing or directing to be able to have that time alone and

and it's a moving meditation. And I think one of the secrets to your success, in my opinion, is

is that you know how to take that time for yourself, lock in, focus, get mentally and physically ready because it's not easy to do what you do every day and to be this present. So I respect it so much. Well, thank you very much. Well, obviously I'm a huge fan of what you do and fucking American Primeval is so good, dude. Thank you, man. I feel like you made it just for me. I've been waiting for a realistic Wild West series like that forever.

ever. And that is, I'll just say it right now. That's the best one that's ever been made. It's the best representation of the wild west that's ever been made. It's so good, dude. It's so brutal. My wife checked out after episode one. Did she? Yeah. I can't because we watch, we watch shows before we go to bed.

And we're in the middle of Severance, which is excellent. Really good show. And Severance is, you know, I mean, there's some brutal moments, but it's just really complicated. It's really engaging. You've got to pay very close attention. Yeah, yeah. Really good show. And then I said, hey, baby, we've got to watch American Primeval. I go, Peter's coming on. Please sit and watch with me. It was a couple weeks ago.

The first episode, she's like, Jesus Christ, what the fuck are you doing to me? It's like 10 o'clock at night. I got to go to bed. I can't like people getting tomahawked in the fucking head and I got to go to sleep. If I have to call her or send her flowers or anything, I will. I've had to send a few people flowers and give them like massages and stuff like therapy. Yeah.

because it's traumatizing. Because you did it right. That's why. Because you did it right. You did it like it really was. It was a fucking barbaric time in a barbaric place. And it's never really been... Other than 1883, Taylor Sheridan's series, which is also excellent. Excellent. Excellent. He did a fantastic job. And how crazy is it that, like, Faith Hill and...

What's the other guy's name? Tim. Tim McGraw. Tim McGraw. They're fucking great actors. Sure. Tim was in Friday Night Lights. Do you remember him in the movie? He played the father, like the mean alcoholic father who used to beat up his kid. Tim was great in Friday Night Lights. Tim's a very good actor. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. That someone who's a great singer can all just slide into this other thing and be amazing at it? He's an artist. I mean, he's a really deep...

thinking, deep-feeling artist. Yeah, clearly. And Taylor Sheridan has a knack for getting great performances out of people like McGraw. Or did you see Jerry Jones, his cameo in Landman, which I think is the best cameo ever? Have you seen that yet? What episode is it on? I'm not sure because I don't know each episode, but he's got... Sheridan has a sequence where Jerry Jones basically playing himself just tells the story of how he got into...

Business and how he started up and it's just beautifully done Sheridan's very good at getting people to to to do cameos and pulling it out of them I think that that show was like Billy Bob Thornton was built for that show. It's like it was born for it. Yeah, I

That's his perfect role. He's so goddamn good in that show. In Landman. Yeah, in Landman. He's so god- I mean, he's been good in a million things, but in Landman, it's like, you just believe he's that guy. Yeah, man. You just believe. But American Primeval, back to that. What inspired you to do such a realistic interpretation of

So do you remember a movie called Jeremiah Johnson? Did you ever see that with Robert Redford? Yeah, yeah, yeah. A long time ago. So Redford plays this city man who goes out west looking for gold and ends up sort of stuck somewhere around Montana and is trying to survive out there. When the Indians first find him, he's so inept.

He's trying to catch a fish in a frozen river with his hands. I mean, he's completely inept that they don't even waste an arrow on him. They don't kill him. And by the end of the film, he's a warrior and he's learned how to survive. And he marries a Native American woman and his wife gets killed and he goes on a vengeance spree and kills a whole bunch of people and ends up getting this incredible respect from

from the Native Americans. And my dad took me to see Jeremiah Johnson and that movie always stuck with me. And I'm good friends with Taylor Sheridan and we work together a lot and I obviously know everything he's doing and I kind of wanted to see if I could play in that space.

But, you know, he's doing it so well and so specifically, I kind of thought, well, what if I just did something that was really about the survival? And I like to call it inch by inch filmmaking, where you think about how hard it would have been just to go 50 feet and take a piss and how there might have been 15 different things that could have killed you on the way to taking that piss.

Instead of just jumping through those 50 things, let's really try and stretch it out and try and show people and capture the brutality of moment-to-moment living back in that part of America in the 1850s. And you're used to doing films, right?

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Yeah, it was a massive job. A big movie is generally like 85-day shoot.

American Primeval was a 145-day shoot. And I had one of my ideas with Markel Smith, who wrote the episodes and was very talented, was let's not shoot in sound stages. Let's not make parking lots look like forests, but let's go up into the mountains. And in this case, we went up onto some different Indian reservations in New Mexico. And we're like, let's really go out there.

for 145 days. Let's do it. This was all prior to us going out and actually doing it. And it's kind of like, be careful what you ask for. You're actually really fucking on the mountain for 145 days. And there's lightning storms and snow storms and wind storms. And we had rattlesnakes everywhere. And we had to have all these dudes going around pulling the snakes out of the

out of the rocks, and stuntmen breaking ribs. Joe Schilling was with us every day. I think we killed Joe five times. Thanks, Joe. I saw Tate Fletcher. I was telling you, too. Episode two. We only killed Tate once, but thanks, Tate, for that. I love that dude. But these stuntmen were so tough and breaking bones and all kinds of horrible things. But-

The creative experience of getting to do basically six movies at once, you know, because I directed all of them. And being able to go that deep in characters and to be able to bring in elements like Brigham Young and the Mormon religion and have big themes circling around just very visceral, violent moments as a filmmaker is fucking awesome.

And it's different, you know, because it's not directing an episode of a television show is its own experience, but that's very quick. Directing a movie is really, really wonderful and very obviously creatively demanding. But this is six movies all at once. And having to keep that in my head and kind of figure out how to keep myself alive.

functioning and not wasting energy. And, you know, I built a gym in my house in New Mexico with a nice bath and a sauna. And I'd get up at four every morning and just have that time for myself to keep myself fit and, you know, mentally and physically ready to go at it. I'm sorry to interrupt you, but when you're in the middle of a project and you're doing your workouts and you're sauna, are you just like constantly going over the show in your head?

Yeah, I mean, I try to...

I do go over it, but in more of an abstract way. I'm a bit of an improvisational filmmaker, meaning I don't like to have everything super planned out. I think kind of the way you conduct your podcast. You have some ideas, and then you just sort of allow whatever happens to happen. And I know what I'm going to do that day, particularly with American Primeval because –

You know, we had so many big battles and stunts and, you know, kind of dangerous, complex filmmaking that there has to be some plan. But even within that, I try to loosely think about what I want to do and then get out there and let the actors kind of stand out.

start doing what they do and see what kind of creative vibe gets going. And a lot of the cameramen, you know, I just shoot handheld cameras. So we have a lot of flexibility with how we can work and capture. And my feeling is rather than plan it all out,

Go out there knowing kind of what you want to accomplish, but allow kind of creativity, allow that kind of divine magic to enter the process, which can kind of be freaky for like my bosses at Netflix because they're spending a whole lot of money. And they're like, what are we doing today? And I'm like, I don't really know what we're doing today, but we're going to do something.

But I've done it. Well, they're pretty good at staying out of the way, aren't they? They actually are fantastic about it. And, you know, I have to give, you know, my boss, there's a woman named Bella Bajara at Netflix who and people talk a lot of shit about Netflix. I'm not one of them. I mean, they're giving so many people so much work that.

And they, you know, once, once you convince them that you have a vision, they let you do it. And, um, she was great and she let me do it. And, um, you know, it was interesting because there was a scene in, um,

In the second episode of American Primeval, where a Native American cuts the throats of five women. Spoiler alert. Sorry. Spoiler alert. I guess sort of. There's a lot of other bad things that happen. But there is this scene, right? And, you know, Netflix is a very busy company. They're making a lot of stuff. And we were deep in the edit process. And I got a call from Bella, the boss, my boss. And she's like, I want to see this show.

And I'm like, well, it's your show, so please come in. And it's hard for her to keep track of all the shows and all the scripts. And I was impressed that she even wanted to come in.

And so she came in to the edit room and she's like, I'm going to watch one episode. It's kind of a big deal. She's, you know, very influential person in our world. And so it's me and Hugo, the editor, and Bella comes in and we're showing her the first episode. And we're just sitting in this kind of dark screening room. And I have no idea what she's going to say or do. And it's pretty violent. And it ends and she goes, I want to see another one.

And I'm like, "Okay, we'll start playing the second episode." And we're getting right to the moment where, spoiler alert, these women are about to have their throats cut. And I'm starting to have a full fucking panic attack because I'm pretty sure that she doesn't know what's coming up, right? And Hugo, the editor, is kind of looking at me like, "Should I stop it?" And I really didn't know what to do. And we get to the moment where this event happens.

And my body heat was literally rising. I'm ready for her to, like, fire me and take the show. And the scene happens, and the girls get their throats cut, and she says, stop. And we stop. And she goes, Peter, I can sense you're concerned about my reaction. Let me tell you something. I'm here for this violence. I'm not afraid of this violence as long as you make it emotional and connect me to the emotion. Do it. And I'm like...

Thank you, Bella. And she left and she allowed us to explore the kind of grit and intensity that people have reacted to. And I tip my hat to her for that. You know, it's it's not you need that kind of support to get something like American Primeval made today because it's not.

You know, it's not your grandmother's Western. No, it's critical that you do it that way. Because if people want to really know what that was like, if you read the historical accounts of what happened, that's what happened. For sure. It happened that way. And it was horrific. One of the things that a lot of people have talked about, and I had, you know, the LDS church story.

issued his statement sort of critiquing the show and critiquing me, which I appreciate and I understand why members of the Mormon community would be offended by the portrayal of Brigham Young and the Meadows—the Mountain Meadows Massacre, which was the event that we use as kind of our inciting incident

for the first episode, which was a real massacre that the Mormons committed on a group of pioneers who were heading out west or a Mormon militia with some Paiute Indians attacked and murdered about 140 men, women and children.

And we present that in the film. And we present Brigham Young in the film. And many Mormons, it's interesting to start reading all the debate about it, but a lot of Mormons were saying, yeah, this is exactly what happened. And this is a part of our history. And there were other Mormons, particularly the seniors in Salt Lake City, who said this is not what happened. This is not fair. But what I find interesting about the Mormon church and

and about kind of how we present it is I've had a lot of people come to me and go, dude, I never knew the Mormons were such savages. So gangster. They were fucking gangster. Brigham Young was, in my opinion, a gangster, a survivor, a warrior. And for anyone who follows Mormon history, you know, they started in upstate New York with this young kid, Joseph Smith, who found these tablets and basically rewrote the Bible and

and started getting this following. And then they moved to Missouri and they got popular. And then there was an extermination order. And it was kill all the Mormons.

So they fled to Illinois and tried to survive up there at this place called Nauvoo that was going to be their peaceful place to live. And Joseph Smith was murdered and they were run out of Illinois. And Brigham Young led these dudes, men and women, on foot across the plains in the winter to Salt Lake Valley, which was dangerous.

this desolate wasteland and he said, oh, we'll stay here. They'll never come for us here. And they started coming and Brigham Young basically said, fuck it. We're not taking it anymore. He built his own army, the Nauvoo Legion, and he said, we're staying here. We won't mess with you, but if you come after us, we will fight. And

And that point, I think, is interesting. And I think Brigham Young, who survived longer than all of them, and if you go to Salt Lake City, he did a pretty good job, right? That's a big city, man. It's a great city. And I don't know. I respect the Mormon religion. I respect Brigham Young. And I feel like we make him look like a gangster in American Primeval and...

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Aged and bottled by Buffalo Trace Distillery. 90 proof Franklin County, Kentucky. Buffalo Trace. American, family owned, independent, and perfectly untamed. A survivor, and I respect that. Well, this is the reality of historical figures. You're talking about a different time in the world. And it was a particularly barbaric time. And if you wanted to survive...

This is what you had to do. And this is, we're not talking about the United States in 2025. We're talking about the wild west. And you're talking about a persecuted group of religious people. Like, if you want to survive, you want your children to survive. You got to fight. You got to take up arms. That's just how it is. Like, you know the story about the Mormons in Mexico, right? Remind me. Well, yeah.

There's Mormon sects in Mexico that moved there when they made Polygamy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and this was a homeboy from Massachusetts Mitt Romney his family is from Mexico His father was born in Mexico and his father could never be president because he wasn't born in America And he was born here in America ran for president the whole deal became governor, Massachusetts but there's still these huge groups of

In Mexico that are armed to the fucking tits. Yeah. Because they're always constantly battling with the cartel. And there was a series of murders a few years back where a woman and children like family were slaughtered and was killed.

Some confusion as to whether or not the cartel targeted them or whether it was a case of mistaken identity or what happened. But, you know, there there's been documentaries about them. They're fucking they live in armed compounds. The Mormons in Mexico. It's a similar sort of a situation with them in Mexico now.

I mean, the polygamy was a thing. And, you know, we do touch upon that a bit in Primeval. I think Brigham Young had 40-odd wives. Nice. And that...

How do you fucking keep up with two? I don't understand how someone could have two wives. That's a whole nother conversation. I mean, I have a friend who lives in Saudi Arabia. And a long time ago, I was in Saudi Arabia doing some work. And I'd asked him, because in Saudi, you can have multiple wives, Saudi men. And I'd asked him about that and sort of like, wow, that's amazing. Multiple wives. That's so cool.

And we were leaving. We were leaving Riyadh Airport. And he was walking with me. And there was a man in front of us. And he was holding like five suitcases. And he could barely walk. And there were four women around him and kids everywhere. And he just looked like he was about to collapse and fall face forward on the ground at the airport in Riyadh. And my friend looked at me and said, Pete.

This is the reality of what having five wives looks like on the ground if you want to see what it really feels like. So they think about Brigham Young having 45 wives. Okay. Good luck, I guess.

Right. Yeah. But that that was one of the the the issues, the polygamy that people that were non-Mormons back in 1850s were using to attack the religion. And, you know, that was something that was the polygamy has obviously been since outlawed and the church has cut itself.

off from that policy. But, you know, the Mormons were, the whole idea that this kid, Joseph Smith, I believe he was a young teenager, 14, when he and his buddy walked into these woods in like 18, late 1830s, right? It was 1820. When did he find, when did Joseph Smith supposedly find these golden tablets? I believe it was, but either way. Early 56 wives.

Brigham Young had 56. There's a photo of you. It's 16 he forgot about. See, I didn't want to oversell it, so I undersold it. I kind of knew it was in the 50s. He had 56 wives. 46 kids, only 46 kids made it to adulthood. That's part of why. Oh, wow. Only 46. Oh.

He's basically Genghis Khan of Utah. 1823, he was visited by an angel who directed a Mamodo Berry book. 1823? And how old was he? 14. 14. So this kid at 14 comes out of the woods and says, the angel came and told me that the Bible's almost right, but it's not quite right. So I'm going to rewrite it, which he did, the Book of Mormon.

And look at where we are today. It was not that long ago, right? And in the course of that journey from Joseph Smith coming out of the woods to where we are today with Brigham Young University and the beautiful city of Salt Lake City, Utah.

There was a lot of bloodshed and Joseph Smith was murdered. Brigham Young fought in another interesting theory that isn't proven, but it's I believe it it holds true.

It was what saved the Mormons because in 1857 when you had the Mormon Wars, Brigham Young was fighting President Buchanan and when the military was coming after him in 1857 and he was holed up and prepared to fight in Salt Lake City and Buchanan wanted him out.

And then right around 1858, 1859, a little thing called the Civil War popped off. And the entire focus of the U.S. military was not on Brigham Young and Utah, but it was on fighting the Civil War. The Utah church was able and Brigham Young was able to grow the Mormon church and survive and thrive. And he was able to politically negotiate things.

you know, a place in the government so that by the time the Civil War ended,

Brigham Young was deeply entrenched and was able to lead the Mormon church to the great power that it is today. I think if the Civil War hadn't occurred, there would be no Mormonism in the United States. Wow. That's crazy. What a fortuitous turn of events. And I'm going to probably get ripped on for that one, but I believe it's supportable. Yeah, you're going to get ripped for everything. That's okay. That's just how it is. Mormons are the nicest people.

My next door neighbors used to be Mormons. They're the nicest fucking people. I completely agree. They're so nice. I know a ton of Mormons because I know a bunch of people in Utah. And Salt Lake City, Utah is a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful state. Salt Lake City is a cool city. And like I'm down with the Sundance Film Festival. So I'm down with the whole state. Yeah. No, I love Utah. But it is a fascinating story. It's a fact. And it's...

You know, look, they have a great sense of humor because the Book of Mormon, when Matt Stone and Trey Parker did that musical, they took out a full-page ad in the playbook.

So they're like, if you want to know more about Mormonism, come visit, like find out the real thing. So instead of protesting and suing and attacking them and they just took out a fucking ad. So when I was doing, I think that shows incredible character for sure. For sure. Cause that fucking, you've seen the book of Mormon, right? Hilarious and pretty brutal. And they're like, well, if you like, you'd like to find out more about Mormonism.

Yeah, I can't figure out. Like I when I was doing my research for American Primeval, I went to Salt Lake City and the Mormon church gave me a tour. And, you know, I told them what the film was about and that the Mountain Meadows Massacre was in the book. I was going to be in our show.

And they took me to the theater. Have you ever been to the theater, the Mormon Theater in Salt Lake City? No. It holds like 20,000 people. It is the most beautiful, incredible theater where they have weekly events and meetings. And they took me in there, and there's a huge pipe organ. And I had a private concert with their organist. Yeah, it's that. What?

- Whoa, look at that place. - And I sat by myself in the center of that theater and you see the pipe organs. And they gave me a private concert

And then they took me into the museum and showed me, you know, the history of the Mormon church. And I told them about the Meadows Massacre, which, you know, I've taken heat for in the show. And at the end of the tour, there's a bookstore in the museum, the Mormon Museum in Salt Lake. And the book, Mountain Meadows Massacre, by this guy Turley was there. And I'm like,

I want to buy this book. I read the book and I'm like, oh, for sure we're putting this story in our film. And it was for sale in the Mormon bookstore. And I met with the author, Turley, who then took me to the site of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. And he had written the book with the support of the Mormon church to get their side of the story out. Did you film at the actual site? No, we didn't. The actual site was in Utah.

But I went and toured it. So you filmed in New Mexico? Yeah, we filmed everything on different reservations around Santa Fe. But if you go to the site of the Mormon Meadows Massacre in Utah...

The Mormons have built a big memorial there honoring 130 pioneers from Arkansas who were killed there. And the Mormons have owned this event and they were very willing to talk about it, which is kind of like them buying a full page ad in Book of Mormon. They're like, you know, we know you're going to make a film about the Meadows Massacre. It's probably going to be inflammatory in some ways. However, come visit us.

we want to meet you, we want to show you, we want to play music for you. And I had an incredible time with the Mormons that were involved with us doing the research for Primeval. This episode is brought to you by the Farmer's Dog. I've been asking dog-owning friends what they feed their dogs, and most of them are surprised by the question. And I get it. For decades, kibble was the only option.

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- So what is the backlash though? If they've admitted that this massacre took place and it's part of the historical record, the book is for sale in this Mormon theater, what is the backlash? - The biggest single issue, if you get into the weeds, and I think it's an interesting point of debate,

is whether or not Brigham Young knew and authorized this massacre. And the way the massacre played out in real life was different how we did it in the film. In the film, we did it in one swell move, like it just happens. And we filmed it in one shot, and it's pretty intense, visceral, very fast events, and then it's over.

In reality, this wagon train was surrounded by the Mormon militia, the Nauvoo Legion and some of these Native Americans. And it went on for about four or five days. And the Mormons dressed up as Native Americans. This is where it gets kind of – some Mormons aren't thrilled that we pointed out the fact that they were trying to put the blame on the Native Americans. So they literally – Mormons dressed up as Indians.

to confuse the pioneers, and in case there were survivors, to say, oh, it wasn't Mormons, it was the Native Americans that did this. So they don't love that. But what the Mormons claim, or some in the Mormon church claim, is that during the three or four days that the siege took place, before the actual massacre, and the details of the massacre are really fucked up because the Mormons pretended they were accepting a surrender.

So they went in with white flags and they said, OK, the men walk this way, the women and children, we're going to walk you to safety because the Indians are going to kill you. Mormons said, we're here to save you. So they started walking them out. And then on someone's signal, they just killed everyone.

Really bad. But the issue of whether Brigham Young knew about it or didn't know about it, we imply that he knew about it. We never say that he authorized it, but we imply that he did know about it. And what many of the defenders of Brigham Young will say is that there was a letter written where Brigham Young said, do not harm these pioneers. Don't don't kill them.

But the letter was sent by horse while the massacre, while the event was already occurring. So I've had people say he knew that that letter wasn't going to make it there in time. He was covering himself. Oh, hey, I wrote a letter. I knew it couldn't get there in time, but I wrote a letter. So there's plausible deniability. No one knows. It's hard to believe if you really start getting into this. And obviously I did. I know it's not on the top of everyone's list of things to give a fuck about.

But it's really hard for me to believe that in 1857, a group of Brigham Young soldiers would act unilaterally on their own and commit a crime that's horrible without somebody approving it. It's hard for me to imagine. So that's the single issue that tends to – if I do – and I really try not to –

My girlfriend's turned me on to Reddit. I never even really knew what it was. Oh, my God. Like, I don't... Like, what? Like, Reddit is fucking crazy. Yeah. I was talking to, you know, Jack Carr, right? Mm-hmm. He's getting into, you know, making movies and he's doing all this cool stuff at the Terminalist and I think he's a great guy.

And he was talking to me about reviews because it was the first time he was ever getting reviewed. Right. And, you know, any filmmaker who says they don't read the reviews is lying. OK, they're just fucking lying. And they we do read reviews and we care and they hurt, you know, and and.

And he's like, I guess he'd gotten, you know, read something he didn't like on The Terminalist. And he's just called me and said, how do you handle this shit? I want to kill this. He's freaking out. And I'm I mean, I'm not he wasn't really freaking out that bad, but he was pissed. And I'm like, Jack, you know, welcome to the world of, you know, what we do. People are going to are going to talk.

I'm like, you don't understand what... Like, before Reddit and comments and all the things, back when we first put movies out, man, there were three critics that mattered. Like, when I first started making movies, there was this guy, Kenneth Turan, in the LA Times. There was Janet Maslin in the New York Times. And then there was Siskel and Ebert, right? Yeah. And, like, they had so much power, right? So you'd make a movie and you'd spend...

you know tens of millions of dollars and you put your heart and soul and you know like we never try to make bad movies right like that's that's never the goal we're always like you know we want to win some it's hard to make a good movie but you put all your your heart and soul into these movies and then it's fucking three critics that control your fate right and i was telling car about um

My first movie was called Very Bad Things. It was about this bachelor party that goes haywire. That's a great movie. Appreciate it. Thank you. I love that movie. So that movie got, hands down, the worst review ever given to a movie in the history of film reviews. Please don't pull it up right now. But feel free, anyone listening, Kenneth Turan's review of my film Very Bad Things in the Los Angeles Times. Okay.

I read this review. I literally vomit. Like people talk about vomiting. I don't know if you've ever vomited when something bad happens. I puked. I went into like shock. I'm like, he tried to destroy my career. And he like, it was, and so I'm telling Jack and I'm going, pull it up right now. Pull it up. And he starts reading it and he's like, oh my God.

Oh my God. I go, don't fucking tell me about bad reviews. Okay. Because I got the worst. And Kenneth Turan, who like after I'd gotten that review, I was in a,

at the Four Seasons Hotel in Los Angeles getting drunk with a couple of my friends and Kenneth Turenne was in the bar and I got up and started moving towards him. Like I was in a blackout rage and my friend Joe and Mike Mendelsohn held me back because I was going to get him, you know?

And for three films after that, Kenneth Turan, he just had it out for me, this guy. Hated me. And finally on – I believe it was either Friday Night Lights or Lone Survivor, he reluctantly gave me a good review. But it was more like a broken clock is right twice a day than – but like nowadays, like –

As I said to Jack, it's like, okay, if you – the crazy thing about if you are focusing on how your work is being perceived and it matters and it does matter. Like I say, anyone who says it doesn't I think is kind of lying. Don't you think it matters more about the audience than about the critics? A hundred percent. My perspective on critics is that no one wants to be a critic. Generally, they wanted to be creative but they're not good enough to be a critic.

- For sure. - To contribute. - For sure. - They don't have anything to contribute. - And they're using a different standard that doesn't really apply to just like the working human being that just wants to be entertained. And that's why I said to Jack, I go, "Dude, like, you know, we have rotten tomatoes, right?" Which is a way of, you know, critics, if you get 61% good, you get a fresh tomato, if not, you're, you know, you've got a rotten tomato and that sucks, okay, I've got a rotten tomato.

That sucks. Oh, I got a fresh tomato. Oh, that's great.

But now they have the audience score right next to the critic score. Yeah. And that's the one that I said, Jack, don't look at the critics. Look at what your audience is saying. And that's when, you know, I learned about Reddit and all that stuff. And I'm like, fuck the critics. I'm down with this Reddit shit because you get such interesting conversations. Yes. And they're much more thoughtful, I think. And they've taken away the power of.

And I'm not shitting on critics. I get it. You want to be a critic? Whatever. I do like the quote about critics and life doesn't go to the critic. It's the man in the arena. I like that quote and I believe in that.

And I've used that to justify my mood when I get a bad review. I'll just read The Man in the Arena over and over until I feel good. Is that Theodore Roosevelt? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a great quote. Great quote. Fantastic quote. And it's true. It is absolutely true that, you know, to do people that do, you know, I was just talking to Dana White recently.

and about something that I actually want to mention to you. My love of a guy like Dana is the doer of it all. The guy who just says, "I don't care what the critic says. I'm going this way. I am fucking going this way. And if I win and you're with me on the ride, you're part of me. If I lose and you're still with me, you're my friend. If not, I don't give a fuck. I'm going to do it again."

And I have so much respect for that. And I'll tell you another interesting thing about my business. It always surprises me how real it is. But when you make something, a movie, or you do something, whether it's American premiere of almost anything I've done, and I don't know if you've ever experienced this,

You put yourself on the line so intensely and you believe in it with your heart and your soul and you go for it. And as it's getting ready to come out, there's this weird thing that happens where everybody separates from you. And you're the one that's kind of – now you're about to be judged. It's going to be determined to be successful or a failure. It's going to get reviewed. And everyone is kind of like –

Good luck, Pete. Good luck. And I could like, like the day or two before it comes out, all the people like, and this is when you know who's got your back. Okay. Cause there's a few, you look around and like, wait, well, all these people were with me for this journey. And I'm all by my fucking word. Where'd everybody go? And it's, you know, like my sister, my best friend, Ari, my dog, my,

My son, there's a few people who are really right there. And then when it comes out and it works, man, you have a lot of friends. And that's just one of the things that you have to do in this business. And it's why the critics fuck them. And it's why Dana and people like that, you, who do create it and build it and make it. And it's real. Yeah.

You definitely need feedback because you definitely need to know if you're on the right track. But you can get lost in feedback. You can get lost in positive feedback too. You can get lost in people approving you. You can get drunk in it. I don't read anything. I don't read anything about me. No Reddit ever? Nothing. I don't read anything. I get it. Sometimes I'm good. Sometimes I'm not as good. I get it.

I do my best. That's all I can do. And I feel like if you're really self-critical, which I am, and you're objective and you analyze yourself and you're brutally honest, if you're brutally honest about what you've done and how it is, like could you have done it better? Is there anything – did you cut corners? Yeah, yeah. And if you don't, if you don't cut corners and if you do your best and you really prepare –

That's all you can do. You just do your very best. And if you haven't done your best, that's when the critics really sting. If you know that you kind of slacked off or you weren't focused or there's something that was wrong with what you did for the money. Yeah, that can often. Yes, I agree with that. To do it for the money is a real, real one. You know, I mean, that's the downfall of Robert De Niro. Yeah. Right. He needs money for divorces. You know, he's got marital problems and.

So I spend a lot of money and you start doing these fantasy movies with Michelle Pfeiffer and it's like bizarre shit where it's like, you're like, what is Robert De Niro? One of the greatest actors of all time doing any fucking goofy ass movies. Yeah. You get extended. I agree with you that like what I always say is I do a lot of research for my films and you know, have, have,

went to Iraq when Navy SEAL platoon and lived on an oil rig and went back to high school for Friday Night Lights and I found that if I Whenever I put that work in and I put that research in And I really really with the exception of very bad things which was a fantasy about a bachelor party gone haywire Which Kenneth Duren didn't like and it did it did hurt me. It did that review, but I was younger and

But if I do stay true to my instincts and my passion and I follow it,

A, the work seems to connect much, much better. And I don't feel – if somebody doesn't like it or wants to talk about it or debate it, okay. It doesn't hurt me. Yeah, that's experience, right? I think so, yeah. Yeah. And any time I've done a job for the money, and there have been a couple, it's backfired horrifically. And the money was never worth it. Right. The reviews did sting worse. Yeah.

Because you agreed with them. Yeah, they were right. I was lazy. I didn't give a fuck. I was, you know, I cared. I still, I didn't phone it in, but I wasn't locked in. Right. And that's the difference, right? Yeah. And I think one of the reasons that you don't have to read your shit is because you know you're locked in. You just are. And that's why you're connecting. And locking in, and I say it to filmmakers now because...

So kids are so confused, young kids that want to become filmmakers, you know, that they think they're, you know, they're going to work hard and they're going to make these movies and they're going to put their heart and soul into them and people are going to watch them. And then they go on and they see TikTok videos that are getting, you know, 400 million likes and someone's just, you know, live streaming them like making toast. They're like, wait a minute, what the fuck is happening? And I say, look, all you can do

is control your passion, your work, your discipline, and believe in something and put the work in. And I believe that the results will take care of themselves. But it's weird for filmmakers today to try and figure out what's going to penetrate and what's not going to penetrate. Yeah. I remember...

When I did that series about opioids, painkiller, and that pretty heavy issue, and we worked really hard on that, and I was very, very proud of it. And we came out number one on Netflix, and we were number one for like six, seven days around the world. And on the eighth day, we were number two. And the number one show was a documentary made on cell phone footage about the Johnny Depp, Amber Heard divorce.

Divorce trial where people were just in the parking lots. And that was the number one show on Netflix in the world. And I'm like, whoa, wow. Like, you know, they probably made that for $25,000. If that and that everything is sort of there's this great parody now. And I'm like, and it's confusing. But I'm like, dude, you just have to work harder. Yeah. And if you're not telling the truth, you're going to have a harder time.

You can't be in the business of getting the most attention because human beings are easily distracted, easily amused. We like a lot of things that have zero quality. And just because we're watching it doesn't mean it resonates with us. Just because you're watching the Amber Heard trial doesn't mean it's changing the way you feel about things, really entertaining you. And not just entertaining you but stimulating you in a way like, wow.

Like that was a fucking masterful piece of cinema. Yeah. Yeah. You know, there's, there's a difference, you know, and yeah, there's going to be a bunch of people that just watch people unbox cell phones or eat octopus. You know, there's like, there's weird videos that get a lot of likes, but you're not in the business of attention. You're in the business of art. And, um, I feel like when it comes to paying attention to comments and critics, I feel like if you're locked in and if you're doing your best, um,

If you don't, if you're one of those people that don't need to be checked on, some people need to be checked on. Some people get off the rails, they get a little full of themselves and they need a little something to just like set them back. You need someone to say that one sucked. You're like, God damn it. And then you work harder. But if you're working as hard as you can,

This is my advice that I give comedians when it comes to comments and things like that and negativity. You only have so much attention and think of your attention as if it was a number. Like you have 100 units of attention. Now, if you're spending 30 units paying attention to comments and negative articles and criticism, that's 30 units you can't use for something that you love.

And then also it probably bleeds into your thoughts when you're doing those things that you do love, particularly like devastating negative reviews and comments and things that are like really hurt you, that hurt your feelings. Takes a lot of numbers. Yeah. Takes a lot of numbers. It's just bandwidth. You're robbing yourself of.

of your ability to do the things that you love. You're robbing yourself of your ability to pay attention to your family, your ability to contact your friends and reach out and to be present. Because you're thinking, oh my God, I can't believe he hated my movie. Oh my God, I can't believe I bombed. Oh my God, I can't believe this podcast sucked. Whatever it is, you're robbing yourself. You can only do your best. And if you're not doing your best, you probably need those comments.

You need something to wake you the fuck up and get locked in. But if you're locked in, you don't want it.

You should know. I know if I talk too much. I know if I interrupt too much. I know. And I'll drive home and I'm like, I hate it. You don't need to be reminded of that. I don't need it. I fucking hate me. I'm my number one critic. So I don't pay attention. And this is something that I had to figure out over the years. But when I knocked it down to a formula of attention bandwidth...

That's when I really understood it because I'm like, okay, the times, even distractions, like the times that I'm spending just scrolling through Instagram and looking at nonsense. Like that hour is a valuable hour to me. I could have been doing like real good things with that hour where I feel good about it or I get nothing. Just distraction, just nothing. Right.

Which is fine sometimes if you're on a fucking airplane or something like that. You got nothing to do. Who cares? Is it really ever fine, do you think? I think it's okay sometimes. But barely, barely. As a comedian, I think there's a value in having your thumb on the pulse of culture. And even the chaotic...

you know, fucking unboxing videos and food and stupid shit and people just sticking their ass out and Insta-hoes. Like there's a value in keeping your thumb on it. You just have to know when your thumb's getting burnt. I don't think there's a value in Insta-hoes. Nah! I don't. I don't. I actually don't and I've gotten pretty

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freshly made food a try. You can get 50% off your first box of food plus free shipping. Just go to thefarmersdog.com slash Rogan. Tap the banner or visit this episode's page to learn more. Offer available for new customers only. I got it like just removing that from my life, but it was challenging. Yeah. The boxing, okay, yeah, people putting shit in boxes, yeah,

Maybe eating asparagus, I guess. I do enjoy cooking videos. I think there's value in that. I love watching chefs prepare food. Where do you stand on, and this is something I talk to a lot of writers and filmmakers about, just being quiet.

is really important. And being, for me, the most creative experiences I've ever had have come far away from any stimulation, from any controlled thinking, from allowing ideas to come, to have like the divine spirit, the angels that are creativity.

That require a certain amount of quiet and space for those to emerge, at least for me they do. And I try to make space because I so agree with the bandwidth, and you're right, but

But more than anything, just turning it all off can be so inspiring for me creatively. Yeah, one of the most disappointing things that I've ever done, some of the most disappointing things, is when I sit down from my computer to write and I wind up looking at my phone.

And I just scroll and bullshit. And then I start writing, but I'm distracted. And then I get an email or a text message comes through. I'm like, oh, yeah, I'll text him. And I'm just distracting myself. And then I realize, like, after an hour and a half's gone, I just fucking wasted an hour and a half that I could have written something that could have been a new brilliant bit. It could have been a new thing that I'm really excited about. Instead, I just fucked off. Yeah, so my creative –

process like I just wrote a script that'll be my next film and I wrote it in a very locked in zone I try to find a way of locking myself into a pattern when I'm writing but it involves the key for me is getting up

about 4.45 at the latest, but usually right around. I'm crazy about it, so I'll set my alarm for 5.45 to the same song every morning that wakes me up. This script was Van Morrison. And from, I will go, I'll take a piss, and then I'll get a cup of coffee, and then I'll go right to my writing room with no phone, no stimulation, nothing until I put in, you know, usually about two and a half to three hours of just

pure mental focus, no distraction, no conversation, no news, no phone, no nothing. - Why do you like to do it in the morning?

Because I think when you – I actually like studying writers and their writing habits. I believe that if you've had a good sleep, a sober sleep, and an intention sleep, meaning you go to bed with some plan of what you want to write tomorrow. So I want to write – I'm making a film about Marines. I want to write The Landing at Okinawa.

in World War II, which is part of the story. I know I'm going to write the actual landing scene. I go to bed with that intention. I might even write that intention down

You wake up, your mind is like at its most fertile. It's like a calm pond, you know, like a mountain pond that's absolutely flat and like glass and reflective and beautiful. And in the morning, it's at its most calm, your mind. And then I believe that every bit of stimulation you put into it is like a pebble.

or a rock being dropped into that water until the water starts getting all churned. And that's what happens to our minds by 11 o'clock in the morning. If you've been plugged in and communicating, your mind is just a fucking feral...

boiling cauldron of acid. This is how I think of it. So I like early morning, super calm. I can find the ideas. And I tend to, if I lock in like that, I write at a high level and kind of to your point about like critic proof,

I know it's good. Because I know it came from the deepest place I have. And it's like, well, okay, if you don't like that, then you don't like me. Sorry. Which is fine. Yeah, I can handle that. But like, I know that, you know, versus...

You know, writing a little bit here, working a little bit there and then going out to lunch and then sitting in a cafe and, you know, a coffee shop and kind of writing but being on the phone. I just don't think that's deep work. Yeah. And I have noticed, though, that like rappers and a lot of people in the hip hop community, I've been working on a documentary about Rihanna for quite a while and spent a lot of time with her in the studio. Yeah.

And it's amazing the hours that

hip hop performers, musicians and rappers keep 'cause they're going into the studio at two o'clock in the morning and working till one in the afternoon and then sleeping all day. And that nighttime, and I've talked to her about it, she's just extremely creative late at night. Almost for me, the exact opposite. But like, do you like to work creatively at night? - Yeah. - Can you write comedy at night? - Yeah, I write when I get home.

Yeah, so what I do is I do shows and then I come home and everyone's asleep my whole house asleep So it's quiet and you can access. Yeah, because my mind is really stimulated because I just performed, you know And you know I just maybe I've had a drink or two and I sit in front of the computer and I just start thinking Really? Yeah, I just start thinking I just try to freestyle with thoughts and the way I write is I just I have a topic and I just start with just essentially an essay and

And not an essay that I think anybody's going to read. An essay is just like my thoughts, just rambling thoughts. And then maybe I'll rewrite a paragraph, but I'll keep the same paragraph above it to reference. And then I'll rewrite it again in a different way. But like what kind of subject? Anything, whatever it is, technology, how it's affecting our lives and what our future is going to be like.

And then I'll sit down with that and think about the pros and cons. And like, what do I really, what hasn't every society faced this? Like, would you want to go back and live in the caveman days again? No, definitely not. Would you want, do you want to live in a time with no penicillin? No, no, no, no, no. Like, so how much technology is too much technology? And I'll just start writing. And out of that, I'll get a big,

Out of that I mean not always maybe one out of ten times something's useful like there's a lot of times I'm just throwing shit against the wall, but the key is throw a lot of shit You have to throw a lot of things you know Hemingway famously said my friend Ari Shafiri has this On his laptop. It says the first draft of everything is shit. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I've heard it such a great question

It just sits on his laptop, and I love it. I love that. It's so true. And I just write. I just write. But when you're writing, because I was just watching you as you were speaking, you were looking up at the sky for an idea. Do you think about your writing intellectually differently?

Okay, I'm thinking this thought, okay, I'm going to write it down. Or are your hands on the keyboard and you're just channeling? It's both. You know, sometimes I'm just sitting there thinking about it before I write or in the middle of writing. Like, is this right? Am I correct?

Is this how I'm looking at this or am I trying to force this? And then I also write on a computer that is not connected to any apps. It doesn't have anything on it. The only thing it has on it is it has – it's a think pad. So it has a – So you can't distract yourself. Right. I can – I am allowed to Google things.

To find out if something's correct. That's it. There's I've never I don't go to websites I don't look at it. This laptop is just for writing. It's connected to the internet, which is a tricky thing, but there's a rule that

So my home computer is, there's no rules. I might watch YouTube videos. I might fucking watch a little Netflix. It's, you know, IMAX, so it's big screen. I might do all kinds of stuff on that computer. But when I'm writing, my laptop is only for writing. And so there's, I don't allow myself, there's no TikTok, there's no Instagram, there's no nothing. I don't ever look at anything else. I just write.

And I use the browser. I use fucking Bing, which is like who searches shit on Bing? But you could – it's good enough to find out what's real and what's not real. Right.

That's the only time I use it. That's it. And do you experience euphoria when you're writing on occasion? Do you blow your mind? Well, you know these ideas are not – they're coming from fucking the ether. They're coming from somewhere. I know that creativity is an individual thing and it varies. But for me, my best ideas seem to come out of nowhere.

It's like, I don't even know if they're my ideas. They're coming from some place. And this is the concept of the muse, right? Like the muse is bestowing upon you these beautiful gifts of creativity. Steven Pressfield stuff. Yes. Yes. The War of Art. Amazing book. I've got a stack of them out there. Yeah. I love him. He's a big inspiration to me. He's incredible. And he's just a brilliant guy. Yeah. But that's where it's at. It's just like...

Setting this table, showing up, and then trying to pull these things from this other dimension, just wherever the fuck they're coming from. And then I get these little nuggets and then the nuggets I transfer to my phone. I feel bad for people who never get to experience that.

You know, I keep a necklace with a dog tag and a quote from a William Blake poem. And he said that has always just helped me quite a bit. And it's the only thing pleasing to God is the creation of beautiful and exalted things. And I remember the first time I got to experience that.

Wow.

quote when I read it, the only thing pleasing to God is the creation of beautiful things. The creation, being creative and being able to please God through creativity or have a religious, a mystical experience that's not drug induced through your power of your creativity. I think it's the greatest thing in the world. And it kind of saved my life because

Because if I hadn't found writing and filmmaking, I don't know what I would have done. I wouldn't have been, I mean, I don't know. Well, that's why it's for you because it feels so real and so powerful that without it, you feel like your life would be lost. Yeah, man. Yeah. Isn't that amazing? That's an amazing thing to find as a human being. If you can find something that you love so much that you can't imagine life without it, like that you would be lost. Yeah.

Can I tell you about, it's sort of a non sequitur, but I did want to mention, and it sort of related to something I love because I love boxing and I own a boxing gym in Los Angeles, which was hands down the stupidest thing I ever decided to do in my life was, oh, it'd be cool to have a boxing gym and manage boxers and, you know, no, don't, don't. It's awful.

I mean, I love the fighters and have so much empathy, but one of my fighters, Chris Van Heerden, his girlfriend is a girl named Ksenia Carolina, who I think I told you a little bit about earlier when we were working out. And this is just a...

A fucked up story. She's a 28-year-old American Russian citizen who made a $51 donation to a Ukrainian charity. She went home a year ago to visit her family in Russia, and Putin got her. And she's in prison now for 12 years. What was the charity? The charity was a Ukrainian –

a charity based in America for Ukraine that she thought was going to give money to children that had been hurt by the war in Ukraine. It's all very researchable. So she got put on a list? She got... Somehow they...

She's a dual citizen. She's an American citizen and a Russian. She went to visit her parents a year ago in Russia. And on her, somehow the Russians were able to figure out, like, if anyone with any Russian citizenship, even if it's dual, makes donations to certain charities, they get flagged. So she came in, got to her parents' house, went.

was called to the police station the next day, came in and they arrested her and said, "You donated $51. This is treason." And she's now almost a year into a 12-year sentence. - Holy shit. - So President Trump has been super cool. Dana White has been helping, just trying to get like, you know, it's so, it's such a crazy chess game, right?

That, you know, someone like and I hope things go really well between us and Putin. And I think Trump's doing some great things and I'm glad we're talking. But the way they do business is different and they will grab somebody, you know, and they've done it to Brittany Greiner. And they just released this guy, Fogle, who they had gotten for smoking weed. If they can get you and hold you and use you as a bargaining chip, they will.

And we don't do that. You know, it's one of the things that the U.S. doesn't do. But you end up having to make these kind of crazy swaps. It's all about swapping. Right. So they get Ksenia. And well, who do we have that that that's going to, you know, get Putin to say, oh, right. Yeah, I'm going to let her out. Right. Release that arms dealer. Yeah. But the people that we have are like crazy.

Pretty serious criminal. The merchant of death. The merchant of death for a basketball player smoking weed. It's crazy. But, you know, if you love Brittany Griner, like, or know, like I know Ksenia and my good friend is engaged to her and he's in hell.

And it's like we need someone to trade, you know. And so it's not going to feel right for, you know, people. We're going to have to trade someone that's done some pretty bad things to get this girl out of prison. And that's the game that these guys are playing. And it's not a game that you ever, ever want to get involved in. And I wish I hadn't, but I have now.

And, you know, Ksenia is a beautiful girl and she's in a really bad way and she doesn't deserve it. So...

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I get booed. No one even cares. They love them. Especially when they're really good. People get excited. Khabib is... Sure. I mean, we don't do it. And that's, you know, we take... America takes a lot of shit. And I don't know, maybe, you know, what we deserve and what we don't. But we don't do that. We don't detain 28-year-old, you know, ballerinas...

for smoking weed and throw them in prison for 15 years, 20 years. We don't take people and say, well, you donated $50 to a charity that we're not aligned with. We're throwing you in prison for 20 years. Yeah, so it's...

But yeah, owning a boxing gym and – Well, you were telling me about how when you met Canelo and Canelo came to your gym to train. I thought that was almost worth owning a boxing gym. Yeah. Canelo saved my gym. Canelo – I sparred with Canelo. Did I ever tell you that? Oh, Jesus. On my birthday. I hope he was nice to you. I was flying. I had landed in LA from – and I had a few drinks on the plane. I wasn't drunk but I wasn't sober. Walked into the gym. Canelo was training.

He was in camp. I don't remember for which fight. I walked in. I announced it was my birthday, and I wanted rounds. Okay? And I wanted rounds. And Eddie and Chepo... You called it on yourself? Oh, I called him. I go, it's my birthday, and I want some fucking rounds. No, no, no, no, no. And he just kind of stared at me. And I ran up, didn't warm up, got my stuff on. Pedro wrapped me up. I put my gloves on. I waited until one sparring partner was out. I go, me?

And to Canelo's credit, he only threw one punch. Okay. I went two rounds with him. He threw one punch at the end of the second round, but it was a jab in a way it landed. I've never been hit like this. He locked my jaw and my whole neck cracked. He locked my jaw down. It was a perfect jab. And he threw it. Maybe I don't 20%. It was just this one perfectly placed jab. Um,

But I did spar two rounds with Canelo, and I can say that honestly. He went extremely easy on me. That's very nice of him. But, yeah, it was cool because I got to see his whole journey when he came into our gym and he was just starting and –

I think he was fighting a guy named Lopez, and he was just this little redhead skinny kid. And to see his progression, you know, he's one of, like, the only good stories in boxing. If you ask me, like, name two good boxing stories.

I'd be like, well, I think Alvarez is a pretty good story. He's stayed with his trainers. He's a family man. He carries himself well. He's made a lot of money. Okay, that's one. And two is there is no two. Well, Floyd Mayweather is a pretty good story.

Yeah, all right. All right, all right. I'll give you Floyd Mayweather. You're right. You're right. Yeah, 50 and 0, all his faculties, still making millions, doing exclamations. Just bought all the real estate in New York. Okay, you're right. I'll give you Floyd. For some reason, it's always hard for me to put – you're right. Floyd is – I got another one. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Okay. Current? Yeah. Sugar Ray Leonard. No, Andre Ward.

Andre Ward, Olympic gold medalist, two-division world champion, retires undefeated, brilliant analyst. They offer him millions of dollars to go and fight Canelo after he's retired. He says, I think I can serve boxing more as a commentator. I will give you Andre Ward, but I would submit that nobody knows who he is. Oh.

Other than boxing fans. Boxing fans, of course. But I mean, he never... Right, he didn't achieve superstar status like Sugar Ray Leonard. He never crossed over. But yes. I don't think Sugar Ray Leonard is necessarily the great example either because... He saved his money, though. He took a lot of fights that he shouldn't have taken later in his career, like against Terry Norris and those kind of fights. I just put him in...

I put him in a slight, like, a positive story just because I've been to his house. He's rich. He's still, you know, sharp. That's good. He's handsome and he's well-spoken and it didn't take his brain. Right. He didn't take his brain. The stories of, you know, like working class boxing gyms like Churchill Boxing, my gym in L.A.,

which I technically don't own anymore because it just was turning into such a headache. If you could see the day in, day out trials and tribulations that these fighters go through. Oh, yeah. And you know it from UFC. I think that boxers have it like harder. I think. I can't prove this. But,

Boxing is a more dysfunctional state than UFC, mainly because of Dana. And, you know, the fact that Dana's been able to monopolize it and that there's a system that you're a huge part of that makes sense and that there's good people involved at the top and on broadcasting and all of it. Boxing has none of that. Right. And so it's this broken, dysfunctional mess that is just...

begging for someone, hopefully Dana, to come in and organize. Yeah, they are talking about doing that. And Turkey Al-Sheikh, who is running Riyad season, has done a phenomenal job of putting together these incredible fights. He's basically just said...

There's a lot of resistance getting these top fighters to fight each other. What's the resistance? They want to maximize their earning potential by staying undefeated and avoiding the really tough challenge. Just give them the money now. Yeah. And he's having all these fighters fight these dangerous fights and it's,

incredible for boxing. Do you think that there's a way for Dana and UFC to work with him? Yes. I mean, they're talking about doing that. How would that go, do you think? What would it look like? Well, I mean, he obviously has an excellent relationship with them because, you know, Riyadh season helped promote the big event at the Sphere.

Which was an insane venue. So cool, right? Have you fucking been to an experience there? I haven't been there, but I watched the UFC fight. It's the greatest. You weren't there. I wasn't there. It's the greatest venue in the history of anything. But it doesn't overpower the experience? I don't know, man. It didn't overpower the fights. The fights were insane. They were so good. But it was like the arena itself is so spectacular. I would say go to see any band there you possibly can. Go to see anyone there. It's so good.

The graphics are so mind-boggling, it's like you're on a drug. It's like you're having a psychedelic experience. I mean, the moment I walked into it, I was like,

You gotta be fucking kidding me. It's so actually there's a video of me like the I made a video I wanted to film the my very first reaction the very first time I walked into it It's it blew me away. What kind of drugs what kind of drug would you compare it to? It's like a you're in a different dimension It's like this is mushroom like a DMT. Well, it's like it's it's so oh, this is this is actually me walking Give me some volume

And this is just, they're just practicing and doing rehearsals of all the graphics packages. This isn't even, the audience is even in yet.

This is insane. Oh, wow. And this is nothing compared to when they had the graphic packages running. And, I mean, it was unbelievable. It's just the amount of money that it cost to put on a show there, though. Do you think that, like, is it going to be profitable? Wow.

Like, how do you make that money back? I don't know. How much did it cost? I think the UFC spent something like $25 million over a normal budget for an event. But I was just thinking, like, if you pay—I think it was Dolan. It was the Madison Square Garden folks that put that deal together. And I just am like, well, okay, it holds how many—

35,000? I don't think it's even that much. It's not that big. Someone spent a lot of money on that screen, right? That's a lot of technology. Yeah. So you thought that Turkey, he did a great job...

But was Turkey involved in the UFC fight? He was involved in Riyadh season. It was a part of the Sphere event. It was co-promoted by Riyadh season. So in theory, Dana could work with him in some way and start... That's the plan. And they own Ring Magazine now. So the reason why that's significant is the Ring Magazine belt is one of the only belts that has kind of been...

There's a bunch of different organizations that are sanctioning bodies. There's the WBO, the WBC, the IBF. There's all these different... It's very fractured, right? But Ring Magazine has always been like, Roy Jones Jr. was the Ring Magazine middleweight champ of the world. The Ring Magazine super middleweight champ of the world. That's the gold standard, is Ring Magazine. So there would be one belt in this. Right. If they can do that and then overpower everything else with money, and then...

really put the compelling fights... Like, did you watch this past weekend Artur Bitterbeev and Dmitry Bivov? Yes. What a fucking fight. Yes. Probably the greatest light heavyweight fight of all time. Yes.

Incredible. Bivel trains in our gym, by the way. Does he really? Churchill boxing. The hardest punch I've ever seen anyone throw in my life was in our gym. David Benavidez was sparring Bivel. Whoa. And Bivel, David Benavidez is a great fighter, but Bivel caught him and dropped him with the jab in sparring.

Whoa. Inspiring. Bivol, an incredible fighter. Amazing. He's an example. So is Benavidez, by the way. So they're both are. Those are actually two guys that I feel like could do it right. But just having so much trouble getting a recognition that they deserve. I mean, Bivol. Well, Benavidez has been chasing Canelo forever. Won't fight him. Yeah, for a good reason. Won't fight him. That's a hard fight. That's a hard fight. And you want that fight? You got to get paid.

You've got to get paid. Yeah, you've got to get paid. But I'm hoping that with Riyadh's season... Turkey would make that fight. Right, because he signed a multi-fight deal with Canelo for $400 million. I think it's a five-fight deal for $400 million. I think that's what's been reported. I don't know if that's accurate. But Terrence Crawford's the first one, which is going to be incredible. But is that really happening? Is the Crawford-Canelo fight happening? Yes, it's happening. So what was going to happen was...

Terrence was Canelo apparently had made a deal with Jake Paul to fight Jake Paul. Ridiculous. Ridiculous, but I bet it was for a significant amount of money. Still ridiculous. Yeah, but fun. I'd watch it. Look, Jake Paul wants to test himself against actual, not just world champion, but one of the greatest of all time. He would be, if Canelo really fought and it wasn't fixed, Jake Paul would not survive this.

45 seconds. I don't know about that. I think it would take a few rounds. Really? Yeah. First of all, Jake is a lot bigger. Jake's a lot bigger. But what weight would they fight at? Well, I don't think Jake is getting anywhere lower than 205 pounds. He's a huge guy. So Canelo would let him fight at 205? I think that would be the case. I think Canelo, when he got to 175, when he was fighting light heavyweight...

And he still fluctuates between 68 and 75. I feel like he probably weighs 190 when he's walking around. So he would probably weigh 190. And Jake would weigh over 200. They would probably fight either at cruiserweight or they would fight at heavyweight. But didn't Tommy Fury take Jake Paul? No, he beat him. But it was a very good fight. It was a very good fight. But that's what I'm saying. But Tommy Fury versus –

compared to Canelo. Right. Different levels. Different levels. Yeah, no doubt. Look, who's favored for sure? The greatest of all time. I mean, one of the greatest boxers of all time in Canelo Alvarez. He's the favorite. But I'd like to see what happens. It'd be crazy. I like a little freak show every now and then. As far as, like, would you like to see... I like a lot of freak show. Look, if Jake Paul wants to fight for the title, I would like to...

see him beat top contenders in the light heavyweight division or whatever division he chooses to compete at and then eventually fight for a title. Yeah. But are the fights even real? Like the Tyson fight? Like I saw video breakdowns of Tyson...

Not throwing punches early on in that fight. I don't know if you've watched any of those videos where like there's like a left hook is 100% available. Tyson, you know, in training 99% of the time releases that punch and he held out. Like, do you think that that was a real, was that a real fight? It looked like sparring to me.

That's what it looked like to me. But like with an arrangement beforehand? I wouldn't want to speculate because I haven't talked to anybody about it. But my educated assessment. Agreed. Yes. Agreed. It looked like sparring. It didn't look like a fight. And you think if Canelo and Jake Paul agreed to do it. I don't think that would be that. I think that would be a fight. That would be a fight. That would be a fight. Like a sanctioned real non-international. It would have to be a fight. I don't think Canelo Alvarez is making any agreements where he's not going to knock you out. Well, he's not taking the fight though, right?

Well, this is what happened. So they had this agreement and Jake Paul actually told me about the agreement when I met him at the inauguration. We were talking about it and I was like, holy shit, it hadn't been announced yet. I was like, that's crazy. And then...

Turkey came along and said, fuck all that. Let me throw some money at you. And said, stop with all this bullshit. You need to be fighting the greatest fighters in the world right now. You need to be fighting Benavidez. You need to be fighting Terrence Crawford. So Terrence Crawford is first on the list. Second on the list, according to reports. I thought they pushed it. He's supposed to fight Crawford in September, and they're going to have him fight Cinco de Mayo weekend. Against like a no-name, right? Skull?

William Scull, S-C-U-L-L. That's why I was asking. He won the title from Strip Canelo last year, or unnamed. Do they have a date for Canelo Crawford? September 13th, supposedly. See, that's kind of crazy that they're going to have another fight beforehand. But it does give Crawford time to bulk up. So Crawford got on the scale the other day. He was 185 pounds.

Really? Yes. And he's doing deadlifts. He was doing deadlifts with 450 pounds. Crawford is a strong dude. I'm going to put Crawford in another success story of boxing. I'm totally just contradicting myself. Now I remember. You're right. I love the guy. He's fantastic. I know you've had him on, right? A couple times. He's so good, and he's the best switch hitter in the game. Maybe the best switch hitter since Marvin Hagler. Yeah. He's phenomenal.

And he's so intelligent. Like his boxing is so clever. He sets traps. How old is he? 36, I believe. And Canelo's like 30... 37. So Crawford is 37? Yeah, yeah, I'm looking at a thing right now. How old is Canelo? I think he's 35? 34, 35? He's still in his prime. What's crazy is he fucking better be of his 40. And went 12 hard rounds where they never slowed down once.

Yeah, that's because people like you are getting us all in crazy shape, Joe. These guys are living forever. You're teaching us the way to do it. Look at that. Very likely Terrence Crawford faces a fighter with 90% KO rate after Canelo, says De La Hoya. Who would that be? That's what I was looking at. What weight class would that be after? So he must have fought a...

That's such a boxing headline, isn't it? Like 90% chance. Virgil Ortiz Jr. Okay, Virgil Ortiz Jr. is a savage. That would be a phenomenal fight. That would be an absolutely phenomenal fight. Yeah.

Yeah. After that, though. Well, I saw his fight with Majumov, who's very difficult, who Crawford struggled a little bit with, too, but beat and Virgil walked him down. He was battering him towards the last rounds. Why is Oscar De La Hoya offering an opinion on who Crawford would fight? Oscar De La Hoya is not Crawford's manager, is he?

I don't believe so. No, I don't think he has anything to do with it. Do you watch... Oscar seems like he's a little off the rails these days. Do you watch... Okay, for sure. God love him. He's having a good time. Do you watch his clap? Like, okay, I know social media, I said don't scroll and certainly like Insta hoes are bad. My favorite Instagram account is Oscar De La Hoya and his clap back Thursdays. No. He...

And then he rips into Eddie Hearn, basically. And it's deranged. It's absolutely deranged. But it's funny. And Oscar clearly doesn't care. He does, like, to your point earlier, he does not give a fuck.

And he just rips apart anyone and everyone. And he does this thing every Thursday called – I think it's called Clap Back Thursdays. And that's my secret guilty pleasure. My secret guilty pleasure is watching him dance around with a thong on. Oh, that was – He's out of his fucking mind. The best. That was the best. With his fake abs. It's a hell of a drug, cocaine. It's a hell of a drug, cocaine. Yeah, but –

I mean, he's... I mean, I like to say we've all been there. I haven't been there. I haven't been there. No, I haven't been there. I haven't put the fishnets on. I've been here, but I haven't been there, okay? And, you know, like, I do respect him. Oscar was a great fighter. Phenomenal fighter. Phenomenal fighter. But, I mean, come on now. It's like...

Oscar De La Hoya and all that's coming with him and Eddie Hearn, who I also like quite a bit. And then you've got Al Heyman and Bob Arum, you know, is in as well into his nineties and it's just going, it's, it's chaos. Yeah. And, and that's the problem is that they're represented by different promoters and it's very difficult for

people to co-promote. Very difficult for people to decide who's the A side, who's the B side. You get ridiculous deals where this fighter wants 75%, the other fighter wants 25%. They have to figure out whether or not they can make this happen. And the fighter's like, fuck that, I want it 50-50. And then the promoters get involved and they don't want you to fight that guy. Fight the number one mandatory contender. And then some great fights never take place or they take place too late, like Floyd Mayweather and...

Manny Pacquiao. They fought too late. I mean, if that fight could have been arranged by Riyadh season, they probably would have caught them both in their prime and it would have been chaos. Yeah, yeah. Manny was, he was done before that ever started. Yeah, and he also had a blown shoulder going into the fight. Yeah. He needed shoulder surgery before the fight even started.

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ZipRecruiter.com slash Rogan. Again, that's ZipRecruiter.com slash Rogan. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Yeah, yeah. Have you, I have a little regret that I never had a professional fight.

And I was just in Mexico. And my driver started talking about boxing. And my driver told me his son was a pro fighter and that if I wanted to, and he told me how much it would cost, I could come have a professional fight and his son would let me win the fight.

No. But then I could have, well, but it would be a sanctioned fight and it would go, I would have a box rec score of one and O or O and one. I mean, I could have not paid the money and like taken the loss, but at least I would have had it. And I did think about it for like about, I don't know, maybe a minute. And I decided not to do it because like you and I were talking, like, I just can't take getting hit in the head anymore. Yeah.

And, you know, when I was younger and I had the gym, I would spar more. You know, in Canelo I sparred and that was controlled. But I sparred Cam Newton once. You know the football player? Sure, yeah. Who's 6'5". And he was in the gym and he wanted to work. And I'm like, well, let's spar. And we'll just, you know, spar light. And he wasn't a boxer. And I have, you know, basic skills.

defensive boxing skills. But I'm like, well, just let's work him. And he's like, okay. And we started, you know, kind of sparring a bit. And he didn't really know what he was doing, but he's a very, very physical specimen. And I lightly kind of jabbed at his face and

and maybe hit the gloves, and he just went insane. And started punching me across the ring. And I'm just like flashes of white. I lost all feeling in my hands.

And then I didn't spar any other athletes until Steve Nash came into our gym, the basketball player. And he wasn't as big as Kevin. So I'm like, well, all right, I'll spar with Steve Nash. And he doesn't know how to box, so we'll just gentleman spar. So we're sparring a bit, and I hit him, and I underestimate how fucking athletic he is. He just fucking cracks me hard with a solid right, and my hands go numb. I see nothing.

And then I'm like, that's it. I'm done. And then Saquon Barkley comes into our gym. Do you know who Israel Barkley was? A pro fighter. His uncle had an incredible career as a pro fighter. Is that Iran Barkley? My bad. Iran Barkley. Thank you.

Wow, that was a political slip. Israel Barkley. Oh, shit. Sorry, everybody. Thank you, Joe. Iran Barkley. Do you know who Iran Barkley is? Sure. Okay, good. So that was Saquon Barkley's uncle, right? Did you know that? No, I didn't know that. Yeah, that was his uncle.

So Saquon comes into our gym and I'm like, oh, I'm going to spar. And I'm like, no, I'm not. I'm not going to fuck with this guy. After Cam Newton and Steve Nash. And Saquon Barkley is a fucking stud, right? Like this guy's like Mike Tyson, but bigger, just his body type. So I'm like, well, I'll hold mitts for him. I just want to see. And that guy could fight like his uncle, Iran Barkley. Legend. Legend.

And he started throwing punches and Saquon Barkley could move and counter and had balance and, you know, head movement. I'm like, dude, if you had instead of playing football gotten into this at, you know, 12, 13 years,

I'm assuming that your brain stayed on. You would have been one of the great heavyweights of all time. He could, um, Saquon could box. Wow. And so, but I learned, I thought about taking the fight in Mexico and I decided I'm not, would you ever? Yeah. Hell no. Right. No, not now. I'm 57. There's no way I'm fighting anybody now. Dude, you're in shape. I did agree to fight Wesley Snipes like 20 years ago.

Yeah, there was... What happened? Well, he... You remember what happened with him with taxes? Yeah, of course. He went to jail, right? Yeah. So I think they were trying to figure out a way to make money to try to pay the government off. And the UFC, they contacted...

Well, this guy, Campbell McLaren, who was one of the original producers of the first UFC before Zufa bought it, he knew me because I worked for him at the time. I was the post-fight interviewer in 1997 and 1998. And that was when I first started working for the UFC. I remember. I started again as a commentator in 2001. So in 19...

You know, 97, when I knew him, he knew that I did martial arts. He knew I was obsessed with this. And then, so he contacts me, like, I guess it was like 2004 or five or something like that, somewhere around then. And he says, this is going to sound crazy, but Wesley Snipes wants to have a UFC fight. And he wanted to fight Jean-Claude Van Damme. And we didn't think that that would be compelling. And so we offered some other names and we said, what about Joe Rogan? And he said, yes.

And I said, well, what do you mean? Like, when are we talking about? Like, how... Because I've been training. I was brown belt in jiu-jitsu, and I'd been training kickboxing still. I was regularly training. And so I would have to really ramp everything up. Well, and he was kind of a martial arts guy, right? Yeah, he's a martial artist, but I don't think he's ever had a fight. And I don't think he...

has any ground game and that's a giant problem no no you would have gotten a hold of them but also I was a national I mean I competed nationally in Taekwondo for five six years traveled around the country like and I had three kickboxing fights I was a good stand-up fighter like and I can kick very hard I'm very good and even then I was even better because I was in my 30s so what happened

He didn't want to do it. For whatever reason you just said, you would have killed him. As time went on, I think he kind of understood that it was a bad idea. I think initially he thought, who knows, it could have been fucking chemically fueled, these conversations with him. The desire to have it was chemically fueled and then he sobered up. But I trained every day. I trained for six months. You would have annihilated him. I was kickboxing with Rob Kamen in the morning and I was doing jujitsu at night. I was fucking...

fucking exhausted. Prepping for the Wesley Shirts fight or just in... We were in negotiation. So the first negotiation was 50-50. They were going to split it 50-50, this and that, blah, blah, blah. And I said, okay, great. And then a couple weeks went by. I had lawyers involved, the whole thing. And then it was like, Wesley wants 60-40. But this time I'd already invested so much time training. I go, okay.

Just give it to him. I'm like, I'm gonna fuck this guy up I go just give it to him just give it to him and then it got to a point where just give me a half a million dollars I don't care what you give Wesley. I go I want give me a half a million dollars We're good, and we agreed on that. I said I don't care what you give him. Just give it to him I'm gonna I'm going to fucking strangle this guy I'm gonna get a hold of them and there's not gonna be a goddamn thing he can do about it I was convinced

And I was like, it was so, but it was so engrossing. Like it took up all my energy and my time. Like when I, my mind shifted into like what it was when I was younger and I was fighting, it was wild. It was weird. Like I became like a different person for like a, like almost a year. So like when you hear the name Wesley Snipes now, I have no animosity. There's not like a little part of your brain that still flips. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I think he did a smart thing.

I think he did a smart thing by not doing it. It's just so interesting, and the idea that you got to experience a version of what it feels like to prepare to fight someone. Yeah. Because people just don't get it, right? Well, I had fought a bunch of times, you know, and when I was younger. I mean, it had been more than 10 years since my last fight, but...

I knew what it was like. I knew the experience. I knew what training and preparing was like. And I also knew that, like, I was a, like, legitimate brown belt in jiu-jitsu. Dude, you would have fucked him up. I had been training jiu-jitsu for a long time. But it was like, I think he had this idea that he was going to be able to hit me when I was trying to take him down. I was like, dude, I would fucking happily stand up. Do you think the Zuckerberg-Musk was ever real? Was it ever even slightly real? I don't know.

That to me is the most silly. Could you ask him, please? Zuckerberg is legit. He trains hard. He trains with legit guys. He trains all the time. He's very smart and very obsessed by it. And he's like legitimately training. He's significantly smaller than Elon. Elon's a big guy.

But that only goes so far, especially if you don't have any endurance. But does Elon – what do you think Elon's fighting strategy would be like? Well, he took karate when he was younger. So would he come karateing? I don't know. I don't think it was ever going to happen. I mean I was entertaining it because I think it would be fun if it did happen and Elon said he would do it and Zuckerberg said he would do it. But –

Like, how can I don't know how the guy tweets as much as he does. How the fuck could you train for a fight? I mean, how do you how do you run SpaceX and Tesla and the Department of Government Efficiency and Starlink? Joe, he's your friend. You know him better than we do. How the fuck does he do it? I don't know how he does it. And I'm his friend. I don't know how he does it. I don't understand it. He's he's I've never seen anybody who knows how to manage time better than that guy. Yeah.

And he also has like 100 kids. Like, I don't fucking—he's a different type of human. I just love the idea of people that don't ever fight having to suddenly have a fight. Right? Just like, you know, because people have never fought but suddenly get themselves— Okay, here's another secret. When I do scroll, I look for street fights with people who don't know how to fight. Right?

Or drunk people fighting is funny too. But like, you know, okay, Elon and Zucker, Mark, you know, are going to fight. Okay, let's say it's going to really happen. They both train, but they're not fighters. So however much they train, they're still running their other businesses. Now the fight starts. And for about 20 seconds, they're going to have some tactics that their trainers have been. And then it's all going to go out the fucking window. It won't go out the window with Zuckerberg. Okay.

Zuckerberg's a real martial artist. But has he ever really fought? Yes, he's had jiu-jitsu matches. He hasn't fought a kickboxing match, but he does a lot of sparring. So he could do a two-minute or a three-minute round? 100%. No doubt. Yeah, no doubt. And also, he's very disciplined. And stay true to his... What style of fighting? Well, he trains in jiu-jitsu, but he also trains in mixed martial arts. So he does Muay Thai, he does everything.

He's really obsessed with it. Yeah, okay. And he has been for years. Okay, so... He's a legitimate martial artist. Okay, but now Elon's going to come out, and Elon's running SpaceX, and he's got the dodge, and now he's going to take some time and focus on the fight. He's not going to do it. No, I don't. No, you don't have the... There's no way he has the time.

If you want to really prepare properly, you train twice a day and you have to have recovery in between. So you have to get massages. You have to do red light therapy. You have to do everything, especially if you're at his age. And you have to take hormones. You have to be on the ball. You have to take peptides. You have to. You have to really watch your nutrition. You have to really make sure you get enough sleep. All those things are out the window. He's not doing any of those things.

He doesn't have the time to do any of those things. No, so it would have to be like a demonstration where they agree to how it's going to go. But even then, there's no way he could be in condition for it. There's no way. And so he did train with some of my friends. He trained with Lex Friedman. I think he trained with George St. Pierre as well.

So I think he realized early on. His cardio wasn't going to get him there. His cardio is non-existent. What is harder on cardio than boxing slash UFC, do you think? I always say boxing, people don't understand how exhausting boxing is.

40 seconds of sparring. And I've never fought UFC. I've always felt that boxing, for some reason, is actually harder on the cardio. I'm sure I'm wrong. I'm sure I'm wrong. Yeah, definitely wrong. Wrestling is the hardest. Wrestling is number one. But what else compares in terms of cardio and physical demanding to boxing?

UFC, boxing? Maybe ultra running? Maybe really crazy things where guys have to run like 300 miles? But they don't have the anaerobic kind of exhaustion. Soccer? Soccer takes incredible conditioning. Incredible conditioning. Those guys are unbelievably fit. Have you ever followed a

Aussie rules football? Yes. So, you know, I'm doing my next films about a football game that some Marines played in World War II. And we're filming it in Australia. It's called the Mosquito Bowl. And in the middle of true story about this football game that was played on Guadalcanal before the Battle of Okinawa. But these Marines all played it. These Marines were good college football stars. And then they all died in the Battle of Okinawa. So it's an intense story.

but we need to film this tackle football game. There was supposed to be a touch game and the Marines ended up playing tackle and legend has it that it was the most violent football game ever played. And so we got to film a tackle football game.

um in australia which is we're going to make the film and like stuntmen are tough but like playing tackle football it you know is a is a painful thing to do right imagine you know even like turkey bowl touch football games on thanksgiving get like people are in the hospital so i was just in australia and i'm i had the idea that well like aussie rules football it's perfect

We'll just take a bunch of these guys and teach them how to play tackle football, and they'll really do it. So I just went to an Aussie rules football practice in Brisbane, Australia, and those fucking dudes are tough. They are tough. Have you ever just watched like the highlight reels of Aussie? I mean, no pads, full smash. And I put that. Yeah, here it is.

I mean, yeah, these are the guys we're going to use. Oh, my God. These fucking collisions. Oh, Jesus. I think these are the toughest athletes. I think this is how they should play regular football. I do, too. I really feel like the pads are bullshit.

But the only way you can play American-style football is with pads. Because the collisions that these guys have, your career would be cut short. Look at this guy. Oh, out cold. He's done. Stiff. Look at this. Look at the hitting. It's just fucking nuts. And I'm sure a lot of head-to-head collisions, too. So I went to a practice of one of these teams. I just got back. And they were...

And I brought in American football. And I'm like, all right, do you guys have any idea? And they're like, zero. I'm like, come on. You sort of have to know something. And they're like, zero. Really? They just know nothing. Like, how much of cricket do you know? Zero. Okay. If I had to gun your head and said one rule of cricket, could you do it? No. Could you do it? Yeah.

No, you couldn't. Cricket, do you understand? The ball's got to stay in, I think. I've seen them try to throw it back in. Stay in to what? The ball has to stay in to what? The pitch. We don't know shit. Do you understand how fucking popular cricket is? Gigantic. Like, bigger than football. Huge. Go to India or Sri Lanka. I mean, like, these people go nuts. So in Australia, they have 100,000 people stadiums for Aussie World's football.

So I go and I'm like, you know, I'm meeting these guys. And these guys I think are big stars. I don't know them. But, you know, this is a major Aussie rules football team. And I got the football. And so I line them up 11 against 11. And they're really kind of starting to get into it. And they're lined up center, guards, tackles, ends. And I'm like, all right.

So what do you think? They're like, yeah, we don't like it. I go, well, let me help. Tell me what this does for you. All right, you're the center. If you were doing this in American football, you'd be making $6 to $7 million a year. You're the tackle on blindside. You're making $40 million a year protecting Patrick Mahomes. Okay, you're Patrick Mahomes. And I'm telling them how much money they would make because these guys make no money. There's no money in it. Which is crazy. Crazy. And then they have...

Do you know tall poppy syndrome? Have you heard of this? Yes. There's no ego. Like these guys...

They're huge. You know, they're members of these super successful teams, but they don't have the ego of American athletes and they don't get the attention. And it's tall poppy syndrome. They're culturally, you know, conditioned to not brag and to boast and to be humble. And and I don't know. I'm I like to see people get knocked down when they get too big. Yeah, for sure. That's tall poppy. They cut the tall poppy gets its head cut off. So they stay humble.

which I kind of thought was kind of cool, you know, just realizing that I was hanging out with the captain of an Aussie rules team, and I had dinner with the captain of the...

Oh, the New Zealand All Blacks, the rugby team. And this guy, this was a little while ago, a couple of years ago. This guy in America, I mean, you know the All Blacks, like the most popular rugby team. And the most humble dude ever. And you go to a restaurant and nobody bothers him. He, you know, no security, no nothing. We don't, that would never exist here. But seeing how hard these dudes hit.

And trained made me think, well, maybe they're working at the level of athleticism that fighters are working at. I mean, that's a hard fucking sport. It seems like it, especially if you watch that video. Like that's unbelievably grueling. The difference between fighting and anything else is there's no one there to assist you. There's no other teammates. There's no rules. There's no timeouts.

You know, you have round breaks, but fighting is very individual. And if you didn't prepare properly and your opponent did, you're fucked. If he's better than you and he's more skilled and he's got better genetics and better training and he comes from a better background and he's more...

He's more technical. You're fucked. You know, it's a crazy sport where you're literally putting your health on the line every time you spar. Let me ask you this question, and this is something I don't talk about, but it's another secret theory that I have. Okay. Just between you and me. I feel like – and I've seen a lot of boxers train, and I've seen a lot of great trainers –

Eddie and Chepo are great trainers. Abel Sanchez is a great trainer. Pedro Neymar from my gym. Lots of great trainers out there. And I've watched entire camps where trainers, like if I'm your trainer, I figure out, okay, this is our opponent. These are going to be our tactics. We're going to do a lot of jabbing with overhead rights. And we're going to take our head offline consistently. We're going to counter this way. And we're going to do this.

And I've really watched this and paid a lot of attention to it. And this is, I'm not in any way shitting on trainers, but I'm kind of making your point about how alone fighters are. I see all this training and I watch it and I understand the strategies and the tactics. And the second the fight starts, none of it has any relationship to how the fight goes down.

All the strategy is rarely employed and it becomes this moment where a fighter has to adjust and adapt and improvise incredibly. And yeah, the conditioning matters a lot, but I often think that like the training doesn't do shit. The trainers are, they can help you get your head right and get yourself in a warrior's mindset. And I do respect that. But tactics, sometimes I think that they're like,

Am I wrong? Yeah. Okay. You're definitely wrong. All right. At the highest level, it's the most important thing. Okay, but do not...

At the highest level, like at a Terrence Crawford level. Tactics are everything. But he just does it. Yeah, he just does it. But it's also because he spent so much time working on the fundamentals and the technique and the movements and counters and positioning. And he understands boxing so comprehensively. He knows where the punches are coming from. He knows where...

where he's going to be vulnerable to get hit. He knows when he's not. He knows when he has to take a risk. And to give one, he has to take one. But how much of that, like his trainer, Boham, I might be saying, I know him. I know his trainer. Just like Eddie and Chepo, who's got to have Canelo. They have lots of other fighters. Mm-hmm.

But like Eddie and Chepo have never had another Canelo Alvarez, including all of his brothers. And I'm like, okay, how much of it is just God-given talent like Terrence Crawford has that's then trained by trainers?

versus how much credit does a trainer get? Trainer gets some credit, but a trainer with a bad fighter is never going to create a world champion. You have to be an extraordinary individual to be a championship-level fighter, no doubt. And then there are some championship-level fighters that have emerged from gyms that don't have any championship, like Marvin Hager, one of the greatest of all time.

He came out of the Petronelli Brothers gym. They weren't known for having like a giant stable of multiple world champions. Who are the top, in your opinion, the best UFC trainers? Well, there's quite a few. There's quite a few. There's some really elite trainers out there, and I don't want to miss anybody. But Firas Zahabi is probably one of my favorite because he's –

very, very intelligent and very analytical. And he does a fantastic job also of breaking down fights, both before the fight and after the fight, and telling you what tactics didn't work and why they didn't work and what went wrong in the fight and what was very effective.

He's just a brilliant human being and also just so intelligent about the way he makes his fighters prepare. And he trained George St. Pierre, who's one of the greatest, if not the greatest of all time. So there's him.

There's Greg Jackson and Mike Winklejohn from Jackson, Winklejohn in Albuquerque, which is a phenomenal gym. That's where John Jones came from. Multiple world champions have come from that gym. Those guys are phenomenal. John Crouch in Arizona. He's phenomenal. There's just so many fucking top of the food chain guys. And how much of that skill is...

And if it's all equal, I get it. But how much of that skill that makes a great UFC trainer is, okay, if I'm your trainer and I'm getting you ready for a fight, I'm going to study your opponent. I'm going to study your opponent's strengths, his weaknesses, his tendencies, his tells. And I'm going to train you in relationship to that and be right. So you can anticipate where there's going to be an opportunity and take it.

How much of it is that and how effective is that versus how much of it is, Joe, I got to keep you fucking ready for anything. I got to keep you in shape. I got to keep you mentally good. I got to remove distractions. And I got to be like your father, your uncle, your brother, and everything else in between. You know what I mean? Yeah, I think there's both.

But I think for some fighters, every fighter has a different approach. Jon Jones is famous for studying tape.

and devising game plans and strategies that are based on what he sees about his opponent's tendencies. Yeah, yeah. And that's how he caught Daniel Cormier with that left high kick. Like, he knew that Daniel dips to the right. Yeah. And, you know, and Daniel even called it out before that. You think you're going to hit me with that head kick? And he actually did hit him with it in the fight. Yeah. Because Daniel had a tendency, and John exploited that tendency. And he does that with everybody. He's famous...

famous for not just doing that but also not taking fights on last minute notice like he's had some opponents fall out and the UFC offers him an alternative opponent in a short period of time and he says no I didn't train for that fighter he

He goes, I'm the greatest of all time for a reason. And that reason is I'm fully prepared for every fight. I'm not going to take a fight against someone who I'm not fully prepared for. And has he had the same coach his entire career? Yes. Yes. So that's a real. That's Jackson Winklejohn. He's been with them forever. And that's an incredible pairing. Well, it's incredible. Jackson in particular is fantastic at devising strategies to deal with opponents. And, you know, he trained Holly Holm when she knocked out Ronda Rousey. I was there. They are. You were in Australia for that?

That was in Australia. No, I wasn't there. I watched it. I felt like I was there because I watched it. And then it was shocking. That was crazy. That was a crazy fight. But they trained her for it. Were you there? Yes. Shocked, right? Oh, it was incredible. Yeah. But Holly was good, man. She was a multiple-time world champion in boxing and in kickboxing. She was a very, very legit striker. You were surprised? Yeah. It was shocking. But it was also like Holly was good. She was really fucking good. Yeah.

And when she landed that head kick, like, holy shit. I remember Rhonda's face, just the shock in her face. And she just, it was, yeah, that was, I literally felt like I was there because it was a piercing moment. But they knew that Rhonda had a very specific entry that she used to try to take people down.

And they avoided that every single time. Kept her out. They circled away. They fought off Ronda's takedown attempts and kept the fight standing. And that flustered her. Yeah. Well, it was just more effective. And so it really depends on the athlete. Like I said, if you get a person that falls apart in the heat of the moment and just throws it all out the window and starts brawling, yeah, well, then your training has kind of gone to waste. And then they're relying on instincts and hopefully skill. But...

If you have a really good fighter and a really good trainer, then you get a Mike Tyson. What was her trainer? Edmund or Rhonda's trainer? I can't remember his name. Yeah.

But I wonder whether he underprepared her for that, right? I don't know. I mean, she was very stretched thin when that was going on because she was doing movies and she was a superstar and she was like constantly being courted. You know, she did a movie for me. I'm part of that problem. Oh, really? What was that? It was Mile 22, but she had kind of retired by then. Okay.

This was after her. This was after the fight. Yeah, I think that the distractions when you're a superstar are huge. And if you give in to all those distractions, you say yes to everything. And you have agents that want you to be. And you think like you're so confident you could do anything anyway. I don't give a fuck. I'll beat everybody. And that's how every champion feels. Sometimes I think about like what I've seen with coaches. And, you know, I do appreciate a coach sometimes.

And I've just seen different success stories in different ways that coaches have really impacted fighters. But I think about like, why don't life coaches work better? And like, I wouldn't mind having a coach that would be like, Pete, here's our enemy. Here's our opponents. And like, I actually had a therapist for a while who actually, when I first started seeing him, his name's Barry and he's a great guy. And

I love him, but so much of my relationship with him was unpacking my shit, my parents and my trauma and my fears and all this stuff.

And for years, Barry would talk to me about my dreams and all this stuff and like the dreams that I had that night, not my goals. And then I started realizing, OK, I feel like I've talked about my mom and my grandma and my grandparents and every fucking thing, the bad that's ever happened to me. And like, Barry, what if we start talking strategy? Like, could you coach me?

And he started coaching me a bit and I found that like with my business decisions, my creativity decisions, like you're so disciplined. Like, I don't know. Do you ever think like, why don't life coaches work better? And if you had someone like John Jones coach in your life every fucking day, would it be better? I think for a lot of people, yes.

Yeah, if you could find someone who could devise a strategy that you could follow and you could help because it's a collaboration, you know, you could collaborate with this person and go, yeah, there's definitely value in that. But you could also be your own coach.

Yeah, but you can. So many people can't, right? Like, don't people ask you or, I don't know, they ask me for, you know, advice and how do you do it? And I'm like, well, you know, you got to go to bed. You got to get up early. You've got to have self-motivation. You have to not make stupid mistakes. And, you know, sometimes what you don't do that helps more than what you do. And I'm aware of people struggling to figure out, like more than ever, especially with

with all this perceived success through social media and the glorification of billionaires and all this stuff, everyone's like, I'm not happy where I am and I want... And I'm like, well, are you following these basic rules? Like the basic rules that I believe you follow, you, Joe, follow. And people seem to have so much trouble getting on a program. Well, you have to pay attention to the people that are successful. Like, what are they doing? And without doubt...

Everyone who is really successful and has longevity has discipline. And discipline is maybe number one. Discipline is showing up with a desire to improve and work hard every day. What do you think the source of your discipline is? Martial arts.

For sure. 100%. Learning when I was young that focus and drive and attention to detail and obsession leads you to get excellent at something. And there's no ifs, ands, or buts about it. The more time I put in, the more I trained, the better I got. The more I was really locked in and focused, the better I performed. And I learned that at a young age. I learned that as a kid.

And so I developed discipline when I was very young. But so thousands of young people, at what age did you start martial arts? I started fighting when I was 15. Okay, but you started fighting? When did you start training? I started training when I was like 14. I took my first karate class when I was 14. That's actually older than I would have thought. But like so many, you know, thousands of kids take boxing classes or lessons for mixed martial arts or whatever, and they don't.

find the level of discipline that you were able to find, right? Yeah, it's not for everybody. So, but what made you able, what made you, like, was it your parents? Was it insecurity? Was it someone that gave you shit when you were eight that made you be like, fuck it, I'm going to learn this shit and I'm going to master it? Well,

When I first started doing it, I just wanted to figure out how to fight. And I was very lucky that I found a gym that was filled with incredible fighters. They were very high level. One of the guys, my friend John Lee, was a national champion and he was like a mentor to me.

And, you know, I was a white belt and he was a black belt and competing in the World Cup at the time. That's when I met him. And, you know, he just took a liking to me and helped me out a lot. So white belts, you were a total novice. Complete beginner. But I got a black belt in two years. I was obsessed. I trained every day of the week. I had a key to the gym and I could work out anytime I wanted because my instructor at some point in time realized that I had potential.

Made a deal with me and offered me I could teach classes and if I taught classes and I taught private lessons like teaching beginners like when they first come in you have to take a certain amount of beginner classes private lessons before you're allowed to enter into the group class, so I would teach people from the very beginning and So because of that I was able to be at the gym all day long and and whenever I wanted to be there I could be there and I also from teaching

Really broke down technique, which is the most important thing to like if you have bad technique Even if you're like a good fighter you have flaws in your you can get pretty far with bad technique If you're just eventually you get your car It's just not you're not gonna be the best the best have excellent technique like without doubt Especially when it comes to martial arts. It's but I

kicking and jujitsu like it's technique is everything in technique and and drive and training and focus and I realized early on like I thought I was a loser and then until I started doing martial arts and getting really good at martial arts I'm like oh I'm not a loser like I'm really good at this like I have a propensity to it I have a genetic propensity I have like very good I'm fast I hit really hard and I really loved it I love getting better I love the fear of it too I love being terrified I

I loved overcoming the fear of competition. It was so fucking scary. It was like religious for you, though, wasn't it? Oh, yeah. It was a massive experience. It was so religious that my girlfriend at the time wanted to fuck in the gym because I had the keys and I wouldn't have sex with her there. I'm like, no. Why? It's a sacred space? Yeah. You can't fuck in the church? Even when no one was there, I would bow. That might have been a mistake. I'd go into the gym. You should have fucked her. No, I fucked her plenty. All right. All right.

So we're keeping it. But like, like, okay. So I think that's so interesting that to trace the origin story of your fuse being ignited because people look at you and they're like, okay, that dude is fucking on. He's in it. I've had people tell me that I'm in it.

Some of our friends, mutual friends are in it. You know when you're in it. You know when you're in it. Most people can't find that. Well, they don't have the thing. Not everybody's going to be great at everything. They're just not. Some people just don't have the discipline, the desire. They don't have the willpower to push through when they're tired. They don't have the willpower to show up when they're feeling tired and lazy or when they're uninspired. You have to learn that.

And you have to learn that through like if you want to get great. There's only one pathway. There's only one pathway It's hard work and discipline. There's no other way and you might not get there still because if you're a hard work and you have discipline But you're you're competing against Mike Tyson. He also has timing. Yeah, he also has hard work and discipline but superior genetics and superior training Hypnotized from the time he was 13. You're fucked. Yeah, you're fucked. Yeah, I am I can remember

When Canelo Alvarez first came into my gym, and he was young, he was just starting to, you know, have a rep. Everything about that guy reeked of exceptionalism. The way he put his bag down, the way he took his shoes out, right? The way he drank his water. Every rep, every, you know, when he started to stretch, every single stretch felt intentional as fuck.

Him starting to just lightly warm up on a heavy bag felt he was absolutely exceptional. And I try to tell other fighters in our gym and other people in general that, like, you don't understand. It's not something, you know, you see other pro fighters. I've seen a lot of them come to our gym and they're talking to people and they're joking around. They're sort of, you know, taking a moment or two off.

And then you look at all of them and these are good fighters. I mean, these are pro fighters.

But they're not exceptional. And they don't have that intention. And when I would see Canelo Alvarez or certain elite... Crawford's done media days at our gym. From the moment they walk in, everything about them, the way they take their sweatshirt off and fold it up and put it down. I'm like, that dude's a world fucking champion. Has nothing to do with the fighting. The way they hold their hands out when they're getting taped. It's almost like everything...

Every breath from the moment they walk in to walk out is so fucking exceptional. And I look at all these other fighters and go, no, you don't understand. He's got something you don't have. And you can still lose with all that. Because you might be competing against a guy who has a slightly better strategy and maybe he's better at one thing that sets you off.

Yeah. And you want to beat that guy? Well, you got to work even harder. You got to go back and figure out what you did wrong. You got to figure out where your flaws are and improve upon them. Whether it's an endurance issue, whether it's a technique and strategy issue, whether it's

pacing, whatever it is. Floyd never lost, right? And I do, I have, I totally agree with you what you said earlier, that Floyd deserves. That's a great story. I just, for some reason, have in my life over the years, sometimes hated on him a little bit for a variety of reasons, mainly because of how defensive he was. Now I know how great he is, but I do sometimes look for inspiration in random places. And if I'm feeling like I need a reminder of what excellence is, I'll watch training videos

from Vegas with Floyd, just him and his uncle or his dad just doing the mitts, doing these like 15-minute rounds, just so smooth and effortless. And what does he say? Hard work, easy work, hard work. I can't remember what his phrase is. But the beauty of

of like Mayweather training in a gym. And I just find that so interesting to look for people who are exceptional. - It's a long road, man. It's a long road. You're making a mountain one layer of paint at a time. And you're competing against other people that are doing the exact same thing. And unless you set yourself apart from the pack

Unless you're a guy like Marvin Hagler that goes to Cape Cod and trains in the winter and runs on the fucking sand. Unless you're that guy that pushes it past everybody else, you're not going to be exceptional. And it's a fucking struggle. That's why some fighters, they reach a certain level of success and they sort of slack off. A lot of people thought Canelo was doing that when he started playing golf all the time. They're like, oh, he's not completely focused anymore. He's

And maybe this is why he doesn't want to fight Benavidez. Might be. Might be a little true. It also might be a money thing. It might be like, look, I'll fight that guy. But I know what that fight is. And I want $200 million for that fight. How about just like how hard it is to stay hungry when your refrigerator is that fucking full? Oh, yeah. Like, you're Ken Alavarez. You're a good looking dude. You have a beautiful wife. You've got this...

Hacienda in Mexico that Pablo Escobar would have killed for with the stallions and the cars. And you got to go fucking deal with David Benavidez? Right. That's like Rocky when he had to go fight, I can't remember who, and he's all rich. Clubber Lang. Yeah, he had to go fight Clubber Lang, rich. Yeah. Like, okay, Canelo Alvarez, I'll fight you poor, but now I got to fight you rich? Right. And I got to wake up for...

Hagler always used to say it's very difficult to wake up in the morning when you're sleeping in silk sheets. Yeah. Yeah. And I do think about that also. I have people asking me, we started talking about making American Prime Viewable. That was 145 days up on a mountain and standing on ice.

with clamp on your shoes because we're on ski mountains and there's fucking wind and it's fucking miserable. And I'm like, people are like, why are you doing this shit? I'm like, because I fucking love it. Because you fucking love it. I love it. But they're like, but we could like, you know, I got a boat. We're going to go into the Mediterranean. I'm like, no, I'm going to be up on the mountain. Yeah. And like staying hungry is a...

I don't know. Well, it all depends on what your motivation is. If your motivation is just get wealthy and then once you reach that point, now you're fucked.

Because now you don't have this motivation anymore. If your motivation is the big house and the big cars and all that bullshit. But if your motivation is excellence, you can maintain that motivation no matter what your financial state is. Forever. It's an unlimited source. I mean, that's the necklace I wear. Pleasing to God is a creation of beautiful things. That's what it says on your necklace? Yeah. The only thing pleasing to God is the creation of beautiful and exalted things. It's that quote. That's perfect. It reminds me, dude, like.

Okay, I don't... I'll enjoy... Like, you want to take me to a fancy Michelin restaurant here in Austin? Okay. You want to take me to Guero's and fucking have some ribs? Okay. Like, I don't care. And, I mean...

I appreciate it. Right, but it's not your primary motivation. Hell fucking no. Your primary motivation is not to show up at the big party and have everybody kiss your ass. No. No, it's creation. The creation of great art. Correct. Yeah, and if you're a fighter, it's the same thing. It's like to...

To be excellent, to be unstoppable, to be the best of the best. And if you have that motivation, you can maintain that with wealth. You can still get hungry to be Canelo and come out and fight David Ben-Avila. But it's obviously very hard to do, which is why most fighters don't maintain it once they achieve wealth. Who's the best fighter?

Who's the best? I think Tom Brady is a great example of someone that was able to just reignite the fucking beast. Yes. Kobe Bryant, I guess.

- You know, yes, but like fighters or people that you know that, I just think it's interesting to think about. - It's a different thing though. Sports and fighting are a different thing because-- - You don't play boxing? - Yeah, you don't play it. It's like you could decide that you're gonna still maintain a very high level of basketball and you wanna just be excellent, but no one's kicking you in the legs.

You know, no one's taking you down and strangling you. Who's the George St. Pierre that's been able to like who is it? John Jones that in your mind is like curious in that they were able to.

with a full fridge and comfortable sheets just keep fucking going. But Jon Jones is exceptional because Jon Jones beat a lot of guys when he wasn't training. There was times in his life where he was fucking off and partying all the time and still beating the best guys in the world. That was like the, when he had that press conference with Daniel Cormier and he goes, I beat you when I was doing coke. Yeah.

That's such an insult. What's a worse insult than that? I was high on fucking eight balls and I beat your ass. Well, John talked to me about it. He said, I used to, when I was younger, I used to give myself an excuse. So I would party really hard like a week before the fight, which you should never do. And it's like, well, if I lose, you know, maybe it's because I partied.

But he doesn't do that now. Now he thoroughly prepares. And he went through a time when he was the light heavyweight champion when he was kind of like playing with his food because he was just so much better than everybody else. He wasn't threatened by people. So he wasn't putting on the performances that he did when he was younger, like when he won the title against Shogun. He lost some of that motivation but then gained it later in life when he went through a bunch of legal struggles, a lot of problems, and realized, like, this could all be taken away from me.

I got to get back to what made me great. And then, you know, won the heavyweight title, defended against the greatest in Stipe Miocic. And, you know, now he's the heavyweight champion of the UFC. What do you think? He's been fighting. How many years? He won the title in what, like 2008? When did, what year did Jon Jones win the title?

Which is just fucking crazy. And he's 40 now? No, he's in his 30s. He's the youngest ever champion in the UFC. He won the title at 22 years old. 2011. 2011, okay. So he has been a world champion for 14 years. That is unheard of.

But so he has to be the greatest fighter in the history of the UFC greater than George St. Pierre. I mean, right? Like I think on paper for sure. I think the problem with that is like, who did he fight versus who did George St. Pierre fight? Who did Khabib fight versus who did George St. Pierre? Like, it's like, who did Mighty Mouse fight versus Harrison Silva? Who do you put number one based on those metrics?

Well, out of just the sheer longevity and the accomplishments, I say Jon Jones. But I could see the argument for Mighty Mouse being the best martial artist I've ever seen. I think he's the best expression of martial arts talent and technique that I've ever seen. But then George St. Pierre is right up there, too. And George St. Pierre was, you know, multiple division world champion. He won the...

welterweight title, then he won the middleweight title, and then he came back after four years off and beat Michael Bisping for the middleweight title. He's in the argument, too. I just think there's a real problem with saying the number one of all time, the greatest of all time. But if you were going to give it to somebody, I would say give it to John. When you think about John and how he's been able to do it for this long and go through these highs and lows and get... I mean, fighting and doing blow, that's fucking...

Well, he's that talented. He was that good. He's an intelligent psychopath. Like, but what's in there? You know, like to what we're talking about. What's the, like, what's driving that motherfucker? I don't know. You can't, you can't.

You can't manufacture that. You either are that guy or you are not that guy. So that's pure nature. That's like... It's a lot of things. It's how he grew up. He has two savage brothers. Both of them are NFL players, superior athletes. They beat each other up all the time, I'm sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, it's like you're in a competitive environment from the time you're young. You have incredible genetics on top of that. Then you go to a place like Jackson Winklejohn that is superior training with world-class sparring partners, world-class coaches, world-class...

World-class recovery, training facilities, technique, strategy, all the above. It's like you need a perfect storm to be a real, true, all-time great. Do you think that – because sometimes I think that having a – being fucked up can work to your advantage. Oh, yeah. And having addictive tendencies and being like – being able to harness addictive tendencies –

into something as violent as in, and to be able to apply those to a sport versus just being, well, I'm a well-adjusted human being with no addictive tendencies, not a lot of trauma. I'm going to, I'm going to fight you. Oh no, I'm a fucking beast that grew up in a fight. And like Mike Tyson grew up, I,

I don't even understand if you grew up inside or outside, dealt with fucking ignited torments, drug addictions, violence, and I will kill. And I guess that's always interesting to look at how well-adjusted people do versus people that have real trauma when it gets fucking brutal. I think there's some real value to being out of your fucking mind.

I really do. And I think some of the greatest artists, some of the greatest athletes, some of the greatest accomplishments were achieved by people that were out of their fucking mind and just had pushed it to a level...

to a level and into an area that other people weren't willing to go. And that's how they became the best of the best. And you don't get to be a Michael Jordan unless you're out of your fucking mind. Or maybe an Elon Musk. I don't know. I don't know. Right. Yeah. Similar. Similar in that regard. It's not a normal person that chooses to take on four or five jobs like that. No. And then runs the Department of Government Efficiency. Like, who is that? Now, very few people are willing to put in that kind of work or have that desire to do anything like that.

It has to be real. You can't be forcing it because if you're forcing it, it's like, oh, God, this is like, I don't really want to do this. Well, there's someone out there that wants to do that. They're going to get better. They're going to be better at it. They're obsessed. They're all in. You have to be all in. And when fighters aren't all in anymore, that's the worst stage of their career. It's horrifying. And, you know, I say that about...

People ask me about my job or how do I get a job working in Hollywood? I want to make movies. I'm like, well, are you sure you want to do this? Because like you're not going to have an office. You're not going to have a boss. You're not going to have someone saying, hey, Joe, get up. Time to get up. And you're going to have to be totally self-motivated. You're going to have to deal with – yeah, like –

I feel what you're saying there, but you're going to be judged. You're going to be only as good as your last job. You have no fucking job security. And, you know, you're going to be up at four in the morning in some mountain filming someone cutting someone's fucking head off, having no idea whether you're like on the right path or the wrong. You got to be a little fucking crazy. Yeah. You have to be crazy to think that you can do it.

Right. Because most people don't get a chance to do that. Delusional thinking. You have to be able to be delusional. Well, I don't even think it's delusional. My business a little bit. You have to be willing to go through everything that it takes to get there. And that is not an easy road.

And it's not an easy road to be a great filmmaker. It's not an easy road to be a great athlete. No matter what you're doing, you have to be a great author. You have to be willing to go down that road. And it is a long road with trials and tribulations and errors and successes. And you have to learn from your successes and learn from your failures. And not everybody has their shit together enough to pursue a path consistently for a long enough period of time that you achieve greatness.

Yeah. Or and having the combination of having your shit together and being fucked up because it's got to be you got to be crazy, but you got to be able to functionally crazy. I always say delusional thinking because I made the point to people asking me about my job. I'm like, well, OK, think about it this way.

You have to have the ability to look someone in the eye. So if I'm a young filmmaker and you're the head of a studio, I have to look you in the eye and say, hey, Joe, here's the deal. I need $135 million. I'm going to make up a story about a bunch of cowboys and Indians fighting in a mountain. I'm going to bring all these people up there. I'm going to

film it and move people around and I'm going to edit it all together and I'm going to for your 130 million dollars I'm going to build this thing I'm going to make it all put music on it and edit it and make it all and I'm going to put it out into the world and people are going to stop doing what they're doing and they're going to watch it and they're going to love it and it's going to bring you value but why is it delusional if other people have done it

Because everyone that's done it is a little delusional. Because it just doesn't... You're right. It's not totally delusional, but it's a little bit of magical thinking. Maybe take the word delusional out of it and be like, you know the idea of magical thinking? That like, oh no, I can do something...

That that's very doesn't quite make sense. It's not like I'm going to make this table. I'm going to measure it and cut it and nail it and attach it to a frame. And no, it's like I'm going to I've got this abstract vision that I'm going to attempt to.

put together in a way that costs somebody a lot of money and yet I'm going to aspire to touch people's hearts and souls with this. It's just a weird way to think. It is, but... I love it, but it's... But it obviously works. Like, it can't be delus... There's a lot of bad movies out there. Yeah, that's true. There's a lot of bad everything. There's a lot of bad books, you know, but is it delusional to want to write a book? No, it's been done forever. Yeah.

You know, it's just like filmmaking is fairly recent in terms of human history. You know what my dad told me when I told him I was going to Hollywood to learn how to make movies? What? So my dad was a business guy, and I love my dad very much. But he, right when I was getting ready to come to Hollywood, he said, Pete, I've secured you a job at Lehman Brothers. You're going to work on a desk, and you're going to learn about finance. Oh, wow.

It's done. And I had studied theater in college, which was making my dad very anxious because I was starting to get into making these little movies and all this stuff. And I'm like, I'm in L.A. and I'm getting ready to move to L.A. And he stopped me. He said, we're not moving to L.A. I've got you a job.

This guy, Barry Frank, who's a friend of my dad's, who knew someone at Lehman Brothers. And I think they're out of business now, by the way. Big money company. And I'm like, Dad, I'm not doing it. He's like, what do you mean? I go, Dad, I'm not. He said, you're really going to go to fucking bullshit Hollywood? I go, I am. He goes, you're not. I go, I am. He said, okay, I'll tell you what. Good luck out there. You know what's going to happen? You're going to end up making them gay pornos. Ha ha ha!

That's the only thing that can happen if it goes wrong. You make gay pornos. Gay pornos. That's hysterical. And he's staring me in the eye and he's not fucking kidding. That's so fucking funny. And I'm like, Dad,

I'm not. And I fucking left. And in the back of my mind for the last 30 fucking years has been that warning. Don't do gay portos. Be careful. You better fucking work. But it's not magical thinking, but

To my dad, the idea that you were his, you know, because I had no artists in my family. My dad was a business guy. He was like Mad Men advertising, worked for Gray Advertising, like Jif Peanut Butter and shit. Like the account guy. He had to go get the Jif Peanut Butter guys drunk twice a week. And that was his job, you know. But the idea that, wow, you can make a career in the arts. Yeah, people do it, but...

Most people don't fuck with that. Most people don't make it. Yeah. They don't fuck with it. But that's just because it's hard. Yeah. If it was easy, everybody would do it. It was easy. Everybody would have their own fucking movie. Everybody would be making movies. Everybody would have their own fucking podcast. If it was easy to have a podcast, my favorite. I think everybody does.

I think everybody does that. Gavin Newsom just started one. Yeah. Well, you're right. You're right. But so like, well, like, so this is the other thing, right? That I think is so interesting. And it's true with podcasts. When I tell people who like come to Hollywood and they're like, I don't understand this business. I'm what do I do? What do I do? I'm like, fuck off. Let me tell you something.

There's no barrier of entry for my business or podcasting, meaning anybody in the world can move to LA. You don't even have to be in LA anymore. You can be in Austin and be like, I'm an actor. I'm an actress. I'm a writer. I'm a director. I'm a producer. I'm a podcaster. Any motherfucker can do it. You don't need a degree. Right.

Get on an airplane and look to the left when you're getting on. Like, can anyone fly a fucking plane? If your toilet is fucking backed up and you need it fixed, can you just pull anyone off the street? Or does a plumber have to have a fucking degree, right? Right. Like...

But we want to exist. This is where I say magical thinking. You want to thrive in a job where all you're doing is talking, Joe. You're just talking. Anyone can fuck. Everyone has a mouth and two ears. But you're doing it on a different fucking level.

That's magical thinking in a way. Well, if I set out and said I one day want to be the biggest podcaster on earth, that's magical thinking. But I didn't. You just followed your instincts. And who was your first one? Who was the guy you were telling me about? Brian Redband, my buddy Brian. Yeah, we just started out with snowflakes falling from the screen. And we did it on a webcam. We were just being silly. And we just did it all for fun. But people moved to L.A.,

Or get into my business thinking I'm going to smash it. Yes. Like they're not. That's a little bit delusional thinking. Delusional. Yeah. Like I always say to people. Or aspirational. Because it's delusionally aspirational. Yes. Because I'm like, dude, if like you come, you want to work in so-called Hollywood, even though it's not really Hollywood anymore, which is so decentralized. But.

It's fucking show business, motherfucker. It's money and art smashing together in this very bizarre way. And you got to get so good at art that the money people trust you. Yeah. And you got to know how to play the money game. Even when they trust you, you still have to know how to play it. Even if you're, you know...

Tarantino or Christopher Nolan or you still have to understand, you know, for the most part that there's there's financial parameters and you have to be able to accept that and play that because you're playing in a serious game. Like our bosses, they don't give a fuck. They're all publicly held now and they're looking at stock prices.

And I say to people, bro, if you just want to be like an artist and just pure and think about like, oh, I just, you know, like you actually were when you were doing your podcast. Like I kind of was when I was in Minnesota making little movies and doing all this idiotic shit that got my dad to say, oh, you're going to make gay porn, you fucking idiot.

Like, this little phase of, oh, isn't – I was in Minnesota and St. Paul in this small school. And I'm like, I just fucking love this shit. Just like your first podcast. I just loved it. But I'm like, I tell people, if you just want to be an artist, go write plays in Oklahoma City and just stay over out there. But if you want to, like, step into this arena, like –

It's tricky, you know? - But you have to be all in and you have to realize that this is a very high failure rate. - And yeah, even all in, just like fighting,

You still might not make it. You might not make it. Yeah. I mean, acting is the best example of that. There's, I mean, we talked about Tim McGraw being amazing. How many amazing actors out there that don't act? There's a lot. There's a lot of people that can act. You can take them and they can figure out how to do it. It's a weird skill that some people either have or don't have. Some people have the ability. You can definitely get better at it. There's definitely like people that, that train very hard and there's method acting and there's all sorts of different strategies, but yeah,

The reality is there are a small number of roles and a large number of people, and they're auditioning for these things, and if you don't get into one, you probably won't get into another. And it might be 5, 10, 15 years, and you've had no success, and you don't know what the fuck to do. And you can quit, or you can do what Billy Bob Thornton is, and you make Sling Blade.

Right. And then all of a sudden, boom, he takes off. Well, that's what the reason I got into directing was I was trying to act and I was having mixed success and I was getting very scared that, you know, you could prepare for an audition for five days and I know everything and I'm ready and I'm all in and I go in.

And I get 30 seconds of the director's time. And you find out, like, oh, you look like the dude that the director's girlfriend cheated on him. And he's like, you were dead before it started. And I was on this TV show, Chicago Hope. It was a hospital drama. And I was kind of getting a little famous. I played a TV doctor, Billy Kronk.

And people kept calling me Billy whenever I walked down the street like, hey, Billy, what's up, Billy, Billy, Billy? And I'm like, oh, my fucking God, this is going to be my legacy is being this TV fucking doctor, Billy. And I was on an airplane going from L.A. to New York. And I'm sitting there and this guy walks by me and he stops. He goes, hey, Billy. And I'm like, my name is not Billy. My wife has this rash, right?

Show him the rash. And she pulls up her shirt and she's got this fucking rash. And she's sticking it in my face. He's like, Billy, what's the rash? And the other people on the plane are like, what's the rash? And I'm like, fuck this shit. I'm like, I've been busting my ass. I'm barely making it as an actor. And people are showing me their rash. I'm like, I got to fucking do my own sling blade. And I did everything.

Very bad things and still got the worst review ever in the history of you But it started my career. It was a good movie, you know, you know, it's a critic But you know what saved me so I get the the horrible review I throw up and I'm literally in on death's fucking door like I'm done I have no career I get a phone call at night and

From a woman named, her name's Kelly Chapman Myers. She was married to Ron Meyer, who used to run Universal. And she's like, he was a huge fucking guy, Ron Meyer. He was a big, big mogul in our business. And I could hear these guys laughing. And she's like, Pete, Pete, I'm on the boat with Ron and Steven and David Spielberg and David Geffen. Oh, wow.

And we're watching your movie and they're laughing like little fucking frat boys. And the fucking Ron Meyer gets the phone. He's like, this is fucking great. And I'm holding the review of Kenneth Turan. Like, I just got it. And I'm like, what? Hold on. Spielberg. This movie's fucking great. It's great. And I'm like, let's go.

that's awesome yeah so they said well they were right and the critic was wrong i appreciate it but i think a lot of those critics probably wanted to beat you and they didn't didn't get the chance and they failed and they got this job and then they on everything and you got to be able to take the hits yeah i took the hit you know like it strengthens you it strengthens your resolve knock down seven get up eight like i believe in that like like if it's just all good all the time

I think you get knocked down seven, you get up seven. I think you have to get up seven times. No, you get knocked down seven. No, you get knocked down seven. Seven times you get up. You get up for the eighth time. No, seven times. You get knocked down the seventh time, you get up. It's a phrase. It's a phrase. The phrase sucks. Get knocked down seven, get up seven, or get knocked down seven, get up. Well, whoever made the phrase, they're wrong. No, because you start- Every time you get knocked down, you get up. That's one time. Right, but if you start up and get knocked down, one, one.

Yep. You're one ahead of getting up because you started up. No, no, you get knocked down one, you get up one, you get knocked down two. Fall down seven, get up eight. Yeah, they're retarded. So you're saying that Denzel Watson, Japanese proverb. Yeah, that's great. That's great. So you're saying this is wrong? Yeah, every time you get knocked down, you get up. You can't get up if you haven't been knocked down. That's stupid. If you get knocked down seven times, you get up seven times, period. That's stupid.

It's like math, man. You're making me do math. Well, it's just delusion. This is just like pump-you-up talk that doesn't make any sense. So this has been misquoted. You can climb any mountain. No, you can't. There's certain mountains you're not going to climb. Shut the fuck up. This is stupid. I believe I can fly. Well, you fucking can't, R. Kelly. Jump off a building. See what happens. You can't fly. Okay? You get knocked down seven. You get up seven times.

Because otherwise, there's no way to get up when you're already up. Did you hear that? Right? Am I right?

I don't know what you're saying, but I also like you have to get up the first time. That's what I'm saying. No, no, no. You don't get credit for fucking. You don't start up. You don't get credit for not getting knocked down and getting up. That's stupid. But you don't start up. Yes, you do. You start standing up. You get knocked down. Now you're up. You get knocked down once. You get up once. Yeah, but then you have to get knocked down to get up. You have to start. But you start up. Nonsense. You don't get extra credit for fucking standing up. But getting in the ring, you have to have courage.

You get knocked down. That's the challenge is getting knocked down. You fight.

You don't get credit for thinking you're gonna fight. You have to actually do it. When you actually do it and you get knocked down, you get up. You get knocked down once, you get up once. You get knocked down seven times, you get up seven fucking times. You can't get up eight times. What I like about what you're saying is it's just like, oh, I can climb any mountain. No, you fucking can't. Yeah. Like, get knocked down, get up. Who fucking gives a shit? Just get up. Get up. Like, that's the kind of advice...

I'm a fan of, uh, it's like life is not fair. You're going to, you're going to come into the, whatever, if you want really to have success, you're going to see people that work less, that have luck or, you know, connections or who fucking soar past you and it won't be fair. Deal with it. Yeah. Fucking deal with it. Well, you can't compare yourself. You know, that's the great quote. Comparison is the thief of joy.

You can't compare yourself. You can look to other people for inspiration. Have you always felt that? Have you always been that way? Like back in the day when Fear Factor days and before you were Joe, like you are now, were you competitive? Were you? I wasn't competitive with other TV shows. You were just playing your own game. Well, Fear Factor wasn't an example because that was just a job.

The fear factor was I didn't want to work with actors anymore. What about doing stand-up? You were doing stand-up then. Yeah, but stand-up was just a thing that I loved to do, and I did it. I mean, certainly compared myself to other people that were doing better than me. Like, wow, why are they doing better than me? Why are they more successful? Why do they sell out everywhere and I don't? Yeah. Yeah.

But then eventually I caught up. You just keep working. That's all it is. All it is is keep improving and working. And if you don't have the desire to keep improving and working, you should get out because you're in the wrong business. Because there's going to be a bunch of people that do have that desire. And if you want to live a life of mediocrity and half-assedness and just fucking...

kind of showing up and doing the bare minimum. Like what kind of a fucking life is that? That's not fun. That's not exciting. That's not stimulating. But some people don't have drive. They don't have this desire. You can't, you can't like, you can't make a championship fighter out of someone who doesn't like working out. Like you can't, it's not going to happen. Like,

Like you have to have something inside you a calling to whatever you do and for you it is filmmaking You have a calling to this thing. It's a passion project. It's love. It's art. It's intensity It's discipline and focus and you're trying to make the best fucking thing you can make and if you're not doing that you shouldn't be doing what you're doing or You need to come to Jesus moment. You need a refocusing you need something that real that like Pressfield has

where he realized he was kind of like 40 years old and like half-assing his life.

He turned it around and he talks about how he turned it around by deciding that he's a professional and amazing career since then, right? Which is kind of spectacular for anyone that doesn't know Steven Pressfield and they're like they want to do anything like writing sports podcast that motherfucker has laid it out and I'm not a big fan of like self-help tell me shit like the war of art that that dude in my opinion and I think yours is

That's the real deal. Yeah, it's a guidebook. It's a guidebook for creativity and discipline and becoming a professional. And he really laid it out. And he laid it out also with his own personal examples of failure, which I think are very important. You need to know that this struggle that you're experiencing when you feel like you're fucking up, everybody has that. Nobody is just like gung-ho, the best of the best right out of the gate. You learn, you improve. It's a struggle.

Long slow journey, you know, it takes a lot of fucking work and if you're not interested in doing that well You better find something else and there's a lot of people that aren't interested in that a lot of people just want to do a job where they make some money and then at the end of the day they'll play video games hang out with their kids. That's great. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that. But if you want to do something that's Extraordinary that's very hard. It's gonna take extraordinary effort. I

It's going to take extraordinary discipline and willpower, and it's going to take objectivity. You're going to have to have introspection. It's going to be a lot of things. You're going to have a lot of soul searching. And you still might fucking get your ass kicked. Still might get your ass kicked. Yeah. Right? Yeah, but that's why when people do succeed and someone can put together something like American Primeval, it's so fantastic because we know how hard it is to do.

It's not easy. Are you going to apologize to your wife for me or do I have to? No, no, no. She's used to watching. She fucking freaked out on Nosferatu too. She hated that too. You have to watch that movie, the climax that I was talking about. I'm not going to watch that with her. No, no, no. Definitely don't watch it with her.

So the climax, tell everybody you were telling me about it in the gym.

And he's he's this guy's made some really fucked up films and I don't recommend them if you if you have like any sensitivity because this guy is the hardest filmmaker out there right now in my opinion like these are fucking intense movies doing called irreversible did one called enter the void and they're about drugs and death and sex and they're very experiential and

So you feel like you're, yeah, so this is it. This is the climax. And it's about these dancers who accidentally drink a bunch of fucking LSD. And this is the hardest film I think I've ever seen in my life.

And you feel like you are on a very very very bad LSD trip. Is this in subtitles? Yeah, it's French. It's French, but it's language is almost irrelevant but if you want to I don't I don't recommend LSD for because I'm not a doctor and I think it's a very dangerous again And I've done LSD and I've had some pretty intense experiences on it. But this is a brilliantly deranged

I've had a trip into, you know, have you ever had a bad trip, like a really bad trip? Not really. So I haven't either. And I've done, you know, some of the DMT and the 5-MeO and, you know, mushrooms. I've had powerful experiences. But I did have one bad experience on LSD the first time I ever took it.

and none of us had ever taken it before so we didn't feel it so we took another hit thinking that so we all basically were a bunch of high school kids in new york city trying to go to a santana concert and we just started tripping out and it was scary it was actually really really scary this movie um is a experientially it becomes and this is something that is one of my strategies when i'm making movies

is I don't want my movie to be a spectator sport. I don't want you watching it, I want you participating. I want to try and grab you by the throat and make you watch and be like, "Come on, bro, watch. "Put the fucking phone down. "I want to own your heart and your mind and your pulse "while you're watching my films." That's just a goal.

some sometimes i do better than others but that's always the goal i don't want you kind of sitting back watching this gasparno he takes you into it in a way that um i'm sure a lot of people will hate it i mean people see the guy that is like speaks to you the most right now no i don't i mean there's a part of me like so i'm getting ready to make a film called mosquito ball this war movie

And these young kids went through, I don't know if you know, the Pacific Theater Campaign and what the battles of Tarawa and Guadalcanal and Okinawa. These were hellacious, awful fucking violent fights. And the Japanese wouldn't surrender and they believed in Emperor Horhito, so they would fight to the death. You know, bonsai charges and seppuku, they would kill themselves before they would die.

be taken prisoner. In World War II, you had these young American kids who, in our movie, were college football players who Pearl Harbor hits, and they immediately joined the military, and they have to go fight these fucking horrific battles, like just people's throats getting blown out and torturing and killing and suicides from the locals, suicide. And

And so to me, one of my goals with this next film is I want to try, because there's been a lot of good war films, and just like there have been a lot of good Westerns, and I always said, well, I never got to make one, so I want to try and make a Western. That was American Primeval.

There have been a lot of great war films, great war films, but I never got to make one. So my take is to try and bring people into the experience of how- But you have made war films. World War II. Oh, okay. So you're right. I made Lone Survivor, but I never made a World War II film. And there have been a lot of great ones, from Private Ryan to Hacksaw Ridge to- Private Ryan was probably the first one that was realistic though, right? Yeah.

I mean, that opening scene. Yeah. Holy fucking shit. Which is like why Steve, for anyone, like you asked me who I look up to, Steven Spielberg. He is so far and ahead the goat of my business to think that the guy who did fucking Jurassic Park and E.T. God love both. Close Encounters. Then it's like, oh, you know, and Spielberg was always like the good boy of the, because it was like he was growing up with like Coppola and Scorsese and Michael Mann and these guys were like fucking. Yeah, they were just.

fucking hard partying motherfucker. - Right. - You know, hard drinking, hard drugging, hard fucking filmmakers. And Steven was like the good, goody good kid, right? Like, "Well, little Steven, he's gotta go home soon. "Keep the girls in the garage, Steven's still here." And then Steven's like, "Oh really?" And then he makes, you know,

Saving Private Ryan or Schindler's List. And these movies, like, he goes, oh, really? You don't think that I know how to do war? Saving Private Ryan was like another fucking level. Another level. So to answer your question, Spielberg's who I look up to still the most. And I think he's on a whole nother level based on the scope of his work.

But Gaspar Noe, if I'm thinking about the thing I got out of watching this film that I would try and use in my own way for Mosquito Ball for a war movie is the idea that you want to try and take the audience into what it would have been like to try and get on that fucking beach.

And, you know, in the case of my film, there was a battle of Tarawa and they were trying to get ashore, but they fucked up the tides. So they came in and the tides were too low. So those landing craft all got stuck on the tides on the coral reef. And they started getting bombed by the Japanese who were hiding in the caves and they brought their big guns out. So these kids...

were getting blown up before they even got to the fucking beach. They were getting killed. And their, you know, best friends or body parts are floating in the fucking oceans and there's sharks and there's giant surf waves and they're getting rocked before they've ever even got... So I'm like, okay, well, how do I want to show that? Like...

And I look at a movie like Climax and I'm like, all right, different horror, bad acid, bad LSD. But my God, you're like, I had to stop watching it. And I knew I was coming in here today and I'm starting to have an anxiety attack because I want to get sleep to do, you know, to talk to you. And I'm fucking watching this movie and I'm all worked up because he's taken me away.

into the fucking experience. And he does his movie Into the Void is about DMT. And he takes you into the experience of DMT. So for anyone who doesn't ever want to experience things that you've touched and I've touched, you can watch his movies and you can be like, whoa, I'm getting that feeling. And that's a real accomplishment for a filmmaker. And it's immersive.

So watch it, but don't let your wife... I'll definitely watch it. Do not. I don't want the shit. She won't. Don't worry. She's not going to. It is not for everyone. I can't talk her into watching anything that she doesn't want to watch. She only watched American Primeval because I told her it was going to be really awesome, and she loves Yellowstone and 1883, but it was like... We're violent. It's fucking violent. Well, it's also... It's that time period, I think, we do have...

We do have a bit of a problem culturally because a lot of the films that were created in the early days about the Wild West were very glossy. They were very whitewashed. It wasn't an accurate representation of what actually went down. You know, film in the 1960s and 70s in particular when it covered that subject like spaghetti westerns, you know, great films. Yeah.

but it just never really quite captured the reality. I don't think filmmaking was really ready for that experience because I think the settling of the West...

and making their way across the plains in particular and dealing with the Comanche and the plains Indians. Like it is one of the most brutal experiences in human history. They couldn't look at it in film back then. There's no way. Right. People have asked like, well, you know, when I was making it, is there going to be sex in the film? Like Isaac and Sarah, are they going to fall in love? Are they going to have sex? I'm like, are you fucking, can you imagine what they would have smelt like? Yeah.

Just think about just odor from head to toe. There's no way these people were going to have sex. There's no way they were going to smell each other or taste each other in any fucking way. And that was like, you know, when we were putting it together and we're writing it and, you know, Mark, and we're like, well, should they have sex? And we're like, there's no fucking way. Just that alone would have been. It's amazing to me that people did have sex.

Like that world wanted to fuck each other. Like, get the fuck away from me. - Yeah, they barely washed back then. - Barely, and they never brushed their teeth. - And making their way across the country. I mean, you're months on end. - Same clothes, no sanitation. Women didn't, there were no tampons. Like, there was no toilet paper.

They didn't have Japanese toilets that blow water up your ass and you can fucking dry yourself. This was a messy fucking world and they were not going to make... I wanted to do a scene where Taylor Kitsch's character has to shit and he's constipated and he's got to use...

sticks to help him get it out because that we had read about that about that was how you had to shit because you were constipated all the time so you would have to stick wood up your ass and probe and break it up and force it out and we we had that scene written um and i i called that one off but

By the way, Taylor Kitsch is fucking great. He's a beast. That scene in the first episode when they first meet him and he has to take off his clothes and he's changing and you see the scars all over his body, like, holy shit.

He's really good in that movie, that show. He's really fucking good. Taylor is such a great guy and a great actor and, you know, like really proven because he had some big fucking misses. One of them was my film Battleship, which I'm proud of. I love all my movies, but I kind of made him do that film and he didn't quite work and he kind of had some other misses, but he stayed true to himself and

And has built an incredible career. And that's a guy who truly does. Like he used to live here and now this city got too big for him. So now he's up way up in the crazy hills of Montana.

I'm just tracking wolves with cameras all day long. Like I looked at some of your pictures on the lobby of the wolves like he he sends me pictures all the time He's just so true to himself in that way. That's awesome. But yeah, he plays a bad man He he plays it so well, I think this is his best work ever I mean he's been in a bunch of phenomenal projects, but this is this is his best and

It's so good, dude. I appreciate it. You should really be proud of it. Thank you, man. It's because it's not just really good. It's really good about a very unique time when you have this convergence of American, you know, this emergence of these settlers trying to make their way across this country and dealing with

the Indians. And it's just, it's just phenomenal. I mean, it's a crazy time in human history and a very brief time. If you really think about the impact that the West has had on American culture, we think about Wild West, every kid grew up playing cowboys and Indians. Like this is a time that was a very short window. It was only a couple hundred years and it really changed the entire world, the

Because the successful settling of this country by the Europeans changed everything. The establishment of America changed everything. And the only way it was going to happen was you got to get through the Indians. So we're doing the next one on – this is an announcement. The next American primeval is going to be on General Custer. Yeah, man. And we're going to focus on –

short period of time leading up to Little Bighorn and how when, you know, because he is a very misunderstood character from American history and I'm sure you know a bit. Are you a Custer fan? Yeah, yeah. I mean, he was a fucking...

And he was a warrior in the Civil War who was leading in the front of the cavalry. He started cavalry charges. Can you imagine being in a cavalry charge? Fucking 500 guys on your side, 500 of mine, and we're just galloping full fucking speed at each other and just fucking smashing. And he just kept doing it all through the Civil War and was just a bastard.

The war ends, and he's a warrior. Like, he starts losing his mind because he doesn't know what to do with himself. So they send him out west to deal with the Indian problem. So have you thought about multiple versions of American Primeval with different characters throughout history? Yeah, so the goal would be to do—

One of the things that was cool about American Primeval and reaction is people are like, whoa, I didn't know that about Brigham Young. I didn't know this about Jim Bridger. I didn't understand. And so you get something that works, hopefully as an entertaining, cool fucking show that's just...

But you're also like, oh, wow, I'm going to fucking learn about the country, right? So I like the idea of taking moments in American history, not necessarily all about the West, although Custer is something that Mark L. Smith and I are both kind of obsessed with. And there's so much there.

cool shit around the story of General Custer and Crazy Horse and building a fictional story around those characters and having some great actor play Custer is exciting. But I could see doing the third one on something like the Attica prison riot, which has always obsessed me. And if you followed that, there's an incredible book by Tom Wicker, who was a journalist called A Time to Die that dissects

that event because I like events you know like I'm good with events if you give me a contained event over a short period of time and I can tell that story and it's emotional and visceral that that's and Attica was fucking wild and how it started and how it escalated and the

the players involved in the negotiating to try and calm it down and the corrupt governor Rockefeller who wouldn't negotiate because he don't want to appear weak. And then finally, it just goes off and everyone's dead. And it was a great look at the American prison system, racism, negotiations.

because the Black Panthers were in there and the Muslim Brotherhood was just... So I like the idea of taking moments in American history that are probably pretty fucking violent and sort of presenting them and being like, wow, this is thrilling and deeply entertaining moments

But I never knew that. And this is like with Attica. Oh, this might get me to think a little bit about prison reform and the state of incarcerated American men today in America. Because that story of Attica is deeply rooted in like abuse of prisoners all over America.

Have you done anything on that? No. I mean, incarceration. Well, I've done some shows with Josh Dubin, who used to work with the Innocent Project. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And now Ike Perlmutter, sir. And, you know, because of the show, we've gotten a lot of people actually that were wrongfully accused released. It's... The prison system is a fucking disaster. It's fucked. It's a fucking disaster. I mean, look, you got...

Going back to Ksenia, this girl who's now in a fucking working prison camp in Siberia. Like, we have fucked up prisons. Russia, South America. Can you imagine being in a Venezuelan prison right now? And so I like the idea. And America has its own unique flavor of fucking hell within prisons. Yeah.

Not to make light of prison, right? And I'm not, but I actually had an idea a while ago for a show that I wanted to do, like Survivor or Fear Factor. Take three guys, like take the three of us in this room right now, three fucking tough, badass American men, right? Three? Yeah, there's three of us in here. In my mind, you are. That's what we're doing.

You're a fucking legend. You're a legend, Jamie. You're a fucking legend, Jamie. But you put each man in a maximum security prison somewhere in the world, like the worst. So you're in Thailand, Jamie's in Venezuela, and I'm in Russia, okay? And you go in by yourself, right? And you just are put in the general population.

And the deal is you can get out anytime you want. You just have to say the code word, Blue Vase. And the warden knows and the prison knows. But nobody's telling – nobody knows. Everyone thinks you're a prisoner. Whoever stays in the longest gets $10 million. Right?

And you have no idea when the other guys have gotten out. So like you could stay in for five fucking years and me and Jamie got out in three minutes. But just like how you would survive.

prison and what a horror prison is today. And so that took me down a rabbit hole of, I assume maybe doing it as a film, but, um, it'd be a good squid games movie. Yeah. Like squid games. Did you ever see the movie brew Baker with Robert Redford? Yeah. Where he, which true story about a warden of a new prison who went in undercover as a prisoner to, you know, to see what was going on. Um, but I think to do something like Attica, something like we're doing, we're going to do Custer next, um,

But if you have any good ones, man, send them over. I will. All right, buddy. Well, hey, brother. Thank you very much for being here. I appreciate you very much. You're a fucking beast. Your work is amazing. Thanks for the workout this morning. My pleasure. It was fun. I was so pumped when you wanted to do it. I was like, yeah, let's go. I appreciate it. It was fun. It was a good time. Thank you, Jamie. American Primeval, right now on Netflix. Can't recommend it enough. Absolutely fantastic. Peter Berg, you're the fucking man. You too, buddy. There it is. Damn. All right. Goodbye, everybody.