All language subtitles for Ear.Buds.The.Podcasting.Documentary.2016.1080p.WEB.h264-OPUS-English

What"s a podcast?

I"m not sure.
I don"t know.

I have no idea.

I could not tell you
even a little bit.

Podcasts are this
kind of, like,

audio representation of the Internet,
which is that whatever you"re into,

there"s probably somebody
talking about it right now.

A "potcast?"

P-O-D. Podcast.

I think it"s kind of like
an... like an MP3.

Video on the Internet.

It"s just sort of like a...
Like an online radio show.

It was like radio
with the purity of stand-up.

They"re doing these
interesting interview shows.

They"re talking seriously.
They"re not doing their stand-up act.

And that made sense
why it was so much fun.

They let people express
themselves without the barrier

of having to prove to someone
that they"re good enough.

I am always thrilled that
my listeners find it delightful.

It"s so meaningful
to them,

so much more meaningful
than I intended.

You know, I get a lot
of people saying, like,

"You got me through
some rough times."

To me, I"m like, "Oh, here"s
me and Dalia fuckin" around."

They "re like," I was dying,
and you restarted my heart

with your conversation
about vaginas."

You can"t talk shit about
anyone anymore, holy fuck.

"Thank you for waking me
from the dead with vagina talk."

I"m pretty sure at some point
my high school golf coach

is gonna punch me in the mouth
for things I"ve said about him.

Well, I started it
because I was at an open mic,

and a guy talked about
the platform.

Podcast? Pod...

What is podcast?

Several people could call in,
into this web site.

They would record it for you,
upload it to iTunes,

and it was called
a podcast.

And I started
the podcast in 2006.

I like to think
that I started in 2005,

but it turns out
the Internet keeps track.

Say, Mister,
what is a podcast?

Can you tell me?

Sure I can, Connor. Sure.

A podcast or netcast
is a digital medium

consisting of an episodic
series of audio,

video, PDF or EPUB files

subscribed to and downloaded
through web syndication,

or streamed online to a
computer or mobile device.

The word is a neologism
and portmanteau

derived from "broadcast"
and "pod,"

from the success
of the iPod,

as audio podcasts
are often listened to

on portable media players.

Wow, that"s a lot of
big words, huh, Connor?

Gosh, I"ll say!

And it"s all free.

Whoa! Free?

I like the cost of that!

Most people do like free.
That"s for sure!

In fact, they sometimes
get a bit unrealistic

with their expectations
of free content.

But not me!

Not you, Connor. Not you.

So, I just subscribe,

and it downloads
automatically?

- Yes!
- Aha, wait.

I don"t need
some fancy machine?

No! And you can get
anything you want.

You can listen to everything
from science lessons,

political talk,
"Game of Thrones" spoilers,

all the way to hearing comedians
complain about their lives.

It"s all only
a download away!

Wow! It"s so easy!

I"m gonna listen
to podcasts from now on!

Thanks, Mister!

Thank you, Connor!

Hello everybody, and
welcome to episode 208!

- My name is Graham Elwood.
- I"m Chris Mancini.

And this is a very
special episode.

- It is.
- We are filming this.

- What?
- For video.

- Is that who these guys are?
- Yeah, that"s the crew.

I started doing the
"Comedy Film Nerds" podcast

with Chris Mancini
in 2009.

We were both filmmakers and comedians,
and we wanted to talk about movies.

When we started in a garage by
plugging microphones into a computer,

I never thought we"d be personally
connecting with people all over the world.

I"m very,
very excited.

If we wanted to find out
more about podcasting,

who should
we talk to first?

Well, we should talk to two
people who had been podcasting

when the whole medium
was in its infancy.

All the way back to 2005.

The Dark Ages.

We started podcasting in 2005

when podcasting was
only known by nerds.

And so we would try to tell
people what we do for a living,

and they would just think
we"re in our mother's basement,

talking to like five friends,
or, you know,

20 people on their computer
or something.

So, we tried saying
we"re talk show hosts.

And we tried, you know,
renaming it.

But since 2005, we"ve been
doing "Keith and the Girl."

Some of our audience has been with
us for the entire time, for nine years.

They"ve listened
since episode one.

Some of them have listened
since episode 100, 200, whatever.

But they usually go back
and listen from the beginning.

I think that they
consider it a storyline.

They consider it episodes
that they have to catch up with.

And they become
actual friends with us.

And so a lot of times
they say that

when they talk
to their "IRL friends"...

They talk about us
like we"re their friends.

And then it"s so interactive.

Phone calls, feedback,
message boards.

Skype, you know,
any of this stuff.

And our fans, our listeners,
make friends with each other.

They"ve married each other.
They"ve had babies.

They"ve conceived during
our events. I"m not kidding.

We"re going on
to 140 tattoos

and brandings right now.

Me, I mean,
if you wanna...

About 140 listeners,
yeah.

So, now it was time to start
meeting the fans face-to-face.

We wanted to find out
who was listening.

And why.

They make themselves
vulnerable, in a way,

because there
is no audience

and they don"t feel
the need to perform.

And they are
in their comfort zone,

usually with their friends.

A lot of guys were like,

"I" m serving in Afghanistan.
Big fans of the show.

One of the ways I can
really take my mind off

all the horrors that are happening
here is listening to your show."

Which always kind of just
surprised me because we were like,

"Really? Our show, which
is about just complete horrors

that happen
in everyday life?"

But it"s the comedy
of it all.

He"s like,
"It just helps us make light

of the gravity
of what "s going on."

We"d go to the field
for a month.

I wouldn"t have anything
to bring with me

other than
an iPod or an MP3 player.

I"d just listen
to back episodes of podcasts.

I"d listen to podcasts
when I was doing counselings.

I"d listen to them in the gym,
I"d listen to them on runs.

I can clean my weapon
while listening to a podcast.

When you e-mail somebody and
a guy like Graham Elwood is like,

"Oh yeah,
my buddy Lucas,"

that makes you feel like
you"re part of a community,

like there"s somebody else
out there that actually cares

that you"re deployed,
and you"re doing something.

"Cause I've e-mailed you with opinions
on things, especially "The Hurt Locker."

You feel like you"re
a part of that show now.

You feel like somebody actually
cares about your opinion,

whether they agree with it
or not.

And I think that"s the best
thing about podcasting.

When it comes
to the military,

you"ve got fans
all over the world,

and we all are
part of that community.

If something"s happened to one
of us and you guys talk about it,

it"s all of a sudden
all of our thing.

You know,
me being in Iraq

isn"t just me and my family
dealing with it.

Now all of a sudden, all
the "Comedy Film Nerds" fans

can feel some relation
to it.

And other guys that are
listening to it that may be deployed

know that there"s somebody
else out there like them, who...

They"re listening
"to Comedy Film Nerds,"

they"re sitting in Iraq or
Afghanistan, and it sucks.

If I envisioned a deployment
where I had no podcasts to listen to,

you"d be lacking
in the feel from home

of somewhat normalcy,

like having a connection

to still being a civilian
in the United States.

And it was happening
from Iraq to California

via a podcast with e-mail.

That"s amazing.

Listening to podcasts has
definitely changed my life,

because I kind of count it
as part of the reason

why I"m kind of
still here.

A while back
I was diagnosed with lupus.

I got to keep myself positive,
that"s part of lupus.

You got to stay as low-stress
as possible.

I like definitely hearing
someone else"s stories.

I count it as the reasons
that I haven"t had

a really bad flare-up
in a while now,

"cause I listen
to a lot of podcasts,

and it... it helps.

There"s a couple people
having a conversation.

Some of them play games.

Some, they talk about movies.
Talk about music.

Anything you can possibly
think of,

there"s a podcast
out there for it.

You kind of feel like
you"re with them.

You"re on a personal level
listening to it,

and it"s not the same thing
over and over again.

You"re never gonna hear
the same thing twice.

My job at the Capitol is to
work as a decorative painter.

I"m either on a scaffold
painting,

I"m at a computer getting
prepared to do a painting,

or just doing an odd job,
or something that"s come up.

When we"ve been listening
to podcasts while working,

I have been caught a few times
laughing, especially on headphones,

but most of the time,
we have them on speakers

so they can hear it when
they"re coming in the room.

I feel more connected to it,

because of the community
that surrounds

all the different
podcasts.

It"s really easy to,
somehow in Baltimore,

to find other
podcasting fans, too.

Like when I"m at work, I see someone
come in with a Marc Maron shirt,

and we immediately have
a conversation about it.

Like, it"s just really easy to
meet people and talk to them.

Even though there"s so many
different diverse podcasts out there,

we can all find
something similar

and something
to talk about.

Podcasting
has improved my life

to an immeasurable degree.

I was very closed off.

I didn"t have
a lot of friends.

And... now I do.

I"m a part of this community
of podcasters, oddly enough.

And we have fans,
as well.

I mean, we have listeners
all over the world.

In Canada, in Europe,

in India, in South America,
in Australia.

And these people, they are
interested in what I have to say.

They write to me
for advice.

"Hey, there" s a bunch of silent
Hitchcock films coming to my town.

I don"t have time to see them all.
Which ones do you recommend?"

"What would you say
is the best book

about Hollywood filmmaking
in the 1970s?"

People that I know

don"t ask me
those questions.

But our listeners do.

And... that means
a great deal to me.

"Doug Loves Movies"...

It"s a comedic discussion
of movies,

followed by trivia games
involving movies.

And then,
"Dining with Doug and Karen,"

the premise of the show
is a chef just makes us food,

and we eat it
and talk about it.

And it"s a total scam.

Like, I get
all this great food for free,

delivered to where
we tape the podcast.

And because of
"Doug Loves Movies,"

I get to get to see
a lot of movies for free now.

And so that"s my advice
to any young podcaster,

is make it about
something you love,

and then hopefully
you"ll get

a ton of free
whatever that is.

With "Doug Loves Movies,"
I just said something like,

"It would be great if audience
members had name tags,

"cause then I wouldn't
have to remember."

And then the next week,
some people brought name tags.

Then people brought
more name tags.

So, now, even when
I"m at a podcast festival

where people are coming to see
all these great podcasts,

they still packed in their
suitcases crazy name tags.

Yeah!

I remember the first time
I listened to

the "Comedy Film Nerds"
podcast.

I remember
strongly disagreeing

with the opinions
you had of movies,

which made me
not like you less,

but it kept me
listening more

because I didn"t agree
with what you said,

and I wanted to respond.

And I put in the comment
that I totally

disagreed with you about,
I think, "WALL-E."

You wrote back, or
responded back, and it was like,

"Oh, you can even
communicate."

So, it was like,
while I was listening,

I sort of felt like we were in
a conversation, in a sense.

And I felt
very engaged in it.

I had an appendectomy,

and that"s when they
discovered that there was cancer.

I didn"t want to get emotional
and depressed.

I still had to maintain

who I am as a mom
and a wife

and a business owner
and a coach.

So, I had to find a way
to keep myself together.

And I think some people
don"t keep themselves together

because the magnitude of the
news just really, like, hits hard.

But I feel like you can also
keep that hit at bay

if you have something
that fills you

with laughter
and feeling good...

Good vibes
and things like that.

And that"s what
stand-up comedy did for me.

My doctor is a very
far drive away from me.

It"s an 11-hour drive.

That"s a long way
to get stuck in your head.

You know, I would always
start out the drive

feeling really scared
and nervous

and not knowing
what was gonna happen.

And not knowing what kind
of medicines I was gonna have

or if there was gonna be
another surgery the next day.

Everything seemed
so unknown.

Putting on a podcast,

it felt more like
having people with me.

And I know none of you
were literally with me,

but your voices were.

Your humor was.
Your discussions were.

And they were
discussions

that I felt like I could
practically participate in,

because I could
leave a little comment

or just even laugh
out loud and respond.

That"s what
did it for me,

was being able to
seek comfort in

something that felt
tangible at the time.

When we sent out the call that
we wanted to interview fans,

Russell e-mailed us.

And when we found out
where he was,

we had to meet him.

We had to meet someone who
was listening from that far away.

He works on the other side
of the planet,

in the Outback
in Western Australia.

And quite honestly, I don"t know
that we actually believed him at first.

- No, we didn"t.
- We required a picture.

He works out in the mines

and he listens to my show,
"TOFOP,"

and he listens to
the "Comedy Film Nerds" show,

and he"s out in a mine
in the middle of Australia.

There"s no one around.

What I love about you guys

is that you"re flying
to Western Australia,

which is a state
that very few people go to,

and you"re not even going to
the city there, which is Perth.

You"re going to a town
called Newman,

population 4,252,
or thereabouts,

and interviewing
one person.

You"re basically going to
one of the most remote parts

of the civilized world.

This is the sort of place that in
the old days, you would have to get,

like, a donkey to bring
your letters or something.

"What is the news from
the rest of the world?"

It"s basically the same
as coming to Australia again

to go there from Sydney.

Most often I"m listening
to podcasts

during the more sort of
menial parts of my day.

So, going for a jog
in the morning,

doing the dishes,
driving to work.

The kind of things that you need
to be halfway paying attention.

Certain parts of my job
that require a lot of thought

and focus
and research-type roles.

There are also parts of the job
where I"m checking lists

and Excel spreadsheets
and so on.

Podcasting is a great way to
break it up a bit, and split my focus,

so I can learn something while
I"m doing the more simple stuff.

When I found out that Chris
and you were coming to Australia

to make this documentary
of the fans here,

what surprised me
the most

was how surprised youwere

by the fact that
you had fans here,

because of course
you have fans here.

And I find it
interesting

that the creators of the content
are surprised by how far it reaches,

because the world is
so small now with the Internet,

you"ve released something on Wednesday
about a movie that I see on Thursday,

and then listen to
about it on Friday.

We"re quite close, really. It"s
just geographically we"re far away.

You know,
we always said that

we"ll go to ends of the earth
to meet the podcast fans.

And look around. This
is the end of the earth!

- This is it!
- This is the end!

- Yeah, yeah.
- It ends right there.

There"s a sign...
"Stops."

The reason I like writing
books even more than journalism

is that you know that you are
connecting with someone

who really chose to
engage with your writing.

And because a book is longer than
a newspaper article, magazine article,

you know there"s a relationship going
on between the reader and the writer.

So, as the writer,
you feel you"re really

communicating directly
to one person at a time.

To me, podcasting is very
similar, feels very intimate.

You"re literally in a
person"s ear. And I love that.

It "s a bizarre paradox of what" s
turned out to be mass media.

It doesn"t feel "mass" at all.
It feels one on one.

Watching Maron and Pardo
and Doug Benson,

and having conversations with
them, and, you know, Doug would say,

"It"s this thing that's gotten more
people out to shows than anything else."

How are you?

- He did?
- Oh, yeah? That"s very cute.

We had, I think our first
live event in New York.

There was a line
out the door.

And in the middle
of the event,

the fire marshal
showed up

and was like, "Some of
these people have to leave."

And people waited in line

for like an hour
for our autographs.

That was when
I was just blown away.

I remember us just catching
eyes across from the room.

Just looking
at each other going,

"What is going on
here?"

What is our life becoming
all of a sudden?

Train by day,
Joe Rogan Podcast by night!

I love the quality of the
podcasts that are available.

I love that the comedians
that are doing podcasts,

which is a big part
of the podcast community,

we all support each other,
we do each other"s podcasts.

And how your eyes precipitate
colors and stuff like that.

- You can actually look...
- Precipitate? Eyes rain colors?

- Yeah. "Perceive."
- "Perceive," you fuck. You"re 40.

This... is "Girl on Guy."

I don"t have a machine
behind my show. It"s just me.

I don"t have an engineer,
there are no producers.

I record every show.

I cut it, I conform it,

I upload it.
I maintain the web site.

After about a year and a half
of booking all the shows myself,

I finally got my publicist
to start helping me.

I ran out of friends
I could call directly

and I started to have to
approach people I didn"t know.

This is my lumpy,
poorly cooked-off ashtray.

And it"s something that I love
and resent at the same time

because it"s an incredible
amount of work.

I kind of refuse to offload
any of the work to anybody else

"cause I know what I want and
I feel like it takes as much time

to explain to somebody else
as to just do it myself.

There is something now,
there"s like a, kind of a cruel pride

in the fact that nobody else
is really involved in making it.

Lock the gates!

I didn"t really
listen to podcasts,

but I knew guys that
I respected were doing them,

and I happened to be situated
in a radio environment at the time

that I had been fired from, and
they didn"t kick us out of the building,

so we just started
using the studio.

If podcasters ask me
what should they do...

Pick a day
or pick two days.

You got to pick a schedule
and honor it, you know,

because you got to be there
for people.

I"ve never had to do it
for anybody else.

I"ve just kind of done what I
enjoy. Like, I talk to the people.

Like, no one pitches me
a person and I go,

"Oh, man, I don"t wanna fuckin"
talk to that dude. Do I have to?"

And they"re like, "The
network would really like it."

No, there"s none of that.
There"s no network.

Even that conversation
with your audience,

like learning about
language that offends people

in a positive way.

Done in, like, a stand-up club
where you say something

and someone, like,
starts a blog and a petition.

But, like, a conversation with
an audience that trusts you to say,

"Hey, you know how the other
day you used the word "tranny'?

That"s actually
quite an offensive word.

And we"re not
having a go at you.

We"re just saying that
maybe you didn"t know that.

And like, in the future, it would
be cool if you didn "t use that word."

I love to hear that.

Did I say "Hollywood
Nights," by the way?

- Doug?
- I think so. I think you did.

- Where"s your mic? What"s going on?
- I don"t know.

Bring you up. All right.
It is "Hollywood Nights."

Dan Pasternack had developed
some shows with me previously.

He was a big fan
of the podcast.

I took some meetings
at IFC just to say,

"Hey, you know, I could
develop shows for you."

Found out that a lot of them
were fans of the podcast.

Them just being fans of
this show led to them saying,

"Hey, would you like
to do a TV version of it?"

I never pitched it.

I never thought that that would
be something we would do.

They were just fans of the
show and said, "Do you want to?"

And I said,

"Okay, yeah,
we can try it out."

Just right before I came here
I was actually cutting a show

and I was just like,
"God, I love this thing.

I love making it. I love how it
makes me think about the world.

I fall in love with every
single podcast guest

and I hopefully help my audience
members fall in love with them,

or some aspect of who they
are and what they"ve done.

So, I just have to keep
doing it. Fuck.

It"s changed the dialogue
between fans and comedians.

You can"t do stand-up anymore.
You have to be honest.

People go... you get onstage
and they go, "How"s your dog?"

And you"re like, "Oh, he"s
going through another surgery."

"Hey, is Isla going through
her occupational therapy stuff?"

And you"re like, "Yeah, fuck,
you know that, too."

There"s no doubt
that the audience

that comes out to see you
because of your podcast,

they"re perfect!

The most important podcast that
I"ve ever done, without a doubt,

was the one that I did
with my dad.

My dad was one of the greatest
professional bowlers of all time.

He"s a great storyteller.

When bowling was on top
in the "60s,

like, he"s got
some great stories.

So I go, "Should I pod...
oh, I"ll podcast him, why not."

So, I set the microphone up
his kitchen,

and we talked
for an hour and a half.

We always had a good
relationship,

but we connected
on such a human level

that I was
completely floored

by how much
we really talked.

Like, podcasting sort of
gave a structure and excuse

to have this conversation
with my dad.

And so Father"s Day
was coming up and I was like,

"Oh, I"ll just put it up
for Father"s Day."

We"ve gotten good responses
to podcasts before, but that one,

people talked to me about it for
months when I would go places.

They would go... it got
people to contact their dads.

When my dad died last year
really suddenly,

the support that I got
because of that podcast

was unbelievable.

And I think back, like, what
if I hadn"t had a podcast?

What if I hadn"t just
all of a sudden said,

"Oh, I should just podcast
my dad, he"s interesting."

And we hadn"t had this complete
breakthrough in our relationship

that carried him through
the end of his life?

I... I mean I feel like,
for that reason alone,

I feel like I owe the concept
of podcasting so much,

because it changed my
relationship with my dad for the better.

You know I had the laser
eye surgery. You know that.

And I just had my girlfriend
use the laser from her CD player.

- That"s expensive, right?
- No, no, it"s not

"cause we just used it
right at home.

But it"s fantastic.
This eye is 20/20.

And this eye
plays Chicago.

So this eye is 20-20.
This eye is 20-25 or 6 to 4.

- Nicely done.
- Silence.

- I see... I see coupons for that all the time.
- Really? Yeah.

"Cause that's right, you want to
save as much money as possible

when you"re dealing
with your eyes.

I was on a podcast,
what I consider to be

one of the best podcasts
out there, "Never Not Funny."

I started on that show
and I was on it for a year

and then I was fired.

From a podcast.

Something that makes
no money, inherently,

and relies on the kindness
of listeners.

I was fired.

So, I had people tell me that I
should start my own podcast.

This is
"The 40 Year Old Boy"...

on the Mike Schmidt
Podcasting Network.

I"m not making any money
talking these days.

Good Christ...

I tell the truth about
everything that happens.

I don"t do a comedy show
where you"re kind of

discussing a project
or we"re just bantering.

It is literally
unfiltered me.

I will tell the truth,
but I will make it

as gut-punch funny
as I possibly can.

They tell me, over
and over, they"re just,

"Don"t ever stop
what you"re doing.

Don"t ever change
what you"re doing."

It"s the closest, most pure
form of comedy there is,

because you actually hear me
creating comedy in front of you.

I don"t sit down and write
bits. I don"t have a set list.

You actually hear me
creating, out of whole cloth,

fucking comedy.

That"s another reason why
I"m so invested in my fans

and they"re so invested
in me.

They want
to see me succeed.

They understand
that I am now

working at a barbecue house
delivering food,

but they"ve also heard me
audition for shows and almost get it.

And they"ve heard me
be invited to the Podfest.

And they"ve heard me start a
Kickstarter, and go out and do live shows.

And they"ve come and they've supported
and they"ve paid and they"ve given money.

And they"ve done
everything they possibly can

because they want me
to succeed

to the point
where I don"t even know

what kind of a fucking "spike
the football" touchdown dance

we"re all gonna do
if I ever get anything good.

I mean literally, it"s
gonna be this weird party,

where everybody who"s ever
backed me and stood with me...

I picture them...
I picture people all over.

I want to bring good news
to the podcast. I really do.

"Cause, you know,
there"s me raging

and me being pissed at shitty things
happening, and I make that funny.

But I really want something
great to happen

because I want to picture
people all over the fucking world

just listening
and then hearing it unfold.

And they"re just going,
"Fuckin" yeah! So happy!"

Because they"ve backed me,
and they"ve waited.

They fuckin " waited " cause
they believed in it. And they know.

And I know.
I know it"s gonna happen.

I know. And that"s not
some Zig Ziglar bullshit.

I fucking do this because
people support it, and I know.

I know I"m good,
they know I"m good.

And I wanna be good for them.
And I will be.

I fucking will be.

We have two different shops.

We got Venice
and they got Hollywood.

My preference is to work
doubles in Venice every day.

I go give somebody food
at the beach

and you just get to look...
If you even get to look

and just smell it and dude,
it"s just...

It shows you why
you"re doing this.

I find myself thinking more...
Like riding in the car...

It is an incredible motivator, knowing that
my life could change with a phone call.

And that was the thing
that I used as a bulldozer

to try to keep my marriage
together for the longest time.

I was like, "You know
that I"m doing this now,

but I could
get a phone call.

I could... everything could change
tomorrow. I could be writing on a show.

I could get booked
for anything."

I"ll be back.

$2.

On a $44 tab.

I knew that
I was eventually

probably going to jump into
the podcast fray.

But I wanted it
to be an idea

that wasn"t
being covered.

And I went
off my meds.

And thought, "Oh, I didn"t
need those. I feel great."

Not knowing that sometimes
it takes about five months

for your depression
to come back.

And it came back between
Thanksgiving and Christmas,

which is a great
time of year.

And I thought,
"Oh, my life really is shit.

I really
will never have energy

or passion
for the rest of my life.

I need to kill myself."

And the moment that I knew
something was wrong

was I was in
a support group meeting,

and this guy was
sharing about relapsing

and he said, "And I was in
my van. And I opened my veins.

And blood was spurting. And
I looked to the sky and said,

"Father, I'm ready
to come home."

And I was crying.
And I thought,

"I'm jealous.

I wish I had the guts
to do that. ""

And afterwards I went,

"Oh, my God,
that"s my depression.

That"s not reality.

This is more
than just the blues

between Thanksgiving
and Christmas."

And I went back on my meds
and within three days,

body"s back functioning,

mood is improving,
and I thought,

"I know that I had
suffered from depression

for years before this,

and it fooled me
that badly.

Other people who don"t know
they have depression,

they need to know
all the camouflage

that mental illness
walks around in."

And so that was when I knew
that that"s what I wanted to do.

And having been
in support groups,

I knew that it could
be done in a way

where mental illness hadn"t
been talked about before.

"Cause it was either being
talked about in a very.

Sedona, New Age-y,
Mother Earth,

sacred crystal
kind of way,

which always just
made me roll my eyes.

Or a kind of pretentious

"Dr. Phil talking down
to people" way.

And I thought, "I" m just
gonna talk to people like I do

with my friends
in support groups."

Having been a comedian
and knowing a lot of people

that had
a good sense of humor,

that would be the thing
that would keep it

from just being
completely dark.

There are some episodes
that are not much humor.

Very, very dark.

And I think
those are valid as well.

I just wanted people to know
that they"re not alone.

That it"s a thing,
it"s a real thing.

It "s not a weakness, it" s
not a bad attitude, you know?

I like to say that

thinking that you
understand depression

because you"ve experienced
situational sadness,

is like thinking
you know Italy

because you"ve been
to the Olive Garden.

Julia and I, we started our podcast
right when we started our friendship.

We meet,
and in the next two days

we had Graham Elwood
on our show.

So, if you wanna listen to
the evolution of our friendship,

- listen to episode one through whatever.
- There it is.

Because we"ve really
evolved since then.

- We shoot our podcast from...
- This rooftop in particular.

...this rooftop.

It"s above
the Hollywood Walk of Fame,

Beverly Hills is behind me.

And honestly, this was
a place that I would come

to kind of visualize.

And I would think about

doing a podcast
on this rooftop.

I moved here
a couple months ago.

Almost two months ago
today, actually.

- From?
- From Seattle.

And then before that, San
Francisco and Cleveland.

So, I was sick
of not living my life.

And so I decided this
is where I wanted to be.

You guys were doing
all these live shows,

all these
"Doug Loves Movies" tapings,

and all these
great improv shows,

things we wanted
to be a part of.

And I said,
"That"s where I'm going."

It wasn"t, "I wanna start
a podcast," at first,

it was, "I wanna work
in podcasting."

And then it found us.

And I said,
"I"m not gonna say no."

My mom is the one who got me
into movies and things at a young age.

My mom got called at school
because we were singing,

you know, songs
from "Monty Python,"

like "Every Sperm Is Sacred"

in school,
in elementary school.

My mom told me when I
was a kid she wanted me to be

a musician or an actor,

or a stand-up or something.

And somehow she"s always
kept supporting me,

and I don"t know why.

But it"s all...
It"s all for love.

I"m gonna go out there
and get something,

and that"s the woman

who told me to do it.

My parents don"t know
what I do for a living.

They"re very conservative
Middle Eastern people

and as a female,
this is really outrageous,

to share personal stuff
about your life and to...

There"s cooking, cleaning,
and then there"s outrageous.

This falls into
"Outrageous."

Yes, basically, there is
where are your babies?

And then there"s
what I do.

When I say they don"t know
what I do for a living,

- they don"t know the words "Keith and the Girl."
- They don"t even know.

It"s something with the mail
and the Internet.

They saw her take
packages out one day.

So, it"s something
with the mail.

Before my parents
moved to Israel...

Oh, there should be cameras
on your eyes.

Yeah. They don"t know,
they"re not takin' the time to know.

She"ll try to explain.
They"re not listening.

I haven"t talked to them
since the end of September.

So, she"s lucky there. She
doesn"t have to talk to "em so much.

- That doesn"t mean they stop calling.
- Oh.

This is not anything new
to me. It"s not just the show.

They"re not happy with
who I"m marrying, either.

They"re not happy with... legitimately
every aspect of my life sucks.

My father once said, "Who"s
gonna marry you with that laugh?"

Yeah.

What we expected is to make
them laugh, to entertain them.

What we didn"t expect is, "You
helped me through my chemo."

"You helped me get over
my child being

in the hospital for weeks."

Stopping suicide,
quite frankly.

Yeah. "I would
have killed myself,

but you guys
were my only friends.

And I understood that things
were lighter than they really were.

And thank you for making me
laugh while my life was tragic."

And what I wanna do
is get those e-mails

and forward them
to my parents

saying, "I don"t have
babies, but I have all of this."

To me, it"s just like
having babies.

I think people have babies
so that they could

affect that child"s life.

They could help them survive.
They could help them thrive.

And I feel like
they should be proud of me,

but I don"t know
if they know how

to compartmentalize
something so dirty.

She just would like
her parents to know,

look at these letters
we"re getting.

Look at these people
whose lives,

whether we meant to
or not,

we"re affecting
for the better.

That would be a nice thing
to know.

When I was
in "Time Out New York"

and they called me
Queen of Podcasting,

I would like to hit
forward on that.

And they have e-mail.
I can send it to them.

But I don"t think
that they would get it.

It"s not worth it.

I think what makes
our show different

than other podcasts, doing it five
days a week, this is the only way

we make our money.

Comedians still have
their comedy.

Authors still have
their books.

I think it stands out because
we take it more seriously,

because we have to.

Podcasting,
like anything else,

is slowly
becoming a business

and that means money
is slowly starting

to enter
the podcasting arena.

Yay! We can finally eat.

But the good thing is different
companies are coming in.

It"s different this time,

and these companies
understand it better

than traditional media
ever could.

The one thing
about podcasting

that"s kind of
changed everything

is, like, advertising.

- Here"s the thing.
- With Vistaprint,

it"s so simple
to make your own.

You can choose from
Vistaprint"s thousands

of easy
to customize templates.

This is great for you personally
if you don"t have a business.

You"re trying to get chicks?
Make it rain in the club.

250 cards?

First of all, you get an ad where
the hosts are behind the product.

I only use sponsors that I would
actually buy something from.

Second of all, people don"t
fast forward through it.

They listen to it, because
it"s integrated into the show.

I"ve even gone onto web sites

and bought products that
I"ve heard from podcasting.

I set up my web site
for my art with Squarespace.

And also,
the podcast community

recognizes they"re part
of something emerging.

I think it was great that
Legendary doubled down on us

because what it said
to mainstream media,

which is what I think we all as podcasters
have been saying for a long time,

is podcasting
is very valuable.

Where Netflix was 10 years ago
is where this could be.

When we first started, no one
was interested in advertising.

We did, I think,
two years

before anyone was interested
in advertising.

But we believed
that people would.

We saw
these projections of...

It was gonna grow
by 250%.

We thought, eventually
they"ll be popular enough

that advertisers
will have to take note

and start thinking
the way we"re thinking.

When a new company
comes on board,

part of the draw
is not just that they have

a good product,
or a good service,

but that they"re a company
that sees something new,

and they want to be
a part of it.

We started advertising
on podcasts several years ago.

Our company was
a lot smaller then

and podcasting
was a lot smaller then.

And we bought a couple
big podcasts

that were kind of leading
the industry.

If you advertise
on a podcast,

people are gonna listen
to that ad in six months,

in nine months,
in 12 months.

And you advertise on TV,
people are gonna TiVo it.

They"re never gonna watch it,
and then it"s gone.

You advertise on radio, you
listen to it once and it"s gone.

A lot of radio is wasted on ad time
and stuff that you don"t care about.

And a lot of repetition, a lot of
station identification, stuff like that.

So, listening to a podcast was just
more information and more entertainment.

A hundred thousand podcast
listeners are more valuable.

It"s a more engaged audience
than a million TV viewers.

We saw kind of a lift
in our business

and we heard from a lot
of customers that they were

hearing us from these personalities
and from these podcasts.

So, we said,
"Hey, let"s try some more."

Every show I listen to has had
a discussion about their sponsor.

"You guys
with Shari"s Berries.

We tried these, they
are amazing, go try it."

I wouldn"t have ever gone
to Shari"s Berries.

But now it"s a thing
in my mind where,

I need to get something for my mom
or my wife or whatever, that"s an option.

I was wearing a "Nope" shirt
on the side of the street

and somebody came up to me and
was like, "I need to take a picture of you.

My friend has
this podcast

and that"s one of their
shirts, and that"s awesome."

It was just weird, this
person I had never met before

was like,
"I"m gonna talk to you."

Knowing nothing about me
other than the fact

that I"m wearing
this secret handshake shirt

that makes them say,
"I get that."

The reason why I think that it"s
worked so well for our business

is because the personalities have such
a deep connection with their audience.

And everyone knows
how to use a computer.

That"s
a complicated question,

"Are we making money
from this podcast?"

- Are you a cop?
- Are you with the IRS?

- We are breaking even with this podcast, which is nice.
- For sure.

It"s a nice change.

But again, the podcast
is really just the outcome

of the live show.

We have advertisers

that Nerdist has found
for us,

but any money that"s made for us
and the cast is from the live show.

Good riddance, creepy doll!

"Deathsquad" actually doesn"t
make me any money at all,

the actual podcast
part of it.

It actually burns a hole
in my pocket,

like, I pretty much

lose money fast
doing this.

I"ll never change the show
for advertisers.

I have that luxury, though, and I
would never beat up another show

for trying to make their show
more palatable to an advertiser.

But I"m never
gonna do that.

And I have told the people

that sell my advertising
I"m not interested in...

Sorry, Adam & Eve.

I did not start the podcast
to make money.

And then I discovered there"s
costs to doing a podcast.

You got to find a place to
physically host the sound files.

You got to keep
a web site up.

You got to rent a space to record,
you need recording equipment.

And so I started asking
for donations,

and the listeners
have really stepped up.

And as the numbers
have grown,

it"s been enough that it
sustains the podcast,

it gives me some
spending money.

I"ve started to get some
advertisers, which has been great,

and they"ve been
really cool.

They"re like,
"Put it in your own words."

We, like,
crack inappropriate jokes

during the ad sometimes.

I don"t know what the
future holds, but for right now,

it"s right on the verge
of calling it a living.

Yeah.
Which blows me away,

"cause I never imagined
that would be for me.

My show has only gone upward
in trajectory.

We"ve only gotten
more fans,

more downloads,
more attention.

I"ve also really thought it out
and I continue to think it out.

I continue to make mistakes,
of course,

but there"s quite
a process to it.

Will I ever stop
self-sabotaging? No. I won"t.

I want to. I mean, I"m going to
therapy to find out all this stuff.

I"m... I'm empty.
I"m fucking empty inside.

But I"m actually finding
myself now getting filled.

You know, the show is in a good
place. It"s entering year seven.

I"m happy, I'm in love. And I have
respect of people that I respect.

You and I had an e-mail exchange
yesterday, and it pissed me off.

It fucking pissed me off.

Yeah, I"ll forward you all those
e-mails. Pissed me off, too.

Hey, I read them.

I reread them after you
fucking hung up on me.

- I didn"t hang up on you, Mike.
- Hmm.

Do youthink I"ll ever
stop self-sabotaging?

I think you could.

And I say that to you

not as a judgment
or as a criticism,

but as a guy that"s
known you for 20 years,

and knows that
you"re capable of it.

Because you are one of the
funniest people I have ever met.

You are guy who can
read a newspaper...

and write 30 minutes
of political comedy

in a way that
I could never do.

That"s why we put you in
the "Comedy Film Nerds" book.

That"s why we put you
in the festival.

That"s why we set up this
interview, despite the fact

that you can"t read
fucking e-mails correctly.

That"s why you're in this,
"cause you're that fucking funny,

and that passionate.

That"s why your show
is fucking great.

And that"s why I also
know you could fucking

stop shooting yourself in the
foot and be a goddamn champion

and they would erect
buildings in your honor.

I"m gonna need everything
from, "Let"s start this interview."

So, I wasn"t
paying attention

to any of that,
I apologize.

It"s nice of you to contribute a
monologue to my segment, but.

I have a master"s degree
in film.

And my wife and I decided,
after we finished up,

we"d move from Boston
to California.

I wanted to work in development in
film. She wanted to be a TV writer.

It was tough getting here, "cause
we basically came here with no jobs.

We didn"t have
full-time work,

either of us,
for like the first year.

We had to be out here in L.A.
That"s where stuff happens.

I am a producer
for The Sideshow Network.

The entire world can hear
everything that I"m doing in some way.

And I have my hand in so
many different shows here.

We each produce like 30,
35 shows.

It happened
right in the middle.

It threw me off
of this groove.

The job I had before this
was doing online financial aid.

And the fact
that I got a job...

It"s a fantasy job.

It"s such a different
kind of job,

where I feel
that I excel at...

And I look forward to
every day coming in to work.

And being sick just
kind of threw that off

"cause I'm like, you know, as a
man, I got so many things I want to do.

I was diagnosed with stage two
Hodgkin"s lymphoma.

Been going through
chemo treatment

and procedures,
and all that shit.

I got a big cancer wad
in my chest

that they"re trying
to fight.

Thankfully, the people that I work
with here are stone cold awesome.

They"ve allowed me to take care of
my business, and do what I gotta do.

Coming in to work
and podcasting,

and all this great stuff
that we"re doing,

it helps me out so much.

"Cause a lot of times,
people get sick

and it "s like," I have cancer. I
could stay home and not do anything.

Go on disability
or do whatever."

I can"t be on disability.
I don"t wanna do that.

I want them to treat me
as the same producer,

as the same person
doing his job.

This job means
everything to me.

I want to work,
I want to hustle.

I want to be a part
of something.

I wanna be part
of the human race.

I"m tired of wearing masks.
Masks fucking smell.

I want to start a family.

You know?
I got... I got plans.

Welcome to "Walking the
Room." I"m Dave Anthony.

I"m here with my special
guest, Greg Behrendt.

- It"s good to be here, buddy.
- It"s nice of you.

- So, we took a break.
- A breather.

What do you have
to say for yourself?

I mean, fuck,
you know, dude, I"m sorry

that we weren"t here to
fucking cook the man chowder.

- You"re a recovering alcoholic?
- Yeah.

- And then about a year or so ago you had a relapse?
- Yeah.

And you talked about this
on the show?

We"d been doing the podcast
about two years

and I was struggling with some
sort of depression and Dave...

And at that point how... how
sober, how long had you...

So, I had had 15 years.
And, uh...

This is what podcasts
could do to people.

Yeah.

It just, if you do a podcast, just throw
your sobriety right out the window.

If you "re sober, I don" t recommend
sitting in a closet with a friend.

Because that"s as
depressing as it gets.

It was just
a very bad Christmas.

I felt
suicidally depressed.

And someone had
noticed, one day,

that the pills that my
dogs took for their...

They"re 18,
so they had pain pills...

They were like, "Oh, my God,
those are crazy strong."

And then that Christmas
I was like,

"Yep. That"s what
I"m gonna do."

They were so strong
that coming off of them

was so difficult,
I just couldn"t.

You know,
that"s what happens.

Dave and I are close. We"ve
been close for a long time.

We"ve been friends
since he started stand-up.

Dave was like, "God, dude,
you"re fuckin' manic!"

And I"m like, "Oh, dude, I
am awesome!" You know.

Like, there"d be days where
I"d be like "I am awesome!"

And then there"s days where
I"m like, "Dude, I can"t, I'm quitting."

"What? Everything,
all of it, I"m gonna quit."

Yeah, I think we talked
about it on the podcast, right?

- You can hear me go through this stuff.
- I was like, you are this...

It"s insane.

And then eventually
it was like...

There was one day
on the podcast

where Dave was like, "Dude, I
don"t know what to do with you."

And I was like, and it...
You know?

- Welcome back to Walking...
- Walking... Walking...

Do you want to keep
doing the podcast?

And then, you know, you have
your fans who will write and go,

"That episode was weird."
And, "Man, Behrendt was off."

It gotten to a point where I
wasn"t able to establish boundaries.

Me and Greg actually
became pals.

I would e-mail him
now and then.

And then he"d be like,
he"d e-mail back.

And then I was talking to him
after a show.

He"s like, "Hey, we
should get some coffee."

It"s like,
"Whoa, what the fuck?"

I was worried about him.

At the same time,
I knew that

whatever he was going
through was important enough

to, you know,
to stop doing the podcast.

To stop doing whatever
it was he was doing.

I couldn"t tell the difference
between what was okay

to share with the world
and what wasn"t okay

because we were sort of
making our name as being open.

Especially after you
get drawn into their lives

and then something
like that happens.

It feels like it happened to
a friend or a family member.

My dad drinks to a
point that I don"t enjoy it.

And he has all my life.

So, I come loaded
into this scenario.

And so, part of me
wants him to get better.

And part of me
is just mad.

Dave was pissed at me,

but he was also
the best friend that I have.

When I told him what was going on,
as funny as he"s being about it now,

he was only concerned
and only cool about it.

And the first thing he said on
the very first phone call was,

"Well, then you
start over now."

And that"s the kind of fucking
friendship that we genuinely have.

I"ve had a couple
of good friends that were

really struggling with
substance abuse and depression.

Which are things
that I"ve gone through before.

And the fact that Greg
has gone through that stuff,

like, I"ve recommended a bunch
of episodes to them to listen to.

Yeah, yeah. It"s a
better addiction, I guess.

Hello. Let"s start there.
Let"s start with a greeting.

Hi, I"m Cecil Baldwin.

Hi, I"m Jeffrey Cranor.

I"m Joseph Fink.

We do
"Welcome to Night Vale,"

which is a scripted
fictional podcast

that takes the form of community
radio from a small desert town

where things like ghosts
and angels and aliens

are just day-to-day
parts of life.

The idea of doing a podcast
came before the content.

I knew I wanted to do one. But I
didn"t wanna do one that sounded like

any of the other ones
that already existed,

"cause
they already existed.

It was a great pilot script,

and we wanted
to write that style,

wanted to write
for that world.

It was a great episode

and Cecil"s voice
was perfect.

I cannot say
Welcome to "Night Vale."

Our main goal is maybe people we
don"t know will eventually hear this.

The moment
that we realized that

there are people drawing
multiple images

of a fictional character
that I get to voice,

and just seeing all this fan art
continue to pop up and pop up.

For the most part,
a lot of that mythology

is built
by the fans themselves,

which is really
fascinating to me.

You have all these people that really
are invested in what you"re making.

What was before just
something that was sort of like,

"I don"t know, what do I
wanna write about this week?"

You have people being like,

"This one specific episode,
it means so much to me."

Or other people being like,
"This one specific episode...

I hate you, you"re
a horrible human being now."

It"s all part of it.

Close your eyes.
Let my words...

With the live version,
you see hundreds of people

that are into the same thing
that you are in,

and you see them
dressing up as characters

in the same way that you
are dressing up as a character.

It has that
sort of cult following

that now you realize that
you"re part of a larger community

that you maybe don"t get
when you"re at home

by yourself,
or in your car,

listening to this thing
that means so much to you.

The whole time
we were planning this film,

we just knew
we had to go to Japan.

We had to meet
the fans there.

We wanted to know how and why
we were connecting with them

in such a personal way.

Our one fan, Sanae,

who we called
"Sandy Big Fan Japan,"

is a housewife
and lives in Tokyo.

She started listening
to our show from the start,

and we mentioned her so much, we
felt she was even a part of the show.

We had to meet her.

And also, we haven"t been
in the movie for a while.

- The director cut us out.
- What a dick.

We"re in Japan because

we plugged a Snowball
microphone into my laptop

four and a half years ago, in
Chris" garage in Sherman Oaks.

That sentence
doesn"t even make sense.

- Nice seeing you here!
- All right, man!

Fans all over.

- That was crazy!
- I"m a fan.

I"m like... it's a lot
of emotions right now.

Like I"m excited.
But I"m nervous.

And it"s
a weird culmination

of everything
we"ve been doing

for the last couple
of years,

and the way that we"ve
unexpectedly connected with people

literally
across the globe.

So, this is kind of
a big moment for us, too.

You know, Sanae has been
with us from the beginning.

She started with, like,
episode one or two.

Yeah, she sends us
birthday presents.

Yeah, I am nervous.

I"ve been waiting for this
for five years, so.

- This is so nerve-racking! Jesus!
- Yeah.

More nervous than excited,
I think.

Maybe we should hide.

I never thought they
wouldever come to Japan.

They talked about it. But I
never thought they would.

All right,
don"t fuck this up!

Don"t you fucking do
anything stupid, you idiot.

This is our oldest fan.
Don"t you fuck this up!

Come on in.

I can"t go in!

- You can do it, Sanae.
- One step at a time.

You"ve come this far,
you can do it.

Baby steps.
Hi!

Hello! Konnichiwa!

Oh, my God. Oh, my
God, I"m gonna cry.

- You okay?
- Yeah.

- Hi!
- Konnichiwa!

Konnichiwa.
Finally!

- Good to finally meet you.
- Yes. Oh, my God.

I know, it"s different from the
words coming out of our heads

instead of like
in the ear buds.

But wow, it"s you.

Yeah, it is.
It"s us.

We made it.

I"m just...
Oh, my God.

Hi.

Oh, Sanae,
you"re adorable!

We"re so happy
to see you!

You"re adorable.

You just... I...

You"ve been with us
from the beginning.

Well, you didn"t really
mention my name.

You mentioned that there"s
a purchase order from Japan.

So, somebody in Japan
is listening.

I think I was
walking the street

when I was listening.

And I screamed.

I didn"t even write you
an e-mail.

I didn"t think
it would mean anything.

But now that
you mentioned me, I thought

maybe I"ll just talk
to them on Twitter.

And I did,
and it got retweeted.

All these other fans
started talking to me.

When I was first going through
all this stuff with cancer,

I did tweet
about it a lot,

because, again, it was sort
of like a little bit of an escape.

And it was the podcast fans that
would immediately comment to me,

or write to me.

Most notably Sanae.

It"s really hard
to explain

to people who don"t really
listen to podcasts.

But there is... how can
you be friends, you know,

just on the Internet?

But you can.

You know,
going through all that,

and feeling uncomfortable
reaching out to my friends,

it was nice to have someone
reach out in a way where

I didn"t feel pressured to...
To share every detail.

That is a real friend.
You know?

And again,
that"s all because

we shared
the love of this podcast.

Breaking news, a violent
earthquake off Japan"s northeast coast

has rocked the nation.

This is the biggest
earthquake since 1995.

All transportation systems
in Tokyo

as well as northern Japan
has been stopped.

Airports closed.

Tokyo Electric called

for rolling blackouts.

The real big shake went on
for five minutes.

I was alone with my son
at home

and my husband was
really sick in the hospital.

In a split second, I thought,
"Oh, I can" t die.

If I die,
my son "s gonna die, too."

So, I was going in
and out of the house

when it shakes, you know,

"cause we might
get trapped inside.

The only thing that was working at
the time was Twitter for some reason.

I couldn"t call anybody.
I couldn"t do anything.

And I just came across
Dave Anthony"s tweet.

It was the weirdest tsunami,
"cause you were watching it,

this slow-moving water,

just destroy this place.

And one of our fans
was in Japan.

I sort of like,
pulled him into it.

It was like, well, this person
knows me from the podcast.

And I can help this person right
now in, like, an emotional way

"cause this person's
really scared.

Oh, I"m gonna cry.

Just really couldn"t...

You know, the TV on,
it shows...

you know, like people
washed away in tsunami.

I was just saying you"re
gonna be fine whatever happens.

You"re far enough away.

It was a sort of profound
moment for me in podcasting.

He kept talking to me.

And so did Erin
and Vanessa.

I felt like I couldn"t even
go on about my day.

Like I... I was so worried
for her and so scared.

And just, I knew it
affected her directly.

And I just couldn"t wait to see a
tweet from her or hear from her.

Graham, were you there?
Were you in on it?

Yeah, I was on,
and several other.

"Comedy Film Nerd" fans
were on Twitter.

"Cause we mention her,
we call her Sandy,

and we call her "Big Fan
Japan" on "Comedy Film Nerds."

Okay.

And so all of the "Comedy
Film Nerd" fans were like,

"Hey, is Sandy okay?"

Hearing Sanae"s kind
of reports on it and stuff

made it feel like it was
happening in Illinois, you know?

It made the world
that much smaller.

It was somebody who
you kind of knew.

After that,
I listed to the pod...

To "Comedy Film Nerds"
and people are, like, donating...

For Japan and...

It sounds really weird
maybe but I thought.

"Oh, my God, I"m
not alone," you know?

You know, that relationship
happened because of podcasting.

I would never know
anybody in Japan.

Oh, my.
I haven"t cried about this.

It"s the first time.

But, yeah.

So, I...
I have good friends.

When things
like that happen,

you do realize that
these friendships are real.

And that these people aren"t just
fans of something you"re a fan of.

You"ve shared something
more than that

and you"ve been brought
closer together

maybe from the...
What you shared.

But she"s a real friend
to me.

I think that fellow listeners
of "Comedy Film Nerds"

helped me
a lot more than

any other
Japanese people did.

I mean, they did, but...

it means different.

I wanted to, like, leave and
go be there, like right then.

Like, she meant so much to me.
And I knew she did.

But in that moment,
I reallyknew she did.

That morning I downloaded
as many episodes

of "Comedy Film Nerds"
as I could,

put "em on the iPod.

I just went to work
as usual,

listening to it
on the train.

I went to my office,
was working on the computer.

The room started shaking,
computers fell off of desks.

And it just kind of kept
coming in waves.

By the time it ended, nobody
was quite sure what to do.

So, I started
walking home.

Put the ear buds in,

started walking along
the train line.

It was nice to have
friendly voices in my ears.

It was about eight and
a half hours of walking.

I just kept putting one
foot in front of the other,

one episode
after another.

There were towns on fire.

And nobody could help
those people.

I didn"t have to think
about that at the time,

and that was
a good thing.

I needed to get home,

and that"s what I did.

So, thanks.

Every day was just very
depressing and devastating,

but I would listen
to podcast.

Make me laugh.

I remember you saying stuff
about Sanae

in the podcast
during that time.

It really helped me
not think about

all
the disastrous situation.

That as a fan proved to me

why podcasting
is the way to go.

You know, it just reinforced
that a community

can come together
because of that stuff.

Social media helps a lot.

Like, she could have gotten
on Twitter

without having the show
and been like,

"Help, we"re in Japan,
we need help."

But instead she had you and
Chris to be like, "Go do this."

It gave a voice to something
that wasn"t already there.

You know,
people knew about it,

but this
made it personal.

It was this person who I
know is a big fan of the show,

and has written in
a few times.

And that proves, right there,
why podcasting is amazing.

It brings people together much
more than anything else has before.

It was actually really cool
to see her, like,

so popular
in the Internet.

I was like,
"That"s my sister."

Yeah, but it was
very touching.

After three years, I"m like
really beginning to realize

what it really meant
to me.

I don"t think I could go through
that without Erin and Vanessa.

If you ever get to meet them
in person,

what would you like
to say to them?

I think I"ll cry.

I think I would just
hug them and cry.

- What"s up, Todd?
- How you doing?

No, I just wanted to come on and promote
my podcast, "The Todd Glass Show."

Oh, shit. I had no idea
that"s what we were doing.

- Oh, yeah?
- What did you think?

Oh, I thought you were gay.

- Oh, my God, no.
- I"m sorry, I...

- Did you really think that?
- Yeah.

All right, let"s cut
the shit here.

How long did it take you
to get to the decision of,

"Okay, I"m ready
to say this."

To come out
on a podcast?

Yeah, it was about six months in,
and I had already thought about it.

But the podcast made me go, "Okay,
now you can" t even do this good.

You"re not gonna do what you
wanna do if you"re gonna fucking...

It"s not what you
want it to be, you know?"

All you thought was, "I wanna be
like Stern, I wanna be like Stern.

I want just that
raw honesty."

I knew that there were a
lot of young kids that are gay,

listen to the podcast.

A lot of young kids listen,

and then
some of them are gay.

I just knew that it
was giving it validity

that it was worth hiding
if I hid it.

My parents knew. And I knew
everybody in the comedic community knew.

That was my paranoia.

I knew it,
that most of my close friends,

they knew,
you knew, everyone knew.

They didn"t give a shit.

You just have to remember,
you"re open-minded,

but there"s
the real world.

And I have to perform
in front of that real world.

So, that"s what I was
nervous about.

That was, like, kind of crazy
that Todd Glass would do that,

would come out
on a podcast.

But it makes sense because
he"s telling his fans.

I chose a podcast to do it. And I chose
Marc Maron"s for a specific reason.

"Cause there were
some people that thought,

"Oh, why didn" t you do it
on this podcast

or that podcast?"

I didn"t do it
on mypodcast!

So, the reason I did it
on a podcast overall

was because I had a lot
of bottled up thoughts,

lot of bottled up
thoughts.

Things that, you know,
I would try to give my opinion

if I was doing morning radio and
they were talking about gay marriage.

Oh, I would pipe in like a
straight guy who"s open-minded.

But when someone knows
why you have these thoughts,

then maybe they"ll forgive
a little anger,

because they know where
that anger"s coming from.

And Marc Maron,
it was an obvious answer

because he had been doing
so many of those interviews

that were heartfelt,
dug a little deeper.

And I don"t know what the fuck
he does, but I will tell you this.

When I was done,
it... I felt good.

I felt heard.

And he made it
reallyeasy.

He was able
to let something out

that was killing him
for a long time.

And there"s
a human connection there

that I felt good about.

Gay? I always felt
like going,

"Fuck that!
I"m not gay!

What the fuck do I got
to tell people I"m gay for?

I"m not fucking gay! I"m
fucking Todd Glass!" You know?

It"s like, I'm not like, you know
what I mean by... by flaming.

Yean, yeah, yeah.

I got to go up to people
and tell them I"m gay?

It"s a fucking lie.
But it"s not, you know.

That was like, "Oh, Jesus
Christ!" I cannot believe

that I feel good
about that.

And that could have never happened
but anywhere else but a podcast.

Then it becomes
that much more personal,

somebody that I"ve
been listening to for years,

that now he"s gay.

And how am I going to deal
with that?

I mean listening to podcasts,
how open they are,

and how personal a podcast
just can be,

it"s almost like my friend
just came out of the closet

and now I have to explain that
to my other friends, you know?

As a born-again Christian,
what was your opinion

of someone who was gay?

Oh, well, I didn"t have much
negative feeling about it.

But I didn"t really
know anybody who was gay,

so that was kind of like, it
made it that much closer to me.

After Todd came out,
if someone

from
your congregation said,

"Oh, I don"t think gays should
be allowed to be married,"

what would you say to them?

I"d try to explain it
to them on legal level.

I mean, they"re all just
on the wrong side.

It"s about equality.

It"s kind of like a difficult
issue to explain to...

To somebody
who"s a Christian

who just believes it
as a morally wrong thing.

Do you think them listening

to Todd Glass coming out
on "The Marc Maron Show"

would help them
understand it?

I think it would help them
understand it a little bit better.

Just because it "s... I don" t
think it's as personal to them.

It"s just, it seems like, "Those
guys are different than me."

And, I mean, I think that that"s
what's great about podcasts

is that it does
become personal.

It"s like
your friend"s coming out.

What would I have wanted to hear
when I was 16? When I was 17?

And yes, it"s cathartic
to be able to go...

To know that somebody"s
got those things in their ears,

and that"s an, that's...
Would you say a privilege?

A privilege to fucking just go,
you, this... lemme tell you something.

And I remember some of
the things I said, you know?

I would say, "Let me
tell you something, I...

I don "t wanna say anything that" s not
gonna make you feel better right now.

This sucks right now.
Because even... you know,

you"re gonna have some people
might accept you.

Some people won"t.

Hopefully you"re listening

and your family"s gonna be
all right with it.

But no matter what, know this,
and I want you to listen to this."

"Cause I would... I think I even
made a joke. Like I tapped the mic.

I go, "I know I" m right
in your ear.

Through it all, and you"re gonna
have days that suck, and they blow,

and no matter what I say
it"s not gonna change it.

If you"ve got a friend
that"s freaking out about this,

or your parents, nothin"s
gonna fucking change that.

That just fucking blows.

But know this,
you"re fucking fine.

You are fine.

You"ve got to know that
at some level.

You"ve got to know that
you are fine. You are healthy.

This is just one more thing
that the world got fucked up.

Do some research.

When you"re starting to think
maybe you"re not worthy,

look at the other mistakes
that this world has made.

Egregious mistakes.

You know, interracial
marriaging or women "s rights."

Or, you know, so many things
that we look back and go,

"What the fuck?"

It"s another one
of those things.

But just know in your gut,
you are fucking okay.

When Jimmy Pardo
went through the issue

with his brother-in-law,

I mean,
that was really touching.

And I really felt like, a friend of
mine is really hurting right now.

We had been doing the show

for like, four years

when, you know,
tragedy struck.

Our video producer, my
brother-in-law, Andrew Koenig,

was in the room
every week with us,

and part of the show

and was a really
unique voice for us.

I"m a clown
that talks about

being angry at the guy parking in
the wrong spot in front of my house.

And he"s bringing in
this political stuff,

that while it pissed off a
lot of our fans, I loved it.

I loved that we had
this social... this conscience,

that I didn "t have, because I don" t...
I'm talking about blue jeans, you know?

I"m talking... I don't...
People always go,

"You guys are getting too
political." And Matt and I, were like,

"Really? We"re talking about
Obama"s tie," you know?

But then Andrew would
give some great insight.

It was devastating, you know?
Because here"s this guy that we were...

You know,
you"re a tight-knit...

And in my case,
legitimately family.

And we had to make
an announcement on the show,

"cause we were trying
to get out everywhere.

And my wife went on CNN,
the family went on CNN,

I did, and then,
you know, using social media

to try to get the word out
that Andrew was missing.

We did a special episode of
"Never Not Funny" to reach our fan...

Doing anything we can, you
know, "We"re looking for Andrew."

Hi everybody, it"s Jimmy.

It is Sunday night,
February 21st.

Matt and I thought
we would take some time

to come down to the
studio here and address

what is happening
with Andrew Koenig.

If you have not seen the
news reports on television

or the Internet or Twitter,
Andrew Koenig, our own AK-47

has been missing
for more than a week.

The response
was just so overwhelming.

These fans that, they too feel
like they"re part of the family.

We knew Andrew
was in Vancouver.

Some fans from Seattle
went up to Vancouver.

They"re looking for him.

I mean...

At risk of sounding like a child,
is there anything cooler than that?

I mean it really is... that speaks
to how strong this fan base can be.

Like I said, they"re right
there. You are right in their ears.

They know you. They know you
better than... than you know yourself.

A little over a week ago
at this time,

Matt and I came to the studio
to announce

that Andrew was missing,
and obviously everybody

has seen the news by now,
but maybe not.

But we sadly got the news
on Thursday of last week

that Andrew had died.

And I...

I don "t know if I" ve said
that sentence out loud before.

When Andrew went missing

and then eventually
was found dead,

we had to put out an episode
celebrating his life,

and celebrating his time
with "Never Not Funny."

Wasn"t the easiest laugh.

- That"s true.
- He would sit there stone-faced a lot.

And Andrew, I"ve said it a
thousand times on this show,

he was handsome
and talented,

and being able to spend
the last two years

involved on this show
with him is just terrific.

Their first podcast back
after Andrew"s death,

it was a breath
of fresh air,

because they had
dealt with it.

It was really nice
to have them back,

because, you know,
they were gone for a month.

And just having
that spirit of,

"This is what" s going on
in our life,

we"re gonna talk about it,
we"re gonna joke about it.

You know, some people might
not like the jokes we"re making,

but we"re gonna be
back at it."

And I thought it was really
one of their best episodes,

you know, talking
about Paul Gilmartin

being a jackass at the
reception at the funeral,

and things like that, you
know, were really cool to hear.

We miss him every show.

I end every show saying,
"AK-47 gone, not forgotten."

One of the things
as we were shooting

that we"ve discovered was
a lot of themes of depression

and having podcasting help
people get through a tough time.

And on the surface
that was surprising,

but as you start to think
about it, you realize

it isn"t that surprising
because a lot of times,

depression is something
you go through on your own.

Podcasting is something
that you do on your own, too.

You listen on your own.

It"s so much more personal
than music,

than movies, TV.

And because a lot
of the shows I listen to,

some of them, at least,
have had some similar issues

dealing with depression,
anxiety,

and how they worked
through it.

It just almost felt like it
was talking to me a little bit.

Like, "You"re gonna be all
right. We"ve all been there.

And we"ll help you
get through this."

So, it... it felt
very personal.

At 21, I was hospitalized
for the first time

from self harming,
from overdosing

and diagnosed bipolar.

It was something I really
struggled with for years.

And not knowing and being
misdiagnosed for so long,

and not understanding
why I felt so alone.

Why I was acting out
the way I was acting out.

Why I constantly was harming
myself, and not knowing why.

And having to move back home
numerous times,

and just not being able
to support yourself

because you can"t control
what you"re doing,

it really hit hard.

When I"m racing,
or when I"m upset,

I get very on edge,
and for me,

listening to something
fun going on,

it"s just a way for me
to block out my thoughts,

and if people around me
are upsetting me,

or pushing me
over the edge.

I personally decided
to come out with my struggle

because I was sick
and tired of hiding it.

I figured out hiding it...

You can only do it
for so long before,

A, you lose yourself...

B, you have no idea
what"s going on anymore

and you"re not
gonna get anywhere.

I"m Paul Gilmartin, this is
"The Mental Illness Happy Hour,"

two hours of honesty about
all the battles in our heads,

from medically
diagnosed conditions,

past traumas,
and sexual abuse

to everyday compulsive
negative thinking.

How important is comedy
to your show?

It"s not the most
important thing,

but it"s probably the second
most important thing.

I think vulnerability
and compassion

are probably the two most
important things.

"Cause it needs to be
a safe place, you know.

If somebody"s gonna be talking
about incest or something, like,

that"s really
hard to talk about,

they need to feel safe.

I"m here with
Christina Jasberg.

With episode 135, I made
the personal connection

with the concept
of self harm.

When I was first hospitalized,
and when I would overdose,

it was never with the intent
of suicide.

For me, it was an escape.

For me,
it was something to feel.

There was so much
mental pain going on,

that I needed to escape
for a minute,

whether it was go to sleep
for a little bit to stop the racing.

My brother has
mental illness.

You know, just,
you know,

baseline depression
since high school.

And having a podcast like Paul
Gilmartin"s "Mental Illness Happy Hour,"

you had somebody
who"s been through it,

talking about it,
making it okay.

I went back on medication
after hearing that podcast.

"Cause, you know,
he often talks about,

"Well, those pills
didn"t work for me, so...

try another one,
try another one.

Keep trying,
keep trying."

And that really
resonated with me.

And I was like,
"Yeah, okay.

I"m gonna find a new
therapist. I"m gonna do that."

And, you know, it helps.

When I was 27,

I lived in a pretty horrific
domestic violence arrangement,

where my ex-husband

crushed nearly every aspect
of my personality

and I was significantly
physically abused

until the point
where I did a cliché

run away in the middle of
the night with no shoes on.

I had to be rebuilt
from scratch.

I was brainwashed.

I had a lot of my vibrant,
enthusiastic,

happy, comedy-loving
personality crushed.

Over time, in the seven years
since then,

I"ve grown back
different parts of my life.

The PTSD
would come along.

It would tell me
that I wasn"t interesting.

Or I wasn"t funny.

Or my friends were
not really my friends.

And physically
it was hard

to get out and do stuff,

because that"s what
PTSD does.

It tells you
that everything"s scary.

Sometimes, when
he was at his worst,

I didn"t know what I
would ever come back to.

It was always
in the back of my mind,

"He might not be there."

When he was
at his worst.

And, you know,
just feeling that,

you can only do
so much.

You can be there.

You can, you know,

give as much of a
shoulder as you can.

But you know,
you...

If somebody
is dead set,

you can"t
do anything.

I found
that podcasting meant

that I could have someone
at home to listen to

having
a normal conversation

when I felt like
I couldn"t leave the house.

I"ve had something
interesting to talk about,

because
I wouldn"t watch TV.

I wouldn"t do anything.

And yet there were these
people talking about current events

and I could feel engaged in
what was happening in the world.

With the comedy,
it gave me confidence

because I got to laugh
and laughing makes you happy.

And then if you hear
a joke on a podcast

and you repeat it to your
friends and then they laugh,

it just reminds you
what living is like

and what it"s meant
to be like.

And now I feel like
I"ve got a bunch of friends

that are all different
types of people

around the world
that I listen to.

And I"m engaged
with their lives.

And if I choose to, I can
interact with other fans.

One
of my Twitter followers,

he had a lot of troubles
at home.

He liked to play guitar, so
he"d go play guitar in public

and try to overcome
his anxiety issues.

And I told him,
shortly after I discovered.

"Mental Illness Happy Hour,"
to go and listen to it.

And the next day,
he said,

"Thank you so much
for telling me about this.

You really do realize
there"s somebody out there

that actually understands
what you "re going through."

And this is all someone
you had not met?

No, never met. Just met
him through podcasting.

It reiterates a lot
of what my therapist

tells me to do
that I don"t wanna do.

Paul Gilmartin does a lot
of the talk,

the therapy talk,
through his guests.

His guests
aren"t all famous people.

They"re people
he meets in group.

And hearing
a bunch of different stories

from many different people
going through

all sorts
of types of torment...

And their growth
reinvigorates my own strength.

A lot of the time
it"s entertaining,

even though
it"s quite serious

and that"s what I love
about it the most.

When you"re in with the
therapist"s office, they"re up here.

They"re the therapist,
they"re talking to you.

They"re telling you
what you ought to do.

Or they"re just listening
and nodding.

This was a connection to people
going through the same kind of stuff.

They"re not this
impenetrable person

that you have no idea
what"s going on in their life.

You have no idea
what"s going on in the life

of the therapist
I was going to.

I have no idea
what she"s connecting to,

what she"s not.

But these people
were living it.

As he says a lot, "This isn"t
a doctor"s office.

It"s a waiting room
that doesn"t suck."

And it really is. I mean,
that"s what it feels like.

These are peers.

Thank you guys for helping me
do this show,

letting me get to know you, and
reminding me that I"m not alone.

"Cause I need to be reminded of
that every day. Every fucking day.

"Cause you know what happens
if I don"t?

I punch guys in the face,

whether they"re on my team
or not.

And that"s no way
to live.

One of the things we"ve
always said about podcasting

is that it"s a community.

It"s a community
of podcasters.

It"s a community
of fans together.

And the Podcast Festival
is that one place

where we can all kind of get
together and meet face-to-face.

I"m nervous.

I"m not supposed to move.

Here"s the thing,
she flew to New York.

What?

No, no.
She"s... we're very close.

I"m getting
super excited.

- You"re excited?
- Yes.

Oh, my God.

Oh, my God.

Hi!

Hi!

Oh, my God.

Oh, my God.

I"m crying already.

Hi.

Oh, it"s so nice
to see you finally.

It"s nice
to see you, too.

I just really wanted
to be there for you.

- You know...
- You were.

Not just on this side
of the ocean.

I just, I wanted
to be there.

You were.

- And you were, too.
- I know.

Yeah, you always were.

Yeah.

Thank you.

- This is for you.
- Oh, thank you.

- Group hug.
- Group hug!

- You did it! You made it!
- I know!

- It was such a...
- Yeah. I"m happy.

I"m so glad
it all worked out.

We weren"t gonna let you
not come.

You know,
I was really teetering.

And then
a couple episodes back,

Graham was like,
"Oh, Vanessa"s coming."

And it was like, on the
podcast. And I"m like...

- That makes it final. Graham said.
- It"s like...

I"m really overwhelmed
and tired.

I don"t know
what to do right now.

That"s what got me going. That
was the day of the earthquake.

And that"s what
got me going.

Or else
I would be devastated.

- Yeah.
- And I was alone at home with my son, so I had to...

- Yeah.
- I had to be there for him, you know?

Didn"t think I'd be able to go
through that without you guys.

Yeah, it"s like,
I saw you were

talking with Dave Anthony
a lot.

So, I jumped in, and just started
talking to you. And tweeting with you.

It was like, you know, I"m
right here. Just keep talking.

These guys were there
for me for 12 hours, so.

- That, that meant a lot to me, really.
- Yeah.

That was definitely
just terrifying.

Oh, there he is.
Crazy person.

No!

Oh! No!

- Hi, Sanae.
- Hi. Oh, my God.

- Hi! It"s nice to meet you.
- Hi!

It"s nice to meet you.

And I"m hugging you.

Yeah. How are you?

Oh, my God,
it"s your voice.

It is my voice.

And my face!
It"s all together.

Wow, finally.

What"s going on under
there? You crying?

What"s happening?
You crying?

That"s so sweet.

It"s... it's really weird
to be,

to be on the other side
of the ocean

and telling someone else
what"s going on.

- Right.
- It was a really

bizarre experience
to be sitting there going,

"Okay, well, this is what
I"m watching on TV."

And you"re getting scared.

I"m like,
"No, it seems okay."

And like, and like, "It"s
not gonna come near you."

And it was very...
I don"t know.

It"s like the world
has just gotten so small.

I was just listening
to "The Dollop" this morning

and now I"m talking to you.

You realize, "Oh, my God.

These are, like, three people
I have never met before."

And they were there for me
for a very long time.

The podcast community,
when you do start to realize

that there"s other people

that are listening
specifically

to the same thing
you"re listening to,

sometimes even
at the same time.

Like, a lot of us
would just

wait for that tweet,
that, "Oh, it"s up!"

And I know a lot of us would see that
tweet and then download it right then.

And I would know that
we"re all listening to it.

When you realize that you"re
a part of that, it is pretty cool.

I think that
when I first knew

I was a part of that,

I was still of the mind-set
that the Internet,

they"re axe murderers.

Don"t talk to people online,
and whatever.

And I quickly let that go

because as soon as I spoke
to people online

that were a part
of that community,

especially
with "Comedy Film Nerds,"

it was
immediate connections.

If you need
something to do,

hold them up,
but I don"t give a fuck.

And I mean,
I will... I"ll be done

when I"m done, kind of.

So, I mean,
I"m anticipating giving...

Give him the time
every 10 minutes.

Don"t let him talk you
out of managing the show.

She"s the boss, I...

Hello, ladies and gentlemen.

Please welcome to the stage,
"The 40 Year Old Boy"...

Mike Schmidt!

That was it?

I"m not kidding, I"m in
the back and I"m fucking

playing do-si-do
with the goddamn cameraman

and I"m waiting for some
long, eloquent speech.

That"s why I asked you to bring
me up. You"ve know me years!

I "m from Philadelphia, and I" ve seen
Mike perform twice in Philadelphia.

And I flew down here
specifically to see him

and his mastering
of the craft of storytelling.

And stand-up. He"ll always
be one of my favorites.

You ever see
"Natural Born Killers"?

In the movie "Natural Born
Killers," there"s a scene where

Robert Downey, Jr.
Starts yelling

at Woody Harrelson"s
character.

And it"s just basically
to make the thing about him.

He"s just like,
"Oh, I been there!

I was there when the ship
went down in Grenada!"

And he"s, like,
yelling and screaming,

and his producer
goes like this,

like, "Hey, dude,
you know, you"re fucking up

and you"re making this
about you."

Well, at one point I was
bitching about something.

Surprise!

And Graham just goes, "You
don" t understand the world

that you"ve got
in front of you!

And you got a doorway
to people all over

the United States
and the world

and they love you,
and you need

to fucking calm down
and realize

that you shouldn"t be
so hard on yourself!"

And he"s just fucking
screaming at me. I"m like...

"What the fuck
are you doing?"

That"s a good shot, that"s
my dimple, that"s good.

I, uh...

Today was perfect.

I... dude,
I cannot tell you how fucking

vibrating I am right now.

Because today
was really great.

It was a perfect example
of what I do.

It was 45 minutes
of just nonsense,

talking downhill,
and then a 45-minute story.

And I married it together in the
perfect fucking ad for my show.

So if anybody on the live
stream sees it who just goes,

"Well, who"s this guy
and what"s he all about?"

They"re gonna see a fucking
funny guy destroy it

in front of a roomful
of people who love him.

I mean, how can you not
want that?

I would do it
all the goddamn time.

All the time.

I started listening to Mike on
"Never Not Funny" with Jimmy Pardo.

And then when he left
that show,

as soon as I heard he was coming
back, I"m like, "I got to follow that guy."

I saw him live in Boston.

And I was used to
hearing him on his podcast.

But live took on
a whole new dimension.

And you could see
the process.

It started out casual,
and he just talked.

And he"s so funny
and quick.

But then he went into a
story that just blew me away.

And I just wanted
to see it again.

Yeah, he remembers you
by name.

He thanks you
for listening.

He cares.

- Well, this year is fantastic.
- We had a show last night.

We do a panel today. It"s my
first panel, too, that I"m doing.

So, I"m very excited
about that.

There were no jobs in podcasting
about five, 10 years ago.

So, we are really happy
to have this panel here.

We had a benefit
a couple months ago.

And the majority
of the people

that performed
were podcasters.

It was really humbling,

as of somebody that"s going
through what I"m going through.

Shawn, if you"d have told me you had
cancer sooner I"d have wrote some shit.

I don"t have this,

I don"t have any fucking
Hodgkin"s jokes just ready to go.

Nah, we"re all
here for you man.

I just recently had a scan.

I am about six months
out of my last treatment.

And I am free and clear. So,
everything is looking pretty good.

We have Keith Malley from "Keith
and the Girl" will be moderating.

Woo-hoo!

Shawn Marek
from Sideshow Network.

Katie Levine
from "Nerdist."

And Matt Belknap
from "Never Not Funny."

That panel was fantastic.

I felt very at home

talking to people
about what I do

and having the opportunity
to do that.

That makes me think
that I can step it up,

and I can learn
from those guys,

but also be on the same level
as them as well.

When it was darkest it was tough
to even think where I would end up.

But I... I made it.
And I"m here.

And I get to spend it
with some

of my favorite people
in the world.

I recently went through
an illness.

I was getting treatment.

And I would answer e-mails
while getting chemo.

Because, why not?

This is... this is the
greatest job in the world

and I love every minute
of it.

I would like you all to know that if
you have, or are going through chemo,

you could say you"re
not available, and...

You could.

There"s a true heart
to the podcast community.

You know, just being here,
and you get to see it.

This is the pulse. This is
where everybody is happy.

They care about one another.
And it just feels genuine.

I want to try and do
something on my own here.

And nothing has... everything
that stopped me,

I went,
"Well, new route."

"Oop! Learned something,
new route."

You adapt and keep moving.

Addie had to do
her own thing.

She"s making a lot of money
freelancing.

And all I want to do
is support that.

And so I"ve learned a lot from
doing "2 Dope Girls." And I loved it.

And I hope that every time she
comes to town, we record something.

So, now we"ve learned a lot
about what podcasting can do.

But where do we go
from here?

I really feel like when
every car is a hotspot,

then it will really, really
start to go mainstream.

"Cause there's still people
now... we think of podcasting

as this big thing
that"s tipped.

And it hasn"t yet.

A lot of people do
know about it.

But I still feel like
there are people who go,

"Podcasting? What is that?
How do I get that?"

And it wasn"t until
technology made it easier that it

kind of tipped
the first time.

Like, when iTunes made it
as part

of their basic platform
on iTunes.

"Oh, oh, a podcast."

The easier it becomes,
the more it"s gonna explode.

And as soon as hitting
a podcast app in your car,

even without having
to transfer it

with your phone
or stream it,

or it just streams right
into your car,

then it"ll really start
to hit mainstream.

You know, I do think a lot
of it is just,

it"s gonna stay small-scale
and personal.

It"s always gonna be, like, a labor
of love for somebody to some degree.

I don"t think
media companies,

for instance, are gonna fall
in love with podcasts again.

You know, they"re already
on to the next thing.

I think it"s where
it belongs right now.

Lock the gates!

- All right, let"s do this.
- How are you, folks?

It"s me, Marc Maron.
This is "WTF."

I"m excited,
I"m nervous,

because the President of the
United States is on the show today.

This is pretty cool.

- This is the place.
- This is where it happens.

- I like this, man. I do.
- You do?

This is my whole life,
everything.

But you"re like a big cheese
now, man.

You"re now big time.

I think you"re right
about most Americans

are decent people
with these core values.

If I"m going
to my kids" soccer game,

and I"m just with
a bunch of dads.

And we"re just talking about
how we"re living our lives,

then everybody"s finding
all kinds of commonalities.

And yet the minute you introduce
"Republican," "Democrat," "Obama,"

suddenly people
start breaking apart.

The question then becomes, how
do you break out of that pattern?

And that"s something
I"ve spent

a lot of time with over the
last six and a half years.

I"ve spent a lot of time
just on policy

and trying
to get stuff right.

I was panicking all morning.

You know, I don"t imagine
you were flying in here

on the chopper thinking,
like, you know,

"I am nervous about Marc."

No, I wasn"t.

- "Cause that would be a problem.
- It would be a problem.

If they president was
feeling stressed about...

Coming into my garage.

...coming into
your garage.

I don"t think podcasting
is gonna stay small,

because there"s this
podcast in Sweden

called
"The Filip & Fredrik Show."

Oh, the one
that had 16,000 people

in the Stockholm Globe Arena
in June of 2014?

Yeah. And they broke the
record previously held by...

Metallica?

The Internet
is inescapable now.

We"re never gonna go back
to writing letters.

We would have to have a
catastrophic failure of civilization

for all this to somehow
or another slip back.

I honestly don"t know
where podcasting can go.

I would love to see
my podcast end.

I"m so... I'm so
fucking tired of like,

"When" s the new episode
coming out?

It"s been two
and half months."

I"ll just be like,
"Fucking fine! Ugh!"

And then I"ll ask somebody
to do my podcast.

I just don"t want it
to change what it is.

I often think when money
comes into any industry,

you know, it happened
with punk rock.

And it happened
with grunge.

Like there"s
eventually a point

where everyone"s getting pay grab
money and then it ruins the thing.

So, I hope somewhere between
I can podcast from a jet.

But before it ruins it.

I hope to eventually
start a religious cult

and get all these people
to kill themselves.

You know,
they say technology

has made the world smaller
and ultimately flat,

but really, podcasting has
brought us closer together.

This is our generation"s
punk rock.

This is our
Radio Free Europe.

This is our time
that we"re living in

where we could say
whatever we wanted.

I have thought, "Well, this is
a podcast for crazy people."

And now I realize no, it...
They"re just a community.

You can be a guy in his
fuckin" basement in Nebraska,

and you decide

I am going to start talking about
the world from my basement.

Just talk.

I guess knowing that

there"s fans
of the same podcast as me

all around the world

just makes the world
feel a bit smaller.

Makes me feel like although the Japanese
don"t speak our language, for example,

we"re clearly
into the same things.

So, can"t be
that different.

It doesn"t matter
about language.

We all have the same hopes,
desires, fears.

And podcasting, we"ve found,
is a bridge to that.

If you think about it,
you"re in people's ears

when they"re having
their great adventures.

Like,
you"re part of that.

When they remember
that story,

you"re part
of that story.

That"s a podcast community.

It"s a small group,
but it"s a mighty group.

This is why people love
podcasting. Because it"s family.

I don"t think anyone"s making a
podcast that they don"t want to make.

And I don"t think
anyone"s listening

to a podcast
that they don"t want to hear.

We don"t just have fans.

We have friends
that we kind of know

all over the world
from the podcast.

Sanae, right here. Stand
up Sanae! Come on now!

It"s the Film Nerds singing
to Sanae on her birthday.

- Happy birthday to you...
- She"s weirdly a character,

part of the Film Nerds
community.

It"s Sandy Big Fan Japan.

I"ve connected
with someone from Japan.

You hear people"s names
getting mentioned on podcasts.

It"s like,
"Oh, I know that guy."

It"s like, "No you don"t,
you"ve never met."

Until you go to Podfest.
You say, "Oh, that"s you!"

We literally went
all over the entire planet

and met so many different
podcasters and fans.

And you see them and think there"s
nothing they would have in common.

And yet we all have the
commonality of podcasting.

The things
that make us all similar

and make us all
just people,

they"re the same
in every country.

You see faces
on the other end

- of this microphone now.
- Yes.

You know that
there"s people in Japan

and Australia and all
over the U.S. and Canada,

and all over the world listening
to everything that we"re saying.

And it"s pretty cool.

Because of podcasting,

I don"t look at the world
in a big abstract way anymore.

I just see it
as a community of people

who have more in common
than they think.

And I love being a part
of that community.

When you make
a connection with someone,

either in person
or through a microphone,

that connection
has two sides.

It defines you and in many
ways tells you who you are.

Sometimes it"s like
looking into a mirror

on the other side
of the world.

I look forward
to every podcast.

And I can"t wait to see
who I"ll meet next.

All right. Let"s say there's a
show called "Shoe Captain."

- "Shoe Captain."
- What would the podcast be about?

"Shoe Captain" is about a guy
who breaks into people"s homes

and masturbates
into one of their shoes,

but he doesn"t
tell you which one.

It"s the Captain
from "Captain & Tennille"

and Elisabeth Shue.

And they would just
have conversations

about their
respective careers, you know.

She"d ask
what Tennille was like

and he"d ask, you know,
what it was like to be

in "Adventures
in Babysitting."

It would be about all the
different kinds of shoes

that people in
the airline industry wear.

Like, next week she"d ask
what Tennille was like.

It"ll be about
Daniel Day Lewis"s

adventures in Italy
as a cobbler.

What was it like
to be Andrew Shue"s sister?

The podcast
called "Shoe Captain"

would be about finding the
best steak in New York City.

"Shoe Captain"
happened to be

the only domain name
available.

Has nothing
to do with shoes.

Was Melrose Place
a fun set to be around?

Well, that would be about a
ship lost at sea filled with shoes.

But it was supposed to be...
being delivered to a Thom McAn,

which I think is closed.

But there"s one.
The Captain knows it.

Carrie Bradshaw
from "Sex and the City."

Everything that has to do about
shoes and fashion and all that.

- "Shoe Captain."
- A woman can"t be a captain.

What are you thinking?

I would hope it was about
a dude who deals Blackjack,

and he tells
all these great stories

about gamblers
and idiots and losers

who come to... out to his
table and tell the same joke.

And they"re totally
hammered. Big tip, whatever.

"Cause you know he's got
some excellent stories.

Anyhow they deal out
of a shoe.

Get it? Ha ha.

The captain shoe salesperson
would be at Nordstrom"s

with the piano player
in the background.

I would totally listen
to that podcast.

Open-toe shoes for men.

Now, you"re not
gonna believe these.

They have
the three-inch heel.

Yeah.

You wear them
with a business suit.

Can you believe it?

This week
on the "Shoe Captain."

The podcast about "Shoe
Captain" would be dismissed and die.

But anyway, yeah. We went out
to lunch at the Tam O"Shanter.

You know Tam O"Shanter?

You can get
a prime rib there

any time of the day
or night.

Yeah, what are we doin"?
Fuckin" wordplay?

I don"t.
"Shoe Captain"?

What the fuck?
It"s a quiz now?

Would you buy
a Shoe Captain t-shirt?

Again?

Yeah, of course.