Jay Mohr is a versatile entertainer known for his sharp wit and undeniable talent as a comedian, actor, and author. Jay first gained recognition as a cast member on Saturday Night Live and cemented his status as a standout performer with his iconic role as Bob Sugar in the movie Jerry Maguire. Jay went on to star in multiple movies and hit TV shows over the years like Action and Gary Unmarried.
, Jay is also an accomplished writer, authoring the critically acclaimed memoir, gasping for airtime. Jay continues to entertain audiences with his headline shows and stand up comedy specials across various platforms. Jay, it’s an honor. Great to have you here. Welcome to the RUN GPG podcast. Woo! Let’s go!
Big D, my man! As I was saying, that was the greatest entry into a Zoom meeting ever. I appreciate you being here. I love the energy. I’m fired up. What are you doing? You know what I mean? Like, I got it made the universe. The game is fixed in our favor. The fact that we can do this on a Friday morning is wild, isn’t it?
You know, we can sit here and do this. This is crazy. got some mutual friends as we learned, which is pretty cool. yeah, it’s some hitters too. Ice cube on B. Come on. So talking about RZA before we started. My best RZA story is I was on the beach, this is when Ghost Dog came out and that was like his big first soundtrack, and I actually went back to the theater just to bug out on the soundtrack.
Saw it like three, four times. I’m on Santa Monica Beach by the pier with my three year old son, and RZA is just standing there with his kid, this beautiful kid with long braids and hair. And Riz is like so much taller than you think. He’s like six, six. He’s a lot of dude. And I go up to him. I go, yo Riz, Riz Erector.
I got to tell you, man, I I’m so impressed by the work you do. And I saw Ghost Dog four times. I saw it the last two times just to bug out on the soundtrack. Respect. And he goes, yo, Lord, that’s peace. That’s peace. Thank you, son. I go, and your daughter. is beautiful. He goes, yo, that’s my son, dude. I pretended I had two kids and I couldn’t find the second one.
I grabbed my three year old. I’m like, where’s Jimmy? Jimmy. And I just walked away. Like I was panic stricken looking for a lost child. That’s the last guy. That’s the last guy. I would have done that too. Yeah. It gave me chills. Wow. Well, it sounds like it may have made up since then. Oh, I haven’t seen him since.
That was my one RZA encounter. Except for, , when I was told for my intervention, I was going to interview Wu Tang Clan. That’s how they got me to go to my intervention. Is that actually how they got you to the intervention? Yeah, like, you can’t just tell a drug addict like, hey, we’re all going to meet up and talk.
It’s like, yeah, nice try. So they said, , when my podcast, More Stories, was going they said, Listen, , my friend, a comedian, Skylar Stone, hit me up. He goes, Bro, I got you Wu Tang. RZA, I got you the whole crew. , 8 a. m. tomorrow morning at your house. And I was like, Really? He goes, Really. I’m like, Great. And I was so high, I thought that was true.
I thought Wu Tang Clan was coming over to my house, David, at 8 o’clock in the morning. You know Wu Tang enough to know they’re not morning people. I thought the eight blackest men alive were going to set eight different alarm clocks and come across town to walk into my cracker cracker house so I could interview them and help them with their careers.
Meanwhile, I haven’t worked in a year. And the last thing I did was a talking dog movie where I’m not even a lead dog. I’m like a receptionist at Chewy Vuitton. And I walked into my podcast room in my house and, , you know, there’s like 15 people in there and I go, you guys got to get out of here. Wu Tang Clan’s coming over.
And then I saw, they flipped it. Yeah, I saw the interventionist. I was like oh. Oh, damn, damn. For the listeners, you can’t see what I’m doing, but I’m leaning away from the mic wheezing because I’m laughing here, but that’s wild. You just kicked it off a too incredible story. Like, I mean, if we can laugh at an intervention, that’s the way to do it, right?
Like, if we can laugh and cry. Yeah, you gotta laugh. I mean, because you’re so, when your life gets to that point in addiction. You’re so mentally gone, you’re so consumed with just, I’m a pill guy, my thing was pills. Like, just more pills, pill math all the time. So you’re so selfish and self centered when they’re like, Oh, we got Wu Tang Clan, and you’re like, Great!
Of course you did, because I’m a big shot. That’s wild. Well, listen, you know, you brought up, you brought up the podcast, right? You brought up more stories, but like, that’s just, you know, when I said versatile in, in, in the intro there, like that’s, that’s an understatement, right? Yeah. I mean, you stand up comedy, TV shows, movies, , you know, media, radio, we talked about radio, , you were doing it all.
So like. You know, what inspired you to, you know, pursue comedy, acting, performing early in your career? Like, like, was there a defining moment when you said, this is my path? Was there something that made you say that? With the risk of vomiting as I say it, I think comedy kind of chose me, you know, which sounds like ugh.
But. I was always so obsessed with comedy my whole life. Those old VHS tapes. I put that when I was in high school, junior high in high school, I put a VHS tape in the VCR when I went to bed at like 10 and I would hit record. Cause they, they had like four hours of bandwidth, whatever it was based. So just in case there was a comedian on the tonight’s show with David Letterman.
And then I would just fast forward it when I got home from school to watch like that five minute thing, and I would just memorize it and obsess over it. And then I was watching, , a public access show in New Jersey. There was a comedy club in the next town over and on public access, they had their comedians.
I watched that religiously. I was just always obsessed with comedians. And then they had a commercial for teenage comedy night. And I was like, Oh, it’s just kind of like two Legos clicking together in my head. Like, Oh, that’s why. Cause I’m, that’s what I’m going to do. So I did it. And it was like the first time I found my tribe, but I went there and it was other teenagers and they’re, you know, they’re Parents it was noon on a Sunday.
It was awful. But then these guys were like, what are you doing? , it was a Saturday. They go. What are you doing tomorrow? We go to this place in Montclair, New Jersey I’m like, I’ll be there then I go to that place and they go Wednesday. There’s this place in Hackensack I was like, I’ll be there So suddenly I had like a place to go people to see and I love that camaraderie and I just got obsessive about it And I got really good at it.
And then I realized I could get acting work from it. If so, I kind of, then I would cater my standup in New York city to make sure there was acting stuff in it because producers would come and see you in the early nineties, it was just, It was the wild west. It was like comedy was everywhere, every single place at comedy night.
And everybody was looking for the new thing, the new thing, the new thing. So they’d be like, all right, these producers are coming this night and that night. So I would do impressions. I would act. I would make myself cry on stage and do all, make the audience uncomfortable and then let them off the hook.
And then I got the Saturday night live audition. And then the other stuff I do, it was just like, did kind of like past tense. It was really just fear of missing out. and ego and pride. Like, well, if somebody’s got a podcast, I want a podcast. Like, it’s just childlike. Like, you have that, I have that. You, you, it’s like when you’re a kid in the backyard, you’re jumping your bikes.
Like, no, I can do it better than that. Watch, no, you can’t beat me at wiffle ball. Watch this. And that’s really everything I did was like just fear of missing out and just wanting to be noticed. Yeah, that’s a powerful motivator. It really is. I mean, it’s a powerful motivator, but like, I mean, you’re, you’re describing, , the comedy scene in the nineties.
The way I kind of remember it was kind of a golden age of comedy, right? Where everybody was looking for it really was. So like, like what comedians influenced you the most in those early years? Like, who did you grow up listening to and watching? I, , probably listened to Dennis Miller’s, the Off White alb as much as any music album I’ve ever listened to.
It’s just the way. He put things together. It’s hilarious. It’s just beyond funny but like the structure and the words, and then I segued into Carlin a lot, and then it was just my peers in Manhattan in 90 to 98. It, my manager owned a comedy club in the village. I was at the Comedy Cellar, the Boston Comedy Club, the Village Gate, the Comic Strip, and Catch a Rising Star.
Like, but at the one place, the Boston Comedy Club, it would be me, Dave Chappelle, Dave Uttel, Bill Burr, Patrice O’Neill, Neil Brennan worked the door and lived with me for about two years. Like Colin Quinn. This is every single night, Dave. When I tell you, it wasn’t like, yeah, sometimes you run into these guys.
I mean, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wed For a decade, you would go to the club, there’d be four guys standing outside, they’d see you coming and be like, aw, sh look at these skinny jeans coming towards you, like, just, you were already in a roast. And that was, I was just talking to Greg Fitzsimmons about this.
It really should be a chapter in that book you know, where they talk about 10, 000 hours. yeah, just the impossibility that we were all there at that time. And we all were just like crabs in a barrel climbing, climbing, climbing, nobody really happy for anybody else’s success. I learned that after Jerry Maguire.
You do Jerry Maguire, you come back to the stoop and talk s It’s not as warmly received. Not the same. You just mentioned a bunch of goats. Like, it’s wild. And we were all nobody. Dane Cook. I remember Dane Cook was on stage and this guy came in with groceries. They would let people in the Boston Comedy Club for free just to fill it.
So we’d have a place to go. And Dane Cook’s on stage. This guy comes in and sits down with two grocery bags. And Dane goes, You don’t look very happy. He goes, I got ice cream in here. You better be funny. That’s why we actually had Dane on and he talked about the early days like it was it was while that you mentioned, , George Carlin you know 20 guys.
I 20 guys. I didn’t mention like but it was I know. Yeah, but yeah, wait Dennis Miller It’s funny. You mentioned Dennis Miller because Dennis Miller was a genius like the way he crafted His jokes and the, you know, his wit and actually it’s funny you said that because I kind of find you similar in terms of like wit and like very highbrow humor to Dennis Miller, right?
Like, cause, cause, well, I mean you mentioned Chewie Vitton. I mean, like this would go over people’s heads, right? It really would. And I think Choreography, that’s stiff since Lee Harvey Oswald prison transfer. Don’t you love the fact that Jack Ruby got into the garage that day? H? dude? Well, like, honestly, like Dennis Miller, I used to live for Dennis Miller’s weekend Updates.
Yeah. Like, ’cause they were so damn funny. You know? They were, and it was so damn cool. It was like, yeah, he was, yeah. Cool. This is counterculture in real time. We knew it was counterculture. Yeah. Like you don’t usually you don’t know it until you’re out of the woods and it’s 15 years later, you’re like. Oh wow, we were really against the grain and cool.
I mean I think his intro music every week was Sympathy for the Devil or? I can’t remember. I can’t remember. I just remember he just, he was just a genius the way he would put his jokes together and I remember them being so like you had to really pay attention and that were so like intelligent, you know, it was, it was very highbrow.
I could see the influence there for sure, but you touched on a part of the gigs and it was, it was, , Miles Davis, kind of blue, the beastie boys, Paul’s boutique and Dennis Miller, the off white album. Like those are my cassettes that I would just drive eight hours and just listen to them over and over.
It’s probably still your Spotify wrapped. Probably still. Yeah. You know, same as me. It must be 20 years ago. Still listening to that stuff. My playlist when I’m in the gym is just like, Every, like, RZA, Bun B, Ice Cube. Yeah. Yeah. The Jane’s Addiction. Jane’s Addiction. Oh, Jane’s Addiction. Nothing. Shocking. That was the other one that was just like, could not stop listening, like, what is going on with these guys?
And sure enough, he, he gets in that fight with, , Dave Navarro on stage. He was on my podcast. He’s, he he’s he’s tough to put a saddle on, is he? Yeah he, he comes to my house. I did more stories podcast in my house in the Palisades in my garage. His wife pulls up in a Jaguar that’s the biggest Jaguar. I’ve never, it was a comically huge Jaguar.
It had to have been custom made. It was like an old Coupe de Ville, like 70. It was so long. She hits my gate in my garage. What? And she goes, yeah, she pulls up and hits the front gate of my garage. I mean, of my driveway. The gate was closed. She hits it. She backs up. She looks out the window, Eddie, and she goes, you got to drive him home.
So I’m not going to be there. And I’m like, yeah, that’s not a problem. I would love to drive Perry Farrell home. He could live in Idaho. I’ll be there. I’ll, great. Tie him along with one of my heroes. So we’re sitting in my garage and I asked him. The question was loaded. What’s the greatest concert you’ve ever seen?
Because when he goes, how about yours? I get to say Jane’s Addiction at the Ritz in 1991 before you guys broke up during ritual. What’s the greatest concert you ever saw? And he’s like, Led Zeppelin, 1977, man, Miami. And they only played one song. And I’m like, what? He goes, yeah, it was raining. It was pouring rain.
And they did, , they opened with song remains the same. Do you know how that goes? I go, yeah. And then he proceeds to do the entire song. We’re sitting, we’re sitting like, there’s no table between us. We’re just sitting like at an AA, it’s like an AA meeting. We’re just sitting like knee to knee. And he’s like, you know, it starts with that.
And he does the entire musical intro with his mouth. Like five inches from my face. I’m like, this is bizarre. And then he’s like, if I had a dream and he goes, and then Robert plant stops the concert because it was pouring rain. He goes, is everybody cool? And we’re like, yeah, we’re cool. He goes, we’re going to take a break.
Stay cool. Okay. We’re going to stay cool. And then we watched Led Zeppelin fly away in a helicopter over our heads. I’m like, that’s the best concert. He goes, it was the best man. Dude, I don’t know what’s funnier. The fact that that was the best concert or the fact that Led Zeppelin trolled the audience that hard.
Is everybody cool? We’ll be right back. In the Led Zeppelin Chopper. Oh my God, that’s funny as hell, dude. I can’t believe I’m just looking up at Robert Plant looking down at him. I just want to say this interview is not good for somebody who’s recovering from a cold. It’s not good. It’s funny as hell. We were talking before we started.
I had that chest cold for three, this is going on four weeks. I thought I was going to do okay, but I’m not sure now. Oh, Jesus. That’s funny. And I Oh, dude, where do I go from there? I did want to ask you about this though you know, you, you touched on Saturday Night Live, like you ended up on the cast of SNL.
How did that happen exactly? Like, how did you end up with that audition and how did you end up on the show? The impossibility and the providence of circumstance and coincidences. My, my manager owned a comedy club and he had Saturday Night Live auditions at the comedy club. So me being his client, who was an up and comer, obviously I was on that showcase.
So this is Early August, the Boston Comedy Club was on the second floor of an Irish bar, and there was, it was like a ski lodge. It had a, like, it was like an A frame. Angled roof? Yeah. Yeah. And on that day, the air conditioning was out. It was a hundred degree. It was awfully hot and it’s packed. And Marcy Klein’s there from Saturday night live.
All the producers are there. And I went up third because my manager, Barry Katz, who’d probably be a great guest here. We had this running joke. Your best hitter hits third like in baseball. So I went up third. Everybody from Saturday night live. Couldn’t take the heat. They left two minutes into the fourth guy.
So eight guys. gave everything they had not having any idea that there was nobody there from Saturday Night Live. If I went on 4th, 5th, 6th, I’m not, we’re not having, I’m not talking to you on Zoom. I’m, you know, I’m selling shoes. Who knows? And then my second audition was at, like two days later, it was at Stand Up New York.
Which is, that was an away game for me, because that club was weird, it was like an operating room, it was very sterile, it was just, it was just like a rectangle with lights, lights, and sterile, and chairs, and tables. And I thought I saw Lorne Michaels and everybody in the back left hand corner of the room, so after every impression, when it was getting a laugh, I would stare into that corner to let them know, like, I wasn’t afraid.
And then when I walked off stage to my right, I walked past them. They were on the other side of the room. So I spent my most important audition of my life, just staring at some like real estate broker from long Island but it worked. I went out and then Marcy Klein ran out after me and said, Lauren wants to meet you.
So we came out on the sidewalk and shook my hand and then, yeah, then I got put into the big leagues. having no idea how to play baseball. Unreal. Unreal. Like you always hear these legendary stories, you know, incredible stories about these household name performers over the years and their auditions for Saturday Night Live and it’s almost lives in folklore, right?
You know, the show lives in this. Yeah, like if I did one of those auditions where it’s just you 8H, I never would have gotten the show. I would die a horrible death. I’m doing impressions of like, Andrew McCarthy, like I’m doing the most weird impressions, Harvey Keitel before like Bad Lieutenant. Yeah, Andrew McCarthy would be a funny one, like did you, he just did a documentary, didn’t he, on the Brat Pack or something like that?
I didn’t watch it, but I took a whole impression. I, I love her, man. That was the whole thing. It was so stupid. It’s like, pretty in pink? I would mash up, I would mash up my impressions, like I would do, and I learned this from watching, I was obsessed with the Ben Stiller show, the first version of it on MTV, it was just Ben Stiller and Jeff Kahn.
And they would do like, Rain Man, but on Star Trek. So like Captain Kirk, like Spock was Rain Man, like, yeah, I’m definitely a Vulcan. Yeah. And I was like, wow. So I would mash up my impressions being inspired by that. So I would do like I would do De Niro and Pesci, but they were Batman and Robin. Why don’t you stop eating, you fat bat bastard?
You’re like a f ing nut! Your belly’s hanging over the bat belly! You broke the f ing bat bowl! Look at you! Like, I would do that stuff. It was so weird. Like, if I had to do that alone in a studio, with no one laughing, I would have killed myself. I would have killed myself in front of them.
That’s funny. you know, for those who don’t know, for those who don’t know, what can you do? Do you mind just running through what a typical week looks like at SNL? Yeah, Monday you’re going around. I’m going around 1. Everybody else would show up around 5. You meet the host at 7 in Lauren’s office. And then you go in and you pitch shows to the host in Lauren’s office.
So Tuesday you go in and you, Lauren sits at his desk. The host sits at the desk and Jim Downey sits at the desk. Everybody else is spread out in like a horseshoe around the desk. And you go around the room and you pitch ideas. , Tuesday you write it. And that’s all night. Wednesday, you read it, every sketch that takes like three hours.
Wednesday night, they pick the sketches. It’s like this huge waiting thing. It’s like waiting for election results. And then it’s like, okay, you guys can all go into Lauren’s office to see what’s on the wall. And the wall had like index cards, like cold open monologue, sketch one. And you just hope that the title of your sketch was up there.
Thursday, so you either were super fired up Wednesday night, or you were just so depressed that you did all that work for nothing. And then Thursday was a rewrite and rehearsal. Friday was rehearsal, maybe some other tweaks, rewrites. Saturday, you’d go in, rehearse again. They would write the monologue on Saturday.
You always wonder, like, why is the monologue always so stupid? It’s like, well, because they write it at the last minute. And you do a dress rehearsal at seven and you do the live show at 11 30. Sunday you sleep until it’s dark out and then you go back Monday. What a, what a action packed week. It’s intense, right?
Yeah, I wish I could do it. It’s a classic. If I knew now, if I knew then what I know now, I would just not be, I would just to not care. Like spades like that. He just has this easiness about him. and my only regret about Saturday Night Live is I wish I could have been there with like Bill Hader. He seems to like have the most fun.
Bill Hader and Jim Brewer and Tracy Morgan are like the three guys. I’m like, oh my god be able to write with those guys. Jim, Jim Brewer is, is hilarious. Like, because I’ve seen interviews with him recently. Like he’s popped up recently on interviews and he’s, he’s really funny talking about, actually the hardest I’ve laughed at him talking about the last night he hung out with Lars from Metallica.
Have you heard him tell that story? That is the Lars impression. It’s the best. And Jim Brewers made me laugh. As much as any human being alive in, in, like in real life, hanging out, like it helpless. I’m helpless. Yeah. He’s funny. The other guy that I, I didn’t appreciate him at the time, but I really appreciate him now is Norm Macdonald.
Norm’s the best, you know?
I do a bit where I about the show Dateline, and when I interview the guys pending trial, the more they talk, the more they don’t make sense. I say it’s like talking to Norm McDonald, it’s like, Eh, it’s true, I’m the last guy to see Patty alive, you know? But that doesn’t mean I killed her. And, , Norm’s one of my favorite impressions to do.
I love Norm. Who doesn’t? Norm, a fellow Canadian, fellow Canadian yeah, I appreciate him now more, you know, looking back. I, like, again, golden age of comedy, golden age of Saturday Night Live, it hasn’t been the same since the 90s, it really hasn’t, in my opinion, but you mentioned a few that were interesting.
What, what’s your most standout memory from your time there, or maybe your favorite story from that show or that era of your career? The first ten are Chris Farley, the most beautiful man I ever met in my life. He was sober those two years I was there, and he was the most beautiful man I ever met in my life.
He was just this ball, a wrecking ball of joy and light. And he, when he came into a room all you could do is look around and be like, is everybody seeing this? Like he was always that beautiful and funny and great. so those are my number one memory is that I got to be with that guy every day. Watching Nirvana, the bands of my two years there were, I think the best two years of bands that would have ever been on the show in a two year clip.
I mean, Nirvana, Aerosmith Beastie Boys, Smashing Pumpkins, Hole Eric Clapton, James Taylor, it was. Ludicrous every week. You just got to stand. I remember watching Aerosmith live during rehearsal doing sweet Emotion, and like I had to, I had to stop. Like I almost, I almost cried. Like I didn’t know that song had its hooks in me, but like that Joe Perry Air get that air box like with just the base going.
I just sat there like, oh my God, this is so I’m, I can’t believe I’m watching this in this empty studio watching Nirvana do rape me. In rehearsal and watching Kurt scream, like there was no other gear for these guys. They just went bananas in rehearsal. And then you get bands like Stone Temple Pilots, like, well, he, Scott doesn’t want to sing because it’s rehearsal.
He’s saving his voice. It’s like, ah, come on, smashing pumpkins. Then you get to go see them live because they’re in town doing a gig. And you’re like, I think, I don’t think people realize how hard smashing pumpkins are. Rocked it was its own. It was its own zip code that fuzzy guitar was bananas Yeah, yeah, I had the privilege of seeing him live a couple times.
Yeah, they’re unreal. I actually it’s funny. We were just talking about slashing pipe my wife the first time I met my wife She was listening to Smashing Pumpkins at her headphones in and had to take him out to talk to me She didn’t want to talk to me So she pretended and it was smashing pumpkins, so special place in my heart.
but then, you know, you transitioned into movies and as we mentioned, you know, you did play the iconic role of Bob Sugar, , in the movie Jerry Maguire alongside Tom Cruise. And what people might not know is that was your first movie. Yeah I, I auditioned to be the quarterback played by Jerry O’Connell first.
And I got a call back, but then, when I had my call back, I just, for whatever reason that day, I couldn’t do a Southern accent. It was so weird. I just could not get my act together. And then Cameron Crowe said, have you read the script? I said, yeah. He said, you know, the part of the male nanny, I said, oh yeah.
He goes, do you want to try that one? I said, anything. So they had sides there and they, they had me go out into the, again, Providence, circumstance, cosmic coincidences. They had me go out in the hallway and read the script and come back when I was ready. The biggest speech in the male nanny’s audition. Was when he says to Tom Cruise, I want you to use this.
And he goes in his pocket. You think he’s going to take out a condom, but he hands him a cassette. And it was a jazz cassette of Miles Davis and John. I had that cassette and I was obsessed with jazz at the time. So I knew all the, it was, it was a speech like. This is two jazz masters at the peak of their craft.
John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley. Like I had that cassette and I knew everybody. So it was really easy for me to memorize because that’s how I felt about it. And Cameron just wrote how I would have, how I felt about it is how Cameron wrote about it. So I went in there, I looked at it. I’m like, I’m ready.
I was ready, like right away. And they thought I was some savant and it went. Well and then there was a weird quiet after I finished and I mean, weird. I’ve never experienced that before. We’re like, no one was talking. There was like eight people, Richard Sakai, Jim Brooks, Cameron Crowe, Cameron Crowe’s assistant, another producer, somebody from Sony.
And then Jim Brooks just looks up and goes, Hey, what about sugar? And the hair on my neck stood up like, Oh, like that’s the role. And they all went, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like they, like, they were all afraid to say it, but I had like pro wrestler hair. Like I looked like Bret Hart. Like, I had big bushy hair, like, I looked ridiculous, and what I didn’t know then was they already had an offer out to Owen Wilson to play Bob Sugar because he did Bottle Rocket for Jim Brooks.
So they had to, by Jim Brooks saying that, they had to rescind Owen Wilson’s offer. Which never happens. So that’s why everybody was like afraid to talk, I guess. And so they gave me a week to prepare for that. And bro, when Sony and Cameron Crowe and Jim Brooks give you a week to get something right, you get it, right?
Yeah, you get it, right. You could have woken me up and said a line. I would have said the next line. And then I did the audition. I screen tested with Tom on a Saturday. I walked in, he was eating lunch and I was like, well, there’s strike one. I’m interrupting his lunch. But the best thing that happened in that screen test with Tom
was he He was completely off book. He knew all of his lines and he tried to kill me with, with that scene. Like it was, we should, we could have shot it. He tried, he wasn’t like, no, that’s fine. It was like, if you’re going to, if you’re going to play against the club pro. Yeah. You better swing. Yeah. So I was like, bro, I’m here to swing.
Let’s go. You know, what’s wild about that story is it’s almost like I, like the part of Bob sugar. Almost looks like it was custom written for you. That’s what it seems like to me, because you’re playing, you know, kind of a quick witted kind of, you know, sharp, sarcastic dude. And it seemed like I didn’t know that.
So I don’t know how many people know that story, but like, Oh, and Wilson, I, , I came here to fire you. And this is like firing the mentor. This is crazy. Nah, that would not be Samoan Wilson though. He’s fantastic, but like the, , like, like that’s crazy to me because like I said, that part of Bob Sugar looks like it was almost custom written for you, you know, so and you talked about working with Tom Cruise.
That must have been incredible. Like what’s something about Tom that surprised you on set? Do you have a favorite memory or interaction with him? He’s the coolest guy I’ve ever met in my life. He’s He’s like a guy. He’s like a guy. He’s like me and you. Like he’s just a dude that happens to be the biggest star in the world with that megawatt smile.
And he, , he treated everybody Awesome. Every single person, I learned, if, if anybody else was my first like star to work with, you just, you just copy cats and in that space and time in my life, I got to copy the right cat. Like, a quick example is when I would get done at the end of the day, I would take off my clothes in my trailer and just drop them on the couch and leave.
And the wardrobe lady came over to me and said something like you know, we’d have your clothes ready for you a lot faster if you hung them up. And I thought she was being kind of snarky and then I look at Tom Cruise, I go, Yeah, I don’t, I don’t, I was a d k. I go, I don’t, yeah, too bad I don’t work in a wardrobe.
And he looks at me and goes These girls bust their a They really bust their a And I was like So like, ever since then, I just make sure my s t hung up at the end of the day. Like, nice, the socks are put together and put in the shoe and this and all the, wore all the props like a wedding ring or a watch like put it because they do they come in like you’re there at 6 30 they’re there at 5 getting your stupid clothes ready so it’s like just little things like that like a little a little like a baby chick wandering and he was just a guy to go no these girls bust their ass man yeah that you know he is known for his like intense dedication to his craft right like so obviously that energy would have came you know, would have like seeped into you a little bit, right?
Like, did his energy or his approach to acting influence, you know, the way he approached stand up and movies after that and TV? No, I, I, , I like to work really hard once in a while. Got it. And I’m, I, I’ve never taken it that seriously, which is my, my career is probably like, well, how come that guy never just,
I’m just having a good time. Like I got it made. I love my life. Like I just, it’s just plain make believe to me. It’s not like this big craft and this intense. There’s been roles like in playing by heart. I was playing a guy dying of AIDS and that was like, you can’t be like goofing off on set. And that was a very intense, like dropping a ton of weight and acting sick.
And you’re with Ellen Burstyn. You know, that’s, that’s a, a thing that’s important and you got to make sure you honor that guy that’s deceased because he’s the writer knew a guy like that. And but for the most part, like professional. Yeah. But you’re also dealing with like an alcoholic and a drug addict.
So I self sabotaged a lot along the way. Like, coming in late, not giving a s like, eh, you know, whatever. That’s their fault. That’s their problem. And I, I suffered consequences from that for sure. But so it was, he showed me the right way to go and I, I, , I, I apply it once in a while. Well, he is a legend.
I mean, , and the longevity is, I mean, you can’t deny it. And speaking of legends. By the way. Yeah. Underrated. Completely underrated actor. Tom Cruise you think he’s underrated. Yeah. As an actor, actor like vanilla sky. Oh, I see what you’re saying. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. It’s like hard. It is to act a little bit crazy.
We’re like your best friend goes with what’s going on with you. Like when Jason Lee’s like, are you, but like, just that crazy. Yeah. I see what you’re saying. Like, like, , you know, you, you don’t usually hear Daniel Day Lewis, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tom Cruise. Yeah, and like that performance was one of the best acting performances.
It was beautiful Yeah, it was vulnerability with the little kid jonathan lipnicki when he shows up to renee zellweger’s House drunk and he’s going on and on about like my dad worked for the I don’t know United Way for 30 years And when he retired he says I wish I had a more comfortable chair and the kid goes my dad died and Tom’s drunk And he goes you’re right.
I’m hogging it you go like it’s heartbreakingly beautiful. Yeah Yeah, it was it was a beautiful movie and you know, um Speaking of legends, you also worked with Christopher Walken, right? What was it like being on set with someone as iconic and unique as him? It’s like somebody put, you know, like when you put cones down to save somebody’s parking spot like you put cones down, the spaceship lands a complete foreign alien comes out.
And blesses you with this phenomenal experience. And then like, as far, there’s an old Irish expression. Who’s he when he’s at home? No idea. He is amazingly bizarre and funny and great and everything. He it’s almost like you’re watching someone when he memorizes lines before you do a scene. It’s almost like he’s learning a song.
Like he, he gets really into the, the quick answer is he’s phenomenal. It’s like, you see him. Instead of getting obsessed with what am I saying? Where am I coming from? What do I want in this scene? Where am I going? It’s almost like he’s learning a song. Like, it’s lucky for you. I know who I know, and I do what I do.
Otherwise, your girlfriend would be chopped mince meat by now. Like, it’s a totally different approach that only works for him. And you realize how many different ways there is. There’s no one way to greatness. Greatness is the way. And that guy just oozes greatness. Yeah. Yeah, he really does. I mean, there’s, he’s so unique, you know, and I was going to ask like, he’s become like this meme, sorry to interrupt you, but yeah he’s become like this meme ish kind of funny, like, Hey, there he is.
He’s dancing in fat boy slim. And he’s this watch was in his ass. But if you go back and watch like the deer hunter not only did he very deservedly win the Oscar, For, , an insane never will ever be captured that Russian roulette scene in the Vietnamese prisoner of war camp, but an ethereal beauty, like one of the most beautiful to look at people that ever lived, like, forget what you know about him.
Go back and look at the deer hunter. He’s mind bogglingly gorgeous and phenomenally great in that role. Yeah. He’s truly unique, you know, and, and, and it started some of the You know, the greatest movies of my generation, he’s like, he’s one of those guys, you know, you can put him in the top five of like these unique actors and characters that you remember.
How about that scene in the Deer Hunter when he’s in the hospital after the prisoner of war and the doctor is asking him, the military doctor is asking him questions. Yeah. He just stares at him and he just starts crying. What? Yeah. Oh, you know, it’s funny. Enjoy your Marvel movies. Exactly. Yeah. Enjoy your Marvel, all the CGI and everything else.
And he’s just, you know, Enjoy the multiverse. It’s never going to happen again. It was funny. I was in Mexico city a couple of weeks ago and there was a big, somebody had like, it was a mural of, of Christopher Walken, like a, like a street artist that created like a stencil, like a Banksy, but with like a, like a Christopher Walken face on it.
I took a picture of it. I was like, That’s crazy, you know, because he’s It is. It’s iconic. He’s got an iconic face, you know. Here I am in Mexico for David. Well, actually, I was going to ask you if you had any you know, standout memories of working with him, but you tell an absolutely hilarious story about meeting him for the first time.
Yeah, I walk up to him to say hi. I had my Rottweiler with me because I’m on set. I gotta bring my dog. I can’t leave her alone for 15 hours. So I walk up to him with a Rottweiler and he goes, You know, I noticed that your dog doesn’t have a tail. What happened to your dog’s tail? Where did it go? And I’m like, Jesus.
I’m standing there, and all I can think is like Where the hell is my dog’s tail? Like, I never thought about this. I bought a dog with no tail. He’s like, it would be great to have a tail. Everyone would know if you were angry or upset. Like, he’s deep in the weeds of like, how great it would be to have a tail.
And then he looked at me like it was my turn to talk and I said, would you rather be able to fly or have a tail? And he goes, a tail, of course I’m so glad that you asked me that you could always get on an airplane with your tail. And then he just turned around and walked away. And I spent the next two weeks like, am I going to, I don’t know if we ever spoke again after that.
But after that, you don’t need to talk again. No, that’s it. That’s all you do. I saw him at the Copland premiere. And I called him Elvis. I said, how you doing Elvis? And he seemed to like, he gave me like a little smirk. Like, I like that nickname.
Speaking of which, you know, you’ve worked with some pretty big name actors and notable performers. You talked about your years on SNL, , Tom Cruise, Christopher Walken, of course. And of course, I mean, you know, big name. Performers on Jerry Maguire as well. Is there someone that stands out to you the most or maybe someone who had the biggest influence on you?
Tom Cruise. That’s that leaves a mark when you work with Tom Cruise. That’s and being your first movie when you don’t know what you’re doing and a guy like that to kind of hold your hand and say no, no, no. You want to do it, you know, if you don’t like the way this is going, just stop it mid sentence that don’t worry about it.
There’s editors. There’s Ellen Burstyn. That was the first time I saw someone transcend their actual who they were and become another person entirely. I wake up in a hospital. I’m dying of age. She plays my mom in Playing by Heart. And I’m supposed to wake up in my hospital bed and look up at her. And my first line is, you look awful.
Like, the big gag being like, I’m dying of AIDS and he says his mom looks awful. I opened my eyes and I looked at Ellen Burstyn and I started crying. The pain in this woman’s eyes, looking at her son dying this, it was, I’ve never seen anything like, she was not Ellen Burstyn. She was my mom and she was, I was watching my mom.
I’ve, am I explaining this properly? Yeah, and the other time was Al Pacino and Simone, which I don’t think anybody saw, but there’s a scene where he, he creates this AI. Wow, that movie was ahead of its time. Gee whiz, he creates an AI actress , to prove to everybody that he can, , direct great actresses, and she becomes the biggest star in the world, and she wins an Oscar, and he programs her via remote because she’s in Africa saving children, And be a remote her Oscar acceptance speech, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba.
And then they go to commercial at the Oscars and his daughter goes, she didn’t thank you. He forgot to have her thank him. And the pain in Pacino’s face in that scene, and you’re just like Long Beach convention center at nine in the morning and you’re surrounded by 80 extras. And it’s just, I realized how out of my league I am as an actor when I work with people like that.
Like, all you gotta do is look disappointed, but he didn’t look disappointed. He was disappointed, like, he transcended. I don’t know. It was crazy. That’s wild. Those two things really, really jump out at me. Chris Farley Al Pacino, Ellen Burstyn. But just think about, just think about those three names you just mentioned.
Right. It’s not lost on me. Yeah. Well, not that it would be. I, you know, I’m just, you know, it was, it was for decades lost on me cause it was just, you know, you just live in this selfish. What about mine? Where’s mine? What’s going on? How come I’m not? How come what you, you did this wrong and I did that. You get in that rat race and you don’t have time to just really reflect.
And it wasn’t, it wasn’t until I got sober. Where I can sit still by myself comfortably, and I can be comfortable being me all day for the first time. Where I can look back at my career and go, Gee whiz! Like, it’s cr Like, standing next to Standing between Keanu Reeves and Forrest Whitaker every day for a month.
Yeah. What the? Yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s wild, man. Like, I, it’s crazy because when I was preparing for this interview and I went back and, you know, went through your, your biography and some other things and it’s, you got a career that’s really tough to put into, you know, a one paragraph intro. You know, you’ve been around.
I’m a weird guy. Well, not, no, but like you’ve had an incredible career, you know, comedy, TV, movies, radio, media, writing, right? You know, looking back, you know, what career moments are you the proudest of and why? Writing , my first book Gasping for Airtime, it, it just took a year, like that discipline that I never had except maybe just going up and doing standup every night, but to sit down and write.
All the time and write for a long time. And then just to hand that to someone else who just criticizes it and edits it and moves it around. But then when that process is done and someone stops you in an airport, I remember being in a Chicago O’Hare airport and this guy was going on vacation with his wife and kids.
And he goes, man, I love your book. And this was like a two years after it came out. And I, that was my, that’s my most proud thing is, professionally, is that book because When people see a movie, they’re in their couch, they’re on their couch, they go to the movies, and then it’s just, everything’s very ephemeral, it’s out, it’s done, next, next, next.
But a book, they carry it with them, and I, it really like, I remember being on the flight I was on after that interaction with that man like that guy took it on vacation with him, it was on his nightstand, like, when you have a book, you have it for a couple months. Like, that guy put, he folded a page over to keep his space, when he went to the bathroom, he’d open it up while he was dropping a deuce, and He’d get home and then like, how you and I feel when we read a book, like when you’re like, Oh, Oh, my book, like, Oh yeah, that’s right.
I’m reading a great book. And like to think that somebody felt that way about what I wrote, which there wasn’t really a lot of writing. I’ve never been a great writer. I’ve just always been a good reporter. Good storyteller. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like you’re a good, incredible storyteller, but like, are you reading, are you currently reading books?
Like, , are you a book reader? Yeah, I read about a book a week. Yeah. Okay. Good for you. Yeah. I only discovered, you know, I know this sounds wild, but I only started reading books later in life, you know, like where I started realizing. I’ve always, I mean, I stopped reading fiction for 20 years after I read Malcolm X.
In 1991, I remember I took that with me to the Bahamas on a show I was doing and I was so sort of embarrassed that I didn’t know anything about Malcolm X and that entire story that Shakespearean drama of his own people are going to kill him because he taught him to take the word of the Honorable Elijah Mammad over their own self will and common sense and Being interviewed on Meet the Press, do you really think the black muslims, it was only the black muslims, they are, even that was a little racist jab back then, do you really think the black muslims are going to kill you?
And him just saying, oh I know they will, I trained them to do it. Wow. And being murdered in front of his kids at one of his own speeches and just, I was so humbled by like how I didn’t know anything about the real world. And then I got into presidential biography, I got big on biographies, presidential biographies I love.
Nixon by Reeves was my favorite. And then McAuliffe’s book on Truman blew me away. And then it wasn’t, it wasn’t until I was in rehab. All they had was, John Grisham. And I picked up the John Grisham book and I’m like, this guy’s pretty good. I’m 50 years old reading, reading the firm. Have you ever heard of John Grisham?
The world’s like, yeah we read that when we were 20. Sure. The, , what are the top, well, here’s a question. I, you know, we, you know, we have a book that’s, , not a book, sorry. , a show that’s a big on, you know, personal development and whatnot. What, what’s the top three books you’ve ever read off the top of your head?
Can you think of them? Most impactful, maybe Malcolm X Hammond, right? Three’s tough. Hammond Kowski, I could go back to over and over and over because that closing the way he closes with the Rockham Sockham robots in the bar, but his spider’s arm is broken. He just can’t beat this little kid. It’s like.
Everything in his life is like that and it just, it ends in a bar with the same thing. I, I a prayer for Owen Meany, maybe but no, this much I know is true by Wally Lamb really knocked me out. Interesting. Don’t know it. Don’t know. Oh, it’s heartbreaking. Yeah. Oh, no. , shot in the heart. Gary Gilmore, , Michael Gilmore.
Oh, okay. I put that book down in the trailer of Jerry Maguire and I cried. It’s about Gary Gilmore is the last man put to death by firing squad. Executioner’s Song is about him. And I put that, I just couldn’t believe it. And I put that book down in my trailer. They called me to set and Cameron Crowe goes, Are you okay?
Think about that, a book that when you walk into a room an hour later, a person that doesn’t really know you that well goes, Are you okay? And I said, No. I just read this book shot in the heart. By Michael Gilmore. He goes, he’s a friend of mine. You want to meet him? I was like, no he wrote with him on rolling at Rolling Stone.
Michael Gilmore wrote at Rolling Stone with Cameron. Wow. You, you got to write another book, Jay. You got to write another book. Like you have to, you know, and it’s, it would be about. recovery, but it’s I was in my mind, I was gung ho about it. And then, , the whole thing about recovering is putting your ego aside every day.
And I, I don’t know if I can separate my altruism, which is probably 8 percent versus my pride and ego and self esteem, which is 92 percent in that equation, because I can’t. It would help so many people, yeah, but I’m gonna wonder how it’s doing on the bestseller list. So I, I’m wrestling with that and I just, I’m 54 bro, I don’t want to work that hard.
Ah, come on, I mean we got AI now, you can just, you know, dump all the transcriptions in there and. I’m not an, I’m, I’m from the heart, I’m not an AI guy, it’s all about that heart. I know, but you just see stories, you know, like for the last, you know, hour, we’ve been talking, you know, about these incredible stories.
I mean, they’re just, they’re wild. I feel like you need to write a memoirs at some point. Maybe you’ll get inspired at some point and that’ll happen. It seems like standup has always been your foundation. Would you agree? That’s what I am. Yeah. You’re a standup comedian. Like, how has your approach to, you know, comedy evolved over the years?
And here’s a question I wanted to ask you. What do you think makes a great stand up comedian? Balls. Persistence, perseverance, and, and balls. Like, I’ll see guys that just keep doing the same stuff over and over and over, and then they complain about like, where’s my where’s my break? And I’m like I just keep my mouth shut.
My stand up is always again, doing it 37 years. I’ve just started to wrap my head around this at year 36. Like, well, what’s your comedy? It’s like I don’t know. I’ve always gotten my biggest satisfaction is when I’m sharing things with you that you can’t believe I’m actually sharing with you. About me. My favorite subject, me.
So when I’m telling you about rehab, and what it’s like to detox from pills and you get so uncomfortable, but at the same time, it has to be hilarious, otherwise the uncomfortable isn’t worth it. I never want to make the audience uncomfortable and let. I’m going to take them off the hook with the huge punchline.
So that’s always been my, my standup has always been that. That’s why it’s always hard for me. Like, I don’t consider doing standup. I don’t consider impressions standup. It’s a completely different brain. It’s it’s there’s algebra, there’s geometry. Impressions is geometry, stand up is the algebra. So I’ll mix them in, obviously, like I’ll mix in Joe P.
when I’m talking about getting mad at my doctor. I’ll do Norm Macdonald talking about Dateline. But like, to just stand up there and do 20 minutes of impressions, I feel like I’m cheating. But I also gotta get over that because the audience likes it, so I get over that and I do it. But, If you’re a comic, you got to have balls.
You got to talk about, like people go, I can’t believe you talk about going to rehab. It’s like, well, it’s kind of the most important, impactful thing in my life. What else would I talk about? I’m going to talk about going to Whole Foods. Shopping carts are crazy. Yeah. But you know, what’s funny is when you, when you’re so open about, you know, your struggles and your past, things like that, you know, I don’t know if you, , appreciate how it helps others.
You know, when people are open and vulnerable with these things, like it really helps others. You know, we had we, we recently had, , Richard Patrick on from Filter Nine Inch Nails. , front man, remember Nine Inch Nails and Filtered. I don’t know if you listen to that music, but. Hey man, nice shot.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, him, him. And, , you know, he was, he’s been really open about his, his rehab and everything he went through and, , how it’s helping others. And it was, it was kind of an impactful moment. Like when you realize that when you tell your story and you’re open about it, it makes others feel okay to talk about it and seek help and all that type of stuff.
So it’s, it’s a, it’s a dance because one of the traditions is we maintain anonymity at the level of press radio and film. so. The way I’ve squared that away, you know, I run it, I run, I don’t, I don’t have, I don’t make any decisions by myself anymore. Because when I make my own decisions, I stand in line for medication without shoelaces or a drawstring in my pants at a rehab.
There’s always a sponsor, there’s always a peer, there’s always a guy. So, the way I do it is, I talk openly about recovery and A12 step program, I leave the second A out of it. And the reason that is is because if somebody goes on and on about the specific brand of recovery that I’m not talking about right now, and then I relapse, then it gives a newcomer a reason to look at it and go, see, it doesn’t work.
That they’re full of over there. Look at him. It’s all he talked about. And he relapsed. So that’s that’s, that’s what was taught to me is the, , the intent behind that tradition of anonymity, but the actual anonymity tradition comes from when it started in the 30s, late 30s, early 40s. They didn’t have enough manpower to take on all the people that would come piling in.
It was just, I mean, it started three guys in a hospital room and it just grew into this hundreds of millions of people saved. So they, they had to just kind of like keep it under your hat, but we’re going to meet at so and so’s house and we stay sober by helping other guys because when we’re helping somebody else, we’re not thinking about ourselves.
Right. So that’s the real genesis of the anonymity was they didn’t have The manpower to keep up and then it in the traditions it’s written at the level of press radio and film and it was just told to me like you can’t give a newcomer a reason to look at it as an example of why not to do it. Man, I appreciate you sharing that being open about it.
That’s really cool. The, the you know, obviously, like, you know, you’ve been talking about you got to help yourself and you got to commit and, you know, kind of really. You know, really time for introspection, reflection, all that type of stuff. When you go through something like that, what’s helped you the most?
Like, do you have a daily routine you follow that’s really helping you? Morning routine is the linchpin of it because you don’t wake up. You just get shot out of a cannon and whatever happens that day happens. Like maybe I’ll go to the carwash. Maybe I’ll buy scratch up tickets. Maybe I’ll see her. I pray the moment I get up, I was told I have to get to God before my mind gets to me.
So I don’t even, I don’t get out of my bed. I don’t stand up. I slide out of my bed onto my knees. I say a third step prayer, a seven step prayer. I ask God to show me who I can help today. Make my bed. I write a gratitude list every single day. I send that to about 40 other guys back and forth. I call my sponsor between 7am and 8am.
My sponsees call me, take my son to school. I go on an 8am men’s Zoom meeting. 9. 30 I go to the gym. By 11am I’ve kicked the s out of the day before lunch. If you want self esteem, do a Steamable X. So, when I first got sober, All the commitments I did and all the things I would do, the good things I did in the rooms, like I’d go to meetings, I’d go early, I’d clean up, I’d clean toilets, I’d make the coffee, I’d stay late, I’d give guys rides.
It wasn’t this sense of altruism it was I’m an approval addict. My first addiction, David, is your approval. I don’t know how to act if you don’t like me, I short circuit. So I’m always being a chameleon, whichever group of people I’m in, I just do it so they like me there. So when I’m by my, the result of that is when I’m by myself, I have no idea who I am and I’m uncomfortable.
So I use and I drink. So I did all these esteemable acts, not out of like a sense of altruism or greater good. I wanted my sponsor to think I was the greatest member of that program that ever lived. I knew, like, if I went there early, made the coffee, swept the floors, I knew my sponsor was going to walk in with another old timer, and in my mind, they were going to be like, there goes the greatest member we’ve ever had.
Thank God, thank God he’s here. Ego, ego, ego, ego. But, in my quest to get his approval by doing those things all the time, I wound up getting my own approval. And I wound up really liking the way I was acting and then people would say things to me Like I called you because I knew you’d pick up and that’s That’s a very Fulfilling way to live your life to have a life of purpose.
My sons will call me They know i’m going to pick up my wife knows where I am all the time. I wake up with a quiet mind I wake up with a full heart and I purpose every i’m going to go to a place at noon today Hang out with other men that share similar miseries, and we all share a common solution. And if anybody there says, could I talk to you for a second?
Yeah because these men it’s hard to talk about without getting choked up. Like these guys, the greatest thing these men have done for me what made the biggest impression on me in my entire life is they simply made time for me. And as the child of an alcoholic that always wondered where everybody was Wanted to know if he was safe and take, am I going to be okay?
The fact that a guy whenever I call him picks up and whenever I bring something to him has a solution for me. That’s , that’s another dimension now. So all those movies and all that resume stuff it’s impressive, but it, it, it can’t, it can’t touch where I’m at today. Yeah man. I really appreciate you being open about that and sharing that.
That’s a powerful. You know reflection on what you’ve been doing and, and, , it’s been four years of recovery for you. Three years, nine months. Oh, I got a little app on my phone, which amazingly hasn’t rung during this podcast because three years meant to be three years, 24 days. Yeah. Wow.
Congratulations. Yeah. Well done. It’s only 1, 365 days. Well done, Jay. But you know, you know, like that, that’s something that’s going to help somebody else who listens to this. Yeah, that’s the whole, yeah, that’s the whole thing. And I, I believe in, you know Carmen things meant to be and things like that.
So somebody is going to hear this and it’s going to help them or it’s going to inspire them to get some help at some point. So I think that’s fantastic. And you know, you talked about, you know, needing approval or whatever our subconscious is everything are, you know, , the things we went through is, , you know, as children and use and things like that, and it manifests itself later in life and we look back and, you know, memories come to the, you know, the forefront.
Now, if you could go back and give your younger self advice at the start of your career. You know, , or another way to ask, like, is there anything that you wish you knew before you started your career, maybe mistakes or lessons learned? Is there anything you wish you knew? I would tell myself, get in an acting class and stay there.
I have no I have no idea how to act. None. Here’s me acting. Not my turn. Not my turn. Oh, my turn’s coming up. Words! Not my turn. Like, that’s I just memorize it. And everything, so I would say get in an acting class and stay there so you have an actual kit, a tool kit to use when you’re maybe not at your best.
And I just tell myself everything’s okay. Yeah, that’s good advice. I mean it’s And I would say don’t turn down Blue Streak with Martin Lawrence. You’re gonna regret it. Oh, did you turn that movie down? I didn’t know you turned that down. I didn’t. Well, to be very clear I didn’t turn it down. I auditioned for it like six times.
Wait, that was Luke Wilson, right? Luke Wilson. Yeah. Screen test and then they go, okay, I know it’s a lot but they want to see you again. And I’m like, Jesus! Ego, ego. They saw me so many times! And they go, this is going to be the last time. I go, this is going to be the last time I’ll do it. If it’s going to be the last time.
So I went in for the last time. Then I flew to New York. I was performing at Caroline’s on Broadway for 10, 000. And my agent called me and said, they want you to go back to LA and screen test with Martin. And this idiot goes, they said that was the last time. And I put my foot down. I go, I got 10, 000 in my hands, a bird in the hands worth more than two in the bush.
And I remember my manager, Barry Katz going, if this movie goes on to make a hundred million dollars without you, are you going to be okay with that? I’m like, yeah it made a lot more than a hundred million dollars. Wow. I didn’t know that story, but, , lessons learned. We learn more from our mistakes. At the end of the day, who cares?
Yeah, who cares? It’s only money. It’s only money. Who cares? Rushmore. Luke Wilson. Yeah. Yeah. It’s only money. okay. Luke Wilson, you’re welcome. Yeah. You’re welcome, Luke. Tell Owen I’m sorry. well, there you got that. Hey, the universe has a way of correcting itself. The, , so what are you working on now that excites you the most?
Like what should fans look forward to in the near future for you? I just stand up. I mean, I just put myself on tape for an audition last night. I got nothing to promote. I’m just, I’m just here to have a good talk with a podcast I like. Jamore37 on Instagram hit me up. I’m just, I just love my life. I’m about recovery.
Like, I hate I mean, I don’t even want to say like, hate to be that guy, but like, no, I’m, I’m that guy. Like, I have a completely different employer these days and I just I help guys get free. You know, that’s the most rewarding thing I’ve ever experienced in my life. I married my best friend at 50 years old.
So here’s. Here’s how recovery worked for me. My wife, my girlfriend at the time, I thought she did my intervention. And I was pissed. And I packed for rehab staring at her. Just angry looking at her the whole time. And then I got to rehab and all I had was 15 pairs of socks because I never looked down. And when I was in rehab, I was living in Malibu, on the beach.
And when I say on the beach, David, I mean at high tide, water would hit my window after it smashed against the seawall, it would come over. And when I was in rehab, my landlord took all my stuff, put it on the beach and told my family, tell him to come, come get his s**t, the tide’s coming up. He’d had it with me.
So over two years, I married that woman on that beach. Buy that guy as the tide’s going out. So what am I working on? I’m working on that bro. Wow. Well, that’s, that’s like, that gives me goosebumps. If Hollywood wants me, they know where to find me. And if they don’t, that’s cool with me too, bro. That gives me goosebumps.
I got a great life. 54 years old, married my best friend. I got two sons that look up to me. I got three idiot dogs. Okay. So final two questions. And these are fun ones. These are, these are, these are fun ones. Okay. If you could have dinner. With any three people in history, past or present, who would they be and why?
Well, you got to go Jesus and just see like how much of it is story, how much of it is real. Anybody that had that cosmic consciousness at that age, where he still, I mean, kind of, you know, seems like he’s a pretty big deal these days. Yeah I would go Jesus my mom, I’ll go musician, I’ll go Jesus, my mom and I’ll go musician.
It’d probably be like, , Miles Davis was kind of a jerk. I’ll go John Coltrane ish, but I, you know, that’s, I’m not happy with that answer, just so you know. It’s a tough one. I know you, you know, get put on the spot and, , stuff to narrow it down to three people, but what a dinner table that would be Jay, what a dinner table that would be Jesus.
And we said Coltrane, not Davis, right? So nobody wants to have dinner with Miles Davis. Well Jesus. Jesus number one answer we get. Who’s more fascinated, like, did you really do this? Did you really, like, tell me, what’s up? How much of this is promotion? How much of this really went down? And if at the end of the day, they wrote all these fascinating stories because you just had this overwhelming conscious awareness that nobody else could deal with, I’m totally cool with that too.
You changed civilization because you said things that blew people’s minds. Like, who else would I want to talk to? Kanye? I don’t, actually, Kanye was on my list forever, and then he just recently came off. He was actually on my list. I think he’s got to replace Coltrane with Buddy Hackett. Oh, wow, okay. My mom and buddy get to hang, one of my dearest friends and my best friend, my mom, and then we get to just pepper Jesus.
And Hackett goes, you know, you could have used a bicycle all that walking. Dude, funny Hackett. I The kids don’t know. The kids would never know. The kids would never know. Okay, and final question. This stuff, you know, I interview captains of the industry, billionaires, CEOs, and they have a hard time answering this.
You’re opening a bottle of, oh sorry, you’re opening a bottle of sparkling sparkling cider one year from now celebrating something you’ve accomplished. What would that be?
Well the only answer, really, for It’s another year of sobriety but for entertainment purposes, I’ll say a show that I’ve created and I have creative control over that me and my friends get to have a blast at a breaking some news. I don’t know. I’m from New Jersey, bro. I don’t know. Nothing. I was in the back.
We need it. You know, we need to , Oh, well, final question, where can the people find you follow you? I think you mentioned your Instagram or J more 37. That’s where we keep up to date on where you’re playing and all that type of stuff, right? Listen, Jay, this has been fantastic for me. Like I said, I’ve been following you for forever, you know, and you’re one of the funniest dudes I know.
You’ve been super real and absolutely fantastic. So I really appreciate you coming on and spending some time, dude. Thank you. I had a great time.
