Duncan Trussell Family Hour - Al Madrigal
Episode Date: April 1, 2016Al Madrigal (the daily show, all things comedy network) talks about what he did before comedy and why hard work is the answer!  This episode brought to you by squarespace.com  go to squarespace.com... and use offer code duncan to get 10% off your brand new web site!
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Ghost Towns, Dirty Angel, out now.
You can get Dirty Angel anywhere you get your music.
Ghost Towns, Dirty Angel, out now.
New album and tour date coming this summer.
Hello, dear friends.
It is I, Duncan Trussell,
and you are listening to the Duncan Trussell Family Hour
podcast being recorded in the luxurious back room
of an authentic tour bus somewhere in Charleston.
We did it.
Last night at 2 a.m., our driver, English,
climbed into the bus and headed down the road.
I still haven't met the guy.
He parks really early in the morning
and by the time you wake up, he's gone.
So I don't know who he is, what he is.
I don't even know if he's human.
Could be a robot.
The bus could be driving itself for all I know.
One thing I'm certain of though is this mattress
has gotta be at least 80% Jimmy Buffett jizz
and that the simulator that we're currently existing in
must be breaking down that I should enjoy
the incredible honor of laying on a mattress
that Jimmy Buffett has undoubtedly filled
with a million gallons of DNA as he lays in the back
watching satellite TV and pleasuring himself in between gigs.
Am I certain that Jimmy Buffett
has slept in the back of this tour bus?
Yes, why?
Because Jimmy Buffett, according to a revision
to the United States Constitution,
has to masturbate in the back of every tour bus
before it's considered road worthy.
Regardless, Charleston is amazing and humid
and I already had a conversation with somebody
who told me that Charleston, South Carolina
is the holy city and because of this,
his mother had been possessed by the spirit
of the baby Jesus who told him that he was forgiven
along with everybody else on earth.
So that's good news for all of us.
Guys, we're gonna jump right into this podcast
three this week and the reason that we had three this week
is because I was inspired by the conversation
you're about to hear that I had with Al Madrigal.
We're gonna dive right into it,
but first, some quick business.
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Squarespace.com, offer code Duncan,
much thanks to them for sponsoring this episode
and not only for sponsoring this episode,
but for putting my ass in the back of a tour bus
in Charleston because they have also sponsored
the tour that I'm on,
which is the Squarespace Presents You Are God Comedy Tour.
We had a wonderful sold out show
in Asheville, North Carolina last night.
We've got a show in Charleston tonight
and then we're headed to Durham on the 1st of April,
then Richmond, Baltimore, Washington, Philadelphia,
Hamden, Boston, New York, Pittsburgh,
Columbus, Cleveland, Ferndale, Toronto, Chicago, Madison,
Minneapolis, Kansas City, St. Louis, Nashville,
Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles,
and then to Hawaii for the spring retreat,
for the Rom-Doc spring retreat.
Some shows have already sold out,
but we've added second shows.
The New York first show is sold out,
we've added a second show there.
The Portland show's sold out,
but we've added a second show
and the Toronto show's sold out,
but we've added a second show.
And tickets are really going fast
for almost every single show on this tour,
so don't put off getting tickets,
get tickets in advance,
and come and see the You Are God comedy tour.
And we've got some wonderful openers,
depending on where you're gonna be.
Johnny Pemberton is gonna be joining us in Washington.
We've got, I'm here with Steven Ajay right now,
who's a really funny comic that I met in Denver
and Mikey Kampman, who is also amazingly funny,
is gonna be hosting the entire tour.
You probably know him from two-wet crew.
Regardless, I hope that you will take some time,
go to dunkitrustle.com and buy tickets
to one of these shows if I happen to be coming
through your neighborhood.
We're also brought to you by amazon.com.
There's an Amazon portal,
which is located in the comments section
of any of these episodes.
So if you're thinking of getting anything on amazon.com,
and one thing that I highly recommend you looking into
is a Moog synthesizer.
In Asheville, we took a tour of the Moog factory.
I don't know if you can call it a factory.
It's like a co-op or something,
but all the workers own the business,
and these guys produce the most amazing synthesizers.
I actually have a Moog, a sub-37,
and I bought it just because when I was playing around
with it, I just couldn't believe how beautiful the sound
it was creating was.
And now that I've taken a tour of Moog,
I am, now I know why.
Cause I really didn't understand that the difference
between an analog and digital synthesizer
is that an analog synthesizer is creating that music
right there in the moment.
It's more like a guitar,
whereas like a digital synthesizer,
even though they're super cool,
it's pre-recorded sounds.
So the Moog is this living thing
that you dial in these weird sounds.
And in the old days, people like Pink Floyd,
if they found, if they had a Moog synthesizer
and they found a sound they liked,
they would actually put duct tape all over the dials
because it didn't have any way to record the sound.
So it's just a fun, amazing thing.
I don't really consider myself a musician
as much as somebody who loves getting stoned
and making sounds come out of a device
that appears to have fallen out of a spaceship
and seems completely capable of channeling angels or spirits
if I just spin the knobs the right way.
So check that out on Amazon
if you're feeling like buying something intense and insane,
but they also have toilet paper, toothpaste.
Look, you know how it works.
Just go through the portal.
They give us a small percentage of anything you buy
and it costs you nothing.
We also have t-shirts and posters
in the shop at dunkintrustle.com.
You could go check those out too.
As I mentioned earlier,
if you've noticed a sudden perfusion of podcasts
exploding from the DTFH,
it's 100% because of the conversation
you're about to listen to that I had with Al Magical.
Al is a comedian.
You've probably seen him on The Daily Show.
He also is the co-founder
of the All Things Comedy podcast network.
He's been on a bunch of other shows too.
Gary Unmarried, Welcome to the Captain
and NBC's About a Boy.
He's got comedy specials out
and he's been on Conan, Jimmy Kimmel Live
and Craig Ferguson.
This is a highly functioning, super successful comedian
who also happens to be a really sweet guy,
a wonderful father and a real inspiration.
Not just for me, but for a lot of comedians out there.
So go check his website out.
It's almagical.com
and I'll have links to his Twitter
and to his website in the comments section of this episode.
Okay, everybody, please welcome to the Dunkin' Trussell,
family hour podcast,
the amazing Al Magical.
It's the...
Al, welcome knowing the Dunkin' Trussell family
on our podcast.
Thank you so much for joining us,
for the great work you've done on this article.
All our amazing, wonderful commentators
on all sides of her channel,
and we recommend all of you to tell us
what you need to spend time with and what integrated
watching and owned impact is.
I don't know why,
but thanks to the family on our podcast.
Thank you so much for coming over.
The least amount of time I've had to travel for anything.
How cool is that?
We're neighbors and we didn't even know it.
Well, it's...
We both had the same desire to get out of Hollywood.
I was living with my family in Silver Lake
when we first moved down here,
and then went to Eagle Rock.
We were there for 10 years.
And then I found this place,
and I'm gonna keep moving east
until I can afford to move to Hawaii.
So you want to move to Hawaii too?
Yes.
See, this is the dream.
And I've heard that the ultimate life
is to spend your winters in Hawaii
and your summers in Seattle.
You ever heard that before?
No, I have not heard about the Seattle thing.
Like on an island in Seattle?
Like going to the San Juan Islands?
I have no idea.
I don't know the makeup of Seattle.
I've only been there a few times.
Every time I go, it's beautiful.
It's incredible, but apparently,
the winners are suicide winners, people.
Now we're in Hawaii.
Maui is where I would move.
I'll go, I'd go Big Island.
Why?
I like it there.
Spread out and not as populated.
And then we'd, if I'm gonna go to Hawaii,
but that's really where we've,
I've gone with my family almost every single year.
We go to the Big Island and...
Big Island is not Honolulu.
No, that's Oahu.
Okay, Oahu.
Yeah.
Big Island is the island of Hawaii.
Big Island is the one that's got volcanic rock.
Yes.
Everywhere.
Yes.
Hilo is one of the cities.
Okay, gotcha.
Kona.
Gotcha.
Okay, yes, yes.
Okay, I've been there.
But Maui is just, you know, and...
It's all nice.
Kauai is insane too.
Like, it's all insane.
And whenever you go there, you think,
my God, what have I done?
Why am I not living here?
When it's the most beautiful place on earth,
people are pretty cool.
So, yeah, I've felt the draw.
And then you sound like an asshole
when you're talking to people there
because you're like, I think I'm gonna move here.
And they're like, yeah, everyone says that.
But I think you get island fever there too.
I don't think you could spend 100% of your time
in Hawaii because you get,
especially on Kauai or something like that,
I've heard from people that you feel a little trapped in
and it might be a little too slow for you to adjust.
Well, yeah, it's like a small town
in the middle of the fucking ocean.
You know, you're in a small town,
and you can't drive away from it to go to anywhere,
anywhere you wanna go outside of that place,
you gotta fly.
People, the way someone, one of my friends moved there
and described it, it turns into the most beautiful
groundhog day ever, where it's just this endless loop
of rainbows and light and beauty,
but you're still stuck in this place.
You need work.
And that's why I'm a huge gardener.
We were talking about this,
and I can probably busy myself.
Between reading what various projects around the house
and gardening and like physical fitness,
like you'd go and work out and do hikes and stuff like that.
You could be very busy.
Surfing.
Surfing, why not be, why, spear fishing?
Why am I not doing that for dinner every single night?
Oh God.
I'd go down and I'd spear fish.
I've got this sort of work down,
but I need to make my whole plan,
and we talked about this a little bit at the comedy store,
my plan is to make as much money as I can
before 50 and 55, those two little marks,
and then just see if I can just walk away altogether.
Now, how are you, you're one of the hardest workers,
I know man, you're always doing multiple jobs all the time.
That's tough, it's a little overwhelming.
It's overwhelming, but part of that is probably
because you have a family, how many kids do you have?
Two kids, 13 and 10.
13 and 10, so for over a decade you have been.
Providing, my wife hasn't worked,
she's been a full-time homekeeper for her
since we moved down here in 2003.
And so 2003, okay, right,
so how old was your kid in 2003?
I should be able to do that.
We moved down in one, he was one year,
it was his first birthday when we actually
left San Francisco.
So you moved from San Francisco,
how long have you been doing stand-up
when you moved out here?
I had been doing stand-up for five years.
So you'd been doing stand-up for five years
and had a child?
Yes.
That must have been terrifying.
Was that terrifying?
It was a little terrifying.
Well, I was working for my parents' family business.
And then-
What was that business?
I was hiring and firing people for other companies.
So I was up in the air with George Clooney,
I used to fire people.
Wow.
And then I was really stressed out,
crying my car, I needed to find something else
and so I always wanted to be a stand-up comic
from the young, young age.
I was grew up on a block in San Francisco
with other stand-up comedians.
So there's Michael Meehan and Michael Pritchard
who lived on my square block.
So I would drive up to their steps.
I remember walking by when I was at university
in San Francisco and walking down
and there was a comedian's hand on the steps
and they were having a joke meeting
and they were gonna start a sketch group.
And I was like, hey, what are you guys doing?
And I recognized them as all these local comics.
And they were like, yeah, we're starting a sketch group.
I thought it was the coolest thing in the world.
That was like the flash-bowl moment
where that started the-
Well, I gave a speech in high school.
I was a salutatorian in my high school class
and I killed.
What is salutatorian?
There's a step below valedictorian.
I was a horrible, horrible, horrible student.
Just the worst doctor, how I was put through school.
And you have math, I was trying to help my daughter
with she's a fourth grader with math
and I was bad at it and I can't,
I'm sure I've un-diagnosed something.
And so just look at it and it does not,
nothing makes sense.
And really, I'm finding adding up tips
and I can function, but in terms of like,
you know, really long division or any algebra,
I have no idea what the math is going on.
Sure. Checked out a long time ago.
It just doesn't, that part of your brain
isn't functioning. It does not work.
So you were, what was your grades in math?
What were you getting?
I don't know how I was passed along.
I remember going to a physics teacher
at the end of high school and I said,
Dr. Parker, I'm in a failure class.
There were all the grades were posted
and then there was they skipped lines
and put mine down below everybody else's.
And I go, Dr. Parker, I'm in a failure class.
And he goes, Mr. Magical, for students like you,
we don't believe in Fs, we believe in Bs.
Cause I was Rushmore.
I created all of the sketches.
I was student body treasurer.
I had an article that was in the newspaper
that everyone rushed to read.
What was the article?
Oh, it was to ask Allen.
I made up all of these fake advice.
I had a fake advice con.
I wrote all the questions and the answers.
And I would really subtly make digs about teachers
and, you know, it was a little controversial as well.
And, you know, teachers coming up on what,
I know this is me.
What the hell are you thinking of doing?
And would, you know, it was,
I went to St. Ignatius college preparatory for boys.
And my dad went there and graduated in 1957,
but there's no way I would get in to that school,
this, you know, to this day.
So anyway, so I also saw Bob Sarlon,
who was this old comic from San Francisco.
He's, he had career day at our school.
And on one of the doors, he just said comedy.
And I would always go to his career day
and he would play his old Lettermans.
Wow.
So I was watching this guy play VHS tapes of Lettermans.
Anyway, so I always wanted to be a comic.
What a cool school.
That's an amazing school that they would even allow
a comedian in as an actual career that kids could pursue.
Yeah.
So this priest, Father Prieto, I did an impression of him.
And I did the winter pops.
I would go on the announcements and pretend to be him.
And everyone would think it was him.
And then I would do, it would go off and get a little weird.
And then they encouraged all that.
And so they, he lobbied for me to be the salutatorian.
I give this speech, 1700 kids crush.
Wow.
And I was like, this is him.
I was a roast.
I roasted my entire class.
And I roasted teachers.
And it was a roast.
I roasted every time.
Did you study roast before that at all?
No, I had no idea what I was doing.
And just wrote digs and subtle jabs at everybody.
And then.
Do you remember any of them?
Not a clue.
I know.
Is it on tape?
What about, I don't think so.
No, this is pre anything.
I graduated from high school in 1989.
And so no record of this at all.
And so, oh, I remember talking about somebody,
some of the kids wore the same clothes every single day.
And I go in, all of us have changed so much.
Except.
That's great.
We've grown so much as people, except for this guy who's
looked exactly the same from day one when we stepped in
the school.
So I did that and then worked in this parents' family
business because we grew up pretty like lower middle class.
My dad was a teamster that made about $30 grand a year.
And then my mom cleaned houses and then
worked as a secretary in this company.
So this is all happening while I'm in grammar school
and high school.
And then eventually worked away and bought the company.
So she has this amazing rags to riches story
where she was making $6 an hour as a secretary
and then working girl bought the company.
So now the company, the kid who had a blazer from Goodwill,
now is getting to an opportunity to take over this business.
So I'm the eldest son in this family business.
I work there from 19 to 32.
Start doing stand up at the age of 28
because I figure if I don't do it before 30,
I'm not going to do it.
My window is going to close.
What was the conversation when you start running your family
business, which is a archetypical thing that you hear about.
But I don't think a lot of people have experienced it.
That's old school.
Was there a formal conversation?
We're passing this on to you now.
You've got to start helping.
It was understood that I would do this.
It would be an idiotic for me not to come in and help.
I fired my first person when I was 19 years old.
I was still at USF and came in.
So the family business is firing people?
We manage other people's problems.
So I'm like a corporate fixer, like Michael Clayton
for small businesses.
And so if people were fighting or if people were stealing
or if people were showing up late,
we employed everyone to work there,
but it was our responsibility.
So I would come in and go, hey, how's it going, guys?
I understand you had a little fist fight
at lunch break today, huh?
Whoa.
And you go, well, it's not going to happen again.
If it does, we're going to call the cops.
We're going to fire you both.
So this is like a business has got some shitty employee
that they're having problems with,
but because you can't just fire somebody
without getting in all kinds of weird.
Yeah, you call in the fixer.
Who will fire, who will make sure that-
It's done perfectly.
So there's no litigation.
Yeah.
Okay, cool.
What there is litigation, because people are fucking horrible.
So no matter what, yeah, you're going to do it right.
Everyone, it was like horrible bosses is the thing,
you know, like, oh, it's my boss, man.
I get fucking embossed a dick.
People just, all types of people are just terrible
because a lot of the people that we work with,
we give so many opportunities to,
and people just don't want to be working.
That was my whole thing is I would really was reasonable
and I would say, hey, you're showing a blade
every single day.
You don't want to be here.
Why don't you go find a job that you want to do?
And this is not your job, man.
Right.
What would they say?
They go, yeah, people would apologize to me all the time
and say, Al, I'm sorry, I let you down, man.
I was like, because I couldn't have been cooler about it.
I was like, look, man, you're going to show up
and you're late again.
I got to show up at the final check,
so please don't make me do that.
So don't see me again.
I do not want to see you.
You're an assassin.
You were like some kind of hitman.
It was horrible.
People would run from me at 4.30 on a Friday.
If you saw me, it was over.
Carried people's plants to their cars.
I was smoking cigarettes heavy at the time.
So I would just smoke cigarettes in my car
and I'd play brand new being everything is everything.
The sense, like the track from menace to society.
Oh.
Right before it walked in the door.
If you're down, if you're down, say if you're scared,
say you're scared.
This is the shit.
Don't fuck around or come unprepared
because you might quit or something like that.
So I would sit in the car.
It's so dramatic, man.
I had to put out a cigarette and I'd walk inside.
I'd fire a fucking single mom without daycare.
Oh, did you feel powerful?
I felt horrible.
So that's when I was taking stained glass glass.
I was volunteering for the big brothers and big sisters
in San Francisco and the peninsula.
So you were trying to diffuse the.
I was balancing it all out.
Now, this is a family business.
That you have been pushed into from familial pressure.
Yeah, yeah, just like the people who had nothing now
have everything because of this.
Like how could you not want to take it over?
And it's a kind of corporate,
I guess you're like euthanizing.
Corporate cubicle euthanizer.
And so your parents, were they aware
that you were having this kind of.
Struggle with it, yeah.
Yeah, I think so.
It was just, it sucks.
My mom's, so I'm half Mexican half Sicilian
and my mom is Judy Tarantino and she's tough as shit.
She's like, it fucking sucks,
but these people fucked up and you got to deal with it.
Like, and they were brutal.
It was just really tough.
Your parents.
Yeah, just tough in terms of not with me,
but just with others.
Like a big fuck you don't fuck with us.
Like you fucked up and this is what you did.
Are they Catholic?
Yes.
So did they have some kind of religious backing
for their life philosophy?
They didn't attach it to like,
this is the will of God, this is.
Not close, but my jet,
I would, the only thing that when religion entered
into the picture, my dad is really sick.
Like just, I cannot believe he's alive right to this day.
He was given five months to live six years ago.
Oh wow.
And because we staffed a lot of medical offices,
my mom and dad would,
they had access to all this great healthcare.
You know other people don't have access?
They have all the access.
And so they knew how to manipulate the system
and fuck with insurances and just did,
they could, they navigate my dad
through the healthcare system better than anybody.
So he got, he was the first person
to get experimental surgeries where they,
they actually cut everything out.
He like, he's in medical magazines.
What kind of sickness?
He is cancer everywhere in his entire body.
Like in his skeleton, in his blood,
his colon, in his skin and just everywhere.
Loaded up.
Where did it start?
Started in his prostate.
And I think he had a web of skin cancer as well
because he was too proud to get anything looked at
and just developed over time.
So they cut it all out.
Spent 79 days in the hospital
and got 35 surgeries in those 79 days.
Holy shit.
Well, this is, you know, what you're saying is,
they're saying this is like the future of cancer
is that you're in the same way that AIDS
used to be this death sentence.
HIV used to be a death sentence in cancer.
It still is a death sentence,
depending on the type you have.
But they're saying as these treatments progress,
it's a treatable, it's going to become a cancer.
You're going to be able to manage it a little bit more.
He got all of his platelets to cancer,
causing cells spun out.
His blood was immediately sent to Houston
and sent back and put back in him.
And he was done twice.
And he was the only person in the world ever
to get that done twice.
Wow.
And then, you know, because of some connections,
we were able to sneak a blood transfusion here and there,
which is a big no-no.
And he came back from that.
He's been eating weed a little bit.
Like, he's game for trying whatever.
But back to the religion thing, what he was telling me,
when anything good would happen with stand-up or writing
or anything like that, he would go,
well, you know, this is happening because I prayed.
And I go, eh, I got a lot of,
the tremendous amount of hard work has gone into this.
That's kind of like, I can bet you we could put aside,
you know, I put my kids through Catholic school.
My son's going to Loyola next year, which is fantastic.
That's like a big Jesuit Catholic boys high school,
that's pretty much the same thing that I went to
in San Francisco.
And I definitely believe in that community
and being surrounded by good, positive people.
But in terms of we prayed and made this happen,
yeah, that's where you start to lose me.
A lot of people get annoyed by that.
Yeah, a lot of people, you know, they, like,
I saw some hilarious cartoon where it's like a doctor
with a sad look on his face as the patient is like,
God saved me and the doctor, you know, clearly, no,
we saved you, but then, you know, maybe, who knows?
It's a mysterious thing.
Do you pray?
No, no, I definitely, so I'm driving by an accident.
I tell the kids, there's a lot of ambulances
and we do a car overturned.
I tell the kids, okay, everybody, let's go close,
you know, they close your eyes and think something positive
and hope everybody's okay.
That's cool.
And then, that's as close as I kind of pray.
In terms of, I do wish people well as much as possible
and we don't go to church that much.
My son's an altar boy and possibly the worst altar boy.
How are you a bad altar boy?
He doesn't want to be there so much that,
so he'll be on the altar and with the priest standing there
and he'll go.
And everyone will be watching and my friends
or all these moms will look at us and just start cracking up
because they know that we know he's the worst
and at one point, he loves basketball.
At one point, he started daydreaming about dribbling
and crossover dribbling and just started like pretending
he was dribbling fake basketball and then he'll lean.
You're supposed to like stand up straight with your arms
skippable, you know, like the pair to dance
and then he would just lean on stuff.
It's torture.
And he's tortured by it.
I was an altar boy in the Episcopal Church
and it was fucked.
It was fucked, man.
Because like, it's like bad enough
to have to go to a church service.
I mean, it's bad.
If you're a kid, you're going to church on a Sunday.
You know that outside is infinite freedom.
There's all these wonderful things you could be doing.
Yeah, here you are in this dank, incense filled-
Sunday, it's the best day.
The best day.
And you're in a doom room and you're like surrounded
by people talking in another language.
And if they are talking in your language,
you don't understand what they're saying
because it's usually some archaic version of that.
The monotonous chance, the weird outfit,
like you're contorted into some terrible position.
It's a mess, man.
It really isn't.
I think that this is the problem with modern religion
is that it has somehow managed to transform
what is theoretically supposed to be
the most insanely psychedelic and beautiful thing,
a connection, a ritualistic connection with the transcendent
into the most mundane, boring, orthodox shit.
And if that's not Satanism, I don't know what is.
It's crazy.
I really love the community of it all.
I think I like people getting together and being positive.
But other than that, it really never felt
any connection to it as a little kid.
I was never an altar boy.
But as a little kid, when I'd go to church,
I sort of got why we'd always gone.
I lived a block away from St. Ann's in San Francisco.
We'd walk there every single Sunday.
And I'd go by myself because they just told me to go.
Yeah, that's cool.
I would just sit there and it was just took time.
It was just an hour lost for me.
But then after a while, with my kids,
I'm like, okay, I'm trying to explain this.
Again, it's like telling my daughter to study math
because I was always horrible at it.
And it's like, I was never good at this,
but I can't get mad at her when she has a hard time with it.
And same thing with church.
It's like, they hate it.
And all I do is say, look, we don't go there very often.
When we do, when we have to,
just sit here and think positive thoughts,
and then we're gonna walk away.
That's the story of religion these days.
You know that theoretically, early Christianity
and Judaism used to have cannabis as a part of it.
So when you hear about anointed his head with oil,
when you hear about like incense burning,
when you hear about the burning bush, for example,
which was an acacia bush that the acacia bush
is just filled with DMT,
which is one of the most psychedelic.
Oh yeah, so basically this is the one,
a theory about religion is,
we exist in a prohibition on psychedelics
and people these days don't wanna talk about it,
but it used to be if you went to church.
And DMT is the God drug, right?
Yeah, that's what they call it.
The spirit molecule, it's an endogenous chemical
that is apparently in your pineal gland.
A lot of great data out there you could look at,
but it's the thing that people who do it all seem to have
similar kind of experiences
where they are contacted by entities
or there's some, they're just insane.
But you know, this was the way back
in the thousands of years ago,
it was a different time, you know?
People didn't have, there wasn't a taboo associated
with taking hallucinogens in the same way that it is now,
but it kinda makes sense that visions of God
and contact with angels isn't gonna happen
if you're just stone cold sober
sitting in your desert hut.
But if you happen to have managed to obtain
some kind of psychoactive chemical
that's floating around that the priests are using,
then suddenly this church service that right now is,
to me, modern church is like going to a campfire
and sitting around a pile of sticks that you haven't lit
and pretending that you're warming your hands.
That's what modern church is.
It's like we're all pretending
that we're having this experience.
Whereas theoretically and back in the day,
those urns that they're walking by filled with incense
were filled with hashish, smoke just billowing out
that the priests, everyone's just stoned
out of their fucking minds
and people are saying these incantations
to some divine being while everyone's just tripping.
That's what church used to be.
And that's a church that a kid could really enjoy.
We'd all go back to church.
Yeah, we would.
We would.
Well, you still can get stoned and go to church.
Highly recommend it.
Do you smoke marijuana?
I eat it.
Me too.
I can't smoke anything.
I took a hit off a joint on December 6th
at a Christmas party and just wore that it would be
the last time I ever smoked anything.
Why?
Because my throat was sore for maybe three weeks.
And I used to smoke cigarettes
and I tried just to get off of my chew a lot of toothpicks
but I was trying to smoke the vape thing, blue,
those things when they came out.
Those are horrible and I can't.
So now I'm not smoking anything
and then I'll just eat it occasionally.
And I think people put a lot of trust
in those vape companies, man.
Oh, Dan Soder.
You know comedian Dan Soder?
I've heard of him.
Oh, yeah.
I'm not touching you.
He's a big smoker and then I was trying to go like,
just transition with these things.
Fuck your Chinese water vapor.
Whatever the fuck is in that thing.
I got sinus infections twice from smoking those things.
Well, we just don't know.
I mean, the problem is it's like,
this is an unknown thing.
But they do say there's a lot less carcinogens in it
but the problem is you're dealing
with a combustion temperature.
So apparently some of the stuff in those vape pens,
if it's not, if the temperature is just a little too high,
it's producing all kinds of fucked up carcinogenic
byproducts.
I got this sweet, horrible pain and sensation
in my lungs a little bit and just decided
I was just who knows what's fucking in these.
I gotta be done.
I read that it's actually that people,
and this could be wrong, but I read that they're finding out
that it seems to be suppressed the immune system.
It's just inhaling anything in your poor goddamn lungs.
Give him a fucking break, man.
Which is what, but edible marijuana is so fantastic.
It's the best.
I love those little Kiva bites and the Kiva chocolates.
There's terabytes, Kiva, the Kiva people
are doing great things.
And also I'm the biggest lightweight ever.
When I first got my pot card, I went and me and,
you know that death squad show that they do at the ice house?
Well that was initially the ice house Chronicles
or whatever that was.
I found Red Band that space and then introduced him
over there because it was me and Ari
who were supposed to take over that second room
before we moved to New York a long time ago.
And we both looked at each other and this is like show two.
We're like, we can't do this.
What are we doing?
Like we fuck this.
And so I go, Red Band, let's get him on it.
And so helped negotiate his rent, moved him over there
and then I was sitting with Ari
on like the very first one of those shows.
I got my pot ID and I got a piece of blueberry cake
and I found this way so it was just,
and I split it in half and I go, take half
and I'll take half.
And he goes, okay, he didn't feel a thing.
And I was standing on my couch like going,
what is happening?
And I go, that cake was fucking crazy, huh?
And nothing.
Ari?
Zero.
Ari, yeah, because Ari has an insane tolerance
because the guy's constantly consuming weed, I think.
Yeah, you know, I think one,
I don't know how many people know this about you Al,
but you are the comedian where if you're thinking
about buying a house that people contact.
Brennan Walsh, I'm the comedy name dropper,
but Brennan Walsh said that if you call Al
and you want him to return your call as soon as possible,
tell him you're gonna buy a car.
Yes.
And I know everything about-
Yeah, you know, you are-
Car purchasing.
Car purchasing.
Homes.
Homes, yard work.
Yard work, yeah.
So you're, but I don't think people realize
how in the comedy community it's interesting
how there are people, like in my mind,
you probably aren't even aware of this,
but in my mind, I have already made the decision
when it comes time for me to decide to buy a house.
You're the first person I'm gonna call.
You should go check it out.
Yeah.
I guess I'm, I've done it twice.
I feel like I'm in the house that I'll live in
for the rest of my life.
And before I move to, there'll be this one,
and then I probably hopefully will keep this.
My idea is that I wanna pay it off as soon as possible
and be done with any sort of payment
and just pay taxes on it.
So that's my next goal in like the next three years
I will pay off my house completely and not owe a dime.
But you, I just wanna say you fly in the face
of the stereotypical comedian
in the sense that a lot of comedians,
there's comedians, when you think about them
as a personality type, generally you don't think,
these are very organized people
who are good at the minutiae of life.
A lot of us procrastinate, put shit off.
I do that, but I also with kids really fucking makes you.
It's the kids.
I feel like that.
And I had this, you know, business background
where I was the operations manager prior to,
I just don't wanna fuck up.
I left a family business where I could have taken
this thing over and made a lot of money.
And then I left it all to go and do stand up.
What courage, what insane courage to do that.
I got cast to a TV show right away.
So it wasn't that.
But still, you were already moving in that direction.
I mean, yes, getting cast in a TV show.
Which TV show?
It was called The Ortegas.
It was with Cheech, played my dad.
And that was my first lunch, or first summer in 2003.
I just was me and Cheech sitting at Hugo's on San Juan.
But you had a kid after this.
Oh no, I had a kid when I came down to.
So that's the point.
So it's not like you just got,
it's not like you're like, you know what, mom,
I'm gonna try stand up.
And then you were on the phone with Cheech
and got a TV show.
It's like you had a child, you were already doing comedy
and you moved to Los Angeles with a child as a comedian
to try to make it in show business.
Yeah, it was scary.
So don't de-emphasize that, man.
That is madness.
That is madness.
But I, and also, I think it was like, how much do we need?
And I've always had this idea is like,
and how famous do you wanna be?
Like I always just won't really wanted to make a living
doing stand up on my own terms, acting on my own.
Like I love acting.
I think it's, I'd love to do more of it.
And just make a fine living.
I don't need all the money
and I don't need any of the notoriety
and it's like I'm really not very good at promoting myself
or anything like that.
But just wanna just make a, you know, living being creative
and to pay for the kids and.
And you're pulling that off.
I mean, you're.
Yeah, but just not work as much as you have to.
And I was telling you the other night
when I didn't have anything going on.
Cause I'm on a TV show that starts in July.
What's that show?
That's cool.
I'm dying up here.
Oh, right.
I'm dying up here.
And I technically don't have to work until July.
That's so incredible.
Now I'm dying up here is really interesting
because this is Jim Carrey's.
Jim Carrey's producing is a book about the strike.
Steve LeBatkin.
Yep.
The guy who committed suicide off the Hyatt.
But this is sort of the story
of like early comedy store days.
And which part did you end up getting?
I got, I'm Edgar.
Edgar Martinez.
I was on acid during the, we find out the guy's dead.
And then I just started giggling.
And I took two hits of bladder acid the night before.
I didn't know he was gonna fucking die.
And like, so I'm just cracking up.
Wow, cool.
During the whole thing.
I do stand up.
They had me, Santino, Andrew Santino,
and Don Marrera did these stand up chunks.
So I got to write and just pull.
I think it was just up on stage riffing
and fucking around with the audience a little bit.
But then did a joke that I never do.
And there was timeless.
And then got to do that.
Cause it's supposed to be 1972, I believe.
Yeah, that's right.
And I was just up on stage fucking around.
Then I'll be in it as a series regular,
but it's a, it's all like the underbelly,
but John Daly is in it.
Andrew Santino, Eric Griffin, this guy, Clark Duke,
and then Melissa Leo, Alfred Molina,
Robert Forrester, Kathy Moriarty, Sebastian Stan.
Like it's just, it's really, it's gonna be a good one.
So that's cool.
So now, but before we get into that,
I just, I wanna talk about a little,
just a little bit about you have a child.
Yeah, too.
And at the time, or you do, no,
when this, when you were transitioning
to stand-up comedy, at what point did you quit your job
and head into the great unknown as a comedian?
Well, I went to Montreal as a new face.
From San Francisco?
Yes.
Okay.
And then I would go down to LA and I started taking meetings
and I would go down and my dad,
which then mom were just yelling at me the entire time.
So they would go, where are you right now?
And I go, well, I'm gonna audition tonight
at the Emperor for my own show.
And then tomorrow I do this show with Janine Garofalo.
And go, who the fuck is Janine Garofalo?
And I go, she's a comedian.
She's famous.
And you just say, well, I don't know who the fuck she is.
And then I go, well, and then tomorrow I meet with UPN.
And then I have an audition for Curb Your Enthusiasm
and he goes, nothing, zero response on the phone.
And I go, what's after the Sopranos?
And he goes, you're gonna be on the Sopranos?
And I go, no, I'm not gonna be on the Sopranos.
I go, I'm just, this is good stuff.
And he goes, well, I gotta change the locks tomorrow
and I don't know who you think is gonna fuck and be there.
And so they would, they were until gone on TV.
So then I got cast in this pilot.
It was me and Freddie Soto, who I ended up,
I was already good friends with.
Me, Freddie Soto, and Carlos Oscar is the last three guys.
It was a nationwide search for a Latino comedian.
We make the pilot and I go back to work the very next day.
So you go from, Al Madrigal is walking,
we got Al Madrigal, Al is walking.
And because I was like number one on the call sheet.
And then I am, oh, you can turn now.
I was number one on the call sheet.
And then I went back to like firing people the next day.
And then it got picked up.
It got picked up, I moved the whole family down
and no one ever saw it because they made six episodes
and nothing aired.
I bought a car for cash, I bought a Volkswagen Passat
for cash, $22,000.
I wrote a check for $22,000.
And then that next day we sat in the stands
and they said they've cut our order for 12.
We now are just gonna make these six episodes
and today is our last day, everybody.
So now I'm just left in LA but I'm not going back
and got cast in another pilot and then after that.
And so that's probably, I mean, we were talking about it
just before we started recording,
but I've probably known you just as long as I've known
anybody down here because I was introduced
to you and Sam Tripoli and Jason Tebow
through Brian Jarvis who introduced me to my wife.
Crazy, that's nuts, man.
So, okay, so you have had an amazing run out here,
it sounds like.
Well, yeah, just the Daily Show helped stand up a ton
and Daily Show helped me get cast and stuff,
but I've already been cast and acting and sitcoms
and pilots and everything.
So it's like I've been on like nine network pilots.
Nine.
And four have gotten picked up to series
and that people don't even know me and these shows.
But About a Boy went for two years.
I was in a show called Free Agents with Natasha.
Yeah, yeah.
And that five episodes maybe?
I don't know.
Did, I guess.
And then I was in a show with Rock Hill Welch
and Jeffrey Tambor called Welcome to the Captain.
I was in Geary and Married with Jay Moore.
That was a season.
And then I was in, you know, all these things and deals
and stuff like that,
leading up written the Al Madrigal show four times.
My pilot that never gets made.
What time do you wake up in the morning?
I wake up with the kids at 6.30 every morning,
pretty much six, six, 37.
What's the schedule look like for you?
I mean, this, it's, I was writing,
I sold three TV shows last summer.
Then you have a podcast network.
We started all things comedy with Bill Burr.
So you have a podcast network, you're writing shows,
you're acting and you-
And people made fun of me at the Daily Show nonstop
because it was, they called me ABS.
What's that?
Always be scheming.
And they, they would all crack up
because I would take and make these shows.
I got my-
Your ambition.
It's your ambition.
I'm shriveling over here.
When I hear about this, I think,
oh my God, you are such a warrior,
such a hard worker.
Whereas for me, that kind of like hard core,
never ending super production,
it seems, I don't want to say terrifying,
but it makes me think of church.
It makes me think of like squirming around as an altar boy.
I would go nuts now.
But it's all looking at all the stuff.
It's all fun.
I'm making a game called Ding Long
with my good, good friends.
It was a game, a card game I played in college.
I'll show it to you on my phone afterwards.
I'm making it.
It's like Chinese zodiac characters playing cards
in an underground Chinese card room.
And it's this Chinese climbing game
that we played in college.
So I'm making that.
I started the Latino comedy festival.
And so there's, because Saturday Night Live
has had no Latino cast members.
And Fred Armisen was amazing
and Horatio Sands obviously,
but since then, which has been a long time,
they haven't had anybody.
So it's a struggle to find Latino talent.
And so I bought that a long time ago
and own that LatinoComedyFestival.com.
And so then found a partner just recently
to start that as a TV show and a festival
and sort of figure out who the next Latino comedians are.
Because at this point, it's like George Lopez
and Gabriel Glacius and that's pretty much it.
Like there's nobody, Cristella, me, Felipe.
And then it severely drops off.
So I was trying to help do that.
And it's just, why not?
I figure, all before I'm 50,
and then the whole goal, and since the very beginning,
is not having to work, wanting to work,
but not having to work over the age of 50 or 55.
Now, it seems like you're somebody who loves to work.
So, right?
Like today, I felt like I was just working around the house
and I felt good about that.
Right.
But do you think, I know a few super ambitious comedians
who are of your tribe who work like you do.
And I always think, I don't know
that you'll ever be able to stop.
Like I think the dream of some,
See, that's where I'm different.
I think like, so super ambitious,
but take a look at my Twitter or Instagram feed.
And I think those guys are all super ambitious,
like self-promoting themselves and doing that and working.
And it's not that.
So I don't really care about,
I'd like to put out another comedy,
you know, a couple more comedy specials.
Yes.
All my own, I don't care where they go.
And then just travel around and do stand-up.
I like the travel that goes with it.
And then I'd like to travel as much as I possibly can.
But I just want to see how much you can sort of get done
and then stop.
You don't strike, you don't seem like,
you know, for someone who's working so hard.
I'm not working that hard.
I feel like I'm not trying as hard,
nearly as hard as I could be.
Really?
So what would, okay.
So tell me if you were at like,
if all engines were firing.
I don't have an assistant.
I would hire an assistant full-time.
An assistant would meet me at my house
every single morning at 8 a.m.
I've thought all this through.
8 a.m.
We'd start at 8.
8?
Well, I'd go to the gym early.
Five, six?
I think you got to go to the gym.
Have you ever gone to the gym at 6 a.m.
or anything like that?
It's been a long time, Al.
If I ever did that, it's been a long, long time.
All the cars are very nice.
And so I'd go to the gym early
and then I would meet and we'd get to work
and I would just start cranking shit out.
And then I would have somebody help me handle my schedule
and we'd write and I'd have like this.
What would you write?
Oh, I would, I have, in addition to all that other shit,
I have at least, I could tell you,
I should have spent 20 show ideas and treatments
and just ready to go.
So you'd work on treatments?
I would write those shows.
I would write them.
A movie with Kevin Christie.
We just finished a movie
and I want to get that out there.
How many hours would you work?
I would work like six hours a day.
Six hours.
And that would be done
and maybe hanging out
and just enjoying the rest of the day.
At three or so?
Yeah, done at three.
Then your kids?
It's the War of Art by Steven Pressfield
and it says it's the work nine to three.
Wow.
You know, Rogan had those books around forever.
Yeah, I've got that book, yeah.
I love that book.
Jarvis introduced me to that book
and then ever since then,
I've seen a bunch of people with it.
But I'm a really big fan.
Like once you follow your bliss
and you're doing what you really love
and like we're making comedy,
like I was talking to Tripoli
and those guys about,
I'm working on a game show with Sam Tripoli called Squabble
where it's two different types playing Family Feud.
We're doing this for Comedy Central Digital to Start
but it's like Black Nerds versus Canadians
and it's trivia and it's real prizes.
So we're looking into game show laws right now
and just making stuff, it's fun.
Now, a lot of people listening are not, including me,
are not as high functioning as you are out.
A lot of us, I'm not speaking for you guys out there,
maybe some of you out there doing,
this is like, I feel like I'm with the guy from Wall Street.
What's his name?
Gordon Gekko.
Gordon Gekko.
Last night, I watched Better Call Saul with my wife
and drank wine and helped my daughter with an art project.
Listen, Matt, I think it's beautiful.
I think it's incredible.
I think what's, we need people doing what you're doing
because it raises the bar and it's exciting.
But what, so like-
But I'm not working at stand-up as hard as I could be.
I'm not doing that.
I mean, I have two sets tonight.
Is this part of your mind that's telling you
you should have an 8 a.m. assistant
and that you should be working more?
How big a part of your mind is this?
I know that's what I need to do to,
if I really wanted to accomplish all the stuff
that I want to, it's like I really need to start
turning it up a little bit in the back of my mind.
It's like, I feel like we all have this subconscious
that's telling us the right and wrong thing to do.
And the right and the path has been laid out
and you need to, you're getting told the right ways to go
on a regular basis and whether or not you choose
to follow the right way is, there's like a path.
This was all a game.
I don't know why we're here, what the fuck we're doing,
but why not try to fucking get the house in Hawaii?
Why not?
Like, why not try to go for that?
It seems like it just, I'm looking at the picture
of Barack Obama behind you, I don't know why.
I'm looking at a joint.
Yeah, it's-
With a mushroom cloud rising up behind him.
Why don't you go for the Hawaii joint house?
Why are you not like a pot farmer on the Big Island?
Well, I never thought of it personally.
That's a great idea.
Can you grow pot on the Big Island?
I guess you can.
You can grow anything.
I was thinking, Hilo is one of the most amazing
farmers market I've ever seen.
It's like Santa Cruz over there.
So anyway, so that's the whole plan.
It's like, why not try to, we should all be trying more.
And then, I'm curious as to whether or not like,
but should I be ambitious?
Should I, why don't I just work in the post office?
Right.
You're asking me that?
Yeah, why don't I just work in the post office?
I was talking to, I had this conversation with Marin
a long, long, long, long time ago.
And he goes, why don't I just bake?
What if we baked?
Would we get the same satisfaction?
Well, this is the question, right?
This is the big question.
So you have this life, then you have a certain amount
of daylight that you can move around on the earth
without artificial light.
And you have to fill that up with some kind of activity.
And so whatever that activity is,
it's, you just, it just depends.
Like what you're doing, when I hear about it,
it sounds really great, but I don't think I would want it.
I'm, you know, like my life, I've got this podcast, I do.
I do stand up, I've got a tour coming up.
You go out on the road, you're on a bus tour
with cool people, hopefully cool people.
But this, when I think about the idea of like producing a show,
when I think about the idea of like going through
the entire process of creating a show,
like you're even.
The podcast network, All Things Comedy
is a gigantic pain in my ass.
I was sending Gareth Reynolds' new artwork to him this morning
and approving artwork, and I had it revised
because I hated the other stuff.
And I couldn't believe that it took so long to get it done.
I didn't get an email, and I was aggravated
that I hadn't gotten his email,
and I called somebody up to say, what the fuck?
That, yes, email.
No, I know exactly what you're talking about.
See, that's scary to me.
The end result is that All Things Comedy
is a cooperative setup, so all the comics profit share.
We should all have, I talked to you about this
a long time ago, and you were one of the first people
that I talked to you about this, but when it was an idea.
So I put on 10 podcasts, and it was Harlan Williams,
Tom Segura, Your Mom's House, it was Ari, me, Bill Burr,
and we just built this thing.
Now we have 60, and the idea is that we were gonna run
Farrell is fantastic, and we've always had this kinship,
but with All Things Comedy, I have way more
of a business plan, and we want to be a big,
multi-channel network for professional comedians,
and we want to distribute comedy,
and then what I wanna do is I wanna get each comic
to look at a check, and go holy shit.
That's cool.
And we were gonna all own this company,
like Ari in particular has a tremendous stake in this,
and Tom Segura the same thing,
Davey Anthony has the Don Lump with Gareth Reynolds,
and like so. So cool.
But anyway, I just want, we can build something,
and I just say no one else was doing it,
and why not do it?
Listen man, there are people listening right now
who have tricked themselves into maybe not being
as productive as they could be.
So talk to them, what do we do?
Those of us who wanna be ambitious,
so let's figure out what do you wanna do?
It's like so I was working in this job,
and I was making money,
you're all working and you're making money somehow.
But what do you, until I became my own sole proprietor,
I'm the owner of my own business,
which is a production company that leases me out
to do all kinds of shit.
But when I saw my mom go from $6 an hour
to owning this company, and how successful,
and sure she was taking on a lot of people's stress,
and she was stressed out,
but a woman who was cleaning other people's houses
now has seven houses, and she has a place in Mexico
where she goes and she plays cards,
and she does it, so I know right now,
it was a tremendous amount of stress getting there,
but the end result is living in paradise.
I should do pictures like my backyard,
I feel like I can't have an unhappy day in my house.
Sure, Al, okay, but you're on,
listen, I'm speaking for them,
you're on TV, man, and you're this talented comedian,
listen, I'm making minimum wage right now,
I can barely afford to get groceries,
I've got a kid, and there's no fucking way
I can start my own business.
I think it's gotta be everybody,
but everybody has an idea,
and everybody has something that they know
will truly make them happy,
and if it's music or whatever it is,
and I've always, see there's,
when people have a midlife crisis,
it's because they have regret,
and now they're 50, 60, and they're in this relationship,
and they've gone to this shit job, nine to five,
and then they've looked up and gone,
what the fuck did I do?
I hate this woman, I hate this man,
and I hate my job, and I need to buy a convertible,
and I need to move to fucking Toledo,
whatever, and get out of where I am,
so how do you avoid that happening?
Well, you have these instincts that you need to listen to,
and it's the whole Joseph Campbell following your bliss,
and when you do follow your bliss or whatever that is,
if it's owning a plumbing supply company,
like the example that they use in the War of Art,
which is something I'd encourage you to pick up immediately,
everyone should own this,
and do your work, all great things will happen,
and you just listen to that muse, and you'll be fine.
But what about, everything he said's great.
So I'm doing that, and this is what's happening.
But now, what about the 50-year-old who's listening?
What about-
You can still do that, it's not too late,
it's not too late at all,
because I think we should all be vacationing,
I think we can't sweat the small stuff.
I used to get, I had this joke that caught me
in a little bit of trouble recently,
because that's the other thing is I'm pretty outspoken
with telling people to fuck off on a regular basis,
and I get myself in trouble on all the time.
But I'm mad at that, I run hot,
and if I feel like I was wronged in any way,
or if there's any,
like I was at coffee yesterday in Eagle Rock,
and this woman came in and swooped in,
and I had my coffee, and I was meeting with this other guy,
and we went for the one table,
and then this woman came in and took our table,
and never got a drink.
Oh, Jesus. The entire time.
Just sat there, and never got a drink.
And it drove me fucking nuts.
And I was close to saying something,
but I bit my tongue, and I wasn't gonna say it,
because I'm really trying not to run as hot as I do,
and confront people as much,
but I think it's don't sweat the small stuff,
and just be kind.
I tell my kids, try hard and be nice.
That's it, that's all I care about.
It's so simple.
Try hard and be nice, takes care of everything.
So that's what I'm trying to do with myself,
is try hard, be kind,
and that's it.
I don't give a shit about anything beyond that.
But trying hard for me is suppressing,
I mean, I like to drink, and I can't.
I have so much, because of stand-up,
I have so much edible weed in my house,
I don't know what to do with it,
and I could eat that every single day,
and not do anything.
I read, I read, I'm addicted to Jack Reacher.
No way.
So, I love him.
You're a true dad.
Yeah, and I garden, and I read it,
so I'll go in my backyard.
I was telling you what I was gonna do,
I had three hours, I was gonna cut that hedge,
and I think I said, did I send you a picture of the hedge?
I was gonna trim, so I got on a ladder,
and satisfaction I get from that,
but I just want to work, work, work, and retire,
and then go camping, and travel, and do shit like that,
and then spend time, and walk dogs, and old man out.
To old man out, but how cool to old man out
after such a long stretch of hard work?
But we gotta be able to afford to old man out,
and we gotta be able to afford the lifestyle
that we know exists, or do you?
I mean, that's the other thing,
is I could wrap everything up here,
move to North Carolina,
move to, what I've thought about,
like the outskirts of Raleigh, Charlotte,
somewhere over there, and just move,
I could go to Montana.
The question is this, it truly is just a decision.
I have, there's someone I email with
who listens to this podcast, and he has a family,
and they made the decision to move into a van,
and live in a van, and travel around the country,
and do it right now.
They didn't put it off.
They're like, we're gonna do it right now,
with what we have, we're not gonna wait
for some moment in the future,
because the, and I don't think,
when I hear you talk about your work,
it doesn't feel to me, as though the sole reason
that you're doing this is because of some future happiness.
Oh, I really enjoy what I'm doing.
You love it.
But some people, they're the big leap
that they've taken, is just a decision
to throw themselves into the moment,
to not have some future retirement plan,
to not think about that,
but just to be here, and live in this place,
with as little as they have.
And I think that that is, it's-
No, it could be homeless, though.
I mean, you could, also, it's like,
I like showers, wine, and this yard,
and I like to be able to afford stuff.
When you travel, you like to be able to stay
in a nicer room, or go to nicer places.
But again, as a kid, I'd never gotten
on an airplane until I was 17 years old,
and we would drive in a Volkswagen Bug to Merced,
from San Francisco, and then we'd go,
and we'd go to Yosemite on day trips.
My dad would put a blender in a box,
and we'd stay at a motel, six in Merced.
Wow.
It was just the best time I've ever had.
And so, with the kids, when we're going on vacation,
we're gonna go to San Diego, Laguna Beach.
We will go to Hawaii, but I'm realizing also,
my kids are happy with a pool, anywhere.
And so we were doing staycations.
We'd go to the, if you're ever in Pasadena,
the Langham Hotel.
Love it.
And we'd do that, we'd check ourselves in there
for two days, it was $99 a night on Priceline,
and my kids had the best time ever.
And so just doing stuff like that more often.
But yeah, if you can afford to do it.
I mean, we met some guy when we first moved down here,
who we were, somebody goes, what are you doing?
And I said, I'm a comedian, and I go in yourself,
and he goes, nothing.
That's cool.
And I said, what happened?
He goes, dude, my wife is super rich.
And he goes, my wife got it as a trust fund kid,
and she got 150 million bucks.
Wow.
And she goes, I could pretend to work,
because I'm a lawyer, I hate it.
I play golf every day.
I play golf every day.
I hang out with my kids.
Well, you know, man, I gotta tell you,
I prefer your version, man.
I think that it's cool what you're saying,
because what I'm getting out of this
is you can always try harder.
You can always do better.
You can always put a little bit more energy in the direction.
And I guess the real question is, why wouldn't you do,
I think the great Zen Cohen that you've given me today
is why wouldn't you?
Why wouldn't you?
Let's just go for it and see what happens.
I mean, there's so much stuff in terms of being able
to travel and actually achieve something.
Like if I can build these two companies
and this gaming company into something that's significant
and leave my mark, and also with the Latino Comedy Festival,
I really feel like it's gonna do a great job.
I mean, do a great thing,
because this community is so underserved
and these guys don't know what they're fucking doing.
Maybe I'm gonna try to get two podcasts out this week.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Al, thank you so much for coming on the show.
I used to do this and I don't do it as much now,
but I think I really wanna do it,
because this is an inspiring conversation.
If you could give any advice,
general life transforming advice
to the folks listening right now,
and it's important because you're an example
of what happens if you work hard,
what would that advice be?
So I'm gonna tell you what I tell my kids,
to try hard and be nice,
but then do what you want to be doing,
start figuring out what your business is
and start it as soon as you possibly can,
because you'll see how things unfold
and it'll change your life.
I walked away from something
and when I started doing comedy,
which is always what I wanted to do,
everything just opened up and I can't believe,
I'm in the situations that I'm in
and the people I'm hanging out with,
comedians that I looked up to so much,
it's incredible.
So yeah, follow your bliss, whatever that is,
and everything will fall into place.
You heard it here, friends, follow your bliss
and follow Al Madrigal on Twitter.
How can people get in touch with you?
It's at Al Madrigal.
You know, go to all things comedy,
we're trying to build that up
and there's a lot of great shows that you might like
and a lot of world friends and so yeah, check that out.
But yeah, I'm dying up here in show time,
that's gonna be a great show.
I'll show you pictures of what I look like, right?
No, camera.
I'll wait till you see them.
Yeah, we'll use that as the picture for the podcast.
Okay.
Okay, cool, Al, thank you very much, man.
It's been a real pleasure.
Later.
Thanks for listening, everybody.
That was Al Madrigal.
If you wanna find out more about Al,
you can check him out over at almadrigal.com
and thank you Squarespace for sponsoring this episode.
Use offer code Duncan at Squarespace.com
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If you enjoy this podcast and wanna help support it,
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subscribe, leave us a nice comment, give us a rating,
give yourself a hot bath, snort some bath salts,
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Howdy, Krishna, everybody.
We will see you next week with more updates from the road.
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