Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - Alan Thicke & Shecky Greene Encore

Episode Date: September 4, 2023

GGACP marks the 40th anniversary of one of Gilbert's "favorite" gigs, the infamous late-night talk show "Thicke of the Night" (premiered September 5, 1983) with this ENCORE of a 2014 interview with actor, writer and producer Alan Thicke. In this episode, Alan reminisces about everything from his short-lived disco career to penning variety specials for Johnny Cash, Bobby Darin and Flip Wilson. Also, Alan and Gilbert swap wives, John Lennon praises commercial jingles, Merv Griffin composes the "Wheel of Fortune" theme and Paul Lynde drives into a ditch. PLUS: A special BONUS EPISODE with legendary funnyman Shecky Greene! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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a million delicious instant prizes and a grand prize of twenty five thousand dollars play at games.circlek.com or at participating Circle K stores. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast. And today, my co-host Frank Santopadre and I have a rather unusual episode. First, I'll be speaking to my wife swap co-star, the guy I swapped wives with, and my old boss from Thick of the Night, Alan Thicke. Hey, this is Alan Thicke,

a video of Gilbert Guthrie, who's up there in the catwalk. And I'm going to be switching waves. I'm going to have a little wave swap with Gilbert Guthrie, because I like to swap waves with Gilbert Guthrie. And, you know, it's a wave swap. And so I'd like to have a weef swoop with Jimmy Guthrie. And then I'm going to have a very strange conversation with my recent Friars Club arch-enemy,

the legendary comic Shecky Green, best known for having the name Shecky. You don't know who he is, but you have heard the name Shecky on like the Muppets and stuff like that. Anyway, I was performing at this event, a Friars Club event, and I was doing my usual type of tasteful material. And I mean, look, it was a Friars Club event where I first performed the aristocrats for a mass crowd, and they loved it there. That's what the Friars Club is about. You could go there. Jack Benny and Milton Berle would go there and do dick jokes. Anyway, Shecky, in the middle of my act, gets up and walks out, which shocked me in two ways. Number one, that he could still stand up. And two, that he can walk. Imagine what I could do to Stephen Hawking.

That kind of material. I could do some of my dirtier stuff and he'd get up and walk out going, I'm very offended by that type of too soon and tasteless comedy remarks. And I don't have to sit here. Anyway, I decide I'm going to take the high ground. And I'm going to call Shecky I'll be the one to uh to give out that uh peace branch or whatever the fuck it's called and so I called Shecky I'm reaching out to him and I actually have a career but I reached out to him here's I actually have a career, but I reached out to him. Here's Shecky,

who's offended by my blowjob jokes. Shecky, who has spent his entire life in Vegas with hitmen and hookers. And so I decided to reach out to him. Shecky, best known for the name Shecky. And well, you're just going to have to listen for yourself. This is Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast and my sidekick Frank Santopadre and you know a lot of people have been complaining you've only had talented people

on the show and so now as a change of pace Alan Thicke and I'm still here after that intro. I know. Which makes me not only untalented, but incredibly resilient and forgiving. Well, I'm still trying to forgive you for Thicke of the Night. No, no, the world, there are just some things that can't be overlooked.

night. No, no. The world, there are just some things that can't be overlooked. That's I think how we met. I was one of the resident cast of Zany's on The Thick of the Night. And

Richard Belzer. Richard Belzer was part of it. Charles Fleischer. And yeah, I was the only untalented guy in the group. Charles Fleischer, the voice of Roger Rabbit. Yeah, exactly. We know him. Now, I heard you refused to let your wife, Tanya, see any recordings of Thick of the Night.

Well, it wasn't so much a matter of refusal. It's just that some of them have self-destructed, I hope. And I just didn't see that it would contribute anything to my third marriage if my wife were to see any of that horrible show. Yeah. And so it's just a discreet way of trying to preserve my marital status. Now, what I remember, can you tell us who one of the sponsors was? Oh, yeah, yeah. That just the irony of it all, just when already nobody was watching the show,

irony of it all, just when already nobody was watching the show, because everybody was watching Johnny Carson. And as you may remember, I was getting roundly stoned in the press. And there was just one sponsor in particular that popped up every single night. It was for lightweight feminine napkins. And in the middle of the show, the voiceover announcer on the commercial would say, once you've tried new lightweight, you'll never go back to thick again. And that was pretty much summed up my whole year. I remember I used to look forward to that commercial. Yeah. There was another

guy. There was one critic in the country who liked me. Just one. And it turned out that obviously he was a functional illiterate. And he tried to pay me a compliment and wrote that Alan Tick has a nice self-defecating sense of humor.

So I wrote back. I said, well, stick with us because we're improving excrementally. I remember when I was on the show with you, and it's always the mark of bad TV, when the producer has changed the whole format each week. Well, that's because we changed producers each week. Oh, yes. And each one of them had their own format. And unfortunately, everyone involved me. I remember one of them, their idea was,

and they told me, they were both really excited about this. They said, from now on, you're not with the whole group of characters you're usually there with. You live in the catwalk. That's right. You would live up in the

catwalk where the lights hang. Like the Phantom of the Opera. You would have been the Phantom of Thick of the Night. And I was looking at them thinking, I must be missing a part here. And then, of course, they had us doing it, where you'd be coming out going, Well, we've got to go to Gilbert Gifford, who lives up there in the kit book. We got to get him down from the kit book. And I would yell, no, I'm not coming down.

It was about as funny as it just sounded. It sounds like you guys were ahead of your time because they did that bit on Letterman where Chris Elliott would come out from underneath the stairs. Oh, my God. And he would live under the theater. It was like a Phantom of the Opera.

I think they ripped you off. Yeah, we were revolutionaries. Yeah, so if we had actually done that and locked you up in the catwalk, we might have been on to something. But no, there were a number of mistakes around that program, including the choice of a host. You know, I was quite successful in daytime television in Canada. We had a big hit up there for about three years. But I was good at the schmoozier stuff.

You know, I was a decent conversationalist and a good listener, and I would have a little fun with people in the afternoon format. But not being a pure stand-up and not having those chops, I was wrong for late night. Late night, you've got to, as you know, you've got to have a killer instinct. You've got to go over the jugular. You've got to be ready to dump on everybody and anybody for a laugh. And I love a late-night format. That was not me.

I was never tough enough for that. Alan, were you familiar with Gilbert? Were you a fan of Gilbert's, or was he sort of foisted upon you by the... Well, no, not a bit. I was not familiar with Gilbert for his SNL days, and I was on a by his insanely unique and hilarious take on everything and delivery, and thus began the bromance that continues today. And then, because I remember a couple of years after Thick of the Night, I bumped into you in L.A., and you asked me to come on.

You had another, it was a short-lived show called... That's my specialty. Yeah. See, my specialty is getting on the show and getting fired. Yours is the whole show goes off. And it was hope and glory. Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, that lasted two years on NBC.

Oh, that's... That was the primetime stuff. Yeah. So we were doing fine, apparently, until you appeared on the show. Kiss of death. Now, also, this is something that's always been amazing about. You have written both, you know, some of the most famous commercial jingles and theme songs for TV shows. Can you name just a handful of those? I don't think so. Doesn't ring a bell.

And that's our show for tonight. Yeah. No, actually, I did have a nice little sideline career. It started back when I was producing a couple of shows for Norman Lear. And so he brought me in and let me write a couple of theme songs. That was Different Strokes and Facts Alive. And it started a minor cottage industry for me, and I ended up writing close to 50 songs over the years. A lot of them were game show themes because, God bless those shows, they run five days a week, 52 weeks a year, and they use five or six minutes of your music every day.

So it was helpful to have that little revenue stream during cancellation periods. And I got to dabble in music long before Robin came along and actually became a musician and raised the family brand. But I was dicking around with four or five chords for a long time and having some fun with it. I think people know different strokes on the facts of life of people who know that you wrote that, but I don't think very many people know that you also wrote the theme to Wheel of Fortune, and I didn't even know there was a theme to Wheel of Fortune. Exactly. You see, but that was the artistic freedom I had.

You know, I could, in the middle of the night, get an epiphany, some great idea for the radar range theme. In the thick of the night. Exactly. I could have a great notion for a turtle wax underscore, and suddenly all the prizes on the show would have my music under it. The music that's on Wheel of Fortune now is not mine. I wrote the original theme.

If you remember, Wheel of Fortune started with chuck woolery hosting at sure ran on nbc for about eight years and went into syndication when i went into syndication merv griffin who owned the show uh... how much money i was making on the payment he needed uh... some cash himself i guess and uh... decided to write his own and uh... uh... replaced my music. And within a couple of years, he was dead, and that's justice for you.

Now, can you sing any of The Wheel of Fortune? I can't, and I'm sure nobody can. But it was a perky little thing. Oh, my God. was a perky little thing. Oh my god. It was perky, you know, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da- For our music fans and songwriters who are listening, Alan, how would you compose these songs? Would you sit down with a keyboard? Would you just get a tune in your head? I would do it on guitar. I had minor guitar skills and just enough chords to make it catchy without having it become actually musical. I see.

musical. I see. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's get timely insights to help you become a savvier investor. From retirement planning and investing to the latest market trends, the On The Money With Dynamic Funds podcast series covers it all. Get On The Money. Search On The Money With Dynamic Funds and follow today. Now, that's something that I always found interesting. It's like Barry Manilow once said, he also wrote jingles and stuff, and he said it's impossible for him to write something that's not catchy. So what is the secret? I've never had that problem.

So what is the secret? I've never had that problem. I'll tell you, I got a little trivia for you. Yes. I was the writer of the Barry Manilow ABC television special in 1977 that won the Emmy that year as the best special. Wow. 1977 that won the Emmy that year as the best special. Wow. And our biggest challenge on that show was wrestling with Barry over whether or not to include his medley of commercial jingles.

He had written a lot of them and teams for other shows like American Bandstand. And Barry had been very prolific. I think he wrote the McDonald's theme. You deserve a break today, so get up and get away. Yeah, and Pepsi. But Barry, as the recording artist that he was becoming, didn't want to trivialize his recording cred by underscoring the jingle part of his life, so he wanted to leave that out of the TV special.

part of his life, so he wanted to leave that out of the TV special. But in fact, his live act in person, his concert act, people went nuts for his jingles. They loved that. So he and I had a few moments and had some words together over whether or not to include that. It ultimately was in the show. They left it in, and we won the Emmy, so I rest my case. Yeah, and he did State Farm. Yeah, like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

Yeah, he was great at it. It always became part of his show. It's funny. Yeah, it was a terrific little skill that he had. And as far as commercial jingles, I think John Lennon once said he watches a lot of TV and he thinks the commercial jingles are as good as any of the early Beatles stuff. I think the Wheel of Fortune has often been compared to Strawberry Fields Forever. You can listen to it backwards when you're high, Alex. You can listen to it backwards when you're high, Alex. Robin was on the show today, by the way, as I told you, so he said to say hello.

Great, excellent. And, oh, then, just recently, we would meet up again when we were both on Wife Swap. Yes, through no fault of our own. I think they really just wanted our wives. They made our wives stars, and you and I were the wallpaper. Yes, so basically, this is a first for both of us. You didn't get the show taken off the air, and I wasn't fired from it. They're still swapping wives. There are some traditions that can't be killed.

Yeah, yeah. If it works the first time, it'll keep working. Has Tonya gotten over the truck? I'll tell you, you were very instrumental and important in your own indirect way. Yeah. instrumental and important in your own indirect way. Yeah. In leading to this show that we have on now, by the way,

tonight is the mid-season finale, whatever they call that, of Unusually Thick. We're on TVGN every Wednesday, and happy to say that we've been ahead, so we're picked up. but the point was that the Celebrity Wife Swap was kind of our testing ground, if you will, sticking our toe in the water, seeing if we could possibly play in that arena and have some fun and feel good about it. And so the experiment with you and Dara was wildly successful on our part because we really enjoyed it.

It was an entertaining show. You guys made it pop. And then we said after that experience, okay, well, we'll try this thing. And now we have a show that's on for a couple of years, and apparently I owe you a lot in royalties. I just wanted to know, Alan, if Tanya was over the trauma of being forced to eat in the kitchen at the Friars Club.

That has stayed with her, a memorable scene that people in airports are constantly reminding her of. But I think the trauma of that was nothing compared to Gilbert's opening line to her when they first met. And he said, so this is white swab. When do we have sex? And that kind of subtlety, I think, was the hallmark of his sex life in college. But the sex turned out to be good, so it had a happy ending. Yeah, we had lots of fun with you guys. Yes.

And your kids, by the way, I saw a recent picture, quite gorgeous. Apparently that skips a generation. I always say my kids are me if I had been born attractive. Yeah. Yes. They're great-looking kids. Alan, tell us a little bit more about the show. I heard you describe it as Curb Your Enthusiasm Meets the Kardashians.

Yeah, it's kind of, you know, it's our real family in our real situations. But with a bit of a wink, you know, we wanted to have a, we want Gilbert to have a happy ending. We always want Gilbert to have a happy ending. So, you know, we've basically taken family drama and turned it around a little bit. It's the same drama that every family has. And instead of doing the, you know, the housewives kind of thing, which they do so successfully already, so they don't need

another one, where people are tearing their hair out and throwing wine at each other. We stopped just short of ultimate cage fighting and tried to find a happy ending to the family drama situation. So it's a bit of a hybrid. It's a little different. If Growing Pains and the Kardashians had a love child, this is probably what it would look like. We've had lots of fun on it.

Gilbert guested on one of them where Tanya did a birthday party surprise roast and Gilbert said some appropriately unrepeatable things about me and fit very nicely into the episode. That's very strange for me to say something inappropriate.

Yeah, unprecedented. Now, you from 1972 to 73 were a writer on 26 episodes of The Paul Lynn Show. I was? Wow. You gotta cut me some slack for that one. Actually, I don't I did his TV special. I didn't

work on his series. I don't even remember that he had a series. We have fraudulent information here. But I think that you got that from Edward Snowden. Now, I'm hoping when you got the job on the Paul Lynch show, there wasn't a casting couch. Well, there probably was, but it had holes in it. Tell us about writing for some of those people. You started out writing for the CBC in Canada? I did. I started in Canada. In fact, I think the first special I ever wrote was the Johnny Cash special.

And we did a Canadian co-production. And then when I came down here, I wrote for other people in the heyday of variety television. You know, when everybody who had a hit record also had a television series. people in the heyday of uh... variety television uh... you know what uh... uh... with everybody let it record also added the television series of the we were trying to make comedians out of singers of the some of them fortuitously you could handle it and then uh... uh... the for bringing in comics and we did series uh... i wrote flip wilson showed richard prior show and Richard Pryor's show and Cosby's variety show, not the hit one, of course.

So I had a wonderful life there through the late 70s writing for other people. Now, did you ever hear Paul Lynn make anti-Semitic comments? Because I heard he was like the biggest anti-Semite in the world. I didn't. He might have suspected my Jewishness. And therefore would have been careful

around me. Because I had heard stories he would get bombed on like Hollywood Squ squares and stuff like that. And he'd be, the other people would be just laughing, telling jokes, and he'd be going, oh, those fucking Jews. Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised. He did enjoy his alcohol. enjoy his alcohol.

And my favorite story about him might have been apocryphal, but it was about him driving inebriated and flipping a car and ending up in a ditch and the police come over and recognize him. Paul Lynn, are you drunk?

He says, of course I'm drunk. What do you think? I am a frickin' stunt driver? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. I heard a Paul Lynn story, also might be totally untrue, but he was working in some really awful place that was basically like some refurnished barn or something. And he, of course, was disgusted.

And he walked in. He said, this place smells like a cunt, I think. Now, you are... You gotta love him for being funny at least. Yeah. I almost have to excuse his anti-Semitism. Oh, they should wipe those Jews out. But now, you also wrote for the Bobby Darin show. I did, yes.

I wrote either for comics or singers, because that's what was big on television in the 70s. And in fact, some of the other music I wrote, I didn't write only jingles. I was also writing some TV music or occasionally had some songs actually recorded by people like The Spinners, Lou Rawls, Alger Rose. I had the R&B groove covered. And then on the flip side of that, I was writing for Johnny Cash, Glenn Campbell, Anne Murray, Meg Davis, Olivia Newton-John. So I had kind of country and R&B roots there covered somehow and with the same four or five chords. But that period of time,

certainly my career, a lot of fun. You know, the variety of what I was experiencing in my work from year to year was really the fun of it. I remember hearing a quote where they said, you shouldn't sing songs, you should write songs. Oh, well, one of the huge mistakes you made on Pick of the Night was me reading my own press clippings and thinking that I was all Latin, smooth and sexy when I played guitar and sang and although that of course is obviously true the other abiding truth is that that's not what anybody wants to see at 11.30 at night anyway.

If you're going to do music, you've got to do it the way Jimmy Fallon does it, which is with wonderful impressions and co-stars. He's terrifically musical, but he plays it for laughs. I didn't. There were times during that series that I was taking myself way too seriously and deserved what I got. Now, I remember when Tanya was here living with me, I was following her around the whole time singing your theme song that you wrote and performed. Yeah, it didn't work for me either. Poor Tanya.

You know, it was, and and i was following her around and she would be getting you know disgusted and angry at me and and saying that doesn't sound at all like him. He doesn't sing like that. And then I looked up a song that you performed during the worst of the disco era, looking as gay as you possibly can, singing Sweaty and Hot. Oh, classic. And I remember Tanya heard you sing that,

and she said, Oh my God, he does sing like that. Yeah, yeah, those were the days, Gilbert. I guess we should point out that you can still find Sweaty and Hot on YouTube. Yes, thank you for pointing that out. Because now people can only watch it and make fun without paying me. At least for the other stuff, you know.

But it's not on YouTube. At least you get 13 cents when they play your song. YouTube, they just laugh. I mean, transvestites would watch that video and think it's too gay. It was a little light in the loafers, yes. Yeah, it was you and a bunch of young... Aerobics.

They were aerobics champions. Yes, yes. Remember how big aerobics was back there in the 80s? And God bless them. I was right there in the middle and and God bless them. I was right there in the middle and singing sweaty and hot and pumping iron and dancing my little push-off.

It was remarkable television. It was the Alan Thicke answer to let's get physical. Let's get nauseous. They even had you in a kind of a, what was it, like a leather, not a leotard, but like a sexy leather jacket unzipped. Oh, yeah, yeah. I'll probably still have it somewhere. You had a little bit of a Cliff Richard thing going on there, Alan, I think.

It could be. Yeah. Tell us about it. Well, you know, if you live long enough, you get a few of those arrows in your quiver. Of course. I'm curious about when you were writing for these variety shows. You're writing for Bobby Darin and Olivia Newton-John and Ann Murray and people like that. Are you writing little monologue bits?

Are you writing skits? Well, it's all of that. But what really goes into the writing of a variety show like that, especially if it's predominantly music, is that it becomes a matter of pacing the show. So writing, I always compared it to supposing you're producing your kid's third-grade variety show at Christmas. It's just all the decisions that go into that. Do you want to start with a song? Do you start with a comic? Do you start with a comic?

Do you start with Santa coming down the chimney? Do you have naked elves? What are you going to do in your hour? And that really becomes the writing, so it's not so much just the words that you produce. It's the whole pace and tone and what the elements are. Some of them are just self-contained three minutes of music where Tony Tennille is going to sing her hit.

But whatever that combination becomes, it all becomes the function of writing. I see. It's a shame. I mean, it's a genre that, I mean, it was interesting, Maya Rudolph just did a variety show. Yeah, I saw that. was interesting, Maya Rudolph just did a variety show. Yeah, I saw that, and she's wonderful and very talented, and, you know, who knows if there'll be a call for her to do more of those, but if it's not her, then nobody can do it. Yeah. She's pretty versatile.

I applaud her for trying to bring it back. Yeah, and you're getting some of that now with Jimmy Fallon every night because his show is certainly more multi-textured than simply a talk show. He's got all kinds of things going on. He can do everything. And that might be as close as we get to variety nowadays. Do you think everyone's gotten too cynical to do variety now. Do you think everyone's gotten too cynical to do variety now? Well, it's just that you don't have to do variety

now because you can get the original artists doing the thing that they do best, so you don't have to have somebody else kind of a middleman interpreting all of those for the viewing public. MTV was the beginning of those uh for the viewing public i mean that was the mtv was the beginning of the end for variety because uh uh variety television was uh tony orlando and tony tenille

and anybody named tony uh sunny and shared like all those people who had hour-long sure variety dean martin and so you'd have uh the the number one song of the week done by Mac Davis or Tony Orlando. And you could simply switch channels, go to MTV, and see that number one song performed in a million-dollar video by the original artist. You know, Olivia Newton-John with her Let's Get Physical or whatever. So you don't have to listen to somebody else do their version of that. And that was what was killing variety television. And I think Mike Wallace said something like, nowadays broadcasting has become narrowcasting.

And I think... Yeah, I think that's truer than ever now with so many channels and specialty channels and uh you can program for a niche audience i i mean i was talking to some actress from um uh in the house that i i'd done a thing on that show I did an appearance and we, and it was funny that you realize now, like there used to be shows with black people on it, on TV, like

Sanford and Son and What's Happening and all that, now there's the black channel. And now there's the rock channel and there's the western channel and the comedy channel and there's the western channel and the comedy channel. I'll be coming with the all-Canadian channel soon.

And you'll have the vocal stylings of William Shatner, the comedy of Gordon Lightfoot, and we'll sneak up on you. Gordon Lightfoot's hilarious. Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, it doesn't get funnier than that. There you go, yeah. Every time I see that iceberg, or whatever the hell got him. Now, speaking of William Shatner, what do you refer to yourself as?

I am the affordable Shatner. The stuff that he turns down, I'm there for. Now, see, what's your opinion of Shatner? I think he's a wonderful icon with a good sense of humor about himself. And he's done and tried so many things, speaking of the variety of life. And he's still around and doing things that please him and occasionally even please others. And, again, I think to have a sense of humor about yourself and what you're up to and being out there and doing your best at whatever comes your way. What a great life. So God bless him for that. He's had an amazingly long career.

He really has. We were just talking about him in old Twilight Zone episodes. Yeah. Yeah, that was one of the classics. And by the way, it's after three my time guys. I have to go immediately. A car is picking me up and taking me out of here. Don't tell me you're employed.

No, no, I'm driving the car. I'm picking up Billy Baldwin and taking him to Chuck E. Cheese. Well, Alan, once again, it's always a pleasure working with you. Gilbert, you're just one of my favorite guys anywhere, and I'm so happy you have this podcast. And, Frank, nice to be connected with you again. Oh, the pleasure is mine, Alan. Thanks for doing this.

Wishing you guys all the best with this, and looking forward to you being on our Season 2, Gilbert. And any time I can come back, you just call me when somebody drops out, and I'll be there. Yes, if Screech from Saved by the Bell drops out. Yeah. There you go.

Dustin Diamond forever. Thanks, Alan. Thank you. Thanks a lot, Alan. Okay, I love you go. Dustin Diamond forever. Thanks, Alan. Thank you. Thanks a lot, Alan. Okay. I love you guys. This is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadre.

my co-host frank santo padre and uh we have on our line believe it or not shecky green now first let me talk uh one question i wanted to ask you first shecky green what the fuck is your problem i mean here let me let me tell the audience what happened. I'm at the Friars Club now doing this. And I was at a Friars event. We were honoring two older comics, Freddie Roman and Stewie Stone. And Freddie Roman even had his grandkids there. And I said, is it okay? Should I watch what I say?

He said, nah, nah, this is a Friars thing. Because the Friars was always known for centuries. Milton Berle, Jack Benny, they'd work totally filthy. Now, so I go up on stage. Next thing I know, instead of Shecky, you Shecky, closing the show, Joy Behar goes on. And Joy Behar goes, I don't know what the fuck happened with Shecky. He got offended by what Gilbert was saying, and he got up and walked out.

And I was shocked by this. I was shocked you were able to get up. And then you went back home and you tore up your membership to the Friars Club. And it ruined the night for not just me, but Freddie Roman and Stewie Stone. So can you give your side of it now? How's that for an intro, Shecky? You still with us? My side of it is this.

I'm in a hotel, a casino. I didn't understand one, and I can't say the word, one word that you said. I know you just discussed about Freddie Roman and Stewie Stone and talked about I heard you say Fires are in there but when you talk, you talk I get it, I don't understand all that funny talking

because when you talk, you fly away so I don't understand one word that you just said. So in other words I sound like Buddy Hacker Wait a minute, you gave me my turn to talk. No, go ahead. You said,

I know exactly what you want, and I know exactly what you want to start. I heard about your friend Howard Stern, but I don't want to start anything with you. I enjoy you as a person. I never saw you act. I don't know what you're doing. I didn't think under the circumstances

to do what we were doing, and I was sitting with children, and I was sitting with the honoree, and the kind of material that you used was not for me, and they were just honoring. This was not a roast. Not a roast like I do at the Friars.

This was an honoring a couple of guys. Anyway, I don't want to get into it because I'd like to be face to face with you. Okay? And the thing is, I'd like to talk to you in your native tongue.

But see, Freddie, Freddie Roach. Could you do me a favor? Could you call me under different circumstances where I can hear you, but I can't hear you and understand you at all? But I would like to settle the sake because I got 5,000 calls from people that hate my guts, that love you.

I got 10,000 calls from people that love me that hate your goddamn guts. Now I use that word I don't want to use. It's democratic. So it's either $10,000 or $5,000 against each other. But, Gilbert, I cannot discuss anything over like this. This is not the way to settle anything. And I'm very fond of you personally. So let's not even worry about that.

It's just that when I found out that Dr. J.P.R. or Bill Bobby Cox, or Balakate, or Pulitzer G we are and she said what she said that that broke my my my my my my

my my my my my my my my

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my my my my my my my my

my my my my my my my my

my my my my my my my my

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my my my my my my my my my my my my my my my my my You speak Italian? Yes, yes, I understood every word. E non agare, e non trepocci, non amore, e non agare. Anyway, let's talk under a circumstance where we can both understand each other.

This is the way to handle it. I'm standing in a casino. People are gambling. They're all looking at me like, did you win, lady? The lady won. Anyway, I'm watching horses. I'm watching the people gamble,

and this is no way to settle our situation but do me a favor I don't know how it started but tell him I doubly don't like him and I know that's your dear friend but I think first of all I thought it was all Jewish then I found it was all I have so I just half hate him.

Okay, guys, is that enough? You call me, and we'll talk. Like two sensible people will talk face to face, but not like this. And tell little Mikey, I want to tell you when Gilbert wants to talk to you. It's very important. Okay? So I'm wrapping up right now, and God bless all of you. All right, Sheck.

Well, we'll be in touch. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast after this. Well, that was Shecky Green. That was what? Was that an hour Frank at least yeah it sure as shit felt like an hour it felt like a fucking lifetime that was Shicky Green ladies and gentlemen

explaining to everyone what happened and it makes perfect sense to me. See, at first, I thought he was out of his fucking mind. But now, now that I hear it, he's... You realize he's completely lucid in every way. Yes, yes. You were misinformed.

He makes perfect sense. makes perfect sense. I thought talking to Shecky was going to be like talking to some fucking maniac. But it turns out he's totally,

totally makes sense. Nothing at all crazy about him. No angers. None. None whatsoever. I was getting a Dalai Lama crazy about him. No anger. None. None whatsoever. None whatsoever. I was getting a Dalai Lama vibe from him. I was getting a Beatles when they visited the Maharishi. I was getting a real George Harrison.

Well, there's always praise for the ball. Yes, that was amazing. That was Shecky Green. He explained it all, ladies and gentlemen. See, like a lot of you thought he was nuts when he stormed out on me for being dirty at the friars club how dare you the friars where i did the aristocrats that was much dirtier than anything i said in front of shecky but i think shecky might have heard things on his own in I think he's got voices talking to him. But now that we've got it all straightened out.

It's all squared away. I have complete clarity. I thought he'd be a little nutty. And I thought he'd be vindictive. But not at all. I was wrong on both counts. And, you know, people had said to me, he sounds a little self-destructive, too.

And after today's interview, I'll say, no, you're full of shit. Why does he get this bad press? And now I have a message to give to Howard Stern. So once again, this was Gilbert Gottfried's amazing colossal podcast with my co-host Frank Santopadre. And we finally cleared the air with Shecky Green. And once again, it made perfect sense.