Mike Birbiglia's Working It Out - BEST OF WIO: Gary Gulman

Episode Date: August 5, 2024

Gary Gulman Returns: Work Friends or Friend Friends?(Recorded September 2023) Mike and Gary Gulman have been friends for a long time, but what kind of friends? Real friends or just work friends? Gary returns to the podcast and he and Mike evaluate the true level of their friendship. Plus they discuss vulnerability in comedy, unhappiness vs. depression, and the advice that Gary got from Larry David.Please consider donating to Give Well

I feel like when you and I first met, it helped me understand a certain thing about depression years later, which is to say you and I met in Los Angeles, out at a show, our sensibilities meshed, this is probably 15 years ago, and you were like, let's stay in touch, and I was like, great, let's stay in touch,

and then I tried to get in touch with you, and you didn't get back to me, and I was just like, oh, I guess, like, I mean, in my mind, I literally thought, I guess Gary's just like a real operator. Like he's onto the next operation. No. But it's an assumption.

I remember thinking, even if I call him back, he was just trying to be nice. And what have I got that a young burgeoning comedian in his prime will feel like I was so insecure about my place in comedy and it's just, it's completely unfounded, but it's depressive thinking. That is the voice of the great Gary Gullman. We are re-airing this classic episode because Gary and I were just in a movie, a documentary film that premiered

at Tribeca Film Festival in June. It's called Group Therapy. Look out for it. Coming to a city near you, I think it's fantastic. Gary is one of my absolute favorite, favorite comics. It's one of my favorite episodes we've done because we work out a lot of jokes. We get very emotional.

It gets very deep. As you can hear in the intro, we talk about our own friendship, why we had drifted apart for a while. A few years ago, he is a great comic to talk to and a great comic to see live. I see he's he's going to be in London

at the end of August. He's gonna be in Orlando, Jacksonville, Burlington, Vermont. He is a phenomenal Comic to See live. I am on tour right now. Thanks everybody who has come out to my shows. I was in Sag Harbor last month. My new show is currently called Please Stop the Ride.

It is all new material. In September, I will be in Red Bank, New Jersey at the Count Basie Theater, which I love for two shows. I'll be in Seattle. I'm doing a third and final show in Portland, Oregon. I'm in San Francisco, Oakland, Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Madison, Milwaukee, Champaign, Illinois, Indianapolis, I'll be at Clues Hall, which I love,

and Arbor, Detroit, I'll be at the Fillmore, which I love. I'll be in Dayton, I'll be in Pittsburgh, at the Biome, we added a second show there. In Louisville, I'll be at the Brown, in Nashville, in Knoxville, I'm at the Tennessee Theater, and then I'll be in Asheville and Charleston, South Carolina to close out the year.

All of this on birbigs.com. Sign up for the mailing list. I love this episode with Gary Gullman today. Gary has a book called Misfit, Growing Up Awkward in the 80s. I couldn't recommend this book more highly. It is a great, great comedy book. I very much relate to Growing Up Awkward in the 80s, great comedy book. I very much relate to growing up awkward in the 80s,

specifically in Massachusetts. Gary and I have a very similar background. If you want more Massachusetts talk, you can also listen to our recent episode with Chris Fleming, who's also a friend of Gary Gullman's. That's a hilarious episode. Chris Fleming, another Massachusetts heavy episode. But Gary and I have a great chat today.

We talk about friendship, mental health, we work out jokes. One of my favorite people on the planet to work out jokes with. Enjoy my chat with the great Gary Gorman. Oh, working it I auditioned for an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm. And Larry David said, you're from Boston,

why don't you have a Boston accent? I said, well, when I got to college, the kids would make fun of me. And he said, why don't you just make fun of them? I'm like, oh, I love that. That's amazing. It's such a Larry name. Because I'm not you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I couldn't be myself like that at that point. I love that. How do you make fun of them? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I haven't, yeah, I couldn't be myself like that at that point. I love that. Yeah. I didn't make fun of them. Yeah. I love that. Exactly, immediately, and they didn't even have to think about it. And I had never even. So quick. I had never even thought about.

Right. Making fun of them. Why don't you turn it the other way? Yes, yes. Right. And had never considered it. That's really interesting because I will say that like one of the things that bullies would make fun of me for growing up would be that I was a nerd,

sort of a bookworm. And in hindsight, when I would go back at them and say, you're not smart, it wouldn't go well. Because it's somehow more mean-spirited to say you're not smart than to say you're a nerd. It feels like an unspoken truth. Remember that movie, Broadcast News?

One of my favorites of all time. When they show Albert Brooks as a kid, telling those kids they'll never earn more than $16,000 a year. And the guy goes, 16,000 sounds pretty good. Yes. I mean, that is a brilliant. It's a brilliant scene.

I always look at broadcast news when people ask me to describe my shows, I say, I aspire to make my shows like the movie broadcast news, which is to say, it's funny in a way where you see yourself in it, but ultimately there's a larger story being told. Yes, that mix of heaviness and the gut punch

that you do so well and very few others, especially comedians are able to do that because it requires some vulnerability and also confidence to not be making jokes the entire time. Well, it's funny because your book does that and your special, The Great Depression, does that. And it's like, my curiosity is, I know why I do what I do, why do you do it?

Why are you willing to give yourself to your audience like that? I mean, part of it is that I experimented with it and it worked really well. Yeah, yeah, like anything, right? Yeah, and in that, I started to open up about depression and the more open and the more specific I got, the more when I did my meet and greets

were people opening up to me and saying really thoughtful, kind things and being grateful for which I was grateful in it and so I was rewarded almost immediately. And also, I like talking about this with you, just the general mindset of comedians. But when we first start out, we're trying to get laughs, absolutely.

And once we can do that, we want the other comedians to think we're good at this and to not, and we talked about this, we said it's not, they say it's not show friends, it's show business, but it's show friends. And you're going to get more work if people think you're good at, my gosh, I'm laughing so hard.

If people think you're good at this, so why not do jokes that not just the audience are laughing at, but your comedian friends are like, you know what? It may be hard to follow somebody who's killing, but it's better to follow somebody who's doing it in a way that seems fair. I remember this comedian, Frank Santarelli, saying,

he had this whole list of things, little tricks you could do on stage, but if you did them, you couldn't come off the stage and say, oh, I killed. Because you did the big one in the 90s when I first started was a stereotypically gay, lispy voice. And it would kill with the audiences if you did that.

But my friend, Frank said, you can't say you killed if you did that, it's such a cheap trick. And yeah. Yeah, such a cheap trick. Smart. And yeah. Yeah, it was so helpful. If you're doing a trope, it doesn't belong to you. Right.

I said to somebody recently, a younger comic, who was doing like a kid voice from when they were kids. Don't do a kid voice. Don't do a kid voice. Yeah, do you as a kid. Do you when you were a kid and then they didn't and it was a great adjustment. Because it's specific.

It's specific. It's funny though, like your persona, and I feel like this is offstage too, is like you have like a confidence of like, you're really good at this. You know what I mean? And you sometimes tell the audience, you're like, I'm very good at this.

Oh, I mean, it's insecurity. Oh, you think so? Yeah, that's the source of that. Braggadocio and bravado. But it's very funny the way you do it. It works really well. It's funny because it disrupts the status quo of comedians being self-deprecating.

Right. Yeah, so they're not used to that. And also, at the point we are in our careers, it's also true. We know what the heck we're doing. And also, everybody is usually a little bit concerned at the beginning of a show with a comedian that they're not that familiar with, that the person is going to be uncomfortable or make them uncomfortable. I certainly feel that whenever I watch a comedy show at all.

I'm concerned for the comedian. Every time. Totally. Totally. It is so anxiety provoking. You're setting them at ease. Yeah. It's interesting like- And also setting myself at ease.

And setting yourself at ease. Yeah. Do you think of there being a hierarchy? Do you think I'm the best? Do you think I'm top 10? I'm top 20? I'm top 20? I think after a cup of coffee, I would say there's 100 people as good as me,

and I can't name that many who are like better where I would be. There are certain people who I watch and I think, like Sade and I, my wife, went to see Maria Bamford a couple weeks ago at Sony Hall and most of us, you watch their act and you say, oh, I see how they got there and that's a really good sentence. And I watch her and I think this is all inspired

and I don't know how she comes up with this. The voice, it's magical and it's sublime and I'm in awe. So I think I'm excellent, but there are people who are better than me and there are people who are better than me who haven't done it. There's so much luck and timing involved and I think we've discussed this,

but Kurt Vonnegut's idea of, he had survivor's guilt after surviving World War II, and he said as a novelist he had survivor's guilt because he thought a lot of audiences have failed artists, painters, writers, actors, and he said comedians, which I thought was very generous. And that's how I feel at this point. We can name a dozen comedians who we'd say,

oh my gosh, this guy is so hilarious and should be a household name. I think Eddie Pepitone is very well known, but he should be as well known as, fill in the blank, a person who's selling out arenas. I can cut this out if you don't say it publicly, because I forget whether or not you, I've seen you do this live,

but I don't know if you've done it, but you'll make jokes at the expense of like well-known people like Chappelle or Seinfeld. Oh, sure, yeah. Do you do that publicly or do you just do that in clubs? I mean, I mention it in theater shows. I mean, the thing is is that Chappelle talks about how sensitive audiences are,

and I point out that he's actually a very sensitive guy, just like all comedians. And then the thing with Jerry Seinfeld is that I feel betrayed because I was such a fan and I bought sign language, and I remember reading it and being outraged. I said, this is just his act. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, so I felt taken. I get that. Have you ever talked to Senvaldo? No, I've never talked to him. I've never been, I was at a party where he was across the way and I didn't think it was my place to introduce myself and nobody introduced me, but I do make jokes

at his expense. With Chappelle you do the knee slapping thing. I don't like it when he slaps his thigh with the microphone. The microphone against his thigh, yeah. It's funny, I don't know about you, I feel a lot of criticisms of Ricky Gervais, Jerry Seinfeld, Dave Chappelle, these moguls of comedy who have said things

that people don't like over the years. And I always just play Switzerland with it. I just go, you know, there's all kinds of comedy and I like all kinds of comedy. Yeah, see I don't care for Switzerland. I think of all the times, not to maintain neutrality, and don't they say if sometimes not taking a side is taking a side?

Who says that? And this is actually a bit I was working on, but Toblerone had a picture of the Swiss Alps on the side of their box, and Switzerland sued them to take the Swiss Alps off their box, and I remember thinking, yeah, the Holocaust, they're not gonna take a side, but the Toblerone using the thing,

I could never get it worded right. And I continued to try almost every time I go on stage. Keep it in the act. Yes, yes. Keep it in the act. That's a great line. Just so somebody else doesn't take it. Right. Yeah.

Here's our red line, chocolate. Oh my gosh, that's so funny. Thank you. Here's my red line. That's perfect. Chocolate. It's cubic chocolate. But also, it'll turn into something that's also about Toblerone.

Once I have a sentence that works, I'm hoarding anything associated with that thing, so I'll do something on the shape of it and the size of the boxes and the duty-free. Like you need more luggage just to take the duty-free size Toblerlerone or something funnier. Yeah, I think that that's a very funny joke. But yeah, I had a journey with,

I was early in my career, I was very critical of a couple of comedians, Jay Leno and Robin Williams. Because we feel betrayed, because we love them and then they don't come through for us. I think there's some truth to that. So like with Jay Leno, I used to do a joke on stage where I said, I like to tune into Jay Leno because I like to hear the jokes that I thought of too.

Oh, that's so good. And it's funny, but at a certain point, a comedian said to me, you know, he is one of us. Right, no, that's a great point. And I was like, that's fair. That's a great point. And so I stopped doing it. I used to make a joke about Robin Williams

because he's known as a joke thief. And he sold jokes and he talked about it on Marc Maron years ago. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was a thing where he explained that the way his brain works is whatever, he had to stop watching comedians at a certain point because everything goes in and then he flies up on stage

and he freewheels and it comes out, whatever comes out comes out. I remember hearing that. I just remember doing a show with Robin Williams for the troops for Wounded Soldiers, Wounded Warrior Project, and he talked to every soldier, these guys, really broken up, battered up folks. And he would be the Robin Williams

that they would dream of meeting to every single one of them. And it was such a reckoning for me because I'm like, I'm for that. And I don't even care if he's still jokes. No, I know. Like whatever you're doing, I'm for it. No, totally.

And I became a complete convert on Robin Williams. And I actually don't really, truthfully I don't even really criticize any comic. I have a joke about Larry the Cable Guy years ago, but it's not even really that mean. It's just about having a catchphrase. Yeah, I think what I feel comfortable talking about Seinfeld with is the difference in his lifestyle

and my lifestyle in that he has a building where he houses this Porsche collection and I literally don't have enough room on my kitchen counter to keep the toaster on display at all times. We have to stow the toaster. So that's a joke from my last special. Well he should be contributing to the Gullman Fund. The human fund.

So good. I gave to the Gullman Fund. The human fund. So good. I gave to the Gullman Fund earlier this month. I tried to do a monthly. I was just getting so many phone calls from those guys. At a certain point, I just put me down for a quarterly. But I think what I said was that we're in the same business. He's worth a billion dollars and he's better than me, but is he $999,911,000 better than me, but is he? 999 million nine hundred eleven thousand dollars better than me that was the yeah

Gary Which so funny and the most vulnerable I've ever been on stage announcing your net worth right to a group of New Yorkers Yeah, is I was naked up there. ["I Was Naked Up There"] Okay, so you say in your book that you wrote this book in grade school called The Lonely Tree. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And I have it. I still have it. I'm going to post some pictures of it.

Did anyone flag that in your life as a metaphor for the mental state that you were experiencing. Nobody flagged it. This was a tree that was being teased by the woodland creatures and cried so much that he grew to be really tall. And I was always the tallest kid in my class. According to your book. Yeah. And so I brought it.

A tree was being teased. Yeah, I brought it home and of course, I didn't know that it was a cry for help, but my father loved it so much that he brought it to, and you may remember the name of this company, it was called Addison Wesley, and it was a publishing company that was on Route 128 in Reading. Oh my God, yeah.

You could see it from the highway, and it turns out they published textbooks. Yeah. So he brought it to, I don't know who we brought it to, maybe just a secretary or something. And they said, well, we published textbooks, but this is a very nice book. They were very kind to my dad. But my dad didn't read anything into it.

My mother didn't. It's interesting, like I was working, I was working on this joke recently about how my wife Jenny said to me, she goes, sometimes I feel like you're not happy, and I'm like, right. That was really, man, that's some simple truth right there, which is like the greatest formula.

Yeah, it's like. The simple truth. I don't mean in a disparaging way, formula, but simple truth is killer. I mean, that's excellent. Right, and I go, yeah, I wasn't happy when we met. I thought that's what you were into. And then we got married and I was like, this is amazing.

And I'm still not happy. And then we have our daughter and it's transcendent. Yeah, but I'm still not happy. No, I'm saying happiness is a spectrum. And I'm in the best angle of this spectrum right now, but I'm not 100% happy all the time. And we discussed this last time we were together. The worry, the big worry is that this thing will cease

or be curbed somehow. Which thing? The big worry is that this thing will cease or be curbed somehow. This- Which thing? Just where I am in my career, we had this exchange where I said, if I could trade any future improvement in my lifestyle, in my career, and all I had to give up was that improvement and I could have exactly what I have now,

which is a nice touring act, and I'm comfortable in terms of paying my bills, I would trade any upside for what I have now. And- A thousand percent agree. Yeah. I could not agree with you more. Yes, and I think, so my only worry is that

something would come along where, like when the pandemic hit, I thought, oh man, this could really be difficult to tour in the future if they don't find a solution for this. Yes. And so, but I have to play the percentages with that as well and say, well, there'll always be something,

maybe a book or maybe making albums, we'll figure it out. That is one thing that I learned from writing this book is that there were all these horrible things that happened to me throughout my life and I figured it out each time and I keep forgetting that, that things that seemed daunting or impossible, from tying my shoes to dunking a basketball, I've figured it out.

Yeah. And to remind yourself of that, when something new comes up, something you're afraid of, is a really helpful strategy. So that's a point that you make in your book, and I'm curious, is there anything right now in your life that feels daunting? Wow. It's a point that you make in your book, and I'm curious, is there anything right now in your life that feels daunting?

Wow. It's a great question. And my wife and I have been doing the things involved in freezing embryos. And so you know what this is like. Can I be a good dad? Will I live. Can I be a good dad? Will I live long enough to be a good dad? Because I'm older for having a child

and it's also around the same age my dad had me. And he was not as involved because my parents were divorced. But I just, because one of the things you can regret not having a great comedy career, not giving it your all as a comedian Yeah, but it would be hard for me with my mindset to be able to live with regrets of not doing a good job as a father or husband and and I think this is a really interesting question for you, which is I Feel I said this to Sade, I said,

we've been playing marriage at the easiest level, and you had a kid, and it increases the level of difficulty, the degree of difficulty, and we're doing really well on this, we're killing it, we're very happy people. But what happens when you involve someone that's also going to reduce your amount of sleep and put you in a sleep deprived mood frequently. That's a different version of us.

That's like the, what was your joke about the version of Mike that it was one drink Mike or? Two drink Mike. That's our first comedy album. Yeah, so Two Drink Mike. Loves dancing, he knows the magic trick. Yes. Zero Drink Mike enjoys biographies

and something and something. So Sleep Deprived, Gary and Sade are not the same person. And you're right, and you're right. And what I'll say in defense of becoming dad is your aperture really opens in this way, or mine has, I should say, in this way that you just, I say the cliche in my special, the new one, people say you're gonna see the world through baby's eyes.

And it's like, and then you do. And then you do, and you go, oh man, the cliche is true. Yeah, yeah. And there should be another word besides cliche because there's so much negative baggage in terms of cliches, but some of them are really true. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I feel like the Dalai Lama

gets away with a lot of cliches. No, but oh, but I got served, speaking, I mean, I feel like the Dalai Lama gets away with a lot of cliches. No, but oh, I, but I got served, speaking of depression and unhappiness, I got served a video on TikTok where it was a clinician who was describing the difference between being unhappy and being depressed. And the way he was putting it, and I'm simplifying this, but it's like, describing depression as the experience

of almost like sand coming through a funnel, but it's too much sand. And so in other words, there's too many things to handle, and there's just a stoppage, and that's why people can't leave their house, can't get out of bed, just because there's a stoppage. And unhappiness, the way he was describing it, in relation to feeling discontent

with things as they are in your life. And when I heard that, I just thought, yeah, both, both, right? And then I was like, but then also, aren't we all a little both? And we're not all clinically depressed. Right. I think this reminds me of something.

I just read this recently, and I must have been reading it recently again, because I remember reading this book a long time ago while David Foster Wallace was alive, but it's called the Brief Interviews with Hideous Man, and it's a group of short stories, a collection of short stories. And there's one called the depressed person.

And it's extraordinary. And one of the things is, I don't know what this is called grammatically, but he doesn't say they in terms of the depressed person. He says the depressed person in every sentence that the depressed person comes up. So he says the depressed person. And one of the main things the depressed person in every sentence that the depressed person comes up. So he says the depressed person. And one of the main things the depressed person

and this depressed person had a lot of things going on, but one of the main things, and I was trying to get this across in the great depression. And when I read William Styron's darkness visible, which is a great account of a depression, they talk about the limitations, Styron in particular talks about the limitations of the English language in terms of describing

what a depression is and that the word depression is so small for what this is. And it also happens to intersect with the idea of I'm depressed because the Celtics lost in the Eastern Conference finals, okay. So there's that, but also there's this frustration that in the depressed person, the depressed person talks about being so frustrated,

maddeningly in the British sense of the term, maddeningly like insanity, the frustration involved in not being able to describe to people who are not depressed, who do not have clinical depression, what that feels like. And it's so many things and that is a really difficult thing unless you're a professional or you've experienced

that it is so hard to describe. So you can give symptoms and you can give stories of how little you accomplished or how difficult something was but it's so hard to describe. And I think that really hit me to the point where I'm feeling great, but I welled up and cried when he was talking about this because I've been there and I've been the depressed person.

And it was just, it really, and also you're reading it years after David Foster Wallace committed suicide. So it's obvious that he understood it like very few have, but also had this ability to describe it in great detail. I feel like when you and I first met, it helped me understand a certain thing about it years later, which is to say you and I met in Los Angeles,

out at a show, our sensibilities meshed, this is probably 15 years ago, and you were like, let's stay in touch, and I was like, great, let's stay in touch, and then I tried to get in touch with you, and you didn't get back to me, and I was just like, oh, I guess, like, I mean, in my mind, I literally thought, like,

I guess Gary's just like a real operator, like he's on to the next operation. But it's an assumption. And years later I find out you had these bouts of depression where you couldn't get out of bed, you couldn't leave your apartment. So there's so much going on. It taught me this wider lesson,

which is you cannot know what someone is experiencing. So it's so unfair to assume what their experience is of that. It was a huge lesson for me. It's so unfair to assume what their experience is of that. It was a huge lesson for me. No, it is really a good thing to learn and I could probably apply it to my criticism of famous comedians, but I think, and one aspect that I don't think we covered and maybe you hadn't said that you thought

our sensibilities matched. I remember thinking, even if I call him back, he was just trying to be nice. And what have I got that a young burgeoning comedian in his prime will feel like I was so insecure about my place in comedy and it's possible that you thought I was a really good comedian

and wanted to be friends besides that. And here's the other thing, would it have been so bad if I was a terrible comedian and you still wanted to be friends? Like that's the whole thing that I couldn't imagine anybody liking me. Other than that, I was a terrible comedian and you still wanted to be friends, like that's the whole thing that I couldn't imagine anybody liking me. Other than that, I was a really good comedian. And if I'm not a really good comedian,

then they wouldn't want to spend any time. What value would I have anyway? Yeah, what value would I have? And it's just so, it's sad and yet it seemed so reasonable and was going on in my mind with just about everyone. So there were people in addition to you that I wouldn't say I was dodging them, I would just not get back to them

and then start to feel so guilty about not getting back to them. And they'll think that I'm a jerk when I do get back to them. And there's also this thing of being afraid that somebody will tell me off. Oh, yeah. If I do get back to them and there's also this thing of being afraid that somebody will tell me off. Oh, why? If I do get back to them, like who do you think you are that you can just take your time and getting back to me

and I called you two weeks ago and it's just, it's completely unfounded but it's depressive thinking. Yeah. When you were in the depths of your depression, what would a good friend, what could a good friend have done? Because I have a lot of friends who have substance abuse issues, depression,

and a lot of times I'm at a loss for what I can do to be helpful. I remember one of the nicest thing, and again, this is a name dropping, but, and I don't know how she knew how sick I was, but Amy Schumer called me and said, let's go for a walk. We walked through the central park on our way to an appointment and it was long walks with people that would get me out of my head or in some cases,

just watching a movie silently with a friend going to the movies, just getting me out of the house was so helpful and I'd go home and I would frequently say late at night, if I felt like this, I would have a life. And then in the morning it resets, it's called diurnal variation, where you feel a little bit better at the end of the day, especially if you've gotten out of the house.

So I used to go to a mood disorder support group, it was on the campus of Columbia University, and there were a lot of trains to switch and buses, and as arduous as it was, it was really helpful to get me moving. So just, and then I'd be with people who understood what I was talking about. And I remained friends with a few people from there.

And one of them was telling me, he said, you would just sit there and listen. And it was heartbreaking. And I wanted to- At the support group. Yeah, and I wanted to say, that was the best part of my day. If I was there, I was really succeeding in fighting back.

And it was immensely helpful. Wow. I don't even want to go down that rabbit hole. No, I'm open to rabbit holes. Well, it's like, I've struggled with this thing in the last few years where I've had depressed friends who just drop out and tried to be helpful. And then at a certain point, they're just gone.

And so then you just go like, well, where's the line? Where's the line between, no, actually, this person might be a bad friend. Right? Oh, that's interesting. And it's a rabbit hole. I don't know that there is an answer to that. No, that's a great point.

I mean, recently I've taken a look at my friendships and done a little Marie Kondo decluttering and found, well, this person hardly ever initiates, I have to set up every meal, I'm going to let them do it. And in some cases they do, and in some cases they don't. And I just think, and my therapist was really good at this, he says, you can still have them in your life, but you do not have to expect anything more

than what you're getting and know what you're in when you go into it. Know that if you meet up with so and so, they're only going to talk about their job and you're not going to get a word in edgewise. And if you want to do that, that's fine. But know that you're making that choice. And I thought that was really helpful.

That's fascinating. What do you, well, this is kind of, I've never asked this question before on the show, but when Tom Papa was on, we had kind of a come to Jesus about our friendship and it was actually really helpful in like a real life way. Where do you, what is our relationship? Are we friends or are we work friends? Oh, I think my feeling is always that this is a really busy guy and I'll bet you that

he wouldn't be able to fit me in. Yeah. Oh gosh. Yeah. So I don't like, cause there are a lot of things that I will think, oh, I bet you Mike would think this is funny. And I'm just like, oh, don't be the guy who's sending cause we all have friends who send us things.

And we're just like, I don't have time for this because if some friends, if they send you something and you react, then your next hour is in getting text back and forth. And I just, especially while writing a book, you don't have time for that. Right, attachments to links, the things you don't have a login for. Yeah.

Ha ha ha! I feel like sometimes. You know what, I don't have a Wall Street Journal subscription, I don't think I'm going to have one. Yeah. I don't know that Kafka meant this when he wrote everything he wrote, but there is something about the Wall Street Journal paywall that I think he would have related to. I think so too.

And I think, so that's a fascinating, let me just say here on the record, this line is open. I always want to hear from you. Okay, good. Oh, that's really nice to hear. I'm always happy to hear from you. I don't know, it's interesting because you and I have now known each other for so long. And I feel like we're in a unique position in our friendship

where we could actually theoretically point out things about each other that we could try in our friendship where we could actually theoretically point out things about each other that we could try in our act that maybe we don't even realize about ourselves maybe is funny. Oh, that's really interesting. It's funny because very few friends ask each other what level of friendship they are.

Yeah. And that's, I won't lie, it's not a comfortable position to be asked that question. It's very vulnerable to ask that question and also on the other end, it's almost, I have to give an account of what happens with us when we're not in the same room, because we were on that documentary together. Yeah, we did a documentary together.

And I was so grateful that you were there because I didn't know anybody as well as I knew you. And it was a great life raft and we had so many great laughs. And then you were gone. And it reminds me of when I graduated from college, I had this close friend all through second semester, senior year.

His roommate had gotten a girlfriend, so he was very lonely, I think, and I had just broken up with a girlfriend, so I was very lonely, and we connected, and then school stopped, and I remember thinking, well, unless he reaches out, I'll probably never see that guy again. And he reached out and we spent the next,

it's now coming up on 35 years, talking on a every other day weekly basis. And I could see a scenario where that friendship never took because I was afraid that he would be put off by me reaching out right away after and he called me like the first day of summer vacation. It was just, I'm, it's an insecurity that I should have put behind me 35 years ago with that piece of evidence, what I would have lost out on, one of my closest friends. I'm going to have to call you tomorrow.

LAUGHS MUSIC So this is called The Slow Round, and we did this last time you were on the show. One of the reasons that we were in a rush to do this again is that the first episode that you were on, and people should go back and listen to it, is one of our most popular episodes of all time.

Oh really? And in it, we had the slow round, and you said, oh, you should get Anne Lamott's book, Bird by Bird, which I do have, and I recommend all the time. I followed her on Instagram. She did not follow me back. Oh, isn't that heartbreaking?

Killed me. Anne Lamott, come on, come on. I talk you up, I plug your book all the time. Are you just so massive? I know. But anyway, there's a thing that we now mention from Bird by Bird as a writing prompt often, and I'll ask you, which is, do you have a school lunch

that you remember from your childhood? Oh, wow. I do remember that one day, my mom sent me with a full Italian sub to school from a sub shop. And because I was used to her always putting- You had me at Italian sub. Yeah, putting a, sometimes just a jelly sandwich, always put in.

Sometimes just a jelly sandwich, sometimes just a jelly and fluff sandwich if we were out of peanut butter. I, without looking into my bag, traded it from Marshmallow Fluff, which is peanut butter and fluff, marshmallow fluff, fluffanata from Boston. And I got a Fluffinata and I traded this kid, unopened my bag, which I thought was just at best, a peanut butter and jelly. Definitely not a peanut butter. You had a restaurant quality lunch.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And this guy, this junk. I had a restaurant quality. And then I told my mother that night and she was outraged. That's fascinating. And the great thing with my mother, as I point out in the book,

is that she can never let anything go. The statute of limitations with her, she still asks me if I ever used the Nintendo that I. My gosh. That I begged for when I was in high school, by the way. Yeah, yeah. Wow. What's the best and worst nickname

you've ever received in your life? In college, there was a football player and he was really good, man. His name was John Stolberg, but not Jewish, as you'll see in this, in what he nicknamed me. And I almost thought it was sort of like Bethos because he was not a bright guy, but he came up with the perfect nickname

for a Jewish person on a college Catholic school football team, which was, he referred to me as gefilte. Oh, gefilte. But what does that have to do with you, really? Nothing except that it's a very specific kosher food, gefilte fish. That feels anti-Semitic if he weren't Jewish. Oh, it was so, yeah.

But it still can be anti-Semitic. He wasn't Jewish. Oh, it was? Yes, it was it still can be anti-Semitic. He wasn't Jewish. Oh, it was? Yes, it was definitely, yeah. He just had a last name that sounded almost Jewish. Oh, sounded Jewish, okay. But it was anti-Semitic, but it was kind of clever. It's not clever.

Ha ha ha! This is Stockholm Syndrome. It was off the beaten path? No. No? No, Gary, you've been bullied with anti-Semitism. It's time you come to grips with it and that's the level of friendship we're at. We've come a long way in 10 minutes.

Oh, that's really good. I appreciate that. By the way, that's a good joke premise. The guy calling you gefilto when you're a kid and you're realizing as a grownup that it's anti-Semitism. In all these years you'd covered for him. Yes. You thought, I thought it was clever. Yeah. It's like, it's not clever. It's anti-Semitism. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. In all these years you'd covered for him. Yes. He thought, I thought it was clever.

Yeah. It's like, it's not clever. It's not clever. It's anti-Semitic and he's a bully. Oh, he was a bully though. I think that's probably worth trying on stage because I feel like with your delivery and the way that you word stories,

I think that that has a really good potential for it to be a joke. Which is by the way way what these slow down questions are intended for, is to yield jokes long term. Is there a song that makes you cry? Oh my gosh. So many, and most recently, while on stage describing how I had just listened to the song,

I started crying while on stage, Bette Midler's The Rose. Holy mackerel. What is it about the song? Just the idea, because I'm big into metaphors and the poetry of winter versus spring, summer, the way that's used so frequently.

So I have on my wrist this bracelet, which says in the depth of winter, I finally found that within me lay eternal, invincible summer, and it's Albert Camus. And there's something about beneath the hard frozen snow of winter, there was this seed of a rose that bloomed and it was about love. And it just, and it really hit me

because the one thing that you don't know when you're in the middle of a depression is that you may come out of it. And the belief that you'll come out of it can be very helpful. And that's what that hopefulness of that song really hit me and really resonated with me. That's beautiful.

Yeah. Wow. But I cry a lot with Eddie Vedder, that song about the elderly woman at the, she's a cashier and a man from her past comes in and she doesn't say anything to him. And I think the name of the song is so long intentionally, but it's like the, I think it's called

Elderly Woman Behind the Register. It's off of verses, I think. But if you, I didn't, I heard it a million times, but I never knew the lyrics. And when I looked at the lyrics, and also an interview with Eddie Vedder, and he talked about the motivation and the origin of the song that this woman was elderly, obviously,

and this person who had been in her life a really long time ago was coming back, but didn't remember or didn't know her. And it was, songs about loneliness really get me, man. I get you. Yeah, loneliness I think is the thing that so much of great art is about. So I feel like it's people,

it's like we're all trying to express what our version of loneliness is. And so if you can connect the way that song is connecting with you, then you're opening people up and it's just a gift. Yeah, I mean, just the fight against loneliness by people who feel that they're more comfortable alone, a lot of us. We're not more comfortable alone, really. We're social people, but there's all this anxiety and second-guessing and insecurity.

And a lot of times we're too afraid of the connection, because then you feel and that's uncomfortable too. ["The Day We Were Together"] Do you have any new material that's sort of half-premise, half anything that you're working on that you want to throw into the mix? Can I grab the notebook? Yeah, you can grab a notebook, yeah. All right, so you hold that up so people can see it a little bit or you self-conscious. Where's my tree? Right here, right here.

I mean, that's nice. Oh, thank you. I like that I can just see the word ignored in all caps. Yeah, because I think there's a better word for this. So I talk about finding out when I was in third grade, I think, that Jesus was Jewish. Yes. And so I wanted to write this sentence where I said,

what great news that Jesus, the focal point of Christmas, this holiday, but I should say Christmas, the focal point of Christmas was, and the word, I don't think it's the right word, was as ignored by Santa as I was. Yeah, I love that. So you're saying, so the fundamental punchline of the joke is that really to use the phrasing

from broadcast news, the movie we were referencing earlier, they're really burying the lead. Yeah, oh my gosh. In the sense of that Jesus was Jewish. And at that devout, serious Jewish person. He was a zealot according to the book, Zealot by Reza Aslan, but I said, Hebrew school never mentioned Jesus.

They bring up Jonas Salk, Hank Greenberg, Sandy Koufax, Kirk Douglas, and Houdini, but ignore the greatest magician of them all. Ah, that's a winner. All right. and Houdini but ignore the greatest magician of them all. Ah! That's a winner. All right. Then I will put a star next to that one. Ignore the greatest magician of them all is so good. Oh, thank you.

Because it acknowledges Christianity as a significant thing but then it also undercuts it at the end. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I wonder, this would be like an Ira Glass note, but it's like how is that joke about you? Right. And like, are you ignored? Do you feel ignored?

How do you feel about what's happening in the joke? That's really good. That's a good Ira Glass note. Yeah. That's what he always says, it's like plot and then how you feel about it and then plot and then how you feel about it. But man, is that funny.

I ain't as funny as hell. Yeah. I mean, part of it is that I have this thing where Jews are so proud of anybody that does something, but then they're very particular about their pride in certain areas. They don't take pride in certain areas. They don't take pride in Jesus and they don't take great pride in,

at least within the world of Kürbri Enthusiasm, which I really identify with for some reason. They don't really embrace Larry. They, as successful as he was, they don't care for Larry. You think Jewish people don't like Larry David? Within the world, the universe of curb your enthusiasm. The people, the Jews in general love Larry David.

But the people in his world. Can't stand him. And here's the thing, I kind of identify that with that in that I feel like a lot of my people who come to my shows are much kinder to me than my family is about my shows. Like my family is just so famous. I don't know if you get this from family and even close friends, they just damn with faint praise.

Oh yeah, all day. Yeah and it's. Congratulations. Yep. Let's go over faint praise. Here's what you don't say to people who just performed their goddamn hard out on the stage. You don't say, congratulations, how did you feel about it?

Oh my gosh, the Barry Katz School. Oh. How do you think it went? How do you think it went? Oh. Any other ones can you think of? You looked great. You looked great. Yeah. Any other ones can you think of? You looked great. You looked great.

Yeah. The set is gorgeous. Oh my gosh. Do you get nervous? Do you get nervous before the show? How do you remember it all? How do you remember all the words? Yeah.

Don't say these things. No. Don't say these things to a performer after they've just performed their soul to you. Just don't. Yeah. You know what? Lie. I don't care about your integrity.

You just saw someone perform. Totally. Don't, you know, your word is impeccable. Sure, maybe tomorrow it is, but not when you just saw the person perform. You go, I loved it, we loved it. Here's my favorite part. You pick one sentence. Towards the end of my set, I loved it, we loved it, here's my favorite part. You pick one sentence.

Towards the end of my sets, I usually say, listen, I don't know what your threshold is for a standing ovation. But I know there are some people who have standing ovation integrity and you have to cry at some point, but I gave you a much longer show than you paid for. That's so funny.

And you have to stand up to leave anyhow. But I wanted to run one last thing because it was on the idea of a husband and wife and I talk about the expression, it was a different time. Yes, yes. And I say, during all these so-called different times, there were people doing the right thing. That's right.

And during World War II, there were German and Polish people hiding Jews. And then I wanted to add this thing where I say, but there were also men not hiding Jews and blaming it on their wives. I'd love to hide you. My wife just, she brought up the dairy restrictions. also men not hiding Jews and blaming it on their wives. I'd love to hide you. My wife just, she brought up the dairy restrictions. Oh my God, that's so funny. And I, is it in poor taste?

I don't think it's in poor taste. I would find it in poor taste if it was a non-Jewish person, but also I feel like as a Jewish person, where's the, I don't know. I think you're onto something massive though. It was a different time thing. Is that in the special that you're developing right now? Like your next comedy special?

Yeah, it's about how my father was a progressive member of the quote unquote greatest generation, whereas most of them were not. And people will say, well, he was a very racist man, but he served in World War II, and it was a different time. And they will say, this time, it must have been before the famous schism

between right and wrong, when they split over creative differences. And so, but that was a very, my father wasn't a, he wasn't a perfect parent, but he was a good person who was progressive in terms of, he never said anything homophobic or racist or sexist, misogynistic. He was very progressive in his politics and his social views.

And I just, it's rare for white men of that era. Not rare, but uncommon. No, I think that that'll work. It helped me to see the context of it, the ramp into it, because I think that the energy of that premise will roll into the, you know, I think the blaming their wives becomes like, if this, what else? I think the blaming their wives becomes like,

if this, what else? And then I think it might be beneficial to do an if this, what else for like four other things. Like who else was blamed? Who else did a thing that was on the line? But ultimately, wait, if they blame their wife, yeah, but ultimately like wasn't helpful. Like other examples of people who weren't helpful. Yeah, yeah.

No, I think that's great though. Thank you. So the final thing we do on the show is working it out for our cause. Is there an organization you contribute to that we will contribute to? I contribute monthly to the Helen Keller Foundation, but it's part of this thing that I discovered from Peter Singer's book, Doing the Most Good. Have you ever read that? It's sort of a hundred pages on effective altruism.

And Sammy Koppelman put me on to it. Oh, that's great. Yeah, and so there's a website called givewell.org and it's the most intense and analytically driven idea of what is doing the most good, it seems, in terms of your money saving the most lives, is how they figured it out. So they said that with $5,000 contribution,

you're saving one life by contributing to either this group that puts up nets, malaria nets in Africa, and in the case of the Helen Keller Foundation, I think they give vitamin a To kids that they don't go blind or die Wow, so So I contribute every month to the Helen Keller Foundation We could also do give well door to organ the general fund where they where they put it to the best use

Yeah, why don't we do give well dot org because it gives people a lot of choices people can learn about yeah Helen Keller Foundation and all the other ones. Yes. No, I think it's beautiful. And I think you're beautiful. And I'm glad that we had this talk because I think it's going to augment a stronger friendship. I'm going to text you tomorrow and do a follow-up. I think we can take our friendship to the next level. And also even our joke collaborations because I have a lot more jokes here

that we didn't even get to and so do you. And I think we could be regularly bouncing jokes off one another. I would love that. Working it out, cause it's not done. We're working it out, cause there's no. That's gonna do it for another episode of Working It Out. I love that Gary Gullman. You can get his book Misfit at your local bookstore.

I could not recommend it more highly. You can follow Gary on Instagram, at Gary Gullman. You can watch a full video of this on my YouTube channel. Check it out, subscribe to it. Go to brurigs.com to sign up for my mailing list to be the first to know about those upcoming shows. Our producers of Working It Out are myself, along with Peter Salomon and Joseph Berbiglia.

Associate producer, Mabel Lewis. Consulting producer, Seth Barish. Assistant producer, Gary Simons. Sound mix by Ben Cruz. Supervising engineer, Kate Bolinski. Special thanks to Marissa Hurwitz, Josh Uppfall, David Raphael and Nina Quick, Mike Insigliari, Mike Berkowitz. Special thanks to Marissa Hurwitz, Josh Upfall, David Raphael and Nina Quick, my consigli Aries, Mike Berkowitz.

Special thanks to Jack Antonoff and Bleachers for their music. Special thanks to my wife, the poet, J-Hope Stein. You can follow her on Instagram, at J-Hope Stein. Special thanks as always to my daughter, Una, who built the original radio for Made of Pillows. And thanks most of all to you who are listening. If you enjoy the show, rate it on Apple Podcasts. It really helps. Tell your friends, tell your

enemies, tell your bullies. Gary and I talked about bullies a lot today. You know what you should do? Look up your old high school bullies, give them a call, make peace. Hey, I know we haven't talked in 20 years and last time we spoke your fist was in my face, but I wanted to let you know about this podcast. Maybe if they'd had the Working It Out podcast back then, I wouldn't have bullied you. Maybe they would have had a better understanding of themselves and others. Thanks a lot, everybody.

We're Working It Out. We'll see you next time.