The Doug Stanhope Podcast - Ep.#357: Legendary Lisa Young and The Gun in the Cupboard
Episode Date: March 8, 2020While on the road Doug invites legendary Boise Funny Bone manager Lisa Young over to the hotel for stories and memories of her time running the club. Also, Doug explains the gun in the hotel room.List...en to the rest of this podcast and get another BONUS one each month by subscribing through our Patreon page at https://www.patreon.com/stanhopepodcast. ALL levels of support will get direct message access to the podcast and instant access to a Bonus episode every month plus all past BONUS episodes. Any level of support is appreciated. Thanks in again as your subscription helps keep this podcast going. Patreon page - (https://www.patreon.com/stanhopepodcast).Recorded Mar. 5th, 2020 at the Ramada by Wyndham Airport in Spokane, WA with Doug Stanhope (@DougStanhope), Lisa Young, Tracey (@Egglester), and Ggreg Chaille (@gregchaille). Produced and Edited by Chaille.2020 tour dates are already up on the website. Don't find out too late about an upcoming performance in your area. Get on the Mailing List at https://www.dougstanhope.com/LINKS -Visit the Stanhope Store - http://www.dougstanhope.com/store/ Closing song, “The Stanhope Rag”, written and performed by Scotty Conant for Doug Stanhope and used with permission – Available on Soundcloud - https://soundcloud.com/scottyconantSupport the show: http://www.Patreon.com/stanhopepodcast
Transcript
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you're listening to the doug stanhope podcast
are you making me a drink tracy
we are here at the uh the ramada by windham spokane Airport, Spokane, Washington, with legendary former Boise Funny Bone manager Lisa Young
and Greg Chaley on his birthday and Tracy on the bar.
And I just checked my messenger on Twitter,
and we just finally got word back from management here at the uh
at the hotel that uh my uh my concerns will be addressed by uh the property
property manager management here corporate yeah corporate yeah corporate had to call the
on the ground of management to address my concern that last night,
while we were looking to steal a hotel Bible,
we saw stolen hotel Bibles at the merch booth.
Lisa,
would you approve?
I don't see why not.
Yeah.
Well,
we didn't find a Bible,
but we found a loaded handgun in that drawer over there with ammunition
rolling around.
So we called the front desk.
I was fucking pickled
and uh yeah so the cops came and took the gun out we're not from here maybe that's how they do it
yeah then you expect maybe the gm will give you a ring the next day and go hey sorry about that
maybe a free breakfast or something drink coupons to the bar so they didn't so i started tweeting about it and now corporate
is telling me that my concerns will be addressed within one week roughly really they can't just
fucking call up to the room and go hey sorry about that we're comping your fucking room
maybe they want to make sure it's not your gun cop killer bullets in it your scam that's my scam
is they fucking spend four $400 on a fucking gun
to get a fucking
free $100 room.
So you lost sleep last night.
No, I was,
I had already taken a Seroquel.
I was fucking out
when the cops were here.
I remember trying to make jokes.
I don't know what they were.
It was pretty quick.
And then the, all the advice from Twitter,
did you sign a receipt?
Because if that gun comes back clean, you get it.
It's like, I don't want, we're not gun people.
All of a sudden, how'd you get into guns?
Well, we found one in a drawer in a hotel
and I've been a gun nut ever since.
And it was on top of the hotel safety brochure.
Was it in a safe?
No, it was in that drawer right there.
Well, in the middle there is where you put your bottles of wine.
And I think they would call that a hutch or a buffet.
Yes.
Yeah.
To be fair, because it's Greg's birthday birthday i got us a suite and we'd be
podcasting so yeah there's a lot of drawers in here it's not like a motel six where there's just
one drawer i can see that's my problem i want to fucking cause a ruckus and get a free room
i want my free shit but i don't want some poor fucking housekeeping girl to get fired because of
it there's a lot of drawers you could easily overlook since there's an entire
kitchen with not a fucking single thing in a drawer no fork no knife it's like a model home
yeah we're like like even like the microwave is cardboard it just looks like it works
okay let's go down memory lane with lisa young lisa young was around for the day back in
hedberg was probably for the day back in headberg was probably
a middle act back then the first time i met mitch he and charred hogan remember yeah yeah charred
he's an opener for mitch a lot right yeah yeah and they were traveling around in a vw bus and they came on like a monday and remember the old club we had the
bars in front of the ticket booth yeah yeah kind of like an old uh teller like a bank teller window
yeah i remember the first time i worked there who was the weird kid he was almost autistic that
worked the ticket booth during the day there was several
forever but i remember the first time i i came in and i said that i'm the comic this week and
just introduced myself and he goes yeah i think you're a fraud and i was like the worst thing you
could possibly say especially at that young like that's what you think all the time as a comedian anyway and i was like what a dick and then then you told me now he's just like
that there's another thing about lisa young is once you she was like mitch in that you hang out
with her for a day and then you start talking like her yeah andy andrist is weird he still is he still is um when i met mitch they came on like
a monday and so it was like we were getting ready to go home for the day you know because we didn't
have a show that night and him and charred they glued their headshots to the counter.
And so that's why I booked Mitch and Chard.
Vandalism?
Yes.
Soft spot in your heart?
Yes.
That's funny.
Yeah, you're a den mother of sorts.
I suppose.
All the fuck ups.
Mitch, Andy, Sean Rouse.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
I think I gave you Andy and you gave me Sean Rouse.
So we're even.
Yeah.
Well, one of you is out of a job.
Yes, it's true.
So who's the biggest fuck up of the three of us four of us sorry how many how many have died on your watch like how many of your people that you
had as regulars are dead now is Hedberg Rouse I couldn't name them all going way back yeah
the first one this was in the 80s that was tragic to me was Dennis Wolfberg.
Oh, yeah.
I remember he died.
I think he died the same week Bill Hicks did, February 94.
Fact check it, Tracy.
No, it was earlier than that.
Wolfberg?
Yeah.
Wow.
When did you start at the comedy club?
I'm going to guess 1986 at the funny bone in arlington texas oh
is that still there no no that was the heyday yeah then i went to fort worth as a manager
and that club's no longer there um you started in the – And then I moved to –
Where did you start in the first job?
Arlington, Texas.
But, like, what was your position?
Waitress.
Waitress, okay.
Moving up.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You used to make so much money back then, three shows on Saturday night.
It was ridiculous not to do it, you know.
It was fun, too.
It was ridiculous not to do it, you know?
It was fun, too.
And I knew people like Kid Dave Miller and Ron White before they were comedians.
Before they were comedians?
Wow.
They were just hanging around?
Oh, yeah.
Ron White was selling windows, and he used to come and lurk around open mic night and wore bib overalls
and he was like i want to be a comedian so bad you must have a lot of good pictures um yeah a few crazy ones that i wouldn't want to show anybody probably she brought my old headshot
i haven't seen it yet the santa claus one i don't know which one the santa hat all it
the long stringy hair yeah the mullet back when you used to wear baseball shirts all the time
yeah yeah yeah i did that didn't we just run into kid dave miller somewhere
shit we did yeah where was that was it florida could it could it have been chattanooga yeah oh
that's what that's what it was yeah yeah he's an old friend yeah he was on he was on every Tribble gig wall.
Yeah, we ran in the same circles quite a bit.
We tried to catch up in Chattanooga, but I don't remember anything.
He tows like ultralight glider things now at an airport.
He pulls them up to altitude and then lets them go?
He's been doing that for a long time.
He was that big hang glider
back in the day. I don't know if he still
does it, but I think
Chattanooga's famous for that kind of
stuff.
For hang gliding?
Oh yeah, it's got that big ridge there.
I don't know.
Yeah, he's let's get that big ridge there. I don't know. Yeah, I can see jumping off of that.
Hang gliding isn't jumping, Doug.
Oh, no, no.
It's a controlled descent.
I just see jumping off that ridge.
I wasn't planning on having the apparatus.
I was thinking suicide.
You're thinking out loud?
How'd you, so, I don't know, do we go down Andy first?
Well, no, Hedberg.
How'd you find Hedberg?
He came to us.
Oh, that's right.
He came and...
Wait, wait.
I thought he was going to do a week here.
Or at the club.
That's why you saw him.
No, he wanted to do open mic night, which was the following night.
And so, I wouldn't let them into the club because we were you're leaving up
i wouldn't lock them they were peeking through the bars and
that was back in the morning that was back in the eidenhaw days the eidenhaw hotel is where
they'd put people up and it was kind of this it's kind of funky like the copper queen or something but it was still had a flop house you know trailer for sale or rent kind of 1940s bible salesman feel to it
metal keys i never experienced ghosts before but i think i did there
um was always super hot because of the radiators. And like if you were in that place in the winter, you had to have the windows open because it was so hot.
But the, you know, it had one of the old elevators and the stairwell that went around it to all the floors.
So each floor had its little kind of big area.
And I felt like ice cold air go through my body.
It was weird,
but they say it's haunted.
I forget the haunted thing.
And so I did have that experience there.
And that was pretty weird.
And I'll never forget it,
but I want to see ghosts you know andy has a story
about him and hedberg he said you put those two together i thought you'd get along uh
but he was trying to tell me a story but it's andy his you know andy was emceeing and this is the old this is the old club
Andy was emceeing
Mitch was middling and Dr. Gonzo
was the headliner
Dr. Gonzo for the listener was his
San Francisco guitar act
and
he's a good enough guy I don't really remember his act
but John Means
that's his real name?
Yeah.
Wow.
He lives in Mason City, Illinois.
Was he kind of like guitar-ted in Henry Phillips?
Pretty much.
Have you seen Henry Phillips' movie?
Yes.
Punching the Clown, that guitar act?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Stupid Joe.
Stupid Joe.
Let's get guitar-ted.
stupid joe let's get guitar did dr bronzo i sort of respected him because he kind of treated his comedy like a college career like he went to san francisco and did it there for a long
time and moved back to mason city illinois with his family so his family. So Andy is doing the same baffled look as Chaley,
imagining him having to do announcements.
It was short-lived, I'm sure.
But the thing that Andy's probably remembering is it was like Sunday.
is it was like Sunday and
Andy comes in first
and they're all smoking
cigars right
and they're all squinty
eyed and slurring
and it's Sunday night
it's last night right
last day of school
and then Andy comes in and mosey's around to the bar or wherever and then
mitch comes in and mitch is all stoned looking and then dr gonzo comes in a little while later later and i'm like thanks a lot um because they partied half the day and yeah so it was a it was
a sunday night he was telling me a story about hedberg being on stage and made some reference
to the eidenhall that hotel is very nosy because evidently he had he brought some skanky whore
up to his room and when he did a joke about it some girl that i guess another girl who he had
slept with that week fell off her bar stool like like you would you did what yeah and she tried to
get up but her heels locked in the bar stool,
so she fell right on her face.
And then Hedberg goes, I meant last week.
That's the jumbled version I got from Andy.
But, yeah, they had some fucking fire escape story about him and Hedberg.
I don't retain a lot.
Me neither.
But you remember some things, right?
Well, I have pictures of the blow-up doll incident.
That's when we moved the condo to an apartment complex.
And we had a blow-up sex doll for some reason.
a blow-up sex doll for some reason yeah there's several pictures and different places all around well we had it i guess mounted on the uh the patio the uh balcony of the the apartment
and i guess we were i was out there making out with it or something, and the cops pulled up and started videotaping,
and you were there?
I came to pick you up to go to radio,
and you had her on the balcony.
This is in the morning?
Yes.
We had it posted up as like a pirate's flag.
Well, yeah, you need to know which room.
She spent some time in my office for a while, too.
Yeah, Andy just sent me the pictures.
Yeah.
Yeah, but you gave us a good stern talking to about it.
Well, I didn't want to get kicked out of the condo.
I guess we could have dressed her, but...
I don't know if it was a new thing, the condo or what,
but I was very concerned that you were getting us in trouble.
I remember being in that condo,
and Sean Rouse is in the other bedroom,
and I went to do laundry.
Sean Rouse is still sleeping it off,
and I opened the washing machine,
and there was a blanket in there coated in
vomit yeah and uh yeah sean rouse had puked the bed and didn't remember it no one was really
surprised that sean rouse died let's be honest yeah did you get to say goodbye? Interesting story. It's a funny story.
We're playing San Diego, and Sean Rouse calls my cell phone when I'm on stage, so I pick it up.
I go, oh, it's Sean Rouse. This could be funny.
And I put it on speakerphone, and he goes, yeah, Dougie, I'm in the hospital. I had a stroke.
I go, oh, this isn't going to be as funny as I thought.
Hey, Sean, you're on stage right now. Let me call you after the hospital. I had a stroke. I go, oh, this isn't going to be as funny as I thought. Hey, Shawnee, you're on stage right now.
Let me call you after the show.
And then I forgot about it.
And then, yeah, a month later, I don't know, however long later,
oh, Shawnee died.
How come no one told me he was in the hospital?
And then Andy goes, don't you remember he called you on stage?
And I go, oh, yeah, fuck.
I should have followed up on that nice friend oh we were here you were gone by then me and shawnee rouse were here on the david tell tour
the insomniac here meaning oh no i keep thinking boise she's from boise we're in spokane you moved here but uh was that at the neural x
no no it's david tell so it was at a theater of some kind you guys do the neural x too
one time couple i've played a neural x a couple times stephanie ann mason i just remembered her
name i couldn't remember when i was talking to andy she had she set up a show there once remember
she was just completely pickled out of her mind.
Was this the NeuroLux?
Yeah.
I don't remember anything with that one.
Your Uncle Bill was there.
My Uncle Bill was there, but there was no green room.
It's basically just a chain link back dock area with a hot hose and grease mats.
And it was just constantly constantly we had to move seats
or the seats were all fucked up it was not it was a regular bar show for us that means that i
spend more time managing like how the show is going to go than remembering who set the show up
especially if they were drunk yeah that's a whiskey bar as far as i remember well we used to
always hang out there after the show that was their oh really it's a lovely bar, as far as I remember. Well, we used to always hang out there after the show.
That was their go-to back in the day.
It's a lovely bar.
Yeah, no.
It's a great bar.
That great sign on stage.
And this was before hipsters.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That sign on stage that blinks.
Yeah.
Yeah, that was fucking awesome.
Yeah, I'd pay a lot of money for that if they ever went out of business.
It's like a crown with all sorts of
light bulbs yeah it's like off of a hotel isn't it it's like from a like a neon sign graveyard
or something it's just a part of yeah the guy that owns the nerlux he bought pen gillies in Boise. It's like when you go in, it's like you're in a bar from the 1800s.
At least it used to be.
But it's real cool, too.
Yeah, Boise is very different.
Yeah, well, we'll be there in a week.
My brother lives out there now.
Oh, my God, it's so different.
Yeah, and that area where Neuralux, I don't remember it being like a walkable area to walk around.
Boise is a walkable town.
I mean, I don't remember it when we did the Neuralux shows.
Downtown is, yeah.
It's on the edge of kind of downtown.
But where we did the show the other night night that's like right in the middle of like
everything's happening right there it's very nice what was the the gay bar next door to the
club emerald emerald i remember being there with shawnee rouse where shawnee rouse was just
complete blackout drunk walking like frankenstein that was barely too that was a good bar, too. That was a great bar.
That was a great after hours kind of place.
And Shawnee was so fucked that I had to walk him to a bar stool.
I'm going to get you out of here because you can't make words.
You can't walk.
You know, he got that leer.
And he'd just look at you and you know he's going to bite you if you keep making eye contact.
God bless.
And I said, sit here and you finish your beer.
I got to take a piss.
And he just he turns right to the girl sitting next to her to him and leers at her.
Hey, what's your deal?
I'm like, Sean, he's just don't stop.
You can't even talk.
And I went to the bathroom and I came back to get him and he was making out with that girl and i'm like how did you fucking pull that off you can't even move
all right uh let's take a quick break
the unbookables it's like uh it's like getting the cast of different strokes together for a reunion.
You're like the Willis of the group.
You're the last person we actually thought would still be alive, but it turns out everybody else died.
Hey, everybody.
It's me, Brett Erickson from the Issues with Andy podcast
We love you
killer termites and we hope you'll tune in
and check us every Friday
Issues with Andy on YouTube
Yeah, it's not
a podcast, right? Isn't it a
vodcast? You're right. For once, Andy
you're right. It's a vodcast
which means it's a podcast fueled
by vodka
If you love the shit you're getting here on the Doug Stanhope podcast,
get more shit with us on Issues with Andy on YouTube every Friday.
And yeah, well, you keep listening and watching or however you do it,
and we'll keep shitting.
All right, we're back.
You were saying?
For whatever reason, everyone always wanted to take care of Sean Rouse.
You especially.
I'd bring him home because he wouldn't have, like,
anywhere to go when the week was over and so he needed to
get a plane ticket or whatever it was always like that and so he'd end up staying with us a couple
days and then you know a safe place to take him we had a cool house in Boise and had plenty of room for people and stuff like
that. And so we, yeah, we brought him home and you know,
the staff would come over and party in the backyard and stuff.
So it was fun.
I remember he was in Salt Lake city.
Sina Adminson, I think his name is ran a room.
And Sean Rouse did the weekend or whatever he
did there and then was there for like four more days at his house doing meth
drinking himself into blackouts he knew how to extend a week
he was uh here when did he die? Last year? The year before?
I think 2017.
No, 2018 because I was just leaving from San Diego to start that international Southeast Asia shit.
Here's another bring home Sean Rouse story.
We were here and he came and did one night at the spokane comedy club one show it was like a monday night weird night you don't have anything to do
with that club though right no you don't work there okay no but we went and saw him and uh
same thing he didn't have anywhere to go when the night was over with and I'm gonna tell you guys this but he
and this was like the November before he passed away so I saw him not too long before he passed
away which why I was kind of shocked and then you you're like, his heart. You know, you're shocked by that.
We brought him home, and he had these, like, flimsy shoes on that were cloth.
And his toenails needed to be cut really badly.
Mr. Burns.
Because they were snagging on his shoes,
and he was hurting more from his toenails than he was, you know.
The rest of his problems.
Right.
Plethora.
And so I cut his toenails for him.
That's a sweet story.
That's a very Lisa Young story.
I have a picture of that night, and he, okay,
she was a McNab cattle dog looked like a border collie
and she was an old lady and she always slept on the couch well I have a picture of her on the
ground sleeping because he's laying on her couch and so I assume she was sleeping with him on the floor no he's laying on her couch
basically where her spot was and he's on the couch laying down and she's on the floor like
looking at me like hey where's my spot um but and she has thus since passed, so that's a special photograph for me.
Those two on my couch.
On my couch.
Sorry, I just had another Sean Rose story.
Sean Rose?
It left me.
sorry i just had another sean rose story it left me i know you could i know when i first worked with andy here you wouldn't let him drink before shows
right for a reason right and then i'd sneak him beers and then you'd yell at me i love andy and
he's funny and i wanted him to do good, you know? Did that help? When he was slobbering, he...
One time he took a...
You know, he was always like a two-fister,
and he'd leave his glass of wine laying around,
and he brought in one time from the co-op,
the health food grocery store there,
he had homeopathic downers.
And I'm like, do they work?
And they must have because he, yeah.
Yeah, he fucked up a show so badly that he was on restriction.
Yeah.
I tried to get him to at least wait till he got on stage.
We used to fuck around.
This is well before any of us had any kind of name.
So we're just the comedians that they're coming to see.
Early 90s are we talking about?
Mid, late 90s.
Yeah.
Right?
Yeah.
I left in 05, so. All all right that's when i got out so it's been a long
time now do you do you still know like when you go to like the spokane comedy club do you is it
does your inner manager come back like they shouldn't be allowed to do that. No, I like it when nobody knows who I am.
I like it when I haven't seen the comedian before.
You don't feel a need to jump in if they're, like, backed up.
Oh, that's not true because some of the open micers I'm really proud of
and I encourage them, the locals.
That's nice.
We got one local to open for us tonight.
But you know the guy, right?
Yes.
We got the confirmation for?
Yes.
So you still stay in the scene, kind of?
No, not at all.
You know the open micers.
You let Shawnee Rose sleep on your couch in your dog's bed.
Of my 20 years in comedy, I love open mic night.
It has a soft spot in my heart.
It's mesmerizing.
It's fun to watch people get better, you know?
And fail miserably.
And that too.
Yeah.
Someone, I forget, tweeted or texted me last night when I was in a haze and said,
yeah, I just went to an open mic where a guy who owned a company thought he'd bring all his employees to see him his first time on stage.
And it went exactly the way you'd hope it would go.
And I go, that's the kind of comedy I would pay to see.
Yes. Brett Erickson's comment on it, because he retweeted it,
was the only advice you need, comedy class advice,
go to your first open mic alone.
Yeah.
My first open mic, I went with my girlfriend at the time,
had her mother in town, and they came and she videotaped it.
So somewhere out there, there is videotape of my first open mic,
which I don't need because I wrote it out in a notebook, long form,
including, hi, my name is Doug Stanhope.
I wrote that down.
I wrote my entire set word for word down, so I don't need the videotape.
Didn't you also write?
You should try to find the videotape.
He'd have to find her.
No, she's the one I wrote about in the book, Pandora Trinowski.
I Googled her and found first mug shots.
She's all methed out, and there's a bunch of mug shots from where she lived in central texas
and then the next thing i found was her obituary that was a nice uh walk down memory lane where
are they now of meth and then dead oh prostitution meth okay the holy trinity dead yeah i don't
really want to hook up with her mother and start rummaging through her storage
shit finding that tape box here somewhere she said well there had to be a bright side i mean
i don't know uh yeah rouse i had two times we worked for you. Maybe you might have been gone. No, you've 2005.
Because I remember I worked there for the 2000 Super Bowl with Rouse.
We watched that together at the bar downstairs after the show.
And then the World Series Game 7 in 2001 when the Diamondbacks beat the
Yankees in Game 7.
I had to be on stage for it.
So Sean Rouse had come up every few innings and give me updates on stage.
Yeah, it doesn't look good.
The Diamondbacks are down.
And then come back up.
Hey, wait.
They're coming back.
All right.
I'm just looking at my watch to do my contractually obligated time
to get the fuck off and go watch the end of it.
Was Sean yelling from the side?
Or did he go up on stage and give the sean yelling from the side or would you go up on
stage and give the announcement no he just he had enough trouble getting up on stage i was gonna say
i didn't know it at what level the that old club in boise had a like a handicap ramp going up to
the stage oh for ralphie may or tanya lee oh ralphie may did you have ralphie may oh yeah all right there's another dead one
um did i ask you about giraldo javar giraldo no i never had the pleasure of working with him
go ahead what were you saying uh chris crazy legs
there's another one he's not dead babysit i love that she has the same name that you guys have
she's management but she still calls him chris crazy that's what he called himself i don't know
the guy i just know from like it's like dr gonzo you and the other guys where all the comics would
talk about this guy but i thought that was a name you gave him not what he would go by that would
be on his headshot yeah the listener you don't know him he's a he's cerebral palsy and in a wheelchair but just a a vociferous drunk just yeah he was a chore
to take drinking because you had to push the wheelchair around town downtown boise he always
jacked me up for uh guest sets and sets when I played Denver. And the last time
he did a guest set, then he was
selling merch after the show at the Oriental
Theater and
literally pissed drunk
where he pissed himself
at the merch booth
and just didn't seem to
notice or care. It's just
all down his fucking khaki pants
and pouring out of them and he just sat there
continuing to sell merch
in a drunken stupor.
At what point do you just
like, Chris, just bring
a blanket to, say you're cold.
And he had a handler too.
You're wearing khakis. It shows up.
It shows up in khakis.
If you wore dungarees, we'd be okay.
He could blame the carpet at the Orial it's from the 20s tell us some more stories lisa young fuck ups i never i never
thought you were a fuck up because like andy and those guys like you would come in with your put it gave it context your two liters of water what and i'd be
like see he's hydrating people wow i don't remember ever drinking water yeah hmm a thing to where
but two liters you didn't have two big bottles of water he'd walk in with, and I'd be like, he knows how to drink.
Did I have a girlfriend when you've...
I'm going to say not.
Because I remember you came up, and I think it was with a girlfriend,
but didn't you come up to Garden Valley where I used to live with us once?
Yeah, we drove you up there.
It was you and Renee.
Oh, that was oh that was renee
yeah that's garden valley crouch where i used to live in the cabin oh yeah we stopped there
we stopped there to eat and then left really quickly got the fuck out yeah it's it was a nice
sunday drive it was yeah uh so renee that was that would have been 2002 2003 all right yeah you've been there through a
few of them christine hajj did she ever yeah oh she did come here because i took her up there
and we went to some to gardens yeah this is a town of like 400 people up in the mountains where I lived when I was a young man when I was 21, 22.
And she went to this guy's trailer barbecue with the mountain men, mountain people, motherfuckers, and Christine Hodge, a former child star.
But she held her own.
Oh, yeah, that girl.
Yeah, that girl.
Okay.
Yeah.
So she must have been here when I was playing here.
It's funny that you're moved.
Betsy Wise.
Take them back.
Remember Betsy?
Yeah.
I didn't know you dated her.
Oh, you know her separately?
Yeah.
Did you book her?
I think so.
Sorry.
Where was she from uh i've only heard from new york was she i met her in miami then she moved
to la and then moved back to new york uh see i don't even know i don't even know your girls
that's why that's the only way i can keep track of time I don't even know your girls.
That's the only way I can keep track of time.
Makes sense.
Of what period of my life, my career, was what girl I was with.
But yeah, Renee, all right.
Yeah.
And you've met Bingo, right?
Yes.
Yeah.
When's the last time I saw you?
Maybe at Dante's in Portland.
Oh, okay.
For the taping?
It's been a few years now.
Yeah.
Beer Hall?
Didn't you do Beer Hall there?
No, I didn't.
Oh, yeah.
It was Beer Hall Putsch.
We were living here, but I bet it's been at least 12, 15 years ago.
You were doing Dante's kind of on the reg for a while. Yeah, that's when we started getting out of comedy clubs.
Dante's was one of the first ones where we were like, fuck Harvey's.
Well, that was it.
It was the Insomniac taping where David Tell goes up, does his jokes,
and then really quick, they had the crew there to do it,
and he just zing, zing, done.
And then Doug goes up.
Well, Cleveland did his set.
Wow.
And then Doug goes up and just starts walking everyone,
and they're just there because they got a free ticket.
They don't know.
Yeah, the owner used to brag that he doesn't need to pay comics a lot of money
because he has the biggest telemarketing department in comedy.
Second floor?
Yeah.
And everyone, I ain't never won nothing in my life.
Honey, we just won free comedy tickets.
Appetizers?
Yeah, I like appetizers.
The worst fucking audiences ever.
But he had it packed.
But he would like david
tell would go up and do you know two clean three clean jokes everyone's all right settling in for
you know this would be a good show i think i've seen this guy and i don't know it went southern
or whatever hillbilly but uh then then the regular stanhope show would go and there's you can't dig
out of that hole they already think they're going to get something that they kind of recognize isn't offensive and then you start yeah
the owner Barry he would come in yeah uh he would come in he wouldn't even watch the shows he'd just
come in the next day and uh sit you down and talk to you about the comment cards he got oh yeah
that's right uh so that's when i like but i was
getting a following in portland but i'm doing a tuesday through saturday or tuesday through sunday
where maybe you know six people in every audience know who i am and i'm like what fuck this i could
get you know just the people i that know who i am and get the full gate doing one show at dante's and that place is still there
right yeah he's gone i believe on wait dante's or harvey's harvey's yeah i believe harvey's is
still there what a cool little piece of property he had there though yeah no the room was great
the corner the bar the restaurant and then that was like that whole corner.
Yeah, and you're right beside the train station in a fucking sea of homeless people.
But I guess Portland is a sea of homeless people.
They turned a couple of those corners into like food courts for trucks.
I'm drinking out of a fucking Dixie glass, by the way.
That's why I keep refilling.
That's why you keep hearing them suck juice glass.
Yeah, it's changed a little bit down there,
but I mean, the Burnside where Dante's is,
that's kind of sketched, though, too.
That whole area.
Do you work that other room in Portland?
No.
They just opened one, didn't they?
Oh, Helium.
No, they never worked at Helium.
None of them?
No.
No, and they have really good reputations.
They have several clubs.
Yeah.
Yeah, well, Rich Miller used to book it,
and we butted heads over the years.
I was fired repeatedly for getting naked on stage by him.
And so I never even asked to work at Helium.
At that point, I had plowed my own path.
You should try to work there.
Adele, we work bigger rooms in Portland.
What's the name of that place across from Dante's that we play?
Oh, the Star Theater?
Star Theater.
Yeah.
That's a little different than Portland.
I mean, Helium is a comedy club. Yeah. That's a little different than Portland. I mean, Helium is a comedy club.
Yeah.
And Star Theater is a whole different vibe.
Who's your favorite new comedians that you see that you wish you could book?
I don't know any of them.
I don't either.
I have this guy that I follow on Twitter.
I told you I like that little open mic-er kid.
Yeah, I'm talking about
new people. This guy's in prison.
Killed his wife or whatever.
But he's a good writer.
He has a Twitter account.
But he just did a thing.
It was comedians in prison
for his website, his blog.
And he just rates how all these
comedians would fare in prison. Likee rogan is a 10 out of
10 and yeah it's a fun read for comedians but he had like five comedians in his list that i've
never heard of and this guy is in fucking prison he's got a lot more time. Was he in LA or something? No, Michigan, upstate Michigan,
Traverse City.
Oh,
that's right.
Didn't his mom
come to the show
in Traverse City?
Bobby Caldwell.
What's a,
God damn,
I was going to plug his thing.
I would really,
I would try a phoner
with him from prison.
We don't do phoners,
but I think that would be fun just get them on for 10
15 minutes of course we'd have to pay the j pay of yeah eight dollars a minute it's more expensive
to call from prison than it was those old fucking cell phones on airplanes remember when the
airplanes had those credit card swipe? Yeah.
For two minutes.
Well, I remember I called my agent once from one of those,
knowing his assistant would answer the phone and accept the charges.
I called collect from one of them. And then he patched me through to Jim Kellum.
And I just talked to him about nothing.
He goes, well, you call him from like a mobile phone back then?
I go, no, I'm calling you from an airplane phone.
He goes, God, you better hang up.
Those things are wicked expensive.
I said, don't worry.
I called collect.
He goes, what?
And then he yells at his assistant.
Is this a collect call?
You motherfucker.
I'll get you back for this.
Click.
I used to fuck with him relentlessly.
Anyway, let's take a break.
Mm-hmm.
I like biscuits and mustard.
I also like the Doug Stanhope podcast.
All right, we're back.
Oh, wait, our fucking question we're back. Oh, wait, our question.
We always ask, every time we work like an improv or something
and they assign you a wait staff to just work the green room,
we always ask who's the biggest douchebag diva that you ever had to work with.
So we're going to ask you that.
Who is the biggest?
Operating years, you said 86 to 2005.
Those were the years you were working, basically?
Okay.
Give us some names.
Douchebags you had to deal with.
She's grimacing.
She doesn't like this.
That's why it's fun.
You guys don't do press anymore, do you? No. we know radio and stuff like that the odd phone you
did a phone or today people don't do radio anymore they don't listen to it so why should we get up
early and do it okay i have this is one time i wish this was on video so you could see her squirming and her face contorting.
You guys all know who Jeff Dunham is.
Oh, yes.
Okay.
He always did great publicity for the club.
And his publicist, and don't ask me her name she did a really good job so good that it was like pesky
you know stacy picluda calling you all the time and this and this and this and this and you know
you're busy answering phones or doing whatever you know to go. But she was a pesky girl.
Yeah, but that's not a comedian.
Like people with demands,
you probably didn't have to deal with a lot of that
because you were kind of around for the comedy dearth.
Well, I had a tendency to maybe not bring those people in.
to maybe not bring those people in.
The one guy, I can't think of his name.
Phil was...
Phil Hartman?
No, my better half.
Phil DeVoid?
Chuck.
His name was Chuck.
I can't think of his last name.
Was he a booker or was he a comic? A comedian.
A comedian.
He wasn't anybody I really cared for, but for whatever reason, he got booked.
But were you the one doing the booking or did you have an agent or did you have a booker?
It was booked out of the headquarters in St. Louis.
Okay.
But you'd kind of tell them who you wanted and this and that and
then they'd say oh so-and-so is available and you're like me but they could push someone if
someone if they were behind someone they could make them yeah okay and this guy he was god i
can't freaking remember his name his name was chuck But anyway, he liked young boys.
And he was doing cocaine.
And this was in Boise at the first club.
And he went to the hospital.
And it was because he was dehydrated. And he's telling me I went to the hospital cause I was dehydrated.
And I'm like,
yeah,
cause you OD'd or whatever.
And so he didn't finish out the week and I can't remember his name.
When I remember his name,
I'll let you know but
he was a oh you know he was around in the 80s um
i can't even remember where he was from midwest maybe somewhere that whole period
was your heyday our heyday was where comedy like for all of the 90s i i there's not a comedian that
became famous from doing comedy for a decade so it wasn't like now where there's all special events
and right there was there was like you got famous not in the 90s jeff foxworthy was the only comic i could ever name from that entire decade
that you knew because of comedy there was like you know chris rock and stuff but they were
saturday night live first jeff was doing those books those books made him famous red you might
be a redneck yeah he did those did those first. Really? Yeah.
He co-wrote one with Vic Henley, too.
Oh, yeah, Vic.
Yeah.
Well, then didn't Larry the Cable Guy get really big, too?
That's 2000s.
That was the... Oh, was that 2000s?
Yeah, it was the blue-collar comedy tour.
No, that was in the 90s.
The color was definitely in the 90s.
I remember
it was probably 2001.
No.
I was in LA.
Larry, the cable sold out
the Moore Theater
in Seattle.
I do remember him being there and it was a sold-out
show, so he had already
amassed a following at that time
but that was you're right it was in the 2000s you were just talking about uh colleen from uh
funny bone omaha she fucking hated me and i hated her and still still oh yeah i hope i harbor a
grudge that's my only bucket list is to get back at people before I die.
Do you know anything about when Doug stopped working comedy clubs?
Can we talk about that?
Sure.
Didn't it have to do with one of the funny bone, one of the gals?
I forget why she hated me, but Betsy Wise, when I was dating her around 2000,
forget why she hated me but betsy wise when i was dating her around 2000 i think betsy was she was at one of the festivals and she was sitting at this whole table full of comics and agents and
colleen didn't know that that was my girlfriend and just started shit talking me at the table
oh yeah by the way, that's my boyfriend. It happens.
Yeah.
And I don't know what it was about.
It might have been Larry the Cable Guy related.
I don't know.
I know he was an Omaha guy.
I know there was a beef with a local morning radio show because I wrote.
Todd and Tyler.
Did you find out?
2000.
2000.
Okay, good.
You're both right. Todd and Tyler. Did you find out? 2000. 2000. Okay, good. You're both right.
Todd and Tyler, you're right.
Yeah.
I wrote a thing on my website back when that was a thing to do was update your website.
And I wrote a whole thing about an open letter to Larry the Cable Guy.
And it wasn't really at him, but as fans.
Because you remember that era where any comic good on stage
and some asshole in the audience is yelling, get her done.
That's not even like, not only am I not that guy,
it's not even close to what I do.
And it doesn't even make sense.
And as imploring him to kill himself just to stop his fans from ruining comedy.
And then Todd and Tyler, I i guess went ape shit on it but fucking colleen yeah she's the reason you quit doing comedy clubs
no no there was someone from the funny bone that was kind of oh oh it was because of uh
sean rouse getting canceled oh that's a. There's a few funny bone stories.
There's Dave Stroop in Columbus where I wrote on some.
Oh, he's the one that fired Hedberg.
Hedberg was working headlining.
Jim Short was a middle act from San Francisco.
And Hedberg had one of his legendary fucking smash a glass on the back brick wall shows and lay down on stage.
And I'm certain it was me recommending these guys to Dave Stroop.
Sure.
Yeah.
So I wrote some shit about Dave Stroop and how I hope his baby dies.
And that got me canceled.
Oh, that's right.
Half the Mid-Atlantic.
And so what year was that?
That would have been 99, 2000.
Yeah, early 2000.
Because I was still in Seattle.
And then you were doing your 20-year.
It's a lovely thing when you can pick and choose where you work, Doug.
Yeah, I persevered.
Stroop and I have made up.
I've worked at Columbus Funny Bone.
Good. Because I was just first on the internet. I persevered Stroop and I have made up I've worked the Columbus funny bone good
I was
because I was just first
on the internet
and not realizing
oh this is forever
and far reaching
yeah
so some fucking narc
showed Dave Stroop
what I wrote after
bad gambling
binge loss
in Vegas
shit faced
at 7 in the morning
fuck him and his baby.
I hope his baby has a shunt put in its head.
It bleeds pus and dies in his arms.
But then there was Sean Rouse got canceled by that.
You have made up since then.
You're not saying this now.
No, I said that back then.
I was heavy on the vitriol in an online alt.comedy.standup.
What do you call those things?
Message board or forum?
Yeah.
Forum.
Forum.
But then Sean Rouse got fired by that fucking.
Janet from South Bend.
South Bend.
Yeah.
She, as Sean Rouse drives all the way from L.A. to go do a week there.
And she knows his act.
And then he does some rape material off the top of his set.
The first gig of the week where there's some kind of rape survivors thing going on.
In the audience.
Yeah.
So she just fires him and doesn't give him a place to stay
doesn't pay him for the week even though well that's the guy you hired you know what he does
and uh so then i was there on a bob and tom tour the one night that i was on the tour and i just
went off on the fucking south bend funny bone at a theater in south bend and fuck them and
theater in South Bend and fuck them and don't ever go.
She was in the audience.
And yeah, I got fired from that tour.
So it's the funny bones that made you quit doing the clubs.
I'm sure it was.
It was a shitty fucking thing to do to another comic that made him decide to do what he did. Oh, and I'll never forget the other comedians that were on that tour
that uh defended her like fuck you guys oh really still harbor those grudges won't mention any names
they will do it on the page suck up see i forgot all that stuff
but but that started the rock and roll clubs and booking that way. And also Doug was the first comic to book shows with ticketing through brown paper tickets,
which started that whole thing.
And they've been really good to Doug since then.
Just him being the first and starting that whole thing off.
And now lots of people do that.
Well, I remember Chaley and I were doing these, a lot of really shitty gigs,
I remember Chaley and I were doing these a lot of really shitty gigs,
the aquarium in Fargo, North Dakota,
and just hoping for mailing list people to word of mouth.
And I remember the conversation where we're driving some fucking lonely stretch of two lane,
going, how many of these people,
when we're booking door deals with a rock and roll club,
a lot of people just you know buy the
ticket and not show up i think we were doing like eight dollar tickets yeah and and fargo i remember
that because someone goes why do you fucking i can't believe you're working for so cheap and
then i realized yeah we should just price ourselves at what we think we're worth not what we think you
they'll buy what they think you put what they'll part with. Yeah, you see what the market can bear.
But yeah, we didn't know.
And I said, how many, like, if you had a door deal, Lisa Young,
and like 15 people bought tickets that the artist doesn't know about
and didn't show up, do you tell them?
Or do you just fucking pay them what the seats are?
Or do you resell those seats and go, yeah, we just didn't sell out tonight?
No answer?
You got to be righteous, right?
I know.
I know.
I trust you, but not some fucking pen gillies.
Do you go in and count seats?
Well, what happened was once we started having... Oh, yeah.
We were going to start doing it through PayPal.
We were going to sell tickets ourselves through PayPal.
We were trying to figure it out.
And then you found brown paper tickets.
I was living in Seattle at the time, and I found brown paper tickets that was...
I mean, they had three employees or something.
It was ridiculous.
But they charged something so minimal compared to everyone else.
And this is when ticket master was doing
the whole thing with pearl jam and all that so it's very there's a lot of visibility on this
kind of thing and then when we started doing shows and i'd see it i'd sometimes i'd be running the
door and we have this this master list and i'd see out of 110 people seven people didn't show up
and then we started thinking, wait a minute.
If this is happening now, it's probably happened in the past.
What happened back then?
They would resell those seats and then just, yeah, we had 107 show up.
What?
So there was always, and then we had one of our first podcasts,
we had some dudes who ran comedy clubs.
Oh, the Dorfmans.
Yeah.
You know the Dorfmans?
They're great.
I didn't want to say their name, but I guess it's on a podcast.
Yeah.
You have to go back far.
And they, I mean, that was, they fessed up.
It's like, yeah, those days are over.
Man, that was fun.
I mean, it was the Wild Wild West.
Yeah.
So it basically introduced more control for Doug on the ticket side
and being able to justify the ticket price and insuring.
And then there was, what, Facebook?
Well, MySpace.
That was a game changer.
Remember the Teenage Improv troupe I used to book?
No. They were called
the Foul Puppets. Once a
month in Boise, Idaho.
God bless those kids.
I love them all.
But
they had the
MySpace and they would
fill their show and I was like
oh this is going to be like unbelievable.
And one day, and it was.
Oh, MySpace.
MySpace and then Facebook.
When did Facebook start?
2007-ish, 2006.
I think it was.
So not that long ago.
And so do you still do stuff on Facebook?
No, I have a Facebook account.
I don't touch it.
Brian, he'll put dates up there, I think.
Some of it's linked to the Twitter too.
So if you tweet something,
then it would automatically go to Instagram and Facebook as well.
I don't know if yours is set up that way,
but there's a way that all those things are.
I wish MySpace was back.
I miss MySpace.
You could go in and like i could
search a town fargo let's say and i could go in and like search for people in that like area that
zip code and then you know by uh smokier uh drinker like you find me these people like people
who would generally.
You wish the old MySpace was back.
Yeah, and then I'd add those people as friends and then hope they'd show up at the show.
I set up a fake account as a hot chick,
and then I'd hit on dudes in that area and say,
oh, you should meet me and my friends at the Doug Stenum comedy show.
We tried a lot of griffs.
comedy show.
We tried a lot of griffs.
Yeah.
It worked out. I used it to find music, new music to listen to.
I don't even like old music.
I like, I don't want to replace it.
We're going to wrap up.
Is there any good stories that you want to close on? I don't want to replace it. We're going to wrap up. Is there any good stories that you want to close on?
I don't know.
I like that you put the mic down.
I can't think of a new comedian I like.
And I can't think of that guy's name.
Chuck.
Chuck.
I think it's better if we don't that guy's name. Chuck. Chuck. You'll get the...
I think it's better if we don't have his last name.
Where are we going to sushi?
Plug your local establishments into the mic.
Sukiyaki Inn.
It's right by the club.
All right.
Convenient.
What was the place we used to go upstairs in Boise?
Shige's. Shige gays it was fucking really good
that's where you told me we were sitting on the balcony and you told me you were in love with a
crazy girl oh that's right i think you didn't like bingo at first huh because i didn't know her
she wasn't there i oh no that was uh there was being the den mother. There was one that was.
What's Ron White's lady's name?
Not his girl, but his manager lady from Atlanta.
She was completely Renee Camp.
She was Camp Renee.
I don't know if you were, too.
When Renee, I left Renee for bingo.
I liked Renee. Yeah. But I mean, I didn't know if you were too. When I left Renee for Bingo. I liked Renee.
But I mean, I didn't know her
that well and
I like Bingo too.
Everybody likes you, Lisa Young.
But it was funny because you told me
you were in love with a crazy girl.
Kathy Nelson.
Yes, Kathy. Sorry, Kathy.
Not that you're listening. We got it.
I don't know who that is either.
She works with Ron.
She's great.
Anyway.
All right.
Let's wrap this up.
What do you do now?
I'm a gardener.
Like professionally or retired?
I work at Finch Arboretum.
Nice.
It's nice.
It's right by here.
I should have taken you guys there today.
We were busy.
They had to do their hair.
I had to look at the internet.
I had to go check out the club.
That club is awesome.
Spokane Comedy Club.
Yeah.
Real nice.
And you know what?
It's the same company that bought Skyline.
We were just there for the first time since the ownership change.
And for 20 plus years, there was no green room.
So this company comes in and the first thing they do, they build a green room.
It was awesome.
They changed the green room location at this one and now they have that back entrance.
It's fantastic.
There's a straight shot to the stage.
It's the fucking way to do it.
So very impressed.
I love it all right
i'm gonna go eat sushi with lisa young do you have anything you want to plug i'm so happy you're here
it's about time what are the hours at the arboretum so someone's come by at dawn to dust
no dogs allowed yes that's why i don't go there in my off time.
Recreation.
All right.
Let's do this.
Okay.
Take us out, Bingo.
12, 12, 12.
Okay.
Bye-bye now. Thank you. សូវាប់ពីបានប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់ពីប់� Thank you.