The Three Questions with Andy Richter - Jackie Kashian

Episode Date: December 21, 2021

Comedian Jackie Kashian joins Andy Richter to talk about being Armenian, growing up in Wisconsin, her family dynamics, and more.

I would like to have you on the dork forest if you ever want to dork out of it absolutely sure shutters like look at the shutters behind you I'm only like uh halfway dork on a lot of stuff like I know I'm familiar with many dork things, but I'm not fully into them because I have commitment issues. Oh, fair enough. And as the pre-production document says, pick one to five things so that we can just, we can meander the world of all the things that you like,

that you're enthusiastic about just a little bit. Oh, and by the way way this podcast has already started i'm going to use all this because that will work as a plug this will work as a plug at the top hi everybody you're listening to the three questions with our new uh cold open attempts pretty great huh really catches you by surprise uh pulls you right in uh i'm Andy Richter, and I'm talking today with the very, very funny comedian, world traveler, Midwesterner, Jackie Cation. Hi. Hello, and welcome to, I feel welcome. Thank you for having me. Good, good, good. You're from Wisconsin, right?

I am. Are there many Armenians in Wisconsin? There's a good three to six hundred, I would say. My brother knows all of them. Really? Yeah. I just talked to him and he was saying how he went to Chicago to visit a factory. Guy likes factories, my brother Russ. And the Armenian church in wherever he was outside of Chicago, was right across the street from his, from the factory. And the guy said, oh, do you know the priest? And my, and Russ was like, and so I rattled off the guy's entire family name. And it felt like the end of a movie where it's like, how did you get this

job? Well, you know, my mother's name is Ellen. And you're like, your mother's name is Ellen? My mother's name is Ellen. And so my brothers always work in the angle of. Yeah, yeah. Yes. When you came out here and to this being one of the most Armenian places in the country, was it? So weird.

Was it weird for you? The weirdest. I was like, for a long time, I counted how many Armenians I would meet a day. Yeah. Yeah. Because I literally in Wisconsin, everybody thought it was a Baltic swordfish. And so I'd be like, I'm Armenian.

And they're like, yeah, yeah. Oh, it sounds good with garlic butter, I bet. And but the the crazy thing is, is so there would be the guy at who changed my oil the woman at the bank the the barista the restaurant you know there was and people would say you're armenian and i would have to say wisconsin armenian we've already melted we've melted i'm so sorry i can do food and church that's's what I was going to say. Yeah, that's what I was going to say. I bet it's like you feel so not Armenian.

Well, right. Because I felt the most Armenian. And and then I moved out here and I'm like, I I would. What was the line? I would say, look deeply into my eyes and I'll sell you a rug. And in the hopes that they would literally shut up. And then I'd once did a benefit for essentially, it was one of those fake, like plant a tree in Armenia. But it was really stick a tree up the ass of Azerbaijanis.

Yeah, yeah. And I just said, okay, I'll do a benefit for Armenia. And then I read the paperwork. Like there was a brochure at the benefit. And I was like, no, no. For the cause. No, no. Wait a minute.

Wait a minute. And so, and it was, I had to, I went to Barbara over at Flappers. And I was like, both of us need to do a little more research. And because I'm not. Was it for buying guns or something? Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

For arming, yeah. Right, for arming the Armenians. And the thing is, is I, I was not, there are two branches of the Armenian church, much like every culture in the world. This joke works for every culture. An Armenian man was stranded on an island. The first thing he did was build two churches. So there was one that he didn't have to go to and he could be angry at or whatever. That's the premise and joke, right? Right. Sure, sure. And so I was raised in the non-political, church of the armenian apostolic you know very non-tashnak and yeah is

the and so whatever asked me someone asked me to be political about the armenian situation i say what my dad always said is like am i moving back no i'm surrounded by political things that needs that need fixing all around me in this country. I can't fix their problems as well. Yeah. I do love, because I live in Burbank, but it's like the diaspora has blanketed this area. And I actually really love it because i love being around it was sort of like when i when i was in chicago and there'd still be little pockets of really creepy germanness

like like people that like really strongly still were a german identifying and bars that like when you walk in and i look like you know the fucking pillsbury dough boy in a blonde wig and i still get the look i still get the like who are you you know um but i do love and i mean the armenian stuff isn't it i just love being in a culture that's so strong and being held on to so much and it does not belong here like it's one thing to say you know like mexican culture or latinx culture is here and it's a it's a different culture yeah but it belongs here like more so than we do it belongs here you know that culture it all comes from the the spanish conquistadors yes from the 16 1500s yes and this was mexico before it was california yeah and so it's it's like a native american

mexican latin spanish you know right and i i thought you were gonna say i love the armenians because i'm a big fan of lamb uh That too, honestly, no problem. Except I've always, and I've always heard that like, it's what's good about Armenian food is what the Lebanese gave them. Like I heard someone, a Lebanese person say this once. Well, of course, a Lebanese person would say that. It's, you know, it was great when the Turks were marching the Armenians across Syria when they added, I don't know, Moroccan spices into the. Thanks so much for that. That is hilarious. Let me get some of this cumin.

You know, I have to say that I'm from outside of Milwaukee and Milwaukee is so German and so Polish. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That it has that sort of vibe to it, too, where you walk into a bar and you're like, it'll just be it'll be literally like when I was a kid, it was and I was in the bars. But no, when I was a kid and they would tell. It's Milwaukee, we understand. I was weaned on Pabst and Hobos. Yeah, the daycare is different there.

It's but they would literally the the polish guys would be sitting around telling each other polish jokes and if you were like well that seems kind of mean to the polish they would all get mad at you yeah and you're like dude seriously you're not helping your own cause here right right right yeah the the prevalence i always i always wondered if it was a regionalism of the prevalence of Polish jokes from when, from my youth to where they don't even seem to be like, I feel like there were Polish jokes in Reader's Digest when I was a kid, you know what I mean? Like where it was just so commonplace and now they don't seem to exist. And it's always borne out like, it also too like oh the whole root of polish jokes and and that they're you know not mentally capable is largely due to the fact that their intellectuals were slaughtered

right what a funny joke hilarious right and and i remember the justification i think was the they talked about the cavalry trying to fight the nazi blitzkrieg yeah with uh the polish cavalry against the tanks of the nazis and i was just like yeah that's not funny that means that a bunch of dudes and a bunch of horses all were murdered yeah and also two who were like cavalry wise one time at one point, one of the world's best. Right. One of the greatest. And I'm like, sorry, they weren't, you know, they didn't industrialize to become a war machine. Shame on them.

They were busy drawing trees. Happy trees. Yeah, Polish was the other one in Chicago where there were it was it was absolutely striking that people along Milwaukee Avenue had lived in this country for 20 years and could not speak a word of English and had a completely full life with work and church and community. Family and community. You don't need English. You don't need English. I'm going to the grocery store in Polish. Yeah, yeah. Yes.

So good for them. I had one of my, I worked in production while I was at film school. I started working in production in Chicago on television commercials. And we were shooting a commercial with Mike Ditka. And we had a production manager who was kind of a brown noser and overheard Ditka saying to his manager or whatever. Oh, there's this restaurant Staropolska. Is that around here? I'd like to try to see if we can go to that place. I always heard it was good. So he comes to me and says, listen, I overheard didka say something about this restaurant maybe you can go find it i look in the phone book because there's no computer i look in the phone

book i see an address i go to drive out to milwaukee avenue and this point i don't really know the city that well i grew up in you know yorkville okay 60 miles west yeah and i'm asking people on the street do you know where star repulska restaurant is and it's just one person after the other of no english no english no english and i finally found it just like by because i walked and there's a little tiny sign star repulska like oh okay and i i ate there many times after because it was fantastic um but i so i get i use a i use a pay phone because again no cell phones right get on a pay phone call back and say and it took me a while I was like because I didn't know exactly where it was yeah I found it it's right here uh do you want me to get something to go and he goes no no we're

almost done with lunch back here and I was just like it was one of many of those kind of errands but yeah but I got a good Polish restaurant out of it. You know what I mean? True. Went back many, many times. It was fantastic. I was just on Milwaukee. I don't know Chicago very well.

I was raised. It is amazing. I just went to Chicago last weekend just to work with Maria Bamford, right? Yeah. And we were on Milwaukee Avenue at the Den Theater. And I'm going to be back there again with Laurie Kilmartin and April at the Lincoln Lodge. They're both on Milwaukee Avenue. Buy your tickets now.

Get them now. They're not for sale. I don't know if you can. It's a one's over. Yeah. But the thing is, I was raised literally to hate Chicago. Yeah. And it was such a weird thing.

Like I had such a good time in Chicago for the first time because previously I had only worked the club there, right? The downtown club and the Rosemont club. And it's a club that has been there for, I don't know, 50 years maybe. Yeah. And they've never cleaned the place, right? 50 years maybe yeah and they've never cleaned the place right and the and the and the staff is infuriated and there's like the vibe is that you know people were raped in corners yeah and so i was like no wonder i hated chicago i need to work other places yeah i went on the architecture tour on the boat.

I went to a writer's museum. I went to. It's a beautiful city. It's a beautiful city. Yeah. The people were nice. It was a delight. Probably, though, that colloquial thing of like Milwaukee is safe and manageable and Chicago is big and scary, you know? Right, right.

And Chicago is so psyched about itself because it's a cool city yeah and milwaukee is like well we're a cool city and you're like no no you're a large small town and it's one of those one-sided rivalries too i'm sure right it's it's like the people in san francisco all mad at los angeles and the people in los angeles going really yeah i like listen i like san franc. Why are you bad? Yeah. It's a beautiful place to live. It's, you know.

You've chosen wisely. It is a delight. Good on you. You should be happy. Yeah. When I moved to Minnesota to do stand-up, one of the most confusing things because I was from. It was a wise move. It was. It was a wise move.

I love it. No, I know. I'm kidding. It's just like when I moved to Minnesota to get into show business. Oh, completely. Actually, I started doing stand-up in Madison, Wisconsin, and all of the other comics I started with moved to Chicago. And I was like, I'm going to move to where they're not.

Yeah, yeah. It wasn't that I didn't. It wasn't that they were horrible. It was just I was sick of hanging out with them. I bet. Also, it's easier to steal their jokes that way didn't, it wasn't that they were horrible. It was just, I was sick of hanging out with them. I bet. Also, it's easier to steal their jokes that way. Oh, so good. Oh my God, Eric Alver wore pajamas.

On stage, it was his hook. No, okay, let's get into the biographical stuff. How many kids in your family? Six. Six? Wow, wow, wee, wow. That's a lot of kids. And where do you fall?

I'm the youngest. My mother. Yeah, my mother is a very, very Irish Catholic and just kept pumping them out. And then I was born and then she died and I didn't kill her. Oh, wow. Yeah. So, but I picture her, Andy Richter, in a heaven that has no children. That is her idea of heaven.

There's not a 10-year-old. There's not an 8-year-old, a 6-year-old, a 4-year-old, a 2-year-old, or a baby. Everyone wipes their own whatever it is. Yeah. Everybody, she gets to be 16. She gets to be 25. She gets to be 30. How old was be 25. She gets to be 30. How old was she when she passed?

33, the age of Christ. Oh, my gosh. Wow. Coincidence? Yes. Yeah, and John Belushi and Chris Farley. That's right. That's right.

And I think also like Jimi Hendrix. There's like a bunch of 33s. Yeah. Maybe even Jim Morrison. Something about that age. If I were a numerologist i would care it's um but it's i mean she is uh yeah so i mean she passed away and um it was terrible actually it was a drug driving accident and oh my gosh my parents were separated i had seven i was just turning eight yeah yeah and she was 33 just turning 34 and um she had

fucking six kids by 30 goddamn three yeah bananas yeah i can't even oh my god right i can't even imagine like right you're just your egg is just kind of getting cooked at 33 you know what i mean when i was 33 i literally had like a uh this sounds uh hippie skippy and it was uh i had like a like an epiphany year right where i was just like am i gonna go the way of my mother right am i gonna grow up am i gonna because i didn't have children what i did was i had my essentially my mother's uh youth right like i got to party i got to do stand-up comedy i got to go around and just have a good time and travel and live for yourself yeah i live for myself and when i was 33 i was like well this is where she died do i you know and i didn't it wasn't conscious i only realized after that year that

i was like well this is the year it was a big year of change for me yeah so um yeah but i have four older brothers and an older sister and one of my favorite stories is that my sister when she was born because it was four boys than my sister and my dad's mom my armenian grandmother said it one time to my sister when she was like eight or ten. It was so great when you were born because I was like, oh, finally a girl, someone to take care of the boys. And my sister goes, you're thinking of someone else. Oh, boy. Man, they really did good internalized misogyny back then right it was just baked

right into the cake they really yeah from the get-go from the get and yeah it was uh but everybody's uh it's so funny because we were because my mother was literally such a child right yeah having a baby having babies and my dad was a baby not not like his his whole thing like 50s dad right yeah where he was she was 16 17 he was 18 19 right when they got married yeah and um and he joined the navy and he would just give her his money every week because that's what his dad did with his grandmother was he stationed somewhere else or were they living together when he was they were living together oh okay yeah and um but he would literally like you raise the kids here's my check i gotta go

and i put aside ten dollars for beer and right right horse races or oh my god he would literally he my father's an aluminum siding salesman right and so he sold awnings and stuff there were if you ever go around and see these awnings that have little spears on them where the spear is broken off on one of them they're called they were a they were a brand called kenron and my dad would always talk about how he kept just a just a box of those spears in his trunk. Yeah. And he would drive around if he was broke and look for broken spears and walk up to the house and literally just one-off sell them for lunch money. Wow. Yeah. He was-

Because he gave all the money to your mom. Right. Who, by the way, had no financial, all all the money to your mom right who by the way had no financial she didn't have any financial skills of course not right she was a child so she would essentially um she would send our laundry out because six kids right yeah yeah and when she ran out of money she would just throw our clothes into the closet and there's several pictures of me where I look like I'm in like a pillowcase and a pair of tights. And then when she got the next check, she wouldn't pull the clothes out and send them off to be clean. She would literally buy us new clothes.

Wow. And so when she died, there was a closet full of this is horrible but rotting clothes wow yeah yeah so she didn't know what the hell she was doing and my dad just kept giving her money and she was like okay and that is such a a kid's way to deal with something very much in there and it doesn't exist it's gone gone. It's gone. Yep. Yep. Yep. And so, yeah. And so she didn't, and my, and it was so funny because my, and when I say funny, I mean,

tragic, hilarious. But so my oldest brother was 14 when my parents separated and I was four. And what my younger brother one time said this, he he may regret this but it's very funny because he said you know there was a fact there was a leadership vacuum when dad left that Terry should have stepped in and taken over that leadership vacuum and your older my oldest brother yeah yeah and my brother Russ who was eight at the time, said, Terry should have. There was a leadership vacuum. And I said, he did take advantage of that leadership vacuum. He got laid and started doing drugs and had the time of his life.

He never had to be home. Right, right. Light. Yeah. He's a perfect 50s dad. Right. He was a 14-year-old boy who was like what okay i'm gonna i'm gonna sell drugs and get laid and gonna hang out with my 12 year old brother and you know wow

and uh it was so funny because they both sold drugs and they refused to sell me drugs because i was their little sister wow but they would sell it to other you know 12 year old right of course yeah of course sure and by drugs is this just like shitty weed yeah yeah just shitty weed and i think some and maybe um acid and stuff yeah yeah yeah because it was the 70s i'm 100 years old no i'm it's the same i mean it was the same thing like the notion of like cocaine being around or heroin. It was just weed and mushrooms and acid occasionally. My brother, Phil, hilariously one time told me, said that his biggest dream when he was about 14 or 15 was that he wanted to be a drug dealer of renown in South Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Aim high, bro.

Exactly. And it's so funny because they all thought about joining the service as well when they turned 18 yeah and my father to a person like he told i never thought about it but they told all he told all my brothers and my sister he's like you could just leave town you know you don't have to you don't have to enlist you can go find a shitty job shoveling sand for 250 an hour just anywhere in the world in walkie in illinois yeah oh my god i i don't know why but it's anecdotal day here andy okay because this is fun christmas i'm 19 i'm home from college uh because uh my brother russ and

my sister darla were like you're going to college and we were the first three to go to college okay and so and where'd you go i I went to Madison, University of Wisconsin. But I'm home for college. For some reason, I'm the only one at the house. My dad comes home Christmas Eve. My stepmother is working Christmas Eve. She's a hairdresser. And my father remarried, by the way, right away because he had six children to take care of. But my stepmother's working Christmas Eve. My dad comes home in the middle of the day and I was like, Hey dad, do you want to go get a cup of coffee or something? And he goes, I'm going to the track. You want to come to the track with me? And I said,

is that going to be our father daughter moment? He's like, I'm going to the track. You are welcome to come with me. And so he's got a good point, you know? Right. So we get in the car. I think we're going to the track, Andy Richter. We are not. We're going to an off-track betting place in Waukegan, Illinois. The saddest concrete bunker. Yeah, like the DMV, but sadder. No windows. The saddest 50-year-old dudes I've ever seen in my life, all just smoking and Christmas Eve.

And we're sitting there. I lose $20 on horses that I don't know what I'm doing. And you can't even drink there either. I could. Oh, no, I could not because it was 21. Oh, I didn't know if there was a bar there or not because I was thinking maybe it was one of those ones that's just purely like windows where you bet and nothing else. There's no. No, there was a bar.

I wasn't actually. I went for the coffee. My dad had coffee. I had coffee. We had a cup of coffee together. So I believe there wasn't a bar. Right, right, right. But every time I drank in front of my dad when I was 18 to 22,

he would be like, beer, huh? Classy. And I was like, what happened? What did you do? Where are we? Look around. It's fucking Wisconsin. Am I supposed to have an old fashioned, which is what my stepmother used to drink?

Yeah. Yeah. A mimosa. A mimosa. yeah yeah a mimosa can't you tell my loves are growing well now speaking of stepmother i mean did you bond with your stepmother i mean did you did the sort of the loss of a mother figure how did that she tried so hard yeah she literally nancy cation was both i i would put her up against anybody's biological mother for crazy and for trying that is a fucking i'd buy 10 episodes of that

crazy and trying oh my god she tried so hard completely unappreciated but uh except for my grandmother she was like she's and she saved your lives she literally she was i used to joke about how she was a great loss to the austrian army uh because she was 26 when my father married her my dad was 35 wow um My oldest brother was 17. And so my oldest brother fucked off right away and went into, you know, looking drugs and and then eventually he moved out and didn't stay. because he was such a mess for the last six months of his childhood. And then he never came back. And he ended up finding Jesus and for the last 40 years has followed the meanest Jesus I've ever met in my life, Andy. As I said to Terry – What's Wisconsin Jesus? I was like, hey, Terry, could you write a children's book called The Meanest Jesus? Because that's your Jesus, my friend.

Angry and trying to stop everybody from having fun. So mad. So mad. And he, Arizona started his own church anyway. Wow. Yeah, yeah. But he is hilarious. But Nancy literally charts, graphs, French corners

on the beds. It was like we all you had to be home by 5, 5.30. She would make us breakfast. Monday and Wednesday were egg days. Tuesday and Thursday were pancake days. Thursday had fruit in the pancakes.

She was the worst cook in the world. She hated it. So the pancakes were wet. And I hated pancakes until I went to an actual diner one time and had pancakes when I was like 25. I was like, no, pancakes are gross. She would overcook the Monday pancakes and undercook the Wednesday pancakes. Or Tuesday, Thursday. And Friday, she had cereal because she had to go to work. She worked like a 60-hour week. My dad, there's a horrible, hilarious joke I used to do on one

of my old albums about how she was having dinner with my dad. And my dad had an affair with my stepmother for nine years. And you know what my dad had to say about it? While he was married to your mom? While he was married to my stepmom. He had an affair for nine years. And when confronted, he had this to say, not nine years in a row. And you're like, that's funny. You're still a dick.

Right, right, right. No, wait, he was having an affair against your stepmother with just some other woman. Yeah. This woman, what the hell was her name? Because married her because here's what happened so i go to college i'm the youngest right yeah so they my stepmother takes my grandmother my dad's mom and his mom uh wait his mom and her mom they all four of them live together and for like two years three years where she takes care of them until they die and my dad's screwing around and he's doing he's being his best self and so uh wow talk about

having to come to peace with your parents right yeah yeah because i just have the one dad right yeah so i have to find i don't have to find things to like about him but i have to find things to love about him yeah yeah and he's 84 and he are they still married oh no they got divorced and still live together like lesbians for probably a decade or 12 years until finally uh nancy figured out my stepmother figured out how to get him and uh so he calls me one day i'm talking to him he's like you know she's going out with uh bob bob ww bob she's dating ww bob and i was like who's ww bob dad he's like he's a window washer guy i've been playing cards with for 30 years i can't play cards with him anymore and i said oh good for her nice one and then we find out that bob owns a window washing company he's not a window washer and he's a 70 year old man so

everybody's 70 and 60 by this time right yeah and um and so finally my dad moves out and nancy moves in with bob and nancy nancy passed away probably 10 years ago now and um and my dad continues to live just like and will live to be a hundred yeah so did you did you continue i mean did you were you close to to nancy is nancy right yeah were you close to her throughout her life and even after your folks after they split you still yeah i was the only one who still really talked to her but all my siblings would be like how's nancy doing and i was like you have her phone number yeah call her but and she was she was so funny because she used to tell us when we were kids that she never wanted kids.

Yeah. And then she would say, but it's happening now. So we don't, now we will all, you will learn to do your homework. You will clean things. And then eventually we will love each other and no one will know why. Yeah. So I swear to God, I get my sense of humor from Nancy Cation. But I get my timing from Elliot Cation from my dad.

Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's always amazing to me when you think about the strides in mental health that are just sort of societal and how you don't really, I mean, it's still crazy stuff still happens, but just not like in our family

we there i had a relative who was married for ever and yet his secretary was his mistress and everybody knew and he sometimes got drunk at family gatherings and would sing songs about his mistress, like, like little improvised parody songs. And, you know, and this is like Christmas gatherings and, you know, cousins standing around just, and it's just so, it's not, it's so not that uncommon that there was this kind of madness. And then the way people get enmeshed to where they get a divorce and live together for 12 years. Right, right. That's crazy. It's just like if they had just spent $12 on therapy, they would have probably been like, this is no way to live.

Civilization. This is not right. Civilization moves so slowly yeah but you look you can the fact that uh i think it moves quicker because of television and because of the internet yeah that information just spread of information yeah right has has has sped up the civilization process uh exponentially i think like uh women's rights and then racial equality and just gay rights are a huge one thinking about how soon how long ago how not very long ago it was that uh how far people couldn't get married yeah now how far we've come from will and grace

yes and it's just like will and grace you look back at it and you're like, this is dumb and vaguely offensive occasionally. But for the most part, it was just making everyone used to it. I watched The Birdcage with my daughter the other day. And holy shit, is that like an insulting, the son comes home and says, dad and dad, hide your identities. You know, I love you, but you should be ashamed of your core selves. Right. And right. The love that you have for each other isn't OK.

Yeah. So, yeah. Yeah. My husband was raised by lesbians, actually. Oh, really? Like ground floor. Been together since he was 12. Wow.

And he tells a story about how his stepmom had two kids and his mom had a kid. And the three kids all lived together. And about a year into it, their moms told them that they were gay. And they said, yes, we knew. We sort of figured. You just have the one room. Anyway. That's not roommates and but it was but i do i was talking about civilization uh being sped up and i i interrupted you well and and and like sexuality and gender right you know like all of the all of my friends

kids who were 13 to 20 are all they thems. Right. Yeah. And they're all they're like, well, am I transgender? And and I and I'm, you know, Aunt Jackie over here. Grammar education is like what you're doing is you just want to be treated as you. And then also trying to be an adult. Right.

Yeah. And so I love they them it's uh it's it's a new bit that i'm it's on my new album you guys get to it but the uh so but the thing is not not yet wait till the end wait till the end and so but the the the idea of of they them is such a great idea and i get it like i and there this is this is something i haven't been able to work in yet but um one of my friends her 11 year old daughter came to her and was all sad and was crying about how she doesn't know what her sexuality is and my friend was like thank thank God you're 11. Please don't have any sexuality.

And when you do, let it be when you're 18, and then you don't tell me about it. So how about that? But it's this whole thing of like, you know how you can't cure someone of homosexuality or heterosexuality? Yeah. You will know what your sexuality is when you get the peter tingles man you whatever that happens and if it never happens then you are asexual or whatever

you'll figure out what your sexuality is as you but all all the kids in the world that are in my life are just like i just want to be me i just you know and that's what i love about a day then because everybody really just wants a cup of coffee and a job or an apartment and for you to get the hell out of the way on the highway. And to be looked at for their actual self, not as whatever sort of layover you put on them. Right. Well, everyone's a stock of meat with a brain on top and we all have different sausage casings. Right. That's the analogy. Right. That I'm working with and on with the bit. Very Wisconsin.

Very Wisconsin. Please do not use the sausage analogy for cannibalism. But we all meet the sausage casing. Yeah. We all go, oh, I wouldn't sleep with that sausage casing. I will only sleep with that sausage casing. I hate that kind of sausage. And you're just like, no, meet the stalk of meat with a brain on top who just wants a cup of coffee or a job or you to get out of the way.

And then when it comes time to think about sexuality, because that's all gender. That's how you want to be treated, right? Yeah. Yeah. And I want because when I was a little girl and I was this is this is an actual I weren't. Well, we're on a podcast. Fuck it. So here's the thing

when i was a little girl i because i i nobody says they them more than me i dress like the men that i'm attracted to right so when i was a little girl i didn't always want to be a little girl sometimes i wanted to be a little boy and sometimes i wanted to be an adult woman. And for two solid years, I wanted to be fucking Snoopy. And that's gender, right? I wanted to be Huckleberry Finn, Annette Bening, and Snoopy. And that's how I wanted to be treated, right? You're an adventure kid. You're an adult woman who's very put together.

And you're Snoopy who gets to be. And you're id. You're pure id. Right. Right. Yeah. So, I mean, you're pure id. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So, I mean, but I love, I love the they, them. It's just going to take a second for us to figure out how to talk to, with, about the syntax.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. No, and I mean, kids already get the hang of it. That's the thing. It's like my daughter's 16, my son's 20. That's not even an issue. They've been. To them, this conversation would be so tedious.

It would be as if we were talking about how to toast bread. It's a shit. My daughter one time, though, it is funny because my son's out This is the will and grace. This is the will and grace of conversations. I'm trying to explain it to old people. Yeah. So your son.

Yeah. And my son, my son is gay and has been gay forever, told us when he was young. And then we like, as you said, we never talked about it again. You know, like we sort of, you know, because it was like, OK, yeah, that's true. He told us we're like, all right. And then he did not you know he made it very clear very clear no you don't get any information from this part of my life cool fine get it absolutely but my daughter my daughter went i think she was maybe 11 and and my ex-wife picked her up from school one day and my my daughter got in the car and she went, well, I guess I'm straight. And then wouldn't say anything more.

That was all she said. Like it was a burden. And it's so funny. Cause it's kind of like, yeah, sorry, honey. Well, it's kind of boring. I'm so sorry. you're the straightest white cis kid that in the world right and also and also too it's like and i mean there's lots of lots of women comedians that make this joke it's like yep and you gotta you gotta be attracted to

men sorry so sad too bad yeah you're to have to put up with men. Sorry. Right. Because and. But that isn't to say who knows what the hell. You know, I mean, I don't mean to. No, no, no. You're she's. And and quite honestly, it's it's all it's also fluid, man.

Yeah. Anyway. And it sounds so weird when people ask when I see people ask a little boy, you know, like there's like a six-year-old boy. I bet he has a lot of girlfriends. Like anyone's still saying that nowadays. It's like, wow. And that's a huge shift, you know? That's a huge shift.

You know what I would like to go away? She's going to break a lot of hearts. She's going to break a lot of hearts. You're like, so you're saying that my niece is going to be an asshole. Please. Yes, yes, yes. She'll be attractive, which uh she'll fuck people over that's how it works that's how it works okay buddy you're not wrong but just still it's a baby she's a good looking kid

please leave her alone this isn't a french cinema the worst the worst the worst person coming up since we're anecdoting uh the worst person the worst coming up to you and saying something about your baby thing we ever had was at like some outdoor restaurant in Malibu. My son was maybe a year old, was a big boy. And this lady came up as we're eating and said, how old's that baby? And we said, a year old. And she said, I knew it. My husband said, that baby's two years old. I said, if that baby's two years old, there is something wrong with him.

Okay. See you later. Yeah. You picking up the check, ma'am? Okay. Thank you. Thank you for planning that in our mind that our baby looks like a. Like it's like a giant. Something like an older baby looks like a like it's like like there's something

like an older baby with something wrong with it great that's what i wanted to hear yeah i don't want any part all right so college stand up yeah stand up do you have any other considerations of what you're going to do with yourself or do you just think a lot of a lot of chaos going on a lot of talk by the way before we get to that does how much of i mean because you're living in chaos that's fucking crazy chaos that you're living in and i imagine it's easy to feel unmoored as a little kid yeah yeah what how does humor play into that for you at that time does it start to become a coping mechanism? Not just for you, but for the group in general? I remember this.

It's going to sound more tragic than it is, but I have very few memories before my mother died. Mostly just me just blocking. And so, and that first year between eight and nine, I was a bit of a handful, but I was trouble. I was trouble. I had, I would literally, I got in so many fights when I was a little kid, when I was about eight. And when Nancy took me over,

I would run out of classrooms and go hide underneath the secretary's bed a desk in the in the because i knew they were going to send me to the principal anyway yeah and so it weirdly enough it morphed into um a lot and nancy cation was super sarcastic very smart very funny but it was in most of her stand her her jokes were uh most of her stand-up was and she was a huge fan of stand-up by the way her yeah when when i started doing stand-up she goes you're not the funny one russ is the funny one i was like russ doesn't get to be everything yeah he doesn't get sorry he doesn't yeah he's also the smart one and then

yeah and the golden child j Tell it to Jesus. Exactly. But Nancy Cation's favorite stand-up comedy, and she really liked it, was Norm MacDonald. Oh, yeah. And when she told me that, I was like, you know, I do stand-up. And she's like, uh-huh, anyway. You should do it more like Norm. Right, right, right. Sure.

Right, right, right. Sure. So, but the, but there was like, so I had a lot of sarcasm when I was probably in, in fifth and sixth. Yeah. I would say through probably fifth grade to ninth grade, I, my only coping mechanism was sarcasm and people thought that I was very funny. I didn't know it at the time. I went to some reunion and people were like, you are so funny in junior high. And I'm like, really?

Okay. And then when I was in ninth grade, I learned what friendship was. And I became, literally a woman, a coach. I tried out for the track team and I read all the time. All I would do is read. And I read while I was trying out for the team. I read as I ran. My sister made me go out for things. She made me join things. My brother Russ and my brother Scott were both, were a student council president and vice president in junior high. My sister was student council president in senior high. And so Russ and Darla were constantly making me do things. They're like, well, you're going to join debate class. You're going to take it.

And my parents were like, you're going to take an instrument. You're going to be in the band. And in junior high, I was like, I'm going to quit band because I don't like the band director. And my sister's like, you're going to stay in band because the senior high band director is amazing. And she was right. And she was like, you're going to go, you're going to learn, you're going to do the speech forensics thing. You're going to be in debate. You're going to be in student council. You're going to run for student

council president. And I was like, please don't make me run for student council president. I'm not going to win. And, um, and my sister's like, well, what do you want to do then? And I was like, I'm going to be the power behind the throne. I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to join the school newspaper. And so I was editor of the school newspaper. And so she was like, that'll do, that'll do, you have to. And, but it was like, there was so much, they were such scammers, my entire family. Why do you think there was that high performing thing among them? I mean, you know, from do you think it was the shock of your mom going with? I think it was afraid of being rudderless.

Well, I think with with Russ, he was Russ and Darla are almost the same person, except for they aren't right. Like, yeah, they were diametrically opposed politically for years until the world went fascist and then my brother who was very conservative was like well that can't be a thing that i am and so he kept moving this you know he was like yeah my brother hasn't voted republican since obama but he still considers himself a Republican. Yeah. And he's like, I can't vote for that chance. And he's like, I want to be conservative, but these people are nuts. Yeah, yeah. And so, yeah, he's sane is what he is. And it's a delight to be around him.

But they are both super overachievers right like yeah and the fact that um and that my father is very much a workaholic and literally speaks in sales talk and and and and numbers and quotas and and and making the sale and closing the deal all the time. Yeah. So it was something that was ingrained. And so you were just like, well, obviously I have to achieve something. Obviously I have to close this deal, whatever. And he didn't care what you did. Right. He was like, I was like, well, I don't know if I want to do that.

And he was like, well, you might as well try because I'm going to make funny either way. Either you're going to be successful and I'm'm gonna call you a big shot or you're not gonna be successful i'm like well that didn't work did it right but in either case uh you should try yeah you should pick which way i'm going to make fun of you right and so like my sister was the only nine-year-old i think i've ever heard of that used to look at the those remember in the in the grocery store there'd be those those newsprint housing yeah uh like classified ads yeah yeah she would get those her hands covered in black newsprint as she would go through when we were she was like nine or ten going i would buy that house and i'm like are you planning on moving and she's like yeah i'm not

living here what are you nuts and uh and like, well, because we shared a room. We all we were stacked like cordwood. There was only like a two bedroom, three bedroom. And she was like, are you going to? I was like, so you're going to move out. And she's like, you can come with me. And I'll need someone to sign the loan with me. Right. She's like, I'm going to need some. with me right she's like i gotta need some and

literally when she was 18 she moved out of the house and she got this job my sister's gay and we found out that she was gay when she was appointed to the gay rights um when she was 19 she was on the gay rights committee for the state of wisconsin oh really yeah she was probably just an intern or something like that but she was in one of the it was a listing right yeah yeah and uh she made me she volunteered me to stuff envelopes for john anderson in 1980 and she's like take two buses to downtown at 10 o'clock at night we're stuffing envelopes we're making calls and i'm like okay. She does it to her. Liberal Republican, sounds good. She does it to her children to this day. She's like, you got to learn how to do a

mailing. And they're like 11 and 14. Yeah. Well, you know what? God bless her though for like, you know, pushing you. Cause I do think, I mean, I do feel like I don't like pushing my kids, but I do feel like I wish I had pushed them more. Just, you know, you're lost in that sort of. You don't know what to do. You're lost in that sort of thing of like, well, do I respect their wishes or do I ignore their wishes? And it's where the border of those two things what's the correct procedure it overlaps a lot and it can be very sort of messy so it's like yeah all right you don't want to play little league but uh you really should go to computer camp or what you know whatever right

do you have any tiny like my brother russ kids, if they had any tiny interest in anything, he would like, oh, you're going to baseball camp. And, oh, I'm going to hire this guy to teach you how to pitch. They are not athletic, my nephews. So stand up. When do you start to think this is what you're going to do with yourself i literally did never we never watched it when i was a kid yeah i never saw it nancy would occasionally when i was in high school she would occasionally go out with friends to go watch stand-up and i was like what is it and uh because she genuinely liked it and um there's a guy who still does stand-up who met

my stepmother when he when i was in high school he's slightly older than me right yeah probably five ten years older than me maybe and um i go to college and at college i don't know why i'm going to college i'm just going right so i take all these classes my brother russ picks all of my my classes first semester he picks he's like well you you have to do this. I did this wrong. We're going to do this. I got a five credit C in science because he picked me a lab. And I took fifth semester Latin because he's like, you'll get retro credits. And I told my Latin teacher in high school and she was like, she almost burst into tears. She's like, you're not good at Latin, Jackie. And I got a C in that, too.

I had to take French eventually. Now, but you stand up for yourself in any way and say, I don't want to do this before he makes you take these classes. Or was that just not the dynamic at that point? It did not. No, that was that is an excellent question because I never did. Yeah. Yeah. You just were used to it. I was just used to it and I was like, okay. He found me. I stayed in a women's co-op.

He found me my housing. Darla was like, you have to fill out all of the grants and loans. And she had filled out all of the grants and loans by herself. And Russ and Darla helped me fill them out and she actually had to go to my dad because my dad was still claiming her on his taxes and she was like you have to refile dad because i'm not getting the loans and grants i need and he's like well why don't i just give you money and he's's like, and she goes, no, I will turn you into the IRS. And so he refiled. And then he claimed me and Darla was like, tell him to refile. And I was like, I don't know if I can do that. And Russ was like, just make him give you money. And so, which is what Russ did.

Yeah. And so my dad just gave me money one year, one year. And then the next year he did not claim me. So, uh, cause he got caught. My father's excellent once he gets caught. And, um, the, uh, but the, the, I, I, the first year I go to college, I just go and I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing. Second year, there's a comedy club that opens in Madison, Wisconsin, uh, owned by Sam Kinison's brother bill kinnison okay and so uh it's in the basement of essentially a coke front um on state street pool hall and just it's 1984 right yeah yeah and so i my friends from the from the dorm are like the co-op are like our let's go see some stand-up.

We sit in the second row. Sam Kinison's on stage. I don't know how to be out in public. I have friends at this point. And he's a big deal at this point, right? Right before Letterman. Wow. Right before he blew the hell up.

But he was a big deal. He was a cult favorite. Yeah, people knew who he was though yeah right and so i heckled sam kinnison uh because i was drunk did what an asshole this is it is an indictment every time i'm heckled i'm just like jk it is and so he can't shut me up there's absolutely nothing worse than a woman heckler, even if you're a woman comic, even if it's me. Because for some reason, the audience is on the side of the woman heckler. Good to know.

Good to know. And so eventually the manager has to come over to me and tell me to shut up. And in the course of that, he says, open mic is on Sunday. Shut up. And so three weeks later, I go says open mic is on sunday shut up and so three weeks later i go to open mic wow and i i swear to god i've never done heroin but i it it it's got to be exactly what heroin feels like wow that first time and you did well that first time i did stand up every day wow for eight months until the club burned down thank Thank God I was insured, Andy.

So every day. I got a 1.8 that semester. Wow. Yeah. So what do you do with that? Do you say, fuck this college shit? Yeah, I try to. And my sister goes, yeah, no.

You have to graduate. Right. She's like, it's just three more years and i was like and then the 19 year old yeah yeah you know just three more years just three more years yeah just almost a quarter of your life and so i stuck it out and i did i did the uh essentially there were open mics because there was no, then there was no club. Two years later, there was a club that started that it was a, it was like a funny bone or something. And that guy didn't know that I did stand up for the eight months before that.

And his name is Victor. And I think I ran into him the last time I was in Madison because now there's an amazing club, weirdly enough, owned by the guy who owned that building that Sam Kinison's brother's club was in.ison because now there's an amazing club weirdly enough owned by the guy who owned that building that that sam kinnison's brother's club was in and whatever so by the end of the fire had enough to keep going yeah he got uh he owns most of state street at this point and the guy that owns comedy on state yeah he's great yeah he's actually a really good guy and um but the so i graduate from college i decide i i decide to do like one of those europe things for six months i do it poorly i go i go to to england i get a dumb job i do stand up once twice in england in london at an open mic um and then i move to minneapolis and i start over in 1990.

Right. Because when you move to a new town in standup, you have to reinvent the wheel a little bit. You're lucky if you're funny because then the wheel is greased a little faster. Right. Sure. But you can't have a lot of ego with it because you're like,

well, I was a big deal in Madison, Wisconsin, and now I'm in Minneapolis. And they're like, nobody knows who you are. And then when I moved minneapolis to la i had to reinvent the wheel again same thing yeah and they're like but i did it you know i've been doing it for a long time and you know nobody gives yeah yeah yeah well yeah because i mean well but when you think about it

it's like i always think whenever in my career, I've been shooting something, working on something as an actor and I have a note, you know, like, and I, and I'm very sparing with them when I'm an actor. I know the protocol, you know, like if I'm a producer or writer on something, I'll pipe up. But if I'm just visiting, or if I'm just there to say the words, I keep it to myself most of the time. There are times when it does, something comes through and I think this is going to affect the whatever, or it's affecting my ability to do my thing. So I'll have this note. And sometimes then, I mean, I have a authority figure thing anyway, but like when people, I mean, I have a authority figure thing anyway, but like when people like the worst thing is when they kind of placate me or humor me or pat me on the head for having an idea.

It makes me fucking furious. Right. But because you look like such a you look like such a nice guy, like you look like the support guy. And you're just like, yeah, but the brain inside of me is actually a leader. Well, thank you. And also, too, it's like I've been doing this a while. Like I kind of know the way things work. So you can trust me. I know like I have a better ending for this bit or whatever. right now and uh but then i think like yeah but if i were that guy and some actor that i didn't know very well uh had a note for me like say it was just like just picking someone off the top of my head like mandy patinkin came in with like a comedy note for me i would be like uh why are you talking to me like inside i'd be

like mandy patinkin i i think i got this yeah i don't need your input this is the one thing yeah and i'm just picking him as a for instance you know i mean he's a wonderfully talented actor but in my area of like hey i got a note for how this could be funnier you know there's very few people that i'll that can come up and that I'll, I mean, I'll be the exact same to all of them, but my interior monologue will be very different from person to person. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. It's the, anybody, you know, the basic rule in standup is if you have a tag or you want to punch up somebody, you can offer it, if you have a tag or you want to punch up somebody you can you can offer it if you can do it well do you hear that train in the background by the way i do i love the sound of trains that's all right no okay good and uh but the um but the the way you do it is important you say like i think the first god dang it I always forget his name, who is an amazing comic. He always played like the principal in Disney movies.

Oh, Larry. Yes. Larry Miller. Larry Miller. Yeah. Yes. So the first time I see. The, like you open officious prick, you know, the dictionary to officious prick.

And there he is because it just he plays it so perfectly you know perfect and so i i emceed for him in 92 right and so i wrote a tag to one of his jokes that was literally when i look back on it it was a joke it didn't have it was topical right yeah yeah so it didn't have any length to it but uh but i had been taught topical right yeah yeah so it didn't have any length to it but uh but i had been taught how to sort of offer a tag or a punch up of somebody else's work right which is hands up show me your hands show me your hands you're not you're not armed and i was like i have a tag if you want to your um and it was uh the navy had opened a new base in a landlocked state. Yeah. And my tag was hell of a portage.

Yeah. Which in Minnesota, everybody portages. Everybody knows it's a weird canoeing joke. Sure, sure. Right. And so I was like, I have a tag. Obviously, take it or leave it. And so whenever I do tag anything, I'm just like, I have an idea, a tag or an angle.

What you want with it, obviously. Because sometimes people will want to tag stuff that's so done. That joke is on an album. I can't. Please don't make me think about that joke anymore. We don't need to rewrite that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, speaking of albums, how many albums do you have now?

yeah yeah yeah well speaking albums how many albums do you have now um i have four and the new one is coming out november 16th okay uh and um also a video also a special you know fancy 4k and it'll all be on 800 pound gorilla yeah couldn't afford the fifth k couldn't afford the fifth k it was 5G, though. Wait, you said something, Gorilla? Is that the name? Yeah, 800 Pound Gorilla is the album, is the label. And it is, and we're going to use, they're going to have the video on their website. And if somebody eventually wants to buy it and put it on whatever, they can do that.

Okay. Because I don't know. The business side of it is not my strong suit. I'm okay at it. I'm better at it than some people. Worse at it than other people. Yeah, yeah. But you know what?

You get what you get. And I'm pretty psyched about the album because it's been five years since I've had another album because two years we had pandemic yeah yeah and so i had to work on the album on zoom shows and it was good i mean it was all right but then i had to i spent 10 weeks reworking the timing for live audiences sure sure and then we shot it and film and recorded it in acme it's's called Staycation. Okay. Get it? Huh? I get it. That's a vacation, but you don't go nowheres. Right. And here's

the good news about the name of that is people are going to know how to pronounce my fucking name. Yeah. Because people like to ethnic it up. They like to cash in it. They like to cash in cash in. Cashinian. Cashinian. Cashinianianianian. They like to put extra syllables.

Yeah. Well, what's next for you? Where are you going now? I mean, do you have any plans to take over the world? I have dreams. What are your dreams? What are your dreams? I got dreams.

They involve me learning how to do voiceover stuff because I got to do a little bit of that during the lockdown. And it was super fun. It's really fun. Yeah, it is. is and uh you know I'm wearing sweatpants yeah so uh good times I you know the podcasts are super fun then um and I like the dork forest a lot and I like the Jackie Laurie show is is always a hilarious it's a very funny show yeah laurie kilmartin nobody nobody riffs nobody riffs like yeah she shuts you down you you guys it's also i always love things when and i think this is what people like about me and conan they like watching a relationship it's not just you know like like david leiterman and paul schaefer like yeah there's a relationship but it's not really a relationship that's on display the last

six years you have watched laurie kilmartin and i or listened to laurie kilmartin and i actually become friends yeah and yeah and the way that you complement each other you know like you know there were different comics yeah and that that was the one of the reasons you wanted to start it because a lot of people think that women comics are all the same you know yeah that and um and it's unfunny that's what you mean right the same but not good yeah not funny how about that how about that yeah it's brutal but but her stand-up is so much different than my stand-up and uh and they're both you know excellent works of the genre yeah and um and so she has a new album out too called corset that is super dark she's uh it's called course did you know that i didn't even know this it's called that because she was being squeezed to death by her mother and her

son oh yeah yeah she's become like the death comic the dead relative comic right right nobody writes a good dark joke like her except for bamford maria's mom died too and uh maria's dead mom jokes are very very the one of my favorite ones is something about how her mom was talking about how she lost weight in the last two years of hospice. And she's finally under her Weight Watchers goal. And Maria makes some crack about how coffins will all eventually fit. And her mom goes, that's not a good one, honey. Well, let's run it by the crowd.

well let's let's run it by the crowd so there's i mean there's there's a there's a personalness to everybody's stand-up comedy that makes it just a delight that's what i love about stand-up you know yeah yeah it i mean do you think is it kind of just steady as she goes like at this point or is there like a script you're dying to do or you know well i mean i i have always liked the idea of some sort of you know sort of like a dramedy about my dad and my stepmother because i thought that that would be you know when everybody remember the year that there were sitcoms where everyone was moving in with, there was an odd couple-y kind of sitch? Where people would move in with their weird, I always wanted to move in with my weird parents. Yeah, yeah.

The other, you know, like I have so many, I mean, I have plenty of ideas. You know, I had like a Bosom bosom buddies meets um the hell was it it was it was oh it was like a latin version of it where two um two uh young mexican women have to dress like men so they can live at the y yeah because of the housing problem in la yeah yeah so then they worked at like a closed captioning company it was was all very, it's all very, yeah. And then I always wanted to do a movie with like Wanda Sykes or somebody else where I was, it was like an action movie where we both worked at Target. Yeah. And then we home alone-ed it and like fought the good fight against the bad guys with like Nerf guns.

Right, right. In Target after hours. And at some point I would get to cock a nerf gun and go, you're a hard target. And then there would be a love interest with like the pharmacy guy. I think actually Lori would be really good in that. Yeah. So I have, you know, I have ideas and stuff like that.

But I want to do, you know, stand up is something I'll always do. Yeah. Voice over stuff and video games. And I want to write novels. Actually, I want to have written a novel, Andy Richter. Writing a novel, quite hard, quite difficult. Right, yes. Brian Kiley has written a novel.

Yes. It's looked like a lot of work. It does. Brian Kiley has written a novel. Yes. It's looked like a lot of work. It does. And so. Also, it takes a lot of attention, like focused attention in one place for an extended period of time. And that has never been my strong suit. Right. So, I mean, there's I want to do all the things, you know, but I know who doesn't want, you know, like Kumail, where like a team came in and made him hot.

Right, right. Feel free to come in and make me hot. I kind of, I have kind of given up hope on that one. I'm kind of like, I think I'm turning 55 in a couple of days. Yeah, probably that. Happy birthday. That ship has sailed. Thank you.

But yeah, you know, you never know. They might need i don't know like there might be you know they might need a new brian dennehy uh you know my my brother russ who watches it and listens uh he was just like i love andy richter he's like he's somewhere between tom hanks and jack black mean, he could do any of those gigs. Oh, that's nice. And I was like, that's a great casting suggestion. Is he interested in getting publicist work?

Because I could use a publicist. Well, what do you, what does a Jackie Kayshun know now that she really values? And, you know, as opposed to the young jk coming out of milwaukee coming out of milwaukee it's i actually i know the value of of other people yeah more than i do the you know the the the definition like i've never i've never been one of those comics who's been able to define success. And I think I can now, you know, because there's no end game. And I think that that's because I come from salespeople, right? Yeah. With salespeople, you don't stop selling ever.

Just churn and burn, yeah. You're always just looking for the good leads yeah and if you get the good leads then you'll sell and you'll make some money and you'll get to go and play blackjack or you know ride a horse or go to the go to walk egan to the right you get you know the otb right you get to you get to take a kid to a zoo. I don't know, but you buy a bike. But my version of success is very different. And I still want to do all the things that anyone would let me do. Yeah. But I know that I've already achieved.

Like, my life is amazing. I live indoors. My husband is a decent human being who I learn from continually. Though sometimes I have to remember what I liked about it because I take advantage, I take for granted the things that when we first got together

that made me want to hang out with him. Now I take all of those things for granted. I'm like, well, he should be smart. He should be nice. He should be funny. He should keep me entertained all the time. What what's he done for me lately yeah yeah calm down how about those three things are great and we just keep going with that and then you don't want new coke stick with the old coke right and i get to do stand-up and i would like to do you know i would love to get into the fancier level of that but uh i also know that the way that i get to like i get to open for maria and when you open for maria bamford you get to

write with maria bamford which makes my stand-up better yeah yeah and we're friends so we also get to hang out and so you're not driven mad by some feature who is mad that he's not headlining right and then i then i get to feature for brian regan and i get to be i get to watch brian regan and i get to see be reminded what silly smart comedy looks yeah yeah and be inspired by that so that's what i that's what i've learned i've learned like the difference like the i've learned to define success when i never knew what it was right you think that's what I've learned. I've learned like the difference, like the, I've learned to define success when I never knew what it was. Right. You think that's just from like the chaos of your childhood thinking like

you're on your own, although you weren't really, you had all that sibling support, you know, which probably felt more less like support and more like being raised as an agricultural product. Right. I will say this.

It was support. We were raised to literally, it was like, you had to, it was, there were like sayings and stuff that were dumb. Where you're just like, you have to, we're family, you have to support each other first. And you're just like, I don't have to support you if you hit me in my face. It's like a couple of my brothers were a little violent because my mother was violent. Right. And they've had to learn how to deal with their anger. Just like everybody's going to learn how to deal with their anger.

You know, if everyone can pause before you punch somebody, everybody else wins. It's a big. Yeah. It's a big win for the world, for the planet. Yeah. Yeah. And yourself, because then you don't get locked up because you're an adult. Yeah.

Because there's no hitting in grown-up land. I put hands on a heckler who had backed me into this corner after the show. And as soon as I touched the guy, he looked exactly like Leonid Brezhnev, by the way. And as soon as I touched the guy, he looked exactly like Leonard Brezhnev, by the way. But as soon as I touched the guy to push him away from me, I was like, oh, that's me. That's on because he was doing he was threatening me by getting super close, but not touching me. Right. Right. But then I was backed up against the wall.

And then I was like, you got to get away from me. And so I push him away from me at which point security comes over. They should have come over a little sooner. And, but I was like, I get it. Red card. I'll take myself off. Yeah. Yeah.

And so then, but so as soon as I touched the, it's like, okay, I know it's my, that's on me. Security was probably seeing if you would handle it, you know, just on your own. That's unfortunate since that guy was six, three. And, uh, and like I said, looked like Brezhnev. Yes. He could have grabbed onto his eyebrows. Steering, steering, steering him away. Well, Jackie, thank you so much for taking the time to be on this. Thanks for having me.

Once again, the album's out November 16th, did you say? November 16th. And it's called Staycation. Yep. Everywhere you get albums. All right. Your albums. All right.

Well, thank you so much and I'll see you around campus and we will be back next week with more of this, whatever this is. I've got a big, big love

for you. The Three Questions with Andy Richter is a Team Coco and Your Wolf production. It is produced by Lane Gerbig, engineered by Marina Pice, and talent produced by Galitza Hayek. The associate producer is Jen Samples, supervising producer Aaron Blair, and executive producers Adam Sachs and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Your Wolf. Make sure to rate and review The Three Questions with Andy Richter on Apple Podcasts.