How to Write Something Ridiculously Funny (Mark Normand Interview)

Mark Norman is on the show today to teach us how to write good comedy. And it's easy to see him as a super successful comedian, multiple Netflix specials, top of the food chain, but no, he moved to New York in 2006 back when he was a nobody. Barely knew how to tell jokes. And this interview, it tells the story of how he worked his way up from admiring Seinfeld from afar to actually opening for him on tour in all these different cities. So I said, "Mark, okay, you got to teach me what did you learn from Seinfeld? What did you learn from Chris Rock and Groucho Marks? To take jokes from like a little seed of an idea in my head to the mainstage on Netflix.

All right, tell me about this quote. A lot of comics don't like to write because writing proves that you're not a genius. That's great. That's why Quinn is the man. He's kind of the godfather of New York comedy. Colin Quinn, that quote is great because nobody wants to write. Writing is a challenge. More more comics could be writing, but they go, I'll figure it out up there. I'm I'm I'm a funny guy. I'll figure it out on stage. They always say I write on stage, which just means I'm too lazy to write.

>> What do you think that is? >> I think it's just work. I think I think comics are inherently lazy, you know, and writing is is hard because it's you're staring failure in the face. You just looking at a blank paper like, "Hey, I thought I was funny. Let's where is it?" You know, no nothing's coming to me. So, you actually have to sit there and deal with that. And that's pretty uncomfortable. It's the hardest thing to do because you got to face yourself.

It's not just a blank page. It's a blank page going prove it. You think he's so good. You think he's so funny. You think he's so clever. Let's see the writing. Where is it? So, it's you're just looking at a mirror. Basically, >> you feel like you go out take a bunch of notes or you kind of sit there, stare at the ceiling like wait for something to come to me. >> What I do cuz the the staring at the paper just doesn't work for me. So, I pace.

>> Oh, really? >> Pacing is my move because you get some movement now. You're flowing and uh I feel like walking and talking makes you the juices go a little bit. I hold the pen like the microphone as I'm writing. I'm like walking around in my office and I'm like, "Ah, then the guy said this and then whatever sounds kind of funny, I'm like, "Let me write that part down." So then I have that and then once I have like a structure, I'll put it all together and make it sound like a a package, like a piece. I feel like a lot of your jokes, they're like very well written out. You know what I mean?

There's some there's some people, some comedians who they're given a joke and it's kind of wandering all over the place. yours. You're like almost as if you memorized what you said. They're very tight. Like Seinfeldesque in that way. >> Oh, it's definitely memorized. Well, I think a knock on me is I could use a little more loosey goosey. I could use a little more uh less rigid writing. But to me, a joke is so flimsy. Like, if you change one word, it doesn't get a laugh.

So, if I got it down, I'm keeping it that way. So, that's why it seems so so tight, so written, because if you change one thing, it might fall apart. It's a house of cards. >> So, then what are you doing? You're writing a joke, performing it, writing a joke, performing it, and then tweaking little words here and there. >> The whole time that Yeah, I did four sets last night. That's the whole night is just what if I said 'the' here? What if I said and or paused here? And you just keep trying that over and over. And then eventually after a million tries, you figure out this is the ultimate best way to say it. And then you memorize that and there's your joke. Why do you do handwritten? I think handwritten it get it gets out cleaner. It's more this once I'm doing this. A I'm not a great typer, but once I'm doing this, it's over. Like it the it's not the same thing from here to the screen. But the

writing feels the same. You can scratch stuff out. You can put something up here down low. The screen is too restrictive to me. I got to press enter to go down here and then it puts you back up and then there's a cursor. I like to go wherever I want to go. So like I'm all about the less restrictions the better. So I just write [ __ ] down on anything. And then I transfer it to a bigger notebook and that's where I write more of it out. These are just kind of bullet points.

>> You know what I like about it? It's just proper messing around. Like you can't get too fancy in a creative process. >> No, no, I agree. I agree. When you try to get too fancy, now you're you're interfering with the you just want to get the ideas out of you and on something. So the the more natural that is, the better. What is it that you

picked up from Groucho Marks? >> Everything about him was funny. He looked funny. He sounded funny. The jokes are funny. He moved funny. Uh, he's such a weird unusual guy. He's a New York Jew who grew up singing and then just got into comedy. And he did Vaudeville. So, I don't know if you ever seen any Marx Brothers movies. They're all over the place. They did that live. They did that before movies were invented. So, those guys are running around a stage jumping on tables and grabbing tits and shooting each other with water cannons and all this stuff.

And it was hugely popular. And then they got into movies. And the jokes are really good. Like for a guy that silly, the jokes are incredibly well written. Like, uh, I shot an elephant in my pajamas the other day. How he got into my pajamas, I'll never know. That's a great joke. So, it's amazing to me that in the 30s and 40s, these guys were writing that sophisticated and being that silly. So, there's something cool about a guy who's a just a human cartoon, but also the jokes are like top-notch zingers, top stop oneliners.

>> I'll never forget a face, but in your case, I'll be glad to make an exception. Yeah. See, there you go. >> It's funny because you do pull from Seinfeld. You do pull from Larry David. >> Yeah. >> How do you pull from both of them? >> Well, Larry has a darker bend, you know? He's he's a little more sex, race, uh, Judaism, religion. He'll go deep into that stuff. Seinfeld's more like zoning in on minutia, whereas Larry David is more uh, why do black people What's with the watermelon? Black Ghoul like they he goes to this these bigger kind of darker uh issues. I mean you see it on his show. He's got shows about like Nazis and this one episode where he his she get muddy. So he goes in the Holocaust Museum and takes the old shoes you know which is hilarious. Uh but Seinfel would never do that. He has a great one where he's out to dinner as a double date. Him and his wife, some other guy and his

wife. And the other guy goes, "I'll get the check." And he goes, "Wow, thank you. Thank you, Bob." And the wife goes, "Well, aren't you going to thank me?" And he's like, "Why would I thank you? It's his money." And she flips out. But he's right. It is his money. So why is he thinking the other lady? So he in an interview I listened to talk about that. He's like, "I know that's psychotic. I It actually happened to me. I didn't say it at the time, but I knew this is funny, so I wrote it down later and made a show out of it. I love those little little moments in life." Well, I feel like really good comedy bits, they often get at something that's so core in life that they kind of just recur in your brain because you're like, "Oh, I'm seeing that. It's like that bit. I'm seeing that. It's like that fish." They kind of live with you. You know what I mean?

>> Oh, yeah. Completely. Completely. Yeah. Yeah. I got a lot of jokes are just been things that have been swirling around my head for 10 years, and I'm like, I got to find a way to get this out and make this something funny here. And if you keep thinking about something, it's it's probably got something to it. And it's so cool to be the comic who nails that observation because that's everyone's been through that. And so he gets to be the one who grabs it and runs with it.

The goal is not just to be offensive or be edgy. It's getting away with it. Like Louis CK is the great one at that where he'll do a pedophile joke where you're like [snorts] and then he flips it and now you're laughing and you're like he got away with it. I feel like in a lot

of my favorite jokes where they got away with it, there's like a certain sequencing like I'm going to say something, you're going to agree with it. Okay, I'm with you. I'm with you. Now, I'm going to stretch it a little bit. Yeah. I'm going to stretch it a little bit. Stretch a little bit. And now the fourth thing that they said, if they had said that first, they would have been shot in the head. >> Yeah. >> But by the time that they've done the other three, they get to the fourth and you're like, man, that's >> Exactly. And that's really the a skilled comedian. Like Bill Burr is great at that where he's losing you so much. just so much air in the room where you're like, I I kind of hate this guy. I'm actually turning on this guy. And then he has a thing at the end and it brings you all back. And not just that, you're glad you went there. So like that is a really skilled comedian, but it takes a

lot of guts to go that far because that means he had to bomb for a long time to learn how to get it back and where the line is and all that. So that is like next level standup comedy. But that's there's like five people on earth who can do that. >> Yeah. Yeah, for you the pacing's a little little faster >> very quick. I'm I'm a big wuss. I just want to get as many laughs as possible. I'm scared of silence. And when you're quiet, I'm freaking out. [laughter] So like I have some trigger, some some childhood [ __ ] I guess, where I I I think my parents were not that interested. So I'm like maybe it goes back to my childhood where I'm like I got to get a laugh every 10 seconds or else they hate me. I mean, you can do the long drawn out whatever, but you're gonna you're going to pay for it getting there. Like, you're going to pay learning that. Einstein has a great quote. He says, "I'm not smarter than

anybody. I just stay with problems longer." >> And I think great comics are like that. They'll just really I know there's something here. I got to figure this out. And uh they'll bomb with it. And audiences are like, "This guy sucks. He's lost it." But you're like, "Ah, I just need more time. Just relax."

How is being funny on a podcast different from the kind of comedy that works in standup? >> Well, it's completely different. It's all uh pretty much improvisational. You're you you only be able to be funny with the stuff that's being given. If you're showing me a a news reel or you have a story and I zing in the story, it's all improv. So, you got to be funny off the cuff and funny quick. Whereas standup, you can write it and hone it over a year. You come used to [ __ ] around all day, you know, be hung over, eat a big meal at 3:00 p.m. and then maybe do some writing, smoke some weed, then do a show at night, and that was our job. Now comedy is a full-time job.

There's so much extra [ __ ] in comedy now that it's people have forgotten about standup, the actual art of it. I could name five guys who are unbelievable on podcast, so funny, so quick, but you see their you see them live and you're like, that was that was kind of weak. It's a bittersweet thing because before you had the industry, hey, when's the when's David Letterman going to put me on? When's uh the Tonight Show going to put me on? When am I going to get an HBO hour special? You had to wait for the industry. But there was a lot less work.

You can do the same hour for 10 years. Now it's I gotta cut a clip. I gotta tweet. I gotta post something. I gotta write about the news. I gotta write my own act. I gotta do a podcast. I gotta do another guy's podcast. I gotta go on the road. So now it's like you're a oneman band where before you can just be like, I'll get on the Tonight Show, which maybe they wouldn't have you and you had no career. Now you can make your own career, but you're going to do a lot more work.

>> How do you prep for one of those late night shows? Cuz that kind of seems in the middle of a pod and a standup, right? >> Sitting on the couch is that's next level, guys. Like that's like uh cuz the stand up you can prepare. The couch is pretty much like let's see how quick you are in front of a live audience in front of the world with cameras and uh you got to be funny. So you can prepare a little but that's really a lot off the cuff.

That's impressive. The couch is killing on the couch is way harder than killing on stage. You know Neil Brennan said all the comics who are doing the best write the most. He's like that's it plain and simple. All these guys you've heard of, they just write the most. There's so many different comics, but I like them all. You know, it's, you know, you like baseball. Most of the players are kind of similar, you know, but comedy, it's like so many different flavors. This episode is sponsored by Alpha School.

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>> You know what I just watched recently that I thought was so well written? It was uh Nate Bgots's America, George Washington. >> Oh, it's a great sketch. >> Oh my goodness, man. Like to me that was real art because you just take something like we're going to found this country. >> Yeah. And you spend like five minutes just finding all these ridiculous things about the way we do things, the metric system, why we call it football, soccer, and when someone just finds all the things and keeps finding new things, it's almost funny cuz they're finding things at the bottom of the well that you didn't think went any deeper. Yeah, >> I know. And that's what's cool about comedy. You can go in on anything and make it funny as long as you present it right. It's all about the structure.

That joke is all structure. Uh, it's not funny if I go, why do they call it soccer? Why do we call it soccer? They call it football. That's not funny. But if you start digging deeper into it, uh, well, they actually use their foot, so they use their foot, so it should be called football. Well, they use your foot in football, in American football, too. But yeah, that's just a kicker. Now you're just going in and in. The more you go in, the funnier it gets, and that's that's comedy. And then to put George Washington as the delivery system is even funnier. So that's that's uh that's good writing there. And that went crazy viral. And it's clean clean, too.

>> You think it's way harder to do clean comedy? >> I think it's more challenging. Yeah. I think I think clean comedy is hits harder because if you go neutral, you really got to hone in on something funny. Like it has the idea itself has to be funny or else the whole thing won't work. And the same with clean. Anybody can go uh I'm bombing. My dick's weird. You know, see that got a chuckle out of you. Like that's an easy parachute to pull. But if you do a joke about stairs, stairwells, it the idea has to the merit has to be there because it can't you can't it has no crutch. How important is simple?

>> Yeah, simple I think is almost necessary. It's not just important. Simplicity and this is going to be controversial, but a lot of people get mad if you do racial stereotypes on stage. But the only reason comics do them is because we all know them. You have to be understood. The audience has to get what you're saying. You have to click into the audience's head immediately. There can't be any like uh what? Oh, I get it now. It has to be immediate and uh involuntary. So, that's why simple is key. Simple is key. Also, Nate is the perfect guy to do that sketch because Nate's a brilliant comic, but his whole shtick is I'm kind of dumb. You are too, but I'm willing to admit it. And when I admit it, you're going to go I do that, too. And that's why it's funny and that's why he's great and that's why he works so well because everyone's had a dumb person moment.

We've all had a moment we're like, "Yeah, I get that." But you don't actually get it. And he taps into that.

>> I want to do like a little fire round where I want to ask you about the different parts of comedy and I want to hear your take on how you think about it. >> All right. I love it. >> The setup for a joke. >> Oh, well the setup's the easy part. Uh, the setup is just like this funny thing happened to me, but the punchline is hard because the punchline has to make sense and surprise you. So, I have to think of a thing that would surprise you. But how does how do I think of something that's going to surprise you?

It has to surprise me, but how do I think of a surprise? You see what I'm saying? Like, a surprise is a complete twist that makes your brain go, "Oh, I didn't see that coming." So, how the [ __ ] do I think of a thing that people don't see coming? I can't see it coming either, but I still got to figure it out. So, that's why it takes so much trial and error. So, uh setup is important, but the setup is easy. The setup should just be simple, concise, and set the table.

>> So, now you've set up the joke. How do you begin to think about the twist? >> The twist is hard. That's the hard part. That's where you got to almost kind of go into this weird quadrant of your brain that you don't know you have. Cuz how the [ __ ] do you think of a twist? You know, a twist is the opposite of what we think of. That's why it's a twist. So, you have to come up with that. And that's the hard part. You know, when people are up there and bombing, you're mad as an audience member because you're like, well, your job is to have the twist. That's the whole thing in comedy is the twist. So, if you're not doing that, why am I paying money to watch you? So, I think the punchline is everything. It's got to be good. That's why I get so jealous of these early writers because they all these tropes weren't done yet.

Everybody's going to think it's the husband, but it's not the husband, but they think it's the husband. So then I'll make it the other guy. But then they're probably thinking, "Oh, obviously you think it's the husband, so it's going to be the other guy." So he has to go eight steps ahead of them. But the first crime writer could be like, "It was the husband." You know what I mean? Like cuz it was no one had done it yet. And it's the same with comedy in the 50s. You can be like, "My aunt's fat." And they're like, "Ah, I said his aunt's fat. That's crazy." But now you got to have eight different, you know, twists before the aunt's fat just to uh because we're getting savvier, >> right? as as things go on. That's why you see a lot of irony, you know, you see a lot of irony in comedy where we're making fun of the fact that we're doing comedy, you know, because you have to find some new twist. That's why he's a

good writer because he's got eight different plot points, but he has to think of those. He has to think what you're thinking and go ahead of it. And that's not easy. >> Can you break down a twist for me like in a joke how you thought about it? >> Yeah. Yeah. Uh I have a joke now. This joke took forever to write. I've said it before, so I don't mind giving it away, but I tried trying to spice things up with the wife. Once you have a kid, you got to keep it, you know, keep the the magic alive. And I said, we should watch porn together. And she said, uh, okay, I like lesbian porn. And I was like, h, I like interracial. So now that's the setup. Now you got the information. You got she likes lesbian porn. I like interracial. So there's a we need there's a divide here. How are we going to watch porn together if we like different porn? So, we compromised and watched a WNBA game. [laughter] And the joke kills. I [ __ ] it up

because I had to explain half of it because we're doing a show, but the joke kills and it's like a bulletproof joke. Works every time, but all the information adds up. So, no one sees it coming because you got lesbians and black, black and white. WNBA is the perfect combination of those two, but no one sees it coming. So, the joke has to make sense and catch you off guard. That's a twist. >> Do you remember how you developed that joke?

>> I remember where I was. I remember being excited when I wrote it. I was in a a hotel room in Baltimore. I did the show. I did a show in Baltimore and I wrote it wrote that day and I was like, maybe I'll try this. But even then, you don't know if it's going to hit because, you know, you want to learn the guitar, you can do that alone in the garage. Comedy, you have to do it in front of other people. It's sadly it's the only way.

Imagine if surgery was like that. Ah, I don't know if this surgery is gonna work. Let me cut your face open. You know, but comedy has to be in front of a person or people. And I remember I remember thinking, hey, that's pretty good. I think it's pretty good. And I tried it. It worked. Thank god. But nine out of 10, it doesn't work.

>> Tell me about a tag joke. What's that? >> Tag is fun. Tag is an extra laugh on the way out. So you you do the punchline, gets a nice laugh, and now for your momentum, you can say a tag. So the WNBA joke, I say, "So we compromised and watched the WNBA game." Laugh. And then I go, "And just like uh just like after the game, I paid her horribly." Tag. So I'm getting a tag. Like, you know, you think, uh, what else is funny about the W&B? Oh, they get paid badly. They make way less than men. So, I'll make it that a joke. And now I'm paying my wife for sex, which is funny. So, it's a it's a tag off of a big punch line. So you're it's kind of like a little little uh mint after the dinner, you know, >> right? Chunk.

>> Chunk. Love a chunk. Uh chunk is you got a bunch of jokes about one subject. Like Jim Gaffin has like a 10-minute joke or chunk on ketchup. You know, Seinfeld do a chunk about marriage or a chunk about his kids and it's all it's a bunch of different jokes >> in the umbrella of marriage under the umbrella of marriage. So, a chunk is really good because that means you really worked hard on it. You you see me do a oneliner. You're like, "Hey, that's a good joke. Whatever. That's quick."

But a chunk is like that means you had a big subject matter and got jokes throughout the whole thing. You don't do as many of those. >> I'm getting better at them because I'm getting less of a be being less of a [ __ ] on stage because I've been doing it so long. So, I got a few chunks in I got a chunk of my casinos now and it's cooking. It's got a laugh all the way through. Big ending just about how just me observing. I play a lot of casinos and casinos have so much comedy in it.

You know, the the guy smoking on a respirator. The uh the fact that I'm trying to add numbers while getting free drinks and getting yelled at and I'm dyslexic. So many funny things about a casino. The guy's got a limp. He's given his whole life savings to this machine. Blah blah blah. So, I don't want to give anything away, but that's a chunk on a casino. Tell me more about what was harder for you early on about writing chunks.

>> Well, a chunk is uh it's hard because you need a multiple jokes about one subject. Jim Jeff probably has the best chunk ever written. I'd say he does a 15minute bit on gun violence. And the brilliance of it is he hits every angle. He's like, "Owning a gun is so crazy. Why would you ever want to own a gun?" Joke, joke, joke, joke. Hey, how stupid it is to have a gun in your house. this many people die a year of guns, blah blah. Then he goes, "I got robbed. Maybe I should get a gun." This is why having a gun is a good idea. And now he hits that angle. So now he's gone taken you one way, you completely agree, he's getting huge laughs, and then he takes you a whole other way, and then you're completely agreeing, getting huge laughs, and then he ties it up at the end. But it's 15 minutes or something.

Give it a go. It's on YouTube. It's like got millions of views. He hits every possible um angle of of gun ownership. The good, the bad, the funny, the stupid, the crazy, the old stories, personal, whatever. Check it out. >> Well, I think part of what's cool about a chunk is now you've set so many tools up that you can start bringing things together. You do call backs. Like there's a certain range of motion that you have in a chunk that you don't have when you haven't established all that context.

>> That's true. That's true. And you have to be have a good tool belt. You have to be able to do a quick oneliner about that. I got quick misdirect over here. Uh a call back there. It's a lot of different It's a skill set. >> Let's talk about the misdirect. I like the PayPal one. >> Oh, thanks. Thanks. That's a classic. That joke never doesn't work. Easy, quick. When I'm bombing, I'll pull this joke out just to like get some some uh some uh goodwill with the audience. So, I say uh I met a Jewish girl on that dating app. Uh what's that one called?

PayPal or something like that. That's the joke. And it was it was JD Date is the real one. But Jew money, come on. And I'm not I'm not anti-Semitic or whatever, but people equate Jews with money or they know the stereotype. Everyone knows it. That's the one funny thing about racism. Everyone knows every racist trope in the world. It's almost like we were taught them in school. Everyone knows them. Nobody knows the the the Pythagorean theorem or the scientific table, whatever, the periodic table, but everyone knows every single I say Chinese. You're thinking of three right now. They we just know them. Uh so I'm not saying they're real, they're not real. They're probably real. But that's the beauty of that joke is you thought of it. You you get the joke, which means you're just as a big piece of [ __ ] as I am. Always kills. Jews like it. Non-Jews like it. Nazis like it. Palestinians like it. Israelis like it. Seinfeld

loves that joke, he told me. So, yeah, that's a fun joke. Didn't you go on tour

opening for Seinfeld >> a couple times? Yeah. >> Wow. >> Yeah. Yeah. Very exciting. We did the Beacon. Four shows of the Beacon. >> Man, what'd you learn from him? >> I was I was a classic New York comic. I just stand there and tell jokes. Tell jokes. Tell jokes. And he's like, "What are you doing? Move around. You're It's already kind of boring. You're standing there just talking. they're staring at one guy on stage, you got to stand there. Move and be in the joke. Show the joke. When you're fighting with a person, fight and, you know, act it out a little bit. So, I was like, "Oh, shit." All right. I thought moving around was like, "What am I, Dane Cook?

What am I?" I thought it was kind of like like not cool to move. I thought just move standing there was was cooler. Uh, and then he said, "Maybe don't show them you're doing comedy. Just act like natural." You know, cuz sometimes a comic will be like, "I told that joke last week." And he's like, "I don't love that because you're telling them that these are jokes." It's actually funnier if they think this is just how you are.

You know, like, you know, Steven Wright, >> the oneliner guy, >> oneliner guy with a big hair and he's balding, he's super low energy. If you actually think that's who he is, it's way funnier than just the guy who's doing that on stage. And Seinfeld was saying that to me. He's like, "You don't want to talk about your act because they don't want it to be your act. They just want you to be funny. >> It's like the unnatural art of make it look natural.

>> Yes, there you go. That's it's a nice nice succinct way to say it. >> Was there anything from like being up close and just seeing him from up close learn? >> Of course. Yeah, he was such a pro. He would do his little meditation. He does uh TM, transcendental meditation. He does that. Uh he likes to hang out like we had this we shared a green room which I thought like I'll get out of this guy's hair. He's a you know star celebrity big time. I'll open for him. I won't bother him. But he's like, "No, no, come in here. We're going to sit on this couch together and talk and hang."

Which was super cool because I'm like, "Oh my god, that's that's what I want to do, too." But I didn't want to bother the guy. Uh, and then we got pizza after and drink wine and talked about comedy and um it was a it was a really crazy experience. I had to wear a suit, which I never do. I had to be clean. And um we did that pizza date after and I remember he got into a black car. He's like, "You good?" We were in the middle of like Midtown Manhattan at like two in the morning and I was like, I'm walking home. I walked from Midtown to the West Village because I had to like decompress. It was such a surreal experience. So, yeah, it was pretty uh I mean, it's a guy I grew up watching with my parents on mustsee TV on NBC, struggling for, you know, years as a poor open micer, eating ramen noodles, bombing, not making any money. I was a janitor for a while. I moved furniture going all that way and then opening for

Jerry. I mean, it was too it was too much to comprehend. So, I had to like walk for 50 blocks to just absorb it all.

>> You know, you said something earlier that I thought was really good of >> Oh, there's a good >> tell your face. >> There was a good uh kind of joke thing where what you can do >> is say something where it's like I said it, I'm a piece of [ __ ] but also you're a piece of [ __ ] for actually laughing. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, Louis CK K has an amazing bit called Of course, But maybe. >> Oh, it's one of the best jokes of all time. It is, >> boy, you know your you know your stuff.

>> I just I love that sketch. I've probably listened to that sketch 20 30 times because >> it is so well constructed >> and you know, he talks about at the end like >> slavery and stuff like that, but he set all these things up at the beginning and he goes, "You laughed about kids with peanut allergies at the beginning. you're in this with me now and you're like fine, I am an awful human being, too. >> There's so many things I could say about that joke. One, as a comedy writer, I know how hard that joke was to get to to finish. Just and introducing those topics to people when that joke isn't ready must have been horrifying. You know, that shows his skill that he could get to the end and figure that joke out cuz he went through hell figuring that joke out. Like, you're saying slavery is what? What? What are you crazy? But if it's not constructed and finished yet, you're going to look like a psychopath.

So that one is I can't believe he he even got there. But two, he's the king of those kind of moments where you go, "Oh, you laughed at this." Cuz now he's tapping into psychology. He's like, "Isn't it weird that that didn't bother you, but this does?" He has another great joke where he he talks about he walked by a um like a a store in the storefront there was a wheelchair for sale. He's like, "It's weird. There's wheelchairs on display." Like it like, "Oh, maybe I'll buy one." You know, like it's like a impulse buy. He's like, "No, if you need a wheelchair, you go get a wheelchair." No one's ever like, "Maybe I'll pick up a wheelchair. I'm already crawling on the sidewalk legless, you know." And then he goes, "I'm crawling on the sidewalk legless because of the Boston bombing." AND THE CROWD GOES, "OH." And he goes, "Isn't that weird?

You were okay with him crawling legless, but now that you know how he got legless, I'm the [ __ ] Why didn't you care before? Now you care because you know how you don't care about a regular handicap. You know, it's a it's a brilliant observation and that's what he's so good at. He can keep he has a joke, but he's going further and I think that's why he's so popular because he he's the only guy to go that extra step where he gets into your brain and goes, "Why'd you do this and not that?"

>> Yeah. >> No one else does that. >> So much of good comedy is it's like we're happy with the truth. Tell me the truth. >> Yeah. >> All right. I'll tell you the truth. Okay, now I'm feeling uncomfortable. Okay, let's stop here. Let's stop here. But what you're doing with comedy is you're making kind of that wall a little bit plushy, a little bit soft. >> Yes. >> And now because you're laughing, you can keep going, keep going, keep go, keep going.

>> You're creating all this tension and oxygen. You're kind of making people feel uncomfortable, but now you've gone farther into the actual truth, and you've been able to shine a light on something that we haven't shined a light on before. >> Exactly. And that's why it's so frustrating for comics when people get so offended or call you a name like you're a sexist or whatever. And I'm like, I'm trying to get to those those Louis CK places and you're you're already coming at me. You got to be a little more open-minded. I know you're trying to be a hero and save the world and be an activist, but you're actually hurting art. You know, let us get there before you write an article and call us a piece of [ __ ] because we're trying to get somewhere. And that's what I don't think these these people understand about comedy. It takes a lot of bombing and trial and error to get to a great punchline or these moments where you

like you just said, but they want to they're quick to call you out. You're like, that's not who I am. I'm just try testing stuff to get to the final product. I'm amazed at how fast he sets it up. He goes, I have a category in my head. >> Ah, >> it's called of course, but maybe. >> Yeah. And right there you're like, "What's this about?" You're immediately hooked. >> So simple. >> Yeah. But that's that's a part of the skill. Everybody thinks funny, funny, funny. But it's also the setup of the writing and the structure of the writing. I always think of him and Bill Burr like and Chris Rock. They're kind of like a boxer. You ever watch UFC or boxing or anything?

>> Yeah, a little bit. >> Well, some of the best fighters can just take a lot of hits and still win, right? >> And I think those guys are like that. Like they kind of have to bomb a lot to get to that that win. And uh I get hit a few times. I'm like, "All right, I better win this fight real quick and end this because I'm being punched in the face a lot." They can take a lot of punches and uh you know, still still get to the end. How did you go about

learning the science, the craft, the technical side of this? >> Sadly, it's mostly failure. Comedy is mostly failure. If you're doing it at a a high level, it's a lot of failure. you know, just like trying a new joke, bombs. Uh, get a tough crowd. Uh, you have a heckle, you try to get the heckler and your line sucked. You know, it's just a lot of failing. I think learning it is just doing it. That's the only way to learn is to do.

That is like I'm I yelled at I didn't yelled. I was talking to Seinfeld once and I was like, "Ah, it annoys me how these crowds, they get a they get weirded out by this and that. I I just want to I just want them to understand. I just want them to get what I'm talking about. I have to like do so much explaining." and he's like, "Yeah, that's that's what we're doing here. That's the that's literally the the craft of what comedy is, is figuring out an idea and packaging it to where people can absorb it, you know? I I just wanted them to I just want them to get my jokes, but you still have to make them get it."

>> Tell me about this idea of turning the joke backwards. >> Oh, how do you know about that? >> I do my research. >> Oh, man. You're good. Well, sometime I don't know if I can think of an example off the cuff, but sometimes um you have a joke and you're like, I know there's something here, but it's not hitting. What the hell am I missing? And sometimes you you just flip the front and the end of the joke all the way around and it works. Like you you had the pieces, but they were in the wrong order. So sometimes you got to flip a joke. Uh like let's say I said, uh you know, PayPal sounds like a Jewish dating app. Not that funny. But if you go, "Hey, I was on a Jewish dating app the other day. PayPal." Big laugh. So, I don't know if that's a bad example, but I'm just showing you that you could change the beginning of the end and it could kill much harder.

>> What is a a day a week like for you? >> Monday I do podcasting with I do two podcasts. So, I do one with Sam Maril and one with Joe List. Usually Monday, I'll do Joe List. We do Tuesdays with stories. Then I do a bunch of shows that night. And I run three shows in the city. So I run a show Monday, a show on Tuesday, and a show on Wednesday. >> When you say run a show, that means >> I uh I produce it. Like I Oh, wow. I have a guy who I book it with. I do the show every week. I try to promote it every week. So they've been going on so long that I've kind of got it down to like like self- sustaining.

>> And these are live shows. >> These are live shows. Yeah, these are live showcase standup shows where it's five comics and a host. So we have to book it every week and it gets and you have to get people in every week. So, it's kind of a lot, but I've got it now. I've been doing them for years, so they kind of work on their own. Just fills up automatically. People ask me, "Hey, can I do it?" I say, "Come on by." So, that's good. But, I got one every night of the every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

So, those those nights I'm already good for shows. Um, so I usually do about three shows a night on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. Friday I fly to a city to do a headlining gig at the club. So, I'll do I'll this Friday I'm going to Seattle. So, I'm doing two shows in Seattle on Friday, two shows on Saturday, and then I fly home Sunday. And that's every week. That's how I pay my rent is those weekend gigs. And I'm booked out through January, every weekend. So, I'm with my kid all week.

He goes to bed. I do spots at night. Come back, wake up. I got home at 1:00 a.m. last night. Woke up at 7:00 a.m. with the baby. Yeah. You feed the baby. You do that. Came here. Then I'll go back home, right? Play with the kid. He's with the wife now. I'll do three shows tonight. >> And so when you say go back, right? Are you thinking about what you're going to write today? What are you thinking about in terms of the game plan for what that's going to look like?

>> The writing is always up here with the new ideas. Like some ideas were new and I cracked the code and I finished it. So those are on the shelf. Those are done. Those are in the act. You know, that's like my A-list roster of my baseball team. But now I need a new You always need new material because you have to build an hour. So then you put an hour on Netflix in a year or whenever. So I got like five new ideas that I'm always tinkering with. So these are just ideas.

Like funeral was just a funny idea I had. It was something about how it's weird. You dress up for a funeral because you shouldn't you you dress up for nice things like a wedding or a graduation. A funeral is a sad day. Shouldn't you show up in pajamas or you know looking like hell? And then I thought it's also weird. You always hear like this guy's funeral. He had 10,000 people there or 5,000. He was so popular. He had a hundred people at his funeral. And I'm like, yeah, but that sounds like a bunch of people just wanted to see he was dead, you know? And I thought, that's got to be so that's kind of something. It didn't work or it didn't work enough. It did okay. But it was like a Yeah. Yeah. But I need a booming laugh. So, I got rid of it. So, I tried it a bunch and it's it didn't work. And that was three weeks of trying it and big waste of time. Didn't work.

And that's most of comedy. >> And you use notepad, not computer, and walk around. >> Yes. Yes. So I I I write down an idea. Funeral. Boom. Right there. And these are the ones I take to stage. But funeral was up here. Bring it to my office. Use a big scratch pad, like a big uh ringed notebook, and I just write out funeral. Pace pace pace. Funeral. Oh, you dress up. Oh, a bunch of people showed up. Oh, they want to see you dead. I write all that down and then I make it a joke. Put it in joke form. Try it in front of an audience couple times.

Change it couple more times. Change it again. Couple more times. This is weeks we're talking. Not what I wanted. Got rid of it. >> How many times do you rehearse a joke before it goes on the special? >> Oh, thousands. >> Thousands. >> Thousands. Because once you write a good joke and it's in the act, you can use that joke to prop up the new jokes. So, like, hey, killer joke, killer joke, killer joke. All right, now I'll try the new one. So, you're up here killing, killing, killing. Then you try the new one. It, man, that new one sucked. It did not get anywhere near that. So, now you have a bar. So, you need those old jokes that work to set your bar. So, when the new one does well as well as the other ones, you're like, this new one might be varsity, you know? So, you need the old jokes as a barometer to try the new ones. It's all for new material. That's what we're doing here. Just trying to

build new material.

>> Tell me about uh finding your voice as a comedian. >> The voice thing is so weird because it's hard to find it. I I try I probably didn't find it for 10 years. Um because you can't explain your voice. It's hard to explain it. It's like this random thing in the ether. You got to It's like a feeling more than something you can explain. It's not tangible. Uh, so I had a couple things. One guy asked him, he was an older comic guy. I was desperate.

I was like, "How do you find your voice? What is this voice everybody's talking about?" And he goes, "Well, look at like 10 of your jokes and see what the commonality is in all these jokes." Like, "Why these jokes? Why are you talking about this? Why these topics?" Tried that. That didn't really do it. And then I got heckled. I was kind of struggling and I got heckled and I went in on the guy and that started working.

And I remember thinking like, "This is me. I'm being me." And it's weird because it's right under your nose. You know, you ever see those movies where they they uh the guy and the girl are friends and they fall in love and they're like they've been friends for 10 years, but they never even thought about being in love, but then one day they just fall in love. They're like, "What? What are we doing? We're perfect for each other." That's what the voice it was right under your nose the whole It's literally your voice and it's right under there. And then you finally find it and then you start writing and you're like, "Oh, this is me. This is a very me joke." And then somebody else comes up and they're like, "Oh, I had a joke idea, but it's too you." And you're like, "Oh, wow." Okay. So, then you have a now you have a voice. But it took forever for me.

>> I feel like there's a point in anyone's creative process where people start off and they're a little bit desperate. So, like maybe in comedy, like they're desperate for the laugh. They're desperate for the laugh. And you can kind of see them like it's almost like they're clawing the audience, laugh at me, laugh at me. Yeah, >> but then there's a point like this is a certain kind of creative maturity where they're just no longer desperate.

>> They have that inner conviction, that confidence, and then I would imagine in comedy now >> you're happy to >> have some space with no jokes. >> You're happy to, hey, I can now set up a proper story knowing that the payoff at the end is going to be really good. The cost of that, >> no laughter for 90 seconds. >> I think you nailed I mean, Bill Burr famously said, "I didn't start killing till I stopped giving a fuck." You know, cuz you go up there and go, "Please like me. Please like me." You're you're living and dying on every laugh. You know, whereas he's like, "I don't give a [ __ ] if you like me." And so that makes the audience kind of go, "Well, let's listen. This is interesting." It's like a girl. You hit on a hot girl. You know, when you're hitting on a hot girl and you're like, "Just be yourself. Who am I? What the hell is myself? What do I do with my arms normally?" You know, that's

what finding your voice is like. You're like, "What do I do?" But it's you the whole time. The whole time it's just being you. And then with your friends, you're like, "Oh man, I was watching this." You fart, whatever. That's your voice. But you can't do it unless you're comfortable. And it takes years to get comfortable. It's really not finding anything. It's really just getting comfortable and letting you be you, >> right?

>> So Joey Diaz is the most comfortable man on the planet. I mean, the guy walks out, you know, you ever put a baby in the middle of a room? Everyone's watching the baby because the baby has zero inhibitions. Just does whatever. Rolls over. It takes a [ __ ] It spits up. It screams. It cries. It picks something up. You can't stop looking at it. But the everyone else in the room is boring as [ __ ] because they're they're trying to be what you think they're

supposed to be. Talk about the story when uh you're watching Chappelle. You're with Chris Rock. >> Well, they were over there. I didn't want to I didn't want to bother them. I was like an open micer. >> So, this years ago, >> this is years and years ago. But these guys, I study these guys. They're like superheroes to me. So, I see Dimmitri Martin and Chris Rock, which is already like a weird combo. And they're watching Dave Chappelle. And this is maybe 10 11 years ago, and I stood kind of near them. I didn't I didn't go and didn't dare bother them, but uh Dave Chappelle told a joke, something about the Mona Lisa. I can't remember the joke. And I got a huge laugh. And I heard Dimmitri Martin go. That's funny, but a little easy. And Chris Rock goes, "That's why it's good." And I remember being like, "Oo, I just got a nice nugget out of that." Demetri Martin's like, "It's a little lowbrow, a little easy to think

of." And I think Chris Rock saying that's why it's great because this great comic, this smart comic has made his idea incredibly accessible, which is also a skill. Dude, I think in a lot of different art, what makes people appreciate it, at least marvel at it, I think one of the highest compliments is, "Man, I should have thought of that." >> Exactly. That's exactly Chris Rock's. That's a different way to say it. But we do with everything. You see Jaylen Brunson shoot a three and you go, he makes it look easy. It's not easy, but he makes it look easy. And that's what I think that's what Chris Rock was saying.

>> What's going on with late night comedy? Seems like it's kind of dying. >> Yeah, big time. big. You only do it now just for the for the fun of it. >> For the cache. >> Yeah. The love of the game. I don't even know if it has much cache anymore. You know, I hate to I know the booker of the Tonight Show. He's a nice guy and I hate to say this, but you did Tonight Show, you get the suit on, you go to 30 Rock, you you sit around, you get your haircut, all this stuff, you work on the set, and then it comes out and you're like, "Hey, that got maybe a 100,000 views." But then you can just shoot a video of you on a comedy club, post it, and it'll get a million. So, I think it's cool. I think it's a great kind of comedy day. You go there. Oh, who's the other guest? Oh, it's Katie Holmes. Hey, that's fun. Oh, it's The Rock. That's cool. I'm on a show with The Rock. I'm talking to Jimmy Fallon. This is

awesome. But at the end of the day, it doesn't deliver. It doesn't put butts in seats, >> right? Sadly, and I hate to say that because it's an, you know, it's a American tradition. It's like an establishment, but or it's an institution, but it's a doesn't have the weight that it used to.

>> You're invited to like some fancy college and you got to give the class on how to do good comedy. You got a semester or something. How would you think about what am I going to teach these kids? Ooh. Well, I got to say anybody who's ever taught comedy usually sucks at it, I've noticed, or had or never made it. But, uh, that's a tough one because I think I think I would teach the writing fundamentals and stage presence because there's so many factors involved in standup comedy, but I think the two most important are standing on stage, being able to deliver a joke, and how to write a joke. So, I would go deep into that. And what do you teach in terms of how to write a joke? Those writing fundamentals.

>> I think I would teach them the type of jokes. There's misdirect, there's nostalgia, there's dirty, there's um u you know, twist or whatever. But I think I would teach those styles, give examples of those, have them do a homework assign where they write their own version of one of those, and then I'd obviously make them stand in front of the sta the class, tell the jokes, so they have to feel how that feels. It's a whole, you know, like you can be a smart guy, but you go on Jeopardy. You got those lights on you. You got that.

You're like, uh, I know the answer, but I'm panicking right now. It's the same with standup. You can be a funny guy, but once those people are staring at you, you go you go scatterbrain. You know, it's like a fist fight. You can learn how to fist fight all day long, but once you're at the schoolyard with the bully in front of you, it's a it's a whole different world. So, you got to learn jokew writing and then you got to learn how to stay on stage still keeping it natural. You don't want to go joke one, joke two, joke three, you know, you got to you got to have like a a through line or um a transition. So, that's all part of it, too. So, yeah, I would just I think making them write a set and then performing the set is the the most important thing.

>> Well, Mark, congrats, man. >> Hey, thank you. I don't know on what, but I'll take it. >> Crazy. It's just crazy. It's like, you know, 2006, moving to New York, and now this. >> Yeah. My friend said I I came here on the video game level hard, and I still beat the game, so I'll take it. Yeah. But that's a whole other podcast. Good to meet you, man. >> Hey, good to meet you. Good to be here.