#78. Jerry Seinfeld and You

*blink-182 voice* What's the deal with growing up?

Hi Everyone,

I’m home for a couple of days, with Maris and Bizzy who has innovated a new sleep position where she uses her tongue as a coaster for her face. She’s so brilliant!

Apparently you CAN teach an old dog new tricks, as long as they are natural side effects of the aging process.

On Wednesday I head out to the west coast for some shows! Last week, I went out to Chicago to record the weekend’s episode of Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me! which was, as always, a blast. The other panelists were pals Joyelle Nicole Johnson and (first-timer) River Butcher who are both so funny! The celebrity interview guest Lyndon Barrois Sr. is an incredibly accomplished and fascinating visual artist! In addition to doing character animation for big movies, he creates sculptures and stop-motion films from figurines made of gum wrappers. It is so impressive and whimsical, and he’s so engaging when he talks about his work!

Then I took the short flight over to Dayton, Kentucky which is directly across the Ohio river from Cincinnati. It was Kentucky Derby weekend, which I didn’t realize when I booked the shows because I am not super tapped into the Horse Calendar. My friend Bonnie and her boyfriend Mike invited me to a fairly grimy local casino (is there any other kind?) where we saw the judging of a fancy hat contest and put down a few bucks on some horses. I made my biggest bet ($3) on Mystik Dan, because it was the horse with the funniest name, and I thought it would be fun if the Derby was won by a horse that sounds like a guy who sells mushrooms in the parking lots of Phish shows. As you may have heard, Mystik Dan won, which was extraordinarily delightful and mildly lucrative. I wasn’t able to go back to the casino to cash out my ticket, so I gave it to Bonnie and Mike on the condition that they spend it on something in the spirit of a horse named Mystik Dan. Something like a lava lamp or an alcoholic beverage that looks like the inside of a lava lamp.

Sunday was Cincinnati’s yearly “Flying Pig” Marathon, which seems like the wrong order to have those races in. Horses have to be the headliners of running. People are the opening act. That just makes sense. Although, I do think the region could make a ton of money if on Monday the fastest marathon runner had to race the slowest Derby horse. (Unclear on how this would make money, but I do think it would be hilarious to watch, especially if they ran along the marathon route instead of on a horse track.)

The shows at Commonwealth Sanctuary were wonderful! The local comics were so funny and gracious! My friend Geoff Tate stopped by to tell a few jokes after opening for Tom Segura at the big arena in downtown! The venue is cozy and charming! What else can you ask for? I can’t wait to go back.

THIS WEEK: I’ll be in San Francisco for one show at Cobb’s Comedy Club on 5/8, which is Wednesday, then three shows at Here-After in Seattle (5/10-5/11) and one show at Helium in Portland (5/12)! It’s Sunday, which is Mother’s Day, so…bring your mom? Or a mom! Any mom!

THIS MONTH: I’m guest co-hosting Butterboy for another few weeks, this month with my buddy Alison Leiby! Come by Littlefield in Brooklyn every Monday (except for tonight) to hear us goof around and present an amazing lineup of comics! I’m also running through my hour of jokes again on 5/21 at Union Hall! I’d love for you to buy up the last few tickets for my special taping on 6/21, but if you can’t make it then, come see me do mostly the same set a month earlier! (Later that night I’m running over to catch Gladie playing music in Williamsburg, which I also recommend!)

PEP TALK FOR JERRY SEINFELD

Guy who can’t say anything anymore and is also (per his own admission on SNL) on an endless run of press interviews.

I really wanted to do a pep talk for Rap Battle Losers, but the guy who’s come out on the wrong end of a microphone this week seems to be in that position because his adversary has levied compelling accusations of human trafficking against him. And this newsletter writer is no Jeffrey Pepstein, so I will pass on hyping him up. As a Jew, however, I would like to urge my community to vocally divest from Jewish institutions it becomes clear that they are doing harm; we need to divest from Drake (for starters).

Jerry Seinfeld has a well chronicled (and less than Drake, it seems) sketchy dating past, but wow he seems to be having a bad time lately! That feels like the theme of his recent interview with The New Yorker, at least.

“It used to be, you would go home at the end of the day, most people would go, ‘Oh, “Cheers” is on. Oh, “MASH” is on. Oh, “Mary Tyler Moore” is on. “All in the Family” is on.’…Well, guess what—where is it? This is the result of the extreme left and P.C. crap, and people worrying so much about offending other people.” (That’s him speaking.)

Jerry! My man! I also lament there being not very much comedy on tv lately. But, I’d love for you to check out any of the comedies that have been made in the 30 years since Cheers went off the air. It might…cheers you up a little. (I bet you’d dig Seinfeld! Almost all of it holds up really well! I still watch old episodes all the time!) I don’t think Jerry Seinfeld has literally forsworn television comedy for three decades, but it does say something about his state of mind that that’s his most recent touchstone. It’s okay to try and enjoy the new things! I promise that sampling a few episodes of What We Do In The Shadows or Arrested Development or Insecure does not disrespect the memory of MASH.

I don’t think that the relative dearth of tv comedies has a ton to do with “the extreme left” or “P.C. crap.” (People have already pointed out the existence of Curb Your Enthusiasm, a show that Jerry Seinfeld has appeared on, as a counter example.) I will say that I agree with your (Jerry’s) subsequent point that people come to see live standup because it’s an art form that’s relatively unmediated by corporate interests. There are some really beautiful aspects to that kind of artistic freedom, and also some less wonderful elements to an ethos of “givin’ the people what they want.” But I’m not here to litigate that! I really want to get to a quote from later in the interview.

“Film doesn’t occupy the pinnacle in the social, cultural hierarchy that it did for most of our lives,” he said. “When a movie came out, if it was good, we all went to see it. We all discussed it. We quoted lines and scenes we liked. Now we’re walking through a fire hose of water, just trying to see.”

So what, if anything, has replaced film? “Depression? Malaise? I would say confusion. Disorientation replaced the movie business,” Seinfeld answered. “Everyone I know in show business, every day, is going, ‘What’s going on? How do you do this? What are we supposed to do now?’”

Jerry! My dude! It sounds like you are sad and miss your friends! Why don’t you take a break from drinking coffee in cars with people with whom you have progressively more tenuous relationships and spend some more time quoting movies with your close pals again! You can still quote the same movies as before, with the same people, assuming some or all of them are still alive! That’s not a joke! I just know what can happen to old friends as time passes. Or you could once again try some of the new things that have come out since your salad days! (“Why do we call them the salad days? I always preferred the pizza and ice cream days.” That’s me doing a respectful impression of you, btw.)

As other, smarter people have pointed out, the problem with the movie industry isn’t like…”the woke mind virus” or whatever phrase people are using to stigmatize the act of living in the present these days. The problem is unfettered capitalism.

But I’m also not really here to litigate that. I was just so struck by Jerry Seinfeld, a billionaire or near-billionaire who just turned 70 (happy birthday, Jer Bear!) and feels sad and lonely, but can’t recognize those feelings. Buddy! You can buy a movie theater and have a Superman marathon any day of the week! You can self-fund movies that are as politically incorrect as you want them to be (and truly, how edgy do you want to go? do you honestly believe that you can’t make art with the ruthless bite of Mary Tyler Moore any…moore?). See if your raunchy(?) throwback comedies make money in the open market! They might! Problem solved (for you)! (I honestly found the Pop Tart movie to have some funny moments, but the #sponcon energy of it was wildly distracting.)

Jerry! My guy! You are allowed to feel demoralized by the state of the entertainment industry. Goodness knows I am. But I think your malaise runs deeper than that. If you want to push against the direction the industry is heading, you are one of the few people with the financial capacity and clout to actually do that! But mostly it seems like you miss being a kid, and that’s not the fault of kids today.

PEP TALK FOR A READER

I’ve taken some liberties with formatting for clarity’s sake!

I have a job interview on Thursday. May I have a pep talk?
- Good Job Hunting

This is a request I used to get a lot when I was doing pep talks more frequently on Twitter. The answer is almost always the same!

If you have a job interview, you got it one of two ways: Either your prospective employer like the person you are, or you lied, and they like the person you pretended to be. If it’s the second thing, you can continue lying and maybe get a job that Actual You might not be suited or qualified for (or maybe it’ll be great)! Or you can tell the truth and see if they like Real You as much as Invented You! (If not, probably the job was better for the fictionalized version of yourself.) Living a lie sounds like a lot of work, like having to do a second job at your first job!

If you were up front with these potential employers from the beginning, congratulations! They like the you that you really are! Maybe you’ll get the job and maybe you won’t, but all you have to do in the interview is be the you you’ve already been which shouldn’t be too hard because it’s the you you are on a day to day basis. You are going to do a great job as long as you don’t mess up and act like a totally different person. I try not to give advice in this space most of the time, but I’d recommend not doing the whole thing in a Borat voice or in full makeup as The Joker.

Maybe you will get the job and maybe you will not. That is not for this newsletter to know or decide. But whichever way it goes, that won’t decide whether you’re a good or bad person (you could be an absolute monster and get this job; some employers prefer that! or you could be an angel and miss out, as happens sometimes too). But you got you this far, and you’ll keep taking you as far as you can go.

PICK-ME-UP SONGS OF THE WEEK…

Here are a few songs that have been pepping me up lately! Some of them are familiar newsletter favorites and some are new even to me! Should I have saved one or two of these tracks for future newsletters? Probably! But that’s a problem for Future Josh. My hope is that he will be too busy zipping around in a flying car to be mad that Present Day Josh did this to him.

My pals in Charly Bliss just announced their new album Forever and released the first single “Nineteen” which is beautiful and full of big-ass feelings. I’ve heard the whole record, and it spans (to plagiarize from their bio, which I wrote!) the bop to ballad spectrum in a really wonderful way. They’re the best. Every Charly Bliss single will have an automatic spot in this newsletter forever, as far as I’m concerned.

Many cool people with great taste that I like and trust have recommended Illuminati Hotties to me, and guess what they were right. I love the restless energy of this song, lyrically and musically. It kind of chugs along and then blooms and then chugs and then blooms. Just listen to it, it’ll make sense.

It is hard to outshine Black Thought (probably my favorite rapper of all time) and Your Old Droog with a beat, but wow this Madlib production bangs so hard. It sounds like Anton Chigurh hunting you down, slow and stumbly but relentless.

Previous Industries is made up of Open Mike Eagle, STILL RIFT, and Video Dave, and I’m so psyched for their full album. As long as we’re doing BARS discourse this week, I want to toss this jewel from STILL RIFT into the mix: “My vices love it when I grip them, and I know because they hold me back.” Come on. Get the hell out of here with that. It’s too tight! The video (an homage to Jaws) rules too.

Did any of these hit for you, readers? Let me know!

UPCOMING SHOWS

I’ve got some really fun shows coming up! Come see one! More NYC spots are listed on my website, and more road dates are coming soon! OH ALSO: In May I’ll be BACK guest cohosting Butterboy at Littlefield with my friend my good buddy Alison Leiby every Monday except for tonight! :)

5/8: Cobb’s Comedy Club (San Francisco)

5/10-5/11: Here-After (Seattle) (THIRD SHOW ADDED!)

5/12: Helium Comedy Club (Portland)

5/13: Butterboy at Littlefield in Brooklyn

5/16-5/18: Vermont Comedy Club (Burlington) (Five shows!)

5/20: Butterboy at Littlefield in Brooklyn

5/21: Running My Hour Set at Union Hall (Brooklyn)

5/22: Pizzazz with Gary Gulman at Union Hall (Brooklyn)

5/23: Wrong Answers Only at Symphony Space (NYC)

5/27: Butterboy at Littlefield in Brooklyn

6/8: Helium Comedy Club (Philadelphia) (4:30pm show!!!!)

6/13: New York Comedy Club - Stamford, CT (Tickets coming soon!!!)

6/15: Kismet Improv Theater (Pawtucket, RI) (EARLY SHOW SOLD OUT! LATE SHOW ADDED!!!)

6/21: NEW SPECIAL TAPING AT THE BELL HOUSE IN BROOKLYN (Late show tickets on sale now!)