Al Madrigal

I'm glad we're in shares. You guys don't usually they put a stool up here, and I wouldn't be able to walk straight for fucking three weeks. Uh, what happened to you? I hurt myself. This is horrible, and I'm I'm forty five years old in July as I try to take a jacket up. Um. Alright, Al is on the show Man. You have a lot going on, so I have like a million questions, but you're super busy. You've got a movie coming out Night School, the show I'm Dying up here, and also All Things Comedy. We're

gonna talk about that a lot. The podcast network. But is it important today as a comedian to stay relevant to do so many things? Um, I just like staying busy. So it's just a way to distract myself from just sitting down from my own thoughts. So I just like keeping busy and as busy as I sort of want to be. There's a million other things going on beyond this couple of things that you mentioned, just to list off real quick. So I sold a show to Fox, so I'm in the middle of writing that right now.

We've got all things comedy, the podcast network, a movie I was just in, I'm dying up here coming back, and then um out pitching a couple of things. I'm just trying to do as much as I possibly can. I have very little desire to work past the age of fifty five, so I'm just trying to cram as much in as I possibly can before I hit You know, read Jack, reach your books by a pool time. One of the things that I know you're not wasting your time on. We were talking about technology. You then told

me you're you're getting off of Twitter. You're getting off already off Twitter, Twitter, Okay, You're off Twitter, Instagram. Now for a lot of comedians. That's kind of like the like a backbone of of what how they market and how they get out there. That was never part of it.

And I know that I'm fairly it's so weird because I be important, raised in San Francisco and having you know, it's been surrounded by friends and tech and uh watching UM comics get their first websites and you know, I think of the first website is done by my neighbor. And if you're not established at all, I can see how it's a good way to get material out there. Start. I encourage young comics to UM put them make their own videos, get them out there as much as they

possibly can. But UM, I I sort of got in before this. I was able to establish myself and I just don't think personally that I need to do it. And then I am easily distracted, so I find myself getting sucked into my phone and I just never wanted to be the guy looking down at his phone while his kid was scoring a soccer goal. So I am trying to put it down as much as I possibly can. I think it's refreshing UM and I also feel and I don't I want to get your opinion on this.

I think some people's opinions change. A lot of comedians that they love to watch their stand up or see them on TV shows, but then they you know that maybe their Twitter per you know, what they do on Twitter really doesn't drive with them. Yeah, you see this allowed when somebody makes a political statement there, like you were your stick to comedy man, you know, it's like you've got a less funny or whatever it is. It's like, yeah, just the Internet allows anybody to do just whatever they want.

So I think that comics, you know, you have a very diverse fan base, and they tend to alienate people, um when they make political statements or they I just don't Also, I just don't like divulging information about my personal life. Are they comics are oversharing so much? I guess it's all celebrities, but just I don't give a ship if you're going to the gym. Do you see

what I'm talking about now? Was like there's a couple of people in particular lately, and I'm not going to name names because they're friends of mine, but they're just I want to do an intervention and say, what the funk are you doing? I don't understand why you're sharing every personal detail about yourself. Get your kids off camera. Your kids don't have a say in this, and stop.

To my point is comedians, he just is the great thing of luxury of being a comedian as you can say and do whatever you want for the most part. So you know, when I was working in New York, I worked with the Opening Anthony Show and a couple of shows in New York and and one of my favorite parts about it was going out after the show with the comedians that were on the show, Um yeah, and and hanging out and just listening to them bullshit

talk and talk ship to each other. And it's something I feel like, well, this is back in the day. It was Paul mercurial a lot, Paul and uh I would go and Patrese and um just I mean yeah, it was a never ending, you know, roller coaster of guys and it was just always so much fun. And that was I just love that. And I love being backstage at comedy shows and just the back and forth. And I feel like this is one of the things that that you are really embracing with. I'm dying up here.

So this is something that comedians have done forever, you know, get together talk and and be funny together. Have you seen that that now with the podcasting, especially with all things comedy, this is this is kind of like bringing that to people now. Yeah, sure, I love There's a couple of things we were trying to do with a t C. Because comedy. There's even so at the Comedy Store in fact that they created a secret bar for us so we could hang out with each other and

have these conversations. And I don't think the fans are previous to me. This is the best part about stand up comedy. What you just mentioned is going and hanging out with the comics, sitting down. Some guys are always on. Some guys you can have deeper conversations with some because you know, we have these relationships to go back anyway. I love being able to hang out with these comics. And so when you have a podcast, because four or five people together that are friends and sure talking about

whatever they're talking about. If it's comedy, you've heard enough of those conversations and podcasting were comic interviewing comic about their backstory or you know, any any just one on one comedian conversation, but just them hanging out is is such it to me, it's one of the best parts.

There's sort of the thrill you get from doing new material in front of an audience and having it go extremely well and killing and then hanging out with comedians that your buddies with as a close second in terms of this rewards of a comedy experience. So you totally, you totally hit the nail on the head when it comes to stand up that it's it's that's easily the best part. Podcasting allows you to sit in those conversations

and being a fly on the wall. We're doing a show at ATC that hasn't come out yet, but it was just comics playing poker, and four of out of the five of us didn't really know how to play poker, So it was me, Bobby Lee, Bill Burr, Eddie Pepperton, and Jay Larson drinking and playing poker, smoking cigars, and it's an abur Bobby Lee cheats at one point. It's really some of the funniest stuff I've ever seen. We have another show that we're working on called Something's Burning,

where Bert Kreisser. It's a cooking show. Bert Krescher just starts you know, he's making a meal he really doesn't know how to cook very well and thinks he does, and comics just sit on the side and make fun of them participate, So you get to sort of sit there with the comics as they're playing poker and just you're doing stuff for hanging out at a bar. And I think that's You're totally right. That's something I definitely want to capture and allow people to sort of hang

out with comedians. And it's one of the reasons, you know, ten years ago I left doing morning shows and radio because the radio quit letting us have comedians come on and just talk, and they wanted them always to do these short segments. And for me, when a comedian came in, it was like, no, this is somebody to like join the show and hang out for an hour as long as they want to hang out and you know, and

actually just beat themselves and be funny. And I felt like podcasting was where this is this is happening again, where you know, people can go and hang out and be funny. And what I like about what the shows you just mentioned is they are breaking that mode. They are about something. They're not just two guys telling dick jokes. It's it's they're telling dick jokes, but they're playing poker and there's something else going on. Yeah. Um, it's the

comics and morning radio. When they always asked me to do, like what can we set you up with? And they wanted me to do material. I just don't. I don't, I don't want to. I just want to talk. That's now we're talking about the best parts of comedy. We're also talking about the worst parts of comedy is doing morning radio and local markets when you have to go sell tickets on the road. It's sort of why I'm

phasing out road comedy. I just can't handle the shlug of going out and doing morning radio and having some you know, wacky DJ and Cincinnati asked me to uh start you know, doing bits at seven thirty in the morning. I absolutely refused to do that. When I was in radio, I just felt like that I and I hated when a comedian came in and said, hey, here's set me up for this and this. I'm like, that would be funny, and like a couple of comedians I really love too

did that and and it was hard. And I will just say, you know, Brian Reagan, somebody I absolutely adore, and Reagan like, it took a while for him to get used to our show in San Francisco. I did at Alice to get used to coming in and just hanging out because he was so used to having that material fed to him and having things ready. Um, and uh yeah, it's just it's a great thing about what you're doing right now. Yeah, I love it. So there's you know a tc we have mostly I'd say, yeah,

comedians and friends, um doing shows together. And also the other thing we're doing with comics is they get to just do whatever they want to do. I know, John Reep and Sarah Tian are funny. What what kind of show you want to do? So we have Ben Hoffman or Fahimanmoir people coming in. It's like, you guys are hilarious. What do you want to make? So that we just let comments do whatever they want? Now starting you know,

a network and owning it. Uh, do you get a thrill for being an entrepreneur because that's you know, what you are with this and and and and as a comedian, that's your business as well. Uh do you get as much a thrill from that? Is? Is doing comedy in some ways, I really do. I get to work with all my friends, So I captured that second great part about comedy, Like I'm getting to hang out with everybody I want to hang out with, and so that's definitely

not going away. And it's the thrill of making something and having it be popular. You know, it's say same thing, So you do get that same feeling when you're doing a bit that works out that people love, where you're creating this network that a lot of people listen to. I mean we're at eighteen million downloads per months. It's a which is fantastic and growing and growing and growing. We're just trying to get that audio out as much

as possible. We're making short form videos. I like giving comics affair shake um and letting them be part of owning this company that distributes your content. So yeah, there's a tremendous thrill. And like anytime you can create something for Scratch and stand there with your hands on their hips, you know, your hips in front of the sign um.

We always talk about me, Bill and their current president, Mike Fertelina talk about you know, the book moments like they're gonna write about this they're gonna write about this because you know, we know in ten years from now, once you really build this thing up, you're building a company that has staying power that will be a force in TV and film as well as you know, all the audio stuff we're putting out. I think it's it's man.

I love that because I have so many friends and comedians who started podcasts over the years who said, how do I make money? What do I do to do this? And do that, and and and and have a place for them to go and and be around people that they can trust to do with the right you know, not to feed them a line of bullshit. Uh amazing. Yeah. So, um, everybody knows that with Bill and myself, we're doing just fine.

So we're we're we don't have a company that needs to exist off of their you know, you don't need to sort of, um take advantage of them to make money. I feel like there's a bunch of companies that I won't name, and a lot of them are producing stand up specials. They're just sort of set up to take advantage of talent. And that's why we started this whole

thing in the first place. I want to talk about I'm dying up here, and and just kind of the history of of of comments that when you watch that and you see interactions that we're kind of getting back to what we were talking about earlier, that that that part of the comedy world hasn't really changed. What has changed the most dramatically, You think what we were talking about earlier just the technology that goes along with it,

just being able to work on material. You know, Chris Swart, Rock and I think Seinfeld have complained about this not too long ago, but it's constantly becoming a bigger problem. It's just people and phones and tech when you're working out new stuff. It used to be that Richard Pryor could go up and on Tuesday start a new bit. When you work it out and come back on Wednesday, and then you come back on Thursday, and then Friday, and then by Saturday. He had just a masterful sort

of thing um with people. Now or you know, somebody whips out their phone and records you on the Tuesday because it looks so great. People were just just listening to Howard Stern and he was talking about Chris Rock getting some pore reception off of material that he's trying to work stuff out just so. I think that's the biggest difference is the technology. And I think younger comics have this expectation that they're going to be immediately successful

when they haven't paid their dues. Night School with Kevin Hart looks super funny. How much fun is it working with Kevin? Yeah? That was a fantastic So this guy, I'm sure what you know about Kevin Hart, but you may know about his drive. You may know that he's absolutely hilarious. He's done sort of what we're trying to do, and is uh you know, d I y um short of stand up. He put out his own movies and then he put those movies in the theater and he

does the run with heart. He's raising money. So you might think that this guy, you know and you think about him his celebrity, you don't. I really had no expectations of what is he going to be like. I did one quick thing with him. I did some Central Intelligence promo with him in the Rock and they were both hilarious and delightful. But then working with this guy every single day, you really got to ask yourself, what would Kevin Hart do? And that's work your ass off

at all times. If I'm ever in bed past six thirty am, I feel like just a lazy bum because you know, he's been up for an hour of working out and he's just done a million things before ten am. He's also hilarious, So on this movie we got to riff so much and improvised that I just can't wait. And he did that. He made up so much funny stuff on the spot and gave us complete freedom to

play around. So the cast was Kevin Hart, Roberiggle, Marylyn Raska very funny comic, and actress Romany Malco Tarren kill Him from Saturday Night Love and Uh. Then you had Tiffany Hattish and the main roles the teacher of this class. So he just had tot of this great group of people hanging out improvising. It couldn't have been better. Listen, I'm gonna let you run in a second. But I always end with these three questions, and I'm gonna give you the first one. This is a dumb question. I

hope you don't find it too dumb. If you're a sandwich personified, what what would it be not like your favorite like? If you were one what says yeah, that's a really stupid question, thank you, but yeah, I'll play along with it. Uh, probably club. I could see a lot of people saying club A club. Say I want simple yet complex and you know, not necessarily the healthiest thing you've ever had, but you know with the bacon turkey. Um, yeah, I think it's a club sandwich. I think, uh, did

you get that a lot? Though? I feel that I get P get P B J a lot? See what else do we get? Grilled cheese? Yeah? I never I don't think it makes that club before. No, no club, you're the first. If you could listen to a podcast featuring any comedians living or dead, who would you want to listen to? Well, I just uh, I'm such a

big shift Hell fan. So I love Dave Chappelle. I would love to listen to him jiggle podcast and interview people because in terms of his take sort of like Bill Burr, you know, I feel like you're going to get a great take out of Dave. Um, I would just go to my favorite comics and Dana Gould. Dana Gould is a podcast you can listen to. So yeah, I just I'd love to hear Patrese doing a podcast. Great Giraldo do a podcast, So probably Patrese and Greg and some sort of back table thing. If I could

pick anyone, that would be my top one. Patrese and Great Giralda. And what was the last podcast that that you binged? Podcast that I binged? Um go out of so many of my own that I need to listen to that I don't really know. My wife, Yeah exactly, I don't. I listen to all all things comedy podcasts all the time. We um, me and my wife listen

to show podcasts, so we're very into television. So recently, you know, and it's just through her, we were listening to some thor podcasts, um and then it's all TV related stuff. So we'll listen to a Stranger Things podcast, West World podcast, Game of Thrones podcast. So it's all sort of TV companion podcasts what we listened to. And one quickly than that, magical home one quick bonus is there?

Speaking of bad TV, is there something that makes you laugh at home that maybe you wouldn't want people to know about that you'd be shamed of, ashamed of? Oh um, we have a sort of running joke in our family where it's like guilty pleasure of music, but I would

be ashamed of people doing. But it is just something that totally makes us laugh here because I have two kids my wife, I play Counting Crows Mr Jones uh at randomly and then we have a well this is not so embarrassing, but my kids when we have to relate somewhere and start playing driving music for me, like sort of baby driver type of thing. So immediately the bluetooth and I drive to Eye the Tiger with my family in the car. On a regular basis, it's a good image to go out on for sure. Yes, how

thanks for coming on, Sure, thanks for having Matt. All Right, it's time for everybody's favorite part of the show, where my producer Z comes in and we talk about three podcasts that you should be listening to. First, I want to know, Z, how was that interview? I always wonder somebody like al who I really love and respect. I'm like, I have that still have that? Do you think he liked me kind of thing going on? Yeah? I think so.

I think there you guys had this bond of like no like working with comedians and stuff like that, and I think you guys got really comfortable with each other. And it flowed. Well, isn't it horrible working with me? Because I'm constantly at the end of every interview going, that's the worst. I just just terrible. I don't know we should air It's all good. I'm gonna say this.

If you're new to podcasting or to broadcasting and you're you're you're wondering if you ever get over that feeling, the answer is no, you will never get over that feeling. It makes you care more, absolutely. And I think everybody I know who's successful in this business, and I'm not putting myself in the same classes those people have that little have that thing where they always think they're not

doing good enough. Therapists and I have talked all about it. Anyway, Let's talk about funny stuff because today's topic is comedy, and of course you can find lots of comedy in the comedy section of the Heart Radio app But you picked up three that you want. So my first one is two Dope Queens. Dope. Yeah, they're amazing. So it's comedians Phoebe Robinson and Jessica Williams. And Jessica Williams is

from The Daily Show. For people who want someone to recognize and they bring their favorite comedians onto their show. It's usually live, and they talked about stories about romance, race, living in New York. And I like it because I feel like I'm at a sleepover with them and it's just like girlfriends talking, you know. It feels super comfortable and casual. Well, let's check it out because I know a lot of people love this one. The Winter Olympics.

Some kind of like, yeah, it's like curling. I'm like, I can't. It's so impressive. It's all so impressive. It's nice. Yeah it is. We could get Honestly, as crazy as it sounds, we couldn't get out there and just start curling. We will be able. I don't want to get out there, but we'd be a mess, That's what I'm saying. Like some people do. So, you know on Ice with their brew they're dope. I can it is. It is one of those podcasts. It is universally loved. Yeah, absolutely, I don't.

I haven't met anyone that doesn't like it. Good job, so thank you. My next one is Love It or Leave It? And John Lovett is one of the guys from Pod Save America. John Lovett not to be confused with John Lovetts love it and um he it. Was also a former speechwriter for Omama And this one is a weekly recap of politics and it's always done live and it's so funny, and he brings on guests like Jack Whitehall, Van Jones, Jenny Slate and it's just a

funny way of he makes Van Jones funny. Yeah, you listen to all right, I will this guy is and just go there with me. He's like a Season one real housewife who wanted off, well what you say, wants her own spin off? Oh she they all want their own spin off. Um, but no, he's like a season one housewife who first of all hasn't figured out her hair and makeup at all. Because it's you surely season two or three for some where they really get it together all right. When you started, you're like, oh, it's

it's politics and it's funny. I don't know. Yeah, it's funny. I can't wait too. That's one. I'm not checked out. It's going on the list. Boom okay. Last one. Shout out to All Things Comedy. Yeah yeah, especially Russell and Rachel over there. Thanks for hooking everything up with us today with altam so This one is Monday Morning Podcast

with Bill Burr. Awesome, so so good. Yeah. I like it because I like people that give off to like, go funk yourself kind of vibe, and that's you know who he is, like when you listen to him, and it's so to hear the effort come out of a little four nine. It's always surprising for me. That's why it's I love that vibe. And he the podcast just sounds like he has so much on his mind and he's just talking to a friend and letting it all out.

But it's just because it's him. It's funny, Like I feel like if it was anybody else, I wouldn't give a shit about it. And I think I realized the Massachusetts accent is my favorite accent of all time in the entire world, really, like of all accents ever, I think because I can't. I can't stop listening to him. Oh my god, so funny. You obviously didn't grow up on the East Coast. You have a whole different opinion of mass holes as we call them. Let's check it out.

My daughter was awesome, man. She didn't cry nothing. She's just like she's so cool, man, She's so chill. She's so you know when people people actually say that when she gets upset, she looks like me. That's when she looks like me, you know what I mean. And as much as that hurts me to hear that, I know it's true. Yeah, he's funny, and I'll admit some of my dearest best friends are from Boston and I have an affinity for that accent as well. I just it just it reminds me of good times. Shout out to

Ben in New York. Yo, Hey, Maddie, the Patriots are the greatest team ever. You don't even know what happened when you moved out to California. It's your voice accent, dude, dude, real conversation, all right, funny stuff. There's so much good comedy out there. One of the first, you know, fields that really embraced podcasting was was comedy. And I think

just about every comedian has a podcast out there. But you know, look for the ones that are are being done like all things called me and not just again giving them another plug, but they're trying to do things with the comedians and do different things outside of just hey, let's let's sit around and tell. And they're cutting out the middleman, right, so like they all get paid for their own podcast without it being like a business venture

kind of thing, and I like, where's our paycheck? For real? Yeah? For real? Come on, I Heart anyway, thanks for listening, everybody. That was fun. This show was produced by No Let's go Zananya, you you and the thing. Okay, guys, he's reading this list and he's spelt it wrong on the list. Alright, you're wrong, Ziania, all right, whatever, Oh my god, I have it all wrong. Okay. For those of you who have listened for for the whole show, for all the episodes.

If you're new, go back and listen. I get it wrong every week. Engineers David Williams and Horse Wong. Artwork by Dalton Runberg. Music composed by Casey Franco. Special thanks to Chris Peterson, the podcast god at I Heart Radio, Don Parker, and Katie Wilcox right here at I Heeart Radio,

San Francisco. By the way, if you want to see the Lovely Z or me, you can go to our Facebook page It's Access Podcast, or you can follow us on Twitter Access podcast one, or follow me at Maddie Stount m A T. T Y s T A U d T, and right now go out download the I Heart Radio app, check out some podcasts and share them with some friends. By Mike