The Grievance Edition: with Lewis Black and Ronny Chieng | Behind the Show - podcast episode cover

The Grievance Edition: with Lewis Black and Ronny Chieng | Behind the Show

Aug 05, 202426 min
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Episode description

Ronny Chieng and Lewis Black unite for a self-described Grievance Edition of Behind the Show. Lewis takes Ronny back to the early days of The Daily Show and the first iterations of Lewis’s rants. They discuss how Back In Black evolved with the show and American culture throughout the years, how Lewis built his stand-up career as TDS took off, and whether political satire stands a chance against today’s insane news environment.

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Transcript

Speaker 1

You're listening to Comedy Central.

Speaker 2

Hello and welcome to The Daily Show Ears edition. This is Ryan Chang, correspondent on The Daily Show, and today we are joined by the longest running Daily Show contributor of all time, the one and only Great Lewis Black yayyy.

Speaker 3

The crowd goruggles.

Speaker 2

They are they're listening, and the clapping in the subway, in the cars right now. So good to see you.

Speaker 3

It's great to see you.

Speaker 2

Yeah, thanks for joining me. I just get into it. I mean, you, by your own words, are older than shit, and you've been here a long time. You've been here since before John Stewart. Yeah, I want to ask you about you seeing the show change, specifically, not just the show itself, but like it's place in pop culture, you know.

Speaker 3

But they brought on other people and sullied my work, you know. I mean that was it for starters. It was kind of like, really, there's gonna be other folks here.

Speaker 2

So the airing of grievances began on the year's edition. Uh yeah, so you've been here, like I read to prepare for this. I actually read the Oral History of a Daily Show, which you're featured in. Yes, I would say not featured enough in because but I always find that style of storytelling, anecdotal storytelling, very interesting by people who are there, and sometimes they contradict each other.

Speaker 3

And then I found out things I didn't know. Yeah, the other thing, but really yeah, yeah, you know. But it started, I mean it was literally Liz Winstead knew me. I was working in clubs and it was one of those things with clubs in New York City, in New York City, and people were going, got, I can't believe you don't have an agent, you know, you really can't

you find an agent? Can't you do this? But meanwhile, Liz Winstead knew me and a guy named Hang Gallo who wrote initially for the Daily News I think it was, and wrote about comedy way back when, and he became a producer on the show, and they both approached me because I was sitting around and tons of material and nobody had heard it, and I hadn't done any specials I'd done really just maybe I'd done a couple of you know shows, you know, I don't even know if I'd done an evening at the Improv.

Speaker 2

So at that point, how many years into stand up were you?

Speaker 3

I'd been doing stand up on and off. But I was really kind of committed to stand up at that point for about five six years.

Speaker 2

Five six years yea where I.

Speaker 3

Kind of went from being a playwright to putting myself full time into doing stand up. Sure, so they said do you want to do this? I said great.

Speaker 2

Just to give people a says do you mind me asking? Well, what year this was? Roughly?

Speaker 3

The year was ninety six, ninety seven, I think.

Speaker 2

I remember that. Yeah, remember Chicago Bulls.

Speaker 3

Yeah, well, yeah, that was like the fortieth year that the Wizards.

Speaker 1

My team was in the.

Speaker 2

Dumps, so called the Bullets at that point, Yes, Bullet.

Speaker 3

The real name is opposed to that idiotic wizard stupid fuck thing.

Speaker 2

And they saw you around the traps, presumably Liz and.

Speaker 3

Yeah, yeah, I mean Liz and I knew each other pretty well, and she had this idea, and the great breakthrough was is that it's a show that I think I had tried to sell a show like it. You know, how are we going to sell this kind of show? She sold it, which is huge right at the time, and because I was hearing things like I couldn't be on Letterman because the guy who was the producer said, you know, politics aren't funny.

Speaker 2

Right, and so the grievances continue here and this the grievance addition. Yeah, so you were kind of doing at that time, you were doing contemporary political maybe like what's it called, like very topical.

Speaker 3

I was doing topical stuff, and I was doing also other things like about Valentine's Day and about you know, the holidays and the general stuff that a comic would do and pick up on and you know, the candy corn stuff and all that. So they basically bring me on. There's no audience. What was at the time PBS Studios in New York City, and they just sat me at a desk and they had a background of people walking around as if I was in some sort of a newsroom.

Right then they just and they I came in and improved.

Speaker 2

Oh, a segment or the whole show.

Speaker 3

No, just the segment. At that time, Kilbourne was in charge, Craig and he was I mean, he had the desk, and so I would come in it was once every two weeks, and I would improv stuff, you know.

Speaker 2

And they saw what they saw in you for the show? Was it because I know you as this prolific social common tat, very very topical. That's the kind of thing which most comics back then probably would not. Most comics would probably be a bit less prolific and maybe a bit less topical, because you want to do stuff that's evergreen. And so do you think that's what attracted them to you?

Speaker 3

Show I had all this material. Nobody knew me. I had all this kind of material that nobody.

Speaker 1

Had ever heard.

Speaker 2

Well, then, how did they know about that?

Speaker 3

Because they both had seen me in clubs. Liz was a comedian, Okay, okay, so she had seen me a ton and we'd done done all the stuff you do together's let's do a benefit for m Okay, I'll see you there. And Hank had seen me a ton, and so they knew that I had them, you know, And it was really like, okay, we're going to do this and we don't know how long we'll be on let's do you want to try this? Yes? And nobody knew what it would be like. And I did it, and

then I would do my bit. I mean it's you you're great at there's too, you're great at improblem, Ronnie.

Speaker 2

I mean you are I'm specialists, that's true.

Speaker 3

And then you come on and do it. And then they come up and they go, keep this that that was wrong, and let's try it again. And then I would do it again.

Speaker 2

Oh that's how they did in the day. No teleprompter, no nothing, just go it like, let's keep what we liked. Yeah, and then let's keep doing it.

Speaker 3

And now let's do it again, and let's do it again. I do it like three or four times. By the fourth time, i'd have it right. Then they brought an audience about like three months into it maybe. Then we went on to the teleprompter. So then I would sit down and write it, write it with Hank, and this is the two of you, just the two of us. I'd write it, give it to Hank, can't it help?

Speaker 1

Edit it?

Speaker 3

Liz would at it, and then I go on and I put it in the tele prompt. I'd read it. There was an audience that it up becomes a different kind of a thing completely.

Speaker 2

You're playing off the crowd. You're playing off the crowd.

Speaker 3

The crowd, yeah, and there was a probably a smaller audience than we had now and then and I kept doing that, and and that blossomed into Back in Black when I did the thing that I will advise against. I got really drunk at a Christmas party. We had a few years into it, and you know, it'd be really great if I could. What I'd like to do is to do is to do you know, news clips and stuff like that instead of just kind of doing this just doing my editorials. Could we put it in

relationship to the news. And they took it. They had at that point access and didn't have to pay for all sorts of clips. So I didn't get those clips. I didn't get the news clips. I got, you know, squirrels on water skis, Oh right, right, right right, that's the stuff I get. And I was like, son of a bitch, and we're gonna call it back in black. Fine, that's great.

Speaker 2

And so you wanted something meteor more dare I say, relevant politically, but they kept giving you the kind.

Speaker 3

Of but then they just weak. They had a ton of this stuff. And I mean, for me, great because it was on. I was on every two weeks, so it was still great in the sense looking at you know, the Veritable Gift Tours. Yes, but I mean I'm going okay, And I had Hank was in there, my producer and a writer gifted writer, really good at punchlines, a couple of the other Like now, the guys who work with me, the writers, they would come in and we'd look at this stuff and then we put it together. They we

would all collect the stuff. Then I would go ahead and write stuff. Then they would write their stuff, and we combine it all together, and I'd do that, and that's what evolved into where we are now.

Speaker 2

Right. But it was kind of you pursuing something with more teeth. You were like, I wanted to say something a bit more teeth, but they kind of saw you as like the maybe the Andy Rooney segment on the show, kind of like the comic relief on a comic show, which is kind of.

Speaker 3

And also yeah, and they were, you know, it was another way to get at it. And then also when John comes in, so what he starts to do is create an arc with each show. So then at this point we're going to use this, this is when we're going to use Lewis, And so all of a sudden, they began to pick and shoes. I ended up doing less shows, but it was still fine because now because of doing the show my as you've noticed, you know, all of a sudden, my stock rises. So now I'm

touring around the country. I become because of the because of the Daily Show, and now I'm getting specials on Comedy Central. Now I'm in the face of Comedy Central along with David Tell. Right then we go on tour with Mitch Hedberg and Dave and I and then boom, I'm now isn't just touring amazing?

Speaker 2

Yeah, and so you I guess it's fair to say the Daily Show did break break you in obviously working hard.

Speaker 3

Yeah, and it and uh the Conan Conan. I did a ton of Conan's at the time too, that I broke, it broke and then and Conan and and also the specials I did because also.

Speaker 1

There again, now I'm working.

Speaker 3

Nights like if you do with clubs and putting together you know, these half hour specials.

Speaker 2

Yeah, and then you got HBO specials after that, and yeah, I guess it was taking off. You kind of skipped a few step steps that because you know, you said, like when you first joined the show with Craig Kilbourne, it was like you didn't even know if the show was gonna last. And then just before John joins, there's a gap where Craig Kilbourne. The show actually did grow

and it became more professional. I had more resources, right, Yeah, and then when John joined you, you were quoted in the book, A Daily Show Book that you said, like it made sense to you why they hired him. You can see that. And then you were like, really, chef auditioned me.

Speaker 3

But there's always agreement.

Speaker 2

Yeah, did you know, like when he took over, you could You're like, Okay, this is gonna be better now, well I.

Speaker 3

Knew it'd be better. I didn't know what it would explode, Okay, but it also you know the thing that you can't really teach anyone and you've been through it. Anybody's experienced it breaks in their career. It's time and place, and a lot of it has to do with timing. Yes, and so John walks in at the point where there's an explosion a cable. So now literally and I see it as I'm performing around the United States. How do you perform in Biloxi? Well, here's how because they see

the same things as we see everywhere. That also had a huge effect on the Daily Show in the way in which people you could see it, and because now they have an understanding much like they do with hacks and a whole bunch of other kind of professions that they know behind the scenes. And so now they kind of have a sense of what news is about. They now have a character.

Speaker 2

They have context full what we're making fun of.

Speaker 3

Yeah, and then John was able to coalesce it and he had really a great eye for talent.

Speaker 2

He sought it and brought in execute. Yeah, take a quick break and we'll be right back. Well back with Lewis Black. So at that point when John joined and it was kind of, you know, things were really kicking off. I mean, much like the Bulls. I guess it's like ninety five Bulls when every time you came back, did you feel like it was growing bigger and bigger and you're like, oh, this cultural phenomenon and the production.

Speaker 3

I mean it took a while, but I mean you could feel it. You literally if you could feel it coming. It was kind of one of those things that you felt you could see the wave in the distance and you went well and then all of a sudden you pay.

Speaker 2

It right right. And I think it was a perfect mix of at that time, there wasn't you know, a ton of content that is diluting the pool. There's only so many shows and this was the only show. And you don't let me put word in your mouth. But for me, I felt that the beauty about comedy when it's done great, it's always this kind of like underground,

it's like counter cultural. It's cool. You guys were like the cool kids making fun of the institutions, and you were and the fact I was on cable made it a little bit hot to watch, was made it even more desirable. Yeah, you know all these times had tucked.

Speaker 3

Away, and I mean, you know you had, and you also had other things that kind of help set it up. Like you know, I don't think he gets the it doesn't get that the amount of credit does. But David tells Insomnia was this kind of are you kidding me?

Just wandering around in the middle of the night. You know, there was a certain you just nailed, really that whole thing about it, and there were other building blocks around it in terms of Comedy Central, they're also what made it great, I think, and it's something I scream about a lot. And I don't think they give the credits. The level of writing on this show was unbelievable and I still do this day. I think that what creates the quality on the one was initially the writers, John

and the writers brought that whole thing up. And now what really does it is a movie. We had a killer lineup then we have had a killer lineup now Correll and Colbert, and so it was a strong group that you know that also had a bent in terms of writing. And we've got that now again and it makes a big difference.

Speaker 2

Oh no, thanks, thanks so much.

Speaker 3

I wasn't talking about I was talking about the bull.

Speaker 4

Yeah, And I guess if you could talk a little bit about like the the way the show has changed culturally, because it started off as a normal talk show kind of like.

Speaker 2

News clips with jokes and I kind of called it like America's final phone videos with jokes when and that's like that's the basic version of the show to me, Like that will get everyone paid. But to make the show great, it started to have a point of view, and the point of view at that time was kind of figured out commenting on the cable news environment.

Speaker 3

Yeah, it was commenting on it was satirizing news. And it was also the take was any authority it was right And that was huge, right because there was nothing really like that.

Speaker 2

There was nothing doing it. There's nothing there's still nothing like that doing it. It's still the only show that I think that is American satire, modern American satire exactly.

And I'm trying to ask this question without answering it because I want to hear your answer, But like, how do you feel that point of view has changed over the years, because as people have grown more savvy, and like, how much did it change from un ironic making jokes to satire and maybe even parody of news to becoming kind of like essay, maybe a bit outragey, And then you know, like how do you feel that that?

Speaker 3

I mean it it grews as it's audience grew is it's audience got smarter. We got smarter, and the audience lead you, and they not only lead you, but they give you the freedom and the freedom that they gave us is huge. And you see it now when all of a sudden, I can now in the midst of one of my things stand up and yell about stuff, I get upset the audiences and it always comes incrementally

and it's really grown. And there was something that really worked about bringing John back, and then something that I was saying from the time before he came back and Trevor had left, I said, let the fucking correspondence host stop it. That was my take on And when I'd have interviews with people around the country, you know, they don't give a shit and des Moin, I mean, nobody listen. But you know, it's all sen telegrams back, you know. But I felt that, I really did. I felt that

it was its time and it would grow again. Having John come back really kind of was like great because it basically got them to look again, and then by looking again, they went, oh, we can try this. Yes, and nobody basically had to take like Trevor had to take over. Yes, nobody's taken over. So it's your take, and it's the take of those others.

Speaker 1

Whoever they are. We'll talk about them later.

Speaker 2

Yeah, But I guess I'm trying to get to this idea that like when the Daily Show started, the news was very different in America, and so you could satirize that. I mean, you know, a nutshell like it was Tom Broke call. It was like there was three news anchors maybe, and there was a way of satirizing it, which I don't know like, how would you approach that now? You know, like if you had to, if a daily show wasn't this institution, if you tried to do it now, it's

almost like you couldn't. I don't even know how you could do it because it's so chaotic and fragmented and there's no monoculture, there's no context for you know.

Speaker 3

It would have to be on this right, it would have to start there, I feel, right, because that's where the whole world. Now you've got what is it? I find myself looking that's going. So there's a thing called news fucking right right, And this guy really and these two women are completely psychotic and are basically saying that

breathalyzers are fake. I mean, you just kind of it's partly having a mirror all, you know, and which is what we do in part still, I mean some of my stuff still deals in that in that frame.

Speaker 2

This is why this is what you're so great is because as long as I've known you, you've never actually shat on the present and put the pass on a pedestal. You've always been like it's different and now it's great and was great before. And you know, I guess what I'm trying to ask you, is is satire dead?

Speaker 1

Now?

Speaker 2

Yeah? I mean, well the hard.

Speaker 3

Thing for me it's been and I've been yelling about this for about the past since since Trump came around, this is how do you it's satirized? What is already satiric?

Speaker 2

Yes?

Speaker 3

And I I kind of go. I go on stage and we'll go read something and go, uh, it's like, what is it? The benefits of slavery? Okay? How am I supposed to make that funnier?

Speaker 1

What am I?

Speaker 3

What context do I fucking have to put that in for you? It's done and you look at it, and I'll say that to the I go, here's my favorite punchline this week, and I do this. I've been doing it for a year now. I'll go the benefits of slavery and they'll go h And I go, you assholes, how do you miss the joke? And if you sit there and groan about it, then what you're saying to me is is maybe there are some benefits, right? And

I do feel like that that's part. I mean, it's when I watched your set recently when we were doing it. You know, when I watch you work, you have you got that sense I mean, it is, and it's not easy. It's like you work through it, You work through it, you work through it, right, And I've had to come around other ways to try to get the joke all right.

Speaker 2

So in a way, satire is dead.

Speaker 1

I guess I think it is.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I mean, I guess it's Those are the questions I want to ask you about the daily shows past, because you are kind of uniquely placed to talk about all this, since you have such vision on it. I did want to switch to the present though, and kind of talk about this week's hot summer piece.

Speaker 3

Yeah, it's about it.

Speaker 1

How hot it is.

Speaker 3

It's really insightful. Well again, I mean because it's hot out.

Speaker 2

Monday was the hottest day ever recorded on Earth.

Speaker 5

The previous record, which was set on Sunday, only lasted twenty four hours. It's hot, really, really hot, the hottest day ever recorded on Earth. Suck on that, dinosaurs. We can destroy the planet ourselves. We don't need an asteroid like you pussies. Yes, this summer, the heat is kicking our ass more than usual. Last week it was so hot in New York.

Speaker 1

That and I can't believe I'm gonna say this.

Speaker 5

I asked the hawk to a girl to hit me in the forehead.

Speaker 2

It is hot out and not to be disparaging, but you have seen a lot of summers, so you have summers to compare to.

Speaker 3

This is the shittiest.

Speaker 2

This is it.

Speaker 3

This really wins I mean by far, because I have a chunk of it off right. You know, it's like I really, I'm supposed to go outside. And then, which they don't fucking talk about enough, is the air quality index. Now it's not only ninety five degrees. You can't you're not supposed to breathe.

Speaker 2

Yeah, you can't breathe.

Speaker 3

I mean except last summer it was the fires on this part of the United States.

Speaker 1

You really couldn't go out. You know you're here.

Speaker 2

The sky turned orange, Yeah, for a couple of days.

Speaker 3

Yeah, but it made for a wonderful sunset.

Speaker 2

Yeah, it was almost a permanent sunset. You couldn't miss it. It lasted a long time. That was pretty scary, that one. So climate change. Climate is fucked politically, well fucked, all right. Just another day in Amaris, another day, just another day, and you have a podcast coming out here.

Speaker 3

It's a rant cast. I don't because I don't talk to people. I read the rants that people send in. Some people send in things about peanut butter. Some people send in things about pickles. Some people scream about things that are going on at their office. Somebody talked recently about the fact that he's had five different bosses in charge in how each of them is a dick, and the levels of dictum in corporate America, and that this

idiot doesn't know that. And then I comment occasionally on him, but mostly I let them stand on their own what's good about it? And it was said, when I had to leave the road and the pandemic had started, these people were starting to write. You know, they wouldn't you wouldn't. I wouldn't put them on the Daily Show as a writer. But they were writing for my voice, that point of view in terms of what was pissing the market brilliantly. Well, and now they're getting back to it again.

Speaker 2

Well, this is the thing about you, is that for a crotchety old man, you will you are very appreciative of modern methods and you are very cutting edge in everything you do. I mean you will. I remember seeing you doing the Rancast live during the pandemic. You really embraced technology and all that stuff.

Speaker 1

You know it was good and.

Speaker 2

You've seen it. You've seen it changed completely. You went from literally theater, the oldest form of of entertainment, to seeing early days of television production of the Daily Show, to full Daily Show, and then now you're live streaming on YouTube.

Speaker 3

Yeah, that's sitting in a place just like this. I'm sitting in what I call a bad cable access studio with nobody around. It's like you're watching a lunatic.

Speaker 2

But it's great. Yeah, And I just I'm going to read this. I don't miss it. I'm going to say something sincere after I read this out, So for tour days, she's gonna check out Lewis Black dot com. Lewis Black's rankcast is available on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. And I just want to say, Louis, thank you so much for your kindness to me and your friendship and your advice, you and all the legends of a Daily Show.

When I joined the show, I was like, if I can be ten percent as good as these people, I'll be very happy. And so thanks for showing the way, and thanks for speaking.

Speaker 1

To me.

Speaker 3

Way more than your bulls suck. You personally, I've been you really have been quite remarkable and we're lucky to have you.

Speaker 2

Oh no, thank you, that's high praise, and thank you for joining us on The Daily Show. You has edition everything.

Speaker 1

No, I'm getting paid a lot o good.

Speaker 2

I'm glad someone is. We'll see you next time.

Speaker 5

Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by searching The Daily Show wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 3

Watch The Daily Show weeknights at eleven.

Speaker 5

Ten Central on Comedy Central, and stream full episodes anytime on Paramount plus

Speaker 1

Paramount Podcasts

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