The Fifth Hour: Benny Behind the Scenes

Kabooms.

If you thought four hours a day, twelve hundred minutes a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants of the old Republic, a soul fashion of fairness. He treats crackheads in the ghetto gutter the same as the rich pill poppers in the penthouse.

Wow.

The Clearinghouse of Hot takes break free for something special. The Fifth Hour with Ben Mahler starts right now.

In the air everywhere.

The Fifth Hour with Ben Mahler and Danny g Radio from the Malar Podcast studio deep in the north Woods and Danny at a secret, undisclosed location as we are hanging out together all weekend long. I'm on drugs right now, man, bringing the razmataz. Danny, you were bringing the rasmut as we flap our gums for as long as they will allow us to.

Flap our gums.

And this being the Friday podcast, it's kind of a big day, Nanny, It's kind of you probably don't think it's a big day. It's like, well, today's the eighth day of September. What's so special about that? Right?

Well, there's no holiday today, right, Oh?

I know what the special occasion is? What would that be you debut on national TV.

That's right, it's all about me. No, well kind of. So this is a crazy day in my life where today the TV show that I've been talking about is actually going to be broadcast on regional cable channels from Boston, from Maine, all over the country.

I don't even know where it's going to be on, and you know all the places it will be on. It's really a great well, it's kind of a cool day. It's also a little bit nerve racking. So this podcast dedicated to a behind the scenes look. I've been getting people emailing me quite a bit saying they have random questions about what's been going on, and like how the hell did this happen? Like are you lying to us? Like all this random stuff. So we're going to dedicate

You're like the spice guy.

You're the spice guy.

I'm like your storytelling referee.

Yeah exactly.

You can say, hey, wait a minute, that's bullshit, that's not true. And then I said, well, no it is, and then you say, well, no it's not anyway, So.

Before you get into it, I have one quick request. Okay, if Looney ever gets on your nerves, which I think is going to happen a few times this TV season, please tell Looney I want Danny G back as the Penny.

Yes. Yes, I have had many people say, well, what about Danny G.

What about you know, we got to get Danny G in there and all that, And yet you loved doing the Penny.

But you're not like a.

Huge gambling guy.

You've admitted that you're not like.

A right right, But I think that was part of the fun, was that it showed that even a non gambling person could have fun with Benny versus the Penny.

Yeah, and that's kind of the deal.

And I've done this for a long time and it's while it is plausibly a gambling show, it's really just you know, goofing around having fun, you know, talking football.

And point out how bad your picks were.

Oh no, I had great year.

How dare you?

I had the greatest year I've ever had last year, which means I am set up for one of the most epic falls of all time. I am going to get crushed by the penny. It is going to be humiliating, embarrassing, all of that emasculating unless it's not. But the question

We will mix them all together like gumbo.

Yeah, we're gonna be well, we're not gumbo. No no, no, no, We're going to make a gulash is what we're gonna make. Yeah, Hungarian gulash. Just throw a lot of crap into a bowl and then call.

It gulash racist.

So uh, this is, by the way, I want to learn all the the podcast listeners. This is a.

Global, worldwide exclusive.

Nobody else has this content, Danny, that we are about to go over here because nobody else wants it. But we are going to take you I saw this on a TV show years ago. We're going to take you on a.

Journey to boldly go where no man has gone before.

I'm in command making of a regional cable television NFL gambling show, and the show we will tape the show every Thursday throughout the NFL season. Yeah. Why do we tape the show on Thursday? Because there's a lot of editing that has to go on in the show and it has to be ready to go for the East Coast early in the day, and because of my sleep schedule doing the radio show.

Danny, I have yo, Ben, that poor editor. You could barely fit Benny Versus the Penny into an hour in the past. How do you fit all of that into a half hour TV show?

It's a great question, Danny, and so yes. In fact, years ago, Benny Versus the Penny at some episodes were ninety minutes or more. It was just just.

Going and going and going.

So having met with the people at NBC, they're like, listen, this is a and we want this fast paced. You're not necessarily going to get as much stuff out there, but we're going to get the really good stuff. And I said, sure, okay, so you're gonna pay me money and I can do less, uh than I that I that I've done. Well, that's kind of that. But we're gonna we're gonna really highlight the cream of the crop and all that. So, yeah, it's a half hour, got you.

So when you get to a game that is kind of a snoozer, you you really don't even spend a few minutes on it. You just pass it up.

Yeah.

Yeah, So we highlight what we think are the most important games of the weekend. And there's a a blue ribbon panel thing, and so I like using the term blue ribbon. But there's my names on the show, and so I have editorial control to a point.

But it's meeting of the minds.

And you know, Vinnie's our producer from NBC Sports Boston. He's really good, and so I I kind of go back and forth with him about what we're going to do and how we're going to do it. Oh, there's no question, yeah exactly. So we record on Thursday, and this, by the way, Dan, this turned into an epic day, all right. It actually started back on Wednesday. So we're going to go back in the hot tub time machine to Wednesday. So one of the guys, you don't know

Show with you, and we want.

To see if we have something here, which I thought was at first, I thought I was getting punk, you know. I thought, well, that's funny, uh, you know, but it looked like an official email. So we've we've gone back and forth for a while. But John flew out, he

What do you think meats?

No, it's the it's the garlic bread. It's the cheesy garlic bread.

And also spotting a lot of celebrities when you sit down.

Yeah, exactly, so that it has this old restaurant aura and decor. You know, you go in there, you're like in a time portal. So it's that kind of place. And in this place, is you mentioned Hollywood? The gaggle of shows, a Rockford American woman. They filmed The Office, an episode of The Office there. I love The Office, Entourage, a bunch of other stuff that's been filmed there over the years. But this was a regular hangout spot for

They'd hang out eating steak. I had a great meal and I.

Went big because I knew NBC was paying for the food, so I didn't have to worry about paying for the food. So I was like, all right, I'll get whatever I want. So I got a ribbi steak. You know, I had it prepared, Dan, you want to take a guess how I had my ribbi steak prepared.

Oh you had them burn it?

Yes, yes, I said, I would like it to look like the tires on the mal ormobile.

Not only I haven't burn it, I hadn't burn it.

But I eat my steak the same way Rob Parker eats his steak butterfly cut. So you butter fly cut it and kick and you cook it well done. At some cheesy potatoes out gratten. Oh yeah, and I was, man, I was happy.

I was like, I remember people ordering their clammed chowder there too.

Yeah.

Yeah, they have a lot of really good stuff.

I really what I wanted was the French onion soup, but that's a that's a premiere item. They only have that on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and I was there on a Wednesday, so I did not get my French onion soup, which was unfortunate. So the meal lasted about ninety minutes. As we give you the in depth coverage of random meals, but this was a big deals like the dinner before the night before, the final supper before

I got there early.

I had the decision of either going back to the north Woods, which would have been two hours, or go about forty minutes to FSR. So I did the forty minute thing and that was smooth. I got ready for the overnight show, and then after the show, I had some time to kill, so I did a crash course, well final preparation for Benny versus the Penny, and it was very rapid and intense and all that. And then

I used to wear.

Lipstick back in the day, but I gave that. But yeah, so I don't I.

Really make up, haven't been anything around your eyes on game day like Derek Carr.

Yeah, yeah, no, I mean you're right.

I mean occasionally it's a big, big night at work, I'll put some eye, will put some EyeBlack on, that's right.

But I haven't done that in years.

And so anyway, she was in charge of the makeup, and she figured out what I needed and all that stuff. And it's not really my domain. That's why I like radio. There's no makeup, but whatever I TV pays better. So from there headed over to this is kind of cool to Universal Studios, but not the theme park, the actual movie studio where they actually make films, although they're not making them now because everyone in Hollywood's on strike, so

Did you pop your head in there and say fake news?

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I kept my master. But we walked.

I walked all over the place, and yeah, everyone was cool.

Everyone's nice, and it's trying to get through the day and all that stuff. Then congratulations. Then had some more time to kill. There's a lot of time to kill on these kind of days. And you know this, this.

Is actually a big deal.

I want to point out, like you know, working in radio Danny, especially doing the overnight show, nobody goes out of their way at all for the show.

No should they, right, you know, you know this, don't do it.

I had people flying in from New York, people that work at Rockefeller Center for NBC. I had people from Philly, and John came out. We've got the Boston crew. I mean, this is like.

A global national operation. It's insane here, man, I can't believe you. This guy, one of the guys I met, and he said, I have flo I worked.

At Rockefeller Center, New York. I came out to make sure this thing goes smoothly. And I'm like, Wow, that's a long trip to make for the half hour show, you know, like Jesus. But they were all great and it was wonderful. So next up on this thorough review of Benny Versus the Penny. The opening episode, we went Seinfeld, got there early, had our window. We're gonna start recording the show. But we did a table read with television's Tom Looney at the round table at the meeting room.

It would have been better if they had that. So I did that.

I kind of went over, you know, the battle plan. I wanted to make sure we did not totally embarrass ourselves. Then I went into the studio, which is very small studio, but it works. It looks massive on television. So I went into the studio, did the whole wardrobe thing. Put my I have a kind of a costume I have to wear every week. Put the mic on the IFB, which is a fancy way of saying an earpiece so the producer can yell at you and say you suck

So that must have been really hard for you.

Andy Reid now fun fact, Danny fun fact. Depending on which market you watch Benny Versus The Penny, it's being distributed by NBC obviously, but it's in non NBC stations will carry the show, some of them, So depending on the market, you'll see a slightly different version of the show. There are small tweaks. There's actually like three or four

Bureaucracy in America.

This is if we talk about betting and gambling, obviously, and so there's different sponsors in different cities, and you can say certain things in some cities and then in other cities. That's for voting, so you got to navigate a lot of that stuff, which I had nothing to do with that. We just did the show and then other people have to slice and dice and edit all that. But it was a very long day and then we wrapped up the shoot and you know, I'm not gonna sit here and say it was one take.

No, No, we had many takes.

Because there's me and Looney, there's a whole production team in Boston. We'd never really done the show that was going to be broadcast. We had done demo shows, but it's much different was actually be broadcast because especially the first show, you don't want to screw up the first show, right the first show, because if you screw up the first show, they might not give you a second show, and boy with that blow. So we really wanted to

I have been there.

Yeah, it's another one of these old places been around. It's a famous hangout spot. Have you seen the green room at Patty's? Have you seen the green The green room is this big boardroom type place in the back, and that's where they make deals like the movie studios. You know, they come in there they say we need the green room.

Eight there twice I think when I lived there in Burbank, I always pictured Walt Disney like in the back making a deal.

Yeah.

Well Burbank, like to Luca Lake, Burbank. There's some great diners in that area, like Bob's Big Boys that's still there. Bob's Big Boys still there. Yeah, to hang out there. Jay Leno when he'd host the Tonight Show would be hanging out it. Go to Bob's Big Boy all the time and all that. Yeah, I love that area. I wanted to live in te Luca Lake. I used to work there and I couldn't afford a house into Luca Lake, so I couldn't couldn't get in.

I was like you, I would have absolutely, that's a great area.

You would have had to be on NBC TV back then.

Yes, yes, the small salary and radio did not quite work. And anyway, so we did the lunch thing with the patties and I said, I'm at Patty's.

You know what I have to have. I have to have a Patty's Melt.

So I had a Patty's Melt and that was great and all that, and then I said I had to go. We talked a bunch of old broadcasting stories. Me and Looney went back and forth on crap that happened. We did the blitz on FSR and regaling our friend John from NBC about that, and had a ninety minute drive.

Really quick? What did Looney order to eat? By the way, did he clean the joint out?

He ordered eggs benedict, which I think is disgusting, but he like, oh that's good, that good choice, and then he had like potatoes. It is odd because Looney's like a vegetable. He doesn't need anything good, anything I would like.

Did he do a steak at the Smokehouse?

Uh? Yeah, I think he did prime rib if I remember, looks gooey to me. Yeah. So we were going big, you know, and that's when you go out and other people are paying, and you know they don't really care what you order. Whatever you want. Yeah, you go big.

You get three four sides just for your side of the table. Yeah.

If I was paying for that meal, I'd say, can I have a side of fries? So that was the meals that did so. Again, just to recaps, I mentioned CompuBox stats, Crackhead Bob hours, Crackhead Ben two meals, four hours, network radio, five hundred stations, several meetings, tape the TV show. First time I've ever done that to actually be broadcast. By the time I got home, it was two PM and I was awake for over twenty five hours.

Take that for data.

At one point during the production for Benny Versus Penny, John pulled me aside and gave me like, hey, come on, we need more energy, man. I was I was fading a little bit. I'm not gonna lie, Danny, I was fading a little bit.

I mean I was. I was not quite.

I had good energy at the start, but by the time we were finishing up, I was like, whoa man, But I did complete the Malor Marathon.

It was like your corner man, did he slap you around?

Oh yeah, I told him. I said, that's great because he gave me a pep talk. You know, He's like, listen, you know, here's what And the people at NBC have been great, And the one thing that I'm most excited about about this TV show is you know how you do TV, Danny, and you see people on TV and they're all buttoned up, you know, they're all serious because you're on TV and you.

Gotta act different.

And when I first started doing some pilots for the show, I kind of acted like that. And and Bill, one of the big guys who's a big supporter of mine at NBC, he said, listen, we want you because of the what you do on the radio. That's what we want. That's the guy we want. We don't want the guy. You don't want to buttoned up.

Guy and all that.

You know, if the stuff you say on the radio and all that, we you know, goofing on Kyler Murray or whatever, that's what we want. We don't want, you know.

Buttoned up guy.

Last time, Like the last time you were on NBC, you were too like serious.

Yeah yeah, I was like news guy. I was like I was Ryle's having their problems on the road. I'm Ben Mallik.

Yeah. So they were very cool, and I was like, Okay, you're gonna let you know as long as I I'm not going to get in trouble for this. And they said, yeah, that's what we want. So I said, okay, So hopefully that comes across you guys. Have to let me know if I'm buttoned up Bennie on Bennie Versus the Penny, if you guys get a chance to watch it today or Saturday or you know, which is obviously tomorrow and then Sunday morning, so we'll see.

But I was I felt like I was letting it rip pretty good.

I was kind of doing doing what I do late night as much as you can, and you can't go certain things. We can say it three in the morning that we can't say uh yeah during the day.

But that's just the way the way of world.

So that was the maiden voyage of Bennie Versus the Penny. That was That was how it went, and it's going to be this way every week we are doing original TV shows. Unless no one watches and the show gets canceled, we are scheduled to do the show all the way through the Super Bowl.

By the time it was said and done. How long did it take to tape the maiden voyage.

Let's just say the radio show that I do took less time. The overnight show takes less time than this day. But the good see, because we had so many moving parts. It was like spinning plates. We are told that within a couple of weeks it'll be real short, but because we had to make sure everything was working and all that that it took a little longer.

So yeah, so you get into a groove and cut that time down in half.

Yeah, And it's really, as Looney says, the fundamentals, the big fundamental you gotta you know, the fundamentals are a little different. There's a little technical stuff that I've obviously used to radio.

We're radio guys, Danny, that's what we do with the radio, and it's.

A little different. In television. There's certainly more people involved. And one of the things I've all always liked about radio is that it's just a couple of people. That's it. You know, it's just you and the microphone and a couple of people with you, and that's it. But in television it's a much bigger deal, and there's a lot of people who are directing, producing, rolling video and sound and all that stuff.

But it's exciting. It's a whole new world.

It's been an education and I'm very grateful that they wanted this, and hopefully it's good and people like it and you know, we could do some more different things down the line and all that. So we'll see where it leads. But even if it is only this season, I will be eternally grateful. But hopefully it'll go ten years, Danny, and then I can retire and you know, I'll be good. But who knows, who the heck knows. We'll get out on that. Thank you guys. And again, if you're wondering, well,

We are supposed to.

Be on in Los Angeles on Sportsnet LA, which is the Dodger station. We are supposed to be on Peacock, although I'm told some of this stuff might be delayed to week two, so I'm not sure exactly. I have no idea. Much like the radio show, Danny Wright, the show, we don't know where it goes, and it goes all over the place, and we just kind of do the thing and.

Provide the content and the world lets us know where they're listening or viewing it.

Yeah, and if you do happen to watch the show, if you happen to see the show, let us know, let us know how it goes. I am such a radio loser. Have a great rest of your Friday. Thank you, thank you, thank you. And we've got a full weekend of podcasting. Danny, are you prepared for the weekend ahead? Here?

I'm ready.

All right, we'll let it rip. And thank you in advance for listening to this. I guess that would not really be advanced, Danny, right, because you've already listened, so I don't have to say in advance thank you for listening, okay, And thank you in advance for trying to find the TV show. I know it is all on also Roku, which is kind of pricey, but if you have Roku, you're going to get Benny versus the Penny. It's on there. It's part of their NBC Sports package or they have the affiliates.

You got anything going? Oh you're working? Is it double dip day for them?

Oh? Man, it's yeah. It's a busy day, but a good one because it's Friday. So I'll go in at two pm on the West coast and that's five pm on the East side, and that's for the Friday Fun Friday Show for Covino and Rich as we react to the Chiefs losing the opener last night against the Lions.

Yeah.

So, my friend Bob does radio.

One of my good radio friends, Bob Fesco, does a morning show in Kansas City, and I was busting his chops. I sent Bob the message. Actually, just this morning I sent him the message. I said, here are your topics for today in Kansas City Sports Radio. A. Andy Reid is on the hot seat. B Patrick Maholmes has turned into a pumpkin. He's lost his way. C should the Chiefs now tank for the number one pick to get Caleb Williams. I tossed that out, d how much would

And that is not hyperbole, Danny. That is not like, oh, you're just saying that you don't really believe that. No, I believe that.

I my got the stat line on that was unbelievably bad.

It was already he finished.

He had one receiving yard, negative one rushing yard, four drop passes, one of those pick six, which is gave the Lions seven points in Kansas City, lost by one.

As a Raiders fan, I have to compliment him on his performance. Great job, mister Tony. I hope he becomes the Chiefs WR one.

Yeah, well, the way he played there, he should be should be working for Uber or something like that.

My gut, all right, we'll get out, Thank you all.

We'll get you next time.

Later, skater got a murder. I gotta go