Howie Mandel: The Power of Yes and Embracing Opportunity | E127
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How do you make an hour of television of just going, "Open that one, open that one, open that one, open that one." There's no trivia, there's no skill.

There's nothing. This is a joke. This is not a game. He says, look at this. He gave me a tape. It was the Italian version of it. I just remember the guy took the offer. He took the offer on the phone and then he turned and a teardrop came down his eye before he told him what the offer was. And there was so much tension and emotion. And I showed it to my wife and she said, take the deal.

You're doing really well. Then you get free of your own shows. And like everybody, we all have disappointments in our career. All three are canceled. You're thinking about quitting the business. And then Michael Rotenberg calls you up one day, wants you to do a game show. And you basically told him, fuck no. First time I've said no. Then what happened? Well, you have to realize and put it into perspective. So this is 2005.

I went from all these stories that I just told you of doing the tonight show, selling 10,000 seats in 2005, I was playing comedy clubs again, not selling them out. You know, there's a, there's an ebb and a flow to everybody's career. Um, there's, uh,

I was on a series in the 80s and now I'm sitting in, you know, casting sessions, auditioning for five lines and under, you know, with just, it was, it was a decade since I had done really well and it was waning, you know, and I'm,

I'm financially set. I just doing it because I love doing it. I'm okay. I've done really good investments. And I said, you know what? I'm going to leave show business. I don't need this anymore. I don't need, this isn't fun. And I could still drop in two, three times a week to a comedy club. I don't need to try to sell tickets. I'll drop in. I'll do that. I don't want to kind of do, uh,

and have other people edit me and write for me. And I don't like it anymore. I don't gonna do it. And Michael calls me and says, there's a game show they want you to do. And before he even finished the sentence, I go, no. At that time in 2005, the game show,

You know, there was not hierarchies, but, you know, people who were movie stars didn't do commercials. You know, people who were soap stars didn't, I mean, people who did primetime didn't do soap operas. People who were, you know, in comedy didn't do game shows. The game show host was, you know, when your currency is irony, game show host was the punchline, you know? Not that I'm not, I like game, but I didn't want to be comedy.

a game show host. That seemed like the lowest rung. I'd rather just continue in what I was doing in real life. I'd rather just deal in real estate and have fun and do my standup. I don't have to be a game show. And being a game show host and standing there with a card and reading trivia questions, I'm going to be the laughingstock of, you know,

the world in show business. So I don't want to do it. So I said, no. And he calls me back and he goes, no, this is big. This is a show that's playing all over the world. It's a very big show. And NBC is going to take a big swing at it. They're going to put it on primetime.

And it'll be on five nights a week. So I go, fuck no, no way. Now I'm going to be humiliated nationally five times a week. I'm not going to do a game show. I just don't want to do that. That's going to put a nail into the coffin of my career. If I ever want to do standup again, I'm going to be a joke. And think about it. No other comedian that you could think of before 2005 is on TV doing it. Not since 2005.

In the 50s, you know, people like Groucho Marx did You Bet Your Life, but they weren't doing, you didn't see comedians. I mean, the closest thing to that was a Regis Philbin doing Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, but he's not a comedian, he's a host. So that was, you know, and that's why NBC wanted to take a stab at a big primetime game show because of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. Michael calls me back again and says, you know what?

Well, you just hear them out. They say they can't do it without you. I go, okay, I'm at Jerry's Deli in the Valley. If you send the guy out, he can come pitch me at my table. I'm not going to go to a meeting. And I showed you the card in there. This guy shows up. Rob Smith. Rob Smith from Endemol. He shows up and he's got that card, which I have framed in this office. He's got a card. It doesn't even, he didn't even go to Kinko's. It's not even cut straight. He did it. And he's got these 26 cards.

little square pieces of paper with amounts of money on them. And he goes, pick one, you know, and I pick one and he goes, you're trying to pick the million. Don't look at it. And now we're going to see what's in yours by opening up all the others, you know, and then we're just sitting at the table and I'm going, okay, number six, number nine, which now I think I'm being punked because how do you make an hour of television of just going open that one, open that one, open that one.

Open that one. There's no trivia. There's no skill. There's nothing. This is a joke. This is not a game. This is not really. And I, I, he says, look at this. And I, he gave me a tape and it was the Italian version. It was all over the world. It was the Italian version of it. And I didn't understand the game, but I knew that if you would open up the big numbers and there was less of a chance of you having the million that the offers would go down.

Okay. So, so I just remember that the guy took the offer. He took the offer on the phone and then, and then he turned and a teardrop came down the, the, the host, a teardrop came down his eye before he told him what the offer was. And there was so much tension and emotion. And I showed it to my wife and she said, take the deal. She said, Howie, you're miserable. I wasn't in a depression. I wasn't really, uh,

being asked to work anywhere and I wasn't busy enough. And my life was, financially I was okay, you know, I'm making investments, but that's not, that doesn't really take up your day. It doesn't keep you in the now. It doesn't, you know, she goes, just take the deal. So I thought, okay, I called them and I said, I'll do it. When does it start? And they said, Monday. I said, well, don't you have to build a set? They said, it's built. I said, well, don't you need to cast all the

They go, they're here. How far down the fucking list was I that they had cast everybody? How many people had said no? And the truth is everybody had said no. Ellen said no. Ellen said no, yes. I know a lot of people that said no. So anyway, I took the deal. And then I thought, I said, can I hire one of my friends to write comedy? I think if I'm going to be on...

At least I could be funny. There's nothing to do. All I have to do, there's no trivia questions. There's nothing to read. All I have to do is say, pick a case and then open the case and then listen on the phone to the banker. Like I don't have anything to do. So maybe I can write some funny comedy and they go, go ahead. And they let me hire writers. And I came back.

you know loaded with material for monday morning and i walked out the first contestant i have a picture here it was karen van i'll never forget i did over 500 episodes but it's karen van and i said what's your name she's karen van i have three kids she's a single mother she doesn't have health insurance she's never owned a home and then it became real i'm sitting here like i'm sitting with you i looked in her eyes and you know first and foremost yes i'm a comedian

but I'm a human being and I'm a father and I'm a husband. And I got so scared. She was looking, I saw this blank look on her face and she hadn't been in this world before. She's in Hollywood and there's 300 people in the audience and all these lights pointed at her and all these cameras. She was,

I was so afraid that I would distract her because the first time, I remember the first offer was something like $15,000. She goes, "No deal." And she's having so much fun. And I thought, you just said no deal to $15,000. You're not from LA or New York.

$15,000 will buy you health insurance, more than health insurance. $15,000 is probably enough to start a down payment on a condo. You can own a home. $15,000 is probably five times more than what you have in the bank. $15,000 is for nothing.

for nothing. You are taking a chance. There's no strategy to get that million. That is 100% luck. I just said to you, will you take $15,000? And you just threw it away. So I started talking to her. I threw away all the comedy. And all I wanted to do is I talked to her. I wanted her and every other contestant to leave better off than how they had come there. And I would look them in the eye and I would talk to them like I would talk to my five-year-old kid. And I

And I would say, you know, Karen Venn, you have to open up another four cases if you say no deal. But right now, the offer is $25,000. Listen to me, Karen, $25,000, 10 times what you made last year.

enough to buy a home. Those three children are sitting there, enough to do, you know, for a chance, for a chance at $1 million, a guarantee of $25,000.

or no deal. You know, Saturday Night Live started making fun of me because I would talk so slow and I just wanted to make the point. I wanted them to, it was so, the biggest skill set that I had there was not to throttle somebody who was making ridiculous, you know, I'm not a gambler. I don't gamble.

who was making, anyway, I finished the show. I did five episodes and I was so embarrassed because I hadn't done any comedy. I hadn't played it. Well, go back because she didn't take it and got zero. No, that's not true. She got five. She ended up getting $5,000. And when we returned to her years later, we went back to find out what people had done with their money and how their life had changed. She had got her breasts done. So she made a mountain out of a molehill. But the point was that I, after I had,

shot all five episodes.

I was so embarrassed because it was the first time in my life, in my career where I wasn't playing a character. I wasn't doing standup. I wasn't doing anything funny. I was just being Howie. And I, it was going to air over the Christmas week. I packed my bags, took my family. We went out to the Caribbean. I went state. I was on Tortola, which is an Island out in the Caribbean. And I didn't have TV and I didn't have internet. And I just thought this is going to be disastrous. I just don't want to be on the continent.

And Rob called me that Tuesday morning after the first one aired and I thought, "Oh, this is it." He goes, "You're not gonna believe it." I go, "I figured it out already," thinking he was gonna give me the bad news. It went through the roof, people loved it. And then he called me the next day, it was even bigger. The next day and then at the end of the week, 100 million people had watched "Deal or No Deal." And it's probably one of the biggest game show phenomenons in the history of television to this day. - I love that show. It's "The Human Condition."

It's greed. It's risk. It was heart-wrenching to watch, Dave. The American Dream was your next talk show, America's Got Talent, which is all these people going up. It's a talent show. In January 2005, you took over from David Hasselhoff. And tell us about that show because I... That was a hard one. So that one, my buddy Jeff Gaspin, who was the president of NBC, I'd finished on...

a deal or no deal. And he said, would you like to be a judge? And I went, okay, you know, I'll do it. Yes.

I was back to my yeses again, not knowing what that was. And knowing the show, I watched the show from incessantly. I watch everything. I live, I have a fear of missing out. We talked about this before we went on the air. I'm on social media every minute, every platform all day long and all night. I sleep very little. I'd watched every episode of America's Got Talent because I think I'm fascinated by anybody who will get up in front of other people and-

do whatever they do. I watch TV, even when it's not in English, I don't understand what they're doing, but I, I'm just fascinated by humanity. And so I said, yes. And then it was really interesting to me because that didn't seem, that didn't seem like a job. It didn't seem like I was there to do anything. You know, I was there. I jokingly say to people, you know, it's like the only difference between having the job and not having the job I'm doing what

everybody's doing at home in their underpants in front of their TV. You know, they're watching the show and then commenting on what they thought. And I didn't think that's a job. You know, it doesn't seem like a job. It seems like I'm just a viewer. But obviously I came to realize that, listen, at that point, I come with a point of view and a point of experience where I've been in this job in different facets of life.

show business in, in, you know, whether it be acting or performing standup or producing or do. So I have something to offer. What was really hard is looking in the, in the way that I was empathetic toward Karen van, I'm empathetic toward anybody I see in person. And it's really hard in person to look at somebody and,

and be brutally honest in, it was hard on, on so many levels as somebody who is on stage and on TV, you know, when I first joined the show, they would, we would travel the show. So it'd be everybody in Dallas. So it was, it was their own, whether it was good or bad, they loved the little girl from Dallas. So if I said I didn't get it, I would be booed

tremendously because they wanted their Dallas kid to be the winner. It was really hard to be paid to say things where that live audience there wanted to hate you. You know, even if they agreed with you, they wanted to hate you. That was really hard. And then it was more importantly hard to be, I want to be constructive. I want to give you

I want to tell you what I legitimately think and how I feel. And I want you to know that what I legitimately think and how I feel doesn't necessarily make, make or break you. It doesn't, you don't have to cater to my needs. And I may have a totally different opinion than the other three people here. And not only that, I may have a totally different opinion than the millions who are watching and are going to vote. What I'm paid to do is,

is be honest and authentic. And anytime I've been honest and authentic in my career, whether it's my standup going, okay, okay, I'm terrified and I don't know what to do. Or, you know, I'll be honest, your song didn't resonate with me, but that doesn't mean that millions and millions of other people aren't going to like you today, especially today. You know, there are people, we're in LA, there are people

playing at the Forum, which is one of our big arenas and venues, whose name I don't even know. You know, entertainment is very siloed now, even more than ever, because it's digital. There was a time when I was growing up where if they were playing the Forum or the Coliseum, even if I didn't like them and I didn't buy your albums and I don't like, I know your name. Today, I don't have to know your name for you to garner a huge audience. So by the same token, and that's what I preface, but it's really hard, especially if somebody's young or they're a kid, to be

critical. But I don't think I'm critical as much as I'm honest. You know, for me, sometimes I didn't get it or I don't, it didn't move me or I don't tap my foot to that or I don't get that kind of music, you know, or, but I'm being honest with you, but that doesn't mean that Simon doesn't like it or Heidi doesn't like it or this whole audience didn't give you a standing ovation. That was the hardest part. That's still the hardest part of that show. But I find that

for the most part, if I'm honest and authentic, I think the majority of people appreciate that.

In fact, the majority of people don't even watch or know the show exists. The majority of people, even when I sell out two shows at, at radio city music hall in New York, and that's 10,000 people, there's 9,890,000 people in that city that don't give a shit and didn't come and probably don't even know I'm there. So the majority of people don't know me, don't like me, don't agree with me. And when you understand that and you're okay with that, you can only be true to yourself and,

You have to be responsible for yourself. And that's how I run everything now. My own business, my show business, my performances, everything I do, I control and I serve myself. 19 years on that show. What's your favorite moment? There's still the one to come. My favorite moment is not knowing what's going to happen.

I don't have a favorite moment. I have a favorite. I have a lot of favorite moments. You know, I loved seeing V Unbeatable, Courtney Hadwin, which is a 13 year old little girl who came out of nowhere. She was like the second coming of Janice Joplin. You know, there's so many moments. There are so many great moments. Also, it's just this fantastic,

feel this patina of another human being 25 feet in front of me who has a hope and a dream, does something, spends two minutes, and you can feel it. I know it comes off on TV, but even more in the room, you could feel that their life is not going to be the same ever again. And I'm there witnessing that. Who's your favorite performer of all time on the show?

I don't have one. I don't have a favorite performer. I love everything. I don't have, there's no one thing. And that's the beauty of, you know, our show, as opposed to like something like American Idol, you can go, who's your favorite singer? But how do you compare a singer with a group of 30 people from India who have been working in the streets and doing death defying tosses and flips and dances and choreography? How do you say, I like that better than that? It's not,

You know, what's your favorite food when you go to Ralph's or Whole Foods? What's your favorite thing in the store? I love that. And I love that about the world. I love there is so much. There is so much. And if you look at how I run my life and my business, there is so much. You're sitting here in my warehouse today.

And, you know, I love sitting at this table doing my podcast with my daughter. I love doing stand-up comedy. I love that I have connections with people on social media and then they end up under the same roof as me. There's no one thing. I love that we are this veritable cornucopia of, you know, life, you know? I just love life. I love the moment that I'm in.

You've become a great spokesperson for mental health, a great role model. Tell us about the Howard Stern show and Robin looking at this red band on your arm. And then tell us about the stranger on the street and what that person said to you. I don't remember what the red, I don't know that reference to the red band, but I do know that I was on Howard Stern after I was diagnosed and I was doing the show. It's on my, in my book. Uh, I wrote about the fact that I, uh,

And I was in the studio talking to him and there was another guy in the studio who left before me and he went to open the door. And then like my mother did on the crib, I noticed the door didn't want to touch the door because he had been, his hands were filthy. And so when I got up and finished my part of the interview, I asked somebody to open the door for me.

and I was open, I said, "I don't want to touch it 'cause it's dirty." They go, "Open it." And I said, "No." And then I went to grab a tissue, they knocked the tissue out of the way. As it turned out, I started to have an anxiety attack. And I said, "You gotta let me out." I couldn't breathe and I thought I was gonna die. And then I said to Howard, who is a friend, I said, "Howard, I have something called obsessive compulsive disorder. I've been diagnosed, I'm on medication. If you don't open the door for me, you're gonna have to call 911."

And they got up and they opened the door for me. And when I walked out through the other side of the door in the hall, I could hear that they were still on the air. And I thought I was in a commercial break. So I didn't think I was sharing this with the world. And I was devastated because now I had told the world that I have a mental health problem that I had been diagnosed with and I was medicated. And I thought first and foremost, my family,

this is a national show. My family is going to be embarrassed. How are my kids going to go to school the next day when their dad just said he's, he's got a mental health problem. How am I going to get another job? Why would anybody give me, you know, any production is worth millions of dollars. Why would they put me in something where they're going to be spending the money when I've just told everybody that I'm medicated and I see a psychiatrist. So I thought the best

case scenarios, I'll probably just walk out onto the street into traffic and I don't know how to end. I don't know how to cope with what I've just done. And I walked out onto the street in New York, the busiest street in the world, and I've never felt more alone. And the traffic is teeming and I'm just sitting there staring at the traffic. And in my periphery, a guy comes up and

to my side and says, are you Howie Mandel? And I said, yeah. And he goes, I just heard you and Howard. And my heart just dropped in my stomach thinking I'm just going to run out into traffic. And he said, me too. And I went, what? And he goes, me too. I have...

the same issue as you and thank you for talking about it. That was so comforting. And that was like the, the lifesaver for me because I thought, Oh my God, you know, I'm not alone. And you know, this is before the internet on the internet probably existed, but before it was known to people and that was the first person. And then when I got home, I was every day, I was getting tons and tons of mail letters and people saying that it was really, um,

and helpful and wonderful that I had talked about it. And they were also, they knew somebody, they were suffering the same way they had it.

And that's when I realized, oh my God, the answer is not keeping this to yourself. You have to talk about it. And the stigma is the most dangerous thing in the world. And from that day on, I've done nothing but talk about it. And I went and spoke on Capitol Hill about insurance companies parroting the amount of money and

that they put into physical health with mental health. I partnered with a company called NoCD, which is an app where people can just be wherever you are. You can just look at your phone, download this app and make an appointment to get diagnosed or even treated. And it's all affordable. And wherever I can talk about, you know, mental health, it's, I know that hopefully there's somebody out there who doesn't know where to turn, but the turn is,

to talk about it, even if it's with a family member, a caregiver, and they don't all have the answers. And they probably, a lot of them won't respond, but to keep talking about it, there is no answer. It's just like, let's just take care of our mental health the way we take care of our dental health and we'd be a better, more productive society. I want to switch gears and talk about the business of comedy.

So most comedians don't make anything. They get up there, they get a free drink ticket maybe. If you're a good comedian, you may make $1,000 every two weeks, something like that. The average comedian, according to what I read online, makes under $30,000 a year and needs a second job. What's your message to everybody out there that wants to be a professional comedian and make it?

I don't think it's for, I think it goes for everything. And Nike is the one that has the answer for that. And that's just do it. And I always say to the people who ask about, well, first of all, making it for me, my definition of making it or success is happiness or is to find something in life that you're excited about. If you're excited to get up, you know, even if I was a janitor,

And there's nothing wrong with being a janitor. But if that was my job and that's how I was paying my rent, if I could go to a club two times a week and do a set or even one time a week, I feel like I made it. I feel like too many people in this world don't have any joy, any fun, any

Wednesday is considered hump day because the connotation is you're halfway through a week of doing all the shit you don't want to do to get to the weekend, not to do something you want to do, just to do nothing, just to not do the shit you don't want to do. Most people are spending time doing what they don't want to do. So success is finding something in life that you're excited about. Life is really short.

There's no, I'll take anybody to a graveyard. You point out the richest guy in the graveyard. We all have the same amount. Our wallets are all worth the exact same at the beginning and at the end. So if you want to find, you've got to find joy, that's success. So I love standup comedy. I made it. What I, what I, and the day that I found success was April 19th, 1978. You know, that the day that I got on stage and I found that swaddle, that's making it, making money, making money.

doing something that'll ultimately pay the rent is about just doing it. I always say to the difference between Elon Musk and you, and I'm talking to the listener or Jeff Bezos and you is they did it and they kept doing it and they didn't stop doing it. That's the only difference. Not that there, I believe that we all have it within us. If we want it, if we need it to lock ourselves in a garage and, and,

Find something that you're passionate about with all the no's and all the obstacles and all the toughness and everything that's against you.

If you can get past that and just do it because you believe in it and you want to do it, it'll work for you. It will always work for you. And if you look at all the people that were on stage when I showed up at Yuck Yucks or showed up at the comedy store, there are so many people that are funnier than me, that are more talented than me, that have more to offer than me. And you know why you don't know them? Because they don't do it anymore. Because they've been said no to.

So many times, and I can't tell you how many times even this week I am said no to, because I just keep, you know, curiosity is my fuel and I'm always interested and I always want to try things and I always want to do things. But all the things that I try, you can't believe how many people say no to me all the time, every day. But no is not if you want to be a boxer, right?

That's like saying, I want to be a boxer, but I never want to get hit. Well, you're always going to get hit. And life is like a boxing match. And if you can't get hit and you can't fall down and you decide you don't want to keep getting up, you just want to walk out of the ring. Most people walk out of the ring of whatever it is they've decided to put themselves up against. And I continue to be in the ring forever.

And nobody is more surprised and thrilled and excited to be doing what I'm doing each and every day than I am. And being invited to the party and having somebody like you saying, hey, can we talk to you? And what I can say from my perspective now is that works for me. I don't know another way, but I realize I'm cognizant enough to understand that the fact that I said yes to whatever I said yes to,

works its way into my life, into my business, into whatever. Maybe because I said yes to you, maybe you will be an investor in Proto and maybe Proto will be the biggest form of communication in e-commerce to come because of you're the final investor in it and you take it over that hump. I don't know why, but that would be because I said yes to a podcast, you know, that has nothing to do-

I've been a huge fan, as you know, and I emailed you at 7 o'clock at night. I don't know. We found your email. Matt Hickerson, my producer, found all these emails. I mean, he's incredible. And you wrote me back an hour later and said, I'd love to do it. I'm just some dude off the street. You don't know me. I don't know you. But I always say yes, but I don't know. Incredible. And what's the worst case scenario? What's the worst case scenario? What's the...

Nobody here, like, I don't know what the worst case scenario is. Well, the worst case is you walk off my show like Dana White walked off your show. But so Dana White walks off my show and that's one of the biggest episodes I have. Right. You know, so like, even from bad, you gotta, it's all a perspective. Life is a perspective. Life is a game and this game is worth playing. And we people make decisions in their time on this earth to stop playing.

If you want to play, and that's how you should look at it, if you want to play, it's hard. You'll get tired. You'll get blocked. You'll get scored on. You'll get defeated. But when you want to stop playing, you stop playing. And there's nothing wrong with that. Everybody decides at a certain point they want to stop playing. I'm having fun playing, and I'm enjoying the game. And I don't think I'm better than anybody. I don't think I have more than anybody else to offer. I just think that whatever it is,

uh, is this need to play this need, this insatiable need to play, to know, to engage, you know, I, uh, I'm doing a lot in the digital space now in as far as, you know, a lot of it is media. But the thing was, you know, my, my son who built this studio that we're sitting in, my son showed me YouTube about 20 some odd years ago. And I saw something that had a hundred million clicks on it. And I was reading the, uh,

The comments and everybody was saying, this is hysterical. This is the funniest thing I ever saw. And I'm a comedian and I didn't, being honest with you, I didn't get it. I didn't think it was funny. I didn't know why it was funny. I didn't get why a hundred million people

We're on this and sharing it and whatever. But that drove me to say, okay, so now what it is, it's like I flew to Italy. I don't speak this language, but I want to learn this language and I like this. How do I engage these people? How are they able, how can I make this hundred million people laugh? How can I do that? And that's what I spend my time doing, just figuring out how do I unlock it? That's the game. How do I unlock it? What do I land on so that they land on me?

So I'm on every fucking platform. I'm saying yes to everything. I'm just out there playing. I appreciate you coming and engaging me in a game of whatever this is. I don't know what it is. I don't know what it leads to. I don't know who hears this. I don't know what this is.

but I don't analyze it. I just kind of play it. It's kind of fun. It is fun. You know, you're talking to the kid that was never invited anywhere. You're talking to the kid who, if you, if I wanted to talk to somebody, I had to stand in a girl's bathroom and brush my hair. Nobody wanted to talk to me. You're talking to the guy who everybody wanted to run away from because they thought I ate shit. You're talking to the guy who, you know, and now you're asking me questions about my life.

You're talking to the guy who was, after they said ladies and gentlemen, Howie Mandel was absolutely terrified and people started laughing at my terror, but I'm okay with that. So then I figured out how do I use my terror was my card, it was my currency in this game. And then I understand authenticity and I understand reality and I understand that we're all human and we're all different and nobody is like me and nobody's like you and nobody's like anybody who's listening. And if you could create that,

If you can, you know, I'm working with a company now, Skechers. One of the most fascinating people I ever met is a guy by the name of Robert Greenberg who started Skechers in 1992. It's now the number three company.

shoe apparel company in the world. They've gone like this as well. Well, they just, you should see him. He is taking off. I was just talking to him the other day. He's one of the most fascinating people that I love to hang with and talk to, just as a human being. He's going to take over the fucking world if he has long enough. He's 84 years old. He shows up every day. He's involved in every aspect of it. I want to be Robert Greenberg. Let's talk about the dichotomy between comedy and tragedy.

There isn't much of a difference. You know, for me, comedy is tragedy. You know, comedy is, laughter for me is the panacea, so I'm not crying. And if you look at the two masks, you know, it's laughter and tragedy. But if you look at what a joke is, a joke and what you're laughing at is the misfortune of something else. Whether you're a little kid and you're at the circus and you're laughing at the clown falling down, you're laughing at their misfortune. If you're listening to a joke,

A joke is really about something bad, embarrassing or awkward happening. If two people walk into a bar, if they just walk in a bar and have a drink, it's not a joke. If they walk into a bar and something horrible happens to one of them, then it's a joke. Jokes are always based in tragedy. Always. There's no such thing as too soon. I think our, our,

right now, people are really sensitive. I don't think there's too soon. I don't think there's people should be canceled for comedy. I think you're taking away an art form and freedom of speech, but it's always based in, there's a story I tell in my book. That's not my story. It's, uh, it was told to me by, um, the director, uh, Blake Edwards, or a,

A guy who's suffering incredible depression, who is virtually suicidal, is going to the psychiatrist and the psychiatrist can't help him. The psychiatrist gives him drugs. It doesn't work. Gives him therapy, verbal therapy. It doesn't work. Tries hypnosis. It doesn't work. And he goes for the last time to the psychiatrist and he can't even sit in the chair. He's in the fetal position in tears in the corner of the office. And he's crying and he goes, I just wanted to say thank you.

to the psychiatrist, I just want to say thank you. And I know you've done all you could possibly do, but I can't, I can't live another day. And I just wanted to say thank you. And the psychiatrist says, wait, wait, wait, wait, before you end it all, just one more thing. I just want you to try one more thing. They say laughter is the best medicine. Today, Bafo the clown is in town with the circus. If you'll just give me one more shot, if you will just let me take you to see Bafo. Bafo has,

got a world renowned reputation for being able to make anybody laugh. Everybody laughs at the most, at the toughest times he will make people, people have died laughing. People have died, but you know, when you laugh, it creates an endorphin. There's something that is released that can remedy depression and anxiety and all this. If you'll just let me take you to see the clown.

the clown that makes men, women, and children, English speaking, every culture laugh. If you'll just allow me one more chance before you end it, will you do that? And the guy in the fetal position, through his tears, he sits up and he looks at the psychiatrist and he says,

I am Bafo. I want to switch gears again and talk about what it takes to be successful. One of the things that has made me successful is something I call extreme preparation. I'm writing a book by the same title, and I always want to be the most prepared person in the room. Has extreme preparation been important in your career? I read at the beginning you didn't prepare, and now I hear you going out at midnight to run a new skit by five people. So...

You know, we have very different philosophies, but for me, it isn't preparation. For me, and I'm not knocking preparation. I'm just saying that I believe as a species, humanity, instinct is our gold. And we know, we know what is good. We know instinctually what'll work. We know what we want and we know what we need.

I think the biggest issue that people have, and this may not apply to you, but I think it applies to a lot of people is overthinking. And I think that thinking is the problem. I think that thinking, when you start thinking about it, you can give yourself a million reasons not to do things like, and I'll give you my personal examples. If somebody said you should get up on stage, if,

Why should I? I don't want to be a comedian. There's no future. There's nobody. I have no connections in show business. What are the chances? It's ridiculous. I'm already making money and have a very comfortable life in sales, in retail. I'm engaged to be married.

You know, I'm about to take on the responsibility of a wife and a family. Why would I give up everything and do that? I mean, if you think about it, it's not what, if I want to be prepared for my life, I should not do that. By the same token, when I did think about preparing, I should not, when I did think about what it meant to be a game show host, that's when I said no.

When I didn't think, and my wife said, just do it, that was the most success I had in my life. I think just do it. If you think about Steve Jobs, was he prepared? I mean, he didn't, even the thought of what he was doing is ridiculous. IBM already existed. When you put yourself in that perspective, what is the value in creating what already existed, a computer, and

That is a little more expensive. And it's something that, why does, this is hard to kind of articulate after the fact, but what does everybody need a computer for? Like who's gonna, at that time, I didn't need a computer in my life. I was doing good without a computer. I didn't need a computer. So when you think about it, it's just that these people, I think for most people,

I see how preparation helps, but I think that people are their own worst enemies. And I think that hearkening back to, I like Skechers better than I like Nikes, but Nikes just do it phrase is how I think has worked for me. And I think that so many people are at a point in their life when they go, shoulda, coulda, woulda, and...

that's because they thought about it because they were preparing, you know, even this, I'm doing really good right now in this environment. When, when, when deal or no deal took off, they offered me a production deal. So they were paying my overhead. You know, I had a staff and I was on a lot in universal, but I felt like I was throwing a party at my parents' house. You know, it wasn't good. I ended up buying my own buildings and inviting my own people. I don't want to,

call a desk or to let somebody through the gate or have to, if I have an idea, I don't want to have to say, hey, there's a union and I got to rent out a soundstage and then I got to go get a camera and hire a whole crew. I just want a place. I have all the equipment I want here that I can have. If I have an idea, I can go to the next room and shoot it right now. And we do that.

And we've had people in this place. They launched, Logan Paul was in here and launched the prime energy drink with KSI in here. We shot that. This is where he does his, his podcast when he's not in, in Puerto Rico, everything from, you know, whether it's technology, music, drinks, whatever, it's just this hodgepodge of just fun. But that doesn't mean that we don't need people like you who are,

brilliantly maybe myopic in their preparation to just maybe the answer there is I'm going to do it. I'm not going to find the, maybe in the preparation, this, this may not work. This won't work. This might work. This won't work. This is what I need. This is what I need. This is what I need. I think my mind is a little too frail to think. So if I just say yes, without thought and work and do my best in the moment, for me, it's about now.

I can't think about what happened because I can't change anything that happened. And I can't think about what might happen because that doesn't exist. Nothing might happen. I don't know what tomorrow is. I don't know what tomorrow brings. There's too many other factors that could change what tomorrow is. I can only think of what I am doing and how I'm doing it right now. So I try to make this moment the most productive moment

fruitful moment I can make in my life. You've talked about luck as part of success. Luck is not a good thing to put into a business plan when you're hoping to create a business, but isn't it, is it, I mean, by virtue, is it like, it's kind of like if you're betting, I'm not a, I'm not a, um,

I'm not a gambler. Neither am I. Okay. But taking that as an analogy for business is if there is a way to cover red and black at the same time so that you're running a safer stream, is that not...

Is that not like, how do you, I don't know what the word luck means, but I think we make our luck. - 100%. - And I think that we make our, you know, so then, you know, it's semantics and maybe I'm just talking about semantics and maybe I do prepare, you know, like, I mean, I showed up today, so that's preparation.

You know, all this stuff that is being, the way we are recording this, that's preparation. The way we're lit is preparation. So maybe I'm not aware of what I'm doing, but it's part of like, I'll just do it and I'll just do it and have it. And I did this and had it without knowing that I'd ever meet you. So how does that work? Is that luck? Is that preparation? What is that? I don't know what it is, but it's just a stream of existence. Yeah.

It's the greatest moment of your life. This is. Yeah. Right now it is. Yeah. It is. It's the only one that's real because the other ones are just my perception of what happened. It may seem better than it was. And I don't know what tomorrow brings. So right now is the greatest moment of my life. I'm honored by that. You've also said that pushing the envelope is very important in our success. How important is it for a comic? And then how important is it to create a business and a life itself?

I think without being that cognizant of pushing, just doing, you know, the, I've talked about this before, but my inspiration is,

for comedy and the way I run my life was Richard Pryor. And when I came out here, Richard Pryor was putting together Life on the Sunset Strip, which is probably one of the most seminal comedy concerts in existence. And you wouldn't have a Chappelle or me or anybody without that. And what was interesting about him is he was on a path, if you know anything about Richard Pryor, he was on a path to be the next Bill Cosby. And I don't mean

having sex with women who were pre-built copies 1.0 yeah and then he realized i can't do this and when he was putting together live on the sunset strip he had a uh still had a bandage on his neck because he almost died freebasing he was a burn victim and it was big news and this late 70s early 80s and i went to watch him every night at the comedy store and what was interesting my

recollection of what stand-up comedy was was people like George Carlin and Rodney Dangerfield and they for all intents and purposes put together an act and they had it's like writing a song they had they had an act you know they had a joke that they wrote and when you listen to um

Richard Pryor, he was talking about real things. He was talking about like, he talked about his burn and he made the jokes about drug use. And I don't know if you know his background, but he was raised in a brothel, you know, and, and by his grandmother and he's had really tumultuous relationships and, uh,

drug use and all this. And he turned this stuff, which he had referenced through, they weren't jokes. He did characters and stories. And I thought, wow,

And if you listen to me or watch me, you wouldn't see an inkling of what Richard Pryor was, but you will see it made me comfortable with authenticity. It made me comfortable to when I was scared, I was going to go, okay, okay, okay. I can't think of anything. And that was my thing. I can't think of anything. And that was real. And I wasn't making it up. And I, I don't know what you want to do next. And by the same token, when I show up at a, at a comedy club in the middle of, of, you know, and four people are sitting there in the rain, I,

And I can act like this is a, you know, I can call it for what it is. Here I am at this point in my career in front of four people who don't give a shit about me. This is like a really bad Netflix special, you know, like whatever it is, the authenticity and reality and keeping it real. That's what I learned there. And that's what I continue to do. And that's what I strive for. And that's what I celebrate each and every moment of my life, keeping it real. If you keep it real, you're,

I'm real, I'm a human, and so is everybody else. And then I find, if you call it success, in people relating to it, wanting to be part of it, they understand reality. They understand, and when you're investing in your business,

If you find the people that you talk to who are the most successful, they invested in things that they thought were kind of cool, that they liked, that they needed, that they understand it, that they wanted to be part of. The things that are most successful in business are the things that we all use, the things we all love.

You know, when you talk about companies like Lyft and Uber, you know, why do we have to wait for a fucking cab when everybody's driving a car? Half the time their car is empty. Why don't they just give us a ride? And not only that, you get a ride and they out of business. It's kind of simple. Why didn't somebody think of that? You know what I mean? It's not brilliant. It's real. It's authentic. It's the every man. You don't need a college education to understand what that fucking business is. You don't, you know?

Let's talk about something that came up in my research that I've never heard before as part of our success, which is stability. You've had the same manager, Michael Rotenberg, I think since you were 14 years old. You've been married to your wife now almost 50 years. She's been a part of your business. Mm-hmm.

We live in LA where things are really crazy at times and people are switching and managers and who's giving you the best deal. Again, in life, it's the same thing. It has nothing to do. My theory is the same with everything. When you ask me about comedians who didn't make it or anybody that didn't make it,

They stopped. They gave up. It's hard. Life is hard. Friendship is hard. Marriage is hard. Parenting is hard. If you're willing to just do it, even when it's not great, even when it's not so my, these people are my, my wife of 44 years has been my stability has been my partner has been my cheerleader.

has been my threat that it was going to be over if I didn't get help, has been there for the good, the bad, the hard. I think that we as humans have a tendency to go for complacency and comfort. And complacency and comfort is the opposite of success in anything, whether it's your relationships, whether it's your business, whether it's everything. We give everything.

trophies for participating. You're not a winner. You just showed up. So I think people give up on their marriages. They give up on their businesses. They give up on their relationships. They give up on their friends. They just give up. They just give up on everything. You look at the average, they give up on curiosity. When you're young,

You want to, and vibrant, you want to know what the next hit song is. And you want to listen, we want to know what everybody's listening to. You want to know what the next sneaker you should wear. And you want that sneaker because everybody has this. Then you reach a certain age where you don't even want to listen to the next, you don't want to know what the next song is. You don't want to know what, you know, we stay with our haircut, we stay with our style. And then we tell young people who are coming up, you don't know music.

You know what good music is? I had good music. Well, no, you didn't have good music. You have music that was good for you at that time. This is a flowing river. Life, business, relationships is a flowing river. At a certain point, we decide we're too tired to go with the flow. We hang on to a little branch on the side and we watch the world go by. And then we tell them it was good back there. No, it's good if you keep going. I'm not knocking anybody that stops.

But that's the difference in relationships, in business, in life. You can go with the flow or just stop. It's easier to stop. That's why I don't understand retirement. People stop. They're tired. You can stop. I don't feel like stopping. We're getting towards the end of this show and I want to talk about technology. This is the longest show I've ever been on.

How long is this show? - Well, hopefully you've been having a great time. - I have, I'm a huge fan of mine. I listen to everything I do. - I love it. Hopefully you're gonna tell me you're a huge fan of mine too. - Now I am, I didn't know you before today. - I greatly appreciate that. It means a lot to me, sincerely. You're doing a lot in technology. I grew up and made money in technology. Tell us what you're doing about

and AI, and you can talk about your wife getting a little mad at you for something that you were doing and licensing your image. - Oh, well, so there's this company called Proto, which I sit on the board of, and you saw it on the way in. - By the way, which is one of the most amazing, I've seen a lot, but when we were walking around for 20 minutes before the show, I was completely blown off my chair. - Well, I'll show you more after. But okay, so I saw this company, I live online on every platform.

you know, watching gamers, watching technology, watching entertainment, watching fashion, watching, cause I'm just fascinated by what engages people. And I saw, uh, David Nussbaum, who, uh,

created this thing called Proto. He was with the company originally that put Tupac at Coachella. But that, I don't know if you know anything about that. That's something called Pepper's Ghost. And Pepper's Ghost is just the ability to project onto an opaque screen. So if you go to Disneyland and you go to the haunted house, you see the ghost there and then there's a lit set behind it and-

Your eyes kind of meld those things together. He said, how can I take an image and project in real time? And I don't have to set up a whole scene and it doesn't have to be a nighttime concert. How can I bring information in real time anywhere to any amount of people? And he created this thing called Proto. And I said to him, I DMed him and I said, how can I be part of this? And I wasn't talking about

you know, investing. I wasn't talking about being a partner. I just thought I'm fascinated by the way things do are done. And I said to him, this reminds me of when I got my first Apple phone.

And when I got the Apple phone, I said, this is a cool phone. But then, and I didn't know anything about it. I bought it because it was cool and everybody was buying it. And then I said, oh my God, this can hold all my music. I don't have to buy a Walkman anymore. I don't have to buy, I don't have another device. I can have all my music in here.

And oh my God, I can text you. I can message you and communicate with you without even a phone call. But not only that, this is like my computer. So I can do my work. The last thing I do on my iPhone is make a phone call. I don't make phone calls anymore. I just do my work, have my media, do my learning. That's where I found you on my iPhone. I think that you have just created the most fascinating thing

technical canvas that remains to be explored. And if I can offer you anything, just because I have a little bit of a voice, maybe I can just be content for you. I don't want any money. I just want to be, I just want to witness this. I just want to see this use me as the voice inside it. So we became friends. This became the head office. I invested in it. I sit on the board, but I believe that,

that we are on the cusp of something incredibly amazing because you understand what a hologram is. So I can, I can stand here and on my end, all I need is 4k. So all I need is my phone. I could take my phone. Essentially Proto is a software company, so they have an app that,

So I could take my phone, record myself. It'll rotoscope out everything behind me and create the image, a 3D image of me with a shadow behind me. And then wherever they have photos,

these, this piece of technology, which is incredibly affordable, everything from $6,000 to $60,000, depending on what size you want, what you want and what you need. So everybody, mostly everybody can afford to have them. And that's what I think. I think they need to be ubiquitous. I think that needs to be, it's a touchscreen. So whether you're there and you want to do your banking,

And then you have a screen that just gives you everything you need and you interact with that screen. Whether you need to talk to somebody in person, think of telehealth, teaching, informing, corporate meetings or whatever, you can be there. And this is Zoom on steroids.

Whether you need to do e-commerce where, and I'll show you that on the outside, you put three together and you have a car on the screen, a three-dimensional full-size car where Elon Musk was brilliant enough to market the Tesla by putting it into malls. So he had that traffic. He doesn't need a dealership per se. The,

This is a dealership, so I can stand there and I can touch the screen and change the rims and the color and the interior. And right there, while I'm on screen, I can scan it and buy it.

I can buy it. So I can do everything that you, and I see that people, we partnered with Christie's who sells art and belongings. They did $1.5 billion in auctions off of that imagery. That just shows you how good that imagery is. If you're gonna spend $40 million on a sculpture,

They used to have to take that sculpture, number one, and fly it to a location. So that would take, you know, that's your carbon footprint and just flying that and, you know, in an airplane, you'd have to insure the hell out of it. And only so many eyes can get in front of that piece in order to auction it off. You know, you can only put so many people in front of the piece. Now Christie's has it so that piece can remain where it is and be projected to

All over the world. And you don't have to insure it. I mean, I'm sure it's insured for where it is, but you don't have to fly it anywhere. You save the carbon footprint. The audience for buying that piece of art is so much bigger because it's worldwide and they could buy it. So every company finds a way to use, I'm not versed in technology, but I know that our, our platform is compliant to whatever your business is. So we had watch companies, uh,

by this technology and what I've seen them do with it, say it's a watch.

So you can scan the image on the screen on your phone. You could turn it around. It's touchscreen. So you can look at every side of it and you can customize what you're purchasing. So you go, no, you know what? I want a leather strap. No, I want the gold strap. No, I want to change the face. And you could change it in real time and then buy it. We partnered with people like Walmart and Paris Hilton, who does this interactive kind of, you can interact with her online.

via AI and make purchases right there in the store. So where people were paying, you know, you, you look at companies like Walmart. I don't know if Walmart does this, but I know Sephora and Ulta, their, their business is basically, you're buying real estate, you're buying,

shelf space. You could put this, this could be your shelf space where you can have, or the customer can have access to every, your full array of whatever your product is, which they can see and possibly be demonstrated in real time on the screen and purchased right off that screen.

So there's so many different uses. Two, the easiest for me is I can go and do my stand-up comedy in a club, stand here,

see the audience interact in real time with no latency and I can do shows. That's the smallest thing that you can do with it, but you can do so many different things with it. It is going to revolutionize outdoor advertising, e-commerce, banking, medicine. You could take imagery, 3d imagery. A doctor couldn't, I'll show you with move his finger around the heart and

beating heart. So I can't remember what the question was, but I'm really sold on Proto. And I just think it's the future. And I love that I can be, if nothing else, witness to watching the way things are done differently than the way they were done. And that's what that company does. You've been the host of two game shows giving away a million dollars. And one of the questions you ask every week, you asked on Deal or No Deals,

If you won today, what would you do with a million dollars? So put yourself back in that shoes, in their shoes when you were 21 years old, what would your answer have been? When I was 21, I wasn't as versed in what I would do as I am now. But there aren't things that I would buy, but there are things that I would do. And what I would do is I realized that, and I did realize it when I made very little money, is that money makes money.

And every dollar you have, and this is like that guy who wrote Rich Dad, Poor Dad, which is one of my favorite books. I don't know that it's a well-written book, but I love his philosophy. As somebody who doesn't have a GED is not really versed in economics. And I do realize that every dollar is like an employee. And even if you're making minimum wage, you should be able to take that in some way and make yourself self-sufficient. Right.

And I mean, that may sound kind of snobby, but I think it's done. I think we have too much of... I think people... The last thing I would do with a million dollars is buy anything of value. What I would do is buy things that are valued to me. So I would probably...

you know, rent a, if I was 21 years old, I probably would rent a four bedroom apartment, not in the best place that I could live because it would be cheaper and rent out three of the bedrooms and live in one so that I was, so I'd be living rent free and making money and then use some more money to rent out other apartments with a lot of rooms or,

buy a house that's not going to cost me money where the mortgage, where I can make more money coming in than the mortgage would be paying out. Last part of our show is a game I call fill in the blank to excellence. You ready to play? Yeah. The biggest lesson I've learned in my life is... Now is important. My number one personal goal is... To be good. My number one professional goal is... It's the same, just to be good. The best moment of my career was when I... April...

19th, 1978, when they laughed at my fear. My biggest regret is... Anything I ever said no to. My biggest fear is... Missing out. The biggest mistake that I've made in my life is... I don't know. I don't know what my biggest mistake is. And I want to keep it that way. The craziest thing that happened in my career is... I have one. I find this whole thing crazy.

The funniest thing that's happened in my career is... Again, it's my career. This doesn't seem like anything that I would have ever dreamed would be. Anything. This is not even close to what anything where I come from even looks like, sounds like, or feels like. The next great up-and-coming young comedian who's going to be a superstar is...

I don't know. I don't know. But, you know, because, and can I, can I, because the, the ability, like in order to become something, when I started, you had to get to the comedy store. That was the place to be seen. But today with digital media, there could be some goofball in his underpants, in his room, in Romania, in,

that starts to do something that becomes incredibly viral and it becomes the biggest thing in the world. And the fact is that we all have access to success. The funniest comedian at the Tom Brady roast was... Nikki Glaser. I'm dying to have her on my show, by the way. We're trying to get a hold of her. She was...

- Easily my favorite. My wife and I just thought she was the best. - She's done my podcast. - The best, best. The early favorite to win AGT this year is? - My golden buzzer, Brent Street. - They were great. The one thing I've dreamed about doing for a long time but haven't is? - My dreams come true every day.

I don't, I really make it a point to not hope for anything. I just, I really, it's not healthy for me because you set yourself up for disappointment. Just now, I don't think, I don't think I wish I could. I will. I don't have a plan. I don't even, even the people that work with me here,

They're not allowed to talk about what we're going to do tomorrow. In the morning, I look at my calendar and I know what I have today. I don't know what I have the rest of the day. I don't know what, I know I'll probably have dinner if I survive, you know, but that's, I can't, I don't. If you could go back and give your 21-year-old self one piece of advice, what would it be? Don't spend so much time on your hair. The number one lesson I tell my kids is? Be nice. If you could be one person in the world, who would it be?

Me. The one question you wish I'd asked you but didn't is... That was it. That was it. I wanted you to ask me what the question was that you didn't ask me. And you asked me. My wish just came true.

I love it. I love it too. I'm so grateful, truly, for you to be on my show. It's been so fun building my show and meeting amazing people like you, especially people that I've been a huge fan of forever. All your shows. Thank you for being here. And thank you for answering my email. Not only did you answer it, you don't know me, but you answered it within an hour, which is pretty amazing. It says a lot about you. So I'm really grateful to be here. It says I'm not that busy, is what it says. It says. It says.