WEBVTT - Penn Jillette's Marathon Life in Magic 0:00:08.560 --> 0:00:11.719 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing, 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:16.720 My chance to talk with artists, policymakers and performers, to 0:00:16.800 --> 0:00:21.120 hear their stories. What inspires their creations, what decisions change 0:00:21.160 --> 0:00:27.160 their careers, what relationships influenced their work. My guest today, 0:00:27.400 --> 0:00:31.240 Penjollette is the speaking half of the duo Penn and Teller. 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:35.479 Their act mixes magic and comedy with a subversive element 0:00:35.760 --> 0:00:39.599 that turns the traditional magic act on its head. In 0:00:39.640 --> 0:00:42.240 addition to having one of the longest running shows in 0:00:42.360 --> 0:00:47.239 Las Vegas, Penjoleette is also a musician, juggler, and inventor. 0:00:47.800 --> 0:00:52.280 The six foot six outspoken atheist and libertarian also finds 0:00:52.320 --> 0:00:55.600 time to write books, host TV shows, and appear as 0:00:55.640 --> 0:01:00.840 a contestant on Dancing with the Stars and The Celebrity Apprentice. Recently, 0:01:00.920 --> 0:01:04.720 Pendolet performed Defeat harder than any magic trick. He made 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:09.240 a hundred pounds disappear. I had wicked high blood pressure, 0:01:09.800 --> 0:01:13.240 and I was telling myself, because it's easy to tell 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:16.560 yourself this, that it's genetic or there's nothing you can 0:01:16.640 --> 0:01:20.399 do about it, and then there is UH. And I 0:01:20.480 --> 0:01:23.480 just started eating in order to fix my blood pressure, 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:26.160 which ends up as a side effect losing a lot. 0:01:26.319 --> 0:01:28.679 Were you leaner and and and and and kind of 0:01:28.720 --> 0:01:30.720 readier when you were young and you got heavier as 0:01:30.720 --> 0:01:32.520 you got over? Yeah? Sure, I was an American is 0:01:32.520 --> 0:01:36.920 another way to say that, right, Yeah, America that was 0:01:36.959 --> 0:01:39.559 doing you. What was the problem. Well, now I'm eating 0:01:40.240 --> 0:01:41.640 what were you not? What are you not eating? Now? 0:01:41.760 --> 0:01:46.160 I'm eating no animal products, no refined grains, extremely low salt, 0:01:46.200 --> 0:01:50.760 sugar in oil. So I'm not able to do things 0:01:50.840 --> 0:01:53.440 in moderation. One of the reasons I've never had a 0:01:53.520 --> 0:01:55.960 drink or any drug in my life is I'm very 0:01:56.000 --> 0:01:59.120 aware that moderation is not my strongest I can't imagine 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:01.120 you and I. Yeah, you and I trapped in this 0:02:01.240 --> 0:02:03.720 room with a bowl of cocaine and the two trail 0:02:03.800 --> 0:02:07.200 makes bars and the cacao. We wouldn't need the food 0:02:07.200 --> 0:02:09.400 if we had the cocaine. But so so I've never 0:02:09.480 --> 0:02:12.040 you know, has has so much as a puff of marijuana. No, 0:02:12.400 --> 0:02:16.679 that's true. Never, never a sip of beer, because well, 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:20.560 my personality is such. Not only do I not do moderation, 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:23.680 I also don't respect it. If you tell me about 0:02:23.680 --> 0:02:25.680 an author that I need to read I will go 0:02:25.720 --> 0:02:28.440 home and read everything. You know, if you uh, if 0:02:28.440 --> 0:02:30.839 I when I start to listen to a different kind 0:02:30.840 --> 0:02:33.000 of music, you know, if all of a sudden I 0:02:33.040 --> 0:02:37.000 discover alban Berg. I'm listening to all twelve toned German 0:02:37.040 --> 0:02:39.680 opera for months, and I love living like that. I 0:02:39.680 --> 0:02:43.200 mean a lot of people seem to strive from moderation. 0:02:43.960 --> 0:02:45.600 I don't. So you and your wife, you're gonna have 0:02:45.639 --> 0:02:51.639 a family, You're gonna have like twelve Fortunately you're able 0:02:51.720 --> 0:02:54.680 to stop that with a vast activation and you don't 0:02:54.720 --> 0:02:57.560 have to do any moderation. What science can science and 0:02:57.680 --> 0:03:00.200 science can step in on these things. Interviews? But because so, 0:03:00.360 --> 0:03:02.920 what's something that you craved or liked or that you 0:03:02.960 --> 0:03:06.560 stopped eating? It's really interesting? But do you mind me 0:03:06.200 --> 0:03:13.840 as I find that? Uh, it's exactly like situation comedies. 0:03:14.639 --> 0:03:18.280 When you were watching situation comedies every night when you're younger, 0:03:18.720 --> 0:03:20.720 they kind of make sense and you want to watch 0:03:20.760 --> 0:03:23.200 them the next night. But if you stop for two 0:03:23.240 --> 0:03:25.959 months and you go back and watch a situation comedy, 0:03:26.320 --> 0:03:30.160 it's nonsense. Why would anybody watch this? Don't they have 0:03:30.240 --> 0:03:32.480 real friends? Why are they watching this? Where do they 0:03:32.480 --> 0:03:34.320 get all that money? For that apartment. And the same 0:03:34.360 --> 0:03:38.360 thing with with food. Uh I really, for the first 0:03:38.440 --> 0:03:41.440 you know, a couple of months, wanted uh hamburgers and 0:03:41.720 --> 0:03:44.240 you know, fried chicken and all that stuff all the time. 0:03:44.480 --> 0:03:46.160 And then after a couple of months the food I 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:49.400 was eating tasted great. It's exactly like you you listen 0:03:49.400 --> 0:03:52.360 to music. You listen at four on the floor, three chord, 0:03:52.440 --> 0:03:54.960 rock and roll, and you love it and it's great, 0:03:55.400 --> 0:03:57.520 and then all of a sudden someone says, oh, and 0:03:57.560 --> 0:04:00.280 there's jazz, and you go, oh, there's whole difference sounds 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:03.960 and different stuff. It's that salt, sugar, fat is just 0:04:04.000 --> 0:04:06.880 that boom boom boom boom. But you take that away 0:04:06.920 --> 0:04:10.480 and there's a zillion other flavors. Everything changes, including And 0:04:10.480 --> 0:04:13.040 I'm a little bit embarrassed about this because I tend 0:04:13.080 --> 0:04:16.320 to as much as I'm a strong atheist, I still 0:04:16.400 --> 0:04:19.640 catch myself occasionally in a in a mind body separation, 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:22.560 you know, thinking that there's there's some sort of intellectual 0:04:22.640 --> 0:04:25.480 side different the physical side. I was really surprised how 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:27.599 my mood changed. Are you ready to become a Catholic? 0:04:28.279 --> 0:04:39.279 Very close? He thinks you're great, there's a great here's 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:42.560 a great story about Roy of Siegfried and Roy. Yeah, 0:04:43.160 --> 0:04:46.599 meeting the Pope, and Sigfried and Roy met the Pope, 0:04:46.640 --> 0:04:50.680 you know, the great magicians. They meet the Pope and uh, 0:04:50.800 --> 0:04:54.720 Roy gives him a ring and the Pope takes the 0:04:54.839 --> 0:04:57.440 ring and hands it to the assistant as this is 0:04:57.480 --> 0:05:00.280 a gift. And then Roy goes, no, no, that that 0:05:00.400 --> 0:05:02.600 is utual, blessed and give back to me my whole 0:05:02.640 --> 0:05:06.839 Oh my god. That which is all you need to 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:11.680 know about Roy and the Pope. Now when you when 0:05:11.720 --> 0:05:17.960 you you you just touched on many subjects atheism. You've 0:05:17.960 --> 0:05:20.719 covered everything. We're done. We guys count now. But the 0:05:20.720 --> 0:05:23.760 the let let's talk about that meaning. Did you know 0:05:23.800 --> 0:05:27.600 you were an atheist from from the earlier? You had no? No, 0:05:28.480 --> 0:05:31.440 I was you know, people do this thing that uh 0:05:31.560 --> 0:05:35.320 that I always always feel very um. I feel it's 0:05:35.400 --> 0:05:37.599 very important to point out. They always say, you know, 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:41.360 religious people must have treated you badly. I'm a religious personal, 0:05:41.400 --> 0:05:45.960 treat you well. The point is religious people treated me wonderfully. 0:05:46.240 --> 0:05:49.520 I have always been treated very well by religious people. 0:05:49.839 --> 0:05:52.440 I was raised, I have a perfect family life. My 0:05:52.520 --> 0:05:55.400 mom and dad and my sister and I were very 0:05:55.480 --> 0:06:00.120 very close. I was raised a Congregationalist Massachusetts wh to 0:06:00.240 --> 0:06:05.240 mess and I went to church an hour you know north. 0:06:05.800 --> 0:06:09.960 When I got to be uh junior high age, my 0:06:10.040 --> 0:06:13.279 parents said I could go to youth group instead of 0:06:13.960 --> 0:06:15.919 Sunday morning services. I wanted to, and I went to 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:18.240 youth group, and I believe I was the only one 0:06:18.279 --> 0:06:21.359 who took us seriously. And the minister spoke with us 0:06:21.400 --> 0:06:24.400 about religion, and I read the Bible and then came 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:29.120 in with some questions, and I had a wonderful, wonderful 0:06:29.160 --> 0:06:32.520 minister who was very open and would talk with me 0:06:32.560 --> 0:06:35.400 for hours. I did this exactly the way the church 0:06:35.440 --> 0:06:39.040 would want you to do it. There was no horrible rebellion, 0:06:39.080 --> 0:06:41.840 there was no fuck you, there was no screaming, there 0:06:41.920 --> 0:06:45.320 was no being molested. I have not one horror story. 0:06:45.360 --> 0:06:50.280 I've just kind, wonderful, sweet people and an intellectual discussion. 0:06:50.560 --> 0:06:53.719 And I went, you know, I don't like the idea 0:06:53.920 --> 0:06:56.840 of putting God before my family. My family is more 0:06:56.880 --> 0:06:59.400 important to me, and I don't like the idea of 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:01.800 their being a love greater than the love I have 0:07:01.880 --> 0:07:05.120 from my family and friends. And I do believe that 0:07:05.240 --> 0:07:08.960 humans are good on their own without this, and I 0:07:09.000 --> 0:07:12.040 don't think anything happens after we die, and my minister 0:07:12.320 --> 0:07:14.680 and I and there's you sound like a moderate Republican. 0:07:15.560 --> 0:07:19.600 There's there's no way to tell this story without making 0:07:19.680 --> 0:07:21.760 him look like a goofball. But he's not a goofball. 0:07:21.800 --> 0:07:23.880 This is a sensible thing. He called that. My mom 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:26.760 and dad had said, you know, Penn is doing wonderful 0:07:26.760 --> 0:07:29.480 and youth group, but we're having discussions, and I believe 0:07:29.520 --> 0:07:32.320 he's doing a better job at converting the other children 0:07:32.360 --> 0:07:37.320 to Atheism than I am with Christianity. So why don't 0:07:37.320 --> 0:07:39.560 you just not have him come to you group anymore? 0:07:39.840 --> 0:07:43.400 And I talked to my my parents and uh, my 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:47.400 dad till the day he died, prayed for me and 0:07:47.440 --> 0:07:51.200 would say what he has Carles, and he would say 0:07:51.240 --> 0:07:54.160 to me all stuff all the time, like, well, Pen, 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:57.080 you were such a good Christian. I say, except for 0:07:57.120 --> 0:08:00.200 that not accepting Christ than Dad, except for that if 0:08:00.200 --> 0:08:03.760 you separate out the dogma of a particular religion. Because 0:08:03.760 --> 0:08:05.880 I'm a Catholic, I was raised a Catholic, and over 0:08:05.880 --> 0:08:08.840 the ark of my present, when I when I've been 0:08:08.920 --> 0:08:11.160 over the ark of my life, I've I've lapsed and 0:08:11.280 --> 0:08:13.440 gone back and laps to go back. But a priest 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:15.240 who I grew up with, who was a priest in 0:08:15.240 --> 0:08:16.760 the church I went to when I was a boy, 0:08:17.520 --> 0:08:19.120 he said, at best, he said, listen, all the great 0:08:19.120 --> 0:08:22.360 religions have something to offer to me. Hinduism and Judaism 0:08:22.400 --> 0:08:25.440 and Buddhism and so forth, and Muslim he says, He said, 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:27.480 the Catholics just seem to have the nicest places to 0:08:27.520 --> 0:08:30.680 hang out, the nicest real estate. But you separate all 0:08:30.720 --> 0:08:34.880 the dogma of any particular religion, and to me, atheism 0:08:34.920 --> 0:08:37.560 is you just don't believe there's a God, right. And 0:08:37.600 --> 0:08:41.600 I also, regardless of your individual relationship, there's there isn't 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:45.200 really there there there is no moral code that goes 0:08:45.240 --> 0:08:47.400 along with that. There's a lot of stuff we've noticed 0:08:47.440 --> 0:08:51.319 about atheists, you know, but there isn't an actual church 0:08:51.520 --> 0:08:54.400 of atheism. And I wanted to say with a great 0:08:54.440 --> 0:08:57.839 deal of pride that my mom when she was eight 0:08:58.000 --> 0:09:01.880 five eight five years old, and what did it? Was 0:09:02.920 --> 0:09:05.760 this this but this is the Great Father was like God, damn. 0:09:07.520 --> 0:09:09.320 My dad used to say, and this is, you know, 0:09:09.559 --> 0:09:13.000 just a tribute to My dad was the most most 0:09:13.040 --> 0:09:16.120 wonderful man I've ever met. My dad would say to me, 0:09:16.600 --> 0:09:20.600 I'm going to have to work so hard after I 0:09:20.679 --> 0:09:23.199 die to get you and your mother into heaven. But 0:09:23.280 --> 0:09:26.199 I'm going to do it. I just have to work very, 0:09:26.320 --> 0:09:29.319 very hard. You can make it so much easier for me. Yes, 0:09:29.640 --> 0:09:32.000 you have to know that. My mom and my dad 0:09:32.040 --> 0:09:36.000 never said hell or damn or any absenter hard in 0:09:36.000 --> 0:09:39.880 the house, hardcore, no alcohol, no heller, damn. When I 0:09:39.920 --> 0:09:43.640 started doing card tricks, my my my father was like, 0:09:44.240 --> 0:09:47.040 you won't be gambling though. You can do card tricks, 0:09:47.080 --> 0:09:49.000 but I don't like having a deck of cards in 0:09:49.000 --> 0:09:50.959 the house. I would say, Dad, I'm just doing manipulations 0:09:50.960 --> 0:09:54.560 and tricks. Well, that's fine. Now when people obviously, when 0:09:54.600 --> 0:09:55.960 they think of you, they think of you as part 0:09:55.960 --> 0:09:59.240 of a tandem and your partner. It's always mystified to 0:09:59.280 --> 0:10:03.560 me the mute performer, what's that like for him to 0:10:03.640 --> 0:10:08.760 play that role all these years? It's thirty years forty 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:13.280 good god, and uh it is a very shut up 0:10:13.280 --> 0:10:16.480 when he's home. Well, that's that's the joke. Everybody in 0:10:16.520 --> 0:10:19.480 the crew will tell you. Penn speaks on stage, doesn't 0:10:19.480 --> 0:10:22.400 speak off stage. Tell there, doesn't speak on stage, never 0:10:22.440 --> 0:10:24.920 shuts up. When if you were to come to one 0:10:24.960 --> 0:10:28.320 of our rehearsals. Uh, it's me sitting over the corner 0:10:28.360 --> 0:10:31.120 reading the paper, and tell their talking to everybody handling. 0:10:31.160 --> 0:10:36.079 They tell us essentially, O Lucille Ball direct and but 0:10:36.280 --> 0:10:39.040 you know, tell her direct Shakespeare. You know he's he's 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:44.360 directing The Tempest in Chicago, a wonderful production with real magic. 0:10:45.240 --> 0:10:48.760 The Yeah, but more more directing and more writing. And 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:51.319 he's very articulate. Who's a high school Latin and Greek 0:10:51.320 --> 0:10:54.840 teacher and he is a classic scholar. Where does he live? 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:57.000 Where as his home Vegas? So you guys both live 0:10:57.040 --> 0:11:00.840 in this Yeah, about five miles apart. And you have 0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:06.840 a theater that your own theater, and it's really near obligated. 0:11:06.880 --> 0:11:09.000 The contract is how many months of the year until 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:13.120 we die? I mean we do? We do forty six 0:11:13.160 --> 0:11:16.920 weeks a year for now, yeah, when you if we 0:11:17.040 --> 0:11:20.280 ever crossed your if you ever, we don't have time off, 0:11:22.200 --> 0:11:24.480 and we sometimes do run outs on the on the day, 0:11:24.559 --> 0:11:27.200 on the day, supposedly six weeks. In Vegas. We do 0:11:27.320 --> 0:11:30.080 about two d and fifty shows a year a little more. 0:11:30.200 --> 0:11:32.040 It's a pretty easy schedule, but I make it as 0:11:32.080 --> 0:11:35.840 hard as possible because I play upright bass, jazz bebop 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:37.880 for an hour before the show, and then we meet 0:11:37.920 --> 0:11:40.800 everybody after the show. So we turn a cushy ninety 0:11:40.800 --> 0:11:44.400 minute gig into three and act like Steve Martin yeah 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:47.320 and everything. Yeah, yeah, I do. When Steve's in town. 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:50.720 I love to talk music with When you were a child, 0:11:50.960 --> 0:11:55.280 I mean I grew up and anything magic or anything 0:11:55.800 --> 0:11:59.560 of the paranormal, if you will, Eurie Geller, crest Skin, 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:01.680 all those, I mean, I grew up glued to that. 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:03.840 I love that where you glued to that kind of 0:12:03.840 --> 0:12:06.440 stuff to come into your life. I was. I was 0:12:06.559 --> 0:12:11.199 horrified by Kreskin Um. I believed when he went on 0:12:11.440 --> 0:12:14.559 he went on a television show and he did an experiment, 0:12:14.600 --> 0:12:17.320 as he called it, and I believed that this was 0:12:17.360 --> 0:12:19.400 an area of science. I was fascinated by science, an 0:12:19.400 --> 0:12:22.520 area of science that I wanted to study. And my parents, 0:12:22.559 --> 0:12:24.199 who I said, weren't wealth. He bought me was a 0:12:24.280 --> 0:12:28.000 little ESP game as piece of ship with little pendulum 0:12:28.000 --> 0:12:29.960 in the ESP cards. And then I would do that 0:12:30.000 --> 0:12:33.920 with my parents over and over and then um, because 0:12:33.960 --> 0:12:36.839 I was becoming a juggler and practicing all the time 0:12:37.200 --> 0:12:39.079 in the library. If you cast your mind back to 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:41.880 the Dewey decimal system. You know that the nine hundreds 0:12:42.000 --> 0:12:47.600 are religion, magic, juggling. They're all there together, which is great. 0:12:47.640 --> 0:12:50.679 My whole life is in the nine decimal system. I 0:12:50.760 --> 0:12:53.480 happened to see a dune in your book The Mentalist 0:12:53.480 --> 0:12:56.480 from the forties. Yeah, he's he's He was the most 0:12:56.520 --> 0:12:59.280 popular mentalist mind reader. And I opened the book on 0:12:59.360 --> 0:13:03.200 magic and theyre in There was the description of how 0:13:03.280 --> 0:13:05.760 to do the trick I'd seen Christ can do as 0:13:05.800 --> 0:13:10.280 an experiment, And that moment in the library was a 0:13:10.320 --> 0:13:13.000 complete breakdown. I mean I went, I could not believe 0:13:13.080 --> 0:13:15.680 that a scientist, which is the way I perceived it, 0:13:15.760 --> 0:13:18.559 had lied to me. And I went almost humiliated in 0:13:18.600 --> 0:13:20.480 front of my parents. By the way, here's the birth 0:13:20.520 --> 0:13:22.760 of the bullshit show too. By the way, absolutely everything 0:13:22.760 --> 0:13:25.400 my whole life, and I also pretty much at that 0:13:25.440 --> 0:13:29.720 point went from straight a's to failing because I said 0:13:30.000 --> 0:13:34.320 to my physics teachers and scientists, lie. Why am I 0:13:34.320 --> 0:13:37.760 listening to you scientists? Lie? Scientists? And I hated magic, 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:40.959 hated magic because why would you be fooling people? It's 0:13:41.000 --> 0:13:44.040 hard enough to figure out about the world is hard enough. Yeah, 0:13:44.040 --> 0:13:46.080 why why are you doing that? And my parents, you know, 0:13:46.080 --> 0:13:48.679 would try to console me. It's just a stupid little 0:13:48.679 --> 0:13:51.640 game pad. God, Dad, It's okay, No, No No, I'm a juggler. 0:13:51.679 --> 0:13:54.680 I'm not a magician all of this. And it wasn't 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:56.200 until I met Teller, who I met when I was 0:13:56.200 --> 0:13:58.600 in high school. Until there's seven years older than me 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:02.680 and amazing Randy and may explain to me the very 0:14:02.760 --> 0:14:06.160 simple thing that if you put a procenium around something, 0:14:06.679 --> 0:14:09.680 it's all of a sudden moral. If Robert de Niro 0:14:09.920 --> 0:14:12.600 runs around New York saying he's Travis Bickle and he's 0:14:12.600 --> 0:14:15.679 a cab driver, he is insane. If he does it 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:19.080 in a movie, he's a genius. Yes, And the same 0:14:19.120 --> 0:14:22.280 thing with magic. If you come to our show, all 0:14:22.400 --> 0:14:25.360 the stuff we do would be immoral if you take 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:27.400 that proscenium. So you did a lot on the street, 0:14:27.440 --> 0:14:29.680 you were on the street, yeah, yeah, but but always 0:14:29.720 --> 0:14:33.040 as a juggler, it wasn't. Uh. So we try to 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:36.560 follow this very strict moral code in the penn and 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:39.080 tell the show, which is what I call the sawing 0:14:39.400 --> 0:14:41.520 a woman in a half code sawing a woman in 0:14:41.520 --> 0:14:46.280 the half, which is we saw a woman in to 0:14:46.360 --> 0:14:49.840 have haves on stage. You see that no one leaves 0:14:49.840 --> 0:14:53.320 the theater thinking they've witnessed a murder. Nobody. That is 0:14:53.360 --> 0:14:55.800 my rule for all magic. If I'm going to do 0:14:56.040 --> 0:15:00.119 a mind reading trick, you cannot leave the theater thinking 0:15:00.280 --> 0:15:02.800 that I can read minds. It must be exactly the 0:15:02.840 --> 0:15:05.320 same as not witnessing a murder. There's a lot of 0:15:05.400 --> 0:15:09.480 intellectual and moral gymnastics that need to be done in 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:11.840 order to follow that code and tell her and I 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:15.360 A big part of our writing tricks is trying to 0:15:15.400 --> 0:15:19.080 be intellectually honest. So what is it required of the 0:15:19.120 --> 0:15:23.240 street performer that you had the street and they score well? I, 0:15:23.320 --> 0:15:26.560 you know, I uh, with my parents permission. You know, 0:15:26.680 --> 0:15:29.560 left home when I was eighteen and was essentially homeless, 0:15:29.600 --> 0:15:34.560 hitchhiking around the country hippie and I supported myself juggling 0:15:34.600 --> 0:15:38.520 on streets and juggling in bars. And uh, you need 0:15:38.560 --> 0:15:42.560 to uh, you need to gather a crowd, and you 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:44.200 need to collect the money for the bit of a 0:15:44.240 --> 0:15:46.920 barker question, what's yeah? Or is they called to the 0:15:46.960 --> 0:15:51.800 carny talker? Um? I was a really really good street performers, 0:15:51.800 --> 0:15:55.000 a matter of fact teller. I'm not sure how to 0:15:55.080 --> 0:15:57.520 take this, but tell her always says, you know, the 0:15:57.560 --> 0:15:59.720 best thing you've ever done in your career was your 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:02.440 a bit of street act. There was really nothing better 0:16:02.480 --> 0:16:04.680 than that. Where was the money good? What was the 0:16:04.680 --> 0:16:07.080 place that was like? I had a rule that I 0:16:07.080 --> 0:16:09.640 would only work places that it was illegal, because I 0:16:09.640 --> 0:16:12.200 thought that was sexy. And I worked head out Square 0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:15.920 in Philadelphia, and uh, I knew all the police officers, 0:16:16.320 --> 0:16:19.240 and the police officers would come to my show and say, 0:16:19.400 --> 0:16:22.440 the second someone can convince me that you're begging, I'll 0:16:22.520 --> 0:16:26.120 arrest you. Until then you're doing a show, and I 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:29.280 would do. I I was making so much money. I 0:16:29.320 --> 0:16:32.160 was nineteen years old and I was making so much 0:16:32.200 --> 0:16:35.160 money street performing. I went to an accountant and I 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:37.320 said to file taxes. I said, I want to file 0:16:37.400 --> 0:16:39.200 my taxes and the money I made And he said, 0:16:39.200 --> 0:16:40.320 what do you do when I said, I'm a street 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:42.520 jungle And he said, how much do you make? And 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:44.880 I told him and I said, I have you know, 0:16:44.920 --> 0:16:48.320 I keep records of every hat I passed and how 0:16:48.400 --> 0:16:50.160 much I make, and I have it all laid out here, 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:52.000 and I had when I brought it to the bank 0:16:52.040 --> 0:16:55.200 and when I did everything. And he said, in your nineteen. 0:16:55.280 --> 0:16:58.040 I said yeah, And he said, if you go to 0:16:58.120 --> 0:17:00.760 the I R S And tell the you made this 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:04.520 much money juggling, they will arrest you as a drug dealer. 0:17:04.960 --> 0:17:07.639 They will assume you're a drug dealer. And then he said, 0:17:07.920 --> 0:17:10.440 and oh, by the way, I think you're a drug dealer. 0:17:12.240 --> 0:17:15.000 By the way, I don't believe. And I said, well, no, no, 0:17:15.040 --> 0:17:18.040 I'm really making this. He goes, take the money, don't 0:17:18.080 --> 0:17:21.000 put it in the bank, keep it in cash, walk away, 0:17:21.040 --> 0:17:23.240 And when does that change meaning that you're doing that? 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:25.800 And then I put all that money. Well, first of all, 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:29.200 totally ruined my voice because I'd work for five people 0:17:29.520 --> 0:17:34.439 outside no training, just scream and put chloris, put chlorosceptic 0:17:34.640 --> 0:17:37.080 in a coke can and just go. Or is your 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:40.760 costume to try to oh yeah. My rule on street 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:44.280 performing was you have to look so that people are 0:17:44.320 --> 0:17:48.359 embarrassed to give you less than a twenty. So I 0:17:48.359 --> 0:17:51.240 wore a three thousand dollar watch when I street performed. 0:17:51.480 --> 0:17:55.639 I wore a really expensive suit, really expensive pants, was 0:17:55.920 --> 0:17:58.560 perfectly groomed, much more than what I went, like Michael 0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:02.480 Douglas than the artful does. Absolutely absolutely. My idea was 0:18:02.600 --> 0:18:04.760 I want to make as much money as Johnny Carson, 0:18:05.400 --> 0:18:07.879 so I'll be out there looking like Johnny Carson. So 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:10.159 the idea was I would gather a crowd and you 0:18:10.280 --> 0:18:13.800 come up and go, man, he's really funny. He's really 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:15.800 a good juggler. You'd be with your date and go, 0:18:16.200 --> 0:18:20.760 I can't give him fifty cents. I get a twenty. 0:18:21.080 --> 0:18:24.159 You can't do that and uh And then Teller would 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:27.000 alternate with me in the same spot, which we kind 0:18:27.000 --> 0:18:32.480 of owned, and the um, the local hoodlum children uh 0:18:32.840 --> 0:18:35.320 loved us because what I would do is I, you know, 0:18:35.560 --> 0:18:37.639 have them take care of my money and buy props 0:18:37.640 --> 0:18:39.000 from me and take care of that kind of stuff. 0:18:39.040 --> 0:18:41.600 Trusted them. So anybody else that came in to take 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:44.840 that spot, the police arrested them and the local kids 0:18:44.840 --> 0:18:47.240 are asked them. So we had that spot to ourselves, 0:18:47.600 --> 0:18:49.679 and I would go to all the store owners that 0:18:49.720 --> 0:18:52.160 are around there. I would go up after every show 0:18:52.200 --> 0:18:54.360 and say, you're getting enough traffic in and out. I'm 0:18:54.359 --> 0:18:57.480 not blocking Everything's okay. The police officers liked us. He 0:18:57.600 --> 0:19:00.399 joined the Chamber of Commerce, yes pretty much, and we 0:19:00.400 --> 0:19:03.199 did that very well. Then then I really got interested 0:19:03.760 --> 0:19:06.080 in doing uh Tell, and I wanted to do a 0:19:06.080 --> 0:19:09.719 full evening show. We thought that the ideas that we 0:19:09.800 --> 0:19:12.359 had were more than just the twelve minutes. So we 0:19:12.400 --> 0:19:15.520 took all the money that we've made street performing and 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:18.920 put it into buying lights and sound and and producing. 0:19:21.200 --> 0:19:24.680 Our very first shows were at the Walnut Street Theater. 0:19:24.960 --> 0:19:28.040 They had a space that would seat like seventy people 0:19:28.640 --> 0:19:31.000 and they had put that aside with a grant for 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:37.919 experimental theater, and the experimental theater company UH could not 0:19:38.119 --> 0:19:40.600 get it together in three months to put an experimental 0:19:40.640 --> 0:19:43.320 show on. Now you know, they couldn't in three months 0:19:43.320 --> 0:19:45.560 get it together. So they came to teller they gone 0:19:45.560 --> 0:19:48.200 to college with, and said, you're doing your little show, 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:51.119 can you just put it in and we'll let you 0:19:51.160 --> 0:19:54.320 have the theater for free. Now they were getting grants, 0:19:54.720 --> 0:19:57.320 we could have the theater for free. So we put 0:19:57.400 --> 0:20:01.040 the show up and we charged whatever it was ten dollars, 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:03.879 and we got wonderful reviews and put the place up 0:20:04.400 --> 0:20:07.160 and then the UH, the head of the Walnut Street 0:20:07.200 --> 0:20:11.000 Theater called us in and said, uh, so the theater 0:20:11.080 --> 0:20:14.080 company up there, they gave you the they gave you 0:20:14.160 --> 0:20:15.680 the space, and how much money they give you to 0:20:15.680 --> 0:20:17.199 put this on? We said nothing. They just gave us 0:20:17.200 --> 0:20:19.200 a space, which is a big help man, huge help 0:20:19.280 --> 0:20:20.960 not to pay rent. We could really make money on this. 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:24.000 We're supporting ourselves. This is trip we're getting going. He goes, yeah, yeah, 0:20:24.080 --> 0:20:26.560 And they were paid money to put a show on 0:20:26.720 --> 0:20:28.600 in there, and they just give to you afraid. So 0:20:28.800 --> 0:20:31.000 you guys are welcome to use the theater whenever you want. 0:20:31.080 --> 0:20:34.960 And they're losing all their grants. So we became we 0:20:35.040 --> 0:20:39.480 became the people that killed the experimental theater in that particular, 0:20:39.560 --> 0:20:41.119 and they were like, what did you do to us? 0:20:41.160 --> 0:20:43.119 We said, we didn't even we didn't know. We were 0:20:43.119 --> 0:20:45.640 supposed to lie. We could have said we can't make 0:20:45.680 --> 0:20:47.760 money in there, but as it turned out, we could 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:50.000 make money, you know, and in a hundred seed theater, 0:20:50.920 --> 0:20:52.720 we we could fill it up and make money doing 0:20:52.760 --> 0:20:55.960 nhhos a week. Um. So you you you perform inside 0:20:56.000 --> 0:20:57.600 and you start to do the show. And what kind 0:20:57.600 --> 0:20:59.120 of a show was it back then? We we did 0:20:59.200 --> 0:21:00.800 we was the three person and show that we had 0:21:00.800 --> 0:21:02.680 a we had a third partner who did classical music, 0:21:03.040 --> 0:21:06.160 and it was called the Asparagus Valley Cultural Society and 0:21:06.480 --> 0:21:11.440 h we got we did a thing that was so nuts. 0:21:12.400 --> 0:21:14.639 Teller was in charge of the putting the ads together 0:21:14.720 --> 0:21:16.800 and putting them in the paper, and I was in 0:21:16.880 --> 0:21:19.840 charge of getting critics to the show. So I just 0:21:20.000 --> 0:21:22.159 put on my leather jacket and went, you know, to 0:21:22.200 --> 0:21:24.399 the list of people that were critics, and walked up 0:21:24.400 --> 0:21:26.640 to their desks and said, Hi, I'm Penn. We're doing 0:21:26.640 --> 0:21:28.800 a show next Friday. We can give you free tickets. 0:21:29.000 --> 0:21:31.720