Speaker 1: From executive search to talent strategy, leadership development, rewards and
Speaker 1: succession planning. Corn Fairy can help you realize the full
Speaker 1: potential of your people so you can take your business
Speaker 1: where it wants to go up. Learn more at corn
Speaker 1: Ferry dot com slash up. Welcome to game Plan, a
Speaker 1: show about our lives at work. I'm Rebecca Greenfield, a
Speaker 1: reporter for Bloomberg, where I cover workplace culture, and I
Speaker 1: am Sam Grobart, a writer at Bloomberg Business Week magazine.
Speaker 1: This week we're talking about success, and before you get
Speaker 1: too excited, listening to this will not help you make
Speaker 1: a million dollars or help you retire early. We don't
Speaker 1: have ten easy tips and tricks for how to climb
Speaker 1: the corporate ladder. We want to tackle a much more
Speaker 1: basic question, which is what is success? How do we
Speaker 1: even define it? Later we're going to talk to the
Speaker 1: comedian Chris Gothard about his ideas on success. But first, Sam,
Speaker 1: why don't we talk about how we feel about success?
Speaker 1: How do you define it? Becca? I would describe success
Speaker 1: for me essentially as freedom and what it isn't so
Speaker 1: it's not worrying necessarily about things financial or monetary. But
Speaker 1: also not feeling like I'm doing work that I don't
Speaker 1: want to be doing that isn't fulfilling for me. The
Speaker 1: freedom to pursue the things that I want to do
Speaker 1: and live a life that is comfortable and absence of
Speaker 1: major concerns. That definitely sounds luxurious and really nice, and
Speaker 1: it also sounds like from what I understand the life
Speaker 1: you live now, do you feel like you have that?
Speaker 1: I mean, I feel pretty fortunate at this point, and
Speaker 1: you're actually catching me, like in a three week period
Speaker 1: of actually like real kind of positive feelings about things,
Speaker 1: and I'm not sure, I'm much sure how longer it's
Speaker 1: gonna last, but I do have it right now. I
Speaker 1: feel like success is you doing the things you want
Speaker 1: to do, you unencumbered, unencumbered by all the other things
Speaker 1: that can make life more difficult, that you are able
Speaker 1: to express yourself, that you're able to be the person
Speaker 1: you want to be do the things you want to do.
Speaker 1: And if you're able to do that, then yeah, I
Speaker 1: think then you're successful. So you mentioned during this three
Speaker 1: week period of happiness, but your life at work has
Speaker 1: been the same pretty study for a while, so I
Speaker 1: guess when you're not in those weeks of periods of happiness,
Speaker 1: what are you worrying about. I'm worried about not contributing.
Speaker 1: I think what corresponds to this three week period is
Speaker 1: that I've actually been really busy. And you know, people
Speaker 1: complain about being busy, but this is the good kind. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I definitely have the same feelings about that. And yeah,
Speaker 1: when the things are contributing are things that you're proud
Speaker 1: of and that you really like and you think are
Speaker 1: useful to the world, I think that feels like success exactly.
Speaker 1: You could work very hard at some stuff that you
Speaker 1: don't really believe in a lot of people unfortunately get
Speaker 1: stuck in that position. I am sure I will get
Speaker 1: stuck in that position again. Yeah, but if you have
Speaker 1: the opportunity to like, really like what you do and
Speaker 1: be working on things that, like you just said, you
Speaker 1: really believe in, then that work is a pleasure. But
Speaker 1: it's unfortunate that we have to feel that way because
Speaker 1: sometimes I do work that I just do to be
Speaker 1: doing work, to be doing my job, and yeah, it
Speaker 1: doesn't feel great, but that still doesn't mean I'm not successful.
Speaker 1: But I still struggle with the angsty feelings that you're
Speaker 1: talking about. I totally understand back. I mean, I'm curious,
Speaker 1: do you feel right now that you are successful at
Speaker 1: what you're doing, or do you still feel like that's
Speaker 1: something that you're always chasing. I feel like it's something
Speaker 1: I'm always chasing, and I have to remind myself that
Speaker 1: other people will probably perceive me as someone who is
Speaker 1: successful in very basic ways. I'm employed, I make a
Speaker 1: good salary, I work for a good company as a journalist.
Speaker 1: I have a pretty good job. All those things are
Speaker 1: how people measure success. And yet somehow I don't have
Speaker 1: those feelings that you're talking about of feeling like I
Speaker 1: have control, even though I do have a ton of
Speaker 1: freedom in my job. So I don't know where that
Speaker 1: feeling comes from. I was gonna ask you what's missing.
Speaker 1: I think it's that doing work that I'm really proud of.
Speaker 1: I want that to be a constant thing all the time,
Speaker 1: and maybe that's an unattainable ideal, Like maybe that's crazy.
Speaker 1: I think that it might be. I think that, Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I do. I think that if you can keep it
Speaker 1: above of work that you're proud of, and hopefully even
Speaker 1: more than that, you know, sixties seventy eighty whatever. But
Speaker 1: I've come to the peace with the notion that, like
Speaker 1: some work is just going to be work. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: as long as it's kept in the proper proportion, I
Speaker 1: can even sort of accept it and feel like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I know this isn't like going to change the world
Speaker 1: or anything, but you know, other stuff I do hopefully
Speaker 1: can or you know, whatever it takes off the boxes,
Speaker 1: get some Twitter faves, that's that's changing the world. Um.
Speaker 1: That's that's my measure. Um. And so you just kind
Speaker 1: of accepted as part of the bargain. I think it's
Speaker 1: harder because I'm at this point in my career because
Speaker 1: I'm much earlier on in my career than you where
Speaker 1: I'm a polite way of saying, she's much younger. Yes,
Speaker 1: I'm a little bit younger where I'm supposed to be, yeah,
Speaker 1: chasing success and investing in my career and finding an
Speaker 1: audience and doing all these things. So it feels harder
Speaker 1: to just sit back and enjoy the ride, as they say,
Speaker 1: right right now. I mean, I think that's probably true.
Speaker 1: And and given where I am in my career, which
Speaker 1: is different than yours, I think I am very familiar
Speaker 1: with the feelings that you're describing, and it hasn't been
Speaker 1: that long since I wasn't feeling them as much, right,
Speaker 1: you know. I mean it really just maybe a couple
Speaker 1: of years. But somewhere along the way you start to
Speaker 1: realize or at least I started to realize or feel that,
Speaker 1: you know, hey, Okay, this is fine, this is good,
Speaker 1: you know, and I think I don't know, you have
Speaker 1: other things you start to care about. I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: like probably the majority of my mental energy is spent
Speaker 1: thinking about like my kids, and so my job is
Speaker 1: that that happens when you have children, you know, and
Speaker 1: so my jobs sort of restructures according to that, and
Speaker 1: like where it once loomed so large, now it's like
Speaker 1: it's really it's important anyway. That is all to say
Speaker 1: that I think you and I are both very lucky
Speaker 1: and this is just like angsty problems I have, but
Speaker 1: still worth discussing. And to dig deeper, we're going to
Speaker 1: bring on our guest, Chris Goatherd. We're so happy to
Speaker 1: have Chris Gatherd here. He's a comedian, writer, performer. He
Speaker 1: started as Bill in the Summers Don't Think Twice, and
Speaker 1: you've also seen him on broad City. He has an
Speaker 1: upcoming off Broadway show, Career Suicide, which premieres octobert Hey, Chris,
Speaker 1: thanks for being here, Thank you for having me. So
Speaker 1: today we're talking about success. Yeah, and Chris, I thought
Speaker 1: I could start off maybe by asking you a sort
Speaker 1: of two part question. Okay, I might ask you to
Speaker 1: be a little bit maybe I modest. I'm not sure. Um.
Speaker 1: The first part of the question is do you think
Speaker 1: and feel? And by the way, those might actually be
Speaker 1: two very different things. That you are more successful today
Speaker 1: than you were a year ago. It's a that's a
Speaker 1: really interesting question because it's intellectually like cerebrallly, I am
Speaker 1: aware that I am more successful than I used to be,
Speaker 1: but emotionally I feel the same type of panic that
Speaker 1: I've always felt. So I can look back and like
Speaker 1: think about what types of things I was doing a
Speaker 1: few years ago, and I'm like, I don't even know
Speaker 1: how I was paying my rent then, but I'm aware
Speaker 1: of how I pay my rent now. I feel a
Speaker 1: lot more comfortable with it and secure in it. But
Speaker 1: I don't necessarily feel more successful emotionally. Although I'm aware
Speaker 1: that I am more successful than I was a year ago.
Speaker 1: How do you measure that? How do you how do
Speaker 1: you know cerebrally that you are well. I can, first
Speaker 1: of all, not to be totally gross, but I can
Speaker 1: look at my bank account and be aware, like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I have more breathing room than I had a couple
Speaker 1: of years ago. That's a good thing. So there's that
Speaker 1: side of it, and then there's also the side of things.
Speaker 1: You know. One thing that I've noticed is I I've
Speaker 1: always been a very self reliant person, and there were
Speaker 1: there was a long stretch where I was sort of
Speaker 1: profound only unsuccessful publicly, and that was kind of my
Speaker 1: public persona. I actually built most of my career on
Speaker 1: a public access TV show, which is kind of the
Speaker 1: definition of not not It's not traditional success at the
Speaker 1: very least, So having built things that way, I think
Speaker 1: one thing I've stumbled into is the success I've had
Speaker 1: is generally all self started and is all stuff that
Speaker 1: I'm very much in control of, and that that's a
Speaker 1: big way to kind of measure it. Is that I
Speaker 1: feel myself being less reliant on gatekeepers, people signing off
Speaker 1: on me, people who can get me in the door,
Speaker 1: because I've sort of found it in myself to kick
Speaker 1: in some doors because nobody was really opening the doors
Speaker 1: for me for a very long time. So that's a
Speaker 1: big indicator, is I need I need less people to
Speaker 1: shepherd me towards success. I found ways to make my
Speaker 1: own opportunities happen, and that's a big indicator. I know
Speaker 1: that's kind of a ramboly answer, but not at all. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's basically, I've put myself in a position where I
Speaker 1: have some agency over my own career, which is something
Speaker 1: I feel more and more the past year or two. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we were talking about having freedom is a really big
Speaker 1: part of success for us in our careers too. And
Speaker 1: you wrote this essay for a Vulture that I really
Speaker 1: liked and one reason that we wanted to have you
Speaker 1: on the show about all of your friends and colleagues.
Speaker 1: I guess you don't call them colleagues and comedy moving
Speaker 1: to l A and chasing success, and how you saw
Speaker 1: them doing that and they were finding a traditional version
Speaker 1: of success and you kind of have that traditional version
Speaker 1: of success. Now. I went through the back door for it.
Speaker 1: But I also I I would argue that I guess
Speaker 1: it is traditional. I guess I have too cop to
Speaker 1: the fact that I've, I've it's gotten a little more
Speaker 1: mainstream than it used to be. Um, but I am
Speaker 1: very proud of Like I like that, Like it's my
Speaker 1: TV shows on public access for four years and now
Speaker 1: it's on a cable network where I get paid to
Speaker 1: do it. But because of that background, I have a
Speaker 1: lot more ability to call the shots then I think
Speaker 1: a lot of people do in in having their first
Speaker 1: TV show, like I like having a podcast. It's such
Speaker 1: a free thing. I get to set my own schedule.
Speaker 1: I get to really define how I want it done.
Speaker 1: So I do get that, and and it's been interesting
Speaker 1: to see so many of my friends go to l
Speaker 1: A and chase it and find it in many cases.
Speaker 1: But I think for me, one of the things that
Speaker 1: sudjusted majorly in my thirties versus my twenties is that
Speaker 1: like success and happiness are not synonymous to me anymore,
Speaker 1: Like they don't go hand in hand. Success oftentimes it's
Speaker 1: a headache that brings pressures with it, and happiness is
Speaker 1: not really inherent on my ability to publicly say look
Speaker 1: at me and all the great things I've done. They
Speaker 1: don't really go hand in hand anymore, which is nice
Speaker 1: do you feel that, having now achieved some success and
Speaker 1: hopefully achieving much more in the future, that you have
Speaker 1: to be like very very mindful of holding onto your
Speaker 1: independence and making sure that you preserve the freedoms. Like
Speaker 1: you said, success can sometimes bring a lot of assholes,
Speaker 1: So it's not just you let success happen to you.
Speaker 1: You actually have to engage it and and sort of
Speaker 1: manage it. I would think, yeah, I think so. I
Speaker 1: think so because I've also seen I've seen a lot
Speaker 1: of my friends get successful over the years, and a
Speaker 1: lot of them remain well adjusted people with their priorities straight.
Speaker 1: But you do see cases where people wind up in
Speaker 1: this weird world where the rules are different, and you
Speaker 1: see them get caught up in it, and you see
Speaker 1: them buy into it, and that, in my experience having
Speaker 1: seen that, it never really ends well. Nobody, nobody ever
Speaker 1: winds up like surrounded by more friends when they go
Speaker 1: into success world and when they go into celebrity world.
Speaker 1: So for me, as I get more successful, I'm almost
Speaker 1: kind of like consciously pushing back against it. Not in
Speaker 1: a self sabotaging way, not that I want to stop
Speaker 1: my career momentum, but I just need to make sure
Speaker 1: my priorities remain true for a few reasons. One because
Speaker 1: I think that will help me remain a person with
Speaker 1: a good head on his shoulders. But also I feel
Speaker 1: like there's a very dangerous thing that can happen, which
Speaker 1: is people will be sort of in the underground. In comedy.
Speaker 1: I can speak to comedy. You know, you're in the
Speaker 1: trenches doing shows, building a fan base, like attracting your people,
Speaker 1: finding your other collaborators who have a similar mindset. And
Speaker 1: then sometimes people get successful and all of a sudden
Speaker 1: it's like, great, I'm done with that, let me leave
Speaker 1: it all behind. And I think that's such a dangerous thing.
Speaker 1: So I'm actually at a point now where I've had
Speaker 1: a couple of good years, but I'm also where that
Speaker 1: won't last. And one of my biggest priorities is to
Speaker 1: try to maybe find some comedians who are less experienced
Speaker 1: than I am, who remind me of where I was
Speaker 1: out a few years ago, and trying to include them
Speaker 1: and trying to sort of create sort of like a
Speaker 1: safety net of allies while giving other people opportunities Like
Speaker 1: I I I'm very proud of my TV show. Like
Speaker 1: there's a lot of people whose first writing jobs and
Speaker 1: first acting jobs are on my show, because it's like
Speaker 1: a very small, entry level show, and I like that.
Speaker 1: But that's also a strategic move on my part, in
Speaker 1: the sense of, let me find all the other like
Speaker 1: minded people and make sure that I'm helping them out
Speaker 1: so that when I'm not doing well and they are,
Speaker 1: maybe they'll feel inclined to help me out. So I
Speaker 1: feel like it's always to me feel it feels like
Speaker 1: a very smart thing. Is the second I got any
Speaker 1: anything resembling success, I was like, let me spread this
Speaker 1: around and include as many people as I can in
Speaker 1: it so that I don't lose sight of myself and
Speaker 1: so that I'm building something more long term. Then right now,
Speaker 1: the adrenaline rush of like being in a movie or
Speaker 1: selling your TV show or mounting this off Broadway show,
Speaker 1: it's like, those adrenaline rushes are really cool feelings, But
Speaker 1: I think I always try to think, well, what's the
Speaker 1: long term? What can I build long term out of this?
Speaker 1: How can I make this sustain beyond this particular month
Speaker 1: or two that feels so exciting. How can I build
Speaker 1: this into something that that serves me in a year
Speaker 1: or five years from now, and I think I've been
Speaker 1: really smart about that, mostly out of necessity. You gotta
Speaker 1: have to find your allies and make sure everybody takes
Speaker 1: care of each other. I really relate to those feelings
Speaker 1: of the adrenaline rush, feeling really good but then crashing
Speaker 1: from it after. And I want to go back to
Speaker 1: something you said earlier about how in your twenties, which
Speaker 1: is the decade I'm in right now, Um, you quit
Speaker 1: a success and happiness and then when you're in your
Speaker 1: thirties you realize that they weren't related. How do you
Speaker 1: do that? How do you even now? Because I mean,
Speaker 1: you're probably happy that you're successful. Yeah, I am, And
Speaker 1: it's a piece of the puzzle. But it's also it's
Speaker 1: very funny because like when you said my name, most
Speaker 1: of the people hearing this were like who, And then
Speaker 1: a handful of them were like, oh, I think I
Speaker 1: know who that guy is, and a very miniscule, very
Speaker 1: very miniscule percentage was like, oh, that guy's rat like
Speaker 1: and I'm aware that that's who I am. Like we're
Speaker 1: talking right now in an interview about how I have
Speaker 1: achieved some level of success. But that being said, if
Speaker 1: I became a household name tomorrow. It would have the
Speaker 1: appearance of an overnight sensation. Whereas I'm someone who's worked
Speaker 1: in comedy for sixteen years. So I think for me,
Speaker 1: I've had so many near misses with big level stuff
Speaker 1: that I think i've I was very I think I
Speaker 1: was very lucky when I was. When I was twenty
Speaker 1: nine years old, I got cast as the lead in
Speaker 1: a sitcom and this it comp bombed hard. It's bad
Speaker 1: and not an easy thing to go through, but I
Speaker 1: thank God all the time for it, because it was
Speaker 1: this thing where I almost got this very traditional definition
Speaker 1: of what every comedian is chasing. I did get it.
Speaker 1: It just bottomed out very quickly. But I was in
Speaker 1: that situation, and while I was in it, I was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: this didn't solve any of my problems. It didn't make
Speaker 1: me any happier. I have this big job. The New
Speaker 1: York Times wrote a profile on me because of this job.
Speaker 1: None of that means that I'm not like an anxious,
Speaker 1: depressed person. None of that means that I'm not sleeping
Speaker 1: in a bedroom with no closet and woodside queens like
Speaker 1: it's not it's not real. It's very gilded and that
Speaker 1: was this thing where I feel like I look back
Speaker 1: on that experience and it was very hard to live
Speaker 1: through them. But now it feels to me almost like
Speaker 1: someone pulled back the curtain and was like, this is
Speaker 1: the machine. You're gonna go get in the gears of
Speaker 1: this machine and get caught up in it, and it's
Speaker 1: not gonna do anything for you. It's not gonna make
Speaker 1: you happy. And when that show failed, when it went away,
Speaker 1: I wasn't that sad. I was like, all right, let
Speaker 1: me try to and the next thing. So it was
Speaker 1: this weird thing of realizing that I've come close. I
Speaker 1: was almost hired as a writer on Saturday Night Live
Speaker 1: in two thousand seven. I was there for two weeks
Speaker 1: as a guest writer, and I was there and I
Speaker 1: was like, Oh, this is so exciting and everybody wants
Speaker 1: this job. And then I got there and I was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: this is so stressful and scary. And then they didn't
Speaker 1: hire me, and I was like, Oh, that's such a bomber.
Speaker 1: Even then, I was seven years in when that SNW
Speaker 1: thing happened. I was ten years into doing comedy when
Speaker 1: the sitcom thing happened. So I think the shorthand non
Speaker 1: Rambobly answer is I've come close enough to big time
Speaker 1: things enough times that I'm aware that they're not the
Speaker 1: healing remedy that I always assumed they would be. They're
Speaker 1: just jobs, and some of them make you happy and
Speaker 1: some of them make you not happy. But at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, like going home to my wife
Speaker 1: or catching up with my buddies from college when I
Speaker 1: haven't seen them in a while, makes me so much
Speaker 1: happier than being in a movie. Not that I sneeze
Speaker 1: at being in a movie. I'm lucky, but I I'd
Speaker 1: rather live a real life. Entertainment is not real life.
Speaker 1: Do you feel grateful that the success that you're encountering
Speaker 1: is happening to you now, given your experiences over the
Speaker 1: past some odd years, that you sort of it's happening
Speaker 1: for you at the right time that you are sort
Speaker 1: of prepared for it now. One thousand percent. I think
Speaker 1: I think about I was just joking with someone the
Speaker 1: other day about they said, because you know, don't think twice.
Speaker 1: The movie that I'm in is about someone who gets
Speaker 1: hired at sn L, and they were like, oh, you
Speaker 1: almost got hired there, And I was like, yeah. But
Speaker 1: if I got hired at SNL when I was twenty seven,
Speaker 1: I would have lost my mind. I was like, I
Speaker 1: was like a depressed person in a big way. Like
Speaker 1: I would have definitely become one of those SNL horror
Speaker 1: stories of like some drugs. I would have been one
Speaker 1: of the drug addicts or the drunks. I would have
Speaker 1: driven me to madness. I wasn't ready. So I look
Speaker 1: back now and realize it hurts so much to not
Speaker 1: get that job then, but I think I really dodged
Speaker 1: a bullet, and I feel like success for me. It's
Speaker 1: almost very very similar to what I learned about like
Speaker 1: dating in my teenage years in early twenties, which was
Speaker 1: like if it's so clear that you want it so bad,
Speaker 1: you don't get the time of day, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean? Like any time I was a kid and
Speaker 1: I was like really pining for a girl, it never worked.
Speaker 1: And when I was able to just be like, hey
Speaker 1: we should go grab food, somebody be like yeah, and
Speaker 1: it was when it was just hey, this is not
Speaker 1: rocket science, let's do this thing. It's like that desperation
Speaker 1: and like I really need this to happen. It almost
Speaker 1: guarantees that it like pushes away any chance. So for me,
Speaker 1: I hit my thirties and I had kind of given
Speaker 1: up on the idea of any anything happening for me
Speaker 1: in a big way. And once I gave up and
Speaker 1: was kind of like, I don't really care anymore, that's
Speaker 1: when I started breaking through. Once I was like who cares,
Speaker 1: which is like so weird. It's like that. A friend
Speaker 1: of mine once told me a phrase about like dating.
Speaker 1: I was like single for a while and miserab about it,
Speaker 1: and he's like, hey, man, you're just you act hungry,
Speaker 1: you stay hungry. You're acting too hungry, man, and that's
Speaker 1: why you can't get girls to pay attention to you.
Speaker 1: I think it's the same thing the entertainment industry. As
Speaker 1: soon as you choose to not care, that's when everybody's like,
Speaker 1: you seem cool, we want to get on board. It's
Speaker 1: very only time I acted like I didn't care was
Speaker 1: with my now wife. Yeah, right, twenty eight years of prining, pining, pining,
Speaker 1: and then I was just like, let's just be I
Speaker 1: believe the term that the kids uses thirsty, thirsty, don't
Speaker 1: be too thirsty. On that note, I think we have
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Speaker 1: dot com slash up. So we're here with Chris Goatherd,
Speaker 1: who has a new show coming out, Careers to a
Speaker 1: Side at premiers in New York on October thirteenth, and
Speaker 1: we're talking about all of our feelings about our success
Speaker 1: are lack thereof? Chris? Can you tell us a little
Speaker 1: bit about career suicide? Career suicide? It's um, it's a
Speaker 1: comedy I've been working on. It's like just me up
Speaker 1: there for an hour and change and I talk. It's
Speaker 1: a it's a very very funny show. I want to
Speaker 1: be clear on that. I've been a comedian in New
Speaker 1: York for sixteen years. Like it's it's I've put a
Speaker 1: lot of effort into being funny. But that being said,
Speaker 1: it's a show that all the stories tend to they
Speaker 1: focus on my issues with depression and a suicide attempt
Speaker 1: and medications and the and the side effects of those.
Speaker 1: So it's it's, uh, it's not necessarily traditionally material that
Speaker 1: people think is like, oh, that's l O l L.
Speaker 1: I get it, so that airplane food wow, Yeah, but
Speaker 1: it's I feel like it's a conversation that people don't
Speaker 1: want to have. And I'm not making fun of any
Speaker 1: of that stuff, but I've lived through it in a
Speaker 1: real way, and um, I'm happy to get up there
Speaker 1: and maybe try to get some laughs out of it.
Speaker 1: And I've I've heard some people say like, oh, you
Speaker 1: can't joke about that, And to me, what they're saying
Speaker 1: is like, you can't talk about it, and I'm really
Speaker 1: against that. I'm like, I really hope the people who
Speaker 1: think this is least appropriate material for comedy are the
Speaker 1: first ones in the door, because I think they'll say, oh,
Speaker 1: that's actually the perspective of someone who's lived through it
Speaker 1: and wants to talk about it and own his his
Speaker 1: experiences and his problem. So that's that. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: named it career suicide because it's about suicide, but also
Speaker 1: like doing a whole show where you stake your claim
Speaker 1: on the idea of suicide is in effect a career suicide.
Speaker 1: But Judd Apatow got on board and he's producing it,
Speaker 1: so that goes a long way towards making you feel
Speaker 1: a little better about it. Yeah, that inoculates you, I
Speaker 1: guess a little bit from yeah. Yeah, But it was
Speaker 1: like my friend, my friend Mike ber Bigley, who directed
Speaker 1: the movie i'man he he was we were talking about
Speaker 1: the title and he was like, yeah, I think that's
Speaker 1: a good one, because like, this is a bad idea
Speaker 1: to dedicate years of your life to a show about suicide.
Speaker 1: It's a bad career move, but that's why you have
Speaker 1: to do it. So I've never been known throughout my
Speaker 1: career for making smart choices, but I do make honest
Speaker 1: choices and choices I'm passionate about. So it doesn't always
Speaker 1: end well, but it's worked out pretty well for me.
Speaker 1: So you brought up Mike Robiglia, and I saw the
Speaker 1: movie Don't Think twice, and a lot of the stuff
Speaker 1: that we're talking about is in the movie. If you
Speaker 1: if you're someone who thinks about success and failure a lot,
Speaker 1: that movie is like a horror movie to you. I
Speaker 1: bet yeah. I was really upset after seeing it, and
Speaker 1: everyone I know loved it, and I really liked it also,
Speaker 1: but it was also like, why am I reacting emotionally
Speaker 1: to this ninety minute movie about improv? Yeah, it's funny.
Speaker 1: A lot of people in creative fields have found that
Speaker 1: movie to be a little I've had consistent feedback from
Speaker 1: people who are in the arts or in creative areas
Speaker 1: who are like, that movie is terrifying, and I'm mad
Speaker 1: at you guys were making it because it's all about
Speaker 1: how you have to just question yourself constantly. It's too real.
Speaker 1: Isn't there something I think about sort of the performing arts,
Speaker 1: where success and failure are so stark that you know,
Speaker 1: as opposed to other careers up where you know, you
Speaker 1: can go to your office every day and some days
Speaker 1: you do a really good job and some days you
Speaker 1: do a really bad job, but you know it averages
Speaker 1: out to keep you employed and you just kind of
Speaker 1: bounce along, whereas if you're an actor or a comic,
Speaker 1: you know you're just encountering so many times where people
Speaker 1: are saying, you know, yes, no you not you big time,
Speaker 1: big time stand up. And that's why stand ups the hardest,
Speaker 1: if you ask me, that's the hardest type of comedy
Speaker 1: because when it fails, it is honestly a room for
Speaker 1: you standing in front of a room full of people
Speaker 1: who are silent because they don't like the material you
Speaker 1: wrote in the way you chose to deliver it. Like,
Speaker 1: they just don't like you. There's no way around that.
Speaker 1: When you bomb, they're like, we don't like you, we
Speaker 1: don't like the things you're saying, we don't like the
Speaker 1: way you're saying, and we don't like you. It's really
Speaker 1: it's very lonely. Failing as a stand up is one
Speaker 1: of the most lonely feelings, and I think you have
Speaker 1: to learn to embrace that very quickly if you're just
Speaker 1: going to survive I mentally and acting to acting. Like
Speaker 1: especially in your early days as an actor, almost everybody
Speaker 1: does tons of commercial auditions, and those are exactly what
Speaker 1: you're describing. Were like you walk in and they're like
Speaker 1: your head is too big to sell cheerios, you know,
Speaker 1: like where you can just feel it where it's like
Speaker 1: we wanted a pay all guy, but your three shades
Speaker 1: to pay off for us say this judgment of how
Speaker 1: you look, and you know, like you'll walk in and
Speaker 1: before you even say a word, they like glance up
Speaker 1: at you and then look back down at your their pad,
Speaker 1: and you're like, I just took hours out of my
Speaker 1: day to just get judged for my appearance. And I
Speaker 1: can feel it, so it can be rough. Maybe that's
Speaker 1: why the relationship with success is so tortured, because you
Speaker 1: went through this horrible process of so much rejection to
Speaker 1: get to this thing you thought you wanted, and then
Speaker 1: you're like, oh, I did all of that for this,
Speaker 1: I think so. And I also like, I'm like I
Speaker 1: grew up in North Jersey. Everybody as a chip on
Speaker 1: their shoulder out there, and it's like I always had
Speaker 1: this idea in my head of like I'm going to
Speaker 1: get successful and prove them wrong. And then when got successful,
Speaker 1: I was like, wait, there was no no they, No
Speaker 1: one was always I've always had this feeling that people
Speaker 1: are going to be like, now we get it, we
Speaker 1: were wrong. But it's like, oh, there wasn't this chorus
Speaker 1: of doubtful voices. I invented that in my head because
Speaker 1: I have mental problems. That's what happened. And then yeah,
Speaker 1: everybody was like, great man, you're a nice guy. You
Speaker 1: deserve it. And then I was like, oh no, now
Speaker 1: I just have mental problems. I was fighting with these
Speaker 1: invisible demons, which is you bring that up in the
Speaker 1: Vulture essay to which I really liked that part where
Speaker 1: you mentioned some people who go out to l A,
Speaker 1: they become successful, and then they still have all these
Speaker 1: demons big time. I do want to be clear though,
Speaker 1: I'm not an l A hater, like, I don't hate
Speaker 1: l A. It's great, it works for a lot of people.
Speaker 1: For me, I lived there for a little while in
Speaker 1: two thousand four and it drove me nuts. I found
Speaker 1: it an isolating, lonely place. And but I do I
Speaker 1: think that I do. I see a lot of my friends.
Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of my friends who have
Speaker 1: families in l A very happy because they go home
Speaker 1: to their spouses and their kids and their backyards and exactly,
Speaker 1: and who doesn't love that a life that you can
Speaker 1: help provide for a family. But see some people go
Speaker 1: out and there may be younger and single and still
Speaker 1: have that chip on their shoulder and living life and
Speaker 1: looking for clubs and looking to get their pictures taken,
Speaker 1: and and those people tend to burn out fast, and
Speaker 1: those demons really rise to the surface in a way
Speaker 1: that's pretty hard to watch. It's hard to watch people
Speaker 1: who I have have known since we were kids maybe given
Speaker 1: to some of those demons a little too much. It's
Speaker 1: very sad and scary. And it happens in New York
Speaker 1: as well. But as a comedian, you see people go
Speaker 1: to l A specifically to chase stuff, and you see
Speaker 1: how that ends well, and you also see very often
Speaker 1: how that ends poorly. I can see that happening to me.
Speaker 1: Don't let that happen to me. Um. So this is
Speaker 1: kind of an unrelated question, but as I've been thinking
Speaker 1: about success, I went to the US Open and I
Speaker 1: was thinking, like, what do you think it feels like
Speaker 1: to be Venus Williams. Her sister is the most successful,
Speaker 1: and she is, by all metrics, also incredibly successful. Do
Speaker 1: you think that she feels like not a failure but like, Okay,
Speaker 1: you know, I have to constantly be compared to this
Speaker 1: other person who's the best. I've been thinking about this
Speaker 1: a lot. People who are like right there. The long
Speaker 1: pause on this answer reflects the sadness that just sorry, guys,
Speaker 1: I mean, Venus Lambs is great, but it's just I
Speaker 1: think the money probably helps, or maybe I'm thinking about
Speaker 1: all wrong and this is just I'm projecting my hippersion
Speaker 1: of success. Their doubles partners fantastic, go a long way.
Speaker 1: I hope you're getting along, Venus and Serena the inner
Speaker 1: workings of the Williams Sisterhood my brother and my brother
Speaker 1: does comedy as well, not professionally, and there was a
Speaker 1: while where we used to butt heads, but now we're
Speaker 1: in a good place. But he always makes jokes of like,
Speaker 1: you're more successful, but I'm far funnier, and he's correct
Speaker 1: correcting that he's much much funnier than I am. But
Speaker 1: I just I think I was a little more stubborn
Speaker 1: and went for it, and there was there was a
Speaker 1: stretch where I think we were like feeling some friction
Speaker 1: with each other over it, But um, now I think
Speaker 1: it's just like we're old enough that it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: we both wound up okay with like reasonably okay lives
Speaker 1: and we're healthy and happy, and that's that's a good thing. Um,
Speaker 1: and the competitive nature of our of our youth has
Speaker 1: gone away, which I think we're both happy about. God.
Speaker 1: I can't wait to be mature and wise. Um. Well
Speaker 1: this was really really great. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: coming and talking about us. I hope it was useful
Speaker 1: on any level. And then I didn't ramble too much.
Speaker 1: Not great, it's great. And now it's time for half
Speaker 1: big takes, happy fake takes. Half big takes are half
Speaker 1: thought out ideas we have about the world in and
Speaker 1: out of the workplace, and this is where we get
Speaker 1: to air them out. So what is your half big
Speaker 1: take this week? Sam Becka, My half baked take is
Speaker 1: actually an endorsement, a recommendation. Um. We spent a lot
Speaker 1: of time here talking about the workplace. There is a
Speaker 1: British comedy series that actually aired a couple of years
Speaker 1: ago called w one A, and that is the postcode
Speaker 1: for the headquarters of the BBC where the series takes place.
Speaker 1: And even though it's a couple of years old, it
Speaker 1: is still as fresh and new and insightful as ever.
Speaker 1: And it's, like they like to say in television, if
Speaker 1: you haven't seen it before, it's not a rerun. It's
Speaker 1: the story of a character played by Hugh Bonneville, who
Speaker 1: many people will recognize from Downton Abbey, who has started
Speaker 1: a new job at the BBC. And it is an
Speaker 1: roorious send up of sort of workplace culture all of
Speaker 1: the different ways, from the design of the office to
Speaker 1: the meetings they have to the titles. People have just
Speaker 1: a bunch of nonsense, and it does it in a
Speaker 1: terri thickly, uncomfortably funny way. And I can't recommend it enough.
Speaker 1: It's on Netflix. It sounds like a more modern version
Speaker 1: of the Office. Well, it definitely shares something with the
Speaker 1: Office in that both besides being British workplace comedies, well
Speaker 1: that's what I was right, but also like there's a
Speaker 1: certain comedy of the uncomfortable, you know, I sort of
Speaker 1: Curb your enthusiasm would be another tent pole there. And
Speaker 1: so it's just a lot of awkwardness and a lot
Speaker 1: of passive aggression and so forth. It's not playing for
Speaker 1: like really big laughs, but it just perfectly captures and
Speaker 1: also amplifies all of the frustrations that you might encounter
Speaker 1: in the modern workplace. I should probably watch it all
Speaker 1: of it this weekend as research for this show we
Speaker 1: put on. You should totally should. I think there's maybe
Speaker 1: like four or six episodes there, half an hour each.
Speaker 1: I mean you can take me one day, you can
Speaker 1: blaze right through it. Yeah, great, I don't think that's
Speaker 1: a take I can really argue with. I will take
Speaker 1: that take. Um. So my half big take is that
Speaker 1: there is a correct bathroom stalls selections to energy, and
Speaker 1: I use it, and if you're not using it, you
Speaker 1: should be what's the strategy. Well, it's kind of complicated,
Speaker 1: but when you go into a bathroom, you should have
Speaker 1: a strategy about which doll you're going to go into,
Speaker 1: and you should look at who is occupying all the
Speaker 1: other stalls and make calculations and pick the one that
Speaker 1: makes the most sense for alienating the least people. What
Speaker 1: does that mean to you? There are say there are
Speaker 1: six stalls in a bathroom, and somebody's in the two
Speaker 1: end ones, Like you should go in a middle one
Speaker 1: so that you're not right next to someone as they're peeing, obviously,
Speaker 1: or like this is maybe tam I if I know
Speaker 1: that I have to just like quick pe I'll take
Speaker 1: an end stall because I know that those are kind
Speaker 1: of the worst ones to be in. But like my
Speaker 1: quick pee, it's in offensive, will be in and out right. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't wait for the stalls. Like if I walk
Speaker 1: into a restroom, yeah, and they're full, I'm out of there.
Speaker 1: I see people who hang out. No, don't do that
Speaker 1: because then also what that creates is the incredibly awkward
Speaker 1: moment where you and the person like, now you're trading
Speaker 1: stalls and I know what you were just doing it
Speaker 1: all the way for men, we really know what you
Speaker 1: were just doing. I think anonymity is key. No one
Speaker 1: should ever know that you're in the bathroom. No one
Speaker 1: in the bathroom should know about anybody else. I'll just
Speaker 1: pretend we're not there and we never go there right
Speaker 1: at work exactly. All right. That's my take, And this
Speaker 1: has been half Big Takes, half Pike Takes. Thanks for
Speaker 1: joining us for another episode of game Plan. You can
Speaker 1: find me on Twitter. I'm at rs Greenfield and i
Speaker 1: am at Sam Grobart and check out Chris Guthard's new
Speaker 1: show Career Suicide, which premier is oct in New York
Speaker 1: City off Fridway. Thanks for listening. See you next week.
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