WEBVTT - Taking Risks and Traveling the World, with Tom Freston! 0:00:14.560 --> 0:00:17.960 You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope 0:00:18.120 --> 0:00:19.120 and iHeartRadio. 0:00:23.680 --> 0:00:24.919 Hey there are podcast listeners. 0:00:24.960 --> 0:00:30.400 I'm Monga's starticular ak Mango, and Will is off today. 0:00:30.440 --> 0:00:34.040 But I've gotten an incredible treat for you. If you've 0:00:34.040 --> 0:00:36.680 listened to the show, you know how much I loved 0:00:36.760 --> 0:00:39.120 Nickelodeon as a kid. My friends and I in third 0:00:39.200 --> 0:00:43.479 grade used to practice for Doubledare every day in the summer, 0:00:44.000 --> 0:00:48.239 just waiting for the execs to call spoiler alert. They 0:00:48.360 --> 0:00:52.199 never did, but I love the way Nickelodeon felt like 0:00:52.240 --> 0:00:55.360 it was talking to me and really providing this channel 0:00:55.560 --> 0:00:55.960 for me. 0:00:56.880 --> 0:00:59.440 And then years later it was the same with MTV 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:05.040 and then Comedy Central, and weirdly enough, these channels were 0:01:05.120 --> 0:01:07.319 something that I thought a lot about when Will and 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:11.760 I founded Mental Flaws years and years ago. Anyway, the 0:01:11.880 --> 0:01:14.240 reason I am telling you any of this is that 0:01:14.280 --> 0:01:18.119 for today's show, I am interviewing the wonderful Tom Freston, 0:01:18.600 --> 0:01:21.199 one of the co founders of a scrappy little TV 0:01:21.319 --> 0:01:26.440 channel called MTV, which grew into a massive, massive bohemo. 0:01:26.840 --> 0:01:31.280 From MTV, he became president of MTV Networks, guiding Nickelodeon 0:01:31.480 --> 0:01:35.520 VH one, Comedy Central, TV Land and all these other 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:40.320 channels through incredible eras of creativity. He is such a 0:01:40.319 --> 0:01:44.600 hero to me. Then he became CEO Viacom. But the 0:01:44.680 --> 0:01:47.720 truth is, none of this is the most interesting stuff 0:01:47.760 --> 0:01:51.560 about him. After college, he hitchhiked across northern Africa. He 0:01:51.640 --> 0:01:54.360 spent years in India running a clothing company. He even 0:01:54.640 --> 0:01:59.080 helped launch a media network in Afghanistan. He is a 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:03.240 world traveler, a philanthropist, and best of all, he is 0:02:03.280 --> 0:02:08.519 an incredible, incredible storyteller. So I was really excited when 0:02:08.520 --> 0:02:11.320 he agreed to sit down with me and talk about 0:02:11.320 --> 0:02:16.280 his new book. It's called Unplugged Adventures from MTV to Timbucktoo. 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:20.399 It is so good, such a wonderful read, and we're 0:02:20.400 --> 0:02:22.600 going to talk about it here. Let's dive in. 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:47.760 So I'm here with Tom Preston, author of Unplugged Adventures 0:02:47.800 --> 0:02:51.520 from MTV to Timbuck two. It's out now. It is 0:02:51.680 --> 0:02:54.800 an extraordinary book. I've got to say, this book reminded 0:02:54.840 --> 0:02:57.200 me of two books I really love. One is The 0:02:57.560 --> 0:03:01.200 Man Who Time Forgot and another one called Barbarian Days. 0:03:01.680 --> 0:03:05.160 And Barbarian Days is about like surfing and chasing this 0:03:05.400 --> 0:03:08.240 high of travel in a way. And the Man who 0:03:08.280 --> 0:03:10.880 Time Forgot is about britt Hadden, who was the co 0:03:10.960 --> 0:03:14.040 founder of Time magazine, and the way that they were 0:03:14.080 --> 0:03:16.360 just so creative and inventive in the way they started 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:18.519 that magazine and so like, there's something about both of 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:22.120 those that really was inspiring to me. But first I 0:03:22.120 --> 0:03:24.079 want to start with just who this book is made 0:03:24.080 --> 0:03:26.480 out to. It's made out to your brother and your sons. 0:03:26.520 --> 0:03:28.239 Can you tell me about why you dedicated to them? 0:03:28.600 --> 0:03:31.440 Well, I love my sons, that's obvious and it would 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:34.320 be true for any father. And my dear brother who 0:03:34.360 --> 0:03:36.960 was my only sibling. He was a couple of years 0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:38.840 younger than me. He helped me out a lot in life, 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:41.960 and he had a tragic death this last winter in 0:03:42.200 --> 0:03:44.720 the Caribbean. He fell down a flight of stairs. I mean, 0:03:44.760 --> 0:03:47.120 you never know when it hits you, and kind of 0:03:47.160 --> 0:03:48.800 went into a coma and never came out. 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:51.240 And what do you want your sons to know from 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:52.600 this book about your life? 0:03:53.040 --> 0:03:56.160 That their life is full of possibility, that they don't 0:03:56.160 --> 0:03:58.320 have to be trapped into one thing. They can change 0:03:58.440 --> 0:04:02.400 lines and find things that are maybe suited for them. 0:04:02.480 --> 0:04:05.880 This is a time of great change in the employment area, 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:08.680 and a lot of businesses that have sort of lost 0:04:08.720 --> 0:04:11.080 their luster, new ones that are emerging, and they should 0:04:11.080 --> 0:04:13.800 not be afraid to start different chapters in their lives. 0:04:14.280 --> 0:04:17.080 I love that, you know. I love openings of books. 0:04:17.320 --> 0:04:20.919 And the opening to your book starts with the chainsaw, 0:04:21.000 --> 0:04:23.080 which is just such an incredible image. Can you can 0:04:23.120 --> 0:04:24.760 you talk a little bit about why you started your 0:04:24.760 --> 0:04:25.200 book there? 0:04:25.760 --> 0:04:28.039 Well, I started my book because the opening scene is 0:04:28.040 --> 0:04:30.840 me getting fired after you know, twenty six years at 0:04:30.839 --> 0:04:34.800 this company, the company that started MTV and evolved into 0:04:34.839 --> 0:04:40.279 something so much bigger, to several incarnations, and the chainsaw 0:04:40.480 --> 0:04:43.839 was sent to me years earlier. This is sometime in 0:04:43.880 --> 0:04:47.360 the nineties by the heavy metal band Anthrax. You know, 0:04:47.400 --> 0:04:49.680 they were heavy metal band. They'd all autographed it, and 0:04:49.720 --> 0:04:51.480 I used to get a lot of you know, gold 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:55.000 records since that jacket, stuff like that. But this was 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:58.400 a useful gift. And I was clearing out my office 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:01.160 after I got fired. I got fired in Los Angeles. 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:03.400 I came back to New York and I only wanted 0:05:03.440 --> 0:05:05.960 to take a few things that were sentimental. But I 0:05:06.000 --> 0:05:09.440 thought besides the sentimental photos and whatnot, you know, I 0:05:09.440 --> 0:05:12.200 could use that chain, so I didn't have one, and 0:05:12.240 --> 0:05:14.039 it'd be a useful gift, So I put it in 0:05:14.080 --> 0:05:16.120 a banker's box with a few other things that was 0:05:16.160 --> 0:05:19.760 a small one, and made my way down the elevator 0:05:19.800 --> 0:05:21.000 to a lobby to exit. 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:26.000 You talk about the exit from Viacom and you merge 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:29.240 there and they're just a sea of people waiting to 0:05:29.279 --> 0:05:31.680 say goodbye to you, and love for you is palpable. 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:34.400 And it's funny because one of the producers on this 0:05:34.520 --> 0:05:38.200 show worked at Comedy Central after you'd left, and she says, 0:05:38.279 --> 0:05:41.400 like people still talk fondly about the Tom Freston era, 0:05:41.600 --> 0:05:44.359 which is so sweet and also just a testament to 0:05:44.520 --> 0:05:48.679 like all the fun and excitement and things you brought there. 0:05:49.279 --> 0:05:51.480 Well, we had a really unique culture, and I always 0:05:51.520 --> 0:05:54.200 put the idea of us having a creative culture and 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:58.520 innovative culture really in the forefront. Is as how I 0:05:58.560 --> 0:06:01.400 wanted this company to be, to edgy, to be you know, 0:06:01.680 --> 0:06:06.440 casual and non hierarchical and risk taking and a place 0:06:06.480 --> 0:06:10.880 at treasured creativity. And in my exit, as CNBC said, 0:06:10.920 --> 0:06:13.960 there was like a thousand people in the lobby cheering 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:17.800 me on, cheering me out, give me a Heroes exit. 0:06:18.480 --> 0:06:20.600 I had thought I could just sneak out, you know, 0:06:20.880 --> 0:06:23.840 I have a bit of the imposter syndrome and a 0:06:23.880 --> 0:06:26.760 mask had been ripped off now and I was depressed, 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:29.240 no doubt about it. But this gave me a great 0:06:29.360 --> 0:06:33.760 lift off that still stays with me. I remember getting down, 0:06:33.839 --> 0:06:36.440 getting through the lobby was all in slow motion. Down 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:40.120 the escalator into Times Square. I too my stuff into 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:42.839 a taxi got in rolled by the Broadway theaters, and 0:06:42.880 --> 0:06:45.600 I said, you know, that was a good way to go. 0:06:46.400 --> 0:06:49.479 It's such an incredible career and obviously not where it stopped, 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:52.719 because there are so many amazing things that go on 0:06:52.800 --> 0:06:56.680 after that. But take me back to the beginning of 0:06:57.360 --> 0:07:00.600 your first interactions with TV and what meant to have 0:07:01.160 --> 0:07:03.040 a TV in the household initially. 0:07:02.920 --> 0:07:04.599 Well, I kind of grew up in a Leave It 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:07.080 to Beaver Way, if people out there remember what that 0:07:07.240 --> 0:07:09.239 was about. That was sort of an all American post 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:12.559 war family, two brothers, a mother, and a husband, stay 0:07:12.560 --> 0:07:15.760 at home mom. I grew up in the fifties. I 0:07:15.800 --> 0:07:19.120 was an early baby boomer, and you know, television came 0:07:19.160 --> 0:07:22.120 out black and white. We had one TV and we 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:25.400 would sit around and watch the shows of the day, 0:07:25.600 --> 0:07:27.840 and you know, I mean one of the great moments 0:07:27.920 --> 0:07:31.320 was in nineteen fifty six sitting around my family and 0:07:31.320 --> 0:07:35.920 seeing Elvis Presley on the Ed Sullivan Show. I think 0:07:35.960 --> 0:07:39.560 there was like sixty million people watching. It was like 0:07:39.560 --> 0:07:42.160 like the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show years later, 0:07:42.760 --> 0:07:44.760 but it was like a hurricane passed through the room, 0:07:44.800 --> 0:07:48.280 and my mother and father were disgusted. My brother and 0:07:48.280 --> 0:07:50.800 I were elated, and we kind of knew. I was 0:07:50.840 --> 0:07:52.560 in sixth grade, we kind of knew that we were 0:07:52.560 --> 0:07:54.120 going to grow up in a different world, with our 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:56.680 own music, with our own clothes, with our own style, 0:07:56.720 --> 0:07:59.080 and we were sort of part of a new generation 0:07:59.200 --> 0:08:01.960 that was really setting sale from the prior one, the 0:08:02.240 --> 0:08:05.680 generation they would call the Great American Generation, the people 0:08:05.680 --> 0:08:08.720 who fought in World War two and so forth. So 0:08:09.000 --> 0:08:13.200 television was always there, and I followed a lot of 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:15.480 the shows, but I was in truth more interested in 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:17.760 the music of the era and spent a lot more 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:21.280 time listening to the early rock and roll radio stations. 0:08:22.720 --> 0:08:25.040 You know, one of the things that I've heard a 0:08:25.040 --> 0:08:28.400 lot about the early MTV days is that most of 0:08:28.440 --> 0:08:31.960 the people were hired were people who hated television. Did 0:08:32.000 --> 0:08:33.240 you fall into that category? 0:08:33.679 --> 0:08:36.400 Well, when I got my job interview, they said, you know, 0:08:36.440 --> 0:08:40.000 we're looking for people with absolutely no experience in television, 0:08:40.040 --> 0:08:42.680 which is an unlikely line at a television company. But 0:08:42.720 --> 0:08:46.280 it was the early stays of the cable programming era 0:08:46.400 --> 0:08:47.920 and we were sort of the tip of the speer 0:08:47.960 --> 0:08:52.040 out there with CNN, ESPN and cable was really just beginning. 0:08:52.040 --> 0:08:55.120 It was mostly in rural areas, but they couldn't afford 0:08:55.600 --> 0:08:58.640 to hire people who worked at the broadcast networks. There 0:08:58.640 --> 0:09:00.640 was really only three or four places to work in 0:09:00.679 --> 0:09:03.880 those days if you include PBS, and they didn't want 0:09:03.880 --> 0:09:07.480 anyone bringing along any kind of expensive production habits, so 0:09:07.920 --> 0:09:10.000 we had to sort of start from scratch, an event 0:09:10.040 --> 0:09:13.000 from zero, And in retrospect, it was a brilliant move 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:16.640 to hire school teachers and people from radio stations and 0:09:16.720 --> 0:09:19.000 record companies and me I came out of eight years 0:09:19.040 --> 0:09:22.240 of living in Afghanistan and India, so it was a 0:09:22.360 --> 0:09:27.079 great mixing pot of eccentrics and people who wouldn't normally 0:09:27.120 --> 0:09:30.040 work in any kind of normal company. And we were 0:09:30.080 --> 0:09:34.079 all on crusade either to you know, take Nickelodeon or 0:09:34.240 --> 0:09:38.440 MTV across the nation and infuse it with our own 0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:43.600 spirit and make it a very obvious counterpoint to the 0:09:43.640 --> 0:09:46.400 traditional program that was being done on the networks. We 0:09:46.400 --> 0:09:49.679 were the early narrow casters, as we were known, just 0:09:49.760 --> 0:09:53.600 programming one thing to one audience as opposed to general 0:09:53.640 --> 0:09:56.360 interest stuff like ABC, NBC and CBS. 0:09:57.000 --> 0:10:01.480 It's funny, there's like an old Garfield comic where they're 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:04.520 joking about narrowcasting and talking about like a food network, 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:07.080 and it's just a picture of lasagna, and I'm like 0:10:07.120 --> 0:10:11.200 a picture of like a refrigerator or whatever, and not 0:10:11.240 --> 0:10:13.400 really realizing that like a food network could be a 0:10:13.480 --> 0:10:16.640 massive thing, or a music network could have a tremendous 0:10:16.640 --> 0:10:17.640 influence on the world. 0:10:18.000 --> 0:10:20.200 Yeah, we used to joke there could be a time network, 0:10:20.200 --> 0:10:22.079 there could be all kinds of useless networks. But I 0:10:22.160 --> 0:10:25.079 remember a man from the music industry, Bob Krasnow, came 0:10:25.120 --> 0:10:26.959 to me once. He says, I got the greatest idea 0:10:26.960 --> 0:10:29.480 in the world for you. This was nineteen eighty nine. 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:32.839 I was then the CEO of MTV Networks, which ruled 0:10:32.840 --> 0:10:36.120 over you know, Comedy Central and pH one and MTV 0:10:36.240 --> 0:10:39.040 and Nick and I got the greatest idea in the 0:10:39.040 --> 0:10:41.800 world for you. Says, food is going to be the 0:10:41.840 --> 0:10:44.120 new rock and roll. Chefs are going to be the 0:10:44.160 --> 0:10:47.360 new rock stars. I thought he was crazy. I was 0:10:47.440 --> 0:10:49.439 too trapped in my own thing and didn't have the 0:10:49.559 --> 0:10:51.760 vision to think that this could possibly be true. But 0:10:51.920 --> 0:10:55.600 sure enough, everything he said came out to be true. 0:10:55.600 --> 0:10:57.480 And I missed the boat on that one. 0:10:58.080 --> 0:11:01.600 Well, you mentioned that before where MTV you had been 0:11:02.040 --> 0:11:05.720 traveling abroad. You've been in Afghanistan. Tell me about you 0:11:05.800 --> 0:11:08.880 as a child. Were you adventurous? What were your thoughts 0:11:08.880 --> 0:11:11.520 about the world beyond Connecticut where you were growing up. 0:11:12.000 --> 0:11:14.200 You know, we never went anywhere. My father fought in 0:11:14.240 --> 0:11:16.480 World War Two and when he came back, he was 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:20.080 in the Pacific Theater. He didn't want to go anywhere, 0:11:20.080 --> 0:11:21.960 and we only took one trip and that was like 0:11:22.200 --> 0:11:25.200 sixty miles from our house to a mystic Connecticut where 0:11:25.240 --> 0:11:28.240 they had some smelly old whaling ships. That was a 0:11:28.320 --> 0:11:30.720 day trip. That was our only trip. So I was 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:34.320 sort of trapped there listening to radio from New York 0:11:34.400 --> 0:11:40.560 City and gradually buying some record albums. And I was 0:11:40.640 --> 0:11:43.080 a young boy. I was a stamp collector, and I 0:11:43.120 --> 0:11:47.960 was always fascinated by exotic stamps, from you know, Africa 0:11:48.000 --> 0:11:51.920 and Southeast Asia. I'd have stamps from Zanzibar and all 0:11:52.000 --> 0:11:55.760 these faraway places. And you know, that, mixed in with 0:11:55.800 --> 0:11:59.080 some shows of television about the French Foreign Legion in 0:11:59.160 --> 0:12:02.720 Algeria and so forth, really captured my interest. But I 0:12:02.720 --> 0:12:05.319 had only been in two states, New York and Connecticut 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:07.200 when I left to go to college on a bus. 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:10.040 And how is it that you end up working in 0:12:10.080 --> 0:12:13.920 bars and various vacation towns during and after college. 0:12:14.800 --> 0:12:17.719 Well, I went to graduate school primarily to get out 0:12:17.760 --> 0:12:19.960 of the draft. I went to business school, which turned 0:12:19.960 --> 0:12:23.160 out to be a blessing in disguise. And when that 0:12:23.280 --> 0:12:26.520 was done, I realized I'd been eighteen years in school. 0:12:26.600 --> 0:12:28.640 I could use a break. And I had been sort 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:32.520 of entranced by the literature of the Beats, which was 0:12:32.559 --> 0:12:35.360 all about you know, experience is a key thing in life, 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:40.359 not so much money, travel around. It's the world's greatest classroom, 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:44.000 build up a body of experiences. So that was one thing. 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:46.800 And then at the time, this was the late sixties 0:12:46.880 --> 0:12:51.080 early seventies, freedom was in the air. Every other song 0:12:51.120 --> 0:12:53.760 had something about hitting the road or leaving the road. 0:12:53.840 --> 0:12:57.040 Joni Mitchell had a big album out called Blue, which 0:12:57.080 --> 0:12:59.520 I loved and played incessantly. It was all about her 0:12:59.559 --> 0:13:02.960 internet adventures, and my appetite was sort of wet and 0:13:03.000 --> 0:13:06.479 ready to go. But I spent a year after school 0:13:07.080 --> 0:13:11.040 tending bar in various resort towns Aspen, Saint Thomas, and 0:13:11.080 --> 0:13:14.360 the Virgin Islands Martha's Vineyard that was known as sort 0:13:14.360 --> 0:13:17.800 of life on the circuit. This was before mass tourism, 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:20.040 so I really was lucky in the sense that I 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:22.480 had a window to be in the Caribbean before the 0:13:22.480 --> 0:13:26.480 big cruise ships and the resorts that you never leave. 0:13:26.840 --> 0:13:29.720 Martha's in her Nassen were nowhere near the lux vacation 0:13:29.880 --> 0:13:34.040 towns for billionaires. They were mostly filled with hippies and outlaws. 0:13:34.640 --> 0:13:37.080 Yes, hippies and outlaws, But you also ran into some 0:13:37.160 --> 0:13:39.080 incredible company when you were in some of these places, 0:13:39.160 --> 0:13:43.600 right like James Taylor shows off and some incredible musicians Sale. 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:45.319 Or Well, he was the big on Martha's Vinyard. He 0:13:45.360 --> 0:13:47.199 had just sort of come out with his Sweet Baby 0:13:47.280 --> 0:13:49.360 James album, and you know, it was sort of the 0:13:49.440 --> 0:13:51.920 beginning of the year of the singer songwriters. And his 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:54.280 brother Alex, who I grew to New he had a 0:13:54.320 --> 0:13:57.200 record store in town and they had speakers outside and 0:13:57.640 --> 0:14:00.679 they would play incessantly James's two records all the time. 0:14:01.280 --> 0:14:04.000 But I met James, I met Tom Rush, who was 0:14:04.000 --> 0:14:07.160 a folk singer, and some other people, and that would 0:14:07.200 --> 0:14:09.200 be something that that would be bumping into people for 0:14:09.240 --> 0:14:11.360 the rest of my life. Out of the music business. 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:15.720 Twenty six years at this company, the company that started MTV, 0:14:15.840 --> 0:14:18.360 and we're evolved into something so much bigger. 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:19.960 We've got to take a quick pause. 0:14:20.000 --> 0:14:25.720 But back with Tom Freston right after this break. 0:14:37.640 --> 0:14:42.040 You know, on one hand you mentioned this like imposter syndrome, 0:14:42.520 --> 0:14:45.080 and on the other hand you've talked about how your 0:14:45.160 --> 0:14:47.880 dad is like really charismatic in this book and can 0:14:47.920 --> 0:14:52.120 talk to anyone. Did you have a problem approaching celebrities 0:14:52.120 --> 0:14:54.040 and things like that or did you grow into a 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:55.800 comfort with that. How did that emerge? 0:14:56.320 --> 0:14:59.000 You know, I was never a starstruck. I find it 0:14:59.080 --> 0:15:01.040 kind of natural to talk to him, because, you know, 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:02.920 if you were able to get beyond the managers and 0:15:02.960 --> 0:15:05.360 the record companies and talk directly to artists, you'd find 0:15:05.360 --> 0:15:08.280 out they didn't have this huge aura around them. They 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:10.360 were approachable and they liked to talk you'd talk to 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:12.400 David Bowie, He'd want to know what books you were reading. 0:15:12.440 --> 0:15:14.680 They'd be interested in you as much as you be 0:15:14.720 --> 0:15:17.840 interested in them, so you could really speak to them 0:15:18.000 --> 0:15:20.240 as if they were normal people, even though they might 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:22.600 have been traveling in many cases with a big entourage 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:25.720 around them. But I would say, of the everybody I met, 0:15:25.760 --> 0:15:28.960 and over the years, I think I met every pop star, 0:15:29.080 --> 0:15:33.560 movie star, president, magazine editor and so forth, it was 0:15:33.640 --> 0:15:37.640 really the Beatles and David Bowie who were hitting shoulders 0:15:37.680 --> 0:15:40.920 above all else and sort of the musical pantheon. But 0:15:41.000 --> 0:15:43.960 even them, even those two, I got to know a 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:44.560 bit over. 0:15:44.440 --> 0:15:48.720 Time, which just feels astounding the fact that you end 0:15:48.800 --> 0:15:53.440 up later in Asana with David Bowie and Paul McCartney 0:15:53.480 --> 0:15:55.640 and I want to talk about that, but before we 0:15:55.720 --> 0:16:00.680 get to that, I am so fascinated with My twin 0:16:00.760 --> 0:16:04.480 interests are like media and travel. Right Like, I was 0:16:04.520 --> 0:16:08.080 an anthropology major, and one of the things I love 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:10.920 is just your ability to pick up and go to 0:16:11.000 --> 0:16:14.760 Morocco and start traveling from there, and what drove you 0:16:14.840 --> 0:16:16.440 to just leave everything and do that. 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:19.200 Well, after I spent a year on the road on 0:16:19.240 --> 0:16:21.480 the circuit. If you will you know, tending bar and 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:24.120 resort towns. I got a job in a big New 0:16:24.200 --> 0:16:27.320 York ad agency and I got on the fast track. 0:16:27.400 --> 0:16:30.280 My first account was Gi Joe. This is an anti 0:16:30.400 --> 0:16:32.040 war period, so we had to give him sort of 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:35.240 an honorary discharge and make him an action man. And 0:16:35.280 --> 0:16:37.120 then I had a variety of other accounts that were 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:40.160 Procter and Gamble accounts. That was a big piece of 0:16:40.200 --> 0:16:42.720 business for the agency. And I was going to be 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:46.680 assigned to charman toilet Paper, who had a big campaign 0:16:46.720 --> 0:16:48.720 at a time called Don't Squeeze, a charman with this 0:16:48.840 --> 0:16:52.880 character named mister Whipple, who research would show by nineteen 0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:56.080 seventy three he was like the third most known and 0:16:56.120 --> 0:17:00.360 admired man in America, which seemed incredulous. But I couldn't 0:17:00.400 --> 0:17:03.400 really face the idea of selling toilet paper. And an 0:17:03.400 --> 0:17:06.040 old girlfriend who was in Paris called me up and said, 0:17:06.080 --> 0:17:09.720 you know you can't do that, Tom. Why don't you 0:17:09.800 --> 0:17:11.359 quit your job and come with me. I'm going to 0:17:11.400 --> 0:17:15.560 go across the Sahara Desert, which sounded really appealing to me, 0:17:15.800 --> 0:17:19.680 as like impetus I needed. I had five thousand dollars saved, 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:22.520 so I was on a plane like a week later. 0:17:22.840 --> 0:17:25.000 That sort of set in place. One of the major 0:17:25.040 --> 0:17:28.240 decisions of my life kind of really freed me and 0:17:28.280 --> 0:17:32.000 I was able to go out into the greater world 0:17:32.040 --> 0:17:35.600 and learn a lot, build up my confidence, and learn 0:17:35.640 --> 0:17:37.359 things that would ultimately help me a lot in my 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:38.160 business life. 0:17:39.040 --> 0:17:41.919 You know, It's funny. Before I went into magazines and 0:17:41.920 --> 0:17:44.240 my friends and I started a magazine, I had worked 0:17:44.240 --> 0:17:47.960 in advertising in India for a summer and I spent 0:17:48.040 --> 0:17:53.439 the whole summer making a washing machine ads and like, 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:55.560 it was so creative and so fun and the people 0:17:55.760 --> 0:17:59.199 around me were just like brilliant creatives. And on the 0:17:59.200 --> 0:18:02.439 other hand, to spend your whole life making people feel 0:18:02.480 --> 0:18:05.200 like one washing machine was better than other washing machine 0:18:05.200 --> 0:18:07.359 when they were the same washing machine was just like 0:18:08.000 --> 0:18:11.159 hard to imagine. But it feels like you found a 0:18:11.160 --> 0:18:14.360 way to align your business and passions. Starting with being 0:18:14.359 --> 0:18:15.120 in Afghanistan. 0:18:15.600 --> 0:18:19.639 Yeah, in my travels, I ended up in Afghanistan and India. 0:18:19.800 --> 0:18:21.920 India was sort of the holy Grail in those days 0:18:21.920 --> 0:18:25.400 in terms of traveling. And I had met this girl 0:18:25.400 --> 0:18:28.400 in Greece who had lived in Nepole and she used 0:18:28.400 --> 0:18:31.479 to make clothes in India and Afghanistan and put them 0:18:31.480 --> 0:18:34.080 in trunks and take them overland and sell them like 0:18:34.160 --> 0:18:37.240 in beach hotspots in Greece and Italy in the summertime. 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:41.919 She had her own little vertically integrated enterprise. So I 0:18:42.000 --> 0:18:44.359 fell in love with Afghanistan from the first day I 0:18:44.440 --> 0:18:48.320 got there. It seemed like people think Afghanistan's a place 0:18:48.359 --> 0:18:50.520 at constant war, but this was a tail end of 0:18:51.119 --> 0:18:54.160 fifty years of what they called the Golden Age. There 0:18:54.200 --> 0:18:58.840 was no war. Afghanistan was steadily moving into trying to 0:18:58.880 --> 0:19:02.959 embrace a form of marginity, and the people were welcoming. 0:19:03.119 --> 0:19:05.480 And the few tourists would see a poster there that 0:19:05.520 --> 0:19:08.720 said visit Afghanistan and see the world's friendliest people. If 0:19:08.760 --> 0:19:11.199 you went, then that's what you would think. But there 0:19:11.200 --> 0:19:14.720 were no cars. You were totally there was no advertising. 0:19:15.160 --> 0:19:18.760 You were totally removed from modern life, which was sort 0:19:18.800 --> 0:19:23.640 of intoxicating for me. And there was just a grand 0:19:24.480 --> 0:19:29.639 you know, vistas and beautiful geography, and I developed a 0:19:29.720 --> 0:19:32.919 fascination with the people. That really led to like a 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:35.639 five decade love affair for me. And I went on 0:19:35.720 --> 0:19:38.479 to India, which was like the crushing India of the 0:19:38.520 --> 0:19:42.520 seventies that was their most turbulent decade. Sixty percent of 0:19:42.560 --> 0:19:46.520 the population was below the poverty line, and it was crowded, 0:19:46.720 --> 0:19:50.359 and I was fascinated, though I was just skimming the service, 0:19:50.400 --> 0:19:52.600 but I thought, maybe there's something for me here. How 0:19:52.600 --> 0:19:55.800 could I start a business doing what that woman had done, 0:19:55.840 --> 0:19:58.800 scale it up and get a house in New Delhi 0:19:59.400 --> 0:20:03.400 and begin to live in a totally farign place and 0:20:03.960 --> 0:20:06.800 making design clothes and sell them to better stores in 0:20:06.840 --> 0:20:10.080 the US and elsewhere. And what was a dream became 0:20:10.119 --> 0:20:14.320 a really solid, multimillion dollar business. It grew faster than 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:18.720 I ever had imagined. I had to hire staff, open showrooms, warehouses, 0:20:19.320 --> 0:20:23.119 and it ultimately consumed me. But in the end, having 0:20:23.160 --> 0:20:25.600 made a lot of money, I lost it. All bad 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:29.960 things happened. We had the Russians invade Afghanistan, and then 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:34.119 Jimmy Carter he put an embargo and huge tariffs on 0:20:34.160 --> 0:20:36.520 any clothing from India, much as like we see today 0:20:36.520 --> 0:20:41.040 with Trump, and my business went under. I came back 0:20:41.040 --> 0:20:43.560 to New York after eight years of that, with my 0:20:43.600 --> 0:20:46.320 tail between my legs, looking for a new career in 0:20:46.359 --> 0:20:48.119 a new leson life in a new lane. 0:20:48.840 --> 0:20:51.560 But what you accomplished was insane the way that you 0:20:51.680 --> 0:20:56.200 got these clothes into boutiques and larger stores. But did 0:20:56.240 --> 0:20:58.880 you imagine yourself living the rest of your life out 0:20:58.960 --> 0:21:02.399 in Asia at that time or had you thought always 0:21:02.400 --> 0:21:03.800 that you'd come back to the States. 0:21:04.800 --> 0:21:07.720 No, I thought i'd stay. I mean, listen, I was young, 0:21:08.480 --> 0:21:11.720 I have anything to lose, and I felt so alive there. 0:21:12.080 --> 0:21:14.359 Life is so vivid, and it was so different from 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:19.040 the conformist Connecticut that I had grown up in. And 0:21:19.280 --> 0:21:21.560 I had a circle of friends. I had developed a lot, 0:21:21.600 --> 0:21:23.800 and there was a circle of foreigners around that were 0:21:23.880 --> 0:21:26.600 kind of like minded. I developed a wide circle of 0:21:26.600 --> 0:21:30.320 friends in Afghanistan and India who were local. I said, man, 0:21:30.320 --> 0:21:32.800 this is the life for me. You know, I'm with 0:21:33.040 --> 0:21:36.680 kindred spirits. I'm seeing new places. I wanted to learn 0:21:36.720 --> 0:21:39.000 as much as I can about those countries, travel as 0:21:39.040 --> 0:21:42.800 far within them as possible, and go on to Southeast Asia. 0:21:42.880 --> 0:21:45.760 And yeah, I thought this was it. I had stumbled 0:21:45.800 --> 0:21:48.359 into something that, you know, met all my needs. But 0:21:48.440 --> 0:21:49.080 it was not to be. 0:21:50.600 --> 0:21:53.240