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Speaker 1: Hey, everybody. It's me, W. Kamau Bell.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to episode 21 of Who's With Me, my podcast

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Speaker 2: that is based on my substack of the very same name.

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Speaker 2: As always, if you want to keep up with me,

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Speaker 2: the best way is to subscribe to my substack.

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Speaker 1: Just go to substack. You can download the app.

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Speaker 2: Follow me. Subscribe to Who's With Me. You can subscribe

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Speaker 2: for free, or you can throw me a few dollars

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Speaker 2: because I got a lot of children. How are you

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Speaker 2: going to do it? Anyway, this is episode 21 of

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Speaker 2: my podcast.

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Speaker 1: Who's With Me?

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Speaker 2: My guest today is my friend, Rafael Casal. Rafael is

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Speaker 2: a director. a writer, a rapper, a musician, did I

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Speaker 2: say actor, a showrunner, an activist, an advocate for the

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Speaker 2: East Bay of California, the whole Bay Area, but specifically

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Speaker 2: the East Bay Area of California. He's one of those

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Speaker 2: people who has a lot of slashes in his name,

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Speaker 2: but is working the hell out of all those slashes.

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Speaker 1: You may have seen him in the TV show Loki.

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Speaker 2: He's most famous for his film and series Blindspotting, which

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Speaker 2: he did with his best friend, David Diggs, who was

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Speaker 2: in episode five of Who's With Me.

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Speaker 1: You know, he's just a good dude.

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Speaker 2: I met him and David when they were first promoting

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Speaker 2: the film Blindspotting. They reached out to me and called

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Speaker 2: me and said, hey, do you want to help us

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Speaker 2: promote this film? I did a moderated conversation with them.

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Speaker 2: That was the first time I met them in real life,

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Speaker 2: and I've been in touch with them ever since. These

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Speaker 2: are just two great dudes. We already talked to the

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Speaker 2: first great dude, David Diggs, and today we're talking to

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Speaker 2: the second great dude, Rafael Casal, Berkeley's own. We'll get

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Speaker 2: more into that later. Oh, also... So I'm done with

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Speaker 2: promoting stand-up dates for a while.

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Speaker 3: Yay!

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Speaker 2: I did the Stanford Comedy Club. That was fun. I

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Speaker 2: did Stanford University. Our national nightmare is behind us of

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Speaker 2: Stamford versus Stanford.

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Speaker 1: I did Stanford.

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Speaker 2: Brought my mom. Called Stanford out for its use of AI.

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Speaker 2: So that was sort of a little bit of a

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Speaker 2: news story. So I called Stanford out for that. We

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Speaker 2: also talked about consent on college campuses. Felt like a

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Speaker 2: good place to do it. And, you know, I did

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Speaker 2: the things I do. And my friend Nato Green was there.

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Speaker 1: Dr.

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Speaker 2: Seema Yasmin was there. And it wasn't that far from home,

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Speaker 2: so it was nice. Right now, the number one thing

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Speaker 2: you can do to say, come out, how do I

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Speaker 2: support you? Pre-order Rock, Paper, Scissors, Cheese. We're supposed to

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Speaker 2: get actual copies of it tomorrow afternoon as I tape this.

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Speaker 2: So hopefully next week I will have physical copies of

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Speaker 2: the actual book. I'll be making videos, me and Adam

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Speaker 2: Mansback will be making videos with it. We'll be doing

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Speaker 2: a lot of things, got a lot of ideas, ways

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Speaker 2: to not just promote the book. but just promote bookstores,

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Speaker 2: independent bookstores. You know I love independent bookstores. I actually

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Speaker 2: just wrote a Substack recently about independent bookstores, the bookstore

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Speaker 2: Moon Palace Books in Minneapolis. I was there when I

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Speaker 2: did my series on Substack. I spent three days in Minneapolis.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, we're going to do some things. So real

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Speaker 2: quick before I get into the meat of what I

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Speaker 2: want to talk about today, I don't know if you

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Speaker 2: know this, but a lot of comedians, we make a

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Speaker 2: little bit of extra money. By royalties, we get paid

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Speaker 2: for our comedy shows. running on Sirius XM satellite radio.

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Speaker 2: So Sirius XM takes our albums, and then they have

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Speaker 2: a channel that they've had called Raw Dog Comedy for

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Speaker 2: years now, and they would play comedians, famous comedians, up-and-coming comedians,

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Speaker 2: comedians you've never heard of, because if you have an

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Speaker 2: album or a special, they would take that, and they

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Speaker 2: would play the tracks on their Raw Dog Comedy channel. Well, recently,

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Speaker 2: and you got paid royalties for it. That's the important part.

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Speaker 2: And you would sometimes get checks like, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho, ho.

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Speaker 2: And as a working comedian who's not super famous... it

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Speaker 2: can make a big difference. You can be like, now

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Speaker 2: I can have like, I can go.

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Speaker 1: To the doctor.

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Speaker 2: So recently that channel has transformed into a Sebastian Maniscalco

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Speaker 2: comedy channel. Sebastian Maniscalco, one of the biggest comics in

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Speaker 2: the country. If you don't know, sells out arenas. He

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Speaker 2: makes movies with Robert De Niro. He's a huge, huge

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Speaker 2: touring comedian. He's always on Forbes top list of money

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Speaker 2: entering comedians for the last five, six, seven, eight years ago,

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Speaker 2: maybe 10 years, who knows?

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Speaker 3: Huge media.

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Speaker 1: So now the channel is in his name.

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Speaker 2: But they've cut back from the 800 comics they used

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Speaker 2: to run on the channel to 300 comics. And apparently,

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Speaker 2: from what I'm understanding, my friend Mike Kaplan, who's a

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Speaker 2: great comedian, said that those 300 comedians are overwhelmingly just

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Speaker 2: household names and legacy acts. So it's going to be

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Speaker 2: super famous comedians, and then apparently Bob Hope is one

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Speaker 2: of the comics on the channel, so you can find

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Speaker 2: out what Bob Hope thinks about stuff. What that means

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Speaker 2: is that that channel, which was a source of income

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Speaker 2: for many comedians who could use the money, is now

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Speaker 2: just going to be a place for... Rich and successful comedians.

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Speaker 2: And so the comedy community is coming together to say, hey, Sebastian,

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Speaker 2: we don't know if you know about this. You're so

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Speaker 2: rich and so famous. It may be below your pay grade.

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Speaker 2: But we're just coming together to say, hey, Sebastian, we

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Speaker 2: know you're a fan of comedy. We know that you

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Speaker 2: were a working comedian before you broke.

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Speaker 1: He didn't break early.

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Speaker 2: By the time he broke, he already had gray hair,

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Speaker 2: kind of like this guy here and me. So think

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Speaker 2: of the working comedian. Bring back the 800 different comedians

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Speaker 2: that we used to play and more. Don't restrict it

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Speaker 2: to only famous names. So comedians are coming together to

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Speaker 2: say that. It happened on Monday this week. It was

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Speaker 2: a big call to action for comedians. So lots of

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Speaker 2: comedians do it. Patton Oswalt did it. And my friend

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Speaker 2: Kevin Avery did it, who will be on an upcoming

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Speaker 2: episode eventually. And lots of comedians in between, from Patton

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Speaker 2: Oswalt to Kevin Avery. So anyway, just want to get

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Speaker 2: that out there. You don't have to do anything other

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Speaker 2: than just know. And if you see those videos on

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Speaker 2: the internet, spread the word. All you got to do

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Speaker 2: is put them in your stories. Um, but yeah, we

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Speaker 2: just want to get the word out and hopefully Sebastian

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Speaker 2: will just say, oops, but you know, wouldn't that be

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Speaker 2: nice if people just said oops sometimes and fixed the thing.

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Speaker 2: Speaking of situations where oops won't work. So, uh, as

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Speaker 2: I said at Stanford, I talked a lot about, or

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Speaker 2: did a good bit about, uh, consent on college campuses.

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Speaker 2: I actually made a video last week on my, uh, Instagram.

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Speaker 2: I posted on Instagram. This video is for heterosexual men.

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Speaker 2: Maybe this information is good for people who are not

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Speaker 2: heterosexual men, but as a heterosexual man, I know it's

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Speaker 2: good for us. If you're not a heterosexual man, keep

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Speaker 2: watching if you want to.

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Speaker 1: I'm not going to tell you to keep scrolling.

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Speaker 2: So men, let's talk about consent. Let's be clear about something.

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Speaker 2: Consent you get at 10 p.m.

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Speaker 1: It's not a.

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Speaker 2: Blanket consent for the rest of the time you're with

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Speaker 2: that woman. That is just 10 p.m.

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Speaker 3: Consent.

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Speaker 1: Consent can change at 10.01, 10.02, 10.03, 10.04. Second thing,

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Speaker 1: we need to take the responsibility to make sure we

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Speaker 1: still have consent.

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Speaker 2: I directed specifically at heterosexual men, not that the information

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Speaker 2: I was putting in there couldn't be for other people,

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Speaker 2: but I just think as a heterosexual man, I kind of,

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Speaker 2: that's the lane I know what heterosexual men need to hear.

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Speaker 2: And it's just simply the idea that like consent is

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Speaker 2: an ongoing conversation. And if you're in the middle of intimacy,

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Speaker 2: sexual intimacy, and it feels weird, that's probably a sign

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Speaker 2: to stop. If it feels awkward, that's probably a sign

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Speaker 2: to stop. if you're not sure about what's being said,

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Speaker 2: that's a sign to stop. And I say probably, but

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Speaker 2: I'm being a little bit rhetorical. If things are weird, stop.

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Speaker 2: And a lot of people appreciate what I said. Other

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Speaker 2: people were putting out videos like this too, men and women,

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Speaker 2: but especially men were putting them out. And I saw

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Speaker 2: some people in the comments saying, especially women saying, men

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Speaker 2: already know the rules of consent. They're just not abiding

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Speaker 2: by them. So it's almost like this advice isn't helpful

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Speaker 2: because men who are violating consent know they're doing it.

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Speaker 2: And I would say 100%, That is true that some

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Speaker 2: men are fucking demons. I'm not in any way saying

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Speaker 2: that there aren't men who are saying, I know what

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Speaker 2: the rules of consent are.

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Speaker 1: I don't give a shit. For sure. For sure.

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Speaker 2: The other thing I know to be true because I

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Speaker 2: was once a young man is that the men, the

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Speaker 2: demons are often louder than the good guys. The demons

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Speaker 2: are the one who will go, hey, who will sort

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Speaker 2: of give advice on how to be around women. I

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Speaker 2: am old enough to be a member of that generation

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Speaker 2: where we started to say no means no. And I

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Speaker 2: can't tell you how quickly after that there would be

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Speaker 2: dudes saying, well, it doesn't always mean no. So the

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Speaker 2: PSA around the country was no means no. And date

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Speaker 2: rape came into the lexicon when I was a teenager,

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Speaker 2: when I was a young man. So the idea that

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Speaker 2: before that, the idea that rape only happened, it was

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Speaker 2: like a stranger chasing down a woman in a dark alley,

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Speaker 2: which happens, but all the information tells us that rape

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Speaker 2: and sexual assault happens more often to a person from

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Speaker 2: someone they know to, it happens to a woman from

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Speaker 2: someone they know, a man they know is who does it. So,

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Speaker 2: and you know, I did a, I bring it up

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Speaker 2: on the podcast all the time and I hope you're

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Speaker 2: not tired of it. I did do a four hour

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Speaker 2: documentary about Bill Cosby. So I had, I learned a

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Speaker 2: lot in that thing about rape and one of the

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Speaker 2: things and sexual assault and a couple of things we

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Speaker 2: learned is the idea of rape culture. There's just a

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Speaker 2: culture in which rape exists in because there's not a

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Speaker 2: lot of talk against it. And I think the talk

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Speaker 2: does need to come from dudes like me who are like, no, no, no, no, no.

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Speaker 2: We need to be louder about saying this is consent,

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Speaker 2: this is not consent, stop it.

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Speaker 1: We need to be louder.

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Speaker 2: And so what I'm trying to do is add my

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Speaker 2: voice and be louder because I think I didn't grow

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Speaker 2: up with dudes who were preaching about consent. It just

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Speaker 2: wasn't a thing. I mean, either you'd see a PSA

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Speaker 2: or every now and again a movie of the week

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Speaker 2: about it or there might be some sort of seminar,

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Speaker 2: but it wasn't a thing that dudes talked about a lot.

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Speaker 2: And so what I'm trying to do is try to

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Speaker 2: be a part of the culture of heterosexual dudes being like, hey, consent,

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Speaker 2: as some people said, consent is sexy. It's great when

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Speaker 2: the person you're with is into it. Let's do that.

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Speaker 2: There should be no convincing. And if there is, if

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Speaker 2: you feel like you have to start convincing, stop, stop.

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Speaker 2: So on Substack, I'm gonna have a conversation with Christopher Pepper,

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Speaker 2: who's the co-author of the book, Talk to Your Boys,

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Speaker 2: him and Joanna Schroeder, 16 conversations to help tweens and

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Speaker 2: teens grow into confident, caring young men. So we're gonna

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Speaker 2: talk about that because he has written a book again.

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Speaker 2: I think those of us who want to be on

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Speaker 2: the correct side of, this discussion have to be louder.

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Speaker 2: And I think it certainly understand women who are like,

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Speaker 2: this is like one-on-one information. Everybody knows this. They're just

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Speaker 2: being demons. I want you to understand. Yes, there are

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Speaker 2: some demon men. And then there's also a bunch of

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Speaker 2: young boys who are just only getting information from the demons.

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Speaker 2: We talked about a little bit of this earlier in

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Speaker 2: the podcast, in the episode with Mike Eagle, Open Mike Eagle.

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Speaker 2: He talked about his son and how he feels like

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Speaker 2: he has to help his son navigate, especially because the

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Speaker 2: internet is also a big part of it, the Manosphere,

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Speaker 2: the Rogansphere, the Andrew Tate of it all.

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Speaker 4: With the way... social media is, of course. They don't

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Speaker 4: have to be asking. They're just getting better.

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Speaker 3: Andrew Tate's just showing up.

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Speaker 1: All the time.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, just with some unsolicited advice.

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Speaker 4: My son has been exposed to Andrew Tate for like

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Speaker 4: seven years.

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Speaker 3: You know?

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Speaker 4: He's not even the one I'm really worried about.

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Speaker 3: I'm more worried about the ones where.

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Speaker 4: It's like I can tell that it's like that, but

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Speaker 4: it's not as immediately apparent.

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Speaker 1: It's not as obvious. Yes, it's not as obvious.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, I think we have to understand that young

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Speaker 2: men who might just be on the internet just because

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Speaker 2: this guy is a funny comedian in the Rogan sphere,

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Speaker 2: or this guy's got hot takes about sports and they

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Speaker 2: don't understand that they're also being flooded with misogynistic, sexist

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Speaker 2: and rape culture content that then if they don't hear

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Speaker 2: anybody else, shout that down. Not everybody has lucky enough

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Speaker 2: to have a dad like open my Eagle. You, it's

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Speaker 2: not that you're a demon, but you're demon adjacent and

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Speaker 2: you don't know how to interact when you're in the

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Speaker 2: room with demons. Like think about this group chat with

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Speaker 2: the Cornell seven. Apparently the, these two young men gave

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Speaker 2: this woman ketamine. This is all allegedly, I'll say allegedly.

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Speaker 2: And then they went to a group chat and told

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Speaker 2: a whole bunch of dudes that they could come over

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Speaker 2: and sexually assault this woman. And it ended up being

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Speaker 2: seven dudes from what I understand, the Cornell seven. And

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Speaker 2: there were more than seven dudes on that group chat.

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Speaker 2: Some of them didn't go and maybe some of them

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Speaker 2: didn't go because then it was wrong, but they didn't

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Speaker 2: take the next step of like, I need to tell somebody,

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Speaker 2: I need to tell somebody this is happening. I need

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Speaker 2: to let people know this is happening because this is wrong.

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Speaker 2: That's what we got to get to. They're like, oh

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Speaker 2: my God, my quote unquote friends are the guys I'm

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Speaker 2: on this group chat with. And we're all in some

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Speaker 2: group chats we don't really want to be in because

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Speaker 2: you don't want to opt out. I need to then

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Speaker 2: alert the authorities that something's happening or alert somebody I trust.

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Speaker 2: The problem is also, and this is too long a

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Speaker 2: conversation to get to, and this is what I learned

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Speaker 2: from my documentary about Bill Cosby.

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Speaker 1: We need to talk about Cosby.

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Speaker 2: Sometimes calling the cops doesn't help because the cops often

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Speaker 2: are part of rape culture too.

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Speaker 1: And they're part of like, well, what were you wearing?

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Speaker 2: And also, if you call the cops and say, my

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Speaker 2: friends are about to go sexually assault a woman, they're

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Speaker 2: probably going to be like.

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Speaker 1: What do you mean about to? They're not.

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Speaker 2: As my friend Kat Brooks says, cops don't prevent crime.

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Speaker 2: But obviously, we need more resources. We need more loud

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Speaker 2: voices out there. College campus need the idea of like

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Speaker 2: my friend, my pastor, Pastor Michael McBride, works with violence interrupters,

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Speaker 2: people who go to interrupt violence before it happens, which

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Speaker 2: are not law enforcement. We also need sexual assault interrupters,

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Speaker 2: somebody you can call to be like, hey, I think

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Speaker 2: this is about to go down. Help me stop this

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Speaker 2: from happening. So I know it's, I certainly understand women

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Speaker 2: who are online right now who are like, I can't

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Speaker 2: believe we're having to talk about this one-on-one conversation about consent.

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Speaker 2: I'm right there with you. I mean, I'm not right

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Speaker 2: there with you, but I understand. But I also think

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Speaker 2: that like part of it is to build a new

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Speaker 2: normal for men talking about consent as being a good thing,

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Speaker 2: about it being sexy, about it being fun, about it

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Speaker 2: being necessary so that we can actually dismantle The Rape

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Speaker 2: Industrial Complex. A man who I also know is interested

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Speaker 2: in dismantling oppression is Rafael Casal. Rafael Casal, as I said, writer, director, rapper, musician, activist,

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Speaker 2: East Bay native, came from Berkeley, but is also down

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Speaker 2: with Oakland. We talk about a lot of things in

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Speaker 2: this episode. We talk about the differences between Berkeley and Oakland.

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Speaker 2: We talk about his early days as a spoken word poet.

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Speaker 2: He came up through the Youth Speaks scene here in

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Speaker 2: the Bay Area, which is a Bay Area spoken word

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Speaker 2: scene for young folks that still exist.

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Speaker 1: You can check it out.

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Speaker 2: And then he ended up on Deaf Poets at like 19.

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Speaker 2: It's crazy with this giant UC Berkeley sweatshirt on. And

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Speaker 2: he's been a musician, which is how he met Daveed Diggs.

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Speaker 2: And they worked together and they wrote Blindspotting, both the

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Speaker 2: film and the series. And Ruff is also acting. He's

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Speaker 2: been in the film Bad Education. He's been in the

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Speaker 2: Marvel series Loki. I see him directing something right now

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Speaker 2: on Instagram that Ethan Hawke is in.

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Speaker 1: So that dude is up there. He's good at a

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Speaker 1: lot of things.

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Speaker 2: We started off the conversation talking about how he's good

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Speaker 2: at a lot of things. And we also talked about

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Speaker 2: what it is to be a white passing Latino. Or

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Speaker 2: he calls himself white.

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Speaker 3: And he is white.

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Speaker 1: So he's white.

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Speaker 2: But we talk about his racial identity and Latinos who–

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Speaker 2: white passing Latinos or white Latinos who vote for Trump.

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Speaker 1: So anyway, it was a great conversation.

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Speaker 3: Check it out.

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Speaker 1: Hey, thanks for watching an episode of Who's With Me.

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Speaker 1: If you're on YouTube, please like and subscribe, share, hit

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Speaker 1: that hype button. I hear it makes all the difference.

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Speaker 1: Please like, subscribe, share, hit the hype button. Thank you.

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Speaker 3: Here we go. Oh, it's so suddenly so quiet in here.

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Speaker 3: It happens. It happens. Welcome.

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Speaker 1: Welcome. What's up, man? We've been talking for like a

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Speaker 1: half hour.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 1: Now welcome.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah. This continues.

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Speaker 1: This continues.

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Speaker 3: Welcome back.

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Speaker 2: Well, first of all, thank you for being a guest

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Speaker 2: on the podcast.

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Speaker 1: How are you, man?

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Speaker 2: You know, the whole point of this podcast is for

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Speaker 2: me to have conversations with people that... I am in

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Speaker 2: community with, but don't talk to often enough, but because

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Speaker 2: I'm a middle-aged man, I have to schedule them as work.

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Speaker 3: Same.

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Speaker 1: I can't just assume we're ever gonna have an hour-long conversation.

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Speaker 3: It's just a friendship.

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Speaker 1: It's a friendship.

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Speaker 2: That's how I build friendships, is through monetizable content.

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Speaker 3: Fair enough.

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Speaker 1: But with people I want to talk to.

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Speaker 3: What an interesting time. Yeah, what an interesting time. Otherwise,

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Speaker 3: my male friendships die, so... That's the next podcast. Keeping

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Speaker 3: male friendships alive.

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Speaker 1: Exactly.

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Speaker 2: Well, and first of all, I always start by giving

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Speaker 2: people their flowers because I feel like in this era

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Speaker 2: of America and the world, it's hard to find good news.

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Speaker 2: So I obviously want to start with the fact how

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Speaker 2: much respect I have for you as a member of

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Speaker 2: the community who prioritizes being a member of the community.

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Speaker 3: Thanks, man.

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Speaker 1: Even though you've been in L.A. for a while now, right?

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Speaker 3: I've been in L.A. for... Seven years?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. You didn't move down there and just become

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Speaker 1: an Angeleno. Nah, dawg.

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Speaker 3: It's a work trip. This is an extended work trip.

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Speaker 1: So when people ask you where you.

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Speaker 3: I'm doing a tour. This is like a tour of duty. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: it's a tour of duty.

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Speaker 1: When people ask you where you're from, what do you say?

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Speaker 3: The Bay Area.

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Speaker 1: Okay, okay.

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Speaker 3: The Bay all day. I say Berkeley and Oakland, specifically. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: That's what I was, because I do wonder about that

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Speaker 2: aspect of it. Because you are a person who reps

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Speaker 2: the bay.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: But from Berkeley. From Berkeley. But then Oakland is such

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Speaker 1: a big influence.

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Speaker 3: O-Town all day.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: They're five minutes from each other. This is a thing

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Speaker 3: that we deeply prioritize here and nobody cares about. No.

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Speaker 3: I'll pull up a map and be like, so I'm

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Speaker 3: from here. And then I lived here and here and

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Speaker 3: here and here. But this line and this line are death. Yes.

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Speaker 2: I remember when I first moved out here, I was

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Speaker 2: living on MLK near the border.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 2: And I remember hearing a group of people yelling at

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Speaker 2: each other. And it was like South Berkeley, you North

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Speaker 2: Oakland motherfuckers. You South Berkeley. And then there are these

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Speaker 2: internal rivalries.

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Speaker 3: Like for years, South Berkeley and North Oakland, it was

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Speaker 3: like people were dying over that. That's the impression I got.

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Speaker 3: So like to misstep that line was crazy. And what

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00:17:38,884 --> 00:17:43,484
Speaker 3: people were really asking is like, what do you bang

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Speaker 3: or like what is your area? And so you had

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00:17:46,304 --> 00:17:49,394
Speaker 3: to be really, really hyper specific. So in the bubble,

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00:17:49,894 --> 00:17:55,824
Speaker 3: deeply important, when you're in another state, they have no

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Speaker 3: association or very few associations with any of these places.

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Speaker 3: And so then you start going, well, what am I

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Speaker 3: really trying to say? I'm trying to tell you what

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Speaker 3: I'm like. And so I go, do you know the

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Speaker 3: Bay Area? And they go, I know San Francisco. I go, okay, sorry.

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Speaker 3: Love San Francisco, but also says something different about you.

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Speaker 3: And people's association with San Francisco right now is like,

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00:18:18,124 --> 00:18:21,224
Speaker 3: tech and money and it's not the san francisco i

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00:18:21,264 --> 00:18:23,344
Speaker 3: grew up with which was like the mission district and

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00:18:23,384 --> 00:18:27,004
Speaker 3: the tenderloin the old tenderloin you know these are it's

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Speaker 3: also when you grew up in the bay this other

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Speaker 3: thing right.

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Speaker 2: Yeah so yeah so i think that when i want

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Speaker 2: to get into that because i have a lot of

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Speaker 2: i i feel like you have expertise in that area

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Speaker 2: that i don't have as a as it's no even

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Speaker 2: though i've been here basically since 97 i will always

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Speaker 2: be a transplant and i'm aware that even though my

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Speaker 2: kids are now from here.

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Speaker 3: But I know, because now you have family who are like,

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Speaker 3: I'm so bae with it. Exactly.

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Speaker 2: My kids don't like Sacramento for no reason other than

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Speaker 2: they're from here, so they're not supposed to like Sacramento.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know what the year minimum

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Speaker 3: requirement is.

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Speaker 1: I haven't hit it.

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Speaker 2: Believe me, people on the internet, people from here on

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00:19:05,364 --> 00:19:07,164
Speaker 2: the internet regularly let me know that I'm not from here.

434
00:19:07,184 --> 00:19:08,484
Speaker 3: The internet's not a great barometer.

435
00:19:08,704 --> 00:19:09,244
Speaker 1: No, it's not.

436
00:19:09,324 --> 00:19:12,724
Speaker 3: For membership. For finding out. No one's a member of anything.

437
00:19:12,744 --> 00:19:15,224
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, my kids, they were all born here.

438
00:19:15,324 --> 00:19:19,154
Speaker 1: Okay, anyway. But also, I have so much admiration for you.

439
00:19:20,064 --> 00:19:22,904
Speaker 2: Because you are, as a person of meager talents who

440
00:19:22,944 --> 00:19:25,804
Speaker 2: feels like I work them, the meager talents, I'm about

441
00:19:25,824 --> 00:19:28,304
Speaker 2: to do it. No, no, no, but I just, I

442
00:19:28,364 --> 00:19:29,884
Speaker 2: know what I'm good at, and I'm proud of what

443
00:19:29,904 --> 00:19:32,984
Speaker 2: I'm good at, but I would never call myself, and

444
00:19:33,004 --> 00:19:35,284
Speaker 2: I put myself in a lot of areas, but I

445
00:19:35,324 --> 00:19:38,204
Speaker 2: would never call myself, like, you know, now the new,

446
00:19:38,304 --> 00:19:41,004
Speaker 2: I'm multi-hyphenate, but I'm not a polymath. Like, I have

447
00:19:41,024 --> 00:19:42,904
Speaker 2: a lot of hyphens, but I'm not good at a

448
00:19:42,944 --> 00:19:43,584
Speaker 2: lot of things.

449
00:19:44,144 --> 00:19:46,044
Speaker 1: And you, my friend, and this is the point where

450
00:19:46,064 --> 00:19:47,504
Speaker 1: I give you flowers, are good at.

451
00:19:47,464 --> 00:19:48,104
Speaker 2: A lot of things.

452
00:19:49,044 --> 00:19:53,614
Speaker 3: I'm derailed by the negative self-talking. It's not negative. I'm

453
00:19:53,654 --> 00:19:54,234
Speaker 3: a good writer.

454
00:19:54,254 --> 00:19:58,454
Speaker 2: I'm proud of my stand-up comedy skills.

455
00:19:59,834 --> 00:20:00,974
Speaker 1: But I also know that like.

456
00:20:01,084 --> 00:20:05,144
Speaker 3: I think because you exist in the craft, you are

457
00:20:05,244 --> 00:20:09,404
Speaker 3: humble about it. But you have done successful comedy specials

458
00:20:09,424 --> 00:20:10,484
Speaker 3: that have been filmed.

459
00:20:10,584 --> 00:20:10,824
Speaker 2: Yes.

460
00:20:11,064 --> 00:20:13,604
Speaker 3: To a new comic or a non-comic, you are a

461
00:20:13,704 --> 00:20:14,424
Speaker 3: great comic.

462
00:20:14,814 --> 00:20:16,954
Speaker 1: Well, and let me be clear about this. Like this,

463
00:20:17,034 --> 00:20:18,094
Speaker 1: this last year, this happened.

464
00:20:18,134 --> 00:20:20,194
Speaker 2: I saw a lot of comics getting like young comics

465
00:20:20,594 --> 00:20:23,494
Speaker 2: getting sort of anxiety online about the Montreal comedy festival

466
00:20:23,534 --> 00:20:25,154
Speaker 2: about like, I didn't get in or I got in

467
00:20:25,194 --> 00:20:26,454
Speaker 2: and I shouldn't have got it. And I put up

468
00:20:26,474 --> 00:20:28,384
Speaker 2: this thing about like, look, I went to the Montreal

469
00:20:28,404 --> 00:20:31,364
Speaker 2: comedy festival, uh, as an older, I was like 30

470
00:20:31,364 --> 00:20:33,564
Speaker 2: at the time, which was a little bit older than

471
00:20:33,664 --> 00:20:35,564
Speaker 2: like new faces, but I still new face. I went

472
00:20:35,584 --> 00:20:37,404
Speaker 2: there with no manager and an agent. I came back

473
00:20:37,444 --> 00:20:40,444
Speaker 2: with no manager and an agent. Uh, I've never been

474
00:20:40,944 --> 00:20:44,244
Speaker 2: top 10 to watch, young comic on the rise, 30

475
00:20:44,244 --> 00:20:47,184
Speaker 2: under 30, and yet, and I listed all my accomplishments.

476
00:20:47,204 --> 00:20:49,134
Speaker 2: It'd be like, I understand that for me, there's lots

477
00:20:49,154 --> 00:20:51,914
Speaker 2: of different paths to success. And I just did not

478
00:20:51,954 --> 00:20:54,054
Speaker 2: take the traditional one. But I wanted to say that

479
00:20:54,074 --> 00:20:57,214
Speaker 2: it's like, don't think because you didn't make that thing

480
00:20:57,274 --> 00:21:00,174
Speaker 2: happen that everybody else is getting, that you're not making it.

481
00:21:00,174 --> 00:21:03,514
Speaker 2: So I understand that. And now back to you. You

482
00:21:03,534 --> 00:21:04,914
Speaker 2: were 18 on HBO doing deaf poetry.

483
00:21:06,714 --> 00:21:07,774
Speaker 3: That sounds cool now.

484
00:21:07,914 --> 00:21:09,314
Speaker 1: No, no, I get it.

485
00:21:09,354 --> 00:21:10,814
Speaker 2: But I'm saying when I look at you, I'm like,

486
00:21:10,834 --> 00:21:13,344
Speaker 2: this dude could be a tenured professor at a liberal

487
00:21:13,364 --> 00:21:15,584
Speaker 2: arts college teaching creative writing and poetry.

488
00:21:16,364 --> 00:21:17,104
Speaker 3: God, that'd be fun.

489
00:21:17,224 --> 00:21:18,884
Speaker 1: Yeah.

490
00:21:19,104 --> 00:21:21,064
Speaker 2: You clearly have made a career as a working actor

491
00:21:21,104 --> 00:21:22,984
Speaker 2: in Hollywood, which is one of the hardest things to

492
00:21:23,004 --> 00:21:26,184
Speaker 2: do as someone who is regularly working in the industry.

493
00:21:26,564 --> 00:21:29,414
Speaker 2: And also, has the debut hip-hop album ever dropped?

494
00:21:29,504 --> 00:21:29,764
Speaker 3: Am I wrong?

495
00:21:30,304 --> 00:21:33,474
Speaker 2: Like the actual, or I don't even know if you'd

496
00:21:33,514 --> 00:21:36,394
Speaker 2: be doing hip hop, because sometimes you sing. That could

497
00:21:36,414 --> 00:21:37,914
Speaker 2: be a career that you could just be doing that.

498
00:21:38,274 --> 00:21:39,754
Speaker 3: We did a bunch of albums. I mean, we did

499
00:21:39,774 --> 00:21:41,714
Speaker 3: them in this building, which I'm sure you'll cut to.

500
00:21:43,014 --> 00:21:46,554
Speaker 3: But no, there was this whole other life as a

501
00:21:46,574 --> 00:21:49,634
Speaker 3: musician in the Bay before any of this sort of

502
00:21:49,694 --> 00:21:53,894
Speaker 3: stuff that I'm known for now. And that was then

503
00:21:54,694 --> 00:21:56,494
Speaker 3: the greatest thing I'd ever done in my career. We

504
00:21:56,534 --> 00:21:58,724
Speaker 3: were on the radio, we could tour, we could sell

505
00:21:58,824 --> 00:22:01,594
Speaker 3: out venues in the Bay. Yeah, like in my mind,

506
00:22:01,634 --> 00:22:05,124
Speaker 3: I was like, wow, I'm like a successful Bay Area musician.

507
00:22:06,484 --> 00:22:08,763
Speaker 3: But this thing happens when you join sort of the

508
00:22:08,824 --> 00:22:12,004
Speaker 3: Hollywood machine is like the minute you get your first credit,

509
00:22:12,584 --> 00:22:16,204
Speaker 3: everything you did before that goes away. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

510
00:22:16,264 --> 00:22:19,834
Speaker 3: Now you're reborn. You're reborn in the, I guess what

511
00:22:19,854 --> 00:22:22,954
Speaker 3: would be considered like the mainstream. And everything you did

512
00:22:23,574 --> 00:22:28,014
Speaker 3: in the independent world kind of becomes this like secondary career.

513
00:22:28,404 --> 00:22:29,664
Speaker 3: It was kind of like the other thing you did

514
00:22:29,724 --> 00:22:31,914
Speaker 3: that doesn't compare to what you're doing now. I find

515
00:22:31,944 --> 00:22:34,414
Speaker 3: that so bizarre because at the time I was like,

516
00:22:35,294 --> 00:22:38,164
Speaker 3: if this is my career, I'm so proud of it.

517
00:22:38,914 --> 00:22:39,564
Speaker 3: So proud of it.

518
00:22:40,014 --> 00:22:42,114
Speaker 1: When did you know that these other things, these lanes

519
00:22:42,134 --> 00:22:42,814
Speaker 1: were open to you?

520
00:22:42,854 --> 00:22:45,494
Speaker 2: Because I had a great time doing a deep dive

521
00:22:45,794 --> 00:22:49,634
Speaker 2: on your deaf poetry career. And I really enjoyed it

522
00:22:49,674 --> 00:22:52,004
Speaker 2: because I know I must have seen you. but the

523
00:22:52,024 --> 00:22:55,033
Speaker 2: time didn't know you. Because I watched, when Deaf Poetry hit,

524
00:22:55,134 --> 00:22:56,594
Speaker 2: I had a moment of like, is that what I'm

525
00:22:56,614 --> 00:22:59,074
Speaker 2: supposed to be doing? Because this stand-up comedy thing isn't working.

526
00:22:59,314 --> 00:23:00,594
Speaker 2: And that was like- Maybe if I didn't try to

527
00:23:00,634 --> 00:23:01,234
Speaker 2: be funny.

528
00:23:01,334 --> 00:23:01,974
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

529
00:23:01,994 --> 00:23:03,814
Speaker 1: Or if I tried to be funny and then serious

530
00:23:03,854 --> 00:23:04,454
Speaker 1: and then funny.

531
00:23:04,474 --> 00:23:07,154
Speaker 3: Serious. Yeah, because that was the- Make the turn, yeah.

532
00:23:07,174 --> 00:23:09,654
Speaker 3: It was for a lot of stand-up comics who couldn't

533
00:23:09,714 --> 00:23:13,174
Speaker 3: stick the landing. There was a lot of that going on.

534
00:23:13,174 --> 00:23:15,294
Speaker 3: I'm a poet. great opening joke and they'd be like

535
00:23:15,314 --> 00:23:19,524
Speaker 3: but seriously guys yeah so trauma and so to see

536
00:23:19,564 --> 00:23:21,544
Speaker 3: you on that especially you were super you know you

537
00:23:21,564 --> 00:23:23,344
Speaker 3: were young on that I was young as hell can

538
00:23:23,364 --> 00:23:25,084
Speaker 3: you talk about Deaf Poets how did that come about

539
00:23:25,744 --> 00:23:28,224
Speaker 3: yeah I mean Deaf Poets so the youth poetry scene

540
00:23:28,264 --> 00:23:30,724
Speaker 3: was big yeah and that's what I was doing and

541
00:23:30,744 --> 00:23:32,454
Speaker 3: I was doing really well at that and we were

542
00:23:32,474 --> 00:23:36,273
Speaker 3: doing the National Poetry Slam and um you know, was

543
00:23:36,314 --> 00:23:38,834
Speaker 3: really making my name for myself in this competition that

544
00:23:38,854 --> 00:23:42,254
Speaker 3: was its own reward. Like that was the top of

545
00:23:42,314 --> 00:23:42,814
Speaker 3: the scene.

546
00:23:42,974 --> 00:23:43,834
Speaker 1: That was the gold medal.

547
00:23:43,934 --> 00:23:45,534
Speaker 3: That was the gold medal. Brave New Voice is still

548
00:23:45,554 --> 00:23:50,134
Speaker 3: going on. It just happened. Simultaneously, there's an adult poetry

549
00:23:50,174 --> 00:23:54,614
Speaker 3: scene that Russell Simmons and Camila Forbes and all these

550
00:23:54,834 --> 00:23:59,543
Speaker 3: sort of producers had discovered in LA with Dante Bosco

551
00:23:59,604 --> 00:24:01,804
Speaker 3: and Sheehan and Poetry and these guys at the Poetry Lounge.

552
00:24:02,204 --> 00:24:04,504
Speaker 3: And they decided to make the show. Stan Latham produced it.

553
00:24:05,514 --> 00:24:07,263
Speaker 3: And they did. And Stan Latham, for you to.

554
00:24:07,224 --> 00:24:09,604
Speaker 2: Know, basically directs all of Chappelle's comedy specials.

555
00:24:09,644 --> 00:24:12,464
Speaker 3: Stan Latham is like this legendary director.

556
00:24:12,484 --> 00:24:12,964
Speaker 1: Producer director.

557
00:24:12,984 --> 00:24:15,644
Speaker 3: Yeah, producer director who did so many of these 90s

558
00:24:15,684 --> 00:24:17,544
Speaker 3: sitcoms and all of Chappelle's stuff and a bunch of

559
00:24:17,594 --> 00:24:20,793
Speaker 3: other specials. He's a legend. And he takes this on

560
00:24:20,834 --> 00:24:24,214
Speaker 3: with Russell Simmons. The show comes out. It's a big

561
00:24:24,494 --> 00:24:28,734
Speaker 3: niche hit, I would say. But it was unusually successful

562
00:24:28,794 --> 00:24:31,484
Speaker 3: for how niche of a poetry. It ran for six

563
00:24:31,524 --> 00:24:32,744
Speaker 3: seasons on HBO.

564
00:24:32,764 --> 00:24:32,964
Speaker 1: Yeah.

565
00:24:33,754 --> 00:24:36,704
Speaker 3: And at around season three, they became really privy to

566
00:24:36,744 --> 00:24:39,544
Speaker 3: the youth scene. And we're like, we need to get

567
00:24:39,584 --> 00:24:43,064
Speaker 3: some of these kids on the show to infuse some

568
00:24:43,104 --> 00:24:46,184
Speaker 3: new blood. And so suddenly there was like, I think

569
00:24:46,204 --> 00:24:48,734
Speaker 3: there was maybe three of us that season. Maybe it

570
00:24:48,754 --> 00:24:51,894
Speaker 3: was me and two other people who were 17, 18

571
00:24:51,894 --> 00:24:54,534
Speaker 3: years old that they brought on. And then the next season,

572
00:24:54,554 --> 00:24:58,474
Speaker 3: it was like 20. They were like, this is it, guys. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

573
00:24:59,024 --> 00:25:00,974
Speaker 3: what was amazing is that, you know, Stan Latham and

574
00:25:01,014 --> 00:25:03,254
Speaker 3: Camila Forbes, who was running the hip hop, Camila was

575
00:25:03,274 --> 00:25:05,814
Speaker 3: running the hip hop theater festival at the time, put

576
00:25:05,854 --> 00:25:09,634
Speaker 3: me on and suddenly I'm in the room with, you know,

577
00:25:10,674 --> 00:25:17,784
Speaker 3: early Kanye, Alicia Keys, John Legend, Common, like, you know, everybody,

578
00:25:17,804 --> 00:25:20,384
Speaker 3: Dave Chappelle, they're all back there.

579
00:25:20,504 --> 00:25:21,504
Speaker 1: It became a thing.

580
00:25:21,524 --> 00:25:23,224
Speaker 2: This is why I think as comics started thinking about

581
00:25:23,244 --> 00:25:25,604
Speaker 2: it because it was like, it became a thing where

582
00:25:27,524 --> 00:25:29,824
Speaker 2: They had poets, like dyed-in-the-wool poets, but they had people

583
00:25:29,844 --> 00:25:31,224
Speaker 2: who were sort of poetry adjacent.

584
00:25:31,744 --> 00:25:34,263
Speaker 3: Yeah, but they were in your court. They were in

585
00:25:34,284 --> 00:25:36,584
Speaker 3: the thing that you do. And so there was this

586
00:25:36,684 --> 00:25:38,304
Speaker 3: weird for like a week. We shot it all in

587
00:25:38,324 --> 00:25:41,604
Speaker 3: a week in a hotel in New York. So everybody

588
00:25:41,624 --> 00:25:43,144
Speaker 3: was in the hotel or they were New Yorkers and

589
00:25:43,164 --> 00:25:46,044
Speaker 3: they were popping in. But I just remember being like, oh,

590
00:25:46,224 --> 00:25:49,724
Speaker 3: it broke the wall of celebrity and put us all

591
00:25:49,764 --> 00:25:52,354
Speaker 3: in this artist space in a thing that I was like,

592
00:25:52,904 --> 00:25:54,524
Speaker 3: you know, I considered myself to be good at at

593
00:25:54,544 --> 00:25:54,944
Speaker 3: the time.

594
00:25:55,084 --> 00:25:57,144
Speaker 2: You weren't being a celebrity space, they were in your space.

595
00:25:57,224 --> 00:26:01,284
Speaker 3: Yeah, and so you're backstage and you're like, you're in

596
00:26:02,204 --> 00:26:07,424
Speaker 3: the wing with Mos and Kanye. You're just like, this

597
00:26:07,504 --> 00:26:10,224
Speaker 3: is so, I can't remember, no one's gonna remember this,

598
00:26:11,024 --> 00:26:14,824
Speaker 3: but Kanye like put a bunch of like, Louis bags

599
00:26:14,864 --> 00:26:16,484
Speaker 3: or something on stage when he, I can't remember what,

600
00:26:16,524 --> 00:26:19,414
Speaker 3: it was some designer bags. And I remember him backstage

601
00:26:19,454 --> 00:26:21,434
Speaker 3: being like, how should I do it? Is it like,

602
00:26:22,174 --> 00:26:25,054
Speaker 3: should I do a stack? It's like, well, you roll

603
00:26:25,074 --> 00:26:25,684
Speaker 3: them out, all right?

604
00:26:25,694 --> 00:26:27,064
Speaker 1: And then I'm going to do a stack and a stack.

605
00:26:27,084 --> 00:26:28,424
Speaker 3: You know, you see it now, you're like.

606
00:26:28,444 --> 00:26:29,844
Speaker 1: And this is pre-Kanye.

607
00:26:29,884 --> 00:26:31,524
Speaker 3: I think Through the Wire had happened.

608
00:26:31,644 --> 00:26:32,184
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

609
00:26:32,224 --> 00:26:34,144
Speaker 3: And that was, and maybe he produced some stuff on

610
00:26:34,164 --> 00:26:35,264
Speaker 3: the Black Album for Jay.

611
00:26:35,284 --> 00:26:35,374
Speaker 1: Yeah.

612
00:26:35,864 --> 00:26:37,164
Speaker 3: But this was, you know.

613
00:26:37,184 --> 00:26:39,204
Speaker 2: When he walks out on stage, people are just sort

614
00:26:39,224 --> 00:26:41,444
Speaker 2: of like, oh, Kanye West. Like there's not like.

615
00:26:41,924 --> 00:26:47,764
Speaker 3: No, this isn't pandemonium Nazi Kanye West. It's backpack Kanye West.

616
00:26:48,024 --> 00:26:54,053
Speaker 3: It's early, you know, deep, you know, the endearing, beloved.

617
00:26:55,214 --> 00:26:56,354
Speaker 1: Still just a guy from Chicago.

618
00:26:56,434 --> 00:26:57,954
Speaker 3: Still just a guy from Chicago. Yeah, yeah.

619
00:26:58,174 --> 00:27:00,314
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I remember seeing that show back in

620
00:27:00,354 --> 00:27:04,234
Speaker 2: the day. And it had basically the energy and vibe

621
00:27:04,374 --> 00:27:08,004
Speaker 2: of Def Comedy Jam. but because it sort of was

622
00:27:08,064 --> 00:27:10,984
Speaker 2: set up the same way, and it was definitely black.

623
00:27:11,084 --> 00:27:14,284
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm sure it was multiracial, but it felt

624
00:27:14,624 --> 00:27:16,684
Speaker 2: black with the same way the Def Comedy Jam felt black.

625
00:27:17,244 --> 00:27:19,664
Speaker 2: But because it was poetry, there was a more artistic

626
00:27:19,704 --> 00:27:20,324
Speaker 2: vibe in the air.

627
00:27:20,964 --> 00:27:24,044
Speaker 3: Yeah, it did feel like, you know, when you went

628
00:27:24,064 --> 00:27:26,184
Speaker 3: to like a Youth Speaks event in the Bay, it

629
00:27:26,334 --> 00:27:29,454
Speaker 3: felt very multicultural. And then there were also open mics

630
00:27:29,774 --> 00:27:32,614
Speaker 3: in Oakland and Berkeley and in San Francisco. Like San Francisco,

631
00:27:32,634 --> 00:27:34,614
Speaker 3: there were ones that felt like very Hispanic. You're like,

632
00:27:34,634 --> 00:27:37,013
Speaker 3: you're at the Latino open mic in the Mission. Then

633
00:27:37,034 --> 00:27:38,924
Speaker 3: there were ones in Oakland that were like, you're at

634
00:27:38,944 --> 00:27:41,644
Speaker 3: the black open mic. Yeah, that poetry was like, you're

635
00:27:41,664 --> 00:27:43,724
Speaker 3: at the black open mic.

636
00:27:43,904 --> 00:27:46,344
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you sort of had that like, you know,

637
00:27:46,364 --> 00:27:49,424
Speaker 2: I feel like you see it in Def Jam or

638
00:27:49,444 --> 00:27:51,624
Speaker 2: black comedy all the time when the white boy goes up.

639
00:27:53,764 --> 00:27:55,303
Speaker 2: When the room has a little bit of like, here

640
00:27:55,354 --> 00:27:56,734
Speaker 2: comes the white boy. Here comes the white boy and

641
00:27:56,774 --> 00:27:57,494
Speaker 2: see what he's about.

642
00:27:57,514 --> 00:27:58,234
Speaker 3: You got about.

643
00:27:57,934 --> 00:28:00,314
Speaker 2: 0 seconds to figure out, to let us know how

644
00:28:00,354 --> 00:28:01,294
Speaker 2: we should feel about this.

645
00:28:01,414 --> 00:28:02,033
Speaker 3: Yeah.

646
00:28:02,174 --> 00:28:03,114
Speaker 1: I mean, you're from here, so.

647
00:28:03,924 --> 00:28:05,474
Speaker 2: You're not probably feeling that the same way.

648
00:28:05,624 --> 00:28:07,684
Speaker 3: You're probably not worried about it. We're not worried about

649
00:28:07,724 --> 00:28:13,584
Speaker 3: New York like that. We're just like, yeah, it's a

650
00:28:13,744 --> 00:28:17,504
Speaker 3: poetry event. We know what to do. And I don't

651
00:28:17,544 --> 00:28:21,224
Speaker 3: think they'd never seen me before. I think they immediately

652
00:28:21,244 --> 00:28:23,644
Speaker 3: knew how to categorize me. Lemon Anderson was also on

653
00:28:23,664 --> 00:28:25,044
Speaker 3: the show, and I think Lemon and I had a

654
00:28:25,044 --> 00:28:28,784
Speaker 3: little Venn diagram overlap, and he's from New York. And

655
00:28:28,904 --> 00:28:30,944
Speaker 3: so I remember him coming up to me backstage and

656
00:28:30,964 --> 00:28:37,304
Speaker 3: being like, Uh-huh. Stay with me, kid. I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

657
00:28:37,324 --> 00:28:38,204
Speaker 3: I see it. Be over here.

658
00:28:39,004 --> 00:28:40,544
Speaker 1: Were you on three times? It seemed like from the internet.

659
00:28:40,564 --> 00:28:40,964
Speaker 3: Three times, yeah.

660
00:28:40,984 --> 00:28:42,904
Speaker 1: Three times, yeah. So all three of them exist out there.

661
00:28:42,944 --> 00:28:46,064
Speaker 1: Two of them are on YouTube. And two of them,

662
00:28:46,104 --> 00:28:49,794
Speaker 1: it seems like you say you wrote like days before.

663
00:28:50,414 --> 00:28:52,994
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I had no concept of like the

664
00:28:53,014 --> 00:28:56,174
Speaker 3: immortal nature of television, really. So I was very like,

665
00:28:57,014 --> 00:28:58,554
Speaker 3: I came from the poetry scene that was like, you

666
00:28:58,574 --> 00:29:01,794
Speaker 3: don't do old shit. Mm-hmm. You know, you write something

667
00:29:01,814 --> 00:29:03,194
Speaker 3: that you feel and you get up on stage and

668
00:29:03,214 --> 00:29:05,694
Speaker 3: you do it. This wasn't that now everybody like memorizes

669
00:29:05,734 --> 00:29:09,184
Speaker 3: their poems and it's this whole theatrical monologue. But at

670
00:29:09,204 --> 00:29:11,224
Speaker 3: the time we were sort of, deaf poetry was the

671
00:29:11,244 --> 00:29:13,804
Speaker 3: first place that I'd really ever seen that. The youth

672
00:29:13,844 --> 00:29:16,684
Speaker 3: scene was like, I wrote this right now. This is

673
00:29:16,764 --> 00:29:19,964
Speaker 3: on my heart. I'm going to spit this thing. And

674
00:29:20,044 --> 00:29:22,464
Speaker 3: that was what you got socially rewarded for. And so.

675
00:29:22,854 --> 00:29:24,734
Speaker 3: The struggle, really, I mean, if you watch, I'm a kid.

676
00:29:24,974 --> 00:29:27,194
Speaker 3: I'm staring at the ground. I've never had to memorize

677
00:29:27,294 --> 00:29:27,954
Speaker 3: anything before.

678
00:29:28,054 --> 00:29:30,464
Speaker 2: It was so, because you're wearing, and the one, I

679
00:29:30,504 --> 00:29:32,604
Speaker 2: saw it through, but the one I saw, you're wearing

680
00:29:32,624 --> 00:29:35,164
Speaker 2: this giant Berkeley hoodie.

681
00:29:35,224 --> 00:29:41,264
Speaker 3: I'm wearing a giant, ginormous Berkeley hoodie and a backwards hat,

682
00:29:41,304 --> 00:29:42,984
Speaker 3: which I'm sure is a New York hat.

683
00:29:43,004 --> 00:29:47,174
Speaker 2: And you look like you weigh 89 pounds.

684
00:29:47,254 --> 00:29:48,614
Speaker 3: I weigh 89. I'm a string bean.

685
00:29:48,634 --> 00:29:50,474
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're a string bean. And you're staring down the

686
00:29:50,494 --> 00:29:50,994
Speaker 1: whole time.

687
00:29:51,054 --> 00:29:52,474
Speaker 3: I hate how many people are going to look this

688
00:29:52,554 --> 00:29:54,914
Speaker 3: up now. Oh, yeah, yeah. For sure, for sure. Yeah,

689
00:29:55,254 --> 00:29:58,484
Speaker 3: I'm nervous, and I haven't really stepped outside of my...

690
00:29:58,454 --> 00:30:01,384
Speaker 3: I hadn't toured yet, so I hadn't been... I hadn't

691
00:30:01,404 --> 00:30:05,044
Speaker 3: really been outside of the Bay yet on my own.

692
00:30:05,284 --> 00:30:08,744
Speaker 3: And so I'm also, like, very in, like, my Bay

693
00:30:08,864 --> 00:30:10,044
Speaker 3: street kid bubble.

694
00:30:10,064 --> 00:30:10,444
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah.

695
00:30:10,704 --> 00:30:12,924
Speaker 3: And I'm in New York and I'm having culture shock.

696
00:30:14,024 --> 00:30:16,664
Speaker 3: And I can't look at people in the eye because

697
00:30:16,684 --> 00:30:20,024
Speaker 3: I've never had to do a monologue before, which is

698
00:30:20,064 --> 00:30:21,834
Speaker 3: essentially what they're asking you to do. They're like, all right,

699
00:30:21,874 --> 00:30:25,234
Speaker 3: cameras here, cameras here, cameras here. Oh, God. No, thank you.

700
00:30:26,254 --> 00:30:27,194
Speaker 3: I don't need to do, no.

701
00:30:27,534 --> 00:30:28,534
Speaker 1: When's the last time you saw that?

702
00:30:28,554 --> 00:30:32,254
Speaker 3: Sometimes I feel like. Jesus. No, thank you. We can stop.

703
00:30:32,274 --> 00:30:33,384
Speaker 3: We can stop that. I love him.

704
00:30:33,514 --> 00:30:34,124
Speaker 1: All right.

705
00:30:37,534 --> 00:30:38,074
Speaker 3: I love that young man.

706
00:30:38,094 --> 00:30:39,674
Speaker 1: Treat him the way you wanted me to treat myself.

707
00:30:39,774 --> 00:30:40,744
Speaker 3: I want to hug that young man.

708
00:30:40,754 --> 00:30:41,524
Speaker 1: Treat me the way.

709
00:30:41,884 --> 00:30:42,424
Speaker 3: So bad.

710
00:30:42,724 --> 00:30:43,204
Speaker 1: How old were you?

711
00:30:43,924 --> 00:30:44,884
Speaker 3: I'm 18 right there.

712
00:30:44,984 --> 00:30:46,624
Speaker 2: I mean, that's the part about it that for me

713
00:30:46,784 --> 00:30:49,884
Speaker 2: as a guy, what year was that? So if you're 18,

714
00:30:49,884 --> 00:30:51,044
Speaker 2: what was it?

715
00:30:51,024 --> 00:30:51,284
Speaker 3: 2004.

716
00:30:51,284 --> 00:30:53,224
Speaker 1: Yeah. So 2004.

717
00:30:53,204 --> 00:30:55,504
Speaker 2: I'm 31 at that point. Comedy is not going the

718
00:30:55,544 --> 00:30:57,374
Speaker 2: way I want it to go. And I'm seeing this

719
00:30:57,394 --> 00:30:59,234
Speaker 2: and I'm like, oh, maybe I'm supposed to be over

720
00:30:59,274 --> 00:31:01,334
Speaker 2: there because comedy is not doing the thing I'm supposed

721
00:31:01,354 --> 00:31:01,484
Speaker 2: to do.

722
00:31:01,494 --> 00:31:03,974
Speaker 3: Oh, we're all doing the other thing though. We're all

723
00:31:04,014 --> 00:31:08,394
Speaker 3: going like. pretty heavy wish i could just tell some

724
00:31:08,434 --> 00:31:10,554
Speaker 3: jokes i know the amazing thing about that show that

725
00:31:10,594 --> 00:31:13,924
Speaker 3: never got aired is in between every poet because there's

726
00:31:13,954 --> 00:31:16,804
Speaker 3: a reset yeah most would go up there and basically

727
00:31:16,824 --> 00:31:20,084
Speaker 3: just do stand-up and he's so fucking funny yeah yeah

728
00:31:20,164 --> 00:31:22,964
Speaker 3: he's hilarious and you're like oh there is actually an

729
00:31:23,064 --> 00:31:26,064
Speaker 3: overlap between for sure all these mediums for the folks

730
00:31:26,084 --> 00:31:28,684
Speaker 3: who are true multi-hyphenates you're like there is a funny

731
00:31:28,724 --> 00:31:30,864
Speaker 3: bone now it's not enough to maybe do an hour

732
00:31:30,964 --> 00:31:34,124
Speaker 3: set off top mm-hmm But you see why getting up

733
00:31:34,184 --> 00:31:35,944
Speaker 3: on stage just turns you... And I would say at

734
00:31:36,004 --> 00:31:40,094
Speaker 3: that point, I was like... Now I look back and

735
00:31:40,114 --> 00:31:41,654
Speaker 3: I go, oh, it was a very pure moment in

736
00:31:41,694 --> 00:31:45,334
Speaker 3: my art because I actually had no interest in the audience.

737
00:31:45,454 --> 00:31:47,814
Speaker 3: It was entirely just like, I have something I want

738
00:31:47,834 --> 00:31:50,054
Speaker 3: to say. I want to say it to people that

739
00:31:50,104 --> 00:31:55,284
Speaker 3: mean something to me. I hadn't really experienced... We played

740
00:31:55,324 --> 00:31:57,404
Speaker 3: like Herb's Theater and stuff in San Francisco for the

741
00:31:57,444 --> 00:31:59,124
Speaker 3: Poetry Slam, but like it's a thousand people in the

742
00:31:59,184 --> 00:32:02,044
Speaker 3: audience of local people. So you really are performing for

743
00:32:02,084 --> 00:32:04,264
Speaker 3: like your community. And you know that it's not getting

744
00:32:04,304 --> 00:32:06,514
Speaker 3: any bigger than this. This was the first time I

745
00:32:06,534 --> 00:32:10,874
Speaker 3: was like, it aired, you know, six months later. And

746
00:32:11,034 --> 00:32:13,194
Speaker 3: this is in the beginning of YouTube. And I was

747
00:32:13,234 --> 00:32:15,254
Speaker 3: one of the first people on that show to like

748
00:32:15,814 --> 00:32:19,444
Speaker 3: get my clip off VHS and Take it to the

749
00:32:19,464 --> 00:32:23,464
Speaker 3: computer lab at Berkeley City College, which was called Vista City. No,

750
00:32:23,504 --> 00:32:26,804
Speaker 3: I think I did it at Laney, actually. Convert it

751
00:32:26,944 --> 00:32:29,474
Speaker 3: to digital and upload it to YouTube, and it got

752
00:32:29,494 --> 00:32:30,354
Speaker 3: a million views.

753
00:32:31,234 --> 00:32:31,954
Speaker 1: Wow.

754
00:32:32,034 --> 00:32:33,854
Speaker 3: And that didn't happen back then.

755
00:32:33,934 --> 00:32:35,874
Speaker 1: No, it's rare you see a YouTube clip that was

756
00:32:35,934 --> 00:32:36,824
Speaker 1: uploaded 20 years ago.

757
00:32:36,814 --> 00:32:38,074
Speaker 3: 20 years ago. That's what it is.

758
00:32:38,094 --> 00:32:38,944
Speaker 1: I was like, 20 years ago.

759
00:32:38,974 --> 00:32:40,854
Speaker 3: And I toured for 10 years off of that clip.

760
00:32:41,304 --> 00:32:43,784
Speaker 2: How is that guy not still doing that?

761
00:32:43,824 --> 00:32:45,164
Speaker 1: Like, how do you branch out from that?

762
00:32:45,184 --> 00:32:46,704
Speaker 2: Because there's a lot of the poets of that era,

763
00:32:46,724 --> 00:32:49,144
Speaker 2: if you look them up, they're still out there doing poetry.

764
00:32:49,164 --> 00:32:51,204
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I think they also came about it later

765
00:32:51,224 --> 00:32:53,304
Speaker 3: in their lives and it became a different sort of

766
00:32:53,364 --> 00:32:56,304
Speaker 3: beacon of their identity than it did for me. I

767
00:32:56,354 --> 00:32:58,044
Speaker 3: started doing poetry when I was 14, and so it

768
00:32:58,134 --> 00:33:01,894
Speaker 3: wasn't like me deciding what I wanted to do. It

769
00:33:01,954 --> 00:33:06,054
Speaker 3: was just something that gave me an identity. I think

770
00:33:06,094 --> 00:33:09,384
Speaker 3: poetry was... a gateway art form for me. It just

771
00:33:09,424 --> 00:33:10,844
Speaker 3: allowed me to do a little bit of everything. I

772
00:33:10,884 --> 00:33:12,844
Speaker 3: got to write. I got to perform. I got to

773
00:33:13,484 --> 00:33:16,534
Speaker 3: tell a story. I got to get some attention. I

774
00:33:16,574 --> 00:33:20,674
Speaker 3: got to do all the things that the arts afford you.

775
00:33:21,474 --> 00:33:24,534
Speaker 3: I was under the mentorship of this cat, Mark Mamouti Joseph,

776
00:33:24,554 --> 00:33:28,624
Speaker 3: who I'm sure you know. Bamu was starting to do theater.

777
00:33:29,294 --> 00:33:30,544
Speaker 3: And so I wanted to be over there with the

778
00:33:30,564 --> 00:33:33,424
Speaker 3: Living Word Project. And music was really important to me.

779
00:33:33,424 --> 00:33:35,524
Speaker 3: And I was like, that's my, I want to start

780
00:33:35,604 --> 00:33:38,164
Speaker 3: recording this stuff and putting out albums and doing music shows.

781
00:33:38,764 --> 00:33:41,644
Speaker 3: That's where the social rewards were more for me. And

782
00:33:41,684 --> 00:33:43,704
Speaker 3: so I was doing poetry to get gigs because I

783
00:33:43,744 --> 00:33:46,524
Speaker 3: just knew I could get paid doing it. But honestly,

784
00:33:46,564 --> 00:33:48,784
Speaker 3: by the time that clip came out, I was kind

785
00:33:48,824 --> 00:33:52,374
Speaker 3: of done. I was like, I was into poetry, but

786
00:33:52,394 --> 00:33:54,514
Speaker 3: I was like done doing that. I'd won so many

787
00:33:54,554 --> 00:33:58,914
Speaker 3: poetry sessions. That day, that same day that I filmed

788
00:33:58,934 --> 00:34:01,514
Speaker 3: that clip, I went to the Nuyorican Cafe and I

789
00:34:01,534 --> 00:34:04,344
Speaker 3: won that shit. And that was my goal. I went

790
00:34:04,384 --> 00:34:06,724
Speaker 3: on a Wednesday night. It was like a qualifier for their,

791
00:34:06,744 --> 00:34:09,203
Speaker 3: like to make their team. I walked up and I

792
00:34:09,204 --> 00:34:11,743
Speaker 3: was like, I'm doing deaf poetry. You guys got to

793
00:34:11,784 --> 00:34:13,824
Speaker 3: let me do the thing. And they're like, all right, kid.

794
00:34:13,884 --> 00:34:16,623
Speaker 3: And I swept the floor with everybody in there. And

795
00:34:16,643 --> 00:34:22,814
Speaker 3: I remember just going like, I'm done. And for me,

796
00:34:22,834 --> 00:34:26,864
Speaker 3: it was competitive. I really enjoyed the competitive element of it.

797
00:34:28,134 --> 00:34:31,034
Speaker 3: But if I didn't have something to say that was meaningful,

798
00:34:31,053 --> 00:34:33,533
Speaker 3: like I wasn't just writing just to like have another

799
00:34:33,553 --> 00:34:36,354
Speaker 3: thing to drop. And so then those questions start around 18,

800
00:34:36,354 --> 00:34:37,943
Speaker 3: 19 years old. And you go, why do I do,

801
00:34:38,634 --> 00:34:41,424
Speaker 3: why do I love art so much? What is it

802
00:34:41,464 --> 00:34:43,844
Speaker 3: that's going to be fulfilling for me? And I realized

803
00:34:43,904 --> 00:34:47,873
Speaker 3: quickly like, oh, I think, Going to a poetry slam

804
00:34:47,893 --> 00:34:49,594
Speaker 3: and waiting my turn and going up there and doing

805
00:34:49,614 --> 00:34:52,763
Speaker 3: the thing is not actually where my heart is, but

806
00:34:53,263 --> 00:34:55,484
Speaker 3: it hooked something in me and now I need to

807
00:34:55,524 --> 00:34:59,534
Speaker 3: explore that hook. And now I'm over here doing theater

808
00:34:59,574 --> 00:35:02,993
Speaker 3: development and I'm doing music and that initial hook is

809
00:35:03,074 --> 00:35:05,794
Speaker 3: growing and I'm going, oh yeah, now I'm chasing the thing.

810
00:35:23,973 --> 00:35:25,383
Speaker 1: And I saw you also were part of a program

811
00:35:25,424 --> 00:35:26,743
Speaker 1: at University of Wisconsin.

812
00:35:27,123 --> 00:35:30,823
Speaker 3: When was that? Oh, man. Yes. So this is a...

813
00:35:30,884 --> 00:35:33,274
Speaker 3: I'll try to keep this short. Okay. I ended up...

814
00:35:33,574 --> 00:35:38,073
Speaker 3: I'd been on tour for... four years, then I started

815
00:35:38,094 --> 00:35:40,504
Speaker 3: doing the NACA conferences where you get booked. I'm sure

816
00:35:40,524 --> 00:35:43,343
Speaker 3: you've done those. Poetry, you could do them as well.

817
00:35:43,364 --> 00:35:45,923
Speaker 3: There was a guy who was recruiting out of deaf

818
00:35:45,944 --> 00:35:47,663
Speaker 3: poetry because he knew he could get a commission off

819
00:35:47,703 --> 00:35:48,973
Speaker 3: of booking people for colleges.

820
00:35:49,174 --> 00:35:51,254
Speaker 2: Yeah, for people who know the NACA conference, the big

821
00:35:51,314 --> 00:35:54,663
Speaker 2: one is like a national conference where All sorts of

822
00:35:54,763 --> 00:35:57,904
Speaker 2: acts go, poets, comedians, magicians, musicians.

823
00:35:57,924 --> 00:35:58,854
Speaker 3: You do five minutes.

824
00:35:59,094 --> 00:36:00,533
Speaker 1: And you do it in front of the bookers of

825
00:36:00,553 --> 00:36:01,274
Speaker 1: the colleges.

826
00:36:01,493 --> 00:36:02,834
Speaker 3: Which are kids. Which are kids, yeah.

827
00:36:02,854 --> 00:36:06,473
Speaker 2: You're doing it for freshmen and juniors and whatever. The

828
00:36:06,533 --> 00:36:08,614
Speaker 2: kids who decide who they want to come to their college.

829
00:36:08,634 --> 00:36:11,324
Speaker 2: And you get five minutes, and you have to impress

830
00:36:11,364 --> 00:36:12,123
Speaker 2: these co-eds.

831
00:36:13,143 --> 00:36:15,883
Speaker 3: And then if you do well, your whole year gets

832
00:36:15,944 --> 00:36:18,084
Speaker 3: booked out. Your whole year gets booked out. You know

833
00:36:18,123 --> 00:36:19,064
Speaker 3: how much money you're about to make.

834
00:36:19,084 --> 00:36:21,473
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And those college geeks pay more. Because

835
00:36:21,493 --> 00:36:22,993
Speaker 2: they have budgets that they have to spend.

836
00:36:23,033 --> 00:36:25,794
Speaker 3: They have to spend. Yeah. So you're getting a G

837
00:36:25,814 --> 00:36:28,373
Speaker 3: or two for a show. Yeah. And so I would

838
00:36:28,413 --> 00:36:31,193
Speaker 3: go to the NACA conferences, all that like Poetry Slam

839
00:36:31,234 --> 00:36:34,314
Speaker 3: experience of doing like three minutes really paid off in

840
00:36:34,354 --> 00:36:38,294
Speaker 3: a five minute slot. Yeah. So I would go. Most

841
00:36:38,314 --> 00:36:40,254
Speaker 3: of the poets are in their 30s and 40s.

842
00:36:40,334 --> 00:36:40,634
Speaker 1: Yeah.

843
00:36:40,654 --> 00:36:43,513
Speaker 3: The kids don't relate to them. They're talking about mortgages.

844
00:36:44,033 --> 00:36:44,874
Speaker 3: I'm 19.

845
00:36:44,873 --> 00:36:45,393
Speaker 2: Yeah.

846
00:36:45,433 --> 00:36:47,794
Speaker 3: You know, and I'm on YouTube, this thing that all

847
00:36:47,834 --> 00:36:52,024
Speaker 3: college kids are looking at. Yeah. And so I booked like, Yeah.

848
00:36:52,783 --> 00:36:55,084
Speaker 3: And so I was going to every college I couldn't

849
00:36:55,104 --> 00:36:59,864
Speaker 3: get into. Every university I'd ever been like, wow. I

850
00:36:59,884 --> 00:37:02,123
Speaker 3: always wanted to see Harvard. Yeah, I always wanted to

851
00:37:02,163 --> 00:37:04,223
Speaker 3: see Harvard. And I'm going to these colleges that would

852
00:37:04,384 --> 00:37:08,014
Speaker 3: never have let me on their campuses. And I'm playing

853
00:37:08,214 --> 00:37:11,093
Speaker 3: shows like 500 college kids. And then the professors are

854
00:37:11,114 --> 00:37:12,913
Speaker 3: hearing about it. And they're booking me to come to

855
00:37:12,933 --> 00:37:14,893
Speaker 3: their English classes. And they're booking me to come to,

856
00:37:14,913 --> 00:37:18,493
Speaker 3: because they're looking for a contemporary tetherer. for the material.

857
00:37:19,354 --> 00:37:21,883
Speaker 3: Suddenly the university's going, when you come, let's keep you

858
00:37:21,904 --> 00:37:23,683
Speaker 3: here for a week and you'll do a week residency.

859
00:37:24,183 --> 00:37:27,004
Speaker 3: And I did, whatever university you're thinking of, whatever liberal

860
00:37:27,064 --> 00:37:30,123
Speaker 3: arts university you're thinking of, I played that shit. I

861
00:37:30,143 --> 00:37:34,123
Speaker 3: did them all. I went to Alaska. I went wherever

862
00:37:34,163 --> 00:37:37,143
Speaker 3: there was a gig. I got a gig and I

863
00:37:37,283 --> 00:37:39,263
Speaker 3: kept going back. How do I get these kids interested

864
00:37:39,303 --> 00:37:45,653
Speaker 3: in Shakespeare? Raphael Casale. Raphael Casale. No. But I, you know,

865
00:37:45,993 --> 00:37:48,834
Speaker 3: I went to UW Madison a few times. Mark Bambuti

866
00:37:48,854 --> 00:37:50,843
Speaker 3: Joseph ended up doing a residency there. He brought me

867
00:37:50,904 --> 00:37:54,443
Speaker 3: out a bunch. Met a girl. So I was coming

868
00:37:54,484 --> 00:37:57,863
Speaker 3: out there a lot to hang out. And they were

869
00:37:57,924 --> 00:38:01,004
Speaker 3: starting a program there, like an undergraduate program for, the

870
00:38:01,044 --> 00:38:05,594
Speaker 3: bridge was to get poetry kids on scholarship at the university.

871
00:38:05,993 --> 00:38:07,093
Speaker 3: And really what they were trying to do was like

872
00:38:07,114 --> 00:38:09,493
Speaker 3: create a diversity initiative program, but to make the qualifier.

873
00:38:09,844 --> 00:38:12,224
Speaker 3: poetry as a gateway art form into the theater department,

874
00:38:12,263 --> 00:38:15,024
Speaker 3: into whatever. So the, their plan was, we're going to

875
00:38:15,084 --> 00:38:17,674
Speaker 3: give out 15 scholarships a year. We're going to build

876
00:38:17,683 --> 00:38:20,973
Speaker 3: a program that is separate from the regular curriculum. We're

877
00:38:20,993 --> 00:38:22,754
Speaker 3: going to hire some staff to run that program that

878
00:38:22,794 --> 00:38:26,014
Speaker 3: helps them like remain artistically active while they pursue their degrees.

879
00:38:26,493 --> 00:38:27,674
Speaker 3: I know I got a lot of press for it

880
00:38:27,694 --> 00:38:29,234
Speaker 3: and they're gonna put all these kids in the brochure

881
00:38:29,254 --> 00:38:32,013
Speaker 3: and all that shit, all that shit that run them

882
00:38:32,033 --> 00:38:35,473
Speaker 3: like the athletes. Yes. But they needed someone to be

883
00:38:35,533 --> 00:38:39,123
Speaker 3: the creative director. that was younger, that knew the poetry

884
00:38:39,174 --> 00:38:41,634
Speaker 3: that these kids were coming from. And so they offered

885
00:38:41,654 --> 00:38:44,754
Speaker 3: me a job. And I said, no, I'm not moving

886
00:38:44,774 --> 00:38:49,053
Speaker 3: to Wisconsin. But of course, like, I'm dating this woman

887
00:38:49,074 --> 00:38:51,593
Speaker 3: that I'm in love with at the time. And I

888
00:38:52,134 --> 00:38:54,703
Speaker 3: do love the city. And I was like, I have

889
00:38:54,743 --> 00:38:55,964
Speaker 3: no reason to be here, guys. I don't even have

890
00:38:56,004 --> 00:38:58,544
Speaker 3: an undergraduate degree. And what they said is they're like, look,

891
00:38:58,564 --> 00:39:01,724
Speaker 3: we'll pay you. And you can take classes for free.

892
00:39:02,123 --> 00:39:04,373
Speaker 3: And you can get your degree while you're here. And

893
00:39:04,493 --> 00:39:06,654
Speaker 3: so I was with a bunch of my boys in

894
00:39:06,674 --> 00:39:08,674
Speaker 3: the Bay and they were like, I mean, you got

895
00:39:08,694 --> 00:39:10,433
Speaker 3: to take that. Nice.

896
00:39:10,614 --> 00:39:11,954
Speaker 1: I love the boys with the good advice.

897
00:39:11,973 --> 00:39:14,153
Speaker 3: The boys with the good advice, man, were just like,

898
00:39:14,263 --> 00:39:17,983
Speaker 3: I mean, that's a free degree. And so I moved

899
00:39:18,024 --> 00:39:21,123
Speaker 3: out there for two and a half years, finished my degree.

900
00:39:21,163 --> 00:39:24,283
Speaker 3: I'd taken some community college at Laney in Berkeley City

901
00:39:24,303 --> 00:39:26,223
Speaker 3: that was enough to transfer in as a second year.

902
00:39:27,024 --> 00:39:30,104
Speaker 3: And I taught, I became the creative director of this program.

903
00:39:30,163 --> 00:39:32,823
Speaker 3: I gave out 15 scholarships a year with a small staff.

904
00:39:33,834 --> 00:39:37,194
Speaker 3: And then I did, I taught two or three classes

905
00:39:37,234 --> 00:39:38,934
Speaker 3: a week and then I took 21 units a semester,

906
00:39:38,933 --> 00:39:43,783
Speaker 3: 18 units a semester. and um yeah and you got

907
00:39:43,803 --> 00:39:47,884
Speaker 3: your degree i'm four credits shy i was like come

908
00:39:47,973 --> 00:39:52,373
Speaker 3: on the alumni association doesn't know this so tell.

909
00:39:52,194 --> 00:39:55,073
Speaker 2: Me where we are right now and why this why

910
00:39:55,194 --> 00:39:56,354
Speaker 2: is more oh yeah so.

911
00:39:56,254 --> 00:40:00,863
Speaker 3: We're in this building um 21 22 years ago My

912
00:40:00,964 --> 00:40:02,904
Speaker 3: first recording studio I ever opened when I was 18

913
00:40:02,904 --> 00:40:04,683
Speaker 3: was in this building. It was right across the hall.

914
00:40:05,123 --> 00:40:07,464
Speaker 3: I haven't been here since then. And I opened it

915
00:40:07,544 --> 00:40:10,533
Speaker 3: up with a buddy of mine, Hiroshi Murio, who was

916
00:40:10,594 --> 00:40:13,373
Speaker 3: one of my high school best friends, and one of

917
00:40:13,413 --> 00:40:18,174
Speaker 3: my childhood friends I went to preschool with, Hawk Galvan,

918
00:40:18,194 --> 00:40:22,683
Speaker 3: who's since passed away, rest in peace. And the three

919
00:40:22,723 --> 00:40:24,903
Speaker 3: of us opened up that studio. It was a shack

920
00:40:24,924 --> 00:40:29,704
Speaker 3: of a room. It was the only thing we could afford.

921
00:40:29,723 --> 00:40:31,703
Speaker 3: I'm sure we were all pooling our collective drug money

922
00:40:32,384 --> 00:40:36,864
Speaker 3: and rented that place. And it was where I first

923
00:40:36,904 --> 00:40:40,654
Speaker 3: started working with my now longtime collaborator, Davide Diggs, who

924
00:40:40,714 --> 00:40:44,473
Speaker 3: was brought through on a late night recording session. We

925
00:40:44,493 --> 00:40:46,673
Speaker 3: were in here working and a mutual friend of ours

926
00:40:46,714 --> 00:40:49,814
Speaker 3: was like, hey, do you remember that theater kid from

927
00:40:50,373 --> 00:40:53,123
Speaker 3: high school, Davide? I was like, the guy who wore

928
00:40:53,143 --> 00:40:54,143
Speaker 3: the pajama pants every day?

929
00:40:54,163 --> 00:40:54,243
Speaker 1: Yeah.

930
00:40:54,283 --> 00:40:57,123
Speaker 3: Yeah, that guy. I was like, oh, well, yeah, what

931
00:40:57,163 --> 00:41:01,243
Speaker 3: about him? They're like, well, he raps. You should work

932
00:41:01,283 --> 00:41:02,763
Speaker 3: with him. And they played me some of his stuff.

933
00:41:02,783 --> 00:41:04,154
Speaker 3: And I was like, yeah, have him pull up.

934
00:41:04,723 --> 00:41:05,964
Speaker 1: Have him pull up.

935
00:41:06,123 --> 00:41:10,234
Speaker 3: And he came through. And we started working on music.

936
00:41:10,294 --> 00:41:12,654
Speaker 3: And I think everybody else left by like 3 AM.

937
00:41:12,854 --> 00:41:15,274
Speaker 3: They got tired. And he and I kept going until

938
00:41:15,274 --> 00:41:17,724
Speaker 3: 6 in the morning, 7 in the morning. And then

939
00:41:17,743 --> 00:41:20,143
Speaker 3: for the next year, we would do that every night.

940
00:41:20,504 --> 00:41:22,564
Speaker 3: We'd burn things to CD and go to the parking

941
00:41:22,604 --> 00:41:24,163
Speaker 3: lot and put it in the car and listen to it.

942
00:41:24,163 --> 00:41:26,784
Speaker 3: I have so many memories just like in this parking

943
00:41:26,824 --> 00:41:29,564
Speaker 3: lot with the sun coming up, listening to some song

944
00:41:29,584 --> 00:41:32,643
Speaker 3: that never came out. We were like, this is the

945
00:41:32,703 --> 00:41:33,683
Speaker 3: greatest thing.

946
00:41:33,444 --> 00:41:34,283
Speaker 1: That's ever been made.

947
00:41:34,303 --> 00:41:35,703
Speaker 3: This is going to change the world. This is going

948
00:41:35,723 --> 00:41:36,203
Speaker 3: to change the world.

949
00:41:36,223 --> 00:41:36,924
Speaker 1: We're just not going to release it.

950
00:41:36,924 --> 00:41:38,463
Speaker 3: We're just not going to release it. But we did.

951
00:41:38,524 --> 00:41:40,743
Speaker 3: We released, he released an album out of there. I

952
00:41:40,763 --> 00:41:42,084
Speaker 3: released two albums out of there.

953
00:41:42,104 --> 00:41:42,364
Speaker 1: Yeah.

954
00:41:42,654 --> 00:41:45,663
Speaker 3: We created a whole sort of mixtape sets that we

955
00:41:45,683 --> 00:41:48,604
Speaker 3: would do, that we would perform all throughout the Bay.

956
00:41:49,604 --> 00:41:52,693
Speaker 3: We started our band in that room. Yeah, it's a trip.

957
00:41:52,734 --> 00:41:54,413
Speaker 3: Walking in here, I was like, oh man, this is

958
00:41:54,694 --> 00:41:55,433
Speaker 3: really bizarre.

959
00:41:55,884 --> 00:41:56,484
Speaker 2: Yeah.

960
00:41:56,623 --> 00:41:58,883
Speaker 1: And that the same person. You had a very visceral, like,

961
00:41:59,004 --> 00:42:00,564
Speaker 1: you were having a sense memory when you walked.

962
00:42:00,584 --> 00:42:02,593
Speaker 3: I was having a sense memory, especially because it's the

963
00:42:02,634 --> 00:42:05,674
Speaker 3: same owner. So, like, that's who rented it to us. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

964
00:42:05,694 --> 00:42:09,354
Speaker 3: Which is, like, we were children. Can you imagine, like,

965
00:42:09,513 --> 00:42:12,213
Speaker 3: three 18-year-olds walking in here right now who, like, don't

966
00:42:12,254 --> 00:42:15,694
Speaker 3: look trustworthy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And are just like, we

967
00:42:15,734 --> 00:42:17,373
Speaker 3: want to rent that room for music.

968
00:42:17,854 --> 00:42:19,834
Speaker 2: And at the time, you all were so before who

969
00:42:19,854 --> 00:42:22,863
Speaker 2: you are now that Brian, the owner, was like, Wait,

970
00:42:23,163 --> 00:42:23,923
Speaker 2: Daveed was here?

971
00:42:24,004 --> 00:42:25,824
Speaker 1: Like Daveed Diggs was here? Yeah.

972
00:42:25,864 --> 00:42:29,053
Speaker 3: Oh yeah. No, but yeah, there would be no semblance of,

973
00:42:29,433 --> 00:42:33,854
Speaker 3: you know, any, any notoriety whatsoever. I mean, I probably

974
00:42:33,913 --> 00:42:36,794
Speaker 3: was spending tour money, you know, it was probably, it

975
00:42:36,814 --> 00:42:40,364
Speaker 3: was probably not a conference. Some university gave me a

976
00:42:40,404 --> 00:42:41,343
Speaker 3: thousand bucks and.

977
00:42:41,623 --> 00:42:43,163
Speaker 1: And you turned it into recording studio.

978
00:42:43,203 --> 00:42:45,424
Speaker 3: And I bought, yeah, I bought Pro Tools and a

979
00:42:45,464 --> 00:42:48,763
Speaker 3: computer and we, you know, whatever, whatever. And, um, and

980
00:42:48,783 --> 00:42:52,043
Speaker 3: we started recording. making art for ourselves, which we still

981
00:42:52,104 --> 00:42:55,683
Speaker 3: do that. And yeah, this is like our clubhouse. We're

982
00:42:55,723 --> 00:42:58,823
Speaker 3: here like all day and all night. We live in

983
00:42:58,844 --> 00:43:03,314
Speaker 3: this place. There's no AC. We're sweating with the doors open.

984
00:43:04,154 --> 00:43:06,854
Speaker 3: And we're trying to figure out what does it mean

985
00:43:06,873 --> 00:43:10,494
Speaker 3: to make something professional that people might want to buy

986
00:43:10,574 --> 00:43:13,794
Speaker 3: and become fans of, which was a novel thing at

987
00:43:13,814 --> 00:43:14,133
Speaker 3: the time.

988
00:43:14,334 --> 00:43:16,033
Speaker 1: So then how does that guy end up being a

989
00:43:16,074 --> 00:43:19,084
Speaker 1: guy who's like, in Loki.

990
00:43:19,324 --> 00:43:19,803
Speaker 3: You know what I mean?

991
00:43:19,824 --> 00:43:23,453
Speaker 2: Like, I just, you're on this very sort of like,

992
00:43:23,723 --> 00:43:26,693
Speaker 2: I get the poetry to hip hop track, but then

993
00:43:26,734 --> 00:43:28,073
Speaker 2: now you're just like a guy who like, I just

994
00:43:28,114 --> 00:43:31,214
Speaker 2: regularly see in the trades, like, like movie announcements and

995
00:43:31,234 --> 00:43:33,654
Speaker 2: things where it's like, and also Raphael Casal.

996
00:43:33,694 --> 00:43:35,593
Speaker 1: Like, you know what I mean? Like you are, you know?

997
00:43:35,814 --> 00:43:37,774
Speaker 3: Yeah. I don't know. I don't, I don't, I don't

998
00:43:37,873 --> 00:43:41,013
Speaker 3: see them all as because of that poetry background, like

999
00:43:41,094 --> 00:43:44,024
Speaker 3: getting up on stage and performing words, which I became

1000
00:43:44,604 --> 00:43:48,234
Speaker 3: on tour, got really comfortable with. Because now I'm not

1001
00:43:48,274 --> 00:43:50,354
Speaker 3: doing it in some competition. I have to do a set.

1002
00:43:51,513 --> 00:43:53,413
Speaker 3: And I'm on tour with comedians, right? So I learned

1003
00:43:53,433 --> 00:43:56,573
Speaker 3: a lot from comedians where I got to go do

1004
00:43:56,574 --> 00:43:59,443
Speaker 3: 45 minutes to an hour. And I remember most doing

1005
00:43:59,504 --> 00:44:01,643
Speaker 3: is in-betweens and I would go and see comedians go

1006
00:44:01,723 --> 00:44:04,524
Speaker 3: up and musicians go up and the banter was big.

1007
00:44:04,964 --> 00:44:08,143
Speaker 3: What's your through line? How do you hold people's attention?

1008
00:44:08,163 --> 00:44:10,804
Speaker 3: Because nobody wants to hear 10 poems in a row.

1009
00:44:11,803 --> 00:44:17,843
Speaker 3: That's crazy. But if you can do five... six good ones.

1010
00:44:18,324 --> 00:44:22,084
Speaker 3: And the in-between are stories that give it context and

1011
00:44:22,123 --> 00:44:24,724
Speaker 3: that are funny. And what's amazing about being a poet

1012
00:44:24,803 --> 00:44:26,403
Speaker 3: is they don't expect you to be funny. So you

1013
00:44:26,424 --> 00:44:29,283
Speaker 3: get easy laughs. It's like somebody making a joke at

1014
00:44:29,303 --> 00:44:33,174
Speaker 3: a funeral. You know, like everybody's like, oh God, thank God.

1015
00:44:33,714 --> 00:44:36,033
Speaker 3: Thank God this isn't going to be all crying. And

1016
00:44:36,214 --> 00:44:38,433
Speaker 3: that helps a lot. And so there was like the

1017
00:44:38,493 --> 00:44:40,693
Speaker 3: building of the set, which I think turned me into

1018
00:44:40,734 --> 00:44:43,734
Speaker 3: a performer. There was working with Mark Mamouti Joseph was

1019
00:44:43,754 --> 00:44:46,783
Speaker 3: like all about being in your body. Um, me and

1020
00:44:46,803 --> 00:44:48,993
Speaker 3: David and Ben Turner, who ended up being on, it

1021
00:44:49,094 --> 00:44:50,834
Speaker 3: was like a kid. It was like, you know, we

1022
00:44:50,873 --> 00:44:52,133
Speaker 3: met him when he was 14. He ended up being

1023
00:44:52,194 --> 00:44:54,904
Speaker 3: on Blindspotting as Earl, but he was much younger than us.

1024
00:44:54,933 --> 00:44:56,814
Speaker 3: We all did a play together that, that we wrote

1025
00:44:56,834 --> 00:44:59,884
Speaker 3: with Bamu directing in New Orleans right around that time.

1026
00:44:59,944 --> 00:45:03,024
Speaker 3: And like that changed my life and turned me into

1027
00:45:03,044 --> 00:45:05,703
Speaker 3: a performer. But to me, I was always like, I

1028
00:45:05,723 --> 00:45:08,304
Speaker 3: was performing out of necessity. I just wanted to perform

1029
00:45:08,324 --> 00:45:11,914
Speaker 3: my own work. And so those, those plays became places

1030
00:45:11,953 --> 00:45:14,214
Speaker 3: for me to perform and I got to do the muscle.

1031
00:45:14,993 --> 00:45:17,274
Speaker 3: but the job of an actor, the thing that I

1032
00:45:17,354 --> 00:45:20,193
Speaker 3: saw David doing, which is like going up and doing

1033
00:45:20,234 --> 00:45:22,694
Speaker 3: a play as a playhouse or, or at the Berkeley

1034
00:45:22,754 --> 00:45:25,113
Speaker 3: rep or something. I was like, I don't have the

1035
00:45:25,234 --> 00:45:27,814
Speaker 3: desire to go and audition for the things that you're doing.

1036
00:45:27,873 --> 00:45:29,444
Speaker 3: I saw him do Jesus off the A train and

1037
00:45:29,453 --> 00:45:31,443
Speaker 3: it was like, this is amazing.

1038
00:45:31,504 --> 00:45:31,743
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1039
00:45:31,904 --> 00:45:33,924
Speaker 3: If I wrote this, I would want to be in it. Yeah.

1040
00:45:34,104 --> 00:45:36,803
Speaker 3: But I don't, the amount of work you're doing to

1041
00:45:36,824 --> 00:45:38,743
Speaker 3: get into it, to do this, you're not showing up

1042
00:45:38,783 --> 00:45:39,544
Speaker 3: at a million auditions.

1043
00:45:39,564 --> 00:45:40,424
Speaker 1: Hi, my name.

1044
00:45:40,504 --> 00:45:41,723
Speaker 3: I had no desire.

1045
00:45:41,743 --> 00:45:41,823
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1046
00:45:42,763 --> 00:45:45,754
Speaker 3: Um, but you know, then 10, 12 years later we

1047
00:45:45,774 --> 00:45:49,234
Speaker 3: do blind spotting the movie, which we had started writing then.

1048
00:45:49,314 --> 00:45:52,793
Speaker 3: We started writing when I was 20, 19, 20, because

1049
00:45:52,834 --> 00:45:55,453
Speaker 3: my producing partners now saw me on YouTube do that,

1050
00:45:55,873 --> 00:45:58,513
Speaker 3: do that video. Wow. And they came up to the band.

1051
00:45:58,533 --> 00:46:00,234
Speaker 3: We're like, Hey, have you ever thought about writing movies?

1052
00:46:00,254 --> 00:46:02,584
Speaker 3: And I was like, get the fuck out of here. Um,

1053
00:46:02,774 --> 00:46:05,113
Speaker 3: and they were kids now that I think back on it,

1054
00:46:05,134 --> 00:46:08,403
Speaker 3: they were like 23 and 25. Um, but when we

1055
00:46:08,464 --> 00:46:13,623
Speaker 3: did that movie, I remember, uh, the first day of shooting,

1056
00:46:13,643 --> 00:46:19,084
Speaker 3: I had like a crisis of confidence. And David, of course,

1057
00:46:19,123 --> 00:46:21,553
Speaker 3: was coming off of Hamilton. And I was like, I

1058
00:46:21,594 --> 00:46:26,513
Speaker 3: suddenly feel really inadequate. I was like, I don't, what

1059
00:46:26,533 --> 00:46:30,294
Speaker 3: if my take on Miles is wrong? And I remember

1060
00:46:30,634 --> 00:46:33,464
Speaker 3: David pulled me aside and he goes, nobody knows this

1061
00:46:33,504 --> 00:46:34,243
Speaker 3: guy better than you do.

1062
00:46:35,864 --> 00:46:36,224
Speaker 1: Nobody.

1063
00:46:37,044 --> 00:46:39,424
Speaker 3: You've done the work, you wrote him and you know him.

1064
00:46:40,334 --> 00:46:42,473
Speaker 3: And that's all it really is, is if you've done

1065
00:46:42,513 --> 00:46:46,873
Speaker 3: the work to know this person. And just as he

1066
00:46:46,993 --> 00:46:49,383
Speaker 3: said that, we were at the corner store, was the

1067
00:46:49,424 --> 00:46:52,163
Speaker 3: first thing we shot. This dude comes out of the,

1068
00:46:52,904 --> 00:46:54,923
Speaker 3: tries to come up to the corner store and we're like,

1069
00:46:55,143 --> 00:46:57,683
Speaker 3: someone was like, it's closed, it's closed, we're filming. And

1070
00:46:57,723 --> 00:47:03,473
Speaker 3: he just goes, it's closed, man. Fuck y'all. Gentrification on

1071
00:47:03,513 --> 00:47:06,993
Speaker 3: a whole other level. And he walks off and he

1072
00:47:07,033 --> 00:47:09,314
Speaker 3: looks just like me. He's like this tall white dude,

1073
00:47:09,794 --> 00:47:11,173
Speaker 3: hoop shorts, big, you know?

1074
00:47:11,214 --> 00:47:11,453
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1075
00:47:12,053 --> 00:47:13,193
Speaker 3: And I looked at him and I looked at Davi

1076
00:47:13,214 --> 00:47:14,974
Speaker 3: and just went, no, I got him. I got him.

1077
00:47:16,783 --> 00:47:17,084
Speaker 3: I got him.

1078
00:47:18,303 --> 00:47:20,464
Speaker 1: The universe said, let me send you an avatar.

1079
00:47:20,484 --> 00:47:22,443
Speaker 3: There's Miles. So I was like, there he is. No,

1080
00:47:22,464 --> 00:47:24,363
Speaker 3: I got him. You don't know him? Here he is. Yeah.

1081
00:47:24,703 --> 00:47:27,623
Speaker 3: And that was really me accepting that acting was a

1082
00:47:27,683 --> 00:47:29,094
Speaker 3: thing that I could say I do.

1083
00:47:29,263 --> 00:47:29,423
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1084
00:47:29,913 --> 00:47:31,594
Speaker 3: And then this movie comes out and of course everyone

1085
00:47:31,614 --> 00:47:33,774
Speaker 3: starts going like, oh, you're an actor who writes. And

1086
00:47:33,814 --> 00:47:35,534
Speaker 3: I was like, whoa.

1087
00:47:35,864 --> 00:47:36,604
Speaker 1: How dare you?

1088
00:47:36,944 --> 00:47:38,643
Speaker 3: And I still get it all the time because the

1089
00:47:38,683 --> 00:47:41,924
Speaker 3: most prominent thing, people who don't know that, career before

1090
00:47:41,964 --> 00:47:44,754
Speaker 3: the career, that weird transition, the first time they see

1091
00:47:44,794 --> 00:47:46,343
Speaker 3: you do a thing, they go, oh, you guys are

1092
00:47:46,364 --> 00:47:48,943
Speaker 3: like the Good Will Hunting guys. You're like our actors

1093
00:47:48,984 --> 00:47:50,404
Speaker 3: who wrote a movie for you to star in.

1094
00:47:50,404 --> 00:47:52,643
Speaker 1: You're actors who couldn't find a movie, so you just.

1095
00:47:52,723 --> 00:47:55,783
Speaker 3: Oh, no, no, no. We're writers and musicians who just

1096
00:47:55,803 --> 00:47:56,884
Speaker 3: think movies are interesting.

1097
00:47:56,953 --> 00:47:58,664
Speaker 1: Yeah. Oh, wow.

1098
00:47:58,814 --> 00:48:00,973
Speaker 3: And so for us, we come about it in such

1099
00:48:01,013 --> 00:48:04,754
Speaker 3: a different way. And David is an amazing actor. And

1100
00:48:04,774 --> 00:48:07,173
Speaker 3: it is very much in many ways like his foundation.

1101
00:48:08,393 --> 00:48:10,403
Speaker 3: Certainly more so than it is for me. I think

1102
00:48:10,444 --> 00:48:13,803
Speaker 3: his entry point to art is as a performer. But

1103
00:48:14,453 --> 00:48:18,473
Speaker 3: He's become so much more of a writer. And I

1104
00:48:18,513 --> 00:48:20,823
Speaker 3: think in the same way, my identity has shifted so

1105
00:48:20,844 --> 00:48:23,064
Speaker 3: much more to like, I am a writer first, I

1106
00:48:23,104 --> 00:48:26,203
Speaker 3: am a musician first, but acting has become a thing

1107
00:48:26,243 --> 00:48:30,663
Speaker 3: that I'm like, I feel comfortable doing and practicing and

1108
00:48:30,723 --> 00:48:42,504
Speaker 3: being in the trajectory of without feeling like quite the imposter. Now,

1109
00:48:42,544 --> 00:48:45,084
Speaker 3: you're always an imposter, but I'm like in the circle

1110
00:48:45,104 --> 00:48:47,243
Speaker 3: of being an imposter. Yeah, with the other imposters. And

1111
00:48:47,283 --> 00:48:48,984
Speaker 3: with the other imposters who are professionals.

1112
00:48:49,004 --> 00:48:51,254
Speaker 2: It's funny, it never occurred to me, because I know

1113
00:48:51,274 --> 00:48:53,893
Speaker 2: you two, to think of you, but of course, as the,

1114
00:48:54,743 --> 00:48:57,524
Speaker 2: Matt Damon and Ben Affleck of the Bay Area.

1115
00:48:57,544 --> 00:48:59,464
Speaker 1: Like it never occurred to me. But of course other

1116
00:48:59,484 --> 00:48:59,723
Speaker 1: people do.

1117
00:48:59,743 --> 00:49:00,923
Speaker 3: I wouldn't say that.

1118
00:49:00,944 --> 00:49:02,843
Speaker 2: But I mean as far as like the friends who,

1119
00:49:02,944 --> 00:49:04,443
Speaker 2: like I didn't think of you as that in that

1120
00:49:04,504 --> 00:49:06,723
Speaker 2: same way, but of course other people might think of

1121
00:49:06,743 --> 00:49:06,994
Speaker 2: you that way.

1122
00:49:07,004 --> 00:49:08,504
Speaker 3: I think we just got that a lot because we

1123
00:49:08,544 --> 00:49:11,283
Speaker 3: were friends who made a thing, you know, for us

1124
00:49:11,324 --> 00:49:14,743
Speaker 3: to be in that we wrote together. And, you know,

1125
00:49:14,763 --> 00:49:16,964
Speaker 3: I think that was in some ways the packaging, the

1126
00:49:16,984 --> 00:49:18,643
Speaker 3: marketing of the movie. It's an easy way to talk

1127
00:49:18,683 --> 00:49:21,263
Speaker 3: about it. Easy way to talk about it. But yeah,

1128
00:49:21,283 --> 00:49:24,193
Speaker 3: the idea that like, Now what I get a lot

1129
00:49:24,234 --> 00:49:25,593
Speaker 3: is like, oh, you're an actor and then you started

1130
00:49:25,614 --> 00:49:27,634
Speaker 3: writing material for yourself. And so actors come up and

1131
00:49:27,654 --> 00:49:29,803
Speaker 3: be like, how did you start writing material for yourself?

1132
00:49:29,824 --> 00:49:32,064
Speaker 3: And I go, oh, shit. I was 14. Yeah, no,

1133
00:49:32,104 --> 00:49:34,564
Speaker 3: that's not, I wasn't, I'm not an actor who suddenly,

1134
00:49:34,584 --> 00:49:36,643
Speaker 3: because that's the advice actors are getting now is you

1135
00:49:36,663 --> 00:49:39,384
Speaker 3: got to write your own shit. It's like, you can

1136
00:49:39,424 --> 00:49:41,783
Speaker 3: and you should do that. But like anything, same way

1137
00:49:42,203 --> 00:49:43,564
Speaker 3: that I was with acting or that I was with

1138
00:49:43,604 --> 00:49:46,584
Speaker 3: anything else, like every medium is its own discipline. Yes.

1139
00:49:46,783 --> 00:49:49,034
Speaker 3: And it can't be like a, like a, a, a,

1140
00:49:49,973 --> 00:49:51,714
Speaker 3: something you just sort of tack on to another part

1141
00:49:51,734 --> 00:49:55,433
Speaker 3: of your career for opportunity. It's a, like anything, it's

1142
00:49:55,473 --> 00:49:59,074
Speaker 3: a deep craft, especially screenwriting, which is so different from poetry,

1143
00:49:59,094 --> 00:50:00,174
Speaker 3: which is so different from music.

1144
00:50:00,194 --> 00:50:00,393
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1145
00:50:00,614 --> 00:50:02,893
Speaker 3: Yeah. Screenwriting is a beast.

1146
00:50:02,973 --> 00:50:05,413
Speaker 2: So, I mean, we'll talk about that too, because, you know,

1147
00:50:05,453 --> 00:50:06,973
Speaker 2: every now and again, I, you know, I've bought the

1148
00:50:07,013 --> 00:50:10,053
Speaker 2: final draft software four or five times in my life. Like, so,

1149
00:50:10,074 --> 00:50:11,593
Speaker 2: you know, here, I think I bought it about a

1150
00:50:11,614 --> 00:50:11,854
Speaker 2: year ago.

1151
00:50:11,873 --> 00:50:12,994
Speaker 3: I was like, here we go. Finally.

1152
00:50:13,594 --> 00:50:17,473
Speaker 2: And so much of that type of writing, you know, please,

1153
00:50:17,854 --> 00:50:19,564
Speaker 2: please correct me if I'm wrong. there's a part of

1154
00:50:19,584 --> 00:50:22,723
Speaker 2: it that's also like math, screenwriting. Like you need to,

1155
00:50:23,384 --> 00:50:25,573
Speaker 2: if you don't have an act one, act two, act three, it's,

1156
00:50:25,714 --> 00:50:28,614
Speaker 2: you know, and you want it to be a mainstream

1157
00:50:28,754 --> 00:50:30,653
Speaker 2: thing that the audience recognizes.

1158
00:50:31,094 --> 00:50:33,314
Speaker 1: Yeah. You're sort of stuck. You're not making it, you know,

1159
00:50:33,354 --> 00:50:33,733
Speaker 1: like you're.

1160
00:50:33,873 --> 00:50:36,334
Speaker 3: Yeah. You got to break the rules strategically.

1161
00:50:36,393 --> 00:50:36,654
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1162
00:50:36,814 --> 00:50:36,933
Speaker 2: Right.

1163
00:50:36,953 --> 00:50:38,133
Speaker 3: You got to know. You got to know them.

1164
00:50:38,154 --> 00:50:40,153
Speaker 1: It's the Coltrane thing. Know the rules, break the rules. Yeah.

1165
00:50:40,174 --> 00:50:41,053
Speaker 3: Know the rules, break the rules.

1166
00:50:41,094 --> 00:50:41,254
Speaker 1: Right.

1167
00:50:41,274 --> 00:50:43,034
Speaker 3: But I think it's no different than poetry or music

1168
00:50:43,074 --> 00:50:43,554
Speaker 3: or comedy.

1169
00:50:43,714 --> 00:50:43,873
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1170
00:50:43,913 --> 00:50:45,553
Speaker 3: Like you learn the rules of a joke. You learn

1171
00:50:45,574 --> 00:50:47,214
Speaker 3: the rules of a poem. You learn the rules of

1172
00:50:47,234 --> 00:50:49,514
Speaker 3: a song. And then suddenly you don't need the bridge.

1173
00:50:49,674 --> 00:50:52,203
Speaker 3: And suddenly you don't need the good intro that has

1174
00:50:52,303 --> 00:50:53,784
Speaker 3: the riff that everyone's going to remember.

1175
00:50:53,803 --> 00:50:55,404
Speaker 1: Suddenly you can hide the exposition.

1176
00:50:55,584 --> 00:50:58,044
Speaker 3: But you know that the first hook you're going to

1177
00:50:58,064 --> 00:51:00,104
Speaker 3: go into is so good. You can just drop it

1178
00:51:00,163 --> 00:51:02,183
Speaker 3: on the one and people are like, damn, this is

1179
00:51:02,203 --> 00:51:07,013
Speaker 3: so confident. But I think screenwriting is the same way.

1180
00:51:07,074 --> 00:51:09,893
Speaker 3: And I'm just now starting to feel like I can

1181
00:51:09,973 --> 00:51:11,504
Speaker 3: say that I feel like I'm getting good at it.

1182
00:51:11,973 --> 00:51:13,354
Speaker 3: And the rest was like a lot of help, a

1183
00:51:13,393 --> 00:51:16,283
Speaker 3: lot of mistakes, a million and one drafts. Now I'm

1184
00:51:16,324 --> 00:51:18,404
Speaker 3: starting to see the matrix when I have an idea.

1185
00:51:18,424 --> 00:51:20,863
Speaker 3: I go, okay, before we even start writing, we need

1186
00:51:20,904 --> 00:51:24,703
Speaker 3: to understand the in, the out. When people say, what

1187
00:51:24,743 --> 00:51:27,644
Speaker 3: is the hero's journey? Truly, what does that mean?

1188
00:51:27,703 --> 00:51:27,943
Speaker 1: Yes.

1189
00:51:28,683 --> 00:51:30,763
Speaker 3: When do you know you have the conflict of a

1190
00:51:30,803 --> 00:51:33,243
Speaker 3: character figured out and the conflict of a story figured out?

1191
00:51:33,824 --> 00:51:38,863
Speaker 3: And that screenwriting is 90% you walking around thinking about it. Yeah.

1192
00:51:39,104 --> 00:51:42,703
Speaker 3: Because it should just be a good myth you can

1193
00:51:42,723 --> 00:51:46,314
Speaker 3: tell another person over a drink. And if you can't

1194
00:51:46,373 --> 00:51:48,434
Speaker 3: do that, if you can't walk me through the story

1195
00:51:49,134 --> 00:51:51,923
Speaker 3: over a meal or a drink or something, it's not

1196
00:51:51,944 --> 00:51:52,344
Speaker 3: good enough.

1197
00:51:53,183 --> 00:51:55,804
Speaker 1: That's a great way to put it. That's a real

1198
00:51:56,104 --> 00:51:56,803
Speaker 1: great way to put it.

1199
00:51:57,183 --> 00:52:00,963
Speaker 3: Think about all your favorite movies. I could tell Willy

1200
00:52:01,004 --> 00:52:03,104
Speaker 3: Wonka and the Chocolate Factory as like a Bible story.

1201
00:52:03,944 --> 00:52:09,393
Speaker 3: It is so perfectly designed. And that's that great thing

1202
00:52:11,013 --> 00:52:14,623
Speaker 3: of great writers is like, Yeah, it can be super contemporary.

1203
00:52:14,683 --> 00:52:16,523
Speaker 3: It can be, like, you know, very.

1204
00:52:16,544 --> 00:52:17,364
Speaker 1: Push the envelope.

1205
00:52:17,444 --> 00:52:19,204
Speaker 3: It can push the envelope. It can be very street.

1206
00:52:19,243 --> 00:52:21,004
Speaker 3: It can be very, quote, unquote, high art. It can

1207
00:52:21,024 --> 00:52:24,073
Speaker 3: be whatever. But the bones of it are always going

1208
00:52:24,094 --> 00:52:28,373
Speaker 3: to be that classic human experience of how we like

1209
00:52:28,413 --> 00:52:32,033
Speaker 3: to hear a good hero or villain story. It's the

1210
00:52:32,074 --> 00:52:34,294
Speaker 3: same every time. And the truth is, like, that should

1211
00:52:34,334 --> 00:52:36,284
Speaker 3: be comforting. You don't have to reinvent that. You don't

1212
00:52:36,303 --> 00:52:36,924
Speaker 3: have to reinvent that.

1213
00:52:36,964 --> 00:52:37,383
Speaker 1: It's right there.

1214
00:52:37,444 --> 00:52:40,003
Speaker 2: I remember years ago, a friend of mine, Clark Taylor,

1215
00:52:40,024 --> 00:52:42,444
Speaker 2: who was a comedian who also wrote screenplays, said that, like,

1216
00:52:42,873 --> 00:52:45,854
Speaker 2: if you hand an executive a screenplay, the first thing

1217
00:52:45,893 --> 00:52:47,493
Speaker 2: he has to do is feels like, especially a physical,

1218
00:52:47,513 --> 00:52:48,863
Speaker 2: this is back in the days of when they were more,

1219
00:52:49,104 --> 00:52:51,484
Speaker 2: like this feels about the right length.

1220
00:52:51,723 --> 00:52:52,983
Speaker 1: If it's too thin, I'm like, you didn't.

1221
00:52:52,884 --> 00:52:53,504
Speaker 3: Write a screenplay.

1222
00:52:53,663 --> 00:52:56,343
Speaker 1: If it's this, you didn't write a screenplay, but it's

1223
00:52:56,364 --> 00:52:57,143
Speaker 1: about the right thickness.

1224
00:52:57,424 --> 00:52:58,923
Speaker 2: And they're going to look at the first page and

1225
00:52:59,004 --> 00:53:00,784
Speaker 2: see the names of the characters and then flip to

1226
00:53:00,803 --> 00:53:02,214
Speaker 2: the last page and see if those, some of those

1227
00:53:02,234 --> 00:53:03,114
Speaker 2: characters are still there.

1228
00:53:03,453 --> 00:53:03,673
Speaker 3: Okay.

1229
00:53:03,694 --> 00:53:05,814
Speaker 2: Now I might read it, but like, there's just sort

1230
00:53:05,834 --> 00:53:08,274
Speaker 2: of the basics of like, Does it feel like, does

1231
00:53:08,314 --> 00:53:11,133
Speaker 2: it have the girth of a screenplay? And also, did

1232
00:53:11,154 --> 00:53:13,254
Speaker 2: you carry these characters through to the end? Because if

1233
00:53:13,274 --> 00:53:14,393
Speaker 2: you didn't, I'm not, you know.

1234
00:53:14,413 --> 00:53:16,294
Speaker 3: You know, in the last three pages, is it all

1235
00:53:16,314 --> 00:53:17,434
Speaker 3: completely different people?

1236
00:53:17,493 --> 00:53:18,734
Speaker 1: Exactly, yeah.

1237
00:53:18,754 --> 00:53:21,873
Speaker 2: With a completely different set of events that were established

1238
00:53:21,893 --> 00:53:22,824
Speaker 2: in the first place.

1239
00:53:22,824 --> 00:53:27,684
Speaker 3: 95 pages versus 140 pages, big difference. What's the genre?

1240
00:53:27,703 --> 00:53:29,883
Speaker 3: Is it 140 pages and it's a comedy? Yeah. It's

1241
00:53:29,924 --> 00:53:34,344
Speaker 3: too long, dawg. too long that's wrong that's not funny

1242
00:53:34,643 --> 00:53:36,104
Speaker 3: you know is it a horror and it's two and

1243
00:53:36,123 --> 00:53:38,963
Speaker 3: a half hours like too long dog horrors are shot

1244
00:53:39,004 --> 00:53:41,284
Speaker 3: out of a cannon yeah you know so.

1245
00:53:41,163 --> 00:53:43,453
Speaker 2: Just is it the odyssey and okay it's three hours

1246
00:53:43,493 --> 00:53:44,814
Speaker 2: long because the odyssey.

1247
00:53:44,594 --> 00:53:47,553
Speaker 3: The odyssey's fine because even doing it in three hours

1248
00:53:47,634 --> 00:53:50,234
Speaker 3: is a feat yeah yeah wow good for you you

1249
00:53:50,294 --> 00:53:52,433
Speaker 3: edited a lot down you really whittled it down you

1250
00:53:52,473 --> 00:53:55,173
Speaker 3: got a lot out a lot of voiceover yeah yeah yeah.

1251
00:54:13,274 --> 00:54:15,163
Speaker 2: You just said something about yourself that i wanted that

1252
00:54:15,203 --> 00:54:16,943
Speaker 2: wanted to bring this up and this is the best

1253
00:54:16,984 --> 00:54:18,863
Speaker 2: way to bring it up you just referred yourself as

1254
00:54:18,904 --> 00:54:21,143
Speaker 2: a white guy did i yeah well you said that

1255
00:54:21,223 --> 00:54:24,783
Speaker 2: you said the guy outside of the bodega was a

1256
00:54:24,783 --> 00:54:26,524
Speaker 2: white guy oh yeah yeah the corner store was a

1257
00:54:26,544 --> 00:54:29,933
Speaker 2: white guy and that was your character in the And

1258
00:54:30,194 --> 00:54:32,234
Speaker 2: I guess, was Miles a white guy in?

1259
00:54:32,453 --> 00:54:34,334
Speaker 3: I mean, if I am, he is. Okay, but so

1260
00:54:34,354 --> 00:54:35,553
Speaker 3: that's my question.

1261
00:54:35,574 --> 00:54:38,334
Speaker 2: So, you know, it's funny, I don't think of you

1262
00:54:38,354 --> 00:54:40,054
Speaker 2: as a white guy, but I also understand, I have

1263
00:54:40,074 --> 00:54:41,964
Speaker 2: mixed race kids, so I understand this.

1264
00:54:41,783 --> 00:54:43,584
Speaker 3: Is all very complicated. It's a construct, my G.

1265
00:54:43,623 --> 00:54:46,524
Speaker 1: I understand. Did a whole film about it.

1266
00:54:47,663 --> 00:54:48,383
Speaker 3: And documentaries.

1267
00:54:48,404 --> 00:54:49,804
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1268
00:54:50,123 --> 00:54:54,194
Speaker 2: And yet, like, my middle kid, who's my, the kid

1269
00:54:54,214 --> 00:54:55,913
Speaker 2: who's gonna pass, and we've talked about that a lot,

1270
00:54:55,953 --> 00:54:58,113
Speaker 2: she knows we talk about it, I love when she says,

1271
00:54:58,683 --> 00:55:00,794
Speaker 2: white people in that way that sounds like a black person.

1272
00:55:00,814 --> 00:55:03,094
Speaker 3: I'm like, ah, okay, I'm doing the right, I'm teaching

1273
00:55:03,114 --> 00:55:04,493
Speaker 3: her the right way. Even though she.

1274
00:55:04,433 --> 00:55:06,054
Speaker 1: Knows some people will see her as white people.

1275
00:55:06,814 --> 00:55:10,013
Speaker 2: So talk about your identity and how you, cause I,

1276
00:55:10,053 --> 00:55:13,194
Speaker 2: you know, I think he was a, as a Latino dude,

1277
00:55:13,393 --> 00:55:15,883
Speaker 2: light skin, white presenting, you know? Yeah.

1278
00:55:16,243 --> 00:55:17,134
Speaker 3: No, I'm white, bro.

1279
00:55:17,344 --> 00:55:21,363
Speaker 1: And also I know that like, but also that doesn't disqualify.

1280
00:55:21,604 --> 00:55:22,643
Speaker 1: Latinos can be white.

1281
00:55:22,763 --> 00:55:22,963
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1282
00:55:23,004 --> 00:55:26,743
Speaker 3: Yeah. They are not, uh, they're not mutually exclusive.

1283
00:55:26,803 --> 00:55:28,643
Speaker 1: Yeah. Um, I.

1284
00:55:30,223 --> 00:55:31,584
Speaker 3: Also be saying white people's shit.

1285
00:55:32,123 --> 00:55:32,924
Speaker 1: I've heard you say that.

1286
00:55:33,004 --> 00:55:34,823
Speaker 3: In a discouraging way towards a group of people I

1287
00:55:34,884 --> 00:55:36,693
Speaker 3: don't feel akin to.

1288
00:55:36,814 --> 00:55:39,173
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. Your hat's black, not red.

1289
00:55:39,194 --> 00:55:43,574
Speaker 3: There are sects of the whites. You've also heard the expression,

1290
00:55:43,614 --> 00:55:46,193
Speaker 3: I'm white, but not that kind of white. Yeah, yeah.

1291
00:55:46,234 --> 00:55:48,393
Speaker 3: That one's good too. That's really like, you know what

1292
00:55:48,413 --> 00:55:50,354
Speaker 3: I'm talking about. Them over there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm

1293
00:55:50,413 --> 00:55:53,794
Speaker 3: not with them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, well, and really

1294
00:55:53,834 --> 00:55:56,854
Speaker 3: the question that you're asking is like, what is Hispanic?

1295
00:55:57,464 --> 00:56:00,243
Speaker 3: latino identity which like we don't have time to get into.

1296
00:56:00,044 --> 00:56:03,834
Speaker 2: No but especially right now it's you know why it's.

1297
00:56:03,433 --> 00:56:05,714
Speaker 3: Wildly interesting and what it means in this country but

1298
00:56:05,754 --> 00:56:08,933
Speaker 3: i think what we talk about when i hear like

1299
00:56:08,973 --> 00:56:12,953
Speaker 3: a purely racialized conversation i hear about like phenotypically how

1300
00:56:12,973 --> 00:56:15,453
Speaker 3: do you how do you function in society right so

1301
00:56:15,473 --> 00:56:17,754
Speaker 3: we're talking about your daughter who's passing it's like it

1302
00:56:17,794 --> 00:56:20,783
Speaker 3: doesn't really there's like there's also this different thing with

1303
00:56:20,884 --> 00:56:23,354
Speaker 3: specifically black people where like the way that we've talked

1304
00:56:23,393 --> 00:56:25,354
Speaker 3: about color in race and the way that we've talked

1305
00:56:25,373 --> 00:56:30,143
Speaker 3: about cultural identity are mixed in one, in one title

1306
00:56:30,183 --> 00:56:32,663
Speaker 3: of a people. And so it's particular, it doesn't transfer

1307
00:56:33,283 --> 00:56:36,343
Speaker 3: in the same way. And so I can like racialize

1308
00:56:37,243 --> 00:56:39,903
Speaker 3: like Latino people so much more easily because I go, yeah,

1309
00:56:39,944 --> 00:56:42,873
Speaker 3: like you can be black and Latino or Hispanic. You

1310
00:56:42,893 --> 00:56:47,033
Speaker 3: can be brown or indigenous looking and you can be Chinese.

1311
00:56:48,274 --> 00:56:50,953
Speaker 3: You literally can be. It's literally anyone. And it's this

1312
00:56:51,013 --> 00:56:56,024
Speaker 3: weird intersection of like, race and nationality and ethnicity. And

1313
00:56:56,183 --> 00:56:59,423
Speaker 3: that is so bizarre. And it's super flawed. I have

1314
00:56:59,453 --> 00:57:02,373
Speaker 3: so many problems with it that we don't have the

1315
00:57:02,433 --> 00:57:05,834
Speaker 3: theme of this podcast to get into. But I think

1316
00:57:06,214 --> 00:57:14,413
Speaker 3: the responsibility of Hispanic people who are white is to

1317
00:57:14,714 --> 00:57:18,653
Speaker 3: own that reality and not pretend as though you are

1318
00:57:18,714 --> 00:57:22,823
Speaker 3: just like really, really, really light. Because there isn't this

1319
00:57:22,904 --> 00:57:27,404
Speaker 3: like weird line that you trip over. It's all made up.

1320
00:57:27,584 --> 00:57:30,343
Speaker 3: And so how you look is kind of mostly all

1321
00:57:30,364 --> 00:57:33,874
Speaker 3: that matters. And then there's how you are culturally raised

1322
00:57:33,954 --> 00:57:36,534
Speaker 3: and how you identify and what your history is. And

1323
00:57:36,554 --> 00:57:38,854
Speaker 3: that's what you carry with you. Your daughter carries with you,

1324
00:57:39,534 --> 00:57:42,754
Speaker 3: you as her father and her mother and the history

1325
00:57:42,794 --> 00:57:45,544
Speaker 3: of that. And she's responsible for all that in a

1326
00:57:45,564 --> 00:57:47,964
Speaker 3: way that some other white kid who maybe looks exactly

1327
00:57:48,024 --> 00:57:51,284
Speaker 3: like her doesn't have to deal with at all and

1328
00:57:51,404 --> 00:57:56,114
Speaker 3: never has to. And so I think what's interesting for me,

1329
00:57:56,134 --> 00:57:59,034
Speaker 3: and I think it's also important, like we're Spanish Hispanic.

1330
00:57:59,054 --> 00:58:02,633
Speaker 3: We're like through, by way of Cuba and Spain, we

1331
00:58:02,694 --> 00:58:07,634
Speaker 3: are Spain Spanish. And so there is no indigeneity myth.

1332
00:58:08,094 --> 00:58:11,064
Speaker 3: And that simplifies it for me in a lot of ways.

1333
00:58:11,204 --> 00:58:14,124
Speaker 3: Whereas I have a lot of friends who are, we

1334
00:58:14,364 --> 00:58:17,403
Speaker 3: could be absolute siblings. In many ways, they are like

1335
00:58:17,654 --> 00:58:22,894
Speaker 3: more that kind of white feeling than I can be sometimes.

1336
00:58:24,574 --> 00:58:29,654
Speaker 3: But some people will hide behind a 23andMe and play

1337
00:58:29,714 --> 00:58:33,334
Speaker 3: the person of color card and try to like unenroll

1338
00:58:33,354 --> 00:58:38,054
Speaker 3: themselves in the responsibility of being a white person in society,

1339
00:58:38,374 --> 00:58:41,193
Speaker 3: white presenting or white, however you want it. And what

1340
00:58:41,234 --> 00:58:43,173
Speaker 3: it means for you to participate in society. And that's

1341
00:58:43,194 --> 00:58:45,423
Speaker 3: where we get like, Why are all them Cubans voting

1342
00:58:45,444 --> 00:58:46,523
Speaker 3: for Trump? It's like, they're white.

1343
00:58:48,594 --> 00:58:49,394
Speaker 1: That's an easy answer.

1344
00:58:49,414 --> 00:58:53,334
Speaker 3: Guys, they're Spanish speaking whites. They're all over Latin America.

1345
00:58:53,574 --> 00:58:55,354
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, yes. They're everywhere.

1346
00:58:55,474 --> 00:58:58,113
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah. Just my favorite game to play. I shouldn't

1347
00:58:58,134 --> 00:58:59,354
Speaker 3: say this. I'm going to say it anyway. My favorite

1348
00:58:59,374 --> 00:59:00,874
Speaker 3: game to play is to just pull up a picture

1349
00:59:01,254 --> 00:59:03,184
Speaker 3: of like a president of a Latin American country and go,

1350
00:59:03,604 --> 00:59:05,504
Speaker 3: is this a president of a Latin American country or

1351
00:59:05,544 --> 00:59:09,744
Speaker 3: a lawyer from San Francisco? And just take the name off.

1352
00:59:10,884 --> 00:59:13,744
Speaker 3: And you start to realize that your perception of people's,

1353
00:59:14,364 --> 00:59:17,644
Speaker 3: ethnicity or race is so colored by where they're from.

1354
00:59:18,364 --> 00:59:20,394
Speaker 3: And if you remove that for a moment and you go,

1355
00:59:20,494 --> 00:59:22,943
Speaker 3: before you hear them, speak before you hear anything about

1356
00:59:23,004 --> 00:59:26,084
Speaker 3: them look at this person yeah you know and there

1357
00:59:26,104 --> 00:59:28,863
Speaker 3: are things that that person can immediately escape and things

1358
00:59:28,904 --> 00:59:31,923
Speaker 3: that they cannot and that what when we have these

1359
00:59:31,964 --> 00:59:34,164
Speaker 3: especially because this comes up in hollywood all the time

1360
00:59:34,184 --> 00:59:39,234
Speaker 3: with these like these very specific representation conversations And I'm

1361
00:59:39,254 --> 00:59:42,554
Speaker 3: always like, what are you actually trying to do? Because

1362
00:59:42,574 --> 00:59:45,974
Speaker 3: this is a visual medium. And you like pumping this

1363
00:59:45,994 --> 00:59:49,693
Speaker 3: full of the widest Latino people you can find isn't

1364
00:59:49,874 --> 00:59:52,994
Speaker 3: doing what you think it's doing. You know, like it's still...

1365
00:59:52,854 --> 00:59:55,874
Speaker 3: Just because their last names end in some Zs or some...

1366
00:59:55,804 --> 00:59:56,844
Speaker 3: It does something.

1367
00:59:57,054 --> 00:59:57,323
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1368
00:59:57,724 --> 01:00:00,304
Speaker 3: You know, like I think my name is Rafael Santiago Casal.

1369
01:00:00,444 --> 01:00:02,104
Speaker 3: It's like, it's a thing. That's a thing.

1370
01:00:02,284 --> 01:00:02,684
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1371
01:00:02,744 --> 01:00:04,934
Speaker 3: I like... Making people read it. And you didn't change

1372
01:00:04,954 --> 01:00:06,773
Speaker 3: the name to, you didn't go, why go by Randy? No,

1373
01:00:07,274 --> 01:00:09,374
Speaker 3: I like seeing it on a screen. I like people

1374
01:00:09,414 --> 01:00:11,434
Speaker 3: having to say it. I like people having to contend

1375
01:00:11,474 --> 01:00:16,133
Speaker 3: with what it might mean. That's important to me. You

1376
01:00:16,154 --> 01:00:19,044
Speaker 3: ever seen the movie Roma? No. It's this amazing movie

1377
01:00:19,064 --> 01:00:22,184
Speaker 3: that shows the dichotomy of like racial disparity in Mexico.

1378
01:00:22,264 --> 01:00:27,843
Speaker 3: And it really like crystallizes the different populations within Latin

1379
01:00:27,864 --> 01:00:32,354
Speaker 3: American countries. I think it was very eyeopening for a

1380
01:00:32,374 --> 01:00:35,804
Speaker 3: lot of people. And for me, when we're having these conversations,

1381
01:00:35,824 --> 01:00:38,713
Speaker 3: specifically because I work in film and television about representation,

1382
01:00:39,014 --> 01:00:42,294
Speaker 3: I care about how it looks. I think how it

1383
01:00:42,354 --> 01:00:46,414
Speaker 3: looks matters a ton, especially when we're talking about reflecting

1384
01:00:46,494 --> 01:00:50,074
Speaker 3: back how a society is supposed to be. And so

1385
01:00:51,084 --> 01:00:53,944
Speaker 3: you can be responsible culturally for what you're standing up for,

1386
01:00:53,964 --> 01:00:55,124
Speaker 3: but not everyone's going to watch.

1387
01:00:54,984 --> 01:00:56,984
Speaker 1: The press tour.

1388
01:00:57,164 --> 01:00:59,284
Speaker 3: But when I'm watching a movie and I see somebody

1389
01:00:59,884 --> 01:01:04,673
Speaker 3: who I know maybe has only really been in American cinema,

1390
01:01:04,724 --> 01:01:08,883
Speaker 3: which is like globally the most popular, you know, or

1391
01:01:09,024 --> 01:01:13,284
Speaker 3: feels like Hollywood is the thing. When I see that

1392
01:01:13,444 --> 01:01:17,694
Speaker 3: in a meaningful role, it means something. That's why it's

1393
01:01:17,734 --> 01:01:19,414
Speaker 3: important for me. That's when they bring me into a

1394
01:01:19,434 --> 01:01:21,773
Speaker 3: thing and they go, and Raphael's a person of color.

1395
01:01:21,814 --> 01:01:25,024
Speaker 3: And I go, boo, you need to shut the fuck up.

1396
01:01:25,664 --> 01:01:28,604
Speaker 3: funny luckily we've done it we've checked that box yeah

1397
01:01:28,684 --> 01:01:31,584
Speaker 3: it's it's it's person of culture person like outside of

1398
01:01:32,624 --> 01:01:35,464
Speaker 3: like am i culturally mixed absolutely am i outside of

1399
01:01:35,504 --> 01:01:39,684
Speaker 3: sort of like the american like white anglo-saxon probably whatever

1400
01:01:39,724 --> 01:01:42,234
Speaker 3: the book is you know the thing is yeah when

1401
01:01:42,274 --> 01:01:45,894
Speaker 3: i when i watch like trump's trump's cabinet talk about

1402
01:01:46,014 --> 01:01:49,014
Speaker 3: a particular kind of like american christianity do i feel

1403
01:01:49,734 --> 01:01:53,874
Speaker 3: absolutely outside of it in every conceivable way yeah yeah

1404
01:01:54,844 --> 01:01:58,244
Speaker 3: And so there's the otherness of that, but it's important

1405
01:01:58,284 --> 01:02:05,164
Speaker 3: not to conflate otherness or a cultural difference with like

1406
01:02:05,204 --> 01:02:10,483
Speaker 3: a racialized America and pretending to be on the side

1407
01:02:10,524 --> 01:02:11,863
Speaker 3: of a line that I'm not on.

1408
01:02:12,404 --> 01:02:15,774
Speaker 2: Which is why I think when I watch, I'm speaking

1409
01:02:15,794 --> 01:02:18,934
Speaker 2: about Blindspotting, the show and the movie, both of them,

1410
01:02:19,654 --> 01:02:21,414
Speaker 2: that it's very clear that you two, and you were

1411
01:02:21,434 --> 01:02:22,374
Speaker 2: the showrunner for the show, right?

1412
01:02:22,394 --> 01:02:22,633
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah.

1413
01:02:23,114 --> 01:02:25,254
Speaker 2: Which is, I think it's important to say, that's the

1414
01:02:25,274 --> 01:02:27,573
Speaker 2: title that you are making the lion's share of the

1415
01:02:27,594 --> 01:02:30,173
Speaker 2: decisions or deciding who makes decisions when you're the showrunner.

1416
01:02:30,224 --> 01:02:33,004
Speaker 2: So you're not just writing on the show, you're not producing,

1417
01:02:33,024 --> 01:02:36,204
Speaker 2: you're not acting, you're also, like, deciding, like, you're trying

1418
01:02:36,224 --> 01:02:37,864
Speaker 2: to figure out, you're trying to make sure the catering

1419
01:02:37,904 --> 01:02:40,784
Speaker 2: is right. And also, and maybe you don't make the decision,

1420
01:02:40,824 --> 01:02:42,073
Speaker 2: but you try to make sure the person who makes

1421
01:02:42,094 --> 01:02:44,234
Speaker 2: the decision knows what they're doing. And you're also casting,

1422
01:02:44,534 --> 01:02:47,934
Speaker 2: that the way that those both are cast, that you

1423
01:02:47,994 --> 01:02:50,054
Speaker 2: and David are really trying to make sure that it's

1424
01:02:50,074 --> 01:02:53,244
Speaker 2: clear that, like, we're talking about a community that has

1425
01:02:53,364 --> 01:02:55,594
Speaker 2: lots of different people in it and lots of different

1426
01:02:55,614 --> 01:02:57,694
Speaker 2: types of people in it and not.

1427
01:02:57,594 --> 01:03:00,754
Speaker 3: Making sure that we have, Oh, we got one Latino person. Okay.

1428
01:03:00,774 --> 01:03:02,044
Speaker 1: That's, we got that wrapped up.

1429
01:03:02,534 --> 01:03:03,334
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1430
01:03:03,434 --> 01:03:05,554
Speaker 1: It's definitely not trying to do one black, one type

1431
01:03:05,574 --> 01:03:07,073
Speaker 1: of black person, you know? Yeah.

1432
01:03:07,094 --> 01:03:09,574
Speaker 3: It wasn't trying to, to be this, it was really

1433
01:03:09,624 --> 01:03:12,104
Speaker 3: just trying to be like, this is kind of what, um,

1434
01:03:12,764 --> 01:03:14,544
Speaker 3: a lot of friend groups and family groups in the

1435
01:03:14,584 --> 01:03:18,943
Speaker 3: Bay look like. Um, and trying to, trying to pull

1436
01:03:18,984 --> 01:03:22,574
Speaker 3: as many different, folks from those communities in as possible.

1437
01:03:22,594 --> 01:03:24,593
Speaker 3: A lot of that was also done in the day

1438
01:03:24,634 --> 01:03:27,294
Speaker 3: players and the storylines and all that. But also even

1439
01:03:27,334 --> 01:03:30,343
Speaker 3: that nuanced of a conversation about race and ethnicity and

1440
01:03:30,384 --> 01:03:33,644
Speaker 3: nationality is all like a product of being raised here, right?

1441
01:03:33,664 --> 01:03:36,403
Speaker 3: Like I recognize also that even going just as far

1442
01:03:36,464 --> 01:03:39,144
Speaker 3: south as LA and the industry, which is mostly populated

1443
01:03:39,184 --> 01:03:43,093
Speaker 3: by people not from California, it's just behind, you know?

1444
01:03:43,174 --> 01:03:47,774
Speaker 3: So like I was being told about the nuances of

1445
01:03:47,874 --> 01:03:52,234
Speaker 3: my identity by older people when I was younger. You know,

1446
01:03:52,614 --> 01:03:55,984
Speaker 3: I got to get comfortable with that early. There's still people,

1447
01:03:56,024 --> 01:03:58,474
Speaker 3: and I don't fault anyone for sort of navigating it,

1448
01:03:58,504 --> 01:04:01,584
Speaker 3: but I've watched like actor friends of mine over the

1449
01:04:01,624 --> 01:04:04,304
Speaker 3: course of five years go from I'm a person of

1450
01:04:04,324 --> 01:04:07,114
Speaker 3: color to I'm white, and I'd like to acknowledge that,

1451
01:04:07,434 --> 01:04:11,153
Speaker 3: back to I'm a person of color. Back to I'm white,

1452
01:04:11,194 --> 01:04:13,693
Speaker 3: you know? And really wrestling with it, and I think

1453
01:04:13,734 --> 01:04:16,894
Speaker 3: that it's important to just like not talk shit And go,

1454
01:04:17,354 --> 01:04:22,194
Speaker 3: you're working it out. This is who you are. That's tough.

1455
01:04:22,894 --> 01:04:25,383
Speaker 3: And you are out of your context. And you're trying

1456
01:04:25,404 --> 01:04:28,823
Speaker 3: to figure out what it means. Because also, like, I'm

1457
01:04:28,844 --> 01:04:31,144
Speaker 3: received so differently up here than I am out there.

1458
01:04:31,604 --> 01:04:34,704
Speaker 3: I have my context here. People know my friends and

1459
01:04:34,744 --> 01:04:36,784
Speaker 3: how I was raised up here and where I'm from

1460
01:04:36,804 --> 01:04:40,363
Speaker 3: and what neighborhoods I'm from. I don't have that there.

1461
01:04:41,324 --> 01:04:44,064
Speaker 3: And you know, like, Hollywood's got its little, like, There's

1462
01:04:44,104 --> 01:04:45,244
Speaker 3: like gangs.

1463
01:04:45,604 --> 01:04:48,094
Speaker 1: Yeah, yep, yep, yep.

1464
01:04:48,354 --> 01:04:48,834
Speaker 3: It's a trip.

1465
01:04:49,074 --> 01:04:51,854
Speaker 2: Which is why I still live up here. I haven't

1466
01:04:51,874 --> 01:04:52,554
Speaker 2: got clearance down there.

1467
01:04:52,574 --> 01:04:55,634
Speaker 3: I'm trying. Trying to get back. Come home, come home.

1468
01:04:55,674 --> 01:04:57,133
Speaker 3: I'm trying, bro. Yeah, yeah.

1469
01:04:57,174 --> 01:05:00,844
Speaker 2: I'm sure you are. So let's wrap up on this.

1470
01:05:02,964 --> 01:05:05,284
Speaker 2: You know, you are also very clear, and I started

1471
01:05:05,304 --> 01:05:08,273
Speaker 2: talking about community. like when people up here need help

1472
01:05:08,374 --> 01:05:10,654
Speaker 2: or you feel like you're a bright light of celebrity

1473
01:05:10,754 --> 01:05:13,574
Speaker 2: and it can help that you will lend your voice

1474
01:05:14,014 --> 01:05:17,073
Speaker 2: and your resources to causes up here. I was a

1475
01:05:17,094 --> 01:05:19,074
Speaker 2: part of the one where you and David were working

1476
01:05:19,094 --> 01:05:22,934
Speaker 2: to save Fairyland during the pandemic, which Fairyland is great.

1477
01:05:23,494 --> 01:05:25,824
Speaker 2: For people who don't know, Fairyland is apparently where Walt

1478
01:05:25,844 --> 01:05:27,383
Speaker 2: Disney went to and was like, oh, I.

1479
01:05:27,344 --> 01:05:28,364
Speaker 1: Should do this, but bigger.

1480
01:05:28,384 --> 01:05:29,124
Speaker 3: I should do Disneyland like this.

1481
01:05:29,144 --> 01:05:32,014
Speaker 1: Yeah, I should do this, but like, but more capitalistically focused.

1482
01:05:32,764 --> 01:05:36,504
Speaker 3: Not $ 5 Wednesdays with children. No, no, no, no, no, no.

1483
01:05:36,584 --> 01:05:37,424
Speaker 1: Not like that.

1484
01:05:37,524 --> 01:05:39,304
Speaker 3: He went to Fairland and was like, y'all ain't charging enough.

1485
01:05:39,364 --> 01:05:41,323
Speaker 1: Yeah, y'all ain't charging enough. You can do it.

1486
01:05:41,704 --> 01:05:44,684
Speaker 2: So during the pandemic, there was an effort to save Fairland,

1487
01:05:44,724 --> 01:05:47,034
Speaker 2: which was obviously not able to operate during the pandemic.

1488
01:05:47,554 --> 01:05:50,573
Speaker 2: And then you've done things for teachers up here. I mean,

1489
01:05:50,914 --> 01:05:52,633
Speaker 2: there's not too much time that goes by before your

1490
01:05:52,754 --> 01:05:54,414
Speaker 2: IG goes, hey, everybody, I need you.

1491
01:05:54,514 --> 01:05:55,034
Speaker 3: I need help.

1492
01:05:55,114 --> 01:05:55,634
Speaker 1: I need help.

1493
01:05:55,784 --> 01:05:56,344
Speaker 3: And often.

1494
01:05:57,184 --> 01:05:58,823
Speaker 2: In the world, but also in the Bay Area. So

1495
01:05:58,884 --> 01:06:00,704
Speaker 2: talk about why that's the case.

1496
01:06:02,154 --> 01:06:06,114
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, you know, I mean, like, we're so raised

1497
01:06:06,174 --> 01:06:11,734
Speaker 3: here to feel personally responsible for certainly the cultural institutions

1498
01:06:11,774 --> 01:06:17,264
Speaker 3: of this place and to not just come in and go, gimme, gimme, gimme,

1499
01:06:17,304 --> 01:06:20,244
Speaker 3: and run. But it's also part of my way of

1500
01:06:20,324 --> 01:06:25,323
Speaker 3: staying connected to the Bay on the ground is to

1501
01:06:25,384 --> 01:06:28,284
Speaker 3: stay really invested in the places that make it what

1502
01:06:28,324 --> 01:06:31,204
Speaker 3: it is, and the places where people are going to

1503
01:06:32,184 --> 01:06:39,154
Speaker 3: continue that legacy of really beautiful cross-cultural connection and music

1504
01:06:39,234 --> 01:06:43,193
Speaker 3: and art. And so I think one of the things

1505
01:06:43,214 --> 01:06:47,414
Speaker 3: that's happened a lot lately is because we're working more

1506
01:06:47,454 --> 01:06:49,714
Speaker 3: in film and television, I'm working more in film and television,

1507
01:06:50,794 --> 01:06:53,573
Speaker 3: I'm more connected now than ever to other people in

1508
01:06:53,614 --> 01:06:56,463
Speaker 3: the Bay who want to be doing that. who don't

1509
01:06:56,504 --> 01:07:00,604
Speaker 3: know how. And the truth is it's, it's, it feels

1510
01:07:00,684 --> 01:07:05,344
Speaker 3: so impossible here. There's no, you know, there's no ladder really.

1511
01:07:06,004 --> 01:07:08,334
Speaker 3: And so the Bay list, for example, is the last

1512
01:07:08,354 --> 01:07:10,754
Speaker 3: thing we did, which is a collaboration with the blacklist,

1513
01:07:10,774 --> 01:07:13,213
Speaker 3: which is you've been a part of, and we tried

1514
01:07:13,254 --> 01:07:16,014
Speaker 3: to reach out to every, all, all the superheroes we

1515
01:07:16,174 --> 01:07:17,994
Speaker 3: could find, all the media makers in the Bay we

1516
01:07:18,014 --> 01:07:18,434
Speaker 3: could find.

1517
01:07:18,554 --> 01:07:19,614
Speaker 1: The Avengers of media.

1518
01:07:19,654 --> 01:07:22,034
Speaker 3: The Avengers of media. We went to Lucasfilm and Steph

1519
01:07:22,054 --> 01:07:26,204
Speaker 3: Curry's company and boots and, Francis Ford Coppola's company and

1520
01:07:26,804 --> 01:07:29,644
Speaker 3: everyone we could. Cheryl Dunye. Cheryl Dunye, who I think

1521
01:07:29,664 --> 01:07:32,744
Speaker 3: we're seeing later today or tomorrow. Yeah, today. And you

1522
01:07:32,784 --> 01:07:35,124
Speaker 3: know the schedule better than I do at this point.

1523
01:07:35,364 --> 01:07:36,843
Speaker 3: I'm trying to wrap it up.

1524
01:07:36,864 --> 01:07:37,664
Speaker 1: We're late.

1525
01:07:37,924 --> 01:07:41,823
Speaker 3: That project, the Bayless project, is really about trying to

1526
01:07:41,864 --> 01:07:45,974
Speaker 3: create some kind of pipeline for people. I think efforts

1527
01:07:46,034 --> 01:07:49,314
Speaker 3: like that, which I'm always trying to encourage anyone who

1528
01:07:49,334 --> 01:07:54,564
Speaker 3: has any clout to do, I think when you're 16, 17, 18,

1529
01:07:54,564 --> 01:07:56,804
Speaker 3: which I remember still very vividly, clearly, as you can

1530
01:07:56,844 --> 01:07:59,744
Speaker 3: tell from being here as an artist, when somebody who's

1531
01:07:59,784 --> 01:08:04,974
Speaker 3: a little further along comes around and says, um, you

1532
01:08:05,014 --> 01:08:07,093
Speaker 3: can totally do this. All right, I'll give an, I'll

1533
01:08:07,134 --> 01:08:10,273
Speaker 3: do a name droppy story. Um, right after we did

1534
01:08:10,554 --> 01:08:12,054
Speaker 3: blind spotting, I was trying to figure out what to

1535
01:08:12,094 --> 01:08:15,954
Speaker 3: do with my career. Um, I, I, I'll, I'll tell

1536
01:08:15,994 --> 01:08:17,854
Speaker 3: the longer version of this some other time, but I

1537
01:08:17,914 --> 01:08:22,094
Speaker 3: ended up at a dinner with, um, with Jim Carrey. And, uh,

1538
01:08:22,634 --> 01:08:26,734
Speaker 3: Jim had just watched Blindspotting and he was wonderful.

1539
01:08:26,994 --> 01:08:27,214
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1540
01:08:28,514 --> 01:08:34,224
Speaker 3: Brilliant, beautiful, amazing man. And somewhere in that dinner, he

1541
01:08:34,264 --> 01:08:36,884
Speaker 3: just went, you know, I'm sure I was telling him

1542
01:08:36,904 --> 01:08:39,344
Speaker 3: how much I deeply admired him or whatever I was

1543
01:08:39,904 --> 01:08:45,534
Speaker 3: babbling on. He just goes, but you're doing it. Same

1544
01:08:45,574 --> 01:08:48,834
Speaker 3: as me. You're being who you are. You're making your art.

1545
01:08:48,854 --> 01:08:51,714
Speaker 3: You're getting after it. You're telling your truth. And it's fantastic.

1546
01:08:52,884 --> 01:08:57,624
Speaker 3: And I was just like, oh. You know, and it's

1547
01:08:57,804 --> 01:09:02,024
Speaker 3: just a permission passing. Somebody that you know that is

1548
01:09:02,104 --> 01:09:04,934
Speaker 3: doing a thing that you love. And that you've seen

1549
01:09:04,994 --> 01:09:07,634
Speaker 3: is somebody who's like on the mountaintop. And that's a

1550
01:09:07,674 --> 01:09:09,573
Speaker 3: name droppy extreme case.

1551
01:09:09,594 --> 01:09:11,034
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it's also happened. It happened.

1552
01:09:11,264 --> 01:09:14,444
Speaker 3: You know, and even if somebody's just like, ah, Blast

1553
01:09:14,484 --> 01:09:16,994
Speaker 3: Body was all right, you know, but me and David

1554
01:09:17,034 --> 01:09:21,094
Speaker 3: roll up and suddenly we're not like these fictional things

1555
01:09:21,154 --> 01:09:24,374
Speaker 3: on a screen, but we're standing there. Mm-hmm. I know

1556
01:09:24,414 --> 01:09:26,694
Speaker 3: that like some of that hater shit immediately goes away

1557
01:09:26,794 --> 01:09:30,014
Speaker 3: and people go, Oh shit. Now it's, now you're standing here.

1558
01:09:30,474 --> 01:09:37,174
Speaker 3: And now I do wish that I had some sense of, um, approval,

1559
01:09:37,714 --> 01:09:40,734
Speaker 3: you know, or a sense of, uh, of relationship and

1560
01:09:40,754 --> 01:09:43,414
Speaker 3: to be able to go in and go, Hey, like

1561
01:09:43,774 --> 01:09:45,514
Speaker 3: I know right now you just think you're like the

1562
01:09:45,554 --> 01:09:48,614
Speaker 3: bummy kid in a recording studio in a warehouse or,

1563
01:09:48,914 --> 01:09:50,863
Speaker 3: or you just have your little DSLR camera and you're

1564
01:09:50,874 --> 01:09:53,654
Speaker 3: shooting shit with your friends. But like, That's the same

1565
01:09:53,834 --> 01:09:59,844
Speaker 3: thing as what we did. And I just think debunking

1566
01:09:59,864 --> 01:10:04,844
Speaker 3: this myth of this gap and making people feel that

1567
01:10:05,284 --> 01:10:09,064
Speaker 3: it's very doable with the very minimal resources and just

1568
01:10:09,124 --> 01:10:12,264
Speaker 3: the dream of it and the ambition of it is

1569
01:10:12,464 --> 01:10:17,974
Speaker 3: so fucking important for artists. And so I just love

1570
01:10:18,034 --> 01:10:19,814
Speaker 3: doing it because I've had it happen a few, it

1571
01:10:19,834 --> 01:10:22,844
Speaker 3: happened with my students at UW-Madison. some of those students

1572
01:10:23,344 --> 01:10:25,844
Speaker 3: have gone on and used poetry to become teachers and

1573
01:10:25,944 --> 01:10:28,904
Speaker 3: principals and lawyers and all kinds of stuff. And some

1574
01:10:28,944 --> 01:10:34,044
Speaker 3: of them are like world renowned artists. And it's crazy

1575
01:10:34,994 --> 01:10:37,174
Speaker 3: that you, you watch them and you're just like, you're

1576
01:10:37,214 --> 01:10:41,294
Speaker 3: doing what? And they're like, man, our time doing that program.

1577
01:10:41,314 --> 01:10:44,354
Speaker 3: Thanks for helping me. You're like, you know, one of them,

1578
01:10:44,494 --> 01:10:47,994
Speaker 3: one of them recently was just like, I was like, oh,

1579
01:10:48,014 --> 01:10:50,714
Speaker 3: for some crazy award and was asked like, name five

1580
01:10:50,774 --> 01:10:53,494
Speaker 3: people who like, you know, really did. And they tagged

1581
01:10:53,534 --> 01:10:57,054
Speaker 3: me and I was just like, oh.

1582
01:10:58,634 --> 01:10:58,754
Speaker 1: Oh.

1583
01:10:58,974 --> 01:11:01,694
Speaker 3: Yep, yep. You know, and it was, look, the shout,

1584
01:11:01,754 --> 01:11:03,554
Speaker 3: I love a shout out on Vane, but also it

1585
01:11:03,574 --> 01:11:08,814
Speaker 3: was just like, wow, that was an important time to you.

1586
01:11:10,034 --> 01:11:11,954
Speaker 3: And that work matters. And I think about all the teachers.

1587
01:11:11,994 --> 01:11:12,594
Speaker 1: And the work sustains.

1588
01:11:12,614 --> 01:11:14,374
Speaker 3: It sustains. And I think about how much like Mark

1589
01:11:14,414 --> 01:11:17,114
Speaker 3: Monty Joseph and Chris Walker and all these mentors like,

1590
01:11:18,714 --> 01:11:21,874
Speaker 3: There are mannerisms during this podcast that I stole from Bamu.

1591
01:11:22,554 --> 01:11:26,454
Speaker 3: It stays with you forever. And I just love that work.

1592
01:11:26,894 --> 01:11:27,614
Speaker 1: That's so cool.

1593
01:11:27,734 --> 01:11:29,574
Speaker 2: It's so funny to think that you just basically described

1594
01:11:29,594 --> 01:11:31,784
Speaker 2: the journey from across the hall where we.

1595
01:11:31,784 --> 01:11:33,124
Speaker 3: Were to right here.

1596
01:11:34,704 --> 01:11:36,804
Speaker 1: But you had to go down Jim Carrey way to

1597
01:11:36,844 --> 01:11:37,204
Speaker 1: get here.

1598
01:11:37,224 --> 01:11:38,714
Speaker 3: I still managed to get that story out.

1599
01:11:39,824 --> 01:11:42,084
Speaker 2: And also it happened and it's a real thing. And

1600
01:11:42,104 --> 01:11:44,924
Speaker 2: I think I've actually had a similar experience. Story I'll

1601
01:11:44,944 --> 01:11:47,084
Speaker 2: drop with Jim Carrey where he saw me somewhere and

1602
01:11:47,124 --> 01:11:48,914
Speaker 2: was like, oh I know who you are and I'm

1603
01:11:48,954 --> 01:11:51,224
Speaker 2: like and it's weird cuz again It's easy to go

1604
01:11:51,264 --> 01:11:55,974
Speaker 2: Jim Carrey Hollywood a-list that uh, and yet, you're you know,

1605
01:11:56,034 --> 01:11:59,374
Speaker 2: the TV can look back at me Really good at

1606
01:11:59,394 --> 01:12:03,113
Speaker 2: what he does. Yeah and has clearly fought for artistic

1607
01:12:03,154 --> 01:12:06,394
Speaker 2: integrity When he sewed up we didn't go that guy

1608
01:12:06,434 --> 01:12:09,864
Speaker 2: has artistic integrity his ace Ventura, but he did and Yeah,

1609
01:12:09,884 --> 01:12:11,464
Speaker 2: but he's fascinating.

1610
01:12:11,484 --> 01:12:13,234
Speaker 3: We don't even have time to get into that guy.

1611
01:12:13,224 --> 01:12:15,374
Speaker 2: That's a whole separate, I think, it's funny, I really

1612
01:12:15,474 --> 01:12:18,054
Speaker 2: appreciate how he has evolved into one of the, like

1613
01:12:18,074 --> 01:12:20,054
Speaker 2: sort of Hollywood Santa Claus, like he's this guy who's

1614
01:12:20,074 --> 01:12:22,774
Speaker 2: still working and clearly made some, anyway, we can.

1615
01:12:22,714 --> 01:12:23,534
Speaker 1: Talk about that another time.

1616
01:12:24,254 --> 01:12:26,914
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's an amazing dude. There's a thing about, yeah.

1617
01:12:27,334 --> 01:12:29,274
Speaker 2: So the last thing I ask, and you sort of

1618
01:12:29,294 --> 01:12:31,504
Speaker 2: mentioned some organizations, and we've also worked together on Make

1619
01:12:31,544 --> 01:12:33,624
Speaker 2: It Bay, which is about trying to make filmmaking in

1620
01:12:33,704 --> 01:12:36,224
Speaker 2: Oakland specifically, but the Bay as a whole more accessible.

1621
01:12:37,264 --> 01:12:39,864
Speaker 2: Shout out, Any organization you want to? There's so many

1622
01:12:39,884 --> 01:12:42,864
Speaker 2: you work with and have started up and created. I mean, honestly,

1623
01:12:42,944 --> 01:12:45,484
Speaker 2: I'm shouting out Make It Bay right now. I'm shouting

1624
01:12:45,504 --> 01:12:47,504
Speaker 2: out Make It Bay. I know it's like, it would

1625
01:12:47,524 --> 01:12:50,344
Speaker 2: be self-promotion if any of us got paid. But actually

1626
01:12:50,374 --> 01:12:55,054
Speaker 2: what's happening is we have an Oakland film incentive. Again,

1627
01:12:55,214 --> 01:12:57,174
Speaker 2: really for the first time, we almost got it a

1628
01:12:57,214 --> 01:12:59,674
Speaker 2: few years ago. And then it crashed and burned. And

1629
01:12:59,734 --> 01:13:02,134
Speaker 2: now we have it again. Barbaralee has approved it.

1630
01:13:03,034 --> 01:13:05,554
Speaker 3: It's not a ton of money, but we need to

1631
01:13:05,654 --> 01:13:10,584
Speaker 3: get infrastructure immediately to be able to get films coming

1632
01:13:10,604 --> 01:13:11,664
Speaker 3: here to use that incentive.

1633
01:13:11,704 --> 01:13:12,824
Speaker 1: We need a real Oakland film office.

1634
01:13:12,844 --> 01:13:15,324
Speaker 3: We need a real Oakland film office, which does not exist.

1635
01:13:16,184 --> 01:13:18,444
Speaker 3: There's some money to start building it in, but really

1636
01:13:18,464 --> 01:13:21,784
Speaker 3: what's going to do that is getting private companies who

1637
01:13:21,804 --> 01:13:25,894
Speaker 3: are invested in building film infrastructure here long-term to start

1638
01:13:25,994 --> 01:13:28,094
Speaker 3: matching some of that money that the city's giving in

1639
01:13:28,574 --> 01:13:30,554
Speaker 3: so that when a big film from LA or New

1640
01:13:30,594 --> 01:13:32,934
Speaker 3: York or wherever is like, this really should be shot

1641
01:13:32,954 --> 01:13:36,714
Speaker 3: in Oakland, or between Oakland and San Francisco, that that's feasible,

1642
01:13:36,754 --> 01:13:39,294
Speaker 3: that there's enough money in that fund to make it

1643
01:13:39,314 --> 01:13:41,914
Speaker 3: worth their time. And so I know there's always people

1644
01:13:41,954 --> 01:13:43,314
Speaker 3: who want to give $ 10, $ 20.

1645
01:13:43,234 --> 01:13:43,394
Speaker 2: $ 30.

1646
01:13:43,314 --> 01:13:44,613
Speaker 3: If you want to do that, give it to YouSpeaks.

1647
01:13:44,874 --> 01:13:47,654
Speaker 3: They gave me my start. Please, by all means, it's

1648
01:13:47,674 --> 01:13:52,774
Speaker 3: an amazing organization. If you have more than that. If

1649
01:13:52,794 --> 01:13:55,314
Speaker 3: you have more than that. If you've got a lot

1650
01:13:55,334 --> 01:13:57,034
Speaker 3: of zeros in your donation and you're trying to figure

1651
01:13:57,074 --> 01:13:59,174
Speaker 3: out how to build up the art scene in the

1652
01:13:59,214 --> 01:14:02,394
Speaker 3: Bay Area in a way that can create mass jobs everywhere,

1653
01:14:02,864 --> 01:14:06,564
Speaker 3: Job creation, which we talk about all the time. Union

1654
01:14:06,644 --> 01:14:10,004
Speaker 3: jobs that will last and last and last and pay

1655
01:14:10,044 --> 01:14:13,584
Speaker 3: for people to buy houses and create families here.

1656
01:14:13,604 --> 01:14:16,544
Speaker 2: As we say, that will make entertainment just another industry,

1657
01:14:16,564 --> 01:14:17,804
Speaker 2: a boring industry.

1658
01:14:18,224 --> 01:14:20,844
Speaker 3: And a local industry, an industry that's not bringing in

1659
01:14:20,924 --> 01:14:23,374
Speaker 3: all this talent from outside, but that actually will reward

1660
01:14:23,474 --> 01:14:26,174
Speaker 3: hiring because the incentive is bigger if you hire local.

1661
01:14:26,774 --> 01:14:30,414
Speaker 3: It will reward local hiring and local training. Get in

1662
01:14:30,434 --> 01:14:32,544
Speaker 3: touch with Make It Bay. get in touch with Sam

1663
01:14:32,564 --> 01:14:34,964
Speaker 3: Benpong who knows all the inner workings of how the

1664
01:14:34,984 --> 01:14:38,604
Speaker 3: city funding is working and make a contribution because people

1665
01:14:38,624 --> 01:14:41,784
Speaker 3: should be shooting here. It's just stop going to Albuquerque.

1666
01:14:41,844 --> 01:14:44,104
Speaker 2: And we have some pretty big local filmmakers who would

1667
01:14:44,124 --> 01:14:44,824
Speaker 2: probably rather shoot here.

1668
01:14:44,884 --> 01:14:48,144
Speaker 3: And we have amazing, the local film, the people that

1669
01:14:48,164 --> 01:14:51,244
Speaker 3: are part of the Baylist sort of like leadership board

1670
01:14:51,544 --> 01:14:55,414
Speaker 3: and co-founders, it's a crazy list of people. There's a

1671
01:14:55,494 --> 01:14:59,934
Speaker 3: reason that Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas brought their

1672
01:15:00,514 --> 01:15:03,094
Speaker 3: institutions here. Yeah. That we want more of that. We

1673
01:15:03,124 --> 01:15:04,904
Speaker 3: want more of that kind of business coming here.

1674
01:15:05,224 --> 01:15:05,384
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1675
01:15:05,404 --> 01:15:08,924
Speaker 3: All right. My last question is, the podcast is called

1676
01:15:08,944 --> 01:15:09,424
Speaker 3: Who's With Me.

1677
01:15:10,024 --> 01:15:10,524
Speaker 1: Are you with me?

1678
01:15:11,284 --> 01:15:12,364
Speaker 3: I'm always with you, Doc.

1679
01:15:12,444 --> 01:15:13,504
Speaker 1: I appreciate that.

1680
01:15:13,524 --> 01:15:16,184
Speaker 3: Thanks, man. My man. Thanks, man. I knew it. I

1681
01:15:16,204 --> 01:15:16,704
Speaker 3: knew it.

1682
01:15:16,724 --> 01:15:20,524
Speaker 2: But it's in the contract, I have to ask. And literally,

1683
01:15:20,964 --> 01:15:23,244
Speaker 2: we are leaving here to go be at this event,

1684
01:15:23,744 --> 01:15:24,244
Speaker 2: The Baylist.

1685
01:15:24,284 --> 01:15:25,404
Speaker 3: Yes, we need to get over there.

1686
01:15:25,444 --> 01:15:26,584
Speaker 2: Yeah, so yeah, we need to get over there. I

1687
01:15:26,604 --> 01:15:28,344
Speaker 2: need to get a beard trim. Next time you see me,

1688
01:15:28,364 --> 01:15:30,414
Speaker 2: it's going to be all cleaned up. But thank you, brother.

1689
01:15:30,464 --> 01:15:31,804
Speaker 3: Thanks for having me, man. This was awesome. Thank you.

1690
01:15:34,544 --> 01:15:36,804
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening to Who's With Me. Thanks to

1691
01:15:36,844 --> 01:15:39,304
Speaker 2: Rafael Casal for stopping by. I love talking to that dude.

1692
01:15:39,344 --> 01:15:40,814
Speaker 2: I feel cool when I talk to that dude. I

1693
01:15:41,074 --> 01:15:42,474
Speaker 2: must be a pretty cool person to talk to Raf.

1694
01:15:43,034 --> 01:15:45,534
Speaker 2: And as I found out, Blindspotting the series is going

1695
01:15:45,554 --> 01:15:46,714
Speaker 2: to start streaming on Netflix.

1696
01:15:46,754 --> 01:15:48,094
Speaker 1: The two seasons, they're great.

1697
01:15:48,154 --> 01:15:50,794
Speaker 2: Check them out. You can binge them. October 20th, they'll

1698
01:15:50,814 --> 01:15:53,414
Speaker 2: start streaming on Netflix. Again, like I said, he's working

1699
01:15:53,434 --> 01:15:56,214
Speaker 2: all the time. He's following him on Instagram. He's always

1700
01:15:56,254 --> 01:16:00,054
Speaker 2: putting up songs and ideas and advocacy. And also you

1701
01:16:00,074 --> 01:16:01,714
Speaker 2: can see he's always working. Like I said, he just

1702
01:16:01,794 --> 01:16:05,054
Speaker 2: directed something with Ethan Hawking, that dude is constantly working.

1703
01:16:05,674 --> 01:16:09,384
Speaker 2: So yeah, he mentioned two different nonprofits. He mentioned Youth Speaks,

1704
01:16:09,464 --> 01:16:12,304
Speaker 2: which is the nonprofit that teaches kids how to do

1705
01:16:12,324 --> 01:16:16,004
Speaker 2: spoken word. And they have camps and afterschool programs and

1706
01:16:16,024 --> 01:16:19,164
Speaker 2: they have brave new voices and they have competitions. And

1707
01:16:19,184 --> 01:16:21,274
Speaker 2: that's what launched Roth into the world. And they're still

1708
01:16:21,334 --> 01:16:23,834
Speaker 2: out here doing good work. So check out Youth Speaks.

1709
01:16:24,234 --> 01:16:25,554
Speaker 2: And then he also talked about an organization that me

1710
01:16:25,574 --> 01:16:27,234
Speaker 2: and him are both a part of called Make It Bay,

1711
01:16:27,614 --> 01:16:30,454
Speaker 2: which advocates for the Bay Area, especially the East Bay.

1712
01:16:30,494 --> 01:16:32,364
Speaker 2: San Francisco is doing its own thing, but especially the

1713
01:16:32,404 --> 01:16:36,334
Speaker 2: East Bay. To be a more accessible place for filmmakers

1714
01:16:36,674 --> 01:16:39,264
Speaker 2: so that more people can make film and media here.

1715
01:16:39,644 --> 01:16:41,064
Speaker 2: And that it's not an idea that it's just, you

1716
01:16:41,084 --> 01:16:42,664
Speaker 2: have to go to LA to do that. It's a

1717
01:16:42,664 --> 01:16:44,764
Speaker 2: thing that can happen here. So making it easier to

1718
01:16:44,804 --> 01:16:48,444
Speaker 2: get permits and to get funding and to have, uh, like,

1719
01:16:48,764 --> 01:16:50,924
Speaker 2: like support from the city of Oakland.

1720
01:16:51,184 --> 01:16:52,114
Speaker 1: So yeah, make it Bay.

1721
01:16:52,474 --> 01:16:55,454
Speaker 2: Uh, it also wants to attract filming to the Bay

1722
01:16:55,494 --> 01:16:56,634
Speaker 2: area the same way that has.

1723
01:16:56,574 --> 01:16:57,374
Speaker 1: Happened in Atlanta.

1724
01:16:57,704 --> 01:16:59,924
Speaker 2: In other cities, we want the Bay Area to be

1725
01:16:59,964 --> 01:17:02,344
Speaker 2: a place where big Hollywood productions can come here and

1726
01:17:02,424 --> 01:17:05,584
Speaker 2: hire locally with those boring-ass union jobs that pay good

1727
01:17:05,624 --> 01:17:09,764
Speaker 2: money and give you benefits. Anyway, thank you for listening

1728
01:17:09,804 --> 01:17:12,944
Speaker 2: and watching. Who's with me this week? Thanks to Ravagrin Productions,

1729
01:17:13,344 --> 01:17:17,554
Speaker 2: Pushkin Industries, and who knows Best Productions. Thanks to Skyline

1730
01:17:17,574 --> 01:17:20,374
Speaker 2: Studios where we take this episode here in beautiful Oakland.

1731
01:17:20,694 --> 01:17:24,374
Speaker 2: As always, special thanks to Fishbone!

1732
01:17:25,114 --> 01:17:25,494
Speaker 1: And again.

1733
01:17:26,024 --> 01:17:28,634
Speaker 2: As always, do something good for yourself. Do something good

1734
01:17:28,674 --> 01:17:31,984
Speaker 2: for your community. Do something good for the world. See

1735
01:17:32,004 --> 01:17:32,384
Speaker 2: you next week.