JB Smoove Talks Real Life Curb Your Enthusiasm Moments | Chris Distefano is Chrissy Chaos - Chris Distefano Presents: Chrissy Chaos

Summary4 min read

Podcast Summary: "JB Smoove Talks Real Life Curb Your Enthusiasm Moments | Chris Distefano is Chrissy Chaos"

Podcast Information:

Title: Chris Distefano Presents: Chrissy Chaos
Host: Chris Distefano
Guest: JB Smoove
Episode Title: JB Smoove Talks Real Life Curb Your Enthusiasm Moments | Chris Distefano is Chrissy Chaos
Release Date: November 12, 2024

1. Introduction and Welcome Chris Distefano kicks off the episode by expressing his excitement to reconnect with his listeners and bringing back conversations with friends, notably inviting JB Smoove, a long-time collaborator and one of the funniest personalities in the industry. Chris reminisces about their first commercial together, highlighting JB's standout presence and charisma.

2. Early Career and Commercial Success JB Smoove shares anecdotes about his early career, including his first Nike commercial alongside Carmelo Anthony in 2013. He credits Rick Dorfman, his manager, for introducing him into such high-profile projects. JB emphasizes the importance of positive energy in the workplace, stating:

"No matter what you're doing, if you just stay ultra positive, even if you're not feeling that positive that day, you come in, big smiles, positive energy." (03:27)

This mindset, according to JB, not only attracts positive people but also fosters success in various endeavors.

3. Positive Energy and Work Ethic The conversation delves deeper into the significance of maintaining a positive demeanor. JB Smoove elaborates on his philosophy of pushing away negativity and surrounding himself with positive influences. He humorously introduces his unique approach with:

"When I smoke my cigar, ain't no negative energy around me. I just rebuke you. Rebuke your ass." (03:55)

4. Longevity and Staying True to Oneself in Comedy Chris and JB discuss the challenges of maintaining a long-standing career in comedy. JB reflects on how he has managed to stay relevant over 20 years by consistently selling himself authentically rather than following transient trends. He likens comedians to salesmen who must truthfully present themselves to build lasting connections with audiences.

"We are the premise. We walk in the room, people put a smile... This side of the mouth go up a little bit like this dude right here." (07:40)

Chris praises JB’s ability to remain genuine, noting that such authenticity leads to sustained respect and admiration in the industry.

5. Transition to Veganism and Health A significant portion of the episode focuses on JB Smoove's transition to a vegan lifestyle. He recounts his decision sparked by a moment of realization:

"I was already part time, full time, right? Part time, part time vegan, full time carnivore for a long time." (51:03)

JB shares the health benefits he experienced, such as reduced inflammation and improved physical fitness, emphasizing the positive impact of his dietary changes. He advocates for a balanced approach to veganism, encouraging the inclusion of vegetables and adequate hydration.

6. Real-Life Moments and Relationships in "Curb Your Enthusiasm" JB Smoove reminisces about his time on Curb Your Enthusiasm, detailing spontaneous and memorable interactions with fellow cast members like Richard Lewis. He narrates a heartfelt conversation with Richard post-filming:

"Richard called me. He got my number from Larry and he called me on the phone... he turned around, I say, 'you a idiot, but you're fucking brilliant.'" (90:00)

These interactions highlight the deep camaraderie and mutual respect among the cast, showcasing the genuine friendships formed beyond the scripted environment.

7. Creating Memorable Impressions and Networking JB discusses the importance of being memorable and building a strong personal brand. He emphasizes that how one presents themselves in any setting can lead to unforeseen opportunities:

"You have to icon yourself, right? You have to icon yourself, meaning you're memorable to people and that's what it is." (72:50)

He shares success stories of how prior commercial roles led to significant opportunities, such as his role in the Spider-Man franchise:

"I said, man, I would love to be in this Marvel universe one day. And lo and behold, like, literally a year, eight months to a year later, I'm on 'Spider-Man: Far From Home.'" (73:28)

8. The Impact of Positive Presence Both hosts agree on the transformative power of showing up with a positive attitude. Chris attributes his admiration for JB's approach to life and comedy, noting how JB's presence can uplift those around him.

"But you start pressuring you into food... I'm just going to get up there and be free with it and you're gonna kill." (38:16)

9. Personal Anecdotes and Future Plans The episode concludes with light-hearted banter about adopting a vegan diet until Christmas, setting a playful challenge among friends. JB expresses enthusiasm for swapping traditional Thanksgiving meals with vegan alternatives, reinforcing his commitment to a plant-based lifestyle.

"We're going to start the vegan diet till Christmas, then we're going to check our blood." (86:00)

10. Final Thoughts and Encouragement JB Smoove imparts final wisdom on the importance of consistency, authenticity, and treating others with respect to sustain a successful and fulfilling career in comedy. He underscores the idea that genuine connections and hard work pave the way for longevity in the entertainment industry.

Notable Quotes:

JB Smoove: "Positive energy, you gotta push the negative stuff away and out, through." (03:27)
Chris Distefano: "What have we made?" (85:26)
JB Smoove: "You have to icon yourself, right? You have to icon yourself, meaning you're memorable to people and that's what it is." (72:50)
JB Smoove: "JB's the only one... You gotta be a character. You gotta be a character." (06:40)

Conclusion: This episode of Chrissy Chaos offers an insightful look into JB Smoove's career, personal philosophies, and lifestyle choices. Through candid conversations, JB shares the secrets behind his enduring success in comedy, the importance of positive energy, and the profound impact of embracing a vegan lifestyle. Listeners gain valuable perspectives on maintaining authenticity, building meaningful relationships, and the relentless pursuit of personal growth.

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Transcript692 lines

[00:00]
Chris Distefano
You have one new voicemail.
[00:02]
JB Smoove
Hi. So you would be so proud of me. I'm hosting Thanksgiving for my friends, and I was stressed because I really wanted it to feel just like Michigan. But then I found the same stuffing mix that you use on Instacart, and I ordered instant gravy, canned cranberry. What else? Oh, I got everyone a little butter.
[00:16]
Chris Distefano
Sculpture shaped like a turkey.
[00:18]
JB Smoove
All right, I should probably get cooking, but I miss you today. Happy Thanksgiving, Mom. Oh, and you should download Instacart. It's way easier than sending dad to the store. Download Instacart and enjoy free delivery on your first three orders. Service fees and terms apply. Hi, I'm Slushy.
[00:45]
Chris Distefano
What's up, everybody? Welcome to another episode of Chrissy Chaos. What a week it's been. Thank God the election's over. We don't have to talk about anymore. We will not talk about it. It doesn't matter. I want to get back to just having episodes with my friends. And make no mistake, I brought in one of the funniest guys in the world. Actually, a guy who. The very first commercial I've ever did, and to be honest with you, probably the only commercial I've ever done. I got lucky in the first six months, and then I just haven't got one since. But it's the one, the only jb Smooth.
[01:19]
JB Smoove
What up, Chris? Woo.
[01:21]
Chris Distefano
I mean, looking amazing. Got the hat on, got the boots on, got the jacket.
[01:25]
JB Smoove
You guys show up. You guys show up all the time for people.
[01:28]
Chris Distefano
That's why I put a hat on. Because, you know, I came. I met you outside in front of my house. You're looking spectacular. I got bedhead. I said, you know what? The least I could do is throw a hat on.
[01:38]
JB Smoove
So you got hair. Yeah. Your hair is your hat, right? People forget about that.
[01:44]
Chris Distefano
Who's a better bald guy than you? Is there anybody better?
[01:48]
JB Smoove
There's a few out there. It's a few good ones, legendary ones. You know, a lot of Samuel Jackson, you know he ain't got no damn hair, right?
[01:55]
Chris Distefano
You know, mj, Michael Jordan.
[01:57]
JB Smoove
Jordan, he probably the dude that brought the ball head back. Yeah, but one of the original ones, Isaac Hayes. Come on now.
[02:03]
Chris Distefano
When Britney Spears shaved her head, she was pretty good bald.
[02:05]
JB Smoove
She moved up the ladder.
[02:06]
Chris Distefano
Yes.
[02:07]
JB Smoove
Top 10. Up the ladder. Somewhere up there.
[02:09]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Top 10, baby. I mean, you know, dude, it's just the thing about JB is when I. We did this Nike commercial with CARMELO ANTHONY In 2013, it was December of 2013. I had just started comedy in like 2010. And so we had had the. The same manager at the time. And JB got the commercial and, you know, and with Carmelo Anthony. And then to credit to my manager, the great Rick Dorfman. Shout out Rick Dorfman. He told Carmelo and the creatives, you know what? It would be fun to have another guy in this commercial, another comedian in this commercial with jb. And I got just the guy. And then he put. They put me in the commercial. And what I learned about comedy and just life that day is that when you. No matter what you're doing. What I learned observed from JB is he took over the room with positive energy. So no matter what you're doing, if you just stay ultra positive, even if you're not feeling that positive that day, you come in, big smiles, positive energy. And I just watched this whole room connect to someone. And I said, okay, so that's what I gotta do. I gotta be like that as much as I can. Because I just saw you were attracting positive people were attracted to you because of the positive energy of who you were.
[03:27]
JB Smoove
I'm telling you, man, look, positive energy, you gotta. You gotta like, put, like, push the negative stuff away and out, through. Out, out your way. You know what I mean? You ever heard people who. Who hate bad energy, so they buy a new home to get a new office space and get some sage and light some sage and walk around the house with the sage. Know what? I'm doing a lot of cigars with sage in them so people could keep the hell away from me. See, when I smoke my cigar, ain't no negative energy around me.
[03:55]
Chris Distefano
Perfect.
[03:56]
JB Smoove
I just rebuke you. You rebuke you. I'm going call it a cigar rebuke.
[04:00]
Chris Distefano
That's it. Rebuke.
[04:01]
JB Smoove
Rebuke your ass.
[04:02]
Chris Distefano
I like that. I like that.
[04:03]
JB Smoove
That's why.
[04:03]
Chris Distefano
See, my.
[04:04]
JB Smoove
My cigars, my girl, it's going to be rolled with. That's a. Not a whole lot. That's a hint. Keep your dumb ass away from me.
[04:10]
Chris Distefano
Rebuke cigars, dude. That's what. See, I'm with. I'm with. Oh, here. Oh, actually, here. We got the commercial right here.
[04:15]
JB Smoove
Oh, yeah. Yo, look, there we go. What a great campaign. What a great campaign. Come on now. Real Nick fans, man. Real Nick fans.
[04:46]
Chris Distefano
And it's funny because, you know, every time JB and I see each other, he always does. It goes men. No, he did it outside. You know what's awesome about that is that was. Because we got. That was my first chance Ever. First time ever, working on, like, a subway and doing that. Now, I know all the movies and TV shows they film, they're never really on the subway. They got. They got a subway museum in Brooklyn, and they make it look like the subway.
[05:09]
JB Smoove
The people on there get the. Get somebody to pee on it, you know, make it. Make it feel like a real train.
[05:14]
Chris Distefano
Hell, yeah.
[05:14]
JB Smoove
You know what I'm saying?
[05:15]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[05:15]
JB Smoove
Somebody eating food on the train. You know, it shouldn't be no food on the train anyway, but somebody eating food on the train, somebody pissed already.
[05:21]
Chris Distefano
You know what I mean?
[05:21]
JB Smoove
Throw a few. Just people moving and shaking, trying to get to work.
[05:24]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[05:25]
JB Smoove
You build that around a scene, and it comes to life.
[05:28]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. And JB is one of those guys. It wasn't like, you know, because obviously he was the star of the commercial. It wasn't. It wasn't. All right, action. Now I'm on this. It was just. We were doing that the whole time.
[05:38]
JB Smoove
We came into you. You got to come into it already in character. So we were those dudes. We ate lunch as those dudes. We walked around as those dudes because you got to feel it. You know, we were selling the product, and we were selling ourselves also. Loving the product. Loving. Mellow.
[05:55]
Chris Distefano
Right?
[05:56]
JB Smoove
You know that right there, that's not even scripted stuff. We just having fun.
[06:00]
Chris Distefano
That's it.
[06:00]
JB Smoove
I don't remember a script. We just was like, here's the idea. We took it and we just have fun with it, and we just bonded real quick, which made it work.
[06:08]
Chris Distefano
I could tell by my chin in that photo. Those are my drinking days. So I was probably secretly actively drunk on set, just trying to mask the pain. But now the boy's chin is back. No alcohol, folks. Besides Vito, Vito sometimes gets me to drink tequila. And by the way, folks, of course, we do have. In the backgrounds, we have John, the father, Grady, Vito, Baby Mouth, Khaleesi. They're both in the background. John, the father, always loves. Loves the Latino women. His last girlfriend didn't speak any English. And then Vito, we call him Baby Teeth because his baby teeth never came in on the back. He's a fully grown man, but his baby teeth are still in the back, so.
[06:39]
JB Smoove
Love it, man.
[06:40]
Chris Distefano
That's what it is.
[06:40]
JB Smoove
Love it. Love it.
[06:42]
Chris Distefano
New York.
[06:42]
JB Smoove
He didn't even get his wisdom teeth yet. I love it. I love it.
[06:45]
Chris Distefano
He's 32 years old, and one day, they'll come in.
[06:48]
JB Smoove
They'll come in one day.
[06:48]
Chris Distefano
Thank you. See, that's the thing. JB's a New York guy. In New York, we have characters. We have personalities. We have characters. There's something about growing up here. No matter what part of the New York City area you grew up in, we just got characters. And the people love that. Like, you're just a character.
[07:03]
JB Smoove
You gotta be a character. You know, I tell people all the time we do stand up, but, you know, not always just selling our jokes and things we do, we're selling ourselves. We're salesmen. Comedians are salesmen. I'm a salesman, man. I sell myself. Before anything, I gotta sell myself to you to make you comfortable, let you put your head down, let you relax. You know what I mean? I want you sitting there acting stuck up and just like stressed out. I want you loose and free. I want you to hear what I'm saying to you. I want you to be. I want you to be captivated by the premise sometimes. And so we are walking premises. That's it. Forget about that. We are the premise.
[07:40]
Chris Distefano
I am the premise.
[07:41]
JB Smoove
We walk in the room, people put a smile and they put the smile or smirk, Smirk like that. This side of the mouth go up a little bit like this dude right here. You know what I mean? Dude, right here. Yeah, dude right here. Oh, my dude. You know, I mean, that's. That shows your product is selling, bro. You didn't even say nothing yet.
[08:01]
Chris Distefano
And nothing. And you already. Because jb, you're a guy. You're. Because even when if I didn't know you, if I didn't know you, I would walk past JB with a beautiful coat on, the hat, the boots. I walk past and I say, I would remember you for the rest of the day. I would go home and tell my family. I said, kids, sit down. I saw a guy today, he looked like he was from the past and the future at the same time.
[08:19]
JB Smoove
You gotta. You. If you don't carry yourself like that. I know him from the past. Do you know my real first name and real middle name?
[08:27]
Chris Distefano
I don't think anybody in the world does. We just know you as JB Smooth. But what's the real name?
[08:32]
JB Smoove
Blow your mind. My real first name and my real middle name. My real first name is Jerry. My real middle name is Angelo. So some people call me Jerry Angelo. Now. Jerry Angelo's a different dude from JB Smooth. Yes, Jerry Angelo. You know, he demands respect. Yes, on that. Puts some respect on my name. When you say Jerry Angelo, I turn around, I turn around, I react differently. Sure. Cause that's a grown ass man name right there. That's A grown ass, respectful ass name.
[09:03]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[09:03]
JB Smoove
You know what I mean? If I was white, I would be in Italy Italiano or something like that.
[09:08]
Chris Distefano
You'd be a mob boss.
[09:09]
JB Smoove
I'd be a mob boss. Jerry Angelo. Hey, the boss wants to see you. Come on, he wants to talk to you. Jerry Angelo has some words for you. Jerry Angelo. If someone said, I got my buddy Jerry Angelo coming over, you know, sitting on down, he wants to talk to you, you would think somebody totally different would walk through that door.
[09:29]
Chris Distefano
Yeah, yeah.
[09:30]
JB Smoove
You know what I'm saying? Totally different. Not me. Like totally. Jerry Angelo just sounds worldly. It's a worldly ass name.
[09:38]
Chris Distefano
You know, Jerry Angelo comes in, I would tell my girls, hey, stand up straight. I would have a suit. I would tell Vito and John to clean their shit up.
[09:45]
JB Smoove
Jerry Angelo.
[09:45]
Chris Distefano
Jerry Angelo's here.
[09:47]
JB Smoove
That's my real first name and middle name.
[09:49]
Chris Distefano
What's the last.
[09:49]
JB Smoove
The last thing is Brooks.
[09:51]
Chris Distefano
Brooks.
[09:52]
JB Smoove
Brooks, Jerry.
[09:53]
Chris Distefano
That's not bad.
[09:53]
JB Smoove
That's my bad.
[09:54]
Chris Distefano
So where did jb. How did JB Smooth come. When did you think of it?
[09:57]
JB Smoove
You know, I've been JB forever, you know, as you know. But the Smooth came about. I used to be a hip hop dancer. Yeah, I used to be. I used to be in a. It's crazy. I used to be in a skate crew, a roller skating crew. I used to be in a dance crew. And I used to be in a pop lock crew, all three. And that's how we grew up, you know, I grew up. Look, I grew up in the heyday of hip hop. So for me, even before I was old enough, even going to clubs, man. Had a fake ID from Times Square. Times Square. Had this arcade on the corner of 40 Deuce and Broadway. And going in. Get anything you want, man. IDs, fake ass IDs, fake ass, passports. You can go around the world as another person. Back then. Wow. Back then, you didn't need to show no ID to get on no plane.
[10:37]
Chris Distefano
Hell, no.
[10:38]
JB Smoove
Remember back in the days? I don't know if you remember these days, but back in the days, you didn't need nothing. One time I got on a plane with my. Damn. When they first started getting some identification, I got on a plane one time with my damn head shot. I said, see, this is me. I had. I. I had the head shot next to my face like this. See this me right here?
[10:54]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Yeah.
[10:55]
JB Smoove
No, that's how it was back then. Back then, it was different, man. Yeah, travel was different. Everything changed after, you know, hijackings and all. Kind of crazy stuff that happened. Everything changed. Yeah, but I remember back in the day, traveling, doing comedy shows, man, going on the road and stuff like that. And, man, you had to have that. You had to have something. I mean, one time, I remember you needed nothing, but then you needed something. You need an idea at least. But it wasn't as strict.
[11:20]
Chris Distefano
No.
[11:21]
JB Smoove
You know what I mean? It wasn't like this how it is now, of course. But, man, I remember I got on the plane, I forgot my wallet. I said, I'm me. I'm me. I said, all I got is a headshot. And I said. I said this. And she said, okay, just go ahead.
[11:34]
Chris Distefano
Just go ahead. Let's go ahead. Let's go. Yeah, because, you know, here's the thing, man. People don't might not know the fans watching at home about JB is by the time you got introduced to all of the world with Curb youb Enthusiasm, you already grinding at comedy for 20 years. And the comedians knew who you were and you had the respect of them, but the mass public didn't know who you were. So sometimes people think. I remember a friend of mine who's a big Kirby Enthusiasm fan. He was like, oh, like, I guess like jb. Like, did he start comedy around Kirby Enthusiasm? And I almost gave him a backhand. I almost treated him like Jerry angelo. I said, 20 years he's been in the game, my friend.
[12:10]
JB Smoove
You gotta really watch tv. Look, when I tell you, if I go back, I mean, look, I did. The first thing I ever did was I did Short Attention Span Theater. When Comedy Central first started, I did. I did a bunch of movies for Louis C.K. his first movies. I did. What else did I do? Oh, I did Apartment two. Was Apartment two F or was it. It was a pilot with the Scar Brothers. I was on mtv. First pilot they ever did, ever. And I did that show. And I did a lot of first. A lot of firsts. You know, shows that were brand new. I did Comic Kazi. Remember Kamikaze?
[12:50]
Chris Distefano
I just remember watching it.
[12:51]
JB Smoove
Yeah, Kamikaze. I was on Kamikaze. I was like, oh, that's old school. Kamikaze is. I'm talking about, man. That's like Fresh Face, jb. Like, no, like, barely had a mustache.
[13:04]
Chris Distefano
You know, that was almost Jerry Angelo.
[13:06]
JB Smoove
That's just Jerry Angelo, man.
[13:07]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[13:08]
JB Smoove
It's crazy. But I did a lot of firsts. So I got a chance to really, really, really be a part of the, like, this upswing of comedy again. Because, you know, we all remember, of course, our favorites you know, priors to, you know, all these amazing guys who started Eddie and Jerry Seinfeld. It's a whole lot of George Carlin and everybody who was, who we were fans of, you know, and that's, and that's me talking as a 58 year old guy. I was a big fan of a lot of people. So I did a lot of. I got an opportunity to do a lot of first, you know, I was only one of three people to do stand up on the Chris Rock show when he had his HBO show, you know. So I say that because you do things in this metropolitan area of New York that you're kind of in a bubble. You're in a bubble in New York, you know, so, you know, you do enough stuff up to a certain point in New York, then you got to make that transition to be, you know, more recognizable face. You move to LA and do stuff like that. But even before I got on Curb, you absolutely right before I got on Curb, I did. I was snl. I was a writer on snl.
[14:15]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[14:16]
JB Smoove
Because for that I've done like three pilots. I was on three Pilots, other TV shows and. Right. Did a lot of cool stuff. I gotta, I'm just happy. I was on Cedric's sketch show. Right. I did lyricist lounge show one day I was doing a radio show, I was on tour and the radio host pulled out my IMDb and he started from the top and started naming stuff and I said, damn, I forgot about that.
[14:41]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[14:42]
JB Smoove
When I really. It made me really, really sit still and say, wow. I'm gonna take these blessings because. Wow. To be a part of that era of comedy and then transition into the speed of the world today and still try to remain relevant. But I'm kind of happy. There's really something cool, Chris, let me tell you this. This is an old Jack telling you something. Something to a new Jack. There's something really cool about people say, smell the smell of roses and stuff like that. It's something really cool about the era that I started in. The speed of the world today is different. You have to know how that feels to appreciate it. You know what I mean? How it felt to hop in your car and just drive to Florida for a show. That's crazy. But your love and hunger for.
[15:33]
Chris Distefano
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[16:28]
JB Smoove
Oh, this is good.
[16:30]
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[19:34]
JB Smoove
It's so different. You say yourself. I was telling myself, oh, I figured out I'm gonna go down there and do this show first, and then I'm gonna work my way back to New York. But while I'm coming back, I'm gonna just make phone calls. I'm gonna stop at every comedy club, every comedy night I can, all the way back home. I would go down to Florida through Tallahassee or whatever. I was in Tallahassee one time to do a show, and then I. When I'm in Tallahassee, a guy called me and said, yo, Miami. He said, heard you in Tallahassee, jb, you want to pick some extra money up? I said, yeah, how much you got? I mean, look, it was scale of things now. It wasn't nothing, right? To be honest, it was like three shows, $800 or something like that. But back then it was money. Yeah, man, I drove from Tallahassee through the Everglades. My damn red Grand Am.
[20:26]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[20:27]
JB Smoove
No, damn. The air conditioner broke. If something happened to the air conditioner, it wasn't working no more, man. I drove through the Everglades, man. It was roasting. Yeah, I opened every window. Yeah, yo, I. I took all my clothes off and I drove in my boxes and my sneakers. I had my baseball hat on backwards. I'm like this, man. I'm just riding, yo. I am drenched. Like, the heat was coming through the roof of the car. I said, yo, I'm on fire. And I'm driving through the Everglades. And they tell you. Hey, they'll tell you, look, man, get gas right here. They'll put signs up of three or four or five miles before you go through the Everglades. Look, the sign says, like, last gas. Da, da, da, da. Three miles away. Look, we remind you there ain't no more gas. And then the next line say, fuck around, lay around, you know? Then another one will say, hey, man, we told you three times already. Last gas coming up Mount. And another Simon say, you did hit me right, when I said five miles ago that it's the last gas, right? Yeah. I just keep getting worse.
[21:28]
Chris Distefano
Cause you do not want to run out of gas in Everglades, bro.
[21:31]
JB Smoove
Everglades, man.
[21:32]
Chris Distefano
Alligators, bro.
[21:32]
JB Smoove
Alligators. I'm riding through that bad boy. Like, yo, I'm in an Everglades show.
[21:36]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[21:36]
JB Smoove
And I drove all the way to Miami, did my shows there, and then I left in the middle of the night after I got off stage. It was pouring down rain, and I said, yo, if I leave now, there won't be no popo out there. Because they hate pulling people over in the downpour like this, 100%. So I left. I left right after my show off stage. Peace, y'all. Thank you so much for having me tonight. I had my luggage in the trunk already. I drove all the way. I didn't stop till I. I stopped probably once. Get gas. I drove all the way to freaking south of the border. Wow. The North Carolina. South Carolina borderline, man. And I was like. I had. I had to try to get up there because I didn't want to drive in the total heat. No. So I said, man, it's cool. I drove all the way up there, and I just booked shows.
[22:17]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[22:17]
JB Smoove
Got on the phone and booked shows all the way back to New York.
[22:19]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[22:20]
JB Smoove
I might do six, seven shows all the way back, different cities, right? That's how we did it back.
[22:24]
Chris Distefano
Because it did it. And then the work ethic. But what that tells me is that work ethic was inside you from the beginning because it was.
[22:30]
JB Smoove
It's a different kind of hunger, Right. Because it was. It was still limited.
[22:35]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[22:35]
JB Smoove
You got to remember now, when Def Comedy Jam dropped, everybody wanted all the comedians.
[22:40]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[22:40]
JB Smoove
They wanted comedians. When Comedy Central Dropped. They want all the comedians, right? When all these shows started dropping, dropping, all the comedians started getting mad work. Everybody, right? Comedy became this thing, right? It became this thing, man. And man. And I just. I just know that it's an appreciation for that era. You know, everything you could think of, you know, you gotta realize no cell phones, no nothing, right? You had to pull over, make a phone call every single time you had an issue.
[23:06]
Chris Distefano
Right? Because. Because for me, like, what I always think about, what, what, what. What I want to ask you about is like, you know, because as a comic, you know, I was a fan of comedy. Of course, we all knew. All the comedians knew who JB Smooth was. We saw you on Def Jam and all these things. But, you know, my mom and the public didn't really find out about you in the major way. They now they know your first and last name from Kirby Enthusiasm. So you were already doing comedy for so long. So I wanted to ask, like, when you first got on Kirby Enthusiasm, there must have been a part of you that was like, oh, for years you must have been thinking, this is as known as I'll ever be. You didn't even know that the. It was really that these next 20 years were going to be the years that defined you to the public.
[23:44]
JB Smoove
I think you. I think what happens is your demographics start to change. You know, I mean, although I did a lot of stuff, I do think that there's something to, you know, different projects, different demographics, they start to come into play. Right. So even though people thought I was somebody new, I was somebody that been around for a long time, but for some reason, I just. I like being in the cut.
[24:14]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[24:15]
JB Smoove
Because I feel like the sooner you get it is as soon as you lose it. Sometimes I feel like people get exhausted with you or they. You get lost somehow or the time you became huge wasn't the right time. You know what I mean? And do you have longevity, right, as a comic? I know comics that come and go. I know plenty of people who I started with, who I was like, man, this dude who I was like this awe, like, oh, my God, this dude's the greatest. He's so goddamn funny. But then they disappear. I'm like, what happened to so and so? What happened to so and so? So there's really something to the. The tortoise and the hare, right? There's something to it. I think there's a way of putting your career on cruise control, because I do think there's an appreciation for it different. It's appreciated differently. I Always feel like if you're in this, if you're in a. You're held on a pedestal, you're in a spotlight. So in a spotlight, things are different. People are gonna love you or they're gonna hate you, you know, And. And I think that determines your longevity. The things that you appreciate. You still want to be able to live as a person and not be seen as everybody's product.
[25:36]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[25:36]
JB Smoove
You know what I mean?
[25:37]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[25:37]
JB Smoove
There's something to that.
[25:38]
Chris Distefano
Well, longevity, I think you keep you saying that because that's the truth. It's like there's a respect if, you know, you're still here 20 years later in this game and whatever you're doing, there's a major respect to that. And now you're like 30 years into this comedy game, and now you probably have the most respect and adoration you've ever had, which a lot of comics, that's very difficult to do. Like you said, they get hot the first 10 years in, 15 years in, and then they fade off where yours just kind of kept getting bigger. So that's a testament to you.
[26:05]
JB Smoove
You can be the loudest person in the room with the quietest career because there's something about that movement. When you show up, you show up. People won't forget about you. Right. When you. And when you're in the moment with them, how have you leave them, how have you meet them and how you leave them is what they're going to remember you.
[26:25]
Chris Distefano
Yes.
[26:26]
JB Smoove
Right. That's how they remember you by. Right. They can only judge you by your presence and how you treated them.
[26:30]
Chris Distefano
That's it.
[26:31]
JB Smoove
Right. Starting back then, it allows you to have that appreciation. Because I feel like you connect different. Because here's another thing. When you're building something, I'm not saying we built it, but I think that era, it was just like this heyday. And I feel like. I feel like it kind of coincides with the heyday of hip hop to me, because there really is a heyday for everything. Right. I really do feel like there's a heyday for everything. And I feel like storytelling comes from your life and everything you've ever been through. And I think people love to be. They're captivated by stories that they're not privy to. Right. Things they would never be exposed to. Right. And it's something really cool about. It's just something really cool about that era, man. I just feel like. Because now you. Now. We're in this age now where whatever is. Whatever is a popular thing to say or Pop. A thing to do is what everybody does. You know what I mean?
[27:33]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[27:34]
JB Smoove
But there's still a core of comics who kind of stick to what they do. Right. And I think that is a thing that I always wanted to. I just want to be me, and I want to. I want to sell me repeatedly. Right. I want a product that can continuously, continuously sell.
[27:53]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[27:53]
JB Smoove
Over and over again. Because it works, right? It works.
[27:57]
Chris Distefano
Well, it works because you are who you truthfully are. You're not trying to be someone because the algorithm wants you to be allowed. We had Louis CK on the podcast, and that was his advice to me. He said, you know, right now, the hot thing in comedy is crowd work. He was like, now, if you want to do crowd work, do crowd work. He goes, but if you don't want to do crowd work, then do not do crowd work. Because what's going to happen is, even if you force yourself to do the crowd work and it gets really popular, then what's going to happen is fans are going to come buy tickets to see your show, and they're going to expect crowd work, but you're not going to give them crowd work, because that's not really what you want to do. You want to do your material. He said, so whatever the trends are, put it out. Put, put. Put whatever you want to do out. And then don't worry about the trends.
[28:33]
JB Smoove
Yeah. Because what happens is they'll change. Nothing better than getting an audience that came specifically. Right. To see what you do. Look at a restaurant. You got a restaurant, right? They make this amazing. What's a great Italian dish?
[28:51]
Chris Distefano
I like fettuccine Alfredo.
[28:53]
JB Smoove
They make an amazing fettuccine Alfredo, right?
[28:55]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[28:56]
JB Smoove
And then you. With garlic, you can go to that bad boy every week because you love how they make it. They change one ingredient. You'll be like, oh, man. That's what's going on with this. It's not taste the same as it normally tastes. Yeah. Oh, yeah. We. The previous chef left, so we're trying to, you know, keep up and try to make it as close to what. How you used to make it.
[29:22]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[29:23]
JB Smoove
This ain't it. Yeah. I like how you had it. You know what I mean? And I think that's what people gravitate towards. You know what? When people love what you do and they love your style, when they say, first 10 minutes is gratis.
[29:38]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[29:39]
JB Smoove
First 10 minutes, they just want to lean forward and be like, oh, and elbow their friend. Man, I love this dude right here. Man, I love this dude, man.
[29:47]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[29:48]
JB Smoove
First 10 minutes, you're talking about nothingness.
[29:50]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[29:50]
JB Smoove
Because you just want to make sure they know you here.
[29:53]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[29:54]
JB Smoove
They just smiling and they just love it.
[29:57]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[29:57]
JB Smoove
How you doing? Like, I'm doing good, man. I'm good, jb. You know, whatever it is, I'm good, Chris. Yeah, you want that? You want that? Then you get to your set or whatever. But.
[30:05]
Chris Distefano
Well, see, that's the thing. Like, you know, when you go, guys, go see JB smoothies probably sold out at Town hall this Thursday in New York City. But if you want to go scalp some tickets, get out there this Thursday, that's that. It's very interesting what you say, because the first few minutes, this is what happens at comedy shows. The first five, ten minutes, when you as popular as jb, they're going to love him no matter what he says. But then after a while, they get used to. They're comfortable. Oh, I'm in the room with JB Smooth. And then, then, then his talent as a comedian has to shine through, because you could make no mistake, no matter how famous you are, even the great Jerry Seinfeld, if you don't come with those jokes after 10 minutes, you'll start bombing your crowd. They paid to see you, will start looking at you, being like, settle in.
[30:43]
JB Smoove
Let them enjoy you. Let them breathe the air you breathing. And that's party.
[30:47]
Chris Distefano
That's it.
[30:48]
JB Smoove
That's party, man. And there's something really cool about that. That means you got your specific audience.
[30:53]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[30:53]
JB Smoove
They want that fettuccine Alfredo, baby. They want that fettuccine Alfredo.
[30:58]
Chris Distefano
Yummy, Yummy.
[30:58]
JB Smoove
And you just. And it's a world you have built around your personality, around your work ethic. There's a thing that you. There's this thing. Right. Thing that you have with them.
[31:09]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[31:09]
JB Smoove
And that becomes their night with you. The rapport is really the rapport, man. And you, you're you. You know, we in this room together.
[31:17]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[31:17]
JB Smoove
We're sharing the laughs together.
[31:19]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[31:19]
JB Smoove
Some of the stuff I can't even repeat in my next show because we're in this room.
[31:25]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[31:25]
JB Smoove
And just this is.
[31:28]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[31:28]
JB Smoove
It's about you right now. It's about you. It's about you.
[31:30]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[31:31]
JB Smoove
Having a good time and enjoying your time with me and being in. Vice versa. And vice versa.
[31:35]
Chris Distefano
You know, being in that moment, because it's all. It's always fleeting. This game is up and down all the time. As I remember, there was one year where I was. I was pretty much the house MC at Caroline. Caroline's comic Isn't there anymore. I would open for everybody. Louis Farranda, which is how me open. And in the same year, I Curb Enthusiasm, my favorite show. In the same year I opened for jb, Susie Essman, Jeff Garland, and I opened up. And Richard Lewis. RIP Richard Lewis opened up all these guys.
[32:02]
JB Smoove
And.
[32:03]
Chris Distefano
And I remember, like, going through that year and in the beginning of the year, this is what happens in comedy when you start to compare yourself. In the beginning of that year, I was just so excited. I was like, I can't believe I'm near these people who are my favorite show, blah, blah, blah. But then you start to get used to who you are. And then by the end, it was like, oh, I'm open up for all these people. But, man, how come I don't have any opportunity whatever? And that's why it's good to have friends and family around you who are not yes men who just remind you where my good, good friend who's also a big Kirby Enthusiasm fans. Yo, remember five years ago, bro, they wouldn't even let you in Caroline's. Now. Now you got you. Now you were close to all your favorite TV show characters and got to open for them and get to know them and watch them work. It's nothing but a blessing, man. And you're like, wow. Because if. Because so much, so many of our peers get wrapped up in that comparison game where they're forgetting what an honor it is just to be doing this. But they're like, how come I don't have what so and so has? And that's a dangerous game.
[32:58]
JB Smoove
I never, ever gauge myself against anybody.
[33:02]
Chris Distefano
No.
[33:02]
JB Smoove
Because I know that there are younger comics who are, you know, influenced by watching you and talking to you and all that stuff, man, that comes along with this responsibility that we have, not just towards our own success, but towards the success of our industry and what we present to people. We're therapists. We're all these things to people. And if you can respect that and know that you've given people something that makes them happy, it puts your career in a different perspective. You look at it different if you look at it like that, man. If you only look at it as your success and you the man, or you just want to be, you know, the hell with everybody else who follows me. Hell with everybody else who's in front of me on stage. You know, I never look at. I never have ever looked at it like that. I look at it like we're here for them, you know? And some. Some comments make it a competition in what they do. And I never make it a competition. I'm the. I'm. I just move very quietly, you know, I mean, all the things that I do, I do. Sometimes I don't. Sometimes I don't even telegraph anything I do. I just let it pop up, right? I let a commercial pop up, I let a TV show pop up. I let a movie pop up. But sometimes what. What am I gaining from just like bragging about something and I notice job people. I really put it in a job category. I really do, man. You know? You know, we are blessed, man, to be able to do this. And I really put it in. This is work. And let people know this ain't the lottery. This is real work that goes into what we do.
[34:41]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[34:41]
JB Smoove
And I think that, listen, with all.
[34:44]
Chris Distefano
The holiday get togethers and parties and all that coming up, feeling and smelling your best is a must now more than ever. You need a routine that keeps me energized and smelling great all season long. That's why I like Jack Black deodorant. I mean, this one, Pit boss. I mean, look, dude, first of all, here, I got one pre opened already. This is the Blue Midnight. It literally. Dude, it smell. I'm going to put some on right now. It smells so good. This is literally one of the. I've told you about this, how great I think this deodorant is. I put it on my balls. You're not supposed to, by the way. You're not supposed to. You're supposed to only put this on your armpits. But, you know, I mean, you're not going to tell me what I can and can't do with my own deodorant because I think it smells really good. And I want to just smell good everywhere at all times. I love getting gifts for the people I love. I really, really, really do. But the best gift you could probably give me and the best gift you could give a loved one, Jack Black deodorant. Get this, dude, get this. Blue Midnight Pit boss. This is awesome. I mean, you smelled this before, Vito, right? Dude, you use it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Podcast is sponsored by Jack Black. Jack Black offers a full line of men's products for every need, from cleaning to moisturizing to beard care. So you can treat yourself to some luxury right at home. And just in time for the holidays, Jack Black's gifting sets are available so I can be well groomed for the holidays. Nobody wants a stinky ass motherfucker around the holidays. So you want to be smelling good. You Want to be smelling right. I use Jack Black today. I mean, I've used it right now. I use it this morning. Jack Black sent me the gifting set. And I love all the products, especially my favorite is this blue midnight pit boss. That's what I like. My dad's already got a few in his bag. Here's the thing, the quality of this Jack Black stuff is unbeatable. Like a lot of other times you put deodorant on, it gets all over your shirt. It's like crusty. It's like dingleberries on your armpit hair. Not this. This is smooth, smells good and it just lasts. And they're really good for holiday stocking stuffers. I mean, what's better than this than putting this little puppy in a stocking stuffer?
[36:40]
JB Smoove
Right?
[36:41]
Chris Distefano
That's what it is. And of course, for listening to this podcast, you're going to get a great discount this holiday season if you want simple, effective products that help you look your best. What you need is Jack Black head to getjackblack.com chaos and use the code chaos for 10% off. Your first order. Once again, that's getjackblack.com chaos for 10% off. And make sure you use my promo code chaos so they know I sent you.
[37:07]
JB Smoove
This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. There's nothing sweeter than baking cookies during the holidays. With Prime, I get all my ingredients.
[37:15]
Chris Distefano
Delivered right to my door, fast and free. No last minute store trips needed. And of course, I blast my favorite.
[37:21]
JB Smoove
Holiday playlist on Amazon Music.
[37:23]
Chris Distefano
It's the ultimate soundtrack for creating unforgettable.
[37:25]
JB Smoove
Memories from streaming to shopping. It's on Prime.
[37:28]
Chris Distefano
Visit Amazon.comprime to get more out of whatever you're into.
[37:35]
JB Smoove
You have to sell that one thing too.
[37:37]
Chris Distefano
I know from being around you, you know, for all these years, is you. And I don't know what it is internally, but externally, you don't put a lot of pressure on yourself. You just show up, you have a positive attitude, you do your homework and then you don't. You kind of roll with it. Which I think is like a key to life is to kind of, you treat everything gently. You're like, not like, not everything is not make or break for you every minute of the day. But there's a lot of people, they walk around with that energy all day and you don't, you're like, even when we're speaking before the show, you're like, oh, you know, I'm gonna work on town hall. I'm just gonna get up there and be free with it and you're gonna kill. And that's how you roll and that's how you operate where, like. Because you just understand that not everything is make or break and you just roll every day.
[38:15]
JB Smoove
You have to, man.
[38:16]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[38:16]
JB Smoove
Because you also. We're all we. To me, we are always in a learning space, right? Because human nature is something that we have to always recognize. We got to always recognize the climate we're in, the tendencies, the energy, the. All these different things we have to constantly keep on recognizing because how do we, how do we keep up with the world, you know? You know, we all know we have this PC thing, you know, everybody wants you to be PC. Nobody wants, you know, comics to talk about certain things anymore. You know, and you know that's, that's a hot topic right now is how does the comedian continue to thrive and continue to make people happy if we're being constantly judged by sometimes folks who don't even go to comedy clubs most times, which is weird to me. If you don't like comedy clubs, don't go to comedy clubs. Right? Don't. If cigar smoke bothers you, don't go to a cigar bar. Right. You know, if alcohol and people drunk, like touching your shoulder all the time and hugging you and their breath smell like alcohol, do not go to a bar.
[39:32]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Do not come to my Christmas party.
[39:33]
JB Smoove
Do not. Yeah, don't do it. Don't do it.
[39:36]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. No, I know, man. And I think, you know, it's one of those things where I feel like with, you know, comedy and like how successful you've been able to be at it, I really think it's even like beyond comedy. Even the fans who are listening, who aren't comedians, it's just literally showing up and being positive every day. I know, it's. I know to some of my, you know, we got some, you know, real blue collar fans might be like, that shit sounds weak, Chris. You sound weak right now. No, I'm telling you, dude, if you go, just be positive every day. Of course we're human beings, we're not robots. There's things that are going to bother us, whatever. But when you're coming out in public and you just have a positive high energy, I mean, the hug that JB gave me outside was like a two minute hug. I loved. I felt better already. I felt better already. And I've had a slight fever today, so now you might have one too, but. No, I'm kidding.
[40:23]
JB Smoove
No, you're right. Now look there is there, there's a balance that you got to have.
[40:28]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Yeah.
[40:29]
JB Smoove
You know what I mean? Not, not that I don't get in people ass once in a while, but there's a way of giving people information so they can carry their day on different. Or, or next time I see you, you'll know that's not how you supposed to act towards people. I give people criticism and advice all the time. Right. Because it don't affect me. Right. It's affecting you. I'm just giving you what I'm seeing from you that I think you need to adjust a little bit so you can. People can gravitate towards you and not. Not want. And not, not want to be around you. I mean, I'll give people, believe me, I get people honest, honest opinion about how you carry yourself and what you're doing.
[41:14]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[41:14]
JB Smoove
Or what kind of threw me off a little bit.
[41:17]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[41:17]
JB Smoove
But that's not being negative and that's, that's still being positive within a negative space.
[41:22]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[41:23]
JB Smoove
You let people know that what you're doing ain't gonna affect me, but it might affect somebody else who ain't as thick skinned.
[41:28]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[41:29]
JB Smoove
You know what I mean? I'm just trying to make sure you know what you're doing.
[41:32]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[41:33]
JB Smoove
You know, before somebody else tells you. Right. It becomes more than what it should be.
[41:38]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[41:38]
JB Smoove
But I, I can post mic to the side in a minute.
[41:40]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[41:41]
JB Smoove
Let me talk to you for a minute. Right. I'll post. I'll pull a cat to the side in a minute, man. Say, yo, I like what you're doing, but yo, adjust that a little bit because I noticed, I noticed someone look like, look at you kind of weird.
[41:51]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Yeah.
[41:52]
JB Smoove
And that you don't, don't decrease your circle. You want your circle to embrace you.
[41:56]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[41:56]
JB Smoove
So I, I give, I get people advice all the time, but I'm a hard ass on people because I know. Because just because of what I've been through and all the things I've already seen, I just know energy and I know the pace of things that are different right now.
[42:13]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[42:13]
JB Smoove
People seem to step on toes and burn bridges more freely right now. And they don't understand that you're in it for the long haul.
[42:20]
Chris Distefano
Oh yeah.
[42:21]
JB Smoove
You're in this joint just to be popular and get some likes. You want the industry to love you.
[42:26]
Chris Distefano
Yes.
[42:26]
JB Smoove
People. People can love you all day because you're saying there's a lot of negative people out there who love to hear certain things and will follow you because they want, they want to, they want.
[42:35]
Chris Distefano
To bask in their own negativity.
[42:37]
JB Smoove
So you just got to realize you, you, you a product, your brand, you're branding yourself out. And you want. You want to be seen in every area that you are, that you aspire to get into. Not be limited, just being in clubs, you know, if you want to be a TV star, you start networking with TV people. That's what a movie star, you start networking with movie people, you start working on your movie stuff. Yeah, you're gonna be a branded guy. Start working on your products. Stop following the products that you love and let them know you. You love their product. Yeah. They'll hit you back hundreds of dmu. Yeah, we love you, too.
[43:12]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[43:12]
JB Smoove
Hey, can we see some product?
[43:13]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[43:14]
JB Smoove
And you can post it maybe, and we'll give you da, da, da da. That's how it works sometimes, little by little. Think about your business.
[43:20]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. A businessman, bro. I'm so. I want to be so branded, I'm about to get a barcode tattooed on my body. Just scam me, bro. Scam me, scam me, and then I'll get uploaded right into your phone. That's what it is, bro.
[43:32]
JB Smoove
What rest of your damn phone, bro.
[43:34]
Chris Distefano
What's the one thing. What's the rarest thing about JB Smoove is he's the very, very ultra rare, super rare, likable vegan.
[43:43]
JB Smoove
Vegan.
[43:44]
Chris Distefano
Almost never meet a likable vegan, but JB is that guy bringing vegans back.
[43:49]
JB Smoove
Tell you something, man, people put that word on the vegan word on. And sometimes it's not. I. I think. I think people have made the word scary. Yeah, people made the word scary. And if you think about it, in all reality, everybody's a vegan.
[44:04]
Chris Distefano
Okay, how? Tell us how.
[44:05]
JB Smoove
Because, look, I'll tell you why. Everybody. Not everybody, but that's the majority of things that I could change and you would never know I took it out, Right? You never know. You would never know I made you that pancake with no egg in it. You never know I made you. I made you vegan pancakes. Guess what? The. The banana replaces the egg. That's all. That's all it is. All it's doing is holding it together and making it good. I could take that egg out, throw a banana, mush a banana up, put it in the microwave, let it get real syrupy, pour that into the mix, put some oat milk in that bad boy, make pancakes. You would never know that it's not. You would never know that's not egg and dairy. Waffle or Egg and dairy.
[44:51]
Chris Distefano
You might like it better.
[44:52]
JB Smoove
Actually, you might like it better stuff, man. Look, French toast. I can make anything. Vegetables are. Vegetables are. Look, man. Do you think that people who were in the wilderness, they always had meat?
[45:07]
Chris Distefano
No.
[45:08]
JB Smoove
You think people who on open ranges always had me? You know, every time they went to bed with no meat and they had to eat their vegetables and their potatoes and their rice, they had to eat other things. Animals weren't always available. You gotta catch that bad boy, right? You gotta catch them.
[45:24]
Chris Distefano
Vito, you listening to this? Vito, you better wake your ass up and listen to what JB is saying.
[45:28]
JB Smoove
People.
[45:28]
Chris Distefano
People think that he loves me. He's about to eat you. He loves me.
[45:32]
JB Smoove
Look, do you. But just understand that. Look, here's what you don't know. Nobody here lives in those factories and sees what goes on. You don't know. You get a magnifying glass and put it on that meat. Get you one of those joints you had in biology class and have someone give you a list of how different bacteria looks, right?
[45:57]
Chris Distefano
Okay.
[45:58]
JB Smoove
Before you eat it, right? Before you look into that microscope that's on your table and you put that sample, that meat under that microscope, let somebody give you all the list of bacteria, right, that's going into your body on a list and how they look, right? And then you look into there, right? And watch how many you recognize off of that list.
[46:17]
Chris Distefano
And we never see what the naked.
[46:19]
JB Smoove
Eyes and you never see. You never know what's going on. So understand that just like we had the COVID and all that stuff going on and the bird flus and all this different stuff was going on, guess what? Animals get sick, too.
[46:32]
Chris Distefano
Hell, yeah.
[46:33]
JB Smoove
They're just as susceptible to sickness as we are, Right? People forget about that. If right now. If right now, right? Every chicken just dropped dead, right? And nobody knew what it was, would you still. Because those chickens aren't the chickens that's already at Popeyes or already at kfc.
[46:55]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[46:56]
JB Smoove
You know, oh, those are new chickens. They died. Would you still go to KFC and get chicken or still go to Popeyes or still go to a restaurant and get a steak? If every cow just dropped dead and nobody knew why yet, but would you still eat the meat? That's not. That wasn't a part of that. And you say, no, I beat the death of all those cows, man, I'm going to give me a piece of steak tonight. Would you still go and get steak tonight? Even though you just saw on the news, they just said, from this point on, don't Eat any beef because we have an outbreak, bro.
[47:28]
Chris Distefano
This is how sick I am. When I remember watching on the news when they were saying that in Pennsylvania they had found cases of mad cow disease. And I was in Philadelphia and I went to Wendy's an hour later and got a cheeseburger.
[47:40]
JB Smoove
Crazy, crazy, bro. But just I said it because. Look, look, man, I'm 58 years old. I'm only five pounds heavier than high school. Five pounds heavier. Could you imagine looking this good at 58, 58 years old, man. Pow, pow. Look at this, man. I look good in the suit. I look good in my clothes, man. I ain't tired. I run those stairs three times, man, right now with no problem.
[48:03]
Chris Distefano
John can't get this piece of.
[48:05]
JB Smoove
Oh, you. Oh, John too.
[48:06]
Chris Distefano
John Grady's through.
[48:07]
JB Smoove
John Grady's through. John Grady done.
[48:10]
Chris Distefano
Vito's got gout.
[48:12]
JB Smoove
Oh, he got gout. Let's make fun of him all day, bro. I do. You got gout.
[48:15]
Chris Distefano
We gotta get vegan. We have.
[48:17]
JB Smoove
People don't really look, you might not notice it completely right now, but I give you another 15. You going. Your health is going to catch up to you because of what you eat and what you don't eat. I say both what you eat and what you don't eat. You have to fill your body with vegetables. You have to, man, Even if you. I tell people, don't put pressure on yourself three days a week, your blood work will change. If you don't eat heavy blood filled meat.
[48:49]
Chris Distefano
You know, bro, I'm gonna start eating vegetables. I'm 40 years old. I'm gonna start eating vegetables. Look, every single day, at every meal, and in the next 10 years, I don't look like a beautiful Black man like J.B. smooth.
[49:00]
JB Smoove
I'm going back three to four days. No meat. Watch what happened. Watch what happened to you.
[49:04]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[49:04]
JB Smoove
Realize this. When you eat chicken, you gotta cook it. Because if you don't cook it, something el gonna kill you.
[49:11]
Chris Distefano
Is that crazy?
[49:12]
JB Smoove
If someone. So you gotta trust the person cooking the food.
[49:17]
Chris Distefano
Yes.
[49:17]
JB Smoove
If they don't cook it right, guess what? You in the ER because they didn't cook it thoroughly or wash it thoroughly. You gotta trust every level of everything you eat.
[49:27]
Chris Distefano
What was the moment that changed for you because you used to eat meat, right? You, you were, you were a meat.
[49:31]
JB Smoove
Eater like the rest of us in North Carolina. Look, I don't had everything. I don't have bear, snake, raccoon, wild turkey, squirrel, rabbit, you name it. No, I don't have it, man. I don't I've had meat. I said, what do you think a snake is? A snake is a sausage. You can stuff all that meat into that sausage of a snake and eat a snake, man. No, I'm telling you that you. That's crazy. A snake is a lemon sausage. Yeah, well, I'm saying, I say that because, look, man, I've been. My wife hasn't had meat in 27 years, right. She's real now. She went vegetarian, which is you can still do dairy, still do egg. Vegan is a whole nother level now. She's been vegan nine years. I've been vegan eight years. Well, I remember my last time. I remember my last time having chicken. I was in Buffalo Wild Wings, man. I believe it might have been Cleveland or Columbus. You know how we do, we drop our luggage, off we go get some eat. So we eat early before the show.
[50:29]
Chris Distefano
Yep.
[50:29]
JB Smoove
My bags. I went to Buffalo Wild Wings, man. Got, you know, got my tin teriyaki, my tin barbecue, my extra celery sticks, you know, sitting there watching the games, the scores of the games, trying to catch up a little bit before I go to the room, take a little nap for the show. Right? Man, I got halfway through those wings, man, and I just ripped some wings apart. And I was like watching the game and I said, I said, damn. I said, wow. I'm over it. I said, wow. I just got hit with it. Wow. I was already part time, full time, right? Part time, part time vegan, full time carnivore for a long time.
[51:03]
Chris Distefano
Got it.
[51:04]
JB Smoove
You know, that means whatever my wife make at home, I eat that.
[51:07]
Chris Distefano
Yeah, you can't be married.
[51:09]
JB Smoove
Yeah, yeah. I'm on the road. I eat what the hell I want to eat. Right? Right. But then I real. I just got shocked, punched into the face like, wow, wow. Damn, man. I only ate half of these. I said, yo. I said, damn. I just got sick and I couldn't go backwards. I said, wow. I said. I said, I'm over it. That's the last time I had.
[51:25]
Chris Distefano
Last time you had a bite of meat.
[51:27]
JB Smoove
Last time I had a bite of meat.
[51:28]
Chris Distefano
Were you still drinking milk and dairy products for a little bit or you just went.
[51:31]
JB Smoove
I skipped over the vegetarian and went straight to vegan. Almost unheard of, which is not easy for people to give up. Cheese, milk, you know, eggs is hard.
[51:42]
Chris Distefano
So what the hell have you eaten today? What's your day of eating gonna be like today? I want to follow JB Smooth diet for this week.
[51:47]
JB Smoove
Tell me what the day is today is this Morning. This morning I made. I can make anything. I can make applesauce. I can make eggs out of mung bean. I can, man. I do chicken. I do chicken fried. Oyster mushrooms, blue oyster mushrooms, chicken fried, and waffles.
[52:04]
Chris Distefano
You cook this?
[52:05]
JB Smoove
Yeah. My wife and I, we cook a lot of food. Our Thanksgiving is bananas. And it's all one piece of meat and everything. Wow. We do sweet potato casserole, Mac and cheese. I make a vegan meatloaf. I get a vegan. I got vegan. Vegan. A vegan turkey meat that I love. You know, everything else, man. Greens, man, every. Anything. I do the cranberry sauce, everything. We have a full vegan Thanksgiving every year. People flock to our house. Wow. All hours. We don't even have meat in the house. Wow. Everybody who comes to our house, they know we're making vegan food.
[52:46]
Chris Distefano
What about him?
[52:46]
JB Smoove
Love it. Every time we have a party, guess what goes first. If we do a. We do an RV party every year, right? At the beach. I got an rv. I bring my big RV out there and I got the little patio on the back and we have three grills on the top of the patio. It's all two vegan grills. And then down there, I put them off the rv. They gotta be on the ground. So my man, he comes in town from New York, he do his ribs and stuff like that, but I keep it away from our food. Guess what goes first Every time all the vegan food evaporates. Gone. Evaporates. Wow. Cause you can't tell the difference. People just put a label on it, Right? But it's food.
[53:26]
Chris Distefano
It's just food.
[53:27]
JB Smoove
Broccoli ain't changed. Broccoli's not. Broccoli's vegetables. Broccoli ain't vegan.
[53:33]
Chris Distefano
No.
[53:33]
JB Smoove
Spring beans ain't vegan. It's just regular ass food.
[53:37]
Chris Distefano
That's all it is.
[53:38]
JB Smoove
Asparagus. It ain't vegan. It ain't vegan. It's. It's regular. It's same vegetables that's been around forever. Squash, potatoes. Oh, that's. Oh, that's regular ass food. It's regular food. People get scared when they see the word. They still eat vegetables.
[53:55]
Chris Distefano
He's terrified of broccoli.
[53:56]
JB Smoove
Why you talking about broccoli? Cauliflower.
[53:58]
Chris Distefano
Look at that.
[53:59]
JB Smoove
Have you ever had.
[54:00]
Chris Distefano
And he's got the broccoli haircut just like a.
[54:03]
JB Smoove
Damn.
[54:03]
Chris Distefano
He looks like a vegetable. Yo. Serve his head on Thanksgiving with his old vegetable head. Yeah, but what do you do? What do you do when you're on the road now you're on the other side of the country. What do you do? Vegan restaurants.
[54:18]
JB Smoove
There's so many vegan restaurants. It's crazy.
[54:20]
Chris Distefano
But in New York. But what if you're in Dayton, Ohio? Where you gonna find a vegan restaurant?
[54:23]
JB Smoove
You gotta. Before I land, know what I do? I start to Google.
[54:26]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[54:26]
JB Smoove
And I put in vegan restaurants, vegan options, and believe it or not, man, it's way better than it used to be.
[54:33]
Chris Distefano
Interesting. Okay.
[54:33]
JB Smoove
Every city I go to has a unique place that I remember. And I know one of the best vegan foods I ever had was a place in Louisville, Kentucky, called V Grits.
[54:44]
Chris Distefano
V in Louisville, Kentucky.
[54:46]
JB Smoove
Louisville, Kentucky, man, you would think you.
[54:48]
Chris Distefano
Could get killed for that in Louisville.
[54:49]
JB Smoove
The menu, oh, my God, it was delicious, man.
[54:53]
Chris Distefano
Wow.
[54:53]
JB Smoove
And. And when I. I did my show there, right? I had food. I sat there one day, I ate. Then the next day we were leaving town. So I said, you know what? I'm gonna get me some food. I can eat it in my lap. Driving. And I had to go to KC somewhere, next city, whatever. And I'm driving and I was eating the food and I had. They made me a ice cream float with their homemade orange soda. It was an Orange Crush. They call it Orange Crush with a scoop of vanilla vegan ice cream on top. Oh, that's. I started driving. I was like 30 miles outside of town and I started eating my food and I started drinking at them. I said, God damn it. I was 10 miles away. I'll make a U turn right now. No, that's how crazy it was. He said, yo, yo. I said, how far? How far am I away from it? I was gonna make a U turn to go back and get another one. Wow. It was that good. The food was that good. So.
[55:44]
Chris Distefano
But not all vegan food is healthy though, right? Or it all is just healthier. Look, how do you look at it?
[55:50]
JB Smoove
How do you justify how they gonna eat, right? I know fat vegans, yo. I know fat vegans, right? That's why I said the word vegan is not important. It's how you eat that's important.
[56:00]
Chris Distefano
Okay, that makes sense.
[56:01]
JB Smoove
It's how you eat. Your water intake is very important. You know, the amount of vegetables you eat is very important. And look, people still get. You can still get high blood pressure.
[56:11]
Chris Distefano
Who's the most dehydrated?
[56:12]
JB Smoove
You put so much salt on your food all the time.
[56:15]
Chris Distefano
That's it.
[56:15]
JB Smoove
Your sodium levels are going to go crazy. You still. You got to really think about and Monitor your intake a certain way, Right. And also don't eat past a certain time. If you say, I'm gonna stop eating at 7:30, that's great for you, right? Your body, that means you're still moving around, you're still doing stuff. The body consists of digestive food.
[56:35]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[56:35]
JB Smoove
You're not sitting there just laying on a belly full.
[56:37]
Chris Distefano
Can't be until midnight.
[56:38]
JB Smoove
Don't be lazy. No, no, don't. Yeah, and we got a hard schedule sometimes as comedians, so. Yeah, you know, so he's got to work it off. But man, there's so many. I'm telling you, there's a way of eating, even plant based meats. I do it once in a while, but I'm not nailed down to it. I can make, I can make all that stuff, right. My wife is an amazing. My wife Shaw's an amazing cook, right? And we both love to cook. I used to be. Look, you talking to a former grill master. No, I used to be a grill master. Like people came over my house to. And beg me to grill some food. Hey, man, if we go to, if we buy some food, would you grill it?
[57:18]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[57:19]
JB Smoove
I said, all right, man, come on over, you know, and I'll put that on my grill and I just, I'll just make some food for us.
[57:24]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[57:25]
JB Smoove
Thanksgiving. Every Thanksgiving, I used to deep fry a turkey. Every year I would deep fry a turkey, right? People would go crazy. One time I made two just because I had another one left over.
[57:38]
Chris Distefano
Oh, shit.
[57:39]
JB Smoove
People were like, you buy two turkeys, it killed it. And I was like, yo. They say, yo, man, you might as well make that other one. I said, God damn it, that's a process, man. You were deep fried turkey.
[57:48]
Chris Distefano
No, I never did it, man.
[57:49]
JB Smoove
You gotta. Look, it's a whole process. Now here's what I do. I go to the supermarket, I find the right size one, a nice size one. I gotta pick it up and hold it in my arm like a little baby, right? I cradle it a little bit and see how it feels on my arm.
[58:00]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[58:00]
JB Smoove
I can tell the weight. And then I hold it up and I smack it on the ass.
[58:03]
Chris Distefano
Pow.
[58:05]
JB Smoove
Like I just birthed that damn thing, you know, I took it home, you know, I clean it, wash it real good. People say, you don't have to wash it because the heat of the oil is going to kill all that stuff. Okay, I get that. I just feel better washing it a little bit and rinsing it off a little bit.
[58:23]
Chris Distefano
Yeah, yeah.
[58:23]
JB Smoove
Taking out the, you know, the little pack Inside with the liver and the neck bone and stuff like that. I like to put my hand in there and I'll be fisting that damn thing. I get it. I clean it real good, make sure it's good, you know what I mean? And I pat it dry. I pat it dry, nice and dry. And I start to. You get the. You get the injector. Okay. It's a. It's a broth injector. I make my own broth too. So I used to make my own broth back in the day. I would put a little pan on the stove, put some little olive oil in there, a little butter in that baby, a little water. Season that water real good. Put the liver and the neck bone in there as my seasoning. And I would boil that, season it real good. Garlic. Put clove, garlic, cloves on that bad boy. Some basil in that. But let that broth. Nice big pot of broth. You get that injector, you know, it's a needle injector where you just keep injecting the damn turkey like a damn drug addict with that broth. And the broth goes into every part of the meat, and I'm just injecting the whole body, the legs, the drumsticks, everything. And I fold the arms back like this. Yeah. So it's like, it's like, you know, that turkey's now part of the family. Yeah.
[59:32]
Chris Distefano
It's like it looks like a founding father almost.
[59:34]
JB Smoove
It's part of. It's part of the family, right?
[59:35]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[59:36]
JB Smoove
Yeah. And I treat it with respect.
[59:37]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[59:37]
JB Smoove
And I sit it up. I sit it up and I just keep injecting it, you know? You know, like drug addict. I just keep injecting that thing.
[59:43]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[59:43]
JB Smoove
Light it up, log it up, man. Then I season the whole outside. Oh, before I do all that, I'm already got my, my, my, my pot and stuff outside. Don't, don't ever do it in the house. I do it outside on the patio and away from the patio, furthest possible. Got my propane tank. I got my. Got my oil heating up real nice, you know? And don't put too much. Put. You, you make sure you base it on the weight of the turkey. Got it? So when you put. If you put that turkey in that, in that oil, it ain't gonna overflow. Right. It's a lot of terrible accidents with deep fried turkey. Right. People don't know what the hell they're doing.
[60:17]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[60:18]
JB Smoove
You gotta know the weight of the turkey and the amount of oil we put in that pan. And man, by the time that baby's done, I let it sit there for a little while. Let him just like, you know, like he just laying there. And then I take him and I test that. I test that with a little sprinkle water in my hand. See if it.
[60:34]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[60:36]
JB Smoove
Put that hook on that bad boy and drop it in there, right? I used to be a master of that, man. Damn. But I digress.
[60:43]
Chris Distefano
Now you don't do it anymore. See, that's the thing. You've went. It's not like you were a guy who. You used to eat meat, cook meat all the time, and now you've went all the other way. So you're telling people it's possible.
[60:52]
JB Smoove
I'm telling you it's possible to do it as. As great as I told that story of, of the process of it. I used to be a real meathead, right? I was a real meathead, man. I was a North Carolina cat. I grew up on meat. There's plenty of times I went to bed just eating meat all day.
[61:08]
Chris Distefano
Not one vegetable in your body all day.
[61:09]
JB Smoove
Because, you know, you're young, man. You're just running. You're just eating and going, you know, Right. I don't think I. I don't think I was even. I used to like vegetables, but I wasn't like going crazy over them.
[61:21]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[61:21]
JB Smoove
When I was a kid. Kid.
[61:22]
Chris Distefano
Now you can't, you can't go a day without eating a vegetable, man.
[61:25]
JB Smoove
I get busy, bro. I love it, man. I think. And this is fun. Being creative without, you know, eating, eating, eating meats and, and just being creative and how you can make anything. I can make a hamburger, man. Without. Without even using hamburger. I can make vegetable. A vegetable style hamburger, you would never know. It's just a matter of how you cook it and how the tenderness of it. I can make anything.
[61:51]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[61:51]
JB Smoove
I can make anything taste amazing, dude. Amazing. My wife be killing the game. I'm telling you all Thanksgiving is legendary.
[61:57]
Chris Distefano
See, my girl's Puerto Rican, so they, they. They don't.
[62:00]
JB Smoove
They.
[62:00]
Chris Distefano
They mess with that meat, man.
[62:01]
JB Smoove
Like, that meat, bro.
[62:02]
Chris Distefano
So I gotta. I'm gonna. I would love for her to come downstairs and say, like, hey, babe, I need you to go vegan for the next week. And she would look at me, start yelling at both of us in Spanish. We don't even know what she's saying. She saw yellow.
[62:11]
JB Smoove
I would love to see y'all do that experiment for a month.
[62:14]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. And see what happens.
[62:15]
JB Smoove
And see what happens. And watch your body change. You know what? Go to your doctor before and go to your doctor after one month and let him test your.
[62:24]
Chris Distefano
You know what we're going to do? What's today? November 12th.
[62:28]
JB Smoove
11Th.
[62:28]
Chris Distefano
11Th. Let's go, the three of us till Christmas. The next time we're going to eat meat December 25, let the three of us go in.
[62:35]
JB Smoove
I would love to see you guys do that, man.
[62:37]
Chris Distefano
We're going to take. Get our blood. I'm going to get us hooked up tomorrow. We're going to get our blood taken. We're going to everyone.
[62:43]
JB Smoove
That's a great barometer.
[62:45]
Chris Distefano
Then we're going to call JB Christmas morning when he's opened up presents, one of his presents going to be our blood work.
[62:50]
JB Smoove
Your blood, bro. I'm telling you.
[62:52]
Chris Distefano
Let's see for one month, if you.
[62:53]
JB Smoove
Can get to jump on. On stuff like that and know where your blood work is at, it's going to save you a lot of headaches later, man, in life.
[63:00]
Chris Distefano
Because as we get older, man, you.
[63:01]
JB Smoove
Get, man, you want to be here. You want no ailments later on in life, man, that's going to cripple you. And you can't do the things you love to do. Can't walk around Disney World with your kids. No. And you got to get into one of those wheelchairs, man, because you. Your health just.
[63:18]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[63:18]
JB Smoove
You. You beat your body up too much as a young person.
[63:22]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[63:22]
JB Smoove
And you. That's all you want. Yeah.
[63:24]
Chris Distefano
Because you know what? It is, too. I realized too, like, you know, my parents are getting older now, and my father's lost a lot of weight. He's lost about 60, 70 pounds. He's going to Italy. He's doing all these things because he got his life back. And he told me something interesting. He was like, you know, he's like, look, right now, you know, you're a young man, fine. You have little kids, right. He said, so when you have the little kids, you know, you want to be active, you want to play with them, all that. He goes, but really, your life, you don't really have as much freedom. You got it? Everything's about your children, as it should be. He goes, but then comes a point when your youngest child will maybe hit their 20s or whatever. And then, you know, he said, like him. He's like. Then I sit here and he goes, you know, you're a grown man now. You know, you're not calling for me every day. He goes, I have men. I have weeks free where I'm not going to see my son. He goes, so if my body wasn't in the shape that it was in, he goes, you know, as you get older, if you can keep your body healthy and you keep your finances, well, you could. He was like, I could go see the world. He goes, I almost feel like I'm a kid again now. Because you're a grown man and if I want to go to Italy for a week, I don't have any responsibility. But if he said if I was in. If I was 100 pounds heavier, I.
[64:24]
JB Smoove
Wouldn'T be able to walk, I would.
[64:25]
Chris Distefano
Have lost my feet, he said. So he changed it all. But my dad, he went too crazy. He's not a vegan. What my dad does, he doesn't eat enough. He eats half a tuna fish sandwich a day. And that's not good either.
[64:34]
JB Smoove
Intake.
[64:35]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[64:35]
JB Smoove
Yeah.
[64:36]
Chris Distefano
This gotta hit those vegetables, dad. That's why he constipated for three weeks.
[64:40]
JB Smoove
Yeah, he needs. He needs some vegetables in his body.
[64:42]
Chris Distefano
You probably take the best dookies you've ever taken since you went vegan.
[64:45]
JB Smoove
What?
[64:46]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[64:46]
JB Smoove
Tell you, man, is. Everything's different. Everything's different, man. I'm telling you, it's different. And that water is very important. That water is so important, man. Yeah, water intake, they gotta drink.
[64:56]
Chris Distefano
That's the only beverage you have, really? Water.
[64:58]
JB Smoove
No, I do other stuff. I do juices and stuff. I do a lot of green juices, too. I love green juice, man. Yeah, A little apple in that bad boy, man, Some. I love a good green juice.
[65:07]
Chris Distefano
Now, what about.
[65:07]
JB Smoove
What about this?
[65:08]
Chris Distefano
You know, because obviously all big Kirby enthusiasm fans here love the last season after. The last season was amazing. That last episode, or second to last episode, when you're, you know, Leon's character is, you know, catching up on Seinfeld, you say how much, you know, you know, Kramer just busting in people's houses. You know, it kind of hit us over like, oh, Larry made you the Kramer. Did you know that? Like when he first. Like when you guys first started, was he kind of telling you, hey, you're going to be my Kramer character? And that just evolved into. You just evolved into the Kramer of Curb.
[65:36]
JB Smoove
Everything. Everything just became, you know, sometimes you don't know what you need or want until you get it sometimes. And I didn't even know if. I just thought. I just was doing a season, you know, I didn't even know nothing about the future of Leon's character, but I came in for that. That role. And not knowing what to expect, I just thought, hey, man, it's Great. I'm gonna be on this season because every season is different. Sure. Who would possibly know you came in for this season with your family and you would be the one that ended up staying on the show, period. You know, I mean, I had no idea about any of that stuff. So for me, it was always like. I always say this too, man. This is weird to say, but I say it all the time sometimes. And don't take the context wrong, but sometimes you gotta take a job, take a friend, take a woman, take a boss. You gotta. Somehow, you got to be who you truly are and not actively do something, but just be. Just be right. You know what I mean? And the natural attraction comes, Right. You know what I mean? Without you doing anything extra. You know what I mean?
[66:58]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[66:58]
JB Smoove
Just do the job you're supposed to do. Come early, stay late. Do what? Listen what they want. Talk to the director, make sure you're giving them exactly what they want every time and more.
[67:08]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[67:09]
JB Smoove
Make the cast laugh, make the people laugh.
[67:11]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[67:12]
JB Smoove
And all of a sudden, whether. Whether. Whether Leon would have continued in the next season and six seasons after. Right. No one knows. But guess what? People got to know you were there.
[67:26]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[67:27]
JB Smoove
They got to refer you for other jobs.
[67:29]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[67:30]
JB Smoove
Don't always believe this is true. You get a job from a job. If you have that concept in your head all the time, I promise you, man, you always work to get a job from a job. That's the rule of thumb, Right. Every time I do a project, I'm. I'm. I'm really actively trying to do the best job I can do. Because I know at any one of these people on this set, producers, directors, camera guys can refer you to something else.
[68:00]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[68:01]
JB Smoove
And listen, you got another job. You know how many jobs I got from being on Curb?
[68:04]
Chris Distefano
I could imagine.
[68:05]
JB Smoove
I mean, crazy.
[68:07]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[68:07]
JB Smoove
I don't been on five, six pilots. I don't been in my own show. I don't been like. It's crazy, but I truly believe you.
[68:15]
Chris Distefano
Get a job from a job, you're the guy. Whether you're doing, you know, whatever it is, a Nike commercial or a local commercial, you're doing a hunt, you're being JB because you're like, this could lead to anything. That's smart.
[68:27]
JB Smoove
I've done. So. Look, I did a Nike commercial that never aired, right. It was a LeBron commercial. Never aired, Right. Never aired because he had some other things going on, some other campaigns and stuff going on. We shot a whole commercial in Miami. The commercial was amazing, Right. Never aired. It. Right, right. The director was so cool. Made him hit it off so well. Do you know I end up doing like three or four other commercials with him because he kept recommending me.
[68:53]
Chris Distefano
Wow.
[68:54]
JB Smoove
Same director did my Caesar campaign.
[68:56]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[68:57]
JB Smoove
Same Director did this at&t March Madness commercial.
[69:02]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[69:02]
JB Smoove
Anytime this dude gets something, he'll be like, yo, I'll do it. What do you think about JB to play the Play, the main character? He'll sell me, man. I appreciate him so much. That.
[69:16]
Chris Distefano
That's huge.
[69:17]
JB Smoove
That's what I mean. You get a job from a job.
[69:20]
Chris Distefano
Right? But that. But that's just because you, you know, raised right, have the right intention.
[69:23]
JB Smoove
That's what Curb has done.
[69:25]
Chris Distefano
Right?
[69:25]
JB Smoove
Curb has done that, man. And I don't know, I never know. Sometimes I don't wanna know. I don't know. I don't wanna know the, you know, why. The whys. Sometimes I just wanna do it. You know what I mean? And that's. I do think that, you know, but see, that's another thing with Curb. You can make choices because there's no script.
[69:48]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[69:49]
JB Smoove
So whatever you say, you're free. You're free as a bird. I made a choice to say Leon never watched Curb. I mean, Leon never watched Seinfeld.
[69:57]
Chris Distefano
Oh, wow. That was you.
[69:59]
JB Smoove
That was season. What's that? Season eight. The Seinfeld season.
[70:04]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[70:04]
JB Smoove
Or not, Whatever it was.
[70:05]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[70:05]
JB Smoove
I made a choice and said, you know what? I'm gonna make Leon be somebody who never watched Seinfeld.
[70:13]
Chris Distefano
Wow.
[70:14]
JB Smoove
If I made him like Seinfeld and love the show, it's different right now. If I got something to play with.
[70:19]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[70:20]
JB Smoove
I can be like. You know, even that scene, I was like, on the set with Larry and we were watching them rehearse, like, who's that guy right there? And Larry's like, what? That's Jerry. And who's that girl right there? That's lame. So Jerry tapping that. You know what I mean? I was like, whatever. And then all of a sudden, Newman walks in the room like, who is this fat bastard?
[70:40]
Chris Distefano
You know what I mean?
[70:41]
JB Smoove
It just gave it some levels to it.
[70:43]
Chris Distefano
You know what I mean?
[70:45]
JB Smoove
And I knew that that would come back at some point. So you plant little seeds with Curb right now. I don't know what. I think it's easy to compare Larry Leon to Kramer because you see it on his feet already. But I don't think that was ever the plan. I just think Leon was Leon and Leon became his right hand man. I mean, the storylines don't match but, you know, I get when people say, oh, you know, maybe JB was Larry's Kramer, you know, because. Well, not really because Larry's. Larry's. Larry was Costanza. Yes, that's Larry.
[71:24]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[71:25]
JB Smoove
And then Jerry is with Kramer or whatever. But I know, I know the context. Like, wow, this, this is that. That world, that. That type of character who's kind of comes in and says crazy stuff and does fun stuff and then he's out, you know what I mean? Or whatever, he does his thing. But I know, yeah, I get, I get that.
[71:44]
Chris Distefano
What's comparison, what's mind blowing to me? And like, what I just always think about is because, like, Curb youb Enthusiasm is fascinating to me because I think when you got on Curb youb Enthusiasm, you probably already in your late 30s, maybe even 40 or coming up, you were in your. You were already doing comedy for a while. You're already. So it's like, it was wild that, like, you know, doing comedy as long as you had already being a little bit older, you didn't even know that, you know, Kirby enthusiasm. Let's call it what it is. It's one of the most iconic shows of all time. It is one of the most iconic shows that we remembered hundreds of years from now. It's just what it is. And you were 20 years into the game, in your late 30s, and you hadn't even done the most iconic show yet. It's just wild to me. You must see I, you know, because I would think, like, you sit here now and be like. Because it's very easy to, you know, at 38, been like, you know what, man? Maybe, you know, I'm never going to be on anything like that. You don't work as hard as you do, or you're like, oh, you just settled into, you know, I'm just going to be a road. It's going to live on the road, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But no, you're like, oh, the actual thing that was going to define me was just coming up. So it's all.
[72:50]
JB Smoove
It's all.
[72:50]
Chris Distefano
It's just amazing.
[72:51]
JB Smoove
Yeah. And in turn, that's why I say you get a job from a job.
[72:55]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[72:56]
JB Smoove
You know, I use this example, too. So, you know, I do a lot of commercials.
[73:00]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[73:00]
JB Smoove
So this shows you how. How you got to present yourself all the time and you got to be conscious of everything you do and how it plays out, and you sometimes you just have to wait for it. You know what I mean? So I did a. This is a whole different project, but I did a Audi, Audi commercial with Tom Holland. Spider Man. Of course, it's an Audi commercial. Audi was the sponsored car in Spider Man.
[73:29]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[73:30]
JB Smoove
Right. So they brought me in and I ended up, you know, getting the part. And I played his driving instructor, you know, for this kid, you know, just to sell the car. And we go on. On a driving test in the Audi, you know, I mean, so that was the commercial, right? And, you know, you don't think none of it. You do a commercial, you do a commercial. Had a good time working with Tom. Cool kid a few years later, you know, that got me hyped, though. The first thing I said was, man, I would love to be in the Spider man in the Marvel universe. One day I was in the audience watching. It might have been Avengers or one of the movies. I said, God dang it, man. Because I like to throw things through the universe.
[74:10]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[74:10]
JB Smoove
And when they come back and fall back to Earth, it falls back when it's. When it does.
[74:16]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[74:17]
JB Smoove
You know, I don't, like, try to push it, push it, push it, say something and just let it go. I said, man, I would love to be in this Marvel universe one day. And lo and behold, like, literally a year, eight months to a year later, I'm. I'm on. They called me for Spider Man. Far from home. Wow. And then I'm in Spider Man. No way home. So, you know, all from that. This job, from that job right there.
[74:41]
Chris Distefano
It was all the same peep. Tom Holland maybe put in a word. I was like, I want to work with JB again.
[74:45]
JB Smoove
I can. I can line up a job from a job from everything I've ever done. That's amazing because I telling you, you gotta sell yourself and you gotta be. You just gotta be a good person. You know, I met people who are on damn Pooty Tang. Like interns. And I will always be nice to the interns, you know? Yeah. I saw somebody else treating them terrible or whatever. I always talk to them. And, you know, sometimes I sit down, eat with them. Sometimes.
[75:09]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[75:10]
JB Smoove
You know, sometimes I see these interns now, and guess what they are. Directors, Studio execs.
[75:15]
Chris Distefano
Studio execs. Even higher. Yeah.
[75:17]
JB Smoove
Every time I ran into people, they said, man, yeah, remember me? I said, oh, yeah, in a little suit. Yeah, man, you was. I tell people all the time how nice you were to me on Pootie Tang.
[75:27]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[75:28]
JB Smoove
How nice you were to me on this commercial.
[75:30]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[75:30]
JB Smoove
He said, man, I never forgot that, man. And now they bring my name up all the time. They'll Be like, I always recommend you for stuff. I said, oh, thanks, man, that's good to know. And I'm telling you, I feel. I don't feel like I'm 58. I truly feel like I can play up and I can play down.
[75:50]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
[75:51]
JB Smoove
I can't go. I mean, I ain't playing no teenager, but I do feel like. Here's what I think it is, your likeness, who you are. This is weird word to say, but. But I tell everyone to think about this. Make yourself recognizable in whatever it is. Make an impression when you walk in a room. Make yourself sellable, make yourself recognizable, relatable. And all of a sudden, guess what? They don't even know you. 58. Right. They just know you. Weird word. Not the context, but think about the word. You have to icon yourself, right? You have to icon yourself, meaning you're memorable to people and that's what it is. You have to look, think about this, think about that. Damn. Remember that diner picture, that famous diner with like James Dean.
[76:51]
Chris Distefano
Oh, yeah, yeah.
[76:51]
JB Smoove
Elvis Presley. Yeah. And Mario Monroe's. They're all in that same diner. You know what I mean? All these cool people in that diner. And think about that diner, right? Think about, take like Elvis. People always remember Elvis like that, right? Nobody ever pulls up the picture of Elvis in his later years. No. When he got fat and he got overweight a little bit, he was in that little suit, doing karate and all that stuff in the baggy pants, you know, the Bell bottle. Nobody, Nobody shows.
[77:23]
Chris Distefano
Nobody shows fat Elvis.
[77:24]
JB Smoove
Nobody remembers. No one thinks about him like that.
[77:28]
Chris Distefano
Right?
[77:28]
JB Smoove
That's not the photo they pull up. No, they pull up young Elvis.
[77:32]
Chris Distefano
Yes.
[77:33]
JB Smoove
They pull up the young hair and the vibrant one, the iconic image of him.
[77:38]
Chris Distefano
Right?
[77:39]
JB Smoove
That's what you want people to. I think, I believe that you have to work, work, work. And you gotta lock yourself in at some point in a certain era, right? And how people remember you is like that, Right. You know what I mean? Like, that's how they remember. If you can find a way to be remembered like that, not just industry wise, but with people, how they think about you, right? You know what I mean? When they tell the story and the story matches. Man, he was crazy, man. Chris used to run around, man, Chris was crazy. I remember one night we were at the Boston, you know, I mean, whatever it is.
[78:12]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[78:13]
JB Smoove
You want people to remember that.
[78:14]
Chris Distefano
Yes.
[78:15]
JB Smoove
Part of you, man. That story, that who you. Who you were and who you are in their mind forever. And that's why I think it helps thinking about the job from a job.
[78:26]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[78:26]
JB Smoove
How you lead people is how they remember you.
[78:29]
Chris Distefano
And the best way to get out there and get from fat Elvis to beautiful Elvis. Go vegan. That's how you get there, baby.
[78:37]
JB Smoove
That's how you get there. Yeah, that's how you get there. But one thing about me, I never twist arms. That's it. I let people just be who they are, man.
[78:44]
Chris Distefano
That's it, man.
[78:44]
JB Smoove
If you love it, you love it. Whatever you love, you do it. But if you can do it in moderation, I mean, there are people who eat. Who eat meat, who are healthy.
[78:51]
Chris Distefano
Sure.
[78:51]
JB Smoove
You just got to do. You just got to know, in moderation, eat what you want to eat. But that's not for everybody.
[78:57]
Chris Distefano
Vito, what do you. What do we got? We got a. Got a question. You know. You know you were talking about Curb youb Enthusiasm before.
[79:05]
JB Smoove
Yeah.
[79:05]
Chris Distefano
And I didn't even think about this, so you were talking. But I remember the season you came on was that was Cheryl's last season as being Larry's wife. Right. Oh, because when at the end of the season, doesn't he. Doesn't he end up staying with Vivige?
[79:20]
JB Smoove
Yeah, yeah, right. That's her last season. Well, I mean, she's been on the show, but you say that was his wife.
[79:26]
Chris Distefano
Yeah, his wife.
[79:27]
JB Smoove
Yeah. Yeah.
[79:27]
Chris Distefano
And then also, I mean, like, the show kind of changed its whole concept when you came in, because it went from being a show that was, like, this guy dealing with his wife to, like, Larry and you being the duo. And then also it brought in this whole aspect of, like, Larry and, like, you brought it up. You were talking about Seinfeld's always, like, slaying different asses. You're like, why. Why is Jerry always getting up all up in his ass? And then Larry actually became that person on Curb for the second half of the series. So did you see that change in the overall show in that it's almost like two different series from season one to six to six to 12, seven.
[79:56]
JB Smoove
No, I think Larry became a single man, and he just, you know, finding his way, man, I think. And. But it gave us opportunity to explore his dating and me giving him good, bad advice on ladies and all that kind of stuff and pitfalls of stuff. And. Yeah, I think. I think somehow that played. Played well. Right. Because now he's with a dude. He's a woman in that house with Leon giving him that kind of advice and hanging. I ain't no woman gonna want this dude living in the bungalow in the back of the house and coming in the fridge, you know, having Leon written on his. On his damn Big Gulp cult.
[80:31]
Chris Distefano
So funny. It's so funny. It's one of the funniest, funniest parts of the whole show. Jazz, when you go out with Larry, do you have to like. We got a quick question, because he's obviously not. The Larry David character is different from the Larry David in real life. But do you see firsthand the Larry David character come out in real life?
[80:50]
JB Smoove
Oh, man, look, there's two Larry's. You know, people ask me about the two Larry's. There's TV Larry and there's. And there's real Larry. Right? TV Larry got a bunch of shit. Right? And real Larry got a bunch of shit. Right? Right. But it's still shit. It's just different kind of shit, right? Larry is Larry on the show. You gotta forget about that. Larry David is Larry David on the show. Leon Black is not Leon, not JB Smooth on the show. Right. It's two different people. Right? So Larry's the only one. I mean, he actually said this in the panel one day. He said, we all play ourselves, but I think JB is not Leon. He has some cadence. Maybe they don't dress alike, but they don't. JB doesn't talk like that all the time. Leon is Leon. JB is jb.
[81:40]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[81:40]
JB Smoove
But he said everybody else kind of plays a version of themselves, of their real self.
[81:47]
Chris Distefano
Right?
[81:47]
JB Smoove
Right. And he said this in the panel. He said JB's the only one. I think it's harder for him because he's creating stuff in the moment that he wouldn't even say. He's saying dialogue that Leon would say.
[82:01]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[82:01]
JB Smoove
I'm not saying stuff that JB would say. I'm actually. Leon doesn't. I don't say that stuff all day.
[82:07]
Chris Distefano
Not all day.
[82:08]
JB Smoove
That would drive somebody crazy. I think that character.
[82:11]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[82:12]
JB Smoove
So that's all you think about. His ass.
[82:16]
Chris Distefano
So, Jazz, we've discovered that JB is a vegan. And he's. And where's. And he's explained it to me in a way that I want to do it. And I want the whole Puerto Rican side. I want us here to start cooking vegan until Christmas. And I want your mom to also get involved and your Puerto Rican mom to cook vegan. Puerto Ricans to do it.
[82:41]
JB Smoove
I'm gonna tell you something right now.
[82:41]
Chris Distefano
I'm gonna tell you something right now.
[82:42]
JB Smoove
I got plenty of Puerto Rican friends, right? Let me tell you something. You go on YouTube, right?
[82:47]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[82:48]
JB Smoove
And you type in Puerto Rican food, vegan options, okay? And you watch what comes up, okay? You will create. No, you will put your spin on stuff and you'll say, holy smokes, look what I just made. This is crazy. You still got your rice, all your, you know, all the good stuff, and all of a sudden you start seeing options. You're going to say, wow, I've just made a whole meal right out of.
[83:13]
Chris Distefano
But what her mom not. That's not what her mom's gonna say. But what her mom's gonna say.
[83:19]
JB Smoove
You can put your spin on anything. You know, there's vegan everything. Now, if you like plant based meats, there's plant based shrimp, there's plant based fish, beef. No, I know. I'm vegan, like, for five years at a time. I got some good options.
[83:34]
Chris Distefano
Your mom's gonna say, they got a.
[83:36]
JB Smoove
Steak, they got ribs, they got this rib company. Let me tell you something right now. It's so good. We need that info. If I didn't tell you it was, it wasn't ribs. The only thing that throws it off is the bone is not real. The bone is made out of this byproduct of meat. It's not meat. I mean, a byproduct of a vegetable kind of bone. You don't eat it, but you can eat if you want to. But it's not a bone. It looks like a bone and it's pliable. But them damn ribs, you could. You could do the rub on them, do the sauce on, marinate it. You put that bad boy in that grill, let it go for like 10 minutes on one side, turn it over the other side, cut it up. It's like regular.
[84:19]
Chris Distefano
Are you able to do it with no pollo? Yes.
[84:22]
JB Smoove
No.
[84:23]
Chris Distefano
You're gonna do it.
[84:25]
JB Smoove
You can do. I'm telling you.
[84:27]
Chris Distefano
You ever had a vegan chiletta? You're about to.
[84:29]
JB Smoove
Boo. My mother would slap me with that. Look at that. Look at that. I'm telling you, every year, every year I buy one of those vegan turkeys.
[84:35]
Chris Distefano
And I made them. See, that's a vegan turkey.
[84:37]
JB Smoove
You see the one on the top? Right there in the top left.
[84:39]
Chris Distefano
Oh, yeah.
[84:40]
JB Smoove
Oh, okay. They got a vegan turkey company. It's pretty damn good and it's delicious.
[84:45]
Chris Distefano
Josh. We're gonna do it toast and no bones.
[84:47]
JB Smoove
And when you cut it, you cut it like this. And man, look, I'm a gravy head too. I love some. Look, I could drink gravy. I'm a gravy. I'm a real comfort food dude.
[84:58]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[84:59]
JB Smoove
No, I could eat gravy every day if I had to, but I don't do it. I won't do it every day. But I love some damn gravy. No, I love making my own gravy. On rice, on potatoes. And I just like to. Sometimes I put gravy on the as a base and I put my food on top of it. I like curling. So we're going to have you for Thanksgiving.
[85:16]
Chris Distefano
No, his house at Thanksgiving. He said all the vegan food.
[85:19]
JB Smoove
I could pull my photo up right now if I could. If I could send a photo to you right now. He's so passionate about it. No.
[85:25]
Chris Distefano
This is what we've been talking about for an hour.
[85:27]
JB Smoove
Put inside my coat. Look inside my coat. Hand me that phone.
[85:30]
Chris Distefano
That's it.
[85:32]
JB Smoove
Oh, let me see if I can pull up right now.
[85:34]
Chris Distefano
No, John just throwing JV's phone, man. John's wild today.
[85:39]
JB Smoove
I'm gonna send you this photo. You're gonna trip.
[85:41]
Chris Distefano
We're gonna trip out on this phone.
[85:43]
JB Smoove
No, I'm telling you, when you see this spread on the table, you're gonna lose it. I'm tell you something.
[85:47]
Chris Distefano
We gotta. We gotta go to JB's house for Thanksgiving. Maybe Thanksgiving, 2025 we'll do at JB's. Are we invited? Thanksgiving, 2025.
[85:55]
JB Smoove
Come on. Come on out to Cali, man. I got you. I'm gonna show you. This row of food is gonna trip you out.
[86:02]
Chris Distefano
You're gonna do it, Josh.
[86:05]
JB Smoove
Try it.
[86:05]
Chris Distefano
If you airdrop it to John Grady. John Grady?
[86:09]
JB Smoove
No.
[86:10]
Chris Distefano
I'll tell you the kind of vegetable head Grady.
[86:13]
JB Smoove
Oh, my God. What have we made?
[86:15]
Chris Distefano
That's like vegan bagels with butter.
[86:19]
JB Smoove
What?
[86:21]
Chris Distefano
Or butter's not vegan. Butter's not vegan.
[86:24]
JB Smoove
How about vegan butter? That's incredible.
[86:26]
Chris Distefano
The only thing I never liked was vegan cheese. I didn't like that.
[86:29]
JB Smoove
That's kind of why there's a vegan cheese that'll blow your mind. And a nice ice cream cheese that's really good. And. And grilled cheesable. I'm talking about vegan. Why? Why did you guys explain.
[86:44]
Chris Distefano
My wife has been vegetarian 27 years.
[86:46]
JB Smoove
Okay? She has, like, straight vegan. No, she hasn't had meat in 27 years. She was vegetarian for a while because she loved cheese so much. Then she just said, you know what? I can't do it. She dropped the cheese, she dropped the dairy, dropped the eggs, and she went straight vegan nine years ago.
[87:00]
Chris Distefano
Okay, Wow.
[87:00]
JB Smoove
I went Eight years ago.
[87:02]
Chris Distefano
And your blood work is phenomenal. You're good to go.
[87:05]
JB Smoove
That works great, man. I just had another checkup. That's the number one thing. You clear that blood up.
[87:10]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. See, I got high cholesterol, high blood pressure.
[87:12]
JB Smoove
All that would change. I used to have inflammation in both my shoulders. Yeah. You know, we travel. Got your luggage, man. My. I couldn't lift my hand, my arm over my head at one time.
[87:22]
Chris Distefano
Right.
[87:22]
JB Smoove
I changed my diet. Inflammation went away.
[87:25]
Chris Distefano
You're good.
[87:26]
JB Smoove
It just started gradually. Now I could do. I go back to the gym again. I could do everything I want to do, man. Inflammation. Imagine at my age right now, you know, before this, like, eight, ten years ago, whatever, having inflammation. Right. That's one thing. But imagine getting inflammation in your knees and your shoulders when you're 60.
[87:45]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[87:46]
JB Smoove
You can't move around like you want to move around. You can't pick stuff up, can't work around the house.
[87:49]
Chris Distefano
Tough to come back.
[87:50]
JB Smoove
Can't carry your groceries in the house. It's like, what? You're useless, right? Your ass. Your wife pull up with groceries. You can't carry no groceries. Yeah. You're useless to me right now.
[87:59]
Chris Distefano
Useless piece of garbage.
[88:00]
JB Smoove
Piece of trash. Go sit down somewhere. What's your excuse then?
[88:04]
Chris Distefano
What the what? Because I haven't changed to a vegan diet yet. Once I change to a vegan diet, I'll help out around the house more. Chris was scouring midtown Friday at 11:30 trying to find cheeseburger. Yeah, I was trying to find cheeseburgers. And then Vito was eating. Vito was eating cacio e pepe with his hands.
[88:16]
JB Smoove
Damn.
[88:21]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Okay, so that's what we're gonna do. We're going. So what's been confirmed, Jazz is right now the three of us are going to start the vegan diet. Till Christmas, we're going to do that, then we're going to check our blood. And then next Thanksgiving, 2025, we're going to JB's house for. For vegan Thanksgiving, man.
[88:36]
JB Smoove
Come on, man. You're doing it too. I swear to God.
[88:38]
Chris Distefano
Veto's going to do it. I feel I apparently have to. If Vito's gout isn't flared up, he's gonna do it.
[88:43]
JB Smoove
His gout isn't flared up?
[88:45]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[88:45]
JB Smoove
Oh, man.
[88:47]
Chris Distefano
No, actually, no, because they said. Right. Weren't you telling me there's. There's certain things like oats, like granola messes with it, but, like, I've eliminated a lot of chicken from my diet. I've been doing a Lot of tofu. So I'm like, halfway there right now anyway. You did not do that at dinner on Friday night. You were wild. Prosciutto, burrata, tiramisu. What the hell are you doing?
[89:05]
JB Smoove
You were.
[89:06]
Chris Distefano
First of all, you're the hardest person.
[89:07]
JB Smoove
To go eat with because Chris doesn't like.
[89:10]
Chris Distefano
What I've noticed about Chris. What I've noticed about Chris is Chris wants to eat bad, but he'll only do it if other people do it with him. Yeah. So he starts pressuring you into.
[89:19]
JB Smoove
So he's pressuring you into food.
[89:21]
Chris Distefano
So he starts being like, wait, you're not gonna eat more than that. Yeah, come on, add some stuff to the table. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm like, you're not gonna get a loaf of fashion bread. What are you, gay? Mario Battle came up to me and said, I'm surprised you're not ordering more food like Chris does. Yeah, I know. It's. It's actually. Actually not good. And then I'm shocked when my cholesterol is 275. I'm like, the dog's like, are you healthy? I'm like, I'm so healthy. I work out. I eat vegetables. And then every story about me from friends is like, yo, Chris ate so much. It made me, like, change religions. I do. I have a problem.
[89:53]
JB Smoove
I'm trying to find this for. I want to. Want you to see the whole.
[89:55]
Chris Distefano
Well, we could send. If you can't find. We could send it. You know, if you could send it later on, you could text it to me, and I'll text it to.
[90:00]
JB Smoove
Yeah, the whole spread on one table.
[90:04]
Chris Distefano
Where you going, Jazz?
[90:07]
JB Smoove
Okay.
[90:09]
Chris Distefano
You should eat them. They're vegan.
[90:13]
JB Smoove
All right. Yeah, man. I mean, wonderful.
[90:17]
Chris Distefano
All right, so listen, guys. Oh, Vito got one more. Just one more Curb question for you.
[90:22]
JB Smoove
Come on, Vito.
[90:22]
Chris Distefano
I. I saw a story you told where you were telling a story about having a real life Curb moment with Richard Lewis.
[90:29]
JB Smoove
Oh, that was so funny, man. Do you have any.
[90:31]
Chris Distefano
Do you have any other real life Curb stories with Larry or Jeff or anybody where it's like, you were, like, living a Curb moment in real life with these guys?
[90:38]
JB Smoove
No, it's hard to find something with them.
[90:44]
Chris Distefano
What's the Richie Lewis one? I didn't hear that one.
[90:46]
JB Smoove
Oh, it's cool. So me and Richard had this fun relationship, man, because we. We never had a scene together in Curb at that time, you know? I mean, we end up doing something together, like, with the guys all together, but me and him by ourselves. So he used to call Larry the hog. So Larry hogs you. And then we started laughing about it. I said. I said, sometimes it's not. It's like it's not. You know what I said? It would have been a great storyline if Leon wasn't even real. Like, he was some figment of his imagination, like Larry's big bird. And I'm like, snuffle off against or something. Yeah, we were laughing at that. So one time, one day I was. And we just had this fun thing we did one time. We was in a Chateau Mamand, you know, so Richard goes. He would go there all the time. He would write there. He get the table in the corner. He says, always right at the Chateau Maman. That's my little home right there by myself in the corner. I just write all my material. And then one day I had to go there for audition one day. So I walk into the Chateau, my mom, and like, it's a step down kind of restaurant right there. So I walk in and I turn, looking around, like, had to wait for a little while because they told me, give them five minutes and they'll send me upstairs. And I look, look to the right and I see Richard Lewis all the way in the corner, Right? He's right. And he looks up because a while ago, like a year earlier, we had promised that we would get our wives together and have dinner together. And we kept saying, we're going to do dinner with the ladies. I said, yes, yes. We got to do it, we got to do it, we got to do it. And we were in front of our wives. So we're gonna do this dinner. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're gonna take the girls out. And then I walked in there and we just. I don't know, it went away. And then we never talked about it or we never brought it up again. I think we were waiting for each other to invite each other.
[92:28]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[92:29]
JB Smoove
And then I looked on the right. I saw him. He looked up, he saw me, and then just stood there for like three minutes looking at each other, staring at each other. And then he stands up. He stands up and he stands up and stands there looking at me. I'm looking at him. And slowly but surely I start to walk down the three stairs that go down into the restaurant. And he leaves around the table. And we walk slowly to the middle of the room. And people are looking at us. It's a crowded restaurant. I mean, tables are full. It's not people running around, but tables are full and people are like. People are looking at us right Walk real slow towards the middle of the room. And we walked to the middle of the room and damn near touch noses. And we were like, we start a full argument about who's supposed to call who and who's supposed to invite who to dinner with the ladies. And we the blame game for like five minutes. People were freaking cracking the hell up, man.
[93:25]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[93:25]
JB Smoove
And just watch this real moment between me and Richard. We were arguing about who said who. You said, you know, you said you would call me first. No, you said you call me first. Me and Tommy, man, we supposed to have this dinner with the ladies, man. And you never called me. Cause you said you called me and people were like, yo. Like, it was the scene, it was crazy. And we just started laughing and then we just hugged each other and people were like, oh my God, that was so funny.
[93:50]
Chris Distefano
That's amazing. And it was like an unspoken improv moment. You didn't plan that. You just knew.
[93:55]
JB Smoove
Crazy idiots in the wild. You know what I mean?
[93:58]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[93:58]
JB Smoove
Idiots in the wild.
[93:59]
Chris Distefano
It's beautiful.
[94:00]
JB Smoove
Yeah, man. So we, you know, Richard Lewis was the best, man. No, man, we lost, man. That's a legend right there, man. When we lost Bob Einstein, Super Dave. Yeah, we lost Richard, man. I was like, wow, man. And these are Larry. I realize these are Larry's real friends, man.
[94:19]
Chris Distefano
For years.
[94:20]
JB Smoove
This is real Richard Lewis. Him and Richard were born in the same hospital. They were in camp together.
[94:26]
Chris Distefano
They knew each other before they were in comedy.
[94:28]
JB Smoove
They realized real friends.
[94:30]
Chris Distefano
Oh, I didn't know that.
[94:32]
JB Smoove
Real friends.
[94:33]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[94:33]
JB Smoove
Larry surrounds himself with people like that, man. And it's really amazing how old school cats did it, man. And Richard was Richard Legend. I used to work at a perfume company for my first. My first job I ever had was in a perfume company. And, man, I used to have. So isn't that weird? I used to be a perfumer as a 15, 16 year old kid. That's why. Wild.
[95:00]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[95:01]
JB Smoove
That's. Wow.
[95:01]
Chris Distefano
That's crazy.
[95:02]
JB Smoove
After school job, perfumery.
[95:04]
Chris Distefano
Wow.
[95:05]
JB Smoove
Like a little ray marauder.
[95:07]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[95:08]
JB Smoove
75 years old. He was like. He must have been like 4ft 5.
[95:11]
Chris Distefano
Wow.
[95:12]
JB Smoove
Little guy, man. Ray Marauder.
[95:14]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[95:14]
JB Smoove
Italiano. Yeah. Ray Marauder, man. And man. And he taught me how to make perfumes and everything. Everything. Anything involved in perfume. I worked in five departments. Wow. I would help him mix, I would help. I would do shipping, I would do filling bottles, I would do labeling. I would do everything, man. Wow. Like, literally, I was a 16 year old kid, man, who knew how to perfume, who knew how to make Perfume.
[95:40]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[95:40]
JB Smoove
Was that crazy?
[95:41]
Chris Distefano
That's wild.
[95:42]
JB Smoove
She's. Wow, man. So. So what was that Richard Lewis he said?
[95:49]
Chris Distefano
When I was a kid?
[95:50]
JB Smoove
Oh, oh, oh. So Bob Einstein and Richard Lewis, man. When I was a kid. So when I would be working to keep the time go by, because to make those boxes, you know, the little boxes that the perfect goes in, you gotta. You. You almost can't be yourself. You gotta be a robot then, right? Cause you gotta keep doing the same boxes over and over again. Keep making little boxes. Keep making little boxes. And I would have Howard Stern show on, and, man, I just listened to Richard Lewis on the Stern show, and, man, I just be crying. I just think that was the funniest damn appearances, man. And I fell in love with this dude. And it's. I just say that because sometimes you end up meeting your heroes. Sure. And you wanna. You. You want your heroes to be your heroes, man. And you don't know their true character. You don't know them outside of their profession. So it always. People always say, be careful when you meet your. Your heroes because they might disappoint you. Right. But let me tell you something. Super Dave, Bob Einstein, Richard Lewis icons, man, and freaking. The people who you hope they would be, they were. And I'm tell you, man, that's character that I had number utmost respect, man, and love for Richard Lewis, man. And Bob Einstein, man. Those two dudes. When I tell you Bob Einstein used to tell me stories. Holy. I'm talking about. People forget. He wasn't just Super Dave. This guy was a accomplished writer on so many TV shows. He had a story for everything. He would tell me stories. I was sitting next to him in like, one of the. One of the chairs. He's just like, I tell you the story about the. I'm like, oh, my God, please tell me. And he was telling me stories, man. I'm, like, fascinated by that era. Wow. That era of tv. He over. Sanford Son, Smothers Brothers, all this. All this stuff, man. Wow, man. He had so many red flock, Red Fox stories, man. Oh, my God, man.
[97:43]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[97:43]
JB Smoove
He used to have me in tears.
[97:45]
Chris Distefano
That's awesome.
[97:45]
JB Smoove
I walk away. I said, man, that did that, sir, did not happen. Oh, it did happen.
[97:53]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[97:54]
JB Smoove
I said, what? And Richard, man. Me and Richard, man, we just became great friends.
[98:01]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[98:01]
JB Smoove
This is how great Richard Lewis is. It's crazy. So after I got Curb, right. I remember this because. Okay. After. Because what happens is this. I never. I never, like, watched Curb the before it airs. I never wanted to see it before. It airs. Cause sometimes, you know, you gotta do a line here and there. But a lot of times, everybody, they'll go screen them and they'll watch all the episodes, right? And I never wanted to see them. Cause I wanted to watch the show as a fan like everybody else. I would want to sit there with my wife and watch the episodes of My Friends and watch Curve for real and not know what happened already, right? So I would always want to watch it with everybody else. So I. I always didn't watch it. So when, so when. So when I got on the show, Richard, he saw the episodes, right? And then it came on air and it started airing. Let me tell you something. Richard called me. He got my number from. From Larry and he called me on the phone. And when I tell you, Richard talked to me for two hours. Wow. He called me and just said, jb, look, we don't get a chance to hang out a lot on the set, but let me tell you something. And Larry hogging. He hogs you. We all say, why don't we have any scenes with jb, you know, storyline or whatever? He said, but let me just call. I just want to call you and tell you this. He said, you know, when I call you, I call you Jimi Hendrix. I said, jimi Hendrix? He said, you know Jimi Hendrix? I said, yeah, I know Jimi Hendrix. Jimi Hendrix would go on stage and he would literally do Jimmy and he would blow people away. Did you mean he's opened up for all Everybody. Rolling Stones, anybody you could think of. Jimmy Hendrix opened up for them and Jimmy Hendrix would just murder. And everybody said, holy. Just the kid. Jimi Hendrix is amazing, right? He said, I'm gonna call you Jimi Hendrix, jb. He said, man, I just watched the whole season. He said, you a idiot. You're a idiot, but you're fucking brilliant. I said, my heart just like started like, yo, I almost fucking cried, right? Cause I felt like. I said, wow. I said, richard, I don't think you understand. I used to fucking listen to you while I fucking was working in a perfume company at 17, 18 years old. Yeah, 15, 16, 17. My first after school job. And I was fucking happy. I was listening to you all the time on every interview you ever did. I just fucking want to see you. I said, to get a chance to work with my heroes. It's unbelievable. Unbelievable opportunity to work with my hero. I was a Curb fan before I got on a show. Like, I literally said, I would love to be on this show one day. My wife told me, you're going to be on that show, one day I could see you and Larry together and all this had to happen. And I ended up on that damn show, ended up coming to la. A friend passed away. I came to la. And one day I was here in one day I was in la. And one day I got curved. She was crazy. Wow. The show I dreamed of being on. And Richard Lewis called me, and I'm telling you, he broke down every scene. And that's how in tune and smart this dude was, right? He appreciates your take on things. He appreciate how you played something he named every fucking scene. And I just sat there like this with the phone in my hand, like, holy. Richard Lewis is on the fucking phone telling me how much he fucking loves my performance on Curb. Wow. And I took that with me, man.
[102:04]
Chris Distefano
Hell yeah.
[102:05]
JB Smoove
I said, wow. And two. No, at least two hours we laughed and we talked about everything. It was like we went to acting school together. Just like, we really broke down. We just broke down the whole season, but we broke down and I was just giving him how much love and he deserved, man. That dude was really genuine, genuinely amazing. Amazing dude, man. Yeah, that was a hard one to lose, man. That's. That's Larry's good, good old friend, man. And you could tell something like that affects you. Of course, I knew it affected Larry, man, because I remember when he was sick, he missed a season. You know, they would bring him back, he would try to do some stuff, but he was sick for a long time. But, man, let me tell you, it's so. And I say that in a. In a wide brushstroke is you just gotta be real, you gotta be true, you know, because you don't know what curveballs are gonna get thrown at you. It could be your health, it could be anything.
[103:05]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[103:06]
JB Smoove
We don't know, right? So just seeing that, man, and seeing, you know, Larry Lewis, one of his great friends, man, like that, and, you know, and these guys the same age. Yeah. And you look at it like, man, it makes you think about. It makes you think about your own mortality when you're someone. The same agents you work with, you love, you love, you work forever together, right? It makes you think about things, man. You can't. Cannot be affected by it, of course, like that. Especially when it's your buddy like that, man. But, man, you know, that dude was something else, man. That dude was, man, he was good. He was good.
[103:43]
Chris Distefano
He was awesome.
[103:43]
JB Smoove
He was awesome.
[103:44]
Chris Distefano
Legend.
[103:45]
JB Smoove
And that's what I mean, man. You gotta. You gotta show up, man.
[103:49]
Chris Distefano
That's it.
[103:49]
JB Smoove
How they how they meet you is how they gotta remember you. So think. I tell people all the time, that's the stuff to put in your pocket.
[103:56]
Chris Distefano
That's what 90% of this game is just showing up.
[103:58]
JB Smoove
Showing up, man.
[103:59]
Chris Distefano
Show up, baby.
[104:00]
JB Smoove
Yeah.
[104:00]
Chris Distefano
All right.
[104:01]
JB Smoove
Good luck, man.
[104:02]
Chris Distefano
That's it, baby. We did it. Go see JB Smooth. Thursday, Town Hall, New York Comedy Festival. What else, jb? Where else can people find you? What's going on?
[104:10]
JB Smoove
We got Buy it now on Amazon. We just dropped this amazing show, man. I'm the host of this Amazon show. Entrepreneurs come on the show. They pitch for 90 seconds to a captive 100 of real consumers. They get a chance to move on. If they get 10 or more, they move on to our panel of amazing, amazing, amazing, amazing celebrity entrepreneurs, which include Gwyneth Paltrow, Jimmy Seminole from the Ring Doorbell, Anthony Anderson and Tabitha Brown, and Christian Soriano, Tony Hawk. This is. This is real, man. It's a great show. And they move on from our celebrity. And one Amazon exec is on the panel so they can move on from this amazing audience. Move on. Two of those celebrity judges have got to say, we love your product and we want to see you in the Buy it now store. Buy it now store is an exclusive store on Amazon where you go right in. And I always say it's a win, win, win situation. People say, win, win, but this is a win, win, win situation. You get a chance to have your product judged by 100 real consumers. You get a chance to talk to some amazing entrepreneurs who have done it and who are doing it well right now. Billionaires on their own, their status. And you get a chance to be seen by millions of people at the same time. So even if your product doesn't make it into the Buy it now store, you have been seen. Your product has been seen. And I tell everyone who comes on the show I talked about earlier, I say, because I give them advice, because I missed the host. I don't have a horse in this race. I just want them to do their best.
[105:43]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[105:44]
JB Smoove
I say so yourself too, now.
[105:46]
Chris Distefano
Yeah.
[105:47]
JB Smoove
So yourself and your product.
[105:48]
Chris Distefano
Yep.
[105:49]
JB Smoove
And when they and every last one who posted online the show, we had three episodes air two weeks ago. We had one air last week. Every Wednesday. We are part of the game show block on Amazon. And, yeah, the feedback I'm getting from them is, thank you, JB Smooth, for calming me down, making me relax, and making me do the best pitch I could do.
[106:09]
Chris Distefano
Yeah. Love it, man. That's it. J.P. the king.
[106:13]
JB Smoove
Let's go.