Michael Rapaport | Club Random with Bill Maher

Summary

Club Random with Bill Maher – Michael Rapaport

Episode Air Date: November 3, 2025
Guests: Bill Maher (host), Michael Rapaport (guest)
Theme: Unfiltered discussions on comedy, pop culture, the evolution of television, politics, and personal stories—delivered with both humor and candor, in the classic Club Random “anything but politics” spirit.

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Overview

In this animated episode, Bill Maher sits down with actor and comedian Michael Rapaport for an energetic and wide-ranging conversation that flows from the glory days of stand-up comedy, to the state of late-night TV; from cancel culture and modern “wokeness,” to intensely personal takes on crime in New York City and the effect of politics on daily life. Both share unvarnished opinions, behind-the-scenes anecdotes, and plenty of sharp humor, with a particular focus on how culture and society have changed over the years.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Comedy & “Stickman” Hall of Fame

[02:15–05:20]

• Bill and Michael reminisce about the old days at the Improv and discuss legacy comedy “dynasties.”
• Bill playfully dubs Michael "the Pauly Shore of the Improv,” adding, “But did better... You’ve had a very estimable movie career.”
• There’s a comedic deep-dive into the enduring appeal of the “dumb guy buddy” comedies of the ’90s and early 2000s, referencing Pauly Shore, Bill & Ted, and Dumb and Dumber.

“America could not get enough of pairs of dumbass guys.”
— Bill Maher [04:04]

2. R-Rated Comedy, Cancel Culture, and Shifting Tastes

[04:30–06:50]

• Michael laments how “R-rated comedies went out with cancel culture,” longing for the era of Judd Apatow and the Farrelly Brothers.
• Bill and Michael dissect how “woke” culture has impacted mainstream comedy.
• They discuss Peter Farrelly’s Green Book: “Woke shit on it... five, ten years ago they would have come all over it because it’s about racism... but it was directed by a white guy, so it had to be bad.” — Bill Maher [05:28]

3. TV and the Purpose of Late Night

[07:55–10:05]

• Michael observes how late-night TV has become too politicized and stimulating, arguing it should return to its old purpose: “lull me to sleep, jokes, light jokes, skits and goofy shit.”
• Bill describes the business mechanics of network late night and how audiences simply “go to sleep”—half dropping off each half-hour after 11pm [09:00–10:22].

4. The Jimmy Kimmel-Charlie Kirk Controversy

[10:27–14:38]

• Bill gives a candid breakdown of supporting Kimmel amidst controversy: “I was adamant that he has the right to be wrong.” [10:47]
• Emphasizes much political violence “isn’t about politics... they’re nihilists.”
• Both agree: finger-pointing days after tragedies is wrong, and that Kimmel wasn’t attacking Kirk directly.

“He wasn’t making fun of Charlie Kirk. He was making jokes at MAGA’s expense. That’s very different... abhorrent but not illegal.”
— Bill Maher [13:59]

5. The NYC Mayoral Race and Urban Crime

[14:38–16:09, 59:23–60:23]

• Michael goes on a passionate rant (and gets personal) about how safety and crime in NYC are real, apolitical concerns—“My wife... has been groped in Times Square, had a fucking shoe thrown at her, been called the N word, and got proposed to on the train by a homeless person all between 11am and 3pm...”
• Bill acknowledges: “What you’re expressing is something that transcends party, I think, and politics.” [63:09]
• Michael decries leniency for repeat offenders, especially when it hits “home.”

6. Policing, Justice, and Liberal Guilt

[69:51–72:30]

• Bill delivers a nuanced take: “You do need the cops. Civilization is a mile wide and an inch thick. If you don’t keep the shit to shoe level, it goes sideways real fast.” [69:51]
• Both grapple with balancing justice and compassion with the harsh realities faced in big cities.

7. Assimilation, Immigration, and “Melting Pot” Values

[73:04–76:57]

• The conversation turns to the difference between immigrants seeking assimilation and those attempting to change host culture values, focusing on shifts in Britain and the U.S.
• “Government was invented as a trade off for security... If they can’t do job one, making you feel safe, then they’re useless.” — Bill Maher [71:44]

8. Personal Anecdotes on Dating, Fame, and Social Change

[36:47–46:26]

• Bill and Michael swap stories of Hollywood dating, discuss how social media killed the “player” lifestyle, and marvel at NBA athletes maintaining affairs in the age of constant surveillance.
• Michael: “Athletes have some sort of underground railroad... I don’t know how they do it.” [42:42]
• Michael tells stories about one-upmanship when dating women who also dated Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen.

9. The “Stickman” and Hollywood’s Offbeat Legends

[51:26–55:47]

• Extended riff on the legendary womanizers (“stickmen”, “coxmen”) of entertainment: Milton Berle, George Clooney, even Burgess Meredith!
• Michael, quoting Stallone: “Burgess Meredith was an incredible coxman.” [52:10]

10. The Godfather Trilogy—and the Art of Acting

[77:17–88:10]

• Detailed, affectionate breakdown of The Godfather movies; why Part III was superfluous but entertaining.
• Bill: “The cycle of Michael Corleone is completed at the end of two... This is just a money grab.” [77:58–79:14]
• Who’s the “Dr. J and Jordan” of acting? Michael draws comparisons between Brando/Newman/Dean and De Niro.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Cancel Culture:
  “People would be forced to apologize... and then the apology itself was not good enough. It was so Soviet.” — Bill Maher [27:52]
• On Social Media & Privacy:
  “Now that would be almost impossible... there’s detectives on the Internet. They figure out everything.” — Michael Rapaport [40:20]
• On Crime in NYC:
  “My wife in the last two, three years, has been groped in Times Square, had a fucking shoe thrown at her, been called the N word, and got proposed to on the train by a homeless person all between 11am and 3pm...” — Michael Rapaport [59:27]
• On Assimilation:
  “It used to be, we’re here and we’re going to help. We're here to be like you. That’s not always the attitude of today’s immigrants.” — Bill Maher [75:04]
• On Police & Civilization:
  “Civilization is a mile wide and an inch thick. If you don’t keep the shit to shoe level, it goes sideways real fast.” — Bill Maher [69:51]
• On The Godfather III:
  “Not a necessary movie, just an entertaining one.” — Bill Maher [77:27]
• On Asses and J.Lo:
  “She brought the fat ass... She changed the game.” — Michael Rapaport [82:31]
• On Respect for Acting:
  “He took what Marlon Brando was doing, Paul Newman, James Dean... and took it to another level, what De Niro was doing.” — Michael Rapaport [83:58]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 02:15: Improv legacy and “dumb guy” comedy
• 04:30: R-rated comedy and cancel culture
• 07:55: Late night TV’s changing purpose
• 10:27: Breakdown of Kimmel-Charlie Kirk controversy
• 14:38: NYC politics and crime
• 36:47: Dating, fame, social media
• 51:26: Stickman/Coxman legends
• 59:27: Michael’s rant on NYC safety and “wife story”
• 69:51: The necessity and frailty of policing
• 73:04: Immigration, assimilation, and Britain
• 77:17: Godfather trilogy deep dive
• 82:31–83:14: J.Lo and culture change
• 87:02: Inside the acting process

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Final Thoughts

This episode of Club Random exemplifies Bill Maher’s signature blend of irreverent humor, pop-culture nostalgia, and social critique—anchored by Michael Rapaport’s equally raw, personal energy. The meandering yet pointed conversation is as much a celebration of old-school comedy and film as it is a critique of the uneasy, hyperconnected, and “woke” present.

If you want fast takes, legendary stories, and real talk on everything “but politics”—while still getting some politics—this episode delivers.

Transcript

[Bill Maher]

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[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah, that's good.

[Bill Maher]

And I was like, whoa, I cannot put Nicole Kidman through this. No, I'm kidding.

[Mark Lano]

Random was a great stick man.

[Bill Maher]

I just want to have another reason to use the wor. Stickman. It's a great word. Never used and never heard, but of course. I love. How are you?

[Mark Lano]

Good to see you, man.

[Bill Maher]

I haven't seen you since the improv.

[Mark Lano]

I know.

[Bill Maher]

Nice to see you all the time. In my improv days and politically incorrect days. Yeah. But I didn't see you there.

[Mark Lano]

I mean, when.

[Bill Maher]

When? I mean, because you were. What were you. I was trying to figure this out. Joanne and Mark are your. Not your real parents?

[Mark Lano]

No. Claudia, your sister, is my half sister.

[Bill Maher]

Half sister.

[Mark Lano]

Joanne was married to my father before I was born.

[Bill Maher]

Okay. This is Mark Lano, who was the partner of the Bud Friedman. So they owned the Improv together?

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

So you were like scion of the improv dynasty. Yes, and when I was a kid. You're the Pauly Shore of the improv?

[Mark Lano]

Pretty much. Pretty much.

[Bill Maher]

But did better.

[Mark Lano]

No disrespect to Paulie, but You.

[Bill Maher]

No disrespect, but you've had a very estimable movie career. Paulie had some huge hit movies. Let's not Paulie.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, the wees, man. The MTV days are iconic.

[Bill Maher]

To you, perhaps. Not to. I'm a different generation.

[Mark Lano]

But what he was doing was.

[Bill Maher]

He was Adam Sandler level. But not for too long. No, there was a. He had a. But. Look, in show business, very few things last a long time. Knock wood. I've been. Been on 33 years. So like crazy. Crazy. Yeah, but. But that's. That's a rarity. But no, he had. He had a huge. What were the movies? Like? One was an army movie.

[Mark Lano]

Paulie's.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. They reminded me of like Abbott and Costello movies.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah.

[Bill Maher]

Go into the army.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah. It was. It was like just throw him in anything.

[Bill Maher]

But.

[Mark Lano]

But he was, you know, Paulie, you know.

[Bill Maher]

Biosphere. Wasn't that one where they went to a biosphere and there's always hot chicks? I mean, they were. It was the E. Like so many like dumb guy. Like Beavis and Butthead and Ted and. What's Ted and Keanu Reeves's. You know, Bill and Ted. Bill and Ted and dumb and Dumber. Like America could not get enough.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

Of pairs of dumbass guys.

[Mark Lano]

How could you team up? Like what. What? Team them up like that?

[Bill Maher]

Yeah, that's.

[Mark Lano]

They should make movies like that now because they're simple, they're cheap and you know, they seem like those kinds of like simple, cheap, dumb comedies.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. I mean the R rated comedy, they just. They, they Naked Gun.

[Mark Lano]

They it up. They comedy up.

[Bill Maher]

How do you feel about it?

[Mark Lano]

No, the naked. The Naked Gun. I liked the. The remake. The Liam Neeson.

[Bill Maher]

Right.

[Mark Lano]

But the. The R rated comedy went out with cancel culture.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. Yeah, but. But don't you think there's a different vibe now? Aren't we into a different. I thought when we were. I thought the vibe. Vibe is different.

[Mark Lano]

I don't think the vibe is different.

[Bill Maher]

You don't?

[Mark Lano]

I think some.

[Bill Maher]

You're right. Woke is not dead.

[Mark Lano]

It ain't dead. And you. Every little move you make, every step you take, if you screw up, they'll jump on you. And we all love all those R rated comedies. All the Judd comedies, all the Seth Rogen comedies, all the Old School and the Will and they won't make them Farrelly brothers. Awesome.

[Bill Maher]

You know, which. Very politically incorrect.

[Mark Lano]

Yep.

[Bill Maher]

Except for the one I so love. I just watched it again. The Oscar foam green book.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

That Peter Farrelly made.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

Which is not at all like his. That's an adult movie. I think it won the Oscar.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, it won something.

[Bill Maher]

And then the woke shit on it, because it was. It's a movie that they should love that five years ago, 10 years ago, they would have, like, come all over it because it's about racism and has all the right. And, you know, the black guy is way smarter than the white guy. It's like everything you should love about it as a liberal, but it was directed by a white guy, so it had to be bad. You know, like, they didn't all say that, but that's definitely why the New York Times said that they're doing a.

[Mark Lano]

Movie now that I wanted to be in, but there really was nothing. They're doing a movie called I Play Rocky, about the making of Rocky. So there's an actor playing Sylvester Stallone before he's Rocky. And that whole story of how he.

[Bill Maher]

Sold the script, how he held onto the script when he was living, like, in his car, and they were offering him $300,000 for someone else to play it. Imagine the balls to say, you know what? I'm destitute. And I'm still gonna hold out for me playing this part.

[Mark Lano]

It's like a Rocky story in the Rocky movie.

[Bill Maher]

That's better than the Rocky story.

[Mark Lano]

And the script, I was. Cause that's my movie. So I read that script, and I was like, holy shit. And they were like, you know, they're in the scenes, and there's a whole relationship with his father. Cause did you see the documentary, the Stallone documentary on Netflix? It's a lot of that stuff that he revealed about the dysfunction with his father and the sort of wanting the.

[Bill Maher]

I love him. I'm watching. I'm almost done with all of Tulsa King. Have you watched Tulsa? Of course.

[Mark Lano]

Of course.

[Bill Maher]

Direct. It's definitely a ripoff of that. Linda. What the f. I never get the name of it. The one Stevie Van Zandt did. I think it was the first series on Netflix, and it's about a Mafia guy who goes, he's a fish out of water.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

In that case, Sweden. In this case, Tulsa. Tulsa, yes. But it's a great. You know, fish out of water movies.

[Mark Lano]

Are great, and it's simple.

[Bill Maher]

It's. It's basic. It's a perfect pairing, Stallone and Tyler Sheridan, because. Not that he writes every word of it. He didn't even put his name on the. He puts his name on so many scripts. I'm like, this guy could not even be up this many hours Writing this many scripts, but it's his style and it's, you know, and Stallone, these guys, you know, it's perfect for before you go to bed because, you know, is it gonna challenge you? No. And I don't want to be challenged before I go to bed. I want to watch tv.

[Mark Lano]

I agree. I totally agree.

[Bill Maher]

Not always, but like, sometimes I don't.

[Mark Lano]

Want to be challenged before I go to bed. I don't want to be provoked. Especially now. You know, I was talking to your producers about like the late night stuff and because I was saying, you know, because I had saw Woody Allen on the, on the chair and I was like, Woody sat in this chair and all this stuff and you know, the Kimmel. Kimmel and all that stuff. For me, like the late night stuff is changed so much. Even since when I first met you, like the 80s and the 90s, Carson, they lull you to sleep night and day. But now I think you should even go back to lulling people to sleep even more. Because we're on our phone all day, we're stimulated all day, we're arguing all day. We're on the, you know, we're watching the news all day. So even more so now, late night TV lull me to sleep. We've, we don't need any provocative shit. We've been provoked all day. We need, you know, jokes, light jokes, skits and goofy shit and put me to sleep. And that, that's why I think that the, those guys on, you know, the politics at night, we don't need it. We've seen it all day.

[Bill Maher]

I remember I was in a meeting when I first got Politically Incorrect and I'm, you know, fairly young and never had my own show and late night, and they're explaining me some of the things about late night and I said such a stupid thing because they said, you know, it depends a lot on when you're on a network. I was on abc, Comedy Central, then ABC for six years. And of course you have to. Each individual market in the country has the option to show you the network. It's a network show which they offer to their stations, to their affiliates. What they call affiliate. They're affiliated stations. There's like 200 of them around the country. Now. The network itself owns the big ones. They own Chicago and New York and la, but they don't own Tulsa, right? There's a guy in Tulsa, and if he wants to put on Politically Incorrect, he will. And if he wants to put on reruns of Dynamite, right, He'll do that, right? Or he can put it on when it's on a time when it's not really supposed to be on. It was supposed to be on after Nightline, right? So they're explaining all. And the guy says, but, you know, after 11 o' clock every half hour, you. You lose half the audience. And I said, oh, my God, why? And he went, because they go to sleep. What do you. What do you think? We lose it. But it's true. At 11, you have 50 million people watching. At 11:30 you have 25 million.

[Mark Lano]

Right?

[Bill Maher]

And at midnight you have 12.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

At 12:30 you have clients. People go to sleep.

[Mark Lano]

What was your take on the whole thing? Now that the dust is clear? Because, you know, as a comedian, as a shit talker, as a provocateur and somebody who's in the business of television and, you know, all these people, like, what was your sort of take on that situation? Now that the dust is cleared, I feel like I'm interviewing you.

[Bill Maher]

You can. It's not an interview. You know, I was forthright on my show about supporting Jimmy, also saying I didn't agree with what he said because it was just wrong. I agree. I was very adamant that he has the right to be wrong. Two points I really wanted to make. One, he wasn't attacking Charlie Kirk. There was no insult of Charlie Kirk, which is what they're all riled up about. He was saying the guy who shot him was probably on your Team maga. I said, that's bullshit. We don't know these. And I did a whole editorial about the fact that most of these killers of the recent variety, you go through their manifestos and shit. It's not even about politics. They're nihilists. They don't believe in anything. They could be. Look, I mean, was he probably rebelling against his MAGA family? Probably. That's more likely. So what Jimmy said was just not to me tracking accurately. To me, it's a guy who, you know, and this is like, Jimmy apparently doesn't like me too much anymore because he thanked everybody but me. And I was adamant, adamant about supporting him that week and the next week. Like I said, I can't lie and say I think what he said was accurate. But I was adamant that he shouldn't be thrown off the air. He did a great show. I went on and on, okay. You know, my problem with hosts, him and hosts like that, quite frankly, they're all quite similar in this regard is that they're ideologically captured by one side. It's just not what I do or what I'm doing. And so. And there's a reason why half the country feels insulted by them and has turned off to them because it's just one very predictable point of view. And this proves that it's often not completely accurate because that was not really a smart thing to say that this guy who shot Charlie Kirk was on the MAGA team, because that's just something that the Blue sky crowd told themselves. And if you're in that, if you're that far in the bubble where you don't really see the both sides and you don't really see the other completely, you're going to believe that. You're going to believe that Blue sky point of view. Oh, a bad thing happened. It must be coming from the other team.

[Mark Lano]

And for me, like it was four days afterwards. And as a public person of any level, to make light point fingers.

[Bill Maher]

Who.

[Mark Lano]

It's a sick person, right? Sick person. Sick person. Sick person. That's it. Because all of us, especially in this day and age, you know, should be humbled by that because that could be anybody. That could be anybody in this day and age. Because you don't know how you're provoking people and all that stuff. And to even make light of it. Four days after point fingers. Joke. Not a joke, Mag. No. It shouldn't be discussed. It was four days afterwards. And I like Jimmy too, but I just didn't.

[Bill Maher]

Well, I don't think.

[Mark Lano]

I don't think that's funny at all.

[Bill Maher]

Again, way, let's be clear. Like I said at the beginning of this, he wasn't making fun of Charlie Kirk. He was make. He was making jokes at maga's expense. Right. That's very different. And even if he was, that would be abhorrent. And the people who did it. Abhorrent, but not illegal.

[Mark Lano]

No, I get it.

[Bill Maher]

I tried it and they tried to make it illegal. They basically said we have a blasphemy law in this country. That's not right either. This isn't Pakistan.

[Mark Lano]

I agree.

[Bill Maher]

And he's not the Prophet Muhammad.

[Mark Lano]

I agree.

[Bill Maher]

Peace and blessings be upon him.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah, right. You got to say that.

[Bill Maher]

So you must be in love with the new mayor that you're going to have. I can only imagine what you've been ranting about that guy.

[Mark Lano]

I can't even believe that he is the front runner to become the mayor of New York City right now.

[Bill Maher]

Well, you better get used to it.

[Mark Lano]

You think? I think. I think. I feel like right now there's a Little bit of energy towards Cuomo winning. Curtis has to drop out, and I feel like there's a chance. I don't think it's a landslide. He's acting like he's the mayor. He's walking around like he's won this thing already. And every day that goes by and he's talking to the press every single day, he's getting more and more bold and more and more honest with the shit that he's saying. And it's offensive.

[Bill Maher]

Well, no, I think quite the opposite. I think he's walking back some of the things. He needs to walk back some of the things. Like, for a long time, they were trying to get him to say something about support. I don't remember what his original comment was, but he certainly did not condemn the idea or the phrase globalize the intifad. Right. Okay. So I think he has walked that back.

[Mark Lano]

He hasn't walked that back specifically. And today.

[Bill Maher]

Well, he walk it back in the.

[Mark Lano]

Way a politician, he double talks sideways with that smiley bullshit.

[Bill Maher]

Well, that's called being apologists.

[Mark Lano]

But he's got it down.

[Bill Maher]

So do many politicians. I know he's not that different in that respect.

[Mark Lano]

I know he was asked, do you. Are you for Hamas laying down their guns? The lady asked him that, are you for Hamas laying down their guns? And he's like, fucking talking about, like, the sky is green and blue and da, da, da. But you're clear on the fact that you will support Bibi Netanyahu being arrested if he comes to New York, but you won't say that Hamas, yes, should lay down their guns. This guy is so full of fucking shit. He's so full of fucking shit. It's baffling to me that we've gotten this far, but it's. This is where we are. He is so full of shit. And I don't.

[Bill Maher]

You.

[Mark Lano]

When you interview somebody, a politician, and you ask them a straight question like that, do you want Hamas to lay down their guns and they don't give you an answer, don't you think you should be like, you're not answering the question?

[Bill Maher]

I do. That's what I do. That's why so many people won't do my show. That's why the Clintons have never been on my show. That's why AOC and I invite these people all the time, every week. You know, this. I could go down the. Kamala Harris never did the show. I mean, these are people. And I voted for her. You know, these are people who should not be. It took me Eight years to get Obama to do the show and a petition. These are people who should do my show. But yes, I'm not. Katie Porter was in the news because she was angry at a reporter for asking a follow up question. And my reaction was, right, they should do that more.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

They don't ask follow up questions because they just smile and nod and go on to the next one because they're not a lot of the, some of them are, of course, very seasoned and smart people in journalism. But there's a lot of people who are out of their depth. I'm not, never have been. My father was in news. It was in my blood when I was a kid. It was in my, it's my early, it's how I was as a comedian, mostly a political standup comedian. I'm not out of my depth. I know my shit. I don't have to look up, you know, whether Iran is Sunni or Shiite.

[Mark Lano]

You know, Are you going to get him on your show, Mandami?

[Bill Maher]

Well, again we ask Zoron.

[Mark Lano]

Come on, Bill Maher. Well, go on, Bill Maher, Zoron the moron. Because when you get asked the questions, you're going to get a follow up question, Right? Well, that's probably that guy on his.

[Bill Maher]

Show that probably is not going to help.

[Mark Lano]

You don't think that's going to help.

[Bill Maher]

The way you phrased it? No. My guessing is that's not going to induce some. But look, I don't have to beg and I can't subpoena them.

[Mark Lano]

I don't think he's gonna. Cause he thinks he's gonna win. Why would he.

[Bill Maher]

Come on, we have already invited him every week. If it was gonna happen, it would have happened.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, he ain't coming on.

[Bill Maher]

Why would he come on?

[Mark Lano]

Things are going good. Exactly.

[Bill Maher]

Because I would ask the follow up question and I am not out of my depth and I do know what Iran is. Yeah. And every place in the Middle East. I love history and I know lots about the Middle east and I hope the peace plan here takes hold. You know, I see that like lots of people give Trump credit and I am one of them. But even like the Clintons came out and said, you know, lots of people who, you know, Fetterman, you can count on him to be honest. But I think even Schumer and I think the New York Times, Time magazine had a, you know, he didn't like the picture. I don't blame him. It was kind of a low blow picture. But the title on the front of the of Time magazine is like his big triumph or something.

[Mark Lano]

So 150%.

[Bill Maher]

And, you know, I mean, he knows me very well now and knows where I stand on lots of stuff he does that I do not like and no one should like. But when he does something right, I think it's. It is deranged Trump derangement syndrome. Not to give credit where credit is due. It's just the fact everybody tried to have the. No, things change. That's true. Maybe the time was just right. But I think. No, I think that the situation is in any way, in many ways, worse than it ever was. And he just tried a different way. You know, it's just. He's not a professional diplomat. We know that, but what is. And that it just worked better. I mean, like, everybody started. The real estate guys. Yeah, you know what? Real estate guys, you know, whatever, they got it done in a way. Now it's not done, but they just.

[Mark Lano]

Got those people home that are alive.

[Bill Maher]

Well, what they did was they, they, they. Here's how they changed the game. And this goes back to the first Trump administration. Instead of dealing with only the Palestinians, they said, let's just, you know, stop putting them at the center of this. Let's have Israel make deals with other countries. I mean, Palestine was never, actually, I hate to break it to you, some people who think otherwise, you know, the useful idiots on the college campuses wearing the keffiyehs. But it was never a political entity. There was never a separate country called Palestine. Okay. That was occupied. That's. That's not history. But there are other countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and Qatar and Bahrain and Morocco, and let's make a deal with the actual countries. Right. And they did that. Yep. And that's where they're going with this thing. Yep. And then the other countries will take it. Hopefully, what will happen is that the Arab countries will take it upon themselves to fix the Palestinian problem. More. Israel has never been able to have a partner with the Palestinians because it was always people like Hamas who just wanted to kill them. How do you negotiate with people whose negotiating position is you all die. You all die. That's how we. That's plan. Part of our Plan A.

[Mark Lano]

They don't want Israel to exist, period.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. From the river to the sea. What does that mean? It means we have it all and you either die or what? Move to Arizona? I mean, it's ridiculous. But you can partner with Saudi Arabia. Things are changing in that part of the world.

[Mark Lano]

It has to.

[Bill Maher]

Yes, it has. Well, it doesn't have to. It's been going on for centuries and centuries and centuries, and it will. Lots of stuff will go on. But, I mean, I also will say this about Trump, that is pretty interesting. Of course, he's beloved in Israel like nobody ever has been, for good reason. He did more for Israel than any other president. And he didn't play the silly game that the other presidents do like, well, we have to be even, Stephen, you know, maybe the, you know, who knows who's right? The people who treasure life or the people who treasure death. And he was like, you know, where would you live? Ramallah or Tel Aviv? You'd live in Tel Aviv. A society that resembles yours and has shared values. You know, not letting women be free to dress as they want and covering their faces and stuff. That's not our. That's not our values. Are you kidding? So he said, no, I'm with Israel, period. Let's see how this works out. I'm with Western values, right. I think democracy is better than theocracy. Now, we can also go into the discussion about how the horrible things he's actually doing to democracy in this country. But for this discussion, just about the Middle east, how about this? The Jews love him more than any president ever. And the Arabs do, too.

[Mark Lano]

Right?

[Bill Maher]

That's quite a hat trick. You gotta give it up for that one.

[Mark Lano]

Right?

[Bill Maher]

That's quite a trick that the Saudi Arabia, they all, you know, they kind of relate on a. You like gold everything. I like gold everything. And also Trump's. The Trump doctrine is really. We don't judge you. You know what, you cut the head off a journalist. Yeah, I wouldn't do it, but, you know, I'm just not going to judge. Now, you can say that's right or wrong, but here's the facts. Biden wouldn't talk to him for a year after that and then had to. He went over there and he fist bumped the guy who did it. The guy who said, we're not talking to you anymore because it's Saudi Arabia. You can't ignore them. They're the counterweight to Shiite Iran, and they are the people who have the oil. So you can't not deal.

[Mark Lano]

So, you know, again, it's a fucking miracle that he got those people home, the 20 people home.

[Bill Maher]

It's.

[Mark Lano]

It's unbelievable.

[Bill Maher]

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[Mark Lano]

Well, and I'll tell you something, as crass as I've been on him his.

[Bill Maher]

First term, but aside, but just on the Israel tip, I mean yes, people who can't give it up, you know, people who can't accept an apology in the peak woke period, it was one of the things that was so obnoxious about it was that people would be forced to apologize half the time for bullshit. You know, like Halloween costume level bullshit. And then the apology itself, it was not good enough. Was attacked.

[Mark Lano]

Right? The apology's not good enough.

[Bill Maher]

Never good enough.

[Mark Lano]

No. Did he Mean when he, he said I sincerely apologize. Was he sincere when he said I'm sincerely apologizing?

[Bill Maher]

It was just, it was so Soviet, you know, like you had to literally like do what they did in the Soviet Union. I would like to thank my accusers for pointing out what a piece of shit I am. I will do better in the. And you just want to like, for the people who wonder, you know, why did you turn on the left? I didn't turn on the left. They became something, part of them became something gross. And I just commented on it. Like I comment on everything. I just didn't ignore it like these other people do. I didn't change how I felt about the right and the horrible things they were doing. But I just. That kind of behavior, that kind of like moralistic smug is fucking ridiculous petty bullshit.

[Mark Lano]

It makes me sick.

[Bill Maher]

The bitches and snitches culture, the people who hate the bullying so much but wind up being the biggest bullies. There's something viscerally about that that's almost more aggravating than the stuff that I know intellectually is more dangerous on the right.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

But this kind of stuff just makes you want to.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, they need to start sticking motherfuckers back in the lockers. That's, that's. They gotta start doing that.

[Bill Maher]

It's such mean, girl.

[Mark Lano]

It's terrible.

[Bill Maher]

It's just. Yes.

[Mark Lano]

To judge the apology, to analyze the apology. The apology isn't good enough. You can't breathe. And it's, it's so bad. It's so bad. And you know, I mean I, I think apologizing, changing growth, all that is, is good, it should be commended.

[Bill Maher]

Not. I had Van Jones on the last show. I just found out the other day. Somebody said, oh, he's been getting ripped for that. I didn't even realize it. That's. I guess.

[Mark Lano]

Do you watch the show?

[Bill Maher]

I, I watched the show but see that's the thing. No one cared at the time. And I've been through these cases at the moment, right when I got canceled off ABC for what I said about the terrorists. Nobody cared at the time and nobody cared at the time or in the audience what Van said. It's just these people afterwards who live well, they live to find something.

[Mark Lano]

Well, your show Saturday is the day to like Saturday, you know, like with sports, you go espn, you watch the highlights. Saturday is to get the reaction on Twitter.

[Bill Maher]

Well, of course people do see it on Friday also, cuz it's on.

[Mark Lano]

But, but I'm saying the reaction. Well, the blow you're trending on Twitter every Saturday morning.

[Bill Maher]

What I'm saying is good. What I'm saying is that people. There are certain people, the kind we don't like, bro, who just live to find something. I always call them the is this something people. Is it. You know, Van Jones said, and he was making a joke, which was not in any way an expense or mocking the dead in Gaza. It was a comment on social media. And of course, you can purposely, purposely misinterpret. That's what happened to me when I said, we have been the cowards. You know, these people who attacked the building, they're not cowards, which is technically true. And certain conservatives, like Rush Limbaugh defended. He said, bill's right. You know what? They stayed with the suicide mission. They're not cowards. Right. You know, we're lobbing cruise missiles from a thousand miles away. You can pretend that I was criticizing the military, which is what they did, but they'd know better. That's called bad faith. And that's what they just did with Van. Bad faith. You know, that's not what he meant. Yeah. You know, it's not at their. But you. Doesn't matter. You can get the other useful idiots to believe it, and they do. And so I think he did have to apologize or something. But, I mean, you know, if. If I do something really terrible, I will apologize. And there's. You know, I'm a fan of apologies. It's a sign of growth and bigness and lots of other good things, but not for bullshit.

[Mark Lano]

I agree.

[Bill Maher]

If they. If anybody comes after me for. For that kind of stuff, and I just, like, you have to say you're sorry, and it's that level stupid. I'm just gonna go, nope. You know What? I've had 33 years on television. If this is what you want to throw me out for, fine. Right. I don't need any more money. Right.

[Mark Lano]

That's good.

[Bill Maher]

You know, and I'm just going to. I'm going to. I'm going to quote Michael Corleone in Godfather 2. Senator, you can have my answer now. My offer is this. Nothing. Not even the price of the gaming license, which I'd appreciate if you would put up personally.

[Mark Lano]

You pay for it, motherfucker.

[Bill Maher]

That would. I'll just say that and let that. They'll be like, what does that have to do. And then, like, beside two seconds, somebody will be like, no, that was from the Godfather. Right.

[Mark Lano]

And the guy will be back. That's a good way to go out. Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

That is a good way to go out. Yeah. Because when I was canceled.

[Mark Lano]

You ever have Diane Keaton?

[Bill Maher]

No, but I would have loved to.

[Mark Lano]

The late Great.

[Bill Maher]

What happened there? We don't know. Huh?

[Mark Lano]

I don't know.

[Bill Maher]

Boy, she kept it. Talk about packing a tight suitcase. No one. That's so like her, you know? Classy. Like, I'm not gonna burden anybody with it. One day they're just gonna open the paper and I'll be dead, and nobody will have. I won't have to endure their, like, stupid pity. That doesn't help. I won't have to endure their. Cause I wouldn't want that either. Like, if I'm on my way out, like, let's just not talk about it.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

Unless you have an actual solution.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

But, you know, just. I hope you. I don't give a shit about what you hope.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

You know, I hope it's just, like, the cheapest word. As soon as you get people, like, they write you an email or a text or even an old phone message, hey, I hope you're doing okay. I'm like, yeah, let's just assume that's your position.

[Mark Lano]

Right?

[Bill Maher]

You don't have to tell me this and leave it on my phone machine. Let's just assume that at all times. Because you're a friend. You hope I'm doing okay if that changes and you hope I don't leave that on the screen. Let me know when you.

[Mark Lano]

You hope I'm not doing well.

[Bill Maher]

Otherwise, it means really nothing to me, you know?

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

I hope I never get a message like this again because I just wasted 30 seconds of my life. That's true. You know, but she just was like, no, I'm not going to burden a soul. And you'll just find out when you find out.

[Mark Lano]

That's 79 is young.

[Bill Maher]

That's class. How old?

[Mark Lano]

79 is young to pass of, like, a health issue.

[Bill Maher]

I think it's not actuarially.

[Mark Lano]

Well, it's not young. It's like, my father's 93.

[Bill Maher]

Okay. But that's not actuarially the norm.

[Mark Lano]

What is the norm?

[Bill Maher]

79.

[Mark Lano]

That's it.

[Bill Maher]

I think that's exact. I have a feeling that is almost the exact age. And it's different for women and men. Women live longer.

[Mark Lano]

So 79's young.

[Bill Maher]

No, 70.

[Mark Lano]

Especially when you have seven sources. Like, you know, she obviously has resources to die. I just feel like 79 is, like, it's young to pass.

[Bill Maher]

It's all genes, bro.

[Mark Lano]

I know.

[Bill Maher]

Not all, but, like, obviously how you Treat yourself. Whether you stay away from drugs. Kids don't ever do that. But.

[Mark Lano]

Right, Listen to Bill.

[Bill Maher]

But it's a look, it's a mystery. It's a mystery why some people live and some people die and some people die young and some people get Parkinson's and some people don't. And I mean, it's just. You are always walking between the raindrops. I know. I know. You are always walking between the raindrops. I know. And all you can do is play the odds. You know, I look forward to these days so much. Not just because I can talk to somebody like you, who I normally wouldn't, and I'm having such a good time doing it, but because it's the one day I let myself have a drink. Oh, really?

[Mark Lano]

Just when you're doing a show?

[Bill Maher]

Basically, yeah. So it's like I'm like Pavlov's dog now. Like, it's like, book somebody.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, we need to do it into a club.

[Bill Maher]

Random.

[Mark Lano]

How many of them do you do a week?

[Bill Maher]

One.

[Mark Lano]

Just one. A week.

[Bill Maher]

Just one.

[Mark Lano]

You start doing two. Two or two drinks a week?

[Bill Maher]

Well, I might have two drinks during one taping, but that's it. The only time I'm really. I didn't ever even think about it otherwise, you know, it's just not where it's used to, you know, when I was, I don't know, even 40, even 50, you know, I would have, you know, I don't know, probably at least a couple of dozen drinks a week, you know. Cause I would go out. When you go out, you drink, right? Do you go out? You're married?

[Mark Lano]

I'm married. And I've never been the go outer and, you know, like, I'm like, never. Not like heavy duty. Like, you know, when I was younger, obviously, you know, 20s, 30s, go out. But it wasn't like all the time. Like, it would be like, if I did one night, maybe two nights a week, it'd be. That's like a lot. I just never. It's never been my.

[Bill Maher]

And what. What kind of a. Were you a guy who always wanted to, like, have a serious girlfriend or were you like a player?

[Mark Lano]

Well, when I was young, I wanted to have a serious girlfriend. And then I was like, oh, shit. Like, you know, like. But then also like, no oh, shit, what? Like, you know, like, once you have some pussy, you want more. Like, you know, you know, but. But. So it was. And also, like, I grew up in. It was kind of like the more the merrier. Like, like, it was so Much like a hip hop mentality. It's like, that's how like the, the music was part of that, like growing up in New York, like, that was like, part of like that.

[Bill Maher]

And also, you were a rising movie.

[Mark Lano]

Star in my 20s. Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You know, you had. You were in movies like, what's the. The one where blood is gurgling out of Tyra Banks face and I still want to have sex with her.

[Mark Lano]

Higher learning.

[Bill Maher]

Higher learning. Yeah, yeah, she's dying with the. Still hot.

[Mark Lano]

But I was, you know, when I was like in my 20s out here and like, you know, getting famous, I sort of shunned the way that, you know, and like actresses and all that stuff. Like, I thought it was like, I wanted to, like, I thought it was like, not cool to fuck around with actresses. And now I regret it. But you know, like, you think, like, oh, I could have been with this person. I could have been with that person, like in my 20s. And even, you know, when they were telling me that this was Drew Barrymore's old house, I remember being at a party on this property. And I remember, like, it was one of those nights where I was just like. I don't know, I thought I was like, you know, I was like. It was kind of like, I don't know, I just kind of looked. I didn't want to be like, cliche like that. Now I'm like, oh, I would love to be cliche like that.

[Bill Maher]

Well, I mean, first of all, dating actresses is cool, but like, a lot of things that are cool, it's just not worth it.

[Mark Lano]

Right?

[Bill Maher]

I mean, I know, of course, that's a sweeping statement. And I'm sure there are many lovely, wonderful actresses who are not a pain in the ass. I never met any of them. I mean, and it's not their fault. They're actresses. That's what they are. And therefore, first of all, they are often canceling because I got an audition tomorrow, you know, and you don't want.

[Mark Lano]

To get a relationship. She's in Spain shooting a movie or.

[Bill Maher]

She'S in Spain shooting a movie with Timothee Chalamet and then what? That's Ross too.

[Mark Lano]

But the 90s was an easier time to move around.

[Bill Maher]

Move around with girls. What do you mean?

[Mark Lano]

Like, if you were a player, you can move around. You can't do that now. I can't imagine being able. Like, why?

[Bill Maher]

Because of social media.

[Mark Lano]

Social media, cameras and phones. Like, you could skate around, right? Like, you could skate around LA easily and you could skate around New York easily.

[Bill Maher]

That's true.

[Mark Lano]

You could skate around wherever you were on location easily.

[Bill Maher]

That's true. When I was in the 90s. You're right. When I was dating like a slew of broads at once, I only had to worry about. And you know, I never lied to anybody, that no one was under the illusion that they were my girlfriend. So like. But of course, you know, people get close. Of course you get close. And you just. What you mentally, intellectually know is not maybe what you feel. So all I would have to avoid was being literally seen at the same place with the other girl. With some other. Yeah, another girl who I was dating. You're right. Now that would be almost impossible.

[Mark Lano]

Impossible, impossible. Because even if somebody else doesn't film them, you might film yourself or they might film, you know, themselves, or who the hell knows? Or, you know, it could be a. You know, there's like detectives on the Internet. You know, you could take a selfie and like, yo, that's so and so's arm in the back. And then like, yeah, that is. He's got a freckle on his hand. They figure out everything.

[Bill Maher]

Oh, you know, I was once, like at the beginning of a relationship, but.

[Mark Lano]

It was with an actress.

[Bill Maher]

No, it was starting to become, you know, a real relationship, but it was still very new and I was on the road and I, you know, very often when I was on the road, I stopped doing that finally this year. What great timing. I mean that. Because who would want to be out there with all the political violence and crazy people and it was just time, but you know, for years, and like, you know, the show ends at 10:00'. Clock. What am I gonna do? I'm not gonna go to a bar. I wasn't drinking much anymore and I don't want to be in a bar. Really. I'm certainly not gonna go to a club. I mean, it's too loud. I'm too old. Where am I gonna go? I'm gonna go to the strip club. Because it's, it's a. Not for anything. I never did anything weird in a strip club. I don't want to. It's just a chill atmosphere. Yes. I like naked women.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

And they're not prejudiced, ever against men who are older.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

Which as most of society is.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

So, you know, I would go there. Right. So why did I even bring that up?

[Mark Lano]

Oh, because about the phones.

[Bill Maher]

Oh, yeah.

[Mark Lano]

So like, you can't go to a strip club now.

[Bill Maher]

Well, I'm just saying I can, but I'm just saying this is many Years ago. And I was at the beginning of this relationship. Apropos to what you said about, you know, not being able to move around. And I was in a. It went to after, like, I wasn't even thinking twice about it. And within 10 minutes after I walked into the strip club, she texted me and said, you know, oh, I see. You're so like. It took 10 minutes for someone to drop a dime on me in someplace public. Twitter, I guess at the time or whatever. I'd be horrified and like. Yeah. So like to be. Feel like you're that under surveillance. Terrible. I am not. I've never been that kind of man who. I'm. I'm not a short leash man. Let's put it that way.

[Mark Lano]

You know, I don't know. I. Like I said, I don't know how they do it. You know, the athletes, they have some sort of underground railroad. No, that's for real. Like the NBA dudes, they have some. They have a system that they don't share.

[Bill Maher]

You're right.

[Mark Lano]

That works out. I don't know how the fuck they do it. I've heard some different things, but I heard there is an actual underground railroad of the NBA, NFL, and they move around and like they're getting passed through and everybody's moving and grooving because they're. They're the only ones that. And even they get caught up in shit. But there's a system that they have in place that. I don't know. I used to let. I. I used to date a. Date a girl. I dated a girl that.

[Bill Maher]

Why do you put quotes around date?

[Mark Lano]

Because I. I dated a girl that was dating Michael Jordan.

[Bill Maher]

Oh.

[Mark Lano]

And she told me and I was just so curious.

[Bill Maher]

I don't think she was dating Michael Jordan.

[Mark Lano]

Well, that's why I said quoting, because I was, I was dating her.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. Same way that you were dating her. She was fucking him.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, well, no, I was dating her too.

[Bill Maher]

I'm sure you were, but I'm just saying.

[Mark Lano]

No, what I'm saying I was, but I was so curious, like, how do you get to the destination spot? Like. And she was like, you go in a hotel and then you go down and like. And it was a whole, like, thing.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mark Lano]

Because I was like fast and that was 90s.

[Bill Maher]

Right. Well, he was married. That's. I mean, part of that is that you, you, it's, you know, you're trying to keep this right. You know, that's. That's part of it. But yes.

[Mark Lano]

And I'm sure that wasn't the only girl that he was dating.

[Bill Maher]

Oh, I, I know for a fact, I know for a fact it was.

[Mark Lano]

Not the only girl that he was dating.

[Bill Maher]

No, I, I, I remember a girl I knew who I really was dating, somebody who was very, very dear to me to this day. And at the time, you know who she was offered to and she was like, no, I know what that's going to be because she was not that kind of girl. But she knew. Exactly. But they definitely were trying to get her to be in the company of Mr. Jordan. And. Yeah, I mean, he was a dog. Let's be honest.

[Mark Lano]

It's Michael Jordan.

[Bill Maher]

He's Michael Jordan. But it must have been. How did you feel going hard to the hole with someone new?

[Mark Lano]

I took it as, I took it as a challenge. I was young. I took it as a challenge. I'm going to tell you something. Here's, I'm going to throw.

[Bill Maher]

Let's hope they weren't playing by Jordan rules because, you know, get that out of the lane you come down the lane with.

[Mark Lano]

Want me to tell you something true? No layups. No layups. This, this young girl, this young lady at the time, this is 30 years ago, she also dated Scottie Pippen. So I was like, wow. I mean, it's a beautiful, beautiful girl, but she, and I was, I was very fascinated by the whole thing because I was, this was when they were in their prime.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

They were playing and I was like, damn.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah, that's a Michael Jordan. That's a flex for you.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah. So I, I took it as a, I took it as a, you know, you wanted to show up. You wanted to, you wanted to do your best. Boy, boy, do you, you gotta show up.

[Bill Maher]

You, you don't want to pass on any weak. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[Mark Lano]

She's with the goat. A goat.

[Bill Maher]

But dating Pippen and Jordan at the same time, I think it was over an overlap.

[Mark Lano]

An overlap. And I don't think I was like a one and it was like a one and done and maybe a two and a half, you know, a couple of times with the other gentlemen.

[Bill Maher]

I'm not gonna say every girl I ever was with is the Virgin Mary. That's certainly far from true. But that would bother me. Like, that would bother me again.

[Mark Lano]

We were. When I say dating, I mean, I.

[Bill Maher]

Understand, but even that. Anyway.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, but I always wanted to show up, show and prove with this girl.

[Bill Maher]

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[Mark Lano]

We were returning home and one of the flight attendants asked Bronx if he wanted to see the flight deck and meet Kathy and Andrew.

[Bill Maher]

I got to sit in the driver's seat.

[Mark Lano]

I grew up in an aviation family.

[Bill Maher]

And seeing Bronx kind of reminded me.

[Mark Lano]

Of myself when I was that age. That's Andrew, a real United pilot. These small interactions can shape a kid's future.

[Bill Maher]

It felt like I was the captain.

[Mark Lano]

Allowing my son to see the flight deck will stick with us forever. That's how good leads the way. But I was young.

[Bill Maher]

Did you ever go out with any famous, like, starlets, like anyone we would.

[Mark Lano]

Know that would be like, nah, that's when I think about, like, like I think about, like, kind of situations that were sort of put in front of me. I thought it was like, not cool to go out with some of these girls that I could have went out with.

[Bill Maher]

Same way I could have gone out with some famous ladies. But I knew I couldn't be trusted to not go out with other ladies at the time. So it's one thing to go out with, you know, this girl and then she sees you out. It's another thing if you go out with somebody famous and then there's a picture of you with another girl because then that embarrasses the famous girl.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's good.

[Bill Maher]

And I was like, whoa, I cannot put Nicole Kidman through this. No, I'm kidding. It was not Nicole Kidman. We were. That's a. That's a joke. That's a joke. But, but yeah, so I thought, you know, better. You know the guy I always thought who did it, right? And he was like, not like the other guys in his league was George Clooney. Because other people, like Brad Pitt, you know, he's with Jennifer Aniston, then he's with Angelina Jolie. Okay. He likes a Listers, right? On his level. Clooney was always. Before he got married, it was always like the ring girl, the waitress from Vegas. Like, these are chicks I would go out with and they were hot. Because you know what? When you're with somebody, we don't really care what your credits are. You know, we just care if we're having a good time.

[Mark Lano]

Exactly.

[Bill Maher]

And, you know, a little humility just. And a little, you know, just old fashioned. We're just grooving.

[Mark Lano]

He was, he was a great stickman in his time. Clooney, Brad Pitt never. Brad Pitt never leaned into his stick man, his stickman prowess. He could, he, he could have.

[Bill Maher]

Pretty boys often don't.

[Mark Lano]

Leonardo's has. He has a building in the Stickman hall of fame.

[Bill Maher]

That's. That's true.

[Mark Lano]

But when you think about the great stick men of all Time. I mean, there are. Milton Burrow was stickman.

[Bill Maher]

Milton Burrow. Well, he had a big dick, apparently.

[Mark Lano]

He was a great Coxman. You know who else is a great Coxman? We go back to Stallone. You know who's a great stick man? Burgess Meredith.

[Bill Maher]

Burgess.

[Mark Lano]

Sylvester Stallone. When I was doing Cop Land.

[Bill Maher]

Come on, man. Burgess Meredith, I guess. See, I only know him as an old man. He.

[Mark Lano]

He. I was asking him because I'm a rocky guy. I was asking him every single thing about Rocky, and he gave me every answer I wanted. And I was asking about, what was Burgess like? Because we would do lines. I would do. I would do Mickey lines, he would do rocky lines. I would do rocky lines, he would do Mickey lines. But I said, what was Burgess like? And he goes, you know, he was a great stick man, right? And I said, huh? And he goes, burgess Meredith was an incredible Coxman. And I was like, oh, shit. And left it alone.

[Bill Maher]

Stallone can write dialogue. He was right. Of course. Obviously, history shows to hold out for doing that part himself. But I'm sure one of the reasons why he had the confidence was he knew that to write dialogue, like when Mickey says, you got hot, you got hot. And he goes, yeah, I got hot, Mick. But I don't got no locker, do I? Cause they'd thrown him out of the gym.

[Mark Lano]

You don't gotta tell me.

[Bill Maher]

That is.

[Mark Lano]

What about My Prime Mick?

[Bill Maher]

That's great writing. That's great writing.

[Mark Lano]

Great writing.

[Bill Maher]

I got. I got heart, but another lock.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You know, so. Yeah, no, I'd love. Boy, I'd love to get him here. Oh, do you know him? Talk to him.

[Mark Lano]

You could get him.

[Bill Maher]

I try.

[Mark Lano]

No, you could get him.

[Bill Maher]

I try.

[Mark Lano]

He's talking now that he's older and, you know, he's not like, that would be great. And ask him, say, Michael Rapport.

[Bill Maher]

And I'm not. See, the problem is people think I want to talk about politics here. I don't. I want to talk about everything. But that's why I do this. I already have a show about politics.

[Mark Lano]

When Stallone comes, ask him about Burgess Meredith being a coxman.

[Bill Maher]

That's what I want to talk about.

[Mark Lano]

That's the only thing you need to talk about. He told me Burgess Meredith was a great stick man.

[Bill Maher]

I just want to have another reason to use the word stickman. It's a great word. Never used and never heard. But of course, I love immediately and.

[Mark Lano]

In the context of Burgess Meredith. Like, I was like, whoa.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah, I don't remember Burgess Meredith's early career. Like a lot of people who I only came to know as actors when I was a kid and they were old, and then you'd find out, oh, wow, Fred McMurray had a career in movies beforehand. I thought he was my Three Sons guy, you know, like, I didn't know.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

Ernest Borgnine was in movies before Mikhail's Navy, you know, and then you'd. And then you'd see them at some point later in your life and you go, oh, I see. At some point they were like the hot. Fred McMurray was the star of Double Indemnity.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

You know, he wasn't always, you know, sweater guy.

[Mark Lano]

That's how he got to be the sweater guy.

[Bill Maher]

Those, those 50s sitcoms which I was too young to watch when they were really on, but I would see in reruns when I was a kid and you were sick from school, what they showed in the day were black and white reruns.

[Mark Lano]

Crazy of.

[Bill Maher]

That's what I watched when I was sick. And I loved it. I loved being sick. You'd be in bed all day, you eat as many cough drops as you wanted, which are like sugar candy.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're like gummy bears.

[Bill Maher]

They're like gummy bears. And like the things we did with our kids and we thought, oh, give him a lot of sugar when he's sick. The worst thing you could possibly do was have me just eating boxes and box of fucking cough drops.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Bill Maher]

But, you know, we learn, we grow. But the shows that I would watch, and it started like at 9 in the morning and did not stop until like 4 in the afternoon when the game shows came on and it was just like the old Andy Griffith Show.

[Mark Lano]

I hated those black and white shows as a kid.

[Bill Maher]

I loved them when I was sick. Leave it to Beaver.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah.

[Bill Maher]

And My Three Sons.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Bill Maher]

And I mean, the world that they depicted, first of all, completely white.

[Mark Lano]

And if it was somebody came in with like a burglar or stuttering or.

[Bill Maher]

The cop. Yeah, the cop.

[Mark Lano]

Or a housekeeper or something.

[Bill Maher]

One line. Yeah, yeah. It's just. It's amazing.

[Mark Lano]

It is crazy how.

[Bill Maher]

But it's always amazing how bad everything was before. It wasn't terribly bad. Yeah, I was just watching this movie. It's really good. It's in French with Johnny Depp speaking in French. He plays King Louis and it's about his mistress and so forth. And it's just like, you know, the people are starving and he's giving her these diamond necklaces and he lives in this giant palace. And it's like for centuries and centuries, we just let one person. We just said, you're king and you can get away with all this shit. And it's only because people allow another person to do it. Right. And somehow this apparatus builds up around it and keeps it alive and it goes on for centuries. That one guy can act like the world's biggest asshole and it's got a whole support system of accord and the people put up with it. Yeah. And it took like a millennium or more before the American Revolution.

[Mark Lano]

It's crazy.

[Bill Maher]

It's crazy what people will put themselves through.

[Mark Lano]

Yep.

[Bill Maher]

And put up with.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, it's crazy.

[Bill Maher]

It is.

[Mark Lano]

You know what I'm. You know who I want to find? Remember the woman when Trump won the first time?

[Bill Maher]

She was like, no, no.

[Mark Lano]

It was like an iconic shoe with her glasses. If Mondami wins, I'm gonna remake that video in New York. That's funny, because that's how I'll feel. I'll feel like that bad.

[Bill Maher]

Now what, What? What will you say if he gets into office and says, look, the Palestinian thing is being settled? I'm now the mayor of New York. I don't want to talk about that anymore. So if you ask me any questions about Palestine, I'm the mayor of New York. I have feelings about it. I have opinions. Great. Right.

[Mark Lano]

You shouldn't talk about it.

[Bill Maher]

Wouldn't that be a great thing to say? And then say, I got elected. Not because of what I think about Palestine. I got elect. Although some of the useful idiots, of course, love him for it. I got elected because this city is not affordable. And then what if he. And of course everyone saying a lot of what he's proposing is impossible.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

Which I would. If I was a betting person, I would bet on that opinion.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

It's not really going to work to have grocery stores that are government run and free buses and freeze on housing rents. Because capitalism, as bad as it is, is over and over again we learn the same lesson. It's the worst system. Except for all the others. That would be my guess. What if he has success? What would you say?

[Mark Lano]

I would say fantastic.

[Bill Maher]

Oh, good.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah. I'm not. I'm not like one of these people that. That like.

[Bill Maher]

Right.

[Mark Lano]

Especially at this point in my life, you know, like, if, if he did. I want people to feel safe in New York City, you know, I want my wife to feel safe. My wife is a tough broad. She doesn't feel safe in midtown Manhattan during the day.

[Bill Maher]

Really?

[Mark Lano]

Yeah. And my Wife, really?

[Bill Maher]

She's like, you like going out for lunch.

[Mark Lano]

I'm not saying she's like, fucking shaking in her boots. But my wife in the last two, three years, has been groped in Times Square, has had a fucking shoe thrown at her, has been called the N word, and got proposed to on the train by a homeless person all between 11am and 3pm and when my wife got touched in the middle of the day coming out of a play, I'm not happy with that. And it was by, like, a homeless person. Like, I don't care that you're homeless. Don't touch my fucking wife. You know what I mean? And it bothered me so deeply that this happened to her and that she's got a shoe thrown at her.

[Bill Maher]

Why a shoe?

[Mark Lano]

Cause he's a crazy person.

[Bill Maher]

Just crazy, crazy.

[Mark Lano]

But when you touch my wife and my wife is violated, I get to thinking, I'm sorry that you're mentally ill. I'm sorry that whatever you're on and wherever it got you to this place, but you're touching my wife at 3pm on 47th and 6th. I want this person put the fuck away forever, Period. And there's other women in New York City that also feel uncomfortable and unsafe. And we're not talking about in the boroughs. I'm talking about in midtown Manhattan, in downtown Manhattan. It's not cool for women to feel uncomfortable during the daytime in the greatest city on earth. It's also not cool that under any circumstances you could touch a police officer, not be from this country, come out the next day and walk out of the court like fucking Tupac, like those guys did when they jumped. You know, like, fucking giving the middle finger to photographers. Like, if you touch a policeman and you're not from the country, bye. Get the fuck out of here. Like, you know, like. And I'm not one of these people who. I know the police are not perfect, but if you touch a policeman, you should be in prison, period. You shouldn't be able to walk out of jail going, fuck. You know, like, fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck. And this shit's been going on in New York City. But this thing with women not feeling comfortable in Manhattan during the day, not down with that shit. It really deeply bothered me that that happened to my wife. And like I said, she's not some laissez faire, you know, like, head in the. She. She looks. She's. She looks out for me more in the street. So, like, I was like, nope, nope, nope, nope. And I'm comfortable saying, put him under the fucking jail. And he should never come out because God forbid he comes out and does something worse.

[Bill Maher]

All right, first of all, it's policemen. Not police. Not policeman.

[Mark Lano]

What did I say?

[Bill Maher]

Because we're not five. That's policemen. Yes, I agree. I mean, I, I'm not. I, I love it. I'm not arguing. I'm not arguing with the basics of anything you've said.

[Mark Lano]

I love that.

[Bill Maher]

I mean, I, you know, go away forever. No, I mean, we still have to follow rational laws. Yeah, put him away forever.

[Mark Lano]

I don't want you on. Because, like, the guy in North Carolina.

[Bill Maher]

Not forever.

[Mark Lano]

He stabbed the girl and he's been in and out of jail for 14 times.

[Bill Maher]

Not forever, that guy. 14 times stabbing. Yes.

[Mark Lano]

I guarantee you the guy who touched my wife has been in jail at least five or six times.

[Bill Maher]

Well, if he has, that's a different story. But groping is not going away forever. Going away forever is like, you know, murder. Okay?

[Mark Lano]

I don't want him in my city touching people.

[Bill Maher]

And what you're expressing is something that people feel that transcends party, I think, and politics. It's very hard for old school Democrats, liberals, to, if they have the same feeling, still go to Trump because so much of what he does also bothers us on a very visceral level. So I understand that. But, I mean, your feelings are all completely legitimate. My question to you is, if this guy bothered you so much, why don't you take care of it?

[Mark Lano]

I wasn't there. What am I supposed to do?

[Bill Maher]

Go find this guy? It's certainly what Bob Odenkirk would do. Okay? It's certainly what Charles Brunson used to do. I mean, find this fucking guy and take care of it, tough guy. If it bothers you so much that your wife got violated. No, I'm kidding.

[Mark Lano]

No, I know, I know. It's just, you know, like, I never. The subway is the subway. New York City subway system. I grew up on New York City subway system. I grew up taking the subway. You gotta pay attention. It's not Disneyland. It's not the, you know, Central Park Zoo. But people like you shouldn't. It shouldn't be a thrill, like, it shouldn't be a house of horrors. It shouldn't be where, like, fucking right.

[Bill Maher]

No, it shouldn't.

[Mark Lano]

And we're talking during the day. I don't know what's going on at night.

[Bill Maher]

I mean, if this.

[Mark Lano]

During the day, it should be. It shouldn't be a house of horrors.

[Bill Maher]

There's one theme I would think, and Again, I don't really want to talk about politics too much, but of the Trump administration, especially this time, it's that on many issues, he has the right idea about straightening something out, that some put it a different way. He has the right idea that something in this country needs straightening out. And I would put in that category, and I could mention lots of things, but let's just say a few. The border obviously was out of control. Elite universities were out of control with their ideological capture by just one side and. Okay. And crime and, like, feeling safe in cities. How he has handled this I have lots of issues with. And that is important because a liberal democracy has to handle things in a certain way that keeps them a liberal democracy.

[Mark Lano]

I agree.

[Bill Maher]

And he does not seem to understand that part of the equation, but he's not wrong about identifying these areas. And since the population really doesn't have, mostly, I think, the educational background, because we stopped educating people to understand that nuance between the way a liberal democracy is supposed to handle things, they're just going to be happy that he's handling them at all. And they. Yes, they are a primal scream, as your screed was. I fully feel your passion. It is so legitimate. It is so honest. It's not. There's no maudlin in your rant. You know, you never. I listened to that whole thing, and I never got one moment of falseness out of it. Like, you were like, you know, there are certain people, and I want to mention names, like, they love to, like, get out there on their soapbox and talk about the things that he's doing that are so terrible. And it's like, you know what? Life didn't just happen to you. And by the way, all these horrible things aren't happening to you personally.

[Mark Lano]

No, they aren't.

[Bill Maher]

So you look a little phony doing that, but you don't. You don't look phony at all. You look. This is exactly how pissed off you are for very good reason. About what happened to the person who. Closest to you. Yeah. You know, this is exactly how pissed off you are. There's. There's no. I don't feel like you're padding it with any theatrics. I feel like that's exactly it. That's. And that's why people like listening to you.

[Mark Lano]

Well, thank you. I just try to, you know, I'm not a. You know, it's funny because I was thinking about, like, when I came on Politically Incorrect and, you know, and, And I, I remember you. You would sort of egg Me on. And you were. The proofs would be like, you know, she's this. And I didn't really kind of know we were talking about more social themes. It wasn't deep diving politics in some nights. It was for me when I was on, it wasn't like, you know, like I, I would.

[Bill Maher]

Well, we had the purpose of the show. It was a, it was a design. Train wreck to have all sorts of people, people who have no idea what's going on and the expert who does it. It was funny.

[Mark Lano]

Yes. But like, you know, I've been so educated in politics and educated in the history of specifically the Middle east and my opinions are, they're, they're new. A lot of this stuff is new to me and there's so many great scholars and great thinkers and great talkers that I'm inspired by and there's so many great, you know, they pontificate and they. Oh, that was a great. I don't try to do that. I try to just.

[Bill Maher]

Right.

[Mark Lano]

No, like, you know, but I leave it for them. I don't try to outsmart or anything. That's.

[Bill Maher]

No, you're, you're, you're working a different side of the street. That's valid.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah. And it's genuine to me. And you know that stuff in New York and you know, when I asked other women about the comfort level and they said no, I'm like, this is not okay. And mayor and Zoron, the Moran isn't our mayor yet. And I know it's gotten better, but it needs to continue to get better. And when he starts talking about, you.

[Bill Maher]

Know, well, it'll get worse under him because the cops.

[Mark Lano]

Exactly.

[Bill Maher]

I mean, he said terrible things about the cops.

[Mark Lano]

Exactly.

[Bill Maher]

And some of them are going to quit right off the bat.

[Mark Lano]

Yep.

[Bill Maher]

And some of them are good. I mean, you know, the cop. Look, I have been very honest about my cop opinions. I've been tough on them when I thought they deserved it. I also think it's a tough job that you can't live without them. So you're just going to have to get kind of real about the fact that it's never going to be perfect. Having said that, yes, they shouldn't be racist. But I don't think that, you know, first of all, there's a lot of black cops. Second of all, some of the racist incidents happen from black cops. So I think it's a deeper part of problem with the police culture. Not that racism isn't still part of the equation, but in general, you know, you do need the cops. Because civilization is a mile wide and an inch thick and you lift off that just very top veneer and people are animals.

[Mark Lano]

Straight up.

[Bill Maher]

If you don't keep the shit to shoe level, it goes sideways real fast. Yeah, real fast.

[Mark Lano]

And he's talking about loosening these laws and I'm not dealt with that shit.

[Bill Maher]

And the thing about the cops, again, I love them and they do a job that thank God, they're doing, but they are very sensitive, like when they get their feelings hurt. And I get it, you know, you're out there and you sacrificed two marriages now because this job was what it was. And you know, you come home and you know you need three drinks because it was a little nerve wracking at times and whatever it was. And you saw, you see the dregs of life every day. You see the worst people. You don't see the best people.

[Mark Lano]

No.

[Bill Maher]

Nobody ever calls you to their porch to tell you how good the marriage is going.

[Mark Lano]

And it's day after day after day after day after day.

[Bill Maher]

So they get a little pissed off when we don't appreciate it. I totally get that. But when they do, you know, the blue flu, whatever they want to call it, like, if you're going to incentivize them to not quite give 100% shit. Okay, 100% of a shit. Yeah. You're not gonna like it.

[Mark Lano]

Nope.

[Bill Maher]

You know, you really, you really are gonna like a world where the police feel appreciated better.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

Because protection is government's first priority.

[Mark Lano]

And everybody wants to feel safe. There's no race, creed, color, people that don't want to feel safe. You could be in Williamsburg with your scribble scrabble tattoos and your fucking keffiyeh scarf. If something happens to you, you're running right to the police that you're protesting.

[Bill Maher]

Mankind wasn't born with government. Government was invented. Why? As a trade off for security. That's the primary and first job of government. It is why people gave up rights, gave up sovereignty. It is why serfs worked the land so that when the barbarians came, they could get behind the castle walls. That was the trade off. Now, government has expanded and it should have expanded. It has expanded too much. But that's the basic thing. And if they can't do job one, making you feel safe, then they're useless. So, you know, maybe he'll.

[Mark Lano]

I don't think this fucking guy. I think that one thing. He's not going to do that. I believe what these people say. I believe what he says. I've learned to not think these things are far fetched. When somebody says something, you have to take them at face value. And he's not crazy. He's not. He's very clear on what he wants to do. And he's very fucking smiley when he's doing any of it, it's all smiles.

[Bill Maher]

He's an EPO baby.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

He's a rich kid.

[Mark Lano]

Mama's boy.

[Bill Maher]

Okay.

[Mark Lano]

Father's a professor, mother's successful film director. I know his mother. Mirror Nair.

[Bill Maher]

You know his mother?

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You worked with her.

[Mark Lano]

No, but I've met her. I met her at film festivals. Couldn't be sweeter.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah, yeah. And it's not a crime to be the child of well to do parents.

[Mark Lano]

It's. It's a little weird if you have well to do parents and you're living in a rent stabilized apartment in Queens. That's weird. That's weird if, if you're doing that, especially when you're so for the people. He's living in a rent stabilized apartment.

[Bill Maher]

I'm not against anyone having a different way of life. I'm just against someone coming to places where we have this different way of life and then trying to turn it into this other way of life that you brought with you. I thought to get away from that. I mean, that's what's going on in Britain right now. I don't know if you know what's going on in the uk, but the UK is undergoing something quite extraordinary which is, you know, a sort of a cultural revolution where practices which we thought in the Western world were not to be tolerated are because they don't want to have civic unrest between a large Muslim population that not like this country really very often did not assimilate.

[Mark Lano]

Yep.

[Bill Maher]

And in the name of like every multiculturalism and stuff like that, the left in Britain is kind of standing up for. For example, there's now a law about, well, it's okay to marry your cousin. Okay. It's different, I'll give it that. But you know, there are cities in Britain that, you know, I know Andrew Sullivan said last week my grandparents wouldn't recognize as the city they grew up in. Right. I mean, it's one thing to have immigration. We all are for immigration and we need it. But the idea of immigrants used to be melting pot. We're here and we're going to help. We're going to melt in. You know, we're here to be like you. That's why we came here. We like this thing you're doing. That's not always the attitude of today's immigrants.

[Mark Lano]

No, no, I know.

[Bill Maher]

And that's not a knock on immigrants. And I would say among the people who like that is not a problem with. As we know, well, in here in California is our lovely Mexican immigrants. They're perfect immigrants. They do want to melt in. We do have a lot of the same values. You know, we're Christian, they're Christian. Not that it's all about Christianity, but that's different. Cultures are different. Yes, but I mean, they are the perfect immigrants. I mean, there's no. We haven't treated them all that well, and yet there's no seething. You don't sense, you know, any seethingness. Yeah. And they slowly are just like every other immigrant did. My Irish ancestors, the Italians, the Jews, like, everybody slowly making their way through, you know, everybody goes through it. First you do the lower level jobs. Now you're the plumbers and the constructors. And then you're gonna be the governor, you know, I mean, that's the Godfather. I thought it was your time, right? It'll be Senator Corleone. Oh, go. That's my life. And I don't apologize. And I refuse to dance on the end of strings held by big shots. Right, Marlon?

[Mark Lano]

That's good fucking Marlon right there.

[Bill Maher]

But that's the thing. That was the Italian thing. Yeah. Like, I'm a gangster because I had to be.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

But you're gonna be a senator, Right. When your time comes, it's gonna be different.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

Because you volunteered when the war came.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

That made Sonny very mad. Right. You don't risk your blood for your country. You only risk it for your family. That's pop talking. Which it was. That was that generation. But he's the new generation. I'm not gonna be in the Mafia.

[Mark Lano]

Right.

[Bill Maher]

Well, that didn't work out so well.

[Mark Lano]

No, no. Because once they got you, once you try to get out, they pull you back in.

[Bill Maher]

What do you think of Godfather 3? Not a necessary movie.

[Mark Lano]

Not a necessary movie.

[Bill Maher]

Just an entertaining one. Right. Just entertaining.

[Mark Lano]

The great Sofia Coppola, who turned out to be a great director and that whole thing, you know, there were a couple of moments in the film. Once you get out, they pull you back in. And the Andy Garcia.

[Bill Maher]

Love that.

[Mark Lano]

But it was a tough. It was very disappointing. I went day one, screening one. I remember it came out on Christmas and I've watched it a couple times since, and it still didn't age well. It's not.

[Bill Maher]

I'm not happy with it. Well, I can't concur with that. Exactly. It's not a necessary movie because the cycle of Michael Corleone is completed at the end of two. He kills his brother. Spoiler alert. Right? That's the full arc. Yeah. From the guy who says at the beginning, that's not me, Kay. That's my family. Speaking of Diane Keaton. That's not me, Kay. That's my family. I don't do things like that. That's my father, who said that to that band leader all the way to, I will kill my own brother. That cycle is done. This is just a money grab. And I think they both admitted it. And Pacino, too. I think they just knew. And so I went in with no expectations. It's not necessary. It's just to entertain me. And Andy Garcia was awesome as the bastard son and that whole thing. And Joe Montana. Yeah. You know, Joey's a Joey. Salsa on the horse. You know, it's just fun.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

It's stupid because the idea that Michael Corleone, of all people, would, like, get back with Kay, who aborted his child.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

You know, don't you know that that is an impossibility, that I could never let that happen? Oh, Michael, you're so blind.

[Mark Lano]

You know, you get Al on here.

[Bill Maher]

He won't do it.

[Mark Lano]

Al Pacino will do it. He's doing press. He's doing things he won't do. I think you could get him.

[Bill Maher]

Oh, I know I can't.

[Mark Lano]

Would you have a thing with him?

[Bill Maher]

Yes. No, no, no. No beef. I just know him quite well, really.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, but he does interviews now.

[Bill Maher]

Not this one.

[Mark Lano]

All right. I feel like there's something behind that if.

[Bill Maher]

Trust me. No, no, no, no. He just. You know, people. People have their. It reminds me of the way my mother wouldn't smoke pot at the end. You know, it would have solved all of her problems when she was a widow. She needed to laugh more, she needed to put on weight. She needed new friends. And I couldn't get it because she just wasn't of that generation. And there's something that just Al Pacino is just like. This is just. I don't know, maybe it's the pot or I don't know, but it's just like there is a barrier there that I know for a fact I can't.

[Mark Lano]

Get because he loves talking about acting so much. And, you know, he'll talk about. You know, unlike De Niro, who hates talking about acting. Hates it.

[Bill Maher]

Him, I could probably get here. He did real time.

[Mark Lano]

He'll talk about politics.

[Bill Maher]

But if you start asking him and he wants to talk about politics.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, he'll talk about politics, which is amazing because he wouldn't speak for 40 years. And Trump inspired him to speak. But it's only about that. It's not. You still, if you talked about Raging Bulls, you know, I do. Talking about Good Fellows, you know, I talked.

[Bill Maher]

No, no, I know, I know, I know.

[Mark Lano]

And everybody's tried, Right. It's just. I don't know if we'll ever get that thing about that part.

[Bill Maher]

He was good on real time, but, you know, that's 12 minutes.

[Mark Lano]

Yes, this.

[Bill Maher]

I mean, I would love to get him here because I could crack that nut open about acting about anything.

[Mark Lano]

The acting is the thing. That's the thing we want to hear him talk about. He talked about his father and was, you see the documentary he did about his father, very vulnerable, very open. His father was a painter.

[Bill Maher]

Right.

[Mark Lano]

And he's talked about politics and he's talked more about, you know, obviously lost his son and that. He talked about that in a very. He talks about New York. But as an actor, we've never gotten him to really talk about his process as an actor. And his process as an actor inspired all of us.

[Bill Maher]

He said, well, all of us, really. Every.

[Mark Lano]

He invented. He changed the game.

[Bill Maher]

I think Marlon Brando changed the game.

[Mark Lano]

Marlon Brando to me is Dr. J. And then Robert D's Michael Jordan. So he took what. Dr. J's sick. Dr. J changed the game. But when Michael Jordan took what Dr. J did and everybody else, like Raging Bulls before, like, there's like.

[Bill Maher]

What is that in a woman's term? Is that Elizabeth Taylor? It is that.

[Mark Lano]

Well, you could say Marilyn Monroe, you know, and then Jennifer Lopez changed the ass.

[Bill Maher]

There we go. There we go.

[Mark Lano]

There's. There's before JLo, you're right. And there's after JLo.

[Bill Maher]

Okay.

[Mark Lano]

She brought the fat ass. And I say this with all due respect to the mainstream.

[Bill Maher]

Yes.

[Mark Lano]

She changed the game. She inspired an entire. Now it's. It's out of control.

[Bill Maher]

Yes. She lived in a world between black and white, and she. Right, that's why it was possible.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

She was like, I'm not really a black girl, so you don't have to be like, Puerto Rican girl. What's going on with me now? But I'm not really a white girl.

[Mark Lano]

She's a Puerto Rican girl from the Bronx, which is a whole other thing.

[Bill Maher]

It was very quick that that changeover happened. Where asses. When I was a kid, a big ass was the Worst thing you. The last thing you wanted to have. Does these pants make my ass look fat? That's what.

[Mark Lano]

No woman changed the whole game.

[Bill Maher]

And then it was like, these pants better make my ass look fat. And I never went along with it because, you know, you dance with who you brung.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

And, like, just how I was raised. What I like. Like, I don't. I never liked it when it became the look in a strip club to have, like, fat people.

[Mark Lano]

You know, fat people. Fat ass is a different thing.

[Bill Maher]

Jlo, you're right. That is true.

[Mark Lano]

But you know this, Bill.

[Bill Maher]

I do know this.

[Mark Lano]

You know this.

[Bill Maher]

I'm just saying, some people ignore that. That rule.

[Mark Lano]

Yes, well, now that's what I'm saying. Now it's gone. And now you got the bbls and all that stuff. But back to De Niro, he took what. He took what Marlon Brando was doing, he took what Paul Newman was doing, he took what James Dean was doing, and he took it to another level, what De Niro was doing.

[Bill Maher]

He's a great actor. I'm a huge fan. I mean, just all me on Robert De Niro.

[Mark Lano]

But he's talking about acting, though.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. And why. And why would he. First of all, why would he give away his trade secrets? I wouldn't. That's one and two. It's boring to talk about it. He's right. It is.

[Mark Lano]

I don't think so. Because some great actors, when they talk about it, it's destiny to you.

[Bill Maher]

Because you're an actor. Cause you're an actor.

[Mark Lano]

But, like, if you hear. Like, there's some of them that love talking about it.

[Bill Maher]

Like, like what?

[Mark Lano]

Let me see.

[Bill Maher]

Like, like, what would it be interesting to know about how they.

[Mark Lano]

Like, when Al Pacino talks about acting.

[Bill Maher]

Okay, give me one thing.

[Mark Lano]

Oh, he just.

[Bill Maher]

It's.

[Mark Lano]

It's like a great. It's like a musician. Like the Billy Joel documentary. You saw that.

[Bill Maher]

I interviewed him.

[Mark Lano]

Okay.

[Bill Maher]

On this show.

[Mark Lano]

So when he's talking about how he came up with New York State of Mind. Right. And he's talking about. On the. Like, when you get that certain actors talk about it. Like, Benicio Del Toro's great at talking about acting. Sean Penn doesn't. Not great talking about acting. But I'm talking about, like, the process. It's like, if you talk about Tom Brady reading defenses, even if you're not a football fan, you can appreciate.

[Bill Maher]

I see. Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

So, yeah.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

So for one of the people that did it at the highest level, for him to talk, break down the process, I Think it's relatable even if you're not an actor.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah, that's true. I mean, I feel like that's more apropos in music, as you say. Like, we all want to know what. What inspired that song. And, you know, certainly with the Billy Joel one, I remember talking to him a lot about the fact that seeing the documentary put color on what formerly was a black and white drawing. And now I know that. Oh, that was because that was what. This was going on in your life. And that's why you wrote Stop in Nevada, because you were stopping in Nevada and you were with the wife and blah, blah, blah. That is interesting to me as a music fan. I don't know if that.

[Mark Lano]

When Stallone was doing it in the Stallone documentary about Rocky, talking about Rocky, he was talking about, what about my prime, Mick. At least you had a prime. And he said they did it in one take. And he. Yeah, he's talking about.

[Bill Maher]

No, it's true.

[Mark Lano]

Everything that was going on with my father and is like, what about me dad? What we think about? And when you hear him talk about it 50 years later, it's like, oh, shit.

[Bill Maher]

Right?

[Mark Lano]

Because, you know, acting, when you're in front of a camera, you're doing take 7, 8, 9, 10, and you might do that one take that is the take that makes it. And for me as an actor, like, I know the things that get me there or the things that don't get me there. And when you talk about somebody like De Niro, that's had so many iconic moments, like, people are fascinated with you talking to me, you talking to me. And they've talked about that story. Scorsese's talked about that story. But De Niro, there's been so many of them. I would love to have access to just those questions and be like, do you remember this specific moment? And ba, ba, ba, ba, ba. Because he's given us so much on screen.

[Bill Maher]

Do you. When you are doing a scene, do you have a good feeling which take they're gonna use? Because you felt like, oh, that was the one. And if they don't use that one, I will be disappointed.

[Mark Lano]

Now I do. Now I do. When you're younger, you know, you don't even think you have the confidence to say anything or talk about it or, you know, when I was younger, you know, you just kind of just doing it. But, you know, sometimes when I'm acting now, you know, they would cut. That was a good one. You know, you could say it, you know, it. You know, it's like. It's like you have to.

[Bill Maher]

You.

[Mark Lano]

You have a better understanding. And what they do in the editing room, you know, that's. I mean, unless you're like the big guys, you could go in there, be like, no, this take is this. If you have access to it, like.

[Bill Maher]

I'm sure very few do.

[Mark Lano]

Well, like the meat and potato guy, like the De Niro. And Scorsese, you know, he. He won't even need to because he trusts him.

[Bill Maher]

Correct.

[Mark Lano]

But I'm sure DiCaprio, well, he's with the best of the best director, so.

[Bill Maher]

You don't have to.

[Mark Lano]

Quentin Tarantino knows the best.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. Direct. I don't care who the star is. The director does not want the actor in the editing room looking over their shoulder. That doesn't happen. I don't care who the fuck an actor is.

[Mark Lano]

Quentin Tarantino doesn't need that. Woody Allen doesn't need that.

[Bill Maher]

You just had.

[Mark Lano]

No, Scorsese doesn't need that.

[Bill Maher]

It's a director's medium. You either trust them or you don't. And when you sign on, you do.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

That's their canvas.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

They're gonna do it as they see fit. You have no say in it.

[Mark Lano]

And top tier guys, all you can.

[Bill Maher]

Do is hope they use the take you think is the good take.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

And they may not. Or they may cut the whole scene. Yeah. Or they may keep it on. They may have you hear you and the camera's on the other actor.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You know, you. There's just. You're. You are throwing fortune to the win. Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

But those top tier guys that those people work with all the time. And only, of course, there's no experimenting with, like, some.

[Bill Maher]

No.

[Mark Lano]

So you could give them everything and they're going to use the best anyway.

[Bill Maher]

But they need to stop. Because I got to say that last. And I'm a huge Scorsese fan. I know DiCaprio. What?

[Mark Lano]

I know where you're going to go.

[Bill Maher]

Where?

[Mark Lano]

The Irishman.

[Bill Maher]

No, no, no. I like that. But it was too long. But no, the one. The last one. The. The. We're killing Indians too much.

[Mark Lano]

Yes.

[Bill Maher]

I mean, that wasn't the exact title, but that was. That was the gist of it. We're killing, too, AKA we're killing Indians. We're killing Indians a lot out here in. In the wherever. And like, DiCaprio is playing a guy who comes home from the war. He's 50. What was he, a general. Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

You know. Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

Coming home from the war.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You know, it's like, okay, you gotta let it go. Yeah. Get the next guy. Yeah. I guess Chalamet is, of course, easy. He'll work with till he's 100.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You know, but, I mean, DiCaprio replaced De Niro.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You know.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

It's a. It's a young man's game.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

You know, or at least for those kind of roles.

[Mark Lano]

The Irishman killed me. Oh.

[Bill Maher]

Because they d. Because they de. Aged them.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, it killed me.

[Bill Maher]

Their face looked young, but they still moved like the crypt.

[Mark Lano]

It was crazy. The faces look crazy. And we know what De Niro looked like when he was 30. He don't look like this. He don't look CGI'd, you know? Like, we know the dimple. We know the face. We know what Joe Pesci. You should get Joe on this show.

[Bill Maher]

I love Joe. I'm Joe on holy. Yeah. I love Joe Pesci.

[Mark Lano]

He's never given a. He gave one.

[Bill Maher]

He seems like he's very shy. I've met him. He seemed very shy. Really nice, but, like, shy and not at all the guy who stabs you in the neck with a pen.

[Mark Lano]

But I think if you talked about acting, I think, and golf and like that, but acting, I think, you know, because he's. His career. I mean, Joe Pesci had a such.

[Bill Maher]

A scary guy in the movies. In movies, like, it's amazing the way a guy who's, what, all of, like, five. Five. Could. Could be that scary on screen. And he is, like. You really think he's gonna stab you in the neck?

[Mark Lano]

100%. In real life, the impression is so deep.

[Bill Maher]

It's. It's. It's amazing. Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

He's kind of shocked.

[Bill Maher]

He never kind of got his due because he kind of played the same. I mean, in Casino, he's the same guy. He was in a Lethal Weapon too. What's the one with Home Alone?

[Mark Lano]

Yeah, he.

[Bill Maher]

He.

[Mark Lano]

I. Yeah, he. He's Joe. Joe is the man. He's. He's another one.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

I love him. Love him.

[Bill Maher]

Well, I'm gonna have you connect me with Joe to all these people. Yeah. You're the connector.

[Mark Lano]

Come on, man. Joe. Yeah, Joe would be. Joe would be. You get Joe and Bob. Come on, man. Let's build this out. We get two seats here. Joe and fucking Bob. Get Joe. Bob and Al.

[Bill Maher]

But it was great to see you.

[Mark Lano]

It was great to see you. I appreciate you having me.

[Bill Maher]

Say hi to Mark and Joe.

[Mark Lano]

I will. Of course.

[Bill Maher]

You talk to them all the time.

[Mark Lano]

Of course.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah. Yeah. You do.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

Yeah.

[Mark Lano]

Yeah.

[Bill Maher]

And how often are you out here?

[Mark Lano]

You know, I moved back to New York full time.

[Bill Maher]

I know you. Believe me. We know you from New York. We know that.