644: Tony Hinchcliffe

Summary

Podcast Summary: Duncan Trussell Family Hour - Episode 644: Tony Hinchcliffe

Introduction

In Episode 644 of the Duncan Trussell Family Hour, released on October 20, 2024, comedian Tony Hinchcliffe joins host Duncan Trussell for an engaging and insightful conversation. The episode delves into the transformative impact of Tony's podcast, Kill Tony, on the comedy and late-night television landscape, challenging traditional media norms and exploring the future of entertainment in the digital age.

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1. Kill Tony vs. Traditional Late-Night Shows

Comparing Viewership and Production Costs

Duncan opens the discussion by highlighting the stark differences between Kill Tony and established shows like The Jimmy Kimmel Show. He emphasizes how Kill Tony has rapidly garnered impressive viewership numbers, posing a significant threat to traditional late-night formats.

• Duncan Trussell [03:39]: "Now, Jimmy Kimmel gets 1,000,763 total viewers per episode. [...] Kill Tony has been up for two weeks and has 3.1 million views."

• Tony Hinchcliffe [04:28]: "I think it isn't that much."

Existential Threat to Traditional Media

The conversation underscores how Kill Tony operates with lower production costs while achieving higher engagement, challenging the viability of conventional late-night shows.

• Duncan Trussell [05:19]: "What you're seeing there is not just awesome, but is an existential threat to what we've come to know as late night TV."

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2. Media Influence and Commercialization

Critique of Traditional Media Practices

Tony and Duncan critique the commercialization and control exerted by traditional media outlets, suggesting that they prioritize profit over authentic content creation.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [09:26]: "They're in desperation mode... trying to catch up with Rogan, who has 12 years of experience."

• Duncan Trussell [09:27]: "They're trying to play this catch-up game with like Rogan, who has experience sitting across the table with somebody."

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3. Showmanship and Format of Kill Tony

Creating a Flexible and Engaging Format

Tony discusses the strategic structuring of Kill Tony to ensure spontaneity and genuine interactions, allowing the show to adapt seamlessly without the need for extensive preparation.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [38:11]: "I built the format so strong that I can just plug and play. [...] I'm Han Solo and I know how to fix things if it goes wrong."

Focus on Guests Over Host

The emphasis is placed on making the show about the guests, fostering an environment where their stories and growth take center stage.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [39:58]: "The interviews can be obnoxiously great, even if the comedians are bad during their minutes."

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4. Personal Journey and Navigating Fame

From Humble Beginnings to Success

Tony shares his diverse work history before achieving fame, highlighting the resilience and adaptability that shaped his career.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [32:22]: "I sold tickets over the phone. I was a bag boy. I was a waiter, a bartender... I literally had to work at a fucking Starbucks 17 years ago."

Handling Increased Recognition

Tony reflects on the challenges of sudden fame, including privacy invasions and the pressure to maintain show quality.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [71:05]: "I'm always just focused on the creative and who's being funny and how can this show be the best."

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5. Philosophy and Ethical Considerations

Maintaining Authenticity Amid Success

The hosts explore the ethical implications of media influence and the importance of staying true to one's creative vision in the face of commercial pressures.

• Duncan Trussell [26:53]: "You just fucking blow that shit up... eliminate the threat."

Conspiracy Theories and Media Control

They delve into theories about media manipulation and the monopolization of viewership by corporate entities.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [15:45]: "It's just really all kind of a propaganda shell."

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6. Impact on the Comedy Industry

Empowering Independent Creators

Kill Tony serves as a beacon for aspiring comedians, offering a platform that values genuine talent over corporate interests.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [42:05]: "I expose the hell out of Shane so early on because he's a freak in comedy."

Fostering Talent and Growth

Tony emphasizes his commitment to nurturing emerging comedians, ensuring they have the space to develop and showcase their abilities without undue control.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [42:07]: "These guys are just so... there's so many of them."

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7. Personal Anecdotes and Show Dynamics

Anecdotes from the Road

Tony recounts personal experiences from performing on the road, illustrating the highs and lows of podcast fame and live performances.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [55:47]: "I was overwhelmed... It was a lot."

Balancing Personal Life with Professional Demands

He discusses the delicate balance between maintaining personal well-being and meeting the demands of a growing show.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [66:37]: "There is no... I'm glad I did it. But there is an opposite reaction to everything."

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8. Final Reflections and Future Directions

Commitment to Giving Back

Towards the end of the episode, Tony announces his dedication to philanthropy, vowing to donate proceeds from Kill Tony to support survivors and local communities.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [95:10]: "Kill Tony is going to be donating the next month of proceeds to Western North Carolina's survivor mini funds."

Mutual Admiration and Future Collaborations

Duncan and Tony express mutual respect and admiration, hinting at future collaborative efforts to further impact the comedy and entertainment industry positively.

• Tony Hinchcliffe [96:19]: "You've always looked up to me, and I think you're just so smart and cool."

• Duncan Trussell [96:31]: "Thank you, Tony. You're the best."

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Duncan Trussell [05:19]: "That's an existential threat to what we've come to know as late night TV."

• Tony Hinchcliffe [38:11]: "I'm Han Solo and I know how to fix things if it goes wrong."

• Duncan Trussell [63:11]: "If you believe in this, well, then here's this."

• Tony Hinchcliffe [71:05]: "I'm always just focused on the creative and who's being funny and how can this show be the best."

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Key Insights and Conclusions

1. Podcasting as a Disruptive Force: Kill Tony exemplifies how podcasts can not only compete with but also surpass traditional media in terms of engagement and viewership by offering authentic, unfiltered content.

2. Creative Autonomy is Crucial: Maintaining control over content and format allows independent shows to thrive without the constraints imposed by corporate interests.

3. Fostering Genuine Talent: Providing platforms that prioritize guest growth and authentic interactions fosters a more vibrant and diverse comedy landscape.

4. Ethical Media Practices: The conversation underscores the need for media to prioritize ethical considerations over profit, ensuring content remains meaningful and impactful.

5. Navigating Fame with Integrity: Balancing personal well-being with professional demands is essential for sustaining long-term success and creative fulfillment.

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Conclusion

Episode 644 of the Duncan Trussell Family Hour offers a compelling exploration of the evolving dynamics in the comedy and entertainment industries. Through Tony Hinchcliffe’s insights and personal experiences, the discussion highlights the significant shift towards independent media platforms like podcasts, emphasizing the importance of authenticity, creative control, and ethical media practices. The episode serves as an inspiring blueprint for aspiring creators, illustrating how dedication and genuine engagement can redefine traditional media paradigms.

Transcript

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[Duncan Trussell]

Hey, pals, it's me. Junkie packs 20 inch quick.

[Unknown Performer]

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[Duncan Trussell]

Tony, welcome back to the show. Thank you.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

My pleasure.

[Duncan Trussell]

Dude. Okay, so I just want to bring this up because I just realized how dangerous you are to an entire industry. And I just want to show you something. Jimmy Kimmel. How many viewers do you think he gets per episode total?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, man, Geez.

[Duncan Trussell]

Prices write it, you know, like more than 2 million less than 2 million less.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But I'm. My guess is that they. They count the TVs that are left on.

[Duncan Trussell]

Oh, absolutely.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Stay on. That are in nursing homes, that are in hospitals, hotels, hospice. I think he's a hospice specialist.

[Duncan Trussell]

If they're showing Jimmy Kimmel to people who are dying, then those people should go to jail because that's a crime against humanity. You know, that's the last thing you.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

See speed up the process for up a bed. That's what happened when, when you.

[Duncan Trussell]

When you are like when someone's lingering in a hospice. They're just like, put on the Jimmy Kimmel Show.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Put on Jimmy Kimmel.

[Duncan Trussell]

They'll be dead in five minutes.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah, like, I mean, there's healthy, there's athletes that watch Kimmel and just stop breathing. It's, it's that, that's what he has going on.

[Duncan Trussell]

Jimmy Kimmel gets 1,000,763 total viewers per episode. Now, I don't know this number. I don't know if you can find it, but Guesstimate, based on the fact that you have been producing maybe the most popular comedy show right now in the world, guesstimate how much it costs to produce an episode of the Jimmy Kimmel Show.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I know for a fact it costs a lot of money. The rent at the El Capitan theater has to be obnoxious or they bought it, which is insane. I think he has like 16 writers. So many executive producers, so many network heads focused on it. His salary, the, you know, I mean, a lot.

[Duncan Trussell]

Security, central casting.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

The millions of assistants, the catering. Like just, you know, guess how much you think it costs per episode? Per episode?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I would say four. 400,000 somewhere around there.

[Duncan Trussell]

And I think that. I think that's probably a conservative. Conservative number. So now let me cut to this. Can you pull this up? Kill Tony, two weeks ago, your podcast has been up for two weeks and has 3.1 million views. Yeah, dude. So think about that. That is almost double the viewership of Jimmy Kimmel. And I don't know how much it costs to produce your show, but I'm guessing it isn't that much.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It isn't that much.

[Duncan Trussell]

So this, when you think about it, that's what I'm talking about. What you're seeing there is not just awesome, but is an existential threat to what we've come to know as late night tv.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, it's an unbelievable threat. Let me one up you here. Which is my show's two and a half hours. His show 60 Minutes.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

After commercial, his show's probably 42 minutes. My show's two and a half hours.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

3.1 times two and a half hours versus one point whatever times 42 minutes. Whatever we said.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So, you know, minutes watched is a big deal if Mr. B. Stephen has a five minute long video that gets a hundred million views.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Which is a lot.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

That has nothing on a video that is two and a half hours long and has, you know, 20 million viewers.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah. Yeah. So it's so what you're looking at for the viewer on your show versus Kimmel. Like, if you look at, like, cost to be a viewer, which you are, there is, like, an invisible cost when you're watching Jimmy Kimmel. Aside from, like, wondering if you're in hell and this is all a bad dream, the cost is the commercials. And you're, I guess, paying with time. Even if you're, like, zoning out, you still are forced to have, like, the corporatocracy jerk off all over your fucking face with, like, weird bullshit. But with your show, it's more bang for the buck. Like, you're not getting blasted with commercials at that level, and you're getting more for it. Now, the reason Jimmy Kimmel's show, I would say, is better than yours is your show is highly censored. You're afraid to say things. You're. Dare I say? Woke. When I watch your show, I'm like, what a flaccid, sad, impotent display. This isn't comedy. This seems like you're paid off by the government. You're up there talking about how people should take vaccines. Come on, man.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

That's what I love the most, is making blood money. You know, I came from nothing. So when Pfizer offers. No, I'm kidding. Another interesting thing, since you brought it up, a real fun fact is the Roast of Tom Brady was the most watched program in Netflix's entire history.

[Duncan Trussell]

Holy.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Ever watched? One point over 1.5 billion.

[Duncan Trussell]

Jesus Christ.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Which takes, like, 13 years to watch. 1.5 billion minutes.

[Duncan Trussell]

Wow.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

The episode of Kill Tony with Shane Gillis is Donald Trump and Adam Ray is Joe Biden.

[Duncan Trussell]

Hilarious.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Beat that. 1.5 billion minutes watched to 2.5 billion minutes watched. It holds a YouTube record, according to the people from YouTube, for retention rate. Anybody that watched it went back and started it where they stopped at the day before or watched it the whole way through. People watched it twice. People watched it three times. YouTube only gives you so many views allowed on each video, or else people would abuse the system. Okay, what they do count is minutes watched, right? And that's a really big deal. 2.5 billion. So the most watched comedy program of this year was done right around the corner. Let me check.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, I want to do a quick bit of math here. See how many minutes are in a human life. Yeah, how many minutes in a human life?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And so, you know, I think the threat to these things runs pretty deep. I notice SNL is making a movie. Like, what? What are they like? What are they trying to remind us of? Because they're just burning money There. Well, why is SNL making a movie? I mean, it's propaganda is what it is.

[Duncan Trussell]

Well, it's confusing.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

I mean, I am so confused by this math because knowing that there, you know, it's capitalism, there's a profit motive in a lot of. Especially what network TV is doing. And they know that the amount of energy they're expending to make an episode of the Jimmy Kimmel show, snl, whatever the fuck it is, is so much more than what you are doing or Mr. Beast gonna get you. Mr. Beast is doing or what anyone is doing who's like, got a massively successful show. They've got to know that, right? And they have to be thinking to themselves, how the fuck do we excise this archaic form and get people to start watching TV again? And they can't figure it out. So that's where I get confused, which is like, how are they sustaining it?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And they're in desperation mode. You know, I've been, you know, I'm a fan of very few shows, right, And I usually just rewatch old episodes of the Sopranos, but I watched a little House of Dragons the last couple years, right? And the beginning of the episode they go, what? Listen to the. Be sure to listen to the House of Dragons podcast following the. Yeah, and the Sopranos has a spin off podcast and a thing and this and that, and they're trying to catch up. They have no idea what they're doing. And even when they try have tried in the recent past to buy their way into podcasting, say Barack and Michelle Obama or like, they give someone a deal for a podcast that hasn't done a podcast and they think they're buying for this exclusive thing, it's like offering vast sums of money to Wolfgang Puck to play golf. It's not what he does, right? They're not podcasts. They don't run a show. They have no idea what they're doing, right? So they're trying to play this catch up game with like Rogan, who has what, 12 years of experience of sitting across the table with somebody that he wants to talk to and having a conversation with them about whatever they want, right? And even when they still, even when these shows, these other new shows that are trying to get in the podcast space, or these old actors that are trying to get into podcasting because their agents and managers or whatever told them it's a big deal now, see the money that Rogan's making because the Spotify deal went public, like all these people playing catch up are still going off of a television model. They're so deathly afraid to evolve or to have a conversation and be themselves because they don't even. A lot of them don't even know who themselves are. Whether it's a politician who's been politicianing, whether it's an actor that's been acting. These people have no idea who they are. And they're not often not healthy, they're not pure. You know, it's like they don't work out. They're on, they're medicated up cuz they're listening to their doctors and they're. They're barely holding on for dear life. Little bit more Adderall, for energy, a little bit more of this to mellow it out. Little bit of this to do that, little bit of this to do that. They have, you know, they're.

[Duncan Trussell]

You just describe my morning of.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It's just wild to me. And I'm watching them play catch up and it's so interesting because must be. It continues to grow and to think that, you know, that I have this comedy thing, right? Like kind of like. Let's just make believe here and say that the Kill Tony universe is the new Comedy Central, right? And Rogan is blatantly the, the tlc, the Men's Health, the CNN and FOX News gives. Gives people news, it gives people a little bit of insight on things. Health, all of these different variables. Your Adult Swim.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You're fucking the Cartoon Network. You're the fucking, right, you know, whatever. Andy Kaufman, fucking spin off channel. What all the weird shit you have, right? Tom and Christina is like fucking silly family fun.

[Duncan Trussell]

They're like satanic view. All satanic view.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yes, but all of the exact. But all of these branches happening even here alone in Austin, Texas, of, of the media just growing, right? And growing. And every time that someone tries to get, you know, someone canceled or stuff happens or they complain, it just draws viewers, they go, I'm gonna find something to complain about too. I'll listen to Rogan, right? They get hooked, the numbers skyrocket.

[Duncan Trussell]

Let me throw a conspiracy theory, they.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Stop doing that, right?

[Duncan Trussell]

Well, okay, here's a conspiracy theory that I just thought of and I haven't looked it up. Probably not true, but you know how it is. Like you, I'm sure by now you've met like business people and you realize that you are with like someone from the Mongol horde in a suit. You realize that you are with someone who has like pretty much given up the normal ethical systems of the modern world and they're very. They're generally charismatic. There's something about them that's, like, amazing. But also, they probably cut your throat. Like, if they could get away with it and they had to, they'd probably pull you in an alley and just be like, I'm sorry, and just cut your throat. And you realize like, oh, fuck, right. You business people have to wear the suit you used to wear like loincloths and have fucking arrows that you would shoot into, like knights visors, whatever they were. I'm getting off track here. But the point is. So you realize there's a Machiavellian ethics system when it. When things get like, into the upper echelons of capitalism and that is sort of like virtuous to them. They kind of. It's like American Psycho was the quintessential representation of that modality. So, like, you have to think they know that this watch time, there's a. There's only a certain number of minutes people can watch anything per day. Right. Based on all the people watching. So when you're sucking that many minutes away, some amount of those minutes could have gone to these shows that are costing so much money to produce so much money.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And the more time that goes on, the more I truly believe that it's just really all kind of a propaganda shell. Right, well, see what I'm saying. Of course.

[Duncan Trussell]

Because he's paying their bills, right?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And the agenda is paying their bills. And I'm watching football the other day, right?

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And I'm. I happen to be getting. I had flown back from Vegas that day after a week there. An exhausting week. Long story short, the. Even at the suite that they put me up at because I was doing a show at the casino.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Fancy suite with big windows and big blinds. Close the blinds. But guess what? There's one little part of the blind always that was open. And guess where that shown the top third of the bed. It was unbelievable. Anyway, it. It compiled day over day, this trip in Vegas. And I was dying. I go home and I hit up my IV nurse lady friend that pumps me filled with vitamins and, And. And hydration.

[Duncan Trussell]

This is very relatable, guys. I know you all probably experienced being put up in a nice suite at a casino and then your IV girl.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right? And I'm not bragging. It's just, you know.

[Duncan Trussell]

No, it's awesome.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

There's levels to it.

[Duncan Trussell]

It's awesome.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And so there I am in my living room getting an IV drip back home in Austin, Texas. Football's on, and there's A commercial with John Legend, and it's a Pfizer commercial. And he's going, I just got my boost not only for the flu, but also for Covid at the same time. And he's playing piano and he rips off his sleeve and there's two band aids there. And I say to the nurse, I go, look at this. Look at what they're saying. Get your flu shot and your Covid booster at the same time. And she goes, you know, you could never do that that way. There would never be a situation where there's two band aids for your flu shots because they have to do opposite shoulders in case you have an allergic reaction. They would have to know which one's which.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So there's propaganda on the. Propaganda on. Propaganda on the propaganda that, you know.

[Duncan Trussell]

You know what that is? That's just like they didn't have enough money to do the other shot. That's all that is. Put two band aids on his arm. Who gives a. We gotta get the out of here. We're already in double overtime. Get this done, dude.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But, but so let me tell you something else real quick. So after that happened, it's bugging me, right? Because I'm like, you're right. They wouldn't even do the two shots in the. Using this John Legend and I. But obviously it was on normal tv because I'm watching a football game.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And time had passed, like 20 or 30 minutes passed. And it's a football game, so I don't want to rewind and watch the commercial again. But there was something about it that irked me. So I have my phone in my hand because you're kind of stuck when you're getting an IV trip. Right. So I'm. I'm on my phone and I type in John Legend, Pfizer, and what pops up is a slew of commercials over many, many, many years. I can't even find this most recent commercial because there's so many commercials and a Twitter partnership.

[Duncan Trussell]

Wow.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So all of these part. All of these other ads with using John Legend as this guy, as this, you know, handsome. Right. Piano playing.

[Duncan Trussell]

Sure.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You know, healthy, dark, but not black. Black. Right. Like successful. So to white older ladies, he's just a student, a romancer. To younger women, he's that. To middle aged women, he's that.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And to liberal boys, he's a piano playing superstar that can get any woman he wants. Right?

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So. Wow. God. What the. Is my point. Oh, so how many are there of those? How many are there of those? Right under our nose where it's like, okay, maybe it's not so blatant that I went John Legend Pfizer. Let me go down this rabbit hole. I wasn't expecting to see 45 different damn over the past 10 years.

[Duncan Trussell]

That's a deep rabbit hole.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Well, I mean, who knows how many more there are.

[Duncan Trussell]

Only because we got to go to commercial real quick. Sorry. This episode of the DTFH has been brought to you by Pfizer. Guys, did you know right now it's cold and flu season and if you head to your local pharmacy, you can get two shots at once. Let me tell you what I hate. Going two days in a row to get my shots. Because when I get one shot, I'll have a night seizure and then I'm tired and sometimes I'm so tired from the night seizures, when I go to get my second shot, I'm late. And something about getting the two shots back to back, it amplifies the paralysis, my facial paralysis. So this is brought to you by Pfizer. You can get them both at once. Dude, this rabbit hole is the rabbit hole.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It's the rabbit hole, man. And not only that, but guess what comes up after that fucking Pfizer commercial? A goddamn motherfucking McDonald's commercial. Or a fucking right double wrapped Carl's Jr. Doritos burrito with extra queso for free. Free extra queso.

[Duncan Trussell]

Dude, I love it.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You're sick.

[Duncan Trussell]

Get your flu shot it go. So this is what I love. Here's the pattern. Forensic Files. You're watching Forensic Files, right? Horrible people dying. Commercial for an antidepressant.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Absolutely.

[Duncan Trussell]

You know what I mean? You know when they're like, what shows do we advertise on? Well, what did what's depress people? What do they like to watch? They like to watch people die. Perfect. Put. Or an antipsychotic medication or, or. And then you get the McDonald's commercial. But then it's a heart medication. Yeah, it's something for your diabetes, you know.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Whoa. So blatant that the two things are feeding one another. And if you barely scrape this rabbit hole, which I'm sure you have, you find out that everybody's owned, everything's owned by the same goddamn people. So literally. Why wouldn't you. If you're a money hungry freak that's is obsessed with being a multi billionaire.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Why wouldn't you? If your family has a private chef and security and is protected and a. And a family doctor that literally takes care of you, why wouldn't you, if you're that much of a monster. Not in the business of making people laugh. No, not in the business of, you know, creating anything. If you just want. And I don't even know what they want because, by the way, you know, a yacht. What is it?

[Duncan Trussell]

Well, they, like, they have everything, right?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

That's it. But like, there's. At the end of the day, there isn't even that much. So it's really just a power. It's almost the evil is. What is the. Is the desire, dude.

[Duncan Trussell]

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[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Conversation, I know I do this.

[Duncan Trussell]

I love it.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

If there's not an Audi, I'm learning this about myself. It took me 17 years to learn this and being in the podcast industry forever, but when I'm like, one on one, I'm like the worst guest. No, you're not on planet Earth.

[Duncan Trussell]

Are you kidding?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

If there was four people sitting in chairs right behind you, I would be funny.

[Duncan Trussell]

Let me tell you something, Tony. This is exactly what my dear viewers want. And okay, so let me jump into this is an. I haven't even looked this up, but based on what you just said, you can sort of like, you can understand the ethics behind the people doing all of this just by what you said. Like, they aren't thinking really about helping people if they're advertising a poison and then the antidote back to back, Right? So here comes podcasting, here comes social media. Suddenly there is an option. Suddenly you don't have to, like, undergo corporate state propaganda if you want to watch a cool show. Now you can watch a show and you don't have that gross feeling you get when you've seen the fucking Ozempic commercial for the seventh time or you've seen John Legend. So now you're a threat. Now, anyone who's got a successful podcast, anyone who's, like, getting into the viewership, anyone who's sucking away those eyeballs is a threat. And if. And you are just into power. And people who are into power, they don't like it when their power gets taken away. So what better thing to do than to signal boost any bad gossipy shit about people who are getting famous that aren't bought? Wouldn't it serve your purpose? And it wouldn't be that hard to do, you know, because you are running, like, a studio or because you have been working with actors for a long time. They're all lunatics. They're all unhinged. They all got skeletons in the fucking closet. And if they don't have skeletons in the closet, they're prone to weird outbursts and they say things they don't think about. Right, Right. So you already know this. So you know it's a matter of time before someone on YouTube, some shit comes out about them. Right. And then all you gotta do, signal boost it. Signal boost it. You know, you've got legions of bots. You're paying for bots.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

So you just fucking blow that shit up.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, they got the money for that. No doubt.

[Duncan Trussell]

Wouldn't you do if you had no morality or ethics and you recognized the threat, you want to eliminate the threat.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

And wouldn't you participate in some.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

Background way in that?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But literally what. And I don't know if they've completely learned it, but I think they have learned it because the media is not dissecting Rogan as much. No, they don't cover me at all. And all the crazy moments that we have on the show.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I think especially with the Rogan thing, it tells me that they're on to the fact that. Oof, that was backfiring. That was back massively bad. Bad because the people can see what's going on. And if someone does chime in, like, yeah, he's an Idiot. Anyway, right? There's a bunch of people like, no, he's not. He's asking questions. He's. He's interviewing the other side, too. Yeah, he's got an answer for that and an answer for that and a question for that and a question for that. He's a guy questioning things, and people are catching on. I mean, it's hard for the older people. It's so weird.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Like our older friends and my mother.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And it's like, oh, Tony, come on. You don't think the news is bought and paid for? Come on, you don't think that, do you?

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You and your boys are smoking too much pot and having your conspiracy theories. I'm like, no, mom, it's right there. You have to see it. Like. But, you know, the backfire is real with people with common sense and that are aware.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And you know, again, when they tried on Rogan, his numbers skyrocketed because entertainment is entertainment. You can't get it anywhere. I mean, even back only, what, 15 years ago, Fox News used to have liberal people arguing with their people. And CNN used to have conservative people on arguing with their people. Now they don't even let you see the other side. And if they do, it's a fake conservative. Former conservative. We have. We brought on. Hey, we're here at cnn. We brought on our senior conservative.

[Duncan Trussell]

Oh, my God.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Analysts to literally be like, well, I think things went bad for us today and vice versa.

[Duncan Trussell]

No, that is the funniest to watch because it's like they. They find like the most uncharismatic idiot they can find. Throw them into the ring. The idiot knows who they are. They know that they're the clown of the show and that everything is designed to overturn their. Their arguments. So, yeah, all of that shit is like, we. I think the problem is, the other problem with what you are doing is that just by, you know, suddenly you're watching something that you've never seen before. This is with your show in particular, man. You know, I'm fascinated by it. Not just because, like, I mean, I met you as a door guy.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

And so to see you skyrocket to, like, you are now more famous, more popular than any. It's like having Johnny Carson on the fucking show. It's crazy, right? So just from that perspective and knowing, no, I'm sorry if this fucks you up. But knowing off stage how you're very sweet. Yeah. But on stage you're this terrible, dark, evil, fucking monstrous, brutal assassin is cool. But I don't think you could do those jokes if you didn't have that inside of you or people would just think you were a dick.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Well, yeah. And plus I'd be miserable if I was like that all the time.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, well, that. And that's what happens to folks like anyone like Sean Hannity or anyone. When your job every night is to talk about what's wrong, it crushes your soul. But so, but to me, like, what's really unique about what you're doing is that it, number one, what the fuck is your show? And I want to talk about that, but I want to finish this point. What is it? It's like some mixture of the Gong show and. But then there's something like. It's. It's wrestling. There's all these things, these threads in it that I've never seen woven together. Like Kill Tony. It's so cool. It's so fucking cool. But the other thing that you're doing, which is unique for viewers who have been watching TV or used to it is. It is uncensored. It is. You're not afraid to say anything. All of the fear, all of the. Like you watch someone on a late night show giving a three minute interview. They have to represent the movie. They want to get booked in a movie again. A huge part is selling the fucking movie. They don't want to say anything that could risk their future because if they don't, they say the wrong thing or whatever, then they're out. Then they can't book movies anymore. They depend on corporations picking them in this weird game of like, I don't know, after school baseball. If you get picked, you want to keep getting picked. If you don't get picked, you're on fucking cameo, by the way. I will be on cameo in November. My point is. My point is, it is so spectacularly weird and I am real curious about how you're dealing with that, how you're dealing with suddenly getting rocketed into the stratosphere. When you were, I think you were parking cars, were you?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Well, that's the only job I technically didn't do, even though I did it a few times. That was never like my post, but I did everything else. I sold tickets over the phone. I was a busboy, a bag boy. I was a waiter, a bartender, a food runner. I was a barista. At one point when I needed a second job to pay rent in LA, I literally had to work at a fucking Starbucks. 17 years ago while sleeping in my car that I would get up on top of the hill after A shift and drive it down. And to be. To park down there after all the cars left so that I could get in the back alleyway behind the Comedy Store. And, yeah, I've done it all. And that. That part, I never lose track of that guy. You know what I mean? I think of him every day.

[Duncan Trussell]

I don't think you could.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

I don't think you can ever get that out of you. I think once you've experienced that, it will never go away. And maybe that's one of the distinguishing factors, which is that, you know, a lot of, like, famous people that you see. And I think it's lame to, like, call, like, to be like, it's a Nepo baby or whatever. It's like, a lot of those Nepo babies are. They work fucking hard, they're talented. You know what I mean? But still, they're born into a culture of abundance. They're born into.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And a lot of those Nepo babies are the first one to overdose or the first one to kill themselves. The first one of this and that.

[Duncan Trussell]

That's right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I have no. You know, I don't. I dislike it when people. And I was guilty of this, the first, like, 35 years of my life, Right. I always go, you know who I naturally dislike are kids that were raised rich, right? Because it was just the opposite. Skin color never mattered to me. Race, this, that, whatever.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, that.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And then here in Texas, really, just the past four years, I've come to learn that, like, wow, some of them are cool as fuck, right? Like, it doesn't mean you have to be a piece of shit in L. A. The rich kids, more often, not saying all of them, not all of them, but definitely the rich kids were kind of just shitty assholes.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And in Texas, everybody's nice. So it's like when you're coming from that perspective of, like, no, you're not necessarily better than everybody or whatever, you know, you have to generate your own things.

[Duncan Trussell]

But. Okay, wait, hold on. Let me push back for one second. This is what you're experiencing, and I don't. Again, I agree with you. But also, here's the thing. I remember when I became the talent coordinator of the Comedy Store. I remember the day before. I won't name the comic, but a comic there was. Just as always, I'm like an unknown dude at the Comedy Store, and the fucking successful comics just, like, use you as a punching bag just to, I think, to take the edge off. They're about to go on stage, so they're just like, let Me just fucking antagonize this poor broke dude who's definitely never gonna. Nothing will happen for him anyway. And I just remember one of these comics was, like, just in a mean way, was being a total dick to me. I barely knew him. I just knew they're somewhat famous. And I'm like, I guess this is part of the deal. So that afternoon, I became the talent coordinator, and I saw that very same comic the next day. They treated me like I was Jesus Christ descending from a fucking cloud. It was the most insane shift I had ever experienced. And I think when one thing you have to be able to filter out is how many people are reacting to you as the door guy. And how many people are like, this is Tony. When you walked in here, when you actually left to park your car, some people walked by and were like, that's Tony Inch Cliff. He sold out Madison Square Garden. I swear to God.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Wow.

[Duncan Trussell]

So how many people. You know, you have to be able to, like, filter that aspect of your life now. You're at the point now where people, when they get around you, they can't help it. They get fucking nervous. They get freaked out.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

So, you know, your experience of humanity as a whole now is forever, permanently altered. You're seeing a side of rich people that they align with other rich people.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah, that's true.

[Duncan Trussell]

You know what I mean?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You are correct.

[Duncan Trussell]

So you don't know.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

No doubt about it. With that said, a couple of the main people that I'm talking about, I met when, you know, they hired me to roast their buddy for.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You know, during the pandemic or whatever. And I'm like, all right, well, artists.

[Duncan Trussell]

Have always gotten a pass with wealthy people. I mean, that's like. Wealthy people, like, artists, they. It's the. It's the patron model. That's what it used to be. Like. If you were a good artist, some rich dude, a duke or something would, like, just give you money and you would, like, paint for them. So this. Okay, this is something I've been thinking about about your show, and I think a lot of people are inspired by your show. Not just because, like, it's successful, but because, like, it kind of does show a progression. You know, you get to watch people grow. You get to watch what happens if your hubris overcomes your wisdom. And you fucking think you can just get in front of a microphone and be funny.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

And you see the. How people crash and burn. And so there's all these stories that kind of emerge in Kill Tony that are really cool and Real. And so it's got a. It's not a reality show, but it has that aspect to it. But if, like, what is your philosophy when it comes to showmanship, when it comes to putting on a show? Because you do have what appears to me to be a very crystallized, very strategic, very smart methodology when it comes to putting on a show. And I'm just curious if you could articulate what that is.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Well, the machine runs. Right. Over the years, the format I've evolved it to so that it. I don't have to prep anything. Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I don't have a monologue. I don't do my material mice. The standup Tony and the host Tony are two different guys. So I built the format so strong that I can just plug and play. Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I kind of feel like it's my Millennium Falcon. Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

Cool.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And I'm Han Solo and I know how to fix things if it goes wrong. But I can just jump in it, lower the ramp and jump in and escape any second. And my thing is, and I think this is the sign of any good host is you make it about who's on.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And who got pulled out of the bucket.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I try my hardest. Even though during their 60 seconds, sometimes I have to fix something or I notice something's off or something. I have to whisper to Red Ban or producer or whatever to do something or to keep an eye on something or what's this? Or where we at or what's going on? What time is that recording? Is that going? Is this. There's so many different variables that, like a pilot, you have to pay attention to, but for the most part, I'm trying my hardest to pay attention to the 60 seconds from the person. And especially in the interview, I mean, in my mind, that's where the party really starts. Because the minute can go great, the minute can go bad. Nobody really cares about that part. That's just the intro. You get your own shot. Everybody thinks it's about that.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And a lot of people, I think early on, especially first time viewers and whatnot, they're like, ooh, they need these comedians to do good for the show to be good.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But it's not that at all. If those comedians are bad during their minutes, the interviews can be obnoxiously great.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And the. And the interviews are usually between seven and 12 minutes.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So so many people focus on this 60 seconds, but then there's 12 times that coming right at you.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Improv improvisational interview. That's unplanned. I don't know anybody. I don't know anything. Maybe they've been on before. And even then I don't remember things. I, my brain doesn't, like, retain what happens on the show. So I tell them what, what, you know, I ask them, I go, what did we learn about you last time you were on? And hopefully they give me the quick Cliffs Notes of I work in a hospice. I, I, you laughed at me because I have a fake foot or whatever.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And, but, and I make it about them. The bucket pools, the regulars. Tell us more. You were, you know, you were sleeping in a van two years ago. Where's your life at now, Hans? Or whoever. And you get to watch the Growth. And yeah, it's long term storytelling. But one of my favorite things about it is, even though it's built and the format's strong, the one thing that I do put a lot of effort into, even though it seems like an easy job, is booking it.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Figuring out when and what episodes are people seeing and who would be good now, okay, they had a black lesbian last week. Who's going to be good right after that, and they haven't had anyone that silly in a while. Where would this be good? So that's the part that I can control, is the bookings. And with that part, you know, a lot of people talk about the growth and the, and the evolution of the bucket pools, but one thing that I take great pride in is the growth and evolution of who I have at the table with me. Maybe I'm introducing them, right, to someone or something that they've never heard of. That's folklore in a comedy world or a fast growing freak. You know, I exposed the hell out of Shane so early on so many, every chance I got, because I'm like, holy, this guy is Frankenstein. This is Brock Les. This guy just stomps when it comes to comedy.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So funny all the time.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You know, he's one of those guys to where he's literally not on Just Funny. Yeah, all the time.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

If he's having fun, let's get his ass out. You know, these guys, they're just, there's so many of them.

[Duncan Trussell]

You know what else? What? I love one of the things, like when I've done the show, which you do, which I don't even know if you know you do it, you probably do. You make people feel real comfortable. Like, you know, because there is a kind of sense of trepidation, like, this is obviously for the guests, not as high stakes as for the People doing their minute or whatever. But still going on a popular podcast. Rogan. It could be unnerving if you think about, like, how many people are gonna be watching it. And you're so good at, like, pulling people into the moment. You're so good at, like, calming people down and making people feel. Feel funny. Like you are a.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You know.

[Duncan Trussell]

Okay. There's a name for it. What are they called? A casino, supposedly. I don't know if it's true, but if someone's on a winning streak, supposedly they have people that they'll send by the table that are like wet blankets.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

That fucking, like somehow ruin the luck streak.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

There's a name for that. I can't remember it. In comedy, there's people like that.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

No doubt.

[Duncan Trussell]

They come in the green room. It's like someone just died in front of everybody. Whatever the great conversation was, it's over. Everything gets weird and awkward and quiet and then there's the opposite. That's who you want your friends to be if you're a comic where when you're around them, they bring some aspect of who you are out. It's funny.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

Maybe it's because you get in like the friendly competition to like, say the funniest thing or whatever it is you. You're like that. You draw something out of people.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I want people to destroy my. When I was a little kid, way before I had business, like fucking controlling. I remember it was the heavy block TV with the dial. We didn't even have a remote for this.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Old ass TV that we had in my living room as a kid. And any chance I got, if I could go switch that thing late at night to Johnny Carson or David Letterman, I was in heaven. And that went on forever. I would try to stay up as late as I could to catch Letterman, even though I had school the next day or whatever. And I think about it a lot because it's like in retrospect type of thing. Now that everybody's telling me that I have such a big comedy show right now, everyone else has noticed what I kind of thought was possible so long ago.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And it's happening is you think of Johnny Carson and David Letterman.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right. And then you have. Those are the ultimate, ultimate, highest level.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Goats.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Top level. Mountain top. Hosts. Yes, Comedy hosts. And then what do you have? Right. Lano, Fallon, Seth Myers, Colbert, all these Camel.

[Duncan Trussell]

All of them.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

What did these two. What did these two do that. These guys that leave a weird taste in your mouth?

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah. Didn't do you asking Me?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah. You can tell, right? Well, I.

[Duncan Trussell]

What do you think?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

They brought on freaks. They wanted their guests. They didn't care if their guests were getting bigger laughs than them.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

They're funny too.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, man.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You don't have to do. It's not a competition at all.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

The winner is the viewer.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yes. It's a team. It's the show, not the host. But dude, this is what you have. This is. This is what you have that I'm really curious about.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And if I did that, I wouldn't get them again. If I tried to. I'm sorry to cut you off, but if I was competitive in that way, if I was a weirdo, that's like, oh, he's being funnier than me. It's never been that. The only people that don't survive the length, the long terms of my show historically, and this is like, you know, are the people that don't listen or pick their timing correctly or try to over bully things. And it's not hysterical all the time.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

If Sam Talent or Lil Hobo or Shane Gillis went on an hour or. Or yes.

[Duncan Trussell]

I mean, Lil Hobo's fine. Him.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah, well, he's. He's more of the. All right, fans. I'm just going.

[Duncan Trussell]

I don't want to derail you. Just keep going, keep going. He's not a good.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

If any one of them went off on a 45 minute long diatribe about this comedian that we pulled out of a bucket, I wouldn't stop it. I wouldn't stop it if it was crushing and I'm laughing and everybody's laughing. I don't care about the format. This is obviously a special moment and a special episode. Everything is malleable.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

In the Kill Tony world, sometimes an interview can be bad in last 24 minutes because I think there's something that this person's not telling me. Sometimes an interview can be decent, but the guy's got a cocky attitude and is just kind of like, you know, too cool for school. And I'm like, God, that's enough.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You know, but he can write a joke. Maybe his minute was great.

[Duncan Trussell]

Okay, here's. Let me add to this formula because I think you got it half right. And I love that you didn't think of what I would consider to be even more primary and even more of something that differentiates the two masters from the derivative, like whatever disintegration of society, hosts presence. They were both completely there with their guests. Yeah. If there was an agenda, you couldn't See it. And what that meant was that if something unexpected emerged, they wouldn't just shift to the next thing because they're robots, but they would allow that thing to grow as much as they could within the time constraints. That's what you do. That to me is like. Yes. Like allowing, you know, not like making it all about you. Yes. Bringing on people that are going to surpass you in some way or another.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

But you can do that all day long. But if you aren't a good listener, and I don't mean listener like nodding your head at the right time.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

I mean like if you aren't attuning yourself to the moment with someone.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

And if you aren't allowing spontaneity to take over, then it's, it's like trying to. It might as well be like, you might as well be filming a corpse. The decomposition of a. It's dead, right? It's dead. And dude, this is where you weird me out. And I'm sorry if this is an over flattering interview. I'm going to get to how you're a racist in a second.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Perfect.

[Duncan Trussell]

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[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I don't know. I don't know what that is, but it's a lot. I think a lot of it has to do with the late night sets back in the day, the never ending grind, the. I love being around people and it. It is getting hard, you know, it is a challenge. One of my favorite things about Austin when I got here was, you know, and it still is here. Austin is the best place for me because, you know, people see me and they're like, oh, this is his home. If I go up to him now and say, I love you, I love the show. I've thought about this. They're like, if I do it now, then I can't do it later, or else they're going to recognize me as the guy that went up to them at the Ba Ba bar eating dinner or whatever. Right, Right. Unless they're visiting Austin and they see me, then they go, hey, I love you. Gotta get a picture, right? And if I'm anywhere else, I've learned as soon as the plane lands and I get off, there's no hesitation from anybody. Holy. That's him. Yeah, right. He doesn't live here. This is my one chance. I'll never have this chance again. I have to do it. So I'm kind of safer in Austin. But what I'm getting at is that I'm the guy that loves eating at restaurants and going to see live music is really my main point. Because I was doing it a lot here during the pandemic, and especially when things were a little bit slower. And I think that being amongst people and mixing that with being on stage, I mean, I'm with people a lot. Yeah, I guess most human beings go out, from what I understand, one or two nights a week. You know what I mean? Like, that's crazy. That means I've already lived 70 lives, right? Basically. Because I've been basically seven nights a week for ever. Forever.

[Duncan Trussell]

It's crazy.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah, that's crazy. Really find any joy in staying at home and watching shows and then doing a hobby and playing online chess and then going to sleep? Like.

[Duncan Trussell]

You mean what? You just described my dream night. What is that? Or do you. Okay, let me ask. Sorry if this is too personal. When you're by yourself, and I know a lot of people like this, do you kind of get weird? You feel weird, like, when you're around pe. Like, the way I've heard it described is some of us, we relax when we're alone. That's when we do the. Some of us, we only can do that if we're around people like, you know, this is the. I guess the difference between psychologically healthy people and depressed people.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I find great peace when I'm alone, but I just gotta get it all out of my system. I have to hang and jam and have a good conversation and talk about it out loud. Show the appreciation to the universe.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Speak of it out loud.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

My point is, when it comes to the psychic thing, like staying in tune with humans forever and never losing that momentum helps a lot. And you mix that with being on stage and doing crowd work and figuring out how to. Yeah. Last night. Literally on stage last night. I don't do a lot of crowd work. I don't. I'm not. There's stuff that I'm trying to work on. Right. But when I do first come out, I try to go bing, bang, boom, real quick just to show them that I can. Right, right. And I.

[Duncan Trussell]

Big bing, bang, boom. You mean you come out and eviscerate three random members of your audience before you do your show? Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yes.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And I go, you're a firefighter. And he goes, nope. I go, what do you do? He goes, I'm a cop.

[Duncan Trussell]

Ah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

God damn it.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I saw the lights and heard the sirens.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And I'm kind of making a joke, but I'm really not like. And that's a weird example.

[Duncan Trussell]

What do you mean you saw the lights and heard the siren? See, I knew it. I got you. You're a witch. No, See, I knew it. Like, you don't think of yourself in that way, but I'm telling you, man, I knew it. Thank you. God, for a second, if you only knew. I have to cut back on the edibles.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I told you that I was in Vegas, right?

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Are you ready for this?

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So I can do a thing.

[Duncan Trussell]

This is so stupid.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

We might have to edit this out.

[Duncan Trussell]

We will if you need. If you want to.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It's gonna sound insane.

[Duncan Trussell]

No, no, I'm gonna believe it.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So we go to Vegas, right? And normally I'll play a little bit of roulette at the cheapest little normal table with all the people. Well, again, shit's gotten crazy, right? And. And not only that, but it's my big ass show that's been plastered on the side of a giant hotel in Vegas the next night. So people are staying there for that, this, that and everything. So I'm already mobbed in the regular part of the casino.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Which is fine. I love the people. And anybody who's ever met me will tell you I was nice, I took a picture and then I moved on, whatever. But it's just. It was overwhelming.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, it was a lot.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It is because people see you taking a picture and then they want a picture and they're like, why does everybody agree? Turns into a meet and greet immediately. Everywhere is a meet and greet. Anyway, my buddy goes, why don't we go to the high roller section? I'll play a few hands of blackjack. Because we had to kill 30 minutes before dinner. So all of a sudden, I'm at the high roller roulette table for the first time in my life because I was getting bored. Well, I don't want to watch somebody play blackjack, right? But I see over there, and I have four numbers that I always play at a roulette table. 1, 3, 7, and 9. They're all red. And 9's my main number. And 7's my second favorite number. And 3 is my third. And 1 is my fourth favorite number. But now the minimum is 2. No, it's a hundred. You have to have a hundred dollars on the table to be able to even play. Whereas normally a roulette table out there, it's 15 or 25 or whatever fucking adds up, right? So I go 25, 25, 25, 25. And as the balls rolling. And this has always been what happens to me playing roulette. But never before have I been to the high roller table. I look at the little slots on my number, and usually I'll follow nine around.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And I'll stare right at that slot as it's going around and around. And I'll kind of be glancing at the ball, but I'll never lose track of where the 9 slot is, right? And I'm staring, and what I do is I picture. I literally not picture it falling into the hole. I envision. And Try to feel the feeling of it. Already fell in that hole, right? Already fell in. I can't believe I just won. But you have to con. I have to convince myself, like, truly, like.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, I call.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I can't believe, like, you have to, like, trick.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

The universe. Even though, again, I'm aware that this sounds crazy.

[Duncan Trussell]

No, it doesn't.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But, you know, I put whatever. I started with the hundred. I put 100 down. I play the numbers. I stare at nine. As the ball's getting closer to falling, I really start pitching. My God, I can't believe I won my first game of the day of the week of roulette. Like, this is crazy. And click, click, click, click, click.38 or whatever, numbers. And boom. Lands right in the nine. I go, right. Blah, blah, blah, blah. I keep doing it again and again, and I start saying to myself, oh, my God, you're on one of those Vegas runs. On the second roll, I go, you're on one of those. Because I'm trying to literally summon it to match up with me. I'm doing the end part first. Like a Tarantino film.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But it's not like I can't believe I want out loud. It's like a interior feeling, Right? It's like a. Yeah. It's like the breath that.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Heat you up. Right? But you're envisioning, envisioning, envisioning. And then.

[Duncan Trussell]

Okay.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Boom. Does it again, does it again, does it again, does it again, does it again, does it. Nobody. All the other people. The pit boss is literally, like, you know, hunching over, staring, doing the math. They're like, do you have a player's card? I'm like, no, I just got here. I don't do that. I'm just playing, Right? Like, can we see your ID? Whatever, you know.

[Duncan Trussell]

Let me ask you this.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

$35,000.

[Duncan Trussell]

Wow.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah. In 45 minutes.

[Duncan Trussell]

When. So I'm just curious. When you sold your soul to Lucifer, do you sign with a quill pen or do they use ball points?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Now, blood, but not my blood. Is one of your children, Duncan.

[Duncan Trussell]

She's not even. You take my children's name out of your mouth.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It's a syringe.

[Duncan Trussell]

Here's why. What you're saying is not weird at all. And in fact, it sounds. If you got. If you read, like, Ernest Holmes. Have you read any of that stuff at all? Oh, my God. Dude, it's so funny. So you know, by now, everyone's heard of the sort of, like, secret New Age manifestation, but they don't get into the deeper philosophy behind it. And so there's a few people who write about it, one of them being Ernest Holmes. Now, Ernest Holmes, you just described in great detail exactly the way these people say to manifest, which is you. Okay, so this is how they put it. When you want something, I want a new car. Really, what's happening there is an expression of lack. You want the car, you don't have it. And because the universe resonates with just the feeling you have, it doesn't care what you want. It's resonating with the feeling of not having a car. And so because of that, the universe, you're part of it, it conforms to that. So it's like, oh, yeah, no car, no problem. You don't have the car. So his recommendation sounds insane. And that's why when you were talking about it, you're gonna have to cut this. His recommendation is, you don't want anything. You have it.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yep.

[Duncan Trussell]

The moment you want it, you affirm the lack. And so you envision. This is. I remember reading. I'm like, whoa, that's nuts. So let's say you want that car number one. Don't think about how. One thing that will stop you from being able to do this is you'll think, well, there's no fucking way I can get that car. I would have to win the lottery. That's not your job. Don't worry about how you're going to get it. The means, the path you take, irrelevant. So then. And also, if you start thinking about that, what are you going to feel? More lack, More impossibility. And his point is, like, you are in a universe that sprang out of nothing and made elephants, giraffes. You really think it can't figure out how to get you that stupid fucking car?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

So you eliminate the way you're going to do it. And then he says, this is how he put it. Imagine sitting at a dinner with a close friend, and your friend is saying to you, wow, how did you do that? That's incredible. And then feel it. Feel the feeling of having it. And if you can pull that off, it will come.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

And then don't worry about it either. And the other thing is, don't worry about it. You have. You can't then be like, where's my car? Yeah, more lack. The main thing is, you must. And my theory on this, I'd love to know your thoughts on this. And I'll. I'll, like, double freak you here. I'll up your weird. I think there could be Parallel timelines. And I think that the way we navigate through those parallel timelines is not like time jumping or opening wormholes, but rather believing fully that that's where we're at. And the moment you do that, you shift into a brand new universe. Everything's different, but it looks the same. That's what you're doing. And that's so cool, man. That's wild.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah, yeah, it's. It's just weird. Cuz roulette, as stupid as it sounds, and I'm positive that 99% of the listeners are like, you got lucky on roulette. What are you talking about? You couldn't do that again. Why don't you just sit there and do that all the time then? Well, first of all, it was exhausting, right? I realized that immediately. Like, right, because the adrenaline from that. I was. I was scheduled to have a dinner, remember? I just had to kill like 40 minutes. Minutes. That's how I ended up there in the first place. I'm not even that big of a gambler. I just always thought the idea of trying to draw a ball into your lucky numbers is cool and fun and hard to do. And if you hit, you really won, right? Whereas if you're playing a player, you're playing two. It's basically everything else is war in Vegas, right? My card better than your card. I got lucky.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, right?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So it's almost 50. 50. But the hound. Anyway, it ended up messing so much up. It ended up messing up. You think? Oh, you on. You turned, you took $100 bill and turned it into $35,000 in 40 minutes.

[Duncan Trussell]

Crazy.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Crazy. But guess what?

[Duncan Trussell]

What?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

That ended up upping my adrenaline and my zippiness so much that when I was at that dinner, I couldn't eat, right? And the nice restaurant that was attached to the casino made to just be nice and to look cool. They made me an espresso martini with the Kil Tony logo in the foam. Fucking cool, right? And I'm like, God, it's beautiful. You know, somebody takes a picture. I take a sip of the espresso martini. Now because of the upped adrenaline, now I'm drinking an espresso martini on an empty stomach after flying into Las Vegas without any rest. Right?

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And all of a sudden that it's an anxiety attacks taking from you.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I can't go to sleep that I don't fall asleep that night until 5:30am because of the adrenaline run from earlier. I can't do the. Again the bus boy, the Bus boy Tony Hinchcliffe can't believe, right, that I just made more money than I made my first five years of being an adult in 40 minutes.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah. So what are you saying? You're saying that it's bad to do that? You're saying you shouldn't have done that?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

There is no. I. I'm glad I did it. But there is an opposite reaction to everything, right? Because I did have a big show the next day. So not going to bed until 5:30 all of a sudden puts my, my first of all, my health, Right?

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So then the next day I'm. I'm having my first meal at 1 or 2pm and I'm not paying attention because I was up all night. So the first bite of this chicken noodle, fancy Chinese dish that I got, I'm like, oh, look, there's a little big clump of rice on top. I got my chopsticks. I'm like, I'm going to eat that first. Turns out it was fucking pure minced garlic.

[Duncan Trussell]

Jesus Christ.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And I had already started chewing it because I so assumed that it was rice by that point. I don't want to spit it out. I'm at a table with people, so I swallow it down. I'm like, I just ate fucking pure garlic. Like. So guess what? That does messes up the rest of the meal for me.

[Duncan Trussell]

Because you're a vampire.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Well, yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

You'Re using vampire powers at the roulette table and then some gives you garlic, but it does.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

The pure garlic takes away my appetite. So now I didn't eat dinner the day before and I can only eat two bites of these noodles because the garlic fucking, you know, overheats your system. Like, garlic's a fucking powerful thing. It turns out. Vampire, not a vampire. Pure garlic is like. Like it's a natural remedy. Exactly. So if you, if your body's fine and, but you're tired and this and that, God only knows what it does. But I'll tell you what it did with me, which is it killed my appetite immediately. And I was starving before that because I hadn't eaten dinner the night before. And it all starts with what, 35 grand? So what's the 35 grand worth when you're about to record a huge episode on an empty stomach and you're.

[Duncan Trussell]

God, that's weird.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Dehydrated. Because you went to bed late, you're trying to catch back up and no.

[Duncan Trussell]

One taught you this kind of math. My guess is if you're born into a family of show people and You're a show person, man. Did you. Were you a theater kid?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I wasn't. The theater lady wanted me to be a theater kid. And she was spot on, it turns out. But I always thought theater was, like, gay. Well, so I was on the wrestling.

[Duncan Trussell]

Well, Tony, you are. Look you so within. You know, I was a theater kid. And like, like, you are taught everything that you're talking about. You're taught this is not about you. It doesn't matter if you're the lead in the play. It doesn't matter if you have a walk on role. This is for the people, not you. We're just trying to put on a good show, get yourself out of it and realize this is something for them. And we're a team. We all are a machine. And the person, like, backstage getting the costumes ready, they're just as important. If we look at it from that perspective, it's an organism. It's like you can't value your liver more than your heart. You need them both to survive. And so you're a show person, but you have this completely bizarre story about how you got here. And so no one taught you this kind of stuff, which, by the way, is you're in such rare air that doing that kind of math, realizing that, oh, my God, every moment of my life leading up to a show is an investment in that show being good. Which is why you're a great entertainer. Because a lot of fucking people don't think that way. But when you start doing that kind of math, your whole life becomes about your show. It's the most insane kind of discipline that only shows up in, like, very rare performance. Fucking crazy. And I have to ask, man, how are you doing with that? Because that's a lot of pressure, man. And you're always. When we're in the green room, I think you're underplaying how hard you're working to some degree. And I don't think you're doing that to be humble or anything. I just think you're. You're like someone who's been running a marathon for the last decade and you just feel like you're walking.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

So how are you handling that? The growing recognition that, yeah, you're free, you get to, like, do anything you want. You get to be in the nice fucking thing, and they're making things for you and all the things.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

And yet, because you've prioritized the show over your own life.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Right.

[Duncan Trussell]

Those things become somewhat meaningless.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Totally.

[Duncan Trussell]

How are you dealing with that?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah, it's. It's a challenge and it is constant upkeep. Luckily, I. I have a show that's mine and I evolved it to what I love.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I kept it excited, I keep it exciting for me. I. It's all me making the decisions of who you see when you see them. Other than the bucket, the regulars, the this, the that. You know, this golden ticket winner wants to go up this week, maybe take another week or two off. We're going to let this golden ticket winner go. I think it's time for them. I want to see growth in them or a thing with this or that. I keep it interesting for me. I've just finished this Vince McMahon documentary. Did you watch it?

[Duncan Trussell]

No.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You have to watch it.

[Duncan Trussell]

No.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Five. Five part. Unbelievable.

[Duncan Trussell]

Okay. You're going to attack me.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

Who's Vince McMahon?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, my God. P.T. barnum. He's the creator and.

[Duncan Trussell]

Oh, the wrestling dude.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yes.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And so, you know, I was reminded of and. And really didn't learn a lot from it, but was just re inspired by watching it.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Because lately, and again, like for example, the numbers that I mentioned about the Shane, Adam Ray, Trump Biden episodes surpassing the most watched program in Netflix history. The only reason I know that is because I was given the numbers a few weeks ago because my managers and agents thought I would like to see that because it's a juggernaut accomplishment. But I'm not a numbers guy. I'm not that guy. Even when my right hand man, Yoni, is like, you know, our YouTube growth is up 250% week over week and da, da, da, da.

[Duncan Trussell]

You don't care.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I don't care. It's not my thing. I'm always just focused on the creative and who's being funny and how can this show be the best. Should we start with this and end with that? How about the band? What's the, what's the addition or the thing we can take away? But when I saw, when I heard of those numbers and saw them in actual print and saw the rankings of everybody's comedy specials, they threw the Kill Tony episodes in with everybody's comedy specials. They started calling on the, on these data charts, they started calling every episode of Kil Tony a comedy special.

[Duncan Trussell]

Wow.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

So you see all of a sudden, oh, you're getting 29 of the top 50 comedy specials of the year. 29 of the top 50. Including number one. Including number four. Five, seven, eight, nine.

[Duncan Trussell]

So is that unnerving or inspiring for you?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It was both.

[Duncan Trussell]

Don't look down.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Very unnerving.

[Duncan Trussell]

Don't look.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Exactly. That's exactly it. Don't look down. So a few weeks ago, when I saw that, I was like, God. Exactly. Don't look down is the smartest way I've thought about it or heard it. Put.

[Duncan Trussell]

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[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But then I watch this documentary, just the last two days, and I blasted through it, and I was completely. All of a sudden, my head was tilted up again, right? Because I'm looking at what Vince McMahon was doing the entire time, and he didn't go, holy. We've been number one every Monday on cable for.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

28 years. And, oh, my God, we're doing arenas every. We're doing arenas five nights a week. And I have to go to all these places and control this. He was going, you know, how do I give these? How do I move this crowd? How do I do it? Now he's only competing with himself. It's his universe, right? He's right. He's the one that's witnessed it all. See, that's a. That's the thing with Kill Tony is like, I've been there for all of them. So.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I know more than what anybody knows, right? And that's kind of a Vince thing. He's right there watching everything, and he's not. Not writing it. It's not all planned like what we think the finishes in pro wrestling are planned. But when it was at its best, when it was truly at its best, the attitude era, where, you know, of Stone Cold and the Rock and it was. Yeah, I know, the early 2000s and all that he was letting them write their stuff, and he was deciding where and what position, how should the episode start?

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Started with the glass breaking. Stone Cold walks out, and he says he's sick of the Rock doing this and calls out the Rock for.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It gets interrupted, and we take it to Wrestlemania or whatever. You know, he was doing a loose outline, which is exactly what I'm doing with Kill Tony. And it's. You know, there's no wrestling, obviously, but it is. You hope that the people that want to do great do great, and you give them an opportunity.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And it's not for everybody. And you have to be a freak, and you have to have a special skill set. And some people hate William and love Cam. Some people love Cam and hate Williams. Some people hated William early on, and they all love William now.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

You know, William is the most beloved character in the Kill Tony universe, probably, if I had to guess, with a 98.7 approval rating amongst all the fans. But a fun fact about that is that early on, when I made William a regular five or six years ago, everybody. And I mean everybody online, but most importantly, in real life, my close friends at the Comedy Store.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

The management at the Comedy Store, the waitresses at the Comedy Store, everybody, sure, he was extreme alcoholic. Everyone had sex with him.

[Duncan Trussell]

Everyone. William, that was the craziest thing. He was the manager, remember? He was everyone there.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But everybody hated William. Yeah, everybody did. I'm telling you.

[Duncan Trussell]

But you.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Lowest approval rating ever.

[Duncan Trussell]

But you saw something.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Absolutely.

[Duncan Trussell]

You saw the spark in there.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

You know, let me tell you about William, man. This is like, because we're friends, and like, when you're friends with somebody. And honestly, I don't watch podcasts that much, but so I was like, I obviously knew your show had blown up, but this is when I really realized how much it blown up. I started taking William on the road, and he would come on stage, and the cheers were not the cheers that you would get when you're bringing a feature who's funny, but people don't know. And I realized, like, he's fucking moving tickets, man. Like, whoa, this is. And then it all clicked. It's like, oh, my God, I'm taking someone on the road who's been on the Tonight show countless times.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Every week, he's put out. You know, William alone has put out more comedy than in the last five years, plus than Chappelle Louis.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Bill Burr, Segura, Bert Kreischer combined.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, man.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

There's no question about it.

[Duncan Trussell]

It's so funny.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

At about seven or eight minutes. And he's being funny the whole interview. We know how to do the dance.

[Duncan Trussell]

So this is like. So this. This territory that we're in here. And this is Mitzi territory. She had the same gift. She. I would watch her pass people and just think to myself, what? What the fuck? Then the next thing you know, they're selling out Madison. Not you. I'm not gonna say, like, no.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

That makes that you were spot on.

[Duncan Trussell]

Because I didn't know comedy. I didn't know what to look for. I was not even doing comedy at the time. I had no idea. But she would see something.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

She would put them up night after night after night. They would bomb, bomb, bomb, die. Bomb, bomb, bomb. All of a sudden something happened.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

And comics would start coming to watch their sets and like just this crazy.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And the fun fact is that the fans. You're exactly right. And the fans never knew that other person. We saw that other. Or you saw that other person that never. They only saw the star.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And that's what people are seeing with really everybody. I mean, everyone other than Cam. Cam came on. He's just a natural. It's what you hear about when you hear about 15 year old Eddie Murphy or 15 year old Dave Chappelle. Right. We're seeing him two years in blowing. Which is crazy.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And. But you're exactly right. And it's interesting to me because I'm obsessed and always have been obsessed with Mitzi. Probably the closest thing to godlike worship that I've had in my life. I knew that if I got a door job at that comedy store, at the Church of Darkness and Free Speech.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

That I would work in that industry for the rest of my life. All I needed was that T shirt to get.

[Duncan Trussell]

That's so cool.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

To change my life. I was positive to this day. I mean, even at my home, I have Jeff Scott's piano that was in his house with a picture of Mitzi on it. And it's the only hard copy picture that. That's anywhere in my giant, you know, living space.

[Duncan Trussell]

Dude, he loved you, man.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

And, you know, so this.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

But I'm a big believer in that is my point. And I feel like, again, that's the universe being like, if you believe in this, well, then here's this.

[Duncan Trussell]

Well, you know, it is a school. You know, the Comedy Store is a school. And it does teach not just how to do standup. It teaches a way of being around people. It like gets you ready if you do feature for somebody how to not be an asshole in the green room, which I don't think people understand how important that is. Like, so many little. Like, there's so much more than your. Obviously, being funny on stage is the primary job, but there's a lot of other things you have to learn.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Taking care of the little people, you know, being able to hang around, being able to control your alcohol or marijuana or anything. Consumption.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It does teach that you can have anything. You can have anything you want. Is a water good for you right now?

[Duncan Trussell]

Right?

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Is a shot, a half a shot of tequila. What you need is a coffee. What you need personal responsibility with cream gonna upset your stomach. Or straight coffee. Or is it. Is it a half a water and a half a coffee?

[Duncan Trussell]

You know what? It always was for me, baby kratom.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

100% of the time. Okay, wait, hold on. I have to ask this. And it is a little gossipy and scintillating, and I'm really not trying to needle somebody here. And you probably aren't even aware of it because you're too busy. But, you know this old Chapel Roanoke controversy that's happening right now. I know about this because my wife.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

What is it?

[Duncan Trussell]

So Chapel Roan is a performer and blew up very. Like, she was like. I think she was, like, not busking, but just someone who ended up kind of like, you know, getting super famous. And she, like, is becoming increasingly less. Seemingly less beloved because she posted some fucking TikTok about how, hey, don't just approach me on the street and talk to me. You wouldn't do that to whoever. Like, it's not cool. She's basically telling people, don't ask to take pictures with me. You know, like, it's unnerving and I don't like it. Pretty much the opposite of what you're talking about. Right? But then it's getting worse because she has started canceling shows, and I think because she was upset by people getting mad at her for not endorsing Kamala Harris or some shit.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, boy.

[Duncan Trussell]

Again, I'm loosely following this. My wife sends me a bunch of fucking chaperone tiktoks, and I watch them, but it isn't. So I'm curious what you think about that, because it seems like in the culture you have a kind of old school approach to what you're doing. It's old school. It's like, I'm gonna take pictures of people. Yeah. It's fucking annoying. Yeah. I'm gonna get a cold. Yeah. But, you know, these are the people who are Giving me the life that I have. They are 100% all that matters. Without them, I'm nothing but. And I don't just mean in like with fame or that, but a general, like. I don't know what you would call it, like a more me centric. I don't know, like people who like feel like. I've canceled shows twice, Tony. Once when I had Covid during the COVID scare and I was thinking about doing. I knew if I do it and I tested positive for Covid, I'm gonna get people sick. I can't do it. I didn't do it. Stayed it was here. Stayed in a fucking hotel for seven days. The Van Zandt. The second time was in San Francisco when I had goddamn norovirus. And I made it to the club and they put a bucket next to the stage that I could go and vomit in if I had to throw up during the show.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Yeah, that happened once in Manchester, England. Got sick in Dublin, had to fly there. Yeah.

[Duncan Trussell]

Worst to me, this is what I learned from Mitzi from the Comedy Store, from being around so many different performers. All that matters is the fucking audience. You do not cancel a show unless you are dying. Like unless you just fucking do it 100% so. But I do feel like not just in that form, but like there's something in the culture embracing like, I don't know, like. Like weakness. Embracing Some, some.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Well, if that's what you're doing, if that's what you're putting out, that's the fan base you're gonna get. Oh, that's the fan base you're gonna get. If you're a victim. Guess what? Your audience is. Bunch of victims. I can relate to that. The world's chair race. Hard on me too. If you. Yeah, it's magic.

[Duncan Trussell]

It's like you. Oh my God, you're.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It is what we were talking about with Roulette.

[Duncan Trussell]

The people who come to your shows are some form expression of your art.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, no doubt one of the most inspired things that ever that I ever saw artistically, which I wasn't expecting. I thought I was just gonna go see Tom Petty and fucking jam out at the, what, Hollywood bowl or wherever it was. And we went, we saw Tom Petty and I looked around and there's white kids, there's white grandparents, there's white teenagers, there's Asian middle aged people, there's black kids, there's black elderly people, there's Mexican, 40 year old couple, there's Mexican kids, there's this, there's that, there's a Jamaican guy with thing. It was a human rainbow. Fat people, skinny people, this, that the broadest range of an audience I've ever seen. And I was like, wow, this is what I want. Right? And you got it so cool. And yeah. And it's. And, and but it's especially that victim thing. Like, it's like, you know, I don't even know this girl that you're talking about. About. So the fact that the first impression of explaining who it is is that it's like, well, that's who they are. Yeah, who they are is who they are. If you can if you had to describe an artist in 30 seconds and a part as well. She didn't want to be around the people. So she's canceling some shows. It's like o, how do you even buy a ticket to that? If that's part of her identity is she had a bad day.

[Duncan Trussell]

People are like posting like again. And my wife keeps me tuned into what the Youngs are doing, but the people are sending like doing tiktoks. Like I bought plane tickets, I got hotel rooms. My kids are so excited to fucking see you. What do you mean you're canceling because you, you just feel a little weird.

[E]

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[Duncan Trussell]

Oh boy, dude, you know what I mean? It's like these people are like to you it's no big deal. I guess to her, not you, but to her it's just another show. But this for some people for months. Looking forward to it. Listening to her music. Like their kids, whoever they're going with, people are planning to ask someone to marry them fucking there, you know, you better have like Michael Jacksoned your ass if you're canceling these fucking shows. Not, like, feel bad.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Oh, I. Oh my God. I've the couple gigs that I've missed recently. I had to reschedule two shows in Florida to do the Tom Brady roast.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yes.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Which was the biggest thing to happen in my mainstream career ever. Right. And that was a reschedule with the thing that I, I wrote myself for the email blast, which is, you know, if you want a refund, you got it. If not, these dates are locked for two months from now. Here's the rescheduled date states, right? And basically, statistically, nobody got a refund. Everybody's like, how cool. And I basically said, you know, I can't say exactly what I'm doing, but it's going to be a big deal. And when you see it, you're going to love it and you're going to know, wow, he was going to be with us this weekend and blah, blah, blah. And the other one was Philly, which it was the largest amount of rain recorded at JFK Airport and the Upper East coast since the 1940s. And we're at the airport and we're flying the day of, and it turns out there was like a riot in Baltimore or something. So all these backup airports wouldn't work. New York wouldn't work. Philly. Oh, it was. The riots were in Philly. Remember when there was crazy.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Riots.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yes.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

That was the night of my Jesus Christ, long awaited big theater show there. And it just so happened that also in the riots, on top of the crazy riots, New York, Baltimore, covered, covered, covered in tens of inches of rain. So all the backup airports were busted and Philly's airport was busted. And I have never been more fucking drained and depressed, literally depressed, which is a rare, rare, rare bird. Luckily, thank God, knock on wood in my life, life. But it crushed me. And. But at the airport when I'm like, well, there's no other options that we tried everything, we exerted everything, even looked into a private flight, which ended up not making any physical sense. Right? And I'm like, well, at least we get tonight off, right? Tomorrow guys, we'll meet here at the airport. Turns out our flights have been rescheduled. We're gonna make the other gig, wherever that was, Buffalo or whatever. So we're gonna meet here at 11:30 for our 12:12pm or 12 or 1pm flight.

[Duncan Trussell]

Okay.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And. And I thought to myself, but at least we have today off. That's pretty cool. And I picture like the swimming pool or whatever. Yeah. I was going to do. And I was miserable for the rest of the day because I could not shake thinking about Philly, about how. God damn it.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yep.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Thousands of people. Thousands sold out show.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

They're dealing with riots. It should be tonight, right? Man, it should be. This is when they need it.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Not in two months when there's no riots.

[Duncan Trussell]

Wow. Dude.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And it bothered me. So not only not cancel shows, not only this and that, but even when being relieved from the stress of the airport and given a night off of work, it's. It still couldn't relax for the rest of the night. Yeah, I was miserable.

[Duncan Trussell]

Well, your brain thought you were gonna do this thing and you didn't get to. You had your brain at blue balls. Essentially.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Nothing to do with me, honestly, even though this sounds gay, as it had nothing do with me. It was literally. I could not shake the. Out of the thousands of people. Let's just be humble and say a couple hundred of them really needed it. I couldn't shake them. All day, all night.

[Duncan Trussell]

Right.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

It wasn't a day off at all. Because all I thought about was that show. That is, instead of. Even if I flew to the show and was at the hotel and eating dinner before the show, I'm not thinking about the show the whole time. At that point in the tour, I have the hour pretty locked and light improvisation. But the set was set and the lineup was set and everything was set. I thought about it more, not flying to the show and doing the show than I would have had I gone to the show and done the show. Oh, I thought about this show all night. I was texting a couple close friends like, God damn it. I cannot shake the fact that I missed this Philly show.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah, man. It's a bad feeling. And look, we have almost. We're way over time now. But one last thing I do want to say. You are amazing. Tony Inchcliffe is going to be donating. What is it? The next month of proceeds from Kill Tony to Western North Carolina's survivor to mini funds there.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

I'm going to make it rain on you.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah. And I'll be handling that distribution.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Your funds are going to be flooded, Misty.

[Duncan Trussell]

I'm gonna make it rain. You monster. You're a monster. He is doing a benefit at the mothership. But by the time you see this, it'll be over.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Tony what's the benefit called? Drowning and clowning.

[Duncan Trussell]

Fucking damn it.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

What's it called? A waddle. All right.

[Duncan Trussell]

No, I was trying to do, like. I was trying to do, like, a clip to help raise awareness and get money over there, and I realized I'm drinking liquid death. Death on camera. We had to shoot it again. I can't have this in the shot. But they need help, friends. And Tony is doing this benefit. And, man, you're so generous with your time. Thank you so much.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Thank you so much. I'd like to apologize to the listeners for not being funny once this entire episode, but we. When you and I get together, you know, it's a different thing. It does. You make me want to get deep. I've always looked up to you, and I think you're just so smart and cool. You're such a wise, wise sage of a big brother to me.

[Duncan Trussell]

Thank you.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

And a true Comedy Store guy, which, again, is my religion. So, like, when I got there and you existed, it just made me know I was at the right place and that I was on the right path. So I love you forever, too.

[Duncan Trussell]

And now that I know you're a sorcerer. Yeah, I love you even more.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Red nine, baby.

[Duncan Trussell]

Yeah. Red nine. See you guys later. Thank you, Tony. You're the best.

[Tony Hinchcliffe]

Thank you.

[E]

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