← Pablo Torre Finds Out
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- [00:01]
A
Welcome to Pablo Torre finds out. I am Pablo Torre, and today we're going to find out what this sound is.
- [00:06]
B
I think Bill Belichick might be the first Asian head coach. We have our representative. That's right, it's Bill Belichick.
- [00:14]
A
Right after this ad. You're listening to Giraffe Kings Network. I love how much you hate.
- [00:35]
B
I hate podcasting, man. Hate this. It's so stupid. It's the death of media and civilization. This is the death of media and civilization.
- [00:45]
A
Right here, this desk, me and you talking to each other.
- [00:48]
B
Everyone thinks they're a creator now. Everyone's, oh, you just need two mics and you just need to talk. And you can make $100 million. And they do.
- [00:58]
A
That is the rub.
- [00:59]
B
Yeah. What happened to production value? What happened to writing a funny article? What happened to work?
- [01:06]
A
We're just going to Google.
- [01:07]
B
We don't even work anymore. We just do this.
- [01:09]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm going to ask one of my producers to Google some stuff as we go, and by the end of it, I will have made nine figures.
- [01:17]
B
Is. Is.
- [01:18]
A
Is what I told my parents.
- [01:19]
B
Yeah. Well, it's cool. At least you opened your own shop like this. I didn't. I. I didn't know you.
- [01:24]
A
We have a physical space. That is. So as much as podcasts are ruining civilization. Civilization, media, ethics, all of it. I built. I. We built a physical studio.
- [01:36]
B
Yeah.
- [01:37]
A
And that feels almost a throwback after, like, the last several years.
- [01:40]
B
Yes, but you could be doing this in your underwear.
- [01:43]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. For our podcast audience. We are naked. We are nude.
- [01:48]
B
Check the IG clips.
- [02:07]
A
I was trying to explain, Ronnie, like how we know each other. To one of my producers, I can't remember.
- [02:12]
B
Yeah.
- [02:13]
A
And I think the assumption was that.
- [02:16]
B
Or Asian.
- [02:17]
A
Exactly.
- [02:19]
B
Which is actually not. Not wrong.
- [02:24]
A
Okay, so the assumption here, just to.
- [02:25]
B
Spell it all out for you, is.
- [02:27]
A
That I obviously knew stand up comedian and big time Hollywood actor and Daily show correspondent Ronny Chang because we're both Asian and on cable television, which, you know, again, not totally wrong, I think, in terms of how we first reached out to each other over the Internet. But we got dinner eventually in person. I watched his Netflix specials, and I became immediately acquainted with his particular brand of holiday ch.
- [02:52]
B
Every nine months in this country. That's like a congressional gridlock, right? Everyone always threatening a government shutdown. Government shutdown? Yo, there's no government shutdown with Asian people in charge. We don't shut down for anything. Yo. We don't shut down for Christmas. Do you understand?
- [03:14]
A
But as for why I mean anything at all to Ronnie, there is another reason.
- [03:19]
B
It turns out I actually know you from. Because I used to be even more obsessed with sports when I was living in Australia. That's when I entered my peak sports phase. And that was when speaking on new media. That was when PTI first started. Sorry, pardon the interruption. For people non sports fans who are listening to this. Yeah.
- [03:40]
A
Around the Horn part of the interruption. Yeah.
- [03:42]
B
And no, but they were first putting podcasts out. And so I was living in Australia at the time, and I didn't have ESPN like most college kids or overseas or, you know, we didn't grow up. I didn't grow up with cable. I couldn't afford it. And so the fact that they were putting out this show on for free and I. I couldn't understand, like, why are they doing this for free? Just the audio. But it was great because, you know, I would, like, pirate it. I would, like, pirate it on tour. I would torrent around the horn. For real. I was like, I was such a nerd. I would torrent around the horn just to watch it. Yo. And then, you know, the Department of Justice better never listen to this podcast.
- [04:16]
A
That's right. Because the stat limitations may not have run out.
- [04:18]
B
If anyone from a DOJ or the motion pictures listen to this, we're just joking. We don't know what Torrens are. Yeah.
- [04:25]
A
I just love the idea of, like, outside this office in Manhattan, there is a van with an FBI agent being like, we got him.
- [04:32]
B
We got him. We got these idiots.
- [04:35]
A
We've been hunting them.
- [04:36]
B
Who. They willingly came on air and did this. But, yeah, I listened to you on pgi. It was great. And I was like, man, as an Asian dude on around the Horn, this is the best.
- [04:44]
A
I'm just imagining, like, okay, young Ronnie Chang at this point, you're where. You're in Singapore, Malaysia, Australia at this point.
- [04:50]
B
I was in Australia.
- [04:51]
A
Okay.
- [04:52]
B
I was in law school in Australia, man. Okay. Yeah.
- [04:54]
A
So I imagine you just like listening on the podcast.
- [04:56]
B
I love that whole format. I love. You know, Tony, it was like a game show. Yeah. But it wasn't. It wasn't. It wasn't right. It was like a self.
- [05:03]
A
Aware.
- [05:04]
B
That format was genius.
- [05:05]
A
When I first started this crusade.
- [05:07]
B
Oh, that's when I first started this crusade. And that's the other part of this. The first person there has been very.
- [05:13]
A
Prominent in all of this. But what did it feel like, Pablo.
- [05:16]
B
After seeing your one seed that you picked to go down Kansas beat Penn but then seeing another one seed Virginia, which you. You didn't have it. But to see it go down. What were you feeling?
- [05:28]
A
You know, Tony, many great inventors don't live to see the now that's Stop Tim show.
- [05:34]
B
When you s. How can we talk about sports in a way that hasn't been done with the point system? And then you. Sometimes you win. Not often enough, quite frankly. Thank you. You know, not represent.
- [05:44]
A
Have a class action lawsuit on this basis.
- [05:46]
B
You will win at the end and then it will give you the Spotlight for like 30 seconds.
- [05:50]
A
Yes.
- [05:50]
B
And you just have to talk FaceTime. And you would always have these great. Everyone always had. No one ever bombed FaceTime. Which I always found pretty amazing because as a professional, I guess public speaker, I don't know if I could hit every single facetime without writing it beforehand. So I don't know what you guys were just off the top of your head. You guys just going off about some stupid, you know, bull in sports.
- [06:12]
A
It is my first FaceTime of 2022, which marks that I've been doing this show. And I just wanted to share with all of you, all of America, really a major development in my life. I got a Japanese toilet, just gas bagging. Just.
- [06:25]
B
Yeah, but it work.
- [06:26]
A
But by the way, like, I think something you appreciate as a guy who is now the senior correspondent of the.
- [06:31]
B
Daily show, we get hired with that position. That's a fake position, but sure, go ahead.
- [06:34]
A
Then you should have made a better one.
- [06:36]
B
Yeah, yeah. The exact president of the president of the Daily Show. That's my new title. America has a problem with food. You guys want your food to be cheap and fast, but also to be fresh and healthy. That's too many things. Okay? You can't have both. It's like racial diversity at a ski lodge. It doesn't exist.
- [06:53]
A
As Daily show president, something you appreciate is just the reps. Truly. Like these are daily shows we're talking about. And when I talk about when I think about show business, I'm like you mother with your precious. Like we do something once a week or once a month. Like I just sound like we're soldiers. We're in the trenches.
- [07:13]
B
Yeah, yeah.
- [07:14]
A
We're pumping out.
- [07:15]
B
We're shoveling this useless content every day so meta can make some money from it.
- [07:20]
A
Yeah, that's right. That's right. So tech companies can monetize us and we can never see the profits. But, but truly like the number of just sheer tonnage of shows, I would imagine that you actually do understand that in a way that few people.
- [07:34]
B
Yeah, well, not just from the Daily show, but that's, that's how stand up comedy works. It's an iterative based art form that you have to jump on every single night and you have to keep bombing until you get it right. And then you have to keep trying jokes or, you know, not, not trying jokes that don't work, but like, you have to keep working on jokes that you believe in. If a line doesn't work, you, you know, you, meaning you've performed it and something doesn't work and you still believe in a joke, you gotta try something different to make the joke work or maybe abandon the joke. But the point is you gotta keep jumping on it. It's iterative. And you do the same stuff, you know, every night, four or five shows a night. So that comes from stand up.
- [08:09]
A
You know, one of the things I, I, I wanted to ask you about was bombing.
- [08:12]
B
Yeah.
- [08:12]
A
There is a sports aspect to it in the sense of like public performance and a, a, a live dimension to trying to not be humiliated. Like a high pressure moment that goes wrong.
- [08:28]
B
Yes.
- [08:29]
A
How would you describe that for people who have not taken that degree of risk when it comes to speaking extemporaneously or even in a, in a practiced way in public?
- [08:39]
B
Yeah. Wow. That, that, you did go to Harvard. That's a good question actually, for once. That's right. That's right. You know, I don't like to talk up myself or the stand up comedy or anything I do as though it's the greatest thing on the planet or whatever. I don't think it's the hardest thing. Of course there's harder jobs. But I do appreciate now with some perspective as well that yes, snap comedy does have some actual skill sets that have helped me out in real life, like in real life that, like, it's.
- [09:09]
A
Absurd by the way, that we draw.
- [09:10]
B
The line, I know we draw the line between comedy and real life, but like the mental toughness of overcoming not just the fear of performing in the moment, which is the analogy of sports, but also not performing in the moment as in failing to perform. That's how you get better. And then the more you see that that's how you get better, the less you're worried about it because you understand that's part of the process. And I think in sports there's this optimum level of failure that you want to reach when you're training. In addition to that is like with comedy, the stakes are actually not that high. You know, if you can overcome your own whatever Insecurities. Yeah. You didn't do well.
- [09:49]
A
But wait, wait, hold on. I want to challenge you on that because you're sort of saying. You're pointing to your head and saying, if you can overcome this.
- [09:56]
B
Yeah.
- [09:57]
A
That's the thing that most people cannot overcome is what's happening. Pointing to my own head here. Right.
- [10:03]
B
Yeah, but I mean, that's why it's not for everybody, you know, and so, yeah, there is a.
- [10:08]
A
Well, this is. That's the sports analogy. Not to interrupt you, but like, this. This job is not for everybody. It's meant to be hard.
- [10:15]
B
Yeah.
- [10:15]
A
It's meant to risk genuine shame and humiliation. And I'm just curious, do you remember, do you have, like, a almost physical, visceral memory of bombing? Is there something that sticks out all the time? So, okay, so if you could describe just like one of those moments, one of those memories, what. What it feels like in your body as it's happening, like, and before you.
- [10:37]
B
Why are you trying to make me relive this, man? So worst, like, you know, I've been booed off stage at music festivals in Australia.
- [10:47]
A
That's beyond bombing.
- [10:48]
B
That's.
- [10:48]
A
That's being evicted.
- [10:51]
B
So I'm doing my set and someone is start shouting like, boring, boring. And I'm just like, powering through it. And he won't stop saying boring. And so I just finally say, like, hey, do you want to get thrown out this festival? Because we'll just throw you out. And I pointed a security guard and the security guard was. There was no way he was listening to me at all. I was just. I was just bluffing the whole time. And I just powered through my set. So I just.
- [11:13]
A
So wait, so your. Your decision, as this is happening is. I'm going to finish this set.
- [11:19]
B
Yeah, I'm just going to finish it.
- [11:20]
A
And so your decision there to do that, how obvious was it that that was the move?
- [11:26]
B
It just felt like, I guess I was pissed off. I was. I'm just going to finish this set. I'm going to make you listen to me talk and just, you know, just bombing the whole time.
- [11:35]
A
I imagine, though, just. I'm. I'm. I've never done stand up. I imagine that among all of the crowds to try to boo you off a stage.
- [11:43]
B
Yeah.
- [11:44]
A
An Australian crowd in the caricature I have of Australia has to be, like, one of the worst ones to experience.
- [11:51]
B
I don't know about that. I started comedy in Australia. I lived there for 10 years. So to be honest, most people who come to shows are nice People, you know, majority of society works because most people are nice people. And then there's, you know, you get one or two of those kind of people who, I guess, I don't know, they were trolling. I don't know what they were doing on the day. But context in comedy is so important, and people don't understand how fragile it is sometimes. And I know it's not the consumer's job to care. It's the comic's job to, you know, be professional and put on a good show. But that's why it's also up to the comics to sometimes say no to gigs that won't be very good. So, for example, if you do comedy in a boardroom under fluorescent lights at 9:00am, I, you know, I don't care who you are. That's not going to be a great gig, you know, so. And. And people, for some reason, a producer, whoever's making the decisions is not thinking about that. They just think, like, oh, throw it on and it'll be okay, you know, and what will happen? For example, music festivals is like, they just offer enough money, and all the comics are like, all right, we're just going to bomb for this for money. We're just going to bomb for money. Now is. Everyone's going to hate this. And. But people don't. It's not like music, you know, you can't just put it on and people in the background. You. You have to kind of buy in as a crowd for comedy.
- [13:02]
A
Right.
- [13:02]
B
You have to want to be there. Otherwise comedy doesn't work.
- [13:04]
A
You know, I know there are some comedians out there, some standups who love crowd work.
- [13:08]
B
Yeah. Yeah.
- [13:08]
A
And they will. It feels like in the. In the social media economy, the dystopia we live in, like, somebody. Sometimes I wonder, like, is that a plant? Oh, because it's just like. Because there is such rich potential for, like, a fun viral interaction. Do you enjoy that opportunity or, like, get the.
- [13:24]
B
I hate that I hate talking to them. I didn't. I didn't come here to talk to you guys. I came here to say what I want to say. I don't want to know what you people think. Yeah. So I don't. Actually, there's a bigger reason why I don't talk to the crowd that much is because, like, I like talking to a crowd sometimes at my own shows. Like, if I'm doing a. If I'm on tour, which I'm going on tour next year. So this is the only reason why I'm here.
- [13:42]
A
That's right. Do this 2024 ronnychang.com right?
- [13:47]
B
Ronnie with a Y. Yeah, I already hate myself. C H I E N G. The reason why I don't like to do a ton of crowd work is not only do I want to do my own jokes, I want to talk to these people, but also because when I started doing comedy, I was doing comedy for a few years and I stopped watching comedy. I was just performing it. And then after four or five years in, I think it was only four years in, I went back to watching comedy as an audience member, not performer. As in, I would just go to shows and watch it now, like, you know, small comedy shows, whatever it was. And I remember feeling this, like, you know, it's corny to say, but it's like this empathy for the audience. Because I used to, my first four years of comedy, I was trying to figure out how to do it. I would basically yell at the audience a lot, like attack the crowd a lot. And that was great for like a 5 minute set or 10 minute set, but you couldn't really yell at a crowd for longer than 20 minutes before it got kind of, it got kind of weird. And I acknowledged that. And I was just trying to transition away from like what was working in the short term to having this as a long term career, you know, and watching comedy again kind of made me realize in terms of empathy with the audience was like, man, people had a long day, you know, you don't know what they're going through in the crowd. Like, you don't know what the, what's happened in their life. They're just trying to get away from their problems or maybe they'll have some horrible thing happen to them or serious stress. So they're there to like, enjoy themselves, you know, and they're there to listen to the comic, you know, and so absence. Any other evidence to the contrary of them being a D man, you know, they're just trying to have a good time. And in that sense, the mutual respect between the performer and the audience is, oh, let me do the stuff. I worked hard and prepare it and not like pick on you for the sake of picking on you, you know, that's what drives a lot of my, you know, show performance, you know.
- [15:38]
A
Well, I should point out for people who have not seen your standup and by the way, like two specials on Netflix, both really funny.
- [15:45]
B
Do you have any idea how meaningless the concept of Thanksgiving is to.
- [15:52]
A
Turkey?
- [15:52]
B
It's dry. Yeah, I'd rather fix healthcare than eat turkey. How about that? Is that Someone you want in charge, please vote for the Asians when you get a chance. Will work while you're eating.
- [16:11]
A
I would say that your use of anger is still like a calling card for you, but it's deployed. It's deployed in a way that is clearly like, let's get on board on this.
- [16:22]
B
You know what I mean? Let's all get angry at this together. Yeah.
- [16:24]
A
And it's trying to galvanize as opposed to, like, directed at someone in the building.
- [16:28]
B
Yeah, yeah. It used to be very directed at the crowd, and that worked as a. I would say that worked as a gimmick when you're. When I was starting out in short, shorter sets, but then, yeah, the name of the game for me was all, what became like, oh, let's all get angry at this thing together. Instead of, I'm angry at you guys.
- [16:59]
A
So I should point out, as we talk about public performance and how fans, how audience members feel and. And what we are passionate about. Should point out that you're wearing a sweater that. That has the NBA logo knit onto it.
- [17:12]
B
Yeah, yeah. NBA. I support the NBA. Yeah, Yeah. I even have a team. I just support the NBA.
- [17:17]
A
That's what I want to know. Okay, so we're back now to you torrenting around the horn in PTI and falling in love with sports in a way that is confusing to me because I'm. And this is the part of, like, all Asian Americans know everything about each other or all Asians. I think about each other. I don't know what it was like to grow up abroad learning about sports from across the world.
- [17:39]
B
Yeah.
- [17:39]
A
How did you fall in love with any part of sports from that distance?
- [17:43]
B
Yeah. If you come from Singapore and Malaysia, we watch a lot of English Premier League soccer, and I always found it also incredibly stupid. Here's your clip for Singapore about how Singaporeans will, for some reason, pick a English Premier League team arbitrarily based on current success or the jersey color and then get, you know, support it. So support their stupid colonial team so passionately that they'll get angry, like, genuinely angry at other Singaporeans who supported the rival team. So I get the love. I never got the hate of it. You know, that tribalism. So for me, how I started joining was just to troll my friends. I would pick the team everyone hated, and I'm like, yeah, I support these guys. And so at the time, it was Chelsea because they got bought over. They had a ton of money.
- [18:36]
A
Yes.
- [18:37]
B
And they were winning. And I was like, yeah, I support Chelsea. So I go Around Singaporeans, Liverpool, man. Everyone's a Man U supporter because you grew up in the 90s in Singapore. Everyone became a Manchester United equivalent of.
- [18:46]
A
Being like a Cowboys or a Bulls.
- [18:48]
B
Fan in the 90s. Yeah. But this is worse because this is Manchester United supporters who've never been to England and if they went to Manchester, would get their ass kicked by Manchester people because that's how they rolled it.
- [18:59]
A
And also, I think this is an important point that I want to clarify. Singapore.
- [19:02]
B
Yeah.
- [19:03]
A
British colony, once upon a time.
- [19:05]
B
Yeah.
- [19:05]
A
There is also the backdrop of literally rooting for the empire that put its boot on your throat.
- [19:11]
B
Yeah, I never got that. So I just bought Chelsea to troll people. And then it became kind of like a genuine love of Chelsea.
- [19:18]
A
I'm noticing a recurring theme here of your. Of your use of hatred transforming into love.
- [19:24]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I like to. That's my transmutation. I like to. That's my alchemy. I turn hatred into love. So, yeah, I support Chelsea and love. Love Telling people I support Chelsea and seeing how angry they would get. They'd be like, why the do you support Chelsea? I'm like, I support Chelsea for the same reason you support Manu or Liverpool, whether the stupid Arsenal or whatever. You. By the way, Arsenal's not even. Doesn't even. It's not even a location in London. There's nowhere called Arsenal. When you support Arsenal as a Singaporean, what are you supporting?
- [19:54]
A
Wait, that was your gateway drug? Was. Was trolling EPL fans in Singapore.
- [19:59]
B
That's how I got. And thank you. You know Michael Jordan, who that he. They would show Michael Jordan.
- [20:06]
A
Ronnie just pointed to the sky.
- [20:07]
B
Yeah.
- [20:08]
A
Thank Michael Jordan.
- [20:09]
B
That's how he. That's how high, how tall he is when. When I stand next to him.
- [20:12]
A
But he. By the way, like, so again, we're talking about what year roughly this is.94. So you were rooting for Chelsea and the Bulls and Michael Jordan?
- [20:20]
B
Well, I. I'm not from America. Well, I. I used to live in Manchester, New Hampshire, but I. I didn't. I didn't have. Like, I'm not. I couldn't claim a US Team, you know, because I never really. I felt. I felt it was like false tribalism to try to claim it. So for that reason, I never supported NBA team. I just love basketball. So, in fact, if anything, I always. Whenever two teams played, I was always like, oh, who's the underdog? You know? So I actually, I was following the knicks a lot.
- [20:46]
A
94, 95, as they lost a lot to Michael Jordan.
- [20:49]
B
Great win for the Chicago bulls. Michael Jordan, 50. Yeah. They lost a lot of Michael Jones. They also won a lot. By the way, they went to the finals twice.
- [21:01]
A
I think they played the spurs in the finals. Lost to the spurs in the finals.
- [21:05]
B
Yes, they had. That team was Chris Charles. Charlie Ward, who was a Heinzman winning quarterback and tennis prodigy and starting NBA point guard, underrated athlete Charlie Ward.
- [21:17]
A
And they lost to the Rockets, I should say as well. So. So. But this team, by the way, Chris Childs punched Kobe Bryant in the neck.
- [21:23]
B
Oh, yeah. Great. Another reason why he's a good guy. And then Marcus Camby. Yeah. Who took on David Robinson and Tim Duncan by himself because Patrick Ewing was injured and somehow didn't break his spine, obviously. Sprewell, Alan, Houston. And that was like a fun team to root for. I would play, I would use them in NBA. NBA 90, 96. I was like a Knicks specialist. Houston. Yeah. It was, it was great.
- [21:47]
A
I was doing the same thing in New York City at this time. I'm realizing.
- [21:53]
B
What do you mean?
- [21:53]
A
I was born and raised in Manhattan.
- [21:55]
B
Yeah.
- [21:55]
A
I was rooting for the Knicks against Michael Jordan and the Bulls.
- [21:58]
B
Yeah.
- [21:58]
A
I was also playing as them in video games.
- [22:01]
B
Yeah.
- [22:01]
A
Yeah. Trying to live a life that they would not deliver.
- [22:04]
B
Yeah.
- [22:05]
A
Winning a title.
- [22:05]
B
Did you ever manage to get online and play online games of NBA?
- [22:09]
A
I wasn't playing online.
- [22:10]
B
Sorry. It wasn't two kids, NBA Live.
- [22:12]
A
Wait, so you were playing online? Multiplayer online.
- [22:15]
B
Yeah.
- [22:15]
A
Okay. What is young Ronnie Chang?
- [22:17]
B
Yeah.
- [22:18]
A
Like on a gamer headset in like not.
- [22:21]
B
What. What are you talking about? We didn't have headsets. Oh yeah. This is like late 90s. We use the dial up modem. So you. First of all, you have to actually know the person in real life. There was no lobby. You would have to like join.
- [22:31]
A
You're right. Of course.
- [22:32]
B
Yeah. You would have to go. Of course you would have to tell your friend in. In class. Hey, let's play right now. Are you ready to play? Ready to play? Okay. They hang up phone. The modem would go through the phone. Oh, I sound so old now. Like the.
- [22:44]
A
Your modem would scream at you.
- [22:45]
B
The modem would scream at you. If you pick up the phone, modem be like, shut the up, put me back. And you had to hang up. And then you probably up your Internet.
- [22:53]
A
Yeah. If your mom picked up your phone.
- [22:55]
B
Yeah.
- [22:56]
A
Your game was over.
- [22:56]
B
Yeah. She would hear all the porn and it'll be over.
- [22:59]
A
Of course I was going to ask were you on America Online? But of course you weren't no, because we're.
- [23:03]
B
You only heard about that in you've Got Mail, the movie. Right. We all like what's the mail. What is this? Like, why is that Internet so weird? Why do they do everything so weird? Why is it like feet instead of meters? Why is it like Fahrenheit Celsius? Why is QBR ratings like an arbitrary. What is the QBR rating? 91.5623. It's like pie or something. Like, make it 100. I love how you're dancing around sports with me, but you don't want to ask me the hardcore sports thing, man. Oh, I want encyclopedia up here about sports. But we're not talking about sports at all.
- [23:35]
A
You want me to test you?
- [23:36]
B
Test me.
- [23:37]
A
All right, yeah. So let me clarify your. Your expertise.
- [23:41]
B
Sure. So you know the NBA, 90s, NBA.
- [23:43]
A
Okay.
- [23:44]
B
I've read every Patriot book. What does that mean about the New England Patriots?
- [23:49]
A
Really?
- [23:49]
B
Yes. I've read every single one about Bill Belichick and Tom Brad, everyone. Patriot Reign. Why? Yeah, the one. What do you mean?
- [23:55]
A
I mean, I mean, of course I find it interesting. I find these books interesting.
- [23:59]
B
Bill Simmons, I read all his books. I read the books that Bill Simmons recommended. The one that got breaks of the game.
- [24:04]
A
David Halberson, about the Trailblazers.
- [24:07]
B
Trailblazers, yeah. Bill Walton, the better version of Jokic. Probably Bill Walton. Right. But we don't have enough clips about him, so we can't.
- [24:14]
A
Well, his feet.
- [24:15]
B
Yeah, his feet, first of all. But I'm just saying in the style. Play style. Point center.
- [24:20]
A
Let me ask you an NBA nerd question about passing big men.
- [24:24]
B
Sure.
- [24:24]
A
Who is the passing big man? Not from America that everybody thinks would have been one of the great passing big men?
- [24:30]
B
Oh, Sabonis. Yeah, yeah, of course. Sabonis.
- [24:34]
A
An excellent passer.
- [24:34]
B
You gotta really watch it. Look at that behind the back. They feel they can make the shot. He doesn't want a great.
- [24:41]
A
You are. You are a genuine.
- [24:42]
B
I'm the guy, man. I'm wearing this. I'm not wearing this for no reason. I'm representing the NBA on this podcast.
- [24:49]
A
It is a deeply Asian thing to come into a podcast studio, being like, do you have a test for me?
- [24:55]
B
Yeah, bring it. I'm trying to establish my sports bonafides on this thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So wait, so the Patriots, though. Okay, yeah, Patriots.
- [25:03]
A
What about that is intriguing to you? As somebody who literally cannot claim to be an American Patriot in that way?
- [25:11]
B
I kind of was like, okay, well, I used to live in New Hampshire, so I Guess that's.
- [25:15]
A
You got to explain that.
- [25:16]
B
Oh, okay. My parents went to college very late in life. They went to college in Manchester, New Hampshire, and they went to college after they had two kids. So I went to. I moved to America when I was 3 years old from Malaysia, and then they did the undergrad and post grad, and then they went back to Malaysia. So I left after that. So I was in America from three to seven. But we were good immigrants. We didn't take any jobs. We left. And so that's how. That's My memory of America was 89 to 94. Manchester, New Hampshire. That was like my whole life. Was that.
- [25:51]
A
So you actually do have some sort of affection for the region.
- [25:55]
B
Yeah, I got huge affection every time I go back there. I talk about every time I perform in Boston. Boston was our Chinatown. I wanna.
- [26:02]
A
I wanna call you out on the hypocrisy of your love, though, because you said before you. That you love underdogs.
- [26:07]
B
Yeah.
- [26:07]
A
You are fetishizing the New England Patriots.
- [26:09]
B
Well, I'll tell you, the only thing I love more than the underdog is a great system. Wow. And, you know, the. The idea, you know, that the. Their philosophy of, like, always, on to the next game, just do your job. Don't care about the hype. Focus on what didn't go right versus what did go right. I think Bill Belichick might be the first Asian head coach. We have our representative.
- [26:35]
A
That's right.
- [26:35]
B
It's Bill Belichick.
- [26:36]
A
That's right. Well, on the sideline, he does have his son there, and it's very clear that he does not approve.
- [26:43]
B
I don't know about how good he.
- [26:45]
A
Is at his son, Steve Belichick, at his job.
- [26:47]
B
Yeah. But. But I. Yeah, I don't know if he doesn't. I think he loves his family a lot, actually, based on the 2000 hours of Patriot documentaries I've seen, I think he actually loves his family a lot. He loves his dad a lot.
- [26:57]
A
That's right.
- [26:58]
B
He loves his dad. So I'm sure he. You know, I don't pretend I know him, but I'm sure he passes that on to his son. That same relationship he wants to have.
- [27:05]
A
Family being very important to build quite.
- [27:08]
B
But he's got, you know, I. I was just enamored by the. The. The whole idea of the team before yourself and ignore the noise. Ignoring the noise is something that. I think in comedy you have to do that, you know, because you have to ignore the haters and just focus on your jokes, which is part of what we were talking about earlier about bombing. Yeah. Overcoming adversity. And bombing is like, you gotta ignore a lot of the noise. And then also you have to, like, focus on the present, which is very Buddhist. He's very focused on the present. It's always the present. You think having a 37 year old.
- [27:41]
A
We'Re on to Cincinnati. It's nothing about the past, nothing about the future. Right now we're preparing for Cincinnati.
- [27:47]
B
Okay. Do you feel like the talent you have here is good?
- [27:50]
A
We're getting ready for Cincinnati.
- [27:52]
B
He's the first Asian head coach. Man, I'm telling you, it's like there's no tomorrow, there's no next. It's right now, this game. And then after the game is like, the past doesn't exist. It's just now we only live in the now, you know, and the success that they have at the time was like, put the team above the individual, which. Don't you think that's a very un American approach to anything?
- [28:14]
A
Yeah. I mean, look, when the Patriots ran out at that super bowl at the same time as a team, that was not a thing that we had seen before.
- [28:24]
B
And now, ladies and gentlemen, choosing to be introduced as a team, here are the American Football Conference champions, the New England Patriots. No, I remember that. Yeah.
- [28:40]
A
And so.
- [28:40]
B
And.
- [28:41]
A
But here's. Here's. Here's where it is now, though, right? Is that Patriots are ass. They're struggling.
- [28:45]
B
Yeah.
- [28:46]
A
But it's.
- [28:47]
B
Look at the. Look at the data points. Look at the overall picture. You're picking one outlier data point. And this NFL is always about overreacting. Everyone is overreacting, which is why ignore the noise is actually more prescient than people understand. Because how many times NFL Week 1 or like, we're gonna win the champions or we're gonna. It's over. Blow it up. After we blow it up. Blow it up. It's over. And it's like, guys, everyone just calm down. If you watch Tom Brady, as I have for thousands of hours on Facebook, watch Tom Tom Versus time. He talks about, like, it's like every year is different. First of every season, every team is different. That's what he says. And that he says, like, you build. You build like you have preseason to figure out your hypothesis of what the team could be. And then you test it. Right? And then you. You build from there.
- [29:40]
A
So it's like, I did not anticipate that you would be this much of a New England Patriots fetishist. I want to turn this a little bit because the Idea of being the, the star.
- [30:07]
B
Yeah.
- [30:09]
A
I am fascinated by how you have also in your own career grown into the role of a person who is in Marvel movies and in giant movies like crazy rich Asians and all of this stuff like stardom for you.
- [30:25]
B
Yeah.
- [30:25]
A
And I know you're again in keeping with your Belichickian Buddhist philosophies.
- [30:30]
B
Yeah. Yeah.
- [30:30]
A
You're naturally deflecting and self deprecating. But what is the biggest difference just from a day to day perspective when it comes to like response from being in one of the biggest movie franchises like Shang Chi.
- [30:44]
B
Yeah.
- [30:44]
A
In the Marvel Cinematic Universe versus being a stand up. How, how much has that been a thing you've had to adjust to?
- [30:52]
B
Not that much. Again, it's the Bill Belichick thing. It's like well on to the next. It's very Buddhist. It's like okay, you know, you don't, don't believe your own hype. You know, like you just do the work and I don't know. I have a lot of gratitude when I do my work. So I'm like, oh, I'm very lucky to be part of these things. And then I don't take as the beyond end all. And I don't think I'm, you know, the whatever like it because you gotta prove yourself the next show. By the way I have to do stand up. You're only as good as your next show or your last show. Sorry. So I got another stand up gig. So who cares. I was in Shangchi. I'm about to bomb in front of this bathel of drunk people in lower Manhattan right now who, who don't care about that. You know what I mean? So there's always the next thing to do. So it. I don't know, I guess I never.
- [31:40]
A
Your life has to have changed in some way though.
- [31:44]
B
I, I think more people recognize me and I'm able to sell tickets to comedy shows which I'm very grateful for. So that's changed. Yeah. But other than that I'm still like.
- [31:53]
A
Yeah, you do martial arts in your stand up now. Everybody should know that you are now doing very sophisticated like almost CGI worthy martial arts routine.
- [32:02]
B
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
- [32:03]
A
That's what they want now.
- [32:03]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I'm doing. I have rings that fly off my arms in the show. It's very. We got Taylor Swiss these production designer to figure out how to. No, you know, stand up's just you and a microphone and then you have to bring it.
- [32:16]
A
Who is the person who radicalizes you into wanting to do stand up? Who from afar across the world you were watching realizing like, oh, this is a thing that people like?
- [32:27]
B
Yeah, there was a few, I guess for me, Russell Peters was blowing up when I was in university and he was probably the one who got me thinking about because his, his special was one of the first to be on the Internet, probably illegally, to be honest.
- [32:44]
A
And it's funny, when you watch white Canadian people talk, especially white Canadian guys, they have this funny ass way of talking. They talk, the way they speak. They make everything sound like it's the most matter of fact thing you've ever heard in your life. And when they talk to you, it looks like they can't control their head. It looks like they're part bobblehead when they say stuff to you because they'll come up to you and they'll go, she. Jesus Christ.
- [33:07]
B
It was spreading around the Internet like, it was like wildfire. His first special was going crazy. Like, I remember walking to Melbourne Law School into the lobby and white people were quoting his routines. Not to me, just among themselves. And I was like, damn, this is really crossing boundaries here in a really cool way. And so that was the first time I thought, like, like, oh, that there could be a way to talk about a non white experience in a way that could be mainstream. You know, that's not super niche. And then I started getting into stand up a bit more academically in terms of like, look, watching, you know, trying to find like, just like the way you would try to find a band, like finding comics that maybe people didn't know about. And then I got into, thanks to the Amazon again, American tech coming through. At that time, even this was like mid 2000s, the Amazon algorithm was pretty strong with their recommendations, cultural recommendations. So I would put in some comment. I can't remember who I put in, but I managed to come across Bill Burr.
- [34:07]
A
Why would you listen to another human being tell you where you're gonna go when you die? It's just like, dude, have you ever been dead?
- [34:14]
B
No.
- [34:14]
A
Great. So wouldn't it be safe to assume that you wouldn't have the slightest idea what you're talking about?
- [34:21]
B
It blew me away, that, that first special blew me away. I was instantly a fan. And then years later, Bill Burr would contact me on Facebook out of nowhere. And I, I couldn't believe it was him. He saw one of my sets on Just for Laughs and he's. And his Facebook is like, his profile picture is a car. So you don't know if it's him. And he was like, I just want to say love your stuff and hopefully we can work together someday. And I was like, man, this is incredible. Like, I was such a huge fan of his. And I told him like, well, I live in Australia, so I don't know if I ever see you, but if you do come here, it'll be great. And he's like, oh, yeah, I'm doing to Australia next year, meet up. And I'm like, oh, okay. And then he asked me open for him in Australia. And until. Until I walked into the green room and saw him, I still didn't. I thought I was being pranked.
- [35:00]
A
Catfished.
- [35:01]
B
Yeah, I thought I was being catfished. And he's been a cool kind of mentor to me.
- [35:05]
A
Well, he EP'd one of your specials eps.
- [35:07]
B
All my specials. Yeah, yeah, he's great. You know, so he's kind of like my comedy hero in many ways. And he's always been very supportive. And at that time, he wasn't household name famous. He was great, though. And so that kind of comics.
- [35:23]
A
Comic rep.
- [35:24]
B
Right, right. Well, in my brain, it's that young person's thing of like, oh, you. Just because you're not world famous doesn't mean you're not one of the greatest of all time. And so that led me to pursue comedy as a craft instead of fame.
- [35:40]
A
I do love the idea of people who take giant risks in pursuit of what they are obsessed with. Not just love, but are obsessed with. And you just sort of like dropped in casually that you were at Melbourne Law School.
- [35:51]
B
Yeah, yeah.
- [35:52]
A
And it makes me think of one of my favorite, I think. I don't know if this was a joke you put in one of your specials, but I remember you saying it.
- [35:57]
B
One of the most common questions I get asked, other than how do you stay so down to earth while being so famous. The second most common question I get asked is, hey, Ronnie. Hey, Ronnie, what do your parents think about this? Hey, Ronnie, what do your parents think about what you do? Are your parents okay with you doing stand up comedy? You'll only ask me that because I'm Asian. You would never ask these other white comedians that question because you know their parents don't give a about them.
- [36:26]
A
And I also, I should say, was planning to be a lawyer before I got into this bull. Oh, yeah, yeah, you were gonna be a lawyer and of course you stopped.
- [36:34]
B
Yeah.
- [36:35]
A
And I just wonder if you reflect on the alternate life that you might have lived if you had stuck with the thing that you had gone to school to actually do.
- [36:42]
B
Yeah. I, I look at my friends and I hate all of them. All my friends from law school. I'm like, yeah, this is terrible. Like, I, you know, I'm so glad I managed to get out of this. This Griff. And if you, if you want one inspiring thing to put in black and white, please slow mo. And then you put the subtitles over it. I think it's, this is like, if you think about specifically comedy, it's, it was, it seemed, and it was extremely risky at the time compared to law school. But in the long term, if you can make it in comedy, you can't fire yourself. You can get fired from a law firm very easily. So in the long term, it was actually less risky.
- [37:25]
A
I hadn't thought about the creative whatever, broadly speaking, the creative pursuit as being more future proofed.
- [37:32]
B
Man, you should be talking to me about sports. All your prepared questions were not sports related, but you didn't do anything.
- [37:36]
A
Okay, so what are your. What are your takes at the end here? What are your sports takes on sports takes?
- [37:43]
B
I love sports.
- [37:45]
A
Great.
- [37:45]
B
That's my hot take. Sports is fun.
- [37:48]
A
But by the way, when you say that, though, you do have. All of your sports opinions have been so deeply genuine.
- [37:55]
B
Yeah, but how else are you supposed. You mean. You guys don't mean what you say?
- [37:58]
A
No, never that, never that, never that. But a little bit, a little bit that.
- [38:03]
B
These hot takes. Just sometimes, Sometimes I see you sports guys talk about sports and I'm like, you guys are just pushing buttons right now. Like, it's so obvious. So obvious. When, when people are yelling at each other, it's like, guys, okay, do you really care this much about this, this bouncing ball that, you know, I just.
- [38:20]
A
I, I'm sorry, I didn't realize the Daily show was the church of pure ideological commentary.
- [38:29]
B
Yeah, when we yell. But what just. We're just doing yuck yucks. We don't.
- [38:32]
A
Oh, yeah, that's right. By the way, that is my favorite. By the way, as someone who reveres the institution of the Daily show, it is. You guys have it both ways in a way.
- [38:40]
B
That's beautiful.
- [38:41]
A
Yeah, it's like we are defending democracy, but also yuck yucks.
- [38:45]
B
Yeah, we're just doing jokes we're not supposed to. Why are we. Why are we. If we're defending democracy. Oh, my God. Then that means democracy is already over, you know, RIP Democracy. If the Daily show is the bulwark. Bulwark. Sorry. No, it's. Yeah, we're just pointing. Fine. Even Jon Stewart Himself said like, like, can the Daily show change the world? And he was like, no. He said, all you can hope to do as a Daily show is come in at the right moment. After thousands of people have done 99 of the work hard back breaking, organizing and advocating and actual doing something good, the Daily show can come in at. To help out that last 1%. Even then, there's no guarantee that will help out. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [39:31]
A
Oh, that, by the way, I relate to that. On the level of. We just talked at length about the greatest coach maybe in all sports of all time.
- [39:40]
B
Belichick. Yeah. Phil Jackson's up there too.
- [39:42]
A
Yeah. Arguably, yeah. Lombardi, sure. But I come in at the end. I'm just like, that dude sucks now.
- [39:47]
B
Oh, spell check. Does he suck?
- [39:49]
A
Oh, God, we're gonna.
- [39:51]
B
Does he suck now? I don't, I, I, again, I don't buy this overreaction to NFL. First, you want to talk about Belichick? Okay, well, first of all, who are you going to get to replace him? These, these guys don't go on trees. On coaching trees, by the way.
- [40:04]
A
His coaching tree, specifically.
- [40:05]
B
Yeah, they don't. They don't.
- [40:06]
A
No one has replicated.
- [40:07]
B
Yeah.
- [40:08]
A
Which is. And maybe it's also in some way like the Asian immigrant nightmare. What is both things? Right. Like, that is, is that Belichick is. Embodies all of these principles, has tried to teach this.
- [40:21]
B
Yeah.
- [40:22]
A
But no one is as good as him. As him.
- [40:24]
B
I don't know if he tried to teach it. You know, I'm not sure if he tried to teach it. Like, from his book, he, like, he, he would give people, the lower people tasks and the people who just did the task. Well, he promote and then you get promoted. So I don't know if he taught almost by iteration. Almost like, like, for example, they would give this job where the lowest guy in the coaching staff would have to label. I can't remember what he was labeling.
- [40:52]
A
Like, oh, he was lab labeling. Illegally taped footage. That's right.
- [40:58]
B
That's, that's overblown, by the way. But, but let's, let's go into the. Whatever. Okay, so, so, I mean, would you call. Okay. Is it, is it illegal to. Oh, no, no, no.
- [41:08]
A
Sorry. I know it was, it was the illegally deflated football.
- [41:12]
B
We'll get into that. I gotta get the right to respond to that. But some, some kid would, like, label something in the locker room. So he was assigned a job to label. And because it was labeling, he was like, oh, who cares? He just wrote, wrote on the tape. And just taped it, whatever. And then the guy above him saw the guy would retape it neatly and write in good font. And that was kind of like the lesson of, like, man, if you can't even tape this, you're not going to learn the next thing. So I don't know how much you, like, I don't think he's gathering people around being like, this is how you win at football. I think he's just like, you know, all right, we're going to, we're going to come out here and just do our jobs, and we need to cover the seams, and we don't cover these seams, we're gonna lose this game. All right? Make it happen. I think that's why. I don't think he's like teaching a Harvard course on how to.
- [41:59]
A
I, I, I just need to remark upon how shockingly good that Bill Belichick impression from Ronnie.
- [42:07]
B
And I have a weird accent. And I could, I still managed to pull up a Belichick, so I don't know what that means. But, but like, back to the thing is, okay, is this, is this illegal? I'm genuinely asking, is this, is this, is this bad? Ethics in football. So one thing, as a non football watcher who I didn't grow up with it, new to the sport of football, when I watched it, I was like, how do you keep track? There's so many rules in it. Make use of the confusion of rules, but everyone else is like, I guess it's like, what baseball rules, where there's all these unwritten rules. Like, no, you don't do that, man. You don't do that. But it's like, why, why not? Is that evil to do that?
- [42:42]
A
Wait, what? You're saying that what you like. And I appreciate this as a systems appreciator myself, on some level.
- [42:46]
B
Yeah.
- [42:47]
A
You like the idea of trying to exploit and push every marginal advantage until someone else says, you actually need to stop this. Yes, like, like they need to catch up with my creativity as opposed to you catering to the, the dumber people in the sport.
- [43:05]
B
Yeah, exactly. That's exactly it. You did go to Hobbit.
- [43:08]
A
This is where I get your sports takes in a, in a concentrated, dangerous way.
- [43:12]
B
Yeah.
- [43:12]
A
You are wearing a sweater with the NBA logo on it.
- [43:15]
B
NBA for life.
- [43:18]
A
If you are the commissioner of the.
- [43:19]
B
NBA, I don't care what anyone says. I support the NBA.
- [43:23]
A
There is a dangerous subtext there that is braver than anybody realizes. For Roddy Cheng to support the NBA international Asian celebrity. What are you Doing as commissioner of the NBA, Ronnie Chang.
- [43:38]
B
What am I doing?
- [43:39]
A
Yeah, what are you doing? Adam Silver says, you know what?
- [43:41]
B
What?
- [43:42]
A
I, I, I'm done here. I am appointing Ronnie Chang and Ronnie Chang's first order of business.
- [43:50]
B
I, I think they'll run very well. I'm not just saying that because I support the NBA.
- [43:54]
A
I cannot stress enough how much he is popping his sweater to show this.
- [43:58]
B
Yeah, I think, I can't think of anything. I think they're doing a great job. I think they respond to, let me put it this way, like during co, during the pandemic, during COVID which major American sport do you think you would attend a game and be least likely to get Covid? Like, it's so funny if you could tell how likely you are going to get Covid by what sport you watch. If you're an MMA fan, oh, you're definitely getting Covid. If you're an NFL fan, Covid for sure. Baseball fan is 50, 50 NBA. You're not getting Covid. At the NBA thing, everyone's gonna wear masks, you know. You know, like, it's run the, the vibes are, that's how we run it, you know, at the NBA, we, I'm, yeah, that's right. But I, I can't think of anything that they're doing wrong. I mean, they're trying new stuff, you know, like the in season tournament. Well, you know, criticize, whatever the court making you blind, all that. At least they're trying new stuff. You know, they always mix up the all star game. I would say, okay, I want commissioner. What I do the one on one All Star game. One on one games. That would be killer.
- [45:04]
A
That would be great.
- [45:05]
B
One on one instead of the dunk tournament, probably. I think you need to let that sit for a bit. Even though it has just historical value, but people get so angry at it. Or do the dunking thing without the crowd just.
- [45:15]
A
Why?
- [45:15]
B
It's just too much pressure. It's just, you know, like, don't give them that much. You know what you want.
- [45:20]
A
You, you want a safe space for dunkers?
- [45:23]
B
Yeah, just let them dunk in a safe space. Because we want to see a cool dunk. We don't want to see a failed dunk. So let them do it multiple times until they get. Is what I'm trying to say. You know, it's like you have 30 seconds to do this impossible feat of human flight without, without jet packs. Let them do it like 10, 20 times. So don't do it, you know, I mean, like, let Them do it and film it, and then we just release it, you know, because we look at dunks on Instagram, we're like, these are killer.
- [45:49]
A
Yes.
- [45:50]
B
Why didn't you do that? It's like, yeah, well, they did it 20 times on before they posted on Instagram. Like, let them. Let these superhumans have more than three tries at doing something that's physically impossible, that breaks the laws of physics. How about that? Can we let the superhumans try more than three times to break the laws of physics?
- [46:10]
A
I'm no psychotherapist, but it does seem to me like you'd like these superhuman performers who get on to this metaphorical stage to not be booed off of it by an Australian crowd. Give them the time to work out their material.
- [46:25]
B
I'm saying let them do it on their own time. Let him do it on time. And the one on one tournament, I think will be cool.
- [46:31]
A
Ronnie Chang, thank you for coming here and thank you for, you know, your viewership, albeit illegally, from about 15 years ago.
- [46:42]
B
You've been great. It was great to watch you on ESPN talking sports, and I love all your takes and everything you do. Very classy. You bring this intellectualism to sports journalism that I really appreciate. And Asians.
- [46:55]
A
That's right, Asians. Put that in giant letters on the screen at the end.
- [46:59]
B
Asians do it now.
- [47:00]
A
Period. Asians. What I am about to tell you is something that I should have brought up in my conversation with Ronnie as he was declaring Bill Belichick the first Asian head coach in NFL history. And I didn't bring it up then because I was distracted. I think I was distracted by how terrible Ronnie's Patriots are. They've lost five in a row now. They have scored one touchdown in three games. They do not have a quarterback of any meaningful sort of. I am actually contemplating whether I should say it here at the end of the show because the revelation I have been sitting on is that there is an Asian head coach in the NFL right now. Ron Rivera. That's right. Ron Rivera has Filipino ancestry. He said this to the Washington commander's own team website, which I, of course, filed away in my dossier of Filipinos across the world that I keep on my computer. He said that his grandfather on his mother's side was born in the Philippines before migrating to the Salinas Valley in California. That counts. So, Ron Rivera, I apologize for erasing you. And I found out today that, yes, potentially soon to be fired head coach of the Washington Commanders, Ron Rivera, who is atop various top five lists of coaches most likely to be fired soon. Unfortunately, I've been Googling this. That's true. He is more Asian than Bill Belichick. And now the world finally knows. This has been Pablo Torre Finds Out. A Meadowlark Media production and I'll talk to you next time.