Paul F. Tompkins is Happier Than Ever

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Paul F. Tompkins is Happier Than Ever" on So True with Caleb Hearon

Podcast Information:

• Title: So True with Caleb Hearon
• Host/Author: Headgum
• Episode: Paul F. Tompkins is Happier Than Ever
• Release Date: April 10, 2025
• Description: Weekly podcast from beloved gay comedian Caleb Hearon. Basically just getting into it and sorting it all out and kind of identifying what’s really real.

---

1. Tour Preparations and Creative Challenges ([01:42] - [04:50])

The episode opens with Caleb Hearon checking in with guest Paul F. Tompkins about the latter's upcoming tour. Paul expresses a mix of excitement and anxiety about the variety show format, which includes guests, stand-up material, sketches, and possibly videos.

Paul shares, "I have to worry about all the things that I do on the tour because it's a variety show. So I build like all this stuff. We have guests and things like that" ([02:14]). Caleb empathizes, noting the pressure of fulfilling audience expectations after committing to specific elements during the show's pitch.

2. Managing Anxiety and Creativity ([04:50] - [12:18])

The conversation shifts to the personal anxieties both hosts face while preparing for tours. Paul mentions experiencing anxiety-induced insomnia, leading to restless nights. Caleb relates by discussing his own stress over logistical details like booking drag queens for different cities.

Caleb reflects on the balance between ensuring a show runs smoothly and allowing creative spaces, stating, "You can't just say, and then there'll be, like, a thing like this" ([03:16]). This highlights the challenge of maintaining spontaneity within a structured performance.

3. Personal Growth and Empathy ([12:18] - [21:24])

Paul delves into his journey of developing empathy, a lesson that profoundly impacted his life. He explains, "developing empathy... makes the world a slightly less scary place" ([13:02]). This growth stems from therapy, where Paul learned to take responsibility for his actions instead of deflecting blame.

Caleb emphasizes the importance of this lesson, advocating for the ability to admit when one is wrong. Paul adds, "The astonishing thing for me was that I found out what a relief it was to say, oh, I'm wrong and I'm sorry" ([23:02]). This mutual understanding underscores the value of self-awareness and emotional intelligence in personal development.

4. Cultural and Political Critique ([21:24] - [37:04])

The dialogue then explores broader societal issues, including masculinity, feminism, and the current cultural landscape. Caleb and Paul discuss the challenges posed by rigid gender roles and the backlash against progressive movements.

Caleb critiques the obsession with asserting strength and dismissing softness, stating, "What does that mean to you?... Why is it so necessary for you to not be this?" ([17:33]). They highlight the detrimental effects of such attitudes on societal cohesion and individual well-being.

The conversation also touches on media influence and political figures, with both hosts expressing frustration towards personalities like Steve Bannon and Gavin Newsom. Caleb sarcastically remarks about hosting these figures on his podcast, emphasizing their negative impact on public discourse.

5. Hope, Community, and Positive Action ([37:04] - [66:00])

Despite the heavy topics, Caleb and Paul discuss sources of hope and the importance of community initiatives. Caleb highlights the tenant union in Kansas City as a beacon of hope, demonstrating practical solutions without relying on government intervention.

Paul echoes this sentiment, stating, "the people that are the bad people that are in charge right now are all incompetent and stupid" ([66:18]), and emphasizes the inherent goodness in most people. They advocate for grassroots efforts and personal responsibility in fostering a better society.

6. Interactive Segment: True or False Game ([72:16] - [75:58])

In a lighthearted interlude, Caleb engages Paul in a "True or False" game, presenting a series of statements for Paul to evaluate. This segment showcases their comedic chemistry and provides a playful break from more serious discussions.

Notable exchanges include:

• Caleb: "Mountain Lions can whistle." ([73:35])
• Paul: "False."
• Caleb: "UPS stands for United Package Service." ([73:36])
• Paul: "False. False. United Parcel Service."

The game culminates in Caleb revealing that some statements were intentionally tricky, leading to humorous exchanges and reflections on their dynamic.

7. Final Thoughts: Positivity and Community Support ([75:58] - [66:00])

Wrapping up, both hosts reiterate the importance of positivity and supporting one another. Caleb emphasizes the significance of small acts of kindness, such as remembering details about friends to strengthen relationships. Paul underscores the communal aspect of supporting each other, especially in challenging times.

Caleb concludes with a hopeful outlook, stating, "We all move through the world... most people are nice and I think most people are good" ([66:00]). This affirmation serves as a counterbalance to the earlier critiques, leaving listeners with an optimistic perspective.

---

Notable Quotes:

• Paul F. Tompkins ([02:14]): "I have to worry about all the things that I do on the tour because it's a variety show."
• Caleb Hearon ([03:16]): "You can't just say, and then there'll be, like, a thing like this."
• Paul F. Tompkins ([13:02]): "developing empathy... makes the world a slightly less scary place."
• Paul F. Tompkins ([23:02]): "The astonishing thing for me was that I found out what a relief it was to say, oh, I'm wrong and I'm sorry."
• Caleb Hearon ([17:33]): "What does that mean to you?... Why is it so necessary for you to not be this?"
• Paul F. Tompkins ([66:18]): "the people that are the bad people that are in charge right now are all incompetent and stupid."
• Caleb Hearon ([66:00]): "most people are nice and I think most people are good."

---

Conclusion:

In this engaging and heartfelt episode, Caleb Hearon and Paul F. Tompkins navigate through personal anxieties, the importance of empathy, and critical societal issues with a blend of humor and sincerity. Their candid conversation offers listeners valuable insights into managing creative pressures, fostering personal growth, and maintaining hope amidst societal challenges. The episode underscores the power of community and the inherent goodness in people, providing a balanced perspective that resonates deeply with the audience.

Transcript

[Caleb Hearon]

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[Paul F. Tompkins]

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[Caleb Hearon]

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[Paul F. Tompkins]

Switch upfront payment of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per month required intro rate, first 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees, extra fee, full [e-mail] I just want us all to realize that there is.

[Caleb Hearon]

We.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I mean, I don't know if we have time to get into the revolution.

[Caleb Hearon]

Paul, what's going on with you?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know, the usual shit. I mean, everything. I gotta say, everything is good. Yeah, but it is. I'm in one of those places where I'm frantic. I had bad sleep last night. I had anxiety sleep.

[Caleb Hearon]

Whoa.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I was thinking about shit.

[Caleb Hearon]

What was going on?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Not even like world stuff, but just things that I have to do.

[Caleb Hearon]

Walk me through it. What's going on in your anxiety that's keeping you from sleeping, brother?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I got this.

[Caleb Hearon]

Come on, Cher.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I got this tour coming up.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yes.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And there's some things that are in place and I feel great about that. Now I have to worry about all the things that I do on the tour because it's a variety show. So I build like all this stuff. We have guests and things like that. So like there's a lot of things that are taken care of that I'm a part of, but are not me by myself. And now I have to come up with stand up material and with some sketchy thing, unreal. And maybe a video.

[Caleb Hearon]

You're one of the most oppressed and put upon people.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

This is a. This is a hit job.

[Caleb Hearon]

You asked me what's wrong.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I gotcha.

[Caleb Hearon]

What's crazy is I'm kind of not kidding. It really is so bad to have to do the thing you said you would do. That doesn't feel fair.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Well, because once. Now you have to do it.

[Caleb Hearon]

I'm saying it's really horrible.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's true. It's like the planning of the thing is so much fun. And then you're like, no, but those spaces have to be filled with things.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yes.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You can't just say, and then there'll be, like, a thing like this.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You can't do that in the show.

[Caleb Hearon]

Because when you pitch the show, I'm being so sincere when I say, I think one of the worst things that happens to anyone is when you say you're gonna do something and then people expect it. When you pitch the show, you go, oh, yeah. And then a sketch. It feels so good.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

To say, I'll do a sketch that makes everyone laugh.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

So write the sketch.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Stop it.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. Pu.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. It sucks. I. We're in a moment. We have been on our tour for a while. That is a Variety show as well. And we are in the moment now where I didn't book a lot of the last several cities are very special cities where it's like we're playing big, iconic venues. And they turned out to be like, we're doing la, Boston, Chicago, New York. They're big ones for us. And I booked a lot of it.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And so these last couple weeks, I've been like, fuck waking up every day going, I've got to figure out the drag queen for that city, you know?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Absolutely.

[Caleb Hearon]

And I. So I feel exactly your type of anxiety. And it's right when I'm going to sleep or right when I'm waking up.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Especially on a day when I'm supposed to be relaxing.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I wake up and go, drag queen. Like, I'm truly like, it. It haunts me putting these shows together now.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That makes me think of a modern retelling of Christmas Carol.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yes.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Drag queens. Instead of ghosts.

[Caleb Hearon]

Come on. Drag queens of Variety Show's future. Mama, we're going to work or not? Are we going to work? Mama? Will it give? Will it slay? Could be me and you could be working on a pretty interesting. Let's get final draft open. This could be good. Wait. Your tickets are on sale now for your tour, and you're going on tour to a bunch of cities going a.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Bunch of cities I've been before. Some new places I haven't been before. Going to Iowa. I've never performed in Iowa before.

[Caleb Hearon]

Des Moines?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

No. Iowa City.

[Caleb Hearon]

Fun.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Iowa City.

[Caleb Hearon]

I like Iowa City.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it.

[Caleb Hearon]

I think we did an Iowa shout out on one of the pods episodes recently.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Please tell me that's so. Is that so.

[Caleb Hearon]

I think we did an Iowa shout out, please.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Thank you.

[Caleb Hearon]

I think we did an Iowa shout out.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I needed the, I needed the closure on that.

[Caleb Hearon]

Somebody, somebody was in the comments recently saying that we shouted out Iowa. And I don't remember what happened. I do like Iowa. Well, it's so close to Missouri. You're gonna be over there if you're me. It's just like that. Are you going to Missouri?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

No, I don't think so.

[Caleb Hearon]

Not kids. No.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

St. Louis.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's Missouri. Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes. Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

Nice. Hell yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

Thank God.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I have to see it in my head as St. Louis Mo.

[Caleb Hearon]

And then I know that's exactly how stlmo you need to go after your show in St. Louis, you need to go get sandwiches at Gramophone.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Gramophone. Okay.

[Caleb Hearon]

Very, very good. Late night sandwich spot.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Okay.

[Caleb Hearon]

Just a hot brick in your stomach before bed. Something, something nice to send you off to your dreams.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That's all I asked for.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. You won't have anxiety about anything other than what's going to happen to your stomach.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That's a dream in itself.

[Caleb Hearon]

Eat a big hot Italian sandwich and then hop right in a hotel bed. That's my, that's my dream, my friend.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Do you think because I listen to the podcast.

[Caleb Hearon]

This one?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

No.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, I do.

[Caleb Hearon]

Paul. Yeah. Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I'm a fan.

[Caleb Hearon]

What if I blush?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Come on.

[Caleb Hearon]

You know I'm shy.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Do you? That's certainly, certainly anyone who listens to.

[Caleb Hearon]

The podcast, they know I'm shy.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Do you think this will be the least listened to episode?

[Caleb Hearon]

No.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That your, your fans will be like, who's this old man?

[Caleb Hearon]

They will be like that? No, no, not at all. You know what's interesting is I think we, we get a lot of requests from like very famous Internet people to come on the show and we say no to pretty much all of them.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

The Paul brothers.

[Caleb Hearon]

They'Ve tried to box. They've tried to box me on the show. No, but it's interesting. We get the same. There's really only a spike in like I have a couple friends who's like their episodes. You know, it's like Benny Broski or Trixie Mattel or something. Their fans go Wild on those ones. Every other guest I have, every comic, depending on what they've got. It's the same. It's the same, Paul. They're gonna be there for you and they're gonna love you, and they're gonna be in the comments going, who is this fabulous man with this beautiful hat? That's what's gonna happen for you, I hope. So, what's your least favorite episode of the show? You've listened to a couple episodes of the show?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. My least favorite episode.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. Be honest.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Josh Gondelman.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. What a scumbag.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I mean, sorry, Josh, but a scumbag. You know, here's why I listen to your show, because I want to hear the guests say things like, remember that time I found out I was in a throuple? Like, stuff like that? That's why when you have people that you've known for years.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That always have some up story.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. Yeah. That's what it. That's what we're here. That's what we're all here for.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That's what we're here for.

[Caleb Hearon]

What. What is. Okay, that. So Josh Kahneman's your least favorite. That. That's good to know. I'm interested. It's just funny to me that you listen. I like that.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That means the world to me. I like to. First of all, I enjoy you so much, and I was thrilled that you had started doing this podcast, but then it also introduces me to people that I didn't know and, like, I just met. I listened to her on the show and then started following her on Instagram. Then we talked, and then I met her, like, a few days later. Laura Peake.

[Caleb Hearon]

Oh, my God.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Right? I enjoyed that. Leann Rimes, a great episode. But I really. I love being introduced to these people. I'm always looking to do that, to, like, expand my world outside of the same eight people I see.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know what I mean?

[Caleb Hearon]

Well, it gets easy.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's exciting.

[Caleb Hearon]

It gets really easy, I think, to. In comedy and probably just in life, but just to. I feel like I just moved out of LA recently because I felt like I was in a groove, not a rut. Rut feels bad. Groove is good.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. But I was going to the same restaurants with the same people, and I felt like I needed something to shake everything about my life a little bit.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And I also have to blow up my life every three or four years. It's like something that's wrong with me, but I do. It is. I'm always looking for. I was just Thinking the other night about. I went to a friend's show, a musician friend's show, and their opener was so great. And I was like, oh, man, I need to, like, I need to get plugged into more new stuff, more new.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Music, more new, you know, Never skip the opener.

[Caleb Hearon]

No.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Never skip the open if you can help it. I've seen so many people that I would not have seen otherwise that I really enjoyed because I got there early enough to see the opener.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And it's like, you never know. You might discover your new favorite band, and it's like. It's more show.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know what I mean?

[Caleb Hearon]

It's more show.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Give the people more show.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Give the people more show.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's also. I've been thinking a lot lately about, like, certainty and designing, like, this. All these little things we do to design our days so that we never get inconvenienced.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And I've been thinking about the value of inconvenience and what can be found in inconvenience. It might be that you. Yeah. You go to the venue and it might be that the opener sucks and actually you didn't have a good time. And it would have been nicer to stay at dinner longer with your friends beforehand.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

It is worthwhile to have an inconvenient experience.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's worthwhile to have a bad time sometimes.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

But I think about all these things that I'm not talking about people in general, even I'm talking about me. All these little things I do where I don't even want to go to a restaurant unless I've spent 10 minutes Google Image, going through the. The menu and the plates and the chairs and the. I want to know everything about it just to make sure that. Know I'm gonna like it.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And I am sometimes rewarded with really good outcomes, you know?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. But I just think, man, how many places have I skipped over? Because the. The seventh picture in the Google Image slide wasn't. Wasn't giving what I needed it to give.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I used to be a terrible eater. I was really picky, and it. I was just like a holdover from childhood or whatever. But I. It was like, I assumed I didn't like a lot of things until I tried them. And a big thing for me was when I quit smoking, I was like, okay, if I can do that, maybe I can do other things. Maybe I can make myself like these foods that are good for me. And it really opened up my whole world. And then I became a person who I Didn't think about. I didn't have to think anymore about the restaurant that I was going to. Except for a while, seafood was like a last barrier for me, where I was like, I just don't want to eat fish.

[Caleb Hearon]

Really.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And now I've. But I made myself, like, introduced it into my diet, and now I don't have to be afraid to go anywhere, you know, and it's very freeing. The big turning point for me was. Friend of mine had his. He was turning 40. He was in New York, and he invited the people that were coming in from out of town to a dinner the night before. And we went to WD40, which I had never. I'd never heard of it. And it was the. This was the advent of molecular gastronomy.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

When it's like this pellet is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or whatever.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, whatever.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And I had a moment of panic where it's like, I can't eat here. What's gonna happen? And then I just said, you just have to give yourself over to whatever this is.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And how bad could it be?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I really had to say, how bad it's food. How bad could it be?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. People are eating it on purpose. And then, come on, someone put it together for it to be eaten. How bad could it be?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. Yeah. And it was great.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And then I had to. But I had to remind myself of that for a while until I got into the. The. Into the habit of saying, it's going to be fine, and looking forward to having a new experience.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Because I can very much. I'm very much a creature of habit. I can do the same thing every day. I can eat the same thing every day and not have a problem with it.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And not get tired of it. You know what?

[Caleb Hearon]

Okay. That brings up a question for me. And this might be. Yeah, we'll see. If you don't like it, we'll just move on or cut it or whatever. But the. What do you think is the. I guess the reason I say this because it feels like kind of a big question. And sometimes when you ask a big question, you know, put people in a corner. But what do you think is the most important, like, thing you've learned or like the most important habit you've changed? Like, what is the thing that you've gotten good at or okay with that has made your life better, the most better. Does that make sense?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, it does. And honestly, I think the answer is developing empathy.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Like, not that I never had empathy, but that. But understanding what that is and how to. How to cultivate it, you know? And it makes the world a slightly less scary place.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

But also it shrinks the world a little bit. And you understand people a little bit better and you give them a little more grace or I gave them a little more grace than I used to. Understanding that people, by and large are going through the same things that you're going through. The world is tough. It's tough to be a person because we got these fucking big brains that are very complex, and it leads to a lot of fear and confusion and all these things that we go through, but it also affords you so many wonderful experiences and to just. To just like, let people have a moment where they might be having a bad time, you know? And also, I mean, it's very hard right now because we're in a place where it's hard to wrap your mind around somebody seeing the world so fundamentally differently than you do that it's like, you really think this. You really think this is. These people are bad, or these people need to be removed from society, or these people need to not. Not have the freedom to do this. Like, you really. That really bothers you? It really affects you in some way?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's so hard to imagine.

[Caleb Hearon]

I. I can't. I can't wrap my head around. And I want to talk more about the empathy thing too, because I'm interested in that journey for you, but I. All the time. I've been talking a lot on stage lately about, like, I just can't imagine how miserable it must be to give a fuck about such stupid little things.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Like the trans panic stuff. I mean, there's so many different angles from which it doesn't make sense to me, but just the idea of sitting in your house and just stewing with anger all the time about, like, what if they compete in sports? It's like, I just. There's gotta be room for some. Is there not a political movement in this country that could happen that just goes. Everyone shut the fuck up and relax. Yeah, shut the fuck up and relax. Everything's not so bad.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, everything's.

[Caleb Hearon]

There's the. There's the very obvious things we need to fix. Rent is unsustainably getting high. People can't afford the rent. That's bad. But everything else, all this dumb culture war stuff where they're like, is the Bible in schools? Is it not? Are trans people playing sports? Are they not? I go, let's just do rent and groceries and everybody on everything else, fucking relax. Yeah, what's the problem? I don't get it.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It really is. To me, it's a fear of change, and it's a fear of surprises where. And I guess it's also a fear of discovering something about yourself, maybe. You know, it's like, apparently young men don't like the word partner to refer to, you know, a relationship. Young straight men.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And obviously the reason is because somebody might think that you're gay.

[Caleb Hearon]

She's a girl, by the way. Exactly. My partner. Girl.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's too gender neutral.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And I think it's that. But I do think that people that are super conservative, the thing that they seem to want the most is for everything to be in a box. This is what this is. This is what this is. There's absolutely no shades of anything. It is just so you can understand the world. These are the rules of the world. And I think it's just people being afraid to find out that there's not a whole lot of rules to the world.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's a big, chaotic thing. It's like, what do you think? What do you expect? Do you know what I mean? It's a huge planet with all these fucking people on it. Like, it's not you. You want to reduce us to animal brains, and it's just not true.

[Caleb Hearon]

Won't work.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's just not true.

[Caleb Hearon]

We know too much.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

We know too much. We have buildings and shoes and shit. You know what I mean?

[Caleb Hearon]

We also. There's a. There's a. There's a thing that has happened a lot that I've noticed in my own life with, like, perfectly nice people that I grew up around that are genuinely. They were. They were kind human beings. And then they became very, very. Most of them conservative. And the specific thing that I'm latching on to about a lot of those folks that were, like, genuinely kind and cool to be around and now are kind of a nightmare. Is this, like, obsession with being like, yeah, everyone's soft. Everyone's soft. No, not me. I'm not soft. I'm hard. I know the hard truth. I see through it all. I'm like, what? When did it get so bad to be soft? I don't. And I don't even, by the way, consider myself a particularly soft person. But I'm not going out and being like, fuck softness.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I'm like, I don't. What is that? I like soft people. They seem cool to me, you know?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And also, it gets into. What does that mean to you? Yeah, what is that? How do you define this. And what is important about it? And why is it so necessary for you to not be this?

[Caleb Hearon]

And why is it becoming your number one thing?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

If you told me your 50th thing in life was that you're not soft, I'd be like, okay. But when you go, my number one thing is that I am not soft. I go, whoa.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Okay.

[Caleb Hearon]

Jesus. Hey. Whoa. That's great. Are you happy? Because I guarantee the answer is no.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Why don't you just go to prison?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Like, are you accepting?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. Why? What is going on?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Can I live here?

[Caleb Hearon]

Can I come in? Going to prison and asking, can I come in?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Rest of the world's too soft for me.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I can't hack it.

[Caleb Hearon]

These guys are soft. Can I come in? The empathy thing, though, what was the journey with that? Because learning empathy is not something I've really thought about.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It was therapy. It was. I used to be a person. It's not like I'm not this completely anymore, but I was the kind of person that I was so raw inside that if I were, it was indicated to me that I'd done something wrong or didn't understand something, whatever. My number one priority was, how can I make this somebody else's fault?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It can't be my fault.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

This has to be. Look around. Who can I blame for this?

[Caleb Hearon]

Who? Someone must pay.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. I can't. The last thing I could do is process this and learn something. And then I had a crush on a woman who did not have a crush on me. And I was trying to live my life like it was a movie, and it turns out that the movies are fake.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And so this person was not going to come around and fall in love with me, and it destroyed our friendship.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And I was so lost that I got to a point where I was like, I don't think that I can do this on my own. And it's time to talk to somebody.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And then that. I lucked out. I got somebody who was great immediately. And I was with this therapist for, I want to say, like, 10 years. And it really, absolutely changed my life and made me so. It got me so much closer to being the person that I would like to be.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know, that I would like people to think me. Think of me as.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And it's not that it's not a challenge, and it's not that it's not. You know, I have. I have plenty of bad days. I have a temper, and I got. I have plenty of. I have depression, and I take medication for it. And, you know, so I'm not. I'm not like, done. You know what I mean? But there was a relief in realizing that I'm not done and that it's a lifelong thing to become the person that you want to be. That it's not. You're not going to be like, oh, I learned my five lessons and I'm all set. Because you will. You age, things keep changing. Your perspective on things keeps changing. That is one of the things that is that I've come to really appreciate about aging is the way I see the world. And I'm also glad that I'm getting softer as I get older. You know, I care more about people and I feel like I understand people more and I'm more about protecting vulnerable people. More about, like, that's more important to me.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Than going the other way, like these kids today and all that shit. Like, it's good that playgrounds are safe. You know what I mean? It wasn't good when I was a kid.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That's. It's good that we improved that.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. You know what I mean?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's like saying seat belts are stupid or whatever.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I really feel like I am in a place now where I'm kind of. I'm happier with myself than I've been maybe ever.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Where as much, you know, mental illness or whatever self loathing that I can have. I really feel like I'm able to like myself the most I've ever liked myself. Like, give my. Give myself grace and say, like, hey, man, you're doing the best you can. You're just a person.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know what I mean? Like, you still fuck up sometimes. It's fine. Everybody does.

[Caleb Hearon]

I think also it's a part of it is. There's a. There is an inability. There seems like there's maybe at least in parts of the culture, maybe a big part of the culture right now, an inability even. Just you saying, like, I had strong feelings for a person that did not feel that way back to me. I destroyed the friendship by, you know, living in an alternate reality where that was gonna change or whatever. Even you saying that is so huge and enlightened and good and necessary. And we need so much more of that from all of us. Like, it feels like there's an inability right now in the culture for people to go, oof. That thing I said maybe even literally five minutes ago, I do not believe. And I was wrong.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Absolutely.

[Caleb Hearon]

Hey, I fucked with it. My bad. Yes. We actually, Joe, Marco and I were talking about that in his episode earlier. But the. Yeah. Just the ability to go, like we've talked about on this show, sometimes that. Sometimes I'll say something on the show, a guest will say something, and I'll immediately go, yeah, I don't believe what I said. I was trying that on. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I was trying it on. Oops. But I think, why not? Why not just be like, yeah, we're fucking. There's a million things going on at once. It's okay to have an idea or a behavior and not even just like a take in the moment on a podcast, but, like, it's okay to live a couple months of your life really thinking that you're doing something correct. And then go, oh, I was wrong.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Whoops.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's a rel. The astonishing thing for me was that I found out what a relief it was to say, oh, I'm wrong and I'm sorry.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's like it was huge weight off my shoulders. Then carrying it around and trying to, you know, reluctantly say, like, I guess I see where you're coming from, or whatever, rather than really try to see where they're coming from.

[Caleb Hearon]

Your perspective is that I did wrong, and maybe there's validity. It's like, no, I was wrong.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I get why you say that. But, yeah, I was wrong. And now I understand better.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And it's like, that's. How can you not see that as a. As a win?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know, to say, now I understand something that I didn't understand before.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

But it also is. We're so online poisoned that the only way people can point something out to someone is by telling them they're a monster.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And it's like, if you try to just say. And the people that have done it with me, it's fucking worked. When people just talk to me calmly and say, you know, you might not have this information. You might not know this, but xyz. And I'm like, okay, thank you very much for telling me that.

[Caleb Hearon]

Genuinely thank you.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That makes sense. Yes. I get it now.

[Caleb Hearon]

This is some of the big conversations that when my dad was alive that he and I had because he was a bad parent. And I straight up would tell him that, you know, I was like, hey, you probably shouldn't have had kids. I think he was a cool guy. I was like, there are things I really like about you. You're really smart. You're very funny. You have great taste in music. You are not good at being a parent. You know, and he knew that but he wanted me to punish him all the time. He wanted. He couldn't stand. He was so guilty. Especially as I got, like, when I was an adult. He was like, man, I regret everything I did in your childhood pretty much. And it almost. It almost hurt him more that I wouldn't punish him like, that I wouldn't be mad at him. I was like, I'm not mad at you, dude. I just want you to do better for you and also for. You're currently blowing it. Like, you're currently also still doing bad because you're sitting so much in this regret.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Because you're allowing yourself. It's like regret and remorse and like self pity. I don't actually want you to sit in that. I actually just want you to get better because we have other kids in our family that you could be better for. You could currently be better for me as your adult child. You could also just be happier for yourself, which would be great. But the inability, I think that so many people obviously, particularly and especially men, just is the reality. And it's not to say that it's the only thing going on, but like, there is, at least in my lived experience, a lot more of this problem with men, and plenty of it for sure, but a lot more with men. Yeah. Just an inability to be like, oh, whoops, I fucked up. Hate that.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's wild how much that those kind of gender roles are still at play as far as we've come. And that this year begins with a two. You know what I mean? Like, we're into the 21st century and we're still like puzzling over this shit of like, what it means to be a man or whatever. And we're going backwards in a lot of senses.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Is like, what's going on, man? Like, why? Again, I think it's. It is the. It's the fear of change and it's the fear of not having things in an orderly, you know, box of crayons where you can see it all laid out and say, this is what it is.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And that just freaks some people out.

[Caleb Hearon]

It also is just so uneven. You know, I spend, I think a lot about masculinity and manhood and like, my role in all of that and like, who I am, you know, and what I think about that. And like, obviously the relationship I had with my dad and guys I grew up with and being gay in Missouri, like, there's so many reasons that I'm interrogating masculinity all the time. And the thing I think is so funny is that feminism as an idea now is becoming like almost a bad word again. But it's like, it actually is for us as well.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

The proper application of it and when it's applied improperly and you know, some woman goes viral on tick tock for being like, all men are lazy dogs or whatever, and then men go, this is just as bad as what we're doing. It's like, not quite. You know what I mean? Yeah. It's a pretty big gap between one woman being annoying online about making generalizations about men and then like the systemic, constant terror that men instill in femme people.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Particularly women. It, it's, it doesn't make any sense to me when I'm like, I feel so freed by feminism. I feel so freed by the idea that, that actually a lot of the bad impulses that I had when I was a teenager or a lot of the, like, things about masculinity that I was doing, my hard headedness, my, my inability to say that I was wrong, my dismissal of women's interests as uninteresting because they weren't interesting to me in that moment. And it's not to say I'm like cured of any of that.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Exactly.

[Caleb Hearon]

But all those things when they weren't examined were making my life worse. And then when I did examine them and realized, oh, actually society played a role in socializing me to feel and behave these ways. Which is not to say I don't have responsibility and autonomy and willpower to change it. Feminism is the reason that I know that, that I go, actually, society told me that these things are true. And it's like given to us in the same way that it's given to women on the other side to discredit themselves. That was very freeing to me that I was like, actually, I don't have to be like this. And the fact that I am like this is not only. It's a power from society that's hurting all of us.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

I don't understand why that wouldn't be exciting to be like, oh, this is a bad thing that's happening to all of us and we can stop.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. And also to feel like, oh, I'm in control of my own mind. Yeah. I have agency. I don't have to think this. I don't have to. Because it's so much more work. It's so much more work when you get that feeling of somehow I know I'm going against the grain of my own personality because this has just been baked into me from when I was born, like, this is the society that I grew up in.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And then you sort of. When you get the tickle in your brain, like, maybe I don't feel that way, maybe I don't. This doesn't make sense to me. And, you know, this actually sounds kind of bad, maybe. And then you have now the freedom to explore that and understand why you feel that way. It's great.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's.

[Caleb Hearon]

Well, it's also funny that so much of the, like, the conversation right now is like, what is the left's message for young men? I'm like, the left message for young men is. Should be the same as what it is for young women.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

If young men can't get on board with that, then we have a problem with young men.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I. The, the message that I have for young. It's not that we don't have. It's not that men and women don't sometimes have different interests or there aren't things that more. More generally apply to men than women and vice versa.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Sure.

[Caleb Hearon]

Those things are true. More generally. Yeah. If you threw a dart eight times out of ten, it might strike the same interest for a young man and not a young woman. Like, there are things that are different, of course, but they don't have to be. It doesn't always look that way. And yeah, young men, when they say that so often, I just think they mean, like, we need to be transphobic or we need to, like, be violent. And I'm like, I don't think that. That. I think if you have a political movement that's talking about being nice to everyone, everyone being able to express themselves comfortably and safely, everyone being able to afford to live a decent and happy life.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

If that doesn't resonate with young men, then young men are the problem.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And I don't. I don't know what to say about that at a certain point.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

You know what I mean? And you can go, oh, well, we need to meet them where they are. I don't want to go where they are. No, I'm not interested. You couldn't get me to go over there with a knife.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

We. I think we know by now we can't meet people where they are in certain circumstances because I can't go some of those places. Not good.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's just things I'm not. Yeah, there's. Obviously, it's like we have. We have to have principles. It's like there's things I'm not going to do If. If you're Sincerely trying to get me to believe that all young men need you to be transphobic and misogynistic for them to get on board with like lower rent and better grocery prices.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Then I guess we're going to be at an impasse until we're not. Because I'm not going to do that for you.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's not interesting to me.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Or they say like, oh, the left needs a Joe Rogan or whatever. I go. I don't think that we do.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Nobody needs. The right doesn't need a Joe Rogan. Like the last thing we need is more Joe Rogans of any kind.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. I'm just like. I don't think. I don't. I'm all good on that.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You don't think it's gonna be Gavin Newsom.

[Caleb Hearon]

Dude. Gavin Newsom.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

This guy.

[Caleb Hearon]

Take the fucking mics away. Guy with his dumb ass haircut.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And his stupid little casual polos from fucking Ralph Lauren.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Sitting there and having on. Didn't he? Do you have Steve Bannon on?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, Steve Bannon. Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk, because his son was, who's 13 or whatever, was getting into this far right stuff and he was wondering where.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. So we're gonna plot the solution is.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I'm gonna have to start a podcast.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And talk to these guys immediately.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Let them say whatever they want with no pushback.

[Caleb Hearon]

Anyone? Charlie. Charlie Kirk to me is only slightly different. I don't respect the guy or like his views. It's slightly different because he's a media personality.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Right.

[Caleb Hearon]

So if you're gonna have a media personality on your media show, I think that's wrong. But do your thing. People having Steve Bannon on their shows, who is a political operative who is actively. With a smile on his face every day in the president's ear and on the news saying we can imprison US Citizens who dissent. We can do a third term. Actively saying these things and then having the power to make it happen because he's in a government position. If you're having Steve Bannon on your show, you are a fucking hopeless brain rotted moron.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I really think that.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. First of all, beyond just the danger part of it, which is we don't need to be giving him any more airtime to say that the election was stolen with pushback. But it's also. I think we know what Steve Bannon has to say.

[Caleb Hearon]

Right. Didn't we get it?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Is there any fresh stuff?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. Also, just why are we not talking anymore about the fact that that guy is just a failed screenwriter who found another grift. That's all these guys, every single one of them wanted to be successful in Hollywood failed because they were talentless. And then they said, I think actually it's. I think it's black people that did this to me. I think actually the Third Reich win would have had my screenplay. And then they turn to fascism. It's like, you're a talentless, pathetic, ugly fucking loser. Nobody likes going to dinner with you. Nobody wants to fuck you. The only way that you can curry any kind of favor in this world is by being a fascistic fucking psychopath. And now for some reason, we have to listen to you.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It is a huge coalition of people who wanted certain groups of people to like them, were rejected by those groups and then found themselves loved by people they despise.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And they're like, I guess I'll go with it. Yeah, I guess I'll go with it.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's what you look at this funnily.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Somebody saying, I love you.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's an orphanage for losers. The right is an orphanage for losers. And it's why you look at their fucking like you look at the crew they've put together. The backdrops behind Trump are like Kid Rock, Elon Musk. And Elon Musk likes to act like, actually, I left the left. No, you didn't. No one was fucking with you. Everyone thought you were a weird bitch.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And it's like Kid Rock him rfk. Like, fucking like Rob Schneider. Deuce Bigelow is your political surrogate.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That's. That's when it's time to look in the mirror.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's the American right, is Deuce Bigelow. Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Good fucking Lord. What a pathetic, bleak. And they make fun of the left for having Beyonce at concerts. Hey, she's good.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Her music rocks and she's pretty.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

People like her.

[Caleb Hearon]

Deuce Bigelow.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Her career is an ongoing concern.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

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[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

All these guys who haven't, who haven't, they just they want to be creative and interesting so bad and they're such fucking dork ass losers. If any single one of them walked into that's the real thing too is they go, oh, we're for the working people. If any one of you had to have dinner with the people with anybody in Missouri, yeah, you'd get laughed out of every single room. Yeah, I could go have dinner with a group of farmers.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

We'd have a nice time. We wouldn't agree on maybe much, but we'd have a nice time. Yeah. These people are socially inept loser freaks. That again, I can't stress this enough. Nobody wanted to fuck. And so now we have to do concentration camps.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Because they couldn't get a screenplay funded.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Elon Musk is going to burn America to the ground. Because nobody thought he was funny.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Because nobody laughed.

[Caleb Hearon]

And because he needed surgeries to look handsome adjacent. If you're not wearing your glasses and it's foggy, you know how many surgeries he's had to look like a five? This guy. He's gonna ruin democracy because he was born a three and then he put millions of dollars into becoming a five. He's a born three with. With dreams and delusions of being an eight. He doesn't. He knows deep down. He knows deep down he's not getting to 10. So we've got a born three dreaming of eight, landing at five. He's got an army of twos that we're calling Doge. And now we don't get to have democracy anymore because the right girls didn't want to sleep with him.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Right.

[Caleb Hearon]

This is fucking insane.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And yet I persist. And yet I show up to Headgum Studios once a week and put out my little podcast. I don't get it, dude. I really don't get it.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's wild that we are the people that are here for this. You know what I mean?

[Caleb Hearon]

I can't. Yeah. I'm not alive at the right time.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah. There was so little history being made when I was younger. Hardly anything.

[Caleb Hearon]

I should have been an adult for that.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Hardly anything.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Now it's all history all the time.

[Caleb Hearon]

Do you know, I don't. I feel that every single year of my life has been bad history.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. I think that's true.

[Caleb Hearon]

I was six when 911 happened. And everything since then has been not great.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's been everything I think about. I can mark every single chapter of my life by a different group of people going, oh, you know, it was 9 11. And then it was the economic crash of 2008, and then it was Trump's first election, and then it was more recessions, and then it was Covid. And then it was historic writers strike. Historic actors strike. Every single part of my life. I can go another bad history.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. When I was a baby, Watergate, then pretty quiet until, like, the challenger chillin.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was Watergate Chill mode. Challenger. Chill mode.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Exactly.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Bush presidency one.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. Bush presidency one. And even then, everyone was kind of like, we'll be fine.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Exactly.

[Caleb Hearon]

Will be fine. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Good lord. What's making you happy? What's exciting you? What are you looking forward to, et cetera, et cetera?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I am, I am looking forward to getting back out on the road. I, I, I still, I feel that there is still that vibe post quarantine where people are still very grateful for live performance.

[Caleb Hearon]

I think so.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And it feels really good.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And it's, it's really exciting. I really am enjoying being creative in Stand Up Again because I took like a long break from Stand up and it's been nice and humbling to get back into crafting material because, man, oh, man, I really forgot, like, I forgot the vibe of doing somebody else's show and doing like a little chunk of material and having it be met with.

[Caleb Hearon]

Well, you don't get that. You also don't get that doing someone else's show when you haven't done Stand up in a while is so humbling because you got like 7 to 12 minutes to kill or die.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And you don't get that on ramp, off ramp.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Exactly.

[Caleb Hearon]

Of your own show where you're figuring it out and you're getting into the good stuff and it's, it's like you're either doing well or you're not. And that's your night.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

That sucks. It feels bad when you haven't done it for a while.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yikes.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And you walk away and of course, it's like I'm thinking, if anyone here in this audience knows who I am, they're thinking, he doesn't have it anymore. I guess it happens to everybody. Yeah, he doesn't have it anymore.

[Caleb Hearon]

Oh, that's too bad. What happened to him?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

No, he used to be great.

[Caleb Hearon]

He used to be. That's, that's also my inner talk. Even when, even in my self talk, when I imagine someone insulting me, I still find a way to bake in a compliment. Do you know what I mean? I'm like, when I'm like, when I'm like, when I'm imagining my detractors, I'm like, this is my, in my head, people criticize me by going, like, I gotta admit, he's a nice enough guy, but he wasn't funny tonight. That's like the furthest I can take myself.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

That's very on brand.

[Caleb Hearon]

Do you know what I mean?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. I'm like, hey, I'm not saying he's not a nice guy, but he's ugly as fuck. You know, like, it's. There's always. I always am able to build in some kind of buffer there.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I think that's smart. Yeah, I think that's smart.

[Caleb Hearon]

Even my biggest critics are in touch with the reality that I'm cool. That's what my brain is able to do.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

God, for me, it is like, the scariest thing to me is. I mean, it's funny, but so what? You know what I mean? Just like, he's pleasant enough.

[Caleb Hearon]

Well, that's so scary because it's like, oh, the one thing I was counting on, like, I've built my whole life around being good at this.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

This is all I have.

[Caleb Hearon]

And for them to be like, oh, no, he achieved it. I still don't care.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, I've made this my identity. Made this my identity, my life's calling.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. That's worse than saying I didn't achieve it, because then I can just count you up to being stupid or not. A good critical thinker.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

No, I understand. He does. Okay.

[Caleb Hearon]

He's funny.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Just.

[Caleb Hearon]

What is it? What does it amount to? Yikes. What does it amount to? He's funny. A lot of people are a lot of things.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Ye. I mean, I work with guys who are funny.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. Dude. That just had a chill in my whole body. That just chilled through my whole body. That's tough. But it's going well. You're. But you're feeling good about the material now you're, like, feeling bad.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I feel better about it.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Okay. I'm almost at the point where I gotta cobble together an hour and, like, run it at the Elysian or something. And with everybody understanding that this is extremely rough, people like that into lower. I think they do like that. Yeah, I think they do like that. I really enjoy. I mean, I enjoy that. I enjoy seeing other people work stuff out and, you know, I. I like. It's nice to have the knowledge of what's. What goes into it when you watch other people do it. You know what I mean?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Like, I like. I love. I love craft and I love. I love when things are being put together. Stand up is. Is perhaps the. The least enjoyable way to do it. But things like if you're in a play or writing a song or something like that, I love the whole experience of that. Of it being rough and then that moment where it tips and you start to feel it come together and you're like, this is going to be so much fun. This is Going to be great. And then when you finally get to do it, you feel the pleasant weight of that whole journey. And the payoff is that much more because you remember you have it in your bones now of like, this was really scary at first and it really sucked. And now I'm having such a wonderful time.

[Caleb Hearon]

And now if I go up and say these words in this order and hold the mic this far from my face at this moment, if I do everything exactly the way I'm supposed to, there is a 99.9% chance it will get the laughs.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I love that shit so much. When you have the timing of things like that. Oh, God, I love that so much.

[Caleb Hearon]

And when you understand the mechanics of why it works, I'll try material for a while and be like, I don't really know why that part's getting a laugh. And then I'll. One night I won't get a laugh and I'll realize the thing I did different. And then I'll be like, oh, it's getting a laugh because I lowered my voice a little bit on that one syllable. Yeah, the whole laugh in that part of it. That whole tag or that whole setup working even. We have a sketch on our current tour, like a video sketch. It was doing fine the first couple cities. And then I realized if I just set it up a tiny bit differently, there was like a permission that needed to be given.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

That stuff is so interesting.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

The last tour, I had a video that was introducing, reintroducing the band onto the stage. Like saying everybody's name and what they played and everything. And it was this video that I got from. I have a nature cam in my house and I have a little picnic bench for squirrels.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And then sometimes the squirrels leave some hazelnuts in there. Then the night people come around. Yeah, the night people are possums and raccoons.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And so I had this great video, Black and white with the glowing eyes of opossum eating. And he was moving his mouth such. And I was like, I'm going to make this talking.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And so I had him introduce the members of the band, of course, with like a little high pitched voice. And it was never really. People were just kind of like, huh. And then one night, his name is Gabriel the Possum and he has like a little graphic that comes like, gabriel the Possum. This is like the end of the tour, I'm setting up the video and I said, how many Gabriel the Possum fans do we have out here? And then nobody says Anything. I'm like, I don't think I heard right. How many Gabriel the Possum fans do we have? A couple people clap and I'm like, you got to be fucking kidding me. And I'm screaming, how many Gabriel Possum fans do we have out here? Everybody goes nuts. Roll that video. And then it destroyed.

[Caleb Hearon]

You gas lift these people.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

You gaslit these fine folks.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

That is so funny.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It was like that realization. I'm sorry I came to it so late.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

But I was like, oh, yeah. They need some sort of context for this. Even if it's a made up context.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. If I invent context and force it upon you.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

There's also. Then there's the part of. So there's the. There's the. To me, it's a bell curve of horror trying new material. There's the horror of starting when it sucks.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Then there's the gradual incline excitement of it starting to work. Then there's that like perfect, beautiful top of the bell that's like. It's working so great. It's hitting every night. I know what the material is. I know why they're laughing. I know why I like it. I know what I think I'm saying about this. And then there's the come down where it's like, this is so in my bones and so reliable that I feel like a hack and I never want to say this sentence again.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

And that's the other side of it where I'm like, now I hate this joke.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's worked so many times in so many rooms that now saying it feels like I'm cheating.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. It feels like somebody else's joke now.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. And it feels like I'm. It feels like I'm lying to you.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Cuz the whole part of the whole point is to make it look effortless.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

You know, and it's like so much effort and so much research and so much data has gone into you laughing right now that I feel. I feel gross.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I feel like I just jerked off in front of everybody or something.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I was stuck. You didn't though, right?

[Caleb Hearon]

No.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Okay.

[Caleb Hearon]

Not most shows. It just depends. There's tier levels to the tickets.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Oh, that makes sense.

[Caleb Hearon]

Some cities people pay extra and I'll jerk off on stage.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Well, that's nice.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. People like it. It's fun.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. It' fun to have an experience like that.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. And it's tiered by seeds too, because of course you have the splash zone.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Splash zone. People get their ponchos on. Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Oh, they don't wear ponchos, Paul. People take their ponchos off in the splash zone.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Take their ponchos off.

[Caleb Hearon]

They wear poncho the whole show sweating in case anything's going to happen. Then for the splash zone, they take them off.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I was talking to a friend of mine who's an actor, capital A actor, about doing, like, a long run of a play, and I was like, that must seem. That seems very hard to me to be able to say the exact same stuff every night and keep it alive, keep it fresh. And he said, well, you do that with standup, kind of. Right. And I realized, yeah, that is true. The best is when you can go to the place of what made it funny to you in the first place. And you can feel that feeling.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know, of like, it's weird to have, like. It's like a little voice in your head that's like, this is funny.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

This is funny.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know what? You know what?

[Caleb Hearon]

Or finding. You have to find little ways to make it interesting to you again.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

You have to. For me, I have to have little. Little chunks where I'm like, that's your freestyle space.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Every. You did all the stuff that needed to do for the joke to happen. Now you can add tags if you want. You can play around. You can set this up differently.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

But every night on stage, I'm improvising at least a little bit. That's the only thing that makes it feel alive to me.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

If I had to go out and do just my set and never remark on anything in room.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

No.

[Caleb Hearon]

I would be like, this is horrible.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Plays. I don't know. Play would be tough.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I would like to do it. I've never done, like, I did plays in high school.

[Caleb Hearon]

To me, the tough. The tough thing about play is the responsibility to others. I like being on stage by myself and knowing that I'm only responsible to me.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Wow.

[Caleb Hearon]

If the show sucks, it's my fault. If the show's great, it's my fault. I'm technically responsible to the audience and then having a good time. But even still, it's not a guarantee. It's a live show.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I like being on stage alone. I really. It's funny because it was when I was started in improv, being on stage alone felt. Would feel horrifying to me. I didn't ever want to get on stage alone. I liked the community of it. I liked having everyone in it together. And now it's the opposite. I feel horrified.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

But now you did. You. You started with improv and then got into stand up, right?

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. I mean, I was always. I had done stand up a number of times before I really got into improv, but I pretty much abandoned stand up for several years and just focused on improv and then came back to stand up. Because really, once things started taking off, I was like, you need to have a solo art form again. It was kind of out of necessity. And then I fell back in love with it and was like, oh my God, I can't believe I wasn't doing this the whole time.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

When was the last time you needed to go to a doctor but you pushed it off? You made an excuse like, it'll heal on its own or I'm too busy, I'm doing that right now. Or maybe I don't even know which doctor to go to. I think we've all been there. Booking a doctor appointment can just feel so daunting. But thanks to Zoc.com there's no reason Zoc.doc Zocdoc. But thanks to Zocdoc leave it in. I'm human. There's no reason to delay. They make it so easy to find and book a doctor who's right for you. ZocDoc is a free app and website where you can search and compare high quality in network doctors and click to instantly book an appointment. We're talking about booking in network appointments with more than 100,000 doctors across every specialty from mental health to dental health, primary care to urgent care and more. You can filter for doctors who take your insurance, are located nearby, are a good fit for any medical needs you may have, and are highly rated by verified patients. They've ended the tyranny of the unverified patient zocdoc has. Once you find the right doctor, you can see their actual appointment openings. Choose a time slot that works for you and click to instantly book a visit. Appointments made through Zocdoc also happen fast. Typically within just 24 to 72 hours of booking. You can even score same day appointments. Appointments made through ZocDoc also happen fast. Already said it. Stop putting off those doctor's appointments. Leave it in. Stop putting off those doctor's appointments and go to Zocdoc.com so true to find and instantly book a top rated doctor today. That's z o c d o c dot com so true. Zocdoc.com so true y'all hacks is back for season four streaming exclusively on max. And so is The Official Hacks Podcast A podcast for Hacks. Yeah, it's called so true. Not having gotten to see much of the new season up to now, but some of my favorite comedies of the last few years, like the Righteous Gemstones, are HBO shows streaming on Max. And so I'm excited to catch up on Hacks now that season four is on its way. Now, as I said before, not only are we getting season four of Hacks starring the incomparable Gene Smart legend, we are also getting a new season of the Official Hacks Podcast. This is a really cool thing HBO does to go above and beyond for fans of their shows, where they release a companion podcast alongside their groundbreaking series to give fans a closer look at their favorite show. In each episode, hosts Bobby Finger and Lindsey Weber will speak with the creators, cast and crew members to unpack the Emmy winning comedy series. Emmy winning. I know that's right. Shout out Hannah. Hear stories from the set, get a peek into the writers room and break down the complicated dynamic between Deborah and Ava. Guests on the podcast will include Hannah Einbinder, Shout out show creators Lucia Aniello. Love, Paul W. Downs and Jen Statsky. Love, Love. Along with other members of the cast and crew who talk about the creative choices that went into making the show. Watch Hacks streaming exclusively on Max and listen to the official Hacks podcast on Max or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I mean, I do having having done both now for a decent chunk of time, I mean, there's nothing, there's nothing better than when a set goes well and all of that glory is yours.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Like you made that happen.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And it happened. It's satisfying because it's like, this is what I wanted to happen and it actually fucking happened and I made it happen and I worked hard to make it happen. It's so satisfying.

[Caleb Hearon]

But can I also just say really quick, to me, it's not the glory. Yes. But even more than the glory, it's the absence of anxiety.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I don't have any anxiety when I step off a stage. Regardless of how I did, if I was up there alone, I don't have any anxiety about what I did to or for my. My scene partners.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Right.

[Caleb Hearon]

I love stepping off and because when I would do improv so often, I would leave the stage and be like, did I steamroll? Did I give enough gifts? Did I set that up? Did I trample that? Did I. When they lobbed that up, did I slam it the way they wanted to? Did there was so much anxiety?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

About what? Like, if you And I had done a scene that I'd be like, is Paul happy with me?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Right.

[Caleb Hearon]

You know, and now when I. When I leave stage alone, I have no anxiety.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Because there was no one that I could have wronged.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Either the audience had a good time or they didn't. And I could handle that. But I don't have to look at a collaborator and be like, are you happy with me? Right. And trust them to say yes or no.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I guess it is easier to know when you're by yourself if you have tried your best.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

But with other people, it can get like, there's so much that takes over. Well, there's so much. There's so much that's swirling around your brain when you're doing improv that it is hard to monitor sometimes. Am I doing the best I can? I think it helped me that I got to it so late that I was much more my own person when I started doing it.

[Caleb Hearon]

Improv or stand up.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, improv. And so I was thrilled to be learning a new thing, but also had enough experience performing experience under my belt that I was like, okay, I can. I know that I. I know that I can learn this, and I know that I can be generous because I do like to. To work with other people. That said, I bet there's probably times I walked off stage where people were like. Like that old steamroll F. Tompkins over there.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Couldn't be a normal guy for two seconds so I could have some fun. But, you know, but. But the great thing about improv for me was it taught me how to let go of. Which I couldn't do before.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And stand up should teach you that. But it. For me, it didn't. Yeah, for me, it didn't. I would. I would dwell on things, and if it didn't go well, I would really take that personally and really try to figure out what did I do wrong. And I would immediately go to a place like, well, it's over for me. I guess I had a good run.

[Caleb Hearon]

I'm cooked. It's over. Yeah. Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

They didn't like that. But I got to a point where it was a huge thing for me to get to a point where I could laugh if I bombed or I could walk upstage. And, like, that was actually really funny. I ate it so hard. I did a show at the Melbourne Comedy Festival, which was great, because I got to do. I'd never done a festival like that before where I got to do the same set night after night after night. And Got it so down and I was so happy with it. But it's one of those things where one night I showed up, there were six people there and you have to do the show, you know, and these people sat there in my memory, all of them had their arms folded and. And what I did was I brought over a stool and I sat down and I just made it slightly more conversational and just went through that whole hour, not a single laugh. And I just acted like I was talking to them.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And then like, while it was happening, I was like, this is pretty funny. Yeah, this is pretty funny.

[Caleb Hearon]

I had that during. I did a college gig once in a town where a blizzard had rolled through and already college gigs. I won't do stand up at colleges anymore. I'll do Q&As, but I will not do stand up because half the time they won't come. There's a better off campus party than your show. They didn't.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

The.

[Caleb Hearon]

The marketing team at the. It's run by drug addled teenagers. So they did. They put up one poster in the PSU or whatever. Like. They didn't. They didn't. It's not good. And I. I did. This is a couple years ago, but I did. There was a blizzard and no, I. No one came. It was. They had me in a. First of all, they had me in a 2,000 seat auditorium. And at that point, I don't think I would agree to that now. And I have a much bigger career now than I did then. I don't know why they would have done it. I did not have the career I have now. I should have never been in a room that size. They should have at least turned off the back row of lights. You know what I mean? Huge auditorium. And it was so, so bad. Note, like, maybe 40 kids showed up.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And that's like. I think 20 of them were like on the council that brought me. So I'd say probably five of them were mega fans of mine. And the others were forced contractually somehow. And I just. I got laughs. But I did. The whole time I was doing the hour, I was like, this is horrible. You are not having fun. It is hilarious. You will never do one of these again. While I was doing it, I'm not kidding. There was a certain point during the hour that I just started thinking about how I was gonna spend the money because the pay is good, you know, I was like. I was like, man, when you're walking around in those new shoes. I was so disconnected from the experience. Yeah, those Are tough ones. Good Lord, I hate those. I think, though, improv is the most. Improv is the best thing that ever happened to me as a human being. Learning improv, the skill changed my life so massively. And it's cornball and it's whatever, but, like, I would recommend to any human being living on earth that they. If you have the opportunity to go and train improv for a little while and really let it seep into you and really buy in, which is, of course, how cults talk. That I would just, like, really try it, because it genuinely did. I met the coolest people. I met both of these people through improv. I met most of my closest friends through improv. And when I'm around somebody who's taken improv training and, like, really done it for a couple of years, a converse dinner is better. Problems are better.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Absolutely.

[Caleb Hearon]

Life is just better because you get so good at just, like, going with the flow and learning how to be in a group. And it just. I don't know. It's the best. It's the most important thing I've ever learned, probably.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And listening.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know, my favorite thing is. Favorite thing in the world is a small dinner party where everyone's having the same conversation. You know what I mean? Everyone's involved. Nothing fucking drives me crazier than if I'm in a group of people and somebody sees me listening and they assume that means I'm open for them.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's like, well, I'm not waiting for you.

[Caleb Hearon]

I'm listening to her.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I'm trying. Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

Shut up.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I'm interested in this.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Why do you. Why you just assume.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Like, it's so weird.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And then it's never, Never has it ever happened where it was something that I wanted to hear.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. It was better over here.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Also, recall. I can't. I can't tell you the number. I trained a muscle of remembering shit. Because you have to. To do a good improv, you have to remember something that happened eight scenes ago or whatever. And it sounds silly, but I can't tell you the number of times that my. A platonic or professional or romantic relationship in my life has visibly, markedly improved because I remembered some shit that was hard to remember, that someone just offhanded in a conversation goes, oh, I love this kind of flower, or whatever. And then three months later, you send them that flower. It's nice. Or you remember that they liked that snack. Recall, Listening and remembering. What two things could you imagine are more important to being an enjoyable person to be around.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

People love it when you do that, and I love it when somebody does it. For me, if somebody's like, I saw this and I thought of you, that means so much to me. Isn't that wonderful that somebody thought of you? They were reminded of you because they saw this fucking dumb thing that might even be three things removed from the thing that actually you had anything to do with. But it's like, this got me thinking and I thought of you, and I just wanted to say hi. Like, bring it. I love it.

[Caleb Hearon]

My friends, that one of my best friends. Her name's Ally. I've known her since we were 14 years old. Her dad has one of these things with me, but it's still really sweet because he basically. I did a show once with Brett Goldstein, and I know Brett, you know, Brett's around, but he somehow that information from Instagram, it's like Largo posted us together or something. It manifested in my friend's dad's head, and he's the coolest. I love this guy. Shout out, Roger. But Roger. Somehow it manifested in his head that I'm a huge Ted Lasso fan. I've never seen it. I like people that are in it. But now he'll call her and just be like, I saw this Ted Lasso notebook. Should I get it for Caleb? Every time it warms my heart, I don't want it. But every time it warms my heart in a way that is indescribable. Absolutely. Because he thinks I'm a fan of Ted Lasso.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And he wants to get it from me.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

I don't. I am not. And I don't want it. But it just means the world to me that he is. He has latched onto something 1000%. That's the best thing.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's the best thing ever.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. I've learned that it's very important to. To do that when it. When it occurs to you when you're thinking of somebody like that, it's very important to immediately say, hey, I just thought of you. Because it's never been easier to do.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know what I mean? You have to get out the parchment and a quill. Like, you just text somebody that you haven't. You haven't spoken to in a year or something, you haven't seen them, and just say, I saw this today. I thought of you. You know, I hope you're doing well. Whatever. It's so. It's so grat. Gratifying to be on either end of it. Yeah, it's so nice.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. Paul, what's so true to you?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Well, speaking of nice, I think there's more. I think there's more good people than there are bad, bad people.

[Caleb Hearon]

I've been saying this. I really do say more.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I really do. I think that as much as there are people that want to make life miserable for other people, I think there's too many of us for them to ultimately succeed.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And I think that people care about each other more than we give ourselves credit for.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And I think especially like going through the fires here in. It is one of those things where you become proud of a place that you live in. You say people are looking out for each other. People give a shit. People really care. Has nothing to do with them. Has nothing. Just instant sympathy and empathy. There's a thing that takes over where we get outside ourselves and we can see ourselves as a community. And it's a really wonderful thing. And I think that's actually our default. As much as there are. There's so much in this world that is trying to make that not our default. I still think our default is that we look out for each other and we care about each other.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. I think most people. I have been. I've been saying this repeatedly lately because. So we talk a lot. There's a lot of talk lately about hopelessness and what. What is and is not possible. And I don't know. I have no answers. I'm just a guy.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Who for some reason has a little microphone. But I. I think that most people are good. Yeah, most people are good. And I understand, like, look, there's. What I don't understand is when I say that. And people are so dead set on proving me wrong. So many people. So many people would go, well, you have money or you're a white guy. And I go, totally. There's not an ounce of me that wants to refute that.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I know my position in the world. I'm perfectly aware of my privileges. I've thought about them. I'm thinking about them all the time. I promise you. I'm on team. I'm on team. Everyone should get treated the way that the good parts of me get treated. But I. It completely is. It's not beside the point. It totally affects maybe a sample size of what I'm talking about. But I'm also a fat person, and I'm also a gay person. None of these refute each other. But I'm saying we all move through the world with things. And I am convinced at Least in my own personal experience, most people are good. Yeah, most people are nice.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Because that's not negating the idea that there are bad people in the world, because there are.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's also not negating the people that certain people have an easier life than others based on things about them.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Absolutely.

[Caleb Hearon]

My life is totally better now that I have money. My life sucked when I was poor. Nobody will tell you that quicker than I will. And I'm not rich now. But I have money, I can afford my bills, I can travel and see my friends and stuff. Nobody knows that better than I do. I promise you. I lived it. I just think most of the time when you go to a gas station and you chat with the person working, most of the time from everyone I know, everything I've seen, most of the time it's like, like, hey, I hope you have a really good day.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's how it is.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Mostly we want to be nice to each other and there are a bunch of forces that are making us. There are a bunch of forces that make people not want to do that. There are a bunch of people that have been so far removed from regular life that are making the decisions that they have become, they've forgotten what it is to be around people and so they don't care about the rest of us anymore. But I think most people are nice and I think most people are good. And that's why I, I think you're right. I, that's why I think that they're the evil, bad people. Cannot win.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Overall they're getting some gains for sure.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

For sure.

[Caleb Hearon]

They've had a couple W's lately.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. There are battles going in their favor.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

But the war.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

The overall struggle towards are we going to be nice, good, happy people who treat each other well or are we going to be evil, selfish, self centered, sycophantic freaks that are mean to everyone who's different than us?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I feel better about our side.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

I like our side of it.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. I think also a thing in our favor is that the people, it's, it's the people that are the bad people that are in charge right now are all incompetent and stupid.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And they're not going to be able to do as much damage. They're going to do a lot of damage. They're not going to be able to do as much permanent damage as they think they're going to do.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Because they don't know what the fuck they're doing.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You know, and thank God, you know, But I don't. I don't think it's going to go. I don't see the purpose in just reveling in the doom of it all. And even, like, online, I got to a place where it's like, I don't want to just repost shit that's like, here's another horrible thing that's happening. And if I'm going to share somebody else's message, it's going to be here's somebody who's fighting back. Here's somebody who's doing a different thing. Here's somebody who's, you know, has courage in the face of this. Here's somebody who's not acknowledging that this dumb shit is real, you know, that I just want us all to realize that. But there is.

[Caleb Hearon]

We.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I mean, I don't know if we have time to get into the revolution.

[Caleb Hearon]

Hey, look, man, I wonder how long the studio lights stay on.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

People are getting pushed. People are getting pushed. And I also think that we're on the cusp of. Of things being so bad that I think some of. I don't think we can go back to doing things the old way. And I don't know how that's gonna manifest itself, but, you know, it'll be, Let me just say, will be wild.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, I think you're right. I think we're past the point of no return on a lot of stuff, and now we need to find a new way to do life. Yeah, I think even I get inspired by so many things, but even. I mean, I talk about the tenant union in Kansas City all the time. Obviously, that's, like, my favorite thing. It's one of the only things. It is the source of my hope. It is the reason I feel politically hopeful right now. Even though I would totally hear the argument of so many people that are like, no, I'm hopeless. It is the source of my hope because I know what's possible. And I believe in the people who are working in the tenant union in Kansas City so intensely. And if they're telling me a better world is possible, I believe them. And even, like, when eggs were fucking, I mean, I think they're still expensive, but the price of eggs being through the roof, proof. Tenant union in Kansas City bought eggs directly from a farmer and sold them at cost at their meetings. Like, and if you couldn't afford it, I think there was, like, an option to just take some. But, like, stuff like that, where I'm like, that is a real practical, everyday solution that no one in the government can figure out, but our neighbors figured it out for each other.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's what I believe in.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

And I didn't have to involve the government.

[Caleb Hearon]

The. Yeah, it's like we're gonna have to. That's the thing is, we're gonna have to. Yes. The government is a thing that I would love to figure out how. Left progressive, bleeding heart, you know, whatever sissy liberals like me. I would love if we could figure out a way to get more people on board with our message, because I think it's a better world for all of us. But, yeah, we're gonna have to do a lot of it for ourselves.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's funny, I think about Catholicism a lot.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Were you raised Catholic?

[Caleb Hearon]

No, but I think they were like, Catholics were on the cutting edge of social good. They were opening. They were opening houses for the unhoused. They were feeding the like. Catholics had a real strong stake in, like, social justice.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

And now a lot of these right wing religious movements have devolved into like, boys can't wear skirts.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's like, what. Yeah, that's where you guys landed.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

What happened to the feeding the poor thing?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

We actually hate the unhoused.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, we're over that. Yeah. The unhoused. The unhoused topic is where you can find a whole bunch of people who are otherwise liberal, telling the tr. Truth.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Oh, man, I. So many people that I was like.

[Caleb Hearon]

Oh, okay, a couple tents pop up on the sidewalk and things change quick, huh? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I also love a lot of people that are like, oh, sure, you live in wherever you live. You don't have to deal with it. Like, I live in America. There's like, there's camps all over my neighborhood. They're all over the place. Like, if you live in Bel Air, maybe, but if you don't, there's no part of a major city that is untouched by this.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

So I don't want to hear about how hard it is for you do.

[Caleb Hearon]

I've also seen this really funny line of conservative reasoning lately that's. Or this argument, this really racist up thing they're saying lately. The new one where they're like, pretty much all of American life is just seeing how far you can get away from major cities because of diversity and integration. Like, they're basically saying, like, because we integrated now, everyone's fleeing the cities. I'm like, more people live in major cities in this country than don't. Like, we. If you. If we had a true democracy and we just voted based on everybody's Individual vote. Yeah. Your guy would never see the inside of another government building for at least 400 years.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

So I don't understand that. When they're like, oh, everyone wants out of the cities, I'm like, no, actually, most people are going to the cities.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah. And they also can't tell the truth is that if anyone's leaving the cities because they can't afford it.

[Caleb Hearon]

Right.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Because of you.

[Caleb Hearon]

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Well, if we were in charge, everything would be fixed.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I think it's so true.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's so true. I really do. Virginia's obsessed with this one clip of the podcast where we're talking about hope. And I go, can I just say, I feel more hopeful than ever. And I think chance goes. Someone goes, really? And I go, I really do. And the way I say it, Virginia brings it up five times a day on tour. She loves it. Paul, guess what?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

What?

[Caleb Hearon]

I have a segment for you.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Oh, shit.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, brother. You didn't think you were gonna have to lock in, but guess what?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I forgot. I forgot.

[Caleb Hearon]

You know what's so funny? When we started kind of concepting this podcast a little over a year ago, so this segment was kind of a throwaway idea of like, maybe we'll do that a couple times. Now we've learned on the live tour, it is everybody's favorite thing. On the live tour, we set up to do the true false, people start screaming. They know the setup. They love the true false.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You can't listen to it and not get invested in it because you're trying to answer along.

[Caleb Hearon]

You want to play?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's very. Yeah. This kind of thing. It's also.

[Caleb Hearon]

Are you looking at this? Don't look at this.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I don't. I'm not looking at it. I never think of myself as a competitive person.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Until I do something like this.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah. And then you're like, oh.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Then it's like, I have to be good at this.

[Caleb Hearon]

I'm dark sided. Yeah.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

After midnight. I lost on after midnight.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's humiliating.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's humiliating. It's fake and it's. It's. It feels bad. Bob the drag queen called me a boomer. That hurt. That hurt bad. And I think he really thought that. I think he really thought it.

[Caleb Hearon]

Bob the drag queen called me a boomer.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yeah.

[Caleb Hearon]

That is so goddamn fun. You know what? I was in a hotel room with Mateo Lane and Nick Smith recently in Charlotte, and they called Bob to chit chat and they go, we're here with Caleb. And Bob goes, caleb who? Caleb who? There's not a million of them from the Bible in our circle. Oh, it hurt deeply. But we're trying to have Bob back on the show, so we'll address that when they come back. When she comes back. Are you ready?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Yes.

[Caleb Hearon]

True or false? I'm going to read you 15 statements. You're going to tell me as quickly as you can if you think what I just said is true or false. If you get 10 or more correct, Paul, we're going to give you 50 US dollars. Mountain Lions can whistle.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

False.

[Caleb Hearon]

True. UPS stands for United Package Service. False. False. United Parcel Service. The Toys R Us giraffes. First name is Jeffrey.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

True.

[Caleb Hearon]

True. The first zoo in the United States was in Boston.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

False.

[Caleb Hearon]

False. It was Philadelphia. Jingle Bells was originally written for New Year's Eve.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

True.

[Caleb Hearon]

False. Thanksgiving. Jellyfish can clone themselves.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

True.

[Caleb Hearon]

True. The first Anchorman movie came out in 2006.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

False.

[Caleb Hearon]

False. It was 2004. Spiders cannot regrow lost legs.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

False.

[Caleb Hearon]

False. They can. Temple University's mascot is Longfellow the Owl.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

True.

[Caleb Hearon]

False.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

What's his name?

[Caleb Hearon]

Hooter. Hooter. Hooter.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Are you fucking kidding me? Hooter.

[Caleb Hearon]

T owl. Hooter. T owl.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Hooter. Tea Owl.

[Caleb Hearon]

The word utopia comes from a Greek word meaning no place.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

True.

[Caleb Hearon]

That is true. H. John Benjamin is 6ft tall. False. False. 5, 6. It snows metal on Venus.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

False.

[Caleb Hearon]

It's true. Ocean algae produces 75% of the Earth's oxygen.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

True.

[Caleb Hearon]

True. Bishop McDevitt High School's newspaper was called the Realm.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

False.

[Caleb Hearon]

False. It was.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I can't remember.

[Caleb Hearon]

The Royalist.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

The Realm was the yearbook.

[Caleb Hearon]

Sarah Michelle Geller has a black belt in Taekwondo.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

True.

[Caleb Hearon]

That is true. How do you do? What a. That was a master class.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

I'll take that. I'll take that.

[Caleb Hearon]

That was a master class in being locked in.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Oh.

[Caleb Hearon]

A lot of our guests, they dilly dally. Paul, they're dilly dallyers.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You can't dilly dally.

[Caleb Hearon]

You need to lock in.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You need to lock in.

[Caleb Hearon]

And I make it so clear in the setup, you get mentally ill gay people in here and they're all over the goddamn map. We needed a boomer to come and lock in.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It only hurts 90% ideologically. The other 10% is pure age.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, that's just aesthetics.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You think so?

[Caleb Hearon]

You thought, that is so funny. I did have a moment when you said, watergate and the Challenge are exploding. I said, oh, boy.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

You're, like, trying to do some math.

[Caleb Hearon]

I said. I said, hold on. Where. Where are we at? I Said, when did those happen? I'm bad at dates, so maybe I'm like, Bob. Bob the drag queen called me a boomer is one of the funniest. I don't know why that cracks me up so hard.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's hard to say.

[Caleb Hearon]

Say. It is hard to say. Well, it's been an absolute delight, Paul.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

It's been a delight on my end.

[Caleb Hearon]

Is there anything that you want to tell the people where they can find you, where they can buy tickets, etc.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Go to paulftompkins.com variety and come out and see us on tour. And also, I'm proud to say that the tickets are very reasonably priced. Yeah, we try to keep it low for the people. We want to bring entertainment to the people.

[Caleb Hearon]

That's actually huge because, you know, I will say artists, we get an opportunity to talk. We get it to be in conversations about ticket pricing. We also get to be in conversations about merch sizes. And if you are selling merch, I am begging you to tell your merch provider today. Join me now in this fight. Please tell your merch provider you want 5 and 6x shirts. You want 3, 4, 5, and 6. Stop stopping at 2. Get the fat people some love. And also keep your ticket prices low when you can. That's a beautiful word.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

We capped it at 3.3x.

[Caleb Hearon]

Yeah, that's better.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

We had a ton left over.

[Caleb Hearon]

I would love three X's. Yeah, I know. That's what happens. But a pre order can help, too. That's the thing is I'm asking anybody who does merch if you're worried about that. If you're like, oh, fuck, we're gonna make all these and they'll be left over. Do a pre order. If you're already doing a pre order, you can put the extra sizes on there and it will only comp. We will all. You only make the amount that you need.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

There you go.

[Caleb Hearon]

And then the rest you can give to unhouse people to use a sheets and blankets. There's so much material I send with.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Those kids in Africa who have the the alternate universe World Series winner T shirts.

[Caleb Hearon]

Let them wear a 5x Ryotopia shirt. What's it gonna hurt?

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Cinch it with a belt.

[Caleb Hearon]

Let a couple of them huddle up under that thing. Yes. Send it to Estonia and let those kids hide under there.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

With my compliments.

[Caleb Hearon]

With my compliments. We love you. Thanks for being on.

[Paul F. Tompkins]

Thank you.

[Caleb Hearon]

That was a hit gum podcast.