Max Silvestri Returns

Summary

You Made It Weird with Pete Holmes

Episode: Max Silvestri Returns

Release date: December 10, 2025

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Overview

This episode of "You Made It Weird" features comedian, writer, and showrunner Max Silvestri returning to the podcast for a candid, funny, and thoughtful conversation with Pete Holmes. The two old friends dig into the inner workings of comedy, the oddities of podcasting, what it means to perform authenticity, and how life and career changes (especially parenthood and loss) have shaped them. They also discuss Max’s new projects, including the HBO series "I Love LA", and share stories about the evolution of the comedy scene and how technology and culture have transformed creative lives.

Main Theme: Exploring the emotional and professional pivots of midlife, friendship, podcast culture, comedic persona, and creative growth—peppered with confessions, laughter, and big life moments.

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Key Discussion Points

Reconnecting and Life Updates

• Reunion in the Studio: Max and Pete reminisce about how long it's been since they last connected in person (03:06–04:00).
• Mutual Respect and Career Evolution: Pete introduces Max, expressing deep admiration for his comedic talent and kindness, noting their 20+ year friendship and Max’s multi-faceted career (00:18).
• Parenting and Loss: Max reveals the impact of becoming a father to his son, Waylon, and details the trauma and aftermath of losing his family home to a fire (19:33–42:54).

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The New Podcast & Creative Partnerships

• Podcast Genesis: Max discusses launching the new podcast "I Need You Guys" with Gabe Liedman and Jenny Slate, prompted by life logistics and the desire to keep their friendship alive despite geographic distance (05:02–07:44).
  • Format talk versus freeform riffing
  • The practicalities of remote recording and including guests
• Podcast as Friendship & Commerce: Both reflect on how podcasts, while commercial ventures, are modern manifestations of classic social rituals (10:00–12:29)

“The more things change, the more they stay the same. People just want to hang out... you end up using the flavor of the times, podcasting, to encourage what you would have done in 1911, which is, like, gotten together and had a jazz coffee.” —Pete Holmes, 10:36

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Personas, Authenticity & the Performance of Life

• Comedy Persona Transparency: Max and Pete compare their on- and off-air selves, noting how hosting evolves to become more authentic, especially when close friends or a spouse is involved (13:47–15:25).

“I’m almost barely hosting. I’m allowing your energy to inform me, and then we’ll see what happens with us together.” —Pete Holmes, 14:00

• Frontstage/Backstage Dichotomy: Inspired by Gia Tolentino’s concepts, they discuss how social interactions, relationships, and even marriage involve the “backstage” self—while most of life involves some performance (15:45–17:03).

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Trauma, Community, and Grieving

• Losing a Home: Max’s harrowing account of the fires that destroyed his house and the emotional complexity of being “the victim” (24:38–42:54).
  • Evacuating in the middle of the night (29:51–34:48)
  • The way trauma reorganizes memory, marking life into “before” and “after” (27:32–29:49)
  • Navigating community and grief groups for new parents affected by the fire

"It was wild to experience the event that you are almost sure would be the organizing event of your memoir." —Gabe Liedman, 26:34

• Grieving Stuff and Identity: They talk about objects and place as extensions of self, the fantasy of “reinvention” after a loss, and the reality of that process (41:58–43:22).
• The Burden of Others' Reactions: How others’ attempts to help after trauma can create additional emotional labor (38:17–39:44).

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Comedy Culture, Critical Voice, Ego, and Aging

• Evolution of Stand-up Persona: They examine how the “coin of the realm” in comedy is having a take—sharp, fast, sometimes biting—and how this can be both a talent and an exhausting habit, especially as they get older and become parents (49:00–53:20).
• They discuss intentionally slowing down, cultivating more curiosity, and balancing the snap judgments that comedy prizes with empathy and patience.
• Reflections on Generational Change: How younger comedians and “influencers” operate differently, what youth and image as currency mean today, and how older comics' perspectives shift (58:32–62:39).

“You don’t get to sell and make a show on HBO at 29 unless you work really hard to get it. You have to work when you have a moment—youth as a currency expires.” —Gabe Liedman, 66:06

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Modern Comedy, Technology & Self-Promotion

• The Social Media & Clip Economy: The merits and neuroses surrounding sharing stand-up online, old myths about "saving material," and how connection—rather than perfection—is now key (71:13–73:02).
• Comedy Scene Nostalgia: Stories about submitting photos to comedy blogs, early-career hunger, and pranking John Mulaney for the comedy blog “The Apiary” (73:10–76:04).

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Memorable Stories & Reflections

Losing the House: The Fire Story

• Haunting Real-Time Decisions: Deciding whether to evacuate, gathering “just weekend stuff,” and the surreal, polite logic in an impending crisis (29:51–33:29).
• Processing Trauma through Humor: Jokingly comparing the fire’s destruction to the “Blitzkrieg” and keeping things riffable as a means of coping (28:45–28:59).
• Aftermath and Support: Finding solace in a trauma group, the emotional weight of not just losing possessions but comforting others (37:12–39:44).

Comedy Life: Advice and Influence

• Marking Each Other: Max recalls advice and jokes Pete gave him that stuck, reflecting on the odd way old friends' feedback can clarify your comedic voice (44:54–46:32).

“You always felt like...you had a real Persona. You had come in from Chicago, like, pretty fully formed...But you had some compliment on my set, and then you said, I feel like I could write for you now.” —Gabe Liedman, 45:13

Industry Paranoia & Pranks

• The Apiary Story: Gabe recounts getting threatened by a disgruntled Rhode Island comic years after a critical interview, highlighting the weird dangers (and repercussions) of early-career candor and the permanence of online archives (78:05–86:07).

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Notable Quotes

• “Our podcast is really a way to keep our friendship together. We’ve always brought this energy. But guests are nice, because otherwise it’s just mining in the same direction every week.”
  —Gabe Liedman, 08:04

• “You mine a different vein, that’s all. ...With guests, you distract yourself from the exploit—not the exploration.”
  —Pete Holmes, 08:27

• “I like having takes, but sometimes I clock myself in my relationship, like, I have the meaner or more confident version of myself on, and it’s not honest. It’s just the coin of the realm.”
  —Gabe Liedman, 49:00

• “We’re in the business of making snap judgments and takes. But as a dad, now I’m interested in being open, curious, slow to judgment. Nobody likes these things unless you’re paying them to make you laugh.”
  —Pete Holmes, 50:44

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Important Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment/Event | |-----------|--------------| | 03:06–05:00 | Max and Pete reconnect and reminisce about years in LA, overlapping at shows | | 05:02–07:44 | Launching "I Need You Guys" podcast—a behind-the-scenes look | | 10:00–12:29 | Podcasting as modern friendship, the irony of scheduling and monetizing hangs | | 19:33–24:38 | Gabe on becoming a dad; introduction to the fire story | | 24:38–34:48 | Detailed retelling of the fire evacuation, loss, and immediate aftermath | | 37:12–39:44 | Grief groups, the burden of others’ reactions after trauma | | 41:58–43:22 | Possessions, reinvention fantasy, and post-loss identity crisis | | 49:00–53:38 | Comedy persona, 'coin of the realm,’ and how comedy habits creep into personal life | | 58:32–61:59 | Writing for new perspectives, moving from satire to understanding, discussing "I Love LA" | | 66:06–67:29 | Youth, beauty, and success as currency—navigating the influencer era | | 71:13–73:02 | Stand-up in the digital era, sharing online and shifting expectations | | 73:10–76:04 | The “Apiary” prank/joke legacy—photo submitted by John Mulaney | | 78:05–86:07 | The "Apiary story" — Gabe’s cyber-angry prop comic, online permanence, and repercussions |

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Tone & Language

• Conversational, honest, comedic: Pete and Max riff freely, tease, reminisce, and occasionally dive deep, always returning to humor.
• Reflective, vulnerable: Particularly in discussions about loss, parenthood, and growing older.
• Insider-y but inviting: Plenty of context for listeners who don’t know every name, but lots of inside jokes and references for comedy nerds.

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Final Thoughts

This episode blends the funny and the sincere, offering rare glimpses into the personal growth and challenges that shape comedians beyond their stage personas. It's rich in both belly laughs and true vulnerability—showcasing the creative, awkward, and painful processes through which comedians adapt, age, and deepen their art and lives.

Check out:

• Max’s HBO show "I Love LA" (Sundays, HBO)
• The new podcast with Gabe Liedman and Jenny Slate, “I Need You Guys.”

“Keep it crispy.” —Gabe Liedman, 91:14

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For More:

• Follow Max Silvestri and Pete Holmes on socials
• Links to projects via their respective accounts and show notes

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Transcript

[Max Silvestri]

Lemonade.

You made it Weird with Pete Holmes. What's happening, weirdos? This is Max Silvestri, one of the funniest, most talented and nicest people I've ever known. And I've known him for about 20 years, maybe more than 20 years. He opens for John Mulaney. He is a murderer in his own right. He's got a Netflix special you got to check out. He also was the showrunner for the amazing new show I Love la. He's all over the place. He writes, he showruns, he does stand up and he's a delight. So I was thrilled when he. Max. Sorry, Gabe. Gabe. Gabe Leadman and Jenny Slate. Sorry, had to think about that for a second. They're doing a new podcast. So they're going around doing podcast telling people that they have a nude podcast. But it was really just a very nice excuse to sit down with my old friend, talk a little bit about the old times, talk about the current times. And I'm glad you guys are here. Check out Max on all the social. All the social Max Sylvester. And in the meantime, enjoy this chat that we had. Or, or before we throw to it, maybe I'm gonna plug my tour dates. Just go to petehomes.com go to petomot comm. I do a monthly show at Largo in Los Angeles. It always means so much when people come out. We got the Milwaukee Improv, we got Brea, we got San Francisco, North Carolina, South Carolina, Miami, Michigan, Texas, Wisconsin, and Denver, Colorado. And thank you to everybody that's been coming out to all the shows. It means so much to see weirdos out there. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Hope to see you out at a live show. In the meantime, enjoy my, my dear friend, the wonderful Max Silvestri. Get into it.

[Julia Louis Dreyfus]

Hey there, it's Julia Louis Dreyfus. I'm back with a new season of Wiser Than Me. The show where I sit down with remarkable older women and soak up their stories, their humor and their hard earned wisdom. Every conversation leaves me a little smarter and definitely more inspired. And yes, I'm still calling my 91 year old mom Judy to get her take on it all. Wiser Than Me from Lemonade Media, premieres November 12th. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Gabe Liedman]

It's morning in New York.

Hey everybody, I'm Mandy Patinkin.

[Max Silvestri]

And I'm Kathryn Grody.

[Gabe Liedman]

And we have a new podcast, it's called Don't Listen to Us.

[Max Silvestri]

Many of you have asked for our advice.

[Gabe Liedman]

Tell me what is wrong with you people don't listen to us. Our take it or leave it advice show is out every Wednesday, premiering October 15th. A Lemonada Media original.

[Max Silvestri]

So happy to see you. I haven't seen you. I haven't seen you in. Well, I think you tell me that. The last time I saw you was when Mulaney was performing at.

Some theater here in la, The Orpheum.

[Gabe Liedman]

No.

I wasn't opening for him. Yes, that might have been the Orpheum, which might have been like.

[Max Silvestri]

Okay, I don't go to places called the Orpheum.

[Gabe Liedman]

No, but there's the theater downtown. It's like a nice big theater. You had people in the basement after. Yeah, yeah. Conan was there.

[Max Silvestri]

No.

[Gabe Liedman]

Martin Short. No. Either way, that's been a while, because I. Orpheum. It's downtown.

[Max Silvestri]

This is a theater I've performed at. Since it's not a Mullaney Theater, it's a regular person theater, like Largo. Similar to Largo, but probably three times as big as Largo, but not.

[Gabe Liedman]

I like that the cadence of this is like, you know the answer. And I'm guessing, but it seems like you don't know the answer. Neither of us do.

[Max Silvestri]

I've also seen Birbiglia at this venue. This is like a.

1200 seat theater. It's not called. If they call this the Orpheum, the person was having a really strong coffee.

[Gabe Liedman]

But either way, that's probably been like four or five years.

[Max Silvestri]

I mean, that's all I really need to say. Yeah. And you did open.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah, yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

And how dare you think I would forget? Because you were incredible.

[Gabe Liedman]

Oh, I appreciate you saying that.

[Max Silvestri]

I loved it, but I used to see you all the time.

[Gabe Liedman]

You know, we both. For a long time. You still do. Had regular shows at Largo, but rarely overlapped.

[Max Silvestri]

Are you not in Los Angeles?

[Gabe Liedman]

I am, but Jenny, who did the show with you, did the show with us, is now fully on the East Coast. She was kind of splitting her time, but, yeah. So we would do it when she was in town, but it just became tougher and tougher. And that's sort of why we jumped to podcast mode. Because it's remote.

[Max Silvestri]

Because you're my friend. I was going to warn you. I'm like, I don't know why I'm being salty. And I was going to say, so the next logical step was to start a podcast with Jenny.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

These scheduling conflicts said, let's keep going.

[Gabe Liedman]

Weirdly, yes. Also, I will say zoom. Yeah. And as does Gabe. We do it all. Zoom. Because we consider Doing Gabe and Gabe Leben and me in person and then like teleconference her in. But that would feel like we were like CNN having like an expert in presentation person.

[Max Silvestri]

Zooming. Bad vibe.

[Gabe Liedman]

No. So we're all zooms, even though Gabe and I are just a few miles from each other. But it's like, let us have New York guests and LA guests. And it is not as good looking as other podcasts because we don't have a beautiful studio with art and decorations, but you get to see into our homes.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah, it's a give and a take.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Sometimes hotel rooms.

[Max Silvestri]

Yep, it's a give and a take. What is the name of the podcast?

[Gabe Liedman]

It's called I need you guys.

[Max Silvestri]

I need you guys. Sweet.

[Gabe Liedman]

And it's sort of a.

You know, we take listener questions, but really it's about us getting advice and help from each other. It's a little bit like plugging into our 20 year old group chat.

[Max Silvestri]

A riff podcast. But you're nervous you won't have enough to talk about.

[Gabe Liedman]

You know, we felt great about it.

[Max Silvestri]

I told you I was salty. We would love to eliminate the call in portion because you will. Three months in.

[Gabe Liedman]

Ultimately. Ultimately a format is friendly to both advertisers and our network.

[Max Silvestri]

And getting it made. Yes, it's exactly.

[Gabe Liedman]

So we were like, sure, we'll do these segments, but like we don't need. There'll be like 10 minute intro, 10 minute interview, 10 minute question. But I'm like, you know, we could just talk for an hour because you.

[Max Silvestri]

Guys have been friends for 30 years.

[Gabe Liedman]

This is what Big Terrific has been is like we get up on stage and riff. But they're like, let's, let's try to put guardrails.

[Max Silvestri]

By the way, this riff is the same for any podcast. Not unique to you.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Meaning people are like, I'm starting a podcast. Everyone tells me their favorite golf club.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

And I'm like, okay, so you have a bullshit grab ass show.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

And you had to tell them that. It's called four exclamations.

[Gabe Liedman]

Literally. Literally.

[Max Silvestri]

That.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. So, um, we do need each other. That's the. And sometimes we need our guests. Look, it's all there. It's all in the two paragraphs.

[Max Silvestri]

You'll have guests.

[Gabe Liedman]

We have guests.

[Max Silvestri]

Cause the three of you could just meet. That's what Big Terrific. I'm not changing your show.

[Gabe Liedman]

No, I mean, I just tried to.

[Max Silvestri]

Give you a compliment that the three of you talking was what Big Terrific was.

[Gabe Liedman]

Absolutely.

[Max Silvestri]

And that was always fun.

[Gabe Liedman]

We definitely don't like, run out of things to talk about. But, I mean, we waited a solid 16 years after first discussing a podcast to get into it. Our timing. Yeah, it's incredible. We want to make sure that the money is gone.

[Max Silvestri]

Make sure the market is flooded.

[Gabe Liedman]

Absolutely.

[Max Silvestri]

The money is. We actually owe money.

[Gabe Liedman]

So in the hole. And it's just like the sky keeps getting smaller and smaller the more episodes we record. But we. Yeah, we didn't want the money to be distracting. We didn't want the potential of grabbing an unexploited area to be too distracting.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah, yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

So, yeah, we. But, you know, ultimately, we did. We do. Like, we can do it ourselves, you know, and we're all doing less stand up, so it's like. Yeah, we. We've always brought this energy together. But I think guests are nice. Guests are nice because they.

[Max Silvestri]

Well, there's two. Look, I'll talk about podcast theory, please. A lot, because I think it's interesting. Valerie, my wife, and I do the Friday edition of this show, and that's no guest.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

And there's a different. It's not better or worse. It's just digging in the same direction, meaning mining the same direction every week.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

And there's no guests to distract you from that exploit. Not exploration. I was gonna say exploitation.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

You know what I mean? So you'll have episodes where you're in a bad mood and you just have to talk about that. Whereas, like, if there's a guest, you just talk about their new HBO show called I Love la.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Which premiered last night.

[Gabe Liedman]

Well done. Yeah, it is. It makes us, like, less. I mean, you and Valerie being married.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Perhaps have lovers. Lovers. Lovers for life.

[Max Silvestri]

Lol.

[Gabe Liedman]

Have always.

[Max Silvestri]

Of lovers.

[Gabe Liedman]

L over question mark for L. Lovers for life. L for L. But it's like you guys are like, we only see each other now. Really? On the podcast. That's a little bit.

[Max Silvestri]

Well, that's the other nice thing about it, is it'll force you to be super friends.

[Gabe Liedman]

It's actually, you know, we waited so long to do it because a lot of the other paths through required, like, a lot more being entrepreneurial, you know, a lot more. Like, who's gonna be the one that's gonna book the guests and keep the. You know. Okay, we've gotta hire someone. When do we have time to, you know.

[Max Silvestri]

Yes.

[Gabe Liedman]

All that stuff that we just kind of knew ourselves well enough after 15 years of doing Big Terrific or whatever, where we're like, it's gonna probably fall on one of us.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

There'll be resentment. There'll be. Well, also all three of us will, like, flake on it. So we kind of waited for someone to just say, like, we'll do. Oh.

[Max Silvestri]

Then like a network said, we'll do it.

[Gabe Liedman]

We'll do it. All right. Um, and it's now, like, the best version of our friendship because we get a lot of time together, but it's without. It's out without even the burden of. You feel, like, go for a ketchup dinner with somebody ever for every four months. There's kind of like, I know a lot to get into, and it's not always the most fun. The older you get, it gets overwhelming. Yeah. You're just like, wow, this is going on in life. And I'm in my 40s. Like, this, this, this. My parents, you know.

[Max Silvestri]

Right, right, right.

[Gabe Liedman]

This just like, puts these, like, lovely little shape to it where we're just, like, consistency. Yeah. Funniest stories and best times.

[Max Silvestri]

Well, and we can move on from the idea of podcasting because.

[Gabe Liedman]

No, we are on a podcast. We need tips. I mean, we're new to.

[Max Silvestri]

No, no, it's not even a tip. I just think there's something very beautiful about how the more things change, the more they say the same. So people just want to hang out.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

And you end up using this, you know, the flavor of the times, podcasting to encourage what you would have done in 1911, which is, like, gotten together and had a jazz coffee.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

The coffee with a little opium.

[Gabe Liedman]

A little bit. Just a little bit of what? Op Opium. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Sprinkle.

[Gabe Liedman]

A relaxing. A relaxing coffee.

[Max Silvestri]

Let's go have jazz coffees. You know what I mean?

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

I also think you and I wouldn't have hung out. I'm not saying that in a bad way.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

And here we are.

[Gabe Liedman]

Here we are. But we have a lot of shared history. We understand each other. You know, like all that stuff.

[Max Silvestri]

If you. If you texted and said, do you want to get a coffee? We could have made that happen. You both know. We both know it would have gone back and forth just like you're saying, yeah, Gabe and Jenny. Yeah. It's like, there'd be cancellations, there'd be resentments.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Then you're out of coffee and you're like, there's a little bit of a. All that for this.

[Gabe Liedman]

You know, I wouldn't. I wouldn't define myself as, like an anti capitalist activist, but there is something. But I'm also not super pro. There's something, you know, like, I'm not like, I Don't. I'm not thrilled by it. I don't like the way the engine rolls things over on its, you know, ever turning wheel.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

But I will say that the, like.

[Max Silvestri]

You mean how we're going to die by the sword of progress over safety?

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Yeah. Or that it's just like. It's a system that just can't keep expanding forever. It seems.

[Max Silvestri]

Cancer like qualities.

[Gabe Liedman]

Exactly. Yeah.

But I will.

[Max Silvestri]

It is terrifying.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah, it is terrifying, but it is like there's something honing. I don't know that I'm using the word right about that. Even like a hang. A casual thing, a jazz coffee with some opium is now sleek and monetized and efficient and has a format.

[Max Silvestri]

And podcasting.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah, but podcasting, that's like also friendship, you know, it's. It's almost like friendship taken to a market efficiency level.

[Max Silvestri]

And you're saying there's a little bit of a sadness to that.

[Gabe Liedman]

I think I'm like, from far back. I'm sad about it, but I'm like, oh, actually it's fixed. Some things that were. Yeah. You know, like, it is this way where it's like, oh, we have this consistency.

[Max Silvestri]

Well, even with Al and I, we have this. It's not just a date. It's a date over an open fire. Like you. You don't want to have lulls. Like, if we were having coffee, I wouldn't be talking at this pace. Sure.

[Gabe Liedman]

Would you be talking faster?

[Max Silvestri]

A lot faster.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. You're slowing it down. I took beta blockers for this. I was so nervous just to keep it to not speed up. I know you need clippables. Of course. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

We need a clip. That's it. Hashtag, beta blockers. We got it. It's funny, I wasn't. We just did an episode before this. It didn't occur to me once. Let's not even think about clips. It's like thinking about erections.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Don't do it your own.

[Max Silvestri]

I mean, unless you're turned on, you can think about erection, your own erection. Just let it happen naturally.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah, yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Your body will know what to do.

[Gabe Liedman]

Don't scream in anger at it. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Don't yell.

[Gabe Liedman]

Come on. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Go home.

[Gabe Liedman]

Go home.

[Max Silvestri]

A Happy Gilmore go home kind of moment.

[Gabe Liedman]

Like, do you feel like you are a different host when you have a close friend on?

[Max Silvestri]

Well, with Valerie, I don't even feel. This is weird. But I like.

Okay, generous question. First of all, we've been doing this show for almost 12 years.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

So I'm almost Barely hosting.

[Gabe Liedman]

Sure.

[Max Silvestri]

I'm allowing your energy to inform me, and then we'll see what happens with us together.

[Gabe Liedman]

Okay.

[Max Silvestri]

I think if you listen to the first time you're on the podcast, that was probably still what was happening. But there's more of a Persona. Yeah. Less and less and less Persona. And when it's just me and Valerie.

I. I'm heightening myself, but there's almost no Persona because my closest person.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

So I'm certainly not gonna. I think if you listen to old enough episodes of the show, I might take a stance or say something that I didn't even necessarily think or feel in. In the interest of keeping the conversation going. That's like hosting.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

You know what I mean?

[Gabe Liedman]

But isn't. I mean, I find myself doing that.

[Max Silvestri]

And we do that all the time.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. It's like you try on takes.

[Max Silvestri]

Try on takes.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

I actually think. Thank you for pointing that out.

[Gabe Liedman]

We could use some more of that on the show. The episode now.

[Max Silvestri]

Not just.

[Gabe Liedman]

That's the energy feeling.

[Max Silvestri]

I'm giving you a note. We'll edit this out. Yeah. Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

The honesty is great, but if you could just. Actually just come up with an angle, a POV would be helpful.

[Max Silvestri]

Here, cut for a second. More takes.

[Gabe Liedman]

More takes. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

No, no. I think I was just reading something about how, like, in the olden. Not the olden days, but like the 20s, 30s, people. The understanding that you would act in society that you were putting, like. We think it's so funny that people on Instagram are clearly, like, just showing parts of themselves and it's an act. But socializing used to have more of an appreciation of how it's all an act.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And you got to put in the work.

[Max Silvestri]

And you put in the work, but it's fun.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Then you go home with your family.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

And you're real. But that. Ever see a top coat?

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Nobody wearing a top coat with tails was being authentic.

[Gabe Liedman]

No, I don't. And I don't like my wife and I always refer to it. I think it's a phrase. Have a wife and we talk often.

[Max Silvestri]

Double brag.

[Gabe Liedman]

I think we first read it in Gia Tolentino's book, but I don't know that she coined it. But the idea of with your partner, ideally, or with someone really close your backstage, that all of life is like a variety of performances, but that the.

With certain people, hopefully you can be a romantic partner. Yes.

[Max Silvestri]

Let's put it.

[Gabe Liedman]

Okay.

[Max Silvestri]

Yes. That's a modern phenomenon. Gia Tolatino, the cookie dough company Said, that just sounds delicious.

[Gabe Liedman]

Sure. She's a New Yorker writer. Yeah. She wrote a great.

[Max Silvestri]

All I'm saying is she sounds like a delicious cookie dough.

[Gabe Liedman]

You should read her book. It's fantastic.

[Max Silvestri]

I'm sure it's great. Is it a cookbook of cookies?

[Gabe Liedman]

No, it's essays about living in, you know, the modern Internet age, about representation. And she's sort of a critic, thinker. She's great fun. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I thought it was funny that, like, when you're like.

[Gabe Liedman]

Glass mirror. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Okay, go ahead. I like this memory backstage.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yep.

[Max Silvestri]

My father was not backstage with my mom necessarily in the same way that you and I, I imagine, are trying to be backstage.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yes. It does feel. Does feel very new.

[Max Silvestri]

It's a new and welcome phenomenon.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

But for sure, I. I do think.

[Gabe Liedman]

You have a male friend that you did sailing trips with.

[Max Silvestri]

Yes.

[Gabe Liedman]

And sort of like, camped by the river. That would be your backstage friend. It would be sort of like a platonic homosexual love.

[Max Silvestri]

Even men in how platonically homosexual it was would have to call that a drinking buddy.

[Gabe Liedman]

Exactly.

[Max Silvestri]

You'd have to be like, he's my testosterone.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yes. And we're light on eye contact, but.

[Max Silvestri]

And there was. That's what ball games are to me. That's why they're so uninteresting to me, is you're facing away. But that's what you want. Sunflower seeds and. Facing away.

[Gabe Liedman]

Wait, facing away from who?

[Max Silvestri]

Like, if we were at a ball game, would be facing, like, this.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right. Shared activity.

[Max Silvestri]

Next. Yeah. You've been married a while.

Right?

[Gabe Liedman]

Right.

[Max Silvestri]

I get that a little bit. If I hate you.

You know what I mean? If I.

[Gabe Liedman]

As a sheer. Sports, like, as a. As a way to get to that.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Is nice in that it's like, I think the pressure to fill time, which we don't have trouble with because we're comedians and we're. We're doing this.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

And. But I think, like, the pressure to always be talking or feel like you always have to talk kills.

[Max Silvestri]

I get it.

[Gabe Liedman]

A lot of vibe. And makes you perform. Makes you do the small talk and be like, God, it's this weather, this time of year, whatever. But I think with sports, it's like, only the. The real stuff comes. You know, you have four hours or whatever to watch a game. Three hours.

[Max Silvestri]

I think you have too much time to sit in silence and premeditate your next asinine comment. Just like astroturf is a totally different game.

[Gabe Liedman]

Sounds like you're not really locking into the game.

[Max Silvestri]

Certainly not.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But I go Dodgers. Come on. I'm just kidding. Okay.

[Max Silvestri]

She is rooting for fucking bank sheets. And that's not a new take. I'm just like, who cares?

[Gabe Liedman]

Sure.

[Max Silvestri]

You're just the team with the most money won. Holy shit.

[Gabe Liedman]

Really? They just barely beat the team with like the fifth most money.

[Max Silvestri]

The fifth most money. @ least that'd be a little bit like the underdogs with only $800.

[Gabe Liedman]

Million. Fair.

[Max Silvestri]

Fair. But it's also, I will say this, it's fun to be in a city where people won, but I also. If I see someone decked out as I did, pulling into the street, decked out in Dodgers clothes, I'm just like, did you win.

[Gabe Liedman]

Buddy? That's a take. That's. I feel that's a take. Kind of coming for sports fandom and city identification. Okay. On the. The parade is happening now as we.

[Max Silvestri]

Speak. Still dumb. The parade should just be the team and no one should.

[Gabe Liedman]

Watch. I think it's. I'm.

[Max Silvestri]

Kidding. That's just a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Take. I like it. But I'm now coming hard for it. I also barely watch.

[Max Silvestri]

Sports. I'm not like, oh, and somebody had the game on. I was doing a show, but somebody had the game on and I was on. I was on the edge of my.

[Gabe Liedman]

Seat. It was an incredible.

[Max Silvestri]

Game. It was an incredible.

[Gabe Liedman]

Game. Yeah. And I also like barely watched the season. I just. I've got a young kid. I did not have time and locked in so hard at the end. I do. I have a two year old. Yeah. That's what's happened since I last saw you. He'll be 2 in.

[Max Silvestri]

January.

Let me know when he's.

[Gabe Liedman]

2.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. What's his.

[Gabe Liedman]

Name?

[Max Silvestri]

Waylon. Waylon.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Smithers Jennings. Oh, yeah. But.

[Max Silvestri]

Sure. Who's Waylon Jennings?

Another New.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yorker. Waylon, is.

[Max Silvestri]

This. Do you know who Waylon Jennings is? Am I. Am I embarrassed right.

[Gabe Liedman]

Now? Yeah. He's a famous outlaw country.

[Max Silvestri]

Singer. Sometimes I don't know who things.

[Gabe Liedman]

Are. That's.

[Max Silvestri]

Okay. Prime Minister. And I'm.

[Gabe Liedman]

Embarrassed. No, it's. You were the one that had the confidence like, you do know what a lot of people are. So when you dismissed.

You know what I.

[Max Silvestri]

Mean? I'd like.

[Gabe Liedman]

To. Like you just said that you are someone who doesn't know what a lot of things are. But then when you didn't know what it was, you acted like I was crazy. It sounds like you have big.

[Max Silvestri]

Gaps. Yeah. That could be in your. I have huge.

[Gabe Liedman]

Gaps.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. So Waylon Jennings is a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Singer. Yes. He died many years ago. He was like a 70s, 80s.

You know, mama, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys. You know, he was outlaw country.

[Max Silvestri]

Great. Yes. I just did to you, by the way, I'm realizing because my daughter's name is Leela, people say Futurama and.

[Gabe Liedman]

I'm like, no, I promise, I wouldn't have said.

[Max Silvestri]

Futurama.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. What is she named.

[Max Silvestri]

After? You don't wanna. Okay, I'll happily do it.

[Gabe Liedman]

Though. No, have you done it before? In the.

[Max Silvestri]

Podcast?

I'm sure hundreds of.

[Gabe Liedman]

Times. Okay. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. But it means the dance of the universe. I don't know.

[Gabe Liedman]

Why. Oh, that's beautiful. Yeah, it's beautiful. Yeah, we named. We liked the name Whalen. I read his memoir while my wife was pregnant and it's one of those. It's a very fun, loosely written memoir, but it's one of those sobriety memoirs where the person misses drugs a lot more than they care about, detailing the interesting thing they did with their life. So it was a lot of like. And then, you know, me and Willie Nelson did an 18 month tour and it was great. What I really missed, these pills called LA Back Again, which were all that because they could get you from Nashville to L. A and back again on one pill. Like, he's just like. He was remembering the ritual, remembering what he used to take, remembering the confidence of thinking that speed, which was prescribable at the time, was like, not a bad.

[Max Silvestri]

Drug. Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Exactly. So he was sort of like judging cokeheads and potheads while he was absolutely ripped on amphetamines and then became a.

[Max Silvestri]

Cokehead. Yes. That happened in like televangelists would be on because it was prescription. Yeah. It's like weight loss or Focus or. Yeah. Golden.

[Gabe Liedman]

Times. World War II. All the Nazis were taking amphetamines. Have you read that.

[Max Silvestri]

Book? No. That's vaguely familiar.

[Gabe Liedman]

Though. Yeah. There was this. It's not called Amped. I'm forgetting what it's called, but it's basically like.

Prescription. Amphetamines were given to all the German soldiers and like the Blitzkrieg, which is about a fast front, you know, east to west through Europe, was basically powered by 24 hour a day movement because they were all on such intense.

[Max Silvestri]

Amphetamines.

[Gabe Liedman]

Wow. And they used to just give them. They were like in chocolates that were called, like Mommy's Little Helpers. This company, Hildebrand, sold chocolates that had amphetamine in them. And like literally painted on the box was like a housewife with A vacuum dusting. The cabinet, glistening house just. It was. We hadn't quite realized. Wow. It was as dangerous as it.

[Max Silvestri]

Was. Oh, my.

[Gabe Liedman]

God.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Wait, those weren't. That wasn't how they packaged it for the soldiers. You could just.

[Gabe Liedman]

Buy. No, the soldiers, they were giving them, like, intense, pure. But this was before that. It was a legal. Right over the counter. Merc, a German pharmaceutical company, was like. It's like one of those things. They hadn't quite realized what the downside.

[Max Silvestri]

Was.

[Gabe Liedman]

Wow. They were just like. The only downside is if you stop eating the chocolates. Just buy.

[Max Silvestri]

More. There's no.

[Gabe Liedman]

Problem. Yeah. Yeah. There's no.

[Max Silvestri]

Problem.

[Gabe Liedman]

Wow. Have another chocolate. You're being.

[Max Silvestri]

Weird. What is that movie? Requiem for a Dream, where she takes speed and she's. Her whole.

[Gabe Liedman]

Apartment. She's like, oh, that's amazing.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Yeah, I bet it is. Until it's really.

[Gabe Liedman]

Not. Yeah. Yeah. And that movie, the ending is pretty.

[Max Silvestri]

Intense. I.

[Gabe Liedman]

Mean. Yeah. But, yeah. The Wayland name just came from. We're not. I love his music, but it was more just like, where do we.

[Max Silvestri]

Go with Wayland Way wei. What are you gonna call.

[Gabe Liedman]

Him? We call him Wayman, but Wayman a.

[Max Silvestri]

Lot. Way.

[Gabe Liedman]

Man. Yeah.

Yeah. Way.

[Max Silvestri]

Man. And what is surprising you about being a father?

I know by the way you're supposed to say you love it, but I'd really love to know, like, is it. It's really hard, right? I mean, it's. It kind of kicks your.

[Gabe Liedman]

Butt. It is.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Coming above the clouds around 2, I think it starts.

[Gabe Liedman]

To.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. They show up more as.

[Gabe Liedman]

People. We. It's, you know, it's like, kind of hard to separate the hard stuff from. So when he was, like, 10 months old, I got.

A job that took me out of the house a lot. And it was, like, a little faster than we expected in terms. Like, I was working and touring a bit and doing some writing, but it was like, okay, now you're going to be in an office, you know, 60 hours a week, and you're going to be on set. The show I love, L.

[Max Silvestri]

A. That's premiered on HBO.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yesterday. It did. It did. So suddenly it was like, oh, it got. It was right before his first birthday. We were suddenly dealing with stuff we hadn't dealt with yet in terms of, like, my wife was home way more, and I was, like, racing and feeling, like, absent and can you do enough? And all this. And then right before his first birthday, our house burned down and we had to move into a friend's.

[Max Silvestri]

House. Oh. Because of the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Fires. The.

[Max Silvestri]

Fires. Okay. I thought you had your.

[Gabe Liedman]

Own. No, no, no. We were part of the party version. No, no. So I'm so sorry. Thank.

[Max Silvestri]

You. So you were now to Dino.

[Gabe Liedman]

Or. We were in Altadena. Yeah. It's our first.

[Max Silvestri]

House. Oh, no.

[Gabe Liedman]

Man. Burned down. And then I went back to work, like, three days.

[Max Silvestri]

Later. And because you need a new house, you're like.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And also, it was. You know, I'm.

[Max Silvestri]

Kidding. But, like, there is.

[Gabe Liedman]

No. A little bit of, like, look, I was lucky enough to have a job, but also get to throw myself into something that was, like, had normalcy and.

[Max Silvestri]

Continuity. Where did you move that? Like, where did they.

[Gabe Liedman]

Go? I mean, we all moved into a friend's, offered their place up in kind of like, near Lake Hollywood. And so we've been. We're still there. Oh, wow. And then I worked for seven more months, kind of around the clock.

[Max Silvestri]

While we were sort of all like, you lost your house. Isn't that, like, a huge trauma? Yeah. And then were you distracted? You just said, yeah, I like Mulaney, by the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Way.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Yeah. It's like a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Real. Yeah, but no, I know. I'm there. It was. I mean, it was the most dramatic thing that's ever happened to.

[Max Silvestri]

Me. Well, walk me. You don't have.

[Gabe Liedman]

To. It's wild to experience the event that you are almost sure would be the organizing.

Event of your memoir. Wow. You know, like, no matter how much life are.

[Max Silvestri]

You. Was the house fully down before you were like, this is.

[Gabe Liedman]

It. You know, there was a grief group we joined with other kind of new parents our age, like, maybe a month after. It was virtual. It was once a week, but we were all, like, real in the thick of, like, processing the emotional and the physical aspects of it. But it was, like, a rare chance to talk with people who did not have to, like, explain it to someone else or it was just, like we were just inside of it and this, like, there was a lot of fury at, like, having a thing happen to you. It's not like, the most. The best chapter of your memoir is, you know, and then I invented fission or whatever. You know, you're like, no, this thing happened to me that I didn't.

[Max Silvestri]

Pick. A passive.

[Gabe Liedman]

Happening.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Or like, a victim, for.

[Gabe Liedman]

Sure. And it's very infuriating that you'd be like, oh, everything will be after this.

[Max Silvestri]

Right. The.

[Gabe Liedman]

Stick. You were measured by and a lot. And most memories are like, before. And, you.

[Max Silvestri]

Know. Oh, yeah. It becomes the line in the same, like, this side of it. And that side of.

[Gabe Liedman]

It.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. So when it was encroaching, was it like that? Were you like, are we going to evacuate or was it like, very clear you were going.

[Gabe Liedman]

To? You know, we like that night, got a text from a friend being like, I think the Palisades fire had started. The winds were crazy. And got a text from a friend that like, in the Way east part of Altadena, Eaton Canyon, a fire had started. And this friend was like, that's right. By our friend so and so's house. And we were like, geez, they're gonna like, with these winds, they're gonna lose their house. You know, it was just like we were texting at 6pm being like, I feel so bad for them that over in the Way east side, right by their house, there's a fire. And then it just started moving fast and weird. And we. There was. Everyone got locked into that app, German Chocolate fast. A little bit. Yeah. I blitzkriegged through the mountain. Exactly. With a little bit of.

[Max Silvestri]

Hildebrande.

The saddest thing that's ever happened to you. I'm like, asking if we can riff no down to blitzkriegging.

[Gabe Liedman]

Down. That's obviously how I'm.

[Max Silvestri]

Processing. The blitzkrieg is also a very traumatic event. Keep.

[Gabe Liedman]

Going. Top two. But I didn't experience it, so it's riffable. Yeah. My wife didn't lose her wedding dress in World War II, but we like, you know, could see it outside. And there was this actual. That was like, telling what just got.

[Max Silvestri]

That. She lost it in the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Fire. We lost.

[Max Silvestri]

Everything. That's how quickly you had to leave. So what happened was you're getting to it. So I thought.

[Gabe Liedman]

The. We could feel the orange glow, but it was like, really east. And we were just like, there's no way it's crossing this sort of central dividing street. There's no way it's coming this far down south. But it was moving pretty fast. And we were watching neighborhoods kind of like, turn to recommend, like, evacuation warning, which was like, before. And then evacuation mandatory. So it would sort of like happen in steps. So we're like, locked into that app. Some friends that live just over this kind of dividing street had to evacuate. And they checked in with us.

And they were like, yeah, we're going. We're headed to a hotel. We'd, like, made a reservation.

How are you guys doing? And we're like, you know, we're still not in the zone that's even giving a warning. So we're just kind of like, you know, we don't want to have to leave. We have a baby who just fell asleep. He's, you know, 11 months old. And this friend was like, I don't know what the app is saying, but, like, it's moving a lot faster than you would think. And I, like, really think you should get out of there. And this was like at nine at night. And just after we stopped texting, I looked out the window, and it wasn't just a glow anymore. I could now see flames in the mountain. Like, it was sort of closer. And a friend had offered a bedroom for us to come stay in with the baby. And we really just sort of made a logistical choice where we're like, it still doesn't say we should leave, but I don't want to wake up our friend at two in the morning in Silver Lake and we have a baby. And like, let's just. Is.

[Max Silvestri]

It. It's so funny how ordinary things, like, let's not be.

[Gabe Liedman]

Rude. House. Truly. It was like our whole thing was like, she's gonna go to bed in an hour and she's already doing us a solid by saying, you can come stay here. Let's not burden.

[Max Silvestri]

Her. You're very.

[Gabe Liedman]

Polite. Truly. We were. My wife especially, but she was also getting bad. She's like, this doesn't feel cool. You know, it's like the winds are blowing. It's feels like a nightmare.

[Max Silvestri]

Outside. I feel seen. I would do the same.

[Gabe Liedman]

Thing. Yeah. But it really was our. Our organizing principle was like, what is the least.

[Max Silvestri]

Burdensome.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And inconvenient right.

[Max Silvestri]

Now.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. So.

[Max Silvestri]

We. Our house burnt.

[Gabe Liedman]

Down. Yeah. It's like, yeah, we don't want to bother. But we were like, it's not. We don't have to evacuate. So.

[Max Silvestri]

We.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right. She's doing a kindness. It's not like we're refugees.

[Max Silvestri]

Yet. And forgive the leading question, but I'm like, I feel like dark flames. It's so classically.

[Gabe Liedman]

Scary.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. It's just like on the nose.

[Gabe Liedman]

Nightmare. It wasn't until.

Even like, it being a mile away still kind of felt like conceptual. It still felt like, well, the city is always ravaged by.

[Max Silvestri]

Things. And it's weird, the things you must be telling yourselves. It looks crazy to us, but this happens all the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Time. Yeah. And it's like, I mean, obviously it's not now going to happen to us. You know, like, it's not going to move three miles. It's not going to like, yeah, burn our house down. It's just like, what a. What a wild thing that will Be. Get, like, will be put under control at some point. But right now we should be smart and we should be responsible. But then we, like, saw the flames actually crackling. Not right outside her house again. It was like just. We could see it through the window, like outlines. Not. Not glow. And we were like, yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Let'S. Let's pack of the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Flames. Of the flames. Like on the, like the ridge of the mountain closer to us. It was sort of like moving westward. And so we packed our cars up, but, like, we were coming back. Going away for a weekend. I didn't even fill my suitcase. I brought like, you know, I could have probably taken 80 of my clothes and two suitcases. I'm not like, I don't own that much stuff, but I packed, like, three pairs of underwear, you know, some jeans. The one thing is, we both had that little, like, scratch in our head. And I, like, went out to the garage and, like, looked for, like, family photos. We both took physical photos. We had that there were no other copies of. But other than that, it was like. I grabbed my laptop. Baby shit. Half a suitcase, the dog and the baby. And there's little ring footage of us walking out the front door. Yeah, yeah. Of us closing the door and the winds. Fire trucks going down the street. And we just like, drove separately to our friend's house. And like, when we finally got on the one. In the movie, you're together in the movie, we're together. It makes more sense, but it was a little. There was tension that we weren't together because she's with my.

[Max Silvestri]

Baby. Okay. I take the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Rewrite. You're in separate cars, so it's like something could happen. You know, trees are down, there's no traffic lights, all the power's off. So you're just going down this huge.

[Max Silvestri]

Street.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And it's just like, trees. Cars are flying by. There's no traffic lights, fire engines. It's no power. It's spooky. And then we got on the 110 and we could see or not the 110, the whatever, 134, it doesn't matter. But we could see then in our rear view mirror, like the mountain on fire. Like a better view of it than we'd had from our house. And then we were like, this is really.

[Max Silvestri]

Bad. And you just closed the vent in the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Car. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Literally. Circulate.

[Gabe Liedman]

That. Recirculate, please. And then the next morning, we still didn't have the evacuation alert, so we were like, maybe it somehow jumped because it was like Doing crazy stuff. Like our little.

[Max Silvestri]

Block.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Was like not lit up. We were the one block that they like didn't alert. Right. So like we're like, maybe this is. And we were on a thread with some neighbors and a neighbor sent a video of basically like this is on the street above you. She's. And we couldn't understand the video. It was like a 360 view. And I was like, where is this? But it was because everything was gone. Everything was gone. All the trees, all the homes. So you could see like a, basically like a half mile in every direction just smoldering. And we were like, suddenly noticed a chimney that we recognized. And it was just like, oh, there's, there's nothing.

[Max Silvestri]

There. And that was when your house was.

[Gabe Liedman]

Gone. Probably it burned at like 4 in the morning. We don't.

[Max Silvestri]

Know. But this was like updating the app. It would, it would require someone whose only job. Like they're not helping, they're just updating the.

[Gabe Liedman]

App. I think I, I, I think there will be a giant lawsuit that will also involve the app. Not, not the app is, I think pulling from like LA.

[Max Silvestri]

County.

[Gabe Liedman]

Info. Info. But there was like, we were in the area where they kind of like gave up and were.

[Max Silvestri]

Miscommunicating. There was a give.

[Gabe Liedman]

Up. Like there was never fire trucks or water. And they just like let our, not just, not just our individual, but basically like the square mile around us just, they were like out of resources. Wind was crazy. There was no water left, they say. But like nobody saw any fire trucks in our neighborhood. Like they never.

[Max Silvestri]

Came. Oh my.

[Gabe Liedman]

God. Yeah. And the friend who was first getting texted about like James Corden. Yeah. James Corden didn't lose their house because they were fighting it so intensely at the source that they then kind of lost control of it as it like moved around. So the neighborhood where it started, which was like people who live at the base of like the canyon where the fire was.

Mostly didn't lose their.

[Max Silvestri]

Homes. Wow. Yeah, I'm not, I guess I am trying to be funny, but like, who cares where the source.

[Gabe Liedman]

Is? It's interesting if only that there's video of it starting because a transformer overloaded. And there is gas station security camera footage and a few house cameras that are synced up to time so they know exactly when the brush fire started because they should have turned it.

[Max Silvestri]

Off. Really. No, I care about it where it starts, but it's like a Seinfeld. But it's like the source of the fires, wherever the fire is, for.

[Gabe Liedman]

Real.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. But, like, we have to have some direction. So we go, let's.

[Gabe Liedman]

Keep. Yeah, you send. You're like, you know, it's. You're playing SimCity or you're playing whatever, and you're like, we have this many trucks. No, it's chaos. It's.

[Max Silvestri]

Chaos. And I. I sympathize with the people trying to fight it. And obviously with you guys. Yeah, for sure. I don't know why I said that kind of political.

[Gabe Liedman]

Thing. Yeah. It felt like almost. Yeah. Like ultimately, first responders are more important than us. Like, ultimately, they're heroes putting themselves on the line, is what you're saying. Not in the line necessarily. Near our.

[Max Silvestri]

Home. I mean. So is that what you dealt with in these groups? First of all, I didn't know there were groups. I'm glad there are groups. You got to, like, unfiltered, Be mad, be.

[Gabe Liedman]

Sad. Yeah. And it was. It was like. It was 10 weeks. I'm sure there's other reasons. Like, this was put together by a friend of a friend, someone I know plays soccer with, like, a trauma therapist, like, my age. And so kind of put an Instagram call out, like, anyone looking for free, whatever. So it just was like, nine people. It wasn't like we're in a, you know, VFW hall, like, all standing up and sharing. It was just like, it happened to be eight, nine people that had, like, kind of the same demo. Like, everyone had young kids, everyone's about my age.

But it was, like, nice to have a little space where you don't talk about logistics. It was just.

[Max Silvestri]

Like. Right, just the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Feelings. Yeah. And complaining about people, talking about the fire in the. In your regular life, which is nice to.

[Max Silvestri]

Have. You mean the exhaustion of having to tell the story a bunch. What do you mean?

What I.

[Gabe Liedman]

Say? No, I mean, like, that's part of it, but it was. It was everything. It was like, people. People had a lot of different reactions to.

Learning the news, to not knowing. You end up having to do a lot of work to make other people feel okay with how they're doing, with reacting, listening, supporting. It's like. And I think there's really no way around this. This isn't like a judgment, but it ends up being like more of a burden is created for you by all the people that encounter you that are trying to help or trying to listen or trying to do the right thing, but because they're so.

Scared of it ever happening to them and also not wanting to offend you, like. Yeah, you have to then do a lot of management to be like, but I'm fine, Or, you know, the non jokey version of like. It's, you know, like. And it's like, what happens with the death? Or with, you know, I was.

[Max Silvestri]

Gonna say it's like a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Death.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And people go, how old was he? And what they're saying is, where am I? How do I place myself on this.

[Gabe Liedman]

Information? Yes. And almost more. But because having experienced both death, people, even if you're young and you're like, I'll never lose my parents and I'm invincible or whatever, you, like, have an understanding that it's inevitable. I think the idea of losing everything, your neighborhood and your house and all your possessions, people are like, God. It's more like finding out someone's like, kid got run down in the street or something. Not that it's as bad as losing a child, but it's like, I actually don't want to look at a universe where that could ever happen to.

[Max Silvestri]

Me because it's so.

[Gabe Liedman]

Random.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And. And just.

[Gabe Liedman]

Cruel.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And you're hard to wrap your head around.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I was gonna say, were you surprised at how upsetting it was? I think I'm gonna put this to you. I think people, maybe even you, before this happened, humored themselves by going like, ah. You know, like, you. You play it.

[Gabe Liedman]

Out.

[Max Silvestri]

Sure. And to prevent facing the horror of it. Yeah. You go, like, just stuff. People say stuff like that. Yeah, just.

[Gabe Liedman]

Stuff. You move.

[Max Silvestri]

On. I don't know why. It's Seinfeld.

[Gabe Liedman]

Again. It is Seinfeld again. I mean. Yeah. And I can't imagine anyone having, like, a less emotional connection to a trauma like that than.

[Max Silvestri]

Seinfeld. But I moved to my other.

[Gabe Liedman]

House. Other people care about fires. I feel nothing, obviously. Fireplace. There's nothing broken to me, but it makes me.

[Max Silvestri]

Good. He's having a real.

[Gabe Liedman]

Breakdown. I don't know why. I don't care. I see people get hurt. I feel nothing. I.

[Max Silvestri]

Try. It's a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Confession. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. The whole.

[Gabe Liedman]

Crowd. Animal Lecter. Yeah. I've always tried to.

[Max Silvestri]

Connect. I'm telling you, I'm scared. Stop laughing. This is not the clip, by the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Way. The clip. Yeah, the clip is not the clip. The fire is making Jerry realize that he's unable to experience empathy. That's what the clip is if you need a title for it. No, I tried. I tried to make myself cry.

Yeah. I mean, like, I.

Yes. And, like, I moved around a lot as a kid and so, like, had less of, like, for my wife, I think, who, like, Parents still live in her childhood home. When she goes home, she like reconnects with her six year old self. This idea of like one house represented a lot psychically, I think loomed larger for her than me who.

[Max Silvestri]

Like. Oh, so it was really hard for.

[Gabe Liedman]

Her.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. The idea of a place, place for you guys, your newlywed home and.

[Gabe Liedman]

The potential of our child growing up there and like what life. Like we moved there when we were, when she was, you know, four months pregnant or whatever. It was like, you know, to imagine a life for him. So that robbery is wild. I, I think there's a millennial like urban hipster thing where I like feel.

Like I, I realized in hindsight that like my personality was more connected to like remnants of things than I thought I had kind of been like, oh, I have to. Every time I move these books again and like, you know, these graphic novels from when I was 23, like loved in my. Especially when you have a kid, I'm like, am I really gonna like, yeah, get into them again? You know, like more hobbies. You sort of have these like things of your life, kitchen stuff when your parents did this and you have the clothes you bought for your first whatever, hadn't ever done that work. And then was suddenly, I think like the real like the, the wild thing was being like I could have any personality now, you know, like all these like totems or whatever of like that period in my 20s when I was really into this or I was going to do, you know, it was really like more connected to things than I.

[Max Silvestri]

Expected. Yeah. And when you say it could be anybody now is. You could say that in a good way or a bad way. You're saying it in a bad.

[Gabe Liedman]

Way.

I'm trying to experience it in a good way. You know, there is, there is like a.

[Max Silvestri]

Cleansing. Well, I think that's another fantasy, if you'll allow when those fires were happening. You can't help but wonder what it's like. And I think again, a self preservational fantasy, a delusion is that you'd be like fresh start. Yeah, yeah, but I'm, but please know, with respect that I'm hearing you. It's not that. It's not that you kind of.

[Gabe Liedman]

Do. I mean you get there. It's just not an immediate of course like, like, because like, you know, if you have insurance and you know what clothes you bought, you know, sure, maybe you've like bought vintage things. Maybe you have like old tailored suits or something. I didn't have much of either. But like you could conceptually conceivably, like, go online and just buy those things, those things that you had. You could look at photos, probably throw them into AI or Google or whatever, and just be like, okay, I had this Uniqlo stuff that's on Depop. This is on Alexmill.com, you know your best joke? What's.

[Max Silvestri]

That? What do we call Uniqlo? It's your.

[Gabe Liedman]

Joke. Mine? Asian M. I don't. Did.

[Max Silvestri]

I. That's your.

[Gabe Liedman]

Joke. That's.

[Max Silvestri]

Me. That's.

[Gabe Liedman]

You.

[Max Silvestri]

Wow. You said that to me in a Uniqlo 20.

[Gabe Liedman]

Years. Wow. That feels like a tweet. I deleted at some point, probably.

[Max Silvestri]

Out of nervousness when you got that HBO game. I don't think Asian M is wrong, but they're clearly Asian.

[Gabe Liedman]

Leaning. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I mean, it's like a Japanese company. Asian M. Yeah. I can't believe you didn't.

[Gabe Liedman]

Remember. I didn't remember that at.

[Max Silvestri]

All. I remember where I was when you said it, because I was so.

[Gabe Liedman]

Upset. Uniqlo. Yeah, yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. But I remember where we were in the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Store. That's so funny. I remember actually running into you in a store. I don't remember doing repeating a tweet. Or maybe I then tweeted it because I had the idea there, probably.

[Max Silvestri]

Because knowing me, especially back then, I yelled at you and insisted that you tweet it. You.

[Gabe Liedman]

Did. It was like, that's always very encouraging about jokes and Personas. Genuinely, a lot of advice of yours sticks in my.

[Max Silvestri]

Head. Is that.

[Gabe Liedman]

True?

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Oh, I thought you were making fun. I'm.

[Gabe Liedman]

Curious.

[Max Silvestri]

What?

[Gabe Liedman]

What? Well, I remember, and I think we've talked about this, that at one point, after doing.

A big terrific, you said to me, it was.

[Max Silvestri]

A. So this is in New.

[Gabe Liedman]

York. So this is in New York. This is probably like 13 years ago or something like.

[Max Silvestri]

That. All about a. 10. Like 10 years.

[Gabe Liedman]

In. Yeah. Yeah. But you were all. You always felt like, you know, you were a little ahead and not well ahead in career, but like you had a real Persona. You had come in from Chicago, like, pretty fully formed is my memory of it. But you had some compliment on my set, and then you said, I feel like I could write for you.

[Max Silvestri]

Now. Oh.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And there was, like, the part of me that, like, didn't quite understand the. The game of standup or even, like, didn't get the compliment of that at first. I was sort of like, is it like redu. Is it you being a little salty? Is it, like, reductive about, like, my.

[Max Silvestri]

Moves? Yeah. The clouds parted And I saw.

[Gabe Liedman]

You. Yeah. And. But also like that is to. It's one of the reasons I don't do as much stand up anymore and I'm like less interested in writing for it is because you do have to know that guy. Know that guy and feel comfortable chasing the edges of just that.

[Max Silvestri]

Guy. Yeah, yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And maybe my discomfort with that was like related to why I like had the reaction. But then it took me like a month or two to realize like, oh, that's actually a.

[Max Silvestri]

Very. Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Nice compliment of like you're a compliment. You're a. You are a thing on stage that like one can understand and you know, write to. And it was like very nice. But I still think about it.

[Max Silvestri]

Often. Oh, I love that. I'm sorry to interrupt with a self serving question, but you ever get curious about like how did I come off? You know what I mean? Not just me, but how did we all. How do you remember? Because it's not close to the full picture, like how I remember.

[Gabe Liedman]

Gabe.

[Max Silvestri]

Sure. It's not Gabe. It's like this weird other carbon copy of Gabe that I could tell Gabe about. You know what I.

[Gabe Liedman]

Mean? I mean Jenny too. Yeah. I.

[Max Silvestri]

Think. And you as well. And me to.

[Gabe Liedman]

You. Well, we. It's like a lot of main, like main characters in their own.

[Max Silvestri]

Head.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yes. All glancing off each other. And it's true. You know, summing each other up also a lot off their material or their Personas. So you sort of. You're already getting just the like hologram or prism of who they are. That's.

[Max Silvestri]

Right. You know, that's.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right. Snap judgments and sort of you're getting.

[Max Silvestri]

Both. You're getting the onstage, but mostly the onstage and a little bit off stage. It's an.

[Gabe Liedman]

Interesting. But you feel like then you really know people because you're like, oh, I see you four nights a week and I like, see your new material and I.

[Max Silvestri]

Like. That's.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right. Think I know the whole. So you. And also we're in the business of making fast judgments and.

[Max Silvestri]

Takes. Do you ever. That's by the way, we can come back to the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Fire.

[Max Silvestri]

Sure.

[Gabe Liedman]

Stuff.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. It's weird. Maybe I was like sensing that we could. I don't know. Yeah. But it is. I wonder if you like me now that I'm a dad and now that I'm trying to be a person. It sounds like you are too less interested in writing for your Persona.

[Julia Louis Dreyfus]

Stuff.

[Max Silvestri]

The. The. There's a burden to making yourself a comedian. And it's just what you said. It's Like, I'm very good at making snap.

[Gabe Liedman]

Judgments.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And I walk around an airport and I'm like, I got 20 minutes on everyone I just walked past. I'm not even Jeff.

[Gabe Liedman]

Ross.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Like, what am I doing? And it's not all cruel, but, like, why do I have to have a take on everything and everyone? I'm just curious if you're. It sounds like you're trying to, like, calm that down a little bit or do you find that to be.

[Gabe Liedman]

True? I mean, I do find that to be true. I find that to be, like a little bit of a burden. I like, I think the one. The one.

I clock myself in my relationship, even, like, we're 13, 14 years in, I'm forgetting the number, but a long way in. You know, we have a kid and we're married. Of like, sometimes if I don't turn like the slightly.

Meaner or more confident version of myself off, like, if I'm texting with comedian friends or I'm coming straight from a writer's room and then we're talking about, like a friend or a family member, I still kind of have the, like.

[Max Silvestri]

Sharpness.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. That is not really that honest. It's just like. It's the coin of the realm. It's sort of like, why say. I think maybe when you could just say like, that, you know.

[Max Silvestri]

What? Even the coin of the realm, I want to like, like, that's fully.

[Gabe Liedman]

Get that reference, you know, like the. Even. Even if I don't do stand up as much, like, I still talk with, you know, my stand up, like, community, close friends all the time. And it's like, it's funny. It's fast. You have to be.

[Max Silvestri]

Like. No, I get that. I really mean. What do you.

[Gabe Liedman]

Mean? The coin of the realm, like the, The. The currency that. Oh, that's the universe. Yeah. So coin of the realm, I think is like, this coin only works in this eyes, you know, but in the realm of.

[Max Silvestri]

Being. I knew I was gonna learn a new expression, and I'm so.

[Gabe Liedman]

Glad.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And you're really helping me. Cause, yes, it's not right. But we've trained ourselves to go. Instead of saying like, you know, one of the things I've noticed about your friend is that they have a big.

[Gabe Liedman]

Head.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. It's just funny to be like, big head Melissa, by the way. That's not.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right. Done with her. You know, it's very. It's like dismissive. It's like, because I can nail her in one sentence and my wife will occasionally, like, get Thrown off by that. And I'll clock in myself that it's like, oh, that's. Cause I was just. I was just there, you know, ripping into someone that deserved it or just trying to be funny in a thread or with co workers or.

[Max Silvestri]

Something. One of the reasons why I live an hour and a half out of the city. If I do a set, by the time I'm home, I'm.

[Gabe Liedman]

Not. That's really.

[Max Silvestri]

Smart. I've transferred the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Coins. Yeah. And you can use now kindness and curiosity. The better.

[Max Silvestri]

Coins. But I'm 46. It's taking. It's like a new endeavor for me to be like, what would it be like to stay? All the best virtues. Open, curious, slow to judgment. Nobody likes any of these things unless you're paying them to make you laugh. Yeah. We did a. I'm not gonna go into that. But I'm just saying, like, a comedian has to have.

[Gabe Liedman]

Takes. Yeah. And you know, but I think that more than having the takes upsetting me because I still like having them. It still feels good to have a really quick, sharp.

[Max Silvestri]

Thing. Sorry. Because it sounds like you're also right here with me. If I'm with what I would call somebody who I'm not clicking with. It's like, I'm like, where are the takes? I need some.

[Gabe Liedman]

Takes.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Even if I disagree, at least would have something to.

[Gabe Liedman]

Do. Come in hot and let me, like, fight with you. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

100%. And I go. I just don't know why I can't talk to that person. It's because they're just asking me thoughtful questions. I'm like, give me a take. Because a take is a question and an opinion at the same.

[Gabe Liedman]

Time. The question is it's an antagonist, which makes for better drama. You know, like something to push against. You can't just like, it's Kramer. I do. I mean, I. There's a lot of nice people that also don't ask questions. And then that's. That's, to me. Marshmallow fluff. That's nothing. Like, at least if you're nice and ask questions, you can feed into my own. You know, like, I like exploring my world through talking it out or whatever. So if you're gonna ask me.

[Max Silvestri]

Something.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. It could be.

[Max Silvestri]

Fruitful. You mean takes is number one. Number two, if nice and ask some questions. Let's get this going that.

[Gabe Liedman]

Way. No, no. I mean, it takes us so far. I just mean, like, at least the person that you're bored of that you're talking about is asking you A question. There are some people that are only nice and, and don't have takes and aren't curious and you're just like, well, yeah, there's nothing here.

I think what I was saying was that I think I got.

I think I just got like uneasy with taking.

Personal responsibility or attaching the. The most exciting takes or things about humanity. I wanted to explore to myself as like a fictionalized character on stage where it's like, oh, if I want to, like go into these feelings about, you know, men or women or 20 somethings or this or stuff in the world that it like the semiotics of it having my name and me being like, I'm this nice guy that's established himself and how do you undercut that or include it or how do you, you know, like, that work felt like back bending and made me feel sort of.

Like even though it was exploring more stuff, it made me feel like incurious, trying to like reduce it. Yeah, I was. And it wasn't like, oh, I don't want to get in trouble for saying stuff with. I'm just like, I'm my ceiling on my curiosity about myself. I like got to it. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Well, that's very good and.

[Gabe Liedman]

Healthy. I guess. I don't know. I'm sure I have more to like. I know I have a lot to figure out and I work on it, but I'm like, I'm more. As I get older, I'm more curious about everybody.

[Max Silvestri]

Else. Yeah. You know, I also think that's dad stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Once Leela showed up, I was like, the premium. This is coming from a guy who interrupted your fire story to ask you what you remembered me telling you.

So there's still a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Healthy. There's always work to.

[Max Silvestri]

Do. Yeah.

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But once you have a kid I think, I think it's very good for creativity. But it's like you doing a TV show, is this where this is leading to the idea like writing for other perspectives and other stories instead of just Max Silvestri's take on this, this and.

[Gabe Liedman]

This? Yeah. And I think like you can one, it's nice to write stuff for characters that have takes that don't have to live beyond. Like it can represent their flaw or their prejudice or their like their hard edge on the world. But I also like the show that I have just been working on is about people that are very much unlike me. It's about like 20 something influencer, ambitious, hungry, like LA cool kids. And it was just a really interesting process in the room to like I had my own biases coming in where it's like about influencers. Yeah. And about the sort of like single minded, like, like ambition, like career and money above all else, you know. And I think in like understanding the world and then having to write a show that was not, you know, a satire about Nazis or whatever, it's like these are People and there's like reasons behind why they present a certain way, why they're insecure about money, why the cloud is important, why they're shallow to service. Where it's like you become like more of a humanistic person. Because I'm like, I like that in writing for these people. I now like both understand them, but also like, like love them and get it, you know.

[Max Silvestri]

Absolutely. The, the example, and I'll make it briefly that I always make is green book. The racist drives a black guy. Yeah. And then you had to drive influencers and you had this road.

[Gabe Liedman]

Trip.

[Max Silvestri]

Sure. And what did you, what did you figure out? Obviously just base humanity stuff. But is there anything that in your research that surprised you.

[Gabe Liedman]

Or. I think ultimately was like getting to know the, you know, getting to know really well the people that like inspire the show and the world. And it's just like.

Through conversations and through having to write three dimensional characters and understand these people beyond how they present. Because I think like the artifice is so tricky where it's like you can think, you know, someone through their videos. Obviously that's like a version of yourself. But even if you peel back two layers, like it's not black and white. It's like porous. People try to be authentic, but they're second. You know, it's all this stuff is just a literal version and a monetizable version of how we're performing at coffee or.

[Max Silvestri]

Whatever. You go back to jazz.

[Gabe Liedman]

Coffee. Exactly. And I tailcoat in a tailcoat and.

[Max Silvestri]

Opium. Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Because if you don't remember, that's.

[Gabe Liedman]

Weird. I do. And I think it's just like a modern current manifestation of like it is, you know, there's, there's no ladder that you can expect to get footing on when you're under 30 now. I think like there's no like waiting your turn or thinking that stuff will be fair. And if you, you, you know, punch the time card that there's like safety in a home and retirement ahead of you. Like, I just think those like myths are being busted and so it's like, get it, get it. And so the panic is not out of greed or self centeredness. It's survival.

[Max Silvestri]

Based. Max, you're so articulate and thoughtful and I'm glad, I'm.

[Gabe Liedman]

Glad. I like, because I came in, I think with a similar. Thank you for that compliment. Compliment. I think I edit it out. Edit it. Take it out or take out Me thanking him. Leave the compliment. No thanks. I think I like.

You know, I'm a 40, 42 year old, like, man who has a child and has changed my attitudes towards, like, you know, fame or the pursuit of it as I've, like, gotten older and realized what I care about. And you can't help but bring your own judgment to people that are like, I'm 27. All that matters is.

[Max Silvestri]

This.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. You know, where I'm like, that's.

[Max Silvestri]

Wrong.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right. Is how I probably started being like, you need to wake up and blah, blah.

[Max Silvestri]

Blah. Do you think people looked at us the way we were looking at them? Like, I mean, you and I were going to a bar in Brooklyn and talking about our, I don't know.

[Gabe Liedman]

Wieners.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I do think my dad must have been like.

[Gabe Liedman]

What? Well, you started in Chicago. When did. How old were you when you moved to New.

[Max Silvestri]

York?

[Gabe Liedman]

24. 24. Okay, so you were barely older than me. When were.

[Max Silvestri]

You? Maybe.

[Gabe Liedman]

25. I'm just thinking that, like, I remember being like, I wasn't even 25. I don't think I was out of college yet. I was coming down to do shows at Rafifi, like, on, like, Friday nights. I'd like, drive down from New England, like, new Greg Johnson, new Eugene, a little bit from doing comedy in Boston. And.

You know, like, I was this sort of, like, over his skis, sort of precocious. You know, like, I wanted a place at the table. I didn't know what the table was. I didn't know, you know, was fighting for something. So I can imagine that I was, like, hungry for something around a bunch of, you know, late 30s.

Guys that had grinded it out or, you know, to me, they didn't seem that much older. But I'm like, oh. I was. I was like.

[Max Silvestri]

Right. We were the young.

[Gabe Liedman]

Kids. Yeah. We weren't, like, waiting. We were like, I'm going to go hang out and ask for spots and beat down.

[Max Silvestri]

Doors. Older guys were some. I caught some of it. Were mad. People were mad at.

[Gabe Liedman]

Aziz.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I remember Aziz got a lot of it. And for being super young and breaking pretty.

[Gabe Liedman]

Quickly. Yes. And I, like, never broke in a way that, like, I think there was like, you're taking food off our table or this is like some sort of. But yeah, you sort of.

I think I've now learned the perspective of, like, I. I hope that, you know, young people in this position both, like, make the money I think they need to make if they want to, like, protect themselves and fight for a place in this, like, world that doesn't want to welcome them. But I also hope that they then in their own time, in their own way, like find the path to like peace and love and like disconnection from, you know, the, the validation that comes from that relationship to your phone. But it's like, it doesn't mean that they should start like that at 17 years old and just be like, I'm cool with. It's like, no, actually you need to be hungry and Messy in your 20s so you can like start sharpening the tools in your 30s and then get happier in.

[Max Silvestri]

Your. You kind of just do it in a different.

[Gabe Liedman]

Order. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And you're right. They. I'm learning from you right now in real time or considering for the first time that they don't really have the luxury of being like, of expecting something, promised something structured. I was talking to Bigli about that. It's like, at least you and I were like, well, there you do a premium blend and then you do a present and then you do an.

[Gabe Liedman]

Hour. I've been Harris's cell phone number. Things are looking good, you know. Yeah. Yeah. You're like these real markers you.

[Max Silvestri]

Could grab onto and there still were until very recently, those markers. My question you started getting to it is, do you think. And you're not here to represent all these people. It's. We're talking about human.

[Gabe Liedman]

Beings.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I'm just wondering if in your research you think.

Are they fulfilled? Are they aware that this is like just a knife fight that they're engaged in right now and once they have some money, maybe then consider something else.

[Gabe Liedman]

Or. I mean, I can't, you know, like I'll. I'll speak for Rachel, who created and stars in the show and because she would say this where I think she. Rachel Senate, she's an actress and comedian from. She co wrote Bottoms and starred in it with Ayo Edebiri and she was in Shiva Baby. And she created the show and it sort of stars some of her real life friends, but also, you know, people cast to play these influencers and she's, you know, she, she's in the middle of the knife fight, you know, and I'm like, you don't get to sell and make a show on HBO at 29 unless you work really hard to get it. You know, I think she's doing this to build for later. I think she has sort of like the awareness that there's sort of. No, you can't hop off the treadmill at this. You know, when you have a moment when you're young, you're only young once you, you have A lot of life to feel fulfilled, but actually, like, youth as a currency. And it's sort of like, why. I think, like, the. The shallowness is the wrong word, but the sort of, like, image obsession with, like, people this age or even the characters in the show is interesting to me because it's like. It's not vapid for the sake of being vapid. It's actually like youth and beauty as a currency is. Is.

[Max Silvestri]

Expires.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And then it.

[Max Silvestri]

Just. I didn't know that. I don't even.

[Gabe Liedman]

Know. I did not.

[Max Silvestri]

Know. We didn't know.

[Gabe Liedman]

That. No. I had no.

[Max Silvestri]

Idea. When you say I was 25 when I got to New York, I'm like, oh, my.

[Gabe Liedman]

God.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Like, now I'm like, that's so.

[Gabe Liedman]

Young.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I remember feeling I had no concept of being young or not.

[Gabe Liedman]

Young. And I don't. I think probably I was also.

Social media was not the same when we. There was Facebook, there was MySpace. But, like, I was not.

[Max Silvestri]

Image.

[Gabe Liedman]

No. Obsessed in my 20s. No. I was. I wanted things. I was ambitious. I wanted, like, validation from peers. But I was never like, what's.

[Max Silvestri]

That? White headphones was the first.

[Gabe Liedman]

One. What do you.

[Max Silvestri]

Mean? The ipod came with white.

[Gabe Liedman]

Headphones. Oh. Like, that sort of.

[Max Silvestri]

Image. I remember that was really a. Oh, I'm sorry. Am I not. I thought things we wear, things we have being part of.

[Gabe Liedman]

It. Oh, no, sorry. What I meant is, like, my pictures and video of myself. I was not thinking of that as part.

[Max Silvestri]

Of. We even said it like, we're looking for clips. Yeah. That's why I'm like, let's not think about clips. But when we were starting, if you were filming your set, it was for some.

[Gabe Liedman]

Reason.

[Max Silvestri]

Yes. Because you wanted to submit it to.

[Gabe Liedman]

Something. I'm going to. And I'm really just chronicling the sound of my jokes. Yeah. And it's horrible footage of me, and I'm sure I look.

[Max Silvestri]

Terrible.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yes. But it was never kind of, like, so that people could consume my picture and get to know me via that.

[Max Silvestri]

Relationship. The thought of uploading a set was absurd. The oldest sets of me, like, at Rafifi or something, somebody else shot, like, Nate. Remember Nate.

[Gabe Liedman]

Igor?

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. He would shoot stuff. Yeah. And, like, he was way ahead of his time. But I remember not being, like, weirded out, but being like, that's not usual. Yeah. This guy's filming. But we didn't even have, like, a don't.

[Gabe Liedman]

Film. Yeah, well, we didn't know that. Like, I think we had all internalized the, like, Jay Leno advice of don't burn material and like, never put a clip online because that could be your premium blend. That could be in your half hour. And I'm, you know, generationally, we were probably like last to the party. You've had a podcast for a long time, so. And write so much that maybe you didn't feel this way, but it's like the, the being like, oh, actually what's more important then the, like monetizing the jokes or saving them for whatever is the relationship with your online, with your audience and it being.

[Max Silvestri]

Consistent. I just called John Marco Ceraci. You know.

[Gabe Liedman]

Him? Yeah. I've seen clips from. I mean, I now literally know him in the last month.

[Max Silvestri]

From. He's killing it. Yeah, he's killing. And I'm actually, I'm glad we're bringing this because with all the influencing stuff, he's like, he's working it. He. And it's. And it's working. Yeah. And that makes me really.

[Gabe Liedman]

Excited.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Because I've known a lot of guys. Because he's truly.

[Gabe Liedman]

Funny.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And he can get it working. And I'm like, that's, that's the exciting, like not the gold rush, but the like, oh, it's, it's, it's not just.

You know.

[Gabe Liedman]

Spectacle.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. It can also afford very talented people a way to like connect with their.

[Gabe Liedman]

Audience. I agree. And like the connection. The connection and the stuff that isn't like, I know there's still people that do it begrudgingly to sell tickets, to get eyes on them for jobs or for, you know, their own special or whatever it is. Like, there's still a little bit of like, I have to do.

[Max Silvestri]

This.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. But more and more, I think just the connection actually, and the work you make putting out content becomes the work. You know, sort of what podcasts are a little bit where you're like, oh, this is. We're killing time trying to write material or just have people buy tickets. But then you start to be like, people care a lot more about the conversations and the moments that happen than they might about the perfect three minutes or whatever in your.

[Max Silvestri]

Special. Well, I was going to ask your opinion, like, because following Gianmarco's advice, he was, he was like, you know, you need to post your, your shorts. And then he's also like, put in like a four minute clip of stand up from a show. And I was like, I still have. I'm the old guy with the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Fedora.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. With a ace of spades tucked into it. Being like, you got to save it for Carson. And I'm like, are you in agreement? It seems like nobody cares. I'm like, if you put a joke before it's fully done on YouTube and then they see you do it live. My wife is 10 years younger than me. She's like, nobody cares. But I don't know, I still catch myself being like, I don't believe.

[Gabe Liedman]

It. Yeah, I mean, like, I, I don't one. I think the idea that is not that old of, like, people expect to not see, to not have seen any material when they go see you live.

Looms larger as a myth than it ever was as a real thing. You know, like, there's this kind of idea of you build the perfect hour and like, maybe that's on the back of, you know, Carlin or someone. And then Louis got into this cadence where it was just like, you know, I, I still am like people. I've toured with Mulaney when he, as an, like, encore, brought out, you know, salt and pepper diner joke from his first, you know, Comedy Central. And people like, lose their minds. Can quote the bit word for word. And, And I'm like, obviously he's doing that as a specific set.

[Max Silvestri]

Thing. Special.

[Gabe Liedman]

Bubble. It is. But, and, and, but I'm like, are people really like, oh, I saw you three years ago and you had a shorter version of that dinosaur bit actually, right?

[Max Silvestri]

Mad. I don't think.

[Gabe Liedman]

So. Maybe that's a part of the special where they're like, oh, I've heard this. And.

[Max Silvestri]

They. Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Cool. But it's like, it's not a golden rule or.

[Max Silvestri]

Something. Might have been our ego. I also think when you and I were coming up, remember, like, cringe humor and all that stuff, there was, there were like comedy bully press.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Yes, there.

[Max Silvestri]

Was. That were like blogs which were like, mattered. I don't know if cringe humor really did this. That was just one that I can. I'm still scared of.

[Gabe Liedman]

Them. Yeah, yeah, the apiary's on you.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Do you know the apiary.

[Gabe Liedman]

Prank? I don't know this one. The apiary was a. Was a. Was a blog with some pull in the alt community in the late.

[Max Silvestri]

2000S. A New York stand up scene comedy blog called the Apiary. Exactly. And there were photos that would be submitted and it would say beneath the photo. Photo submitted by Max Silvestri. Be a picture from. Yeah, big.

[Gabe Liedman]

Terrific.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. The best prank. I'm not a prank person. I made a fake email address malaneyjohnmail and I submitted to the apiary a photo of John Mulaney and Dimitri Martin. I even cropped someone out of it, which made it funnier to make it look like he just wanted it to be them. And I submitted it to the apiary. It got on and it said, photo submitted by John Mulaney. It's the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Greatest. That's really, really great prank I've.

[Max Silvestri]

Ever done in my life. And he absolutely, like, he didn't get upset. He. He laughed. He did ask me. I think he didn't even have to ask. We were just like, hey, take that down. But I still have a screen grab of it because it's the fine. It was my finest hour. Photo submitted by John Mulaney. We might have even talked about how uniquely embarrassing it is that people submit.

[Gabe Liedman]

Photos. Right. Also, like, there wasn't an industry alternative. Like people were only self submitting.

[Max Silvestri]

Photos. That's.

[Gabe Liedman]

Right. It's like for funny now to read like a Deadline or a Hollywood Reporter announcement. And it's got like a handsome photo of a showrunner and then it says, photo submitted by the show. And you're just like, well, that's. Yes, that's a bummer they didn't pull you from Getty Images. You were just like, I'll go out and make my assistant do a shoot in front of bricks. Like, that sucks. So it's still. There is a higher stakes version of it.

[Max Silvestri]

Yes. But the apiary.

[Gabe Liedman]

Mattered. It's and so funny to. To. To be like. And I was with Dimitri like that. That was exactly the sort of hunger, the no stakes hunger we had, where it's like, if. If I can be on a free show with David Cross, the way in which this would change my life. You know, it was the sort of like.

[Max Silvestri]

Heady. I'm going to show it to.

[Gabe Liedman]

You. Do you mind, please? And then I have a great AP story.

[Max Silvestri]

Because. Oh, I can't wait. Because of photo searching being so good, I can type it.

[Gabe Liedman]

In.

[Max Silvestri]

Wow. Not only do pictures of John come up, which is weird, but here.

[Gabe Liedman]

Is. Oh, that's really.

[Max Silvestri]

Good.

It's this deeply embarrassing.

[Gabe Liedman]

Photo. It's important that it's captioned Dimitri Martin and John Mulaney. Photo submitted by John.

[Max Silvestri]

Mulaney. It has. It's double John Mulaney. How far? And it's April 29th, 2009. The honey shot. Do you remember? It was called the Honey Shot.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Is that like their weekly. Like on Fridays or whatever, they would drop a Sony cyber shot photo from a bar show and it'd be a big.

[Max Silvestri]

Deal. Okay, so there's a hand on his shoulder that shows the cropped out person, which I think is the Chef's kiss. It's the Chef's kiss. This episode is brought to us by our friends at dad Grass. Why is it that when you want to relax and just have a little fun, modern weed products strap you to a rocket like a confused chimp and blast you into outer space? You can't follow a movie. You can't hold a conversation. You're just orbiting the earth surrounded by empty pizza boxes and a lot of regret. Well, can't we just take the edge off? Well, can't we just get a little giggly with our friends keeping our feet on the ground? Well, thanks to dad Grass, yes we can. I am obsessed legit with their leisure drinks. It is a sparkling Yuzu flavored can that ships legally to all 50 states if you're over 21. And each one has 2.3mg of THC and 6mg of CBD, which is the perfect dose so you feel happy and relaxed without the hangover. Plus they're stackable for a bigger buzz and they are fast acting, which means you'll feel it in about 10 to 20 minutes so you can get it just right. Get leisure drinks and all of dad Grass's products, including their joints and gummies, [e-mail] weird and use promo code weird for 20% off. That's dadgrass.com weird. Use promo code weird for 20% off. Check it.

[Julia Louis Dreyfus]

Out. Hello, I'm Gretchen Rubin. And I'm Lori Gottlieb. We're two friends, one a happiness researcher and the other a therapist. And we are here to tackle the problems of everyday life with all of you, from big issues to small. We'll share advice and fresh perspectives, and we'll also highlight responses from you, our listeners, to the questions we discuss. Whether it's that pet peeve that's been bugging you for years, a tricky dilemma, or just something you've always wondered about? We'll talk it through the since you asked podcast from Lemonada media premieres on September 23rd. Wherever you get your.

[Max Silvestri]

Podcasts. Okay, what's your apiary.

[Gabe Liedman]

Story? So the apiary probably stopped operating in what, 2012? I mean, like, it was just a guy. It was just a guy. And the scene. Kind of like the easily comedy.

[Max Silvestri]

Bureau. Yeah, Comedy.

[Gabe Liedman]

Bureau. Yeah. But you know, you barely would even see him around that much. It wasn't like he was a figure ever. I met him once or twice maybe at the Ekney's, the Emerging comedian of New York awards. He was there. But I. Big deal at the time when I was in New York is the apiary did, like, an interview with me when I, like, had my show at Rafifi. And one of the questions was, you went to Brown. What was stand up like in Providence? Did you start in college? And I basically explained that I started at the comedy studio up in Cambridge because Providence had a really bad standup scene and that I tried to.

[Max Silvestri]

Do. I forgot.

[Gabe Liedman]

Rick. Yeah. So Rick was up at. Yeah, at the comedy studio. That was, like, where I first got going. But then I tried to do stuff locally in Rhode island, but it was like, a really brutal New Englandy local scene. And I called out in the interview, like, as a joke, like, oh, I went to do this Rhode island funniest comic competition. And it was just like, at this restaurant. And the, like, host, headliner, judge was this, like, terrible prop comic who just, like, you know, brought out, like, dirty stuffed rabbits. And he was like, this is the Easter bunny in Central Falls crushing with, you know, the, like, little old ladies. And then told my friend a gross story about hooking up with the waitress and how he doesn't pay taxes. Whatever. It was just like. He was just, like, hustling, whatever. But I called him out by full.

[Max Silvestri]

Name. This is so.

[Gabe Liedman]

Twenties.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Story. So.

[Max Silvestri]

I. It's also so early 2000s because you had no. Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. And I just was like, this is. He's a. He's a character that appeared. And I think he bragged. I think maybe I said this in the interview, and luckily I can't even remember his full name. But he said that the rumor was that he had.

Like, killed someone and gone to prison for it and not ratted on anyone. And so sort of like. So it was kind of like mob affiliated, that he'd, like, beaten someone up in a bar fight and they died and he'd gone to prison and never said anything that was, like, part of his lore that he maybe talked.

[Max Silvestri]

About. Oh.

[Gabe Liedman]

No. But I said all this to Nate from the apiary. And let's say 2008, it's 2016. I'm out in L. A for work. My wife, not. Not wife yet, but she's with our, you know, dog or whatever in Brooklyn. I get a Facebook message from this Rhode island comic being like, who the fuck do you think you are saying this stuff about me online where people can search it? This is truly eight years later. Like, he just found it. He's like, you realize you're taking money out of my pocket and, like, costing me.

[Max Silvestri]

Jobs. Whenever people say, out of my pocket, it's. It's not a good. It's like Mulaney's bit about, are you a tough guy? No, you're a tough guy. Tough guys ask if you're a tough guy. Regular guys don't ask, are you a tough.

[Gabe Liedman]

Guy? That's so funny. I don't know that.

[Max Silvestri]

Joke. I don't think, you know, being friends with John. He just speaks in bits and. Yes, that's a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Bit. Yeah, I did it once. Yes.

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Great. Mulaney.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. So he starts sending these, like, it's. I think it's like five in the morning. These kind of, like, frantic messages, but angry. Like, I'm going to fucking kill you. Like, oh, like, I'm looking you up in Brooklyn. Like, you live in Williamsburg. Huh? I'm going to, like, I'm driving up from a show in Florida right now, and I'm gonna, like, come to your house. And I'm like. At first, I couldn't figure out what he was talking about. Then I found this interview from eight years ago. Somehow, he'd either just found it, or someone had been like, hey, we didn't book you on this thing because we found this story online where it, like, alludes to you being, you know, a creep who killed someone or whatever. But he genuinely was, like, making threats about going. And he was like, why would you threaten someone whose whole thing is that they went to prison for killing a guy and never, never, like, ratted on anybody. Like, you think I. Or people I know, like, wouldn't do something about.

[Max Silvestri]

This? What is, like, you right.

[Gabe Liedman]

Now? Yeah. And this on Facebook message. I'm in LA and, like, an Airbnb for, like, a Bravo show. I'm hosting some, like, weird job. I'm so scared, so I'm panicking, and I, like, reach out to my manager and I'm like, do we have, like, what do we, like, are there resources? Like, what is the recourse? He's, like, making literal threats and saying he's, like, getting in a car and driving back to Rhode island from Florida and is going to, like, stop in my house. My, like, girlfriend is in the house. They say they're going to try to do something, but my next move is to reach out to Nate from the apiary, being like, can you take this down? The apiary hasn't been active for, like, five years. I don't think he works in comedy journalism anymore. I think he's just a guy. So he finally replies like hours later. And he's like, I don't think I even have the password to the blog spot anymore. You know, like, it was just a free online.

[Max Silvestri]

Thing. And I'm like, well, you're gonna go ahead and click. Forgot.

[Gabe Liedman]

Password. Yeah. Can you figure it out? He's like, I'll have to try. I don't have that email address anymore. So I am like trying to also bargain with this guy. Driving.

[Max Silvestri]

Back. So you applied to.

[Gabe Liedman]

Him? Oh, yeah. And I was like, what? I know that was some interview. And I like. But then I'm like, I'm really sorry. I never. I should. I was like 24 and never thought that this would like, stick around and all this stuff. But I'm like, I'm trying to change. And also he was like, why do you on your website. That was the other tech. He was like, you're posting stuff on your website about me. Like, I'm gonna kill you. And I was like, it's not my website. It's a. It's a blog that I did an interview for. Like, it was just so clearly like an interview. But he's like, I just found your website. Like, it was like. It was like a 60 year old man like screaming at me. And I was like, it's not mine. I'm trying to get it taken down. Like, really, like, you know, I. I'm wrong, I'm wrong. It was like, it was a dumb thing for a kid to say. I don't really know you. I don't even remember if we. How much we met. And then he cooled. Like, I did get it changed, like within 24 hours. They basically just like redacted that paragraph out or maybe even just took his last name off or whatever it was. And he like cooled down and he like apologized. But it was like this 24 hours where I was like, I don't do well with.

[Max Silvestri]

Things. Like, oh my God, whole story. I'm like, sir, I do not disrespect. I'm just like being associated with.

[Gabe Liedman]

It. Yeah. And I'm.

[Max Silvestri]

Like. Because I think we're similar that way.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. I'm like, I don't like anybody mad at me. And I certainly don't have a like, devil may care attitude about, like, burn bridges and like, deal with it later, you know, Remembers is that they remember. You know, I like, want everyone to be nice and think I'm.

[Max Silvestri]

Nice. Doesn't matter what you think about.

[Gabe Liedman]

Silvestri.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. As long as you think.

[Gabe Liedman]

Something. Yeah. Don't read the reviews. Weigh them. That's what I always say if they're talking about. I just heard that this week I really weigh.

[Max Silvestri]

Them.

[Gabe Liedman]

Wow. Yeah, it's good. It's so old timey. Feels like a. Like a 60s cigar chomping scales.

[Max Silvestri]

Mattered a lot more back then. Like there was a lot of weighing.

[Gabe Liedman]

Happening. Yeah. And you get, I guess, print magazines and put them on. It's like, are we really. Are we weighing the whole.

[Max Silvestri]

Magazine? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like a truck weigh.

[Gabe Liedman]

In.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. You weigh the magazine. You take the article out, you weigh it.

[Gabe Liedman]

Again. I get in the tub with all the reviews and then I see how much water spills over the edge of the tub and that's how. It's a displacement thing.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. What is that? What is the term for.

[Gabe Liedman]

That? Yeah. Water displacement. Aren't.

[Max Silvestri]

You. Yeah, but it's.

[Gabe Liedman]

Volume. Volume. Yes. What's the volume of your.

[Max Silvestri]

Reviews? Don't read your reviews. Determine their.

[Gabe Liedman]

Volume. Shout out to the apiary. What A long, big shout.

[Max Silvestri]

Out. I believe you had the one of the finest. I'll never. You know what I'll never forget is you talking to your representatives. Yeah. Being like, he says he's in the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Car.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And then you hang up and they're like, we're on.

[Gabe Liedman]

It.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. You're like, how on it can they.

[Gabe Liedman]

Be?

[Max Silvestri]

Yes. And you hang up and then you're just like. You know what I mean? Like those moments.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yes. And I think it was like, you know, you always feel bad as like someone in this kind of like in a business where you like have to travel quickly or, you know, I. I remember feeling bad that I was like in a nice paid for house in Silver Lake while my girlfriend, I think, was like dealing with our like new puppy. And I was just like working, you know, two hours a day or whatever for some job and getting all this stuff paid for. And I'm like. So someone I was cruel about in a. Yeah. Blog interview 10 years ago might come to the door. Don't threaten.

[Max Silvestri]

You. Yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. But I'm working on.

[Max Silvestri]

It. Jehovah's Witness on Halloween mode, baby, I'm gonna need lights out. Lights.

[Gabe Liedman]

Out.

[Max Silvestri]

Exactly. Well, Max, the new podcast is called Let me get it from memory. We need each.

[Gabe Liedman]

Other. It's close. The sentiments there. But it's not going to help people in.

[Max Silvestri]

This. We need you.

[Gabe Liedman]

Guys. I need you.

[Max Silvestri]

Guys. I need you guys. I need you guys closer than I.

[Gabe Liedman]

Thought. You did.

[Max Silvestri]

Great. The show is called we love la. I don't know why I'm doing I love.

[Gabe Liedman]

La. I like that you bring the weeds of both.

I like how generous you are with being a group thing, but no, I love la. I need you.

[Max Silvestri]

Guys. Okay. I'm sorry. I need you guys as the new podcast. I love la. I'm excited for a new.

[Gabe Liedman]

Show. Yeah. It's Sundays. Sundays on.

[Max Silvestri]

Hbo. Always the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Best. Yeah. So exciting. We're after the Chair company, which is very, very funny.

[Max Silvestri]

I. It's getting less funny. And I'm not saying that as a dig. It's just becoming.

[Gabe Liedman]

More. I'm really drawn into the, like. Yeah. The, like the Thriller party starts being like.

[Max Silvestri]

Oh. And then it's like. Yeah. I'm like. When his daughter. I'm no spoiler, but we watched the last one and we turn off. We absolutely love.

[Gabe Liedman]

It.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. And we.

[Gabe Liedman]

Go.

[Max Silvestri]

It's. It's less funny, but I like it more as a show now. What.

[Gabe Liedman]

A. They're really doing a great.

[Max Silvestri]

Thing. Zach Canaan, too. I know. From the. The New Yorker. Second New Yorker. Because he did.

[Gabe Liedman]

Cartoons. I did not know that.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Yeah. So I. Maybe I'll have him on because I don't. I've tried to get Tim for years, but. Not to say that Zach is. But I have a feeling he might be Larry David in this.

[Gabe Liedman]

Situation. Interesting. I know that they hate so much doing.

[Max Silvestri]

Press. Oh.

[Gabe Liedman]

Really? About. I think Tim really doesn't like talking.

[Max Silvestri]

About. I think what he does is so.

[Gabe Liedman]

Brilliant.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. That if you talked about it, it would ruin it. Because one of the things I want to say to him which would ruin.

[Gabe Liedman]

It.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. Is you really seem to be a person that hates. That finds how people talk to be absurd. When people are like.

[Gabe Liedman]

Really? Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

And. And. But why would you want him to weigh in on.

[Gabe Liedman]

That? Right. Don't, like, tell the story behind the. The hate he has for small talk or whatever. You're like, oh, no. I like.

[Max Silvestri]

Just. Just let the work speak for.

[Gabe Liedman]

Itself.

[Max Silvestri]

Exactly. I stand by his decision to not do this and other.

[Gabe Liedman]

Podcasts. I was like, very. I mean, you do. Do Pete's podcast. Zach.

[Max Silvestri]

Tim. Maybe Zach.

[Gabe Liedman]

Will. Yeah. I don't know His. His position on it. I was so happy to know almost nothing about the show going in because I. I feel like. I mean, they have the pull to have me pay attention. And it's hbo. But I was like, I am not. I'm not walking with any agenda here. Yeah. I was surprised a.

[Max Silvestri]

Lot. And that's how I'll be with your show. I'll know a little bit.

[Gabe Liedman]

More. It's really been marketed really heavily, I guess. Yeah. You're not seeing. Yeah. You know, but that's okay. I'm. I'm curious what you think, because it is about people very much unlike.

[Max Silvestri]

Us. Well, I'm excited to see.

[Gabe Liedman]

It.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. But don't, please, because when I. My show on hbo, I would take it personally that you're not seeing marketing. I'm really. I'm out there growing my own fucking.

[Gabe Liedman]

Hops. Are.

[Max Silvestri]

You? No. In.

[Gabe Liedman]

Farming.

[Max Silvestri]

No. We do have.

[Gabe Liedman]

Bunnies. We're bunnies. You have.

[Max Silvestri]

Bunnies? Yeah, yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah. Oh, my.

[Max Silvestri]

God. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. If you're ever coming through with the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Kiddo.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. I mean, a lot of chickens and bunnies and.

[Gabe Liedman]

Does. Lila. Lila.

[Max Silvestri]

Lila. It's.

[Gabe Liedman]

Okay. Does she love the.

[Max Silvestri]

Bunnies? She loves. Bunnies aren't.

[Gabe Liedman]

Chill. Oh, really? I.

[Max Silvestri]

Thought. Pick up a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Bunny. I thought you could just pet.

[Max Silvestri]

Them. You can pet them, but if you pick them up, they're.

[Gabe Liedman]

Gonna. They're gonna kick. Yeah, yeah. Thumper. Famous. One of the famous ones. Yeah. Kicks the leg. Okay, well, I'll pet the bunny. Whalen might not want.

[Max Silvestri]

It. Waylon can pet the bunny. But don't pick up the.

[Gabe Liedman]

Bunny.

[Max Silvestri]

Okay. And we might get.

[Gabe Liedman]

Goats. Wow. Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Yeah. For ceremonial purposes. I'm just.

[Gabe Liedman]

Kidding. But for real, I would believe that it was for ceremonial.

[Max Silvestri]

Purpose. Yeah, it could.

[Gabe Liedman]

Be. You know, you're exploring.

[Max Silvestri]

Stuff. Yeah, yeah.

[Gabe Liedman]

Yeah.

[Max Silvestri]

Famously. What you're thinking we make a flame circle. The pentagram is not an evil symbol. I'll just say that it's a power thing.

I've loved this. I'm only wrapping up because I have to. I would have talked to you for nine more years, so nice. I'm very glad that technology and commerce and capitalism has brought us together. And it's a.

[Gabe Liedman]

Pleasure. It's been so.

[Max Silvestri]

Nice. I feel like I fizzled out.

[Gabe Liedman]

There. No, I. I'm trying to let you have the last word, but if you want to have a stronger one, you.

[Max Silvestri]

Can. No, no. You get the last word. You say, keep it crispy. You haven't been on the show in, like, 10.

[Gabe Liedman]

Years. It's been a really long.

[Max Silvestri]

Time. So you get the last.

[Gabe Liedman]

Word. Well, it's been a blast, Pete. Keep it crispy.

[Julia Louis Dreyfus]

Foreign.

Listen to your favorite Lemonada shows without the ads. Subscribe to Lemonada Premium on Apple Podcasts. You'll get ad free episodes and exclusive bonus content from shows like Wiser Than Me with Julia Louis Dreyfus, Fail Better with David Duchovny, the Sarah Silverman podcast, and so many more. It's a great way to support the work we do and treat yourself to a smoother, uninterrupted listening experience. Just head to any Lemonada show, feed on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe Make Life Suck Less with Fewer Ads with Lemonada Premium. Are you looking for ways to make your everyday life happier, healthier, more productive, and more creative? I'm Gretchen Rubin, the number one bestselling author of the Happiness Project, bringing you fresh insights and practical solutions in the Happier with Gretchen Rubin podcast. My co host and happiness guinea pig is my sister, Elizabeth Craft. That's me, Elizabeth Craft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore ideas and hacks about cultivating happiness and good habits. Check out Happier with Gretchen Rubin from Lemonada Media.