Part 17 (1/2)

Jeff: My line is Michael Bay better be able to take it. Not even because of money. f.u.c.k him for making those s.h.i.+tty movies. f.u.c.k him for wasting America's time. f.u.c.k him. f.u.c.k him. And by the way, Albert Brooks's speech in Broadcast News about lowering our standards: Michael Bay does it at a rapid pace. He's not like slowly chipping away with each movie. Immediately upon first movie it's a punch in our face to make us stupid. I'm sorry. You just got me on a rant. I apologize.

Judd: You say this and you've never seen any of his movies. What are the top three or four jokes that, even for you, are uncomfortable?

Jeff: I never-generally, I'm thinking about what's for lunch. Uh, the only time that I am offended is when something is not funny. Trying to be shocking, and if it's not funny, you know, like whatchamacallit, who played Kramer?

Judd: Michael Richards.

Jeff: Michael Richards. You know, I've seen things worse than that, and you have, too. Horrible, horrible things. And if he was funny that night, n.o.body would have been p.i.s.sed. But he wasn't funny. Hall of Fame not funny.

Judd: But was it offensive?

Jeff: What? Him saying what he said about the fork and s.h.i.+t like that? Yeah!

Judd: I've seen people do things like that. I felt bad because I felt I kind of knew what he was trying to do.

Jeff: He was trying to provoke a response. Do you know that when he came offstage, he said-I think it was Tom Papa, who was going up next. He walked over to Tom and goes, ”Yeah, weird crowd.” Having no idea that his life was about to change. People freak out like that. Not every night, but it happens. Anyway, we're done. And thank you. I thoroughly enjoyed my time with you. You're a good man. You should take more credit for being a great guy.

Judd: Thank you, Jeff.

Jeff: You're welcome.

Judd: And I'm going to tell that to my good friend, Michael Bay, when I see him.

Jeff: You can tell Michael Bay. Michael Bay, by the way, I wish him nothing but happiness. I really do. I want him to be happy, have a good meal. I hope that all things are good for Michael Bay, but I want him to stop making movies. That I do. If it brings him joy, let him make movies-but don't put film in the camera.

This interview originally took place in front of a live audience at the Largo in Los Angeles for Jeff's podcast.

JERRY SEINFELD.

(2014).

I couldn't wait to talk to Jerry Seinfeld again for this book, thirty years after our first interview. Jerry is someone I have known a little bit for a long time. Whenever I'm around him, though, I usually don't speak much. I'm still a little bit intimidated. The truth is, most comedians don't understand why he's so happy when they're so tortured. But I look up to him more than ever, and every conversation with him is an opportunity to learn. You'd be a fool not to take advantage of what Jerry Seinfeld has to offer.

When we did this interview, I had just started doing stand-up again, after a twenty-year hiatus, and it seemed like a perfect moment to grill him about his current joke-writing process, and to soak up some of his stand-up wisdom. And, once again, he lit a fire under my a.s.s-no one else has his work ethic or his clarity of vision, his pa.s.sion for the craft. But I also had the opportunity to ask him questions about how he raises his children and his spiritual life, which is something I always wanted to do. Also, this being a few decades after our first interview, it was fun to remind him of what his dreams were back then, and to ask him how it feels to have made every single one of them come true.

Judd Apatow: You know how, back in the day, I interviewed you for my high school radio show?

Jerry Seinfeld: Yes, it's still resonating.

Judd: Well, I thought I'd start out by talking about that interview, back in 1983-which I remember and you shouldn't.

Jerry: No, I do remember. I do. It was an odd thing.

Judd: We did it at your apartment in Santa Monica. Do you remember that?

Jerry: I mean, I'd never had a kid come to interview me with a tape recorder before.

Judd: I remember you had a funny look on your face because I don't think you knew a child was coming. The tape recorder I used was literally straight from the AV squad at Syosset High School-this huge green ca.s.sette recorder.

Jerry: How old were you when we did this?

Judd: I was fifteen. But I was aware of you, I think, from your earliest TV performances. I was watching way too much Merv Griffin Show for a kid my age. I saw you on TV before you ever did The Tonight Show.

Jerry: Wow. Boy, those were the days.

Judd: Is that the greatest moment in a comedian's life, doing The Tonight Show for the first time?

Jerry: Yeah.

Judd: Do you remember it?

Jerry: Well, Leno recently told me that he came to my first Tonight Show-which I didn't even remember.

Judd: The other thing that I remember about our interview is that your apartment had nothing in it. Like, it was not decorated.

Jerry: Oh, I was a minimalist from the beginning. I think that's why I've done well as a comedian.

Judd: No distractions.

Jerry: If you always want less, in words as well as things, you'll do well as a writer.

Judd: That whole high school radio show thing happened because a friend of mine decided he wanted to interview rock bands-we were like fifteen or sixteen years old-and then he goes off and interviews R.E.M. one day. And it occurred to me: Maybe I could use this high school radio station to meet my heroes and ask them, like, ”How do you become a comedian? How do you write jokes?”

Jerry: Wow, that's great. Not to take you off track here, but I heard that you were doing some stand-up at the Cellar recently. Is that true?

Judd: It is true.

Jerry: I want to know what that was like.

Judd: Well, I was interviewing Pearl Jam for their last record and as I was writing questions-you know, I think about them a lot because they're my age and they've had, in a way, a similar experience to us in the arc of their careers. And I just kept thinking, These guys get to write songs, and they spend their lives singing them and enjoying themselves. But I make these movies, and there's all this stress and then, when the thing comes out, I'm not a part of the experience at all.

Jerry: I understand.

Judd: So I was making a movie with Amy Schumer, and she kept talking about doing stand-up and I finally said to her, ”You know what, I'll do a set and see how it goes.” I hadn't done it in twenty years. And the first set went well and I went on every night, after we would finish shooting, for the next three months. I've been doing it ever since and it's literally like I spent my entire life directing movies just so I could get better spots in comedy clubs.

Jerry: It's really fun. You find that you're this breed, you're a dog breed. I always thought it was weird that dogs would bark at other dogs. They should be barking at everyone else. And that's the way I see comics. I didn't feel comfortable anywhere until the day I walked into a comedy club. But where do you think you'll go with your stand-up, Judd?

Judd: I have to say that I am loving the fact that there's no career goal connected to it. It's purely for the joy of trying to get good at something that I was just okay at back in the day. It's unfinished business. And it would just be great to figure out how to tear the house down consistently.

Jerry: Right.

Judd: It's been so much fun-oddly, way more fun than anything else I've done.

Jerry: Now, why would you say that?