WTF with Marc Maron (it's a podcast)

Yeah, I'm glad she's chosen to share all this stuff, but her personality is such that it's probably just more enjoyable to thumb through the book than to hear her speak about it.

^^^

i'm sure it's a horrible thing to think but i was kinda disappointed Carlin had a relationship with her. and the Jupiter alien letters stuff... well, I guess even brilliant ppl have embarrassing corny personal lives.

rosenthal was nice butnice like an uncle you are cool with sharing 10 minutes with every couple of months.

shandling trying to bring down america was o_O

http://splitsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Fozziewtf.jpg

Feels that way sometimes.

needs a bubble between the last two where he talks at length about his own relationship with his father

Maron is live in studio on the Best Show tonight. FYI!

cool!

Really enjoyed the Harmon interview. He seems like a very cool, genuine guy. And the self-doubt makes him more likeable to me, like oh hey I feel like that all the time & have done fuckall...makes me realize I really am the only obstacle to me doing cool things :)

every ilx person should call into the best show tonight 9pm est

Was kind of enjoying the pretense that Scharpling actually had a problem with Maron.

wth i didn't even read this thread but just trampled in here . so marc maron is on the best show tonight? crazy. ok fuck it i'm totally calling in. and i'm not even a marc maron person by any means god said it, i believe it, that settles it.

Ask him if those Ray Romano calls are staged.

I thought the Ray Romano call during the Rosenthal episode had to have been staged because Romano was worried about spoilers for his TV show when Maron never actually said, "This conversation is being broadcast for WTF."

Maybe he assumed it would be broadcast for WTF. Probably a fair assumption considering who Maron is.

True.

The Ray Romano calls were clearly a bit.

You'd think, but Louis CK claimed that Maron ambush calls him.

But that was during the actual show, with another guest in the garage. The Romano calls were during the little "sponsored" period where the only objective is to push Men of a Certain Age.

true, but Maron also seems to take enough pride in his rep as a "straight shooter" that i can't imagine he'd mock up so much how random the call was ("should i call him?" "i'll call him." "is it okay i used your cell #?" "are you sure?" "that went well. i'll be calling him again.") just for the advertising. it's possible, but I guess I've really bought his persona as authentic.

(nb authentic as convincing not some benjaminian authenticity etc etc)

See? From the get-go, I read it exactly opposite. Maron's self aware enough to actually caricature his own schtick when it comes to advertising for a sponsor. The fact that Ray played along as though he was reading from a script cemented it for me.

The show always goes in this order:

Today's show is sponsored by ______.
Music/intro
Long monologue bit
Sponsored bit
Interview
Exit

The Romano calls very clearly took place in the sponsored bit all three times they happened.

In the early WTF days Maron used to do more bits, where he'd talk to some comic doing a character--like the racist self help guy who wanted black people to "lighten up" like Obama's father had.

But the Romano bits seemed betrayals of the rep Maron has built for himself since then--and I'm specifically thinking about how they mirror the call to Louis CK, which was clearly authentic. They really bug me.

If it was an attempt to caricature his own shtick, it was really poorly communicated. He sounded like he was trying to sincerely sell the call as authentic.

Brian Posehn seems like a total sweetheart.

yea hes a delight. i didnt know he worked on metalocalypse but of course that fits perfectly

I want Brian to have his own podcast. Every time Marc interrupted I wanted to smack him.

Every time Marc interrupted I wanted to smack him.

― EZ Snappin, Thursday, 9 June 2011 16:18 (3 minutes ago) Bookmark

thread descrip

romano calls were a bit, clearly. also, they were hideous.

liked his conversation w harmon; they complemented each other well.

also maron was sweet with carlin's widow.

Oh boy that last call to Ray, bit or not, just gave me the CREEPS.

I'd never heard of Iris Bahr or seen her in anything, but really enjoyed that interview.

its amazing how much we are all addicted to listening to this podcast yet find maron a whiny twat at the same time. i think he still makes a good interviewer though.

xxp yeah, I was gonna say, if they were bits, Maron is a really talented actor. that last call was supremely uncomfortable. ray seemed legitimately confused about how to deal with maron and maron kinda seemed like a socially inept psycho.

I'd never heard of Iris Bahr or seen her in anything, but really enjoyed that interview.

Ha, I chose not to listen to that one, since her Svetlana character kind of annoyed me whenever I saw commercials for her DirecTV show at the movie theater.

Or HDNet, rather.

I've not heard of half these people - or more - he interviews, but the Iris Bahr interview was a good one.

Loved the Posehn interview. He's such a good dude.

i like Maron as a standup and the podcast obviously has good guests but skimming this thread all of you guys already seem so sick of him/it that i'm like yeah i guess i don't need to check this out

i had a lot more enthusiasm for the show when i was going thru the whole back catlogue of eps so i'd say try that, though i doubt theyre free anymore (most used to be linked from wikipedia)

i like Maron as a standup and the podcast obviously has good guests but skimming this thread all of you guys already seem so sick of him/it that i'm like yeah i guess i don't need to check this out

nah man, it's fantastic

Yeah, seriously. Even if it isn't always consistently great, it's great most of the time. I daresay it's some of the more important work being done in the comedy world ATM. And I personally think Maron's preamble is a pretty essential part the overall show. Dude's working on himself, and it ain't always a pretty picture, but he's always engaging and usually pretty damn funny about it, to boot. I like knowing what's going on in his head.

Maron is very engaging and part of what makes him engaging is all the stuff that we're discussing here. I get annoyed at him plenty but that's definitely part of what makes him interesting.

Lol yeah al the show is usually awesome, if youre already a fan of him I see zero reason for you to ignore this

It works because all comics seem to share the same set of neuroses/horror stories/insecurity/disdain for mankind and/or each other. Put them together and the shit comes out.

i'm sorry if it seemed like i was asking to be convinced -- trust me if i ever get to a point in my life where i want to listen to a podcast, that will probably be the one. reading this thread is just kind of a bummer because every fan of it seems to hate Maron as an interviewer.

That's... Exactly the opposite of true. It's just the kind of style that becomes easy to caricature over time. But if this is like your thing w ilx bookmarks where you won't listen to a podcast for inscrutable some dudeian reasons, then nev mind

he is actually not that terrible an interviewer. it's just his own personal hangups, quirks & shit that he'll interject can really grate sometimes

i also feel like guests are being less candid lately (idk say since the nyt article) and are now specifically coming on with a thing to promote

i'm just hesitant to give up any of my ever-shrinking window of time in which i can listen to music to internet talk shows, sorry if that's inscrutable

reading this thread is just kind of a bummer because every fan of it seems to hate Maron as an interviewer.

He is an EXCELLENT interviewer

It's the open-emotional-wound stuff that often fills up the Maron preambles that makes him such a great interviewer too: his experience of 12-stepping a) makes him process-oriented w/r/t human foibles and motivations, so he approaches that stuff in a deeper way than 99.87% of all interviewers in the world, and b) gives him some sometimes-facile but v effective shortcuts for asking ppl about personal shit. And his own wide-openness makes people respond in kind - he's not a smarmy Entertainment Reporter, or a local radio person who skimmed your wikipedia entry while you were in the elevator, he's a charming fuck-up who'd genuinely interested in you. And hell, he's so open about his problems and flaws, and how they inform his creativity, what do you have to lose by not trying to talk on that level too?