WTF with Marc Maron (it's a podcast)

he's pretty "acute" ;)

When he's in the kitchen finishing up the eggs benedicts I bet he helpfully says "I sauce all 'ese"

...cos he is pretty tan.

Letterman's ex on tomorrow

Merrill Markoe? If so, I'm sure he's going to ask nothing about her comedy writing, comedy performing or showbusiness development career, and define her solely through a romantic relationship she was in over twenty-three years ago.

Hopefully he'll get around to doing an episode with Andy Prieboy's girlfriend sometime.

^think maron was consciously wary of this crit & didnt try and dig too deep; i think theres a clear difference when marons talking to or abt someone he truly admires/respects vs you know a dane cook or w/e where hes gonna press/pry more

overall i thought this was a v good conversation, merrill seems p cool

Still haven't listened to Merrill's ep yet (will do that sometime today), but so happy that Mary Lynn Rajskub is on Monday's show!

dr. Steve episode had me crying like a girl - on the way to a job interview. hell, before the talk to dr. steve! just maron at the start. fucking hell this show can be rough. (luckily i pulled myself together, having turned up an hour early, at a pub on the corner.)

but yeah, WARNING if you haven't listened to it.

it basically hit me so quick that there was no point turning it off. usually maron rambling at the start leads you in, prepares you and you know if you need to save the actual interview for a later date. but it was maron who had me going!

I've been meaning to listen to that one, I love Dr Steve!

The Ralphie May episode was really good, he has a great attitude despite some of the shitty things that've happened. And Steven Wright was a
a delight, that whole conversation just made me grin like an idiot. What a sweet man.

I did not know about the Ralphie accident as a teen! Damn.

i think i make the mistake of trying to listen to them in order. i dont really know who 85% of the comedians are, so i don't know if it is going to be funny, sad, historical, political etc.

like the one w/ lettermans old head writer/girlfriend was terrific! Merrill Merkoe. Should google, her voice sounded familiar.

I like to listen in order too...I am still recovering from listening to Todd Hanson in the car, holy fuck

oh shit his story was too much.

dr. steve was on that level fyi.

there have been some good one lately for sure, but god damn, i couldn't get through five minutes of that bert kreisher dude.

I had to stop Stoller, his voice was too unbearably shrill for me. Also his whine just...nails on a chalkboard

Yeah Bert Kreisher was unbearable.

Todd Glass was pretty interesting. Felt like Maron did some good interviewing, trying to get Todd to drill down into his discomfort.

I haven't listened to Kreischer...now I am glad, lol

whats the russell brand one like? i havent listened to any wtf's in a while.

I enjoyed the Russell Brand one more than his comedy. Came across as bright and affable.

I am so far behind on these.

Yeah, Russell Brand was really good. I thought I hated him, but hearing him talk without watching him be all twitchy helps a lot.

definitely. russ brand seems really smart & reasonably thoughtful. i begrudge his success far less than previously had

His persona is so overwhelming it's sad. Russell Brand the person seems like an interesting guy.

He's very quick too, I loved his riffs with Maron

The Russell Peters one was interesting too--the guy is playing arenas and works outside of Maron's personal heirarchy, that he seemed dumbfounded, while also doing a good interview.

(P.S. I can't write today.)

tbh russell brand was russell brand. but the russell brand of his radio show or halfway thru a season of big brother, not the guy you see in the papers or at scripted hyper show.

really great eps lately; feel like maron's doing much better at connecting with (bigger) celebrities.

the ralphie one was wonderful. love that i can love a conversation so much even when i don't know the interviewee at all.

his interviewing is improving, you can tell he's listening a lot more

it works best when people talk about subjects he is interested in or is knowledgable about. i've got the donald glover one soon and i bet that is super awkward, tbh, because they seem worlds apart in what interests and inspires them.

Nah, the Glover one is good.

i didn't really like the Glover one. Glover comes off as pretty unlikable weirdly. i mean, not that he does or says anything unlikable but more that his demeanor was kinda -- trying too hard maybe? Or just awkward?

haha Ralphie named his daughter April June May

i dont think he got that right

Ralphie May seemed super prepared for that interview. As in: these are my WTF-compatible stories. I think it was the lowest Maron to guest speaking ratio of any episode--mostly Marc saying, "Really?" "Those guys sound like dicks." etc. Still, enjoyable interview.

Stephen Wright wasn't all that revealing or interesting a guest, but he's Stephen fucking Wright, so it was awesome to hear.

^^^ otm re Steven Wright

oh wait, I did find him interesting so *partly* otm :)

What I really loved about the Todd Glass interview was how it was so in-line with how young people think and react when they are finally coming to terms with themselves, but with added benefit/anger/experience of having an adult's perspective. That shit about not being able to hold someone else's hand really resonated for me. I sort of haven't been able to stop thinking about that interview for the past week.

Yeah, I liked that too, how real it was. It made me feel for him that he sort of hung onto "I'm doing this for the kids" like a safety blanket...not that it wasn't a really good motivation but through the interview it was almost like a tic, like he really needed that to talk about himself, how in his mind if he did it this way it'd be okay, he'd be safe somehow.

I'd only come across him a few months ago on another podcast and had found him very sort of animated and almost like a man-child in a way. Maron was right about how it's about as focused as you'll ever hear him.

Oh yeah, "I'm doing this for the kids" as safety blanket is really otm. It's also incredibly poignant, I think, especially considering how often he reverts to juxtaposing kids today (i.e. that story about seeing those two boys in Boston) with his own youth, where he almost seems apologetic when he says that he was ok and his family loved him, AND YET the obvious anger when he says he "didn't get to have a youth."

I also loved Maron, being his close friend, expressing surprise and gratitude at this whole new side of him that he can finally talk about. That's always a response I like hearing, though it's not as prevalent obv: this idea that when someone comes out, their friends have this new aspect of their personality to get to know. It can be a wonderfully intimate thing.

Yeah, absolutely. The stuff he kept going back to about his parents actually did get me thinking, that in a way a supportive household is good, and sure he *should* be comfortable with his sexuality but it just highlights that disconnect that you can't just be gay in your own house, that from what he saw or the way he interpreted everything outside of his house, he could absolutely NOT be gay. And really, it kind of drives home what a huge *mental* leap it is to come out. Not just wrestling with your family and friends being okay with it, but you yourself being okay with it.

I could talk about it for hours, I was very moved by the psychological insights of that interview. Which is kind of gross-sounding, I don't mean to sound like a scientist and a labrat but it made me think a lot about my gay friends.

My husband kind of laughed at me when I told him about the Glass interview, he had never heard of him and was like 'he came out on a podcast, wtf'...but that's the thing. It wasn't even the actual coming out that was notable, as the process, and the emotions of doing that laid out right in front of you, which is something a lot of people might not have much experience with. Including me.

Anyway, tl; dr

I was having dinner with my recently-divorced friend and we were talking about movies we'd seen in the past few months; I brought up the British film Weekend, which was a nice segue into talking about the Todd Glass interview as they both deal with the politicized aspects of identity--of public v. private, marginalization from "mainstream" as well as the marginalization within the "mainstream" of one's own subculture, and the discomfort of straddling complex social lines.

Really when I say that I haven't been able to stop thinking about Glass it's because of how his emotions remind me of my own when I was coming out at 18, and so in a cyclical way it makes me relive a lot of my own coming-out process and its attendant anger and activist tendencies and ambiguity.

I don't know that it's gross-sounding to be moved by the interview; I feel like why it's so special is because we've been inundated with many rote "coming out" narratives, but none of them seem to have gone into such in-depth analysis of someone's neuroses (I mean, he still has trouble saying "gay"!). It was really thrilling because you hardly ever experience someone figuring out themselves right in front you, and finding the words to say all those things he has never been able to.

I really enjoyed both Todd's and Bert's episode. Bert I knew about from his constant appearances on Jay Mohr's show.

xpost, Yes, you nailed it.
It was interesting how he wrestled with the idea of the 'femme' gay, vs how he saw himself...there was definitely an otherness there, that somehow his own 'type' of gayness was quite separate from "that".

please sban me for overuse of airquotes

done :)

Pete Holmes' laugh gets under my skin fer some reason. I can never tell it apart from somebody faking it.