#1011 - Tom Papa

Joe Rogan (0:00)

gonna go live, five, four, three, two, one. Tom Papa is obviously some sort of a nicotine junkie. He's using a knife made out of a nail to scratch open the box so he can get at these cigars.

Tom Papa (0:15)

I feel like Ben Franklin used this knife to open up wine once.

Joe Rogan (0:18)

Well, no, that's from the Pygmies.

Tom Papa (0:20)

Oh, really?

Joe Rogan (0:21)

Yeah, they made it for me.

Tom Papa (0:22)

Look at their little handle.

Joe Rogan (0:24)

My good friend Justin Wren, who's been on the podcast a few times, he's this amazing guy that does, he makes wells for the Pygmies. He was a former UFC fighter, now he fights for Bellator.

He's in their heavyweight division, this big teddy bear of a guy, like the fucking nicest guy ive ever wanted to meet. And he goes to the Congo and builds wells. And we've helped him out, we got some people to donate Bitcoin, which by the way is worth more money now. So what I'm gonna do is take whatever it's worth now and just give it to the Congo people.

SPEAKER_3 (0:57)

We gotta wait this week. I gotta wait? The JP Morgan guy screwed it up.

Joe Rogan (1:01)

He fucked up the Bitcoin.

Tom Papa (1:02)

I don't understand the Bitcoin.

SPEAKER_3 (1:03)

I can just make it go up and down fast.

Joe Rogan (1:05)

Ooh, how's that look?

Look at that. These cigars.

Tom Papa (1:08)

Beautiful.

Joe Rogan (1:09)

They look luscious. How many people...

Tom Papa (1:12)

This is what you offered somebody right before you screw them. Joe, have a cigar.

Joe Rogan (1:16)

Isn't this strange? Stop and think about this.

When you are buying a cigar, let's think about the kind of people that you think of smoking cigars. I think of like a Jay-Z type character on a yacht, right? Just looking out over the beautiful ocean going, I did it.

I fucking did it. I mean, there's no denying I'm here. Jay-Z's got a fat gold rope around his neck, right? And he's puffed on a cigar.

Tom Papa (1:41)

He's got a... Drinking some champagne.

Joe Rogan (1:43)

Or maybe a nice martini or something, like a gentleman. And sitting there just going, what the fuck?

Tom Papa (1:48)

It doesn't get any better.

Joe Rogan (1:49)

This is it.

Tom Papa (1:50)

I did it.

Joe Rogan (1:53)

I mean, give that man a cigar.

Tom Papa (1:56)

Absolutely.

Joe Rogan (1:58)

He wins so hard.

Tom Papa (2:00)

And that's the beauty of the cigar, is you could be in your little crappy yard smoking a cigar, you feel like that.

Joe Rogan (2:06)

But here's my thought. When we associate the cigar with that guy, think about who makes a cigar.

You're talking about people who live in tiny villages that get paid almost nothing, that are rolling these things together.

Tom Papa (2:19)

God bless them.

Joe Rogan (2:20)

How much are they getting paid? I mean, I know there's some places in Miami where you can actually go and you can actually watch them make cigars. They'll roll up cigars. It's pretty badass.

Tom Papa (2:29)

Impressive.

Joe Rogan (2:30)

But who is profiting from this?

Tom Papa (2:36)

Yeah, whoever owns the big giant tobacco company.

Joe Rogan (2:39)

Right, but they need those people that roll those things.

Tom Papa (2:43)

Yeah, you do. But the little guy who's rolling the things, he's just making a little living, doing his little thing.

He can't build the whole tobacco company.

Joe Rogan (2:53)

This is corporate Tom, Tom.

Tom Papa (2:54)

Yeah.

Joe Rogan (2:55)

What it's essentially like.

Tom Papa (2:56)

He's a little worker. You need the worker bee and you need the queen bee.

Joe Rogan (2:59)

Right, but isn't that person a lot like what we were talking about with Stand Up? Like the comedian is the one who actually makes the product.

Tom Papa (3:08)

Yes.

Joe Rogan (3:08)

The comedy clubs were getting all the money.

Tom Papa (3:10)

Right.

Joe Rogan (3:11)

And you were in poverty.

And the comedy club was balling out of control. Yeah. Wouldn't you feel like, this is bullshit.

Tom Papa (3:19)

Yes and no.

Because in New York, as you remember, there was a big riot, a big, everyone was like, these clubs are paying us 20 bucks a spot. They've been paying us that forever. Screw them, they make money, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And I had a hard time with it because I felt like what they're giving us in a place to go and do Stand Up every night and have an audience there, the value I was getting for my act was so much more valuable than the $20 I was getting paid. I didn't care about the $20. I wanted them to give me a place where I could go work on my act and then take that to some other city or some other bigger gig and that's where I would make my money. So you know what I mean? It wasn't purely like screw the man. The man's giving me a comedy club and has run this place for 30 years so I can roll in on a Wednesday and have 200 people there.