#1448 - Joey Diaz

Joe Rogan (0:03)

And we're ive, Joey Diaz.

Joey Diaz (0:06)

My brother.

Joe Rogan (0:07)

How are you feeling?

Joey Diaz (0:08)

Like a new fucking man, rested.

Joe Rogan (0:10)

I know, rested, right?

Joey Diaz (0:11)

Rested, very rested. I looked at it at this as a reset button.

As soon as I came back from Vegas, I knew what time it was. February 29th, it was at 50% capacity.

Joe Rogan (0:25)

Yeah, we were there a week later. We were there when Tommy was at the Mirage, and the UFC had their Vegas, the Las Vegas card.

It was a ghost town, not even half full. I mean, a week after you, you were at 50% capacity. It was probably dropping less than that.

Joey Diaz (0:42)

30, it was at 30

Joe Rogan (0:43)

But the UFC was packed.

Joey Diaz (0:45)

It was packed, packed. And then I came to the Comedy Store March 2nd, and that's when I could smell it in the fucking air.

When I went into the green room, bro, when I saw all those people in the green room, I basically had a fucking panic attack. Yeah, and I went right to the door. There's a street door in the back of the Eddie Murphy door. If he comes back, that's what we'll call it, the Eddie Murphy door. This house is gonna get it out of there.

Joe Rogan (1:10)

Yeah, they're gonna have to have guards to get in and out.

Joey Diaz (1:13)

So I went to the Eddie Murphy door, and I stayed there. And you could just see people in the audience like nothing was going on. And I just got, I just got, like I was shattered by Saturday. And remember, I was supposed to be in New York for St. Paddy's Day.

And the Monday before, I was supposed to be in New York the 16th and 17th with a show at NIAC on the 12th. And I saw it happening. I went to a doctor for a shot on my knee to get the gel for the arthritis. And he said that you might have a weird reaction to it. And sure enough, Tuesday, I went to boxing class, and the guy goes, dog, your leg is bruised. So I had a little bruising on my leg. And I got home, and that night on the news, it had hit New Rochelle.

And I go, wait a second, New Rochelle and NIAC, they're like fucking neighbors.

You know, my memory of mine, and I served me right, but in my mind, that talk, cluster, it's all pretty on top of everything. So I sent the letter, the picture of the my knee to the producers, and I said, I'm not coming in, because they wanted me to come in Thursday for wardrobe. And then I was just gonna sit in my hotel room for two days, you know, go to Jersey and eat and shit like that.

Joe Rogan (2:20)

So even during all this, they were still planning on filming. And this is for The Sopranos movie.

Joey Diaz (2:26)

So we were gonna do a couple of shoots, reshoots. No, not reshoots, extra scenes. So that Tuesday, when I got home, New Rochelle had busted. I sent them a picture of my knee, and said, I'm not getting on a plane till Friday. I want the swelling to go down. But it doesn't take a fucking, I got a GED. And when I was in New York City in May, I went by The Garden to eat lunch. I wanted to get out of my hotel room, and I went to The Garden on the side. You could sit there at 12 o'clock, and they have everything, steak sandwiches, whatever you want. Pretty fucking good, too. Trucks? No, they have a building that has food inside, and they have some trucks, and you could sit outside. Fucking beautiful. But while I was sitting there, it was a Tuesday, I was off from shooting, and I remember calling my wife, and specifically saying, I like it here and everything.

But if Godzilla comes out of the Hudson River, where are all these people gonna go?

If you sit in New York City and Manhattan, like on the 50s, and just sit there at a cafe, you could estimate, I mean, it's like maybe 10,000 for every 10 minutes that you sit there, people that walk by you.

We don't have that foot traffic in LA like there's in New York.

There's a little bit of foot traffic downtown, but Sunset Strip, that ship sailed. You don't see people walking around the Sunset Strip, Hollywood Boulevard, but not to the dense population. Not to the numbers of New York. So what was it, no fucking brain? There's a GED here. This is me sitting there going, this is gonna happen. I just kept cutting it down. And my biggest fear was going to the East Coast and getting stuck.