Episode 551 - John Mulaney

**Marc Maron** (0:09)
All right, let's do this, how are you WTFers? WTF buddies, WTFineers, WTFniks? How are you? I'm Marc Maron, this is WTF.
My guest today is John Mulaney, the young stand-up comic, a young man. A young man, you know, I've gotten some feedback on occasion when I talk to the younger comedians, that maybe I'm a little hard on them, or maybe it comes off as sour grapes of some kind. But I don't think I did that with John, but maybe I'm guilty of that. I guess, you know, show business is tough, man. It's tough, and if you're lucky or unlucky enough to not see any way out of it, maybe something will pan out for you. Things eventually did, but I can't tell you how many times in my life where I thought that everything was gonna happen, that this was it, this was it. If I really think about the amount of heartbreak and disappointment that one encounters in pursuing one's dream or even a career, any of you, everyone understands that, how much we have to sort of reconcile that and absorb it and process it if possible, hopefully without getting bitter or cynical, which seems almost ridiculous, a ridiculous task to open your heart so much that any sort of leveling will just become a learning experience. It sort of has to be. You don't have any real choice, do you? But I don't, like now looking back at it as a 51 year old, I don't know that I learned any lessons necessarily other than when I look back at all the failures and disappointments and the ways that I fucked up, I just sort of think like, well, I lived through it, but there are some things I don't know if they're any better at all.
Because there are some, like there are younger people, and I'm going to talk to John Mulaney today. He has a big opportunity. His show is in a little bit of trouble, but the truth of the matter is, he's going to go on with his life one way or the other. Life is full of heartbreaks and disappointments. It just gets to a point where it's like, I don't want anymore. Can I not have them anymore?
Wow.
Oh my God. I watched that movie Whiplash last night and it has something to do. Like there's something about that really being humbled and beaten enough to finally grow the fuck up. And I know some of you are on to me already with this stuff. I don't know that if I've fully done that, I don't like, I know I'm a 51 year old man, but emotionally I don't seem to be that. And I don't know what I expect out of people, but like all of a sudden, all this shit is becoming very clear. Like, I got all this stuff going on, but here there's this one flaw, dude. There's this one flaw that keeps you spinning in the same place. Keeps you in pain, keeps people who are with you in pain, on and off, pain relief, you know, the drama cycle.
God damn it. I don't know, maybe I'm just having a bad day. Maybe I think I wasted my youth somehow. I can't, I don't look back and think like, what about all them good times? Just panic. Just a parade of panic in different outfits with different ideas about what was going on. Wasn't panic, it was passion. Angry panic and a lot of like, come on, look at me, what about me? Where's mine? How come I can't have it? When am I gonna, what's the story? Why does that guy get it? God damn it. What about me? What do you do? I do me, I do me. I'm doing it right now, you don't like it, come on, fuck you. Fuck you wrecking with me. I don't know if that's everyone's idea of entertainment. Well, you're bullshit.
You're not entertained, are you compelled?
Are you engaged? You fuck? Yeah, I got, this meeting's over. Yeah, fine, I don't give a shit. I don't give a shit.
That was it, that was my early years. I was definitely not as together as John Mulaney, who we're going to talk to right now.
We're in a garage, I don't even intro people, I don't even know why I did that. If I just did it for my own sake.

**John Mulaney** (4:38)
Just like a clapboard.

**Marc Maron** (4:39)
We're gonna land, we're gonna get grounded.

**John Mulaney** (4:42)
Yeah.

**Marc Maron** (4:42)
Right now.

**John Mulaney** (4:42)
We're gonna set it up.

**Marc Maron** (4:43)
How you feeling? Were you nervous coming up here?