#40 Wait Wait… It’s Alonzo Bodden

Announcer 0:00

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Jeff Dwoskin 0:15

All right, Jay, thank you for that amazing introduction. You get the show going each and every week. And this week is no exception. And it's a big week. It's a big week. This is Episode 40. That's right, Episode 40 of live from Detroit, the Jeff Dwoskin show. I'm your host, Jeff Dwoskin. So glad to have you back. Once again. We're doing it for the 40th time. I can't thank you all enough for being here. And the emails and the tweets and all the support means the world to me, and this episode. It's a great one. So I'm glad you're here again. We have the amazing and hilarious Alonzo Bodden with us. That's right, Alonzo Bodden from Last Comic Standing. You love him. He's a regular on Wait, wait, don't tell me on NPR. He's got a great comedy special out there. We're going to talk about so hilarious and that's coming up in just a little bit. I do want to thank everyone who's been subscribing and sharing their love for live from Detroit the Jeff Dwoskin show without their friends can't thank you enough. If you're like wait a minute, Jeff. I haven't done that. Well then what are you waiting for? Go to your favorite podcast app, Apple podcasts, Spotify, Pandora I hard humbly pod chase or any of those places you'll listen find live from Detroit the Jeff Dwoskin show share it to all your social media say guys, you can't you gotta listen.

You gotta listen. This is great. So many amazing interviews. Last week he had candy Clark from American Graffiti Dave Landau has been on from the Anthony ku Mia show with Dave Landau, Horace HB Sanders Star Search winner Carl Gottlieb screenwriter of jaws and co writer of the jerk Billy Van Zandt, Kelly Maroney, Susan near Liz Priestley, the list goes on and on so many great interviews. Don't keep it to yourself, share it. And I do want to thank everyone for all their support week after week after week of the sponsors can't thank you enough when you support the sponsors. It's just like supporting live from Detroit the Jeff Dwoskin show the sponsors are who helped us keep the lights on week after week.

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I do want to remind everyone that every Wednesday 9:30pm Eastern is crossing the streams. That's our live show that we do. That's every Wednesday 9:30pm Eastern Follow us on our YouTube channel search for live from Detroit, the Jeff Dwoskin show on YouTube or on Facebook facebook.com slash Jeff is funny. Follow those and you'll be alerted every time we go live. We talk about some amazing TV shows that you should be streaming get it crossing the streams, TV shows you should be streaming and we have great guests every week. So check that out. I also want to kind of point out another show another live show that's happening every week that just started it's called ending the stigma a path to recovery. It's from friends of mine, Fred Carroll, and Scott H. Silverman. He's a crisis coach. And they're helping people solve life issues and giving them a path to recovery. Follow them on YouTube, I'll put a link in the shownotes You can find that if you need any support or help at all. That's another live show where you can go and get some help. So lots of helpful stuff for you right there. Check those out.

And now it's time for the social media tip! this is the fun part of the show where I share it social media tip so make sure you're aware of some of the cool stuff going on online and then you can Google it and learn more about it. I do want to share one quick thing though from super fan Jerry and I just retweeted this at Jeff Dwoskin jo but this is funny. This is a Twitter fun fax some of you may or may not know this, but at KFC Kentucky Fried Chicken, they only follow 11 accounts, people named herb and all the Spice Girls. So 11 herbs and spices. So that's pure genius. And thanks for flagging that for me, Jerry, that's it's a great fun fact that the whole world to know. And now I think everyone does. But now to get back to the tip, something you can actually use on Twitter. Other than that great bit of trivia, you can drop it your next party, Twitter just rolled out this new newsletter feature, they bought a company and they integrated it's only on desktop. So if you go to your desktop, and you click More, there's an option now called newsletters. And so you can go to this newsletter and you can create a your entire newsletter. So you don't need like MailChimp or anything like that anymore. You can do everything right in Twitter, you can build the newsletter, and then you can distribute it to an email mailing list. But you can also tweet the newsletter and post it and share it to Facebook as well. So you can actually create a newsletter and your subscribers can be your followers, which is great, which is exactly what I wanted it for. But that being said, Go to at Jeff Dwoskin show, you'll see my newsletter post, check it out, subscribe, because that way I'll make sure you're aware of stuff that's coming up. And some great past episodes you may have missed. I know you haven't missed any but just in case, but it's a cool feature. So if you're looking to get into doing newsletters and reach out to your follower base, this is a great new feature on Twitter. And that's the social media tip!

Alright, ladies and gentlemen, it's that time of the show. It's time to hear the conversation I had with Alonzo Bodden You're gonna love it. And here it is. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, I'm excited to introduce you to my next guest. You seen him on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Last Comic Standing Comedy Central Ladies and gentlemen, the hilarious of Alonzo Bodden. How are you?

Alonzo Bodden 6:50

What's up, Jeff? How you doing? Man?

Jeff Dwoskin 6:52

I'm doing great. Thank you for coming to my show.

Alonzo Bodden 6:56

Yeah, well, you know, I'm so busy these days. It's amazing. I could squeeze you in between naps. But it's good to be here. And

Jeff Dwoskin 7:05

I appreciate you. Yeah, that's that's basically it's been a podcasters dream in terms of being able to get gas. Everyone's pretty free. So that's nice. It's been nice, but Well, thank you. I've been a fan of yours since I first saw on Last Comic Standing as I was kind of digging around. You are you went to school to be your jet mechanic.

Alonzo Bodden 7:27

Yeah. First career was aerospace. I went to aviation High School in New York. What's interesting about that, so I was graduated, I was hired by Lockheed and Burbank, and I went to the Skunk Works division, which was a top secret aircraft division. And the first thing I worked on was the stealth fighter, the F 117. And at that time, it was totally top secret. Nobody knew about it. We couldn't say anything about it. Well jump forward about 15 years. And I was doing shows in where were we at? We were in Kuwait, and hopped over to Egypt, and I entertained the pilots and flight crews for that plane. And they were like, how do you know so much about our secret plane? I was like, relax, son, I saw it before you did. So I think I'm the only person who can say that I built the stealth fighter and entertain the pilots.

Jeff Dwoskin 8:16

That's quite an achievement. What made you kind of you say I'm gonna, I'm gonna give up this Chad mechanic life and go into comedy.

Alonzo Bodden 8:26

Well, you know, I did that. Like I say, I did that all through the 80s. Another thing that went on in the 80s, and you might not have heard about this was cocaine was rather popular back in 80s, which I, let's say took a liking to I went to rehab, went into recovery in 88. And then got a job training new people how to fix airplanes and do all of that. And I could always make them laugh. I always had a sense of humor. Well, where I went to recovery was a place called Studio 12. And I like to tell everyone that the stars went the Betty Ford and the crew went to Studio 12. So I met the grips and the electricians and the makeup artists and all of that. But it was the first time I was around the entertainment industry. And they made it very real. So when I said hey, I want to be a comic, they will they were so encouraging. They were like, yeah, you could do it. Like when you're not in the entertainment business. I think the entertainment business seems completely unattainable. At least it did to me. It seemed like some different worlds. But having met these people who worked in that world and then telling me I can do it. The two came together. I decided to do it. And the other thing was being an instructor. I got in front of the room and I had zero stage fright. I think that's one of the things I've been lucky in my career. I've never been smart enough to be afraid to go on stage. So I didn't have the you know, the big hurdle for most people is public speaking and I just never had that one I just something about somebody was like, Yeah, I'm fine. Let's talk.

Jeff Dwoskin 9:55

I had a similar experience. I was in the in the business world. I've always been in the business world. I was I was funny, I would do presentations. And I would be funny because I wasn't afraid to be in front of people. So I took a class and then did stand up comedy for many years. But once I had that, and I always tell people, it's a great thing. Even if you don't even become a stand up comic or do improv, it's to be able to get in front of people. It's amazing. Anytime I would do a presentation, it'd be like, don't go after jack. But you're right. It's a great thing. And it's

Alonzo Bodden 10:24

Yeah, I have a friend in Vegas. And he teaches that comedy class like teaching comedy to CEOs and corporate people just to make them less dry. I took one of those writing classes also, because I didn't know how stand ups come up with material. But when I got out of that class, and did that first five minute graduation show, I can honestly say I had no doubt that I was going to be a comic like there was nothing that ignited the passion. And I was like, I'll do whatever crappy day jobs or whatever else you got to do to pay the bills until comedy pays the bills. Yeah, I

Jeff Dwoskin 10:58

loved it, then I still love it. Now, once you start doing comedy, it's kind of a high that nobody can It's hard to explain to someone like just that Russia get and it's hard to walk away from So yeah, I guess once you got that. So how long? were you doing comedy before? What would you consider your big break just for laughs

Alonzo Bodden 11:15

Well, yeah, my first big break was new faces that just for laughs I was doing comedy. About four years, I got invited to new faces. I was one of the I'll say one of the lucky ones. One of the stars, one of the hot ones, whatever you want to call it a new faces, but I got a deal. And this is something that has since changed. But back then like and I think it had to do it also being before the internet, we really were secret, like they did a good job of keeping our names out of the press until we did our show. And then when you did your show, there was all this excitement over new comics. So for your listeners, getting a deal means that a studio signed me and he gave me a check and kind of took me off the market for a year to try to develop a TV show. Unfortunately, that didn't develop. But the fortunate part was I got a little money and I was able to quit the day job and that so that's why I consider that my first big break. Then a few years later, when Last Comic came along. I always considered that my introduction to America, right? Because that was primetime TV, which is a big one. And suddenly millions of people are seeing you so that that was good. How long you

Jeff Dwoskin 12:22

been doing comedy when you landed Season Two of Last Comic Standing

Alonzo Bodden 12:28

10 years. Yeah, I had been doing it 10 years. And the funny thing about that was that was the point in my career when things really started happening, because I got picked for Season One of Last comic, but I didn't do it because I also booked my first movie, and we didn't know what Last comic was at the time. And my managers were like, screw that TV show. You got a movie that began a long and illustrious career of playing bouncer slash security guard in movies, which I've done numerous times I was bringing it down to house was my first security guard. I was a security guard at the party. Queen Latifah was throwing in Steve Barton's backyard. And the cool thing about playing security guards is I'm always protecting star movie. So I beat I beat the stars. That's awesome. I was working with Queen Latifah and Steve Martin, both of them fantastic. Queen Latifah. And this was a funny thing. So I was like, What do I call her? I'm not gonna walk up and call her queen. And I found out her name is Dana. So she said to me, she said, you know, you look familiar. Like I've seen you somewhere. And I said, Well, I do stand up. You might have seen me. She said, Yeah, Bobby. And I just said to her, didn't you make a record? And she just busted out laughing? And then for the next two days, I every time I saw I was like, What was the name of that song? You did a record, didn't you? So she was she was very cool about that. And then I did her talk show years later, Steve Martin, very intimidating to meet Steve Martin, because he is Steve Martin. And so the setup is we're at the guarding the gate going into his backyard. He drives up and I stop him from coming in right there rehearsing it, and he's walking up and there's an extra next to me and the extras like wow, Steve Martin, and Steve just looked at him and said, I'm acting and so in my head, I'm like, Oh, shit, like, okay, serious, like, stay quiet, blah, blah, blah. So lunch or whatever comes along. And somebody said to me an assistant when it says, Hey, your stand up, you know, you should meet Steve. He loves stand up comics. So they introduced me to him and I said, Why did you leave? I said, you were the biggest stand up comic in the world. Why did you stop doing he said that, you know, I moved on. I do. He said I still tell jokes. I still host things once in a while. And I was like, really? Like what do you host and he looks at me said the Oscars. And I said who books that and he fell out laughing. said that and it was cool. So it was fun meeting them and joking around. I will say this in watching Steve Martin work and again, I was only on set for two three days, but He could do anything funny. It was the most amazing and unique talent. If you told him to go get a toothbrush, he would come up with something funny while walking to get the toothbrush. He was his scenes where you Everyone had to hold back to not bust out laughing, you know and ruin the sound cuz he's just such a creative funny guy. It was very cool to meet. That's awesome to see. Mine's

Jeff Dwoskin 15:24

one of my faves. That's cool. So wait, so it says we're diving into your some of your acting savvy. You've done a lot with the Power Rangers.

Alonzo Bodden 15:32

Oh, yeah. Well, I'll tell you, that was my so that was my main day job. What happened? I got laid off from my last aerospace job, right as I was starting comedy, and I made an agreement with myself to not work on airplanes again, because it would have been too easy to make money. And I wouldn't have you know, maybe not put my heart and soul into comedy. So I'm wondering what to do. A friend of mine calls me and he's like, Hey, you know how to drive a u haul? Right? I'm like, Yeah, he said, Good. It's the same size as a camera truck. come work for me on this new show. Power Rangers. It's some stupid kid show stupid. So I ended up driving the camera truck, right. And the show is is horrible. Jeff, it was the initial we were watching them make it and we're just like, no one's gonna watch this. Right. So they did six episodes. As you know, the show starts blowing up the producer calls because they liked me around set order. And he says, Hey, do you want to be transportation captain? And I said, let me call you right back and I called my friend. I'm like, What the hell is a transportation captain, he said, you can figure it out, take the job. So I became captain and that means I'm assisting the boss with you know, rental trucks and rental cars for scenes and this and that the other right? So after doing that for a couple of years, and it's a perfect job for paying the bills, I don't have to work every day. But I make enough money to cover my lifestyle while pursuing comedy to producers are very cool. They're like do your road gig come back your jobs always here? One day, I was just getting some snack or coffee or something at the craft service table. And the sound guy said, Whoa, what a voice Hey, do you want to do monsters? And I was like, You mean as opposed to driving trucks? Yeah, so I started doing a voiceover for various monsters on the show. And then there would be scenes there was like a beach scene where they needed a lifeguard guy and I played that we had another one where they needed someone to drive the fire engine. And it was like, yeah, Lonzo can drive it and let me tell you something. I developed a new respect for firemen. Because wearing their suit is like all rubber and that truck is hard to dry. Sweat is pouring off of me just driving this thing around. I was like, wow, this firefighting business is tough. I'm glad I'm only pretending. So I worked with that show for about five years. I knew all of the original Rangers had a great time. They were great people, the producers, everybody. We had fun doing that show.

Jeff Dwoskin 17:54

I yeah, I met them once at Disney World, but you know not to name drop.

Alonzo Bodden 17:58

Which ones did you meet? Did you meet the original?

Jeff Dwoskin 18:01

They were just a fake whines?

Alonzo Bodden 18:04

No, no. Cuz it's funny because they became generational. Like Which ones did you marry? Right? Because people talk about that. But yeah, they were cool. And they got paid nothing. When that show started. The highest paid person on the crew was a teamster who ran the generator. He got paid more than the actors. The actors started out like, I don't know, like 1000 bucks a week or something like that ended up being the number one kid show on the planet. They had to renegotiate. Yeah.

Jeff Dwoskin 18:33

They just keep reimagining rebooting and bringing it back

Alonzo Bodden 18:37

all they do yeah, just keep bringing in new colors new Rangers take them to outer space do this. The thing that the the Rangers no Ranger wanted to hear that they were going to the International Peace Treaty or whatever, because that meant you're off the show. like nobody ever flew to the inter global peace treaty and came back.

Jeff Dwoskin 18:58

It's the Power Ranger version of being given a red shirt.

Alonzo Bodden 19:02

Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Jeff Dwoskin 19:04

How is working with David Duke having a California occasion.

Alonzo Bodden 19:07

Again, just just a very cool guy, big basketball fan. And when I was doing Californication, it was like, you know, May June. And so an NBA Playoffs were going on. So we would end up talking basketball all the time. And the funny thing is when you talk to a star like when David the company goes to the game, he sits courtside and meets LeBron, and we're like, yeah, we didn't have those seats. We were further up, you know, but the cool thing is a guy like him. He has a sense of humor about that. Right? He gets it so yeah, we were able to joke about it. And the fun thing about doing Californication my role was to be one of the writers in the writers room. So it's really it's kind of what we do anyway, just improvise jokes and throw jokes out for the show. It was a fictional show. But it's the same thing we would do you know if we if you're a writer on a regular TV show, so that was fun but not the company. Nice guy. great sense of humor big basketball fan. That was when he were the hot team so he Yeah, he was telling us about hanging out courtside meet LeBron, and we were like, shut up movie star. Man. Oh, the other thing. The other thing about working with Dave to company, I had no idea how much women lose their minds over him. Because to me, he's not that stereotypical sexy star guy. You know what I mean? Like, men. I don't think we recognize what women see in men. Some are obvious, right? Like, you know, Denzel or Idris elbow or what's the name of the guy who plays Thor?

Jeff Dwoskin 20:48

Chris Hemsworth.

Alonzo Bodden 20:49

kosamba. Like, you see one of them. You're like, yeah, okay, I get it. But with the company, and this is no disrespect to him. It's just you wouldn't think it Jeff. I had more women hitting me up about Can I meet him? Can they come? Can you it's like, oh, yeah, I'm gonna give him your phone number. Get the hell out it But no, it was women were, you know, Facebook and all of that. It was like you're working with Dave to company. Oh, my God. I was like, Okay, enough.

Jeff Dwoskin 21:19

That's fine. That's fine. You You were on. NPR is way way down. Tell

Alonzo Bodden 21:24

me I still am. Don't write me off yet. Jeff.

Jeff Dwoskin 21:29

You've been? Well, you've been on that forever. I was. I was trying to think of it and segue into a way to make sure it didn't come up that I don't listen to NPR. But I like to come off like I'm intelligent. But as like, I haven't been in the car in a while. I haven't been tuning it. So how is it because a lot of your comedy is is based on and you talk a lot about social events and of the day. So that probably prepares you pretty well for that kind of show.

Alonzo Bodden 21:53

Yeah, I love doing social commentary and current events in my stand up that came about actually after last comic because in doing last comic every week and having to do new material, I realized the world was funnier than me. So I started doing more topical and less personal my Waitwait story. This is what's funny me I had never heard of Wait, wait, don't tell me. I had no idea what the show was. My agent set it up. And they came in some some of their producers or one of the producers came and saw me do stand up in Chicago. I was working at the improv in Chicago. And they said, Wow, he'll be great for the show. So they booked me to do my first show. Now I go down there. All I know is it's a current events panel show. That's all I knew. I know how to do panel shows as a comic. I'm used to doing them with three or four comics. But now I'm working with I remember Tom beaudette was on my first show. I don't remember who else was. But I was like, well I got to do is be funny. And that's all I did. And Peter sago came up to me at the end. He said, that's one of the best first shows we've ever seen. And I didn't want to tell him it was like, Well, that's because I didn't know I was supposed to be nervous, you know. And then I found out that it's one of nprs biggest shows and 5 million people a week. Listen, the funny thing about that show, I've been doing it a little over I think this year be my 11th year, and they have stats they know but I didn't realize I'd been doing it that long. But it takes a year before the NPR audience accepts you. And they're like, man, I know about this guy. I wasn't in the brochure for the first year. They're like you still we still got him on probation. But once they love you, they're all in and support. You know, every show I do they come to shows and stuff like that. It's a very cool world to be a part of,

Jeff Dwoskin 23:38

they go pretty deep on that show meaning I mean, obscure. I mean, in terms of the stuff they're talking about

Alonzo Bodden 23:43

you if there's at least one question every week that I have no idea what they're talking about zero. And I've always said that it is more important for me to be funny than to be right. I just don't sometimes, you know, I follow the news, but I'm not that deep a news junkie. So they'll ask about it might be something about some obscure Congress person or something that happened in another country somewhere and I'm like, Yeah, I got no idea. And then you just roll with the funny and get out of it. I don't win too often. I've maybe in 10 years, I've won five times.

Jeff Dwoskin 24:19

Let's talk about Last Comic Standing. So season two, I auditioned for season two, and then they were like when I was auditioning, they're like we just booked the last spot. This guy Alonzo Bodden. So they sent me home some Where did you audition? Or did you have an agent? They guys

Alonzo Bodden 24:36

la la. Okay, the only break we got in the auditions when I say we I mean professional comics is we had a specific audition time. We didn't have to wait in line to go up. But we still had to do every step from doing it starts with two minutes in the afternoon for Mark and Ross who the two guys they used to book the tonight show at the time. They were the talent guys for the tonight show. To do your two minutes for them, and then you did five minutes that night in front of the audience. And then if you made that they brought us to, I think they brought like 50 of us to New York, and we had to do another five minutes. And then 20 of us went to Vegas, and you do another five minutes. And then 10 of us back when we did season two, it was a reality show. So finally, 10 of us went into the house. So those were the preliminary steps you had to go through. So my thing Jeff was, the show was every Tuesday, and I tell people just imagine you have a job. And you know that every Tuesday someone's getting fired. My whole thing was don't get fired, don't get fired. And then next thing, you know, where to final three on stage. And we're like, Well, I didn't get fired. It was quite a cast was

Jeff Dwoskin 25:48

was Jay Mohr the host.

Alonzo Bodden 25:50

Yeah, Jay was the host. Yeah, actually, Jay was great. So you'll hear all kinds of stories about Jay Mohr, good, bad and indifferent. But I've always had a good relationship with Jay, I think cuz I got him and he got me and we had a respect for each other. Jay was like the member of the fraternity, treating us like the pledges, right. So Jay would give you a bunch of shit. And just I don't know if I can curse on your podcast, but I already have, but he would pick on you and this and that. And if you gave it back to him, he would back off. But if you didn't, then he would continue. You know, it was just his his thing. But I was cool with Jay. And you know, he did say one thing that was very true. He said, Look, you're about to go on primetime TV. So if you don't triple your income that's on you. And it really was like I said it introduced me to America, which built popularity and grew from there. So that was very cool. But yeah, I've always gotten along with Jay but he can definitely he could definitely rubbed some people the wrong way. So you will hear some stories about j more that are less than flattering.

Jeff Dwoskin 26:55

Yes, I did hear somebody telling me almost fistfights and all that kind of stuff.

Alonzo Bodden 27:01

That happened one time and it was it was actually pretty funny. What do they say don't poke the bear. Jay poke the bear

Jeff Dwoskin 27:12

will spill some more tea. What other What else? What other? So you were that that season was Tammy Pescatelli who I've worked with and she's amazing. I love her. Kathleen Madigan I got a chance to work with her. She's great. Because it you had Ant was on there. Todd glass, Jay London. John Heffron. Gary Gulman, Bonnie McFarlane, Corey Holcomb it's quite a cast

Alonzo Bodden 27:35

all headliner All Star Show. I think the maybe the newest comic was ant in it. It was there to stir up the pot create troll ant like to be in the gossip and liked stirring up stuff. It was funny it like everyone had almost played out certain ways. Todd glass is insane. And I love that guy. And like I say we were living in this house right? We're doing a reality show. Whenever Todd started with Did you ever we knew something funny was about to happen. Todd was about to say or do something crazy Corey Holcomb just cool, funny. talk smack about anything. Courtney's favorite thing what I say when I say after saying something horrible loved him. Gary Gulman might be the smartest person I've ever met in my life and not exaggerating. Just a brilliant mind. Heffron is a giant 15 year old kid. I love that guy. To this day. We're good friends. Tami's fantastic bonding was cool. Kathleen Madigan that you're talking legendary. You're talking legendary. Kathleen has been so funny for so long, and is so good at it. She and I were kind of grown ups when we were there. Because we were a bit older. You know, a few years older than everybody but love Kathleen. Yeah. Just just a lot of friends made on the show. Even though we were going at each other. Listen, we fought the producers more than we fought each other. In the end when all the dust settled friendships that I still have to this day love those people.

Jeff Dwoskin 29:07

See you made it to the final three final two. And I was like this strategy was their strategy. You had to kind of do like were there people that were people to avoid, say a Kathleen Madigan say they didn't have to go up against her.

Alonzo Bodden 29:19

So we had a thing we had now I don't know how much time you got. So I'll try to condense the story. What they did on the show, is every show you had to say I know I'm funnier than blank, and you would challenge somebody, right? So I'd be like, I know I'm funnier than Gary Gulman. Gary used to hate me challenging him. And I was like, well, it's either you or Kathleen. And considering she's one female comic of the year has already had an HBO special and 15 Tonight Show appearances. I'm going to challenge you. But anyway, so what people would do Kathleen and I were probably least challenged and every now and then like the way it works. So if say I say I I'm funnier than john Heffron, right, and five other people say that and he gets the most votes. Now he has to perform, and he picks one of those people to go against, right? So there were some of us like me and Kathleen, I'd say Cory was in that group to where people didn't want to go head to head. So they would challenge you knowing you're not going to get the most challenges, you know. So it's kind of a way to try to avoid so that was good. But the bad part was, you didn't get featured on the show if you weren't challenged. So we were kind of under the radar until the last they were getting to the final five. And it turned into a three way challenge between me Cory, and john, me and john moved on Cory unfortunately got eliminated but that was when they highlighted me and then we went into the final five. And I have to say again, when we're living in the house, me and Kathleen at a quiet it's we're not getting involved in dramas and isn't that the other thing I took as a high compliment was the reviewers of the show when I did my semi final thing said, Now we know why people didn't challenge him, which was cool. My strategy. I didn't hold back. I went for it every week, because I always said, like some people like I'm gonna save this joke for next round. And I was like, What if I don't make it to next round? What if I go home knowing I had a great joke in my back pocket. So I would just go all out every week and and it worked until the finals and john one and I knew he wasn't we wouldn't see each other sets. You It was almost like you were downstairs in the theater when the other person perform. And you'd come out to their closing applause and his closing. Applause was big. And what the hell did you do? And I didn't mind But that night watching the TV show, I was like, Yeah, he got me he had a great set. I have no, no beef toward him. No, no animal. He had a great set. And he won. I will tell you the worst position in a reality show is second because there's three of us on stage meet him and Gary Gulman. Right. So they're like, the third runner up. Gary Gulman. And everyone claps thanks, you know, and he leaves Now there's two of us. And the winner of Last Comic Standing. john f. Ross. Oh, yeah. Alonzo, thanks. Thanks for stopping by,

Jeff Dwoskin 32:21

right say the same thing with Miss America and they just move right.

Alonzo Bodden 32:26

Exactly. Exactly. When you come in second, you never get your moment because they have to just announce the winner, but it was all good. And then we came back to season three, which is when I had something foreign

Jeff Dwoskin 32:38

to what how much did what did john win for season two

Alonzo Bodden 32:41

john 150 grand and a development deal with NBC? I don't know what else I don't know. You know, other than you know the title and I think he went on Ellen and some other maybe the tonight show something like that. Yeah, that's what that's what he got.

Jeff Dwoskin 32:57

JOHN is from my hometown, and I grew up listening to john he was on with Danny Bonaduce on the radio. I when I was in college, actually some bar the spaghetti vendor. JOHN Heffron, actually was there during our Greek week doing stand up comedy. And so it was like john Heffron, sort of like a local legend guy.

Alonzo Bodden 33:18

Oh, I know. You went with the Homer. I am mad at you.

Jeff Dwoskin 33:21

I went Yeah, I had I had

Alonzo Bodden 33:23

a mad at you.

Jeff Dwoskin 33:24

I love them. I'm just I needed to come clean, though. It's all good. So season three, season three is an interesting season. They rush it right. And because they Oh, this is doing great. So like everything. They just try and jam another one down. And so they don't actually go to newbies. They just pull season one and season two best selves together. Which row part of so how is that because now you're interacting with some of the dat fans?

Alonzo Bodden 33:51

Right? So it was weird in a sense that they came to us about a month after season two. Now we're doing live stuff, but we're doing we're making great money and drawing big crowds because we just came off this TV show and they said, Hey, we want to do a season three best of the best. And we're like, yeah, okay, we'll go back on TV now, from a TV standpoint. And this was Jay Mohr had a big problem with them with doing this. They didn't promote it. So people watching weren't really they were like, is this a continuation of the one from the summer? Or is this a different thing? Like if they had done better promotion? Like, hey, this is an all star show or something? Maybe it would have done better. But anyway, yeah, it was just straight up head to head comedy with the 10 of us. Now mind you, a lot of us do each other. We're comics like I knew Voss, I knew ralphie I knew different comics who were on the show. So it's not like we're total strangers, but we're playing the game yet. We had to go week to week round to round. I will say I don't know if I was a favorite going in. But I saw it as I got a witness. Like, you know, I just felt like I got a second chance. I'm gonna win. This thing so that's how it started. And that's how

Jeff Dwoskin 35:02

we went in you when you beat john f Ron this time yes in more ways than one right because the reason I recapped his prize is because your prize

Alonzo Bodden 35:12

that was the thing so and again this was a j Moore thing right? So j more like they they're negotiating this season three. And Jay told us basically he told the producers look The Biggest Loser gets a million bucks for losing weight a common you got to give the best comic more money so they bumped the winning prize up to 250 grand So yeah, I did remind half Ron that I one five times as much money as him and

Jeff Dwoskin 35:43

and that my friend is show business that had to hurt. So the other thing that I was reading, which was interesting was so season three, they actually canceled just before your big win.

Alonzo Bodden 35:59

As soon as they found out the black guy won, they canceled the whole

Jeff Dwoskin 36:02

night. So they're sitting around NBC, but like we got to Brown was it brown black guys?

Alonzo Bodden 36:07

Like this ain't UPN What the hell is it? I am the unknown winner for that reason they canceled the final episode. Nobody really knows why for sure that there were all kinds of rumors as to why that they were given time slot to I think Spielberg had a TV show he was exact producing or the ratings were bad or whatever. Nobody knows. I always tell people when the suits cancel a show. It's not personal. Whoever was in some ivory tower at NBC that said canceled Last Comic Standing. I promise you, he has no idea who I am, or my name or anything like that. Right. But it was weird the way it happened. Because like I said, we're touring live. So we record the show on Tuesday, and people vote Tuesday night now. To your listeners. Remember this is before social media. There is no Facebook or Twitter or anything me and half always joke about how many MySpace friends we got when we did Last Comic Standing 10s of 1000s of MySpace friends MySpace for those who listen or listen. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Google it, kids. So anyway, so they do the voting Tuesday night, and then the following week, they would reveal the winner. So Wednesday comes and I'm back east somewhere. I'm on tour with Gary Gulman and Jay London, I get a call. I don't even know who it was from. Somebody said they canceled the show. And we like what they said shows canceled, like, well, who won it? Like they're not saying nobody knows. Okay, so that's Wednesday. So Thursday morning, Jay London comes to me says you won. Like what? He said you won J bar, set it on TV this morning. So what had happened was Wednesday, it was canceled. They brought it back. It was canceled again. Thursday, Jay is doing publicity for some comedy club. I think he was in Phoenix at the time. And he said they're screwing around with Last Comic Standing Alonzo Bodden one, right. So now I call the show. And I'm like, did I win? And they won't confirm. I said, if I won, do I still get the money? And they're like, Oh, yeah, the winner still gets the money. I was like, I'm cool. I'm good. Then it did come out that I did when and then Comedy Central used to re air the show. It used to come on NBC on Tuesday and Comedy Central on Saturday. So Comedy Central was like, Hey, we need a show. So we ended up shooting this 30 minute reveal episode to show that I won. But it had to be the most anticlimactic reality show finale in history, because it was like everyone already knew that I won. So there's no way to build up anything and everyone was over it. I will say NBC killed their own show when they did that. Because prior to that, we were considered one of the a list reality shows we used to get coverage every week in TV Guide magazine. Look it up kids. It's what we used to use all the variety or whatever, you know, the entertainment stuff would cover Last Comic Standing. They didn't usa today would always cover it and do profiles and stuff like that. Well, when NBC cancelled it. When they brought it back. It never got the same publicity. It was never the same after that. And a lot of people said, well, when NBC said screw this show, everyone else said screw the show. And then they changed the format every season and nobody really knew what was going on. Then. It was off the air for a couple of years it came back. Phenomenal comics have done the show. Amy Schumer did the show. She didn't win, but she became Amy Schumer. You know, Gabriel Iglesias fluffy. Eliza Schlesinger is probably the biggest winner as far as a winner whose career went you know, Eliza's career is huge but Felipe Esparza he's done really well. JOHN reap you know, so that the other winners have been great. And have done well. But it wasn't the same as when we did it. But the other winners had the benefit of doing it in a era of social media which we didn't have

Jeff Dwoskin 40:10

to hold their hand all day and world. Maybe someone will Google you on YouTube.

Alonzo Bodden 40:15

I'll take it. You know, people still remember that. It's funny now because now young comics will be like, I saw you when last comic when I was a kid, like Shut up, punk. Yeah, that's how I mean, it was 15 years ago.

Jeff Dwoskin 40:27

Now. I remember dude, one. I definitely remember you whine and now you come back and then beat half Ryan. And then was there any drama in season two,

Alonzo Bodden 40:35

you know what happened? Me and half have agreed to never compete in anything again. Because what he told me and I completely forgotten, but we also went up against each other on Star Search, when they had a new version of Star Search hosted by Arsenio Hall. This was like in 2002, or 2003. He and I went up against each other there. And I also won that one. So I beat him two out of three, we just agreed No, no more competition.

Jeff Dwoskin 41:03

But it's funny, I just interviewed a friend of mine, Horace HP Sanders, he was on he won Star Search one of the one of the years with a senior Hall. And what made me think of that is because your season three got canceled. And and then then you kind of came at you won. And you know, the, the when he won, they were in the middle of his show, we went to war. And so they actually canceled the show. And they were they have posed is literally by the walk on stage. And then the other guy had already gone. So it just kind of reminded me that that's fine. Alright, so let's let's talk about you have a new special on amazon prime, heavy, lightweight.

Alonzo Bodden 41:40

Yeah. So and now it's on all platforms. It was initially amazon prime. And then after a year, it now you can get it on iTunes and everywhere else. You know what heavy lightweight came about? Because there's heavy topics. And there's lightweight topics. And I wanted to talk about both because Louis black, who's a friend, mentor, whatever. He told me what I love Lou, and I love all political topical stuff loaded loose and listen, you can't beat him in the head all the time. You gotta lighten it up. They can't think that much. So he's like, you got to mix in addict jokes. I was like, gotcha. So. So on that show. It was like, Okay, let me talk about racism. Okay, now I'm going to talk about yoga pants. Let me talk about the me to movement. Now I'm going to talk about Taco Bell. So that's what the heavy lightweight was, it was let's go heavy to light too heavy to light.

Jeff Dwoskin 42:35

It's a great special. It's funny, because he made it he made a joke in the beginning about talking about a topical humor and what was it? Can it be funny when it comes out? And then you're like, yeah, it's gonna be funny when it comes out. And like it's on here. And so here I am, like listening to it. Like, you know, a good year, probably a good year and a half or so at least between the time you recorded it. And it showed up on Amazon originally, but and I'm watching it. I'm like, it could have you could have done it yesterday. I mean, it was just like, there's a timelessness to how you approach the material.

Alonzo Bodden 43:04

Well, one of the great things is stupid. Stay stupid. So Kanye is never not going to be a punchline, okay, there's never going to be a time where we're like, Man that Kanye West now that's somebody No, no, Kanye is always going to be funny. So things like that, you know, our our dependence on Alexa and Siri, which I did a thing about, that's only grown since then. So in that respect, those kind of things are, are both topical and evergreen. And I learned that in the 90s. I had this bit about Darryl strawberry. And Darryl was nice enough to get arrested every two years to make the bit fresh again. I was like Thank you, Darrell, you've, you've extended this one, eight years. So So you find out that some topics are like that, or unintentionally evergreen, and then other things when you do topical comedy. It reminds people of what was going on back then. Right? So like, on my first special who's paying attention, I did this better. It was in 2008. It was a year Barack Obama got elected. And I just joke about imagined but you're the first black president the united states. And what's the first problem they hit you with? pirates, pirate and you I gotta solve 15th century crime. And now when people hear that joke, they're like, that's right. He had he had pirates to fight you know, to Somali pirates and all that. So sometimes topical humor, just like a song will take you back to when you heard the song. The topical jokes will remind you of when that was in the news. And it was like yeah, that was funny. That war. Yeah, I do remember that. So that that's how topical stays evergreen. To give you a great example of that. George Carlin again, one of my idols when it legends. He said never underestimate the power of steel. People in large groups. How topical is that today? How? I mean, is there anything else going on today then stupid people in large groups, you know, so yeah, it just sound My God. Yeah, there is a timelessness to it, which is very cool.

Jeff Dwoskin 45:16

So who's paying attention? Also the name, your podcast?

Alonzo Bodden 45:19

Well, who's paying attention goes back to my view of the media, because and again, remember this started in Oh, eight, right? So we had like Sarah Palin, my problem with the media then and still now, it gives credibility to people who deserve none, because it's entertainment. It's infotainment, as they call it. So my joke was, you know, if Walter Cronkite had to interview Sarah Palin, it would have been the quickest interview you ever heard, would What? Read a book and have interview? So I, you know, the media, historically, is the fourth the state, right? And they're the ones who are supposed to keep an eye on things. They're supposed to be on both sides, making sure you tell the truth, calling bullshit when it is bullshit. And they stopped doing that long ago. So comics do it. We're the ones who tell the truth. And that's why I'm like, Who's paying attention. It's us. It's comics and the podcast started, I would go through the news articles behind the jokes. So if you listen to my humor, you'd be like, Oh, that's what he's done. But then it just became a thing of my take on the week's news, some serious, some funny, and it's just me talking. It's just stories I find interesting, funny, stupid, etc. I've done it. I've done a few interviews on it over the years, but I kind of like doing it myself. And I am absolutely surprised at the number of people who listen, I appreciate every one of them. I'm one of those listeners. Thank you.

Jeff Dwoskin 46:47

I subscribed. So where can people keep up with

Alonzo Bodden 46:50

you on the on the socials? It's Alonzo Bodden calm. Everything's my name, Instagram. I'm so funny, ZO. f u n ny because, again, this goes back to when these things started, right. And everybody had this idea. I'm gonna steal somebody's name. And then they got to buy it back from me. It's like, I don't have to buy it back. I'll just change it. And I also found out how difficult it is to verify who you are with these sites like you got to send in your ID and it's it's a big pain in the ass but everything else I just use Alonzo Bowden. And I tell people just Google comic Alonzo. It's either going to be me or crystella Alonzo. And I think you can tell which one of us is when she's a short Mexican woman. Maybe not short, maybe an average height Mexican woman I love I love crystella by the way of just super funny and a fellow clippers fan. So we got that going. No clippers. We were happy enough to unload Blake Griffin on you guys in Detroit. I don't know if you're a basketball fan. But here's here's some advice. You might want to check the knees on a used car before you buy one. Because we we unloaded one on you there.

Jeff Dwoskin 48:03

Okay, I'll pass it along to the team owners. Man is fine. Thank you so much for hanging out with me. I really appreciate it.

Alonzo Bodden 48:12

I had a great time, Jeff. It's all good. anything comes up. You ever want to talk again? I'm here. If you want some dirt on Heffron, I'll have to look it. He's He's a tough one to pin down. But yeah, we'll just find something and see if we can somehow ruin his reputation. I'm good with that.

Jeff Dwoskin 48:32

Thank you. All right. How great was that? Alonzo Bodden. Ladies and gentlemen. Check out his special heavy, lightweight. I know it's on amazon prime. And it sounds like it's other places as well. Also, you can catch him on Wait, wait, don't tell me on NPR. Check out his website. I'll put all these links in the show notes. So when it comes to your town, you can score live comedy and you can support Alonzo Bodden. You won't regret it. He's hilarious. All right, as we get close to the end of the show, you know what time it is. That's right. It's time for the hashtag roundup trend of the week. That's right. That's where we dive deep into Twitter. Find an amazing hashtag game that was played by the hashtag roundup community. You can follow hashtag roundup on twitter at hashtag Roundup, you can download the free hashtag roundup app at Apple iTunes or Google Play Store. It's totally free. And you can play along on Twitter with us and one day one of your tweets may end up on a future episode of live from Detroit the Jeff Dwoskin show that's right fame and fortune awaits you. All you have to do is play along today's hashtag bad airplane etiquette. That's right. Hashtag bad airplane etiquette brought to you originally by the cat funny Kennedy hashtag game on hashtag Roundup. We're going to talk about bad airplane etiquette. Things you should never do on an airplane. never play a game of spot the sky Marshal, especially the top of your lungs. Hey, I think that guy over there in the khaki shorts. It looks like he might have a gun. Don't go to him never bring a snake on the plane. Well, you can bring one steak but don't bring a lot of snakes then you start to piss people off especially Samuel L Jackson. Never bring a leftover fish dish to eat on a plane. Never Never bring a leftover fish dish anywhere. These are all hashtag bad airplane etiquette. Never critique the inflight movie out loud during a flight. Oh my god, doesn't everybody die the end of this? Why are we watching this? Never make a huge fuss about the Gremlin on the wing. Excuse me, stewardess. There's a gremlin on the wing. I didn't know if I should mention it or not. But it didn't look like he actually paid for his ticket. never asked the flight attendant. Are we there yet? Are we? Excuse me? Ding ding ding. Are we there yet? never play beer pong with the pilot. Even if the winner gets to land the plane. Just don't do it. That's hashtag bad airplane etiquette. Never eat beans a few hours before boarding. Never do that. Never do that anytime in life. Never insist that vaping isn't the same as smoking and that it's okay to do it in the airplane bathroom. Never as a pilot to take a breathalyzer test. That's the copilots responsibility. Never recline your seat. If you're in front of me. Don't recline your seat. If you're on an airplane if you do your jerk never eat peanuts next to someone you shouldn't eat peanuts next to anyway Don't do that. Don't eat peanuts on a plane. Never call anyone surely. Am I being serious? Yes, I am. Alright, on a bad airplane etiquette fun for today. That was a fun game and you play along with all the hashtag games on hashtag ground up and you could end up on a future episode. I already said that. All right. Well, can you believe it? Were at the end of this episode Episode 40 has come and gone. Thank you to Alonzo Bodden. Thank you to all of you for coming back week after week after week. I can't thank you enough. I love being here. I love doing the show. Glad you're enjoying it. And we'll see you next week.

Announcer 51:52

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Jeff Dwoskin show with your host Jeff Dwoskin. Go repeat everything you've heard and sound like a genius. catch us online at the Jeff Dwoskin show.com or follow us on Twitter at Jeff Dwoskin show and we'll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai