#301 Comedy Legends Unleashed – John DeBellis and Steve Mittleman

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Jeff Dwoskin 0:28

All right. Thank you so much for that amazing introduction. You get this show going each and every week, and this week was no exception. Welcome, everybody to Episode 301 of classic conversations. As always, I am your host, Jeff Dwoskin. That's right, Episode 301. We're now barreling towards episode 600 We've crossed the halfway mark. Thanks for being here with us to celebrate this milestone. We have not one but two amazing comedians today, Steve Mittleman on The Tonight Show a start and Roxanne he took on Rosie O'Donnell and Star Search you love 'em. An d John Debellis, head writer for the acclaimed DC follies wrote and directed the last request author of Stand Up Guys, I want to say this is an interview but it's mostly me trying to get questions in while two good friends. John and Steve, have an amazing conversation about comedy that I was just honored to be in the room for you're gonna love it and that's coming up in just a few seconds. And in these few seconds budge Patrick Eddie monster was here last week for episode 300 That's right episode 300 We talked monsters and more. Do not miss that amazing episode right now. Buckle up for Steve mittlemen. And John Debellis. Enjoy. Alright everyone. I have two special guests with me today. comedy legends. We have Steve middlemen winner the show himself. Yeah. Showtime laugh off champion. Vin on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Johnny Carson, HBO. He's been everywhere honored. They also have John Debellis, head writer for BU Ed writer from the acclaimed DC follies wrote and directed the last request writer on Saturday live and so much more. Welcome to the show. Oh, yeah.

Steve Mittleman 2:29

Yep. For having at least me. I don't know about John here.

John DeBellis 2:33

I don't even know what to say. You are that busy with guests that

Steve Mittleman 2:36

you had to merge? I guess. Actually,

Jeff Dwoskin 2:38

that's it. Steve, you're the first person that bring a friend. Oh, I

Steve Mittleman 2:41

see. Oh, never add up to a whole guest. Do

John DeBellis 2:44

you need to date up to lease on? Yes. Probably

Steve Mittleman 2:46

does. You know you got to he men here as we have.

Jeff Dwoskin 2:52

He What brings you two together? Honestly,

John DeBellis 2:54

since 1975, or 7676?

Steve Mittleman 2:56

You have to admit that publicly? Yes. Oh my god.

John DeBellis 3:01

I'm very much into self shame. Well,

Steve Mittleman 3:05

we yeah, we met the summer of 76. And at the Improv, I was waiting until I do audition. And John was you know, begging for money.

John DeBellis 3:15

Or Steve, of course, didn't give me any of it gave nothing because that was it. Oh, I had three adopted kids with me and they hadn't eaten in seven weeks. You didn't care? Nothin.

Steve Mittleman 3:23

Go back to Jersey. That's what I said. Once you go back to Jersey.

John DeBellis 3:27

Now we've known each other actually a long time. Yeah. Oh, yeah. We started out I guess almost in the first day you started out he started about a few months ahead of you.

Steve Mittleman 3:37

I see that my first day of comedy was December 16 76. I don't really count that summer because I was you know, going back to school and you know, I just auditioned a bit, but I hung out at the clubs and watch people and I learned from that summer from the improv and I'll tell you a story, John, I don't think you know. And Jeff, I'm sure you don't know, you're at your beck, who used to run into Sunday night audition nights, the improv at 44th. And ninth, they were you know, there was a kind of a fishbowl, and you stuck your hand and he picked a number unless you order for the show, you know, he could be number one or number 40, you know, or something, you know, at five minutes each, and it was like four or five hours show. So whenever I picked it, she liked me that it was funny. And so I pick a number, you know, like number 39. She got back into like big number 28 Or number 14, or he loves He I pick a good number. She was very kind to me. That

John DeBellis 4:39

was great. I mean, at first, I mean, I was there. My very first night. I had passed two editions at catch a rising star. And that's where I met Larry David the first night. Wow. Richard Lewis over to the improvisation and told me to Chris you got to put this guy on. No, that's good. All right, but I met him Glenn super. I mean all these guys that imbues there. Bob Shaw at the first night was amazing, amazing time. Belzer,

Jeff Dwoskin 5:05

it was all great. Quite a list. Talk to him about Larry David

John DeBellis 5:08

Larry's like I've known Larry from day one. Like I said, What do you want to know about him? He's insane. But in a good way, what you see on Curb your enthusiasm is what Larry thinks he wouldn't necessarily do. But it's what he was thinking.

Steve Mittleman 5:23

I think it's it's a tempered mellowed version of the real latter.

John DeBellis 5:27

No, well, you Larry, Larry's just, you know, he would bend Well, you were there. We have pictures nowadays in my house. Let's see, was there Gilbert was there a lot? Yeah.

Steve Mittleman 5:37

Everybody that all the way were Jews. They needed like a Christmas Christmas.

John DeBellis 5:41

They'd go to my mother. My mother was a good cook. So we go back to my mother's house.

Steve Mittleman 5:45

And what I did for your parents one year for Christmas, you

John DeBellis 5:49

gave me an envelope with a doll with a fight. You said $5 and $5

Steve Mittleman 5:52

each if I gave me a $5 cash with a Christmas card.

John DeBellis 5:58

We didn't ask him stuff about Larry. I mean, I have so many Larry's stories. One of my favorites is that. Well, you've heard that Steve the popcorn girl story was I go over his house one day quote me up. John, you got to come over. So I drive up into his Laurel Canyon. Oh, hang on. He goes, John, I met this girl. The popcorn girl thing. I'm in love with the popcorn girl. And I saw Cray Lowry. So what do you think I should do? So I think well, maybe you should write her a note or something like that. And he writes a note it was very funny note and says for you. I'm prepared to give up meat and all this stuff. You know. So we go over, we drive to the theater, and like parks his car and we walk in and he walks up to this guy, this really skinny young kid and we're the kid and says, I'm here I believe with a popcorn girl. So Larry, to guy looks to Larry. So what do you want to talk to Friday? I talked your popcorn girl. She's not here. You know how he talks up? Because she's not here. She's not you know, she's off tonight. He says Oh, well. I got to know to give the given note to the popcorn group. So he'd give it a no. So we get back in the car and we're driving away. And we pass the theater again. I said, Larry, I think they're near Reading a note. So we go into the data is a bunch of 20 year olds reading this note, and Lowry goes a minute. That's my note for the popcorn girl and he's getting really a popcorn girl. The guy turns around, you shouldn't be reading my note as a popcorn girl and the guy turns around, he goes, That's my girlfriend. How do you tired all kinds of colors and just turned around and we rode well, I never saw him driving a car sold fast in my

Steve Mittleman 7:29

life. It's exactly the Alarie scenario. Oh, yeah. And we

John DeBellis 7:33

saved his life one time to he had Gravity Boots on. You know, they were hanging upside down. Lucky kept the phone down, and by the ground because he couldn't get up. So me and my wife had to drive through Laurel Canyon trying to find his house is always difficult to find even during the day when I knew where it was, but at night trying to drive to his house. We got to his house by Tony got there half hour later. He was super red, totally beet red and he couldn't get up. He was stuck upside down. If we hadn't reached him, he would have been dead.

Steve Mittleman 8:03

Yeah, that's crazy. You say Larry David is alive to get pay me

Unknown Speaker 8:08

some money for that. And it's funny.

Jeff Dwoskin 8:10

You mentioned Gilbert Godfried. Yeah, I worked with him once. A stand up shower. Yeah, Stand Up Show. He was in town in Michigan and magic bag theater and I opened for him. He's a good dude. It's just it's amazing how different he is backstage. Yeah. Before he walks on stage. pretty mellow fellow. Oh, yeah. It was just he was so chill. And it was just like, it was right after he had gotten fired from Aflac with that whole thing. You know,

Steve Mittleman 8:39

the amazing thing about Gilbert he was so talented. That when he finally you know, the fetching, old you character that he does that voice. When he finally kind of made it could have made it eight different ways. You know, I mean, his material was funny. He didn't need the voice. But I remember going oh my god in my head I've got this is what he chose to make it with. You know, and he did great, great career is so many he was truly a comics comic. All the comics love was going in and watching Gilbert do his thing.

John DeBellis 9:10

Did you know that Gilbert when we mean my ex wife got married? Yeah, we moved to LA and Gilbert after about I think we only married a couple of weeks Kilburn lived with us for about a month and a half. Well, who might see the cheapest individuals that ever lived? Yeah. Really. It's not a character that is just incredibly cheap,

Steve Mittleman 9:28

openly. He's open about it. Actually. He'll go to hotels and just take this this champagne

John DeBellis 9:34

with the soaps and that's what time he would he tells a story about how he bought a shirt in a thrift store downtown New York, and it was 30 cents or 40 cents or whatever. He didn't know if he should take it back or not. He was talking to his sister, you know, and his sister was saying, I don't know, maybe you should wait and decide or whatever. So he finally decides he's going to take it back and he got really pissed because he had gone back and we'd gone back into it. It was a fun IRS something the store was destroyed, said he was 40 cents he was because he couldn't bring the shirt back.

Steve Mittleman 10:07

I don't actually I love all the guys. He's a guy that I don't remember going out to eat with, you know what I mean? We were friendly in no way. Didn't want to pay for D down.

John DeBellis 10:17

You know, there's another story that you might be telling a story this a great just a typical guilt story for me and Buddy, all of us are at the bar that catch a rising star. And we still see Gilbert get in a car with the girl cam, okay. And we saw him he paid for the cab, which blew our mind. So he got they go downtown. So he's apparently on the couch with this really hot girl. And he's making out with her. And they stop. Right? And then she asked for money. So he was telling us this story. And we said, Gilbert well, you're it's been really pissed. He goes, No, I said, cuz he goes when we were moving around, I said it must have shook a lot or whatever. He said, I picked up the cushions and said a bunch of change.

Steve Mittleman 11:05

That's classic. Wow. Yeah.

John DeBellis 11:08

I'm sorry. Eat up that story. By the way.

Steve Mittleman 11:10

John. John wrote a tremendous book about the improv and you can mention that I mean,

Jeff Dwoskin 11:16

Stand Up Guys Stand Up Guys. And um, guys, yeah, fun book.

Steve Mittleman 11:19

Once I knew I was ended, I didn't read it. Really? It's a great rate, everybody. Oh, thanks.

Jeff Dwoskin 11:26

Oh, John, talk talk a little bit more about the book. Is it road stories? Is it just anecdotes, from the different story,

John DeBellis 11:33

it's my mom. But it really it's about how to become the whole goal in the beginning of book has really become a heavyweight into clubs. So you get to get your own spots. And it's about that process of becoming, working your way up through the clubs and the process and all the different people at different kinds of people that were back then, you know, all the different comics, and it was a good thing. I wanted to bring a feeling of what it was like to be there to be, you know, with everybody in the fun that we had and just a good time feeling. I didn't badmouth anybody. I kept it just fun. And about everybody, though, bartenders, everybody has

Steve Mittleman 12:06

a great, great, great book, it is a great note was actually real, anybody that's interested in comedy and the formation of all these brilliant minds, we were very lucky. I have to say that there was no Jeff there was no guarantee, except we love comedy. We love laughing. We love funny people we love developing, but there was there were no gigs back then there were almost zero gigs. We did it because we didn't know comedy was going to build. And there was going to be a renaissance when he knew that. Nobody knew anything. We just knew we were like this cast of characters. And this was home for us. It was an amazing time for many, many, many, many years. So there will never

John DeBellis 12:50

be another time like that. We were lucky. Because we were comedy had been really asked. I mean, in the club scenes with dead, everything was dead. So anybody that came up at the time came up because they loved it. You know, and there wasn't an opportunity. We didn't even see an opportunity to make money.

Steve Mittleman 13:07

Yeah, I'm not I'm not doing this to showcase myself for an acting career. People did comedy music exist, grew up loving comedy. And they thought maybe I can do this Bill Maher

John DeBellis 13:17

had that great statement about going into the clubs. And he said he remember they're going in there and he has to have been there a couple of days, whatever he does first when his first thoughts and feelings is wow, I am around people just like me. Yes, he always fell, you know, as a comic. Well, you got both the guys comics, you know that we always feel not like a lot of other people. We always have been a little different about us. And when you went into this club, which is called 40 comics, 30 comics, just like yourself neurotic, crazy, you

Steve Mittleman 13:47

know, and the camaraderie was insane. I felt that what he said people just like me except for you job that was the only person with a thing like this.

Jeff Dwoskin 14:00

What was Bill Barr like back then it was a basically the same as he has now very close. He

Steve Mittleman 14:07

knew he was very smart, among the smartest in the room. He was fairly confident in his abilities. And he you know, he like he was you know, if you call it rough around the edges, because we all were and you know, you I think I kind of liken it to a sculpture, you know, your artistic voice

John DeBellis 14:26

and then the game a lot because his father was I think was a network executive. Oh, I didn't know that for CBS. And whenever ABC Bill was not only very smart from going to an Ivy League school and all the other stuff, but he also knew more about playing the game and he knew how to do it. He was shrewd Yeah, to this day. He's very, you know, respectful of the guys from our time period and stuff. Oh, yeah. He's he's a good guy.

Jeff Dwoskin 14:52

You worked with him on politically incorrect for a while? Yeah, yeah, he's he's a good guy. Very

John DeBellis 14:59

compact. shift towards comics. That's I found him anyway, very passionate towards comics, when you know, this is

Steve Mittleman 15:05

Rodney, Rodney opened up a club at the Tropicana and they've had many clubs around the country as Jeff has, you know, I'm sure John knows. And I played a great deal of like with the casino, you know, clubs and you know, all throughout the country had been probably every state or almost every state and so Rodney opens up rod nice place at the trop is the only one and all these years meals for the COMEX $150 cash for the week for expenses aside what he was paying them. He's the only one in the history I can think of that did that, you know, he's like, take care of the guys take care of the mom when

John DeBellis 15:46

my mom was in Vegas, and we're a bunch of girlfriends and she calls me up and she says John Rodney is in town in Vegas playing and I said once you just leave a note, tell me my mother leaving though. You know he'll get back to you. So Ronnie Natalie gets back to when he gets to the table right up front with five or six of her girlfriends comped. Nobody pays everything we love to set. He does his set. He does two or three jokes that I wrote in a row, you know? And then he calls my mother. He says how many stops to show and he says I like you. That's three jokes. I just did this to them and Mr. Bellos please stand up his her son wrote these jokes and stuff. It's a great story. And afterwards, he went over and sat with them. You're not shy. Rodney can be he's three. The oldest one

Steve Mittleman 16:28

is awkward. Awkward. Unless he unless he had a chance to score maybe score with him. We don't even know. Yeah,

Jeff Dwoskin 16:35

I will say you guys are the first comedians I've talked to reflecting on Rodney Dangerfield that didn't do it in his voice. Oh,

John DeBellis 16:45

you do? Good. Rodney. Steve.

Steve Mittleman 16:48

Things are rough. I'll tell you what, I'll tell you a couple of stories. So every you know few months I would get a call because I had like shorter what he calls self deprecating deprecating material. And once in a while, somebody would go in they had these joke writing services. And they would go out to the clubs. They lift a line. So sir Rodney, and that rod he would try and the joke. I would get a phone call from rod eight. Hey, Steve, how you doing? Hey, I'm good. Rod. Said, I got this joke. They say it's your joke. I go. Yeah, guess what? It is my joke. But I was trying to sell jokes to rod in his back then. Like $50 a joke. It's still today. comics don't like to be $50 A joke that's 40 years later, 45 years later, and after like three or four or five or six tries to try to sell them a joke. I said Rodney, it was. I was breastfed through a straw. It was pretty strong. I knew why mom hated me. I was breastfed through his truck. Anyway, and then I'm on you know Rodney Dangerfield group and they show clips of all this stuff. And then I finally went, Oh, my God, I got to hear him do my joke. That's awesome. Well, it's somewhere around 1980, early 80s. I was visiting Seinfeld and ship in LA. And spontaneously we go. Let's drive to Vegas. We drive to Vegas. We get there. We see. I think it's at the sands, Rodney Dangerfield that we all knew and loved Rodney and he knew us. We got Let's go. We tell the woman that hey, we're friends recovering from New York. She got us a seat in the back like a booth in the back. We that at the end of the show. We had blast watching the show. And we had seen him you know endless times at the clubs in New York and hung out with him. We asked you know, where's Ronnie go after the show? They go and she comes down and says hi to people after the show. We go and he goes, Hey, boys, how you doing? My role manager left, he can take his robe that we'd have like bills with him. We slept for a couple of days. And we saw that weekend we saw Steve Martin we saw Freddie Roman and shigar. We saw David Grettir. We saw like four comics in 48 hours. And then we drove off. He's like an amazing education. And we had so much fun and it was all spontaneous trip two days. Sorry

Jeff Dwoskin 19:07

to interrupt, but we have to take a quick break. I do want to thank everyone for their support of the sponsors. When you support the sponsors. You're supporting us here at Classic conversations. And that's how we keep the lights on. And now back was Steven John. I would have loved to have seen Steve Martin live. Oh,

Steve Mittleman 19:23

amazing. I mean, he was the Beatles truly read. I worked with him on a couple of movies. His response from the audience is Why do you love comedy? He just couldn't. He could just go hello or whatever. However you did it while the crazy guy and then he'd have like an hour and 20 minutes of laughs but he didn't feel like he had any input. It was just you know, pointed laugh because of this famous guy who sets it up and Sam. Yeah, kind of like he was like the Beatles a comedy for X amount of years. Some you know that one time in Vegas, but one time at the Miami Highlife on Tom I think it's called Fontan anyway, and they had a concert in there and everybody's jammed in. And the laughter was insane. It was insane. This is the mid 70s visiting my parents down in Florida. And it was just the laughter was so crazy. It was like nothing I've ever seen. Well, the funniest

John DeBellis 20:18

guy I ever saw in person for me, and I still don't know why I laugh. I can't even tell you why LF was Andy Kaufman love though I, I would cry when I saw that call from Andy. And I don't even know why I was I had no idea why I was laughing. Well, it's so the joke. It's it's just with whatever he does that Prasanna that he did, which is make you all of a sudden you can't help but you don't want to laugh because he gets you angry. And then he makes you laugh so hard to stop. I know. You like him. He's just he was it blew my mind

Steve Mittleman 20:50

watching him. I don't know if I've ever met him. I think I nodded hello to him. You know, that's about it buddies with Bob's and Muda. So when I was I used to sneak in because I'm tall, you know, and I was like, 17 I would sneak into the clubs and watch you know, some either from in high school I'd go with friends. You know, I was very lucky. They just let me in Saturday night. One Saturday night. There's this British MC we're talking it had to be like 1972 or something. This British MC the whole night. Thank you, Mr. Friedman for allowing me to, you know, be the master of ceremonies tonight need like, whole show. Bah bah, bah, bah, bah. And I'm telling you 20 years later, I went and because yeah, I did not know. It was anti tilt. It crystallized out of nowhere, like Andy cop who was Andy Kaufman. I had no clue

John DeBellis 21:40

improv hated when he worked the door because he would come into work the door sometimes and Judy would say he would answer the phone and people would make reservations and he keep putting him through to other people but it seems em with different accents. And they wouldn't get your reservations because it just keep putting him through different people. That's so funny. But and he was Elaine boozer was first love and

Steve Mittleman 22:00

yeah, big time. Yes, she's still very fun. Yeah, yep. Very far away. She's

John DeBellis 22:05

one of the greatest, the

Steve Mittleman 22:07

greatest at a med fan. Let's

John DeBellis 22:09

go back. Elena is wonderful.

Steve Mittleman 22:11

Let's go mats.

Jeff Dwoskin 22:12

You guys are so funny. All right. Elaine. Boozer talked to me about Elaine boozer

Steve Mittleman 22:16

she's a very welcoming, sweet, good natured well meaning decent sweet. So she

John DeBellis 22:24

showed me the ropes so i She was one of the past me watching you Bob show up at the auditions. But then the next night I met Elaine and Elaine Choate took me under her wing from day one and showed me told what to do he told me to hang out at the clubs even when you don't have to come on show

Steve Mittleman 22:40

the day to not day one let's try to correct your recollection. whatever date

John DeBellis 22:46

you then I call my friends job to lane first job ever so Joe Lane boozer you know you're getting fat when you step on your toes, dogs telling me dies. First job ever I wrote

Steve Mittleman 22:56

it is harder than Radek because she's such a dog lower. Yeah, that's true. is greatly. So yeah.

Jeff Dwoskin 23:03

Let's talk about Rosie O'Donnell, part of my

Steve Mittleman 23:06

claim to fame as I beat her on our search. So our search Yeah, and she had held Wow, there's a story behind the story behind the story of Star Search would be but so she had won like 1011 weeks in a row. And even though it was like two minutes of material when you did stand up on the show, when I beat her, she she held my hands and backstage she said, Oh, thank God, I run out of material like three weeks ago, she had the personality that you know, I think some nice people have the personality or fun enrolling, whatever you want to call it. And that's it was her time to be discovered. And that weekly exposure did like wonders for her. I don't I think she I don't know if she went on to win the whole season. She definitely had a and then I lost the next week. So we'll tell you the story. John knows a bit about my neurotic parents. Oh, yeah. And I was telling him a story about my mom today but show my parents they weren't supportive. They didn't know how to be supportive. So I, I won, and everybody's happy. I won and they thought it was going to move on and onward and upward on Star Search. And I thought so even the people, the producers thought so. But I lost the next week to Ken over may he rest in peace, funny guy. Even Ken said to me backstage he said i i would have voted for you. I thought you won. So I lost and I never heard a word of consolation from my parents. You know, you feel like Well, son, you know, we I wish you had one but Bravo you beat Rosie and you know you're doing well in your career and so on and so on. So after a week of nothing, and I'm kind of boiling over with like, they don't call and so I finally called them and I got my dad on the phone. I go you know it really would have been nice if I got some kind of sweet message from you guys or or a call or an anything from you guys after losing is you knew I was disappointed and he literally said mom didn't like your material. Man.

John DeBellis 25:11

You got one better than that though.

Steve Mittleman 25:14

Remember that my parents were in the Gilbert category of Thriftiness. But my parents lived through the Great Depression. And they both had their own sad stories around it to defend them a little bit, but this is bad. So I do rock SEO as Steve Barton. It's like a 10 week shoot. I'm like the sixth lead in the movie. It's a hit movie. It was Entertainment Tonight. They did the premiere at some, you know, Grossman's is something I walked into red carpet. I'm on Entertainment Tonight. It's so it's now the next day, and it's Thursday, it's gonna pop up and on Friday, I called my parents just to make sure they know hey, this movie is going to be ahead. It's going to be well received and Steve Martin and Daryl Hannah and you know, I have a big role in the movie and my dad goes, Wow, we're gonna wait for it to get to the dollar theater. Imagine, imagine, I was not surprised but it was shocking that my parents were wackadoo and it was more sickness than anything. Look how spiritual I am. And

John DeBellis 26:20

tastes father. How emotionally

Steve Mittleman 26:23

evolved I am.

Jeff Dwoskin 26:25

Ivanka Jewish parents said recognize that boys grow to be a nice Jewish comedian. Yeah,

Steve Mittleman 26:31

I know. There's one other story like that my whole family was down in Florida for something maybe my parents anniversary and so Coco and her husband were Benny were there and J and BB my sister in law so Coco is my sister or husband and my parents you know and it was at the comic strip in Fort Lauderdale and I just destroyed you know I just destroyed but they were further enough back with the lights in your eyes that you know club lights you don't see you can't see people it's better that way and when you have family there when I killed and never heard a word from my parents you know of course never heard a word or just remember I was telling my brother and sister this they sit oh man dad he was pounding the table laughing so hard but he could not tell me you are breaking that way but I realized in perilous over others and honestly I think that's their loss there was my loss a bit but that's their loss not having the ability to express that

Jeff Dwoskin 27:29

definitely their loss in the moment to be able to fell over your child that's not something you should pass on. I

John DeBellis 27:35

when I told my grandfather I was gonna go to college yes good just stupid kids when you went to college

Steve Mittleman 27:40

I remember that line Yeah, so God I don't know if I told you this but we live you know create more mental hospital

John DeBellis 27:47

Yeah, honestly about that place many times it's like

Steve Mittleman 27:50

but I'm gonna tell you what really happened we actually when we were really young they were you know building parts of it either giant mounds of dirt my friends that I you know would sneak in weird sneak into metal hospital. We literally among the metal patients and everything we would think it was they had these giant mounds of dirt It was fun. It was near us it tells you about my child and my family that we would sneak into a mental Ross like once a month people would escape there they literally had the man in the White the booby wagons like looking for a metal frame today to actually continue and I was afraid my brother and sister who are older they will go who they're gonna come to get you in that saw they're coming to take you away right? I wouldn't hide under my bed. It was so thin and small. I would hide under my bed Wow Yeah, but we used to sneak in to a mental hospital that's how crazy my family was nothing seemed wrong about it is he lived the perfect place for me it is it is it's my home

John DeBellis 28:49

yeah now we're at the point the age now when you're with a girl just says when you go to my play your high school home

Steve Mittleman 28:56

yeah yeah yeah you go you want to go back to my place you go she goes you we are in your place are ready What do you mean with John

Jeff Dwoskin 29:02

toxic talk to me about writing for a Saturday Night Live?

John DeBellis 29:06

I would that was not great that you know I didn't I wasn't crazy about it. Be honest. It was a lot of work and wasn't as wild as I thought it would be as far as to create creatively. Television in general is is not in the only there's only a few shows I had fun on. One was with the blue my bosses I forget the name of this show was Paul Haggis pull he gets wrote Million Dollar Baby. You wrote a couple of Bond movies. He wouldn't he won an Emmy for one at a school. Oh, it was crash. He direct wrote and directed crash and we who I work on a show with him and it was so much fun. We come in about 11 and he say okay, can you just get any time to go out and buy CDs. So we go out and buy music. And then when we come back and it was wild. We just had a party who didn't work. He's dancing, putting music on he's dancing on top of tables and stuff like that. And finally about four o'clock he decided to write we'd have with Leonard Cohen playing on the stereo. Really? Wow. This one. He was the greatest guy. Just just it's fun. Yeah, he's a great guy. I'm looking at you were you say?

Steve Mittleman 30:16

Can you hear me just as well, by the way now? Oh, no, really? Wow. Oh, it's only because my back was hurting. That's why.

Jeff Dwoskin 30:24

All right. Alice Johnson questions. Well, it's back.

Steve Mittleman 30:29

Okay, go. Why not? I don't mind. I've talked.

Jeff Dwoskin 30:32

Well go back talking about Fred Willard and DC Follies.

John DeBellis 30:35

Wow, man is another great guy. What a great, great way. What's your love? It'd be he was his not only so funny, but he was so quiet, very shy. And you would she would come up to you with a script. And I'm not exaggerating. He would actually say can I take it all out, place it with ah, he was he was so respectful and that he and his wife, his wife. She was wonderful. He wrote this really, really dirty sketch for the wrap party where Nixon playing with his balls. And Fred didn't want to read it because it was so dirty and his wife made him read it said she had read it and we blew the place down and Marty sitkoff would not come on after us because it was after Fred and with a puppet accent. Fred is wonderful. I did rock say with him. He was great baseball fan too. And and Elvis Elvis. He loved Elvis.

Steve Mittleman 31:27

No. We got to try. I know this. Is it off track, Jeff but there's a show about Elvis in Simi Valley. somebody finds out he's alive. They interview him and it's a show about that. So maybe we could find that show. It'd be a lot of fun. The guy plays Elvis is if he never died if as if he did like a like a JFK or any one thing. Good premise.

Jeff Dwoskin 31:50

Good premise. That sounds really really interesting. Great. Great.

John DeBellis 31:53

Very, very quiet. But yeah, really funny. I used to do the end that I used to let him in John rocker used to do the Reagan puppet. I would let them ad lib at the end of the show. And then I would call it down. Put it up again. And I let them ad lib more from Waffle what they did. And he was so funny that I

Jeff Dwoskin 32:11

interviewed Jim paddock and we were talking about the scene from Best in Show that they did together when they were Yeah, we're doing a dog show.

Steve Mittleman 32:19

What a great show. That was I was gonna mention that Christopher guest's movies and you just mentioned Yeah, he's he's insane. You know? Guffman brilliant Guffman awesome show great

John DeBellis 32:31

best Joe he stole the whole show. Yeah, I thought I thought he was amazing. Like to

Steve Mittleman 32:34

see it maybe we should watch that one of these days.

John DeBellis 32:37

I would love He makes me evil. He laughed so hard. I also work with Leslie Nielsen.

Jeff Dwoskin 32:41

Oh my God really? Yeah. Where

John DeBellis 32:43

we are just a very sweet guy but he always carried a whoopee cushion with him. Oh

Jeff Dwoskin 32:48

my God always heard that we've put it down or something.

John DeBellis 32:52

Whatever nasty nobody would have make the sound and stuff whatever he would do. He always had the always say

Steve Mittleman 32:56

something about whoopee cushions. I opened up for Robert goo lay in Rochester in February, Rochester, New York, the coldest, it was like the worst dinner theater. It's like you got very old people eating dinner and you're doing stand up. I'm with Kathy Landman and it was, you know, we're together for a few years. And you know, I meet him backstage opening night and all of a sudden you hear you grow up from seeing you know, Robert gelei in the movies and Broadway and you know, Merv and Mike Douglas and every show our TV shows in the US a big big name and and all of a sudden he's fired up a storm and fired up a storm right the second meeting how many squinty edits Robert qulaity has a whoopee cushion like behind his

John DeBellis 33:42

watch? Hysterical. It's so funny.

Jeff Dwoskin 33:43

That is really funny. What did you work with Leslie Nielsen on a TV or movie or take

John DeBellis 33:50

a special like one shot special of sort of like a DC file is the same puppets and all the other stuff and it was a I forget what the premise was did a show with him on our show and he was wonderful. It's really I have to pick you know, some you united or many people because we come up in this business. You know, who isn't? He may listen all of him. I don't know yet this thing about him. I don't know what it was. But he was just really great. I mean, I'm not saying being

Speaker 2 34:17

funny, but now it's just amazing them that make a gun TV show was about that scene when he plays the umpire

Jeff Dwoskin 34:25

while police squad the original show too. It's just so brilliant. Yeah, that's great. Sorry to interrupt me. Let's take another quick break. And we're back. Here's a question for ya. Carson and Leno from a comics point of view. What was the difference? Yeah,

Steve Mittleman 34:41

everybody loved cars. A lot of comics. Don't love J mean, I know. There's two different J's there's a that's a club act and travel the country and he's a great comic. And he I mean, I did a sketch with them, but there's a GA that is ultra competitive. Mmm. Were Seinfeld's 40th or 50th birthday, and everybody did a little bit there. And Jay is heckling me. And I said, you know, I said, and I was doing like three minutes or whatever. I was goofing on Seinfeld style. Why do they call it the number two pencil? What is number one feel like you had you know, what was three days, Doug thing like that, and insight and all of a sudden Leno's heckling me. And I stop. I go, Jay, you got an amazing career. You're known worldwide. You've been the host of The Tonight Show for 20 years, and you need to echo me, you really need to echo me at Jerry's birthday party, Jay, I think is just ultra ultra ultra competitive. I think in the comedy world, he and Jay kind of were the cook, he and Jerry were like the CO kings of comedy from our generation, I would say Larry's way, way, way up there. But as far as visibility and seizing that and wanting it, I think and being very talented. That mean there was nothing like Carson, he was

John DeBellis 36:09

double thing going with Jay though, Jay. Jay, I remember I was sitting with him and a table at the Improv surely maybe a year or so after a few years after he did tonight that you know not did it but was hosting the show became his he was looking at this one because one comic gate wanted to give him a video of his set. And he gave him the video and the guy left and chases me I don't know these people. They think because they weren't very good in the beginning. They're going to be good but now and I'm thinking yes, that's how people do they change they didn't the beginning weren't very good. They get better. But watch a disdain. And I think it was part of who maybe he was getting pestered by so many people.

Steve Mittleman 36:47

I don't know how to well I will I will say is he's a nice guy. I

John DeBellis 36:52

still think he's a really nice guy.

Steve Mittleman 36:53

I would agree with you on that. I mean, I guess it depends on your experience with him. Me It's okay if somebody say so and so is all about so and so. But Jay is like crazy about Jay I think it

John DeBellis 37:05

was not right him heckling you like that? He should not you should have gotten nowadays, right?

Jeff Dwoskin 37:09

You could be like

Steve Mittleman 37:11

Will Smith. But no. The other thing I would say about Jane is Jane made it from all these appearances on tonight's show and Letterman mainly those two are worth watching points and that J did not intern lodge anybody that we know of unless they were like the dancing Ito's the one great thing about Carson is he had such joy in people succeeding. Yes. And Jay, you never got that from Jay. And to me that's a very telling legacy. Sadly, he can't say the talent wasn't out there. No, it's always so it's there. And then you look at Letterman on the other side. Letterman had people on Listen may recipes job where the spoon, you know, it's like the material gets thin after a while. But he friend of his they started together. There were many people like that. You know, he was like wanting to help his friends you help other comics. And that said something or a lot about

John DeBellis 38:08

why Richard Lewis is Korean. Yes. I remember when he was got to decide to get in Latin as you kept telling me I was going to tell he was so unbelievably happy. He was using him and it changed his career.

Jeff Dwoskin 38:18

I think David Letterman revived Jay Leno's career. I watched the whole CNN history of late night and the way they played it out is Leno and pretty much was done like the tonight show wasn't having him back nothing and but he kept killing on the Letterman Show. Yeah, any man He parlayed that into the back into the tonight show casting and then eventually you're robbing David Letterman of his dreams.

Steve Mittleman 38:43

Well, I think again, assuming everything worked out well because CBS I thought it was a great fit Letterman and CBS in New York. So probably would it be as he was very talented would have done well, if he did take over the Tonight Show. I finally watched that late shift movie, which is I'd like you to I watched a walk while working out like right there on my spin bike watched a couple of days they watch that.

John DeBellis 39:11

You know they kick Johnny all out. I know that story. Because I was friends with Jim McCall. McCall. He was head to town quarter Tonight Show and good friends a chain that did a lot of work with different things with him. Jim told me, he said that Carson wanted to stay on what we did. But they had higher ratings when the younger guys took over the show. So NBC actually push cars now.

Jeff Dwoskin 39:34

Yeah, yeah. And I think that Helen, Krishna ik helped with that, too. I just watched the late shift. Also, the I watched it not too long ago. Yeah, I'm a big Betty Thomas fan. It was a good thing. I loved seeing rich little. I haven't seen him in a while. Yeah,

Steve Mittleman 39:49

yeah, yes. Oh, yeah. Sal, talented. He and David fry were the two gods and Frank Gorshin the three Impressionists that were amazing every time I did the best when the Nixon and JOHNSON Oh yeah, I wrote an album for him. Did you know that with Billy and I, yeah, we wrote an album for him. But it never got sold. He had in a really bad drinking problem and it kind of he was really

John DeBellis 40:13

sick. We're up the show halfway through for him. He would show a little

Steve Mittleman 40:17

Phillips and Nixon kind of spoof film while he would run to the bathroom. If through checks

John DeBellis 40:24

of the tray, Steve, have you were you in Ronnie's dressing room? When he would ever come in? You would come in between shows he would wear a robe but nothing not when he would sit and talk to you when he pee in the saying yeah, I

Steve Mittleman 40:36

know that his balls would be flowing out of that robe I know it's so his

John DeBellis 40:42

philosophy of life. He told me Dr. Tam my philosophy of life and so one day you think I have the perfect blow job? He said you realize what we play that you want another one is better.

Jeff Dwoskin 40:54

Everyone talks about Rodney his generosity and eventually his balls. That is a constant theme.

John DeBellis 41:02

And the hookers want to get a hooker quadrature cook for it. Come on. I'll pay for it. I

Steve Mittleman 41:06

think well, that actually happened with Larry with it many times Ryan and Billy and I and I said no, I can't. I couldn't I couldn't handle it. I just left every different times.

Jeff Dwoskin 41:18

Steve, I want to ask I wanted to ask you about Extreme Makeover was more like just wow, just putting your body through that. I mean, you look amazing. It's

Steve Mittleman 41:27

it should be called Extreme Makeover work in progress. Because it took about three months. I'm glad I did it. As long as they look better than John I'm happy I John set a high bar I said no way I can not live the rest of my life.

John DeBellis 41:42

When problems Didn't you have to go back to something because you exercise

Steve Mittleman 41:45

zodia My I actually had my hurt my third eye straighten that was interesting. But I had a strabismus surgery. This guy No artl Rosen bow or Blum. I forget already. It's 17 years ago. And wow. He would do kids like lazy eye they call it but strabismus surgery, and I was exercising too much after and they had to redo forgetting my right eye or my left I had in both eyes. I had it done. So I'm glad I did it. You know, I was doing all the self deprecating material. And I did it you know, for like 20 something years. And it was like I was turning 49 during the process of makeover certainly was like burnt out. I said, You know something, this is going to shake me up. And you know, just about 50. And, you know, maybe this is a sign that I It's okay to do. It'll force me to do different material and kind of get out the self outside of the self deprecating material. And anyway, so that's, that's what I did. I had the opportunity. I got an email one day and I familiar with the show I was I'd seen it you know, it was married around that time. And then we split up. I remember watching it with my wife at the time. And I said no, these people are very brave. And in a who knew I was going to meet like, you know, 20 people going through the process. But I got an email one day going, Hey, I'm an agent, I'm in the Midwest, and they put the putting it out there. I thought you were right for this.

John DeBellis 43:13

I think you need to get your finger. What kind

Steve Mittleman 43:16

of compliment is that? Like, hey, not really great candidate for this. And then I ran it by everybody. I ran it by going look at your jump audit, you know? Like, I still had to fill out like literally 40 pages of forms and get approval and my family approval and you don't like it? You don't mess around. Yeah, my brother did agree to it. John. I'm just

John DeBellis 43:42

curious to ask your blogger and get them to get approval.

Steve Mittleman 43:45

They want to make sure you're literally before you do the gift of makeover. You go through like hours upon hours of psychological testing. Meet therapists. Yeah, you go through a hell of a screening for that. I thought because of my credits that I would this is kind of a real win win. It's a cool for them because I'm sort of known, you know what I mean? It's like, like, Hey, we're giving a makeover to comedians see middlemen. And yeah, it done like 100 TV shows, 50 commercials, a bunch of movies, some sitcom. So it's to me that had some visibility. There was one other comic that it was down to the wire between he and I were we had very, I thought very confidently that based on my credits that I would be the one picked and I was the one pick. So Wow. It's a weird experience. But it was it was very good. So I'm

Jeff Dwoskin 44:35

guessing you did not mention the hanging out at the mental institution store. Yeah,

Steve Mittleman 44:41

that's very funny. Very funny. So yeah, it was very unique. I will tell you and I don't know if John knows the story that it's like $100,000 where the surgery. They don't want you to be seen by anybody. They want to be the ones that launch you they like the big surprise Hey, this is when you look like Like now, I don't want to do that. So a couple of things. One, I had split up with his girlfriend. And so my other good friends you know since starting in comedy like also like John Blake 45 years, Billy reback and Tom Stern, they, they kind of like I set up a meal with them. And because there was like, you know, going up, I just put up with her, but it was my choice, but I split up with her. And, you know, they took me out for dinner somewhere during and I was not supposed to be seen by anybody somehow in this restaurant, this Italian restaurant. And as I think it's called on Pico in LA, somebody from the production office from ABC saw me there, oh, call the Exec. And I had like three screaming phone messages in the old days with answering machines, three screaming messages from the executive producer. We're going to sue you. You mean I had to talk them down the next day. Crazy. I wrote out her apology. Please understand, I just split up with somebody and my friends were big, very nice. And so I kind of saved my face. Now I asked. I see my ex by phase seems

Jeff Dwoskin 46:06

like an extreme overreaction. They had Oh, on their part.

Steve Mittleman 46:09

Yes. Because nobody. It's not like I was going to bleed out into the oh my god, Steve middlemen. Had a makeover. Nobody was going to do that.

Jeff Dwoskin 46:19

Because what was going to happen is I was gonna take your picture, it ends up in the newspaper a week later. It's not like today. Yes,

Steve Mittleman 46:24

it was such an overreaction on their part. And my friends were just doing me a favor. But I think it's an interesting story. So

Jeff Dwoskin 46:32

the great story, great story. And the other

Steve Mittleman 46:34

thing is last thing I know I'm sure it up time here. But so the show airs literally, I probably got 50 emails, like probably 50 phone calls like the night of the show. And the next morning, I was flying out to Florida. And but I was recognized more from the Extreme Makeover than any other TV show ever did. Wow. Walk on board the plane I was going to a gig and and the flight attendants go. Oh my god, we saw you last night. Congratulations. Good for you and walk it down the toilet paper pouring Hey, good for you, Steve. Congratulations. I sit down and take off and then a flight attendant. You know, she's moving the drink cart along taking the drink orders and she spots me and goes, Hey, congratulations, good for you. You look great. And you know the woman next to you. She knows nothing, obviously. And she puts down her magazine. She says Well, I gotta ask you what's all this? Congratulations about? I said, Well, I'm I just got Extreme Makeover. And I swear to you she looks reopened down and says that is so fabulous. So when do you start? I swear to you that's a true true true story.

Jeff Dwoskin 47:48

Man. Very funny. I couldn't believe it. That is funny. What a classic. Yeah, this classic. I want to thank you guys for hanging out with me. This was so much fun. Thank you guys. Great.

Steve Mittleman 47:58

It was fun for me. But no, you have to deal with John's ego.

Jeff Dwoskin 48:02

John's egos are worse.

John DeBellis 48:04

I'm gonna let put this onto you Steve real quickly. I'm gonna just start it. Does the thing mean Steve do when we started out with the fake feud, where and everything and when we got built to everything is middlemen fault. It's middlemen fault. We have this group checks and I'm gonna let you finish it myself. kneeled around on the GitHub type Pat Bennett House Husband and the guitar player you know, writes the songs and stuff. Brian, Karen, who's a news guy on CNN and a bunch of different stuff and a former guy FBI.

Steve Mittleman 48:29

US press bull for like 40 years. We

John DeBellis 48:32

started doing the middle man's fault on this group text. So as most middle news folks we get almonds fall. Brian picked it up. He's with the press pool the White House now you take it away. Brian's

Steve Mittleman 48:41

walking into the watching the CNN. He's on the phone with John and they're making fun of me get out. Brian's emphatic. They go it's Milburn's fault. You know, like some terrible tragedy happens in the world anything that somebody can be blamed he and jawed, especially middlemen is fault. But this whole text everybody is it's middlemen fault. So one of the executive producers of some show that he's going on Don Lemon or something, and he hears this

John DeBellis 49:11

back, the mic went out and something and Brian, you know, it's minimize that.

Steve Mittleman 49:16

And then Brian explains what we just explained to you. And the guy goes, Oh, yeah, I love that guy. And I'm a fan of his which is very sweet. You don't know who knows you're right. in show business. You don't know who knows you. Like a few weeks later. There's another incident at CNN, like goes out of St. Mike goes out and this producer goes to Brian is middle of his fall. Okay, now now it's starting to catch on. Now, weeks later, Ryan's going into the White House, the West Wing security in the White House. And at that moment, a guy hops the fence, which Ryan has told us happens more often than we know and is running toward the White House. Right? They're gonna make a higher fence. Oh, Anyway, Brian had been telling it's middlemen his fault to the security service at the White House and the one guy was a fan of mine, you know, another guy, you know, explains it to him who I am and why they call me that as middlemen fault. This guy's I jumped at punch line but a guy is running toward the White House. And Brian, here's through the Secret Service sound system is his IT security. He hears the word these words, we have a middlemen situation. And

John DeBellis 50:31

then months later, again, there was a problem and it became a catch word

Steve Mittleman 50:35

for the food became a buzz lingo was wrong White

John DeBellis 50:39

House now you will hear the secret server. We have middlemen situation. It's

Jeff Dwoskin 50:44

amazing. We have a middle of middlemen situation right here my Zoom times, right, it's right.

Steve Mittleman 50:50

Oh, yeah, we have a minute to go. We

Jeff Dwoskin 50:52

have a minute to go. Okay. Appreciate you guys so much. This was so much fun. I know. We could probably go on for hours. But like so many great stories. I can't thank you enough for sharing them with me, Boris,

Steve Mittleman 51:02

if you send flowers in honor of the passing of John's humor. But no, we have so much fun with each other and we have endless our fake feud is a lot of fun. You know, maybe we've done a drop of it here. But we do endless fake few with each other. But it's all because we hate each other room

John DeBellis 51:22

and spa, you stand on as middlemen for Thank

Jeff Dwoskin 51:25

you very much. Thank you guys so much. Thank you.

Steve Mittleman 51:28

That was a lot of fun, Jeff, anytime. All right, everyone.

Jeff Dwoskin 51:31

One more time for Steve Edelman and John Debellis. That much similarity and one episode has never happened before may never happen again. They were awesome, weren't they so many great stories loved everyone can't believe the interviews over I mean, it's episode 301. Now complete. Again, huge thank you to Steve mittleman and John Debellis. And of course, a huge thank you to all of you. Coming back week after week means the world to me, and I'll see you next time.

CTS Announcer 52:01

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