Mike Knox on Comedy, Corrections, and Turning Pain Into Purpose

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Welcome to Hecast, the official podcast of He Changed It.

As always, I am Mike Chisholm. As always, I am so excited to

have conversations around the world of men's mental Wellness

and hear the stories of the plethora of people that we have

as guests on our show. If you haven't downloaded the He

Changed It app, what the heck are you waiting for?

Head on over to hechangedit.com and take a look at this, this

movement that is trying to be made in, in, in, in making the

world a more empowered place where men can actually, we're

going to take back the phrase man up.

You know, I talked about this with our with our guest off

camera. We want to take back the phrase

man up. You know, manning up many times

has been sort of a negative thing where you you stuff stuff

down and you just, you know, you know, man up.

Well, manning up really at the end of the day is taking

responsibility for where we're at in our lives and taking a

look at what we can do to change things and actually making those

efforts. That's manning up.

And that's the very definition of courage in so many

situations. I appreciate that.

Today's guest is a guy by the name of Mike Knox.

Mike Knox, you may have heard of him.

He's a comedian out of California, you know, the hotbed

of, of, of stand up down in the LA area.

He's up on stage all the time. But his, his story is pretty

crazy. You know, he's in his early 50s

now. He was a corrections officer for

a long time and, and, and, and, and state a corrections officer

because he had to pay the bills and, and as he was doing that,

you know, would try and do stand up, you know, around, around his

schedule if he could, to exercise about creativity.

But then he talks about his daughter.

He's written a, a couple of books, one of them on, on the

ordeal that he and his wife went through with his daughter with

epilepsy. And, and thank goodness she's in

a she's in a great stage right now about to go to college, but

was not like that when she was in her early, early years.

And he wrote a book about it. Vivian's reign.

Mike is phenomenal. And of course we talk about

stand up. Of course we do.

We talk about that as well. But just a really awesome

conversation from a really great guy, funny guy as well.

We talk about the world around us and it just had a really,

really nice conversation. You can find him if you search

everywhere online. Mike Knox comedy, KNOXMIKEKNOX

comedy. He's on the the Instagrams, he's

on the Tik Toks, he's on all of that stuff.

And he's got a website as well if anybody wants to book him.

I hope that you enjoy my conversation.

I sure certainly enjoyed my conversation.

I hope you enjoyed my conversation with comedian,

former corrections officer and author Mike Knox.

Mike, it's so nice to have you here.

A lot of people who have viewed and listened to this show over

the years know how big of a fan I am of stand up and, and how

that's a big part of my world. My first question for you is

this. Rick Ross went from a

correctional officer and became a hit rapper #1 hip hop star.

You took a different Rd. You were a corrections officer

and became a stand up. Is that where you get your

material from? Yeah, but when I worked in the

prison, I, I couldn't really use any of that material.

So I had to wait till I retired. But I definitely, I planned to

get out of there and start doing comedy.

And then so yes, all of my stuff is basically about my, you know,

talk about your background, your vulnerabilities.

So it's all basically woven into prison.

And when I was a parole agent and also the real Rick Ross, I

would walk that guy to the shower because he was in my he

was in my housing unit. And he was a real cool guy.

Like, are you kidding me? Rick Ross?

Yeah. Rick, you, you were a correction

officer at the real Rick Ross's Correctional Facility.

Yeah, he was in, I, I worked in the whole administration

segregation. And he was in there fighting

his. I think he had a bunch of, he

was doing life. And they ultimately, I think at

that, he'd already done 20 years.

But he was just very, I mean, compared to the other 200 guys

that were in there, just very humble, very quiet.

You would never know. And when I was working in there,

I tried looking up Rick Ross, but it was like kind of pre

Internet. There wasn't really a lot on him

until after I left. But you would have never known.

And that's basically for those who's a great is a great

businessman because of that. I mean, he didn't brag or

anything and you wouldn't even know that that's who he was.

For those who don't know, I literally just threw a line out

there to start this. I didn't.

I didn't know that part about this.

For those who don't know the story of the real Rick Ross, it

is a fascinating story. And now that you've said that,

gosh, we talked about, you know, he changed.

It is the is the idea, the whole idea of he changed.

It is going from one place to another.

You talk about a guy who that's, that's that's what he did

essentially, you know, got enough knowledge in, in, in

prison to almost become a lawyer.

Got himself out of prison because of the knowledge that he

got, you know, and he was put in there originally because he was

selling drugs for the CIA essentially, and didn't even

know it. It's a crazy, crazy story.

And now he's out, got out because of the education in

prison. I gotta ask you this.

OK, so you saw him in there, kept to himself, that sort of

thing. Did he stand out as a guy who

was different than all the rest, or were there other stories that

were equally inspirational? But because they didn't have the

headlines and whatnot, you, you see guys who are in there

literally becoming rehabilitated, educating

themselves despite the difficult circumstances they're in.

Oh, yeah, you sell that all the time.

I I just want to add also that the real Rick Ross is free

Freeway Rick Ross. And the reason that he got that

name was because he lived near the freeway and was that was,

you know, the 110405. Yes, but no, I would see I was

in amazing stories that never made it into, you know, mass

media for one reason or another. I mean, there was a another guy

connected that was in my housing unit.

That was his name was Harry O And he, I think he just recently

got out, but same thing. He got life.

And he was the guy who supplied all the money for Death Row

records. And he was a very nice guy.

And I talk to him all the time. So I knew his story more than

Ricky Rick Ross's just because I was in the housing a lot longer

and I I could hear his phone conversations with his attorneys

and all these kind of major players in record, you know the

record business because y'all you.

Heard him talking to Suge Knight.

I don't. Know if he was ever talking to

Suge Knight at the time but Suge Knight was definitely in and out

of that because Suge Knight also was I mean all around Lai mean

Suge Knight, I think lived in Grata Hills when I lived in

Grata Hills at the same time so yeah, you know he was all I

think he's back in prison now but.

A fascinating time. And certainly, you know, I, I, I

there's a lot of people who, you know, vicariously wish that they

lived in California at that time despite all of the crazy ups and

downs of what happened during that time.

You're from Pasadena. Yes.

Yeah. And I, I, I'm super curious

because, I mean, you know, corrections officer, yet you're

such a creative. You know, you look at stand up,

of course, but. But but then also, you know,

you've written the books that you've written.

And I mean, you talk about the touching subjects that you've

written about. And then, of course, fiction as

well. You know, have you always been a

creative? And it was just, you know, got

to pay the bills, got to feed the family, which is why you

moved into into corrections. Yeah.

I'm. I mean, I'm still trying to

figure out how to make money in the arts, but I, I wanted to do,

I wanted to be a writer. And a lot of it was I, I tell

people now, if that's what you want to do, go and do that if

you want to. You know, I wanted to do acting.

My parents said absolutely not. I want to be a writer.

My parents, same thing like you, never gonna make any money,

which obviously is true, but you're always gonna find another

job if you like. If I had started out in acting,

I would have been able to find another job and film something

else. I could have, you know, if

that's what you love to do, go and do that.

And I hate that advice of find something to fall back on

because that's what I did. I fell back into law enforcement

simply because I wanted health insurance at the time.

I'd never had a job before that that had paid days off anything.

I was, I was just minimum wage guy.

And so then you start making all this money and you're looking

around at other people and they're losing.

You know, I went through years of friends losing their jobs

that had master's degrees, couldn't get a job anywhere.

And so I just felt fortunate. OK, well, at least I'm, I'll

stay here until, you know, I can get a pension.

And that so the very first day that I could get a pension that

it was offered to me, I left to go pursue acting and comedy full

time. And that's what I've been doing.

And I love it. And I absolutely hated law

enforcement. I loved it in the beginning

because I got into it. Also with parole was I could at

least help somebody. And I just realized, like, it's

government. You're not helping anybody.

You're just drowning them. And, and for you, many of the

people that I've had on the show that have something to do with

law enforcement in any way, the vast majority of them, it's kind

of the family business. Did you have people in your life

that were in law enforcement already?

No, I knew nobody and and when I got into Department of

Corrections, I realized real quick, like the ones who are

related to each other, they got the better jobs and they got the

transfers right away. And since I didn't know anybody,

I was last in line for everything.

Oh, that's interesting. OK, so so how old were you when

you left? Like how many years ago were we

talking I. Left three years ago.

So when I, the moment I hit 50 and I didn't know, I calculated

everything myself. I was trying to get, you're

supposed to have somebody that helps you figure out your

pension. Nobody was there to do any of

that. I figured it out myself and it

just happened when I first got that first pension check, it

worked out. My math was OK.

So I did take a keep, keep of faith.

It was very scary for me. I tell anybody that who, who

retires because it's all mental and, and I had so much stress

and my health was deteriorating, which is another reason I wanted

to leave. And it just made me a, you know,

a whole 360° turn of, of health. I mean, I'm the happiest I've

ever been. I was basically depressed for

the last 20 something years. Yeah, and I mean, there's a lot

of guys who are exactly in that spot right now where they're

just grinding it out for whatever reason.

You have many reasons. Another thing that you and I

have in common is we both have had a little girl in our lives

who, who, who means the world to us.

My granddaughter in my case, you know, spent 18 months at BC

Children's Hospital and or she's, I'm sorry, when she was

18 months old, spent six months at BC Children's Hospital.

She's a cancer survivor. She's 8 now.

She's doing great. You've got a little girl in your

life who was going through stuff.

And I mean, when you, when you think about guys who are

grinding it out, there's always a reason.

And, and, and I, I think about, you know, one of the books that

you wrote, I, I wanted to start this conversation by talking

about your little girl and saying, Hey, how are things

going? And, and, and, and can you maybe

talk about her story a little bit before we get into some of

the fun stuff with stand up and the adventures that have that

have come since then? Sure.

My daughter was diagnosed with epilepsy at the age of 2, so we

were in and out of the hospital. You know, I was stuck in

hospitals long periods of time just like that.

And you're looking at all these other families and just your

heart breaks for everybody that's there, especially

spending long amounts of time at the hospital.

And now she's doing great. She got a a medical device

implant and she's been seizure free for nine years.

And she's, you know, there was one doctor said she's never

going to progress past the age, basically 2nd grade.

She's graduating high school, she's got into a college that

she wants to go to. She's going to live

independently in a couple months.

So huge. That's all I ever wanted for

her, you know? Well, and I mean, you talk about

the reason like why guys will do like you said, you know, I was

basically depressed for 20, for however long, 20 years or

whatever, how long it was. You know, many times when guys

are in that situation, there's a reason for that and they're

grinding it out for their family.

That health insurance you talk about, that's a huge, huge

thing. And to see it on the other side

of that, that's got to be so gratifying.

What's the book? You wrote a book about it?

Because my wife and I, this is another thing we have in common.

My wife and I wrote a book about our experience when when our

granddaughter was at at BC Children's because the

grandparents situation is a little bit different, even

though we were there the entire time.

We moved down with the family to Vancouver for, for, for that.

And, and so we wrote a book about it as well.

I just, I appreciate the fact that you have you always been

the guy that basically when you go through something negative,

you want to somehow turn it into something positive.

Was it therapeutic? Talk about the book a little

bit. Yeah.

It was definitely, and it's the book is about my daughter's

struggle with her epilepsy and finding the right kind of

doctors. And and I went into a lot like

you did. You go into a blind and you're

thinking, you've seen all these movies where everybody's going

to come be your friend and help you out.

And you just realize, wow, nobody gives a shit.

Even the medical staff doesn't care.

And you're fighting for your child.

And which a lot of people are, you know, you're just fighting

for basic rights of, hey, could you just treat my kid?

And that's what the book is a lot about is finding the right

doctor, finding the right treatment plan for my daughter

because there's no cure for epilepsy.

And just as a parent going through same with work, I had a

lot of problems with my work not wanting to let me get days off

to do with my child when she's in the hospital.

And it was just all, all I wanted, the one word that I

wanted was empathy from people. And I never got it.

And that was the reason why I wrote the book.

It was just, I'll write down what we're going through.

And hopefully meet somebody that has the same, goes through the

same thing. And I haven't met all those

people. But the majority of it is just

negativity because people are going through a crisis in their

life and, and they don't we as humans don't know how to express

ourselves and talk about it. And so I I lost more friends

because of my daughter's illness then gained them.

Yep, I, it's funny, my wife, the way that we wrote our book is my

wife wrote 1/2 and I wrote the other half and you flip it.

So, so and it's both of our perspectives of going through

that and that and what we've learned along the way.

On my side of the book, one of the chapters I focused on

exactly what you're talking about because it's, it's, it's

funny. You have these people in your

life, whether they're friends, whether they're even family

members or business partners, whatever, they're in your life

and, and, and you think everything is like you think

they're going to have your back when this stuff happens.

And the entire chapter of that book was, it was exactly what

you just said. It was like, holy smokes, was I

ever. And it now that Alara's fine and

she's cancer free and what not, it's actually given me a bit of

a superpower because what it's done is it's made me realize,

OK, there are certain people that will have your back.

And that number, like you said, is probably a smaller number,

but then there are others who you would assume, you know, have

your back. But when the going gets tough,

they're out there. They, they, they, they get going

and, and, and you realize it's a superpower knowing that those

people in your life. But then when you're going

through stuff, the people who actually stand up and are there

for you, that makes you realize, you know, the goal that they are

in your life. And we, I wrote an entire

chapter about I can totally, totally relate to what you're

saying. I'm so glad to hear that your

daughter's OK. What's the name of the book?

Because there's people out there who are going through similar

things. What's the name of the book?

And you still get it on Amazon for sure.

Is there other spots you can get it?

Yeah, pretty much anywhere on the Internet.

It's Vivian's reign. Vivian's reign and here's

another question for you. How old was she when you wrote

the book and have you has she read it?

She has not read it just because I I feel like it's too adult for

her, even though she's 19 now. It's, you know, such a sad

period of time. I couldn't for so long I

couldn't talk about it, which is another reason that I wrote it.

So it stops about the age of I think 9 because her device

started to work and then she was seizure free and she was

allowed. It was like a the first day

where she woke me up. She could never do that before

she got dressed. She'd never do that before she

made her lunch. She could never do that before

we drove to school. She told me a joke which as a

comedian, she was just a zombie kid and couldn't couldn't even

decipher humor. So the day she told me that

joke, I was like, Oh my, this is like crazy to me.

I was experienced like a a miracle just with my daughter

and I in the car going to school.

And also she hated going to school.

She hated she couldn't, she couldn't process communicating

with people because they were epilepsy.

She's having seizures all the time and the school didn't want

her there. She's on the verge of getting

kicked out of the school at the time because they just didn't

know how to deal with her. And legally they didn't have to

deal with her. And I, I, I fought very hard to

get a law passed where the, in California where the teachers

had to recognize seizures because they didn't have to.

And they didn't have to carry her medication at school.

And I would walk her to class and sit in class with her or

wait outside because they didn't want me inside.

So I, I had a lot of anger towards the school, also my work

and school, just because nobody wanted it.

Nobody wanted to just give you your basic kind of civil rights

for your child. And then the lack of empathy,

like you said earlier, you know, it's funny.

One of the things that, that you, that you learn when you

have a, a sick and it's not just a sick child, but it's a parent

or, or, or somebody who isn't able to speak up for themselves.

If you care for that person and you're involved in the

situation, you become an advocate.

And, and, and that's a huge skill in itself, becoming the

advocate, knowing how to talk to the doctors, knowing how to

stand up for things that you're, you're, you're, you're looking

for or that need to happen. That kind of a thing, that

advocation for you. I, I mean, I assume that's the

same thing for you because it didn't end.

I'm fascinated by the idea that you had a lot helped, helped get

a law passed for that. What was what was that?

Was it just a matter of you were fired up because of what your

daughter was going through and so it's time to stand up and go.

Were there other groups who were trying to get this similar law

passed that you kind of banded together with?

How did that happen? I.

Was assuming there would be other groups and I just realized

that none of these organizations that get tons of money from the

state and the feds, they like the Epilepsy Foundation Los

Angeles. All they cared about was a walk

that they do. So I had to look past that and

go, OK, I, I guess they don't want to help.

They'll tell you that they're going to help you and they don't

want to help you because they just want to do their walk and

their fundraiser. That's all they care about.

And then Los Angeles doesn't talk to New York and New York

doesn't talk to Kansas. So none of them are on the same

page. And it gets very frustrating.

And so I just looked up kind of similar to a law and, and how it

was written and I just wrote it. And then I took it to a

assemblywoman and I just realized all of these

politicians are, they're just fundraising.

They don't, they didn't care either.

But out of 550, I was able to find one woman and she took the

bill. But then when she took the bill

to Sacramento, the Epilepsy Foundation said, oh, no, we

already wrote this. So they just took it and said we

did this and it was recognized more than just some father that

did it. And I just said, I don't care.

I just want it to be put into place.

It doesn't matter to me. So it was signed about a year

ago, I think this year is when it takes place.

But at least it got signed by the governor and it became law

where the schools have to recognize in this in the state

of California that children have epilepsy.

Because before that, like I said, we're they didn't have to

carry her medication. So you would have Epipens for

food allergies that looked identical to the EpiPen to stop

my child's life threatening seizures.

You know, I could see them in the nurse's office and they

refused to carry it. I mean, I everyday panicked

because I'm thinking I'm this is a death trap for me.

I'm dropping my daughter off. Nobody's trained to identify.

I would go to school. Sometimes my daughter would be

on the yard where she already had a seizure and the yard staff

who wasn't trained at all would just say, oh, she's just lazy.

I would hear that all the time. She's just lazy.

She don't care because they're just coming.

They're coming from this. What the school tells them.

And that's why you need laws is the law is just telling people,

hey, you need to do this and then people wake up.

But it never ceased to amaze me at the just the stupidity that I

would hear from people just simply because their boss told

them something different, that is.

I'm really grateful that you're talking about this right now

because I, I promise you there are guys out there that are in a

similar situation right now thinking that they're alone.

And, and, and the fact that you're able to shed light on

this and talk about this stuff, it's, it's really, really

important. Mike, it's, it's again, when I,

when I, when I saw you come across the, the the table as a

guest for, for, for he cast. I'm like, Oh my gosh, the layers

here. Never mind how we could just, we

could just go on stand out. Like, I mean, you know, and I

and I and I want to talk about that a little bit here, But

there there's, there's a lot more power in in, in what you're

talking about here, How, how and, and how people can make it,

make it make a change and they can stand up and change will

happen. I am.

I was going to ask if the Epilepsy Foundation or if the if

the if the if the nonprofit raised you up as a poster child,

but it is No, they didn't even do that.

They they took all the credit. Yeah, no.

They asked me for $50,000 to put an advertisement in their little

flyer. But that's, it's just all, it's

all money. It was all and that's what I

take out of it. I, I learned what the

foundations are and I learned, you know, the politicians are,

they're just politicians. They're not really, they're,

yes, they can take that bill, but anybody can write a, anybody

can write a law or a bill. That's the large reason why a

lot of politicians are lawyers is they know the lawyers speak,

right. But you know, I, I kind of tell

people who, and a lot of people just don't want to listen.

They're going, I, I get it. They're going through a lot of

painful process and the epilepsy community is very fractured.

I very, I very rarely talk to very few people.

Nobody wants to hear it. So I just kind of don't.

I started a foundation that got pushed, you know, quickly got

pushed aside and I realized there's a lot of people that

have just dropped out of that community because they've been

pressured by other people because it's all it really is

just about money. It's not really about helping

anybody. And I just again, focus on my

family and what little I can do, I will do.

And I just, my mantra is to do good and be good.

And that's all, all that I can do is, you know, what's around

me. I can't solve all these other

problems. I'd certainly like to, I have

ideas for it, but a lot of people just don't want to hear

it. And then, you know, I, I kind of

get to chuckle because they're unmasking so much corruption

going on that I saw years ago, you know, that doesn't have to

do with epilepsy. It's got to do with all this

other stuff in Los Angeles, just.

Waste. Yeah, just total.

Total waste. I saw that all the time I worked

for the government. All they did was waste, you

know, constantly. Wasting cash grabs and things

like that. It's, it's an interesting

perspective that you, you've seen it from, you've seen it

from angles that many people just don't see it from and

you've seen it with a front row seat from some of these

different angles. I, I want to give the

opportunity though, going through that meeting some of

these groups, some of these people, were there anybody who

were like shining stars? Were there anybody who was like,

oh, wait, you guys are trying to do well here.

You guys are trying to you. You get it, You know, again,

these other people that are pushed aside, you were pushed

aside. I assume you're not the only

one. Yeah.

No, there was there's I was, I always say there's 10% and there

was especially one guy. He had his own podcast and he

just he had an epilepsy himself. He had brain surgery, David

Clifford and just a great guy. But again, he's one guy and he's

also dealing with epilepsy. He's now and he's a father, so

he's dealing with a young daughter.

And so life sidetracks you. It's hard for, you know, I, I

get it gets exhausting to you know, I go every, I, I go every

year to the Disneyland epilepsy awareness and every year

somebody else has lost their child.

So it's just heartbreaking to constantly go there and and meet

somebody that their kid was alive last year and now their

kid has passed away because of epilepsy.

If. There are one or two changes

that you could see in the world out there when it comes to this

because again, you have a front row seat to it.

I mean, obviously awareness is one of the things and, and

education, obviously that's one of them.

But if there's if there's any, are there any silver bullets?

Are there any changes that could be made to make things easier on

people, on parents, on on families that go through this?

Yeah. I mean, like another one, the

law that I'm trying to do is there's a lot of fake seizures

you're doing. Another one you're going to.

You're not done with one, you're doing another one, I mean.

The other one took five years, so I got plenty of time.

I got plenty of time, but there's a lot of fake seizure

videos. They're monetized.

So the kids that all have phones in the class would show these

fake seizure videos to my child and pretend to have fake seizure

videos and the school wouldn't do anything.

The teachers wouldn't do anything.

And it's that's bullying. I'm a comedian.

I don't find it funny. I don't think it's funny, but

that's what I would hear from the school.

You don't understand humor. That's just the kids.

They're just kids. They're they're, you know,

they're just having fun. Well, that's not fun to my

daughter who has a, you know, has epilepsy and, and, and

struggles every single day. So that was another time where

we had to leave schools because she was getting bullied

constantly because of her epilepsy.

And the kids see these videos and it delivered right to them.

And they're making lots of money.

And the there needs to be a law written where, you know, they

can't be shown on social media, but unfortunately they are.

Wow, that's again, I'm, I'm, it's something I never would

have even thought of, you know, 'cause the idea of course is

your daughter and, and kids like her, you want to send them to

school so they can feel normal, they can be normalized a little

bit and, and, you know, in those situations, anything but that is

happening. So yeah, I appreciate, you know,

as, as much as I wanted to get into the stand up stuff is when

I, when I saw this part of it, I, I knew that I wanted to

dedicate a part of this episode to that.

And, and if there's anything that can be done to help, I

mean, sharing the story is, is, is where it starts, right?

Because one person can make a difference.

And, and, and when, when one person tells the story to

somebody who's willing to listen to it and hear it, you know,

that can make change right there because you're creating

awareness. But then also people who are

going through the same thing. I mean, there's a lot of

families, a lot of men out there.

You know, this is a men's focused endeavor that we're

doing here, obviously, but there's a lot of people living

that quiet life of desperation. And these are the ingredients.

It's stuff like this. It's the stuff that's going on

beneath the surface that you don't even know.

That's that that that guys are going through, you know, and and

so you talking about this today, I appreciate it very, very much

because it's going to help people feel like they're not

alone. And I think that that's

something that's really important.

And I appreciate you letting me have a voice because most people

don't want to hear it. They want to hear about prison

or comp. They don't want to hear about

the epilepsy because they don't want to hear about being sick.

I mean, I, I understand that. But you know, just like with for

men, especially when you, I always think about this as a

father going into the pharmacy and the pharmacies that I go to

are just the biggest morons I've ever met in my life.

And you're as a man thinking logically like it's, it's easy.

I'm giving you money. Give me the medication for my

daughter that saves her life. And they just can't compute that

together because insurance is 1/3 factor.

And just every year, like clockwork, my insurance gets

cancelled, the medication gets cancelled.

I have to reissue the same thing.

It's like all this bureaucracy and red tape that I just got a,

you know, again, I all I can do is laugh and find humor in, in

the stupidity of it. But I always think about that as

a dad. There's so many people that

probably when the pharmacy just goes, Oh, well, we don't have

your medication. They just go home and don't take

their medication. I mean, because how would how

would a kid know I, I get all the medication now, Now I'm

dealing with my daughter is an adult.

So they don't even want to talk to me.

They don't want to talk to my, my daughter that's never picked

up her medication before. How would she even know how to

do it? And and and the go back to the

advocacy. The advocacy never ends.

And and there you go. Like that's a, when people are

that you use the word empathy earlier and, and, and man, it's

becoming, it's becoming one of those things where it's gold

when you find it. And, and growing up, I felt

like, and again, I don't want to sound like the old man, but I

am, I guess I'm 50 now. And so I guess I am the old man.

But, but growing up, there seemed to be a lot more empathy

in the world. And, and things now seem to

become so compartmentalized and empathy does not seem to be the

first, second, third or even 4th mandate of organizations like

what you're talking about. You know, again, these

nonprofits, what are they doing? Well, they're trying to stay in

business. They're trying to stay going.

And then it becomes something else entirely.

Like you say, it's all fundraising.

And I don't know about you, but I'm fundraised to death.

I would like to just look at solving some problems and

figuring out ways to do that. Do you see any, do you see any

obvious solutions of any sort that like common sense stuff

that could be put into place that you know just isn't there

yet, But but if, if enough people kind of got together,

they could make some common sense solution.

Yeah, I mean, one of the big things with epilepsy is for some

reason East Coast doesn't talk to West Coast of the United

States. So communication, there's huge,

there's huge stars, mega stars in in New York that go to all

these galas and there isn't a single one in Los Angeles, which

is Hollywood. Not a single celebrity shows up

to any of this stuff. I mean, it's just mind blowing.

If you could get everybody on the same page for the advocacy

of these organizations, that would be great.

But what they do is they don't share information with each

other, which again, reminds me of law enforcement.

All these different divisions didn't share information with

each other but that. And why is that?

Why is that? They're just covering their own

butt. They're trying to stay keep

their world as stable as they possibly can.

What what what's the logic of that?

Or is it just too busy? Is it too?

No, I just. There's two things that drive us

is money and power. And I think that that's the

power, the power part. It's hard for us to process that

because I think most people are good.

So they're like, well, why would somebody want to be a

narcissist? And and just do something mean

to me. And that's how people think.

I mean, and when you are in law enforcement and you have a badge

and a gun, you have huge amounts of power over somebody.

It's really a one way conversation.

I mean, think about a traffic stop.

If you say if you look at the cop the wrong way, he just flips

out, you know, he or she just flips out on you and you're just

like, but you pulled me over you, you knew what was going to

happen. You know, you know the process,

but it's a one way conversation because that's a cop with a

badge and they have all the power and they're going to abuse

the power and the power gets abused a lot.

And again, when you have all the money, naturally power seeps in

there and they kind of go hand in hand.

I I hope we move to where? To a place where we can go back

to a society where that's not the, that's not the influence.

And, and, and you think about like, I mean, it's like people

are starting to act like corporations.

Like that's the thing about corporations getting so much

power. Corporations have no empathy

whatsoever. Their job is to get the bottom

line and to pad the bottom line as much as they can.

And if you have people who start acting like corporations, that's

just another level of this lack of empathy.

So, so, so it's, it's, it's it's wonderful to hear a guy, you

know, bring this stuff out into with a voice that maybe we're

perhaps not used to and that kind of springboards be over.

I do want to get into the comedy a little bit of it.

You see a lot of comics that are out there and I'm a big fan of

stand ups and there's a lot of stand ups out there who put a

message into their into their material.

Are you that guy? Are you still figuring it out

because you know, you're you're still relatively new to the full

time aspect of it? Is it, is it something that you

want to mandate as you build your material?

Because I'm certain that that that this could lead to perhaps

a little bit darker, but a whole bunch of material that you could

come out with this as well. Yeah.

I mean, my main message right now is just to, like I said

before, was to tell people, don't get into law enforcement,

get into some sort of the arts. I think it's better.

And what I've been weaving into it is prison and how

dysfunctional prison was. I mean, when I worked in the

prison, I had more problems with the, with the people I worked

with and the prisoners. And so conveying that and and

then when you're, when I was in, you know, that business, you're

not allowed to talk about what you do.

I had AI had a guy one time that saw me one night in a comedy

club and he threatened me at the office the next day because

you're not allowed to do anything else.

So it's really is a cult and you're and you become, your mind

becomes very warped because they don't want you to succeed.

They want to hold you down, going back to the power part,

but I'm in this position, you know, I'm in this position of it

really is. The prison looks at it like it's

inmates against the the guards and you have to be around these

guys all the time. And you're, you obviously become

friends with them, but you're not supposed to.

And so you have all these people.

It's all this negativity, all these people telling you what's

wrong with you. And then if you try to seek some

sort of therapy, you can lose your job.

You can especially, you know, if you're on the street, you go to

therapy, you're going to lose your badge and your gun because

you're not allowed to go to therapy.

So constantly being blamed for everything, constantly saying

that there's no way out, constantly no outlet.

And that transitions into I've had six of my coworkers that

took their own lives because of that, because they feel like

there's no nothing left to do. I can't talk to anybody.

You know, you can't basically nobody relates.

And I've lived that life for a very long time.

I lived with, I would just tell people I was a comedian rather

than a parole agent because people didn't even understand

what a parole agent was. And if he did repeat it to them,

then they would say, well, I don't like the fact you give out

tickets. Well, I don't give out tickets.

I never have. And again, it's just society.

They didn't. To them, it wasn't a job where

they really, you know, you were kind of hidden.

And then the department didn't want the public to know what you

did either. So people made-up their own

assumptions about what's going on, which they still do.

I mean, they think, you know, everybody in their prison is

suffering. They don't really think about

all these guys have been in prison.

It's a subculture of our culture.

They've been in prison their whole lives.

They're comfortable with it. I wasn't comfortable with it.

But they see things differently. So it's just your perception of

the. So there's a whole bunch of

stuff there. I just, it's funny because you

know, loneliness, when you look at he changed it, right?

He changed it. There's a bunch of different

pain points that are kind of up at the top of the of what men,

especially specifically middle-aged men are, are, are

going through. And I mean, one of them is lack

of purpose, but another huge one is loneliness.

And loneliness you can have, you can be surrounded by friends,

bring a party in your honor and you could be the most lonely

person in the room, you know. And, and so they talk about

loneliness and, and the fact and to bring it back to prison for a

second, how, how solitary changes people and, and, and

it's so ironic. The irony is astounding to me

because what you're talking about to me is that you're being

influenced to essentially live a life of mental solitary of, of,

of, of, of not being able to, of compartmentalizing you to the

point where you're not supposed to talk about these things.

It's funny because I've had a lot of Canadian law enforcement

on and, and, and you know, up here, there at least seems to be

an effort to the idea of helping these, you know, not just

police, but first responders with the mental toils that come

with the job. And it seems to have a lot more

awareness than it did, say, when I was growing up 20 years ago

or, or 30 years ago now, I guess I'm a Gen.

Xer. So are you.

So. So, yeah, as we were growing up,

the stigma was astounding. You know, nobody was supposed to

talk about this stuff. PTSD was.

It was, you know, being proven at that point.

You know, it wasn't. It wasn't a household name.

The way it is now is that is the ship turning at all.

In your experience, in the corrections from the place that

you were, do you see that ship turning at all?

Are people being influenced to talk about stuff?

Are there programs available that are there?

I mean, what you paint, the picture you painted was pretty

bleak. Yeah, I mean, it's shifted.

It just hasn't shifted in the right direction.

And I think a lot of it just has to do with, you know, for

example, with what they do with the laws in our state is they'll

go to a, a college campus and they'll have a survey and

they'll go and they'll pay the parolees to take the survey.

Well, you're, you're not, you're, you're taking a survey

out of a parole office, but you're not ever asking any of

the parole agents about the guys that they supervised.

You're just going to the guys and having them fill out a

survey. And then so you're, you've

already brought your perception into it.

So they are trying to change it, but in my opinion, they're

changing it the wrong way. So like one of the things they

did right before I retired was they lowered all these laws so

nobody was held accountable for anything.

And me as a parole agent constantly blamed for somebody

committing a crime. And so that's one of the things

that you need to change. You need to, if you commit a

crime, you need to have accountability for that crime.

It's nobody else's fault. But that's kind of seeped into

everybody's mind is we're feeling sorry for the criminal.

We're not feeling sorry for the victim anymore.

And we're certainly not feeling sorry for the law enforcement.

And then in what I would see in Los Angeles, it's like, hey,

we're here to help you. We're going to shoot you 4

times, you know, and then figure it out later.

So they'll say that they're here to help you.

But like one of the things that I always ran into with parole

was they'd get out of prison and there'd be a panel of all these

professionals waiting for him to get out of prison.

And they just sent him to my office with instructions to come

to my office. And he's going to find housing

for you. He's going to find a job that

simply doesn't exist. So the Department of Corrections

doesn't have any housing. They don't they don't fund any

housing. So you'd have guys that would be

homeless. They'd come in on a Friday at

5:00. Well he's going to be homeless

till Monday until I can try to find him some sort of housing

that is not run by a. Halfway house or something?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And.

There's very few and far between because they're taking private,

which is they can get 60,000 a month for private insurance.

So they're gonna take the private guy over the state guy

and then they're gonna take the federal guy because they get 3

times more than the state guy. So again, it's all a money

racket that nobody wants to talk about.

They could easily house the guys.

I mean, I had an office. I would always bring this up,

too. Was we had empty.

We had empty offices in my building.

Why don't we house them there? How dare you?

And I'm like, but isn't this like a, aren't we trying to,

like, help human beings here? And it was just like, yeah.

And that was another thing that I always felt it was a cult also

because you were just chastised if you ever brought up an idea

like you have an empty room. This guy could stay here for a

night till he figures something out.

A transitional housing. You're Oh my God, I can't

believe you would bring this up. You know you're you're a monster

once. Again, we're talking about

creativity being stifled. I mean, that's a creative idea.

That's a creative. It's, it's worth exploring, you

know, and, and, and whether it's right or wrong, it's feasible or

not. There should be no bad ideas

when it comes to fixing such a problem.

Yeah, I mean, one of the one of my gripes always was I would

stay with somebody. I would get to know the parolee

for up to three years, sometimes longer.

And then the my supervisor would just look at the crime that they

committed and not the background of the crime and and say he, you

know, he's a monster. Retain him on parole, keep him

on parole. Even though I've gone to bat for

the guy and said I don't think he's ever going to commit a

crime ever again. I mean, he got a he got a job,

he got a place to live right away.

He's not a threat to society. No, I'm going to retain him

because again, it makes the supervisor look better when you

have all these people that are on parole.

It's protecting all of those jobs rather than you're

discharging them. So the numbers lower down.

So again, it's it's money, it's a numbers game.

And that killed me. It hurt a lot where you would

legitimately be trying to help somebody and and it would be the

people that you worked with that were sabotaging what you were

doing. It's a frustrating place to be

and, and never mind the fact that you've got, you know, good

corrections officers who are actually in the prisons

themselves, they're seeing some stuff and and they're not in a

position where they can necessarily talk to people about

what they're seeing or hearing as as well.

And I mean, you've got, you know, a lot of rocks between a

lot of hard places. I appreciate the fact that that

we can talk about this today and we can, you know, bring

awareness to the issue and hopefully there this falls on

some ears of people that can minimum relate and perhaps

again, not know that they're not alone.

But you know, the more we talk about this in the different

venues, the more awareness is going to be out there and if the

tide turns from a social standpoint and people.

Start to stand up about this. That's really the only way it's

going to change. I appreciate the fact that you

do that now. Now let's take it back to stand

up for a second because again, a lot of guys are living these

quiet lives of desperation that we talked about and they need an

outlet of some sort in the, in my little stand up world up here

in Kelowna, BC you know, you, there's, there's always a scene.

You know, if, if you've got a stand up scene, you've got

these, these, these comics of all sorts of different shapes

and sizes and genders and they're everywhere and they've

all got a story and they've all got stuff.

One of the commonalities that I seem to see is that it's an

outlet for the ones that are doing it part time.

The ones that are doing it full time, it doesn't matter.

It's an outlet for them. Was stand up always an outlet

for you even in like what entertained you growing up?

Did you love stand up growing up as a medium?

Yeah, I always loved. I mean, those are my heroes

were, you know. Name some of them.

Let's hear your heroes. Well.

I. Mean I always loved Chevy Chase

until I think recently he became insane.

And that's kind of the thing where I don't want to meet your

heroes, but one of the early on comedians was Kirk Fox and I

just loved his persona. And so I was like that what kind

of what got me into it was I saw him one night and I was like, I

really liked his presence and he and that's what what I was like,

Oh, I I could do that's something I could do.

I could do that presence. And how I got started in comedy

was I was in college and there was a band and the band wanted,

I got up one night and it was in front of like 100 people on the

street. And I, I, I imitated Eddie

Murphy imitating somebody else and everybody cheer.

It always seems that way. Your first time is you get a lot

of laughs. And so that encourage that

encourages you. So I open for this band and I

just bombed every time. And I and I didn't realize

because I didn't have the Internet at the time was don't

ever open for music. Music and comedy don't go

together. Don't ever open for a band.

It's. Very tough, very tough.

So I. Stopped doing it for a while and

then picked it back up. So it was always something that

I wanted to continue to do and it scared me to death.

But I just figured, hey, I worked in a prison that scared

me. Also, I could, I can do comedy

and I just look at it like every single time I'm going to go up

there and I'll just try to bomb. And if it does, hey, if it I'm

successful, then I'm successful. But it hurts every time.

But it is to me therapy because I see so many people that are

wounded that are up there and they've had horrible lives.

And I just consider myself, I didn't have a great life either.

And that's what we're all doing. We're just taking it day by day

and managing it. I mean, what are you gonna do?

You're gonna play golf or you're gonna go do comedy?

I'd rather do comedy than play golf.

And I just look at it like it's my golf.

Yeah, I, I dig that a lot. I, I, you know, it's funny.

I want to go back to the don't meet your heroes for a second

here, because I, I'm super curious in the stand up world.

It feels like and it's always been, you know, don't get me

wrong, I I look at stand ups as just like I look at pro

wrestlers. You know, there every single

ones got a unique persona and a unique character.

Some of them are are true characters.

Some of them it's just them with the volume turned up.

I wanna I'm curious about you and, and as you're finding your

voice, what that looks like. But the idea, like you talk

about Chevy Chase earlier, you know, the idea of separating the

art from the artist and, and, and how in other times, other,

other other times in our, in our, in our generation times in,

in, in places, it seems that art and who the actual person is

could be very easily separated. And there wasn't a lot of, you

know, obviously in heinous cases, perhaps there was, but

there there wasn't a lot of people who like, I think about

Andrew Dice Clay and, and, and one of the very first comics to

sell out MSG, if not the very first one.

You know, back in the day and, and, and when you looked at, you

know, the Dice band character versus, you know, who he was off

stage, even as, even as he was becoming an actor as Andrew Clay

at the time. You know, people could, could

for the most part separate it. You get a few people who would

protest and things like that, but for the most part, people

could separate it. Now we kind of live in a bit of

a topsy turvy time where, you know, how somebody is personally

very much affects the opinion of people, how they are

professionally. Oh, yeah.

And I just want to know if, if if how you feel about the

pendulum swinging the way it's going.

Is it real? Is it imagined?

You know, when you take someone like Chappelle, you know, going

in front of a stadium saying, am I cancelled?

OK. But that's also the biggest

comic in the world. When you look at people who are

grinding it out on the indie side of things.

I wonder if the if the perspective is different.

So I don't know if that's something that you have been

aware of a little while, if you got anything to say about that.

But it's something that fascinates me, yeah.

No, I mean, there's certain things I can and cannot say.

And there's, I mean, there's definitely stuff that I'm not

ever going to say, but I just look at that like I can write

those jokes for somebody else and give those jokes to somebody

else that I, that I consider to be funny.

And that's what I do. Hey, this isn't going to work

for me, but maybe this will work for you.

And the other side of that is a lot of people don't want to hear

it. They don't want to hear your

stuff. So that's what I, I usually

don't say anything, but if I get to know the comic, I go, hey, if

you ever need this because everybody needs more time, maybe

this, maybe you could work this. But what's interesting to me is

probably around 2008, everybody thought comedy was going to die

because nobody was really showing up and going out.

And then COVID came and COVID kind of turned everything

around. So I, my perspective has changed

where it, it ebbs and flows. I mean, comedy comes and goes.

Right now, people want to go out.

I don't get it. I don't want to go watch comedy,

but people want to go out. And I think that COVID did that,

that made people realize, you know, hey, you don't want to be

at home looking at your phone. You want to go out and socialize

with people. So it really revived comedy and

I'm thankful for that. And now that I'm, you know,

retired, my, my mindset is in a different place than it was when

I was doing it before. And so I, I look at it like I'm

always thankful for my stage time.

I could see myself when I'm younger as being pissed off and

negative. And, you know, I'm mad at the,

I'm mad at the crowd because they're not laughing, but that's

not their job. So I just have learned that

comedy changes all the time. And you got to go with it.

That's your job. You mentioned that that you're

not in a place where you want to go out and necessarily watch

comedy right now. I've heard it both ways.

I've heard some comics who talk about the idea of they immerse

themselves in everything to see what's out there and to and to

kind of figure out who they are and what their place is, that

sort of thing. And I've heard of ones who say

they don't listen to anything because it influences them.

And, and, and so I've literally heard it both ways.

Are there anybody out there that you would go out of your way to

see? Is there anybody or, or are you

of the opinion that because you are building new material

yourself, you don't want to be influenced by anybody else?

Are you or somewhere in the middle?

No, because I'm always writing. That's always going to give me

an idea for something else. When I'm in the presence, I

consider it being in the presence of greatness.

I just mean, I will always go support and see comedians.

It's just that I don't want to be there and that's just like to

go out. I have a I'm a basically a

agoraphobic person that will go and support you, but I'm not

going to do it multiple times. But you know, I just watched Jay

Leno do an hour. He was great.

I'd never seen him before, but I did that specifically now that I

have time to do it and to support him and my God, he's

killing it. You know, he's he was doing

great. Where?

Was he at the Comedy Magic Club or was he at one of his?

Benefits that he does. He was at Flappers in Burbank.

Oh, we went to Flappers. OK.

Yeah. Good, good friend of mine.

A shout out to Gabe Abelson, good friend of mine who, who

does comedy classes at Flappers sometimes and things like that.

And he, I know that's a place that he likes to go to.

You perform at the Ice House, the legendary Ice House.

That's one of the places you like to perform.

How often are you there? I used to be there all the time

and then when my daughter got sick I stopped going there.

So now I go to mainly go to Flappers and Comedy Chateau

right now just because of driving.

It's just strategically easy. Yeah.

Geography. Yeah.

So, but I went to the Ice House I think about a week ago.

I just, I love the Ice House. The reason that I love the Ice

House is that families go there. The crowd is more comfortable

when you're going to other places that are more like

Hollywood. It's just this idea of people in

the crowd think they're famous. And it's kind of this

competition that you're feeling with everybody.

But it's a great place like the Comedy Store, Laugh Factory,

Hollywood Improv. Those are great places.

And I encourage anybody and I meet people all the time.

They're rolling the dice. They've most people that are in

LA have moved from all over the world to come do stand up.

And that's why I think it's the greatest place in the world and

I'll never leave Los Angeles. That's what I want to do.

You know, that's I have fun doing that, even though at times

the traffic annoys me and I don't like getting over there.

But that's what you do as the comedian.

You find the places that you like and it's just repetitive.

You're doing it over and over and over again, and hopefully

it's gonna work out. As I try and find my voice with

it, one thing I can do is obviously I can communicate and

things like that. I can do that on stage just as

well as I can in front of the camera here.

That part there is good. So when I started doing it, some

of the locals were like where did this guy come from?

Because many of them are fighting through the idea of

actually being able to be on stage with a, you know, a

captive audience and silence. I have no problem with silence

because if I'm doing a, a financial seminar, say, you

know, it's silent until I make them laugh.

And, and, and, and so I'm used to the silence if I'm, you know,

trying to make them laugh. But what I do is my entry point

to it has been stories. And as I tell the stories, every

once in a while, I'm able to throw something into the story

that becomes a joke. That's been my entry point so

far as to how to do this. You are a storyteller.

Clearly you've gone through stuff.

You're you're a writer. Do, do do actual writing jokes

and gags come easily to you? Or are you somebody who will

write a narrative and then build the jokes into it from there?

Yeah. I'll just, I'll kind of reverse

engineer it. You know, they said like every

writing class I take. As I say, take that idea and

then make three more out of it. I'll, I'll usually just take the

idea, write one joke, and then it takes a while when I'm

telling that joke, whether it works or not.

Because a lot of times you as a comedian thinks something's

hilarious and you're not getting a response from the audience.

You just have to let it go. And so that's what I've realized

with writing. If you can let stuff go and not

hold on to it. A lot of life, what I didn't

realize before is just improv. It's you're saying all this

stuff and you're not, and try not to get your feelings hurt

and, and, and try not to have any emotions about it and just

let it go. And that's kind of the hardest

things for comedians is, you know, you're up there telling

your vulnerabilities and you're wanting people to laugh and

sometimes they're not going to laugh.

And you, that's what you do. Then you go back and you rework

it. So I just look at it like a job.

It's, it's your job as a comedian to get that, get that

time in there and perfect that, you know, you when you're

starting out, you're doing 5 minutes, so perfect that 5

minutes. And then I go from chunks, you

know, five 10/15/2020 5:30 but it, it's a struggle.

But it's like anything else. It's a, you know, it's a job.

That's the way I think a lot of people, they just, you know, I

see this with acting is they think it's going to be this

glamorous thing where everybody's pampering you.

No, it's you're on set for, you know, 14 hours.

It's hot or it's cold and the crafty guy doesn't want to give

you a grilled cheese sandwich because he hates you.

So there's some great things about comedy that are better

than you know. But people think that's what I

see at least, is people think that they're going to become

famous and it's not. It's a job.

Just be thankful you're getting paid, you know?

And a job that you know you're not on a factory line or

something like that, you're able to use your creativity for it

and and what not. Do you write everyday Mike I.

I do just because I am always writing novels or script.

I've always got something and I do that because I have always

looked at it like I was always somebody that had a lot of, you

know, I think a lot of it because of the job gave me PTSD

and it was just my therapy and my outlet was I'm constantly

writing stuff down, you know, little notes and stuff like that

and then putting them back together, filing them.

So I'm always constantly writing something and hopefully, you

know, especially with like scripts, you're you're hopefully

you're going to meet somebody that be like, hey, I need that.

So you're kind of you're kind of writing.

Same with comedy. I always look at it like you're

doing comedy until you don't have to do comedy.

So I'm writing until I don't have to do writing.

But a lot of the writing is just I always looked at it like this

is keeping me sane. I'm going to continue to do it.

Well, again, the outlet and there's a lot of guys who are,

who are, who have creativity inside them, but life is just so

hectic and chaotic where they're not, they're they, they, they

don't get it out. And I mean, like, I love the

idea. Like, again, I've got a couple

of, well, I've got a couple of little careers here that I, that

I have. But to me, going out once a week

and getting that, getting that mic, that stage time, you know,

it's, it's, it's an outlet, it's a release.

It's, it's, it's that kind of thing.

You've had both, you've had it where you were working a job

that you could not stop working. You had to, because, you know,

you had to get things done. You had to grind it out and you

use it as an outlet, maybe a moonlighting outlet, one that,

you know, people didn't necessarily need to know.

And then you were able to say, OK, I'm gonna go do this as an

actual job. Do you get, are you scratching

the same itch or and you're just scratching it harder now?

Or is it a different, is it a different beast now that you're

doing it more as as a as a vocation rather than a hobby?

I'm. I'm just going harder than I

could before. And a lot of it is also, you

know, I tell people younger people also is if you have a

family and you want to be in this business, it's extremely

hard because you're like, when you're doing comedy, like last

night I was got home at 1:00. That's hard on your family.

And a lot of people don't they they're like, no, my family is

going to support you. They're not really going to

support you. They're not going to like that

you're not around. And that's the hard, hard part

where now that I'm retired and I don't have a job, I can, I, can

I spend the time and which I couldn't do before.

So I'm trying to get out there five days a week, which in

reality, you really should be doing 20 times a week.

You should be going up constantly, which is this is now

a great time, which never existed before, which is you can

go to all of these open mics and you could book your time on

Instagram. You can pick and choose.

And they're running all the time.

And these places weren't around when I started doing it.

Or you can film your film your own stuff, which you couldn't do

before. You can create your own.

That's another thing that I see is I see people that have never

gone on stage that are making money as a comedian.

So everything's changed. And I think it's changed into to

the advantage for everybody. But it just comes down to people

don't want to hear that. They want to hear what's the

easiest way I can get there, you know, with the minimal amount of

time that I have to spend. And that's what it is.

You're going up against time, a lot of time.

And, and that's especially with comedy, you're sitting there,

you know, the way that comedy is, is you've got to bring

people and then they want to sell drinks and people aren't

drinking alcohol the way that they were before.

So people, people don't want to, you know, so everybody, the

comedy clubs kind of can't figure out what they're supposed

to be doing. So again, you're in a

interesting situation business wise for a lot of these places.

Well, yeah. And I mean, we've seen it like,

again, you know, there might be younger people that are

listening to this or viewing this and, and I mean, they don't

understand where Mike and I came from in the sense of, of, of, of

we've seen a comedy kind of, we've seen it expand and

contract a few times. Like we have, you know, but, but

again, the, the, the net result seems to be that it's that it's

growing and growing and growing. Like, again, you know, Andrew

Dice Clay selling out Madison Square Garden, right?

Didn't happen for a while, for a long time.

And then, you know, Dane Cook shows up and it's like, oh man,

OK, here we go. And then, you know, contracts a

little bit. And then, you know, Rogan and

his crew and some of these other, these other people

bringing so much awareness to it.

You see it expanding. Yet now we're at a place where,

like you say, it's happening all the time.

You've got killed Tony selling out Madison Square Garden, Never

mind, you know, a headliner or whatever.

You've got this random show with random people and, and, and, and

it's selling out all of these places now.

So it is a great time to be in comedy.

Like you say, the local guy got to figure out a way to, to re

monetize or change the way that they monetize because Gen.

Z isn't drinking as much. They're just not.

And, and it's, it's across the board, people in the restaurant

business, people in the entertainment business, you

know, people in the nightclub business.

I mean, you look at how many nightclubs are closing down

because of these things. But but the art form itself,

because it's such a, it's so personal, but it's so universal

at the same time. It's both at the exact same

time, right? You know, the person that's

going up, you going up there and literally taking chunks of your

soul, exposing them and then exaggerating them.

You know it, it's you, it's so personal.

But the net result is something that's universal and you're

talking to everybody about it and you're making kind of

everybody kind of feel the same way or ponder the same thing.

It is such an important art form and, and, and you know, I take

it very, very seriously, despite the fact that it's in a

hilarious art form. I, I take it very seriously.

I also, and I'm, I'm super curious about your, your, your

viewpoint on the idea. I've always said that comics

stand ups are, are, are the number one guardian of free

speech and, and, and you look at what it is that you guys do.

So what you guys do is very, very important.

What do you think of the idea about stand ups being advocates

for free speech? Yeah, because it's the same.

It's the same idea where people don't want to hear the truth

even though we're lying to ourselves every single day.

But a cartoon can say the truth and people are OK with that.

Like, right now you have all this fraud going on in these

different States and nobody wants to hear that all this tax

money is being stolen. But if you used it in a joke,

then people are receptive to it. So absolutely.

You even have, you know, you have words and verbiage that

weren't being used before that are that are being used now.

And I just think people figured out like it went a little too

far. Let's bring it back to reality.

But you know, you you've had people that are going into

comedy places just solely to film somebody to try to make a

story about it. But I do think that the comedy

places are your kind of last. They're like the churches, you

know, it's the last place where you can actually have free

speech. And the great thing also is that

when you're a comedian, you can say, well, I was joking.

It's it's it's comedy. I don't really feel that way.

You know, I don't like like when I'm talking about my daughter

and making a joke about, you know, one of my jokes is about

her being bullied about her epilepsy.

And then my response as a father is, well, you're on your own.

Like that's it's not real. That's a joke.

But you could have somebody take that and be like, oh, he's a

horrible father because he thought he joked about that.

So in that respect, you know, you just got to rewrite your

joke. But I'm a big believer that in

free speech, I think it's constantly trying to be

everybody's trying to take that away from everybody because it

really is the last thing that you're not taxed on.

Oh, I love the way you put that. It's the last thing that's not

taxed on. I'll tell you this, I don't know

if you do this or not in your ACT, but I'll tell you one of my

favorite things. Shane Gillis is actually very

good at this. I love when a comic can go up

and they can say something and you look at the people in the

audience, they're ready to be outraged.

Like there's a, there's a bit that that that Gillis does about

a family member of his that has Down syndrome and, and, and ends

up using I'm, I'm going to say it here just because we like to

say PG, I'll just say the R word.

I feel like the R word is one of those words that's, it's a

really it's, it's, it's, it's contentious to people.

And so I'll be respectful to the people that are, you know, but

growing up Gen. X or growing up, that was a word

that was commonplace and it's a word that's now since kind of

moved over. But I love when a comic.

When a good stand up can use a phrase, a word, a topic that you

look at the outraged police in the audience and they're ready

to get outraged, but then they actually like listen to what was

said and there's nothing that they can get outraged about.

It was it was totally an appropriate way of that's one of

my favorite things in the entire world.

When a comic does that because it it, it, it, it, it, it is a

good commentary on the absurdity of outrage culture.

And and it's so fun to do that. And they say that when you're a

comic that has that you're a part of something, whatever it

might be, whether it's gender, whether it's race, whether it's

orientation, whether it's something that's personal in

your life, whatever it's free game, you can make fun of it

because it's about yourself. That's one of the things that

seems to be one of the commonalities that's there.

You do have a daughter who's gone through stuff.

You can get material out of it. Have you ever been that guy that

likes to poke the bear a little bit about the outrage stuff?

Or do you stay? Do you stay away from that?

No, you have to. And I just, I equate it to, you

know, everybody loves anything that has to do with talking to

the crowd, right? But there's other people that

refuse. They put up, they don't want to

see that 4th wall and they don't.

They're afraid of the audience. If you embrace, if you embrace

the audience because they came to see you and you just

normalize, it's the same thing as it took me a long time to

realize you have to stare people in the eyes because then they

feel like they're a part of your show.

Whereas when I would stare at the floor, I would stare at the

back. You're not connecting with the

audience. So no matter, I was always

thinking like, I'm going to say something that's going to offend

somebody and they're not going to like that and then they're

not going to like me. You got to put all that out of

the way and you just got that's what brings the audience in when

you're looking at them. And then no matter what it is

that you're talking about, but she'll let people, you know, I

was afraid of being heckled. But that's the greatest gift you

can have is to be heckled because you're the person on

stage. You're the one that has all the

power. Most likely that person is

drunk. They're not the going to be the

brightest person in the world. And when they start telling you

you're a piece of shit, the easiest response for me to,

yeah, I know I'm a comedian. I'm up here.

You think I don't know that? So that's one of those things I

think maturing as a comedian is don't, don't be afraid of the

audience. There's always going to be

something. My biggest thing now is you're

just having people, they're on their phone, they're in the

front row on their phone. And it's just like, why did you

even come here in the 1st place if you're going to be on your

phone? And you just have to that stuff

you got to power through. But I guess if there's any

advice, don't ever be afraid of the audience.

Embrace the audience and definitely embrace the silence.

You've got to embrace the silence.

And I always look at it like the they are the clowning is you're

silent, you're not talking. And if you can embrace that,

you're going to go far in comedy.

You're going to be fine. Oh, I appreciate your

perspective very, very much on that.

The idea of the audience. Yeah.

And with the hecklers like it's the, it could be the greatest

gift because guess what? Most of the people in the

audience are just as frustrated as you are.

They may not be as flustered as you are being up there, but

there there is frustrated, right.

And it's an opportunity for you to bring the audience along with

you against that person and it connect even more.

You connect even more with them with if you can, if you can

bring them over and talk about, you know, how that person is

frustrating them in a hilarious way of some sort or a humorous

way of some sort. I love that you said that I love

you talk about, you know, connecting with the audience the

way that you do. It's it's, and it's neat to

watch the subculture of crowd work comics that are, you know,

you look at rife and how big he's getting and some of these

other some of these other ones that are the the that are just

absolutely killing it using that device.

And really what they're doing is they're kind of combining almost

like a maybe not a Ted talk, but like an inspirational, like a

motivational speaker type type situation with comedy at the

same time, because the audience is such a part of it, It seems

like a natural progression. It's interesting that we live in

the time and place that we live right now.

Are there any, is there anybody out there that you like right

now? That's, that's, that's killing

it? Is there anybody out there in,

in, in comedy that that that you appreciate and, and and and

helps motivate you to want to write better or do more?

I, I always blink when somebody asks you this question.

And I, I just, I always root for everybody.

And I, I say that because there's, there is so much

negativity and people go, I don't think that guy's funny.

And just the courage to get up on stage is enough for me.

And I don't care who it is. You know, like last night there

was a girl, she comes from China, came here to be in or to

be in East Hollywood doing comedy.

That's I wouldn't go to China and do comedy.

I'd be afraid to do it. So if anybody can get up on

stage, those are, those are my heroes and those are the people

that always impressed me. And then the ones who finally

after so long end up, you know, getting a show or, you know, get

their hour, I, I'm always impressed by that because it

was, it was hard work. They did that for a long, long

time. So fun to be proud of these

people. And, and it's I, I love that you

say that because again, I've met people and again, you meet all

sorts of different shapes and sizes, right?

But, but, but you, you meet people who, if somebody gets

featured to open up for somebody, say, you know, say

somebody big is coming in. Like Marc Maron came to

Vancouver not that long ago. And A and a, and a friend of

mine who's been doing stand up for about 8 months got a chance

to open for his set for, for from Aaron's set.

He was one of two or three openers.

Yeah. And I mean, I saw local people

who were like, it's like they're eating, they're young.

They're like, they were so mad. You know, I've been doing this

five years and I haven't had a chat, you know, why is that my

spot? And, and, and there's jealousy

and backbiting and all that. I love that you mentioned that

because it's so fun to be proud of those people that, that,

that, that, that, that get the opportunity and nail the

opportunity. The other thing about it too, as

he killed it, he killed it and, and, and Marin, you know, he

shouted him out, right? There's a local comedian named

Ian or local, a Canadian named Ian Bag, who again, he talked

about crowd work. He's one of the best crowd work

comics I've ever seen. Like I, I personally prefer him

to rife, you know, I, I think he's, he's just so good.

He's just got this real Canadian persona about him that I think

is just delightful. You know, he opened up for

Kreischer and, and, and it's just so cool to see these people

kind of move up and, and get these opportunities and get

their unique voice out there. And it's good to celebrate that.

I love that you said that because not everybody does that.

And it's cool that you're you're you're one of those guys and

that you do appreciate whether there's a big guy or the small

person that's just starting out. It's cool that you appreciate

that. I, like I said, you know this,

you've done enough of these where you know that time gets

really, really slippery when we start podcasting, that I

appreciate your time being here today.

And like you like, well, I think you could probably tell, I could

go real deep. We could talk about comedy the

entire time. But I'm really grateful that you

have this depth of character and for people who love your work, I

love this being an opportunity that people can kind of see the

other side or the the depths that you have, the layers that

you have. I think it's cool.

I appreciate you, you you being so vulnerable and talking about

that. If people want to find you, Mike

Knox comedy is kind of the place to look, right?

Is is there is there? Do you have a social media

presence? Do you have a a website?

You were podcasting at one point, right?

I was. I think as you know, it just

gets exhausting and then you kind of forget about it.

But I I want to do it again. I want to do it again, but yeah,

on Instagram and TikTok I'm always on there and that's at

Mike Knox Comedy and I kind of have 1/2 ass website at

mikeknox.com, but I'm definitely.

OK. And if people want to book you,

is that where they book you? They book you through the

website? Yep.

Yep, OK, through Mike Knox comedy.

OK, that's awesome. Like seriously, from the bottom

of my heart, this has been an absolute delight for me for a

variety of reasons. But but number one, of course,

you know, trying to trying to get the he changed it movement

moving here for folks who haven't downloaded the app, by

the way, what are you waiting for?

Go to hechangedit.com for all the information.

And you know, we want to be a place where guys can go and they

can take something that they need.

They can leave something that they know they could hear these

different perspectives and these different stories.

So you're not living quiet lives of desperation.

So you're not in that place in solitude and and and Mike,

you're doing that in a variety of ways.

I just want to say thank you so much for taking time out of your

busy schedule to be here on he cast today No.

I appreciate it. Thank you.

Thanks for having me. Oh, absolutely.

I say it every time. This is why we do the show.

It's conversations exactly like this as to why we do the show.

Is, is, is, you know, if you're out there and you're hearing

this and you want to go and, and, and change something in

your life, you know, proof positive that not only is it

possible, but you're going to end up being better for it.

And and you know, you know, stop living that like quiet life of

desperation start moving forward.

This has been another episode of he cast the official podcast of

he changed it. My name is Mike Chisholm.

Go change something.