Desus and Mero, welcome to The Daily Social Distancing Show.
-Yo, Trevor Noah. -Hey, good to be here.
-Now to the homey, Trevor Noah. How you been, man? -(laughs)
I feel like I haven't been as good as you guys.
I'm not gonna lie. There-there is something
that I enjoy about watching your show
where no matter what's happening in the world,
I always feel like the Bodega Boys
are gonna keep me feeling like it's not the worst day
in-in history. Do you know what I mean?
-Yeah. -Yeah, I mean, 'cause there's probably gonna be
worse days in history, to be fair, so, you know.
It's very weird. It's very weird.
That's our new... our new, uh... our new status in life.
We are now the court jesters to the end of America.
-I like that. -Like, everyone tunes in.
Everyone's like, "Hey, Desus and Mero,
take our minds off the fact the world is ending."
-And we're like, "Ha ha ha! Trump's..." -MERO: Ha!
(all laugh)
-Um... -We're the band... we're the band on the Titanic.
Yeah. But you guys... but you guys are crushing it,
'cause I think you're furth...
You're the furthest thing from being the band on the Titanic
because, uh, your ship is not sinking.
Congratulations. Your show got renewed
for a third season on Showtime.
Let me ask you this. You guys have described the show as a...
It's almost like being in a barbershop
or at a barbershop but with more facts.
You know, you cover the news, but you guys cover social media.
You cover what the streets are talking about.
It feels like, in my opinion, of all the late-night shows,
your show was shaken the least by the coronavirus
because you guys have always been wearing hoodies.
You guys have always been, like...
I mean, you got the sneakers that you've been rocking
every single day of your show.
Has anything changed for you in a big way?
I mean, just kind of, like, balancing,
you know, work and home life.
'Cause before, like, I can't...
Like, personally speaking, like, I compart...
I put everything in a nice, little compartment.
-Right. -So, my office in the studio was work,
and then my house was my house
where I live with my kids and my wife,
and th-they were two separate entities, you know?
Like separation of church and state.
-Right. -Now we got the church in the state,
and it's like holding a Bible upside down,
and everybody's running around all wild.
You know what I mean? So, that was the only, like, adjustment.
But, like, as far as, like, you know,
losing the audience and that type of stuff,
the show's always been, like, you know,
Desus and I, like, bouncing jokes off each other
and, like, trying to make each other laugh
a-as opposed to, like, you know, selling a joke to you,
-you know what I mean? -Right, right, right.
So, it's... The energy has remained the same,
I feel like, because of that.
I think as far as, like, consuming culture
to make the show, it's definitely changed
because before it was like, yeah, you turn on the news,
turn on Twitter or whatever, and you take it in,
and then you talk about it the next day on the show.
But you had the outside life.
You had New York City to balance that out.
So you had other... You could go to a bar.
You go to the movies, hang out with your friends.
Now it's like, sit in front of a TV,
just death scroll on Twitter, take in all the information,
and now go into your sneaker room
and report it and make it entertaining to the world.
-Uh-huh. -So, that's a little draining mentally,
so you have to do things to balance your mentals.
But other than that, like Mero said,
it's basically the same show,
and it-it feels a heightened sense of importance now
because people are getting their information from the show.
-Right. -Before, it was just, like, entertainment,
and now we got Dr. Fauci on.
You know, and it's, like, the same thing with your show.
Before, your show was just like,
"Hey, here's some levity and a little information."
-Uh-huh. -And now it's like, yo, your show
is getting people through this pandemic.
And I know you get that the same way.
One of the things I've loved about the show now
is the backgrounds.
I feel like you guys have to keep this
when you go back to a studio, if you do,
because I love seeing, like,
more of who you each are individually.
Like, Desus, I won't lie. For, like, a few weeks,
I thought that was a Zoom background.
-You know what? -I was like, "Man."
I was like, "Where do I download
that Zoom background of all those sneakers?"
'Cause nobody owns that many sneakers.
-Bro, I... -Like...
The amount of people that I get
and they're like, "This is a green screen."
I'm like, "Yo, bro, look. Real sneaker. Real sneaker."
Like, this is-- this is the real thing.
And, like you said, it's-it's so--
It really-- That really heightens the show,
because it's just like, "Yo, look at Desus over there
"with mad sneakers and stuff.
Yo, Mero's in the basement over there."
It's just like, do-- The backgrounds are indicative
of who we are, and that kind of helps when we're talking,
'cause you'll see, like, Mero will talk about, like,
-family stuff and things of that nature. -Uh-huh, uh-huh.
And I'll be over here, like, "Yo, this sneaker came out,"
whatever. And it's a good blend.
And then, visually, it looks good.
It looks different than everyone else.
Because early on in the Zoom--
You know, when Zoom got introduced to humanity,
we were all looking at each other's backgrounds
and we didn't know which way to go.
I was like, "Should I put a potted plant? Should--
-Maybe I'll do a fern. Maybe some books." -Hmm. Some art.
But I was like, "You know what, I'm-a do the background.
I'm-a stand out." So, Room Raider, I want my raiding.
-Okay? Stop fronting on a kid. -(laughs)
You know what I'm saying? This is all carefully curated.
This is not, you know what I'm saying, like,
-just random clutter. -Let's talk about your new project.
Um, you've done everything. You've made podcasts,
you've made TV shows, you've got a-a live tour
that was-was going around the United States
before coronavirus hit, and now you've got a book
entitled God-Level Knowledge Darts:
Life Lessons from the Bronx.
I'm-I'm not gonna lie.
I was like, "What-what does that mean,
'God-level knowledge darts'?"
I've-I've never heard that phrase. I-I can't lie.
That's just the highest level of information you can get.
It's just like-- It's casual information you get
that will change your life.
And it's not that deep when you hear it.
But then when you stop and think about it, you're like,
-"Yo, wait a minute. -Whoa. (mimics explosion)
-That's-that's wild." -You know what I mean?
Think about it. You know what I'm saying?
There's-- This is-- this is knowledge,
but it's in a dart form, so it's gonna penetrate.
You know what I mean? Really. And penetrate your third eye
and decalcify your pineal gland.
-You know what I mean? -(laughs) -It's like--
it's like when you're drunk at a party
and someone-- or you're high-- someone goes to you,
"Yo, if you spell the word 'stop' back around,
it's a different word." You're like...
"Wait a minute." And then, you see, that's how--
-that's how it starts. -You're like, "Yo! 'Pots.'"
You're starting your journey to enlightenment.
-This... -Nah, it's just-- it's just us-- it's talking
about what we learned growing up in the Bronx.
-Yeah. -Some stuff that-- Lessons we learned
that maybe we learned them so you don't have
-to go through that. And then it's also-- Uh-huh, uh-huh.
It's kind of-- it's kind of a photograph
of where we're at in life now
versus where we were a couple years ago.
And those people we were a couple years ago
might not necessarily be-- have been people
you wanted to watch on TV. So it's also--
You know, it maps the growth that we've had.
And it's just us talking candidly on different things
in our life. I'm talking about relationships.
Mero's talking about families and stuff.
We're talking about people dying.
You know, that's my wheelhouse. So, you know,
it's just-- it's just a good collection of us.
I loved some of the topics in the book,
because I've always been amazed at how common our story can be
regardless of where we're from in the world.
Like, the hood seems like the hood no matter where you are.
And, in fact, one part of the book is where you're talking
about, like, how the Bronx taught you to be broke.
And it reminded me of something my mom said to me
when the coronavirus started and I-I said,
"Hey, are you okay? Is everything good?
Do you need any help or whatever?"
And my mom said to me, she's like, "Oh, honey,
"don't worry about me. I've got a PhD in being broke.
I can handle this if things get bad."
And-and it-it, like-- You guys were talking
about that same thing in the book, is, like--
Do you think there are life lessons that you learned
growing up in an environment like the Bronx
that somebody doesn't learn in, like, a "good life"
that they need to survive today?
-Oh, absolutely. -For sure. 100%.
If you have never gone to bed hungry
or if you've never had to just drink water
so you're not hungry, you know what I mean,
you could definitely learn something from this book.
You know what I mean? Like, if you've never had to, like,
you know, "Oh, I want some meat with my food tonight,
"so let me, uh, just, you know, throw it down my pant leg,
you know what I mean, and walk out of the store." You know?
You're definitely gonna learn a lesson in this book.
Like, this book, it's-it's not about suffering.
That sounds wild. But it's, like-- It's really about,
like Desus said, like, a-a time capsule
to-to a point in our lives where it was just, like,
these were not, like-- these were not jokes.
They're jokes now. But back then, it was like,
"Yo, this is real. This is real life.
And we have to do this to kind of, like, survive and--"
Like, there's-- You know, Desus talks about paying rent on time
and all these kinds of topics that are really...
common across the board, like, you know, surviving,
eating, paying your bills, et cetera, you know?
I know your chemistry works. Everyone knows
when the two of you are together, there's just magic.
But to see it in a book, I mean, like,
you-you've also written differently.
Mero, you've got the all-caps thing,
which still throws me off because it seems
like you're shouting at me from the pages of a book.
-(laughing) -But it does make me feel
like I'm talking to both of you individually.
It really-- it really feels like you've captured the essence
of Bodega Boys on a page.
Were you shocked at how well that worked?
No, you know what, it was-- It-it kind of lended itself.
Because after doing the podcast and then doing live shows
and then doing TV shows, it's basically-- any format we do,
we just basically keep the same energy
and we vibrate on the same frequency.
So it was just a matter of just being in the Google document
and just working-- shout-out to Google Docs--
'cause now you're working on the same thing.
And I think if we didn't have Google documents
and it was, like, old-school style,
where it was just, like-- we're just mailing back and forth,
like, a Word document, some of that energy
and that chemistry definitely would have been lost.
But having a free-flowing, living document
like a Google document, where we're both working
at the same time and the editors are working
and you can see each other working,
that lended itself to being, like, a stream of consciousness
and definitely feeling like a typed-out version
of the podcast.
Well, congratulations.
The brand is stronger than ever before.
The book is out. The show is still out.
You guys are still successful, still doing your thing.
I appreciate you for doing it.
Thank you so much for joining me on the show, my dudes.