i'd like to invite my good friend ron
funches in
to talk about his first set on our show
hi ron
hey jp i like that your your podcasting
voice is slightly different
from your regular voice really this is
how you think i'm putting on
putting on airs and you're putting on
yours because you're not completely
comfortable yet
ron this is like episode six give me
some time i am
i'm telling you what i hear i'm giving
you all the time in the world
you watch queen latifah's first episode
of fresh prince that is not her voice
then you watch live and single she's
more comfortable
and then you get to chicago when it's
just off the charts she's yeah she is
fully
realized a lot of work goes into a short
late night stand-up set
join me jp buck as i spotlight the
comedians who came up with some of my
favorite coin sets
this is the setup please welcome the
very funny
ron funchess
you say your voice has changed since
this
debut i think i'm more confident and
calmer in myself
and have more of a i'm a better
performer now
than i was then that just seems natural
to be true you would hope so i would
hope so
chicago is an extremely rough place to
grow up in
especially if you're the only brother on
the block
that's in the bump in alanis morissette
[Laughter]
so you oughta know
i moved to oregon
one thing i really liked when i watched
it was that
i was always telling a truth about
myself
like i think that's something that i
love to do in my comedy i don't really
like to like
lie unless i unless it's fun to me
i i generally like to tell what my real
life is about
and sometimes you don't do that when
you're scared you have
really become so much more able to
use the various tools of your voice and
your rhythms and the tonation and it
really
does give you a bigger toolbox
when you're on stage no absolutely just
learn to be more you
you know that that's i think the biggest
lesson i've learned
through everything is not like to try to
amass this outside knowledge
as if it's you know it's it's all within
me it's more unlocking
who i truly am through through life
experience to experience on stage
through just gaining more confidence and
putting myself outside my comfort zone
like right now you know i'm taking
a lot of singing lessons because i want
to do a christmas show and i want to
sing a couple christmas songs and i
don't want to be bad at it so
um and i just love singing i sing around
the house all the time but i never
do and i don't plan to be like oh throw
it in my act but like
if i can have a new tool set that like
people don't even know i have
it's really fun i remember that the
second guest was a kid
from a horror movie um and that
he uh he was really cute
but he didn't seem to have any stories
at all
and so i was like i was backstage
freaking out going like this kid's
bombing it for me
he's digging a hole
you're not alone i can't tell you how
many comics i've had to talk off ledges
one of the things about my standup is
that it's kind of
different enough and kind of personal
enough that like
anytime i follow anyone it's kind of
like a reset
so i have to like just reset the room
temperature to what i
need and what i'm about so in that way
you know as long as it's not like hate
speech or something like it i can kind
of follow
anything you making your debut i figured
okay there's got to be some
motivational you know support i could
give i can provide to ron
and so i remember clearly in my mind and
these are the words that came back to
bite me
and i had to change my advice after this
so this is 2011. i'm walking to the
stage with ron funches
in my last two two three words were
take your time and ron
i took my six and a half minutes later
you were finished with your five-minute
set
yeah that's only a minute and a half
over
that's not too much longer
it's very unprofessional in our business
that i mean that like you go
five five minutes ten seconds five
minutes 20 seconds
five minutes 30 seconds maybe but a
whole
minute and then another half a minute
over
i was concerned that i was gonna get
some things cut out
however i was keenly aware that i had
crushed it
so
[Laughter]
they're not going to be too mad at me we
always have a post meeting where the
producers and the writers and
conan all come together we discuss what
things get pulled or what things worked
and we sort of made little tight little
edits like you know usually about a
minute
or two most out of a show uh
so they all look at me they're like
well the comic would have been a half
long and i'm sitting there like okay
uh how do i respond and then all i mean
before i even had a chance
conan said you're not touching that set
he goes pull one of my monologue jokes i
mean you could just cut that kid that
kid's interview
really is how i feel about it if you
[Laughter]
there's always someone that tries to
make you feel bad
about what you enjoy i call these people
my parents-in-law
we have a weird relationship
i kind of treat them like a walmart
which i'll explain it means i really
don't like
going to them for anything i'd prefer it
if they stay out of my town
i get a strange satisfaction from
stealing from them
pause break
mostly because they believe i need a
real
job i like this joke because it was
just completely again one things i love
when i watch my comedy is that is true
like all of it is
so 100 true like they didn't like
that i was a comedian they didn't you
know the the main sentence i heard every
week was like
you need to know how the real world
works you need to figure out how the
real world works
you don't know what you're you're
destroying your life of your family and
um and i hated walmarts very much
i still still do
[Music]
if you ever get an interview they always
want to know so much about you
like the soundtrack of your life or what
type of tree you would be
and i'm a bonsai but that's
my damn business
it's so silly and fun but also
it paints a picture that you're this
delicate little tree
that needs a lot of maintenance needs
also needs a lot of maintenance and care
and love like bonsais don't grow just in
the wild
yeah and you can see it in my hair and
my my style at the time where like he
needs some pruning
and some taken care of and if you get
past that
there's a drug test that's never fair
one time they tried to give me a mouth
swab drug test
which is where they take a piece of
cotton run the inside of your cheek
to get your dna and that's how they find
out what you like to do
that's against everything
i believe in because there's no way
i'm going to let you take something that
you made my people pick
200 years ago
and then turn around and use it to deny
me a job
you've built up to this because i think
what's what's nice is they don't see
this coming
there's there's social commentary in
this joke that you haven't done up until
this point really this joke the walmart
joke there's a lot of like
anti um i guess i wouldn't say
necessarily truly anti-capitalism but
just more humanistic i guess just seeing
some of the negative
in in the in the structure of things and
the structure of
the things that that had to do to get a
job in order
to get a job that i did not want in
order to try to take care of my son
you know like i don't you mean i think
there's maybe a little bit of
ego again there but i just like i don't
even want this i don't even want this
i'm trying to do this to be responsible
and you're throwing up every
barrier would you steal from us if you
saw someone stealing would you snitch or
would you not snitch and
like what type of tree would you be oh
like these were like the real
questions on this thing where they're
deciding where they're gonna give me a
job and i was like what does this have
to do with anything
you know just give me the job or not
if i knew that's how you treated your
employees
i would have never have taken the time
to duct tape this cheetos bag full of
urine to my lane
[Applause]
that was a waste of mine and my son's
day
what love is this you make your point
here
and you then move on like you're not
hitting them over the head with it you
make it you move on and then you you
have this
fun really silly
illuminating tag
that tops everything but have you ever
not done the tag had the joke ever
existed before
without it no no that this joke was
originally just a
semi true story about how i had to use
my son's pay to get this job at wakovia
bank
so that part was always the end of it
um if anything i think the um cotton
picking thing came in a little bit later
and originally i was kind of afraid to
do it
because i thought it was a little bit
base level
commentary as far as like um
like to me that's easy to get to but
then when i
said it every time i said it people i
mean sometimes people would groan
but every time it got a reaction so i
was like oh there's like
there's something here
what i love about seeing you two come
together it's the first time he's met
you it's almost like
when harry met sally because he loves
you so much like it's like a little bit
of a romance
comedy romance it's nice in that moment
when it first started
the best moment of that set that i
remember like i can
almost traveled back in time to that
moment was doing a joke
and then hearing the audience laugh and
then
just hearing on my right ear conan laugh
and i was like oh okay i'm good at
comedy
if i can make him laugh i'm good at this
job i don't
think i would be the comedian that i am
if if it wasn't for the work that you
guys have done
you guys um kind of let me know like or
at least showed me a way to just do
weird fun comedy
um that doesn't necessarily pick on
people
or um try to be
like or doesn't like try to be in the
zeitgeist
all the time doesn't try to be so
political and so
like what what is everyone else talking
about like you guys kind of
do your own thing and that's something i
have always gravitated towards
told me don't be happy to be here
don't think about all the people who
said who are excited for you to be here
who said oh you made it we knew you had
made it
think about all the people who told you
you would never get here
and show them wrong and show them why
they you they were wrong
and that really helped help me out a lot
you were talking about getting into that
sort of zen place sometimes uh before
a big set do in my mantra which is
which is that it's not from me or within
me
that these abilities flow but through me
that i need to go out there and just
work within the best of my abilities
that i will make mistakes and i need to
just unders to go with that and
lean into it and go out there and have
fun
that's that's pretty much it well thanks
but i really appreciate this
i appreciate you jp thanks for having me
what do you think about
my hosting voice has it gotten better or
am i still putting on airs a little bit
no the more we talked the more you got
comfortable and you just started talking
like the jp that i know
it was really just the beginning where
you're just like and guys
go easy on me i am i'm still i'm still
still a newbie
hey what if you never gave me notes