Sebastian Maniscalco: Is It Me? (2022) Movie Script
Vegas, the jewel of the desert.
People here come in all shapes and sizes.
While today,
the hotels are taller and shinier,
the clientele has,
let's face it, lost some of its sheen.
My favorite Vegas is from a bygone era,
when cash was king.
When everybody smoked,
drank martinis,
and dressed to impress.
And when the Rat Pack ruled.
That's the Vegas I dream of.
That's the Vegas
I'd like to bring back to life.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Sebastian Maniscalco!
Wow. Give it up for Las Vegas, Nevada,
huh?
So, I wanted to do like a throwback
to when people dressed up...
...in Las Vegas.
Um...
So I gotta thank the people
that actually took the time...
to put a suit on or a dress.
Yeah. Nice.
Appreciate it.
By the looks of it, no...
a lot of people didn't really,
do that.
That's nice.
Nice to see couples out on the weekend.
My wife and I, we don't go out
on the weekends, 'cause I generally work.
So we go out on Tuesday.
That's our date night.
Everybody says you have to have
a date night when you have kids.
Like, "You need a date night!"
"For you and your wife to connect."
So now we go out and
we argue without the kids.
It's nice.
We get a lot more accomplished
without the kids bein' there. It's good.
I love my wife Lana to death,
but she's not...
she's got no urgency, there's no...
When we park the car,
our doors never open at the same...
time.
I always get outta the car,
I shut the door,
I look, she's still in the vehicle.
And I'm waiting, I'm like,
"She's gotta notice I've exited
the car, that's gotta click in."
But nothin'.
I gotta go to her side
and knock on the window and go,
"What the fuck are you doin'?"
She's always lookin' for something.
There's a full Sephora
on the console. What the...
She's lookin' in the back.
What are you looking in--
We didn't go in the back!
What's in the back?
Her shoes are off.
It's a ten-minute ride,
she loses her shoes. Wha--
She wears heels, they hurt.
I get it. I get it, okay?
But if it was me,
I'd look at the GPS and go, ""
"We're three minutes away, maybe I should...
...start reassembling my feet."
And when she gets outta the car,
she can't even walk in these heels.
It looks like a "Thriller" video
across the parking lot.
She's like, "Don't I look sexy, babe?"
"Don't I look sexy?"
I'm like, "Yeah, I'm hard already."
"Just get into the restaurant,
people are lookin' at you."
"It don't look good."
"Don't look good, babe."
And we get into the restaurant.
Always make a reservation,
I think you gotta do that.
You feel proud.
You feel proud
when you make a reservation.
Soon as you walk in, you see people
milling around in the lobby.
You tap your wife, like,
"They probably don't have a reservation."
And you give your name--
You're kinda nervous sometimes
when you give your name.
Like there's a moment there, you're like,
"Do they got it?"
"Maniscalco for two."
You ever look with them?
Yes, right there. Thank God!
Now, when we go to our table,
my wife thinks this is the best time
to have a conversation with me
as we snake through a crowded restaurant.
My wife's turning around,
"My mother's coming in May."
"So if you want,
we should tell
your mother to come in July."
I go, "Babe, we lost the guy.
I don't knowwhere our table is."
"We're gonna have plenty of time
to discuss this at the table."
"Let's find the host."
We sit down, all right?
My wife doesn't utilize
her menu time appropriately.
She's gotta look around the restaurant,
"My God, did you see the...
crown molding."
I said, "Start reading,
get your head in the menu."
"They're going to ask us questions."
"We need to be prepared with answers."
"Pick a protein,
stop looking at the molding."
My wife don't know how a restaurant works.
She never worked in one.
I've worked in restaurants my entire life.
I know the back of the house,
the front of the house.
My wife don't know anything.
She's flaggin' down busboys.
What? You don't flag down
the busboy, all right?
He's got two jobs,
he clears it and he sets it up.
He don't know the register,
he don't know the specials,
and sometimes he don't know the language.
Generally speaking, the busboy is
a foreign male
between the ages of 18 and 35.
All right?
Generally speaking.
My wife don't know foreign people.
She didn't grow up with foreigners.
I grew up with foreigners.
My own father, foreigner.
Grandparents, foreign. Aunts, uncles--
I gota bunch of foreign people
in my family, right?
I know how they behave.
Like if my father was here tonight
and I didn't know him,
I would point him out and go,
"That guy wasn't born here."
Just the way my father moves.
Those aren't American-born movements.
My wife flags down the busboy,
right away I knew it would be a problem.
She's like, "Excuse me."
I'm like, "Babe, what are you doing?"
Comes to the table.
She don't adjust her speech,
her word choice. It's the same.
She talks to the busboy
the same way she talks to me.
Like, "Sorry to bother you,
but we actually can't find our waiter-- "
I go, "Babe! You lost him already."
"He don't know, 'actually, '
what are you stringing
sentences together for?"
"You gotta lob in keywords.
Salt, napkin, ice-- "
"Shit he knows, babe."
"He just arrived."
"He don't know, 'actuallys."
She asked him for a Tito's and soda.
I go, "Babe, the only Tito he knows
is washin' dishes
in the back of the restaurant."
He's gonna go in the back,
"Tito, they need you!"
He's gonna come out,
"Hey, my name is Tito,
and soda,
you need some soda in your juice?"
The waiter comes up. She's shocked, right?
She's been sitting with the menu
for 25 minutes.
Waiter comes up, "What can I get you?"
"My..."
"My God!"
She gives me this one, "You go first."
Ever get that? "You go first, babe."
"Okay. I'll get a filet
with mixed vegetables."
"Back to you!"
"How long did you think
I was gonna talk to this guy?"
Think I was gonna take him around
the restaurant, hold his hand,
ask him what his dreams are, his hopes?
"You go first..."
It's not skydiving!
Tell the man...
But my wife and I,
we're in a new chapter of our lives.
Got these two kids, five and three.
A five-year-old and a three-year-old,
and I'm 49. I'm 49.
There's an age difference of 46 years
between my son and me. Okay?
Now, I love to play with him,
don't get me wrong, but a lot of the play
is laying down. All right?
There's a lot of,
"Let's bury Daddy tonight."
"His knees hurt,
something's wrong with his shoulder."
It's a lot of lay and play, right?
My five-year-old daughter,
she's in kindergarten.
She's got a kid in their class
that identifies as a lion.
Comes to school with a tail, ears, and fur
around the wrists, right?
Goes by Roary. Listen...
I'm not making this up,
I'm just reporting the news, people,
all right?
Twenty-three kids, one lion in the class.
I live in Los Angeles,
so you gotta be careful
who you're talkin' to over there.
Got me and another dad waiting
for the kids to come outta the class,
so I tapped him, I said,
"You see the lion...
...they got in the class?"
He's like, "I know! Isn't that fabulous?"
And then I just floated away
from that guy, huh?
Not gonna be talkin'
to that guy the rest of the semester.
I don't blame the kid.
I blame the parents.
Right?
Huh.
Listen, kid probably came down
in the morning dressed as a lion.
Right?
Came down,
"I'm a lion, Mommy. I'm a lion, Daddy!"
And the idiot parents, "He's a lion."
"Well, come on. Let's go to school, lion."
Now, if my kid comes down,
he's dressed as a panda bear,
I tell him, "Get the fuck back upstairs
and go put some jeans on."
"I'm not taking a panda bear
to school, all right?"
That's it, done.
We don't see that outfit ever again.
Daddy said no.
I got some people here,
looking over here, going,
"What does it matter to you?"
"How does it affect you?"
It's affecting my daughter, okay?
She ain't learning nothin',
'cause this lion...
...is disruptive.
He's in the back of the class...
...knockin' over books
and desks, right?
The teacher's gotta stop what she's doin'.
Nowadays, you can't say nothin'.
Because if I say somethin',
now, all of a sudden, I'm insensitive
to the lion's feelings.
I can't go up to the teacher,
and go, "The fuck's up with this lion?"
"If he thinks he's a lion,
bring in a cage, give him some raw meat."
"My kid don't know the alphabet...
...because Roary's in the back,
lookin' for zebras."
Can you believe
we're even talkin' about this shit?
Now my son,
I gotta take him to school too.
That's all I'm doin'. Doin' drop-offs.
Growin' up, nobody dropped us off.
We didn't get a ride
anywhere growin' up.
Especially to school.
I don't know how you people grew up,
but in my house
my parents just told us,
"Walk down the sidewalk
and when you see people your height,
that's the school."
"Listen for your name,
walk in the building."
"Hopefully you'll learn some shit."
Now I gotta take my son to school.
I gottabasically hand him off
to the teacher, all right?
And you go to these schools,
talk to the parents.
Listen, I don't wanna talk
to anybody in the morning.
All right?
You just wanna do your own thing.
But people love to talk in the morning.
You ever talk to people?
You know how boring people are?
Ever get in these conversations?
"What's going on?"
"Well, last month, we had COVID."
"My husband had 102 temperature."
Hey, listen...
Can you listen to this?
I can't listen to this.
I need to hear some stuff.
When I talk to you,
if I ask you what's going on,
I need to hear... "What's going on?"
"I had an affair last night."
"You did? What happened?"
That's what I wanna hear.
I don't wanna hear about your cold.
When I take my son up to the classroom,
I hold his hand.
He wants to be picked up.
I don't pick him up.
Said, "I gave you a ride.
Now, come on, walk."
Approachin' the class,
I see an Asian guy, an Asian father.
Look how quiet it got on "Asian father."
You believe that?
I said "Asian father,"
everybody in the room,
their ass just tightened up.
"Ooh. Where we goin' with this?"
"Why would you do that?"
This is what happened in the country
the last six or seven years.
You can't even mention
someone's background in describing them.
It's not meant to be derogatory.
Growin' up, it's how you knew
who you were talking about
in the neighborhood.
You'd be sitting in the neighborhood,
and be like, "What guy?"
"The Puerto Rican guy." "I know him."
Today, you got people in this room,
right now,
lookin' up here going,
"What does it matter?"
"Why would you even mention that?"
"What does it matter?" It matters.
At the end of the story,
you're gonna find out why I said,
"Asian guy," all right?
Loosen up your hole, it's okay.
It's all right.
Nice guy, comes up to me, like, "Hi,
I'm the room dad."
I said, "Wha-- What's-- "
"What's a room dad?"
He's like,
"I'm in charge of all the dads socially,
we get together once a month."
"We're going over to Christopher's house
on Tuesday for an ugly sweater night."
"If you wanna wear your ugliest sweater,
we're gonna...
talk about being a dad,
maybe open up some Diet Cokes."
So I said, "Listen..."
Listen, I'm nice. If you talk to me,
I'll talk right back at you.
But I'm 49 years old, and I'm not
actively pursuin' new friendships
at my age, all right?
I'm lookin' to lose people in my life.
We're doin' a massive layoff
at the Maniscalco household.
Not accepting
new applicants.
So I tell him, "It's nice of you to offer.
Can't make it."
"But keep me in mind for the next
sweater event, maybe I'll pop in."
We're lookin' at the class
and he points out his son.
It's the only Asian kid
in the class.
He's like, "That's my boy."
I'm like, "I know."
But again,
you got people in this room lookin' up,
goin', "You are so closed-minded."
"How dare you assume?"
"Don't you think
there's other possibilities?"
"Maybe the Asian father
adopted the Black child
and the Black father
adopted the Asian child."
Listen, if I'm puttin' money on who
this Asian kid's goin' home with,
it's this guy, all right?
Put $100 on the table,
I wanna see how PC you get.
Where I'm from,
these two came in the same car.
All right?
Now, my kid walks in, right?
My kid's like raising a chimpanzee,
this kid's all over the map.
Just comes in.
Takes his shirt off,
ripped his shirt off. Beautiful.
I gotta tell you, as an Italian father,
to see my son rip his shirt off
in front of 13 of his classmates,
was a proud moment for me, right?
I get him ready for school.
I dress him up,
I put his shoes on and socks,
a little cologne on him. Just a touch.
Just decorate his ear
with a little cologne, all right?
I want him to get used
to having his own scent.
Plus, when the teacher helps him out,
she's like, "Okay, we're gonna-- "
"The fuck do you have on?"
My son goes get some crayons
and a coloring book,
comes right over to the girls,
just bypasses the guys,
right into the chicks.
Sharin' his crayons.
"Take a green.
You want my green? Take my green."
I'm watchin' this and now
the teacher's gotta come over
and fart on my dinner, all right?
She's like,
"You wanna put your son's shirt back on?"
I said, "For what?"
"He's havin' a ball, look at him!"
"There's a lion in the other class."
She's like, "We don't want
these kids to remove their clothing."
"Could you please do something?"
I said, "All right, I got you."
I said, "Come here. Come here!"
"Put your shirt back on, all right?
People are jealous."
"I know you're upset, we'll take it off
at the grocery store on the way home."
And I tell him,
"Listen, you share your toys
while you're here."
"You respect your teachers."
"You say, 'please and thank you.'
You understand?"
"Get back in there."
A little slap on the ass.
He walks back in the class.
That's how I talk to my son.
There's no baby talk.
I know some fathers do baby talk
to their son.
"You share your toys, okay?"
"Share your toys. Be nice."
No, I talk to my son
like he's in the Union Local 606
working in a warehouse 15 hours
on a forklift.
I start to leave and the teacher's like,
"Excuse me, where you going?"
I said,
"I'll be back at 3:00 to pick him up."
She's like, "No, we actually
encourage parents to participate
in the learning process,
so if you'd like to stay a few hours-- "
Few hours?
What the hell am I gonna do?
I don't do this.
I don't teach.
Right? I don't know
what these schools are doing now.
The schools I grew up in were volatile,
the teachers were drunk,
the kids were fightin',
people were stealin', I don't know.
What am I gonna do?
Everything's so nice now.
The teachers come out.
Everything's a song.
Teacher comes out.
We look at the clock
And what does it say?
Five minutes to play
No idea.
Teacher's like,
"We're gonna sit in a circle, everybody."
"Sit in a big circle."
"Grab your child. Big circle."
I'm like,
"You want us to sit Indian-style?"
"Yeah, well...
we don't say...
...Indian-style."
"It's crisscross applesauce."
What?
Crisscross, what?
I had no idea the Indians got upset
and had a meeting and said,
"They stole our style too,
this is bullshit."
"This has gotta stop."
No one knows what to say.
You don't know what's off-limits, right?
Until you say it and somebody says,
"You're in trouble."
In some states,
if you wanna sell your own home
in the description of the home,
you can't even say
you got a walk-in closet.
Can you believe it?
Can't say walk-in closet anymore.
Why?
Not everybody walks.
You're telling me a guy in a wheelchair
is gonna go look at a home, right...
...and the real estate agent's gonna go,
"And this is the walk-in closet."
And he'd go,
"What the fuck did you just say?"
"I don't walk."
World's upside down.
All right?
They say it's better today.
Look around, it sucks. Sucks.
I grew up in the '70s, '80s.
I was a kid back then,
and I'd reflect back on those times.
It seemed a little simpler.
My birthday parties were simple.
I had water balloon fights.
Remember water balloon fights?
My family's too cheap to buy
the balloon that held the water.
We had little balloons that
we had to fill up, kept popping off the--
Remember?
Filling up a balloon? Pssht!
Shit! God!
Eighteen rubber rings
around the kitchenfaucet
by the end of the party.
Three balloons you got.
But once you got the balloon,
you couldn't wait
to hit the kid that you couldn't stand.
He would dart across the yard and--
Pssht!
Right in his ear, man,
the balloon went in his ear canal.
Went deaf, the kid--
Kid couldn't hear nothin'
for three months out of his ear.
Came home from the party,
parents were, "How was it?"
"Can't hear nothing.
It was a wicked party. Balloon."
Nobody got sued.
Back in the '70s,
if you went to a birthday party,
it was understood you could lose a finger,
eyesight.
Hearing loss.
Played games growing up at our parties,
with food.
I remember food bein'
a big part of our birthday parties.
Seventh birthday party,
my mother brought out a two-foot zucchini.
She's like, "We're gonna play Gagootz."
"What?"
"Don't we have
pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey?"
"What the hell is...
Gagootz?"
She lined up the kids and took a zucchini
and put it in between
the boy's knees.
There's a seven-year-old boy
with a two-foot
zucchini
comin' out of his kneecaps.
The object of the game was you...
You had to turn to your left
and give it to the kid,
and the other kid clamped on.
I mean...
The other kid
gave it...
If the zucchini fell on the ground,
you were eliminated from the game.
And the last one with the zucchini,
got to keep it.
That was the prize.
Brought home a zucchini from my party.
Parents were like, "What's this?"
"I don't know, it's a Gagatza."
"I don't know."
"But they gave us a recipe,
they said to slice it,
dip it in egg and bread crumb and fry it."
"It makes for a good snack."
"What?"
"This is at a seven-year-old's
birthday party?"
"Yeah."
Another game,
my mother brought out pantyhose.
And she tied a leg around the kid's waist.
Then she took a potato and stuck it down
the other leg into the foot,
so the kid...
...the kid had a potato
hanging from his crotch.
She did this with two kids.
She brought 'em to the sidewalk.
And she put a lemon in front of each kid
and it was a race that
they had to hit the potato
to the lemon.
This is on a Saturday afternoon.
Nobody called the police.
This was just a normal
birthday party.
Feels like it was yesterday.
Now?
I got these kids, I'm gettin' older.
I'm not one of these guys that complains,
"I'm old." No.
Just gettin' older and startin' to see
some changes in myself, all right?
I'm claustrophobic now.
It happened two years ago.
I was never claustrophobic.
I was on an airplane,
sitting at the window
mid-flight,
the middle of the flight, I'm like--
"Gotta get outta here!"
I don't know what happened.
I can't go to something like this.
I cannot go
to something like this.
I don't know where I'm gonna sit.
I can't be confined.
Last time I did anything
like this was four years ago.
My wife and I went to go see
Hamilton on Broadway.
Everybody was talkin' about Hamilton,
you'd run into these people.
"Have you seen it?"
"My God. It is amazing."
"We saw it, How many times?"
"How many times did we see it?"
"Three times, we saw it three times."
"And each time it was just an ex..."
"It changed me as a-- It changed me."
All right? As soon as I hear that,
I'm like, "I ain't gonna like this."
My kids changed me, not Lin-Manuel.
So we go.
All right? My wife and I sit down.
This woman sits next to me.
She's diggin' in her purse.
It's killing me, right?
She's-- I'm like,
"Find it! I gotta get outta here."
"Babe, we gotta leave,
I can't deal
with this shit with the purse."
"I don't know what she's looking for,
but it's killin' me."
So this thing starts, all right?
Ten minutes into Hamilton,
I tap my wife, I go,
"I got no idea what's goin' on."
I didn't understand it.
I couldn't understand the rapping.
I'm like, "What'd he say?"
The characters.
I don't even know what Hamilton did.
I went to this play to find out
why this guy was so fabulous, all right?
And you gotta understand something
about my wife and I, we are dumb.
All right.
Like, as a couple, we're equally dumb.
You don't find this in
a lot of relationships.
In a normal healthy relationship,
someone is always smarter
than the other person
and you rely on the smart one
to get you through movies, books,
and life.
We don't have this dynamic.
I'll tap my wife, I go,
"You know what's going on?" "No, you?"
"Nothing."
We just sit there, dumb-dumb.
So, at halftime, we--
I thought the thing was over,
the lights came on, I'm like, "Thank God."
"Let's go eat some oysters."
I find out we got
two and a half hours of this
thing left.
I don't like an intermission,
burn through the damn thing.
I don't wanna get up at a half-hour.
We go out.
We saw another couple we know,
highly intelligent couple.
All right?
We get in a conversation with them.
They're rattling off US presidents,
wars, events.
Ever get in conversations
with people who are highly intelligent?
In my head I'm like,
"I can't add shit to this conversation."
I'm just nodding.
"Yeah, nah, the 1700s..."
"Long time, y'know?
It was a long time ago."
"Nah, long time, the 1700s.
Long time. Long time."
"Long time."
"Long time ago."
This guy's lookin' at his playbill,
telling me about the actors.
I felt bad,
I got my playbill rolled up into a tube
and I'm playin' a Bon Jovi song on my leg.
So I turned to my wife,
"You wanna go back in there?"
"I have no idea what's going on.
No way I'm pickin' it up midway through."
My wife is like,
"I know, babe, I'm so lost."
"I have no idea what's goin' on either."
"I had no idea Hamilton was Black."
"Let's get outta here."
"Don't ever repeat that
to another human being."
"That is a Black actor playing Hamilton."
"Let's get outta here.
We're dumber than shit."
"Get in the car. Take your shoes off.
Let's get out of here."
"We're lost."
Dumb.
Anytime my wife and I go out,
when we go back to the house,
she's always shocked
how fast I get into bed. All right?
I don't know what you people do
after a night out, but I go home,
I brush my teeth, take my clothes, boom.
Right in bed.
There's no washin' the face.
I just washed it two hours ago, what?
A sink bath after goin' out
for an hour and a half?
My wife always walks in the bedroom,
"My God!"
"You're in bed already?" "Yeah."
"It's nighttime."
"What did you think I was goin' to do?
Cut the lawn? Get in. Get in!"
I don't know
what she does in that bathroom.
The noises that are comin' outta there.
The water going "Pssht"...
"Pssht-pssht."
She comes out rolling her face
with some spiked roll.
I go, "Is-- You're bleeding!
Is that helping you?"
"My mother uses that to make pasta."
"Why are you using that on your foreh-- "
Then she puts some Korean mask on.
As soon as you see the mask,
"No sex tonight! There goes that!"
I'm gonna make love to a hockey goalie?
"Just blink, babe,
so I know you're enjoying this."
"You under that thing?"
And my side table, I got nothing on it.
I got a lamp and that's it.
Her side, eight bottles of water, right?
A mouth guard, eye drops, Tylenol.
What the fuck are you doin'
on your side of the bed?
How long?
Now we get in.
We gotta find something to watch.
My wife hasn't seen one movie.
This one hasn't seen a movie
in her whole life.
Shawshank came on.
I go, "You gotta watch this."
"It's a great movie."
She's like, "I can't watch this movie."
I go, "Why not?"
She's like, "It's started already."
I go, "It's five minutes in.
I'll get you up to speed."
She's like, "I can't watch a movie
that's already started."
Like, my wife needs to see the lion--
Some of you didn't even get that.
Like, "There's a lion in Shawshank?"
"I don't remember a lion walking around
the prison yard with Morgan Freeman."
The problem
in our relationship is I worry.
She don't worry about nothin', all right?
My fear is having a home invasion.
That's my biggest fear.
Growin' up,
our house got robbed three separate times.
As an adult, I got a fear of wakin' up
at four o'clock in the morning,
and I got another guy in my bedroom.
Now, I don't got a gun,
I got nothing against guns.
But again, I'm 49 years old
and I'm not pickin' up any new skill sets
at my age.
I feel gun owners have
a good grasp of their gun.
They go to the range, they got a lock
and key for it, keep it in the cabinet.
Plus I feel when a gun owner hears
somebody breaking into their home,
the gun owner gets happy.
Hears a little jiggle at the door,
he's like, "Yeah!"
He tells his wife, "Just lay there, babe."
"I know you got a big day.
I'm gonna go take care of this guy."
Last month, our alarm went off.
This thing is loud,
woke me right out of a dead sleep.
And my wife, my wife don't wake up.
Like tonight,
I'll probably go to bed at two o'clock
and then I'll get up,
I'll think it's morning.
I'll look at the clock, 2:09.
I sleep in nine-minute increments
throughout the night.
My wife goes to bed,
wakes up in the same position.
Her side in the morning, beautiful.
Everything's tucked in,
the pillows are layered.
Hair is cascading off the sheets.
My side, I look like
I got in a fight with a shark.
Everything's untucked,
I'm missing pillowcases.
I'm wet. Why am I wet?
My neck is drenched.
I gotta wring out my underwear.
What the hell happened to me last night
where I gotta flip the mattress over
in the morning?
Why am I soaked?
Why am I drenched?
So the alarm went off
last month and my wife don't get up.
I'm up right away, and I'm not one of
these guys that goes and handles it.
All right.
I'm like, "Get up! Get up!"
She's like, "What's goin' on?"
I said, "The alarm!"
"The alarm's on!"
She's like, "Just go look."
"I'm gonna go look, take two to the head,
while you escape out the back
with our two kids and start
another family with some other guy?"
"Fuck that. Get on my back.
We're goin' out together."
"Go look."
"The hell you think you married?
Rambo? Let's go together."
"Look..."
I just wish I was a little bit
more aggressive that way, all right?
Tryin' to teach my kid to be that way,
you know, a little bit more manly.
We got him in soccer,
we put him in soccer.
It's not even soccer.
I don't know what this is.
It's about eight three-year-olds,
just runnin' around.
The ball don't move.
I take him
to this park in Los Angeles.
It's a big park.
They got like basketball courts.
They got a playground.
Heroin. It's nice.
It's a nice place
to raise a family.
And I'm the type of guy,
I just bring my son, I don't bring a bag
with snacks,
water, change of clothes, nothin'.
It's just me and him, all right?
All the other parents, they got blankets,
they're layin' out picnic blankets.
Puttin' up umbrellas.
They got fruit plates.
It's not Coachella,
it's a 45-minute practice.
There's a lot of dogs runnin'
around this park off-leash.
Now, I know this is unpopular to say,
I'm not a big dog guy.
Okay? I'm sorry. I know there's
pet owners in here, some dog lovers.
I know you're goin'
into a panic attack right now,
just hearin' somebody say that,
but when I was six, I got mauled
by a German Shepherd. Okay?
So when your dog comes up to me,
I'm not--
I'm not in on it, all right?
It's a threat. I take a couple steps
back and I assess it.
Now, I'm looking at the practice
and from afar,
I see a dog running
at such a high rate of speed,
I can't even make out the breed
on this thing, right?
So, it zips through,
it almost clips my son's head.
"Whoosh." Just right through the practice.
I even had to ask the family,
"Was that a cheetah?"
"What the hell just ran through here?"
And I look, it's a Greyhound.
Now, listen, I'm sorry,
you don't own a Greyhound.
All right?
Top speed on this thing
is 48 miles per hour. All right?
They're a sight hound,
which means, once they see something,
they go and get it, and they don't stop
until they retrieve it.
I don't know if you've ever seen one run,
it is frightening.
The ears are pinned back and...
This thing ain't street-legal.
It's kickin' up sod.
I think I split my pants on that,
I don't know what's goin' on in the
back of my ass, but somethin' happened.
There's a draft. I don't even wanna look.
No, I wanted...
I wanted to get in shape for this thing.
I gotta get in shape for this
Netflix special, gotta fit into the suit.
And, it didn't work.
I tell you, this is tight.
Tight.
I'm lookin' around the casino,
some people still got their masks on.
All right?
You wanna wear the damn thing, wear it.
I don't care. I got other problems,
to worry about you and your mask.
I'm not one of these people--
"Can ya-- ?" No, I got shit goin' on.
All right?
You wanna wear the mask, wear it.
People are passionate about their masks,
you see these mask people?
"Got my mask."
They make a necklace for it.
"I make a necklace for it
just in case I have to take it off.
It just dangles right here."
"I have another in case
someone didn't bring their mask."
"I have extra."
That's fine.
You wanna do that? That's fine.
Then you got the other half,
"Fuck the masks! I ain't wearing it!"
"I ain't wearin' no mask!"
"Nobody gonna tell me
what to do." Fine.
All right. You wanna be on that team?
Be on that team. I don't care. Either way.
I don't care. I just know me.
I got bad luck, bad.
Bad luck.
I don't talk bad about this virus.
No matter where we are in this pandemic,
I never make fun of the virus.
Not gonna be one of these guys.
You see these guys walkin' around,
"Yo, this is a scam!"
Next thing you know--
No!
I'm not gonna be on my deathbed,
"Get the vaccine!" No!
I got the vaccine and to be honest,
I didn't get it to save my life.
I really didn't.
I didn't get it to save your life.
I got this thing, same reason
why a lot of Italians went to go get it.
As soon as the Italian community
found out, if you get COVID,
you lose your ability to taste food...
...scared the shit out of us.
I ran to get this thing.
I got two, Moderna and Pfizer,
just pump me full of this.
I don't care if I die from the vaccine,
at least I'm gonna die with the taste
of meatballs in my mouth. All right?
Not goin' 15 months without tasting food.
Rather be dead.
I got the vaccine at Walgreens.
I was hopin' for a medical facility.
With trained professionals, not a store
that sellsPeople Magazine,
tampons, and Bubble Yum.
That doesn't sound healthy to me.
I was nervous, I was in line.
Over the intercom, I hear,
"Assistance in vaccines."
"Assistance in vaccines."
Then the guy stockin' Gatorades
ran into the pharmacy.
Now I'm nervous, I'm lookin' up there.
There was a question that
was throwing a lot of people off.
The question was,
"What arm do you want your shot in?"
I get up there, guy's askin' me questions.
"You allergic to anything?"
I said,
"I'm not gonna give you my medical history
in the middle of Walgreens."
"Just give me the shot
and we'll find out."
So he jabs me with this thing,
I start to bleed.
I'm like, "Is this normal?"
He's like, "My God."
"Come on, bro."
"Lie to me, make something up,
tell me 2% of the people get it,
bleed, I'm nervous."
He's like, "I've never seen anybody
bleed like this before."
"You want some Gatorade or something?
Got some orange, grape, frost."
"You want a frost?"
"What flavor?"
Then they tell you to wait,
I don't know who's makin' up the rules.
After the shot,
they tell you to wait 15 minutes
and like an idiot, I'm like,
"Okay. Wait 15 minutes. Right here."
"How long you been here?"
"Eight minutes, just waitin' to pass away,
nothin' yet, though."
"I think I'm gonna make it.
I think it's pretty good."
"Guy next to me had a rash
on his inner thigh."
"I don't know if he came in with that...
but I think I'm gonna be good."
Fifteen minutes.
And if something does happen,
what the fuck is Walgreens gonna do?
Are they gonna call the cashier?
"He's foamin' at the mouth!" "My God."
"If this was a return,
I'd be able to help you out, but jeez."
"This is above my pay grade.
It don't look good, man."
Fifteen minutes.
No one went to their car
at 17 minutes and were like--
Fifteen minutes, you're gonna make it.
You're gonna live.
I don't know. I'm trying to reduce
some stress in my life, I get like
aggravated quick.
I went to a coffee house.
This was last week.
I was in a neighborhood that
I'm generally not in,
but I'm dyin' for a coffee.
Normally we all have our own coffee places
you go to on a regular basis.
I was outta that.
I was in a different city.
Walked into this, like a hipster coffee--
Ever get hipster coffee?
Walked in, everybody had like
a sticker on their laptop.
If you're a 42-year-old grown man
and you got a sticker
of Chewbacca on your MacBook Pro,
you might wanna re-evaluate
where you're goin' the rest of your life.
I'm in line. I'm lookin'
at the guy makin' coffee,
he's got a half-top on.
Right away, I'm upset.
Just hair all over-- Come on, bro.
It's eight in the morning,
I don't wanna see hair
funneling into a belly hole.
This guy had no--
No belly button. Had a belly hole--
Do you know what lives in a belly hole?
If you got one, go home tonight,
take an air duster,
blow it in your hole and watch
what falls out on your table. All right?
If you're workin' food and beverage
with an exposed belly hole,
you might as well have your left nut
hangin' outta your shorts.
It's the same thing.
Nut, hole, hair, just get your hole
away from the scones.
This guy's goin' in for a croissant,
and his hole is up against the scones,
no one's seein' this? Apron!
And the workforce
we got out there today, piss poor.
The labor force?
Ever order something from someone
and in your head, you're like,
"I ain't getting that.
That's not coming out."
I ordered the coffee from him
and then he told me to go wait over there.
This is awkward.
When you're in a coffee place,
you gotta wait
with other people
for your coffee.
It's an awkward entrance into that group,
right, 'cause you come in and--
"Hi!"
"What are you guys waiting for? A coffee?"
"What'd you get?"
"I got a cappuccino. You?"
"I don't know,
whatever he feels like makin' me."
I ordered a hot coffee and he brought out
iced coffee and I'm like, "Okay."
"Looks like I'm drinking it cold."
I'm not one of these guys that stops
the whole op-- "Excuse me!"
"I ordered a hot coffee."
"I got an iced coffee."
What are you gonna do?
It's gonna throw this guy's whole day off.
He's not gonna be able to process that.
You give him a whole different thing.
He was gonna make a--
A cappuccino.
"I was gonna make a cappuccino,
now he said..."
"He said he wants hot coffee."
I just took the iced coffee. No straw.
They don't give you a straw.
You gotta ask,
and it's made outta chalk and plywood.
I don't know what's going on
with the straws.
I don't know,
apparently a turtle died in the ocean.
Now I gotta get a brain aneurysm
trying to suck liquid
through a straw made out of drywall.
Just bring the straws back.
They're disintegrating.
In the middle of the drink.
Nah, it's good.
One turtle died for this shit?
I was FaceTiming my dad,
my dad is 76 years old, all right?
He's falling apart.
If you got parents in this age range,
everything hurts, right?
Every time you talk to them,
they're gonna tell you what's goin' on
with their body. All right?
I FaceTime him last week,
ask, "What's going on?"
"What's going on?!
I can't see nothing outta my left eye."
"That's what."
Every time I call,
it's something different,
the pain travels.
I call him up, "What's up with the eye?"
"Not the eye anymore. Look at this.
I can't move my hand."
"I got a claw now for a hand.
I can't move it."
Ever see your parents aging
just right in front of you?
He called me yesterday on FaceTime.
He's like, "Did I call you,
or did you call me?" What?
He recently told me
what's gonna happen when he dies.
Italians talk about death,
it's really out in the open.
Especially old-school Italians.
They pay for everything
while they're alive,
so the kids don't have to do it.
He's like,
"When I die, you cry. That's it."
"You call Mario
at the Cumberland Funeral Home when I die,
that's it."
"Everything's paid for, in advance."
You don't see Italians on Facebook
doing a fundraiser for Nonno's casket.
All right?
Shit's taken care of.
He told me he don't wanna go
in the ground, he got a drawer...
in a mausoleum.
He's like, "Come on,
I want you to see it."
"I wanna take you to the mausoleum,
see what I bought."
It was a wall.
"Come on, we'll go."
So, we're there,
he's like,
"I'm the third one in on the top."
"Your mother's gonna go in first."
"I don't wanna go in the back.
She's gonna go in first."
"And then I wanna be by the wall."
"What does it matter? You're dead."
"'Cause I wanna be by the wall,
just in case they gotta take me out."
I go, "Yeah, but now--
Why don't you get one down here?"
"So I could put some flowers there."
He goes, "Are you nuts?
They want an extra 20 grand."
I said, "Put me by the ceiling.
Take the 20 grand,
split it between you and your sister."
I go, "Now I gotta crane my head when I-- "
"I gotta throw shit up there."
"I love you."
My dad wants the whole thing, a wake.
The whole thing.
He don't want no-- People do this now,
celebration of life, right?
He's like, "I don't want a celebration,
I don't want anybody happy when I die!"
We went out to dinner recently.
We're having the dinner.
I told him, I gotta go to the bathroom.
He's like, "Me too. Let's go."
I'm like, "No. You go."
"Then you come back, and I'll go."
Like, "What, you gonna be alone here?
I'm gonna be alone?"
"We'll go together."
Okay, so...
My father and I,
we go to the restroom together.
Now, he takes the stall, I take a urinal.
Now, my father has
an enlarged prostate, right?
Which means when he goes to the bathroom,
it's not a steady stream.
It comes out in sections.
Okay?
Now he's in there and he's swearing
while he's going to the bathroom.
He's like,
"Sa-- ! Fuck, come on!"
"Pssht-pssht!"
"See-- you bitch!"
"Come on, you fuck!"
"Pssht!"
While this is going on,
another guy walks in.
And he gets to the urinal next to me.
This guy's loud.
Ever get these loud pissers that come in?
Everything they do is like--
What's going on
with your upper respiratory system
that you're coming
into a public restroom this way?
Then he leans on the wall.
Ever see a guy, he's gotta put a hand up?
What happened to you
the last time you went?
Did you fall in?
And now you gotta
brace yourself to go? What?
Then he starts texting.
He's got one hand here
and he starts texting.
Listen, you gotta remain in contact
with this at all times.
You can't let this go,
it could go all over the wall.
You gotta remain
in contact with it, all right?
Now while this is going on,
my father is still--
"I'm hungry, come on!
Goddamn shit-s!"
And this guy
he starts to go.
I don't know what's coming out of him.
It's like, honey, it's thick.
Ever get these thick pissers?
He's pissing on the urinal cake
and it's loud.
It's just, "Get off the cake, man."
He's like pissing honey, it's just like--
When I go, I'm quiet, it's quiet.
I go off to the left-hand side,
it just runs down the gutter
and trickles into the drain quiet.
I piss like a Tesla.
You guys are great. God bless, Las Vegas.
Thanks for coming out to the show.
People here come in all shapes and sizes.
While today,
the hotels are taller and shinier,
the clientele has,
let's face it, lost some of its sheen.
My favorite Vegas is from a bygone era,
when cash was king.
When everybody smoked,
drank martinis,
and dressed to impress.
And when the Rat Pack ruled.
That's the Vegas I dream of.
That's the Vegas
I'd like to bring back to life.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Sebastian Maniscalco!
Wow. Give it up for Las Vegas, Nevada,
huh?
So, I wanted to do like a throwback
to when people dressed up...
...in Las Vegas.
Um...
So I gotta thank the people
that actually took the time...
to put a suit on or a dress.
Yeah. Nice.
Appreciate it.
By the looks of it, no...
a lot of people didn't really,
do that.
That's nice.
Nice to see couples out on the weekend.
My wife and I, we don't go out
on the weekends, 'cause I generally work.
So we go out on Tuesday.
That's our date night.
Everybody says you have to have
a date night when you have kids.
Like, "You need a date night!"
"For you and your wife to connect."
So now we go out and
we argue without the kids.
It's nice.
We get a lot more accomplished
without the kids bein' there. It's good.
I love my wife Lana to death,
but she's not...
she's got no urgency, there's no...
When we park the car,
our doors never open at the same...
time.
I always get outta the car,
I shut the door,
I look, she's still in the vehicle.
And I'm waiting, I'm like,
"She's gotta notice I've exited
the car, that's gotta click in."
But nothin'.
I gotta go to her side
and knock on the window and go,
"What the fuck are you doin'?"
She's always lookin' for something.
There's a full Sephora
on the console. What the...
She's lookin' in the back.
What are you looking in--
We didn't go in the back!
What's in the back?
Her shoes are off.
It's a ten-minute ride,
she loses her shoes. Wha--
She wears heels, they hurt.
I get it. I get it, okay?
But if it was me,
I'd look at the GPS and go, ""
"We're three minutes away, maybe I should...
...start reassembling my feet."
And when she gets outta the car,
she can't even walk in these heels.
It looks like a "Thriller" video
across the parking lot.
She's like, "Don't I look sexy, babe?"
"Don't I look sexy?"
I'm like, "Yeah, I'm hard already."
"Just get into the restaurant,
people are lookin' at you."
"It don't look good."
"Don't look good, babe."
And we get into the restaurant.
Always make a reservation,
I think you gotta do that.
You feel proud.
You feel proud
when you make a reservation.
Soon as you walk in, you see people
milling around in the lobby.
You tap your wife, like,
"They probably don't have a reservation."
And you give your name--
You're kinda nervous sometimes
when you give your name.
Like there's a moment there, you're like,
"Do they got it?"
"Maniscalco for two."
You ever look with them?
Yes, right there. Thank God!
Now, when we go to our table,
my wife thinks this is the best time
to have a conversation with me
as we snake through a crowded restaurant.
My wife's turning around,
"My mother's coming in May."
"So if you want,
we should tell
your mother to come in July."
I go, "Babe, we lost the guy.
I don't knowwhere our table is."
"We're gonna have plenty of time
to discuss this at the table."
"Let's find the host."
We sit down, all right?
My wife doesn't utilize
her menu time appropriately.
She's gotta look around the restaurant,
"My God, did you see the...
crown molding."
I said, "Start reading,
get your head in the menu."
"They're going to ask us questions."
"We need to be prepared with answers."
"Pick a protein,
stop looking at the molding."
My wife don't know how a restaurant works.
She never worked in one.
I've worked in restaurants my entire life.
I know the back of the house,
the front of the house.
My wife don't know anything.
She's flaggin' down busboys.
What? You don't flag down
the busboy, all right?
He's got two jobs,
he clears it and he sets it up.
He don't know the register,
he don't know the specials,
and sometimes he don't know the language.
Generally speaking, the busboy is
a foreign male
between the ages of 18 and 35.
All right?
Generally speaking.
My wife don't know foreign people.
She didn't grow up with foreigners.
I grew up with foreigners.
My own father, foreigner.
Grandparents, foreign. Aunts, uncles--
I gota bunch of foreign people
in my family, right?
I know how they behave.
Like if my father was here tonight
and I didn't know him,
I would point him out and go,
"That guy wasn't born here."
Just the way my father moves.
Those aren't American-born movements.
My wife flags down the busboy,
right away I knew it would be a problem.
She's like, "Excuse me."
I'm like, "Babe, what are you doing?"
Comes to the table.
She don't adjust her speech,
her word choice. It's the same.
She talks to the busboy
the same way she talks to me.
Like, "Sorry to bother you,
but we actually can't find our waiter-- "
I go, "Babe! You lost him already."
"He don't know, 'actually, '
what are you stringing
sentences together for?"
"You gotta lob in keywords.
Salt, napkin, ice-- "
"Shit he knows, babe."
"He just arrived."
"He don't know, 'actuallys."
She asked him for a Tito's and soda.
I go, "Babe, the only Tito he knows
is washin' dishes
in the back of the restaurant."
He's gonna go in the back,
"Tito, they need you!"
He's gonna come out,
"Hey, my name is Tito,
and soda,
you need some soda in your juice?"
The waiter comes up. She's shocked, right?
She's been sitting with the menu
for 25 minutes.
Waiter comes up, "What can I get you?"
"My..."
"My God!"
She gives me this one, "You go first."
Ever get that? "You go first, babe."
"Okay. I'll get a filet
with mixed vegetables."
"Back to you!"
"How long did you think
I was gonna talk to this guy?"
Think I was gonna take him around
the restaurant, hold his hand,
ask him what his dreams are, his hopes?
"You go first..."
It's not skydiving!
Tell the man...
But my wife and I,
we're in a new chapter of our lives.
Got these two kids, five and three.
A five-year-old and a three-year-old,
and I'm 49. I'm 49.
There's an age difference of 46 years
between my son and me. Okay?
Now, I love to play with him,
don't get me wrong, but a lot of the play
is laying down. All right?
There's a lot of,
"Let's bury Daddy tonight."
"His knees hurt,
something's wrong with his shoulder."
It's a lot of lay and play, right?
My five-year-old daughter,
she's in kindergarten.
She's got a kid in their class
that identifies as a lion.
Comes to school with a tail, ears, and fur
around the wrists, right?
Goes by Roary. Listen...
I'm not making this up,
I'm just reporting the news, people,
all right?
Twenty-three kids, one lion in the class.
I live in Los Angeles,
so you gotta be careful
who you're talkin' to over there.
Got me and another dad waiting
for the kids to come outta the class,
so I tapped him, I said,
"You see the lion...
...they got in the class?"
He's like, "I know! Isn't that fabulous?"
And then I just floated away
from that guy, huh?
Not gonna be talkin'
to that guy the rest of the semester.
I don't blame the kid.
I blame the parents.
Right?
Huh.
Listen, kid probably came down
in the morning dressed as a lion.
Right?
Came down,
"I'm a lion, Mommy. I'm a lion, Daddy!"
And the idiot parents, "He's a lion."
"Well, come on. Let's go to school, lion."
Now, if my kid comes down,
he's dressed as a panda bear,
I tell him, "Get the fuck back upstairs
and go put some jeans on."
"I'm not taking a panda bear
to school, all right?"
That's it, done.
We don't see that outfit ever again.
Daddy said no.
I got some people here,
looking over here, going,
"What does it matter to you?"
"How does it affect you?"
It's affecting my daughter, okay?
She ain't learning nothin',
'cause this lion...
...is disruptive.
He's in the back of the class...
...knockin' over books
and desks, right?
The teacher's gotta stop what she's doin'.
Nowadays, you can't say nothin'.
Because if I say somethin',
now, all of a sudden, I'm insensitive
to the lion's feelings.
I can't go up to the teacher,
and go, "The fuck's up with this lion?"
"If he thinks he's a lion,
bring in a cage, give him some raw meat."
"My kid don't know the alphabet...
...because Roary's in the back,
lookin' for zebras."
Can you believe
we're even talkin' about this shit?
Now my son,
I gotta take him to school too.
That's all I'm doin'. Doin' drop-offs.
Growin' up, nobody dropped us off.
We didn't get a ride
anywhere growin' up.
Especially to school.
I don't know how you people grew up,
but in my house
my parents just told us,
"Walk down the sidewalk
and when you see people your height,
that's the school."
"Listen for your name,
walk in the building."
"Hopefully you'll learn some shit."
Now I gotta take my son to school.
I gottabasically hand him off
to the teacher, all right?
And you go to these schools,
talk to the parents.
Listen, I don't wanna talk
to anybody in the morning.
All right?
You just wanna do your own thing.
But people love to talk in the morning.
You ever talk to people?
You know how boring people are?
Ever get in these conversations?
"What's going on?"
"Well, last month, we had COVID."
"My husband had 102 temperature."
Hey, listen...
Can you listen to this?
I can't listen to this.
I need to hear some stuff.
When I talk to you,
if I ask you what's going on,
I need to hear... "What's going on?"
"I had an affair last night."
"You did? What happened?"
That's what I wanna hear.
I don't wanna hear about your cold.
When I take my son up to the classroom,
I hold his hand.
He wants to be picked up.
I don't pick him up.
Said, "I gave you a ride.
Now, come on, walk."
Approachin' the class,
I see an Asian guy, an Asian father.
Look how quiet it got on "Asian father."
You believe that?
I said "Asian father,"
everybody in the room,
their ass just tightened up.
"Ooh. Where we goin' with this?"
"Why would you do that?"
This is what happened in the country
the last six or seven years.
You can't even mention
someone's background in describing them.
It's not meant to be derogatory.
Growin' up, it's how you knew
who you were talking about
in the neighborhood.
You'd be sitting in the neighborhood,
and be like, "What guy?"
"The Puerto Rican guy." "I know him."
Today, you got people in this room,
right now,
lookin' up here going,
"What does it matter?"
"Why would you even mention that?"
"What does it matter?" It matters.
At the end of the story,
you're gonna find out why I said,
"Asian guy," all right?
Loosen up your hole, it's okay.
It's all right.
Nice guy, comes up to me, like, "Hi,
I'm the room dad."
I said, "Wha-- What's-- "
"What's a room dad?"
He's like,
"I'm in charge of all the dads socially,
we get together once a month."
"We're going over to Christopher's house
on Tuesday for an ugly sweater night."
"If you wanna wear your ugliest sweater,
we're gonna...
talk about being a dad,
maybe open up some Diet Cokes."
So I said, "Listen..."
Listen, I'm nice. If you talk to me,
I'll talk right back at you.
But I'm 49 years old, and I'm not
actively pursuin' new friendships
at my age, all right?
I'm lookin' to lose people in my life.
We're doin' a massive layoff
at the Maniscalco household.
Not accepting
new applicants.
So I tell him, "It's nice of you to offer.
Can't make it."
"But keep me in mind for the next
sweater event, maybe I'll pop in."
We're lookin' at the class
and he points out his son.
It's the only Asian kid
in the class.
He's like, "That's my boy."
I'm like, "I know."
But again,
you got people in this room lookin' up,
goin', "You are so closed-minded."
"How dare you assume?"
"Don't you think
there's other possibilities?"
"Maybe the Asian father
adopted the Black child
and the Black father
adopted the Asian child."
Listen, if I'm puttin' money on who
this Asian kid's goin' home with,
it's this guy, all right?
Put $100 on the table,
I wanna see how PC you get.
Where I'm from,
these two came in the same car.
All right?
Now, my kid walks in, right?
My kid's like raising a chimpanzee,
this kid's all over the map.
Just comes in.
Takes his shirt off,
ripped his shirt off. Beautiful.
I gotta tell you, as an Italian father,
to see my son rip his shirt off
in front of 13 of his classmates,
was a proud moment for me, right?
I get him ready for school.
I dress him up,
I put his shoes on and socks,
a little cologne on him. Just a touch.
Just decorate his ear
with a little cologne, all right?
I want him to get used
to having his own scent.
Plus, when the teacher helps him out,
she's like, "Okay, we're gonna-- "
"The fuck do you have on?"
My son goes get some crayons
and a coloring book,
comes right over to the girls,
just bypasses the guys,
right into the chicks.
Sharin' his crayons.
"Take a green.
You want my green? Take my green."
I'm watchin' this and now
the teacher's gotta come over
and fart on my dinner, all right?
She's like,
"You wanna put your son's shirt back on?"
I said, "For what?"
"He's havin' a ball, look at him!"
"There's a lion in the other class."
She's like, "We don't want
these kids to remove their clothing."
"Could you please do something?"
I said, "All right, I got you."
I said, "Come here. Come here!"
"Put your shirt back on, all right?
People are jealous."
"I know you're upset, we'll take it off
at the grocery store on the way home."
And I tell him,
"Listen, you share your toys
while you're here."
"You respect your teachers."
"You say, 'please and thank you.'
You understand?"
"Get back in there."
A little slap on the ass.
He walks back in the class.
That's how I talk to my son.
There's no baby talk.
I know some fathers do baby talk
to their son.
"You share your toys, okay?"
"Share your toys. Be nice."
No, I talk to my son
like he's in the Union Local 606
working in a warehouse 15 hours
on a forklift.
I start to leave and the teacher's like,
"Excuse me, where you going?"
I said,
"I'll be back at 3:00 to pick him up."
She's like, "No, we actually
encourage parents to participate
in the learning process,
so if you'd like to stay a few hours-- "
Few hours?
What the hell am I gonna do?
I don't do this.
I don't teach.
Right? I don't know
what these schools are doing now.
The schools I grew up in were volatile,
the teachers were drunk,
the kids were fightin',
people were stealin', I don't know.
What am I gonna do?
Everything's so nice now.
The teachers come out.
Everything's a song.
Teacher comes out.
We look at the clock
And what does it say?
Five minutes to play
No idea.
Teacher's like,
"We're gonna sit in a circle, everybody."
"Sit in a big circle."
"Grab your child. Big circle."
I'm like,
"You want us to sit Indian-style?"
"Yeah, well...
we don't say...
...Indian-style."
"It's crisscross applesauce."
What?
Crisscross, what?
I had no idea the Indians got upset
and had a meeting and said,
"They stole our style too,
this is bullshit."
"This has gotta stop."
No one knows what to say.
You don't know what's off-limits, right?
Until you say it and somebody says,
"You're in trouble."
In some states,
if you wanna sell your own home
in the description of the home,
you can't even say
you got a walk-in closet.
Can you believe it?
Can't say walk-in closet anymore.
Why?
Not everybody walks.
You're telling me a guy in a wheelchair
is gonna go look at a home, right...
...and the real estate agent's gonna go,
"And this is the walk-in closet."
And he'd go,
"What the fuck did you just say?"
"I don't walk."
World's upside down.
All right?
They say it's better today.
Look around, it sucks. Sucks.
I grew up in the '70s, '80s.
I was a kid back then,
and I'd reflect back on those times.
It seemed a little simpler.
My birthday parties were simple.
I had water balloon fights.
Remember water balloon fights?
My family's too cheap to buy
the balloon that held the water.
We had little balloons that
we had to fill up, kept popping off the--
Remember?
Filling up a balloon? Pssht!
Shit! God!
Eighteen rubber rings
around the kitchenfaucet
by the end of the party.
Three balloons you got.
But once you got the balloon,
you couldn't wait
to hit the kid that you couldn't stand.
He would dart across the yard and--
Pssht!
Right in his ear, man,
the balloon went in his ear canal.
Went deaf, the kid--
Kid couldn't hear nothin'
for three months out of his ear.
Came home from the party,
parents were, "How was it?"
"Can't hear nothing.
It was a wicked party. Balloon."
Nobody got sued.
Back in the '70s,
if you went to a birthday party,
it was understood you could lose a finger,
eyesight.
Hearing loss.
Played games growing up at our parties,
with food.
I remember food bein'
a big part of our birthday parties.
Seventh birthday party,
my mother brought out a two-foot zucchini.
She's like, "We're gonna play Gagootz."
"What?"
"Don't we have
pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey?"
"What the hell is...
Gagootz?"
She lined up the kids and took a zucchini
and put it in between
the boy's knees.
There's a seven-year-old boy
with a two-foot
zucchini
comin' out of his kneecaps.
The object of the game was you...
You had to turn to your left
and give it to the kid,
and the other kid clamped on.
I mean...
The other kid
gave it...
If the zucchini fell on the ground,
you were eliminated from the game.
And the last one with the zucchini,
got to keep it.
That was the prize.
Brought home a zucchini from my party.
Parents were like, "What's this?"
"I don't know, it's a Gagatza."
"I don't know."
"But they gave us a recipe,
they said to slice it,
dip it in egg and bread crumb and fry it."
"It makes for a good snack."
"What?"
"This is at a seven-year-old's
birthday party?"
"Yeah."
Another game,
my mother brought out pantyhose.
And she tied a leg around the kid's waist.
Then she took a potato and stuck it down
the other leg into the foot,
so the kid...
...the kid had a potato
hanging from his crotch.
She did this with two kids.
She brought 'em to the sidewalk.
And she put a lemon in front of each kid
and it was a race that
they had to hit the potato
to the lemon.
This is on a Saturday afternoon.
Nobody called the police.
This was just a normal
birthday party.
Feels like it was yesterday.
Now?
I got these kids, I'm gettin' older.
I'm not one of these guys that complains,
"I'm old." No.
Just gettin' older and startin' to see
some changes in myself, all right?
I'm claustrophobic now.
It happened two years ago.
I was never claustrophobic.
I was on an airplane,
sitting at the window
mid-flight,
the middle of the flight, I'm like--
"Gotta get outta here!"
I don't know what happened.
I can't go to something like this.
I cannot go
to something like this.
I don't know where I'm gonna sit.
I can't be confined.
Last time I did anything
like this was four years ago.
My wife and I went to go see
Hamilton on Broadway.
Everybody was talkin' about Hamilton,
you'd run into these people.
"Have you seen it?"
"My God. It is amazing."
"We saw it, How many times?"
"How many times did we see it?"
"Three times, we saw it three times."
"And each time it was just an ex..."
"It changed me as a-- It changed me."
All right? As soon as I hear that,
I'm like, "I ain't gonna like this."
My kids changed me, not Lin-Manuel.
So we go.
All right? My wife and I sit down.
This woman sits next to me.
She's diggin' in her purse.
It's killing me, right?
She's-- I'm like,
"Find it! I gotta get outta here."
"Babe, we gotta leave,
I can't deal
with this shit with the purse."
"I don't know what she's looking for,
but it's killin' me."
So this thing starts, all right?
Ten minutes into Hamilton,
I tap my wife, I go,
"I got no idea what's goin' on."
I didn't understand it.
I couldn't understand the rapping.
I'm like, "What'd he say?"
The characters.
I don't even know what Hamilton did.
I went to this play to find out
why this guy was so fabulous, all right?
And you gotta understand something
about my wife and I, we are dumb.
All right.
Like, as a couple, we're equally dumb.
You don't find this in
a lot of relationships.
In a normal healthy relationship,
someone is always smarter
than the other person
and you rely on the smart one
to get you through movies, books,
and life.
We don't have this dynamic.
I'll tap my wife, I go,
"You know what's going on?" "No, you?"
"Nothing."
We just sit there, dumb-dumb.
So, at halftime, we--
I thought the thing was over,
the lights came on, I'm like, "Thank God."
"Let's go eat some oysters."
I find out we got
two and a half hours of this
thing left.
I don't like an intermission,
burn through the damn thing.
I don't wanna get up at a half-hour.
We go out.
We saw another couple we know,
highly intelligent couple.
All right?
We get in a conversation with them.
They're rattling off US presidents,
wars, events.
Ever get in conversations
with people who are highly intelligent?
In my head I'm like,
"I can't add shit to this conversation."
I'm just nodding.
"Yeah, nah, the 1700s..."
"Long time, y'know?
It was a long time ago."
"Nah, long time, the 1700s.
Long time. Long time."
"Long time."
"Long time ago."
This guy's lookin' at his playbill,
telling me about the actors.
I felt bad,
I got my playbill rolled up into a tube
and I'm playin' a Bon Jovi song on my leg.
So I turned to my wife,
"You wanna go back in there?"
"I have no idea what's going on.
No way I'm pickin' it up midway through."
My wife is like,
"I know, babe, I'm so lost."
"I have no idea what's goin' on either."
"I had no idea Hamilton was Black."
"Let's get outta here."
"Don't ever repeat that
to another human being."
"That is a Black actor playing Hamilton."
"Let's get outta here.
We're dumber than shit."
"Get in the car. Take your shoes off.
Let's get out of here."
"We're lost."
Dumb.
Anytime my wife and I go out,
when we go back to the house,
she's always shocked
how fast I get into bed. All right?
I don't know what you people do
after a night out, but I go home,
I brush my teeth, take my clothes, boom.
Right in bed.
There's no washin' the face.
I just washed it two hours ago, what?
A sink bath after goin' out
for an hour and a half?
My wife always walks in the bedroom,
"My God!"
"You're in bed already?" "Yeah."
"It's nighttime."
"What did you think I was goin' to do?
Cut the lawn? Get in. Get in!"
I don't know
what she does in that bathroom.
The noises that are comin' outta there.
The water going "Pssht"...
"Pssht-pssht."
She comes out rolling her face
with some spiked roll.
I go, "Is-- You're bleeding!
Is that helping you?"
"My mother uses that to make pasta."
"Why are you using that on your foreh-- "
Then she puts some Korean mask on.
As soon as you see the mask,
"No sex tonight! There goes that!"
I'm gonna make love to a hockey goalie?
"Just blink, babe,
so I know you're enjoying this."
"You under that thing?"
And my side table, I got nothing on it.
I got a lamp and that's it.
Her side, eight bottles of water, right?
A mouth guard, eye drops, Tylenol.
What the fuck are you doin'
on your side of the bed?
How long?
Now we get in.
We gotta find something to watch.
My wife hasn't seen one movie.
This one hasn't seen a movie
in her whole life.
Shawshank came on.
I go, "You gotta watch this."
"It's a great movie."
She's like, "I can't watch this movie."
I go, "Why not?"
She's like, "It's started already."
I go, "It's five minutes in.
I'll get you up to speed."
She's like, "I can't watch a movie
that's already started."
Like, my wife needs to see the lion--
Some of you didn't even get that.
Like, "There's a lion in Shawshank?"
"I don't remember a lion walking around
the prison yard with Morgan Freeman."
The problem
in our relationship is I worry.
She don't worry about nothin', all right?
My fear is having a home invasion.
That's my biggest fear.
Growin' up,
our house got robbed three separate times.
As an adult, I got a fear of wakin' up
at four o'clock in the morning,
and I got another guy in my bedroom.
Now, I don't got a gun,
I got nothing against guns.
But again, I'm 49 years old
and I'm not pickin' up any new skill sets
at my age.
I feel gun owners have
a good grasp of their gun.
They go to the range, they got a lock
and key for it, keep it in the cabinet.
Plus I feel when a gun owner hears
somebody breaking into their home,
the gun owner gets happy.
Hears a little jiggle at the door,
he's like, "Yeah!"
He tells his wife, "Just lay there, babe."
"I know you got a big day.
I'm gonna go take care of this guy."
Last month, our alarm went off.
This thing is loud,
woke me right out of a dead sleep.
And my wife, my wife don't wake up.
Like tonight,
I'll probably go to bed at two o'clock
and then I'll get up,
I'll think it's morning.
I'll look at the clock, 2:09.
I sleep in nine-minute increments
throughout the night.
My wife goes to bed,
wakes up in the same position.
Her side in the morning, beautiful.
Everything's tucked in,
the pillows are layered.
Hair is cascading off the sheets.
My side, I look like
I got in a fight with a shark.
Everything's untucked,
I'm missing pillowcases.
I'm wet. Why am I wet?
My neck is drenched.
I gotta wring out my underwear.
What the hell happened to me last night
where I gotta flip the mattress over
in the morning?
Why am I soaked?
Why am I drenched?
So the alarm went off
last month and my wife don't get up.
I'm up right away, and I'm not one of
these guys that goes and handles it.
All right.
I'm like, "Get up! Get up!"
She's like, "What's goin' on?"
I said, "The alarm!"
"The alarm's on!"
She's like, "Just go look."
"I'm gonna go look, take two to the head,
while you escape out the back
with our two kids and start
another family with some other guy?"
"Fuck that. Get on my back.
We're goin' out together."
"Go look."
"The hell you think you married?
Rambo? Let's go together."
"Look..."
I just wish I was a little bit
more aggressive that way, all right?
Tryin' to teach my kid to be that way,
you know, a little bit more manly.
We got him in soccer,
we put him in soccer.
It's not even soccer.
I don't know what this is.
It's about eight three-year-olds,
just runnin' around.
The ball don't move.
I take him
to this park in Los Angeles.
It's a big park.
They got like basketball courts.
They got a playground.
Heroin. It's nice.
It's a nice place
to raise a family.
And I'm the type of guy,
I just bring my son, I don't bring a bag
with snacks,
water, change of clothes, nothin'.
It's just me and him, all right?
All the other parents, they got blankets,
they're layin' out picnic blankets.
Puttin' up umbrellas.
They got fruit plates.
It's not Coachella,
it's a 45-minute practice.
There's a lot of dogs runnin'
around this park off-leash.
Now, I know this is unpopular to say,
I'm not a big dog guy.
Okay? I'm sorry. I know there's
pet owners in here, some dog lovers.
I know you're goin'
into a panic attack right now,
just hearin' somebody say that,
but when I was six, I got mauled
by a German Shepherd. Okay?
So when your dog comes up to me,
I'm not--
I'm not in on it, all right?
It's a threat. I take a couple steps
back and I assess it.
Now, I'm looking at the practice
and from afar,
I see a dog running
at such a high rate of speed,
I can't even make out the breed
on this thing, right?
So, it zips through,
it almost clips my son's head.
"Whoosh." Just right through the practice.
I even had to ask the family,
"Was that a cheetah?"
"What the hell just ran through here?"
And I look, it's a Greyhound.
Now, listen, I'm sorry,
you don't own a Greyhound.
All right?
Top speed on this thing
is 48 miles per hour. All right?
They're a sight hound,
which means, once they see something,
they go and get it, and they don't stop
until they retrieve it.
I don't know if you've ever seen one run,
it is frightening.
The ears are pinned back and...
This thing ain't street-legal.
It's kickin' up sod.
I think I split my pants on that,
I don't know what's goin' on in the
back of my ass, but somethin' happened.
There's a draft. I don't even wanna look.
No, I wanted...
I wanted to get in shape for this thing.
I gotta get in shape for this
Netflix special, gotta fit into the suit.
And, it didn't work.
I tell you, this is tight.
Tight.
I'm lookin' around the casino,
some people still got their masks on.
All right?
You wanna wear the damn thing, wear it.
I don't care. I got other problems,
to worry about you and your mask.
I'm not one of these people--
"Can ya-- ?" No, I got shit goin' on.
All right?
You wanna wear the mask, wear it.
People are passionate about their masks,
you see these mask people?
"Got my mask."
They make a necklace for it.
"I make a necklace for it
just in case I have to take it off.
It just dangles right here."
"I have another in case
someone didn't bring their mask."
"I have extra."
That's fine.
You wanna do that? That's fine.
Then you got the other half,
"Fuck the masks! I ain't wearing it!"
"I ain't wearin' no mask!"
"Nobody gonna tell me
what to do." Fine.
All right. You wanna be on that team?
Be on that team. I don't care. Either way.
I don't care. I just know me.
I got bad luck, bad.
Bad luck.
I don't talk bad about this virus.
No matter where we are in this pandemic,
I never make fun of the virus.
Not gonna be one of these guys.
You see these guys walkin' around,
"Yo, this is a scam!"
Next thing you know--
No!
I'm not gonna be on my deathbed,
"Get the vaccine!" No!
I got the vaccine and to be honest,
I didn't get it to save my life.
I really didn't.
I didn't get it to save your life.
I got this thing, same reason
why a lot of Italians went to go get it.
As soon as the Italian community
found out, if you get COVID,
you lose your ability to taste food...
...scared the shit out of us.
I ran to get this thing.
I got two, Moderna and Pfizer,
just pump me full of this.
I don't care if I die from the vaccine,
at least I'm gonna die with the taste
of meatballs in my mouth. All right?
Not goin' 15 months without tasting food.
Rather be dead.
I got the vaccine at Walgreens.
I was hopin' for a medical facility.
With trained professionals, not a store
that sellsPeople Magazine,
tampons, and Bubble Yum.
That doesn't sound healthy to me.
I was nervous, I was in line.
Over the intercom, I hear,
"Assistance in vaccines."
"Assistance in vaccines."
Then the guy stockin' Gatorades
ran into the pharmacy.
Now I'm nervous, I'm lookin' up there.
There was a question that
was throwing a lot of people off.
The question was,
"What arm do you want your shot in?"
I get up there, guy's askin' me questions.
"You allergic to anything?"
I said,
"I'm not gonna give you my medical history
in the middle of Walgreens."
"Just give me the shot
and we'll find out."
So he jabs me with this thing,
I start to bleed.
I'm like, "Is this normal?"
He's like, "My God."
"Come on, bro."
"Lie to me, make something up,
tell me 2% of the people get it,
bleed, I'm nervous."
He's like, "I've never seen anybody
bleed like this before."
"You want some Gatorade or something?
Got some orange, grape, frost."
"You want a frost?"
"What flavor?"
Then they tell you to wait,
I don't know who's makin' up the rules.
After the shot,
they tell you to wait 15 minutes
and like an idiot, I'm like,
"Okay. Wait 15 minutes. Right here."
"How long you been here?"
"Eight minutes, just waitin' to pass away,
nothin' yet, though."
"I think I'm gonna make it.
I think it's pretty good."
"Guy next to me had a rash
on his inner thigh."
"I don't know if he came in with that...
but I think I'm gonna be good."
Fifteen minutes.
And if something does happen,
what the fuck is Walgreens gonna do?
Are they gonna call the cashier?
"He's foamin' at the mouth!" "My God."
"If this was a return,
I'd be able to help you out, but jeez."
"This is above my pay grade.
It don't look good, man."
Fifteen minutes.
No one went to their car
at 17 minutes and were like--
Fifteen minutes, you're gonna make it.
You're gonna live.
I don't know. I'm trying to reduce
some stress in my life, I get like
aggravated quick.
I went to a coffee house.
This was last week.
I was in a neighborhood that
I'm generally not in,
but I'm dyin' for a coffee.
Normally we all have our own coffee places
you go to on a regular basis.
I was outta that.
I was in a different city.
Walked into this, like a hipster coffee--
Ever get hipster coffee?
Walked in, everybody had like
a sticker on their laptop.
If you're a 42-year-old grown man
and you got a sticker
of Chewbacca on your MacBook Pro,
you might wanna re-evaluate
where you're goin' the rest of your life.
I'm in line. I'm lookin'
at the guy makin' coffee,
he's got a half-top on.
Right away, I'm upset.
Just hair all over-- Come on, bro.
It's eight in the morning,
I don't wanna see hair
funneling into a belly hole.
This guy had no--
No belly button. Had a belly hole--
Do you know what lives in a belly hole?
If you got one, go home tonight,
take an air duster,
blow it in your hole and watch
what falls out on your table. All right?
If you're workin' food and beverage
with an exposed belly hole,
you might as well have your left nut
hangin' outta your shorts.
It's the same thing.
Nut, hole, hair, just get your hole
away from the scones.
This guy's goin' in for a croissant,
and his hole is up against the scones,
no one's seein' this? Apron!
And the workforce
we got out there today, piss poor.
The labor force?
Ever order something from someone
and in your head, you're like,
"I ain't getting that.
That's not coming out."
I ordered the coffee from him
and then he told me to go wait over there.
This is awkward.
When you're in a coffee place,
you gotta wait
with other people
for your coffee.
It's an awkward entrance into that group,
right, 'cause you come in and--
"Hi!"
"What are you guys waiting for? A coffee?"
"What'd you get?"
"I got a cappuccino. You?"
"I don't know,
whatever he feels like makin' me."
I ordered a hot coffee and he brought out
iced coffee and I'm like, "Okay."
"Looks like I'm drinking it cold."
I'm not one of these guys that stops
the whole op-- "Excuse me!"
"I ordered a hot coffee."
"I got an iced coffee."
What are you gonna do?
It's gonna throw this guy's whole day off.
He's not gonna be able to process that.
You give him a whole different thing.
He was gonna make a--
A cappuccino.
"I was gonna make a cappuccino,
now he said..."
"He said he wants hot coffee."
I just took the iced coffee. No straw.
They don't give you a straw.
You gotta ask,
and it's made outta chalk and plywood.
I don't know what's going on
with the straws.
I don't know,
apparently a turtle died in the ocean.
Now I gotta get a brain aneurysm
trying to suck liquid
through a straw made out of drywall.
Just bring the straws back.
They're disintegrating.
In the middle of the drink.
Nah, it's good.
One turtle died for this shit?
I was FaceTiming my dad,
my dad is 76 years old, all right?
He's falling apart.
If you got parents in this age range,
everything hurts, right?
Every time you talk to them,
they're gonna tell you what's goin' on
with their body. All right?
I FaceTime him last week,
ask, "What's going on?"
"What's going on?!
I can't see nothing outta my left eye."
"That's what."
Every time I call,
it's something different,
the pain travels.
I call him up, "What's up with the eye?"
"Not the eye anymore. Look at this.
I can't move my hand."
"I got a claw now for a hand.
I can't move it."
Ever see your parents aging
just right in front of you?
He called me yesterday on FaceTime.
He's like, "Did I call you,
or did you call me?" What?
He recently told me
what's gonna happen when he dies.
Italians talk about death,
it's really out in the open.
Especially old-school Italians.
They pay for everything
while they're alive,
so the kids don't have to do it.
He's like,
"When I die, you cry. That's it."
"You call Mario
at the Cumberland Funeral Home when I die,
that's it."
"Everything's paid for, in advance."
You don't see Italians on Facebook
doing a fundraiser for Nonno's casket.
All right?
Shit's taken care of.
He told me he don't wanna go
in the ground, he got a drawer...
in a mausoleum.
He's like, "Come on,
I want you to see it."
"I wanna take you to the mausoleum,
see what I bought."
It was a wall.
"Come on, we'll go."
So, we're there,
he's like,
"I'm the third one in on the top."
"Your mother's gonna go in first."
"I don't wanna go in the back.
She's gonna go in first."
"And then I wanna be by the wall."
"What does it matter? You're dead."
"'Cause I wanna be by the wall,
just in case they gotta take me out."
I go, "Yeah, but now--
Why don't you get one down here?"
"So I could put some flowers there."
He goes, "Are you nuts?
They want an extra 20 grand."
I said, "Put me by the ceiling.
Take the 20 grand,
split it between you and your sister."
I go, "Now I gotta crane my head when I-- "
"I gotta throw shit up there."
"I love you."
My dad wants the whole thing, a wake.
The whole thing.
He don't want no-- People do this now,
celebration of life, right?
He's like, "I don't want a celebration,
I don't want anybody happy when I die!"
We went out to dinner recently.
We're having the dinner.
I told him, I gotta go to the bathroom.
He's like, "Me too. Let's go."
I'm like, "No. You go."
"Then you come back, and I'll go."
Like, "What, you gonna be alone here?
I'm gonna be alone?"
"We'll go together."
Okay, so...
My father and I,
we go to the restroom together.
Now, he takes the stall, I take a urinal.
Now, my father has
an enlarged prostate, right?
Which means when he goes to the bathroom,
it's not a steady stream.
It comes out in sections.
Okay?
Now he's in there and he's swearing
while he's going to the bathroom.
He's like,
"Sa-- ! Fuck, come on!"
"Pssht-pssht!"
"See-- you bitch!"
"Come on, you fuck!"
"Pssht!"
While this is going on,
another guy walks in.
And he gets to the urinal next to me.
This guy's loud.
Ever get these loud pissers that come in?
Everything they do is like--
What's going on
with your upper respiratory system
that you're coming
into a public restroom this way?
Then he leans on the wall.
Ever see a guy, he's gotta put a hand up?
What happened to you
the last time you went?
Did you fall in?
And now you gotta
brace yourself to go? What?
Then he starts texting.
He's got one hand here
and he starts texting.
Listen, you gotta remain in contact
with this at all times.
You can't let this go,
it could go all over the wall.
You gotta remain
in contact with it, all right?
Now while this is going on,
my father is still--
"I'm hungry, come on!
Goddamn shit-s!"
And this guy
he starts to go.
I don't know what's coming out of him.
It's like, honey, it's thick.
Ever get these thick pissers?
He's pissing on the urinal cake
and it's loud.
It's just, "Get off the cake, man."
He's like pissing honey, it's just like--
When I go, I'm quiet, it's quiet.
I go off to the left-hand side,
it just runs down the gutter
and trickles into the drain quiet.
I piss like a Tesla.
You guys are great. God bless, Las Vegas.
Thanks for coming out to the show.