Killin It
Comedians London Brown, Justin Hires, & BT Kingsley converse with top people in entertainment and culture that are killing it in their life and career.
Killin It
RYAN DAVIS
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Comedian, Ryan Davis, talks about creating the side-by-side reaction videos on social media, producing the newest 'Comic View' for BET, putting his comedy special on Ali Saddiq's YouTube channel, and we have our first official Oprah moment!
Hosted by @RealLondonBrown, @JustinHires, @BTKingsley
YouTube (Full Episodes): @KillinItPod
YouTube (Clips): @KillinItPodClips
Instagram: @KillinItPod
TikTok: @KillinItPod
Facebook: Killin It
Website: KillinItPod.com
Executive Produced by London Brown, Justin Hires, BT Kingsley
Engineer: Aaron Brungardt
It's so important for people to see new people, but it's also important for people to see the dogs that's been overlooked. Yes. You know what I mean? Yeah. It's so important. You were fighting for them. Yeah, and I be fighting for him. That's why he has a producer credit. Yo, man, I'm telling I was in these rooms and they were like, hey, such and such has a good following. And I was like, that's great. But have you seen this? Because this is a stand-up show. At the end of the day, who's gonna do the job? You need people you can trust. They going, hey man, but I really like this person. Have they ever filmed themselves doing stand-up? Have they acted? Have they ever had a camera right here while they have to do the thing that they have to do? Stand-up is difficult. It is difficult. And I learned this whenever I shot all deaf comedy. When they brought Def Comedy Jam back, that's right, I did that too. We're gonna get on. We start to gush us now, baby. When you film stand up, it's you. Clubs are set up for you to win. They can put the audience in the dark. They put the spotlight on you. There's ways to ignore what's happening in the room. When you film for TV, you see everything. You see the face of every person in that room. You see every camera. Yeah. Yeah. And there's people in the room who don't like comedy, but they heard Comic View was shooting, and I want to be on camera. So now you ain't even in front of comedy fans. You gotta be so good that you make who don't usually do this laugh. Why would I put somebody up who only performs in front of their fans? Right. Your fans aren't here. It's not gonna go like you think it's gonna go.
SPEAKER_03What's up, y'all? Killin' it is coming live to Flappers Comedy Club November 11th. That's right. We all hitting the stage and we slanging them jokes.
SPEAKER_08Be slanging dick after the show, too. Hey, hey, hey, hey. Come on, ladies, pull up.
SPEAKER_02No, get the tickets. Don't come by yourself, man. Get the tickets. You've been watching us online. Catch us live.
SPEAKER_03Get them tickets right now, flapperscomedy.com.
SPEAKER_02Do you have a you have a homie who do what you do?
SPEAKER_05Not like that. I only hang with him. Yeah, like we done turned, we just turned to friendship. Yeah, for sure. Well, yeah, and he shot my he shot my uh I I I hosted Thanksgiving like a few weeks after that, and he came with his lady and he shot everything. My family got recorded it, everything. Because he was shooting everything. He live events, weddings, everything. He shoot the whole thing. But after I started seeing his work from working together, I was like, I was like, hey man, too bad you can't do this full time. He was like, I I can quit my job. It's not let's talk about it. Let's talk about it. And that's the type of person you gotta have. A person that's just like they see the vision.
SPEAKER_08They're like, Hey, cool too. Yeah because the the it's a certain amount of trust and a certain amount of action. A lot of boy.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, you got boy. Man, he's so good at editing stuff before I even get it.
SPEAKER_06It's not gonna be editing.
SPEAKER_05He's so good at editing. I've I I used to go, uh, hey, make sure you're like, come on, man. Come on.
SPEAKER_02Come on. But that's that's my whole thing, because I, you know, I reached out to people online. Or even when it comes to like having an assistant, all those things are cool, but it is I know that lots of people willing to do it, but it's the trust thing. I mean, I mean, so you think about assistants, they gotta have your cards, your info. I don't need no woman tripping when I want to send flowers because she's looking at me and two of them sending all of that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_07Who do you think sending flowers too? My mother.
SPEAKER_06With the Speedy, the Speedy Mormon.
SPEAKER_03That's hilarious.
SPEAKER_08Hey man, you want to kick it off or you Oh, bro, man. Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Hell! So listen, um Thank you for uh tuning in to Killing It, man. Uh I'm very, very excited. Uh we have a nut we got a we I'm one of your hosts. My name is B.T. Kingsley. It's London, bro.
SPEAKER_03Justin Hyes.
SPEAKER_08And you know, when you the show, the concept, the the the whole idea of the show is very specific. Are you killing it? Either you are killing it right now, you were killing it, or you're clearly about to be killing it. That's always been the idea of the goal. Some of the comics that want to do the show, we love you, bro. Just give us a second or or make us force our hand. Sometimes they force your hand. We had a couple forces recently. It was a it was a couple, I mean, it happened this fast. It'd be like, you you'd be like, man, they don't have me on the pad. Next day we'd be like, hey, man, can you please do the pod? We will switch it up, bro. I promise you, right? We coming. We will call you.
SPEAKER_03This situation basically the show is called Killing It's Not Doing Sh is everybody's doing it.
SPEAKER_08And it's not killing it on stage. This ain't about you not being funny. I swear to God, it's not. We know the hilarious that is not doing this.
SPEAKER_03If your credit is being on killing it, then you can't be on killing it. Okay.
SPEAKER_08So the dude that that we have today is a pioneer of our generation. He is one of the best in the business by far. Argue with your mama. You hey, you heard what they said on that show. You heard the list, baby. Um, so many credits. Uh hey, we gotta.
SPEAKER_03I'm about to get we gotta start doing better. I got I got the credits. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, go host. I gotta do you right. You know what I'm saying? I wish we had the gunshots. I wish we had the gunshots. Put them in the edit. We gotta have the gunshots in the post. Host of black comedy in America. Your enthusiasm, insecure, all deaf comedy. On YouTube right now. Underrated four million views. Can we say what you about to be on? Yeah. The upcoming season of Comic View. I'm a man of woman and only. What else? Anything else?
SPEAKER_05Producer of Comic View. What is happening, bro? How you how you doing? How you feeling, man? I'm feeling good, man. Surprisingly. Surprisingly. It's a little early for me, but yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_08You had something you was uh you was you was talking about before we got on, but uh when me and Linda were sitting here.
SPEAKER_05I'ma tell you, man, it's a lot of people uh don't understand how important this show is. When I was going through what I was going through to get my special off the ground, and then it and then I put it out myself and and uh was trying to get the word out about it. Which looks great. It looked great, bro. It was great. You was the first one of the first people to say something about it. I was just, I was just, it got sent to me. It was on y'all's pod. They were like, y'all were like, yo, I like what uh Ryan is doing. And y'all shouted it out. I was like, oh, I like these, man. I like because man, it it don't cost nothing to show love. And man, we didn't, none of us had had a conversation about it or anything. And it was just like, I don't know, man. It just it really meant a lot to me. And I was like, man, I can't wait to get in a room with y'all to tell y'all, man. Because that was before it was on YouTube, anything. That was when I would just released it on Patreon. Yeah. And y'all, y'all was that was a year ago.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, man. Well, you you always been a solid dude, bro, at least with me. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? And so I I'm the same way, it don't take nothing to share somebody, highlight somebody. When people don't like uh praise, like uh salute somebody, congratulate somebody, it really speaks more about their own insecurities. Yeah. Yeah, you know, their own insecurities and envy and stuff like that, but you know what I'm saying? You just you're a funny dude, bruh, and you you get in that the mud and it just is what it is.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, and and they don't know what it takes, too. It's like to do it the way that you're doing it is also very different. And on top of that, as we build in this thing, as it's content creator, uh individual, it's the system and the industry and pulling away and so on and so forth, the other thing that has to be built out is uh the media aspect of it. So it's like you create something and in LA, it was just like this huge gap. It was like, wait a minute. So if you live here and you produce something, you gotta go do 85 South or Joe Buddh or the Breakfast Club or Hot Night South. You gotta go all the way to the East Coast. What do you do over here? And it was it was nothing. And it was like, nigga, nothing. No, no, no. We we we we we we have we want a non-salacious place where you can come and talk to space because it's too much information that needs to be shared.
SPEAKER_03Uh Justin, I know you got a bunch of I mean humor in heart is what this podcast is.
SPEAKER_02Giggle, you know, you know, and also to what you know, to what Justin was saying, it's just like it takes nothing to really show to show that kind of love and acknowledgement. You know, and uh that's why when I saw your vulnerability was showing love to Ron T. Yeah. Bro, I was like, you know, I can I can see because you know, you know, Cats. Ron Taylor Ron Taylor, you know, uh shout out to Ron Taylor, man, who just won um Funny AF. Funny AF, man, and and doing his thing. And so, um but what was dope about that was when you part of what this what we're doing here on this podcast, and you'll you'll you'll recognize as we get towards the when we get towards the end of the interview here or the podcast is just that being able to project where where you see yourself and be t go into go into those details later. But the fact that y'all was in that car, what's going on, how do you see it? What's going on? And and going back and just the vision of that and walking and having that conversation early on, and then to see you show and give those flowers to to Ron Taylor like that was just dope, man, because a lot of cats be feeling, you know, it's a it's a dangerous thing because especially if you if you you rock with somebody early on and then you start looking at them, you be like, oh, they they they they they passing me. Yeah, you get all get weird. It gets funny. It gets funny, bro.
SPEAKER_05And Ron never got weird with me, man. Right. People do. People do people do, people do. They're like, man, I want to see you make it. Then they go, hey man, you making it too much to help for what for what I for where I am right now. I'm not comfortable with what I'm seeing.
SPEAKER_06I'm like, I'm not doing anything.
SPEAKER_08And watching my brothers like just move, and I'm like, who are you referencing? Uh Nate Jackson, Matt Reif is like, these are my dogs. Like, I've known Matt since he was 15, bro. Like, when we used to go to the club, he was just a pimpley young kid, like, man, I love to get up. And DC Curry, my mentor, was like, yeah, let him get some time. Like, like, I I know him from way back then. We sh sharing the uh Wow, I didn't know that. What's the uh, you know, uh some clubs they give you a hotel, but some clubs got their own little condo selling, sharing the comedy condo. It was like it was like to see it happen that close, you have to be comfortable within your own skin. And so does someone and to to be able to show the love. Uh, we got a lot of shit to get together. Yeah, about to say, let's get into some questions.
SPEAKER_03We're done sucking your shit. Oh, man. Let's get into some real shit. Let's get into some real shit. I've had enough of this. All right. Okay, right. When we talk about the special, bro. Um I want I know you discussed it on other platforms, but I want you to talk about why you decided to put it on YouTube, why Ali Sadiq, Ali Sadiq, you know, like what went behind that decision making.
SPEAKER_05Okay, cool. And this is why I'm glad I'm talking to my peers, because you guys get this. All right. So me and Ali both shot independent around the same time. My special is actually filmed the same, around the same time. He filmed Domino Effect. Oh, shit, the first one. Yeah. In the in the uh special, I was like, my five-year-old son, that nigga turned nine Sunday. Do you understand what I'm saying? That's how old the special is. Man, and we just like I I got a like, me and Ali got a similar story as far as shopping it and stuff like that, and how they was treating us or whatever. Ali is just different than me. I'm more of a, I'm more of a whiner than Ali is. Ali is like, Ali is more like, fuck you then. I'll show you. Right.
SPEAKER_06I mean, I was like, why this man did everything?
SPEAKER_09I was supposed to do that.
SPEAKER_05I did this and I did the whole time. I'm just whining. Ali done dropped three specials and it's going, it's going crazy in theaters now. He's like, waiting on your special, man. What's going on? Because he was supportive the whole time. He was like, man, just, you know. Right. And uh, you know, and then I start telling my story, and then I put it on Patreon and all of that. And he was like, when you putting it on YouTube? And I was like, man, to be honest with you, I couldn't even get in my YouTube account. It's over a quarter million followers. Wow. Subscribers, I couldn't even get into the account. And I was like, I'm gonna have to build something to uh monetize it so I can drop it there. He was like, and I Ali, me and Ali talk about working together a lot before, and he was like, I think sometimes uh because of the nature of what we do, you don't wanna uh offend somebody, you know, by offering to put it on your platform. And I think maybe that was what it was. It was like, you know, how would you feel about putting it on my platform? Some people might be like that was his suggestion, too. Yeah, and and some people might be like, What do you mean put it on yours? It'll do just fine. I was like, nah, absolutely. Ali don't do skits.
SPEAKER_08He doesn't.
SPEAKER_05Ali don't do nothing. Everybody on that page loves stand-up comedy. Loves stand-up comedy.
SPEAKER_08Almost stand-up specials.
SPEAKER_05And stand-up specials only. So I was like, that's the best possible place to put this.
SPEAKER_08And he's not gonna offer it to everybody. No, he don't. Hey, everybody, everybody thinks that you could just call Ali and get a special on there. I I I have not talked to him about this, and I'm telling you, you can't. He's gonna have to be good.
SPEAKER_05Quality's gonna have to be good, and you're gonna have to be great. Yeah, I'm one of the only ones. Me and Sidney Castillo are like one of the only ones. Uh Malik S2, but one of the only ones that you can got it on his platform without him shooting it himself, because he he is very particular. He won't put it on there if it don't look right. He won't put it on there if you don't have a good set. And some people will be like, man, I was I was doing my thing. I was killing. That's not what a special is. Special gotta have a through line. Yeah. You know what I mean? This is I think a lot of people don't understand that. Like, I get on stage and I'm gonna just do material and then no, that's not how that works. Right. And you one of the you one of the best we got at it. Like, yeah, once BT start talking about something, I know it's not the end. I be waiting. I'll be like, nah, it's coming back. Yeah, it's coming back. You'll, man, you'll go through the whole, everything of what you're talking about. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02What do you what do you think for those who are considering to uh to put out a special, can you break down that idea of the through line for as far as the special goes?
SPEAKER_05So what is it that you're trying? I'll just use uh domino effect, the his original, Ali's original. That man told a story from when he was a kid all the way up to when he was in prison and the things he believed led to him going that way. You're right. That's literally the through line. He was like, this is how I got from here to there. And and in my special, it's this is this is how I see the world. This is this is what makes me this way. You're the building blocks. It's the building blocks. It's me, this is who my parents are, and then this is how I ended up being, and then becoming a parent, and because of that, this is how I see relationships. Right. And then that's the through line. And your special needs to really feel like one continuous conversation. If it doesn't feel like one continuous conversation, that's fine. It's just not gonna be considered special. So, so just so it I I it was like uh Dave Chappelle's um what was the one he did? Uh Unstoppable? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. The older one or a newer one? It was, man, he did so many. It was when he first came back. It was one of the he did two when he first came back. Oh, Jay Simpson was. And then and then he did one right after that. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. So they got Bird Revelation, you got a right before Bird Revelation. Sticks and Stones. Classic. Sticks and Stones. When you see Sticks and Stones, yeah, that special, everything on that special was for that set. Yep. It was, it was, it was one performance. He even started it singing Prince 1999. It was so everything was on purpose. Yes. And that's what you have to do. Some people will go, I'm gonna take my best jokes and put don't worry about that. Make it one performance. Right. Make everything make sense for one performance. Because I realized that the best thing you can do, especially now, is keep people invested in what it is. And whenever you clip it, you can always get people to be like, oh, if you do a joke, if you clip the whole joke and put it out there, they feel like they saw the whole thing. But if I clip it and you can tell that there's more to it, they go, where do I go get the rest of this?
SPEAKER_02Everybody, stop what you're doing right now. Make sure you subscribe to Killin' It Pie. Boom.
SPEAKER_05And that's and I think that's the beauty of it. And then Ollie showed that you clip it, you can drop the whole special, but in part one, part two, part three, part four. And then people, when they see that, they go look for the other parts or they go look for the other thing. How you release your special matters. He showed me how to market it. When you set up your your press run, you get people talking about it all the time. And and luckily for me, the selling point, all I sold it on was, hey man, this is really good. You should look at this. Right. That was all my they were like, yeah, what else around? It's really good. Right. It's really good. It's really good. That's all I that's all I kept saying. And people would go, and I didn't realize how many people go, why he keep saying that? Why he think he really, I just go go watch it. And then if it's good, go see why it's not really good. They're like, I don't think it's that good. You you should watch it and see if it's really, because it's gonna get views regardless. And and this is the thing, man. I think um I I've been telling people for a while, I ain't think they were listening to me, but it don't matter because it's here now. I see it's here now. I said, the pendulum is swinging back. Yes, it is. If you know how to do stand-up, don't you worry. Just give it a second. Your time is coming. Your time is coming. And you'd be like, man, I don't know how to do all the other stuff. Well, you might not have to anymore because it's swinging back. Everybody's tired. Everybody's tired of going to see somebody just to be in the building. Yep. People are going, man, now I like stand-up. Where are the stand-up comics at?
SPEAKER_08Tony Roberts sat right in that seat uh yesterday and said, There's fans and there's followers. He said, followers want to be here because you're here and they just want to see you live. Fans are people that want to see the art form that you create and watch you differently. And it's different. It's way different. And and and and the comedy clubs kind of bit themselves in the ass because they were so busy trying to fill the room, they st they lost quality control a little bit. So now, so so so so sometimes the audience is a little caught off guard. So I told somebody the other day, it's like we we always had this conversation. Comedy will hill itself. You was worried about the social media people, you worried about the crowd work, the story. Listen, listen, everybody relax. The reason, let me tell it. The reason that crowd work is so popular, storyteller with Ali is so popular, so on and so forth, is because we're back at the beginning of stand-up. Where a person sat down, watched a social media comedy, you're making me laugh on my phone, went and and saw them, and then they weren't good. So then when somebody's doing crowd work, they went and they watched you was like, Well, he has to be funny because he's on stage doing it and he's doing it in real time. He has to be good. And they showed up, and the people that were doing the exact same. Yep, and they were good. And then you realize It was Nate Jackson and Matt Rabi's like, oh shit, he's good. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And I promise you, anything you laugh at stand-up wise on your phone, you would have laughed twice as hard if you were there. Twice as hard. You would have laughed twice as hard if you were there. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Here's my other question when it comes to your special. So you put the you put this one on YouTube and it's done crazy numbers. The next one you do, are you thinking to drop it on YouTube again or are you gonna shop it around again?
SPEAKER_05Oh, it's on YouTube forever. It's over.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05That's the streaming service as far as I'm concerned. They number one. Yeah. So they are number one. Yeah, yeah. Everybody, because look, I took it to everybody. And you told me the way I feel is is very simple for me. Uh I am an artist. I have no desire to be a star. Uh I never did. That's why I could be on a show called Killin' It, and somebody would be like, Really? He been doing whatever? Because I think I look so much like I like I'm never doing anything that people don't realize how much I fucking do. Right, right. Yeah, and uh because I don't want, I never, I'm not even a person who likes attention. I think I can look like an attention whore on uh line. And this I'm by myself when y'all see all this stuff. Like I'm posting because that's the nature of the beast. Right. You know what I mean? This is just the because I realize people will do the out of uh sight, out of mind. This isn't, we don't live in the same times where you disappear and then it builds anticipation. Right. That used to be the time, they're like, man, I ain't seen him in four years. I wonder what he's gonna do. They're like, I ain't seen him in four years. I forgot that nigga was alive.
SPEAKER_03Because it's just it's just different.
SPEAKER_05I be trying to tell my homeboys that the absence does not make the heart grow fonder. Not no more.
SPEAKER_08See, you're also you also have a very unique perspective about this thing because I always, so I'll say this over and over again, we're very early on in the internet because I remember before it existed. So it's like right now we're building the building box. You have something very specific that I, and you are welcome to correct me if I am wrong. To my understanding, if you're not the first, you are for sure the person that popularizes the side by side. The you subject matter happening, having the conversation about this thing that is happening in a fully flushed out, hilarious way. As far as I'm concerned, you are the first. And if you are not the first, you clearly are the pendulum that makes it go. I was first.
SPEAKER_09You got that money, but I was first.
SPEAKER_05I never said it. I never said it, I was just like, yeah, man. I I saw it, I saw the style take over the internet. I was like, man, that's great. Ain't none of you niggas gonna say acknowledging it. I'm watching niggas do interviews when I came up with it. Really? So this is how, this is how And you're first first. You're you're pre the platforms. You're pre Instagram encouraging it, TikTok existing. Yeah, Instagram was 15 seconds. So they you you couldn't even anybody saying, oh no, I was on Instagram. Instagram wouldn't even let you do it. So you're lying. Right. Uh I went to Facebook. First. Yeah. Man, I'm talking about Vine was hot, Instagram was hot, people were talking about photos and stuff. Well, I'm long-winded. Who was letting you do long form videos? Because I had to do flushed out thoughts. So it was Facebook, and it was really only me and Country Wayne on Facebook really doing our thing over there. At that time, how many followers did you have? Man, I gained a million followers in one year. Uh it was uh so this was crazy. This was crazy. So you're killing it. So it was uh it was 2016. Uh I made my I went viral for the first time. It was January 10th. It was about Odell Beckham Jr. Yeah. Man, this is this is how crazy 2016 is versus Dow. We were like 10 years ago, technology wasn't that different. Man, my phone was going off from the that was back in Facebook, where if somebody commented, it came to your phone like a text message. Somebody liked it. Yeah. You got the notification for everything. Because virality wasn't a thing like that. Right. So they didn't have to worry about how much, you know, it came to your phone. Bro, my battery in my phone got so hot it started burning me. And I had to take, that's what going viral was back then. You had to take a battery out of the phone.
SPEAKER_08It was back in the day when you could take a battery out of phone. Yes.
SPEAKER_05You had that. That's what I'm telling you. That's how long ago it was. And I lost my, like when I went viral, I was like, what does this mean? Right. I don't know what this means. Does this mean I made it? What does this mean? And then I and I and I uh the next day I got back online and everybody went about their business. I was like, no, I did not. I did not become famous. Yes. But I it was it was weird because I felt a pressure I never felt before. Because I'm like, there, I went, I gained 10,000 followers in a day. And I'm talking about 10, nobody was having 10,000 followers back then. Right. Like, that just wasn't a thing.
SPEAKER_08He just taught the kick around about this. He's he's the same exact thing. He was like, that wasn't like a thing.
SPEAKER_05When people go, oh, 10,000 and no, Nick, nobody had 10,000. He was like, what? And I thought about something Patrice O'Neill said. Everything with me always goes back to stand-up. Everybody I listen to, everybody I think about quotes I remember are always stand-up comics. I'm a stand-up before everything. Right. And Patrice O'Neal said, if you can get 100,000 fans, you'll work for the rest of your life. 100,000 fans. 100,000 fans, you'll work. There's no one can stop you from eating. Right. I'm talking about, and he said, eating good, if you can get 100,000 people to want to shop with you. Right. I just need 99,000 and 99.
SPEAKER_03And I'm on my way.
SPEAKER_05And um so I was like, all right, that's the goal. I gotta get a hundred. Because at the time I didn't know that it didn't, like you can get the 100,000, and that really be like 8,000. Right. I didn't have that understanding yet, so I was just like, let's get the 100,000. What you mean by that? Uh if you go, you see somebody with two million followers, that might be eight people that actually will go pay to go see them or anything. You can get, you can get one good year of you the brand new shiny thing. Right. After that, because we could to get repeat customers, you gotta prove that you're worth coming back again. Yeah. That's why we see people, we be like, man, that dude blew up. Whatever happened to that dude. Yeah, they didn't have anything. They didn't have anything. When it was time to, you know, present something to the people, they didn't have nothing to present to the people. And um and uh so I was like, yo, the goal is a hundred thousand. And I remember I hit thirty thousand uh after the next video. And then I I started crying. I was like, oh, it's over. Because I know me. I am I get tunnel vision, right? Once I set a goal, I just run through the wall with it. So by the time the summer came around, I had a quarter million. And then I was like, I need to see if this is real. So I rented a car and drove to Houston, rented a comedy club, drove 16 hours to Houston to do a show. I ain't even have uh money for a hotel. If the show didn't sell, I live in Houston now. So that's hilarious. So yeah, so because at the end of the day, I'm a comic. This is just this is how it is. If you we you get up where you can get up, you take your shot where you take your shot. Man, it sold out in three days. I got there and I and I got there a day early. That's still my uh thing. I do it all the time still. I got there a day early. The club owner pulled me to the side and said, Who are you? I was like, Oh, I was just doing wanted to rent your club out or whatever. He was like, Nah, people are calling to say, Is he really coming? Why wouldn't they believe that you coming here? Right. I was like, oh, this shit is a real thing.
SPEAKER_08Okay, so you had a shirt on saying who is Ryan Davis? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05But I tell you, so we talking about at June, I was at a quarter million, and by December, I was at a full million. So that can about tell you how much I ramped up. Sheesh the uh like once I got back and realized this is a real thing, it's over, nigga. Like I was glued to my phone, bro. I was and it was.
SPEAKER_03How many pieces of content were you posting a day to get to that million? It was it was every day.
SPEAKER_05And you and we talking about one piece or like three or four. No, it was like one piece, but this is the thing. It's one piece while nobody's doing anything. Right. So you see what I'm saying? And uh so we talking about, and I'm and this is this was my process. Like I would wake up in the morning, and man, God, I'm glad y'all are here. That's what we embody, baby. We killed it, baby. Because people just don't know what it takes. Like, like now, people will be like, you gotta post postable content. This is what I this is we talking about 2016. I was like, okay, I see that I I do these, I do these posts, but I I was like, how do you retain these people? Because everybody doesn't hit follow. They'll like, they'll comment, everything. I created eight personal Facebook pages. You cannot do it now because they think you a bot. But I but I created eight personal pages, and I went requesting everybody as a friend who commented and said they liked the video. And they'd be like, Who are you? I was like, I'm the dude with the video, this video. Uh, if you I make content like this, if you want to keep seeing it, uh uh just friend me. Because then I would post it and then I would share it on all eight pages. And all eight pages I would make to where I live somewhere else in the United States. So it'll uh and then whenever I would do that, I would do that every single day. And then the and whenever you would get on Facebook in the morning, you hit the search bar, it'll tell you the top ten things most talked about on Facebook today. And that's what I base my content off of. You don't do that anymore, do it? No, it don't do nothing. You can't do no more. So I feel, and they would let you have like this nigger's getting too successful.
SPEAKER_06I swear that's what they do. It's writing book.
SPEAKER_05So in eight pages, they let you have 5,000 friends per page. So that's 40,000 people you can touch. Right. And some people be like, man, you can't just touch 40,000 people. You don't know who you're talking to, nigga. I will message 40,000 people in one day if I had to. I was a machine. Like you wouldn't, so once I realized I was going to be like this the whole gap the whole day. People be like, man, Ryan kind of hunchback. 2016. So a great comedian is self-aware like a motherfucker. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So whenever, so then I wanted to start my own tour. So I still didn't have no manager, no agent, no nothing. I'm just sitting in Concord, North Carolina in my mama's house, right? Well, I got kicked out. So I'm in Charlotte now. Uh I'm in Charlotte, and like if I was doing a show, I'd post it on the main page, and then I would go to each individual personal page, and Facebook lets you do this, used to let you do this. Friends who live in such and such. So, and you just put the city and they would show you everybody who you were friends with that was there, and I would personally message every single person. Hey, I'm coming to your city and I'm going to do a show or whatever. And if they were like, Oh man, I can't really afford to come, free tickets. Boom. I just needed to get you in the room to see that this is what I actually do. Right. Right. So stand-up, that's all I was doing. I was using that to sell the stand-up. And then it worked out. I got a million followers in a year. Drew Tillman found me. You know, uh, it was a couple people trying to manage me, but uh Drew. I've been with Drew the whole decade. Wow.
SPEAKER_03Shout out to Drew, bro.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, been with Drew the whole decade. And then uh, so this was the craziest part because I'm really good manager. Hey, Drew, a good manager.
SPEAKER_03He's a great man. That's how your ass a producer on Comic View. You can have Ryan Davis, but he's gonna be a producer. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So I I dig it. Keep going.
SPEAKER_05But I but I had learned something. I'm the one thing about me is it's just, I don't know what it is. It's like uh, it's like fucking uh Final Destination, where you all you there's always the premonition before something happened. I knew it was gonna swing to the internet, and I knew it was gonna swing back to stand. I always see what's coming before it comes. And the one thing I saw coming was the people who follow you aren't fans of stand-up. And so I had to re like people don't even know this is the second swing. I had to make people think I fell off so I could build the stand-up audience. Yeah, like I stopped posting. People was thinking, oh, he falling off. I was like, no, I need the people who who just because you can get into the point where you posting all the time and you just feeding people who are never gonna show up.
SPEAKER_03Nigga, bruh. What I just said that what I just told him because of these conversations, I'm gonna let you finish your point. Because of these conversations, I said, bruh, I'm gonna stop posting these fucking reaction videos. I said, I'm finna start just focusing on posting my stand-up, I said the podcast and stand-up clips because I'm trying to get people to buy tickets to these shows. And all that reaction shit is cool to build your get your face out there. And it helps getting some money on Facebook, the $12 that they pay niggas now. Yeah, yeah. They done played nigga. But that's a whole nother story. But I realize the type of content you posting is gonna dictate the type of audience that's gonna come out to see you or not come see you.
SPEAKER_08I mean, speaking on coca, I remember having a conversation with you, and you specifically told me I was because this is when I knew people were getting real because here's the thing. There's real money in LA. There's real money. There's real money. And at some point in time, I remember standing in the comedy union. I looked across the room, I saw two niggas, they were doing that little quiet talking series. I was like, them niggas getting some money. What y'all doing? I said, them nigga, them niggas over there getting some money. I was like, hey man, what y'all talking about, man? It just felt like good money talk. Like, not not not it wasn't a thousand dollar talk. This was this was six-digit talk. I was like, and I realized I was like, okay, I gotta figure out how to get money in the city. And then niggas tried getting money on social media. And I had a conversation with you because I knew how hot you were on social media, and you was like, I try, I'm trying to steer away from that money. Because if I get it, uh, I'ma I'ma I'm a like I'ma kind of just start chilling, and I gotta focus on stand-up.
SPEAKER_05People, that's what and I feel so bad for my manager at times, my agents at times, because I'm not moved by money. Yeah, I'm moved by legacy. So there was so much money to get on social media when it was at its peak, and I ain't even monetize my page. I know. And people are like, you crazy, you crazy. And then when they start playing with everybody's money, everybody was like, I don't know what I'm gonna do. I got a mortgage that I can't keep up with, or whatever. I was like, man, that's crazy. It's almost like I told you that if you depend on them to feed you, they can starve you. Right. You can't give nobody that type of leverage over you ever. I was like, man, that social media money is just sub is mailbox money. Supplemental money. I get the uh I get the email, I'm like, oh, that's great. And that's all it is to it. I I never depend on it. I never will depend on it. Man, uh, oh man, I don't I I gotta tell this story, bro. And if you do, like I'm just saying to him, if he if he get mad, it's whatever, but my homeboy Damon Darling, right? Okay, kicked it in the high gear one month. Facebook meta shitted him out of a hundred grand. Where I'm from, that is a different Mark Zuckerberg gotta see me. You see what I'm saying? Yeah, he gotta see a hundred grand, bro. Yeah, but yeah, like I know you're worth billions, and a hundred grand may not be nothing. But see if you take it. There's some people out here that'll knock you clean off of that wherever you at over a hundred, man. That's a headshot. That's a headshot, bro. And I'm talking about we ain't even trying to be stealthy. Nigga got the gun out. Where is Mark Zuckerberg? Full Luigi. Yeah, yeah. That's real that. Right. So it's like, nah, I could I couldn't let nobody play with me like that. But that I also realized, right, whenever you whenever you go into social media and you like, oh no, I gotta get this money, this good money over here. When was the last time you wrote a joke? When was the last time you went up? You worried so much about this, yeah, like you'd see a person out, they ain't wrote a new joke in two years. Yeah. You'd be like, why ain't you wrong? Why ain't no comic view? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06Nobody called me.
SPEAKER_05Nobody called me for the comic view. I was like, man, we thought about it, man. We thought about it. It was just, it was just, it was your joke about Beyonce being pregnant with blue ivy.
SPEAKER_06As if it was new that was really like you know what I mean.
SPEAKER_05Not a specific the fact that she in high school and you was like, yeah. He was like, have you seen Beyonce's new baby, Blue Ivy? I don't think you should do that.
SPEAKER_03But did I I feel like I stopped you when you was talking about content and the type of content to get people to come to shows? Yes.
SPEAKER_05I was like, and and shout out to Andrew Scholes, because that's who he pulled up on him, and that's the thing. Man, if you know me, I'll pull up on you. I done seen him with DC Curry, I done seen you. If you come anywhere near me, I'ma see you. Right. You know what I mean? I respect my peers, and I love seeing my peers do what it is that we do. And y'all niggas do it at a high level. I go see you niggas anytime. Uh, my first time uh being here in LA, the person I saw at the union was this nigga. And he killed that night. And I was like, I gotta know who this nigga is. Because he the only he was the only one on the show I didn't know. They had niggas who was on Comic View back in the day and whatever. And then I was like, and he was young. I was like, I think he was the youngest on the show. I was like, he embarrassing you niggas. I was like, yo, that was 2014.
SPEAKER_03He embarrassed me one night. That nigga featured for me. Yeah. I went to the bathroom and I was like, that nigga a tough.
SPEAKER_06We bring the funny part. I was, and the thing was They did it to me the other day, too.
SPEAKER_05I would I had never been in LA. I didn't know how many comics were here. Right. I know it almost anywhere in the country. I'd be like, I'm a comic. Can I get some time? They'll do it. Man, I did that shit at the Union and it was like, who was this nigga? I didn't know that it was like that out here. They're like, we'll let you in. You might still gotta pay the two drink minimum because nigga, we ain't we don't know you. And then I was like, man, I was seeing niggas, I was like, man, if I got up, nigga, I would have showed these niggas. And I saw BT, I was like, you know what? Everybody ain't meant to be. Everybody ain't meant. Because at that time I was only doing stand-up for a year. I was a good baby, but I ain't never seen nobody polished like that. I ain't seen nobody good like that.
SPEAKER_08It's funny because you you've told me, you told me that before. But now when we're seeing, when we're watching the art and we're watching you, and you're you're in full rhyme. You're in full of your greatness, it's full. You've the voice is there. Yeah, I know it out. Because here's the crazy part. The voice was there beforehand. When you were doing the commentary, these are fully flushed out ideas. Now, transitioning that into the stage, because you are one of the rarefied people that that have encompassed that seat, you a ticket mover. Yeah. You can have the numbers, yeah, you can have the credits, and ain't nobody coming. For whatever reason, disrespect, you know. But but you can be hilarious. You are moving tickets. So it allows for a certain amount of comfort, a certain amount of success. Um tell me about how you maneuver through the business with that understanding. It's like, listen, I I know there's things y'all want to say, but this this is happening.
SPEAKER_05I'm gonna tell you, man, this was such a crazy trip. Because it's not the way stand up is supposed to be done. You're supposed to be mentored into you know your headlining. Right. Jumping in, I wanted I did this because I wanted to be a headliner. I did all this work because I wanted to be I never. I wouldn't take hosting gigs. I wouldn't take any because I was like, I don't want to learn that. I always knew I wanted to be a headliner, and so I kept that and not closing either. Or I didn't want to work uh cruises. I didn't work and I didn't want to knock I don't want to knock anybody who does that because those are some of the best comics in the world. I didn't I wanted to always get in front of an audience and say what I wanted to say and not have no limitations, so that's why I don't take corporate gigs and stuff like that. And that's incredible money. Very good money. But yeah, it was just I never wanted money to control me. But the problem is, once I had got into that headlining position, you realize you don't know nothing about the game. You ain't watched a pro and how they handle being a headliner. You don't see the process of getting to the club, how they handle staff, how they handle the people who are under them, how how uh professional they are with time, how, and I'm gonna tell you something that people have been headliners a long time know how to do. Say no. They know how to say no, and they don't care if you see them as an asshole. Right. Because they understand that everything falls back on them. Yes. I ain't get to see none of this. I'm learning on the job. And then I'm moving with fear. My first two tours, I don't even think I changed a joke because I was so afraid. What if they think I'm not funny? So that was the disconnect in my stand up from so you I would have my real point of view on social media, and then I'd go do a show and do jokes with no point of view. Just because I was like, I gotta make them laugh, I gotta make them laugh. And then I was like, nigga, I done toured two straight years, and I ain't said nothing I wanna say. This is not what you signed up for.
SPEAKER_02What do you think helped you get through that fear to just speak your voice?
SPEAKER_05Austin Hall. I met a guy named Austin Hall, and he was the same kind of person as me. He was like, I don't want to do, I wanna be able to say whatever I want to say. I'm taking this nigga on tour, and I'm like, bubblegum, right? So hates when it's on your shoe. So chewy. And he's like, and he's like, and he's getting on stage talking, like, you know, the difference between this and this psychologically is you gotta think about it. People are doing this. I was like, that's the shit I wanna do.
SPEAKER_08And you're doing it on the online already.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, and I'm doing it online. And I'm just sitting here, and then I'm watching the nigga was like, I'm gonna try this. I was like, damn, you you ain't afraid to take an L on stage. It was like, how do you get better? I was like, I know, right? And then I was like, you know, there's so many people here. Well, if it don't go well and they never come back, you have to get rid of that fear. You gotta get rid of that fear. A lot of people, a fan wants to see the journey. If they go, I went to see him, it was pretty funny, and I went to see him again, and he and he was funnier, they'll go, hey boy, getting better. Yeah, hey, I see, I see what you asked. It's real fans out there that want to see the journey, so keep working. I had to learn that. I you cannot operate in fear as an artist. You cannot operate in fear. Say it one more time. You cannot operate in fear as an artist. You cannot. And I had to learn that in acting. When I first started trying to act, I was like, what do they want? What do they want? You don't think, what do I bring? Yeah. What do I bring? How do I feel like so many people are afraid? You always want to do it right. And a lot of times, man, as an artist, the right thing is who you bring to it. Who are you and what do you bring to it? Because once people see it, they'll go, I didn't even know it could be this. Imagine telling Eddie Murphy, no, no, no, don't do that. This is the way I see it. Right. We can't even imagine. This nigga is sitting at a table as seven different people. Yeah. Something wrong with that nigga. And that and that's the thing with all of us. That's something, that's with all of us. Nobody can nobody can really steer our art like that because nobody lives up here other than us. And you you gotta trust that. You gotta trust that.
SPEAKER_02How long have you um how long have you felt you've had this perspective? Like you, I mean, of course, obviously we as comics we have it have an angle, but how long do you feel that you've kind of looked at the world differently?
SPEAKER_05Oh, I knew when I was a kid, I was a weirdo. Um so I can't stop trying to analyze stuff. I literally just can't do it. Because I'll see behavior and I'll be like, why is why are you doing that? Right. Why are they doing it? I don't know why. I just I just want to know. Uh I'm the nosiest nigga on the planet. I I think that's just what it is. Like, like, man, I'll I'll not care about something. Right. But somebody will say it, and I was like, I just gotta know how it ends. Right. And I don't know what that is. It's curiosity all the time. And I end up going down these crazy rabbit holes and getting to the end. And then that makes me understand people like Kanye West and other people when they say wild stuff, and people be like, oh my God, this is crazy. I was like, no, I understand this rabbit hole. Yeah, yeah, I see how they got there. I would have never said that. But I do understand what you're supposed to stop. You're supposed to learn when you're going, you went too far. You've you've asked too many questions. It's like, yeah, this is normal conversation. This is beautiful. You can get people to understand this. All right, nigga, keep this to yourself.
SPEAKER_09Right, right.
SPEAKER_02Keep all of this to yourself. You know, I took that too, which is I'm into that same thing, which is not so much what people do, but why people do. So, you know, because people say, what would you? I said, Well, I guess if I went to a stand-up, somewhere in there, I'd be in the zeitgeist of psychology. Also, too, when you understand why people do what they do, your sentiments of judgment start to change. You're not gonna You get way more forgiving. You get it. You understand? Yeah, yeah. It's not it's it's not so this because you understand, oh I mean, because life is nuanced.
SPEAKER_08And when people are trying to do broad strokes over complex situations, you're missing a lot. And as soon as you get into the details, you'll be like, oh, we agree. Yeah, it's just like it just took you a different way to get there. Uh uh, if you if you don't got all right. Go for it.
SPEAKER_07I I didn't I don't one, I don't know if I've ever said this to any of the men that have said on this show, but it it hit me as you were talking.
SPEAKER_08There are necessary voices in our business. I told uh Ida Rodriguez, I was like, you're a necessary voice as a comic because politically you can convey something that other people can't. Uh I feel like Takar's like that. I feel like you are like that also, and more specifically than anything, specifically for the art form of comedy. You will take it upon yourself to create a list of comics that the public does not know to say, hey, listen, here's a bunch of comedians that you should know, because every time I ask you who your favorite comic is, everybody's dead. Well, they love naming a dead.
SPEAKER_06Oh my God.
SPEAKER_05Whole list.
SPEAKER_06Yes.
SPEAKER_05I mean, like, who was your favorite comic? They'll name niggas who ain't been here for over a decade. Yes. I was like, how is this your favorite current comic?
SPEAKER_08Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And and so, so you're an extremely necessary voice. You said something, uh, I heard you say something one time. It was like, you know, we used to get uh the music, you have to go and buy a CD. And now there's a world where all the content is like damn near free, or you're paying for all of it for a very low amount.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, you pay $10, you get all the albums. You'll never be able to appreciate music that way. Right, yeah, right. Never. Yeah. But if I buy a CD. For sure, that investment is serious. The investment is serious. They be like, they'll be like, yo, you listen to the new album. I'm still listening to it. Yeah, I'm still. I'm still listening to it. How do you feel about it? I'll let you know by the end of the week after I get it. I only got six distinct to change it. Yeah, exactly. Nobody sits with stuff anymore. And art is something you have to sit with. Yeah, to really. Because think about think about y'all doing an hour worth of stand-up. Right? Let's say you go blank, blank slate. You're not using none of the material you currently got. I tell you, six months from now, you gotta film an hour. How much work go into building that hour in a six month? And imagine if somebody watched it once and was like, uh. Yeah. I'd be like, Nick, no, no, no, no, no. You need to go, yeah, I'm doing a lot of shit in here that ain't no nah nah nah. And they watched it doing this.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, it was in the kitchen. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, kids running around. Yeah. Yeah. Y'all, you man, art is not like content is not art, and art is not content. There's a lot of content creators. Artists are not content creators. There is something completely different about it. You know what I mean? That's why, but I know people love art. That's why when you see centers and how everybody is having whole conversations, man, did you see what they did with this? What do you think this means? Jordan Peel did it with uh Get Out. Art causes conversation. Yes. And then when so the thing is, once you become a content creator, you are now cheapening what art is. And then it leaves people, uh people start getting like their attention spans start getting shorter. And the people who attention span getting shorter, they are cheating themselves out of an opportunity to experience something dope because they because they now are stuck on content. I don't, that's why I don't consume content like that. People be like, you know what the newest dance is? I have no clue. And I will and I will not you know what song is popular? I have no idea. And I haven't uh and I don't want to know. Yeah. Man, but you I'll watch somebody's content where a nigga play four different people. He he got four different personalities, he done wrote a script and everything. I was like, oh nah, this dude is just doing his own movie. Right, right. I'll watch that. But no, no, no, no, no. I'll go to, I'll listen to y'all podcasts. I'll and the thing is, I don't even really like listening to podcasts. I want to watch the podcast because I want to see the interaction, the real human interaction between. But I can't, you can't always hear that. You know what I mean? Like, if you you gotta listen to stuff a lot to tell what a if a nigga's smiling or he's gritting his teeth or whatever, whatever he says. But if I'm watching, I can see. Like, y'all be talking, you say something funny, and I like, nah, BT didn't really like that. He laughed, but he ain't he ain't he ain't really never you you telling personal shit. I can tell that if I'm if I'm watching or whatever, and I just like I I love community too. That's my thing. I take my people with me everywhere. You know what I mean? I don't like I'm it's so funny because I come off as a loner, but I'm so communal. That's why I'm always making lists and telling people about the the craft, I'm telling people about the art, I'm telling people y'all should go see. And I think one of the things that gets me in trouble as a comic is it's such, it's looked at as a solo thing. Right. So I gotta promote me solo. And whenever I do that, and and then I and then I uh shout out my peers, the people who don't get shout out, and go, what is he doing? You know what? Am I nothing? And I'm like, you know, you can do the same thing I'm doing. Yeah, right. When I go, hey man, I'm dope, here's some more dope people. And you could have easily went, Ryan is right, these people are dope. But here's some people I think are dope too.
SPEAKER_03You know, I would have shared that. Yeah. Y'all been asking, how can y'all support killing it? Well, we got an answer for you.
SPEAKER_02We got one.
SPEAKER_03Cash app.
SPEAKER_02Boom.
SPEAKER_03We just like every other send about it. A money symbol, killing it pod, is where you can donate. We are independently produced right now.
SPEAKER_08Y'all be asking about a Patreon. You don't even have to, this ain't even much of money. Just go and put something in there right now. I'm gonna jump in right here.
SPEAKER_03I'm gonna jump in right here. So that's that is the one thing I don't feel this way. The one critique I've heard about you is some people feel like, well, why he always gotta say how good of a comedian he is? Why he always gotta say that. Now, me, I'm I'm like, well, Lil Wayne said I'm the best rapper alive, people started saying, yeah, he the best rapper alive. T.I. said I'm the king of the side. T.I. said I'm the king of the side. Like, yeah, T.I. is the king of the side. So from I understand from that perspective, but I want you to say out of your mouth, why do you feel it's necessary for you to tell people how dope you are?
SPEAKER_05Because I watched y'all not do it. They said, they said, oh, if you really like that, the people to say it for you. I saw D-Ray do almost a different set for 20 years straight every Monday and then sell out shows and break records all over the country. He's been at hit movies, he's been at everything. He even had a uh successful reality show. When y'all talk about legends, what y'all gonna talk about D-Ray? This nigga was his nigga was uh responsible for every skit on the Kanye album first and second album. This nigga, we talk about Grammy Award winning classics. He's providing the funny all the way through Dolo. When you gonna say something? Y'all gonna do it for Lil Duval? When you gonna do it for Duval? Tony Roberts, when you gonna do it? Nah, nigga. I seen how y'all like the. I see how y'all get done. I'm about to take it. No, no, no. I'll tell you. Don't you? No. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, because when these niggas is doing all of this, and then I go, who you who who killing it right now? They can name somebody dead. I'll be like, nope. Nope. I'ma tell you. No, I do not believe. Do not trust these niggas to give you your flowers. Yeah. Do not trust the public to give you your flowers. They don't know. Shows like this is so important because people are watching shows like, I didn't know he did all of that. Well, you watched it all.
SPEAKER_08Absolutely.
SPEAKER_05You watched it all, you consumed it all. What is it? Because there's something about people are so moved by stardom and not art. Whenever you see somebody doing a whole bunch of dope shit, why can't you just say it's dope? And people hold on to nostalgia so much. A nigga, a nigga have nine stand-up specials, and they'll tell you you not better than that nigga that they played on Comic View over and over and over again that had three sex. Right. I remember them three jokes, buddy. Yeah, that boy, that boy was good. He was good. And we sitting here like, nigga, all of us got a dope ass sex man crap. But if I say that, oh, you a hater, you not giving the problem to the to the legends. No, man. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, but my fucking generation is dope, nigga. My generation is dope, nigga. You would see when y'all, when y'all play with me, you playing with us. That's the way I feel. That's the way I feel. You're not, I'm not just fighting for me. When I talk shit, I ain't just fighting for me. I'm fighting for us. That's a good transition.
SPEAKER_08Because comic views filming right now. Yeah. You made a song.
SPEAKER_09A jingle nigga.
SPEAKER_08I I'm I've I uh have a very unique perspective about the city, about the business, because uh humbly, not humbly, fuck that shit. It is what it is. Most of the time when I'm in the city, I'm closing out a show. I'm going uh when when a couple of shows happen um in the city and I could not get on, I couldn't get an audition. And there was comics that were mad for me. But nigga, why you ain't here? Fast forward to Heart of the City and the 30-minute special. And if I had had the credits, I couldn't have did it. So now, one, I was I was cool the first time. Two, I want to show love to my niggas. And three, when Comic View happens this year, and people call me, I say, no, no, no, no. It's not, that does not, it doesn't work like for that for me. I showed up, I show up, I look at the list, I say, okay, love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love. We're fine. We're fine. I'm only gonna I'm gonna raise hell if it's them niggas.
SPEAKER_05And that's where I ain't seen you do shit, I'm gonna start flipping shit over. That was the thing for me, right? I understand, you know, it's so important for people to see new people, but it's also important for people to see the dogs that's been overlooked. Yes. You know what I mean? Yeah. It's so important. And you were fighting for them. Yeah, and I be fighting for them. That's why he has a producer credit. Yo, man, I'm telling I was in these rooms, and they were like, hey, such and such has a good following. I was like, that's great. But have you seen this nigga? Because this is a stand-up show. So whenever at the end of the day, who's gonna do the job? Then there's, and then you need to trust, you need people you can trust. They going, hey man, but I really like this person. Have they ever filmed themselves doing stand-up? Have they ever seen, have they done, have they acted, have they ever had a camera right here while they have to do the thing that they have to do? You know, I think people don't understand. Stand-up is difficult as fuck. It is difficult. And just because I learned this whenever I shot all Deaf Comedy, when they brought Deaf Comedy Jam back, that's right, I did that too. And uh we want to get it. We start the gunshots now, baby. When you film stand-up, it's you. Clubs are set up for you to win. They can put the audience in the dark, they put the spotlight on you. There's ways to ignore what's happening in the room. When you film for TV, you see everything. You see the face of every person in that room. You see every camera. Yeah. Yeah. There's people in the room who don't like comedy, but they heard Comic View was shooting, and I want to be on camera. So now you ain't even in front of comedy fans. You gotta be so good that you make niggas who don't usually do this laugh. You need people who have done that all the time. How many times have y'all played in front of people? Especially in LA, who really ain't there.
SPEAKER_02Especially in LA.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. You need those people. Why would I put somebody up who only perform in front of their fans? Right. Your fans aren't here. It's not gonna go like you think it's gonna go.
SPEAKER_02We just spoke about this um even yesterday, how how comedy, how how like the the changing of the energy of comedy shows for example, like the thing that makes Def Jam so dope was that you could tell they went right to the subway and said, yo, we got a show. And niggas just came in there with their boots. And real people. They left their daughter at daycare and they would just, they was just some nigga let they was just ready to go. They stopped at the drug sale, they were like, let me stop. Everything. Right? And then so now we get to a point where you you you you even sometimes you watch a comedy, uh a comedy tape and now the audience think they the act. And so they they come up and they they they can laugh, they and they it's like, yo, what's Did you get my good side?
SPEAKER_05Did you get my good side? You the audience! Yo, you the audience. And I was I fought for that. Yeah. Whenever the comic review came up, I was like, it's gonna be real people in the audience saying that. They're like, why would you think that would hey nigga? I see what niggas be doing, bro. You gotta have real people there because real laughs are contagious. Contagious. It makes people who are at home, they gotta feel like they were in the room. And they know no one laughs, like, oh. They know people don't laugh like that. Yeah, they know black people don't laugh like that. So what are we doing, right? So for me, it was, and and I had the and and big salute to uh Drew Tillman and and and uh Royale Watkins, who also fight for the art a lot. Fight the Royale, man. Yeah, fight for the art. Royale be fighting his ass off for the art, boy. People don't know. We need a sweeping shot. Yeah, yeah. So for me, it it was very important. Uh and I understood, like, did I need Comic View for my career and nothing like that, or anything like that? No, but it's no, but it's important to me if I have a light on me, if it'll bring people's eyeballs to it, I gotta bring the eyeballs to my peers. I gotta, we all are holding hands together to lift the craft up.
SPEAKER_08And that's see, see, see, now see? Now see. See? When I get visceral about the people that that don't come down the hill, that's what I'm talking about. If you haven't been to Chaka Sundays in in 14 years, if you haven't been to Mobile Mondays, if you haven't done, you just pulled up the killing it. If you haven't pulled up to killing it, let's say, let's say you you're not you're not active no more. Yeah. Maybe you do your tours or whatever, whatever, but you're not active anymore. We don't see you. You don't love us. You don't you're this is your job now.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I so it's like people do that. You the people that are keeping it alive, and then you just be on the interview of them when they were like, it's a fraternity. Like, nigga, we ain't sick, you ain't paid your dues. It's hot, nigga. I bet you break your back. Do you even remember the step?
SPEAKER_08Right.
SPEAKER_05Hey, are you serious?
SPEAKER_08We have not seen you. We ain't seen you. We haven't seen you. So it's like if you're keeping the art form alive, that's true. Uh any stand-up show, unless it's called Legacy X or brand new niggas, should have the idea should be the people that are keeping the art form alive right now. Who is in the business, killing shit, running through the business. That's what you have on, baby. And when I looked at the list, that's who was on there. I said perfectly fine. That's all I it's all I wanted.
SPEAKER_05I just wanted to give people. I'll see you niggas season three. I yeah, I want to. But I I see. But I wanted people to see, like when they watch it, they were like, what is stand-up look like currently? Exactly. And I didn't want what does popular stand-up look like currently? What does actual stand-up look like currently? Right. And it was, man, that's why like Ron Taylor winning.
unknownOh my God.
SPEAKER_05Means so much to me. It meant so much to me. I can't talk about it. I'm gonna cry. So but it meant so much to me. We need our Oprah. Tears, man. Tears. That's real, man. It meant so much to me because, like, one of my biggest knocks on Netflix is man, you guys have the eyeballs. You got millions of eyeballs that you can put on this craft, and it's never about the craft. And I kept saying, man, they don't care about who the best out here is. They don't care who the best out here is. And then they did one competition where they're like, well, we'll see who the best. And the best won. Which proved my point that you niggas never cared about because Ron been in front of your face the whole goddamn time.
SPEAKER_08I went into Netflix. There was some black women who frequent uh uh Chakra Sundays. And they would they see me doing this every week, and every now and then I I take a little shot at Netflix. I'm like, I'd slow the set down. I'm like, no, let me be interesting because that's how you get a special. No more laughs, you guys. Yeah. And they they they made it, they took it upon themselves to produce a show at the Netflix building specifically for me. Hey, call some comics you know, this is gonna be the show. We love you. We need, we just gonna bring the people down. I don't even know what department they work in. They was like, they just put it together. It was beautiful. In that meeting, I was running walking around talking to Netflix people. I said, you know what y'all need? Y'all need a comedy competition. I said, Y'all need a comedy competition, set the shit up, let the comedy at the time, I don't even know about the the Kev thing. And then like after I said it to a few people, they kept bringing people into the conversation. And then one of them like, yeah, I think Kev's working on like a competition thing. Fast forward to Ron Taylor winning. Who knows? Yeah, and I might just I I'm not saying I sparked the idea.
SPEAKER_05I'm saying it already existed because it was right there. It's like No, I'm gonna tell you, it hat it actually happened. I hope, I hope I don't get in trouble for this, but actually it happened before COVID shut it down. There actually was, you know, they did the hip-hop version. Yeah. They did a comedy version of that, and they were into like the second and third round. You mean the one that T.I.
SPEAKER_03and all of them did, and that's what rhythm and flow. Yeah. They asked me to be on second season. A rhythm and flow? Yeah, I was like, I'm on my guy if I can't be right. That's when I was putting out music. No, yeah, yeah. Nah, they hit me up to be on it, but I'm listening.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, they did, they was doing a comedy version of it. And uh, God, I don't, I don't know if I get in trouble, but a couple of our peers who really get down, who really get busy, was on that. And I know they were about to, they were about to show them what time is it. Kevin hosting that too? No, they they were doing it like rhythm and flow. So uh I can't remember who all was a judge, but it, yeah, man. And then COVID shut it down, and I was like, oh, this, see, it ain't gonna happen. But then whenever they did that one, and this is what I was talking about when filming, right? Is people when you look at Ron Taylor's set in the finals, there's thousands of people there, right? Nobody bought a Ron Taylor ticket. It didn't matter. That nigga is so good that they filled up a room of thousands of people that did not really know who he was, and he murdered. He rocked that bitch. That's what so when if some people go, how come I don't get an opportunity? Do you know how good you got? If he that good in front of niggas who don't know him, imagine when he gets his face. Oh my god.
SPEAKER_02So you know, the paint gonna come off the wall. Oh my goodness. Bro, that's a you know, the to your same, to the same point. That's why you you catch cats at the Y at the Y, and just because a nigga's in the league and he ain't getting no playing time, the nigga at the end of the bench is still way better. Way better. Way better.
SPEAKER_00Nigga, just to get to the league. Yeah. You gotta be.
SPEAKER_02Let me ask you this important, not not to even go into that, but you you I I can see your uh your loyalty to Ron. I hear about your I can tell that you got some some fundamental things that you get from home. Where does that come from? Some things, what I'm saying is basically I can see there's some things within you that the industry hasn't removed from you. There's some gro some grounded things. Where does that come from? Uh loyalty is such a huge thing for me.
SPEAKER_05Um and just because it's a huge thing for me don't mean I always get it right. I'm a human.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_05Because I can I can mess up a relationship too, or I can end up doing something where my loyalty didn't show up the way that it should, or I might have been loyal to the wrong things. Right. Right. But loyalty will always be such a huge thing for me. And out here I learned that survival is a huge thing for people out here. Or like everybody, and I'm not everybody, but you know, we talk indefinite when it's not, but it feels like everybody is wanting to come up and and it's never about loyalty. Like, this pie, we talking about three niggas who were successful who could have just did it on their own, but saw the value in each other. Right. Nigga, that's just not a thing. Like a nigga. It's so crazy. Like, like, man, uh I remember uh I um wanted to do like, you did gimme five. Yes. And then uh I was uh doing this thing where I was starting to film top five or whatever, and and they were like, well, you know, dad, man, you know, BT doing whatever, whatever. I was like, yeah, I'll do something else. They were like, nah, what if we could, hey man, ain't stepping on this nigga's shit. What are you talking about? Nigga, I'ma do two episodes. Right. That's right. That's what it is. Like the way, man, out here, you can't even be like, if I'm excited about something I create, I gotta be worried about telling a nigga. Right. Because he might get a general and not have nothing to pitch and pitch your life. And pitch your shit. And pitch your life. It was like, they're like, you got anything? What if I was a comedian from North Carolina? And a green about this.
SPEAKER_04I wore a green hoodie. Y'all wore a green hoodie.
SPEAKER_03This is what I wanted to ask you. This is one of my last questions, is okay, you're popping on on social media, you're killing it with the ticket sales. You're starting to get into the door when it comes to Hollywood. Is there a part of you that feel like you're still being slept on by the Hollywood system? Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I'm definitely being slept on by Hollywood, but only certain aspects of Hollywood. There's, I'm in the door. I've been in the door for a minute. But the uh people who believe in me are, you know, in this game, niggas have runs. Right. Where it's certain times where people just seem like some people are getting everything greenlit. And and right now, I'm connected to a person who's it seems like they're getting everything greenlit, who believe in me. So whenever you have that, it's like the Ryan's. Who's this person in their email address? Man. It's actually a group. It's a group. It's a collector. It's a collective, but they're collective at gmail.com. But uh even then, I don't, I just don't lean on that. I don't lean on it. Like, my ticket sales have doubled since the drop of my special. Yeah. Wow. Right? Yeah. But I don't talk about it because uh you can I can say that, people like, oh, he's flexing. No, I could be telling you comics that this is the way. Drop the special. But all people are here is that this nigga talking about how many tickets he said. No, I'm telling my peers, nigga, that this is it's in front of you. Nate showed you. Ali showed you, Matt showed you. You gotta show them the thing. You gotta show. Stop holding on. They they beat it into our heads. Hold on to your material because one day you, you know, you're gonna have to film. Man, let all that shit go. Everybody that just did that Netflix competition did all the jokes you already seen on their goddamn page.
SPEAKER_02That's a fact. Wow, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05All of them did. Man, I've been tracking Ron. This nigga did uh crew, how many followers did he get yesterday? 42,000. 42,000 yesterday. Wow. 24 hours. Yeah. Put the stand-up out, nigga. Just just put it out. And whatever, like somebody like me, y'all, uh comics are so egotistical. You think everybody knows you. That's hilarious. Oh my God. They're like, why ain't I get picked? Believe it or not. Nobody knows who the fuck you are. I'm killing it in my city. None of them people are making decisions, nigga. Like, so whenever, so if if uh if they like, man, we need to pick people from different cities, right? And they be like, yo, who ha who nice in Sacramento? I'll ask you, I'll ask Lance. I'm not going to Sacramento. Right, bro. If they don't have a relationship with you, why don't you have a relationship with BT or Lance?
SPEAKER_08Right. That's a fact. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Them of the dogs from your city. Them of the niggas you saw got it done and got out and doing the. Why the fuck they ain't talking to you? If you, I don't even think you're serious. Yeah. Straight up. If you don't know who, if you ain't connected to who doing it and did it out of your city for real. Yeah. And then you wonder why you don't get picked, then you're like, man, I feel like I'm the nicest. You go to the page, you ain't posted one. How I know? How I know how good you are. I'm here with my baby. Hey, man, you got me and my girl on date. Yeah. You couldn't tell from this picture of me and my girl. I got an old ass flyer from sex six months ago. Right. And I'm just like, you ain't see the picture of me on stage. Man, if you don't get the fuck out my face with this, y'all, you gotta understand, y'all. You gotta give people the opportunity to find you. You're not doing the things to find. That's like doing the hey, you go into a job interview, they're like, hey man, uh, how do I know you can do this job? Trust me, my nigga. Yeah. Right, right, right. You just relax. I got it. Ask about me. Right. Ask who? Anybody. Hey, man, you better get this nigga out. Hey, anybody, you know him. I never met this nigga before. Yeah, and then somebody walked by, you know this nigga? Never seen this nigga a day in my life.
SPEAKER_08I got I gotta do a little cocaw.
unknownAll right.
SPEAKER_08All right, uh, a little cocawal. I know, I know. I see you watch it. Uh a little coca-call talk. Um, what was the how much money had you made when you decided that I what was the decision making that made you say, I don't need to be in LA? I could go and buy some property over here, I could be back and forth, I could fly as much as I want.
SPEAKER_03Because he lived in LA for three weeks and then he moved to the L. Yeah, lived like four years. Yeah, four years, okay.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, so let's. I'ma tell you, man, uh uh when COVID hit, we and then you know London and y'all, y'all, they you turn in auditions digitally. Yeah, yeah. Once I ain't gotta stand in front of people no more, what the fuck am I here for? Right. Yeah, I can feel this anywhere.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_05But the thing for me that was very important is I couldn't get a situation right with my children to where I could get them over here. So I had to keep flying back. And I was like, man, now I ain't gonna audition, now I ain't gotta do that. The first thing I thought was, man, let me get closer to my kids. And then when I got over to uh when I made it back home, I realized I had too much money. It kept me humble out here. Right, right. Real money. And and I didn't know that my real, that my money was real. It ain't real here. But it's a good thing. You doing very well. I'm doing very well. The mayor keeps calling. And then you see Jamie Foxx House, she be like, man, I ain't made a dime since I've been out here. Then you get back home and it's like, I can have Jamie Foxx House. I just gotta have it over here. I just gotta have it over here.
SPEAKER_03All my property on the East Coast. Yeah, in the south. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. Yeah. He let the flex told me a couple times. Another like, yeah, I'm thinking about getting in the property. You know, what do you think about Florida? He's have you seen my Florida property?
SPEAKER_03That sounds like some shit I did. Let me flip my shit.
SPEAKER_05Well, and listen, nah, man. The thing was, uh I I grew up poor, for lack of a better phrase, uh, a better word. And I'm low maintenance. Right. I don't need nothing. Right. Man, the thing I spent all my money on was food and shoes. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05That was that was two things I didn't have a lot of. And then now I get to have as much as I want. So I'm still pretty low maintenance. Uh even the house I live in now is very small. Uh I just need enough room for me and my babies. Yeah. And we good to go.
SPEAKER_08I think the reason I ask or sometimes I pose that conversation is it's not really about the dollar amount. But what happens is, uh, I'll step out of this conversation, step in. There's like a perspective of like comedy's like, oh, what do you do? What advice would you get to a comment? It's like, well, where is the motherfucker? Like uh Nate said we were sitting in the show, he was like, Are they funny yet? Because that's a different conversation. Now that you're funny, okay, cool. But now there's a conversation of, okay, cool, you're hilarious, and you're there's you're not worried about bills anymore. How, how now what?
SPEAKER_05It's like how long has Nate been doing it, do you think? Uh it's definitely over 20 for some. For sure. So over 20, right? Took him 20 years to become an overnight success. Right. Yep. That's what people don't understand. They'd be like, man, you see Nate doing uh crowd work, you'd be like, I can do that. Nigga, you ain't been doing crowd work for 20 years. You can't do that in your wildest. And he was one of the best four years ever showed y'all to do crowd work. We already knew. We already knew. Man, I'm gonna tell y'all, man. Y'all ain't see Nate before. Then when y'all was seeing him do crowd work, I was like, he cheating y'all. Y'all don't even know. Y'all don't even know. I remember when like after Transformers came out and he had the Transformer bit where he talked about jazz and all the stuff.
SPEAKER_08The nigga button. Nigga, what?
SPEAKER_05And then I'm watching crowd work. Y'all did Def Jam together, yeah. Man, I was like, ah, man, that nigga have you pissing on yourself. Y'all have no idea. Yes. You have no clue what type of, and and and some people are like, well, I'm seeing Nate, right? I'll tell anybody, if you want to get into comedy, cool, you got 10 years of your life to throw away in hopes that something will happen.
SPEAKER_08Two good relationships.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 10 years ago. Like, man, and because I was that nigga. It ain't gonna take me 10 years. That's why I worked so hard to become a. And as soon as I got to be a headliner and did all this, couldn't even make the special until I was 10 years in. Right. Nigga, you can't cheat it. The process is the process. You not really gonna be nice like that until 10 years. Because it's so much you have to experience. There's so much you have to go through. There's so much you have to see. And nigga, even when you become a headliner, right? You become, you go from, you go from host to feature, right? When you go from host, right, you gotta learn how to deal with doing material while niggas is sitting down, niggas is ordering, niggas is walking in, everything, right?
SPEAKER_03That's why he's phenomenal, BT at hosting. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05You gotta do and keep people invested and the show still be good, right? And then you gotta you gotta remember announcements, you gotta know how to get into them, get out. You gotta, if somebody fuck up, you gotta be able to reset the room and set them back up. The host is, nigga, the host is the quarterback. He the driver of the of the ship. Right. Your host is so important. And then like you get into the feature spot, and the feature spot is all money. Oh my god. Everybody then did the work in front of you. Somebody about to do all the work behind you. You just in the sweet spot. Yeah. And then people be like, man, I'm ready to be a headliner. I think I've done it. Well, we're finna see. I'm gonna tell you, 25 ain't nowhere near an hour. It is not. I promise you it ain't nowhere near an hour. They get hot up there. 25. And then you go, and then you go, all right, I'm cool. I'm I'm surfing. Then at the 45-minute mark, they drop checks on your ass. Yeah, slowed up. Yeah, they drop checks on your ass. And you gotta deal with shit as a headliner that the host was dealing with. You don't even think as a headliner, you'll have to, you like, hey man, you about to get into your best bit and you hear somebody go, hey man, I ain't ordered this many goddamn wings. And if you think you, you think you funnier than a nigga who just got overcharged, you crazy. You'll never be funny. You'll never be that good. You'll never be that good. You'll never be that good. And you're like, hey man, I'm about to tell this joke. Nigga, somebody gotta take this shit off my tab, nigga. Like that is nothing you can say to a nigga, and especially people who are splitting the bill. I ain't ordered all this. Check drop and you gotta, and check drop a fuck with your ego. Yeah. If you've been killing, and then all of a sudden you you got 25% of the room, you be like, damn, y'all ain't like that joke. And you look, and ain't nobody looking at you.
SPEAKER_02Everybody down.
SPEAKER_05Nigga, everybody bones over the t. Yeah, I was like, so now you gotta learn. Now you gotta learn how to pace, and then you gotta have bits that you willing to just, your ego is not gonna hurt whenever you do during check drop, and then when they come up, you gotta be able to end with a boom. Now you go, hey, it's time to shoot the special. There's no check drop during the special. So whatever, even if you got a prolific club hour, that's not a special hour. Yeah. Because you are, you've already, you've been rehearsing for club. You, and then you you're gonna shoot the special in a theater. Club pace and theater pace ain't the same pace.
SPEAKER_08There's different things. It ain't even the same at some point. Theater pace is different than arena pace. It's different than arena pace.
SPEAKER_05That's why I be looking at people and be like, I'm ready to do. You ain't ready to do shit. There's so much you gotta do and experience before you could ever. One of the biggest things, people look at my special and be like, it's so good. How did you prepare? If it wasn't for Jill Scott, I don't even know if that special looks like that. She took me on a theater tour run as her opening act. I would have never been able to fill up those seats to be able to get the uh the reps. I don't know how to explain. I don't know how to tell that to somebody to get people to understand that. They'd be like, Ryan, I'm ready to do my hour. Nigga, if you a club comic, do the hour in a club. Facts. Do it where you do it at. Do it where you do it at. You you man, you play where you practice. That's a fact. You play where you practice. Everybody like, but I I want to look like a star. You gonna look stupid as shit. If you ain't used to how the laughs come back to you and you experience it, yeah, you experiencing it for the first time during your special. Are you slow? Yeah. Have you lost your mind? Right. So I everything I did for the special, that's why I was so gung-ho about I'm telling y'all it's this good. I did all the work to make sure it was good. I it took me a year. I planned for that special for a year. Me and Royale scouted places. He was meeting me out on the road, running my set, taking notes. We going like I think people think you just you be like, I'm ready, and you grab a camera and you go. You can do that. And what you'll have is a recorded set. But you won't it won't be special. It won't be special, but you'll have a recorded set for sure. Because also, you gotta watch all of us do little things with our face, with our hands, or whatever. The person directing you gotta know when to push in, when to pull out, when. To go to the crowd. All that stuff matters. It's still a production. Yeah, it's not just you recording a set. I gotta know when you're gonna walk. When you're gonna, you know what I mean? When you're gonna use the stool. That's cool. If you're gonna use the all of that.
SPEAKER_08Uncorded Mike. Uncorded Mike. It's so many different things.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, uncorded Mike. Hey man, did you know you stick your hand in your pocket whenever you when you perform? Keep trying to do it without you can't do it. Cool. Hey, designer, don't put no pockets on this shit. Don't put no pockets on this shit. All that shit matters. All that shit matters. You gotta think about all this is your production. You gotta think of it like that. If you do not think it of it like that, you will have a recorded set. But you will not have a special.
SPEAKER_02Me and a T. Oh. Oh, you niggas.
SPEAKER_03Three words. Tell the people. Hold on. Listen.
SPEAKER_02We're listening. Three words, bro.
SPEAKER_03No, the audio people need to know what's happening.
SPEAKER_02Um, what's going on? We sent, I just handed Ron a photo of him and his pops after a show. Uh uh. Oh man. What was you going? What what was that moment hugging your pops, man?
SPEAKER_05My father had never even been on a plane before. Never even been on a plane before. He was diagnosed with cancer. Uh oh my God. So he he wasn't doing well. He didn't even have clothes for real. We flew, when he flew up to Chicago, I took him shopping and everything, but he was so much in pain, he couldn't even really try on the clothes. I had to help him put his shoes on and everything. But it was like nothing was gonna stop him from supporting me in that moment. Me and my mom wasn't even talking. And she wasn't, her and my dad wasn't talking. They were divorced. Both of them niggas is on a plane together coming to support their son because it the only thing that mattered to them was was that the the person that they created and they believed in and they sold all these seeds into is doing the thing that they love. It's the only man, I think sometimes people uh see my uh my criticism of my parents and they don't understand when I'm talking about these things. I know people go through stuff and nobody speaks on it. So I speak on it, and because I speak on it, people may think I think negatively of my parents, and I don't think negatively of my parents. I think negatively of some of their decisions. Right. You know what I mean? But I understand that they're human beings and I love them, and when it was and when it meant the most to me, they didn't even hesitate. All the things that they felt in them, they didn't even hesitate. And I'm talking about them in the special. I'm talking I'm on stage telling people I ain't talked to my mama in four years while she's looking at me. I'm telling my I'm telling people my dad had an inappropriate relationship with my mom. I look at this nigga like R. Kelly. While he's in the building and everybody, and then after the show, neither one of them went, even though it may hurt them to hear or whatever, it was I'm proud of you. It ain't I'm gonna make this about me. Meant the worst, it was always about me. Can't nobody tell me nothing about my parents, bro. That's beautiful, man. Can't nobody tell me. It was it was it I wanted it to be the greatest moment in of my life, and it and it and it was, man. It meant everything. It went everything. And I'm telling you, London, we boxing after this. There's no way. I ain't gonna hold you. We gonna jump this nigga because the optimum is supposed to be for y'all.
SPEAKER_03This was about this is about go ahead and do it. Shit, man.
SPEAKER_08Okay with shit, man. Uh we have a game. You ain't got no. I mean, we gotta. All right with shit. Uh all right, so uh this is a blind. Uh we in we in the game where we're wrapping up. This is a blind, uh, keep it, keep three, kill five.
unknownWoo!
SPEAKER_08So you, so you ain't gonna know what's coming. I know. You didn't know we like these. Yeah. Keep three, cut five comedy specials. Number one. Bigger and blacker.
SPEAKER_06I hate niggas smelling because you came by swinging.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, because it's like strategically, I gotta keep it. I'm gonna keep it. All right. You only got two more keeps. I know. All right, about to hear a whole lot of cutting. Underrated never faded. It's cut. Okay. Possibly the funniest special ever in my mind. Okay. Yeah. Shout out to Mike Epps. Nigga, if you want to see a clinic and funny, a clinic, yeah, I might need security. I knew you were gonna say that. Cut it. And they all classic. They all classics. So yeah, when he started making flag, I was like, this nigga is only doing it. Wait. Sticks and stones. Keep. I love it. Live from sunset. Cut. I'ma tell you though. I had to cut that. I didn't get to experience it like everybody else did. That's okay. That's fair, that's fair. When I saw it, I thought it sucked. I'm gonna tell you why. Because I knew all the jokes already. Which means niggas have been stealing for prior for 30 years by the time it got to me. That's wild. Yeah. Yeah. That's wild. I couldn't even enjoy it because all you niggas in the 90s was telling them goddamn jokes and remixing them and everything. You dirty niggas. Yo, yo. Elephant in the room. It's over. That's the three cups. I'm cool with one of the cubs. Definitely, uh even if mine on there, nigga, you can crazy.
SPEAKER_08Yep, because the one after that was definitely underrated.
SPEAKER_05Hey, listen, man. I'm very proud of the work I did. But them three right there, nigga. We talked about three of the best five to ever do. The only argument I always have is bigger, blacker, better than Bring the Pain. Bring the pain. Yeah, bring the pain was. Bring the pain to me is just ruckus.
SPEAKER_08I'm not talking about more on Chappelle, though. Sticks and Stones is my favorite. Sticks of Stones is the same. I think so. Me too. Final question, man. Um you are killing it in all avenues, man, uh, of what's going on, man. What does it look like specifically career-wise? What does killing it look like for you? Are you is it behind the camera, in front of the camera, more produce it?
SPEAKER_05But what does it look like? I think this is what people need to. This is a conversation, not just for me. Every person who watches this, if you do not define what success looks like to you, you're gonna be out here winging it instead of killing it. The the the most important thing you can do to kill it is to really write down what and think about how would I feel if I didn't get this, but I got this. How would I feel if I got this and didn't get this? And you'll realize some of the little things mean more to you than some of the bigger things. And that's how some people get really big, but they not happy. Right. Because that was because you didn't write down what was meaningful to you. So for me, killing it, we go back and do that. You whenever you do that, uh keep three cut five, if it makes sense to have one of mine in there for every guest that you have, then I'm killing it. Then I'm doing a job. Everybody you name, Jamie Foxx, was killing it. Fucking Mike Epps was killing it. Patrice O'Neill, uh Martin Lawrence. Yeah, Jamie, yeah. Yeah, you named uh Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock. Those are, I believe that was the eight that you named, right? I meant to say Illen and Philly, too. Illan and Philly. So shout out to Tommy Davidson. And and and I knew the names of all these people based off the name of the special. That's killing it. To me, I want when people hear underrated or whatever it is that I name any of my work, and niggas go, that's Ryan Davis. Niggas who do the art are like, they're like, what are you talking about? You just named a masterpiece. Oh, Live from Sunset Strip, that's what you named for Richard Pryor. You ain't when you ain't gotta even say who did it, killing it. And and stand up is what I care about the most. So that's the thing that I want to be killing it in. And then when it comes to acting behind the screen and create, I just want to make dope shit with people I respect. That's it. That's it. I just want to make dope shit with people. I don't need no Oscars. I don't need no Emmys. I don't need nigga, Friday ain't never getting no Oscar, no Emmy, no nothing. Them niggas did something special. Special. They did something special. They made careers for like 15 people with one project. Yep. That's killing it. That's what man, I I want, I want more of us to do that. If I get to do that, if I get to make dope shit with other dope artists and it lasts forever, I that's the thing. I just want to create shit that when I'm long gone, I want people to be like, I want people to go to their kids and be like, hey, nigga, can't let you go into school and not see this. They're gonna take your card away if you don't know this. That I want to make that type of stuff. Impact is dope. Impact, baby.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05We did it.
SPEAKER_03Hey, we did it. Hey, let people know where they can find you at any projects you got coming at.
SPEAKER_05Yes. Um, I'm about to shoot the second special. Um, really looking forward to that. Gotta lose some weight first, but yeah, gotta do that. Uh I'm on tour right now. Uh, it's called the Prove It Tour because uh Aries Spears hung me out the dry. Uh said I was said I said I was better than so many people that people are like, well, it's a nigga like that. I was like, okay, I'll prove it. So I'm on. That's what I'm that's the tour I'm on. Uh you follow me at Ryan, Ryan Davis comedian or Ryan Davis comedy into anything, I'll come up. Uh uh, you just follow me there, man, and just keep up with what I'm doing, you know? And I'm gonna just try to bring you the best stuff that I can. Make sure you come see me live, though. There's nothing better than my live show is that you can get from me. My live show is what I I'll I'll bet on that any day.
SPEAKER_03Hey, that's a fact, man. It is. Hey, man, uh, this has been an amazing episode. One of my favorites. Uh appreciate y'all watching. Make sure you like, comment, subscribe. Uh, appreciate you sharing the clips. Keep doing that. Uh, let us know your favorite moments. What you took away from this conversation today. Let us let us know in the comment section. And uh, yeah, man, we've been your host, Justin Hyas. Lyndon Brown.
SPEAKER_08BT Kingsley and two of the most amazing words of comedy right next.
SPEAKER_06We did it, baby.