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The Roast of Excuse My Grandma! In this episode, Kim and Grandma Gail are joined by comedian, Roastmaster General, and now Broadway star, Jeff Ross. After playing Jewish Geography in the outtakes, Jeff talks about his new show, Take A Banana For The Ride (running until September 29th). The comedian puts himself and his family on stage, hoping to share stories of his past. How he knew he could do this? Being the funny guy in unfunny situations. He tells Kim and Grandma Gail how this show has helped him talk through grief and resilience. It's a tribute to his parents, grandparents, and friends that have passed. Kim, Grandma, and Jeff also talk about family heirlooms, their favorite Jewish inventions (Grandma's is brisket), and who Jeff would still love to roast. They then answer AGA questions about mean in-laws, the surprising place to find a nice guy in NYC, and what to do if you're looking for love in your 50s. Get tickets to Take a Banana for the Ride at jeffrossbroadway.com Follow Jeff at @therealjeffreyrossLeave a voicemail at Grandma Gail’s Voicemail, DM us on Instagram, or email team@excusemygrandma.com for advice!Follow us onInstagram @excusemygrandma TikTok @excusemygrandma Watch on YoutubeSpotifyMusic By: Guy Kelly00:00: Interview With Jeff Ross29:05: Ask Grandma Anything37:15: Old Fashioned Dating Quiz
The Roast of Excuse My Grandma! In this episode, Kim and Grandma Gail are joined by comedian, Roastmaster General, and now Broadway star, Jeff Ross.
After playing Jewish Geography in the outtakes, Jeff talks about his new show, Take A Banana For The Ride (running until September 29th). The comedian puts himself and his family on stage, hoping to share stories of his past. How he knew he could do this? Being the funny guy in unfunny situations.
He tells Kim and Grandma Gail how this show has helped him talk through grief and resilience. It's a tribute to his parents, grandparents, and friends that have passed.
Kim, Grandma, and Jeff also talk about family heirlooms, their favorite Jewish inventions (Grandma's is brisket), and who Jeff would still love to roast.
They then answer AGA questions about mean in-laws, the surprising place to find a nice guy in NYC, and what to do if you're looking for love in your 50s.
Get tickets to Take a Banana for the Ride at jeffrossbroadway.com
Follow Jeff at @therealjeffreyross
Leave a voicemail at Grandma Gail’s Voicemail, DM us on Instagram, or email team@excusemygrandma.com for advice!
Follow us on
Instagram @excusemygrandma
TikTok @excusemygrandma
Watch on
Music By: Guy Kelly
00:00: Interview With Jeff Ross
29:05: Ask Grandma Anything
37:15: Old Fashioned Dating Quiz
Grandma Gail is full of wisdom... even if Kim doesn't always take it to heart. Every week, the granddaughter/grandmother duo share stories, chat about their lives, discuss pop culture, and unpack the generational differences of dating, sex, relationships, and more. Listen on Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch the show in full on YouTube and follow @excusemygrandma on TikTok and Instagram to keep tabs on what’s happening in their lives between episodes.
Inquiries: team@excusemygrandma.com.
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Speaker 3:Welcome back to another episode of Excuse My Grandma. It's Kim and my cohost. Grandma Gail. We have such an amazing guest today. First, let's do a little bit of maintenance before we introduce who it is.
Speaker 3:Grandma, you need we need to pay our bills. You need to get paid. So everyone needs to follow us on social media. Excuse My Grandma. Please subscribe wherever you're listening to podcasts.
Speaker 3:It makes such a difference for the show. Now let's get into it. Today, we have Jeff Ross. He's the Roast Master General. I'm so excited to talk to him.
Speaker 3:You know him from his celebrity roast. Grandma, I don't know if you I I even read you this list. Pamela Anderson, Charlie Sheen, Justin Bieber, Rob Lowe, Donald Trump, Tom Brady, like, literally goes on and on. And now he's starring in Jeff Ross Take a Banana for the Ride, a one man show running August 5 to September 28 at the Nederlander Theater. I was there opening night.
Speaker 3:I loved it. So we're gonna discuss. Oh. Jeff, welcome to Excuse My Grandma.
Speaker 4:This is so cool. And thank you.
Speaker 3:Yellow for
Speaker 4:I was about to say
Speaker 3:wearing yellow.
Speaker 4:I am so flattered by your attire, ladies.
Speaker 3:Oh, thank you. We wanted to be in theme. And do you know butter yellow is very trendy now?
Speaker 4:Oh. Yep. Did not
Speaker 3:know that. Butter yellow. Butter yellow.
Speaker 4:And you look both beautiful in butter yellow.
Speaker 5:Thanks. My new favorite experience.
Speaker 3:You don't have to be nice to us. You're allowed to roast us throughout the episode if you do want.
Speaker 4:Good to know. Noted.
Speaker 3:Grandma's been roasting me for twenty nine years, so I'm gonna It's
Speaker 5:just a continual roast.
Speaker 4:I I love your this fact that this is a grandmother granddaughter podcast.
Speaker 5:Thank
Speaker 3:you. Oh, that's so nice. I mean, you talk a lot in your show about these multigenerational stories as well. Family's so important to you. Do you think that now is a great time in the media landscape to, like, be telling these stories and that there's a need for this?
Speaker 4:You know, I've been telling family stories my whole life, not always on this platform on Broadway, but to me, that's what sustains me. It's when I'm, you know, my nephew graduated college right before I started rehearsals and I did not have time to go to his graduation. And I still went because I knew I needed that more than rehearsal.
Speaker 3:I
Speaker 4:needed the fill. My heart had to be full.
Speaker 5:And it is something about family attending those kind of things. And if you don't do it, you'll feel, Oh my gosh, I missed a moment. And I agree, those moments never come back. Right. The rehearsal will come back, but the moment of his graduation is a wonderful thing.
Speaker 4:I had to be there just
Speaker 5:because
Speaker 4:to see how happy it made my sister.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 4:You know?
Speaker 3:That's right.
Speaker 4:It's important to me though. And that's what the show's about. Take a banana for the ride is something that I've been thinking about and working on since I was your age. I was a young comic, did a show about my parents and my grandfather, and I didn't have the emotional strength to keep it going back then. And I resurrected it now for Broadway.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Also, sister was there opening night.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:There were so many stars there.
Speaker 5:Was Is she younger or or older?
Speaker 4:She's sixteen months younger.
Speaker 5:Oh, so you're almost like twins.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And I was gonna say too, I still hold it against my brother that he didn't come to my entire college graduation. Well, he came to most of it. He came to the first day and not the other events, but I remember that.
Speaker 5:Yeah. I that's true. I mean, because
Speaker 3:Let him off though.
Speaker 5:He wasn't mature. He wasn't mature. He was
Speaker 3:in high school or whatever Yeah. It
Speaker 4:He wasn't. You're a big star now. You gotta float above that.
Speaker 3:Exactly. Yeah. You're right. I'm over it. Jeff told me.
Speaker 5:He's still there. She wasn't over it five minutes ago. Now she's
Speaker 4:over I'm very good at, like, handling these family dynamics. Yeah. I help you navigate this.
Speaker 3:Why do you think Broadway was the right format for this if you've been working on this material so long?
Speaker 4:Well, for me, it was more like a dream. I saw Jackie Mason on Broadway when I was a young comic. My aunt And Bess took I remember every joke, and I remember her laughing at the setups. He didn't even get to the punchlines yet.
Speaker 5:He just walk on the stage and would laugh.
Speaker 4:And I was like, you know, and he's like, how many people in this theater, the, the, this guy and this guy? And I was like, oh my gosh, this is one person by themselves captivating this Broadway theater. And I always remember that every time I go to a Broadway show, I it's a little bit like when some kids go to a Yankee game.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 4:And they go, oh, if that guy ever got sick, I'd be out there playing shortstop. So as even as a young man, I was like, wow. Even when I go to Broadway shows now, I go I'm in the audience going, if I was up there right now, I would knock them dead.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 4:So I had to see that through for myself. I hung onto my apartment for twenty years in New York, even though I was living and working in Los Angeles. I was like, I'm gonna need that apartment when I do Broadway.
Speaker 3:That's amazing. You manifested it.
Speaker 4:I did.
Speaker 3:That's so wild.
Speaker 4:Something I've only recently learned how to do, but it was more like an insurance policy. I was like, let me keep the apartment.
Speaker 5:You never know when you're gonna go back.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Right. I feel like building a one man show is extremely daunting. And who kind of was your team behind you working on this? Did you write the material completely?
Speaker 3:Like, where was the support?
Speaker 4:I have tremendous support. You know, I'm not up there alone. A director, my agent and manager were really the first ones to say, well, you know, you, you've had some hits recently. I lost three good buddies within eight months and my managers and Amy said, maybe you should look back at your old show and see what you were talking about as a young man when it came to resilience and mourning and bouncing back. And, you know, more recently I lost Bob Saget, Gilbert Godfried and Norm MacDonald.
Speaker 4:Like I call them the Mount Roast Remore. These guys were so darn funny. And when they went in eight months, it made me question my own mortality and go, why am I the one left to tell the story? Yeah. And I better tell the story and what better way to Exactly.
Speaker 4:Tell And I like keeping their names alive. I like talking about my friends. If the show was all me, me, me, I'd be bored.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 4:But because it's about my parents and I read their love letters and it's about my pop Jack who told me to take a banana for the ride when I was a young comic, He was giving me life advice. He didn't even realize it. He, he thought he was just giving me a snack in case I got stuck in the hull and tunnel.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 4:He'd give me 40 napkins and a banana. I was like, pop, I don't need it. But you know, in the end, stayed with me forever. And I like it that it's a tribute to some of the people who made me who I am.
Speaker 3:Totally. And there were a lot of very tender moments in there and harder moments you had to go through, as you're saying, how did you balance that with the more light comedic moments?
Speaker 4:Funerals, practice. Yeah. Being the funny guy in unfunny situations gave me this sometimes I think it's a superpower because I don't always control it and I don't know where it comes from, but in the saddest situations, I can make people laugh.
Speaker 5:And that's very important. You know, as we age, especially, you're very young, so you're at that stage yet, but still, even when something doesn't go right in your young age, if you can laugh about something, even for five minutes of the day, it makes you feel better. And that's just what he does. He's taken a serious, sometimes really tragic parts of your life, and if you can get a little bit of humor out of it's wonderful. It's uplifting.
Speaker 5:It's uplifting for himself and for us, but for the audience who listens to it because everybody has trauma. I don't care who they My mother used to say, what was the whole thing? If you put keys in the table and you mix them all up, you're gonna grab your own keys back. Well, was something like that, whether it was But it's really true because everybody has issues and everybody has tragedies And if you can find some humor in some of it, it makes life a little easier.
Speaker 4:It not just easier. In my case, I took so many hits as a young guy. I feel like it saved my life. I feel like I would've been some wreck.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 4:So I don't know, unemployed, a drug addict. Like when people lose their parents as a teenager, sometimes things go upside down pretty quick. That's correct. And
Speaker 5:So how did you and your sister survive that? Were you young when that, when, when your parents evidently Yeah.
Speaker 4:I was 12 when my mom got sick, 14 when she died.
Speaker 5:Right. No kids were young.
Speaker 4:19 when my dad died.
Speaker 5:So your sister was younger.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 5:So who did you live with? Your grandparents?
Speaker 4:No, we were, we were in college. So
Speaker 5:Oh, really?
Speaker 4:One of the things you guys didn't talk about in the show.
Speaker 5:Was she in college?
Speaker 4:She was graduating high school.
Speaker 5:Okay.
Speaker 4:So I switched her admissions from one college to another to be closer to me.
Speaker 5:That's wonderful.
Speaker 4:So we wound up being in the same college, Boston University. -Right. -Very, they accepted her acceptance to another school. -Oh, -And they put the house in my name so that she could get financial aid. Like I was a smart kid at 19.
Speaker 4:I figured out a lot of stuff.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I love in the show when you were like, wanted to adopt us and we were like, no, I wanna live by myself in my own house.
Speaker 4:Yeah. They were like, you're an orphan now. Yeah. They're like, no, we're good. Yeah.
Speaker 4:You're good. And, and that's where the resilience part comes in and you have to be open to help. You have to be open to patting yourself on the back, not always waiting for someone else to do it for you. And I just didn't wanna waste my life.
Speaker 5:So what was your first, taste of the comedic role? I mean, when you graduated college, I guess, you went to, So when did this start, right away? Or did you go into some other related business first and then go into comedy?
Speaker 4:I didn't even think about comedy in college. I was a film major and a political science major. Everything I wrote was very serious, dramatic. Was, you know, that was my life experience was intense like that. And those are the kind of thoughts I had.
Speaker 4:It wasn't until a couple of years after college, I was making training films for a health and beauty aids company. And, you know, I knew I was I knew I could make people laugh, but that wasn't a commodity. -Right. -That was just something I needed to talk to people in a bar, you know, like, or maybe to, to make a woman laugh, you know, and- Did
Speaker 3:you have a pickup line that you used?
Speaker 4:No. I've never been good at that.
Speaker 3:Just improv.
Speaker 4:My best pickup line has always been, Hey, do you wanna come to my show?
Speaker 3:I don't
Speaker 4:really have an opener. So when I have no show, I'm really stuck.
Speaker 5:Right. I don't have watching television like us.
Speaker 4:To me, it was a survival mechanism, you know, like just keep laughing about it and throw your arms up in the air and go, you know, what the heck? This is life.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Well, so you mentioned your parents' love letters. You wear your grandfather's ring. Are there any other, like, family heirlooms that you didn't mention in the show? I feel like I'm always stealing things from my grandma.
Speaker 5:It's always in my closet.
Speaker 3:More like a Birkin bag. We we laugh about because she's got a
Speaker 5:closet full of things herself, but sometimes it's always better. It always looks better in
Speaker 3:her grandma's closet if it's yourself. Yeah.
Speaker 4:I'm jealous because the heirlooms that I held onto of my grandfather's are like his false teeth in a
Speaker 3:little So
Speaker 4:you're doing up really well with
Speaker 5:You don't have to worry because my teeth are all good.
Speaker 3:Going down Okay. With Good.
Speaker 4:And I got his union card and I got his denim jacket, you know, like stuff I couldn't part with. Right. So, and, and I have all my parents' love letters from when my dad was in college writing to my mom. I read one of them in the show. And that was the hardest part was finding out which deciding which one and, like, going through it all.
Speaker 3:Even the photos behind you throughout the show, like probably picking those. What, I mean, I was talking about this earlier, actually. Now, if I look at a lot of photos of my childhood, Some of them early years were in photo albums, but now they're kind of just all on my phone. Yeah. And I was like, is that gonna change the experience?
Speaker 3:Like, it's so nostalgic that you have all of these photos.
Speaker 4:I think it does.
Speaker 5:I think it does too. Because you constantly are in my closet looking at my photo albums.
Speaker 3:Right, because it's nostalgic for me to look at your Right, my life. But it was also I feel like my future kids, like, are they gonna just scroll
Speaker 5:down They're not buying. I have to hold onto your phone and look through it.
Speaker 3:Yeah. It's just a different experience.
Speaker 4:That's why I made the set look like a photo album almost or, or, not a photo album, but like the wall at someone's house when they have all the picture family pictures
Speaker 3:I
Speaker 4:wanted it to feel like that because we're always in our phones and
Speaker 5:that's right.
Speaker 4:You know, I'd be on a plane if I get, if I'm bored on a plane, I'll look at all my favorites and go, oh, and and sometimes it makes you sad. And but it's just it's in your hand. You shouldn't be able to carry your whole life around in your hand like that, but we do.
Speaker 3:But we Yeah. There is something special about that. It was so nice watching yours because I feel like everyone does think about their own situation and their own family.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:It's they're very relatable. You also had your great grandma, Rosie, that you talk about a ton. Yeah. Did she my grandma gives me rules all the time to link Yeah. Did she give you any dating rules or just life advice rules?
Speaker 4:Here's the interesting thing. My middle name is Ross. Right. I talk about that in the show. I'm very open about all that.
Speaker 4:I'm named after her, which means she passed away right before I was born. But she's the only member of my family that I'm jealous of because she had the swag. She was the boss. She was a pioneer in her field. So yes, she led by example.
Speaker 4:I was, everyone talked about her when I was a kid, great grandma, Rosie, and you're named after her. And so she's sort of this, don't even wanna say matriarch is that diminishes it to gender. She was the boss. Right. She was a pioneer.
Speaker 4:She started a kosher catering hall in Newark in the fifties. Women did not do that back then. Right. So she lived above the catering hall with her husband who works for her. My great grandpa Gus and, and her partner, like her business partner, this guy.
Speaker 4:So like she was really running this operation. So she's the jumping off point of the show and a big inspiration from my life because she would throw the family parties that I try to throw now. She kept all these crazies together. She was the one handing out
Speaker 5:one person that keeps a family together. And when that person disappears, somehow the family flies away.
Speaker 3:Or hopefully someone can
Speaker 5:Well, take it doesn't usually happen. It doesn't usually happen.
Speaker 4:Takes a It takes the next generation to mature. And now I feel like my cousins and my sister and I, we all kinda do it. Right. And I think part and and and my sister and I started it by getting a beach house big enough for for 25 of us.
Speaker 3:Right. That's fine.
Speaker 4:You know, on the summers down at the Jersey Shore.
Speaker 5:And But it's terrific. So you can keep each other in the how many children does your sister have?
Speaker 4:She has two. They're they're
Speaker 5:both They're
Speaker 4:ones one they both had big weeks. I might as well shout them out. Yeah. My nephew Mitchell and his lovely fiance Melody came in and saw my show and stayed with me this weekend and asked me in the cutest way to officiate their wedding next So
Speaker 5:nice.
Speaker 4:Shout out to Mitchell and Melody. I'm I'm already writing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm sure.
Speaker 4:And my nephew, Jared, who I mentioned earlier, just graduated college. I mentioned him in the show. He, he, in the summers, he fights wildfires. He's very brave. I don't wanna say too much.
Speaker 4:Today was an intense day for him. He's doing great. And I love you buddy.
Speaker 3:Aw, that's so sweet. Yeah. Right. So nice. Were there any stories, family stories or otherwise that got cut out of the show?
Speaker 4:Oh my gosh. A thousand. I could do a whole other show on
Speaker 3:each
Speaker 4:family member. Gosh.
Speaker 5:You forget in the time when he was growing up, families really stuck together much more. They were not as mobile. People didn't go to different From the East Coast, they didn't go to the West Coast. They stayed in their own community for a very, very long time. So stories built up from to generation and people knew the stories, which is a wonderful thing.
Speaker 5:Now so many stories are lost because the kids don't know their aunts and uncles or their grandparents.
Speaker 4:Well, don't care because Instagram's more interesting.
Speaker 5:Well, I don't know if it's more interesting. I just think they're not part of it.
Speaker 4:I
Speaker 5:really think if they knew it and were to spend time with their older relatives or their cousins or whatever, they would take an interest.
Speaker 3:It's a new way to connect. Like, now that you are on Instagram, even though you're scrolling, of course it's not the same, but I'm saying we could send things back and forth.
Speaker 5:Yeah, it's not the same as looking at you touching your hand and having your pasta or having your pot roast, talking about the recipe. It was a different kind of continuity in a family. It's different.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Long for it sometimes. And one of things I talk about in the show is that I miss that.
Speaker 3:And
Speaker 4:my dad wrote me a letter saying, I'm sorry if you missed that. And there's something really genuine about that that is hard to
Speaker 5:Who writes letters today? Do you know anybody? Nobody. We're texting. We're texting.
Speaker 4:Don't- You get a letter today, you're nervous.
Speaker 5:Know it's the IRS and you probably think it's a scam.
Speaker 3:Or jury duty.
Speaker 5:Or jury duty. Exactly.
Speaker 4:That's true. Or it's my neighbor asking me to move my bike out of the hallway, you know, because he did.
Speaker 5:There won't be a letter. It'll be a note on a post it.
Speaker 4:Right. You know? So I'm trying to keep some of that- Alive. Alive and thriving. Like a lot of people are telling, you know, I wanted to sell stationary at the theater,
Speaker 3:but I couldn't get that done in time.
Speaker 4:You know, take a banana for the ride stage because people leave and they, they wanna write a letter. They'll tell me, you know, oh, the letters in your show made me wanna write to my kids or to my grandpa or whatever.
Speaker 5:Yeah. That's terrific.
Speaker 4:Yeah. That's to me, that's the, that's the, the, the, what really gets me excited to do it every night.
Speaker 3:Mhmm.
Speaker 4:If it was just about me and my life, I'd be bored already. But because I can do it about not just my family, but your family. Like, like, when I talk about my great grandma, Rosie in the show, I don't keep her picture up very long because I want you and you to see your great grandma in there. Right. And when I talk about my uncle Murray, I want you to think about your uncle that, you know, teased you when you were little or whatever that means to you and your dog.
Speaker 4:I don't hit you over the head with a lot of pictures. I put them in there for effect, but I really want people to see their families and their lives in the story. And that way it's like a, it's like a doggy bag you've taken home with you and you're still thinking about
Speaker 3:it. A 100%. And it definitely worked that way. Thank you. It was extremely emotional and that really can only happen, I feel like, because we're empathizing and we're thinking of our own situations.
Speaker 3:So I
Speaker 4:Where were you sitting?
Speaker 3:Oh, I was sitting orchestra right.
Speaker 4:That's a good seat.
Speaker 3:I got friendly with one
Speaker 5:of the, with one of the producers. Mark's wife.
Speaker 4:Mark and Natasha Kornstein, who have been the greatest champions of this show. It's their, it's all of our first time on Broadway. We're really digging in and loving the, the doing of it. The process is so fun.
Speaker 3:I'm sure. I don't know anything about it, but I my grandma and I have gone to Broadway together since I was a little kid, and it's We love you. Always something I've like, it's so sentimental to us. And I feel like a lot of New Yorkers feel that way too.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Just connected. And I grew up in Jersey. So we went to a Broadway show. Was a big deal.
Speaker 3:Was a
Speaker 4:big deal.
Speaker 5:Talk about that often. I used to live in a suburb too growing up. That was a big production.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Oh, you gotta go to the get something
Speaker 3:to eat before. What are you
Speaker 4:gonna do after? Where you gonna park? And, you know, the playbill and all of it.
Speaker 5:Kim collects all her playbill.
Speaker 3:I do. Now you're in the collection.
Speaker 4:Oh, that's nice.
Speaker 3:What's the best advice you got from a friend about being on Broadway?
Speaker 4:Oh. Well, I don't know about a friend, but a hero of mine is Billy Crystal. And I guess I'll call him a friend. And I asked him because I loved his solo show 700 Sundays.
Speaker 5:Mhmm.
Speaker 4:And I reread it recently for inspiration. And I he warned me and I was like, He said, you're not gonna wanna stop. He's like, don't try to shoot it for TV right away. Right. Enjoy the Broadway of it all.
Speaker 5:The experience.
Speaker 4:And you you'll, you, you know, you might think you're gonna be done with it. You'll be sick of it. You won't. It'll, and, and, and I'll, because I tried this years ago and I really couldn't sustain it. It was too emotional, but I figured out a couple of things in my head.
Speaker 4:Like for one, for instance, I wear a banana colored suit with little diamond bruises on it. By wearing the costume, essentially, I can take it off, put it in the dressing room and go out to dinner with my friends. I can leave the emotions And in the because I'm not playing a character, I'm playing myself, you know, with all due respect to Audra McDonald, who I just saw in Gypsy, I was blown away. She could still take the wig off on the costume and go and, and leave it there. Yeah.
Speaker 4:Till the next day I gotta leave with my real dog and my real emotions. And so
Speaker 3:Wait, is your dog in every show?
Speaker 4:Oh yeah.
Speaker 3:I thought just cause it was opening night. That's amazing.
Speaker 4:Oh, she's crushing it.
Speaker 3:Oh, she's the best.
Speaker 4:She has hit it. She knows her lines better than I do.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So good.
Speaker 4:So Billy warned me that I might not wanna give it up so fast. And I kinda see that happening. Yeah.
Speaker 5:So don't give it up.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Maybe not.
Speaker 5:Not the city. That's all.
Speaker 3:Just keep That's all. Just get another opportunity. It's not that easy. I'm sure. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Like, people are obviously loving it. So I'm sure all the opportunities will come, but it's also like, I can't believe you're on every night. Like, pretty much. I would die.
Speaker 4:It shows a week.
Speaker 3:That's crazy.
Speaker 4:I thought it would be a lot harder on me than it is.
Speaker 3:Okay. That's good.
Speaker 4:My voice gets, cause you know, I'm also doing press and others, my real life. And you know, I have a lot of friends
Speaker 3:who You're wanna talking
Speaker 5:to us.
Speaker 4:Right. Right. Yeah.
Speaker 5:A lot of talking.
Speaker 4:So, but I'm a comic. I'm used to doing two shows a night. Like that's not the hard part for me. The hard part is the, is the emotions of it every night. Going so deep and to my parents and people I lost, you know, and my birthday's coming up and Bob Saget wishes me happy birthday in a video in the show that occurred to me last night is gonna become very real next week.
Speaker 4:So there's these real, there's a human experience playing out on stage every night.
Speaker 3:Yeah. You said you're turning 60?
Speaker 4:Yeah. Don't tell anybody.
Speaker 3:What are you doing for the birthday?
Speaker 4:You know, I was just thinking like, was gonna have a party, but I have two shows that night.
Speaker 5:Because you're not.
Speaker 4:And then I have a matinee the next day. Yeah. So I was thinking of maybe just renting out the Irish bar next to the theater.
Speaker 3:That's fun.
Speaker 4:Making it just a wild, like here, the crew comes over, my family's around and we just do kind of a punk rock improvised party outside the theater.
Speaker 5:That sounds good.
Speaker 4:That's a
Speaker 5:good thing.
Speaker 4:Otherwise I'm gonna do a fancy party downtown. By the time I get out of there, it's an hour drive in traffic on a Saturday night. All my friends are flying in. They're all gonna expect some fancy party, but I think I might go the other way and just like, you know, have have a couple drinks. And and to me, it's not about the party.
Speaker 4:It's about the show right now. So I don't know. I'm You could talking
Speaker 3:out light the birthday party too. And, you know, to, like, a few months from now.
Speaker 4:I probably could have a big blowout. I love parties. The only reason I'm talking about this out loud is because I grew up-
Speaker 5:He's thinking about where
Speaker 4:he's the catering business.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:So parties are like-
Speaker 5:See, now you're reliving Rosie again.
Speaker 4:Exactly.
Speaker 5:Here it goes.
Speaker 4:Here we go, Gail. You're right. You're you should be a shrink.
Speaker 3:Oh, basically Yeah. You should
Speaker 4:sit here and I should sit on the couch.
Speaker 5:Nobody's listening to what I'm saying, but I am a shrink.
Speaker 4:Everybody's listening. What are you talking about?
Speaker 5:Listening. People meet me on the street. They ask me these questions. We've had this happen in Florida. A woman came out of a store and said, I have a terrible problem.
Speaker 3:Oh,
Speaker 5:yeah. And she started asking my advice, and I said, You know, I'm really not a psychiatrist or psychologist. I'm happy to give you my opinion.
Speaker 4:Yes,
Speaker 3:ma'am. It's because you're no BS and people wanna hear it straight. But I'm sure you feel that way with roasting too sometimes. That's why it's funny, it's because it's kind of the truth.
Speaker 5:How long doesn't get mean? See, as long as it's not mean spirited, I think you can roast anybody and have a good time and laugh. I know
Speaker 3:you think that, I know I do.
Speaker 4:I agree. By the way.
Speaker 5:I think people have to be honest and talk about their thoughts and if they know it's coming from a good place, then you take it for what it is. And it's very much like Don Rickles and all those comedians who were so wonderful and Jackie Mason. They were funny, they weren't mean. They were just funny. And, you know, they give you a little bit of a zest every once in a while.
Speaker 5:But it disgusting bad humor. It was funny.
Speaker 4:Well, the mantra I always use, and it's not I didn't create it, but it's I only roast the ones we love.
Speaker 5:Right. Well, that's
Speaker 4:And if I definite take the time to write a great joke, it means I like you.
Speaker 3:Mhmm. True.
Speaker 4:If I ignore you
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 4:That's the insult.
Speaker 3:Yeah. That's the fact. That's really good. So, Grandma, if I put you on the clock and gave you thirty seconds to roast me, do you think you could do it?
Speaker 5:I don't think I'd ever wanna roast you.
Speaker 3:But you basically don't think
Speaker 5:I'd wanna roast you ever.
Speaker 3:But you love me. Jeff said if you love me, you'll I'd roast love you.
Speaker 5:I'd like to smack you around sometimes, but I don't think I wanna roast you. You're too sweet.
Speaker 3:Okay. Fine. Chuck, you've roasted, like, so many iconic people. Is there anyone still on the list that you wanna
Speaker 4:Oh, wow. You know?
Speaker 5:Number one, who would you like to roast?
Speaker 4:Who would be a good roast?
Speaker 5:Today's world. I don't know. Everybody. Putin.
Speaker 4:People keep mentioning certain names to me. Springsteen is an idol of mine.
Speaker 5:Would be a roast.
Speaker 4:They would be a good one. He has a sense of humor. Yeah. It's it's like for me, it's best when it's on a celebration, on achievement. Like Tom Brady worked so well because he was retiring and starting this new career in broadcasting and owning teams.
Speaker 4:And I think the roast helped set that in motion for him. It kind of put the past away. Right. He doesn't have to hear another divorce joke for the rest Right. Of his He did it.
Speaker 4:He sat through it. So I would say not who, but why. Like if some great, if you told me Oprah's turning a certain age, I'd go, that would be a great roast.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 4:I, to me, I fantasize about roasting Oprah Obama would be a great one. You know, political people are always a little nervous about that type of stuff, but showing you can laugh at yourself is a great strength, I think.
Speaker 3:Agree. That totally makes sense. Okay. Let's move on to our Ask Grandma Anything and Jeff.
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Speaker 3:So these are questions that our audience wrote in on Instagram about their dating lives and things like that. So we'll get both
Speaker 4:Oh, I love it.
Speaker 3:Your opinions. Okay. So actually, the first one is what to do about an extremely mean in law from hell? Grandma, you wanna go first?
Speaker 5:Well, I think you have to if you're you're in a marriage, you're in a relationship, in laws come along with it. You almost have to just keep your ears shut and your mouth shut. Walk away, excuse yourself, go get a Coca Cola in the kitchen and say, Oh, you know, I forgot to do something. Let me just I'll be back in a minute. Try to avoid conflict because it really doesn't work and, you're not gonna change, their dispositions, I don't think.
Speaker 5:What do you think?
Speaker 4:Well, I'm always in the diplomacy Right. State of mind. Life's too short for fights. Having grown up in the catering business, I saw a lot of families through the window of the kitchen, but I saw families fighting over things that they shouldn't be fighting about. I just would spend time with my nephew who I mentioned is getting married.
Speaker 4:And one piece of advice I gave them was don't fight about the wedding. Let her Exactly. Do what she And don't fight about the wedding because, you know, gowns, seating It's
Speaker 5:one day. It's one day that you forget That you fantasize about your entire time.
Speaker 4:She is not forgetting about it. They're gonna they're gonna capture it with cameras.
Speaker 5:Exactly. But I'm telling you, the long run, it's it's just one day. And let the girl, if she really is that into it, let her do whatever she wants.
Speaker 4:Of course. But I told him, like, I told both of them, if you guys are united, every if you're having fun, everyone will have fun and don't fight.
Speaker 5:Exactly. Good eye. Good advice.
Speaker 4:I'm a very high road with that kind of stuff.
Speaker 5:So I so I think if this girl has a really terrible in law, she just has to walk away from it.
Speaker 4:Not only does she have great parents, they're from Hong Kong. Oh. They came to my show the other day.
Speaker 3:Oh, wow.
Speaker 5:This is your nephew's.
Speaker 4:This is my nephew's new in
Speaker 5:laws. Okay.
Speaker 4:Soon to be in laws. Wonderful, wonderful people, scholars. And they wanted to go to the US Open. They're very into tennis, and, they live in DC. So after the show, I go to see them, and he's sitting in the theater, and he bought a DFWTJ hat.
Speaker 4:You wanna tell your fans what that is? Please. You saw the show.
Speaker 3:DF, don't fuck with the juice.
Speaker 4:Yeah. So now here's this beautiful Chinese man wearing a don't fuck with the Jews hat.
Speaker 3:Incredible.
Speaker 4:All over DC. And I go, this guy's gonna be my. This is my new family. I love this guy. So, so we're very lucky.
Speaker 4:We have some new family members who are representing.
Speaker 3:Yes. I love that. Also in that, bit, you kind of go through all the things that Jews have created.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:At the beginning of time. What is your favorite?
Speaker 4:Oh, wow. Probably NoodleKoogle.
Speaker 5:Don't blame you. I would've said brisket.
Speaker 4:Yeah. I didn't have to think very long.
Speaker 3:That was quick. We're
Speaker 5:quick. We're quick on this.
Speaker 4:You're making me hungry.
Speaker 5:Forget Einstein. Forget sock. Forget the flu vaccine. We're we're going right to the Yeah.
Speaker 4:We're going right to the brisket.
Speaker 5:To the noodle pudding.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Well done, please. No raisins.
Speaker 5:Another question. This is we're getting lower and lower.
Speaker 4:I'm getting hungry just doing the pog.
Speaker 3:I know. Literally, same. I think the microphone, because I use it the most. Okay. Is the best invention.
Speaker 5:Okay.
Speaker 4:Yeah. That was a joke in the show.
Speaker 3:Was that
Speaker 5:a Jewish person that invented the microphone?
Speaker 3:Yes. According to my gosh.
Speaker 4:In the show, I go through all the creative inventions that Jews have come up with. And at one point I go, the microphone. At some point, some Jew was like, I think we need to be louder.
Speaker 3:So good.
Speaker 4:Yeah. People love that one. Thank you.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 4:So There's lot of good Jewish jokes in the show.
Speaker 3:Incred a lot.
Speaker 4:You don't hear them off it anymore.
Speaker 3:It's my favorite kind of humor. So enjoy it. Okay. So someone said I'm 53. Should I give up on trying to find a partner?
Speaker 4:No. Come on.
Speaker 5:Only halfway in her life. Are you giving up? Yeah. You're gonna live to be 110 now.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 5:Absolutely don't give up. I mean, just be realistic, though. Yeah. You're no longer 20. So find somebody who's age appropriate or whatever and who has commonality of interest and have fun.
Speaker 5:Don't worry about it. You're not having children anymore, so just have a good time together. Exactly. Here. Enjoy yourself.
Speaker 4:I love that.
Speaker 5:Right? Yeah. I I can never be alone.
Speaker 4:Nobody should be alone. No. You know, I I talk about some of this in the show about bouncing back, part of that, you know, human beings aren't made to mourn forever.
Speaker 5:Correct.
Speaker 4:That's really getting stuck. That's not fair.
Speaker 3:No. And part of that, and I went through this with some of
Speaker 4:my friends who passed away, I
Speaker 3:would talk to their wives after. And I go, no. You have to. It's been a year. It's been two years.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 3:You know, my friend would not want you to be by yourself.
Speaker 5:That's right.
Speaker 4:And and people shouldn't be that way. I talk about my grandfather on the show about how I had to, you know, push him to go to the senior center to
Speaker 5:He needs sociability. Right. Everybody needs to be sociable. Yeah.
Speaker 4:Hanging out with other old people will make you younger.
Speaker 3:Yeah. That's right. Yeah. I love that story too.
Speaker 4:Yeah. I talk about my grandfather going to the senior center. Finally, I made him do a practice run-in his car and he wouldn't go and I don't wanna need anybody and I'm fine. And he finally, finally goes and he's gone all day. Six and a half hours later, I hear honk honk.
Speaker 4:I go outside. He has three ladies in his car. Oh, he overdid it. I said, pop, what's going on here? He said, I'm the only one that can still drive at night.
Speaker 5:That's the best joke.
Speaker 3:It's very good.
Speaker 4:Yeah. It's a lot of good laughs.
Speaker 3:Speaking of someone said, what's the best place to meet a nice guy in New York City?
Speaker 5:Oh. Oh. Figured it's all asking me.
Speaker 3:I mean, I guess it depends on your age and your interests, where you're hanging out and all of that.
Speaker 4:Okay. I'll throw one out there. Go ahead. And it's just not because I'm a comedian comedy clubs.
Speaker 3:Oh
Speaker 4:yeah. Comedy shows, if not my show, the comedy clubs.
Speaker 5:That's a good idea. But then
Speaker 3:when do you talk to people? Cause you're just listening.
Speaker 4:No, no. The you're coming in, you're online, you're going out. There's there's there's certain nights that are more social. They always have a bar and a restaurant. Yeah.
Speaker 4:I think finding people with a sense of humor can add a lot of time to your life. And the other thing that no one ever talks about comedians, I don't care if it's a man or a woman comedian, they're icebreakers. You go on a date. I'm already talking about the things that you wouldn't get to till your eighth date.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 4:So I'm already breaking the ice for you. I never wanna be a buzzkill. I want my show. I wanna be a wingman for whoever. And I, you know, I'm not talking about straight or gay or whatever.
Speaker 4:Whoever you are, a date at a comedy club, I think, is a good icebreaker.
Speaker 5:That's a point,
Speaker 3:Kim. The only thing is if you go to comedy seller and they take your phone away, you can't give someone your number unless you remember
Speaker 5:Write it on a napkin.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Makes it even cooler.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 4:It makes it sexier. You gotta pass a napkin. You gotta wait around outside. You gotta
Speaker 3:True.
Speaker 4:I like that. I I
Speaker 3:I'm into it.
Speaker 4:And by the way, by putting your phone away is probably how you found that person.
Speaker 5:Exactly.
Speaker 4:Because now your head was up and you're looking around and
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 4:You catch someone smile, you see the whites of their eyes.
Speaker 5:Good luck.
Speaker 4:That's how animals meet in the in the wilderness. It's wild.
Speaker 5:They they don't do a texting.
Speaker 3:Okay. We're gonna do a quick round of Grandma Gail's old fashioned dating quiz.
Speaker 4:Oh, great.
Speaker 3:So it's basically rapid fire, and we'll see whether you're more traditional or more modern in your thinking around dating. Okay. Okay. Would you rather receive a call or a text if it's just to say hi?
Speaker 4:Oh yeah. Oh, a
Speaker 5:call or a text.
Speaker 4:I don't think it matters that much for it just to say hi, in my opinion.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:I happen to have learned from a friend of mine, at least I picked up the habit of FaceTiming more because I feel like it's more of a personal thing.
Speaker 3:Totally.
Speaker 4:Especially I started that my friend, Seth Green, my neighbor, the actor, he started FaceTiming during the pandemic.
Speaker 5:Okay. Well, that's very important. That was important.
Speaker 4:And I kept that. We've kept that tradition up. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. When you have the time, a 100%.
Speaker 5:Yeah. Somebody always has time.
Speaker 3:Would you sleep with someone on the first date?
Speaker 4:I guess I have, but I don't think that's the goal.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Open to it.
Speaker 4:Yeah. I guess I'm open to it, but that's not always the priority.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Dating apps or setups?
Speaker 4:Setups.
Speaker 3:Would you move in together before getting engaged or married?
Speaker 4:I would, yeah. I would think that that would be important in this modern age.
Speaker 3:I think so too.
Speaker 4:Especially with these New York rents.
Speaker 3:Yeah. With the rent. Two is better than one.
Speaker 4:Yep. Yeah. What are we doing?
Speaker 3:You know, it's like, you gotta figure it out. Would you post the person on social media or keep them off until it's serious? Serious.
Speaker 4:It's a great question. And it's always been a conundrum with, with me because my brand is insult humor. So if I was to post a girlfriend, she's liable to get roasted. Not everybody's ready for that in a week or two of dating. A year or two in, I think-
Speaker 3:They know who they're dating at that point.
Speaker 4:But you're right. And if so so to me, I like the privacy. Mhmm. The jokes are funnier to me when they're private and personal and the relationship is stronger when it's not for show.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I agree. Should one person pay for the date or should you split alternate?
Speaker 4:Theoretically, grandma Gail, you might have a strong opinion about this.
Speaker 5:Well, we never had the women pick up the check, but now it's a different age and women are as as successful as men today and it depends. You could pick up one, one week, the gentleman can pick it up the next time or it depends on the economic situation of the couple. If somebody clearly doesn't matter how much money they spend, then let that person pay when they want to pay. I don't think it matters very
Speaker 3:much But it's preference of the couple.
Speaker 5:I think it's the preference of the couple. I think we started these questions when I think about it, about younger people dating. I think once you're over a certain age, it really doesn't matter. When you're in your 20s and you're first going out on the social scene, I still think the guy should pick up the check. Because like so many people on the Instagram, they've gotta fix their hair, they've gotta get a new dress.
Speaker 3:A lot of expense that goes in for
Speaker 5:a girl. I understand that, but once you're hit the age of 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, you know what, whoever wants to pay for it, let them pay for it.
Speaker 4:It's Doesn't funny. Like, yeah, now I've always picked up the check because I don't know.
Speaker 5:That's the way you were taught.
Speaker 4:Chivalry or something. Exactly. Don't know if that's still a word that people have to Google these days, but I always saw that. But some of my most amazing dates were when my girlfriend at the time said, I'm taking you to this. Yeah.
Speaker 4:One of my greatest memories, core memories of, for being a comedian was a girlfriend with an expense account. I, and I remember this because I ran into her at my theater. She was buying tickets for her and her husband to come to my show. I dated her when I was a beginning comedian. And hi, Mindy.
Speaker 3:And she
Speaker 4:took me on her Sassoon jeans expense account when she was a Garmento thirty years ago to Carnegie Hall to see the comedian Richard Lewis.
Speaker 5:Oh my God.
Speaker 4:And I'll never forget that she did that for me. It's so nice. You know, I think it can go either way. But generally speaking, I I can't imagine not picking up the check.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I think you're Much pretty like split? No, I've been counting.
Speaker 4:I dated a billionaire once, ran her own company, and I still picked up the check.
Speaker 5:Yeah. Because I do think that's still right.
Speaker 3:I agree. I do.
Speaker 5:Yeah. But I think today, if the woman wants to pick it up and you've gone at it a bunch of times and she feels like she wants to do it, go for it. Who cares?
Speaker 3:Jeff, thank you so much for joining us today. This was so fun. Tell people where they can get tickets to the show and follow you and
Speaker 4:Jeff let you rossbroadway.com for tickets. I hope everybody comes.
Speaker 5:Go Until out the end of the month. So everybody come has to buy tickets.
Speaker 4:Come now. Exactly. Gotta we gotta we gotta
Speaker 5:Every month. And weeks.
Speaker 4:And shout out to the proud Jews out there that have been filling up this theater. It makes me so happy. But I also get a big kick out of seeing people from every ethnicity, every walk of life, singing with me, howling. I howl at the end of the show, like a wolf, like my German shepherd. So that part has been amazing seeing all the different types of people.
Speaker 4:Broadway, I'm like a tourist attraction, you know, like
Speaker 3:you are.
Speaker 4:It's that part's really fun. So go to jeffrossbroadway.com, come see the show while we're still there and follow me, the real jeffrey Ross, on Instagram and send me your reviews for the show.
Speaker 5:Yes. That's perfect. Thank you
Speaker 3:so much. And thanks everyone for listening. We will see you next week.
Speaker 4:And wait, wait, last thing. Last thing. You both for having me on your podcast. I'm now gonna be a regular listener. This was so fun.
Speaker 5:Thank you.
Speaker 4:Have you ever had a comedian on before?
Speaker 3:Yes, we have. You had Freed. He
Speaker 5:was one of our first.
Speaker 4:He's great.
Speaker 3:He's so fun.
Speaker 5:A guy.
Speaker 3:A few. I feel bad that I'm not remembering
Speaker 5:the other ones. Well, we will. We'll think about it at the end day.
Speaker 3:My favorite. Think Well, I'm
Speaker 4:on it.
Speaker 3:And now you're my favorite. Was on twice. He was.
Speaker 4:Yeah. He's very good with the dating question.
Speaker 3:Yes. Right. Yeah. We we talked a lot about relationships. That was yeah.
Speaker 3:Exactly.
Speaker 4:He's a good guy.
Speaker 5:Yes. Very.
Speaker 4:Well, I'm very flattered that you have me on, and thank you both for wearing banana yellow, my
Speaker 3:boy, recorders. You're absolutely honor. Alright, everyone. We'll see you next week. See you next week.
Speaker 3:Bye.
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