Joe DeRosa: Stand-up comedian, writer, and actor known for performing at the Comedy Mothership and co-hosting the horror-movie podcast 'We'll See You in Hell.' He just released his self-directed special 'I Never Promised You a Rose Garden.'
What this episode covers
Joe Rogan and Joe DeRosa sit down for a rare one-on-one conversation, drifting from the supportive family-like culture of the Austin comedy scene to the corporate sociopathy of the insurance and politics worlds. They dig deep into a shared love of horror and sci-fi movies, debating the scariest films ever and trading concert stories. The back half turns to anxieties about AI: voice-cloning scams, AI replacing Hollywood crews, ChatGPT-induced psychosis, and China's tech dominance. Throughout, DeRosa talks about quitting drinking, the exhaustion of modern outrage culture, and his deep affection for old sitcoms like NewsRadio.
No purchasable items were genuinely recommended in this episode.
Big reveals from this episode
- Joe DeRosa reveals he has basically quit drinking, calling sobriety a life-changing energy boost.
- DeRosa recounts his pre-comedy job as a radio reporter for the Texas Senate Media Department, partying with hammered senators.
- DeRosa credits the sitcom NewsRadio with 'saving his life' during a bleak, lightless COVID lockdown.
- DeRosa names The Exorcist the scariest movie of all time and says he rarely re-watches it so the fear never wears off.
- DeRosa tells the story of a friend who got an AI voice-clone kidnapping scam call using his daughter's replicated voice.
- Rogan and DeRosa argue social-media flexing reveals an 'attention deficit' and cite brain scans showing holes in heavy users' brains.
- Rogan claims a Chinese car factory is bigger than San Francisco and that China now makes the most advanced AI-integrated cars on earth.
- DeRosa names The Twilight Zone his favorite TV show of all time and Rod Serling the greatest TV writer.
Worth remembering
- An exterminator told DeRosa to mix glass into concrete because rats will chew straight through plain concrete.
- The Netflix doc 'Rats' suggests NYC's rat biomass may equal the city's human biomass.
- An Iranian lock box built 800 years ago reportedly had around 4 billion possible combinations.
- To save money, Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings generated thousands of orcs from only about five actors in makeup.
- Heavy ChatGPT use is linked to cognitive decline because users stop doing their own critical thinking.
- In China, a wallet of cash can reportedly sit untouched on a bar for hours because fear of harsh punishment keeps crime near zero.
- Ozzy Osbourne died about two weeks after performing the final original-lineup Black Sabbath show.
- The doc 'Best of Enemies' frames the 1968 Buckley vs. Gore Vidal TV debates as an early prototype of podcast-style media.