David Cross: Comedian, actor and writer best known for the cult HBO sketch series Mr. Show with Bob Odenkirk, the sitcoms NewsRadio and Arrested Development, and his stand-up career rooted in the 1980s-90s Boston comedy scene.
What this episode covers
Cross and Rogan open reminiscing about old-school AM radio (Art Bell, Phil Hendrie) and the art of improv before diving deep into Cross's origins in the cutthroat 1980s Boston stand-up scene. They trade legends about Nick's Comedy Stop, the mob, comics who never left town, and the late Barry Crimmins. Cross recounts stumbling into NewsRadio with no acting experience and the creative freedom that made it and Mr. Show special. The back half turns dark and futuristic: a long riff on AI, deepfakes, the AlterEgo silent-speech device, autonomous war robots, and the fear that this is 'the last of the regular people.' Cross closes by promoting his new YouTube stand-up special and describing his on-stage writing process.
Recommended on this episode
Prey
Human Head Studios
“Did you ever play Prey? A great underrated underrated game. Got ripped off.”— David Cross
When We Were Kings
Leon Gast
“Have you seen When We Were Kings? Yes. Yeah. It's great. It's amazing.”— David Cross
Call Me Lucky
Bobcat Goldthwait
“Did you see Call Me Lucky? Oh, you got to see that. It's Bobcat's documentary about Barry.”— Joe Rogan
Stand Up Stood Out
Fran Solomita
“You've seen Fran Solomita's documentary? I haven't. I got to. Stand up stood out. Yeah, it's really great.”— Joe Rogan
The guest's own work
Mr. Show
David Cross & Bob Odenkirk
“Did you guys ever talk about doing more Mr. Shows? A great [ __ ] show, man.”— Joe Rogan
Also referenced (named, not recommended)
Quake
id Software
“those [ __ ] got me hooked on Quake. Great game.”— David Cross
Doom
id Software
“Wolfenstein was the first 3D shooter and then Doom was the big one. You clearly know your [ __ ]”— Joe Rogan
Red Faction
Volition
“Oh, you could use the environment as a Red Faction. I believe that was it. There you go.”— Joe Rogan
Minecraft
Mojang
“my daughter is way into Minecraft, which I have no problem with. It's great. And she plays with her friends.”— David Cross
The Color of Money
Martin Scorsese
“The scene in The Color of Money with Tom Cruz where Tom Cruz uh shows up at this pool hall”— David Cross
3 Body Problem
Netflix
“You see three body problem. Amazing. that whole the idea that you put that thing on, you're like, Oh I'm here.”— David Cross
Twilight Zone
Rod Serling
“If you go back and watch the Twilight Zone, even today, like it's all brilliant. There was like no duds.”— Joe Rogan
Art School Confidential
Daniel Clowes
“It's like a Dan Clowes thing. Have you read Art School Confidential? His stuff is [ __ ] genius.”— Joe Rogan
Ghost World
Daniel Clowes
“he did uh Ghostworld turned into a movie and then there was another one that was uh Wilson”— Joe Rogan
Wilson
Daniel Clowes
“there was another one that was uh Wilson that was turned into a movie. Um his stuff is great”— Joe Rogan
Eightball
Daniel Clowes
“so he's the guy who did 8-Ball uh and then he's got he did uh Ghostworld turned into a movie”— Joe Rogan
Big reveals from this episode
- David Cross reveals he got a hair transplant and it was useless, so he now just shaves his head bald.
- Cross only landed NewsRadio because Ray Romano was fired during the pilot, then that replacement was fired too.
- Cross admits the saddest moment of his poverty days was selling his old Spider-Man and Hulk comics now worth a fortune.
- His grandmother threw away his uncle's original EC Comics collection he guesses was worth a quarter million dollars.
- Rogan confesses he had a T1 line dug into his street in 1997 just to host his own Quake server.
- Rogan declares 'we are the last of the regular people' and predicts humans will have to integrate with AI to survive.
- The entire stand-up special pitch is teed up by Cross as 'that was the segway', a self-aware plug.
Worth remembering
- Art Bell's Coast to Coast AM had a dedicated phone line just for callers claiming to be time travelers.
- Phil Hendrie performed all his radio characters live himself using multiple mics and strategic breathing.
- NewsRadio's first season ran 12-14 hour days while they figured out the show.
- The Tonight Show came to Boston scouting comics and chose Steven Wright, breeding resentment among local comics.
- The video game Doom got its name from the Tom Cruise pool-cue-case scene in The Color of Money.
- The AlterEgo device lets two people 'talk' silently via subvocalization and even translate thoughts into other languages.
- Rogan claims an AI was given the task to escape an offline network and found zero-day exploits to send a message out.
- Ukraine reportedly forced Russian troops to surrender using only autonomous robots, with no soldiers at risk.
- A claimed 'ghost murmur' / quantum magnetometry tech supposedly detected a downed pilot's heartbeat from 40 miles away (experts doubt it).