
Transcript
Deathbed Humor with Ritch Shydner (Hour 1)
Nite Lite with Pete Schwaba and Greg Bach · Thu Apr 24, 2025
Broadcasting live from the Civic Media Studios in Green Bay.
This is Night Light with Pete Chwaba.
Your inside source on everything entertainment from Wisconsin to Hollywood.
And now, a guy who never leaves the house without wearing a cup.
Pete Chwaba.
It's not true.
I'm not wearing a cup right now.
Mostly just because it's Thursday.
Hey, welcome to Nightlight, ladies and gentlemen.
Great to have you with me.
I am Peachwalla.
I could have just as easily made a joke about going commando, Aaron,
but I'm
not gonna do that.
I'm way too mature for that kind of thing, though.
Well, of course, I would expect nothing less.
That is the voice of Aaron Zommer's, ladies and gentlemen, joining me tonight on Nightlight, because the kid Conrad Krieger is on vacation like only Conrad can do.
Of course, he's at the NFL Draft.
hoping the Packers will draft him as their punter or sign him as a free agent.
But Conrad will be back on Tuesday.
In the meantime, I am in great hands here.
We had Sam last night.
I know you and Sam don't get along personally, but you're both very professional.
That's news to me, but okay.
I guess I'll keep my
distance.
He badmouthed you all night.
Listen to the podcast, Aaron, and you'll see what I'm talking about.
No, you guys are both awesome.
Thank you so much for filling in tonight.
Absolutely.
Oh my God.
Catherine Lake is here.
Gordy is here of John and Gordy fame.
What is going on?
And he's got a puppet.
That is so unprofessional.
For you to come in here with a, what is that, an ostrich?
Hi, Pete.
I've always wanted to meet you.
Gordy Young, come on in the stream here so people can see.
No.
Oh, sorry.
There's no Gordy.
It's just a puppet.
How are
you?
I'm the cheek.
All right.
Why are you here?
This is a
family show because I'm trying to keep your seat warm for you buddy on Monday.
I'm sorry.
Are you on the
air?
I am on the air.
Oh, God.
Yeah.
And people are listening, and this is just, it's absolute chaos breaking out.
But you're legend and radio, so it's okay.
You raise the Q rating of the show.
Really?
Yeah, you want to have a seat?
Do you like our new microphone setups here?
I do.
With Milton Berle books.
Folks, if you haven't tuned in to John and Gordy, they are outstanding.
They're on every morning here at WMDX from 8 to 6 to 8.
6 to 8,
6 to
8.
I
love you.
I love you too, buddy.
in the most platonic way possible, I assure you.
Nothing is happening.
Do you dig me in the big way?
Is that what you're saying?
You
know, we can talk,
okay, after the show.
What is happening here?
I make a joke about going commando and the next thing I know, Gordy's hitting on me.
It's just a weird sequence of events.
See,
we love
you.
That's great.
Have a seat, man.
No, that's okay.
Yeah, absolutely.
Hey, you want to hear the show I got tonight?
Yes.
Who's on?
So I don't know how.
tied in you are with the world of stand-up comedy.
But comedy legend Rich Scheidner is on the show tonight.
He's also an author.
You've seen him on Letterman, Carson.
He's making the popcorn pick of the week at 6.35 tonight.
And
Rich is awesome.
And he's going to tell, he's got all these great old stories about comics,
like
Henny Youngman, the first Civil War comic, a funny story about Steve Martin.
And he wrote a book about it.
So he's going to come out and talk about
it at 6.35.
And then I've got
Catherine you'll know who this is too.
I
thought Catherine.
Why Catherine should be in here
come
in
here if
she
wants
it's
Madison.
She owns this town come on
in
here Don Rosen
of W. R. J. M.
Really?
Yeah.
Don
and I
like
to get
together and talk about celebrity sightings because Don's had a few of them.
I've had a few of them.
Hi Catherine Catherine
Lake ladies and gentlemen he is the
radio anymore
No, you don't do radio.
You have a great radio voice.
It's good to see you guys.
This is a fun little impromptu
party.
We thought we'd come in and just show you how it's done.
Yeah.
Listen, if you've got a pie
graph or something, I'd love to see
it
because I'm kind of learning it on the job still.
But Gordie Young of the John and Gordie show, mornings here from six to eight
on WMD.
By the way, missing for the last two days, a little illness, but John Peterson without Gordie Young.
Not a good thing.
Sorry, it just didn't work.
There was no structure.
There was no laughter.
You were missed.
You were missed.
Really?
You think so?
I
thought there was drama between Sam and Aaron.
No, it sounds like
this is much.
I'm
going to ask for a raise now.
I didn't know I was that important.
It's like all a big reality show here.
I love it.
We like to have fun.
You
know, that's what it's all about.
Will you guys be part of my question of the night?
I think it's
time for us to do the question of the night.
Was this shared with you, Aaron?
It was
not.
Okay, so let's just go right to
it.
We'll figure
it out.
We don't need an intro for the question of the
night.
Ladies and gentlemen, in honor of National Bucket List Day, the question tonight is what is on your bucket list?
That is the nightlight question of the night.
You gotta go to Africa?
I gotta go to that
continent.
You know, it's funny you mentioned travel because that's the first thing that came to my mind is I'd love to go to Alaska.
I
would
love to go to Alaska.
That's very doable.
Yeah, I know.
I did stand up comedy there in the 90s.
I did at Anchorage.
Really?
Good crowd.
You know what?
It
wasn't a good
crowd.
They were chilly, but there was a great, the show was great.
They were good crowds.
And then we had, there was a band, like a house band that played every night and they were fantastic.
Really?
It's like one of the best weeks I've ever had on the road.
And then I got hell of it for like four bucks because it was Alaska.
I imagine it just like Northern Exposure.
Remember that TV show?
I just, I would love to walk right into a town like that.
Seriously.
Yeah.
That's how you picture it.
That's how I, I don't know if that's real, you know, really the way it is, but that's the way I
picture it.
I mean you get the problems,
but it
was.
I enjoyed myself, but that's our question of the night.
So, Gordie Young wants to go to Alaska, Catherine wants to go to Africa, and it's all about travel, right?
Interesting, isn't it?
Yeah,
I'd like
to go to Italy.
I've
never
really been, you know, and I'd like to win an Oscar.
I probably have a better shot at this point.
Going to Italy.
Yeah, especially since I want to Oscar for sound design, and I know nothing about that.
But that's our question of the night, 855-752-4842, 855-75 Civic.
Let us know what is on your bucket list.
Why is she leaving bailing?
Why I got it.
We got a text on the stream 92.7 WMDX says we love having Pete at the WMDX studio.
Yes, but that's from WMDX Why don't that?
But sometime why don't you get up early and and crash our show in the morning?
I'm not gonna beg to get up at that hour, but if you say Pete
We've got a spot for you.
Pete, we do have a spot for you.
Come in
tomorrow morning.
Listen, I am staying in like Kettle Moraine.
That's where they put me up.
It's
like I'm in the
western suburbs.
I'd have
to leave now to
get back here somehow.
I don't even
know how that works.
That's like Kettle Moraine.
That's
beautiful.
Beautiful this time of
year.
But if Gordy and Catherine are here and you're in Kettle Moraine and I'm not doing it, who's manning the text line?
That's what I
do.
It's a little paranormal x-files activity.
Yeah, yeah.
Now I'm kind of freaked out.
I'm glad you guys are here.
Who is on the text line?
There's a lot of people.
You get a lot of text from all over the state.
It's amazing.
But you
guys must, too.
You're
like local legends.
You know, Madison is a sleepy little town, so the first hour is, you know, a little spare of text.
Because nobody's up, yeah?
Nobody.
Well, it might be up, but it takes a while for them to get going.
They kind of get their text muscles warmed up.
Yeah.
They got to do
their thumb exercises.
Anyway, it's great to have you here, Pete.
It's fun to be here.
I love
doing the show from the studio.
It's fun to inhabit the same space you guys do.
I love when you guys came on my show.
You did the popcorn pick
last week.
That's
great.
Now, why are you here where everybody's up in Green Bay tonight's the night, the opening night of the NFL Draft?
I would have thought you'd be there, no?
You know, somehow I got talked into, all right, I'm in Calamari and I'm in a tent.
They got me in a tent, but it's nine bucks a night, but they're covering it, so that's good.
No, I told this story last night, actually.
I'm in this hotel, and I check in Tuesday night.
I did the show in Green Bay.
I come down here, and my room smells like weed, like strong.
I'm like, maybe it's in the hall, and it's just wafting in here.
But I asked a security guard who was walking by, and he said, that's coming from this room, right?
And she goes, yeah.
So I had a new room.
But it reminded me of a story, Gordy,
where I was
doing stand-up comedy.
I was working in Winnipeg at a club, and they used to, you know, in the contract.
They put you in this nice hotel, but it's really a room above the club.
Oh, great.
It looks like somebody died in there at some point.
Somebody
owed me, you
know.
But I go in there and it smells like weed really bad and just musty guy smell.
It's horrible.
So I call the club owner and I said, what is the deal?
This really smells in here.
It's terrible.
He goes, really?
Tommy Chong stayed there last week.
He didn't say anything.
I swear to God, that's interesting.
The room smells like Tommy Chong.
That's why
it
smells.
So they moved me to.
They moved me to a
Ramada.
Wow.
I get that kind of stuff.
You know, Tommy Chong is like 86 years old.
I'm serious.
Yeah, I believe you.
He's done well for himself.
He's doing okay.
And it's not from a lack of smoking weed.
I
can, in my own experience, I can share that.
But that is tonight's question, folks.
What is on your bucket list?
Share it with us.
Stream us.
Text us on the app.
If you don't have the Civic Media app, you absolutely should.
It's so easy to use.
Just click the little text icon right next to the station you're listening to and let us know what is on your bucket list.
Aaron Zomers sitting in for Conrad tonight and Conrad stands actually, but
I could stand.
Oh,
well, you don't want to do that.
Why am I supposed
to do this exactly like Conrad does, you know,
I bring my own style.
So
does
Conrad get the night off now?
Yeah, he's at the draft.
Oh, is he?
Yeah, he's
partying hard.
Okay.
He is partying hard, my friend.
This is a pleasant surprise.
Thank you.
Well, it was a surprise.
It's not that pleasant.
Oh, it's good to
see
you
guys.
I never see a
Catherine
anymore
when I come in here.
I know.
And you're already
back
taking a nap, probably.
Well, do you like the new studio here?
Isn't this cool?
Yeah, I do.
Yeah.
I wish they had left the couch, though.
There's still room for the couch in here.
The problem, I think, is that if you have the couch, it's no longer ADA compliant, because then you can't fit a wheelchair through.
Oh, is that really it?
I believe that is the reason.
So, oh, wow.
OK.
Just get a smaller couch.
That's true.
How about a nice hide-of-bed?
Then I wouldn't ever
stay in Kettle Moraine.
That's right.
A hide-of-bed.
A roll-away bed.
Yeah, exactly.
A Murphy bed.
Yeah, that's what this studio's like.
Hammock.
No, it looks awesome.
I love it.
And it's always fun.
It's fun to look over State Street.
Yes.
So it's awesome.
It's always wonderful to have you in town.
Thank you, buddy.
I'll come on your show anytime you
name.
Okay.
Tomorrow morning, six 20.
Next time I'm in town.
Six 20.
Look at you.
My
God.
I probably you guys are so responsible when it comes to radio.
I know you're already booked.
So I don't want to infringe.
We're booked weeks in advance.
Yeah.
It's hard to get on our show.
It's Gordy young ladies and
gentlemen.
Check out the morning show with John and Gordy.
Will John be back tomorrow?
Hell, I don't know.
We don't
talk.
Did you call
in sick today?
I did.
And
you're here
tonight?
Yeah, I've been a little under the weather the last couple of days.
Oh, thanks for coming in.
It's nothing contagious.
This is
like when you call in sick at school and then the teacher sees you out of the park
or something.
Exactly,
yeah.
It's all good.
That's awesome.
Thank you, buddy.
All right.
Good to see you.
We've got speaking of right there.
Oh, God, not on the neck.
Go home and my wife's going to be.
Well, Gordy had an ostrich puppet
and
she'll like.
She'll be very affectionate ostrich.
I would say
so.
But that's like such a weird excuse like if I had a hickey and I went home and I said to my wife, what actually happened?
She'd go, oh, it's
Gordy's
ostrich.
All right.
Yeah.
That sounds too
weird
to be
made
up.
Yeah.
So I think she'll buy it.
Awesome, buddy.
Thank you.
Good to see you.
Feel better.
All right.
Tune in.
Let's do this.
We've got big changes happening here at Civic Media.
And the new schedule is fantastic, folks.
And speaking of Gordy and John, even though we have a new schedule, you can still hear them six to eight every morning here at WMDX, followed by Stephanie Miller from 8 to 11.
Here in
Madison.
Right.
And then in mind when the mayor are still on in their slot up in Northeast Wisconsin at WISS and WGBW.
So that hasn't changed.
But from six to nine on the network, you can hear Pat Crite low, and that's powered by Up North News.
And before that, it's Pam Yankee with the Farm Report from five to six a.m.
Matt Naranair, Jane and Greg from nine to 11.
The Tom Hartman show from 11 to two.
Todd Alba and my pal Aaron Zalmers, who is here tonight from two to four.
The Maggie Dunn show from four to six and Nightlight.
remains unchanged for now.
It's great to have you with me on this Wednesday night coming to you from Madison.
It's a popcorn pick Thursday night.
And we're coming right back.
What did I forget here?
I'm not sure.
All right, we're coming right back.
It's Nightlight with Pete Chihuahua on the Civic Media Radio
Network.
Just roll
me up and smoke
me when I die Just roll me up and smoke me when I die
Welcome back.
Tonight Light with Pete Schwama.
Great to have you with me.
I'm live from Madison tonight.
We had a little pandemonium here break out at the beginning of the show.
I can't remember
what
it was.
It was a beautiful thing.
It was like spontaneity, spontaneous.
It was good to see Gordy Young and Catherine Lake stopping by.
That was fun.
So our question of the night, ladies and gentlemen, is what's on your bucket list?
It is National Bucket List Day.
We've all got a bucket list.
Aaron, do you have something that's on your bucket list?
I would really love, funnily enough, since you mentioned earlier, you wanted to win an Oscar for sound design.
I would love to score a movie.
Oh, how fun would
that be?
It would be very fun.
I've written some music.
Really?
I went to school for music theory.
So it is something theoretically within my realm of capability.
I would love to do it someday.
Let
me ask you this.
Does working here with all this equipment in any way help you maybe produce something?
Yes, in a way.
It's definitely just the more audio that I process working here.
I'm able to record stuff at home faster, even though it's recording completely different things.
It has transferred over to some degree.
That's interesting.
That's a great bucket list item.
Score a movie.
And that out of the realm of possibility, like even if it's like an independent film.
Oh yeah, I'm not saying like I need to do the be the next John Williams or something.
Just a movie.
I think that's cool.
So let us know what's on your bucket list, folks, 855-752-484-2855-75 Civic, text us on the app, text us on the stream, YouTube, Facebook, or X. You can let us know what's on your bucket list and we will read it on the radio.
Always more fun when you guys participate in the show.
You know what?
I don't get political on this show because I feel like entertainment brings everybody together, like sports, it's something we can all, you know.
There are Hollywood haters out there.
They're kind of irrational sometimes, but, um, but
I don't get me
wrong.
Exactly.
What do you got against movies and TV?
Give me a break.
But I will say I was prepared to go slightly political today when I was on Todd's show because I saw a comment under a hotel site that had an interracial couple on the ad and they had, it was a white woman and a black husband and, you know, kids that were black and white and the
comments underneath were so hateful enough with this woke stuff.
I'm like, that's woke?
An
interracial couple?
That's been happening for centuries.
People are losing their minds.
I don't get it.
Yeah, it reminds me of, I think it, I don't remember which Star Wars movie, but I think it might have been The Last Jedi when that came out.
And there's literally like a quarter to a half of a second of two women kissing at the end of the movie and people freaked out.
It's like, dude,
Yeah, first of all, it's a galaxy far far away even if even if you don't If you're not with it, I guess in the real world, it's fantasy So I don't get
it all the more reason it's fantasy.
You don't even know what is happening or where they are right hairs But anyway, and I don't get it either because I don't like like there are people that are like done with Springsteen because he
It sings about this or that I'm like have you been listening to his music for decades?
It's
always been like
that.
It's
working man.
It's under like that's who he is Like Vince Vaughn was at the White House the other day I'm still it's not like I'm never gonna watch swingers again or old school.
I mean that just that mentality is so odd to me, but we are We are broadcasting live from Madison tonight folks.
It's great to have you with me at night late Aaron Zahmer sitting in for Conrad Krieger who is at the draft
This is fun.
And I feel like this needs a replay because last week, I think it was last week, actually, Mike did the popcorn, the popcorn pick of the week.
I think Gordy and John did it the week before that.
But Mike talked about how he wrote a song that was very famous in Wisconsin and probably around the country called the Pacarena because the Macarena was popular then.
And we were talking about how I used it in a movie I made called The Godfather of Green Bay and Mike said, I saw that, you know, and you probably don't know this, but I wrote a song.
Called the pack arena and Jane McNair sang on this on the song on the recording And so I think since the draft is in Green Bay right now.
We've got some Green Bay stuff that left over from the Todd Alba show that Aaron was certainly a part of I think we should hear a little bit of that the Mike Clemens creation with Jane McNair on
vocals
That's
hilarious.
I-
Jane has such a great speaking voice sort of so unique.
She does.
She's
kind of great.
That's her singing.
It sounds
nothing That parts her too.
No, it's not it was her broadcast partner at the time Dan Weber But you said Mike Clemens is not credited.
I This is I just found this on a random YouTube video.
This isn't like the you know, the official label release or anything like that So this only mentions those two, but if Mike says he wrote it, I believe he
wrote it
I believe him too.
He has no reason to lie.
And it's not like, I mean, all the proceeds went to charity.
It's not like Mike's getting screwed out of royalties or anything like that.
But
a
very cool thing.
I had no idea about this.
It's just so great.
All right.
Rich Scheidner is coming up in just a few minutes, folks.
He is an author and a legendary comedian.
You've seen him on Carson and Letterman and all the shows.
He's one of the people that really influenced me in my early stand-up days.
Just a phenomenal comic.
He's gonna make the popcorn pick of the week in just a few minutes and then we will talk to him about some really Fun iconic stories about comedians one that involves Steve Martin and lamb chop and it is hilariously funny and then our pal Don Rosen comes by at 720 To talk about celebrity sightings, I'll probably ask Don what's on his bucket list too What do you think son?
Let's do this.
What do you
think is on Don's bucket list on Don Rosen's bucket list?
Yeah
I don't know.
He's already done a lot of stuff to my knowledge.
Let's think about that.
Let's ponder.
Let's noodle.
We'll be back right after Civic Media's award-winning news team keeps you informed.
Folks, this is Pete Schwabba in Nightlight on the Civic Media Radio Network.
Welcome
back.
Ladies and gentlemen, live from downtown beautiful Madison, Wisconsin tonight, looking out over State Street on a gorgeous spring evening here in the state of Wisconsin.
Conrad is at the draft up in Green Bay.
our typical home, Aaron Zommer's sitting in.
Thank you for riding shotgun, buddy.
Conrad will be back Tuesday night and probably, well, very hungover, let's be honest.
But hope he's having a good time.
Our question of the night, it is National Bucket List Day.
What is on your bucket list?
Share it with me, please, and I will read it on the radio.
But right now, it is time, ladies and gentlemen, for our popcorn pick of the week.
And joining me...
to make the popcorn pick of the week, is an author and a legendary stand-up comedian.
You've seen him on... What did you do, Rich?
You did all the shows, right?
Carson, Letterman, all the
big... I did everything I was supposed to do.
I did about 16 Carson's and half a dozen or eight Letterman's and Lennos and HP.
I did everything I was supposed to do then, and I'm still talking to you.
That's what I do.
I
pray on the guys that still need to talk
to me.
I got my hooks in you, buddy.
I'm not
behind a little vultureism.
It's good, man.
So we've got
a lot to talk about, Rich.
You were here a few months ago.
We're going to do the popcorn pick.
And
then I want to hear, I love what
you're
doing on social media.
We'll talk about that too.
But let's start
with a little
conversation about movies.
How do you like
to watch
movies?
You like to go to the theater rich or do you like to be at home?
No,
no, no, I'm watching at home.
We got a great home system.
I think you know the theaters is just the problem is people the problem is people you know to come in they got to be on their phones that I try on it drives me nuts.
I was Bonnie Ray concert last night I I knew this this I haven't been in concert a while but the reason I stopped going is because people singing along with it
Angel from Montgomery, woman right behind me, had to break out the Diane Crow voice.
It was just horrible.
It was horrible.
But I like to sit at home.
I like to sit at home and watch.
And so we got a great system.
and sound system and a great big screen and high depth.
And you know, it's great.
But every once in a while, I'd still like to go to a movie because I can go into daytime.
I'm an old comedian.
We always go into daytime.
We are like, you know, there's certain movies you've got to see big screen.
Absolutely.
Um, and that was the best thing.
I mean, I haven't been a comic in years, but was going to the theater and nobody was there during the day.
So you could stretch out, you know, all
that kind of
stuff.
Yeah.
If
we had phones back then, we could be on our phones, but we didn't even
have them
yet.
So, um, what do you know?
I was going to say, when you go to a theater, I know you're, you're kind of a guy that doesn't take a lot of crap from people rich.
That's kind of your, you're not afraid
to say it,
to say it how it is.
Your reputation precedes you.
When people are talking in a theater, what do you do?
Do you shush them?
Do you threaten them?
Do you give them a
look?
If it's possible, I move now.
Yeah.
Shush them.
I've been far worse.
This has actually happened.
Rick Overton and his girlfriend at the time, Debbie DuPay, my first wife and I, Carol Liefer, went to Westwood Village in LA to see Victor Victoria, right?
Blake Edwards movie, right?
This guy back and he's talking.
I turn very nice.
I mean, but I'm much younger and much angrier.
And I turn, I go, come on.
And he just stares at me.
And then he talks some more.
I mean, he's just talking to a regular boy.
He's like, I don't know what this actor's funny.
You know, I'm like, come on, man.
He's like, no.
And then the third time I turn, he went FU.
And I really went over to chair.
I went over to chair.
I went over swinging.
I grabbed his funny shirt and I was tagging him.
Tagging him and tagging him hard.
And so he finds, all right, all right, he's down on the floor.
And I was like, Hoverton said, my feet were up in the air.
You couldn't even see me.
I was down, down.
And we get up, I get up, I go back to my seat, you know, I watch the rest of the movie.
I mean, I'm done.
It's over and I watch the rest of the movie.
And he moved.
I don't know where he was.
And the end of the movie comes up to me, his shirts ripped, he's holding this little chain.
He says, you got to learn to deal with your anger.
I said, you got to learn to deal with the fact when you say F you to somebody, that starts the fight.
That kind of escalates things where I'm from when I'm from when I'm from when you say that The next thing is a punch.
I mean, I don't know where you're from, but we don't do like 13 f use back and forth, you know, right?
That's where it was.
It's on
but if I'm much different I just move I move I move I did they're talking if I can all if I can move it at all possible.
I just moved that's it That will be the guy down on the bottom of the pile I'm 72 Are you really?
It'll be up there
Yeah,
yeah, yeah.
Overton was on the show recently.
He did the popcorn pick like five or six weeks ago.
Love talking to Rick.
Are you guys still
friends?
He's great.
Yeah, absolutely.
He's a great guy.
Great guy, great comic.
Improvisational wizard.
Yeah, he's fantastic.
Rich, what's your favorite movie snack?
Like when you're sitting at home or in the theater, do you
change it up?
Popcorn, popcorn, popcorn.
No, popcorn, popcorn.
Popcorn I like butter and I put the yeast on my wife does started then did a yeast on top of the butter and And I and I like it.
Wow butter everything's them everything I everything I eat is just a butter delivery system thought is you know You realize lobster you go lobster man.
Lobster's a little butter and then one time I had lobster without any butter I went lobster is just a butter delivery system In fact, I'll eat shoe leather if you dip it melted butter
That's great.
So you like to watch movies at home.
You like popcorn.
What kind of movies, Rich, like, what's your favorite genre?
What do you typically like to watch?
I tell you the truth.
I mean, my wife and I'll do like, we'll take one director.
We'll just go through that whole director's library.
That's a great way.
So, you know, right.
So it's where whoever it is is John Houston, whatever we just go through them and and but I like the old I'm done right now I'm watching a lot of old pre-code movies So we watch this movie baby face with Barbara Stanwyck young Barbara Stanwyck.
It's really wild man pre-code is pretty interesting because they were really, you know, they were out there in terms of 1930 movie or 1929 movie really out there, but um
Yeah, I like that.
I like that.
But it's, you know, comedies are tough.
You know, we're comedians.
So comedies are tough, you know.
But certain movies, man, just, I mean, you know, Dr. Strange Love, I'll watch again and again and again.
And Don't Look Up, which is kind of a recent favorite movie.
But I generally like...
something with aliens.
If it's a movie about aliens, I want to see the aliens.
Oh, nice.
But yeah, it's sort of like, I don't know, that's what I like.
Do you like, do you find when you watch?
Not just the alien movie, but any kind of space creatures, any kind of
space creatures.
Yeah.
Have you seen a movie called, what's it called?
Battle Los Angeles?
It was, it's Aaron
Eckhart.
No.
It's from like 15 years ago, and it kind of flew under the radar, but it's about Marines.
in Los Angeles and aliens are invading Los Angeles.
Oh, I didn't see that.
I didn't see that.
I didn't see that.
It's great.
I forgot the name of it, but I, it is great.
Yeah.
It is great.
I did see it.
I did see it.
It was
one of those movies I was like, I kind of stumbled on and I was like, well,
I'll give this a
shot and I loved it.
Like my
expectations were low.
No, I remember that movie now.
Yeah, that's a great one.
Rich Scheidner is here, folks.
He's
an author.
We're going to talk about his books and he's got this new thing he does in social media where he tells these
fantastic stories about comedians.
He's here to make the popcorn pick.
What do you think, Rich?
Are you ready to give us a great pick?
A great pick.
A popcorn
pick of the week.
A movie you can recommend.
Let's do a
drum roll.
This is big stuff.
Rich Scheidner, ladies and gentlemen, making the nightlight popcorn pick of the week.
Anatomy
of a fool.
Oh, wow.
Couple years ago.
Yeah, nice.
Yeah, that actress.
Yeah, I know this actress is great She's great.
It's interesting Yeah, it's very artistic.
I mean I Yeah, very nice awesome.
Are you so just came you know when you first said that I came in my head That's it.
So that's one folks if you haven't seen it.
It's only a couple years old You probably stream it just about anywhere great movie Oscar-nominated Best picture awesome pic.
Thanks buddy.
Yeah,
that was great.
Yeah
How are you doing?
So let's do this.
You're in Asheville, North Carolina now.
You left LA, right?
Yes, we live in Asheville, North Carolina.
OK.
So my aunt moved down there recently, like probably right before the floods.
How did you get through that?
Are you doing OK?
And what's it like down there now?
Are people
going through it?
Well, it was wild.
I'm telling you, it was absolutely wild.
Power was out for, I think, like 10 days in our house.
We had a generator, but we didn't have.
I didn't like.
Fill the propane tank before and so it really had to be judicious with that.
What's interesting We had water because given well a lot of people of course they lost electricity lost the water city water, too City water was out for months My neighborhood A lot of trees were on the side of the mountain so it wasn't flooding for us.
It was trees that came down a lot of trees on my property But I got lucky just missed the house missed the car took out fence, but the roads we have a
private community.
So our roads were blocked and all the driveways.
Interesting thing to me was it just sort of ad hoc crew formed the first day to open up the road to through one road goes into community house.
So we had to open that road and we just started and then we worked every day for like seven days.
Every day I'd get up like my job eight in the morning is out there with these guys and chainsaws and I learned that there's a hierarchy.
By the way, Milwaukee Tools is a big favorite.
Milwaukee's high, high, high up on the tool, tool echelon.
And then when it comes to the chainsaws, it's tough to beat steel.
A guy showed up with, what is it that Sears used to make?
I can't remember with their craftsmen.
So everybody's out there with steel chainsaws and he comes out with a craftsman.
And really, I mean, they heckled him off the crew.
He had to go back.
He had to go back and a couple days later.
He finally was able to buy a steel at the hardware store with an open like 340 center But I mean I never saw anybody going like he was shamed his he was shamed for his choice We don't get those leaves off that branch over there But we had so much fun we had so much that just that you know that guy kind of
And it was and it was work every day.
And I you know, you just got to a bond with these neighbors of people, you know, some of these guys I didn't hang out with before.
Right.
And and it was tremendous, tremendous.
But there's I mean, this place is going to be a long time.
They're still cleaning up places.
There are still streams with huge tractor trailers in them where they floated downstream and then got stuck there.
And just there they haven't pulled the debris from all the streams yet that that turned into huge rivers and the rivers that were it was.
Historic a 29 feet crest on the river the biggest before that that they ever Recorded was over a hundred years ago at 22 feet.
So it was seven feet above the record We're flooding it was incredible and there are a lot of a lot of people that There was a guy who just this was really sweet.
He he moved from Pensacola, Florida because he was sick of the hurricanes
Oh my right and he's in this group that I'm in this group that I'm in the stop drinking group and he and he moved up and his friend both of them were Vietnam vets and Tony come on move up here is not a problem in hurricanes so he comes up and he moves to a place called Pensacola North Carolina which is like a few miles north of agile right he's gone his house is gone he's gone never found them there's so many things that got washed downstream washed down river like
he's
passed away later yeah yeah
Yeah, nobody had nobody had nobody had cell phones for us for a few days, right?
So, uh, his friend, I saw him at this place.
We all gathered and he said, uh, I'm going to go up there and check.
I said, you want me to go?
He goes, nah, I just got to go check what he means.
All right.
I'm sure he's all right.
He goes up there.
There's going to foundation that this house is gone and him.
Can't
let's let's pick up there.
We can back.
We do very
sure the water coming off the mountain to cut the cut I'm supposed to do comedy sorry But yes about the flood and that was it.
I'm like what it is now.
Yeah, take a break.
We'll jump break and then and put a Put a bubblegum commercial on something
nice We'll jump we'll jump right back in a comedy when we get back with rich cider a nightlight with peach wabba on the civic media radio network
Welcome back.
Tonight Lights.
I'm your host, Pete Schwabba, coming to you live from Madison, Wisconsin tonight.
Our question of the night is, it is National Bucket List Day.
So what is on your bucket list?
We will read your texts coming up.
My guest right now is the very funny and very accomplished Rich Scheidner.
He's an author and a legendary standup comic.
And he made our popcorn pick of the week, which was Anatomy of a Fall.
Great pick.
And we just kind of ended the last segment on a very, very sad story.
Hey, you know what?
I got some funny ones.
I got some funny.
I got some semi-sad funny.
I wouldn't even count class assignments funny anymore.
Here's where I want to start, Rich.
You post these great stories on Facebook and you call it a history of stand-up comedy.
Is that?
A book one of your books or is a book to be?
No,
I've been written.
I've outlined it.
I have a show that I do a history of stand-up comedy.
Oh, yeah.
So I have all these stories that there's no room in the show.
I do an hour and 15 minutes, an hour and 20 minutes and then do a Q&A.
And there's so many other stories.
So and it covers so many different areas that I started putting them on.
I have a hundred videos prepared.
Wow.
I've been doing it for a while, and I stopped doing it, then I started doing it.
Then I was like, what am I doing with these things?
I mean, I'll just start posting them.
So as these younger people, you know, edit them and get them, put captions on them and get them ready to put on social media.
I've just been posting them.
So here, that's where I like to start is you told that story right
before
you break about your friend.
You have something called, and I watched this one a couple of days ago, deathbed humor.
Can you elaborate on
deathbed
humor?
That's a great one.
Yeah, you know, anybody can be funny when you're young and healthy, you know, but when you're dying and you come up with humor, that to me is, you know, gallows humor, they call it gallows humor.
Gallows humor came from the fact that it's a story, whether it's apocryphal or it actually happened, I have no idea, but a condemned prisoner was walking up the gallows to the hangman's noose.
And his foot creaked on a board.
It just creaked.
And he looked up the executioner said, you sure this thing is safe?
So that's where you get gallows you were from.
I mean, if you would crack a joke while you're facing death.
One of my favorites, W.C.
Fields, who was a great vaudeville entertainer before he became a movie star back in the 30s.
And he was a standup.
And he was on his deathbed.
And he was a noted atheist.
And he had a Bible open.
on his chest and his friend came in and said, WC, you're reading the Bible.
He said, looking for a loophole.
Oh, I love that one.
I mean, I love that kind of stuff.
I do too.
The other one.
Voltaire, you ever hear Voltaire?
You ever hear Voltaire's last words?
Voltaire?
Voltaire's dying and a priest, Voltaire, the French philosopher, he's dying and a priest says.
Are you ready to renounce Satan and both there goes my dear man now is not a good time to make new enemies
That's great, where can people Can people follow you on Facebook to hear these?
Yeah, you're following me on Instagram Instagram tick tock Facebook, of course, you're sure
The other one I like so much I had a guest on recently while I let you do this first.
This is when
What I love about this is is when you see another comic bomb and you talk about how delicate jokes are and how they can be derailed so quickly by the the staff or whatever you talk about that a little bit
Yeah, every comic knows that I mean if the people are talking to your audience and distracts other people around them Jokes are delicate.
You have to have the audience's full attention.
That's why lights are important So you're focused as an audience member on the personal and stage talking
good sound system, elevated so the joke is presented in front of you very well.
Jokes are very delicate.
Fred Allen, who was a great entertainer back in vaudeville before he became a radio star back in the 30s, was working in vaudeville one time and he's working and every once in a while you hear this clonk.
And of course it knocked the punchline out of his joke.
He's getting ready to do a punchline, a clunk, big clunk out in the audience.
This goes on for a while, so finally he steps in front of the footlights and looks out and sitting in the front row at this vaudeville theater is a man and he's got a bucket of oysters.
And he's shucking an oyster, slurping it, then throwing the shell in an empty metal bucket.
It's just a clunk.
I mean, just oblivious to the fact that there's a show going on.
But every comic knows that, you know, the blender, back in my day, your day, the blender in the rooms was, and then finally some clubs, they built boxes, soundproof boxes around the blender, because everybody wanted a margarita or whatever it was, blender drinks.
And you'd be like, and then my dad said, back to the room.
Once I was performing at this club and they didn't shut down the pool tables, not a pool table, it was a little worse.
You know, again, you know, you're going, and then I said,
You know, the pool ball is hitting each other
at just any distraction.
I remember your buddy, Kevin Nealon, who you were in Roxanne with.
You guys had a very
funny scene with Steve Martin.
He was at Largo in LA and it was like 1998.
And at that time, it was the shakers when they make martinis.
And so every time
he said something, the
shaker, the bartender would do the shaker and he goes, oh, that's great.
A couple of guys saw Swingers last night.
It was just a great, you know.
And my buddy, I don't know if you know Bill Gorgo from Chicago, but he had a story.
Yes,
yes,
yes.
Bill shared a story about it was a New Year's Eve somewhere down near Milwaukee and it was a hundred people and they served crab legs.
And all they could hear the whole time was people cracking
crab legs.
The hammers, man.
The hammers on the crab legs.
Oh, it's so great.
Crab, crab, because the whole point, potentially, you really have to work.
They get into a crab leg, so nobody's looking up from the crab legs.
They got a beer and they got a crab leg and they're sipping and cracking and sucking.
So nobody's looking up.
Everyone's already looking up.
Are you still up there, man?
There's crabs.
Nobody's.
Keep it down.
I'm cracking a crab leg.
Worst food.
Worst food.
All right.
So we got to do
some news, and then I'm going to ask Rich about his Steve Martin story, which is awesome, and a Pee Wee Herman story.
We're coming back right
after
Civic Media's news team keeps you informed.
Rich Scheider
is here,
ladies and gentlemen.
on a Thursday at Nightlight
with Pete
Schwabba on the Civic Media Radio Network.
Broadcasting live from the Civic Media Studios in Green Bay.
This is Night Light with Peach Wabba.
Your inside source on everything entertainment from Wisconsin to Hollywood.
And now, a guy who travels so he can pretend he's on the lam, Peach Wabba.
Welcome back.
Great to have you with me on this Thursday night here on nightlight It is like the Christmas Eve of weekdays folks and we are barreling through another edition of nightlight comedy alive for Madison tonight Right above comedy on state and you know rich ever played Madison, Wisconsin when you were a comedian
Now I played Milwaukee, okay few times, but I never played Madison
great comedy top
they don't Madison Yeah,
go ahead.
Yeah, you know
When I was in law school and lived in Washington, DC, I was doing work for Normal, which was the national organization for the reform of marijuana laws.
Wow.
This is a true story.
I was just, I stopped an envelope, you know, when people buy t-shirts and bumpers from the back of Rolling Stone magazine and I would outfill the orders.
That's what I was doing.
But one time they had a strategy session.
Everybody come in to the big conference room, which, you know, 20, 30 people.
And we're going to have a conference, you know, a strategy session.
Of course, it was a hot box as a kid would say today.
I mean, there was a lot of marijuana being passed around and during this session.
And so this guy standing in front, he had a map United States.
He said, Madison, Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin has.
criminalized marijuana that is this was like 1977 or whatever it was they criminalized marijuana and so we have a good shot right there to use that as a springboard to other places somebody went Wisconsin and there's somebody else went cheese and then somebody went pizza and they were pizza and the meeting was over it was word association
oh that's
fantastic
Rich Scheider is my guest, folks.
He's an author and a comedian who you've seen on TV over the years, dating back to 1980s, been around a while.
Where can people find your books, Rich?
Amazon.com.
I killed.
There's a book that Mark Schiff and I put out.
There were all sorts of road stories.
And then my book is kicking through the ashes.
It's my life as a standup in the 1980s.
So I just framed it from that period of time.
You know, when I was doing stand up in the 80s and then and then went to write on the Roseanne show started writing for sitcoms.
So that's that's that's a time.
That's so great.
Mark Schiff.
I worked with him at the improv in Chicago and he did a joke.
It was just like the most he talked about dining and dashing.
And he would just he was so.
Oh, my God.
And it's a whole audience.
Let's get the whole audience to go.
We can all go.
We can all run right now.
We can run out of this club.
That was chef.
He's deadpan.
So I know some people know it's going.
Hey, this guy's serious.
We can.
They can't.
They can't stop us all.
He'd go.
They can't stop us all.
No,
he was run.
We can all just he was so
deadpan and he would go.
He'd go.
They left the roast beef off the menu.
Get the car.
The roast beef off the bill.
It was just so you're right.
It was so deadpan.
Hey, Rich, one of the
stories you posted that I loved involved Steve Martin and Phyllis Diller.
Can you please tell
the
story?
So
Phyllis.
Yeah, yeah, I became friends with Phyllis Diller, and she said the key to showbiz is eating the proper word for it would be crap, but there's a different word for it, you know.
Right.
So that's the key.
You have to learn, you have to learn how to eat crap.
You're gonna, because you're gonna eat a lot of crap in showbiz, you know, you're gonna take a lot of guff, basically, what she was saying in a different way.
And so this story to me was one of the best ones of that.
Steve Martin, you know, was a young writer when the Smothers Brothers show.
I think, you know, 68, 69, whatever it was, he was writing for them.
And so, one week, the guest host was Sherri Lewis, and she had a hand puppet.
She was ventriloquist, had a hand puppet named Lambchop.
Lambchop.
So, they're having a writing session in Sherri's dressing room of the show, and they're trying to, you know, brainstorm corporate ideas for what to do with it this week.
And at one point, Sherri looks around, and she goes, where's Lambchop?
It's in Lambchop.
Where's Lambchop?
So, everybody's now looking around for his hand puppet.
And then Steve Martin realizes he's sitting on the lamb chop.
He's sitting on the puppet.
So he pulls it out from under.
I mean, here it is, sorry.
And she goes, okay.
And they all leave.
And a couple of minutes later, Tommy Smothers, he's told me this story.
Tommy Smothers comes in to Steve Martin and says, listen, Sherry's very upset about you sitting on a lamb chop.
And she's going to walk.
And we won't have a guest star this week.
You got to go down and apologize to her for sitting on a lamb chop.
All right, go.
So Steve Warren wants to keep his job.
So he goes down there.
And he apologizes.
I'm so sorry.
You're one of my favorite stars, and I'm so glad you're here.
And we're going to have a lot of fun this week.
I'm so sorry I sat on a lamp shop.
Please accept my apology.
She says, I accept your apology.
Steve turns, starts to walk for the door, and then hears, what about me?
And he turns around and says, Sherry's got the lamp shop puck going on.
She goes, are you going to apologize to me?
So Steve had to apologize to the hand puppet.
That's so great.
I love that story.
And everybody asked, everybody asked me to go.
Well, she's serious or joking, and I asked that same question at the time when he told me he was, oh, she was serious.
But it doesn't matter.
It's hilarious either way,
whether she's
joking or not.
Either way.
Oh, it's just absolutely.
Thinking
of Steve
Martin having to do that is just gold.
Yes, exactly.
Hey, maybe we could squeeze one more in here, if you don't mind, Rich.
Jackie
Mason
is from Wisconsin, and I know he was born in Sheboygan, Wisconsin.
I know you have a Jackie Mason story.
Well,
that's it.
It's a little long story if you want to do the Ed Sullivan story, but he was on Ed Sullivan in 1964.
He was a regular in Ed Sullivan.
He did a great Ed Sullivan impression TV show back on the only three networks or three stations on your TV and Sunday night.
That was a huge one of the biggest shows of country this particular week.
Lyndon Bain Johnson, the president of the United States was speaking that this is a live show that's held in show and
it cut into his speech Johnson's speech cut into the show so they don't cut away from the president they just delay cutting into the Ed Sullivan show and Jackie Mason is already on stage performing for the studio audience when the cameras come on they go and they're back on and he's performing now Ed Sullivan was standing on the stage to the right of Jackie Mason.
which is growing, not a problem, because he's just laughing at the performer or whatever.
But this particular time, they were running short because of Johnson's cutting into the show.
And so he's trying to give signals.
He doesn't know stage manager signals.
He's trying to give signals to Jackie to cut a couple minutes out of his bit.
And now the audience is looking at Ed over there doing hand gestures.
You know, it looks like he's signing for the death, but he doesn't know what he's doing.
He's doing the hand gestures.
Jack is afraid of losing the audience's attention, so he starts, you know, oh, you got fingers?
You got fingers?
Do you have fingers?
Are they talented fingers?
Are such talented fingers?
Maybe people should come to see you on your fingers.
You're talented fingers, right?
And he's flashing fingers, too.
Well, he's sort of upstage, and Ed got angry.
After the show, Ed...
Jackie gave him the finger.
That's what he thought.
He claimed Jackie gave him the finger on national television, which never would have happened.
Jackie, Jackie said, I didn't know what the finger was.
I don't buy that, but there's no way Jackie gave him the finger.
Well, the result was he banned Jackie and also put the word out.
I mean, this was 1964.
People didn't say darn, you know, they barely said darn or dang on TV.
They certainly didn't say damn, or they weren't giving each other the fingers on national television.
So it really hurt his career, like bookings were canceled.
And so he sued Ed, I don't know, it sued him for like $3 million, 1964, a lot of money, sued him for $3 million, which caused Ed to go, well, maybe I should look at the tapes.
They did have tapes back then.
So he looks at the tape, he goes, well, God darn, he didn't give me the finger.
He did not give him the finger.
And so then he welcomed Jackie back on the show, you know, open arms, please drop the lawsuit, have some more appearances, and all was, all was well.
That is so great.
Just awesome stuff.
Maybe we could get one.
Oh, can you tell the Pee Wee Herman song or a story before we let you go, Rich?
I love.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
So this was like 1981 Pee Wee Herman, you know, who became he had this great character and he went on David Letterman show and the next night this is in New York City.
I lived in New York City and with my first wife, Carol Lever.
And the next night he was performing in the theater.
Can't remember where it was.
Is in New York City, obviously.
So we were friends with mutual friends with.
a woman who was a TV producer in New York, and she was very good friends with Peewee's manager.
And so we got backstage.
We're in Peewee's dress room.
I don't know Peewee, never saw him before.
He's in his Paul Rubens, Paul Rubens, in his Peewee outfit, the little gray suit, white shirt, the little bow tie, pancake makeup, red lips, you know, he's backstage, but he's not, he's just talking regular and smoking a cigarette, and everybody's chatting, and he starts going off like, I hate this character, I'm sick of him.
You know, I'm like there's a packed audience out there, you know, and he's like I hate it up those sick of doing this character and the stage manager pops his head in the dress room and says Paul it's time to go on and he just puts the cigarette and he goes Right in the character and right in the character and dances that pewee dance out of the dress room onto the stage hour and a half killing him You know what I when he eventually, you know what happened to him in the movie theaters
I said, well, he finally figured out how to kill that character off years later.
He finally figured it out.
They're not going to bring Pee Wee out again.
Nobody asked me to do Pee Wee after this.
Here comes Pee Wee.
So great.
Rich, this is so fun.
I'm just going to say this to you.
I think I said this to you the last time you were on the air.
But when I started doing stand-up comedy at the funny firm, well, I started not at the funny firm.
I was there one night with a friend of mine, Ty Phipps.
You were the headliner and Ty was asking you all these questions that I chimed in.
I mean, you gave us probably a half hour of your time to these two eager guys just trying to become comedians.
And you were gracious with your time and you were insightful.
And it's just to this day, I've not forgotten that.
I just think the world of you.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it, Pete.
I gotta tell you.
Yeah.
It's like, you know, it happened to me when I was a young comic in Washington DC and Franklin Jai, who was a big star headliner
at
the Cellar Door was a nightclub.
in not a comedy club, but an actual performance venue where Warren Zevon and Linda Ronsted would come in.
And he was, and I went up to him and I said, I'm a young comic.
I went to see him.
And he said, come into my dressing room.
And I hung out with him for a couple of hours.
And he was just giving me advice.
And he was very generous.
So you kind of pass along what you're taught.
I should be passing this along, whatever I know.
It may not be much to help you.
But you know, obviously, when somebody's interested in doing this, you have a connection.
Absolutely.
And your pleasure.
My pleasure.
You're still doing that with your story.
So keep in common.
Follow Rich on Instagram.
All right.
Keep up the great work, buddy.
Thanks, Rich.
Thank you,
Pete.
All right.
That's
Rich.
Thank you, Pete.
Thanks,
man.
Thank you, buddy.
He made the popcorn picker week, which was anatomy of a fall and those stories are just absolute gold So hopefully he will put those in another book because that that's Steve Martin story I heard a couple days ago when I was watching this I couldn't even catch Catch my breath.
I was laughing so hard thinking of Steve Martin having to go do that.
It's just it's fantastic
So our question of the night ladies and gentlemen, Don Rosen is coming up in just a few minutes.
WRJN morning host, Don Rosen will be here momentarily.
We'll do a little celebrity talk like we do with Don.
And our question of the night is what is your, what is on your bucket list?
It's National Bucket List Day.
And you can share that with us and we will read your text on the radio.
Tom from New Berlin, I'm sorry.
Tom says to create AI.
that George Carlin and Frank Zappa word debate monitored by Howard Stern.
Yeah, what was that story?
Tom, give us some clarification.
I vaguely remember that, something about that, but he says, with my blackberry.
Oh, I'm lost.
Tom's awesome though.
Tom gives awesome texts.
Please give us a few more details, Tom.
He says, love this.
Tom says, Jane love.
He was talking about the pack arena, of course.
Jane sounds awesome.
Totally agree, Tom.
Monica from Mount Horrib says, I'm a nerd.
So I want to get all the presidential museums in.
She wants to go to all the presidential museums.
That's cool.
That would be pretty cool.
That would be amazing.
She says, I have three left.
Nixon, Reagan and FDR would like to visit all 50 states to have about a dozen left.
That's a great bucket list item.
I went to the.
Reagan's, where Reagan is buried in California when we lived out there.
It was up in CME Valley.
It is the property that is on.
I think his library was there too.
It's stunning.
It's absolutely gorgeous.
So good luck with that though.
That's a great text.
Thank you, Steady Eddie.
We'll do Steady Eddie's when we come back.
I think, hey, Don Rosen is coming up.
Next, we've got some texts on the stream we have to get to.
What's on your bucket list, folks?
Join the fun.
It's Pete Schwabba in Night Light.
Don Rosen coming up next on the Civic Media Radio Network.
That is Barbara Streisand.
It's her birthday today.
She's
one of the biggest, if not the biggest star.
Maybe ever like one of the one of the she's like in the top of the upper echelon Certainly in contention certainly in contention in the in the running in the conversation however you want to say it she is I want to say in her 80s today, but I had the opportunity to meet her I wrote a movie called a guy thing co-wrote and at the premiere She was there because James Brolin her husband was in the movie.
Oh, yeah, so I get to meet I get to meet Barbara Streisand and then
Don Rosen, if you're listening, we need your phone number, pal.
We're missing, we're missing a digit.
So I can track that down for you to the where and I know I have that somewhere on my email.
But yeah, and then we, I went to this premiere and I'm sitting in the crowd and they sit me and my writing partner, Greg, who's been on this show several times next to Ariana Huffington and she
I looked over and that was when she was on the air lot with Al Franken.
They were on Bill Maher's old show, Politically Incorrect.
So she's with her daughter.
I'm with my wife.
I lean over to Ariana Huffington and I just wanted to kind of have words with her and I said, hey, where's Al Franken tonight?
Not my best work.
Not a great line, not really necessarily clever.
I'm just trying to start a dialogue.
Ariana Huffington doesn't even look at me.
And she goes at home.
So that was my, uh, that was my interaction with Ari and Huffington at the guy.
A conversation.
A guy thing premiere.
Yeah.
That's about as far as I got.
Well, let's get, we'll get Don's number.
I'm going to search my email, but right now I want to play a clip.
This is, um, it's Jack, Jack Nicholson's birthday was yesterday.
He's in several of, I mean, he's in many amazing films.
But a couple of my favorites are Chinatown and the last detail.
In Chinatown, I have a clip between Jack Nicholson and John Houston, and this is where the whole movie kind of wraps up.
The plot is sort of summarized in this one quick scene between Jack Nicholson and John Houston from
Chinatown.
Either you bring the water to LA, or you bring LA to the water.
How are you going to do that?
By incorporating the valley into the city.
Simple as that.
How much are you worth?
I have no idea.
How much do you want?
No, I just want to know what you're worth.
Over 10 million?
Oh, my yes.
Why are you doing it?
How much better can you eat?
What can you buy that you can't already afford?
The future, Mr. Gitz.
The future.
Now, where's the girl?
I want the only daughter I got left.
You found out Evelyn was lost to me a long time ago.
Who do you blame for that, Har?
I don't blame myself.
See, Mr. Gitz, most people never have to face the fact that the right time and the right place, they're capable of anything.
Claude.
Take those glasses from him, will you?
Not worth it, Mr. Gates.
It's
really not worth it.
He's got a gun to his head after basically figuring out what the deal was with the water.
Such a great movie Chinatown.
I'm due for a rewatch.
Absolutely great stuff.
I'll meet you since birthday.
Have you seen it though?
Right?
Yes.
Yeah.
It's just it's like a great noir written by Robert Towne.
Just a phenomenal movie and I cannot wait.
It's been long enough.
Sometimes you rewatch a movie and you're not ready to rewatch it.
You just you saw it too soon.
And then all of a sudden it's like I should have waited a little longer.
But it's been about 10 years since I've seen Chinatown.
I'm excited.
One of
my favorite things about it is also like you wouldn't expect Chinatown to be a special effects movie.
But there's the scene where they stick the knife in his nose and then they cut it.
Oh, yeah.
And the way they made that look so real is by having a knife that had a spring and a hinge so that when they pulled it, it would slide out and then go back quick enough that you wouldn't see it.
Really?
And it had a tube that squirted fake blood at the same time.
So it looked like they cut his nose.
That is so cool.
I thought it
was really cool.
I love behind the scenes
stuff like that.
How did you find
that out?
I just never even questioned it.
Uh, what, there was a YouTube video that I watched where they tried to recreate it and compare it to if you tried to do it with CG and they're like, no, this is way better than trying to do it with CG.
Yeah,
that was a great, that was Roman Polanski, I believe.
It had a cameo.
It was the one that sliced his nose.
I think so.
Um, yeah.
Wow.
Great, uh, great tidbit.
Mr. Zamas bringing the heat.
Uh, Anna from Madison says, hi Pete and Aaron, my bucket list is to see the Rolling Stones in concert.
Paul McCartney in concert and Ringo Starr in concert.
That's a great bucket list.
Why couldn't I think of something like that?
I've pretty much seen everybody I want to see concert-wise.
So I wasn't thinking along those lines, but that is a great text.
Thank you, Anna.
Anna always has good thoughts.
And steady Eddie says, Pete, I completed my bucket list last night.
Wow, this is nice.
He says, I was at a Bonnie Rake concert in Carolina.
I just arrived back home to Wisconsin.
in parentheses.
I was singing like a lark with Bonnie to the song Angel from Montgomery.
It was beautiful till some mean old guy gave me such a dirty look while mumbling something like, shut up, you old crow.
Huh, that sounds familiar.
It does sound familiar.
Don't know what his problem was.
I guess some people just don't appreciate good music.
Well done, steady Eddie, as always.
That's great stuff.
And then PJ on the stream says, bucket list to travel around the world.
First Canada to find distant relatives, then make my way to Germany to find more distant relatives.
That's another great one.
Like it includes travel and tracking down ancestors, your family tree.
I think that's awesome.
Keep those texts coming, folks.
What's on your bucket list?
It is National Bucket List Day.
We are going to get Don Rosen on the phone.
That is my vow to you.
During the news, we will track down.
Don Rosen and have a little bit of celebrity talk with the host of the WRJ and Morning Show.
We're coming right back.
This is Pete Schwabba and Nightlight on the Civic Media Radio Network.
Welcome back.
This is Nightlight with Pete Schwabba.
I am Pete Schwabba, your host.
We are coming to you live from Madison, Wisconsin tonight, folks.
Beautiful downtown Madison.
Good to change things up every once in a while.
Riding shotgun tonight instead of the K-man is Aaron Zahmer's Conrad is
Eagerly awaiting probably the Packers draft pick in the first round.
He's at the
draft, chilling out.
I hope he is sober enough to comprehend what's going on.
You never know in
Green Bay, specifically.
Listen, with the draft.
They can put it away.
And here's another guy who, I don't know if Don, Don is such a music guy and a radio guy.
I don't even know if Don cares about sports.
He could be a classic sports hater.
for all I know.
But we'll find out because we're going to bring them on the show right now, ladies and gentlemen.
It is my pleasure to welcome my friend and the host of the WRJN morning show, Don Rosen.
Hey, buddy.
Hey, please.
Thanks.
You know, the whole world is heading to Green Bay and you're running from Green Bay.
Well, I told the people at the radio station and we're seeing let's rent space in our parking lot.
for people to park, for the NFL draft, and they're taking Uber up the green
bed.
They might be taking you up on that.
I've been hearing.
It could be cheaper.
It could be cheaper, right.
The hotel rooms are jacked up.
But are you a sports fan, Don?
Not really.
When I lived in New York, my father had season tickets to the New York Mets.
So back in the 60s and their championship year 69, I went every weekend.
I was in pride of the neighborhood.
Everybody wanted to get my four tickets, you know, come with me.
And we didn't drive, so we used to take the long island railroad in the Shea.
And this is when they had the World's Fair around.
They built a spur.
So you were able to go take the old World's Fair spur and take it right to the front gate of Shea Stadium.
And it was really good.
When I went to college, it was the training camp, it still is, off to university, the training camp for the York Jets.
And we used to sit there, have our lunch on the grass.
They'll name it.
That was a loser.
Don Meredith, all coming up to us, talking to us while we're eating our lunch, taking our French fries.
That's about it.
That's kind of
cool.
That is a Don Rosen story, if I've ever heard one.
You have great stories, Don, about just comings and goings with celebrities.
I have several because I lived in just north of Hollywood, basically, but you
have been around in radio.
You have such great stories.
Can you?
I know you've told this before
I hear,
but can
you tell me your point?
Yeah, go ahead.
Our pastor at our church, he just left to take another church assignment, but he was there for 25 years.
He went to North Hollywood High.
That's where you grew up going there.
I live two blocks from
there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Molly Ringwald was in his class and Dweezel Zappa was in his class too.
That's great.
Well,
you had a very famous classmate too and you were friends and I love the story you tell about him Especially when you talk about the other friend who is mad that he didn't stay in touch.
Do you know what I'm referring to?
Oh, yeah, can you please tell me?
Yeah, yeah Jerry Seinfeld, we grew up in Las Apequa, New York and he was about six houses from me But we went to school together went to each other's birthday parties all that kind of stuff.
His next door neighbor was again in Joel Edmond
And at my 20th house, the reunion, Joel came up to me and he said, boy, Jerry is really stuck up.
We're friends all our lives and now he doesn't want to talk to me.
He doesn't return my calls.
I said, he's a different girl.
No,
Joel.
He said, it's different.
And he said, yeah, but we're his friends.
We grew up with him.
We hung up all the time.
I said, but he's got different friends now.
He's in a different world.
Now, cut to on one of the seasons of Seinfeld,
And I forget the character's name on the show, but it was Joel Harnig or something like that.
And
on the show, he played an old friend of Jerry that kept pestering him all the time, but the good old days, ones who want to be friends with me anymore.
And I'm watching this and I call my brother and I said, that was Joel Higman, he's talking about.
And I thought that's him.
And so I have it on DVD and I watch it and I describe the story to my wife.
That's about what's the episode.
That's Joel Higman he wrote that about.
I love it.
And Joel never, I know Joel Higman never picked up on it.
Well, that probably describes why he didn't understand initially the nuance or the difference.
I don't know.
I guess that doesn't surprise me is what I'm saying.
And you know what, Jerry, he's a different life, you know.
Yeah.
Don't keep pestering him and that's just it.
Well, most people don't keep in touch anyway with her.
I mean, when you get out of grade school, for God's sakes, even if you're not a famous TV star, you just don't, unless you live right by the, you kind of lose touch anyway, don't you?
Yeah.
And, you know, we had a young girl working for us at the radio station at WRJN, and she was going to see Jerry at the Riverside Theater in Milwaukee.
And she said, he's having this biography.
He's from Massapequa.
That's where you're from.
And I told her the whole story.
And I called my mother.
I said, do you have any childhood pictures of us?
And she found one.
We were like five or six years old together.
And she made a copy of it.
She brought it to Jerry.
And Jerry's manager came out in the lobby of the Riverside said, did you give that picture to Jerry?
He wants to meet you.
So she went back to the dressing room.
And Jerry said, where'd you get the picture?
And she told him.
And she said, could you sign it?
Unfortunately, he signed it to me, not her.
It was heartbroken.
He said, dear Don, we must get together more than once every 40 years, Jerry.
That
sounds a bit
weird.
But I said, you still got his autograph.
What difference does it make?
You should have said something to him.
Yeah, I'm sure he would have.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, he's a nice guy.
Do you think
he, you know, I've met him three times and he was always really nice.
I was a young comic, probably peppered him with too many questions, but he was, you know, he was fine back then.
And notice he seems a little curmudgeony.
more so in the last few years.
Have you noticed
that?
Do you know how old
he is?
If you give me a second, I can figure it out.
He was 33 in 1987.
I know that much, but I'm not good enough at math to figure that out quickly.
He's going to be in April.
He was 71 years old in April because we got Bar Mitzvah a few weeks apart when he was school together.
And I remember his Bar Mitzvah was in mid-April and mine was in May 28th.
Did you guys go to each other's bar mitzvahs?
Not the parties, but we went to each other's bar mitzvah in the synagogue,
yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, I just, I think he's a little crabby the last few years.
And I don't know why.
I don't understand why a guy with a billion dollars who's got the world on a string still, even at 70, is like that.
Cause he's got Joe Higman calling him day and night.
And he's probably got about 50 Joe Higmans out there calling him day and night.
My
guest is Don Rosen.
He is the host of the WRJ and Morning Show in Racine.
And he joins us here on Nightlight periodically.
We talk about our celebrity sightings.
Don, I
got a bunch of them.
Well, share another one.
And then I want to tell you why I think Racine and Kenosha are going to be boom towns.
Okay.
Before that, I wanted to, we run the entertainment beat.
uh, in the morning on W. R. J. Oh, yeah.
Six fifties, seven fifties, eight fifties.
I love them.
And I love your gigs in there.
And I wrote two of them down because you were talking about the monopoly movie.
He didn't want about that.
And you're really under your breath.
You said, I hate it already.
Normally you got that.
And it was so fast.
And we were talking about Russell Brand.
And I guess he's got another
Accuser or something.
Yeah,
he's okay.
And you're talking about the salacious things he's accused of and then under your breath you said what a guy
Well, I apologize I was in a hurry today, so I've got a couple clunkers coming your way for tomorrow, but stick with me I'll get the no I appreciate you playing them, and I'm glad you're enjoying them.
They're fun to do
Yeah, yeah Kenosha Racine boom.
Yeah, okay, so
here's the thing
I have a cousin that just bought a house in Kenosha, and Kenosha and Racine, you know, right between Chicago and Milwaukee, closer to Milwaukee, but I've been doing all this reading where Michigan is going to be the go-to state in 20 years.
Because of global warming and climate change and what's going on in California and Florida, people are going to go north to the Great Lakes.
Michigan supposedly is the darling, but I say, you know, Wisconsin were basically very same.
topography-wise and whatever.
Kenosha and Racine are right on the water.
And they're right between two huge cities, this little kind of haven between Milwaukee and Chicago if you don't want to live in giant cities.
I really think, I think you're going to make a killing on your house is what I'm saying.
Well, I'm sitting in it now.
We got everything redone the walls.
We got new floors, getting a new roof, we got new porch.
We got new water heaters.
We got a new bathroom.
We got a new shower.
We got new... So yeah, I hope so.
I
can get my money
back.
I just want to get my money back.
I want to put it
into the house.
Yeah, we like this house.
We have two nice neighbors.
We live on Main Street, but the neighbors couldn't be better.
I love them all.
And we all watch out for each other.
So that's great.
I just think it's like a great... You can be on the train.
You can take the train to Chicago from
there.
You get 20 minutes
to
Milwaukee.
I mean, it's amazing.
Five bucks you get the the method training from you got to go to Kenosha for the Metro But if you catch it five bucks takes you right in on the weekend right to downtown Chicago
So all right, so that was just a little that was like an intermission.
What is going on at WRJ and you've got this great new facility How are things going there and what have you got you can share with us?
Well, I've been there 25 years
I took nine off.
I got fired by one owner and then when he sold the station, I got hired back.
So there for 24 years, the first go around in a year and a half with Civic Media so far.
The Civic Media network is done from there, the talk network.
I'm from our studio, so that's kind of nice.
They were all refurbished.
It's a great facility.
It's in a residential neighborhood.
But you know, we were there before the other homes were there the station turns 100 years old in the year and a half.
How about
that on December 6th of 2026 early 100 years old The the historic museum downtown the as you said you heard it museum downtown is doing a 100-year exhibit for us It's pretty
cool.
It's been it's it's pretty good radio stations got a lot of history to it and it never it never gave up it never went the way of am radio stations just
You know, dying was always vibrant, always a part of the community.
And one of the ratings I saw in the morning show came out number two in the county, which is great.
Oh, fantastic.
I mean, it's, I mean, it's doing real.
We got two FM signals and one AM on WRJM.
Love it.
But, you know, Civic Media is done from there.
All their talk shows are done from that studio across from me.
That's fantastic.
Except for you.
I know, except for, I'm all over the place.
I, you know, I haven't, I would love to do a show from there, just to do a show from there, because I typically, uh, re, or broadcast from Green Bay, occasionally from Madison when I'm here for PBS stuff or like a special circumstance like this, but I would love to see those studios.
Uh, so maybe we can make a field trip or something.
I think that would be fun.
Do you want to hear my, uh, do you want to hear my Steven Soderbergh, how I was emasculated in front of the director, Steven Soderbergh?
Yeah.
All right.
So he's one of my favorite directors.
So my wife and I moved to LA.
It's like late summer, 97.
And I'm up for this TV show, which I ended up getting cast in.
It was a VH1 pilot.
And one of the producers had a friend who showed up at this party and her boyfriend was Steven Soderbergh.
So I had had some back and forth with this woman because she was the woman who cast me his friend in the show.
And she starts talking about, you know, I should wear the same thing.
to my callback audition that I had on the initial audition because it was a very cute top.
She kept saying cute top and Steven Soderbergh is just nodding and she's like, oh, he had this really cute top on.
Are you going to wear that cute top?
And I'm like, I have to clarify, I'm being emasculated in front of the hottest director in town right now.
And all I can think of is I have to tell him it's not like a pink tube top or something.
You know, it was just a, you know, women talk like she just thinks it was a nice shirt.
So that's my humble brag about Steven Soderbergh.
But when we come back, folks, I'm hoping Don will tell his story about how he almost killed Jimmy Stewart, America's real sweetheart.
That's coming up next with our pal Don Rosen.
This is Nightlight with Peach Waba on the Civic Media Radio Network.
headphones.
Yeah, probably.
Hey, this is Nightlight with Peach Wauva.
Welcome back.
Our question of the night was a pretty decent one.
Fight in the NFL Draft, but what's on your bucket list?
It's National Bucket List Day.
Bridget from the 818 says, I'd like to take a really nice vacation, relaxing, full of good food, adventures, sun and water.
That's a great one.
Thank you, Bridget.
I still like Gordy's going to Alaska.
That's probably the most attainable of the ones we've heard tonight.
And then PJ on the stream says, Clay Matthews just did a short speech and said while unfolding a sheet of paper, dear America, the bears still suck.
You know what, Clay Matthews?
I think I could take Clay Matthews.
He's been retired.
He's probably let himself go.
Let's find out what
Don Rosen
thinks.
Don, how do you think I do in a fist fight with Clay Matthews?
I don't know how you would do, but I'd do very poorly in a fist fight with anybody.
I was in one fight in my entire life.
Oh, really?
And it was over in about three seconds.
When I was in the fifth grade, a kid named Mickey Strange, that was his name.
Oh, dear.
It was bragging all over the school.
And I'm tall.
You're a big dude.
Yeah, I'm six foot three now.
If I'm a little taller then.
OK.
And he said how he could take me.
And the whole school, the whole elementary school was waiting on the playground.
And I saw him leaning against the fence.
And I said, let's get this over with.
And I just charged him as fast as I could.
And I pounded him into the fence.
Just, you know, not with my hand, just my body.
Fight was over.
He was crying his eyes out.
It was the only fight I was ever in in my entire life.
Can I just give you an A for strategy there, Don?
Knowing your strengths, that's impressive.
Just push them into the chain link fence.
He tried to cry.
The whole school was there and people started to feel the reality was crying as I felt.
I feel
like that's how all elementary schools fights goes.
Whoever lands the first hit wins.
Right.
It's over immediately.
Especially the other guys bigger.
It's just, it's a done deal.
That's fantastic, Don.
Don,
do you have a...
Oh, go
ahead.
Sorry, buddy.
I emailed you a picture during the break there.
Oh, you did?
Okay.
Yeah.
Let me see what we got here.
It's a photo.
Alright, is it of the fight?
Oh, I love this photo.
Alright, I'm gonna send this to you, Aaron.
Let's see if we can post this in the stream.
This is Don Rosen with his old buddy.
I'm in the back row.
I kind of geeky looking.
I was tall.
I'm in the back row there.
These two girls there that look kind of odd, like space creatures.
I'm between them.
And Jerry is in the far right on the floor with sneakers.
Of course, he's wearing sneakers, right?
All right, I just sent that to Aaron.
Let's see if we can post that in the stream.
Do you have a bucket list, Don?
An item you have to get to?
No, I've done everything I wanted in my life.
You're kidding.
Wow, look at you.
I've been in radios since I'm 18 years old.
This is my 54th year in radio, continuous.
And this is all I wanted to do in life.
I've got a great daughter.
I've got a great wife.
What more do I want?
Oh, it's nice.
No pressure then.
That's great.
I see this picture, Aaron, you sent down.
We were talking about Chinatown and I'll have to watch this later, but it was the Aaron saw a video about how they cut Jack Nicholson's nose.
Do you remember that scene?
Yeah, I remember that.
Yeah, it was like
a great special effect even for back then.
And that looks awesome.
You know, my wife and I are watching courtroom movies recently.
Okay.
And I got to tell you, we watched the courtroom scene of a few good men.
If you don't think
If you just think that Tom Cruise is a nothing actor, just an action film, watch him in that courtroom scene with Jack Nicholson.
Getting Jack Nicholson to admit that he wore the code red.
I mean, you see his eyes are watering.
He's kicking, he's nervous, he's scared.
He's desperate.
And he gets it.
Yeah, he's desperate because he knows now if he doesn't do it now, he's going to be court-martialed.
He's already started doing it.
That was the best one of the best acting courtroom scenes I've seen.
I agree.
And I said that about Tom Cruise.
Like he went through kind of the weird phase where he was dancing on the couch and everybody thought with Scientology.
That guy is maybe the greatest movie star that's ever made movie.
He just makes so few bad films.
And even if they're not great, they're really entertaining.
He's phenomenal.
So that's a great take.
We have your picture up Don.
Those of you
watching on
the stream.
So Seinfeld's in the front row.
It's a front right
front right
at the end.
I see it
looks like Jerry Seinfeld.
Yes, it doesn't then where's
Don?
Right in
front of the teacher.
What's
that?
You have a plaid shirt on?
There's two tall guys.
I'm toward the center.
Okay, that's done.
I love that.
Thank you for sharing that buddy.
Hey, we've got about what do we have Aaron a couple minutes two minutes two minutes Do you think you could tell your Jimmy Stewart story before we have to sign
off?
All right real quickly I was in Los Angeles with two business guys from radio station in Milwaukee We were in San Diego to listen to a radio station.
This is for the internet.
You had to physically go there And I beg miss let's go to the stars homes I want to take a ride to the stars homes and we get a map from some kids sitting on a beach chair on the corner for five bucks And I'm driving through and this woman is on Roxbury Drive
And this woman is walking across the street with her dog and I let her go.
She weighs me.
Thank you.
And I started to go in this old man with a sailor's cap pulled down.
He starts to walk across and I stop and he weighs me on.
And as I start to go, he steps into the street.
So the guy next to him says, let him go.
I said, he weighs me on.
So he weighs me on again.
He steps into the street again.
And so I roll down the window.
I said, Mr. Stewart.
Please go.
He's going for his wife and his dog and he gives me a salute and he walks on.
So that's the, I almost ran over James Stewart story.
That is my favorite almost killed a celebrity story.
I think I've ever
heard.
I
never get tired of that.
Don, that is awesome.
Thank you so much.
Let's not let as much time go by next time.
I love
having you on the show.
You got it.
And
thanks for playing the beats again.
Glad you're enjoying them.
Have
a great show tomorrow.
All right.
All right.
See you Don.
That's Don Rosen.
Check out Don's work on WRJN every morning, outstanding stuff.
Aaron, thank you so much.
This is so fun.
I always
enjoy
working with you.
You're just on it, and it's awesome.
And thank you a bunch.
I know I was a little frazzled today, so you hung with me.
Well, you also got ambushed at the beginning of the show by an ostrich pushed by an ostrich and a guy who fake called in sick Come on.
Thank you to Don Rosen.
Thank you to Rich Scheidner.
Thank you for all your texts Brian and walkie says go on a cruise always love ships and water was born in June So I'm a cancer the crab.
All right.
Have a great night, Wisconsin.
See you Monday