Season 3 - Episode 6 - Special Guest Mike August - Part 1
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Cousin Bill 0:01
From the books and podcast one this is give them the business with booth CEO John Tabis news girl Katie Rotella and me cousin bill.
Unknown Speaker 0:16
Money
Unknown Speaker 0:20
What's up? Give them the
Cousin Bill 0:25
right Welcome to the give them the biz podcast. Please welcome our host the big baller of the books, the Shasta Daisy of startups. When he says jump we say, Matt, give us a minute. JOHN
John Tabis 0:46
that was so rude. twice in a row where in my epic WWE entrance bill is just mocking me the entire time. You're lucky you're in Boston, you much larger than me, human are away. There's
Cousin Bill 0:58
no, there's no consequence.
John Tabis 1:00
What would the consequences be? If you were here? I
Unknown Speaker 1:02
think you could take john Bell,
John Tabis 1:05
rudely tap you on the shoulder and be like, What's up with that? Don't be nice. I don't like it and hurts my feelings.
Cousin Bill 1:14
We haven't talked about it.
John Tabis 1:15
We could we could we would have a heart to heart. I would sit you down and tell you about how our relationship means a lot to me. And I'm going to give you some hard feedback. And then I would tell you get the fuck out. Sir. Oh, came right out. Yeah. Good bleeped. This is a friendly program.
Katie Rotolo 1:37
I have said the S word.
John Tabis 1:38
Yeah, but that's okay. Well, believe me. Believe me. What's up, guys? What's up, cousin bill? How's the East Coast brother?
Cousin Bill 1:48
Good, man. It hasn't gotten too cold yet. It's it's kind of pretty out here. So. Yeah, we're
Katie Rotolo 1:52
in a tank top on the Insta earlier today.
Cousin Bill 1:56
Yeah, no, it was freezing. I did that for the I did that for the picture
Unknown Speaker 2:00
for the gram.
John Tabis 2:02
Awesome. And what's up? What you can't even tell? Oh,
Katie Rotolo 2:04
oh, you know, just living the dream. You know, that's all Yeah, just yeah, going swimmingly compared to the last you know, several times.
John Tabis 2:13
Yeah, we've become competent. And it actually works and 90% of their 12 90% of the time it works 100% every time it's pretty amazing. It's pretty amazing. To see it you believe it. super glad to be back and so excited about today we have Mike August from Adam Carolla show and podcast one fame coming in. It's gonna share his whole story about his entire life from when he was born to today and everything that happened in between, but really excited. You know, we're super honored to be part of the podcast, one network, but really excited to go back into sort of the journey of how we got to where we are now with podcast one and the Adam Carolla show. I don't know if bill Kate I don't know if you know this, this story. But I was a really, really early listener to the Carolla show, like, back in the really, really early days when it was sort of not working all the time, like like here, and I actually am out.
Unknown Speaker 3:13
Totally calling them out.
John Tabis 3:15
Every pirate ship I actually use the pirate ship analogy because Adam did in the early days, but every pirate ship has, you know, the, the, probably the boat and the leaks and you know, things like that. Yeah. But I actually was working at Disney and the Adam Carolla show taped, like, right down the street, and I actually volunteered to be an intern. And I wrote them a note, I was like, hey, I've worked in corporate strategy at Disney, which I thought might be impressive in some way. And I will come work for you guys for free. And I'm sure they were just like, MBA nerd. Never. So they just never wrote me back. But you'll years later books actually became a sponsor of Adam Carolla, especially around the big holidays.
Katie Rotolo 4:01
Like I'm not sponsored, no, I
John Tabis 4:02
listened to the whole way I listened to the whole way. It was always a fan, and actually got to be a guest on the show a couple times. And that's how I met Mike and so super excited that he's going to join us and but because we don't have a ton of time to make sure we have ample time for Mike's story, we're not going to do you know, a big long rant. But one thing I would say is that you know, generally speaking you put things out there things come back. I was a fan of that show. I remain a fan of that show and the people that has something to do with it. And here we are now sort of part of the of the bigger family so you never know when things might might come around in a good way. So let's dive into some news. Katie, what's going on in the world
Katie Rotolo 4:40
coming up on today Tom Cruise has a new movie and we're going to be talking to him. Hey, funny man. Al Franken will be stopping by for a visit. And Wolfgang Puck shares his recipe for apple strudel. So stay tuned because we've got all this and more coming up in the next hour. Oh, well. Nevermind. Oh my gosh. So in the news today. We're talking about no way we're talking about something you're gonna give me a hard time about this is apparently how I always ensure the news. We're talking about how Americans are spending less and less money at big box stores on Black Friday, because of well,
John Tabis 5:18
it hasn't Black Friday kind of jumped the shark at this point.
Unknown Speaker 5:21
Well,
Katie Rotolo 5:21
they say Actually, this year that we'll spend, what is it? The average shopper will spend $525 on gifts this year, which is actually 20% more than the average on Black
Unknown Speaker 5:32
Friday or overall?
Katie Rotolo 5:35
I think actually, that's a great question. It's an overall if I'm not mistaken, people.
Unknown Speaker 5:41
Wow.
John Tabis 5:43
No, I might cry. I might crack 125
Katie Rotolo 5:46
No, but you have kids, you spend more. I mean, my
John Tabis 5:49
wife spends
Katie Rotolo 5:50
Oh, is that not? Oh, I don't know how much
John Tabis 5:53
money but our money is all the same. My wife. We have one budget. It's all the same. But she does.
Unknown Speaker 6:00
She does shopping but she's
John Tabis 6:02
saying I just pick out like the one or two like super cool things. I'm like, hey, let's get like
Unknown Speaker 6:08
the whole thing.
John Tabis 6:10
Yes, drones. Pretty much I buy the stuff that I want to steal and play with. When like they're not looking.
Katie Rotolo 6:17
Of course. Yeah, like a recorder. Right? digital recorder one of those like really annoying noise making machines.
John Tabis 6:24
So what Where did you grow up? What are the cool gifts in your record? I'm talking about like, VR drones with like the Hulk jumping out of it. And he's like, yeah, I'm gonna get a record. I was just thinking, you were super adventurous john, you might get them an oboe.
Katie Rotolo 6:43
No, I had I had a Barbie Jeep. That was pretty bad. Now
John Tabis 6:46
see, now you're talking right? That's Yeah. Is that what like the one you write in yourself?
Katie Rotolo 6:50
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Brother was always too big to fit in it. But he would
Unknown Speaker 6:54
suggest that now the recorder the
Katie Rotolo 6:57
most annoying gift to get a child? Because that's what I would get your kids?
Unknown Speaker 7:01
Oh, well, no.
John Tabis 7:04
My wife would not get them to record or to annoy us. That would just be bad strategy, bad strategy. So the spending 525 bucks will be people generous. Good job, people.
Katie Rotolo 7:13
People are spending more and more online, which I think is obvious. But yeah. So just as we go
John Tabis 7:20
on to our subscriptions, right, that's like all they're spending on Yeah,
Katie Rotolo 7:24
that that's the problem. They're spending all their money on flour. Yo,
John Tabis 7:26
yo, que es calm. People are wondering only in studio sponsor, that's
Katie Rotolo 7:32
not in the news. Anyway, so shoppers are going to be spending about 50% of their budgets online, but only 30% 36% excuse me in physical stores and that's per Deloitte and auditors.
John Tabis 7:44
So the madness is still there. For like the crazy people. Sorry, if people if you listening, you're crazy. And you go, you go and like trample each other at Walmart. I I've never understood it. But it teaches down, right? But people are still doing that. It's just that they're also they're just spending more and more online. And
Katie Rotolo 8:03
yeah, less people are less people are doing that because you don't have to wait in lines. And if you think about another Cyber Monday, and there's all these other info on it, and now Black Friday
John Tabis 8:11
sales start like 10 days before Black Friday and
Katie Rotolo 8:14
on Thanksgiving. And that's,
John Tabis 8:17
by the way, she was side note opening the stores. The mini rant. Today, I heard somewhere. I were that was I might have been on. It was on the radio. Yes. I was actually listening to terrestrial radio today. And there was an advertisement for what's the channel that has like the 25 Days of Christmas, where they have like all the shows, like the Hallmark Channel, one of those are ABC Family maybe or whatever. I think it's ABC Family. One of those. They came on advertising their Christmas marathon, Ted day. No,
Cousin Bill 8:53
you can't do that before Thanksgiving. Well, look before Thanksgiving happened a
John Tabis 8:57
long time ago, but it's November. What it's like the first week in November. You can't cheat by that far
Katie Rotolo 9:03
up on Halloween. No joke on Halloween. This is madness. They threw up Christmas and I was laughing. Are they all orange?
John Tabis 9:11
All of a sudden time means nothing anymore because now we're talking about Christmas for Halloween. I'm talking about Black Friday sale starting 10 days before Black Friday. It's not Black Friday. It's like Black Friday week. And it's it's just
Katie Rotolo 9:25
one thing about all the people that work in retail. I feel like
John Tabis 9:27
losing lots of meaning as it's gone and probably part of it as well. It's online, obviously. But as you dilute it by saying hey, the Black Friday sale starts on Tuesday at noon. It's like okay,
Katie Rotolo 9:39
what did it ever really mean? Let's
John Tabis 9:40
start it in June. June 8 guys is Black Friday sale starts we're gonna run it straight through. Yeah. All the way to Christmas. Just eat
Cousin Bill 9:48
a whole bunch of smart
John Tabis 9:50
we're just marketing for six months. It's gonna be awesome. Anyway, sorry. fired up about that today. How dare they? They were like we 17 new movies. Oh, I was like 17 new movies about Christmas. What stories are we telling? Are there any left game? 17th? How many sugar plums were there? People?
Katie Rotolo 10:07
I mean, that's with any movies. So think about it. How many remakes and reboots and things that we eat? Yeah.
John Tabis 10:13
Let's Let's hold. Let's just do me a favor and let's let's start advertising it after November 15. Let's just that'd be nice. Note to self. Give me a little bit of room I breathe, please. Sorry. Oh my gosh.
Katie Rotolo 10:31
Okay, well, that brings us to Twitter.
John Tabis 10:34
So Twitter has not a snappy happy. Not not. Not every webinar in the news this week. Not this week. I have to ask Mike, if he uses snappy web, he knows what it is.
Katie Rotolo 10:43
JOHN doesn't know it's not called snappy Webby. It's called.
Unknown Speaker 10:47
snappy things.
Katie Rotolo 10:48
But anyway, Twitter has brought on its first ever global director of culture and community. And which this is really amazing. So God is Rivera is serving as our global director of culture and
John Tabis 11:01
Whoa, give me that name again.
Katie Rotolo 11:03
God is God hyphen is?
Unknown Speaker 11:06
Yeah, her his or her
Unknown Speaker 11:08
her.
John Tabis 11:09
Her name is her first name is God is. That is the most amazing name in the history of time. you imagine that? What? Hey, nice to meet you. My name? My name is john. What's your name? God is?
Cousin Bill 11:25
Yo,
John Tabis 11:26
my name sucks.
Katie Rotolo 11:27
And I hope I'm pronouncing that right because on her Twitter, it's spelled out as God is but in on most of the interwebs it's God hyphen is so I would think it's pronounced Do you think it's a
John Tabis 11:40
it's a spelling of God? Maybe. But again, even better.
Cousin Bill 11:45
That's a lot to live. I'm
John Tabis 11:46
gonna change my name to supreme leader. Yeah. Hey, Goddess, your goddess, um, Supreme Leader. What's up?
Cousin Bill 11:55
Anyway,
Unknown Speaker 11:56
so the goddess so she
Katie Rotolo 11:59
previously served as the director of inclusion and cultural resonance for VML y&r, which is a digital and creative agency via Malema pretty much via Muller. Is that am I?
John Tabis 12:12
No, no, I just a very long acronym. everything
Katie Rotolo 12:15
wrong, and you're just correct.
John Tabis 12:17
No, no, I don't know how to say it either. VML Why are
Katie Rotolo 12:21
it's Yeah, it's all capital letters. Moeller
Cousin Bill 12:25
rolls off the tongue. Yeah, no. Awesome. Anyway,
Katie Rotolo 12:29
so the play
John Tabis 12:30
watch, he wasn't had a brand, because then I would have some questions.
Katie Rotolo 12:33
His plan is for her to better serve engaged communities on Twitter, through their brand marketing, campaigns, events, etc. So internally, her role will be to ensure Twitter's campaigns and programs are inclusive, and quote, reflective of the communities we serve according to their press release, and in
John Tabis 12:50
with everything going on, right in the world, generally, but then all the sort of oversight and focus on all the social networks right now around, you know, the, the Russian interference, as it might be the political discourse as it might be the, the white nationalists, like, all these, all these things are getting so much attention, they have to do something to engage in that conversation. And obviously, they're putting resources against it with obviously good reason.
Katie Rotolo 13:26
Yeah. So basically, they want to give a voice to everyone and to be inclusive in their conversations and in their relationships with content creators and brands. And to give a bit of context, 20% of US adults who identify as black use Twitter, and 24% of white, identifying adults, and 20% of good excuse me, I don't want to pronounce this wrong. lateen x, which is the Latin community. Yeah, it's it's a gender neutral term for Latino Latina x. Oh, oh, wow. Yeah. So it's pronounced Latino. just
Cousin Bill 14:07
learned something
John Tabis 14:08
yet? Let me guess that, yeah,
Katie Rotolo 14:10
learn something new every day. That's so 20% of lateen x identified adults also use Twitter. So this is according to a 2018 survey from Pew Research. And really, Twitter's just trying to engage that audience and really speak to them and know how to speak to them. And I think that's really cool.
John Tabis 14:30
Yeah, look, I think at this point, because, again, everything that's going on, all these social networks have to invest heavily in this world. One from a brand perspective, they have to be seen as doing something about it, right? Because there's so many issues of hate speech of conflict of, you know, people, essentially planning things that are or threatening things that they might do. So they have to do it from a brand perspective and then it's just smart business. Do it anyway. But it's also the right thing to do. So I don't think that they really have much of a choice. But the fact they got a goddess to do it is like, so much better than just hiring you must be God. Goddess,
Unknown Speaker 15:13
I just thought because it was like God
John Tabis 15:15
no, I when I saw it I thought the same so yeah,
Katie Rotolo 15:18
anyway so yeah, she's she says in a statement that she feels a great responsibility to amplify and support diverse communities. And they exist in full force on Twitter. So you know, Twitter's something
John Tabis 15:29
good on you Twitter's snappy web he's gonna have to catch up and do something similar. Well, Hey, everybody, we have a guest. We have a guest we have a guest we have a guest
Cousin Bill 15:44
please welcome to the show. The powerhouse of podcast one, the chief of Corolla digital, the most respected pizzas Julia Louis Dreyfus, Mr. Mike
Unknown Speaker 15:57
wow studio
Mike August 15:59
wide an intro. Thank you so much.
John Tabis 16:02
I you want to go off the top the top rope right? Yeah,
Mike August 16:05
I am fired up.
John Tabis 16:07
awesome to have you man. Really appreciate Thanks for having me.
Mike August 16:11
Perfect to be here. Books Central. What a crazy great places must be to work every day. It's not like a movie set. Right? may see those movies where it's like the lead actors, you know, has this great company in this great warehouse space and it's all decked out and you know, super, super comfortable. This is the place where everybody bring their dog here. We have many dogs attend work here every day. I think
John Tabis 16:34
we typically have three dogs in the three. Wow.
Mike August 16:38
Yeah, that's a low POC out.
John Tabis 16:40
I know. We used to have a higher car when we were like 20 maybe 2025. We had like five or six dogs and shirts. It was like sure. It was madness. Yeah.
Katie Rotolo 16:51
Dog so we're here. The dogs that work here.
John Tabis 16:55
We actually strap flowers to their back Katie and we just send them out. They chase the scent. And they figure out where the where the flowers need to go. Um, ya know, they're they're generally pretty chill. couple little pups. They're really nice. Yeah, I wouldn't I would have. I would have 20 dogs if if we had really? Yeah, I'd be I'd be happy to have dogs mind just passed away about Oh, I'm sorry. He's worse. I'm dealing with it. Okay, now I would have cried my eyes off two weeks ago if we talked about it. But yeah, she had a great life. Billie Jean
Katie Rotolo 17:24
where she was. She was up there she was. Yeah,
John Tabis 17:26
she was 13 for a Boston Terrier. She made it really for I have a Boston Terrier. Oh, he do. Yeah. Best dogs right seven. Yeah, yes. Dogs. Her name by the way, like on the on the registration papers was Billie Jean apostrophe s not my lover. Officially, official name on the paperwork. I love writing it down. apostrophe snap my lover.
Katie Rotolo 17:49
My brother. He also comes up with a great names for dogs.
John Tabis 17:53
My kids nickname is Captain EO two. There's Michael Jackson theme. Just
Mike August 17:58
we just went with Rocky.
John Tabis 18:00
Rocky. Yeah. Right. What kind of dog is Boston Terrier. Oh, that's right.
Unknown Speaker 18:04
Sorry. Are you listening to the show?
John Tabis 18:09
This is Mike my first time Mike is important in the podcast. We're
Unknown Speaker 18:14
reason we're here.
Mike August 18:16
My fault listeners.
John Tabis 18:18
Yeah, Mike was kind enough. You know, by I mentioned before, was lucky enough to go on the crawl show I think three times. So cool to to have that experience. We could we could give you a bill mark. This time. We're going to hit pause for a second and get Mike something that he doesn't have to like, just punch over here.
Katie Rotolo 18:50
Like I would help you but john always does it himself so
Unknown Speaker 18:54
he can help you better.
John Tabis 18:55
I'm so above manual labor.
Unknown Speaker 18:57
We're just
Katie Rotolo 18:58
giving him the standing mic.
John Tabis 19:03
See, what's a good hike for you there?
Unknown Speaker 19:06
That's
Unknown Speaker 19:09
perfect.
John Tabis 19:10
He told me this.
Unknown Speaker 19:13
Mike knows what he's doing.
Mike August 19:14
I've done this a few times.
Unknown Speaker 19:17
Yeah, you tell me. That's why.
Mike August 19:19
Right there. Dawson. Our engineers always on his talk over the top of the mic always over the top. podcasting tip.
Unknown Speaker 19:26
No way. away Dawson.
Unknown Speaker 19:31
So we're still rolling.
John Tabis 19:32
Yeah. So so I was lucky enough to be on the coral show three times. And I'm one of those times I was just biessing with Mike afterwards about some politics stuff. Unite America, check it out. And, and we started talking about how I like to talk about things. And he's like, hey, look, you like to gab. Like, give it a shot. Hey, baby was kind enough to give us a roll. So thank you. First of all,
Mike August 19:57
please like it's my fault. No, I listen. No one Obviously, I'm a huge proponent of podcasting. As you know, we're now 10 years into the adventure that it's been Corolla digital and going strong and obviously, we're always looking to evangelize others to get into the space, you know, broaden out the categories because there's no real rules or you know, reason to this business.
John Tabis 20:22
Well, I thought was really funny is when I told people that we were on the podcast, one network, I think they thought like, we had to be really good or something. Mike Slavin for a reason.
Cousin Bill 20:34
My God,
John Tabis 20:35
do you have a pulse? And can you speak? Yes, you're in. We're funny. We aren't, we're hilarious.
Unknown Speaker 20:41
And people,
John Tabis 20:41
I'm not saying we're not good. I'm saying that there wasn't some big prerequisite. It's like, hey, look, give it a shot. And that's the great thing about it is it is purely entrepreneurial. If you can build an audience to build an audience, how can you can't that's exactly what it is. But I've
Mike August 20:55
listened to two of your episodes, I believe, I think maybe episodes two and three. And I was very impressed with your whole approach, which I think is fun, different. conversational topical, you know, you're mixing a lot of other elements in other than just straight biz talk.
John Tabis 21:11
Well, look at the average business content. You know, if you're, if you're, you know, in the workforce early in your career millennial is just not all that relevant. Yeah, I mean, I imagine I hear a lot of the like, self help guru stuff goes, you know, way deep in the granola, or Katie lives every day, just swimming in my Corolla. A lot of the switch show, a lot of this stuff ends up in like the hardcore MBA realm where it's just really technical or just,
Katie Rotolo 21:38
we're just boring, very techie. And kind of,
Cousin Bill 21:41
yeah,
Mike August 21:42
we'll have to go with what they know what they know really well, because it's gonna speak x, you know, x, what's the word? Yeah, expertly and expositionally. You know, you're going to answer questions, you're gonna take questions, you're gonna, you know, give your perspective. The other stuff off the cuff, just news items and commentary and that kind of, you know, back and forth between the talent is not native to people who aren't performers. Right? You know, it's easier for the that's why I think you have so many successful comedic comedic podcasts because comedians, improv people sketch people, what have you got loads and loads of stage time. So it's fairly easy for them to sit down and flow, you know, and just jump on topics. That's what they do all the time when they're on stage off stage. That's how they write. That's how that's the process. So it kind of you know, applies itself very well to podcasting. In a comedy context, much more difficult when you start getting into business, and whatever else legal legal, what have you. You know,
John Tabis 22:40
I gotta tell you, those legal podcasts I crack up. I mean, those things are just joke, joke. Joke. Joke joke, killing lawyers. Well, I think what's cool about us, and not to toot our own horns, or whatever, but we've all been in the business world, but always in like, sort of just on the edge of the creative side of things. I mean, Bill has was did set comedy stuff for a while. Okay. Katie has been a producer and his shows. So like we I haven't really I was my likes.
Katie Rotolo 23:12
That's one thing, though, that I hadn't been on air for a while. And you forget how many times you say like, right here?
John Tabis 23:23
I haven't been on air. And while I shouldn't. I got way too many arms still going on. But
Katie Rotolo 23:28
you speak a lot. So you actually, I mean, in general, at events in it schools and stuff. So I think that you, You speak very well, you don't say a lot of as my dad would say, like and stuff.
Unknown Speaker 23:39
Like all you guys used
Katie Rotolo 23:41
to say like, like and stuff.
John Tabis 23:44
Yeah. So I think I think it's nice, because we both we all, you know, sort of both understand the business world from our experiences within it. But then we have also had these other experiences that we can bring into a venue like this. And that's
Katie Rotolo 23:56
what you wanted the whole time is to kind of bring this human side of business rather than this right tech.
John Tabis 24:02
Yeah, I try to I try to have this conversation all the time with with our teams, which is like the business world tends to be a very staid, sort of, you know, there's this, I was actually talking to a mentor of mine, Mitch Matthews, who was cmo at Microsoft for 20 years. She's this amazingly successful executive. And she talked about how like, at some levels in business, like you have to play the game, meaning like that there's a certain expectation of your behavior, and the way that we'll talk about things that you have to do at sort of a certain level, and our company's kind of getting that place where I have to start doing that. But as much as I can, I want to break down those sort of artificial barriers between people because at the end of the day, we're all human beings, right, who do have their dog passing away that weekend, or who can have a stomachache and those are reasons why you might not look happy in a meeting and has nothing to do with the presentation you just did. But understanding that human human interaction can make everybody more trusting and and creative. Better Business. But it's but it's hard to break those barriers.
Mike August 25:02
Yeah. And I think it's hard to develop those skill sets because the business doesn't really allow for it's not encouraged. You have to extend yourself
John Tabis 25:10
to exactly. So Mike, I want to hear your story. Oh, fantastic. Like, I want to go deep. Sure. So give us like the beginnings like how like, what was where were you born? What was your family? Like?
Mike August 25:26
I was actually born in the same state. You're from Pennsylvania. Nice. Yeah. One place called Belafonte
John Tabis 25:31
Pell I've heard of Belafonte.
Mike August 25:34
Right. My father was a football coach. And so I was born at Penn State. And we were there just for a year. And he was actually Joe paternalist, graduate assistant. Wow. And then paternal got him his first job at William and Mary. So we were we've been married for six years. And then he got his next job at university Colorado. And so we went to Colorado for like seven years.
Unknown Speaker 25:55
Wow. He was,
Unknown Speaker 25:56
yeah, he was a college football coach. You know, what was
John Tabis 25:59
that like? Like growing up around Really?
Mike August 26:01
Really cool.
John Tabis 26:03
I just were you like to? Do you ever run on get the team?
Mike August 26:06
And when I was I was a ball boy, everything when your dad is a football coach, you know, football coaching is an all encompassing profession. I mean, because it's dawn to dusk, every day year round in college, because in season, obviously it's prepping and getting ready and playing games. offseason is recruiting so we never saw the guy because he was you know, in the offseason we'd go he go on the road two or three weeks
John Tabis 26:29
at a clip I imagine the like your your relationship with him was about football. I mean, you're the program he was in you were there when you spent time with him was probably in the office or on the field? Absolutely.
Mike August 26:41
It's just football is the business and all your other friends are the sons of other football coaches, you know, so you all grow up in kind of college football is your business recruits are your business. The university is your life. You know, you just grew up on campus and in football stays when we go on vacation because my dad was a coach in the 70s late 60s 70s 80s when these guys didn't make any money as well before the ESPN came in and flooded college football with money because now you sit around as a kid and say what's it going to be son doctor, lawyer or football coach? I mean, football coaches are paid. I mean, Nick Saban makes a million dollars a year. That's an unbelievable number. I mean, literally, my dad went to the University of Colorado. I think his salary was $7,000 a year
John Tabis 27:28
right this that was when it was all passion.
Mike August 27:30
Yeah, it was you didn't coach because for money the head coach made $15,000 you coach because you love coaching you love the kids. You love the university the life you really weren't like rah rah guys, you know, sort
Katie Rotolo 27:42
of paid coaches like the pay teacher's
Mike August 27:44
worse. And they had like, my dad's were married, they also had to teach. I was like, Lou Holtz like high school was the was an assistant coach of my dad. And like Lou Holtz would coach volleyball and my dad would coach you know, soccer, I mean, whatever. Yeah, that's that's how that's how, you know, it's
John Tabis 28:02
like, more like high school coaches today. Yeah, right. Yeah, it was different. So Colorado, and then Colorado, Boulder,
Mike August 28:08
seven years, and he got his first head job at the University of Louisiana Lafayette as it's known. So I went to Louisiana, which is a huge culture shock. I went all the way through junior high in Boulder, Colorado, which is, you know, the most idyllic place in America. There's nowhere else like Boulder, Colorado, you know, it's just nestled right there at the foot of the Rockies. And very progressive, very progressive, a little too progressive for the football coach community. You know, I can see that boulder was a hotbed in the late 60s, early 70s. You know, it's like birdcall, Boulder and Berkeley, even the university is local, like, I mean, it was a very, very kind of agitated place. There's a lot of, you know, riding and demonstrating and all types of things. But it was just a beautiful place to live. I love being there. But we got out. We went Southwest Louisiana into the swamps, and ended up going to high school, college and law school in Louisiana. Oh, wow. Yeah. So ended up at LSU law school, finished there, took the bar and then got the hell out. The day I took the bar was a day I drove out to Louisiana and drove to LA. Literally just never wanted to practice law didn't go to law school to practice law. Really just wanted to get the degree for the education end of it. But I was really interested in what was going on entertainment. You know, I didn't know anybody entertainment. Didn't have any relationships there. But knew you had to be where it's happened. What
John Tabis 29:26
What do you think sparked that interest in it? Like I mean, that's a pretty bold move. Like Yeah, no, no, I just got a lot of gray. I'm just gonna go to LA
Mike August 29:35
literally no, I used to sit there, watch television shows and I would watch the credit scrawls after the shows you just see just rows and rows and rows and names right way past the cast it to see producers, writers, executives, this. Who are these people who makes this because I knew it was a business, but I know how it worked. Because unless you come out to LA or move to New York and really immerse yourself in the business, you don't really know how stuff comes together.
John Tabis 30:00
What was like what was the the show? shows? mash mash?
Mike August 30:03
I love mash was Do you ever hike
John Tabis 30:05
up to see the old set? I have not. Oh, it's great. You could do it. I heard you can. Yeah, my wife and I did it maybe.
Unknown Speaker 30:11
Creek
John Tabis 30:12
Park, right. Yeah. Pretty amazing. Yeah. There's like some old army trucks up there. You can crawl it. I mean, it's still all there. I know. Highly recommend it.
Mike August 30:20
Every time we get out like in the mouth. I always start doing the mash theme, you know, because the California mountains all look the same. They all look like the mash mountains. Right? Every time we always a Jimmy Kimmel wedding. And we were walking around a little he was like Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. Were there. And I just started sounds like just like my wedding. Yeah, exactly. The same thing. But they started cracking up because I was like, yeah, this looks just like this. Like you could just see the choppers coming over the mountain, you know? And it was like one mountain over from so
John Tabis 30:45
you watch mash and then you leave Louisiana. Yeah, ever.
Mike August 30:48
I literally did. I moved west like a bet like Beverly Hillbillies. just packed up, came out here and just started trying to educate my son
John Tabis 30:56
about a man named my baby.
Mike August 30:59
I came out here in a 72 Eldorado convertible.
John Tabis 31:03
Nice lectric blue. You need to still here. Yep,
Mike August 31:08
I really came here to play. I actually ended up in Disney in the corporate legal department of all places. So
John Tabis 31:15
you ended up being a lawyer? Yeah. Well,
Mike August 31:17
you know, I had to eat right? Yeah. So I was at Loyola law school downtown. It was the same Disney corporate legal needs project attorneys like I could do that. So I go down and I basically apply and I get me in like six other lawyers have to essentially this was way back in the early 90s. We were clearing, licensing and clearing for a new theme park Disney was building in Orlando called the Disney MGM great movie ride. Right? Which if you've ever been there, it's basically audio animatronic figures re you know in encapsulating great movies right Wicked Witch of the West What have you so I'm giving you a laundry list of talent cuz they're going to show clips from great movies that they're doing you know, various things where I'm giving a laundry list of town I've got to go out and get them to sign releases. So they can their likenesses in those films can be used. So my list is literally Tom Cruise and Top Gun alpa Chino and sensible woman who else was on my list. I think Paul Newman, Robert, Robert was just crazy, right? And I got I'm not going to them, but I'm going to representation, right? Because they have
John Tabis 32:21
Peter just you didn't just ring the doorbell. Tom, you're gonna sign this exam. It was so funny because out of
Mike August 32:27
my whole list. The only guy who has representation on his behalf refused to sign the release was Tom Cruise. Ah, so to this day, I just bury that file in a drawer. The Top Gun clip that I'm sure is still running that ride. There is no license from Tom Cruise what they're using it illegally
John Tabis 32:46
are released. Tomorrow, Tom Cruise gonna fly private jet in Orlando and like light it on fire? Or just sue them
Mike August 32:53
for the 100 million dollars we made last year.
Unknown Speaker 32:57
Fine.
John Tabis 32:58
What happened? was in media actually going to he's actually going to repel in at night. damp appetite, but they
Mike August 33:06
still got it? He does. But so the teachable moment, you know, there is one was in meeting all that representation. These agencies, lawyers, whoever I was dealing with, I learned what agents and lawyers do, which is, this is how the business is run yo shows come together. Because the talent agencies through their client bases who are writers, producers, actors, directors, what have you put programs together, they package them and then sell them to the networks in the studios for distribution. So I threw my Disney job, I got introduced to a lot of the representation in town and got educated on the on the major talent agencies and
John Tabis 33:41
in theory, you became friends with some of them.
Mike August 33:45
Not so much friends, but I was able to, you know, basically get an end where I'd say if I wanted to become an agent, how would I do it? And they'd say, Well, you'd have to come into our training program, which is not a training program. It's a complete lie. I mean, IBM has a training program, they hire you, they train you, you go through a very systemic, you know, system of learning all about the the culture and you know, their business. In the agency business. They throw you in the mailroom, you literally are delivering mail. This is before the internet, right? So when scripts and tapes, they were still videotaped back then, were necessary to go to clients or writers and all that type, you know, for audition stuff. They were physically handed out. We the mailroom kids, just just a mailroom full of MBAs and lawyers, from all over from Harvard and Duke, it was nuts. You know, you're in Beverly Hills at the William Morris Agency and it's just a ridiculous collection of you know, over educated kids who are driving Mercedes and Porsches and they're literally got mailbox they have a, you know, a box full of scripts and tapes. They're driving into Beverly Hills into the bel Air's they're dropping off, you know, packages. I would, I would go to Bruce Willis his house and give Demi Moore her script for ghost. I mean That was kind of that was the whole
Unknown Speaker 35:01
no big deal.
Mike August 35:02
Well, if it was from the standpoint of we were just free labor, we got paid nothing but we're learning supposedly, because so what you do is you get in the mailroom, you get in the system, and you start learning what parts of the agency that are interesting to you, right? And I was, I love stand up comedy. I just that, to me was the most interesting part of show business. And I didn't know anything about it, other than the fact that I just loved George Carlin's and Richard Pryor's. And we actually had an agent in the television department who was working with Stan of comics and ended up being an assistant on his desk. So that got me into stand up comedy.
John Tabis 35:34
One of the things that was surprising to me, I guess, I don't know why it was, but I had similar reasons. Rutelli, I loved entertainment. I loved storytelling, not necessarily like a particular part of it. And I got an internship at Universal Music. And when I was in my MBA program, and I sort of everyone pretty much said, like, yeah, you can start at the beginning. Yeah, and a&r right, but everyone, next year is gonna be 19 or 20, making your make nothing, because that's just the journey you don't get to skip. Right? Because it's an apprenticeship industry. Yeah, this is totally, it's changing a bit, but not very much, because everyone is better off, if it's, at least the ones at the top are better off if it stays the way it's been. And disruption isn't good for anybody. And I mean, obviously, Netflix is changing that and a lot of ways but sure. But it is, it's still an apprenticeship world, and you sort of learn by following someone else who
Mike August 36:29
has the treadmill for representation, or, or, or even production, you know, even you know, if you're a baby writer, right, you're coming into, you know, you just come out of school or whatever, you've written a few spec scripts, and you're now getting work on your first television production, whether it's a drama, or comedy, whatever, you're still coming in as a writer's assistant, right? And then you're, you're essentially getting to pitch ideas, or maybe do punch up and stuff like that, then at some point, maybe you get to actually write it in conjunction with someone else, and then you matriculate to that process. And you know, 510 years later, you're now a showrunner, right. But you've come through that whole process from being you know, literally the person getting coffee to the person now running a multimillion dollar a week operation. But you need to learn that entire, you know, process in order to be good at it. If you just got it dropped on you, you would know all the ins and outs of it. It's necessarily the same thing, the representation business, I think you have to literally sit on somebody's desk on their phone calls. Listen them talk to clients listening and talk to, you know, development executives listen to talk to studio executives, talk to, you know, the stuff that comes over the transom. So you get a feel for how to represent talent, and then talking to talent themselves and see what their issues are, you know, it takes a little bit of time some obviously can catch on quicker than others. But there is a learning curve to working as an agent, you know, I don't think you can just jump in feet first managers may be a little different. But But
John Tabis 37:53
best ever was when I was an intern at Universal Music. We had a call with Snoop because we were putting out a directed TV movie called Boston up. And my boss was this very proper Indian woman born in in, in London, and she didn't know it. It was Snoop Dogg really was. And so it's the best. Like I was like,
Katie Rotolo 38:17
Okay, what year was this?
John Tabis 38:19
This is like 2000. I don't know,
Mike August 38:21
fy 18.
John Tabis 38:25
It was like past his peak peak. But like, right, he's had several fields for the second wave. But like, but he was Snoop. I mean, everyone knows who he was. But he gets on the phone. And I sort of expected like him to be sort of, not on. Oh, yeah. And he gets on and he's like, Yeah, I was cracking and everybody was like, immediately into it. And she looks at me, like, what is happening? She did not understand. And I was like, Oh, I got this. I was
Unknown Speaker 38:53
like, I haven't listened.
Unknown Speaker 38:55
lackin mean,
John Tabis 38:56
it was the best. It was the best. He was just like so on. And he's like, it was so great. I'll translate beans mom was so awesome. So. So you go to William Morris,
Mike August 39:09
I go to the way Morris Agency. Yep. And I was at a smaller age, I was at the fourth largest agency in town for 10 seconds. They got bought, by the way, Morris Agency. And so they picked me up and shipped me to way more sciency to the New York office, which was the greatest thing could happen to me because I got to go in and sit in the middle of the comedy business because the stand up business emanates from New York City, anybody who's any good at stand up goes to New York because nobody goes to New York to get a sitcom tons of people fly out, dry out, crawl out to LA and clog the arteries of the comedy business here. Not to become great stand up comics, but to try and get a sitcom or an acting thing going and it just it's an impossible place for real writing, you know, deliberate stand ups to break through because there's so much clutter there's so much competition for stage time that it's not a good Audience environment here. New York totally opposite. The clubs are great. The talent that is there is just there to be stand up comics. So I got dropped right in the middle of you know, we already had a young jon stewart on the roster. And Dennis Leary was just breaking off of MTV at the time. And we had less basically the town ourselves, our competitors, ICM didn't care about comedy ca wasn't there. So, you know, we just ran crazy signing everybody from, I mean, I went out one night and I saw literally, this little sketch comedy group from Chicago, put on these crazy shows that were written by David Sedaris with his sister, Amy starring with co star Steven Cole bear, right? No. Oh, yeah. Another guy named Steve Crowe. That was this little nucleus of talent, right.
John Tabis 40:47
That's crazy.
Mike August 40:49
That's what I'm saying. This was like, you know, the mid 90s.
John Tabis 40:51
I was like the one who's like,
Mike August 40:53
Yeah,
John Tabis 40:53
not the important one.
Unknown Speaker 40:55
Crazy shows
Mike August 40:56
like one woman shoe and Amy Sedaris Lived in a Shoe and these are all her children or they had another one called stitches and Amy face she was she was like a Roseanne type sitcom star who had been tragically, you know, disfigured in in a, in a skiing waters. He acts on her face or writing a propeller. So she had like, you know, this crazy, you know, as face stitches. And then, you know, bears are her kind of gay nurse and it's just these these do these shows for a week, and they just put them up, knock them out, you never see him again. But you go in the audience and Madonna would be in the audience because of the reputation of David scars as a writer was just so tremendous. And Amy is a performer. So you know, we sign them and put them in comedy central into a show her first you know, that first show?
John Tabis 41:39
That is crazy.
Mike August 41:40
Yeah. Then the Upright Citizens Brigade with Amy Poehler and Matt Walsh, and you know, so love that that was all kind of just coming out of the New York scene. And then I you know, I signed Dave attell when I first got there and put him on Saturday Night Live. And then we got I put Kurylenko bear on The Daily Show and Jon Stewart took over the Daily Show, and that's how they kind of, you know, rose up in the business. So that's, you know, we we signed Ray Romano and put him in visit Letterman that turned into you know, everybody's Raymond and then we signed Kevin James and took it a Montreal and showcased him and so
John Tabis 42:10
when did you start getting good people?
Unknown Speaker 42:13
That's what I'm saying.
Katie Rotolo 42:14
This was in the 90s. Right around the RV show.
Mike August 42:19
I put corral ankle bear on the on the Kirby show.
Katie Rotolo 42:22
Well, thank you for that.
Unknown Speaker 42:23
Yes.
Mike August 42:26
I'm actually in that show.
Cousin Bill 42:27
Wait, yeah,
Mike August 42:28
I met I have a C co bear brought me in to play his agent. And I'm sitting across the crater guy named Robert smuggle, who's a famous, you know, Senate live comedy writer. And the take is he gets so angry he throws a steno notebook at me. And the first take he throws it at me it has like that wire thing that holds the pages together, cuts my lip and I start bleeding profusely. We have to do like five more takes and I have I'm like holding my lip and I'm bleeding. And I was like, you know, this is showbiz. So a lot of fun. That's, that's how I got the stand up comedy. That's how I got so great relationships with two young guys out here in LA named Jimmy Kimmel and Adam Carolla, who were on the radio out here and on a station called k rock was the world famous k rock. Jimmy was holding down. He was a sports guide, you mean the sports guy, and he cultivated his relation with a guy named Adam Carolla who's literally a carpenter and a boxing coach who came on the show one day to coach Jimmy up and you know, stunt boxing match thing that turned into the bleeder and receita. And you know, that Jimmy then saw Adams comedic potential, started mining it put him on the air next character called Mr. Bertram, who was just shot teacher who hated kids but love wood and just became an overnight success right so Adam then became like, locally famous here in LA is this Victor burcham character, he started getting gigs going out and playing Mr. burcham. And then a show called love line, which was already on k rock was changing their their co host. They had Dr. Drew young Dr. Drew just fresh out of USC med school, and they were getting rid of the other guy. So they tested out Adam Carolla and he tested very well. So overnight, that show blew up without him on it went from locally on k rock to being syndicated nationally, and MTV picked it up. So as the funny thing is, here's Jimmy Kimmel has been in radio 15 years finds a carpenter named Adam Carolla puts him on his radio show, right? The show he's just producing, he's barely on. And within three months, Adam is now you know, on a nationally syndicated show, and then gets an MTV show.
Cousin Bill 44:34
Thanks for joining us tonight on give him the biz. We've run out of time for this week with Mike August. Please tune in next week. We will air part two of our interview with Mike August. Thanks so much. Thanks for listening to give him the business podcasts from the books and podcasts. Be sure to download new episodes every Tuesday, right here on podcast, one on the podcast, one app or on Apple podcasts. And don't forget to Rate review and share. also find us on Twitter and Instagram under the handle at give them the biz g IV m th e bi z. Hey guys,
Unknown Speaker 45:12
it's Jeff Bennett from the lady gang and I'm sitting here with true crime TV producer and my best friend Alexis Linkletter and we are so excited that we are finally launching our true crime podcast called the first degree right here on podcast one in each week, we are going to bring you the craziest true crime stories and talk to the people who are one degree away from each of these crazy events. And we've dragged crime journalist Billy Jensen along for the ride and the he can't get rid of us. Join us on the first degree every Wednesday on podcast one calm and the PC one app also remember to rate and review
