Show Notes
Best of WIO: Josh Johsnon
(Recorded March 2025) Comedian Josh Johnson is a writer and correspondent for The Daily Show and his stand-up sets have millions of views on YouTube. Josh talks with Mike about cultivating a fan base via the YouTube videos, why he thinks chasing success in the comedy industry is sometimes antithetical to the art form, and shares the advice he got from Trevor Noah. Plus, Josh helps Mike work out a new story about animals living in Mike's walls.
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Comedian Jon Rudnitsky returns for another round of questions from listeners, this time about when to give up on a joke, what are the most underrated comedy towns in America, and a question from Meghan Trainor (yes, *the* Meghan Trainor). Mike and Jon talk about Jon’s upcoming special/tour documentary Special Boy, and they share stories from the gig in Nantucket they did together as a result of Jon’s last appearance on the podcast.
(Recorded June 2025) In 2012, Mike was invited his film Sleepwalk With Me at Pixar and he’s been friends with filmmaker Pete Docter ever since. Known for his directorial feats of greatness with Monsters, Inc., Up, Soul, and Inside Out, Pete Docter is now the Chief Creative Officer at Pixar. Pete walks Mike through the Pixar “draft” process for developing a story, and reveals the ups and downs of being a Pixar director. Pete shares stories of his time spent with Steve Jobs, George Lucas, and some of the original Disney animators. Plus, advice on giving (and receiving) creative notes, and the story of Pete’s Star Wars fan film he made when he was a kid.
Comedian Ariel Elias rose to prominence after a video of her chugging a beer that an angry heckler threw at her went viral. But the real story is more interesting, notably how Ariel drew on the incident for her act. Mike and Ariel talk about how to write jokes about upsetting experiences, and Ariel shares the highs and lows of her experiment writing one joke every day for a whole year.
Comedian, podcaster, and actor Stavros Halkias is having a moment right now but he’s been doing stand-up since he was 19 years old. Stavros talks with Mike about starting out in Baltimore and hitting rock bottom healthwise just as his career was skyrocketing. Stavros discusses acting in Bugonia and this summer’s Tony, a film that reflected Mike’s own real life experience working in a Cape Cod restaurant. Plus, Mike and Stavros decide which accent is worse—Boston or Baltimore—and what Stavros means when he says he wants to go “Birbiglia mode.”