SmartLess: "Paul Anka"

So, Jason's got to pee. I got to take a nap, will.

But maybe we can get the show done and then I can pee in my seat here? How does that work?

You should do that. You should get one of those.

Or should get one of those microphones that like singers use. I can just take it to the

bathroom right on a long cord.

And then do you guys mind if I take a nap while you do that?

Are you ever awake?

Welcome to SmartLish!

All right, so hi Will, hi Sean.

Hi Jason.

Hi. How are you?

You look like you're doing a hostage video. Where are you?

Yeah.

I'm safe. I'm fine.

I'm holding up today's newspaper.

Are you in Atlanta?

I am. I'm in Atlanta.

Are you in the dressing room?

I'm in an office. I'm in a production office.

Oh really?

So what you have is like a little break. You have a little lunch hour.

They built it around our record today.

That's what they do down here.

Everybody's real helpful.

Sean, let's just drink him in for a second.

I've been drinking for years.

Even on a hostage video lighting setup.

He looks just...

What's going on down there?

I have free refills with looking at Will.

I just fill up every time.

Right?

Just pour him over you. Will, are you sick?

No, thank you for asking.

No, no, no.

It's a real sharp jawline.

I know.

Yeah. Cut yourself.

I'm just down here.

And I kind of say again, everybody's super nice.

Remember last time I was here, I was dealing with a lot of issues

at a certain department store with the Glory Hole.

Yes.

I remember that.

You do remember that.

I'll never forget.

Why would I not remember a Glory Hole story?

This year we're dealing with the same guy who told us about that

is telling us about this app,

which is that he's

that he's on to

meet people.

Sure.

And now it's not even like a tender thing

where it's just like, face comes up

or griter where it's just other guys.

It's just action shots.

So he showed us a photo

he got from

a guy.

And it's just his rear end,

naked rear end,

and his garbage

hanging and all from behind.

So he's bulldogging him.

And then he just said, howdy.

Howdy.

This is an app he pays for?

Yes, I don't know.

I couldn't believe it.

Which one, which one's for the fellas?

Is that the tender or the grinder?

Grinder. And so this is, but this is a much more

this is just down to business.

This is just like, here's what you're looking at.

Yeah.

It's not, it's a step above grinder.

It's a different name.

Yeah. I don't even know what it is.

And it's just a, oh, I do it.

I think that is, look, I get it.

It's like, cut to the chase. Why the small talk?

Are we going to do it or not?

Yeah. It's just like, this is what I got going on right now.

Where are you at?

This is what you're going to be dealing with.

Are you in or are you out?

Because I got to move on.

And that's the girls, like the girls don't get that.

The girls need to be talked to and like emotional.

And then that turns them on.

But the guy and guy thing is just like, look,

I know what I want. I know what I'd like.

Let's just do it or not do it.

I know the girls want to be, right?

But by the way, just,

That's the fun part.

Now, Will, did he tell you about this

or did you ask for a visual?

No. He was excited.

This is, this is my buddy,

and he's like, wait till you see what I got going on this year,

you're going to, you're not going to be able to believe it.

I'm like, okay.

And then, and then he shows me that.

And I'm like, oh my God,

it was so, yeah, yeah.

You know?

Just there it is.

God, it's so funny though, it's so funny.

Sean, is your life as exciting currently?

Anything, any toppers?

Yes, I do.

I think we all have something else to change,

to talk about, which is our docu-series on Max.

Yes.

Right, coming out.

Smartlist on the road.

Smartlist on the road.

It's a six-part documentary series on Max.

I mean, what's the date?

It's the 23rd, yes?

May 23rd.

Yes, May 23rd.

And it's called Smartlist on the Road.

And it's just basically us three idiots.

Yeah, we're traveling around,

because we took this show on the road

to a bunch of different theaters around the country.

And it's us traveling and living in the same hotel room

and eating and flying.

I mean, if you thought you were bored with us before,

wait till you watch this.

Just put your right out.

Yeah, this is guaranteed.

When you see us flying.

Some people use white noise to sleep.

There is actual, I think we have some shots, Jay,

of you eating, which I think fans will be fascinated by.

Those are fun.

Yeah.

Well, it's rare.

It's like sighting Yeti, you know.

Yeah, it is.

Yup.

And there's a lot of talking about eating.

Yeah.

We've got plenty of shots of you guys eating.

I mean, yeah.

Good Lord.

I mean.

And in cold, it was all cold.

Jason, you ordered, you used to like,

Jason ended up being the default ordering room service guy.

And I noticed one thing that I didn't want to bring it up,

but often I would notice when you were,

when you were placing the order, you had full bone.

Just ordering food.

The forbidden fruit.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's his body responding,

getting so excited about getting food inside of him.

So it is, we like the show, but, you know, we're biased.

But we hope you do too.

Yeah, May 23rd on Max.

It's, I don't know, it's us.

It's just this, right?

Yeah.

If you get to see what we talk,

when you get to see us, instead of just hear us.

Yeah.

So we do these interviews on stage, great guests,

but then it's also all the travel in between the spots.

So check it out.

That's on Max.

It's called Smartlist on the Road.

Yes.

And Sean, speaking of doing the show and being on the road,

didn't somebody recently just call you,

didn't somebody mistake you for Jason?

Oh, that's right.

I just texted you guys an hour ago.

Yeah.

I was walking on Broadway and some guy goes,

hey, it's Jason from Smartlist.

And I just smiled and I said, super guy, go, hi.

And then you pushed your stomach out.

Right?

Is that what you told me?

I unzipped my zipper and I stuck my fat stomach out.

I said, oh, Zark, oh, Zark.

I just, that's all I did, right on Broadway.

Oh, Zark.

But isn't that funny?

I'm like, well, I don't look anything like you.

Watch, oh, Zark, girl.

Hey, girl.

You know what I was doing this morning?

I was talking to a New York Times journalist about you,

Sean, you've got, he's doing this,

some sort of a profile on you.

And so, listener, you know,

when a journalist has profile on a famous friend,

you know, they'll usually call you to get a little background.

Oh, wait, is that why they called you?

Yeah, yeah.

So he was asking me to kind of fill in some of the blanks

and no, it's cool.

I was really well compensated for it.

No.

And it was, you know what?

You know what I discovered, Sean?

I had nothing planned to say.

I found that it was very easy to say nice things about you.

Oh, that's really sweet.

You know, usually you have to kind of dig

for some flowery verse about a friend.

And it just all fell out.

They called and they said,

would you be willing to say something

for this thing, this piece about Sean?

And I said, no, thank you.

Yeah.

Yeah, because what did mom tell you?

If you don't have something nice to say, yeah.

Do you know that, wait,

do you know that Betty Davis thing from David Letterman?

Did I tell you guys that?

No.

So I'm not gonna get this right,

but it's something like this.

Betty Davis, like a year before she died

was on David Letterman and David goes,

so what was it like working with Joan Crawford?

And she and the audience laughed

because they knew he was kind of prying or poking at her.

And she goes, David, my mother always said

to say something good about the dead.

Joan Crawford's dead?

Good.

Wow.

That's very well done.

That's pretty great.

I'll borrow that.

I'll take that.

Well, guys, can we segue

while we're talking about legends?

Sure.

Oh my God, yeah.

Good segue.

Let's segue now.

You know, we've got a fella today

that we could learn a thing or two from.

Hopefully he'll give us some pointers on career longevity,

creative relevance,

reinvention, and overall swagger.

He's in the music side of show biz

and has been one of the more recognized names

around the world for as long as our parents have been alive.

He has over 900 songs to his credit,

recorded over 130 albums worldwide.

His LP and single sales collectively number

more than 90 million.

What?

And he is the only artist in history

to have a song in the Billboard Top 100

during seven consecutive decades.

He's a legend.

Wait a minute.

He's a friend and most importantly,

be cool because he's my father-in-law.

Yes.

Oh my God.

No way.

Oh my God.

Dad.

No way.

Hello, dad.

Can I talk and get rid of the cardboard?

You can talk and get rid of the cardboard.

Okay.

There he is.

There he is.

Oh, look at Mr. Polenka.

Guys.

Wow.

Hi, Pops.

Hello.

I guess this is the end of the Canadian quota, right?

You know, speaking of which,

during my incredible research,

do you know Will,

he's got a day named after him in Canada.

There's Paul Anka day in Canada.

I'm not surprised.

What do you have?

I'm nothing.

Do you have an hour or anything?

There are a few tiers.

Paul is like a few tiers above me

in the sort of the Canadian hierarchy

when it comes to legends.

I have a long way to go.

I have nothing named.

I'm not surprised.

Paul, I can't believe, first of all,

I can't believe that Jason and I have been friends

for so long and this is the first time

we've met.

Is that true?

I know.

I've never met you either.

Well, we can say that about a lot of people.

I know.

Paul, listen, Paul's a hard guy to nail down.

He's always moving.

He's always on the road.

Where are you now?

I'll bet you're not in LA.

I'm in Florida.

I'm doing a tour.

I just finished the Hard Rock Casino.

Finished Palm Beach and I'm on my way to Naples

on the completion of this wonderful event for me.

What do you do?

You still do about 30 weeks a year?

Something like that?

I do about 70 days, 70 days.

That's all I want to do.

And you've welcomed the 80s now, right?

I mean, and you still,

Will, you're not going to be moving at that age at all.

I know.

It's so impressive and again, Paul,

it should be noted that I like your son-in-law.

I love your daughter, Amanda.

Singing to the choir, Will, singing to the choir.

Yeah, I know.

And I talk to her probably more than I talk to JB, thankfully.

It's not probably, that's a definite.

That's a definite.

And she talks so glowingly about how much,

first of all, through her life,

but like when she was little,

but even now, how insanely busy you are

and how in, I'm going to say industrious,

but you just, you never stop moving.

What is the secret to doing it for so long,

to being able to have that kind of motor?

I guess.

If you stop moving, Will, they throw dirt on you.

That's number one, right?

That's a good one.

That's gonna be our new logo.

I've learned that from the age 16.

And as long as you've got a passion for what you're doing

and when you started the way that I did out of Canada,

hey, as long as the dream's alive,

the passion and the energy, you keep doing it.

Unfortunately, you stop like I've seen many of my buddies do

and you see a lot of TV, read a lot of books and die.

So I love what I'm doing.

I'm constantly changing.

I'm in the middle now of doing my documentary.

We've got a Broadway show that we're doing.

Something with writers.

And it's just something that I love to do, man.

When you leave Canada and you make it,

you're really grateful because nothing was happening up there

other than Moose Jerky when I left.

Moose Jerky.

Hey, is that a thing?

You guys don't know it.

You guys, I respect all of you, obviously,

but when I did start, there was no opportunity.

When I get lucky as a kid, I leave Ottawa.

You know what, 150,000 people at that time.

And I hit and the luck's been continuing since then.

And I said, I'm not going to lose this.

And then you go through the Rat Pack and Vegas and the Mafia

and you learn what to do, what not to do.

And then you say to yourself,

you'd be an ass to really give this up.

So that's pretty much been the motivation, you know?

Yeah.

I mean, this, first of all, you came,

so I want to get into this.

You come out of Ottawa,

or as I used to refer to it, the town that fun forgot.

Yeah.

And so-

I just never seen since.

And to all our fans in Ottawa,

I only say that as a Toronto Maple Leafs fan.

It's a joke, so relax, you know, hold back your comments.

But you come out of Ottawa, as we know,

these guys don't know the nation's capital in Canada,

but a small town.

And you were, but you didn't do this, Paul,

when you were 25.

No, he had, before the age of 18,

he had five top 20 hits.

Before what?

Before 18?

Before 18.

Before 18, this is what blows me away, Paul.

Talk to us about how as a young guy,

you had all this success.

It blows my mind.

When I first read that years ago,

I couldn't believe it.

Well, you're 14, you're 15, you're in school,

you're in grade 10 for two years, so you get the hint.

Wait a second, you repeated 10th grade?

Yeah, twice.

Oh, boy.

So I'm in a class with a bunch of girls,

with my friend Tommy,

who is family with a big ski champs.

And we wanted the quickest way out,

so we took typing and shorthand.

I got thrown out of a shorthand class and took music.

So now I get interested in music.

And one day I started writing poetry

and I win awards for my writing.

I get thrown into a music class, I take piano lessons,

and I start becoming this real big fan of, you know,

all the rhythm and blue stuff.

The black music experience, as it is now,

drove everything back then, as it did when back to the 30s.

So I get hooked on music and I just start writing away.

Now I'm playing hockey like all of us attempted to do.

I got tired of ducking,

because I was very short, I was playing goalie.

So I said, it's not in my future.

And in my day, you know, those guys didn't wear helmets,

they didn't wear masks,

and there was no glass around the rink,

so you can imagine how dangerous it was.

So I said, it won't be hockey,

so I'm gonna just write songs.

So I start writing songs.

So I'm hooked, I'm loving the music.

I had a paper route,

and then I got a job at IGA food stores,

because I heard if you won the contest,

you'd get to go to New York, where all the music was.

Because the music business was in its infancy stage back there.

There were not a lot of labels.

What year ish?

What year ish, are we?

This is 1955.

Okay.

So I win the award for collecting soup wrappers

for Campbell Soup.

And me and 40 kids from across Canada

put on a train with soggy sandwiches.

And 15 hours later,

I met the YMCA in New York.

I said, man, this is it.

I'm coming back.

So I go back home,

and I said to my dad, look, give me some money.

I had some saved up from my paper route.

I'm going back to New York.

I've got a connection to see a record company.

And I go down, I walk into ABC Paramount Records,

which had ABC TV network just starting out.

I sing for Don Costa.

He was the A&R guy.

And like all of us guys,

success has a lot of fathers.

And he was the guy that made it happen.

He said, where are you from?

Blah, blah, blah, blah.

I told him, he said, bring your parents down here.

We want to sign you.

You're too young.

So I found my parents down.

They signed a contract.

And May of that year,

I'm in a record studio doing Diana.

Two other songs.

That was a song you wrote for the gal

that didn't want to hear it, right?

Yeah, that was it.

And then two, three months later,

American Bandstand started.

I'm on there in the Ed Sullivan show.

And that was it.

It took off from there and my life changed.

Wait a minute, you did the Ed Sullivan show?

I mean, yeah.

What was that like?

How was that?

Scared to death.

Scared to death.

Yeah, because that was like the biggest show then.

Well, that was it.

You know, television back then was three channels.

Color TV, my dad would bring out a piece of plastic

with a blue sky, red in the middle

and green on the bottom.

And he'd tape it to the TV.

And that was color television.

Come on.

And in Ottawa, it didn't start till five o'clock

in the afternoon.

And there was like news, a cooking show,

and maybe wrestling once.

I mean, it was nonexistent.

And millions and millions and millions of people watching

because there were no other choices.

Amazing.

Well, it was all radio before that.

I used to sit in Ottawa next to a radio

and listen to everything until television came.

God, am I aging myself?

Could you imagine asking our kids to sit in front

of a big box that has sound coming out of it

and entertain yourself for a few hours,

just listening to it?

No, they wouldn't do it.

I mean, they'd look at us like we're nuts.

No, obviously not now.

But you know, that's all that there was, right?

Right.

It felt like, I gotta be honest with you.

I mean, obviously I grew up, I was born in 70, so it's not.

But I do remember as a kid, on my clock right here,

I was just talking about with my buddy, Eli,

I used to be able to get the W,

what was the station out of Buffalo

and I could get Saber's games.

Oh yes, the Hound Dog, yes.

I know the station.

Yeah, and I could get them on my,

so when I was told to go to bed,

I could still hear the Buffalo,

because as a Canadian, Paul, you know this.

When you get that radio signal out of the States,

it feels like a whole other world.

You can't believe it, right?

Everything came at you.

There was nothing to watch.

I mean, it was just so boring.

There was nothing going on.

I was listening to Fats Domino and everybody else.

All right, so Diana gets you signed.

That takes off a bit.

And then how, so that was your first number one hit

and you're 14?

First number one hit, yeah.

Okay, and then what were the other four

that were the five top 20s before you were 18?

So at 15, you got Diana.

Then my dad wanted me home and then a promoter called up

and my second was you're my destiny,

but my dad wanted me to finish school.

And I talked to the promoter and they let me live with him.

He had a bunch of drug stores, Izzy and Irving fell.

So with you are my destiny,

I move in with them down in Washington.

Then I had those lonely boy, puppy love, I love you baby.

There's a string of hits.

Really quick, really quick, Paul.

The guy, I'm doing a play here in New York

and the guy who wrote it, Doug Wright

and my other actress friend, Deb Monk

wrote a song called Puppy Love Doggy Style.

Yes. Wow.

I love that.

Paul, we'll see them in court.

Let's get your retreats.

I offered it to Frank Sinatra.

So I started working for the mob in Vegas.

He wanted me to write for him.

And I said, well, I can give you a puppy love.

We'll change it to love as a bitch.

You know, I was thrown into that world

because I worked for the guys.

I mean, a lot of people, you know,

they fantasize of what it was about,

but it was real.

They controlled everything.

Talk a little bit about how that happened.

How did you end up?

So well, first of all, you wrote, talk about, you know,

you wrote a big, a very popular song,

one of the great songs of all time for Frank Sinatra.

My way, yes.

Well, that came later.

You know what happened?

Oh wait, you wrote My Way?

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

I think so.

Wait, wait, you have me thinking about that.

Yeah.

No, I didn't know that.

So let's go back before we get into My Way then.

Let's go back into how do you start working

with those guys and working with the mob?

Well, I'm making lots of money and I've got lots of hits.

And everywhere that I had to play, the mob ran everything.

They ran all the clubs, all the distributors, labels,

all the restaurants.

Which is the youngest to play Copacabana?

Well, I became, with those hits,

I became the youngest to work this mob place

called the Copa, which was huge.

Yeah.

And I started working it as the youngest kid

and I must have done weeks there

and there was kids around the block, Bob.

What, he's 17, 18, 19?

I was about 19 years old.

Well, I was in Vegas first.

I played Vegas at 18 with Sophie Tucker.

And then America's favorite group.

And from there, I went to the Copacabana in New York

and I started there very, very young

and I had a bunch of hits going into that.

And then the bosses said,

would you like to go work Vegas with the rat pack?

Now, you know that these guys are in the mob

at this point.

You totally know who you're working for.

You're told to behave yourself.

These are the guys and when you see them, blah, blah.

I mean, there's this real strict education

as to behavior, what to wear, how to act.

Me, Bobby Darren, Frankie Avalon.

So we knew who we were working for.

When the word came out, go to Vegas.

I fly out there, spent a lot of time there.

I saw Sinatra, Marilyn Monroe, that whole thing.

And I start working for the boys

and with the rat pack at the Sands Hotel.

What year is this?

That's 1961, 62 somewhere in there.

You're too young to gamble.

Couldn't go in the building.

I had to look through the windows

until I was old enough at 21.

Could not go in.

You didn't have a fake ID or something like that

to get in there?

He's famous.

He's Paul Anke at this point.

Those guys knew everything.

They knew everything of who was in there,

who was allowed in, who wasn't.

I would have died so quickly if I was part of the mob

because I always thought like it'd be so cool.

But like, oh, these guys are like,

I don't know, there's something glamorous about that life

that I think everybody would have said.

You would have been like that annoying dog in the cartoons

that just runs circles around the big dog.

It's like, where are we going?

Where are we going?

Yeah, I didn't know.

Sean, what are you guys talking about now?

You meeting the mob would immediately be,

like the scene would be you meeting them

and immediately like all those guys doing

one of those funny scenes about how they're gonna bury you,

where they're gonna bury you.

You know what I mean?

Who's gotta get rid of your stupid mob.

And we knew, listen, it was such a small community.

You knew when somebody got smoked.

Wow.

You know when a game was rigged.

Were you ever scared about that?

No, ever.

I'm scared going there now.

I'm scared going to Vegas now, what's there?

I mean, believe me, you can't trust anything

that's going on there now from the streets to your room.

Really?

And we will be right back.

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And now back to the show.

What would be the main thing that you would have to watch out

to not do when you're conversing with the mob?

Like, what would be, what would get you in trouble?

Well, respect was everything, okay?

What you said was everything.

Respect was everything.

You never wanted to get out of line or do anything

destroying a room, trying to do something

that was out of line.

You gotta remember, all these guys were older than I was.

The Rat Pack were older.

Carl Cohen was my rabbi.

And Carl Cohen was the guy out at Cleveland.

He was the sweetest guy ever.

And he watched over me, you know, those were the guys.

And were they like father figures and brother's type?

Yes, totally, totally.

And Carl Cohen, he was the guy, I'm gonna jump ahead

that knocked the teeth out of Frank Sinatra.

Oh, wow.

This is a rabbi.

Rabbi lit up Sinatra.

This was Carl Cohen.

And he was the nicest, salt of the earth type of guy.

And every time I needed something or I had a problem,

I would go to Carl Cohen and he would watch over me.

Cause I was this kid, but I was making money for them.

It was very freaky for them because they were used to

Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis.

And all of a sudden this kid is wandering around

doing business singing these cockamamie songs.

You know, they're doing Cold Porter and I'm going,

I'm so young and you're so old.

Right.

So then the rap pack, they're what?

They're in their mid thirties, forties.

Oh yeah.

Or you're hitting 20.

I would say close to forties.

And were they welcoming to you?

How long did it take for them to kind of bring you

under their wing and kind of show you the ropes

a little bit?

Right away.

You see, they all had a vested interest in whatever sense.

And anybody that made money for them, you know,

they had the swagger, those were the guys.

Sinatra made Las Vegas, all those guys.

Everybody showed up only because of him

and then the gambling.

So when I hit the scene and I'm making money for the mob,

the word is out, be nice to the kid.

That was my nickname, the kid.

And we'd all hang out in the steam room,

this little steam room in the back of the hotel.

On the back of our robes, we had our nicknames.

You know, Sammy was Smoky the Bear, Dean was Dino.

My name was Dino.

So there's a bear in the steam.

And they embraced me right away.

Right away.

Very nice.

And I just watched and learned.

Watched and learned.

They were amazing.

That education that I got at those early years

you couldn't get today.

There was no technology, no tricks.

It was all real stuff.

And those guys were the real deal.

It was fun, fun, fun and professionalism.

I learned so much from those guys.

Then how did, not to jump too far ahead,

but then how did my way come around

for you to deliver to Sinatra?

Well, you know, for years in there,

he had always teased me about writing for him.

Now I'm still young.

I'm scared to death.

I'm intimidated.

And I figured if I'm ever gonna write something,

it better be good cause that'll be my one shot.

But I'm in my early twenties.

And I moved to Italy and I'm living over there

because the Beatles hit, which I'll tell you that later.

I got them over here.

And I come back and I'm still working.

And in the late sixties, we're down in Florida

at the Fountain Blue Hotel.

And that was a hang place for all of us

and all the mob guys, the Fountain Blue.

Which was the model for Vegas, by the way.

Caesar's Palace, Steve Nguyen,

all those guys learned from the aesthetics

of the Fountain Blue Hotel in Miami.

Okay.

That's where that preacher guy,

his wife got that pool boy from there.

I just watched that documentary about it

was the Fountain Blue.

Unrelated, unrelated.

All right, sorry Paul.

Sorry.

So, oh yeah, good friend.

So the preacher boy, he was also around.

I'm covering everybody here today.

So I met the Fountain Blue.

Wait, wait, wait, go back.

What was the foundation of Vegas?

Well, Steve Nguyen, who's responsible for the,

let's call it the second chapter of Las Vegas.

Genius of Steve Nguyen.

He and the guy at Circus Circus

and the mob who lent all the money,

the Teamsters Union,

they were gonna build Caesar's Palace.

And I had 5% of Caesar's

because my friend, Nate Jacobson out of Baltimore

came to me who I'd invested with.

And he said, blah, blah, blah,

we're gonna build this hotel.

We want you to be a part of it.

Well, my people said you don't wanna own anything

because the governor will be all over you.

So they all wanted to build this amazing hotel,

Caesar's Palace.

How are we gonna build it?

What's it gonna look like?

The model, the aesthetic model and everything in it

was taken from the Fountain Blue Hotel,

the inspiration for that aesthetic look of Caesar's,

which was the cheapest investment in real estate

and the biggest bang of real estate in the country.

It only cost them about $18 million,

if you can believe it, to build it, yeah.

So anyway, so there I am in Florida,

Sinatra's having dinner, he invites me to dinner.

He's, I think he's running with Mia Farrell at the time.

And he told me, he said,

you know, I'm quitting show business, I'm tired,

Rat Pack's over, I've had enough of this

and I'm gonna rest.

I'm doing one more album with Don Costa.

Don Costa, as I mentioned earlier, was my producer.

And I introduced him to Sinatra in the 60s

and he did that amazing album, Sinatra and Strings.

And he said, I'm quitting, but I'm doing one more album.

Mia never wrote me a song.

So I can't believe it, Sinatra quitting.

So I go back to New York where I'm living at the time.

I'm sitting up at my piano, 12 midnight,

thunderstorm outside.

I'm saying Sinatra, retiring, I can't believe it.

I sit at my typewriter, paid off,

from sitting in grade 10 for two years

and I'm typing away metaphorically.

And now the end is here.

In five hours, I finished the song.

That's crazy.

So now I call him up at Caesars and I said,

sir, I said, I've got the song, blah, blah, blah.

He said, bring it out.

I fly out to Caesars Palace, go to his dressing room.

I sing him the song.

He says, kid, I love it, I'm gonna do it.

Two months later, he calls me from a record studio in LA.

Listen to this kid and he takes the phone

and he puts it up to a speaker and I hear my way

for the first time.

How old are you?

25 years old.

I'm not kidding, I'm getting chills.

That's amazing.

So the lyrics were quite literal

that you just took, it's like,

for me, the end is near and I did it my way.

So that came from his telling you what he's done.

Exactly, metaphorically, I wrote it

as if he were writing it.

Otherwise, it would never use ate it up

and spit it out and stuff like that.

But that's very indigenous to Sonata style.

Right, that's amazing.

That blows my mind in a way that,

and that gate, like I said, it quite literally gave me chills

and then the chills were gone when Sid Vicious recorded it.

Years later.

I felt more than chills when I first heard it.

So says he called and they said,

we're using this Sid Vicious.

I'd never heard the record.

I said, is this a prank?

He says, no, this is a real guy.

So I heard it and I did some investigating.

I said, you know, the guy was sincere.

He went to Paris, he was ripping up amps

and trying to get the sound.

I said, who am I to stand in the way of someone's expression

of a song and I granted the license.

That was so crazy, Sean.

Jason, you know about that, right?

The Sid Vicious from the Sex Pistols recorded my way.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's so crazy.

And speaking of Scorsese,

I don't know if you guys know this,

but I wonder if our listener does.

The, that classic, that opening shot in Goodfellas,

that long tracking, not tracking steady cam shot

through the kitchen and all this other stuff.

That was a shot Scorsese came up with

as a result of watching a documentary about Paul

where a handheld camera followed him

all the way through a kitchen, right?

And then up on the stage, Paul, is that right?

I produced a film with the National Film Board.

You guys know how important their work is.

And they came to me in the early sixties.

We want to do this documentary first time ever

on a pop artist, blah, blah, blah.

I said, let's do it.

So we did it and we won a lot of awards,

the Venice Award, New York Critic Awards.

And it became this really acclaimed piece of Verité

on a pop artist and Scorsese used it,

the Beatles used it in terms of the application

and how it was directed, et cetera.

And that shot was taken from the Copa Cabana.

I used to do scene study with this guy, Vito Aniformo,

the former boxer, and he's in that shot at the very end

when Ray Lioti comes in and Ray Lioti says, hey to him.

And he says, hey.

Hey Vito.

Anyway, he used to be my scene study partner years ago.

I want to know, I want to know, like Jason and Paul,

like at what point, Jason, after you met

your gorgeous, amazing, wonderful,

incredible wife, Amanda, did you go, oh my God,

your dad is Paul, Anka, and then you're thinking,

oh my God, my father-in-law is Paul, Anka.

And I'll never live up to, oh, sorry.

Yeah, yeah.

And then at what point did it go away

where you're just like, okay, I can't stay

in this frame of mind anymore.

And I'm just like, that's my dad.

That's my dad.

Well, I knew because I knew her name when I met her

and she introduced herself, you know, I was like,

oh, I don't remember if I even asked if she was related.

I think I just assumed.

And so I was, I thought, well, if this goes

a couple of more dates, I might get to meet this guy

and I'll be nervous about that.

Yeah.

And then I think Paul was the first time we met

at the Plaza Athene in New York.

I feel like it might be.

Yeah, first, and then you hung at the house

up in Mulholland.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jason remembers that, but no vacation with his French shot.

Go ahead, Jay.

No.

With his French what?

He doesn't remember the glory holes either for months.

He put me to ease very, very quickly.

He's obviously very used to being famous

and having people be intimidated when they meet him.

And so he's got that down where he just disarms

any kind of arm situation you might create, you know?

He's just, you know, as you can tell.

And the way that you talk about these incredible, iconic,

not just people, but moments in time and eras

that you inhabited, you were just an observer

you were part of, you alluded to the fact

that you were in Europe because of the Beatles

or they were big at the time.

Talk a little bit about that.

Well, I'm writing away, but I'm realizing

while I'm in the business, all I kept hearing

is this may not last.

They come and they go.

They come and they go.

I'm saying, yeah, they may not last.

Okay, I might be back sucking on that moose jerky

in Canada in two years.

So now I said, well, I got to start writing songs

for other people because I was a writer.

I wasn't sold as a, you know, they groomed me up

to look cute, but I was not a good looking guy.

But your voice is undeniable.

Well, at least we had the voice going for us.

Yeah.

So I'm singing away and I started writing for other people.

I wrote Buddy Holly's Last Hit.

It doesn't matter anymore.

And, you know, we lost him on one of our tours

in the plane crash.

And it started there.

And then I'm writing for Connie Francis.

Then I go to Europe and I'm asked to be in a movie

called The Longest Day for Darrell F. Zannick,

classic war film.

I'm in the film and look, I'm not an actor,

but I'm in the film and I say to Zannick,

hey, I'm a writer, I'm a writer.

I'm telling everybody, I'm a writer.

You need a song.

I mean, open the fridge, the light went on.

I'll write for you.

So now with Zannick, I go home, I'm inspired.

I write The Longest Day for the film.

Then I meet a guy called Johnny Carson.

He's starting this TV show for a year.

I said, but I want a new song.

I write the Tonight Show theme.

You're joking, man.

Did you not, you did not know that, Sean?

Wait a minute, you're joking me.

Yeah, that is crazy.

I wish I wanted to put Amanda through school

until Jason took over.

It's the most recognized TV theme song in history.

It's been performed a million, 400,000 times.

You wrote that song.

Well, let me tell you, writing is one thing,

but getting it out there.

I got thrown off from Mitch Skitch Henderson

who was a part of the show.

And when Johnny came in, who was new,

and I'd given him a job on my TV show, Johnny.

Wow.

Skitch Henderson said, I don't want some kid

taken over here.

We're not using the song.

And when Johnny called me and said,

you know, I'm sorry, I love it,

but I can't use it because Skitch has been here,

blah, blah, blah.

God damn, Skitch.

He said, yeah, Skitch the switch artist.

So I said to Johnny, I said, look,

I'll give you half the song, half the publishing,

half the writing, and if anything happens,

you're gonna earn half of everything with me.

Wow.

So a day goes by and he calls up with his man and says,

you got it.

Now they don't know it's gonna be on, what, 30 years.

Yeah, right, right.

Either did I.

Uh-huh.

So he says, the song is back on.

Da, da, da, da, da.

And every night we listened to for, what, 30 years.

I'm believe.

And I gave half the song away,

but I had nothing anyway.

Well, you had half of half of something

instead of 100% of that.

And then Skitch went on to be Sean's,

Eric got it right, Sean, is that right?

Does your hair?

What's his name?

Skitcho.

Skitcho, Skitcho, Skitcho, Skitcho, sorry.

So then I go to Europe.

I go to Europe and I had a whole career in Europe.

I went to Japan when I was 18.

Yeah, what's this, you lived in Italy.

You just said.

Yeah, I lived in Italy.

I didn't know that.

Everything, well, when the Beatles hit, you know,

let me go to that.

I'm working the Olympia Theater

and I'm really loving the culture

and I'm loving Europe and I'm touring

all over the place from Japan to Europe.

And I go to see a friend of mine at the Olympia.

And on the under bill from my friend, he says,

the Beatles, I don't know.

Watch your mic, Paul, you're hitting the mic with your hand.

I says, the Beatles, the Beatles.

So I'm sitting there watching the show

and the guy, ladies and gentlemen, he's the Beatles.

And these guys come on and they're doing these cover songs.

And I'm looking at these guys, shirts, ties, long hair,

and they're singing away.

And as a musician, I'm going, God, there's something here.

So I go backstage and I meet them

and they're talking to me and oh, we love what you're doing.

And so they're saying, we want to do what you're doing.

We want to publish and write and produce the music

and blah, blah, blah.

And I strike it up with these Beatles.

And then I go to London and I think they started with a hit

and I'm having drinks with them over there

and we're talking and rapping.

And I come home to New York where I'm living

and I go to Normie Weiss and Sid Bernstein,

who are my agents.

I said, there's these guys in England called the Beatles.

You got to sign them.

Now you have to remember,

we're not in a media driven society.

Pop music is still in its infancy stage.

Nobody had any idea what was going on in Europe.

And I'm pounding these guys to go get them.

Like rock and roll just started, right?

Just started, infancy stage.

So long and short, they go over and they sign the Beatles

and bring them over in what, 64 on Ed Sullivan?

And that was the start of it all.

So they bring them over, you know the story there.

I leave and I go to RCA Victor Records,

who built his huge sound stage in Rome.

And they introduced me to one of the most amazing

genius musicians I've ever met called Inyo Morricone.

Oh yeah, of course.

You guys must know that name.

Yeah, yeah, of course.

He knew films better than the directors.

And he was unbelievable.

He starts my career in Italy.

And I'm singing and living in Italy.

On you volt, on you volt.

Take torno, no more, no more.

And I'm out selling the Italians.

Just in Italian.

So I'm living there.

And I'm having a career in Italy with Inyo Morricone.

Who are you?

I mean like, have you ever?

The answer's probably yes.

What is it?

By what?

Throw it at me.

I was gonna say, did you ever write a song for the Beatles?

No, they did their own thing.

I wish I had.

Do you know Italian?

Yeah, sure.

You could speak Italian.

What else could you do?

What other languages could you speak?

I recorded in Spanish, recorded in Japanese.

I lived in Germany.

And Weiswärtschnurl, Sarkraut, Undrei Lüderbjörn,

had a career in German in Germany.

Yo, wo gibst denn das?

I get up in the morning at nine

with this strict German woman, Siegfried Vogtmann.

Now, Paul, you will put it in your tongue in the front.

Weiswärtschnurl in the tongue.

I hadn't even had breakfast yet.

I'm worried about my tongue.

And I sat with her five days a week learning German.

And I loved it over there.

It's a great country.

Very beautiful country.

Beautiful.

That's how I met Scotty, by the way.

Anyway, so, if you, I wanna know about.

I thought you were gonna go back

to embracing the bear in this theme room.

I wanna stick with the tongue.

Wait, love, love never felt so good that song.

I don't know if you, Jane.

Yeah, Michael Jackson, but,

and then Justin Timberlake, we recorded it with.

Drake, and yeah, talk to us about the collaborations,

the duets with some of these folks.

Is that something that you'd love to do?

I started somewhere in there.

I said, you know, I gotta meet some other people

and write with them because I love the experience.

Anyway, I start with, you know, Michael McDonnell,

Bert Backer, a bunch of talented people, good friends.

You know, make Bert rest in peace.

And this guy, a publicist,

kept bringing Michael Jackson around.

I knew the family from Caesars.

Joe would bring him in.

They watched Sinatra and me, Dean Martin.

And I saw this family grow up.

So he said, Michael's starting over at Sony

and he wants to write and be on your Sony album.

And I'd already had everybody slotted in the album

and I had two slots open.

And I'm living in Carmel at the time.

And Michael flies up with this guy

and we start writing together.

And you knew right away,

with a guy like Michael, how talented he was.

Now, unlike everyone else, he didn't play an instrument.

He was all in the head.

It was chica-ba-ca-ba-ca-chica-ba-boot,

chica-ba-ba-poor-poor-poor-poor-poor-poor-poor-poor.

All these noises, like working with a bird.

And I knew that the way that this guy had it down,

he knew what he wanted and he knew what he was about.

So we sit and speak.

Paul, you sound just like him.

Yeah, thank you very much.

You're welcome.

I do 20 minutes of that in my act every night.

Back-ta-ca-ba-ca-ta-ca-ba-poor-poor-poor-poor-poor.

So we start writing.

In the middle of the process, which is interesting,

his record thriller or whatever the first one was,

starts to take off.

Off the wall.

And Michael goes into second gear of Michael,

you know, really into his career,

really into being very professional.

But he steals the tapes out of the studio in Los Angeles

and I couldn't complete the songs with him

because he had taken the tapes.

Something happened to your face, Jason.

I think you're growing an appendage.

I grew a second face.

Oh my God.

You're a second elder.

Your daughter, Amanda.

Am I the daddy of your tanner than Will?

Oh my God.

First of all, Amanda.

Here she comes.

Here she comes.

I'm just saying, I love you all.

You're very tanned.

You look very cute.

Amanda, wait, Amanda, don't go anywhere yet.

I can't believe this is the first time meeting your dad.

I love your dad.

And now I know why you've been keeping me away,

keeping us away from him.

We love your dad.

Sean didn't know about the tonight show.

He came to a father daughter dinner up at our Sundays

and it took the house down.

Yeah.

So we need to invite him back.

Yes.

He's a big hit everywhere he goes.

By the way, I love you all.

Willie and Sean, I'm crushed that you're away.

I know, we miss you.

I can't wait, we're gonna see you very soon,

but I miss you too.

I'm so excited.

Daddy, I miss you, I love you.

I'll see you at the party, remember, next week.

Yes, at your party.

You're coming to dinner.

That's right, I can't wait, I'm so excited.

I love you guys.

Bye, I love you too.

Bye, Amanda.

Paul, will you be my dad?

Okay, so wait, I wanna get back to Michael Jackson,

the tapes, so Michael Jackson took the tapes or something?

What are you saying?

He stole the tapes from the studio and they called me.

I mean, I hate being negative because he's a talented guy.

In the 80s, Sunset Sound, they called me up and said,

Mr. Anika, Michael came and took your tapes.

Now I've got the tapes are gone, I can't finish.

But the tapes of what?

Of songs that you were working on with him

or songs that he recorded?

Three songs that we wrote together.

Okay, got it.

Here's, I'll give you the payoff in a second.

So I've got all of these songs, the three songs,

my tapes are gone and now I'm in Lawyerville

and I'm not litigious.

I think the worst thing you can do in life

takes the eye off the ball is get into litigation

if you can avoid it.

Anyway, tapes are gone, I'll leave a hunk out,

the lawyers decide to convince him, give him back the tapes.

So he gives me back the tapes, but he's gone.

I can't finish the project.

Now this is the 80s.

The years go by and what happens when he comes back

on the This Is It tour?

I get a call from Harvey over TMZ.

He said, Paul, there's a Michael Jackson record out called

This Is It and we think you wrote it and it's his tour.

It's the name of the show, blah, blah, blah, blah.

The documentary that he was shooting when he passed away.

I said, well, Harvey, let me do some homework.

So I get ahold of the record and what happened was

the original title was called I Never Heard.

This was called This Is It.

When I hear the record, the first line is this is it.

Here I stand.

They took the first lyric, turned it into the tour title

and indeed it was the song that we wrote together.

Well, now the shit hits the fans.

This is only like in the, This Is In 2000.

It wasn't that long ago.

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

So now we get the same lawyers on the phone again

and there's a big conference call.

But Bob, but Bob, what are you doing?

It's our song, did you?

Oh, you know, lawyers.

Oh, we didn't know Bob.

I said, look, let's make it real simple.

You're stuck.

Your tour is named.

You got a record coming out in a week.

We'll make this very sweet.

I want half of everything or you're not gonna put it out.

Well, we got everything.

So then after This Is It came out,

I got a call from the guy that was running Epic Records,

L.A. Reed.

He said, did you write a song called Love Number?

It felt so good with Michael.

I said, yes.

He says, well, it's coming out with Timberlake and Michael.

I said, well, what did you do?

He says, we found these tapes in his drawer.

We thought they were his and we've made a record out of it.

I said, well, it's gonna be half of it.

Let me give you an address.

Thanks for doing the heavy lifting.

Let me hear you.

That song is fantastic.

It's such a good song.

So it comes out.

There's that.

And then I get a call.

Drake, did you write a song?

Yes.

So he comes over to the house.

Nice guy, talented Toronto boy, as you know.

Yeah, Toronto guy.

And he said, look, what do we do with this?

I said, look, I don't know anything about your world.

Culturally, I can't write what you do.

But if you want to take this and break the code

and put your magic on it and let me hear it,

you can put it out.

He takes it, what I'd written and what was there with Michael.

And he turned it into, it don't matter to me.

And that was the third record.

Wow.

That's unbelievable.

It's so lovely.

Crazy stories, huh?

Yeah, incredible.

We'll be right back.

And now, back to the show.

So, you know, I put your head on my shoulder

and you pop your love, you're having my baby.

All this stuff.

Every time I think about all the really recognizable songs

that you have done, I keep thinking about,

I'm going to ask you about this again.

And I would like your take on it, guys.

I want him to, remember the three tenors?

Remember that?

Yeah, sure, of course.

I want him to do the three crooners

because each, you got to, let's workshop

and find the other two folks.

But you've got enough, you've got enough

to fill your section of it, I mean, in spades.

I mean, you're just playing your hits.

You could do, you could do, you could tour,

you could do Vegas, as you know,

you could do on Broadway, it would be an absolute smash.

Yeah, who are the other two that would do it with you?

That's a big question.

Who are the other twos that leave their ego at the door?

You tell us, you know these guys, you know these players.

Well, you know what, Paul, you just said something

really important before you answered that,

which is check your ego.

And I love hearing you talk

because you have been around and seen it all.

And I can tell that you don't have time for the bullshit.

You don't have that ego in that way.

I love that there's an authenticity to it

that is so refreshing because we don't have enough.

And by the way, I was thinking,

you were talking about the mob before.

I mean, you're in the talent mafia.

You have been doing it

and you have been working with and collaborating

with people for so freaking long.

There's no reason you can't do this now.

It would be a crime if you didn't do it.

Well, if you've got time,

I mean, you're doing your Broadway show,

you're working on a documentary,

probably writing another book and you're touring.

Well, I'm touring and I leave for Asia in May.

We're booked right up until next January.

You know, the problem is this,

you have to have a business mind

and an artistic mind in this business.

You really do.

You gotta watch your stuff.

And every time I've addressed it,

you've got managers in the way,

you've got agents in the way

and you've got some artists who are very talented,

but that's it.

There's no business acumen and there's threats.

They don't want to get on stage with certain performers.

They don't want to go through it.

They don't get it.

And it's a shame.

You know who gets it?

The country acts get it.

The rap artists get it.

But there's not many in my milieu

that I could really say to you,

look, I'd love to bring Julio Iglesias

out of retirement or whatever he's doing, okay?

Because the Hispanic base in our country politically

and everything is huge.

If you could get Tom Jones,

Tom has been, you know,

had some health issues recently, great voice.

There's a few people that I think would work,

but you can't get past the agents, the managers.

Oh, I'll bet you could.

Yeah.

Well, somebody would have to do it.

I just don't have any time to press it.

Great.

It's a smart list tour and we're gonna get it done.

Guys, why don't the three of us sing all the songs?

I'm open.

Oh, Sean.

As long as I'm not responsible for any of the...

Sean, you do the singing and then Jason and I,

what do we do?

Well, these two talented guys are doing it.

Yeah, exactly.

What does the furniture do?

We'll make funny faces on the sides.

You put me on your shoulders.

Oh my God.

I mean, just...

Well, we're gonna work on it.

We're gonna come back to you with a proposal on that.

Okay.

It's a great idea.

Now, talk to us about this,

how, you know, the stamina, the endurance,

the longevity, you still touring like crazy.

Literally, how do you do that?

Yeah, but how are you able to stay so healthy

and have someone say, what's the ritual?

Yeah, look.

I mean, walk us through your day.

It's so basic.

Look, you know, I know what you do.

You run, you watch what you eat.

You know, Amanda's always been like that.

I literally, from hanging around those guys in Vegas

with the smoking, with the drinking and all the bullshit.

Hey, if that's your thing, do it.

I couldn't sing if I drank too much.

I couldn't function if I did what too much.

If I tried a little of this and that, you're goddamn right.

Made up my mind and made choices.

But when I get up in the morning,

you know, I have my lemon juice.

I eat blueberries.

I have my olive oil with a squeeze of lemon.

I don't have a big breakfast.

I don't eat white bread.

I mean, I can give you a boring list.

His body is not a fluke.

Okay?

This is it.

Even Paul Ek is quoting Richard Erlich.

Is that Richard Erlich?

Was that where I heard it?

His body's no fluke.

The great Richard Erlich.

How's Richard doing?

Tricky dick is good.

He's married, isn't he?

Oh yeah.

He's on the big deal.

Tell Tracy who Richard is.

Richard is one of my best friends and a friend of,

but all four of us?

No, I'm sure he'd make it.

And anyway.

Richard is, I love,

by the way, it should be noticed that,

yeah, hi dick, it should be mentioned

that Richard is one of the first

smart list super fans when we first heard of,

he was like the first guy to keep texting us

and being encouraging.

He's such a sweet hearted guy.

You want to buy a house?

Find him.

Yeah, by the way, you want to buy a house

and I like Richard Erlich.

Yeah, he's the guy.

See these blueberries guys?

I eat them every day.

These guys, he's eating blueberries right now.

That's a super food.

That's how he's getting through this interview.

This is a super food, okay?

I love it.

The olive oil, I'm going to do it now, Paul.

I'm doing it every day.

I'm going to do olive oil for some.

You put it in a shot glass

and you squeeze a lemon on top of it and drink it.

Drink it in the morning.

Before you go to bed, you make sure you have ginger.

I'd rather drink a soda and die early.

Yeah, listen, Sean, you're not going to make it to Paul's age.

You keep having the corn flakes on the tuna fish and the,

I mean,

Listen, they're coming up with some stuff from Israel.

I read a lot.

They've got some stuff now.

They're going to turn it all out back.

You're going to live to over a hundred years old.

You guys, especially kids that were born after 2000,

they'll be living to 125.

Now, what about playing music day to day?

Not physically playing music

because you're doing that on the stage,

but what are you listening to that's keeping you inspired?

Do you keep up on new music?

Do you have a staple that you listen to that keeps you going?

What gets you going?

Yeah, I'm listening to everything eclectically.

You know, there's some stuff I'm not interested in,

believe it or not,

but I'm listening to stuff from, you know, Bruno Mars.

I mean, I listened to Adele,

there's some rap stuff, Jay-Z.

I mean, there's some talented people out there.

Is there anybody that you've always dreamed of writing for

or with that you haven't?

John and Sting.

Wow.

Yeah.

I think Elton's very talented.

Yeah.

I think Sting is very talented.

Of course.

I think Billy Joel is amazing.

Amazing.

You know, you're never going to discount,

you know, when you look at the foundation

of those doing the business out there,

it's all the guys that are close to 80.

Stones are still doing it.

I mean, there's a ton of them.

There's some good stuff out there that, you know,

I listen to opera music when I want to calm down.

I listen to a lot of Sinatra.

I listen to everything as long as it's good.

If it's good, I'm on.

I'm down for it.

Paul, for many, for many, many reasons,

I want to be you when I grow up.

I know.

We never grow up, my boy.

Yeah.

We never really grow up.

Trust me.

I get that sense.

Paul, it's unbelievable.

Again, I don't know what Jason,

I think that, I think he's jealous of you.

You've got too much charisma for us.

And he knows that we're like,

Sean and I are going to be like,

we got to get rid of Jason.

We got to get Paul out of here, the podcast with us.

Keep it in the family.

If you guys want to recast, that's fine.

Just got to keep it in the family.

You know, slip it in, slip it in.

I got to tell you, I'm so proud of that guy.

I don't know if I'm laying on.

All of you.

We all are.

All of you representing what you do.

I'm a fan, okay?

And this guy in front of me and he's been a hell of a father

and with those kids, but beyond that,

I'm not even gonna get into it

because it speaks for itself and I'm not gonna embarrass him.

But as proud as he may be of me,

that's how proud is Jason, is he,

is that your son-in-law?

Everywhere I go, they don't even know who the fuck I am.

We're taking his guests, right?

But take, no, listen, whatever you're throwing at me,

I'm throwing it back to him.

Well, I was gonna say this

and I was gonna bring that up,

which was, I wanted to mention this earlier.

When Amanda started dating,

when he said that he didn't know,

that he figured that you were Amanda's dad

when you first heard her last name.

When Jason and Amanda started dating and then got married

and I don't want to embarrass Jason either

because Sean and I both love him.

I give him a lot of shit, but I love him.

And he's a brother and more than a friend.

And how lucky did you feel that you got to have this guy

as your son-in-law and in your life?

He's a thoughtful, smart, sweet, great dad.

All the shit that you said,

times a million as you know.

No doubt, he's a brother for another mother

to all of you guys because it's,

you know, the great thing is, as you guys know,

it's all real.

You're never gonna hear anybody say anything

and I never have.

And Jason's been through it, man.

He's pulled his life together.

You'll never hear anybody say anything derogatory

about Jason.

We had, you got it, you had a nice little window.

We're still looking though.

We're still looking.

I'll find it, I'll find it.

Paul had a nice window into my old life though.

Right when I got married to his daughter,

he took me and two buddies,

Erlich was one of them, Dickey, to Vegas.

And he gave me and Richard and Danny Comden and one.

The wholesale good crew.

Yeah, and we had, he showed us his version of Vegas

and it was just incredible.

And so you got to see me lubricated, you know.

Erlich was making deals right down to the end.

What do you mean $30 for a lap dance?

Who's gonna kick over here?

I'm not paying that.

Jenny's listening to this right now going,

Richard said he's never been to a strip bar before.

This is crazy.

Paul, we've taken a lot of your time, too much of it.

You're very, very nice to have come on and done this.

Thank you for saying yes.

And Paul, next time I'm in Los Angeles,

I want to have a dinner and keep talking about everything.

Let's do a dinner.

Let's do a dinner.

Paul, please.

What a thrill.

I'm down.

We're doing that as soon as you get back.

My mom and dad, my dad who grew up in Winnipeg,

Manitoba has been a fan of yours.

He was born in 38, just outside of Winnipeg.

And for him, I'm not kidding.

As soon as I'm done, I'm gonna get off this thing

and I'm gonna call my dad and say that we had you on

and he's gonna be absolutely blown away.

He's gonna be blown away.

You got a pretty decent hockey team out there, you know?

Yeah, we do.

Decent hockey team is right.

That's what we should do.

We should go to a hockey game together.

Should introduce him to Shani, too.

Yeah.

We should.

Do you know which team in the NHL makes more money

than any other team?

You guys are hockey savvy.

Toronto?

Let me see.

Toronto?

Toronto Maple Leafs.

Yeah, Toronto Maple Leafs.

Everybody is way behind.

Do you know why Wayne Gretzky never had a curved stick?

Why?

Why's that?

Because he always scored on his backhand.

He never wanted to stick curve.

Yeah.

Hardest.

And I knew Wayne when he was a young little fella.

I used to fly him around on the jet.

He was scared to death of private planes.

So I knew him when.

Wow.

So Paul, I don't know if you heard the episode

that we did with President Biden,

but what he wanted to do and did do,

he was so excited,

because I guess he did all some research,

found out that you and I were related.

He came in playing one of your songs on his phone.

It's one of his go through songs

that he's got on his phone all the time.

He played his entrance music.

On his own personal cell phone.

That was funny.

I thought you were putting me on.

Nobody handed it to him.

He got it on his own phone.

He walks in playing that.

Jason blushed.

Yeah.

And then I feel like, did we call you?

Yeah, we called.

Yeah, yeah.

You called me, he got on the phone,

and said, I'm only doing this with your son along

because I said I wanted to talk to you.

Well, you know, I was getting ready

from the world I come from to say,

fuck you, Jason, don't put me on.

And then I heard the sound of his voice

that's saying, this is real, right?

And then he carried on as you heard him.

He was very complimentary and very nice.

I was very touched and it was very cool.

It's cool for us to experience all of that happening

in front of our face.

It was really cool.

Very, very cool.

Well, Paul, you've been killing it for a long, long time.

In many, many years to come,

we can only hope to have the kind of longevity

and relevance that you've had in this business

and your success in your personal life too.

I mean, I'm a huge benefit of your offspring as well.

And we got a couple of great grandkids of yours

to prove it and so I just love you.

And thanks for chatting with us.

Hey guys, it's been my pleasure, you know?

My pleasure, thank you.

Thank you, Paul.

Good to be here.

Paul, thank you, the great Paul, Anka.

I look forward to the dinner, guys.

Can't wait, that's a done deal.

That's a done deal.

Let me know when you're back and get it done.

All right?

All right.

Bye, Paul.

See you, Paulie.

Bye, guys.

Bye, buddy.

Bye.

What a legend.

What a legend.

Yeah, that's cool.

By the way, I mean,

I can't believe you guys haven't met him before.

I've never met him, yeah.

I'm not kidding.

I'm not kidding either.

I can't believe that we haven't met him yet.

Well, I'm so excited.

You're like, oh yeah, he's great, I love him.

He's great, he's great.

And I'm like, I would be,

I can't believe that you haven't like paraded him

and being like, Sean and Will,

you guys are gonna love this guy.

I wasn't even sure that you guys were gonna be cool

with me bringing him on.

I don't know what to think.

What the hell are you talking about?

It's just so self-serving, you know,

I mean, he's my father-in-law

and like I wanna bring him on a chat with him.

Do you ever call him, do you ever call him Pankah?

Can you think about us?

Pankah.

No, but Juki, that can be your little pet name for him.

Yeah, Pankah.

No, you guys were very, very sweet to him.

Thank you.

I'm dead serious.

I wanna sit down with him.

I'm not even kidding.

Oh, he'll talk to you every day.

I just wanna know if he's,

I was gonna ask him,

I wanna know if he's ever whacked anybody.

That's a great question.

I know that Sean has,

I know that Sean has, but that's different,

but that's different.

And that's different.

That was mutual, that was mutual.

Oh my God.

Well, that wasn't...

Sean got led into the mob because they asked him,

he was the first thing he said,

he says, I love whacking people.

Well, you're in.

Just sign here.

Okay.

That same app that your friend used to send.

The same app.

Howdy, can you,

that's amazing.

By the way,

oh, go ahead and win what we're gonna say.

No, I was just gonna say,

I'm really blown away, Jay.

I really am.

I just love him.

And loving Amanda as much as we do as well,

certainly as much as I do,

just seeing her dad and starting to understand,

putting the pieces together.

Yes, yes, that's what I was doing too.

I had met one of Amanda's sisters.

I remember I played golf with Amanda's mom.

You and I played golf with her mom years ago

before she passed,

which was such a treat.

And then just meeting her dad now

was just brought it all full circle

and it just makes me love Amanda even more.

Yeah, likewise.

With that name that she came on and said hi,

I was the first time I saw the show.

She's never done that.

It was so cute.

See, we should have her on.

We should have her on.

But now that gets her to get really self-indulgent.

Now we know,

because we wanna hear the real stuff.

I don't think I can be on that episode.

No, because she'll get too real.

She'll be like, I told Jason, I told him.

We just started fighting.

It'll be a one hour fight.

I wanna echo,

I didn't wanna stay silent during that.

I wanna echo what Paul and Will were saying too,

but what an incredible father you are,

what an incredible person you are.

I truly, and this is the episode to say that

and this is the time to say that.

So I just think you're amazing

and hearing him love on you was just really cool.

It was really cool for me.

You're very nice.

I feel like you're working into a bye here.

I am.

I wanted to quote some of the lyrics from the song My Way

that I didn't know he wrote until today, which is-

You can't say I did it by way.

Why not?

Why not?

Because that's not a fucking thing.

Yes, it is.

I think you're gonna fucking blew it.

You fucking blew it.

No, I didn't blow it.

Anybody who heard you say that knew exactly what you were.

No, he's gonna talk about sleeping with a man and a woman

and watch, he's gonna do this whole, all these lyrics, right?

Go ahead, John.

I was gonna do just the one lyric about,

I planned each charted course, each careful step,

along the,

bye,

Way Way.

Very nice.

Come on, that's pretty great.

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