Mx. Dahlia Belle. Comedian! Speaker! Accidental activist! Friend! Delight! More!

From her website:

"Hilarious, and the best sort of mess, Portland-based comedian MX. DAHLIA BELLE has been compared to a Swiss Army knife - different tools to extract sharpness, softness, vulnerability, hope, and wicked wit. She's been declared one of '11 Trans Comedians... Funnier Than Dave Chappelle' by Out Magazine and has written for Cosmopolitan Magazine, The Guardian, The Stranger, and Portland Mercury. She has been a repeat guest on NPR, CBC, XRAY FM, and Portland Radio Project (PRP). Her live performances have included NW Black Comedy Festival, Upper Left Comedy Festival, Mutiny Radio, and an awkward conversation with John Waters and Piers Morgan. You can catch Dahlia in the popular Netflix special Hannah Gadsby’s ‘Gender Agenda’ or in a comedy club near you!"

I agree with it all!

We had a wonderful chat. You can have a wonderful listen! Enjoy!

And this is only one HALF of our chat.
For the other half, subscribe via Apple Podcasts OR simply head on over here to Patreon!

Thom Norman! Co-Founder and Director of Outreach for FarmKind! Friend! Delight!

Thom is the co-founder of FarmKind, a non-profit whose mission is to connect compassionate people with impactful charities that are fixing factory farming.

Thom and I had a great chat and you can have a great listen!

Also since we spoke, Thom let me know that they helped raise over $2M for farmed animals via the Dwarkesh podcast!

Anyone who would like to try out their offset calculator to give to neutralize their personal impact on factory farming can see that here: https://www.compassioncalculator.org/

And this is just the first HALF of our conversation.
For part two, subscribe via Apple Podcasts OR simply click on over here to Patreon!

Andy Sandford! Comedian! Friend! Delight! More!

Andy is a super funny comedian and his new special out now from Comedy Dynamics is called "&y S&ford" and here's what they have to say about it:

"Andy Sandford picks apart the slow collapse of modern life with deadpan precision, covering obsolete pharmacists, houses on wheels, and clowns ready to snap. With sharp jokes about the absurd grind of existence, Andy turns low-grade daily panic into a dry, ruthless hour of stand-up about how weird, sad, and hilarious it is to keep showing up for life."

Andy and I have a great chat! You have a great listen!

And this is only the first HALF of our chat.
For part two, subscribe via Apple Podcasts OR simply click on over here to Patreon!

Kelly Carlin-McCall! Author! Podcaster! Producer! More!

Kelly is an author, depth psychologist, podcaster, Emmy Award winning TV producer, and founder of Humans on the Verge, an online community that supports creatives in their writing projects, and others who are seeking deep and long lasting personal transformation. Her memoir, A Carlin Home Companion, was published by St. Martin’s Press in 2015. She is a founding member of the Advisory Board of the National Comedy Center that preserves and honors the people and story of comedy.

Her podcast is here.
My podcast is also here, in a different sense.
Kelly and I had a great chat and you can have a great listen!

PS This is only the first HALF of our conversation.
For part two, subscribe via Apple Podcasts or simply head on over here to Patreon!

Fabrizio Copano! Comedian! Friend! Delight! More!

His new special "From the Future" is out now!

About Fabrizio Copano:

NYC-based comedian Fabrizio Copano was the first South American to shoot an original comedy special for Netflix and is a Comedy Cellar regular. He co-wrote and starred in one of Chile’s highest grossing comedies, Barrio Universitario (2013). His credits also include: actor and writer in the hit Chilean comedy show El Club de la Comedia, late night show host of El Late de Copano, and host of La Culpa es de Colon for Comedy Central Latin America. Fabrizio made his American late-night debut on The Late Late Show with James Corden, was included in the Just For Laughs 2022 New Faces cohort, and was a part of CBS’s 2025 Comics to Watch Showcase.

We have a great chat! You can have a great listen!

And this is only the first HALF of our chat!

For part two, subscribe via Apple Podcasts OR simply click on over here to Patreon!

Reena Calm! Comedian! Friend! Delight! More!

Reena is a wonderful comedian and human.

Social media-wise, you can follow her @ReenaCalm on everything, including whatever app is coming next.

Andy Woodhull! Comedian! Friend! Delight! More!

Andy has a new special out now called "Beach Brain"!

We have a great chat and you can have a great listen!

ABOUT BEACH BRAIN:
Two decades into his comedy career, Andy still has as much fun on stage as he did at his first open mic in 2003. All seven of his albums are time capsules of where Andy was in his life when they were written. His jokes have played over 50 million times on Pandora and are on rotation on Sirius Radio. His DryBar comedy special on YouTube has over 12 million views.

The name Beach Brain was inspired by fellow comedian Dave Waite who joked that Andy (originally from Elkhart, Indiana) developed a perpetually positive attitude after moving by the beach. This hour of comedy was crafted during one of the happiest periods of Andy’s life, and features his signature style of clean humor with a sharp edge, while adding a Beach Brained optimistic spin.

Calling it his silliest album yet, Andy says “My hope is it will appeal to like-minded Beach Brains, and give non Beach Brains a little taste of life by the water.” On the album, Andy explores the humor in second marriages, gaslighting, and buying toilet paper in bulk. .

ABOUT ANDY:

Los Angeles-based stand-up comedian, writer, and television host Andy Woodhull was the first comedian to make his network television debut on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. He has also appeared on The Late Late Show with James Corden, Conan, Live at Gotham, and Comedy Central. He has written for SYFY’s The Movie Show, was featured in two episodes, and currently hosts Totally Funny Animals on the CW Network.

And this is only the FIRST half of our chat.
For the second half, subscribe via Apple Podcasts or just click on over here to Patreon!

Enjoy!

Kris Lefcoe! Filmmaker! Writer! Director! Musician! Friend! Delight! More!

We have a great chat! You can have a great listen!

About Kris, from her website:

"Kris Lefcoe (DGA) is a Canadian-American director and writer based in New York City. Her work has screened at TIFF, SXSW, Tribeca, British Film Institute, Art Basel Miami, IFC and on the Sundance Channel. 



Kris is co-creator, writer and EP of “Making Plans For Nigel,” a comedy series in network development with Priyanka Chopra Jonas and Mary Rohlich (“Atypical”). Lefcoe's half-hour comedy “Giving Up,” about a New York couple facing their own deadline to either ‘make it’ or give up their dreams, won top prizes at Seriesfest and New York Television Festival, and just had a theatrical premiere at the Roxy Cinema in NYC. The series was executive produced by David Wain and developed with Imagine Television. In 2020, Kris made her network directing debut on the NBC comedy “Superstore.”



Pitch-black comedy “Public Domain,” Kris’ audacious audience-award-winning feature debut about a surveillance-based game show, was hailed as "creepy-funny and well-acted" (Variety), and "an assured debut" (Austin Chronicle). The film premiered at SXSW and was installed at Art Basel Miami.


Lefcoe’s stop motion short “Tiny Riot Project,” featuring a riot squad of corporate mascots in a violent face off with endearing anarchists, premiered at IFF Rotterdam, was installed at Galerie Tomas Schulte Berlin, Havana Biennale, and Art Basel Miami, then sold to the Sundance Channel. Her acclaimed Twilight Zone-esque short “Can I Get a Witness?” starring Scott Speedman, screened at TIFF, BFI and Anthology Film Archives.



Kris' explosive music videos have garnered numerous nominations and awards, including the Peaches smash “Boys Wanna Be Her” which has over 3 million views on YouTube.
She recently won Best Director at New York Cinefest, and Best Director and Best Comedy at Deluxe Film Festival in Rome, for the sex-robot comedy “Technical Support” starring Aparna Nancherla and Courtney Pauroso, which quickly racked up almost million views on YouTube.

As a musician, Kris performs haunting original songs at live venues around NYC on a vintage keyboard she found in the garbage. Her first solo album will be released in Fall 2025. The advance single “Booked A Room” came out in 2024 with a hallucinatory stop motion video directed by Kris that premiered at the 2024 Tribeca Festival and just won Best Video and the Audience Award at San Luis Obispo Festival.

Kris is also a professor in the MFA Film and Television program at Stony Brook University, SUNY. In 2024 she created and launched the Post-MFA Pilot Incubator Lab to shepherd alumni into the industry. She lives with her husband and daughter in a long-forgotten borough called Manhattan."

And this is just the first HALF of our conversation!
For part two, subscribe via Apple Podcasts OR simply click on over here to Patreon!

Enjoy!