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#61. The Substandard Needs Therapy!
Listen to this episode ↗on Substack, where the show lives now
Dudes Chatting — the show is eating the friendship: JVL opens with a genuine lament: the podcast is cannibalizing his real-life friendship with Vic and Sonny. He wants to fire off a text about something funny he saw, but stops himself because it feels like it "belongs to the show." Sonny reports winning his fantasy baseball quarterfinals, which the group discusses briefly. The hosts then explore how friendship works differently across generations — old-school friendships involved just hanging out, while the modern millennial mode involves scheduling and performing. JVL argues the show has turned their relationship into a kind of professional arrangement. No film or TV content appears in this mini-episode.
Full transcript
Sonny00:00:001, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7... I hate Jonathan! Relationships!
Vic00:00:12Hello, and welcome to another micro-episode of The Substandard, sponsored by Dollar Shave Club. I'm Victor Matus, along with Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. Just a quick reminder that full episodes of TheSubstandard are available every Thursday at 11 a.m. Now, gentlemen, I thought we were going to talk about football and sports. It is football season. Sports, sports, sports! Sports, like the Huey Lewis in the news album Sports, and baseball is heading into the playoff season. We just concluded the U.S. Open.
Sonny00:00:42My fantasy baseball team just won the quarterfinals. I'm headed into the semis going against the number one seed.
Vic00:00:47Congratulations, Sonny. That's good. I hope you didn't pull a hamstring. How much money do you stand to win?
Sonny00:00:54If I win... It's a small-stakes league, so like $150 or something like that.
Vic00:00:58I did pick Eagles over the Skids.
Sonny00:01:02It's much more for bragging rights, because this is a, like, almost... I want to say it's almost 15 years now, keeper league that we've had going.
JVL00:01:11So you have whole careers that have played out inside this league.
Sonny00:01:14My original number one draft pick was Albert Pujols. That's how long ago...
Vic00:01:19And would their God, would their engine, or their God, what happens?
Sonny00:01:22Well, you keep a certain number every year, and then you have to draft, you draft. I think you can keep up to six. Can I say that?
JVL00:01:28Can I suggest something for your league? Sure. No. Because you guys have been going so long, I'm going to do it anyway, you should retire numbers of guys who you drafted as rookies, who are so, such obvious Hall of Fame candidates that you can't pick, like, another number two or something like that. That sounds really complicated. Well, but it'd be awesome, because it shows the longevity of your league and your friendships.
Sonny00:01:50You know, we have a really good thing going, and I'm not sure we need outsiders from New Jersey. You should change it. If our ratings tell us anything, it's that when you change the show, people love it. I love it. Like, a last-minute topic change, for instance, is, like, a really big thing.
JVL00:02:02Why would we do that?
Sonny00:02:03JVL? Why would we do that?
JVL00:02:04All right, so this is on me. We were going to talk about the great sports cheaters or something like that. I don't know, and I can't do it. Because another Boston team, yet another Boston team was caught cheating.
Sonny00:02:14Yes. Does your son love the Red Sox, too, in addition to the Patriots?
JVL00:02:17No, in fact, he's really upset by this. Oh. Which is funny. Because he's a Yankees fan? Because, no, it's like his sense of cosmic justice. He's all like, thank God. Do that. It's horrible. But when I bring up, like, you know, Deflategate and Spygate, he's like, well, you know, I mean, I'm not sure how much effect that really has on anything.
Sonny00:02:37Physics. It's the physics.
JVL00:02:39They train them early.
Vic00:02:40They train them well.
JVL00:02:41So I got upset because I was driving from Belmar down to the wilds of Virginia yesterday afternoon, and I had a whole bunch of things that occurred to me that I wanted to talk to you guys about, and I was just going to start texting you, and then I realized, oh, I can't text you. I can't do that because we can't have conversations outside of the show anymore. Because whenever we try to have a funny conversation like we used to do as friends, now one of us says, no, no, save it for the show. And I feel like this show is eating our friendships, and this is not shtick. I am legit bothered by it.
Vic00:03:18I am not. I think that the show is the friendship. I think that we're having a conversation right now. It's happening. This is like Sean Connery telling, you know, Indiana Jones. So, what do you want to talk about? You know, they're on the Zeppelin leaving Berlin. So, go ahead. What do you want to talk about? But it has eaten the normal IRL friendship. See, but here's the thing. You and I never had one. You and I never had one because I guess I was in the office at the time, so we would talk about it. And then when I left to go over to The Beacon, then, but The Substandard already existed, so we've never had a text relationship.
JVL00:03:50It is entirely possible that you and I have spent more hours talking than I have spent with my wife in person over the last 20 years. 20 years. Don't say we didn't have a relationship. It's true. Wait, what was this to you? Inside and outside the office.
Sonny00:04:02Sonny. I'm just imagining JVL's bunny recipes right now for Vicks, you know, Vicks. No, but can we, a very serious point, what you are discussing are like the old mode of friendship and the new mode of friendship, right? Like, what we have here in the studio is the old way of being friends with people where they would get together and they'd like play cards or they'd go bowling or something, right? And they'd all get together and they'd chat and they'd, you know, they'd, you know, blah, blah, blah. The kids these days, they don't get together. They all just hang out in their rooms and they text each other and they send each other the snap faces and, but it's very impersonal and it's very, it's very personal, but it's also very detached. It's very separate.
JVL00:04:42I disagree.
Sonny00:04:43And you prefer the millennial way of communicating. No. Not the old way of communicating.
JVL00:04:48So here's the thing. I disagree because this is like a curated version of our friendship where we prepare for it and come up with topics to talk about. It's not a real relationship. It's not a real friendship.
Sonny00:04:59It's like a distilled version of the friendship to its best aspects. I'm saying that I want both.
Vic00:05:04It's truncated.
JVL00:05:05I would like to be able to text you guys. It's truncated?
Sonny00:05:08It's truncated?
JVL00:05:08It's truncated. It's truncated. With Manja.
Vic00:05:11Sorry, I forgot to take my antibiotics this morning.
JVL00:05:13No. So like, as I'm driving and I hear Paradise City, I would like to be able to text you and say, holy crap, have you guys ever noticed that there is a whistle in the intro to this song? Like all of a sudden there's the musical prelude to it. And then there is like a gym whistle. And who added that in the editing booth for Guns N' Roses? Who thought, boy, what we really need right here before we get into the meat of the song is a whistle. Is a whistle like, go now. I would like to have had that conversation with you.
Vic00:05:41I got news for you. It's happening now. The conversation's happening now. That's my point, Victorino.
JVL00:05:48I like this because it rewakes no time with just blah. Does Mary Catherine and Kristen, do they not talk outside of the show anymore? I don't think so. I think they're normal human beings who figured out a way. I would like to have it both. I would like to have both. You want to have it all. I want to have it all.
Sonny00:06:01We need an Atlantic cover story about Jonathan V. Last. How I learned to have it all, both texting and microphone-based interaction.
Vic00:06:10Also, what you were upset about here is when you hear stories, for example, about David Letterman, because he puts it all out there on camera, right? And he's hilarious and he's funny and the crowd loves him. And as soon as that camera's off, you know, he's a different person, you know? And he just has no material. He doesn't talk. And, you know, you put it all out here, and then when we're done, we're done. We don't talk anymore. That's actually true. That's literally true.
JVL00:06:34Like, you guys show up in the basement, in the lobby. I go down and bring you up, and I say, hey, how are you guys doing? And one of you says, no, save it for the show. And then we turn off the microphones, and you guys just like, all right, see you next week. And that's it. We don't actually communicate or converse. I tried passing on a compliment to Sonny. Oh, what were you trying to say? No, I texted you about your fantastic review of It. Oh, thank you. You are probably the single best working film critic in America today. That's true.
Sonny00:07:03I mean this with all of my heart. I'm glad that you said it. I disagree. I'm glad somebody finally said it, frankly.
JVL00:07:09And I send this text to you, and immediately I'm thinking, oh, God, can I say this, though? Because maybe I should just save it for the show. Because maybe we could do a bit on this or something. But I did it anyway. And your response, a little terse. What did I say? I don't remember, but it was. He said save it for the show. It didn't turn into a conversation.
Sonny00:07:26Well, here's the thing. Because I'm also very, while I appreciate the compliment, it makes me very awkward. Because as a person who doesn't often receive them, I don't know how to handle it. Usually it's people just yelling at me on Twitter saying, you know, you're an idiot. John Podhortz is like, you're a dum-dum. You like it? That book is dumb. And then I'm like, well, you're old. Shut up. And that's how most of my interactions go. So when somebody sends me a genuine compliment, I'm very flustered.
JVL00:07:56Do we think John, Jonah, and. And Rob have this problem?
Sonny00:07:59Where they don't talk to each other outside of the show? No, I seriously doubt that. But they also have a lot of ideas. They're mature adults.
JVL00:08:05But they're also doing other things and they travel and they work.
Vic00:08:09I don't know how often they talk to each other outside of the studio.
JVL00:08:11I'm not saying we have to move in together, Vic. Again. I'm just saying. I'm just saying that I think we should be able to have outside of the show conversations. And I would like us to maybe do a little bit of relationship therapy. Oh my gosh. To bring our. To bring ourselves closer together again the way we used to be. Can we get Dr. Katz in here?
Sonny00:08:33I simply don't remember Dr. Katz.
JVL00:08:35No, we're going to get Daria instead. Deep cut.
Sonny00:08:38Well, Daria was never a therapist. I mean.
JVL00:08:40No, she was shared the time slot with.
Sonny00:08:42Oh, really? Dr. Katz. I actually didn't know that. Followed by Daria.
Vic00:08:47No, I. Sorry. I didn't mean to jump that out there, Sonny. My outburst.
Sonny00:08:53Sorry for all the speakers that just got blown out.
Vic00:08:55No. I remember. I remember experiencing this problem for the first time when I first emceed a wedding. And I've emceed several. And what happened was I had all my shtick out there. I think the first wedding I emceed was for our good friend and substandard listener, Brian Fotten and his wife, Miriam. And I remember coming back to the table and I didn't feel like talking to anybody.
JVL00:09:16I was done. I was just like.
Vic00:09:17You, Mr. Class President. Because I was saving my joke about, for example, because it was an Irish Indian wedding. And I said, that's great. I said, I thought the food was going to be a six pack and a samosa.
JVL00:09:28I will just say, because I'm sure we're running up against the clock here. You have a minute. If we have to kill the show to save the friendship, I'm willing to do that. So I guess the show goes on.
Sonny00:09:40Yeah, I mean. I don't really see that happening. I don't know. I'm sure it's fine.
?00:09:51Yeah.
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