Don Reed (Part 2) - How Don Reed Turned Setbacks Into a Legacy of Storytelling

Welcome to the Legacy All Stars podcast. We feature inspirational stories from people who dedicate themselves to helping others. Here is your host, Alan Pavloski.

We're back with Legacy All Stars where we're talking to people that make a difference in the lives of others. This is a part two of a two part special episode featuring my good friend Don Reed. Hope you get a chance to listen to the first episode. Thank you very much for coming. And here's part two. You've talked about your new deal with Simon and Schuster, your publishing deal, and tell me about the direction of that and what the intent of that publishing deal is for and what are you going to talk about in those publications.

That was a wonderful situation that came about as a result of a Simon Schuster editor seeing me perform a particular show. And if now's a good time, I'll share the story of how that please do came about.

Yeah, absolutely.

Back in 1992, Johnny Carson called Robert Townsend at home and he said, I saw that guy Don Reed on your show and I want him on before I leave. I, I've got two months left. Have his manager call my office directly. And so Robert called me, he's like, are you sitting down? I said, I might be. What's up? He said, don Carson just called me at home. He's handpicking you. He's got two months left. He wants to blow you up right now. So have your manager call his office directly. I said, I'm on it. Call my manager. She's like, what? Excellent. So she's calling, you know, only two months left before he's leaving the air to retire. Now a month goes by, she's like, I'm having a hard time getting through as far as I can get is to this kind of gatekeeper guy who wants to see you do two or three minutes to see if you're good enough. I was like, oh, no, no, no, that's not what we're doing here. Johnny said, call his office directly. She said, okay, I'll cost more. So she's calling and calling down to three weeks, two weeks. Around the two week window or so. She said, don, I don't know if it's going to happen. In fact, it's not going to happen. Don't. And I was heartbroken. And I watched Johnny Carson tearfully say goodbye to 50 million people, thanking them for supporting them all those 30 plus years. And I was like, that's it, that's it. It's over. Three months later, I got a call from my manager's Office. An assistant, for lack of a better explanation, kind of a gopher, would get our coffee, book our flights, put toner in the copier. He said, don, I gotta tell you something, man.

She never called Johnny's office. I was like, what? Never called Johnny's office. Don. I know the call logs to confirm it. She sat us down. She said, we don't care if Don gets a movie or TV series or anything, as long as Don is booked on the road, the lights are on, the lease is paid. This toner in the copier, that's Don's role. He's the workhorse. Had me on the road performing everywhere, but that was my role. Forget about me being famous. And so I left. But I remembered a quote that Johnny Carson made. Johnny Carson said, the number one key to success is desire. Not talent, not education, but desire. So I kept my desire and I kept moving forward. Years later, I was standing in a BMW dealership looking at a BMW I could not afford. But you got to look to stay motivated, right? So I'm sitting there looking at it, and.

It was a call from the Tonight show with Jay Leno. And the. The producer on the phone said, hey, Don, the opening act warm up comedian gig has opened up. You get to do stand up every day in front of the live audience. Are you interested? I'm like, oh, yeah, definitely interested. He said, well, you know, I can't give you the job, but what I can do is I can get you down to the last three people who have to try in front of the live audience. Somebody was going the first day, I was going second day. Someone else was going the third day after the guy with the first day I went. The second day they came to me. They said, we don't care who was here yesterday. I was supposed to come tomorrow. It's your gig. Negotiated killer money, staying in town with the family, on the show multiple times as well. But the kicker to the story is that little assistant who called me, warned me, and told me that that manager was taking advantage of me. That little assistant, 20 years later, had become a producer at the Tonight show with Jay Leno and said, don, you deserve this. That that's how I got that gig. And that's the crux and base of the show. Starting all the way back from little blinky Don Reed in Oakland, knocking on doors as a tohova situs, finding out my father's a pimp, and then getting pushed through all the way to the hallowed halls of the Tonight show, which I did a thousand episodes and an opening act, and was on the show four or five times. So it changed everything for me and impacted so, so much.

Forgive me if I didn't know this already, because, you know, I should know all your shows, but have you incorporated that story in any of your shows and have you talked about it in front of live audiences?

Yeah, that's the one that the Simon and Schuster person saw. That show was called the Never Too Late Show.

Okay. And the show not fortunate enough to see that one.

Yeah. After all those years of going for it, all the best things happened at the very end because I got a phone call from Pat Hazel. Pat Hazel produced a show during the pandemic and forward that Seinfeld and Ellen, a bunch of other people were on, called Creativity and Captivity. And I told some stories on his podcast, including that story about getting screwed out of the Tonight Show. And he said, hey, Don, I got something coming up. So he called me about a couple months later and said, we're doing a big event at the National Comedy center in New York to induct a new exhibition with all the tonight's show footage, Johnny Carson's garb and hats and different stuff he wore. And we want you to tell your story. But everybody on that night, that variety show, you know, launching this new exhibit at the National Comedy center, have been on The Tonight Show 5, 10, 15. One woman had been on there 70 times, and here I come only telling a story about not making it. And then the host, Pat Hazel, said to the live audience, after I told the story about getting screwed out of it and getting the Tonight show with Jay Leno, he said, hey, folks, how you like to see Don 2000 people? He said, how'd you like see Don do that set he's supposed to do 30 years ago for Johnny? And they were like. And I did it. I got a standing ovation. I started crying. The audience was crying. And Johnny Carson's family approached me immediately and said, we'd like to give you access to the entire library because this is a. A great story about it's never too late, never give up. And so it's called the Never Too Late Show. At the end of the show, it turns away from me out to the audience. It's never too late to write that book, to take that trip, never too late to fall in love with. Got to normalize, doing amazing things late in life. But I found out through running the show, and I'll be doing it again on the fourth week of August at Deer Park Villa, where Redwood Knights is. We'll get to that later. But I'll be doing the show there live under the redwoods with a big screen, with all the footage that the family licensed to me. But there's something else I was going to mention, but I. I know you have a question.

No, I was just going to talk about resilience and one's ability to withstand disappointment and almost tragedy in life and still overcome those obstacles. And I think one of the things that's so poignant about that story is the fact that, you know, you've had a heartbreaking experience, that most people would just pack it up and shut it down. But what gave you the strength to keep going and to keep fighting through for the adversity you felt based on that experience?

I called my grandmother and my grandmother had said, donnie, you didn't get to do it. We was all excited for you because I watched Johnny Carson. My grandmother all the time, she's like, yeah, me too. You know, maybe something else good is going to happen for you at some point. And I called my father and my father said, baby, you know what you got to do, right? You got to keep going for three feet past the finish line. That's what you gotta do. You know that, right? Said, go 3ft, 5, 3ft past the finish line. But don't go for four or you might hit your forehead. And don't go for five or you might not be alive. So it's that family support, you know, that's connected to the stories that my father told me that kept me going.

Did your ability to get through that create some extra sense of self satisfaction based on the knowledge that you were able to fight through that adversity?

Yeah, because I knew at that point if I was going to keep going past that, I was never, ever going to quit. Maybe people take the time to recognize that moment when they were resilient, that thing they beat out. Because people sometimes don't take enough time to see how much they've made it through already. And if you could find that laser moment where you rose and fought and kept going, then you can always keep going and it can always be never too late. And I want to mention something about Older folks are told, hey, you 50 something, you 60 something, ain't about time you gave up on that. But people are told much younger. I relate the story of a woman who came to see the Never Too Late show in Berkeley. She's about 57. So you got to bring my daughter out to see this. My daughter, or really enjoy. This daughter came and her daughter had just graduated from UC Berkeley after going back to school at 30 as a single mom and graduated from UC Berkeley, now got a degree and was a managerial position in a corporate dynamic. And she was 30. She had just done her never too late. And she said, I got to bring these young women in my office who are 25 years old. People are telling them, stick with the safe thing. You know, don't try to do too much. It's too late for you to try that. Too late to try that. Stick on the safe route. So people are told it's too late, much earlier than we'd expect. We know someone may say it when you're 50 or 60, but you're told that sometimes when you're 25 years old, well, it's too late to try that. Won't you go the safe route and just do this?

We talked about this earlier. You know, the tipping point for people sometimes is a story about somebody who else who overcame. Have you talked to anybody else that has come back to you and say, you know what, your story made me move forward with something I was doubting myself on. And how did that impact you?

Yeah, a number of folks. I want to relate this story of this young guy after the show. He said, can I buy you a drink? I need to talk to you. He said, about maybe six, four, white kid with cool hair, really handsome with his beautiful girlfriend. He said, we were walking around in Berkeley and we said, let's go see some comedy at night. Where's some comedy? Aren't any comedy clubs in Berkeley specifically? And they said, what's this Never Too Late show? It's got a comics, let's go and see this. And he, they came to see the show and we went in the bar, we had a beer. He said, man, you don't know how badly I needed to see this show. He said, I have been.

Most recently in the tech world and I'm doing very, very well. But I gave up on a dream because people said, and they get a little late for that. He said, I'm 24 years old and I gave up on baseball. He said, and I was on the semi pro teams. I was on the farm league. I was one step away and I stopped because everybody said, isn't it a little late for that? He said, I'm going back, I'm going back, I'm going to try. I'm going to check in with them pretty soon. I don't know how it turned out yet, but that was an instance where I know in real time it hit somebody in the chest and made them go, oh, I got to go for it. I got to go for it.

Yeah. I mean, look, you've made a lot of impact on a lot of people with, with the stories that you tell and with the inspiration you give them. You said a lot about your current work being all about legacy. You know, in our previous conversation, that's what came up. What does legacy mean to you now, especially on this show, Legacy All Stars.

It truly means leaving something behind that genuinely and directly uplifts others. A lot of people will align legacy with their name being on a building, but I rather have my name on someone's heart and have them go, he left behind a track, a direction, an example that I am from Oakland, perhaps, or I'm from an inner city dynamic that doesn't give me all the opportunities that you may get somewhere else. But if I can leave a legacy to my sons and to other young people of color and walks of life and gender focus, then I will have done my job. Leave these stories behind that have messages like, be yourself, never too late. Nothing is too wonderful to be true. Through those stories, the legacy will be of good and positivity and all linked to moving forward and going higher.

Wow. Great stuff, man. Let's just talk a little bit now about Redwood Nights. This is something I've been looking forward to talking to you about. You've been a part of Redwood Nights, which is storytelling under the stars. Tell us what makes this gathering so special.

Oh, wow. Redwood Nights. Very, very special. It's a deer park villa in Fairfax. It's been for years a wedding location, a wedding destination. They do world class weddings there. But I joined forces with a business partner and friend, Mike Girangeli, and his family has owned that property for quite a few years. As I was told the story years ago, his grandfather and grandmother came to that property, to this little diner and they were eating there and they said, wouldn't it be wonderful to have a place like this one day, you know? And so grandpa Joe worked and worked and the grandma worked and worked and they bought that property and. But one of the kickers to the story is the towering redwoods, towering beautiful redwoods that are set in this like circular grove. A hundred years ago, they weren't even there. Grandfather went to the hills and got some 15 foot saplings and planted them. And over a hundred years of weddings and events and life celebrations were there. Sharing stories in this wonderful setting with a mixture of couches and pine chairs. You can have a glass of chardonnay or A cocktail, have some grilled oysters and listen to people get inside your chest with some stories that are sometimes funny, sometimes moving, but all of them are true. Storytellers from npr, hbo, people like Glenn Washington from Snap Judgment and just world class storytellers and, and people who've won the moth many, many, many, many times over are there as well. And I host the show and I remember the first time, you know, we were working on a comedy club out there and my business partner Mike took me to the property for the first time. When I walked through this archway, I got a knot in my throat. I said, oh, I know what needs to happen here. He said, what? I said, storytelling under the stars. Redwood Night. Storytelling under the stars. He said, you think people want to come to that? Two years later, just about almost, here we are and we're there the second and fourth Wednesday of every month. We're either doing me hosting with four other storytellers or myself or another master storyteller is there doing a whole storytelling show. So I get to do all my one man shows and other big players get to do their one man shows there as well.

How long does a typical show last on redwood nights?

About 90 minutes, but it starts at 7, so it's. It's on the earlier side so people can get home once in a while. We do have Friday shows intermittently, but the main shows are the second and the fourth Wednesday and people can go to redwoodnightslive.com and get some tickets and they will not regret it at all.

Yeah, amazing. I understand you call Redwood Nights a different kind of AI. What do you mean by that?

Oh yeah.

I have had some very good experiences with AI artificial intelligence, but I know in some sequences of people's lives it can be too much. I think we keep using AI in a nice productive additive fashion. It can be very good. But some people lean on it so hard they're not really doing any work. And it shows no human touch, no true knowledge of the content. There's a lot of AI artificial intelligence out there. And storytelling can be one of those first things that are truly connected to human connection. But that's why I say we're doing AI as well. Out there under the redwoods while sharing stories. We're doing AI as well, but it's called authentic interaction.

We ask people, we beg of you, requests to turn off your phone during the intermission. Try not to check it. Introduce yourself to someone around you that you may not have met. Otherwise. When you share the show with someone else, try to tell them with your own voice or your own face rather than emailing or texting them. Tell somebody in a coffee shop that you had a smile or have having a good day. Hey, I know something you might want to dig that human connection is so important. You know, Salman Rushdie once said, when a child is first born, the first thing they request is love and protection. The very next thing that child asks for is to tell me a story. That's how deeply connected storytelling is to we as these human things that walk on our hind legs, if you will.

Yeah. Wow. Amazing stuff, man. If someone's listening today and thinking, maybe it's too late for me, what would you say to them?

Oh, it is not, it is not, it is not over until it's time for the dirt nap. That's what I say. I don't say try out for the NBA at 47 years old. Don't want to snap your ACL or something. But there's so many things that people say isn't about time for that. You have to put in perspective. Pablo Picasso painted into his 90s, Twilight choreographed deep into her 70s. Gordon Parker took photographs deep into his early 80s. There are people doing things in their 80s and 90s, so for sure, when you're 45, 50, you don't really have an excuse. You got to go for it. And when you think about these people that have made those kind of moves late in life, you know, some people started some wonderful things in their 70s, so you got to take that cap off of was a bit too late for this and go in and dig in and get it. As I say, sometimes got to get that thing.

Did.

I try to tell people at every moment I have the opportunity to do so? To get rid of your limiting beliefs?

Yes, absolutely. Yeah. And get ready to leave your legacy.

Absolutely. How can people support your causes? Especially we talked about Elevate Oakland then also, how can they see your upcoming shows? Let's take that as a two part question.

Okay. Elevate oakland.org elevateoakland.org There are different ways that you can donate or you can make contact with us. Say you like to offer volunteer services or your artistic capabilities. It's fascinating. People take, you know, just take a little quick look at what their full skill set is. You never know how you might be able to aid others, but go like, what can I do? There's always something you could do. So elevate oakland.org we'd be so grateful for any donations or any assistance you might be able to have. And Sometimes it's the fact that you have a strong connection with someone. Like I happen to know this guy who is a music teacher who can aid them. And we do have some funding. So sometimes a teacher's coming in the mix and we're aiding them financially. One of the guys, Keenan Foster, he's at Anna Yates elementary school in Emeryville, K8. He's making a huge difference there and at Castlemont. And we have him on a salary so we can have that retention of great, you know, instruction. So that's oliviaoakland.org and then redwoodnightslive.com is where the storytelling happens. We're looking at other locations to have them besides Marin, where we just wrapped up something where we'll have a bunch of the storytellers of Redwood Nights and Carmel. But we're also looking at some East Bay locations. So keep your eyes open for all of that and more.

Yeah, I expect to be the first one to be notified about those East Bay locations.

And you will. I'll go.

We're ready to go.

Absolutely. Let's talk about one more thing. What legacy do you hope to leave, not just on stage, but in your community?

Well, ideally.

I'll be able to.

Engage in some storytelling dynamics with the Marsh that long after I'm gone can still impact students. The Marsh has great students program, particularly in the summer. And I've spoken and performed for some of those very young kids before. And I think the more content I can create that can be left behind, then the communities can actually see it. And if they can see it, they can remember. That's some of the great things about celluloid and video is worse enjoying people long after they're gone. They left these incredible legacies behind. And that's all I truly hope to do, is that the stories live on and on and on and inspire them to go to higher ground.

Yeah.

Wow. What a treat it has been to catch up with you. I want to thank my special guest, Don Reed, for joining us today. His talent is only surpassed by his generosity and his authenticity. And I mean that from the heart, my friend.

Thank you so much. Thank you for having me on because it's very interesting. I don't know how many people mention this, but when you're on shows like this that are authentic and you start digging in below the surface, it helps you confirm what you believe as well. So it gives me as much as I hope to give your listeners.

Thank you for our audience. Please use this conversation as inspiration and keep making a difference until next time. I'M Alan Pavloski, signing off for Legacy All Stars.