01-14-2004, 04:18 PM
In this months FHM magazine, Opie and Anthony do an extensive interview on "How to get fired". They also go into what's happening with them.
Click here for the link
For those that are too lazy to click over, below is the interview. Enjoy
Nationally syndicated radio gods Opie & Anthony were pulled off the airwaves in August 2002 when a couple participating in the show's annual Sex for Sam competition was accused of doing the dirty in New York's St. Patrick's Cathedral. When the pair sat down with FHM to offer advice on how to piss off your boss for February's "Comedians' Guide to Life," they had more choice words than one page could contain. Here are further excerpts from the duo's first interview about getting canned-in which the two also delve into the time they got the c-word on broadcast television, when to give pies to dying children and how to trick a major metropolitan area into believing the local mayor is dead.
On their current employment situation
Anthony The fallout from the Sex for Sam controversy has been that The Opie & Anthony Show, which was syndicated to many major markets throughout the country is no longer on the air. And we are sitting, eagerly awaiting our return to the airwaves. We want to work. We love the medium of radio, but due to contractual issues, we can't go on the air until June.
Opie Yeah, contracts aren't the greatest thing. I didn't know what I was signing at the time.
A The company's always going to get what they want in a contract. Your lawyer or agent's job is to then negotiate with them to get the best deal for you. It's never exactly what you want though. Usually the company gets a few things that you wouldn't like in there. The fact that we're not working right now is a good example of that. But at the time that you're signing them, it's all balloons and birthday cake.
O Oh yeah, the boss came in with a five-foot pen for us to sign the contract. Everything was great. I'm like, "Maybe I should read this thing before I sign." And they're like, "Oh, you don't need to read that."
A I'll compare it to something people can understand: a marriage. You go into a marriage and everyone's in love, so you don't think about the possibility of it ending. You just eat your cake and dance and put on the sunglasses and play the big blow-up saxophone with your friends. But then before you know it, you're in court going, "How much? What happened?"
O Anthony and I are pretty intelligent guys, but when it comes to simple stuff like contracts, we're idiots.
A We really don't have much of a window to do any kind of work because we're still under this contract. Viacom [the company that controls the contract] doesn't want us working for them or anyone else at this point.
O We pretty much gotta tell them when we're gonna dump.
A At first, it was like, "Damn, I'm going to Disney World. I'm going to the Bahamas." Then after a while, it's like, "I could go to the Bahamas again, but what am I going to do?" You find things to occupy the time. I think I've seen every DVD that's been put out.
O You realize all of your friends have jobs. I wish this happened to me when I was 22, so I could call up all the guys and go to the beach. You make phone call after phone call after phone call and realize you're the only one not working.
A It's amazing. There is nothing going on in radio now. And I don't say this as a poor schlep who isn't on the air. I don't have anything to listen to. There's nothing on in New York to make you turn your head from the road and look at your radio and go, "What!" Where's the controversy? Where's the fun? Where's the stuff people either loved or hated but at least talked about? It's gone.
O You gotta wait until June.
On the lessons of termination
A I don't know if there's much of a lesson to be learned from what happened to us other than: If you're going to do something, there will be consequences. And in some cases, there's no way to prevent the consequences if you go through with the entire gag. We could have been fired for 20 other things before the final Sex for Sam contest if the cards had fallen a certain way. Like the Voyeur Bus, where we had a transparent bus full of nude women driving through midtown Manhattan.
O I really think we should have gotten fired for getting the c-word on live TV.
A That was another one. We had our listeners getting on live local-news shots. We'd monitor the local news, and then when the camera went live, we'd tell people on cell phones, who'd jump in behind the shot. Soon we had guys in there with signs and gorilla suits. Then one day this woman is doing her live shot and right up behind her comes this sign. I think that's the first time the word cunt was on broadcast TV. The sign said, um, just "cunt," right?
O Yeah.
A But you know, come on, if you're sitting at home watching that, you're laughing your ass off. It's like "Did that just… Did… What the fuck? It just said cunt, and I don't know why."
O It was a TV station our parent company owned. So that's not smart if you want to keep your job.
A For these things, though, the fallout was always either, "It's going to be OK," or "You're fired." There's no gray area.
O There's no employee handbook for radio personalities. Any other job you can look it up and be like, "Oh, taking a leak in the office coffee pot is not a good thing." But with us, you never knew which was going to be the thing they fired us over.
A Whenever we get a new job, the first thing we say is, "We hope you enjoy the show. Someday you will tune the station in and we will not be here." Radio is a job where you don't get to say goodbye and you don't get two weeks' notice. Listeners tune the station in and there's not any reference to you. They don't allow you to even take that box and make the walk of shame out of the building. You know, that box with the folders and the little plant, maybe a Ziggy cartoon that's been on your file cabinet for ages.
O We know going into a new job that eventually we'll get the boot.
A It's a shame to have that attitude, but it's the nature of the beast. We have learned a few things though. Like not to send a couple to have sex in a church. That's a good example. There's a different climate now. There are a few people who can make a huge noise if they're offended by something. And they can negate what millions of people enjoy. They take the threat of economic warfare to the corporation, who listens to them like it's gospel.
O We need our own letterhead.
A Yeah, it seams if you have some fancy letterhead and you fire it off to a company with some threats and company sponsor names, you can pretty much control what a lot of people enjoy.
On getting the boot in Boston in 1998
A A lot of the radio jocks do these dopey, April Fools' gags. "Oh, look out your window at noon and you'll see a meteor!" Yeah, great. So Opie calls and goes, "Let's blow it out of the water with something so outrageous it will put all the other ones to shame. It'll end the genre of jocks doing these stupid things, because after this, where are you going to go?" So he goes, "I'm thinking we say, 'Mayor Menino's dead.'" I'd been out of construction, doing radio for about a year at that point. I was still just happy to be there. Plus, I had just woken up and was groggy, so I was like, "Yeah, whatever, O. Shooting planes from the hotel window? Great idea."
O When we went on the air and said Menino was killed in a car crash, he happened to be on an airplane, and no one on his staff could get a hold of him. So people panicked.
A At this point our boss started getting nervous because of the simple fact that he was getting calls asking what was going on. He came in and told us to back off the gag. Not stop it, just back off a little.
O When you're in the process of pissing off your boss, it's very important to lock the studio door so he can't come in. You figure it's going to take him at least an hour to find the plug to pull the show off the air.
A At that point, we were able to see a TV in another studio and the station was running flashes like, "Mayor dead? Radio prank? April Fools hoax?" It was like, "Oh Jesus, we're in trouble now." I don't believe we actually said he wasn't dead for the entire show. We just left.
O That's the beauty of how stupid we are. Our boss said, "As long as you say it's an April Fools' prank at the end of the show, it's OK." We said, "No problem." Then all of sudden, we ran out of time. I don't know what happened, but we hit the Limp Bizkit record and walked out of the studio.
A When we were off the air over the next couple of days, the shit hit the fan. Our bosses hung us out to dry to save their own hides at that point. We've been in that situation a number of times.
O You forgot to mention the pies.
A Oh yeah, our boss decides he's going to smooth things over. He calls the mayor's office and suggests that, in retribution for us saying the mayor was dead, we'll get into those old stocks that you put your head and hands through and let the mayor throw pies at our faces. We instantly said, "There's no way in hell we're having pies thrown at us." Where's the wacky horn on that one? So we went on the air that day and spent 45 minutes saying how stupid it was.
O And they'd already ordered the pies.
A They'd ordered the pies!
O Like a thousand of them.
A At that point, we knew we were out the door anyway. They still had to find a way to use the leftover pies, though, so they decided to send us to a children's hospital.
O They hired a photographer from a PR firm to take pictures and hoped the local paper would run shots of us handing out pies to sick children.
O We were sitting there, trying to figure out what the hell we got ourselves into when one of the nurses had the kids start singing Christmas carols. Now remember, this is April. This one girl did a beautiful rendition of "Silent Night." Just awe-inspiring. But the whole time I'm wondering in my head, "Why are they singing Christmas carols in April?" That's when one of the adults whispered in my ear, "You see Cindy there who just sang 'Silent Night?'" I was like, "Yeah, that was really nice." And the person said, "She's not going to see Christmas." Oh my God. Ant and I looked at each other like, "That's it."
A We told the photographer that if he snapped one picture, we'd kick his ass. We called the station and said, "Make nothing of this, you guys are vultures and assholes." We just gave the pies to the kids and got out of there.
A When the bosses don't know what the hell you do, you can't listen to their input. In radio, this guy is a suit. He knows nothing of what makes people laugh, but he's going to try to tell you about it anyway. Meanwhile, you're the one on the air who knows what the people want to hear. That's why you have the job. But the boss constantly has to be a part of that machine. Like this idiot we've just been talking about.
O We called him the Ameba because he had no backbone.
A He used to say that we should consider him the third member of The Opie & Anthony Show. The third member!
O That's like the boss who wants to go out with the guys after work: "Hey, guys, let's go get a beer!"
A No matter how much of a chum he is, he's not funny, and he doesn't know funny. He can tell you about how much the show's billing. That's great. But when it comes down to, "Guys, I don't think you should do this because I don't think it's funny enough to offset the risk," shut up. We're doing it. We know why we're here and what got us here.
O There is one other tip though: When you fuck up, don't do it on a slow news day.
A Yeah, that's a biggy. That'll snowball on you. Also, you can't go in on day one and lead with your balls. You gotta kiss a little ass at first. But after you build up a power base, all bets are off. You can jump on your boss and treat him like the dick he is.
Once their contract expires in June, Opie & Anthony promise a swift and triumphant return to the nation's airwaves.
Click here for the link
For those that are too lazy to click over, below is the interview. Enjoy
Nationally syndicated radio gods Opie & Anthony were pulled off the airwaves in August 2002 when a couple participating in the show's annual Sex for Sam competition was accused of doing the dirty in New York's St. Patrick's Cathedral. When the pair sat down with FHM to offer advice on how to piss off your boss for February's "Comedians' Guide to Life," they had more choice words than one page could contain. Here are further excerpts from the duo's first interview about getting canned-in which the two also delve into the time they got the c-word on broadcast television, when to give pies to dying children and how to trick a major metropolitan area into believing the local mayor is dead.
On their current employment situation
Anthony The fallout from the Sex for Sam controversy has been that The Opie & Anthony Show, which was syndicated to many major markets throughout the country is no longer on the air. And we are sitting, eagerly awaiting our return to the airwaves. We want to work. We love the medium of radio, but due to contractual issues, we can't go on the air until June.
Opie Yeah, contracts aren't the greatest thing. I didn't know what I was signing at the time.
A The company's always going to get what they want in a contract. Your lawyer or agent's job is to then negotiate with them to get the best deal for you. It's never exactly what you want though. Usually the company gets a few things that you wouldn't like in there. The fact that we're not working right now is a good example of that. But at the time that you're signing them, it's all balloons and birthday cake.
O Oh yeah, the boss came in with a five-foot pen for us to sign the contract. Everything was great. I'm like, "Maybe I should read this thing before I sign." And they're like, "Oh, you don't need to read that."
A I'll compare it to something people can understand: a marriage. You go into a marriage and everyone's in love, so you don't think about the possibility of it ending. You just eat your cake and dance and put on the sunglasses and play the big blow-up saxophone with your friends. But then before you know it, you're in court going, "How much? What happened?"
O Anthony and I are pretty intelligent guys, but when it comes to simple stuff like contracts, we're idiots.
A We really don't have much of a window to do any kind of work because we're still under this contract. Viacom [the company that controls the contract] doesn't want us working for them or anyone else at this point.
O We pretty much gotta tell them when we're gonna dump.
A At first, it was like, "Damn, I'm going to Disney World. I'm going to the Bahamas." Then after a while, it's like, "I could go to the Bahamas again, but what am I going to do?" You find things to occupy the time. I think I've seen every DVD that's been put out.
O You realize all of your friends have jobs. I wish this happened to me when I was 22, so I could call up all the guys and go to the beach. You make phone call after phone call after phone call and realize you're the only one not working.
A It's amazing. There is nothing going on in radio now. And I don't say this as a poor schlep who isn't on the air. I don't have anything to listen to. There's nothing on in New York to make you turn your head from the road and look at your radio and go, "What!" Where's the controversy? Where's the fun? Where's the stuff people either loved or hated but at least talked about? It's gone.
O You gotta wait until June.
On the lessons of termination
A I don't know if there's much of a lesson to be learned from what happened to us other than: If you're going to do something, there will be consequences. And in some cases, there's no way to prevent the consequences if you go through with the entire gag. We could have been fired for 20 other things before the final Sex for Sam contest if the cards had fallen a certain way. Like the Voyeur Bus, where we had a transparent bus full of nude women driving through midtown Manhattan.
O I really think we should have gotten fired for getting the c-word on live TV.
A That was another one. We had our listeners getting on live local-news shots. We'd monitor the local news, and then when the camera went live, we'd tell people on cell phones, who'd jump in behind the shot. Soon we had guys in there with signs and gorilla suits. Then one day this woman is doing her live shot and right up behind her comes this sign. I think that's the first time the word cunt was on broadcast TV. The sign said, um, just "cunt," right?
O Yeah.
A But you know, come on, if you're sitting at home watching that, you're laughing your ass off. It's like "Did that just… Did… What the fuck? It just said cunt, and I don't know why."
O It was a TV station our parent company owned. So that's not smart if you want to keep your job.
A For these things, though, the fallout was always either, "It's going to be OK," or "You're fired." There's no gray area.
O There's no employee handbook for radio personalities. Any other job you can look it up and be like, "Oh, taking a leak in the office coffee pot is not a good thing." But with us, you never knew which was going to be the thing they fired us over.
A Whenever we get a new job, the first thing we say is, "We hope you enjoy the show. Someday you will tune the station in and we will not be here." Radio is a job where you don't get to say goodbye and you don't get two weeks' notice. Listeners tune the station in and there's not any reference to you. They don't allow you to even take that box and make the walk of shame out of the building. You know, that box with the folders and the little plant, maybe a Ziggy cartoon that's been on your file cabinet for ages.
O We know going into a new job that eventually we'll get the boot.
A It's a shame to have that attitude, but it's the nature of the beast. We have learned a few things though. Like not to send a couple to have sex in a church. That's a good example. There's a different climate now. There are a few people who can make a huge noise if they're offended by something. And they can negate what millions of people enjoy. They take the threat of economic warfare to the corporation, who listens to them like it's gospel.
O We need our own letterhead.
A Yeah, it seams if you have some fancy letterhead and you fire it off to a company with some threats and company sponsor names, you can pretty much control what a lot of people enjoy.
On getting the boot in Boston in 1998
A A lot of the radio jocks do these dopey, April Fools' gags. "Oh, look out your window at noon and you'll see a meteor!" Yeah, great. So Opie calls and goes, "Let's blow it out of the water with something so outrageous it will put all the other ones to shame. It'll end the genre of jocks doing these stupid things, because after this, where are you going to go?" So he goes, "I'm thinking we say, 'Mayor Menino's dead.'" I'd been out of construction, doing radio for about a year at that point. I was still just happy to be there. Plus, I had just woken up and was groggy, so I was like, "Yeah, whatever, O. Shooting planes from the hotel window? Great idea."
O When we went on the air and said Menino was killed in a car crash, he happened to be on an airplane, and no one on his staff could get a hold of him. So people panicked.
A At this point our boss started getting nervous because of the simple fact that he was getting calls asking what was going on. He came in and told us to back off the gag. Not stop it, just back off a little.
O When you're in the process of pissing off your boss, it's very important to lock the studio door so he can't come in. You figure it's going to take him at least an hour to find the plug to pull the show off the air.
A At that point, we were able to see a TV in another studio and the station was running flashes like, "Mayor dead? Radio prank? April Fools hoax?" It was like, "Oh Jesus, we're in trouble now." I don't believe we actually said he wasn't dead for the entire show. We just left.
O That's the beauty of how stupid we are. Our boss said, "As long as you say it's an April Fools' prank at the end of the show, it's OK." We said, "No problem." Then all of sudden, we ran out of time. I don't know what happened, but we hit the Limp Bizkit record and walked out of the studio.
A When we were off the air over the next couple of days, the shit hit the fan. Our bosses hung us out to dry to save their own hides at that point. We've been in that situation a number of times.
O You forgot to mention the pies.
A Oh yeah, our boss decides he's going to smooth things over. He calls the mayor's office and suggests that, in retribution for us saying the mayor was dead, we'll get into those old stocks that you put your head and hands through and let the mayor throw pies at our faces. We instantly said, "There's no way in hell we're having pies thrown at us." Where's the wacky horn on that one? So we went on the air that day and spent 45 minutes saying how stupid it was.
O And they'd already ordered the pies.
A They'd ordered the pies!
O Like a thousand of them.
A At that point, we knew we were out the door anyway. They still had to find a way to use the leftover pies, though, so they decided to send us to a children's hospital.
O They hired a photographer from a PR firm to take pictures and hoped the local paper would run shots of us handing out pies to sick children.
O We were sitting there, trying to figure out what the hell we got ourselves into when one of the nurses had the kids start singing Christmas carols. Now remember, this is April. This one girl did a beautiful rendition of "Silent Night." Just awe-inspiring. But the whole time I'm wondering in my head, "Why are they singing Christmas carols in April?" That's when one of the adults whispered in my ear, "You see Cindy there who just sang 'Silent Night?'" I was like, "Yeah, that was really nice." And the person said, "She's not going to see Christmas." Oh my God. Ant and I looked at each other like, "That's it."
A We told the photographer that if he snapped one picture, we'd kick his ass. We called the station and said, "Make nothing of this, you guys are vultures and assholes." We just gave the pies to the kids and got out of there.
A When the bosses don't know what the hell you do, you can't listen to their input. In radio, this guy is a suit. He knows nothing of what makes people laugh, but he's going to try to tell you about it anyway. Meanwhile, you're the one on the air who knows what the people want to hear. That's why you have the job. But the boss constantly has to be a part of that machine. Like this idiot we've just been talking about.
O We called him the Ameba because he had no backbone.
A He used to say that we should consider him the third member of The Opie & Anthony Show. The third member!
O That's like the boss who wants to go out with the guys after work: "Hey, guys, let's go get a beer!"
A No matter how much of a chum he is, he's not funny, and he doesn't know funny. He can tell you about how much the show's billing. That's great. But when it comes down to, "Guys, I don't think you should do this because I don't think it's funny enough to offset the risk," shut up. We're doing it. We know why we're here and what got us here.
O There is one other tip though: When you fuck up, don't do it on a slow news day.
A Yeah, that's a biggy. That'll snowball on you. Also, you can't go in on day one and lead with your balls. You gotta kiss a little ass at first. But after you build up a power base, all bets are off. You can jump on your boss and treat him like the dick he is.
Once their contract expires in June, Opie & Anthony promise a swift and triumphant return to the nation's airwaves.
<center>![[Image: grumpsig.jpg]](http://volcano.photobucket.com/albums/0803/Grumpy/grumpsig.jpg)
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![[Image: carrottop-19200.jpg]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v62/TopperHarley/carrottop-19200.jpg)
