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Joe Rogan · 2024-06-27 · 3h 19m

Joe Rogan Experience #1962 - Eddie Huang

Eddie Huang and Joe Rogan riff on AI taking over, Vice's chaos, weed, fighting, curiosity over insecurity, and a near-derailed shotgun wedding.

Joe Rogan Experience #1962 - Eddie Huang
The guest

Eddie Huang — Restaurateur, author of the memoir Fresh Off the Boat, filmmaker who directed Boogie, former Vice host of Huang's World, and podcaster.

The gist

Eddie Huang returns to JRE after roughly six years for a sprawling, free-associating conversation. They open on his wild Vice/Viceland years and the absurd extremes of global wealth, then drift through politics, China vs. America as 'business models,' and social credit scores. A large stretch is devoted to artificial intelligence as a potential new life form that could codify the human spirit and even replace us. They also dig deep into combat sports history, weed and Adderall, the value of curiosity over insecurity as a creative drive, and the philosophy of competition, meritocracy, and open borders. The episode closes on relationships, with Eddie recounting how he nearly blew up his own shotgun wedding the week prior.

Big reveals

  • Eddie says Viceland burned money so recklessly that Shane Smith personally called him out for filming a food show at an Abu Dhabi F1 track.
  • Eddie admits taking Adderall during overnight shoots on his film Boogie made him uncritically positive and worried it hurt the work.
  • Eddie reveals he was tested as a kid, scored off the charts on an untimed IQ test, and doctors wanted to medicate him for attention before his mom refused.
  • Eddie recounts nearly canceling his wedding the week before, telling his pregnant fiancee he wouldn't marry her if she skipped the rehearsal dinner.
  • Eddie says he started a podcast with his wife because the years-long fallow periods between films left him 'rotting on my couch.'
  • Eddie shares his therapist's view that curiosity, not anything else, is the core of love in a relationship.

Things worth remembering

  • Vice sent David Cho to the Congo to look for a dinosaur and to the Hadza tribe to hunt baboons with bows.
  • Joe describes The Immortality Key, arguing ancient Greeks drank ergot-laced wine with LSD-like properties at the Eleusinian Mysteries.
  • Joe calls Canelo Alvarez's head movement against Danny Jacobs one of the most beautiful displays in boxing history.
  • Joe recounts being live in Sao Paulo for Marcelo Garcia's debut, where his arm-drag-to-back-take choked out Victor Shaolin.
  • They note the NBA stopped testing for marijuana during the pandemic bubble because so many players play high.
  • Eddie floats his brother's theory that recent leaps in technology like fusion may be reverse-engineered alien tech.
  • They discuss China's social credit score system and fears of pairing it with digital currency and vaccine passports in the US.
  • Joe describes a Bourdain interview where, at 58, Bourdain fell in love with Jiu Jitsu, got a six-pack, and competed in a tournament.

Recommended in this episode

Books, products and media the guest or host genuinely endorsed here — with the buy link.

Affiliate link — we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.

Guest’s ownMedia

Boogie

Eddie Huang

“there are days where we were doing overnight shoots on the movie boogie right and I have really I had trouble staying up on the overnight shoots” — Eddie Huang 01:46:15
Find it on Amazon
Guest’s ownMedia

Huang's World

Eddie Huang

“I think the end of Wong's world was just they were like yo we still want to do Wong's world but can we make it domestic” — Eddie Huang 00:00:35
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RecommendedBook

Shoeless Joe

W.P. Kinsella (inferred)

“I think you would like this book called Shoeless Joe Jackson and it became Field of Dreams but the book is really about the White Sox cheating scandal” — Eddie Huang 01:37:24
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Contact

“the original uh novel was by Carl Sagan and um they converted it into one of the best like Alien movies of all time” — Joe Rogan 02:12:19
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The Good Place

“the good place is uh Ted Danson and Kristen Bell and uh it's [funny] man I laughed hard I laughed hard” — Joe Rogan 02:43:31
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Abbott Elementary

“Abbott Elementary is good I guess that's what's happening it's about like School teachers in Philadelphia it's like the office but it's a workplace comedy” — Joe Rogan 02:42:28
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The Ms. Pat Show

“there's a few of them that are good Miss Pat's is really funny Miss Pat's is genuinely very [funny]” — Joe Rogan 02:42:28
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