Aug. 27, 2026

DCN Live - Mulaney’s Late-Night Misfire, Rosie O’Donnell Rumors & Arthur Treacher’s Returns

Show Notes
Transcript

Johnny Mac records poolside while his basement studio is cleaned, noting he finally got the pool reasonably clean. He’s surprised his college students don’t know Bill Burr, briefly comments on Theo Von’s podcast with Nate Bargatze, and revisits why a Rosie O’Donnell late-night show “is just not gonna happen,” citing her age, budget pressures, and that Netflix couldn’t draw viewers to John Mulaney’s late-night show despite high-profile guests like David Letterman, Jerry Seinfeld, and others. Drawing on his radio experience, he argues Mulaney’s show was misproduced because it should have focused on individual guests, following a “Johnny Carson theory.” He also mentions Rosie responding to a White House comment with a Trump photo, and shares a Cleveland.com story about an Arthur Treacher’s opening in Lakewood, including Bob Hope’s role in helping launch the chain.

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WEBVTT

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Hey, Johnny Mac, cool side. We are outside today. The

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cleaning lady's here, and she's cleaning the basement studio. So,

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aside from the beautiful day, we are outside. As you

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can see, I finally got the pool reasonably clean, which

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is nice. We'll see if the leaf robot kicks in

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at some point. A couple of random things I wanted

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to talk about today. I do teach college classes, and

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on Monday night, I asked the college students if they

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knew who Bill Burr was, and they had no idea. Boy,

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it goes quickly. I mean, I know I do this

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for a living, but I don't think Bill is the

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most obscure comedian out there. That was kind of shocking

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to me. I was listening to Theo Vaughn. His guest

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was controversial maggot comedian Nate Bregazzi. I didn't last with

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it long. I know Theo's show is super popular, but

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he's just not smart. That's all I have to say

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on that. I'm still hung up on Rosie O'Donnell getting

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a late night show, which is just not going to happen. Rosie,

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66 years old. The more I think about it, you

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may be familiar with Colbert's show ending, possibly because of budget.

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You may be familiar with Jimmy Kimmel being suspended at

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one point because the people in Washington were not too

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happy with him. Why would you go out of your

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way to hire Rosie O'Donnell and put the red flag

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in front of the wild bull? That's just not going

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to happen. Plus, I was thinking, Netflix gave a quote-unquote

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late-night show to John Mulaney and couldn't get people to

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watch it. Even with John Mulaney's star power, the guest

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star power, which I'll talk about in a second, and

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the algorithm, nobody was watching the Netflix show. So the

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guests on Mulaney's show included David Letterman, Jerry Seinfeld, Nikki Glaser,

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Stavros Halkias, Bill Hader, Wanda Sykes, Pete Davidson, Hannibal Buress,

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Marc Maron, Ronnie Chang, and others. Now, sure, the show

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was misproduced, which I'll talk about in a second. But,

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I mean, if Netflix couldn't get people to click on that,

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how is anybody going to watch Rosie O'Donnell on, I

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don't know, ABC at 1230 in the morning? That's just

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not going to happen. Now, I had a long career

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in radio, and I worked on a show called Rambling

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with Gambling, which was actually the longest-running radio show. And

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I worked with John R. Gambling, who was the third-generation

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John Gambling, to host the show. And I just remember

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one time in the mid 90s, I was asking him

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something about the format of the show. And he said,

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we've been doing it this way a long time and

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it works. Leave it alone. And he's right. So I

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felt with Mulaney's late night talk show, it was misproduced

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because if you have Jerry Seinfeld on the couch, talk

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to Jerry Seinfeld. But what that show did was they

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were trying to be quirky and mix and match the

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various guests. But it just didn't work because nobody knew.

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All right. Should I jump in? When do I jump in?

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Is it my turn? If you've got Jerry there. Just go, hi, Jerry,

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and shut up and let Jerry be funny. I call

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that Johnny Carson theory is, you know, Johnny knew how

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to make his guests look good and would stay out

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of the way. And then the next day, people would say,

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did you see Johnny Carson last night? I did tell

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you the other day that the White House had some

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comments about Rosie O'Connell. Well, she shot back. She shared

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a photo of Donald Trump from his golf resort from 2024.

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She captioned it. This is the guy calling me a slob.

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Hashtag mirror mirror. And as I put together the show today,

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this from Cleveland dot com, the headline is, Arthur Treacher's

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opens in Lakewood. Tap's like, what? What is this? The

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story is, let me tell you the big news story

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from Cleveland dot com. Arthur Treacher's is celebrating a grand

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opening in Lakewood, marking its first location on the West Side.

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The new location at eleven seven five Madison Avenue. Hey,

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if you're in Cleveland, bop on over. Officially open the

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doors at ten thirty a.m. on Wednesday. The space, as

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you know, was most recently Joe's Deli and Restaurant. but

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was previously home to an Arthur Treacher's, so it has

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returned to being an Arthur Treacher's. Where's the comedy? Stay

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with me, Cleveland.com. Who wants us to remember that the

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chain got its start in 1969 in Columbus and once

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boasted more than 800 locations worldwide. However, after bankruptcy in

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the early 80s, the Arthur Treacher's brand dwindled down to

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just a couple local-owned restaurants. Now, why did this show

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up on the comedy tracker? Because of this next paragraph.

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Bob Hope, the famed comedian showman originally from Cleveland... loved

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fish and chips, and helped launch Arthur Treacher's by suggesting

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that its founders hire the British actor as the public

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face of the company. Who knew? Arthur Treacher's is best

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known for its fish and chips, fried chicken, clam chowder,

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hush puppies, and other comfort food favorites, and apparently the

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pool robot is not going to move today. All right,

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back in the morning with a normal episode.