Eliot Glazer, Paisley Rekdal, and Jonny's Day Out
Live Wire with Luke Burbank
This episode of LiveWire features comedian and writer Eliot Glazer discussing his essay collection about navigating queer identity, followed
Key takeaways
- Eliot Glazer describes closeted high school survival tactics, including adopting an elderly persona and working at Talbots while listening to NPR
- Glazer contrasts his neurotic comedy-scene friends with his boyfriend's 'professionally gay' crew during a chaotic Fire Island trip
Main topics
- Queer identity and coming out experiences
- Grief, family legacy, and poetry
Notable quotes
This is the book that you write when somebody is gone. It's the only book that you can write when you can actually say the things that you really wanted to say.
Conclusion
The episode delivers a compelling blend of personal storytelling, literary
Transcript preview
Speaker 2 (0:02) Hey there, welcome to LiveWire. I'm your host, Luke Burbank. All right, this week on the show, we're going to be joined by the comedian and actor Elliot Glazer. He's written for the TV shows like New Girl and Younger and Broad City. Plus, he's got a new book of essays. It's titled The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Gay, which is full of funny and actually really heartbreaking stories about his attempts to navigate queer life. He's also going to talk about how as a kid, He called into the public radio station WNYC in New York so many times, they finally just let him on the radio. Then we are going to be chatting with poet Paisley Rechdahl about her latest book of poetry. It's called Heritance, and it explores memories of parents and partners and children. Then we're going to hear some music from one of my new favorite bands, the Portland indie rockers Johnny's Day Out. It's Livewire, and it all starts right after this. Speaker 4 (1:00) From PRX, it's... Speaker 4 (1:11) This week, writer and comedian Elliot Glazer. Speaker 1 (1:14) So I guess it was just starting with that bookish neuroses that really just helped me flourish in my bad gayness. Speaker 4 (1:22) Poet Paisley Rechthal. Speaker 3 (1:24) This is the book that you write when somebody is gone. It's the only book that you can write when you can actually say the things that you really wanted to say. But then when that death happens, it was such a gift to be with my father when he died. With music Speaker 4 (1:37) from Johnny's Day Out and our fabulous Fabulous house band. I'm your announcer Elena Passarello and now the host of Livewire, Luke Speaker 4 (1:48) YAY! Speaker 2 (1:53) Oh my goodness, thank you. Speaker 2 (1:56) Thank you, Elena Passarello. Thanks, everybody, for tuning in from all over the country. And thank you for coming out to the Alberta Rose Theater here in Portland, Oregon. Speaker 2 (2:06) We've got a humdinger of a show for you this week. Of course, we're going to kick things off the way we always do with a little something called the best news we heard all week. Speaker 2 (2:19) Here's the thing. The news is pretty rough. It's pretty rough out there. But there is good news happening somewhere in the world, and we spend hours and days and weeks and sometimes months searching for it. Speaker 4 (2:31) And Speaker 2 (2:31) then we find it, and we bring it to you here on LiveWire. Elena, what is the best news you heard all week? Speaker 4 (2:35) Well, the best news I could find this week is a story about mange. Mange. Speaker 4 (2:41) It was a rough one, Speaker 3 (2:42) but Speaker 4 (2:42) it is actually really good news. And it starts with something a little more palatable. It starts with a venerable Nashville singer-songwriter named Jeff Vandiver. He's 78 years old. He has been writing songs since the 70s and 80s. He's written for Barbara Mandrell, Tim McGraw, and he has a new kind of increase in his followers. because he started putting on his Facebook page that has all of his gigs and when he's going to be performing his passion side project, which is working for Walden's Puddle Fox Rescue. And that goes all around the Nashville area. You know, Nashville's a pretty big city, and it's spreading out bigger and bigger and bigger. And with the deforestation and things that comes with that, the red fox population is sort of kind of... a lot more present in suburban and tri-urban areas. And they have been developing mange, this skin disease. But the good thing is that it's a highly contagious fox transmission disease that is very treatable. All you have to do is capture the fox, take it to a place that will treat it, and then let it out again. Oh, that's all. A little easier said than done. but not if you're Jeff Vandiver. As he has been documenting on his singer-songwriting Facebook page, he has been trapping foxes for years. In 2025, he spent 234 hours trapping, treating, and releasing 44 foxes. And at press time, the 2026 total is 60 foxes that are now not. Mange-free? Yeah, mange-free. And they're really communal animals. They're very territorial. They snuggle. They're very snuggly. So we really want to, the clearer their skin is, the less likely this is going to transmit. And he has like 40 times the social media followers he has ever had in his life. So I'm just hoping that home on the mange, like maybe he can make some kind of a song about it or something. Speaker 2 (4:40) Have you seen any clips of foxes laughing? Yes. I mean, if anybody needs a pick-me-up who's hearing this on the radio or whatever, pull over, but then just Google the sound of a clip of foxes laughing. It is the most adorable thing you've ever seen. The best news I heard all week was happening out on Staten Island in New York, where there is a little neighborhood bodega. It's called Zach's Finest Deli. And the guy who runs it is a guy named Wael. Al Selwi, everybody just calls him Wally. And as often happens in a neighborhood, you know, this bodega is kind of like where all the kids go and hang out. It's like the one fun place. They have candy. And a few years ago, there was a particular kid who Wally became really friendly with. This was a 12-year-old kid named Zamir Davis. Zamir Davis was not doing great at school. Speaker 4 (5:28) Wally Speaker 2 (5:28) was kind of taking him under his wing. And Wally said, if you can improve your grades, in fact, if you can get on the honor roll at your school and prove it to me. I will let you pick anything you want in the bodega. And so Zemir went off and improved his grades and got on the honor roll, Speaker 4 (5:45) brought Speaker 2 (5:46) his report card back, showed it to Wally, and was then allowed to pick anything he wanted in the store. Here's what he went with. The cash Speaker 4 (5:53) register. Speaker 2 (5:53) Multiple bags. He's now doing five to ten in Sing Sing. Speaker 4 (6:00) Good job. Speaker 2 (6:02) Zamir picked out bags, multiple bags of spicy sweet chili Doritos, a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich, cookies and cream milkshake topped with Oreos and Hershey pieces because he's a health nut, obviously. Speaker 1 (6:13) So Speaker 2 (6:13) what happened was while he videotaped this, Zamir running around getting all his stuff in the store and put it on the internet. And of course, the internet got really interested in this and kids just start showing up at the bodega. like a lot of kids, and they're just bringing in their report cards. And there's so many kids that Wally's like, okay, I guess we're going to make this a program. He's calling it Grades for Grabs. You bring in your grades, and then depending on how you've done, you get to pick something out of the store. And these are a lot of kids that are coming from some economically marginalized backgrounds, kids that have a lot of challenges. And so this is really incentivizing these kids. It may be working too well. People have now been coming in from other states to bring their report cards. People have traveled from Illinois, Oklahoma, and Canada. Oh, Speaker 4 (7:01) God. Speaker 2 (7:02) To show Wally their grades. When the report cards are coming out, there are sometimes 300 kids in front of the bodega waiting to show their grades. So their official system is this. This is how grades for grabs works. If you score below 80%. You can come in and show your report card. You can get $10 worth of items. If you're scoring above 90%, you can get your pick of a snack. If you're getting 100%, you get a $100 bill. Speaker 2 (7:31) This was costing Wally like a lot of money. His profit margins. And so he was going to shut it down. And his brother was like, let's just try something. So they did a GoFundMe and they raised half a million dollars. Speaker 2 (7:45) On the GoFundMe. Speaker 2 (7:48) Grades for grabs. And this is one of the coolest things about it, too, is that this guy, Wally, he and his family came here from Yemen. And he says he's got children of his own. He really sees his children in a lot of these kids that he's befriended and is helping out. So the way that it's structured is... If you are a kid and you're failing and then you move your grades up into passing, you get the top tier prize like someone who's getting 100. Speaker 4 (8:13) Oh, I love that. Right? Yes. Yeah. Because that change is almost as big, if not bigger, as somebody who goes from an A to an A plus, for example. Speaker 2 (8:22) Absolutely. And so that is the best news that I heard all week. Speaker 2 (8:34) All right, you're listening to Live Wire Radio. We are at the Alberta Rose Theater this week. Let's bring our first guest on out. Elliot Glazer is a comedian and actor known for his roles in An American Pickle on HBO, as well as the show Broad City, where he played Elliot. Truly an acting challenge. He's also a musician and he's a writer with a new book out, The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Gay, which Kirkus calls a hilarious, playful assessment. From an anti-hero living on the fringes of the gay community, please welcome Elliot Glazer to Livewire. Speaker 2 (9:21) Hi, Elliot. Hello. The beginning of this book, you talk about one of your first jobs was you were doing some kind of weeding and gardening for your mom's esthetician. That's right. And you'd be listening to NPR on a little radio in your pocket. I'm wondering, did that stunt the trajectory of your life to be a 12-year-old kid rocking out that hard to NPR? Speaker 1 (9:45) Stunt? I think it blossomed my youth. I was always an NPR geek. Really? Yeah, we listened to, I'm from New York, so even early on, there was a show on public radio on WNYC called New York Kids, and I listened to it so religiously, and I would call in every week to win prizes, and they literally were like, dude, you can't win another prize. They were like, why don't you just come into the studio and co-host the show as a kid, which I did. What? Yeah. And then when I got there, I must have been like eight. And when I got there, the team was like, you know, excited or just probably like, who is this elderly child? And they were like, oh, we had a bet on whether or not you had glasses. A lot of people won. A lot of people won. Speaker 2 (10:36) You write in the book that you were kind of an anxious kid. This is a list of things that you write you were afraid of. Alien abduction. Roller coasters, the texture of marshmallows, the actor Dom DeLuise, and his twin, the celebrity chef Paul Prudhomme, who I thought were the same person until I was in my mid-20s. Totally. So did I, Speaker 1 (10:59) of course. How were they Speaker 2 (11:00) able to operate with impunity as Speaker 1 (11:02) basically the same person? But why did those kinds of things seem to make you anxious, Elliot Glazer? I don't know. I'm like, as a kid, I was born so anxious and nervous about everything. I don't think you mentioned, maybe I didn't write it, that I was so afraid of movie trailers, but only in the theaters. Speaker 2 (11:21) So Speaker 1 (11:21) we'd go to see a movie and I would insist on whichever grown-up that I was with that we'd stand outside the theater and plug my ears until they were done. My poor... And parents were like, oh my God, this kid. Well, Speaker 4 (11:36) it is a little ominous to be like, Speaker 1 (11:37) coming soon. In a world. I think, I mean, as a kid, my reasoning was that they were louder. For me, it's more so misophonia, like people chewing and food noises. I want Speaker 2 (11:52) to find out about more of your anxieties, but we have to take a very short break. My anxiety is when we miss the break here on Livewire. So let's do that. And then come back with more with Elliot Glazer here on LiveWire. Stay with us. Speaker 2 (12:19) Kiln Portland is a thoughtfully designed co-working community in the heart of Southeast Portland built for individuals, teams, and companies to do their best work. With flexible offices, meeting spaces, wellness amenities, and a vibrant professional community, Kiln brings workspace and hospitality together under one roof. More than a place to work, Kiln is a place to connect, create, and grow, proudly supporting the people, ideas, and creative energy that make Portland such a special place. Learn more at kiln.com. Speaker 2 (13:10) Hey, welcome back to Livewire from PRX. We are talking... To Elliot Glazer about his new book, The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Gay.