good evening from los angeles. i'm tavis smiley. every one of us sooner or later experiences pain, but how do we find meaning in our suffering? tonight, first a conversation with rabbi steve leder, his book "more beautiful than before" examines the many ways we can transform physical, psychological or emotional pain into a more authentic and meaningful life. then, actor-comedian paul reiser is here to discuss his new hulu serie series," there's...johnny!" and his reoccurrin roles on netflix's "stranger things" and this last season of "red oaks." this dude is busy. we're so glad you've joined us. steve ledend paul reiser, in just a moment.

♪ >> and b contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ pleased to welcome rabbi steve leder back to this program, the senior rab at one of america's largest and most important congregations located in the heart of los angeles. his latest text is titled "more beautiful than before: how suffering transforms ."

he's a great guy, more important than that, he is my friend of 30 years, i think. >> 30 years. >> good to see you, my friend. >> you as well. >> i told you months ago when i heard you were doing this i wanted to have you on to talk about this, because we're living in a moment now where so many people are suffering with and from so many things. and yet, because suffering tends to happen in dark and desolate places, we can't see how when we're in it, it ultimately transforms us. >> yes. >> tell me the back story for why you came -- how you came to write this one. >> well, you can imagine, being a senior rabbi of a congregation with, you know,10,000 people in it, that you see an awful lot of suffering, you know. it's my phone that rings when people's bodies or lives fall apa apart. it's my phone that rings when they lose the love of their life, a spouse, a sibling, a parent, a child. so, i was witness to a lot of

suffering. i've been on the inside of many people's lives. and i thought i was doing a good job of helping people who were ering. and then i had a car accident that resulted in excruciating back pain to the degree that at one point i was essentially paralyzed from the waist down. i really -- my brain told my body to move, but it wouldn't move, which is a very frightening feeling. and i spiraled into physical pain, depression, opioids, steroids, and i suffered terribly. and i realized that all those years that i'd been talking to people about suffering, i knew very little about suffering. and i learned a great deal from that experience and decided that it was important to help people help others who are suffering.

and one of i think the important things about t book is that the book does not only address what do we do when we're the one who's suffering, but the book also deals with a very important topic, which is what do we do when we are the cause of another person's suffering? what do you do when you are the betrayer, not the betrayed, then what? which is its own sort of terrible, terrible pain. and it took me a long time to learn the lessons that pain had come to teach me. and look, not for a moment am i trying in the book or in my life to glorify suffering or to somehow pretend that this is only apparently difficult or evil or sad. no. as a fend of mine who had cancer three times, and when i visited him in the hospital the third time -- by the way, three different forms of cancer. when he was dying from the third form of cancer, he looked up at me from his hospital bed, hand and he said "this much character i don't need."

so i'm not pretending that somehow pain is, you know, a blessing in disguise, always, or that it's worth what we can learn from it, but it's not worthless. and the truth is, success doesn't change people very much. pain is the greatest teacher. it's pain that forces people to make changes in their lives in their relationships. so, it's a great teacher, if we're good students. >> so, i had a chance to get an early copy of the manuscript when you were working on it. and as i started thumbing through it, the part i was most anxious to get to is this part of the text where you talk about how you navigate the process of moving beyond being the person who causes the pain. say a word about how one comes to terms with that, because i have found at least in my own life that as you get older, and

as you mature, there's some things that in m life i regret having done. >> yes. >> there's some pain in my life i regret having caused. and you can't navigate your life forward beating yourself up every day for pain that you caused a former friend, a former girlfriend, a former colleague, but you can't live in that space, but you've got to come to terms with it somehow. >> well, you can live in it a little. >> yeah. >> because a little bit of guilt is a very positive lane corrector. you know how cars now have these warnings -- >> yeah. >> -- when you start to veer out of your lane? a little bit of guilt about your past behavior is like that kind of warning, like, ah, i never want to go back to being that kind of person. >> fair enough. >> i never want to go back to that kind of hurt, that kind of anxiety, that kind of embarrassment. so i think a little bit of living in the past is appropriate. you don't want to be shackled by it, right?

so, there are real and concrete steps -- the greatest thinker of the middle ages died over 800 years ago now, talked about a four-step process for meriting forgiveness. by the way, not only forgiveness from the victim, but self-forgiveness, which is a very difficult thing. the first thing you have to do is stop that behavior. just stop. the second thing is confess that behavior out loud. saying to one's self, i shouldn't have done that, i'll never do it again. to say it out loud to another human being and to god is quite another. confess. stop and confess. and then, you know, thirdly, you have to seek forgiveness. apologize. and finally, when in the position to commit that same mistake or sin or error again, and you do not, then you merit

forgiveness. you have done everything you can do. and i'll tell you, the sages are very wise. the ancient jewish sages that if you have gone sincerely through these four steps and have sought forgiveness, and the person you hurt refuses to grant that forgiveness three times, the sin is then upon that person. you have done everything you can do. >> let me ask you this. this is a politically impolitic question coming at you, like a fastball -- >> aren't they all? >> like a fastball down the middle. >> all right. >> but here it goes. you're a rabbi. if harvey weinstein and bernie madoff were members of your synagogue and you had to counsel them -- >> what would i say? >> can suffering transform -- dr. king put it this way -- there's some evil in the best of us and some good in the worst of us. >> yeah. >> can suffering transform harvey weinstein?

can suffering transform bernie madoff? >> it can. >> yeah. >> it doesn't m that it will. one has to be willing to go through those four steps i just suggested to you. i will say this about our feelings toward these people. there's a beautiful line in jothan saffron-foyer's new book "here i am," in which he says "everyone is wounded, and remembering a person's wounds makes it easier to forgive." so, the first thing i do when i'm dealing with someone who's done something horrible and whose life is falling apart, is i first ask myself, what is there in me that -- what pain is there in me, what deficit, what shortcoming? am i so perfect? let's give this person not a free pass,ut a chance. you know, people don't get up in the morning and decide to be horrible people or misbehave. i would say to harvey weinstein, i would say that the past cannot

be undone. it can be atoned for. and this is probably the last opportunity you will have in your life to become a different kind of person. and only you are capable of that. no one can do this for you. but you have an opportunity here. i say in the book, everyone was through hell, but the point is not to come out empty-handed. you, harvey, will decide whether or not you come out of this hell empty-handed. that's your decision, and there will be people who will support you in that effort, but the effort has to come from you. so ion't think any person -- >> is beyond redemption? >> well, is beyond the opportunity. there are people who are beyond redemption because they won't grasp the opportunity. >> yeah. >> pain is an invitation. it is an invitation to lead a

different kind of life. it's an invitation to be a more empathetic person. it's often an invitation to be a kinder and gentler person. that's why the book is called "more beautiful than before." pain can result in you and your life being more beautiful than it was before, even though it's broken. you know, in a way, we are more whole when something in us is broken, because it forces us to become a more sensitive and better human being, assuming we're willing to grasp that opportunity. >> what's the greatest stacle, then i have to go -- what's the greatest obstacle that we face to not wallow in our pain? >> the greatest obstacle we face is -- there's a chapter in the book entitled, "the prisoner cannot free himself." we cannot get out of prison all by ourselves, the prisons we create in our lives, the

addictions, the insecurities, the anxieties. the greatest obstacle people in pain are facing is the lack of ability or the unwillingness or the fear or the narcissism or the stoicism that prevents us from reaching out to another human being, that prevents me from reaching out to you, my friend, tavis, and saying i'm in trouble and i need you. >> fortunately, he's not in trouble, but if he were and ever needed me, he knows i would be there. >> and i would ask. >> as we have been for each other for 30 years. i'm honored to have him on this pogram. rabbi steven leadleder has a bo out called "more beautiful than before: how suffering transforms us." i highly recommend it. steve, thank you. love you, man. >> you, too. >> up next, actor paul reiser. stay with us.

actor-producer paul reiser has produced a media trifecta. he's in the position of having shows on all three major streaming networks. he stars in season two of "stranger things" on netflix, the final season of "red oaks" on amazon, and he has produced a passion project that wille available on the hulu streaming service starting november 16th. it's called "there's...johnny!" before our conversation, here now a scene from "there's...johnny!" >> that's your work. oh, well, i'm glad we cleared that up. [ laughter ] >> what's in johnny's hand? >> take thi to johnny. >> no! >> go! >> making believe you're here -- [ laughter ] [ applause ]

>> thank you. dinner for two at o'delise restaurant, is that how you pronounce it? >> i read somewhere you worked on this for a long time. >> yeah, not consecutively, but this is an idea my buddy, david simon, and i had 12 years ago? and once we realized that we wanted to -- it would be really helpful to actually use johnny's clips, so we needed thehe invoement of the johnny company. >> yeah, yeah, yeah. >> so, that's what took a long while. they're understandably very protective of, and they weren't eager to do things right away. but it took a while. and then, you know, among the joys of doing it was just the fact that they trusted us enough, you know, to sort of be the guardians of johnny's legac to an extent. so, but i had been on a lot, and johnny was always so gracious to me and helpful, and so, i have nothing but, you know, admiration and affection.

so i think theyelt he was safe in our hands. >> yeah. i would love to have been in that pitch meeting, as it were. when you ran this idea past them, because they are so protective of his legacy, as they should be -- >> yes. >> like, what was your pitch? >> well, it's interesting. the fella who's one of our partners who runs carson companies, jeff sotsing, who's johnny's nephew. we told him, we have a story, it's a fictional character, a 19-year-old kid who gets a job doing just menial odd jobs, but johnny likes him, so he can never get in trouble because johnny likes him. and he said, well, you know, that's my life story. i said, no, i just met you. but apparently, that's what happened. >> right. >> uncle john gave him a job, just go make yourself useful somehow. and no matter what trouble he got into, couldn't touch him, he's johnny's boy. so luckily, we kind of dove tailed nicely, but, so, it's really, it's all fiction. we made up these characters, except for you can't play

johnny, you know. nobody can do johnny. so the fact that we have the clips really seamlessly blends it and makes you feel like you're there. and we have such a great cast. tony danza you saw playing the legendary freddy -- >> he's great. tony's really great in it. >> so, it took a long time. and once it finally, they gave us the go, weind of went and we got all the cast, all our first choices -- jane levy and all of these terrific actors and we did it really fast we just did it a few months ago. so it's nice to see this thing finally fly into your homes. >> there are two questions that are historical in nature that i want to ask. >>s it a quiz? >> no, it's not a quiz. >> history quiz? >> this ain't "jeopardy!." first question is, if i had asked you this question 30 years ago, you m have had a different answer then. >> okay. >> as you look at carson in the mirror now, what do you so regard about him all these years later?

>> well, it's an interesting question, because even watching this, you know, the people -- when you're a kid and somebody's sort of locked in your head as what they were, so johnny's always, you know, the father figure. i'm 20 years older than he was there. so it's hard for me to remember, oh, he was -- you know, he wasn't always there. he was 40-something. and i certainly have an even greater appreciation now of his skill. and you know, the reason for his longevity, he was there 30 years. granted, it was a much less crowded field and you didn't have that many places to go, which would only made him more important. that was the place to get your seal of approval. if johnny carson likes you, you're doing okay. but in watching these clips and going through them to decide what clips to put in our show and how to use them, i got to watch a lot of them, and i just was sort of slack-jawed, like man, he's good! and he was funny and he

straddled that line of hipnd sort of conventional, you know, middle -- he was middle america, nebraska guy. >> nebraska, sure. >> everybody felt very comfortable with him, but he was hip and edgy and a little bit of bad boy, you know. and he made you comfortable. and it's a way that other than your show, because you're very polite, but no, in general, in general, talk shows, it's much ster pace and it's not always about making the guest feel at home. >> sure, sure. >> and johnny did that so masterfully. he just made everybody feel at home. >> you know, in preparing for our conversation and knowing that letterman is doing something for netflix now, i think. >> mm-hmm. >> i was pondering how johnny would fit in this moment. so i have a strange question, because every late-night talk show host has his or her day and they have their moment. but i'm only raising it because he was so funny and so gifted and so good with the political satire, the political humor, but this moment is so -- >> i can't imagine. >> it's rich, but it's also rife

with -- you know what i'm saying? >> yeah, it would be interesting to hear his voice at this time. but the interesting thing is you never quite knew where he stood. >> that's my point. >> because he straddled the line and would never do anything too controversial. >> that's right. >> and he poked fun to the gentle spots where you could poke fun and just have a nice laugh. but you know, we sort of have an indication when he went off the air in '92, we found out later, he was sending jokes to dave, right? because he couldn't stop the machine. and on the night that he passed, if you remember, dave went on and did a whole monologu and only afterwards said those were all written by johnny. >> see, what's funny about this, too, is that -- and i love all these guys, i love fallon, but as we all know, he stumbled for a minute trying to figure out how to do that late-night thing in the era of trump. colbert went another direction. you see what i'm getting at? >> well, the ground is shifting, yeah. and i'm sur if you look at the very, very first years of johnny carson, he hadn't quite found

his groove. he grew into it. and our show, we saet it in 197 when they had moved from new york to l.a., to burbank. and that was sort of an historically, a culturally historical moment because, first of all, it sort of gave rise to what became the comedy boom of the clubs. >> sure. >> people would be on a club and then featured on his show. but also, it just got -- it became this institution that it -- i don't remember it being quite that way earlier in new york. that suddenly that was the hip place to be, in burbank. he put burnk on the map. and, yeah, everybody finds their groove. but for sure, i would imagine -- and i always suspected that his politics were not what we would assume, you know? >> i think that's right. i just know it's really tough trying to figure out in this moment how to do the late-night comedy thing in an air when people are feeling -- >> you're going to lose somebody. but people are making their choices. you know, stephen colbert did a -- who's brilliant, and he

sort of went through his moment of saying, you know what, i'm trying to be in the middle, but i can't, so re's who i am. and by the way, it paid off. >> yeah, yeah. speaking of paying off, you're sort of on this retro wave right now. it's like, all you retro guys are back in fashion. >> yeah. >> what do you make of that? >> i don't know. >> "will & grace" is back. >> yeah. >> i keep hearing about "mad about you" maybe coming back. >> i don't know. all these shows, ironically, all of the three shows i'm doing are retro. >> what you're doing. >> but that's not on purpose. some people say that's so cool, you have three shows at the same time. i didn't plan any of that. it took ten years, just happened to come out now. but yeah, there is something -- i don't think there's -- it's not on purpose and i don't really think of retro, but there is something about putting it in a time period that makes it a little more relaxed when you look at it, because okay, it's -- that period is locked

off. or as you say, this moment is so excitable and precarious that i thin -- i never really thought about it to ask him, but i think there is something warming and comforting about, okay, the '80s seem -- and they weren't perfect, but they seem better. they were comforting. also, we were younger, so we look back fondly. >> we weren't getting alerts on our phones every two minutes about drama in washington. >> that's true. >> talk about "red oaks." so, that's on amazon -- >> they just added the third and final season. it was a very different type of thing. it's a very warm andn the best sense comforting kind of show. it's about a kid similarly, and i'm just an actor in that. i just show up and do my lines, but it's about a country club, and it was written by a guy who was writing his youth. he worked as a tennis pro at a country club in the '80s and this was the world he remembered. he had all these stories. and it's just a very sweet show at i hope people will continue

to find. you know, that's one of the nice things about the streaming and the world that we live in now. even though everything is hit-driven and you want attention and you want eyeballs, there still is the fact that now nothing disappears, you know. johnny, if you missed it, you missed it. maybe it will come around next year. but now people will find a show -- i know i get -- you can't watch everything when it comes out. there's just not enough time. so, i find that somewhat of a relief, like make the best show you can, put it out there, and people will find it and they'll come to it, if not this month, they'll get there next month. >> and "stranger things," the other one. >> "stranger things," i'm trying to help them out. you know, they are not -- [ laughter ] they weren't gaining an audience, and i feel -- >> yeah. >> you know, that's one of these -- that's sort of a one in a lifetime thing, a show that is so of themoment. we just, we had the premiere, and it was like a global event. i went, are you kidding me? and people all over the world in their own language areaving a "stranger things" party.

i'm going, what am i stumbled into? so, that's a really -- that was the easiest decision i ever had to make. would you like to come and play this role? yeah. just point me and tell me what to say and i'll be there. >> in a quick minute here, you talk about it just a second ago a bit, but what do you make of e way the business has changed from your "mad about you" days and prior to? what do you make of these? >> i mean, on the surface, there just seems like there are -- doesn't seem -- there are indeed more places to put content. and it gives you more freedom in these little niche places that, you know, used to be you had to think of the big, fat hits. what's going to be the home run? what's going to last for seven years? >> syndication. >> well, a lot of times you come up with an idea, you're like that's ten episodes and done. you couldn't do that in the old world. well, now you can. and the way the streamings work, it seems to me, it's like they don't need any show to be a particular hit. just come into our tent and we have these wonderful choices,

and so you watch that, you watch that, it doesn't matter, just come to us. to me, i think it's a plus, you know, for the creative community. >> well, you're making it work for you. >> that's all i'm worried about, really. [ laughter ] >> not one, not two, but on all three of the big -- >> i'm trying to work it out with my agent, even when you shut off your devices, i'm still there. that's hard. that's hard to do, but it's worth trying for, because otherwise, they forget you. they forget u, tavis. >> if anybody can, you can. >> nice to see you. >> that's our show tonight. keep watching, and as always, keep the faith. >> for more information o today's show, visit tavis smiley at pbs.org. >> hi, i'm tavis smiley. join me next time for a conversation with religious scholar reza salan about his book "god: a human history." that's next time. we'll see you then. ♪

♪ >> and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. ♪ >> be more, pbs.

good evening from los angeles. i'm tavis smiley. tonight a conversation with playwright eve ensler. more than 20 years ago, she unlocked an outpouring from women around the world when she started performing her play "the vagina monologues." she joins us tonight to talk about abuse and sexual harassment from men in fire and a new play based on her memoir. we're glad you've joined us with a conversation with eve ensler, in just a moment. ♪