Prefer reading your Black funnymen? Here is your jam!
Keith Knight and Ngaio Bealum got on a Zoom call with me. We talked The Rock politics & Sactown Japanese food. I adapted. It was fun.
Though hard to imagine, it’s possible for multiple Black men to get together and not discuss sports. Let us preserve this podcast for future generations.
Comedian Ngaio Bealum and cartoonist Keith Knight have in common with me the experience of living in pre tech boom San Francisco. The City through the 1990s was an accessible scene that was pregnant with creativity.
We are pure products of that San Francisco. Knight (Woke, The Knight Life) now has family life in Germany, but uses North Carolina as his base. (He was slightly tardy on the call for fowl reasons). International Cannabis Business Conference host Bealum lives in Sacramento and pops up when and wherever on the planet weed’s getting legalized.
Last week I talked to Bealum and Knight, from suburban Oregon, via Zoom. Our conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Donnell Alexander: Welcome to the Substack podcast that's known as West Coast Sojourn. We got a trio of voices today. People that you haven't heard. They should be together. They have been together. And I don't mean that sexually.
Ngaio Bealum: It's not too late.
If they have to poop, they just poop outside. Like you run inside to poop, they run outside to poop.
DA: Keith Knight and Ngaio Bealum, the San Francisco connection that's now so far flung we can't even call it that. But welcome to the podcast.
NB: Heeyy, thanks for having me.
Keith Knight: Yes, it is a pleasure to be here, and uh, yeah, San Francisco Connection, but now… Worldwide Superstars!
DA: I was going there. Why were you tardy? What were you doing? What were your problems out there?
KK: North Carolina problems. As you know, I am in North Carolina, just outside of Chapel Hill. And I saw one of my chickens run over to our coop. And so that means, “Let me in now. I'm going to lay an egg.” So I had to run out there and let the chicken in.
NB: Right. Because they don't have to poop. If they have to poop, they just poop outside. Like you run inside to poop, they run outside to poop.
Ngaio Bealum
KK: My youngest, when we first bought this house, I remember walking outside and he was out there pissing on a tree and I was like, what are you doing?
He's like, I'm pissing on this tree. “Why are you doing that? We have a bathroom in here.” He's like, “This is our land now, right?” I thought that was pretty cool.
NG: I'm here for it. Also, it keeps the bears away.
KK: That's what I say about snoring, is that my snoring keeps, it scares the bear away. And they're like, What are you talking about? There are no bears around.
I said, Do you see? Exactly.
NG: That's why, uh, why elephants paint their toenails red.
DA: Okay.
NG: So they can hide in strawberry bushes.
DA: [sad trombone sound]
NG: Hey, the reason you never see an elephant in a strawberry bush is because it works.
KK: Oh.
NG: I can't believe I have to explain this.
DA: Can I jump in here with some questions? Because I've talked to you guys separately, and it provoked some things I'd like to ask you together. Let's talk about Woke for a minute. One of the things I like about Woke is I imagine that it happened in the time that we were all in San Francisco. And I have my imagination and my recollections of time with Keith. But where were you, Ngaio, around that time? And what was your relationship to the man they call Keef?
NB: I first met Keith at a street fair on Clement Street. It was like a Clement Halloween fair when I was a young street juggler and he was a young street artist, caricaturist as it were. I still have it somewhere. I should find it.
KK: No, do not find it.
NB: Oh, no, it's embarrassing for both of us, bro. You should see my outfit. But I do still have it somewhere. I used to use it for flyers. And then that's how we met. Then we just always kind of kicked it. We were in bands at the same time. He was in Marginal Profits, I was in Most Chill Slack Mob. Just living our young, slacker, Gen X, creative San Francisco lives.
You know, smoking weed and causing problems. Good problems.
DA: Are you bummed that you didn't show up even in the margins of Woke?
NB: Me? If they got a Season Three, I'm sure I could have been a bit—
KK: I honestly think that the characters, the roommates in the show are an amalgamation of all the different people I knew in San Francisco and slackers, stoners, you know. Everyone had a job, but you weren't quite sure what it was. It's an homage. It definitely is an homage to that time. In fact, we were wondering whether we should set it in the 90s or in current day.
We were able to do it in current day, but people who knew us back then know when the show really does take place and police brutality is timeless, it's evergreen.
NB: Sadly.
DA: Badly. So let me ask you, Keith, because you, after Ngaio and and I spoke, you made mention of not being offered crack. If you had been offered crack, you might have tried it. Why do you think you weren't offered crack?
KK: I don't know. But what I'm saying, I guess, [is] that's another homage to back in the day. Like, back in the day, you could try anything and live, you know, you can't do that.
Now I tell my kid listen, if it's not some plant, if it's not some natural thing, don't take it, like, don't do it because inevitably something's going to have fentanyl in it and it's not going to be a good ending. So, we were lucky. We were very lucky and I had this very laissez faire attitude. I remember I would take anything in college. My first roommate in San Francisco gave me birth control pills once.
NG: And how was the buzz?
We're getting to the age now where like, Why should we put up with it? We put in the years here, the foolishness. Listen, I don't have a problem getting out of the States.
KK: Listen, I didn't get pregnant. So there you go. But it taught me a lesson. Don't just take anything that, that people give you, but I don't know. I guess I'm surprised at the amount of people I know who have tried crack and no one ever came out and said, “Hey, I got crack right now.” I don't know. Never seen it smoked or done.
NG: I got invited to a party once in, um, I think it was Rock Springs, Wyoming. It was some small town in Wyoming. I finished the show, doing like the shitty one-nighter tour. I finished the show and this guy was like, Hey man, we're partying in my place. I was like, that's cool, give me the address. So he gave me the address. I went back to the hotel, grabbed my bag of weed, right, and rolled out to this party. They were all sitting around smoking crack. That was the whole party. So I was there like 10 minutes. It was like, Hey, anybody want to smoke some weed? They're like, nah, we're good. And they’re like, Hey man, you want some crack? I'm like, no, I'm good. And then I left.
I probably should have come back. Cause I figured they'd be fucking probably like about an hour afterwards.
DA: I have to tell you the experience I had working in a Christmas tree lot, just like six months after my book bombed, that's how bad my book bombed that I was cutting Christmas trees down like six months after and everybody behind, you know, behind the proscenium, everyone behind the scenes was smoking crack and cutting the trees. And, you know, I had lied and said I knew how to work a chain saw just to get the job anyway. I definitely felt better than them because I was only smoking weed back there.
NB: Were they better at cutting trees? Does crack help you cut Christmas trees down?
DA: They were quick. I'll say that. [Laughter]
Keith Knight
KK: I always got the impression that people thought that like I was an innocent person and I shouldn't be spoiled. Like, Oh, don't, no, don't give it to him. Or maybe they just thought I'd be hooked on it.
NB: You're like the gifted athlete that all the gangsters are trying to protect.
KK: Kind of. Yeah, that would happen. I remember growing up, just outside of Boston, they would be like, Oh no, no, no, we'll leave him alone.
NG: “The boy's a genius. The boy got potential!”
KK: I think they were just all afraid of my dad, because my dad was huge.
NG: “The boy also has a father who'll kill you just as soon as he look at you.”
DA: I don't want to look back this whole time because it's 2024.
NG: Let's look forward. Let's look forward to new variants of diseases and pandemics.
DA: Funny you should bring that up. How funny you bring up pandemics and disease and pestilence. Because you're the rare pair of guests that I can invite on and say, you're genuinely international in how you live your lives. And I would love for you to give me—children aside—the best reason for staying in America at this point in history.
NG: I’d have to move a lot of people to Spain. Or actually Portugal would probably be the spot. That's the first thing. Also, I'm fucking stubborn, bro. You know? I'm stoned and easygoing, but I'm crazy hyper competitive and I'm a super idealist. So I'm always like, you got to stick around and fight for shit. You can't just leave other cats behind. If you're trying to embody the Bodhisattva, where you forego enlightenment until everyone else is enlightened, you got to stick around and do the right thing. But it's hard. I'm older every day. We can run up to Southern Humboldt and start a small farm and just be cool and give up Thai food at midnight because you live in a small town.
You dedicate your life to cannabis, and hopefully cannabis will dedicate its life to helping you.
DA: Once you've had it, it's hard to give it up.
KK: Yeah. Especially smoking what you're smoking. How can you give up Thai food at midnight?
NB: Listen, you live in a small farm and you grow what you grow, you can learn to make Thai food at midnight.
KK: That's true. No, you know, it's interesting, but I agree with Ngaio—the whole James Baldwin philosophy. When he moved to, to Paris he felt like you can't criticize America and leave it at the same time. You know, sitting somewhere else and going, “Look out, look at how bad it is over there.”
My sister got out though, a few years ago.
NG: Where is she?
KK: In Portugal, and they're living their best life. If I can get another show and have a decent amount of money because it's not cheap, it's not cheap—
DA: Friends I know who've left are also happy, so uniformly happy… You're talking about responsibility socially and this being-a-good-person business, but it just seems like a relief to them. That's why I asked.
KK: Yeah, we're getting to the age now where like, Why should we put up with it? We put in the years here, the foolishness. And there's a whole new generation coming up who I think they're more adapted to the modern tools to fight the same fight that we've fought, that generations before us fought.
Listen, I don't have a problem getting out of The States, if I had the means to. But right now I don't have it. It's great to see you, Ngaio, traveling the world. Seriously, you found your niche. The world pivoted to you, and I love that.
NB: Yeah, you dedicate your life to cannabis, and hopefully cannabis will dedicate its life to helping you. And everybody can have a good time, because I believe in the plant a lot. You know how I am.
Also, to your point, like, [Knight’s sister is] happy, and that's true, but also, happiness is a state of mind. You can be happy in the middle of turmoil, in the midst of revolution. Some people thrive on shit like that. But also joy is a revolutionary act, right? Continuing to stick around and to have fun in the face of this ridiculousness is something that I've always been a fan of and hope to try to do. I think of homeboy from Everything Everywhere All at Once. It's like, being kind and being nice is how I fight people. I'm paraphrasing. I don't remember the whole monologue.
DA: I think “Joy Is a Revolutionary Act” could end up being the title of this podcast. Since you’re on a roll, Ngaio, what's the big thing in weed that you're looking forward to in 2024?
NB: I'll be at the international cannabis business conferences in April in Berlin. Shout out to Alex and the whole ICBC crew. My plan this year is to get to some spots that have legalized weed that I haven't been to yet to try their weed.
I've never been to Detroit in my life and I know that sounds weird, but I really want to go to Detroit. I want to check out some of this Illinois weed. I'm going to see what's happening in Ohio. That's me.
Longer term goals? I really need international cannabis import-export to be a thing because I would like to buy Moroccan hash and Spanish [product] when I go to the dispensary. And when I'm in Spain, I would like to buy California weed, where it's not $40 a gram. [laughter] Yeah, you can get it in Spain, but they're going to charge you a lot for it.
DA: I think people would be happy if they could get legal California weed in Utah. Interstate commerce, before we get international trade.
NB: They just canceled that, actually. They were looking into it, and then the California attorney general is like, We are exposing everybody to a lot of risk. If we start exporting weed right now. Yeah, I mean, I buy California weed anywhere.
DA: You're probably smoking California weed almost everywhere except Oregon. (Editor: and Washington) That made me think about reclassification. Can you tell us, there's something going on with reclassification of weed. It might happen. No? What's that look on your face?
NB: They say a cynic is a disappointed idealist. And so every year congress will say some shit like, Oh, they’re going to do the SAFE Banking Act. Or, oh, we're going to reschedule cannabis. Or, we're going to loosen the restrictions on this. Oh, we're going to do that. They never do it. It's been 30 years.
DA: I heard it's an—
NB: Listen, Joe, Joe Biden just pardoned a lot of people with federal, nonviolent cannabis convictions. And it's a few thousand people. But the feds don't go after small-time cannabis users, right? If you're trying to get people out of jail, you gotta get people out of state jail, state prison. It's not necessarily federal prison for cannabis. Although they've let a few people out. Shout out Luke Scaramazzo and a bunch of other cats.
We all thought cannabis was going to be legal in Clinton's second term. And that was 1996. And so here we are. And it's going, it's going piece by piece. Germany's going to legalize. Switzerland's looking at it. Spain's got, Spain's got a plan. You can buy it in Colombia. It's going, but I need it to be faster. I would like to buy some Moroccan hash before I'm 70 years old.
KK: Also, psychedelics fans. Psilocybin. I would love to be able to trip on mushrooms, just legally.
NB: Come to California, bro. Go to Oregon, Colorado. All the hardcore cannabis activists, like the radical ones. They're all on mushrooms. They're not on mushrooms. I mean, they probably are, but that's the thing everybody's pushing for.
KK: I'm surprised at the amount of parents who micro dose, in North Carolina.
DA: Really?
KK: Yeah, it's shocking. I don't have any issue getting that and getting weed despite the fact that it's not really legalized here. It's like, they don't arrest people here.
NB: The last time I was in North Carolina, I bumped into some random kid at a bar who had a backpack. He had like four different kinds of weed. He had vape pens. He had dabs.
KK: I'm going to be vague about this, but there is somebody who goes around like publicly in our town. And they have the above ground stuff and then they have the below ground stuff. So they talk to you for a couple of minutes and then they're like, Oh yeah, I have the real stuff here. [laughter] It's pretty, pretty loose and pretty, pretty open.
NB: “I have the Delta-8. It's all Delta-8 THC, which is legal.”
KK: It's so absurd like in North Carolina, this Republican-run legislature, who is all about business. They can't think through the idea that if they legalized it before anyone else, there are four states around them that everyone would be coming across the border— just coming across the border and helping all these small towns. The fact that they don't think that through,
NB: You know, they do think it through. Remember, every time someone goes to jail for pot, some police department gets paid, right? Some sheriff's department gets paid. Somebody gets paid a per diem for keeping people in jail.
KK: That is true, but it’s such a strong tobacco state that I figured that the tobacco lobby could totally just switch easily to weed. And I figured that they could lobby hard, but I guess it’s the tobacco industry versus the police— I guess the prison industry. That's a heavyweight battle that we can't quite fight.
NB: It's the prison industry that you have to fight most of all.
KK: Yeah. That's true. I'm sorry, my cat. My cat and my wife are meowing back and forth at each other. Did you hear that?
DA: No, I did not. I'm going to ask the impossible. I'm going to ask that we pivot from weed.
NG: You started it!
DA: I know.
KK: How dare you?
DA: My 40th anniversary of high school, the reunion's coming up this summer. Should I go?
NB: Yes!
DA: Have you ever gone to a reunion?
NB: This is your chance to hit on that girl who you always had a crush on.
DA: She's not the same girl. Let's face it.
NB: Well, she probably still looks pretty good. You also look different. Uh, shout out, Debbie, and hope to see you in 2025. Hope you look good.
KK: I think classes should have reunions where it's three classes at the same time, so that the kids under you, the kids right above you, and they all get right. I think that half my friends were either younger or older than us.
NB: And also we're older now. So there's fewer of us.
KK: Where is it? Where is it located?
DA: Sandusky, Ohio.
NB: Oh, you have to go.
DA: Yeah, I've never been to one, but I feel like this is the time I should do it.
NB: Have you been back to Sandusky since you left?
DA: I haven't been back since 2002.
KK: Oh, you should totally go.
NG: It's time.
KK: You got out. If only so you can drive around and be like, Oh, what happened? That used to be the Burger King. That was where I used to get my hair cut.
DA: I just imagine it's going to be much smaller in retrospect now that I've been out and seen the world.
NB: Sandusky's going to seem like a small town. Was it the big city when you were a kid?
[Laughter]
DA: It seemed big. It seemed like the whole world. The greater Sandusky metropolitan area. Yeah.
NG: You know, that's where they originally set Superman, they just changed the name to Metropolis.
DA: Yeah, and I was Clark Kent. Another question, because we’ve avoided politics, with the exception of talking about rescheduling cannabis.
NG: Have we avoided politics? Is it possible?
DA: Who would you want to be president of the United States in this time? Who would be the greatest president?
NB: I would like to be the king of America for approximately four and a half years. And then I would willfully abdicate. But you have to do everything I say for four years. No take backsies. And we'll make everything a little smoother. You can't fix it all in four years, but you can smooth out a bunch of things and make it easier for a lot of people. Then, and then I would retire to some small island off the coast of Southern California.
KK: So it's someone who's alive right now, or is it like some fantasy?
DA: It should be someone who's alive.
Obama was good at working on the nuts and bolts, and he could also do the verb of presidenting. He could president his ass off. He'd stand up there and fucking look into the future like he's posing for a coin and everybody would lose their mind. It's hard to find somebody who can do both. I think Biden is pretty good on the nuts and bolts, but he's a trillion years old. So, sometimes when he looks into the future you feel like his future maybe is only a few more steps.
NB: Dr. Doom of Latvia!
DA: No.
KK: I will tell you this about The Rock, The Rock made me quit my daily cartoon. I watched a motivational speech that he was giving to the LA Lakers when they were really terrible. It was like the transition, post-Kobe and before LeBron. I don't even know what it was.
DA: I'm guessing it's the Smush Parker era.
KK: I just stumbled upon this motivational speech. And by the end of it. I called up my syndicate and said I quit my daily comic strip.
DA: What was it, what was it about him?
KK: He just talked about how he was. He had no money, he had like five bucks in his pocket, he was living out of his car in Los Angeles, like all this different stuff. But just the way he did it, he was swearing. It was the first time I heard him swearing, not in a movie, it was just like straight. And I was just like, Oh my. He's very charismatic.
NG: I'm not sure how he would be on day-to-day policy. I'm not sure his grasp of the subtleties of the Middle East is maybe as strong as it could be. But I remember in the 80s Jon Carroll used to write a column for the San Francisco Chronicle. His proposal was that we have two presidents. One is more of the administrator and the policy wonk. And then one is like the Captain Kirk. Where they show up, they give the motivational speeches and they look good. Like Obama was good at both, right? Obama was good at working on the nuts and bolts, and he could also do the verb of presidenting. He could president his ass off, right? He'd stand up there and fucking look into the future like he's posing for a coin and everybody would lose their mind. You know what I mean? It's hard to find somebody who can do both of those things. Like, I think Biden is pretty good on the nuts and bolts. But he's a trillion years old, so sometimes when he looks into the future you feel like his future maybe is only a few more steps. [Laughs]
KK: But you're right. The person that should be a nerd, someone who's into the details and stuff and not concerned about having that front. I would say The Rock would be that front. And then, yeah, who would be the one behind the scenes?
NB: Sheldon, from Big Bang Theory.
DA: We've got to get our references outside of Hollywood.
NB: Vote for Sheldon and The Rock 2024.
DA: The powerful thing about The Rock is that it sort of ties into your Biden thing. The president himself is a, I don't want to say a figurehead, but you're voting for his cabinet, really, you know?
KK: Yeah, it's the team.
DA: He'd have an amazing cabinet.
NB: Nah. People will probably want to work for The Rock, but it's funny how people lose their minds when somebody becomes president. And also some people are paid very well just to be recalcitrant and to be obstinate and just to be automatically against something. So even if we did hire The Rock, who's beloved in small towns and trailer parks all over the country, somebody would find a reason.
KK: But I think he would put together like a mixture of people on various sides, all over the spectrum.
NB: Would his cabinet be like that though, or just would it be all sports agents? Scriptwriters?
DA: [Laughs] He would have brought some people in. I mean, people love The Rock. They really do. You don't think The Rock is a serious person deep down? He would not be putting out these feelers to be president if he didn't have the aspirations. I think he's very comfortable being the 20,000-foot CEO.
NB: We haven't learned anything about making movie stars and TV stars our president? Reagan and Trump haven't taught us anything?
DA: Oh, those are the white ones. [Laughs]
NB: He's half white, so it'll only be half the problem.
KK: If you look at all the movies that he does, when you add The Rock to a franchise, it, it gets better. [Laughter]
DA: I wasn’t expecting when I set this up that we'd spend so much time talking about The Rock as a presidential prospect.
NB: I can't imagine The Rock trying to have a high level meeting with Putin, like, “What'd you say your name is?” “It doesn't matter what your name is!” He's just gonna be out there: Let me tell you something Russia, shut your mouth and know your role! [Laughter] He’ll be the people’s atom bomb. People's drone strike.
DA: People say we're not serious people. I think we've recused ourselves very well. The evidence is here in front of us. Anything you want to say on the way out the door?
I just love Sacramento. Sacramento is an amazing place. I had the most amazing Japanese food in Sacramento, like three weeks ago on a Friday night.
NB: Which place?
DA: It's on W Street. I don't remember the name of it.
NB: The little tiny hole in the wall?
DA: It's a little hole in the wall and it's amazing.
NB: Oh yeah? That place is hella good.
DA: The waitress had a t shirt on that said, I Eat Butt. No, it was I Eat Ass. Excuse me, I want to clarify. It's a dish on the menu. And I have a restaurant where the waitress was a young amazing-looking person, who was declaring that she eats ass.
NB: That's what the kids do these days.
DA: Well, but it was a delicacy and maybe they just tell them—
NB: Well, it is.
KK: It really is.
NB: Some would say it's an acquired taste. [Laughter]
KK: Someone at the museum there wants to bring me out. So Ngaio, I may be out there in 2024.
NB: Let me know, let me know. I'm going to be in Spain, in Barcelona, and the hither parts in like mid March through mid April, but then I'm back and we're chilling.
DA: Anything good going on, Keith, that you really need to talk about here?
KK: I think, you know, but I'm going to be coming out to San Francisco for BCAF, the Black Comics Art Festival. Martin Luther King Weekend, so that's in January. I'm going to be at TCAF in Toronto, in May. And Boston, too.
NB: You have BCAF, TCAF, do they do a Detroit one so they can call it decaf?
KK: They should have that, right? But I will tell you this: I did this tour in the Midwest and I was so excited to go to Detroit and it did not disappoint. It was the funniest, craziest… we had the funniest, craziest time.
My buddy was out of money, and we were doing this book tour, and he had like two dollars left to his name, and he had weed. So, he was really stoned, and he went out to get some pizza. He was able to get one slice of pizza, and he was just about to take a bite out of it, outside at this place. Homeless woman came up to him and asked if she could have his slice—a piece of his slice—and he's like, You know, this is my last money and I just can't. I'm sorry. She's like, Okay. She wanders off. He goes to take a bite out of it. It slips out of his hand—cheese first onto the grass.
NB: Onto the Detroit ground.
KK: He was so broke and so high that he's like, I gotta eat this. I have to eat this. And he picked it up and he brushed this stuff off and he took a bite and cracked his tooth. And he came walking into the place and he's telling me this stoned out of his head. I laugh every time I think about the cracked tooth.
NB: She put a curse on him.
KK: But it was great. Detroit was amazing. And when you, if you go, just have a great time. It was really, really wonderful.
Let’s reconvene. We should do this every year.
NB: Twice a year. Let's get together in a few months.
KK: You should go back to your reunion. I just did an event in Malden, where I grew up, a slideshow at the library. The mayor was there. I had kids from my grade school to my high school to my college. Family was there, like people I still owe money to. It was, uh, it was pretty cool.
NB: I'm going to try to slide down to BCAF, bro. Let me know.
DA: You guys, you guys meet up in Detroit, but we're going to meet up online again in 2024. Thanks for showing up.