Name: What Jon Bernthal Learned His 3rd Day Living in Russia
Uploaded: 2022-12-28T18:13:38.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'What Jon Bernthal Learned His 3rd Day Living in Russia' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-12-28. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'What Jon Bernthal Learned His 3rd Day Living in Russia' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-12-28. Transcript available.

I think my third day there was my birthday, and you know, again, I lived in a
place called Park Kulturi, which is Gorky Park, it's kind of a pretty rough,
sort of shitty area in Moscow, and I had a translator, I spoke no Russian at
all when I first went over there, and my translator, Max, came and picked me up
where I was living, and he took me to the Moscow Art Theater, which is on Tverskaya,
right across the street from Red Square.
It's a few subway stops in a couple different directions to get there, and once
we got there, the one thing that they tell you that's absolutely essential at
all times is you always have to have your papers back then, at that point, the
mayor ran the mafia, the mayor's police, they didn't really have a salary, they
made their money by what they could sort of shake people down for, so we get to
the theater, you know, on my birthday, and my first day of school, and I think
like I'm actually making something of my life, I'm here in Russia, but me being
the fuck up that I am,
I forgot my papers, because I'm just a, just, you know, unadulterated asshole,
and I said to Max, man, I'm so sorry, man, I forgot my papers, you know, and he
said, okay, well, we got to go back and get them, and I said, nah, man, let's
just go into school, and we'll do it the next day, he said, no, they're not
going to let you into the school without your papers, let's go back and get
them, I said, look, man, I'm a grown-ass man, let me go back and get my papers,
you don't have to come with me, you just took me here.
Completely fucking lost, and I just had no idea where I was, I'm three days in
Russia, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, it's getting dark, I'm screwing up, I finally make
it back to my place, I get my papers, I make it back to the school, but now I've
missed the first day, it's like completely dark, and I'm on the wrong side
of Tverskaya, which is like this main street, about 16 lanes, and I got to get
to the other side to get to school, and I just start kind of like, like Frogger,
I'm like dodging cars like a total asshole, I'm like, I can't get to the other
side, as soon as I get to the other side, boom, AK-47's in my face, Russian
police are right there, they get me for crossing, you're supposed to cross
below, I didn't know that, they're yelling at me in Russian, I give them, you
know, 20 rubles, they let me go, and I'm just like, just such an asshole, it's
my birthday, I've missed my first day, I don't know what the fuck I'm doing,
and so I do what any good American would do, I go and treat myself to a meal at
McDonald's, right, so I go and I get myself some McDonald's, happy birthday to
me, you're a fuck up, right, then I'm going back that night, and I'm back in
Parkle Touring, I'm walking down the street, I'm all by myself, it's pitch
black out, it's cold as fuck, and I'm walking down the street, and this
Mercedes pulls up in front of me, and these two guys get out of the front seat,
and they reach into the back seat, and they grab something,
out, and I see it's this woman with beautiful red hair, and she's in like a
beautiful cocktail dress, and they're pulling her out of the back seat of this
Mercedes, and I'm the only one on the street, and they clearly don't see me,
but this woman sees me, and she makes like direct eye contact with me, and they're
pulling her out of the side, they're pulling her out of the back seat, and she's
not fighting them, but she's not helping them either, she's just like
completely limp, and just being dragged,
and they take her over to this building, and they just start like opening her
head up against the side of this building, and start smashing her head, so I
like forgot where I was, and like, I ran at this guy, and I grabbed him, and in
English, I'm like, man, what the fuck are you doing, what are you doing, and he
just pulled out a gun, he just put it like right to my forehead, and he said in
English, he's like, go away, like that, and, and, and, you know, Joe,
Joe, I knew, like in an instant, man, I knew in an instant that like, it was
like I was a bug, like I was a bug, like that was a different, you know, I'd
met, I'd seen guns before, I'd seen stuff before, I just knew that this was a
completely different level,
and so, you know, I walked away listening to that, listening to what they were
doing, and, and, you know, it was like day three, so that's on the brutality
side of it, but I think conversely, on the, on, on the beauty side of it,
you know, there was just, it was, it was, it was a culture that I found like
completely full, free of pretension, you know, if you have a conversation with
somebody, you really have a conversation, you look you in the eye, and there's
no, hey, how you doing, hey, I'm doing great, there's no bullshit,
it wouldn't be strange or weird for, to have somebody break down in tears in
your first meeting and talking to them, and not because they're sort of like
emotionally fragile or weak, but because they're just so honest, and in the
moment,
I, I saw this unbelievable national appreciation for the arts, I saw people who,
you know, you go on the subways, and people weren't reading, you know, Us
Weekly, they were reading Bogalkov and Tolstoy, it's an unbelievable,
unbelievably literate society,
yeah, I don't know, man, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm so grateful for my time there, and
it, yeah, it really, you know, Alma and that place really, really saved my life.