AVC: Are you desensitized by this point, or do you still get the shock of "Holy crap, this exists!"

JM: We have to keep reminding ourselves of how different television was when we were kids than it is now. We see Bret Michaels on the air, and Flava Flav or even Dutch Oven, where a guy just sits there and cooks and doesn't say a word for an entire segment—there was nothing like that. There is some stuff on television that is shocking that it's on there, and shocking that it's not being censored. We run to that with torches and pitchforks and go after it. On Flavor Of Love, when a woman took a dump on the stairs, I mean, that's like J.R. being shot on Dallas, or like maybe the last episode of M*A*S*H. It's a milestone on television that's covered with chlamydia.

AVC: Do you think the war on stupid culture is unwinnable? Are we headed for Idiocracy?

JM: Oh, that's a good question. I think the smart people will get even smarter, and the dumb people will get even dumber. But I think they all will enjoy A Shot At Love With Tila Tequila, no matter how you slice it. You know, we keep eating it up. Some of the most intelligent people I know cannot get enough of it. That's a dangerous thing.

AVC: Is it the dream of every Soup host to be a serious actor?

JM: Yeah, that was on the résumé. "Would you like to re-do the movie Dying Young with Julia Roberts and Campbell Scott?" I don't know. I guess all the Soup hosts that came in, they were doing acting before they were "Souping." It's logical why they're gotten into it.

AVC: You studied acting in college, and you've had roles in TV and film. Do you think it can be tougher to get a role because of your Soup persona? Like, "No, he's Mr. Snarky Guy. We can't give him that."

JM: I would say possibly, but not nearly as hard as it would be for, like, a registered sex offender. So, you know, happy medium somewhere.

AVC: An exhaustive YouTube search turned up no clips of your stand-up.

JM: Thank God.

AVC: But one of the first links was for a celebrity baby blog, announcing the birth of your second child. It was a picture of you, your wife, and your son.

JM: Well, that's my son that we already had. We had another one. I didn't know that. That's good to know. You should forward me that link. I can say that that has nothing to do with my stand-up—or it will, probably. I do make a lot of fun of my own children in my stand-up, and my wife. Actually, it is apropos. Believe me, it was a very loose word, celebrity. It should be "basic-cable celebrity" or "basic-cable quiz-show host."

AVC: "That guy from that show."

JM: "That guy from that show who looks like a Skeletor Ryan Seacrest" Baby Blog.

AVC: Besides the Soderbergh film, what other projects are in the works?

JM: The constant project is making sure my sons don't turn into criminals.

AVC: They are growing up in Los Angeles, so they'll either be criminals or like the kids on My Super Sweet 16.

JM: Oh, boy. I'd rather have my kid in the penitentiary than that. That show is really… it's like a morality tale, like they had in the Middle Ages.

AVC: The most offensive show on television.

JM: If you were to film a guy with food poisoning who was vomiting and crapping himself at the same time, it would be less offensive than this.

AVC: Well, your job is to wallow in the lowest common denominator; it's like a diet of junk food. What do you do when you want to eat something healthy?

JM: I seem to be constantly cleaning up after my 3-week-old and my 3-year-old. That's the type of monotonous work that I end up doing. I really like driving my car fast. I drive a Subaru STI, slightly modified, it has 320 horsepower. I love driving that around really fast. I would say reading, but I don't read a lot. I used to. The shows that I watch are like Battlestar Galactica, John Adams, The Tudors. That would be the closest I get to being refined, I guess. My little brother, who's an Episcopal priest married to a Lutheran minister, they don't have a TV, but they get Us Weekly and People.

AVC: That's a weird dichotomy. So they don't have any idea what you do?

JM: Well, they watch my show now on iTunes. There was a time, before iTunes was all spun-up, when he did not watch it. So I would be like, "Hey jerk, how many of your other friends' brothers have a TV show?" But he won't get one. Now they watch it on the Internet, but it irks them to pay a dollar an episode. No, but he's a very good little brother, and he's much more into hiking.

AVC: He's the pious soul who's making up for you.

JM: Yeah. Sometimes I feel like I'm doing the Lord's work, though.

[Source]