Welcome to the 92nd Street Y on MSNBC. I'm Nicolle Wallace, and we believe that some of the most important conversations happen when you bring smart, curious people together and give them the space to really talk. And now we're partnering with 92NY to bring you some of the very best of those conversations. Tonight, we bring you my friend and colleague, Rachel Maddow, and the great Hollywood agent and dealmaker Ari Emanuel. They talk about his new book, about his life and career, about his bizarre health routine that includes eating live worms, and of course, about his relationship with Donald Trump. Here's the 92nd Street Y on MSNBC.
Hey, hi you guys. Thank you, thank you, thank you so much for coming. This is going to be fun. And it's probably going to be a little prickly and a little uncomfortable, and it's going to be funny, and there's going to be swear words. It's going to be amazing. Alright, by clapping your hands, I want to know who here is a friend or family member or colleague of Ari Emanuel, if you have worked with him in some way. How many of you here at the 92nd Street Y tonight actually know Ari Emanuel? Okay. And, same thing, by clapping your hands, who here is at least slightly scared of Ari Emanuel? All the same people. Who here is wondering how on earth we're going to put an event like this on television, given that you are not allowed to say the F word on television?
So Ari Emanuel is, of course, the mega agent of our time, the larger than life, uncontested King of the Hill as a talent agent and dealmaker in sports and culture and entertainment. He also eats a cup of live worms every day, and he thinks you should too. Ari's new book is called Roll the Calls. We will explain what that means. It comes out today. It is an unexpected memoir. It's very good. It is pretty much impossible to put down. I read it much faster than I had intended to. It's very, very funny. When he rips people, which he does frequently in the book, he does it using their full names, which is really refreshing. When he himself behaves atrociously to people in the book, he tells you how atrocious he was in unvarnished terms, which is a disarming thing. It is an unexpected book. I don't think famously ferocious people are expected to write about their feelings and their failings. It is unsettling. It's like being in the cage with a lion and the lion invites you to take a long, careful look at its back teeth. Get closer. Stick your head in there a little further.
When Ari Emanuel's company went private, which was finalized last year, it was valued at $13 billion with 10,000 employees on six continents. He and his company have owned or represented everyone and everything from UFC to Oprah, from Donald Trump to me. That said, I read every single word of this book and I have many, many questions about it. So we will see if by the end of tonight, he still is my agent. Thank you all so, so much for being here tonight. Please welcome the author of Roll the Calls, Ari Emanuel.
Thank you for doing this.
Well, thank you for doing it.
Well, I'll see at the end if I thank you.
Yeah, if you are, can you just fire me? Is it, does it work that way?
It usually goes the other way.
But with, back in the day, I have let go of clients. Certain clients have complained and said things like, I'm finding my voice multiple times. And then all of a sudden, the last time I got the call, this is nine calls and the team was working very hard. And maybe they weren't doing a good job, I don't know. And I thought I was doing a good job. And I said, I think you should take your voice someplace else. So I have let clients go, but usually it's the reverse.
All right, tell everybody what roll the calls means.
So when I walk into the office and my office is down the hall and there's other people in assistants' bays there. Before I even get to the bay, I'm screaming, 'Roll the calls,' because there's calls that I want to make and there's calls that come in about all the different things I'm doing. So, that was a phrase that I just used, because that is how I operate my life. And it's -- I mean, I do jigsaw puzzles. My ex-mother-in-law taught me that in Watch Hill, Rhode Island. And when I get in the car, and I'm driving, and I call into my office, and I just start with my assistant, I say, roll the calls.
And so your assistant calls people and says, I have Ari Emanuel for you. Right. Click. I have Ari Emanuel for you. Click. I have Ari-- And then they'll put it through when they get somebody. They get a person, then, OK, all right, the person you're talking to is this person. Right. And so how many calls are on the roll? Is it like 100 calls?
There's a lot of calls, because calls lead to calls. But here's the great thing about how I conduct my business. So I'm rolling calls, and it is a jigsaw puzzle for me, and I'll give you a perfect example. I read an article about Marc Andreessen, and this is just one example. Early on, he had just started his firm, Andreessen Horowitz, a big VC firm. I ripped out the article, gave it to my office. I said, 'I want to talk to that guy.' I get him on the phone. He gets on, we start talking. I said, I want to meet you. Well, that little call led to my relationship with Egon Durban. He sells Skype to Microsoft. Egon Durban invested in Skype and then sold it. He then, we had been talking a lot about the business. Teddy Forstmann passes away who owned IMG. I have been trying to raise money for IMG.
Yeah, I wanted to buy IMG. He comes down and says, can I have lunch with you? And after we've had this great relationship, he says, 'I want to buy into you, and I want to go after IMG.' I said, 'That's never going to happen. You're a private equity firm. You'll never get an agency. I've been through this game.' Long story short, he invests in us, we get IMG, we're off to the races, and everything else happened because this man got into my life through my roll the calls.
Because you read an article about him.
Because I read an article about Marc Andreessen that led me to this jigsaw puzzle. And I can go through multiple examples in my life where that is the case. And it's the same thing with the UFC and my relationship with Abu Dhabi. And that's why I roll the calls. I roll the calls because that's how I have figured out my life, my map, my curiosity, my energy. And it's a great process by which I live my life and enjoy my life.
So here's the thing that I feel like makes me the most crazy about the way that you have built your empire.
Because one of the things you write about in the book, beautifully actually, is when you've taken a public stand. Right, Mel Gibson, we should blackball him as an industry because of what he's done with his anti-Semitism, Kanye West, your very strong words to Prime Minister Netanyahu about what was going on in Gaza, for which people booed and walked out of the room and everything, you've taken these public stands. And it matters when you take a public stand because you are rich and famous and powerful and very connected. But the thing that made you rich and famous and powerful is your relationships with the most powerful people in the world, right? You can get anybody on the phone, you can get anybody to take a meeting with you, they will fly to you to take the meeting, you get powerful people to meet each other or to get them to give you what you want. And so I thought this book would be about you pressuring those people privately to do better. And it's not. And so is there anything--
Is there things that happen privately that you don't know?
Well, that's what I want to ask you. I mean, is there anything about, I mean, Andreessen is one of them. And Bezos and Trump and Musk and Ellison, all these guys. Is there anything about your relationship with these guys that has ever had any positive or mitigating effect on the harm they are doing to our country?
Well, here's what I would say to you. She sent me a text, are you okay with tough questions? And I said, yeah.
I asked, you said it was okay.
This is like the dinner table at the Emanuel house. So here's what I would say to you is, you know, I'm not in favor of people in college not having people speak at their college if they disagree with their points of view. I don't want to live in an echo chamber. I don't want to live in a cult. I want to live in a society. And I was leaning towards a lot of my life different from what my mom taught us. You know, you don't make peace with friends, you make peace with enemies. And that means you have a conversation. And the conversations I've had and when I've disagreed with the president, with Elon Musk, with a lot of the people you've mentioned, has, in my opinion, swayed them. And some of their arguments have helped me think about it differently also. Not swayed me, but taken a different perspective on it. At least learn their side. I have not won every one of those arguments. But I am in the fight. And I'm in a society. And I think that's better than us as a society and as a country going to our ends. Now that might not satisfy you, but that's the only way I think we can get to a place where we're a better society. Now that might not satisfy you, I'm sorry, but I don't think it's right to just sit at opposite ends.
You're just the only person I know who can call all those people. And so I know what your political beliefs are. And I know what your convictions are and I've seen you be very brave in public and risk stuff.
But here's what it is, on Mel Gibson. I went off and I said everybody, we should stop working with him. And then Mel Gibson, because of that, and it might have been financial or whatever, or he just wanted to better himself, and I'm hoping that he just wanted to better himself, he did a lot of work on the very bad things he said. And he and I then had a conversation. Mark Wahlberg then said, can I work with him? I said, this guy's done a lot of work, you should work with him. I have not seen that work being done by Kanye West. I have not seen the doctor's report that he's bipolar. I haven't seen any work. So for me, I don't think that's cool. And that's a bridge too far for me. But with the other, Jim, I think there's great things that Elon has done. And there's some things I completely and utterly disagree with. And he and I have gotten into text messages and calls about it. And guess what? He'll have his point of view. I'll have my point. And I hope that I get to move him. And that's all I can hope for. I can't change people, and I don't think it's productive to say, 'I'm never talking to you,' because I'm hoping that I do change him, and I think I have a little bit.
Have you talked to him about his most recent, basically just gutter racism?
I have not. I have been on the road, so I haven't seen if there's something today or--
You want me to give you some stuff?
Okay. Let me ask you about the constructive nature of that. You say in the book, after the last election, for months I've been having spirited debates with the right-leaning people in my friend circle, yelling at them, pleading with them, wake up Dana, meaning Dana White from UFC, Elon, a few others, they let me yell, they've listened with patience before stating their cases, now the votes are cast and I'm not doing that sh-- anymore. I tell Larry David on election night, I can't fight anymore. He laughs, since when? As a famous fighter. I tell him I'm serious, I can't have beef with half my friends, I can't hate half the country. Obviously that makes me want to explode. But it also makes me really curious, when you talk to Elon or Dana or your other friends and their reasons for supporting Trump, do you think it's, particularly people like Elon who changed, is it just transactional?
My relationship with them?
No, do they support Trump because they just, oh, okay, I guess we'll have a dictator, but we'll get to be the oligarchs.
No, no, no, they have a point of view at how they think the country has moved. I disagree with that point of view. I don't think we've let immigrants in to capture votes. I mean, I don't agree with Elon on that point. We have gotten into very hard discussions about that. On the other side of it, I am happy for what that man did in Ukraine, blocking the Russians from using the satellites. I'm happy what he's doing with Neuralink. I'm happy what he's doing in space. So there's a give and take, and I'm in the conversation with him. That's all I can ask for. I cannot sit in just one corner. I won't do it anymore. And I was getting into that corner, and I was in that corner a lot, and it's just not a healthy place because I do want, I do want to live in a better society and I don't think there's any other way as my mother taught me than having conversations. And that's my point of view now.
Did UFC pay to repair the grounds of the White House after that ridiculous cage match wrecked the grass in front of the White House?
I don't think it was ridiculous, but here's what I would say. Three years ago this November, the president at Madison Square Garden went up to Dana and said, 'I would like you to do this for 250.' And of course, Dana said, 'Yes.' And if Obama asked, we would have said yes. If Biden asked, we would have said yes. If Roosevelt asked, which had boxing matches on occasion, yes happened. And for us, I think again, sports is a thing that kind of bridges. You can root for somebody and I don't want to say I'm a Republican, I'm a Democrat, I'm a this, I'm a that. You don't have to say that. You can just root for somebody. And you can have a great conversation. And I hope you watched a little bit. I can send it to you. There were incredible videos about American history. And for us, it was one of the greatest marketing plays of all time. We lost $30 million, which was in our plan. And yes, we paid for everything we had to pay for.
It struck me, while all that was happening, how much Trump wanted that cage match. Like Trump really, he wanted that more than he wanted anything else in the 250th. I think if you asked him right now, he would not remember that there was a car race. All he remembers is that cage match.
I will say he is, and this is what I love about Dana, this one, I love a lot about him, but he's a ride or die guy. And when UFC started 33 years ago, the only person that would have them at his place in Atlantic City was Donald Trump, and he sat through every match. And he is a major fan, watches every fight, calls, talks about the fights, who he loves, who he doesn't love. And because of that moment, Dana's loyal to him. And Dana is a, he's right in the middle. He's a centrist. I know that might be shocking, but he's a guy right in the middle.
For me though, I feel like in my world, the most important thing that's going on right now is that we're in the process of having our constitutional republic overthrown by a guy who wants to rule for life and get rid of the Constitution.
I don't think that's true.
And it's working, you don't think he's,
And so the reason, the only reason that I care about the UFC thing is because it seems to me that in that moment, you personally had a thing that he wanted more than breath. More than anything in life, which gave you an incredible moment of leverage over the most dangerous president of the United States in history.
You don't think people said that Nixon at the time was the most dangerous president in United States history? Stop.
Shut the (beep) up. What do you guys, it was Watergate, people were going crazy, stop.
Nixon, George W. Bush, there's been a lot of bad presidents.
We could put a lot of the Andrews in there too. Andrew Johnson, Andrew Jackson, lots of bad presidents. Nobody has ever tried to make sure there was not a transfer of power. And I believe--
I agree with that. I completely and utterly agree with that and I was very vocal about that. I agree with you, however--
I think he's a different kind of cat, is all I'm saying.
Here's what I would say to you. I spoke to him three weeks ago. He called me about the tax credit.
The film and television tax credit. And he said, 'Send me a memo.' I sent him a memo. Adam Schiff is on board with it. He complimented Adam Schiff. And in that conversation, and I got him the memo, and I talked about what I thought was good, and it's one of, he asked me, what do you think about J.D. and this one, and Democrat, and we had this conversation, and he thought that J.D. and Marco Rubio were going to be a formal group of candidates. They're going to be running mates.
That's what he thought, yeah.
And I would just say to you, that's not a man trying to be in that White House forever, as much as you might believe it. Made me feel good.
I don't think he's staying around forever. I do not believe that.
If something goes wrong in terms of--
In terms of the 2026 elections coming up, if we don't, if we get the FBI seizing ballots, if we get, you can't certify those votes, we're not going to swear in these Democrats.
Well, Rachel, let's see, let's just go--
Yes, you can call me. I think there's a lot of things that we have to change. But if you're asking me, do I think he's going to run in 2028? I don't. And do I--
I don't think he's going to run, I just think he's not going to leave.
We'll see. If your brother runs for president, are you going to fund his run?
First of all, I don't know if my brother's running.
So here's what I would say about my brother. My brother worked for Bill Clinton. He then became an incredible congressman, won back the House for the Democrats when he ran that program. He then went into the Obama administration as the chief of staff in one of the worst economic crises, '08, '09, got us through that crisis with the president, got Obamacare passed, which is so crucial for us, and then he became the mayor. And kids in Chicago had the least amount of time in school, and he did the right thing. He took on the teachers union. They demonstrated in protest and struck for nine days, and he held his ground. And why? Because he cared about those kids' education and post-high school graduation. He then went into the Biden administration, became the ambassador to Japan, and worked with our allies to combat the aggressiveness of China and understands how to work with allies. And most recently, better speech than I gave, gave a speech condemning the Netanyahu administration and what's happening in the West Bank. So if you're asking me the following question, is there anybody more qualified than my brother? No (beep) chances there. That's only been two (beep) and one (beep).
One of the things that I learned in the book is this, and this is a PSA for everybody in the room. If someone who is an agent, or who might be an agent, or is in any way agent adjacent, ever asks you the question, are you happy? The only correct answer is yes. Because if you say anything other than yes, yes I'm happy, you have succumbed to a trap. Is that true or false?
Here's what I would say. Isn't it a great question to lead with? Because everybody's, yeah, kind of happy, satisfied, and it just leads to an, it opens the door.
It's the way you pry the lid off of people and you do it to people even when they know you're going to do it, and it still works. How does it work?
Well, you say, are you happy? They then have to pause and think, and there's always something that might not be happy in their creative life.
You'll say you'll solve it.
And then I go into why that should have been solved and the conversation, and then you learn a lot and the conversations begin. Sometimes signings are, you realize they have left their agent and so you're immediately, why didn't that work? And you get into that conversation, or sometimes it's a long process.
Michael Ovitz at CAA discovers your plot to break off from CAA, to break out. Ovitz tells you you're finished and that he's going to annihilate you.
You respond by getting out of the chair that you're in. You say you jumped out of the chair that you're in. You grabbed the chair.
You picked it up and hoisted it over your head and screamed at him, threatened to destroy his mother-effing office.
Why did you do that and how did that work for you?
Pretty, pretty, pretty good. Here's what I would say. You know, it was a chair that had an opening here. So I just went in there and I picked it right about here. And it was my only move. You know, I was scared out of my wits. I mean, he was, first of all, the man is on Mount Rushmore of agents. He was at that time the most powerful agent in the world. He had created something incredible. Watching him and studying him from afar, I mean, he was incredible. But I didn't have any of it, and I was scared. And the only way at the time I thought to combat this is, and I don't like anybody threatening me anyway. I'm not good with that. Really not good with that. And so, yeah, I didn't like getting threatened, and so, but I'm okay with a fight. I'm okay to, let's rumble. And I didn't care if it was physical, I didn't care if it was, and I'm okay to defend myself. I don't, hopefully in the book you get, my mother taught us to have agency, to believe in yourself, to believe in your ideas. And just because powerful people tell you not to do it, that doesn't mean you don't do it. And it's hard, and hopefully this book gives you a road map to say if it's hard, it's okay to go. You just have to work hard, and you've got to go for it, as much as it's going to be difficult. And so at that point in time, I'm not going to be bullied by anybody, and throughout my life, I'm good with taking on bullies.
Well, that's really the origin story that you sort of tell for yourself in the book. You write at the very beginning about being in school and just beating the snot out of a kid in the lunchroom because that guy was bullying another kid. So your origin story is intolerance of bullies.
Well, I was, I'm, shocking news, I'm ADHD and dyslexic. And back then, dyslexia, I was in special ed. But I was in special ed and we were in the lunchroom, football team in the lunchroom early. One of these football players making fun of one of the kids in special ed with me. I was a wrestler, pretty good wrestler. And I just said to him, you know, don't do that. That's not cool. How old are you? 14, 15. And he kept on doing it. Hit the third rail, tray in hand, tray on his face, it was game on. And I didn't care, because I didn't think it was right to pick on that kid. And in a weird way, picking on that kid, calling him stupid, was like calling me stupid, because I was in special ed too. And I wasn't dumb, and I didn't think it was fair. And that little story, and that little event, I've been doing that for myself and for other people and standing up for things I believe in. Do you want me to ask you a question about the worms or no?
Rachel, this has been a wonderful conversation. You can ask me any kind of, first of all.
I have questions from the audience.
Okay, you can, let's start with the worms.
Okay, how big are the worms?
They're like microscopic, you can't see them.
How do you? So this is all about my crazy list of health things that I do.
Which is listed in the book. You freeze yourself in an ice bath, then you light yourself up.
Here's the point, let's just say the following. Let me answer some questions that you haven't asked me, just let me answer them because this is not my first rodeo about this issue. I don't want to live forever, I just, what I do makes me feel really good. My workouts, the light bed I do in the morning, my ice baths, my saunas, my workouts, my fasting, worms, what I eat, how I live my life. And it's a long, we could do the whole hour on this. Whenever I come across something that I think is interesting, I call up my brother Zeke, and I said, okay, can it kill me? He does his work, he gets back on the phone with me. When it came to the worms, I got the doctor from Duke on the phone that I read the article about. We're having this conversation and one of the funniest lines I've ever heard in my life, the doctor says, 'Well they don't colonize.' I lose it on the phone. Cracking up. And I go to Zeke, I said, 'Okay, can it kill me? No? I guess I'm trying them.' I've been doing helmets, they're called. Helmets? Helmets. Microscopic worms. Microscopic worms from Thailand and the UK, every day for 15 years.
