Martini Shot
44 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 4 years ago - ★★★★★ - 239 ratingsA wry take on real life in Hollywood.
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Episodes
Psychic break
March 18, 2020 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot, I talk about the audience, which has been practicing a kind of social distancing since the moment Netfix started streaming — or, if you want to get deeper, since YouTube dot com turned on the juice. Now it’s Hollywood’s turn to stay home.
One or the other
March 12, 2020 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I realize that there are two kinds of people in the world. We’re all either R2D2 or C3P0 or Wile E Coyote or the Road Runner or Moses or Complaining Israelites or Jeffrey or Ina.
You keep forgetting
March 05, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot, I try to figure out how YouTube made fifteen billion dollars, and how to handle breaking up with my barber. They are deeply linked, I promise.
The babysitter
February 27, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I reveal what a friend of mine confessed to me years ago. One time, when she was babysitting an infant, all it did was sleep, which bored her. So she woke it up and made it cry. Sometimes we’re the baby. And sometimes we’re the babysitter.
Quibi
February 20, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I talk about the newest venture in Hollywood and how people like to say, Never Gonna Work about things that, you know, really could work.
Still angry
February 13, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I get really angry at something that hasn’t happened yet, and then get angry when it doesn’t happen, and then don’t know what to do with all of that pre-anger when it everything turns out okay. I’m like the opposite of a Buddhist.
Pay the money
February 06, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I watch a group of people refuse to pay the cover charge at a jazz club and think, I wonder if those people pay for Netflix.
Illy
January 30, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and I need to offer a trigger warning on today’s Martini Shot. It’s about my wonderful dog Illy. And it ends the way all stories about wonderful dogs end. In a lot of tears and a lot of gratitude.
Happy Hour
January 23, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I try to work at a co-working space but discover that what people do at co-working spaces is take a lot of breaks from working.
New Year’s Purge
January 16, 2020 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I do my annual new year’s purge of all of the ideas and articles and clippings I’ve saved, thinking they’d be great shows, but I haven’t done anything with them, so time to give them away.
This Year Will Be Different
December 26, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I give you the best Christmas gift ever, and ask for the same thing in return: Total digital absolution. You no longer need to keep up with what’s on Netflix or Hulu or your Kindle or your inbox. Merry Christmas to us.
Louis Quinze and Louis Seize
December 19, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot, I act like the famous, late fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, by ruining what should be a nice quiet evening watching television.
The Gates
December 12, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I present my ID to the guard at the studio gate and wait to be waved through, and when I am, I’m elated, but also a little disappointed because, well, now I gotta have the meeting.
Stargaze
December 05, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I talk about what it must be like to be down a well and to look up and see the stars, and why a place I know in Hollywood is trying to do something like that for homeless youth.
Keynote Speaker
November 28, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I learn what a keynote speaker is, and I learn that it’s someone who can just talk about anything and make it seem like it’s about work. Sounds like my kind of job.
Supposed to Fly
November 21, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot although I am not technically a licensed pilot I do pilot a plane to takeoff. A real plane. Into the sky. But I do not land it, as my presence here proves.
“Liza Minelli, Private Detective”
November 14, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutes - 3.37 MBThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I decide to pitch a show that I’m pretty sure won’t ever get made, but I do like the title: "Liza Minelli, Private Detective."
Bristol sessions
November 07, 2019 00:44 - 3 minutes - 3.3 MBThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I break the first rule of show business, which is "Nobody Pays for Homework". It’s basically a history lesson.
Vintage me
October 30, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutes - 3.26 MBThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I wear a jacket to a party and someone tells me it looks good and then asks if it’s vintage. No, I say, I am vintage. The jacket is just the jacket.
Madison Avenue
October 23, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutes - 3.33 MBThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I discover that there’s a place where slightly used but still sought-after brands can be bought for cheap. It’s the RealReal, the YouTube of retailers.
UAP
October 16, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutes - 3.63 MBThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I remember a few weeks ago, when videos of unidentified aerial phenomena surfaced, and the Navy said, yeah, those were UFOs, and then we all went Huh and moved on, instead of freaking out like every single science fiction movie predicted.
Unblock
October 09, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutes - 3.52 MBThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I suddenly remember I blocked someone’s number when I see on Facebook that they’ve died, and yes I know that makes me a bad person.
Mr. Popular
October 02, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I am called courageous for doing something I had no choice but to do, and for doing something else I had no idea was risky in any way, so I’m not really courageous per se as much as cowardly and thoughtless. Tomato tomahto.
Remote control
September 25, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I stretch the limits of apology by comparing driverless cars, navigation software, binge watching television, and the really great Amazon BBC show “Fleabag.” I’m not sure it totally works.
Fake Rob
September 18, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I talk with authority about Deep Fakes — those digitized and undetectable fakes of actors and well-known people doing and saying things they didn’t — and I look enthusiastically at the possibility of a Deep Fake Rob.
The voice
September 11, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I have a super groovy singer friend who tells me that the reason I don’t like the sound of my own voice is because I don’t know how to breathe, which is weird because I’m breathing right now, but it turns out she’s right. I mean, I’m out of breath from just saying that.
Learn more
September 04, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I pretend I’m the kind of person who has never and would never buy vitamin supplements from Instagram, but sadly that is not true. I also bought the Ronco Rotisserie from TV years ago, for the same reason — I see and ad fifty times, eventually I buy the thing.
Key demo
August 28, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I predict that the most popular and sought after audience demographic is going to be old people, because once they figure out how to subscribe to Netflix or Hulu or whatever, they’re not going to want to mess with it.
The Rounds
August 21, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I try to talk some sense into the most stubborn jerk I know —me — and try to make him take the advice he’s always giving to other people, so if he’s smart — and that’s debatable — he’ll just shut up and write the script.
The Hollywood 'email update'
August 14, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long. I got a “new email address” message that has the wrong email, and it’s emblematic of a bedrock truth about the entertainment industry: it was better when it was a Rolodex business.
Pizza night
August 08, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I take a long boat trip to interesting and exotic places, and end up heading back to the boat for pizza night, which is a metaphor I hope everyone can relate to.
Plot Device
July 31, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I try to teach a writing class and fail to properly refuse the call, mirror the resolution, or find the pinch point. And apparently that’s what writing is all about.
Steam clean
July 24, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I talk about my old leaky, oil burning car and why it was a mistake to get it fixed. Turns out, the oil leak grime was holding the whole thing together, sort of like show business.
Face app
July 17, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I download the Face App and see what I look like when I’m wrinkled and decrepit, which will probably be what I look like next Thursday, but there is good news: old people are about to get very popular in Hollywood.
Price is Right
July 10, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot my washing machine breaks down and I fix it, sort of, and it all makes me think about Disney Plus. They connect, I promise.
Ooni
July 03, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I tell you about the time I went to Costa Rica and drank ayahuasca for four days. There was probably a more artful way to put that, but, I went to Costa Rica and drank ayahuasca. I ran out of euphemisms.
Phone swap
June 26, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I tell you about a game show called Phone Swap that is funny and creepy and also on Snapchat, in case you were wondering what the young people were laughing at.
Flywheel
June 19, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I get super technical and talk about flywheels, which are those things on wheely machine parts which make it go whoosh, whoosh. See? Told you it was technical.
Code of conduct
June 12, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I buy a t-shirt and get an email and somehow it reminds me that writers aren’t always the greatest bosses, especially of other writers.
Always someone else
June 05, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I commit acts of violence and mayhem on the Transitive Property of Mathematics, for which I apologize to my eighth grade math teacher.
Three
May 29, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I get an email from the third assistant of a powerful show business figure, who, you know, must be powerful because who else would need three assistants?
You and I are just alike
May 22, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot I talk about serial killers and families living together and all of the ways writers have of making the job a little easier and the viewer a little less inclined to grab the remote.
Pickpocket
May 15, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long, and on today’s Martini Shot I explain how the entertainment business works. It’s like when you have some French fries on your plate, and people keep reaching over and taking some — because fries are delicious — but then why don’t they have any of their own?
The Long Game
May 08, 2019 23:44 - 3 minutesThis is Rob Long and on today’s Martini Shot, I get into an argument with a friend of mine, a fellow writer, at dinner, and teach the other two people there a valuable lesson about having dinner with two writers during a Writers Guild battle and that’s, don’t.