Actor, teacher, and dad Rob Brownstein joins host Reena Friedman Watts. You may recognize him as the pain doctor in the Michael Jackson documentary. He’s a working actor, and he talks about what that really looks like: the freelance hustle, the rejection, and the persistence it takes to keep going. Rob traces his path from budding musician to working actor, and what he learned along the way. He also talks about raising two daughters who are chasing their own dreams, and how being a parent has changed the way he thinks about life, art, and his own career. If you love the arts, or you’re trying to figure out how to support the people you love while building a life you care about, this one’s for you. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━🔥 WHAT YOU’LL LEARN What life as a working actor looks like, ups and downs included How parenting shapes your personal and professional growth Why passion and authenticity matter in any career A look behind the scenes of film and television How to build confidence and push through self-doubt ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━⏱️ TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – Meet Rob Brownstein: working actor, teacher, and dad 05:15 – From musician to actor 15:30 – Supporting your kids’ dreams 25:00 – The reality of working in entertainment 35:45 – Building confidence and overcoming self-doubt 45:00 – Family, passion, and what matters most ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━💬 QUOTABLE MOMENTS“You might as well find a job you love, because no matter what you do, it’s going to be freelance, and it’s going to be difficult.” “Confidence comes from having the proof that you can do something.”— Rob Brownstein ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━👤 ABOUT ROB BROWNSTEIN Rob Brownstein is a longtime working actor, teacher, and coach based in Los Angeles. His credits span film, television, theater, commercials, and voiceover, including Argo, Mad Men, The Office, Gilmore Girls, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Breaking Bad, Modern Family, Grey’s Anatomy, Young Sheldon, Straight Outta Compton, Blonde, and Velvet Buzzsaw, among many others. He also appears in Michael, the recent and very popular Michael Jackson biopic, where he plays the burn doctor. In addition to acting, Rob runs An Actor’s Space in LA and has been teaching and coaching actors all over the world. He loves talking about the craft of acting, auditions, self-tapes, confidence, career longevity, and why acting classes can be valuable for actors and non-actors alike. Quick Links:IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0115282/An Actor’s Space: https://www.anactorsspace.com/about ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━🎙️ ABOUT BETTER CALL DADDYHosted by Reena Friedman Watts alongside her dad, Big Daddy Wayne Friedman, Better Call Daddy features stories of inspiration, resilience, and the wisdom that comes from experience.bettercalldaddy.com | Instagram: @reenafriedmanwatts ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━Enjoyed this episode? Subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━KEYWORDS: Rob Brownstein, working actor, Michael Jackson documentary, acting, parenting, family, confidence, creative process, Better Call Daddy, Reena Friedman Watts, Big Daddy Wayne Friedman

What makes someone fall for extremist ideas, and what makes them finally stop believing? In this episode of Better Call Daddy, host Reena Friedman Watts sits down with TM Garret Schmid, a former KKK and neo-Nazi member who broke free of hate and converted to Judaism. TM shares the loneliness, trauma, and need for belonging that pulled him into extremism, the tragedy of his then-wife's kidnapping, and the years of therapy and self-reflection that helped him confront his past. Together, Reena and TM explore forgiveness, why people are drawn to hate groups, and why compassion and real human connection are the most powerful tools against hate. If you've ever wondered how someone leaves a hate movement, or whether anyone can truly change, this conversation is for you. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔥 WHAT YOU'LL LEARN - How a former KKK and neo-Nazi member came to embrace Judaism- The vulnerabilities and unmet needs that push people toward extremism- How trauma shapes relationships, and what healing looks like- Why compassion and community are essential to combating hate- How self-worth and self-reflection make lasting change possible ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⏱️ TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – Meet TM Garret Schmid: former extremist turned advocate05:15 – The journey to Judaism15:30 – Confronting trauma and the kidnapping25:00 – Why people join hate groups35:45 – How community helps us heal45:00 – Love, self-worth, and human connection ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 💬 QUOTABLE MOMENTS "If I can change one person's life with what I'm doing, then I have succeeded." – TM Garret Schmid "You need to listen to the people around you; it might change your perspective." – TM Garret Schmid ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 👤 ABOUT TM GARRET SCHMID TM Garret Schmid is a former white supremacist who left extremism, converted to Judaism, and now speaks about understanding, compassion, and the humanity in everyone. He works with people struggling with identity and the search for acceptance. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🎙️ ABOUT BETTER CALL DADDY Hosted by Reena Friedman Watts with her dad, Big Daddy Wayne Friedman, Better Call Daddy features stories of inspiration, resilience, and hard-earned wisdom. 🔗 bettercalldaddy.com🔗 LinkedIn | Instagram: @reenafriedmanwatts ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 👉 Enjoyed this episode? Subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ KEYWORDS: former KKK member, leaving the KKK, KKK to Judaism, former white supremacist, neo-Nazi to Jewish, how to leave a hate group, how people get radicalized, why people join hate groups, breaking free from extremism, overcoming extremism, deradicalization, reversing hate, TM Garret Schmid, TM Garret, trauma and healing, forgiveness, Better Call Daddy, Reena Friedman Watts, Big Daddy Wayne Friedman

Forbes contributor Frank Racioppi reveals what it takes to get your podcast noticed by major publications, and why independent podcasters are winning on authenticity.

Storyteller, podcaster, and author Jim Littlefield Dalmares shares ”A Breath for Sophia” and a father’s journey of seeing ability, love, and acceptance.

Former FBI analyst John Petrozzelli on dating after divorce, co-parenting, and using investigative skills to match people on Done With Dating.

From oil fields to SpaceX, Roberto Vella III opens up on military discipline, rocket launches, and building a legacy as a young dad.

Punk musician Jenny Wuckert opens up about her journey from shy kid to stage performer with her band Toaster Bath, the challenges of being a woman in the punk scene, and her personal battle with endometriosis and self-advocacy.

In this milestone 500th episode of Better Call Daddy, host Reena Friedman Watts sits down with Will McKee, Jiu Jitsu black belt and founder of Asylum Jiu Jitsu in Aledo, Texas. Will shares his transformative journey from a 255-pound medical operations manager to a confident, mission-driven Jiu Jitsu practitioner shedding 60 pounds and rebuilding his mental health along the way. Will opens up about the physical and mental transformation he's experienced through Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ), emphasizing self-confidence, resilience, and discipline. He explains how he coaches kids to embrace competition without pressure, creating a gym culture where every student child or adult can grow, learn, and overcome real obstacles. The conversation dives into Jiu Jitsu culture at large: the balance between competition and personal growth, the importance of a safe training environment, and the darker sides of martial arts culture that Asylum Jiu Jitsu was built to push back against. Despite its name, Will explains, Asylum isn't a cage it's a place of refuge, structure, and freedom, closer to a monastery than an asylum in the traditional sense. Will also reflects on his own mental health struggles and how Jiu Jitsu became his sanctuary during the hardest chapters of his life. He shares stories of student progress, his approach to mentorship, and his mission to be the coach he wished he'd had growing up — shaped in part by his relationship with his own father. If you're interested in martial arts, BJJ, mental health, fitness transformation, or raising resilient kids, this milestone episode of Better Call Daddy delivers all of it. 🎙️ What's In This Episode Will McKee's journey from medical operations manager to Jiu Jitsu black belt His 60-pound weight loss transformation through BJJ How Jiu Jitsu improved his mental health and self-confidence Coaching kids in competition without pressure or fear of failure Building Asylum Jiu Jitsu as a safe, supportive training environment The balance between competition and personal growth in martial arts Confronting the darker side of Jiu Jitsu culture Why Asylum Jiu Jitsu is a space for freedom, not confinement Community, mentorship, and student success stories Lessons from his relationship with his father 💭 Memorable Quotes from Will McKee "Jiu Jitsu is about helping people. I want to create a safe place for everyone to train." "It's not about winning or losing — it's about learning and growing from every experience." ⏱️ Timestamps (00:00) Introducing Will McKee, Jiu Jitsu black belt and founder of Asylum Jiu Jitsu (05:15) His 60-pound weight loss journey through BJJ (15:30) Building confidence in kids through martial arts (25:00) Community and mentorship at Asylum Jiu Jitsu (35:45) Competition vs. personal growth on the mats (45:00) Mental health, resilience, and finding freedom through Jiu Jitsu 👤 About Will McKee / Asylum Jiu Jitsu Will McKee is a Jiu Jitsu black belt and founder of Asylum Jiu Jitsu, based in Aledo, Texas. After a career in medical operations, Will transformed his own life through Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and has since built a gym culture centered on safety, mentorship, and personal growth for students of all ages. His mission: prove that Asylum isn't a cage — it's a space for freedom, discipline, and community. Keywords: Asylum Jiu Jitsu, Will McKee, BJJ, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Aledo Texas, martial arts mental health, Jiu Jitsu weight loss, Better Call Daddy podcast 🔗 Connect with Will McKee / Asylum Jiu Jitsu Instagram: Asylum Jiu Jitsu | Will McKee, BJJ 🔗 Connect with Reena Friedman Watts Website: bettercalldaddy.com | LinkedIn: Reena Friedman Watts | Instagram: @reenafriedmanwatts   Thank you Podcast in a Box!!! TikTok — https://www.tiktok.com/@podcast.in.a.box Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/podcastboxio YouTube — https://www.youtube.com/@podcastboxio Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/podcastboxio X — https://x.com/podcastboxio Signup page: https

Dr. Ravi Iyer explores human potential, integrity, suffering, authenticity, and how AI is reshaping truth, reality, and human connection.

In this episode of Better Call Daddy, host Reena Friedman Watts sits down with Kiko Zang, business executive, tech founder, and opinion leader building human-centric consumer products. Kiko is the Founder & CEO of Chomp, a social game that rewards honesty instead of punishing it and she's on a mission to fix what she calls the "performative internet." Kiko opens up about her path from boarding school in China to New Zealand and the United States, the anti-authoritarian streak she carried as a kid, and the long road to understanding her own identity across cultures. The conversation gets candid as she discusses her experience with open relationships and how it reshaped her views on love, trust, kindness, and loyalty then turns to the bigger picture: why social media rewards performance over authenticity, why women in particular self-censor online, and why honest human belief may be the scarcest, most valuable data in the age of AI. Kiko also shares her founder journey from COO at Orca (one of Solana's largest decentralized exchanges, where she helped raise $19M and grow the platform to $1B+ in 24-hour trading volume) to building Chomp, which drew 50,000 beta users sharing millions of honest answers and raised $3.6M from backers including BlueYard, JSquare, and Accomplice placing her among the 2% of female-led startups to raise venture capital. Chomp launches on iOS in 2026. Equal parts personal memoir and founder story, this episode covers identity, relationships, resilience, the loneliness epidemic, the funding gap for female founders, and what it takes to build something real in a "dead internet" full of bots and AI slop. Keywords: Kiko Zang, boarding school identity, open relationships podcast, cultural identity, female tech founder, women in venture capital, social media and authenticity, dead internet theory, Chomp app, Solana Orca DEX, honest opinions app, read the room, loneliness epidemic, Better Call Daddy podcast, Reena Friedman Watts 🎙️ What's In This Episode How growing up in boarding school in China shaped Kiko Zang's identity and friendships Immigrating from China to New Zealand to the U.S. navigating culture shock and belonging Childhood rebellion and an anti-authoritarian mindset where it came from and what it taught her Inside open relationships: what they are, how they work, and the lessons they teach about love Why kindness and loyalty matter more than performance in real relationships The perception vs. reality gap what people really think vs. what they post online Why women self-censor online, and how anonymity can support female mental health The loneliness epidemic and the search for genuine connection in a performative social feed The "dead internet": bots, AI slop, and human authenticity as the new luxury From COO at Orca (Solana's largest DEX) to Founder & CEO of Chomp Raising $3.6M in venture capital as a female founder and the broader funding gap Building Chomp, a social game that protects honest opinions instead of punishing them Why honest human belief may be the most valuable data in the age of AI 💭 Memorable Quotes from Kiko Zang "I think the most universal experience is feeling misunderstood." "It's important to find a space where you can embrace all of who you are." ⏱️ Timestamps (00:00) Introduction to Kiko Zang, Founder & CEO of Chomp (05:15) Growing up in boarding school: culture shock and identity (15:30) Inside open relationships: love, trust, and commitment (25:00) Kindness and loyalty as the foundation of real relationships (35:45) From Orca to Chomp: building a career in tech and Web3 (45:00) Social media, the "dead internet," and the case for honest opinions 👤 About Kiko Zang Kiko Zang is a business executive, tech founder, and opinion leader passionate about building human-centric consumer products. Career Founder & CEO, Chomp — a social game that rewards honesty instead of punishing it, in a world of performative internet. Chomp drew 50,000 users