The Rich Eisen Show on the Roku Channel
Comedian Bill Burr and co-founder of The Smashing Pumpkins Billy Corgan are not only spitting images of one another but recent revelations have determined they might actually be half-brothers. They recently met face to face on Howie Mandel’s show with Bill Burr blindsided when Howie brought out Billy Corgan and the two had a great conversation and seemed to accept that they might actually be half brothers (more on that below).
At the time I wrote about the Bill Burr-Billy Corgan meeting last week on Howie Mandel’s show I was struck by the gall of Mandel to surprise the Bills with potentially life-altering news like this. I think at the time I wrote something like “I’m not sure I would’ve been so calm and cool about it like Burr” but in reality, I think I would’ve bene pretty furious if I was Bill Burr and wasn’t able to process this news in private and had to meet my potential half-brother while on camera for the first time like it was a Jerry Springer Show segment.
Appearing this week on The Rich Eisen Show, Rich asked Bill Burr about this. He asked Burr “people want to know, were you really pissed?” Lo and behold, Burr didn’t like being put on the spot and ripped into Howie Mandel for surprising him like that.
Bill Burr went on to say “I don’t like… talk about (my stuff), I don’t. So Howie (Mandel) did what he did because he is a Hollywood w—e and he doesn’t care what happens. He could have said something and he just, y’know, brings up all that weirdness.”
Burr added “Billy’s fine, that’s the first time I met him. That was fine or whatever but I did not appreciate what Howie (Mandel) did, no. Not at all.” Then the jokes began… Bill Burr continued, saying “he’s Howie so he’s hard to hate. Know what I mean? How do you hate a germophobe? He’s not threatening. He walks with his arms (tucked) in so he doesn’t rub against curtains that he owns. That’s the weirdest thing about him. He’s a strange man.
Here is that full Bill Burr clip from The Rich Eisen Show on the Roku Channel where they discuss Howie Mandel:
Again, it is hard to imagine remaining as cool about it in the moment as Bill Burr was on Howie Mandel’s show. Burr fits the Boston stereotype of a guy from Irish descent who has trouble sharing his feelings unless there’s a few drinks involved. It’s just not in the nature of that particular type of dude from Boston.
To be blindsided by ‘hey, this might be your brother’ at 56 years old WHILE ON CAMERA would’ve been enough to see Bill Burr snap but he was cool about it and that should be applauded but Howie Mandel needs to checked on decisions like that in the future. It was really out of line.
As for whether or not Bill Burr and Billy Corgan might actually be half-brothers. They seemed to accept that they might. But for the backstory on that, I will just pull from a previous article I wrote back in late November…
Are Bill Burr and Billy Corgan Brothers?
Appearing on ‘Howie Mandel Does Stuff,’ the conversation kicked off with the physical similarities between the two but Billy Corgan quickly jumped into telling his Bill Burr story for the first time. Billy Corgan says it began years ago at a birthday party for one of his brothers when his step-mom approached him and asked him about Bill Burr… Things got weird from there.
Corgan started by saying “Most of my friends don’t even know this story. About 10 years ago, one of my brothers was having a birthday party, and my stepmother was there, who was obviously married to my father. And my stepmother said to me, ‘Do you know who Bill Burr is?’” He continued, saying “Now at that point, I had never heard of Bill Burr… I didn’t know who he was. I didn’t know he was a comedian or anything. He could have been the guy down the street.”
Billy went on to say “And she said, ‘Well, he’s this comedian.’ I think I even somehow called up a picture on the phone, and I kind of noticed right away, ‘Gee, he kind of looks like my father.’ Bill Burr looks more like my father than Bill Burr looks like me or I look like Bill Burr. So I said to my mother, ‘Why are you asking me this?’”
Corgan kept on going, saying “I thought the first thing she was going to say was, ‘Oh, I thought you’d notice the resemblance.’ She goes, ‘I think it might be one of your father’s illegitimate children. Bill Burr might be one of the children that your father sired in his days being a traveling musician.’ This is a true story. I’m not making this up… there is no joke in this.” That interview with Billy Corgan and Howie Mandel can be seen here:
For the conclusion and the two Bills meeting face to face, scroll back up to the top of this article and I’ve linked my article from last week with video of their meeting and quotes from the segment.