Allegedly… with Bo and Ryan Podcast E4| Transcript

Bo: [00:00:00] You ever heard of N.W.A.? And I said, Well, I know what it stands for, but I’m definitely not going to say it. And they all started laughing. And so I felt like by the end of that, I’m pretty much best friends with all of N.W.A. At this point.

 

Ryan: [00:00:17] Welcome to Allegedly with Bo and Ryan, the only Entertainment and Law podcast that brings you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Allegedly.

 

Bo: [00:00:27] I’m Bo Bowen.

 

Ryan: [00:00:28] And I’m Ryan Schmidt.

 

Bo: [00:00:30] You’re listening to Allegedly with Bo and Ryan. We’re coming to you from our law offices in beautiful historic Savannah, Georgia, where we’ll be chatting about pop culture, hot legal topics in the news, and doing our best to change the way people think about the law and lawyers.

 

Ryan: [00:00:46] But first, a little about us. Bo has the voice of an angel and once brought Beyonce to tears with his a cappella version of Single Ladies.

 

Bo: [00:00:55] And Ryan once outran Usain Bolt in a 100-yard dash while wearing flip-flops.

 

Ryan: [00:01:02] Together, we are Savannah’s consummate renegade legal titans.

 

Bo: [00:01:06] And the only corporate and entertainment lawyers in the free world who have never lost a single case, allegedly. I’m very excited for today’s show, Ryan, because I want to talk about our shared obsession with Wordle.

 

Ryan: [00:01:23] Yes.

 

Bo: [00:01:24] Every morning we both have to do the word of the day. And I have to admit, it gets pretty competitive.

 

Ryan: [00:01:32] Oh, absolutely. I mean, if you’ve got — if you figure out a word all within less guesses than I do, it just ruins my day.

 

Bo: [00:01:40] Fair enough. Now, for anybody that’s unfamiliar with Wordle, why don’t you explain what that is exactly.

 

Ryan: [00:01:46] Okay, well, in case you’ve been living under a rock for the last six months, Wordle is a game that you can play on the New York Times. It was actually created by somebody named Justin Wardle, if you knew that.

 

Bo: [00:01:58] I did not.

 

Ryan: [00:01:59] I recently found that out, which I thought was pretty funny. But you you’ve got six chances to guess a five letter word. And there’s there’s no — it’s all just blank boxes and you’ve got to just go and try your hand at it. And if you get a — if you get a letter, that’s correct. It’s going to be yellow if it’s not in the correct spot and if it’s in the correct spot, it’s going to be green. And then you just kind of deduct what what letters are left in what’s available.

 

Bo: [00:02:27] So if you’re listening and you’ve never played Wordle, do it and then curse us out later, because then you’ll do it every morning.

 

Ryan: [00:02:33] Right! And then there’s also that streak after you finish and it says, How many days in a row have you done it? And oh, if I break a streak, it’s like it’s just game over.

 

Bo: [00:02:44] Fair enough. Well, the reason I brought it up this morning is because there’s a little bit of controversy surrounding World, which is there’s been a lot of chatter on the Internet about the fact that World is actually an absolute rip-off of a game show called Lingo. Lingo Lingo was a game show. It first ran back in the ’80s and then it was they brought it back in 2002, hosted by Chuck Woolery.

 

Ryan: [00:03:15] Wow.

 

Bo: [00:03:16] And then they actually brought it back again a third time in 2011, hosted this time by Bill Engvall. Of course. Here’s your sign. And then finally, it’s actually coming back again, either this year or late this year or early next year, hosted by RuPaul.

 

Ryan: [00:03:35] Oh, amazing.

 

Bo: [00:03:36] And so Lingo is actually the exact same thing as Wordle. You have six chances to guess a five-letter word in the exact same grid. And there’s been a lot of people that have said, well, is Wordle going to get shut down? I mean, are they going to file a complaint or are they going to say this is copyright infringement? I mean, they clearly have just ripped off the game show Lingo. So I wanted to talk about that a little bit today, because if they shut down Wordle, they’re going to have a problem on their hands, not the least of which from The Bowen Law Group.

 

Ryan: [00:04:11] That’s that’s absolutely right.

 

Bo: [00:04:14] So why don’t we talk about that a little bit? What’s your thought on whether or not the fact that I mean, if you look at it, it definitely is an almost exact copy. What’s your thought on whether there is some actionable complaint on the part of the game show lLngo?

 

Ryan: [00:04:31] Well, I looked I looked into this and you’re touching upon an area of intellectual property law that doesn’t have a lot of protections. And what we’re talking about here is games and rules. And the reason is because you’ve got to think about the purpose for intellectual property. When you get a copyright, trademark, a patent, the government is essentially giving you a monopoly over that idea, that expression for a certain amount of time. And because of that, they want to really limit the amount of monopolies they can. They set the rules of what can and cannot be protected. So in the in the arena of games and game shows, they’re just not they’re just not protected because the idea of the game is really the rules of the game. Right. And that’s no different than a recipe, for example, a formula. And these are things that aren’t going to be protectable unless there is some unique expression behind it. So I’ll give you a perfect example. Like the Monopoly board game, you know, it’s iconic. You’ve got your pieces, you know, the thimble and the the dog and all that. Those are absolutely copyrightable. They can be filed for copyright protection because that is in essence, a mini statuette, you know, And you’ve got the board. It’s got its own physical design of the board that is more or less a a painting or an artistic expression of the game. But as far as the rules, you know, you’re going to roll and you’re going to pull a card and that sort of stuff. That’s not copyrightable. And that’s really what we have here with this game that you’ve got. You’ve you’ve got these letters and you’re trying to figure it out and stuff like that. But that is an idea of a game that is not the expression of the game. So you’re not going to actually be able to copyright that. And there’s there’s certainly other areas of the law that they might be able to hang their hat on for future IP protections. You know, Lingo, they’ve been using it, you said since the 1980s they could trademark the name :ingo. Wardle has no problem using the word Wordle because those are two different words. And Wordle just the same way could go ahead and trademark their name. But as far as Lingo, being able to prevent Wordle from from doing their game, it’s just not going to happen.

 

Bo: [00:07:00] It’d be kind of like “tic tac doh” trying to say, sorry, we’ve copyrighted tic tac toe.

 

Ryan: [00:07:07] Right? And you actually brought up a really good point, too. I mean, titles of songs, of games, of movies, those also are not able to be copyrightable. You know, they’re there’s something that if they gain secondary, meaning they can potentially be trademarked, but you can’t copyright a title.

 

Bo: [00:07:25] All right. Fair enough. I mean, you know, I have to say Lingo, I didn’t really I wasn’t familiar with the game. My sister and brother actually audition recently to be on the new RuPaul version of Lingo.

 

Ryan: [00:07:39] Oh, wow. So how did that go?

 

Bo: [00:07:41] They said it went really well. They’re still waiting to hear. But, you know, fingers crossed for them.

 

Ryan: [00:07:46] I’ll be watching.

 

Bo: [00:07:47] So but how about what are some of your favorite game shows over the years?

 

Ryan: [00:07:53] Oh, man, I love I love the Weakest Link because that lady was just so mean. You know, and like, when they got voted off or not voted off and they got kicked out, she’d just say, you’re the weakest link, goodbye.

 

Bo: [00:08:08] So the Gordon Ramsay of game shows.

 

Ryan: [00:08:10] Yes, I do like that. Obviously. No game show list is complete without Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?

 

Bo: [00:08:19] Right. And then some of my favorites. When I was a kid, they had the Match Game, which I really liked. I don’t know if you remember that. Probably not.

 

Ryan: [00:08:28] Is that the one with the whammy?

 

Bo: [00:08:30] No, that was Press My Luck.

 

Ryan: [00:08:32] Okay. Okay, fair enough.

 

Bo: [00:08:34] So but the Family Feud, obviously.

 

Ryan: [00:08:37] Of course.

 

Bo: [00:08:37] Jeopardy!

 

Ryan: [00:08:39] Yeah.

 

Bo: [00:08:39] You know, which of course, I’ve never missed a question. Allegedly.

 

Ryan: [00:08:43] That sounds about.

 

Bo: [00:08:44] Right. And then you’ve got what has to be probably my all-time favorite, The Newlywed Game.

 

Ryan: [00:08:51] Oh, yes, yes! Nothing’s more awkward than this couple that has just got married. And they’re like, oh, we know each other so well. We’re soul mates. And they get every question wrong.

 

Bo: [00:09:02] Well, you know that that gives me an idea. What if you and I did a little version of the Newlywed Game?

 

Ryan: [00:09:10] Okay, I’m listening.

 

Bo: [00:09:12] I feel like we know each other really well.

 

Ryan: [00:09:14] Sure.

 

Bo: [00:09:16] What if I were to come up with a question and then I’ll tell you what I think your answer will be. And then you tell me if I’m right. And you do the same for me.

 

Ryan: [00:09:28] All right, I’m game. Wow. Yeah, that’s — that sounds pretty fun. I feel like we’re going to know everything, though.

 

Bo: [00:09:36] Well, give it a shot. Give me a question.

 

Ryan: [00:09:38] All right, So what would you say is your craziest courtroom experience?

 

Bo: [00:09:45] All right. What do you think my craziest courtroom experience was?

 

Ryan: [00:09:49] Well, you had this one case where you were doing criminal defense early on in your career, and you were representing identical twin brothers. And I think I think there is there was a good a really good story there.

 

Bo: [00:10:07] Right. I won’t use their names. Let’s call them John and Sam Smith to to protect the innocent. So I wasn’t actually representing both. I was only representing John. And then another attorney was representing Sam. So John’s sitting next to me in a blue shirt, Sam is sitting next to his lawyer in a red shirt. And what happened is there were these two young black kids. They were probably 17 to 18 years old, getting off a school bus, walking home, and they cut through a junkyard just to cut a corner. And one of them reached over and like broke an antenna off of a junked car. And a police officer actually arrested both of them and charged them with criminal damage to property.

 

Ryan: [00:10:59] Oh, my God.

 

Bo: [00:11:00] It was literally absurd. And the district attorney came to us and they were like, look, we’ll just offer you probation. I’m like, are you out of your mind? This is the dumbest case that’s ever been brought in, basically Georgia, Georgia jurisprudence. I mean, there is nothing you could offer short of we’re throwing this out that we’ll agree to do. And this case, believe it or not, goes all the way to a jury trial. So we’re sitting there and we are questioning, we have to pick a jury. The police officer takes the stand and we’re questioning him. And then the judge breaks for lunch. So we come back from lunch, the officer gets back on the stand and we pulled a little trick during lunch. And so when we got back, the officer gets back on the stand and I said, all right, officer, my client and this other client here, John and Sam, are identical twin brothers. I said, There’s absolutely no way that you can sit there on the stand in front of this jury and tell and tell that jury which one of them actually broke that antenna. Can you? And he goes, Oh, I absolutely can. I said, seriously, even though they’re identical twins? No, I know which one broke it. Okay, well, fine then if you will point out for the jury exactly which one of these two brothers broke that antenna off that, that vehicle. And he points to the my client sitting right there next to me and says that, that one right there, John in the blue shirt, he’s the one that broke the antenna. And I just looked up and said, let the record reflect that the officer just identified Sam. All right, boys, you can switch seats now. The jury started just busting out laughing. Of course, we had them switch shirts and everything, switch seats. And needless to say, about 15 minutes later, not guilty verdict.

 

Ryan: [00:13:06] Amazing. So did I get that right?

 

Bo: [00:13:08] You’re very close, Ryan, but not my actual favorite courtroom story of all time.

 

Ryan: [00:13:14] Oh, wow. What was that?

 

Bo: [00:13:15] Well, my favorite happened down in Brunswick, Georgia. I had a client I’m going to call her Lisa Johnson. She was had her ex-husband had filed a contempt against her and claim that because her — what he claimed in the in the pleading was that because she had her boyfriend living with her, he should get custody of the child of their minor child. Now, here’s what you need to know. First of all, you can’t change custody in a contempt. You just can’t. It’s against the law. The second thing you need to know is by definition, contempt is the violation of a court order. Now, some divorce decrees have what they call a morals clause, which says that you can’t live with someone of the opposite sex. This one did not. So, again, by definition, she was not violating any provision of their divorce decree. So she was not in contempt even. Right. Beyond that. This wasn’t her boyfriend. This was her fiancee. And they were literally getting married that weekend. And so we went in front of this judge who was a real piece of work down there. She’s no longer on the bench, but I’m not going to use any names. But we go in and this doctor now, you have to understand, this was a doctor that was that was the husband. He had made life miserable for my client for months and months and months, just filed one thing after another just to try to get the better– he was so angry about this divorce. So he — the judge comes in, says, you know, here’s from the doctor. He says, you know, I want you to hold this woman in contempt because she’s got her boyfriend living with her. And the judge says, Mr. Bowen. And I said, Judge, I said, first of all, not her boyfriend, it’s her fiance, they’re getting married this weekend. I said, second, you know, this — his demand to change custody is completely illegal. You can’t do it in a contempt. You know that. Obviously, you’re a judge. I’ll tell you that. Third, there is no morals clause. So by definition, she’s not in contempt. There is no provision. He’s even alleging that she is violating. So we would ask that this be immediately dismissed and all costs cast upon the the doctor in this case.

 

Ryan: [00:15:36] Sounds reasonable enough.

 

Bo: [00:15:37] The Husband have to pay her attorney’s fees for filing this ridiculous, frivolous motion. Judge looks at me, says Mr. Bowen, I don’t need a piece of paper to tell me or some law to tell me what’s right or wrong. She goes until this woman is either married or has this man out of the house, then I am giving custody to her ex-husband. I mean, I completely lost it. I couldn’t. I had never seen a judge so thoroughly and completely just ignore the law. I mean, you just can’t do it.

 

Ryan: [00:16:14] Wow.

 

Bo: [00:16:16] I was so furious and I was like, Judge, you cannot do that. You are literally legally prohibited from taking this course of action right now. And she’s like, then take me up on appeal, Mr. Bowen. I’m telling I’ve made my ruling. She’s either out of the house or they’re married or the doctor is getting custody. I’m like, Judge, could we have a five-minute recess? I said, let me let me talk to my client about this situation. She goes, Okay, but I’m not going to change my mind. So we walk out in the hall. Her fiance is there with us and I said, Let’s go down to probate court. Now, what a lot of people don’t realize is when I was young, I was very religious to the point where I’m actually an ordained minister.

 

Ryan: [00:17:04] No way.

 

Bo: [00:17:04] So we went down to probate court, got a marriage license instantly. I had them both say, Do you take this man? Do you take this woman? Signed it. Married them right there in the hallway of the courthouse. Stamped it in. Walk back up to the courtroom. Literally all within 5 minutes. The judge is taking the bench and says, all right, Mr. Bowen, are you ready to proceed? I said, indeed I am, Your Honor. And she goes, Do you have anything else to add? I said, As a matter of fact, I do. May I approach the bench? And she goes, Okay, I took that marriage certificate, slammed it as hard as I could, and said, Judge, they’re now married. Rescind your order.

 

Ryan: [00:17:54] And did she?

 

Bo: [00:17:54] Oh, she did. She didn’t have any choice. Her eyes got wide. But even better was the look on the doctor’s face.

 

Ryan: [00:18:01] Oh, nice. I can only imagine.

 

Bo: [00:18:03] So I said, how did that work out for you?

 

Ryan: [00:18:06] True love prevails.

 

Bo: [00:18:07] So that was my all-time favorite courtroom story.

 

Ryan: [00:18:11] I like it.

 

Bo: [00:18:12] So. Well, I guess it’s my turn. Yeah. I get to ask one of you, so. Let me think here. All right. I got one. And I think I know the answer to this. So. My question is, why did you decide to become a lawyer?

 

Ryan: [00:18:30] All right. Now, what do you think? What do you think that is?

 

Bo: [00:18:32] I think the reason is because you were a performing musician, traveling, recording artist. You you were very heavily involved in the music industry. And you because of that, you were able to see the way that musicians get treated through all facets of the industry by by venues, by companies, you know, recording companies. But, you know, many of the contracts that musicians are forced to sign are extremely unfair and one one-sided. And I think that you took that very personally and you decided to do something about it, and that’s why you became a lawyer, to be able to help musicians and to be able to help them fight back against things like that.

 

Ryan: [00:19:24] Well, that is absolutely a reason why I am a lawyer. That’s not why I first wanted to become a lawyer.

 

Bo: [00:19:33] I feel like you’re changing your answer just to make me wrong.

 

Ryan: [00:19:37] Well I mean, that’s that’s all true. But when we get back to the genesis of me, like, okay, I’m going to law school, I’m going to do this, we got to look a little bit further back and we got to thank a little TV show called The Voice. So in my senior year of college, I received a message from producers of The Voice and they said, Hey, you know, we’d love for you to come out to L.A. and try out for us and do this thing now. But people think for these singing competitions that most of the time they find their talent singing outside of, you know, Gillette Stadium, you know, and sitting in, you know, 50 degree weather for all for a whole week and whatever. No, they called me up. They invited me out there. I sang an and when I got out there, they said, we really we really like your music. We really like you. But you know, what is your story? Who is Ryan Schmidt? And I was like, I don’t know. I’m a guy that plays guitar and I and I like to sing and I like to do music. And they said, Well, we’ve got a couple hundred of those, you know, like, Who are you? Like, This guy over here just had like an open heart surgery, you know. Like we need something better than that. And so I was like, okay, well, you know, you’re going to have to help me out here. That’s kind of what I do. Like, I’m a musician, so. Okay. Well, let me ask you this question. If you weren’t doing music, you know, if music was gone from you tomorrow, what would you do? And I said, I haven’t really thought about it. I literally graduated college, got on a plane and came here. But I studied music business in undergrad, and I’ve always been really interested in the legal side, the contract side, the IP side of the music industry and, you know, maybe, maybe I go into entertainment law and the producers eyes lit up and said, That’s it! You know, you are the entertainment law kid. So here’s here’s here’s the story, right? You’ve already you’ve already taken the LSAT. You know you’re going. I didn’t even know that the entrance exam for law school was called the LSAT at this point. I was just shaking my head. Yep. Give me the check. Thank you. So they said you’ve already taken the LSAT, you’re going to law school. But here’s the thing. Law school is kind of your backup plan. You really want to make it as a musician. This is your last chance. And if nobody turns around, then you’re going to law school. But you really are. This is your last chance to really make music happen and really, really fight for your career. So this this whole time that I was out there, you know, I was like the the law school kid. And it was it was really funny for me, but it was even funnier for my parents because I was all about just telling whatever story they wanted to hear. But, you know, my parents are like, they’re asking my parents, you know, So like, how long is Ryan wanting to be a lawyer? And they’re like, Never. You know. What?

 

Bo: [00:22:28] Since you told him he did.

 

Ryan: [00:22:29] Yeah. But, but that really, like, planted a seed for that that I kind of kept coming back on. And then a few years later, I was, you know, at the kitchen table with my fiancee, now wife. And I was just really burnt out on the music industry. And I said, I just don’t know if I can, you know, wake up every single day and go and do these co-writes and play these shows. And and it’s just incredibly hard with everything that artists have to face. And she asked almost the exact same question in the exact same way, and she said, Well, if it wasn’t music, what would it be? And I said, Well, I’ve always thought maybe I’d go to law school and be an entertainment lawyer.

 

Bo: [00:23:14] You know, Ryan, you’re actually making me question whether all the stories we hear on The Voice in American Idol are actually true.

 

Ryan: [00:23:23] Oh, it’s all true. That’s why it’s called reality-TV, Bo.

 

Bo: [00:23:26] Fair enough. All right. So that was a your incredibly sly way of getting in the fact that you were on The Voice.

 

Ryan: [00:23:36] That’s right. That’s right. And actually, now that I’m shamelessly plugging my music, the intro music to allegedly with Bo and Ryan is actually one of my original songs.

 

Bo: [00:23:48] Oh, fair enough. All right.

 

Ryan: [00:23:51] So let’s let’s ask you some questions. All right. So. You know, you’re you’re the film/TV guy here in the office. You’ve got a lot of good celebrity stories. What is your favorite celebrity experience?

 

Bo: [00:24:07] Hmm. Oh, I already know the answer to this. But let’s say let’s hear your guess.

 

Ryan: [00:24:13] I’m going to say it’s that it’s that time. Your interaction with Joe Manganiello.

 

Bo: [00:24:19] That was a good one. What you’re referring to is the time I made Joe Manganiello think that he actually knew me.

 

Ryan: [00:24:27] How on earth did he do that?

 

Bo: [00:24:29] So this was probably not that long ago. Several years ago, I was out in L.A. visiting some friends and I went to dinner at this really nice restaurant with three friends that I went to law school with, and we’re having a great time. We look over Joe Manganiello and his wife, Sofia Vergara. We’re sitting at the next table and of course, you know, we’re all dorky law school kids, so we’re like kind of geeking out over it. And I’m like, I bet you I can make Joe think that he knows me. And they’re like, Come on, get out of here. You know? I mean, there’s no way. I’m like, Watch this. And I got up, I go to the restroom, I come back and I’m like, starting to walk toward the table. Walk right by and I’m like Joe! He looks up all confused. I’m like, Hey, it’s like, Good to see you. I was like, You may not remember me. Now you got to understand that just like two months before Joe Manganiello had been in Savannah filming Magic Mike. So I looked at him and said, I don’t know if you remember, but just a couple of months ago I was the production attorney for Magic Mike, and I said, You know, we met on set two or three times. I’m Bo, and he looks at me, goes, Oh, yeah, good to see you, Bo. I’m like, How you been, man? He’s like, Good. I was like, Be happy with the way the movie look. So we chat for like 5 minutes, and then he introduces me to his wife and I’m like, I walked back over and I’m like, Oh, good to see you. Talk to you later. And the guys at the table are like, Oh my God, you really do know him? I’m like, Oh, no, I don’t. So yeah, that was fun, but not my favorite celebrity encounter.

 

Ryan: [00:26:06] Oh man. What is your favorite?

 

Bo: [00:26:08] Favorite celebrity encounter actually took place years before I actually became a lawyer.

 

Ryan: [00:26:13] Okay.

 

Bo: [00:26:13] So I was probably, I don’t know, I’m going to say, early twenties and going I was stuck in the Atlanta airport and I end up going into the lounge there, the one you have to pay to go into. Sure. Because I had hours to kill and you know, I was over 21, so why not? Well, I go in and standing there at this bar, sitting there is the rap group N.W.A.

 

Ryan: [00:26:44] Yes.

 

Bo: [00:26:45] So, I mean, we’re talking all Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, all I mean, I’m literally in awe. So, you know, I’m too shy to say anything, but I go up and get a drink and Dr. Dre just looks over, Hey, how are you doing? And we literally just strike up a little conversation. So I felt like literally the coolest man on the planet.

 

Ryan: [00:27:10] As you should have.

 

Bo: [00:27:11] And he was like, he’s like, This is my group. Because you ever heard of N.W.A. And I said, Well, I know what it stands for, but I’m definitely not going to say it. And they all started laughing. And so I felt like by the end of that, I’m pretty much best friends with all of N.W.A. At this point.

 

Ryan: [00:27:32] That’s fair enough.

 

Bo: [00:27:33] So that at 23, 24 years old, probably my favorite celebrity encounter.

 

Ryan: [00:27:39] Yeah, that’s that’s pretty great.

 

Bo: [00:27:41] All right. So let me come up with one for you, Ryan. All right. And I think I know the answer to this. So my question for you is going to be, what is the craziest slash, weirdest job you’ve ever had?

 

Ryan: [00:27:57] I’ve had a lot of them.

 

Bo: [00:27:59] I know. But I do know one story, and I think this has to be the craziest, wildest, weirdest job you ever had.

 

Ryan: [00:28:07] All right. Give me give me a sneak peek.

 

Bo: [00:28:09] I think it was when you were working. I don’t remember which one it was, but it was some music awards. And you were tasked with telling Bobby Brown to get on stage.

 

Ryan: [00:28:20] Okay. Yes. So and that’s again, that’s not my weirdest job I’ve ever had, but that’s a weird one. So when I was when I was in high school, I would volunteer. I would actually like cut school. I’d say, you know, my stomach hurts and I leave. And so I could drive into Boston about the 45-minute drive to go and work this Boston Music Awards, the NEMO Music Festival, all these different things and try to network and get in this industry. And I loved doing it. And my parents didn’t really know that I was playing hooky and doing all that other good stuff. So anyway, I was working with the Boston Music Awards and they were having their 25th anniversary at the Orpheum Theatre, this big, beautiful theater. And one of the artists that they were there — presenting Bobby Brown with the Lifetime Achievement Award, the Boston Music Awards. And so one of my tasks was being the artist wrangler and letting letting talent know, you know, they need you on on stage. You know, you’ve got to accept your award now. So I knock on Mr. Brown’s dressing room and I open the door and immediately a wave of smoke comes at me of of not the legal kind. And I said, Mr. Brown, you know, you’ve got to go on stage. You’ve got to accept your award. He’s like, okay, cool, cool. He and 20 people proceed out of this tiny green room, this whole entourage proceeds out of the green room, except a few little kids on the floor, and they’re playing like Legos and stuff. And I said, Yep, So I’ll just I’ll just walk you walk you over to the stage. I’ll show you where he said, No, no, I know where I need to be. You stay here and watch my kids. So, yes, I have babysat Bobby Brown’s kids, but not the weirdest job I ever had.

 

Bo: [00:30:17] Well, let me just say this. In fairness to Bobby Brown, having you watch his children was his prerogative.

 

Ryan: [00:30:27] That’s fair.

 

Bo: [00:30:29] So if that’s not the weirdest story you’ve ever heard, the weirdest job. What is the weirdest job you ever had?

 

Ryan: [00:30:35] Okay, So you have to understand, when I was a full-time working musician, shows were. Shows were few and far between that that paid well. So every now and then you got you had to do some some shows to to pay rent and do some things. And I was actually asked to play a six-year-old’s birthday party. As Justin Bieber. And of course, I said yes because the money was right and they were also going to feed me. And that was to two things that I was I was looking for. So this is early, early, early Bieber. You know, we’re talking about the hair, the luscious hair in the he’s still singing about love. And he has no tattoos at this point. So, you know, I look, this is pre-mustache. So I looked like a 13-year-old boy. This was perfect. I had the kind of shaggy hair. So I showed up. I had a white a white hoodie on, some sunglasses. And, you know, no offense to the six-year-old, but she couldn’t have been that smart because she was convinced that I was Justin Bieber. Like it just — she and she was his biggest fan. She had a picture. She was wearing his t-shirt and she was getting pictures with me. I’m like, I look nothing like this guy. But but, you know, there was a few songs I downloaded like karaoke tracks from like iTunes or something like that. And I sang a couple Justin Bieber hits. And then I remember at one point I got a weird request to sing the national anthem as Justin Bieber. So of course I did that as well while they were cutting the birthday cake. And it all was all going really well until she asked me how my dog was doing. And I said, Yeah, it’s good. It’s good. Well, apparently Justin Bieber’s dog had just died and I didn’t know that. And so then she started wondering if her mom had actually hired the real Justin Bieber.

 

Bo: [00:32:39] Oh, well, I hope you at least got to go out on a date with Selena Gomez out of this.

 

Ryan: [00:32:45] Of course.

 

Bo: [00:32:46] Fair enough, man. All right. I’m going to I’m going to admit defeat. You did have the weirdest jobs.

 

Ryan: [00:32:54] That was pretty weird. So. You know, we get a lot of calls. We can’t help everybody that calls. And, you know, sometimes there’s there’s different matters that are just outside of our practice area. I would like to know what’s your favorite story about rejecting a potential client?

 

Bo: [00:33:15] Oh, I do love rejecting potential clients. It’s one of my favorite things to do. Not not just to be mean, but sometimes they really, really deserve it. So what’s your thought? I know I’ve told you many stories about rejecting. We’ve gone through this. There are some people, you know, if you get a bad vibe, if someone seems crazy. Put — Send him away. We don’t need that. Right. Always trust your gut. And I know I’ve told you stories of people I’ve rejected. So what’s your guess?

 

Ryan: [00:33:51] Well, there was. I don’t know how you can beat the flasher.

 

Bo: [00:33:56] Oh, the guy who exposed himself, right? Oh, my gosh. Yeah. So, again, very early in my legal career, I was doing some criminal defense. This guy just sets up an appointment. I had no idea what he wanted. He comes in and he sits down and he tells me that he’s been accused of exposing himself to a — not really exposing himself, but but dropping his pants and exposing his underwear to a teenage girl. And he was charged with that. Now, this this is an older man. This is a man probably in his sixties. So this was no little innocent thing. This was seemed real weird. So I already want to throw this guy right out of the office. But by the same token, part of me is thinking, look, let me just make sure it happened, because being accused of something like that, if you didn’t do it, I mean, now that’s horrifying. That’s somebody I would literally help. But, you know, if he did it, I have no interest in this. So I’m asking him, you know, well, tell me through walk me through what happened. And he’s like, you know, he’s telling me this story, which already sounds like complete bullshit about what happened. And I said, All right, well, you know what happened when when, you know, you were contacted by the police? Well, they asked me to come down and give a statement. Well, did you? And he said, yeah. He goes, you know, I didn’t see any problem with it. You know, he’s being all nonchalant. And and I said, All right, well, what did they ask you? And he’s like, well, he goes, They made me pretty mad. And I’m like, Why? And he goes, Well, they asked me if I wore boxers or briefs. And, you know, I thought that was very inappropriate. I’m like, Well, you were charged with exposing yourself to a teenage girl, so I could get why they would ask that. Yeah, I mean, that’s a question you probably should have anticipated. And so I said, Well, how did you respond? He goes, Well, you’re probably not going to like this, because I was so mad that I just stood up, dropped my pants and said, Why don’t you see for yourself? Like, let me make sure I am crystal clear on this point. You were being charged with exposing yourself to a teenage girl. So in your defense, you exposed yourself to the police. I’m like sorry, don’t think I can help you.

 

Ryan: [00:36:29] Yeah, that’s not going to work out for us.

 

Bo: [00:36:31] So that was pretty fun to reject, but probably not my favorite rejection story.

 

Ryan: [00:36:39] Oh, there’s a better one than that?

 

Bo: [00:36:42] This this just happened a few years ago. This guy came in and oh, my God, he was insufferable, carrying on and on about politics and the state of our country. Just, you know, and our country is, you know, it’s losing all its morals today. And, you know, you know, I’m just I’m trying to just get him back to the point. And I’m like, okay, if you say so. And this guy’s just insistent. He wants to pull me into this conversation. I could I could feel the devil, you know, climbing up onto my shoulder.

 

Ryan: [00:37:17] Right.

 

Bo: [00:37:18] You know, listen. And finally he pushes too far and he’s like, I’m dead serious. We just have no morals anymore. Because, as a matter of fact, I didn’t even have sex with my wife before we got married. Did you? I looked at him and said, you know, I have to say, I don’t know. What was her maiden name?

 

Ryan: [00:37:41] No!

 

Bo: [00:37:44] You know, the good part of that story? Didn’t actually have to reject him. He just left.

 

Ryan: [00:37:49] Fair enough. There are just some clients you don’t want to work with.

 

Bo: [00:37:54] So that was my favorite rejection story. So I think we got time for one more question.

 

Ryan: [00:38:01] Okay, well, we’re doing pretty bad in this game.

 

Bo: [00:38:05] All right, well, I’m bound and determined to get this one right, so I’m going to ask you. All right. When you were a kid. Who is your celebrity crush?

 

Ryan: [00:38:16] My first celebrity crush.

 

Bo: [00:38:18] First celebrity crush.

 

Ryan: [00:38:20] Oh, man. Okay.

 

Bo: [00:38:21] So I’m going to go back and we’ve actually never discussed this. So this is going to be a pure guess on my part. Sure. So I’m going to say this had to be around probably the nineties. I’m going to say Britney Spears. I think almost everyone had a crush on Britney Spears in the nineties.

 

Ryan: [00:38:45] I absolutely did have a crush on Britney Spears.

 

Bo: [00:38:49] Did I nail it?

 

Ryan: [00:38:50] But the question was, who was my first celebrity crush? And she was not my first.

 

Bo: [00:38:56] Oh, all right, let’s hear it.

 

Ryan: [00:38:58] I was pretty amorous from a young age, I would say. And I. Fell in love with a — somebody on the silver screen who was on the television children’s television show Barney. I was probably five years old. And there was somebody on my on my screen name, Amy.

 

Bo: [00:39:23] So it wasn’t Barney.

 

Ryan: [00:39:25] It wasn’t Barney. No, no, it was. It was. It was his helper, Amy. And. You know, I just thought she was the coolest and the cutest. And, you know, I just knew we had to be together.

 

Bo: [00:39:40] You do realize every single person listening to this is going to immediately Google Amy from Barney. Yeah.

 

Ryan: [00:39:47] Yeah. And I’m sure I’m sure like, you know, IMDB, IMDB her and she’s an actual person, so just let her know that, you know, I’ve got a crush on her. So, yeah, so that was, that was my first celebrity crush. And I fell hard.

 

Bo: [00:40:02] Oh, man.

 

Ryan: [00:40:04] Well, well, and and, you know, there was a there was a there was a chance there was a moment when I thought that I actually had a chance. And let me tell you about that. So I’m a I’m a twin. I have a twin sister. And we would always have these shared birthday parties up until a certain age when that started getting weird. So then when we were five, we had this Barney party and Barney came to the party. It was a big deal. Big deal.

 

Bo: [00:40:34] And so I’m guessing like the six-year-old girl who believed you were Justin Bieber, you 100% believe this was the actual Barney.

 

Ryan: [00:40:45] Absolutely. No, this was Barney. So I was thinking, Barney is cool, right? But I’m really using him for his connection to Amy. So the whole time everybody was like, Oh, my God, it’s Barney. It’s so great. I’m like, Hey, man, like, do you know Amy? Where where is she? And you’re like, Oh, like, oh, she’s not here. And the party was great. It was fine. But I was always like, Huh? Why is Barney kind of like grabbing on my mom? And it turns out — And also, where the hell is my dad? At my own birthday party, Right? And I was pretty pissed about that. But it turns out my uncle was supposed to be Barney, and at the last minute, he was just like, Yeah, I’m not doing that. And to save the whole party, you know, my dad had to put on the purple suit. And as a result, he also got a little fresh and handsy with my mom.

 

Bo: [00:41:51] You know, I feel like, why is Barney grabbing my mom? You know, that might be your next single.

 

Ryan: [00:41:57] I think so. So? So that was. That was my first. That was my first experience with love was. Was Amy and Barney grabbed my mom.

 

Bo: [00:42:06] Well, you mean kind of like how The Bowen Law Group grabs all the headlines for our work with corporate and entertainment clients?

 

Ryan: [00:42:14] Wow. You really spun that one. Exactly. Which is why, of course, we’re the most successful lawyers in the history of American jurisprudence. Allegedly. Well, that’s our show for today. Thanks for listening to the legal mastery of the highly intelligent and easily most attractive true legal lawyers in Savannah. And remember, the only lawyers in the free world who have never lost a single case, allegedly, to continue to receive free edge of your seat. Legal anecdotes mind blowing takes on hot legal topics in a general master class in awesomeness, please head over to the Bow and Lounge Group Comp podcast and look for…

 

Bo: [00:42:51] The Plaintiff rests his case already — the verdict is in. Hit subscribe.