A Wall Street Banker Turned to Comedy for Happiness and a Career Change
You’ve seen Adam Carolla. You’ve seen him on Late Night. You’ve seen him on The Tonight Show. And you have heard his songs, like “Joke of the Day.” His life and career are as improbable as they are inspirational — and he has certainly left his mark.
Carolla turned to comedy in the early ’90s after struggling to find success in the corporate world. He was forced to change careers after a personal tragedy. He went from being the CEO of a public corporation to a bartender. He moved in with his mom for eight months. He even went on to say, “There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about the time that I worked for a company that made a killing off the idea that smoking was good for you.”
While on late-night, Carolla has been as warm, funny, and thoughtful as ever. He has made the transition from a Wall Street banker to the executive director of a charitable organization. In a recent interview, he talked to CNBC’s Brian Williams about his career and his recent health scare.
Brian Williams: I was intrigued by the fact that, as an executive in the financial services industry, you were having to deal with a financial crisis that some people may find surprising.
Carolla: Yeah, you’re not the only one, but the financial services industry just saw their income drop off in a big way over those last couple of years.
But, you know, the financial services industry was making up this massive amount of money. And, and a lot of people, when they lost their jobs, their retirement income, their life savings… and the people that were in charge of that were not very good at it, they just kept on losing money.
So, what did you do when you lost your job? You know, my dad, you know, when he lost his job, he was lucky because his company had a layoff program. He didn’t have to do unemployment. He just had to, you know, get a new
