All language subtitles for How. to. with. John. Wilson. S03E01. AMZN. WEB. h264-EDITH. en[sdh]

(light music playing)

John Wilson:
Hey, New York.

The relationship
that you have with your toilet

is unlike any other object
in your home.

Much like a romantic partner,

it's the one thing in your life
that's always there for you.

You've shared countless
intimate moments together,

and you're familiar
with all its beautiful curves.

It's a reason to come home.

And something to buy nice
things for when you go away.

And you can't imagine it
with anyone else

even though it may have had
many partners before you.

But, when you leave the house,

you're ripped out
of your comfort zone,

and you have to use
whatever toilets
are available.

You usually start
by asking a local business,

but none of them
wanna let you in.

John: Okay.

No? Alright.

And just when you start
to consider

taking desperate measures
to relieve your pain,

you start walking over
the Queensboro Bridge

and notice a Porta-Potty
balancing on some two-by-fours,

uh, over the guardrail.

So, you scale the bridge
to see if it's open.

And even though you eventually
found a place to go,

you wish that it didn't
take so much effort.

You know that the city
is full of toilets,

but they're always slightly
out of reach,

uh, when you need one.

But, maybe if you did
a little research,

you could finally
crack the code

and hack into
the, uh, Restroom Matrix,

and getting into any restroom
in the city

will finally become easy.

So, instead of worrying
about drinking too much water,

(clears throat)
or getting too far from home,

take a seat, friend,
and I'll show you

the best way to find
a, a public restroom.

The city actually has a ton
of public restrooms

that were open around
the turn of the century.

You used to be able
to go into any park
or subway station,

uh, and, and use a bathroom
whenever you wanted.

But then, in the 1970s,

most of them started to close

for budgetary reasons.

And the problem has only
gotten worse since then.

There's about eight million
residents in New York

and another 60 million tourists
that come annually.

But, there's only around
a thousand public restrooms

to accommodate everyone.

And only two of them
are open 24-7.

There are somehow
no public restrooms

in Times Square,

or Rockefeller Center,

and the Upper East Side

is actually one of the biggest
public restroom deserts of all.

But maybe the city
isn't opening more restrooms

because our sewer system
is already overwhelmed.

So you take a visit to the,
uh, waste treatment facility,

uh, to see if they
can actually handle more.

(upbeat music playing)

Tour Guide:
Here, we can oversee, uh,

basically everything
going on in the plant.

John:
Is a scum pit, like,
a technical term,

or is that something
that, like...

Tour Guide:
No, we have a couple scum pits.

-John: What's
"Special Tool number one?"
-(Plant Worker laughs)

-That was a tool I developed
yesterday to do a specific task.
-John: Okay.

♪ ♪

-So what kind of material
comes out of this hole?
-(whirring)

Tour Guide:
Wrappers, plastic bottles,
cardboard boxes.

John:
And is this stuff that goes in,
like, to the sewer, too?

Yeah, anything that hits
the sewer comes here.

John:
What about, like, cat feces?
Can you flush that?

-Kitty litter, no.
-John: Hm.

♪ ♪

Could our sewage system, like,
support more public restrooms

if we built them?

Oh, without doubt.

John:
What would happen if all
of the sewage facilities

were to stop operating
in New York City?

We would have sewage
backing up into people's homes,

restaurants...

Essentially, everything
would probably collapse.

♪ ♪

John:
What, you just had
a baby shower?

Uh, no, that was just left
on my desk today

from, uh, somebody that didn't
leave their name on there,

so I have to find out
who, who dropped it off.

-John: Oh,
could we see what's in it?
-Sure.

-John: Okay.
-It is a nice little outfit.

John:
Oh, that's beautiful.

My granddaughter
is going to be so happy

-when she wears this.
Oh, my goodness!
-John: Oh, wow.

It must be
a "Star Wars" person because...

-John: Oh, a little Yoda.
-A little Yoda.

♪ ♪

John:
Because there aren't many
public toilets open anymore,

a lot of places
have temporary solutions

that sometimes
stay up for years.

The handful of bathrooms
that are still open

are in pitiful shape.

The city usually takes
the doors off the stalls

to discourage people from
do-doing bad stuff in there.

So, you might need
to bring a blanket with you

to give yourself a little
privacy, uh, in the bathroom.

There's usually also
not any toilet paper

because it seems like the city
has other, uh, uses for it.

There's one public restroom
in Brighton Beach

that's actually really nice,

and that's because
the people that work there

take really good care of it,

and, and, uh,
decorate it with stuff.

So, this is like the Christmas
tree stuff with the popcorn...

No, but I changed it to...
I can't pronounce it.

-The Jewish "par-oom. Per-im."
-John: Oh, Purim. Purim.

-Yeah, I think.
-I went from that,

-and then I went to
the next holiday, to "Per-oom."
-John: Oh.

I learned from the Jewish
people that come in here.

-I got Maya Angelou.
See? Maya Angelou.
-John: Oh, nice.

Get my doggies. "Happy New Year.

Please don't drink and drive."
I added "Pray."

Maybe three years ago,
a lady came from Manhattan.

-She was gonna go jump off
the Verrazzano Bridge.
-John: Oh, really?

But then, she read
one of these sign... signs,

and she just started
hysterical crying.

-John: So you saved a woman
from potential suicide?
-Yes.

John:
What would it take for
other New York restrooms

to, to look like this?

-Well, first of all,
I'm not supposed to brag.
-(toilet flushes)

We, me and Sebesta, we use
our own funds, our own money.

-Everything in here,
we use our money, so...
-John: Really?

Yes. Everything in here,
we use our own money.

-John: Oh, okay.
-Yes, honey?

Oh, okay.

♪ ♪

John:
The city's only effort
to solve the restroom problem

was in 2008,
when they installed

five self-cleaning
restrooms, uh,

to service the whole,
all five boroughs.

It cost 25 cents to get in,

and there's
a 15-minute time limit.

(door whirs)

John:
You're curious how
it cleans itself,

and you-you realize the floor

is actually a button,

and if you sit on the sink,

you can trick the bathroom
into thinking that you're gone.

-(machinery groaning)
-(clanging)

(surprised shout)

(majestic music playing)

-John: Wow!
-(clanging)

-(hissing)
-(music stops)

(door whirs)

(ambient street noise)

John:
Because there aren't
many public options,

most bathroom activity
just ends up happening outside.

So many people urinate
on certain areas of New York

that every morning,
the shop owners

will cover the sidewalk
in bleach

in order to
eliminate the odor.

They also started
screwing down the toilet lids,

uh, in the showroom at IKEA,

to prevent people
from using them.

But as you were
checking them out,

the only one that wasn't secure

was actually filled with pee.

You could smell it.

And every few blocks
in New York,

you'll usually see
one of these bottles,

which are typically
filled with urine

from someone who couldn't find
a bathroom in time.

Hey. How's it going?

-Good.
-John: Uh, do you have a second?

For the day drivers,

it's harder for the people in
the daytime to use the bathroom,

so they use a bottle.

And I see the bottles of piss
all over the floor sometimes.

John:
Everyone has different ways
of holding it in

when they can't
find a bathroom.

But if you have enough money,

you actually might not need
to worry about that.

So, there is a condition, um,

that I dubbed
"Hampton's bladder,"

which is a condition,

um, based on the idea
that a drive

from New York City
to the Hamptons

takes anywhere
from three to six hours.

Injecting the bladder with Botox

relaxes the muscle
of your bladder.

That should be able to get you
out to the Hamptons

without you having to stop.

John:
How has Hampton's bladder
affected your life?

Yeah, you know, I think
I've lost a couple of friends

just by having difficulty
finding bathrooms and...

-John: Wait, like they died?
-No, not that they died.

-Just that they...
-John: Oh.

You know,
they wanted to be, um...

uh, they wanted me to find
a bathroom where,

you know, none existed.

The interesting thing
is, uh, one of, uh...

Peter the Great, in Russia,

actually died of urinary
retention in his 50s.

You know,
back in the 16th century

-or whenever that happened.
-John: Wow.

Did you guys know that?

I wasn't aware of it, no.

♪ ♪

John:
According to
the official city website,

they actually recommend
going into private businesses

to relieve yourself.

But, you often need
to buy something, so

you can always
just get a receipt
from the trash outside, uh,

(clears throat)
with the bathroom code on it

and just go in afterwards

like a normal customer.

(handle clicks)

John:
You went to go visit
Hudson Yards recently,

which is a new development
on the west side of Manhattan.

You really had to pee,

but when you asked
where the restroom was,

it turns out you have to walk
through a mall

filled with security guards
in tuxedos,

then up an escalator,

and, and down a long hallway,

then another hallway,

and then right before
you collapse in front of Muji,

the bathrooms should be
on your left.

And when you're
finally done in there,

you can go check out
their new attraction,

which is a shiny staircase
to nowhere

that you have
to pay to climb.

But it was
actually closed, uh,

because they couldn't
stop people

from killing
themselves on it.

It seems like
you're also not allowed
to film this thing,

so you might be approached

by the cops after a while.

I'm done. I'm gonna walk away.
You'll never see me again.

(police officer 1 speaking)

John:
I'm not gonna give you my ID.

I'm not gonna give you my ID.
There's no reason for that.

(police officer 2 speaking)

John:
I completely understand.

This place was already
inhospitable enough,
and I'll never return.

John:
It's getting harder
to tell in New York

where public spaces end

and private spaces begin.

Businesses often
have weird rules

that try to keep
certain people out.

And you can't always tell if
you're doing something wrong.

Employee 1:
Can you call the police, please?

Employee 2:
Well, this is a private space,

and we don't know
what you're filming,

and you're not telling us
what you're filming.

John:
I'm just trying
to find a bathroom.

-Employee 1: Can you just go?
-John: Okay, I'll go.

Maybe one day,
the only public place left

will be the sidewalk.

But, who knows for how long?

There's one neighborhood
in New York called The Hole

that you usually pass, um,

on, on the way to get to JFK.

It's actually
below sea level,

so it's not connected
to the city's sewage system.

So, a lot of the sewage
just ends up in the street.

This water here,
if it touched you,

you could get cooties.

Those are cootie waters.

Right there,
the shit come out of.

-John: Oh, th-that's where
it comes out of?
-Local: Yeah, right there.

Filthy fuckin' sewage water.

I'm not polluting this
motherfucker with no shit water.

I'm living in that grid there.

When I want to use the bathroom,

I gotta use the bathroom
inside of my place,

wrap up my stuff,
and carry it one block away.

-Look, see?
-John: Yeah.

And every Thursday,
the guy come with the truck

and he pick them up,
and he take them with him.

I've been in this neighborhood
eight years,

but I've been living
on the side of the road here

for three years now.

Yeah, we got bed,
we got TV, everything.

John:
What are you watching here?

Local:
I'm watching
"Ice Road Truckers."

John:
Oh, okay.

What is all this stuff
on your bed?

-Local: That's some condoms.
-John: Those are condoms?

-Local: The girl gave me those.
-John (laughing): Oh.

Local:
She gave me
a whole bag of condoms.

I don't use them, though,

'cause I ain't got
no girlfriend now.

John:
Oh, okay.
That's a lot of condoms.

Local:
Yeah, she gave me, like,
a thousand condoms.

-John: Okay.
-(Local laughs)

People who living off the grid,

it's, it's, it's much harder
to live off the grid.

Oh, big time. You know that.

Local:
But, it's like a preparation

in case the place
is in a disarray.

I will be the one who gonna
have to help the people,

them who don't know about
this type of living.

You know what they're talking
about now, right? What if...

New York were to go through

a nuclear explosion?

And I was just
saying to myself...

-Local: We living
outside already.
-Yeah.

I was saying to myself,
if we were to decide to hook up

our trailers to our trucks
and head for the hills?

-We would live!
-Local: We will make it.

-We would make it!
-Yeah.

But you take somebody from
one of those buildings up there,

-to try to come...
They wouldn't survive.
-Local: I know.

-'Cause they don't know
how to survive.
-Local: Right.

-Water, light, gas.
-All this stuff.

-You know, those essentials...
-(truck rumbling)

...are, like, the basic things
that you need,

-you know, to, to, to survive.
-Exactly.

But you take those
three things away,

-they wouldn't know what to do!
-They're in total disarray.

-They wouldn't know what to do.
-Total disarray.

-Makes you very resourceful,
living off the grid.
-Oh, yeah.

John:
Recently, these strange
"Ghostbusters"-themed posters

started to pop up
all over New York,

telling residents to prepare
for something bad

that's about to happen.

And around the same time,
the city released a weird PSA

asking you to prepare

for some other
unspecified disaster.

John:
If the big one were to come,

you would be
totally vulnerable

and wouldn't have anything
you'd need to survive.

You'd only have enough
blue cheese

for about a day and a half.

You'd have to make
your own milk somehow.

♪ ♪

But when you walk outside,

you don't really see any
immediate signs of Armageddon.

Uh, but, but,

you go to the store
and buy a pocket knife

and a gallon of water
just in case.

And then at
the worst possible time,

your toilet breaks.

So, you call the plumber,
and he says

there's something really dense
causing the blockage.

You said you didn't have
the faintest idea

of what it could be.

No idea.

He said they would need
a few days

to get into the walls
and replace something.

So, until it's fixed,
you're just gonna have to

become more resourceful

and find bathrooms in places

you hadn't
really considered before.

Very nice.

-How long has this been
on the market?
-Realtor: About a week.

(doorknob clicking)

♪ ♪

-(rattling)
-John: Oh, shit.

(quiet chatter)

John:
Hey, what are you guys doing?

Is this... Is this a...
Is this a party bus?

-Yeah. Kind of looks like it.
-(group chattering)

We're getting ready
for the show.

-John: So, where's the show?
-Uh, Forest Hills, New York.

Going to see Odesza.

Some of these guys
six times, so...

John:
Oh, really? Can I come?

(muffled music playing)

-(party bus chatter)
-(electronic music blasting)

(chatter, music continue)

John (yelling):
How much longer until we, uh...

20 minutes? Okay.

How old are you turning?

-H-How old are you turning?
-I'm turning 28!

John:
Oh, really? That's a good year!

Partygoer:
We are three minutes away!

-John: Are we here? Okay!
-Yeah!

(music becomes quieter)

John:
Alright. Well, have fun
at the concert, guys.

♪ ♪

It was definitely taking
a lot more effort this way.

But looking for a bathroom

opened doors you-you may have
never entered before.

McNally Employee:
Lou Reed was here once.

Mason:
And of course, in the center,
you'll find a, uh,...

an altar, um, with,

sorry to disappoint,
no blood stains.

(laughs)

(John laughs weakly)

John:
And this is the men's room?

Mason:
Oh, it's just a men's room.
Yeah.

John:
Finding the rarest bathroom

became an exciting pursuit,

and you became determined to
see how far you could take it.

Camper:
You have to have water, and
then you have to have a pump,

-so...
-John: Okay.

So what do you...
So where are you
going with this?

-I'm going to Burning Man.
-John: Cool.

-(rips tape)
-Uh...

can I come? (laughs)

(laughs) I mean...

♪ ♪

-John: Do people try to sneak
into Burning Man?
-Camper: Of course.

People try to sneak in in RVs.

It's really difficult these days

'cause they're kinda
on to the whole experience.

But, like, you could run in.

John:
What's the bathroom situation
like in there?

Camper:
There is...

a plethora of porta-potties.

Like, you can find
a bathroom everywhere.

-So that's nice. Yeah.
-John: Oh, awesome.

She said it was a place that
encouraged free expression,

a society of people
who give each other gifts

and build big sculptures
everywhere.

-Are you waiting for ice?
-Yeah. She's pumping...

-She's making the bags for me.
-John: Oh.

You actually did manage to,
uh, get a last-minute ticket

and spent an entire week
filming there.

It was the hardest thing
you've ever done,

and you were really proud
of what you shot,

but you were eventually told
that you couldn't use

any of the footage because
another documentary crew

negotiated
for exclusive rights

to film that year.

It turns out,
some of the film crew,

uh, were actually former
NXIVM members

who made that TV show
"The Vow."

You sat in a hotel room
for two days

trying to negotiate,

but they still refused

to let you use what you shot.

♪ ♪

You were crushed.

It was the most creatively
constipated you've ever felt

and you resented the whole
Burning Man organization

for being such hypocrites.

So, you finally just
threw in the towel

and gave up.

(curtain rattling)

John:
You didn't want your trip
out west to be a net loss,

so you set up an interview
on the way back

with someone you thought, uh,
might be good for the episode.

I'm Steve Savage,
otherwise known as Stinky Steve,

and, uh, I'm in
the septic business

here in central West Texas.

John:
How's business here?

Steve Savage:
I mean, I've got some repeat
customers just south of Abilene.

That's where a lot
of the subdivisions

are kinda being built.

-John: Oh, there's a dog
in your bathroom.
-Steve: Yeah, that's Lola.

-John: Oh, wow.
-Steve: Lola!

John:
Do you have a septic tank here?

-At this house? I do not,
but I do at the silo. Yeah.
-John: Yeah.

-At the silo?
-Yeah, the, the silo,
the silo has a septic.

I don't have it functioning yet
as far as that goes, uh,

because I don't have
the pump, the pump installed yet

in the silo
to pump the sewage to the deal.

But, I, I don't even
have the bathroom
hooked up in there yet.

-John: What's the silo?
-Huh?

-John: What's the silo?
-The missile silo.

-So, this part right here,
like where that missile is...
-John: Uh-huh.

...the, that structure
that's underground

is where I'm building my house,

or my future residence,
to live in that.

-John: Oh, really?
-And, and so that has...

-that actually has a septic tank
on the property.
-John: What?

Right here is the entry
to an Atlas-F missile silo,

the launch control center.

It was designed
as a retaliation weapon,

like an insurance policy
against the Soviet Union

to kinda prevent World War III.

We are probably
about a hundred...

and fifty to 160 foot

above the bottom of this.

John:
So, I could fall
18 stories down there?

Steve:
And hang on to that rail.

Just make sure you're always
holding on to something.

If you fall down, there's no way
of getting you out of there.

This is gonna be
the master bedroom

with the master bath
right there.

So, somewhere a bed
will end up in here.

But, in the meantime,
I had that air mattress.

John:
You got MREs here.

Steve:
Yeah, you know,
I did that for shits and grins.

You're gonna love this.
This is my fun room.

John:
What? (laughs)

Steve:
This is where they launched
the missile from,

and right now, it's just
kind of a temporary game room.

♪ ♪

There was a point where I was
out here working on it so much,

trying to get it
all done, um, that it did...

it put a little bit of a strain
on the marriage,

it caused us some conflict.

We were split up
for about six months, so...

John:
So, you were, you were
living down here

for six months by yourself?

Steve:
Yeah, about six months. Yeah.

These, these guys
are with HBO.

They're makin' a,
a little short documentary.

-I'ma be on HBO.
-Oh.

-John: Yeah.
-Now, you might be.

So, I don't know.

I mean, with the silo...

I mean, sometimes I wonder
if we will move out there,

you know?
I just don't know. Um...

We did hit a rough patch.

Me and Steve did hit
a rough patch, um,
this past year,

but we are working on it,
you know, to move past it.

And so some of the things
we're working on is,

you know, him spending
more time with us.

-John: Hm.
-And, um, you know,

he's not pushing us
to go out there so much.

'Cause it's pretty quiet
down there.

You don't really know
even the weather,

what's going on
with the weather.

Steve:
You can hear thunder.

-I, I can hear it.
-That's, that's the one thing
I will miss.

You know,
if we do move in there,

it's just not being able
to hear the rain.

-John: Hm.
-Um...

just look out and see
if the snow, you know,

did it snow the one time
of year that it snows here?

Or, you know,
what it looks like outside.

Steve:
Well, you just put
cameras out there.

John:
Seems like even if you are
prepared for a disaster,

the reality
of your new environment

would take some
getting used to.

And if the big one
were to come,

it's unclear who, who else
would still be around.

You asked if there were
any other places like this,

and he told you about
another bunker he knew about.

It, it was underneath a hotel
near Washington DC

that was built as
a secure place for Congress

in, in the event of
a nuclear attack.

Employee:
The Cameo Ballroom is where
you would find large parties,

wonderful dances, balls,

beautiful crystal chandelier.

Brad Paisley was here
this summer.

Alfonso Ribeiro was here
a couple summers ago

with his family.

So during the Cold War,
in case of a nuclear disaster,

this is where
our House and Senate
would have relocated to,

to continue doing their job.

John:
Wow. How heavy is this door?

-Employee: This door
is actually 18 tons.
-John: Wow.

So, this is the start

of the decontamination process.

They're going to have
to take everything off,

and everything would be
immediately incinerated.

This was a dormitory
with 60 to 65 beds.

And there would also
be riot gear.

John:
The riot gear is to protect
the people in here

-from each other?
-From each other.

So, they had to make sure

that they survived
and that our government

would continue
running our country.

John:
Like, is there any kind of world

that you would not
want to reenter?

Like, if, if there were
such... fallout?

Well, if we have
complete devastation,

and there's no vegetation,
there's no animals left,

um, I don't want to be
a part of that world

to try to figure out
how to sustain life.

So, yes, I would not
want to be here

in that situation.

(beep, door clicks)

-John: Oh, wow.
-This is the briefing room,

and this is where
our representatives

would have addressed
their constituents from.

-John: And that would be the
background for the broadcast?
-Correct.

If you have a photo of,
of devastation and destruction,

you're going to be scared.

You're going to want to flee.

And this is going
to help calm everyone down.

John:
Like, wouldn't it just be,
like, an illusion

that the White House was intact,
even if it wasn't?

It would, but it would be
an illusion that we would need.

Us having this

would really calm
everyone down and say,

"Hey, just hold on a minute.
We can get through this.

They're tryin' to find
a solution for us."

♪ ♪

John:
So, this is the bathroom
Congress would have used?

Employee:
Yes. (laughs) Help yourself.

(clicking)

(toilet flushes)

John:
So, it's good to know that

if anything really bad
does happen,

everything will still be able
to run the same way.

And even if these old relics
don't function

the way they should anymore,

at least they provide us
with images

that make us hopeful

that things
will get better tomorrow.

(water spraying)

John:
And if you can't
film at Burning Man,

you can always just make do
with what you have at home.

Because if all
our public spaces

are eventually gonna
become private,

then we should all get used
to seeing our private stuff

in public.

This is John Wilson.

Thanks for watching.

(jaunty country jingle playing)

♪ If your toilet
quits a-flushin' ♪

♪ There ain't no point
in fussin' ♪

♪ Pick up the telephone
and call Stinky Steve's ♪

♪ If your septic tank
is smellin' ♪

♪ And your spouse
just started yellin' ♪

♪ Pick up the telephone
and call Stinky Steve's ♪

♪ They're number one
with the number two ♪

♪ You are sure to see ♪

♪ Pick up the telephone
and call Stinky Steve's ♪

(jingle ends)

(majestic music playing)

(music fades)