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DC: How do you keep that from happening? How do you pay a sincere tribute without becoming overly earnest?
MR: I don't cheat, I try hard, and I actually do the work. If there's a joke, I try to make sure that I'm the brunt of it. And when I'm genuinely scared or worried or out of my comfort zone, I don't try to hide it. When viewers see honest vulnerability, they'll start to trust you. And they'll forgive quite a bit, even the occasional fart joke.
DC: I didn't want to go there, but I guess it's inevitable. You've said "poo" on camera more than any other person in the history of this network. Maybe in the history of television. Why?
MR: Because you guys yell at me if I call it "crap."
DC: Seriously. Why the fixation with Number 2?
MR: Because aside from TiVo and the bottle opener, and maybe electricity, indoor plumbing is the greatest invention of all time. Poo is a fact of life, and one of things we all have in common. But we've made it a taboo. Not only do we like to pretend our poo doesn't stink, we like to behave as though our poo doesn't even exist. Well, believe me, poo is real, and poo is everywhere, and the people who handle our poo are keeping polite society on the rails. Imagine the state of affairs in New York City if for one day, just one day, none of the toilets flushed. There would be riots in the street. Poo riots, guaranteed.
DC: So you have a passion for poo?
MR: Plumbers don't get their due, because people are frightened by poo.
DC: That rhymes.
MR: I know. I'm a poet as well as a gadfly.
DC: So what's the perfect dirty job?
MR: The best segments feature interesting people doing something truly dirty or difficult or disgusting that makes all of our lives better. "Roadkill Picker-Upper" is a classic. If the people who pick up road kill for a living all called in sick for two weeks, interstate commerce would shut down. It's a horrible, but really important job. Hot Tar Roofer, Oil-Driller, Exterminator … the list is long.
DC: After this many jobs, there has to be a certain element of repetition, right?
MR: Well, I'm always going to wake up clean and go home dirty. That's a given. As for locations — farms, fisheries, factories, dumps and sewers have all been featured more than once. But I haven't done the same job twice.
DC: Any jobs out there that you have "applied" for but been rejected?
MR: Early on, the name Dirty Jobs scared a lot of business owners away. Surprisingly, people in the food service business were not eager to see their product featured on a show about dirt. Go figure.
