DESUS The problem is, trying anything in late-night literally means making the same show. Even us, we thought about it. Should we just do the regular late-night thing? Come out in suits, have the house band? It works. There’s definitely an audience for it. But there’s also the audience for something else, and that’s where we come in.

You never felt you had to give up any part of your voice or identity to make the show reach a broader audience?

MERO You’ll know when that’s us. When we’re like, “Brought to you by Clorox toilet-bowl cleanser.”

DESUS This is fun because it wasn’t put together by a corporate office. We started together. When we were at Complex, the show would be done and we’d both get on that 6 train. We’re just riffing back and forth and some guy’s sitting there, listening to us, and he’s like, “You guys are funny. You guys should do something with it.” At that time, we didn’t believe in the podcast. We were like, “Ah, shut the [expletive] up. You like what you see? Clap. You don’t like what you see, don’t clap.”

MERO It was literally just supplementary income. I had two kids — he had back rent. We needed that extra couple hundred bucks to make life work.

DESUS If us right now went back and told us from Complex that we’d have a Showtime deal, we’d be like, “Get the [expletive] outta here. And empty those pockets.”

MERO “Is that the new iPhone? Oh, you got AirPods? I don’t even know what those are.”

DESUS It’s like a reflex at this point. Just put us anywhere, man. If we didn’t get a TV deal, we’d probably be in front of a bodega. “Yo, those two bums are hilarious!”

MERO But they smell like urine.