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In the new FX series The Comedians, Billy Crystal and Josh Gad star as satirical versions of themselves. The show is about how the two comedians are hesitant to work together and share the spotlight, but they do, and they begin a strained relationship, in which they're separated from each other by a generational comedy gap.

But in real life, when Crystal and Gad met, they hit it off.

"Even though there's 30-something years between us, there's a lot of commonalities and a lot of interesting parallels in our careers," Crystal tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross.

"It really was kismet," Gad says.

Gad, who was on Broadway for The Book of Mormon and did the voice of Olaf for Frozen, says he wasn't planning to go back to TV, but he couldn't pass up the opportunity.

"I wasn't looking actively for any reason to go back," he says. "And I have sort of been unlucky in love with television and it's hard ... to find a comedy that really works for your voice and is going to be something that connects with audiences."

On The Comedians, the characters Crystal and Gad play are heightened versions of themselves.

"I like to think of myself as a lot more jovial and easy-going than this guy, who sort of does have an egocentric personality, this guy who is constantly jealous or neurotic or what have you," Gad says. "My guy in the show is a vessel for anything but responsibility. He sort of doesn't have anything he's committed to other than himself and you see that reflected in his personal choices and his professional ones."

Crystal says his character is a lot more insecure about the success of the show and is often uncomfortable about the direction it is going.

"He senses more about the danger of messing this one up," Crystal says. "I don't feel that way. Whatever happens, happens now. I have much more of a carefree attitude than I ever had."

Interview Highlights

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Billy Crystal (left) says that onstage Josh Gad (right) "lights up." Ray Mickshaw/FX hide caption

itoggle caption Ray Mickshaw/FX

Billy Crystal (left) says that onstage Josh Gad (right) "lights up."

Ray Mickshaw/FX

On seeing the Swedish series upon which The Comedians is based

Billy Crystal: Within five minutes I loved this thing so much, I basically committed to it because the premise was so terrific: It was a veteran comedian, he has a show that he wants to do and they can't really let him do the show and they want to team him with somebody else. And they force him to be teamed with a younger — what they think [is] an edgier — comic to make this sketch show. I thought the premise was so strong. Then comes the decision: "All right, who is going to be the guy? Where do you find this guy who can play with me and be funny and do all the things that I'm going to do, just his own version? And who is going to be the Sancho to this guy's comedy Don Quixote?"

On finding Josh for his partner in the series

Crystal: I had seen Josh in Book of Moron and he was a revelation to me. I saw him once or twice as a Daily Show correspondent and you can tell he's a very skilled writer and very funny and has a really interesting charming charisma about him, but onstage he lights up. To me he's a new Zero Mostel. He embodies all the good things about many great musical comic performers.

On the generational comedy gap

Josh Gad: There's certainly a disconnect that exists, I think, in a lot of comedy out there and different approaches to comedy. I happen to have a lot more in common with Billy than not — so it was almost more difficult to create this sort of gap between the two of us. ...

Crystal: It happens a couple of times in the show where I have to go in front of an audience of young people and bomb and make it really uncomfortable. And that was really hard to do. The instinct is to go out and get 'em. But to deliberately do stuff that looks out of touch and out of date was really difficult. And it'll be very painful for the audience because it was for me, but in a really funny way. ...

It's really just awkward references. [It takes place] at a place called the Comedy Living Room ... [and] everyone is sitting on the floor and I just say, "You know, back in our day we used to call these sit-ins. We'd protest Vietnam. So what are you protesting, lumbar support?" And you could hear this "What is he talking about?" "We had these protests during the Vietnam War. Vietnam. That was the war that Forrest Gump fought in." It just dies. It's just so painful.

On their work in animation, Gad as Olaf in Frozen, and Crystal as Mike Wazowski in the Monsters Inc. films

Gad: In general, when you're doing something like this, you sort of are looking over your shoulder at all of the amazing comedic sidekicks that have come before in the Disney or Pixar canon. ... I was blessed enough to be growing up in what they call the "second golden age of Disney animation," which was The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and Lion King. And I remember seeing Robin [Williams'] performance as the Genie and I watched it over and over again in the theater and I just thought it was so unique and so brilliantly captured the essence of him as a performer. And I sort of wanted to have that kind of freedom when I was approaching Olaf in the recording studio. And the creative team gave me that freedom, especially when it came to improv.

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Crystal: [Mike's] a little one-eyed green guy but they videotape me and I said, "I want the hands of Sammy Davis Jr." They looked at film of Sammy and they would tape me when I was doing the voice work, so it's weird, it's this orb with this one eye but actually ends up having a lot of my expressions, it's very interesting that way.

To me, little Mike Wazowski is one of the best characters I ever got to play because he was funny; he was outrageous; he got angry; he was romantic; he was a full, well-rounded character.

On starring in The Book of Mormon on Broadway

Gad: I got a phone call one day from Bobby Lopez who was working on the music with Trey Parker and Matt Stone, and it was about four or five years before it ever hit a Broadway stage. And he said, "I'm developing this show about Mormons, would you want to be a part of it? It's with the guys who created South Park." I said, "Yeah, of course!" I listened to a demo they sent me and the first song is "Hello" and it's lovely, it's hysterical, the second song is "Two by Two," then I get to this song called "Hasa Diga Eebowai." And I called my agent and I said, "I can't do this." And he said "Why?" And I said, "Because I'll be shot. This is the most offensive thing I've ever heard. You can get away with this in animation, not on a stage." I sort of took a leap of faith and I did the very first workshop we ever did and I white-knuckled it and the audience not only embraced it but was laughing harder than I've ever seen. And from that point on, I never looked back.

The White House announced Tuesday that President Obama would remove Cuba from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism. That got us thinking about which other nations are on the list, how they got there, whether any others have been removed, and what happens to countries when they're put on (or taken off) the list.

Who's On The List?

Aside from Cuba, there are three other countries currently on the list:

Iran, there since Jan. 19, 1984

Sudan, since Aug. 12, 1993

Syria, since the list's inception on Dec. 29, 1979.

Cuba was added March 1, 1982.

The countries that have been removed are: Iraq, Libya, North Korea and the former South Yemen.

Why Are they There?

Three laws dictate a country's presence on the list:

Section 6j of the Export Administration Act of 1979

Section 40 of the Arms Export Control Act

Section 620 of the Foreign Assistance Act

To be added to the list, according to the U.S. State Department, the secretary of state "must determine that the government of such country has repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism."

That designation triggers unilateral sanctions by the U.S. These include a ban on weapons exports and sales; the imposition of financial and other curbs, as well as a ban on economic assistance; and restrictions on the exports of items that can be used by the country to enhance its military capability or its ability to support terrorism.

Cuba was previously accused by the State Department of being a safe haven for armed left-wing groups from Colombia and Spain. In its most recent report on terrorism, the State Department noted that "there was no indication that the Cuban government provided weapons or paramilitary training to terrorist groups." But, it added: "The Cuban government continued to harbor fugitives wanted in the United States. The Cuban government also provided support such as housing, food ration books, and medical care for these individuals."

Iran was cited for its support of the Shiite group Hezbollah, as well as Hamas in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen and other militant groups across the region.

Sudan was listed for allowing terrorist groups to operate on its soil, but the State Department notes that the country "remained a generally cooperative counterterrorism partner and continued to take action to address threats to U.S. interests and personnel in Sudan."

Syria, the report said, continued its political support of groups such as Hezbollah and other groups.

It's worth noting that being on a U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism does not necessarily mean that the country stops trading with other nations. Typically, as in the case of Iran, strong multilateral sanctions are needed to have an impact.

How Do Countries Get Removed?

For a country to get off the list, the U.S. secretary of state must make a recommendation to the president. Should the president accept the recommendation, a 45-day review follows during which Congress can vote on whether to block the move. A country can be officially removed from the list after that time.

Just because a country is no longer on the list doesn't necessarily mean it is considered a U.S. ally, but it does mean the U.S. and said country can enjoy a semblance of normal relations.

As President Obama told NPR in an interview this month: "There are areas where there are serious differences, and you know, I don't expect immediate transformation in the Cuban-American relationship overnight," he said. "But I do see the possibility — a great hunger within Cuba — to begin a change — a process that ultimately, I think, can lead to more freedom and more opportunity."

Indeed, countries that have been removed from the list are not all U.S. allies.

For example, Iraq was one of the original members of the list, but it was removed in 1982 during the Iran-Iraq war when the U.S. was supporting Saddam Hussein. Iraq was slapped back on the list in 1990 following its invasion of Kuwait.

Libya, another of the original members, was removed in 2006 when its then-leader, Moammar Gadhafi, gave up his program to make weapons of mass destruction and, in the words of the U.S., renounced his support of terrorism.

North Korea was removed in 2008 following commitments it made on its nuclear program.

South Yemen was removed when it was united with the north.

state sponsors of terrorism

Terrorism

Cuba

When Henry Paulson first visited Beijing in 1991 as a banker, cars still shared major roads with horses.

"I remember getting into a taxi that drove too fast on a two-lane highway ... [that was] clogged with bicycles and horses pulling carts," says the former secretary of treasury under George W. Bush. "You still saw the hutongs — the old neighborhoods [with narrow streets] — which were very, very colorful and an important part of life."

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A 2006 photo of former U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson meeting with Xi Jinping in Hangzhou, China. Jinping became president of China in 2013. Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images

A 2006 photo of former U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson meeting with Xi Jinping in Hangzhou, China. Jinping became president of China in 2013.

Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Since the early '90s, Paulson has returned to China more than 100 times, as the head of Goldman Sachs and U.S. Treasury Secretary. Along the way, he has watched China become the world's second biggest economy.

"Now the country puts up half of all new buildings on Earth. It consumes and produces 50 percent of the cement in the world, 50 percent of the steel, the coal," he says. Most of the old hutongs have been replaced by glass and steel skyscrapers.

Eventually, China will likely surpass the U.S. and become the largest economy in the world, Paulson says. "But it's also a country with monumental challenges. There's as much danger in overemphasizing China's strength as in underestimating its potential."

Dealing With China

An Insider Unmasks the New Economic Superpower

by Henry M. Paulson, Jr.

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In his new book, Dealing With China: An Insider Unmasks the New Economic Superpower, Paulson describes some of the major challenges China faces as its people become richer.

At the top of that list is government censorship. China has the fastest-growing urban population in the world, with nearly 650 million people living in cities. At the same time, the government continues to severely limit political freedom.

Paulson says that approach isn't sustainable.

"Today you have the president of the country emphasizing the party being tougher on certain human rights, and on the media and internet — toughening up censorship," he says. "I look at this and I tell them, 'You live in an information economy, and you're not going to succeed if you close people off from information and innovation.' "

Both publicly and privately, China's president — Xi Jinping — is very direct about his own views on this topic, and his colleagues' views.

"They don't aspire to have a Western-style, multiple-party democracy," Paulson says. "They don't aspire to have Western values. Jinping believes that the future of the country, the stability, is dependent on a strong Chinese Communist Party.

"I feel quite strongly that won't work long term," Paulson says. As more people prosper, they'll demand information and rights.

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But Paulson does give the government credit for listening — and responding — to its people.

"The Chinese leadership over time has been pretty pragmatic in terms of understanding the mood of the people," he says. "Today they are focused on the things people care about the most: fighting corruption; restoring property rights to peasants; working to clean up the environment; working to ameliorate some of the income inequality."

development

China

People have been drinking tea for so long that its origin story is rooted in mythology: More than 4,700 years ago, one popular version of the story goes, a legendary Chinese emperor and cultural hero named Shennong (his name means "divine farmer") discovered how to make a tea infusion when a wind blew leaves from a nearby bush into the water he was boiling.

By the 4th century B.C., as Jamie Shallock writes in his book Tea, the beverage had become part of everyday life in China — though in a very different form than we might recognize today.

As the culture surrounding tea has changed through the centuries, so, too, have the tools we use to drink it. From the first dainty tea bowls to the mugs people use to warm themselves with a cup of tea today, tea sets have changed to meet cultural and utilitarian needs.

Before 1500

The first tea leaves weren't drunk in loose form; instead, they were compressed into cakes. To prepare tea, early drinkers had to tear off a piece of the compressed brick (often stamped with intricate patterns, and so valuable that it could be used in lieu of currency), roast it and tear it into even smaller pieces. Then they boiled their tea in heat-resistant kettles. According to Rupert Faulkner's book Tea: East & West, by the Song Dynasty (960-1279), tea had moved into a powdered form that could be set in a cup and whipped into the boiling water poured onto it. This whipped tea is most commonly associated with Japanese tea ceremonies today.

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A modern-day tea brick, compressed and embossed with an intricate design. Before the 1500s, tea leaves came in bricks not unlike this one. Wikimedia hide caption

itoggle caption Wikimedia

A modern-day tea brick, compressed and embossed with an intricate design. Before the 1500s, tea leaves came in bricks not unlike this one.

Wikimedia

A proper tea service could include 25 objects, according to Lu Yu, whose seminal 8th century book, The Classic of Tea, is the authority for early drinking habits. But the most important of these was the tea bowl. These glazed, ceramic vessels were simple in shape and tended to be between two and three inches in height.

1500s

By the 1500s, powdered and whipped tea had given way to steeped tea, which came in the form of rolled leaves rather than bricks. This necessitated the invention and use of the teapot as we know it today. These first teapots, James Norwood Pratt writes in A Tea Lover's Treasury, came from the Yi-Xing region of China and were soon copied throughout the world. Japanese potters moved the handle from the side to the top of the teapot.

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A Yi-Xing teapot made circa 1900. The first teapots came from the Yi-Xing region of China. Japanese potters moved the handle from the side to the top of the teapot, a style that later made its way back to China. Wikimedia hide caption

itoggle caption Wikimedia

A Yi-Xing teapot made circa 1900. The first teapots came from the Yi-Xing region of China. Japanese potters moved the handle from the side to the top of the teapot, a style that later made its way back to China.

Wikimedia

1700s

Tea finally reached Europe in the 1600s, along with the necessary tea wares manufactured in Japan and China. As English potters began to adapt the tea set to their countrymen's tastes, they eventually added a handle to the tea bowl to protect fingers from the transmission of heat through the delicate porcelain. According to Steeped in History, edited by Beatrice Hohenegger, this "became necessary because of the British habit of drinking hot black tea, which is consumed at higher temperatures than Chinese green." The English based the new design off existing large, handled mugs and containers used for hot beverages. The size of tea cups also grew to accommodate the English taste for milk and sugar in their tea.

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An illustration of Samuel Johnson, the 18th-century English writer, at tea, by R. Redgrave and H. L. Shenton R. Redgrave and H.L. Shenton/Corbis hide caption

itoggle caption R. Redgrave and H.L. Shenton/Corbis

An illustration of Samuel Johnson, the 18th-century English writer, at tea, by R. Redgrave and H. L. Shenton

R. Redgrave and H.L. Shenton/Corbis

However, Christina Prescott-Walker, a European ceramics expert and the director of the Chinese ceramics department at Sotheby's, believes the invention of the handle may have been a fashion statement more than a utilitarian choice. "In England, tea bowls were still being made as late as 1800," she tells The Salt. Faulkner writes in his book that the original bowls were perceived as more "authentically oriental" than their handled cousins.

1920s

By the early 1900s, innovations in tea drinking became an American affair. The most revolutionary was the tea bag, which was accidentally commercialized by a tea merchant named Thomas Sullivan. He had been sending customers tea wrapped in silk, and rather than take the leaves out of the bag, as Sullivan intended, the customers put the bags into their teapots instead. According to Faulkner, not only did the tea bags push the teapot back to the sidelines of tea service, they were too large for tea cups and ushered in the modern practice of drinking tea from large mugs.

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The tea bag was an American invention, commercialized by tea merchant Thomas Sullivan. Ryan Kellman/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Ryan Kellman/NPR

The tea bag was an American invention, commercialized by tea merchant Thomas Sullivan.

Ryan Kellman/NPR

Today

Today's designers are thinking up ways to integrate technology into our tea. Take, for example, Playful Self, a new exhibition piece at the Dublin Science Gallery. The tea set – which is still far from commercial use — responds to and collects biometric data from the user, including heart rate, breathing rate and even sweat production. From bowls to biosensors, the tea set has come a long way.

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The creators of the Playful Self tea set believe that "in the future, biometric data will only become more ubiquitous." And your tea set could become one of the devices gathering these data. Project by: Alex Rothera & Jimmy Krahe. Tea set design: Pascal Hien. Photo by: Marco Furio, Magliani Photo. Playful Set Editor: Karen Oetling. Marco Furio Magliani and Karen Oetling/Courtesy of Alex Rother and Jimmy Krahe hide caption

itoggle caption Marco Furio Magliani and Karen Oetling/Courtesy of Alex Rother and Jimmy Krahe

The creators of the Playful Self tea set believe that "in the future, biometric data will only become more ubiquitous." And your tea set could become one of the devices gathering these data. Project by: Alex Rothera & Jimmy Krahe. Tea set design: Pascal Hien. Photo by: Marco Furio, Magliani Photo. Playful Set Editor: Karen Oetling.

Marco Furio Magliani and Karen Oetling/Courtesy of Alex Rother and Jimmy Krahe

Tea Tuesdays is an occasional series exploring the science, history, culture and economics of this ancient brewed beverage.

Tove Danovich is a writer based in New York City.

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