Brian Regan: Ten Years of Brian Regan Live

by Dylan P. Gadino

In an interview with veteran comedian Brian Regan, Punchline Magazine takes a look back on his first album—10 years after its original release.

What’s your favorite bit on Brian Regan Live? Click around and tell us!

By Dylan P. Gadino

For years, entertainment publications have enjoyed the privilege of paying homage to historically important movies, television series premieres and original album releases with exciting anniversary nods.

Punchline Magazine recently celebrated two years online, and we’re still, admittedly, in anniversary mode. So we thought now would be a good time to reflect a bit on one of the most popular, important – not to mention the most steadily selling – stand-up comedy records of this generation: Brian Regan Live.

Released by Uproar! Entertainment – the first commercial shipment went out in August of 1997 – the album, from its simple packaging to Regan’s simple joke themes, is a perfect representation of the stand-up veteran’s comedy.

To date, the album has sold well over 120,000 copies (that’s huge for a comedy record) and according to Uproar’s CEO David Drozen, Brian Regan Live averages about 2,000 copies sold each month; last December, more than 8,000 were scanned for the holidays.

If it isn’t obvious already that Drozen, who signed Regan, knows how to pick a comic, you should know this: he’s also the guy that discovered Richard Pryor at the Comedy Store in Los Angeles, signed him to the legendary Laff Records in 1970 and went on to produce 12 Pryor albums.

“I just recognized a great stand-up comedy talent and it has turned into more greatness that I really expected,” Drozen says of Regan.

But 10 years after its release, what does Regan think of his first album? Lucky for you, dear readers, we asked him.

Looking back on Brian Regan Live, what do you think of the album?
I’m thrilled with the CD and it’s really been amazing to me that it just keeps selling. The sales never seem to go down. In fact, they’ve gone up over the years. I would’ve thought that after a couple of years, people would say, ‘Ok I got that, don’t need that anymore. But for whatever reason, people get it and tell their friends.

I’ve been incredibly tickled – and that’s the first time I’ve ever used the word ‘tickle’ with how it’s done. I’m quite flattered by it.

When you listen to it, do you have any regrets or are there things you would’ve liked to do differently?
It’s been a while since I actually listened to it. I want to though, partly because it’s been a while since I’ve heard it, it’d just be nice to hear. But secondly, when I do live performances now, people tend to shout out things at the end of the show that they want to hear from the album and I don’t remember how to do my own jokes, which is kind of embarrassing.

I especially don’t remember the exact way they were done on the CD. In fact, I joke about that on stage. I do hear bits of it all the time on XM and stuff. And for the most part, I’m very pleased. I listen to it and say, ‘Wow that sounds pretty tight.’ When I made that, I was probably at the point where I was ready to lay something down on a track.

How did you decide to record it in the first place?
Uproar! came to us. We weren’t seeking out someone to record it. They came to us and asked if we wanted to do a CD and my manager and me talked it over and said yeah, it would probably be a good thing to do at this point— especially since I had a bunch of material.

I wanted to have a version of that material that would be on a disc and if anyone wanted to listen to it, it would be there. David Drozen came us before anybody else seemed to have much interest in me. I’ll always owe him a debt of gratitude for that. He wanted to capture my comedy and it really helped put me on the map.

Did you expect the album to catch on the way it did?
I had no clue. I didn’t realize that many people would hear the album before they saw me live. I guess I was a little naïve. I always thought it would be the flip— that people that were already fans would say, ‘Hey, man. I like his comedy so I might as well get the CD.’

But with the computer and the Internet exploding around that time and with people being able to share clips, it was sort of the cart before the horse. People would come up to me and say, ‘Hey we heard your CD and we wanted to come out and see you live.’ And I was like, ‘Wow that’s amazing.’

What’s on the horizon for you?
I have Comedy Central in my corner now. They gave me a two-year deal, which includes two one-hour specials; the first aired in June. Having them in my corner is kinda nice. To have Comedy Central thinking you’re pretty good is a nice little feather to put in my cap.

For more information, check out www.brianregan.com.

You don’t have Brian Regan Live yet? Get it here!

Nick Swardson: Party

by Dylan P. Gadino

You’d be hard pressed to find a stand-up comedian – a good one, anyway – that doesn’t drop at least a little bit of sadness, anger or some form of edge into his act. It just seems part of the package; well-adjusted, incredibly happy people most times make bad comics.

And it’s not that comedian Nick Swardson is well-adjusted— he’s far from it.

It’s just that he lacks that overt troubled-artist demeanor; instead, he’s happy to deliver the bulk of his joke repertoire as a 12-year-old boy trapped in a 31-year-old’s body.

At times the recipe works— especially when Swardson uses his boyish wonderment to create absurd adult-themed “what if” bits, like when he examines alcoholism: “I wonder if wine coolers ever just fucked somebody’s life up… just took somebody down,” he says. “Hi, my name is Nick and kiwi-strawberry ruined my life.”

It works even better when he tells the crowd at the Tempe Improv about him buying a “sounds of the ‘80s CD” only to realize upon getting it in the mail that it was filled with sounds of the 1580s and that it was just a recording of one man talking:

“Winter’s coming again,” Swardson narrates. “We don’t have much time. Father’s got small pox. He’s not going to make it I know it. We’ve got to find food. Where are the horses? I can’t feel my legs! Is there a god in this world!?!”

He pauses.

“Ok, I can’t dance to that. Is there a club remix to ‘I Can’t Feel My Legs?”’

But his boyish charms start to wear thin during his third or fourth poop joke. He jokes about feeding his cat diarrhea; he spins a tale about his house being haunted by a farting ghost; he uses the phrase “shit factory” in one of his punch lines and a closing skit (featuring David Spade) finds Spade’s character, Mindy farting uncontrollably in an elevator.

But, in his defense, with his laid-back, stoner-like, stuffy-nosed delivery, Swardson never claims to be breaking down the walls of stand-up comedy or leaving an audience with something to think about.

Party is a light-hearted, largely funny collection of Swardson’s now classic bits (his John Stamos funeral joke, grandmother stories and his faux anecdote about his friend stabbing a guy in the face are all finally captured on disc) and his newer, if not better, material. While it clearly isn’t designed for repeated listens, Party no doubt deserves a spot in your growing comedy collection.

Marc Maron: Heartbreaking Comedy

by Dylan P. Gadino

How do you turn frayed emotion and freshly splayed wounds into something brilliantly funny? Ask veteran stand-up comedian Marc Maron.

Inherent in most great comedy, and in most great art of all kinds, is tragedy and heartbreak. Even the most optimistic stand-ups find a way to sprinkle those themes into otherwise easily digested fun-time material.

But there are a few comics – call them brave, brilliant, or just psychologically fragile enough – who thankfully incise themselves and prod their guts right in front of us all— without anesthesia, without the assurance of help, sometimes without the means to put all the pieces back in the right places.

You see it in Louis CK’s bits about self-loathing and marriage; you see it in Christopher Titus’ stories about his painful upbringing; you see it in Greg Giraldo’s vulnerable rants about aging.

But with his impressive emphasis on soul-baring material, veteran stand-up comedian Marc Maron leads the pack of these thoughtful, enigmatic performers. His two albums, Not Sold Out and Tickets Still Available are topically diverse masterpieces that find Maron, 44, spilling on everything from his own depression, religion, politics, his sobriety, his father and his relationship insecurities.

Through it all, two things are constant: Maron’s intense, painfully honest approach and a steady stream of laughs.

Punchline Magazine recently spoke with Maron from his Los Angeles home about, among other things, his purpose as a comedian, his unique approach to tired topics and his faithful, inspired following.

You make no secret out of wanting to weave some sadness into your stand-up material. Are there some bits you do that you feel are bigger downers than others?
Well, I don’t know if stripping people down to the fact that life is short and usually it ends up disappointing you is necessarily what people are looking for in entertainment. But lately, if you fuse that with a little frustration and anger and not just strip it down for no reason, then something good seems to happen.

Whether or not people are willing to go there, that’s up to them. And if they’re not they could just laugh at me, like ‘That guy’s crazy.’ I seem to be more philosophical than whiney. The questions I always ask myself when I get off the stage is, ‘Jeez was that really necessary? Did I have to do that? Did I help the audience at all or are they going to leave feeling worse?’

Sometimes people leave my show saying, ‘that guy was hilarious’ and other times they say, ‘I hope that guy’s ok.’ And either way, I’ve engaged you in something. If it’s the latter, I’ve forced you into the position to care. And some of you are selfish so maybe that was new for you.

I’m in the middle of a separation and a divorce so now something else is happening on stage. I’ve finally gotten my genuine heartbroken stripes. I really don’t know what’s going to happen now in the sense of where my comedy is going.

I don’t think people want to see some of those things. It’s not that I’m telling some dark secret truth; it’s just that sometimes I do exactly the opposite of what people are going to a comedy club for. I do it in a funny way. But I don’t think people are used to hearing it.

Yeah, you seem comfortable wearing your heart on your sleeve.
I’m willing to be fairly candid and to put my heart on the line on stage. That’s what the comedians I liked and I respected did; I want to create that electricity of real risk and real exploration. But I’m not a fireworks guy. It’s all coming directly from my emotions.

Sometimes that could go either way. I don’t think I bum people out anymore. I used to. They could see the sadness right now, because I’m a little fragile with the situation with my wife. But that’s ok, I don’t mind offering it up.

You’ve done a lot of material on your wife in the past. Can you keep those stories honest with the divorce— or do you have to lose them?
I’m really trying to put together an hour about love and relationships. Which means ultimately I’m going to disappoint my more socially active, political fans. But maybe I won’t. That stuff could become political as well. Lately, what I’ve been realizing is that if you’ve got a job and your husband or wife has a job and you have a household to hold down, it’s not that you’re apathetic to politics— it’s that you’re fucking busy.

Most people are just consumed with just staying afloat, managing their lives and managing their emotions. The political process is something that most people just can’t delve into. I just found this out by being consumed with this horror of having my life torn apart and my heart ripped out of my chest. Like who the fuck has time to read the paper? I’m in trouble here. It’s really changed my point of view of what I think most people are up to.

It’s interesting that you say some of your more socially aware fans might not be into the love and relationships material.
But I say that mostly out of insecurity. I think that most of them do [still like relationship material]. When I hosted the show on Air America, that’s exactly what they listened to me for— that balance.

Most people, especially lefties, are vulnerable and sensitive; they’re angry, they’re very attuned to injustice and they feel marginalized. And that’s been my whole life— politically or otherwise. Sometimes it’s not tethered to an ideological angle. It’s just being hypersensitive and hyperaware and just wanting things to be better.

So you being hypersensitive and hyperaware encompasses all facets of life, not just for social and political causes?
Yeah. And people relate to it. It’s not even that I’m an acquired taste. There’s just certain people that gravitate and could relate to me. Some people walk around a little heavy-hearted and some people do everything they can to avoid that. I’m sort of trying to acknowledge that feeling and move through it.

You present yourself as fragile but at the same time not completely falling apart.
No, definitely not falling apart.

And I think people are inspired by that.
Yeah, some people are and it’s a good feeling. I wish there were a lot more of them but there’s a few.

I think that there’s still a lot of people that think weaving that raw emotion into comedy is too much of a deep thing.
Yeah, it’s a rarified thing to see somebody do that. I don’t even know what I do or how it really looks. It’s just the way I talk and think. I’ve always seen comedy as an ongoing standing dialogue about how I see the world. I don’t fundamentally write jokes. Sometimes I do. But I’m usually entertained by jokes more than I’m excited about doing them.

I have to be able to insert these thoughts and chunks into my philosophy. I don’t dwell much on pop culture. I find it temporary and tedious and I beat myself up about it. If you watch other comedians, they’re reading the paper, the tabloids and watching E! television and bringing it all in. I’m trying to render it down!

I often think that I gotta spruce this [emotional material] up with some light-hearted shit. If I don’t put some pop culture shit in between this stuff, people are going to leave my shows exhausted— and on a very deep level. So I’m trying to do that in the best way I can because the truth of the matter is I don’t give a fuck.

I honestly don’t watch any TV shows regularly. I try to do my own thinking. I read newspapers; I try to get as objective news as possible so I could have my own ideas.

If I apply myself I could write jokes about anything. I used to do Colin’s [Quinn] show. I did daily radio. If I sit down for two hours and you give me five news stories, I can write jokes from my point of view. I hear a lot that I’m too cerebral or I’m too heady. I don’t like that because I don’t think I am. I think I’ve very alive and in the present, but whatever.

Yeah, I don’t agree with that at all. You do tons of material on love, your family, especially your father. These are all actually very ho-hum stand-up comedy topics. It’s just that you attack them from a wildly different perspective.
Thank god. I feel like I’m rooted in the classics, man. That’s where I come from. I’m not a fucking alternative comic. I am a straight-out fucking stand-up who paid his dues in a real way and I have heroes that were stand-up comedians. I don’t aspire to be precious, or a caricature of myself or act like someone who has been there and done that. I don’t aspire to be smug and shallow.

When I first heard your bit about your dad’s bi-polar disorder-inspired middle-of-the-night phone call to you, I thought it was hilarious but at the same time if really destroyed me emotionally.
That’s good. Good comedy should have some of that in it. When I saw Dane Cook in an interview say, ‘I just want to take people away,’ I thought ‘away from what’— other entertainment options?

Most people aren’t in anything. They may be frustrated with their lives but they’re not doing any real deep work about it. They don’t need to be taken away, they need to be put back! This idea that I’m here to distract you or I’m here to make you laugh so you don’t think about anything— what the fuck is that?

The biggest issue I have is this: Am I an entertainer? Do I fundamentally see myself as an entertainer? What am I up there doing? I never got into comedy to get a TV show and I’m not even sure if it was necessarily to entertain people. I got into comedy because it was a noble profession where people can express themselves any way they wanted and you could put together a philosophy or point of view and you had the freedom to say whatever the fuck you wanted.

When I interviewed Doug Stanhope a few months ago, he said something very similar about how people try to convince themselves into thinking they’re really embedded in all these things happening in the news, like they’re going to be affected by terrorism or by disease. [ed note. After reviewing the Stanhope interview, Doug never really mentions disease; he says this: ‘You’d much rather believe that fucking immigrants are trying to take your job, and pedophiles are trying to fuck your kids, and terrorists are trying to blow up your Ford Focus in particular, than realize that you’re probably never even going to break a bone.’

Back to Maron: They might not become a victim of terrorists, but they will become sick. And that’s the other thing that no one really talks about. Everyone dies, everyone gets sick and they do everything they can in this culture to make it happen elsewhere.

There’s a sort of hyper presence that’s going on where no information has any context. There’s no historical context or immediate context unless it’s a car chase or a tower falling, then people have no choice but to understand. Sometimes things get real. Things slow down.

It’s when you step on the brakes and the road is icy and you realize you have no control over anything and you’re hurtling toward another piece of metal or a fucking tree. That’s what being awake and really present feels like. The rest of the time you’re just reacting to stimulus. We’re rats. It’s all reaction and most of those reactions are fear and what most people do when they’re scared is eat.

So that’s what this country is based on— scaring people enough to keep eating and to keep buying things to put in between them and their feelings before they start asking questions. To be just another item on the menu to keep people away from themselves is not something I want to do.

For more more information, check out www.marcmaron.com.

Kyle Cease: A Familiar Face

by Chase Roper

He’s only 30, but stand-up comedian Kyle Cease already has a Comedy Central album and half-hour special under his belt. Now, the LA-based comic will be seen this week on the same network in his first hour-long special Weirder, Blacker, Dimpler.

By Chase Roper

No doubt, you’ve seen stand-up comedian Kyle Cease as the slow clapper in Not Another Teen Movie, or as Bogie from 10 Things I Hate About You, or maybe from his Comedy Central Presents half-hour special (which was the network’s most played special of 2006) when he coined the now cult-classic catch phrase, “Like a vagina!”

Now more than ever, Cease is a busy guy. His one-hour special airs this week on Comedy Central, he’s filming 100 short films with his brother Kevin and just finished a summer of one-on-one coaching for emerging comics.

Kyle recently took some time out to field a phone call from Punchline Magazine and answer a few questions.

Hey, Kyle. Is this a good time?
Yes, this actually works out perfect because I was just rapping on the other line. Literally, I was just gangsta rapping with this girl I really like. No, seriously though this girl is awesome. She can really throw down some rhymes.

I assumed you were kidding, but when you said she can really rhyme I felt bad for doubting you. Anyway, how are the short films going?
It’s going really great. We have nine or 10 shot so far and we’re just trying to work out which website to give them to. What’s really great is that doing this on our own we have the most freedom. We’re free to put in our cutting edge new material and not have to worry about what some guys in suits say is supposed to be funny or was funny and has worked like in the 80s.

So Weirder, Blacker, Dimpler, is finally coming out (Oct. 13 at 11pm on Comedy Central). What was it like preparing for your first one-hour special?
You know, I’ve gone with friends when they were going to do a big show like Leno or something, and we’ll be in the green room and they’ll actually just be staring at the ground, pacing and be like, ‘Don’t talk to me!’ I try to just be in the moment and live for now. So I could have been like, ‘Oh my God, there’s cameras out there. What if I screw it up?’ But no, I look at it is as, ‘There’s cameras out there, you know, I’m gonna party.’

That’s funny you say that because I remember from where I was sitting during the taping I could see you and your friends backstage high-fiving and jumping around and getting stoked for the show.
That’s awesome that you could see that. That’s exactly what I mean by trying to just enjoy every moment that I’m in. When I’m going to get on stage, I’m not thinking about how well the set is going to do or what if it doesn’t go right. I’m thinking, hey, I’m going high five that guy before I get on stage, or I’m going to go over and talk to that person.

I just felt really ready to get out there and rock it. My manager would see that I have no set list and think I’m not ready but my mind was more ready because I could get out there and be loose and be able to riff with the audience and be able to come up with jokes on the spot.

Most people who really follow stand-up are familiar with what a call-back is— a joke that refers back to another joke performed earlier in the show, often presented in a different context. During the taping, you attempted and pulled off something I’ve never seen done before – the ‘Call Forward.’ How did you come up with that?
I had actually done that before one night just sort of in the moment at the Improv. It was an off the cuff thing and I was just being in the moment and loose and just thought about it on the spot. I remember other comics who were there that night had told that they really liked that too. I like to try to make my material multi layered and I think I actually doubled the laughs on that joke just by setting up the segue with that call forward.

Dane Cook has said recently he’s going to put out a rock album–
Really, he said that?

Yeah, it was in a recent article I read online. Since you play the piano, is there any chance you will be putting out like a Cease does Gershwin album?
I actually would like to start using music more on stage. Everyone always seems to really like it.

Is music really important to you as a creative outlet?
Absolutely. My first goal as a little kid was to have a career in music— like a music teacher or something. But comedy was really kicking ass so that’s the direction I went in. But yes, music is one of many things that can really focus your mind.

I read on your MySpace blog that you’ve recently lost friends to drug abuse and addiction. How do you think that affected your drive and outlook on comedy?
Wow, it’s really weird that you would say, ‘My outlook on comedy.’ I’ve lost a lot of friends because of this and it’s absolutely terrible. I just try to ask myself, ‘What can I do with this? How can I make this a positive?’

If you do that every time, you start immediately looking for answers. Eventually, it makes it a given that it will become a positive. I first went to write that blog and I thought, ‘Oh, well people are going think this is corny,’ and I’m supposed to be this hard-ass comic. But since I wrote that, I’ve been overwhelmed with the responses.

Just today, three people wrote to me in private telling me that after reading my blog they have decided to quit, throw out their stash, and go into rehab. I’ve asked them to go public with that because just think of how many people would be inspired by their stories. Just think of how much a bad thing like the death of my friend can be used to change people.

I asked your fans on MySpace to send me questions that they would want to ask you if they had the opportunity. So my last four questions are from them. The very first response I got was from [comedian and Kyle’s roommate] Bob Bledsoe:

You know that carton of eggs in the fridge? Are those yours or mine? Because I don’t remember buying them but maybe I did. I just want to eat them before they go bad if they’re mine.
Bob, we’ve gone through this. You didn’t buy those eggs. You haven’t paid for any of our food. In fact, you owe me money. I’m on the road and I don’t have time for this shit. Also, I’m giving you 30 days notice.

What is the craziest thing a fan has ever done?
The craziest thing? Wow. I don’t know how dirty you want to make this, but one time a fan asked me to sign her vagina. She just gave me a marker, pulled her pants down and just kind of sat there doing the splits. I told her I couldn’t sign it. It was the first time I thought I should wear a condom before signing autographs.

The last question is from a fan who doesn’t understand the Jack O’ Lantern joke you told during your half hour special. She said that the joke is funny, but that she still doesn’t get it and her question is, ‘So was it a pumpkin or was it a report?’
I really like that joke but I’m always afraid to use it because it gets such a mixed response from the audience. But everyone I talk to seems to really like that one. I guess the joke is that it’s a report but to answer her question:

The joke you are asking about is like a fun time you can take back to your friends. Like Disneyland, except, you can’t take Disneyland to your friends. But wouldn’t it be weird if you could? I guess what I’m saying is that the joke is Disneyland and that you should go there and try to move it.

You can watch Kyle Cease’s one hour special, Weirder. Blacker. Dimpler, Saturday, Oct. 13 at 11pm on Comedy Central. For more on Kyle, check out www.kylecease.com.

Lead photo by Michael Schwartz; second photo by Kevin Cease.

Jeff Allen: Jeff Allen Live: Happy Wife, Happy Life Revisited

by Nick A. Zaino III

Jeff Allen was a comedian before he was a born again Christian. So he seems to understand that, when he’s onstage, he’s not preaching.

Like any other comic, he’s just trying to give people his point of view. What he presents on the Jeff Allen Live: Happy Wife, Happy Life Revisited DVD is a somewhat haggard family man who has enough trouble dealing with the smaller questions – like what to do when his wife asks if she looks fat or how to deal with a hyper-active child – without trying to take on larger questions of religion.

Jeff brings to mind another Allen – Tim Allen in his Tool Time phase rather than his more vulgar onstage personality. Jeff Allen is a gentle smart ass with a gruff exterior but essentially harmless, and the joke is usually on him— especially when it comes to his family.

He hates the family cat and wished it a decidedly un-Christian-like demise: “My dream is one day the kids come into the bedroom, all three boys, each holding a cat leg. ‘Daddy, kitty broke.’”

He gets hurt trying to learn how to ski with his wife, and can’t deal with the insurance company: “You got hit in the head with a chair lift? Well that makes you a moron. We consider that a preexisting condition.”

Allen’s performance is light, family comedy, and nothing you haven’t heard before. References to religion are sparse, aside from a quick bit about giving the children Biblical names (they decided on “Satan” for the youngest).

There’s a few good routines, like his take on weight loss – “We’d all exercise if the weight we gained was on a more uncomfortable spot on our body. Where do we gain weight? Our stomachs and our behinds. It’s not in our way, is it? A couple of pounds on your forehead, that would get you to a gym, wouldn’t it?”

But this is mostly a workman like set. Allen is a capable, engaging comic who’s not shooting for deep philosophy. He’s entertaining, but not terribly memorable.

A couple of his funniest bits come out in the “Bonus Testimony” section of the DVD, which is basically Allen’s story of how he found God. Yes, there’s some of the teeth gnashing and uncomfortable tears that go along with anything labeled religious testimony, but it’s also where Allen is at his most honest and vulnerable, which is a great place for comedy to germinate.

He talks about how he was depressed and apathetic, how he had sucked the life out of his marriage, and how it wasn’t necessarily God that saved his marriage.

“One of my biggest problems in life is procrastination,” he says. “It was my job to fill out the divorce papers.” That’s a great line, with as much drama as comedy, and it’s a shame it didn’t make the main show.

His best point, about blaming your problems on a dysfunctional home, isn’t necessarily a joke: “I’ve been looking at that for the past eighteen years,” he says. “Show me a functional home.”

Michael Ian Black: Comedy’s Snark King

by Carla Sosenko

Sure, he’s known for dishing the kind of dry humor that makes you suspect he’s kinda sorta fucking with you, but when you get right down to it, he’s just a really funny guy who’s decided to take a stab at stand-up. And is actually good at it.

By Carla Sosenko

You know Michael Ian Black.

Maybe from his sketch-comedy work on The State and Stella or more likely because you stumbled home drunk one night, heated up a microwave pizza and flipped on one of those VH1 I Love the…[insert bygone era here] shows in time to catch his musings on Rubik’s Cubes and leisure suits.

Perhaps simply hearing his voice (which gave life to the Pets.com sock puppet) is a reminder that you forgot to buy Buster his Purina Dog Chow.

Like his brethren (and token sister) on The State, all friends he met as an undergrad at NYU, Black has done pretty well for himself. He’s a well-known face (if not name) whose humor often seesaws between hubris and self-deprecation. He’s an author, blogger and screenwriter who hawks Sierra Mist with the likes of Jim Gaffigan and Kathy Griffin and a Connecticut-dwelling family guy with a 4-year-old daughter and 6-year-old son. (Suri and Maddox, if you believe the CD, who both suffer from a deficit of imagination and intelligence.)

By all accounts, life is good for Michael Ian Black. Which begs the question: Why on earth would he try stand-up now? Punchline Magazine caught up with him just as his debut comedy album, I Am a Wonderful Man, was about to hit stores and before he embarked on his tour which begins Oct. 7.

Congratulations on your first stand-up CD. I couldn’t help noticing the big seminaked picture of you inside.
Fully naked.

Right, fully naked but tastefully covered.
Artfully obscured.

Is that your bearskin rug, or did you have to procure it?
That, unfortunately, was not mine.

I thought it was funny but then particularly interesting when I got to the bit on your CD about how you hate being naked in public. You say you’re the guy on the beach in the T-shirt. So whose idea was the picture?
It was my idea. Both things are true, meaning I am self-conscious about my body, but I also thought it would be funny to have a naked centerfold.

It is funny. It’s pretty brave, knowing it’s something that, I’m guessing, you weren’t comfortable with.
I just think if it’s funny, then you don’t worry about the rest of it. It wouldn’t be funny if I had a good body.

You talk about your kids a lot on your CD. You kind of make fun of them a bit. And say that they’re dumb. Do they know they’re part of your CD?
My son knows I do his monkey-fish-stick joke, and he knows that people laugh. But I don’t think he fully understands the context.

How does your wife feel about it?
Oh, she doesn’t care.

I was just reading your blog and I have to wonder, also, how she feels about your story about her being raped by a gorilla.
She hasn’t seen that.

Is it intentional that she hasn’t seen it?
No, she just doesn’t really care what I do, so she’s definitely not going to be checking out my blog. It’s actually a marriage of convenience.

You guys have been married for a long time though, right?
Eight years, almost nine.

Wow, congratulations, that’s very impressive.
It’s a dead marriage, you have to understand.

I got it. “Eight years. Dead marriage.”
Yeah, Eight years, seven and a half of which I would say have been dead.

Right, pre-divorce.
And the first six months weren’t great.

So why did you want to do a stand-up CD? Obviously people know you’re a funny guy, but for the most part, people know you for…well, you know what they know you for. The State…or…a lot of ensemble stuff and sketch and stuff like that.
I’ve always been interested in the craft of stand-up comedy but never was brave enough to start doing it. So over the last couple years, I just sacked up and decided it was time to put my money where my mouth was.

And that meant starting to develop and perform stand-up comedy because it was something I always wanted to do but really hadn’t had the courage to.

And also, there’s something really great about, as opposed to working in an ensemble, about finally being able to just be myself, by myself onstage and not be responsible to anybody but myself.

I don’t have to say anything particular, I don’t have to be in any particular place, I don’t have to share. It’s a very wonderfully selfish way to perform. And it’s also a lot riskier. Because in the past if something went wrong, I could just blame David Wain. Now I don’t have that scapegoat. I mean, I’ll still blame him.

You sound like you’re enjoying yourself on the CD. It definitely is a little bit, I don’t know if tone is the right word or voice, but it definitely seems a little different than the other stuff you’ve done.
It is a lot of fun. I’m having fun doing it and hopefully it comes across on the album. It’s a joy for me to do it, when it’s going well. When it’s not, it’s a disaster.

What happens when it doesn’t go well?
It usually goes pretty well. I can’t remember the last time when it was just a terrible show.

That’s pretty amazing. Most comics have war stories.
Yeah, but, you know, I’ve done plenty of things in the past when I was terrible, but with the stand-up, I’ve just been doing it enough. I’ve been doing comedy enough that when I made the transition to stand-up it wasn’t like I was starting from scratch.

I kind of knew what I was doing on the stage. It took me a while to find my stand-up voice and I’m still working on it, but in terms of being a babe lost in the woods, that didn’t happen for me.

Are most of the people coming out fans of other things you’ve done, like Stella or Wet Hot American Summer?
There’s a cadre of fan that is aware of all of that stuff, and some people know me from VH1 and whatever. I don’t care why people are there as long as they have a good time.

Those VH1 shows are awesomely fun to watch and I’ve always wondered if they’re as fun to do.
They’re actually kind of difficult to do. You’re sitting there in a room for four hours at a clip and you have to be funny for four hours and that’s not easy. It’s hard to keep the energy up and it’s hard to have something to say about…you know, Smurfs. When you don’t necessarily have anything to say about Smurfs. But you kind of have to think of something.

There’s a lot of self-deprecation masked in gigantic ego in your comedy, like the title of your CD, I Am a Wonderful Man. And in your act you talk about how you’re a huge celebrity and you’re overwhelmingly rich, but you have kind of blown up. Does it ever actually go to your head?
(Laughing) Uh, believe me. There is no danger of anything going to my head.

Why do you sound so sure of that?
Because when you’ve had as many miserable failures as I’ve had, which is to say, just about everything I’ve ever done, there’s just no chance of me getting too big for my britches.

But what failures? I mean, I guess we hear more about the successes, but I can’t really think of anything other than The State not getting picked up.
Everything I do can be viewed through two different prisms. The State could easily be looked at as a failure in many ways and also as a tremendous success.

Wet Hot American Summer, you know, great movie that nobody saw in the theaters. Stella, which I think is a terrific show, canceled after one season. I made a movie that MGM bought which was a huge success and then shelved, which was a huge failure.

What movie was that?
It was called The Pleasure of Your Company, and then they retitled it to the worst title in the world, Wedding Daze.

Ah, right. D-A-Z-E, I believe.
Yes. So there’s been a lot of that stuff. There’s been a lot of ups and downs. Anybody’s who’s been in this business more than a hot minute knows that it’s more about endurance than anything else.

The people who have big egos tend to be the people who’ve only known success. And those tend to be kids who are like 22 years old. But check back with them in three years and see how they’re doing. It’s a very humbling business. I honestly don’t know anybody who I would say is arrogant or has an ego.

I wonder if the fact that you have been humbled or that it’s been ups and downs…it seems like you’re doing a ton of different stuff. I mean, you’re still writing a column for McSweeney’s right? What’s the draw there? It’s like this ultrahip, intellectual, “wink, wink, nudge, nudge” kind of site.
For me, especially lately, I just ask myself the question is it fun or not. If it’s fun, I do it. If it’s not, I don’t. It’s really as simple as that.

I really am just trying to do things that I find fun. Otherwise it’s a drag. So, that’s all I’m trying to do. I like writing, and I like writing specifically for McSweeney’s. And, you know, those kinds of projects can lead to other projects, whether you’re wanting them to or not. Those McSweeney’s pieces led to me writing a book that will come out next year.

Is that the children’s book?
No, I’ve got two children’s books coming out and then another book.

It’s fascinating to me that you wrote children’s books. I think that sounds totally cool.
Well, it’s because I have kids. I wrote a book called Duck Butt, which is just a compendium of animal butts. Sort of a silly little…

That you drew?
No, I didn’t draw it, I can’t draw. It got pushed back because of this other book that’ll come out January 09. And then I’ve got a book that doesn’t really have a title yet, but it’s tentatively called Purple Kangaroo, which’ll come out in 0-10, I guess is what you would say.

But before that, my grown-up book, which will be called Michael Ian Black Is a Celebrity (Very Famous) will come out in June 08. If everything goes according to schedule.

What’s that book about?
It’s a collection of short comedy pieces, like my blogs and the McSweeney’s stuff and other stuff. It’s like Steve Martin’s Cruel Shoes or a Sedaris book. Without all the genius. Or, you know, with a lot more off-color things.

It’s funny that you said off-color. I feel like the tone of comedy in general has changed a little bit over the past couple of years. Like those VH1 shows for example. Everything’s snarky these days.
I feel that way too. I mean, I’m not trying to sound arrogant, but I feel like I sort of helped fuel that.

No, I understand that.
It wasn’t intentional. It wasn’t anything I was trying to do and now that it’s out there in that way, I don’t like it anymore. And I don’t feel like my album is that. At least I hope it’s not.

That’s what I meant about it feeling a little different.
Yeah, well, I’m not that guy. I didn’t want to be that guy. When I was doing those shows, that tone emerged as something that was funny and that was working, so I stuck with it. But it’s just one thing that I do.

I hope it’s not the only thing I do. And in terms of the tone of comedy, I do think that there’s a real split between what’s considered high-brow and low-brow comedy. You can look at those supposedly funny New Yorker pieces—and they’re never funny—as kind of high-brow comedy. Or even somebody like David Sedaris, who gets credit for being a high-brow author. And they’re funny on a certain level. And then you contrast that with real lame-brain, low-brow stuff…like, I don’t know, any number of movies…

Like American Pie stuff?
Yeah, I guess. Any sort of gross-out movies. And I think a lot of that stuff is funny and I think the high-brow stuff is funny, but I feel like there’s a kind of middle ground that isn’t really being explored too much. And I guess that’s what I’m trying to do somewhat in my writing.

But I guess I feel like in prose in particular there’s not a lot of honesty in terms of voice, in terms of the way that people talk and what they talk about, and that’s what I’m trying to do. So when I say off-color, like, I was just working on a piece that’s going to go in my book called “Taco Party” that’s just basically a rant of the narrator going, “Hey, you’re invited to a fucking taco party. It’s going to be fucking awesome.”

And it’s just the repetition of the word “fucking” and what they’re talking about in relation to this taco party and how incredibly fucking awesome it’s going to be. And I feel like that’s the kind of piece that I find really funny but that a lot of people would not find funny because they think it’s base or off-color. And in my mind it’s not at all. It’s a reflection of the way people actually talk. There’s a kind of honesty that I feel is missing from a lot of comedy, so that’s what I’m trying to get at sometimes with my prose.

Are you more comfortable in prose than you are onstage or on film? Like, is there one place you feel is most natural to you?
No, they’re all just different parts of the same thing. I like all of it. Hopefully they’re all things that I can do well enough. In some ways I think the thing I’m least comfortable with is acting.

People obviously know you for comedy. But when you think of your role on Ed, that was mostly comedy but you had to delve into other stuff, too. Would you ever go completely in the other direction? Would you do a dramatic role?
I would love to do a dramatic part, but I don’t know that anybody would take me seriously in it. Like, I just watched Mr. Brooks, with Dane Cook in it. I understood why he was doing it but it was hard for me to get into him doing it because it’s just how I think of him. He’s a goofball. So I just think that would be the problem. It would be great to do, and I would love to do it, but I’d be surprised if anybody hired me for it.

You thank a few of the guys from The State in your liner notes, and I just saw David Wain’s The Ten; you’ve got a small part in that. You guys seem like this really supportive group of friends that kind of just show up for each other, and I’m wondering if it’s really all as it seems or if it’s ever a mixed blessing or it’s competitive.
Well, it’s definitely competitive, no question. But it’s also supportive. It’s both. These are all the people that I feel closest to in the world. We owe each other everything. We grew up together, so those relationships are really strong. Those bonds are really strong and I don’t anticipate that changing.

I think we’re all really happy for each other’s successes and I think at the same time those successes drive everybody else. We definitely want to keep up with each other. So, if Tom [Lennon] and Ben [Garant] are writing A Night at the Museum, I’m like, Well fuck, now I gotta do something. It definitely keeps you motivated. But I don’t begrudge them their success at all. I’m thrilled for them.

Your part in The Ten is pretty small. Is that the kind of thing where David Wain calls you up and says, I’ve got this little part that I want you to do, and you’re there, you’ll do it?
In that case, he just wanted me to do anything and I was in the middle of editing my movie, so I couldn’t. And I was just like, I’d love to be in your movie—what can I do that I have time to do? And he said, I have this little thing you can do if you want.

A soliloquy. Very impressive.
Yes, as you can see, I am a gifted actor.

You’ve got Run, Fatboy, Run, which you wrote and David Schwimmer directed, coming out. Tell me a little bit about that.
It’s a very sweet romantic comedy about a fat guy who runs a marathon. It’s just that simple. Very easy story to grasp and I think handled very well. The great Simon Pegg stars and hopefully it’ll do well.

It’s been doing very well in England where it opened a couple of weeks ago and I’m hoping that success translates overseas. But I mean, it’s not something you would necessarily peg me as having written because it’s a very mainstream traditional comedy.

Why did you want to do something like that?
I did it as a kind of exercise. It was literally like, Let me see if I can do this, if I can write a traditional Hollywood comedy. And, so that was it.

It seems like a big payoff for an exercise.
I guess. Financially it wasn’t. It’s still a small movie. It was a British production. You know those Brits haven’t had any money since the war.

And then um, Kids in America, with Topher Grace and Anna Faris.
Yeah, that was another case of somebody just called me up and asked if I wanted to do it and I said sure. Any way I can get acting work.…

That seems to be happening a lot, like you’re at a point in your career where people are coming to you.
Not as much as one—and when I say one, I mean me—would like. Certainly not as much as I would like. Yeah, it’s starting to happen a little bit. I get a lot of offers to host reality shows and things like that. Not a lot, I get some offers to host things like that. I always politely decline.

Do you hate reality TV?
I don’t watch enough of it to really have an opinion. And I guess the reason I don’t watch it is I don’t think I would like it. From the ones I’ve seen, I haven’t really gotten into it. Michael Showalter, on the other hand, is a fanatic about reality television.

Oh really?
Yeah, he loves that shit.

Well, I guess there are different kinds of reality TV. There’s the Survivor kind, and then there’s like, The Hills.
He likes all the worst ones. I mean, he’ll watch The Bachelor.

Ew.
I think he’ll TiVo The Bachelor.

Awesome, we’ll put that in here. He’s going to tour with you right?
Yeah, we tour together. He’s got a CD coming out, too… in November.

Does that help, having a friend on the road with you?
It makes touring really fun as opposed to being by myself all the time or working with a random stand-up. It makes all the difference. We have a great time.

It must be kind of hard being away from your family.
That’s the only downside, being away. But being on the road I really love and I’ve always liked it. I love driving from town to town and eating at Denny’s and staying in shitty hotels and doing shows at night. To me that’s really fun. And in between all that, we play poker.

You’re quite the poker guy, I’ve heard. You really cleaned up on Celebrity Poker.
I did all right on Celebrity Poker, yeah. I’m a student of the game. But I don’t have the kind of money that would allow me to fully indulge my vice.

That’s probably a blessing.
Um, yeah, it’s a good thing.

Let me just finally ask you, if this whole comedy thing hadn’t panned out, and I know you said it’s still a struggle and it’s still work obviously, but what would you be doing if you weren’t doing this?
Do you mean what am I qualified to do? Because the answer is nothing. Or what other field would I have ventured into.

I guess we should go with the second question since I already have an answer to the first one.
(Chewing) Maybe political science. Yeah, something like that. Because being on a campaign is a lot like being on the road.

Who would you be campaigning for?
Right now? Maybe the black guy. Whatever that black guy’s name is. I like him.

And what are you eating?
Dried pineapple.

Delicious. Ok.
That’s my new joke, that I’m rooting for the black guy to win.

He seems all right, that black guy. The woman seems all right, too.
Yeah, I don’t know anything about that woman, but I like the black guy.

For tour dates, check out Michael’s official MySpace; go to Amazon.com to buy Michael Ian Black’s new album, I Am A Wonderful Man.