From the archives: The Marriage Ref’s Tom Papa

by Punchline Magazine

Tom Papa is one of the most well-respected stand-up comedians in the country. Now, he’s the host of NBC’s highly anticipated Jerry Seinfeld-helmed The Marriage Ref.

A longer version of this interview was originally published on Punchline Magazine in July of 2007. The videos in the story are updated. Every once in a while, when the time is right, the editors of Punchline Magazine will re-publish an archived story… just to remind our readers we have tons of great interviews from the last four and a half years. Enjoy!

I always thought you had an old-school charm in your delivery.
Yeah, I’ve read a review like that once.

Are you conscious that you have that type of style?
No, I don’t really know what it means. [laughs]

I guess that’s probably a good thing. You don’t want to be too aware of what’s working.
Yeah, I just write the jokes and say them the way I say them. What makes you think of my comedy that way?

The first few times I saw you, you were dressed up a little bit. You wear ties. Or am I making that up?
No, sometimes I do.

So you may have had a tie on, and I was like, ‘Oh, this guy’s kind of old school; he looks kind of dapper, and he reminds me of a different generation of performers where it was important to be presentable.
Right, right. I never caught on to the t-shirt and ‘maybe-I-haven’t-showered’ look.

Right, the oversized leather wristwatch look.
Yeah.

You should maybe try it. You know, frost your hair a little, spike it out.
It’s really nothing more than I don’t look cool in casual clothes. You know what I mean? It’s too much to think like, ‘What, now we’re all doing retro t-shirts with some kind of baseball cap that’s frayed on the edges? Jeans made by who?’ To me it was just always easier to just grab a suit and go onstage.

A suit will always look good.
And I always thought it’s funnier to see a guy who’s coming out who looks like he’s presentable, then starts acting like a moron.

What would you say is the biggest difference in the way you perform now from, say, 10 years ago?
I have a lot more confidence now, and for me that translates into giving myself more room onstage.

And in your case, what does ‘more room’ mean?
I don’t have to be up there rapid fire, talking out of fear of being judged by the audience. I know what’s funny. And now I have the room or the courage to play with pauses, and be more relaxed, and let what happens in between the jokes be as funny as what’s happening in the jokes.

It’s funny you mentioned that. I definitely picked up on that when I last saw you at Gotham [Comedy club in New York]. You went through a series of jokes, and you slowed it down, made a few comments, talked to the audience a little bit, and then after a minute or two, you were right back into material.
Right.

It breaks it up a little bit, and it’s nice to have that uneven pacing sometimes.
Yeah I don’t want to be up there just throwing fastballs all night. It gets tiring to listen to that. You start to lose the importance of what’s being said, or the clarity of it all. So I throw a couple curves in, throw a couple sliders, throw a couple fastballs. It’s mixed up. It’s very lyrical, too. You want to kind of change it up.

Do you have a strict writing regiment?
I try and write when I wake up. I try to do it before I do anything else, before I read; it’s coffee and writing. Because once I get to the point of the day where I’ve seen some newspapers, I’ve had some phone calls, I’ve watched some TV, I’m a lot less productive. When I’m first up and I don’t really know what’s happened yet, that’s when I can get some writing done.

You try to do that every day, or does it matter?
I usually don’t do it on Sunday. Sunday I usually blow it off– and sometimes Saturdays. It depends how busy the weekend is. If I’m doing a lot of shows during the week, I may tweak a little something, but I don’t actually sit down for an hour or two and write. I usually blow those days off.

That sounds like a pretty dedicated system.
Some guys can just go up and wing it onstage and be brilliant at it, but I was never that guy. I kind of had to sit and get my head around it and then head out that night and work on it. I always find if I don’t sit down and look at it and work on it, then when I get onstage I just kind of fall back into old patterns.

Do you sit down with pen and paper or do you bang it out on a computer?
Pen and paper.

See, you’re totally old school.
Yeah, who knew?

I bet you don’t even use pen. I bet you use a pencil.
It’s actually a little stubby piece of rock and some slate.

That’s impressive that you have that kind of dedication. Which actually reminds me–  why do you feel compelled when you’re headlining three shows at Gotham, to jam 10-minute sets at the Comedy Cellar in between your headlining spots? That seems psychotic.
I don’t know. I’m up, I’m out.

So Why not?
Yeah, what am I going to do? What else can I do between shows? Sit there and talk to somebody about the basketball game? I’d rather go do comedy. At Gotham I’m showing everyone the new hour or so, and then I could go down to the Cellar in between and work on my next short set, which is a whole different process.

I’d assume that most guys would give themselves a break if they were doing three one-hour sets a night.
Those guys are babies. [laughs] You know, a comedian’s life is pretty relaxed. I don’t know how much more relaxed I’ve got to get. That’s the great thing about being in New York– you can do lots of sets in one night. When I’m in the middle of Arizona, you do your set, and then you just sit up there and stare at the MC for an hour before you go on again. And try not to fall asleep.

You’re pretty much split evenly between living in both New York and Los Angeles. What kind of advantages does that give you?
It’s great because there’s definitely different influences and that results in people performing slightly different styles of comedy on each coast. You can see LA comics and know that they’re from LA for the most part, and New York comics and know they’re from there. Both have great aspects to it. So for me, it’s kind of good to mix it up.

A lot of people adhere to the generalization that New York comics are in it because they want to be comics and LA comics are in it because they want a movie deal. Do you find that’s at least partially true?
It’s partially true. I think that there are real comics on both coasts. And I don’t know any comic that hasn’t had some success in some other area that they didn’t take advantage of to then further themselves as comedians. You know, Chris Rock, Eddie Izzard, Jerry Seinfeld, whoever. Everybody wants to do something else.

That doesn’t mean that they turn their back on comedy. And there are some guys in LA who aren’t truly comics that get up and share the stage to try to host some reality show. But there are still a lot of guys in California who are true comics. Just because someone goes out on more auditions doesn’t make them less a comic than the guys in New York.

That’s very diplomatic.
Well, it’s true. I used to think that way as well, but then I got out here and found guys like Daniel Tosh, Paul F. Tompkins and Arj Barker. These guys are real comics. They’re not just out here trying to host the next round of The Bachelor.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Yes there is.

Is there anything bad about being bicoastal?
Anytime I’m in LA I’m needed in New York, and anytime I’m in New York there’s some big thing happening in LA. So that part of my plan is completely screwed up.

You mentioned Jerry Seinfeld. You guys are good friends, right?
We are.

What’s the biggest thing you’ve learned about comedy from Jerry?
How to be a successful comedian. You know, I was kind of adrift and I was doing my thing, but I never really had confirmation that writing every day and going up and telling jokes was really a good thing to do. And being with him, he kind of simplifies everything to just do the work, write everyday and the success will come.

When I met him it was like showing up as a freshman and seeing this guy who was like a grad student saying, ‘Yeah, this is exactly how I did it, keep doing this and you’ll be fine.’

You guys met while you were performing at a club, right? Or was there a connection before that?
No, there was no connection. It was at the Comedy Cellar. I never knew him. He saw me several times, and we just started talking, and had the same sense of humor, and became friendly after that. And then Colin Quinn was also around at the time and I think he quietly told Jerry I wasn’t an idiot.

That was nice of him.
Yeah. And then we just hit it off. We just really became friends more than anything else. It’s like being friends with somebody who’s also your mentor in a lot of ways.

And you guys constantly tour together.
Yes, we actually worked on Bee Movie together as well.

You have two daughters now.
Yep, five and two. I’m blessed amongst women.

And how does that generally work out for you?
Not very well. It’s like being invited to a game that you know you have no chance of winning.

Well, as long as you know that going in–
Yeah. it’s fine. You just try and figure out ways to cheat.

Does your five-year old understand what you do for a living?
Yeah, she knows. She has kind of a twisted view of reality, I think, because all our friends are comedians or actors, and everybody’s on TV.

Yeah, that’s going to be strange when she’s in second and third grade and starts realizing that everyone’s parents’ friends don’t have a TV show.
Yeah, she’ going to want to quit school pretty quickly I think.

You mentioned some comics you respect. Do you find yourself obsessed with knowing what’s happening in the national comedy scene, or do you kind of just ignore it because you feel it’s distracting to what you’re doing?
It’s kind of like this weird combination. I don’t like to dive too deep. I love comics; all my friends are comedians. But on the other side of it is that you get too mired into the who’s doing what and who’s got what and that kind of taints the fun of it all. So I like being abreast of everything, but I tend not to obsess on the business end of it.

I don’t need to get annoyed when I see some comedian I don’t respect selling out some theater somewhere. That doesn’t help my writing. That’s why I write first thing in the morning before I learn those things.

When you’re not doing something comedy-related, what are you doing?
Everything’s kind of comedy. [laughs] And then just, as Kurt Vonnegut said, a lot of puttering around.

Would you ever go back to working on a sitcom?
Yeah, I would love to. I just cut a deal last year to try to get something going. Working on a show is a lot of fun, and I would love to do it again. I’ve got a couple ideas up my sleeve.

Yeah? You said that very deviously.
It was supposed to be devious. That’s one thing I learned about being in Hollywood. A little devious never hurts.

For more info, check out www.tompapa.com.

Kyle Kinane: Death of the Party

by Dylan P. Gadino

It’s lazy to describe comedian Kyle Kinane as “bleak and misanthropic,” which, according to Kyle, himself, is how the London Evening Standard once summarized his live act.

Sure, on the surface, the Chicago native doesn’t exactly present himself as happy with himself or the people around him— few truly engaging comedians do. And yes, he says things like, “Anybody here ever make that mistake right when you wake up in the morning and you believe in yourself? I’ve been having the tendency to do that lately” and “[I] come home at five in the morning shit housed and eat half a dozen quesadillas while [I] sit on the toilet and read books about werewolves.”

But beneath the repeating chorus of seemingly negative assertions and admissions found on Death of the Party (A Special Thing Records), there runs a stream of hope for humankind– a narrow (but very healthy and very real) stream that may circumvent those not willing to try to find it but washes – again and again – those who embrace it, those that find comfort in simple social truths. And goddamn, is it ever refreshing.

But even without the layered reasons to love this album, it’s simply impossible not to embrace this likable underachiever, who proves to be a strong joke writer and an incredibly natural storyteller—one of which – about the time he was forced to drop a deuce at a rough “chola” bar in Chicago – anchors the entire album quite nicely (Listen to the track below).

Beyond that, Kinane is deft at being simply goofy; he breaks down the subtle racism at Trader Joe’s, recounts a time where he and his girlfriend saw one bunny face-fuck another and, using his gift of insomnia, examines how one would cook meat over the mouth of an erupting volcano.

A truly original, funny and wholly satisfying album, Death of the Party is a welcomed introduction for a rising comic into the landscape of the national stand-up comedy scene.

Check out a track below and download the entire album from Amazon by clicking the image below.

Nick Thune: Will strum for laughs

by Reid Faylor

Nick Thune did not necessarily get into stand-up on purpose. From emceeing bar mitzvahs to covering Enrique Iglesias, his career is one built on unconventional routes and an ever-necessary lack of ambition that led him not by pursuit, but by nature to success in the comedy world. His debut album of music-accompanied absurdity, Thick Noon, will be released Feb. 23 from Comedy Central Records.

Perhaps one of the few gems to come from the now defunct Jay Leno Show, Nick Thune strummed his guitar only four times on the program as a correspondent, before the Conan/Leno feud forcibly brought him to new pastures. But this is no upset to the young comic. Thune has learned the merit of following opportunities wherever they might go, and to not let his own demands get in the way -after all, this is how he got started in comedy to begin with.

Through appearances in films such as Extract, and Knocked Up, a series of short films called iThunes, a Comedy Central Presents episode, numerous music videos and songs, and not to mention a yet undeveloped children’s talk show, it is clear that Thune is a comedian of numerous interests. But this is not the mark of a lack of focus, nor is it the product of excessive ambition, rather it is what results from his simple and seemingly singular goal: he just wants to make people laugh, through whatever avenue will allow it.

Taking the time to chat with Punchline Magazine, Thune discusses the role of music in standup, the pressures of hosting a bar mitzvah, the Late Night controversy, and what it’s like to be a hero.

Before we get started, is there anything you want me to bring up? Anything you’d like to talk about?

You know, I trust you Reid. I can’t think of anything I want to force you to ask me about. You know what? At one point, could you ask me what it’s like to be a hero?

I would be happy to do that.
And just make it feel natural. Make it seem like you thought of asking.

Like it didn’t come out of nowhere, I just really wanted to know what it was like?
Yeah.

Yeah, I can work that in somehow.
Oh yeah, also, I don’t like to answer any questions about my height. I don’t know if my PR people told you that or not.

They did not tell me that. But I should be able to work around that I think.Anyway, you play a lot of guitar in your act, as a complement to the jokes. What role do you think that plays? How do you think it changes the jokes for the audience?
For me it’s always fun, especially in comedy, to underscore something, to make it very dramatic. So I try with my music to add a dramatic element to jokes, to add a kind of seriousness, and I think that adds comedy. The jokes also work without it. I do them a lot around town without the guitar, and when I’m performing around I go without the guitar, too. So it just adds a different thing. And then at some point you have people expect to see it and want to see it, so you have to do it.

Jokes.com
Nick Thune – Missed Connections
comedians.comedycentral.com

But you also do a lot of bits without guitar on the album. What’s the reason that you don’t add this musical element to all your jokes?
Well, I started with the guitar, because I was more comfortable with it in the beginning. But I really wanted to break away from that. So I started working out different pieces without the guitar. And there are those I traditionally do without it, and then there are times when I take pieces I normally do with the guitar and I’ll do them without music.

All the pieces I’ve been doing for The Jay Leno Show -I’ve done four of them since this last fall- all those I worked out without guitar, and then added it in at the end. They wanted me to have guitar; I guess at some point if there’s an expectation for doing it, you’ll just have to do it. I don’t mind using it, but I wanted to make sure that everything was strong enough on its own.

And the guitar has a certain relaxation behind it, where people kind of fall into a trance. But there’s also this element where if I’m on a show where I’m not headlining it, it kind of restarts the room. If the room’s not a good room, it slowly transforms the room into something where people are ready for something different.

You keep mentioning all this expectation to use the guitar, does that ever change your opinion of it? Do you find yourself getting tired of it?
I really like it. I really like it especially when it’s working well. But I think it changes per set per day, depending on how I feel. Sometimes I don’t want to do it, especially if somebody puts the expectation on me for it. Then it kind of doesn’t fit. I don’t feel like I want to do it as much. But when I feel like it’s my choice, it’s a lot more enjoyable. Really for me, it’s just fun to get an audience to laugh. So, if that’s through the guitar and doing it that way, or without it, I just love to hear the audience laugh.

Looking at another aspect of music, the last ten minutes or so of the album are actually these very well produced, synthesizer-heavy, cheesy and ridiculous songs. What was the choice to include these?
There’s forty minutes of stand up on my album, which most albums will have, so already a bulk of it is what is normally on stand-up albums, and the tracks are longer than most track lengths on most stand up albums. So I’m really giving a full stand up album, and then on top of that I added four studio produced songs.

I didn’t want to make Adam Sandler comedy -jokes into songs- I really just wanted to play with the character of a guy who takes himself too seriously a little bit and just makes bad music. One of them [the song "Lobster"] is even like a terrible-er, a worse version of a song I already did on a short film, like a guy singing my song at a karaoke place, like he’s drunk.

The way that it really all came together to have it produced the way that it did, is that Richard Swift, who’s a producer and a musician, I heard his stuff and I met his manager and I just said ‘listen, I really like this guy, and I’d really want him to produce these songs for my album, could you get me in touch with him and show him my stuff or whatever?’ And the guy was totally interested in doing that. And I thought it’d be fun to make it a whole experience. He actually lived up in Eugene, Oregon, actually in Cottage Grove which is just off of Eugene, and I went up there and lived at his place for a week. He’s got a family, and he’s an incredible guy, and we just made these songs.

I had no plan when I got there. I had the rough songs kind of written out, and ideas for them. But once we got into the studio, we decided to go in that direction with them. He really is a great musician; everything was engineered really well. So in that aspect it was fun to have high production values for really a stupid song.

Jokes.com
Nick Thune – Stoned
comedians.comedycentral.com

I was wondering about how you got started in comedy. I had heard you started on a different route, speaking at high schools and emceeing bar mitzvahs -how did that eventually lead you to a career in comedy?
I basically just started with the speaking, which wasn’t really motivational; it was just about life experience. I did it a couple times, and people kept asking me to do it again, to share my story of struggling in high school with alcohol and drugs and stuff, and at the time it was so much fun for me. I really enjoyed people being impacted by what I was saying whether it was laughing, or whatever, and I really just got hungry to get more reaction out of people.

Later, when I was doing bar mitzvahs and weddings and high school dances, I was playing to every group of people. When you’re doing a bar mitzvah your job is to make the kid happy, but really on top of that their parents are paying for it and you have to make them happy -it’s two different demographics, the 13 year old kid, and then his 48 year old parents. And then on top of that you’ve got their grandparents who are probably paying for most of the bar mitzvah, and you have to make them happy, and then all their friends, and all the kids friends, all these people you’ve got to please in the evening.

It’s very stressful, you know, under me I’ve got a DJ deejaying, I’ve got dancers, like 16 year old high school girls that my creepy boss hired, they’re out dancing with the kids to get them motivated, and I’ve got a microphone teaching people the electric slide, and running the stupidest dances that you’ve ever heard. Basically, just humiliating myself in front of people, that’s what it is in the end. You have no pride when you’re doing it, because you’re emceeing a bar mitzvah. You are the lowest of entertainment. And I loved it. I still loved it, I loved people liking me, I loved getting people’s approval, and doing good.

From there I decided to start playing songs, so I started doing this character, his name was Nash Dodge. I would open up for bands, come out as this guy, this singer-songwriter, and really just talk the whole time and never get into songs, which is probably unoriginal, as I’m sure people have done that. This guy was a worn out guy from the 80s who would talk about spring break, give shout outs to local radio stations, and from that bars started asking me to do my own thing at them -I wasn’t playing at comedy clubs.

I started my own band called No Hablos, we’d sing all Spanish artists, sing Enrique Iglesias, his American songs, so we’d cover those songs, take them very seriously, took ourselves very seriously, that’s where the comedy was. Then I did my own stuff during the intermissions, bars asked to come back, do like a Sunday night, whatever you want, you got the stage for the night, whatever you want to do. So I made my own radio station that I made up called 105 The Breeze, set up a table and had a banner I made in front of it, had my own microphone and pretended I was live on the radio, giving out stuff out at the bar, really just bombing a lot.

Some stuff worked, but the hardest part was all my friends were coming to see me -it was making it hard for me to riff on stage, starting to find my own voice, so that’s when I moved more to doing open mic comedy. Then I got sick of doing that in Seattle, because again there were many people who were just friends who had known me forever that wanted to come out and see what I was doing, so I had to get out of town. That’s when I moved to LA, then from there I started doing open mics before moving up to the clubs.

I’ve always heard warnings about stand-ups starting off in LA, that’s it’s very hard to start there. How were you able to get it to work for you?
It’s hard to start if you have any idea what you’re doing. I didn’t study stand-up at all, I didn’t know what to do before coming to LA, I wasn’t fully aware of how the system worked. So, I was performing at open mics, mostly musical or poetry open mics probably more often than I did comedy open mics when I came down here. I was very sheltered from comedy. I got advice once before I moved down there that you have to stay under the radar of being seen by any industry for as long as you can, become as good as you can get where you’re seen. Because that’s people’s problem, they’re seen too early, they’re not ready yet, they don’t have their voice yet. And that was probably the one piece of advice I ever took from anybody.

I just did open mics for a year, did like 580 sets in LA, which is hard because you have to drive, and then you’re waiting to go on stage for three hours to do a 5 minute set, and I think that was what made me figure it out, and then the second or first time I played at the Improv they made me a regular and I moved past that. But I wasn’t trying to play at the Improv ever, and that’s the problem with people: they go up on the stage before they’re ready when they come to LA.

Everybody remembers you the first time they see you, that’s how I feel, me and the industry, and I think most comedians want to be accepted by industry, but the most important thing is to be accepted by your peers. If you can try to please your peers you can be successful. It’ll be tough, but in beginning that’s what you’re searching for, your peers to like you and encourage you, you know what I’m getting at? I guess I’m rambling.

Jokes.com
Nick Thune – Two Birds
comedians.comedycentral.com

No, I can see what you’re saying. Is that still the case with you? That you’re looking more for acceptance from your peers, or is there an aspect of pleasing your audience now that you’ve built one up?
I’ve learned if you’re trying to please any of those things you’ll never be happy. If you’re trying to please the audience you won’t be happy, if you’re trying to please the peers won’t be happy. The only person you can really try to please is yourself, not in a selfish way, but that you’re enjoying what you’re doing. Because the deeper you get in this, you know it’s like the guitar thing, the longer I play it, the more people expect me to use it, if I hated it, then I’d be digging my own grave, just hating what I was doing. But I love playing it on stage. I dreamt about it when I was a kid, I wasn’t planning on singing or knowing what I was going to do; I just wanted to be on stage.

I like how you’re suggesting the only way you made it in LA is by not having any idea or ambition as to what you wanted to do.
Exactly. I mean, if you do, obviously if you know what you’re doing that can help you in some ways, if you’re smart you know not to have all these expectations about things.
When I came down here, I didn’t have any clue, and that ended up helping me because I overanalyze things, then I start looking too hard for it.

Did you at first even have the idea that it was stand-up you were interested in?
It wasn’t. When I first came down, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be a stand-up comedian. Kind of the first thing I really did was pitch a show for Nickelodeon that I thought would be really great. I was pitching a kid’s show that I really wanted to do. I wanted to have a talk show like Ellen or Oprah, like at 2:30 when kids came home from school, so when they came home it’d be like their tonight show or something. I thought that would be so funny. Because I worked in boys and girls club for five or six years, so when I first came down, I really wanted to do good, be a role model, that was the first thing. I saw kids and I saw how much they idolize. I wanted them to have a show like that on a kid’s network. And then slowly I was performing more and I got focused on stand-up.

That’s really great how you were looking out for kids like that. Standing up for them. How does it feel to be a hero?
Wow, Reid. That’s a tough question, man. I think you hit it right on the head there. I’m going to have to pass though -on answering that question.

You’ll have to pass?
Yeah, I think that’s the more heroic thing to do in this situation.

Alright.
I’ll tell you what though, being taller than people, people are going to look up to you. Brad Williams is one comedian that really looks up to me.

I thought we weren’t going to be talking about height.
Well, when you ask hard-hitting questions you’ll get hard-hitting answers.

Okay.
Google Brad Williams. Put that in there.

I can do that. Anyway, previously you mentioned working as a correspondent on The Jay Leno Show, what was it like being on his side of things during the whole Late Night debacle?
I basically had the same view as everybody else. The day that the news came out that his show was being canceled, I think TMZ broke it or some Hollywood blog, I was in Starbucks on my way to a meeting at the Leno show to pitch my final piece, well, as far as I knew it wasn’t going to be my final piece, I was just going to pitch a piece, and I texted my producers backstage about it coming in, and they said, ‘yeah come in.’ Then that night I had a showcase to get on The Tonight Show, I was performing at the Improv with the guy that was booking The Tonight Show, and then later that day the news came out that they’d be moving the show and there was all this crazy news.

So that day I went into the Leno offices, and I basically had to do an audition for The Tonight Show; it was just a funny place to be in, because both those shows had no clue what was going on. They were getting news just as quick as anybody else that had the internet was getting it, and they didn’t know how much of it they could believe. Nobody really knew until Jay and Conan started making announcements and Conan wrote the letter, that’s when stuff became real.

And obviously I had a job, and I really liked the job that I had. It was really giving me good opportunities to perform on such a huge level, I got to do it four times, write my own pieces, and I was worried about not being able to do that anymore. And also I was worried about not seeing Conan, because I love Conan, I think he’s hilarious, and I really liked The Tonight Show. When the news all came down and what happened happened, nobody was happy with that outcome, because in the end you just really want these guys to have jobs for their employees.

To make it clear, will you still be doing anything with Leno now that he’s back on The Tonight Show?
We’ll see what happens, but they have told me they want me to go with them to The Tonight Show and to continue to do my pieces, but I think they’re going to have less of those pieces and have less correspondents. I think I’ll still have a place to go on TV, and to do my stuff for the time being.

That’s good, I’m sure people would be missing out, what with you being a hero and all.
I think people are counting on me. I know some kids aren’t able to eat enough. I know there are a lot of people going hungry out in the world.

And you can help with that?
No. I just know that.

So is this kind of an awareness thing? Just spreading that fact around?
You just hit it on the head, again.

I must be doing well with this whole interview thing.
Actually, I get to interview the Smothers Brothers pretty soon. I’m pretty excited about that.

Really? What for?
It’s for this website, Brightest Young Things in Washington DC, they did this comedy festival last year that Tig Notaro kind of hosted/put on/came up with. And they just started asking me to interview people; they actually asked me if I wanted to interview Maynard, the lead singer from Tool.

Wow, that’s an … odd pairing.
Yeah, I don’t think I could, I’m not really aware of anything Tool’s ever done.

That might make a good interview actually.
Yeah, ‘I have no idea … what you do.’

‘Tool, are you some kind of construction firm?’
‘Yeah, what are you, a hammer guy or a screw guy? I guess it’s actually nails versus screws, that’s the big issue right now, with your industry, right?’

I feel like you’d probably nail that interview -I’m so sorry I just said that. I’m really sorry.
No. I should be thanking you for doing that.

Are you going to use that?
Yeah, if I nail this interview.

Ooh!
Got it!

That’s good. Well, before we wrap this up, what new ventures do you have coming up, any new films?
Well, Extract [the latest Mike Judge film] came out on DVD, which has been exciting, so it’s cool to buy a DVD of a movie that you’ve been in. I’m not a lead in that movie; I actually just have this one scene in the beginning that’s less than a minute. And right now, I have nothing that’s even ready to promote that’s coming out yet, mostly just heading out and hitting the road and doing stand-up, and trying to make more movies.

Well, you mentioned you didn’t even start off initially looking into stand up, is that still your main passion? Or is it a means to get you to other aspects of comedy?
I think my main interest, like I said before, is just making a venue to make people laugh, that’s what I love doing. If that means stand up, or whatever that means, I’m willing to do it, if that means that I have to go on a cruise ship I think I would do that. I just haven’t figured out any other business yet.

Comedy Central Presents	Friday 10pm / 9c
Nick Thune – Interview – Back Flip
www.comedycentral.com

Is this your way of leaking that you’ll be working for a cruise ship line?
Yes, actually it is. Have you heard of Princess? I’m not working for them, it’s another cruise ship. I can’t fully say the name of who it is I am working for yet. It’s not Princess.

Anyway, you know typically I think there’s this type of person who does stand-up until they hit it, and they get into movies or do TV, and for every single comedian -I think that’s their goal, whether they say it or not. It would always be nice to have that extra thing. I think I would make way more money doing that, since at this point I’m not selling out stadiums or anything.

Of course I want to be in movies or be on TV. I want to be in that stuff, but I love standup. And I really do want to continue doing it. There’s something about being live, being able to perform in front of people, being in touch, and still get laughter that makes you feel relevant. I guess being relevant is a very important thing in humor. It’s great to be able to perform in front of so many different kinds of audiences, that’s the great thing about LA, you can play in tourist places or play somewhere really hip like the UCB, it’s fun to be able to hit all those different crowds.

For more info, check out nickthune.com. To buy Thune’s new album, click the image below.

Review: The Ricky Gervais Show

by Dylan P. Gadino

The Ricky Gervais Show premieres Feb. 19 at 9 pm EST on HBO.

One of the biggest surprises about HBO’s The Ricky Gervais Show comes during the end credits of each episode. That’s where you find out that it takes 17 animators to bring to visual life, Gervais’ world famous podcast. It’s a surprise because the animation of the 30-minute weekly show is understated and largely static. However, we all know amazingly advanced animation does not necessarily make a great animated show.

For an animated show to be artfully successful, at the very least, the viewer needs to feel there’s a reason for the animation. The reason, however, for the animation in the case of The Ricky Gervais Show seems to stem more from logistical and financial reasons rather than an artistic one.

The three stars – Gervais, his writing partner Stephen Merchant and former radio producer Karl Pilkington – didn’t need to show up on set or at a recording studio, since the dialogue is taken from Gervais’ previously produced – and brilliantly funny – podcasts. Combine the relatively easy production process with the amount of cash the show will bring in – DVD sales alone will be huge – due to Gervais’ past successes with The Office and HBO’s show Extras, and you have a no brain business decision to create a new cable comedy show.

The audio content of the show itself is fun, light and incredibly entertaining. Honestly, though, it’s difficult to justify the animation. The majority of the show finds the trio talking into over hanging microphones around a wooden table. Periodically, the scene breaks to act-outs of the conversation, which bring to mind Comedy Central’s ill-fated Shorties Watching Shorties. Like the original podcast, the HBO version of the show would be better heard during a long car ride, treadmill jogs or on iTunes when you’re avoiding work.

After watching three episodes, the formula of the show wears thin. Gervais and Merchant provide the set up (a topic is introduced) and then the pair, with no subtleties, throw it off to the real star of the show, whipping boy Pilkington with a phrase like, “What do you think about that, Karl” or “Karl, you must have some comments on that.”

Karl, a likable and gullible chap, then happily takes the bait and begins philosophizing on all things from implanting babies into 78-year-old women, trying to convince Ricky and Stephen that the first monkey that went to the moon committed suicide or his beliefs in the story of a haunted tankard.

Ricky Gervais animated HBO show from Punchline Magazine on Vimeo.

Regardless of Karl’s level of stupidity on any given topic, Gervais and Merchant lay into him with equal fervor: Ricky says things like “I’ve seen [Karl] blossom from an idiot into an imbecile” and “You are brain dead. I’d rather have [a] monkey drive me home than you.” It’s funny the first few times, but since the podcasts have been truncated to 30 minutes, the continual Karl beatings get exponentially meaner and less funny.

The bottom line is this: the animation produced around Gervais’ masterful podcast doesn’t hurt its content. But it certainly doesn’t make it any better.

Tom Green: Comic mercenary

by Emma Kat Richardson

Comedian Tom Green has gone back to his stand-up comedy roots by launching an international tour. The traveling circus hits Comix in New York this week. You’re town just may be next.

Tom Green wears a lot of labels, but in reality, everything you think you may know about him is probably wrong. (Or, at least, partially incorrect.) Yes, he’s irreverence incarnate – remember, he’s the former MTV star who once gained notoriety by both suckling on a cow’s utter and humping a dead moose on camera. But what you may not suspect of the Canadian export is Green’s intimate understanding of how to both manipulate and overhaul the comedy establishment simultaneously, or his keen sense of what constitutes tools to build the perfect joke. (Wackiness frequently included.)

Although he’s well-adept at playing dumb, there’s nothing remotely dumb about Green, despite the outrageous and often shocking comedic persona he sports. He has recently managed to stay several steps ahead of the competition by pioneering his own Web TV, streamed on TomGreen.com, which has provided him with the perfect, uncensored outlet for his unique brand of humor while effectively keeping the oddball comedian out of the corporate, restrictive fold of network TV. (Conan, you may want to be writing this down.)

Along with the TV show, Green is also in the midst of embarking upon the TomGreen.com-sponsored world stand-up tour – an endeavor sending him and his loyal band of jesters traipsing across the globe for a stand-up extravaganza that makes ample use of Internet broadcasting and new media technology, mainly by video updates from Green’s website and an open invitation to fans to bring recording devices to the shows to tape their reactions.

Checking in from the television studio that doubles as his house, Green waxes philosophic with Punchline Magazine about the corporate media monopoly, Andy Kauffman, and Green’s own reputation as the continued torchbearer of “gonzo” comedy.

How does your stand-up act differ from your well-known TV persona?
Well, I’m being myself as much as possible when I do stand-up, as I do when I do the TV show. I’m goofing off and being silly as well, and talking about things I find interesting and ridiculous. It’s not like I’m doing a different persona, you know? I always like to keep it as real as possible, but I always tend to be a little bit wacky, too.

Obviously, there are a lot of differences between doing television and stand-up. Stand-up is so much more of a pure art form. You’re standing there all by yourself on the stage; you don’t have a teleprompter, you don’t have a bunch of cameras pointed at you. You’re talking directly to the audience. On television, you’re talking to two audiences at once: you’re talking to the audience that’s in the studio and you’re talking to your audience that’s [watching] television. You’re kind of splitting your attention between the two.

But it’s exciting. You can’t yell “cut!” when you make a mistake and hope that they’ll edit it out, so the differences are obviously more technical, you know? As far as what I’m trying to do and as far as the message I’m trying to convey, what I think is funny, it’s the same.

Did you always envision yourself as an Andy Kaufman-style gonzo comic?
I’ve always liked weird and outrageous and ridiculous things that are kinda coming from a different perspective than the mainstream. I don’t know what word I would use to describe myself, because there are so many words. People call me a “shock comic,” people call me a “gross-out comic,” people call me “outrageous,” “wacky,” “goofball.” Obviously, things evolve over time, too – I’m doing different things now than I was maybe 10 years ago.

The main thing is that I’ve always kind of liked to take on the status quo. I’ve never liked to go out and do exactly what everybody is doing in the mainstream; I’d rather challenge the mainstream. I’ll take “gonzo.” Sounds good to me. Andy Kaufman, he was awesome because he seemed like he was pretty acutely aware that the mainstream way of doing things didn’t [work], and was often a little bit contrived. He had a fun way of taking that on, you know? Sometimes, he would sort of make himself look foolish in a way that not everybody understood, in order to make a point. I definitely think I do things like that at times.

Do you feel like he’s always been an inspiration on your comedy?
You know, it’s funny, because I didn’t know who he was until Man on the Moon came out. It was sort of one of those things that kind of missed me; it was just a few years before my time. But then, when I started doing my show… I did my show for a long time in Canada, and it wasn’t until I moved my show to the States that it started drawing that comparison, and I kind of went in and looked into it. I realized that I find him really hilarious. I definitely find him very inspiring now. I grew up really interested in comedy: folks like Monty Python, David Letterman, and all sorts of different things. I don’t really think that I would compare my stand-up to his, you know, now, but there are some things that I do that might be similar.

I was just reading that your new stand-up act incorporates not only stories onstage, but music. How do you weave those things together to make a show that’s compelling?
Yeah, I do a couple of songs. I’ll sing two songs from Road Trip, “The Salmon Song.” Most of my audience knows the song, and everybody sings it with me. I like to pull a guitar out for three or four minutes, and I’ll do a couple of little things. And, I may or may not do some rapping, if I feel like it – I do some rapping in the show because I’ve always liked rapping.

But mostly, it’s pretty heavy spoken word stand-up, joke-telling and storytelling. I don’t get too, too much music. Maybe if I start doing longer sets; when you do two shows a night at comedy clubs, you tend to not go too much over an hour. I don’t want to incorporate too, too much music into that; I want to think about the stories and the jokes, but I could see myself bringing more music into the show in the future, as I move into larger venues and do longer shows and things like that.

What have you done over the years to develop your comic style?
Well, to be honest with you, I didn’t really do stand-up [consistently] over the years. I wanted to – I did stand-up when I was in high school, but then I sort of stopped doing it and I started doing a public access show. I tend to be somebody that kind of focuses on one thing at a time: I really ended up focusing on that show for five or six years in Canada, and then it got picked up by MTV. It was very specific to itself – it was all about me going and out doing guerilla pranks on the streets and stuff.

I was building this talk show, but I always wanted to go back and do stand-up, and I was never really able to find the time to devote to doing stand-up. Now, I’m doing a Web TV show in my house. I built a TV studio in my living room, so with my comedy… I’ve got to put it all in the same category, though, because being up onstage, doing the show, hosting the show, it’s been sort of in the same vein, and I’ve been thinking about how I would apply that to doing stand-up. About a year ago, I started up onstage in LA, running this live show and practicing.

Speaking of MTV, is there a moment from your run there that sticks out most clearly in your memory?
Well, you know, my show started in 1999 on MTV, basically through 2000, and I had been doing it for a few years before in Canada. Is there a moment that sticks out? Well, there are a lot of pretty crazy moments. It was a much longer process than most people in America realize. I sort of had seven years of working my way towards getting that show, so obviously, I think just getting picked up by MTV was a huge moment, because I’d been doing it for so long. I’d been doing it in such an independent way, and when they picked it up, it was just very exciting.

As far as the comedy itself, there were watershed moments when I realized that we were doing something that was really striking a chord with people. Five years before MTV picked up the show, we did a couple of pranks on my parents when it was playing on the public access station, and it really seemed to strike a chord with people. Like, here’s this guy who’s waking up his parents in the middle of the night, and he’s pulling all these pranks on his parents; that was something where I kind of realized that, like, this is something that people really like.

It was also just kind of like figuring out all the stuff with video cameras that you can do – at the time, I didn’t have any television people telling me what to do, and all of a sudden, we’d be realizing that, hey, it’s funny to film people’s reactions. The reactions of people can be a really funny one, you know? It was really figuring all that stuff out that was really kind of exciting. Obviously, the show got picked up by MTV and it took off and became sort of a huge show on MTV, that was hugely exciting. It surpassed my expectations, and obviously was the dream, you know? MTV picks up your show, and the next thing you know, you’re walking out on the David Letterman show and sitting down with Jay Leno, and you’re getting all these great opportunities and exposure. People are loving your show – that was exciting stuff.

Since you’re a talk show host yourself, I’m curious to know what your whole take on the Leno/Conan late night debacle is?
I think it’s the nature of the television business. At the end of the day, everybody involved is extremely talented and highly capable; there’s only one time slot at 11:30, and everybody seems to want it. Things end up happening, and sometimes I think it’s kind of nice, in a way, to be doing the show in my living room on the Internet, because nobody can come along and cancel me. But I’m not being paid $40 million to walk away from a canceled show, either, so if I could cancel myself and get $40 million, I’d probably do it.

It’s just the nature of the television business right now. Things are changing right now: everything’s influx, the Internet is here, TV ratings are going down, more people are getting their [television] intake online, so there’s a lot more competition. I don’t personally believe that anyone’s to blame in what happened, you know? It’s just kind of… shit happens.

What sort of creative process do you employ when coming up with ideas for your bits?
I always start out with what makes me laugh. I tend to joke around a lot with my friends; pretty much always analyzing and talking about things that are going on around the world, things that are going on in my personal life, things that are going on in the media. If I’m talking with my friends and thinking about something that makes me laugh, I’ll just write it down. I used to carry a notepad around with me and write everything down in the notepad, but then I’d lose the notepad. But now, my cell phone has a little electronic notepad, and I’m always jotting down notes to myself in my cell phone.

Every once in a while, I’ll sit down at my computer and look at all the notes I’ve made and see if I can actually write it all out, and then try and craft it into more of an actual joke. Then I try it with stand-up onstage, and usually by the time I try it onstage, it gets a laugh, but sometimes you need to try things or type things up. I tend to think outside the box, so sometimes I’ll say things that are a little out there and people don’t necessarily know what I’m getting at, so I’ll revise it or change it.

That’s the great thing about getting up onstage and doing a world tour, where I’m doing six shows a week, an hour at a time, so I’m constantly revising what I’m talking about, whether people are kind of vibing with what I’m getting at.

I really want people to connect with not just the silliness of what I’m doing, but also the points I’m trying to make and what I’m trying to say. I think we’re living in kind of a crazy time right now, where corporations are really taking over a lot of [everything], and we’re being forced to ingest by the media. I don’t think that’s necessarily fair to consumers or society as a whole, that we’re being told what we have to watch, basically. There are only a few companies that really run all of the television stations and all the magazines, and I think there’s a lot that needs to be said about that.

I like to make jokes about that, but sometimes I think I go so far down the road that people miss the point, because we are so consumed by that media that I think some people don’t question it. It’s always amazing to me that sometimes an audience might not even necessarily… I can really tell the way people think when you get up onstage and make a joke about the Kardashians, or you make a joke about American Idol, or you make a joke about TMZ, right? Sometimes the audience reacts like they really, really like that stuff, you know? I was sort of trying to make the point that that was some mainstream stuff that we’re being force-fed, but when you’re taking on the establishment, you’ve got to remember that a lot of people like the establishment.

So I try to walk the line. I want the show to be something that’s cool to the mainstream audience, but also not complete milquetoast, middle-of-the-road garbage stuff.

Because you’re doing your new show on the Internet, do you feel like that’s given you a better outlet for saying what you want to say, without having to adhere to certain corporate principles?
Well yeah, absolutely. You know, I started with a public access show, and there were no real rules; it wasn’t run by corporations. I didn’t come up to the system of working for the man, so to speak, where you kinda had to play by all these corporate rules. I definitely think that’s made me kind of used to working without those rules, but I also have the experience of going to MTV and working with major movie studios.

By the way, I like working with both – it’s fun working with major networks and studios, because they kind of come in and put their own constraints on, but they put them on for a reason. You don’t necessarily want to be flying around and not appealing to a mainstream world. When I first went to MTV, I’d been doing my show, as I said, for six or seven years, and I had audiences where I knew what they’d like. I had a lot of people coming up and following my crazy little college radio show to my crazy little public access show, and they were loving what I was doing.

You move to MTV, and they wanted you to kind of [cut out] a lot of the rough edges, so that mommy and daddy and grandma and grandpa like it, too. And, you know, that’s cool, because you want mommy and daddy and grandma and grandpa to like it. They’re people. I don’t just want to appeal to 21-year-olds, 25-year-olds; I also want to appeal to 35-year-olds and 45-year-olds and 55-year-olds, so you kind of get a different perspective.

I worked for The Tonight Show for a few years, and I’d go do these little bits and musical pieces, and sometimes I’d run off the handle and do something completely outrageous, and they’d edit it in a way that they didn’t show the most outrageous thing that I did. I’d go, “Hmm, wonder why they didn’t show that,” but then [I’d realize] that oh, that might not necessarily appeal to somebody who’s kind of more of a mainstream person. And it’s cool – it’s cool to have that experience, and that’s why The Tonight Show has been rated so well over the years.

But when I do my stand-up, I like to kind of play with both things, you know? I think it’s kind of fun for me to play with the audience a little bit. I like to kind of confuse the audience a little bit and take them on a little bit of a ride, you know?

That sounds a lot like in the tradition of people like Andy Kaufman and Steve Martin.
I just read Steve Martin’s book about stand-up, Born Standing Up. It’s something that’s really exciting to me to just be able to play these clubs that a lot of these comedians have played in, with the history. We just did Zanies in Nashville, and you get to see all the pictures on the wall of Seinfeld and Leno, Adam Sandler, all these people that have come there over the years. It’s definitely very exciting to me, to be able to do what I’ve always wanted to do, to follow in the steps of these great comics.

Is there any goal that you’ve set for yourself that you haven’t yet accomplished?
Yeah, I really would like to be able to kind of, you know, independently make my comedy and do what I want to do without really having to worry about being allowed to do it. I still haven’t quite gotten to that point. I can always work, and that’s cool, but I can’t always go and do exactly what I want to do. I love doing my Web television show, and it’s done really well – it’s really highly rated – but it’s an ongoing struggle to get financing and sponsorship. It’s still an underground thing: TomGreen.com is the website for the television studio that I’ve built in my house, and it gets 2.8 million views per episode.

I’ve got a great little thing going here, but it’s still an underground thing; it’s not like I can hire five or 10 employees and do whatever I want. It’s still something that I’m trying to get off the ground, interestingly enough, and I’d like to be able to expand that. I’d like to be able to make a movie once a year, and go and direct, but I’m still not quite to that place.

It’s funny, though, because I just finished directing a movie, which took a few years to get made. It’s a really crazy movie, and I love it. It’s called Prankster. I’d like to be able to kind of continue to grow and be able to continue to create funny, crazy, non-conventional things. It’s a catch-22 that I’ve always had to deal with, because I like to take things so far and make the point that I’m not conventional, and the point that I’m not just sort of doing what I’m told.

The point of making comedy, to me, is then just a bit of rebelliousness to me. I like to make the point that this is making fun of the system, but if you make fun of the system too much, sometimes the system doesn’t support what you’re doing. I’m really excited about [what’s going on] with the Internet and independent television, and I’m trying to create this really independent business model for the Internet so that I can go directly to sponsors and just make a great, self-produced TV show every week, without having to worry about somebody coming in and saying, “Oh, you can’t say this! You can’t do that! You can’t interview this person! You can’t do that joke!” That’s the goal for me – that’s always been the goal, to get to that place where I can get a real good rhythm, and not have somebody tell me that I can’t.

To me, I like to look at it as art. I like to feel like I’m being artistic and doing something that’s pure and true to an idea that I come up with and accomplish. I don’t like to look at it as a corporate thing, but it is a corporate thing. It costs money to make this stuff; it costs money to make movies, and it costs money to make TV shows. Finding that balance is something I want to do, and not really have to worry about funding.

I think for as long as artists have found a way to make money off their art, that’s always been the conundrum.
I’m not complaining. I certainly have done some successful things. Ultimately, I’d like to find an ongoing way to do this Web television show; I think it would be really cool to do that with a decent budget and sponsorship and good distribution. I just want to continue growing that and be able to do what I want to do.

Can you tell me one thing about comedian Tom Green that’s completely true and unexpected?
Uh, let’s see. Completely true…but also unexpected. Well, I’m kind of a normal guy. I’m much more normal than I think most people would expect. A lot of times, that’s what I hear more often than not, and when I do interviews like this, people tend to think that I’m going to be, you know, making a bunch of funny sounds or funny faces or what have you.

But all that sort of silliness and wackiness, that comes from when I was younger, and when I was in high school and was a kid, I was sort of a very high energy, hyperactive kid. I was always trying to get attention, and started doing these funny faces and things that I do. Now that I’ve gotten older, I’m not running around making all these funny sounds or funny faces all the time. I think sometimes there’s a disconnect where people think that I’m going to be constantly on or constantly flying off the handle, but really, I tend to think things through a lot.

I like to try and craft my stand-up, like, “Okay, this is where I’m going to make the funny face, or do the funny sound. This is where I’m going to tell the story; this is where I’m going to tell the joke.” I think there might be the misconception that I’m a nut-job.

For more info and to check out Tom Green’s talk show online, visit TomGreen.com. Get to tickets to Tom’s New York City shows here.

Comedy Matters with Russell Peters, Kevin Hart and more

by Jeffrey Gurian

The Phenomenon That Is Russell Peters

Russell Peters is not just a comedian. He’s a phenomenon, and that’s a hard word to type more than once! I’ve often referred to him as The Messiah of Comedy, because he has such a diverse audience and makes people of all backgrounds laugh together, and at each other. And he can imitate every accent in the world, but nothing is funnier than when he does the Indian accent. With the requisite head movements!

The show opens with a two minute film where Russell magically morphs into about 100 characters within the two minutes. It was made by his cousin Shaelin. (I hope I spelled that right!)

Russell is just too hip. He comes out on a stage fit for a rock star. And he’s just so calm and relaxed. Like he’s in his living room. Not one, but two DJ booths, with two hot DJ’s on the ones and twos. DJ Spinbad in one, and DJ Starting From Scratch in the other. It was great to see those guys again.

So the audience comes in to hot music, and doesn’t just have to sit there waiting for the show to start, twiddling their thumbs. (Coincidentally, there’s a brand new course on thumb twiddling at The Learning Annex.)

It was Russell’s 20th anniversary of performing and he was on his Green Card Tour. I was so happy to receive an e-mail from his assistant a couple of weeks back saying that Russell and Clayton (his brother and manager), would like to invite me to his show, and to the after-party at Radio City Music Hall. That’s six thousand seats!

Russell sold that out two nights in a row. Along with my tickets was an actual green card that gave you access to the after party. You had to stick it to your clothing. The guards made you put it on, I guess to avoid giving it to someone else. I fooled them by only taking the top piece of paper off the sticky side, and putting it on my jacket, and as soon as I walked through, I put the paper back on and kept the card as a souvenir.

At the after party, I asked Russell what the largest crowd was he ever played to. He said 18,000 people. In Canada. Vancouver to be exact. Four nights in a row. That’s 72,000 people who came out to see him perform.

And I get nervous in a room of 30!

South Beach Comedy Festival

In the midst of 23 degree weather in New York, who wouldn’t jump at the chance to go to Miami for a few days? Especially when you’re being flown out there as I was to cover the South Beach Comedy Festival for Punchline Magazine.

The festival featured Gabriel Iglesias, Mike Birbiglia, Kevin Hart, Brian Regan, and a couple of guys from The Daily Show, namely Rory Albanese who is not only the producer, but also a great stand-up comic, and the great John Oliver who puts on such a fantastic English accent you’d think he was actually a Brit. And he manages to keep it up through his entire act! It’s amazing.

Needless to say I had an incredible time. The success of a comedy festival is not based only on the comedians. In this case it was thanks to two people in particular, Woody Graber the P.R. person for the festival, and Aubrey Kessler the fantastic director of the festival.

Between the two of them they made sure I was totally hooked up. I was given the Spa Penthouse in a fantastic little boutique hotel called The Sanctuary. My rainfall shower was the size of a small room, and there were three flat screen TV’s in this one room. There was one near the bed, one outside the shower, and even one in the bathroom. The hotel spared no amenities, and had a fantastic restaurant called Ola, that was packed every night, so definitely check it out next time you’re in Miami.

What made it even better was that it was literally right around the corner from The Fillmore Theatre where I went to see Gabriel Iglesias, Kevin Hart, and Rory Albanese and John Oliver from The Daily Show.

It was also walking distance from the shows on Lincoln Road where Mike Birbiglia was performing. I had a fantastic time, and the manager, Max Dietermann made sure I was taken care of from the moment I checked in till the moment I left.

People often ask me if I ever write anything bad about any of the performers I see. I have a concept that guides me concerning things like that. Having performed comedy myself, I know how hard it is. You take your life in your hands stepping out on a stage trying to make people laugh. Because I have so much respect for comics, if I don’t like someone’s act I just don’t write about them. I don’t include them in what I write. It’s like they don’t exist. I’d rather not put out any negative energy to the world. There’s already enough of that.

The first night of the festival, things got kicked off with a show and party at the Lucky Strike Bowling Lanes.

Only comedians would be expected to perform over the noise of bowling. Like it’s not hard enough to make people laugh. You need to be hearing loud screaming, and pins falling in the background besides. They had roped off part of the bowling alley for the show. At one point in the show I walked over to the other side where people were trying to concentrate on bowling and realized that they were forced to try and bowl while listening to the comedy, so both sides had it rough.

I got to see two talented acts that first night that stuck out in my mind. One was Will Hatcher who I saw again at the big party at The Gansevoort Hotel, where he was hosting the red carpet, and so when he interviewed me I was able to tell him I thought he was really good.

The other act was two guys who go by the name “A Pair of Nuts,” and they definitely are. Johnny Trabanco and Yamil Piedra are the two guys, and they are a two man sketch group that are very funny, and inventive on stage.
Needless to say if you’re performing in an active bowling alley you can’t expect to have great dressing rooms, so I met with them in a utility closet where they were changing, so I could snap their photo and show people what it’s like when you’re first starting out.

Next year I hear they’ll be performing in a gas station!

Gabriel Iglesias is just so funny, and one of the nicest guys in the business. Lots of guys are funny, but they’re not that nice. He’s both. He was so concerned about the sound not being right in the first four rows that he comped the people who were sitting there, and kept stopping his show to inquire about them. He’s gracious to a fault and after the show stayed to greet every single audience member who wanted to meet him, despite the fact that the security was anxious for him to wrap it up.

He brought his boys from LA with him. Four Mexican comics, and they were all hysterical. Martin Moreno was the MC., then Alfred Robles, and then Noe Gonzales who made the astute observation that you never see a Black guy with a cat. They might have a dog, but never a cat. You’ll never hear a Black guy yelling out, “ Yo Boots!”

The same way I don’t write bad stuff about people, I can’t go backstage if someone I know had a bad set, cause I don’t seem to have the ability to lie, or to hide my feelings. If someone has a bad show, they know they had a bad show, and if I try and say “Great show” they know I’m lying, and it makes it even worse.

With Gabriel I ran backstage cause I LOVED his show and the first thing he said when he saw me was, “You got it with you?” And I knew exactly what he meant. He was referring to my big pen. That’s PEN, like the kind you write with!

Someone gave me that pen a couple of years back, and I’ve been carrying it ever since. When I first met Gabriel out in LA at the Latino Comedy Festival, I had the pen, and it made such an impression on him that he never forgot it. I also carry a medium size pen in case the big one is too big for whoever!

The next night I went to see Kevin Hart. Everyone went to see Kevin Hart. Kevin Hart is a star. Shortly before his show I got a text message from Aileen Budow from Comedy Central that she was on her way to see him too. People LOVE Kevin Hart. And the theater was PACKED!

His road manager Nate Smith, who’s a really nice, hard working guy, makes sure that everything goes down the way it’s supposed to, and because of that was the brunt of Kevin’s jokes for the last part of his set.

Opening for Kevin was his boy Na’im Lynn who travels with Kevin a lot. That’s an enviable position to be in, opening for a guy who’s on his way to the top. Na’im says he’s finally ready to settle down. All he needs to do is find two nice young ladies, …

When speaking of his favorite body parts, he says he likes “ass” all day long. He says he likes girls who’s ass is so big, “when she sits down she looks tall!” And he had a great observation. He said that any guy who comes up behind another guy, puts his hands over his eyes and says, “Guess who?” is stone gay. And if you’re the guy and you “guess who” you’re gayer than he is! Hysterical!

Kevin just has a very endearing way about him. Not only is he incredibly funny, but he’s a story teller. Not many of those. When he tells a story, it’s so expressive, he paints a verbal picture, and takes you on a ride with him, while you’re laughing the whole way. All I kept thinking through his whole show was, in about three weeks, my partner Jean Alerte and I are producing him at Westbury, and he’s gonna be AMAZING!

When I went backstage after the show, he was in his dressing room with a guy that looked just like Ludacris. And it wasn’t till after he left that I found out it actually WAS Ludacris. There was someone standing between us, and I couldn’t really see. I shoulda said, “Move bitch, get out the way! “

Comedy Central was filming Kevin constantly. Even backstage he was shooting promos for them. He was also chosen to be the host at the big festival party at The Gansevoort Hotel, where Comedy Central was filming the festivities.

Kevin had the mic, and interviewed most of the comics who performed. It seemed like he interviewed half of Miami by the time he was finished. I was dying to get on camera and plug our Westbury show, but I wasn’t able to hook it up. But everyone I spoke to about it already seemed to know, so that’s cool.

Jean and I saw Kevin again a few days later at the first of his ten sold-out shows at Carolines. I ran into Caroline and Andrew Fox walking into the party at The Gansevoort in Miami, and congratulated them on selling out Kevin’s shows so quickly.

Andrew asked me if we sold out Westbury yet, but I explained to him that Kevin had to promote his shows at Carolines first before he could do ours, and that we’d probably sell out in a week or so. Kevin has 200,000 followers on Twitter alone, and we only need 2800 people to fill Westbury! Hey Kev, start Tweeting!

CBS At The Comic Strip

So co-owner/founder of The Comic Strip Bob Wachs got on the phone to his friend CBS Pres. Les Moonves, to tell him about some talent that he and partner/co-owner and Pres. Richie Tienken are working with, and the next thing you know a CBS video team is at The Strip, along with agents from ICM.

They came to shoot the sets of Marina Franklin, Brian Scott McFadden, Ray Ellin, who was the host of the evening, Jermaine Fowler, and the great Chuck Nice, for possible CBS TV deals.

It was a packed house and every one of the performers had such a strong set. I think they were all really happy with the way things came out. Sometimes it’s better not to know who’s in the audience, so you just come out and do what you do, but in this case they all knew, and absolutely rose to the occasion.

Brian Scott McFadden recently made his first Letterman appearance and killed it. His bit on what women want in a man borders on comedic genius. Just to be able to remember it is a major accomplishment.

Marina Franklin had been chosen as one of Jay Leno’s correspondents for his late 10 P.M. show so we’ll have to see what happens with that. Ray Ellin is currently taping a series for AOL called Late Net with Ray Ellin, which I covered in a previous column, and Ray is a great host. He knows how to ask the right questions and make his guests feel comfortable enough to elicit the kind of answers that make for a good show.

I think Bob looks at Jermaine as the next Eddie Murphy who Bob and Richie co-managed for 11 years, and you can’t say enough about Chuck Nice.

Chuck has managed to combine his real-life personality into his stage act. What I mean by that is that he is an intelligent, elegant kind of guy, who takes pride in his appearance. He can also be “street” and very cool.

He brings that mix to the stage. He can speak eloquently on a subject, in explaining his comedic premise to the audience, and then launch into a very hip take on what he just expounded upon. It’s what every comedian strives for, a unique comedy stage persona, and he goes back and forth effortlessly between the two Chucks.

We first met years ago, when he was the co-host of Leslie Gold’s Radio Chick Show, and I was a guest. Chuck and I just clicked, and I’ve seen him evolve into a really great talent. He’s a perfect example of what stage time can do for a performer.

I always look forward to seeing him perform, and also to just seeing him ’cause he always has a smile and an upbeat mood to share with those around him.

At the same time that the CBS crew was there, the crew from Letterbox Pictures, led by Brent Sterling-Nemetz was there as well, filming the proceedings to be part of the documentary film being done for the 35th anniversary of The Strip coming up next year. Chris Rock is exec. producing, and Richie, Bob and myself are producers of the film.

Gotham Happenings

I hadn’t seen Tony Woods in too long, but I didn’t think it was long enough that I wouldn’t recognize him.

He was headlining at Gotham and just before the show this guy came over to say hello. He was all thugged out and “hard” looking, and it took me a minute to realize the guy I was talking to was Tony Woods. That and the fact that Jason Steinberg, his longtime manager was standing nearby.

The man has different looks. The next night, when I saw him on Anthony Anderson’s Mixtape one year anniversary show, he looked like a Harvard graduate in a nice argyle sweater.

No matter what he looks like, the man is funny. Very funny. On his headlining show, Karen Bergreen was the MC. Her children drive her crazy by repeating the same question over, and over again. “Why don’t you love me mommy, why don’t you love me.” Her husband says, “ Now you know what it’s like to have a wife!”

One of my faves Ted Alexandro went next, and I think he spoke for all of us when he said, he wants to learn to speak real Chinese, cause he’s so tired of speaking fake Chinese.

Commenting on the fact that Obama is half Black and half White, he said, “Maybe someday we’ll have a woman President. Or maybe half a woman.”

I’ve often thought that Joey Gay’s performing voice was so loud that he didn’t need to use a mic. I guess he thought the same thing cause he did his whole set sans mic. Most guys you wouldn’t hear at all. Joey was still too loud! He makes up for it by being very funny.

Tony Woods has always been a crowd pleaser, but he’s not only funny, he’s also so clever, and he does a great African accent. I’ve said it many times, but audiences LOVE when someone does a good accent. It’s funny the way people mangle our language. Like a comedic anthropologist, Tony humorously examines all the different types of Black people.

Re: Aborigines, who he saw on his tour through Australia, he says he never saw a Black guy like that, … “even in Baltimore. It was like a horse meeting a zebra for the first time.”

He described a boomerang as an Australian murder weapon that comes back to you when you try and throw it away. That would never work as a murder weapon in this country. He said, “No Black guy wants to throw away a murder weapon and have it come back.” The visual of a guy trying to throw away a gun, and having it come back was absolutely hysterical.

Tony never seems to run out of material. He did his hour seamlessly, not like some guys who suddenly ask the audience, “So what do you want to talk about now?” The only reason he ever stopped was because he had another show to do.

I saw Tony again the next night at Anthony Anderson and Royale Watkin’s amazing Mixtape Show. I am now a loyal fan, and will try and make it every month. This was their one year anniversary and they KILLED IT!!! It was filmed for the Internet on Ustream.com.

Anthony opened the show, and introduced the hysterical Rodney Perry, an LA based comic I had seen before. Then Mark Viera stepped up, and also brought the house down, as I had also seen him do previously.

I was glad to see Carmen Lynch up there who was commenting on how when you break up with someone suddenly everything you see reminds you of that person. She said she was dating a Black guy, and when they broke up, not more than a week later there were Black people everywhere.

Tony Woods was on that show also, and did a bunch of things he hadn’t done the night before. The man is a never-ending source of material.

Besides a rap battle, there was even a dance off and Anthony Anderson showed himself to be an amazing dancer. He even did a complete body flip on stage. The man is so agile, he moves like he used to be a stripper. He recently lost 30 pounds and looks great, but despite the fact that he’s still a big guy, he’s got moves that would make Randy Jackson’s Best Dance Crew. For real!

Comedy Matters Shorts

I’m In The Press

It was a good start to the year for me and Comedy Matters press-wise.

Within a period of a week, I had a story in Crème Magazine about me being one of the producers of the documentary film on The Comic Strip, that Chris Rock is exec. producing, had the classic 4-in-one photo of me, Belzer and Paul Shaffer, holding a photo of me, Belzer and Paul Shaffer, holding a photo of me, Belzer and Paul Shaffer, holding still a fourth photo of me, Belzer and Paul Shaffer in an article by Mandy Stadtmiller in the NY Post, and in light of the terrible events involving Artie Lange, was featured in a big story on ABC.com on the dark side of comedy, (known to anyone in the biz) , and was quoted throughout.

I know we all send Artie our love and prayers for his speedy recovery to good health.

Mark Anthony Ramirez at Iguana

Mark Anthony Ramirez is a comic we should see more of. He launched a new comedy show with Sean Lynch at The Iguana café on West 54th Street on Tuesday evenings at 8 P.M. I attended the opening at which Lynch was the MC.

Great comics like Carole Montgomery, Joe DeRosa, who does a masterful bit on how people go crazy by living in New York, and Jamie Kilstein performed, but guest star Janeane Garofalo had to cancel at the last minute due to illness.

Fortunately for everyone, the great Colin Quinn stepped in and did his usual amazing, genius take on every ridiculous thing you ever saw and experienced in your life, but didn’t have the wherewithal to comedically dissect.

Colin is a master of language, whether it’s examining the people who ask you a question and answer it for you, “ How you doin’, … good?” And even if you say something like, “my girlfriend just broke up with me,” they insist on ignoring that by saying, “Yeh, but you’re doing good right?”

Or guys who have to act out physically on YOU, what they did to someone else, while regaling you with the story. This is fine until the story involves throwing the guy against a car and beating the crap out of him, and you have to remind them that you are only an actor in their fantasy, and don’t deserve to be beaten.

Gabrielle Bernstein Adds More “ING” To Your Life

Gabrielle Bernstein is a very successful motivational speaker whose new book, “Add More – ing To Your Life” is called “A Hip Guide To Happiness.” (addmoreing.com) I went to her book party, and just had to show you a photo of the dress she was wearing. It definitely belongs in Comedy Matters!

Fundraiser for Haiti

My partner Jean Alerte and myself are producing “Kevin Hart Live” on Feb. 20th at the Capital One Bank Theatre in Westbury, Long Island, starring the hilarious Kevin Hart who sells out every show he does.

My partner Jean is Haitian, and literally three days before the quake, I brought him to meet my longtime friend Unik Ernest, the nightlife impresario who is also Haitian, so that we could align ourselves with a charity to receive part of the proceeds from our show.

I knew they would get along, and Unik is the founder of Edeyo (edeyo.org), which means “ Help Them” in Haitian Creole. It’s a Haitian charity that dedicates itself to helping educate Haiti’s poorest children. They recently built a school for 200 kids. We decided to make our charity Edeyo.

Three days later, the tragedy occurred, and we already had everything in place. On Monday, Jan. 25th we held a fundraiser for Haiti at Jay-Z’s 40/40 Club, and raised about $6,000. plus lots of food, bedding and supplies for the Haitian people.

I myself donated about ten bags of clothing to Haiti, and three days later I got them back with a note that said, “Thank you anyway. We’re desperate, but not THAT desperate!”

Wil Sylvince attended the fundraiser. Our show on the 20th also features TV/film star Tony Rock, and Wil will be the MC. Check it all out at kevinhartlive.com.

Anyway, until next time, remember, … COMEDY MATTERS!!!

Bill Maher: Bill kills

by Emma Kat Richardson

A Barack Obama presidency has, in no way, slowed down Bill Maher’s attempt to deconstruct all that’s wrong with American politics. In fact, he’s got plenty more to say. The proof is in his new live HBO comedy special premiering on Feb. 13.

There isn’t too much that can be said about Bill Maher that hasn’t already been committed to a thousand pieces of journalism. We know him best as the pot-smoking pundit who, for almost two decades, has entertained and informed audiences with a sharply critical rhetoric on everything from organized religion to the toxicity of America’s food supply.

As his HBO ratings knockout Real Time prepares for its new-season debut on Feb. 19 as well as the premiere of Maher’s ninth HBO special, But I’m Not Wrong, which airs live on Feb. 13, here’s what America’s most outspoken social critic had to say for himself in a conversation with Emma Kat Richardson. (Portions of this interview and introduction were originally published in Real Detroit Weekly.)

Do you prefer doing stand-up or doing your show, and do the benefits of one outweigh the other?
Well, you’re asking me which one of my children I like better. But since I don’t have children, I’ll answer this question. I have to say, if I had to choose, stand-up. It’s the most fun I can ever have with my pants on. It’s very pure – I’ll put it that way. Well, pure in the sense that it’s just me, my jokes, and the audience. There’s no time limit; there’s no network; there’s no people sitting on the panel, you know, cutting me off. It’s all about making people laugh out loud continually for an hour and a half. There are very few places where you can go for that nowadays: there are very few places you can go where you can laugh until you’re exhausted, and that’s my goal.

How much of your stand-up act is really you and how much is an onstage persona?
Oh, it’s all me. I have no onstage persona. Once in a while, people will not quite know who you are but will know your face, and they’ll say, “Oh, hey, I know you, you’re an actor!” That’s the one thing that makes me kind of bristle. No, I’m not an actor; I’m the opposite of an actor. I’m not acting at all, I never say anything I don’t believe. I’m a comedian and I tell jokes, and jokes are not always about [truth]: the premise may be true, but the joke part is an exaggeration, but people understand that. I am exactly who I am, I think. Even when people who’ve known me through television first get to know me later, that’s the comment I’ve heard many times: “Boy, you’re not really that different from what you are on the air.”

It’s a good thing for what I do – it wouldn’t be a good thing if I was trying to be an action movie star. Then you’d want to be, you know, larger than life. Television is an intimate medium, and what I’m doing, what I’m selling, is keeping it real. So if you’re going to be the keep it real dude, you should be real. If I came in with a facelift next season, for example, I’d understand why the audience would peel away. [Laughs]. They’d be like, “Oh, this is the guy we thought was very authentic; we’d think he was never pulling a punch when he talks, and here he is now with a tummy tuck or whatever.”

Do you ever revisit some of your material from the ‘80s?
God, no. I had an HBO special in 2007; I wouldn’t even do a joke from that! I mean, maybe one: there’s a couple that if they fit, people will say to me all the time, you know, “Do that thing!” Once in a while I will do that, but people who come to see me when I do a stand-up show are seeing almost all new stuff, because jokes are not like music. In music, people want to hear the hits they heard 40 years ago, but as a comedy fan myself, I don’t want to hear that. If I go see a comedian, I don’t want to hear his old act: I know those jokes, and when you know a joke, it’s sort of over. With exceptions, as I say – some bits, you can hear more than once. But basically, I want to keep it as fresh as I can for them.

Have you ever had to struggle to make your act so prolific?
I just stop. After I do an HBO special, then I won’t do stand-up for a while. It’s like, after you harvest a crop, you have to let the field lie fallow, so you can grow more jokes.

So that’s what you’re growing in your basement: jokes.
Well, among other things, but we don’t have to talk about that.

Do you find audiences in some of the more economically depressed areas of the country to be more or less receptive to your material? How have they reacted to it?
Oh, they love it, because I think I’m voicing what I know a lot of people are feeling, which is a lot of frustration at the corporatist scant of America right now. Back when I was starting to get on Obama’s case, my own studio audience was booing me. It’s a liberal audience, and we all like Obama – I certainly like Obama – but people are turning to the point of view that I’ve been expressing for a while: unless he gets off his corporatist ass, he’s becoming a big disappointment.

This is not change that we can believe in, that we all thought we were getting. No public option in health care – he seemed to back down on that. No real reform for the banks that caused this giant economic mess that has caused such misery in Detroit and everywhere else in the country. People are getting very frustrated with this president. He seems to always be trying to placate the crazies on the right instead of rallying the people who voted for him. I think there is a level of frustration with continued personal affection that we have for him. But you know, he’s not our boyfriend – he’s the president.

Do you think a lot of his unwillingness to stand up to corporate interests has to do with his campaign funding?
I do. He got half his money from corporations. They made a big deal about the fact that he raised more money from small donations than anybody – that’s true. He raised $400 million just from average people, and that’s an impressive achievement, but he also raised $400 billion from fat cats and corporations. I think that tells you a lot.

Did you read the article in Time about comedians having a tougher time coming up with topical material in the age of Obama?
Oh, Christ. I’ve read that in every fucking magazine. Yes, they’ve been asking that, and they’re finally starting to stop asking that: you know, can comedy continue after George Bush? Yes, George Bush was funny, but, yes, it continued. Hallelujah!

I’m having more fun than ever with the material, and I think George Bush probably was the greatest comedic punching bag we’ll ever have, but anything gets tired after eight years. I mean, I was thrilled when he left office, because there was new stuff to talk about, and of course, if you want to, as many comedians do, just concentrate on how crazy the right-wingers are, they’re more crazy than ever. When they’re out of power is when they’re really scary. When they’re out of power is when they’re really funny, because they’ve completely gone batshit; they’re absolutely not connected to reality. Tea-baggers, and Texas threatening to secede, and the Glenn Becks and the Rush Limbaughs – this stuff is very rich, so comedy is just fine.

Since we got to see your childhood background with religion in Religulous, I’ve always wanted to know whether you had a similar experience with politics. Did you grow up in a civic-minded household?
Yes, I did. My father was a news guy – my father worked in radio news. News and what was going on in the world, current events, was always something that was discussed in my house, which is something that’s not that typical in America. I think that’s much more of a European thing. In Europe, there’s a cafe society – people sit out at night at cafes and they talk about what’s really going on. We don’t do that: we sit at home and watch television.

So, in that sense, it was always sort of in my blood, that interest in the news. On Real Time, we definitely have our audience, but it will never be a cafe society. This will always be a society that prefers diversion over education. American Idol will get 30 million people and Bill Moyers Journal will get 300,000. That’s who we are.

Do you think that there’s a natural kinship between righteous anger over certain issues and the ability to make them humorous?
Yeah, probably, but what I wonder about is, why aren’t people more angry? Considering how much they’re poisoned, ripped off, and lied to in this country, why aren’t they rising up? I thought Capitalism: A Love Story was [Michael Moore’s] greatest ever – it’s the perfect meeting of a man at the top of his game as a filmmaker meeting the exact right subject matter.

Michael has always been about corporations screwing the little man: this is what Roger and Me was about 20 years ago. So in a way, he’s come full circle in this movie, and it’s a brilliant movie. He seems to want people to rise up, and seems to be asking them to rise up, and the movie is sort of intimating that they are going to rise up, but I don’t see it. I don’t see people rising up; I really don’t. Maybe they should stop giggling and get angry. I think we’re doing a disservice by making them laugh. [Laughs].

Is it difficult sometimes to form jokes around serious subject matter?
Not for me. I’ve always been interested in it. There are some comics who love the trivial. There are a million comics who have tried to be Jerry Seinfeld, and Jerry is a guy who can make the trivial into something incredibly fascinating. He can talk about the socks in the dryer and it’s brilliant. But, unless you do that kind of comedy exactly right, I find it to be shallow and corny. It’s very hard to be Jerry Seinfeld, even though so many of them try.

But that was never the kind of comedy that interested me: I never talked about trivial matters, even when I was starting out. I was always interested in religion, politics – the big issues, the big meaty issues.

I’ve got to ask you about [disgraced former Detroit mayor] Kwame Kilpatrick. I remember when he was a guest on Real Time. Have you been following that scandal at all?
Well, I certainly know what happened. He’s doing time now, is he?

He’s out, and he’s now in Texas. But he was in jail.
Yes, I remember when he was on the show. He had a whole bunch of guys with him, kind of a posse, and had on this big suit. It did appear more like he was a celebrity than a mayor. If you didn’t know he was the mayor, you would have thought maybe he was high caliber. I don’t remember anyone else with that kind of presence – certainly not in politics. He did have more of an entourage than Jay-Z did – Jay-Z was on our show recently and he came in with just one guy.

Do you have any major career plans for life after Real Time?
No, you know, my big Moby Dick was Religulous. I always wanted to get a movie made about how stupid and dangerous religion is – it had never been done, and I had it in my craw for years and years. Finally got the right director, did the movie, and the movie did really good – people will stop me every day of my life, and probably for the rest of my life, and say, “Thank you for Religulous.”

So that was like my big Moby Dick that I had to harpoon, and other than that, I’m content doing the show. Next year will be our eighth year – I mean, Politically Incorrect was on for nine years, but I never thought we’d do this one for as long. Between that and stand-up, that’s plenty for me. I’m happy to do that – I’m not going to do any more movies. People say to me, “Are you going to do more documentaries?” No; I had one subject that I wanted to do, I did it, that’s it, I think I made my point, so I’m happy to go back to what I really do, which is being a stand-up.

There’s nothing that you set out to accomplish when you started your career that you feel like you haven’t achieved yet?
Not really, no. I mean, I’m happy doing what I’m doing. I don’t want to be an actor; I was an actor in the 80s, but that was the right thing for when you’re young and don’t really know what you want to do. I’ve been on TV for… Politically Incorrect went on in 1993. We’re coming up on 20 years – that’s the big middle chunk of your life. I would never have predicted that we’d have such a long run. I’m just happy it’s lasted this long.

Do you ever think about writing a personal memoir?
Yes. I’ve thought about it. I don’t know; I’ve put out four books, and those are great, but it’s not really a book age anymore. People don’t read ‘em. It’s just different: media has moved on, people’s habits have moved on. Twitter is 140 characters, and that’s challenging for people. Everybody puts out a memoir, and it’s like, “Whatever.”

Bill Maher’s new HBO stand-up comedy special But I’m Not Wrong premieres live at 10 pm on Feb. 13. For more info on Maher, check out BillMaher.com.

Isaac Witty: Zero Balance

by John Delery

With a name like Isaac Witty, you’d have, no, you’d better be funny, especially when telling not one, not two, but three consecutive cell phone jokes, the 21st century equivalent of the 20th century stand-up standby: the airline-food lament.

It sounds like an improbable way to hook a likely cell-absorbed crowd, but Witty (his given name, incidentally, not a gimmicky stage name) lands three successive punch lines at Go Bananas Comedy Club in Cincinnati on his way to a knockout performance on Zero Balance, his new CD from Rooftop Comedy Productions.

The “Ringtone” track alone, No. 10 of 33 tracks, is worth the price of the album. It underscores Witty’s altogether giddy style and his enviable technique of cobbling fresh comedy from seemingly exhausted premises. His success derives as much from his dizzy delivery as his inventive writing. Witty imagines the unimaginable and mines uproarious jokes from what ought to be mundane sources of humor: middle school gym class, the mall, the grocery store, the windup of his act.

“I’m going to keep doing this as long as anyone is mildly entertained,” he says while deliberately milking his finale. Next time, just for precision’s sake, substitute “wildly” for “mildly.”

Check out Witty’s “Ringtone” bit below. And click the graphic to purchase the album.

Sarah Silverman Program: Season 3

by Dylan P. Gadino

For its first two seasons, The Sarah Silverman Program did a fine job of turning Sarah Silverman’s demented onstage material into an even more demented weekly series for Comedy Central.

Judging by the first two episodes of season three, thankfully, very little – in the way of style and theme – has changed. If anything, this season will turn out more thematically absurd (and dare I say, more intense) than its first two.

Truth be told, “intense” is a euphemistic way of saying that the first episode, “The Proof is in the Penis,” written by Eric Schaar, made me laugh and want to vomit in equal parts. Please note, I don’t mean laughter-induced vomiting. I’m talking about the kind of vomit coaxing that comes from seeing Sarah wearing a severed infant penis around her neck after having swallowed the shriveled and dirty, pinky-like member and saying things like, “I’d love to help you guys but I think I’m about to poop out my own penis.”

So why the fleshy jewelry? In order to encourage Sarah to stop grubbing off her, Laura tricks her sis into thinking she was born a man. If I told you why, in Laura’s head, this plan would work, I’d spoil the whole episode. I’ll leave it at this: Laura turns out to be just as conniving and simple as Sarah– and it’s awesome.

While the second episode is less visually disgusting, it beats out the first in plain wackiness. Written by comedian Chelsea Peretti, this installment finds Sarah taking the name Sarah St. Claire, donning a fairy princess-type costume and hosting her own children’s “story time” show, which ultimately has very few stories and, of course, no morals and instead includes nap time with Ambien, Sarah watching Lost and songs about the importance of protecting your neck with wooden mittens.

The pair of episodes kick off the season perfectly and illustrate what the Sarah Silverman Program became during its first two seasons. That is to say, the hilarious, smelly ball sack ruining the fun for all the mindless sitcoms on network television.

The first episode premieres Feb. 4 at 10:30 pm EST on Comedy Central. Check out the official show site here. Check out a preview of season three below.

The Sarah Silverman Program
Season Three Preview
www.comedycentral.com

Steve Agee: Comedian for all seasons

by Rob Turbovsky

Just days away from the premiere of the third season of the Sarah Silverman Program, Steve Agee — one half of the most dynamic gay couple on television — gets deep about reality television, Twitter and his dramatic shift in the popular Comedy Central series.

Steve Agee is best known as half of the gay couple that lives across the hall from Sarah Silverman in The Sarah Silverman Program. He also worked a decade in reality television (including on Temptation Island and The Osbournes), then became a writer for Jimmy Kimmel Live and later a writer/director/actor in his own online work on Funny or Die and Channel 101, including his most recent (on Atom.com), the Berry/Agee Experiment, with English comic Matt Berry.

On Silverman’s show, Agee, along with his TV lover Brian Posehn, smokes a lot of pot (including once with God), plays a lot of video games, and gets into a variety of domestic spats, only to adorably and hilariously make nice by the end of the episode.

In a strange way, he’s the moral center of a show that delights in pointing out how stupid it is for TV shows to have moral lessons at all. Ahead of the third season premiere, Agee called to talk about the show, his time on reality TV, and his prolific Tweeting.

At the time of this interview, you have a mini Twitter war going with Todd Barry. [When Agee Tweeted “my new hip hop name is Tim. I will only answer to that,” Barry responded “Hi Tim. If you see Steve, can you tell him to shut the fuck up?” It’s escalated from there.]
Yeah.

It’s getting kind of intense. I don’t know that intense is a word used to describe Todd Barry a lot.
Intense is the last word I would use to describe Todd Barry. Todd and I are friends; we’ve known each other a long time. He started this. I don’t even know how or why he would do this, but of course, I played along. It’s weird. There are so many people on Twitter – I don’t know if they think it’s real or not – but they will take sides. I’ve blocked a few people for saying really shitty things about me. And, he’s had to do the same thing.

Do you feel any pressure on Twitter to entertain people with your Tweets?
Every now and then, I will start to write a Tweet, and it’s usually the Tweets where I’m trying to be funny, and about halfway through it, or just before I hit send, I can already tell how people are going to be replying. Sometimes, it’s annoying in my head, so I won’t even hit send. Umm. What was the question again?

There really wasn’t a question there. We should talk about Sarah Silverman, because, otherwise, I will talk endlessly about Twitter.
I could talk for hours about Twitter.

But, The Sarah Silverman Program is coming back, and it’s been gone for a while.
Yeah, our last episodes were in December of ’08. Our momentum is non-existent. But, this season is an epic season. The writers just went nuts. These episodes are like mini-movies. Some of the stories are absolutely crazy.

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Your parts seem to be bigger in some of these episodes, especially the gay marriage one.
I think with that one, with the subject of Brian [Posehn] and I getting married, they had to put a little more screen time in there for us. There’s another episode later in the season, I can’t give away what happens in it, it’s pretty huge, but Brian and I are the A-story, we’re the focus of the episode, which is pretty huge for us.

As the show has gone on, do you feel like you’re getting more confident as an actor?
Definitely. For the episode I’m talking about, Rob Schrab, our director, actually sent me to an acting coach. It’s a really heavy episode. Kind of dramatic. It’s funny, but there’s definitely dramatic scenes in there. I’ve never done any kind of dramatic acting, so Rob said he’d send me to a coach. Sarah’s show is basically my first acting gig, so I was happy to take him up on that offer.

It seems strange that you and Brian play the most caring gay couple on television.
Especially because if you break down the stories in our episodes, we fucking fight a lot. Every now and then you’re like “Why the fuck are these two guys even together?” But, eventually, it ends with us very sweetly realizing we could never be with other people. We’re like two teddy bears.

It’s a strangely positive portrayal, which is weird, because in the whole rest of the show, no one ever learns anything, which is rare on TV.
Sarah’s character especially never learns any lesson at all. She’s borderline retarded. For some reason, that’s very endearing. You almost feel sorry for her. If any characters learn anything, it’s usually Brian and I, I guess. We learn what we already know…. which is that the other person is awesome.

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I hate to take you back to working on reality TV, but I think you’d be a good person to ask about Jersey Shore. When you watch a show like that, can you enjoy it, or do you see all of the parts that go into making it? Or, is it just too miserable to watch?
I’ve never seen Jersey Shore. I can appreciate why it exists. I know why reality TV has lasted. I know why it’s never going to go away. It’s because people love watching train wrecks. People love that kind of shit, because it makes the viewer seem less crazy. You can watch and go, “Holy fuck. I am so glad my life is not like this.”

Reality shows have just come to the point where they’re casting people who are going to be controversial. They look for assholes, they look for despicable people, and the average viewer loves to watch that. I worked for almost 10 years in reality TV shows, so I’ve seen it all. I just don’t like watching it, not because it takes me back, but because it’s so tiring for me. I know those people are out there, I’ve known it for years, and I don’t need to be reminded of it. But, I’ll never say to one of my friends, “How can you watch that?” I know how they can watch it.

Do you think there’s a difference between the reality shows, like Temptation Island, where people are competing for a prize, versus something like Jersey Shore, where the prize is just being in the show?
A lot of these people do go on just for camera time. They have some weird mentality, and they think they’re going to be celebrities and make a lot of money. And, for the most part, they won’t. The people who make the money are the producers. They’re making so much money off of these people’s stupidity, and that’s kind of a bummer to me.

Have you wrapped up the Berry/Agee Experiment?
We only ever intended to do four videos for the Berry/Agee Experiment, because Matt and I are so busy. I look at Matt as a huge star. I honestly I got to do a web series with Matt Berry, because Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace is one of my favorite shows of all time. That show is brilliant. Rob Schrab and I were such huge fans of the show and of Matt Berry, and we just wanted to have him on Sarah’s show and Rob figured out a way to have it done. He came out to do an episode, and he and I really hit it off.

Matt’s also a musician, so when he went back to England, he wrote a dumb song about me and just e-mailed it to me. And, I first came to L.A. as a musician, so I have recording equipment in my house, so I recorded a dumb song about Matt. So, for no reason, for like a week straight, every day we would e-mail each other really horrible songs about the other person being really terrible. This was for no profit, for nothing, just to make each other laugh. I was pitching some shows to Comedy Central and nothing was sticking, and I mentioned these songs and played a few for them, and they were like, “This is great. Let’s do a documentary web series about you guys recording these songs.”

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You Tweeted recently that you went on an audition but didn’t get the part. What was it?
It was for the lead in a sitcom. The character description was “an overweight Chicago cop.” I was supposed to be a fat guy. Like, I know I’m out of shape, and a little bit overweight, but I’ve never really thought I’m fat. I’ve looked in the mirror and thought, “Goddamn, I need to lose weight.” But, it was really a bummer to get this audition. So, I come in, and I meet the casting director, and she has me read the scenes, and she was laughing a lot. Afterwards, she was like, “That was great. You nailed it. The only problem is that you’re not fat.” My only response was “Thank you so much.” So, I’m not going to get it. But, I don’t mind.

It’s a very flattering rejection.
Exactly. And, that’s very rare.

The third season of The Sarah Silverman Program premieres this Thursday at 10:30 pm on Comedy Central. You can follow Steve Agee on Twitter at twitter.com/steveagee. The Berry/Agee Experiment is here.