By special request, here’s the David Cross interview. Confederate Mack, here comes a (not-so) long distance dedication! Keep your feet on the ground, and keep reaching for the psilocybin!
Where the last two I posted were complete transcripts, this is the edited version that actually ran (in Punchline #58, Sept. 16 1999). I have the tape around here somewhere, but as I remember, there wasn’t that much more to it.
This interview was done to promote with Mr. Cross’ HBO special, “The Pride Is Back,” which is awesome & worth finding a copy of. The one thing that comes to mind is that the last anecdote given by Mr. Cross, about the guy on the subway, also appears in an interview that ran in The Onion about the same time.
Anyway, happy reading, as we await the release of “Run Ronnie Run”, the Mr. Show feature film, the Mr. Show DVD’s supposedly coming in February, and more than anything, THE NEW DVDVR!!!!! WHERE’S MY GLASS BOWL?!?!?!? I CAN'T DIE WITHOUT IT!!!
(Mul)Doomstone
DS: I was glad to see you had the guts to take on some of the institutions that have gone on unchecked in our country for far too long. I’m talking of course about “High Times” magazine and bumper stickers.
DC: (laughs) Yeah, yeah, I know.
DS: Do you have those bumper stickers in California that say, “Mean People Suck”?
DC: Oh, yeah. They’re coast to coast.
DS: Really?
DC: Yeah, we’ve got all of that stupid, trite, cliche, sentimental bullshit. And the “Who Farted?” one I mentioned is real, too.
DS: You know, the only issue of “High Times” I ever owned was the comedy issue, with Carlin on the cover, and there was an interview with you and Bob Odenkirk in it.
DC: Oh yeah . . . that was weird. That was . . . honestly, I don’t remember anything about that. I don’t even remember ever doing the interview.
DS: You sing a lot on Mr. Show. Did you ever take singing lessons?
DC: Sort of. I went to a school for the arts in high school in Atlanta, starting in the tenth grade. The first year I was in chorus until I switched over to acting. We had to do, like, arias and shit. So not really lessons, but I did sing.
DS: Then you went to college in Boston?
DC: Yeah, for like fifteen minutes.
DS: Is that where you started doing comedy?
DC: No, I had started in high school in Atlanta, just totally inaccessible, open-mic shit. And I took a year off after high school, but then I went to Boston and started again. When I first got to Emerson, I was too busy to do comedy. I was too busy being a stupid college kid.
DS: Boston is where you started a show called “Cross Comedy” in some local clubs, which I understand was a precursor to “Mr. Show.”
DC: Sort of. It had the same philosophy. Like, the sketches ran in to one another, and there were running themes, and there were callbacks to old characters. It was kind of more Python-ish. A lot of those guys ended up on Mr. Show, like John Ennis.
DS: What’s up with the title of your special, “The Pride Is Back”?
DC: I don’t know, it was just out of desperation. I was just thinking about it too much and then I just said, fuck it, make it that.
DS: How important are the background sets on HBO specials?
DC: (laughs) You tell me.
DS: Not very.
DC: Right!
DS: Your wording seemed more precise than what I recall seeing in the past.
DC: Huh. I don’t know, that’s interesting. Perhaps it’s from doing Mr.Show. I don’t know, I really haven’t thought about it.
DS: How long did you work out the material for the special?
DC: Well, it would be misleading to say one week, but I only worked at a club for one week. But this stuff has been culled from alternative comedy shows I would do out here, and in New York as well. You know, I’d just go up and bring the tape recorder and talk for like fifteen minutes or whatever and then kind of hone that stuff, and put together mu idea of a running order of the stuff I wanted to talk about. Then, the week before the special, I did another show at a room here in L.A. called Largo, and that was like an hour and twenty minutes. I taped it, watched the tape, and said, I’m gonna do this, I’m not gonna do this, y’know? When I got that hour, I went and did a week in San Francisco and then went and did the hour in Seattle.
DS: Where you out of practice?
DC: Yeah, I was definitely out of practice.
DS: How long had it been before that L.A. show that you had done a full hour?
DC: Probably about two years, easy.
DS: Didn’t some lady start screaming at you during a show in San Francisco?
DC: Uh-huh, yeah. Where did you here that?
DS: I think it was in the San Francisco Examiner.
DC: Was it really? Oh, wow. Well, all I know is that there were seven shows over seven nights, and every single night someone left, or asked for their money back or something. And there was one night when a lady stood up and told me I would be sorry when I was dead and in hell. Something to that effect.
DS: Do you find that since you’ve become known for playing characters on Mr. Show, that when people come to see your stand-up, they expect you to be more of a character?
DC: Umm, I didn’t. That may be just because I didn’t notice what was there. I never got that sense, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t there.
DS: Did people know who your are when you did the clubs?
DC: When I go to alternative rooms, people know who I am from Mr. Show. But if I go to Gotham in New York City of the Laugh Factory in L.A., they just know me as the “chicken-pot pie” guy. And the rest don’t know who I am. And that’s fine, that’s good.
DS: That character from “Just Shoot Me” has gotten really popular.
DC: I’m getting a sense of that. It’s sort of a bummer. I mean, you work so hard on this other thing, and you do this goofy, fluffy kind of forgettable thing. And now people are yelling that shit at me, and it’s just like, “Awww, man.”
DS: Are there newer comedians that still blow you away?
DC: Oh yeah, totally. Like Patton Oswaldt. Do you know him?
DS: Yeah, he’s incredible. He went to school at William & Mary.
DC: Yeah, he’s from Virginia or Maryland or something. He’s great. Todd Glass kills me, he’s fucking hilarious. All the guys who have been on Mr. Show are really good stand-ups in their own right. Laura Kightlinger, who I worked with in San Francisco, makes me laugh. Sarah Silverman . . . do you know these people?
DS: Laura Kightlinger, yeah, and Sarah Silverman just from Mr. Show. Do you get sick of going to comedy clubs?
DC: Oh, absolutely. And that’s why I usually don’t go.
DS: I see a connection between your advertising jokes in the special, and some of the satire on Mr. Show. In both cases you really have a knack for nailing the tone of the ad you’re spoofing. What do you attribute this to?
DC: Well, we’re just observant about what annoys us, you know? You know, there are some things that bother some people that to me, just go in one ear and out the other, and don’t bother me. And then there are other things that people find really meaningless that really bother me, and advertising is one of them.
DS: How important is the ability to use the seven dirty words on Mr. Show?
DC: Well, we get a little sensitive to over using
it. But if it fits a character or a situation, or a joke, then its gotta
be like that.
DS: It just makes it seem more real.
DC: That’s a very worthwhile observation. Doing that does make it seem more real, and the comedy is just better when it seems more real.
DS: When you act in, say, “Men In Black,” does it feel like a cakewalk?
DC: Absolutely. It’s gravy. It’s vacation, it’s a treat. Totally. You’re just treated so well, and it’s fun, and it’s not hard at all. It’s just a vacation.
DS: A single episode of Mr. Show must take forever to film.
DC: Yeah, well, that’s why we just can’t do another season. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be able to do anything else, ever.
DS: It’s just constant work?
DC: Constant work. It’s nine months of constant work. I’d say that out of that nine months, no exaggeration, we have maybe twenty days off.
DS: That’s apparent in the detail of the show.
DC: And we have no budget, either.
DS: I assume it’s much smaller than, say, Saturday Night Live’s.
DC: Oh, fuck yeah!
DS: But you guys achieve so much more.
DC: Well, that’s cause of Troy [Miller, director of all Mr. Show episodes and the Tenacious D shorts].
DS: Will Troy Miller direct the Mr. Show movie?
DC: Yes, he is.
DS: And the Ronnie Dobbs thing is still the movie?
DC: Yeah, we’re just trying to negotiate it, and get to the point where we can start filming.
DS: It’s been written?
DC: It’s been written, it’s been sold, and now we’re just doing the bullshit details you have to do.
DS: Wasn’t Tool in the original Ronnie Dobbs sketch?
DC: Yeah, that was them. Actually, it was two of the four guys, Maynard and Andy.
DS: How’d that come about?
DC: I’m friends with Maynard and Adam, and have been for a long time. We’ve helped open their shows and they’ve been on our show, and we’re just part of the same creative community. They’re big comedy fans.
DS: Don’t you find that a lot of bands are fans of Mr. Show?
DC: Oh, yeah, totally.
DS: Seems like the perfect show to bring tapes of on tour.
DC: Absolutely. Yeah, you fuckin’ nailed it.
DS: What’s spinning on the David Cross platter these days?
DC: I just got back from the Bumbershoot festival in Seattle, and saw some great, great bands. Still though, my favorite band for a long time now has been Superchunk. I love seeing them live, I love their albums. They’re really a fun band. I like Built to Spill and Pavement and Guided by Voices and Ween and Cibo Matto and all that kind of stuff.
DS: Do you use the DVD player that HBO gave you very much?
DC: I use it all the time, actually. You haven’t seen porn until you’ve seen porn on a DVD player.
DS: Different angles?
DC: Yeah, plus the director commentary, which is always interesting to hear.
DS: Who have you been most surprised is a fan of Mr. Show?
DC: I had a surprise when I was on the subway in New York about a year and a half ago. And by surprised, it was only by my own ignorance and judging of people. Which is wrong. But this like forty, forty-five year old, lower middle class, working guy gets on. Really beat down looking, looked like he’d been working all day, wearing a quilted flannel jacket, and he’s dirty and looks like he just wants to find a bar and drink all night. And he’s standing there and he just keeps looking at me, and I just figure he thins I’m just some punk, like there’s something about me he just doesn’t like. But he keeps looking, and when he’s leaving he turns to me and says, “Hey, uh, I just want to say I love your show. It’s the fucking greatest thing on TV, and I really appreciate what you’re doing.” And it was just like, “Holy shit!”. The last thing I expected. That’s really cool.