[Defend Yourself]

LEWIS BLACK

By Rob Turbovsky

Lewis Black once sat next to me at a Radiohead concert, and then left early in something of a displeased tiff. He looked angry. I wondered, is he angry all the time? Now I know the shocking truth: not really. He's mainly just gently ornery, in an agreeable, get-the-hell-off-my-lawn kind of way. Onstage, Black is what you call a screamer, a member of the hilarious but tiny fraternity of stand-up comedians whose brothers have included Sam Kinison and Bill Hicks. And, with those two long gone, few comics out there manage to touch absurd brilliance with flailing, shouting and cursing the way that Black does. Given the venom of his political material, it's surprising to realize that Black might be the biggest name in the comedy world not also reviled by some large sector of it, unlike cable guys (or Dane Cooks) that we could name. Part of the reason must be his affection and dedication to stand-up itself, along with a relentless touring schedule that has him coming back to Boston in a month for a book tour. We talked about Radiohead, his years as a playwright, and his impending 60th birthday. Oh, and we also talked about how his bus almost hit a car during this interview.

HOW ARE YOU?

Ah, it gets better every day, doesn't it?

I SAT NEXT TO YOU DURING A RADIOHEAD PERFORMANCE SOME YEARS AGO AT BONNAROO. YOU WALKED OUT EARLY.

It didn't make sense. I've never really listened much to them. And I was kind of excited. And then I thought, "Hmmm...this is a long night." Really, always, it bugs me, because it's like, if I can hear what they're saying, I've got a fighting chance. I'll listen to anything as long as there are words. It's just they never have that. You have to read them on the back of the album or go online. It's absurd. So, they're really depressed, and I don't know why.

WHY DON'T MOST PEOPLE THINK OF COMEDY AS AN ART?

Because there's a good portion of the country that thinks, "I can do that. I can be funny. Everybody at the office thinks I'm funny." The nice thing that's happening is that up at Emerson College, they're starting to deal with it as a subject.

YOU'RE A GRADUATE OF YALE DRAMA SCHOOL, AS IS ROBERT KLEIN. WHAT DO YOU THINK THAT EXPERIENCE GAVE YOU AS A PERFORMER?

Hopefully, it informs the way I write my act onstage. It gave me a drive to want a through-line in my performance. It was silly the actors I watched work there: Meryl Streep, Mark Linn-Baker, Christopher Lloyd and Christopher Walken. There's this endless list. A lot of people that are now household names I watched and hopefully learned something through osmosis.

OTHERS HAVE NOTED THAT ONE OF THE STRANGE THINGS ABOUT STAND-UP IS THAT, AT ANY GIVEN MOMENT, THE BEST PEOPLE IN THE FIELD ARE TRYING TO DO SOMETHING ELSE.

Sorry, could you run that back again? Because we almost just hit a car.

ARE YOU DRIVING?

No, no, no. We travel on a tour bus. We just went in to get gas, and this guy just—without paying any attention—almost drove ... unbelievable.

WHAT STATE ARE YOU IN?

We're in Nevada crossing the border now. We just stopped at the beautiful Whiskey Pete's, which is on the border of Nevada and California.

IS IT ANYTHING LIKE FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS? THAT'S HOW I PICTURE IT.

No, I wish. There are no bats flying around. Just assholes on the road.

WHAT I WAS ASKING WAS—WHY DO SO MANY PEOPLE TRY TO USE STAND-UP TO DO SOMETHING ELSE?

Well, I think you have a small group of people who get it and who focus on it. And, for a lot of people, and rightfully so, because of the nature of the beast that is entertainment, just use it as, "I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that." And, I can appreciate that. My thing has always been, if I'd known what I know now, why'd I go to drama school? I should've gone straight to stand-up. Fucking moron.

USUALLY, THEY SAY THAT IN ORDER TO BE A GREAT STAND-UP YOU HAVE TO FAIL AT A COUPLE OF OTHER THINGS. ARE YOU SAYING YOU DON'T THINK THAT'S TRUE?

No, I'm glad I did it the way I did it. I think I was successful in theater and that was part of the reason I left it, because I wasn't going to do the stuff that had to be done to work with the people that I didn't even want to work with. There are a lot of people who run American theaters who are assholes. I don't even want to argue about it. I did it, I lived it, I don't know what the problem is, but I was treated better by alcoholics in bars where comedy is done than I was by the people I was trained to work with.

IS STAND-UP MORE SATISFYING THAN THEATER IN TERMS OF THE IMMEDIACY OF THE AUDIENCE'S REACTION? IS THAT SOMETHING YOU LIKE BETTER?

I do. And, what I really like about it, ultimately, and probably why I ended up there, is that it's just me and the audience. Nobody else. So, somebody can tell me what they think, and I know what happened. I can have a critic come in and talk about something I did as a stand-up, and I have just as much of a sense of what occurred as they did.

AS A POLITICAL COMIC, HOW DO YOU KEEP YOUR AUDIENCE ON EDGE AND UNCOMFORTABLE AND MAKE SURE YOU'RE NOT JUST PLAYING TO PEOPLE WHO ALREADY AGREE WITH YOU?

Well, there's stuff I'm saying that I think is nuts. The people who subscribe to my point-of-view are both Republican and Democrat, so it's not this homogenous audience. It's 18 to 85.

DO YOU TALK TO THE REPUBLICANS AFTER THE SHOW? DO THEY THINK YOU'RE NOT DIRECTING YOUR CRITICISMS AT THEM?

Oh, they know. They know much more now than they did before. They certainly know from the last special. Because now I just say, "You're more delusional than I was when I was on LSD."

I just met a guy yesterday who said to me, "I like you, and I'm a Republican." And, I said, "I'm not a Democrat. Both make me sick. When are you guys going to grow up?" It's really quite simple. Just look at what the Republicans and the Democrats have to say about each other. If both sides are telling the truth, then it's really time to move on, isn't it?

YOU'LL BE COMING BACK TO BOSTON IN JUNE FOR YOUR BOOK TOUR FOR ME OF LITTLE FAITH. YOU'VE SAID THAT'S A MORE PERSONAL STORY ABOUT RELIGION.

It is. There are all sorts of really good books written about why religion might suck. All sorts of diatribes about organized religion. It's been done, it's been done well. My Catholic pals who are stand-ups do a much better job of talking about the priesthood than I can as a Jew.

So, it's my relationship to religion. I think religion is important. It's comparable to those books by people about how they found Jesus. This is about how I found a couple of things that helped me. There are all those fucking books. Book after book about meeting a guru, meeting Jesus, meeting Mohammed. This book is "I went here, I went there. I saw this. I read that."

YOU'RE TURNING 60 IN AUGUST. ARE YOU ESPECIALLY REFLECTIVE NOW?

I don't really like this getting-old shit. It really blows. Mortality is not fun. I don't have that "Oh, inner peace. I'll become a part of the universe" crap. I think it's great if people have it. I don't.

 

WHAT'S THE WORST PART? DO THINGS START FALLING OFF WHEN YOU'RE 60?

Every time you have a fucking conversation, it's like a game of charades. "It sounds like—what? Just give me a vowel, I'll remember the name." I'm lucky though, because mentally I don't feel it. Except when I can't remember shit.

 

HOW DO YOU FIND COMIC ABSURDITY IN THE NEWS WHEN THE NEWS ITSELF IS ALREADY ABSURD?

That is the problem. It's trying to come up with a framework that's larger than the psychotic framework that we're living in. And, really, it's exhausting. It's like this thing that was on page 8 that I just read to the audience the other day, where Iraqi soldiers are now pulling people over for violations of the seatbelt law. I mean, that's all of Catch-22 in a headline. It's the entire book.

Then, the president shows his support for the troops by going on Deal or No Deal. That's how you show your support? Are you serious? You go on a show that is the dumbest show in the history of television? The show should be called America's Braindead. Watch!

 

IS IT IMPORTANT FOR YOUR COMEDY TO KEEP SOME EMOTIONAL DISTANCE FROM THESE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES?

They do a tremendous job of distancing me. I don't even have to do the work anymore. Obama did it from the very beginning, even when Barack looked like supposedly this golden light. I felt it was beyond cynical for those senators to be running around the country when they should've been back in the Senate. There's work that's got to be done. We don't have a president right now. He's on Deal or No Deal.

 

[Lewis Black at the Boston Opera House, Thu. 5.8. 8pm/$62.50-$72.50. 539 Washington St., Boston. 617.259.3400. lewisblack.com]