i think having kids and getting into my mid 40s and some minor health issues have focused my thinking on the subject of death a little more than when i was younger.
The loss of CEW was fucking hard. I saw him with @rosepetalpistol at a place on the east side days before he passed away, his wife and beautiful daughter were there and we talked for 40 minutes about life, the show, and him. It was a huge blow to the show, he was the funniest person on it. So he's irreplaceable and I think that everyone felt that, and I felt worst for the writers and editors, seeing him over and over, writing him out of the show, the whole lot of it. But in the most disgusting and at the same time beautiful way, "the show must go on."
I think that saying means something bigger than most people think. The show is the most important thing in many ways, because it is for the w...
Well, the toughest part is questioning the relatives of the victims of a death - a child who was murdered, and you have to talk to their parents, or children who are missing. Those kind of emotional things are always the hardest, you don't like doing them, you have to do it, and it's always, always hard.
Cervantes. I found Don Quixote transformative. I mean, I never read anything like that before. Well, I'm reading this norwegian guy and I can't remember his goddamn name. I'm trying to remember! I know what it's called, the book is called My Struggle. By Karl Ove Knausgaard. No wonder I couldn't remember it. The title is even very daring, but it's an unflinching look into mortality, which I like to do. I like to look into mortality, in an unflinching manner.
Some days, I'll flinch. Some days I'll be honest with you Victoria, I'll stare into my own mortality in that abyss. I'll flinch. But I can't say the same for Horgalveyeysbadlobad. I'm sure he flinches too, but he writes it down and pret...
i like what ramana maharshi said when he was dying: "Where could I go?" the question isn't what happens when we die, it's "Who is dying?" The universe certainly seems to be into recycling, so while i don't think my ego makes it persay, i think our essence isn't going anywhere!
Q: What’s the best book on the subject of death other than the works of Becker?
A: Wow, this person knows the works of Becker? Well that's probably the best one, Becker's Denial of Death. There's a book by Otto Rank, the trauma of Birth, he talks about death in that one a lot. You probably don't want to read about death, but if you do want to read about death, it's a good "summer read."
[In response to Louis CK's question: Are you a healthy comedian?]
I try to do coke a couple times a month to get my heart rate up though Viagra can really get the ticker running at high speed especially if you are trying to come while you’re extraordinarily drunk. Cialis to a lesser extent but for a longer duration.
Often times on the road I will take very long walks when I wake up and don’t know where I am and need to get back to my hotel. Terror can at times be a great replacement for a sauna to help you sweat out the toxins. Sushi is very healthy I’ve heard and will help clean out your system the longer you leave it sitting around before consumption. Dry heaves help keep the abs ti...
[Are you a healthy comedian? - Louis asked this question to those in the "Alt Standup Comedy Google Group"]
I know a lot of you out there have a diet that consists of Hardees and Taco Bell with the occasional frozen buffalo wings heated up in the condo microwave, and that your exercize regimen… doesn’t exist. Personally, one of the reasons I chose standup as a life is because it allowed me to lie on a floor for several hours eating lard and crying, only having to pull myself together for an hour a day or so. But if you want to have any longevity as a comedian, or if you want your brain and body to provide you with any consistent creative flow, you have to eat somewhat right and do some ex...
The best part is standing on the stage with your comedy being able to turn a passive audience into an unruly mob. The worst part of standup comedy is the insane pressure on the spine and lower back from standing up for so many hundreds of hours.
I stopped smoking, I lost weight, I became very conscious of health. I became a good patient. My father died at age 46 of a heart attack. I had my heart attack at age 53, and now I'm 80. So I must be doing something right, even though I'm currently eating a pizza slice. If I drop off in the middle of this, goodbye to all.
Well, I would say: Holy Ghost Power (you've got to be one of God's favorites, because he whispers in my ear EVERY Day).
But here's the REAL answer: moderation, and do what you are supposed to do. Listen to that little voice. You'll be a lot less stressed. Most stress comes from the fact that we're lying to ourselves and the people around us. Follow your primal impulse. And realize that there's no escaping plain old death.
For me, it’s not really about weight loss. Training just makes me sharper and mostly increases my endurance. let me put it to you all this way: Trying to be a standup comedian for a living, or beyond that, trying to pursue a life in comedy that has longevity and bredth, is crazily hard.
Lots of folks say it takes 15, maybe 20 years to make a great comic. Lots of people start out with a lot of talent but by the time they hit that many years they’ve given up, become bitter and crusty or have died from ill health and depression. Outside of all that, it seems to me that if you’re trying to do something extraordinary, which succeeding as a comedian is, if only by virtue of the fact that...
The first time we did it, Fred just starting doing that voice ("Whaaaaaat are you doing here?!") and Kristen and I were like "What?" It was so funny. I hadn't heard him do it before. Man o man it made me laugh. Then it became a game of who could stretch out the vowels in their sentences the most. It got crazy.
i usually just think of one funny grain of the character's identity and let it build from there. with hoho, for instance, i just wanted to be an elf who delivers toys to naughty kids.
Yes I do. I'm constantly talking to my phone. Whenever an idea occurs. Sometimes I don't say enough. I'll dictate "large coffee cup" and have no idea of what I thought was funny about that subject.
Larry David and I discovered that we were both obsessed with superman and admired him and also found him very funny at the same time, so that is why he came up a lot. Are you related to the hot dog Kobayashi in Coney Island?
Nick and I came up with Too Much Tuna in five seconds with Jessi Klein about ten years ago at a restaurant on 6th avenue called French Roast. We got a plate with too much tuna and we said "this is too much tuna."
Tim Heidecker