An AmericasComedy.Com Interview

Comedian Cedric The Entertainer is one of the hardest working men in the entertainment business. Perhaps you love him from his roles in Barbershop, Be Cool or The Original Kings Of Comedy. You may have became a fan of his voice-over roles in Madagascar, Charlotte’s Web or The Proud Family. Maybe it was his staring role in the hit Johnson Family Vacation. Anyway you look at it, Cedric IS “The Entertainer.”

Even with his success as an actor, producer and director, Cedric The Entertainer is coming to Sacramento’s Memorial Auditorium and going back to his roots of stand up comedy.

We spoke to Cedric, (Mr. Entertainer?), by phone as he was recovering from a minor surgery performed last week.

Have you ever worked in the Sacramento area before?
Yeah, I was in Sacramento about 3 years ago at one the local clubs and then at, I think the same venue that I am playing on Thursday, so it’s been awhile.

Fantastic! I know that you rescheduled from Saturday, and you tweeted out that you had some minor surgery.
Yeah, I had a little hernia I had to take care of.

Everything’s Okay now?
Yeah, I’m ready to get back at it, you know, I’m up moving around and doing 110 crunches a day, so I’m good. (chuckling).

Cedric, you are truly a complete package as an entertainer. You act in comedies and dramas, animated movies and plays on Broadway. You also write, direct and produce. What gives you the most satisfaction?
I started with stand-up and I think that probably ranks pretty high up there with the opportunity to get immediate reaction to your thoughts and commentary. Having that audience response so immediately, is one of the greatest satisfactions.

I also enjoyed directing my first movie and I look forward to seeing what people think about that when it comes out.

Have you decided on a title yet? I heard it was a toss up between “Chicago Pulaski Jones” and “Dance Foo Fighting.”
We decided that the title is “Dance Foo – The Legend of Pulaski Jones” (laughs)

So, nobody won, but you just compromised!
Yeah, (chuckling), at least that’s settled.

Most people don’t know that before you were Cedric “The Entertainer” you were Cedric “The Insurance Salesman.” What was the big step you took that put you on the stage?

I started stand up almost the same week that I started at State Farm (Insurance), and it was kind of weird that I felt like my life was calling at the same time I found the best job that I had ever had since getting out of college. But I worked for State Farm for over 2 years before I decided that I could do comedy full time and so I just built my initial career around St. Louis then got an opportunity to tour on a national tour with the Funny Bones comedy clubs and that’s when I decided to go for it.It was a relatively short period for most comedians. I know a lot of guys that put their 13 or 14 years into their careers before they got a real break.

I always knew I was a performer. My mother was a school teacher and was all about the education in our household and I remember trying to convince her to let me know to a performing art school where I could sing in talent shows and stuff like that. I have always had a knack for it. But I didn’t really try to act until I was out of college.

The story about how you got the “The Entertainer” moniker was that you wanted to charge more money so you had to do more time.
Yeah, (chuckling), You know comedy is all about time. The opener does 10 minutes, the feature act does 30 minutes and the headliner does an hour, so when I started, I wanted the money for at least the 30 minute guy.

I didn’t have a lot of material so I would sing songs, do poetry, paint pictures.I would do whatever I had to do. They said I was entertaining and the guy (MC) kept calling me a comedian and I said, “No, don’t call me a comedian, call me an entertainer.”  So, he introduced me as Cedric “The Entertainer,” I had a good show, the name stuck and that’s what it’s been.

You have a daughter who’s 6 years old and a son who’s 9 years old. You have done a lot of animated shows and movies including; Charlotte’s Web, Madagascar and The Pride Family doing voice overs and you worked with Oprah Winfrey. How do your kids react to watching and hearing their dad?
They do get more excited about the other people in the films though I do love telling the story that my son had no idea who Oprah was. When I was doing Charlotte’s Web, we (Oprah and I) were in the studio together at the time and I said to my son, “This is Oprah Winfrey,” and he goes “And you do what? Do you know that my dad is Cedric The Entertainer?” (laughing) and I told him, “There you go son, that’s telling her!”

You’ve worked with so many of the greats in comedy, sports, actors and even politicians, who have you most enjoyed working with the most?
I guess I’d have to say that I have had the most fun working on the “Barbershop” movie with Ice Qube who is a very interesting character to work with. We had great laughs with Jim Carrey on “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events,” and also in “Be Cool” with John Travolta, he was actually a very cool dude too. He liked to sing old Motown songs on the set and we had a good time.

Is there anyone that you still want to work with on projects that you haven’t yet?
Yeah, even though I kind of got to work with him while doing voice work on “Dr. Doolittle 2,” I still would like to do something with Eddie Murphy. Something big like a comedy where there’s a lot of comedic minds there and we’re all having a great time. I also have the opportunity to work with Tom Hanks in his latest movie, “Larry Crowne” so that’s a big deal. Eddie Murphy will probably be someone on the top of that list  that I would want to have the opportunity to be around and laugh, do something funny and create something special and unique with.

Is there any one project that you have worked on that you look back and say, “I wish I hadn’t done that?”
No, not really where I wish that I hadn’t done it. The Honeymooners was something that I really enjoyed and it was a big brand. We had another idea that we were going to do when we started off and then the studio got involved and changed it and made it something else. It was one of those things where I wish we could have done our original ideas. It would have been a lot funnier and more true to the characters that Mike Epps and I were going to bring to it. At one point it didn’t turn out that way. It was such a big franchise and we would have had the opportunity to make so many more and add to it’s success. Sometimes you just look back on it and say, “man, that was really disappointing!”

The bigger the budget the less control you have?
The less power you have. You don’t have the say in the overall direction of the movie. We had  a new executive come in on the movie and change the movie into something he thought would make sense. He was trying to make a name for himself at the studio. You had to deal with the politics of that and that’s what was going on. You end up falling prey to studio politics.

I heard that you were interested in doing more TV. Do you have anything in the works?
We are developing a couple of different things. The title of one project is “Anger Management” based on the Adam Sandler, Jack Nicholson movie. It’s a sitcom so it would be about me as an anger management therapist who actually has anger issues of his very own. It is set in Brooklyn, New York and I am looking forward to doing that. It is still in early development though.

I’m also developing a reality show where I show up and kick in on people’s family reunions where I try to convince the families to try to eat better. We thought it would be fun to go to family reunions, Superbowl parties and anytime people are gathered together, eating wings and drinking beer and I’m like, “Alright fool, can we change this out and try something different?”

You’re one of the hardest working people in the business. Do you have any thoughts of taking a break or retiring anytime soon and just kicking back and enjoying life?
I’ve always kind of set my eye on being 50 years old and being able to down shift a little bit. I have about 4 or 5 years left for that. Yeah, I’m definitely planning on being able to slow down and travel and enjoy life and just do the fun things before I’m just old and gotta do it on a cruise ship. I just want to be able to still cause some debauchery and trouble, maybe get on the news!

Cedric The Entertainer is appearing at 8:00 PM at the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium, 1515 J St., Sacramento, CA, 95814 Tickets Here

An AmericasComedy.Com Video Interview

Iliza Shlesinger is sweet, smart and sexy. In addition to being the first woman winner of NBC’s Last Comic Standing in Season 6, she is also the youngest person to win that honor.

In a fortuitous turn of events, AmericasComedy.Com caught up with Shlesinger in the green room at the Pepperbellys Comedy Club in Fairfield, CA where she graciously allowed us a spur-of-the-moment interview before her show. Lucky for us, we had our video camera with us!

Watch as she talks about Last Comic Standing, how the $250,000 prize changed her life, her dog Blanche with the floppy vagina, and the fact that she has, in fact had sex. And the fact that although she loves Facebook,  she is an angry tweeter.

Please enjoy and excuse our production values!

Click Here To Watch Iliza’s Interview on YouTube!

Headlines July 24th For One Night Only!

“Lady Business,” the name of the newest, and to our knowledge only, all-female improv troupe in the Sacramento area is quite the misnomer. These six very funny girls certainly aren’t “ladies” in the conservative, Emily Post kind of way.

We were able to meet up with this troupe of very sexy, very funny ladies as they were practicing together at the Sacramento Comedy Spot in mid-town in preparation for their fourth consecutive monthly appearance there on July 24th.

Improv-ers all, Micaela Smith, Mel Gelbart, Becca Costello, Brittany Birrer Stacy Beckley and Lisa Spivak constitute this hilarious and ribald troupe that presents a point of view that women can relate to and men can only fantasize about. The July 24th show will also feature Tiffany Shultz who is standing in for Beckley who is unavailable.

Using the long form improv style as their vehicle, the women break down their 40 minute show into two main categories. During the first half, the women each do monologues and group montages and in the second, they utilize the audience for ideas and concepts for them to create from.

The women are all veterans in improvisation and regular players at the Sacramento Comedy Spot. Birrer and Shultz are also full time members of the long running improv troupe, Anti-Cooperation League and many of the other members are regulars in the Comedy Spot’s Wednesday HAROLD night show and are all currently competing in the 3 on 3 competition at the mid town venue. 

“We swear a lot but so far have not done any masturbation sketches,” Gelbart replied to our questions of what constituted a women’s point of view. “Not stupid boy humor,” added Shultz.

Plan on attending this show at the Sacramento Comedy Spot, Saturday, July 24th at 8:00 PM. Admission is only $5 or you can attend both Lady Business and the Anti-Cooperation League’s 9:00 PM show for only $10.

Melissa Peterman takes her time weaving through the audience, savoring the tidal wave of energy she has created, even stopping to dance with a lucky young lad in the front row before taking the mic and unabashedly flirting with an even luckier older lad in the front row… who just happens to be out with his wife, daughter, and her date…who just happens to be the aforementioned younger lad.  And the stage is set.

Before the night is over, Peterman has invited a recent divorce onstage to flaunt her newfound freedom, knocked over a table in a fit of blonde rage, and made older-lad’s wife spit out her water.  Melissa Peterman is an unstoppable force on stage.  Well versed in improvisation, she transitions seamlessly between audience play and a sharp set that is elegantly balanced between physical comedy and intelligent wit. Not a single inch of the sold out room was left unattended by Peterman for a solid 60 minutes.

If you missed Melissa Peterman the first time around, fear not!  You may be able to catch her weekly on her new CMT sitcom, “Working Class” which is one of four pilots ordered for two slots. After watching Peterman, we know that the odds are stacked WAY in her favor!

Here is some raw video of the AmericasComedy.Com interview with Melissa. Due to some technical difficulties, the volume is a little low and only one camera was used. We are working hard to get the corrected version online! In the mean time… Enjoy!

Click Here To Watch Melissa’s Funny Interview on YouTube!

A SacramentoComedy.Com Interview

Listening to comedian Felipe Esparza is a cross between listening to Cheech Marin from Cheech and Chong fame and hanging out with your funniest “homeboy.”   They both have the East L.A. accent and down to earth sense of humor that comes from growing up in the barrio.

We spoke to Esparza recently just after his advance to the semi-final rounds of NBC’s Last Comic Standing, Season 7.

“The next step is to have a big battle between the semi-finalists in New York and Los Angeles,” Esparza said. We asked him if he anticipated any drive-by shootings in the heated East Coast/West Coast face-off.

“Naw, everyone is telling me to leave my Blackberry at home, though.”

Apparently, one of Esparza’s best friends is comedian Gabriel Iglesias, who has the distinction of being the first and only comedian kicked off the “Last Comic Standing” show in the fourth season for smuggling a cell phone into the comic’s sequestered quarters so he could text his girlfriend.

“Gabriel will always represent ‘Last Comic Standing’ to me,” he exclaimed.

The friendship between Esparza and Iglesias goes back to 1998 and we suspected that there was more to the story.

“I was running a one nighter room in Montebello called ‘Gotham’ and Gabriel showed up one night. He wanted to meet me but at 20 years old, he was too scared or shy so he sent some kid over,” he said. “‘Gabriel really thinks you’re funny Felipe. He wants to do some time on stage’ (the kid said).

“I just told him to tell Gabe that if he wants to perform, he needs to get his scared ass over here and ask me himself. Gabriel did get up that night, did a lot of voices and killed.”

Esparza just finished a movie called, “I’m Not Like That No More” that co-stars comedy great, Paul Rodriquez as Esparza’s dad.

“We shot the movie in 9 days. It’s based on my stand up comedy and most of the plot comes from my CD called What’s Up Fool?

“I play the lead and throughout the movie, everyone will freeze while I narrate what’s going on in my head,” he said. “Then the story continues almost like (the movie) ‘Ferris Bueller.’ It’s pretty cool!”

“Then, I even got to make out with my co-star, Deborah Baker Jr.,” he said. “She’s a hot blond! My first sex scene!! What???”

He laughed, then paused like he was contemplating his ‘next’ sex scene.

The movie will premier at the New York Latino Film Festival in July. To see more information and view a short trailer, you can go to www.imnotlikethatnomore.com.

Esparza, who grew up in the Latino neighborhood of Boyle Heights in East LA and now hails from Echo Park, first performed on stage at a coffee shop in LA called The Natural Fudge, where the comics were required to buy food in order to get a chance to perform.

Along the way, Esparza got to perform and hang out with the likes of Alonzo Bodden, the “Last Comic Standing” winner of Season 3, and Freddy Soto, while eating his way to fame.

From there, Esparza began appearing at venues throughout the LA area including The Laugh Factory in Hollywood, which had a Latino-themed show on Mondays.

“Were you always this funny or did you have to work for it?” – we wanted to know.

“Back then my style was really ‘deadpan’ like Steven Wright. I’d talk real slow and try to enunciate but that was a really hard style in those rooms,” he said. “One room I used to work also was a biker bar. We used to have the same crowd every week so we had to come up with different jokes every week and as I got better with my comedy, the crowd got better with their heckling! It was a rough room.

“I got my first TV credit in 1996 on Showtime’s “Latino Laugh Festival” with Paul Rodriquez. You should have seen my hair back then, I was a ‘thug.’ But then I grew it out because the cops were profiling bald Hispanic people,” he said. “My first (head shot) is still on the wall at the Comedy Store right next to Gilbert Iglesias’ who’s dressed in a sweater.”

Esparza’s star just keeps shining brighter. His TV credits include: ABC’s “Comics Unleashed,” Showtime’s “Comics Without Borders,” BET‘s “Comic View,” and “One Mic Stand,” and Galavision’s “Que Locos” (where he holds the title of most appearances by any comedian) and now his opportunity to shine on NBC’s “Last Comic Standing.”

You can follow Esparza’s appearances at comedy clubs, comedy festivals, television and theaters at his Official Facebook Fan Page.

You can also listen to (and buy) Esparza’s latest acclaimed CD, “Rebound Material” at Amazon and iTunes.

A SacramentoComedy.Com Interview

Henry Cho’s fairytale career began in 1986 when, as a student at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, he entered a “Funniest Person in America” contest sponsored by the Showtime network.

Cho, who is a full-blooded Korean, but raised in the heart of the South, walked onto the stage and in his deepest, most Southern drawl stated, “So, I’m from the South. So I guess that makes me South Korean.” It was a juxtaposition “hook” that launched his career.

“It was my first joke, so I had to explain who I was,” he said. And that hook has served him well. The late Steve Allen, first host of the original “Tonight Show” and a huge supporter of Cho’s, once commented that there were very few original jokes left and Cho had at least 12 of them.

I just happened to hear about (the competition) and called to see if I could go on stage,” he said. “I was on the waiting list and somebody canceled so I got the last spot. I was the last to go on and received a standing ovation. That was on Monday and the club owner immediately offered me a job for Wednesday. By Friday, I dropped out of college to do stand up full time.”

Cho also had another hook that set him apart from most all other comedians. He only does “clean” comedy. Can a mainstream comedian be funny and clean at the same time? Cho thinks so.

“I pride myself on never using a cuss word on stage. Ever.” Cho brags. “I headline in Las Vegas every year, and this summer I am performing on an Alaskan cruise. Not too many comedians can pull that off. Funny thing is, my show doesn’t change for Vegas.

“My show is an adult comedy show, but it isn’t offensive. Your kids could listen to it, even though I hope they wouldn’t ‘get’ most of it. But I get a lot of fan mail from soccer moms saying ‘I love having your CD because I can listen to it with my kids in the car.’”

That clean act is partially responsible for his early success. A quickly rising comedian named Jerry Seinfeld was performing in Atlanta and looking for an opener that would perform totally clean. Cho was the perfect candidate and toured extensively with Seinfeld.

“So, when Jerry moved to Los Angeles, he told (Gary) Shandling and Leno and these guys that I was funny so I ended up working with the top 10 comedians in the nation in my first two or three years doing stand up.”

Have there been any hardships or “hell gigs” along the way?

“Well, in 1989 or 1990, Tim Allen, myself, Seinfeld, Larry Miller and Dennis Wolfberg were hired to do the White Mountain Cooler Tour. We traveled around the country and had to do eight venues. One stop was in Jacksonville, Miss., and unfortunately the comedy club there had closed two weeks before so they put us at a place called The Docks. It was actually a dock and people would come off of their boats and there was only four tables so everyone had to just stand around. That’s not even the worst part. We had to do four nights there, one show a night and it was exactly the same people each night. By the end, we were just chatting with the audience asking things like, ‘How’s was your job interview, Bob?’”

Cho moved to Los Angeles in 1989 and then to Tennessee five years later.

“Everything was great and my career was on the upswing, but it was just making me somebody I didn’t like. I’m not an L.A. kind of guy. I just have a different moral compass, so I moved back to Tennessee to buy a farm. I commuted every week for two years after that, while I was hosting ‘Friday Night Videos’ for NBC, I would just commute.”

Even though Cho appears on television and in movies, including the 1996 movie “Material Girls” with Hillary Duff, Cho has lived and owned a farm in Tennessee raising Black Angus cattle with his wife and three kids since 1994. Since it was a working ranch, we asked him if he raised anything else.

“Nope, kids and cattle. That’s enough!”

Cho works on the road about eight to 10 days a month and shares his child-raising and family duties with his wife.

“I take time off through the holidays and the summer so we can hang out with the kids.”

“There’s no down-side to my life,” he said. “If my television show (currently being marketed) doesn’t get picked up then it’s no big deal because I get to stay in Nashville and do what I do. I have a blessed life.”

It is also a good thing that being a comedian doesn’t have an age requirement.

“My wife asked me how long I am planning to be a comedian and I just told her that George Burns was performing until he was 100.”

Since Cho has performed with many great comedians, we asked him if he would give us some quick thoughts about some famous people he knows. He agreed.

Bill Envall: “One of my best friends! His son is one of my godsons. Great mentor.”

Jeff Foxworthy: “Another great mentor and dear friend. I have so many stories with him about working back in the day before the ‘Blue Collar Tour.’”

Tim Allen: “Tim and I go way back from our time on the road. I see him occasionally.”

Phil Nee (the only other Korean comedian performing nationally when Cho was beginning his career): “I hear that he isn’t doing comedy anymore. Some of the young Asian comedians nowadays find that between Phil and I we have done almost every Korean joke there is, so it’s hard for them to find their own version.”

Craig Ferguson (co-Producer of Cho’s comedy pilot): “Most producers of television shows just put their names on there like a vanity plate. Craig went to the meeting with Paramount with me, the meeting at CBS with me, and is a class act.”

Jerry Seinfeld: “Seinfeld set me on the right track. He told me, when I had been doing comedy for less than a year, ‘People are going to throw all kinds of stuff at you, they may want to give you shows with a stand up theme, but don’t stop doing stand up because very few people can do it as well as you can do it.”

Cho admits that he made a decision early on that he would choose to be successful over being famous.

“You know, I stay right under the radar and I get all the great perks that go along with where I am. But when opportunities arise, like doing a television show, my wife and I talk about and pray about how that exposure affects the entire family and our lifestyle. Early on, I wanted to be an actor, but it just isn’t conducive to my raising a family. I can’t go away for six weeks to do a movie in Australia, no matter how much they pay me.”

With over three television pilot scripts to his credit, Cho is a member of both the Writers Guild and Screen Actors Guild.

“Today, it is hard to get a show that is created by the lead actor. Shows like ‘Rosanne,’ Tim Allen’s show ‘Home Improvement’ and even Ray Ramono’s ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’ were ‘based on the stand up of…” and not created by the comedians themselves. To be able to get a “co-created by” gives you the control over the show, which is what I have to have. I want to control what my show is going to be.”

What can the audience expect to see next month at the Cache Creek Casino?

“I usually know what kind of show that I want to do when I get up on stage, but it often doesn’t work out that way. I have a God-given talent for thinking fast and ad-libbing on the fly, and so a percentage of my act is “riffing” with the audience and I usually have a question-and-answer segment that I do toward the end of my show. I like to interact with the people and know what they think.”

Cho will appear Friday, June 18 at Cache Creek Casino. Follow this link for more information about Cache Creek Casino Entertainment. Must be 21 or over. Admission is free with a Cache Creek card or $20 at the door. A Cache Creek card is free and can be obtained at the Customer Service desk on the day of the show.

A SacramentoComedy.Com Video Interview

Ahmed Ahmed, comic, actor and now producer/director appeared at the Sacramento Punchline recently on his headline tour. While he was here, we got a chance to sit and visit with Ahmed and talk about his name, his career and his new movie, “Just Like Us” which debuted at the Tribeca Film Festival in April.

Join us as the interview is already in progress!

Click Here To Watch Ahmed’s Interview on YouTube!

A SacramentoComedy.Com Interview

You may not think that the name “Ralphie” is something you would call a390-pound man. But, in the case of comedian Ralphie May, it’s just fine. May, 38, who was named one of the “Top 10 Comics To Watch” in 2008 by“Variety Magazine,” was given that nickname as a young boy growing up deep in the heart of the south.

May, who will be performing his two-hour show Thursday at The Crest Theatre, likes to tell people that his shows are about two hours in length for a reason.

“My average fan works for about $20 per hour, if they are lucky enough to have a job,” he chuckled, “and then factoring in insurance, taxes and such, they’re maybe bringing home $15 per hour. If my tickets are just under $30, it took them about two hours of their life to make the money to come see my show. Why shouldn’t I give them two hours too? That way I am not any better than anyone else.”

Born in Chattanooga, Tenn., Ralphie didn’t have it easy. Like so many famous comedians, May knew he wanted to be a stand-up comedian by the time he was 9. He performed at talent shows at 13, and before he could establish himself as a serious performer at 16, May was involved in a life-changing automobile accident.

“I broke 14 bones in 64 different places and was in a coma for 10 days,” he explained. “Yeah, it still hurts! Now, whenever it gets cold or it’s about to rain, I think I’m gonna die.”

But can May usually turn any personal challenge into part of his act?

“Without a doubt. More importantly, it has provided me with empathy. I think that that is a necessary trait to being a great communicator, and to be a great stand-up you need empathy for others. Put yourself in different people’s positions, that way you can see the angle from inside the joke rather than from the outside.”

May learned his craft by performing at open mics and showcases throughout the southern states. Was that “southern” environment different from, say Los Angeles, Chicago or New York?

“Oh yeah, without a doubt. There was a lot less competition. I started doing stand-up in 1989 in Arkansas. I was only 17, attending both high school and college at the same time. I was doing open mics and showcases when I won a radio talent show and got the opportunity to open for Sam Kinison. It was on Sam’s advice that I moved to Houston to pursue my career.” He then added,

“When I performed in Houston, I realized that it wasn’t really a ’southern’ town. It’s a Texas town and has a different feel. It’s a melting pot and one of the most diverse cities in the world. It was great just being a kid from Arkansas to be around so many different types of people.

“What was weird, though, was that when I got there, I was still only 18, (and) the white clubs wouldn’t really work me that much. I started my stand up at mostly ‘urban clubs’ like the Comedy Showcase and the Hip-Hop Comedy Club, opening for people like Steve Harvey. It was crazy.”

One of May’s most recognizable physical features is his weight. From a top weight of almost 800 pounds, May has had gastric bypass surgery and is committed to diet and exercise to keep his weight under 400 pounds.

“I’m half the man I used to be…” May sang as I pointed out that he has lost more than another person in body weight.

May appeared on the VH1 reality fitness show “Celebrity Fit Club” during its first season. During the two months he appeared on the show, May lost 78 pounds of fat, 18 inches around his waist and gained 24 pounds of muscle.

Those impressive numbers came with a certain amount of physical damage, however.

“I tore two tendons in my foot, and I gave myself an eight-inch hernia, but still it was great. It hurt, and the subsequent surgeries weren’t fun, but it really helped me and gave me a lot of new (nutritional) information that I never had before. As soon as my foot heals up, I am going to hit it again and lose more weight in 2010.”

May had stated when he was hovering around the 600-pound mark that there were two goals he had had regarding his weight loss. Riding a bike with his wife (then girlfriend) and going surfing. We asked how he was doing on attaining those goals.

“I ride a bike with my wife at our home in Nashville, and I am about 150 pounds away from surfing.”

May and Lahna Turner, his wife of five years, both perform stand-up. They have homes in both Los Angeles and Nashville. I wondered whether he stays home to take care of their two young children, a daughter, age two and a half, and a son, almost 1, when his wife was working and he wasn’t.

“We have a nanny, and she usually goes with Lahna because our son is still breast feeding. But most of the time, we like to tour together.”

May and Turner’s senses of humor didn’t stop when they had kids. Their daughter’s name is April June May, and their son is August James May. We wondered whether those names corresponded to the months that they were born.

“No, August was born in June, and April was born in September.”

Does having a family and two young kids affect your material now? Does it keep you from being as edgy as you have been? I guess what we are asking is, are you making diaper jokes now?

“NO! If anything, I am probably edgier now. People always ask me if I am going to be a family comic now and tone down my rhetoric and my bullshit. But I’m like, ‘Why?’ First of all, I can’t do family jokes like Mr. Cosby. Mr. Cosby has been doing that family shit for fucking 40 years. He’s covered every fucking angle on jokes that deal with the family. When a comic is talking about family, if you don’t think you are ripping off a joke that Cosby has done over the years, then you have to be retarded. Bill did it all.”

May exploded in popularity in 2003 after taking a highly protested and controversial second place behind winner Dat Phan on NBC’s freshman season of “Last Comic Standing.”

Many people believed May was ripped off for the title win because he and fellow comedians Rich Vos and Dave Mordal were very mean to Phan when they were all cooped up in the “comic house.”

May laughed. “I don’t think that Dat Phan robbed me of anything. NBC picked the winner. You can spin it anyway you want to. You can say that the people picked the winner, but what they were shown was at NBC’s discretion. NBC chose to show Rich and I busting Dat Phan’s balls, but we busted everybody’s balls because we’re ball busters. That’s what we do. But Rich is one of the sweetest people on the fucking planet.

“Dat Phan kept on wearing the same fucking clothes over and over and over again. Rich finally asked him, ‘Don’t you have any other clothes?’ and Dat, very meekly said, ‘No, I don’t.’ Rich was mortified and just said ‘Holy shit! Are you serious?’ and then Rich passed the hat and we all pitched in and collected $100 and bought Dat Phan a new set of clothes. Nobody ever said that, and NBC never showed that. It would have made great TV, but nobody shared it because they wanted to control the outcome.

“I was told by Jay Mohr, (the MC for the first season) that if I didn’t get a standing ovation each week that NBC would throw me out. They didn’t know what to do with me. You never see anyone at 650 pounds on TV. But, in trying to finagle the competition, they actually did me a favor. They galvanized my fans to be loyal and fight for me and become active and motivated and buy my albums to prove everybody wrong. And it worked. That is why my first album, ‘Girth of A Nation’ went platinum.”

We wanted to know how the opportunity to do “Last Comic Standing” came about.

“I had worked with Jay Mohr at ESPN Sports, writing and producing his show, ‘Mohr Sports’ in 2002, and Jay said, ‘I’ve got this show called ‘Comic House’ I’m working on, and you should do it.’ Then, 15 months later,  I was working in Honolulu at The Laugh Factory when he called me on a Thursday. He said, ‘Dude, I need you to audition for this show called “Last Comic Standing” on Saturday.’ Hey! I’m working, I told him. You don’t need me to audition, you know my work. But he told me that everything had to be above board with no favorites because NBC was involved.

“I looked up the cost of the flight back to Los Angeles, and it was over $800, and I didn’t have it. I was broke. My girlfriend said, ‘I believe in you, and I think you can do this. You should just go and do it.’ So when I told her I didn’t have the money, she just said, ‘I’m not going to let you miss this
opportunity just because you don’t have the money. Here, put it on my Dad’s credit card.’ Now, her rent was $900 a month, and she just spent almost an entire month’s rent on a charge card because she believed in me. The funny thing also was that her parents hated my guts!”

You married that woman, right?

“Yes, she is one hell of a woman. I would be worthless if I didn’t have her in my life. I would be a piece of shit. She had my best interests and believed in me when no one else would, including me. She’s amazing!”

That belief paid off. After his “Last Comic Standing” participation ended, May appeared on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” and was the first comedian in more than 10 years to receive a standing ovation. He also appeared on most every late night show to rave reviews.

May has released three comedy albums to date, with his most recent, “Ralphie May: Austin-Tatious,” released on DVD and CD in May 2009. It was recorded live to a sold-out crowd at the Paramount Theater in Austin, and May is due to appear with Neil Patrick Harris and Amy Sedaris in the new movie, “Best and The Brightest,” later this year.

But you don’t have to wait. Watch May perform live May 13 at The Crest Theatre . Showtime is at 7:30 and tickets are $29.75

If you enjoyed this interview and would like to have all of the SacramentoComedy.Com features, interviews, news and reviews delivered to your iPhone, iTouch or iPad, download the SacComedy App at iTunes.

A SacramentoComedy.Com Interview

From his start telling jokes at family Passover dinners at age 10, to catching hell for doing impressions of his high school coach, Kevin Pollak was meant to perform.

Comedy

“I was born in San Francisco but moved to San Jose when I was young. When I began performing, it was in venues that were designed for music. There were no comedy clubs then in San Jose. I would go on between the bands breaks when nobody really wanted to listen. When I moved to San Francisco, I was amazed that people loved going to see comedy and would actually pay to see it!”

Entering the San Francisco comedy scene in the late ’70’s, Pollak was the youngest performer in the San Francisco Comedy Competition in 1977 and finished in the semifinals. In 1982, he took second place behind Jim Samuels and placed ahead of Sacramento’s Jack Gallagher.

Pollak is famous for his spot-on impersonations of Christopher Walken and William Shatner. We  asked which one he preferred and whether there were some voices he would like to do but hasn’t mastered.

“Yeah, there is no contest in that they both (Walken and Shatner) serve me incredibly well, so no, I really couldn’t pick one over the other. I’m asked quite often if there are people that I can’t do and the answer to that is that there are always going to be people outside my wheelhouse. But the truth is, it’s like being asked ‘Why can’t you hit the curve ball?’ Why is that? I don’t know, but I hit the one down the pipe out of the park. How do you talk about the things that you can’t do other than to say that you can’t do them?” He added, “I’ll play with a voice and if it falls into place I’ll do it. If it doesn’t, I let it go as easily as a glass of water. It’s not something that I dwell on.”

Acting

Pollak has appeared in more than 60 feature movies (“with four or five being really good ones”). He has called stand-up comedy his first love, what “feeds the beast.” We asked him to elaborate.

“I think the reason that stand up is so powerful for the performer and why many try to recreate that ‘high’ using drugs or alcohol is that there’s nothing else in the performer’s life that matches that ridiculous energy of the live performance and the immediate, instant response, either good or bad, to your own thoughts or musings. It’s a magical thing.

“When I started off in movies, all that was gone. If you did something funny during a shot, the crew was not allowed to laugh for fear of ruining the take. In terms of the acting, it was always fairly frustrating. So, as much as I love acting, it is that desire for that live experience that draws me to stand up. That need just doesn’t stop when I do movies.”

Pollak has worked with some of the greatest actors and under some of the finest directors.

“My first really large role in a large, dramatic movie was working with Barry Levinson in ‘Avalon.’  For a comedian who had no formal training, this was a bizarrely huge opportunity. Because Barry had just won awards for his last film ‘Rain Man,’ everyone in Hollywood was watching ‘Avalon’ to see what he would do next. Because of that, I got the opportunity to audition for more serious acting roles.”

“The next giant movie was ‘A Few Good Men,’ which was like being brought up to the majors. This juggernaut studio movie where I am one of the leads and everyone else in the film is ridiculously famous and I’m not. After that was the goal line that you cross as an actor between auditioning and getting offers. And that was 52 movies ago.”

One of the films Pollak is most remembered for is “The Usual Suspects.” We asked him about that experience.

“It was ‘lightning in a bottle’ like I have never experienced. In terms of an utterly unknown writer and director, Christopher McQuarrie and Bryan Singer, it was amazing. McQuarrie went on to win an Academy Award for best screenplay and Singer went on to ‘X-Men’ and other great movies. But at the time, they were just these young punks that hadn’t done anything and the cast was relatively unknown, other than Gabriel Byrne. We debuted at the Cannes Film Festival, which was otherworldly. It was another milestone. That same year, I was offered the role in ‘Casino’ by the great master director Martin Scorsese. Then, of course, there were a few more.”

We asked how Pollak chose his parts and whether there was one he liked best.

“I like working,” he deadpanned.  “It’s really about the script. I long for great scripts.”

Kevin Pollak Chat Show (KPCS)

“Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show” debuted in April 2009 and has become an award-winning entry in the rapidly growing field of Internet-only entertainment.

“Just last month we won a ‘Streamy Award” and that was a big thing as it is the highest award to having original content online,” he said. “That was pretty awesome.”

The show has featured Seth MacFarlane, Kevin Smith, Matthew Perry, Jim Gaffigan, Joe Montegna, Bobby Slayton, Adam Carolla and many more.

“We book this show ourselves, without a marketing department or a publicity department. I don’t deal with agents. I just reach through to friends and friends of friends. It’s an every week process that is sometimes easy and sometimes not. We have been incredibly fortunate in that we have had FIVE Academy Award winners and Grammy winners and some of the greatest comedians alive on our show.

“We also have had captains of industry such as Tesla Motors founder and CEO, Elon Musk.”

We asked why he chose an “Internet-only” format.

“The Internet is the ultimate ‘if you build it, they will come’ model. It not only allows complete creative freedom, it also means that you can’t force your audience to watch anything. You have to just put it up there and wait for the results. There is no big, splashy advertising campaign like a network television or broadcast television in general would have. It took awhile to get used to the ‘be patient’ aspect of letting the audience find you, which is part and parcel to the original content online process.”

Did he consider putting the show on broadcast television?

“No, I designed it to be Internet only. That is how I could do two hours of Seth MacFarlane, and Eddie Izzard holds the record at two hours and 30 minutes. There isn’t a network that is going to give me that much time. We are averaging 90 minutes to two hours with every guest. It is a real conversation as opposed to a talk show with commercial breaks.

“So, here we are a year later and we are up to about 68,000 live viewers every Sunday afternoon and over a million and a half have seen our show. Amazon just ‘knighted’ us by being our partner in offering the show in downloads, DVDs and Video on Demand. So, that is unbelievably and insanely rewarding and exciting and validating our ‘if you build it they will come’ strategy.”

One of the games Pollak plays with his guests is “The Larry King Game.” Guests are asked to imitate talk show host King, tell something revealing (and usually humiliating) about King and then take a call from someone in a little known town.

We asked him to demonstrate using a theme suggested by the local comedy troupe “The Real Funny Housewives of Rio Linda.”

(In his best Larry King voice): “I just had sex with the real funny housewives! …Rio Linda, you’re on the air!”

“That was invented by my partner in life and crime, my better half and head writer on the show, Jaime Fox (Pollak spelled the name to make it obvious she wasn’t the African-American Oscar winner). She also came up with the Twitter game. If you go to the website  kevinpollakchatshow.com, these are actual interactive games you can play on the site. But we also have our guests play them each week.”

Vamped Out

Pollak’s newest venture on the Internet premiered April 12 as a six-episode series called “Vamped Out.”  It features a real-life vampire who also is an actor who keeps getting turned down for vampire roles. Pollak is the creator, executive producer, writer, director and has a featured role as well. It runs on Mondays on Babelgum.com.

“This level of creative freedom and control I have never experienced in decades of writing, producing and acting in movies or television. Suddenly, it was opened up to me in original content through the Web.”

How did the concept develop?

“Jaime and I were meeting some friends for lunch, one of which is a very talented character actor like myself, named Jason Antoon. We sat down bemoaning this billboard that we saw driving to lunch advertising the TV show ‘Vampire Diaries.’

” ‘Can you fucking believe that there is another vampire TV show?’ Then Jason asked, ‘Can you imagine being a vampire right now and you can’t get hired to do any of these movies or TV shows because you are not skinny or pale or handsome?’ Jaime thought that it would be a good bit for my comedy act, but I immediately thought of it as a Web series. I had not thought prior to that moment about a Web series  but it just sort of came out of me. Before I knew it, it was too late and Jason and I were in my living room writing episodes for the show. Babelgum.com was one of the first places we pitched it and they gave us all of the freedom to produce it as we needed.”

SacramentoComedy.Com Viewer Questions:

Christopher Hampl wanted to know if Pollak had done his ‘Columbo’ impression for Peter Falk, the actor who played the role in the television series.

“I did that impression one night on the ‘Tonight Show,’ sitting on the couch next to Johnny Carson. Peter say me on television doing that and the next time we met,  he referenced that by saying, (using his best Columbo voice), ‘How do you do that with your eye? Me, I understand, but how do you do it?’ ”

Svitlana Kurylo asked if there was were an actor or comedian with whom he wanted to work.

“Oh yeah, I can’t really answer that. There is an endless list of people I would love to work with. I think Johnny Depp and Leonardo DiCaprio are as good as it gets, in terms of their generation. I would certainly kill to work with either of them, but there are so many others. I have been insanely lucky to work with many of the most brilliant people; there are hundreds more, I assure you.”

Kurylo  also asked if Pollak ever got stage fright or was starstruck.

“Stage fright, never have. Like a lot of comedians, some get nervous every time but the rest of us were just born to do this. We suffer from what I call ‘Hey, look at me’ disease.

“Star struck? Definitely. Just like a normal human being, I am blown away by any actor or actress that I see or meet in person whose work that I admire. I am no different than anyone else.”

Walter Kawamoto asked if Pollak was upset when another actor was cast as Captain Kirk in the “Star Trek” movies.

(Sarcastically):”Yeah, I cried for a couple of days. I have a good group of friends, so I was able to lean on them. Especially when I saw the ridiculously young and handsome guy they hired, I was really thrown for a loop.”

Remy Gervais wanted to know if he had a favorite role.

“Not really. If there had to be one that I enjoyed doing, that nobody saw, it would be the sequel to the movie ‘The Whole Nine Yards’ called ‘The Whole Ten Yards.’ I was in makeup for three and a half hours to get into prosthetic makeup to play the role of the father of the character I played in the original. I played a 70-year-old Hungarian mobster. That was probably the most fun comedically that I have had portraying a character in movies. And about 17 people have seen it.” he added.

Pollak will appear this Saturday at Cache Creek Casino. Follow this link for tickets and reservations. Must be 21 or over.

A SacramentoComedy.Com Interview

With a name like Ahmed Ahmed, in this day and age, you might think that it could lead to some mishaps with law enforcement agencies. If so, you’d be correct. Ahmed’s family came to America when he was just a month old, and he grew up in Riverside, right in the epicenter of Southern California, so misconceptions aren’t uncommon but, in retrospect, the name has served him well.

We caught up with Ahmed by phone in New York, having just completed his first appearance at the Tribeca Film Festival, premiering ‘Just Like Us,’ his freshman directorial debut earlier in the week. We decided to start off by asking, (very politely), about his name.

“Ahmed Ahmed is my ‘God-given’ name. It is the name that my parents gave me. Today, as a comic, it sets me apart in the U.S., but it has also helped me a great deal overseas. My new movie, ‘Just Like Us,’ was filmed in four countries in the Middle East, and I doubt that it would have gone over as well if my name was Steve Jones.”

With his current successes both here and abroad, we wondered whether Ahmed was recognized more here in the United States or in the Middle East.

“It’s not like famous American movie directors or big comedy clubs are calling every day or I am stopped on the street here,” he said. “In the Middle East, it is a little different. In most Middle Eastern countries, if I am in a restaurant or an area where my demographic (18-24) hangs out, then I am often recognized.”

Ahmed’s career in the entertainment business began when he was 19 and moved to Hollywood to make it as an actor. He spent a year attending the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and studied with acting coaches Cliff Osmond, Ivana Chubbuck and Sandy Marshall.

After getting myriad small parts playing the stereotypical terrorist, cab driver or Middle Eastern prince, Ahmed’s agent suggested he change his name. That agent was promptly let go. Then, working as a personal trainer and waiter while studying his craft, Ahmed decided to try stand-up comedy.

After doing comedy for a few years, one key turning point in his career was being taken in by Mitzi Shore, the legendary owner of The Comedy Store in Hollywood right around 1999-2000.

“A many great comedians had come out of the Comedy Store to do extraordinary things with their careers,” Ahmed said. “David Letterman and Jay Leno started there. Richard Pryor, Robin Williams, Sam Kinison, Howie Mandel, Michael Keaton, Paul Rodriguez and Jim Carrey performed there. A lot of comedians became who they are today thanks to being ‘taken in’ by Mitzi. She would embrace them in such a way, almost guiding like a mother hen.

“Mitzi also had an epiphany that something bad was going to happen in the Middle East and that Arab comedians were going to be necessary to break down stereotypes. That was her prophesy. We didn’t know what she was talking about. We just wanted to tell jokes. Then 9/11 happened, and she gave us a platform to exercise our talent. And this was at a time when comedy clubs didn’t want Arab comedians. That has changed over time, but it was because of Mitzi that it happened.”

So, has the stigma of being of Arab descent eased up since 9/11?

“Well, yes and no. There was a lot of backlash after (9/11).  I have been arrested or detained half a dozen times because of my name. It’s an awful position to be put in. As an American, paying taxes, you play by the rules and be a decent human being, and society lets you be. Suddenly, that’s taken away from you. You are sitting in a cell with 12 other people who are brown.

“There was one time in Las Vegas I was arrested and was put into jail. It was very unfortunate. But just telling the story is brilliant. I talked about it on the ‘Wild West Comedy Tour’ (with Vince Vaughn). I was placed in this holding cell for about 12 hours. You have to know that in that cell were the cast members of ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.’ After about eight hours, this Mexican gang-banger walks up and say, ‘Hey homie, you arrested cause you’re like Arab and shit?’ I told him, ‘yeah.’

“(He went on to ask), ‘Do they think you are a terrorist and shit?” I told him, ‘yeah, but just for the record, I’m not.’ Then he says, ‘Hey, just blow this place up and get us the fuck outta here!’ And everybody in the cell just started laughing. Then I just thought that maybe this was God’s way of lightening up the situation, because I was breaking down at that point. Why the hell am I in jail? I am just an American guy with an Arab name. So, either this gang-banger was definitely God-sent or it was just His way of telling me, ‘Ahmed, write some new material!’”

Do you think that the bridge of understanding that is taking place between the United States. and the Middle East countries and the Muslim world would be happening today if it weren’t for 9/11?

“Probably not as much. As much as I hate to say it, tragedy in its darkest moments eventually ends up shedding light on a situation. It’s interesting that you bring that up. Jane Rosenthal and Robert DeNiro are the co-founders of the Tribeca Film Festival. Their whole reason for creating the festival was because of 9/11. When the city was at its lowest point, DeNiro and Rosenthall were wondering how they could give back to the city, how they could make a positive impact out of this negative.  Now, nine years later, there are Arab and Muslim films being shown at the festival.”

The film “Just Like Us,” filmed documentary-style in four Middle Eastern countries, was Ahmed’s first time producing and directing a movie. We wanted to know how his debut at the Tribeca Film Festival went.

“The support that Tribeca extended us has been great! We got our world premier on Saturday night, and it was sold out. It was a full red-carpet event. Vince Vaughn, who is a good friend of mine, flew in to support the film. For the ‘after-party comedy show’ featuring the comedians that appeared in the movie, Robert DeNiro showed up. I was hosting this show and watching him laugh so hard he had to wipe the tears from his eyes. After, he came over and provided a photo op. He was overly kind, offered his congratulations and told me the he watched the show with his wife and that he really liked it.”

One question that came to mind while we were talking about the making of his movie was what inspired him to do it.

“I would come back from a doing a comedy tour overseas, and my friends would ask me if I was performing for the troops. They, and many people here, don’t know that people from the Middle Eastern countries and Muslims have a sense of humor and like to laugh. Each country has different customs around it, like, in some countries, entertainment is designed for the whole family so you are often performing in front of young kids. I also learned a great deal about this format of filmmaking doing the ‘Wild West Comedy Tour’ with Vince Vaughn. I also had a great producer in Peter Billingsly. Yes, the same Peter Billingsly that played Ralphie and is famous for shooting his eye out in the movie ‘A Christmas Story,’” he answered to my unasked question.

We also wondered if there were any critics to the new group of Arab-Americans who use comedy to poke fun at themselves and the Muslim stereotypes.

“I never used to put my clips up on YouTube, but now I just let it go. If you Google “Ahmed Ahmed Dubai,” you will see a clip of a joke that I do. I got slammed on that one. There are over 450 comments. I sometimes write them down and read them from stage. So, yes, I am often a target for my type of humor.”

You will get the chance to experience Ahmed’s humor May 6-9 at the Sacramento Punchline Comedy Club.

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