Jackass star Steve-O has re-scheduled Sacramento dates for his Entirely Too Much Information Tour to Nov. 17—20 at Punch Line. You may remember that we did a cover story on Steve-O back in June before he was originally scheduled to be in town, but unfortunately the death of fellow Jackass star and longtime friend Ryan Dunn forced him to postpone. Glad to see he’s getting back out on the road! Check out our website (Submergemag.com) to read our interview with Steve-O. Hit up Punchlinecomedyclub.com or call (916) 925-5500 for more information and to purchase tickets.

Steve-O Hits the Road on his Entirely Too Much Information Tour

Words by Mandy Johnston – Photos by Mike Carano

Stephen (Steve-O) Glover is a busy man. In the first half of this month alone, the jester infamous for stapling his balls to his thigh, huffing wasabi and spiraling into a Whip-it!(among other ingestibles)-filled demise that was caught (per his instructions) on camera and later made into a documentary, won $50,000 toward The National Down Syndrome Congress on the hit family show Minute to Win It, had his life featured on the Biography Channel, and released Professional Idiot: A Memoir. The autobiography gives a chronological blow-by-blow of his life that so befits the rollercoaster cliché, one should be warned not only to not perform the stunts mentioned in the book, but to keep all legs and arms inside the vehicle while riding along. Laugh- and cringe-inducing highlights include his entrepreneurial gumption that led him to meet the boys of Mötley Crüe backstage at 13, his drug-fueled leap from the precipice of sanity that resulted in crazy diatribes distributed to his self-titled “Rad Email List” and his path to sobriety and resulting stint on ABC’s Dancing with the Stars, on which he surprisingly didn’t suck.

How is your comedy show different from your previous live shows?
Well … the previous shows consisted of a lot of alcohol consumption and drunken rambling and crazy stunts. And this time around, I’ve replaced the drunken rambling with standup comedy and kept the crazy stunts. I do standup comedy in the beginning and do stunts at the end.

Is the standup original material, like setup punch line, or is it more based on your history with Jackass and the stuff you did previously?
It’s both. The purpose is supposed to be standup you know, so while it’s all based on experiences that I’ve had, there are jokes that tell the story.

Is the memoir meant to coincide at all?
Nah. The memoir is something else I’ve been working on.

I read that you’ve been working on it for a long time. But what was the impetus behind getting it out now?
I dunno, I mean, I always wanted a book, and I don’t think there’s anything really particularly special about now, except that I couldn’t have done it when I was still loaded. So, I’m glad that I waited, so I had some perspective on everything. Beyond that, there’s nothing… It took as long as it took, and now it’s ready.

In the book, it seems there’s maybe a few apologies that you might not have been able to give face to face. Is that part of the reason for the book?
I don’t think so. I mean, [it was] awkward…trying to tell my story without redoing bad shit, you know? It’s hard to describe how you did something wrong without doing that wrong thing again in a lot of cases. And I was struggling with that. But I dunno, I wouldn’t say that’s why I wrote the book.

I also noticed, not to get too deep, but it seemed like when you escaped bodily harm, jail time, getting your ass kicked, you talked about good luck. But when the bad shit went down, you took full responsibility for that. Is that a philosophy of yours? Am I just pulling that out of my ass?
I dunno, it’s not a deliberate philosophy; it’s not anything that’s occurred to me. It doesn’t sound wrong. Sounds about right.

When you get to the hard part in the book…the period just before you went into rehab, with the Rad Email List. The first thing I think anyone would think is a comparison to Charlie Sheen.
Sure I can relate to what he’s…you know, I don’t know what’s going on with him now, but when he was real crazy and all that, I could relate to that.

Was it surreal to watch that?
A little bit. It was kind of different. The Charlie Sheen stuff is ridiculous. But like, I dunno. He never seemed to kind of hit a wall where he realized that that was kind of… not rad? [Laughs]

Do you think that has to do with… I mean, with you, you had friends and family who came in…
Right I mean, even when all that stuff was going on, at least at times I kind of realized that it wasn’t that rad, you know? I mean I guess I’d be all loaded and send out certain things [to the Rad Email List] and then whenever I’d sort of wake up from having slept off a gnarly bender or something, there’d be some kind of remorse and I’d realize that it wasn’t cool. I wouldn’t admit that, but I knew it.

And you don’t think you see that in Charlie Sheen?
I don’t think so. I think…if he realizes it, I dunno. I can’t speak for him.

Is there anything you look back on, stunt-wise, that you would say, I probably shouldn’t have done that, or I’d rather not do that again?
Yeah, there’s a lot of stuff that I never want to do again. But there’s not a lot of stuff that I wish I hadn’t done in the first place. I don’t have regrets about stunts. Thankfully I’ve been fortunate and have gotten away with the things I’ve done without any real permanent damage. And all the rest of it, I’m OK with all the stuff I did.

I did notice toward the end of the book, you were starting to think more about what bodily harm could happen to you if you kept doing crazy stunts. Is that, maybe not slowing you down, but affecting your decisions more?
Yeah. I mean I always picked my battles fairly carefully, I think. I mean, at this point, having survived what I survived and come this far to become healthy, it just doesn’t make a lot of sense to be killed or paralyzed doing some stupid stunt, you know?

Let’s talk about that, the getting healthy. You’re sober now for a little over three years?
Yeah, it’s been three years, two months, three weeks and two days.

Wow. Congratulations.
Thank you.

And you’ve also gone vegan? How’s that going?
I love it. I love being vegan. I love it so much. It’s truly benefited every area of my life. There’s no question that it’s benefited me–in every way.

Is there anything else lifestyle wise? I mean those are pretty huge changes.
I don’t drink caffeine anymore. I don’t drink coffee or soda. I quit smoking cigarettes. It’s been two-and-a-half years since I’ve smoked a cigarette. I’ve really changed a lot of things.

Is there anything on, for lack of a better term, your bucket list?
There’s always more stuff to do. I dunno, if we do more Jackass stunts, like, I wouldn’t be surprised if I got a phone call about that. And at the same time I’m not holding my breath.

Another movie?
I don’t know. I do not know either way. I guess I’m not part of that discussion [laughs]. But yeah, I think that I’d love to do some more stuff. I’d also hate it. I kind of… It’s kind of a love-hate thing. I don’t know what’s going to happen, and I feel like I’ll be all right either way.

What do you say to the kid who wants to be the next Steve-O?
I don’t know. I think that there’s been a number of people who have tried, and it doesn’t seem like the world’s really receptive to a new Jackass troupe, you know? But I kind of feel like at the same time, regardless of what it is people want to do, the best thing is to just get off your ass and do it, you know? Regardless. Whatever it is. I don’t have any advice over what people should do, but whatever it is people want to do, I’d just say get off your ass and do it. I mean, it’s the best advice anyone can give.

Unfortunately Steve-O’s Sacramento performances have been canceled due to the death of his good friend Ryan Dunn earlier this week. Our condolences go out to the entire Jackass family!

I was a rambunctious youth. I had an overactive imagination and an ample energy supply. The obvious result of this combination was regular injury. Somehow I managed never to break a bone, but I have had more than my share of concussions, stitches, cuts, scrapes and burns. You would think that so many injuries would be cause enough to spring for health insurance, but alas, I have none. Now cautious as hell, I stand before you as some sort of glass man waiting to break. This is my tale.

My first major injury occurred when I was about 4. My sister was playing with a neighbor and I was trying to tag along. They decided to go to their friend’s house across the street and I, of course, charged right after them. I remember pausing at the gutter line, thinking that there was something important I was supposed to do before crossing. Fortunately for me, a reminder in the form of a green Buick was on its way up the block. My brain said, “Fuck it man, just go!” (yes, it cussed) and I took a leap of faith headfirst into the aforementioned Buick. The driver, being a good citizen, slowed slightly and continued on his merry way, as he was late for a wedding.

Apparently cars are harder than the human head, and an impact between the two may result in a concussion. Had I known this before, I probably wouldn’t have found myself holed up in a hospital bed at Kaiser for overnight observation. By the following morning I had already eaten and thrown up my weight in green Jell-O, causing a forfeiture of my favorite blanket for “cleaning” (R.I.P. Kiki, and fuck you Kaiser, you dirty blanket thieves!). The trauma of the event should have taught me that hospitals were not fun places to be, but my body was just not ready to learn.

About a year later, I once again found myself at Kaiser. There was no concussion this time, just massive bleeding from my right arm. On this particular occasion my sister and I had a disagreement, and I was forced to sink her Barbie swimming pool into the frigid waters of our pool (It was a matter of principle!). Of course, she saw it differently and tried to correct me by hitting me on the head with a plastic dog bone. The chase was on; unfortunately, I was playing the part of Wile E. Coyote.

I was gaining on her as she neared the glass back door. I knew she would have to slow down to get the door open, so when I got close, I just let one fly. Somehow, my sister managed to get outside and close the door behind before I ever made contact. The entire force of my 65-pound body was behind that punch and the door reacted accordingly.
Broken glass was everywhere. My sister and I stood there and stared at my arm dangling through the newly punched hole in the glass. My other sister rushed to the noise and screamed, which scared the shit out of me enough to try to yank my arm back through the hole. Thankfully there was a lot of jagged glass to slow my overreaction. My patience was rewarded by an arm shower in the bathroom sink followed by being laid out on the kitchen table until mom got home from work. Kaiser was happy to see me again and welcomed me with open arms. For my trouble, I was given 25 stitches and a sweet arm sling. Still no blanket”¦

The slapstick didn’t stop there. Over the next two years I would crack my head open after pulling down a hanging speaker (two more stitches) and get hit in the face by a friend’s bike handle, splitting my eyebrow open. By the time of the bike accident, my parents were reluctant to take me to the hospital for fear that they would be charged with abuse (“Sure kid, you got hit by a bike”¦ can we get CPS in here?”). Instead, I ended up with some Tylenol and a butterfly Band-aid. Like all the others, that wound eventually healed, but I still have the scar to prove it.

Bocephus Chigger
bocephus@submergemag.com