Chris D’Elia’s stage is set for a hallmark 2013

Chris D’Elia’s manic stage presence and energetic delivery make him perfectly suited for life as a standup comic, but when he was trying to break into comedy he first took a different route. D’Elia tried his hand at being an actor first, then a writer, but when that wasn’t working out, he decided to take the plunge into the do-or-die world of standup. As it turns out, it was the best thing the young comedian could have done.

Standup was the springboard for his career, but D’Elia is as focused as ever on his stagecraft. In the following interview, he talks about his popularity on video sharing app Vine, his standup career, conquering his fear of the stage and what life is like as a “black comic.”

You’re in Denver tonight right?
Yeah, I am. It’s really nice up here.

I’ve been through Denver once. It’s a fun city, but it’s got a weird vibe. I don’t know if it’s the mountain air or what. People seem a little wilder up there.
Yeah, I think it might be because at certain times of the year they don’t have much to do so they go nuts.

Does the altitude affect you in any way since you talk on stage for an hour?
The last time I was here, it did. It definitely takes its toll on me. I get anxious. A few days in, I get short of breath. But I live.

I was checking out some of your standup clips on YouTube the past few days leading up to the interview. How do you feel about clips of your live show being up online for free?
If it was already on TV, I don’t care. If it was already on TV, then it’s good to have it up online too so people can access it, so I like that. When it’s just from the club, or a fan or audience member did it, I always message them to take it down, and they’re usually pretty cool about it. If it’s like The Laugh Factory shooting it—they’ll shoot a lot of their shows and they’ll ask you if they can put up stuff—I always tell them no with the material and OK if I’m just messing around with the audience, because that’s just going to be a one-time thing. It’s not something I’m working on.

Yeah, I noticed a lot of The Laugh Factory clips, which is why I asked. I noticed a lot of them were you interacting with your audience…
Yeah, that’s why they’re up there. Sometimes because of that, people think that’s what I do at shows, that I mess with the audience, and that’s not the case. I don’t like that. I don’t enjoy it. I’d rather do my act than have somebody heckle me, because that’s annoying.

So audience participation isn’t something you particularly enjoy?
No. I’ll do it, because I like to put people in their place for being rude.

I saw a couple of clips where you were ragging on Drake…
Yeah, I don’t know. I’ll be driving to the clubs, and there’ll be hip-hop on, and then I’ll be like, “I’m going to talk about this on stage.” Those two bits, those were like the only times I did those, and Laugh Factory got them on camera. If it’s a really current topic I’m talking about, I don’t mind if they use it, because it’s not like I’m going to be talking about it for a few years. If the song’s hot, maybe it’ll catch on. And they did.

Have you gotten any backlash from Drake fans?
No not really. I don’t know if Drake saw them or anything. I say in the clip that I like his music, so it’s not a hateful thing.

You told us about trying to become an actor and writer before trying standup. Was acting or writing your first focus?
I always wanted to do comedy first and foremost, but I wanted to be an actor. I wasn’t getting work as an actor, so I started writing. I thought maybe I could write a good script and maybe do that, create my own opportunity. That didn’t work out. I was like, forget it, I’m going to get on stage because I need people to immediately see what I’m doing. I need some people to recognize what I do. Even if they’re going to boo me, at least people are seeing my work.

Does being on a sit-com or working on a TV show cut into your standup routine at all?
Not too much. I did 430 shows before I got on Whitney, and when I got on Whitney, I was able to do 300 and something. So, it’s a little bit. It kind of makes me obsess about it less, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s all for the standup, dude. All the TV and all the other stuff, whatever helps get people in the seats and have me do shows is the best. I shot my special about a month and half ago in New Orleans, so it doesn’t slow me down too much…

Standup is what I always wanted to do, but I was afraid to do it. It took getting beat up in the business for me to actually be like, alright, I’m going to get on stage. Standup was the first thing I ever wanted to do though.

Was it just the business being rough that got you over that fear or was there another catalyst?
It’s like this, dude. If you’re getting beat up in an alley by three guys and another dude comes along like, “I’m going to beat that guy up too,” you’re like, OK, bring it on. It’s like, what’s one more dude? That’s what I was like when I was like I’ll do standup.

I was looking at your Twitter feed today and I saw that you’ve been posting a lot of videos on Vine, which is really starting to pick up steam, even though it’s not at Instagram level yet.
No, it’s not at Instagram level yet, but it’s a force to be reckoned with. It’s pretty much the only thing I get recognized for now. If I’m walking down the street, people are like, “Oh my God, you’re the guy on Vine!”

The stuff you’re doing on Vine almost seems like guerilla comedy. You find things that happen on the street or wherever and you comment on them. Have you been attracting a lot of followers?
I’ve got one of the most followers on Vine, I think. But I think it’s cool because it’s just purely me. It’s nothing else but what I would do with six seconds. Some people are buying wigs and shit on Vine and trying to make funny videos. I’m just trying to comment and be funny.

Has anyone you’ve commented on ever caught you and taken exception to it?
No one has caught me in the act, but a few people have commented on it later and said, “Hey, that’s me!”

So they’re more honored than anything else?
Yeah, they’re honored. I was Vineing at the mall in Dallas, and the kid left school and came to the mall. This kid came and said, “I saw you Vineing, so I left school and came to the mall,” so I did a Vine with him. It was really funny.

The other thing I’d noticed on your Twitter feed is that your headline reads, “White male. Black comic.” Were black standup comedians your biggest influences in comedy?
I always liked that style, but also it was an inside joke. This other comedian, Erik Griffin, he’s black and he would always say about my act—because I’m all animated and shit—that, “you’re blacker than I am on stage.” It was a joke, but I would say, “Yeah, I’m a white dude, but a black comic.” I put it up as my Twitter headline as a joke and then people started to talk about it on my Twitter feed. I think that’s what I’m going to name my comedy special, White Male, Black Comic.

Chris D’Elia will perform three nights at Punch Line in Sacramento from June 6–8, 2013. To buy tickets, go to Chrisdelia.com and click “Tour.” Follow him on Twitter @chrisdelia.

Sacramento funnyman Keith Lowell Jensen is set to release his newest comedy album on Feb. 19, 2013 on Stand Up! Records and even the title of the album is hilarious: Elf Orgy. We’re not going to try and explain why it’s named that, you’ll just have to listen for yourself and find out, let’s just say it’s a funny (and somewhat disturbing) story that involves Keith as a child masturbating to a comic book scene of, you guessed it, an elf orgy. OK, we basically just told you. Still, listen to this album! It’s fantastic! Plenty of Sacramento-area jokes, too (sorry “Murder Park,” I mean, Oak Park). You’ll be able to find the album on iTunes and Amazon but make sure you mark your calendar for Sunday, Feb. 24, 2013 when Jensen will headline a killer show at Punch Line (2100 Arden Way, Sacramento) as his official CD release show. Doors open at 7 p.m. and the cover is $15, 18-and-over only. Learn more about Keith Lowell Jensen at his website, Rockass.net.

Comedian Iliza Shlesinger moves from reality show fame to rise the stand-up ranks

Talent, hard work and confidence–and a dash of luck–are needed to nurture any career in entertainment, and Iliza Shlesinger has been fortunate enough to have all these ingredients in abundance.

The winner of Last Comic Standing 6 back in 2008, Shlesinger is the only female comic to take the title, though even that wasn’t an easy road. She staved off elimination multiple times in order to take the prize. It’s an accomplishment to be sure, but it’s not something she has ever hung her hat on.

“It’s a cool thing for sure, but I think other people are more impressed with it than I am,” she says. “I would be a real tool if I rested on those laurels and still talked about it.”

While it’s not her sole accomplishment, it certainly gave her a quicker start than others in the field. Still, it’s what she’s done since that’s entrenched her as a force in stand-up.

“I know comics who have been doing it longer than I have,” Shlesinger says. “I know comics who have been doing it for 10 years, and they’re still featuring, and there’s nothing wrong with that. That’s the way it is. I’ve had the luxury of skipping a lot of the BS that stands between opening and being a headliner. I’m very fortunate to have been able to do that, but there’s also lot of hard work that I’ve put into it.

“I don’t brag about it, because I know what I did. As we get farther and farther away from it, I don’t want to be the guy who’s like, ‘Remember how good I was at football in high school?’”

Her journey in comedy began before Last Comic Standing. She says her first loves were sketch comedy and improv. She wrote for a troupe while she was in college, but then one day, she wrote a one-woman show, which, probably more so than her victory in the popular TV show, laid the roadmap for her current career.

“I was the only girl in my troupe who wrote stuff, and then it hit me, why am I writing stuff for other girls who aren’t writing for themselves?” she explains. “Why don’t I throw my thoughts in linear form on to paper and write them for myself? I just started writing paragraphs. It’s a weird answer, but I moved to Los Angeles, and it didn’t seem like a stretch to start doing stand-up comedy. Someone gave me some stage time, and they asked me to come back the next week. I just kept coming back and getting asked to do other shows, and it just became something I was obsessed with, I guess.”

Shlesinger says that she always knew she would be “funny for a living.” She was so single-minded about that inevitability that she “just didn’t think about anything else.” For years, she hosted The Weakly News, a news satire show for Thestream.tv in addition to touring as a stand-up comic. Armed with striking good looks and an even sharper tongue, she has recently made the jump to more traditional airwaves, hosting the syndicated dating show Excused, which has recently been picked up for a second season. Shlesinger discussed her latest endeavor, how success as a stand-up comic hasn’t necessarily translated to success in auditioning for acting roles and fetishist Google searches in the following interview.

When I Googled your name, the second thing that popped up was “Iliza Shlesinger feet.” I wasn’t sure if you were aware of that.
I don’t know why. It’s very odd. Everyone mentions it to me. I don’t have a foot fetish, I don’t know people who have feet fetishes. People are just creepy.

It’s because of that one video you did, right? For The Weakly News where you showed your feet because you injured one of them.
I guess, but it’s not like billions of people watch it, but I’ve done plenty of videos where my arms are showing, and people forget about that.

That’s just the one that happened to catch on.
Yeah, people are sick.

How did you get hooked up with Excused and how has the experience been so far for you?
I wish I got hooked up with it. I auditioned for it. Do little girls dream of hosting a dating show when they grow up? No. [Loud car horn] Sorry. [To another driver] For real?! Oh my God! I’m sorry, this one person is ruining my life single-handedly. Give me one second. Is it bad that I believe she should be put in jail for being that bad of a driver? My whole thing is like, if you’re driving and this is a simple turn that you can’t complete, what poor decisions are you making in everyday life that are affecting the rest of us. You’re an animal. You shouldn’t be allowed out if you can’t make a left hand turn.

Anyway… It’s a late night dating show, and I got the gig, and I was like, I either do it my way or I don’t do it at all. I make up all my own jokes on the spot. There are no writers, there’s nothing like that. I’m fortunate, because most stand-up comedians get a gig, and they have to read lines…but for me, they really let me say what I wanted to say.

I’ve seen a few clips from the show, and you really don’t pull any punches with the contestants.
There are things that I want to say that they won’t let me say. Then you watch it, and because of standards and practices, they edit out a lot of things. Even though it’s a late night show, in some places it’s syndicated at 4 in the afternoon, and it’s like, really? It’s weird what will fly and what won’t. Last night, I made a gay joke on the show, and they kept that in, but I’m not allowed to say, “douche bag.” It’s like, OK, let’s offend the gay community, but not douche bags.

Were you into dating shows when you were younger?
No. I loved Blind Date when I was in middle school or high school. I don’t remember, but this is the same producer who did Blind Date. Everyone liked Blind Date. I remember, of course, watching Singled Out. I really liked Jenny McCarthy, and I always thought she was great on that show. It’s kind of ironic that I looked up to this blonde woman with big boobs who was funny and crazy, and now I do that for a living. I don’t think I look like Jenny McCarthy at all, but it’s funny how things come full circle.

Has the show affected your views of the dating pool or the dating scene?
No. It’s such a microcosm. You’re going to get creepy guys and gold diggers and douche bags no matter where you go or what you do, so the fact that we condense that world down to 19 minutes and put it on display, I’m not disheartened or anything like that. It’s a TV show, so everything’s exacerbated. I look for very specific things in mates, and I don’t think I’ve found it on my show, so I don’t like to judge them because different people like different things. I’m trying to be as political about this statement as possible [laughs].

Is writing something you’d like to get more into?
For TV shows? No. The people who love writing, all they want to do is be writers, just like teachers or nurses or whatever. I find a lot of times for stand-up comics, you write because it’s a gig that you can get that you’re good at, but if you had your druthers, you’d write for yourself or do your own thing. I’ve been very fortunate that I’ve never had to take any sort of job in comedy that I didn’t want because of these small successes that I’ve had. Writing for my own show would be one thing, but I don’t really have an interest, other than for a friend or a really cool project, in sitting in a writers’ room and writing for someone else. It’s hard to do once you’ve done stand-up. It spoils you for a lot of things.

Is it the singular control you have over it?
Kind of. I could imagine any writer would be like that. When you write a joke, you want to have it said a certain way, and depending upon your director or your producer with his two cents, the actor may say it differently. For me, I don’t think I would want to have the challenge of writing for someone else’s voice. I’m always impressed when writers can do that. Being a stand-up comic is a weird thing, because when you’re on stage, everyone loves you and you’re a star. And then the next day, when you go out on an audition for like girlfriend No. 3, you walk in the room and no one knows who you are. Someone will be like, “Oh, have you tried stand-up?” and you’re like, “Yeah, I’ve tried, and I’ve bought a house with that money.” One art form doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be good in another art form or recognized in one, so it’s a real mindfuck for lack of a better term.

Sometimes I’ll see stand-up comics who I really like, and they’re in a commercial for like two seconds, but I know them by name.
Right, right. It’s weird. Even just from an appreciation standpoint, you go to a club, you’re there for the weekend, they pick you up in a car, your fans come. You want to go to these casting directors and say, “I have fans.” People ask me for my autograph, and you want me to show me your profile so I can read this horribly written thing about being a sexually frustrated neighbor. Give me a break. It’s the weirdest thing ever.

Is it tough to find good roles for women in comedy?
I think it’s getting easier and easier. I think people are starting to realize that women are just as funny. It’s not about the fact that you have a vagina. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of unfunny women, but there’s also plenty of unfunny guys. In fact, there are probably more unfunny guys. Pretty much everything I read is, “You’re the quirky neighbor who just wants to have sex and doesn’t understand relationships.” I’m like, I don’t really know a ton of women like that, but OK. A lot of them are written in a very similar voice. One network will get a show that’s a hit so every network will copy it. I think women are gaining more and more. You look around at movies and TV shows, and women are getting more of a chance to give their opinions, and I think that’s great.

Iliza Shlesinger will play Punch Line in Sacramento Nov. 15—17, 2012. You can buy tickets for the show through Punchlinesac.com. To keep up to date on Iliza, you can follow her on Twitter at Twitter.com/Iliza, where, amongst other things, you can view daily pictures of her freakishly adorable dog Blanche.

Comedian Doug Stanhope never abided by the rules, and we wouldn’t have it any other way

In one word, Doug Stanhope is polarizing. If you are a fan of his work, you probably think he is a comedic genius, unparalleled by any other active in his craft. Should you fall on the other side of the spectrum you probably think he is a vile, drunken psychotic who should be jailed for abuse of the First Amendment. It’s not a conscious effort on his part to be a polarizing comedian, though, and while ultimately he is an entertainer, he is not an actor playing a role. His ingenuity, love it or hate it, is in his sincerity. He flaunts his flaws and mocks his shortcomings, and though his views of the world may come off as bleak, they are not shortsighted shock value statements. His approach is unfiltered tact; nothing is off limits, and if you are offended, you probably shouldn’t have been listening in the first place.

With more than two decades of stand-up experience, 11 live albums and a resume that spans the BBC and The Man Show, Stanhope is no slouch. He exists within his own lane, and with a DIY approach to his profession has established himself as an undisputed comedic heavyweight. On the stage is where he thrives, and from Feb. 23 through 25, he will be headlining the Punch Line, testing out new material before he heads overseas for a tour of the United Kingdom. In anticipation of the gig, the following conversation conveniently took place immediately following the State of the Union address.

So when you watch something like the State of the Union address are you solely as a comedian, or is there a part of you that is watching as a citizen?
Completely as a comic, especially on Twitter. It was funny to watch my brain work actually. This live tweeting thing was new to me, though. It was like open heckling. To keep up with what he’s saying, and type as clumsily as I type, and then to read what others are saying so I don’t copy them, I just felt like, “Oh shit, I’m taking too long.” It was like playing bingo with too many cards, and I hate that I know what that reference means.

Do you think you could do your stage show with a John Boehner type of figure behind you?
There is always a John Boehner type behind me, and it’s the negative version of me judging all of my jokes saying, “You’ve said that before! Everyone is bored with you!” And there is a Joe Biden on the other side, the angel on my shoulder saying, “Just take the check.”

Do you ever hit dry spells or do you find that the political climate and endless stream of social bullshit provides you with enough material to never run out?
Oh yeah, I’ve been in a dry spell for years. The things that I’m passionate about start drying out, that’s simple mathematics. The longer I do comedy I start running out of ways to talk about things. Like over-population, I don’t know how to find a new angle on that, but it’s something that really bothers me. I’ve found ways in other stuff, but I can’t keep saying the same shit again and again. Over 20 years, I don’t want to fake being angry about things I’m not passionate about, #BillMaher.

One of my favorite lines of the speech was, “America is back and anyone who says otherwise doesn’t know what they are talking about.” Would you like to elaborate on that?
Yeah, I mean, it’s the exact same America I’ve always lived in. I’m 45 now, and it’s all the same shit every year. Every year we need to change something or stop something, and then I realize that none of this will affect my life. Nothing that any president has done or talked about doing has affected my daily life. Taxes, yeah maybe I have $20 more, or $20 less in my bank account at the end of the year, but it doesn’t affect me day to day. I’m sure it does some people, but they play by the rules, which I never did. I don’t mean like, “Oh, I play outside the lines, the rebel,” I just live a weird life.

Have you always been like that?
Yeah, I quit school when I was 16, but I had to live at home until I was 18 by law. As soon as I turned 18 I jumped on a train with $400 and went to Los Angeles to be an actor. That lasted four months, moved to Florida for four months. I did fraud telemarketing and just fucked off until I started comedy when I was 23.

What inspired you to blaze your own path like that?
I have no idea. I was always a weird kid. I was very similar to what I am now, which doesn’t really fit for a kid. I had a really dark sense of humor. I still have a framed letter from my school psychologist on my wall, hold on a second, let me read it. The second paragraph reads, “I very strongly believe that Douglas is in need of professional help. As you know he is extremely negative about getting help.” I was just being funny, drawing fucked up doodles. You know how you would trace your hand? Well I would trace my hand, but move three of the fingers over to the side like they just got chopped off and then make pools of blood around them. I thought it was cool. They thought I was a psychotic.

I love that you had the foresight to hold onto that letter.
Yeah, definitely. When I first got into comedy I had no press pack so I would put this letter in there and highlight the sentence I just read.

So were you the funny guy then?
No, people thought I was creepy. A couple people thought I was funny but most were creeped out by me. So I guess with that, I have the same ratio of fan base I have now. I had a cult following in school, but I was generally observed as way too dark for the room.

You have very strong beliefs and opinions. Do you want people to share all of your beliefs?
Yes, I do. Or I want to share theirs. I just see things a certain way, and I wish that was normal. I don’t like feeling different all the time. I’m not the goth kid who is dyeing my hair and putting on temporary tattoos to stand out. I want to be normal. I want to be able to put on my iPod at a party and have more than three songs play before someone goes, “What the fuck is this!?” I want to fit in and have more friends.

I feel like when people describe your work they only highlight the debaucherous side, but no one ever mentions that you are really smart, which I think is a huge discredit to what you do.
Unless you disagree with me, then I’m just a drunken idiot. That’s one thing that really bothers me, because I do think people who disagree with me will always blame it on alcohol as if I would have completely different opinions if I didn’t have a cocktail at 7:30 p.m. Christopher Hitchens was the only guy I know smart enough to overcome the [drunken idiot image]. He was one of the guys I wanted to get drunk with before I died. Him and Bill Murray. Hunter S. Thompson was fantastic, but you would never want to be him to be that brilliant, and I think the same goes for Charles Bukowski. They aren’t people you want to emulate, because you know their lives were miserable. I would rather put out shitty art and have a nice life.

Your comedy is pretty boundless. Generally speaking, do you give a fuck?
Well, I’ve become angrier which is the antithesis to not giving a fuck, but it’s usually pointless rage. Patrick Cox of Taxmasters, every time I see that commercial with his fat bullfrog throat, I get angry. I call them and accuse him of looking weird at my kid through the TV all the time. I get angry at really stupid things, and I know they are stupid, but it’s actual rage. I get more scared of people and things too. Generally, I give a fuck in a desperate and helpless way. I want things to be different, and there is no way to do it, and that makes me angry. I’ve given up hope. I don’t know if I don’t give a fuck, but I’ve given up hope.

Doug Stanhope will play five shows in three days at Punch Line Comedy Club in Sacramento beginning Thursday, Feb. 23, 2012. Shows will start at 8 p.m. (all three days) with 10 p.m. shows on Friday, Feb. 24 and Saturday, Feb. 25. Tickets range from $18.50—$23.50. You can purchase them through Punchlinesac.com or Livenation.com.

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.