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September 14, 2007
Inside With: John Mulaney
By: Eliot Glazer
Just in time for the new season of Best Week Ever tonight on VH1, we chatted with John Mulaney, one of the show's breakout quippers, about performing on Conan, his comedic roots, and life in fast lane.
Ok, John, so you're young and already found success. You've been on Conan twice and are on the writing staff for Michael Ian Black's upcoming pilot. How and when did you get into comedy?
I started doing comedy when I was 7 years old in a sketch group called The Rugrats (we had the name before that knock-off Nickelodeon show came along). I'm not sure how I got into it. I think my mom heard that some theater company in Chicago was putting together a children's comedy workshop and signed me up for it. It's foggy. We would basically spend a few weeks doing improv games and scene exercises and then gradually develop four or five loose sketches which we would perform for [our parents]. I know one of the sketches was about male secretaries with female bosses. In another I did my rip-off of Dana Carvey's George Bush impression. I think we even did a Godfather sketch.
In my first week of college my friend dragged me to the auditions for the Georgetown Players Improv Group because he wanted someone to audition with. I got cast and he didn't. The director who cast me was this wise-acre named Nick Kroll. I did improv all through college and started doing stand-up when I lived in New York for a summer internship in 2003. I moved here as soon as I graduated from college and kept at it.
You've made no secret of the fact that were once an alcoholic, and I've always found it to be a slightly jarring yet effectively personal part of your act. How did facing addiction at such a young age impact your comedy?
Yeah, a lot of audiences find it jarring or confusing and some of them flat out don't buy it. I am not sure what to do about it. I really like the jokes I have about drinking, my black-out episodes, drug shenanigans etc. I normally set them up with the fact that I quit all that jazz a couple years ago, but it depends on the set I am doing. Sometimes I leave it out. I don't know if that is good or bad, but sometimes I don't want to deal with an audience getting over that hurdle if I only have five minutes on-stage.
As far as how it impacted my comedy... well... it affected my life a lot so obviously it changed how I worked and how I pursued doing stand-up. More to the point though, the first jokes I wrote that I really liked, that is the first jokes I wrote that I thought were funny and real were about being a drunkard.
Tell me about the origins of The Oh, Hello Show.
A couple of years ago Nick Kroll and I were in the STRAND Bookstore when we saw two sort mid-fifties guys wearing turtle-necks and blazers walking around and speaking what became Oh Hello speak (Hotel=Huh-tel, etc.) We followed them around the store and noticed that they were both buying copies of Alan Alda's memoir "Never Have Your Dog Stuffed." We started talking like them, pretty much all the time, and when Nick and I started hosting the Thursday night show at Rififi we decided we should just host as those two dynamos. The back-story came to use in about two seconds: that they weren't gay, but divorcees, that they never leave the Upper West Side, that they love Alan Alda and Dianne Weist, that they think the best way to start the day is an early doctor's appointment and on and on and on. I remember just before we left to do the first show I asked Nick, "Wait, what is your character called?" and immediately, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, Nick said, "Gil Faizon." I miss doing the show now that Nick is in LA, but I have to admit people were getting a little tired of how I was incapable of talking without doing that voice.
Speaking of which, how'd you handle the Del Close Marathon? You and Nick [Kroll] did a 3:15 show, which may or may not have been absolutely insane.
Unfortunately, Nick couldn't make the show as he had to head West, but Brett Gelman, Julie Klausner, Becky Drysdale, Anthony Atamanuik and John Gemberling joined the show and we pretty much figured, these UWS lunatics would of course love "impruv-isation" and would mount a show despite being awful at it.
Tell me about the origins of I Love The 30's.
Kroll and I had written and shot a short-film called "Cavalcade of Personalities" while I was still in school and it was a newsreel about a 1930s Gatsby-style party at a country home. Conrad Mulcahy and Brian Donovan, who Nick performed with in the Improv group Littleman (along with Mike Birbiglia and Ed Herro), were such an integral part of making Cavalcade work out that the four of us decided to do some more short films together. I think we liked the tone of those old-timey characters so much that I Love the 30's was a perfect next project. Obviously the idea for the series started as a parody of the VH1 "I Love The" franchise. I watched them again recently though, and there isn't much parody of "I Love the 80s" outside of the title. The people we got to appear in it were so damn good that it became more about the insanity of those characters commenting on sad or tragic events.
What was doing Conan like?
It was the best thing in the world. That show has loomed so large in my mind since I was 13 that to appear on it was pretty unbelievable. When I did it in February I got to the studio too late to see anyone before the show, so the first time I met Conan O'Brien was when he walked over at the end of my set. It was absolutely surreal.
How did it feel to be asked back again on Conan, and so quickly?
I was very fortunate that that worked out. The first time I did the show I knew a month in advance, the second time, they called the day before they wanted me to appear. Not having the time to over-think it was actually a big help. Again, it was an absolute thrill. A lot of the jokes I did in June were pretty new too so it was extra fun to perform them.
Where'd your website go?
Hackers hacked into it using hackery. I like using MySpace more anyway because I know how to update it [without making the lovely Anya Garrett do it for me].
Has anyone ever compared you to Archie? Because, to me, you look like a cartoon character from the fifties.
I don't care for the Archie comics. They portray the 1950s as nothing but sock-hops and drive-ins when we all know that the era was tainted by the rise of Roy Cohn and the alcoholism of Desi Arnaz. I have also been told I look like Mickey Hart. This interview is over.
Posted by The Apiary at September 14, 2007 3:22 PM
Comments
I've said it before and I'll say it again: John Mulaney is the future of comedy!
Posted by: Keith Whitener at September 15, 2007 1:04 AM
Let me just say, for the record, that Mulaney is one of my favorite comics around. I'm afraid even to talk to the guy. He is on fire.
Posted by: klaus_kinski at September 17, 2007 8:11 PM
I love John Mulaneyyy. He is so funny, and cute too! ;)
Posted by: Shelly at September 28, 2007 2:20 PM
I agree with Klaus Kinski. 100% =]
Posted by: Erica at January 12, 2008 2:05 PM