Since starting out as a local comedian in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Brian Regan has made 20 appearances on "The Late Show with David Letterman" since first appearing on the show in 1995. He'll take his act of relatable comedy to Letterman's alma mater at Emens Auditorium stage Friday.
Features editor Amanda Junk had a chance to speak to Regan over the phone from his home in Las Vegas about his upcoming show:
On how he got into the comedy business:
I went to college (Heidelberg College, in Tiffin, Ohio) thinking I was going to be an accountant, and I was all geared up for one exciting rocket ship ride of a life in the accounting world, but I had a cartoon strip when I was in college and a humorous advice column in the newspaper, so I started realizing that was more interesting for me doing that sort of thing. I doubt I would be doing accounting. … I hopefully would be doing something that was on the creative side of the tracks.
On his job at a comedy club cook:
I worked at a comedy club as a cook and a host in Fort Lauderdale and got to watch professional comedians every night. Finally I got lucky enough where they said, ‘we're going to consider you a local regular.' I didn't even know what that meant, but I guess would get $10 instead of zero dollars. And I've been making $10 a night ever since. Although recently I've moved up to $12.
On developing material that's relatable and timely to his audiences:
I try not to saddle myself with that kind of a challenge. I just talk about what I want to talk about, and hopefully it ends up being relatable. If it's great, and works out that's good, but sometimes the audience will collectively stare at you. You don't know what's going to work and what isn't going to work, and that's one of the thrills of comedy is not knowing.
On adapting to bad jokes onstage:
One of the beauties of being a comedian is that the audience can laugh at the joke or you can make them laugh at the fact that they're not laughing at the joke. You always have that as an out, and other professions don't have that luxury. A brain surgeon or a pilot can't mess up and make a silly joke out of it, but with a comedian you can goof up and then just joke about how much you goofed up. So I'm lucky I have that out.
On striking balance between telling classic jokes and newer ones:
Once I record something, I begin the process of moving on from that material. But when I'm doing a show now, like with the "Epitome of Hyperbole," I might have a handful of stuff from that, but usually I want it to be new, fresh stuff. That's different from the encore—then I try to do older bits for about 10 minutes, but that's always kind of a fun thing for the audience.
On writing shows and adapting them to specific audiences:
You might cater it a little bit. I have some jokes about getting older and losing my memory and high cholesterol, so I don't know if college students would relate to that. I might skew toward some of the things that aren't age-oriented. For the most part, it's just me and my silly, goofy little brain and you share those thoughts and hopefully people relate.
On the difficulty of separating comedy into genres:
Music has genres, but they have titles on theme — rock'n'roll, reggae, jazz. It's all music, but you can put them into different categories. Comedy also has different styles, but it's murkier and more challenging to describe those. You do hear the expression ‘alternative,' which is a kind of comedy, but it's such a broad term it's hard to understand what that means.
That's one of the fun, interesting things about comedy: It's hard to define and put into different genres that are very clear and easy to title.
On classifying his own style of comedy:
Once you start talking too much scientifically about it it takes away from the beauty of it (comedy in general). I think the beauty of comedy itself is that it's kind of hard to put words on it. The best answer I guess is that you just kind of see it, sort of like a painting on a wall. You look at it and it can be very interesting and creative, but then to leave that room and go somewhere else and try to explain that painting to someone, there's just no way to really do it. Even though the painting might be beautiful, it's hard to find the words to express it adequately.
Regan has been featured in two Comedy Central specials, 2008's "The Epitome of Hyperbole" and "Brian Regan Standing Up" in 2007.
If you go:
Brian Regan
Where: Emens Auditorium
When: Friday
Cost: All tickets are $35, $5 off for students with college ID.
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