Bill Burr - Stand up's Newest Big Deal By Ben Kharakh

Comedian Bill Burr has specials both on Comedy Central and HBO in addition to his role on Chappelle's Show. Here's what Bill has to say about stand up.

What should someone unfamiliar with your stand up expect from one of your shows? 

To laugh. I'm not good at analyzing my style. It jumps around to personal stories. Sometimes I'll have something that's a little political and some stuff is just stupid shit.

When did you know you wanted to be a Comedian? 

The first time I saw one. When I figured out that I was actually going to do it, I was about twenty.

It was Foster Brooks, maybe. I saw him on Johnny Carson. I'm talking about 1974. Him, David Brenner, and guys like that that were getting on. Anyone that was funny. Then I started buying albums, in the early 80's.

We finally got cable and some of those HBO specials that came on. That was the first time I saw Richard Pryor. I already had some of his albums, but seeing him on television was even better.

When did you perform your first show? 

I was twenty-three. I figured I was going to do it when I was twenty-one, but then I had to get through college and get the balls get on stage.

What were you studying in college? 

I was a communications major.

Is that something that you're able to draw from in your career as a comedian? 

I guess I'm communicating.

Where did you do your first show? 

Nick's Comedy Stop in Boston.

How did your first show go? 

I went down there one night in '92. It was awful, but exciting. I was supposed to do five minutes, but I did three and got off the stage. I got a couple of laughs. I tried a bunch of jobs at that point and I sucked at everything, but when I did stand up it felt right. Felt amazing, even though I sucked. It was a contest. Find Boston's funniest student. It was a scam to fill the club with a bunch of drunk college kids watching their friends. I was going to Emerson at the time and Emerson has a bunch of freaks on it so it lasted two nights.

Are you familiar with Emerson's program called the ECW? It sounds like professional wrestling, but it's a comedy workshop where people can perform in front of whoever's there to watch. 

That's great. I wouldn't have done it, though, in front of classmates. I'd have to do it in front of strangers. Although I did do a sketch one time.

What sketch was that? 

I was taking an interpersonal communications class. We were doing different social situations and we set up a restaurant. I was this waiter with a really hackney Italian restaurant, and of course it killed. Anything that's mindless and totally mainstream always kills. I thought it was brilliant, but I was beyond a hack.

Were you often incorporating humor into college, high school, and middle school? 

In high school I was a little ahead of a nerd, but I was not in the cool crowd. I was in the middle. I used to screw around in classes depending on what the social dynamic was. If it was a bunch of geeks like me, I would joke around a lot and be outgoing. But in other classes, with football players and cheerleaders, I knew the pecking order and kept my mouth shut.

What do you mean by geek? 

I just mean I was socially awkward and without a girl friend. I was into sports and stuff. I had all the ingredients, but it didn't work out.

What were the next few years like after the first stand up show? 

They were wild. The thing about learning to do stand up is that the only way to learn how to do it is to do it. You have absolutely no idea what you're doing. That's why in the beginning it's so terrifying and hilarious. You make such an ass of yourself. If you come up in a town with a good comedy scene, there are about ten or fifteen people that come up at around the same time. Watching people up there just flailing.

There's a cool camaraderie as soon as you start out, as long as it's not in New York or LA where it's brutal because there's so much industry and it's competitive. Boston was a great town to start in. It was a whole bunch of guys you started out with, you made friends, and rooted for other guys. It's how you got through really awful gigs.

I used to do this gig with Dane Cook, Patrice O'Neil, and Robert Kelly. It was the Ninety Nines Restaurant at Billerica Massachusetts. It was as though every week, the management was trying to create a new distraction. I remember going up during the hockey play-offs. They had the Bruins game on and shut it off. Maybe Dane was on stage and the whole crowd was flipping out doing some Robocop bit. By the time I got on there they had a truce where they had the game on but they had the sound down. I'm upstage and these people are just watching the game. I already sucked. If you were already paying attention to me you could maybe get a joke or two, but the whole crowd was just watching the game.

We were just talking about that on Opie and Anthony. I was sitting in for Jim Norton and Dane stopped by. He was promoting his show at Madison Square Garden and we were just talking about these old stories. These were the funniest stories because comedy was so new and so exciting. We had no idea of what we were doing. And the odds of someone screwing up horrifically was eighty percent. Someone had a meltdown, it seemed, almost every show.

What were you doing to support yourself financially at the time? 

I was working at a dental office with my dad. I got certified and was taking X-rays, impressions, and assisting on extracting of wisdom teeth. It was a great time, during which I got to know my dad well and got real close to him. When I was younger, he was working a lot trying to establish his practice. I'm glad I had five years to work with him.

Were other comics trying to come in to you for free dental work? 

I think Robert Kelly came in one time. We did something on him, but I don't remember what.

Can you compare doing stand up to something a norm would have experienced? 

Sales is the closest to it, I would say. You have a routine and you go in there. I tried to sell health insurance for two brutal weeks. I bought a suit, some wing tipped shoes, and it was a lot harder than doing comedy.

What changes have you noticed in comedy since you've started out? 

When I came in, it was during the tail end of the whole observational be a clean comic get on the Tonight Show period. The sport coat over the T-shirt, Miami Vice look, with converse high tops. It was around six years after that, in the early 90's and there were still a lot of shows that you could do if you were a comedian. A & E at the Improv, Comedy on the Road, Comic Strip Live, Stand up Spotlight was toward the end, and then comedy Central was just starting out. There were like fifty-two shows, and there were a lot of guys out there that had forty-five minutes but they were writing in five-minute chunks of clean material.

They were writing, I didn't feel from their hearts. It was, "This is a good bit to do on TV." I think they were trying to compile a bunch of those little bits to try to become a superstar, which is kind of hard when there's forty thousand comedians and they're all on those five shows. It was the beginning of political correctness, but I think there's been a backlash to that style. There's more people now working and talking in a conversational style.

How did you get involved with Chappelle's Show? 

I met Dave in about '97 and somewhere in '98 he caught the tail end of my act at the Comedy Cellar and said some really nice things to me. He said that I was working a unique angle I was working toward and that the route I was taking was going to take longer than somebody taking a safer route but when I hit I'd hit hard. He was encouraging the whole way along. Then I'd see him and say, "What's up." We'd talk, nothing major.

Then, in the second season they had a part they thought would work for me, in the Law and Order skit. I went in, did real well, and they liked the work I did on the sketch and started having me in.

What was the process for writing a sketch?

No, the only part I was participating in was submitting stuff that they weren't using. I'd submit a sketch and they'd say, "No, Snoop Dog already did something like that." They were hyper sensitive in making sure that what they were doing was original.

Was it a hectic work schedule you had at the time, balancing TV and stand up? 

I only did five sketches. That Law and Order one was probably the longest. It's a one camera shoot, so there's definitely a lot of set-up. I was taping sketches, it wasn't like a feature film or a sitcom. I did that Sam Jackson skit and all I did was sit there with a piece of cotton in my ear. And then Dave yelled at me.

What's the status of Chappell's Show? 

It's on hiatus.

When I told people I was interviewing you and asked if they had any questions for you, they said the same thing: is it hard to resist dropping the n-bomb with Dave, Charlie, and Paul doing it so often? 

No. It's like if I hung around with a bunch of surfers and they were all, "What's up brah," or whatever the hell they say, I wouldn't feel inclined to say that because I'm not a surfer. I'm white, so I'm not going to be saying that cause the only way if I could say that was if I was coming from a clan angle or some sort of wannabe, which I'm not. I'm a white dude from the suburbs and I like people, so I never use that word.

What projects are you currently involved in? 

I'm working with some people right now. We're developing a TV show. The big thing I just had was my HBO special. I'm on the Opie and Anthony Show. Jim Norton is away doing a sitcom, and they have me sit in quite a bit.

What's this show you're involved in?

I met with a production company and they maybe want to be in business with me. Then I get with a writer, try to come up with a show, maybe pitch it to the networks. That whole grind.

Do you have any ideas in a sitcom? 

I got a few, but I'm not going to put any of them in a magazine.

Good idea. Now, on your site, you're reading an edition of the New York Post with the headline Holy Shit. What was that article about? 

It says Holy Shiite. Typical, hackney, stuff. I had the idea of taking a picture of me sitting on the stairs reading the paper like I do in the morning, which I don't. I usually sit in my apartment, but it's a better picture outside. I went out and grabbed a paper without checking out the headline. It was an accident and I kinda wished I had taken something else because it looks like it's s stupid joke I was doing.

If you look closely there's two I's in the middle and an E at the end. I imagine it was so wacky, Middle Eastern story.

Have you got a message you'd like to leave our readers with?

Always wear a condom.