A Quote by Mike Scully
I did a show called 'What A Country,' with Yakov Smirnoff and Don Knotts. I used to write jokes for Yakov's stand-up act.
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So Fox News is the voice of America and Obama is Stalin? Oh my God! I guess that makes me Yakov Smirnoff.
I was not only typecast as a Russian, but I was typecast as Yakov Smirnoff. This is understandable, and I was very happy to get the roles, but it would be nice to be in a movie where I could be someone else.
When I first started doing my stand-up act, I played the banjo, did comedy, magic tricks, juggled, read poetry. I stuck it all in. I didn't know you were supposed to just stand up and tell jokes. Essentially, that's what my act became: those five elements - except I dropped the poetry.
I remember seeing Letterman do stand-up on 'The Tonight Show.' Or, it's probably more accurate to say, I remember hearing him do stand-up, because the Carson show existed mainly as sound leaking under my bedroom door at night. I'd hear Johnny telling jokes and my dad laughing at them.
Being on the plane is my catch-up time. I write thank-you notes. I read. I write stand-up jokes.
I used to do stand-up, actually. I had a ten-minute routine I did for a thing called 'Stand Up for Labour' where we'd go around different seats and use comedy to raise money. I stopped doing this routine when I started running for mayor.
When I started comedy, I was a big Eddie Murphy fan. I thought if you did stand-up, you were supposed to know how to act, write, and host. I thought it was all one thing. That's why it doesn't feel like I'm transitioning to acting: because in my stand-up, I do characters all the time.
Stand-up life is really hard. At one point, I got so paralyzed I could write five screenplays before I could write three jokes for stand-up. Later, I've finally allowed myself to relax quite a bit, to think I can do it because I've done it in the past. The pressure to come up with the material is the same but the anxiety about whether I can do it is gone.
Once you're in a room like '30 Rock,' it's a creative setting, so you write more even after you go home, just because you're still in that mode of coming up with jokes. So the job wasn't sapping standup jokes, but it was sapping stand up time and energy, and I wouldn't be able to travel as much.
I always wanted to be an actor. I did drama at Manchester University and then had a stand-up comedy double act with a guy called Bruce MacKinnon.
My first time on TV doing stand-up, I actually did this show in Holland called 'The Comedy Factory' hosted by Jorgen Raymann. It was in 2006 in Holland. It was amazing. I had only been doing stand-up for four years, and I booked that gig through the Just For Laughs Montreal festival, and they flew me out and put me up.
I try not to write jokes that are mean. I try my best to write jokes that are pretty universal and jokes that don't attack anyone. I know I often fall short of that and end up taking unfair swipes at people, but I try not to.
I used to make everything myself. I used to do my own hair, make my own costumes, write my own jokes, and write my own songs. There were definitely some days where I had to choose between having tights that didn't have holes in them or having to buy makeup or something I needed for a show.
But long story short, I didn't start doing stand-up because I wanted to have a TV show or be an actor or even wanted to write sketch comedy. I got into stand-up because I love stand-up.
I write in reverse: Rather than come up with a narrative and write jokes for that narrative, I write jokes independently of the narrative, then I try to fit them in.
In the stand-up comedy top, there's room for everyone - if you're good, there's room for everyone. You'll put on your own show - no one casts you. You cast your own show as a stand-up comedian. When you get good at stand-up comedy you book a theater and if people show up, people show up. If people don't show up, people don't show up. You don't have a director or a casting agent or anybody saying if you're good enough - the audience will decide.
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