Brian Regan makes waves in the comedy world, but accomplishes it in a unique fashion. He does it completely clean-no vulgarity, no risq??e situations, just clever, straight-up comedy.
Whether he jokes about Little League horror stories, inane UPS regulations or one of Evel Knievel's accidents, Regan keeps it pure and hilarious.
Recently, he talked with The Daily Cardinal about his \Take Luck"" tour, which stops by the Barrymore, 2090 Atwood Ave; Friday night, as well as his comedy, his family and chimpanzees-funny ones, in human outfits.
The Daily Cardinal: What's it like to be a clean comedian in a dirty comedian's world?
Brian Regan: Well, I didn't realize they owned the world. I have to check in with them every day and get my sets approved-that sort of thing (laughs). Actually, there are a lot of comics out there who work dirty, blue, filthy, raunchy, who I think are great. I just happen to like to work clean myself. It has nothing to do with being a prude or anything like that; I just enjoy the challenge of it.
DC: How did you develop your comedic style?
BR: I never really consciously set out to develop a style-when you first start you throw everything at the wall to see what sticks and then, after a while, you go, ""Ah, that stuff doesn't really work for me."" When I first started I had this old videotape of me from the early '80s. I walked on stage with a bag and had a handful of props.
DC: Like Carrot Top?
BR: Carrot Top wasn't even around then. This was PC-pre-Carrot Top in the comedy timeline. I had maybe four or five little props and was just exploring, trying to see what would work for me.
DC: When you're trying out new material, do you find people are non-receptive because they want to hear the old bits from the CD, Brian Regan Live!?
BR: I'm pretty fortunate in that the people do respond to the newer stuff. I try to concentrate mainly on newer stuff when I'm on stage. Of a given hour that I do, I would say that 80 percent of it is from the last three years. And then I'll throw in some older stuff just to have it in there, or just to have some fun.
It's weird, it's like a catch-22-some people want to hear the older stuff, some people want to hear the newer stuff-it's impossible to please everybody at every moment, so I just try to please myself.
You know, my attitude is, ""Hell with the audience. Hell with them and their wishes and desires. This is all about pleasing Brian Regan!"" (laughs)
That should be the name of the tour: ""The Hell with You Tour"" starring Brian Regan (for Brian Regan's benefit).""
DC: Speaking of your CD-which came out in '97-is there anything new coming down the pipeline?
BR: In the year 2016, I have a pamphlet coming out (laughs)... no, I have a DVD out called ""I Walked on the Moon,"" and it's available on BrianRegan.com. That came out a week before Christmas, and it features a completely different hour of material than what is on the CD and it's doing quite well.
DC: While we're talking about your projects, rumors recently came out that you were working with ""Scrubs"" producer Bill Lawrence on making a show.
BR: That's a rumor I got started just to have some interesting buzz out there, but I just made that whole thing up (laughs). No, it's true. I'm quite honored that he and his writing partner, Tim Hovert, had both been fans of mine for a while, so we're all working together on a show idea, and we have our fingers crossed, so we'll see what happens.
DC: Do you have any set ideas for the show, or is it still in the experimental stage?
BR: Well, there are definitely going to be funny chimpanzees. That's the one thing we've all agreed on-that you have to have funny chimpanzees doing human-like behavior, because there's nothing funnier than an animal acting sort of like a human.
DC: Wearing human clothes, right?
BR: Oh, you gotta wear human clothes, and then you give them some type of situation where they need to react like a human would react-you see the monkey's version of the human reaction and laughter just ensues!
DC: What do you do in order to prepare for a show?
BR: Well I travel with funny chimpanzees, and I just stare at them-no, I'm going too far with the whole chimpanzee talk!
No, I don't really do that... I have a couple of notes jotted down on a napkin-certain bullet points of new stuff I want to get to when I'm on stage, and I'll go over that. Also, I don't know if this is appropriate, but I mainline black tar heroin, and I can't speak highly enough about that, and that's about it-I go over my notes, and I mainline my heroin (laughs).
DC: Aside from the black tar heroin, in your free time, what do you enjoy doing?
BR: Well, I enjoy golf and mostly hanging out with my wife and children-I can't recall their names, but from what I remember they are just wonderful. No, I have a terrific family, and that is everything to me. The comedy thing, people wouldn't realize this, but it's sort of a secondary aspect of my life. As much as I love doing it, it pales in comparison to being at home.
DC: Does being a comic on the road ever conflict with being married and having a family?
BR: I'm able to make my schedule family-friendly. I've gotten to a point where I'm not on the road all of the time. I can take plenty of time off to be home, so it works out quite well.
DC: Do you think any of that might change once the TV show starts up?
BR: Once the TV show comes, I'm already talking with attorneys, that's when you file for divorce, because they have models and stuff out in LA. What you do is get yourself a model that you can be with. I've already told my wife, she already knows it's all part of the deal. She understands... now put in parentheses ""Brian said jokingly"" (Brian said jokingly).
My hope is that we will still have plenty of time together, in fact, my wife and I talk about that quite a bit. If I do get lucky enough to get a show, we're trying to figure out ways in which we can spend plenty of time together.
-Interview conducted by Kevin Nelson
