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SOURCE: E-mail interview with Doug Stanhope, U.S. comedian and host of Comedy Central’s The Man Show.
DATE: August 12, 2004
TEXT:
MARRIOTT: Why do you discuss politics in your act?
STANHOPE: I discuss what annoys, amuses or concerns me. Could be bloodfarts as easily as taxes or North Korea. If you're looking for a specific answer, I need a more specific question.
MARRIOTT: Generally, do political bits receive a better/worse crowd response today as opposed to when you began your career?
STANHOPE: It depends on what you call "political". Talking about Lewinski or choking on pretzels will always get a hoot from your average yay-hoos but it ain’t politics. Nor are most people interested in politics beyond the tabloid non-issues.
Politics is sports to most folk. They were raised to root for a team - Rep or Demo - and will root for their team to win using whatever nonsense issue or personal attack as fodder to make themselves feel part of the game. If you're talking to a Red Sox fan, you'll always get a Hooray by saying the Yankees suck but it doesn’t mean you’re discussing the game of baseball. Besides, when I started my career I was doing jerk-off jokes so I couldn’t tell you.
MARRIOTT: How great an effect on an audience do you believe political humor has to change individual perspectives or cause people to at least rethink their points of view? How great an effect do you hope it has?
STANHOPE: Most political comedy is defeatist in nature - "Hey politicians are all liars - but what are you gonna do?" It isn't usually presented in a form to affect change as much as to laugh at our perceived inability to make change. When you consider how music has fuelled movements from Vietnam to world hunger to Farm Aid, comedy fails miserably. One of the most hackneyed comedy routines in the history of stand-up is pointless airline rules and to this day we still have to have our seats two inches up during take-off.
But you'll get the strays caught in the net - the kid in Omaha that thought he must be crazy for thinking what you just finally said out loud and validated. You may not start a movement but its still worth it do for the strays.
MARRIOTT: What is your personal view why Bill Hicks was popularly received and played stadiums in the UK and Australia and was welcomed home with a gig at the Laff Stop (aka still only a cult figure in the US)?
STANHOPE: If you are popular with mainstream America, you're doing something wrong or they just don't get it. You're asking why they don't have a sushi bar at Wal-Mart.
MARRIOTT: Do you think 'entertainment' news (The Daily Show, Politically Incorrect) is a reasonable source of information? Do you think US network news (MSNBC, CNN, FOX) is a reasonable source of information?
STANHOPE: The Daily Show is possibly the best - if not anywhere near complete - news source on television. I watch 8 hours of CNN or Fox news a day on the road and they milks the five same stories that Jon Stewart covers logically and hilariously in 7 minutes.
I get my news on Salon.com. And at the end of the day, I realize that even if I knew the truth about everything, most of it doesn't make any fucking difference.
MARRIOTT: Any thoughts on the current presidential campaigns?
STANHOPE: Vote Libertarian until there's a viable and electable independent - which will probably come in the form of a celebrity in the next 8 years.
END.
to APPENDIX B
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