Here’s some unsolicited advice for anyone wishing to interview people for publication: record your conversations with two devices. If one happens to fail, you likely won’t have to experience the moment of sheer terror when you realize the amazing 45-minute tête-à-tête you just had with Jay Mohr has vanished into thin air. Fully and completely. I was heartbroken. It was such a great discussion. We talked about everything from civility on the internet to the Cleveland Browns – and he couldn’t have been funnier, more insightful, or more genuine.
Damn it.
While I learned a rather valuable lesson from that little miscalculation, I learned even more about Mohr’s character. After I’d sheepishly emailed his publicist about my incredibly amateur mistake, she responded a short time after to tell me that he was happy to reschedule. He certainly didn’t owe me that. But, we were on the phone again just a few days later for another half an hour — talking about everything from drinking at New York Rangers games to my hometown of Winnipeg. And he was even funnier, more insightful, and more genuine. He paused our interview at points to share a few hilarious off-the-cuff anecdotes – “this is not for the article… this is for you.” I’ll cherish those little personal asides for a long time.
I’d like to think my interviewing Mohr was kismet. I saw him perform stand-up for the first time in 1998 at the Laugh Factory when I was living in Los Angeles for the summer; and actually, he was the first stand-up comic I’d ever seen live at that point. He was a few years removed from Saturday Night Live, and had just recently been seen in major roles in Jerry Maguire and Picture Perfect. Almost eighteen years later, Mohr has significantly more notches in his belt, having appeared in about two dozen more films — including Suicide Kings, Pay It Forward, and Go. He was cast as Professor Rick Payne in the CBS drama Ghost Whisperer from 2006-2010, and starred in the network’s scripted comedy Gary Unmarried from 2008 to 2010.
Mohr currently helms his own talk show, Jay Mohr Sports, on Fox Sports Radio, publishes a regular blog series on his website, JayMohr.com, and hosts an acclaimed podcast, Mohr Stories, on the PodcastOne network. He continues to perform stand-up around the country, and premiered his second Showtime comedy special Happy. And A Lot. — written solely by his wife, actress Nikki Cox — last March. This Friday, he’ll stop in Columbus to perform at the Rock on the Range festival at Mapfre Stadium.
You’ve have your stamp on almost every type of media imaginable, but no matter how many projects you juggle it seems you continue to come back to stand-up comedy. I get the sense that it’s your first love – am I right about that?
“Yes, stand-up comedy is definitely my first love, but I think it’s more because that’s what I am. You’re born a comic, you’re born a comedian. People say ‘I think I’m pretty funny, maybe I could try it’. I always say ‘go! Try it! You’ll know immediately.’ So, I always return to stand-up comedy because I have things I want to say. I want to be the center of attention. Me, me, me, me. We get into this business because we’re egomaniacs. Let’s be honest – when I do stand-up comedy…I get paid a nice wage. I’m compensated…if you’d told me at twenty years old…absurdly. So, I don’t know why anybody would leave that money on the table. Jay Leno – with The Tonight Show – would fly to do corporate shows. He did, like, three a week – he did a hundred thousand dollars three times a week and never spent his Tonight Show money. It’s Accounting 101, but also I like making people laugh; ever since I was a kid. But, I could never find the people – everyone was older than me in my neighborhood. And when you’re in high school, you’re not gonna hang out with a junior high guy – when you’re a senior, you’re not gonna hang out with a freshman. And when I finally got on stage, that was the first time I could really just be me. It’s what I am. Tiger Woods was born to play golf – and cheat – so, he’s a cheater-golfer. I was born to do comedy and not cheat. I’m a comedy-not-cheater.”
I laugh and Mohr pauses. “That’s horrible. You’ll cobble that all together.“
I shift focus to his podcast, Mohr Stories, which has been airing since 2011. During our first interview, we discussed why he decided to conquer yet another format with his hands already firmly immersed in radio, television, film, and the blogosphere. He requested I listen to a handful of episodes that best illustrated moments at which he and his guests drifted away from comedy into deep and unexpected subject matter – something he believes makes podcasts like his uniquely intriguing. When we spoke again a few weeks later, I had done my homework.
I listened to the Reggie Watts episode you suggested on our last call. I loved that you two explored the topic of space travel – and you did it so passionately. It was such a great conversation. I could’ve listened to you two talk about the cosmos all night.
“When you stop talking about comedy – ahh! When you listen to interviews, and comics specifically – great comics like Reggie Watts – they’re listeners. You watch Russell Brand on Conan – it’s amazing. Robin Williams – best listener there ever was. If you had a joke he’d give it up. Comics walk around going ‘eh, that’s funny’, but Reggie Watts was, like, listening when I was talking about NASA.”
The episode where you and Pastor Rob Bell talked at length about the concept of faith was fascinating. You also reflected on how it’s specifically impacted your life and your relationships. I haven’t heard you mention it explicitly in your material, but does your faith shape your comedy at all?
“Um, no. I doesn’t at all. Shape my comedy? No. It never really enters my mind, and I don’t have any jokes about it. It’s very off-putting if you’re on stage with bright lights and microphone and start talking about faith. I have references to personal things that have happened to me, answered prayers…But no, oddly I do not have any material about it. No, it doesn’t shape any of my comedy, not at all, actually. I’ve never been asked that question before. So, I’m really on my heels a bit – this is great! You would think a guy with faith that follows The Word with a capital ‘W’ would have faith sort of shaping ideas and thoughts and stories. Maybe my faith is not that funny to me, but also I think it doesn’t really dawn on me. It has dawned on me to talk about certain things on stage that are Biblically-related. But you can sense a part of the room sag out and sort of take a break – maybe the tide goes out. Saturday I did a joke about my son’s Bible books. He’s four and he’s obsessed with the resurrection – the crucifixion of Christ! And he just wants the crucifixion story over and over again, so I go to the library to get a kids’ Bible, you know – so it’s age appropriate. And that got a laugh. But somebody drew Jesus in this Santa Monica Public Library book – he’s just like an Italian guy with a gut. He just didn’t look like the Jesus that we’re used to, and my son called BS and goes ‘who’s that guy?’ I go ‘that’s Jesus’. He goes ‘that’s not Jesus. Who’s that guy? Who is that guy?!’ And he had, like, Wolfman Jack hair. And then, I did Guido Jesus – and it did well. But, I could definitely feel people…they’re not comfortable laughing about faith. So, if I ever have anything faith-related in my show, it’ll be a conversation I had with Father Tim, or I’ll put it in a long narrative of a story about something else – it’ll be a bit of a pit-stop as opposed to the actual story, and it’s important to the story. But, to do an entire thing around it, I that’s more for, like, a book. I’m sure my faith has guided me in certain directions and to certain places in humanity and the connections I make with others – if I was going to go deeper on an existential level. Certainly. Just going up there (on stage) is a leap of faith, but no, I don’t believe so. I think that’s – you should be on the podcast asking that question.”
I want to talk about Los Angeles – partially for sentimental reasons. You were the first stand-up comic I ever saw on stage when I was living there. I don’t remember everything about your set, but I clearly recall a hilarious bit you did about the difference between people on the west and east coasts giving directions…
“…Wow, I forgot about that, Grant. Yeah, you come to L.A. and you ask ‘how do I get to Sony?’ And people say ‘get on the 405.’ And you say ‘well, where the hell is the 405?!’ And they say ‘well, go west on Sunset Boulevard, and…’ What? West?! What am I – Magellan?! What am I – Vasco de Gama?! I gotta carry a compass?! Left or right, dummy?! And the freeways here…you can get on the 101 north, or the 101 south – and there’s a part of it in the San Fernando Valley where you can get on the 101 east or the 101 west! It’s like a highway asterisk.”
Stand-up seems to be synonymous with L.A. There also seems to be a notion that it’s this tight-knit comedy community where the performers all know each other, partner together, look out for one another. Is that reality or perception?
“Uh, that’s perception. There is definitely a fraternity in New York, Boston, San Francisco… Denver has a really great little community of stand-up comics. Los Angeles, by its very design, is so spread out – it’s very difficult to see your closest friends as often as you would wish. You have to get in your car and go all over the place – whereas Manhattan you walk down the street. And, comics are never really in the same town at the same time. There are definitely L.A. comics, but we all come here from somewhere else, mostly. So, when I’m backstage with Greg Fitzsimmons talking, and Eddie Ifft comes over and asks a question, there’s three completely separate cities right there that are backstage at one place. So, I think it’s more perception, but I can see why – because if you’re successful you come here because you want to go to that next step – you want to take that next rung on the ladder of television voice-overs, movies, whatever it may be. Or be on The Tonight Show. So, we are here but I don’t know of “Los Angeles comics” really like sort of hanging tight like we did in Manhattan when we literally would sit on a stoop until four o’clock in the morning breaking each others’ chops. And when I moved here and I was breaking people’s chops, I realized if you do that and you don’t know the person really well, they’ll think you’re a jerk. If you’re successful and breaking the chops of a person who’s not as successful, it’s not OK. It’s sort of like Jenga – like, every time you leave to go do a sitcom, there’s a piece missing from the tower. So, when you come back and you say ‘hey! Look at that shirt!’, you kind of knock the tower over. It’s not as steady as it once was. In Boston – when I came up in stand-up – there were Manhattan comics; they were the ones that didn’t drive. And I always had to go pick them up and I would open for them because I had a car – in high school. So, I wound up making a lot of my money just because I had to place for them to sit to take them to their actual jobs of comedy. When I went up there in the early 90s – incredible. Barry Crimmins, Don Gavin, Jimmy Tingle – these are legends. San Francisco, sure. There are a lot of L.A. comics, but the guys that I mesh with – the guys that I consider brothers – are from somewhere else.”
You’ve just mentioned an entire list of comedians that have made some sort of impact on you. You and I talked about Russell Brand already tonight, but are there any up-and-coming talents that have piqued your interest?
“More than a new person that blows my mind – what really gets me thinking and excited is the established headliner taking it up a notch. Patton Oswalt – we all know he’s a national headliner. He’s amazing. You just look at his Twitter feed and on any night he’ll have ten tweets about a TV show – and you think to yourself ‘where were you storing this before Twitter and this particular show?!’ And then you listen to his albums and there’s such a difference between one to the next, to the next, to the next. And when I see Greg Fitzsimmons go on stage, who’s already a headliner, and talk about his wife and his kids – I can’t do any of that material after he has done it. Because I don’t know how I can improve on it. It’s very different than what he did, but he just got that response. You know what? I’m gonna do impressions instead. It’s what I love about comedy – when a guy’s been doing it for twenty-five years…now what are they doing? Because when I came up, guys had their one hour and they just did it over and over and over. Now guys get their hour and they just put it in their spam file and they just keep going for a new hour. That hour’s on television. Then it’s another hour. These guys have eight hours of material. That’s what gets me really excited. And when I listen to George Carlin – like, people that have long passed…or I listen to Steve Martin and Cruel Shoes or Let’s Get Small…I think ‘oh my gosh…how?! How did this happen?! This is amazing!’ And there are other albums, obviously, conversely, that age horribly. It’s like ‘wow, when I was fifteen this was the best…this is awful! This is the most homophobic rant I’ve ever heard in my life!’ But the headliners that take it up a notch and keep going, and going, and going – that’s way better than any up-and-comer.”
I’m going divert our conversation to a more serious topic – but I think it’s so important for you to give voice to it because you’ve been so open about discussing your personal struggle with anxiety and depression. And maybe even more specifically – is there a greater need to talk about how it impacts men in particular?
“Well, I don’t think mental health is spoken about enough – and I think there is such a terrible stigma attached to (it). When somebody has depression, it’s hard to explain to another individual ‘I don’t know why I get out of bed. I don’t know what my purpose is. I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know what the point of going to work is. I don’t know why anybody likes me’. You need to share those feelings and get well – and get help. But guys – speaking from a panic and alcoholic point of view, personally – we want to fix things ourselves. That’s how we’ve ran our entire lives: the lightbulb goes out, I’ll get the lightbulb, I’ll take this one out and put the next one in – click! – we’re good. But we’re not neuroscientists, we’re not psychopharmacologists. If you have panic disorder – it is a disorder. It’s a sickness. If you had asthma, you wouldn’t treat it yourself. But because it’s your brain, it’s embarrassing to reach out – which is absurd. The manliest thing you can do is ask someone for help. And you’ll be amazed at how quickly and how beautifully people will extend their hand and bring you toward them – and express ‘I know exactly how you feel. It happened to me here. It happened to me there.’ So, I talk about it very often in my stand-up because that’s what I have gone through. I tell stories about myself. I had panic disorder – horrible. Saturday Night Live – live television…the panic – it bends your mind up to a space-time continuum you didn’t know existed. And, if you’re struggling with alcoholism…I get emails at JayMohr.com, and I’ll tell you – fifty percent of the emails I receive are ‘I think I have panic and I need to get help’, ‘I’m an alcoholic – what do I do?’ Fifty percent. So, there are people out there who hear the signal and the noise and they respond. And I don’t feel the need to do it on stage as an outreach program to help those in need – I’m not that magnanimous. I feel the need to do it on stage because it happened to me, and something hilarious happened as a result of it…I do it ’cause it’s funny. I’m glad I’m talking about it, and if anyone else goes through it – help somebody, reach out, or be of help.”
You’ve talked about your son, Meredith. Does he know dad’s funny, or that he’s in the business of being funny?
“He knows that I’m funny. He knows that when Daddy goes to work there’s times he puts on a suit jacket and gets on an airplane – and that’s different than other dads going to work. And, it’s interesting ’cause I can tell how smart he is by what he laughs at. Like sarcasm – when he was four years old he’d end up getting hysterical about something sarcastic – over and over. And you think ‘well, this guy’s really smart. He understands this. Like, this song’s horrible and I’m telling him that it’s my faaaavorite song. It’s so good!’ And he’s laughing and laughing. So, he definitely thinks I’m funny – I don’t think he can process that you go on stage and make people laugh for an hour. You know, ’cause he wants to be a trash truck driver. And the trash truck comes by every Tuesday, so he’s got something tangible to look at and aspire to – whereas stand-up comedy is sort of this way out in the galaxy idea. So, he knows – I think he knows I’m funny and I’m judging that by us laughing a lot together. We’re a silly house. And his mom is tremendously funny – funnier than me. Smarter than me – oh, man. So, he gets it, certainly. I’ll put on certain things and watch him laugh; like if I put on “Puttin’ On The Ritz” – Gene Wilder in Young Frankenstein – that’s hysterical. He gets all of that. Steve Martin tap-dancing and stuff – Gregory Hines…he thinks that’s funny. Just very specific high-brow, odd things, you know? I think if I’m trying material out on a four-year-old, it’s probably going to south pretty quickly – longer attention span in my audience than in my own home. But, I’ll tell you this – I’m batting a thousand in that top bunk.”
Jay Mohr will appear Friday, May 20 at 7:30 pm at Rock on the Range at Mapfre Stadium, One Black & Gold Boulevard. Regular admission tickets are sold out, but VIP Experience packages are still available for purchase via Ticketmaster. Jay’s blog, links to his podcast, Mohr Stories, and other information can be found on his website. You can listen to broadcasts of the Jay Mohr Sports show on Fox Sports Radio here.
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