Interview: Dane Cook
by Gordon Downs
Every so often, a comedian will come to the surface of popular culture and encapsulate an era and define the time, in a manner of speaking. And Dane Cook may very well be the comedian who shall carry America’s disenchanted youth into this brave new millennium. While his exact age is unknown (some speculate he may be 33 years old) the facts about Cook are as solid as cialis. He’s been doing stand up comedy for fifteen years. He’s been featured on TV from his appearances on the Tonight Show and the Late Show with David Letterman, as well as his many appearances on Comedy Central. His last album, “Harmful If Swallowed” was released in 2003 and established Cook as the comedian who would be king. In August, his second album, “Retaliation” debuted at Number Four on the Billboard top 200, surpassing Steve Martin as the highest charting comedian in motherfucking history. With Cook’s larger than life fan base and the appeal of the albums packaging, it’s a no brainer that his time to shine has finally arrived. A three disc affair, “Retaliation” contains two CD’s worth of Cook doing prime stand up, while the third disc is a DVD containing a teaser for his recent comedy tour, “Tourgasm”, unedited appearances from various Comedy Central hoo-ha’s and all the crank phone calls Cook did with the Crank Yanker’s squad of mental sodomites. I managed to catch Dane while he was relaxing at home in the Hollywood Hills recently, and this is how our conversation went.
Dane, what’s your problem?
Dane Cook: (laughing) I’ll tell you something, I’ve got seven problems and you’re five of them! That’s actually a quote from my favorite heckle that I’ve ever gotten. That happened about four years ago at a club. A guy was sitting in the front row, he was hammered and he was just being really despondent and making little sounds to himself. I finally looked down at him and I go, “Dude, hey you’re ruining the show,” and he kinda glared up at me and he was looking all salty and I go, “What is your problem?” And he just stood up [with] a bottle in his hand and I think it freaked everybody out so everybody got dead quiet, and he goes, “I’ve got seven problems! And you’re five of them!”
What year did you graduate high school?
1990. According to what I’m going to tell you right now. I’m a mystery dude. Everything is on the low-pro with me. You’re gonna find like seven different ages if you look on the internet. I never tell my real age dude. I’m very JFK.
Can you recall the first time you ever went on-stage at a comedy club, like at an open mic nite?
David Cross used to host one at Catch A Rising Star in Harvard Square. I was hanging out in the crowd just to watch, and I was not supposed to go on stage, and what they would do is they would read the list of names from the stage of who was next. Then all of a sudden from on stage David Cross says, “Okay, where’s Ernest Glenn? You’re next, Ernest Glenn? Ya here?” and then he would make up a weird intro for you. But no Ernest Glenn was in the crowd, and after about two seconds I realized that and shot my hand up in the air, and he looked at me and said, “Are you Ernest Glenn?” And I said, “Yes I am.” And that was my first set ever. I did five minutes, and it went great. I would do comedy every night, except for Holidays; I have a two or three year span in Boston where I never missed a night in comedy. I was just doing stand up, open mics, laundromats and Chinese food restaurants, every single night. So yeah, I know the world of the open mic.
That’s pretty wild man, serving up fresh comedy every night.
My way is to go up and keep it raw. I like living in the fear moment on stage. You’re on the cusp of, “This could all go away,” you always live moment to moment in stand up. You’re always constantly reassessing the crowd and what you’re saying, it never ends, it never will end, that’s stand up. It’s a constant energy back and forth that you have to like.
What about your first joke, can you remember that?
The very first joke I ever did was about an article in the newspaper, and the headline said: “I Was Raped By A Snowman.” So that was the first thing I talked about on stage. I was talking about the girl in court having to testify that she sucked his snowballs and that she was a snow-blower. It was just a wonderfully bad joke, but they were getting laughs.
So it’s your first night up and you’re not even really prepared to do a set, and you dive into rape material?
Yeah, I was opening the can right there. I was not going to just twirl the top, I was opening the can.
The new album is fucking hilarious and you have an amazing flow when it comes to timing. What’s your writing process like for jokes?
I haven’t physically written a note or anything comedically in about eight or nine years. I come from an improv background, the first four years I did sketches and all that shit. But when I started writing out jokes I became very frustrated, because of the speed at which my brain works. Especially on stage, I felt like I was molasses when I would try to actually see everything written. I knew that I liked to improvise, and I knew that when I saw bands or even certain comics. I wanted to give a crowd a feeling like this is happening right now. Those are the best fucking shows ever.
How about chess? Do ya like playing chess?
I’m a chess player, I love playing chess. And comedy, I structure it like chess because you have to always see ten moves ahead and remember what you did five moves ago.
Do you toss a few back before you hit the stage?
I’ve never had a drink of alcohol in my life. I never had a drink or a drug ever.
What the fuck Dane?
Dude, I’m a mutant. I’m a freak, I know. I’m in ballrooms my entire life and I’ve never even had a sip of alcohol in my life.
What do you attribute that to?
Not to take it too deep; but there’s a moment in your life when you have the opportunity to get into all that, and I remember being really young and I had a friend in school who was kind of like the school stoner. I was hanging with him and a bunch of guys one day and my friend never offered me any drugs but his buddies started offering me some stuff, and I had an epiphany. This has nothing to do with who I am. I would be lying if thought I would enjoy drinking. I like feeling feelings. I like feeling pain, I like going through fear, joy and I don’t like to put anything in my body that either enhances it or skews it. I wanna be as crystal clear on stage as I can.
What’s up with your military fan base? You seem to be quite popular with the US forces?
Every day from Iraq, I receive thousands of emails that are just unbelievable. I got this letter a few days ago where it was like, “Hey listen man, I’m a marine and we were in a fire fight last night, and me and my guys threw “Harmful If Swallowed” on when we got back, and it just relaxed us and had us all laughing.” I get letters from these guys in Baghdad, being like, “Got shot at, came back, listened to your CD thank you very much for making me feel like I’m home.” You don’t think about that when you start comedy.
“Tourgasm” what can you tell me about this apocalyptic film?
“Tourgasm” was thirty days, the entire month of April 2004. Twenty university dates, all five to ten thousand seaters. Right now we got four hundred hours worth of footage in the edit bay and we’re just piecing it together. Hopefully for something that will be out in spring 2006.
Is this gonna be a theatrical release or DVD only?
Having looked at the footage and all the crazy shit that happened, I think it could be like a “Kings Of Comedy” type thing. But my goal for it would be to put out a great documentary. Like a ten hour documentary of what we went through out on the road. But now TV people are getting into it and it could end up on Comedy Central or TBS, or it could end up in theaters I dunno?
How’s that dude who fucked up his knee in the “Tourgasm” teaser?
That’s Robert Kelly, he’s actually the guy I started doing improv with fifteen years ago. He’s alright. He snapped his ACL and tore his MCL. He’s walking on it and he’s gonna be okay. He’ll just never have any lateral movement again. He won’t be able to play football.
Does Dane Cook have a message for the children?
A message? “Retaliation” is in stores now.
2005 “Retaliation” (Comedy Central)
2003 “Harmful If Swallowed” (Comedy Central)