Black Comedy

Lewis gets to the root of it.

by A.D. Amorosi

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Lewis Black has every right to live up to his high-strung, stressed-out persona these days. The smartly sardonic playwright and comedian is currently readying his The Root of All Evil series for Comedy Central, filming a History Channel documentary and sharing acting tips with NYC schoolkids. Luckily, he's still finding time to deliver his beloved politically charged rants on the Red, White and Screwed tour. "Once I became a mainstream comic," he says, "I knew we were all in the shitter."

City Paper: What made you focus on comedy?

Lewis Black: I did it and do it because it's a way for me to write stuff and perform it. Because I couldn't get my plays done.

CP: As a standup, how married are you to the words on the page?

LB: I don't really write it down beforehand. I write night to night.

CP: What was the moment when what you acted and wrote morphed into standup?

LB: I always did it on the side. Eventually I became more comfortable and it turned into what I did. People became interested. I was only getting a play done each year. But in the meantime, I was getting paid good money to be a comic — at least compared to what I was making as a playwright.

CP: You're doing The Root of All Evil for Comedy Central. How does it feel to commit yourself to a series?

LB: I've wanted to do a series for the last decade. I'll do one if this writers' strike doesn't kill it. Then again, I can do it without breaking anything. I'm legally allowed by the Writers Guild to do my own stuff. We have a few non-Guild writers. We were going to go on as a non-Guild show to begin with. We'll see if we have to cross a picket line — which is never fun.

CP: And if someone calls you a scab?

LB: I won't feel good. But for all intents and purposes, I'm not a scab on any legal level. So they can go fuck themselves. I would back off of it because I believe in what they're doing. But don't tell me I can't do what I can legally do.

CP: Having studied at Yale Drama School, do you give as good as you got while teaching theater arts?

LB: I do. I give better. Yale was kind of a hellhole. I had great teachers, but I have more of an understanding about being supportive while giving criticism. Originally I figured I was going to be a teacher if I wanted to make a living and write.

CP: Why this persona, this yelling guy? Have you tried others?

LB: I did try others. A lot of comics are funnier offstage. When they start they don't know what from their real life to bring onstage. I'm funniest when I'm angry in real life. My friends said, "Start yelling," and I did. And all I could think to myself was, "Fuck, it took me that long to figure that out?"

Lewis Black

Thu., Nov. 15, 8 p.m., $45-$65, Academy of Music, 1420 Locust St., 215-893-1999, academyofmusic.org