Richard Lewis talks about Curb Your Enthusiasm, getting health advice from Keith Richards, and 'the [blank] from hell'
The Interview From Hell
At 66, comic Richard Lewis is as busy as ever. He's in the process of putting together a box set that includes live stand-up performances, a movie he did for Saturday Night Live, a documentary about his Hollywood home (featuring three stories of showbiz memorabilia), and the 1995 film Drunks, in which he stars as a junkie. He's working on a book with an artist friend, who he says is "putting illustrations to my darkness." He's developing a TV project. Oh, and he recently acted in the upcoming Peter Bogdanovich film, Squirrels to the Nuts, in which he plays, believe it or not, a redneck. And somehow, he still finds time to work the stand-up circuit, as he'll do at Zanies Jan. 16-19.
The Scene caught up with Lewis by phone recently. On the agenda: Curb Your Enthusiasm, what it's like to get health advice from Keith Richards, and "the [blank] from hell":Tell me about Squirrels to the Nuts.
I was on the road doing some gigs and I get a text from Peter Bogdanovich's team, and I'm on the way to a show, and I'm trying to figure out the iPhone. I'd just had it like two days — I'd had the Thomas Edison cell phone, and I took the leap. And I see, "Bogdanovich wants you in his film," and I try to text "when," and he says, "tomorrow." ... I had to fly to New York and shoot the day after.
I play a redneck. It's really fun to not have a shred of neurosis.
Do you speak like a redneck?
If I don't I'm going to have to hide and move to Idaho.
So how does Richard Lewis do redneck?
There's no whine in my voice. If there was any whine, Bogdanovich said, "Cut!"
I'm a little nervous about it. Jennifer Aniston, Owen Wilson, Will Forte ... there was a whole load of stars. Cybill Shepherd is my wife, Imogen Poots is my prostitute daughter who sleeps with everybody on Broadway to get a show. ...
I had to get help from the stunt guys. I told my wife, "I don't have erectile dysfunction, but every time I flash back to me asking the stunt man, 'How do you make a fist?' " I mean that's really fucking with my brain, Jack!
Is it possible you could ever get too well and your act wouldn't work anymore?
It's inconceivable that I can get too well. In fact a therapist once said ... Oh, God, Jack, I don't want to bring you down.
When did you start doing standup?
I started when I was 23, in New York City. Played all the clubs in Greenwich Village. '71. With guys like Andy Kaufman, Billy Crystal, Freddie Prinze Sr. We were doing well onstage, but we weren't making any money.
The three big breaks I had, well into my career, were ... Carson of course. But the biggest one on the talk show circuit was when Letterman got his show in '82. And he basically told me, "Listen, you're so physical onstage." And he was right. It's not great for the camera if you're all over the place. ... He says, "You'll come on my show as often as you want and just sit on the couch, and just go nuts on the couch. It's better." I did about 60 or 70 of his shows, and that bumped me.
But I didn't really break until 17 years in, getting a TV show [Anything But Love] with a four-year — which should have have been a five-year — run. We got screwed out of it, really fucked out of it by executives. With Jamie Lee Curtis. And all of a sudden, 30 or 40 million people are seeing me, and within a month I'm selling out Carnegie Hall. That's just the luck of the draw.
And then, at 49 or 50, Larry David came over to my house and asked me, would I play myself on his show.
You were already good friends at that point, right?
Here's the deal. I was born three days before him. I was born very premature — immature. I was in the same ward as he was, when he was born three days later. But we didn't know each other then. And then I went to this sports camp when I was 12 or 13. ... And Larry David was there. And we were arch rivals. I mean the worst human beings. The long story short is that I really despised him, and he hated me. We were pretty good athletes and we were rivals.
And then about 12 years later I was already a stand-up, and he came in and watched me, and he loved my work, and he went on, and I loved his work, and we became inseparable. ... So one night I must have been putting a few back, and I was looking at his face, in an almost Roman Polanski way, like Rosemary's Baby. He looked like Larry's Baby. I said, "I know you, man!" And he got all shaken up, and said, "What are you doing?!" I said, "I'm not drunk, man. There's something about you that's satanic." I was sort of putting some words in there to scare him. He gets freaked sometimes.
So we retraced our childhood, and lo and behold, we were the two guys 13 years before. We fucking laughed, man. It was funny. ...
If Larry David and I walk into a Jewish service in a temple, it will pretty much be the end of the service.
Do you go to temple?
Uh, no. But I've been with him in the streets. We'll walk into a delicatessen. "When is Curb coming back?"
I'm in fairly good health, but even with my doctor doing the most intimate of procedures, he actually says to me ... I'm in a very uncompromising position, and he says, "Is Curb coming back?"
Of course, you know that's one of my questions.
Yeah, but he could take his finger out of my ass before he asks!
There it is! The headline!
Take the finger out of my ass! People will think it's homophobic, but it's not.
It's just medical.
It's a medical thing. ... But it's everywhere! At funerals! They're lowering the casket. [In a hushed voice] "Is Larry gonna come back?" Can't you throw some dirt in the grave first?
So answer the question.
I haven't asked him. Other people ask him. We have this thing that I just don't like to bug him. I'll just get a phone call. "We're coming back."
[We get on the topic of the Rolling Stones.]
I'm really close friends for 25 years with Ronnie Wood. Less so with Keith, and I had just met Jagger four or five years ago, and Charlie. [Ronnie's] been pretty public about his recovery. ... We help each other.
I've kept sober for a lengthy time, so he knows that, and so do the Stones. So they once invited me — first of all, to see the Stones in a small venue is great; it was like a 2,000-seater or 3,000 — so they said, Richard ... I don't know who called me, but they said, "Ronnie said, come in with your wife Joyce, just you two." And we did. And they had one of those espresso machines in there for them. And I might add the same shit food they give to anybody. I couldn't believe it. The flies, one piece of pastrami, and crusted bread.
Not even Hebrew National, huh?
Nothing! Little frilled toothpicks. And that was the day — I'll always remember — I was reaching for some Swiss cheese, and Keith grabbed my hand and pulled it away. "Keith," I said, "Why the fuck shouldn't I eat it?" And he says, "It's bad for your cholesterol." And I went, "Keith, really, with all due respect, you're not my nutritionist."
[We start talking about his house.]
It's three stories of show business history. Which, if you ever come out, you'll get a kick out of seeing, before I get out of the house.
Is that an invitation? Yes, it's an invitation. I'll give you a cake.
This sounds like the making of a Curb episode. I show up at your house banging on the door.
And I forget that I promised you, and then I don't let you in. And it turns out you have some affiliations, with some, you know, Hamas. And that you're a spy.
There are so many Curb episodes where Larry is embarrassing you. Does that happen in real life?
He had total control, thankfully, for the show. I think he just ... thought the best thing would be for me to be angry. I'm sort of thin-skinned. He played that card — the "embarrass Lewis" card — and would upset me.
I just watched the bracelet episode again last night.
That's one of my favorite episodes. And by the way, on that episode, when we were racing for that door — I'll always remember that — we were really physical, because we were such rivals. We were really fighting down there. I broke his glasses, and I hurt his wrist. He wasn't pissed off, because he got the shot. But once we finished the shot, and he realized that he hurt his hand, and he had to get new glasses, he was pissed off. But it was totally real. He just pushed that button of, "Oh yeah? Screw you man!"
He's a tremendously literate guy. Articulate, and a great wordsmith. The point is, when I would screw up with a word — on one show I called bin Laden "Ben Laden" — I saw his eyes get as big as a possum or raccoon. I thought, "Fuck me, I'm a moron. The whole world will know."
And he said, "Did you actually say Ben Laden?" And he knew he had me. And luckily I said, "Yeah, Ben Laden, he's my shirtmaker on Broadway and 45th Street." I turned him into a Jewish shirtmaker. And he kept that in too. Luckily, it was a good comeback. He loves to humiliate me if I use the wrong verb tense or mispronounce a word. He goes fucking nuts.
You mentioned Mel Brooks earlier. I've got a great idea: He brought The Producers to Broadway. What about a musical version of Robin Hood: Men in Tights? You think the world is ready?
I don't think you could top The Producers. And why should he? It won more Tonys than anything that ever lived. ...
It was great fun working with him. That was 22 years ago. He did call me up and say, "You're my Prince Charming! Don't say no!" And he hung up. He's a very tough guy to hang up on. Not that I would have.
So did you really invent "the [blank] from hell"?
Yes. Absolutely. Well, I didn't invent it, I coined it. In fact, [the Curb episode] "The Nanny From Hell" was based on that. Larry knew that. I totally popularized the phrase in the late '70s. If you go on YouTube, you can see on Letterman, David would cut me off, and go, "You mean it was the Bar Mitzvah from hell?" "That's right!" And I stopped saying it. I felt self-conscious. I was getting applause for it. I guess subconsciously I thought I was a victim of everything.
Was that improvised in the episode?
The outline for the show was there. I didn't know about it. There's always a few key lines to move the story forward. So this actor was sitting next to us in this diner. Larry is always uncomfortable if people are too close to his body. I am too, actually. So he is staring at this other guy at the other table, and Larry says, "Are you getting all of this?"
And the guy says, "This is the conversation from hell." And I said, "You see, Larry!"
He had that in the outline. It was a real solid for Larry to do that for me. That really immortalized it in some respects.
What can fans expect in Nashville?
One show a night. Every show is different. I don't have an act. I just have about 30 million images in my head. I bring about 2,000 new things and sit in a hotel, and cram for it like it's a mid-term. And then I hear my name, and I have no idea ... Once Leno said to me, "Why do you always look so freaked out?"
I said, "Jay, maybe I don't have an act, OK?"
It will be great seeing some of my pals. I'm old friends with Henry Gross, who lives in Nashville. I don't know who's in town, but hopefully they'll come and check me out. Nashville has become so cosmopolitan lately, and branched out musically. I started becoming friends with most of the people I listened to, like Peter Frampton, and I'm a longtime friend of J.D. Souther. I've been shooting out emails that I'm coming to Nashville. I can't wait to get there. You better get some hipsters out there.
So now I'm thinking about what kind of juices ... do you like Pellegrino when you come out here? I don't want to let anyone down. I don't like to make promises and, you know. You said you come out to California?
Yes. If you're for real, I'll take you up on it.
Of course I'm for real! A Jew? A sober Jew who works for a hip magazine? Yeah, the sober Jew thing. And we can make it a Curb episode, like you're going to kidnap me.
And I'll come see you at Zanies.
Hey, don't feel obligated to come to the fucking show. Hey, you're lucky if I fucking show up.
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