Standup comedy can include more than just normal “jokes.” It can also include art, or music, or simple humorous sentences.
Demetri Martin’s act has all of this. After writing for The Late Show With Conan O’Brien and appearing on The Daily Show, he had a short-lived sketch-comedy show, Important Things With Demetri Martin. He’ll perform at 8 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 14, at the McCallum Theatre.
During a recent phone interview, Martin discussed how Important Things helped him develop a niche fanbase.
“It ended up being a weird experience for me, because at the time, it felt so high stakes, and I put so much work into it,” Martin said. “It was like a kamikaze mission just to get everything done, learning sort of on the job and everything—and then the show ended, and that was it. It just sort of vanished. That was before, obviously, the world we live in now. There’s so much content, and there was a lot then, but so much more now. … At the time, if I had known that it doesn’t really matter, I probably still would have worked really hard on it, but I might not have taken some of it so seriously—to be like, ‘Oh, god, this is so important.’ Now most people not only have never heard of it, but you can’t even find it.”
Martin said he struggled to get the show more attention.
“At the time, I fought really hard to get clips on YouTube and try to promote it,” said Martin. “It was very clippable and all that stuff, but Viacom got in a big fight with YouTube or their parent company, whatever it was, so they would take down anything. There was no chance to promote it beyond Comedy Central’s crappy website, so I sort of knew it was doomed in a lot of ways. I think what was kind of ironic was, by the time the show got canceled, I was starting to figure it out. I was like, ‘All right, I think I know how to do this now,’ and then they were like, ‘Yeah, show’s done.’”
Martin is visiting the Coachella Valley as he prepares for a new Netflix comedy special. He said will be part one of a trilogy that’s interlinked narratively.
“I’m hoping (they’ll be released) over the course of about two years; we’ll see how the release dates work out,” Martin said. “… Even though each one will stand on its own, they’re also linked together, which is kind of cool. It’s definitely all still based mostly in jokes, but there are some personal stories in it, and then there is a larger story that connects all three. It’s a personal story, but it’s almost like sci-fi. It’s very different and weird, and I think it’s its own thing. I haven’t seen anybody do this sort of thing yet, so I feel excited that I might be in a slightly new area here to try to do this linking thing.”
In other interviews, Martin described his time writing for Late Night as a “quarter life crisis.” Since Martin turned 50 this year, I was curious what his midlife crisis was or is.
“(My quarter-life crisis) got me on this path, and then I was like, ‘All right, I think I feel like I’m going the right way for me,’ and now I’m 50, and I’m like, ‘Wow, I’m pretty far down a certain road,’” Martin said. “The challenge has changed, because there’s less natural newness to things. … It feels like you’ve got to not get too stuck in certain ruts, unless you’re comfy doing that, then fine. For me, I’m trying to mix it up and challenge myself in different ways, and just not just do the same sorts of things.”
Martin said he has completed his midlife crisis.
“There was an interesting coincidence of the pandemic hitting right when I was in my midlife crisis stuff,” Martin said. “It was a global crisis, so I got to just sort of ride that wave while my little midlife thing happened at the same time. I’m coming out of both of them at the same time, so that’s good timing. I’m working on all kinds of different new stuff. I’m still trying to write books, and think I’m going to do my first art show in the spring, which I’m excited about.”
Art and cartoons have long been parts of Martin’s comedy. His sketches often illustrate his stories or provide visual gags for his thoughts. The art show that Martin is working on will feature “paintings that are funny.”
“It would be like going to a comedy show, but it just takes place on the walls, and there’s no words, and I don’t have to be there,” Martin said. “If it were to work, I’d love to be able to have it be seen in different countries where people don’t speak English … to see how much comedic ideas translate or travel that are just about basic conditions, situations or human nature. It’s kind of like one-liners, but even more reductive. How economical can I make a joke?”
Martin’s media-varied style took years to fully develop. When he first started doing comedy, his approach was more fast-paced and centered on traditional jokes, he said.
“I would just tell as many (jokes) as I could in the six minutes or 10 minutes that I got onstage,” Martin said. “I was carrying notebooks around a lot, which I hadn’t before I was a comic, and that led me naturally into drawing more, which I had done as a kid. When I started drawing, I was thinking immediately that there could be overlap here.”
New York’s experimental comedy scene helped Martin develop his signature style.
“Back then, there was more of a clear line between what they would call ‘club comedians’ and ‘alternative comedians,’” Martin said. “The club comics were doing, in retrospect, much more of an ’80s style of standup comedy—not necessarily in the topics or the content, but more in the form, which is microphone, stool, brick wall and that sort of thing. These other rooms that were in the backs of bars and music clubs and small weird venues, those were a little bit more experimental. People were doing different kinds of things with music and props and visuals. … In that context, I was like, ‘Let me try some of these drawings onstage,’ and then I was trying stuff with music. … By the time I was headlining and doing longer shows on the road, some of those things became really useful as ways to break up an 80- or 90-minute show, so that it wasn’t just 120 jokes in a row. There were endpoints, like little breaths in the run of the show, so you could reset and then go into another section.”
Martin said he’s come to realize that doing creative things just for the experience of doing them is “worth it.”
“You don’t have to use it or apply it or monetize it or any of that stuff. It feels good,” he said. “It’s almost like a vitamin or something, and it does make me feel a little more balanced or involved in things, in a good way. And it’s not passive; it’s active, and there’s something really nice about it for your brain, I think.”
Demetri Martin will perform at 8 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 14, at the McCallum Theatre, 73000 Fred Waring Drive, in Palm Desert. Tickets are $35 to $85. For tickets or more information, call 760-340-2787, or visit www.mccallumtheatre.com.
He looks awesome at his age though so props to him