Interview with Bob Nelson
We recently had the privilege of chatting with comedian Bob Nelson. Among other things, he talked about how he got started in comedy, his first appearance on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, and the impact that Red Skelton had on him and his comedy.
TQ: Just wanted to talk with you about your stand up comedy and how and when you got started.
Bob: It was 1978.
TQ: At the White House Inn?
Bob: Yes. The White House Inn. It was a small tiny club on Long Island right where I lived. The way I got into comedy was, I was a paste-up artist at a telephone book company. And what happened was, there would be problems with the telephone book ads and we’d have to call down south because it was for Southern Bell. We’d have to call down south if there was a problem. So I would call up as different people just to have fun with them and everybody in the office would watch me do it. Like we’d call a tractor company and they’d have an ad that said, “We’re open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.” and at the bottom it would say, “Open twenty four hours.” So, you’d have to call them and ask, “Which is it?” And I’d get on the phone as a guy like a guy from New York and say “Hey, how you doing? This is New York calling, there’s a problem with your telephone book ad.” And there was a guy on the phone going, “Who is this?” I’m going, “Well your ad is really messed up. Like - the numbers are all messed up.” And he’d say, “I don’t know who this is.” And I’d have this little thing going with him - and they’d all stand around the phones laughing. One day, they didn’t dial the area code and they called the guy who owned a comedy club. This guy Richard M. Dixon who looked like Nixon so he’s talking like Nixon on the phone to me and I’m making him laugh and I thought it was somebody my friends hooked me up with to mess with me this time. But it was the club owner and he said, “Yeah, you’ve got to come down next Wednesday.” I found out he was serious and I went down. I did comedy for the first time in my life and it snowballed to this.
TQ: I know you had been on Carson.
Bob: Yes. Johnny Carson. Three times.
TQ: Can you talk about your experience being on the show?
Bob: You know what? Back in the eighties - when I was on that - was what every comedian strived for - was to get on Johnny Carson and get the thumbs up or sit down on his couch there. My first performance on the Tonight Show was like performing in a vacuum. I remember performing and hearing Johnny and the band kicking and banging their feet on the floor. And I was still performing and it was almost like I was outside my body. This was like destiny for me. And I just remember being almost on automatic pilot. I was getting laughs out of nowhere. After the show, he says, “You won’t laugh any harder in five or six minutes than you did at that guy - Bob Nelson!” I was like, “Whoa!” So that was like the pinnacle of my career. After that, I felt like I had hit and I had made it but there was still an emptiness I needed to fill. And that is why many years later, I become a Christian.
TQ: There are many arguments about the content of entertainment. Some say ‘working blue’ is harmless, that it’s just entertainment. Others say entertainers’ content does affect their audience. What are your thoughts on this?
Bob: When I started back in the seventies, I started out with guys like Jerry Seinfeld, Bill Maher, Paul
Reiser. Really ‘anything goes’ was their attitude. Anything is game. And then years down the line, I met Red Skelton. And Red Skelton said to me, I was sitting with him, and he said, “Bob, the good thing about you is that you don’t curse.” And I said, “No Red. I do. I do curse. I do this Brooklyn character and to be realistic I curse.” And he goes, “No, no. You do not do any foul language in your act.” And I said, “Red. I’m telling you I do.” And he goes, “No you don’t.” My wife started poking me and she said,
“Don’t you get it? From now on, you don’t curse.” And I looked at Red and I said, “Red, is that what you’re saying?” And he said, “I was trying to.” So from that day on, I stopped cursing. Because he explained to me afterward, he said comedy - laughter does good like a medicine. And when you put cursing and sexual innuendo in comedy - dirt with comedy - you’re putting poison in the medicine. So, he wanted to bring me up higher. Before I was even a Christian, he was trying to bring me up higher and explain to me that what I’m doing is something that helps people and makes them feel good about themselves. And it doesn’t when the comedy is mean spirited or full of filthy language.
TQ: I saw you even have a link on your web site. Do you have any interesting stories about interacting with Red Skelton? Is there anything he may have taught you or helped you with?
Bob: Absolutely, he helped me quite a bit. For the longest time I would do comedy, I didn’t feel like I fit in with Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Maher and all of those guys. I felt like there was something different here that I’m not getting. I don’t feel like I’m part of this whole scene. I said to Red I don’t feel like a standup comedian. And Red said, “Well that’s because you’re not. You’re a clown. Just like me. You just don’t belong to a circus. You’re borrowing their stage as your circus.” From that day on, I was kind of set free in who I was. I was able to do my act and not worry about who I am and what I’m doing, because I’m not part of this. And that kind of set me up also when I became a Christian to kind of enforce that, because now I’m not of this world. The riches of this world and all that other stuff are not meant for me. I’m called to a higher purpose. If I could just figure out what that is? (laughing at camera, jokingly)
TQ: Whom do you see as being ‘cutting edge’ right now? Who’s doing good stuff these days?
Bob: Whom do I like? You know, a guy who’s not saved - I would say someone like Brian Regan. He is extremely funny and he’s very clean. I believe he’s on Comedy Central quite a bit. I believe he also has a tv show that is coming out. And then in the Christian world, there are guys like Jeff Allen who is very funny. He draws off life experience. And it’s not “Christian” per se, but it is family oriented. It is all the stuff we can relate to. There’s nothing mean spirited about it. There is no dirt. Jeff Allen really makes me laugh.
TQ: Can you talk about your work with Bananas and the DVD?
Bob: There’s these guys in Columbus Ohio. It’s called Guardian Studios. Have you heard of the book called ‘ROARING LAMBS’ by Bob Briner. It’s a book that tell you how we’re called to be the salt and light of the earth and how we need to impact the world. That’s kind of like where I’m at now - where I want to impact the world more than the world impacts me. As the church body, I really feel that the world is impacting the church more than the church is impacting the world. We gotta turn this thing around. You know, when you’ve got a Christian saying as a Christian comedian, ‘I’m edgy’ - that’s not good because when you say ‘edgy’ on television, you mean pushing the envelope. So, you don’t want to come into Christianity saying, “I’m an edgy Christian comedian” because that doesn’t make sense. What you want to do is to shine a light into the darkness of the world. These guys at BANANAS, what they’re doing is they’re creating alternatives. Instead of pointing the finger and saying, “Isn’t that horrible what they did, that movie is so dirty, and that’s not good” - instead they’re creating an alternative for people to watch. And that is what BANANAS Comedy is.
Tags: Podcasts
