British comic credits success to stint on reality show

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This article was published 05/04/2012 (5257 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The recent rise of reality-TV programming has produced a large population of formerly fame-seeking folks who are truly sorry they ever signed up for shows that demanded a lifetime’s worth of dignity in exchange for an extended 15 minutes of prime-time notoriety.

Matt Kirshen isn’t one of them.

The British-born comedian is grateful for his reality-TV experience; in fact, Kirshen credits his appearance on NBC’s Last Comic Standing for most of the good things that have happened in his career since 2007.

“It was a huge thing for me,” said Kirshen, who was a top-seven finalist on LCS’s fifth season (which also featured Canuck cut-ups Gerry Dee and Debra DiGiovanni). “In terms of the progression of my career, I don’t know how much immediate impact it had in terms of the levels I’ve got to, but it is the reason I’m in America. The only reason I’m speaking to you right now is because that show got me on American television, got me a visa, got me the exposure that got me into Just For Laughs. So without Last Comic Standing, I wouldn’t have been on the Just For Laughs tour (last fall), so I wouldn’t have been in Winnipeg and I wouldn’t have been seen by the guy who books the festival there.

“Everything traces back to that TV show.”

Kirshen, a native of London, England, who now resides in Los Angeles, admitted that he does have mixed feelings about the notion of turning the standup art form into a vote-off-driven TV competition.

“I went into it knowing that it is what it is,” he said. “They made it a lot about the storylines and the drama, because that’s what makes their TV show work, so you’ve got to go along with it. Yes, there is that bit of me that adores comedy as an art form and is uncomfortable with turning it into a reality show, but on the other hand, the part of me that loves comedy as an art form loves the fact that it was the only show that was putting comedians on prime-time network TV…. So if that’s the way you have to go about doing it, fine, I’m on it.”

Kirshen, who performed here last fall as part of an all-Brit edition of the annual Just For Laughs Comedy Tour, returns to town next week to perform several shows during the Winnipeg Comedy Festival — including next Friday’s 9:15 p.m. Observational Comedy Disorder gala at Pantages Playhouse Theatre, hosted by Harland Williams and featuring Jen Grant, Nigel Lawrence, Simon King, Terry McGurrin and Fraser Young. (Tickets are Tickets $39.95 at Ticketmaster.) He’s also part of the popular blue-hued Dark and Stormy Show, a taping of The Debaters and has his own headlining gig at Rumor’s Comedy Club.

“It’s pretty much every kind of show I could be doing, unless I added some sketch or improv,” he said. “There’s a gala set, a dirty set, a full club show and a panel show. It’s going to be a lot of fun.”

Since he first started dabbling in comedy while studying mathematics at Clare College, Cambridge, Kirshen has consistently looked for venues and shows that would challenge his standup abilities.

“It was a gradual thing for me,” he explained. “I certainly gave it serious thought for about three years before I did my first gig; it took me a while to actually get onstage. But after the third or fourth time, I was in all the way.

“Once you have your first couple of really good gigs, you think, ‘Oh, I really need to do this.’ Your first few gigs, you’re really nervous, so your adrenaline is on an absolute high — it’s like you’re on a roller coaster or taking a parachute jump. And as you get more experienced and less nervous, some of that joy subsides, so you find yourself seeking out shows that are more nerve-racking so you can get that adrenaline spike again.”

These days, Kirshen tests his own mettle by taking part in a radical standup experiment that’s run regularly in L.A. by veteran comedian Paul Provenza (who directed the 2005 dirty-joke documentary The Aristocrats).

“I started getting involved with this Set List thing that Paul Provenza has going — it’s improvised standup, and what happens is you get handed your set list as you go onstage,” he said. “As you’re onstage, your topics flash up, and they’re very specific — not things like ‘family’ or ‘pets,’ but more like ‘family lighthouse’ or ‘pet embargo’; stuff that you won’t have material on, so you just have to riff on whatever the topic is.

“It’s extremely nerve-racking, but you really recapture the fun of those gigs when you have no idea what’s going to come out of your mouth and you don’t know if it’s going to go well or not.”

As it necessarily must, Kirshen’s southern-California showbiz existence involves having his agent and manager send him out on an endless series of movie and TV auditions. He’s happy for the roles he’s able to land, but the witty Brit said he has no intention of using standup as a stepping stone into a different kind of Hollywood career.

“When you’re in L.A., you’ve got to go to auditions and pitch things and write things,” he explained. “But none of those things are a route out of standup. If I get cast on a TV show, that’s great, because it’ll get more people to come and see me when I’m on the road and I come to play in their towns.

“I love standup more than any other art form. If I get cast to act in something or write something or be a talking head in something, that’s great; I’m sure it’ll be a lot of fun. But I’ve never been one of those people who viewed standup as just a way to get an acting job. Standup has always been my first love; it’s what I enjoy more than anything else.”

brad.oswald@freepress.mb.ca