As the excitement builds for the third-annual Magners Comedy Festival taking place this month in Boston, there’s an enormous amount of buzz about what is by far the festival’s biggest highlight – the live taping of Marc Maron’s WTF Podcast on Friday, January 27.
Following Maron’s headlining show at The Wilbur that night, he will take the stage again at 10:00 pm along with Kenny Rogerson, Tony V, Barry Crimmins, Mike Donovan, Jimmy Tingle, Frank Santorelli to record a very special episode of WTF in the town that helped to launch Maron’s career.
“They wanted me to be part of the festival, and it all seemed to work out,” says Maron in a recent phone interview with BCSE. “Boston was a very important part of my life, and my early comedy career, and I just do not go back there very often to work, or any reason – I don’t know why that is, I don’t know if there are some ghosts there. I actually do know that there are, in terms of my life at a different point in time. When I got the opportunity to do it I just reached out to the guys that were big comedy guys when I was there. I would have to drive to open for most of the guys who are going to be on the show, and I just wanted to pay some respect and say hello and be entertained by some very funny guys.”
And when it comes to the lineup, Maron certainly doesn’t have to think hard to recall some funny stories involving each comedian.
“When I was in college I was doing open-mics one year before I really committed to comedy, probably in ’84, and Kenny Rogerson was hosting that open mic, and I remember he got way too drunk and forgot to put me on and I’d waited all night, “Maron recalls. “Tony V – I used to open for and do gigs with when I was a kid, and Mike Donovan – I went down to Nantucket with Mike Donovan. Barry Crimmins used to host a show on Wednesday nights at Stitches at the original Paradise…I think it was Wednesdays.”
The festival weekend is loaded with comedic heavyweights – including Tom Papa, Colin Quinn, and Maron’s competition, Eugene Mirman, who is also performing earlier that night at Mottley’s Comedy Club. The main performance, however, will clearly be Maron’s double-header.
“I hope I didn’t compete with myself, but yeah – I’m doing a stand up show and then we’re going to do the live WTF,” Maron states. “I hope that people come out, because to me, the guys I’m having on – Kenny Rogerson is really one of the funniest guys that ever lived, and he always was. It’s just amazing to me that more people don’t know some of the people I’m going to have on there. Barry Crimmins is going to drive down and hopefully be in a good state of mind, and he and Jimmy can talk politics a bit. Frank is just Frank, he’s great. I really haven’t seen these guys in a long time.”
You’d be hard-pressed to find a comedy fan who hasn’t heard of Maron’s legendary podcast, WTF Pod, which has been downloaded over 20 million times in its two year life span. Maron’s ability to evoke some of the most personal stories from just about anyone who is anyone in comedy (including Robin Williams and, more recently, Steven Wright) has earned him the audience and exposure that seemed to have long been overlooked for the most part (which is unfortunate, given Maron’s comedic brilliance).
Part of what makes Maron so successful as an interviewer stems from his massive self-doubt and lack of ego, which is a rarity in comedy these days, but that also has its downside as Maron does experience pre-show anxiety here and there.
“I usually just panic and pace,” Maron describes, “and wonder what they’re gonna be like, because 95% of those are really the first time I’ve really had a long conversation with them. I try to do a little bit of research if I don’t know a lot about the person, but generally not a lot of research just to sort of get a sense of who they are a little bit. When I have very big celebrities over here who have big lives and very big schedules and are huge, there’s still part of me that thinks, Why are they even doing this? They must have better things to do.”
If you haven’t listened to last week’s episode of the podcast featuring Steven Wright, you should do so immediately (after reading this, of course) as Maron and Wright not only have an amazing discussion about comedy and Boston, but it features Wright getting a little bit of info out of Maron.
“It was great. I didn’t really know him or spend time with him in my life, and I was a little nervous at first because I know him like everyone else knows him, as Steven Wright the comedian, and I didn’t know if we could actually have a conversation for an hour but only because I didn’t know if sort of talked and thought like that in regular conversation,” Maron says, half-joking. “Turns out he’s very sweet, he loves to laugh and he’s a great guy to talk to. We had a great time and it was a lot of laughs and a lot of fun, and it was good to get to know him, and I think that came through on the show. He did something funny at the end, we talked for almost an hour probably and I turned the mics off and closed the show, and he said, ‘I didn‘t ask anything about you’, and I said, that’s alright that’s not really what the show is about, and he said ‘Turn it back on!’ So, there’s a small section where he’s interviewing me at the end.”
There’s no doubt that Maron’s love and respect for the city that helped form his comedy career, and while he can’t spend a great deal of time in town, he’s looking forward to it just as much as his Boston fans are.
“There are a lot of memories and I’m looking forward to it, and I’m certainly looking forward to seeing the guys that are on my show,” Maron tells me, as he searches for a recent email from Kenny Rogerson. “I emailed him and wanted to confirm and everything, and he said he’s ‘looking forward to letting our madness run together’.”
It’s pretty safe to say that’s something all of Boston is looking forward to as well. Grab your tickets now for Marc Maron’s headlining show at The Wilbur AND his live WTF Pod taping on Friday, January 27 before they’re gone, and be a part of Boston comedy history.
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