TODD BARRY

I used to write things out beforehand. But sometimes it backfires.

I'm traveling the world, ripping rooms apart with my stupendous comedy.

Some venues are better run than others. Sometimes it's just maddening to deal with full dinners being served in front of your face. You can have a good or bad show anywhere.

Well, I have since seen you at Tinkle. It's a comedy show started by David Cross, me and Jon Benjamin. It features a wide variety of acts for all tastes and seasons.

You come there and hang out and have a drink before the show and eat, so it's not that brutal. It's only $6.

I wasn't as nervous as I thought I would be when I started.

I loved Australia. I was very successful there.

I mean, I've always had scattered interests, but I never went on stage to get an agent or anything like that.

I got access to a private tour of the zoo. I got to go in a cage with a koala, which I highly recommend.

And the goal really is to make the audience laugh, to bring them some joy.

I mean, I guess I realized subconsciously that this is what I should be doing before I realized it, consciously. Verbally, I don't think I had committed to it, even though I was driving everywhere, every night, just trying to get on stage.

I would call it a comedy variety show. We have some people just doing straight standup. We usually try to have one musical act of sort. So its just people being funny in different ways, not just sketch, not just standup, not just characters, all of those things.

I do not like sports, unless you consider treating all humankind with love and respect a sport.

I want to release another CD this year, finish writing a screenplay, and make another short film.

There's people that are just in awe of what you do, and then there are people who just think it's garbage. And I think there are people who are just uncomfortable seeing someone have fun with their job.

If I'm at a party and someone puts on a Blues Brothers tape, I tend to go nuts.

It's cool to go to a place that has posters up and it's one night only. It feels more special.

People don't understand that that's really what it is. They're looking for a magic phone number or something. And to a certain extent, I understand that, because comedy is treated so much as a stepping stone by a lot of people.

I did end up doing substitute teaching, but there's not a lot of teaching involved in that.

I basically did comedy there for about a year, and then moved to New York. If I had it to do over again, I would have booked myself on the road for at least a year.

I don't really know much about pirates, or pirate culture. I'd be a contrarian pirate.

I will not be misquoted!

I'd rather send out a mass email then hang posters all over the place.

There seems to be more comedy for comedy's sake.

My sister sometimes does a Todd Barry tribute act.