The Paula Poundstone Interview

Comedy comes to the State Theatre on March 10, when Paula Poundstone hits the stage at 8 PM. While she might currently be best-know for appearing on National Public Radio’s Wait, Wait  . . . Don’t Tell Me!, she has had a very long and successful career.  She’s appeared on Letterman, Leno, and Saturday Night Live. And performed for president. The Tompkins Weekly got the opportunity to talk to Paula at her home in California.  For more information please visit www.stateofithaca.com

Tompkins Weekly: Right now, at least among the National Public Radio demographic, you’re probably best know for being a regular on NPR’s Comedy Game Show, Wait, Wait  . . . Don’t Tell Me! But you’ve had a pretty varied career, including winning the American Comedy Award for "Best Female Stand-Up Comic in 1989 . . .

Paula Poundstone: Let me tell you something. There’s no female comic that hasn’t gotten that award. It’s one of the things that holds us together as a group.

TW:  As well as Comedy Central’s 100 greatest comics of all time. Can you talk about how your career started out?

PP:  Yeah, I started doing open mic nights in Boston in 1979. 

TW: Was that before college or after college?

PP: I never went to college. I was 19 years old and I was bussing tables for a living and I’d always thought that I’d be a street performer of some sort, but I started going to open mic nights and doing stand up comedy. I was on it pretty fast.

TW: So did you have any material that first time or did you just kind of step out there?

PP: I wrote like five minutes of material and I went on. I think I forgot half of it, within seconds, even though I’d been practicing while I was busing tables, for weeks.

TW: And how’d it go?

PP: You know, my recollection is that it went pretty well. However, the second time it was a disaster. I think that’s most guys’ experience. The first time went pretty good and the second time went horrible.

TW: Did you have any unusual jobs to pay the bills before you could work as a comedian full time?

PP: I was a janitor for a little while. I worked for a temporary agency for a little while. Fortunately . . .  I think I’d been doing stand up for not that long really, a year and a half or two years, maybe when I stopped having any kind of a day job, And fortunately, I was young and had very little responsibility and it just didn’t cost that much money to live. I could be broke professionally.

TW: Wait, Wait  . . . Don’t Tell Me! Is pretty popular. What do you think the appeal is?

PP: Sometimes I’m not sure. I think it’s really fun first of all for any listeners to figure out how much they know about the week’s news. It is really fun to play the game. I often look forward to the “Lightening Round,” where I always get pummeled. I think that’s part of it. Also it’s a fun show, it’s pretty quick and clever. I think the guys who make the show are geniuses. They’re very smart. It’s Peter Sagal and some other guys helping him out. But there was a period of time there, where Peter did almost all the writing. And it was starting to get to him. [Laughs]. It was a lot of work to be on the shoulders of one guy. They come up with really good stuff.

TW: You guys are really quick and funny.

PP: It’s like being a batter in a batting cage. You watch some of them go right by. And then every now and then I get a piece of one. And then there’s the energy of the other guys to play off of, which is nice and not what I normally have.

TW: Have there been any major standouts in your career? 

PP: I remember a long time ago I got to do the Ford’s Theatre, twice actually, for these things called “A Night At The Ford’s Theatre,” actually. And they were shows entertaining the President. Both times I did the Ford’s Theatre it was for President Clinton and it was so much fun to see him laugh. He may have just been faking it, I have no idea, and The Mrs. But I had a feeling at the time—and I don’t always like the person who’s president and sometimes I distinctly dislike the person who’s president—but I would still sympathize. It’s gotta be the worst—maybe it’s not as bad as dishwashing with no air conditioning in Boston. It’s just a lousy job and I felt glad that I lightened the load for a few minutes. There’ve been lots of jobs that were fun to do. Last night I was in the Guthrie in Minneapolis and I had the time of my live. My God they were a fun crowd. It’s mostly that way, honestly. It’s mostly really, really fun.