Interview: Eugene Mirman
In his latest promotional photo, Eugene Mirman is pictured standing in waist-deep water, eyes drifting off into the distance, hands chest level, with his fingers in the process of either buttoning up or unbuttoning his navy blue shirt.
“You know, l think I’m buttoning up,” the comedian disclosed during our recent conversation. “I think I'm actually like, ‘Oh, I'm late. I have to finish getting dressed, in the lake, to get to further into the lake where I would meet people.’ That’s the occasion…”
For those familiar with Mirman, absurdity is to be expected. Over the past few decades, he’s developed a reputation as one of the funniest people alive. Though most recognizable to many as the voice of Gene on the hit animated series Bob’s Burgers, his impact on the comedy world goes far deeper than his role as the attention-craving chubby middle child of the Belcher family.
The 2019 documentary It Started As a Joke, an inspired look at the decade-long run of the Brooklyn-based Eugene Mirman Comedy Festival, offered a well-rounded glimpse into the founder and namesake of the festival. In the film, directorial duo Julie Smith Clem and Ken Druckerman not only captured the endless hilarity, but also the deep heart and camaraderie of the NYC alt-comedy scene in the aughts of which Mirman was long a central figure.
Asked about the experience of being the subject of a documentary, Mirman admitted, “You know, it's funny. It's hard watching something about you. But I think it's true that I adore the community and having there be a community. I think oftentimes, you try to make the thing you want in general. So I think for me, a lot of it was just about finding funny people and interesting people and putting on these fun shows and having there be both odd comedy and camaraderie.”
Finding like-minded comedians to collaborate with has long been important to Mirman. “When I was in the Boston area starting out, there were friends and we would do shows, and then in New York,” he said. “I think in general, you end up finding people you like and collaborate with. I think that I've always been a part of worlds that a group of people create together.”
It’s in New York City where Mirman established himself as a jolly alt-comedy kingpin. Just as the city was experiencing the music explosion chronicled in Lizzy Goodman’s book Meet Me In The Bathroom, something similar was happening in the comedy scene. And if any one show best represented that moment in time it was Invite Them Up, a weekly stand-up showcase at Lower East Side bar Rififi co-hosted by Mirman and Bobby Tisdale. From 2002-07, a steady stream of present day stars honed their craft there, including Chelsea Peretti, Nick Kroll, David Cross, and John Mulaney.
When Rififi closed, Mirman began hosting a free Sunday night stand-up show in the basement performance space at Union Hall, a popular Park Slope bar that looks as though it’s designed specifically to be featured in a Noah Baumbach film. You never knew who was going to show up and do a set, but you could be pretty certain that it’d be worth going. Kristen Schaal, Demitri Martin, Aziz Ansari, Mike Birbiglia, Kumail Najiani, and Reggie Watts were all regulars at those Tearing the Veil of Maya (later renamed Pretty Good Friends) shows.
As his fellow comedians workshopped new material, landing punchlines or occasionally totally eating shit, Mirman was usually at the rear bar of the sub-100 capacity room, laughing as hard as anyone in attendance with his distinct cackle spreading an infectious joy.
During that period, Union Hall was one of my homes. When that room wasn’t hosting comedy shows, it was an especially well-booked music venue where several of my friends worked. I even occasionally arranged concerts there. As a devout comedy fan, Tearing The Veil of Maya was my weekly Sunday mass, and Mirman was my pastor.
In one particularly unusual and hilarious set, someone performed their entire act as cantankerous Major League Baseball manager Jim Leyland. With the culprit hidden behind a mask made from a color printout of Leyland’s face, the question of their identity long evaded me — that is until Mirman provided me with the answer: Jon Glaser.
“I don't know enough about baseball to be 100% sure, but I believe that's who did it and that's who I think would do it,” Mirman said. (In hindsight, of course it was Glaser, the creator and star of the bizarre Adult Swim series Delocated on which Mirman played Russian assassin Yvgeny Mirminsky.)
In 2008, Mirman launched the aforementioned Eugene Mirman Comedy Festival, an annual multi-day series of events that took what was great about the stand-up shows that he hosted and amplified the experience. Like a child given a budget to throw a huge party with his funniest friends, nothing seemed too outrageous. When the premiere event included a pig roast and a bouncy castle, it was a simultaneously surprising and totally expected happening that perfectly embodies Mirman’s comedy. He’s able to take a seemingly ludicrous idea and just go for it, eventually building it into a deeper, more engaging commentary on our world.
Those worlds that Mirman and his friends have created together include beloved comedies Bob’s Burgers, Delocated, Home Movies, and Flight of the Conchords. For over a decade, Bob’s Burgers has been a constant in Mirman’s life, so it was a big deal when the series made its way onto the big screen in 2022 with the release of The Bob’s Burgers Movie.
“The Bob's [Burgers] movie, and Bob's in general has been such a long, fun thing to be a part of,” he said. “We worked on that for several years before it became a show, watching it slowly grow and then become a movie. And then the premiere is actually the first premiere I've ever been to — maybe the first real red carpet kind of thing I've been a part of. So it was just sort of fun and watching people enjoy it. It was just so nice.”
And it wasn’t just Mirman’s voice that debuted on the big screen in 2022. Appearing as a yacht club security guard in Confess, Fletch, he made the most of his time on screen. “Confess, Fletch was so fun to be a part of, and I got to improvise a lot of the lines,” he said. “It was just a neat thing to then see on screen. Both things were just so enjoyable to work on and be a part of. I think a lot of it is getting to collaborate with friends and work on projects with people you admire. It's just really like, I love it like.”
You may have noticed a theme of collaboration. It doesn’t just apply to his work in television and film, but also his upcoming tour, which includes a stop in Asheville at The Orange Peel on Thursday, Nov. 10.
“Even on this tour, I have friends that are coming with me who I made my last album with, who helped me do this sort of children's book thing, and they helped me with a song that we did together,” he said. “It's fun getting to collaborate with friends. Stand-up is, in a sense, something that's uniquely individual, but it also is fun to bring people in to do these more elaborate things with.”
Though Mirman has performed in our mountain town a few times, it’ll be his first visit since he co-headlined at The Grey Eagle in 2016 with musician Robyn Hitchcock. In the time since his 2015 comedy special, Vegan on His Way to the Complain Store, Mirman has become a father and, more recently, lost his wife to cancer in 2020, so his touring has been very understandably limited over the past several years. “Yeah. When my wife was sick I wasn't touring a ton, just doing a little bit,” he said. “And then there was also the [COVID-19] pandemic, which made touring hard.”
Mirman didn’t just become a central figure in the Brooklyn alt-comedy scene because of his heart and social skills. He’s also really funny, with a unique knack for observing and acting upon things in his life with a childlike curiosity and a willingness to just see where he can take things. This approach can often lead to comical feuds with businesses and local governments — he once took out a full page ad with my former employer NY Press to air his grievances with Time Warner Cable — so I inquired into any ongoing feuds that might make their way into his routine.
“Well, you know, what's funny about the feuds is…I think sometimes it reaches the feudee, but sometimes I’m not sure it does,” he said. “No, not exactly. But, who knows? There's always time.”
During our conversation, when asked about whether or not he’s been using an entrance song on this tour, he joked, “Maybe I'll try a handful. I'll try four entrance songs and then have the audience vote.”
Following my suggestion of testing out “Enter The Fuckscape” — a 22-minute “erotic soundscape for lovebirds and adventurous friends” from his nine-volume 2015 album I’m Sorry (You’re Welcome) — Mirman quipped, “Maybe I'll try just over 45 minutes of crying [alluding to another volume from the same set], and then do what could easily be 15 killer minutes of stand-up.”
Although he won’t be recording any of his current tour dates, Mirman hinted that a new special could be a little further down the road.
“I think in general, I would do shows and refine stuff over time,” he said. “And then eventually turn what this will be, hopefully, into another special or album.”
Maybe by then he’ll have decided on an entrance song.
IF YOU GO
Who: Eugene Mirman
When: Thursday, Nov. 10, 8 p.m.
Where: The Orange Peel, 101 Biltmore Ave., theorangepeel.net
Tickets: $35 advance/$40 day of show
(Photos by Ilya Mirman)
