And I thought, “oh, well, I can't do that.” There's no way I'll ever be that good, you know? But I'm better than the guy who opened for him. I saw him in a bunch of tiny little rooms in the Bay Area. I know I can be better than that guy and he's getting work.” I remember seeing Dana Carvey and he was phenomenal. And even back then, I - the comics that I saw that made me want to do stand-up were ones that weren't very good because I was like, “I'm better than that guy. That gives me a couple seconds to move ahead of everybody while they're laughing, hopefully. And even still, I'm always thinking of the next laugh I'm trying to get and using the audience's laugh to think ahead. And I started to go watch standup shows in San Francisco and downtown San Francisco at The Other Cafe, which is on Haight Street, and the Punch Line and Cobb's and I was like, “oh, my God, I could do that.” And then I became really obsessed with stand-up and it's been, you know, 31 years.ĪARON CAIN: I'm wondering kind of how the ratio worked there between just the delight of seeing someone making people laugh and the joy of the environment in a club like that, versus the other half that you mentioned - the – “I can do this.” Was the feeling that you saw an audience getting part of your math for wanting to get into it yourself?
And I had originally wanted to be an actress and I had gained 60 pounds and I was like, there's nothing for me, you know? It just seemed like that wasn't a place that I could go - acting, Hollywood, all that kind of stuff. And I got into standup because I had dropped out of college and I was incredibly depressed. And so I had a couple friends I was funny with, but I definitely didn't have that reputation school-wide for sure. LAURIE KILMARTIN: I think I was funny within a very tiny peer group, but I was not a class clown because I was afraid of being laughed at, I guess.
Laurie Kilmartin, welcome to Profiles.ĪARON CAIN: So how did you get started in this life of comedy of yours? Were you a funny kid or was there a time when your humor - you remember it kind of activating or was it always there? While she was here, she joined me in the WFIU studios. Laurie Kilmartin was in Bloomington to perform at the comedy attic. When her father lost his battle with cancer in 2014, Laurie Kilmartin's own experiences processing grief with humor inspired her to write a practical, comical and heartfelt guide to coping with the dearly departing. It's called Dead People Suck: A Guide for Survivors of The Newly Departed. The title of Laurie Kilmartin's second book can be said on the air, but only just. The book is a tongue-in-cheek and thoroughly inappropriate how-to guide for awful mothers and it was a New York Times bestseller. But I can say the subtitle, The Parenting Guide for The Rest of Us. Her first - well, I can't say the title of her first book in its entirety on account of a naughty word. Punchline Magazine called it “one of the top comedy CDs of that year.” Laurie Kilmartin is also pretty outspoken about politics, parenthood and the entertainment industry in a weekly podcast she shares with fellow comedian Jackie Kashian called The Jackie And Laurie Show. In 2009 Kilmartin released a comedy album called Five Minutes to Myself, comprised of material that she was not allowed to use on the air. Some of the topics she covers in her standup and in her writing aren't taboo, but they aren't exactly tame either. She attended UCLA, did some competitive swimming, and moved to the Bay Area to pursue acting before starting her stand-up comedy career gigging around in the Pacific Northwest. Laurie Kilmartin grew up in Santa Clara County, Calif., in the shadow of Mt. And she was a finalist on season seven of Last Comic Standing. And as a stand-up comedian, she's appeared on Conan, Jimmy Kimmel Live, Comedy Central, and in comedy clubs around the country. Laurie Kilmartin is an Emmy nominated writer for Conan O'Brien's talk show on CBS. She's a comic and author, and comedy is both her night job and her day job. (SOUNDBITE OF PENGUIN CAFÉ ORCHESTRA’S “NOTHING REALLY BLUE”) On Profiles, we talk to notable artists, scholars and public figures to get to know the stories behind their work.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELA FLECK AND THE FLECKTONES’ “BLU-BOP”)ĪARON CAIN: Welcome to Profiles from WFIU.