Steven Wright says Louis C.K. was wrong but he is still his friend
Comedian Steven Wright is in a parking lot somewhere in Massachusetts.
He won’t be more specific as to what parking lot.
His reticence is not due to his need for some celebrity anonymity but rather his need for a laugh.
“It’s better for me to not say that I am in a parking lot of a place then your brain has many, many, many guesses that are more interesting than my one answer.
If I give you the answer then the guesses are over, so I would rather have you not know,” said Wright.
“Is it a police station parking lot?” I asked.
“No,” he said, then laughed. “See.”.
An a-lister comic with an Eeyore-like delivery of well-crafted and often absurd jokes, Wright will be on stage at Hard Rock Casino here on Jan.
19.
He makes trips up here every couple of years and happily does so despite thinking something weird might be going on.
Weird? Wright? What?. “I like that city.
I like how clean and beautiful it is,” said Wright.
“I noticed that when I stayed in hotels and I could see out to the water that the water always looked like it was going up on an angle.
Like the horizon was not straight up — that the horizon was elevated.
I don’t know why that is? The angle from the shore to the horizon seemed unusually high to me.
“It’s consistent year after year.
It’s the only place I’ve ever noticed it,” added Wright.
“It’s an optical illusion but I don’t know why I am only having it there.
Maybe I’m a specialist.
I only have this optical illusion in that city.”.
Wright, an actor, writer, and an Oscar-winning film producer,  has been in the business for 40 years.
His comedy rise is mythical as his 1982 success on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson helped draw focus to the Boston comedy scene that at the time was home to the likes of Lenny Clark, Denis Leary, Paula Poundstone and Barry Crimmins.
“When it got to be 10 years that was weird because I hadn’t done anything for 10 years other than be alive,” said Wright a Cambridge, Mass., native.
“Then 20 years wasn’t that weird but now that it is 40 years, I don’t even think about it.”.
What he does think about is upcoming shows and new material.
“Really I just think of stuff and I write it down.
It’s like I’m a receptionist for my head,” said Wright whose comedy has been described as ironic and philosophical.
“It’s like a little circus is in my head.
If something interesting happens in the circus I write it down and if I still think it’s interesting when I go to do a show then some of those I’ll try out.”.
Wright has never waded into the political or timely pop culture arenas for his jokes.
It’s life’s daily outings and observations that have earned him recognition and even the honour of having websites dedicated to his one-liners.
For the record he says a lot of those jokes he never actually wrote, but in fact wish he had.
While politics don’t play in his standup shows he doesn’t back away from the topic of the “very stable genius,” that is running his country right now.
“He reminds me of Lincoln in many ways.
You never see a picture of either one of them driving, right?” said Wright admitting he just thought that up while sitting in the parking lot.
“Home Depot?”.
“No,” said Wright before continuing.
“It’s insane.
He is insane and it’s insane that it got to be like this.
It’s like the Niagara Falls of insanity.
Rather than water it’s insanity.
It’s unbelievable.
“If this was a movie you’d be interested but when you left you’d say ‘that could never happen,’ then you get in your car and go somewhere and eat.
While Wright is obviously affected by the weirdness of the current White House inhabitant he sees Donald Trump’s tenure as a footnote in history not a game changer.
Yes, he is optimistic even if he doesn’t sound like it.
“The United States has gone on a long time so even if he is there eight years, unless the world ends, unless he causes the end of the world he is going to be like a tick on a buffalo.
He’ll be gone and we’ll continue,” said Wright.
“The overall thing is more powerful than him in the long run.”.
Aside from The Donald’s daily dispatches, conversations these days invariably lead to the latest man to face sexual misconduct allegations.
For Wright, one of those stories hits close to him as he is not only a longtime friend of Louis C.
K, but Wright was an Emmy-nominated producer on the Louie TV show and was in C.
K’s series Horace and Pete.
“Ohhhh, what are you talking about,” said Wright pausing briefly.
“I think he shouldn’t have done that stuff obviously.
I don’t condone that.
It’s very bizarre, a weird thing to do.
Also he is still my friend though, absolutely and that’s the truth.”.
Wright has seen the embattled C.K.
since the allegations against him (you can look those up online) came to light.
He is still his friend.
“It didn’t affect me at all with him,” said Wright.
“I mean if you knew someone who did that would you write them completely off? It would depend on your relationship wouldn’t it?”.
As this monumental shift continues does Wright think his friend and someone he, and for the record, many, many people consider a comic genius have a chance for a comeback?.
“I don’t know,” said Wright.
What he does know though is the world is a very changed place.
That people are fine-tuning their interactions and second-guessing everything they say, he included.
“It’s good that this is all happening.
It’s absolutely good,” said Wright before offering up an example of the sea change.
Recently he was in L.A.
at a coffee shop with a friend and they were having a conversation with the woman working there.
“We were joking around,” said Wright.
“She was a real character. She was funny.
We were all joking back and forth and she had this dress on that was very conservative, farmerish almost.
I thought it was a nice dress and I almost said to her, ‘oh that’s a nice dress you have on,’ but I didn’t.
Then me and my friend were outside and I told him I didn’t say that to her because I thought ‘wait a minute is that over some line?’ I didn’t say but we both agreed I over-thought it.
But I’m just giving you an example of how much it is in your head.
You know?”. Yes, I know.
“Wait a minute you like coffee? Are you in a coffee shop parking lot?”.
“Nope.
I’m in a parking lot of a hula hoop repair shop,” said Wright.
“Ahhh getting your hula hoops repaired,” I said.
“They’re not mine,” said Wright.
“It’s a side business I have.”.
Of course it is.
