Andy Dick Interview

 

 

Andy Dick started his television comedy career as a cast member on the sketch comedy program The Ben Stiller Show, which aired on the Fox Network from September 1992 to January 1993.
In 1993, on the fourth night of David Letterman's new CBS show, Dick appeared as "Donnie the CBS Page Who Likes to Suck Up", during which he gave a watch to Letterman. The host then handed him a pencil, prompting Dick to cry and then walk backstage to much applause.
In 1994, Dick played the part of Pepé the stylist in the episode "Maggie the Model" on The Nanny. He also starred as the son of Maxwell Smart and Agent 99 in a Get Smart TV remake, a role he reportedly tried to escape in order to go into work with NewsRadio. In 2001, Dick starred along with Kieran Culkin on the short lived NBC summer television series Go Fish.
Andy Dick has been a series regular on several sitcoms for their entire duration including NewsRadio on NBC (1995–1999) as portraying Matthew Brock, and on the ABC sitcom Less Than Perfect as Owen Kronsky.
In 2001, he created a show on MTV called The Andy Dick Show. The series ended in 2003 after three seasons. In 2004, he starred in a satirical reality television show, also on MTV, called The Assistant. The show spoofed themes and scenes from The Apprentice, The Bachelor, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and Survivor, among others.
Dick competed in the eighth season of Bravo's Celebrity Poker Showdown. He finished in last place, behind Robin Tunney, Christopher Meloni, Macy Gray, and Joy Behar.
On May 16, 2007, Dick was roasted on The Howard Stern Show by Artie Lange, Lisa Lampanelli, Reverend Bob Levy, Sal Governale, Shuli, Colin Quinn, Benjy Bronk, Dave Atell, Greg
Dick has also made appearances on Comedy Central's The Gong Show hosted by Dave Attell.

In 1997, Dick had a supporting role alongside Luke Wilson and Jack Black in Bongwater, as Luke Wilson's gay friend who gives him a place to stay after his house burns to the ground. In 1999, Dick played a warm-hearted yet cowardly scientist that helped Dr. Claw in the movie Inspector Gadget.
In 2000, he made a cameo role in the motion picture Dude, Where's My Car?. That same year, he also appeared in the teenage comedy film Road Trip, playing a motel clerk. In 2001, Dick made a cameo in Ben Stiller's comedy Zoolander as Olga the Masseuse (Dick also made a cameo in Stiller's directorial debut, Reality Bites, back in 1994). In 2002, he was featured in the band Ash's music video "Envy" as a taxi cab driver. In 2003, he appeared in Will Ferrell's Old School as a gay sex education teacher, and as a villainous Santa in the movie The Hebrew Hammer. In 2005, Dick was featured in the documentary The Aristocrats. In 2006, he appeared in the film Employee of the Month as Lon, the optician who is strongly near sighted.
His feature film directorial debut was the 2006 film Danny Roane: First Time Director.
Dick is the lead singer of his comedy band Andy Dick and the Bitches of the Century. They have appeared together on television, and released a self-titled album in 2002. On occasion, Dick has Rodleen Getsic perform as his opening act. Each night she plays the song she wrote for him called "Fucker".
On May 15, 1999, Dick drove his car into a utility pole in Hollywood. He was charged with possession of cocaine, marijuana, drug paraphernalia, and driving under the influence of alcohol/drugs and hit-and-run driving. He later pleaded guilty  to felony  cocaine possession and two other misdemeanor  charges: marijuana possession and possession of "a smoking device". After Dick completed an 18-month drug diversion program, a judge dismissed the felony and misdemeanor drug charges against him.
On August 16, 2006, Dick made a widely publicized appearance at the Comedy Central Roast of William Shatner. He licked the faces of Farrah Fawcett, Carrie Fisher, and Patton Oswalt, and groped and bit the hand of New York Post reporter Mandy Stadtmiller backstage.[21] Dick, who holds that Stadtmiller "slanted" the incident,[22] returned to rehabilitation after the roast.
In 2009 he appeared on VH1's Celebrity Rehab spin-off Sober House with Dr. Drew focusing on a sober living environment. Dick approached Dr. Drew Pinsky to ask for help with his addictions and agreed to enter the Sober Living house. In the penultimate episode, Dick explained that his excessive drinking led to many of the public incidents for which he has become notorious and for which he has ruined many of his relationships. In that episode, he visited a number of the people whose lives he had so affected, such as comedian Mo Collins, to apologize for disclosing information to her husband, information which led to her divorce.
On September 20, 2009, Dick appeared on The Adam Carolla Podcast and reported that he had been sober for approximately one year. More recently, on January 23, 2010, Dick was arrested around 4:00 a.m. in a bar in Huntington, West Virginia, on charges of sexual abuse.

 

 

HT:    You were born in Charleston, South Carolina? 
AD:    Um, hmm.
HT:    You grew up all over the place?
AD:    Um, hmm.
HT:    And from what I understand you were somewhat neglected by parents?
AD:    Um, hmm.
HT:    Now, with all that stuff (inaudible) growing up--
AD:    It wasn’t their fault, though.
HT:    What do you think came out from all of that traveling all over the place?  I’m sure it’s the typical military kid, can’t settle down, and make real good friends.
AD:    Yeah. Well, you learn how to make really good friends really fast, you know.  And you learn how to get attention. ‘Cause if you…. if you don’t get attention then no one’s going to pay attention to you. (laughs).  And then you also learn how to meet really good people.  ‘Cause--and you learn how to be loyal.  Because I would always move to a town, and then a few--I was always the new kid. And most people treat the new kid like a freak.  So, you’re looked at like a freak.  And then a couple kids, 1 or 2, of all the hundreds in the school, 1 or 2 would come up and say, “Look, I know you’re new, and, uh………. makes me want to cry.” They’d be like “If you need a friend, I’m here.  You know, it’s gonna be hard, and I know, and I’m here.”  I would always make those people my friends right away. Then eventually I would take over the school. I would become very popular.
HT:    Because of your humor?
AD:    Yeah, because I just knew how to do it. Yeah, I knew how to make people laugh, I’ll say, yeah.  I could diffuse fights by laugh, by making people laugh.  But then I would always bring those people that were those--they were just usually just very unpopular, smaller people, and I would bring them up in the ranks. It’s true.
HT:    …like Janeane Garafalo’s characters in those high school reunion movies.
AD:    (eating and agreeing emphatically) Um, hmm! (laughing)
HT:    And you were a hard worker as a child, right?
AD:    Um, hmm.  It came out of the fact that my parents never gave me a dime. I think I got a $1.50 allowance, when I was real little, but then it just went away altogether.  I was too old for an allowance by age 10 or so. Um, they, they, they basically said, “If you want to have money, you need to go make it.”
HT:    Were you poor or just average?
AD:    Middle class, you know.  But I didn’t even have a Big Wheel.  I didn’t even have a fucking Big Wheel! Um, but, I have been shoveling snow and mowing people’s yards and landscaping and baby-sitting since I’ve been probably 10 or 11.  And then I was a busboy when I was 15. I have a really good work ethic.
HT:    So you knew that if you were going to amount to anything, you were going to probably have to do it yourself.
AD:    That’s what I’m doing to this day. I am executive producer of The Assistant on MTV.  I’m doing it.
HT:    No matter what opinions people might have about your private life, there’s no question that you’ve always hustled in your career. Where did that hunger and determination come from?
AD:    From my Dad. He was very…well he was a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy on a submarine and so he ran a tight ship.  At work and at home. I got in--
HT:    (inaudible) at 17.
AD:    (laughs) Yeah.  I got into--through my Dad; I got into some spiritual things too, like transcendental meditation, and EST.  I did EST when I was really young.  Um, you know, my Dad died when I was like, 20, 22…21.  But, he was a disciplinarian.  He--
HT:    Did you get a chance to get close before he passed away?
AD:    We did. At the very end, right when he was dying, the last couple of years, we got very close.  It was, it was really sad that he died when he did, because, I never saw that he was proud of me or anything, but when I started acting and getting a headshot, and being in some plays, in his hospital room, he hung my headshot up.  It was really sweet.
HT:    That was 15 years ago; imagine how proud he’d be if he saw where you are now?
AD:    He’s seeing it.  He can see it.  But yeah, I always trip out that--I always thought my Dad made so much money, ‘cause he had a--he retired from the Navy and became a nuclear engineer at nuclear power plants?  And he, um--‘cause used to work on nuclear submarines— he used to get a pension from the--just for free, because he retired from the Navy, he’d get, like, 20 or 30 thousand just for nothing, and then he was making another 50 or 100 thousand being a nuclear engineer.  He made so much money.  But I trip out, thinking that I make way more than he ever did…that trips me out. My Dad worked his ass off. (inaudible)

A BEEPER IS GOING OFF…(AD speaks to his assistant who answers him)
HT:    It seems like all you’ve been good at socializing, making a lot of friends?
AD:    Right
HT:    You make friends all the time…
AD:    I really did.  I was good at that.  I’m still good at that.
HT:    Are you still in touch with a lot of your school friends? Do you still try to attend high school reunions and so forth?
AD:    Uh, huh.  I was, (choking on something, he clears throat and coughs) maybe too many.  I was—
HT:    Sounds like it got stuck, you know?
AD:    (laughing) I know.  I was invited to my 20th, my 20-year high school reunion.  (coughs again)  All my friends were begging me to come, but (coughs again) that was on the...24th.  Which is when?  That was yesterday, right?  That’s what I thought.
HT:    Are you also cautious of old acquaintances coming out of the woodworks?
AD:    No.
HT:    You’re a good judge of people?
AD:    Yeah.  Um…if they want something from me, you know, I probably, usually want something from them.  It’s always a give-take.
HT:    Right.  So, you’re not one of these guys that only have celebrity friends?
AD:    No, I don’t have any celebrity friends.
HT:    Yes, but surely you’re pretty tight with Ben Stiller, Jack Black, and all that lot?
AD:    Nope.  Unless it’s an event.  Mostly on-camera stuff. 
HT:    Right, right.
AD:    So at my party that I just had for my show, Hugh Hefner came, Rick James, Chris Rock. (asks assistant) Who else was there?
AS:    John Cusack, I saw there.
AD:    John Cusack, Joe Francis from Girls Gone Wild.  But I don’t really hang out with them, they’re just, we’re… People I attract, you know?
HT:    I read a quote where you said, that because you were neglected as a child, nobody ever taught you etiquette and the finer points in life.
AD:    Ummm.  Boundaries. 
HT:    Yeah.  But you used that in your work. Because you knew how to get across that awkwardness in situations.
AD:    Yeah, well, well, well I, my thing is that I don’t have boundaries.  And so, things that I do or say, other people wouldn’t do or say, because it would make ‘em look bad…And I don’t have that.  I really don’t care... I mean, to a fault.  It’s like, to a fault.  I should care more.
HT:    Right.  People think…
AD:    I go too far.  I admit that I go too far.
HT:    That’s why guys like Howard Stern like you.  Because you’re one of the few guys that are real.
AD:    Yeah, we are very similar.
HT:    Because when it comes down to it, there are only a couple of guys that are that free…
AD:    That--really it’s about not caring. You can’t care what people think, man.  And then, of course I have my days where you get to the point where you just don’t care so much that people start to um, uh…crap on you.  I’ve been crapped on a lot. Uh hmm…I try to have a balance.
HT:    But you weren’t that much of a bumpkin, were you?
AD:    A what?
HT:    A bumpkin.
AD:    You mean like country?
HT:    Yeah.
AD:    No. A little bit, but no, not really.  No, I wasn’t like a…trailer trash hick. But I really had a lot of friends that were, and um, ‘cause I was kind of smart.  But I always--I got put--thrown--into some, some circles where beauty was important. Design.  I remember this one--one of my friend’s moms was Swedish.  Her house was just so beautiful and I never understood why the house I was living in just didn’t seem to have--like this restaurant just really has a…feel, you know?  And my friend’s house had such great feel, I so I always wanted to hang out there. So early on I got into to design and beauty, and I love surrounding myself with beautiful people, guys and girls.  And things.
HT:    Are you materialistic?  One thing I have always noticed about you is that you do care about how you look…
AD:    I do.
HT:    You always try to be fashionable…
AD:    Yeah I really care about lookin’ good, yeah.  But I’m not materialistic in the common sense of the word.  I get things for free; I’ll wear it, get my picture taken at an event, and give it to my friends.  I’ll never wear it again.  Very…too generous. Sometimes I’ll give so much away and I wonder where things are.  Nolio was wearing a pair of shorts and I’m like “I love those shorts, where’d you get those?” and he’s like “You gave them to me.”  It’s like, “Oh, shit..”  You know?  I give a lot of stuff away, but that’s because I remember--I still feel, like, where I came from, when I was mowing lawns and getting blisters on my fingers.  I feel like that was yesterday. So when I see my friends working their asses off, it just reminds me of me.  And I want to help them the way I wished somebody would have helped me. 
HT:    But have you spent too much money on nice things not knowing that it all adds up?
AD:    No.  I don’t buy all these--I could, I mean--I have.  And I saw how empty it made me feel, and I really don’t do that as much.  Like, I bought a Hummer:  I sold it within a month.  I bought a Mercedes S-500:  sold it within 2 months. And I took a hit on it; I lost like 10 or 20 thousand dollars when I sold it.  I can buy any car I want.  I don’t want it.
HT:    So you’re real in that sense.
AD:    I really don’t care.
HT:    You felt stupid?
AD:    Yeah, it’s stupid.  I’ll tell you what: it doesn’t make me feel stupid.  There’s nothing like driving around in an S-500. (laughing) It’s like driving around –how I used to describe it--it's like driving around in your living room if your living room was made out of butter.  I mean, it was so smooth, and big and just smooth.  But I tell you, what it did for me, stressed me out.  I would be stressed out because it’s so…it’s like, it’s such a nice piece of art. It really is beautiful.  That it was like a piece of art, it should be in a museum, just sitting there.  Not be driven around.  I would freak out.  I like to just use my things.  I wanna, I wanna have a car where I can--I crashed my own car into my own apartment building the other day, you know--
HT:    (laughing) Really?
AD:    And I don’t get too upset, because, you know, I can replace that, that headlight, and I can spackle the building, you know?  I own my…I own the apartment building.
HT:    Because a lot of people are surprised, you know, when you had that incident in Vegas, you were driving a Nissan Sentra…and you were…
AD:    It wasn’t in Vegas, by the way, it was…uh…
HT:    …when you were quite successful, already.
AD:    Yeah, I had a Nissan, uh, Nissan Altima.
HT:    Yeah, right. (laughing).
AD:    I didn’t even have a Maxima!  I didn’t even have the Maxima because I really am not…materialistic.  I would like to have--I'm gonna--I don’t even have a flat screen TV…yet.  I’m gonna get one, but I’m not even going to get the most gigantis one, you know?
HT:    You just gotta go with what…
AD:    What you need, really.  What you need.  Some people feel like--
HT:    But you know, like athletes or stars, when they get rich, you know, they’re so tempted to buy the watches and spend too much money, and before you know it, they don’t have a bearing of---They might have a $10 million contract but you keep spending that stuff, like Tyson…
AD:    You’re bankrupt.
HT:    Yeah.
AD:    Like he is, isn’t he? Here’s what I did.  I’m doing pretty damn well. I bought an apartment building. And I live in one of the units. I’m just going to pimp it out.  Not too crazy…but pretty nice. You would love to live there.  Wait ‘til I’m done, you’re going to love it.  I’m taking, I’m taking a 3 bedroom and I’m sizing it down to a 2 bedroom.  My master bedroom is going to be big, and you know, like that. I’m just real super-super smart with my money.  I know what I need and I know what I don’t need.  I know what I like and I know what I don’t like.
HT:    Right.
AD:    I can afford to actually take 2 of the units, I’m gonna have—
HT:    You know who Vincent Gallo is?
AD:    Oh, I love him!  In fact, he--he--we’re friends--acquaintances. Um, I’m stealing one of his ideas because last time I talked to him--
HT:    He’s rich, apparently.  You know that?  I interviewed him and the guy’s got like 30 cars, you know.   He’s got, like, Lamborghinis and stuff.
AD:    (pause). I’m not into that stuff.  But, one thing…
HT:    He buys property and sells it…and he does a whole bunch of things
AD:    Yeah, and he made a good amount on Buffalo 66. He--
HT:    No he told me he didn’t hardly make any money.
AD:    Well, it was in the millions, must have been. And that’s all you need to start the ball rolling on property. And he was very smart.  There’s a house that he used to live in that I still to this day want to buy.  I know the new owners; the new owners are my friend Maura Tierney’s accountants. Um--I know, it’s weird--I’ve knocked on their door and just said “Can I come in and look at this hou--…?”  It’s a beautiful piece of art.  It’s a famous house.  I want to buy it to this day.   And he told me (imitating Gallo) “Um, my new thing…”--Vincent Gallo told me--“My new thing is”, uh, instead of like spending 10 minutes driving up windy hills to get a view, he rather take a one minute elevator ride and just have …condo… in a $1.2 million condo.  And have even more exquisite views but you didn’t have to drive.  And have a full service building.  So I’m doing that all across the country, right now.  I’m doing that in South Beach…
HT:    And he drives cross-country, you know that?
AD:    He does?
HT:    He never takes airplanes.  And he’s got a white--he's got the only white-- some kind of a dog.  And he goes from New York to LA, driving.
AD:    Right, ‘cause he’s afraid to fly.
HT:    Yeah, (inaudible:) angry, just going off.
AD:    He’s an angry guy, huh?
HT:    Yeah, but he’s very --I love listening to him talk.
AD:    I do too.
HT:    Yeah.  He--talk about no boundaries.  He just kept going. I love that guy.
HT:    He’s talking about Niggers and Jews, this and that…
AD:    Wow. 
HT:    Adrien Brody’s a fucking Jew with a ugly fuckin’ big nose!”
AD:    WOW.  Now, that sounds like he’s trying to stir it up a little bit.
HT:    Yeah. But he’s honest, too, you know.
AD:    I love that guy. I stole his idea about the condos.
HT:    Yeah.  Well, its smart.  To get rich, you gotta do something.
AD:    I’m buying a loft, we just saw one in downtown LA.  At the Toy Factory.  That’ll help my investment co-op.
HT:    You know, we talked about you having no boundaries, and I think we’re finding that, it seems like right now, everyone, universally, is sort of really respecting you for it.
Because the Andy Dick Show was very popular, but now, with The Assistant, it’s like everyone’s looking back at every thing you ever did and acknowledging your… genius.
AD:     Yeah.
HT:    Because I think people are, generally, sick of reality shows.  It’s coming to an end.
AD:    Did you see last night’s new episode?
HT:    Yeah I did. It was hilarious. I think it’s the best show on TV right now.
AD:    Thank you, dude.  That’s what Rolling Stone said about the Andy Dick Show. 
HT:    Exactly.
AD:    Because they were the only ones that said it.  No one else was watching.
HT:    But people will catch up to it in time. It was genius.
AD:    Thank you!
HT:    But you always want a regular gig on the Networks on the side too?
AD:    Because the sitcoms pay me a lot of money.
HT:    Because that stuff you do at MTV, that stuff’s always gonna be there.
AD:    Yeah.  Um, hmm, I agree.
HT:    Like all those skits you do on VH-1 and MTV, it’s genius stuff, you know?
AD:    Thanks, you’re right on my level.  You know what I’m doing.  Not a lot of people get what I’m doing. They don’t, they just don’t--
HT:    But I think they’re getting it now, though. 
AD:    Like, I think so… this is the first time…
HT:    I think the genius of The Assistant is the timing of it. The audience was beginning to feel a little bit insulted by these dumb reality shows one after the other. But people are still hooked on them. But you came along with The Assistant and made a big farce about the whole phenomena.
AD:    Yep. Exactly.
HT:    But do you feel bad about offending some groups sometimes?
AD:    Sometimes.
HT:    When you go to certain level?
AD:    Uh hmm.  There certain things I won’t do.  There’s--I don’t think that, uh, any kind of jokes about…anything with kids.  I don’t--‘Cause I have kids.  It’s not even funny to me.  It’s not even funny.  It’s just too…too creepy. I think, um…I think it’s kind of an epidemic, isn’t it?  In America? Kids getting kidnapped and shit?   And where are they?  And what’s going on?  Why don’t…why does that happen?




HT:    I don’t think people, in general, know that you’re probably a very sensitive person.
AD:    No, because when the cameras are turned on, I put up a little bit of a harder front.  Like, I’m the asshole.  “Don’t fuck with me.”  But I put that up so that they won’t fuck with me, because I don’t want them to.  Because I am sensitive.
HT:    But is it a defense mechanism?
AD:    Yeah.  That’s what I just said.  It’s totally a defense mechanism because I don’t want them to fuck with me.  I’m sensitive so I put on this harder act so that they don’t fuck with me, because it they’d fuck with me, I would just start crying (laughs).
HT:    You’ve always been very open about your troubles and your lifestyle, but that’s probably not always a good idea?
AD:    No, it’s not, but…No, I just have a problem in my mind. My therapist even says to me, “You need to create boundaries, you need to stop being so open in the press.”  My own therapist, not my publicist.
HT:    Right.
AD:    My publicist says the same thing.  You know my publicist--and the MTV executives, they say, ‘Andy, you can’t talk about these things that you do, you can’t do it.”  They--they threaten me. They say, “If you want a second season, it can’t be like this.” They dangle that second season carrot in front of me and say, (imitating the executives) “Don’t talk about thaaat….or you won’t have this.”
HT:    What kind of movies do you like?
AD:    Donnie Darko’s one of my--I love that movie. Um..the American Astronaut, great movie--you probably never saw that. This guy wrote it, directed it, starred in it and did the music for it.   Probably produced it, too. He did everything.  Yeah, this guy is so talented who did the movie--I was sitting in a movie theater and I saw a preview for his movie and I said, “What the fuck is that?”  It’s very rare when I see something that is so different; I’ve never seen it before.  That’s what I’m always trying to create.  I’m always trying to create something that you’ve never seen before.  Like this show, The Assistant, that’s what people are liking about it. 
HT:    Right.
AD:    There’s nothing like it!  The idea should have been done 3 years ago, really. In fact, we came up with it about two and half years ago…and shot the pilot.
HT:    Oh Yeah?
AD:    2 years ago. Yeah. But people just can’t stomach, they can’t digest things until later.
HT:    Kathy Griffin tried to do--she was into reality shows…
AD:    Yeah, where she talked about them…
HT:    Right.
AD:     Boor-ring.  People saw the Andy Dick Show  now, they’d get it… but back then…
HT:    Oh yeah, it’s like the Ben Stiller Show. I mean, Ben Stiller is a huge star now, and everybody sees his show on Comedy Central…and everyone’s like “Wow, this thing got cancelled?”
AD:    Yeah, I know. They need to wake up. I’m trying to wake people up, but maybe I’m trying to wake them up a little too early and they’re trying to hit their snooze buttons, still.
HT:    (laughs)
AD:    Seriously, I, I need--I need to relax a little. I think now that I’m 38, I kind of do things more organically, as before, I was trying to force it down people’s throats.  And they don’t like to be raped in the mouth.  (laughs) You know?
HT:    But you’re a workaholic?
AD:    Been, yeah, but not--not as much lately.  It’s funny, ‘cause my new thing is um, just, least work-most effort.  I mean, wait--no! (laughing) Least effort-most results.  You don’t have to do it as much.
HT:    It’s probably smarter to be a little bit more patient, too.
AD:    Yeah, you don’t have to. And you literally don’t have to do as much to get more results.
(THE PHONE RINGS AGAIN)
AD:    I don’t like to not answer my phone, I’ll tell you that.  I’m kind of addicted to it. I mean you can see, we’re in the interview and I still answer it. I just like to be available for people.  ‘Cause I know how it is when I can’t reach somebody, I don’t like that.
HT:    Yeah, when I called you, it didn’t even ring and you picked up.
AD:    I know.  (laughs)  I know, I like that, though.
HT:    You’ll be getting opportunities now.
AD:    Well I hope so.
HT:     Because you were on TV so you couldn’t do a lot of movies.  But you still did a lot of memorable movies doing cameos.
AD:    Yep.
HT:    But now that you’ll be starring in movies and so forth…
AD:    We’re going to star in the ones that we wrote.  I wrote 4 movies--3 or 4 movies.
HT:    And would you do some serious stuff, too?
AD:    Yeah.
HT:    Would it be hard for you to show emotions?
AD:    Nope. No, that’s easy. In fact, the really--for me—there's no line drawn between comedy and drama. One of my favorite movies that I wanted to mention earlier, but it’s just such an odd movie and I don’t think anybody saw it, but it was called, um, Lorenzo’s Oil.
HT:    Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
AD:    It was--Nick Nolte was doing a really bad accent during it but I--you have to look past that--but the movie is so powerful…but that’s probably personal to me because I have kids.  But within the first 5 minutes or 10 minutes of the movie, this kid’s going into convulsions for no reason, you don’t know what’s going on, and it’s just the speed it’s happening--at Christmas!  You know, and it’s like, HORRIFIC. And I didn’t know what--I didn’t know what it was about.  We should go see--we should go watch it again, because it was so powerful to me I was like bawling my eyes out within the first 5 minutes and I didn’t stop.  But the other thing--on the other side of the coin—I laughed really hard. I laughed really hard.  But, like, because of the reality of the situation, there was parts where there were things that were just really funny.  Like really clever and funny. And that’s why I don’t--I don’t really have this line drawn.  I like movies like that.
HT:    Sometimes there’s humor in life, even when it’s a little bit of hard.
AD:    Yeah, I prefer that kind of humor.  I’m not a big--I'm not a giant fan of the--of Dodgeball and Anchorman.  You know, I was asked to be in both those movies?  I was asked to be in them.  I like John Cassavettes movies.  I love him.  That’s the kind of movies I want to make.  So that’s what I want to do. I’m going to do what I do on TV where I do Less Than Perfect, but I do MTV, and I go the ying-yang balance.  I’m gonna do that in movies.  I’m gonna do my independent movies, very cheaply, and my way; you know, real fucked up.
HT:    Are you going to work in low budget with the digital cameras?
AD:    Sometimes.  Sometimes we have to.  But, you know, Blair Witch was done all on stupid video, and it’s a really great movie, it’s really fun. Um, but then also, I’ll also do the other ones, like you said.  I will do the Dodgeball movie, who’s going to say “No.” to a $5 million paycheck?  Not me!  Because,  I really do want to buy that (Perfect 10) house.  I like to surround myself--I like to be in an environment that inspires me. That’s why I want to be in that loft.  You would love to live there.  I would let my friends just stay there…I’m buying it.  I can, and it’s cheap.  And its only going to go up, dude.  I guarantee you. A rooftop pool?  …a pool that I don’t have to take care of. (regarding the phone) I’m sorry, I have to take this.  Which is great, its great.
(ANDY ANSWERS THE PHONE)
HT:    What do you think of something like Da Ali G. Show?
AD:    Ohhhhh! I cream in my pants over that.  When I get jealous of a show, that’s when I know it’s really good.  He is so awesome.  That guy is the most awesome guy.
HT:    Isn’t he brilliant?
AD:    Yeah, I really, I want to work with him.  My favorite one is--the--I don’t know what his nationality is--but he’s like--
HT:    Khazakistan.
AD:    Yeah, what is he?  Is he like, Ukrainian?  I LOVE that fucking character.  We’re on the same page.
HT:     You’d be good on HBO.
AD:    I know I could some--I've had development deals at HBO to do my own shows and then I always chicken out and go for the bird in the hand because a development deal--Janeane Garafalo had a development deal…did you ever see anything develop? No.  Things a lot of times don’t ever develop. And so I got freaked out when I had a development deal but then…but then ABC came and said “Hey, do you want to, uh, do a show right now, starting next week?” “Here’s the offer, we’re just giving it to you.”  I’m like, “Well that’s a bird in the hand, as opposed to..”
HT:    What do you like on TV?
AD:    Um, I don’t get to watch a lot of TV, but I have to admit I’m still a fan of the Real World. I just am, man.  I love to see people try to pretend to be real at first, and then get so trashed--you know that’s what they do, they just get ‘em drunk.  And then people, just, their true colors come out.  They get busted…
HT:    Because they’re posing at the beginning.
AD:    At the beginning they’re posing, and I love to see that.  Who they think we think that they are. They’re showing us who we--who they think we think they’re fooling us into being, you know.  They think, “Oh this is Me, and I’m fooling them.” and then they sloooowly get drunk, and they slowly start getting arrested, beating each other up and fucking each other. It’s like rats in a cage and I LOVE it!…And then I try to find them. I try to find them in real life and fuck ‘em! (laughing) We do?
HT:    (laughs)
AD:    (laughing) Yeah, we hang out with them.  They’re fun, they’re just normal people.
HT:    How were you as a stand up?
AD:    No, no, I didn’t do stand up.  Well, I was very bad at it because…I didn’t do jokes.  God I was so bad at it. But what I--I do it--like I got just done doing 5 shows--I just came back yesterday--I did 5 shows in San Francisco.
HT:    With The Bitches of the Century?
AD:    No! Well I brought one of them.  So, (laughing) one Bitch and we just--what I do is I go on stage and I field questions on paper…  I have the audience write down questions they want to ask me, ‘cause they seem to be full of questions.  That’s--really they just want their questions answered, when they come to see me.  And instead of trying to pretend--
(Interrupted by the waiter)
AD:    Yes, I want to see it because I want to get one glass of port. Maybe we’ll get the cheese plate too. (To the waiter) We’ll just have some port.
(THE WAITER LEAVES)
AD:    But what I was going to say is that, so my show, that I created--see, I’ve been doing live shows since I was 18…
HT:    Right.
AD:    …now I’m 38 so for 20 years…
HT:    Cabarets, right?
AD:    Yeah, so for 20 years I’ve been doing this cabaret show that is definitely not stand up comedy.  I don’t do jokes.  There are some bits I’ve done that get laughs, but they’re not…they’re not, um, legitimate jokes and…
HT:    They don’t belong--
AD:    Yeah, they don’t really belong in a comedy club, and I get booked by these comedy clubs and ultimately always get angry at me because they’re expecting this robotic jokester.  They want some fucking cloned robot joke-teller “Blah, blah blah.”  Set up, set up, punch line; set up, set up, punch line; set up, set up, punch line.  I don’t do that shit.  I’m not interested in doing that shit.
HT:    Well you’ve never experienced a real high in doing it.
AD:    No, I do! Because, I can get people to laugh harder than just people who are just, like, conditioned to laugh.  They’re conditioned and so they get a certain level of laugh like,  (imitating them) “Ha-ha-ha-ha!…oh here comes the other joke…oh here it comes…and there’s  the joke and…ha-ha-ha-ha!”  They’re conditioned, like rats, dude.  Like, when you see a movie…and when…
(Andy decides to wait until the assistant is off the phone)
AD:    When you have a trailer for a movie this phenomenon drives me crazy, because it doesn’t happen to me.  I don’t know why it doesn’t happen to me.  I’ll watch a trailer and there’s something funny in the trailer, and I laugh. And I’m like “Well that was funny.” And like, in the trailer of the movie, right?  And you’ll see that trailer over and over on TV. Then you go to the movie, to the actual movie, I’ve already seen that. So I’m just like, ”Oh I remember that from the trailer.”  But everyone else is conditioned to laugh even harder at that part that they’ve seen over and over, like “Oh here comes that funny part that we saw!” and they laugh harder and I hate that.  I hate it.  It’s like, why are they laughing? That’s why I don’t like to watch trailers.  If there’s a movie that I know I’m gonna like, I will not watch it, I will leave, I will plug my ears and close my eyes.  Because, I want to see it fresh.
HT:    Right, right.
AD:    But that drives me crazy.  And that’s what stand up comedy--that’s the whole phenomenon that’s happening with me right now, is I get invited--and get paid a lot of money--to go perform these shows…I go on for 1 to 2 hours per show, depending on whether somebody drags me off.  I mean I could go on for 3 hours, sometimes.  Just talking.
HT:    Just talking?
AD:    (laughs) I do and its too long!
HT:    And you’re not necessarily trying to be funny…
AD:    No, I’m not! 
HT:    …you get serious?
AD:    I’m just talking. I’m talking and I get serious and sometimes I want to cry, but, but they’re always laughing and I think, sometimes, I hope they’re moved sometimes.  Or freaked out.  Or angry.  They don’t know what’s going on, and then, I’ll mix it up with songs. So, like, every 10, 15 minutes I’ll do a song.  Sometimes every 5 minutes I’ll do a song. So it’ll be song-talking-answering questions from the audience--because that’s when I realized that people come--when people come to see me, they just really want to know--they have questions that they need to get answered, and instead of trying to guess what their questions are, and trying to answer these questions I don’t even know, I just say “What are your fucking questions?”  And it’s weird, they’re the same ones at every show, they just change, a little different, a little bit, over the years.  Like now, there’s a bunch of questions about Trishelle, because of the Surreal Life, where we were makin’ out.  It just aired again--you can see how conditioned people are by the TV. By the questions they ask me.
HT:    Right.
AD:    And, man, it really is, is…profound.
HT:    Yeah.
AD:    You would love to see one of my shows.  We just taped every one--every five--every one of my five shows in San Francisco.  Real good quality, video, high fidelity stereo, mics everywhere, 4 cameras, everyone--we're gonna edit them together into a really nice DVD and I’ll give you one.
HT:    That’s cool.
AD:    You’ll love it. (regarding the port) This stuff is so hot--this is from 19-fucking-54. Oh man…
HT:    It looks like espresso, or something
AD:    Looks like...(laughs)…looks a little dark.
HT:    You never wanted to do Saturday Night Live?
AD:    No.  When I did the Ben Stiller Show, the next question my manager had, Bernie Brillstien, who managed everyone on Saturday Night Live--they basically said “Okay, you ready to do Saturday Night Live?” and I said, “I…” At the time, I had just done the Ben Stiller Show and felt that I had pushed myself to my limits doing characters, okay? Took me another 5 or 10 years of just experiencing life and running into more people to develop more characters and just the ability to do characters… So I didn’t have confidence and I didn’t feel like I would shine if I had joined the cast back then, so I said no. Now…I was here last night, and Rachel Dratch was sitting right at the bar, from Saturday Night Live, and I said, “Hey!” cause I know everybody in comedy--or more specifically, everybody in comedy knows me, you know?  And my friend goes, (imitating him under his breath) “You know, that’s Rachel Dratch” I do know Rachel Dratch but there are people that I don’t know that they have to point out--"You know, that’s so-and-so from so-on”—and, whatever, and I have to be like “Oh, Rachel Dratch, I know her, she’s great, she’s real funny, she’s got that downer character, that I heard people talk about.  I went up to her, and I did say to her, “I’m ready to host that fucking show.” I mean, I’m not going to join the cast, obviously, but I certainly would love to fucking host it, and don’t you think it’s time?  Fuck yeah!  I mean, the hosts they’re getting? C’mon…
I mean, if Nick and Jessica are hosting it, I can fucking host it!
HT:    Working with that cast and SNL writers for a week, you’d be outrageous!
AD:    Oh I’ll kick their asses, I swear to god.  From here to high hell.  In a good way.  People will be laughing.  We will have a fucking awesome time.  I’m gonna probably be cracking up because, for the most part I don’t work with a bunch of people that are super-super funny.  To me, the funniest people around are Jennifer Coolidge and Mike Hitchcock, I don’t know if you know them.  They are probably the funniest man and the funniest woman I know.  Along with Bob Odenkirk.  Hysterical, man.  Brilliant guy.  Like, if you hung out with him right now, we’d just be laughing…we would be laughing, man.  But Jennifer Coolidge is that woman from American Pie--
HT:    Right, right, right.
AD:    --and Mike Hitchcock is a writer on Mad TV, he was in Best in Show…It’s very--that part doesn’t show him off as well--
HT:    He was great in Guffman, too.
AD:    So funny in Guffman.  He was in my show, the Andy Dick Show, he played my stalker.
HT:    Ohhh, yeah, yeah.
AD:    That’s him, dude.
HT:    He’s so good.
AD:    And he’s so funny.  People don’t know, man. And he doesn’t know how to market himself, ‘cause he’s so good, that it’s hard to pin him down to something. Like I can be pinned down to just little freak, and people hire me for that.  But he’s so massively good, man, he really is. I’m gonna use him, you’ll see.  He’ll get his just reward.
HT:    So you didn’t really do stand up but who did you idolize?
AD:    Yeah.  I loved Andy Kaufman.  He’s one of my heroes.  So he’s not really a stand up, but he did stand up at the Improvisation 2 blocks from where I live,  where I can go any night of the week and walk on stage and just do 5 minutes.
HT:    Right.
AD:    Bowlshiiiit. And I should take advantage of that more often.  That’s an opportunity that I should be taking advantage of. I should do a fucking DVD called the Improvisation…uh--what's it called(snaps his fingers)--the Improvisation--the Improv….Renderings or something like--the Improv…Mutterings, you know?  Where I go on every week, once a week--I really should do this, dude.  Once a week I go on for 5 minutes, we just videotape it, videotape it, videotape it, videotape it, and then 100 episodes down the line, I’ve got this weird compilation of fucked up shit.  But I need to really tape it with good sound and stuff.
HT:    Don’t you want to open your own theater, too?
AD:    Yeah I do, how’d you know that?
HT:    I know my shit.
AD:     I will open up my own theater.
HT:    How significant was it to be involved in the Ben Stiller Show?
AD:    It was the most important thing that happened to me.  Up to that point.  Because, then, of course, I did News Radio which lasted for 5 years, and then I really was in the public consciousness.  But up that point, I did the Ben Stiller Show, and you know why I did that? Because I was performing, all around town on stage doing my fuckin’ shit that was, really, just a bunch of bullshit.  That--
HT:    That a lot of people didn’t get.
AD:    No one got it.  Ben--I noticed this guy Ben, who I had met earlier, was showing up.  He was showing up with--sometimes there’d be 10 people in the audience but he was one of them.
HT:    Scouting you?
AD:    He was scoutin’ me! I see now.  And then he shoved me into a show, only 4 of us. Me, Ben Stiller, Janeane and Bob, 4 people.  There’s not that many people.  So we had to do a lot of parts, man.  It was hard for me.
HT:    The Mummy one.
AD:    That was hard, to do the fuckin’ Mummy. To do Woody Allen.  Man, I had to work as an actor.  I had to approach that from the back door, like an actor.  Like--(imitating Woody Allen) “How do I…This is great…My name is Woody Allen, I’m a doctor”  I couldn’t even--took me a long time--I had to go the--I went to the movie theater and watched Woody Allen movies that were out--that movie was out at the time.  The umm…not Bride of Frankenstein…Woody Allen’s Husbands and Wives.  That was our take, our parody of Husbands and Wives.  Not only did I watch it, I recorded it on a fucking tape recorder and then listened to it over and over. You know and just (imitating Woody Allen) “Kept trying to do the…”
HT:    (laughing)
AD:    I  got it, finally, a little bit.  But I’m not Rich Little or Dana Carvey.  Those people really mimic, they’ve got good, um...vocal range?…Good capacity…good use of…
HT:    Some critics have commented that the contestants on The Assistant must be--they must have found, like, the dumbest contestants to put up with that bullshit, you know, considering what’s at stake? 
AD:    Maybe…Well you know what, MTV picked the contestants, and to be honest with you, they probably picked…. I didn’t see even see them, or see their pictures or anything.  And that’s how they wanted it--you know people, the smart ones, aren’t going to do a reality show.  So yeah, they probably got people that were a little more desperate—
HT:    Naïve?
AD:    And more naïve, yeah that’s a better word. That’s perfect
HT:    From out of--
AD:    From out of state.
HT:    From Illinois and Louisiana.
AD:    They’re naïve, they’ll do anything to be on TV.  And of course they come on TV, and they do anything to win a car. So of course, they’re just gonna do anything.
HT:    But it’s any young person from out of LA could fill out an application to be an intern or work in the mail room of a Talent agency or a Publicity firm. But, I guess, they think this is a huge opportunity to get the exposure?
AD:    And it is a huge opportunity.  They’re all doing so well, man.  One of them, I’m not going to say who, but one of the girls got, uh, offered to possibly be a VJ on MTV, out of being on the Assistant! She already went in… Also, I’m managing half the cast, I don’t know if you know that.  I offered them. I said, “Listen, I know I was a freak with you guys, and I’ll be honest with you, I was just playing a game.  And the game is called Make Some Good TV.”
HT:    Right.
AD:    Let’s just make some good TV, here. Entertaining TV.   I know them and I know the opportunity they have laid out right there in front of them.  And I can at least submit them on things.  And so I started this management company, that I would love it if you talked about.  But I started a management company, just to see what could happen, and it’s weird because right away we got somebody cast.  Not from the Assistant, another client of mine got cast on a show, within 4 days.  So like, maybe--
HT:    The crazy thing about this culture of reality shows is that they’re all naïve and the jokes were on them.  But…
AD:    But then they become celebrities.
HT:    …because it was a successful show, they’re all stars, now.
AD:    Yeah.  Like that guy who was really bad on American Idol, or any of the Bachelors or Bachelorettes.
HT:    1 or 2 of them might even end up in a movie or something.
AD:    Yeah, oh yeah
AS:    or FHM.
HT:    Exactly,  FHM or something.
AD:    FHM would be perfect for these girls.  Dude, write FHM, we could have a cover called “The Girls of…it could be Anna, Melissa, Sarah…
AS:    Stephanie.
AD:    And Stephanie.  And you might as well…and Nikita can kind of be in the back, ‘cause--
AS:    Mmmm--Ebony could probably do that.
AD:    Both of them.  We have to have them all in there, cause they’re our girls--there are guys that like that kind of girl, you know?  We could get her in there looking as hot as possible--she could look like Queen Latifah, we could get her to look hot.  ‘The Girls of the Assistant’, dude, YES!  Call Nicole on that one.
HT:    I’m surprised they haven’t done it yet…
AD:    No, no, you thought of it.
HT:    Because you’re only on the third show, the timing is right now.  It should be on the stands next month, you know?  Because you’ve got plenty of episodes left.
AD:    You’re so right, dude.
AS:    The finale, have a release for the finale, definitely.
AD:    Or it could be--if we need to cut out  the ones that aren’t as attractive, it could be ‘the Finalists of the Assistant’.  And it would just be Melissa, Anna…They all look good.  Even I look good.
HT:    And that other...Anna or whatever?
AD:    Anna…
HT:    I mean,  she’s looking better and better every week.
AD:    She’s the one that got offered to be a VJ.  But I can’t tell you won or didn’t win.
HT:    Right, right.
AD:    And that’s not telling--and that’s not, that’s not a hint. I’m not--Shhhh.  She might have won, she might not have one.  You really won’t know.
HT:    How much of the show was, like real?
AD:    Um, the only thing that was real was their reactions.  And sometimes, my reactions.  But, uh…I can never predict what they’re going to do or say.  So whatever I say back to them---our interactions are pretty real.  We set up scenarios that are a little unreal, and then whatever happens in the confines or the structure of those scenarios is real, ‘cause they think it’s real. And I’m acting like it’s real.
HT:    Do you still go out a lot?
AD:    Oh I used to go out every night for probably 10 or 20 years, almost.  And now I don’t go out because, well I got punched in the nose, and that’s as, that’s as…that’s as uncomfortable as it gets…Which is pretty fucking uncomfortable.
HT:    Out of the blue?
AD:    Yeah, out of the blue, didn’t even talk to him, no interaction.  Mark actually sort of started talking to him.
HT:    Was he a big dude?
AD:    Big dude. Big fucking…
HT:    That’s bullshit.
AD:    …dude.  It was horrible, dude. But, it gets uncomfortable in other ways as well that I usually can hang with. Most people couldn’t but just, getting pulled or dragged or shoved over here, or grabbed on my ass or…
HT:    That’s a problem…
AD:    …shoved on the phone, or talked to me, or “I love you”, or trying to make out with me on lips, like, I get molested.
HT:    People think they know you.
AD:    Exactly.  People think that we’re intimate friends.  Which is my own doing.  That’s my own doing.
HT:    You could probably be humorous most of the time but people have no idea how you’re feeling at that time.
AD:    I can always be humorous, but it’s not even about that, its just being pulled and pushed in so many directions and violated..
HT:    And you don’t know them…
AD:    And I don’t know them, and I’m trying to hang out with my friends, you know?  I love going out only to hook my friends up with hot chicks.  Going out--if I go out with 5 of my guy friends, 1 or 3 or 4 of them will hook up, if they want to.  In San Francisco, everybody hooked up!  They just love it.  And if they can’t break my walls, they start looking right close near me, and then they just--all my friends just get fucked.  It’s called the spill-off effect. Or the run-off.  (laughing) I’m running off to (inaudible: bedville)
HT:    Even like Joe Rogan.  Do you know Joe?
AD:    Of course.  We were on News Radio together, remember?
HT:    Oh that’s right.
AD:    He called me about 2 weeks ago.  He called me out of the blue.  He is a womanizing freak.  That guy loves to fuck.  And I’m guessing that every--that all of his fucking is anger fucking.  I imagine that when he fucks its all anger fucking.  He just fucks those women.  He’s--there's something about him--
HT:    Well he’s into that fucking grappling shit—
AD:    He’s an angry guy.
HT:    …he’s kind of a--wants to be a tough guy, too.
AD:    Oh yeah.
HT:    I saw that VH-1 show on Fear Factor.
AD:    I saw that one.
HT:    They showed the outtake of when I guy refused to leave, and Joe took it into his own hands, and Joe’s like “You got to fucking leave!  I’m sorry…this sucks!”  He was great--
AD:    I saw that.
HT:    And he was about to fucking choke him.
AD:    Yeah.  Between me and you, and you can quote this, I don’t give a shit…I don’t care.  Bring it in.  I love Joe Rogan.  I love him to the point where I would--I’d jerk him off if (inaudible: get wood).  He’s a hot guy, man, and I think he probably…
AD:    There’s the cover, “Joe….has a real nice cock.”  (laughing) ‘I think Joe Rogan has a nice cock’, that’s the cover… I was going to say, that I think that, you know, he probably hates part of him--his own self, and the part that he hates about himself, is the part that’s gay.  ‘Cause I think everybody has a little gay in them.
HT:    You know, Stern was saying the same thing--
AD:    I think he’s a little--and he’s not homophobic, he’s homophobic in that he’s afraid of the gay in him.  Fuckin’ serious.  I know that’s true.
HT:    Personally, I would never do that grappling shit, just because I don’t want get that sweaty and so intimately close to another dude. 
AD:    It’s homoerotic.  He’s--that's his--that's as gay as he’ll get. He is --that sport is very homoerotic.  C’mon, it turns me on to watch it.  For real.  C’mon, you don’t think it’s turning him on?



DICK INTERVIEW: Part 2

AD:    …I’m always directing, so why wouldn’t I want to be a director? (laughs) As if he asked me “Why do you want to be --?” (laughing) He never even asked that! Why wouldn’t I?  I’m always directing, I’m direct--why aren’t you--?
HT:    Okay--when you do the Assistant or the Andy Dick Show, how much of it is scripted?
AD:    There’s always a skeleton outline, at least. Sometimes, like with the Andy Dick Show, there were scenes that were completely written 100%. I didn’t even have to change one thing.  Didn’t even have to improvise. 
HT:    But improvising is a big thing for you isn’t it?
(THE FRISBEE GAME HAS CAUGHT HIS EYE)
AD:    Oh wait, do that again, Geoffrey…(to HT) Yeah, oh yeah…that is so fucking sexy.
HT:    But does it always begin with your ideas? Or do you have a writing team? Or how does it work?
AD:    (sotto voce) Ohhh, they got it good.  Um, on the Andy Dick Show I had 7 writers. One of them was Paul Henderson, by the way.  He got fired by MTV.  He got fired.  But anyways, but on the Assistant, no.  There’s no writers.  Except for me and a guy named Adam …Cohen.  Adam Cohen is not a writer.  There are no official writers on the show, but Adam Cohen is a--is part of the producing team, of Adam and Kara Tapper from Superdelicious. And Joanna.  There’s 3 of them.  But Adam is the one that is fucking constantly next to the camera, coaching me, saying “Ooh, you should say this! This might be funny! This might be intriguing!”  He’s very good at--he’s like a director.
HT:    Right.
AD:    But I like to think that I am the ultimate director, and I’d like to--I would like to have 100% control but I really don’t.  Even though--I’m executive producer.
HT:    So you don’t have ‘final cut’?
AD:    NO. I-Wha?-I-Why?-No…Why--
HT:    So you don’t even go in there and edit with them?
AD:    No, I couldn’t have final cut. MTV…you know…the government, has final cut.
HT:    No.
AD:    Yes!  The government has final cut! Who has final cut?  There’s no such thing as FINAL CUT anymore when you’re dealing with TV!  The government has final cut, okay?  MTV is out of--they don’t even--you know--yes, they cut me, MTV cuts me, but then the government cuts them. MTV is pretty fucking laid back, that’s why I love them.  I know those people. You know, the woman that married the drummer from Devo, runs…Lois. Well she was one the executives on my show.  She’s awesome.  These are, like, really hip people, older hip people, you know?  Brian Graden? He rocks….Brian Graden is gay, too, you know.
HT:    All the shows--
AD:    Brian Graden is gay, he runs all the fucking networks, I love that.
HT:     Is that…
AD:    You didn’t even know that, did you?
HT:    Is it surprising to you that he’s…
AD:    Well he’s…
HT:    …gay and successful?
AD:    Very successful.  He runs Viacom.  He runs VH-1 and he’s young.  He’s younger than me.  VH-1…
HT:    Oh really?
AD:    Yes and hot. That’s why when he called yesterday I stopped everything. I was filming and Brian Graden called and I said “Stop, who is it?” “Brian Graden.” “Okay I need to take this call…and tell everyone I’m talking to Brian Graden.” (laughs)
HT:    Which project do you think is the best project you’ve done?
AD:    Well, to me…to me the culmination of my career, of all my work has been the Andy Dick Show, because--you don’t understand--I  got--should I stop because of that airplane? I don’t know.
HT:    No.
AD:    You don’t understand--that's how I got my start.  On a variety show called the Ben Stiller Show. I didn’t think I could do it at the time, I wasn’t this character guy that does all these (imitating an old southern man) “crazy characters, here’s another one over here a-hee a-haw!”  But anyone can do it.  You can.  When Ben Stiller said, “You’re on my variety show, we’re all going to play a bunch of different characters, and it’s just me, you, Bob Odenkirk and Janeane Garafalo.” I’m like, “Where do I sign?” You know, (imitating southern guy) “I can do it!  I can do it!”  Times 10!  But I was the guy, that, when they fucking tried to hire me to be in the equestrian center, they didn’t try to hire me, I auditioned  to be Ebenezer Scrooge in the fucking Legend of Sleepy Hollow, that’s like the main, you know, book guy, the crazy guy, and SCARED OF THE HEADLESS HORSEMAN!  And it was in the equestrian center where people sat on bales of hay and you really rode a horse…
AS:    That’s not Ebenezer Scrooge.
AD:    Not Ebenezer Scrooge…no-- Ichabod Crane! Ichabod Crane! Yes!  Yessiree, bob.  I didn’t write that.  But—that’s just.--And we had to fuckin’ ride…and I like bro-- well I didn’t break my ankle, but I sprained it real bad, ‘cause not only did I have to ride a horse, which is kind of a big deal, you know, to just say “Yes.” I shouldn’t have….Onstage! Not onstage, the stage was the whole equestrian center.  We were rushing, galloping through forests, do you understand?  People could see us in the trees, it was the fucking most awesome play and I was Ichabod Crane! And they had a real headless horseman on a black horse with NO HEAD!  But he--or she? I think it was a she, actually, could see out of her thing, yeah, with a cape and with no head.  And she’s fucking goin’ and she’s holding her fucking thing and everything.  Her Jack-o-lantern.  THROWS IT AT ME!!!  Dude, this is a real fucking play.  I wish I had video of that shit.  That really happened.  That’s probably how I started getting into the more of the experiential, performance-arty type of situations, like what I do.  I want to include the audience, I want them (sniffs) SMELL (sniffs) the fuckin’ HORSESHIT.
HT:    Alright.
AD:    I’m sorry.  He’s not gonna --Norm’s not gonna--Norm’s not gonna like that. Norm gets offended.  You could say--"I want the audience”--that is how my theater is. I want the audience to smell (sniffs) the horse’s….sweat.
HT:    Season one of The Assistant is a success. Its one of the biggest successes in your career, isn’t it? 
AD:    It is, actually.  Not over time, though.  Over time, in a cumulative fashion, the Ben Stiller Show has given me the biggest thing. But a lot of time has passed, it came back, so much time has passed, it now runs on Comedy Central, but you know, things are a lot quicker nowadays.  It’s weird that it took 10 years.  People forgot about it and Ben became such a big fucking star, that’s what it is. But yeah, and then News Radio was very big for me. Did you know, when News Radio was on the air, it was not a hit, in fact, that’s why it got cancelled.  I mean, it stayed on for 5 years, but….a hit stays on for 10.  You know?  This was not a hit it just barely made enough to go into syndication.  It was a --I’m gonna tell you what--it was a solid, out of 100 shows, it was a solid 76.  Only one time--that’s an average-- one time it got into the 20’s, like--that’s a top 20’s show.  It didn’t even ever make a top 10 show, like Seinfeld or Friends.  No, never.  But over time--it was just such a good, solid show.  And, it was too good, at the time.  And you know, you watched it re-runs and you’re like “Oh wow that was a really good show.” You know, you’ve seen that, right?  You’ve seen it.
HT:    Would you say that that’s the one show that should have been given more of a chance?
AD:    No.  People just couldn’t stomach it at the time. I think I realize that’s what it is.  Its…people need to be spoon-fed things. And at the time…some things they can’t stomach.
HT:    It was funny, though.
AD:    It was.  But then people had to catch up to it. And that’s what I think--you know, this sounds SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO--and you can put 15 ‘O’s on that ‘so’.—egotistical that…I think, I think the Andy Dick Show, I think people are going to catch up to it. Maybe, in the next couple of years.  I think they’re ready now.
HT:    Well, yeah..
AD:    We just have to put it out on DVD. And we’re doing that.
HT:    Well, the thing is, I mean, 2 years down the road people are going to want to see your character ‘Ziti’ more than re-runs of the Assistant. To be honest with you.
AD:    I hope.  Because I was just fucking around when I was doing the Assistant. We were just having fun. That was easy.  That’s why I want to do a second season.  Good money, little effort!
HT:    Are you surprised how well it was received?
AD:    Yes, I’m very surprised!  It’s funny. It’s another life lesson for all of us to learn.  The thing that I just had fun with--the thing that I had the most fun with, and just didn’t care--I wasn’t thinking “Ooh, I gotta make this work and that…” I was just having fun.  What would be the funniest thing, or what would be the most weirdest to fuck with them! (laughing) ‘Cause I was just trying to have--I was just entertaining myself. I just wanted to fuck with these guys. It was entertaining me. And now its entertaining …AMERICA.
(LAUGHTER)
HT:    No pressure to be more outrageous next season?
AD:    But I was just having fun.  I’m fucking serious, though, I was having fun, that’s my point.  Who knew it was going to be such a fuckin’ hit?
HT:     But do you feel pressure coming up with new stuff for the second season?
AD:    No no, no, no.   No, no, no, I’m gonna fucking--I’ll make it way better.  The second season will be way better.  There’s no pressure, there’s only excitement and anticipation.
HT:    So you’re going to just up the ante with…
AD:    Oh yeah.  We’re gonna get…crazier contestants.  Even better looking and crazier…
HT:    What about upping the prize, wouldn’t that make a difference?
AD:    Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I’m sure MTV will.  Even if you down the prize and gave ‘em a snickers bar--ice cream bar, the little snickers, the frozen kind? And it’s been in the sun all day?  So it’s a totally melted snicker’s bar--
HT:    ‘Cause they’re signing up mainly for the exposure?
AD:    Exactly!  They would do it for nothin’. But, they’re going to fucking up the prize, too, I’m sure.  They’re going to get a better car--they got a fucking car by the way, that was pretty cool.
HT:    Colin didn’t drive you guys in the car today so that kind of tells me something.
AD:    No, no the car doesn’t go to the winner, ‘til, um, until the finale, obviously.
HT:    Oh yeah?
AD:    But I did not say whether Colin won or not, did I?
HT:    Okay.
AD:    Did I?  Did I?  You can print that.  I did not say if Colin won or not.
HT:    It’s always been important for you to push the envelope in all your humor…
AD:    You have to say it like that!  Or I will get in trouble.
HT:    What?
AD:    You can’t say that Andy referred that Colin won.  No I didn’t!  I did not say whether Colin won or not. I’m not going to tell anybody who won.
AS:    He asked you another question, buddy.
AD:    I’m just making that perfectly clear. ‘Cause they can sue me.  They told me--
HT:    What’s—
AD:    --Have I told anybody?
AS:    Because they could sue me for 2 million.
AD:    Me for 2 million, too. Well I haven’t told anyone.
HT:    Listen..
AD:    I have told you? Honestly?
HT:    Yeah, I know, but you didn’t tell me.
AD:    Someone else told you?  Oh that’s fucked.
HT:    I’m not going to disclose my sources, but…
AD:    Colin?
CB:    Nope.
AD:    Mark?
AS:    Nope.
AD:    It was Mark. Better’ve been Mark.
HT:    What’s the craziest thing that you’ve done?
AD:    Oh, I don’t know what people think is crazy.
HT:    But for you?
AD:    Things I’m doing are normal…and fun.
HT:    But for you?  The thing that you think.
AD:    Oh, when I was younger I used to shit--(laughs)  What are we talking about?  Things when I’m younger?
HT:    No, no, for entertainment.
AD:    Oh, on TV?
HT:    Craziest thing you’ve done…
AD:    Well…
HT:    …that you felt like “Wow, I’m really pushing it here.”
AD:    Ummm…well I always try to do that.  I filming something to--today? Or yesterday?--Yesterday.  I was filming something yesterday…with the wombat?
HT:    Getting jizz on the face?
AD:    From the wombat, yeah. But you know what?  That was mean,  knowing that I was pushing them.  But…to me it’s not, it’s not pushing it.  I’m always trying to push it. That part, yeah, that was pushing it.
HT:    But obviously, some of these things that you--
AD:    NO!  Let me think of the Teen Choice Awards.  I feel…Oh I know. Oh, here’s stuff that will never get on the Teen Choice Awards  I’m always filming much more fucked up shit than you’ll ever see. Because it just doesn’t get allowed to air, ever.  And I’ll tell you right now I’m always doing that.  Yesterday I was filming a short movie that I produced, for the Teen Choice Awards, ‘cause we have a company, Pollywog.  It’s a production company.  Listen, wait, he has to hear about Pollywog.  We have a production company called Pollywog.  We did the Andy Dick Show--
(SILENCE. PERHAPS A FRISBEE HAS BEEN THROWN)
AD:    Can you hold on for a second? No, Geoff needs to hear this.  We have a production company.  We produced.  I’m the executive producer of the Andy Dick Show. We also produced commercials that have won Addie Awards, which is the Academy Awards for commercials.  By the way, my first set of commercials won it.  And, I’ve only had 3 commercials. People just don’t want to hire me right now.  I’m just a little too crazy.  They’re afraid.  I don’t care.  I’ll produce commercials for own products!  If I have to! I’m fucking serious.
HT:    But it hasn’t changed even with this recent…
AD:    Well, yeah, I keep doing it.  I keep doing whatever they let me do, I do. So then they let me do a TV show at MTV. And by the way, that was the only network that accepted me after I went to rehab.  Really.
HT:    So you’re grateful.
AD:    I love them, man. They’re--
HT:    By the way, I just thought of an idea for…when you’ve got your DVD coming out, you should do it as that guy, as that late night guy that goes “You can get it for FREE!” Remember that dude that you did?
AD:    Ohhhhhh,
HT:    Do it like that…
AD:    Oh ‘cause people loved that. Write that down.  ‘Cause people love that character. See, to me…
AS:    I love that character.
AD:    Everyone does.  But I hate to say it, I did it.  That’s why it’s hard, it’s even crazy that I have as much success as I do, and the reason I do is because I let a production company like Superdelicious take over and kind of do their version of what I really want.  I’m telling them “Here’s how you do it” but then they keep throwing their ideas in that I don’t like as much, but they’re softer and you know what?  America loves it. And they were my middleman between me and America.  For real! They’re hip enough, but they’re not as risqué as I am , but they’re not as tight assed as America. You know, America--I mean, I’m not saying America is tight assed, I love you, America. Please…Come here, I am America.
HT:    Can you define your humor as self-deprecating?
AD:    Well yeah, I’m always willing--no, I’m more bi-polar. I’m more bi-polar, because I’m willing to be self-deprecating, but I would also like to, you know I was trying to be hot for the magazine shoot today, for this magazine.  I’m not trying to look--well my version of hot is different.  I have to work with what I have so I have, I try to add a little humor to it, like the tie and the thing, you know? Be a little funny.  I have to work it, a little harder than Colin, from my show.  Did you ever see Colin, from my show?  He’s the hot one?  I’m not saying whether he won or not.  Just because he is here with me now, does not mean he won or did not win. He might have won, he might not have won; you’ll never know. ‘Til you see the episode, or until that fucking asshole says something.
HT:    Alright, do you think the bi-polar that you’re talking about is what keeps your hardcore fans?
AD:    No, I don’t really…my fans just grow slowly, it’s painfully slow.
HT:    You think so, huh?
AD:    (laughs) It’s too slow for me.  Wouldn’t you want to be pplahhaapp! Crapped out of the womb?  And… be famous and rich.
HT:    Yeah but you travel different places to do your show…and people come to see you.
AD:    Like Paris Hilton.  Paris Hilton’s CRAP! out of the womb and she’s number one. And then she can just do with it what she will.  She can do a sex tape with the fucking green night vision…
HT:    So you don’t feel as accepted as you should be--
AD:    And she’s still as--she’s still Paris Hilton, makin’ all that money that she doesn’t even need to make, because she eats her daddy’s…money.  I was gonna say something else, but I’m trying not to...
HT:    But as far as the work is concerned, have you always been satisfied?
AD:    No. NO. I bare--Well, only with this new thing, the Assistant, only because we have--just…we were playing--and I laugh (laughing), ‘cause I remember saying half that shit. (SCREAMING LAUGHTER) Just because there was a lot of improvising going on.  Not…
HT:    So you were surprised to see the end product?
AD:    I love it.  I hire editors that I know get my humor and I say “Just find the funny stuff and string it together and make it work.”  That’s what I say. And they fucking do it.  But then MTV’s like (imitating big gruff man) “Make sure there’s a story!  We want to know the kids!”  “We want to see the pain!  We want to know this is real for them!”
HT:    Do you ever have to re-shoot a funny incident?
AD:    So see, the combination is fucking brilliant.
HT:    Do they tell you to re-shoot certain things?
AD:    Brilliant…YES! We had to re-shoot one thing.  We didn’t have to re-shoot something--well no--
HT:    Everything’s live?
AT:    Always live, but sometimes—no.  It’s always live but sometimes after the first thing that happened, that’s always real, sometimes we go back and film…you know…I’m sorry to say…we would film…it, whatever. Pick-ups. Yeah, like pick-ups.  Like the bushes burnt down. But then we went back and filmed me going crazy with those torches, what was that?  And there was--if you look closely, they’re totally different.  At one point I’m just kicking ‘em, but then at another point, they’re back up again and I’m kicking them in another way. It’s weird  That’s me, though.  We go back and shoot me just being funny. Like, we do. We go back and shoot me being like Jerry Lewis on the set.  Like, “Okay, we’re finished with this set, we’re finished with this set, now let’s film a little while Andy Dick goes…Jerry Lewis on the set.” And I do.  Like with curtains.  And then sometimes they’re used and sometimes not., for real.  I’m like, “You know what?  You guys put these curtains up, right?” and they’re like “Yep.” “Then I can rip them down?  Because you can put ‘em back up and then take ‘em down again, right? You can do that, right?” And they’re like “Yeah.” I always ask. And they’re like “Yeah.”  And I’m like “Well then, let me do something with the fucking curtains.  Let me do something with the curtains.” And then I fucking (whistles) spun around in ‘em and ripped ‘em off the fucking wall. And that was me just asking “Can I rip these curtains down?”  So there’s a lot of set-up things.  But they didn’t even see that.  NO. You  guys were there.  Did you think it was real?
AS:    I don’t know...yeah?
AD:    You thought the curtain thing was real?
CB:    I didn’t see that, I was eating kit-kats.
AD:    What?
CB:    I didn’t see that part, I was eating kit-kats.
AD:    Oh my God, I didn’t know horses ate kit-kats.
(DISINTIGRATES INTO HYSTERICS)
HT:    If there’s nothing happening do you always try to find something to do?  Workwise?
AD:    Wait, what?  Like a hobby? Do I have any hobbies kind of thing?
HT:    Well, that’s my next question, but do try to find, like a movie to do a cameo or something like that?
AD:    No I never try to find a movie to do a cameo in.  They find me, and I always don’t want to, but then I do. (laughs)
HT:    Is it important for you to be busy all the time?
AD:    Yes, it is important for me to be busy. Like,  I’m actually double-busy. I always have 2 things to choose from.  Like in the next couple weeks, there’ something that came up where I could either be going to Chicago, my old stomping ground, Second City and all and get 15 grand.  It’s not a lot, but just to do a show, a couple shows, I don’t know how many--don’t say it. I don’t know, and I don’t want to know.  In Chicago--
AS:    14
AD:    (laughing) 14 shows. Yeah, there’s no way! ‘Cause I go right to Chicago and just do a couple of show that are like an hour and half long and whatever. I can just go on stage, by the way, and talk. I  go on stage and answer questions from the audience that I make them write on paper because if they yell them out, they just--it turns into a riot situation.  I’m serious. There’s a thing that happens with groups of people, where they have their own brain.  Their whole brain becomes one and it’s a monster brain. It’s called mob mentality.  Yes, and it gets crazy.  And if I let them take over,  “What else do you have for me?” They start going, (screaming) “SHOW US YOUR COCK!” Like, shit like that.  And then they start running onstage, it’s crazy.”  So I make them write it down on a piece of paper, and then I can edit it backstage, and I can maintain control. I lay ‘em out and then…anyways, what?
HT:    Do you have time for hobbies, and stuff like that?
AD:    Ohhh.  Oh, no, but I didn’t say--I remember that I could have done that--wait. Hang on you guys. Johnnie, can you please sit down? I could either do that for 15 grand in Chicago, or do this new show called--what’s it called?
AS:    North Shore.
AD:    North Shore? I never heard of it. What network is it on?
AS:    It sucks. Fox.
HT:    Brooke Burns?
AD:    Oh GOD, exactly! Like Summerland, probably.
AS:    The’ve got the ugliest leads ever.
AD:    Guys?
AS:    Guy and a girl. Ugly.
AD:    They are? Well, that’s why they need to bring me on. It’d be hotter. Switch that up, bitch. (smells himself and whistles) I gotta take a shower some time this month. Listen, I could either do North Shore, and that’s a TV show, so you think, “Oh Wow, he must be making a hundred grand.” No.  Everyone on that show makes a minimum salary, and I’ll tell you it’s below 15 grand, I’ll just tell you that. I just have to work for one day, and then I hang out--or something like that--for 2 hours probably, I don’t remember.
AS:    3 hours.
AD:    And that’s it. I just hang out.  It’s just a cameo, literally.  I show up and I pretend like I’m checking in or something.  Or I pretend like I’m at the bar, FOR REAL!  And then, I get--you know, I still get a good amount, and I get to hang out in fucking Hawaii for a week after that.  They just pay for everything.  So what do you think I chose?
HT:    How important is money?
AD:    Money…should always be important.  To everybody--I hate to say it, but I don’t want to be like George Bush.  I saw that Fahrenheit…
HT:    911.
AD:    …411 (laughs)  I saw that Fahrenheit 411--
HT:    But money’s important to the point that you would sell out and do a tame sitcom or a lame movie?
AD:     I’m always doing a tame sitcom.  I’m doing one right now, but it’s a good one.  Less Than Perfect.  Don’t forget about that, by the way.  I can’t--
HT:    Eric Roberts likes you.
AD:    I like him too.
HT:    When I interviewed him he had compliments for you.
AD:    He’s so good.  We love each other. We’ve hung out, we smoked--smoked cigarettes together. (giggles)
HT:    Oh that’s good.
AD:    Drank…Pellegrino.
HT:    So selling out is not really a major issue for you?
AD:    No.  I don’t consider it selling out, I’m still having fun.  I have so much fun on Less Than Perfect.  I could turn the whole year into a party…that they pay me for.  What?
HT:    What about selling out to do a movie that you know is going to be disastrous but the money was good?
AD:    Yes, I would do it.  I would do it because I’m always having fun.  Pay me as much as you want!
HT:    Names that they associate with Andy Dick like…
AD:    Ben Stiller.
HT:    …Will Ferrell.  These guys are making like $20 million.
AD:    Oh, don’t try to push my buttons.
HT:    In this day and age.  So…
AD:    Don’t try to push my buttons dude.
HT:    So if it came down to that, you don’t mind doing that?
AD:    I—(laughing)--no, I don’t mind.  Pay me $20 million.
HT:    But as long as you get to do your stuff on the side too?  Because the MTV projects are creatively satisfying but I’m sure they don’t pay a whole lot.
AD:     No. Here’s what’s going to happen, Buddy.  I’m going to make the $20 million, doing my stuff.  It’s just going to take longer.  Will can--I love Will, he’s fucking hysterical—all my friends are, Ben Stiller, Jack Black.  They’re making a shitload now, but I’m going to be making a shitload, maybe more, I assert more.
HT:    Right.
AD:    Let’s call it an assload.  I’m going to make a lot more.  I’m going to be sitting--I hope to buy this house from Norm.  Someday I will buy this house from Norm because he’s going to move to an island in Tahiti that he bought.  A series of islands, its like mini Hawaii.  He bought the whole 7 islands, and he’s living on the main one.  And I’m going to buy this measly shack—he’s going to think is shack even though it’s a $100 million house that is impeccable.  And done with such taste, I love it.  I love--(to the posse)Would you please stop talking?!
HT:    He’s pulling a Don Rickles.
AD:    No. I’m talking, and its not going to record if they’re so loud.
HT:    MTV doesn’t pay a lot of money.  But it’s a good place for you to create?
AD:    I chose to be on MTV in the beginning.  That’s why they let me stay after I had all my troubles.  I chose them when they were a fledgling network,  ‘Cause I thought they were cool.  I loved them.  I loved their ads.  I still love their ads for MTV.  I love MTV so much that Pollywog produced a whole series of these mini MTV ads.  You’ve seen those promos for MTV?  We produced a whole series of them--guess what?  They couldn’t air.  Course not! That was when they let me do anything and they were like “Do anything!”  But the network said, the people, the FCC even back then said “Oh you can’t air these!” (laughs)  It was just….not right.  It was not right, but it was so subtle.  I didn’t have a problem with it. It was about this--I knew this girl, she was 35. But she would do this character called Puberty Jones, supposedly--no, no you have to hear this, you have to record.
HT:    Yeah, yeah.
AD:    She was 13 years old, supposedly.  Her name was Puberty Jones.  But really, this actress was 35.  She had these braces and she’d have this thing…but she was really good at it; it was so creepy.  And she--we has this whole theme music that went (singing) “Puberty Jones, Yeah!”  It was, like, awesome and all pink and weird.  And it was about her--5 different ones.  One of  ‘em was with her with the fucking pizza delivery guy.  And she’s like “ding-dong!”  And the pizza guy’s like (imitating pizza guy) “I, have a, um, deliberty for Stephanie Jones.” And then she would have to go into her sister’s room and her sister’s fucking hot as shit. (laughing)  Her sister’s hot as shit but really young, really--like 19.  Right? And she’s like “Your pizza’s here.” (laughing) And her sister’s like “WHATEVER!  Pay for it!” (laughing) “PAY FOR IT, Whatever!”  Her sister hates her--so she goes back up and she says (imitating Puberty Jones) “I think my money’s in my fanny pack, can you get it?”  She’s always sexually inappropriate, everybody, but she’s 13! That’s the problem.  Her fucking ex--her mother doesn’t have a husband anymore, and her boyfriend shows up--who's Eric Roberts, by the way!
HT:    Oh.
AD:    Her boyfriend--I directed this and put him in it.  He loves me so much, back then, but he did--but he was my actor, Eric Roberts, for free.
HT:    Academy Award nominee.
AD:    Academy Award nominee was in my short film, that never could air because it’s too creepy, but I’m describing it to you.  You guys will at least get to see it and somebody lost it, dude.  They won’t even let ‘em OUT at MTV, they’re so creepy.  But anyways she comes over, Puberty Jones--No.  Puberty Jones is in the living room and Eric Roberts comes over, ‘cause he is dating her mother.  Eric Robert is dating Puberty’s mother.  She’s like “I’m here, is, uh Loretta here?”  or whatever. And--I can’t do her character, but it really is like a 13 year old going “Shableofvksba” (laughing) It really is like a 13 year old!  And then she goes--and then she comes back with these snack crackers that are Ritz’s with Cheeze Whiz and some of them are (laughing) (inaudible)  You can see the (inaudible)  It’s so close up and they’re just grimy. And she’s like “Snacrooeuewohsnacks” And then she says--I don’t know what she’s doing but they’re on a couch covered in plastic and you hear “errrrrr!” --all that is so good.  And then all of a sudden, they cut away or something--I don’t remember---it cuts, but then, all of a sudden it’s always cutting to her, Puberty Jones, bouncing on her bed, and they cut back and she is, they are slow-dancing in the living room.  Eric Roberts and her, and she’s on his feet.  And they’re doing that…Or she does things where she asks--I can’t remember exactly what, but there’s always a way-too provocative question.  And then she licks her cheese-covered braces, or her Cheetos-covered braces.  I was in one.  I was in one where I’m the principal, writing her up saying “I’m sorry”--you know I’m all sweatin’, I’m like “I just have to do this to you.  You can’t--you cannot leave the tour in the middle of...”  I don’t remember, something about “You can’t leave the tour in the middle of the museum like that.  You’re on a school field trip.”, it was creepier than that.  “You can’t leave the field trip like that, you’re in a museum.” or whatever.  And she goes “I’m sorry but the nudes were so life-like.”  And then she licks her Cheetos-covered braces.  I remember mine more because I was in it.  And then I’m like, anyways, “Bring this to your mother.”  And then she says--she takes out this Bonne-Bell thing, and she goes “Mmmmm.”-- watch this WAIT,!--she goes like this  “Mmmm, cherry.” (laughing)  And you see me sweating.  And like, it’s so wrong, and then you see me wiping the Cheetos away from the thing.
(ONE OF THE GIRLS LEAVES)
AD:    AH, Look at that. What the fuck is that?  That’s wrong. That’s wrong, buddy.
HT:    That’s a butt.
AD:    You want that don’t you? You want that.
HT:    Have you talked to HBO?
AD:    Oh yeah.  I had a holding deal on HBO a couple of years ago that I blew.  I would love to reignite that relationship.  Because I love HBO, I always have.  My lawyer, or it might have been my manager or my agent, or my publicist--who fucking knows?!--someone advised me to take bird in the hand as opposed to 2 in the bush.  They were giving me money to--literally--HBO was giving me money to develop anything I wanted there, did you know that?  But then I’ve had friends that have tried to develop things that never made it to air, so then all of a sudden I had this network show that was actually going to give me a lot, probably the same amount of money, like that, per week.  I like it.
HT:    But it’s always been important for you to take control of your destiny, right?
AD:    Yeah, we all should, we all should--I still think I’m in control.  Everyone still always thinks they’re in control, but when you look back--I listen to people. I still do.  I just put people around me that I think are smarter than me and I listen to them.  And sometimes you make the wrong choice, c’mon!  I’m a dumbass.  I’m a horse.  I’m more like a Shetland pony.  So see—
(COMMOTION)
HT:    So Andy do  you…
(COMMOTION)
AS:    What are you doing? Is the weirdest interview, ever?
HT:    Yeah it’s...  He’s had a lot of drinks and pot.
(laughter)
(COMOTION AND LAUGHTER)
HT:    What event do you consider to be a turning point, for you?
AD:    Every one.  Every step I take is a turning point.
HT:    But is there any particular show or event that happened to you that really…?
AD:    Well all of them.
HT:    Because you’ve made it, and seemingly blown it a couple of times but you always come back bolder and stronger.
AD:    The Ben Stiller Show was a turning point.  News Radio was a turning point, up.  Get Smart was a turning point to the left.  (laughs).  They’re all turning points; they’re all turning points we just don’t know which way they’re turning.  We want them to always be turning up.  But as long as they’re always turning points that’s the point, right?
HT:    What’s the best thing about being Andy Dick?
AD:    Now the interview is mostly over, when you start to guess my answers.  When you start to guess what I’m about to say, you get me, c’mon.
HT:    But what’s the best thing about being Andy Dick?
AD:    That.
HT:    The perks?
AD:    Colin kissing me.
(LOTS MORE COMMOTION)
HT:    What’s the worst thing about being you?  The negatives.
AD:    Everything. I can’t--well I don’t--I just have problems.  Everyone does.  Colin says he can fill ya in.  He can tell you,,,
HT:    Are there other things you don’t like--
AD:    Just some of my obsessions.  No, but for real.  But my mind tends to obsess and that part drives me and all my friends’ crazy.
HT:    But what about, like, the hypocrisies in show business, that doesn’t get to you too?
AD:    I don’t care about that.  That’s been around, show business is one big hypocrisy, you can probably accept that, can’t you?
HT:    Do you mind if I talk to you about when you were on drugs?
AD:    (laughs)
HT:    Spit take.
AD:    When I was on drugs? You wanna talk about the present--
HT:    No the dark days…
AD:    Oh, the dark days when I was, like, out of my mind.
HT:    When you got arrested for--fairly recently…
AD:    I got arrested a lot.
HT:    No, that was fairly recently.
AD:    I got arrested a lot.  Which time?  When I got arrested for stealing pumpkins? Or...smoking pot at Coachella?  Or…crashing my car into a median pole.
HT:    That was this year, wasn’t it?
AD:    (laughs)  I don’t know, you got me, buddy.
HT:    That was this year, right?
AD:     NOOO!  You better be joking!  You were joking.
HT:    Yeah, I was.
AD:    (laughs) Well, you got me.
HT:    But you’ve been clean for a while?
(ANOTHER ASSITANT LEAVES AND AGREES TO LET ANDY KISS HER)
AD:    You took a picture!? Was my boner in it?
HT:    Yes.
AD:    Are you fucking serious?  Let me see!
HT:    No, no it wasn’t, it wasn’t.
AD:    DON’T!  You cannot print that shit.
HT:    We have no boners.
AD:    I’m not Paris-fucking-Hilton.  I’m not Dickie Hilton.  I’m not Andy Dickie Hilton.
HT:    So you’ve been clean for how long?
AD:    (laughs). (Silence) Year--well, since they threw me in the pool.
AS:    (Laughing).
AD:    Before that, I hadn’t showered for days.
AS:    (laughing).
AD:    There.  That’s how you answer that shit.
AS:    Good answer.
AD:    I know.
AS:    You know, I would respect that one.
(THEY ARE KISSING)
AS:    That was clever and inteli--
(THE TAPE IS STOPPED AND STARTED AGAIN)
AD:    Give me one on the lips.
(THEY KISS)
AD:    Love that boy. 
AS:    That was not on the--
AD:    Get him to roll another one, buddy.
HT:    Okay, but seriously, though.  I mean, when we say clean we are talking about no real hard drugs, right? 
AD:    (sighs). Honey…
HT:    You still drink a little bit.
AD:    Yeah.  Dude, I don’t want to talk about drugs and alcohol.  I believe that people should not talk about their politics, their religion, their sex or their drugs and alcohol.  And guess what?  I have fucking spilled the beans on all 8. (laughs).  That’s only 5. But, all 8, if you catch my drift. Why does my finger smell like somebody’s butt?
HT:    ‘Cause you stuck it up Wendy’s…
(TAPE HAS BEEN STOPPED AND TURNED BACK ON)
AD:    Love that smell.
HT:    So…
AD:    Buddy…where are you going?
AS:    I’m going to go get changed.
AD:    I want to get changed.
(A PHONE RINGS)
HT:    But…
AD:    My phone must have been ringing off the hook in there.  Where--Get my phone, dude!  How many missed calls do I have, 39?
AS:    84.
AD:    84. How many?  DON’T press it, I want to see it.
HT:    But the thing is, you don’t want to talk about that stuff, that’s cool.  But you’re doing good now, though, right? (laughing)
AD:    You want me to start jerking off?
HT:    I’ll take a picture…
AD:    Nooo. No you won’t
HT:    But you’re doing good now, right?
AD:    Let me jerk off in front of the interviewer!  JOHNNIE!  I’m jerking off! NO!
AS:    Don’t take pictures, don’t take pictures!
AD:    YOU ARE A FUCKING ASSHOLE!
(TAPE HAS STOPPED AND RESTARTED)
AD:    (inaudible). Jerk off.  I’m just like a monkey in a cage, anyways. (laughs)  JOHNNIE!  I’m just like a monkey in a cage, anyways, and that’s what they do!
AS:    A cage made of vodka! (laughter)
AD:    That’s what…and that’s how brilliant you are…give me a--
AS:    I  know. But when…
AD:    Give me a kiss.
AS:    …were you going to…
AD:    Just give me a kiss.
AS:    …fucking realize this? You already got one.
HT:    All this is on the tape, all right?
(COMMOTION AND RANDOM BANTER- TAPE IS STOPPED AND RESTARTED MULTIPLE TIMES)
AS:    Let’s take an estimate on how many missed calls Andy has.
AD:    Okay, okay.  Whoever wins I will pay them $5.
(TAPE IS STOPPED AND RESTARTED)
AD:    Yes, I’m very depressed that no one’s calling me.
HT:    Okay, but right now because you have--
AD:    I make it so that everyone calls me.
HT:    You’ve always had a lot of people around?
AD:    Yes, I have to.
HT:    But now, you’re really happy with the people that are around you?
AD:    Yes, I love them all.
HT:    And that’s why..
AD:    They’re like my family.
HT:    That’s why things are good with you?  With the things you don’t want to talk about, with the alcohol?
AD:    There’s nothing to talk about there.  I’m so happy with my family.  That I created.
HT:    Are you afraid of a relapse at all?
AD:    No, I’m not.  I’m not afraid of drugs and alcohol at all!
HT:    Oh yeah? 
AD:    No.
HT:    Because you know, like Gary Oldman was an alcoholic for instance.
AD:    He was?
HT:    Yeah.
AD:    But he’s a really good actor--I  call him ‘Gary Old-MAN’. (laughs).
HT:    But a lot of alcoholic that get clean, they don’t even like the taste anymore.
AD:    I’m not like Gary OldMAN.
HT:    You still like it?
AD:    I’m sure he likes it too, he just---he’s just--you know, as he should be--he's afraid of it. I should be.  In real life I should be afraid of drugs and alcohol, but I’m a little crazy so I’m not afraid of it.
HT:    But a lot of comedians, particularly, a lot of guys in show biz,  they get into the darker side of the, you know, of the excess.  Whether it be women, or…drugs or alcohol, or...whatever. Why do you think that is?
AD:    ‘Or whatever’?  What does that mean, absinthe?
HT:    (laughs) 
AD:    What is the ‘whatever’.  That’s my question.  You know what—we’re gonna turn this interview around and I’m asking you the questions--
HT:    ….spending all your money and shit.
AD:    Spending it on what?  Absinthe?
HT:    No. Cars.
AD:    No I don’t buy cars.  Don’t try to push me and paint me into a corner.  I know what you’re trying to do.  You’re a sneaky…little…interviewer.
HT:    No but what do you think it is? 
AD:    God that guy looks…
HT:    Insecurity? Loneliness? Confusion?  Unhappiness?  What?
AD:    Umm…I would say all of the above possibilities.
HT:    And people like your friends--
AD:    At different varying degrees at different times in my life.  Like right now.  You should ask me about right now. And then ask me again in 5 minutes ‘cause it changes. ‘Cause I really do try to live in the now, don’t I Geoffers?  GEOFFERS!  Where the fuck is he?
HT:    Inside.  But like your friend Farley, and Phil Hartman.
AD:    Foley.  Dave Foley?
HT:    No. Chris Farley.
AD:    Oh, Farley.
HT:    …and Phil Hartman…
AD:    (sighs). Buddy…What about them?  And my friend Rick James?
HT:    Right.  Were you a friend of his?
AD:    He was at my party a week ago.
HT:    Oh.
AD:     You didn’t know that?
HT:    No.
AD:    There’s your interview. There’s your interview.  I’m the last guy that partied with him….Please don’t write that.
HT:    (laughs).
AD:    GEOFFREY! He needs to edit.  He needs to help me out here. GEOFFERS!
HT:    He’s inside. He’ll be out.
AD:    I can’t talk.
HT:    What is he, your mutha’fuckin’ lawyer?
AD:    Nope.
HT:    But that could have been you too, right?...’Cause you were with them before they died and stuff.
(A HELICOPTER HOVERS LOUDLY)
AD:    (pretending the helicopter is cutting off every other word) He-cop-ter-shou-we-ho-fo-ah-t-ba-lovta-wan-ta-an-swer-my-aaaa all the thing should be hold for the helicopter or can you hear it?
HT:    No it’s cool. Actually I don’t mind--
AD:    That was my award winning…
HT:    That was your Chevy Chase.  That was a Chevy Chase bit.
AD:    Oh.
HT:    He does that.
AD:    He does? I’m sure a lot of people do.  Does anybody do this, though?
HT:    (Laughs). No. They don’t.
AD:    Don’t be frightened of it, buddy.  Everybody’s a little bi.
HT:    Right. (laughing). I’m not terribly bi.
AD:    Everybody’s a little bi, buddy.
HT:    I understand what you’re saying.
AD:    Don’t worry. Don’t--
HT:    But you’re a little more extreme bi than--
AD:    SO?  But you’re a little bi. 
HT:    No…
AD:    How old are you?
HT:    I just turned 40.
AD:    Eewww. (choking, throw-up noises)
HT:    Jay Mohr was surprised at how good I looked yesterday.
AD:    Well you do, I thought you were 18.
HT:    Yeah.
AD:    Fucking--you Asians.  You Asians, you must roll yourselves up in those oriental rugs.  You must roll yourself up--you must slather your body in Oil of Olay and then roll yourself up in one of them oriental rugs. (laughing). Yeah that’s a good one!
HT:    I use that baby oil gel.
AD:    No, Oil of Olay, ‘cause its Asian.
HT:    No I don’t think it is Asian.  It’s American.
AD:    But they’re trying to be like they are.
HT:    Oh okay. 
AD:    You didn’t know that?
HT:    That’s clever…
AD:    I know!
HT:    It’s good.
AD:    Yeah.  And now you don’t--you can take out your part.  We tried to re-write it better. It was already fucking...please.
HT:    But so you don’t want to get into the whole…the…
AD:    The what?
HT:    The Farley, Strickland, Hartman…..
AD:    Yes I do!  But I have to get Geoffrey here.  GEOFFREY!
(TAPE CUTS OUT AND HAS BEEN RESTARTED).




HT:    You keep saying you were going to help him. But...
AD:    (inaudible) now we can talk about it.
HT:    But obviously it’s  uncomfortable for you to talk about.
AD:    What?
HT:    That whole area of it, that time in your life.
AD:    Where? Now or then?
HT:    The death of your friends.
AD:    Then--That’s happening all the time. When are you talking about, now or then?
HT:    Now.
AD:    Who, Rick James? 
HT:    No.
AD:    ‘Cause he was at my party?
HT:    No.  No, Chris--
AD:    Are you talking about Rick James, ‘cause he was at my party my party a week ago?  And he hung out at my party, at my house.
HT:    But Farley and…you know, because they were right there--
AD:    You’re trying to talk about Rick James.
HT:    No.  Not really.  That’s sensational journalism.  And I don’t do that.
AD:    Well, then don’t ask about Chris Farley either, if you don’t want to be a sensationalist.
HT:    But I want to get--
AD:    I did not kill Chris Farley.  Or Rick James. Or--
HT:    But were there people who said that you killed them? 
AD:    …Phil Hartman…
HT:    Were there people who said that you--
AD:    Yeah! There’s whole websites about how I killed David Strickland and Chris Farley and Rick James.
HT:    But you didn’t make their party habits any…
AD:    I’ll kill you before I kill any of them, they were my close friends.
HT:    The knives are right there.  But you didn’t make their habits any harder though, by…did you?
AD:     What?!
HT:    Why would they say that?  I never read that you killed them.
AD:    I’m not--I know!  Other people did write it.  They wrote it.
HT:    But I--
AD:    They really did write it.
HT:    But I have read…
AD:    What’s your question?
HT:    I have read you--read something about you saying “I should have intervened with Bree.
AD:    No…I should intervene with you, on this interview.
HT:    Right. So, now you don’t care to talk about any of this stuff?  Because you don’t have to.
AD:    WHAT am I supposed to do?  No one can do anything.  C’mon.  What’s your question? What’s your ultimate, final question about this topic?  And I’ll answer it.
HT:    The bottom-line?
AD:    Yeah.
HT:    What have you--how  has it changed you and what have you learned from it?
AD:    No. Nothing. (coughing)
HT:    But it’s changed you, hasn’t it?  Because you feel like you survived it.  You were lucky to survive it.
AD:    I didn’t survive anything.  I didn’t survive anything.  What are you?--Oh, I remember now.  Remember, something about me and Farley died...something you didn’t record.  What was that?
HT:    What about it?
AD:    What was it?
HT:     The question?  How has it changed you, the whole experience?
AD:    No.  The question--remember earlier the one that you didn’t record about me and Farley?  And I kept saying “Are you saying that I--”
HT:    Killed him?
AD:    (laughs) No, that I’m dead with him.
HT:    No that not what I was saying. What--
AD:    What were you saying?
HT:    Well I asked a couple questions, but one of them was, you know, the reason why you were close to Strickland and Farley at the time very close to their deaths was because you guys had very similar extreme habits.
AD:    Oh, and that’s why we both died?
HT:    That’s why they died.
AD:    Oh that’s why we all died.  ‘Cause--can I give you a little hint?
HT:    Well—
AD:    OKAY, Let me give you-- Let me clue you in, as the interviewer; I didn’t die.  I’m alive.
HT:    You didn’t, you survived.
AD:    I’m alive.  That’s why I’m talking to you right now. So what’s your point?
HT:    I guess I--
AD:    What’s your point again?
HT:    I guess the point is, I mean, would you--even--
AD:    That we all died?  That I gave them drugs? No.  I didn’t give them drugs.
HT:    Um, hmm.
AD:    That we all partied hard enough to die?  Well, I didn’t die.  What’s your question?  That I made them party? They made me party? The only reason we hung out is because we partied?  Is actually your question, isn’t it?
HT:    Yes. Right.
AD:    Is that your question?
HT:    Yes.
AD:    NO.  We hung out before, during, and after.
HT:    Ok.
AD:    Now I remember.
HT:    That’s good. 
AD:    Before, during and after.
HT:    All right.
AD:    We did drugs or not did drugs or died even, because I did hang out with Kurt Cobain…after he died.  But that’s Anne Heche territory that you can’t get into.
HT:    Okay.
AD:    That’s what I wanted…
HT:    Okay.
AD:    That’s true too.
HT:    But you have changed your ways since then, right?  Because of that?
AD:    Um, hmm.  I made sure I don’t hang out with people who are going to die.
HT:    (laughs) But you--
AD:    That probably not true.  Cut--I don’t want that in the interview.
HT:    Okay.
AD:    I don’t want that in the interview ‘cause it’s not true.
HT:    You were somewhat destructive after they died, too right?  Because of depression.
AD:    I got more destructive than that.
HT:    But then, after you survived that…
AD:    So I’d beg my friends not to die.  I’d say, “If you die, I will fucking kill myself.”
HT:    Yeah but isn’t that more--
AD:    “And go to hell and beat you up.”
HT:    But isn’t it more that you needed to take care of yourself, so that you all don’t die?  Theoretically, isn’t that where you are right now?  Because--
AD:    I try.
HT:    Because your friends aren’t like, destructive.
AD:    Let’s go to Luke’s and have some sweetbreads, and some Pinot. C’mon.
HT:    Now right now, you’re very religious, somewhat?
AD:    Spiritual.  There’s a difference between spirituality and religion.
HT:    Okay, well, because, obviously, it’s a personal thing. You pray and so forth?
AD:    Uh hmm.
HT:    Because if you were religious at all, people would say “Then why are drinking still?  Why are you…?”
AD:    No.  People that go to church drink.  There’s a lot of (inaudible) every week.  Some of them get narc’d on.
HT:    But they don’t survive drinking vodka by the swimming pool, and then--
AD:    When you mean ‘by the swimming pool’ you mean by--'you’re lounging by the swimming pool’, or do you mean ‘ I have a swimming pool full of vodka’? That I drink vodka by the swimming pool?
HT:    No, I mean…
AD:    ‘Cause I drink vodka by the swimming pool.
HT:    No, no, we’re good.
(TAPE HAS BEEN STOPPED AND RESTARTED)
AD:    Yeah, I drink vodka by the swimming pool.  I (inaudible: think I’ve had to drink) at least a swimming pool full of vodka, in my lifetime.  I bet!  And if I haven’t, I’d take that challenge. I’m not drinking vodka.  Why would you put that in the novels of--in the ears of America?  Why would you do that to me?  You’re trying to take me down like Howard Stern.
HT:    Okay, but you keep going back to this, I don’t know why.
AD:    Its pivotal.
HT:    Because you called them, even--
AD:    Pivotal.
HT:    Even when you were on the road.
AD:    It was pivotal in my career.
HT:    But is it therapeutic, also?  That you get to get stuff out?
AD:    Yes, but he was pivotal.
HT:    And also, he gives out the more (inaudible: insensitive) which is better, isn’t it?
AD:    Pivotal. (inaudible) Let me think about it…(inaudible)
HT:    Let me ask you one more thing about Farley, as far as professionally, do you he think he--how good to you think he would be today?  Jay Mohr said he’s the best ever?
AD:    How good would be he be when he was--?  He was the best when he was ali--
HT:     No, how--
AD:    He’s the best.  He is one of the best actors I know, to this day.
HT:    Jay Mohr said he’s the best ever.  That people are still talking about how--
AD:    He’s one of the best actors I know.
HT:    And Sandler and Myers are--
AD:    He should not have died and I’m fucking mad at him. 
HT:    Who’s the most memorable guy that you have worked with?
AD:    They’re all--I have memories of all of them.
HT:    But tell me of your favorites?
AD:    I have all of them.  If you want to know about...somebody you might not think of…’cause they all…I love them all.
HT:    Christopher Walken?
AD:    Well I love him, and I love Dave Foley and Phil Hartman, and the whole cast of Less than Perfect. I can tell you stories about all of those and they’re all awesome.  One of my favorite times, though, I hate to admit it…No I don’t hate to admit it, I have to admit it, is with James Caan.  Did you even know that?
HT:    No.
AD:    That I did a scene with James Caan for News Radio?  It was fucking good, you know why?  Because he was so good.  James Caan was so good.  There’s a whole Second City saying that ‘you’re only as good as who you’re on stage with’, so he brought me up to his level when I did a scene with him.
HT:    Do you have anybody that sort of you consider a mentor now, like Phil was to you?
AD:    Colin.
HT:    Colin Quinn?
AD:     No.  Colin from my show.  I wish I was as beautiful as him.  Colin, from my show, The Assistant.
HT:    Okay that’s good.
AD:     If (inaudible: it wasn’t for him), I might have paid anything I can to change my face to look like his.
HT:    You never worked with Jim Carrey, right?
AD:    Yes I did.
HT:    Oh yeah, The Cable Guy. How great was he in that?
AD:    He was awesome.  He’s(inaudible).  I thought you only had one more question.  You’ve got to make me look good, buddy.
HT:    Yeah, yeah I will.
AD:    You’ve got nothing to lose.
HT:    You’ll get to see it, before it goes in.
AD:    Oh, thanks.
HT:    Edit it, you can change anything.
AD:    Thanks buddy.  We gotta go to Luke’s, I keep eating this shit, dude. C’mon buddy.
HT:    Is there like a memory that you want to forget that’s real bad?
AD:    I have things that happened in my life that are so bad I did forget them.  So there not even memories now.
HT:    So is that the way you operate, you just…Where are you going Andy?
AD:    I’m going home.
HT:    We have to finish this thing.
AD:    How many…?
HT:    A couple more, a couple more questions.
AD:    This is forever, dude.  Can we so it at Luke’s so I at least can start ordering my sweetbreads?
HT:    Who do you want to work with?
AD:    You.
HT:    Who--see that’s why it’s taking so long.  Just answer these questions.
AD:    I don’t know.  (inaudible) Who wants to work with me, that’s the real question.
HT:    Are you bothered by the fact that you told everybody about your bi-sexuality and lifestyle. Is that a problem for you that it keeps coming back, coming up?
AD:     No…we talked about all of that.  Your repeating questions, buddy.
HT:    Some of it might have come up before.
AD:    It did.
HT:    Are you a good Dad?
AD:    Yes.  Well, I don’t know, ask my kids, I’m not the one--I'm gonna say ‘Yes, 110%’.  I wish I could spend more time with them.  They don’t live with me. 
HT:    Okay.
AD:    Ask them if I’m a good Dad.
HT:    But for the future, is it important for you to have a good family life?
AD:     Yeah, I’d like to bring us all back together, living under one roof.
HT:    But even with a future--
AD:     I had that, you know, one time.  All my kids and my exes and my current girlfriends, living under one roof. Uh, I liked that.
HT:    I don’t think there’s any--
AD:    I could live under this roof, I’ll tell you that.  With  all this…
HT:    I don’t think there’s any (inaudible: instructions) about that, but everyone likes to think it’s strange, you know?
AD:    I know.  I mean, if I had this house, I would move them all in.
HT:    You just want to keep everybody together, what’s wrong with that?
AD:     I know!  I love my kids. And my exes.
HT:    But in the future, if you got married again, had kids…
AD:     If I do that, it’s gonna be when I’m fucking 64.
HT:    Oh yeah?  Warren Beatty?
AD:    And I--yeah--and I marry--No, I was thinking more of Dennis Hopper marrying a 22-year old ballerina.
HT:    Yeah, yeah, I know Dennis real good.
AD:    I went to their wedding reception.  For that wedding.
HT:    So do you only like young girls?
AD:    I just like beautiful…architecture.
HT:    No, girls is the question.
AD:    Oh.
HT:    What kind of girls do you like?
AD:    Beautiful girls.  I’m open to--
HT:    Personality is important?  What if they’re beautiful, but they’re bitches?
AD:    Personality is always important.  You know that.  But…
HT:    Why do you think these girls, these young, beautiful girls are attracted to you?  Is it the show biz thing or…are you a funny guy?
AD:    Money…show biz…fame, funny.  Incredibly sexy and hot.  Why would you leave that out?  You’re such a fucking asshole.  Why don’t you start with that?  Incredibly sexy and hot with a big dick.  Then you could work your way down to funny.  Funny is the least of it.
HT:    Okay, last question, last 2 questions.  What’s the best compliment somebody gave you?
AD:    (pause) You’re an oriental mix.
HT:    Yeah.  Touché.  You’re taking all the goddamn cashews or something.  What’s the best compliment somebody gave you?  Or you were never complimented that much?
AD:    No I really wasn’t.  I got one letter--I was in a community play when I was like, 17--
HT:    Yeah, but you get compliments now.
AD:    Yeah, but…
HT:    You don’t take it seriously?
AD:    I just…it’s shoved down their throats.  But I was in a play when I was 17 and I was the lead in and English play called Look Back In Anger.  It was hard.  I had a…I wish I could have a video tape of that…
HT:    So you were proud of that...you’re proud of --
AD:    I don’t know, I worked hard, but I got a fan letter from some old 60 year old saying “I really was inspired by your performance”. I wish I--FUCK--
HT:    Okay, final question point one.  Tell me one thing that nobody knows.
AD:    How many points are there?
HT:    No this is it--what  is one thing that people don’t know about you that you wish they did?
AD:    I don’t wish anybody to know anything else about me.  I already don’t have boundaries, we talked about it.  Everybody already know everything, and the question is, what do I wish they don’t know about me.  And that would be everything.  I wish I could just take it all back.  They throw it back in my face.
HT:     And finally--
AD:    I’m trying to be open and honest and sweet and everyone just throws it back in my face.
HT:    So you’re not a big fan of them.
AD:    I’m talking about you. (laughs)
HT:    Okay.
AD:    I’m talking about just friends even.
HT:    And finally…finally, what the fuck is my question--what is the biggest misconception about you right now?
AD:     Finally.  I’ll tell you misconception is you saying that finally. That’s, like, not the final question.
HT:    Go ahead, I’m all packed up.  What’s that--
AD:    There’s no…misconceptions, everybody knows everything. What’s there not to know? And if you don’t know it can look it up online.
HT:    How about the fact that--
AD:    Start at andydick.com and work your way to…
HT:    So you want me to put…
AD:    Perfect10.com.
HT:    You want me to put it like that?  Go to andydick.com and everything’s as it is.
AD:    Well no, that’s where you start, and then you--yeah, if you tune in every second you’ll see people writing.  That say true things; that sometimes aren’t too pleasant that I have to erase.
HT:    Why do you keep--except for the…
AD:    But yet they still are true some--sometimes--
HT:    Except for the that that, you know, you promote and stuff when you do interviews.  And it’s therapeutic, maybe.  Is that why you keep doing it, Andy?  So that people will eventually get--
AD:     No I keep doing interviews because people beg me to do interviews, dude.
HT:    No, you don’t like doing it.
AD:    I do like doing it.
HT:    Oh you do?
AD:     I love--I like doing everything, I just hang out.  I’m trying to get you to come out to dinner with me and you don’t want to.  I like doing it, do you like doing it?  Why do you keep doing it?
HT:    I get paid to do it.
AD:    Well, I don’t.  I’m just doing it ‘cause we’re hanging out.  That’s why I want to go now, I want to eat my sweetbreads.
HT:    All right