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Steven Wright On!
April 23, 2007

I had a chance to speak with comedian Steven Wright last month about his latest DVD, Steven Wright: When The Leaves Blow Away (Image, street: April 24, $14.98 srp). Needless to say, it

was a fun 20 minutes or so and when I began to transcribe and write it a coupla weeks ago, I found that a news-like article was not the right kind of form to give our conversation justice; Wright has the kind of inimitable persona that demands his voice being heard. So I started from scratch and re-wrote the entire piece as a Q&A, the better to imagine hearing Wright’s deadpan monotone giving his responses (because that really is how he converses!). Here’s the first half of our quick talk—let me know if works and then I’ll hit you with the second part later in the week!

VB: I had a great time watching your stand-up performance in When The Leaves Blow Away last night. It’s been a while since you released a live concert recording.
WRIGHT: I’m really excited to have this DVD because I haven’t done one a recorded special since like 1990. In the last few years, I’ve been looking out at the audiences before the show starts and there are people in their 20s, but most were in there 40s, 50s and 60s and I started thinking that people who are in college now, they were only five when I did my last special. And I thought, ‘They don’t know me—I’ve got to put another one out for the people who are already my fans and like what I do and to reach a whole other generation of people.’
VB: You’re 1999 short film One Soldier, which is quite fun, is also on the disc. Of course, I was reminded of your 1988 short, The Appointments of Dennis Jennings, which won an Oscar.
WRIGHT: I want to do more shorts also. You’re more open to doing more things in a film then stand-up. When you say something and have the audience physically laugh out loud, you’re working in a narrow window. You have more leeway in films. In One Soldier, there’s a lot of interesting material, but nothing that makes you laugh out loud.
VB: Do you want bring your short film experience, persona and writing style to feature-length films?
WRIGHT: That’s the main thing that I haven’t done yet. I’ve written parts of a big thing, but not the whole thing. It’s one of my goals.
VB: Are you ever approached by any of these cable networks, the established ones or the new ones that keep popping up, to make any short films for them?
WRIGHT: No.

Posted by Laurence Lerman on April 23, 2007 | Comments (0)