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An opportunity to see Rob Schneider? You can do it

Tim Parsons
Neil ViselRob Schneider: Comedy's bravest man.
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By Tim Parsons

Lake Tahoe Action

Rob Schneider has a simple view about comedy: “I want to do what makes me laugh and I don’t care if I look like an idiot doing it.”



Schneider is fearless when it comes to his characters, which include Tiny Elvis, the Orgasm Guy, the Richmeister who sat next to the office copy machine and the Sensitive Naked Man.

“It’s a like a woman,” he told Lake Tahoe Action. “If a woman is trying to be sexy, she will never be funny. And if a guy’s trying to look cool, he can’t be funny. For me it’s never about that.



“I just want to do what I thought was funny, and if it’s a naked guy making other people uncomfortable and not thinking that it has anything to do with him, that was it. It wasn’t more complicated than that.”

Schneider will be onstage in the MontBleu Theatre – we suspect wearing clothes – Saturday, March 26, for a standup comedy performance. A native of nearby Pacifica, Schneider was a standup comic before gaining stardom on “Saturday Night Live,” followed by numerous appearances on the big screen.

Schneider has returned to the stage, recently touring in Australia and Singapore, and this spring will perform in Northern Europe. He also is writing a new television show in which he will star.

“I haven’t done standup in a long time and I really wanted to do it,” he said. “I saw George Carlin at his last show and it was incredible so I wanted to give it a shot. … I’ve been really working at it and I feel my comedy is in a really good place.”

Live comedy takes a different kind of courage than sketches require.

“You have to get over your self-preservation of your ego,” Schneider said. “You have to throw yourself to the lions. You have to try to tame the bull but the bull’s never going to be tamed so you have to dance around it and figure it out. It’s just different.”

Heeding the words of Jerry Seinfeld – “If your famous you get 30 seconds, then you better say something funny” – Schneider said he has done his homework.

“It’s such an arrogant idea: I’m going to make you laugh,” Schneider said. “Well, you better. It’s also a form of aggression, comedy. A mild form of aggression but aggression nonetheless.

“For me, (it’s about) simplifying a little idea and making people laugh. I’ve been criticized for it for 20 years since I’ve become a movie star, it doesn’t bother me because that’s what you’re supposed to do. Your supposed to take a complicated idea, simplify it and show the humor in it. My heroes were Monty Python, and they could be very esoteric and they could also do fart jokes and fall-down, goofy physical stuff. To me, it’s whatever makes you laugh. Those guys were obviously making themselves laugh.”

Schneider talked about his upcoming television show while squashing an Internet rumor that he was going to star as Larry in a Three Stooges movie.

Schneider will play a man who marries into a Mexican-American family in a CBS sitcom tentative named “My Casa.” His wife will be played by Nadine Velazquez who might best be known for her role as Catalina in “My Name Is Earl.” Other stars include Tony Plana (“Ugly Betty”) and Lupe Ontiveros (“Desperate Housewives”).

The program will be written by Schneider and Lewis Morton who worked with Schneider on “SNL,” and wrote nine episodes of “Futurama.”

“I’m excited about doing a TV show,” he said. “I think you can do something on TV that maybe you couldn’t do (before). There’s a real resurgence of comedy on television. There are some really funny shows and there hasn’t been for years and years and years (since) ‘Seinfeld.’ Decent really funny shows now. ’30 Rock’ is funny. ‘Eastbound and Down’ is funny. ‘The Simpsons’ still funny, ‘Modern Family.’ So I think you can do a decent show.”


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