When Paula Poundstone called in for her interview with the Source, she said she was feeding her cat Larry who was on a weight-loss journey. She says the moments she spends with him are some of the more serene moments in her busy life.
In less than a month, she will be on tour with a stop in Central Oregon. Poundstone will be performing at the Tower Theatre on May 9. She is known for her podcast “No One Listens to Paula Poundstone,” her role as Forgetter Paula in “Inside Out 2,” and the appearances she has made on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.”
The Source: Where are you now?
Paula Poundstone: I am in my living room in Santa Monica, California, and I am feeding my cat Larry. I throw one piece of kibble at a time, and he has to run and get it. When I got Larry, he was 23.9 pounds, which is very heavy for a cat. And so, we began a weight loss journey. Now he is 11 pounds. He loves chasing his food… It appears to me that Larry is enjoying the healthier lifestyle, he was so fat before… I swear he’s almost a different color than he was when I got him because he was too damn fat to bathe before. And now he is really into his grooming. Maybe he’s gone over to the other side.
tS: Is that what a typical day looks like for you, hanging out with your cat?
PP: No, no, it’s a few minutes of my day. Probably the most serene moments of my day are feeding Larry. I have a bunch of cats. But, no, I respond to emails like every other sad human being. I have to promote my shows, so I do interviews and I also post things on various social medias and hopefully I walk the dog somewhere in there. But I’m gone out of town, a couple nights a week. There’s a lot of time on airplanes and there’s a lot of time packing. And since mid-August, I’ve been making these “Hey Donald Trump” videos. And the premise is that I’m talking directly to Trump like FaceTiming or something. And I’ve made one every night since mid-August. About 95 days ago, I started another daily series of counting down until November 3rd. You know general election day and the midterms and trying to give people something they can do every day towards saving our democracy. And, within those videos, and I have no idea why I did this, but I’m going to make a commitment to add a pogo on my pogo stick every day until we take back the House in the Senate.
tS: You were last here in 2021. What keeps you coming back to Bend?
PP: I get hired. That’s the main reason. You know, the truth is, although I’m aware that Bend is very beautiful, I do very little tourism anywhere I go because I do one-nighters. I fly in and I usually have time to take a nap and eat some dinner and do my show. Then I fly out again early in the morning.
tS: Who are some of your greatest inspirations or influences?
PP: Well, when I was a kid, I wanted to be Lily Tomlin and Carol Burnett, and Gilda Radner and Lucille Ball, and I missed by a country mile. Um, I don’t do what any of those people do, but certainly they inspired me. Because I loved them so much. And because I like the sound of laughter and because I like thinking of things that I think are funny… I love Richard Pryor. His first standup comedy movie, I saw before I ever did an open mic. And he did like two or three of those stand-up comedy movies, which had never been done before. There was no such thing as, you know, where you go to the theater and you’re seeing a stand-up comedy, that was very unusual. But he was so goddamn brilliant. Every little bit of it, as you’re watching, is not only funny, but it feels like nourishment.
tS: Any traditions you have when travelling to different places?
PP: When I go to Portland, Oregon, I like to eat Sizzle Pie because they have good pizza. Normally when you eat a vegan pizza, to some degree, you’re taking one for the team. You know, it’s not good flavor-wise. Non-vegan pizza would be preferable, but I would say Sizzle Pie is the only place I’ve ever known that has made a vegan pizza.
tS: What do you find funny?
PP: Someone with toilet paper stuck to the bottom of their foot has probably made me laugh harder than anything ever in my life… I had gone to the movies one day with this guy who, you know, sort of an arrogant guy, but that wasn’t unusual. We were leaving a movie theater and someone had a napkin stuck to the bottom of their shoe as we’re walking up the aisle to leave. And there’s something about that that always strikes me as so funny. And so, I started to laugh. And he says to me, ‘what’s so funny?’ And every time I go to explain what I’m laughing at. I’m like paralyzed and incommunicative by peals of laughter again. And the guy starts to get annoyed that I’m enjoying something that he’s not a part of and that he can’t understand. He still didn’t know what I was laughing at. And even if I was ever able to tell him what I was laughing at, he simply wouldn’t have found it as funny as I did. But it bugged the shit out of him that he wasn’t in control or a part of this fun experience that I was having. And when I realized that, I howled. I just remember that feeling of how funny it was that he was so irked he wasn’t in control of what made me laugh. He was a big ass, by the way.
tS: Do you feel like your comedy has evolved, if so, how?
PP: My act is largely autobiographical. And so, I talk about what I’m thinking, what I’m learning, what I’m doing. I’ve, sort of expanded in that way. And therefore, to some degree my subject matter has. But, whether you call it evolved or not, I don’t know. I mean it’s still me telling the jokes. But I think I’m a little more circumspective about some things.
tS: You recently made an appearance on Stephen Colbert’s show. Can we expect more of the kind of material you had on the show while you’re here?
PP: I suppose. Again, it’s largely what I’m doing, what I’m thinking about, you know. I have some cat jokes in there because I have a lot of cats. I’m staring at two of them right now that are looking out the window. They’re bird watching, which just delights me. They make that little chitter noise every time they see one… My favorite part of the night is just talking to the audience. I do the time honored, “Where are you from? What do you do for a living?” And in this way, little biographies of audience members emerge, and I use that from which to set my sails. And the truth is, I never know…
tS: You are very quick with your jokes. Is it all memorized or is some of it improv?
PP: No, but a third of it probably is just unique to that night.
tS: Do you feel like it’s been difficult keeping up with the changing arena in comedy?
PP: No, I think I’m in a little world of my own to some degree. I don’t have the biggest audience in the world, but I have a very loyal audience that’s been with me forever. And people will say to me, ‘I’ve seen you 8 times, but this is my sister and she never saw you before.’ I’m like, ‘Oh, thank you for bringing her because, you know, it would be good to expand…’ We’re not much affected by whatever else is going on in the world of comedy, you know?
tS: What are you excited for?
PP: Well, I’m excited for the midterms. I’m excited at the possibility of making the rule of law work again… People want fairness. So, you know, when there are laws they want laws to apply the same to everyone. When there’s voting, they want voting opportunities for everyone. When there’s, you know, financial opportunity, they want that opportunity for everyone; they want fairness. And so, you know, I’m looking forward to the possibility of building —and we’re never going to be perfect— but of building, a country that at least has fairness as their North Star.
tS: If you weren’t doing comedy, what would you be doing?
PP: Oh, I’d be dead…When I was young. I bussed tables for a living. I thought that I would sort of work my way up to be a manager maybe. I mean, these are like 18, 19-year-old thoughts, but that’s pretty much what I thought I would do… Nothing fun. That’s the answer. It would have been nothing fun.
tS: What do you hope people take away from your performance that is coming up in May?
PP: I consider myself a proud member of the endorphin production industry. I just want them to get that, you know, that endorphin hit in their brains so that they can just hit refresh.
Paula Poundstone Live
May 9 at 7:30pm
The Tower Theatre
835 NW Wall St
https://www.towertheatre.org/event/paula-poundstone#spektrix-iframe
$32-$52 (plus $8 Historic Preservation Fee)
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