The next Green Lantern?
Patton Oswalt on comedy, music and superheroes
INTERVIEW. Patton Oswalt is finishing up a role in a movie that doesn’t yet have a title. “I play a guy who loves sports,” he laughs. “I don’t in real life, though.”
So, how does a comedian who is so outspoken about his love of pastimes of the Dungeons and Dragons ilk get into a part like that?
“I put the same passion into it that I put into my geekdom,” he says.
And so, our conversation with said geekdom begins.
You’re such an outspoken superhero fanatic, would you ever want to be in one of these movies like “Iron Man”?
I don’t know. I’m such a fan of all these movies, I don’t just want to be in a great superhero movie and play a s---ty part in it. I don’t want to ruin something I love. … I don’t want people to be like, “What’s that a—hole doing there?”
What superhero would you be if you could? Wolverine?
Maybe, but that’s kind of a theme of constant pain and torment. I don’t know how useful it is to have regeneration and healing when you still have to feel all that pain. It doesn’t seem like it’d be that much fun. Also, you couldn’t get drunk, because your body constantly heals whatever you’re putting into yourself. I think Green Lantern would be awesome. You know, having a ring, flying around, creating stuff. That’s gotta be amazing, right?
For sure. Speaking of amazing, you recently ate crocodile...
Well, I was in Melbourne, saw it on a menu at a Chinese restaurant, went back the next day and said “I have to eat crocodile!”
And?
And it was delicious.
One of your quick quotable jokes is that a hippie loses a hackey-sack every time you eat steak. What happens when you eat crocodile?
Paul Hogan farts? I don’t know, I never ate crocodile before that.
My favorite parts of your routine are the absurd true stories, like your heavy metal brother being treated to a one-on-one set by Elvis Costello, and the one-armed man who heckles you and says he deserves heckling rights simply because he’s lost an arm. When this stuff happens, are you at least a little psyched because it’ll be a good story?
Yeah, I get really psyched if anything bad starts happening, even the tragic stuff, because it’s an experience, and after that, you see the world a little differently. So, good and bad, it’s all kind of the same in the long run.
How long before you heal and translate it into your routine?
It depends on the incident. The one-armed thing I spoke about the following night. It just depends on if it’s a tragedy for me, or a tragedy for someone else.
How about the Elvis incident?
That was something that actually pissed me off, and it took a while for me to be like, “Hey, that’s actually a good story.”
Who would have been the worst artist for your brother to have seen and not appreciated?
That is the worst one! Right out of the gate, he nailed it.
Have you since tried to turn him onto Elvis Costello?
No, it’s pointless. He’s heavy metal all the way.
AltCom! The Alternative Comedy Festival
Friday and Saturday
Somerville Theatre
55 Davis Square, Somerville
MBTA: Red Line to Davis
$32, 617-931-2000
www.ticketmaster.com