Actor Paul Reiser Brings His New Standup Act to Rutland

It’s a sign of staying power in the entertainment industry when a new generation of fans is completely unaware of a celebrity’s early body of work.

That’s been the case for actor, writer and comedian Paul Reiser. Most of his Gen Z fans know the 69-year-old as Dr. Sam Owens in the hit Netflix series “Stranger Things.” A tiny subset of those has likely seen him in the 1990s NBC sitcom “Mad About You,” let alone in James Cameron’s 1986 sci-fi thriller Aliens or the Beverly Hills Cop movies.

But it’s Reiser’s breakout role as a wisecracking friend in Diner, Barry Levinson’s 1982 coming-of-age movie, that offers the clearest hint of his first love: standup comedy.

“You know what word I’m not comfortable with? ‘Nuance.’ It’s not a real word,” his character, Modell, says in the film. “Like, ‘gesture.’ Gesture’s a real word. With gesture you know where you stand. But nuance? I don’t know.”

A New York City native, Reiser got his start at Catch a Rising Star, a now-defunct Manhattan club that launched the careers of many successful comedians, including Jerry Seinfeld, Bill Maher, Eddie Murphy and Chris Rock.

Though Reiser said he’s always seen himself as a comedian, his most recent TV special, 2024’s “Life, Death and Rice Pudding,” was his first filmed standup show in two decades. Why did he wait so long?

“I like to spread them out and not flood the marketplace,” he joked.

Reiser spoke to Seven Days by phone from his home in Los Angeles in advance of performing his new act this Thursday, July 24, at Paramount Theatre in Rutland.

A lot of comedians return to standup after years of success in movies and television. What brought you back?

Actually, I’ve been back doing standup for 10 years, but I hadn’t done a special in about 20 years, since before “Mad About You,” because I was busy doing other things. There are comics who thought of standup as a launchpad: I’ll do this and get discovered and then go do TV. But for me, it’s always been about standup. The first time I went onstage, I was 18 and my goal was to someday get on “The Tonight Show.” It was my love of standup. That’s what I always wanted to do. As fate would have it, I just got distracted and busy.

When I finally did get back, it was so joyful and exciting. There are not a lot of things you can do in your sixties that feel like your twenties. Standup is one. It felt just as exciting and nerve-racking as when I first went up. As much as the world has changed and the landscape has changed, standup hasn’t changed. It’s still you and what you have to say and people sitting in chairs looking at you.

I heard an interview in which you talked about seeing George Carlin, Richard Pryor and Robert Klein in Greenwich Village as a teen. Did you model your comedy after theirs?

They were huge influences on me — Klein for sure. I remember seeing George Carlin and Robert Klein in the Village in what were probably 80- to 100-seat clubs, so it must have been before Carlin got big. I’m gonna guess 1970 or ’71. My friends were going to Led Zeppelin, and I was going to George Carlin. Our paths were diverging.

Who else were your comedic heroes?

Mel Brooks was certainly a big influence. So much of my mental process was influenced by Mel Brooks, just his leaps and how his mind works. I must have listened to that “2000 Year Old Man” record, with Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner, hundreds of times.

Did you ever get to work with either of them?

Both of them, actually. Mel Brooks was a guest star on “Mad About You” about five times. It was sort of a dream come true. The first time he was on, I was useless because I was laughing so hard. It was like staring at the sun — it was so intense. I was like every kid in a fourth-grade Thanksgiving play, turning my back so they didn’t see me laughing.

What’s different about doing comedy in your sixties versus your twenties?

I’m not smart enough to make anything up, so I only talk about what just happened in my house. Luckily, it’s funny. But what happens in your twenties is different from your sixties. In your twenties, you’re leaving your parents’ house and getting your first apartment. In your sixties, you have children and marriage and health issues. So the material changes.

But, mostly, I’ve been doing this for so long, if the audiences are coming to see me, it’s not by accident. They know me, and there’s a presumption that they like me. It always has this great feeling of getting together with old friends.

In “Life, Death and Rice Pudding,” you tell a lot of jokes about family members. How do they feel about that?

I have a very good filter, so I don’t do anything that would embarrass anyone. But my older son had never seen me do standup until the taping of that special. For some reason he’d been avoiding it. He said, “I’m afraid I’ll laugh.” I go, “You’re supposed to laugh!” “But I might laugh at an inappropriate time.”

The truth is, when you talk about things that are personal, invariably they turn out to be universal. So when you talk about an argument with your wife, everyone goes, “Ugh, yeah!” That was the secret to “Mad About You.” People would go, “Oh, man! We just had that argument in our house yesterday.” So when you identify something and you share it, people are relieved to find out they’re not the only ones going through these things.

Do you still get nervous before you go onstage?

No, I get excited. I’ve heard this from other comics, as well. Even if you’re feeling under the weather or you’ve got a headache, you step onstage and it’s gone. Maybe it’s just adrenaline, but you never feel bad onstage — unless you’re dying. There’s something comforting and invigorating about it.

You’ve done TV, movies, standup. You even played piano onstage with Michael McDonald of the Doobie Brothers and wrote a best-selling book together. What’s left to do? A podcast? A Broadway show?

[Laughing.] A podcast and Broadway could not be further apart. No, I never had a checklist of things I wanted to do. Everything sort of comes up, and it’s like, Gee, that’d be fun.

It’s always surprising when things like “Stranger Things” come out of the blue. I didn’t go after that. They called me. And the Mike McDonald book, that was a strange thing. We had become friends, and it was during COVID, and neither of us had anything to do. I kept asking him questions and finally said, “Why don’t you write a book so I don’t have to ask you all these questions?” He said, “I don’t know how to write a book.” So it was born out of opportunity.

I’ve never felt like an out-of-work actor because, to me, all the acting was a bonus. In my head, I was first and foremost a comedian, even if I hadn’t been going out on the road. But that’s what I do. Now, because of “Mad About You” and “Stranger Things,” there are people who go, “I didn’t know that guy does standup.” There’s nothing in “Stranger Things” that makes you think, Man, I bet that guy is funny.

At 69, do you plan on working for as long as you can?

What else am I going to do? I have no skills in any other arena. George Carlin used to say, “I work for free. You just gotta pay me to go through the airport.” Invariably, I’ll be at the airport and I’m like, Why am I doing this? This is not fun. And then I get onstage and go, Oh, yeah. I love this.

This interview was edited for clarity and length.

This article appears in The Connections Issue.

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