Dwight Slade

[faceless]

Comedian goes for a split personality approach
Portlander Dwight Slade's double DVD will divide his material into "Right & Raunch"
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
KRISTI TURNQUIST
The Oregonian
www.dwightslade.com

On stage, Dwight Slade is an energetic, unpredictable blend -- one minute a wry observer of life's strangeness, the next an overgrown kid making goofy faces and funny noises.

At his home, a cozy bungalow in Northeast Portland, Slade is definitely in off-stage mode. The house is quiet. Slade is divorced and shares custody of his two children, a 17-year-old son and a 20-year-old daughter, with his ex-wife. This afternoon, the children are out, and Slade sits on the couch in a tidy living room. His manner is reserved, and the general air of late-afternoon calm is underscored by Jones, Slade's white-and-orange cat, who snoozes soundly in a nearby chair.

Instead of firing off one-liners, Slade contemplates the current condition of stand-up comedy, an art form the Seattle-born Slade has been practicing since he was a precocious 14-year-old, trying to get a slot on open-mike nights. But Slade is also thinking about the concept of duality -- how comedy can be both reassuring and confrontational. How audiences can be in the mood for something family friendly, and something more challenging.

As Slade is explaining the subtle distinctions, Jones starts making sudden chechh-chechh-checch! noises: the unmistakable sound of a feline with a fur ball. It's not exactly a cat's version of heckling. But the unexpected interruption does make Slade pause. "You all right, Jonesy?" he asks the cat, who continues to sound like it's in the process of hawking up a loogie. Eventually, Jones' hacking subsides, and the cat's head drops back onto the chair for more naptime. Slade looks relieved.

So, meanwhile, back at the duality: that's the idea behind "Right & Raunch," Slade's upcoming show. The concert will be filmed for a live double-DVD release, and Slade will also pitch it to such outlets as Comedy Central and HBO. In each show, Slade will first do a family-friendly set of material -- then a second set of more adult comedy.

But that doesn't mean, Slade hastens to point out, that the "raunch" set will be a four-letter-word, graphic, dirty-for-dirt's-sake routine. "I don't think that kind of stuff is funny at all," Slade says. Instead, he sees "raunch" as a term for jokes that may ruffle feathers, stir controversy and rouse heated opinion, in the tradition of the late, great George Carlin.

The idea of splitting his material into two sets, and two DVDs, came out of an unlikely laboratory -- Slade's experiences performing on cruise ships. When he first started being booked on cruise ships, Slade recalls, he was instructed to be "very, very funny, but very clean and inoffensive." In fact, he was told, "We'd rather you be mediocre than offensive."

For a working comic trying to make a living, the cruise ships are good gigs, Slade says. But as he developed his sets, he wondered, "What am I sacrificing to do this? My favorite comics, and the comedy I enjoy, is spicier, has more drama and dimension, and a little more meat with your dessert."

Slade came up with appropriately clean material, but, he says, "I also like to throw in jokes about the whores of the corporate elite," and similar topics not everybody sees the humor in. "So I thought, why not separate the two?"

The "right" stuff is suitable for all, with nothing awkward or potentially uncomfortable. The "raunch" lets the audience know that it's OK to laugh at jokes about touchier topics: "race, gender and money are the classic ones that make people tense," Slade says. "A lot of people have this duality," he says, his eyes serious in a boyish face topped by sandy hair. "You have the very socially accepted side, but you have a wild side you like to let loose."

Though he's only "40-ish," as he puts it, Slade has about 25 years' experience in understanding how comedy affects audiences. In a childhood marked by many family moves, Slade attended middle school in Houston and met Bill Hicks, who shared Slade's interest in stand-up comedy and ultimately went on to a controversial, influential career cut short by his death in 1994. The pair started writing jokes and auditioning for comedy clubs. Slade's family then moved to Klamath Falls, but stand-up remained his calling.

After attending the University of Oregon, Slade took on the Los Angeles comedy world, performing at the tender age of 18 at the famous Comedy Store. He's kept busy as a touring comic ever since, even as stand-up comedy has seen boom times, bust times and a new resurgence.

The first comedy boom was sparked in the wake of "The Cosby Show," a series so successful that every network was scooping up stand-ups to star in sitcoms. Ray Romano, Tim Allen, Drew Carey, Brett Butler, Ellen DeGeneres and, of course, Jerry Seinfeld, all made big bucks. Slade had his own brush with sitcom greatness in 2003. He signed a development deal with Warner Bros. for a potential series, but the concept stalled as the sitcom boom was giving way to reality shows.

Thanks to the Internet, comics can now get their material out in new ways. Ninety seconds of stuff that catches on virally can lift a comedian to a whole new level, Slade says. Being based in Portland is, he says, "comfortable," though that can be a blessing and a curse. "As a creative person-slash-artist, you're not as motivated."

The Portland mellow vibe extends to audiences, too. "Comedy audiences in Portland are more sensitive than other audiences," Slade says. "People are very polite in Portland. We don't want other people to feel bad. You can't get away with as much in Portland."