Whether he’s onstage alone, perched in his distinctive up-close-and-personal posture, interviewing someone in the garage of his Los Angeles home for one of the more than 500 WTF podcast episodes recorded there, or playing a lightly fictionalized version of himself in the IFC original series bearing his name, Marc Maron distinguishes himself on today’s comedy landscape as a maestro in the craft of exhaustive self-analysis.
This summer, the comedian added arena comedy to his résumé, joining old pals Louis C.K. and Sarah Silverman as co-headliners on the 2014 Oddball Comedy and Curiosity Festival tour. It makes its final stop this Sunday, Sept. 21, at the Austin360 Amphitheater. The Chronicle asked Maron about the experience prior to his visit. (For his views on South by Southwest, and Austin at large, plus the future of WTF, see more from the interview at austinchronicle.com.)
Austin Chronicle: With Oddball’s shorter sets, amphitheatre setting, teeming crowds, and revolving door of world-class comedians, what anxieties did you have about lending yourself to this tour?
Marc Maron: It was sort of twofold, I guess: I wanted to be part of it because, given where I’m at right now, there are a lot of markets – Austin not being one of them because I play Austin – that I don’t know that I’m really familiar with or that they’re necessarily familiar with me. So, in one part of my brain, it was a way of introducing myself to some of the markets that I just don’t play in; and on another level, it was being part of something special and also getting to hang out with guys I started out with like Louis and Sarah. There were a lot of appealing things to it.
The primary anxiety is that I’ve spent most of the last decade of my career making my comedy extremely intimate. So the idea of playing for 10,000 to 15,000 people was a little daunting in my mind; in the sense that, is it possible to make that intimate? I mean, I went out of my way to make a special [2013’s Thinky Pain] that I shot in front of 240 people. I don’t necessarily think that comedy, stadium comedy, is always the best way to see a comedian, but it is a way to see a comedian, and it’s also a way of doing comedy. I used to be, personality-wise, a much more gregarious act and a lot more aggressive – so I have it in me. So my anxiety was: How do I represent who I am now and what I’m doing now in this setting?
AC: How has conducting hundreds of penetrating, long-form interviews over the last half-decade affected your stand-up?
MM: I think the podcast itself – and not the interview portion necessarily but the entirety of the podcast, just sort of improvising and speaking my mind freely at the beginning and talking with other people – has made me a lot more comfortable with myself. How that informs my comedy, it’s hard to define, but it’s pretty astounding. And a lot of what I rattle on about at the beginning, ultimately when I’m thinking out loud, some of that stuff becomes material. And then also the popularity of the podcast has brought more people to come out and see me who know me very well and know what to expect from me and are generally very supportive – so it’s helped me out in a lot of ways.
AC: How has the success you’ve achieved in the last five-plus years impacted your overall enjoyment of life?
MM: I think that, with finding my place in the world, I’m a little more okay with myself. And now what I’m dealing with is a strange amalgamation of arriving at a relatively healthy sense of self, and then not quite knowing what the hell to do with myself. I still have a lot of problems with relationships and figuring out how to have fun, but on a core level I’m a little more grounded and I’m sort of grateful and humbled by the success of everything; and, you know, I’m busy and I’m writing good stand-up and the podcast is still good, so this seems to be my window to work – and the work is actually very rewarding in a much bigger way than I’ve ever experienced. I feel generally more grounded, but my brain’s still a little aggravated and a little doped with panic, but I’m not sure how to make that go away. And I would like to know what the hell to do with myself. You know what I’m saying?
This article appears in September 19 • 2014.