INTERVIEW: Comedian Alonzo Bodden on the art of being evergreen
Photo: Alonzo Bodden’s new comedy special is called Heavy Lightweight. Photo courtesy of Jen Maler / Comedy Dynamics / Provided by artist’s rep with permission.
Alonzo Bodden is a funny, funny man.
From his nonstop touring of comedy clubs to his celebrated win on Last Comic Standing to his hilarious podcast, Who’s Paying Attention?, to his continued laughs on NPR’s Wait, Wait … Don’t Tell Me!, the projects this comic is associated with are of the highest caliber and have given him exposure in multiple media.
Bodden’s latest laugh-fest is called Heavy Lightweight, a comedy special coming Aug. 23 to Amazon Prime Video.
“I was on another show with Amazon called Inside Jokes, which followed some new comics to the Just for Laughs Comedy Festival in Montreal, and I was the host of the comedy festival,” Bodden said in a recent phone interview. “So I think that was my first dealing with Amazon. And they liked me, and they wanted to do more.”
In the new comedy special, Bodden talks about many topical issues, including the #MeToo movement, Kanye West and the Millennial generation. He likes to inject news items into his bits, but he’s also aware that certain stories or individuals have a particular shelf life.
“I try to be a little more evergreen, although some of the things in the news stay in the news,” he said. “So some of the topics I talk about, whether it be Kanye West or Jussie Smollett, although it’s not at the top of the news, people still remember it, the story or the person I’m talking about. Then we have other topics, which unfortunately don’t change, like our racism, our immigration issues, things like that. That material works. I try not to do something too specific. If it’s a small story that just happened, then I’m not going to put that on the special because people will have forgotten it, but the bigger stories, more evergreen people, I’m happy to use.”
Some of the topics he jokes about are hot-button issues, but Bodden never self-censors himself. He looks out at society and offers his commentary; if society has problems, he’s not going to back down from exposing them and issuing his two cents.
“I feel really good when people thank me for being ahead of the issue, so I did gun control two specials ago,” Bodden said. “I don’t censor something thinking that it’s going to upset somebody because everything is going to upset somebody, whether you go too far or you don’t go far enough. There’s always going to be someone who is not happy with it in the end. I don’t believe in censoring my comedy.”
When audiences check out Bodden on the road (he has upcoming gigs at Casa Loma in Toronto and the Comedy Club of Kansas City), he likes to work in a mixture of his greatest hits — bits he’s been working on for quite some time — and new material that he writes on a constant basis. This keeps things fresh for new and old fans alike.
“It is definitely a mixture of both,” he said. “Because I do topical material, things are always fluid, and things are always changing. So, for example, more recently I’ve been talking about ‘The Squad’ and about women in Congress and women in positions of power, and that’s kind of new. And then that leads into talking about our race issues, which can lead into Black Lives Matter and Colin Kaepernick, which becomes an evergreen topic that becomes new again with the football season because people start talking about it. … Or we have a situation with Nike and the Fourth of July with the sneaker and the Betsy Ross flag, and then that connects to the original Nike protests of people burning up their Nike’s. So that’s how it ties in, and then some topics are absolutely evergreen that I joke about — men, women, dating, relationships, family, things like that.”
Bodden is a self-avowed news junkie. He enjoys staying abreast of what’s going on in the world. That has helped him with his stint on NPR’s Wait, Wait … Don’t Tell Me!, a news panel show that offers tongue-in-cheek recaps and quizzes based on the week’s headlines.
“I’m qualified for that because I do have an interest in the news,” he said. “I try not to do the same thing too much, you know what I mean. Like Donald Trump, which is obviously something that we have to talk about. … Am I going to write a joke every time Donald Trump tells a lie? No, because I don’t want my whole act to be about Donald Trump.”
Bodden said he loves joking in the moment, improv comedy and topical commentary, and that’s why he is a natural fit for the radio show. Wait, Wait’s producers saw Bodden perform in Chicago seven or eight years ago, and they walked away impressed at his routine. Soon enough, his agent made the connection, and he has been a frequent presence on the NPR staple.
Even though Trump and the current political climate have given Bodden and other comedians ample material for their sets, he is quick to make a distinction.
“I didn’t want comedy material at the cost of my nation’s soul, and the thing about Donald Trump unfortunately is he is doing exactly what we expected,” he said. “So this has come up, is he good for comics? I mean, he’s been great for Stephen Colbert. Stephen Colbert kind of designed his show like, OK, I’m going to do Trump in my monologue every night, and that works great for him. I don’t want to be trapped in that one topic, and again it becomes sort of repetitive. Oh, Donald Trump said something horrible. Donald Trump said something racist.”
He added: “It’s like when they brought up the question recently after his tweets about ‘The Squad’ and his tweets about Baltimore, and they’re like, is Donald Trump a racist? And it’s like, you’re asking that now? I thought we settled that one years ago. I have to acknowledge it as a comedian. It’s the elephant in the room, but I don’t want to give him my whole show. … Barack Obama was more of challenge, but that was more fun to be challenged. Barack Obama, for one thing, he was funny himself, and the other thing, he was so beloved. And he didn’t make a lot of mistakes, so it became funnier — the fact that he did everything right became funny. That was more of a challenge comedically.”
Bodden has been making people laugh ever since he was a child. He said his family has a sense of humor, and that no doubt influenced him at a young age. But he wasn’t standing in front of the brick wall with a microphone in his hands in those early years. In fact, his career trajectory first made a stop in the world of aerospace.
“I was an airplane mechanic, and then I got a job training new mechanics,” he remembered. “And I would be in front of the room, and that is a situation that so many people get nervous in. It had the complete opposite effect on me. It was the most natural thing in the world for me to talk to a group. I found I could make them laugh. I would talk about stories of things I had done in my past — aircraft stories. I was training people who are trying to switch careers, so I talked to them about their past career and just made jokes about it. And that’s how the standup part came about. I could always make people laugh. I wasn’t the class clown. I was the guy who made a joke to the guy next to me in school, and then he laughed out loud. And he got in trouble, and I was like, ‘I don’t know what he’s talking about. I was just sitting here.’”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Alonzo Bodden’s new comedy special, Heavy Lightweight, will premiere Aug. 23 on Amazon Prime Video. Click here for more information.
