Show Notes for Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show, Episode #252, Kelly Carlin
Listen to this episode on Earwolf.
The Cheat Sheet
- We love to build up our heroes (such as George Carlin). We also like to tear ’em down. But what about humanizing them? (29:05)
- Being the daughter of a famous comedian is a constant dance of trying to find your own identity. (32:58)
- A love of learning, combined with competitiveness, ambition, and perfectionism, runs in the Carlin family. (40:57)
- And so much more…
More About this Episode
Kevin opens the show with giving his love to the families and victims of the Paris terrorist attacks.
Kelly Carlin’s memoir, A Carlin Home Companion: Growing Up with George, is out. It’s been a book of the month in Playboy, written about in Vanity Fair, and featured on NPR’s All Things Considered. But this book isn’t a biography about George Carlin, though Kelly says that that’s what a lot people assume. Nor is this just about George Carlin’s comedic genius, cocaine addiction, and alcoholism. More so, this is a book about Kelly finding her own voice as she steps out from under the shadow of her father’s brilliance.
Kelly has been on a whirlwind tour promoting her book. In today’s show, she reveals to Kevin that she’s fed up with how interviewers sometimes over focus on her father. She says that they often just “want to talk about their experiences with my Dad” (14:12). She adds, “I’m grateful to receive [their] stories about my father — but twenty minutes of them? Can we move on? Maybe we could talk about what it was like to write the book or something” (14:35).
Before she wrote her memoir, she wrote a one-woman show, “Driven to Distraction,” in the 1990s. It was partly about the spiritual awakening she experienced concerning her mother’s death. Prior to performing it, she sent the script to her dad. Kelly tells the story: “He said, ‘We have to talk … At your therapist’s office.’ And I knew, ‘Oh, this is going to be one of those life changing conversations. There will be boxes of Kleenex involved’” (20:32).
When Kelly first told her dad that she was thinking about writing a memoir, she tells Kevin (23:15): “He said to me these strange words. ‘Real artists start with their autobiographical work, but then they move on. Like me. I did Class Clown. I did Occupation: Foole. And then I moved on to other stuff.’ And I’m sitting there going, ‘Yeah, that makes perfect sense’ — in the moment. Of course, I got home and went, ‘Wait a minute! That makes no sense! What about Richard Pryor? That’s a man who never moved on.”
This relates to an insight into her dad that she’s only fully grasped now that she’s been talking about him so much recently — that he rarely talked about his personal life (23:49). On stage, he talked about the world at large, things like the “seven dirty words”, things like consumerism and materialism (see: A Place for My Stuff). Rarely did he, for instance, talk about his only child or his wife.
Kelly isn’t so much an extrovert that she’d want to be on stage — as either a stand-up comic or an actor — five nights a week. Her most recent show, which shares the title with her memoir, came about quite serendipitously. As she tells Kevin, Lewis Black mentioned to her that he was pulling together a bunch of funny friends to do a comedy cruise- — and there was a spot open for her. She took it. On the cruise, in her performance, she would show a clip of her dad, then tell the story behind it. She did this repeatedly, ending with Kelly talking about her dad’s death. By then, she says, there wasn’t a dry eye in the house. After the cruise, Paul Provenza encouraged her to work her performance into a show, which she later performed for five weeks at the Falcon Theatre, in Burbank, California. It was that show that forms the backbone of her memoir.
Thanks Kelly Carlin!
If you enjoyed this show, send Kelly a quick shout out on her Twitter or Facebook.
Also say hi to Kevin on Twitter and to our KPCS producers, Jaime Fox’s Twitter and Samm Levine’s Twitter.
Other People Mentioned in this Episode
- Comedians Tom Shillue, Dennis Miller, Flip Wilson, Shecky Greene, Lily Tomlin, and Marty Feldman.
- Comedian Dana Carvey and his two sons Dex and Tom.
- Actors Christopher Walken and Jeff Bridges.
- Cary Grant and Dyan Cannon’s daughter, Jennifer Grant.
- The Dalai Lama.
Cool Stuff and Selected Links from this Episode
- Kelly Carlin’s official website: TheKellyCarlinSite.com
- Get Kelly’s memoir, A Carlin Home Companion: Growing Up with George, from Amazon, IndieBound, or Google Play.
- Add the book to your Goodreads or like it on Facebook.
- “Pixie and Dixie and Mr. Jinks”: a short cartoon; a clip of “I hate meeces to pieces.”
- Kelly’s podcast, “Waking from the American Dream,” on iTunes and SoundCloud.
- The NPR/All Things Considered interview, “Life With A Comedian Isn’t Always Funny: Growing Up In George Carlin’s Shadow.”
- Vanity Fair’s article, “How George Carlin’s Daughter Kelly Lost a Father but Gained a Family of Comedians — and Her Voice.”
- Check out Kelly in Kevin’s documentary, Misery Loves Comedy. Watch the trailer and get the movie from iTunes, Amazon, and Google Play.
- The Lewis Black Comedy Cruise.
- Photos of Kelly performing her show at the Falcon Theatre.
- The Green Room with Paul Provenza.
You’ll Also Like
- The show’s official website: KPChatShow.com.
- Facebook.com/KevinPollaksChatShow.
- This is Kelly’s second appearance on KPCS. Check out her first appearance: Earwolf, YouTube.
- Want to learn more about our producers? Jaime Fox’s IMDb. Samm Levine’s IMDb.
Don’t Miss Upcoming Episodes
On KPCS’s SoundCloud, click the orange “Follow” button. Or subscribe to KPCS on iTunes, Stitcher, or YouTube. Also get the Earwolf newsletter.
If You Enjoyed Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show
Drop the KPCS team a line: kpcsfanmail@gmail.com.
Add your voice to the Earwolf forum page for this episode or leave some comments at SoundCloud page for this episode or the YouTube page for this episode.
Write a podcast review on iTunes:
- Go to the Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show page on iTunes.
- Click “View in iTunes” (you’ll need to have iTunes installed).
- Now that you’re in the iTunes app, click the “Ratings and Reviews” tab.
- Click “Write a Review” button.
- Click the appropriate star rating and leave a review of the show.
Write a podcast review on Stitcher:
- Go to the Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show page on Stitcher.
- Click on the stars.
- Click the appropriate star rating and leave a review of the show.
Rate or review on IMDb:
- Go to the Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show page on IMDb.
- Go to “Your Rating” and click the number of stars out of ten.
- Or go to “User Reviews” section at the bottom and write a review.
Lee Bob Black is a writer and editor.
(Explanation: A while ago, I was vying for a job as a freelance writer for Earwolf Podcast Network, which produces the Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show. These show notes were part of my attempt at landing that gig. I also wrote some show notes for an episode of the Cracked Podcast. LBB.)
