15 February 2012 (Comedy Interview)

Words: John Balfe

Mick Foley is a man of many talents. He is a multi-time New York Times bestselling author currently embarking on a fledgling comedy career, after a couple of decades spent in pro wrestling; an industry which he reached the absolute summit of. What sets Foley apart from his comedic and literary peers, though, is the seemingly indomitable drive with which he approaches his various endeavours and an ability to completely change tack (no pun intended) from hardcore wrestling matches in Japan, to penning children's books, to guest slots on shows like 30 Rock. He is, and will presumably forever remain, the only bestselling author to survive 20 foot drops through tables unless, of course, Malcolm Gladwell slips one evening while repairing his TV aerial.

Mick Foley is coming to Dublin to perform his Nights In Red Flannel comedy show in Dublin's O'Reilly Theatre on Friday 2nd March and in The Empire in Belfast on Saturday 3rd March.

Tickets for the Dublin show are available via entertainment.ie/tickets

We are giving away free tickets and the chance to meet Mick in our competitions section!

Your books are filled with a lot of humour, so you've had experience writing with the intention of making people laugh. Was it difficult to transplant that from the page to the stage?

It's difficult to differentiate between a story that's humorous and clever and one that actually makes people laugh out loud. I do have stories in the books that make people laugh out loud, but there are others that make people smile or chuckle and you have to learn that you can't tell too many of those types of stories on stage.

What hurts more; a joke bombing on stage or crashing through a table from the top rope of a wrestling ring?

(Laughs) A joke bombing on stage doesn’t bother me, especially if it's intended to bomb. I do some things just to entertain myself and I figure that part of the audience will be entertained as well. There's something to be said though for the emotional pain of a show that doesn't go the way you'd like it to. But all things being said and with all due respect to comedians who put their heart and soul into what they do, there are not many emergency room visits associated with comedy. Wrestling had emotional pain combined with actual physical pain, but they're both tough in their own way.

When did you first have the idea to pursue comedy?

I talked to colleges for several years, including some major universities in the United States but there was never an emphasis on making it funny. I just found that I enjoyed telling humorous stories. Like I said though, you find out when you're on the comedy stage the difference between a humorous story and a really funny story. I started looking into it a little over two years and did a dozen or so shows and really started applying myself about eight months ago. That was when I decided to really give it a try.

Is the feeling before going out on stage for a comedy show the same feeling you have before going out to the ring for a big wrestling match?

Not anymore because these days I'm absolutely terrified to go out to the ring and I look forward to going out on the comedy stage. I hate to admit this is true, but when I go out on the comedy stage I'm usually hurdling some pretty low expectations so the audiences are almost always pleasantly surprised about how much fun they're having. In wrestling I have to vault over some pretty high expectations that the audience sets for me and that I set for myself. It's pretty nerve wracking to try to live up to those standards.

Have you learned much through wrestling that you can immediately apply to your comedy career?

Yeah, I think so. I think the most important thing I learned what that in the same way you can't judge a wrestling match by how many cheers or boos you get but by the lasting impression it makes, I try not to judge what I do on a comedy stage by how many laughs I get. I work with an amazing comedian on the last few shows in the states and he gets far more laughs per minute but I'm very comfortable with the laughs I get, the stories I tell and the idea that not every reaction has to be a laugh. It could be complete and utter silence but that indicates that people are listening. Some people would claim that would disqualify me from being a comedian because I'm not looking for people to laugh but there are times that you can see people really sitting and waiting for what comes next and that's as rewarding to me as getting the big laugh is.

Do you think you're blurring the between stand-up comedy in the traditional sense and a spoken word performance? 

Probably. I think ultimately the spoken word is where I'll be more at home but if it's called comedy I'll do my best to make people laugh.

Who makes you laugh? 

I've seen so many great guys since I started doing this but I wish I was more up on my Irish comics. There's such a great tradition of storytelling there. But I like the comedians who would make you think a little bit. George Carlin was one of my favourites. The way he'd play with words was incredible. I think Steve Martin in the late '70s struck on comedy gold because he had an act that was seemingly ridiculous and infantile but was really incredibly intelligent.

It's quite well known that you wrote the majority of your books longhand on paper instead of using a typewriter or a computer. How do you write your jokes?

I've written all of my books with the exception of three chapters of the last one by hand. I've been working on a children's book over the last three days and I'm writing that by hand as well. When I do write jokes or stories, I do it by hand. I've been experimenting over the last several weeks with just having ideas and jus seeing what happens with them, the same way that I used to do my wrestling interviews. I'm not claiming that's the best way and ultimately I think I should be writing stuff down so I don't forget it.

When you look back on your professional career in all its various guises, what are a couple of things that stand out to you personally as big moments, be it in your wrestling, comedy or literary careers?

Winning my first WWE title was probably about the equivalent of hitting #1 in the New York Times bestseller list. Each of them is indicative of really, really making it. I think the difference is that I angered a lot of people in the literary world when my book did so well.

Did you get a sense that when you achieved such success with your books that some people were looking down their noses at you because you were a pro wrestler?

A little bit. First of all there was the sense among the people in the literary world that it was ghost-written, which it was not. Second that it was not anything of substance, which it actually was. And also that it was beneath them when, in fact, if you look at the bestseller list it was actually on top of them.

You've recently resumed a role with WWE. Is it difficult to balance the various aspects of your career at the moment?

It is. That's why I'm really going to be cutting back on the comedy shows after this tour. I don't think I'll be back in Europe doing comedy this year and I'm cutting back my shows in the states to about one per month. It is difficult, especially when you consider having four kids. I'm especially looking forward to this tour because it'll be my last chance to do one for quite a while.

How did your recent appearance on 30 Rock come about?

Judah Friedlander is friend of mine and he thought that I would make an interesting choice when Jenna was choosing to hang out with cool new friends. It's already aired here but I missed it I didn't have the DVR properly set up, so I'm going to come back and watch it with my family because 30 Rock has turned into my 11-year-old's favourite show.

You're coming to Dublin on the 2nd of March. What can fans expect to see at the show?

I ask them to take a little leap of faith and trust that if they liked the books and enjoyed my wrestling interviews and know that I would not be on the stage unless I was pretty sure I could entertain them. So they can expect to laugh, to think and to leave happy that they took that chance.

You've wrestled and performed comedy in Ireland before, actually quite recently in both cases. What do you make of Irish crowds?

I've always loved the Irish crowds and that's why I was thrilled that my first show back in WWE was not on Raw or Smackdown but was at a live event in Dublin. I realised that my flight was landing in Dublin on the same day that that the WWE was in town. I was scheduled to go down to Cork and do a couple of shows and so I just made a phone call and the next thing you know I was in the ring. It was a complete and total surprise, not only to the fans but to every one of the wrestlers.

There's a story that I tell involving Al Snow that I tell and one of the laughs that I get involves when I start singing Nat King Cole's 'O Holy Night' and realise that nobody else in the club is singing along with me and what was so startling in Cork was that everybody sang. It was the only time that anybody had ever sung and in this case everybody sang. Irish crowds are very excitable!

Mick Foley will play Dublin's O'Reilly Theatre on Friday March 2nd. Buy your tickets here.