Comedy Saved Me, and so when you watch a great comic on stage, you might be seeing them in this video and Netflix or whatever that bit that they're doing and has taken usually a year plus to develop.
Welcome to another episode of the Comedy Saved Me Podcast. I'm your host, Lynn Hoffman and Lucky Me. Today we are thrilled to welcome renowned comedian, political satirist, is it satirist or satirist?
Not sure?
And social commentator Jimmy Tingle. Now With a career spanning stand up, television, radio, and film, Jimmy is known for
his sharp wit, insightful humor, and heartfelt storytelling. From his appearances on everything from Oh Sixty Minutes to The Tonight Show to his acclaimed one man shows and activism, Jimmy's unique comedic voice has inspired and uplifted audiences nationwide, and in this episode, so we'll explore how comedy has shaped his life, provided resilience through challenges, and become a tool for social change. Jimmy Tingle, the man, the myth, the legend, is here with us today on Comedy Save Me.
Welcome to the show. It's so great to have you here.
So great to be here, Lynn, Thanks so much for having.
Me, Well, thank you for being had.
I know I don't have a lot of time with you, so I want to start off with what first drew you to comedy? Was it a television show? Was it an album you listened to?
What was it?
Oh? Boy, probably the funniest stuff that we heard as kids where we watched The Honeymooners with the whole family, you know, back with Jackie Gleason and Ott Connie and the June Taylor Dances. That was a great show on Sunday nights. You know that. You know, as I get older,
more things like oh, the movie Lenny Lenny Bruce. But Dustin Hoffman was really influential set it in that live when it first came on the air, you know in the early seventies, and you know, watching the Tonight Show with Johnny and the people that he would have on. Especially in college, we had sit around the dorms and we'd watch like a Saturday Live and then of course the Tonight Show with Johnny and all those guests that they would have on. We just had a blast watching it.
It was you know, it was inspiring and yeah, so what really got me into it though, is when the a comedy club opened up in my hometown, to my neighborhood in Cambridge. It was called the ding Ho. It was a Chinese restaurant slash comedy club and it opened up in Cambridge and it was like two blocks from my house and they were having an open mic night. And one of my friends from high school, Lenny Clark, also a comedian. He was hosting an open mic night
on Wednesday nights. And I was interested in performing, but I didn't have I didn't play an instrument. Really, I didn't you know, sing, But comedy was something that you could do just by basically talking and telling stories and jokes and stuff. So that's that was really my first intro into it, the open mic nights back in like seventy nine, eighty eighty one. Yeah, that's when I first started.
Wow. And it didn't take you long too.
I mean, what eighty eight was You end up on the Carson Show, which is the pinnacle at that time. But I need to know before that happened, when did you realize it was more than just making people laugh? Did you know that there was healing things involved there going on?
Well? I knew that, you know, there were people like George Colin and people like Richard Pryor. Of course, there were big influences on everybody. And like I said, Lenny Bruce and you know, Moresaul, those folks were using comedy laughing. In the sixties and seventies, there was more true commentary along with just the stand up component, you know. So and my friend Barry Kremin's worked at the dingh as well.
He was the booker and the founder of the Dingho, and he was doing political humor and I was just talking about what was going on in the news. So I knew that it could be it could be effective. Yeah, there was. There was a track record of people who admitted had used it effectively, from Will Rogers to Mark Twain to like I said, Prior and Colin and Lenny Bruce and Mortsol and all those folks, and of course
the Skitz and Saturday and that Live. You know, all of those were talking about really what was going on, uh in the in the society at the time, and it was just it was funny and it was fun to When I went to college, I studied sociology, political science, history, you know, so it was fun to approach the comedy with that kind of a background and that kind of an insight because that because that's what I was studying in school, and that's what I'm supposed to be learning about,
which I was very interested in, and it kind of just translated into not always, but eventually it just evolved into more social commentary and along with the laughs.
Yeah, you know, it's funny you say that about college because I studied, you know, journalism and broadcasting, but for some reason, I felt like I need to know how to talk to people, so I took my secondary was abnormal psychology, and I like got no idea how well that would help me in my life moving forward.
You're in the right field.
Can you share or remember a moment when comedy helped you through a difficult time in your life?
Does anyone time stand out to you?
Yeah? I mean, well, we worked in bars, and you know, I was a heavy drinker, and a friend of mine said, if you have a quit drinking, you know, you could do really well. You could do well in comedy. And you know, that was very attractive to me, the idea of actually being successful in this field. But as you know, and there's you know, it's it's very difficult to fulfill your potential as a carmak or an actor or any field. If you're a really heavy drinker at a young age,
it just is, it just is in the way. And so it was in the way for me. It was screwing up a lot of things in my life. So that was the biggest thing. But when when he put he connected this guy connected my comedy career to quitn't drinking, that was like, that was like the magic bullet that really got my attention and helped me to It helped motivate me to really try very hard to quit drinking,
which I was able to do. So that was really really good, with the help of a lot of other people and you know, the higher power and everything else, not just me. But so that was the comedy was a real game changer like that because respect.
That's like an epiphany moment when someone says that to you.
What were you? How did you react initially?
Were you?
Were you offended?
It was so encouraged. No, I was encouraged. I was encouraged because it's a very depressing substance. You know, if you drink every day for an extended period of time, you can't help. But being hungover all the time for the end, hungover, I guess there's a form of depression. So it was just it was kind of a darker time. Even though I loved performing and being in the clubs and the camaraderie and all the people that were around and the audiences. That was a blast, but the hangovers
were a killer, you know. And and yeah, and so it was like this reason, it was a really strong reason, a strong motivation to try to make a real solid effort to get sober. And so that's the path I went down, and it's worked for the last thirty five years. So so it was. But without the comedy, I don't know if I would have got that incentive, you know what I mean, I don't know if something else would have caught my attention, maybe, but maybe not, you know. So it was definitely a game changing.
Sounds like a great combination between a mentor someone who's going to just say it straight shooter like it is and what you love to do was like that perfect storm that that.
Well he was a comic also, he was a comic, and he said, you know, I'm in the business, and you know, you're you're you're you're good you could be really good, you know, if you so that was that was a big thing.
In what ways do you think humor can help people cope with with adversity or trauma?
I mean, we're in the middle of a.
Horrible mental health crisis of epic proportions today.
Yeah, how do you think that.
Well, I don't know if comedy alone can you know, I don't know if comedy alone can you know, help people. I'm sure puts you in a better mood, that's for sure. I think if people were doing you know, comedy around mental health issues in maybe facilities or hospitals or two people who were you know, had those issues, then they maybe somebody who had their own mental health issues, you know, is doing comedy around those issues. That can definitely help.
I mean, there's a common friend of mine, Gary Gullman, who you know, had severe depression and talks about it on stage and did a one person show about it called The Great Depression. It's a great special, but he addresses depression on stage, and I know that thousands of people have reached out to him about that issue and their personal challenges with that. So in that sense, it
can help. It can because you're communicating with people. The comedy, you're communicating with people, but the laughter itself is it's going to be more than laugh. It's got to be the follow up and the work that is involved, whether it's getting sober or whatever it is. You know, mental health issues are getting help, you know, but it can be a motivated because it's fun. It's fun to listen to, it's fun to laugh at, and it's fun to know that you're not alone.
Right there, right right there, It's fun to know you're not alone.
I mean that, that's huge.
Yeah, And because it's obviously a communication medium, you're telling people, and he was doing that part of his story. I do some of that in my in my shows and people respond because, like you said, it is a it's a national epidemic, the mental health issue, and so is the addiction and the you know, whether it's alcohol or drugs or whatever it is.
You know, you'll be right back with more of the Comedy Save Me Podcast. Come back to the Comedy Saved Me Podcast.
I want to talk to you a bit about your craft and your process. I want to say a few years back, maybe in the two thousands, what do they
call them, the aughts now, or something. Yeah, the early two thousand, I was fortunate enough to know someone who took me to Joan Rivers at the cutting room where I found out when I got there was this little room in the back where she would test out all her material and she would just put these big like she'd write her jokes and throw them on the floor so she could see them on the stage floor.
What you want?
I had no idea, That's what I was going to see. What is your process about writing new material and testing it out on your audiences, especially if you're dealing with things you know of a serious or political topics where you really have to be extra creative.
Well, I wish I was as organized as Joan Rivers, and I have a little place to go with big It's it's really trial and error. You know. You get an idea, you write it down sometimes just in your head, and you present it to people. And my process is basically I'm much more of an oral I don't you know. Some folks write it down in every word and it's perfectly and they memorize it. And again, I'm just I've never been that disciplined in that organized to write it
down to that extent. Although I'm a big fan of people who do, and it's good to hear that that Jo Homa was doing that. But I write a set list, and I have ideas and I present them to a live audience. And the thing is, you don't know really if something's going to work until you do it. It's the only way to tell. It sounds great on paper, right, it sounds good on paper, but it depends on you know, how the audience reacts, and also having a safe place to do it, having places that you can do it,
because you have to fail. You have to fail, and that's part of the process in terms of just presenting new material. And that's that no one likes to fail. Nobody likes to be in front of a bunch of people with a great idea go and they do it and nothing. It's like, it's embarrassing, happened, But it's part of the process.
Has that happened to you? And if it has, Oh, how how do you handle that with an audience?
You just keep going, You just keep going. Yeah, yeah, you keep going. These days, I record most of my sets and I can listen to them and see what worked and what didn't, and you know, it's got I've gotten much better and much more disciplined as if you know, evolved as a comic. But in the early days, you know, the nobody was video video and everything, and nobody had not everybody had, you know, a phone with a you know, you couldn't just record yourself and your phone, so it
was much more memory. That's how it basically was for me, notebook, trying to memorize it and remembering, well, how the audience reacted. That's really how it was in the early days for me anyway. But I would record some of my sets, not all of them, but you know, enough to enough to remember how they worked and if they didn't work.
Yeah, And did you ever have an issue with an audience member or anyone that you had to kind of handle live in the room. I'm just curious how you would deal with that.
Oh yeah, I mean some people are better than others. Some people talk to the audience and you know, want to solicit back and forth, and that was never my style. I just go up there and go this is what I've been thinking about, boom, and just do it. And occasionally people get upset or talk back or whatever. I tend to ignore them more than engage with them. Honestly, you know it's not it's my style. I don't want to.
I'm not. Nobody's there to hear that person hit what I got to say and my comedy, and so that's what I stick to pretty much.
That's incredible.
First of all, the fact that you don't write them down and that it's from memory is amazing to me.
Well, you know, I write a set list like, this is what I'm going to do here, This is what I'm going to do here. This will bullet points, Yeah, bullet points exactly exactly, and and then and do the bits. And a lot of them are tried and true, and you know they're going to work because you've spente them a hundred times. Other ones are new and the only way to work it is to just keep saying it and doing it. And I mean then you listen to the tape and change the word here. Change is set
up there. So much of it is how you say it, when you say it in the show. You know what you open with, what you close with, which lines are the funniest, How it builds. I mean, there's a lot that goes into it. And so when you watch a great comic on stage. You might be seeing them in this video and Netflix or whatever that bit that they're doing and has taken, you know, usually a year plus to develop, and the only way to do it is over and over and over again.
Yeah, is there anything you're working on right now that you want to test out on me?
I don't know why.
I just wanted to ask you that I want to be the first to hear something.
Not really, No, I don't have anything right now.
I just three on this.
Thank you for asking.
I've been told that I'm a good audience, so when the urged strikes, call me anytime, I'm a good audience. In what ways do you see comedy as a force for social good and activism? Because I do know that I saw and I'm pretty sure I saw this that you literally ran for lieutenant governor of Massachusetts, which I think is amazing in and of itself.
Yeah, well, thank you, and I did. And the reason is is because going back to entertainment, entertainment like what John stewartt did with the with the firefighters and getting the treatment and the healthcare that they deserved the people who were injured because of the chemicals, right, and getting that and bringing that before Congress, and all the hard work that went into that was the result of the
hard work behind the scenes. It wasn't the result of the jokes necessarily, but his career as a comic and the platform that he has allows him to draw attention to these issues. But the real change is the people in Congress writing you, writing the bills and enacting them and motivating people and getting people on board to actually
change the law. So it's a combination of both. The reason I ran for Lieutenant governor, one of the biggest reasons was around the substance abuse issue in Massachusetts, and I know that that comedy can do a certain amount. Again, give you the platform, tell the jokes, reach the two hundred people in front of you or how many people are watching on television, But the real work is in
the legislature and in the public. You know, the public awareness and the pressure on the legislature and the pressure on the politicians, and that's where the real change comes. Where whatever the issue is, you can have cultural awareness through comedy and cultural awareness through entertainment. But entertainment by itself is just a means to a lodger end. If
you're trying to use it for those ends. For example, I started an organization of social enterprise called Humor for Humanity, and our mission statement is Humor for Humanity more than entertainment, raising spirits, funds and awareness for nonprofits, charities and social causes. Our mission is your mission Humor for Humanity, humor and helping humor in healing, humor and hope. Ha ha ha. And because of this organization, what I do is I I love comedy. I try to use not every night,
but a lot of the time I'm using. I'm doing fundraisers basically for non profits, and I EMC and I perform and I can do the auctions and help raise money. And we've raised a lot of money over the last ten fifteen years for organizations. So it's not the comedy. The comedy is one component of the fundraiser, but the fundraiser and the nonprofit that's doing the work, whether it's around you know, child development or subst abuse, or rehabs or treatment centers are any of that type of thing.
It's the people on the ground doing the work in the trenches that are really changing things. But the comedy is a great gift and a great entree into that In terms of an entertaining component to do our attention to that particular issue in that particular nonprofit. So that's been a lot of fun doing that.
What better way? Did you enjoy the process at all? Or was it?
Was it more grueling than you thought it would be even though you bring such money purpose?
Yeah?
Yeah, oh the process is pretty grueling. Did I enjoy it? I loved meeting the people. I loved, you know, being on the stump. I don't know if I enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed doing the Humor for Humanity, Because the Humor for Humanity, I just have more freedom. There's direct there's the direct effect with the with the nonprofits. And if they raise you know, one hundred thousand dollars, it's a big deal. You know, it's especially the smaller one to some of the events we've done. I've raised
a lot of money for large hospitals. They've raised you know, a million where I was the MC and the auctioneer. But most of them are on the smaller end of you know, moderate nonprofits, and they have they don't they have budgets aren't huge. So fifty thousand dollars here and one hundred thousand dollars there or twenty thousand dollars here. That's a big deal and it helps them so and that's what I like to do.
Well.
I think it's amazing, and I also think it's so selfless of you to have had the cajones to do it.
To begin with.
Like, you know, I really I really applaud your efforts on that, and I think it's amazing because basically, at the core, you just want to help others, and I think that's such an amazing thing.
Yeah, but running for office is like that's that's a job. And in the human humidity is a job too. I mean, you know, it's part of my business, is what I do. But it serves the most purposes like a public servants. You know, people get paid for running for well, if you get elected, you get a salary. And same thing with humor for humanity. But it's the it's way, your passion is. That's how people come up with material. Usually what are they passionate about? And that's what you see
them talking about on stage or on TV. You know, what are they passion what? What motivates you to write material or come up with this or even want to be in public talking about it.
Well, speaking of passion. Looking back, now that you have a little bit of a hindsight, how would you say comedy has changed you as a person or shaped you as a person?
Well, it gives you a great sense of it's empowering. It's empowering to think of something. I have an idea and present it to people and you get an immediate reaction and like that was a good idea. All these people like that. I want to do that again, you know, And so it builds it can when you you know, the more you do it and the more successful you become, it builds confidence. It builds a sense of that you can do things. You can you have You're not powerless
in the world. You have a voice. People listen, people enjoy it. You can make a living at it. And so in that respect, it's been pretty amazing because I never thought I would be doing this when I was growing up. You know, there was it wasn't as common as it is now. You know, so well.
Everyone has a studio at their house now.
Exactly exactly so. But it's I mean, I was able to go back to school, I was able to run for office, I was able to do a lot of different things in my life. Travel all over the world. It broadens your perspective. You meet new people, uh, you know, get to live in New York and LA at different times, and travel and so it's broadened my perspective of the world tremendously, especially trying to keep up with politics on what's going on in the world. That it's kind of like your job, you know, and.
Your exact job.
How does that feel to you, though, when when you've made a difference in someone else's life.
Oh, it's great. It's a great feeling. It's a great feeling, you know. I was on the I did a show last night, and one of the things is, you know, I have my own political opinions, and I'm on the Democratic side of the ile generally speaking, that's I've been a lifelong Democrat. But I say in the audience, I say to the Trump supporters, I said, you guys won, Let's see what happens. And I tell a story about how to react after your side of the ile losers,
and and my friends. I have friends that are the Trump is They you know, they that's the that's what they like, and that's what they voted for. And I said how am I going to react to these guys? And I said, how about just saying congratulations? So when I saw them, I just said, hey, man, you guys you won. Congratulations. Two on two occasions, this guy lit up.
He goes, Jimmy, thank you. I appreciate it. And our kind of relationship went to a different level because he felt heard, he felt respected, and he felt like it's like having a good game, a hot fought, you know, basketball game or sporting events. Yeah, you shake hands and you're you know, good game, man, you guys won. It got three hits. Good for you. I mean, that's how it was. And it did that on a couple of occasions. It was just it put the relationship on a different level.
So it's not a big thing, and it's not even so much of a comedy thing, but you're affecting somebody the way you act off stage as well as on stage, and that's really effective. And of course, when you when you do something that changes people or helps them with whatever it is the mental illness issues or the recovery issues, or raising money for their charity or their school, or we did one for the school down the street and
they raised a lot of money. They were thrilled. They were thrilled the relatively small nonprofit and they were just a static over it, you know. And it wasn't even millions of dollars. It was a fair amount of money for that school and it meant a lot to them. And it's like, you're actually putting your ideas and your actions where you're I mean, you're putting your actions where
your ideas are and where your values. And comedies allowed me to do that, whether it's the jokes or off stage or in the service of the performance for something other than yourself purely.
Well, Jimmy Tingle, leading by example literally and figuratively. I love I love all that you are doing, and I love that you stop by to share that with us, because I think it's important. Your angle on life in general is such a great and unique take that people need to hear more of it.
I think, well, thank you, it's very kind of you. Just say Lynn, I appreciate it.
Thank you, And before you go the real quickly, are there any projects that you're working on besides what we discussed and what's next where people can see you all that fun stuff?
Sure? Well, I have a film out. It's called Jimmy Tingle The Radical Middle Why would a comedian run for office? It's on my website Jimmy Tingle dot com so people can watch that for free, ladies and gentlemen for free. And on my website, I have all my show dates coming up. I'm gonna be a Mortha's Vineyard and Nantucket in August and cartul At Center for the Arts and on the second and shows in September and all for the rest of the year. So Jimmy Tingle dot com.
You can follow me on Instagram at Jimmy Tingle humor get some funny clips up there. I think you'll get a big kick out of But thanks again for having me Lynn, And they can always find me there and sign up on my newsletter and I'll keep you in touch and informed about what we're doing.
Yeah, find out why he got the last name Tingle, That is.
My real name.
That's awesome. Thank you so much for being on a Comiday.
Thank you