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Delta Living caught up with comedian Johnny Steele to have a heart-to-heart
to see just what this local funny guy has been up to lately. Born and raised in
Pittsburg, CA, his friends and family knew him as Johnny Lopez, but he gave
himself the stage name of ‘Steele’ in honor of the local steel company. His
career in stand-up began in 1984, after quitting graduate school, what he
says his parents dubbed, “
Operation $40K Down The Drain
.” Since then, he’s
been poking satirical fun at corporate stupidity and human nature in clubs and
colleges across the U.S. and abroad, on radio when he hosted the Live 105
Morning Show, and on TV with co-host Susan Blake on KRON/Bay TV from 1999 to
2001. He’s lived in Pittsburg, San Francisco, and the last 13 years in Berkeley with
his wife Allison.
A sit down with funny guy
Johnny Steele
by Charleen Earley
What’s on your plate or in the mix for
the near future?
“
I’m trying to apply
some business sense to my career for
a change. Go figure. I have a business
manager who’s trying to guide me.
You can’t just do stand up and then
hop in your car and go home. Even if
you destroyed, killed that night, you just
won’t get anywhere. You need to master
the new social media - record podcasts,
produce some funny videos, tweet, and
post all this stuff on Facebook and your
website. I’m exhausted by the time the
weekend comes and I finally get to the
comedy stage.
We’re (with my business manager,
Jim Mogavero) also producing some
demonstration reels for TV shows. These
are little 4-5 minute samples of what our
show might look like. I’ve got a travel
show, an interview show, a sit-com. I
should have the demo reels up on my
website soon, including one with Carlos
Alazraqui of Reno 911. When they are
finished, we’ll pitch them to networks
and cable channels and hope they
don’t slam the door in our faces.
I’m also cutting my first CD. I know,
25 years in the biz and still no CD.
Most comics just record a comedy
performance and then sell it. Smart. Not
me, of course. I have to do it the hard
way. My CD is more like, say, Monty
Python in structure. It’ll have stand up
segments, but they’ll be sandwiched in
between skits and other silly nonsense.
A great idea but something like this
takes writing, recording, editing, re-
editing. It takes, basically, forever.”
Tell me about comedy trends. Is
comedy cyclical?
“
A few years ago
comedy was mostly done by white,
heterosexual men. That’s changed
dramatically. Gay comedy, ethnic
comedy, women, that’s all big now.
I was performing in LA recently and
the shows at the club that week were
all urban (Black) or Latino or Asian. Talk
about specific, one show featured just
women from the East Coast. There’s
an atheist group, there’s a diverse
religious group called the CoExist
Comedy Tour. You name it, there’s
somebody doing it.
Ethnic comedy is big now because
the nation’s demographics are
changing. But more than anything,
it’s all about niche. Whether it’s The
Blue Collar Comedy guys or, on the
complete other end of the spectrum,
Bill Maher, it’s all about having a
distinct style and POV (point of view).
That’s always been the case, but it’s
more important now than ever. Fewer
people want to just see ‘comedy.’
They want to see something that
speaks specifically to them.”
What type of venues do you prefer to
work and why?
“
I prefer mostly theaters,
coffeehouses, small nightclubs, and other
alternative venues. My natural sense of
humor is a tad irreverent and my POV
somewhat iconoclastic. But I never know
where I’m going to find that audience.
I’ve worked smack in the middle of a
town where I thought I didn’t have a
single fan. But I’m doing a fundraiser for,
say, a theater or a group trying to save a
river, and my people show up and I kill.
But I can work nearly any kind of
room darn near anywhere. I’ve done
everything from retirement communities
like Trilogy to corporate gigs, fundraisers,
even prisons. I tailor my performance
a little for each different group. For
example, folks in the burbs don’t really
get jokes about riding mass transit.
But when I’m totally unleashed, when I
can say and do anything that comes to
mind, when the folks are there to see me
(not just ‘comedy’) and they know what I
do, when the room is tight and cozy, the
light just right, the sound perfect, that’s
when I’m at my best.”
Do you teach comedy classes? If so,
does one actually teach comedy, or
enhance the skills one has already?
“
People say you can’t make somebody
funny who isn’t funny. I think anybody
can be funny. Take Bob Newhart for
example. He was an accountant. He
Comedy-wise, what have you been up to lately?
“Mostly trying
to rethink the way I do everything. It’s taken me 25 odd years
to learn that ‘show business’ is all about the ‘business.’ Being
funny is important, but not nearly as important as having a plan-
Which I never had. I think I’m funnier, more confident and more
powerful on stage than ever before. But my career is lagging
because I forgot to have a plan. Duh. “