Speakeasy with - Bob Saget

Former “Full House” and “America’s Funniest Home Videos” star Bob Saget has reinvented himself in recent years with his stand-up routine and blue humor, most famously captured in the 2005 documentary The Aristocrats, as well as his 2006 direct-to-video comedy Farce of the Penguins. Saget performs Friday, June 27, at the Tabernacle.

How do you sense the audience’s reaction to the paradox of your off-color humor compared with your image from “Full House” and “America’s Funniest Home Videos” now as opposed to a few years ago?

After the two shows ended I started hitting the clubs more, trying to figure out where I lost my funny gene. For me, it was like a 12-year project. I’m always a comedian. It’s the root of what I do and what I want to do. I found out what I thought was funny again and I always kind of talked the way I talk now, but I’m 52 now, when I was 32 hosting those shows, and a guy will change, hopefully. I started not to care as much and do what I thought was funny. Through the whole process audiences thought it was funny, so it’s the longest 15-year overnight transition that an artist can grow through.

But did you feel like you had a novelty with that paradox, that now part of the joke has worn off and the material has to stand on its own and not a previous perception?

Now there is less pressure because it was always the material standing on its own. It was people’s predispositions that made it not funny for them; now it’s more funny for them and there is less scrutiny.

Was your song “Danny Tanner Wasn’t Gay” (a parody of his “Full House” character) a mini-burial? Kind of like, “For the record, I had a lot of fun with this,” but it could be comedy but also a wink and a nod to the audience?

One hundred percent! It’s a mission statement. It’s a comedian’s mission statement and that to me is the joke. My attitude on stage is a guy who is trying to own all his bullshit in a fast-paced way, but, “Yes, I did that and I’m not ashamed of anything.” In fact, I have a large gay following.

How do you think you’ve grown as an artist in general and as a comic in particular in the last couple years? It sounds like you’re embracing each stand-up gig singularly, like, “Hey, this is going to be a great night.”

I truly am. It sounds so cliché, but it’s not. It is so crystal to me, and I don’t mean meth. Every time I hit the stage it’s like a romance taking the microphone. It’s like when Jerry Seinfeld did Comedian, or anybody who loves stand-up does it because they have no choice.

Your father made you laugh?

He made me laugh a lot. He was a really great guy. His funeral was hilarious. In the eulogy my friend Brad says, “Ben died watching Farce of the Penguins, and his last words were, ‘For the love of God, would someone turn this thing off?’” It brought the house down, and that’s how my dad would conduct himself at a funeral. He had an amazing gallows humor. We would laugh at the worst things because life is so painful for people.

To hear a podcast of this interview, click here.