Demetri Martin carries with him a notebook, filled with blank pages, no lines. In it, the comedian writes jokes, composes drawings, or jots down film ideas and dialog. The more ideas the better.
“Whether you tour or not, you need new material,” said Demetri during a phone interview last month from his home in Santa Monica, Calif. “It’s like I’m using it up. The answer is always to write more.”
| Onstage |
| Demetri Martin |
| Where: Warner Theatre, 513 13th St. NW |
| When: 8 p.m. Friday |
| Info: $35; warnertheatredc.com; for a chance to win backstage passes, visit demetrimartin.com |
And recently, Martin has had to write plenty. He’s on his first substantial standup tour since 2006.
Martin brings his combination of jokes, music and drawing to the Warner Theatre on Friday. He recently wrapped up a handful of shows in Canada, and is now hitting a number of dates in the States. All of this is in preparation for a live comedy special to be recorded at the tour’s final stop in New York on Feb. 18.
“To get ready for it, I needed to do a bunch of shows before it,” Martin, 38, explained. “I wanted to do a lot of shows to get ready for that special, write a lot of new jokes, fix some of my old jokes.”
Martin has kept busy away from the standup circuit. He’s appeared in a handful of films (“Taking Woodstock,” “Contagion”); contributed to “The Daily Show;” had his own series on Comedy Central; is working on a book; and may have an animated series in development.
“It kept me out of the regular tour rotation,” Martin said. “Standup is the thing I’ve been doing the longest in showbiz, so I’d say it’s the thing I’m most comfortable with. The degree of freedom and control you have with standup is unmatched. There isn’t really anything else like that for a performer.”
Martin grew up in New Jersey and attended the NYU School of Law before dropping out to pursue comedy. For him, the decision to abandon an NYU law degree and forgo a legal career was only half of it.
“I think the harder thing was figuring out what it is I wanted to do with my life, when I first got to law school and didn’t like law school,” Martin said. “That part was hard. Once I realized I wanted to do comedy, then it wasn’t that hard. Then it was dealing with people’s disapproval and disappointment, and that was not as hard as I thought it would be. I guess I didn’t care that much about other people’s opinion regarding my life or my state, because they’re not me.”
“I’m the one who’s stuck with me,” he added. “No one else really is. You’re going to have to deal with me the way I do.”
