Comedian talks about the upside of ‘Crashing’
Pete Holmes, creator and star of the HBO series, discusses his nostalgia for the days when his career was going nowhere.
On his quasiautobiographical HBO series “Crashing,” comedian Pete Holmes plays an earlier, less savvy version of himself as he tries to make it as a standup in New York.
The true story, though, is that Holmes came to Chicago first. And it was here that he became friends with a group of stand-ups who, like Holmes, would go on to bigger things, including T.J. Miller and Kumail Nanjiani.
Miller shows up in an episode of “Crashing” (as himself ), and he talks about longing for the old days: “You’re open-mic’ing, it’s like a party. Comedy every single night. You’re meeting people you want to hang out with every week. Those are your friends. Then as you get more successful, you start having to do all of it alone. When I bomb, there’s no, like, shots afterward with all your friends. It’s very lonely.”
I talked about some of that wistfulness with Holmes, who was back in town recently.
At 22, the day after he got married, he and his wife packed up their car and moved from Boston to Chicago. “Literally my honeymoon was driving to Chicago,” he said.
I must have looked surprised. “Yeah. Romantic. But the reason we picked our wedding date was because, I got married on a Sunday and I was starting class at iO on Friday. So we had four days to get to Chicago. And you can see right away, this is what ‘Crashing’ is about — about a guy who loves comedy more than, well more than anything, really.”
More than his wife, I asked? Because on the show (and in real life), his wife leaves him. “For sure,” Holmes said.
On “Crashing,” like in person, he is also exceedingly polite. Homeless and jobless as well. Each week, he bounces from one couch to the next, relying on the kindness of his fellow comedians.
Is there really a nostalgia for those days when you were struggling and not making any money and your career was going nowhere?
Oh my God, yeah! It’s the best! That’s what “Crashing” is about!
But it probably didn’t feel like the best when you were living it.
No! But that’s what life is about. You go through something like that, and then you get to a place — whatever success looks like, it doesn’t have to be fame and fortune — and you can look back and pine for that. But at the time, we did have some awareness that, this sucks, but one day we’ll look back and be like, “Remember that?”
On “Crashing,” it seems like T.J. is basically saying, “This sucks now.”
That’s why Val is with me, she always tours with me.
And she is what — what’s her title?
My fiancee. (We both laugh.) I’m so happy she has a title! “She’s my fiancee!” But I also bring the same opener with me, and it’s to combat that isolation. Steve Martin in (his book) “Born Standing Up” says the reason he quit doing stand-up was because it was so lonely. And he even says, “I don’t know why I didn’t bring friends with me,” and I’m like, “Me neither! I wish you had found a way!”
Q: Did you tell your exwife that the show was going to portray your marriage to her? (On the show, she is played by Lauren Lapkus.)
No. I haven’t talked to her in over a decade. So (smiles knowingly) that’s a weird one.
Wait, so it’s possible she’s watching this — or her family or your mutual friends from back then — and they’re probably thinking, “What?”
Yeah, that is a surreal thing. I wonder about it all the time. But I really think she would like it, because the show is a reflection on everything I learned about my part in the divorce. I thought divorce was for people that threw plates at each other and I’d have to be an alcoholic or having affairs. But the truth is, sometimes a very sweet, well-meaning person just doesn’t do it for you, and you need to get out of there. And I tried to make that very clear.
So if I made a revenge piece, something that was ill-willed toward her, I maybe would have tried to — I don’t know, would you warn in that case or just deal with it? And not to make myself sound like such a great guy, but we could have done something where it was so heavily biased toward my opinion and really try to make a smear campaign. And we didn’t!
My fantasy is that she sees it and likes it. But it’s not her. Please make that clear, we don’t want to be sued! We were very careful to make the character different — he said as he gritted his teeth and started crying.