HE’S MR. CLEAN
Kevin James brings back observational humor in standup special ‘Irregardless’
Kevin James’ standup special, “Irregardless,” is a breath of fresh air focusing on observational humor — sans politics or profanity.
The Prime Video special is a nice change of pace in a genre that’s morphed into opinionated takes on topical issues peppered with a barrage of F-bombs that, long ago, lost their ability to shock an audience.
These days, it’s actually more shocking to see a comedian who eschews all of that for a more good-natured approach.
“Very early on when I started doing standup I knew that if I was going to get a spot on ‘The Tonight Show’ or another TV show I had to change my act,” James, 58, told The Post about “Irregardless.”
“I didn’t want to be limited by these things … and I wouldn’t write about politics or current events and I didn’t want to lose my material.
“I wanted to be as universal as possible and not have to edit my act to go on TV,” he said. “It kind of stuck with me that way and [my act] grew into being more family-friendly — it’s sometimes trickier and harder to write that way, but I like it.”
James, of course, doesn’t have to worry about broadcast television-type censorship on Prime Video, but, still, it’s refreshing to see him stick to his observational narrative in “Irregardless,” filmed during his titular 2023 comedy tour.
(James is about to kick off his next comedy tour, “Owls Don’t Walk.”)
In the special, the former “King of Queens ”and“Kevin Can Wait” star covers everyday concerns in a conversational fashion, joking about aging (his doctor, he points out, told him he’s “pre-diabetic” … but why?), fear (“I find things to be afraid of ”); trust; trying to motivate his kids (he refers to them as a “slug farm”); punishment (back in his day it was “the belt”; now it’s a “time-in”); and his childhood, drinking water out of the backyard hose from rusty spigots to “suck all the asbestos and lead out of the house.” “Irregardless” runs a bit over one hour and James is rarely static onstage; he’s a constant flurry of movement and physicality.
“We’re actually shooting a documentary right now about getting in shape,” he said. “I have a couple of projects coming up; one is an action-comedy that I have to be in shape for and the other was a movie I already shot … but I fell out of shape and we had to do some reshoots.
“The documentary is me trying to get back to that place again and see if I can stay there consistently … or if it’s too late and I’m just going to be [98-year-old] Dick Van Dyke for the rest of my life — who, by the way, is in better shape than me.” James works on writing his act before going out on tour, testing out new material. “I add it into little spots and see if it goes then. I’ll do the new stuff in a show and always have a fallback if it’s not going well; I can get out of it and the audience won’t know but I’ll know.
“My favorite time ‘writing’ is when I’m actually up there with an audience because that’s what it’s going to be.”
There has been talk of rekindling “The King of Queens,” which aired on CBS for nine seasons (1998-2007) with James as Rego Park UPS worker Doug Heffernan; Leah Remini as his wife, Carrie; and Jerry Stiller, who played Doug’s oddball father-in-law, Arthur Spooner.
James is ambivalent about that scenario.
“They were asking me about ‘The King of Queens’ and I don’t think that’s possible because a third of that big core cast is gone, and Jerry Stiller was such an amazing part of that show.
“To me, it would be hard to do it without him and I don’t know how that would work,” he said.
“It can work — they did it with ‘Frasier’ [on Paramount+] … but it depends on the show and the story and if there’s more to tell or if you’re just getting back together to get back together,” he said. “It’s tough to recapture that nostalgia, it really is.
“[‘The King of Queens’] was a moment in time and that was just so great and I miss it and loved it — but it might be hard to get that back again.”