[From the Ithaca Times] Jerry Stiller is the consummate comedian — he’s dedicated his life to iconic roles, from Frank Costanza in Seinfeld to one-half of the dynamic comedy team Stiller & Meara, the other half being his wife of more than 50 years. Although he’s a seasoned pro on the stage, the silver screen and on TV, it wasn’t until quite recently that Stiller, now 81, attempted the challenges of stand-up comedy.
Recently, Stiller spoke in front of a packed house at Cornell’s Statler Auditorium. Brought by Cornell Hillel, Stiller shone as an authentic storyteller — revealing personal anecdotes about his upbringing, meeting his wife, fellow comic Ann Meara, and struggling in Hollywood. Throughout, he remained keenly observant and, of course, very funny. Thanks to starring roles in sitcoms like Seinfeld and The King of Queens and, most recently, movie roles in Zoolander, Heavyweights, and Hairspray, Stiller has made his undeniable mark in pop culture history.
Ithaca Times: You’ve done film, television, theater — is there anything you felt like you haven’t done that you would like to do?
Jerry Stiller: Tonight. Tonight, I did what I wanted to do. I’ve always wanted to stand up in front of a crowd of people who were willing to listen to me and tell me whether my life was worth anything as an actor. I’ve been in plays, movies and all that, but this is something that’s always been in my mind, that I wanted to be up there as a stand up comedian, which I was never able to do. And when I stopped working on these television shows I had the opportunity to start to put my life together for people and see how they respond — and they liked it!
IT: So this has been a pretty recent development in your career.
Stiller: Right. I’ve been touring around the country, wherever I can. I’m very lucky. I started to craft the stories in such a way that they became more than just little sound bits. But at one point in time, I was not counting on it. I’m going to be very honest about it — with these things, I wasn’t ready for the critical telescope that would put me in that position, so I’m doing it slowly.
IT: This time around, you had a special guest who joined you…
Stiller: Luckily, I had my daughter with me. I asked her to come in from Hollywood, so she flew in on the red eye flight. Usually my wife hangs out in the audience, and even though I do my own stuff, she’s always interrupting. People love it, she heckles me and reminds me of my own life and it becomes part of the evening. And when she comes up and joins me, it gives me a lot of insight into what I can do.
IT: Have you always considered yourself a storyteller?
Stiller: Well, my wife says, “You go on long too long! People can bore the hell out of you with their stories.” And she always says, “It’s always about you.” (Laughs) Well, yes, it’s about me, of course, and if people want to hear it, then fine. But I don’t think I was always a storyteller. It was something that I started to develop when I would go to parties, and I would find myself being alone. People wanted to be with the most famous people, with stars or celebrities, and I would be off in the corner. And I think to myself, “Why isn’t anyone talking to me?” Well, if you want to be at a party, you have to say something interesting. So I started putting pieces the together. And then something very interesting happened. After about 15 years of writing stuff down, I got on Seinfeld, and suddenly everyone knew the name of Frank Constanza. I called up a friend of mine who was teaching at Columbia, and she read my stories and thought they were wonderful. She got them to Simon and Schuster, who got it published. All of those things burst loose, like a success story. So I thought, why not go out and talk about those stories to an audience?
IT: What does comedy mean to you?
Stiller: Well, what is ‘funny’? When I shoot a scene with other people, I never know what is funny, and that’s a rule that I have internally. Not that I make up any rules, but I know that something could be funny on the way to being funny. What can happen on the way to the punchline? At one point I learned as an actor — and it took a long time — to allow whatever was taking place inside you to come out in some way. Almost like a flower — well, maybe I’m not a flower — but something that blooms, or happens in stages. So as an actor, I don’t necessarily know what is funny until I see it on the screen in the film, or when I hear a laugh from the audience. It took a lot of courage to do that, because in this business that we’re in, where timing is everything, people write scripts with a rhythm to it, and you have to get to the joke. But I refuse to go that way, and it worked out. It kept me alive.
