DEADPAN ALLEY : Football Fan Kathleen Madigan Scores With a Subtle Style She Calls ‘Sarcasm Light’

Kathleen Madigan is a low-key, engaging comedian. Her subtle style relies on imagery and substance. She is not a high-energy stage stalker. So it came as a surprise when the St. Louis native talked about how she spends her Sundays: glued to the TV set, thoroughly enjoying one of America’s more violent pastimes.

“Football is my favorite sport,” she explained earlier this week from her rented Hermosa Beach home. “I like hockey, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to see a game, especially out here. I’m not a Kings fan. My dad and brothers all watched sports (when I was) a kid. I talk about sports in my act. I could sit on Sunday from 10 a.m. and watch football until the last game is over on TNT, watching full-grown men beat the hell out of each other.”

Madigan, who plays the Irvine Improv through Oct. 2, remembers her mother’s disapproving tone when she asked if her daughter would be perched there all day.

“No, Mom. I’m going to go get a Coke at halftime and come right back,” the younger Madigan replied.

Her fascination with the game has extended beyond passive viewing. She was in a fantasy football league last season, but didn’t have the time for it this year. So for now she’s content with making a wager or two on the games.

Her sister’s Nevada marriage a couple of weeks ago was a godsend.

“I was in Vegas trying to pick all that stuff. It was perfect because (the wedding) only took six minutes out of my gambling time,” said the comic, who has been on “The Tonight Show” an impressive three times since debuting with Jay Leno in May, 1993.

It was another surprise to find out that Madigan has moved West, especially after spending a good portion of her career saying, roughly, that for all she cared, L.A. and its incumbent traffic and congestion could break off and sink into the ocean.

“I’ve done most of the TV stuff,” she said, referring to credits that include “An Evening at the Improv,” “Bob Hope’s Ladies of Laughter,” a commercial for the US West telephone company and the HBO special “Women of the Night III.”

“If you want to do more than that, it’s nice if you’re out here. I put it off as long as I could. Actually, this area is real nice, if you don’t have to leave. I can walk to the bank. I can walk to the beach. But sooner or later, you have to go into the big city.”

The woman with the Midwestern roots is not, however, ready to fully commit.

“I don’t think you could talk me into buying out here. Maybe if I had a million dollars that I could just let go of and didn’t care. Even if I were a normal person, I don’t think I’d buy something. But I bet you could get O. J.’s house real cheap.”

This, she said, points out another way the coast is amazingly different than the Midwest. She was surprised to find that celebrities out here have homes on the street and that not all of them live in mansions nestled high atop the hills.

“I probably drove past (O. J’s) a million times and didn’t even know it. In Chicago or St. Louis, (big stars) have huge palatial estates that are far out. They are not mixed in with everyone else.”

Just having a home is a concession for Madigan, 28, who until moving here kept her room at her parents’ house in St. Louis, figuring it would be a waste to set up housekeeping when she’s on the road 75% of the time, mainly headlining at clubs, with an occasional corporate gig thrown in. College bookings, though, she prefers to leave to others.

“The money is inviting. It’s like Satan calling you. But I just have a problem entertaining 18-year-olds. I prefer to work a week of clubs.

“It’s hard to work on your act,” she explained, referring to the campus promoters and audiences who expect an hour of well-tested material. “It’s hard to keep their attention. I’m sure No. 1 is Carrot Top. They enjoy him. They make me a nervous. . . . Teen-agers, I’m sure, are very nice people as individuals, but as a group. . . .”

The college circuit today, she contends, is not the same one that Woody Allen and others worked 20 or 30 years ago.

“If you don’t start doing what they want, you’ll eat it every night. What they want are things they can relate to, which could exclude people over 30.”

Though Madigan’s style (“sarcasm light,” she calls it) isn’t tailored to the college crowd, it hits home with just about everyone else. It’s clever. It’s about life. It’s challenging. She’s been nominated three times as best female club comic in the American Comedy Awards.

Her quick trip to the top was not a calculated move. She earned a journalism degree from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville and went to work for an athletic club’s in-house magazine.

“My whole career has kind of been an accident,” said Madigan, the fourth of seven kids. “I never really thought about it, to tell the truth. I had friends at the Funny Bone in St. Louis and had been in there enough to see what open mike was like. One night a guy and I did it on a dare. I just kept doing it for fun. Then, once they paid me, I figured, ‘That was easy.’ I kept my day job for a year and half, then quit.”

She has been doing stand-up for about six years and, as her move to Hermosa Beach indicates, she’s making a more concerted effort to tap into Hollywood. Exactly what she wants to do hasn’t crystallized yet, but she knows she’s going to be careful. She doesn’t want to take a sitcom that might bomb, sending her back to the clubs to prepare another time-consuming run at the brass ring.

“I’m wide open,” she admitted. “I don’t think I could be a 9-to-5 comedy writer. How many fat jokes can I write? Maybe five to 10 years from now. At times, the road gets a little chaotic. The mail is chaotic. Where I’m going to be is chaotic. Which is fine for me right now. I’ll be the first one to know when I snap.”

And just in case the right role comes along, Madigan is putting the foundation in place--which means acting lessons. But she’s realistic about her thespian potential.

“I’m just trying to at least get the basics down. I’m not going to be Meryl Streep or anything. I won’t be playing a Polish immigrant.”

Kathleen Madigan discusses:

* Her father on education: “He wouldn’t pay for our college, and then he would say, ‘College--these are the best years of your life.’ And I’m thinking, ‘Oh yeah, right, Dad--three jobs, junk car, no money. Pinch me, I’m dreaming.’ ”

* Her bowling career: “I was drunk and needed shoes. I’ll give bowlers credit. I think they’re steroid-free.”

* Motherhood: “I get those maternal feelings, like when I’m lying down on the couch and I can’t reach the remote control.”

Who: Kathleen Madigan.

When: Through Sunday, Oct. 2, except Monday, Sept. 26. At 8:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays, 8:30 and 10:30 on Fridays, 8 and 10:30 on Saturdays and 8 on Sundays.

Where: The Improv, 4255 Campus Drive, Irvine.

Whereabouts: Take the San Diego (405) Freeway to the Jamboree Road exit and head south. Turn left onto Campus Drive. The Improv is in the Irvine Marketplace shopping center, across from the UC Irvine campus.

Wherewithal: $7 to $10.

Where to call: (714) 854-5455.