Seriously funny

By PATT MORRISON

June 6, 2009 12 AM PT

A little deep Googling reveals that a sizable hunk of what I’ve laughed at in American humor over the last 30 years bears the mark of Harry Shearer: On TV, “Saturday Night Live” and a dozen or so character voices on “The Simpsons.” On radio, “The Jack Benny Program” (before my time but just thinking of Benny makes me smile) and “Le Show.” On the big screen, “This Is Spinal Tap” and “Teddy Bears’ Picnic.” My seat was next to his at the O.J. Simpson civil trial, where he mined a much more comedic seam than I did. And for a time, we took turns on the columnists’ page in the L.A. Times Magazine. So I can say that I know Harry Shearer, a bit. Harry Shearer is an acquaintance of mine. And I’m no Harry Shearer. But I don’t have to be. He does it for us all.

The Simpsons are on a stamp -- a stamp! George Washington is on a stamp. And Elvis. Is this right?

You had me with George Washington, but when you opened the door to Elvis, I thought, yeah, we can walk right in there.

You’re touring for the 25th anniversary of “This Is Spinal Tap.” How difficult is parody when Mick Jagger and Paul McCartney are old enough for pensions and still performing?

We were rehearsing for the tour in L.A., and in the next studio, rehearsing for Coachella, was Paul McCartney, who came by and said, “Give us a tune, lads.” Then we went over to watch him, and he didn’t look like he’s on Social Security when he’s got a guitar. But yeah, it’s amazing that this thing has prevailed against all the then-conventional wisdom of Hollywood and the dedicated efforts of the company that released the film to suppress it.

Spinal Tap performs in London this month. Why is it that the British just seem funnier than Americans?

You hear any Brit talk and you realize they certainly do talk better than we do. So comedy that depends for part of its punch on what’s funny about words has more appeal to them than it does here, where words -- as recently as [for] our most recent president -- tend to scare Americans. There’s certainly been loud, non-dry British comedy. But they’re able to sustain this other kind of comedy too -- verbal and underplayed. In this country, the showbiz establishment thinks that if you like the broad stuff, you can’t possibly like the dry stuff, and I don’t think that’s true.

You work in virtually every entertainment medium. So why do you love radio so much?

Because I don’t do stand-up, radio has always been my equivalent, a place to stay in connection with the public and force myself to write every week and come up with new characters. Plus it’s a medium that -- having grown up with it and putting myself to sleep with a radio under my pillow [as a kid] -- I love. No matter what picture you want to create in the listener’s mind, a few minutes of work gets it done.

Is there any medium you don’t do?

I’ve never done an ice show. They did “Simpsons on Ice” one year, but I wasn’t part of that. I think my agent doesn’t have very good contacts in the ice community.

In 1953, you had small roles in “Abbott and Costello Go to Mars” and the biblical epic “The Robe.” Why choose comedy over drama?

Partly it was just starting to work for Jack Benny [on radio] as my first experience in show business -- and then partly it was that stunning moment when I first made Jack Benny laugh.

I made Carl Reiner laugh once.

See? It’s very powerful. What lures certain kinds of people into comedy is when you realize that you can take what in childhood can be a very unpleasant experience of people laughing at you and assert control over it. It’s fun, but there’s a deeper level to it.

“Le Show” airs just about everywhere except Washington, Boston and New York City.

It tells you all you need to know about the Eastern Seaboard and [its] presumed hipness and cosmopolitan nature. New York is the world capital of “It can’t be good if it ain’t from here.” The program was on in Washington for nine weeks and was canceled on Sept. 10, 2001. A conspiracy theorist would have a ball with that.

You’re an L.A. native, but your heart is in New Orleans.

I will always have a home in Southern California, but I’ve really adopted and been adopted by New Orleans. You could take away the fabulous food culture and music culture and the ridiculous richness of architectural heritage and it would still be mesmerizing because of the way the people are. For somebody who grew up in L.A., the most individualistic of cities, New Orleans is the polar opposite, the most tightly knit community masquerading as a city that I’ve ever been in. [After Hurricane Katrina] I read about some of the exiles in Atlanta, and one said, “I just want to go back home. People aren’t nice here.” And I knew what she meant. New Orleans people are engaged in this nonstop conversation.

There’s a lot of Harry Shearer out there on the Internet. Where do you come down on Internet copyright and piracy matters?

I have a leg in both camps -- I’m a copyright owner, and I’m also an avid user of these things. Don’t go suing me, record company. One of my experiences with Napster was looking for the original version of “This Wheel’s on Fire.” I tried record stores and online, all the legitimate things. I turned to Napster, and there were 12 copies. Napster was probably a threat to the continued revenue flow of record companies. But when you hear record companies talk about artists’ rights, the only appropriate response is a loud, rude guffaw, because these people wouldn’t recognize artists’ rights if they swallowed them, and they do.

You’re a Greek chorus of voices on “The Simpsons,” you’re Spinal Tap and “Le Show” -- what are you doing with all your free time?

Two dream projects. [To get] “J. Edgar!” the musical comedy about J. Edgar Hoover onto the legitimate stage or have it adapted as a film. And I’m working on a Nixon project. Nixon is in danger of become a caricature that’s devoid of all of his Nixon-ness -- sort of a standard-issue movie villain. There are more tapes that are a lot more revealing about Nixon. I’ve wanted to do a project on Nixon as the funniest person in American history.

patt.morrison@latimes.com.

This interview was edited and excerpted from taped and written transcripts.

An archive of Morrison’s interviews is online at latimes.com/pattasks.