{"id":3813,"date":"2017-06-08T12:40:42","date_gmt":"2017-06-08T17:40:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/?p=3813"},"modified":"2018-08-20T14:33:58","modified_gmt":"2018-08-20T19:33:58","slug":"brooks-wheelan-midwest-comedy-day-jobs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thebozho.com\/brooks-wheelan-midwest-comedy-day-jobs\/","title":{"rendered":"Brooks Wheelan on Midwestern comedy and the universal truths of day jobs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>To be familiar with Brooks Wheelan, even in passing, is to know him like an old friend. Whether it\u2019s from his time on <em>Saturday Night Live<\/em> or his hilarious stand-up, the lanky Iowan\u2019s jokes can sprawl out into fantastical stories, often about his former day job as biomedical engineer (yeah, the guy\u2019s a real dummy).<\/p>\n<p>In 2014, Wheelan recorded\u00a0his debut album, <em>This is Cool, Right?<\/em>, here in Madison\u00a0at The Comedy Club on State. &#8220;It&#8217;s my favorite comedy club in America,&#8221; he says. &#8220;If I was going to do an album, I wanted to pick the place where I\u2019ve had my favorite sets.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He returns to the venue tonight to begin <a href=\"https:\/\/www.madisoncomedy.com\/show.php?nextshow=2017-06-08\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">a\u00a0three-night run<\/a>, and\u00a0<em>The Bozho<\/em> caught up with him\u00a0ahead of the visit to talk comedy in the Midwest, the universal truths of day jobs, and Anthony Kiedis\u2019 nonsense lyrics.<\/p>\n<p><strong>You started dabbling with comedy when you were still living in Iowa. Did you ever make the drive up here when you were just starting out?<\/strong><br \/>\nNever to Madison, no. I went to Chicago a lot. I spent a lot of weekends in Chicago. I spent a summer there, I spent one in Kansas City, [and] I would go to Minneapolis. I wasn\u2019t aware back in 2005 of the comedy scene in Madison, otherwise I for sure would have been there.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The growth of the comedy scene here was kind of sudden. It seemed like one day it wasn\u2019t there, and the next it kind of exploded.<\/strong><br \/>\nYeah, there is a scene there now, and it\u2019s great. And I attribute that to The Comedy Club on State. They bring in great comedy and that inspires people to want to do comedy throughout the city and state.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"689\" height=\"388\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/QxrJJYMq3XE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>A lot of people are going to know you from the season you spent on &#8220;Saturday Night Live.&#8221; What\u2019s the day-to-day experience of being a featured player on the show?<\/strong><br \/>\nIt\u2019s the same as the day-to-day of everything. You just work your butt off. You write all week and you hope you get on. Sometimes you do and sometimes you don\u2019t. It\u2019s long hours and stressful, and you never know if you\u2019re going to be on the show, sometimes literally until the last second.<\/p>\n<p><strong>How did your stand-up crowds change after you left SNL?<\/strong><br \/>\nOh, I got to headline. It was great! [<em>Laughs.<\/em>]\u00a0Before that I wasn\u2019t headlining. I was still a biomedical engineer for money. That was my day job. After <em>SNL<\/em>, I got to become a full-time stand-up comedian, and people knew who I was when they came out to see me. It was great.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Have you ever tried to find a way to combine comedy and science?<\/strong><br \/>\nYeah, I used to do a podcast called <em>Probably Science<\/em>, which was a science-based podcast that was funny. I ended up leaving that to go do <em>SNL<\/em>, but they\u2019re still doing it. So that\u2019s the only time I\u2019ve ever incorporated the two of them. Other than that, it\u2019s kind of tough to do, like, scientist jokes. [<em>Laughs.<\/em>]\n<p><strong>Is science just inherently dry and unfunny, or is there a way to take elements of science and find the humor in it?<\/strong><br \/>\nI think there are just universal truths to day jobs. I talk a lot about my day job on my album. Even if you\u2019re a scientist, you go to work with other people and adhere to certain formalities of what is an office job. So it\u2019s not really that specific to science. I don\u2019t talk a lot about the aortic valve.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Your description of the Red Hot Chili Peppers <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hulu.com\/watch\/544701\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>as sounding like \u201cbing bong da-ding dong\u201d<\/strong><\/a><strong> has become my go-to way to talk about the band.<\/strong><br \/>\nYeah, I loved them until I smoked weed, and then I listened to the lyrics. I was like, \u201cWhat is this guy talking about?\u201d They\u2019re a great band and everything, but then he\u2019s just like \u201cbada bing dong dong!\u201d It\u2019s like, okay, he\u2019s just being a vocal instrument now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>To be familiar with Brooks Wheelan, even in passing, is to know him like an old friend. 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