When I first interviewed Demetri Martin four years ago at Montreal's Just For Laughs fest, he was entering his 10th year in standup comedy and had just taken a meeting with Steven Spielberg over a script he was writing.
Other stuff he'd written was being "optioned." The movies beckoned, and that, it seemed, was where his future was finally heading.
"I never really aimed at having a TV show or doing sketch comedy so much, so that was more of a surprise," Martin says in retrospect, on the heels of his second and probably last season of Comedy Central/Comedy Network series Important Things With Demetri Martin.
The ex-Conan O'Brien writer and Daily Show With Jon Stewart contributor "did a standup special not long after we spoke. And the ratings were high enough that Comedy Central was, like, 'I guess we should talk to this guy about a pilot for some kind of series.'
"So I went back to think of a structure. All my jokes are about things, looking at an object or sitting in a waiting room or an airport and just looking. I could pick a thing and do 20 minutes on it, I could do scenework that explores points about that thing, jokes, visuals, and then music. It all came together that way."
Example of the free-associative comedy Martin will offer up as host of the second of Thursday's two Just For Laughs Toronto galas at Massey Hall: "I wrapped my Christmas presents early this year, but I used the wrong paper. See, the paper I used said 'Happy Birthday' on it. I didn't want to waste it so I just wrote 'Jesus' on it."
He was on O'Brien's staff when that show made its much-hyped visit to Toronto for a week of tapings. He wrote the sketch in which a guy dressed as the CN Tower fought a guy dressed as the Seattle Space Needle.
"It was the best environment," the former law-school student says. "Mike Sweeney -- who was head writer and probably will be on (Conan's) new show -- he and Conan created an environment where you could say the stupidest, most out-there thing."
Never a left-brained person, hosting and producing Important Things apparently built up the "details" part of Martin's brain.
"Every episode had 15 or 20 different little pieces that had to be produced, that needed locations, time to be shot, edited, pre-produced, cast. By accident, it taught me way more about production than I ever wanted to know. Not just daydreaming like I usually do and writing and coming up with stuff. It was, 'How do I actually execute these things? How do things get made?' "
And the movies? You can't blame Martin for feeling a little snakebit. A year ago, he was cast opposite Brad Pitt in the Steven Soderbergh movie Moneyball -- about Oakland A's manager Billy Beane and his scheme to field winning teams cheaply. The movie was scrapped on its first day of production for, ahem, exceeding its budget.
"It was so cool. I cut my hair, did all these costume changes, and I came home and the next day I woke up ready to go. And my agent called up and said, 'Hey buddy, this is crazy, you're not gonna believe this, but they told me they pulled the plug on the movie.'
"Brad Pitt was really nice and Soderbergh was great, a smart guy and really creative. But Bennett Miller (Capote) is the director now, and Jonah Hill now has my part. Brad Pitt's still in it," Martin says about the movie, which is slated to start filming next month.
"I got this book due in September, a book of essays and writing and stuff. And then, hopefully I can just write a small movie I can control as much as possible, so I can get the role I wrote for myself."
jim.slotek@sunmedia.ca
