David Koechner
by Daniel Robert Epstein for SuicideGirls (http://suicidegirls.com/)

Second City alumnus David Koechner has been bubbling under the comedy surface for the past few years with fantastic supporting roles in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, the US version of The Office and an amazing role as religious man who recreates the manger scene in an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm. But 2007 is shaping up to be Koechner’s best year yet. He is starring in The Comebacks in his first lead role and Comedy Central is bringing his long running stage show The Naked Trucker & T-Bones Show to television. The Naked Trucker & T-Bones Show was co-created by Koechner with Dave "Gruber" Allen. Koechner plays the backwards backwoods T-Bones, who hosts a show with The Naked Trucker. They regale the live audience with stories while introducing hysterical short films. I got a chance to talk with the fecund Koechner on one of his rare breaks.

Check out the website for The Naked Trucker & T-Bones Show

Daniel Robert Epstein: What are you up to today?

David Koechner: Today I’m doing press. I just wrapped a picture called The Comebacks on December 6th then I had time off. I’ve got a wife and four kids so there’s not real time off. It’s time off from business I guess but that always catches up to you as well.

DRE: The Comebacks was your first lead role in a movie.

DK: First lead for the right hander. I had a great time and apparently the studio likes it, so all is good.

DRE: How many episodes of The Naked Trucker did you guys shoot?

DK: We have eight.

DRE: When do you find out if they pick you up?

DK: We have to wait to see how it does. They don’t have to pull the trigger very fast. I’m hoping they will because otherwise you don’t know what you’re really doing that year. Like anybody, I’m just in search of another job. What I’m thinking is, if we get great numbers before four shows, maybe they’ll say “Hey, let’s go ahead and do more.” But who knows, they could let the whole season run out and then make a decision.

DRE: Comedy Central can move slow sometimes.

DK: You’re right. You’re right.

DRE: I loved the opening of Naked Trucker.

DK: Yeah, it’s cool. I’m very happy with that. We had done a template opening for this pilot presentation so a lot of those ideas from that were transferred over. We had a company called King and Country do all the imaging.

DRE: Is that the real story of how The Trucker and T-Bones met close enough?

DK: Yes. That’s the legend of how they met, no question.

DRE: I know that you guy’s have been doing the live stage show for a long time. Is the stage show the same format with short films in between stage stuff?

DK: The live show is stories and songs for an hour and a half. I guess the difference with the TV show would be that we get to see the stories. Also there are more built in, what I call stage pieces, which we don’t necessarily have in the live show.

DRE: Did you and Gruber come up with those characters through improv?

DK: Well, we came up with the show improvisationally but we both had been doing these characters separately for a number of years before we even met. We met when he was a guest writer on Saturday Night Live for two weeks during the one season I was there. Then he and I did an independent picture together that summer called Dill Scallion. We struck up a friendship there and he said, “Hey man, why don’t you come and do your T-Bones character with my Naked Trucker Show?” I did, it worked so it stuck. The chemistry was there. It was one of those things where they’re stronger together than they were separately. So we’ve been doing it ever since.

DRE: That doesn’t really happen anymore where do people are doing characters then they bring them together. It happened with Laurel and Hardy and people like that.

DK: Exactly. It’s been a real satisfying treat.

DRE: Was T-Bones always the way he is?

DK: Oh yeah. He hasn’t changed much. I’ve learned more about him as the years have gone along but he’s pretty much the same guy as when he started.

DRE: Is he like anyone that you knew?

DK: I’ve put his birth place of origin as the Quad City. That’s where I always say T-Bones is from. I know people latch on and say he’s Southern, but he’s probably Midwestern more than Southern. T-Bones is loosely based on a drifter that came through my hometown of Tipton, Missouri one summer. His moniker was Four Way George so T-Bones is probably about 55% Four Way George and 45 percent other people I’ve encountered through life.

DRE: Where is Four Way George now?

DK: I don’t think we know. I’d love it if he was a person who reads or cruises the internet or watches television and goes, “Hey, wait a minute.”

DRE: Do drifters really usually check out Comedy Central?

DK: Drifters don’t have cable but he was a roofer so he may be gainfully employed.

DRE: Obviously it’s somewhat the point of the gag but I love that the straight man of the show is naked.

DK: I do too. I love it when people are watching the stage show, and this happens often, they’ll come up later and go “Halfway through the show I had to remember that guy’s naked” and he’s the one I’m looking to take care of me. That’s always a kick.

DRE: Was Gruber’s Naked Trucker always a straight man?

DK: I guess so because he’s more of a storyteller folktale spinner. It’s a little bit of a different comedy, a little bit dryer. It wasn’t outrageous because he didn’t need to add to it, my goodness the guy’s naked. So there was no gimmick, the other guy just completed the other half if you will.

DRE: Is he really naked under there?

DK: As far as I know. If the Health Department asks, no, of course not. But that’s the mystery of theatre that I’m not going to give away. It’s the willing suspension of disbelief.

DRE: Yeah, it’s the deus ex machina

DK: There you go [laughs]. It’s a huge phallus sweeping down to inform the audience that this is the moment.

DRE: How much of the stage part of the show is improvised?

DK: Not at all. When you’re dealing with 21 minutes 30 seconds, you don’t have time to just go off on a jag, much as we’d like to. You’ll find some of that stuff in rehearsal but the show’s pretty tightly scripted, just because it has to be. If you move one brick, then you have to redo the whole building. It’s that tight because the shows are always long so you’re going to be cutting things anyway. Anything else you add, something else goes away, so you’ve got to be very conscious of that when you’re deciding if you’ll dick around.

DRE: So you’re also an executive producer of the show.

DK: Yeah, which gives me a great deal of control. That’s the only way we would have done this because this thing’s our baby. There’s no way I’m just going to turn it over to someone else and go “Okay, whatever you say we’ll do.” That wasn’t going to be the way it went. Gruber and I have been doing this particular show for eight years and I’ve been doing this character for 15 years so it’s pretty precious to us.

DRE: It seems like Comedy Central is very in tune with what you guys wanted to do.

DK: They’ve been wonderfully collaborative. They’re really on board. There was a hardcore group of executives at Comedy Central who for several years was trying to get the show on their network. But for whatever reason, a number of things stacked up in the right way and boom, you get over there and they give you a shot. I’ve been doing this stuff a long time so people I’ve known from Chicago are now executives at Comedy Central, so that helps. They’re very respectful and protective of us. They know what they need for their network and they’ll let you know that. If you’ve got the mindset of “Alright, if we have to work within these confines, I’m going to do it.” But they never said what we could and couldn’t do.

DRE: I’ve seen Gruber in about a hundred different TV shows playing a hippie, is he happy not to be playing a hippie?

DK: [laughs] You’re going to have to ask Gruber. I think Gruber’s happy to be like anybody else in LA, happy to be working. In LA there are about 10 to 15 Trucker billboards so my favorite thing is to look up and there’s Gruber on the billboard, but it’s not Gruber, it’s The Trucker.

DRE: And he’s naked.

DK: Yeah.

DRE: I’ve spoken to [Anchorman director] Adam McKay and he told me something very interesting. He said that Del Close doesn’t turn people into good improvisers but that it needs to be in them first. Do you agree?

DK: Absolutely. You can make them better, you can make them more in tune, but you can’t create something that’s not already there. It’s interesting because there was a time in Chicago, when there were about 20 to 25 of us who came through and all of us had the same mindset. Now most of those people are working in show business in somewhat influential places like Tina Fey, Adam McKay, Andy Richter and many others. So I guess we’re all very fortunate to have had each other going through that place. A confluence of talent.

DRE: Did Del ever rip you a new one?

DK: He was never personal. It was always about the work. It might feel personal because you’re up on stage and he’d just basically say “Sit down, that was terrible.” But he would never attack a person, he would critique the work.

DRE: I thought sometimes it would get personal.

DK: Maybe it did but never with me. Now his partner Charna [Halpern] would give it to you in personal ways and sometimes run people out. That’s culling the herd.

DRE: What stuck you and Gruber together?

DK: The movie we did together, Dill Scallion, is like a country music Spinal Tap. We were on this tour bus for 3 ½ weeks so you get to know people pretty well. Gruber and I became fast friends and we’re both culturally from the same place. We both grew up in the Midwest so we both had that cultural point of reference. But we share the same political ideas and I think we both appreciate the same kinds of comedy and what we thought was important comedy wise. We became kindred spirits along the road and he invited me to do the show when we got back to Los Angeles.

DRE: I watched Snakes on a Plane last night and I loved your monologue to Sam Jackson.

DK: Oh my gosh. That was nerve-wracking. Here I am standing next to this amazing actor and I’ve got to yell at him and tell him what’s what. Wow! But that was fun and he’s such a gracious man. That was a cool movie to be part of.

DRE: Can you believe it turned into such a big deal, at one point anyway?

DK: I thought it was going to be huge. I was really shocked when people didn’t show up. I think there was a backlash. You don’t tell Americans what to like. Maybe they felt they were being hoodwinked or something because I thought it was going to open at $30 million.

DRE: That’s what I thought. I think no matter what, it’s tough to get certain people to go see a movie called Snakes on a Plane. Were there any real snakes around?

DK: Well, that’s your movie magic. No actor was ever in danger of any real poisonous snake.

DRE: How was it working with Tom Lennon and Ben Garant on Balls of Fury?

DK: I’ve known Tom and Ben for a long time. We’ve probably done five movies together, either acted together in them or I’ve acted in movie that they’ve written. They’re friends from way back and they asked me to come and do their picture. I had one day off and put it in on their last day of shooting.

DRE: Who do you play?

DK: Rick the Birdmaster, a Vegas style showman who sings Eddie Money tunes with a cockatoo [laughs].

DRE: I know that Reno 911: Miami might be improvised but is Balls of Fury?

DK: Reno 911 had a ton of improvisation. There was a little bit on Balls of Fury.

DRE: Did you write or produce The Comebacks?

DK: Oh no. I just got hired on to that and I’m grateful to be there. But Tom Brady was the director and he took great care to make it as smart as he could. It’s not really a spoof movie; it’s more of a sports comedy.

DRE: Are you in Adam McKay’s next movie, Step Brothers?

DK: I have no idea. I don’t think they’re finished with the script yet. By gosh I’d better show up one day. I don’t care if I’m the waitress pouring a cup of coffee, I want in. Those guys have been amazing to me and I would literally do anything they ask.

DRE: Do people recognize you the most from Anchorman?

DK: I think so. The Office gets quite a few hits too.

DRE: I love The Office.

DK: That’s a really well written show. They’re all good people too, a lot of fun on that set. Everyone’s very happy.

DRE: Have you ever heard of SuicideGirls before?

DK: Yeah. Interestingly enough, you guys had some big media exposure within the last month and a half.

DRE: Yeah, the burlesque show is opening for Guns N' Roses now.

DK: Fantastic. I’ve done a burlesque show here in town and that’s where I heard about it. I’ve looked at the site a couple times and the best thing is, you’re not looking at pornography. They’re art pieces honey.

by Daniel Robert Epstein

SG Username: AndersWolleck

web address: http://suicidegirls.com/interviews/David+Koechner/