True Stories by Rob Corddry

Yesterday morning I observed my usual procrastination ritual before settling down to work. I ate a Luna Bar (I am 100% straight), IM’d my friend Jason, called my mother-in-law, tried to hang a picture, watered a plant, lost ten minutes to god-knows-what, surfed my usual sites, and then went to Suicide Girls to get my Daniel Robert Epstein fix. And like that, he was gone.

I’m truly, truly heartbroken by this terrible news. Daniel Robert Epstein was, by leaps and bounds, the best and most prolific interviewer working today. When he first interviewed me I was a young, upstart fake reporter on a little known program called “The Jon Daily Show,” or something. Having been on the show for a few years, I fancied myself quite the savvy interviewee. They would ask me the same five questions and I would give the same five answers, just reworded slightly. But Daniel was disarming in that he was a man that simply wanted to talk about comedy, movies, music, comics, art, people, pop-culture. We had very similar interests and our conversation seemed no more than just that. His is one of the only interviews I’ve done that I can reread without cringing. He’s the only interviewer who’s face I remember.

Our interview was conducted over the phone, so the first and only time I met Daniel was a couple of years later in an old prison in Queens where director David Wain was filming me rape Ken Marino in the ass. We spoke for a while that day, mostly about comedy and movies and about how excited we both were to be standing so close to Winona Ryder. His was a huge presence and not just in physical stature. He leaves behind an even bigger hole.

So please take the time usually spent reading my column to read a few of his past interviews. If it’s your first time reading DRE’s work I feel both sorry and excited for you. I can almost guarantee you’ll be lost for hours in it. I only lament that the vast collection of his work has just become finite.

If it weren’t for Daniel I would never have known the work of Stephen Berkman. I may never have read the comic Y: The Last Man. I would never have known that Sarah Jessica Parker likes me. The list goes on. He has made my life richer.