Some people will always see Bob Saget as Danny Tanner, the lovable, cardigan-wearing neat freak who raised the most adorable little white girls to come out of the '90s on the sitcom Full House.
Saget doesn't mind that. In fact, he embraces it. He recently filmed a Super Bowl commercial with Full House alumnae John Stamos and Dave Coulier and recently had a reunion with the two on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon. He also just finished his first book, Dirty Daddy, which will be released April 8. After that, he's hopping on a plane for his first Australian theater tour in May.
But before all that, Saget is stopping by one of his favorite venues, the West Palm Beach Improv, for some sun, comedy, and poop jokes.
New Times: So you, Dave, and John were just in a Super Bowl commercial not too long ago. Was that fun to shoot?
Bob Saget: Yeah, it was really funny. We did two of them; they're running the second one now. The whole exercise was — and they shot like B-roll and C-roll — and all it is is Dave Coulier farting and us laughing. You know, it's just weird. We did that show together, and we have this brotherly kind of thing. We can't even look at each other anymore and not laugh. Or get livid if Dave farts in front of other people and stinks the world up. It's all a 12-year-old mentality. But it was quite a lot of fun.
I loved the reunion you guys did on Jimmy Fallon too. I saw you guys looking at each other, and it looked like you were really struggling not to crack up.
I'm not a cracker-upper normally. I am if I can't remember anything, but they had stuff written on cue cards, so I was fine. I wish Full House had cue cards. We could have been on another eight years! [laughs] It's hard to remember dialogue that might be deemed sappy by some people. But I guess the look of us wanting to crack up was just the look of, "Holy crap, that was 25 years ago, and here we are standing here." And Full House became something. It became this thing of legendary television. So I think the joke of it was — for all three of our perspectives — "You're the two chuckleheads who did this with me." It's a privilege that people love it the way they love it. When I was a kid, it was Brady Bunch and Happy Days, so now we're that.
It's nice to see you guys have no problem stepping back into that world of Full House.
Even in my standup to this day, I do an homage to it. If you're going to be famous for something, you really can't be angry. It's not like we do county fairs. You know, it's not like I'm cutting a ribbon at a market. I'm doing standup and going, "You know, by the way, you probably know me from Full House." And Dave Coulier does the same thing. And John Stamos still plays with the Beach Boys. [laughs] What I love about this situation is, we're all pretty aware of who we are and where we fit in and where we've gone. And we all have plans of where we want to go. We all just want to date twin-sister beauty queens.
Who doesn't?
Well, I don't. No need to go into my personal life. I'm a blatantly single man, which is why I must come to West Palm and visit. No, that's not the reason. The reason to go is to entertain in a nice club that's — I'm getting out of this really well, aren't I? — but the West Palm Beach Improv is one of the biggest clubs in the country, and it's really a fun place that I've worked up to.
The cougars are just an added bonus.
Yeah, there are cougars, there are panthers, there are pumas, there's manthers. It's really like Noah's Ark in there. It's a tan, cut, Noah's Ark with a lot of jewelry and a lot of shots. If you say "no Botox" at the door, you got four people in your audience. So you really can't do that.
It's like a Noah's Ark nightclub.
Exactly. But I love it down there.
Do you think you've been unfairly categorized as dirty or vulgar just because people can't help but associate you with Full House or America's Funniest Home Videos?
Sure. Yeah, and I don't really care... Standup is a heightened reality. Most people that are standups, you can't get the same person at a microphone that you're going to get just talking to them. But eight years on a family sitcom, you can break out of it a lot of times, and I'm working on it now. I've got a lot of new stuff happening. But they'll still always go, "Oh my God, you're so-and-so." You know, you watch the amazing amount of work that Robin Williams has done since Mork & Mindy, but they'll still mention it. They'll play the theme song of Mork & Mindy at an awards show. If you see Anthony Hopkins somewhere and go, "Oh my God, you're not like Hannibal Lecter?" "Well, no, he eats people." So I don't clean up like Danny Tanner or hug people or wear cardigan sweaters all day long. But I do eat people.
Well, naturally.
But the guy you've got to look out for that would eat people would be the guy that looks like Danny Tanner. That's the guy you really want to stay away from.
So your new book is done now?
Yeah, the book is way done. It comes out April 8.
Was writing a book different than you thought it would be?
It was kind of like taking out your guts and deep-frying them, and then maybe putting them back in if you were fortunate enough to not die on the table. It was difficult. I mean, you're going to write this article about me, and that's it. You're lucky. [laughs] You get to stop... It was like the movie Adaptation. I would just go from one computer to another, try to go somewhere else, talk to myself, you know. Fifty hours straight not sleeping for three days, drinking coffee, trying to be creative. It's an amazing experience, because my book is about comedy and death and how they intersect and the people that I was related to that died and then the comedians that I loved. I officiated Rodney Dangerfield's funeral — he was my friend. And I knew Richard Pryor, and it just talks about the greats that kind of influenced me the most. So it was quite a psychological journey.
Was it therapeutic to get all that down on paper?
I think so — I think so, but then, it's been a tough time, because my mom got ill and just normal life stuff. Stuff you talk about in your standup and joke about, but then life changes... There's a chapter called 'Things I Shouldn't Have Done.' I don't really name names in the thing. I'll talk about myself, because I don't care if it says what I did, because I did a lot of dumb shit. And certain famous people made the cut, because that's how you sell a book. But I don't kiss and tell or have sex and tell. I only talk during sex, not after it. [laughs]
After is complete silence?
Yeah, I write really long poems and stuff during sex. And then when I'm done, I don't speak to anyone for three days. [laughs]
Is that the next book we can look forward to? Bob Saget's sex poems?
No, hopefully it's the next date I go on. [laughs]
I heard you say that one of your editor's notes was "less stuff about your balls." I hope you didn't listen to him.
You know, it's funny, I stopped doing standup for a while because I needed to hibernate and figure out what I'm doing and finish the book, and then I went out and did standup this past weekend in Kansas City and my balls seemed to have entered right back into it.... The only thing I'm secure in is I know I'm funny. And some people don't have to agree with that. I mean, a lot of people don't. No one really has to agree with it. [laughs] But the audience does because they're there. They paid to see it. But I sure do love performing live still. I really get my nut doing it.
