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God Bless America is a comedy, but it’s a far cry from when Goldthwait was stealing scenes in Police Academy sequels and One Crazy Summer during the late 1980s. For starters, he’s behind the camera now. America is Goldthwait’s fifth feature as director, preceded by Shakes the Clown (1992), Sleeping Dogs Lie (2006) and World’s Greatest Dad (2009), as well as the Comedy Central TV-movie Windy City Heat (2003), and he has logged more auteur time on TV series including Chappelle’s Show, Important Things
with Demetri Martin and Jimmy Kimmel Live. The erratic comic
seems to have matured from a shrill-voiced character actor to a serious
satirist in America, using violence and darkly disturbing humor to point
out the fundamental flaws in American popular culture. That being said,
he’s still a pretty funny guy.
Joel Murray (from the American Movie Classics TV series Mad Men) and Tara Lynne Barr star in Goldthwait’s new film as Frank and Roxy, a demented reimagination of Bonnie and Clyde. The pair travels the country, executing people who “deserve to die,” including reality stars, spoiled debutantes, TV pundits and, worst of all, people who talk in movie theaters. The black comedy is a violent satire denouncing the state of culture in America. After all, Frank asks at one point, “Why have a civilization if we’re no long interested in being civilized?”
The morning following the God Bless America premiere, I sat down with Goldthwait in the lobby of the Driskill Hotel in downtown Austin. The 49-year-old comedian settled casually into the leather sofa opposite me and glanced at the outdated, oversized voice recorder sitting on the table between us. “What’s wrong?” he laughed in a disappointingly normal voice. “They didn’t have any big ones?”
Q: So this was the U.S. premiere of God Bless America, correct?
A: Yeah, and kind of the world premiere because after Toronto {the film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September} I re-edited some stuff. I added back in a long diatribe by Roxy about conservative media that I’d originally taken out.
Q: Why’d you decide to do that?
A: Well, the people that the movie works for tend to enjoy Frank and Roxy’s rants.
Q: Who does the movie work for? I mean, who is your target audience?
A: Disgruntled 50-year-old comedians who were big in the 1980s seem to be the target audience {laughs}. So Gilbert Gottfried and I love this movie. Howie Mandel is on the fence, probably because he’s Canadian. But really, when I say, “Who the movie works for,” I mean, I hope it reaches out to a lot of people. The majority of the press so far has been very positive.
Q: It’s funny: Your movie is very dark and narcissistic, but that isn’t really the vibe I get from you. Are you an angry guy?
A: I would say that I’m fed up. It’s really a violent movie about kindness. There’s a part of me that’s fed up with the fact that we celebrate the lowest common denominator in pop culture. Everything is reduced to entertainment—politics especially. No one’s interested in the truth of what something is; they’re only interested in the sensational aspect of it.
So yeah, I guess I am mad. When I’m sitting there watching the news and the commentator says, “Send us your tweets,” my head wants to explode. I don’t really care what PoWarrior68 has to say about anything. So I guess this was a movie where I was asking where we {as a society} are going when we let the lowest common denominator dictate our narrative like that. And I was also asking if I’m alone to feel like this.
Q: You could argue that this movie itself is very sensationalist.
A: Of course, of course.
Q: So why the sensationalist violence? Are you fighting fire with fire?
A: You can’t hug a Glenn Beck fan into reason. I could have made a documentary about our culture but it would have been preaching to the converted. And why would I want to do that? I saw a Tea Party member holding a poster that said, “We came unarmed. . . This time.” That’s an aggressive threat. And part of me went, “OK, you want to be crazy? I’ll show you crazy.” And that’s what this movie is: it’s crazy. It’s a satire. I’m not asking people to be violent by any stretch of the imagination. It just seems like the nastier and the crazier people are, the more of a voice they get in our culture. So I made a nasty, crazy movie to show the other side of it.
Q: You’ve gotten some backlash, especially from right-wing media about this.
A: Before the movie came out some of the right-wing websites totally bashed it and hated it, and I thought that was really funny. It’s like when Frank {the main character} says to the conservative commentator that he agrees with some of his ideas. I agree with Bill O’Reilly on the death penalty: I oppose it just like him. But he and I can never be on the same side. He’ll never try to reach for me. He will just say anybody from Hollywood is a pinhead. He’s not interested in change and he doesn’t care about America. He’s interested in being famous.
That’s all Rush Limbaugh is, too. He doesn’t care about anything. If I were a Rush Limbaugh fan I would be so upset that he apologized {for his comments about Sandra Fluke}. Because that says his beliefs are not as important as making money. So if you’re his fan, he really doesn’t have your back.
Q: You mentioned in the Q&A following your film last night that you try to avoid this nonsense, which I assume includes guys like Rush.
A: I try to, which is why a lot of references in the film may seem dated {the film satirizes American Idol contestant William Hung, for example}. But unfortunately, as a comedian, I’m drawn into a lot of non-versations where people are talking about absolutely nothing. Rush is just this week’s Charlie Sheen. I try to avoid it.
Q: Can you do that? You obviously know what’s going on with Limbaugh right now.
A: No, you really can’t avoid it. That’s where my frustration comes from and where this movie came from. There’s a scene where a woman walks by Frank with her husband and they’re having some dumb conversation about Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston. It’s always all around you.
And I’m not saying that you should hate pop culture. I don’t have hostility toward these people; I just don’t care about them.
Q: But what about you? Aren’t you a figure of pop culture and a part of that machine?
A: I was. And I made a decision to not be part of it. I used to do a lot of celebrity bashing in my nightclub act. About 10 or 15 years ago I just decided not to. And sometimes when I’m out on the road it’s easy to get sucked back into that. But I don’t want to be doing that any more. And I’m in an interesting position now because I have to choose whether or not to promote this movie in media that I object to. I don’t know what I’m going to do, because I want people to be aware of the film.
Q: You mentioned that Rush compromises his values for the money. Your motive might not be money, but wouldn’t that still be selling out?
A: You know, I really wrestle with that. And so far I haven’t done it. I haven’t given in to things I don’t believe in. Just the other day, for example, TMZ was hassling me about the film outside of Joel {Murray’s} improv show {laughing}. And I told them, “You’re going to love the movie because you’re in it!”
{The film features a segment inside the newsroom at a gossip magazine called TMI, which brutally mocks the celebrity-obsessed news media, particularly TMZ.}
Q: What did they say?
A: They said, “Oh we are?” They got so excited, blah, blah {makes farting and vomiting sounds}.
Q: Is it tough to stay grounded when you’re now living in Los Angeles?
A: LA is a funny place. My daughter went to a very private school in LA and people always ask me, “Was she treated differently because you’re in show business?” But in LA, being Bobcat Goldthwait’s daughter is not a big deal at all. The other kids would be like {in a snotty kid’s voice}, “Oh, Bobcat Goldthwait’s your dad? My dad canceled his show.” Everybody is somebody there.
There’s this funny thing that country music stars do the most. They say {in a mocking twangy, country singer voice}, “You know I just try to keep it real and I just live here in this small town and I don’t go to Holly-weird.” But if you’re in show business, Los Angeles is the most humbling place on the planet. It doesn’t matter who you are; you’re just another guy that works in show business. When you refuse to sell out and live in a small town, you’re the biggest guy there.
Q: Do you get that treatment when you go back to Syracuse?
A: When I go back to Syracuse it’s strange because for some people I’m not just a guy who got lucky and made some movies and was big in the 1980s. When I go back to Syracuse, I become their property. There are people who normally wouldn’t be my fans who are aware of me. And that’s weird. That’s the only place where I go back and people get excited. And I go back to Syracuse a lot. It’s uncomfortable if your goal is just to be a regular Joe.
Q: You shot a few scenes in the movie in Syracuse {Clinton Square} and your main character is a regular Joe from Syracuse. Is he supposed to be you?
A: I picked Syracuse because that’s where I’m from and I’m sure he {Frank} is an extension of me in some ways. I agree with about 90 percent of the things Frank has to say. I don’t necessarily agree with everything Roxy says, though. When I write movies, my characters might say things other than what I think or feel. I’m a writer. I don’t write movies where everyone just says crap I would say.
Q: So the Alice Cooper rant in the movie, that’s not all you? {Roxy rants in the film that Alice Cooper is underappreciated.}
A: I appreciate and respect Alice Cooper but I don’t have this anger that Alice Cooper is not respected. That’s based on my time in high school at Bishop Grimes. Tom Kenny loved Muddy Waters and he loved Muddy Waters because it was his thing. Everyone else was listening to Journey and Kiss and he would say, “Muddy Waters invented those three chords that Journey rips off!” So I thought Roxy would have something like that.
Q: If you could shoot one person, who would it be?
A: {Laughing} That’s a tricky question because people are going to accuse me of encouraging violence and wanting to kill people and I don’t believe in that. That being said: Shooting a Kardashian doesn’t interest me. Shooting a grown adult man who makes his living reporting on Kim Kardashian or writing and telling jokes about Kim Kardashian. . . I would like to shoot all of those guys, not just one.
Q: Good to know. If I’m ever in a shooting range with you and you go nuts, I’ll just stand next to Kim.
A: {Laughing} You know, I was at a shooting range not long ago and it was pretty cool. There’s no tension on a shooting range. I go to this place in LA and there are hillbillies and gang-bangers and cops all there together. And they’re all talking to each other about their Glocks or whatever. It’s really funny. Everyone is comparing weapons and firing each other’s guns.
Q: Are you a big gun fanatic?
A: No, I’m not Tackleberry from Police Academy. But I have a
gun. That’s the thing—there’s no discussion anymore. Just because I’m a
progressive or a liberal I’m not supposed to have a gun. We’re not
allowed to figure out what works for people. You’re either this or
you’re that. How can you be a vegetarian atheist and own a gun? Well,
that’s who I am. Mostly I’m just tired of the fact that there’s no more
conversation or logic or reason. It’s just an “us vs. them” mentality.
And that’s what this movie is ultimately about.
As if anyone gives a f*** what this never-was thinks...