"If I wasn't funny, I don't know what I'd be doing. I certainly wouldn't have attracted such a cute wife. I lucked out. She was a goth chick into comedians and I was a comedian into goth chicks."

It’s a similar message that you hear from a lot of successful comedians; that without their life on the stage they would be in jail or marketing. This time, it was said by Tim McIntire, a successful headliner and one of the most respected voices on comedy in Boston. I spoke to Mr. McIntire on the phone. He was at his stately McIntire manor in the one of New England’s most exclusive vacation spots – sunny Medford, Massachusetts. Both his kids had gone to sleep on time. He started by raving about some yoga relaxation game for kids that was helping them sleep. Then we went on to a Point-Counter-Point analysis of Dora the Explorer v. Blue’s Clues and why Wonderpets and Backyardigans totally rock. It’s the everyday conversation of new dads. It’s what their kids watch, so they watch it. When I used to see Tim perform, his material was right out of the Bill Hicks school of social commentary. Government was fucked up. New forms of execution for fat inmates should include walking up a flight of stairs. There was an inner monologue from the bus driver for Up with People who couldn’t take the singing anymore. Now, it’s reflective, includes a lot less profanity, and a helluva lot more about him and his family.

'I was definitely influenced (by Hicks) early on. I like to think not so much anymore."

"When I had my first son. It (change in material) wasn't a conscious decision at all. You know how life-changing that (birth) is. I just didn't care about some things as much anymore. I think my second disc, Scatterbrain; I'm much prouder of that disc than the other one. It’s more personal. When I was a younger comic, you had to be edgy and dangerous and talk about The Man! You'd rant and rave. I think it's a little more dangerous to be a little vulnerable on stage and talk about yourself. After the fact, I realized that. I just wasn't paying as much attention to the rest of the world. I was no longer very angry. I wasn't in a ranting place. I think it's kind of pathetic if you see a comic who's raving, then see them again ten years later and they're still raving. What, you haven't evolved or changed at all as a person? That's kind of sad. I saw this one comic when I first started doing comedy and I thought he was awesome. He would pace on the stage and smoke cigarettes and say, ‘Fuck this! Fuck that! Let me tell you something folks.’ Then, I saw him ten years later and it was the same thing. He was obviously older, paunchier. He had bags under his eyes. So, instead of being an angry young man, he's an angry middle-aged man.”

That doesn’t mean Tim has walked away from the outside world entirely without the odd jab or two. "Ted Haggard, head of the Evangelical Church, caught with a gay lover doing crystal meth. No one was happier hearing that than me. He ruined my home town. I'm from Colorado Springs where their mega church is. When they moved in, it ruined the city. They took over the city council and school board. When he got busted, I was doing an end zone dance here in Boston."

"I'm still pretty much a raving liberal. But, I'm a Colorado liberal. It's like being a Massachusetts liberal, but I like guns."

"Nothing surprises me. I'm glad that I've moved away from current events. It's harder to do now. When I was coming up, if something happened, I had all day to sit and write my jokes. If something happened on a Tuesday, there weren't any comedy shows 'til Wednesday night. So, I had almost two days to write some jokes. Not only would I be the first one doing it, but I had two days to refine it. Now, if something happens, you have 400 blog posts, a couple of YouTube movies, some MySpace bulletins. The possibility of being original, is much less likely. I'm glad that I'm not doing it anymore. It's much harder."

For someone like Tim, who has been a successful closer for so long, (He had been making a living entirely from it in Boston until they had kids. Suddenly, health insurance became a little more important.) it’s unusual that he recalls and seems to relish so many performances where he’s bombed. His new disc has an extra track which has him eating it for half an hour at a private gig for a hunting club. It’s fucking brutal. But, not as funny as this one: "Oh, man. I was opening for Martina McBride, country singer, not exactly my demographic at the Melody Tent on the South Shore. It’s a performance space in the round. I didn't know that going in. Half the crowd, at least, can't see my face. I'm doing unabashed, liberal political jokes for Martina McBride people. My first two, three jokes bomb, bomb, bomb. I hear this grinding of gears and the stage starts turning. It's a rotating stage. So, I do the setup here. Then the stage rotates. And I do the punch line over there. And it keeps rotating. So, I'm spinning & dying & spinning & dying. I had no idea it was going to spin. It went on for half an hour. Not one laugh. It was the worst thing ever. Watching these faces go past me, more incredulous and appalled every single time I came by. There's no one laughing so everyone can hear the ‘Grrrrrr’ of the thing."

So, how does a young comedian from Colorado end up in Boston? "There was no great strategy. I met this chick and I wanted to hook up with her. I had never been to Boston until I moved here. You can make a fair amount of money in Boston. The good thing about Boston is you can make a fair amount of dough and sleep in your own bed at night."

"You read on the internet from old comedy stand-ups in forums, all these guys know each other, from all over the country. But nobody from Boston knows them and they don't know anyone from Boston either. It’s because nobody leaves! DJ Hazard does road work. Kenny Rogerson does a couple of dates out and about. But by and large, people stay in Boston and there is no way for people to come in from outside of Boston to make money here. It's like this weird kind of pocket."

So, why stick around? Why not head off to LA or New York? "On paper, yes, because there is only so far you can go in Boston. I wish it weren't the case, but it's true. But, it's not just me now. I've got the wife and kids in tow. I think it would be a good thing, but even less likely than before."

"My crew. My peeps. It's changed it a lot. I stopped working for some of the sketchier agents of which there are plenty. Suddenly, I have a better option for a Thursday night. I'd rather hang out with my wife and kids."

"Once upon a time, it would be, ‘What, 50 bucks to drive up to Bangor and back? Sure! Absolutely! It's a gig!’ But now, why in the world would I do that? So, I don't spend as much time hanging out in the clubs as I used to. Now, if I'm leaving my wife at home and doing a $500 corporate gig, then, OK, that's good for the family. If I'm going to leave her at home to go to some wretched open mic and just hang out and drink beer, then I'm an asshole."

"I do better gigs. I try to be more selective. It's actually working out pretty well for me. Like they say, 'Once you say no to the bad gigs, you can say no to the good gigs.' It's the conventional wisdom that I had always heard, but never did. But, it's true. There are a few guys who are kind of sketchy, so I'm not going to work for those guys anymore. And low and behold, my calendar starts to show a better caliber of gigs.”

“There was a guy who was giving me most of my work and he was horrible. The shows were far away. The checks were always late, or wrong. But, he was giving me most of my work so I put up with a lot. I overlooked a lot things. So, I finally said, 'You know what? It's just not worth it. If I have to pick up another job, a shift at Blockbuster or something, I will do it.' They were just these wretched horrible gigs. I wasn't making much money. I was away from my family. In New York, you don't want to miss a show and find out later that 15 dudes got sitcoms that night. But, this ain't going to get me on TV anytime soon. What the fuck am I doing this for?'"

“Probably the best thing about Tim is his ability to mix the personal with the political. He's a socially aware guy, but he doesn't stick to any particular dogma. When he's struggling with an idea, he lets you see that, which is usually more effective than pounding away at an audience. And when you put that into context with his stories about the birth of his first son, you can see a human being reacting to his own life's events, and you get a better sense where that point of view is coming from.  
You hear it said in sports all the time that the most successful teams do the little things well -- you don't get the Fastest Show on Turf without your offensive line getting in the right stance before the snap. That's maybe a bit of a belabored analogy, but it fits Tim. He knows the mechanics of what he needs to do to get an audience to respond, and he's faced every kind of audience imaginable. He's really become one of those guys young comics go to for advice.  
He's also one of those rare people who can appreciate a band like Blue Oyster Cult without the irony. And, you know, that's pretty rare these days.”
– Nick Zaino, Boston Globe

Tim, who may or may not fear the reaper (see previous BOC reference) is a self proclaimed Spiritual Nerd. He is also the Reverend Tim McIntire. However, he’s not going by that name anymore on stage. "When I was The Reverend, I would try to be edgy, Mr. Politics. It was kind of a cool, little stage name. Now that I'm telling stories about my wife and kids, it's a little creepy. The Universal Life Church of Modesto, California. They will ordain anybody for free. I did it as a gag. Only later did I find out it was legitimate in all 50 states."

"I've actually done some weddings and stuff. I've married a few comics. None of them were quite normal. The first one was at a rest area in Maine, where the couple met. It raised some questions I thought it impolite to ask. I just did one where the guy was from England and the bride was some Wiccan chick. They had this big Wiccan alter set up with crazy burning incense, which I am definitely allergic to. I'm trying to go through their vows; and my throat is swelling shut and my eyes are swelling closed and I'm just thinking, 'C'mon, talk a little faster here. I'm dying!'"

"I don't know what to call myself anymore. But, when I saw my first son born, I felt the universe shift. It was like, 'Oh, so that's what it's all about. Now, I understand.' ‘God is love’ suddenly makes a lot more sense. All of those sweatlodges I did, all those mushrooms; really, all I had to do was have a baby."

"Now, I am actually optimistic about life. I'm more cynical about comedy. But, about the whole world, I'm more hopeful. Sometimes it (comedy) just seems so shallow. When it's done well, it's not. People say it's making a comeback, but I think it's making a comeback in the wrong way."

"People are talking about this renaissance of comedy that Dane Cook has kicked off. There is a renaissance of comedy contests, maybe. A lot of young, good-looking people with seven minutes doing comedy. I haven't really seen a renaissance of a lot good, thoughtful, interesting, creative stand-up comedy. They just did this Sierra Mist MySpace Contest. I didn't pay a lot of attention to it. But I saw something and thought, 'When did comics get so good-looking? Who gives a shit what the good-looking people think?' It's an offshoot of Comedy Central. You hear from people in the industry that people aren't young enough, thin enough, good-looking enough. If you're young, thin, and good-looking, why are you funny? You don't need to be funny. Being funny is for the rest of us. It's our crutch."

"In 8th grade, I was a total nerdbag, just fighting for survival in junior high school. Some girl wrote in my yearbook that I was the funniest guy she'd ever met. I did a couple of talent shows when I was around 17-18 in Colorado. They went great. Looking back, I want to claw my brain out. But, I was going to do an open mic in a legitimate comedy club. The night I went, the plumbing exploded. The club was closed. I didn't try comedy again for four years."

"I went to the College of Santa Fe, which may or may not still be credited. I was a theatre major. All I wanted to do was stand-up, but I really didn't have a clear idea of what that meant. I also went to the University of Colorado for a year. What a nightmare. I was in some weird black box play. There was this Iraqi director there. He'd written some play called, The Rape. I went out for it because it wasn't a comedy. I wanted to be a serious actor. I had the audition and he said, 'You are fantastic! I love you.' I said, 'Great.' He said, 'You are very funny. I am putting some comedy in this play for you.' So, I was the comic relief in a play called, The Rape. It was an incredibly depressing play about this woman who gets raped. He just tacked on my wacky character, who'd kind of wander across stage between the whaling and revenge to do something nutty with a couple of melons and a pig ."

"In Colorado Springs, there was The Comedy Corner. One club. Two in Denver. I started in '93. I got on about once a week. It was a cool system that I wish more clubs would adopt. They had an open mic. But, they also had a workshop for the open mic. You had to do a certain amount of workshops before you were allowed to be on the open mic. They taught you the basics: how to hold the mic, where to put the mic stand, make sure your punch line comes last. The open mic show had a lineup of six, then a headliner."

"I listened to a lot of records. I watched Letterman every night, back when he had comics on occasionally. I loved Bob Newhart, Mort Sahl, Shelly Berman, Cosby, of course. There was Kinison, Eddie Murphy's Raw; I loved that."

"When I got to Boston, I had just started headlining on the road out west; pretty sketchy road rooms really. In Boston, I didn't know anybody. So, I had to start over from scratch. On the plus side, I was the new guy in town and just happened to have 45 minutes of material. So I was new, but seemed like I was some kind of prodigy. That made it easy to get noticed. In Boston, if you start here, nobody will give you anything until you move away and come back. I was able to sell myself as a headliner. People gave me a shot. I had a few sets. It kind of stuck."

"In the Boston comedy scene, there are three separate scenes that never meet. On the one hand you have the 'old school', The Comedy Connection, Nick's Comedy Stop, and Giggles. All of which have a set roster of comics. All of them are very good. You have Mike Donovan, Tony V., DJ Hazard, Kenny Rogerson, Don Gavin. Great guys. Brilliant comics. They've been closing these rooms for fifteen years. It's your basic comedy show. Three guys. Tons of punch lines. Set 'em up. Knock 'em down. High energy. Loud. Great stuff."

"Then there's The Comedy Studio, the epicenter of the second scene; kind of like Catch a Rising Star in Harvard Square used to be. It's young, hip, brainier, a little more creative; the alternative comedy scene. There are also some off-shoot rooms, open mic's around town, where these comics work out."

"The third thing going on, which I think is pretty exciting, started with The Walsh Brothers. They're brothers and hilarious and saw Boston for what it was. If you're young and creative there's no future for you here. They went and got themselves a regular night at Improv Boston. It was them and five or six people helping them out. It was a free show. They actually brought free beer for people. Once a week, they had a totally new show; some sketch, some stand-up, some videos. They built a huge following in a fairly short period of time. They just got back from Aspen (Aspen Comedy Festival) and got representation, meetings in LA. There's another group called Zero, which is a bunch of Emerson kids. They have a regular show with sketch, stand-up, music, short films. There's the Untrainables, who have a show at The Paradise. It's weird. They're not even doing open mic's or other gigs. It's one show, once a week. They have total creative control and don't limit themselves to stand-up. It's great to watch. It makes me feel like a dinosaur. It's this intersection of stand-up, improv & variety show which lends itself to being developed by industry. You're not just telling jokes. You can act, edit film, do whatever. That seems to be the trend here in town. It's a pretty cool thing."

"The downside of it is they are insular groups reinventing the wheel on their home base. What I learned from doing shows on the road was chestnuts of old comedy wisdom from guys you worked with. I remember one of my first road gigs, the headliner chewed me out because I didn't wear a jacket on Saturday. I was trying to do this hip thing. He said, 'No, Saturday night is date night. They're going to dress up. You should dress up.' Another one, 'First show on Friday, the audience is coming from work, you should work clean. Second show on Friday, they've been drinking. You can be dirty.' It's like an apprentice system where wisdom is handed down from one generation to the next. These new kinds of shows, for all their creativity, they don't have dinosaurs in residence to hand down these little pearls. Then you hear about some of these kids playing out somewhere else and bombing miserably because they didn't pick up the basic competence they should've learned. It's a small price to pay for total control of your own show.”

“It's great to have this safe space to create in. But, part of being a comic is marching into hostile territory and having your ass handed to you once in a while."

"Sometimes people will come see me and love it. They come back three weeks later and be totally surprised I don't have a new 45 minutes. You show up all proud with two new jokes and they say, 'We heard a lot of that shit last time.' I don't think people think it's easy, but I don't think they know what goes into it either."

"I've had nights when it's just not there. I can hear myself saying the words but I am completely disengaged. I've had shows where it's the sound system. One time in Providence, I bombed for half an hour, dead silence. I came off stage and my wife told me the sound system was so bad she couldn't understand a word out of my mouth. She knew my jokes and couldn't understand what I was saying. That's what makes comedy awesome; that the possibility of bombing is always there."

"If you go in the club, and they have TV's on and they're talking, you don't give a shit about the show and don't worry about it. The ones where you go and everything's set up perfect and you still tank it; that's one you take personally."

If Tim set out to reveal more about himself and be vulnerable on his new CD, Scatterbrains, he succeeded. He pulls off the delicate trick of turning inward without losing his persona. He is still The Reverend. Now, rather than pointing the finger at others, he’s pointing it at himself. Instead of looking at obscure news stories and making them universal, he takes something universal, the birth of a child, and makes it his (and his wife’s, lest we forget). It’s smart and fearless. Mr. Hicks, this is Mr. Cosby.

Like Ophira Eisenberg, Tim spends a lot of time talking about siblings and parents. Similarly, at this point in his career, it produces the most laughs in his set. So, how does Tim deal with his folks on this matter? "They've been very supportive. They just can't listen to the second CD. My dad was begging to buy one from me and I said, 'You can have it, but I don't want you to take the plastic off.' I'm glad you're proud of me and I'm proud of it. But, if you listen to it, I can't be held responsible. My dad loves my show. Of course, when he comes, he doesn't see the same show everyone else sees. They've been very cool. Of course, my sister is a lesbian who lives with a black chick, so by comparison..."

"I love Louis CK. When I saw him at The Comedy Studio (in Cambridge, MA), I don't remember ever laughing that hard. I hate everybody. Either they're not as good as me, or they're better and I'm jealous. But, him... I was just pounding the table with tears streaming down my face. It was like I wasn't a comic, it was like going back before I was a comic and fell in love with the whole thing. I laughed my ass off over that guy."

"He's alternative in the right way. He's old school in the right way. Honest. Real. Just funny. We need more of him and less good-looking skinny people. If we were having a renaissance , we'd have more Louis CK's walking around."

"Well done stand-up comedy is tough. I think anybody can come up with five hack minutes and give it a go. If theatre is coffee, then stand-up is crack. It's better shit but it's also more dangerous. You have to be more in the moment. You have to connect with the audience on an even higher level. There's no fourth wall; they can talk back to you and it's perfectly acceptable."

"I made a guy cry at The Vault (a damp room for comedy in the basement of a restaurant on Beacon). I was hosting an open mic. There was a guy on the show who I didn't know. He just came in and sat down in the crowd with a friend. They’re talking the whole time right through other people's sets. I didn't even know who he was, thought he was just some shithead in the audience. So, I read off his name and he stands up to come up on stage to do his set. He gives me the 'pysch' fake handshake. He does over 20 minutes, filthy stuff, won't get off the stage. He comes off the stage and I take him into the vault and unload on him, 'Who the fuck do you think you are coming in here disrespecting me? Disrespecting the stage?' I just chewed him out. I was screaming at him and I noticed his lip starting to quiver. Big, fat teardrops start rolling down his face. So, I yell, 'You're crying? You disgust me! Get the fuck out of here!' He runs out of the room crying. After the show, I'm up at the bar and a woman comes up. She's one of his friends and apologizes for him. She knew he had done everything wrong and had it coming. Then she says the guy is basically autistic and this is his life long dream to try comedy. All I could think was, 'Oh, my god. I just made an autistic kid cry.'" (Probably not something for the Make-A-Wish Foundation reel.)

"You've got to be kind of damaged to be funny in the first place. I think humor is a defense mechanism. That's where it develops, right? They say comedy is pain. It's kind of a cliché, but it's true. People learn to be funny for a reason; maybe it's to get their parents' attention or keep from getting beat up. It comes from somewhere. I think that's why you see so many damaged souls try stand-up. That's why I think the good looking kids are phonies."

"Thanks for being patient with me and letting me ramble on like an old man. 'Kids today, they don't got no respect for the business.'"

To find out where Tim is performing or pick up a copy of his CD, visit themcintireconspiracy.com