Playboy Interview: Dennis Miller

During a recent five-day, sold-out stand in Los Angeles, Dennis Miller fine-tuned material that eventually became part of his HBO comedy special "Citizen Arcane." The audience was wildly enthusiastic. No one seemed to care that during most of his set, Miller kept glancing nervously at his shirt pocket. Crib notes? Not likely. Miller's one-liners are like paragraphs from a pop culture encyclopedia, and cue cards could never keep up.

Why the averted eyes? Backstage, Miller confided to a friend that "I can't look at the audience while I'm still building confidence in the material." That's an unexpectedly vulnerable admission from the man "Time" magazine called "the angry prophet of the airwaves—["Network's"] Howard Beale with a bottle of Evian" and who once said of himself, "I vent, therefore I am." But maybe we don't know Dennis Miller as well as we think we do.

Most people agree that Miller is extremely bright and funny. Beyond that, opinions differ. Some consider him a dazzling social and political satirist with an unequaled ability to make references so obscure, trivial and inventive that his act sounds like a week's worth of "Jeopardy" questions. Others think he is a self-indulgent navel-gazer who is riding on the ragged coattails of his six-year shift as Weekend Update anchor on "Saturday Night Live." Of course, to paraphrase one of Miller's favorite sayings, those are just opinions. They could be wrong.

There's no better time to form your own opinion of him than Friday nights at 11:30. On HBO's "Dennis Miller Live," the 41-year-old comedian attacks the topic du jour with biting wit and a sardonic "give-me-a-fucking-break" attitude. Then he brings out a celebrity guest to continue the subject with live phone-ins, followed by a segment that echoes Miller's "SNL" days, in which he roasts the week's newsmakers using photos with hit-and-run (and sometimes hit-and-miss) captions. It's a smart, opinionated half hour that has provided HBO with what "Newsweek" calls an "inspired" hit.

But others have used a television show as a bully pulpit without becoming must-see TV. Wliy do people respond so strongly to Miller? He will tell you that he seeks only to entertain and not convince, fearful of falling into the same traps that have swallowed other smart political comics, such as Mort Sahl. Still, like Rush Limbaugh and Howard Stern, Miller's righteous indignation connects with the audience's anger over how society has lost its way. He also proves that it's possible to laugh and think at the same time.

Through it all, Miller tries to remain non-ideological. One minute he's the illegitimate son of Ayn Rand and Andy Rooney, a social Darwinist with a funny bone, and the next he's a Sixties ethlcist with a soft spot as big as a satellite dish. His high-octane harangues are now collected in a book, "Dennis Miller: The Rants," and he skewers all sides with equal vigor.

Mouthing off has paid off. "Dennis Miller Live" is now in its fourth season. In 1994 the show won an Emmy for best writing in a variety series, beating out "The Late Show With David Letterman." College students are perhaps Miller's most loyal fans. According to Notre Dame junior Jennifer Laurie (mistress of the World Wide Web's wildly popular Dennis Miller home page, at http://www.nd.edu/~jlaurie1/dmhome.html), "His humor is so close to the truth that it scares people." Another fan, sounding off on the Web site, writes, "You are the voice of reason in a hyper and psychotic society."

In addition to his numerous comedy specials, Miller has branched out into films, appearing with Michael Douglas in "Disclosure" and with Sandra Bullock in "The Net." Miller kills vampire hookers using a Supersoaker filled with holy water in this summer's "Bordello of Blood."

Miller, whose younger brother, Jimmy, manages Jim Carrey, among others, was born in Philadelphia in 1954. He never knew his father, who "moved on when I was very young." His mother was a dietitian. Both have since passed away. Despite the jagged edges, Miller describes his childhood as "middle-class, uneventful and chronological." Inspired by "All the President's Men," he studied journalism at Point Park College. But upon graduation he gave that up. "I realized I didn 't look like Robert Redford when I put on the houndstooth jacket–plaid shirt–wrinkled tie outfit," he said. Instead, Miller held a variety of jobs: janitor, flower truck driver, ice cream scooper—just the background for stand-up comedy. He worked the Pittsburgh clubs before moving to New York to climb the comedy ladder. He returned to Pittsburgh, where he wrote, produced and performed humorous essays for the syndicated "PM Magazine" TV show. He also hosted a Saturday morning show for teens, but soon quit to travel the comedy-club circuit.

In 1985 "SNL" producer Lorne Michaels spotted Miller at Los Angeles' Comedy Store and offered him a job that changed his life.

Miller left the "SNL" anchor desk after the 1990–1991 season, and the next year, with the backing of Tribune Entertainment, tried to shoehorn his sarcastic persona into a generic nightly talk show. The "Dennis Miller Show"—beset by an unimaginative format, bad ratings and the host's own discomfort—was short-lived.

Miller also had trouble securing top-flight guests; he blamed the hardball booking tactics of Jay Leno's former manager and onetime "Tonight Show" executive producer Helen Kushnick for his show's demise. That led to a three-year feud with Leno, who had been one of his best friends. The rancor ended during the course of this interview when Miller decided to give his estranged friend another chance. "I didn't change what I believed, but it was the right thing to do. I felt the half-life on my anger had burned off," he explains.

Out of the talk show game, Miller once again hit the road. He refined his "rant style" and turned it into "Dennis Miller Live." This time all the elements combined to create a comfy niche for a professionally cranky man.

We asked Contributing Editor David Rensin (who has also interviewed Jerry Seinfeld, Garry Shandling and Lorne Michaels for Playboy) to try to keep up with one of the few men who can intemidate a thesaurus. Here's Rensin's report:

"I met Dennis in 1991 when I interviewed Lorne Michaels. I stopped him in the hallway and asked him to sit for a background session. He politely declined, but he didn't give a reason. When we met for this interview I asked for an explanation. 'Come on,' he said. 'That was like asking Red and Sonny if they want to go on record when the King's still in the building. Do it and you'd find yourself sleeping next to the plane on the main drag.'

"That encounter should have prepared me for what I would eventually discover. For a guy who spends his career illuminating the insanity of our time, Miller is surprisingly self-conscious when asked to go on the record with his personal opinions. Professionally, he may reside on Disdain Boulevard, but privately he prefers homesteading on Harmony Street with his Irish-born wife, Ali, and two sons, Holden and Marlon, and working one night a week.

"When Dennis and I started talking, O.J. Simpson was still in jail. When we finished, the trial was over and the Juice was on the street. Because Miller had taken his share of potshots and believes O.J. should be in prison, there was one thing we had to clear up at the outset."

[Q] Playboy: We have to know right away: Do you own the O.J. videotape?

[A] Miller: [Laughs] No, I don't. I hope the motherfucker calls my show so I can refuse the call. I can't believe everybody took his calls. He's sounding a little weird, isn't he? Dedicating a song to Nicole? Isn't that getting a little ghoulish? He's going to slip up. I think I should spend the rest of my life fighting the double jeopardy law.

[Q] Playboy: Each Week on Dennis Miller Live you tackle a host of topics beyond O.J.—power in America, the tabloids, political correctness, sexual harassment, infomercials, bad TV, the family and the death of liberalism. Are you really an opinionated guy or do you just play one on TV?

[A] Miller: I'm an opinionated guy whose opinions no one would hear if my job didn't dictate that I share them.

[Q] Playboy: Well, you chose the job.

[A] Miller: I'm not saying I've been dragged into this line of work and whipped into confessing. I do it by choice. It's just that if I were a cobbler I wouldn't be nailing heels and complaining about the way things are.

[Q] Playboy: Sure you would.

[A] Miller: I don't think so. These days everybody tries to force their opinion on everybody else. Every special interest wants its way to be the only way. It bugs me.

[Q] Playboy: What makes the way you deliver your opinions any different?

[A] Miller: One reason my opinions might seem palatable is that people don't sense that I'm trying to convince them. And I'm not. My goal is to entertain. I have a whole set of idiosyncratic beliefs, but they're just my beliefs. On every show—and people think I'm just being coy—I say, "Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong." It doesn't bother me if someone thinks I'm full of shit.

[Q] Playboy: It only bothers you that you might somehow influence people?

[A] Miller: I do a half-hour comedy show. Being funny is the first thing for me. If I miss that prime directive, the next thing I know I'll be moving to New Orleans to sack out with Jim Garrison and figure out who was beyond the grassy knoll.

[Q] Playboy: Too late, he's dead. Come on, you must want to have some impact beyond getting a laugh.

[A] Miller: I was golfing in Palm Springs once when this older woman came up to me and explained that her daughter had just died. She said, "I don't know much about you, but I do know your tapes made my daughter laugh at the end of her life, and that's the only thing I remember that made her laugh." She started crying and said, "I have to thank you for that." Now there's an impact I don't mind having. Taking somebody think, Do I like Gingrich or not? is bullshit.

[Q] Playboy: Then why focus on social and political issues? Isn't that a risky area for most comedians?

[A] Miller: Only if it's not funny. Let me try to explain it this way: This isn't so much what I choose to be. This is all I've got. I know there's a Renaissance-man thing with guys who can wear nine hats. I wish I had it. When I became a comedian I gravitated to the topical stuff because I could do an opinionated pass on it. That's all I've been given comedically. I don't see jokes in any other way. I play to my strengths. I'm not a physical humorist, I'm not great at improvisation, I don't use props, I don't do impressions. I'm glad I found a niche. I never felt I had to be the guy who tried to set the flag on top of K2, lost three fingertips in the process and then, unaided by oxygen, crossed the glacier. I'll get to the fifth base camp with Mongo the Sherpa and boil water. I'll stay in the down sleeping bag.

[Q] Playboy: How did you come up with "the rant," which you recently turned into a book, Dennis Miller: The Rants'?

[A] Miller: I was doing some light topical stuff in my HBO specials. There are strains of it in Mr. Miller Goes to Washington. And then in Black and White I got a chunk together about fur and freedom of speech. It ran about eight minutes. It was tight, man. I went over that like haiku. Then I noticed it attracted people's attention. I thought, I've got to tap into this. I found myself building to these points like I was hitting a speed bag at the gym. Ba-da-da-ba-da-da-da. And when I'd look out into the crowd I'd see that I was getting not only laughs but also this sort of head-nodding and catharsis. I thought I might be on to something, sort of a pre-Howard Beale paranoia. I was fascinated by Beale in Network. The rant seemed a neat way to deliver high-octane material. When the talk show was canceled I promised myself I'd distill it and make it the core of a new show.

[Q] Playboy: Why does it work for you?

[A] Miller: Because I am the simile guy. I read things in the news that piss me off, and I like commenting on them. I find my best humor comes when I'm angry.

[Q] Playboy: Let's try a few hot topics and see where you land. President Clinton?

[A] Miller: He wants to appease everyone and be all things, and he's ended up fucking up what could have been a grand presidency.

[Q] Playboy: So you don't like him?

[A] Miller: He may be a nice guy. But I think he's a vacillator and not real honest. It's too bad, because he has potential. That's why I'm so disappointed. I look at Clinton and I think, I know he's smart. I know he knows he's full of shit. And that really bugs me.

[Q] Playboy: Maybe he is smart enough to know that he can't be honest and get reelected.

[A] Miller: I'm looking for a guy who is that smart who will say to America, "Listen, stick your second term up your ass. I don't want it." To just walk away with the theme from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly playing in the background. I'd go, Wow, yeah!

[Q] Playboy: Nonetheless, it isn't as if he's not a strong contender this time around.

[A] Miller: Clintoon's not a horrible man, he's not a great man. But do I think he's leading me? I watched Gandhi recently. We need that guy and he aiin't coming that often. We don't have a guy who looks 60 minutes in the eye and says, "Yeah, I had an affair. I fucked up. My wife has forgiven me, so you forgive me." Even when Clinton had the chance, he said, "I can't say there haven't been moments." Cut to the chase, man. Anyone who does that right now will discover that the electorate is a bone-dry sponge waiting for a drop of water. We're just waiting for some guy to step forward on the first night of the debates and say, "Listen, if you're judging me on shit like whether I smoked a fucking joint 25 years ago, I don't want your vote." Only 30 percent of the country votes, but that's when the other 70 percent will say, "Are you fucking kidding me? Thank you!" That guy is going to be the president, and he's going to change things. But until somebody gets the balls, it's not going to happen.

[Q] Playboy: How about Ross Perot? You voted for him last time around. Now people think he's flaky.

[A] Miller: I don't care if he's flaky. If Perot had gotten in I don't know if he would have been better or worse, but the M in E=MC2 would have been replaced with an X for the unknown. He certainly would have stumbled around and inadvertently thrown a klieg light on what I think has become an incestuous little pool of self-interest. I guarantee you, if some idiot like Newt Gingrich called Ross Perot and said, "Ross, I'd like to vote with you on your crime bill, but I need you to throw me a bone—I need a water treatment plant in my district or I can't give you a vote"—Perot would have been on Larry King Live that night saying, "Guess who called me today and threatened me? That little motherfucker Gingrich!" He would have rocked the boat. The boat needs rocking.

[Q] Playboy: Before he dropped out of the race, did Colin Powell intrigue you?

[A] Miller: I don't think there should be a president, and I don't know why anybody would want the job. I don't believe in the system anymore. I think it's crappy and weird. I'm looking for something more like the queen and some legislative body, not as big as the Senate and with more power. I think we could probably pull together a star chamber of 16 to 20 guys. Powell probably knew it would be insane to immerse himself in this crap. The great men of this world all look at that job and say, "What, are you fucking kidding me?"

[Q] Playboy: Have you given up on the criminal justice system too?

[A] Miller: Six months from now I might turn 180 degrees on all these opinions—and honestly, I feel like a schmuck talking so much about myself—but right now it seems like a brutal system. Something is not working. There are too many cautionary notes, too much legalese and admonition. Nobody can go into a courtroom anymore and get a good, solid, code-of-Hammurabi, commonsense hard-on. It's over. It's like the jurisprudence equivalent of performance anxiety. I gave up on the jury system during John DeLorean's trial. He was videotaped purchasing a siloful of blow. What does he have to do to be found guilty? Do lines off the rail of the jury box?

[Q] Playboy: The death penalty?

[A] Miller: I believe in the death penalty.

[Q] Playboy: Abortion?

[A] Miller: No. [Pauses] I know. How do you reconcile the two issues? I don't see any sort of connect-the-dots. To me, those ideas can coexist in a pragmatic man's mind. One is an innocent unborn baby who has no say in anything. The other is, say, some idiot troglodyte who iced a cop. There is no middle ground. Some people should have their lives ended when they fuck around with the rules too much. But I don't think unborn babies deserve that.

[Q] Playboy: Should a woman have the right to choose?

[A] Miller: Fine. I would never tell anybody what to do. I really wouldn't. All I'll say is, "Here's what I believe." Then, if a woman said, "Well, I'm getting an abortion," I'd say, "That's your business." It's such a cosmically intricate issue. I have children. I love my children so much that I can't fathom it. But at the end of the day, it is a woman's choice. If there is accountability in the universe, she'll face up to it someday. On the other hand, it might not be wrong.

[Q] Playboy: Sexual harassment?

[A] Miller: I'm not a woman so I can't judge, but if a guy grabbed my breasts ... I could want him to grab my breasts, in which case it would be a nice moment. I could not want him to grab my breasts, in which case, depending on my degree of pissed-offness, I could elbow him or knee him in the balls. If he's my boss, I could realize it's not a job I'm going to want, that the guy's a pig. Then I could use the legal system to try to get him to stop. But until you really know what's happening—that it's not just a guy meeting you at the water cooler and thinking you're pretty and hoping he can take you out, saying, "Hey, you look nice today"—back off. Knowing what constitutes sexual harassment is just common sense. Everybody knows what it is if they stop to think.

[Q] Playboy: Most critics seem to like Dennis Miller Live. But some critics have complained about your sarcasm, your vulgarity, your laugh, the way you run your hand through your hair. Does that bother you?

[A] Miller: I'm aware of my quirks. I know I run my hand through my hair—that's a nervous thing. People also call me smug. But having a point of view is in the job description. My laugh was cultivated, but now it's my laugh. Also, I buy the word-of-the-day calendar and actually try to use the words. I've always liked words. So I'm reasonably at peace with what my critics say.

[Q] Playboy: When have you gotten flak for doing a topic?

[A] Miller: Everyone said our show about homosexuality would be a minefield. But why? At the end of the day all we said was that it's nobody's business what people are into. And then I put in the weird turn. I said, "Butbisexuals, I think we'll all agree, are just incredibly greedy motherfuckers. I don't ask much from people, but come down off the fence and pick a hole!"

[Q] Playboy: What's been your favorite show so far?

[A] Miller: Dysfunction—and I say this as a card-carrying member for much of my early adult life. I liked the guest, Wendy Kaminer [author of I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional]. She had good ideas. And the show made me laugh. I remember one joke: "It's hard to wake up from a fantasy where you're the epicenter of the universe to an Eraserhead reality where you're the condiment guy at Der Wiener Schnitzel."

[Q] Playboy: Not many people can work Der Wiener Schnitzel into a punch line.

[A] Miller: You like that? I've always tried to find a joke for Der Wiener Schnitzel, but until then it never worked. It's a nice confluence of words.

[Q] Playboy: How hard do you have to work to be the king of cultural esoterica?

[A] Miller: Part of my comedic talent is a Rolodex of arcane cultural references.

[Q] Playboy: Which is why you call yourself Citizen Arcane.

[A] Miller: It's not contrived. Jerry Seinfeld once said that comedians have a sort of sieve in their brains with holes that are just a little smaller, and it catches more stuff. That's what happens with me. That stuff just sticks in my head. I'm not being deep or flighty. Those things just come to me.

[Q] Playboy: But how many people understand it when you call Ross Perot "a Simon Barsinister replicant"? How do you leap from an Underdog cartoon to Blade Runner and expect everyone to get there with you?

[A] Miller: [Laughs] Perot looks a little squinty and kind of pissed off. Then you throw in "replicant," which is a great word, the kind you write jokes around. Critics like to take shots and say, "Dennis Miller is not as smart as he thinks he is." Well, I've never thought I was that smart. When I do a Simon Barsinister reference, I'm not setting myself up as cutesy-pie precious-smart. You're talking about a kid who watched a fucking Underdog cartoon, and it stuck! The little weird guy stuck.

[Q] Playboy: Aren't you worried about going over people's heads?

[A] Miller: I will never get so out there that people will have to consult the Cliffs Notes. If they don't get it all, that's fine. I sometimes throw in a reference just for myself. But I have an inner alarm that goes off after two arcane references. It says, I'll explain this in more depth later. Really, I have a formula by which I think, Get back to an easily graspable joke here, you idiot. I'm not into playing to silence. I want laughs.

[Q] Playboy: You've said that one goal of Dennis Miller Live is to "put the spine of vitriol into the staggering rag doll known as comedy." Has comedy gone limp?

[A] Miller: Let's face facts: Comedy has kind of killed itself. We all know it. It's not like it used to be. There's too much of it and too much is bad. It's not dead. There's always going to be an upper echelon of comedians who will make a living at it upstairs at the On the Rox of comedy. But the bottom room is empty right now. Too many guys wanted in. Comedians are the garage bands of the late Eighties and the Nineties.

[Q] Playboy: What made you decide to take telephone calls on your show?

[A] Miller: I guest-hosted Larry King Live a couple times and the phone calls were fun. Phone calls are a chance to fuck up out there. With that chance comes the opportunity to be D'Artagnan. Everybody wants to do that once in a while. I wanted to show off a little.

[Q] Playboy: You've been described as an angry Sixties liberal who joined the right wing. How close is that to the truth?

[A] Miller: It's not. I'm a conservative libertarian.

[Q] Playboy: Which means?

[A] Miller: I believe in everybody's right to believe whatever they want to believe. I admit that when you get into the Rubik's Cube inside your head, beliefs are sometimes contradictory. I don't believe in abortion, but that guy who killed Polly Klaas should have been dead before he was able to pronounce the "t" at the end of "I did it." The world would operate more smoothly. I don't want to understand Adolf Hitler. I don't want to understand Richard Speck. If you fuck up—Next! Bye-bye. That may come off as conservative, but it just seems pragmatic to me.

[Q] Playboy: In your act you talk about Republicans and Democrats steering an ocean liner. People fall overboard, and only the Democrats seem to care enough to turn the ship around to save them. But, as you say, you can't save everyone. People will drown anyway and that's just the way it is.

[A] Miller: There's a law of the jungle: It's a mean and unforgiving world. I don't think my saying that I've noticed the state of things is also an endorsement. It's just an observation. However, man's inhumanity is not in doubt. I mean, guys are fucking retarded kids in Bosnia. Gang rape of retarded kids? I hear that stuff and I wonder, How can that be possible in a human? I'm stunned at the dark side. Have you ever had a friend who was an alcoholic? You hold out for him, but you also realize that he probably has to smash the bridge of his nose on a curb and almost bleed to death before he pulls it together. I think that has to happen to the world. The world has sunk to a weird place. I don't have a big enough brain to define it any more clearly. I just know that I can't watch the news anymore because it makes me think we're living in a pre-apocalyptic world.

[Q] Playboy: Does this mean you don't have much faith in the positive potential of human nature?

[A] Miller: What is human nature from the beginning of time? What are the consistent themes? Two guys around a campfire, third guy comes across the river—let's club his fucking head in. I just read history, man. It's not like I'm being cynical. I'm being observant. It seems to me there's a lot of odd behavior out there. The only way to deal with it is to start copping to the fact that this isn't the DeBolt family. This is not one big lovefest here. Men are mean to one another.

[Q] Playboy: We can't wait until you get roasted at the Friars Club.

[A] Miller: I was part of a roast there for Chevy Chases I'll never forget it. It was my worst moment in show business. I was on 15th out of 16. The word cocksucker was passé by the time I got up there. Paul Newman was sitting right below me. Here's the classiest, coolest guy in show business, and I'm eating it. The first thing I said was, "You know, Milton Berle's dick is so big it makes me think he stole that, too." I forgot that Berle is a deity to the Friars. They hated that joke. I'd caught a sucker punch in the first five minutes of the bar fight and I'm reeling in front of an audience that I've completely alienated.

[Q] Playboy: What was your follow-up?

[A] Miller: "You know, when I was asked to perform here tonight I naturally summoned up the stereotypical image of a Friar as a short, bald, fat man in ill-fitting, coarse clothing. And now that I'm here I can see I wasn't too wrong." Boom. Now they hate me. I look down at Newman like, "Can you believe this?" and he avoids my gaze. It was my worst moment. It haunts me to this day.

[Q] Playboy: What about the MTV Video Awards show you hosted last September? Is it true that Michael Jackson threatened to kick your butt if you went after him?

[A] Miller: The producer told me that Michael said he would beat my ass if I said anything about the child stuff.

[Q] Playboy: Had you planned to?

[A] Miller: No. I had a joke about him and George Hamilton officially crossing lines on the pigmentation flow chart. That's not a horrible joke if you're not right in front of the guy. But then somebody from his side pointed out that he says it's a skin disease. Besides, I went on 30 seconds after he had brought the house down. Lisa Marie was in the first row. I was on in front of 300 million people, in 70 countries, and there were 6000 in the room who dig Michael. So, beyond good taste, it wasn't a good tactic for me to take this guy on and get killed and then have to stay there for three hours with people thinking, This guy's a prick. Fuck him.

[Q] Playboy: Do you think Mike could take you?

[A] Miller: [Laughs] I don't know. I was prepared. If he had come after me I was going to moonwalk away from him and say, "Don't make me break that nose again."

[Q] Playboy: Michael and Lisa Marie—did you think it would last?

[A] Miller: No. Just ships that went bump in the night. I can understand why he wanted to marry her. He's had such a freakish existence. He probably married her so he could look across the bed at night and see somebody who's had an even weirder existence.

[Q] Playboy: You've been likened to "a Mort Sahl who's funny and a Lenny Bruce who doesn't get the walkouts."

[A] Miller: You need walkouts. You need somebody to say, "This is too aberrant." Lenny Bruce, toward the end, got a little self-absorbed. And the people left him.

[Q] Playboy: What about Sahl?

[A] Miller: He meant a lot to me when I started. He's a fascinating man. I love watching his head. There are a lot of Palomar mirrors in his mind; they're bouncing all over the place. Some people say Mort was blacklisted. I think it's fatal to take yourself too seriously. You get unfunny. Comedians have a tenuous grasp on the audience, which isn't coming to you for anything except this involuntary elicitation of laughter. And once you lose sight of that and start talking about the Kennedy assassination ad nauseam, they're going to say, "What the fuck is this?"

[Q] Playboy: What do you think of your former Saturday Night Live cohort, Al Franken, getting into your territory with his best-selling book Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot?

[A] Miller: Franken is so much smarter about politics than I am. That guy is a wonk. Al and I came to the same fork in the road. I hung a right down Disdain Boulevard and became Citizen Arcane. He went hip-deep into the Pogo Politics Swamp. He digs it.

[Q] Playboy: What about Bill Maher? His show, Politically Incorrect, is so popular it's moving from Comedy Central to ABC. Is that something you'd like?

[A] Miller: No. I like working one night a week. He's doing five a week.

[Q] Playboy: You tried to do a talk show five nights a week. The Dennis Miller Show was canceled after six months. Why did you want to sit in that unforgiving hot seat of late-night talk in the first place?

[A] Miller: It was time to get out of SNL. I wanted to try something new. My son Holden had been born and I wanted to do something to make him proud. Also, you can make a lot of money if a syndicated show hits. Even though Arsenio Hall is taking a rest, he must be as rich as Croesus. [To Arsenio:] Baby, don't wade back in!

[Q] Playboy: Wasn't Arsenio a friend during your show's troubled days?

[A] Miller: He's a great guy. When things got bad he would send me handwritten notes of support.

[Q] Playboy: You blamed Jay Leno for much of the problem. But you've made up.

[A] Miller: I thought Jay did a couple things to me or my show that were wrong. They concerned booking. Going after me was like dropping an atom bomb on an ant. We were in trouble anyway. He was one of my best friends on the planet. He helped me find an apartment and smoothed things for me when I came out to Los Angeles. He gave people my name. I cared for the guy. Maybe it was because of the panic he felt replacing Johnny Carson. Anyway, I recently called him at work and said, "Jay, it's time to patch this up. I don't agree with certain things you did during our time together, but then again, I don't know what sort of pressure you were under. All I know is this: In the past two years I've probably sniped at you more than I had to. I never initiated chat about you, but I never ran from it either. But it's starting to ring hollow, so I want to apologize."

[Q] Playboy: How did he react?

[A] Miller: He said, "Well, I didn't know about all those things you think I knew about. I knew about some of those things. I apologize, too." Then I said, "Listen, let's not try to make this one of those sloppy things in the course of one phone call. Let's live our lives and see what happens. But I want you to know that it's over for me if it's over for you." And he said, "Fine." And then something weird happened: I got off the phone and I told Eddie Feldman, one of my writers, what had happened, and he showed me that day's USA Today. It was Jay's birthday. Eerie.

[Q] Playboy: What's your best memory of the Dennis Miller Show?

[A] Miller: It was quick and quirky and odd. Not traditional. I had beautiful, pure moments, like the night Ray Bradbury told me about the first time he confronted his muse. And then there were moments when I'd hit a complete impasse with someone and think, Fuck, I don't even know what I'm doing here.

[Q] Playboy: Was the panic button on your show pushed prematurely or was it a mercy killing?

[A] Miller: I think they made a mistake. They should have waited another six months. They had $10 million into the game and they should have stayed at the table. But they whacked me the first chance they had.

That said, at the time I didn't have the wisdom to see that I had to get out. I couldn't be doing that show right now. I wouldn't want to. So it's providential that it happened that way. One night a week is great for me.

[Q] Playboy: Why couldn't you hack it now?

[A] Miller: Simple: I now know it's more important to be a good husband and dad. I want to treat show business as the game it is. I have goals. Five nights a week was making me crazy.

[Q] Playboy: What happened to the great furniture on your old set? Did you get to take it home?

[A] Miller: KTLA, a local TV station, uses it on its morning news. I sat down in the chair there to do an interview and said, "Christ, I remember this chair." The weather guy, Mark Kriski, said, "Where's it from?" I said, "It's from my old show." He said, "Oh yeah, I see the bloodstain." A great line.

[Q] Playboy: How come you've never guest-hosted Saturday Night Live?

[A] Miller: I don't want to be like the guy who graduated and is back at the frat mixer trying to get laid around the beer tap. I think, Hey, pal, Peter Pan time is up. You have to move on. So I don't go back. Also, I'm not Lome Michaels' idea of a big star. In a weird way Lome and I are contentious right now. We're in a bad phase. Of course, he would never cop to this. I can just hear his tone on that one, that sort of disbelieving attitude: "Dennis said that? I don't even bump into Dennis."

[Q] Playboy: Why are you at odds with Michaels?

[A] Miller: Because I think he fucks with people more than he has to. That said, the guy gave me everything I have, and I will cop to that. He doesn't owe me anything except a little respect, because I think I was a good guy in the trenches.

[Q] Playboy: What do you mean, "he fucks with people more than he has to"?

[A] Miller: I don't want to be whiny, but he makes it harder to work there than it has to be. He has this theory that if he keeps you on eggshells he'll get your best work. That gets tired after a while. I found that sort of Henry Higgins manipulation endearing my first couple years there because I thought he cared about me. I figured any interest he showed toward me, even if it was detached mistreatment, was good. It's like a woman who gets slapped around. Why does she stay? Get the hell out. But she thinks, Well, at least I'm registering. When I used to register with him I'd think, God, that's Lome Michaels!

Lorne is a charismatic guy. He is charming. The first time you hear his comedy stories they're great. But everybody has feet of clay, and eventually Lorne repeats a story, and you think, Oh, fuck, he's just like me. He's got the same eight stories I have and occasionally forgets who he's told them to. That's in your second to fourth years. In your fourth to sixth years you see him being mean to people sometimes. You think, Gee, it doesn't have to be this hard.

[Q] Playboy: Did you learn anything from Michaels?

[A] Miller: Important things. One was: He'd comment about a sketch that I'd chosen to do and he'd say, "I didn't like that." I'd say, "Well, Lorne, a lot of people this week said they loved it." He'd say, "What the fuck does that mean? Do you think the people who hated it are seeking you out? People who come up to you want to say nice things to you." He was right.

[Q] Playboy: It's been reported that the women on SNL are second-class citizens. True?

[A] Miller: [Smiles] It's a vicious gladiator camp. Remember that scene in Spartacus where the guy is painting the other guy with different colors? He says, "This is a maim zone. This is a stun zone. This is a kill zone." Show business is tough. It's rarefied air in terms of how many people want in, so it gets pretty ugly. But do I think something that's really funny doesn't get on because a woman wrote it? No. You're dreaming. It is hard enough to fill up an hour and a half. I don't think they're sexist in picking stuff. But I also don't think women, across the board, have learned to be the self-absorbed motherfuckers you have to be to get on the show. It's a tough place, man. The cast was so big. Before the last cast change you were talking about 14 or 15 people who had trudged a long, hard road and they're now at the gate. It is a metal gate that you can see through into the promised land. They know that only one or two are allowed in. And women, while it's getting better, still have a bit of a bastard-child mentality as a result of years of second-class treatment. They hesitate to step up and say, "Move, (continued on page 168) Dennis Miller (continued from page 68) motherfucker. I'm in now." Well, see, that's sexist there. That's the weird period we're in. But you have to be like Dennis Rodman on the offensive glass.

[Q] Playboy: Would you rather have male or female writers on Dennis Miller Live?

[A] Miller: When I hire people for the show, I take the names off the stuff I read. I don't want to know who wrote what because I don't want to get into all that shit. I want to read the jokes. I say, "Hire number one, number four and number eight." If they were all women, that would be fine. I'd be like Bosley on Charlie's Angels. But if they were all men, I'd be fine with that, too.

[Q] Playboy: Rate the SNL anchors.

[A] Miller: There have been only two since me. Kevin Nealon always wanted to be an actor, anyway. Kevin has a great comedic mind, but I don't think he paid enough attention to that newscast because he was blocking the six or seven other sketches he was in each week. Weekend Update is a tough mistress. It's you, dead on to the camera, for eight to ten minutes. For him it was more of an afterthought.

Norm McDonald's really good at it, but his meter is becoming a little predictable. He's doing jokes that have the same noir payoff, and he has to watch that. You can't get trapped.

[Q] Playboy: Rate yourself.

[A] Miller: I had a good routine. People knew I would go down with the ship. When ajoke fucked up I would say, "Can you believe I looked at that at some point during the week and thought it was funny?" I swear to God, the key to my success on the show was that not once in six years did I let a stinker go by without letting the audience know that I knew it sucked. They felt unviolated by me. That lets the audience trust you. I would also laugh at some of my jokes—to the consternation of critics—and have fun.

[Q] Playboy: Where did your Weekend Update pen flourish come from?

[A] Miller: Conscious insecure need for a hook. I didn't want to be like Chevy Chase. I knew I'd get sick of being compared to him. I decided to be the anti-Chevy. I was never vaguely a news anchor. I was Dennis Miller and I was a complete score monkey. I wanted to endear myself to the crowd—at any cost [laughs]. So I realized that if I was going to be unmannered and unpredictable, I'd better have a wraparound people could bite into. I knew that, on a weekly basis, the American public loves its hooks. So I thought, How can I look detached from this thing so that I don't seem to take it so seriously? The answer: Say "I am outta here" at the end, and do the pen thing. Pfft, hey, I'm outta here.

[Q] Playboy: Words for your tombstone?

[A] Miller: [Laughs] I've never thought about that. Chevy's will be: "I'm dead and you're not."

[Q] Playboy: Let's go back to the beginning. When did you recognize your comic instincts?

MILLER: I was quiet in grade school and sort of a loner. But my mother told me I was a gregarious baby—very talkative. Somewhere along the way I got quieter, though not because there was anything wrong with me. I used to have great lines in high school. I never said them, but they still came into my head. The comedian was in me then. I just didn't let him out.

[Q] Playboy: What made you come out into the open?

[A] Miller: Seeing Robin Williams' first HBO special. That was so long ago that the audience celeb cutaway was Joanne Worley. At one point, Robin was rifling with John Ritter, and he was so unteth-ered. I know Ritter was watching him like Moses at the promised land, thinking, He got in. Why can't I? I know I'm making a great living on Three's Company. I do a great pratfall. But this guy has entered the magic world. All I could think was, I have to try that. I have to get into that game. That'll make me feel great.

[Q] Playboy: But you didn't try to emulate Williams.

[A] Miller: I toyed with being like Robin, but you get dealt that hand and you can't cheat. When I started I did prop stuff, which I soon set aside. At least I didn't put a cantaloupe on my head. I was also inspired by a guy named Kelly Monteith. He was sharp and accessible and a craftsman. You can tell I'm proud of being a comedian. I think it's a noble vocation.

[Q] Playboy: But it's not without its trying moments.

[A] Miller: In the beginning, I worked the Pittsburgh comedy clubs. Other comics would come through town, and if they sensed that the local talent would probably stay local for a while, they'd cannibalize your act. They'd think, Well, this kid is stuck, he's not going anywhere. I'll take this back. He'll never know. When I finally got to L.A. I had a pretty decent act. Seinfeld or Leno helped me get on at the Improv for Bud Friedman. I didn't know anything about the business except that Bud was a big to-do. He wears a fucking monocle, which is intimidating. I always figured that if you're not Werner Klemperer, why are you wearing a monocle? So I go onstage and I do pretty well. I don't remember burning down the house, but I had a nice ringing double standing up at second. I come off and Bud grabs me and says, "Young man, I don't know who you think you are to come into my club and steal regulars' material, but you don't do that. This is Los Angeles, and you don't do other guys' jokes." What had happened was that guys were taking my jokes back to L.A. I've since grown to be reasonably good friends with Bud and his wife, but that night I drove home in tears. I was 31 or 32 years old, and I thought I'd really blown it. I thought I had been marked with a pentagram as a thief.

[Q] Playboy: Didn't you try to explain?

[A] Miller: He didn't want to hear it. He wanted the aisles cleared. He wanted drinks poured. I was in shock. I left thinking I'd fucked up. I thought, God, the fates are cruel. So I went to the Comedy Store. Frightening. I had comedy friends, but L.A. is really competitive. It must be like the Mustang Ranch. You don't want to fuck for a living to begin with, but you sure don't want to be passed over once you've made that concession. It's like, "Geez, can somebody fuck me now?"

[Q] Playboy: How did you do at the Comedy Store?

[A] Miller: I think I killed. The owner, Mitzi Shore, sits in the back. She's so funny. To this day I don't know her. I remember her calling me over and saying, "You're obviously not a stage performer, but you're a pretty good writer. If you insist on going onstage, I think you should wear more sweaters." [Laughs] I remember looking at her and thinking, Wow: Wear more sweaters. What the fuck does that mean? I actually mulled it over for a day, thinking that she had some insight into comedy. Then I realized I'd missed the point. It's not about getting into the club feeder line, like Pink Floyd's The Wall, where some people get channeled into the crushers and a few get siphoned through. It's about staying away from it. I decided to go on the road and put together an hour so devastating that one day I would do it and everyone would say, "Who the fuck is that? Where is he from? Why haven't I seen him, and how does he have an hour?"

[Q] Playboy: When did you finally settle on your comedy style?

[A] Miller: The night I saw Richard Belzer at Caroline's Comedy Club in New York. I had previously thought comedy was about caloric expenditure, about getting along with the crowd or sucking up, about being a good little boy and then getting your due. Then I saw Belzer total a crowd! Napalm! They loved it. A woman in the audience kept screaming for him to do his Mick Jagger imitation. Finally Belzer said something to her like, "What am I, your fucking comedy pet? Why don't I just come down there, tie your husband to a chair and make him watch while I fuck you?" And I thought, Bingo! There it is. The audience gets enough sucking up in their lives. They get enough of people trying to ingratiate themselves. They want to laugh. They don't give a fuck how wicked it is. They don't care if you abuse them. They'll suffer you through many things if you just look like you're in command. Belzer in that era was Patton onstage. And I remember telling myself, "Hey, get off sucking up. They're not looking for you to be endearing. They want you to be proficient. And if it gets a little rough around the edges, if it gets a little mean, they'll follow you if you're good at it."

[Q] Playboy: Who are your comedy gods?

[A] Miller: Steve Martin is probably the greatest stand-up comedian I've ever seen. Our approach to comedy, though, is antithetical. He is just funny. There's a purity about that. I saw him sing King Tut one night in a 20,000-seat arena. It was brilliantly mindless. He is Willy Lo-man out there: The briefcase isn't that full, and he's selling the hell out of it. I also like Seinfeld. He's the evolved New-hart. A buttoned-down brain and maybe the best joke writer on the planet. And Steven Wright. I always imagine that if my therapist had done comedy he would be Steven. Some of his jokes are so well crafted that you have to lay them down on a black cloth, get out the jeweler's loupe and just stare at the facets. David Spade is brilliantly funny. And there's a new guy, Brian Regan, who makes me laugh as hard as anyone.

[Q] Playboy: What about women comics?

[A] Miller: Roseanne, the time in Denver when she opened for me at the Comedy Works. How about that? [Laughs] When I'm in my dressing room I usually hear a modicum of laughter for the opening act. This was like a crowd scene from The Day of the Locust. I said, "What the fuck's going on out there?" I went out and saw this wonderful mind at work, with a great persona. I remember thinking of a pissed-offTotie Fields. I don't want to be one of those guys who has an apocryphal tale about my influence on Roseanne—which is nil—but I do remember saying, "If you were in L.A. you'd be a great big star." Then we went to McDonald's. We didn't have a car and the doors were closed, so we had to use the drive-through window. We walked up and got burgers and sat on the curb, and she was sweet and devastatingly funny. I didn't hear from her for a while, and the next thing I knew someone said, "Hey, that Roseanne girl was on The Tonight Show."

[Q] Playboy: How did you learn to write a good joke?

[A] Miller:Saturday Night Live gave me that because I had a schedule to keep. I had to get rid of the whining. Joke writing is really a whiny process. You have to step up to the precipice, look down and see how full this Marianas Trench of your potential is. And if you see a puddle, it's heartbreaking. You want a Jeroboam. We all kind of creep up to the edge and say, "How creative can I be?" Saturday Night Live ripped that whole thing out of me because it became, "OK, it's Friday. I go on TV tomorrow night, live, at 11:45, and if I'm not loaded for bear, nobody falls to the pavement but me." There is no net. You can potentially eat it in front of 10 million people—horribly eat it. No buffer zone, no seven-second delay. It's, "Fuck! Did you see that? He spontaneously combusted!"

[Q] Playboy: What was the routine?

[A] Miller: I'd sit down at 4:30 every Friday afternoon with Herb Sargent, and we would Rorschach through the news. Now, I'm sheepish in many ways; I'm reticent and not really self-confident. But I used to get to that point on Friday where I knew I had to be an animal. I would refuse to be defeated, and that's a great feeling. It's exhilarating. It's like you finally find this hero that we all hope to find inside ourselves. I'd get my ten minutes together and I'd know that I'd bought myself a free zone. To me that's the best thing about comedy, that free zone, after you score, after something really scary.

[Q] Playboy: Like a runner's high?

[A] Miller: It's real calm. I'd walk off, decompress and the endorphins would kick in. I loved that feeling. I feel placid as I talk about it now.

[Q] Playboy: Why does everybody who leaves Saturday Night Live think they have to be in the movies?

[A] Miller: Well, I never made a play for it. Now I'm getting some play. Maybe I didn't look like I needed it that much.

[Q] Playboy: In fact, you once said, "Acting isn't my cup of tea." Then you did Disclosure, The Net, Never Talk to Strangers and now Bordello of Blood. Do you want to recant publicly?

[A] Miller: I must admit there's something about a comedian's Marlboro Man existence that makes it nice to come off the range and get into a warm cabin with some bunkmates for a while. I like the cooperative process more than I thought I would. It's been fun. I've met great people on movie sets.

[Q] Playboy: Tell us about Bordello of Blood.

[A] Miller: It's a little vampire movie written a long time ago by Robert Zemeckis. Although I have a limited background, it could be the best film I've done so far.

[Q] Playboy: Why?

[A] Miller: It's the character that's closest to me—sort of flippant. I get to walk through this vampire film with a raised eyebrow. It's like Dennis Miller airdropped into a whorehouse staffed by topless vampire chicks.

[Q] Playboy: And your mission in this is to ...?

[A] Miller: Eradicate them. I play a private detective. There's great carnage at the end. I run through with a Supersoaker filled with holy water, just melting the vampire chicks. I put bottles of creamy garlic salad dressing into their mouths, squeeze and blow up their heads.[Laughs]

[Q] Playboy: Do you have sex with any of the vampire babes?

[A] Miller: [Laughs] It never actually occurs. Sylvester Stallone's ex, Angie Everhart, is the head vampire. She wants to have sex with me, but I kind of avoid her. OK, I'm afraid. I don't actually get laid in the film, come to think of it. But so what? I co-star with Chris Sarandon, who plays a cleric who realizes the evil of his ways. He rediscovers his commitment to the good side and at the end he and I are Starsky-and-Hutching it through this whorehouse.

[Q] Playboy: Sounds like you would enjoy a film career.

[A] Miller: I'd have to take it on a film-by-film basis and consider the financial rewards. After 12 hours on the set I'm saying, "Fuck this for the day. Let's go home. Let's get some rest." So far, nothing has made me burn to be an actor.

[Q] Playboy: Do you burn to be funny? Do you need it to live?

[A] Miller: I think so, but I haven't fully explored that hypothesis. The only time I've ever really not been funny in front of people was when I lived in Paris for a couple months. The language screwed me up. I was always on the periphery of conversations and not able to include information, much less the slant that is humor. And after two months, yeah, I began to feel a little removed.

[Q] Playboy: Are great comedians born or made?

[A] Miller: Hard to say. Lots of pieces to the pie. You have to be a bit of a loner. Mix in brains. A disaffected quality. A bemuse-ment at what others find enticing. Comedians aren't the kind of people who play team sports. I'm not saying they're all in pain—indeed they aren't—but they are standoffish. Some are ostracized by the pack. And pretty bright. A little needy. Putting your esteem in the hands of 400 drunk strangers is definitely adventurous. Just the fact that you get out there is. It's not something you intellectualize: "I could if I wanted to, but maybe next week." It's like, "Ah, fuck, I have to get up there, and this is part of it." I remember the first time I jumped up, thinking, Oh, Christ, what am I doing? I was petrified. Most people are. But I don't believe that it's ever horrible.

[Q] Playboy: What's it like when comedians get together?

[A] Miller: We're a dark breed. We earn a living making laypeople laugh, but when we get together it's a whole different game. Anything goes. It's wicked. We go for one another's jugulars and weak points. We nail one another about our worst set, our worst TV shot. And the way you react to the slings and arrows of your peers determines whether you're a player or not.

[Q] Playboy: How do you deal with what's served?

[A] Miller: A good comeback. You can't get too uptight about it. And you don't want to look lame. Seinfeld was on Dennis Miller Live once and he said, "Love the opening." He was talking about the bit where I shoot some pool. I said, "Oh, thank you." Then he said, "You're acting a little there, aren't you?" That took me off at the knees! Jerry's one of those guys who never wants to see you trying too hard. It was bemused detachment. It was just brutal.

[Q] Playboy: Once upon a time, weren't there occasional postmidnight sessions at Leno's house?

[A] Miller: It was weird, man. When he wasn't doing a nightly show, no matter where you were in Hollywood, you'd go up this hill to Jay's house. It was like the summit. It was a tough club to earn your way into. The degree of black humor that went on in that house was directly related to who was there. Some of my best times were there with Seinfeld, Ron Richards, Leno and Jeffrey Cesario, who is my executive producer. Anything was fair game. Jay is one of the smartest men on the planet. If you did bad panel with the puppet on Madame's Place in 1971, he knew it. Jay had a big-screen TV and we'd watch it. If you flip through 100 channels, you can see the whole bizarre bouillabaisse of life. We would rip things. It was so funny. It was the purest comedy I've ever heard. Those were magical moments when connections were being made by a pretty astute group of guys.

[Q] Playboy: You've said that your wife and two kids have changed your perspective on life. Your company is even called Happy Family Productions. Is career really less important now?

[A] Miller: It's important on a different level. I hit the jackpot. I'm in love with a woman and I got two great kids out of it. I'm not as worried about losing my career. My wife and kids have defused a lot of personal bombs for me. My career just doesn't stack up to my personal life.

[Q] Playboy: What do you do that makes your wife laugh?

[A] Miller: Sometimes I will act stupid. I shouldn't say this, but I have characters that I do for my wife. [Smiles] I can see Garry Shandling reading this: "He's admitting he does characters!" Now he's on the phone. I've never revealed these characters to the world because I don't think they're for general consumption.

[Q] Playboy: Now is a good time.

[A] Miller: [Smiles] There's one I do around the house, called Caribou Boy. That's all I need to say. I've already revealed too much by saying the words caribou and boy. I feel like I'm beet red now. Caribou Boy makes my wife laugh.

[Q] Playboy: A boy who runs with caribou? Half-caribou, half-boy? A boy who plays for a sports team called the Caribou?

[A] Miller: You'll get nothing more from me on Caribou Boy!

[Q] Playboy: Does your marriage prove what women's magazines say, that a sense of humor is the most important quality in a man?

[A] Miller: It can be on a long car ride.

[Q] Playboy: How did you meet Ali?

[A] Miller: One night I saw her leaving Catch a Rising Star as I was talking with another comic. She walked by me with two men, and I thought she was the sexiest woman I'd ever seen in my life. That was my first impulse with my wife, pure lust. I was never very adventurous with women, but I felt I had to follow her out onto the street, if for no other reason than to continue to look at her. I walked out on the street and I heard her, with an accent, say to one of her friends, "So, what should we do now?" And I thought, Man, if I don't say something, I'll never get the chance again. I jumped in and said, "I think you should come with me." These three people looked at me and I said, "Well, I heard the accent. Obviously you're from out of town. I thought as a good New Yorker I should buy you a drink, show you a place to have a drink—the three of you." One guy went home, so now I'm with her and the other guy. They said, "Yeah, we'll go have a drink." So I took them to the Columbus Café over on the West Side. The other gentleman eventually went to the bathroom and I said, "Is that your boyfriend?" She said, "No, he's just a friend." I said, "Well, would you have lunch with me?" I didn't even want to do the dinner thing. I thought I was so in over my head, anyway. I was telling myself to take it easy. When I asked her to lunch, I said, "You're the most exquisite woman I've ever seen." We got married about a year later. I'm still smitten.

[Q] Playboy: Did she know who you were?

[A] Miller: She knew what Saturday Night Live was but hadn't seen it. She had been living in England.

[Q] Playboy: What sealed the deal for you?

[A] Miller: She made me laugh that first night. We were talking about favorite cities and I said something about liking San Francisco and finding it to be—well, you can tell I had my bachelor rap out—one of the "more European," and therefore interesting, American cities. She said, "Well, of course it's interesting. James Brolin shoots Hotel there." I remember thinking, Wow! Did you say that? I'm looking at that body, that face, and a pissy Jimmy Brolin line comes out. Boing! It was such an odd reference. And for somebody like me, it was perfect.

[Q] Playboy: You named your first son Holden. Are you a big Salinger fan?

[A] Miller: Yes. But what fascinates me even more than The Catcher in the Rye is that the author just blew Dodge. Could not handle it. I get that same creepy feeling once in a while, like I've stepped out too far. At the beginning of your career, when your back's against the wall, it's all very linear. Then when you get successful, it starts to get peripheral, and you have to divert a lot of energy from being creative into just keeping your place. I very much admire that Salinger just split. It makes me laugh that he would put that much energy into dodging pictures at the post office.

[Q] Playboy: Why does that strike a chord?

[A] Miller: I feel a little needy in terms of cultivating the approval of strangers. I don't think that's something you come out of the womb with. I pooh-pooh that neediness and feel a little sheepish about it. I admire guys like Salinger because they not only pooh-pooh it, they also head in the other direction. He could be a major cultural figure if he wanted to. Instead, he doesn't give it up to anybody. He doesn't talk about his little feelings. I admire that.

[Q] Playboy: How happy are you?

[A] Miller: I'm not Leo Buscaglia, but I'm pretty happy. I go out with my wife and boys. I walk around my home and feel I've carved out a little piece for me. I'm a lucky man. I'm so lucky that I trivialize it by saying I'm lucky. It looks like I'm trying to accrue some suck points by saying it. But I'll say it again: I got lucky. I have an easy, nice life. I'm loved and I'm capable of loving. I've learned a little monkey trick that they give me green rectangles for, and a pretty good stack of them. I meet young comedians and they say, "I don't think you're soft. I kind of dig what you do." I got it all, man. I caught the cosmic wave and I'm riding it all the way to the shore.

I never had to be the guy who set the flag on K2 and lost three fingertips. I'll get to fifth base camp with Mongo the Sherpa and boil water.

Remember that scene in "Spartacus" where the guy is painting the other guy? He says, "This is a maim zone. This is a kill zone." Show business is tough.