BONUS: Interview w/ Sam Miller

In this BONUS episode of Nighttime Benders, we sit down with headlining comedian Sam Miller, who’s coming to town later this month. We talk life on the road, touring stories, and how sobriety has shaped his comedy journey. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

Hi everybody and welcome to Nighttime Benders. This is actually a little mini bonus episode, a little quickie, with one of our favorite comedians, Sam Miller, who I had the chance of sitting down with today. He's gonna be coming through Central Oregon with his headlining show on June 14th. And before he tickles your funny bone in person, we thought you might like to get to know him a little bit more. I hope you guys loved this conversation with Sam as much as I did. We got to hear all about how his journey from sobriety to headlining comedian has made him the person who he is today. So please enjoy Sam Miller. Well, okay, so that's a great place to start. So how long have you been doing comedy, Sam?

SPEAKER_01 0:54

I've been doing stand-up comedy for 12 years this month, actually.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

12 years this month. And and can you tell us your comedy origins story?

SPEAKER_01 1:03

Yeah, I've been in recovery for a long time. So I'll have uh this this year, I'll mark 18 years clean off of drugs and or alcohol for me. And uh I was involved in uh like recovery groups and stuff like that for addiction stuff, and people would call on me and I'd get asked to speak at different like conventions and stuff, and people kept being like, You should do stand-up comedy, and I'd be like, Oh, I'm a dishwasher, you know, I got a good thing going. And then uh one day I did it, and it turns out they were right. Like, I I really love it. And so yeah, I was walking down the street and I saw there was a stand-up comedy open mic, and uh I just went in and did it, and uh I did pretty good my first time. And uh yeah, it was uh it was love and hate at first sight.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

So Yeah, absolutely. And you're not the first comic that we've talked to that's sober. Why do you think that there are so many sober comedians out there? What do you think about sobriety and comedy go hand in hand?

SPEAKER_01 2:07

Well, I think a lot of folks I think more than anything that addiction and comedy didn't really work that well together. If you look at all my all my dead heroes, you know, like my favorite comedian is Mitch Hedberg, you know. And uh you look at folks like that that uh had the world at his fingertips, you know, and uh yeah, and I think another thing too is that uh doing stand-up comedy is already like a pretty brutal lifestyle with the ups and downs. Getting used to rejection, trying to earn that thick skin that I've gotten to that I'm so lucky to now have that when you combine that with uh chasing chasing like some sort of chemical relief, you're kind of asking for trouble. But if it makes you feel better, there still is a lot of drug addicts and drunks in comedy.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

So oh, fantastic. They haven't all left the profession.

SPEAKER_01 2:58

No, no, no, no. We've still got a warm, warm place in our heart for some battered bastards, you know.

SPEAKER_00 3:05

Uh there's a place for everybody. There's a place for everybody.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Amen.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

So tell people a little bit about the show that you are bringing to Bend.

SPEAKER_01 3:12

Yeah. Um well I'm in Madras, which is very close to Bend.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Yeah, Central Oregon.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

Yeah, yeah. It will be uh it's Sunday at the Madras Winery, I believe. Let me double check. Oh my god, I'm on the spot.

SPEAKER_00 3:27

No, I understand how that is. Sometimes when you're touring, it's hard to keep the venue times, start times, door times straight for all the different conversations that you're having with people.

SPEAKER_01 3:38

Oh, yeah, it's the Marigas Winery, is where it's at. Not Madras Winery. I'm in Madras at Marigas. Yeah, it's my second time there. We had a blast last time. It sold out last time. I think what they said that if uh if we sell enough tickets, they might open up the garage door and let more people in, you know. And uh yeah, it's gonna be fun. It's uh it's a Sunday show. It's gonna be pretty laid back. It starts at um doors are at six, shows at seven, and yeah, I've done a lot of comedy in central Oregon. I'm gonna be I'll be back in Bend in late August as well, and that'll be that'll be wonderful. Yeah. Yeah, I've done I've done, God, I did an American Legion Hall in uh geez, outside of Bend in one of those little cities. I can't even remember what it was called.

SPEAKER_00 4:25

Yeah, there's there's lots of American Legions in Le Pine and Redmond. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

I think I did the one in Le Pine. That was really fun.

SPEAKER_00 4:32

There you go.

SPEAKER_01 4:33

Yeah. I've even done it, hey, check this out. I've even done a show in Lakeview, Oregon, which is a tiny, tiny place with a very, very small geyser.

SPEAKER_00 4:43

Yeah, you're like, it's absolutely beautiful, but you've never heard of it.

SPEAKER_01 4:47

Yeah. Yeah, right. It's wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 4:50

What do you like about touring? It sounds like you're on the road all the time. Ooh.

SPEAKER_01 4:54

I like the freedom, you know. I like the I like that feeling you get when you uh finish a show. And especially in like a smaller town where people are genuinely surprised that the show was as good as it was. It's getting a little bit harder for me to surprise people because my profile has grown like a lot, which is a good thing because it's easier to get people out to shows. I like it when I have like this weekend, I will be uh this tour. You know, I start in Roseburg and then I go to Ashland and then I go from Ashland uh to to Madras. And I'm excited. I'm gonna go by Crater Lake, I think, on my way there. I'm gonna take a detour. Stuff like that's amazing. You know, I've been in Tennessee a whole bunch the last month. And uh, I mean, I was just in Alaska last weekend, so yeah, just seeing seeing all the beautiful sights and honestly meeting people, you know. I like that. I like I like the folks in Central Oregon. People are generally pretty nice, you know. I like going to the cities, I like going out in the middle of nowhere. I think that's enough stuff. That's a lot of stuff that I like about it.

SPEAKER_00 5:59

Yeah, no, I understand. I understand the feeling. It's always nice to kind of it's all the new stimulus, you know. And it sounds like you've been all over. Do you handle your own bookings or do you work with a team that helps you get these shows all over?

SPEAKER_01 6:10

For the most part, it's just me. There are areas of the country where I'll use like a booking agent, you know. I have a guy up in Alaska who's been helping me. There's a guy down south that helps me. It all depends, you know, on where I'm going, but generally it's just me. It'd be nice someday. My I have a friend and kind of a mentor, this guy, Nate Jackson. He talks about how we all kind of wear different hats. As a professional comedian, I have these different hats, you know, and there's the performance hat and the writing hat and the the the what do you call it, promoting hat.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:42

And hopefully you get to a place where you can hand those hats off. I am not in that place yet. Yeah. So I get to I get to continue to wear all these hats.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Yeah, and show up for interviews like this one to help promote your shows. I love that. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:57

This is an easy, this is an easy part of my job.

SPEAKER_00 6:59

This is Okay, you're like the talking part's fine.

SPEAKER_01 7:02

Yeah, yeah, the talking part's fine.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

How do you get the word out about your shows when you go to a new town? Do you primarily rely on social media or the venues, or what do you find most effective?

SPEAKER_01 7:11

Uh it's nice when the venues help, but a lot of it is social media, including running ads on social media. So like I have an ad running in Ashland right now. I have one running in Roseberg. I don't have any currently running in Madras, but I might, I don't know. We'll see.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

Hopefully the I you know, what I what I've talked to a lot of people is like when you get the support from the venue, the ads aren't necessarily as important as they are for a show that might not quite have as much support from the venue marketing wise.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

And honestly, a thing with this show is that I've been not only to Madras before, but I've been to this venue before. Yeah. And I really like the fella there that runs the winery. He's a sweetheart dude and uh loves making wine. And and the show went really well last time. It was really fun. And uh people people remember that and like you know, word of mouth is still so important. Like people sleep on it, you know, and also traditional media like newspaper radios and stuff. I still do a lot of traditional media, you know.

SPEAKER_00 8:14

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And so if you've been touring for twelve years, that means that you survived the pandemic, right? Yeah. So how was that kind of coming back to road life after after all the changes?

SPEAKER_01 8:27

It was tough. And I wouldn't say I've been touring for 12 years. I'd say so. I've been doing comedy for 12 years, but it's been my full-time job for about six years. So and that's when the majority of the Yeah, yeah. It was it was rough. It was rough. The pandemic was really hard on a lot of us, and uh I had a lot of going really good momentum going into 2019. So much momentum, in fact, that I was planning on I was planning on quitting my job at the end of 2019 and going into comedy, and that's when uh that's when the world stopped uh for a little bit. I was working at the time, I was working with homeless youth in Pierce County. And so I just kind of dove into that head first.

SPEAKER_00 9:11

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

I wound up uh helping to run a a shelter in Tacoma.

unknown 9:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:17

Homeless shelter for youth in Tacoma. And uh yeah, it was really, really hard. And uh and then on the back side of that, like coming back was pretty amazing. I I still remember the first show I did after the pandemic. I was on a patio out in Portland, Oregon, and um I remember the first laugh I got, the first big laugh I got, and it actually screwed me up because it felt so good that I forgot like my next joke. I actually had stopped the show and I was like, oh my god. Like I forgot what it was like.

SPEAKER_00 9:46

You know, you're like Tinkerbell, you need the applause. You know, it brings you back to life.

SPEAKER_01 9:51

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:52

So when you're not on stage, what do you like to fill your time with?

SPEAKER_01 9:56

Uh a lot of family stuff, you know. I uh I recently fell in love with a bike. Like I have a bike now, so I've been riding my bike.

SPEAKER_00 10:03

Like a pedal bike?

SPEAKER_01 10:05

Like a pedal bike, yeah. Yeah, it's been wonderful. Yeah, because I need the exercise too. So uh two birds, one stone situation.

SPEAKER_00 10:13

Now, is it an electric bike?

SPEAKER_01 10:15

No, no, it's just a regular bike.

SPEAKER_00 10:16

Oh, it's an old school, like use your own energy pedal bike. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 10:20

Yeah, I didn't want an electric bike because I know that you can pedal those ones too, but I'm just naturally like a lazy person, and I think I'd lean pretty hard on the electric side, you know.

SPEAKER_00 10:30

Yeah. I mean, like if cheating's easy, I'm gonna do it, you know?

SPEAKER_01 10:34

Oh, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

That used to get me into uh that used to get me in a lot of trouble.

SPEAKER_00 10:42

I imagine that a lot of people who are sober have, you know, stories of reasons that they became sober. Do you work that stuff into your set? Do you talk about kind of your your previous addiction life in your set?

SPEAKER_01 10:54

Yeah, yeah. That's uh that's kind of you know it's funny, it's one of those things that I'm kinda known for is is mining my checkered past for comedy. And uh I got plenty to mine. And you know, uh not just like the difficult parts about when I was an active addiction, but also the hard parts about like my life now, you know, there's certain parts of my life were a lot easier when I was a drug addict, you know what I mean? Like I didn't have I didn't have to look I didn't have to worry about taxes or like you know or things like that. And uh definitely had like a much more open calendar, travel planning, emails, like none of that stuff, you know. And uh so I like talking about that, like my new life, you know. So Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:42

Well I imagine it gives people that might still be in a cycle of addiction some hope that on the other side there's humor, right? Like you can look back on it and find the humor.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

Yeah, I've gotten some amazing um I've had some amazing experiences with folks that have my comedies help them find some kind of like some kind of solace, you know, in this world. And uh that's pretty big.

SPEAKER_00 12:08

Yeah. No, it's it's nice to know your work's having an effect and that people can tell you that is the best thing about live entertainment is the feedback is right there, you know.

SPEAKER_01 12:17

Yeah, I've tried to um I've been writing a lot, like I've been working on a book, I feel good about it, but that's the challenge to writing is that you have to be like you have to be okay with just um your own feedback, you know, to be like, oh, I think this is probably pretty good, but I won't know for a while, you know. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 12:37

Until I hand it to someone else.

SPEAKER_01 12:39

Yeah, stand-up comedy, man. There's there's there is something really special about it. And uh, you know, I've gotten to do some like really big venues. I've I I do smaller venues, I do everything in between. And yeah, this I'm looking forward to this tour.

SPEAKER_00 12:53

Yeah, no, I we're definitely looking forward to having you here in town. You have Liam Gibler opening for you. Have you ever seen Liam perform before?

SPEAKER_01 13:01

I don't think so.

SPEAKER_00 13:02

Oh, he's fantastic. You'll wonder you'll enjoy his comedy. It's very good. Yeah. I produced a show and I took him on tour with me to Idaho and Wyoming, and I was associated on tour. Yeah, he's he's a young comedian. I think you're really gonna like his stuff at the time.

SPEAKER_01 13:16

What kind of performance do you do stand-up too?

SPEAKER_00 13:18

Yeah, yeah. I do a show called Pinups on Tour. It's like a World War II style variety and comedy show. We go all over.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

Oh, that's fun.

SPEAKER_00 13:25

But so it's like it's more vintage style, but we have stand-up, and it's like I like to think of it as if like Bob Hope and a Vegas showgirl had a baby.

SPEAKER_01 13:34

Oh, that's wonderful. You know what'd be fun? What if I dressed up like a B-17 and I was on your show and I just did jokes from like the perspective of a B-17?

SPEAKER_00 13:46

That would be that would be unique for sure.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

It could be really cool. And I could cut out my the the stomach, and that could be like the ball turret. I think it's a really good idea.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

I'm picturing it in my head. I'm picturing it in my head. When you're writing a joke, where do you generally start? Is it just stuff that comes to you, or do you have a process that you use for writing your comedy?

SPEAKER_01 14:07

It's usually I'll have a stupid idea like the one I just had.

SPEAKER_00 14:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:10

And then I'll I'll make a little note in my phone and then I I take it from there. There's one I was working on today. Oh, yeah. I had to go to the dentist this morning.

SPEAKER_00 14:20

And the dentist.

SPEAKER_01 14:22

Yeah, it was rough. And they were doing x-rays on my teeth. And she put the thing in like the back of my mouth, and she was like, All right, bite down on this so I can take these x-rays. Except, like, I don't have I'm missing teeth in the back. And she was like, bite down, and I'm like, with what? Like, there's nothing back there. What bite down with a memory? Like, what are we talking about?

SPEAKER_00 14:48

I know. I feel like they're being what is that, ableist? She's being ableist.

SPEAKER_01 14:53

I think it was really foolish. I mean, you work with teeth, you can't tell there's not one there. That's a red flag, you know.

SPEAKER_00 15:00

Yeah, that's funny. So when you're back home, you're taking care of life stuff. When you're on the road, do you pretty much just like travel, sleep, show, or do you get out and explore while you're traveling?

SPEAKER_01 15:12

I drive so like I'm so annoying. Sometimes comics will be on the road with me and they they're not used to it. But I uh I put avoid highways into my maps, and uh I mean it. I'll take the longest way and then I'll stop. I'll stop, like I'll just see, I'll see like a garage sale or a swap meet, and I'll stop, and then I'll just talk to people, you know. And I like talking to people. It's really lonely. It's gotten lonelier too. Like uh it used to be so exciting, like hotels and rental cars, and now now it just makes me really sad. So what I do is I try to fill up on conversation, you know. And that counteracts the how much I hate driving a RAV 4 with Michigan plates in Florida, you know. They're like, we know it's a rental, yeah, or Florida plates in Michigan. I think that might be worse.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

That I that's probably where I'm actually from Michigan. That's where I went to college. And I will say, I know there is, but there is, there is like, you know, there's a Florida Michigan rivalry for sure. It's not as tight as like the Michigan-Ohio rivalry.

SPEAKER_01 16:19

I think Florida has a rivalry with everywhere. Nobody likes Florida.

SPEAKER_00 16:23

You know, some Florida people like Florida. That's I I I've spent quite I like I have this like weird affinity for like the weird Florida person. You know what I mean? It's like I I like a good original human being.

SPEAKER_01 16:35

I I didn't like Florida for a long time. And then I was on tour there one time and I stopped at the swap meet, and I was like, it's hot. I was like, I hate Florida. And then this Rad Haitian lady made me some strawberry lemonade and it was really good, and then I was like, I like Florida.

SPEAKER_00 16:53

Yeah, Florida's chill.

SPEAKER_01 16:54

I just had some good lemonade.

SPEAKER_00 16:56

Yeah. You see, that's the thing. That's what you gotta people realize. Like, once you have a human connection to a place, it's a lot easier to like it, you know?

SPEAKER_01 17:04

Yeah, there's nothing wrong with Florida. I mean, it is what it is. People are people.

SPEAKER_00 17:07

Well, of course, it's not as beautiful as Madras, where you're gonna be.

unknown 17:10

No.

SPEAKER_01 17:11

This week. I love it out there. I love Central Oregon. I love all the volcano stuff out there. That's like my favorite thing about it out there. I'm so excited to go to Crater Lake. I've never been there. I've traveled so much all over the Northwest and like I didn't mean to do it to go from like I can't remember which of these shows. Oh, you know what's crazy is that I was supposed to be out in Elk City. Like, I was supposed to be down in the Redwoods. I was going down to but I screwed it up. I screwed it up, and the shows that show's not till next year. No. I I replaced it, and then you know, it'll it'll be fine. I'm looking forward to it.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

So well, we're looking forward to have you. If people want to come check out the show, where's the best place for them to get tickets?

SPEAKER_01 17:51

Yeah, sammillercomedy.com. It has all my all my stuff on there. Yeah, use SammularComedy.com and then you go to backslash tickets or you just click on the tickets and schedule portion of my website, and there it is.

SPEAKER_00 18:06

Perfect. And if people want to connect with you personally and follow you, you're active on the socials, where can they find you?

SPEAKER_01 18:11

Oh yeah. Sam Miller Comedian on Instagram and Sam Miller Comedy on Facebook. And uh Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:17

Great. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us. Is there anything else you want to share with the source audience before we leave?

SPEAKER_01 18:24

No, just uh just know Central Oregon. My uh I'm true with my words and my deeds. And uh there's a reason I come to Central Oregon as much as I do, and that's because I really do like it there.

SPEAKER_00 18:35

So Well, perfect. We like having you. Thank you so much, Sam.

SPEAKER_01 18:38

Hey, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 18:39

Thank you so much for listening to our conversation with Sam Miller. I hope you liked getting to know him as much as we did. If you want to get to know other funny faces that are coming through Central Oregon, please remember to subscribe to Nighttime Benders wherever you get your podcast. And if you like what you're here, please give us five stars. It really does help as we get our new podcast off the ground. Thanks so much, you guys. Till next time.