Now sober, “Jackass” Steve-O does stand-up at the Hollywood Improv, realizes decline in American culture

You may have seen Steve-O do stunts you wouldn't expect any human being to do willingly, but before Wednesday night, you most likely had never seen the "Jackass" daredevil perform stand-up comedy clean and sober. Or at least sober, as Steve-O's 10-minute set Wednesday night at the Hollywood Improv's ComedyJuice show was anything but TV-clean, dishing about his sexual dysfunction, celebrity culture and the devolution of our culture.

Steve-o_2010 Steve-O (aka Stephen Glover) told The Comic's Comic after the show that, although he has gone onstage to perform stand-up before, this was "only my second time in sobriety." You can see a clip showing Steve-O joking at The Laugh Factory a few years ago about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.

Toward the end of the show, he took the stage at the Improv on Melrose and acknowledged to the crowd: "I'm sure you're all wondering what I'm doing here. If I f*ck it up, it's all Dane Cook's fault." Audience members laughed. But Cook was standing by the door, watching his set. And just little more than a week ago, Steve-O and Cook took part together in a live YouTube show for Young Hollywood. Steve-O noted that it felt odd to be so scared of doing stand-up, considering all of the dangerous and downright painful things he has done for the Jackass TV series on MTV, as well as its movies — Jackass 3-D is coming out this fall. 

"Jackass 3-D. Just another insult in what I like to call … a career," he said. "It's f*cked up. I get paid to endure pain, and now people want to see that sh*t in 3-D!"

Steve-O, who performed recently on Dancing with the Stars, said he wouldn't do just any TV project anymore, saying he had to draw the line at a possible Vh1 dating show. Why? "I don't want 30 women to be telling everyone" about his premature ejaculation problems. Not that that was stopping him from doing so, as well as noting that in a celebrity culture, it doesn't seem to matter.

He announced that he's now 2-1/2 years sober, and joked: "You know you have a drinking problem when Johnny Knoxville is your interventionist."

Steve-O had a camera guy documenting his performance, and told me afterward that he's hoping to pitch a TV project involving his efforts to gain a foothold into stand-up comedy. There's more to it than that, but I'll let him to tell the network execs himself.

Sean L. McCarthy

Editor and publisher since 2007, when he was named New York's Funniest Reporter. Former newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News, Boston Herald and smaller dailies and community papers across America. Loves comedy so much he founded this site.

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2 thoughts on “Now sober, “Jackass” Steve-O does stand-up at the Hollywood Improv, realizes decline in American culture

  1. Good for Steve-O. It’s fucking hard to live life Sober. Really Hard. It’s way harder than any tricks he or any of the other guys ever did on Jackass. Don’t believe me…. TRY IT!

  2. When I was asked in year 6 who my hero was, I said Steve-O. He is the kind of guy that always made me laugh. To here a few years back he went on suicide watch, I was shocked. The downfall he went through to hear how far he has come now makes me feel really happy for him. Good on you Steve-O, this time your life is on your own terms.

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