Kevin Pollak Chat Show

[priceyeah]

I had no idea this show exists, but I came across a reference to it on Basket of Kisses, the big Mad Men site. Pollak just had Michael Gladis and Rich Sommer on.

Pollak is a very good interviewer, which for some reason surprises me a bit. He basically plays it straight, but throws in jokey stuff every now and then, so it's a very satisfying mix. It helps that he seems genuinely curious about the people he's interviewing, plus he's just very comfortable in front of a camera.

http://kevinpollakschatshow.com

[priceyeah]

I guess I'm the only one watching this....

I just looked at the one with Dana Carvey, and I think people here would enjoy it a lot, very informative about his early days, standup vs. sketch and so forth. And holy mother of God, does he throw out the funniest random bits in between.

[kevin]

i saw one ep. the one with huebel and scheer. it was great. but to me pollack seems a little out of place hosting a talk show, like maybe he's not cut out to do it and sort of realizes it himself. he's got what seems like a humongous staff and a reasonable budget but his bits are kinda weak and his asides seem more dry than genial.

i've never seen him do stand up. how is it? i've heard him do all sorts of impressions, though, from christopher walken to christopher walken.

[priceyeah]

He's funnier than Jon Favreau, you got to give him that.

[metal2000]

I liked Pollak's stand-up the one time I saw him here in Winnipeg.

I'm a big fan of his show, but only if the person he's interviewing interests me. I've added it to ShowbizMonkeys.com's late night guest listings and also post the embedded video of the previous week's show (you can find it via a new direct domain: www.latenightguests.com -- cheap plug!).

I like that he gives the interview time to grow (with 1 or 2-hour slots depending on how many guests he has that week) and I've seen some really interesting ones. Hank Azaria was great, as was Huebel/Sheer and Rob Corddry. And it was nice to hear he and Winnipegger Nia Vardalos spend a good chunk of time chatting about Winnipeg (he's filmed 2 movies). So far he mostly has on either people he's friends with (Azaria), people he's met via Twitter (Huebel/Sheer/Corddry), or people he's a big fan of (the "Mad Men" actors), which makes the interviews that much more engaging.

Thumbs up from me so far!

[beccaBeccaBECCA]

I just found Kevin Pollak's Chat Show last week and I LOVE it. I found it via Nick Kroll's twitter (he was on two week ago) and his episode was great. This past Sunday, Chris Hardwick (G4, Attack of the Show, Web Soup) was on - and Pollak was basically helping Harwick fine-tune his stand up act.

Every time Chris Hardwick said something funny, Kevin would say "Is that in your act? No? It should be!" ...

He should have a new podcast called Kevin Pollak: Stand Up Consultant.

Great show. I definitely recommend it. It goes looooong though. Both episodes I've seen so far were over 2 hours long. But it's substantive. And funny

[maxbarth]

Watching one now with Seth MacFarlane. Who knows.

So far, pretty good.


[Edit: Wanted to laugh - SWITCHED TO DANA CARVEY interview. Loved the shout out to Yuengling. Didn't realize most people haven't heard of/had it]

[MattB]

America's Podcast Guest Paul F. Tompkins was on fairly recently as well, which is always worth checking out.

I feel like Pollack as a host is still sort of a work in progress. His biggest problem in my mind is that he doesn't let the guest just tell the story. He'll be so eager to show that his people did the research that he will step on what the guest is about to say and reveal a bit of information that would have just come out naturally if he had just sat back.

This was especially evident in the episode with Weird Al Yankovic, where Al called him on it at least twice.

The show on a whole is pretty good though. I like that Samm Levine is there to pitch in from time to time and the games are typically pretty fun, especially when the guest gets into it. Rob Huebel's Larry King was priceless, as was PFT's, for that matter.

So yeah, well worth the time in my opinion.

[onelinedrawing]

I like it a lot, i started watching just as i started to have to taker a commute to class one hour bus each way, it was cool to have something to look at rather than listen to a podcast and play solitaire.

I wouldnt watch every episode though only ones with guests I had some level of interest in.

[metal2000]

Forgot to post this a while back... my interview with Mr. Pollak from early November. Was supposed to do one in person when I was in L.A., but there were scheduling conflicts, so we had to do one over the phone once I returned to Winnipeg.

http://www.showbizmonkeys.com/features.php?id=1401

[masterofsparks]

The recent-ish David Koechner episode was pretty great.