David Cross:
Making America Great Again!
At the Wilbur, March 27 at 7:30 p.m. and 10 p.m.; March 29 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets: $29-$39. 866-448-7849, www.thewilbur.com
David Cross has been a whirlwind of work for the past couple of years. There was “With Bob and David,’’ which reunited the “Mr. Show’’ cast for Netflix; the third and final season of “The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret’’ for IFC; and his film directing debut, “Hits.’’ And that doesn’t count his voice-over work in the “Kung Fu Panda’’ franchise and a cameo in “Pitch Perfect 2.’’
But on his current “Making America Great Again!’’ tour, Cross is focused on nothing but stand-up comedy again. He plays the Wilbur Sunday and Tuesday.
True to the tour’s name, a variation on Donald Trump’s campaign slogan, there is political material. Speaking by phone the day after Super Tuesday, Cross was “cautiously optimistic’’ about Trump being the Republican nominee, because he thought it would help dispel the notion that Barack Obama’s election as president marked the beginning of a post-racial America.
“Now we see it for what it is and it’s always been there, and it’s ugly and hateful and ignorant and lacks empathy and, you know, that’s a third of America,’’ he says of Trump’s support. “Maybe this is the kick in the ass we need. But probably not. That’s why I say ‘cautiously optimistic.’ ’’
Not that he has any more faith in Hillary Clinton, or Democrats in general: “Here comes Hillary,’’ he says. “Eight years of Clinton. Eight years of a stronger Democratic machine, and ever inching away, increasingly, from a true democracy.’’
Still, don’t expect an hour of political vitriol from Cross. He says he’s bringing a mix of silly and goofy material, personal anecdotes, and topical subjects. “Clearly I’m not up there yelling and screaming for an hour or talking politics for even a third of the time,’’ he says. The first 20 minutes, especially, is silly, safe, crowd-pleasing stuff. “There’s nothing offensive,’’ he says. “It’s designed that way, but the first 20 minutes I think everybody will be happy with. It’s the next chunk where people get upset and leave.’’
Cross’s work tends to attract a passionate crowd, for better or worse. The main complaint he heard about “Bob and David’’ was that there weren’t more than four half-hour episodes. Fans wrote letters to help get “Arrested Development’’ back on the air; Netflix released a new season in 2013. And “Todd Margaret’’ got its final season at IFC in part because of support from fans on Netflix.
“It’s nice to know that the thing you like, that you spent a lot of time on, that really didn’t make any kind of real impact when it initially came out, was discovered a few years later,’’ he says of “Margaret.’’ “And that applies to ‘Mr. Show,’ too, because, people assume we were popular or highly rated, but we weren’t. We were very much a little niche, cult thing that kind of grew over time.
On the flipside, Cross knows his work can be polarizing. “I’d say 40 percent of people hated ‘Todd Margaret’ or my stand-up,’’ he says, “and 40 percent of the people love it, and maybe 20 percent are like, ‘Eh. It’s all right.’ ’’
Cross doesn’t work on stand-up much while he’s focusing on other projects, which is partly why it has been six years since his last stand-up tour and its resulting special, “Bigger and Blackerer.’’
He says he now has more than enough material for his new “Making America Great Again’’ special, which will tape at Austin’s Moontower Comedy & Oddity Fest on April 22.
“I will stop thinking in terms of stand-up when I’m doing, say, ‘Bob and David,’ and then I’m looking at things through a sketch lens,’’ Cross says. “And I say, ‘I can’t do stand-up right now.’ I wish that wasn’t the case, but I have to focus on one thing.’’
David Cross: Making America Great Again!
At the Wilbur, March 27 at 7:30 p.m. and 10 p.m.; March 29 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets: $29-$39. 866-448-7849, www.thewilbur.com
Nick A. Zaino III can be reached at nick@nickzaino.com.
