Atlantic City Weekly

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Considering the plight of the newspaper industry, perhaps Kathleen Madigan chose wisely when she left her post as a features reporter during the late 1980s for comedy.

“I worked long enough as a journalist to realize that I really didn’t want to be a journalist,” Madigan tells Atlantic City Weekly. “There had to be something else out there for me.”

Madigan, 44, gave comedy a shot 21 years ago and by 1990 it was her occupation. “I didn’t get paid a lot, but when you’re just out of school you don’t need that much money,” Madigan says during a telephone interview from her Los Angeles home.

The St. Louis native didn’t give up journalism entirely. She scored a gig as an ESPN 2 reporter in 1991. The emerging sports network was so impressed with her wit she was offered a gig as an anchor the following year.

“I was like, ‘Wait a minute,’ I’m supposed to move to Bristol, Conn., [ESPN homebase] for just $28,000 a year?’ I also don’t love all sports. I’m not into college football or NASCAR. That wasn’t the job for me. I found the right job.”

Indeed. Madigan, who has appeared on The Tonight Show and Late Night With Conan O’Brien, is an inveterate stand-up.

Madigan, who will perform Saturday, March 20, at the Trump Marina, will crack wise about religion, politics and pop culture.

“I voted for Barack Obama, but I wasn’t a big backer like my sister, who is 10 years younger than me,” Madigan says. “She was like, ‘C’mon, vote for Barack, don’t you have any hope left?’ I told her that I lost hope for this country when American Airlines stopped giving out pillows. If I had been one of those rabid Obama backers, I would be a little ticked off. When you look at who he’s picked, it’s the Clinton administration again. Is this really change?”

When Madigan isn’t performing in America, she’s doing USO shows in the Middle East. “It’s nothing like the military commercials when you see what the soldiers have to deal with in Afghanistan,” Madigan says. “No American soldier is fighting a dragon. Afghanistan makes Iraq look like Las Vegas. They show you the tent where you sleep and the tent where you go to the bathroom. I wanted to know where the tent was where you quit.”

But Madigan is impressed with the transformation of Iraq since America invaded in 2003. “We’ve built hospitals, roads and given jobs to people. If it were a show, it would be called Extreme Country Makeover. I think America should invade Detroit. We should get everybody out of there, bomb it and make a new Detroit and everyone would be happy.”

Madigan is happy that she recently graduated to the theater/casino circuit. “I didn’t want to have a boring old job working in the office with the same old people and situations everyday,” Madigan says. “But it started becoming a bit predictable playing the same clubs in Omaha and Cleveland. But now I’m playing a lot of places I haven’t been to before and it just makes it interesting for me. I’m playing new venues and I have new jokes.”

The affable Madigan also has a new gig. She is toiling as Dr. Phil’s special correspondent. The quirky humorist hits the streets and has fun with unsuspecting people. “It’s a fun job,” Madigan says. “It’s just one more good thing to happen to me. But it’s been a succession of good things that have happened to me since I’ve made comedy my career. There are obvious risks when you become a comedian. But isn’t there risk with just about everything that you do today? I would rather take the risk being a comedian than working for some company that will terminate you out of the blue. Comedy has certainly worked out for me. I have no regrets.”

Kathleen Madigan talks about Madonna’s fake British accent:

Madigan is amazed at how different the comedy landscape is today. “It’s dramatic how it is now compared to when I started,” Madigan says. “It’s the same for society. There were no cell phones or Internet back then. But as far as comedy, you went on Johnny Carson and boom, you were headlining Las Vegas. There were just a few channels and everyone was watching those channels. Today there are hundreds of channels. There are so many outlets to showcase what you can do as a comic. But you’re not performing in front of an audience like you would have been during the Johnny Carson era. It’s more of a marathon than a sprint today and I’m fine with that. But a lot of other comics aren’t fine with that and they quit. They want a normal life, a family. They look at other options. Once I got into this, there were no other options for me. This was it and I’m so glad I stuck with it because I couldn’t imagine doing anything else.”

Kathleen Madigan
Where: Trump Marina, A.C.
When: Saturday, March 20, 8pm
How Much: $30