My one-cigarette interview with David Cross

Photo by Fred Benenson

One bad night in St. Louis turned David Cross off to the whole town. I love that he’s still so grumpy about it. I remember that night well.

A friend sent me this RFT piece about David Cross telling Reddit that St. Louis is the most humorless city in America, citing a night at Saint Louis University back in 2001.

I was the student newspaper reporter who interviewed David Cross at SLU after that show. At least half the audience had walked out on his performance. And while Cross didn’t really want to talk to me, he agreed to be interviewed for the length of one cigarette.

My story from 14 years ago still lives on the internet but it’s pretty flimsy, weakened by my distress for the staffer who booked Cross and a lack of detail. What I do remember is this:

Cross was captivating that night. Many of us stayed throughout his whole set because he was killing it and repulsing us and often doing both. I was a sheltered 19 year old at and had certainly never seen anything like it.

It was an easy audience to offend. The event was held as part of Welcome Week and many of those brand new Catholic college freshmen were watching the act with their parents. Even if you’re going to laugh at a joke about David Cross being raped by the Virgin Mary, you’re probably not going to do it in front of your mother. Do you want to go see Louis CK with your mom? Good for you. I don’t.

To be clear, I still don’t think that rape joke was funny. But many of those people weren't going to laugh at Cross anyway.

Back on that fire escape after the show, while dragging on his cigarette and giving sideways glances to his publicist*, Cross told me that he didn't realize it was a Catholic school until he got there and saw the crucifixes on the wall. Ok, sure. I guess that’s possible. But I think it’s more likely that something else happened.

I think Cross still remembers that night because he still felt like he had something to lose. Maybe a great comedian feels that way every time they perform. In 2015, Cross could come back and just do Tobias Funke for an hour and the kids would love it. But in 2001, most of us didn’t know who he was, and he wanted us to remember.

It took some cojones for Cross to realize that the person who booked him had made a huge mistake, then to bring out his most awkward, lewd material anyway in hopes that some of us would like it.

Otherwise, we wouldn’t still be talking about it.

Looking back, I also admire SLU for not pulling him off stage. It’s a conservative school, but someone was smart enough to know that silencing a comedian’s free speech wasn’t a good move either.

(Aside: Jim Gaffigan also performed at SLU while I was there, and who would have known that his bizarre Hot Pocket bits would evolve into his super-Catholic dad-of-5 routine?)

I went on to spend many a late night in my 20s eating pizza with my roommates and binge-watching episodes of Arrested Development, admiring Cross as his weirdness grew in the best of ways.

Give St. Louis another try, Mr. Cross. They will know and love you now, and you can probably land a better gig than a Catholic college on parents night.

*Or, some lady. I don't know. It seemed like she was there to protect his time.

Postscript: Since I posted this, my friend Courey sent me the link to the recent Nerdist podcast interview with Cross where he talks about this in detail and, well, our recollections of that night are pretty similar. You should listen to it. And, one of the Nerdist guys cracks a similar joke about college kids just wanting to see Tobias Funke. It would be kind of amazing. I've also learned via Facebook that some of my friends did stay and watch Cross that night, and it's a story they remember and tell. So, you gave a bunch of SLU kids some cred, D.C. We desperately needed it.