Comic Jim Jefferies is beaming. Not just for being sober over 700 days however for settling down, having a beautiful spouse, wonderful youngsters, and a improbable profession. Oh, and for lastly making an attempt hashish in his 40s and completely loving it.
No stranger to the arduous partying life of medication and alcohol, Jefferies had beforehand abstained from weed however lastly began exploring the plant throughout the pandemic and hasn’t regarded again.
“Throughout COVID, I used to be sitting round consuming an excessive amount of, blacking out, and forgetting the entire night time,” Jefferies stated. “No matter occurred, I used to be forgetting issues. So I began taking edibles and lower out the consuming.”
Throughout our dialog, the Legit star addressed his adventures with weed and his newest Netflix particular, Jim Jefferies: High & Dry, which expands on his profession trajectory, cancel tradition, cocaine, his joke writing course of, and the way weed makes him much less paranoid.
Excessive Instances Journal: Rising up in Australia, did you all the time know you needed to pursue comedy?
Jim Jefferies: I needed to pursue stand-up comedy from the time I used to be 13 however didn’t inform my mother and father or anybody else out of worry I’d be informed I wasn’t humorous. I ended up pursuing musical theater at college as a result of I knew I needed to be an entertainer, and I believed so long as I might get into the humanities perhaps I might do stand-up later.
I did some open mic spots after I was 17 that didn’t work out very properly, so I didn’t do it once more till I used to be about 20 or 21. Now it’s been my full-time job for the previous 24 years.
When had been you in a position to lastly share along with your mother and father that you just needed to be a comic book?
It got here out of necessity. I used to be learning on the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts—WAAPA—on a full journey scholarship and ended up getting nodules on my vocal cords and needed to have surgical procedure. Whereas the restoration time now could be about 4 days the place you’ll be able to’t speak, again then you definately couldn’t speak for a few month. I simply determined, “Fuck this, these [vocal cords] will come again; I ought to cease being so gutless and simply do the factor I truly need to do.” After I might speak once more after the surgical procedure, I went head-on into stand-up comedy and type of forgot about the remaining.
I don’t assume anybody in my household or anybody actually thought I’d achieve success. I feel they thought that I might have a job doing it, however you must keep in mind that within the late ’90s/early 2000s, there have been two comedy golf equipment in Australia, so it wasn’t even an occupation. It wasn’t a matter of “if I might do it,” it wasn’t an precise job [at the time there]. We didn’t get HBO specials or something like that. We had 4 TV channels and the one specials we had had been Eddie Murphy: Delirious and Eddie Murphy Uncooked as a result of they had been cinematic releases and you may get them on video. Aside from that, I solely actually received to see stand-up comedy in five-minute bursts on late night time reveals in Australia when some comedian was visiting. It was a darkish time, man [laughs].
What helped you uncover your personal model and standpoint?
I feel the very best motivation for anybody who desires to get into comedy is to see some people who find themselves unhealthy at it. I noticed some individuals who had been unhealthy at it and I keep in mind considering, “I can do higher than that.” If everybody I noticed was superior it will have appeared so unattainable, but it surely was the individuals who had been doing it and getting paid who weren’t that good [that gave me confidence]. Not all of them, however the occasional act and you’ll nonetheless see them to at the present time. I used to be like, “I can undoubtedly do higher than that bloke.”
After I was learning musical theater, they all the time gave me the humorous roles, so I used to be assured that I used to be humorous, however I didn’t know if I might put collectively materials and that sort of stuff. However [everything that happened] simply felt prefer it occurred organically. I went up at one membership, then I did it once more and I did it once more. I moved to England and I bullshitted my manner into some golf equipment and I’ve simply been doing it ever since.
I additionally discovered my social group. Earlier than that, I used to be working as a bartender, a waiter, promoting cellphones—after which impulsively I discovered individuals who I felt much more much like than I had earlier than. I’m not going to offer you a wanky reply like, “I by no means actually slot in,” or something silly like that—as a result of I slot in effective. Going to the Edinburgh Comedy Festival [for example], I keep in mind being round all of those like-minded folks and it was an actual type of eye-opener for me. My profession is a product of the Edinburgh pageant.
Individuals will do issues extra by way of social media now—put up clips and attempt to get their 5 minutes on late night time reveals and that sort of stuff. However after I was beginning out in Britain, if you happen to had been an act that went to Edinburgh, you had been a profession act and also you had been actually giving it a go. Should you had been a man who would simply dangle across the golf equipment, you had been simply doing it to earn a bit of money. However if you happen to needed to make a profession out of it, you needed to go to Edinburgh. Edinburgh was a spot the place the entire media got here and noticed you. You weren’t doing 15 or 20 minutes at a membership, you needed to do an hour. Individuals had been coming simply to see you.
In America, you had quite a lot of comics who—within the early 2000s—had been making an attempt to get their 5 minutes so tight so they might get on Letterman. I used to be making an attempt to make my 10 minutes so lengthy that it could possibly be an hour, and in order that’s why I’ve this meandering, storytelling vibe to me as a result of I needed to work within the longform much more.
Which appears like the other of what different comics had been striving to do.
I feel that’s why after I got here to America, I stood out slightly bit. I had a 30-minute story about muscular dystrophy and taking a good friend to a brothel. Individuals didn’t actually do this again then. Now, with everybody making an attempt to get specials, my model appears slightly extra commonplace nowadays.
I by no means thought I’d get any tv or something like that. I believed I’d develop into slightly cult act at greatest. Now, I’m internet hosting a recreation present in Australia, so it’s all type of rotated—issues that I believed I’d by no means do.
My profession was by no means an in a single day success, it was an actual gradual construct. The individuals who simply uncover you all the time assume it’s an in a single day factor the place you got here from, however I used to be getting there one step at a time—simply constructing, constructing, constructing. I feel it was a extra natural approach to construct an viewers than at the moment with the web and I don’t know if the best way my profession occurred might occur at the moment.
Due to the best way the comedy trade has modified?
Yeah, I wasn’t a very good self-promoter or proactive in that manner. I simply thought, if I stored going up and crushing, extra folks would see me and extra folks would see me. All that mattered was how good I used to be on stage.
It was additionally a unique period. There weren’t digicam telephones and stuff like that so you may be a little bit of a—properly, I used to be a drunk. So I’m drunk up there, I’m on cocaine, I’m performing like a idiot. However everybody round me was type of doing the identical factor. It felt very regular. It felt like we had been extra like rock acts than the rest.
Now, you type of get performed for that. Individuals would videotape it and also you’d should apologize or one thing.
So in some ways, you’re saying the profession trajectory that you just’ve had was a product of the instances.
Yeah and unusually I used to be additionally a product of the web within the sense that I received punched within the head and other people observed that. Then the gun management factor went viral, however I by no means put any clips up. I don’t even know easy methods to load a clip to YouTube, however the web did assist me in the long run. I’m not saying one’s higher or one’s worse, I’m saying the setting that I grew up in was a a lot completely different setting than what comedy is now.
Everybody talks about backstage at The Comedy Retailer they usually go, “There was once medicine in all places.” I heard it was painted black so when folks dropped their cocaine they might discover it. That’s not the tradition anymore. The tradition’s fully completely different. You’d be seen as type of an outlier if you happen to acted like that now.
I’m glad these days are over. I couldn’t have sustained them endlessly and now I’m in a a lot happier place. I want I’d type of received to the place I’m now in my life loads sooner.
Was there a defining second or set of experiences the place you felt stand-up was the factor you had been going to do for the remainder of your life?
Most likely after I first received into the London Comedy Store. It was such a coveted place to get into, was the toughest membership to get into and I used to be nonetheless solely perhaps 22. I’d solely been doing comedy for a few yr and I received in there and I keep in mind having the stress of getting to do that gig and the entire different comics had been so properly established and I simply held my very own. I didn’t look misplaced, and I keep in mind considering, “I can truly do that now.”
There’s moments although the place I believed I’d made it, like taking part in Carnegie Corridor. After I performed Carnegie Corridor—and that was a decade in the past—I keep in mind considering, “If all of it simply ends now, I can all the time say to anyone that I did Carnegie Corridor.” However that wasn’t as vital a second for me as stepping into the London Comedy Retailer.
When it comes to the place you are actually, you’ve simply launched your newest Netflix particular Excessive & Dry, during which you speak fairly extensively about discovering weed.
I by no means took weed in any type till my 40s and I all the time thought stoners had been a little bit of an odd group of individuals. I by no means favored smoking a joint and I nonetheless don’t like smoking a joint—I discover it arduous on the throat—however then edibles got here into my life throughout COVID.
Throughout COVID, I used to be sitting round consuming an excessive amount of, blacking out and forgetting the entire night time. No matter occurred, I used to be forgetting issues. So I began taking edibles and lower out the consuming.
I haven’t had a drink in 700 days now however I’ve tried to surrender alcohol three different instances: As soon as for a yr and two different instances I went three months. There have been additionally intervals in my life the place I had alcohol beneath management and I used to be consuming like a accountable particular person, but it surely all the time received away from me. When it received away from me, my conduct wasn’t good and my relationships with different folks would disintegrate. However ever since weed got here in, I’m a happier particular person. It actually did change my life.
How does weed affect you now and what do you utilize it for?
Effectively I don’t do it daily—solely about three days every week—and it helps me not be depressing.
It truly helps me with paranoia. Different folks go the opposite manner, however with me it appears to settle that down loads, and it received me off antidepressants. I used to be on antidepressants on-and-off for a yr—went again on them throughout quarantine—then received off them and simply took weed and I haven’t gone again since.
I’ve received two younger youngsters and it positive helps with watching Pixar motion pictures. I used to should muscle by way of these however now I’m like, “Go forward, throw it on. Let’s watch [Finding] Nemo once more.”
The colours and the plotlines develop into much more engaging.
Jim Jefferies: [Laughs] And also you begin seeing subplots. I get proper into it.
Creatively, does weed assist your course of?
I don’t go on stage excessive however I’ll take an edible after I get off stage and sit back. I do write quite a lot of jokes whereas excessive although, after which the following day I’ll take a look at them and go, “Effectively that’s not that humorous.” However no less than they make sense.
After I was drunk, I used to write down some jokes down they usually didn’t even make sense to me. I couldn’t even learn the handwriting. Each every now and then I’ll write a joke whereas excessive and skim it again and go, “There’s one thing in it,” however most of my jokes—if primarily based on one thing foolish that occurred—I’ll provide you with them the day afterwards. I’m not going to say that weed helps my writing or that it helps my performing, however I don’t imagine it hinders it in any manner.
I’ll say this about alcohol—I had the very best reveals of my profession whereas drunk. The most effective ones I ever did. However I additionally had the very worst ones I ever did—those that I’m ashamed of in that class. Whereas sober, I’ve had wonderful reveals and a few unhealthy reveals, however I’ve by no means had any fucking horrible ones. The issue with alcohol is that issues fly out of your mouth in a short time and that’s good in comedy in the event that they’re the suitable phrases. In the event that they’re the fallacious phrases, fucking hell.
You talked about you could not provide you with bits whereas excessive, however that an concept or seed of an concept will resonate the following day. How so?
Plenty of the concepts are formulated [while high] after which the writing occurs the following day. The one drug that may aid you provide you with actual batshit loopy jokes is mushrooms. Batshit loopy jokes. If you write jokes on cocaine, you assume every little thing is good. If you write jokes on mushrooms, you assume every little thing is on this increased degree and that you just’re considering on a unique airplane from everybody else. If you write jokes on weed, every little thing’s foolish, and foolish’s not all the time that nice.
Do you will have a desire in relation to strains?
I prefer to calm down on indicas and finish the day with them. I’m not a “get up and take it” sort of man—if it’s on vacation, positive—and I don’t take loads, solely 20 milligrams.
For some, 20 milligrams is a stable quantity.
Effectively I began at 10 and now I’ve moved on to twenty, however I’ve performed that silly factor the place you’re like, “I’m wondering what 50 seems like?” After which I’m like, “No, no—don’t do this once more.” [Laughs] That’s an excessive amount of for me. I’ve performed that a few instances the place I’ve gone all in after which gone, “No, no. An excessive amount of for me.” I by no means go greater than 30, and that’s if I’m seeking to have an actual good time.
Creatively, what impressed Excessive & Dry and what do you hope folks take from it?
This final particular is a little bit of a throwback. I used to be type of doing a particular the place I believed, “I’m simply going to say no matter I need,” as a result of I’ve had specials the place I received criticized for saying issues that I believed had been borderline. Persons are all the time going to say you ought to be canceled for this joke or canceled for that joke, so for this particular I simply thought, “Fuck it, I’ll simply say no matter I like.”
My life is fairly good now. I’ve a stunning spouse, I’ve nice youngsters, I’m comfortable at residence, and I’ve good pals. I’m not the offended younger man I as soon as was so I feel I can get away with saying extra risque stuff now as a result of I’m barely much less confrontational.
After I was youthful, I used to need to virtually change folks’s minds or give them issues to consider. Now, I don’t consider it like that. I simply need to say the issues that I feel are humorous and my hope is that my fanbase has aged with me and has type of gone by way of the identical shit I’ve gone by way of. They’ve gotten married, they’ve had youngsters, they’ve performed cocaine, and now they don’t do it anymore. Now they go to the physician as a result of they’ve hemorrhoids. I simply need folks my age to have the ability to relate to [the special] and for youthful folks to perhaps see a dodgy uncle they as soon as knew.
This interview was initially Up to date within the June 2023 situation of Excessive Instances Journal.