“Even though they’re nice, they’re still juicy,” she said. “I’m fascinated just by seeing what Kimberly — I call her Kimberly — is wearing in the driveway. Sometimes, a drone will fly over, I assume because someone wants to catch her in a bikini, so of course I immediately run outside naked.”
After struggling for nearly 20 years on the Los Angeles comedy scene (“I basically worked for free until I was 35 years old,” she said), Griffin got her first break on the 1990s sitcom “Suddenly Susan.” After that, with the emerging of reality shows and a shifting cultural paradigm where the public preferred to ridicule the rich and famous instead of admiring them, Griffin found her true calling at last: to be a kind of comedic liaison between celebrities and civilians.
Yet despite the increasing wealth and status with the success of her Bravo show, “My Life on the D-List,” her award-winning stand-up career, and the release of a new book last November, “Kathy Griffin’s Celebrity Run-Ins: My A-Z Index,” Griffin said her place in the Hollywood hierarchy remains unchanged.
“My current living situation is the perfect metaphor,” she said. “I live next to iconic people, I’m in the ‘hood, but I’m still peeking through the window. I’m invited to the party but I’m not a VIP.”
One thing that has changed, as outlined in her new book, is that celebrities who used to despise her now actually speak to her, though there’s always a risk of relapse.
“After Christina Aguilera and I finally became friendly, she asked if I was going to keep making jokes about her,” Griffin said. “And I’m like, ‘Are we back here again?’ Then she posed for a picture with me (and made an obscene gesture). I consider that progress.”
Despite the timing of her book’s release, Griffin promised that her material at the Taft will be all new.
“I’m not going to just read the book, though I could probably sell a lot more books that way,” she said. “I typically go where the audience wants me to go, and you can get a sense of that in the first few minutes. But I’ll be on my iPad right up until showtime seeing what’s going on, including whatever’s happening locally.”
It has been noted by many in the media that, since the election, the stand-up comedy world has grown tenser, with multiple reports of people walking out whenever a comedian jokes about President Donald Trump. Griffin said it’s a mixed bag, with the comedic fodder Trump provides balancing out the hostility.
“I think you have to double down,” she said. “The people who come to my shows know me, and you can assume they’re primarily lefties (liberals). I don’t hate Donald Trump, but I’m fascinated by him. Whether you like him or not, I know him, so you can’t deny those experiences. He is often friendly, chipper and rude, and he doesn’t seem to understand when he’s being rude. That’s one of the reasons why comedy is booming, though it may not be a great time to be a citizen.”
Contact this contributing writer at aaronepple@gmail.com.
How to go
What: Kathy Griffin
Where: Taft Theatre, 317 E. Fifth St., Cincinnati
When: 8 p.m. Friday, March 24
Cost: $42.50-$62.50
More info: 513-232-6220 or www.tafttheatre.org
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