Matt I always say that you’re a better person than the rest of us. I really do. Gratitude is one of the highest emotions you can feel. I have a dark kind of gloom, it’s just there. That’s probably where the cigarette act is coming from. Once, at The Slipper Room, I was in a bad mood, and people said, “That was the best version you’ve ever done.” I wasn’t glaring, I wasn’t remotely reaching out to the audience in any way.
It’s very important to me to make eye contact and I did that, but I wasn’t smiling or winking. That is part of my character, too. I turn off some of the silliness in me. There are people who say that they don’t see any of the silly, sweet guy that they know up there on stage. In the act, they just see this cold assassin kind of person.
That’s on purpose. I’m turning a lot of that off. I purposely don’t smile as much as I do close-up. I want people to kind of come to me. You talk about gratitude for what you do, and on my better nights, I really do feel that. The sense that, “Man, I get to do cigarette magic.” It’s something that no one does, or even wants to do, because it’s gross, and you burn yourself, and your mouth tastes like crap.
Alex Do you really get burned?
Matt Every single time.