Duo doing double duty on the road
Janeane Garofalo and Patton Oswalt first met in San Francisco in the early '90s as a couple of like-minded comedians playing some of the same clubs. For the next few weeks, they'll be tourmates on the "Rata-tour," playing theaters and large clubs during the evening and doing press for the
For Oswalt, "Ratatouille" is the first time he has played the leading man. Or, in this case, a rat named Remy who wants to be a chef in Paris. He couldn't have been happier to do that as part of a Pixar production. He's been a fan since the studio was producing animated shorts like "Luxo Jr." (the one with the lamps) in the mid-'80s.
Oswalt has done voice - over work before from "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" to "Kim Possible," but when "Incredibles" writer-director Brad Bird tapped him for the project, it was hard for him to fathom. "Just Brad Bird directing a Pixar movie," he says. "It just seems so unreal to me. I thought they got huge celebrities to do these things. He had apparently heard my album and really liked it."
Though Pixar is the impetus behind the tour, don't expect to hear much about "Ratatouille" from either comedian onstage. "It seemed like a good way to tackle all the press that one does for a Disney event and also might be fun for us to be touring together anyway," Garofalo says.
Oswalt and Garofalo are a good comic pairing. Both are character actors who tend to get cast in supporting "best friend" roles in film and television (Garofalo is working on a pilot for CBS). Both are predisposed to progressive politics and have a talent for eviscerating pop culture. And both appeal to the indie rock crowd (Sub Pop Records releases Oswalt's new CD/DVD, "Werewolves and Lollipops," July 10). "We have similar tastes and viewpoints," Oswalt says.
They are also friends and mutual admirers. Garofalo goes as far as saying Oswalt is the better comic. "And I'm not saying that to be self-deprecating, that's just a fact," she says. "He puts the ideas together better. But our minds do work in a similar way, our minds will latch on to similar topics."
No matter what other gig they might have, Oswalt and Garofalo have always made comedy a priority. Oswalt says he tries never to make purely financial career moves, but that some of the bigger jobs allow him to do projects like the Comedians of Comedy tour, which will surface again on Comedy Central this fall. "Everything else is to make it easier for me to do more stand-up," he says. "I try to make everything I do kind of creative, even if I'm doing it for money. I try to add some sort of creative element to it."
