With an awkward dating past under his belt, HOWIE KREMER comes armed with his web series Uh, Hey Dude. The series, focused on the romantic challenges of main characters Joey, Betty and Totsy, is nominated for five LA Web Fest Awards, including Outstanding Comedy Series. You may remember him from the long-running “Late Night With Howie” show, at The Second City Studio Theatre. He’s also performed at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater. He’s appeared in Bad Teacher, Community and Turtletopia and written an episode of Trophy Wife (yes, a real one). So, what does this diehard St. Louis Cardinals fan think of fans who don’t wear jerseys? Where does he see comedy going? And, how did this former-amateur dater turn into an actual-real husband, whose wife stars in his web series? You’ll want to get to know this proud Cat Dad.
COMEDY CAKE: You’re a cat person. Tell us about your relationship with your cat. What was the most important thing he/she urinated on?
HOWIE KREMER:I was actually raised with a dog, but when I met my wife, Tracy, I instantly fell in love with her kitten… who I eventually fell in love with and adopted as my own. Then we got a second one. They’re the best!
And they have never peed anywhere besides the litter box… seriously, they’re the best!
CAKE: “Uh, Hey Dude” is nominated in LA Web Fest’s Outstanding Writing Lead, Actor, Categories, as well as two Lead Actress nominations and a nomination for Best Series. How does that feel?
HOWIE: It’s really humbling and exciting to be nominated for these awards. It just proves that hard work and working with funny people has paid off.
CAKE: What inspired “Uh, Hey Dude” to come about?
HOWIE: UHD came about because I wanted to flex my observational humor writing muscles. There are a lot of types of comedies out there to write in and one I hadn’t tried was funny observations and blowing them out. Previously I was writing slightly broader scripts. So this was super fun to try to work with one observation/idea and then expand on it as far as I could.
CAKE: In the series Joe Wengert plays a slightly awkward, sensitive, and indecisive character. How is this similar to you, in real life?
HOWIE: He is similar to me in real life. Before I met my wife, I NEVER knew what to say to girls. And when I didn’t know what to say, I would just kind of bunch up and be awkward and then try to say something funny and laugh it off. Luckily, Joe was able to nail this character and bring so much fun to it.
CAKE: How did you and the ladies of “Uh, Hey Dude” meet?
HOWIE: Totsy (Tracy Meyer) is actually my wife. We met in Chicago seven years ago. And luckily I was able to trick her into marrying me. Shhhh. don’t say anything to her!! ;)
And when we moved out here we immediately started doing improv and sketch at UCB… which is where I met Joe and Betsy and the rest of the crew of UHD.
CAKE: The three of you seem to have such great chemistry. How do you think that plays a role in the success of the series?
HOWIE: I think the actors’ chemistry was KEY to the success of the series. They were able to relax on set and just have fun and bring life to the characters. It was a joy to watch.
CAKE: In “Uh, Hey Due,” the characters struggle with awkward scenarios, centered around dating. What was the most awkward date you’ve been on?
HOWIE: The most awkward date I ever went on was in St. Louis (where I’m from). I took this girl to a St. Louis Cardinals game and obviously I’m a huge Cardinals fan. When I arrived at her door to pick her up, I asked if I could use her restroom. I hadn’t put on my Cardinals jersey yet and was going to change since I was coming straight from work. She said she was super relieved to see me in plain clothes and was glad I wasn’t one of those guys who wears jerseys to games.
I was literally about to put on my Cardinals jersey. Which in ST. LOUIS EVERYONE WEARS JERSEYS TO GAMES! YOU’RE WEIRD IF YOU DONT! I came out without putting my jersey on and we argued over why it’s OK to wear a jersey to games. I’ve never been so silent at a baseball game in my life.
CAKE: What are your hopes for “Uh, Hey Dude”? Where do you see it headed?
HOWIE: I’d love to get funding for UHD and possibly make a season 2 and/or sell it as a show to a network. That would be the ultimate.
CAKE: What are the things, or what is the ritual, that you go through to generate material?
HOWIE: To generate material I usually get them from two places:
1. Personal experiences that I’ve had, I think to myself, what about this spin on it? Or what if this happened instead? And if that makes me laugh I’ll want to tell that story. Sometimes, the experience in itself is good enough and I don’t need to fictionalize.
2. The other thing I do is let my imagination take over. I still perform improv to keep that spontaneous part of my brain working at all times. This allows me to play characters and do scenes I would never live in real life. And it allows me to think in a different way. Sometimes in writing things that are too milk toast and predictable… and it’s OK to let your mind run wild and just totally invent a world or characters that you want to explore. The key is to keeping them in somewhat grounded situations. For example, I have never lived in the OLD WILD WEST… but one of my favorite TV pilots I’ve written is a half hour comedy about the wild west. It’s super fun, broad and made me laugh.
I guess at the end of the day you want to write something you’re excited about and makes you laugh. Otherwise you’re just wasting your time.
CAKE: Who are the comedians and writers that inspired you to get into comedy, and what do you find interesting about them?
HOWIE: One of the people who inspired me to get into writing is a comedy writer by the name of Gene Stupnitsky. He was a big reason I moved out to LA from Chicago to pursue writing and he and his writing partner Lee Eisenberg are an even bigger reason why I’m able to learn and hopefully become a successfully writer.
Other people I don’t know, but look up to and are the main reasons I wanted to write comedy:
Tina Fey – everything about her.
Adam Sandler – the first comedy album I ever bought
Steve Martin – favorite comedy book I own
Chris Rock – favorite stand up
Seinfeld/Larry David – grew up on seinfeld
Stephen Merchant – someone I’ve always admired.
CAKE: You’ve now gotten to work on such shows as “Community” and “Trophy Wife.” Tell me a story where you “geeked out” in front of a celebrity, at work or not.
HOWIE: I would say the person I’ve geeked out the most in front of was Bradley Whitford. But I did it like a man, to his face. When I was shooting my episode of Trophy Wife, I was on set and I told him he is one of my favorite actors ever. But not because of why he thinks I like him. I told him that I loved him in Billy Madison. He played such a great bad guy and that laugh was incredible. That movie was the one my friends and I would grew up on and watched 1000 times. So it was a big part of my comedy upbringing. He really got a kick out of that and after the shoot, I asked to take a picture with him. He took the camera from me and changed it to video and told someone to take the picture. Then he said the famous line from Billy Madison “Business Ethics” and did the silly laugh. It was pretty awesome.
CAKE: What was life like growing up?
HOWIE: Life was pretty fun, weird and awkward.
I lived in suburban St. Louis… a place called Chesterfield. Next to where John Hamm and Ellie Kemper grew up. And not too far from Nelly. I played a lot of sports growing up, tried to be cool, failed, succeeded, then immediately failed again. My biggest success growing up was my high school Senior Prank. It was so stupid but we thought it was so cool. I helped coordinate like 20 dudes to sneak into the stadium at night and we had like walkie talkies and shit. And in the bleachers we spray painted ’99 so you could see it from the street as you drove by. PCH was already professionally painted on… so then it read: PCH ’99. Our ’99 was in black spray paint and looked ridiculous but so worth it. I forgot if we got in trouble or not, I don’t think so. But it was so worth it. I hope I don’t get in trouble 16 years later. There has to be a statute of limitations right?
CAKE: So, you’re a huge Cardinal fan. What’s up with that?
HOWIE: In ST. LOUIS there is breathing and baseball. The Cardinals are a part of me like my arm or liver are a part of me. I love that organization and it has provided me with so many great moments of my life. It’s hard to understand if you’re not from St. Louis but it’s just the most fun thing in the world: a beautiful spring, summer, and if we’re lucky, late fall day/evening and watching a Cards game at Bush. Growing up my dad used to take me to every home opener. Even if we had to skip school!
CAKE: Looking back, how are you a smarter writer today, than when you started?
HOWIE: INCREDIBLY smarter, better, funnier. Everything I did before was garbage and poop. It’s something that is inevitable for every writer. The more you do it, the better you’ll be. I cringe to think about the stuff I wrote in 2007 when I first started out writing comedy in Chicago.
CAKE: How do you see comedy changing within the next 5 years?
HOWIE: I think, as far as TV goes, that multi-cams are going to make a come back. Maybe a hybrid of them. People who are in charge of networks and studios — a lot of them grew up at a time when multi-cams where insanely popular. And I think maybe they’re all nostalgic for those times. Cheers, TGIF, Silver Spoons, Family Ties, etc.
Also, I think, hope and pray, that reality TV dies down and more scripted shows come back. I think there have been so many reality shows in the past 20 years they’re kind of grasping at straws to come up with new ideas and the popular shows are running their course. I’ve spoken to reality producers who feel the same way too.
CAKE: Was there ever a time you wanted to give up on comedy? How did you handle that?
HOWIE: Yes. A lot early on in my career. Comedy is super hard. Especially improv and sketch comedy. It’s such big highs and such major lows. Getting that laugh and you’re on cloud nine. And then if you blow a show or have a bad sketch, you’re immediately humbled. Comedy doesn’t owe me anything. It doesn’t care who I am… it will chew you up and spit you out. I don’t know if that makes sense. I hope so. I’M SORRY IF IT DOESN’T! I’M TRYING!
CAKE: We have your YouTube and Funny Or Die links. Where else can we see your work in the near future?
www.howiekremer.com —- this has my Twitter, Instagram and YouTube on it. And other fun stuff!
:) Byeeeeee!!!
Mentions: The 2015 LA Web Fest happens at the Hilton Los Angeles/Universal City Hotel April 2-5.
CakeMama