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Almost Interesting: The Memoir
Written by David Spade
Narrated by David Spade
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Start ListeningDescription
A hilarious and biting memoir from the actor, comedian and Saturday Night Live alumnus.
David Spade is best known for his harsh "Hollywood" Minute Sketches on SNL, his starring roles in movies like Tommy Boy and Joe Dirt, and his seven-year stint as Dennis Finch on the series Just Shoot Me. Now, with a wit as dry as the weather in his home state of Arizona, the "comic brat extraordinaire" delivers a memoir.
Spade takes fans back to his childhood as a wannabe cool younger brother and recounts his excruciating road-tour to fame—when he was regularly mistaken for a fourteen year-old. He dishes about his time on SNL during the beloved Rock/Sandler/Farley era of the 1990s, and brags about the ridiculous perks that fame has brought into his life, including a crazy assistant who attacked him while he was sleeping, being threatened on the street in Beverley Hills by Eddie Murphy, and being one of the shortest guys at the Playboy mansion (the views weren't bad).
Sometimes dirty, sometimes just plain silly, David Spade reminds us what made him one of our favorite funny people.
A HarperAudio production.
Book Actions
Start ListeningBook Information
Almost Interesting: The Memoir
Written by David Spade
Narrated by David Spade
Description
A hilarious and biting memoir from the actor, comedian and Saturday Night Live alumnus.
David Spade is best known for his harsh "Hollywood" Minute Sketches on SNL, his starring roles in movies like Tommy Boy and Joe Dirt, and his seven-year stint as Dennis Finch on the series Just Shoot Me. Now, with a wit as dry as the weather in his home state of Arizona, the "comic brat extraordinaire" delivers a memoir.
Spade takes fans back to his childhood as a wannabe cool younger brother and recounts his excruciating road-tour to fame—when he was regularly mistaken for a fourteen year-old. He dishes about his time on SNL during the beloved Rock/Sandler/Farley era of the 1990s, and brags about the ridiculous perks that fame has brought into his life, including a crazy assistant who attacked him while he was sleeping, being threatened on the street in Beverley Hills by Eddie Murphy, and being one of the shortest guys at the Playboy mansion (the views weren't bad).
Sometimes dirty, sometimes just plain silly, David Spade reminds us what made him one of our favorite funny people.
A HarperAudio production.
About the author
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Reviews
Spade talks about his life from childhood through the Tommy Boy/Black Sheep days.This one was a hoot. Spade is one of my favorite stand-up comedians, and of course he brings his excellent timing and sense of humor to his memoir, which is filled with fascinating tidbits from his early career and SNL days. I highly recommend the audio version, because he reads it so well, and that goofy laugh cracked me up every time.
I liked it. Wish there was more about his post SNL and Tommy Boy career. He seems to be a genuinely good guy who’s led quite a life.
David's interesting life, who would have knew it! must listen
Very interesting read. I was a huge fan of SNL during David's employment there and loved hearing about his experience.
Knowing more about one of my favorite comedians was great
Amazing !!!! Loved this book sooo much!! I tam ate and funny and a little bit of sad all wrapped into one great book! Looking forward to reading his newest book!
If you need a laugh, I highly recommend this book!
Enjoyed the narration by the author. Like being in a continuous on demand stand up show, presented by a guy who has overcome many challenges to get there.
I started listening to this on an airplane and I kept laughing. People were looking at me and probably thinking I was a weirdo, but I couldn't contain the myself. I usually don't enjoy hearing about the childhoods of autobiographers, but I loved all of David's entertaining stories. Everything from his mom making him wear a t-shirt with his own face on it to hiding out from Eddie Murphy for 20 years was hilarious. Hearing all the jokes the actors and writers of SNL played on each other helped me imagine what it would be like to be one of the gang. I've seen David Spade in Las Vegas perform and he was excellent and so is his book.
I Loved it. Laughed out loud. Will be listening again
If you enjoy Spade's snarky sense of humor, you'll probably enjoy this autobiography.
Spade did not have an easy life and I enjoyed learning about his childhood and family. For me, though, the best parts of this autobiography were easily the parts about when he got to Saturday Night Live.
All the behind the scenes info on how SNL works, how the skits are pitched, written and rehearsed-it's all here. I was hoping for a lot of this info when I listened to both Tina Fey's and Amy Poehler's autobiographies, but in both of them, SNL only played a small part. Here it plays a big part, as does, of course, Chris Farley. The Farley parts are both poignant and hilarious. I felt my heart crack a little bit when Spade mentioned talking to Dan Ackroyd about how it was to lose such a close friend/partner to drugs.
There were a few irritating things involving the writing and narration-the need to abbreviate a lot of things into annoying little words-using sitch for situation, for example. I didn't like that and it got on my nerves. Luckily, Spade was entertaining enough that I could overlook it most of the time.
I'm surprising myself by giving this audio 5 stars. I thought Spade's snarky sense of humor would bother me, but it made me laugh more than ever. He's funny, seemingly honest and as the title suggests-Almost Interesting.
My highest recommendation to fans of Spade's humor and for fans of SNL.
Spade did not have an easy life and I enjoyed learning about his childhood and family. For me, though, the best parts of this autobiography were easily the parts about when he got to Saturday Night Live.
All the behind the scenes info on how SNL works, how the skits are pitched, written and rehearsed-it's all here. I was hoping for a lot of this info when I listened to both Tina Fey's and Amy Poehler's autobiographies, but in both of them, SNL only played a small part. Here it plays a big part, as does, of course, Chris Farley. The Farley parts are both poignant and hilarious. I felt my heart crack a little bit when Spade mentioned talking to Dan Ackroyd about how it was to lose such a close friend/partner to drugs.
There were a few irritating things involving the writing and narration-the need to abbreviate a lot of things into annoying little words-using sitch for situation, for example. I didn't like that and it got on my nerves. Luckily, Spade was entertaining enough that I could overlook it most of the time.
I'm surprising myself by giving this audio 5 stars. I thought Spade's snarky sense of humor would bother me, but it made me laugh more than ever. He's funny, seemingly honest and as the title suggests-Almost Interesting.
My highest recommendation to fans of Spade's humor and for fans of SNL.
Funny and heartwarming. It was so much more than I expected. Really enjoyable.
Interesting read how Spade became famous. I didn’t care for the last two chapters, seemed like an after thought.
It was well done . Easy to listen too and very informative.
Very funny book it is as spade said almost interesting.
I haven’t laughed this hard in a while. He is compassionate and sweet. I hope he does find the girl of his dreams. Lol
David Spade has such great comic timing! Listening to this audio was a such a pleasure. He humorously relates tales from his rather difficult childhood in such a way that you can't help but laugh out loud and upon further reflection respect him for rising above it all. His stories of his own celebrity are self-depreciating and humble - above all hilarious!.
Lots and lots of good dating advice. I recommend it highly.
There are a few different approaches to comedy memoirs. You can go with the actual story of your life (with jokes), a la Amy Poehler: This requires you to a) have an interesting life, and b) be funny. You can try for the structured set approach: You set the book up as a connected strand of narratives, each one with its own theme, and riff as you go. This is the most common approach, at least as practiced successfully: Patton Oswalt's Zombie Spaceship Wasteland, Jim Gaffigan's Dad Is Fat and Tina Fey's Bossypants.
All of this is by way of saying that David Spade could have really used a thoughtful approach here. The book's a bit schizophrenic: The first part is a pretty straightforward narrative of his life coming up in comedy. It's not peppered full of jokes, but memoirs don't need to be — it's about the person's life, and in Spade's case that life is worth reading about.
He of course covers Saturday Night Live, where most people know him from, and it's a worthwhile addition to the numerous full books that have been written about the show from Studio 6H. He also touches a bit on his most-well-known partner, Chris Farley, which I mention only because I've read him in other places talking about the emotional bond between the two. There's plenty of Farley information (with new stories), but Spade doesn't delve as deep into himself and his own feelings as he did in the beginning, so it winds up feeling a little bit like fanservice. Which is understandable — maybe he didn't want to linger too much on Farley (whether because of genuine emotion or not wanting to be eternally Farley's sidekick is immaterial) yet knew there would be an expectation for it — but it's noticeable, nonetheless.
But then it gets weird. We hear a genuinely terrifying about attempted murder, a pretty egregious theft by his housekeeper and ... Spade's thoughts on women? The general reader might not know it, but Spade possess a fairly sizable filmography post-Farley: Joe Dirt, Joe Dirt 2, Grown-Upses, Just Shoot Me, Emperor's New Groove, Benchwarmers, Dickie Roberts ... These get name-checks, at best. I'm not saying a memoir has to include absolutely everything that's ever happened (that's what the sequel's for!), but in this case the latter half of the book is just random stories. Personally, I would have much preferred jettisoning it entirely (except where it made sense in the narrative of his life) and gotten more about his work rather than what sounds like rehashed standup material.
All of this is by way of saying that David Spade could have really used a thoughtful approach here. The book's a bit schizophrenic: The first part is a pretty straightforward narrative of his life coming up in comedy. It's not peppered full of jokes, but memoirs don't need to be — it's about the person's life, and in Spade's case that life is worth reading about.
He of course covers Saturday Night Live, where most people know him from, and it's a worthwhile addition to the numerous full books that have been written about the show from Studio 6H. He also touches a bit on his most-well-known partner, Chris Farley, which I mention only because I've read him in other places talking about the emotional bond between the two. There's plenty of Farley information (with new stories), but Spade doesn't delve as deep into himself and his own feelings as he did in the beginning, so it winds up feeling a little bit like fanservice. Which is understandable — maybe he didn't want to linger too much on Farley (whether because of genuine emotion or not wanting to be eternally Farley's sidekick is immaterial) yet knew there would be an expectation for it — but it's noticeable, nonetheless.
But then it gets weird. We hear a genuinely terrifying about attempted murder, a pretty egregious theft by his housekeeper and ... Spade's thoughts on women? The general reader might not know it, but Spade possess a fairly sizable filmography post-Farley: Joe Dirt, Joe Dirt 2, Grown-Upses, Just Shoot Me, Emperor's New Groove, Benchwarmers, Dickie Roberts ... These get name-checks, at best. I'm not saying a memoir has to include absolutely everything that's ever happened (that's what the sequel's for!), but in this case the latter half of the book is just random stories. Personally, I would have much preferred jettisoning it entirely (except where it made sense in the narrative of his life) and gotten more about his work rather than what sounds like rehashed standup material.