And now for the substance abuse stuff: Shydner boozed it up for years, dabbling in drugs too, and only stopped when he saw that all the drinking and drugging was sabotaging his comedy career. He got that career back but then, years into sobriety, decided to give up the stage so he wouldn’t have to always be on the road away from his family. I Am Comic focuses on his decision to get back on the comedy circuit—a decision that allowed him to get off the meds he’d been on for a decade-and-a-half. In this episode, he and I discuss how cops used to drive him to concerts instead of arresting him for drunk driving, the best way to perform for a Rasta audience (hint: smoke out and then just laugh on stage) and getting heckled by Sean Penn, among other topics.
Subscribe to the podcast on Itunes or listen to it on Soundcloud or Stitcher. Find Ritch Shydner on Twitter and his own site. Photo courtesy of RitchShydner.com.