COURTTVPRESS.COMBest known from his work on “The Daily Show” or his appearances in the “I Love the ’80s, ’70s, ’80s Strikes Back” series, Mo Rocca entertains and informs with his facetious, satirical humor. Rocca will visit campus this Tuesday to give a lecture in Graham Chapel. Cadenza contacted Mr. Rocca for a phone interview in anticipation of the occasion. Five minutes before my scheduled time to call the interviewee, I received a call from someone speaking Spanish at a rapid rate. Feeling ignorant and ashamed of my time spent learning Spanish I could barely recall, I foolishly attempted a dawdling reply in the language I so admire yet cannot speak. The caller responded quickly with another indiscernible statement in Spanish and then hung up. Confused by the call and embarrassed by my linguistic inadequacy, I wondered if the caller might have been the man I was about to interview, descended from a Colombian mother and probably prone to having a bit of fun with interviewers. I slyly attempted to see if, in fact, the mysterious caller proved to be Mr. Rocca (see below). After a small translation into very bad Spanish, I contacted Mr. Rocca by phone.
How did you end up working in so many different areas of entertainment and journalism?
When I was growing up I always wanted to be in entertainment, and I really like the news. Then, lucky for me, news and entertainment started merging together and blurring together into one big blob, one big fog of infotainment, so I just sort of wandered into it. I’m not sure where I’ll come out, but it’s a wonderful world of cable, and it’s great because there are just so many different nooks and crannies to explore.
Do you view yourself as more of a comedian or a journalist?
Oh gosh, I’m definitely not a journalist. I’d be insulting those journalists I respect if I called myself a journalist. I consider myself as someone who gives lots of opinions that he isn’t qualified to give, but is learning to give them in a more believable way.
You’ve written for a number of different age groups between writing for “Pepper Ann,” “Wishbone,” “The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss,” “Perfect 10,” and doing work on “The Daily Show.” How did you transition between such varying content?
I started out performing in musical theater and non-musical theater. I was lucky that a friend of mine, a really really brilliant friend of mine named Stephanie Simpson created this show called “Wishbone” on PBS, which I know a lot of current undergrads really like. I’ve been very heartened to see that when I’ve gone to campuses and when I’ve mentioned “Wishbone” there’s just a lot of great responses, which is really cool because it was a great experience working on that show. So that got me into the children’s television world. It was a smart, good show run by smart people. And I’m not including myself there, but the people who were actually in charge were great. And I sort of learned that writing good children’s television wasn’t so different from writing good television or fiction or nonfiction, really. There were more similarities than differences. “Wishbone” was really about taking great books and pulling from them an element of a good story and distilling that element because it was only a half an hour. I really brought that to bear, I think, when I interviewed for “The Daily Show.” I came with two key news stories that I had found on my own. Working on “Wishbone” and learning how to recognize a good story and distill a good story and present it in a short form really helped me when I had to actually do kind of the same thing: cull real stories from real life for “The Daily Show.” I feel like on all the shows that I’ve worked on the biggest and most exciting challenge has been learning to recognize a good story and to try to tell one, and it sounds so pretentious, but that was um, that’s what’s uh, yeah. So there are similarities. Now, with adult soft-core pornography, [a slight laugh] it may be a little bit different. I’m not sure how important narrative is there, but I can say that $150 an hour to edit interviews with topless models when you’re $30,000 in debt from college is, um, is helpful.
You wrote and held position as president in the Hasty Pudding Theatricals at Harvard. How was that experience?
I actually co-wrote the Hasty Pudding show with Oren Izenberg, who is the son of Gerald Izenberg, a professor of intellectual history at Wash U. He was my roommate at Harvard and is one of my best friends in all the world. We co-wrote the Hasty Pudding show, and that was an extraordinary experience for me because it was the first time that I had written, co-written anything of full-length script, in this case, a musical.
Do you have any desire to work in theatrical productions again?
Yeah, I would like to. I’m just finishing my book now. It’s been sort of a long haul. Actually not, but I want to turn it into something. Whether it’s a movie or whether it’s a musical, I’m not sure.
What is the book about?
I’m really into presidential history and I go around the country visiting homes and grave sites of past presidents. This interest morphed into an interest in the presidential animals in the White House, and I figured I should do something with this information, otherwise it would truly be useless. So I’ve written a book called “All the President’s Pets,” and it’s my expose into the role that pets have played in the White House. I wouldn’t say that it’s sick, but it’s kind of twisted.
Which has been your favorite home or grave to visit?
I certainly like Independence, Missouri, and I want to curry favor with my audience in Missouri even though I know people from St. Louis and Kansas City hate each other. They’re like Sharks and Jets. I would have to say Rutherford B. Hayes’ place in Spiegel Grove, Ohio is really fantastic.
If you could have any five bands or musicians, dead or alive perform at a party thrown for you, who would you choose and why?
This is a great question, and I would have
1. Waylon Jennings, because I’ve gotten really into “Outlaw Country.”
2. Mahalia Jackson, because I think she’s amazing.
3. The Monkees, because they’re fun and they work on TV.
4. Rachmaninoff, because I admire his dexterity.
5. Bobby Darin, because I think he’s amazing.
And I want an extra one:
6. The Carpenters, and I’m not going to apologize.
What would you have as your last meal on death row?
It probably wouldn’t be very rich. I would probably be in a very spiritual frame of mind and want to have something like berry, like simple minimalist, maybe I would just have a tuna roll and a glass of water, but I would definitely need some wasabi.
Crunchy Cheetos or puffy?
They’re both really trashy, although they’re not as trashy as Cool Ranch Doritos. Cooler Ranch Doritos. I think Cooler Ranch Doritos-I don’t know why they’re so trashy. But if I had to choose between the two, I would go with the hard crunch, because the puffy ones are so unnatural. I could see someone in the American Southwest, long ago, having baked something in their own kiln that was akin to the harder crunchy ones. But the puffy ones are the devil’s work, just totally unnatural.
(Begin my attempt at becoming the next greatest super sleuth in the world.) ¨Que haces para un barro de Klondike?
Excuse me, what?
¨Que haces para un barro de Klondike?
Que es un barro de Condi???
(Realizing my clever endeavor had failed miserably, I concede and return to English.) What would you do for a Klondike bar?
Oh! Oh my gosh. I thought you said something about Condi Rice, like un barro de Condi. What would I do for a Klondike bar? I would perjure, but I would not obstruct justice.
Who is more likely to show up in your nightmares chasing you with a cheese grater: John Ashcroft or Donald Rumsfeld?
The political answer is probably Rumsfeld, because even though Ashcroft is not terribly popular right now, he’s still from Mizurra. So I guess I would be more prudent to choose Rumsfeld.
Who would win in a thumb war: Yassir Arafat or Kofi Annan?
Yassir Arafat because I think Kofi Annan would be way too concerned with consensus. Rather than go for it, he would just require too many resolutions before he even began sparring with his thumb.
If you could, who would you nominate from the general population as candidate for president?
I want to say someone from the OC. [pauses to chuckle] No, I haven’t even watched it. I guess I would nominate Average Joe. He’s just so common. I feel that Average Joe just gets me, he’s just so…average.
He just has that populist appeal?
Yeah, I’m always, [small chortle] that’s it. Well you know me, I’ve always been a populist, so I would have to say Average Joe.
Our school is having its student government elections soon. Based on their names, who would you vote for: Pamela Bookbinder or David Ader?
Okay, well, David Ader’s name, [pauses to snigger], um, I mean, yes, I used to work-I stopped working in pornography long ago, so I’m afraid I’d have to say no to David Ader. I’m trying to leave that life behind me. I love the sound of Pamela Bookbinder. She sounds like some library, some like sort of animated character that’s in a PSA for your local library. Pamela Bookbinder sounds a little less party-oriented. She sounds a little more serious. And I really like what she’s had to say about Haiti and about social security solvency.
Sesame Workshop is currently running “Sesame Stories” in Israel, Jordan, the West Bank, and Gaza? Do you really think muppets can harbor an environment of peace, love and understanding in the Middle East?
I think that they might be able to ease tension a little bit. And I’ve worked both with Sesame Workshop and Henson studios, and I’d like to believe that they had the power to ease tensions, but [pause] there will be no conflict resolution until Spongebob Squarepants gets into it.
Do you have any words of advice to all those aspiring comedic journalists out there?
Don’t stop believing! Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars.
Whether or not Mr. Rocca was indeed the Spanish caller, I shall never know. Nevertheless, he will grace the presence of those interested with his lecture “Making It Up As I Go Along: Satire in an Absurd World” in Graham Chapel at 4pm on Tuesday, March 30.