Toronto-born Howie Mandel was a successful carpet salesmen when someone dared him to try stand-up comedy. Mandel took the dare and found his calling.
Appearances at The Comedy Store in Los Angeles and on the comedic game show “Make Me Laugh” were early successes in a stellar career. Mandel, who serves as a judge on NBC’s summer hit “America’s Got Talent,” has also been a writer, producer, film actor, talk-show host and voice-over artist.
Mandell, 62, returns to Hawaii for a one-nighter Saturday at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center.
JOHN BERGER: Of all the things you do in the entertainment industry, what do you enjoy most?
HOWIE MANDEL: There’s no place I’m more comfortable than on stage doing stand-up. That’s the thing that’s my constant and my primal scream at the end of the day. There’s no editing, there’s no marks to hit, no lines to recite (and) no commercials to go to.
JB: When did you reach that point in your career when you didn’t have to go out looking for work and people started bringing work to you?
HM: I don’t feel I have. There are many requests that I take, and that’s very nice, but I’m always looking to do things that haven’t been done in a way that hasn’t been done, so I’m selling ideas and sometimes people say “no.”
I know I can make a living now but I can’t do absolutely everything I want to do.
JB: I may be the millionth person to ask where you got the idea to put a latex glove on your head.
HM: I’m very open about the fact that I have obsessive-compulsive disorder and that I carry gloves because I don’t want to touch things.
(One night) having absolutely no battle plan on stage, I pulled it out of my pocket and put it on my head and started breathing, and I guess the fingers were going up and down. I could hear the audience roaring and that became a signature piece.
Nobody thought it was sillier and more ridiculous than me — but it bought me a house.
JB: What do you like to do that is not related to work?
HM: My grandchildren. It’s such an amazing thing, the miracle of watching your babies’ babies.
JB: What would you like to be doing five years from now?
HM: I don’t think that far ahead, and that has been my career. I got on stage as a dare, and each and every day I wake up and I’m getting paid for (doing) everything I’ve ever been expelled, punished or hit for.
