Matteo Lane has something most people can only envy: an addictively friendly and disarming personality. When we sit down with him via Zoom, it feels like talking to a close friend – both of us complete with what we call our “emotional support vapes” in our hand as we chat Pokémon wall art.
It’s a character trait that’s served him well. Starting his career in the fine arts as an oil painter and opera singer, Matteo moved over to comedy and is now one of the biggest rising stars in the game. He’s just come off a return to the Netflix Is A Joke stage alongside the likes of Chelsea Handler, has more than 1.2 million followers on TikTok, and has been selling out shows across the world. Now he’s about to embark on his next journey: the Can’t Stop Talking tour later this fall.
An out and proud gay man, Matteo incorporates his life experience within his work, sometimes in a conversational style that, as he puts it, “feels like you’re catching up with a friend at brunch”. In his Advice Specials on YouTube, he seamlessly blends his hilarious viewpoint on any given situation with the tact of a friend who’s had one too many mimosas. But his stand-up shows are so much more than that. While he feels the pressure of being someone in the comedy spotlight, in a world where what we can and can’t joke about differs almost on a daily basis, he’s found the best way to cope with it: just keep making people laugh, and he’s home.
Sitting down with 1883 Magazine, Matteo Lane talks about where he’s come from, what he’s got coming up, and how he’s found happiness in his career path.
You’ve always been a creative person – an opera singer, a Fine Arts degree graduate and an artist – what made you land on being a stand-up comedian within that artistic spectrum?
I hate when things get like ‘woe is me’, but the fact is I didn’t see a gay – an openly gay – male do stand up comedy until I was 22/23. His name’s Bill Cruz, and he has an open mic in Chicago. Even though there was Mario Cantone [Sex and The City], who is phenomenal, none of it felt available to me. The only comedy that was available was via HBO, Showtime, Comedy Central, and it was either straight men, some lesbians, but I never saw a gay man do stand up. So I just assumed, similar to sports, it was kind of this thing that maybe I wasn’t always welcome.
But I loved comedy. I loved Kathy Griffin and Joan Rivers and Margaret Cho, they were the first. Very common answers for 38-year-old gay men who love comedy! [laughs]. But that was our sort of first step into the world of stand up comedy: people that talk directly to you. So Kathy Griffin, for me, really spoke to me, but Joan Rivers made me want to do stand up, and I didn’t see her till I was 21.
I wasn’t one of these kids that wanted to be a stand-up comic, even though I had all the traits of a stand-up comic. I did impressions, I liked making people laugh, I hated authority, so it was just sort of all the elements, but once I realised that I could do it, and I saw someone else do it. I thought, ‘Oh, then I want to do it!’
Do you remember your first ever show and what that was like?
I want to say it’s a place called Town Hall. It’s in Chicago, right across from Zanie’s on North, and my friend Marty DeRosa, who’s a comedian in Chicago, was dating my friend Anais. I didn’t understand the world. I didn’t know about open mics, I didn’t know about bar shows, I didn’t know about anything. There’s no system to getting there, and I said, ‘Can I do stand up?’ and as a gesture of kindness he was like, ‘Sure, you can do three minutes and come do my show’. So I wrote jokes in my apartment, very Kathy Griffin-esque – sort of celebrity and making fun, but it was just 31 members of my family that came – and they all stared at me. I did okay, but I remember that was the very first time that I ever did it, and I just never stopped.
You kind of discover the world of stand up. I always look at stand up as like a big building, and you kind of walk around it forever, and when you go inside, you’re finally there, you’re at the open mics, you’re with a community, you’re learning how to write jokes, but you keep going up different floors, and you just keep learning new things. There’s a lot of lessons to learn and stand up [laughs]. But, yeah, but I loved it, and I do consider myself a stand-up comic. I’m not someone who does it for fun. I’m not a comedic actor. I love stand-up. I’m not doing it to get something else. I love being on the road. I love performing in shows. I love writing jokes. I love the life. I love comics. I feel most at home with comedians. It’s something that I truly love, and I’ll do it till I die.
It’s interesting you referred to stand-up as a building because there’s also a lot of doors comics go through into a specific way of doing it – some are more situational, some are more clowning, and some are more interactive. I’d argue you can be quite conversational in your stand-up.
I mean, I have these specials that I put up on YouTube called My Advice Specials, and they’re crowd work, but basically they’re things I do every few months while I build my material on the road. So when you come buy a ticket to come see me on the road, I’m not talking to the audience. I’m doing my hour of stand up, and I think it’s a nice surprise for people too. But my stand up does feel conversational anyways. I mean, you come see my show, you feel like you’re just kind of catching up with a friend at brunch, that’s sort of where I landed in my stand up. I’m not an intellectual, I’m not political, I’m not dramatic or sad, and there’s not going to be a twist. That’s my comfort zone.
People who I think don’t understand stand up that well, they assume that you have to have some kind of stance on something, but I’m like, ‘well, that’s like going to a museum and all the paintings are the same’. You want to go to a museum and see all different types of paintings. You can’t be everything for everybody, but this is sort of where I’ve landed, and I just want to kind of bring some levity to people who are going through something and have fun. Make it feel worth them buying tickets, travelling to the show, or getting babysitters. I really care about the audience’s perception of the show. I want them to feel like they had a good time! And I want them to know that I really care that they had a good time.
You touched upon it just then, but it was a question I already had. There’s always been this consistent discourse about what you can and cannot say, what is and isn’t a joke, and what you can and can’t get away with as a comedian. What are your personal thoughts on that?
I think for every comedian, it’s also contextual. I think when you see a joke online – that’s 30 seconds, right? And it’s really offensive, and people online can react a certain kind of way. But stand up is meant to be digested in a room where you’ve watched me for an hour and built your trust. I’ve never been that kind of comic anyway. I don’t get a rise out of people. Some people do, and they’re really, really good at it. I know a lot of comics, like Andrew Schultz. Andrew Schultz can talk about anything, and he’s found a way to do it. Sam Jay, she can really get into some material that is just on that edge, but she’s so smart she can get away with it. I think online and social media has kind of destroyed the nuance of joke writing.
Obviously, there’s some things that you shouldn’t say, because just the way that we speak has changed. I mean, the way society and what we accept and don’t accept, changes all the time. But there’s comics that still do, and there’s comics that don’t, and I think I’m definitely in the mindset of everyone should have the freedom to say what they want. No one should control anybody else’s artistic expression.
If you choose to buy a ticket to the show, that’s the difference. For example, I don’t like Eminem. I think he said a lot of things I don’t agree with, so I just don’t listen to him. I’m certainly not going to stop him. It’s not my business, that’s just not how the world works. I don’t know, I’m very much for say whatever you want, and if you want to buy a ticket to go see more, go. If you don’t like that, don’t buy a ticket, don’t go – because the worst thing you can do to a comic is ignore them. Not buy tickets, not laugh and not go. You write online, you yell, you protest? You’ve given them fodder, you’ve given them everything they’re seeking, you know? So I just think of it the opposite way. I think musicians, actors, artists, comics… you don’t like something, just don’t show up, and then they don’t have an audience.
There seems to be a lot of pressure on entertainers at the moment to be more political, or have an outspoken political stance, in their work. Do you feel that pressure?
I think everybody feels that pressure. I don’t even think it’s just entertainers. I think Joe Schmo, who posts a picture of his salad at lunch, feels the pressure too. Again, I think it just comes down to what you’re comfortable with, and also, what are you doing in your personal life? You get people who post online and they’re very political, and then they treat people around them like shit, and then you get the opposite, where people are quietly doing the things that they should be doing. I think it’s really just a balance, but we have to remember that our own mental health comes first before you can help others. I think it’s just the natural way of things. I really do. I think people have their political opinions reflected in those that they love, and I think it’s totally natural, and some people handle it really well. Some people don’t. And you know, what can you say?
Your Italian-Sicilian background has been a major influence in your work. Were you expecting people to latch on to that so much, and have it be such a part of your work?
No! My third largest following is Italy, and I’m recognised everywhere I go. I never expected that, but I did one video where I was making fun of fettuccine alfredo, and the Italians lost their mind! I’ve had a lot of people in Italy say to me, ‘thanks for representing Italy of today, not 80 years ago’. I think a lot of people think of Italians, especially American Italians, as like The Godfather and it’s not the same. So when I go there, they’re always… and also that I speak Italian. I think that was shocking for them. It’s not like I say ‘ciao, grazias’ – I fully speak Italian, and I think even for them they’re like, oh my god, like ‘an American Italian who speaks Italian and can make carbonara!’ [laughs] They were so excited!
Is there something you wish to achieve in your career going forward? Maybe a venue you want to sell out, or a career goal?
I never thought that I’d be performing at Carnegie Hall with Nadine Sierra, who’s the number one Soprano in the world, and sing opera with her at the end of the show. So I don’t know that I have much more ambition! [laughs].
I don’t have any sort of grand fantasy for my life of taking over and dominating. I’m not comfortable in those positions. I’m like the Barefoot Contessa – a chef here in America. You’re gonna get the same roasted chicken every week in a different version. I don’t have that kind of ambition.
My ambition is to be funny and to work and care for my family and do the right thing, you know? I mean, recently, I pulled out of shows with people I don’t align with, and that was a difficult decision to make, because that means I’m not making money, but I have to do the thing that’s right for my heart. I made a lot of big decisions recently to do that, and it’s like, ‘okay, you know What? What matters more at the end of the day? That I lay my head in my bed and I have more money in my pocket, or I lay my head on my bed and I feel good about the decisions I made and I stood true to who I am? That’s something you know, that I have, and will continue to, wrestle with, and every entertainer does in the future. I’m living a pretty good life. I’m happy.
Interview Tilly Pearce
Photography Troy-Hallahan
