It seems clear: Howie Mandel is not picky.
The comedy mainstay, who will be performing a night of comedy with Performing Arts Houston at Jones Hall on December 10, seems to be happy performing for any audience that will have him. “The upside of working a theater setting is just better than being at home by myself,” the funny man quips. “I like any setting where people show up. When you do what I do, it is awkward to be by yourself. I think of what I do like throwing a giant party where I am the center of attention.”
“I have worked in The Woodlands [recently],” he continues, “and I have worked a lot of venues in the Houston area but this will be the first time with this particular venue. But I like any venue where people want to show up, escape for a couple of hours, laugh and have fun. I look forward to having fun without a plan. Obviously with over 40 years in the business, I have material and things I can do. But what I love about live entertaining over everything that I do is there are no marks to hit, no lines to recite, anything can happen.
Notably, audience engagement seems to be a high priority for the Toronto-born personality. “It’s kind of improvisational,” he shares on his process. “I want you, the audience, to throw me a curveball. I like whatever happens in that moment. I find that at my shows people tend to speak up and make themselves part of it, whether it’s a technical issue, someone saying something to me or handing something to me. Whatever happens in the moment, I want to make each night and each performance different than any other night or performance in the past.”
Howie himself seems much evolved over four decades in the comedy limelight. But when asked about the changing audience, he responds with a bit of perspective after considering. “I don’t know that the audience has changed, as much as our world has changed,” he says. “There is a culture in social media where people talk about they saw and heard and that is taken out of context, then things happen.
“But within the confines of a performance people still want to laugh and have fun and you are going to a comedy show. I don’t know that there is anything that is off limits at a comedy show. What happens at comedy show, which is difference between now and when I started, was that people will talk about what they heard or saw. There is no context for that, and troubles a’brewing.”
Interestingly, as Mandel has diversified his creative output, he’s grown a massive number of followers that might each have their own favorite version of the comedian-actor-host. “That’s always been a problem for me,” he admits. “but also a little bit of a challenge. Through out my career, my audience has come to me from different venues. Whether they knew me as the guy they saw doing stand-up on HBO, you know, I’ve done 10 cable specials through out my career. There were people who only knew me, talking about early in my career, as fans of St Elsewhere. But I would get inquiries asking if this guy playing this was the same one who put the rubber glove on his head? Or people who knew me from Saturday Morning cartoons like Bobby’s World.”
“Not until I did Deal or No Deal did people kind of understand I was the same guy hosting that and that I was the same guy doing acting and hosting and stand-up and voice over work. I kinda brought them all together on that. But still, there is an audience for America’s Got Talent that is a nice, clean, family audience. I would say don’t bring your kids to the live show if they’re fans of AGT because I don’t edit myself, it is not for the entire family. And not because I will do anything that’s necessarily off color, but I just don’t edit myself if something happens in the moment.”
Comparing the jobs of working the road and sitting behind the judges panel on NBC, Mandel surprises. “I’m not winded [in stand-up],” he says. “I find it more tiring to have be on AGT. I find it more tiring to have to sit in that seat for 15 hours in the course of the day. I love it and I want to continue to do it. But that’s a lot harder than to spend 90 minutes on stage getting paid for everything I ever got expelled for, gotten in trouble for, be reprimanded for. It’s now what I get paid for. I don’t think it’s a very tough job to be talking to strangers. I am just talking! I am just standing there and talking. So I don’t know how I could be winded from that. Where as if you show up to a studio, and spend 15 hours – which isn’t hard work either! Just watching a show and judging it. Nothing I do is tough!”
The empire of America’s Got Talent continues to grow, as the mega franchise continues to be a reliable performer for NBC. Now Mandel adds two new series to his plate: a great white north spin-off aptly called Canada’s Got Talent, which is filming its 4th seasons currently. Also in the offing is the soon-to-debut, America’s Got Talent: Fantasy League, which launches on NBC on New Year’s Day.
On AGT: Fantasy League, Mandel seems revved up to play in a more engaged format, which has shades of another NBC series The Voice. “Fantasy League is mostly non-American [acts], which has the audience picking 40 of their favorite all time Got Talent acts, so it has people who have won all over the world. Then we drew straws: me, Mel B came back, Heidi [Klum] and Simon [Cowell]. Terry Crews is still hosting. We picked our team, we have 10 on our team each, and we are competing for the best of the best.”
Mandel agrees taking on the role of a mentor is “more involved,” but adds: “I enjoyed it more! There are [transferable skills from comedy]. As someone who has been judging all these years and as someone who has been in the business all these years, you know that the audience is ultimately going to vote and choose the winner. So you can ultimately watch and see something, then say it would be even more memorable to do something like this. Or choose a different song, or do something more dangerous – this might give you a step up over the other acts. So you have input. I don’t think there is anyone alive who doesn’t sit and watch and say I would rather watch this.”
Meanwhile on the Canadian front, Mandel seems quite proud to be part of sharing the gifts of his fellow northerners. “There’s a lot of talent in Canada,” he says. “I don’t know if you know, but a lot of what you watch listen to and enjoy is Canadian talent. Cirque Du Soleil comes from Canada, Drake, Jim Carrey, I’m from Canada, a lot of movies are from Canada. You wouldn’t know the difference. You very well could be Canadian!”
Not content, Mandel is also helping revive his first game shop love Deal or No Deal with a brand new tropical twist. “I am executive producing a new version called Deal or No Deal Island which is hosted by Joe Manganiello,” he announces. “It’s cross between Survivor and Deal or No Deal. They have to compete to get the cases they will be playing for, and they will be playing for many times more money than they have played for before. Remember: Deal or No Deal was a million dollars. And that’s nothing compared to what the stakes are on this show, aside from basic survival.”
When your schedule is as packed as the acclaimed performer, sometimes even finding time for family can be a challenge. But even this conundrum Mandel has hacked, sharing he’s started a podcast, co-hosted by his daughter Jackelyn Shultz. “I am doing a podcast with my daughter called Howie Mandel Does Stuff. It’s doing really well and drops every Tuesday wherever you get your podcasts, but mostly on YouTube. In fact we’ll be shooting some in the state of Texas after, we’ll be in Austin the next morning shooting episodes with Tony Hinchcliffe and Tom Segura and a bunch of others.
Mandel shares that the podcast was born out of necessity during the heights of the pandemic. “The truth is we started it over COVID, because we weren’t getting together and it was a fun way to communicate,” he recalls. “Then I got bored and started calling friends and celebrities and doing crank calls. Then that turned into asking questions, and it became this kind of group chat.
“My wife walked in one day and asked ‘what is this for?’ And it was just for killing time. She suggested we record it, and then we recorded it and it became Howie Mandel Does Stuff. We have had everybody who is anybody of note to come on. It’s kind of a great dynamic – we’re both just being ourselves, and sometimes me being myself is inappropriate.
“My daughter is an adult, but still, she’s my daughter. So we have this weird uncomfortable wonderful dynamic which makes us different than most. I think a lot of the time I am just incredibly embarrassing. She often says what the audience is thinking, asking ‘how could you do that, how could you say that?’ Or she might correct me, or teach me, or school me. So that adds a dynamic more than me just talking to somebody. It’s also produced by my son. It is a family business. They are teaching me the ways of the world.”
Howie Mandel will appear at Jones Hall at 615 Louisiana on Sunday, December 10 at 7:30 p.m. For information, call 713-227-4772 or visit Performing Arts Houston at performingartshouston.org $29-$99.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2023.
