Colin Quinn spoke exclusively with hamptons.com about his new show “Colin Quinn: The Last Best Hope.” The show concluded a sold-out NYC run at The Lucille Lortel Theatre in November, and is now coming to The Bay Street Theatre in Sag Harbor, NY on June 25 at 8 p.m.
Mr. Quinn said he knew by the time he was eleven that he was funny and could entertain folks. “I started getting laughs in school. I was funny. My family would laugh. I liked getting laughs. I was known as the funny person.” Amazingly it was a long time later that Colin first got paid for making folks laugh.
He said he first was paid “When I was like 25, I got ten dollars, I didn’t feel that moment, even at the time I was ungrateful, I thought ‘only ten dollars?’ ”
Things changed when Colin Quinn replaced Norm MacDonald on SNL behind the news desk. He said, “The first time I really felt like I made it was one night when I was on Saturday Night Live and I did this character called the Lion, and it was live in front of a crowd and I knew it was going well. I said to myself, this is amazing!”
Quinn emphasized, “I grew up like a lot of people watching Saturday Night Live, and couldn’t believe here I was.”
About fame Colin Quinn shared, “I have met some stars but the two times I was star-struck was when meeting Sidney Poitier and Tom Cruise. For some reason those two were early enough in my career where you can still be star-struck. In both of them I saw these larger-than-life stars…when I saw Cruise, I just said to myself, this guy is a star, like an old fashioned star, and that was in the 1980s!”
Being a homegrown New Yorker (Brooklyn) Colin Quinn has fond memories about the east end. He shared, “I go to Montauk, I love the Hamptons, I have been going there like anyone from New York, since I was a kid. I would go out there with friends. In fact, I was very sad to hear about the Boardy Barn being sold and closed. Spent some time there in Hampton Bays.”
Quinn loves the Bay Street Theater. “I love it there, I don’t know how many times I’ve done it. I like that amphitheater effect myself, I really like it; some people may not like it, but I really like it.”
When asked is there anything he really would like to do? He joked, “Well, I’d like to be in charge of the country for five years!”
That brought the conversation to his June 25th show; “Colin Quinn: The Last Best Hope.” The official show explanation states, “In a society where there are too many voices, Last Best Hope finds Colin Quinn offering up his voice as the only one that needs to be heard.”
What he said was, “Everybody in comedy says the same thing, there is just something about performing live, it’s unpredictable. It’s a live moment with always changing material. I get a little buzz. (Laughing) It’s probably not the same buzz like when you were 25 but it’s still a great buzz. In some way it’s more satisfying because you are talking about things that have more depth and you are getting laughs. That is very satisfying. You toy around with stuff that is really complex and get people laughing.”
Colin Quinn’s previous shows include Red State Blue State, New York Story, Unconstitutional (all streaming on Netflix), and Long Story Short, which garnered a Drama Desk Award nomination.
Tickets for all performances of Last Best Hope are available at www.ColinQuinn.com or www.baystreet.org
