For some people of a certain age Pauly Shore will always be “the Weasel,” a semi-coherent West Coast surfer/slacker who burst out of Shore’s imagination in the early 1990s and ruled as a role model for the minimally ambitious of the era.
In the real world — the world that exists outside of those vintage video clips on YouTube — that was almost 30 years ago. Shore is 51, and his resume as a multimedia entertainer includes success as a stand up comic, actor, recording artist and movie producer.
His current projects include hosting a video podcast “Pauly Shore’s Random Rants,” that runs on Soundcloud, iTunes, Stitcher and YouTube, and getting back to his roots in stand up comedy for two shows Saturday in Honolulu.
“It’s kind of like my version of ‘Big Brother,’ but it’s just by myself. I’ve got cameras all over (the house),” Shore explained, calling from his home in southern California. “It’s a way for me to incubate material, and a way to get stuff off my chest, so that’s kinda where I’m at.”
The biggest change in Shore’s life since Hawaii saw him headline at Hawaiian Brian’s three years ago is that he is, in his own words, “an orphan.”
His father, veteran stand up comic, Sammy Shore, died in May. His mother, Mitzi Shore, known for decades as the owner and queen bee of Los Angeles’ famed Comedy Store comedy club, died in April 2018.
“It’s a different way of being so it’s all new, and I’m a little burned out from it,” Shore said, frankly. “I just try to take care of myself. That’s where I’m at.”
“They’re in my heart now, so they’re with me, even though they’re not. They’re inside of my soul.”
If there is any consolation to be had in being an orphan at 51, it’s that Shore’s parents witnessed his six years of high-profile success as the host of “Totally Pauly” on MTV, as the star of an acclaimed HBO TV special, “Pauly Does Dallas,” and as a prominent actor in several contemporary comedies — and then saw him survive the leaner years that followed.
Shore created new projects and found new platforms for himself even while media pundits were smugly writing him off.
He approached the plight of the “used-to-be-famous” in 2003 with “Pauly Shore Is Dead,” a semi-autobiographical mockumentary that purports to show him fallen so low that he fakes his own death with hopes of capitalizing on the burst of popularity that accrues to dead celebrities. The movie was Shore’s debut as a writer, director and producer.
In 2013 he went “on the road” to the American Midwest to shoot a real, unscripted documentary, “Pauly Shore Stands Alone,” that followed him on a cold mid-winter tour of off-the-beaten-path part-time comedy venues in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
”It’s authentic. I’m a person that likes authenticity,” he said of the Midwest and the people who live there.
“When I started doing stand up I was opening for (Sam) Kinison, and he took me to, like, Peoria, Ill., and the Midwest and all over, and ever since then I’m more comfortable out there than I am in LA. It’s like that’s like my real home. Sam is the one who introduced me to America. If you know anything about me, I’m very much Americana.”
ALTHOUGH SHORE “grew up” at his mother’s comedy club, she didn’t book him to work there until he had racked up a string of credits elsewhere.
It was Kinison — a Comedy Store headliner — who got him started as a professional stand-up comic, not his mother, who got the club in the divorce settlement after his parents split in 1974.
Shore will tell the story in more detail when he finishes a documentary film he is making about himself.
“It’s my life story. Growing up in L.A. — Beverly Hills, West Hollywood. From the Playboy Mansion to MTV to my movies to Beverly Hills High School to growing up at the (Comedy) Store,” he said.
“It’s a work in progress, I spent five years on it. It’s 80 percent finished, all pretty much organized and edited, and I’m talking with my management to get in bed with a production company to make it better and bring more credibility to it.”
He also recently finished work on another project: “Guest House,” following the experiences of a newly engaged couple who buy the home of their dreams and then discover that a friend of the previous owner refuses to move out of the guest house. It’s scheduled for release early next year.
“It turns into this whole kinda farce with me in the lead character,” Shore said. “It’s a rated-R movie, so its like ‘American Pie’ or ‘The Hangover’ — it’s almost like the old Pauly, but the new Pauly.”
AMY TEEGARDEN and Billy Zane are the unlucky couple in “Guest House.” Shore plays Randy Cockfield, the guy who won’t move out.
“I’m not really motivated by projects that don’t motivate me,” Shore said. “I’m not one of those people who feels like he has to work — unless something really interesting comes along, like this.
“I think the premise is really funny, and I think its very relatable. Imagine someone not leaving your guest house, know what I mean?”
Coming almost full circle, Shore says the ‘new Pauly’ values time in ways that ‘old Pauly’ in the MTV days did not.
“My time is more valuable now than it was before,” he said. “A day is a really special thing — especially after your parents die. We’re not 20 anymore. We don’t take our days for granted.
“You appreciate the fact that you got another day ‘cause this isn’t going to be forever. It makes you kinda humbled to know that.”
PAULY SHORE
>> Where: Blue Note Hawaii
>> When: 6:30 p.m. and 9 p.m. Saturday
>> Cost: $35
>> Info: 777-4890, bluenotehawaii.com
