Now clean and sober, Steve-O doesn’t “have to hurt himself anymore”

• steveo.com

There are many dumb things Steve-O regrets. Taking a leap from a plane without a parachute into an ocean is one of them. There was also that time he got an unemployed registered nurse to intravenously fill him with five ounces of vodka. And, of course, there was that rap album.

But now that he’s 36 years old and three years sober, the Jackass crew’s rowdiest, most extreme daredevil has became more serene and cautious these days. (Viewers of the last, cinematic Jackass outing, Jackass 3D, may have noticed how he sat out the more dangerous stunts, but still took in gross ones like drinking a fat guy’s sweat.) But the man is still crazy enough to take on some risk-taking feats, like performing stand-up. This weekend, Steve-O will be the headliner at Goodnights Comedy Club, the latest stop on his “Entirely Too Much Information Tour.”

The Indy spoke with the self-described “distraction therapist” (and former Dancing with the Stars contestant) about his new persona as a stand-up comedian.

The last time you were on tour, nearly a decade ago with “Don’t Try This At Home: The Tour,” it was more of you just doing crazy, hazardous, usually drug and alcohol-induced things onstage. Now that you’re on the wagon, what’s different about this show?
I’ll tell you how it’s the same and how it’s different. Back then, when I was doing that old tour, I promoted each show by promising that I would be drunk and on drugs or your money back. And there was really a lot of emphasis on how wasted I could be, and I’d come out onstage with breaking beers on my head and chugging hard liquor from a bottle. And I would do a lot of drunken rambling and I would do a lot of crazy stunts as well. And, now, I’ve been clean and sober for some time. And what I’ve done with this tour is to replace the rambling with stand-up comedy, and kept the crazy stunts.

And, you know, it’s so rewarding for me. What makes me feel really good is, after my shows, generally someone comes up to me every night and says, “Hey man, your stand-up comedy is really good. You don’t have to hurt yourself anymore.” That really means a lot to hear that.

So, what do you talk about onstage?
Basically, what people are interested in is kind of the way that the notoriety of Jackass has afforded me. Like, how that’s changed my life, I think that’s what people are interested in hearing. And the fact is when you go from being unknown to being known, all of the sudden, you find that the women are a lot more attracted to you. And it’s really pretty hilarious how that’s the case. So, there’s a lot of, like, behind-the-scenes, sort of juicy stuff about my life as a jackass and my love life in particular.

And, you know, the fact is I’m a shameless son of a bitch and there’s nothing too personal to share with an audience. And that’s why it’s a really appropriate name for the tour, because I really just have some really ridiculous personal shit, you know. A lot of it revolves around, you know, the trials and tribulations of my life as a chronic premature ejaculator with a crooked dick, you know. [Laughs]

Steve-O performs tonight through Sunday at Goodnights Comedy Club, 861 W. Morgan St., in Raleigh. For info, call 828-LAFF or go online at www.goodnightscomedy.com.