On a summer evening, while hail raged onto Manhattan’s streets, Denis Leary took the stage of Webster Hall with fellow comic actor Robert Kelly (Louis C.K.’s brother on Louie) and comedy newcomer Elizabeth Gillies (a Nickelodeon star) to hawk their FX series, Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll. Conceived by Leary to skewer the tropes of ’90s excess as it’s played out in the PC/abstinence-filled/mopey indie/social media-centric present, its creator stars as a prototypical one-time sensation taken down by the (now) terrible trio of its title and looking for a comeback. The show gets funnier with each episode, there are appearances (onscreen and off ) by your indie-rock faves, and Leary’s hair looks fantastic.
This is a very specific moment that you start the action of the show—the year you broke. What were the models for it? People you knew?
A lot of guys I played with in Boston at Emerson College stayed my friends when they left town. Some of them, like Adam Roth, who I still play with, hit NYC and became the guitarist in bands like Jim Carroll’s and the Del Fuegos when each of those acts was hot. Then there was guys from Boston who made it super big, like the Cars. That fame, though, was much less interesting than watching the guys who didn’t make it, but wanted to be famous.
These bands had the same problem big bands had—the lead singer and guitarist not getting along?
I still know those guys. When we were filming Rescue Me, I would run into some of them on the Lower East Side, when you could still afford to live in that neighborhood. They were still doing it—few had given up the idea of stardom even in their 40s. Some, though, were bitter angry; blaming anyone they could for stealing their sound, their aura. My experience in show business? Everyone who’s famous has a dozen people left behind blaming them for their failure. For my Johnny character, those guys are Greg Dulli and Dave Grohl—that should have been me. But you’re not. You’re 50. Now what? You don’t find that in other professions.
Men who don’t make it in other professions rarely wear Cuban heels and leopard-skin pants.
You gotta pick a look. I remember running into Lenny Kaye—all in black, but in slightly baggier pants than usual. It wasn’t a new look. His daughter made him get rid of his skinny jeans and his jewelry because she was embarrassed when he took her to school. When I created Johnny, I had to consider guys who have had the same look their whole life, for better for worse. Bono chose a good look. My guy chose the wrong look, and it’s not aging well.
Why 1990? I had you sussed as a late ’70s/’80s music guy. Or was that to make the daughter a more plausible character, play into tropes such as the Twitter hoaxes you use in the show?
I started it in 1990 because that’s when I first got famous. My insight on fame came from me coming up doing all that MTV stuff like Remote Control. One of my best friends, Ted Demme, created Yo! MTV Raps, so I had that exposure. Big rock guys and up-and-coming rock guys were everywhere—the Stones, Grohl, Dulli’s Afghan Whigs started to kick. That was a rich time; I wasn’t into grunge, but I liked Nirvana. The Whigs got tied into that Seattle thing, even though they went against trend. They just thought they were rock ‘n’ roll. That’s why I picked Greg and Grohl—I had to find guys for Johnny to blame, and who better? You have two forms of the rock star: the giant star, which Grohl is, and the critically acclaimed indie god like Dulli. Johnny’s failure is reflected in those two guys. When they went onstage, they went to work—something Johnny had problems with then and now.
You invoke Bowie quite a bit during S&D&R&R. The title song sounds like “The Jean Genie.” You bring him up seven times in the first two episodes. Do you think his talent dried up before Let’s Dance, like Johnny says?
No … but Johnny believes that. And I thought the Let’s Dance tour was great. In my pantheon of stars, Bowie is at the very top. The Stones and the Who got me through the ’70s until the Clash arrived. Bowie was huge throughout all of that. I met him doing a television show from a London West End Theater where Bowie was the musical guest. I stepped outside to smoke when Bowie arrived, and all of a sudden, he asks me for a light. Swear to God, I couldn’t talk. Then he asks me what Bobcat Goldthwait, Sam Kinison and Steven Wright were like. I told him, they called him in for sound check, and that was it. I’ve never met him again, and I wasted the entire fucking conversation talking about Bobcat Fucking Goldthwait!
Are you really not much of a Radiohead or Morrissey fan, as portrayed in the show, or were you just looking for someone to hang mope-rock jokes on?
I’m actually a huge Morrissey and Smiths fan; Radiohead, too. Here’s the thing: I’m not a fan of pretentiousness. That’s tough, though, because some of my favorite rockers can be pretentious. Before Springsteen did “The Rising,” he was getting there. I hate pretense, prog rock, Yes and all that fucking bullshit. I like three-minute songs. After “The Rising,” though, I gave Springsteen a free pass to do anything he likes because that was an extraordinary comment about what we went through on that day—and so quickly after that event. Radiohead, I fucking love, but they get denser as they go along. Morrissey is great, but, dude, really—I can’t have a fucking hot dog? C’moooon.
—A.D. Amorosi
