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IPAULA
LIVE
Comedian Paula
Poundstone
comes to Greens
boro
by Joshua G. Lewis
Paula Poundstone is a big kid.
She lives with six cats, tells jokes for a
li v ing and eats only one kind of Pop T arts, brown
sugar cinammon-coated (she's burnt out on the
rest)
In her act, the 32 year-old comedian
has the demeanor of a child with whom you are
discussing a cool comic book. Poundstone's
speech is straightforward and honest, as when
she talks of Daryl Hannah ("She's a sucky ac
tress.")
Her voice just sounds like a kid's, even
on the phone. But talking from her home in Santa
Monica, Ca., Poundstone reveals there is much
more to her than jokes and ready-made breakfast
food.
She is very close to her cats. They're
not allowed outside generally, but one of them.
Scout, has gotten out. Poundstone is almost pout
ing now that Scout has shunned her temporarily
for the great out-of-doors.
"I'm supposed to have six (cats),"
Poundstone says. "I have five and hurt feelings."
However, the comedian shows a more
mature side as well.
Even though she never attended college (hers is
an "incomplete education" she says,) Poundstone
maintains a fairly formidable reading list.
For instance, she's now reading 1929:
The Year of the Great Crash by William K.
Klingaman, a book detailing the beginning of the
Great Depression.
"I figure we're just about to be back—
Spencer Green
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maybe not as a result of the stock
market—in the same place,"
Poundstone says of the current
economy. "I justthoughtl'd
read up on the kind of
activities we'll be hav-
ing."
The re
cession definitely
affects her job, she
says.
"It kind
of puts a damper
on the crowd when
you say to somebody
'What do you do for a
living?' and they go
'l'm unemployed,'"
she says.
The book
Poundstone most re
cently finished is The
Souls of Black Folk by
W.E.B. Du Bois. And
even her cats are named
from classics. Scout got
her name from the girl in
Lee's To Kill a Mocking
bird. Poundstone dubbed
another of her cats Smike
after the orphan in
Dickens's Nicholas Nickleby.
In mid-conversation, she says another
of her felines, Hepcat, just bit the little plastic
piece off the end of her shoelace.
"Every time you come up with a good
name, you have to get another cat," she contin
ues. "Good thing I haven't come up with any
good kids, names," she says.
But offspring won't be a problem for
Poundstone, at least in the near future.
"You know I don't even date or any
thing. I don't know if I'm just like totally devel
opmentally stunted," she wonders.
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But Poundstone comes up with a more
definitive answer right away: "I couldn't (date)
this year because it's an election year and there's
just so many things to think about. Who could
clutter their life with that sort of thing anyways?"
Poundstone has politics on the brain,
especially after her recent coverage of the Demo
cratic National Convention for the Tonight Show
with Jay Leno.
"Boy, I'd love to be a politician," she
says. And while "Paula for President" is as un
likely to be seen, Poundstone says she has enter-
THE }
terrEß yer, J
September 10,1992
tained the thought of running for city council in
Santa Monica.
"The only problem is I already have a
seedy background," she says. "They wouldn't
even have to dig for evidence."
But for now, Poundstone will stick to
governing her cats, even though Scout is still
outside and Hepcat continues to terrorize her
feet. If she ever does attain office, Poundstone
won't have any trouble laying down the law.
"If this cat bites these shoes one more
time, she becomes a projectile!"
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