New opportunities
I thought I would live here forever.In 1983, Bill Hicks and I were sharing a studio apartment in Burbank, CA. The 80’s comedy boom was beginning, and Bill decided to head back to Houston. I was struggling with the LA open mike scene. Sometimes waiting hours to perform 3 minutes at the Westwood Comedy Store or at a brand new, tiny club on Sunset named The Laugh Factory. My friend Bill Weber called me and said I should come to Portland for the summer. He was going to house sit for 6 weeks. I could stay with him. What a great opportunity.
I could do open mikes in Portland while trashing the house of a complete stranger.
Of course, some of this recalls Bill Hicks, with whom Slade cut his comedy teeth. But Slade is his own man: there’s an excel-lent physical sequence about a driver and his car radio , that is light years from Hicks’s shtick. And Slade’s focus is more domestic than political.
When I got to Portland I found a charming, rainy city with a ton of open mikes. I remember taking the TriMet bus over the brown, rusty Hawthorne bridge that crosses the Willamette river and emerges into downtown. I thought to myself, “I can handle this city. Why should I go back to LA and be frustrated and unknown, when I can be frustrated and unknown in Portland?”
I plunged into the open mike scene and found a loving and creative group who had an absolutely unique combination of unbridled support and gritty competition.
Dave Anderson, Mike “Boats” Johnson, JP Linde, Dan Deprez, Dawn Greene, Susan Rice, Art Krug and Robert Jenkins. We all found a link to what our lives would soon be about.
Before long we had all graduated to local headliners fueled by a crazy group of fans who loved this brand-new irreverent form of stand up. This was before Evening at the Improv and chain comedy clubs.
I made Portland my home.
But spent most of the time on the road.
Dwight Slade's New Opportunities Blog Post - Quote
"I have seen how much the city of Portland has given me. How much it has changed me. My kids have grown into wonderful human beings that know not to laugh at fart jokes in movies; a wonderful marriage and a 17-year-old cat."
Cutting my teeth as a middle act all over the US. Mostly in Nebraska, however. All while raising two wonderful children. This was so long ago that my first CD, “Weird State,” was printed on cassette.
In 1998, Dave Anderson and I found an opportunity to do talk radio in Portland.
I stopped doing stand-up as Dave and I tried to make our mark in talk radio. This was in 2000. Which featured the most contentious election in history. In an awesome stroke of irony, the day the Supreme Court gave the election to Bush, KXL decided to let us go.
I was suddenly without a job and hadn’t performed stand up in a year. I had no choice than to throw myself back into stand up. Maybe that Renton gig wasn’t so bad.
Within a year I had experienced my most creative period. Winding up with a development deal with the company who created Gilmore Girls. I did road work, I travelled to Edinburgh to do the Fringe Festival, went to Afghanistan to entertain troops (US Troops)
All from a small house in NE Portland. This was my home. Where I recharged and healed through auditions, marriages, the kid’s saxophone and flute lessons.
I thought I would live here forever.
I’ve discovered however that for new opportunities I need to rattle my cage every now and then. And there is no better rattling than to move to Boise, Idaho.
Since Whitney accepted her new job with the Idaho Food Bank and we decided to move, I have seen how much the city of Portland has given me. How much it has changed me. My kids have grown into wonderful human beings that know not to laugh at fart jokes in movies; a wonderful marriage and a 17-year-old cat.
This has entailed a lot of tearing of roots. This was the house where I dealt with my Dad and Mom’s illness; my two brother’s deaths, Dave, Mike and Bill Hicks.
All from this pretty blue house in NE Portland.
I’m not going far. But wanted everyone to know that I will carry you, and Portland, with me no matter where life’s adventures takes me.