Biography:
Andrew "Dice" Clay, born Andrew Clay Silverstein (born on September 29, 1957, in Brooklyn, New York) is an American comedian and actor. He is known for his profane comedy in a career that has lasted more than 20 years. His popularity peaked in the late 1980s.
Director Jay Dubin was quoted on the "E! True Hollywood Story: Andrew 'Dice' Clay" as saying, in effect, "What's the bad news? That he's making seven figures in Vegas?", a reference to Clay's popular Las Vegas Strip comedy shows. He was ranked number 95 on Comedy Central's list of the 100 Greatest Stand-ups of All Time. After a live comedy appearance on the 1989 MTV Video Music Awards he received a "lifetime ban" due to his profane language and offensive jokes. According to his new show Dice: Undisputed on VH1, Clay is engaged to Eleanor Kerrigan, a former professional wrestler with the professional name EZ Rider, from Women of Wrestling.
Early career:
Born Andrew Clay Silverstein in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn, he was doing impressions and entertaining his family in the living room by the time he was 5. He was a fairly proficient drummer at Sheepshead Bay High School, and played bar mitzvahs and casual dates as "Clay Silvers". In 1978, he auditioned at Pips, a local comedy club, doing comedic impressions, then headlined there the following week as "Andrew Clay". His act at the time included an impression of John Travolta in Grease and Jerry Lewis as The Nutty Professor. Clay graduated to the major Manhattan comedy clubs, including Budd Friedman's Improv, Catch a Rising Star and Rodney Dangerfield's. The inevitable move to Los Angeles came in 1980. He was "adopted" there by Mitzi Shore, owner of the famed Comedy Store. His work at the Store led to sitcom appearances on M*A*S*H and Diff'rent Strokes. He later landed roles in movies such as Making the Grade, starring Judd Nelson (1984) (playing a character named "Dice"), Pretty In Pink (1986) (credited for the first time as Andrew "Dice" Clay). As "Andrew Dice Clay", he also had a regular role on Crime Story from 1986 – 1988. That was followed by a series of less-notable films. He eventually turned from acting to pursue a career in stand-up comedy, focusing on the character "Dice" from Pretty in Pink.
Nursery rhyme adaptations:
One of his routines involved the subversion of traditional nursery rhymes. Clay turned the nursey rhymes from child-friendly poems into records of sordid sexual encounters. Dice's versions of "Old Mother Hubbard" and "Little Boy Blue" are examples of these profane adaptations.
The Day the Laughter Died:
Clay recorded his most successful example of "Dice" as performance art. The two CD set The Day the Laughter Died, lasting just under two hours, hit the Top 40 Album Chart. The album's comedy broke from traditional stand-up performance, and consisted mostly of audience-baiting, and deliberately unfunny and scatological musings on life.
Popularity and controversy:
Clay garnered a recording contract with Rick Rubin's Def American label. His debut album Dice was a commercial success. Sampled excerpts from the album made their way to tracks by gangsta rap artist Ice Cube and rock band EMF. In 1989, he appeared on the annual MTV Video Music Awards, where his raunchy and profane material caused MTV to ban him from the network for life. When he hosted Saturday Night Live, musical guest Sinéad O'Connor and cast member Nora Dunn refused to appear, protesting Clay's misogynist and racist persona. Clay donated the money from this appearance to charity. One segment on the program parodied both It's a Wonderful Life and the controversy surrounding Clay's appearance on the program (which was a running gag throughout the episode), with Clay pondering suicide on a bridge, when he is met by his "guardian devil," played by Jon Lovitz, and Frank Zappa, played by Dana Carvey. Lovitz shows him what the world would be like if he had not been born, including Nora Dunn crushed by Sinéad O'Connor's guitar amplifier. His bad attitude and short fuse often cause him to pick fights with people (including audience members at his shows, and the hosts of the shows).
Commercial success:
Clay's first starring role in a feature film was as the title character in The Adventures of Ford Fairlane in 1990.
A stand-up performance at Madison Square Garden was given movie release as Dice Rules in 1991 but many movie theatres refused to show it. Then in 1992 he released 40 Too Long.
His 1993 album The Day The Laughter Died, Part 2 was recorded in front of a small audience at Dangerfield's in New York. On the comedy album, he verbally insults his audience. Apart from the audience-baiting, he also attacked American film critics Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert for giving Dice Rules and Ford Fairlane bad reviews. (Ebert, giving Dice Rules zero stars, stated that, "It could not be more damaging to the career of Andrew Dice Clay if it had been made as a documentary by someone who hated him."). (Dice mispronounced Ebert's surname as "Ebrik") He also insulted Marlee Matlin, the deaf film actress. He went on for a number of minutes trivializing her struggles as a deaf actress. Responding to a request for a nursery rhyme, which he had previously refused to do in The Day The Laughter Died, he claimed, "You don't know how much I hate those fucking poems, you have no idea how I hate those fucking poems, I wish I'd never thought of those fucking poems." The album comes to a sudden close when Dice challenges one person in the audience to a fight; the comedian can be heard exchanging words with the individual in poorly recorded audio as the track fades out.
Bless This House:
He returned in 1995, dropping the "Dice" from his name, eschewing his "Diceman" persona, and playing the part of a caring family man in the CBS sitcom Bless This House. It co-starred Cathy Moriarty.
Later works:
Following the sitcom's cancellation, Clay again retreated from the media spotlight, for a couple of years. 1996 saw him again trying to reclaim his stand-up throne with the broadcast of the HBO special, "Assume the Position." Although a great success for both Clay and the network, the special failed to return the comedian to his previous heights. It did, however, land him a starring role on the short-lived 1997 UPN comedy Hitz as record exec Jimmy Esposito.
In 1998, Clay released the triple-live album "Filth" via the Internet. Although chock-full of his trademark raunch, the album was criticized for being too much about shock and not including enough strong material. Around this time, Clay fell out of favor with longtime friend and supporter Howard Stern. Stern stated on the air many times that he felt Clay had lost his edge and was no longer funny. In the late summer of 1997, Clay had written an article criticizing Stern. In retaliation, Stern got into a huge fight with Clay over the air and they insulted each other virulently. Thus, Clay was not welcome on the shock jock's morning show any longer, which closed him off from a then-tremendous national audience.
Not long after, Clay aligned himself with New York City-based talk program "The Opie and Anthony Show." The show, which was rapidly becoming popular in New York City at the time, was a perfect match for Clay and his appearances seemed to breathe new life into his persona and on-stage act. 2000 saw the release of "Face Down, Ass Up," the comedian's first album in over two years. Clay credits Opie and Anthony for revitalizing his career, which is confirmed in the liner notes to the album.
To coincide with the release of "Face Down, Ass Up," Opie and Anthony teamed up with Dice to once again allow him to perform at Madison Square Garden. "The Opie and Anthony Show" plugged the performance with a relentless intensity and eventually achieved Clay a half-full house at the infamous New York City arena. Having almost bottomed out barely two years prior, this was seen as a major achievement for Clay despite the event not selling out.
In August of 2002, "The Opie and Anthony Show" was cancelled abruptly following an on-air stunt that went too far, leaving Dice without a radio home. Although the comedian aligned himself somewhat with the moderately-successful Mancow show based out of Chicago, IL, it seemed as though his trajectory had stalled without the backing of his biggest supporters, Opie and Anthony. "The Opie and Anthony Show" did return to the airwaves in 2004, however, broadcasting on XM satellite radio. But to the chagrin of both the members of the show and its audience, Clay did not resume his regular appearances on the show.
Instead, Clay made an attempt to revive his relationship with Howard Stern. The comedian appeared on Stern's program as the two spoke about their resolution of differences and willingness to maintain their long-defunct friendship. Many fans and supporters saw this move as a desperate stab at reclaiming his former fame and glory and criticized Clay for essentially turning his back on his friends Opie and Anthony. Opie and Anthony remained quiet on the air about it for some time, but later aired their grievances when Clay began openly mocking them while on "The Howard Stern Show."
In 2005, Clay signed a deal with Sirius, Howard Stern's post-FM broadcasting home, to produce and broadcast his own show, Out of the Cage.
CNN appearance:
In an interview promoting his recent work on November 12, 2003, Clay used several profanities on a live CNN cable news program, The Biz, hosted by Allan Chernoff. Clay was angry that the newscaster asked him if he was running a gym instead of working as a comedian. He left the set and called Chernoff a "fucking jerk off...asshole guy". During his recent show on VH1 he is seen getting upset when others imply that he is no longer successful.
Dice on Sirius Satellite Radio:
Andrew Dice Clay is doing his own radio show, Out of the Cage on the "Special Time Slot" on Sirius.
Artie Lange fight:
Clay and Artie Lange had an altercation on the Howard Stern show. Lange claimed Clay didn’t pay him in a timely manner for the gig they did together at the Borgata in Atlantic City, New Jersey on July 7, 2006. Artie believed Clay lied about trying to contact him and also accused Clay of patronizing him by telling him that he's a great performer, when he merely wanted the exposure of being on Artie's show. Artie also claimed that it was his presence on the stage that enabled the show to be sold out, which is something Clay denies.
On July 24, 2006, Artie Lange revealed that his agent had finally received payment from Clay.
The First Live Stand-Up Show on Radio:
On November 4, 2006, Andrew Dice Clay performed stand-up live with Artie Lange on Sirius Satellite Radio. A subsequent discussion of the show revealed that he was booed and heckled for over 20 minutes.
Dice on Tom Green Live:
On November 1, 2006, Andrew Dice Clay appeared on Tom Green Live on Tom Green's Internet show at his website. [1]. On the show, Clay mentioned his displeasure with MTV, Dick Clark and his subsequent banning from MTV. He also voiced displeasure with Gene Simmons, mocking his reality TV show and hairstyle, and mentioned VH1 was there to film his own reality show, Dice Undisputed. Towards the end of the show, he picked a fight with Green before making up with him on camera. He appeared on the show again on November 14, and Green later admitted (while interviewing Erik Estrada on the show) that their "fights" had been planned. On December 1, Dice and Green taped a segment in which they interviewed Paris Hilton. A video surfaced on the internet of Dice, Green, and Hilton backstage in which Dice, some argue, is hitting on Hilton.
Dice: Undisputed on VH1:
On March 4, 2007, Andrew Dice Clay premiered a weekly celebreality series on VH1. The show focuses on Clay and his entourage as he attempts to revive his comedy career. The series is produced by Fox and follows Clay as he writes a book, records a CD and produces his own Sirius satellite radio show. VH1 Senior Vice President Jeff Olde describes the show as a "real-life 'Entourage,' only with disheveled fortysomething guys in the comedy world." Dice: Undisputed is executive produced by Danny Salles for Fox TV Studios. Jeff Olde, Jill Holmes, Alex Demyanenko and Damla Dogan are executive producers for VH1.[3]
Clay was banned from MTV, but his current show is on sister network VH1. Both VH1 and MTV are subsidiaries of MTV Networks, which itself is owned by Viacom.
Discography:
- Dice, 1989
- The Day the Laughter Died, 1990
- Dice Rules, 1991
- 40 Too Long, 1992
- Day The Laughter Died, Part 2, 1993
- Filth, 1999
- Face Down, Ass Up, 2000
- "Shadows Fall Rant", 2007
Filmography:
