Wrimos Around the World: “Life Can Be Wondrously Fun”

One of the best parts of NaNoWriMo is the incredible community of writers behind it. Today, Cody Melcher, writer, stand-up comic, and host of the podcast Tomefoolery , shares his creative journey, and why fear can be an important part of the productive creative’s process :

What drew you to NaNoWriMo? Did its emphasis on unfiltered, uncensored creativity resonate with you?

I first heard about and got involved with NaNoWriMo in college. When I was young, I wanted to be a writer. I was a member of my school’s writing club in elementary school, I used to start and never finish elaborate space operas in middle school, and in high school I was a part of a local writers’ group at a Barnes & Noble in Houston.

It was something I really wanted to do, but a lot of personal things sort of took over my life at a certain point and my studies in school took away the rest of my time. At the time I heard about NaNoWriMo, I was trying to get my ducks in a row and my eggs in several baskets and I really connected to the idea. When it comes to non-standup writing, I’ve always been too obsessed with outlines. I write outlines out in my head and get really caught-up in having—essentially—a whole draft of something written in my head before I even put it to paper. I had had dreams of publishing a book before college, but I kept paralyzing myself before I could ever write one. Nothing was ever good enough.

NaNoWriMo came along and it seemed like such a perfect way to jump in and see if I could actually do it. To just write. And, as a goal-oriented person, the goal wasn’t to write a book, it was just to write the words needed to complete the challenge. They didn’t need a perfect first draft of a novel at the end, and that took so much pressure off of me.

I love your flair with underrepresented words! You describe yourself as a “witwanton” and a “Gentleman Radicalist.” You also make a reference to “finishing schools” in one of your stand-up shows. Do you find yourself in two worlds (old-fashioned aesthetics and iconoclast rebelliousness)?

I actually haven’t really thought of it in such directly concrete terms, but yeah, I guess I do in some way. I was very prim and proper growing up—obsessed with the concept of “Britishness” as an American tends to view it, and I loved the idea of that sort of Victorian style of manners as well as dress. I was raised pretty posh in terms of Americans as part of an old Southern family in Texas that attended a lot of gala events, so the gentleman thing was instilled in me when I was young, but I also really burrowed into it in the way that a kid does—that sort of surface-level way. I wore a bowler hat in middle school.

As I got older and the whole being queer thing started to be more of a part of my inner life, I started trying to find a place for myself, and I also got into the punk scene a bit. I always sort of thought of myself as a punk-punk—rebelling against the punk scene, which was pretty aggressively heteronormative and not at all interested in suits. I hadn’t yet discovered queercore, which came about in late high school and college for me.

I used to call myself an “Eccentric Gentleman”,which was on my business cards from middle school through college and into my professional life (case-in-point, I had business cards in middle school). “Gentleman Radicalist” came about as a replacement term because I felt that “Eccentric Gentleman” was an expression of what I am, but I wanted to express who I am. 

I never really felt like I had a capital-T Tribe growing up—a group of friends, a pack, a club or place of belonging—I sort of wandered in and out of different music styles, television shows, book genres, and eventually just had to figure out who I am on my own through trial and error. I mean, I’m still figuring myself out and I’m constantly trying to find new and radically different things to be into it.

I can’t help but love your podcast “Tomefoolery.” What gave you the idea for a podcast that’s essentially a book club for crazy literature?

In early 2012, I had recently moved to Chicago and was taking classes at Second City, Annoyance, iO, anywhere I could. I’d had a failed podcast and improv troupe, was moving away from improv and into stand-up, and was desperate to do things.

A new friend of mine from one of my classes at Second City—Ranjit Souri (who is one of the funniest and most fantastic people you’ll ever meet—check out his group Siblings of Doctors if you ever get the chance) approached me about doing a podcast together. His initial idea was something with books, which I was all for. I thought we should do a more narrowband concept, since there are so many podcasts out there, you have to differentiate yourself somehow. 

I had majored in Rhetoric at The University of Texas in Austin and had the absolute luck and joy of studying under Professor Trish Roberts-Miller in her Rhetoric of Demagoguery class. Trish and this class, honestly, is one of the biggest influences on my entire career moving forward. I had become obsessed with ideas—and books specifically—which were being put out into the world in sort of horrible ways. It was like watching a car crash, but a car crash you could warn people about and laugh about later (that makes no sense, I know). I suggested we should do a podcast about “weird and effed-up books”, with our first episode on Edgar Allen Poe’s only (racist) novel; the rest was history.

You’re tackling so many different projects, including your work as a stand-up. Has writing prep tied into creating your comedy?

I think the biggest lesson of NaNoWriMo that affected my stand-up—and really helped me in all aspects of my life—was to let myself breathe a little and be more spontaneous. When I write my stand-up, usually a premise comes to mind and then I’ll sort of follow a few tendrils of possible outcomes. 

A lot of the time, I’ll take the premise, have an idea of where I want to go, then just jump on stage with it a few times and just run until I reach the end; I think that’s informed a lot by the concept behind NaNoWriMo. There is no right or wrong, only through. As long as I’m having fun, the audience is having fun, and the material will be, you know, fun.

As someone with so many balls in the air, could you reveal one multitasking secret of Cody Melcher?

I’m going to cheat, but because I think there’s not really one key answer here, and also because the first one which came to my mind was not uplifting necessarily. I will say Fear, Scheduling, and Fun.

Fear was what first came to my mind, because a lot of my life is driven by it, but I attempt to harness it. I don’t want to fail myself or others, and so I get things done because they need to get done. Fear isn’t always the best motivator, though, because it can cripple (which is why I’m terrible at responding to emails—they just come back if you answer them! It never ends!).

Scheduling is incredibly important and not just for the purposes of a calendar. Scheduling is more than a to-do list: it’s giving yourself realistic goals and realistic time limits for accomplishing them. It’s also prioritizing and giving yourself a buffer so that if important or unexpected things come up, you’re not overwhelmed or thrown off (again, something I’m still mastering).

Fun is something I’ve been trying to work on more and more. You can and will burn out. No one can last forever, and the people who claim they can are running on a tightrope. It’s a great trick and everyone’s impressed, but it’s dangerous and not guaranteed to end well. I work pretty much all the time I’m awake, but I’ve been trying to dedicate more time to not working. My New Year’s resolution last year was to take a day off from working every week (I failed miserably, but I fell like a shooting star of hope).

You need to take care of yourself, because even if you can work 24/7, a lot of that work won’t be as good as it could have been if you were rested and calm and happy—and also, you’re a human person, find some time to enjoy your life. I will also say that, for creative work, you need to experience life and drink deep of the world around and within you. You can’t be influenced by your alarm clock and your desperate determination to finish everything as quickly as possible. Sometimes, you know, life can be wondrously fun.

Do you have another creative endeavor stewing that you are willing to share? How have you motivated yourself to get started on it?

Oh, man, I have too many things. As of right now, I run a semi-monthly podcast, a weekly standup showcase, a comedy festival, I do standup, I’m in a sketch duo which is currently in a show run, I have a one-man show about politics in October, a play I wrote and am producing in November, and a nonfiction book I’m working on for next year. I’m also trying to get a webseries, a blog about wrestling fashion, and another podcast off the ground—but I’m trying not to overexert myself.

As for stewing projects, I’m going to open up my list of big projects that I can’t work on yet (because I’m trying to be realistic this year). They are: a novel, a one-man show about President James Garfield and fame, two film scripts, and three television pilots. I feel tired already.

In terms of getting motivated to get started on the ones I am definitely doing this year, it was just a matter of “No one else is going to do this for me”. I have a lot of great people I work with, but in a lot of my projects, I tend to work solo or at least tend to grab the baton a lot, and it’s because of that Fear thing I talked about earlier. I never want to feel like I’m just letting life slip by while I’m not at least trying to take hold of the reins. Some have called me a control freak, and sadly that’s probably true, but that’s also why I work alone a lot. It has to get done, and by hell or high water, if I have to be the one to do it, it’s going to get done. Also, you know, they’re fun sometimes. After they’re done and I can finally relax.

Cody Melcher is a witwanton and literary gentleman who weaves a tapestry of obscure observations and personal proclivities designed to delight and enlighten.  Based in Chicago, he is the producer of 100 Proof Comedy at CSz Chicago, half of the celebrated sketch duo Melcher & Hauser, Editor in Chief of wrestling fashion blog Bespokeslam, and host of the critically-acclaimed podcast Tomefoolery.

Interview conducted by Madeleine Flamiano.