A common icebreaker is, “If you could have lunch with anyone, living or dead, who would it be?” I’ve never really cared for questions like that. When it comes up, I always choke and can’t think of anyone cool. I was giving it some thought lately and here’s who I came up with. I went with artists, generally. No lame people like philosophers, leaders, or politicians (boo).
Name: Mitch Hedberg
Profession: Comedian
Living or dead: Dead, and the world is poorer for it
When I first heard about Mitch Hedberg, I had already been interested in stand-up comedy for a while. I gained consciousness and the later part of the '80s where Bill Cosby was everywhere. We know he’s a bad guy now, but my parents had a bunch of his comedy albums and that was the first time I heard standup comedy, and it was transformative.
But then around 2001 I randomly saw Mitch Hedberg on TV on a Saturday afternoon at Just for Laughs or something and it blew my mind. His one liners and how he could turn a good joke into a great joke with just his pronunciation, emphasizing different syllables. He seemed like a mad genius. This caused me to get more into standup which solidified for me the fact that Mitch was doing something other people couldn’t. I inhaled those first two CDs like a religious experience, and even when they release that posthumous “work in progress” album (Do You Believe in Gosh?) I lapped it up.
I remember I found out he died from a post by the Minneapolis band Motion City Soundtrack in a weird confluence of my interests. That he died, and so young, was obviously tragic and I took it hard.
If I had lunch with Mitch, we’d have sandwiches, of course.
Name: Andy Summers
Profession: Guitarist
Living or dead: Living
I like Andy Summers because he seems like the unsung hero of the Police, one of my favorite bands. He seems like the middle child of the Police. Sting has the smug confidence of an oldest child, where Stewart Copeland has the brash attention seeking behavior of a youngest child.
Sting wrote surface level literary and psychology references, Stewart Copeland had the flashy drums, but Andy Summers is where the Police come together. (This is a big part of why Sting’s solo stuff has always felt a little dull to me.) He also seems like a very chill dude, even though he was part of one of the biggest bands on the planet.
If I had lunch with Andy, we’d have tea? That’s what British people like, right?
Name: Jared and Jerusha Hess
Profession: Filmmakers
Living or dead: Living
I had just started college in 2004 when I read about Napoleon Dynamite in a magazine and made a point to go see it. Very 2004. It checked a lot of boxes for me. I was living in Idaho, for one. I also grew up as an awkward teen surrounded by a lot of other awkward teens, so Napoleon Dynamite spoke directly to my soul. I would put it in my top five movies, easy.
I think it’s cool that Jared and Jerusha are a husband and wife team and that they have a unique perspective. No one makes movies like them. I think it’s a shame some of their movies have not been understood by critics and audiences. It's been a little bit painful to watch them kind of struggle to find where they fit in a post Napoleon world, but they’ve stuck to their guns and they’re still kicking around 20 years later and I have nothing but respect for them.
If I was having lunch with Jerusha and Jared, we would have – and you should have seen this answer coming from a mile away – tater tots.
Name: Kurt Vonnegut
Profession: Author
Living or dead: Dead
I've mentioned before that I was kind of a sad kid with an unhealthy attachment to his high school English teacher, and she was the one who recommended Slaughterhouse Five. I thought it was really good back then, but every time I re-read it, it gets better. The premise of a person becoming “unstuck” in time and experiencing the story out of order was ingenious and is not only a good narrative device, but it makes everything funnier.
That was the book that first interested me in Vonnegut, but what made me stick around was God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater. It's about a person who is born into money but wants to give it away because he sees the sorry state of the world, and the distress it causes his rich father and all the establishment of people who have money. It basically asked the question: why don't we care about poor people? And why is it so bad to want to take care of poor people?
If Kurt and I were having lunch, we’d have a Three Musketeers bar.
Name: Miranda Hart
Profession: Actor/Writer/Comedian
Living or dead: Living
Miranda Hart is an actor/creator. In her series Miranda, she writes herself as the butt of many jokes, but is alternately vulnerable and dignified on screen. She gives this dignity to other characters she portrays as well. She has a gift for physical comedy as well as funny turns of phrase, and she is the best at breaking the fourth wall. If you’ve seen Fleabag, it's essentially a sadder, dirtier version of Miranda.
I think critics weren't necessarily super stoked about Miranda, but she weathered the criticism, and I think the show is classic status. Packed to the gills with jokes, it’s comfort TV of the highest quality and holds up over repeated watches. I’m always looking forward to seeing her pop up in something new and reading whatever she writes.
If Miranda and I had lunch, I think we’d have “novelty” chocolate.
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