‘You need to locate yourself’: Jeremy Piven, raised by stage actors and comedians, takes his tour national

When actor Jeremy Piven is preparing to perform a standup comedy show, he knows at least a few in the audience are attending because they think they’ll see Ari Gold, the ruthless, rough-around-the-edges agent he played for eight seasons on HBO’s “Entourage.”

He knows others are at the show solely to make fun of him for performing standup after years on screens big and small.

And to be frank, he doesn’t really care.

“That doesn’t really matter how you come to my show, whether you love me or hate me, really that’s not my business,” he said.

Piven said as long as he gets people in the room, he knows he’ll have the opportunity to show them what he can do, something he’s essentially been doing since his stage debut at 8 years old in a production of Anton Chekov’s “The Seagull” at the Piven Theatre Workshop, which was founded by his parents.

Growing up, Piven assumed pretty much everyone had performer parents and a theater in which to play. Piven’s parents, Byrne and Joyce, who also had a hand in the creation of the world-renowned comedy troupe Second City, taught acting with improv and theater games created by actor and educator Viola Spolin.

“I had no reference for any of this,” he said. “I was getting on stage and having a great time and having fun and playing. Their whole credo was ‘Be in a state of play. Be totally present, put your energy and your focus on the other person, and always remember that you’re enough.’ That’s very empowering.”

Piven kept that credo in mind as he worked to establish himself as an actor. He starred, among many other television appearances, as head writer Jerry in “The Larry Sanders Show” for two seasons, as Spencer Kovak, cousin to Ellen DeGeneres’ character in “Ellen,” for three seasons, and Trevor Hale, aka Cupid, in “Cupid” for the show’s single season.

On the big screen, Piven has appeared in more than 60 films, including “Heat,” “Kiss the Girls,” “Black Hawk Down” and, of course, the “Entourage” movie.

Even with all that early work, it wasn’t until booking “Entourage” that Piven really burst on the scene, much to his amusement.

“For good or ill, I was incredibly tenacious and stayed after it and won the Fresh Face of the Year Award at 40 years old,” he said. “When I accepted the award, I said, ‘There’s nothing fresh about my face, but thank you.’ So I do really believe if you don’t give up, you’re going to break through.”

Despite a lengthy career behind him, plus post-“Entourage” work like “Mr. Selfridge” and “The Performance,” for which Piven spent more than a decade learning to tap dance, and training from Second City, the lifelong performer was still nervous about the idea of stand up comedy when he began considering it a decade ago.

“It’s a different exchange,” he explained. “You don’t have a scene partner, you’re alone and we’re human, so because it’s different, you have those nerves. Nerves are just an energy that we put a negative connotation on, but those nerves will get in the way of your flow and you being in the zone. We’re trying to get into the zone so that we’re present and working at our highest levels and creative entities, and you can do your work and have fun and bounce off the audience, and that just takes time.”

Piven started logging stage time at small venues like dive bars, initially just trying to get laughs.

Over time, Piven found that his past stage and acting work helped him feel comfortable enough on stage to successfully execute his material and, in a way, speed up the process of becoming an established comedian.

Now Piven’s comedy, which brings him to the Bing Crosby Theater on Sunday, has evolved into having conversations with the audience that reveal his take on life.

It’s all about finding your voice as a performer, he said. Jerry Seinfeld stays away from political topics, while George Carlin focused on observational humor and Dave Chappelle is fearless in his comedy.

“One of the things (my mother) said is, ‘You need to locate yourself,’ ” he said. “This was a note for actors, but I think ultimately standups can use it as well. You have to locate yourself as an actor. Who are you speaking to specifically?”

Piven said comedy works on both explanatory and escapist levels. Audience members are often looking for someone to make sense of life and what’s going on in the world as well as simply a reason to laugh.

Even still, Piven doesn’t put too much weight on what audiences expect to hear from shows, mentioning “The Four Agreements” by Don Miguel Ruiz, which discusses removing expectations from the equation.

At the same time though, Piven does address some of those expectations through his material.

“I let them know that I see them,” he said. “I let them know that they may think that I’m Ari Gold because I’ve been in their living rooms, and I unpack all of that and make it funny … I connect with the audience and really see them, so that we’re all in this together, and then reveal the misconceptions and the funny within it all, and then take them on this journey.”

Piven said, even after 10 years as a comedian, he still gets the “beautiful backhanded compliment” of “We didn’t know you were this funny” from audience members. Similarly, he recalls one club owner, who didn’t expect a lot from Piven, asking him if he was OK disappointing the audience.

He doesn’t get offended by either of those comments though, as he trusts in his experience and knows people are merely speaking from their own perspective and putting those feelings onto him.

“I’m not offended, because I know I’m not going to disappoint them,” Piven said. “I know that I’m prepared, and I’m going to make them laugh and surprise them and have fun with them.”