mascan42
01-30-2005, 04:30 PM
Pretty sure this is from a Jersey paper, but since I'm not from Jersey, I don't know which one.
Opie 'n' Anthony sidekick is awfully entertaining
Sunday, January 30, 2005
By TOM TRONCONE
STAFF WRITER
It's a Wednesday in early December, and comedian Jim Norton claims he's had sex with four prostitutes in the past week.
His mother wants him to renounce "ladies of the night" and replace them with running on a treadmill at the gym, where he might meet a nice girl.
But it isn't likely that "Little Jimmy," who appears nearly every night at the Comedy Cellar, on MacDougal Street in Greenwich Village, will stop paying for sex. The stand-up comic, cable television regular and all-around pervert is addicted.
Though the self-described "weak-chinned nothing with fat-man breasts" doesn't share the marquee with Gregg Hughes and Anthony Cumia, better known as the radio duo Opie 'n' Anthony, Norton has been every bit the little "n" since the twosome reemerged on XM Satellite Radio in October.
And the Jersey native is helping O&A attract listeners to the free-for-all, uncensored landscape of satellite radio. By all accounts, the listeners are signing up in droves to listen to the show that was once the highest-rated afternoon radio program in the metropolitan area in virtually every male demographic.
Neither Hughes nor Cumia will discuss numbers, saying only that management has told them that they have "far exceeded" expectations.
And the absence of restrictions has clearly benefited the potty-mouthed Norton the most.
"Jim adds this side that is so dark and perverse," Cumia said. "It's not that we wouldn't go there. We wouldn't even think about going there."
There are no topics off limits in the cuttingly obscene, cringe-humor world of Jim Norton. Pedophilia. AIDS. Gays. Down syndrome. Minorities. Abortion.
Norton was a regular O&A cast member when Infinity Broadcasting reacted to pressure from religious groups and pulled the plug on the radio funnymen after a sex stunt at St. Patrick's Cathedral in August 2002.
The Opie and Anthony show had about 5 million listeners - including a massive North Jersey following - when it was syndicated nationwide on FM radio. Today, their office in XM's 57th Street studio where Norton, Hughes and Cumia each sat for a recent interview is little more than a closet.
Light bulbs in metal cages adorn the ceilings. The furniture consists of two tables with a single telephone on each - one labeled "Opie" and the other "Anthony." A mop leans in the corner, and a lone stapler sits in front of a window overlooking a nondescript New York alley.
Norton sits back in a chair and plops his leg on the table with the "Opie" phone.
He is an odd mix of confidence and self-deprecation. He clearly knows he is a top-notch comic. But does he really embody the prison locker room humor persona he adopts on-air or onstage?
"It's an exaggeration at times," Norton said. "But I am a pervert. I'm a creep. I'm a sex addict."
The stories about prostitutes are real, he claims. It's part of what he brings to the radio show - brutal candidness.
"He's brought complete honesty," Hughes said. "We all have some ... [skeletons] in our closet. He just opens the closet."
"I would hate to think he has something in his closet that he won't talk about," Cumia said. "How demented that would be."
Behind the comic act, however, it's apparent that Norton, 36, is intelligent. He's quick-witted. He's knowledgeable about world events. He doesn't rely on just being dirty to get laughs.
Norton was an alcoholic at a very young age. He was voted "class clown" of his high school graduating class at North Brunswick High School in Middlesex County, but the school wouldn't give him the award because he was in rehab after an alcohol-induced suicide attempt. But he no longer drinks. Instead, other vices - like paying for sex - have taken its place.
Norton attended Middlesex County College for one semester, where he received "one B and three F's," he said.
The fact that he can joke about himself, Norton said, helps him justify some of his vicious attacks on others.
"To me, contentwise, anything is fair game, because I am so brutal with myself," Norton said. "There is nobody whom I hit with the hatchet more than myself. ... I'm honest about my awful life, and people relate to my awfulness. They know they are in the same toilet that I am."
Norton's particular brand of humor can make for awkward personal moments. Christmas at his parents' house, for example, is difficult. His mother and father both listen to the radio show, and his dad is often forced to convince Norton's mom that the topics he mocks and exploits he details on the air are simply for show.
"It's awful," Norton said. "Nobody wants their mom to know they double as a toilet."
Hughes, 41, nicknamed "Opie" for his boyhood resemblance to Ron Howard's character on "The Andy Griffith Show," said that he and Cumia, 43, first brought Norton onto the show to act as a "sniper," someone who could interject an "exclamation point" into a conversation.
"Ant and I are radio guys," Hughes said. "We learned how to be dirty without cursing. ... A comedian like Norton is used to the clubs where anything goes."
Which, apparently, translates well to satellite radio. Norton is now free from censors and the influence of advertisers to discuss just about anything he pleases.
But, according to Hughes and Cumia, once the mics are turned off and the crowds are gone, Norton tones down his persona.
"Off air, he is one of the nicest guys you'd ever want to meet," Hughes said.
"But those nasty, evil thoughts are there," Cumia said with a laugh.
Opie 'n' Anthony sidekick is awfully entertaining
Sunday, January 30, 2005
By TOM TRONCONE
STAFF WRITER
It's a Wednesday in early December, and comedian Jim Norton claims he's had sex with four prostitutes in the past week.
His mother wants him to renounce "ladies of the night" and replace them with running on a treadmill at the gym, where he might meet a nice girl.
But it isn't likely that "Little Jimmy," who appears nearly every night at the Comedy Cellar, on MacDougal Street in Greenwich Village, will stop paying for sex. The stand-up comic, cable television regular and all-around pervert is addicted.
Though the self-described "weak-chinned nothing with fat-man breasts" doesn't share the marquee with Gregg Hughes and Anthony Cumia, better known as the radio duo Opie 'n' Anthony, Norton has been every bit the little "n" since the twosome reemerged on XM Satellite Radio in October.
And the Jersey native is helping O&A attract listeners to the free-for-all, uncensored landscape of satellite radio. By all accounts, the listeners are signing up in droves to listen to the show that was once the highest-rated afternoon radio program in the metropolitan area in virtually every male demographic.
Neither Hughes nor Cumia will discuss numbers, saying only that management has told them that they have "far exceeded" expectations.
And the absence of restrictions has clearly benefited the potty-mouthed Norton the most.
"Jim adds this side that is so dark and perverse," Cumia said. "It's not that we wouldn't go there. We wouldn't even think about going there."
There are no topics off limits in the cuttingly obscene, cringe-humor world of Jim Norton. Pedophilia. AIDS. Gays. Down syndrome. Minorities. Abortion.
Norton was a regular O&A cast member when Infinity Broadcasting reacted to pressure from religious groups and pulled the plug on the radio funnymen after a sex stunt at St. Patrick's Cathedral in August 2002.
The Opie and Anthony show had about 5 million listeners - including a massive North Jersey following - when it was syndicated nationwide on FM radio. Today, their office in XM's 57th Street studio where Norton, Hughes and Cumia each sat for a recent interview is little more than a closet.
Light bulbs in metal cages adorn the ceilings. The furniture consists of two tables with a single telephone on each - one labeled "Opie" and the other "Anthony." A mop leans in the corner, and a lone stapler sits in front of a window overlooking a nondescript New York alley.
Norton sits back in a chair and plops his leg on the table with the "Opie" phone.
He is an odd mix of confidence and self-deprecation. He clearly knows he is a top-notch comic. But does he really embody the prison locker room humor persona he adopts on-air or onstage?
"It's an exaggeration at times," Norton said. "But I am a pervert. I'm a creep. I'm a sex addict."
The stories about prostitutes are real, he claims. It's part of what he brings to the radio show - brutal candidness.
"He's brought complete honesty," Hughes said. "We all have some ... [skeletons] in our closet. He just opens the closet."
"I would hate to think he has something in his closet that he won't talk about," Cumia said. "How demented that would be."
Behind the comic act, however, it's apparent that Norton, 36, is intelligent. He's quick-witted. He's knowledgeable about world events. He doesn't rely on just being dirty to get laughs.
Norton was an alcoholic at a very young age. He was voted "class clown" of his high school graduating class at North Brunswick High School in Middlesex County, but the school wouldn't give him the award because he was in rehab after an alcohol-induced suicide attempt. But he no longer drinks. Instead, other vices - like paying for sex - have taken its place.
Norton attended Middlesex County College for one semester, where he received "one B and three F's," he said.
The fact that he can joke about himself, Norton said, helps him justify some of his vicious attacks on others.
"To me, contentwise, anything is fair game, because I am so brutal with myself," Norton said. "There is nobody whom I hit with the hatchet more than myself. ... I'm honest about my awful life, and people relate to my awfulness. They know they are in the same toilet that I am."
Norton's particular brand of humor can make for awkward personal moments. Christmas at his parents' house, for example, is difficult. His mother and father both listen to the radio show, and his dad is often forced to convince Norton's mom that the topics he mocks and exploits he details on the air are simply for show.
"It's awful," Norton said. "Nobody wants their mom to know they double as a toilet."
Hughes, 41, nicknamed "Opie" for his boyhood resemblance to Ron Howard's character on "The Andy Griffith Show," said that he and Cumia, 43, first brought Norton onto the show to act as a "sniper," someone who could interject an "exclamation point" into a conversation.
"Ant and I are radio guys," Hughes said. "We learned how to be dirty without cursing. ... A comedian like Norton is used to the clubs where anything goes."
Which, apparently, translates well to satellite radio. Norton is now free from censors and the influence of advertisers to discuss just about anything he pleases.
But, according to Hughes and Cumia, once the mics are turned off and the crowds are gone, Norton tones down his persona.
"Off air, he is one of the nicest guys you'd ever want to meet," Hughes said.
"But those nasty, evil thoughts are there," Cumia said with a laugh.