Louis C.K. on the Importance of Acting Like an Asshole -- Vulture

Full of Cinnabon and self-loathing, Louis C.K. might be the funniest man alive. As a stand-up, he can play it dirty, with jokes about getting blown by his (now ex-) wife, or dirtier, with jokes about blowing Satan. His comic infallibility took a hit in 2006 when his HBO sitcom, Lucky Louie, was canceled after one season, but now he's back to prove that his fellatio jokes (and many others) can work in any format: Tonight at 11, FX premieres his new half-hour comedy, Louie, a one-man show (he writes, stars, directs, and edits) that mixes his stand-up with filmed vignettes about his allegedly depressing divorcé life. We talked to him about why complaining about your kids is a social imperative, and why comedies are the least funny movies out there.

Why didn’t Lucky Louie work out for you?
Well, it worked out for me. [HBO’s] choice was not to keep doing it, but for me, I got a full season of television that I really enjoyed. I just didn’t catch the right wave with what was going on at HBO.

What do you mean by that?
The feeling I got with it was it was hard for them to re-up the show. Warner Bros. had financial concerns. Everybody who was working there is not working there anymore. We had higher ratings every week than we did the week previous; that’s usually a show that’s gonna get renewed. There was other stuff going on.