Rory Scovel, Stand-Up’s Unexpected Renaissance Man

Rory Scovel sweated his way through postproduction of his latest stand-up special. The night it taped, he’d been sure his Minneapolis set had killed. But the laughter was barely audible in the cuts he was watching. “I thought I bombed,” he says. “Here I am, entering year 20 in comedy, only to find out I’m actually very delusional.” 

Anxious, perhaps, but not delusional. There’s abundant laughter in Religion, Sex and a Few Things in Between, out Feb. 22 on Max, now that it includes actual audio of the audience — and not just Scovel’s stage mic, the only recording that he’d previously heard. The 43-year-old South Carolina native’s two-month doom spiral had been for nothing. But even if it had been the disaster he feared, Scovel has more to fall back on these days. Key roles on the Apple TV+ drama Physical and Damien Chazelle’s Babylon opened acting doors that had long been closed to him, and he’ll next appear in Nick Stoller’s You’re Cordially Invited as Reese Witherspoon’s “douchey Southern brother.” He’s also making a second career out of a relatively new hobby. A few years back, he got turned on to painting after buying some art supplies for his 8-year-old daughter. He’s since converted the garage behind the Eagle Rock home he shares with her and his actress wife, Jordan Boughrum, into a studio and is actively making, showing and selling his work. “It never occurred to me how much I’d like it,” Scovel explains over lunch at his favorite Thai restaurant in Pasadena. “I am obsessed with painting. I think about it all the time.”

At what point did you regain your confidence in this special?

When we finally sat down with the guy who mastered the sound. Suddenly, I could hear everybody. I made him pause it and asked, “Have you sweetened this?” I don’t like when specials do that. It’s always obvious. He goes, “No, this is the first time you’re hearing the eight microphones in the crowd.” I almost started crying.

Do people actually add laughs? 

Oh yeah, all the time. You can start to hear the laughs’ rhythms — the exact same, over and over. Sometimes people only sweeten certain areas. Others blanket the whole thing. I get the image thing. I want people to think I crushed, too. But how can you live with yourself? If people don’t laugh at a certain joke, that’s just part of the show. 

Once this special is out, you’re done with this set. Is writing the next exciting or anxiety-inducing?

In a perfect world, I’d already have the next hour ready, and we’d drop the new tour dates. But I don’t think I could operate like that. And the landscape is changing, in terms of timing. So much consumption is in these little snippets on TikTok, Instagram or wherever the fuck. The pressure I feel the most is figuring out how to find the audience — and, as someone who works at this pace, how to have the audience find me. 

Any comedy social media conversation invariably leads to Matt Rife.

He’s a great example of someone who was doing fine and then figured out the TikTok game. He posted this crowd work, and they fucking loved it. They want to go to see it live. I will say that’s the only thing I don’t like about it. He’s very fast and very funny, but that isn’t what I want to do. I don’t want people to show up for me thinking they have some kind of power over the show. 

You had one person chime in during this special.

This woman was front and center and really wanted to get in on this rhetorical question. One time gives me an opportunity to fuck around. I don’t mind it, but I don’t love it. I want audiences to be aware that if you’re at my show, it’s like my house. I’m hosting you for dinner — and I want you to love it — but I’ve dictated the menu, the cocktails and the music. You sacrifice that when the crowd gets too involved.

Your own work gets broken up into little bits on social media. When you post character work, which is sometimes a parody of bro humor, do you worry about people just taking it at face value? 

You eliminate the setup of sarcasm and any rapport when you’re posting something that’s 30 seconds. I have a clip up right now from my Netflix special, where I have a Members Only jacket hiked halfway up my torso. It’s a joke I set up for an hour before it pays off — and has nothing to do with the clip. So some comments are just, “This guy looks insane.” And if that 30 seconds is a character, some people are sadly not curious enough to wonder if maybe there’s something more to it. 

So is posting that 30 seconds worth it to you?

I think so. I totally get if someone sees five seconds of me talking and is like, “I hate this guy.” I sometimes hate myself. (Laughs.) But I think I’ve graduated from wanting to be liked by everybody. I also don’t blame them for not wanting to look into it. That just means that it’s a relationship that wasn’t meant to be. 

You have your own audience, but you share some billings. What takes, religious or political, don’t travel as well? 

I’m so tired of people saying, “I’m at a comedy show. I didn’t come to hear about politics.” I do get that, on the surface, we’re drowning in it. That just makes me try to find material where people don’t realize we’re talking about politics. What delivery or persona can make you go, “Oh man, we’re really talking about heavy shit,” while you’re still laughing? There has to be ways to address this stuff — not just to feel better but to maybe wake some people up a bit. I get so apocalyptic about it all, but the people who are compassionate and respectful of others … I think our numbers are higher than we realize.

Tell me about the push to painting.

My dad passed away during COVID. When I came back from the funeral in South Carolina, where no one was taking any precautions at all, my wife and my neighbor set me up in this back apartment with canvases and paints. I was in solitude for nine days, mourning and in quarantine, so they were just like, “Here you go, if you want to make something!” I gave myself a goal to make a painting for each of my [six] siblings. It took me a long time, but I kept finding a joy in it. I did an art show in a space I rented in December, and I now sell paintings. It’s incredible therapy. 

Where does acting fit in your priorities right now?

It’s become a bigger one because of Physical. That was not a job I thought I was going to get. This was also just after my dad passed, and I had the worst attitude. Putting yourself on tape is the worst to begin with. You just feel so vulnerable. When it’s just you, no other actors, you feel so dumb. But my wife, the greatest person in the world, was like, “There’s nowhere to go. There’s nothing to do. Let’s just do it a thousand times.” Next thing I know, I have a chemistry reading with Rose Byrne and what in the fuck is even real? I don’t get these roles. 

They’re roles I want, where it’s not just, “Deliver the joke,” but no one’s coming to me for them. To get to learn from Rose for three years, it changed my respect for acting. Now I’m curious how far I can go.

Babylon is such an outlier on your résumé. How did that happen?

Another audition on tape. (Laughs.) I didn’t hear anything, which always means you didn’t get it. But once we started shooting Physical, my confidence was super high. I asked my manager if they’d cast the part and if I could put myself on tape again. It’d been five months, but not an hour later she says, “Damien wants to get on a Zoom tomorrow.” We hit it off so well that I honestly thought we were going to exchange numbers and hang out that night. I remember thinking, “If I don’t get this role, he’s a psychopath.”

Apparently he’s not.

And day one, I’m just working with Margot Robbie, another actor where you keep having to take a step back because they’re so good. God, it sounds like I’ll only work with Australian women. I guess Cate Blanchett will be next. 

This story first appeared in the Feb. 21 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.