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This is the second episode of the Comedic Pursuits podcast! I’m your host, Seth Payne, as always. The music we play at the beginning of this episode is by Zach Mason, our guest on the show today. Zach is a DC improviser, director, writer, and general comedic performer, a real renaissance man of comedy.

Highlights from my interview with Zach Mason

Zach actually has his very own podcast called Like Yes, which you can find on iTunes, so give that a listen when you’re done here!

Some of the interview questions and answers have been edited for clarity, but you can hear the full version in the podcast recording.

Can you give us some background on your comedy career so far?

I’ve always related to other people by trying to make them laugh. I did a lot of class clown kind of stuff through high school. I also started drawing when I was really young. When I was in my early 20s, I started doing comics. A lot of those were a simple drawing with a joke under it. I got really into that and was doing some longer stories that were less funny. I did that for a bunch of years and was doing comic shows, going to other cities and tabling and selling comics. That kind of worked those joke writing muscles.

About four or five years ago, I was in a pretty dark depression and realized I needed something that was going to get me out of my head and put me around other people. I loved comedy, so I thought I’d see what improv was like.

I’d done some theater stuff in high school and thought it was really fun. I enjoyed that experience and liked being around those people. It was a very creative energy and a very nurturing environment. I wanted to reconnect with that energy a little bit but also be more comedy focused.

The idea of stand-up, at the time, seemed totally scary. Being alone onstage felt very isolating, whereas improv was more building a thing together. So I started looking around different theaters in DC to see which ones offered improv classes.

The main options at the time were DC Improv and WIT. My entire knowledge of their classes came from their respective websites. DC Improv’s website was like, “Do you want to get on Saturday Night Live? Take these classes!” But I was in my 30s, so that didn’t seem accurate to my situation. The tone of WIT’s website was more, “Do you wanna to try improv? Cool. Read these ten books.” And I thought, “Okay, I’m with that. I get that. That is the nerd way, and I will follow it.” So I signed up for classes and went straight through their curriculum.

Along the way, I started a couple indie groups and eventually got cast on a WIT Harold team.

What was your Harold experience on Diviglio like?

I auditioned for Harold once, and I got really lucky. I hate auditions. Even the idea of an audition makes me so stressed out.

I think I was cast because—I’m prone to low self-esteem anyway, so I’m going to attribute it to the fact that WIT was starting two brand new teams, LIZARD GIRL and Diviglio, at the same time. They had 24 slots to fill, so that was a help. It was a very unique situation because most people don’t get in on the first audition.

I loved being on the team. I love everyone on that team.

First, Kristin O’Brien,