Tim Heidecker is a blazingly prolific comedian. Most famously, he’s created a universe of projects with his absurdist comedy duo, Tim and Eric, including a major motion picture (Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie) and several television shows, the best known of which is Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! (2007–2017). In 2012, Tim starred in Rick Alverson’s dark comedy film The Comedy, which revealed a new, bitter color in his acting. Currently, he works with Gregg Turkington on Adult Swim’s movie-review parody show, On Cinema at the Cinema, which has spun off projects including Decker, an action-comedy series; The Trial, a five-hour mockumentary about his On Cinema character’s murder trial; and a real campaign for district attorney of San Bernardino County.  

Heidecker is also a prolific musician and has released ten albums, which some critics separate into two bins: ironic and sincere. Urinal St. Station, from his piss-obsessed group the Yellow River Boys, goes into the ironic bin; In Glendale, a meditation on suburban life, goes into the sincere bin. But in taking a broad view of Heidecker’s work, I’m not convinced this binary works anymore—or that it ever worked—as a set of stable categories for Heidecker’s prolific artistic production, which finds uncanny depth in poking fun at comedy itself by hovering eternally over the line between real and fake.  

And there’s also his weekly call-in podcast, Office Hours, which has been translated into a live stage show—as were Awesome Show and On Cinema. His production company, Abso Lutely Productions, has launched brilliant shows like Nathan for You and The Eric Andre Show, as well as ad campaigns, including the best three-minute advertisement for pizza rolls ever conceived.  

We met over coffee on the sunny patio of a new Whole Foods in Brooklyn, near the venue where his On Cinema at the Cinema Live! show concluded its recent tour of the East Coast. 

—Molly Brodak

I. “REPRESSED MEN GET VERY ANGRY.”

THE BELIEVER: In your show On Cinema at the Cinema, you play a vapid jerk who goes by your name. From where do you draw this character of “Tim Heidecker”? Is it just an exaggeration of you? Some element of who you are?

TIM HEIDECKER: JP, our tour manager, who I’ve worked with for many years, and who I’m very close with—we are picking up some VHS tapes for Gregg [Turkington], which we sell at the show, and Gregg...