Yakov Smirnoff

There are legends, and then there are legends. It was quite stunning how kind Yakov Smirnoff was in agreeing to record with me in person. When I got an initial response, I was convinced I was talking to an assistant. It wasn't long before I realized, it was Yakov all along who agreed to record with me and fit me in to his very packed Moontower schedule. Sam got to sit in and he wrote a lovely piece about the interview. I was excited to give people a glimpse into Yakov 1.0 and his origin story because you can't really appreciate Yakov 2.0 without knowing the history. Still pinching myself that I got to sit across from Yakov and hear him talk about his time in the U.S.S.R. This is one interview I'll never forget. Enjoy Sam's article and enjoy the podcast.

The story of Yakov Smirnoff is a story of luck. Born and raised in Soviet Ukraine, his beginnings in standup were subject to strict censorship. An upwardly mobile career in comedy was not possible in a communist state. To his family and peers, the concept of telling jokes for a living was inconceivable. Smirnoff could conceive of this, however, and through various moments of serendipity, he was able to make this living a reality in America. Much of Smirnoff’s trajectory comes from simply being in the right place at the right time. Sometimes, he just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time. In the late 70s, he landed a gig as a cruise director on a Royal Caribbean line out of Miami. This was, as Smirnoff calls it, a mistake. “They realized I don’t speak English, which was kind of part of the requirement”. Fluency in English, as it turned out, was not checked for before the ship had set out to sea.

This oversight cost Smirnoff a job, but it lead to him making a lifelong friend in Gary Powell, a genuine Texan and generous soul who corralled the rest of the crew staff to chip in for Smirnoff’s return trip to New York City, where he resided at the time of his then very new life in the U.S. “That was mind-blowing to me, that kind of kindness,” Smirnoff notes. “I didn’t know the guy at all, and he became kind of like a model of Americans.”

This was one of the first instances of a recurring theme in Smirnoff’s life of unexpected blessings. Shortly thereafter would come the recognition he’d receive from the late Comedy Store owner Mitzi Shore. Shore saw the star power in a young Smirnoff, and she essentially bankrolled his immigrant family’s new residence in Hollywood by giving him and his father work as carpenters. Shore would credit Smirnoff for helping to mend the ideological standoff between the U.S. and U.S.S.R.- and also credit him for helping to literally break the Iron Curtain. “I was like, ‘come on, I just tell jokes,’ and she goes ‘no, you got that wall torn down’. I was oblivious”. Despite Smirnoff’s admitted naivete towards his own significance at the time, his rise to fame in the period that it happened was itself another lucky strike. The Cold War, in all its intensity, was the perfect backdrop for a comedian with an international audience to make an impact. Smirnoff became an accidental Soviet spokesman to the United States at a time when each nation's populace were trained to see the other as inhuman.

In the 1980s the Ukrainian comic took on the role of the friendly, good-PR mascot for Russian people. That decade brought us the most famous hallmarks of Smirnoff’s oeuvre: exaggerated comparisons between Soviet Russia and the U.S, alongside played-up misunderstandings of American culture typically punctuated with the catchphrase “what a country!” Notably the material was (and still is) completely clean, something that sets Smirnoff apart from the acts he would share bills with at Moontower Comedy Festival this year and also the broader comedy landscape in general. With standup came acting roles in movies and commercials. Faster than you can say ‘Smirnoff’ he was selling Miller Lite to Americans nationwide. Smirnoff attributes his introduction to America to these ads specifically.

Since the 90s, Smirnoff’s material has taken a divergence towards interpersonal relationships, especially marital ones. Spousal dynamics have been a subject of both his comedy and his studies; the two areas overlap much more than you might think. After earning a PhD in Psychology, he’s developed his own theses on the importance of laughter for lasting marriages. He notes the warning signs for his first marriage collapsing were when laughter ceased to exist between him and his former wife. Unlike in standup, you can’t just tighten up your jokes to fix a marriage. What Smirnoff did instead was take his observations to the collegiate level. “I decided to get a doctorate because I wanted to have professors who know a lot,” Smirnoff explains. “I know a lot about comedy and laughter, and I wanted them to help me to put it in a form that legitimizes my thought process.”

Just as he used humor to ease an international relationship, so too has Smirnoff used humor to bolster a personal one. Continuing his career as a comedian has only proven to Smirnoff what he already knew: laughter brings people together.

Smirnoff carries his psychological line of thinking into his own podcast, The Comedy Couch, where he interviews other comics to dive into their comedic psyche. The crux of the pod can be summed up in just one question: when did you become funny?

Smirnoff is still regularly performing at his own theater in Branson, Missouri, a city he’s called home for the last thirty-two years. Even a legend like himself is not immune to the fickle nature of the industry, seeing as how he’s gone from doing 400 shows a year to just 30, but things may be on the come up for “Yakov 2.0”. A documentary on his life is purportedly in the works. At his age, Smirnoff is doing well for himself, and with spots on Moontower and a commencement speech at Pepperdine University it is evident that he’ll be reaching newer, younger audiences, even if he’s a bit shaky about the prospect. “It’s not necessarily that easy when you’re 75 and you’ve got to restart the whole machine.” Fortunately Smirnoff has a 50-year career already under his belt and at least 25 more years to go, because, as Smirnoff points out, he will be living to a hundred years old with the words of his wife as encouragement: “‘If you don’t make it, I’ll kill you’ “.

Where his purpose as a comedian felt clearly defined in the 80s, since then the goalposts have fluctuated. But, as Smirnoff notes, there will always be turmoil, so there will always be a need for laughter. “What does America need today?” asks Smirnoff. “I know what I can contribute, and that’s clean comedy with a positive outlook.” That’s Smirnoff's stock in trade.