Diceman ditches his usual attire for ‘Dice’ season premiere
If this writing thing doesn’t work out, Scot Armstrong may have a future as a hypnotist on the Strip. Or at least a used car salesman.
He somehow convinced Andrew Dice Clay to forgo his standard black T-shirt, leather jacket and fingerless gloves in favor of a striped buttoned-down shirt, slacks and wire-rimmed glasses for the season premiere of “Dice” (10:30 p.m. Sunday, Showtime). He also got Teller to speak, on camera, for the first time ever.
For the second-season debut of the Vegas-based comedy loosely and exaggeratedly based on Clay’s life, the comic encounters a rabbi from his childhood. But Dice’s excitement over seeing him again doesn’t last long.
“This ‘Dice’ that you created is an abomination that you birthed into the world. For shame,” the rabbi scolds him. “This gollum that you continue to nourish with a steady diet of vulgarity and obscenity. A curse on you!”
The next morning, The Diceman never existed. In his place is Andrew Silverstein, Clay’s given name, who’s spent the past 35 years in the haberdashery business.
“I’m thrilled that we pulled that one off,” Armstrong, the comedy’s creator, says of the wardrobe switch. “That was a big idea that sort of, like, explains what the show really is about, which is this battle between this guy you see onstage and this guy you see in real life.”
He says Clay was on board from the beginning — to an extent.
“Even picking out what glasses he was going to wear as his Andrew Silverstein character was a little bit of a debate, you know what I mean? And how straight he was going to play it,” Armstrong reveals. “And then, in the end, he just embraced it as an awesome acting opportunity.”
The show’s original premise was that Dice was being forced to perform in the fictional Tangiers casino to pay off his gambling debt. That debt is waived early in the new season, leaving Dice to figure out his next move. He isn’t worried, though, because anyone who’s anyone is in his Rolodex — at least that’s the way he remembers it. “Think this guy died,” Dice says, rifling through the cards. “This one, too. Slept with her, sorta burned that bridge. Think I owe this guy a Chrysler LeBaron.”
Many of “Dice’s” plots and jokes lean hard on the comedian’s lean years.
“He’s placing a lot of his trust in us to make it funny and to not have it backfire for him,” Armstrong says. “And so I respect that, and I take that as a big compliment that he trusts that I’m going to take care of him and make sure it looks great.”
Despite “Dice’s” Vegas setting, the cast and crew had only two weeks to shoot here. Most of that was centered in and around the Tropicana, because it can take hours to pack up everyone and everything and move to a new location.
“It’s expensive,” Armstrong says of filming locally. “So every hour you have in Vegas is really, really valuable.” Time constraints and cost compelled them to carefully select where to shoot “to have the show look as big as it can while being on a budget.”
Upcoming storylines include Dice’s running into his former stalker, played by “Mike & Molly’s” Billy Gardell. Mickey Rourke turns up swearing he and Dice once made a pact to never grow old, so he’s there to kill them both — Dice, of course, remembers none of this.
Then there’s the appearance by the publicly silent Teller, who, like many of the show’s guest stars, is playing a version of himself.
“We spend a lot of time crafting these sort of heightened realities of people’s personas,” Armstrong says, including having Teller speak. The magician’s previous speaking roles have been limited to voicing himself on two episodes of “The Simpsons” and making cat sounds on an episode of “Dharma & Greg.”
“We were hoping he would do it, and I was kind of, like, expecting maybe a ‘no,’ ” Armstrong admits. “But he really responded to the script.”
What to watch this week
■ The horrible game show that Matt (Matt LeBlanc) hosts becomes a huge success, so much so that he’s forgotten as an actor, in the premiere of the final season of “Episodes” (10 p.m. Sunday, Showtime).
■ Every superhero deserves a do-over, right? The big, blue doofus is getting one in the second attempt at turning “The Tick” (Friday, Amazon) into a series.
■ Kathy Bates stars as the owner of a California weed dispensary in “Disjointed” (Friday, Netflix), co-created by Chuck Lorre (“The Big Bang Theory,” “Two and a Half Men”).
■ Behind-the-scenes footage, interviews and some of Whitney Houston’s performances offer an uncensored look at the late singer in the documentary “Whitney: Can I Be Me” (9 p.m. Saturday, Showtime).
Contact Christopher Lawrence at clawrence@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-4567. Follow @life_onthecouch on Twitter.
What to watch
■ The horrible game show that Matt (Matt LeBlanc) hosts becomes a huge success, so much so that he's forgotten as an actor, in the premiere of the final season of "Episodes" (10 p.m. Sunday, Showtime.)
■ Every superhero deserves a do-over, right? The big, blue doofus is getting one in the second attempt at turning "The Tick" (Friday, Amazon) into a series.
■ Kathy Bates stars as the owner of a California weed dispensary in "Disjointed" (Friday, Netflix), co-created by Chuck Lorre ("The Big Bang Theory," "Two and a Half Men").
■ Behind-the-scenes footage, interviews and some of Whitney Houston's performances offer an uncensored look at the late singer in the documentary "Whitney: Can I Be Me" (9 p.m. Saturday, Showtime).
