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[0:05] Robert Bannon: Are you ready? It's the Roundtable with me, Robert Bannon.

[0:09] Robert Bannon: Well, welcome to the Roundtable, everybody. My name is Robert Bannon. You're listening to us on Broadway World over here on the Broadway Podcast Network, iHeart, Spotify, wherever you listen and get your news about theater and art and culture. And our next guest, in the beginning of his show, I haven't seen it, but I saw the clip, which is on the website. Oh, he says where he was born and the day he was. Oh, I was born October 31st, 1983 in Teaneck, New Jersey. What? A couple I grew up in Richfield Park, New Jersey. I could jump on Route 17 and be in Lyndhurst right off Route 3 in 15 minutes if there's no traffic and see my friend Tom. Thomas here. He has a one-man show. He has a big giant stand-up career, but he's coming to the stage to tell his story about growing up.

He's a Jersey boy. He has a family. We all have a family, but Tom is selling the truth giving his scoop about a brand new show coming to one of our favorite places to see a show. Go to the tank and see A Cat in a Box, May 11th through the 21st. There's a bunch of shows at 7 o'clock. Tom Nemec is here. Welcome to the show.

[1:18] Tom Nemec: Richfield Park. Some people I knew in high school said Park. Do you have the Jersey accent?

[1:29] Tom Nemec: I guess I do. I guess I have, uh, people tell me that or New York when I say coffee.

[1:35] Tom Nemec: Coffee. I don't say coffee so much anymore. But I don't say cat. I just say coffee. I don't know. Uh, people have told me I had in the past. I think I, as I got older, I've tried to become more aware of what I'm saying. So I don't sound like a New Yorker. Not that that's a horrible thing, but I, you know, technically I'm not from here. I live here now, but I grew up in Joisey.

[2:01] Robert Bannon: What's funny is I don't think I have a Jersey accent. I try not to. My husband is a Detroiter, and he knows things that I say, like he'll say, open the drawer. And I say the drawer, open the kitchen drawer. And he's like, a drawer? Water? I'm like, water. What a water.

[2:24] Robert Bannon: So it goes out. So, Tom, when did you decide you wanted to be in this business? What inspired you to be a comic, which is the hardest thing in the world?

[2:33] Tom Nemec: Well, growing up in a dysfunctional family, I've always wanted to do it. I thought when I was younger. Well, when I was younger, I always thought I wanted to do comedy. Or I did. I did say I want to become a comedian. My brother was listening to George Carlin. Um, I heard him and Richard Pryor. And I did that when I got older in my 20s. And I did it for quite a while. And then something happened in my life where I started to really look at my life and what I was doing and why I'm doing it. And I kind of quit comedy for a while and quit everything, moved back to New Jersey. I was living in New York, bought a little house, moved out there, and I just, I had a lot of unresolved childhood trauma.

So basically, I became a comic by default. I didn't really want to be, but it was my role that I took on as the youngest of the family. There was, uh, we were hanging out with some kids up the block from us once, um, in a different neighborhood, a few blocks away, you know, in Jersey, you just kind of hang out with, and there was a couple of other kids from a few blocks the other way, and one of them said, Oh, I heard about you, you're the funny guy, because I was making everyone laugh. And I was kind of offended, and I said to my best friend, I'm like, What's he talking about, the funny guy? I'm just being me. But anyway, I used comedy as a way to survive as a child. And I'll tell you the truth, my first 15 years doing comedy when I did it the first time, starting in 1990-ish, 91, uh, I wasn't happy.

I was doing it, but it was just because I didn't know what else to do. And I was still on stage reliving that childhood trauma. And even though my job was to make people laugh, the last thing I wanted to do was go on stage and make people laugh. Because, um, you know, I did it as my survival, if that makes sense.

[4:31] Robert Bannon: A lot of people say about comics, people that are comics that it's very typical that the funny person has a lot of trauma or has had a rough upbringing, or that comedy comes out of the deep dark places that people come from. Do you find that to be typical in the case with your comic friends?

[4:49] Tom Nemec: Um, majority of them, yes. Yeah, majority of them. And I'm very jealous of the ones who, um, will go on stage, and I'm better now at this, but I'm jealous of the ones who go on stage with a big smile on their face and can laugh about it like it's a joke. Because I do do that now because I have to, but for so many years I didn't. And that's why I was driven more to theater, and that's why I love doing my solo show. There's dark humor in it, but you know, like I always tell my director, like, I want to and tell other people I want to stab the audience. I want them to leave bleeding a little bit. When people leave a comedy show and they're driving home with their friends, like, you know, that comic, he was right, dysfunctional family.

I'm gonna have to look for a therapist because I have unresolved childhood trauma. But when they leave theater, people tell me I see them all the time. Um, people will email me or message me on Instagram, some acquaintances. Tommy, I'm still thinking about your show. Oh my God, that one thing you said here, or the one thing you said there, or that time, how many times have I felt like that? Oh my god, I still think I'm still thinking of your show. And that's what I want. I want people to think of me. No, I want to make people feel, and comedy, I just feel like we laugh at it and then we move on.

[6:07] Robert Bannon: You know, I relate, but I haven't seen your show. I can't wait to see your show.

[6:10] Tom Nemec: Oh, you have to come. You better.

[6:12] Robert Bannon: Oh, you're gonna be in trouble. I love that you, um, I always talk about with a lot of therapy, a lot of therapy in my own life. You know, growing up, people always talk about the entertainer. Because you know, I'm a, I sing and I act, and I, I don't think I'm funny in a comic way, but I've always been this personality, and I think that that does grow out of survival. Like it was truly out of my own survival with my own trauma growing up and my own dysfunctional family, who I love them, they're dysfunctional, they're nutty, you know. And when you grow up in that, sometimes you take on traits that you become as an adult because that's what your body has used. So Tom the comedian is up there surviving, just like Tom the kid was trying to survive.

[6:57] Tom Nemec: Yes. I was still, when I was doing comedy regularly, years ago when I first started, I was still little Tommy in his pajamas on stage, 10 years old. Um, and now I'm not. Now, uh, at least I'm an adult on stage, and it's fun when I do do it. But I love theater more.

[7:16] Robert Bannon: I, I me too. I get it. I should have went, I should have really, I hate to say shoulda, could have would have, but I don't know. I think I was scared to focus on theater more, and people told me I was funny, and I wasn't sure if I was a good actor. And years ago I thought, you know, I do love comedy. I love Pryor and Carlin. It turns out years later I loved them really mostly, not because they made me laugh, but because I heard them saying the truth between all of those other things that they were saying, and that's what I wanted, you know. Um, so, uh, when I, I, I probably really could have gone into theater sooner, but I just decided like, well, comedy's easy. You know, comedy you just go to an open mic and you get on stage and you can just go up, but nobody's bothering you.

Also, I didn't trust people. So it was a solo thing, I thought, you know. I did, you know, acting was like, oh, I got the audition, and then I gotta hang out with these people, and then I gotta talk to them, and I gotta learn lines, and then I gotta show up. Screw that, you know. And then what if I'm not good? And what if nobody just craziness going through my head? Where comedy was just all me.

[8:17] Robert Bannon: Well, look, it happened. It happens in its divine timing because now you have A Cat in a Box and it's at the same time, which was long overdue. I've been thinking about it for years. This isn't just a one-time thing. I've been talking about it for years. I would write monologues ago in the nineties, the early nineties. Um, and they would just disappear, and I would never do anything with them. So I'm sorry, I cut you off.

[8:40] Tom Nemec: Nope. My show. The tank nyc.org.

[8:43] Robert Bannon: No, no, it's that nyc.org is where you can get your tickets. And what we love so much about the tank is the tank takes care of everybody who goes there. You can get tickets. They make it affordable. They make it available so that you can take somebody and go see the show, and you don't have to mortgage your house to go see live theater in New York City. You can go head over to the tank and get your tickets. So when did the idea come that you were going to finally sit down and write this? And then was there fear in sharing this story about what people would think, what your family would think? What was how'd you get through that?

[9:15] Tom Nemec: Well, a lot of good questions. Yes, there was a lot of fear. Um, it's something I wanted to do for a long time. I talk about this in the show. How, um, I was living in my house in Jersey, Hurricane Sandy happened. I'm the youngest of four. And, um, I spent the night in a sister's house. Everyone knew my house was ruined. And I stayed in my house a couple of days, and every morning I heard people out front, and it was never my family never showed up. And then I got an email that was forwarded by one of my sisters explaining how everything is okay with them, and everything was okay with my other sister who lived a few blocks away. And nothing about Tommy's house was completely ruined, and he's sleeping on couch cushions in hefty bags with sleeping bags on top of it.

Um, and I remember sitting in front of my house one day, and in hurricane situations, you got the entire house. You've probably seen them on TV, seen them, seen it on TV, and they put everything on the lawn on your lawn, a big pile of stuff. And mine was done because the Amish, God bless, came by and helped. Um, it was funny. I took a picture, and one guy was like, like looking at me, like, oh, you're not supposed to take pictures of us. It was the Amish Mennonites. Anyway, I was sitting on my front stoop, and I just thought, like, I don't have family. I don't have family. All my life I've been pretending we were that family, that family photo hanging on the living room wall. All my life I've been pretending we were that and we weren't. And I know I was pretending.

I do that with a lot of things. Um, to not feel the pain. I would pretend, oh, my father's coming over tomorrow. I would do that in like a split second. My father's been dead since 1980, died from cirrhosis. I didn't even like him. But that's how I would deal with pain by doing this imagining. So, and then I moved back into New York. We had the pandemic. I was back at my house in Jersey. There was nothing to do. People were having open mics. This whole idea about not having a family. And I was studying a master's degree in early childhood, and I was sitting in my basement working on a paper. And I thought, how many more studies about childhood trauma and brain development and how untreated childhood trauma makes everything worse.

And that's you. And how many more of these do you need to read to realize you were right? Your family was messed up. It wasn't helpful. It was a bad environment. As one therapist told me, I've been through a war zone. And I just said I'm going to do it. And I just decided, let me put it on paper first. And I put it on paper, and it was, it was messy. It was ugly. It was not good. It was blaming. And over time I just whittled away at it. And then I got a coach who helped me like see things. My one rule with him was like, I don't want you to write it for me. And he said, no, no, it's your show. And he knew me really well. Um, so now hopefully I feel like I'm talking too long. Uh, now we have a show.

Now we, and it's still always a work in progress. Things are changing a little bit. I'm adding little things. I just added something today I remembered. Um, so yeah, that's how I got to the show. That was a long answer.

[12:21] Robert Bannon: No, that's why you're here to talk about your show. You know, you, you you've done the show. You have done the show in New York last year. You're back in November. It's a return engagement here at the tank.

[12:33] Robert Bannon: How does it happen that the tank says, hey Tom, come on in, take our theater for five nights and do a show and tell us about how did this process go for you?

[12:43] Tom Nemec: Um well, I asked, and it went well last time. And I think because I got a decent turnout, and um they approved it. And they knew that I was earnestly working on it. I got good reviews. I think that's why they did it. Um maybe they did it because they had an empty spot. That's where my negative self is. You know, it's like uh I can hear my mother going, Oh, Tommy, they did it because they just had nobody else to do it, and you're the only idiot who would bring your show there. That's what my mother would say, probably. Um but but that's how it happened. I I I just asked. I said I really want to keep my show running. I I don't want and I told them at the very beginning, this isn't a one off. Some people do a solo show and they don't do it again. This is not gonna die. This is gonna keep growing. I want to keep doing this. Five nights. Five nights your tickets. Yes. But but I want to I want to do the show more and more. You know, I'm bringing it to Edinburgh in August.

[13:37] Robert Bannon: Okay.

[13:38] Tom Nemec: So when Tom does it in Edinburgh, then he's gonna book more places, then he's gonna bring it back to New York for a longer run. And this is what happens. So for you, Tom.

[13:45] Robert Bannon: That's my goal.

[13:47] Tom Nemec: It's gonna happen.

[13:50] Robert Bannon: So for you, when you do a show like this, people may say when they hear the pitch or read it, that they're scared of the show, that it's not gonna be an enjoyable evening because I'm gonna think I'm gonna sit for an hour and it's gonna re-traumatize me, or it's gonna make me feel upset, or I'm gonna leave upset, or I'm gonna feel the world is scary. Why should we go? What is the hope that you're you hope to share to us?

[14:16] Tom Nemec: Great point. Because much like yourself and your personality, even though I may not be showing it, my show is very empowering and it's very inspiring. And that's what people, when they do tell me about something they remember from my show, as I said when I run into them, they they got hope from it. Um yeah, that that's what you you and I and I wanted it to be like that. I've seen other shows where you left and you were like, oh well, okay, what do I do with all of that? I just got um I didn't want it to be like that. So you're gonna leave, you're gonna feel empowered and inspired. And if you've never been through what Tom's been through, or you've been through what he's been through, or if you've been through worse than what's out, you know, whatever you level are people who have been worse. You you you can um you're gonna feel sunshine uh when you leave and you're gonna be grateful to figure this out.

[15:05] Robert Bannon: So, in your life's work and the all the work that you've done on trauma and your own trauma, what do you think is the way people heal that? How how did it work for you? How has the healing process been for you?

[15:17] Tom Nemec: Um I've been thinking about this a lot because people ask me, like, how did you get there? And they wanted to know that in the show, how did you get there? And um the best answer I can give is everything that I tried contributed to my growth. I don't feel like it was just one thing, but if I do have to pick one thing at one point, remembering and learning, and then remembering that I can change, and even days when I felt that I couldn't change, I had to believe that. Because even though I may not believe that I can change, I know that people can, and people do all the time. And I'm not any different than anyone else. I don't have any other disability in my way keeping me from being able to change. If that makes sense.

[16:17] Robert Bannon: Yes.

[16:17] Tom Nemec: And no matter how old you are, what you've been through, it's never too late to today and tomorrow and start and try to get and heal some of them. You don't even realize you know what really moved me when I was going to therapy all these years in Jersey, in Cine, was that the energy that we're not to get too deep and heady about this, because Tom's a funny guy and the show is going to be great, and you need to go get your ticket.

[16:39] Robert Bannon: Yeah.

[16:39] Tom Nemec: It is, it is dark humor, though. It's not one of those like microbiglia type of stand-up specials. It's theater, it's dramatic theater too. I just want to clear it. So that's why you need to go, it's gonna be a piece. So if you like, you want to do this is a theater piece, everybody. It's a theater piece.

[16:55] Robert Bannon: Yeah.

[16:55] Tom Nemec: What I realized is the energy that we spend that we don't know, that invisible energy that we spend suppressing the trauma and the issues and the insecurities and the feelings that we have, the anxiety that we have, and that's why we have blockages in our life that we can't go on and do other things because we're carrying around, and you don't even realize the amount of energy because it's become your norm that you're using to just suppress all of this that you get help, get some help and free yourself of that. Was there a moment that you felt free, or are you still on the process to feel free from from the past?

[17:31] Tom Nemec: Um, I don't know if there was one moment. It it happened um a little bit out of time over time, and you get little windows where something happens, or you go through a day and you lay down, you think, wow, look, look what look what my day was like today. My my day was beautiful. I I interacted with people, I didn't isolate, I went out and I lived. I didn't beat myself up. I I you know I wake up in the morning sometimes and I think, like, wow, I had a good night's sleep. I didn't wake up worrying about something, or or even worse, lay in bed worrying about something. I used to wake up, I'm 60. I used to wake up depressed every day until my late 40s, early 50s, and then it just started to wane because I started to do the work.

The hardest part, I would have to say, is getting in between those thoughts, having a thought because they happen so fast, and like I was telling you, I make those little mini movies to um to uh that I it's a bad habit I developed years ago to a survival technique to keep me from feeling the pain. It's getting in the middle of those, and sometimes going throughout my day and whatever, you know, I don't know what I'm doing here. I think I'm washing dishes or something, and then go, oh wait, no, oh my god, those last few seconds, I just created the whole doomsday scenario, and I'm gonna stop right now and I'm gonna tell myself that that was not real, and that was all BS, and that was just some crazy thing I made up.

Who knows why? I'm not gonna beat myself up over it, although I have many years, but I think the key is to not, and I'm gonna recreate that. It's it was hard. There was oh my god, many, many years when I couldn't even smile at myself in the mirror. I I there was two times in my life I know specifically I caught my reflection in a window, and my first reaction was, oh, I hate that mother. And then I realized that's me. Like, like that's my reflection. I'm looking at. I didn't realize it at first. I that's the God's honest truth. I saw my own reflection, and my first impulse was to hate that bastard in the window. Excuse my language. Um so that was really horrible. I don't do that anymore. I smile at myself in the mirror. I love myself. I mean, I'm even doing this. I wouldn't have done this 10 years ago. I wouldn't have done this. Talking to someone about my life and their life and life in general.

[19:49] Robert Bannon: I relate.

[19:50] Tom Nemec: I get it. I think you know, I I really I really without seeing it, maybe it's a Jersey thing. No, it's a universal thing for all of us. Without seeing the show, I understand in my own way, and in you in your own way will come see the show. And that's what theater is so amazing is because you're gonna go take Tom's story, be inspired and moved by what he's gonna tell. He broke his heart, he made it art, put it on stage for you to see, and then you're gonna go home and think about it and then imply things and think about the way you are. And I hope when you leave, if he's telling you to find some love as corny as that is, Tom, I get it. I've looked, I've spent, I'm 42 years old. I spent way too many years looking in the mirror, wishing I was so different. Until you embrace what is you, it is it takes a lot of money and a lot of therapy for me to get there.

[20:34] Tom Nemec: Yeah, yeah.

[20:35] Robert Bannon: I at one point I had three therapists at the same time. I didn't tell each other. Uh I didn't tell, I didn't tell, whatever, I can't phrase it right. I didn't tell them that I was going to different therapists. Uh, because one of them suggested that, you know, I did mention it, and one of them suggested that wouldn't be a good idea. So I just said, I'm not gonna tell them. They don't need to know.

[20:53] Tom Nemec: You've done something similar. Have you done that? Is that why you're laughing?

[20:56] Robert Bannon: No, I think that's hysterical. That is the funny.

[20:59] Tom Nemec: It is funny, but it's true. You tell the same story three times. I had a therapist that would fall asleep during that session.

[21:05] Tom Nemec: Um she would fall asleep, and I was so insulted because I thought I was way more entertaining that you wouldn't have during my session. No, I didn't tell the story the same story three. I just needed I I wasn't trusting people, and I was on the verge of starting to trust people, and I just thought I need I just I just needed more help. I needed more push. You know, I I just needed more push over the edge to get me, you know, moving forward.

[21:31] Robert Bannon: So who do you think?

[21:32] Tom Nemec: But you know, please.

[21:34] Robert Bannon: Oh, and and it's still not perfect, you know. My life still isn't perfect. I was I still can go into um uh you know I can't think of the right word, just ruminating. I could just go into you know a a uh a spiral ruminating about just things, you know, just doesn't matter what it is. I'm trying to think of what it was last night and what it was this morning, and they were they were unimportant, they really were not, you know. It's funny. I know you have you have a bunch of you talk about your siblings. I have one brother, and um it's funny to see him and me operate in the same way, but in different ways about anxiety ruminating thoughts and and uh you know OCD, all these things that can come out of trauma or however we feel. And it's so funny because I look at him and I'm like, oh, he's a mess. And then he looks at me and he's like, Oh, he's a but we're all a mess because we all came from the same place. We just did with it in different ways.

[22:33] Tom Nemec: And um, I think what you're doing is so important, Tom. What who do you hope comes out and sees the show when you think about the audience?

[22:41] Tom Nemec: Well, I love that theater goers want to come see the show. I love that, and and I do want them to come, but who I really want to come are the people that don't normally go to theater that when they see the clip of my show or hear me talking, know in their heart that, hmm, this is something that I relate to, but they're a little uh, I don't want to say afraid, a little less, I don't know, willing to come to see a show because they're just maybe they're not theater people, they don't know what it's gonna be about, they don't know what's those are the people that I want. The people that it really resonates with that aren't normal theater goers, that's the best way to describe it. I would love for them to come.

I I would offer a money back guarantee, honestly. I'll say it right here. I I'm not lying. If somebody comes to my show and really truly does not say, like, yeah, I get that, I will give them their $23 in tax back. Scroll down, by the way, when you go to the ticket, because the highest price is on the top. So scroll down to the third option that's the lowest.

[23:48] Robert Bannon: Oh, I can't hear you.

[23:51] Tom Nemec: Oh do you hear me? No, I know I can.

[23:53] Robert Bannon: I heard you, but I didn't hear me.

[23:57] Tom Nemec: Um, okay. Uh I will edit this and make it sound perfect and sound be amazing.

[24:01] Robert Bannon: Okay, yeah, you could edit me out, make me shorter.

[24:03] Tom Nemec: No, make me sound succinct.

[24:05] Robert Bannon: You're gonna be perfect. What I want people to know is you can go to Tomcomic.com and you can find out more information about the shows and the runs and all the things that Tom is doing. You can follow him on Instagram. The links and all the information will be below. And then if you want to get your tickets, please go to the tankmyc.org, get your tickets, go see the show. It's important. Take somebody, take a friend, take your partner, take your loved ones, take your family, somebody come and see the show, and Tom's gonna move and inspire you. I'm moved and inspired by your story, and I can't wait to see the journey and what this beautiful show is gonna do and where it goes from here.

[24:34] Tom Nemec: Yeah, I I've said in a few of my uh uh spontaneous Instagram ads: come to the show and leave lighter.

[24:42] Robert Bannon: Oh, I love that.

[24:43] Tom Nemec: I'm leaving lighter just after talking to you.

[24:47] Robert Bannon: Thank you for being here.