See ‘Colin Quinn: Long Story Short’ on Broadway through Jan. 8. (Colinquinn.com)

By JQ magazine’s Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02) for Examiner.com. Visit his NY Japanese Culture page here to subscribe for free alerts on newly published stories.

Give Colin Quinn 75 minutes, and he’ll give you a hilarious history of the world’s greatest empires. Written and performed by the Brooklyn-born comic (Tough Crowd, Saturday Night Live) and directed by Jerry Seinfeld, Colin Quinn: Long Story Short premiered earlier this month on Broadway to rave reviews from the New York Times, Variety and Entertainment Weekly. I spoke with stand-up’s Renaissance man about the show and his admiration for today’s Japan.

Putting this show together had to have been an educational experience on so many levels. What did you learn?

It was more like thinking about things that I sort of knew more than learning. It’s like realizing how it really is amazing that we’ve never changed at all in terms of how we behave as people.

How about for the sense of stagecraft in your act?

Definitely the sense of movement; the sense of being in different places and trying to, you know, keep it about movement—a lot more movement—which I definitely think is important. In stand-up you don’t think in those terms. Thinking in terms of acting as different characters, you do it a little bit, but not really.

Your show covers China, but Japan is totally absent. Do you have any plans to inject more of it in future shows?

It is kind of a disgrace to leave out imperial Japan; they were a giant empire, let’s face it. I had this whole thing about the Dutch and Japan and England all being these little countries that ran things. Maybe I’m going to try to find a way to incorporate that stuff in. I used to have a line about how Japan was like the little guy that used to intimidate the big guy China—China was kind of the mama’s boy at that time. So maybe there’s a way that I can incorporate that back in, but we cut it out for time.

Where have you traveled to in the world?

I’ve been to Japan, I’ve been to China, I’ve been to Africa, I’ve been to the Middle East, I’ve been to Europe a little bit. I’ve never been to South America.

What was your time in Japan like?

I was just doing shows for the USO, so I was at all the military bases. I spent two weeks in Japan, but I went everywhere except Tokyo. [laughs]

What other cities and places did you visit?

I was in Nagasaki and Hiroshima and all that stuff, just wherever the military bases were.

When was that?

About six years ago. I’ll tell you the truth, it was so beautiful to travel—we traveled by bus most of the places, and just passing the houses, everybody’s got these beautiful roofs. It’s like, wow, the people really just care, you know?

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