Die-hard Jackass fans may already know that Steve-O is one of us, but it was news to me. The stuntman’s mom is Canadian and he lived in Toronto for two years in the ’80s.

Justin Bieber, Pamela Anderson, and now Steve-O?! We’re one badass nation.

“When I gush about Canada,” he tells the Straight by phone from his home in Los Angeles, “it’s more about how America’s kind of going down the tubes. When it all goes down, I don’t have a possession that I value more than my Canadian passport.”

Known for his life-risking and sometimes gross antics, such as sticking a large fish hook through his cheek while swimming with sharks in the Gulf of Mexico, butt-chugging beer and getting it out with a plunger, willingly getting whacked in the nads with a ball, tightrope-walking over a pit of hungry alligators with food hanging from his jockstrap, snorting wasabi, and strapping himself down in a porta-potty and having it flung into the air for something they called “Poo Cocktail Supreme”, the man would appear to be fearless. All these stunts are YouTube-able, but kids, please don’t try them at home. Not that you’d want to.

But the one stunt he’s most proud of is jumping out of an airplane without a parachute. It was only 40 or 50 feet high going between, he guesses, 40 and 50 miles per hour—it was a glider aircraft—“but an airplane nonetheless,” he says. “That was a big deal for me,” even if his dad was “super unimpressed” with the resulting video. “I disagree to the bitter end. I love that one,” he says.

It’s a wonder the guy is still alive. He can’t begin to count the number of crazy feats he’s done over the years. “I think an accurate number would be virtually impossible to gauge,” he says. “But defining stunt as an ill-advised activity—something sort of dumb—there’s been a lot of them. I’ve done a lot of dumb stuff!”

He claims he doesn’t have an extraordinary tolerance for pain, just “an extraordinary need for attention”. His fears, he says, are irrational. Like roller coasters. Not, though, talking in front of a large crowd. For the past eight years, Steve-O has taken to the stage to perform standup comedy.

“I didn’t intend to get into it,” he says. “I got invited to do a crazy stunt at a comedy club and showed up without a stunt in mind and when I walked in and looked around, I couldn’t think of anything crazier than me trying standup. With great fear and trepidation, I committed to trying standup. The first time, I had a really favourable experience. I got the sense that people were rooting for me to do well.”

He played 15 countries in his first year, and he’s been headlining for a shade under four. When he started taking it seriously, Dane Cook would give him pointers.
“He never helped me write material, but we would set a time to meet at various comedy clubs,” he says. “I would do my set and then we would sit down and he’d give me notes. It was a really, really big deal. I don’t know if the actual nuts and bolts of the notes he gave me themselves were as helpful as just the notion that he was taking his time to encourage me. It just put so much wind in my sails.”

When Steve-O brings his act to the Rickshaw, there will of course be stories, but he’ll still be up there telling jokes. “By no means am I a spoken-word performer who’s not funny,” he says. “The whole idea is to get laughs.”

He explains his show caters to the sensibility of the Jackass fan. “I skew quite blue,” Steve-O says. “A lot of my stuff is really, really pretty filthy and raunchy, which I don’t think would be much of a surprise. And I include some physicality as well. I suppose it’s an exercise of being faithful to my brand, but I do enjoy doing physical stunts and tricks and I always incorporate some of them into the show as well.”

He’s a regular new-age Renaissance man. “In my ripe old age of 40 years, I think I’ve become quite an accomplished entertainer,” he says. Skateboarder, circus clown, stuntman, author, actor, comedian. He can’t pick just one. “When I fill out my immigration forms and it asks my occupation, I just write entertainer. ”