One of the founding fathers of the Boston comedy scene, Martin Olson has become the go-to guy when Hollywood needs comedy. He has sold screenplays to Dreamworks and Warner Brothers and has been a staff writer for the Screen Actors Guild Awards for three years. He was head writer for four HBO comedy concert specials and is presently head writer for Disney's Phineas and Ferb.

When did you first realize that you were uniquely funny?

You won't believe this. My mother just had open heart surgery when I told her I sold a comedy screenplay to Dreamworks. Soon after, on her deathbed she said, “I have something to show you.” She pulled out a shirt box with two old notebooks inside. On the covers: “Joke Book 1” and “Joke Book 2” by Martin Olson. I'd forgotten about them. I wrote them when I was eight and in her mind I was destined to be a comedy writer. I thumbed through the books and couldn't break the truth to her that they were execrable. Later in life I vowed to duct-tape them to my chest when I hung myself from the Hollywood sign.

When did you realize that comedy was something you had to do for a living?

I remember the moment I wanted to be a comedy writer. I was nine years old. I was watching The Merv Griffin Show with my mom when Merv introduced a comedian named Brother Theodore. The screen went black and a harsh spotlight hit this weird scary-looking German guy all in black. He began ranting about life being meaningless and how we should all kill ourselves. And each rant ended with a precise paradoxical punch line. Like a Steven Wright joke.

It was the funniest thing I'd ever seen, and liberated my mind. I knew then what comedy really was, a license to fuck with people's minds and break their thought patterns, to inspire freedom of thought through satire, and show that what we consider normal is, from another perspective, insane.

Do you remember your first original joke?

My first bit was “Bachelor Baby Tips.” One of them was if you open the top of the toilet tank and put the baby in, it'll not only wash the baby but save water when you flush.

Who do you think were your influences?

The writers I worshipped were Brother Theodore, Mark Twain, Samuel Beckett, and later, Bruce J. Friedman. Also the composer Charles Ives who did profound orchestral music with weird comic elements thrown in. I was of course mad about all the comedy greats from Chaplin on, all the way through Jack Benny, Spike Jones, Steve Martin, Albert Brooks, and Andy Kaufman.

What was your first job in comedy writing or performance?

I created a late night local comedy series, a half hour of original comedy every week sandwiched between a bad monster movie. I wrote it for a year with one of the funniest Boston comics, Lenny Clarke, who was also the star and my roommate.

What is the biggest difficulty you've encountered being a comedy writer?

For whatever reason, I never liked sitcoms. And aside from comedy movies, that's where the big money is. What happened was, I was spoiled by seeing Brother Theodore early on. The sitcom format was way unfunny to me compared to my initiation through free-form imaginative formats like Brother Theodore and Spike Jones, formats that threw you off-kilter and made you have to think and struggle a bit before the payoff.

What are the differences between writing for yourself and writing for others?

As a writer I never try to write for anyone other than myself. My writing process is me typing and laughing. Everyone who works with me has to put up with me laughing like a goon in my office. If they only knew after the door closed, how the laughter stops and the cutting begins.

What is the difference between writing for kids and writing for adults?

Obviously you can't write “adult humor” for children. I've never written a toddler show, which would definitely call for a different comedy sensibility. As for the kid shows I've written, I never write for kids but for myself, since I am 12 years old. If I laugh I'm pretty damn sure some version of the joke or story will make people laugh, not because I myself am funny, but because of my experience and success in writing in which I start by making myself laugh. Never fails.

What show have you worked on where you feel you had the most creative freedom?

Shows for Penn and Teller and for comics like Bobcat Goldthwait and Kevin Meaney. They specialize in satirizing comedy performance in three unique ways.

What do you find exciting about comedy right now?

Exactly what you'd expect. All the imaginative linear-thought-busting trickster weirdos: Zach Galifianakis, Sarah Silverman, Sasha Baron Cohen, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Michael Meehan, the Mighty Boosh, Demetri Martin, Paul Kozlowski, Ron Lynch, Louis CK, Dino Stamatopoulos, Brendon Small, the Lampshades, crazy Charlyne Yi, many others. There are so many either super imaginative comics or smarmy hacks performing right now comedy clubs are like taking a cool refreshing dip in a pool filled with embalming fluid. There's exciting comedy at the Fake Gallery in Los Angeles.

Where do you think the future of comedy is headed?

The new guys either build on everything that came before them or react against it. So since self-reference and put-on humor and obscenity are accepted elements now for “edgy” comedy, I predict more of the same combined with a synthesis of unlikely styles of performance juxtaposed in new ways. Bobcat Goldthwait's two new films, Sleeping Dogs Lie and World's Greatest Dad are two examples I think of synthesizing different styles of comedy and creating something new that on the surface looks normal. Sort of “put-on” films and comedy that work on several levels at once. I have no idea what I just said.

As audiences become more specific and more segmented, is your job becoming easier or more difficult?

I usually write the same kind of nonlinear or self-referential comedy that makes me laugh, so that's what they hire me for. It's always the stars or creators of shows that hire me, never the executives, who understandably are not in it for the art.

What is the best thing about being a comedy writer?

Being paid to have challenging creative fun and to work with incredibly imaginative geniuses on a daily basis.

Do you have any advice for up-and-coming comedy writers?

Write for yourself and not for an audience or for executives, try your best to be respectful to everybody, and on a personal note, if you strangle a nurse after a party, make sure you find a ravine with off-road access to dump the carcass.