HBO
You and Dane are from the same hometown.

check out Robert Kelly's bio.

KELLY
I'm a Boston boy. I grew up in Medford, which is right next to Arlington, where Dane is from. But we had two different upbringings. I was a punk - spent two years in juvey jail. I tell Dane, he was eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches while I was in juvey. He likes to throw that back at me.

HBO
Two years in juvey? There's a story there...

KELLY
I probably did what everybody does, I just got caught. It was a fight with another town... I stole a gumball machine, kicked a mailbox, ripped off a pizza store. Technically, unarmed robbery, assault and battery.

HBO
There was no peanut butter and jelly in juvey?

KELLY
Hey hey - okay, there was but it was the sh**ty kind that came out of a big cheap jug.

HBO
So juvey's pretty hard core, pretty serious. Where'd you got your sense of humor?

KELLY
In juvey jail, either you have to be tough or you have to be funny. So I developed a sense of humor. I've also got a huge Irish Catholic family, and everybody deals with pain in a funny way, everyone's sarcastic. And I look nothing like anyone in my family - I actually look Spanish Asian. On MySpace I look like I'm in the band Menudo, but much sexier than Ricky Martin. My mom used to say, 'some day some lady's going to come to the door and take you back.' Now I go to therapy every week. I have three fathers - I'm no pussy - I had foster dads, stepdads.

HBO
How did you get started in comedy?

KELLY
Well, I got sober at 15 (laughs), when most kids were eating peanut butter and jelly. I wanted to be an artist. I went to college for it. After juvey, I got a job at a Styrofoam factory, worked my way back into regular classes. Then I got a scholarship to a community college and studied fine arts. I painted, drew. But I never got instant gratification. People went, 'that's good.' But you were never that good. Then I signed up for a talent show with an improv group. I wrote a couple sketches, saw improv groups at comedy clubs and stole some of their games. And we ended up winning the show - got a standing ovation. From the first time I stepped up there, I was finished. I knew what I wanted to do.

HBO
So how did you go about doing it?

KELLY
The group from the talent show decided to keep at it, try and take it to the clubs. One guy dropped out though, and we needed another guy. A friend of mine knew Dane from acting class in high school, so I pulled him in. We auditioned a bunch of people, and everyone was a little f**ked up, cocky, hesitant. But he was like - I'm just f**king good. Not insecure, not f**ked up, just trying to do well. After that, me and Dane would rehearse four to five days a week, three hours a day -- right from our jobs. We'd try to write new sh**, then go to comedy clubs and try to get on stage. We busted our asses.

HBO
You and Dane seem to have pretty different styles though. How would you describe yours?

KELLY
My style is a little harder edged than Dane's. All my stuff is true; it's stuff that has happened to me in some form or another. I'm a little self deprecating - if you're honest you have to be. I talk about the stupid stuff I've done. I talk about how I'm an addict - weight and drugs and sex - and being a little fat. There's some imagination stuff in my act, the way I feel about something, and I do some outrageous stuff. I put tighty whiteys on and my girlfriend's high heels and walk around like a centaur.

HBO
So you're on this tour bus hassling each other 24/7. How do you come up with new material on the road?

KELLY
You create when you're relaxed -- you don't create during turmoil, least not myself. I shut the f**k down. The first day I was arguing with Jay and thinking, wait a minute, I don't really know these mofos. There was not too much writing going on.

HBO
Is it hard to be surrounded by other comics all the time?

KELLY
Comics are psychopaths, egomaniacs with inferiority complexes. If you play a guitar, you're gonna get applause. They sit and listen and automatically clap. With comedy, I have to f**king make you laugh every 30 seconds, so hard you'll want to f**king applaud. I have to make you feel an emotion. I am f**king telling you how fu**ed up I am and making you laugh about that - and you don't know me.

HBO
Are there any moments from Tourgasm - from the bus or the behind-the-scenes stuff - that you're cringing about?

KELLY
Probably all of it is a little cringe-y. There was a lot of ego, alpha male stuff. The low point was definitely when I broke my knee. They were wheeling me into the E.R. and I was starting to lose it, I was in some f**king pain, like I needed to squeeze something. So you can hear me say 'hold my hand, man.' As soon as I said it I knew - it was like the gayest thing. You can hear me right after saying, 'pleaaaase.' I knew it was pretty retarded.

But they called Opie and Anthony and fed them the audio, me going "I broke my knee, maaan. Hold my hand, mannn." They played it on the air. Next thing you know they've got over 100 remixes - their fans are crazy. One fan mixed it in with a scene where Joe Pesci got shot, another put it in a Led Zeppelin song. Some guy made it into house music. Then people started showing up at the shows in shirts that said "Hold my hand, man." Not much more that can really embarrass you after that.

HBO
That's pretty funny. Did you work the busted knee into your act?

KELLY
I came out on a crutch the first show after that, but people just kept looking at it. It was a distraction. So I had to change my whole act. Before that I was using the whole stage, running around, acting things out. And I was getting standing ovations. After that I had to lean on one leg - stand and deliver. It was good for my comedy. It forced me to write jokes with a punchline, rather than try and act out the punchline.

HBO
So where can people go and see your act now?

KELLY
I'm based in New York, but I've been doing shows all over the country - Miami, Philly, Boston. The best place to see where I'll be is at www.RobertKellyLive.com.

HBO
You've known Dane since 'the beginning' as he puts it, and now this guy you used to do improve with at 20 is TIME magazine's 'most influential people of our time.' Can you believe it?

Listen, he set the curve. People use Dane as a verb now - I 'Cooked' it. Everybody's on MySpace because of Dane. And he's good to his fans. A lot of comics won't sign autographs. They always put their head down, cause they feel like they're taking themselves too seriously if they get into it. But there's nothing uncool about saying 'hi' to a fan, making somebody feel good about saying they liked your show. Even if there's just two people, I'll sign those autographs.

But don't get me wrong - Dane is Dane. The internet and the fan stuff will help, but Dane has something other people don't. He had it from the get go. His imagination is retarded. He'll say, I want a hot air balloon, then he acts out a hot air balloon. He can talk about a dirty subject without being dirty - he just uses his imagination. Instead of talking about getting his c**k sucked, he'll say something about taking the spiral staircase up to the thunderdome. Who thinks of that? A little kid laughs cause its goofy, but the parent knows what he's talking about. He just goes another way, and that's what makes him The Man. That and he's got a great ass in jeans.