Boy is he !$%&@ blue

Thursday, March 20, 2008 | 2 a.m.

The general public knows Bob Saget as the all-American host of “America’s Funniest Home Videos” and the wholesome patriarch of “Full House,” whose San Francisco family included a young girl played by the twins Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen.

Unsuspecting fans of the TV star with the squeaky-clean image may have been taken aback if their first exposure to his stand-up comedy was “The Aristocrats.”

He was one of a cast of comedians filmed telling an infamous dirty joke — each in his own way — in the 2005 documentary.

Stand-up fans know Saget as the bluest of blue comics. And he didn’t disappoint in “The Aristocrats.” His version may have been the dirtiest of the dirty.

“I told it the best I could, but I don’t really like the joke,” Saget said during a phone interview from his home in Los Angeles.

Saget, 52, began doing stand-up at the age of 17. His first big break was on “9th Annual Young Comedians Special,” a 1985 HBO special hosted by Rodney Dangerfield. The young comedians included Sam Kinison, Rita Rudner, Louie Anderson and Yakov Smirnoff.

Since Saget left “America’s Funniest Home Videos” in 1997, he has continued his stand-up career and done some acting, some directing, some writing and some voice-over work. In October he made his Broadway debut in “The Drowsy Chaperone,” which was cut short by the stagehands strike and closed Dec. 30. Saget went home to Los Angeles in the middle of the strike by the screenwriters guild.

Last year he hosted the NBC game show “1 vs. 100,” and he expects the show to be renewed.

He’s preparing for a fundraising event for the Scleroderma Research Foundation on April 16 at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Los Angeles. His sister, Gay, died of the disease in 1993. Saget produces one or two benefits for the organization each year.

Saget will perform at the Hard Rock on Friday.

After 35 years in the business are you mellowing out or do you still work blue?

My stuff is as perverse as always. I’m like a 9-year-old, having learned a lot of dirty, weird stuff. I have a lot of new jokes, but people want to hear some of the older stuff too.

Have you always worked blue?

It was always kind of weird. I wrote two original songs when I was starting out, one called “Bondage” and one called “She’s a Man.” I was 18 years old and taking the train to New York City to do stand-up comedy.

Who influenced you?

Everybody at the Comedy Store in 1978, when I moved out there. David Letterman and Jay Leno and Billy Crystal and Michael Keaton and Richard Pryor and Rodney Dangerfield. Pryor and Dangerfield were the people that influenced me as a person when I was sitting at home wishing I could go into the field — and Johnny Carson. Woody Allen had a great influence. Rodney gave me my first break when I was 25 or so, on the “Young Comedian’s Special.” It was a weird special. So many people were on it.

Does it bother you that, after all these years, people still connect you to “America’s Funniest Home Videos”?

It used to but now it’s almost like a badge of honor. I feel like I served my time. It was a blooper show. Your favorite comedians in the world don’t usually come out of a blooper show. I was hard on myself, and hard on the kind of humor I was doing, a lot of puns. But in truth, I’m real proud of it. It was on for eight years.

And it created a whole new genre of entertainment.

Yeah, like the beginning of YouTube. I’m proud of it. It made the world laugh. It still does.

What did you do when “America’s Funniest Home Videos” and “Full House” ended?

Back then I was on TV so much, between “Full House” and the video show I didn’t even know who I was. I was kind of lost. “What am I doing?”

Soon after the shows ended I did an HBO special, kind of the guy on the video show and on “Full House.” I was kind of part that guy, even though I was dropping the F-bomb and talking about adult things — of the awkwardness of being a parent and having kids and being a guy with a weird sense of humor. Then I kind of offed the beast. I felt like I had seen enough of it and I tried my hand at directing for a few years, which I love. I made a movie called “Dirty Work” and a couple of TV movies, but nothing really caught fire to the point where “this is going to be my career for the rest of my life.” “Dirty Work” became a college cult movie, but when it opened it didn’t see any success.

Was it difficult to get back into stand-up?

It was one of my 40 transitions. You know how it goes in this business: “The job’s done. I’m never working again.” But stand-up is an unusual hub to work from. I always went back to stand-up. That time when I went back after the video show ended, you’ve got to find out what’s funny to you. I just started talking. A lot of it was self-deprecating, a lot of it was, “Guess what I was doing the past eight years.”

Were the two shows a distraction from your career?

Nah. That’s kind of like the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life.” If George Bailey hadn’t been born, what would life be like? We all do that. But no. Things just happen. That’s the way they are. A couple of my friends went on to become the biggest comedy movie stars the Earth has known and a couple have passed away. What door could any of them have taken that would have changed things? I have no regrets, as long as I’m not on “Celebrity Fat Club.”

Did the two shows make you so wealthy you don’t have to work if you don’t want to?

I don’t believe in not working. I don’t know what it’s like not to work. I was raised by a dad with a very harsh work ethic. I love to work.

I just came back from doing a play on Broadway. I could have gone on a bunch of trips or sat around, but I just went up onstage instead and did what Jerry Seinfeld did in “The Comedian,” tried to work out new material. I need to always work on something. I love it. While I’m talking to you right now I’m downloading a video. My sister (Gay Saget) passed away from scleroderma (in 1993) so I do three events every two years for the Scleroderma Research Foundation, so I’m downloading video of patients I interviewed at Johns Hopkins.

Speaking of wealthy — what was it like working with the Olsen twins? According to Forbes the 21-year-old twins are worth about $100 million — the 11th-richest women in entertainment.

Yes, they are worth a fair amount of money. People packaged their stuff when they were young and their business was handled very well. I’ve known them since they were tiny. I’m very protective of them.

They weren’t terrors to work with?

No. They were adorable. When I did the play in New York they came to see it. When my dad passed away they showed up. We are truly close.

Are you working on any projects you’d like to mention?

The main thing, for the next couple of months I’m doing the stand-up tour. There are a couple of film things that I don’t want to talk about out of school, and then there’s a TV show we’re developing I can’t talk about.

Does it have anything to do with home videos?

God no. I’ll never do anything video again.