Career's made of Sterner stuff
By JIM SLOTEK -- Comedy

It's a marriage made in bad taste heaven.

When the oxymoronically-named Howard Stern Radio Show debuts on WUTV this Saturday, the guy listed as producer/writer will be Vito Viscomi -- ex of Toronto's Vacant Lot comedy troupe, who had their own short-lived CBC show. The Vacant Lot leaned heavily toward shock, inspiring a CBC exec to say, "If they could make it through a skit, let alone a whole show, without killing or maiming somebody, maybe they'd still be on."

For all that, Viscomi feels, "Howard Stern says things The Vacant Lot may have said around the card table and we wished we could say on the air. For some people, it's very freeing."

How Viscomi got there speaks to the pinball career he's had since the Vacant Lot days. After CBC, Viscomi and colleague Nick McKinney (brother of Kid In The Hall Mark) went to New York to develop an "Internet sitcom" for Lorne Michaels and Microsoft.

"We did 13 episodes and now, of course, the Microsoft Network no longer has an Entertainment division, 'cause they found out pretty quickly that the ideas are bigger than the actual technology. The Internet is much more feasible as a service provider, buying tickets and things like that."

Then he was story editor of Apartment 2F -- the U.S. vid channel MTV's first attempt at a sitcom. "It was about a couple of brothers who live in an apartment with a wacky neighbor and other sitcom elements. But on top of that, you had to have a musical guest and a sketch troupe." It lasted 13 episodes, too.

When Howard Stern signed his deal for a Saturday night CBS/syndicated series based on his radio show, the exec producer was Jim Bederman, the ex-exec producer of that aforementioned online sitcom. (In hiring Bederman, Stern -- who aims to nuke Saturday Night Live -- hired away one of the top execs of SNL boss Lorne Michaels).

For his part, Bederman took along his favorite writer -- Viscomi.

"It's pretty ironic that I'm working for Howard now," Viscomi says. "I've been a fan for years. When I was in Toronto, my wife's brother, who lived in New York, used to dub these tapes of his show and send them to me. And I'd think they were disgusting but funny as hell. Then, when I came to New York, I listened to him all the time."

So what's the Stern experience like? "I'm working with a lot of strippers and freaks -- and those are just the CBS executives (pauses for imaginary laughs). Thank you, I'll be here all week."

The Howard Stern Radio Show is largely just that -- on-camera/in-studio stuff from Howard's radio show. "We actually leave the morning crew (Stern, Robin Quivers, Fred Norris and Jackie "The Joke Man" Martling) to do what they do. We oversee the show and see what we can cull from them."

The other 20% or so, "bumpers, animated segments, stuff like that," is a bit of a state secret. As we talked, however, Viscomi was in the midst of editing short films involving some of the freakish Stern "Whack Pack" -- Crackhead Bob and Fred The Elephant Boy. "We're introducing the regulars on the show and letting people know who they are. This is going to 70% of the country, and a lot of people haven't actually heard Howard's show.

"This is what my life's become. I don't know Howard all that well, but me and Fred The Elephant Boy, we're best friends."

And despite his CBC experience, Viscomi has no intention of ending up on-camera with Howard, "because I know the first thing he'll want to do is shave my back."

Unlike some of his old Vacant Lot pals -- including Paul Greenberg, who's auditioning in L.A., and Rob Gfroerer, who's back in Toronto -- Viscomi finds New York a perfect fit.

"Anthony LaPaglia said it best, 'I like the fact I can walk out the front door and be faced with humanity.'

"And it's no coincidence that this is where Howard broke big. It's a human circus -- the perfect place to find people on the street and make them stars because of their speech impediment."