Allan's Got a Hilarious Hidden Talent

So, you may be surprised to hear this, but Lou Avery on Mad Men is a funny guy! In fact, the actor who plays the role is Allan Havey, and he's actually a comedian, not a smarmy humorless obnoxious fellow. That's right — the nasty, super-not-funny guy you're familiar with got his start cracking wise. Bet you didn't see that one coming, did ya?

Anyway, his backstory: Havey did a ton of standup on Letterman back in the '80s, when hair was big and so were the laughs. His jokes caught the eye of HBO, who gave him his own show on The Comedy Channel, which was the predecessor to Comedy Central. The show, which was called Night After Night, would run for three hours (uh, that's kinda long), and he'd interview tons of celebrities, muse on random things, and talk a lot. It was pretty off-kilter (and may I reiterate: three hours long). After three years, the show got the axe. But he was pretty good at that hosting gig — Lorne Michaels actually had him on the list to replace Letterman on The Tonight Show, but Michaels nixed the idea and chose Conan O'Brien instead.

But let's talk more about this stand up stuff. Since Lou Avery seems like one of the most unlikely characters on television to tell jokes to an audience, wouldn't it be worth it to see the man behind the unpleasant character crack some jokes? Check out these jokes from this actually funny guy, Allan Havey.

This was his network television premiere on Letterman talking about how he's a yuppie and why we need microwaves, amongst other things. Amen to microwaves.

Here's Havey joking about some age-specific erotic dreams that he has...and about how he has a stripper pole in his bedroom (but not for stripping at all).

Havey waxed about morons on Night After Night. There are apparently facts...and myths. Find out the truth!

He also made observations about how old folks make quite the descent into grumpiness, and he does a killer impression of an irate senior citizen.

And here's a true story about "Chicken Wings...and Allan Havey." Chicken Wings is another performer, by the way.

Pretty dissimilar to Lou Avery, right? It's unlikely we'll see any of these jokes on next Sunday's Mad Men, but at least we can say that the actor behind the role has quite a range.

Image: AMC