This interview was originally published during the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. World’s Greatest Dad debuts in New York this week, and it’s already available on VOD.

In the director’s statement slipped into the press notes for his Robin Williams-starring Sundance entry World’s Greatest Dad, Bobcat Goldthwait says it took him 25 years in show business to figure out that what he really wants to do is direct movies, and doing so makes him feel like he’s “getting away with murder.” That’s a fair description of what he pulls off in Dad, in which a frustrated novelist/high school teacher (Williams) exploits the death of a loved one to plump up his own popularity. Though far more polished than Goldthwait’s 2006 Sundance competition film Sleeping Dogs Lie (also known as Stay), Dad rides the same line between obscene satire and almost mushy sincerity. I talked to Goldthwait about self-Googling, why he has no desire for his stand-up fans to see his movies, and why he’s not going on Celebrity Fit Club any time soon.

I was a really big fan of Stay/Sleeping Dogs Lie.

Well, I actually know that. I would like to pretend I was more secure and didn’t Google my own name, but you - you were very supportive. [laughter] It meant a lot to me. And you’re also a funny writer. That’s my girlfriend over there, she’s the costume designer and we’re kind of a team. I started reading your stuff out loud to her, because it made me laugh. Not just to hear you say flattering things about my movies.

Wow, thank you very much. Anyway, I noticed a sort of interesting theme between that film and the new one, which is that they both kind of send the message that lying makes your life a lot better.

I thought it was the other way. I wanted this to be, like, the flipside.

Right, ultimately he turns away from lying.

Right. And actually, [the main character of Sleeping Dogs Lie] embraces it. No, that was kind of the idea. I thought of the end of this one first and I wanted it to be - the last one was kind of about unconditional love from other people. This one was about … [pause]. This is so pretentious. Often when I’m doing interviews, if I heard them I’d have to come over and punch myself in the throat. But it is a really unpopular thing, I think, [to talk about] a man learning to take care of himself. And this is the part that’s gross for me to say: “to love himself.”

Because to me, Lance, he has to earn my caring about him. Because the only people that are kind of nice in this movie, to me, is Andrew, the little boy.

When you say that you sometimes say things in interviews that are so pretentious that you’d punch you if you heard it - there was a thing in your director’s statement about how it took you your whole career to figure out you wanted to make movies. And then there this line in the movie about how movies are “for art fags and losers.” Did you feel some resistance earlier in your life about making independent films, or about being a director? You also said something when you were introducing the move about how you’re not an “auteur.”

Here’s the thing. I spent all this time in the system being miserable and being really beat up. Not realizing that this is my second life. When I turned away, I was so happy. My goal is to keep on making movies, and really I know that if I do them like I did Stay which was with a crew from Craigslist and was shot in two weeks, I have no problem with that. I really don’t care. And not like I used to say, “I don’t care, man!” [raises both middle fingers in the air]. I really don’t care. I just want to keep making movies. Sometimes they connect and sometimes they don’t, you know? I don’t mean that. I certainly wish I could connect with a bigger audience. But I’m not going to worry about that because I’m happy right now.

You also said something about how sometimes you just want to say, “Fuck it,” and write a Kate Hudson movie.

[laughter] I’ll say this. I’m probably the only director here who in three weeks is going to be playing an Indian casino in Iowa. Which is true. It’s true. And I go out on the road and I don’t like doing stand-up comedy. And what’s funny is I can say that to you in this interview, that I hate stand-up comedy. And the people who come out to see me, they’ll never see that quote. Because those people come - it’s like I’m Foreigner, going out on the road. There’s still going to be an audience to see Frampton.

Are you saying you’re a nostalgia act?

Oh, totally. Totally. These people don’t come - the last time actually I went on stage, I had to make some money to pay the rent, and I was on the road. I figured it out, and I’d been on the road and only three times did someone bring up that movie. And the rest were like, “Remember that movie with the homeless dude?”

Do you think if you starred in the films there would be of more of a connect with that audience? Or do you not even want that connection?

I don’t want to star in my movies. Because I don’t. I don’t. I don’t want to. It took me this long to get out of it. I truly don’t like acting. I’m in this one, and I wanted Guillermo from the “Jimmy Kimmel Show.” I don’t know if you ever watch the show, but he’s the parking lot attendant. And he had become my friend, and he had to work that day. Which is truly why I’m in the movie.

My daughter and I were laughing about how bad my acting voice was. I almost had Tom Kenny loop my voice, not have it match, because I thought it would be really funny. But then I thought it would take you out of the movie.

One thing I really like about both of these last two movies is something that seems to stem from your personality: there’s a split between being obscene and satirically funny, and then being really sincere. And that seems so perfect for Robin Williams, too.

Yeah. Well, thanks. I am sincere. It’s so funny, like - I mean, that’s probably why I had that persona all those years, because it was a place to hide and not have to reveal who I was. But these movies are way more about who I am than anything I’ve done or anything…It wasn’t until I’d finished it recently that I realized, “Oh, I get it. Lance turns his back.” It’s like no one believes you that you don’t want to be in front of the camera. If I want to be on “Celebrity Fit Club” it’s one phone call, you know what I mean?

Right.

I could still be out in the public eye. And I remember at that point during my stand-up, when I set the “Tonight Show” on fire, the director - obviously something happened. I don’t want to become an armchair shrink, but I was trying to get out, you know? But that made me more bookable.

When you do something like that you just create attention around yourself. And then attention feeds on attention.

Yeah. I really do like being behind the camera. The whole set ends up being like everybody’s family. And all these guys, I’ve worked with them and they show up. Like Tom Kenny and Jill Talley, they show up briefly. I just like working with friends.

The actors did a lot of ad-libbing?

It’s really funny, because Robin got really defensive when people asked him if he was ad-libbing. And he says, “No. It was all in the script.” I go, “No, but that’s a compliment, they just thought you were being natural.”

I’m not a writer who goes, “Ah, these are my precious words.” I like that you do it and you keep working on it and you do some where it’s staged, really, and some where it’s straight as a heart attack. And then I’ve got all these choices when I go back to edit. I don’t like directors who almost embarrass the actors. That’s a real thing.

Just to get the kind of performance they want?

Yeah. Fuck them, it’s just a movie. We should all be in the same thing. Some days though - I don’t know if you know Tom Kenny, but he one of my best friends since I was 15. He’s Spongebob. We grew up together. And I never felt funny because I always just watched him. He’s really, really awesome. That’s why I like directing him. I’m back to watching Tom Kenny. It really was like the Marx Brothers [on set]. Screaming and running around this PBS TV stage. And I’m pulling out what’s left of my hair. “Come on, guys, really, we’ve got o finish.” And they’re all like, “Whoo-oo-oo.” And I was like that too. And it just feeds it, and it’s good.

Does the finished film end up looking really different from what you had in mind before you started?

Robin is such a great actor that he exceeded my expectations. And Daryl. And I have to say Alexie, she could be in these scenes with Robin and to not disappear is really impressive for the both of them.

There was a guy in the Q&A who thanked you for making movies that make him squirm. He said that that’s what Sundance should be about. But it really isn’t. There are so few independent films or really any films that take risks and are comfortable with making the audience uncomfortable. Why do you think that is?

I had the luxury of being recognized and all that crap. I know that it’s bullshit, and I think a lot of these young filmmakers are hoping to make it. And I know that people, when they’re trying to sell a movie, that’s just more pressure. Because I don’t want anyone to take a hit because they believe in me. I want the movie to recoup.

But this is the destination. I just want to shake them all and go, “I didn’t even have a distributor and they let me in, and gave me a good crowd to see a movie.”

Another thing that you said in your director’s statement was that you whole goal is to have an audience see the film, that’s why you make the films. There’s been a lot of talk this week about new distribution models, movies skipping theatrical distribution to go on video-on-demand and all these other things. But aren’t there are certain types of films that need to be seen in a theater with an audience, like the kinds of comedies you make?

Yeah. That’s how it’s made. People second-guess whether something works [when watching it alone] versus watching it with a crowd. That’s the nature of comedy. I do hope people - do I want to say I hope people see it? Because that’s not true. [laughs] I hope the right people see it.

Who are the right people?

I don’t give a shit if people who went to see that goddamn Kevin James movie see this movie. [laughter] I don’t give a fuck if they see my movie.

So if the right people aren’t the people who go see a Kevin James movie, and they’re not the people who go see you do stand-up, who are they?

I don’t know. I might just be me and a couple of my friends. [laughter] Fuck “American Idol.” Fuck ‘em all.

They just gave me the wrap-it-up signal, so I’ll just ask you one more question…

Do the voice. [laughs]

[laughs] No, I’m not going to go there. What else are you working on? What’s coming up?

There’s another script in the so-called the “Boo-Hoo Trilogy, ” in the same tone of these two, although there’s not the same characters. Although my daughter’s really funny. I go, “It’s a little bit based on us, but not really” - she goes, “Fuck off, that’s my life!” But I’m super lazy. This movie was like me remembering horrible things some people said, and I put it in the screenplay. [laughs]

That’s basically your process, is just remembering your pain?

Just like hearing someone saying something and it be so cringe-worthy that I go, “Ahh.”