Eric Bogosian blazes his own trail. On arriving in New York City in 1976 with a newly minted theater-arts degree, he skipped the preliminaries ("I'm not an audition kind of guy") and went straight to the starving actor role ("To try to live for a week on a bag of rice and a head of cabbage is an interesting idea"). He became a gofer for a theater group, took over a dance troupe and hung out in the liberated precincts of downtown Manhattan, where he brewed up a solo-performance style from his considerable native anger and the prevailing local Zeitgeist. "Everything had gotten so wishy-washy during the Seventies," says Bogosian, so low-key and mellow. You wanted to come out and scream. Just smash things."

Bogosian's early monolog performances caught the eye of New York Shakespeare Festival impresario Joseph Papp, who tapped him to perform at the Public Theater. There he co-wrote the play Talk Radio; Oliver Stone directed the film version. Robert Altman directed him in a television special, The Caine Mutiny Court Martial. He played roles in Miami Vice, Crime Story and The Twilight Zone. Some of his own work has appeared, heavily edited, on cable and PBS. But Bogosian remains best known for his monolog collections, including FunHouse, Drinking in America and Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll. A filmed performance of the last will be released in August.

Warren Kalbacker tracked Bogosian to his office on the edge of Little Italy, in Lower Manhattan. "Bogosian's place is a study in black and white filled with books, tapes of his performances and tapes of heavy-metal rock. He favors black-and-white dress. There was just one patch of green in the place, the cover of a gardening magazine.

Q 1

PLAYBOY: Your characters plead, cajole, threaten, offer skewed insights, suffer delusions and exhibit paranoia. Is your stage act your own cry for help?

Eric Bogosian: I need to solve my own personal problems. I know nowhere to look other than to myself, so I look at my own questionable traits. And then I personify them in a character. Early in my career, I spent a lot of time on things that had to do with sex, because I wanted to have better relationships with women. FunHouse was about pure, unadulterated fear, because at that point, I was just freaked out. My wife, Joann, and I were impoverished; we lived in this tiny apartment. Drinking in America, written when I became more successful, was about a hunger for power and success. Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll asks, How do you live when all you know how to do is party?

Q 2

PLAYBOY: You honed your performance style in New York's downtown art scene. Was it easier and cheaper than enrolling in drama school?

Eric Bogosian: The downtown scene allowed me to walk out on stage every night and say and do whatever I wanted. I would go out and insult the shit out of the audience. There were nights when I took all my clothes off. I had fights with the audience. The best thing about the scene was that we were making our work and having a good time entertaining one another. I would perform in front of audiences that were guaranteed smart and hip. They didn't care whether or not I was doing something right, like some acting teacher had taught me. They would tell me whether or not they got it. I was performing loud, nasty, insulting stuff.

Q 3

PLAYBOY: We noticed quite a few well-dressed uptown types at a recent performance of Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll. Is that kind of audience smart and hip enough for you?

Eric Bogosian: I'd say most of them enjoy it, twenty-five percent are not quite sure and a few people walk out. My stuff is not easy. It's not like joke, bang, laugh, then on to the next one. The comedian's goal is to make everybody laugh as often as he can, and the guy who makes them laugh the most is the best comedian. My job is to entertain myself in the most complicated and sophisticated and fun way I can so that I have a blast out there and as many people out there who are like me can similarly enjoy it. I don't give you all the answers. My characters analyze themselves, and I've done them enough so I'm starting to see that they all have a blind spot. If I make a piece right, the audience is thinking, What's wrong with this picture? That's the whole bit for me. You can be as powerful as you want, you'll never figure out life. Your dick can be huge. You can have a million bucks.

Q 4

PLAYBOY: Does The Stud, your monolog about one man's extraordinary endowment, reflect your own desire for a larger penis?

Eric Bogosian: I was taking a pee one day and I looked down and I wished I had an eight-inch dick. You're going to quote me on that. Don't quote me on that. It's part of men's fascination with themselves. I wanted to take something out of the back room of male mentality and stick it right out in front of everybody. The Stud is one of my oldest pieces. Doing things about giant dicks is not that far out at the moment. There are probably twenty comics out there doing dick things. But when I started ten years ago, it was extremely embarrassing for men in the audience; they'd sit there with their hands folded over their crotches, not laughing, and the women would be laughing their guts out and the men would be getting angry. I thought it was great stuff going on between people in the theater.

Q 5

PLAYBOY: Horny guys populate your monologs. Do you claim special knowledge of America's testosterone level?

Eric Bogosian: I'm very average in what I want. And my desires point me toward centerfold models as the ultimate, the ultimate, the ultimate. The ultimate accomplishment in my sexual life would be to ball a centerfold model. For a pretty girl with large breasts to be the object of delight to millions of red-blooded American men is perfectly normal. Nothing wrong with that. Guys get horny and need to focus on something. Large breasts are great. A large breast is a lovely thing at a particular moment. But as I become old and wise, I think the really important thing is being oriented toward something and understanding that you don't necessarily have to have the thing to enjoy the thing. I happen to be in love with a woman who has medium-sized breasts.