Paula Poundstone returning to Englert in Iowa City

Starburn Industries, the parent company of Starburns Audio, has burned a star. Starburns, which was the home of Paula Poundstone's podcast, “Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone” owes the veteran comic $30,000.

“They (Starburn) are supposed to declare bankruptcy,” Poundstone said. “I feel like I had a ‘kick me’ sign on my back. Over the last couple of years, I was getting ripped off here and there, but this one with (Starburn) is the biggest one. I have to look at the big picture, which is that I’ve had a great good luck streak.”

After being encouraged by Robin Williams to move to Los Angeles and become a full-time stand-up 40 years ago, Poundstone's career took off. During the 1990s, her cerebral and quirky HBO specials catapulted her career to another level. Poundstone was amusing as a political correspondent on “The Tonight Show” in 1992.

“I really enjoy what I do,” she said while calling from her Los Angeles home. “I found my calling, which is what everyone hopes to do.”

It’s been an enviable run for Poundstone, 64, who is always curious and unpredictable. The comedian, who returns Saturday, Jan. 20, 2024, to the Englert Theatre in Iowa City, never performs the same show twice, since she always working the audience.

“That’s always so much fun for me,” she said. “I love getting to know the crowd. I do want to know what’s on their mind — and what comes out is often surprising.

“I was taping an HBO special and I was talking to a lawyer (in the audience). After I asked what he did, a woman in the crown moaned when she heard him tell me what his occupation was. I asked if she had a bad experience with a lawyer. She said she did have a bad experience with a lawyer after her mother who was in a service station had fallen and lost her face on a lube rack. It was such a wild story that I’ve been asked to do the lube rack bit. It’s not a bit. It was just one of the wild stories I’ve heard since I’ve been interacting with crowds.

“You never know what you’ll get.”

Home life

The altruistic entertainer fostered eight children, three of whom she adopted.

“But they’re all old now,” she said. “Old as in grown up. They don’t need their old mom around anymore.”

The Alabama native, who grew up in Sudbury, Mass., misses having the kids around, but she’s not quite an empty nester.

“I have two big dogs and seven cats,” she said. “That’s not a big deal for me, since I used to have 16 cats. Unfortunately, the cats don’t live forever.”

Poundstone is one of those performers who was funny as a child and hoped to become a comic actress, like her heroes, Lucille Ball, Mary Tyler Moore and Lily Tomlin.

“When I was growing up, you had female actresses who were funny, but not so many female standups, so there were the female actresses,” Poundstone said. “I didn’t quite make it there.”

But she’s certainly “made it.”

“I’ve had my ups and downs, but it’s worked out for me,” she said. “I still get to do what I love, which is amazing. I love going out on the road and I have never gotten tired of the crowd work. It’s going to be so much fun going back to Iowa and meeting people from the stage. That never gets tired.”