Whatever else you think about Pauly Shore, the guy is courageous. Last month in Pasadena, he actually showed up as scheduled to face a room full of television critics.
And that's no small thing - not when your career consists of the kind of low-brow, idiot comedy that has become Shore's trademark.And not when the critics filling that room have had a chance to see the pilot episode of Shore's new sitcom, "Pauly." Because that pilot actually surprised the majority of the critics - it was even worse than they expected.
But, apparently, Shore is nowhere near as stupid as his movies would make him appear. He was smart enough to completely discard his public persona - which even he describes as "the whole weasel thing" - and instead adopted sort of a quiet, thoughtful, almost studious approach to answering questions.
The tactic was so unexpected that critics, many of whom had already extended their claws and bared their fangs, were nonplussed. And those of us sort of hoping to see a bloodbath were sorely disappointed.
His basic message - that "whole weasel thing" is only an act. Shore tried his best to make critics believe he's not the character he portrays over and over again, and he doesn't deserve the disdain - if not outright hostility - that his moronic humor garners from critics.
"When I walk through malls in middle America, and when I get letters from kids that are dying and I show up at their homes, (when) I was in Australia and I visited cancer patients - those are the people that continually appreciate my brand of comedy," Shore said. "That's kind of what keeps me going."
Yes, indeed, Shore laid it on thick at times. He managed to work the homeless and the Make-A-Wish Foundation into his answers, just to demonstrate what a great guy he is.
But the subject always came back to the difference between the on-screen and off-screen Pauly Shore.
"When I started doing comedy, I kind of just developed this character on stage, being from Southern California," he said. "And then when the show on MTV took off and it got ratings, it just snowballed nto this thing, you know.
"And then (former Disney President) Jeffrey Katzenberg signed me to do three movies playing that particular thing, but that's the opportunity I have had."
Not that any of this explains the sheer tasteless stupidity of Shore's MTV series, his movies or of "Pauly," which premieres Monday at 8:30 p.m. on Fox/Ch. 13.
The premise is pure Pauly. Shore plays 28-year-old Pauly Sherman, a rich, lazy, spoiled brat who lives in his father's (David Dukes) Brentwood mansion and off his father's fortune. But his life takes a sudden turn for the worse when dear old dad brings home a gorgeous young gold-digger (Charlotte Ross) he intends to marry. And she wants Pauly out of the house.
Pauly, of course, battles back, using every tasteless trick in the book.
"Pauly" may have set a world record for the most double en-tend-res stuffed into a half-hour sitcom. Many of the alleged jokes are so vulgar they can't be reprinted here in a family newspaper.
But Shore wants everyone to know that everyone "worked really hard" on the show. "And I think I have an audience that will be really excited," Shore said.
Inexplicably, he's right. Not only have many of his movies been hits, but when Fox aired the theatrical movie "Son-in-Law" last year, it got very good ratings despite the scorn of critics.
In that calm, measured tone he adopted for his encounter with the critics, Shore took aim at his detractors.
"I think that people who don't appreciate it (his humor) are people that just haven't tuned into it yet," he said.
And even the executive producers of "Pauly," Stan Zimmerman and Jim Berg," admit to be taken aback by Shore's appeal to some segments of the audience - teenagers in particular.
"All he has to do is walk out there and they start screaming," Zimmerman said. "We've had girls come with `I love Pauly' written across their faces. It's like a rock concert."
"It was quite an awakening for us to se the audience response to Pauly because we had no idea," Berg said. "They really come there so excited to see him. We usually turn away busloads of kids. And when he walks out, there's just this frenzy that goes through the audience."
What they want to see is that idiot personna, though.
"Well, I AM playing a character," Shore insisted.
But exactly when he's playing a character is still open to question. Is the weasel a character, or is the rather reserved Pauly Shore who appeared before critics the fabrication?
One critic in attendance mentioned meeting Shore on the set of his movie "Encino Man" some years ago - and finding the comedian in a completely manic state.
"When I first started, you know, I came out of high school and I got a show on MTV," Shore explained. "So I was just flabbergasted. . . . So, I mean, I was on MTV and I was bouncing off the walls. And I was just so enthusiastic about my life and what was happening, it was hard for me to have a conversation with anyone. So that's probably why people were very much thinking that that's all I am."
(A likely story.)
"But then, like, my friends and people that know me know that I have this whole other side that actually has a whole brain," he said.
No one questions whether Shore has a whole brain. The question is what he does with it.