Andrew Dice Clay doesn’t want to hang out with anyone his own age.
“I’m going to distance myself from anyone over the age of 45,” the 59-year-old recently cracked to Page Six. “Old people just talk about medical problems — ‘I gotta take this medication, that medication, I got this wrong with me, that wrong with me.’ Just give me a burger and flash me! I have a very young spirit. Energy of youth is what I love. I never lost that energy. If I have a friend tell me he’s being fitted for a brace, I’m going to tell him, ‘Leave my home and never come back. We’re not gonna be friends. You don’t exist anymore.’ I just want new, young buddies.”
Those youthful pals include Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper, with whom he stars in the upcoming remake of “A Star Is Born.”
“I call her Stefani because I really got to know her,” he said of Gaga, 31. “She’s one of the most grounded stars, especially on her level. She’d have her mom, her dad, her sister on the set, and you wouldn’t know she’s the star that she is. She’s as grounded as any New York girl I’ve ever met. We still keep in touch.”
Clay, who got his start as a “song and dance man” hanging out with a Broadway crowd, drumming and singing in lounges before breaking into comedy, feels that Gaga may be the best thing to hit the stage or screen since Judy Garland (and Garland’s famous daughter).
“Old people just talk about medical problems — ‘I gotta take this medication, that medication, I got this wrong with me, that wrong with me.’ Just give me a burger and flash me!”
“She’d get really absorbed in the character — she’d be crying, getting into whatever [scene] she was about to do. She took on a role from two of the greatest ever, Barbra Streisand and Judy Garland, and she’s going to be just as good at it, maybe better,” he gushed. “She’s got that thing … and she wanted to introduce the standards and that kind of music to her fans, to the millennials. She can do it all. She has all the respect in the world from me.”
There are exceptions to Clay’s 45-year-old rule, like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, respectively 69 and 71, who Clay insists are “genetically perfect” and “probably made of glass, steel, a couple high-grade plastics.”
That’s good news for “A Star Is Born” director Cooper, who, at 42, is edging closer to Clay’s limit.
“Bradley Cooper is one of the nicest people I’ve ever met,” Clay said of the Oscar nominee. “I wanted to do a great job for him. He knows he’s new at directing, and he made sure he was prepared. He was very patient and he knew exactly what he wanted. Bradley Cooper will go down as one of the great directors.”
Clay is accepting aging in his own way, maintaining his “young spirit” by keeping insanely busy: Since being banned from MTV in the early ’90s, the comic legend’s return to the spotlight began with a critically acclaimed turn in Woody Allen’s “Blue Jasmine.” From there, he worked with Martin Scorsese in HBO’s “Vinyl” in 2016 and premiered his own Showtime series based on his life, “Dice,” the same year. Fresh off a victory with partner Valerie Vasquez on Fox’s “My Kitchen Rules” in March, Clay filmed season 2 of “Dice,” premiering Sunday, Aug. 20, maintained a Las Vegas residency and went on tour.
“Sleep is a state of mind. You don’t really need it,” he said. “We had a grueling schedule for ‘Dice,’ and I was only sleeping a couple hours a night. It was nuts, but I loved it.”
During the rare moments that Clay isn’t working, he relishes in kicking back with his sons, Max and Dillon, until the wee hours, then goes to sleep when the sun comes up.
“I go home and I hang out in the backyard with my sons usually around 3 a.m., and it’s always colorful. We have lights — blue, purple, green, red lights. My lights are never bright or normal in my house,” he said. “If anyone walked by, they see the red light in the window and they probably think it’s a whorehouse. Maybe it used to be,” he sighed. “But not anymore. I think I’m too old.”