Entering 25th annual AFAN AIDS Walk, Penn Jillette talks ‘Duck,’ ‘Fool Us,’ Broadway plans

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Penn & Teller at the 21st AFAN AIDS Walk on April 17, 2011.

Fri, Apr 17, 2015 (1:30 p.m.)

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Jesse Lenat and Uncle Si Robertson attend the grand opening of “Duck Commander Musical” on Wednesday, April 15, 2015, at the Rio.
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Lately, Penn Jillette has been musing about curtailing Penn & Teller’s long commitment to AFAN, as the organization preps for its 25th annual AIDS Walk.

When checking the dates in the duo’s performance calendar, juggled like broken bottles in Jillette’s stage act, you can see why.

The 25th edition of the Aid for AIDS of Nevada event, set for 7:30 a.m. Sunday at Town Square, is being held in the teeth of one of the busiest periods of Penn & Teller’s career. They are to perform a show in Tyler, Texas, on Saturday night, only to return Sunday morning for the AFAN event, then bolt to their theater at the Rio for the taping of two hourlong episodes of their TV show “Fool Us.”

Then there is the not-so-insignificant matter of planning the return of Penn & Teller to Broadway at Marquis Theater in New York from July 7 to Aug. 16. More tour dates in such outposts as Tulsa, Okla. (on April 24), Prior Lake, Minn. (May 12) and Windsor, Ontario (May 15), also are in the near distance.

“If there were ever a time when we would pull back, it would be now,” Jillette said during a phone interview this week. “Someone even put out the possibility of us just showing up at the end and waving, but, you know, someone would catch us if we did that.”

Jillette pulls back and adds, “We kid about this stuff, but it has been an important charity for us for a very long time. We raise a crap-ton of money — which is never enough, but it is a lot — for the people who perform research and are trying to find a cure. They do a great job, and I couldn’t be prouder to be affiliated with them.” (For registration and donation info, click to AFAN.org.)

Sunday marks the 14th year Penn & Teller have served as grand marshals for the event. Last year, the three-mile walk raised nearly $440,000.

The event is being staged at Town Square for the first time, as through its history it has been held on Fremont Street, at World Market Center and, most recently, at the Student Union courtyard at UNLV.

Sunday’s event is hosted by Bryan Chan and is to feature performances by “Absinthe” star Melody Sweets, Mark Shunock of “Rock of Ages” and cast members of “Le Reve — The Dream” and “Jabbawockeez.”

More from the latest session with Jillette, including the elephant in the corner and onstage:

On the arrival of “Duck Commander Musical,” which shares the same hotel as P&T’s stage show:

“We were talking about this the other day with one of the people involved in AFAN, that we’re planning this event and, at the same time, this show about homophobes is coming into the same hotel,” Jillette said, noting anti-gay comments by Robertson family patriarch Phil Robertson. “I don’t know. ... It has big talent behind it, so I have to respect that.”

On the difference between his views and those of Robertson:

“A lot of what he has said, in his recent diatribe (to a prayer breakfast in Vero Beach, Fla., in late March, where he sets up a hypothetical in which the family of an atheist man is raped and murdered), is what I’ve been saying for years. What he says at the end is you don’t need God for morality, and at the end of all that raping and killing, the atheist would say, ‘There’s something not right about this,’ and of course that’s exactly true. There is something not right about this.

“The point he’s making is that atheists have morality without God. ... He makes that point in a very unpleasantly poetic way, but he’s making the exact point I’ve made a zillion times, and that’s that morality is more important than religion.”

But there is significant distinction between Penn’s position onstage and the character of Phil in the musical.

“I am me and he is source material, and there’s a big difference, there really is,” Jillette said. “We have to be fair about that.”

On the possibility of seeing “Duck Commander” at the Rio, and if he’d consider sharing a stage for a debate with Robertson:

“I don’t know. I guess I kind of, sort of should,” Jillette said. “I’m certainly going to be asked about it now and again.”

Asked if he would appear in an open forum with Robertson, Jillette said, “It would be great, wouldn’t it? To give you a taste of that, when I go to Texas, on the way to the gig in Tyler, I’m meeting up with my friend Glenn Beck, and we’re meeting in a Greek Orthodox church to talk about religious and atheist tolerance. We’ll be doing an hourlong interview, me and Glenn Beck, and those I really, really enjoy. Glenn and I disagree with each other but in a really sweet and pleasant way.”

On his own weight loss, which exceeds 100 pounds since late last year:

“I could do this walk backward while hopping on one leg, and that was never the case when I weighed 330 pounds,” Jillette said, swiftly adding, “but don’t take this as a challenge for me to do that.”

On the challenges of performing “Fool Us” onstage at the Rio compared to previously recording the series in England:

“Fortunately I don’t believe in jinxing myself, so it’s going great — much, much better than in England,” he said. “(The host) Jonathan Ross is a superstar in England and not well-known here, but we couldn’t find someone better. He’s killing it.”

On the high quality and quantity of magicians in Las Vegas who have signed up to try to “fool” Penn & Teller:

“I say with great pride that American magicians, and in particular those in Las Vegas, are much better than in England,” he said. “This is the center of magic in the whole world, and you can thank Siegfried & Roy and Lance Burton for that. Maybe Jimmy Grippo, too, and a few others who have performed here. But we have a high number of great magicians. The Magic Castle is close by, and we do magic really, really well in Las Vegas.”

On the ambitious plans for the P&T show on Broadway:

“This is going to be a bitch on wheels, but Teller and I are in our 60s now, and we have planned the definitive Penn & Teller show. I say that with no hesitation,” Jillette said. “We’re putting in all the big tricks. We’re going to perform it for three weeks in Las Vegas before taking it to Broadway, then for at least two months and maybe a year after we get back from Broadway ... and the only places you can see this version of the show is on Broadway or in Las Vegas. You can’t travel with it. It’s too big.”

On how to handle Elsie, the star of the new vanishing African spotted pygmy elephant act, on Broadway:

“We still don’t know. I think we’re probably going to get a couple of — and you’re going to love me saying this phrase — a couple of cow trainers, or cow handlers, in Jersey who have worked with Jersey cows,” Jillette said. “We need someone with experience in this area.”

Jillette then paused to correct himself.

“Oh, by the way, I made a mistake,” he said. “It’s an elephant. Elsie is an elephant.”

Whichever is the case, it can be said that when Penn & Teller empty the, uh, trunk, they leave nothing to chance.

Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at Twitter.com/JohnnyKats. Also, follow “Kats With the Dish” at Twitter.com/KatsWiththeDish.

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