Comedian Scott Hansen Balances Family and Fame

He also calls Maple Grove home.

By: Bobby Hart | From the issue: July 2010

Photo: Marshall Franklin Long

Comedian Scott Hansen who has helped build the Minnesota comedy scene for the past 30 years still spends time performing stand up routines at The Minnesota Comedy Club and mentoring other comedians.

Scott Hansen pulled up to El Rodeo’s in a brand new truck. As the manager of the local Mexican restaurant approached the table of one of his favorite regulars, Hansen exchanged greetings with him in Spanish before referring to his new toy outside. “It’s only got 20 miles on it,” Hansen says. “I just got it yesterday. We’ll go for a ride later.”

There was only a slight pause before he leaked the whole story. “You see, my son blew up his car. His engine blew up, so I have to get him a car. So he’s getting my old car, and I get a new car,” Hansen explains with a menacing laugh. “I couldn’t have planned it better.”

This is classic Scott Hansen. The five-time Minnesota Comedian of the Year is quick to find the humor in all things. After all, it’s his job. But, all jokes aside, he’s quicker to make family his top priority—even when there’s no four-wheel bonus.

Family First

Although his resume is highlighted by performances with Jay Leno, Jerry Seinfeld, Tim Allen, Roseanne Barr and Tom Arnold, there aren’t many people who have turned down more lucrative jobs than Hansen. Comedy gigs and TV writing opportunities with many of those names also came and went untouched. But Hansen, who raised three children—Nick, Annemarie and Andy—with his wife Michele in Maple Grove, was never willing to put his kids through the duress of changing schools and moving away from their friends and extended family.

“What was important for our children was what drove his business decisions,” says Michelle, who has been married to Scott for 32 years. “Very much from his own experience, growing up, and his folks moved here from Wisconsin—I think how disruptive that was to Scott. It left quite a memory with him, and he really didn’t want to do that to our kids. Being close to grandparents and extended family was very important to both of us. He really thought that needed to be a priority for our children, too.”

Like he did with his children, Hansen played a key role in raising the live comedy scene in Minnesota. In 1978, Hansen was part of a core group of comedians that included Louie Anderson, Bill Bauer and Jeff Gerbino, who were starting out as stand-up comics at a hole-in-the-wall bar in Minneapolis called Mickey Finns.

“There was this automatic bond because here we are, a bunch of people trying to do something that was pretty new for the Twin Cities and definitely really new for all of us,” remembers Anderson. “It was really interesting because we were all different. That was probably the biggest advantage that we had. I’d say Scott definitely was a really great character as far as joke writing. He was the guy that definitely knew how to deal with the local flavor, which I really learned a lot from.”

Anderson and Hansen remain close friends and appear as recurring guest-hosts on the KQRS Morning Show. But Anderson, who has homes in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, took a different path than Hansen, pursuing a more nationally-famed career highlighted by a few TV shows, books and currently a five-night a week show at the Excalibur Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. While Anderson still considers himself a bit of a hometown boy, he says Hansen really owns that title.

“Scott’s the kind of guy a town names something after,” Anderson says. “Here’s a guy who could have been very nationally known, who chooses to raise his family and have that deal. I respect him for his decision … I think Scott wanted to be a dad, a husband and then a comic. It’s a cool thing.”

Hansen took with him a valuable piece of advice he gathered when first talking to the late comedy legend Rodney Dangerfield. Hansen explained that he didn’t have any longtime friends from his childhood because he moved around a few times, and he didn’t want to put his kids through that. “[Dangerfield] said, ‘You can be a star where you are. You set the level of your own success,’” Hansen remembers.