Former Tucsonan Jeff Fischer lives in a metamoment: He plays himself on television.
The popular animated show "American Dad" pokes at fun at too-perfect family life and right-wing politics with irreverence and biting satire.
The show airs 8:30 p.m. Sundays on Fox Channel 11.
Fischer's character, named Jeff Fischer, is "the boyfriend" on the show. His eco-friendly, socially conscious, pot-smoking ways enthrall his significant other, Hayley, and irritate her father, Stan. It's him, only exaggerated, he says.
"I'm very environmental, so that shows up a lot," he says. "But I'm not really a pot smoker. I'm not opposed to it, but on the show they portray me as a full-time stoner."
He landed the part because he's buddies with one of the writers, Matt Weitzman. The two met on the University of Arizona campus and reconnected later in Los Angeles.
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When Weitzman, who also wrote for "Family Guy," helped create "American Dad," he slid his friend in. "He said, 'We wrote this part for you. We're going to base him on you and Seth (MacFarlane).' "
As if that weren't surreal enough, Fischer then found out he had to audition. To play himself.
"They were like, 'You still have to come in and read for it.' " He told them if he didn't get the part, they had to change the name. "I said, 'That would run me out of Hollywood,' " he said.
For inspiration, the writing crew will call Fischer and quiz him about his wanderings through the day.
He talks the crew through dropping off his mail, threading his way through traffic, walking through the grocery store.
"Sometimes they bring me in just to rap with me."
He talked about going to "Burning Man," a festival in the Nevada desert, and a few episodes later, his character ran off with Hayley's mom, conveniently afflicted with amnesia, to the festival.
Fischer says the job is natural but at times a little bizarre to have a director tell him how to be, well, himself.
"Sometimes I'll read a line, and the director will say, 'No, no, no,' and I'll be like, 'But . . . that's how I say it,' " he says.
But he takes another crack at the line.
"It makes me laugh," he says. "I just think it's funny."
