ENTERTAINMENT Carey's ready to rest -- sort of

Another TV show last fall, a hit film this spring. Whose retirement is it, anyway?
By GEORGE M. THOMAS
KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
Drew Carey was a bit miffed as he called from a Los Angeles-area coffee shop last week.
Why? Because a writer -- this one -- was interrupting his self-imposed retirement. Of course, he was joking. He can afford to after having three television series -- "The Drew Carey Show," "Whose Line Is it Anyway?" and "Green Screen Show" -- enjoy varying degrees of success in the past decade.
Now the portly comedian and native of Cleveland is ready to just enjoy life. "I travel. I hang out with my friends. It's fantastic," he said.
However, he hasn't been all play. Those with sharp ears will recognize his voice in the guise of Crank Casey in the new animated movie "Robots," which opened Friday. It's the story of an all-robot world where those mechanical beings who are in danger of being outmoded must fight for their existence.
It's just a small part, Carey said, one that required him to work only 15 to 20 hours over the course of a year and a half. It wasn't time-consuming, but had he not been asked to do it back then he may not have even considered it.
"I started it a couple of years ago, so I didn't have a choice," he said jokingly. "I knew it was going to be this big huge animated thing and I wanted to be part of a movie like that. It's the cool thing to do. Bottom line is, you always want to do stuff that people are going to enjoy and remember."
His show
What he is likely to be remembered for is "The Drew Carey Show." The show, which had a working-class sensibility and followed the misadventures of Carey and his oddball friends in Cleveland, was an ABC network staple for several seasons, but flickered out with little fanfare last summer.
His success with it led to "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" an American adaptation of a British improvisation show, and this year's "Green Screen Show," another improv show. However, after almost a decade in the spotlight, Carey's ready to step out.
"I honestly feel like doing nothing. I really wouldn't mind doing nothing for the rest of my life, to be truthful. I perform improv with my friends and theater gigs, but that's not work. That's hanging out with my friends," he said. "I want to keep doing that."
But when asked if he was through with television, he chuckled and said, "Yeah, kinda." The success of "The Drew Carey Show" made him wealthy beyond any expectation he had while growing up on Cleveland's west side, but it came with a hefty price tag -- criticism that he viewed as personal attacks -- that left him more than a bit disappointed.
Going to the fans
"The last thing I want to do is try to do another TV show and have a dumb-a-- critic take a shot at me because they can. They don't know anything about comedy. They don't know how hard it is to write a show or anything involved," he said.
"Some publications, some magazines and some critics just love being snarky and that's their only reason for living, and I've had it with them -- I just want to do stuff where I can go directly to the audience and just be around my fans and do stuff for people who really enjoy it."
Many of his friends suggested that he not let what people say or write bother him, but much of it crossed the line, he said.
"Criticism I can take. Honest criticism that's intelligent and thought-out I can take, but sometimes some people take a swipe at you just to be mean," he said. "A lot of it, I think, is because I'm from Cleveland and because I'm blue-collar and people don't accept it. Everything has to be like 'Seinfeld,' that's the only thing they accept in the world."
Carey often joked that when he left the industry, he wanted to retire and return to his hometown. That hasn't happened yet, and it suggests that he's not quite lost the desire to entertain. Indeed, he produced and hosted the WB network's "Green Screen Show," a program combining improvisational comedy and animation, last fall. Although the series has been canceled, he has no regrets about it.
"That was a really good experience. I wish it would have caught on. The whole idea was very experimental and I'm so grateful for the WB taking a chance on me," he said. "Everyone knew it was a crapshoot doing a show like this, but they all did it anyway because they wanted to do something different and that hadn't been on TV before."