Carlos Mencia's brother called him up a few months ago in a tizzy.
He had just bought a house in Phoenix, but the Honduran native worried about the state's soon-to-be-enforced immigration law.
"They're going to ask me for my papers. I know it. Ees no fair, man!" he lamented to Mencia in an accent that has not softened after 42 years in the United States, the comedian said.
So Mencia, who comes to Desert Diamond Casino for a show on Saturday, phoned up a friend in Scottsdale who is from England and is in this country on an expired visa.
"I said 'Hey man are you worried about this law?' . . . His response was" - at which point Mencia perfected a nicely worn English accent - " 'Why should I be worried? This law is not for me, you know that.' "
"Man that is cold!' Mencia quipped, joking that he considered calling immigration on his friend.
"I don't know if that's the case, but the truth is there's a lot of stuff about the rhetoric regarding the law that I don't understand," he said during a phone interview last week.
Expect our immigration law, which goes into effect July 29, to play a key role in Mencia's concert.
He is coming here with two hours of new material.
"Tucson is a place that I love performing because when I get together with my family and they're all in the backyard - that's Tucson," said Mencia, who has played several sold-out shows at the Rialto Theatre and Casino del Sol's AVA over the past seven years. "All those people are exactly like my family. Tucson is one of those places where I can perform and it just feels very familial."
As for the immigration issue, Mencia boils it down to one basic fact: "We gave these people jobs. You cannot blame somebody for trying to better their life. You just can't."
The true winners in the debate? "Kids," the father of a 3-year-old boy said. "They don't have to work at McDonald's. They don't have to cut the grass. Think about it, I'm old enough to remember going to McDonald's and all my friends worked there."
Mencia won't let you nail him down on where he stands on the immigration debate - "I don't pick a political side. I'm sick of the divisiveness, I really am," he explained. But he does think Arizona likely erred in how it plans to enforce the law. The state should take the approach that the Federal Aviation Administration has taken with airport-security screening: Search everyone, not just those who look the role.
"For me, it's much ado about nothing, man. In all honesty . . . there is only one group of people - one group - that can tell all of us 'Get your ass off of my property' and that's Native Americans," he said. "Our founding fathers had no papers when they came over."
If you go
β’ What: Carlos Mencia in concert.
β’ When: 8 p.m Saturday.
β’ Where: Desert Diamond Casino, 1100 W. Pima Mine Road.
• Tickets: $35-$65 in advance, $5 more day of show through ticketmaster.com
