Comedian George Lopez has walked down an off-beat road to success. After making a name for himself in the world of stand-up, Lopez broke out as a rising star in 2004 when he won the Grammy for best Comedy Album and then went on to bigger heights with his own Showtime and HBO specials before becoming a member of The Latin Kings of Comedy, working with Disney on a Christmas special, appearing in several films, and eventually getting his own self titled hit show aptly named The George Lopez Show.

Now George Lopez is back on the big screen (once already this month in Swing Vote), this time with Luke Wilson and Radha Mitchell in Henry Poole is Here, in which Lopez plays a local priest who's sympathetic to the terminally ill Henry Poole (Wilson), who ditches his job to live his life out in peace only to be at the center of a supposed miracle.

At the recent press junket for Henry Poole, The Deadbolt was on hand the day funny man Bernie Mac passed away, which loomed over the event. Oddly, there was an bizarre feeling of spirituality given Mac's passing and the fact that Henry Poole deals with miracles and how Lopez plays a priest.

We got the news this morning of the loss of one of your comedy colleagues and I guess you had worked together with Bernie in television specials, is that right?

GEORGE LOPEZ: Yes. I knew Bernie for about ten years and I really appreciated the fact that he made it the way that a comic is supposed to make it. He worked really hard at his craft, was probably the last and least known of the Kings of Comedy to become a success, but probably the funniest one of them. And his voice and his style and that really kind of southern, ‘I’ll beat the kids til they’re why me in their head,' that kind of tough father stuff. But then himself being a very gentle father and a great husband is what I’ll always remember. The conversations that we had about comedy and the mutual respect and the fact that at fifty years old, it’s way too young and he will be missed. And comedy guys like that, I mean we’re all brothers who’ve been out there grinding it out and have had some success. He had the kind of career I think any comedian would want. From the clubs and TV to the movies, he was a pioneer and will be remembered as such.

The image of getting together and talking about comedy, I mean Woody Allen gave us an insight into that in Broadway Danny Rose. Does that really happen? After the shows, do you guys sit down and talk about...?

LOPEZ: We did and now I think there’s almost kind of a gunslinger thing now with... You know, I see Chris [Rock] and we talk a little bit about comedy, but there’s just much more of an appreciation for guys, I think, when you’ve had some success. I mean I played in that Yankee stadium game, that softball game, and I talked to Billy Crystal and Whoopie Goldberg there and you just appreciate those journeys, you know. Chris Rock was on my team and you see guys that were inspired by Richard Pryor and you see a younger generation of kids who are more kind of MySpace, YouTube comedians that really don’t have an appreciation of comedy. And you can’t blame them. If you look at NBA basketball players, they don’t really - Dr. J, Kareem, or Wilt are not relevant. People tend to think because they make a lot of money they invented it. But there were people who probably did it better than them, more natural than them, and fundamentally more sound than the generation that’s out there today.

Do you think we’re in a time where all kinds of people are trying to be funny? It seems like I watch the entertainment news and it’s like they think they’re comedians.

LOPEZ: Yeah. You know, it’s just - Comedy was left to comedians and you see now on headline news, now there’s a thing called Not Just Another News Program and everybody is trying to be funny and they’re trying to give funny anecdotes to clips. I mean, I watch the golf channel and they got guys there trying to be funny. It used to be just about reporting the facts and about issues. The further we get into this thing where you have like, people that come on Nancy Grace or Anderson Cooper, who have integrity and all they’re trying to do is just kind of rip people and - VH-1 has a whole laundry list of shows that comment on people and before you had to leave things to the imagination. So I think that’s a gone art, where things were left to the imagination. Now they show you and they try to tag it and you have the internet and anybody can be a success or a celebrity. But you used to actually have a bit of talent and a bit of drive and you had to pay some dues. Nobody’s paying dues anymore.

When was the last time you had two movies out in one month?

LOPEZ: There was a baptism and a Quinceañera I went to back in the mid-'70s and there’s two videos of that. [laughs] No, it’s never happened to me. As a comedian and then doing the transition to TV - When my show was over in May of 2007, I really hung up the phone and thought, ‘What am I going to do? What do I want to become?’ And I had done Balls of Fury with Tom Lennon and Ben Garant from Reno 9/11, that was already in the can. I saw Kevin Costner in May of 2007 at a golf tournament and he said, ‘I want you to be in this movie, Swing Vote,’ which I thought was very poignant and relevant about the power of voting and about relationships and the actual power a vote has. It's a bit of an extreme to think that one guy would decide the President of the United States. But you know, elections have been decided by just a few thousand votes when you think about the millions of people who live in the country. And in Henry Poole being able to make such a departure from what’s expected would make Sandra Bullock proud, because when the show was over she sent me an e-mail saying, ‘Now you have to do something that is completely unexpected of you.’ And I think playing Father Salazar in this movie is that part.

What about putting the collar on? Because we’ve often heard from actors saying the costume makes you walk differently or whatever. But how about stepping out of the trailer when you’re dressed as Father Salazar?

LOPEZ: Well, we shot it in Downey and my show was incredibly successful with kids. Let me tell you how uncomfortable it was to be in a collar, surrounded by nine year old kids at a neighborhood in Downey. It was - Because there’s a certain - even in a movie portrayal of it - there is a certain respect that you have to have for that eight inch piece of plastic that you put around your neck and you feel it when you put it on. Your posture is better, your hands for some reason interlock and just hang at your side. I went and talked to a father at this church, St. Charles in North Hollywood, and the hour and a half I spent with him I left with a better sense of this inner strength and calmness that he transferred to me. I didn’t have it before and I needed to find it. I told Mark [Pellington] I was going to go and visit this guy and he thought it was a good idea. I went and talked to this guy and I left a completely different person.

Let me ask you about putting the other collar on, Beverly Hills Chihuahua?

LOPEZ: [laughs] Yes, that’s a great line. I’m going from one collar to the other. Beverly Hills Chihuahua is a wonderful movie about trying to find your inner bark. It’s about a dog from Beverly Hills. It’s Drew Barrymore’s dog, who is a Chihuahua but a pampered pet. And in the pamperedness, there’s an expectation of always being cared for in a certain way. So she gets in trouble and the only way out is by these dogs who are stray dogs. They’re complete opposites to her. And to defend herself in the end, she has to stand up for herself and nobody else. I think that in a movie like this, with Disney and everything, they bring to a film and the pure power they have to make a movie succeed. The movie’s very sweet, it’s funny and it’s cute. It’ll be annoying to a lot of parents who take their kids, the trailer is already annoying. It either gets you or you hate it to death. I mean there’s thousands of YouTube entries of people who are sick of the trailer and then there’s thousands who love it, and there’s kids who can’t wait. So I think in any reaction, whether it’s a groan or a laugh, silence is death. But a reaction either way is a step in the right direction.

Taco Bell took a lot of heat for having a Chihuahua. How is this going to be different from that?

LOPEZ: Well, we’re not selling quasi Mexican food, for one. I think these dogs are - They’re Latino, for one, they’re not selling food, and they’re helpful to each other and they’re trying to make something good happen. And they get to have attitude. You know, Chihuahuas have great attitude. They pee a lot, but they’re very driven dogs they’re very strong. I gave my dog some layers that he didn’t have before. [laughs] My dog is the main dog, Poppy, that is in love with Drew Barrymore’s dog.

I appreciate the confidence you bring. I was wondering how long did it take for you to generate that confidence? Is that something you just crafted over the years?

LOPEZ: I started in 1979 on June 4th, I was eighteen years old, and in the beginning I was such a - I had such a horrible childhood and was so suppressed and devalued as a child that I wanted to do something like this because I saw Freddie Prinze and I’d been listening to Cheech and Chong and George Carlin. I don’t come from a background of performers. My family are not circus people. They’re freaks, but they’re not circus people. And I wanted to do this even though it was probably the most painful and least rewarding thing for the first ten years for sure, every time I stepped on stage. But in 1996 I got some really valuable constructive criticism from a guy in New York that said, ‘There’s really nothing in your act that tells me about you or what you believe in or what you like or dislike or what your family’s about.’ And from that point on I started to make the material more personal and it’s been a wonderful ride for the last eleven years. To be able to find the characters, like my grandmother and my uncles and people that everyone can relate to, whether you’re Latino or not. That dysfunction and that tough love mentality that I brought, even in political stances and things, you know. If you believe it, you can say it. I remember Ted Danson said to me, ‘How do you get away with saying all of that stuff?’ And I said, ‘I believe what I’m saying and I’m willing to take the hit if somebody disagrees.’

What do you think about Cheech & Chong hitting the road again?

LOPEZ: I know both guys. I wish them the best and I was always hoping they’d get back together and we’ll have to see how they do. I mean it’s really difficult to perform live and it’s really hard to sell a ticket in these economic times. It’s tough to get people because there’s less money. But I think if any comedy, they’re the best living duo on earth, one of the few comedy teams - Laurel and Hardy, Burns and Schreiber, and Cheech & Chong is our version of Laurel and Hardy. I think there’s going to be a wonderful anticipation of all of those shows. I’ll be there.

Will they last all the way through the shows?

LOPEZ: They might not. I’ll tell you this: they’re not going to fly together and they may not stay in the same hotel room, so...