text: It had been 20 years since comedian Bob Saget played the squeaky clean patriarch of “Full House” when Netflix launched an updated version. “Fuller House” stars many of the original cast, who remained close in the interim and are currently filming Season Three.
  But Saget had spent the last two decades shaking off the good guy image. His 2007 stand-up special drew attention for the f-words he dropped, but Saget insists: “I’m not that dirty. It’s just that people haven’t seen the newer stuff.”
  Saget appears Friday and Saturday at Comedy Zone and will soon film a new comedy special, then directing the film “Jake,” a dark comedy about an intervention that goes awry, after his character’s girlfriend posts it on Facebook. “There is comedy in that. No one is quite dumb enough to do that... It’s a serious movie with serious themes. It’s relevant.”
  He says he does his current stand-up out of obligation – and it’s one he enjoys.
  “Right now, people from other planets are laughing at us. What’s been happening with the world has made me get out more and more. The (audience) has suffered enough,” he saus. “It counts more. It means more.”
  He told friend Norman Lear (creator of classic working-class sitcoms “The Jeffersons” and “All in the Family”) that he felt he was taking people out of their difficult lives for a little while.
  “(Lear) said, ‘No, you aren’t taking people out of their lives, you are bringing people into their lives. You’re bringing people into a larger, shared experience.’ And he’s right. It’s a large group in a room and all get to be entertained. That’s a gift.”
  Unlike a lot of comics, Saget isn’t focusing his comedy on current events. “I’m not doing topical stuff too much. It’s pretty evergreen. You could watch it in five years,” he says of the special.
  “I have not enjoyed performing this much in 30 years. The only weird thing with me is I spent eight years on the show and I’m playing him again.
  “(People) think that’s how he talks in real life. It’s a cartoon. People don’t talk like that... I shot an episode last week I actually loved. It’s like no time has passed. Candice (Burr) is 41, or 40, I should say. Jody (Sweeten) is in her mid or late 30s. They’re doing a great job with the show.”
  He swears he hadn’t counted on returning – or at least not dressing like Tanner used to.
  “I did a Broadway play, ‘The Drowsy Chaperone,’ for Bob Boyett, who hired me for ‘Full House.’ Bob had me back in a cardigan sweater. I told him, ‘You’re the only person that could get me back in a cardigan sweater again.’ ” He was right.
  When: 7:30 and 9:45 p.m. Friday, 7 and 9:30 p.m. Saturday.
  Where: The Comedy Zone, 900 NC Music Factory Blvd.
  Details: 980-321-4702; www.cltcomedyzone.com.