Tucker Max (born September 27, 1975) is a comedy author, movie producer and internet blogger. Known primarily for his "fratire" writing style, mostly regaling his own exploits, he is most famous for his first book, I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell, which was made into a movie.
Most of his writing centers around his various exploits in chasing women, drinking, or having crazy adventures with a mix of both. His later works explored how his fame from his earlier works increased the opportunities to do all of these.
A graduate of the University of Chicago and later earning a Judiciary Doctorate from Duke University, he chose not to pursue a career in law in favor of his burgeoning writing career, which started on his exploits blog at tuckermax.com. As his blog and his crazy stories became hugely popular, he eventually rewrote and expanded on many of his most popular stories into Hell in 2006, which became a surprise success and NY Times bestseller.
He would follow up with three more books and additionally adapt Hell into a full-length movie. After the movie failed to gain much success and his own lifestyle had changed from what had made him famous (and thus, running out of stories to tell), he announced his retirement, although he still does speaking engagements and is working on an advice book.
Tucker wrote the following books:
- The Definitive Book of Pick-Up Lines
- Belligerence and Debauchery: The Tucker Max Stories
- I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell (made into a 2010 movie)
- Assholes Finish First
- Hilarity Ensues
- Sloppy Seconds: The Tucker Max Leftovers
Tucker Max's works contain examples of the following tropes:
- The Alcoholic: He's often accused of being one based on his tales of wild excess binge drinking.
- All Girls Want Bad Boys: He's very...descriptive of being blatantly rude and jerky as his main way of flirting, and also how that it seems to work very well for him.
- Artist Disillusionment: Felt his original audience outgrew his shenanigans and the newer audience was full of idiots. Not to mention his own somewhat maturity. This is mostly what led to his retirement.
- Based on a True Story: As hard as it is to believe some of the crazy things he has written, he insists all of it is 100 percent true.
- Card-Carrying Jerkass: This is Max's entire gimmick as a comedian; his first two books were titled I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell and Assholes Finish First, and consisted mainly of stories about frat-boy drunkenness, promiscuity, and douchebaggery.
- Drugs Are Bad: Despite his famous drinking stories, abstains from drug use out of general disinterest. Doesn't help that the one time he ever got stoned (accidentally ingesting a badly made marijuana brownie) resulted in stomach damage due to the stems not being properly removed...although he did say he enjoyed the high.
- Easter Egg: When character in the movie adaptation of Hell uses his cell phone to call Tucker, the real cell number for Tucker Max can be seen.
- Frat Bro: Hates being referred to as one of these since he was never in a frat. Naturally, it's the go-to insult for his detractors - the fact that he does resemble the stereotype doesn't help his case.
- Genius Ditz: Yes, he parties hard and loves chasing the ladies and can come off as a Frat Bro as above, but he is a Duke University Law School graduate which he attended on an academic scholarship, and described the LSAT's as fairly easy (and he scored really high on).
- Hilarity Ensues: One of his favorite catch phrases, and the title of his last full book.
- Jerkass: His basic description of a lot of his behavior (the megaphone incident at the season ticket camp out at Duke is hilariously jerky), yet to many a charming one.You got a fake ID for 19? What, just to sleep with me? You can't even buy alcohol with this! Go home.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: A rule he sticks with with his actual friends who come along on his adventures; they all have pen names in his stories. However famously averted with 1999's Miss Vermont, who he had a relationship with. A lawsuit briefly had her removed from his blog; it was later dropped and she returned, along with getting a long write up about the relationship itself and the fallout of the blog and lawsuit incident in Assholes Finish First.
- When it comes to himself, however, he insists on using his real name for everything. The disclaimer at the beginning of his books reads "My real name is Tucker Max."
- Noodle Incident: He once met Angelina Jolie at a charity event. He hasn't gone into any details about what happened, saying only that he's pretty sure she doesn't like him very much.
- Sensei for Scoundrels: He's become a bit of a cult leader for the hedonistic lifestyle. Max has argued that he shouldn't be taken as this, since his real advice is "you're more likely to find happiness and success in your life if you do what YOU want to do instead of trying to conform to expectations"
- Small Name, Big Ego: He's had his moments. The best may have been in "Tucker Has Moment of Reflection, Ends Poorly" when he first realized the possibility that he'd been played by some of his hookups. He threw an all-night temper tantrum over it.Friend “Dude, it’s happened to all of us, and we’ve all done it to others. Women are women, men are men. This happens to everyone.”
Tucker “FUCK THAT. I AM TUCKER MAX. I AM BETTER THAN ALL OF YOU. THIS SHIT DOES NOT HAPPEN TO ME!” - Trope Namer: Is rather fond of the fact that many people now distinguish between being drunk and being Tucker Max Drunk.
- During his time at Duke, there was no penalty for not attending class, and the assignments didn't matter. All that did was the final exam - pass that, and you were golden. Tucker took advantage of this by leaving in the middle of the semester to herd drunk college kids in Cancun for a month, then came back as if he'd never been gone. He said all this on his site, and when Duke caught wind of it, law schools across the country changed their policy to penalize students for missing classes - known among the higher-ups as "the Tucker Max Rule".
- What Did I Do Last Night?: Several times, most famously the sushi incident from the beginning of Hell which he still describes as the most drunk he's ever gotten.
- Younger Than They Look: Not he but many of his fans. Though he obviously doesn't like that as he adamantly refuses to sleep with underage fans, and in fact demands ID from his "suitors" who pursue him. One girl all of fourteen showed up at his house with an obvious fake ID... that said nineteen.
