David Spade has a dirty mouth. His role as the ex ice skating, cat loving personal assistant Dennis Finch in "Just Shoot me" has helped propel the show into one of the most popular on tv. Now, with his new film - "The Adventures of Joe Dirt" - David Spade is set to take on Mullet heads everywhere.

Top Ten Signs You're Not White Trash :

10. You think Lynard Skynard is a person, not a band.
09. You can't tell the difference between Heather Thomas and Heather Locklear.
08. You've never said anything "rocks".
07. Other than insulation, nothing in your childhood home was made of fibreglass.
06. You don't know what it means to "shotgun" a can of beer.
05. You don't consider croutons vegetables.
04. Your family dog has never worn a bandana.
03. You can't smell what the rock is cooking.
02. You've never eaten any meat product sold in a can.
01. You don't know the difference between country and western music.

David Spade is a smartmouth. The Arizona native, who now lives in Los Angeles, is currently holed up in a stylish hotel, where he will answer questions about himself and a guy called Joe Dirt. "The Adventures of Joe Dirt" co stars Christopher Walken and Kid Rock, and was made by the same team that created Deuce Bigalow. Despite Joe's mullet and penchant for bad '80s rock, he's not such a bad guy. Spade is also not such a bad guy; whether it be berating Laura San Giacomao on "Just Shoot Me" (who describes Spade as "the heart of the show") or discussing having sex with models with "Maxim" magazine ("Well, the bummer is that they're always too tall for me and I'm too tiny for them. That sucks. And during sex they constantly have to stop and get touched up. The hair and makeup team runs into the bedroom.") David Spade is not quite the sarcstic backhander you would think. "I'm a pussycat, really," he says.

This is the second leading film role for Spade since the death of his long time friend and partner Chris Farley (who suffered a massive heart attack on December 18, 1997). Spade stars as a mullet sporting radio station janitor, abandoned in a garbage can near the Grand Canyon at age 8, who embarks on a cross country search for his "white trash" parents. Along the way, Spade draws heavily on the outrageous brand of buffoonery he and Farley made famous in the classic mid '90s comedies "Black Sheep" and "Tommy Boy".

When I asked David Spade to talk about his most outrageous high school prank, I expected he would come back with something off the wall. You know, stink bombs, underwear on flagpoles. But who would have thought that Spade, the otherwise mild mannered star of NBC's "Saturday Night Live" (SNL) and "Just Shoot Me" would turn out to have a secret criminal past?

It seems that back in the day (1982, if you want to be exact) the future actor comedian became a bit overzealous about his impending graduation from Saguaro High School in Scottsdale, Arizona. "We put up posters all over the school saying stuff like, 'We Rule, You're Not Cool', and '82 Rocks', Spade admits, laughing to himself in a Los Angeles hotel suite. According to Spade, everything was fun and games until the local authorities showed up to investigate a complaint of vandalism.

"So we made a break for it," he recalls. "It turned into a two and a half hour police chase. We were going through alleys and canals until they finally caught us. They said, 'You tied up our police force for two and a half hours with your horse s*it shenanigans.' I was like, 'Why did you even chase us? We put paper up on a wall at school.' There was really nothing that we did except run, and make them look stupid.

The end result was that Spade and his seven partners in crime were all suspended from school until graduation. Perhaps this in some way helps to explain Spade's unique and often off colour sense of humour, which rears its head again in "The Adventures Of Joe Dirt."

"I hear a lot about 'Tommy Boy' when I do college [stand up comedy] gigs," Spade explains, grinning. "So I really wanted to get back to that kind of thing." And suffice it to say, fans of his earlier work probably won't be disappointed. But then Spade, who shares the writing credit on the film with fellow SNL alumnus Fred Wolf isn't likely to win over many critics with scenes where he has horse manure poured over his head. And the part where his character helps a golden retriever free its family jewels, which are accidentally frozen to a wooden porch, well, lets not go there.

The bottom line is this : "Joe Dirt" is exactly what the televison commercials make it out to be - a somewhat silly, but often humourous "check your IQ at the box office" kind of film. And that, says Spade, is precisely what he set out to make. "it's just a fun light movie aimed to make people happy," Spade boasts. "That's why we did it. And if you don't like [that kind of humour] that's okay."

But "The Adventures Of Joe Dirt" also has a serious side. At least for its biggest star. You see, Spade is not entirely unfamiliar with the experience of losing a parent. "My dad left us when we were four," remembers Spade, who was born in the small Midwestern town of Birmingham, Michigan. He and his two brothers, Bryan and Andrew were subsequently raised by their mother, Judy Todd. Growing up, the actor recalls his father would "pop in once a year to take us to the circus. I know what it's like to want my dad around," he says, "and I would think for someone who had both parents gone, possibly on purpose, it's 10 times harder."

Spade says he tried to incorporate some of that emotion into the character of Joe Dirt. He describes his on screen persona as a composite of many poeple he has known, including Wolf, who he jokingly describes as "a true dirtball from Montana". Says the actor: "He's worked on oil rigs and in a pawnshop and he worked at the carnival. And there was me, being from Arizona, seeing guys at 7-11 doing crystal meth, and seeing the guys with their Trans Ams looking for gas. We'd always talk about these things. Then we said, 'We should put them all in one place, take all these people and make them into one guy.'"

Hence, Joe Dirt was born - a hapless loser who spends most of his journey being ridiculed and beaten up. But Spade insists they were careful to make the character funny without being insulting to anyone who may find himself in a similar predicament ("We didn't want to offend anyone in the South," he admits)

For Spade, some of the taunting may have also hit close to home. In several interviews, he has openly discussed being picked on in elementary school, mostly because of his advanced math and reading skills. "In grade school I was smart, but I didn't have many friends," he once said. "I wasn't exactly on the road to having a social life."

Back at home, Spade's real life story seemed to be heading in a happier direction, at least for a while. His mother eventually remarried, but sadness struck the family again when his stepfather committed suicide. In 1999, Spade credited the tragedy, along with the death of his best friend (from a motorcycle accident), for inspiring him to finally step up to the microphone and follow his dream."When my stepfather died I just kind of fell apart," he confessed. "I felt pretty vunerable, like there literally could be no tomorrow. That while I was doing a lot of talking (about becoming a comedian) everything could end. So I figured, if I don't go after it now, I might never get to do it."

Spade's official entry to the comic stage came at an open mike night at a nightclub in Arizona ("I was horrible," Spade recalls.) He eventually put his business classes at community college on hold to pursue comedy full time, paying the bills by working at a local skateboard shop.

Spade's comedic star began to rise in 1989 when he was selected to appear on HBO's 13th Annual Young Comedians Show. That special was hosted by Dennis Miller, who was so impressed by what he saw that he helped Spade secure an audition for SNL.

Spade became a Not Ready For Primetime Player the following year and eventually earned fame for such comedic skits as "The Hollywood minute", in which he would drag celebrities over the hot coals with his cutting commentry. Since then, he has enjoyed tremendous success in both film and television, most recently as Dennis Finch on "Just Shoot Me."

That series, which debuted as a mid season replacement in 1997, has earned Spade two Golden Globe nominations and one Emmy nod. But that is hardly consolation for the actor who has endured a turbulent relationship with the media for years.

"The press has been terrible," he insists. "For my last movie (the 1999 stinker "Lost and Found"), some critics seemed to come out of retirement to kick me in the balls. I'm thinking what am I doing that's so wrong? Are people secretly hating me? It's just a goofy movie. Jesus Christ, everybody gets so riled up about it."

Members of the tabloid press were also licking their chops last November, when the news broke that the comedian had been attactked with, of all things, a stun gun, during an apparent burglary at his home in Beverly Hills. The assailant? His personal assistant, 29 year old David Warren Malloy.

In an interview last December, Spade refused to speak about the episode, instead issuing the following statement : "David Malloy was a good friend of mine for five years. I believe he is a good person who is obviously mentally troubled right now." Today, however, Spade seems more comfortable discussing the incident. "The first 15 minutes were really bad," he says. "Since then, I'm okay."

In fact, he has even been known to make a few jokes about the attact, telling reporters, "He lost a lot of my trust. He's down to three days a week."

Now what was I saying about a strange sense of humour.