Above: Comedian Brian Regan performs during Comedy Central’s “Brian Regan: Live From Radio City Music Hall” on September 26, 2015 in New York City. (Photo by Bennett Raglin/Getty Images for Comedy Central)

When Brian Regan proposed his first stand-up special in five years for Comedy Central, he wanted to do something memorable.

“I’ve done specials in the past, and I wanted to do something a little different, or a lot different,” says Regan, who performs Nov. 22 at the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex Concert Hall. “I said, let’s do something that would create a little more buzz than your normal special.”

So a little more than a month ago, Regan took to the stage at New York’s Radio City Music Hall, and Comedy Central for the first time ever aired a stand-up special live.

“It went very smoothly,” Regan says. “It was interesting to me as the performer because I was so focused on trying to hit my words without mangling them. Usually, for a special like this, you’ll tape two different shows, and if you mess up a joke on one you can pull it from the other, but I didn’t have the opportunity with this one.”

Regan says he “hit about 97 percent” of his jokes for the special.

“There are a couple of words here and there I didn’t get quite right,” he says. “But overall, I was very pleased with it. I felt like I had to make an 8-foot putt to win the U.S. Open, and I got it.”

For Comedy Central, betting on Regan to come through was a no-brainer. He’s one of the top touring comedians in the world, and, perhaps most importantly for a special airing live, his act is clean, devoid of the four-letter words found in many a punchline these days.

“I was almost always clean on stage,” says Regan, 58, who played football for Heidelberg University in Ohio before pursuing a comedy career. “When I first started, I was mostly clean, but I had jokes that had four-letter words in them or some references that some people would be surprised by today. I decided to be 100 percent clean not because I’m wholesome, but because I’m anal. I don’t want to be 95 percent clean – that’s no fun.”

Comedian Brian Regan, left, with comedian Ray Romano, center, and producer Rory Rosegarten after Regan performed during Comedy Central’s “Brian Regan: Live From Radio City Music Hall.” (Photo by Bennett Raglin/Getty Images for Comedy Central)

Like Jerry Seinfeld, Ellen DeGeneres and other observational comics, Regan’s funny moments come from living and observing life rather than just telling jokes.

“I’ve come to realize that for me, I’m not really great at sitting down in front of a blank piece of paper to come up with comedy,” Regan says. “My inspiration comes from going through my natural routine. I hear things, see things, read things.”

And then he writes about them and performs them, hitting the road from his home in Las Vegas for about half the weekends of the year. You’ll see him on TV a lot, too. Before David Letterman retired, Regan appeared 28 times on the Late Show.

“That show was tremendous for me,” Regan says. “To have such a good run on that show just meant the world to me. It was a great way to get your foot in the door in a more national way. The stuff that has helped me in my career has almost always been from other comedians. Other comedians seem to like what I do. It means the world to me.”

As for Birmingham, Regan says he’s looking forward to getting back down South again.

“I will be doing the same exact show that I always do, but I’ll be wearing bib overalls and a John Deere cap,” he says with a laugh. “No, seriously, I try not to get geographical with my comedy. I’m coming to your town to tell you how I think and feel as a comedian, not to tell you stuff you already know about your city.”