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RAYMOND FISCHER is busy. And he’s not one of those people who find ways to tell you how very busy they are, in tones that suggest suffering. No, Fischer is bubbling with positive energy as he profusely apologizes for postponing a previously planned interview. His firm represents big companies — Whataburger, for instance — and, as part of the legal team, he sometimes has to leave town on short notice to address a situation.

“It’s everything you would imagine,” he says. “Slip and fall claims, wrongful firing or discrimination [lawsuits], the chicken-wasbad or bug-in-my food complaints.”

Fischer provides first-rate counsel in areas of general commercial litigation, but the fact that he works for Crouch & Ramey law firm today — considering the path of his last few years — is remarkable.

After law school at Louisiana State he landed his first job — a great one, he says at Crouch & Ramey. He spent two years building a sound reputation and married the woman of his dreams, Lee.

That’s when Fischer quit his job and moved to Chicago to attend comedy school.

While lawyering in Dallas, Fischer longed to take a shot at the performing arts, namely improvisational comedy.

“I’d be sitting at my desk, unable to focus because I was thinking about it.”

Everyone was shockingly supportive, he says.

“My wife encouraged the idea from the beginning. I told her on our first date I wanted to act. Before we started having kids, she wanted me to try this,” he says. “I was amazed at how my bosses reacted — in a good way. In fact, Cole Ramey said he wished he’d been able to do the same thing. Not that his thing was the same as mine, but he meant following your dream, whatever it is.”

The Fischers relocated to Chicago and Raymond enrolled in The Second City, where photos of alumni including Gilda Radner, Bill Murray, John Belushi, Mike Myers, Steve Carell and Stephen Colbert, to name a few, line the walls. He also regis- tered for courses at Improv Olympic, where Tina Fey, Chris Farley and Seth Meyers once practiced their craft.

Because he had taken classes with Dallas Comedy House in the past, he tested out of some of the remedial classes, he says. But he was not the typical student.

“Most were millennials who had recently graduated,” he says. “They had drama degrees. They all were a good 10 years younger than me. One girl asked me if I was a narc, which did not technically make sense, though I knew what she meant — ‘Who is this old balding dude?’ ”

Some of his life experience helped him in improvisational situations, but his relatively old age (early 30s) occasionally placed him out of the loop.

“There was a time or two when they brought up a video game or something that I had no idea what they were talking about,” he says.

However, his classmates promptly warmed to him and he emerged successful, being one of 10 Second City students (out of more than 60) plucked for an end-of-season public show; he occupied the same stages as, throughout history, his comedy idols.

It was like an itch scratched, he says of his time in Chicago. Lee had secured a teaching job and was happy, too, but about three years in, they both felt it was time to return to a more financially stable existence, one in which they could raise children.

Crouch & Ramey was fully staffed, so Fischer applied to other firms. Just as he was about to accept a position elsewhere, Ramey called to say that a position was open, but that he needed to come now.

With his 7-months-pregnant wife, Raymond Fischer returned to Lake Highlands, where they now raise daughter Abigail.

Fischer works diligently these days to ensure that his bosses don’t regret their decision to take him back, he says. But he finds some time for improv, which is his release from life’s stresses.

In Dallas Comedy House’s early years, Fischer became its in-house counsel, a position he still holds. He was thrilled, upon his return to Dallas, to see how DCH has blossomed. “Amanda [Austin, his friend and the founder of DCH] took a leap of faith opening this place years ago. It was crazy watching it grow. Amanda had a lot of foresight — she has built a community. I come back and it is in full bloom. It is exciting.”

Eventually, as he learns to balance family, work and performing, he hopes to become more of a regular at DCH, where today he sometimes stands in with existing troupes, and maybe even teach classes there.

“The best part is that I can now practice law with satisfaction, knowing that I went and did what I wanted to do.”