Your morning profanity
Good friends of Crap Filter, A Week of Kindness, have posted their latest video sketch for your enjoyment. The Internet is a funnier place now, thanks to them.
Also, why not head over to their blog and wish them a happy first birthday?
Crispin Glover is batshit crazy
We report. You decide.
Sent to me by Nate Kushner via AIM.
In your face, Dick Cheney!
Apparently the most newsworth aspect of the whole Cheney-shoots-a-man saga is that it’s being made the subject of fun on late night televison. Shocking.
If you missed The Daily Show last night, be sure to catch one of the next six re-airings before tonight. If that’s asking too much, here’s a bit of what you missed:
Jon Stewart: “I’m joined now by our own vice-presidential firearms mishap analyst, Rob Corddry. Rob, obviously a very unfortunate situation. How is the vice president handling it?
Rob Corddry: “Jon, tonight the vice president is standing by his decision to shoot Harry Wittington. According to the best intelligence available, there were quail hidden in the brush. Everyone believed at the time there were quail in the brush.
“And while the quail turned out to be a 78-year-old man, even knowing that today, Mr. Cheney insists he still would have shot Mr. Whittington in the face. He believes the world is a better place for his spreading buckshot throughout the entire region of Mr. Whittington’s face.”
Jon Stewart: “But why, Rob? If he had known Mr. Whittington was not a bird, why would he still have shot him?”
Rob Corddry: “Jon, in a post-9-11 world, the American people expect their leaders to be decisive. To not have shot his friend in the face would have sent a message to the quail that America is weak.”
Jon Stewart: “That’s horrible.”
Rob Corddry: “Look, the mere fact that we’re even talking about how the vice president drives up with his rich friends in cars to shoot farm-raised wingless quail-tards is letting the quail know ‘how’ we’re hunting them. I’m sure right now those birds are laughing at us in that little ‘covey’ of theirs.
Jon Stewart: “I’m not sure birds can laugh, Rob.”
Rob Corddry: “Well, whatever it is they do … coo .. they’re cooing at us right now, Jon, because here we are talking openly about our plans to hunt them. Jig is up. Quails one, America zero.
Jon Stewart: “Okay, well, on a purely human level, is the vice president at least sorry?”
Rob Corddry: “Jon, what difference does it make? The bullets are already in this man’s face. Let’s move forward across party lines as a people … to get him some sort of mask.”
Better yet, check out the video.
Click here…
it’s really not necessary to say anything else….
Chappelle keeps quiet about disappearing act
Who wouldn’t want to know what’s up with Dave Chappelle? Well, James Lipton for one. The bafflingly old Lipton and Chappelle play a two-hour game of softball on the latest installment of “Inside the Actors Studio.”
The Hollywood Reporter has slightly more:
Why did Chappelle hightail it to Africa? He said it’s because the Hollywood environment is “a little sick,” and the more successful he became, the less he enjoyed it. In Africa, he said, he found anonymity, reassessed his career and thought about not coming back.
What made Chappelle decide to return? What’s he doing differently now? How did he resolve things with Comedy Central? You won’t find out by watching, but you will learn how much the comedian admired Bugs Bunny.
Ground breaking stuff. Catch it Sunday at 9 on Bravo.
In LA? Got $20? Now you’ve got plans.
The Kids in The Hall are reuniting with new material for three shows in Los Angeles on Feb. 20, 23 and 25. Tickets aren’t on sale yet, but they’re only going to be $20 and the venue only seats 110 people, so get your camping gear and head out to the Steve Allen theater, like pronto.
My gut tells me this is a sort of “testing the waters” thing ahead of a bigger tour, but my gut is 3,000 miles away, and if I was in LA, I’d be going to one of those shows. Get on it, people.
A Christmas gift for you
You don’t know how lucky you are. A Week of Kindness, New York’s only sketch comedy group, has seen fit to bless the Internet with three videos from their latest show, Barnyard Jamboree.
Ho, ho, ho-ppy (Happy) Holidays from A Week of Kindness! We got some Christmas-y commericals that we debuted at our December Barnyard Jamboree. For MAX holiday effect, watch all three in succession.
Head over to AWOK to check them out, and be patient while they load, since they’re hosted at the Internet Archive.
Satanic Christmas Party
Originally debuting on Wednesday December 15, 2004, last night Comedy Central aired the “Woodland Critter Christmas” episode of South Park. If you haven’t seen it, you need to hit up BitTorrent and get it, NOW.
Basic plot line: Stan is visited by cute fuzzy creatures who convince him to kill a mountain lion that is going to eat their savior on Christmas morning. He does, and soon thereafter finds out that their savior is the Anti-Christ. Stan then must save the world, with some help from mountain lion cubs and Santa. Continues after the jump »
Pay up, bitch!
Everybody’s favorite spaced out comedian, Dave Chappelle might end up having to pay up for his mystical journey to South Africa if his ex-manager has anything to say about it.
DECEMBER 13—Claiming that Dave Chappelle has stiffed him for at least $864,500, the comedian’s former personal manager has sued the star, opening a window on the performer’s finances and his lucrative Comedy Central deal. In a breach of contract complaint filed yesterday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Mustafa Abuelhija claims that he and Chappelle last September entered into a management agreement, though the deal “was never reduced to writing.”
“Never reduced to writing?” Good luck with this one, bud.
Read all about it at The Smoking Gun.
The Kazakh strikes back
Bad news for Borat, but the government of Kazakhstan is shutting him down.
For those unfamiliar with the controversy, here’s a primer: The Kazakhstan government is none too happy with Sacha Baron Cohen’s character Borat, a semi-retarded, Jew-hating, sexist Kazhakstani journalist. Basically Borat goes around and lets others expose their ignorance, but in a way that’s not exactly flattering to everybody’s favorite central Asian country. It’s pure satire, but being an ex-Soviet republic, satire’s apparently an art form still in its infancy there.
After Kazakhstan denounced Borat, Baron Cohen responed with a video on Borat’s Web site, borat.kz — note the .kz.
Sacha Baron Cohen plays Borat in his “Da Ali G Show” and last month he used the character’s Web site www.borat.kz to respond sarcastically to legal threats from the Central Asian state’s Foreign Ministry.
A government-appointed organization regulating Web sites that end in the .kz domain name for Kazakhstan confirmed on Tuesday it had suspended Cohen’s site.
“We’ve done this so he can’t badmouth Kazakhstan under the .kz domain name,” Nurlan Isin, President of the Association of Kazakh IT Companies, told Reuters. “He can go and do whatever he wants at other domains.”
Please tell me I’m not the only one who saw this coming. I think everybody must have. It’s been a while since Baron Cohen issued his response, and frankly I’m surprised it’s taken this long.
Peace out, Richard
It’s apparently my sad duty to announce to the Crap Filter audience that comedian Richard Pryor has died.
If you’ve ever seen his act, you’ll know that Richard Pryor was one of the filthiest mutherfuckers ever to stand in front of a brick wall. A lot of people, especially those too young to observe the rise of his career, know him mostly from his movies, like Brewser’s Millions and The Toy, which are far from his best stuff. Hopefully he’ll be best remembered for his foul-mouthed stand-up routines, without which he would have never made mediocre fodder for Comedy Central Saturday afternoons.
Without Richard Pryor to lead the way, we would probably have never gotten those he influenced, like Eddie Murphy, Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock. Pryor’s good sense of humor got him through some incredibly rough personal times, and the world benefited. I think this says it all:
Pryor lived dangerously close to the edge, both on stage and off.
He was regarded early in his career as one of the most foul-mouthed comics in the business, but he gained a wide following for his universal and frequently personal routines. After nearly losing his life in 1980 when he caught on fire while freebasing cocaine, he incorporated the ordeal into his later routines.
Yeah, that’s awful, but c’mon — you know you think it’s funny even now. His IMDb profile says he’s admitted it was actually a suicide attempt and a story cooked up by his management to cover it up, which is maybe a little less funny, but you know that Richard Pryor would have laughed if it had happened to you.
Schebb’s upside ya head
A Week of Kindness, New York’s only sketch comedy group, has released the third installment of the Dr. Schebb’s “Soft” Gel Shoe Insoles saga.
Drop on by to visit what some people, mostly me, are calling the Crap Filter of sketch comedy. While you’re there, make sure to check out some of their other great sketch videos.
AWOK will be preforming their Barnyard Jamboree show at the People’s Improv Theater in New York on December 10 and 17. You won’t be disappointed.
ArmaGit-R-Dun!
This nicely sums up what I think of the whole ‘Blue Collar’ comedy movement.
Though Cross, like always, comes off as a little high-falutin’, he addresses the idea that “Larry the Cable Guy tells it like it is” with a clarity and intuitiveness that few have taken to the situation as of yet. This is something that a lot of people that defend him fail to understand: it has more to do with the idea behind what is said than what is actually said. How can someone, whose whole act is dedicated to being a character - essentially a living lie - be the voice of honesty?
From time to time we look towards media for truths, and the argument could be made that it is just the same as listening to something you hear in a song or film as the truth, but I don’t agree with that. There is another factor at large here: that Dan Whitney takes his character and makes him live amongst us, while we KNOW that characters in a film are just that. Because of this people take a greater weight to what he says than if he was just some guy they saw in a Jeff Foxworthy TV show. There is a difference between the way they use language, and sadly, Whitney makes himself out to be a bit of an ass with his half-informative rant.
I would honestly like to see a debate between these two. A real debate, discussing the real ideas that go in to what is written and what they choose to present when they take the stage. Not in some perverse hope that Whitney would make an ass of himself and Cross could be carried off to the Lower East Side on the shoulders of his hipster fanbase, because I don’t want to see that happen. I know for a fact that Whitney is a nice guy. I just think he’s (incredibly) misguided.
Misguided all the way to the bank, but hey, can’t win ‘em all.
The Comedians of Comedy
- The Comedians of Comedy
- Tour doc following four of the funniest comedians in the country during a 2004 mini-tour of rock clubs along the west coast.
- Rent the DVD on Netflix
- Catch the film on Showtime
One of the biggest problems with stand-up comedy today is that the general perception still sees it as a fossil of the 1980s. From club owners that still hope for another weekend like that one in 1984 when the joint was so hot they auctioned off seats on the floor and everyone bought 35 drinks apiece, to the casual audience members that INSIST that every yukster on the stage is just a shoulder-pad sport jacketed buffoon with a wacky impression of a police siren and a barrage of airline food jokes. While there are still some people out there that market in this tripe, I have some good news: that almost all died in the 90s, and what grew from its ashes was a phoenix of comedy that is just now beginning to shine as brightly as it initially promised. Proof of this comedy renaissance can be found in the Netflix-exclusive DVD documentary, The Comedians of Comedy. Continues after the jump »
Demetri Martin
Yeah, I’ve only seen the guy a couple times and, sure, I’m prone to hyperbole, but I’m ready to declare Demetri Martin the next big thing in comedy.
I first saw Demetri on the “The Daily Show” in which he appeared as the show’s Youth Expert, or Youthspert, for a segment called Trendspotting (watch it here). I initially thought, “Oh no, another snarky 30-something from New York wearing a sport coat.” But my prejudging was rebuffed in a matter of minutes. Continues after the jump »
Move over Jane: it’s Hanoi Gary
Gary Glitter’s at it again.
Police in Vietnam are looking for the British musician whom they believe is having a relationship with a teenage girl.
The police are currently interviewing the girl, who was found at Gary’s rented house in the Asian country. Continues after the jump »
Word to ‘Mother’
- Mother: The Soundtrack
- Edgy improv comedy fueled by the embarrassing music of its audience.
I had been wanting to see the Upright Citizens Brigade in New York City for while but my brother would never go with me. It’s not that he totally refused, he just kept avoiding it.
Why? I think he was sort of afraid he was going to be pulled up on stage, or totally humiliated in some way by the improv group. To be honest, so was I actually.
You see, us Bodenraders have this aura that causes acts to zero in on us whenever they need the proverbial “participant from the audience.” The phenomenon reached its peak in the early 1990s when my father, who embraces the aura, was pulled on stage at a German restaurant in the World Showcase at Epcot Center. My father was asked to conduct some Oktoberfest-inspired band. I’d give you more details, but that’s all I really remember — I’ve been supressing it for years and years and I’m not about to stop now.
A couple years back I checked out The Groundlings with my friends in L.A. and this lady just across the ailse from me was serenaded by a cast member to open the show. Two seconds into it her face turned a sort of cherry red. So, yeah, these things happen, and they probably prevent a lot more people from attending their shows. Continues after the jump »
Keeping my fingers crossed
It’s probably worth noting that Jason Lee hosts Saturday Night Live, with Foo Fighters as the musical guests tonight.
Even if Jason Lee’s comedic range basically spans only the jerk spectrum, from angry jerk to remorseful jerk, he’s still good at what he does. At it won’t be the host that ruins it this time (Steve Forbes, Michael Jordan, Rudy Giuliani), it’ll be the bad writing and bad cast members.
Update: Zell Miller. Ugh.
How can we sex this up a bit?
Everybody secretly hates the news.
I’ll let you in on a little secret: The only reason people even bother to watch the news is the off chance that something involving cheerleaders having sex in public or pirates might just crawl across the bottom of the screen. The world rejoiced this week when conditions came together to form the perfect storm of pirate and cheerleader non-news.
Here’s a little secret of the news business that they tell you on the day you get your journalism degree: When it comes down to pirates or cheerleaders, go with the pirates. Unless it’s cheerleader pirates, but even a second year journalism student could tell you that.
The works got significantly gummed up this week when the No. 3 news item, sonic death rays, got involved with the pirate story. The No. 1 pirates and No. 3 sonic ray averaged out to a 2, which meant that some poor schlub at Local 6 had to make the difficult choice of sex cheerleaders or sonic pirates. They went with the cheerleaders. Continues after the jump »
The city of blinding lights
Being an up-and-coming comedian in a place like New York City is a struggle. There’s a long, long food chain of people all waiting for their turn. Hours of standing on corners asking people to take flyers for a show full of shitty comics, or paying $5 to a booker just so you can get five minutes of stage time to work out material in front of an audience of other comics who don’t really want to hear you talk about Mike Tyson’s Punch Out because they’re waiting for their turn on the mic. It’s an arduous, almost soul-pummeling experience, to be certain; you’ve heard all the stories before. Continues after the jump »
Somehow, I feel a little safer
I think we’d all be a little better off without sarcastic satirists ruining things for the rest of us. I like my news like I like my ice cream: Vanilla. The White House happens to agree with me, and that’s why the president has his lawyers writing letters to The Onion.
See, The Onion has the presidential seal on its weekly radio address page. If you’re anything like me, you thought that this was the one page on The Onion that was serious.
The Onion has been around forever, but let’s face it — it’s hit-or-miss these days. George Bush, on the other hand, is always good for a laugh.
Ah, so this is why NYC rules
Where I once didn’t have shit to do, all of the sudden I have shit to do.
I just moved from Harrisburg to New York City. (Alright, I moved to Hoboken, New Jersey, but it’s fucking close enough. Check Google maps.)
I won’t bore you with the details of my boredom in Harrisburg, because that’s what moving to NYC/Hoboken is all about — starting afresh with a more positive, more mindless attitude.
Anybody who knows me understands this basically goes against what I’ve become over 27 years. It means shaking some of the sarcasm, the snarkiness, the cynicism, and moroseness that dominate my mind and mouth. (Notice I didn’t say lose completely.) To put it in pop culture terms, I’m throwing out my Nine Inch Nails “Pretty Hate Machine” CD and buying Oasis’ “Definitely Maybe.” I’m not ready for Rush-level cheeriness just yet.
What better place to strap on my new happy face than NYC/Hoboken, the cultural center of the planet. Continues after the jump »
