Probably more than a few folks raised their proverbial eyebrows when NBC announced that Robert DeNiro would be Jimmy Fallon's first guest when Late Night with Jimmy Fallon debuts on Monday, March 2. DeNiro long has held a reputation for being a tough interview, with more than a few magazine profiles about the actor focusing on just how difficult the process was. But the network recently released this clip that shows the two have sat side-by-side on camera before, when DeNiro popped in on the Weekend Update desk at Saturday Night Live in 2000. There's an element of the moment earlier this season when Mark Wahlberg confronted Andy Samberg about Samberg's Wahlberg impersonation. And yet. I'm not sure this helps as much as it harms, though, because yes, acting is involved here, but anyone who thinks Fallon gets too nervous in panel chats or laughs at himself just a little too much only will think, case closed.
All over the country, stand-up comedians are preparing for auditions -- comics try out for commercial roles, sitcoms and film parts all of the time -- but this week, there's the added bonus of special showcases for Montreal's Just For Laughs Festival. I got to sit in on an industry showcase the other night for, among other things, Comedy Central's upcoming season of Live at Gotham. Most everyone scored laughs with the audience and the scouts. Of them all, though, I'd like to talk about TuRae's set, because I think he did something that even Simon Cowell over on American Idol would have approved. And no, TuRae did not sing.
Millions of you watching the live semifinal telecasts (and even any of the past seasons) of Idol undoubtedly have heard Simon and the other judges criticize bad performances and highlight others with the same main points: You need to bring it with your best stuff, show us your range, make us remember you, be yourself, but also tell us a little about who you are, exactly. All of these keys apply just as well to stand-up comedians.
"I'm expecting a daughter at the end of April...(applause break)...I just hope she gets my looks and personality!" -- Patton Oswalt, last weekend at Carolines in New York City, during a set full of material about how he'll have to change his lifestyle once he becomes a father. And also "sky cakes." He is recording his performances tomorrow, Feb. 28, 2009, in D.C., for his third CD as well as a new Comedy Central special.
February is wrapping up with some interesting and curious comedy items to relay from around the Internets. To wit:
-- Dave Chappelle performed a four-hour set earlier this morning (as in late last night) at the Comic Strip Live in New York City, and comedian/employee Adam Cozens took advantage of being bumped to take some photomographs. Cozens said only 17 of the 60 audience members managed to stay for the full show. But could they, or Chappelle, do 50 hours at the Strip? (Earlier: The world record 50-hour marathon show at the Strip) -- Coincidentally, at the same time Chappelle was doing a surprise set at the Strip, Chris Rock stopped in for an unannounced set at the Comedy Cellar in the Village. Less coincidental, perhaps, the model who has been engaged in a decade-long lawsuit against Rock had her files unsealed (Los Angeles Times). -- Comedy Central Insider has compiled a list of 100 funny Twitter feeds to follow. I am on it. Follow me @thecomicscomic. -- Among the new Twitter members this week: Dane Cook and Louis CK. A clip of Louis CK on Conan from October apparently has gotten some renewed mileage on YouTube this week. Why? Because it's funny. That's why. Louis CK also reported via Twitter that he has postponed taping his new DVD (was planned for March 14 in Boston -- show will go on, but without big cameras). Dane Cook, meanwhile, ranked among the biggest concerts in the world among all acts (music, comedy, whatnots) in January, selling out the 19,092-seat St. Pete Times Forum in Tampa, Fla., on Jan. 31. That show grossed $1.2 million with a top ticket price of $102.75 (before service charges?). So if you thought the Dane Train was slowing down, think again. -- Boston comedy correspondent Nick A. Zaino has a new interview with The Whitest Kids U Know, which is good and timely, because the group began as a live sketch show, has moved to TV and IFC, and is currently on a nationwide comedy club tour performing live again (and also a feature film starring two of them!).
Yesterday, Entertainment Weekly said writer/director Bill Condon (Dreamgirls) was shopping his own script with Eddie Murphy set to star in Richard Pryor: Is It Something I Said?, while HitFlix went further to say it had been shopped to Fox Searchlight with a $25 million budget. Condon helped Murphy get an Oscar nomination in Dreamgirls, and Murphy used to impersonate Pryor in his young stand-up act, so you'd think this would be a solid choice. Roll the NSFW clip:
And here is a classic clip from Richard Pryor (also NSFW) about going to prison in Arizona:
Then again. Two things.
1) Eddie Murphy is such a star himself, that despite the impersonation, I'll be curious to see how he slips into the role and life of the groundbreaking Pryor without reminding us that he is Eddie Murphy. In Dreamgirls, he was playing off of his James Brown/SNL riffs without having to play the actual James Brown, so it was a little easier to follow. Yes, yes, Jamie Foxx won an Oscar playing his Ray Charles. It is possible. And in a more of an apples-to-apples comparison, Jim Carrey pulled off Andy Kaufman in Man on the Moon. But I sometimes watch Eddie's brother, Charlie Murphy, and find myself thinking about Eddie. I'm not the only one who does that, right?
2) Which leads me to a previous attempt at a Richard Pryor biopic. Just a few years ago, comedian Mike Epps was telling MTV News that he would play Pryor, saying in 2005 he was personally auditioning for the family. In December 2006, Epps said a family fight over the late comedian's assets had delayed the project, along with a desire to rewrite the script with material from Pryor's daughter, Rain. Pryor and wife, Jennifer Lee Pryor, had been producing that project, and Jennifer had told Variety back in May 2005 that they originally had thought of Damon Wayans for the role, but reconsidered. "The material is larger than life, and you need someone to fit into it
who's not extraordinarily famous or else it would be like Al Jolson
playing Malcolm X," she said. "Richard and I saw Mike's standup, and
there is a dangerous edge, a Richard-esque quality about him." Pryor died in December 2005.
Naturally, then, I wonder what the family thinks of this latest development.
Following hot off of the successful Broadway run of Will Ferrell's Bush spoof, Robin Williams announced today that his current stand-up tour, "Weapons of Self-Destruction," will include a weeklong run in New York City at the Neil Simon Theatre. Tickets will go on sale March 1 for shows April 28-May 3. His nationwide tour stops in New Orleans tonight and ends May 24 in Las Vegas.
From the press release, Williams said: "I'm excited to be back on Broadway. It's
been a blast working on new material for this tour. The current state
of the country's political and economic climate, while so hard on so
many people, has been like gold for a comedian. There's just so much
that's ripe for the picking."
Today is the 15th anniversary of the day stand-up comedian Bill Hicks died. Over in the U.K., comedy club Jongleurs in Camden held a tribute show last night. Tonight, his childhood friend Dwight Slade performs at Cap City Comedy Club in Austin, Texas, with a special screening of the 2007 tribute film, "Squeegee Your Third Eye," and a Q&A session. And as trends go, it's not surprising to see people have a dedicated Twitter hashtag for #billhicksday.
Ann Carr doesn't simply create characters, she jumps into them so fully that you wonder where Carr went. I often want to tell anyone who likes Showtime's new comedy United States of Tara that if they really want to see how one person can inhabit so many different personalities and leap from one to another at will, then they should take a closer look at Ann Carr. She is truly captivating.
Carr's many creations have come out to play before, in shows such as "The Winner's Circle" and "There is Only One You." In "Use It," her new one-woman show directed by Eliza Skinner that's making a run at the UCB Theatre in New York, Carr takes on some of the characters she has crossed paths with in her own real-life struggle to make it in show business. There's a male coworker who makes awkward small talk. There's the college classmate who went on fame and fortune, bumping into Carr as she works as a waitress. "She's so jealous!" the actress says of Carr, adding another level of self-absorption with this chestnut: "This is your struggle, and I'm part of it...Use it!" There's a mother accompanying her son on an audition. There's a scene losing it in public at a Starbucks. At one point, one of Carr's characters wonders: "I keep doing it because I know it's not all bullshit, right?" Not if you use it. Use it and turn it into something you can control. It's not all played for laughs. But you won't want to look away, either. She is a delight to behold, in all of her wondrous characters.
Jerry Seinfeld doesn't need the money. But Seinfeld cannot stay away from the stage, whether it's stand-up comedy or television. NBC announced today that he's coming back to the Peacock Network, creating a comedy/reality show about married couples tentatively called "The Marriage Ref." It'll take real married couples with disputes and have them judged upon by celebs, comedians and athletes.
No word on whether Seinfeld will appear on camera or stay behind the scenes, nor when it'll debut, but it won't air in the 10 p.m. hour. Leno's got that wrapped up. More likely 8 p.m.
Speaking of comedians in places you don't expect to see comedians...the second edition of The Celebrity Apprentice starts on Sunday night, because, well, I don't know why NBC has trotted the Trumps back out, but I'm almost compelled to watch this. Why not have a silly rich man who's always going bankrupt while claiming to have the "#1 show in America" even though that's not true, playing pretend boss to a silly sparkly comedian who thinks the time-space continuum stopped in 1989 because he's still on TV saying he's the "#1 comedian in America." Yes, my friends. This shall be meta. It's a comedy-heavy Apprentice, with Andrew Dice Clay, Tom Green and Joan Rivers, not to mention some "celebrities" who themselves are "jokes." Dennis Rodman is laughing at himself in the first episode for making
yet another bad life decision. There is a Kardashian. And a Deal or No
Deal suitcase holder. It sounds like I am making this up but, sadly,
no. Someone else thought this up and put it on our televisions and
Internets for all of the world to see.
Did I mention they're competing by gender, and Trumpy McTrumperson says their first task is making cupcakes? Tune in March 1 and tells me all about it! Roll the clip:
People think that the funny guy in the office would make a great stand-up comedian, but that humor does not always translate from the workplace to the stage. Ditch Films has produced a series of online shorts that puts a reverse spin on this, taking stand-up comedians and having them do their act in an unnatural setting for stand-up. I'm not sure if it's funnier this way, but it certainly makes for an interesting piece of film. The most recent features Chris Laker in an office cubicle (note: contains NSFW language).
After the jump, videos from Pat Dixon, Nate Bargatze, Jim Norton, Dustin Chafin, Matty Goldberg, Jason Rouse, Tomi Walamies, Mark Demayo and Bill Burr.
Location, location, location. That's the mantra in real estate, and perhaps the folks at Adult Swim followed it by choosing Bleecker and Lafayette as the setting for their larger-than-life advertisement for Delcoated, the very funny new short series that airs on Thursday nights. (Thanks, Aziz)
But about that location. The billboard looms large over 45 Bleecker, which is home not only to Mike Birbiglia's successful off-Broadway run of Sleepwalk With Me, but also Lizz Winstead's Shoot the Messenger satire of the morning news, as well as the new one-man show by Marc Maron, Scorching the Earth, which will play Sunday nights at the theater in March.
Coincidentally, Maron sat down with his show producer/comedy blogger Dylan P. Gadino for "A Tight Five."
Watching Phil Hartman's audition tape for Saturday Night Live is such a bittersweet experience. Mostly sweet. To know that you don't have to be a kid to get your big break in show business -- Hartman was 38 when he joined the cast of SNL. To see the precision, vision and versatility in his audition -- even though it's hack now to do Jack Nicholson, Hartman still found a way a generation ago to make his takes seem unique and fresh, even when you watch them now. To see his friend, Jon Lovitz, lend a hand -- Lovitz joined SNL in 1985, Hartman in 1986 -- and gain a deeper appreciation for Lovitz stepping in at NewsRadio after Hartman got killed by his wife in 1998. Watch Hartman make the most of his SNL moment:
For those of you who do not live in New York City, let me just preface this by saying that we first got introduced to Sal Lupo at comedy shows by learning he was a cab driver from the Canarsie neighborhood in Brooklyn. Turns out Lupo has shifted gears more than somewhat, from comedy to making his own feature-length movie that's a CIA thriller. Here, Sal shares his insight on a few scenes from his movie.
Are you going to the 2009 SXSW festival in Austin, Texas, next month? I know these comedians will be, because they're all listed on the festival site as performers mingling among the thousands of fans and musicians, with performances March 20-21 at either the Velveeta Room or Esther's Follies.
Maybe Kate Winslet should have thanked Ricky Gervais more on Oscar night when she accepted her Academy Award for playing a hot illiterate Nazi in The Reader. After all, Gervais had given her the funny lines to say a couple of years ago in his HBO show, Extras. This has floated the Internets already, obviously, but this is probably the last time to share it before it becomes untimely.
Andy Richter and Conan O'Brien once again will be side-by-side launching a late-night talk show, as NBC announced today that Richter will serve as the announcer and also sketch comedy player for The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien when it debuts on June 1.
Richter appeared on O'Brien's final "Late Night" last Friday. But he had been O'Brien's sidekick for close to seven years, from his "Late Night" start in September 1993 until May 26, 2000. From the official NBC press release, this statement from O'Brien: "Andy is one of the funniest people I know and we've maintained a close
friendship since he left 'Late Night.' We have a proven
chemistry that will be an incredible asset to 'The Tonight Show.' I'm
looking forward to working with Andy on a daily basis again,
particularly since he owes me $300."
That reminds me, I'm going to need to create a few new categories.
If you had romantic plans on Valentine's Day, then, well, God bless you and your loved ones. But if you were like me, and had no one to share in the love and the forced romanticism of Feb. 14, then you were at the UCB Theatre in New York City for Jon Friedman's third annual heartbreak edition of his monthly Rejection Show. Actually, I saw quite a few couples in the audience clearly still dressed up from a night on the town and a fancy dinner, but whatevers. The show was great. Afterparty greater. And twas all for a good cause, celebrating the book release of Rejected: Tales of the Failed, Dumped, and Canceled, which Friedman edited. His introduction -- itself a rejection piece of sorts -- is ingenious. Several of the contributors (among whom include folks from Saturday Night Live, The Daily Show, The State) took part in either the Valentine's Day party or an earlier book release this month at the Bell House. You should go to your nearest book store and/or online bookseller and get yourself a copy.
"You know it's Patton's crowd when they boo the L train! It's so refreshing." -- Julian McCullough, while hosting the second show Saturday night for Patton Oswalt at Carolines in New York City. Oswalt performs again tonight at 8 p.m.
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