• In Phoenix for the week, feeling a little under the weather. On a steady DayQuil/NyQuil schedule at the moment. I still had the wherewithal to do the one show I was booked on in Phoenix. In fact, it was an interesting hybrid Show/Mic hosted by Matt Micheletti called “Hot Mic!” at Crescent Ballroom which is typically a concert venue in Downtown Phoenix. I showed up to the venue an hour early with my Mom, Dad, brother Ben Levy and his fiancee Tiffany Wood and Sam Levy and his girlfriend. When I do shows in AZ, the ENTIRE family comes. My friend Douglas Morehouse from my old job Right This Minute showed up too which was a really nice surprise. As comics know, when your family comes to see you, there's pressure to do jokes they haven’t seen before. So I did almost all stuff they had never seen (other than using my typical opener as a crutch). It went OK. I give myself a 5/10. The room was kind of tough but that’s no excuse. Micheletti killed it and worked the room. Looking forward to coming back and doing this one again when I visit Bird City again. I love seeing the scene evolve from what it was back in 2013.
• Pretty slow week for consuming comedy stuff for me. On the plane to PHX, I watched “Stuber.” I don’t know about you, reader, but I love plane rides. It’s a completely guilt-free time dedicated to watching movies. I look forward to them. I plan what movies I’ll watch in advance even. This one was high on my list. It’s actually much better than reviews suggest. Kumail is fantastic and Dave Bautista does a great job playing a guy recovering from Lasik. The movie has all your standard twists and turns but this is a good studio comedy in a landscape where they are dying. Wish I had supported it in theaters so this genre doesn’t collapse.
• Also, finally caught this season’s “Treehouse of Horror.” It was a little behind the times with parodies of “The Shape of Water” and “Stranger Things.” The parody was called “Danger Things.” Yes. Really. The most disturbing thing I caught this season though, wasn’t from this spooky episode. I just caught that Harry Shearer no longer does the voice of Smithers. It’s Dan Castellaneta. He’s great (voices Homer) but it is really not the same. As much as I love the show, it would have been much better had they ended it long ago before dragging it down and ruining the show’s formerly spotless legacy.
• This week’s SNL with Will Ferrell was easily the best of the season Anna E. Paone and I thought. So many great sketches from the monologue with Ryan Reynolds to the Heniz product placement commercial to the music video about the teacher that parties with his students to the first Thanksgiving to the family doing a pizza commercial to the cut scene from “Wizard of Oz.” All of these are instant classics in my mind. If you have Hulu, give it a watch. There was one truly outstanding cut sketch too. The link is in the comments (it’s supposedly a parody of “90 Day Fiancee” which I didn’t know. Either way, it still works on its own).
• Listened to a great, new podcast this week. The first was the pilot of Matt Maran and Anthony Passaretti’s new sports comedy pod “Who’s on First.” It’s a brisk listen at an hour and really hops from sport to sport with ease. I loved hearing hockey stories I knew nothing about (the dude who didn’t exist that was drafted) and the segment at the end with the producer who also doesn’t know anything about sports. Definitely going to listen to more.
• There is no FREE FRIES show this week to keep it nice and chill after the Thanksgiving weekend. We’ll be back the following Sunday.
This year, I’m thankful for you reading my completely earnest “Stuber” review
