• Sitting at home not doing much makes you sigh quite a bit. It’s not intentional but I find myself letting out involuntary sighs 10-15 times a day. Every time I do, my wife Anna Paone asks to make sure everything is OK. It always is. That, coupled with seeing the style of Roy Andersson’s sublime “A Pigeon Sat On A Branch Reflecting On Existence” inspired me to write a lil sketch called “Lord of the Sighs” (interestingly, “Lord of the Flies” was trending all week. Coincidence? I think so). The sketch, shot tableau style like Andersson’s film is 1:53, I got up at 6:30 AM one morning since I was so excited to edit this baby and honestly it’s my favorite sketch I’ve made this quarantine (yes, I say that every new sketch but I think each one is better than the last). If you’re so inclined, the link is in the comments and I think a worthy way of spending less than two minutes of your time, my friend.
• I did speech and debate all four years of high school at Central High School in Phoenix, Arizona. It was a really interesting time in my life. I’d been a privileged, upper-middle class Jewish kid my whole life up to that point and then decided to go to an inner-city high school kind of on a whim. They had a.) an international program so I could learn Japanese PLUS travel to Japan with my classmates for cheap and b.) the speech team lured me in. The three coaches Diana Krauss, Brian Gruman, Kevin Berlat and his wife Kimberly Bayan-Berlat came to my middle school Madison Meadows and spoke about the benefits of the program and I was sold. The four years in speech were actually even better than advertised. We went to tournaments at Harvard, speech camps in Northern Arizona where the team bonded and weekend competitions where teenagers dressed in ill fitting suits. I even had the peak performances of my entire life acting out Randy Noojin’s perfect one-act play “You Can’t Trust the Male” with Iris Sheehy and method-impersonating Andy Kaufman outside of competition all day at tournaments in my sophomore year. I was very nostalgic for all of this so I set up a Zoom reunion. Hit me right in the heart. Around 20 of my teammates attended as did all of the coaches. Man, the only good thing to come out of quarantine is reunions that you never would have had if everyone in the world didn’t have free time. I highly recommend getting little reunions of high school clubs you were in together- way better than your standard awkward, grade-wide get-together. Plus, the Zoom concluded with our old warm ups we used to do before every tournament. We all screamed, “BLOOD, BLOOD, BLOOD” from our apartments and homes. I think I scared my neighbors. Worth it.
• Had the honor of performing on Matt Storrs and Hattie Hayes’ “Our Topic Tonight” show on Thursday. They do this weekly show where performers have to do material centered solely around the topic of their choosing. This week was “Elevators.” I wrote a bunch of stuff by searching “Command F Elevators” in my notes app from all thoughts I ever jotted down about elevators and came up with some so-so stuff. The best thing was the closer though; a made up story of how I met my wife Anna on an elevator. She came in and delivered the final line getting the biggest laugh of all for my set about how I was “very handsome” (it was extremely obvious that I wrote this). It was a great time and a fun comedy homework assignment. You really should watch this show- it’s interactive and can be a part of it in the comments which they implement into the makeup of the program. The link to their Facebook page is in the comments.
• Week four of my fledgling start up “A Profile About You” I founded went quite well. Not a bad Q1 for...the company. This week, I wrote profiles about performers as varied as director/writer/comic/mother Arma Benoit, comedy anarchist/genuinely great guy Max Fine, philosopher/comic/free spirit Adam Christopher, Dan Frigolette’s excellent sex positive podcast “Porn Stars Are People,” wise guy/comic/amazing storyteller Joe Naughton, former businessman/current comic Adam Muller and 90s talk show host/Twitter master Jason Planitzer. Even outsourced one profile to my friend John Field to write about Noah Savage’s super timely and fun podcast “The World According to Noah Savage.” Big news for the site coming this week too. If you’re at all interested in a profile, please reach out to me! Don’t feel weird about asking. I will write about anyone and turn the piece into whatever you want. It's PR for you! If you don’t know what all of this I’m talking about is, check out my site. Here’s the link:
medium.com/@aprofileaboutyou
• Two quick social media recs this week:
Wanted to shout out the exceedingly hilarious Twitter account run by Rebecca Kaplan. She Tweets up a storm, posts funny videos, captions photos hilariously and I can’t recommend following her enough. You can follow her at @RebeccaTKaplan
Secondly, if you’re not following Gianmarco Soresi on Twitter and Instagram, change that. He’s putting the rest of us comics to shame with his steady stream of one-liners, stand up clips and short quarantine videos. You can follow him at @gianmarcosoresi
• Maybe watched more movies and TV this week than ever before. Couldn’t be happier with what I saw. I’ll keep it all brief since you all have to go FaceTime your Moms:
“The Last Action Hero” (1993): Came across this movie I’d heard so much about through the years but never got around to seeing. For those not familiar, Arnold Schwarzenegger plays “Jack Slater,” a parody of his stock action characters in a movie within a movie that is clearly a “Die Hard” parody (this movie is also directed by John McTiernan who directed “Die Hard”). A hardcore film buff is inserted into this movie and said film buff is...eight-years-old. He helps solve the film’s main conflict, blah, blah, blah. The story is intentionally lame; it’s sending up the genre. What’s great in this movie is the satire. “The Last Action Hero’s” best joke is that all women in action movies are attractive; in the police office, all the men are schlubs and the women are dressed as dominatrixes. Danny Devito plays an animated detective cat (similar to Roger Rabbit). Chevy Chase and Jim Belushi have short cameos. This flick flopped and ended the satire era of Schwarzenegger’s career (had this done well he was in talks to appear in a Hans and Franz movie that was canned) but THIS IS A GEM. TOTALLY CHECK DIS OUT (Streaming on Showtime; you can get a free month trial).
“Popeye” (1980): Another flop I’d always been fascinated by. Directed by THE Robert Altman, starring THE Robin Williams, I wanted to like this movie so bad. However, it was just a little too hokey in a way that felt cloying more so than charming. There are fun songs, everyone is cast fantastically well down to the extras and you can see how much Altman and Williams loved the idea of this film and these characters probably ever since they were children (I know I did- my grandma had a shelf of toys and the Popeye ones were always my favorites) BUT THIS DOESN’T QUITE WORK (Streaming on Netflix).
“Borat” (2006): Saw this in theaters way back when; it was the second best theater experience of my life after “Superbad.” I love Sacha Baron Cohen and this movie is maybe the best comedy of the 21st century (with apologies to “Stuber”). Anna had never seen the classic. We watched on a Tuesday night and it more than holds up, is ballsier than you remember and ages surprisingly well. IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN THIS, WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING (Streaming on Amazon for $3.99)
“Cracked Up: The Darrell Hammond Story” (2018): As an SNL lifer, I watch every single SNL doc I can. From “Saturday Night” (the James Franco doc about a week in the creation of the show) to the doc chronicling the history of the show, I’m gonna see it. This one popped up on Netflix and I’m quite glad it did. Always loved Hammond on the show; he could make anything punchy. This documentary is not an out and out remembrance of his comedic talents though. It’s a bit more of a portrait of a damaged artist. Darrell had a very difficult childhood and he confronts it here with footage of him at Carolines even. A great, harrowing watch that IF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE ABOUT AMERICA’S PREEMINENT IMPRESSIONIST, THIS IS THE SOURCE (Streaming on Netflix).
“I’m Dying Up Here” (2017-2018): Caught the pilot of this show when Showtime put it out for free on YouTube in 2017 and thought it was fine. Then, once quarantine hit, I made it my mission to watch all twenty episodes of this season in a month before my Showtime subscription ran out. I succeeded. As for the show itself, I have mixed feelings. Everyone speaks like a pithy philosopher, the stand up in the show is borderline awful at points, storylines are wildly dramatic, many of the characters are more unlikeable than any show I’ve ever seen but...I loved it. It was unapologetically inside baseball and doesn’t hold the hand of people that don’t really care about comedy- this is for people that really are into it. Melissa Leo as the club owner/Mitzi Shore type at Goldie’s is electrically vindictive, Andrew Santino (also from “Dave” and a fellow ASU alum) shows flashes of brilliance as the stand-in type for George Carlin (that’s what the internet speculated), RJ Cyler is amazing as the up and coming Eddie Murphy surrogate and Erik Griffin and Al Madrigal are the best part of the series. The cast is rounded out with familiar character actor faces like Clark Duke, Michael Angarano, Ari Graynor, Jake Lacy, Brad Garrett(!), Andy Kindler, Rick Overton, David Paymer, Dana Gould, Dylan Baker (as Johnny Carson), Moses Storm, Dom Irrerra, Richard Kind, Joey Diaz, Paul Provenza, Ian Karmel, Robert Forster (RIP), Sebastian Stan, Alfred Molina, Jon Daly (as awful as his character is, he got the biggest laughs out of me), the guy who played Jesse’s AA leader in “Breaking Bad” as the Sammy Shore of the show (say that ten times fast), a guy playing Richard Pryor I didn’t recognize and so many others. Most importantly, one of my ASU comedy heroes from the incredible improv troupe Marvin’s Room Joel Dauten was in the show. So cool to see a guy I used to watch perform under a Taco Bell during lunch hours in college on a show you need a subscription to see. Kudos, man.
“Middleditch and Schwartz” (2020): This three-part special starring JUST Thomas Middleditch and Ben Schwartz and no one else is kind of a revolution. There wasn’t a true special that really captured the feel of being at an improv show. These three specials do that big time (Jesse David Fox wrote a Vulture article about this that articulates this much more effectively which is linked in the comments) and the fact that it’s a twoprov (just two performers) makes it doubly impressive. The first hour special is about a groomsman who doesn’t know his status as best man, the second about copyright law and the finale about applying for a job at SNL as a photographer. IF YOU ENJOY IMPROV EVEN ONLY A LITTLE, WATCH THIS FOR SURE (Streaming on Netflix).
“23 Hours to Kill” (2020): Seinfeld’s new special dropped out of nowhere this week. To be fair, I had seen him do this exact hour from the very last row at the Beacon Theater with my pal Jesse Swatling-Holcomb back in July 2016 but it still mostly bangs. There’s an errant punchline here and there but Jerry is considered the best for a reason. His comedy is precise and he just says jokes better than almost anyone. Incorporating a little physical humor and a few act-outs, I think this was a big step up from his last special at the Comic Strip (which I was at the taping for too!) and better than the backlash it’s receiving online. I LIKED IT, OK (Streaming on Netflix).
SNL Season Finale: Well, it was certainly bittersweet to say goodbye to this season of SNL so soon. We were cheated out of three or so episodes I believe. Plus, isn’t everyone just sitting at home? Why not just keep cranking them out? In any event, what a way to go out though! Cameos abounded (Martin Short and Kristen Wiig to name just two), the quality of the performances, writing and cinematography skyrocketed and the final sketch that was an ode to dreaming about life pre-pandemic was just as hilarious as it was touching and done wordlessly (linked in the comments). Reminded me of old Tom Schiller sketches in the best way possible. Plus, Boyz II Men Tweeted at me when I said, “My Mom would have preferred Carly Simon as the Mother’s Day musical guest.” They agreed. I LOVED ALL OF THIS EVEN THE WEIRD MISFIRES IN THE EPISODE (Streaming on Hulu).
“Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck In Time” Trailer: Five years ago, I donated to a Kickstarter for the first and last time. Bob Weide, the man who made a four-hour Woody Allen doc was working on his lifelong obsession to make a documentary of my hero Kurt Vonnegut. Chipped in $15. Over the years, I’ve received email updates, gave up hope that it would ever be completed and finally, now a trailer has arrived. It is better than expected; the only downside is Weide inserts his making of the doc into Kurt’s narrative a bit too much which is my least favorite documentary making technique. Link below.
“Good One” David Wain podcast episode: Listened to this pod hosted by Jesse David Fox while playing Tetris this week. In said pod, Wain (one of my other favorite comic minds of all time behind “Stella”) discussed the creation of “The State,” one particular sketch “Taco Man” (the conceit of the “Good One” podcast is to dissect one joke/sketch/scene in a comedian’s ouvere to use as a jumping off point for a larger discussion) and some of his movies. It wasn’t the best listen of all time and I did kinda zone out a bit at times. Wain is still great though and if you’re a fan, might as well. Anyhow, if you’re not familiar with this podcast and you’re a comedy fan, it is worth looking into. Especially if you’re tired of WTF and You Made It Weird (I know I burn out on them occasionally).
No major plans this week. Starting a new job at a company called BrainPop doing customer service on Wednesday. Pretty stoked for that.
Finally, Happy Mother’s Day. My Mom isn’t on Facebook but if she was, she’d say, “You should spend your time more wisely than writing these things.”
Love you, Mom (if you’re reading this).
01.) Lord of the Sighs starring Anna Paone and myself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0OCehIU9Fw&list=PLoBsCsHJsKMrx6cuZ4Se8CQ_QBfOUcJ5U
02.) Matt Storrs and Hattie Hayes show: https://www.facebook.com/OurTopicTonight
03.) Jesse David Fox’s article: https://www.vulture.com/2020/04/middleditch-schwartz-netflix-comedy-specials.html
04.) SNL “Dreams” sketch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fEQeo4cUd8
05.) “Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck In Time” Trailer: https://vimeo.com/414827061
06.) “Good One” with David Wain discussing “The State’s” “Taco Man”:https://www.vulture.com/2020/04/david-wain-taco-man-silliness-good-one-podcast.html
