Legendary comic Rudy Ray Moore (aka "Dolemite") has sent out a myspace bulletin urging all comedians to cease use of the N-word.

I would like to send a message to everyone regarding the N word
I can remember when I myself, Rudy Ray Moore used to use that word. In the days it was quite popular, we used it towards each other all the time.

As time passed though, I felt it to be more and more of an embarrasment. I stopped using it, I was one of the fore runners, and my act never suffered one bit.

I convinced the late great Richard Pryor to abandon it's use and came behind him and applauded him publicly when he did. Paul Mooney has recently announced that he will no longer use it either.

I commend him for it and wish to call on everyone else to follow

With Love,
Rudy Ray Moore aka Dolemite

In a related item, Paul Mooney is interviewed by the San Jose Merc-News on the Richards meltdown and on his crusade to eradicate the use of the N-word.

Oh yeah. I had a romance with the word. I worked with Richard Pryor using the word. It was so destructive-- it was created by whites to hurt and destroy-- and we were trying to defuse it, trying to desensitize people to it. We did it every chance we got, we would drive people crazy. We were very funny at it. But Richard backed off the word in the early 1980s...

If Pryor's proclamation had no effect on the frequency of usage, what hope do Moore and Mooney have of reducing it?

It will be interesting to see what happens. We're especially keen on finding out what Russel Simmons thinks about this. And, with two more episodes of "The Wire" in the can (but not yet shown on HBO), it would be fascinating to hear what David Simon (Executive Producer) thinks about this controversy.

The Yellow Wiggle (Greg Page to us adults) has quit, according to Reuters. He had a double hernia operation a year ago. No doubt his physician has told him to take care when lifting heavy objects and to stop wiggling.

For years now, we've been telling toddlers that The Male Half of the Staff is "the Fifth Wiggle." Those tots heavily into their "Wiggles Phase" then regard The Male Half with a mixture of awe and dread-- It's as if one of the Wiggles has popped out of the set and now stands before them. They often short circuit. When the Male Half effects an Australian accent (and sings "I use my fins... to swim and flop around..."), they shriek and sometimes weep.

According to the LA Times, Jay Leno is suing Judy Brown, editor of such joke compilations as "Joke Stew" and "Joke Soup."

Leno and NBC Studios filed a federal court lawsuit Wednesday to stop comedy teacher Judy Brown from publishing his punch lines in her books, which are largely compilations of jokes uttered by Leno and other comedians, including Ellen DeGeneres, Joan Rivers, Jerry Seinfeld, Lucille Ball and Tim Allen.

Also included among the many comedians in at least two of the compilations are The Male and Female Halves of the Staff. Way back in 2000, we signed a release, submitted a handful of jokes and felt that the inclusion of a joke or two in a joke book (and any ensuing "exposure") was a way of cementing our place in the annals of standup history and a good way to promote the magazine. (We even ran one example per day, from the first book, on the front page of the magazine. We did so with Brown's permission, assuming that, if we signed a release, so had all the other comedians featured in the book, and that was where our responsibility ended.)

That we were included in a subequent tome or two gave us pause, but we figured that maybe we hadn't read the release carefully enough, so that was our fault. Besides, we haven't the wherewithal to sue anyone.

From reading the account of the lawsuit in the LAT, it looks like Brown made a fatal error by taking the gags off the television (from, we assume, the nightly Tonight Show monologues), without the permission of Leno, NBC or Big Dog.

Leno plans to donate any proceeds from the lawsuit to charity.

Joke compilation books are a time-honored tradition. In the past, though, the jokes are rarely attributed. At the very least, Brown attributed all the jokes in her collections and provided a bio of each "contributor" in the back of each volume. This may or may not vindicate her, but we have on hand here at SHECKYmagazine HQ a half-dozen similar such books that don't identify the author and that has always galled us.

If, as Leno's suit alleges, Brown has collected and published gags without permission, she and her publisher are probably going to pay dearly.

ADDENDUM: The Male Half had a joke appropriated, without permission, approximately 20 years ago for use in a collection of jokes published by Random House. We suspect that the joke was scraped off of an early TV appearance or from an interview with a newspaper in Lancaster, PA. (We suspect this, because he never used the gag in the act and only used in one TV appearance and in one interview with a newspaper in Lancaster, PA.) No permission was sought. When a letter was written, asking at the very least for one copy of the book in question as compensation for the use of the joke, the letter was ignored totally! Ignored! Totally! No response!

Seattle comic Brad Upton guested on the op-ed page of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, giving the persective of a veteran comic:

If a person were to start yelling at a singer, or speaker, or pianist or stage actor, they would quickly be hustled out of the room by security and the rest of the audience would look at that person with absolute disgust and feel bad for the performer. Why is it that a comedian is expected to learn to deal with it? There is no harder job in show business than stand-up comedian. None.

It appeared Monday and there are 106 comments so far.

And Brian Miller (definitely not a comedian), writing for the Seattle Weekly alt-rag brings his hackneyed cliches and jaundiced view of comedians to work in a piece entitled "Laugh Riot."

Like piano-keyboard ties, acid-wash jeans worn high with white Reeboks, and a pre-Seinfeld Seinfeld with a full head of hair, stand-up comedy seems a relic of the Reagan years.

And that's just the first sentence! Read the rest for a thoroughly disheartening view of a once-great comedy market.

Go here to order "Shecky Greene Live In Las Vegas," the CD ("His mugging, dialects, impressions, ad libs, and song parodies are unsurpassed.") is available only via SheckyGreene.com and it's only $20 (plus $3 S & H). A convenient PayPal transaction is all that's needed to bring this legendary comedian's mirth to your mailbox!

While you're there, check out the "The Shecky Story," and read the Shecky Greene Bio.

(Note: If you go there to order the CD, be persistent! Click on "The CD," then, on the next page, click on "Order!" That'll do it!)

Damonde Tschritter took the top prize in the Seattle International StandUp Comedy Competition. He hails from Vancouver and the vowels in his last name are outnumbered 4 to 1 by the consonants!

Now that Kinky Friedman has lost the election for Texas governor, the MSM doesn't feel the need to dig up 30-year-old quotes to discredit him and he is no longer referred to as "comedian Kinky Friedman."

From an AP story ("Kinky's Campaign Furniture Up for Grabs"):

People started showing up Tuesday more than three hours before staff opened the cigar-smoking, black hat-wearing musician and mystery writer's former campaign office.

It's all smiles and backslapping now that Kinky isn't headed to the governor's mansion!

At a press conference yesterday (summarized in this AP article), attended by Jesse Jackson, Paul Mooney and Maxine Waters, Laugh Factory owner Jamie Masada said "the comedy club will ban comedians from using all "hateful words" including the "n-word."

Masada also said "We want to be the first place in the world to ask all of the comedians if they go on stage and use the 'n-word,' (it) comes out of their paycheck."

In this matter, there has been a suspicious lack of any talk of a slippery slope, a deafening silence from the usual defenders of free speech. This is not about the "n-word." It's about free expression in general. When Masada broadens his proscription to include "hateful words," he goes down a road that no one should go down. It is easy to imagine that the language and the work of comedians at the Factory might come under the scope of what amounts to a speech code. His blanket banning of a word (or ill-defined set of words) doesn't consider context, and it opens up every comedian who might work there to intense scrutiny. It quite possibly might have the effect of shutting them down. And then there is the matter of making them vulnerable to lawsuits or monetary extortion. (Masada himself has gone so far as to lead the charge when it comes to punishing comics who work his room and violate his speech code. What assurances does any comic who works there have that Masada would not throw him or her under the bus should a patron take offense to say, the use of the word "cunt?" Or maybe an attack on Christianity? Or a percieved slight of gay people?) By broadening the ban, Masada has declared open season on the "A-word," the "B-word"... you get the idea.

If Jesse Jackson can stand next to Masada and declare that the "n-word" is "unprotected" (his exact word!), then who is next in line? Will Katherine MacKinnon exert sufficient pressure on Masada so that the "c-word" is banned (along with any comic who might dare to construct a joke using it)? Will Ralph Reed be sending registered letters to Masada in order to pressure him to ban comics who might offend the sensibilities of evangelicals? Let's take it to a far-fetched but perfectly logical extreme-- Will comics who tread the boards at the Factory be instructed not to say how much they hate cats lest PETA come down too hard on Masada? (If you think that's implausible note that PETA is trying to banish the term "pet" from the lexicon and replace it with "animal companion." In effect paving the way for legislation against any/all "animal ownership.") It seems like only yesterday that there were police detectives in Philadelphia and San Francisco taking notes during Lenny Bruce's shows. We can easily see a return to such an oppressive atmosphere

There's nothing wrong with having a club where all comics are expected to work "clean." It's been done, with varying degrees of success, over the years. But his latest public utterances leave the door wide open to abuse. His latest warnings are so vague, so imprecise, that they should give any comic pause before they mount the stage at 8001 Sunset Blvd. In mishandling this situation, Masada has taken an isolated incident and extrapolated it over the entire comedy community. In doing so, he has done all comics a disservice. He has proven that he does not have our best interests in mind. Why would any comic want to work under those conditions?

Why, in this case, does everyone have traction on this particular slope? Where are all the comedians defending their right to say anything they want to say? Where are all the comics-- who make their living with words-- expressing alarm at an encroachment on their freedoms?

To paraphrase Masada, we want to be the first place in the world to ask all of the comedians to shun the Laugh Factory.

This is an ideal opporunity for all other comedy clubs to step up and declare their venues "free speech zones."

A regular reader sent us a link to a CNN.com item about Jamie Masada's plan to rid the world of standup... or at least rid the Laugh Factory of standup. Here is, quite literally, the money quote:

Masada suggested Richards donate at least $500,000 (euro381,270) to charity for every time he unleashed the derogatory term. Masada also said the comedy club will ban comedians from using all "hateful words" including the "n-word."

"We want to be the first place in the world to ask all of the comedians if they go on stage and use the 'n-word,' (it) comes out of their paycheck," Masada said.

This should be condemned in no uncertain terms by every working comic in America. Can we say that any more plainly?

We don't know about you, but when we see the work "ban" come out of a club owner's mouth, we get nervous.

Gloria Allred is repping the two audience members who were "wounded" by Michael Richards' tirade at the Factory. The Chicago Sun-Times Richard Roeper has a summary of the whole mess:

As for the two men who say they were the targets of Richards' rants, how refreshing that they've stepped forward to say they forgive Richards and they have no wish to exploit this incident for publicity or money, and they hope everyone will soon move on to more important issues.

Yeah, right.

Frank McBride and Kyle Doss reportedly have retained the services of Gloria Allred, the attorney/publicity hound who never met a satellite TV appearance she didn't like. (Who's going to show up next to exploit this, Jackie Chiles?)

Allred says Richards should meet with her clients face to face and there should be some kind of hearing about monetary compensation.

"It's not enough to say 'I'm sorry,' " said Allred.

"Our clients were vulnerable. He went after them. He singled them out and he taunted them, and he did it in a closed room where they were captive."

Really? I thought he did it in the Laugh Factory, where they walked out after they were insulted.

Question: Are we hearing Frank McBride and/or Kyle Doss on the infamous cell phone video? Because somebody says to Richards, "That was uncalled for, you f------ cracker-ass m----------- ... F------ white boy. We'll see what's up."

Not that I'm excusing Richards' rant in any way, but that's not the ideal response to a racial taunt, is it?

Allred wants the parties to sit in front of a "retired judge" and determine whether or not her clients should receive money from Richards. An AP account says that Allred "pitched the idea as a way for the comic to avoid a lawsuit."

Retired judge? A way to avoid a lawsuit? If Allred actually had a case, why would she take it to an arbitrator (her "retired judge")? We're no attorneys, but if there were damages of some sort, actual damages, or if there were laws broken, her clients would have recourse in a criminal or civil court. No one in the media has called her on this retired judge nonsense and no one has displayed even the slightest bit of alarm at what effect this kind of genteel extortion might have on free speech. And why is Allred lying to the Matt Lauers of the world by saying that her clients were "held captive?" And why aren't the Matt Lauers of the world laughing in her face when she utters such nonsense?

Of all the reactions out there, this one is the most dangerous when it comes to artistic freedom. For the seventeenth time, we're not defending what Richards said. But since what he said was not a violation of any laws, his speech is protected, no matter how disgusting you may think it is. As comedians, we all have a stake in the way this plays out.

Allred's proposal reminds us of "Eagles Court" the description of which is taken from Wikipedia's entry on Philadelphia's Veterans Stadium:

The Eagles fans' behavior during a Monday Night Football loss to the San Francisco 49ers in 1997 and a Dallas Cowboys game a year later was such that the City of Philadelphia was forced to assign a Municipal Court Judge, Seamus McCaffrey, to The Vet on game days to deal with miscreants removed from the stands. Rowdy fans were held in the teams executive offices prior to appearing in McCaffreys "courtroom", a converted storage room in the stadium basement.

Of course, both the offending comic and the aggreived (or "wounded" in Allred's words) audience member would be brought before the judge in Allred's Heckler Court. (Note to club owners: The judge would probably bang the gavel and award the entire table's drinks to be comped. Now does Allred's crusade seem threatening?) If she's still a member of the Friars, they should bounce her on principle.

In an article in Converge Digest, Roman Polz, senior marketing manager of the Mobility division for Agere Systems, makes ten predictions about the cell phone industry in 2007. (Polz is responsible for 2.5G and 3G terminal specification consolidation and technology road mapping-- whatever that means-- so you know he knows what he's talking about.)

Prediction Number Two caught our eye. Tiny mobile phone screens, says Polz, will make long-term, non-stop viewing unappealing and "not a wonderful user experience." But...

...music will be a non-stop, slam dunk appealing feature of a cell phone that won't require staring into a small screen. It will only require the cell phone user to listen and relax.

The most likely mobile TV applications will be people checking sports scores and updates; cartoons, videos, standup comedy and general news. All these will need to fit in about a 3-to-20-minute time frame, according to industry experts. Most people won't watch TV on a cell phone for much longer than that, except for some special, out-of-the-mainstream reasons.

Bold face brought to you by SHECKYmagazine.com, of course.

We've been skeptical of just how much folks are going to dig "never before seen footage from the upcoming release of "Bad Boys VI," but we've always figured folks would be fine with catching a laugh or two on the train home from work. If the comedy clips are part of the promotion of an upcoming special or a standup show, it just might entice mobile phoners to tune in.

Just when you thought the story couldn't get weirder, Richards is accused of making anti-Semitic remarks in the past. And the press is trying speculating on whether or not Richards is in fact a Jew.

A Jewish Journal article delves into the "Is Michael Richards Jewish?" question. "Someone needs to tell Rodriquez that Michael isn't a Jew," says a mysterious, unidentified "television director who has known Richards for years."

At left is the premier issue of P.O.V. from spring 1995, found while culling the detritus here at SHECKYmag HQ. The mag features a two-page chat with Richards in which mention of his military stint is missing, but two mentions of his Bhuddist leanings are prominent.

If you're keeping score at home, the only people that have dared to defend Richards are Tom Green and old boss Jerry Seinfeld. The enigma that is Michael Richards unfolds.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

For the past few years, on the evening before Thanksgiving, it has become an informal tradition that a gaggle of Philly comedians and other standup-centric people who are friends of Paul F. Tompkins converge on a The New Wave Cafe to celebrate, give thanks, catch up and/or celebrate the regular, annual, temporary eastward migration of Mr. Tompkins.

Following is a photographic documentation of the 2006 gathering.


Comedians Dom Irrera, Joe Conklin


SHECKYmagazine editor Brian McKim, comedian John Kensil


Comedian Big Daddy Graham, New Wave proprietor Sam Lynagh


Comedian Dennis Horan, comedian, actor, raconteur, bon vivant, connoisseur and boulevardier Paul F. Tompkins


Comedian David P. Hardy, SHECKYmagazine editor Traci Skene


Comedian Frank Barnett, the elegant nose of comedian, actor, raconteur, bon vivant, connoisseur and boulevardier Paul F. Tompkins

In plowing through the mounds of paper here at SHECKYmagazine HQ, we came across the above itinerary. It's a little hard to read here, but it's from January 1986 and its the Eastern Airlines itin for The Male Half's first Punchline tour.

He flew from Newark to Charlotte, Charlotte to Columbia, Columbia to Atlanta, Atlanta to Greenville, Greenville to Charlotte, Charlotte to Newark. The pricetag for all that flying? $147! And the club picked up the tab, of course. (Of course, they had a killer discount because they dealt in volume, but it's still impressive!)

All this flying around enabled him to feature three straight weeks at three different Punchlines. With the Southwest Effect taking hold in more and more airports, we may yet live to see another era When Middles Can Fly!

A Canadian Press article seeks insight into the Infamous Factory Meltdown by quizzing Yuks mogul Mark Breslin and some comics from up north. One describes Richards' performance as "a very amateur, childish response." Others offer advice on how to deal with hecklers.

Other Canadian comics said Tuesday they were astonished by Richards' outburst, saying they have their own tactics and techniques for dealing with hecklers - none of them involving the shocking route that Richards took.

This film was shot by comic Travis Simmons.

Enjoy.

Thanks.

From FOS Bill Dykes:

Let me state for the record that watching Comic Relief (both live and on tape) was akin to having a Shrimp Po Boy served with frozen shrimp on WonderBread. Where was the local representation? Not even a nod to the local scene and the work we have done in the last year-- United Way fundaraiser w/Marc Maron, successful shows w/(Doug) Stanhope, Todd Barry and others, three working comedians calling this home.

Just a bit disappointing.

It felt kind of... empty.

Reuters felt we were newsworthy, though!

Dykes refers to an item on the wires yesterday ("Dark humor brightens life in battered New Orleans") that details the revival of that city and its comedy scene.

Navigating government bureaucracies, battling over insurance claims, and watching politicians roll out recovery plans that are never put into practice have all whetted what was always a large appetite for the ridiculous and the absurd.

Bigger-than-ever audiences attend comedy shows, residents are devouring humorous blogs and satirical newspapers and growing numbers of amateurs are trying stand-up routines, comics say.

Here on the east coast, Seinfeld is just now being introduced on The Late Show. Word of this appearance and Seinfeld's statement were on the wires ealier today (after the taping) and there's an account on AP already, from which this comes:

Comedian George Lopez told Los Angeles television station KTLA that he thought Richards' lack of stand-up experience may have been a factor.

"The question is you have an actor who is trying to be a comedian who doesn't know what to do when an audience is disruptive," Lopez said. "He's an actor whose show has been off the air, he shouldn't ever be on a stand-up gig."

When we heard the Seinfeld statement earlier today, we suspected that he was distancing himself from Richards merely to protect the profits from the syndication of his popular television show-- an understandable strategy. We were unaware that the statement was made in conjunction with the appearance on Letterman... to plug the release of the DVD of Season 7 of Seinfeld. Talk about your bad timing. Perhaps the plugging of the DVD could have waited for a while.

Seinfeld seemed genuinely upset at one point, even a little choked up as he talked about his friend Richards.

Then comes the satellite confessional. At one point, Jerry tells the audience to "stop laughing." Richards even remarks about the studio audience's nervous laughter and says he isn't sure the situation is funny. He rambles a bit and even veers into Katrina (?) while formulating his bizarre apology. And then he transposes his rage over all of society in a sort of a meandering speech. We're fairly certain that if Richards had read a prepared statement, his words would have seemed hollow. However, we're stunned that he didn't have some sort of an outline for his remarks.

Richards jabbering accomplished little to either get him off hook or dispel the notion that all comics are hate-filled goofballs. His ambiguous message was "I'm not a racist, but maybe I am. And maybe you are, too." Great!

We're inclined to agree with Lopez.

From a Washington Post story ("Spoofer of Iraq's Chaos Becomes Another Victim"):

For the last three years, Walid Hassan had an impossible task. He had to make war-weary Iraqis laugh. Week after week, the comedian and broadcaster found inspiration in the turmoil and bloodletting. On his weekend television show, "Caricature," he poked fun at the poor security, the long gas lines, the electricity blackouts and the ineffective politicians.[...]

On Monday, Hassan, 47, a father of five children, became a victim of the war and chaos from which he drew his inspiration. A Shiite Muslim, he was found in the majority-Sunni neighborhood of Yarmouk in west Baghdad with multiple bullet wounds to his back and head, according to police. He was last seen by witnesses in a black car with a driver and two other passengers.

If you must, read this piece of garbage from pompous douchebag Nikki Finke about the Michael Richards incident.

Here's the money quote:

In my opinion, the real news behind Seinfeld's Michael Richards spewing "n"-word racial epithets after being heckled during his Friday night stand-up routine at the Laugh Factory (see video here) is this: many of today's comedy clubs have become a cesspool of hatred. Inside them, racism, ethnic prejudice, religious bigotry, homophobia and sexism all masquerade as humor. Anyone who's been to the clubs and heard the acts knows this to be true.

Have we not been warning all of you that this was coming? Folks have been rolling their cyber-eyeballs at us when we get the slightest bit panicky. Well, roll those eyes no more.

It's coming again and they (The MSM) only need the slightest excuse. They did it in the late 80s/early 90s-- all comics were "screamers," and mysogynistic cretins. Once the business tanked, we were no longer a threat, no longer worthy of their attention. We're a target now.


Thanks to Paul Ogata for sending us a link!

"WARNING: WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO SEE IS PROFANE AND RACIAL" warns TMZ.com next to the video clip of Michael Richards going mental during a recent set at the Factory in Los Angeles. (The video clip rolls after an advertisement for a video game based on "Flushed Away." How appropriate!)

From the TMZ.com transcript of Richards' tirade:

Richards continued, "You can talk, you can talk, you're brave now motherf**ker. Throw his ass out. He's a nigger! He's a nigger! He's a nigger! A nigger, look, there's a nigger!"

The crowd is visibly and audibly confused and upset. Richards responds by saying, "They're going to arrest me for calling a black man a nigger."

One of the objects of the tirade summed things up nicely, saying, "That's un-f***ing called for, you cracker-ass motherf**ker!"

Perhaps Richards is just a reeeeeally big Lenny Bruce fan. (The Sarcasm Light is flashing!)

The TMZ folks filed the posting under "Train Wreck."

One of our new favorite phrases-- "Audibly confused!"

Our every move is being recorded. Big Brother is watching? No... Little Brother is in the back of the house and he's got a cellphone that can capture video! Fascinating times these are. When a comic loses his cool, or bombs, or gets booed, it'll show up on the WWW. It matters not if the incident occurs in Manhattan or Missoula, in Los Angeles or Lake Charles, it can pop up on the WWW in a matter of hours. The implications are enormous.

UPDATE: Former co-star Jerry Seinfeld has weighed in on the incident:

Seinfeld issued a statement saying he was "sick" over the "extremely offensive" statements.

"I’m sure Michael is also sick over this horrible, horrible mistake," he said.

"It is so extremely offensive. I feel terrible for all the people who have been hurt."

The number of articles on Google news is past 400 and no doubt growing hourly.

November 26 is the date for the final. The Underground is the place. These are the finalists. One will come out with $5,000.

Tyler Boeh-- Portland OR
Dylan Mandlsohn-- Toronto, ONT
Paul Myrehaug-- Toronto, ONT
Rory Scovel-- Washington DC
Damonde Tschritter-- Vancouver BC

Steve Byrne won. Congratulations to Mr. Byrne.

(Before you read this, take a moment to read our interview with Richard Lewis from our October of 1999 issue.)

That's the title of a bulletin making the rounds on MySpace. It is being sent out by Nick Thune. (We reproduce it here, complete with the faux-E. E. Cummings punctuation.)

i am working the west palm beach improv with richard lewis for the weekend.

there is an opener, a guy that does 10 minutes.

then there is me, a guy who does 25 minutes.

then there is richard lewis, the guy everyone came to see, a guy who does 45 minutes.

when i have performed for 20 minutes, the manager is supposed to light me from the back. using a lit up cell phone or a flash light. a signal to let me know there are 5 minutes left.

on thursday night, my first of seven shows for the weekend with richard lewis, they did not give me a light. i ended up doing 40 minutes.

richard lewis, does not like to hang out at the club. he has the manager pick him up at his hotel 5 minutes before he goes on stage. the manager drives him to the club. calls someone inside the club to light me, then walks richard lewis in right when im getting off.

since they didnt light me, richard lewis was standing in the kitchen getting furious.

a couple of the waiters told me what he said, while standing in the kitchen: "Get that F*CKING GIGOLO OFF THE STAGE!" when i was finished, i introduced him, he didnt want the opener to come back up and do it... he wanted me to do it. i waited for him to come up on stage, so i could shake his hand (usually what happens). when he came on stage, he wouldn't even look at me, let alone shake my hand. so after 6-7 seconds of awkwardly standing there, i walked off.

needless to say, he isnt crazy about me.

he eventally said he was sorry. and told me he liked my jokes. that was nice, cause his fans don't seem to be crazy about the jokes. they may or may not be handing out a senior citizens discount for these shows.

We're unclear as to the purpose of the bulletin. Was it to confess to bad behavior and seek some sort of forgiveness? There doesn't seem to be any contrition. Or is it merely to slam Richard Lewis? (There seems to be mild contempt for Lewis and his fans.)

We're puzzled as to why Thune would admit to being so irresponsible. (Not wearing a watch, not getting off on time, etc.) And it's doubly puzzling that the management of the club disrespected Lewis in this manner-- After the fuming in the kitchen, why wasn't Thune lighted? Repeatedly? The failure to physically drag the feature off the stage after the 30-minute mark indicates either that Thune is fudging the truth or the management of the club was delighting in making Lewis fume.

The Male Half had the pleasure of opening for Richard Lewis and can attest to Lewis' precise demands. They're well-known throughout the business-- He spends as little time in the club as possible, he limos up, shoot in one door, does his thing, then shoots out another door. After 35 years in the business, he's entitled to have such relatively mild requirements met. And the club certainly knew what Lewis would demand when they agreed to hire him. So how did this happen?


And another mystery: Since Thune admits that Lewis' fans "don't seem to be crazy about (his) jokes," how did Thune go 15 minutes over his time while not exactly killing? As any comic will tell you, the perception of time is that it sloooows down when the hilarity level is low. This whole episode sounds rather odd. Thune is fortunate that the title of his bulletin wasn't "Richard Lewis demand that I be sent home."

To which Mr. Thune replies:

i like richard lewis. and so do his crowds. in my bulletin, i was referencing the crowds not being crazy about ME (to be more clear). i did decent at most shows and really well in one. other than that, i found it hard to connect with the older crowd richard lewis draws.

something i thought was clear in my bulletin:

i did not run a light. i was never lit. to my knowlege. one waiter says he held up a candle in the back of the room at one point (manager was out with richard, he called the waitor on his cell phone. could have been the waitors first time lighting someone. he didnt wait for my response). i did not see the candle among all the other candles. usually they use a cell phone or a flash light.

richard lewis was mad that i was going over. he thought i was intentionally running the light. but he is also a sane-human-being who isnt going to have me dragged off stage. when i finally did see the light, i wrapped up in less than 1 minute.

you asked why i didn't get off stage if i knew i was over my time?

one reason. i wasnt fully sure. i mostly rely on the club to let me know that. i have never worn a watch.

main reason. my job is to stay on stage until they light me. if i haven't been lit, and im going way over my time. in my mind, something has gone wrong. was there a mix up picking up richard? is he not feeling well and wants me to do more time? these are common things that happen. i thought this was one of those situations.

in the end, i wanted to shake richards hand. he wasnt happy. he ignored me on stage and i walked off. the waiter told me about him yelling, "get that F**KING GIGOLO off stage." and i laughed. i laughed becuase it was hilarious. his use of that word. it was funny. i could picture him saying it in on 'curb'. i can picture him yelling it in a kitchen... the wait staff and the bus boys... the cooks. they must have been dying. but they had to hold it together... thats funny.

i felt everyone else would picture him saying it, and think it was funny too. i should read my bulletins better before posting.

keep up the good work,
nick thune

ps. tonight was the last show. richard rushed on stage. quicker than the other nights. and shook my hand. he told me some nice things, and as i was walking off he had the crowd clap for me again and said he loved working with me.

pps. the purpose of the bulletin? (you asked for that.) i'm alone in a city, something odd happned between me and someone famous, i wanted to share the story with anyone who reads my bulletins or blogs or whatever i type.

Happy to set the record straight.

...we tried, honestly, we did.

Watching Comic Relief on HBO, then switching over to the slightly delayed simlucast on TBS to see which words were bleeped was amusing. But that wears off rather quickly.

Does anyone know who won the Sierra Mist Standup or Sit Down contest? They were supposed to announce it on the broadcast. Perhaps they announced on the west coast. Perhaps they announced it when we had the sound turned down. Perhaps Robin Williams announced it (which means we missed it, because we had the sound turned down every time Robin Williams came on the screen). It wasn't on the website, either. We know-- we're supposed to be the ones telling you what happened. In this case, however, we implore you, the reader, to tell us what happened. Leave it in a comment if you can. And thanks in advance!

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert were interviewed in Rolling Stone. The two come off as new Age Marx Brothers (playing the pompous and befuddled Margaret Dumont role is Maureen Dowd). Along the way, they make some good points and, from the excerpts we've read, give good interview (as do most of your comedians).

Dowd: Your shows are like mirrors within mirrors, using a cycle of fakery to get to the truth. You've tapped into a sense in society that nothing, from reality shows to Bushworld, is real anymore. Do you guys ever get confused by your hall of mirrors?

STEWART: I didn't know we were going to have to be high to do this interview.

COLBERT: I think we see it less as a hall of mirrors and more as one of those slenderizing mirrors you can buy that you see in catalogs that make you feel good about yourself before you go out the door.

Of Stewart, Daily Show and Colbert Report producer Ben Karlin said that "He's self-trained in stand-up. He learned in the wretched comedy clubs of New York." At one point, they've become comedians in response to traumatic incidents to which Stewart replies that he is sick of being a comedian regarded as "an affliction when its really an ability."

Comic Relief is on HBO this evening, featuring the one-named comics (Billy, Robin and Whoopie). The HBO website arrogantly says, "Everybody in comedy will be there; will you?" Well, we're somebody in comedy and we're not there.

In culling our worldly possessions (in anticipation of our move to a new dwelling in the next 100 days), we came across (and threw out) our Comic Relief 1987 T-shirt. It had shrunk to the size of a hand puppet. (Or one or both of us was the size of a hand puppet 21 years ago and it hasn't shrunk at all!) We got it, if we recall correctly, for phoning in a donation during that year's cablecast. Back then, the money went to hope the homeless. Back then, comics actually had extra scratch to kick in for helping the homeless-- blissfully unaware that many of them would be teetering on the brink of homelessness a scant seven years later! Oh, the irony! (We exaggerate, of course, but exaggeration is but one of the many weapons in our comedy arsenal!)

One of the main reasons we aren't physically in Vegas to observe firsthand the goings on is that The Female Half of the Staff has been sick as a dog for the past two months or so. And just about three weeks ago, she was diagnosed as having an ulcer and was also found to be suffering from acid reflux (which we like referring to with the much more whimsical-sounding "GERD!"), so after fulfilling her contractual comedy obligations this fall, she welcomed the few weeks of relative inactivity that our recent schedule has afforded her. (For perspective on TFMHOTS' current tummy trouble, take a moment to read her March/April 2002 column entitled "From The Gut," which pretty much certifies that this recent digestive problem has been with her longer than anyone realized!)

And this GERD phenomenon might be a little more widespread than anyone realizes. As evidence, we present the following citation from website Mother Tongue Annoyances:

Spend an hour at Blogger.com reading a few personal weblogs and it won't be long before you read several comments that consist of the following statement, either entirely or in part:

OMG! I think I threw up a little in my mouth reading that!

This ultra-mega-super-duper-pooper-scooper-gag-inducing Internet cliché (c'mon, Tim, tell us how you really feel) is almost always enough for me to dismiss whatever the rest of what the commenter had to say and skip to the next comment, post, or weblog/Web site.

Coincidence? Who's to say. We find it very suspicious to say the least.

SHECKYmagazine.com-- Only we can go from Billy, Robin and Whoopi to homelessness to GastroEsophageal Reflux Disease to pop culture etymology in the space of one posting.

The Reuters article, like a handful of others over the past few months, is only a couple hundred words or so. These articles only scratch the surface. Read between the lines and it's-- please pardon the overused word-- a revolution.

Now it's HBO who is announcing an internet intitiative, partnering with AOL to bring more comedy to more eyeballs.

The cable television network said the new site, called "This Just In," will feature original programming and not full-length shows from the cable network.

Its first Internet foray outside of marketing-centric HBO.com comes amid ongoing discussions with cable operators and affiliates over how to reach new viewers on the Internet, an HBO spokesman said.

Emphasis ours. We (us, you comedians who are readers, you comedy fans who are readers, you industry types who are readers) have a ringside seat for one of the most fascinating transitions the entertainment world has ever experienced.

Consider that when Bob Hope started out as an entertainer, KDKA hadn't yet applied for a license. He went from street performance to vaudeville, Broadway, radio, film, television, cable, satellite and there was video and/or audio of Hope available on audio cassette, on VHS tape, on DVD and on the WWW before his death, at age 100, in 2003. The man chased the eyeballs (and ears) wherever they happened to reside. He probably figured there were no more innovations with regard to the delivery of the image, the likeness, the comedy of Bob Hope.

Along comes broadband.

And now HBO and several other entities are formulating their strategies for how to reach new viewers on the Internet, and comedy is an integral part of many of these intitiatives.

Let's allow for a moment that TV killed live comedy (we're on record as saying that this is hogwash, as many or you readers know), but let's say it did. Does that mean that this current wave of broadcasters, cable outlets and others seeking to deliver comedy content via the WWW is a nightmarish reenactment of the late 80s/early 90s-- only this time, it's a hundred, a thousand, times worse? And that Broadband will prematurely put an end to the resurgence that comedy is currently enjoying? If, at the heart of the TV Killed Comedy argument was a combination of "familiarity breeds contempt" and "why pay for it when I can get it for free," isn't this recent trend sure to kill comedy deader than it ever was?

No.

This is a new world. The old rules do not apply. Consumers are no longer slaves to the clock. Appointment TV (and the resentment it breeds) is a thing of the past. There is no such thing as a "crowded schedule" when it comes to television. There is no schedule. The consumer is the programmer. The websites (and there will be dozens, hundreds, of them) are miniature studios. We, the artists, will be producers. Often, we will deal directly with the studio/website. There will be little or no friction between the producer/artist and the consumer. It's a hundred times more disruptive than the situation confronted by performers like Hope when radio came along, when film distribution matured, when television exploded, when cable, satellite and video changed the rules even further.

The WWW is an awesome entity. We're lucky to be alive. To use the old lingo, stay tuned.

P.S.: File this under We Don't Get No Respect-- The photograph that accompanies the Reuters story about HBO launching a comedy channel with AOL? James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano.

What the heck was that?

Caliendo, on Late Show (as part of Impressionist Week), in the middle of his set mentions Norm MacDonald. He says, and we're paraphrasing:

And then there's Norm MacDonald. (In MacDonald's voice) Hey! Why write a punchline when you just say "Crack whore?!"

(At least it was supposed to be in MacDonald's voice. It sounded more like a Canadian John Madden.) Then, just like that, he's onto something else.We expected more... but there wasn't any-- Just boom! Trash Norm! Then, out!

Perhaps they're best friends and this was a wise-guy shout out to his buddy.

It was still weird.

What took them so long? We suppose that this piece was written from a hotel room in Vegas, which is where the industry is assembled for this weekend's HBO Comedy Festival. Janelle Brown, writing in Variety, says:

Standup is in the midst of a stunning comeback.

We've been telling folks for five years that standup is back to pre-bust levels (and approaching boom levels for at least three years). Of course, we can't expect Variety to be aware of anything outside of NYC or LA (or Montreal).

To what does Variety (and their sources) attribute this resurgence?

Why the sudden surge in live comedy at a time when the network sitcom is on life support and the economics of feature-film laughs have become tricky? Industry insiders say the Internet is the main reason. Every comic in America seems to have a MySpace page these days; and YouTube's $1.65 billion payday was built on the backs of the sketch comics who posted their videos there.

Ya gotta love those industry insiders. They'll tell the Variety reporter anything!

To be sure, the internet is helping, but it isn't anywhere near the main reason. We have our own theories as to why comedy is back. And, as long as standup continues its slow, steady growth, the golden-egg-laying goose will continue to thrive.

Alfred Lubrano, writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer, talks to some of the most weakminded, humorless people on the planet in an article entitled "Is 'Borat' funny or a hate film?" (We are disturbed by the weenie tendency to frame the "debate" as a question. The other Borat story, from ABC News, was titled "Borat a Bad Influence?" took the same tack, as if naming the piece with a question gets the authors and editors off the hook or automatically implies some sort of objectivity.)

"It's a funny movie...But it's perhaps dangerous as well."

"He [Cohen] creates an atmosphere where it's more acceptable to make anti-Semitic comments, especially if someone takes what he's saying out of context."

"I'm not Jewish, but it's possible some may see the film and think Jews are like that."

"...Cohen is obviously ridiculing the anti-Semitism...not everyone... might get the joke."

"We're concerned people will use material in the film to create more anti-Semitism."

"Given a choice, we wouldn't have asked anybody to produce a film like this. We say beware of potential damage."

"I think [Cohen] is doing damage to Jews. His aggression reveals self-hatred. He's getting a cheap laugh. This is the humor of a very callous young Jew with no great depth."

So, the rules are clear:

1. No joking about anything, lest the morons among us "take the joke out of context"

2. No joking about anything, lest the morons among us "not get the joke"

3. If you make a joke about the ethnic group you happen to be a member of, a humorless academic will smear you by labelling you as "self-hating" (Apparently, she didn't get the memo that Freud is sooo last century.)

4. Joking about something serious is "dangerous"

That last one should give any comedian pause.

We are particularly struck by how horrified people are that Borat blames the Jews for 9/11. For five years now, we've heard and read a non-stop stream of drivel-- on startlingly mainstream chatrooms, in books by tenured American academics and from the mouths of comfortable, suburban college students from Austin to Boston that the Jews were in fact responsible for 9/11!

Now, mysteriously, that claim, coming from an outlandish character in an ill-fitting suit with a bushy moustache-- in a movie that is clearly a comedy-- is dangerous. Suddenly, it gives folks license to kill Jews in the street. Inexplicably it is cause for a lot of warnings and admonitions and dire predictions.

The weasels at ABC News, who so slavishly followed the media pack when building up the anticipation prior to the release of the Borat, have led the charge now that the Borat Backlash has begun. Privately we predicted this would happen. The movie is, after all, a comedy. And it's a comedy that takes on political correctness. It was only a matter of time before comedian Sascha Baron Cohen would be portrayed as evil.

In an item titled "Borat a Bad Influence?" a 17-year-old Bronx high schooler says that:

...he's heard teens repeat some of the more misogynistic lines from the movie.

"They talk about women being b------ and prostitutes."

One particularly hysterical nitwit said the movie was "a disgrace and an insult," and that the movie "was reversing some of the progress her community had made teaching its teens to be respectful and ethical." We would bet money that these same weepy goofballs (and the editors at ABC News) are positively placid however when it comes to the following:

Fat, gorilla, monkey mouth bitches cant get in our mothafuckin' dressin room or backstage
And if they do, we kindly put our foot up their asses
And re-direct them bitches to security dressin' room, you dig?
Sick of these ugly ass bitches bein' my dressin' room

That would be Ludacris, featuring Snoop, from one of Luda's trademark, bouncy rap romps called "Hoes In My Room."

We're not suggesting for a minute that ABC News go all C. Dolores Tucker on Luda, but we are suggesting that, for some odd reason, they seem to get more bent out of shape when the insults are delivered via comedy. When the bitches and hoes are talked about with virtually zero sense of humor and without a hint of irony, like in the above example, it's truth-telliing, it's refreshing; the rappers are the modern equivalent of troubadors, broadcasters, purveyors of socially relevant messages, etc. When Sascha Baron Cohen's message is misinterpreted and subsequently repeated by immature goofballs trying to get a laugh (and maybe noticed by the girls at happy hour), the movie and the comic who masterminded it are a "bad influence."

Note to parents: Borat is "Rated R for pervasive strong crude and sexual content including graphic nudity, and language." Children under 17 are not admitted. And if your 17-year-old lacks even the maturity of a 15-year-old, perhaps he/she shouldn't be permitted to see something that requires a sense of irony.

As for the adults condemning the movie, perhaps they need to work on their sense of irony as well.

"Throw The Jew Down The Well" is the "Short People" for the new millennium. We wonder what Randy Newman thinks of all this commotion.

The Sierra Mist Standup or Sit Down Finale will present Steve Byrne, Sarah Colonna, Eddie Ifft, Jen Kober and Jordan Rubin on TBS this Friday night at 10 PM EST as the five finalists. The winner will be awarded $50,000 on Comic Relief, which airs November 18 (Saturday) at 9 PM EST.

But wait, there's more: After the conclusion of the show, viewers will be able to hop onto MySpace.com and vote for one of the five finalists. According to MySpace.com: "One user that votes during the final round will automatically be entered for a chance to win $1,000."

We like how MySpace refers to us regular folks as "users." Those of us who watched enough episodes of Mod Squad can't help but associate the term with heroin addiction!

And what is with the wording? "One user that votes" will automatically qualify? What exactly does that mean? We interpret this as meaning that one user will qualify and compete against... against whom, exactly? Himself? (Or, to be gender neutral, him or herself?) If there's only one user, it's hardly a competition. We suspect that someone from Kazakhstan is writing the copy at MySpace. We figure this: One user, among the thousands that vote, will be chosen as the winner of $1,000. At least we hope that's what they mean.

A short piece on that network's Sunday Morning Show talked about how comedy is big business.

They talked to Denis Leary, Kathy Griffin, Stu Smiley and Doug Herzog. Herzog takes the Straight Face prize (as in "Did he actually say that with a Straight Face?"):

The success of Comedy Central all comes from point of view. Jon Stewart has a very particular distinctive point of view. Stephen Colbert does, Carlos Mencia does, Dave Chappelle does. We think that's what succeeds. We're not looking for the guy who appeals to everybody. (Emphasis ours)

Say wha?! It's television. He who is not looking for someone who appeals to everybody (or closely approximates same) will find himself out of a job.

(Note to Doug Herzog: Substitute "guy" for gender neutral terms like "person" or "performer" or "comedian." Never thought we'd hafta give the president of Comedy Central sensitivity training.)

An Ananova item tells of some scientists who "blended the features of 20 top comics to come up with the perfect face for comedy." See the results below.



"The characteristics of a feminine face imply that the person may be agreeable and co-operative, which can be causal in our first impressions of comedians as being friendly and funny," say the eggheads. And that "a round face, small forehead and wide nose, with soft feminine features, is most likely to make us laugh."

The Male Half has a large forehead, a long, narrow face, a thin nose and sharp masculine features. All along he's been convinced it was the glasses that made some audiences hostile.

You may recall that Letterman had Ventriloquist Week a few weeks back. This time, it's mimicks who get spots each night. The first one? Rich Little.

Coming up in subsequent shows: Fred Travalena, Gordie Brown, Frank Caliendo and Kevin Pollak.

Upcoming theme weeks: Comic Magicigan Week? Guitar Act Week?

The Male Half is waiting for Tall, Fair-Haired, Freckled, Late 40s But Can Play Late 30s, Observational Comic Week.

The Female Half is waiting for Dick Joke Week.

The folks in Ithaca College's Comedy Club are upset. With good reason.

The club is a regular meeting of a bunch of campus cut-ups (not a "club" in the sense of a bricks-and-mortar building) who get together to work on the funny. Apparently, during a recent meeting, one of them made a "joke about lynching" (no details available) during an improv exercise.

In last week's issue of the Ithacan (the campus newspaper), is a story about how the African-Latino Society was alarmed about "six bias-related incidents," in recent months on campus, incidents like the "destruction of a Jewish student’s mezuzah prayer scroll" and "swastikas drawn in Emerson Hall." Lumped in with the rest of the incidents was a "racist joke about lynching" made by a member of the IC Comedy Club.

The club members are pretty steamed.

When it comes to jokes in our meetings, everything is fair game. Our meetings are hallowed ground for any kind of joke, and once someone declares a topic off-limits, then a bias is created...

Equating us with the other events in the article is ludicrous. Racism is a deep-seated mentality that manifests itself in worse ways than an off-the-cuff remark.

They have a point. Of course, since comedians (especially beginners) aren't accorded the usual status of other artists whose purpose is to shock, to stretch the boundaries of human experience, to experiment, etc., anything we say can and will be used against us. Other spoken word artists can say all manner of vile things about any person or group-- it's exciting, it's art, it lays bare the listeners' prejudices and biases, it's an agent for social change because it makes the recipient of the message look inward.

When a comedian says something that's slightly off-kilter, the reaction among the academics and the media is to immediately suspect that something is wrong with the soul of the bearer of the message. "It is indicative of a deep-seated opinion or long-held belief," is the usual diagnosis.

We were going through some old floppy disks (the 3.5-inch kind that nobody uses any more) and we came across this quote from a book called "Hate Crimes-- The rising tide of Bigotry and Bloodshed" (Plenum Press 1993, Jack Levin & Jack McDevitt):

In sharp contrast, modern "attack" comics like Andrew Dice Clay, Sam Kinison, Eddie Murphy, Bobcat Godlthwait and Jay Charboneau make no pretense of having some higher purpose."

That's right. In 1993, in a book about bigotry and bloodshed, the connection was made between horrific violence against a person based on race, creed or color and "attack comics." None of the comics named had, to the trained eye of the academic, busy-body authors, a "pretense of having some higher purpose." So the ground rules are clear: The Comic had better justify his every utterance with a "pretense of having some higher purpose" lest the intellectuals mount a campaign against him.

It is worth noting that this was published near the very bottom of the Comedy Bust. We have always maintained that a significant contributing factor to the crash of comedy was the pall cast over the land by political correctness. In an atmosphere where a couple of Boston eggheads can make even the faintest connection between Kinison, Clay, Goldthwait, et al, and bigorty and bloodshed, it is hardly a wonder that comedians of all stripes felt embattled, stifled, undervalued.

Unique among artists, the comedian is ajudged to harbor the very prejudices he seeks to destroy. Wes Craven is not thought to secretly want to dance around the corpse of a freshly killed innocent. Brett Easton Ellis writes "American Psycho" and it is said that he "imagintavely explores the incomprehensible depths of madness and captures the insanity of violence in our time." No one would put forth the notion that Ellis secretly wants to saw off his ex-girlfriend's head.

We see echoes of such anti-comedian bias frequently. And we see echoes of it in the Ithacan piece. Some might say we identify this bias a bit too frequently. However, if you're at all familiar with the piece upon which the title of this post is somewhat facetiously based, you'll know that we're deadly serious about fending off any curtailment of our artistic freedom this time around.