Contributor Mo Diggs continues his look at the churn of alternative comedy as a reaction against the mainstream.
Beatschtick: ‘50s-’60s
Time magazine ran an article in 1959 on the new wave of comedy. Entitled “The Sickniks,” the article profiled a comedy scene rife with jokes on sex, drugs and the civil rights movement. Mort Sahl would read the newspaper onstage without wearing a suit and tie, obliterating the comedy dress code once and for all. Jonathan Winters was obsessed with psychosis. But Lenny Bruce would be the most influential, saying whatever came to his mind.
Bob Hope would riff on current events and pop culture but Bruce changed the game by:
writing jokes about everyday life; whereas previously comedians told fictional comedic anecdotes, Bruce would use everyday life as his inspiration
making it ok for comedians to use profanity
writing his own jokes; comedians before Bruce often used joke writers
being determined to shake the audience out of its complacency
From the late ‘50s to early ‘60s, Bruce was the hippest comedian around. In one of his bits, he mimicked Vegas comedians. This parody of the nightclub comedy world (which would feature comedians like Buddy Hackett and Milton Berle) would later be done by Albert Brooks, Steve Martin, Andy Kaufman and countless comedians afterwards.
Bruce was so monumental, his legacy overshadowed another great comedian: Lord Buckley.
A Native American, Buckley’s retelling of classic tales in jazz argot (like “The Raven” or the story of Jesus Christ [called “The Nazz"]) were popular with the hipsters of the day. Buckley would often begin his sets by saying “Me lords, me ladies” in a British accent and he would give friends aristocratic titles. Buckley enjoyed marijuana and LSD much like The Beatles, who were reportedly huge fans of Lord Buckley--so much so that, in the ‘70s, George Harrison would write a song about Buckley’s estate, Crackerbox Palace.
Though the ‘60s were a tumultuous time, the beatnik comedians like Bruce and Buckley were more vocal and popular than the hippie comedians. George Carlin was famous for his Hippy Dippy Weatherman character, which he would perform in clubs. But hippies were not fans of this character.
It wasn’t until the ‘70s that Carlin and Richard Pryor would bring the energy of the ‘60s counterculture into the world of comedy.
A second stand-up found in the nigh-upcoming Grand Theft Auto IV is Katt Williams. Here’s a video of his appearance, which gives a bit more of an idea of what the club looks like. (The clicking sound you hear is the filmer’s video camera.)
Williams routine is interesting in that it refers to Liberty City by name multiple times and has a relatively long segment on how difficult it is to buy a car with bad credit. A sort of meta-funny bit for a game that’s all about stealing cars. Can you even buy a car in GTA?
Williams also references a second comedy club that he calls “Club Bullshit” and describes as very small. I’ll put this down for creating an atmosphere of a big city, but who knows? Maybe Liberty City can support two comedy clubs.
A couple of things can be deduced from the exterior:
Ricky Gervais and Katt Williams are likely the only two comics in the game, since they’re the only ones with posters beside the entrance.
2) The club entrance looks to be based on the Laugh Factory TImes Square, which has since closed and is now the TImes Square Arts Center.
I’m a little surprised considering Rockstar’s satirical tone that I haven’t noticed any details that making fun of stand-up comedy yet. Split Sides isn’t even a childish pun. It’s probably there, but it hasn’t come out yet. Perhaps in the form of a radio ads or maybe there’s a poster for a fake stand-up who’s a stand in for a famous real world name.
Oh, and from the comments on the YouTube video we also learn that you can’t shoot the comics. So save that shit for the hookers.
Occasional contributor Mo Diggs did the legwork to outline alternative comedy through history. He’s got a bit more of a broader definition for it, as you’ll see in his introduction below.
Introduction: What’s The Deal?
Alternative comedy as a genre was officially recognized in the ‘90s. But the idea of stand-up comedians defying the mainstream is as old as stand-up itself. In each chapter of this gloss, you will learn about the comedians who railed against convention and the establishments that they were trying to undermine.
Just The Garnish: ‘20s-’40s
At one point in the history of comedy, Bob Hope and Jack Benny were considered avant garde.
In the vaudeville days, jokes and one liners were meant to be the garnish for a vaudeville act. An emcee would tell jokes and introduce a juggler. The comic acts often involved ethnic clowning--either minstrelsy or dialect comedy. Bob Hope was a blackface performer.
But a writer named Al Boasberg--who wrote for Bob Hope and Jack Benny-- wanted to forge a new style of comedy; one that eschewed funny suits and accents.
Boasberg’s ideas were new in comedy: a modern style that required no goof suits, make-up, songs, tap dance, seltzer bottles, Will Rogers rope tricks, cream pies, or accents — just talk. He turned Jack Benny, Bob, and a few others onto his stripped down, sleek humor. He called it “smart dress” comedy. Today we call it “stand-up.” (Suck.com)
From its inception, stand-up comedy railed against all that was hackneyed and conventional. When audiences first saw Jack Benny, they saw him wearing regular street clothes and felt alienated since they were accustomed to their performers wearing grease paint and costumes.
And Benny didn’t exactly set vaudeville on its ear, especially when competing with the Marx Brothers or Sophie Tucker in 2000 seat theaters that had no PA system. Critics kidded him for looking more like a doctor than a comic. Other acts thought him too dull to make it. Despite that, he gradually became a respected headliner through the 1920s, until 1932, when he took a job as an emcee introducing bands on a radio show. (suck.com)
Though he did not affect an ostentatious guise, Benny was not the miserly, self-absorbed schlemiel he appeared to be onstage either. Indeed, that was his greatest legacy: using the same name onstage and offstage (though Benny used a stage name he often was referred to as Jack Benny on and off stage) but playing a completely different person onstage. Albert Brooks, Larry David and Sarah Silverman would all play themselves in a similarly grotesque fashion, portraying themselves as despicable people.
Hope’s legacy was everything else:
His influence on American comedy is so profound we don’t even notice it. His stand-up defines stand-up. Look at it this way: Bob went on in street clothes talking about pop culture, lightweight politics, his (fictional) life, and the front page. (suck.com)
No more hackneyed accent comedy. No more paint on the face. Now comedians would use everyday life as their materials.
Much as the web has helped alternative comedy today, the radio was the medium of choice for the revolutionaries of yesteryear. Juggling didn’t work on the radio. Words were all a comedian had. Benny, along with a new writer, Harry Conn, helped create “group comedy” or what is currently called the sitcom. Catch phrases, recurring characters, insults: The Jack Benny Program had it all.
By the end of the ‘30s, America had its first stand-ups and its first sitcoms, even if they weren’t on television yet. The alternative comedy of the early ‘30s quickly became the mainstream by the end of the decade.
Indeed, for decades, comedians like Hope and Benny were the only game in town. But in the ‘50s kids were railing against their pappy’s comedic sensibilities again.
Here’s a look at virtual Ricky Gervais performing stand-up at Split Sides, the comedy club inside Rockstar Games latest satirical video game Grand Theft Auto IV. The audio takes a while to come in, but after a moment you can hear Gervais’s routine, which is about being fat not being a disease. (Watch while you can, GTA IV video, at least today, has a way of disappearing fast.)
That virtual crowd’s laughter is a little creepy, huh?
The bit is kind perfect for the game - the developers love to make fun of American gluttony. This isn’t the previous unreleased material mentioned before, but, according to Pilkipedia, a bit from Gervais’s special “Fame.” (Patrice O’Neal has a similar bit, but I suppose might have been a bit more difficult to render in polygons.) This is only an excerpt, so I kind of wonder how long Gervais’s set is (and if has an opener and a middle).
If any of you folks are getting the game at midnight tonight, Split Sides is located in the Algonquin borough (the stand-in for Manhattan). If you heckle, try to do it with words, not machine gun fire.
Update: According to this Wired report, Katt Williams is also in the game.
At the previously mentioned Friars Club event, I talked to Drink at Work’s Carol Hartsell a little bit about the following clip. I found it on Mark Evanier’s website. It features Charlie Callas in a bit from Johnny Carson era of the Tonight Show. Mark says he was there on the night of the taping and had never seen a human being laugh as hard as Carson did at the following bit.
Callas pretty much goes nuts on stage there, exaggerating the physicality of the bit to the nth degree. No wonder it hit Carson so hard. Callas fucking committed. One of the things I voiced to Carol was how I worried that some alternative comics today, in order to not appear desperate for a laugh, wouldn’t go for broke like this.
And then I saw Kristen Schaal and Kurt Braunohler‘s appearance at the 2008 Melbourne Comedy Festival gala. They did “Kristin Schaal is a Horse"…
Last week, I dropped by a book “warming” at the Friars’ Club for “Milt & Marty” - a fake memoir for an unsuccessful comedy writing team. The book was penned by Tom Leopold and Bob Sand, two veteran comedy writers themselves (but far more successful, much to the consternation of Milt and Marty, who took the pair under their diseased racist wing).
At the warming, Milt and Marty made an appearance via video, in this interview was conducted by the funny (but playing it straight here) Frank Santopadre. There’s more than a little joy watching some old pros biting the hand of the generation before them, packing jokes in the rapid clip of that time, sometimes dropping a reference you might have to look up on Wikipedia.
The event was held in the club’s Milton Berle room, jokingly described as appropriately the biggest room at the Friar’s Club (the room is actually a little small, doing no justice to the comic’s legendary shvantz). The Friars seem probably to most like the echo of a bygone era, but there’s still something a little amazing about the place - a private club where comedians could be funny uncensored among each other, doing the stuff they couldn’t on stage. That sense of fraternity doesn’t seem necessary today, but it’s still more than a little attractive. Might need to find myself a membership application.
Here’s a look at the story of Ricky Gervais’ first time performing stand-up comedy, from a British show called “Comedy Map.” Gervais, despite being known on TV as a comedian, felt he needed to put some time in front of a live audience. (I sort of love/hate the aside from the club owner about how he set up Gervais first show. Yeah, no pressure.)
Meanwhile, can you believe there’s a TV Show featuring landmarks in the history of British comedians. Is the whole country full of comedy nerds?
Onion local print editions in trouble? Rex Sorgatz shares a rumor that some of the humor paper's city editions are underperforming and may be shut down.
Tom Smothers on his landmark satirical comedy hour: "...the funny thing was that I didn’t know that we were saying…that the show was saying anything important…until they said, 'You can’t say it.' And I said, 'Well, that must be important!'" (Bullz-Eye)
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is Katt Williams. Here’s a video of his appearance, which gives a bit more of an idea of what the club looks like. (The clicking sound you hear is the filmer’s video camera.)
- a fake memoir for an unsuccessful comedy writing team. The book was penned by Tom Leopold and Bob Sand, two veteran comedy writers themselves (but far more successful, much to the consternation of Milt and Marty, who took the pair under their diseased racist wing).
and on DVD, the third season of 
and 
, Don Rickles 
and Martin Mull's 
