Mar092006
Eliza Coupe’s “Patriots” / Whitest Kids U Know
Filed Under Aspen Comedy Festival, Sketch Comedy
This double bill was my favorite show so far. Eliza Coupe‘s “Patriots” was first, appearing as five different characters, each uniquely American in some way. My favorites are a working class Boston woman who’s at Wallmart in search of an engagement ring ( “Fricking gays can get married, this one right here can get her own frickin’ ring.") and an Irish girl who wants to be adopted by an American couple for all the wrong reasons. Each character is rendered completely whole, completely recognizable and perfect in tone.
Then the Whitest Kids U Know come on and tore the place up. Combining some of their popular video segments with live sketches, the show grabbed the audience immediately and did not let go. There’s so many highlights here: an overwrought inspiring line leader who leads his charges to recess and into “worse horrors cannot be conjured by R.L. Stine”, a grossout sketch where one of the WKUK joins the audience screaming at another to not drink from a bucket of “boners” and a scene that intentionally doesn’t play funny until it’s revealed to be written as a vendetta against one of the player’s girlfriend. And that’s a small sampling of what we saw.
The WKUK have no dogma about making a sketch last a certain length. One sketch which involves a pirate captain trying to get the attention of his fellow “yarrr!"-ing pirates plays at a perfect and surprising length. Another sketch holds for an almost uncomfortable length on two character crying over the discover that one is afflcted with a brain tumor, culminating in a wonderful payoff that’s enhanced by the tension.
To see some of the video segments from this show, including “Pregnancy Test” and “We Gon’ Make Love”, check out the clip archive on the WKUK site. As one audience member said between sketches, “Wow!” Somebody, give ‘em a deal now.
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