Going for Broke: Charlie Callas and Kristen Schaal

the difference between the two clips being…Callas’s performance included a JOKE with a (gasp) HUMOROUS POINT OF VIEW.  A better question would be “Would an alt performer ever give such a physical performance earnestly, without it having to be some kind of ironic anti-performance?”

I don’t know about alternative comics, but you know who does go for broke with the physicality like Callas does here? Dane Cook, and the comedy cognoscenti crucifies him for it.

(Not a Cook fan—just an observation.)

you should still worry. i completely agree with comedyfan.

what kristen and kurt did was not funny. it was merely something that a kid would do to get attention - and while i’m SURE alt comics would say “that’s why it’s so great - it just breaks the rules” - i say baloney; stop getting on stage just to fulfill your need for applause - how about you also genuinely put yourself on the line with an opinion, a story, or a joke.

these alt comics LOVE to think they are risky and dangerous, and all it amounts to is “look-at-me-aren’t-i-wacky” nonsense.

so lame.

comedyfan & jeff

Well… I love comedy that has a point. That has a view. I love it when a comic can get me to laugh at something surprising they’ve noticed that I’ve missed.

But there is such a thing is finding joy and laughter in something completely silly, which is what this Schaal does here. Obviously, both of you think comedy with a viewpoint is a higher form. I, and a few other people I imagine, love something that’s purely ridiculous. There’s something kind of childlike about it… which you perhaps see as childish. The ironic anti-performance part put a bizarrely respectable veneer of what this is.. which is clowning.

I certainly don’t think you have to like it. But I’ve witnessed it first hand more than a few times and each time it makes me giggle maniacally. You don’t have to… but hopefully, you can see why I might.

Peter Lynn
Good point. Dane does go for broke physically. And he is crucified for it. I think because those cognoscenti see it as desperation to cover for something lacking in the written material.

The question then becomes, when does clowning end and desperation begin?

“Would an alt performer ever give such a physical performance earnestly, without it having to be some kind of ironic anti-performance?”
  I definitely think it’d be possible for an alt-comic to give such a physical performance—most audiences ought to love it.  But the rooms where said alt-comics work out their material is a different beast all together… one would be crucified by their alt-comic peers for acting out at all and then, after the crucifixion, they’d get called a hack, to boot.