Boris out Dore in at Yuk’s

A great last minute replacement has made Yuk’s Ottawa the show to go for this weekend. If you haven’t gotten a chance to see  Jon Dore recently or ever I can’t encourage you enough to do so now.

Well I could kidnap a beloved family pet and start sending you body parts in the mail but that might be a bit much if not messy.

Dore is the best I’ve seen of  “alternative” comedy in awhile if not ever, that is his stuff isn’t a bunch of wanking . He’s smart, weird and clever but above all original and funny with the bone-dry understated delivery required to make such tricky material work.

Words I don’t think I ever used to describe Jon’s act when he was here on Wednesday nights. Of all the guys to leave Ottawa he may have benefited the most creatively from the trip outta this jerkberg.

While his show is hit and miss I blame the misses on the Comedy Network, after all this is the same putrid hole that’s vomited out “Comedy, Inc” and continue to reanimate the long dead corpse of “The Air Farce” so its small wonder that even the most solid of talents gets tainted in the process. I thank the gods that “Kids in the Hall” was on before that abomination of a network, could you imagine what they would have done to them if they had gotten their lame hooks into it?

<in eddie murphy white guy voice>”The Chicken Lady, can we have her go out on a date with Saddam Hussein? And this ‘Head Crusher’ sketch, Bill over in accounting doesn’t get it, could we give him giant foam hands? The wife saw that at the ball game and thought they were a hoot!”< / in eddie murphy white guy voice>

The horror would be too much to imagine, I should stop now.

So go and see the one of the bleeding edges of modern Canadian stand-up  because one day the Comedy Network’s suits might notice he’s doing good stuff and strap him down to go all “Clockwork Orange” and program out the original comedy out leaving an empty husk that recycles gags from “You Can’t Do That On Television”

RIP

Comic actor Harvey Korman dies at 81

Launching Pad puts Absolute on the rag

Short story, Yuk Yuk’s Ottawa is hosting a “Launching Pad” show at the Prescott on Preston right across the street from Breslin’s ambitious competition’s flagship location.

Longer version here.

Initially I was stoked about this because more stages = more time = uh… well more time. But Jason Laurans has declared that anyone who plays that venue can’t play Absolute or any of their local road gigs for six months. From what I hearsayed  he deflects charges of “restraint of trade” by pointing out it’s just for that particular venue not for the Yuk’s chain as a whole. I’m no law talking guy but I’m not sure if the legislation concerned take scale and scope into consideration. It sure sounds like Jason is doing exactly what Yuk’s does (and part of the reason why he went indy) but of course on a much smaller scale.

And that will include me because I’m booked on the Pad in July. Since I’ve only played one Tailgators and I’ve never done a show at AC other than the am side of the pro-am Wednesdays it isn’t a really big deal to me, it is a shame however because I did want to do more for and at AC.

Should be interesting to see how it all shakes out.

Chris Rock coming to Ottawa

Love ya Chris but not enough for $72.00 - $88.00 x 2.

Perhaps I can use my contacts in the Ottawa comedy community to score free tickets!

Yeah, I crack me up too.

Thank you Jebus, Buddah and Bill Hicks

One of the biggest Internet frustrations is the Comedy Central video clips and Canada. For reasons that I’m sure would make my eyes roll up and out of my head in annoyance you can’t watch them in in the Great White North. As such whenever there’s a “Daily Show” or other clip I want to watch I have to do some stupid Haxor type stuff to see them.

However in this case I’m grateful that I can’t watch this:

What if Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull took place in a Los Angeles liquor store?

Wha-ho-ho! Why I bet there would be hysterical stereotypes galore!

So what hack horked out that premise so lame if it were a horse it’d be glue by now?

That’s the premise of Indiana Holmes, a short from Comedy Central’s unabashedly politically incorrect Mind of Mencia (embedded right).

And by “unabashedly politically incorrect” they mean thieving hack who is about as edgy as a soft boiled egg.

Show architect Carlos Mencia possesses one of the truest voices around, effortlessly skewering every sacred cow that walks the continent. He’s fearless, and pretty damn funny.

Well yeah, lifting others material is pretty effortless, not so sure about “true” or “pretty damn funny” however. He is fearless, I’ll give him that, if George Lopez ever grabbed my by the throat and knocked me out I’d probably give up comedy to make sure our paths never crossed again.

Look at me! I’m doing Jay Leno’s headline shtick!

Gaylord says Ogle’s death ruled accidental

I have no idea what the story is about but Gaylord and Ogle would be a kick ass buddy-buddy cop show.

So two sets this past week chock full of newish stuff.

I did about five minutes of brand totally new (except for one bit resurrected from the dead file cuz I missed it) at the Royal Oak. For that set I had that weird thing where they laugh at the bit you didn’t think was funny and stayed stone silent for the bit that you know was funny.

Times where you just want to stop and explain it to the crowd so they understand just how wrong they are.

What’s great is I wrote a whole new angle for one bit right on stage that got (for that room) a huge laugh. The fear of course is that I’ll never be able to recapture it for later shows.

But all in all it was a good set and I leant a fair amount from it.

Yuk’s was pretty weak however. Some of the new stuff hit and the “A material” ranged from meh to acceptable. Watching the tape (thanks Russ!) I can see I was really unfocused, I’m still searching for that right mix of rehearsed spontaneity.

Speaking of bad sets, this guy has some funny shit being performed for a crowd of idiots, morons and jerks, just brutal:

Things people don’t find funny

Hitler.

Bombs in hospitals.

Shooting Barack Obama.

Agog and aghast

Why would anyone human with a soul do something like this?

Peters Pimps for TO

Comedian Russell Peters, Toronto’s new global ambassador for tourism, says he tells friends they should come here instead of visiting other parts of the country.

“People keep going up to Vancouver and I’m like, `Why? Are you a heroin needle? Why do you need to go there? Why don’t you come to Toronto, the good city in Canada?’”

Hmm I’m pretty sure there’s heroin in Toronto along with enough guns to make Navarone envious.

This is funny:

Asked what he tells would-be tourists they need to see in Toronto, Peters replied, “Besides the CN Tower and the SkyDome (Rogers Centre)? The Eaton Centre. In wintertime you can go ice skating at Nathan Phillips Square. We have Chinatown, Greektown, Little India, Little Italy.”

Peters said he also enjoys the yearly street festival on Yonge St.

Told that city council had cancelled the event last year, Peters didn’t miss a beat. “Oh, good, I didn’t want that anyway.”