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Last night I performed on a show in Hoboken at a bar & grill named Busker’s.  I have performed many times in Hoboken before (Pat Breslin, Jim Dodge and I ran a show for about 2 years at The Goldhawk) and have found the crowds almost always good.  Quick reference for what makes a crowd good:

1) They shut the fu*k up.

2) The get basic news and cultural references.

3) The do not want to fight the comedian.

Basic and simple requirements for a good audience.  Well, back to Busker’s…

So I take the stage and I am the third comic on stage (including the emcee) so by now a normal crowd is warmed up, or at least understands that they are at a comedy show.  I open my set with my bit about big n tall stores, which offends almost no one, is a clean bit and has been consistently (every time for the past year) working.  Well – it got some tepid applause and a few stares like I was either speaking too quickly or speaking the wrong language.

So then I go into my bit about breast cancer awareness month and as it relates to the NFL and more specifically Ben Roethlisburger, quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers.  Some key point I make during this 90 second bit:

1. Ben Roethlisberger is quarterback for the NFL Pittsburgh Steelers
2. Ben Roethlisberger raped women
3. Michael Vick served 2 years for killing dogs, but Roethlisberger, who has “rape chicks” as a bulletpoint on his resume served no time and was suspended a measly 4 games
4. The NFL could have spent the millions of dollars they spent on outfitting players with pink wristbands and cleats on something more productive, like breast cancer research or keeping thei quarterbacks from raping people with breasts.

When the bit was finished, once again to record low laughs – though there was some – a woman, or more specifically a stupid woman, says: “Who is Ben Roethlisberger?”  Here is the exchange that followed:

JLC: I just said he is a pro football quarterback who rapes chicks!  See you can’t listen for five seconds every five minutes because you will lose things along the way like information and jokes.

Dumb Woman: But if he raped women he should be in jail.

JLC: excellent point (crowd laughing) – you are right – see I was making that exact point, but I was using something called sarcasm, which is where I state the opposite of what I mean, but in a way that is so obvious that only the dumbest person could not pick up on the fact that I mean the opposite of what I am saying,

DW: Ohhh – just keep doing sports jokes – tee hee (not her actual laugh, but that is the laugh of a dumb chick who thinks she is smarter than you).

I left her alone at that point because she was too dumb to insult effectively.  Referring to Ben Roethlisberger’s rape allegations as a “sports story” is slightly less embarrassing than someone saying they never heard of OJ Simpson because they never saw The Naked Gun.  But like much of America, when someone doesn’t understand something or know something she decided to mock me and make it like it was my comedy that was defective.   I was tempted to go after her more because it is rare in life that you get a full throttle opportunity to destroy someone who represents part of the essence of what you hate in the world, but just one night earlier a club owner told me I have to make a conscious effort not to be a dick on stage.  So I took a deep breath and moved on to my next bit.  Not one line into the next bit some older, leathery skinned woman who’s claim to fame is probably sleeping with a security guard for Skid Row in 1988 let her opinion be known as to my next premise by saying, “That’s not funny.”  Here is THAT exchange:

JLC: But I have not gotten into the joke yet

Tanned Whore: It’s Not Funny

At this point I start to lose my train of thought so I jump into a verbally clean bit, but one that is highly offensive (even I will admit that), which got some laughs from some of the crowd and the other comedians.  But TW kept yapping.

JLC: God comedy is great, sometimes you tell jokes on stage and other times you want to wrap the mic cord around someone’s neck.

TW: Bring it on!

JLC: (inner thought) Hitting women is 100% wrong, despicable, evil and totally justified in rare cases – the rare case where the woman actually and literally asks for it.

Calm down – I did not assault the woman.  I would never do that – but I am in the process of hiring a female ex con as my bodyguard and instructing her that she can assault women that I feel threaten me.  Because then it is just two women fighting and that is OK, even if one of the women is over two hundred pounds and has facial hair.

JLC: You are ruining the show for your boyfriend.

TW: He’s not my boyfriend.  We’re just friends.

JLC: Lucky man -dodged a bullet.  But I guess we’ll all be able to catch you on your new Bravo series – The Real Cu*ts of New Jersey.

And then I walked off stage.  Probably not a good start to finding the kinder, gentler J-L.  But comedian Andy Kaufman gained fame by wrestling women so maybe there’s still an avenue open to me.

A few years ago I was attending a Halloween party, but I did not have a costume.  I went to all the large stores that emerge in Manhattan like a plague in October every year to look for a costume.  There even was a section of pre-packaged costumes in the “large male” section or whatever they called it.  And everyone of the costumes in the pituitary affliction section said  -“will fit men up to 6’4″ tall.”  If you read this blog, know my jokes or have met me since I turned 19 you know that I am 6’7″.  It was that day that I had literally outgrown Halloween.

Comedy is starting to feel like a Halloween store to me.  Like a 6’4″ shooting guard in the NBA I am starting to feel like I have no position.  Sometimes I like to make political jokes, sometimes I like sharp social commentary, sometimes I like doing impressions and sometimes I like making the occasional crude joke.  But that is what you get when your favorite comedians range from Chris Rock to Jim Norton to Jerry Seinfeld to Patric O’Neal to Gary Gulman to Bill Hicks to Greg Giraldo.  I like different styles and I just like to write funny things.  Perhaps I should just get a job writing for comedians, except my ego is not ready to give up the stage or to submit my writing to potential overwhelming rejection.

Last night I received a very precise and helpful critique from a club owner regarding my set.  Without getting into specifics, it is clear that to make it in comedy I am going to have to choose a persona and style and be consistent within it.  For example after 7 minutes of jokes that are detailed, sharp, clever and clean, it was not consistent closing with a joke about Moms pimping photos of their kids on Facebook and masturbating to the photos just on principle.  The joke got a big laugh, but was slightly out of sorts with the rest of my set.

The thing that makes me sad about this is that comedy is no different than acting.  Live at Gotham had made that brutally evident to me after being passed over several seasons and then watching a show that looked like they were trying to re-cast The Hangover (sans Bradley Cooper), no matter what sacrifices had to be made occasionally in the comedy department.  Humor is still important of course, but I had always hoped that I would not have to necessarily be a niche performer – that I could just say funny things and if a few happened to be dirty or provocative, or if a few were clean and a few others were socially critical I could do it if the crowd laughed.   Basically because I hate niche comedians.  And I don’t want to be them.  For all the frustrations I have with comedy it would be unforgivable to become one of them.

One of the other critiques I got was that I sometimes come off as “a bit of a dick” on stage. 

No sh*t. 

Fu*k Halloween.

One of the sad parts of being an up and coming stand up comedian, besides having to call yourself an up and coming stand up comedian for at least a decade before you can just be a “comedian,”  is that producing time-sensitive original content can be difficult since you do not do it professionally you do not have crew and actors on the ready to produce whatever you come up with.  Well, a month ago I wrote a sketch for PMSports – a new website that claims to specialize in sports-related comedy, but actually specializes in dick jokes, racial slurs and only approaches sports stories that even non sports fans are aware of.  Well, after having 11 sketches rejected by the site in a month and seeing them set comedy back several IQ points I decided to film a couple of my sketch ideas.

This one is about how Brett Favre treats rehearsals for his commercials the same way he treats pre season for football.  Sadly, 6 days after filming it, but two days before completion of editing Saturday Night Live, which tends to be funny by accident these days, produced a spoof of Favre’s Warangler commercial.  Their spoof focused solely on Favre’s texting of penis pictures (did someone sneak a PMSports sketch into the SNL writers’ room?).  Mine has a couple of references to that, but is about more than that.  Hopefully you enjoy it and can forward it around.

Unlike most of my sketches this one is a very manageable 2 minutes in length.

The last week I have spent doing my least favorite thing in comedy: sending e-mails for 2011 work at clubs.   To describe the feeling of this endeavor is to look into the eyes of a stripper at a strip club who keeps getting rejected by patrons.  “Do you want a dance?”  “Ugggggggh, no thanks.”  The only difference is the stripper is able to never go back to that customer and salvage whatever pride her uncle did not already take from her, whereas in comedy bookings you keep e-mailing the same person who has ignored you 20 times in a row because

a) maybe they get a lot of e-mails and you just have to be persistent (2 years and counting on several clubs without a response)

or

b) some of your friends or acquaintances have worked a certain club and you think/know you are funnier than them so at some point you will break through

or finally

c) to quote Richard Gere – “I got nowhere else to go!”

So after 45 e-mails this week I have received two responses.  One was entertaining because it would be opening for black comedian who has it in his contract that there can be no other black comedians on his show (making a half black, somewhat minority-ish looking comedian sort of a Plessy v. Ferguson test case for stand up comedy).  The bottom line is that comedy is looking less and less like a tenable option for employment.  Bookers seem to be 1/3 liars, 1/3 honest, but extremely busy and 1/3 indifferent.  Perhaps I need to book my gigs old school.  Like go to clubs in person.  With Luca Brasi.

Yesterday my favorite comedian, Greg Giraldo, died from a drug overdose.   The first time I saw Giraldo perform was at the Columbus Funny Bone.  I was in law school at the time and was visiting my then-girlfriend in Ohio.  It was only my second time to a comedy club and he delivered the goods.  The guy clearly had a great mind, but also the talent to convey his strong opinions on subjects without alienating audience members (though at this point he was big enough in comedy to bring some of his own audience).  I would start doing comedy shortly thereafter and Giraldo has been the standard I have measured myself against ever since.

 

He was an attorney before pursuing comedy, but it was not just personal parallels that I felt connected to.  It was the sharp way he took down people and institutions without once seeming like one of the lefty zealot Carlin-wannabe hacks that dominate the political discourse in comedy these days.  To borrow from politics, he thought like a liberal, but seemed to deliver from the center.

What bothers me most about the loss of Giraldo is that I wonder if the comedy climate will allow or develop another comic in the same mold as Giraldo.  More than ever I feel like comedy is about niche markets.  The more people I see getting breaks these days, the more I feel like producers are simply trying to re-create The Hangover – if you look half crazy (Alans), nerdy (Stus) or are very telegenic (Phils) you are even money.  And if you are a social critic, “truth” is acceptable as long as it is is delivered by some far left, “daring and brave” comic who preaches consistently to his own choir, but beyond that – good luck.

But Giraldo was the comic who achieved success while not fitting any mold or focus group.  He could mock the Church in one joke and then mock gay marriage in the next and never feel preachy about either.  He was just a comedian who could look on the handsome side of normal (when not disheveled), speak intelligently without being consistently left or right, and could just write the best fu*king jokes.  He was just so good as a comedian that he did not need a niche.  I hate when I read about him being pigeon-holed as an “insult comic.”  He was so much more than that.  But even Giraldo, a comedian who while alive did not need a niche to make it big, is now being shelved into a niche so he can be neatly categorized in death.

But I wonder if the direction of modern culture will restrict or constrain the next Giraldo (or the next great comedian to be inspired by Giraldo’s voice) from reaching his or her potential.  Much like I never think another Michael Jordan can be fostered because nowadays anyone with Jordan’s talent would be exalted as a superhero from the age of 14 (see LeBron James) and would thereby lack the insecurity, drive, and chip-on-shoulder syndrome that drove Jordan.  Similarly, Giraldo came up in a pre-Twitter, pre-Facebook age in comedy, where a comedian’s mind was his chat room, complete with insecurities and fears, which, for anyone who read the Psychology Today article featuring Giraldo, knows helped drive him, even if he never felt as focused as he should have been.

Now, more than ever, comedy, especially for up and comers, is a big circle jerk of artificial support and well wishing and just generally a cyber world of sycophants.  Anyone who has been to an open mic in NYC knows that there is such a cliquish and tribal nature that is utterly nauseating.    Giraldo was so deep in his own head, at least from what I read about him, that he fell into addiction.  But sometimes I feel like great comedy can only be borne from minds that go into places that most people don’t like venture into.  Instead the comedy world I live in is full of young comics with lots of friends, lots of “likes”, and lots of meaningless drivel.

My favorite compliments I have ever received as a comedian were the few times when people have told me that my comedy reminded them of Greg Giraldo.  It meant that I was funny and what I was saying actually had meaning.  One time a club manager asked me who my favorite comedians were and the first answer I had was Giraldo.  He dismissed my choice and replied that Giraldo was not making nearly the money that some other comedians were making.  And I replied that that spoke poorly of clubs and the business, not of Giraldo.

I abhor people’s inability to have feelings anymore without posting a Tweet or status update.  I felt no need to express what I felt about Giraldo yesterday because anyone who is worth anything intellectually or comedically would mourn the loss of Giraldo and his immense talent and originality.  But since I am a comedian and I had not written anything in a while I figured readers or fans of this blog would not know me as a comedian without knowing how I felt about Giraldo.

I remember when I lived on the Upper West Side a few years ago I was working out at Equinox on 92nd st and Broadway and I saw Greg Giraldo on an elliptical machine.  I had never actually met him and I was very excited.   I smiled at him and pointed as if to say “Hey – I’m a big fan.” He removed his headphones and sort of nodded a thanks and that was the only exchange.  I guess if I had known all his internal struggles I would have told him he was worth more than a drug addiction and that he meant a lot to me and to a lot of people.   He may have just written a joke about some weird, preachy douchebag at the gym.   But maybe he just didn’t hear that enough.

Well, it was primary day in NY and six other states plus the District of Columbia yesterday.  Here are some of yesterday’s lessons that are clear about the American people (that I have harped on for so long):

1) Without a cool, young black guy there isn’t nearly as much enthusiasm for politics in America (from some groups).  Barack Obama’s double-edged sword of 2008 is coming to fruition.  He ran as a pop culture icon, which was brilliant personal strategy.  However, many of the “engaged new voters” (yes young people and black people I am talking to you most of all) who were not as much engaged in the political process as they were engaged in Facebook, Twitter and wanting to be part of history.  I waited an hour to vote in November 2008.  I waited 0 seconds yesterday, despite going at the same time of the day.   Ironically it was at the Church I attend and the demographics looked the same – me and some old women.

2) People want to matter, more than they care about issues.  The tea party has two unspoken founded principles.  One is that they are bursting with racist frustration at having a black president.  They KNOW they cannot say “Nig*er” but they can still feel it.  Joe McCarthy did not hate “socialism” as much as these people.  “Obamacare,” “socialist,” and “not born in America” are all surrogates for nig*er.  But the less insidious, but more relevant factor behind the Tea Party is the desire to matter.  The new American way is to force the world to recognize your relevance, even if you are completely irrelevant.  Some examples:

• Reality television – failed actors and stupid people now can become stars, as long as they have an unbridled desire to be famous.  Talent, relevance or meaningful contributions are no longer needed to be famous.  All you need is the desire to be famous above all things.
• Twitter, Facebook – we now all have important things to say
• Political elections – The Tea Party is comprised almost entirely of angry, older white people and they were the ones who felt left behind by Obama’s election – either because of their age, the skin color or their inability to use a computer.

The Tea Party is a great example of this.  They may cost Republicans a chance at the Senate because above political gains, they value being heard and being viewed as relevant above all.  Now they get attention paid to them.  That is the end game, whether they are conscious of it or not.  They are never going to win the White House, they are never going to win a 51 seat majority in the Senate.  But they are going to be noticed.

3) America is about “Me” and about “Them” and Not about “We” or “Us.”

Every marketing campaign in the U.S., from medical books to cable television has some variation of “It’s about you,” or “The Guide to You” or “On Your Time Warner.”  This is what people want.  An increasingly superficial and secular society still has the needs that family and religion provide(d).  Obama created his election in 2008 into a moment for each person to be involved with.  He may have said “You” and “We” as a collective term, but his election presented the rare opportunity for people to feel like they were individually part of history – something that we all seem to want nowadays.  But when that “we” started to be used to ask for patience and cooperation and voting in smaller elections that are just as critical, that “we” started to feel like being an anonymous part of a group, i.e. we’re no longer special and important individually.  That is why voter turnouts are terrible on primary days and on non-awe inspiring election days.

The flip side of this is why the Tea Party candidates won in New York and Delaware.  Carl Paladino, he of the Pimp Obama  e-mail, crushed Rick Lazio in the Republican primary because the Republicans that cared the most were the black-hating, black-fearing folks (sorry a photo of The President and First Lady as a pimp and a prostitute has no humor value unless you believe the simple fact that they are black makes them pimp and prostitute material – remember when being a racist could disqualify a lot of candidates?).  They were the most fearful of being left out of the new America (seriously can someone explain to me what is so drastically new in America?).  Also in Delaware, where you have the trifecta of being old, white and from Delaware – the perfect storm of obscurity, they nominated Christine O’Donnell, politically, fiscally and intellectually the poor man’s Sarah Palin.  But now Tea Party people from Delaware get to be on the front of the New York Times.  Mission Accomplished – you matter.  These candidates have managed to to turn blacks, Democrats, immigrants and Muslims into “them.”  And that is saying something considering Rick Lazio lost, despite making opposition to the Islamic Cultural Center near Ground Zero his signature campaign issue.  Perhaps he simply did not want the mosque located there, whereas Tea Party voters felt more sure that Paladino actually hated Muslims.

I just think America is too full of sh*t anymore.  There is a tremendous amount of racism still in this country’s fabric.  There is also an incredible amount of self-centeredness.  If Obama wants to keep Congress or at least the Senate he needs to get all his people that voted for him in 2008 (at least the ones that were not doing so to appear less racist to their peers, kids and grandkids for voting against a historic candidate) he needs to make it about US (i.e. You and ME).  We are the country that stops buying SUVs and clamors for energy independence when gas is high and then, in an almost seasonal and satirical shift – we immediately start buying SUVs when gas prices lower.  From the angry to the apathetic the majority of this country (comprised of all political stripes) just care about themselves.  Both sides of the country, left and right want to matter more than they actually do.   But we are only moved to political action when it appears that we can win (and winning does not mean winning the election – winning means mattering).  Obama voters felt like they mattered in 2008 (I remember reading posts on Facebook on Election Day from people who I knew to be politically apathetic – “Bye bye Bush – get out there and vote everybody!” – those would have actually mattered a lot more in 2004 dummies) and Tea Party members feel like it is their time to matter.

Whichever side you are on – I think we are all fu*ked.  And to paraphrase Obama, we are the ones we have been waiting to blame.  The Internet, 24 Hour politicized “news” and our decreasing attention spans are going to bury America in an interminable, political trench war.  I think America is becoming a place where the average person (i.e. obviously the people who vote in primaries are more politically involved than the average person – and yes I know people are registering more and more as independents, which fits my theory – everyone wants to be that critical swing vote in a meaningful election) don’t care about issues or candidates or America.  They care about themselves and they care about mattering.  The average voter is no different than Kim Kardashian or The Situation. They’re just uglier.

Yesterday my schedule appeared to be a typical day in the life of a stand up comedian.  I started the day off splitting a pair of games with the Tampa Bay Rays in MLB The Show 10 on PS3 and finished up some comedy sketches I’ve been writing.  Then I headed to Roosevelt Island to perform comedy at a hospital and lastly to Long Island for a club audition.  It would not be typical.

Now the gig paid $30 and like prostitutes, comedians will often perform anywhere where payment  is involved, no matter how emotionally or physically painful.  It was offered to me by Brian McGuiness, who was going to host the show.  The show was to be one hour long and each comic would do 20 minutes (the third 20 minutes was to be provided by Joe Pontillo).   When you arrive on Roosevelt Island on the F train you are greeted by a man who is lying on a cot who has only a torso (unknown is it waist down or cock down, but in any case it is rather impressive).

When I met the other two comics we drove to the hospital, the name which escapes me, but what Joe Pontillo referred to as “Shutter Island.”  Whatever ward or wing of the hospital we were performing in seemed to only include people with severe phyiscal disabilities, coupled with slight mental disabilities and all exceeding 60 years of age.  In other words, my prime demographic.

Now I know I am supposed to feel good about bringing laughter and joy to people who do not always get entertainment, but it just did not feel that good.  Intellectually I know they probably liked to have the monotony of the day broken up by an activity, but the comedy aspect of the show was brutal.   McGuiness got up there first and got some tepid laughter and a couple of boos from patients who could barely speak.  I was unsure if it was light-hearted or if the people booing would prefer the sweet embrace of death to McGuiness’ humor.

Next was Joe Pontillo who actually had a pretty good set.  I hesitate to say “killed,” because there is a 25% chance someone actually died during the show.

Then it was my turn.  Here are some highlights:

That was it – those were my highlights (not a misprint – there’s nothing there).  One of the most awkward sets of my life.  Not the worst, because at least a couple of staff members and one or two patients laughed a couple of times.  But I did not know what silence was before this set.  It was like the hatred of Medgar Evers College for me (the worst show) was replaced with indifference of Shutter Island. (here is the link to the write up 4 years ago after the Medgar Evers show – https://jlcauvin.com/?p=140)

So after the show on The Island of Dr. Moreau I was off to Governor’s on Long Island to audition for work.  The audience was pretty good, but there were a couple of issues with the crowd.  One was that several of the Long Islanders at the club were joke echos – a term I think I invented, meaning that they have to repeat every punchline they find funny for their table.  It is incredibly irritating if it goes on for an entire routine.  The other group were the Obama boo-ers, who felt the need to boo me vigorously before getting into my Obama routine – which is completely non-political and not going to be on Saturday Night Live 🙁   As I went into the Obama it actually felt sort of like the scene in Goodfellas when Joe Pesci is yelling at his girlfriend for overly praising Sammy Davis Jr.  “I get it he’s talented, why do you keep going on about it!”

But the good news is I got passed to get work at Governor’s and I never have to go Roosevelt Island ever again.

Hey – I have no topic big enough to warrant an entire post, so I thought I’d just politely ask some people to simmer down:

1) Fantasy Football players – you make me ashamed to be a man.  Shut up about your league(s).  From hearing about your preposterous “draft” plans to hearing d-bags cheering against my team in a bar, simply because they need someone to make two more catches to win in their league, I hate it all.  I do not care how many people do this – you are a fu*king loser.  The inability to enjoy sports for sports’ sake should be a sad thing.  Perhaps the exponential growth of fantasy sports is one more indication of our culture being overstimulated to the point of needing more than just their favorite team to make sports interesting.  And there is just something extra grating about seeing many unathletic people participating at Fantasy Sports, giving them a long-awaited outlet to be competitive over sports.  It is the extra dose of rage I feel at losing in sports video games to a lesser athlete – it just feels doubly wrong.

2) The Comedians who are sweating Louie.  The FX show is solid.  A lot better than Lucky Louie which I thought was terrible.  But comedians can’t wait to heap praise on it.  It is hardly the best comedy I have ever seen, let alone the best on television.  30 Rock, Eastbound and Down and Community are all better right now.   Metaphorically inserting Louis C.K.’s balls into your mouth on your Facebook or Twitter updates will not make you any more meaningful a comedian by association.  I will say that – at least it is delivering a lot more than the movie Funny People did, with regard to stand up comedy.

 

3) Jay Pharoah.  Technically he has not said anything yet, but this is pre-emptive when he gets to be the Obama impersonator for the 36th Season of Saturday Night Live.

Tomorrow I am doing a show at a hospital and auditioning for a club in Long Island, so hopefully those experiences will provide some blog inspiration.

As Saturday Night Live prepares for its 36th Season with a monopoly on late night comedy viewing on Saturdays (which sometimes feels like the way the Detroit Lions still have an inexplicable and indefensible hold on Thanksgiving Day football) there has been a lot of buzz from the Huffington Post via The Comic’s Comic blog about a 22 year old comedy phenom named Jay Pharoah who claims to have (and is being claimed to have) a great Obama impression.  Now he is 22 years old so he has clearly paid the dues in the comedy business that every comedian is told they have to pay, so I don’t begrudge him his hard earned buzz and success, but I do take umbridge at his Obama impression, which is good compared to exactly one person, Fred Armisen.

Now a while back I sort of abandoned impressions because I was more interested in exploring personal matters on stage and not setting up tons of scenarios that allowed me to showcase impressions.  I had a ton of traditional and non-traditional impressions that I was proud of, but I sort of grew out of them.  But the one I still use as my closer is Barack Obama because there are no well known good ones.  It is probably the best impression I do and it kills every time.  In fact I almost got a manager based solely on the strength of it.

So I have done as much as I can to promote it without the help of a manager and the comedy bloggers, but it has not caught on beyond individual comedy club audiences and my family.

But to watch this guy do Obama is like seeing someone urinate on my comedy.  My friend comedian Jim Dodge told me he did not want to send me the clip for fear that my head would explode.  It just is not good.  To quote Zoolander’s Jacobim Mugatu, “Am I taking crazy pills?”  Of course if Jay Pharoah gets SNL, he will no doubt be groomed into the Eddie Murphy-Chris Rock mold and will receive praise for his “great impression” simply because it is not Fred Armisen.

This is not the usual “oh he did that joke and I cannot do it now” quandry that happens to lots of comedians.  This is a “I do it better than him and it’s obvious, but I do not have the means or know-how to become a ‘YouTube sensation’” situation.  I cannot fault Jay Pharoah – he is just trying to get his and make people laugh, but has Lorne Michaels become Joe Paterno in his talent evaluation?

So if Mr. Pharoah gets to do Obama on SNL, move on to a lucrative comedy career of headlining clubs, starring movies and doing cocaine with strippers I will be forced to challenge him the way Clubber Lang hounded Rocky Balboa, standing outside SNL offices demanding to know why he keeps ducking me.

And despite appearing mostly white I am much closer in resemblance to Obama (not to mention a black Dad from a foreign country and a white Mom, sound familiar) – this guy looks like a small Justin Tuck from the NY Giants.  People will rejoice because he is black and Fred Armisen is undetermined racially, but lowered expectations should not a comedy career make.

So I guess if you are reading this – I will provide you with links to my video and to Jay Pharoah’s video of Obama impressions and then write to your Congressman, your Senator and to Lorne Michaels to get me an Obama showdown.  And forward my video to people.  It’s 90 fu*king seconds for God’s sake so try to do me this one favor if you read this and let people know. Pretend like I’m Betty White or something.

Jay Pharoah

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkZgHjmBlvE

J-L Cauvin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaU77LQS0VM

It was a quite eventful weekend for me in Washington, D.C.  I had the honor of emceeing shows for Patrice O’Neal.  Normally I would not be jazzed to be emcceeing, but a comedian of Patrice’s stature generally draws a good and big crowd and all five shows were sold out.  Now I have opened for many headliners of different levels, but Patrice was the like playing in the major leagues after a career in the minors, with all due respect to the people I have opened for.  It was an incredible experience.  The man is so funny, raw and honest with the crowd that it is both intimidating and inspiring.  He does things that I try to do at open mics, but he has the skill, experience and courage to do it in front of 300 paying customers every show.  It is cool when as a comic you can watch the headliner and be turned into a comedy fan instantly, laughing like you’ve never been exposed to comedy before.

We were also fortunate this weekend not to draw too many Glenn Beck fans to the club.  He was holding his white power rallies at the Lincoln Memorial this weekend and I know at least on the Friday late show there was a group of women (white, obviously) who were in town for the “Enhanced Rights For Dumb, White People” event on Saturday.  But I did not see them walk so perhaps they were not as offended as I thought they’d be (perhaps a black headliner is given a little more leeway from the Beck crowd because entertainment is an acceptable job for black men, as opposed to President).

Overall the weekend was a great success.  All shows were great, all my sets went well and I never had direct contact with any of the legion of Beck-and-Palin-loving old white men and white families on the red line (the only train line deemed safe enough for the out-of-towners by the Beck-ers) in.  And then I received a Tweet at 11 pm announcing that Mad Men had won its third straight Best Drama Emmy, beating Breaking Bad for the second consecutive year.

I think the only problem with America greater than its collective stupidity is when they heap awards on shows like Mad Men because it makes them feel smart and cultured.   The show is fu*king boring!  Does no one else recognize this?  I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!  Breaking Bad manages to do what Mad Men has generally failed to do – it creates realistic characters while building tension and interesting plots.  Mad Men’s cache as a glimpse into a bygone time is over – we get it – people were white, women were subservient and they smoked and dressed well.  But into its fourth season now all Mad Men is has pretentious people still boosting it because they are afraid to appear uncultured or stupid for not liking it.  It is The Emperor’s New Show.

Breaking Bad is the best show on television.  End of discussion.  The best shows on television have never won though.  Six Feet Under lost to The Sopranos and The West Wing, worthy opponents for sure, but the brilliance of SFU will outlast those other two shows.  The Wire was never even nominated, but lots of black people obviously scare Emmy voters.  Arrested Development did win best comedy once, but it should still be winning just for repeats it was so good.  But Modern Family has already taken home the award for Best Comedy Series.  It is a funny show, for sure, but it is also as if some television executive pitched it like this:

“Alright, remember that show Arrested Development?  What if we took away 60% of the subtlety, added some cop out heart felt moments and put it before Cougar Town?”

Despite that Modern Family is one of the best comedies on television right now so I cannot hate the player.  But Breaking Bad has been royally fu*ked over.  If you have not watched it you should. And if you watch Mad Men and think it is the best show on television stop fooling yourself.   People, including my mother have asked me if I own stock in Breaking Bad. No, but in the last 15 years, partly because of reality television forcing more talented writers onto fewer original shows (my theory), we have lived in a golden age of television.  But we still seem to settle for second best.  It is as if every year the Emmys give the Oscar to Dances With Wolves instead of Goodfellas or to Forrest Gump instead of The Shawshank Redemption.   You may think I have overreacted, but do yourself a favor and watch Breaking Bad – you’ll see that I am at least right.