Hostile Hostel Comedy

Having spent all of yesterday cooped up in my apartment listening to and watching CLE programs (the bringer shows of the legal world – paid programs lawyers are required to take every two years to keep their license to practice in good standing) I was eager to get out and do some comedy.  So nothing – neither a snowstorm, nor missing American Idol (in hindsight I think a lineup of Steven Tyler, Randy Jackson and Simon Cowell would be the greatest AI lineup that can never happen) would keep me from the show.

The show was at a hostel on 103rd and Amsterdam and unlike some other hostels I have performed at, this one seemed fairly cheery – like a renovated college dorm.  So I walked down to the basement, which is where places like to keep comedians and checked in with the show’s producers.

The first thing I learned watching the comedian on stage, who I know personally, was that there was a creepy man who appeared to have possibly kidnapped a woman and her children.  I was not there to learn the whole story, but it seemed to have the comedians laughing with disturbed delight.

Next on stage was one of the show’s producers and that is when the show went from slightly awkward to off the charts uncomfortable.  He began by doing some crowd work and then he got to a man who can best be described as a sad and more grizzled looking version of Patton Oswalt (for complete descriptiveness the comedian is an Asian guy from long Island and admits in his routine that he sounds like Sly Stallone).

It began as mildly humorous, but then came that crucial moment in any crowd work exchange.  It is the point where the audience member makes it clear that he or she no longer wants to be involved.  The comedian must have missed that tipping point because this is what happened over the next 5 minutes:

Sad Patton Oswalt (SPO): OK!  Move On – I thought this was a comedy show!

Asian Stallone (AS): DOES THIS LOOK LIKE A COMEDY SHOW – NO ONE HAS LAUGHED SINCE I HAVE COME UP HERE!!

Te crowd laughed a little bit and then AS proceeded to tear into whatever New York State county SPO said he was from

SPO: My mother died recently and I was (trail off, but I am guessing it was about needing a laugh or not wanting to get harassed).

At this point SPO stood up, which raised the tension in the room.

AS: I have been talking to everyone in the room and they were fine with it, but you have to cause a problem!

I believe there may have been expletives also, but the SPO began to approach the stage.  And like a Jerry Springer guest eager to scrap at the slightest shot of provocation, AS dropped the mic and immediately went chest to chest with SPO.  No punches were thrown, but AS did drop some gems like “Don’t step to me!” and “I will drop you SON!”  Yes, Asian Stallone dropped a “son” on a 40 year old man.  The only thing missing from this late 1980s showdown was someone calling someone a “herb.”

Sad Patton Oswalt left, but came back a few minutes later demanding an apology, to which we were all greeted by another drop of the mic and a threat to call the police, to which AS responded, “It’s 9-1-1!”

So after witnessing enough things to make it the weirdest and most awkward show I have ever performed on, it went right to an 11 with the next performer: a burlesque dancer.  I do not know how burlesque came about, but it is somewhere between a Hooters waitress and a stripper, but with the unjustified pretentiousness of a sommelier.  It is like someone told a stripper, “Hey, you are not hot enough to strip, but just pretend to be an ‘artist’ and then you can do burlesque because there is no oversight committee for burlesque.  Like modern art, poetry slams or jazz music, no one wants to look stupid and tell you to stop or will have the balls to actually tell you to put on clothes and stop inducing the gag reflex of straight men because your ‘art’ is irritating.” So after seeing a woman shake a bare ass and pasti-covered breasts the next comedian went on for about 5 minutes in front of 3 tired and bewildered audience members.  The it was time for your headliner… me!

I proceeded to get alternating reactions ranging from laughs to abject horror (admittedly jumping from Hallmark cards to abortion jokes is an emotional journey).  Which is exactly the range of emotions I had at the show as well.  I felt like I was the star of a David Lynch film, but without the obligatory critical praise.

Tomorrow night I am headlining a fundraiser for Haiti – let’s hope it is less awkward.