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Mad Man

Today I depart for Boston for the semi-finals of the Boston Comedy Festival.  Last night I had my own show that I produce and I was excited both for the great lineup we had, as well as the fact that I would be able to do a nice practice run of my set for tonight.  Unfortunately, that would not happen.  What would happen is that Medgar Evers College would finally be bumped down to #2 on the list of worst gigs I’ve ever performed.

Last night the bar was largely occupied by young members of an ad agency (think Mad Men, but all stupid, unable to handle their alcohol and unattractive) who had been there drinking and playing Wii since early afternoon, since they had a half day.  Even in my glass half empty approach to life I thought, hey maybe we could make fans of this group since they work nearby.   Instead what we got was a bunch of drunk as-holes.

I managed to get through about 4 minutes of material until I had to deal with the idiots (and they had already ruined 4 people’s sets).  There were two main offenders.  One was a drunk kid who looked like he was about 19.  He managed to make a spectacle during everyone’s set.  The other was a slightly older d-bag who would shout random things he thought was funny.  For example when I said the word Obama, he shouted “Obama your mama hahahahahaha.”  Even when they appreciated the jokes, they would then discuss and argue loudly why the joke was or was not funny.

I felt terrible and embarrassed for the great comics I had come to perform, but fortunately all of them know experiences like this.  I was very close to actually pulling the Chazz Palminteri scene from A Bronx Tale, which I ironically just filmed a spoof of, where he locks the bar door and tells them that they can’t leave the bar.

Adding insult to injury, I was talking after the show outside with Nick Cobb when the 19 year old spectacle came outside and started talking to us.  So I said to him, “You just ruined our show, but now you are interrupting my life and a private conversation.”  Then when I was talking to Nick one of the worker’s from the ad agency, we will call him Token after the South Park character,  decided to flex his muscle by saying the following, “Don’t you hate comedians who aren’t funny and make fun of the audience.”  At this point he might as well have come into my apartment and taken a sh*t on my bed.  Despite actually trembling with rage (my only fear was that I might hospitalize the jerk – I am no fighter, but I am big and like most comics have very little to live for) I managed to utter out the most sensible thing I said all night – “you and your friends ruined the show in there, but now you’ve come outside and disrespected us out here.”  Hearing that, and probably seeing the crazed look in my eyes that only occurs during Utah Jazz losses and listening to Sean Hannity, he apologized.

But there it is.  Bad audience, but not as bad as Medgar Evers College.  But the fact that it happened at my show and nearly resulted in misdemeanor assault charges makes it the worst.   All in all, since Monday, this has been the worst string of shows I’ve done (3 “eh” shows on Tuesday, an awful open mic on Wednesday, and a crime against humanity on Thursday).  Let’s hope Boston brings me back some good vibes.

There is a happy ending to the Always Be Funny show story though.  My friend who part owns the bar where my show takes place left me a voice mail last night.  He told me that the drunk 19 year old had torn down one of the bar’s signs in drunken stupidity and thrown it in the bushes outside, so my friend threw him in the bushes, at which point he began crying.  The only thing that would have made me happier is if Token had somehow had his jaw broken during this exchange, but even so, maybe it was a sign that my luck was changing at the right moment.

We’ll see – Boston Comedy Festival Semi-Finals tonight at 9 pm – Hard Rock Cafe.

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A Night of Ridiculousness

 

The New Yankee Stadium & The Season Finale of 24

 

PART I

Last night I was engaged in not one, but two events of gross excess.  I went to the new Yankee Stadium for the first time last night and was treated to the most gaudy piece of architecture south of Newport, Rhode Island.   I began my evening at the Hard Rock Cafe where a tasteful mix of Bronx natives and aspiring actors served me some decent food in a chaotic environment.  My plan for any future games will be to go to the Court Deli (as any good Bronx native/cost conscious human being should go – they have better french fries than the HRC anyway), but I wanted to soak up as much of the new amenities as I could on my first trip.

After the Hard Rock cafe I strolled around the stadium for about an hour burning off some of the 45,623 calories I had consumed (according to the helpful/guilt inducing calorie counts in the HRC menu) admiring all the amenities of the new stadium.  Here are a few:

  • Helpful greeters before the game and people directing you to the subway after the game.  Wow – when they expect a greater influx of rich people (given the ticket prices) they really go all out.  Sure, the charm is almost completely gone and it feel s a little like the manager of Chotchkie’s is running the Stadium (Office Space reference), but that is a small price to pay for the Roman Coliseum that is Yankee Stadium.  Did people not need help getting around or getting to the Stadium last year?
  • The sushi bar and farmer’s market stands – what would a baseball stadium be without these classic additions.  Take me out to the ball game, buy me some sushi and pomegranate…
  • There is a roped off bar in centerfield.  Because nothing says classic baseball than artificially pumped up exclusivity, privilege and status.  I assume wine bars and tapas bars are coming soon behind home plate, as well as some stylish new one word named frozen yogurt place – perhaps called “Juice.”
  • There are what appear to be at least 5 or 6 large stores dedicated to selling Yankees merchandise.  It is as if the Stadium is screaming, “WE NEED TO SELL A LOT OF STUFF TO MAKE A PROFIT.  OK THAT’S NOT TRUE, BUT WE FIGURED WE GOT TAX PAYERS TO PAY FOR A LOT OF THE STADIUM – NO NOT YOU D-BAGS FROM JERSEY, JUST YOU NEW YORKERS,  SO WE FIGURED WE COULD SQUEEZE MORE CASH OUT OF YOU.”
  • There is a small art gallery in the stadium, curator included.  See #2 and realize that I did not exaggerate nearly enough.
  • Forced nostalgia.  Everywhere you walked pre-game there was epic music playing and slow motion video every fifteen feet.  It is as if the Stadium is telling the Twitter/YouTube generation, “Don’t worry about forming your own memories or nostalgia, we are beating you over the head with sentimental sensory overload so that you don’t have to experience nostalgia, we’ll simply tell you what your nostalgia is.”
  • Energy Overload – I was told that the new Yankee Stadium has a significantly larger carbon footprint than the old one (the 1700″ HD flat screen probably has something to do with that).  The comparison is like the old stadium is the carbon equivalent of an old Asian woman with bound feet and the new Stadium is Shaquille O’Neal.

Other than those things the Stadium looks great and I saw a great game (Yankees won 7-6).  So if you like your baseball like you like your trophy wife, attractive, expensive and soulless I think we have found your stadium.

PART II

And if you like your television loud and absurd then I am sorry that 24’s 7thseason ended last night.   Rumor has it that Season 8 will be the most explosive ever.  In it the writers will have condensed 14 months worth of time into 24 hours, which people will still believe if the show continues to post incongruous times on screen.  Jack, who clearly survives at the end of Season 7, will have to stop terrorists who plan on destroying 350 nuclear warheads at 350 different locations around the world.  Unfortunately the only people who can help him are Tony Almeida, who makes a deal for immunity, ex-President Logan, who has been exiled somewhere and David Palmer whose head was blown off in Season 5, but is secretly still alive.  One bomb will go off only killing competent screen writers, but Kim Bauer will be kidnapped.  Jack will have to sacrifice his life to save Kim, but only after he tracks down the the cure to AIDS, rebuilds the World Trade Center and uncovers Jimmy Hoffa’s body.  But before all this can happen, Jack must be brought out of retirement because he is at peace with himself and regrets all the people he has murdered.   And in the final twist (7 minutes left in the season) Jack realizes he has been the bad guy the whole time and must torture himself and kill himself to stop the attack.  You heard it hear first – Season 8 will be the most explosive season ever!!!!

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The New Yankee Stadium

If you thought the American Pastime needed more meatpacking district influence – here’s your baseball stadium.

A couple of days ago I received an amazing investment opportunity in the mail.  If I invest the GDP of a small country I can receive some entertaining sports surrounded by all the bells and whistles of a Manhattan club delivered in the form of a product that has had diminishing returns over the last decade.  That’s right I received my Yankees prospectus a/k/a ticket information and fan guide in the mail.

Like General Motors the Yankees have cost the American taxpayer more while providing less over the last several years.  There are several problems I have which were only augmented by the mailing I received.

The Prices

The Yankees, my second favorite team in all of sports, belong up there with the executives who received bonuses from AIG.  The ticket prices are absurd – it literally feels like what a night out to a Broadway play was before Broadway had to sell out to get seats filled in the theaters.  Baseball was not supposed to be high society  – it was supposed to be a day or night for families and working class folks who could enjoy entertainment with superstars without a bank loan or a blow job being involved.  There are now six (that’s six) special tiers of tickets for which the prospectus does not even list prices.   Presumably because they are so special and elite that only people with American Express black cards can even hear the prices without going deaf.

The Bronx

The Stadium was completely unnecessary and with the economy as it is , completely irresponsible.  What’s worse is that with the hollow promises brokered by the Yankees and the city and in part by former Bronx Borough President Adolpho Carrion, the Yankees got a subsidized stadium and in the process destroyed a massive, well-attended park with no equivalent replacement in waiting.  In one of the poorest communities in America, do you think destroying a quality outlet like a park with softball/baseball/soccer fields, a track and all sorts of other amenities is a wise decision?

The other promises that are often made – pumping money into the community, a school structured for high school students interested in sports management, etc.  seem to not be panning out.  Even worse is that all the restaurants (NYY Steak, Hard Rock Cafe) will actually probably take from the local businesses that thrived with the extra customers coming in for games.  Why would a tourist try local fare when they can go to the more familiar and ethnically-cleansed Hard Rock Cafe.

I would also love to know if Bronx residents were given priority for jobs created by the stadium and all its surrounding new businesses.  The Bronx has the highest unemployment rate in the city and this could have been an opportunity to make a small dent in it (very small, but at least meaningful as a step that says the Yankees will give something back – even if it is only salaries earned).

The Stadium

This thing looks beautiful.  Plush lounges, high end suites, a sports bar in centerfield, numerous quality food retailers at the stations in the stadium are just a few of the upgrades.  Hell, there’s so much at the Stadium that if they have a store producing Latino people they could render the Bronx completely obsolete.  However, isn’t this a fu-king baseball game?

Will there be a cover charge on top of tickets and techno blaring as you enter the stadium and some giant black dude frisks you and some sleazy grown-up prep school kid asks you if you party?  The American pastime should not be so slick and corporate looking.  People used to go to baseball games for the game – but now it seems that Manhattan spirit of needing to be seen has officially immersed itself in the Bronx, even if that immersion does not spread 20 feet outside the Stadium.  Now you can say “I have tickets to the Yankees” and it can mean more than “I like baseball and the Yankees.”  Now it can mean “I like status symbols and high fives.”  It won’t be long until Yankee fans become, due to financial restrictions and character depletion, like an LA Dodgers Crowd – famous for arriving in the 3rd inning and leaving in the 7th inning.

The old stadium used to be called The House That Ruth Built.  This one seems to be destined for The Club That Douchebags Inhabit.  Or maybe in the spirit of its apparent inspiration, just call it Stadium.  Or Douche.

I have my tickets for May 18th.