Chris Farley

As a kid growing up on all things comedy, I loved Chris Farley. I loved his explosive personality and the way that he was able to make most people laugh, most of the time. Even the most jaded prick I knew couldn’t deny the man’s likability factor. It was practically glistering. His brand of humor didn’t require a lot of thought, but I couldn’t keep a smile off of my face while watching him exert every ounce of his larger than life self to maniacally get a rise out of everyone around him. I thought his chemically-aided departure was a tragic way to go out early. It was a horrible, violent eruption that ended a beautiful person. The news was upsetting to Farley’s fans, such as myself. Devastating for those fortunate enough to have had a more-than-casual relationship with Chris. I think, by now, those inflicted to any degree have come to terms with the situation. There is peace and closure. So why the fuck does DirecTV want me to entertain the notion that Chris Farley is still above ground, dancing around in an undersized coat?

I do realize that I live in the United States of Consumerism. I pledge allegiance, to the brand…and so on; but do mega-greedy, obscenely wealthy, attention whore companies really have to grave rob celebrities in order to push their unholy product on the living? I cringed upon notice of this form of sub-advertising emerging from the Hollywood sewer a few years ago when the ghost of John Wayne was indirectly telling me to drink Coors Light. I think a more “living” Duke might have opted for room temperature horse piss. The Wayne estate was okay with renting out John’s retired good name. Oddly enough, they were also okay with the initial payoff and they were just fine with the years of royalty checks that ensued. That’s indicative of the reasoning behind such a morbid concept as a deceased spokesperson. Every time something like this occurs, the “we just want to honor their memory” facade is defensively offered, instantaneously. No one can be honest enough to admit that money is a factor, let alone admit that money is thee factor.

The insanity escalated to new heights in 2008. The well-intentioned folks at DirecTV took things a step further, while pushing society as a whole multiple steps back, when they answered the age old question: What could possibly be creepier than using a dead man to promote for the behalf of other peoples profit? Why, a dead child of course. Heather O’Rourke, the cute, sweet, and tragically perished twelve year old girl of Poltergeist fame was apparently summonsed from the spiritual realm to pitch Craig T. Nelson dialogue set-up. I consider myself a fairly decent human being, which is probably why I didn’t feel compelled to pick up the phone and promptly tell cable to get fucked. I was too busy trying not to lose my Cheerios. It just goes to show how low they will go, you know?

What’s next? Plastered caskets, covered in McDonalds and Energizer Battery stickers? “Is that a NASCAR vehicle? Never mind, it’s just John Goodman’s coffin.” As long as the “nothing is sacred, not even life and death” mentality is running rampid, why not go for the gusto? Authentic celebrity death rattle ring tones have serious market potential. It’s all done in admiration, right? After all, celebrities aren’t people, right? Heavens no. They’re machines, whose creation was funded with advertising dollars, built to persuade me to guzzle domestic beer while parked in front of thousands of channels worth of satellite television. Beer and TV? I get it. Use dead people to encourage me not to live. Well played, marketing scum.

This is, by no means, a new trend. The Farley spot serves as one of many sobering, disturbing glimpses into the black hole that is the corporate soul in this country. Seeing Chris’s memory take a televised sleaze bath was especially disheartening. Chris Farley never tried to sell us anything but himself. His passion was making people laugh, and he wasn’t in it for the money. Not even when he made stinkers like Beverly Hills Ninja. He made that movie for kids to enjoy and cried in private at the premiere. He cared deeply about his image and about what he lent his name to. He could have hawked some shit to us in his hay day, but he chose to take the high road. In more ways than one. Putting Farley in such a bizarre position is weird and foreign to his persona and is in poor taste. It’s as if to imply that if blessed with the breath to say one more thing to his family, friends and fans, Chris would take the opportunity to tell us about a free Showtime package trial. Let the man rest in peace. What’s that? Spade needs to get paid? Well, he is only moderately wealthy. Poor fella. What the hell. Let’s take a trip to make believe land. Chris Farley is alive and dancing. David Spade is a genuine friend and a respected, relevant comedian. Yay for delusion. Yay forever!

Meanwhile, back on Planet Earth, we are left with a trashy advert, an unendorsed endorsement, and a cash-eating weasel that deserves to be sentenced by comedy court to report to real prison. That way he can be purchased for a carton of Kools, then get mouth raped immediately after being ass raped. There is a certain symmetric justice to that plan. David couldn’t muster up the courage to attend best friend Chris’s funeral because it was “too much to deal with” emotionally. Yet, when it comes to pretending that Chris is still alive for financial gain, it’s time to suck up your emotions and honor the memory of your friend? Maybe if someone had cut Spade a check, he would have showed for funeral services. The dead have no place in commercial purgatory. How would David Spade like it if his career were portrayed? It has been dead exactly as long as Chris Farley has. Leave those that have left us, alone and leave the product peddling for the celebrities that are only dead on the inside.

Ladies Duck

Misogyny in comedy. It exists. Some may even argue that it’s prevalent. Sure, it doesn’t parallel gangsta rap, or even old school Country-Western music, but sit through any random open mic and it will eventually surface. Whether it be in the form of an ill-conceived rape joke, a strangled hooker joke, a joke that implies that women are ignorant, or just a passive-aggressive exhibit of blind anger toward the opposite sex- I’ve seen it all in my many months of stand-up. Usually, the comic in question is as comfortable around a vagina as John Wayne Gacy. There is a fine line between taking a “taboo” topic and exposing the absurdity in it and using the stage as a platform to maliciously attack a group of people that you happened to be frustrated with. The latter sounds a little Klan-ish.

Personally, I love women. Almost everything about them. I am by no means a playboy. In fact, I can count the number of women I have slept with on one hand. A hand that has been maimed in a band saw accident, at that. Which baffles me, because I’m hung like a horse. A horse that has also been maimed in a band saw accident. I have a gap in my teeth, so cunnilingus is usually preceded by a half an hour of convincing the girl that her clit will not be in danger. Point being: I’m not deprived, but I’m not immersed either. I think my point of view is rooted in mutual ground.

Furthermore, I’m not completely innocent of pushing the envelope, as far as the subject goes, with my own material. I have a bit where I declare that “I refuse to hit women…unless they’re pregnant. I’m all for child abuse, and I likes to get a head start. I walk around Target, crushing stomachs whack-a-mole style. “Pardon me, Ma’am. Nothing personal. This is between me and the little pretard inside of you.” I’d say about thirty percent of the women I have done this bit in front of look at me like I just took away their right to vote. The rest of the ladies, and most of the men, just chuckle at the absurdity of the premise. I’m not talking about specific jokes. Jokes are harmless. I’m questioning the attitudes and personalities behind the comics that have a visible chip on their shoulder.

I swear, some of the open mics that I have done must have been located next door to a court-ordered anger management class. I don’t like feeling like I have just witnessed a fraternity style gang rape being committed against an imaginary girl. A lot of these angry comics end a typical night by relieving their sexual frustrations into the still-moist sock fresh off of their foot (a surefire way to contract Athletes Cock, by the way) and they use the stage, a stage intended for comedy, to vent about the hand they were dealt in life and what they chose to do with it. If any of these Romeo’s were to go through with the rape that their act revolves around, they would probably pay their victim afterward out of force of habit. When Andy Kauffman wrestled women, it was so bizarre and subversive that it came off as purely entertaining. A far cry from the hostile overtones of an all male open mic. Some bitter, creepy, awkward-vibe producing antagonist with a grudge against the no-financial-strings-attached pussy that has always eluded him is seldom funny or entertaining. This isn’t as much of an issue on the professional level. It’s hard to be main-stream when you alienate half of your potential audience right off the bat. Also, this isn’t an issue that exists solely inside the walls of the comedy club. Society as a whole has a concerning tendency to look the other way when shitty behavior is exhibited; a diminishing concern for human decency, if you will.

Kobe Bryant commits anal rape, but C’mon! He’s the best player in the NBA. Sometimes you have to break in the back door, we understand. Chris Brown goes off on his girlfriend like a startled chimp. Beats, chokes and bites her before dumping her on the side of the road like she was an old sofa. Are women outraged? Probably, but not like they should be. One sixteen year old girl told me that Rhiana had it coming. Dumb bitches still show up in droves to Brown’s concerts and they still support his albums to a fanatic degree. As one enlightened lady put it, “any girl ignorant enough to buy a Chris Brown record deserves to get slapped with it.” Thanks for the line, grandma.

I will never understand our contradicting morals and standards. I cannot help but to let out a long-winded “what the fuck?” (Not WTF. Outrage is too combustible for abbreviation.) If Tiger Woods would have beaten his wife, rather than cheating on her, his character would have been demonized to a much lesser extent and he would be able to come out of hiding and get on with his life already. I’m not going to lose any sleep over the any of this; I just wish that we could all come to a consensus. That we could all agree that what’s right is right, and what’s wrong (i.e. women-beating, non-consensual penetration of any orifice, war, Republicanism, etc.) is wrong.

Conan & Jay

Pun perfected. I wouldn’t normally say this about a privileged wonder(bread) kid that has spent the better part of the last two decades raking in gross amounts of money in a dream job setting, but Conan O’Brien deserves better. Better than a beaten up, out of touch, spineless banality factory of a network. NBC, which apparently stands for Never Be Comical, is abandoning all faith in a performer that has performed consistently excellent year in and year out. The Peacock is in last place, and they are exerting the type of attitude that might lead one to believe that that’s right where they should stand. Shit belongs in the sewer, if I recall the popular nursery rhyme correctly. When you strategically produce mediocrity in favor of an alternative that is purely and undoubtedly better, when you operate under that type of ass-backwards mentality, you cannot expect extraordinary results.

In the family of Tonight Show hosts, integrity must skip a generation. If Johnny Carson lacked charisma and relevance, and had been asked to step down “early”, I confidently speculate that he would have taken a gracious bow in lieu of lurking in the shadows of Prime-time like a crazed jackal. We’ve all heard the story of Jay Leno hiding in the board room closet, eavesdropping while NBC executives discussed the fate of the show. Almost twenty years later, and Jay is still in that closet. With all due respect to Mr. Leno, he is resembling less a seasoned stand-up comedy veteran and more an attention starved, network poster-manchild Mongoloid that houses an extra chromosome in his abnormal chin. Nevermind the fact that Jay has all but buried the very platform that he built his career with, essentially cutting the rope that he climbed to the top with; but the man just isn’t very funny anymore. He’s like what Bob Sagget would be if Bob had completely said “fuck it.”

For years, I would reluctantly catch snippets of Leno pandering to his vanilla audience while awaiting a more honest comedic effort in O’Brien. When the planned switch was announced in 2004, I was elated to see someone genuinely talented being awarded for all the right reasons. The time came and all seemed right. Conan’s Tonight Show was the double shot of Listerene that I needed to get the bad taste of Leno’s Tonight Show out my mouth. Five years and seven months of being mislead to the notion that the World was going to make sense. A hope that has been aborted by what has unfolded over the last couple of weeks. The ratings are in. It’s official. Up will be down, once again. I admire Conan for refusing to move the Tonight Show into a morning time slot. He seems to care more about NBC’s history than NBC does.

Conan will be out of the picture and Jay Leno will swoop in to transform the Tonight Show into the Good Night Show. A fitting metaphor, considering the age demographic that comprises Leno’s core audience. Older, calmer, less-impulsive, set in their way, less likely to be responsive to new advertising. Got to keep a group like that appeased. Not only is it an issue of pissing off the kids that buy the shit that is being peddled, effectively losing the respect of a new generation, but I notice that the smarter audience tends to be down with CoCo. His line of humor is very much appreciated within the alternative comedy scene. A more likely Leno viewer is a guy that doesn’t like to reach too far for his punch lines; or an overbearing housewife, with too much pent up energy, that laughs and makes annoying facial expressions every time she is even remotely kidding. You know the type. The “I’m just trying to keep shit off of my mind” type.

The Jay Leno Show didn’t fail because it wasn’t right for Primetime. It failed because it wasn’t right. It was uninspired. I dare you to watch it without once rolling your eyes. Jay’s going through creative menopause. His comedy eggs are drying up. The very idea of having respected professionals earn their plug is a pretentious idea that puts Jay and his show on some undeserved pedestal. The very idea that a guy that screwed David Letterman coming and Conan O’Brien going wants anyone to “earn” anything is suspect, to say the least. The main reason that Leno scores better numbers than Conan is pretty cut and dry. In a society where mediocrity is exalted, there are simply more people content with Leno’s C game than there are purists who desire a more deeply-layered talent like O’Brien. America is pumped so full of vapid horseshit that passes for entertainment, many people begin to prefer it. Further evidence that we are in a constant state of arrested development: Arrested Development was cancelled. Cleared out to make room for such programming as Are You Smarter Than a Cheese Grater? David Cross, no. Jeff Foxworth, yes. That is what the majority of the viewing audience wants. When, if ever, is the majority right about anything?

Anything that challenges the intelligence of the double digit I.Q. median that stays glued to the tube is feverishly swept under the rug. Meanwhile, a bi-polar teenager with wig lice and her dullard daddy pimp our youth with substandard, watered-down pop music and a television show that is “good for kids.” Just because a program is devoid of colorful language and hooker spit, doesn’t automatically make it good for kids. It just ensures that a new generation will pass down paralyzed standards to their shallow children.

So, that’s all that’s at stake here. The future quality of our art and entertainment. That’s all. NBC, the good folks that told us that Norm MacDonald isn’t funny (a claim made by Dickless Ebersol and backed by the network), will ring the last few years out of their comedy workhorse until any alternative with a credibility factor removes themselves from the equation. I’m sure big name talent will be bursting through the doors down at NBC Universal now that everyone has witnessed how team players are treated. The integrity of a storied franchise will be compromised for the sake of one man’s inflamed ego. So it will be. If all this is indicative of how things are going to be at NBC, then their immediate future is looking pretty bleak. On the other hand, the rainbow after the storm might prove to be worth all of this trouble. In the wake of such an onslaught of bullshit, it’s good to see it have the right effect on people. The outcry of support for the good guy is reassuring. So often, mediocrity triumphs quality and it goes virtually unnoticed. Maybe The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien will serve as a martyr, perhaps it will not die in vain after all. Conan may end up with a product that is truly his own. He might take over Letterman’s spot in 2012 and make things interesting for all of us. Any business that would screw a good man so blatantly, doesn’t deserve good people in the first place. I cannot think of any puns that involve NBC and First Place.

Artie Lang

I, along with the rest of the comedy community, am hoping that Artie Lange gets well soon. Physically, yes. Mentally, especially. It takes a very deep-rooted hatred in one’s self to attempt suicide in the first place. To do so in such a gory fashion, a 13” butcher’s knife driven into the gut nine times, well I can only assume Artie sees an image of Hitler feasting on a baby’s heart when he looks in the mirror. Which makes no sense, considering that those exposed to his comedy usually fall in love with his personality within the first two minutes. Whether it be as Norm MacDonald’s counterpart in the hilarious Dirty Work, the generator of most of the laughter on Howard Stern’s program, or the reason to skip SNL in the late Nineties as the shining light on MADtv; Artie is a natural. A great comic with a great spirit. When an episode like this surfaces, people begin to wonder why. What is it about comedy, about creating laughter for a living, that has an adverse effect on the messenger? Why did Richard Jeni hide a fatally depressive side with a chipper stage persona? Why did Freddy Prinze blow his creative mind into chunks? Why did a promising young comedian like Steve Lubetkin end it all by attempting to land on The Comedy Store from the fourteenth floor of the neighboring Hyatt House Hotel? Surely these incidents have to implicate that being a comic, and the pressures and anxieties that come along with the territory, can be intense enough to drive a right-minded man to the brink of destruction. Well, I’m not so sure that if any type of link is legitimate.

What makes me an expert on the subject? I’ve been down that dark alley, Jack. Most comics have tried suicide at least once. As for me, I was in the bathroom, standing naked in front of the mirror. I was at the end of my wits and the plan was to slit my wrist. At the last second, I became uncontrollably nervous and my shaking kicked in. All this turned my suicide attempt into a sloppy circumcision. Now I’m like the rest of you in the pants, and it sickens me. But seriously, folks. As torturous as comedy can be, I don’t think that funny business alone has ever caused anyone to do something so drastic. I think the ability to do such a thing is hardwired in ones psyche all of their life. A chemical imbalance, if you will. A case of genetic miswiring. The same thing that might cause a person to be gay or Republican. Same difference, I know.

The onslaught of blow, pills, smack, crank, booze and whatever other chemical substance a pressure-ridden comic can get their grubby little hands on only aides in triggering such brain abnormalities. It surely isn’t an issue of material content. Feeling grossly irresponsible for the horrible things that they have shared with others. If such was the case, Rush Limbaugh would have hung himself with a rodeo lasso long ago. Glenn Beck might have an on-air epiphany and puncture his jugular with the knife that he uses to slice watermelon with (side note: I figured out why Beck eats during his broadcasts. My theory is, he wants to literally and continually increase the amount of shit that he is full of. Releasing said shit over the airwaves requires immediate replenishing.) I think some people try to over-analyze the issue. Years of not getting what they want from an audience, creative frustration, not hearing the laughter the way they needed to drove a once happy clown into a walking tragedy. It makes for good fodder in an overly-dramatic L.A. Times piece, but this is one green comedian that isn’t buying into such drivel. I’ve considered the arguments, as I do with all issues. I like to think that my mind is more open than Kurt Cobain’s. Furthermore, it isn’t like I’m sticking up for the art form that I have decided to dedicate my life to just for the sake of being comfortably oblivious. As bad as my worst night in comedy has been, intensify it a thousand times over and I still realize, it’s only comedy. Jokes. Bullshit. Nothing in this game of ours is serious enough to end your life over.

Artie is battling chemically induced “demons.” A supernatural metaphor if I’ve ever heard one. Jeni battled severe depression and psychosis for years. Factor in a steady diet of anti-depressants. Side effects may include suicide. If anything, I’m willing to bet that comedy proved to be a much needed cathartic escape for the fallen soldier. Lubetkin chose a radical extreme to prove a point that was very near and dear to his heart. Again, mark it up to psychosis. He wasn’t completely crazy, but he clearly wasn’t completely sane. Obviously are positions aren’t parallel, but if I were banished from The Store I would bitch and gripe as a form of protest, but I would do it in front of The Improv. Life in-tact. Linking the high-pressure nature of stand-up comedy to suicidal behavior is a cheap cop-out. It’s an easy, and sometimes maybe even interesting, way to dance around the core issue behind such an unfortunate occurrence. I will sum this up with one more “get well, Artie.” Mentally. Leave the poison behind and bless the attentive ears of the comedy community like only you can.