Episode Transcript
[00:00:08] Speaker A: All right.
That's a good. That's a great sound effect. It really does sound like jerking up.
It is time for Don't Make Me Laugh with Mark Geary. You might have known Mark Geary from another podcast years ago called Laugh Out Loud or something. What was it called?
[00:00:30] Speaker B: No, it was called you think that's Funny?
[00:00:35] Speaker A: You think that's funny?
[00:00:36] Speaker B: You think that's funny.
[00:00:37] Speaker A: They're all derivative of the same kind of thing. Like this one's called Don't Make Me Laugh. You think that's funny? Like, you're so corny. We need a better name.
[00:00:45] Speaker B: One of the terrorists.
[00:00:47] Speaker A: Yeah. How about we'll call it Muhammad Atta's Take on Comedy?
[00:00:52] Speaker B: All right. Oh, we can laugh about it now.
[00:00:55] Speaker A: Yes. Yes. You've got your cranberry juice. You're still battling that urinary tract infection.
[00:01:01] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:01:03] Speaker A: Now that we've been doing the show for a little bit, I was thinking on the way over here, I was thinking, I wonder how he likes sitting down and watching comedy every week as part of his week and part of your new routine. How do you like that?
[00:01:17] Speaker B: It's a chore, isn't it?
[00:01:18] Speaker A: Does it feel like a choreography? Just sit down. Like I gotta sit down and watch this comedy special?
[00:01:23] Speaker B: No, I mean, it's. It's like, I say, it's my quest to be back to humanity. Right. So I'm not, like, dreading it at this point.
It's just a thing that I do.
[00:01:34] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Like you're taxing pretty much.
[00:01:37] Speaker B: Pretty much my entire life.
[00:01:38] Speaker A: Right, right. That's what I'm wondering. That's what I want.
[00:01:41] Speaker B: Just get up in the. Okay, let's do a bunch of things that I do. Get through the day.
[00:01:45] Speaker A: When are you watching these? Especially watching them at night. What is your.
[00:01:49] Speaker B: Wednesday nights, my missus is out, so I, you know, some of them have been a bit. A bit ropey. And I'm like, well, I'm not gonna sit here and piss her off.
[00:01:59] Speaker A: So what is. What does ropey mean for.
[00:02:01] Speaker B: You know, was this could go either way. I mean, I'm heading into Adam Sander. I was like, I'm not sitting watching this.
[00:02:09] Speaker A: That would be ropey. That could be ropey.
[00:02:11] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean.
Yeah. So Wednesday night is comedy night.
[00:02:19] Speaker A: Yeah. I'm just trying to fit them in whenever I can.
[00:02:21] Speaker B: Thought you watched him when you went to bed.
[00:02:24] Speaker A: I have. But like this. This one we're going to talk about today. Wanda Sykes, I'm the entertainer. Talk about.
[00:02:32] Speaker B: I like that. I Like the title. I really like that title.
[00:02:35] Speaker A: Why? What do you like about it?
[00:02:36] Speaker B: I don't know. There's something about, like, people who call themselves an entertainer. Like, remember the expression light entertainment? It's light. And. And people would be called a light entertainer.
[00:02:49] Speaker A: Who was called a light entertainer in England?
[00:02:51] Speaker B: It was common. So they would say, oh, that. Yeah, yeah, he's good. You know, he or she is like, light entertainment.
[00:02:56] Speaker A: Like, mildly amusing.
[00:02:58] Speaker B: No, I don't know what it meant. It meant, like, you remember when people used to, like, sing and dad, like, they really tried to be like, the complete package, and that was really what they called light entertainment.
[00:03:09] Speaker A: This makes sense. If they're the complete package, it's full entertainment. It's. It's light.
[00:03:15] Speaker B: I do like. Like Cedric the Entertainer. That's like this. It all in one. Who is it? Yeah, it was a bargazzi. Had that thing like the. The job is the name.
[00:03:26] Speaker A: Yes. Yeah.
Cedric the Entertainer. Is there anyone. Is there a comedian called somebody. The comedian.
Not a bad idea.
[00:03:36] Speaker B: The unknown comedian. Remember?
[00:03:37] Speaker A: Yes, I do. Yes, I do. I saw some unknown comedians at Sox park this season when they had bags over their heads, like paper bags.
[00:03:46] Speaker B: Oh, because the fans.
[00:03:47] Speaker A: Because they're so.
[00:03:48] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:03:49] Speaker A: Embarrassed to be fans.
[00:03:50] Speaker B: That's an old one.
[00:03:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
Well, maybe we'll do him next. The unknown comedians. He have a new special out.
[00:03:57] Speaker B: Yes, he died about five, 10 years ago.
[00:04:00] Speaker A: Who was he?
[00:04:00] Speaker B: Anyway, it's revealed. I don't know. Like, I just remember, like, I really like the unknown entertainer. It's kind of good.
[00:04:09] Speaker A: Yeah, it's kind of a good bit.
All right, so I. So back to that. I watched Wanda in this special about 20 minutes ago, some of which I watched in the car on the way over here.
[00:04:24] Speaker B: Oh, my God.
[00:04:25] Speaker A: Yeah. And the Internet kept going out and had to. And close it and open it back up.
[00:04:30] Speaker B: So you never finished it?
[00:04:31] Speaker A: No, I absolutely 100% finished it. I had, like, three minutes left.
[00:04:36] Speaker B: What's the last bit?
[00:04:37] Speaker A: The last bit is her on the stool, legs akimbo.
[00:04:42] Speaker B: Okay. You got it? All right. We don't need. Let's not ruin the surprise.
[00:04:45] Speaker A: Well, we're not gonna. So I don't think people want to hear us walk through every bit in here and talk about it. Okay, so why don't we start at the end?
[00:04:53] Speaker B: Start at the end. Get back to the.
[00:04:54] Speaker A: What did you think of her closer and what do you think? How important do you think that last bit in a special is, right? Like, do you think.
Because we've seen a couple now. And some have been underwhelming, some have been great. Like I thought the Sandler ending was. Jeez, that couldn't have been more. Couldn't have been better. But what do you think about the last bit in general? Do you think it has to be the best bit?
[00:05:16] Speaker B: Well, that's the old cliche, isn't it? Start with your best bit, end with your second best bit.
[00:05:21] Speaker A: Is that the formula?
[00:05:22] Speaker B: Yeah, that's like a. That's like a. An old road dog, like, testament. That is, you know what I mean? Like, you know, the old road dogs have their testaments and that is numb. I think that's the first Larry Reid.
[00:05:36] Speaker A: Would describe to that.
[00:05:37] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:05:39] Speaker A: I didn't know that. I mean, I would think you would end with your best one, right? The whole leave them laughing maxim. Right.
[00:05:48] Speaker B: Well, I think the idea is you should have two really good ones and.
[00:05:51] Speaker A: You bookend them that way.
[00:05:53] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:05:54] Speaker A: Because if you notice. Right. And the fun thing about, for me about doing this is taking notes on comedy. I don't know how much you've done that in your life before, but I never.
[00:06:03] Speaker B: Oh, I always took notes.
[00:06:04] Speaker A: Like, if you watched a comedian, you would take notes for. Yeah, for the show here.
[00:06:09] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Early days. Not anymore. I don't even watch them anymore.
[00:06:12] Speaker A: But the early days, like, you took notes on me.
[00:06:15] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, I got what I. I still, I still tell people's jokes back to them from 20 years ago.
[00:06:23] Speaker A: Because you took notes and you have them encoded in your brain.
[00:06:25] Speaker B: If I didn't physically take a note, I would mentally.
You know, people. There's this thing of me, oh, Gary doesn't watch anything. He doesn't really take it in. He hates comedy and stuff. I always keep the receipts, right? And the receipts are really good joke or a really shit one. And every comedian I see, I remember those two things.
And so what? Hey, what was the question? Oh, yeah, yeah. Remembering. Yeah, yeah. I got notes on everyone.
[00:06:55] Speaker A: Dude, do these notes still exist, these receipts you speak of?
[00:07:00] Speaker B: Possibly. There might be. I had this backpack, you remember when all the.
[00:07:03] Speaker A: I remember the backpack idiots used to.
[00:07:05] Speaker B: Walk around with backpack.
[00:07:06] Speaker A: Well, they still do.
[00:07:07] Speaker B: Still do. Yeah, yeah. And I, you know, I had. And I was one of those idiots, you know, copious notebooks, you know, post it pads, like, just jammed in there. But yeah, I took notes on other comedians and stuff.
Not to be like, you know, but just genuine, like, interest.
[00:07:27] Speaker A: I think a great episode of this would be to get that box, that banker's box out of the Early Days.
[00:07:36] Speaker B: Out where the comedy irs.
[00:07:40] Speaker A: And we'll see what you thought of some of the legends of the Chicago comedy scene back in the day. That would be. That's fascinating to me. I can't believe that.
Well, I've never taken notes on comedy before and doing it, it brings me back to my. I was a debater when I was in high school. I don't want to toot my own horn, but third in the state of Massachusetts and Lincoln Douglas debate. Anyway, we would have to flow the debate and that's what this has become for me is taking notes on comedy. I'm doing a flowchart of bits and connecting them to other bits just like arguments in a debate. So that when you get up to speak like we're doing now, I can follow them and I'm getting better and better each week of taking notes, I guess on things and so you get to see where things are connected. But what I notice in the end bit back to this idea in the very end bit is it's often. And it makes sense now that you just explained it a little bit.
Some of these bits are long or not bits, but some of these blocks of the act are long. Like her first block about COVID was the longest of her bits. Lots of notes on it and then the blocks get smaller. This end bit is often an out of left field kind of joke. I think for a lot of comedians, right. It is that one that they always get laughs with and maybe disconnected to the rest of the act. Like she just had to drag in the gynecology appointment to end this bit with it. Just to get her legs up on the stool and everything.
[00:09:14] Speaker B: Physicality.
[00:09:16] Speaker A: Yeah, I have that too.
She's pretty physical in this when she rolls on the ground.
[00:09:21] Speaker B: Oh yeah, yeah.
[00:09:22] Speaker A: She six year old woman doing a stop, drop and roll. That was pretty good.
[00:09:27] Speaker B: Yeah, she. And she does a lot of the duck down and then stand up.
[00:09:31] Speaker A: But you last time on the last episode you said you hate physical comedy. It's a, it's a parlor trick to take away from your bad jokes or something like that.
[00:09:41] Speaker B: No, well, maybe I'm misrepresented. I don't.
Unless I'm subconsciously influenced by it. To me the most it's going to be is an annoyance. If it's too much, it'll annoy me. If it is, I want, I'll notice it's going on, but I won't be. I'm not going to like, oh, that's an impressive part of your physicality or whatever. Bullshit. No, you're just doing it for whatever reason.
[00:10:05] Speaker A: Do you why I'm thinking about this now? Do you remember the. I can't remember the comedian. I want to say it was a local guy, but he was doing a bit about big cell phones. The cell phone being like people who have oversized cell phones, they haven't got the newest phone. And he picked up the stool and made that. So who was that? Do you remember?
[00:10:20] Speaker B: That was fucking everyone in the 90s.
[00:10:23] Speaker A: A hundred times over.
[00:10:24] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:10:25] Speaker A: Wasn't much. I know.
Okay, so Wanda Sykes. I'm the entertainer. Were you entertained? You don't have to give your full.
[00:10:34] Speaker B: Review, but in a nutshell.
So here's the deal. I got a question to you, right?
One thing I hate about the 21st century is everyone's need to tell you their goddamn opinion. Oh, this is my opinion. This isn't my opinion. Right. I can tell you my clinical opinion of this or I could tell you my personal opinion of this.
[00:11:00] Speaker A: Let's just start with this. Did you laugh?
[00:11:04] Speaker B: Not particularly, no.
[00:11:06] Speaker A: And I think this will go into what you're about to say in terms of your clinical opinion. Yeah, because. Go ahead. Yeah, give it. Give me the clinical opinion.
[00:11:14] Speaker B: My clinical opinion is this is inside baseball.
[00:11:17] Speaker A: This is jokes in that kind of thing. Yeah, yeah.
[00:11:20] Speaker B: My clinical opinion of this is it's adequate comedy. It's hitting. It's got things people can relate to. It's got physic. The physical stuff you did, it's got good pace to it. There's no ponderance. There's no this, that, and the other.
So I could see people liking this. Can I see Mark Geary liking it? No, there's too much.
There's nothing in here that I particularly am looking for.
[00:11:50] Speaker A: There's nothing groundbreaking in here. There's nothing new. There's nothing creative. Like, if you compare someone like her, not because she's a female, but to Maria Bamford, who is breaking the mold in many ways for stand up, she is working in tropes more than anything, I think.
Yeah.
[00:12:11] Speaker B: And you can get critics. Oh, well, that's because you're a white man. And this, that, and the other. And it's like, no, it's nothing to do with that. It's what I'm looking for. This is not delivering. So, like, the first note I have is, you know, you can't be doing Covid bits in 2024. Come on.
[00:12:27] Speaker A: Well, five years in. In her defense, I mean, it's 2023. I think is. Was the stamp on it when it came Out.
[00:12:33] Speaker B: Oh, I thought it was 24. Okay.
[00:12:36] Speaker A: I have no, I. Look, it said 2023, so maybe she did it in 2022.
I mean, but aren't people still doing Covid bits?
[00:12:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm not gonna like any of them.
[00:12:50] Speaker A: So anytime someone comes out with a Covid bit, at this point, I'm just like, no good.
[00:12:53] Speaker B: Yeah, this. This should have been retired.
[00:12:55] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:12:56] Speaker B: Unless you're doing something amazing.
[00:12:58] Speaker A: Yeah. And nothing amazing here. Right.
[00:13:02] Speaker B: I mean, if you spin through the bit. So.
No, I'm not saying there's nothing original. I'm saying there was too much to not be so original. I've got, like. She did a bit about online church I'd never heard anyone talk about. Oh, I switched to going to online church.
[00:13:17] Speaker A: That was good. I didn't laugh, but it was good.
[00:13:19] Speaker B: Yeah. Mosquito man was probably the closest I got to like, okay, I'm buying into this.
[00:13:25] Speaker A: That remind you of anybody's bits or anyone in particular? Because I got a Eddie Murphy used to do a bit about the ice cream man. Right. And they'd all run out for the ice cream. It reminded me just like that she kind of delivered it in the same way.
Black, poor people. Mosquito man comes around. Black, poor ice cream man comes around reminded me a lot of that. I wrote that one down for that one.
[00:13:47] Speaker B: I mean, she had a line like we were playing in a fog of pesticide. I was like, okay, this is taking me somewhere that I'm not used to, shall we say?
[00:13:57] Speaker A: Yeah, well, what about. What about her relationship stuff?
[00:14:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:14:02] Speaker A: Married to a white woman, a French woman. Let's get right to this, because this drove me crazy. The fucking impression of her wife smoking in the French accent did it. So I didn't. You know, I have it written down times 10, because I think she pulled it out 10 times.
[00:14:18] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:14:18] Speaker A: It was thread that really wore me out.
It wasn't funny. The impression wasn't funny. The smoking bit wasn't funny, man. I just thought that really dragged it down. Like, she kept going to it and going to it and going to it.
[00:14:35] Speaker B: Yeah, she did go to the. Well a little too much. But to be. To be fair, she had a huge bit in the middle about, you know, sexual politics and her family life and all of that good stuff. And so most of it revolved around. I feel like once you've done the impression, then you're going to have to keep doing it. So she kind of dug her own hole with that. But I don't know. I don't know.
[00:14:58] Speaker A: That didn't bother you?
[00:14:59] Speaker B: That didn't bother me so much initially. I was like, oh, yeah, that's French people. And Americans are going to go, yep, that's a French person.
Well, anyone's. Not just Americans, but particularly Americans are going to go, yeah, that's a French person. Smoking and, you know, being kind of arrogant and all that is. Is what we expect. So, yeah, it didn't.
At no point did I ever go, God, I want to get out of this thing.
[00:15:29] Speaker A: You didn't want it to be over, you mean, Is that what you're saying?
[00:15:32] Speaker B: Yeah, that. That to me, is the acid test. I'm looking at my watch.
[00:15:35] Speaker A: When is this going to be over? Yeah, no, yeah. I didn't know it. It. It passed time.
[00:15:40] Speaker B: Yeah.
So the stuff that did get on my bloody nerves a little bit, and this is because of my exposure to so much comedy now, is all the kind of, like, virtue signal liberal stuff. You know what I mean? Like, getting applause breaks for, like, we need love, not hate and all that stuff. I'm like. I'm like, I don't need any of this.
[00:16:08] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:16:09] Speaker B: Because I'm kind of super lefty. So I'm like, you know, who's this for? Like, everyone in this audience has come to see a gay black woman, right? They don't need a lecture on we need love because they're already very aware of it, right?
[00:16:28] Speaker A: And. And she was losing me there, if she hadn't already. But then what I. Like what she did was she called out the Democrats, called out the liberals, right?
For part of it, like, she started bashing the Democrats. Do you remember that part where towards the end, she, you know, she's got a Covid block, a gay block, a bathroom toilet block, a race block. And then she gets into the politics block and she talks about January 6th and old people hiding, and then she said, you know, some Democrat's gonna give me a hard time about making fun of fucking Mitch McConnell's jowls or whatever like that. And then she leads into the whole thing about how horrible it is to be a Democrat. And now she's winning me over because I'm a Democrat, too. And it is horrible, right? Like living in this world now where, you know, the liberals, we have to uphold everything that's right, and it's a fucking drag and we're losing. It's like she had some.
I thought she had strong material for that, and I didn't expect that because obviously this is a liberal crowd. This isn't, you know, really playing to that.
[00:17:45] Speaker B: No, no, I got. I got a note. Want to go low, not high. Yeah, the damn. The Democrats are pbs. The GOP is tlc.
[00:17:53] Speaker A: Right, Right.
[00:17:54] Speaker B: Like, yeah, you know, pbs. PBS is better than tlc. But which one are you watching? Yeah, I want to watch. You know, what is it? Naked and afraid.
[00:18:03] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, right.
[00:18:05] Speaker B: Bullshit. So, yeah. Yeah, you're right. Yeah. I do have that as a no.
[00:18:08] Speaker A: Because I thought, here we go. She's going to play to this crowd and, you know, the evil of the right and all that shit.
[00:18:14] Speaker B: What did you think of the black people can't be weird bit? Is that trite or not? I couldn't.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: No, I had that.
I like that bit. Right. Like Lizzo playing the flute.
I think it's true. I think it's really true. And this is where a lot of her humor is. It is like the truisms of black people are this way, white people are this way, Democrats. But I think she's right in saying white people get away with all kinds of shit, like being bizarre and like the guy that stormed the Capitol with the horns and the helmet and shit. But if a black person does anything weird, it's like, grab that person.
[00:18:54] Speaker B: I thought that was good, but is that. Is that. Is that a. I couldn't decide. I'm like, okay, yeah, I get, you know, that's a good bit. It's good commentary and all that, but I'm like, I don't know enough. I've not watched enough comedy to know if that's old ground or not. Is it?
[00:19:11] Speaker A: You're talking to someone who's been frozen out of ice watching comedy for the past 20 years.
[00:19:17] Speaker B: So you're listening to a podcast about comedy from two people who haven't watched it in 20 years. Yeah.
[00:19:23] Speaker A: Unfrozen comedians.
So I.
[00:19:28] Speaker B: It is. That's kind of. We're like that. What's it. It was the film with the guy who gets in a time capsule and.
[00:19:34] Speaker A: Then Encino man or something with Brendan Fraser.
[00:19:37] Speaker B: Brendan Fraser. I don't think it's.
[00:19:39] Speaker A: I think it is. Yeah.
[00:19:40] Speaker B: Yeah. We're the Encino Men of comedy.
[00:19:42] Speaker A: No, I always. I always think of the Siren Live bit with Phil Hartman as key rock unfrozen caveman lawyer. Right. He's a lawyer, but he was unfrozen. And so he's like, I don't understand what's going on in today's world, but I do know that my client slipped and fell on a patch of. Anyway.
Yeah. So I don't know if any of this is old, but No, I do know this. All of this, to me, is old ground. Not specifically, but if you walk through those themes that I just talked about, other than Covid being, you know, from today, gay versus straight. Right. The gay humor, the race stuff, this isn't dismissive, but I don't need to ever hear another. Black people are this way, white people are this way.
[00:20:28] Speaker B: Right.
[00:20:30] Speaker A: Not that they're not right or there's not new observations. I've just heard so much that any comedy room you've ever been in where there's a black meeting, that's almost what you always get, right?
The politics stuff. The. You know, I did like the. But I did like the last stuff. And maybe this is, you know, and when we get to other comedians, I think we talk about how we identify with them. She talks about menopause, right?
[00:20:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:20:56] Speaker A: And old guys and their problems first. Old ladies and their problems. And I'm that age and I'm not in menopause, but my wife is. So, like, anything menopause or middle age related, I love it. You know, Give it to me.
[00:21:09] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, the bent. She did the whole bent dick bit, like fixing bend dicks, which.
[00:21:15] Speaker A: Which I think it's been done too.
[00:21:16] Speaker B: Maybe I'm just not into body anymore because I did so many open mics and I've seen so many edgelords that I'm like, you're gonna really have to pull something special here. The one that I. The bit I really did like towards the end was when she talked about breast replacement. And then she. Because. And this is. This is gonna sound horrible, but most of the special, I was thinking, man, she is like an odd shape. She is like. She's like skinny legs, but then she's kind of round, but then skinny again. And she actually addressed it. So I felt. I felt like I was like, I'm off the hook here because she said, oh, you know, I'm this shape because of this medical condition, and the doctor is gonna suggested using some of my stomach fat to build new breasts. And I felt this massive. I thought, okay, this is gonna be a good bit. But, like, I'm off the hook now, like, morally and ethically for thinking like, oh, she looks kind of an odd shape.
[00:22:18] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, I like that she did that. I like when, you know, you call that stuff out. And I thought the bit about Esther was really good, naming, you know, her fat role.
[00:22:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:22:30] Speaker A: Giving it a name and a personality and moving it around. But that was great. Yeah, that was great.
[00:22:34] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I do like comedy I know like you meant to be body positive and all this stuff, but I do like comedians that like acknowledge their like physical drawbacks or whatever you want to call it, because I don't know, like again, that's the leftism thing, right? Oh, you can't say that or whatever. And it's like I always used to talk about what a fat bowl bastard I was like, like it doesn't. I'm not, I'm not doing it for a reason other than I think it's a cheap laugh.
[00:23:05] Speaker A: But if you're not self deprecating, right. If you can't first make fun of yourself, then I don't think you can really be funny. Right.
[00:23:13] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. I think you got. That's how most comedians, Genesis is trying to be the class clown by making fun of themselves, to deflect and blah, blah, blah.
[00:23:23] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And her saving that, that part for the end I thought was really good.
But I think the name of her special, to go back to that which you liked, should be called Wanda Sykes. Nothing special, Right.
[00:23:39] Speaker B: Oh, this kitten has claws.
[00:23:42] Speaker A: I didn't mean it like that, but like that actually is a great name for a special one.
[00:23:45] Speaker B: Yeah, it would be a good one. Yeah.
[00:23:46] Speaker A: Is there one out there that should be somebody special, right? Nothing special.
[00:23:49] Speaker B: I was surfing through all 800 of them on Netflix and I think someone has something akin to that.
[00:23:57] Speaker A: The not so special.
[00:23:59] Speaker B: Something like that. Yeah, yeah.
[00:24:01] Speaker A: Only because. And I think you feel the same way. It sounds like it was good, it was fine. It was old terrain, done sort of well, but nothing novel and you didn't really laugh, but you appreciate the craft. She's a pro.
[00:24:18] Speaker B: Absolutely pro.
[00:24:20] Speaker A: Right.
The thing I want to talk about though, before we stop, this one is the laugh track, or not necessarily the laugh track, but in watching more and more of these specials after being unfrozen from ice. Right.
There's something with the laughter. Right. I don't think it's. It's like when they pipe in crowd noise at a sporting event to make it louder.
[00:24:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:24:45] Speaker A: Did you sense. Did you feel any of that in this one?
[00:24:49] Speaker B: No, and I'm.
One thing I did notice was some empty seats near the front, but I didn't know.
[00:24:56] Speaker A: I don't really show the crowd, do they?
[00:24:58] Speaker B: There's brief flashes.
[00:24:59] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:25:00] Speaker B: I didn't see much and. Yeah. But I've noticed that on a couple of the others as well.
Especially down the front because that's the tickets they give away, that's the VIPs, which makes no sense to Me, like, don't make your vip, especially if you're filming.
Or at least half a bunch of bodies on hand to go. You gotta go sit there.
[00:25:20] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:25:21] Speaker B: Because, I mean, I watched a special where someone actually referenced that fact. Like, oh, I'm glad we've got six empty seats down the front here just to like, really set it off. But I don't know, maybe I would. I think I would notice.
[00:25:37] Speaker A: I don't. I'm not saying canned. I don't know that it's canned, but I've noticed that, you know, you audio guys, Christian or whoever would know some specials, the laughter is turned up a lot. Right. Like, it's.
Can be overwhelming. In others, it's more muted. Right.
Or like in this special, I was picking up a couple individual people, like, there'd be a joke and then it would peter out and be like, oh, like that kind of thing, you know, and it's like, maybe that was the.
[00:26:12] Speaker B: Person nearest the mic.
[00:26:13] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. So now. Now that we're watching more of these specials, I'm like queuing in on frequency that maybe, you know, the average listener.
[00:26:20] Speaker B: Wouldn'T talking of all the technical stuff. So I liked. Did you. It was a very old school 90s intro, right? Like, ladies, you remember the. Oh, let. Yeah, here's how we keep. Oh, this will knock on. Just keep it to. Ladies and gentlemen, the comedian. And I was like, wow, this is like. You could tell this is an older comedian because there was no frilly bullshit. You know what I mean? It was just like, I'm like, oh, this is old school nights. But I did, like, from. From now I'm noticing, I'm trying to know, okay, do I like the set, you know, in the back? Do I like what they're wearing? Have they made an effort? Like, you know, Sandler looked like a tramp that had wandered in. But, you know, Wanda Sykes, brand Sykes made the effort. And I really liked her stage backdrop.
[00:27:05] Speaker A: Yeah, it was cool.
[00:27:06] Speaker B: You know, the afro thing. Like an effort was made.
[00:27:10] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:10] Speaker B: To. To do that.
So what else did I do?
[00:27:13] Speaker A: Well, hold on, because you mentioned the clothes and we've started talking more about clothes on this.
Something bothers me too, about the comedians who have a special. It's like their first. They wear an outfit like it's their first day of school. Like, everything is brand new. The shoes are right out of the box, crispy, brand new. I tend to focus on that. I shouldn't be focusing on how brand new those shoes are or where they're from or like the Bargazi had that, you know, right out of the box.
[00:27:41] Speaker B: We disagreed on.
[00:27:42] Speaker A: Yeah, it's, it's, it's too cultivated. Maybe all of them are cultivated, even when they're meant to look sloppy like Sandler. But yeah, the, the clothes really do take away for, from it for me.
[00:27:54] Speaker B: But it's showbiz.
[00:27:55] Speaker A: I know, but I, I, this, this.
[00:27:57] Speaker B: Is something that's always driven me nuts about like grassroots stand up comedy where I exist and scratch out, well, not even a living. I don't get paid. So this is showbiz. Make an effort. You look like six sacks of shit tied up with string. And this is show business, right?
[00:28:18] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:28:19] Speaker B: I don't get you. Like, and that was like a funny thing. When I first moved to Chicago, I was like, no one dresses up here, do they? Like, I walk down like to get it just to get into a bar or nightclub in England, right, You got to drop 300 quid. And like bouncers would literally say, you're not coming in here. That with those trousers on or those, you'd be like, I'd be like, what's wrong with them? And they're like, no, no checks or whatever. And then I come to Chicago and I'm like, fuck it. Is everyone just roll out of bed on Friday night and like you've going down, you know when Lincoln Avenue. Do you remember that, that was like the place that Lower Bill.
[00:28:59] Speaker A: Oh, where the college bars are dudes.
[00:29:01] Speaker B: In like sandals and cut offs and shit on a Friday night.
[00:29:05] Speaker A: Yeah. And that spills over to comedy, right? Yeah, to your point. Right.
[00:29:09] Speaker B: But, but look good when you're on stage, people are looking at you look good. And this is coming from someone who looks like, like most of the time. Because I'm at an age where it doesn't matter what I look like anymore. But if you're on stage, you're an entertainer.
Try not.
[00:29:26] Speaker A: Here's, here's. I think you should look like who you are, right? If you are sick. What is the expression? Six bags of shit held together by string, which is great. Then you should go on stage and look like six bags of shit held together by string.
[00:29:39] Speaker B: But if you are, shouldn't go on stage. If you're six bags of shit, you should be at home working on. Okay. What? Where's my life going?
[00:29:47] Speaker A: No, no, you don't. We want to see. And this to her credit, like, if I look back at the whole thing, I got a sense of who she is as a person, right? Like, I know her life. After this hour Right? Her wife, her kids, her opinions on everything. You want to see someone on stage being themselves. You want to see some bullshit fake personality that they've created for the stage with fake stories and jokes that are contrived in an outfit that isn't what they would ever wear except for this fucking special, right? I don't want to see that. I want to. I want to see you, whoever you are, warts and all, right? That's what I want to see.
Because that's true. You want truth.
[00:30:29] Speaker B: No.
[00:30:29] Speaker A: Right? You don't want truth. You want artifice. That's what you want.
[00:30:31] Speaker B: No, I want rock and roll, okay?
[00:30:34] Speaker A: Rock and roll. So you're saying, yeah, you want glam. You want glam rock? Or you want, you know, hair bands.
[00:30:40] Speaker B: Of the 80s and roll.
[00:30:42] Speaker A: Rock and roll is. You don't give a shit. Right? Isn't it?
[00:30:46] Speaker B: When bands go on stage, they don't slob up there and you want Barry.
[00:30:50] Speaker A: Manilow is what you want.
[00:30:52] Speaker B: No, I want who's a good band with a great look.
I'd need to research it, but generally speaking, you don't see a band on stage in sweatpants.
Think, Come on, name me the band where they all go on in sweatpants and a T shirt, you know, and like Pavement.
[00:31:12] Speaker A: There you go. One of my favorite bands.
[00:31:14] Speaker B: Bullshit. You pull me the picture of Pavement in sweatpants.
Google it.
All right, anyway, let's get cut to the chase, okay?
[00:31:24] Speaker A: So, Wanda Sykes. I'm the entertainer. I think I showed my hand on this one.
Listen, I remember when Wanda Sykes popped. She popped first on. She came out with who she was.
She was like a pop up character in a show and she was fresh and different.
[00:31:41] Speaker B: And I only remember from Curb and that she was.
[00:31:44] Speaker A: Well, well before that. And I can't remember how she came out, but. Came out.
Came out when she was 40. Yeah, but. So I liked her then and I like her now. And I think she's. She's smart and she writes good jokes, but, like, doesn't. Yeah, doesn't do anything for me. Even though we're of the same vintage.
[00:32:07] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, Right.
[00:32:08] Speaker A: So I'm giving it a.
What do you call it?
[00:32:14] Speaker B: Well, we had a scale last week, didn't we?
[00:32:16] Speaker A: So what's a light bomb?
[00:32:18] Speaker B: We said like a. What did we say? We said bombed. No, it was killed, maimed.
Neutralized. Neutral. Neutral is the word.
[00:32:29] Speaker A: Yeah. Neutralized.
[00:32:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:32:31] Speaker A: Tased. I was tased.
[00:32:32] Speaker B: I'm neutralized as well.
[00:32:34] Speaker A: Yeah, neutralized. You wouldn't give it a. She's too professional. To be a bomb.
[00:32:38] Speaker B: Yeah, you would.
[00:32:39] Speaker A: But we're not gonna see any bombs in TV specials. You think where there's.
[00:32:44] Speaker B: We might.
[00:32:44] Speaker A: Where a guy goes up on stage and bombs and doesn't get any laughter?
[00:32:48] Speaker B: No, we're gonna call it a bomb if it's technically inept.
[00:32:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:32:52] Speaker B: Which it could be.
[00:32:53] Speaker A: Well, I mean, I don't think that's the only criteria, right?
[00:32:55] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:32:56] Speaker A: Technically inept, but yeah.
[00:32:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:32:58] Speaker A: If it's. Yeah.
[00:33:00] Speaker B: If it's utterly terrible. Yeah.
[00:33:03] Speaker A: Not utterly terrible. That should be the. On the marquee.
[00:33:06] Speaker B: There are utterly terrible things out there that go on tv. Like, I always remember I used to be part of this comedy festival that almost gave me a nervous breakdown. And the worst. And we had submission tapes from the spectrum. I mean, you would have loved, like, going through that. And the wor. I can honestly say the worst tape I ever saw was off, like a late night show.
This guy sent us a tape.
[00:33:37] Speaker A: He made it to the late night show.
[00:33:38] Speaker B: He made it on a late night show. He sent us a tape like, hey, here's me, you know, and obviously the implication is I'm on Leno, so. Yeah, yeah. But myself and whoever was watching it just looked at each other and said, this is awful. This is like everything to hate in comedy.
[00:33:56] Speaker A: Well, that's a lot of what you'll see in. In whatever remaining stand up comedy clubs there are. Right. Like you'll see just road warriors coming in and just. It's awful. Right.
[00:34:04] Speaker B: Well, I mean to say it's not awful, though, is it?
[00:34:07] Speaker A: Well, it might not be technically inept, exactly, but it's. It's, you know.
[00:34:12] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:13] Speaker A: Soil turned over a thousand times.
[00:34:14] Speaker B: Yeah. All right, so we're both neutralized.
[00:34:18] Speaker A: Both neutralized by Wanda Sykes.
[00:34:21] Speaker B: All right, let's end it. I'll put some music in now.
