Impress These Apes, Season Three, Show #2 - Broadway Musical Challenge

Old Town Ale House Hangs Nude Portrait of Sarah Palin

Northside Chicago bar (and favorite Second City-area hangout) Old Town Ale House is sharing a naked picture of a high heel-wearing, gun-toting Sarah Palin, painted by the owner's husband.

"Elliott, whose wife, Tobin Mitchen, owns the Old Town Ale House on Chicago's North Side, painted a nude portrait of the Republican vice presidential nominee and hung it above the bar, where it's now a prime attraction among his display of more than 200 celebrity portraits and other racy art."

"'I've been following her religiously,' he said Monday at the bar. 'I had never heard of her before, like everyone else. I find her bizarrely fascinating, even though I pretty much despise everything she stands for.'"

Adam Burke at Chicago Underground Comedy Sept. 23, 2008

Adam Burke is one of our cast member at ChUC, and got started doing stand-up after writing an article about the scene for Chicago Social magazine. He's a natural talent, and, as you would expect from a professional writer, delightfully clever with wordplay and silly flights of imagination. Video, music and editing* by me.

*The quality of the clip here is lower than usual, for reasons I won't bore you with. The quality of the comedy, however? Top notch, as befits his Burkeness.

Andrew Singer ("Soce the Elemental Wizard") - I Am So Gay

From my e-friend Andrew in New York. This is the clean version, which has so much cut out it almost doesn't make sense, but is still hilarious. The full version is here. It's a surprisingly catchy ditty; I've been singing "I'm sooo gaaaay" all morning.

No, Governor Palin.

PALIN: I can give you examples.

COURIC: Please give me examples.

PALIN: I can't give you examples.

...

MCQUERN: Please give me more Obama.

Self-Indulgence With Nunchucks, by David Angelo

Just one more video...my adorable comedian friend David Angelo, in what he calls "Self-Indulgence, part I." Hilarious and impressive at the same time.

Kate McAlpine's LHC Rap

Kate McAlpine is a 23-year old girl from Michigan who is carving out a life for herself as a science writer, a career I wish I had known existed when I was in school. (Not that I could have pulled off a double major of creative writing and physics, like she did.) Anyway, she's interning at CERN, and made this AWESOME video explaning what the LHC does. It's received over three million hits on YouTube, and I love it! It's hilarious and cute and actually really explains what the LHC is all about in a way that dry science articles can't. Kate, you are a genius! For real.

"If We Were Charlie Gibson" - Joe and Noah for 23/6

Holy crap, funny.

Oh My God, I Love This! Light-Paint Piano Player from Ryan Cashman

It's only 35 seconds and it's delightful, watch it! It's like a cheerful little alien playing music.
Light-Paint Piano Player from Ryan Cashman on Vimeo.

Photos from Andrew and Tammy's Going-Away Party

My cutie-pie boyfriend Bryan whips out those hot guns for some hot dinosaur tattoo action:






Andrew wants us to whack his donkey:


Poor little pinata!:


Adults scrambling for floor candy:

Beth Stelling at Chicago Underground Comedy Sept. 23, 2008

Beth Stelling charms the crowd at Chicago Underground Comedy on September 23, 2008. Beth co-produces Entertaining Julia Sunday nights at Town Hall Pub. Video, music, and editing by moi.

Flora and Calpurnia Snuggle

Ha ha, I made you watch a video of my cats kissing and snuggling!

Chicago Underground Comedy and the Lincoln Lodge Under One Roof

...so four months after moving to Chicago, my roommate Nellie is one of the new producers of the Lincoln Lodge, which means the two biggest alternative stand-up showcases in Chicago are centered around a household full of girls who cry watching Animal Planet and believe in the healing power of pot roast dinners and cupcakes. This can only be a good thing.

Mismatched Press Release of the Day #3

from T2Entertainment
date Wed, Sep 24, 2008 at 1:50 PM
subject Carlos Mencia LIVE IN CHICAGO OCTOBER 24th & OCTOBER 25th
mailed-by gmail.com

Carlos Mencia is at it again with his AT CLOSE RANGE TOUR

live at ROSEMONT THEATRE on FRIDAY, OCTOBER 24th & SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25th
presented by Bud Light, Icon Entertainment and LIVE Nation.

Tickets available now at TICKETMASTER.

Uh, NO. I like comedians like him, and her, and this guy, and these people. Not this joke-stealing, lying, pandering, unfunny idiot.

Crush Me! CERN'S Large Hadron Collider Down Until 2009!

Dangit. I know I'm a big geek, but I was really, really pumped about the LHC breaking down reality and getting to the bottom of things. I was following the initial tests via Twitter, and having updates sent to my phone, for goodness' sake - my excitement even had the New York Times emailing me for a layman's nerds-eye view of this whole thing. Then, the Twitter updates stopped.

And now? According to this press release:

...a large helium leak into sector 3-4 of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) tunnel have indicated that the most likely cause of the incident was a faulty electrical connection between two of the accelerator’s magnets...“Coming immediately after the very successful start of LHC operation on 10 September, this is undoubtedly a psychological blow,” said CERN Director General Robert Aymar...The time necessary for the investigation and repairs precludes a restart before CERN’s obligatory winter maintenance period, bringing the date for restart of the accelerator complex to early spring 2009. LHC beams will then follow.

I haven't been this disappointed since Congress was debating yanking Voyager's funding and letting the little far-flung probe go totally silent.

Oscar the Bar Cat

I joined the Blewt crew at a bar by the Lakeshore Theater, after the first Impress These Apes night before last. It was good times with some of my favorite people until I saw an apparently stray cat wandering around outside the back door of the bar. He was sweet and affectionate and amusingly shaven (shaved close but for a poof on the end of his tail and a full, lion-like head and mane) but had no collar, and of course I grabbed Bryan for emotional support as I went into "this kittycat is lost and someone obviously loves him and I don't want him to get hurt and I know I can't take him home but I don't want to leave him here and I'm a big softhearted idiot waaaahhh" until the bartender informed me that his name is Oscar, and he's her cat, and she lets him wander around the enclosed area outside the back door of the bar all the time. Ahem. Anyway. Bryan took this blurry shot of Oscar on one of his forbidden forays into the bar.

Fashion: Do Not Want

My loved ones know I am fashion-impaired. I can try to justify it however I want: I'm too busy to think about clothes and hair and makeup. I am living on a limited budget. I'm a little OCD/body dysmorphic/self-conscious/shy.

Terrifying truth be told, I wore the same pair of jeans almost all winter last year, until a snaggy patch split the butt wide open (at which point I simply started wearing leggings underneath), and this spring and summer I've been wearing a pair of my boyfriend's shorts at least every other day.

Nevertheless, what Kohl's is trying to convince me is attractive and appropriate fashion for women is clearly a big fat lie. Case in point at left.

Impress These Apes, Season Three, Show #1 - Stand-Up Comedy Challenge

All pix by me, full set here. Impress These Apes - Mondays at 8:30 at the Lakeshore Theater, from Blewt! Productions.

Impress These Apes is an eight week talent competition. Each week its contestants are asked to perform in a new talent challenge. One week they may be performing stand-up comedy, while another week they may be performing an original dance. Each week they are judged and scored by three hyper-intelligent apes from the future. At the end of eight weeks, the contestant with the highest score will be awarded $500, a grab bag of groovy prizes, and the title of "least pitiful human."

Impress These Apes is a production of Blewt! Productions, creators of long running comedy game show Don't Spit the Water! Blewt! recently returned from a trip to Los Angeles, where they met with Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, and other networks to pitch their unique shows and vision. Blewt! is excited to be co-producing this run of Impress These Apes with The Lakeshore Theater, which is quickly becoming Chicago's premiere stage for comedy and entertainment.

Steve Gadlin, Paul Luikart, Tyler Lansdown:


Impress These Apes Season Three Contestants:


Ken Barnard, Alan Metoskie:


Becky Eldridge:


Danielle Puterbaugh:


Seth Dodson:


Ken Barnard, Leigh Vandiver, Jim Fath


Jared Logan and Dan Telfer:


Ken Barnard, Jim Fath:


Steve Gadlin, Paul Luikart, Tyler Lansdown, Ken Barnard, Alan Metoskie, Jim Fath:

Mismatched Press Release of the Day #2

...or "welcome to my spam filter!" I was an independent Chicago-focused comedy blogger, people. How would this possibly be of interest to me?

Oh, and hey, random entertainment industry people, could you please tell Dat Phan's manager that Dan and I aren't really interested in booking him for ChUC? Thanks a mill.

Press Contacts:

Cxx Cxx 212-462-51xx

Exx Rxx 212-986-70xxx

Jxx Nxx 818-777-05xx

DIRECTV The Lippin Group Universal Media Studios

DIRECTV’S The 101 Network Rolls Out All New Commercial-Free Fall Season Line Up on October 1

Friday Night Lights, Live From Dillon, Rock & A Hard Place, Supreme Court of Comedy, Crash Sneak Preview Coming Soon to an HD Television Near You

EL SEGUNDO, Calif., September 23, 2008 — DIRECTV’s The 101® Network kicks off the new season with its biggest fall line up to date including...

Apes A'Poppin'!

The airline version? No, not really. But last night's Apes was amazing and fun. Time Out Chicago had a good time, I took over two thousand photos (editing the set down now), Erica was selling buttons with the pictures of the contestants I took on them, and the adorable Seth Dodson started off his stand-up set by telling Bryan a "your girlfriend so nasty" joke about me (the cliche he was required to work into his set was insult humor). Apparently I like to pour salt down my pants to keep the crabs fresh. That's what we get for raising our hands when he asked if there were any couples in the crowd. Then he made fun of Tammy, and Roger. It was awesome. Behold:



Or, as Apes reporter "Pep Gibbons" (AKA season one winner Jamie Buell) said, "But the star of the show tonight was SETH DODSON. If laughter is happiness’s illegitimate child, then DODSON was a priapetic sailor tonight - splashing his laughter-batter across the audience’s smiling faces. He turned his razor wit on all of us, passing out zingers and put downs with a smile and a hypnotic little tush wiggle that made this reporter feel a tingle I haven’t felt since those crazy APES used their zapper on my Arch-Bishop of Pantstown!! You’ll have to check out the video to see what I mean."

Impress...These...Apes!

Here we go!

(Oh, my who took those charming photographs of the contestants on the home page? Was it me? Why, yes, it was.)

Bryan Bowden and Blewtenanny on Gapers Block

I just posted a big ol' piece about Blewtenanny on Gapers Block. Yes, that's my foxy-ass boyfriend, the producer and host.

The disclaimer at the bottom:

(**The fact that the author of this post is inextricably intertwined with Chicago comedy, edited the above video clip and most of the video clips linked to in this post, and probably couldn't be objective about any of this no matter how hard she tried does nothing to negate the awesomeness of all the above-mentioned comedians.)

Becky Garcia at Chicago Underground Comedy Sept. 16, 2008

Becky Garcia entertains the crowd at Chicago Underground Comedy on September 16, 2008. Video, music, and editing by me. TexMexBex, as some fondly call her, was a founding member of the Spitfire Girls and moved to Los Angeles last year.

Mike and Duane at Chicago Underground Comedy September 16, 2008

Musical comedians Mike and Duane entertain the crowd at Chicago Underground Comedy on September 16, 2008. Video, music, and editing by me.

Holy crap, did these guys rock ChUC last week. The crowd was practically screaming with laughter, and I was trying really hard not to laugh too loud into the mic. "Thanks for being in the universe with us!" Also, I just noticed that early in their set, Mike refers to Duane as Mike. Awesome.

Bubba Versus the Burrito

This is Bubba, a 220 pound Mastiff. He eats Taco Bell bean burritos in one bite. He also likes cupcakes.

President Obama Huggypants

Healing America, one adorable little boy at a time.

Heart's Ann and Nancy Wilson to John McCain: Stop Playing Our Song, You Gnarly Old Fart

YouTube Comment of the Day

Kumail on Saturday Night Live!

Our sweet Emily Gordon has informed us that KUMAIL IS GOING TO BE ON SNL TONIGHT!

I’m not kidding! They called him in two days ago to play an Indian reporter, and he’s been in rehearsals all day. Tune in tomorrow night to watch the sketch about reporters, and bampsh! There he’ll be!

Holy flipping shnit!!

KB's Twitter Cupcake Project

A couple of days ago on Twitter I saw a message from my friend KB:

I enjoy baking and decorating cakes and cupcakes. Who would like some this Monday? What kind and how many? And... I'm totally serious.

I didn't want to be greedy so I didn't respond. After (astonishingly) she got no replies to her offer for homemade, hand-delivered cupcakes, she offered them to me! Even asked me what kind flavors I like. Then last Thursday night she came to the house with a giant container of cupcakes, which were chocolate chip cookie dough in vanilla cupcake batter, with vanilla buttercream frosting made from scratch.

KB just finished her degree from the Art Institute and is amazingly creative. There is some kind of thoughtful, arty "remote communications technology used to facilitate the sharing of a personal, homemade foodstuffs" idea behind her Twitter cupcake project (it's ongoing) but our reaction when she walked in our front door with an armful of cupcakes was no more complex and thoughtful than NOM NOM NOM as we picked cupcakes apart with our fingers and devoured them like greedy little children. Then we sat on the back porch talking for several hours, about comedy, and love, and dealing with critical detractors, and the strength of art, and so on.

The next day I Twittered:

Nellie, Teresa, and Elizabeth inhaled KB's chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting and YUM!

Then KB Twittered:

Talented supportive women are the most extraordinary creations known to me. That & giving away choc chip cookie dough cupcakes. I enjoy life.

XO XO, KB. You're one of a kind.

P.S. Do I really have a pre-existing tag named "a special message delivered with cupcake?" I guess I do.

I'm in a Big Article in Time Out Chicago!

A big huge article about the shuttering of the Bastion! God, that's a huge amount of my freckled face in that picture. But what an incredibly nice article. I admit I was very nervous about it.

Aw, I wish I could hug Kristy and Nate right now -- and Steve Heisler, for that matter. He understood when I kept saying "Anyone can do this, anyone can do videos and put up photos and posts, and more people should!"

Meanwhile, McQuern was attracting attention of her own. In March 2007, she began performing stand-up (she auctioned her stage fright on eBay), where she met the comics she’d written about. The following October, she took over as coproducer of Chicago Underground Comedy. No longer an anonymous, unaffiliated blogger, McQuern found her time disappearing to paid freelance work. She tried many times to get contributors on board, but few stuck around. “There’s just more work involved than people realized or were willing to put into it,” she says. Three weeks ago, with Mangel also slammed and no one stepping up, McQuern and Sloan decided to pull the Bastion’s plug.

Despite its short, amorphous stint, the Bastion filled a void. It was an update site for outsiders and an accessible outlet for comedians hurting for exposure. It surveyed the scene through a biased lens, but readers were okay with that. Yet if the comedy community truly valued the Bastion’s input, it’s time for its members to step up to the digital plate. “Personally,” McQuern notes, “I’m still puzzled that more people weren’t writing funny blog entries for us to quote from or editing highlight-reel clips of sets or sending photography for the photo posts.” If every other comic who’s complained about the media’s lack of caring registered a domain name, the resulting vibrant, dynamic Chicago-comedy blogosphere would be impossible to ignore.

Fay Canale at Chicago Underground Comedy August 26, 2008

Stand-up comic Fay Canale entertains the crowd at Chicago Underground Comedy on August 26, 2008, video, music, and editing by me.

Fay Canale is moving home to Seattle very soon, which is a huge loss to the stand-up community. She was well-established on the scene long before I came around, and, to be truthful, I've always been a little intimidated by her boldness and confidence onstage. She is powerful and funny and it's going to feel like something is missing in the scene here until we get used to her absence. You rock, Fay!

Aaron Foster at Chicago Underground Comedy August 26, 2008

Stand-up comic Aaron Foster entertains the crowd at Chicago Underground Comedy on August 26, 2008, video, music, and editing by me. Topics addressed: Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Bernie Mac, John Kerry, Vietnam, George Bush, and more.

Large Hadron Collider Update

Besides "non-malicious" hacker issues, there were power problems involving a faulty transformer shortly after the initial test last week, which explains the lack of Twitter updates since then. I wonder why they didn't report it right away, though? The lack of explanation about the lack of updates was making me a little nervous.

According to Scientific American, it would take 3x10^-8 second (30 nanoseconds) for the LHC to defrost a frozen pizza.

Did you know that robots carried out the nearly 54 million precision welds needed to create the machine?

Also, riding bicycles is one favorite way of getting around the collider's 17 mile underground circle.

Celebrating 26 Years of Winky Smiley Winky!

This is the man who invented the ASCII-based emoticon, on a computer science BBS at Carnegie Mellon 26 years ago!

"the modern emoticon does trace its lineage directly to Fahlman, who says he came up with the idea after reading 'lengthy diatribes' from people on the message board who failed to get the joke or the sarcasm in a particular post -- which is probably what 'given current trends' refers to in his own, now-famous missive. To remedy this, Fahlman suggested using :-) and :-( to distinguish between posts that should be taken humorously and those of a more serious nature."

Here is the September 1982 BBS post where he proposed the smiley emoticon:

19-Sep-82 11:44    Scott E  Fahlman             :-)

From: Scott E  Fahlman 

I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:

:-)

Read it sideways.  Actually, it is probably more economical to mark

things that are NOT jokes, given current trends.  For this, use

:-(

Awesome!

Cameron Esposito on AfterEllen.com

Our dear little Cameron Esposito is featured on AfterEllen.com today!

“I talk about my girlfriend, past relationships, and add a ton of non sequitur and weird little observations,” Esposito said. “I feel the same about my being a female comic in a male-dominated field … I can’t possibly divorce either of those qualities from my act, because they shape how I see the world.”

Previously she worked professionally in improv. Being able to quit her day job (which is the biggest accomplishment she says she’s had thus far) has allowed her to focus on her act full-time because, well, it’s a full-time job. When not performing, she’s hosting comedy gatherings at several other venues in the city and filming web shorts.

Go Cammy!

Magazine Updates

The big Midwest Living article about Chicago comedy is on the newsstands (it's in the October issue), but I can't seem to find an online version of it yet, so I might post some scans of the article later.

Time Out Chicago linked to one of my recent Blewtenanny photo posts today, in anticipation of an upcoming article about the shuttering of the Bastion. They talked to me, Kristy, and Nate for the article.

Since I forgot they needed a picture, I ran out earlier today and snapped a bunch. It only took taking 600 to get 6 that I liked! (That's a terrible ratio.) Too bad I'm not a better planner - I have a flaky allergy nose, it was a flat hair day, and you can totally see the reflection of my hand holding the camera in front of my face in every picture where I'm wearing sunglasses. D'oh!

On a related note, Ryan Robinson, who does photography for TOC, has a really great blog about his work, check it out.

The Ballad of Carrie Callahan

Last night Carrie came over and made us some snacktacular homemade pizza for dinner. Teresa, Nellie and Carrie and I had a delicious meal, then sat on the back balcony, taking about boys and dating and comedy stuff, and telling dumb dirty jokes and laughing until our stomachs hurt.

After Nellie and I walked Carrie to her bike, on a corner near our house, a man and woman walked by on the other side of the street. He was drunk, loud, and stupid, and telling the woman he was going to "punch her in the face...in front of these three motherfuckers over here," gesturing to us across the street.

Before I knew what was going on, Carrie was crossing the street with purposeful strides as Nellie and I stood there, sort of stunned. "What is she doing?" "I don't know." But we knew we had to follow her. We pushed Carrie's bike across the street, where Carrie had the police on her phone while the drunk idiot yelled homophobic and sexist slurs at us. The woman, probably terrified, said nothing. My hands were shaking and my heart was pounding as they finally walked away. I hate to think what the rest of that woman's evening was like.

Carrie Callahan, a small handful of human being, remained cool as a cucumber walking into the middle of a volatile situation to try to help a fellow human being. She did not hesitate. I hope her next stand-up intro goes like this: "Ladies and gentlemen, coming to the stage, a women who will bake you incredibly delicious pizza, make you laugh for several hours, and if your idiot asshole boyfriend ever threatens you in a public place, she has got your back...Miss Carrie Callahan!"

Here's a clip I edited of Carrie when she opened for our special Jared Logan show this year at Chicago Underground Comedy:

Renee Gauthier @ Angel's Farewell Show @ Lincoln Lodge

This is the last of the set clips from Angel's Farewell Show at the Lodge three weeks ago. (Jason Fever and Ricky Carmona's clips are also awesome.) Best parts of the clip - Nellie and Bryan's laugh (Bryan was sitting right next to me taking pictures, Nellie was across the room, ha ha).

Renee Gauthier moved to Los Angeles about a year ago and has been doing really great things. She flew back home to Chicago especially for Angel's show. To recap, Chicago stand-up superfan Angelica Busque, still just a twentysomething, has been dealing with the effects of lupus for a long time, and after years of living independently in Chicago, needs to go home to Michigan for awhile to take care of herself. It sucks, frankly, that she can't stay here with us, but we are all Facebooking and Gchatting our faces off to keep her up to date on things. Love you, Angel! And love you, Renee.

Mismatched Press Release of the Day

Since I shut down the Bastion I've been very happily putting PR people's urgent missives into my spam folder. It's one thing for Chicago improv groups to send me stuff, it's another thing for theater people, and national music people to bombard my inbox with lots of things I have no interest in. Here's the latest thing to find its way into my spam folder, and yes, there were lots of LARGE CAPITALIZED fonts involved:

Hey! Raphael Saadiq is bringing something different to today's music, and he is doing it right. If you haven't checked out his new sound, I suggest you do so. Here is everything you need to know about his new album, plus a few streams, to get an idea of what he is doing with his music. I listed some show dates at the bottom as well, enjoy. We also got some copies of his new album for contesting/giveaways! so let me know what you think!

Hey! Well, I think you should target your PR audience a little more closely. I've never been a music blogger. Also, people are probably going to figure out that 42-year old Raphael Saadiq used to be Raphael Wiggins, the lead singer of Tony! Toni! Toné!, and he's not, as his MySpace profile says, 28. I do kinda like his Motown throwback sound, actually, it's kinda nice, but seriously.