Everybody's a comedienne

As you might have read, Sarah Silverman, an accomplished and very funny American comedienne currently enjoying quite a bit of popularity in the States, was critically panned following her UK debut here in London on Sunday night.

As one of the thousands of people who bought £45 tickets ($70ish) to attend the show, I am not particularly surprised for the following reasons:

1. Due to technical difficulties, the theatre held us mashed together in the atrium for an hour and a half before letting us in, a fact that made her paltry 40 minutes of stand-up seem particularly inadequate.
2. When she left the stage abruptly, the audience refused to leave until she finally came back on in her slippers, told everyone to go home, and claimed she was out of material.
3. When the audience still wouldn’t leave, she subjected us to a painful Q&A session that actually made me embarrassed for her and resulted in someone yelling, “you’re overhyped!” and another someone saying, “I want my 45 quid back!”
4. British people don’t understand American Jews or Puerto Ricans or Mexicans, so even though that’s her shtick, using those jokes over and over again doesn’t really work here.

But still, I thought she was pretty darn funny. Yes it was too short; yes, she should have had new material more catered to her audience; yes, she should have been better organized and equipped with something—anything!—additional should the situation present itself, but still, she was funny. The reviews claiming she “bombed” seemed a bit unfair.

On the other hand, in Sarah’s defence, the Brits can have an odd sense of humour—perhaps not so much odd as utterly uneven. One minute they are creating masterpieces like Monty Python or the original The Office, and the next minute, they are laughing uproariously because someone said, “poo.” For a country that invented sarcasm, they seem to have a high tolerance for toilet jokes.

Anyway, all of this took me back to another comic bombing in jolly old England, only this time, the audience was a group of Alex’s friends I’d just met that night and the American comedienne was yours truly.

I was sitting in a pub, sipping some potent cider and someone had just brought up Arnold Schwarzenegger (as they do). I’m not sure why (possibly the aforementioned cider), but I started to go off on a bit of a tangent about him. You know, I said, he seems to be the only successful actor in Hollywood who has never been asked by a director or production company to change his accent. He’s just an Austrian (update: for those of you who read this before, I had a momentary nationality confusion with Van Damme) guy in every movie he’s in, whether it makes sense to the plot or not.

Sensing I was onto something, I started to cite examples: The man-made robot from the future sent to protect some kid in California says, “I’ll be back” with an Austrian accent; a cop who goes undercover as a kindergarten teacher says, “It’s not a tumour” with a Austrian accent; Danny Devito’s twin brother…I mean, in addition to looking not a thing like Danny DeVito and being totally different in age, he’s also inexplicably Austrian.

While Renee Zellweger and Russell Crowe are off with some voice coach 20 hours a week to prepare for a role, we are just supposed to accept that any one of your average, everyday American firefighters, scientists, FBI agents, barbarians, etc, could also be an Austrian bodybuilder. And I don’t know, I guess I thought that was kind of funny.

Alas, I was alone. I looked around the table mid-rant, realized that everyone looking back at me had blank, stony stares. It was my first comedic strike out in Britain—but considering the fact that in general, I cannot figure out the method to the comic madness here in the UK, it will likely not be my last.

That said, I suppose the Americans have hits and misses when it comes to comedy as well. After all, the U.S. made Talladega Nights a box office hit, but also created Seinfeld and Arrested Development (granted, no one watched the latter, but it was American-originated genius nonetheless). I don’t know, maybe the important lesson du jour here is that “funny” is not so much a British or American thing (and god knows it's not an Austrian thing), but a human thing. Ahh...the many lessons of the OckleShow*.

*This post is dedicated to my dad, who told me that I needed to "get back to the observations between British and American culture" and "stop writing a travel log." Since I'm currently attempting to write these posts while also nurturing a severe over-scheduling habit that consists of morning boot camps, weekend writing classes and evening drinks with anyone from America I've ever met who happens to be in London, the best I can offer is spurious comparisons and half-assed insight. But because it's my Dad, and I don't want to disappoint him, I'll try to be better from now on. Or at least funnier. Whatever that means (see prior blog post that you previously skimmed because it's stupid).

When the cat’s away

Lately, I have been over-scheduling myself like a Baby Boomer mom with her Gen Y kid. This urge to fill my calendar springs from an effort to assert my independence during Alex’s latest trip and carve out the elusive social life I so desperately (and impatiently) crave here in London town. The drawback, however, is twofold: First of all, I have been scheduling much of my time with people who are from the States and visiting (therefore negating the London social life aspect) and secondly, I’m so damn tired that the little space beneath my desk at work suddenly looks like a dern good place to take a nap.

Still, it has been a very fun week, and you know, all of this activity keeps me off the streets and whatnot, so I think it’s good.

Allow me to review...

Le weekend:

Before Alex took off on Sunday morning, we got to enjoy a beautiful 70-degree and sunny Indian summer day in the city. It began with my trip to my first Creative Writing Class, which was cool but somehow made me feel buoyed and defeated at the same time. More on that as it progresses.

Afterwards, we went to Hyde Park. Somehow, despite having been here for over four months now, I haven’t ventured too far into the wonder that is Hyde Park and the Serpentine. On such a beautiful day, it was pretty crowded because all of London felt the need to expose their startling pale skin to the sun for the first time all year, but was heartening to see the peeps out and about.

We met up with Christy and Jason at the Frank Gehry pavilion at the Serpentine Gallery.

I was somewhat underwhelmed by the structure itself (it’s no Pritzker Pavilion), but the people-watching alone made for a lovely afternoon.



Tuesday: (I realize I just skipped a few days, but unless you want to hear about how Alex and I watched Minority Report for the umpteenth time or how I unwittingly guilted him into giving me his Wii Fit, be happy we’re skipping over the rest of Saturday through Monday.)

Megdon and I headed to The Old Vic (creative director: Kevin Spacey) to see Table Manners, part of The Norman Conquests, a trilogy of plays by Britain’s own national treasure, Alan Ayckbourn. The concept is that the three plays, comedies written in the 70s, all take place at the same time over the course of a weekend, but each focuses on a different room in a house. In other words, you see the action of the six characters in one room/play, which tells a complete story, but you don’t know the full story of what was happening when each character was off-stage until the see the other two.

The play was great (and we’re already booked in to see another one: Round and Round the Garden), but an even funnier aspect of the night was the action that took place afterwards. Megdon and I headed to a pub across the street for some late-night food and drinks. Let’s just say it was the first time I’ve been a wing man in London, and you’ll be happy to know that the whole my name-is-Jessica-and-this-is-Elizabeth-and-we’re-sisters thing totally translates across borders.

Wednesday:

My friend Chris from college came to town, and we enjoyed a few drinks at The Crown and Sceptre. It was so great to see him, but I might have scared him when I told him he was my third best friend in London, even though he was leaving in two days and I hadn’t seen him in 8 years.

Thursday:

Do you remember that show, Mystery Science Theater 3000? The one where the bad movies would be shown and comedians would make fun of it? Jason, Megdon and I went to the live-action version of that phenomenon last night, aptly named the Bad Film Club. Last night’s cinematic trainwreck was Congo, a jewel that managed to escape my attention when it was released, but now might replace Teen Wolf Too as the worst movie I have ever seen, ever. Even after seeing it and listening to two very funny comedians rip it to shreds throughout, I still have no idea what that ridiculous spectacle was about.

It starred Laura Linney, who was slumming it big time before her string of Oscar noms, Dylan Walsh (who would go on to be plastic-surgeon-and-family-man-turned-sociopath Sean McNamara in Nip/Tuck), Tim Curry (doing an appallingly bad Genericistan accent), and I kid you not, a man dressed as a talking gorilla called Amy. There was a rhinoceros attack, mass murdering of evil gorillas with a laser, and a scene where the black guy from Ghostbusters (here with a British accent, for some reason) jumped out of a plane with Amy the talking gorilla strapped to his chest. I mean, you can’t make this stuff up…and it provided ample fodder for the comedians to turn it into a very funny night.

(Also, we got gorilla masks to cut out. I made a Sarah Palin one complete with bangs and glasses. It’s now hanging in my living room…I’ll make sure I photograph it for future eps of the OckleShow).

Le weekend part deux:

This weekend another friend from home is in town; I have my second writing class; Saturday is out on the town night; and Sunday, Megdon and I are going to see Sarah Silverman live at the Hammersmith Apollo.

Should be fun, assuming I manage to work in some sleep during that time. Thanks for the well wishes to Alex during the hurricane scare (he’s fine, btw), and keep the comments coming! I do love them so.

Hurriceinous

See that red blob? That's where Alex is right now...right in the middle of the eye in St. Kitts. Contrary to what you might think, it is not the wrath of a woman left in a new country alone. That is a far more formidable force: Hurricane Omar.

Alex promises he has battened (is that a word?) down the hatches, but just because I'm not the gambling type, please think good thoughts.

Home Again, Home Again Jiggity Jigg: Part 3

Of course no trip involving me and Alex in the States would be complete without a stop in Baltimore. Our friend David got married two weeks after Christy and Jason, so it was a fitting conclusion to our American tour.

Plus, we got to hang out with these people....

The lovely Miss Laura and Miss Meghann put me up in their respective houses for the 10 action-packed days I was there. Not only that, but they actually DVR'd numerous episodes of Project Runway, the new 90210 and the like for my viewing pleasure. God bless em.

Laura's very talented fiance Chef Michael Costa also extended his hospitality...and sacrificed his comfort when we were jammed in the back of a car on the way home from dinner.

The wedding of Dave and Amanda took place at the new Maryland Institute College of Art building. It was meaningful to them because Dave was an architect on the design of the very cool building and Amanda graduated from MICA.

It was a beautiful event, and Amanda looked like a gorgeous 1950s film star.


Of course no wedding (or post wedding celebration) is complete without a bit of debauchery....and we brought it in spades. Enjoy!

That concludes HA, HA JJ. Despite having a great time in the States, I'm suprised how happy I am to be back in a lot of ways! Stay tuned for more.

Home Again, Home Again Jiggity Jig: Part 2

Last time I took Alex to Chicago, he literally flew around the world to get there. It was January 2008. He left London to go to Melbourne for a few days for work, which, due to flight issues, was followed by a day and a half in Sydney. When it became apparent that he would have to be in Los Angeles shortly afterwards, he continued his eastward journey around the world from Sydney to LAX. After a few days doing seemingly nothing that remotely resembled work (unless staying on a yacht and partying with Victor Garber constitutes hard labour), he was set to head back to London, thereby completing this circumnavigation of the planet. On the way, however, he decided to meet me in Chicago.

Now, if this itinerary/decision-making process seems ridiculous, you have to understand how our relationship was at the time. Leveraging work travel to our advantage, impulsively spending exorbitant amounts of money on flights and meeting up in places where neither one of us lived was pretty much par for the course. It was tiring and at times, ludicrous, but it worked for us.

Anyway, I was very excited to show Alex my hometown city for the first time, despite the fact that I knew it would be extremely, if not brutally, cold when we were there. The temperature, however, was nothing he or even I could have prepared for. It was frost-bite-threatening sub-arctic, arguably the coldest couple of days in Chicago that I’d experienced since that time in grade school when school was cancelled. We’re talking negative 40 degrees F here—not exactly a great climate in which to explore the city and begin Stage 1 of my Plan to Convince Alex That Chicago is the Greatest Place to Live in the World.

After two weeks of summer in Australia and sunshine in L.A., the poor guy was rugged up in five layers of my dad’s coats, hats and scarves, with just a sliver of face skin showing, his eyelashes freezing before the wind-blown tears could fall from his eyes. It was pretty sad, and certainly not the impression I was hoping he’d get of my beloved Chi-town

So this time around, I was determined to make it count. I WILLED the weather to behave, and behave it did. When Jason, my flatmate, and Alex arrived, the sunshine emerged from the clouds and provided us with two uninterrupted days of pure sunshine, blue skies and warmth. We hung out with my friends, saw my parents, went to a gourmet food and wine festival, took the architectural boat tour, went to a birthday party, and took in the sights and sounds of the city.

It was a legendary weekend preceding an equally fun week/weekend in Baltimore (check out HAHA JJ: Part Three coming up tomorrow). As you can see from the pics Alex took below, I think Chicago finally made the impression I was hoping for...

Home Again, Home Again Jiggity Jig: Part One

Due to circumstances largely beyond his control (a.k.a. yours truly), Alex has been to Baltimore close to 10 times. I imagine that’s about 9 to 10 more visits per lifetime than most DC residents take to their northerly neighbour, despite it being only 30 miles up I-95.

Although he is fairly significantly better travelled than most foreigners when it comes to the States (newsflash, World: there’s more to America than California and Manhattan), the fact that Alex has repeatedly and inadvertently invested his vacation time in the same three square miles in “Charm City” since he met me has more or less throttled his continuing U.S. education. And has left me feeling slightly guilty as a result.

After all, this is a guy who is supposed to gradually and subconsciously become convinced that he wants to move to the other side of the Atlantic some day (shh…don’t tell), and well, though it is near and dear to me in many ways, Baltimore does not exactly a persuasive argument for expatriation make.

So I’m happy that on this visit to the States, despite culminating in a trip to Baltimore, my deprived boyf was at least able to experience more of what America has to offer. Unfortunately, many of the destinations he hit up on his own time were also of questionable influence (ask him about his time spent in a Key Largo bar with a gang of recently released prisoners), but at least the occasions when we met up in between my stints at work represented some steps in the right direction.

We started in New Symrna Beach, Florida, a place chosen by Christy and Jason (both Americans living in London) as a wedding destination more for the venue and the geographical convenience to their respective families than the merits of the beach town itself.

The rehearsal dinner took place at J.B. Fish's Camp, an apparently very famous, fun, low-key river-side restaurant complete with delicious hush puppies and grits, cold Bud Light out of plastic cups, and a framed photograph of Sarah Palin smiling over a dead moose. Mmmm....God Bless America.


The next day, the wedding took place at the stunning Atlantic Center for the Arts, and Alex, despite his terrified expression in the pic below, did a helluva job with his Best Man speech. Though we were hot and sweaty in the balmy Florida heat, I (and Alex, in his first trip to Florida) were suitably charmed by the tropical environment and swimming in the Atlantic Ocean.

As you can see, the first three days spent in America's Southeast provided a fine introduction to two glorious weeks to follow in the States. Tomorrow (or Friday): Part Two of Home Again, Home Again Jiggity Jig and the next installment in The Continuing American Education of Alex. You won't want to miss it.

I'm so excited, I'm so excited, I'm so.....scared

As a member of the Starbucks generation, I’m meant to have a Mary-KateOlsen-ian tolerance level for caffeine. I should be capable of inhaling cardboard cups of coffee twice the size of my head from sun-up to nightfall without losing a minute of my precious beauty sleep. The words, “Double Venti Nonfat Organic Latte Extra Hot with Whipped Cream” ought to roll off my tongue with the same ease as the theme song to Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and the McDonalds’ “two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun” jingle that is permanently etched in my brain.

The truth is, however, I am a traitor to my generation in this regard: I am, and always have been, a caffeine lightweight.

On an average day, I drink no coffee. Once or twice a week, when I’m especially tired, I'll have a half a cup, while the rest gets cold and, on the days when I truly forget about it, develops a film of blue mold. On the rare mornings when I'm suffering from a bad night’s sleep or the evil moonshine has posioned me, I’ll choke down a full cup and then have the shakes for an hour.

In the delicate chemical balance that is my bod, there’s a very fine line between staying awake at my desk and Jessie Spano as a “drug” addict in a very special episode of Saved By The Bell (seriously, go back and click on that link...You won't be sorry).

So when I tell you that today, my first day back at work since I flew home yesterday morning, I have had FOUR CUPS OF COFFEE and TWO DIET COKES and still had to take a short nap in the bathroom and run a lap around the block in order to function at work, then hopefully you’ll understand the severity of my jet-lagged/sleep-deprived state. And hopefully, as a result, you’ll forgive me for continuing to drag my feet in the ol’ blogosphere.

Assuming I’m not up all bouncing on my bed, singing The Pointer Sisters and wishing Mark-Paul Gosslear would save me from myself, tomorrow I’ll be back with a vengeance.