Here's the latest episode of Amy Poehler's web series Smart Girls at the Party, in which she interviews Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer, stars and creators of the web series Broad City and the upcoming Comedy Central show of the same name. Don't listen to the graphics, Ilana is the one on the left and Abbi on the right, not the other way around.
Throughout Saturday Night Live's history, the show's cast has been mostly culled from four places: the stand-up world, L.A.'s Groundlings Theatre, the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatres in L.A. and New York, and the Chicago improv sketch/scene (the Second City, iO, and Annoyance theaters). Sure, there are wildcard hires who avoided these standard comedy training grounds, like Fred Armisen – a drummer for a punk rock bank who caught the eye of Bob Odenkirk after making some videos of himself bothering strangers at a music festival – or Anthony Michael Hall – an actor from John Hughes's Brat Pack who had a one-season run on the show in the [...]
After a debate over whether the UCB Theatre should begin paying stand-ups or not swept the internet last month, the UCB and a group of stand-ups have reached an agreement after two weeks of discussions. Read comedian Adam Conover's Facebook post for details on what everybody worked out.
Our story this week: Jon Gabrus, your typical hipster, douchebag, Atheist and host of Guy Code on MTV2 overcomes the joys of mocking the faithful and sneaking a quiet toot on the church pew to learn a timeless lesson about kindness and tolerance. It's a goddamned Christmas miracle. Happy Holidays from A Funny Thing!
Jon Gabrus can be seen hosting Guy Code on MTV2. New episodes start January 15th. If you'd like to see his cherubic grin sooner than that, check him out performing with Death By RooRoo at the UCBTLA. Follow him on twitter @jongabrus.
This episode of A Funny Thing is brought to you by [...]
Interviews by Matt Visconage.
Improv was doomed with a semantics crisis from the start.
When long-form improvisation began to flourish as its own art form under comedy guru Del Close in Chicago in the 1980s, “improv” referred to The Improv, a popular chain of stand-up comedy clubs in dozens of cities around the country. The Palm Beach Improv, for example.
When I used to intern at an improv theater in Hollywood, it wasn’t uncommon to find a couple who wandered in from the street, expecting to see a guy with a microphone, telling jokes. Television shows like Whose Line Is It, Anyway? helped audiences distinguish improv from stand-up, [...]
Amy Poehler has a pretty solid resume as both a comedian and a person. After spending time studying at Second City and iO in Chicago, Poehler moved to New York with friends Matt Besser, Matt Walsh, and Ian Roberts to found the Upright Citizens Brigade, which has since grown into the massive community of learners and performers of long-form improv and sketch that it is today. In more recent years, on her off time from her TV work on SNL and Parks and Recreation, Poehler and friends Meredith Walker and Amy Miles started Smart Girls at the Party, an online network to encourage and educate young women about [...]
The Paley Center for Media, which has locations in both New York and LA, dedicates itself to the preservation of television and radio history. Inside their vast archives of more than 120,000 television shows, commercials, and radio programs, there are thousands of important and funny programs waiting to be rediscovered by comedy nerds like you and me. Each week, this column will highlight a new gem waiting for you at the Paley Library to quietly laugh at. (Seriously, it’s a library, so keep it down.)
The Upright Citizen's Brigade Theater has been talked about quite a bit this month, with escalating Facebook messages, responses from people working in every [...]
UCB Theatre founders Matt Besser and Ian Roberts did a special episode of Besser's Earwolf podcast improv4humans today, in which they walk listeners through the theater's philosophy and economics. In response to the recent internet hubbub over the theater's practice of not paying stand-ups, Besser and Roberts use the episode as a forum to explain that they use all the money generated by the theater's popular weekend shows to keep the place running during its less-popular free or cheap weekday shows. Check it out here.
Long-running Bay Area comedy festival SF Sketchfest just announced its 2013 lineup, and it's pretty impressive roster that includes pretty much everybody in comedy. The event runs from January 24 to February 10, 2013, taking place in 26 different venues in San Francisco. Tickets ranging from $10 to $50 will go on sale at 10:00am PST this Sunday at www.sfsketchfest.com. The lineup is so good it should make any comedy fan who doesn't live near San Francisco go absolutely insane with envy. Highlights include:
Happy Endings is finally coming back to TV tomorrow, and to ring in the new season, the cast and writers held a live show at the UCB Theatre in LA on Saturday (embedded in its entirety above). Hosted by cast members Casey Wilson and Adam Pally, the live show is full of funny stuff, whether you're familiar with Happy Endings or not, and it also features Happy Endings actors Damon Wayans Jr. and Eliza Coupe, Happy Endings director Fred Savage (yes, that Fred Savage), Happy Endings writers Gil Ozeri, Jackie Clarke, Brian Gallivan, and non-Happy Endings people like Kat Dennings and Adam Pally's cousin Ben. It's a jam-packed show featuring cardboard cut-outs, crazy [...]
Matt Walsh is one of the stars of HBO's Veep, which was just renewed for a third season, but he's no stranger to critically-acclaimed comedy after spending over two decades in the industry. Since rising up through the Chicago comedy scene in the early '90s and founding the UCB Theatre with Matt Besser, Amy Poehler, and Ian Roberts, Walsh has amassed a ton of credits in well-regarded comedies like The Daily Show, Conan, the UCB's own Comedy Central series, and cult hits like Dog Bites Man and Jon Benjamin Has a Van. Veep, from UK comedy demigod Armando Iannucci, is currently in the midst of its second season, airing [...]
Everybody fancies themselves as some sort of wizard that can conjure up laughter by a few strokes of a keyboard, but only a few tweeters are truly worthy enough to have all of their witticisms transmitted to you, the ever busy comedy fan trying to navigate through an increasingly congested internet. Every Friday we'll make your life a little bit easier by introducing you to an individual that you might not know about who consistently makes us laugh and momentarily forget that other days of the week exist.
(If you're reading this from an RSS feed, jump on over to the website where you can actually view the [...]
There's been a debate raging across the internet this weekend about the UCBeast Theatre in New York's practice of not paying stand-ups who perform there. The whole thing started last month when comedian Kurt Metzger, in his words, "trashed UCBeast" on Facebook for not paying comedians for a sold-out $10 dollar-a-head stand-up show called "If You Build It." Here's some of Metzger's Facebook musings:
"So last week I trashed UCBeast for packing a 120 seat theater at 10 bucks a head for a standup show in NY on a Saturday night, and then not having the decency God gave Jerry Sandusky to peel the performers off a twenty. I'll [...]
Ever showed up to a costume party to find you are the only one in costume? Imagine that, then add blood. Lots of blood. You won't believe how much blood comes out of storyteller Christian Capozzoli in this tale of an ultra awkward puberty, self shaving, self loathing and Hollywood make-up wizardry.
Christian told this story at Nights of Our Lives at the UCB Theatre in New York.
You can check out Christian's videos and other ephemera here and follow him on Twitter right over here.
Download this business (MP3), subscribe here on iTunes, or listen to the stream below.
