Chelsea Handler @ Carnegie Hall 1.23.09

I've been looking forward to this show for so many months that writing this blog post is almost hard, mostly because it's over.  But the longer I wait the less amazing the experience is going to come off so here I go.  

I first got into Chelsea Handler several years ago through my Chelsea-obsessed cousin, Michele, who has seen Chelsea's shows more times than I can count and has risked her life by driving through snowstorms to see her stand up, way before her popularity skyrocketed through her late night show, Chelsea Lately.  Michele showed me everything Chelsea had done (up to that point) and once I saw it, I knew I was hooked (although obviously not as much as she was).  Since then I've followed Chelsea's career by religiously watching Chelsea Lately, as well as reading both of her books, 'Are You There Vodka, It's Me Chelsea' and 'My Horizontal Life', which are both amazing and I would recommend them to everyone that knows how to read.  Unfortunately, I had never been able to see her perform stand up, as she now lives in L.A. and performs in New York infrequently.  So, way back in October, when I saw that she would be performing stand up at Carnegie Hall on January 23rd, I called up Michele and informed her that I had to come with her this time, and gladly forked over $50 for the tickets.

Carnegie Hall is not your typical stand up comedy venue, as it exudes class.  However, the beautiful venue only enhanced the experience by giving it a more fancy feel.  The house was packed and our seats were on the third tier, but in the first row on the far right, so it almost felt as though we had our own V.I.P. box (we didn't) because our view was fantastic.  I was super excited and almost peed myself before the show started, but luckily for Carnegie Hall, it's a classy place so I felt bad and used the ladies room before the show.

The show opened with a familiar face to anyone who regularly watches Chelsea Lately, Heather McDonald.  Heather's set was a mix of personal experiences and impersonations, and it was hilarious.  Many of her jokes centered around parenting her two sons and step daughter, which I appreciated greatly, though it will probably scar the children later in life.  She impersonated Drew Barrymore's lisp to the T (or should I say to the thsssss), the Kardashian-Jener posse, the ever-annoying Aliana Lohan, Celine Dion and even took it as far to parody her husband's Korean baby mama telling her to make sure little McKenzie eats her broccowi (not a type-o, sound it out grammar police assholes).  Heather's set was great and I found out that she co-wrote one of the most ridiculous, over-the-top and hilarious movies of our generation, the incomporable, White Chicks, which makes her 10x more awesome in my book!

When Heather introduced Chelsea Handler, the crowd went wild.  The crowd consisted mostly of girls and gay men, so the noise was high pitched and piercing.  What can I say about Chelsea besides that she is amazing and it's no wonder she has had her own show, twice.  Chelsea is relatable, to me, in that she hails from New Jersey (less than 10 minutes from where I live), she is jewish (I am half) and she's not socially awkward.  She says, aloud, things that I get embarrassed even thinking about.  For example, a significant segment of her set was based on her discovery of masturbation, at age 8, at a sleepover.  Around the time she told, and acted out, this very detailed event, a young boy approached the stage with a very large bottle of Grey Goose AKA Chelsea's signature vodka.  While thanking the young boy (maybe 12 years old), she also told his parents that it probably wasn't the best parenting to have their young son at a clearly R-rated show.  Many of her jokes related to stories she told in both of her books, some of my favorite, being those about her father, who actually graced the stage with his presence.  It was a family affair, even Chelsea's boyfriend, Ted, was in attendance.  Seeing Chelsea Handler do stand up, exceeded my expectations by a lot (which I can't believe due to my extremely high expectations).  After the show, my cousin, her friend and I went to the stage door to try and sneak a peek at Ms. Handler, and in an awesome twist of fate, we actually went to the correct door and got to meet Chelsea herself!  She was super nice, even with a growing crowd of fans surrounding her.  I was extremely lucky in that I got to speak with her and tell her how much I enjoyed reading her book and recognizing the places she referred to in Jersey.  I expected her to be like "OK GREAT MOVE OUT OF MY WAY", but she was extremely friendly, even asking me if I'm familiar with more places in our surrounding areas.  My cousin, Michele, was snapping pictures away and randomly got one of me actually speaking with Chelsea.  While it is not the best photo, this website is about attention so here you go: 

Also, she signed my copy of "Are You There Vodka, It's Me Chelsea".  Her inscription says illustrates exactly why I am such a big fan: "Jill -  Suck It  - Chelsea".

Is this appropriate?

  

This is my new favorite youtube video.  These guys are more entertaining than most people on TV.

It's in your best interest to watch this.

He Had it All Along

Most people are at least aware of a little show called Rock of Love. Most people aren't aware of it to the extent that I am, but that's a problem I am working on privately. As someone who was more or less in the fetal stage of development when Poison became famous, I had never really seen any photos of Bret before all the surgery and hair extensions, so I decided to do some research and find out what all the hype was originally about.

What I found was shocking. I was expecting #4 on Playgirl's Hottest Men on Earth list circa 1988 would look like Brad Pitt or someone as equally dripping with masculinity. Unfortunately what I discovered is that the band Poison, was made up entirely of women. There are whores who don't wear as much make up as these guys. What I also found interesting, is that the other members of Poison all look like girls who have appeared on the show. This is exemplified by the cover to their album "Look What the Cat Dragged In". So I took the liberty of photo shopping the girls names onto the album cover for your viewing pleasure.

If you are not as familiar with Rock of Love as I am, you can compare this album cover to the real girls: Marcia(the Brasilian firecracker who choked out Ashley on the first episode of season 3), Ashley (she sang a song about Marcia taking a shit and then got choked), and of course the 'New York' of Rock of Love, Heather Chadwell (also has appeared on Rock of Love 2, I Love Money, & Charm School, and undoubtedly at least 3 more VH1 celebreality shows in the future).

Big Terrific 1.15.09

I couldn't possibly have come out of my winter cocoon without going to my favorite stand-up show, Big Terrific! I haven't been able to go in almost a month and it has been the one of the least funny months of my life. Big Terrific, in case you don't know, is a weekly comedy show at Sound Fix Lounge in Williamsburg (110 Bedford Ave), that takes place each Thursday at "8 o'clock sharp", which usually means around 8:30. But if you want to get a seat I would recommend arriving a little before 8, since the show is growing increasingly popular each day and the number of seats stays constant(that is the most math I am capable of doing).Anywho...Big Terrific is hosted by Max Silvestri, Jenny Slate and Gabe Liedman. Max opened up the show with some completely appropriate jokes about the plane crash of the day (a plane crashed into the Hudson River yesterday because some geese flew into the engine, but no one was hurt, in case you have no idea what I'm referring to). Max was probably the first person in history to publicly joke about this plane crash, granted it happened hours before, the jokes were new, fresh and weren't offensive to anyone (except maybe geese, but geese suck anyway so who cares).

Up first was Myq Kaplan, who introduced himself as "a jewish". His jokes were mostly self-deprecating, but he also threw in a few about abortion and rape, which is always a winning combination. He used a lot of words in his jokes and they often made sentences that were funny when said aloud.

Following Kaplan was Sean O'Connor, who was introduced, by Max, as having started the most stand-up shows in NYC. O'Connor lived up to his name by having red hair. Not only was his set funny, but also informative. For example, did you know that a man can ejaculate with a flaccid penis? Neither did I, until O'Connor explained not only that it was possible, but in detail how he discovered this scientific anomaly. The way I see it the dirtier, the better so I give O'Connor two thumbs up (your butthole).

Following O'Connor was, Rob Lathan of Human Giant and also other things. He began by showing the audience a wonderful skill of his, fast hands. I just tried to youtube "fast hands" and only got a bunch of nerds playing video games, so unfortunately I have no example to show, but it was pretty sweet to watch his face turn beet red while performing this fantastic feat. He also talked about yesterday's plane crash, but focused more on where was immigration and security when these Canadian Geese were coming into the US. I enjoyed it.

Next was Eugene Mirman of the hit HBO series, Flight of the Conchords. Before Mirman took the stage, Max passed out slips of paper to the audience. The papers had questions on them: name, age, male/female/bothsies, "what are you afraid of?", "what do you need advice about?". The papers were collected and handed to Mirman at the beginning of his set. He informed us about he new book, 'The Will to Whatev', which offers up life advice that is somewhat to very useful. Before he got to our questions, he showed three short videos that gave advice on high school, getting into college and drugs & rock 'n roll. The videos were just him sitting in a room talking, but ended up hilarious because what he said, at times, was ridiculous (or ridiculously true?), also because his facial expressions were so serious throughout. Then he got to the audience questions and yippee mine was picked, as was my friend's. My fear was 'walking on subway grates on the street',(which is an actual lifelong fear of mine) and what I needed advice on was 'how to stay off facebook'. He told me that my fear was totally irrational because no one ever falls through (even though that is not enough for me to walk on them if I don't have to and he said it in a much more entertaining way), and his advice for my facebook problem was to get into a horrible relationship so I would have no time to be on the computer because I would be too busy screaming and pressing charges. He was fantastic and it's no surprise to me that he is on a HBO series.

The final act of the night, was none other than Gabe & Jenny! I'm not sure that it's possible for me to get sick of them, and this was kind of tested considering I saw them two nights in a row. While some of the material was repeated from the night before (I still laughed and thought it was just as funny as the first time I heard it), they also featured new material and a longer set. The highlight of their performance, however, was probably the video short they showed and the 'skit' they performed before pressing play. Recently they were asked to recreate a black and white, silent film from back in the day. Their recreation of it litterally almost made me pee my pants because it was so chocked full of comedy.

All in all, the show was fantastic and I really can't believe I took so much time off. I'll try to never let it happen again!

picture courtesy of Max Silvestri

Totally J/K with Joe and Noah 1.14.09

It's been really cold lately and when it's cold I prefer not to go outdoors, unless it is absolutely essential, but I made some exceptions this week because I was really missing my favorite activity: watching stand-up. So this Wednesday, I headed down to my favorite place to go for free, and wonderful, stand-up comedy, Sound Fix Lounge.

Every Wednesday at 9:30 PM, Joe Mande and Noah Garfinkle host a show, appropriately titled, Totally J/K. And this week was no different. The BFFs opened the show with the "Totally JK List of Nothing", which never fails to entertain. If I had to pick, my favorite item on the list of nothing is probably "Clarrissa Explains it: Balls", which, Noah explained to me, was originally intended to be a sexual education series, starring Melissa Joan Hart, until they realized it was nothing. Although I think that Clarissa (I like Clarrisa Darling, much better than Melissa Joan Hart, so I'm going to call her that) would probably be up for the idea considering her career has amounted to nothing more than Sabrina the Teenage Witch reruns on ABC Family. Anyways, I'm getting off track. My favorite "List of Nothing" item that they actually discussed during the show was "Nut or DoughNut", which is supposed to be a spin off of Deal or No Deal and is much funnier when they explain it, so thats where I stop explaining this. Moving on..

The first performer was Roger Hailes. Hailes has written for Comedy Central, VH1 and probably a whole lot of other things that I don't know off-hand, but more than likely would recognize. Hailes' jokes are mostly observational; he spins an everyday occurance into something relatable, but also hilarious. This is my second, or third, time seeing his stand-up and each time he has brought something new to the table and has never failed to make me laugh

After Hailes, Noah came onto the stage and made jokes about his professor dying. It probably doesn't sound funny when you're reading this thinking "OMG, it's like totally not cool to make fun of dead people", but you're wrong because it is funny to make fun of dead people, especially when it's coming from Noah. So suck it. Anyways, the next act to hit the stage is one of my personal favorites: Gabe and Jenny! This boy and girl duo did jokes, for both, people with a "hangey-downey" or a "puseta" and stayed true to their promise to "entertain 100% of the audience". Also they showed a short video, from their series "Besties by Bestie", highlighting aspects of their BFF-ness, and also brought on many laughs from the audience.

Also Wyatt Cenac, from 'The Daily Show' and Baron Vaughn of Comedy Central were also there that night, but I was with friends I hadn't seen in awhile and by the time they came on I was pretty drunk so I don't want to pretend I remember specifics from their sets. I do remember that both were very funny and I guess I'll have to see them again, with a little less beer in my stomach, to fully be able to give any sort of review. Sorry about that.

All in all, I had a great night and hopefully will be back next Wednesday. For those of you who don't know, the show is every Wednesday at 9:30 PM at Soundfix Lounge in Williamsburg (110 Bedford Ave.) and the show is free, and while there is no drink minimum, there is a bar. Everyone should go to it!

i'm watching you.

I'm a total stalker. No I don't literally follow people around with binoculars and make hair dolls, but I do utilize Facebook, as well as Google (when Facebook just isn't enough) I tend to mainly stalk the same kinds of people over and over again.

I stalk the following:

people under 25 that have babies

• Babies in general, yea they're cute, but I won't purposely set aside time in my day to look at pictures of them, especially not pictures I've already seen (many, many times). But there's just something about the girl who was on your pee-wee softball team in 2nd greade and her child. I'm not even sure why I feel this way. I just have a strong compulsion to check her (even though there are multiple hers in this case...) Facebook account almost daily to see if Little Suzy learned to walk yet, ate an apple, got a new dress, pooped her pants, etc. So if you're ready this, went to high school with me, and have a baby that you post pictures of on Facebook...I hope you're comfortable with this and please don't be freaked out because I promise I'll never be outside your window like a major creeper. I'll just be several hundred miles away looking at your baby like a total creeper.

girls I believe want to fuck my boyfriend

• This one is just obvious. All girls do this. However, in my stalker world, I probably stalk these whores the least. But if you must know why its because you have to know that they've moved onto someone else and also that they're uglyier, fatter, smellier, sluttier, bitchier,and more of a loser than me. Also, in a lot of cases the girls don't really even want your boyfriend, which makes you more stalker-ish. This category of stalking doesn't really do anything besides make me feel dumb, so I'm done talking about it.

interesting people (who usually end up being very uninteresting hipsters)

• Let me clarify. You can be really interesting, but if you aren't a hipster, I prob won't stalk you. There's just something about them that is so interesting to me. I think mostly it's wondering how the kid that grew up next door to me ended up living in Williamsburg, drinking PBR, wearing glasses way too big for their face and lots of flannel. It makes me wonder, "Where did I go wrong?" and also makes me curious. I get curious about what kind of stuff they know that I just have never even heard of. Like I know a lot of pointless shit, and even some stuff that might have a point if you really search for it. But I just wonder how they think compared to how I think...so I stalk them to try and figure it out. Usually though, I find out that they don't really know/watch/see anything differently than I do and that's usually when the stalking ends.

and

people that are so ridiculously douchey you can't look away

• self-explanitory.

This video is about stalking and being funny.

(fyi:i am not affiliated with this video at all, just like it)

Resolutions are for Suckers

New Years resolutions are stupid.

Here are some resolutions

that are more likely for me to keep,

than the typical stop smoking,

loose weight,

stop being such a cry baby

bitch resolutions that everyone makes every year:

• Make it into an issue of Sports Illustrated
• Find an ride a real live dinosaur
• Prove that Chickens and Eggs were both created at the same time
• Petition a bill that forces all sex offenders who don't have moustaches to get one and all men who have moustaches that are not sex offenders shave them off
• Get so drunk that I urinate actual vodka
• Start a band called "DUI and the Hubcaps"
• Devote myself to any religion

Happy New Year!