OFF THE SHELF – Issue # 32: THE STAND-UP COMEDY COLLECTION
Yeah, so sorry about the delays etc. You all know why that is. I’m not really in the best of moods at the moment so I’m not going to bore you all with a huge introduction as I normally do. I’m also going to hit on the “irony” of this week’s issue being about ‘Stand-Up Comedy’ when my life is shit at the moment and I really don’t feel like laughing. Funny how the world works eh? Anyhoo… These are the DVDs that make up the subsection of my DVD collection marked ‘The Stand-Up Comedy Collection’. Enjoy!
Jimmy Carr: Stand Up Jimmy Carr was as fresh and invigorating an appearance on the British stand-up comedy scene back in 2000 to 2001 as his unrelated namesake, Allan Carr, has been in the last couple of years. Carr’s style of comedy isn’t for everyone – it is essentially little more than a barrage of one-liners and witticisms one after the other – but if you like clever, intelligent comedy (the sort where there’s a seconds gap between the punch line being delivered and it hitting your funny bone) then Jimmy Carr is the man for you. He’s probably best described as a British George Carlin! I’ve found a lot of his stand-up releases to repeat a lot of the best gags so I always settle on this release which has one of the best gag to running time ratios you will ever see. One of my favourite jokes of Carr’s (not specific to this DVD) is “If we’re all God’s children, what’s so special about Jesus?”
Comic Aid: Live & Uncut This was a big event held on Tuesday 22nd February 2005 in order to raise funds for the Tsunami victims hit in Thailand on Boxing Day the previous year. The line-up was a stellar one, including the very best of British comedy. Simon Pegg and Jessica Stephenson rip the hell out of each other for great comedy effect, The League of Gentlemen clunk, and the majority of the “old guard” (Dawn French, Alistair McGowan and Dave Spikey sink without a trace) leaving it to the likes of the always fantastic Omid Djalili (you’ll recognise him from The Mummy and Gladiator) and Eddie Izzard to steal the entire show. In tribute, here’s another classic Izzard witticism: “The National Rifle Association says that, “Guns don’t kill people, uh, people do.” But I think, I think the gun helps. You know? I think it helps. I just think just standing there going, “Bang!” That’s not going to kill too many people, is it? You’d have to be really dodgy on the heart to have that effect.”
Lee Evans – Live At Her Majesty’s Theatre (1994) Part of the fantastic Lee Evans Live Comedy Collection 1994 – 2005 Boxset. Here’s a cracking gag: “At school they made you do stuff, like swim in your pyjamas, what the hell point was that? You’ll be asleep. Someone comes up to you and goes, “Somebody’s drowning!” You’ll be like, “I don’t give a fuck. I was havin’ a lovely dream.””
Lee Evans – Live From The West End (1995) Part of the fantastic Lee Evans Live Comedy Collection 1994 – 2005 Boxset. Here’s a cracking gag: “You’ll say to my goldfish, ‘Sleep!’ and it’ll go, ‘I CAN’T! I’VE GOT NO FUCKING EYELIDS! I’M KNACKERED!’”
Lee Evans – Different Planet (1996) Part of the fantastic Lee Evans Live Comedy Collection 1994 – 2005 Boxset. Here’s a cracking gag: “The Great British seagulls, they are fucking huge! You see ‘em with feathers rolled up, fucking tattoos. There’s always one with a gammy leg. They’re on mobile’s now. It’s like, “Chips, chips, two o’ clock.” They come up to you and are like, “Oy! Monkey Boy! Giz a fuckin’ chip!””
Lee Evans – Live In Scotland (1998) Part of the fantastic Lee Evans Live Comedy Collection 1994 – 2005 Boxset. Here’s a cracking gag: “Why are we still embarrassed about the condom machine? The only blokes who are not embarrassed are the blokes who don’t get any! You know, they wait in the bog, pound in hand, and as soon as someone comes in they’re like “Come on! come on! I’ve got birds waiting!””
Lee Evans – Wired & Wonderful: Live At Wembley (2002) Part of the fantastic Lee Evans Live Comedy Collection 1994 – 2005 Boxset. Here’s a cracking gag: “I swear, the other day I bought a packet of peanuts, and on the packet it said “may contain nuts.” Well, fucking YES! That’s what I bought the buggers for! You’d be pissed off if you opened it and a socket set fell out!”
Lee Evans – XL Tour (2005) Part of the fantastic Lee Evans Live Comedy Collection 1994 – 2005 Boxset. Here’s a cracking gag: “Car thieves operate in this area, Where else would they operate? It’s a f**king car park! The number of times I’ve been driving through the country, see a couple of car thieves standing in a field saying ‘You said there’d be cars!’ And thanks for telling us! They’re not doing anything about it! You’d hate it if you were getting mugged and a copper ran up to you and said, ‘He’s mugging you, he is! He’s running away with all your money!’”
Eddie Izzard: Circle I was lucky enough to see this show live in Melbourne whilst I was out there struggling to make it as a stand up comedian with my own tour, Resistible. He came on, struggled for twenty minutes, took himself off stage and straight back on again to turn the audience completely around in the blink of an eye. He was on show for two and three quarter hours with nothing more than a fifteen to twenty minute break in between. It was one of the best live comedy sets I’ve ever seen. His encore – involving a monologue about Darth Vader in the canteen at the Death Star – is in my top three pieces of comedy of all time! I was lucky enough, through an agent I had at the time, to be introduced with the girl I was seeing at the time to him backstage after his set. I was nigh on dumbstruck. Luckily I was wearing a bright red polo necked tight fitting jumper which broke the ice as he accused me, along with the tight fitting jeans I was wearing, of being a transvestite like him. He appeared like a lovely bloke in all honesty. I leave you with another of my favourite Izzard gags: “During the Second World War Pope Pius the 12th was supposed to apologise, not apologise, he was supposed to castigate Hitler for being a genocidal fuck-head with bunny rabbit ears. Um, but he didn’t say that; he wimped out, and he’s been renamed now, as Pope Gutless Bastard the first. He did apologise for the Spanish Inquisition. He said it was far too inquisitive. It was supposed to be the Spanish Casual Chat.”
Peter Kay: Live at the Top of the Tower One of the best stand-up comedians the United Kingdom has ever seen. He makes it appear so natural, so effortless, that – for someone like me who’s tried and failed at it – you can recognise that it’s almost an art form to watch him. “When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bike. Then I realised that The Lord doesn’t work that way, so I stole one and asked him to forgive me.”
Peter Kay: Live at the Bolton Albert Halls The ‘difficult’ follow-up to the hugely successful ‘Live at the Top of the Tower’ concert which took him from being a working class word-of-mouth sensation to the country’s number one comedian almost in the blink of an eye. To debut a stand-up performance as assured, confident and well constructed as this under such pressure is nothing short of fantastic! “I think animal testing is a terrible idea; they get all nervous and give the wrong answers.”
Peter Kay: Live at the Manchester Arena This is one of those disappointing Christmas rush-releases from a few years back that I bought because I adored his first two concert releases – but then released that this was just an amalgamation of the gags from both of those concerts, in a different venue. Still funny as hell though if you’ve never seen either of his gigs at The Blackpool Tower or The Bolton Albert Halls. Time for another great Kay witticism: “Why is it that when someone tells you that there are over a billion stars in the universe, you believe them, but if they tell you there is wet paint somewhere, you have to touch it to make sure?”
Eddie Murphy: Delirious Probably one of the best stand-up comedy movies the “genre” has ever seen and a film only really bettered by Murphy’s follow-up. Raw. It really annoys the crap out of me when this was being talked up for an eventual DVD release and people remarked on just how politically-incorrect and offensive Murphy was. Jesus people, this is comedy! Stand-up comedy! Told and set in the very early eighties! They let the god that is Richard Pryor get away with it but Murphy gets hauled over the coals? This isn’t an “official” DVD in my collection. My mate Kirk, about three years ago, went to the trouble of downloading every inch of it off the internet whilst it was still wholly unavailable and structuring it back together, making it into a DVD with a proper cover and everything as a Christmas present to me. I keep this and don’t upgrade it out of a sense of loyalty to him and all his effort AND the fact that the quality of what he achieved is nigh-on perfect anyway! I leave you with the film’s sublime ‘best bit’: “Your wife’s a Bigfoot, isn’t she, Gus? Your wife is a Bigfoot, isn’t she? That’s why the bitch’s moustache is so motherfuckin’ thick… ’cause you shaved the bitch down and taught her to speak. I know a motherfuckin’ Bigfoot when I see one! Don’t bring a Bigfoot into my home, Gus! With my children? The bitch can’t talk! She can’t walk a flight of steps! She’s not trained well, Gus! She can *not* walk steps! I’ll bet she climbs the fuck outta trees, though, don’t she, Gus? Doesn’t she? DOESN’T SHE? But you got to not bring her around here – fuck her! And your motherfuckin’ children? They’re Bigfeet, too. They’re half-Bigfoot, Gus, ’cause the motherfuckers is 6 years old and have Afros 17 inches long. They’re little hairy motherfuckers, just like their mother. Look at the motherfuckers! You know how I found out they was Bigfoot – when I realized your wife was a Bigfoot when I took your kids fishing last week. I put the motherfuckers in the boat, Gus, and I took the worm and I put it on the hooks. And they both sat there, and they put their poles down in the motherfuckin’ boat, and slammed their faces in the water for 2 minutes! And I think, “What the fuck are these kids doing?” Then they start moving their heads like this [quickly shakes head back and forth] and the motherfuckers come up with fish! I jumped back and said, “Can you believe this motherfuckin’ shit?” Then the kid took the fish out his mouth and looked at his brother and said, “Goonie-Goo-Goo.” What the fuck is going on here? Normal kids don’t do shit like that, Gus. But I’m going to tell you something, motherfucker. You can take your motherfuckin’ hairy fat-ass wife moustache bitch out the fuck, you can go upstairs and get the motherfuckin’ dog and scoop up the shit and take Eddie and get these motherfuckin’ long Angela Davis afro-wearing motherfuckin’ kids of yours and put them in the motherfuckin “Goonie-Goo-Goo” mobile and get the fuck out! And if my wife don’t like that, she can get the fuck out, too!”
Eddie Murphy: Raw Murphy’s more successful follow-up to Delirious. And when shit is this funny and stand-up is so effortless to him then you’ve got to question why he doesn’t drop the “family comedy” schtick and get back to doing stuff like this huh? “The brothers went to court and got educated on the judge. All of a sudden, it was like, “Can you state your case?” [gangsta voice] “Uh, yes, Your Honor. On the evening in question, per se, Your Honor… yo, check it out, Your Honor. I was just out the disco, right? Coolin’, right? I went in with my girl, right, and my girl starts illin’, says “There go Eddie Murphy.” Started actin’ all tipsy and shit. I said, “Where, where?” She go, “Over there.” I say, “Fuck that big-nosed motherfucker!” I make my money just like him, right, Your Honor, cuz I don’t give a fuck, I ain’t gittin on nobody’s jobs, you know? So, Your Honor, check it out, right? What happened, what happened then, right? I said, “Yo, what you want me go get the motherfucker’s autograph?” I got the autograph for my girl, walked over and said, “Yo, Ed? Sign this autograph.” [pause] Then Ed said, “I ain’t signing a *motherfuckin’* thing! Fuck you and your ugly bitch!” I said, “Yo, Ed, I’ll bust your ass for sayin’ shit like that.” He say, “Wh-Where, motherfucker, I’ll kill-” And he ran over to my woman and slapped her in the face, Your Honor! Then he slapped me and my man in the face, all three of us like the Three Stooges, Your Honor! 12 million! 12!”
Richard Pryor – Live & Smokin’ This is that iconic filmed footage of Pryor destroying his sub-Cosby reputation by getting up on stage and setting fire to all the preconceptions levied against his character. The Richard Pryor we know and loved comes alive before our eyes. It’s not always comfortable viewing, not always funny, but when it hits, it hits you fucking hard and you’ll bust a gut laughing! In Pryor’s own words “I had a break-up. I decided that I wasn’t going to do the sort of routines I was doing anymore. So I went to work, trying to develop the thing I do now.”
Richard Pryor – Live In Concert The new, “blue” Richard Pryor in probably one of the greatest piece of vintage stand-up comedy performances caught on camera. I used to watch this on VHS before I would go on stage in Australia: “I like makin’ love myself, and I can make love for about three minutes. I do about three minutes of serious fuckin’, then I need eight hours sleep! And a bowl of Wheaties!”
Richard Pryor – Here And NowAnother pitch perfect example of how genius a man Mr Pryor was when he was on stage and how, just like Chris Rock is finding out right now, fictional movies are not always the best representation of your talents as a comedian: “I’d like to make you laugh for about ten minutes though I’m gonna be on for an hour.”
Richard Pryor – Live On The Sunset Strip This is the infamous performance given relatively soon after Pryor set himself on fire whilst freebasing crack cocaine. A performance so free, so alive and so incredibly funny every person on the planet should be made to watch it at some juncture: “When that fire hit your ass, it will sober your ass up *quick*! I saw something, I went, “Well, that’s a pretty blue. You know what? That looks like *fire*!” Fire is inspirational. They should use it in the Olympics, because I ran the 100 in 4.3.”
Chris Rock: Bigger & Blacker Like I said, people forget just how funny a comedian Chris Rock can be thanks to his disgustingly poor taste in movie projects AND his below-par turn hosting the Oscars. If you ever want to remind yourself then check out any of his HBO Specials. I recommend this one, if only for the iconic, intelligent and hysterical observation that: “Everybody is talking about gun control. Got to control the guns. Fuck, that, I like guns. If you’ve got a gun, you don’t need to work out! Cause, I ain’t working out. I ain’t jogging. No, I think we need some bullet control. I think every bullet should cost five thousand dollars. Five thousand dollars for a bullet. Know why?
Cos if a bullet cost five thousand dollars, there’d be no more innocent by-standers. That’d be it. Some guy’d be shot you’d be all ‘Damn, he must’ve done something, he’s got fifty thousand dollars worth of bullets in his ass!’ And people’d think before they shot someone ‘Man I will blow your fucking head off, if I could afford it. I’m gonna get me a second job, start saving up, and you a dead man. You’d better hope I don’t get no bullets on lay-away!’ And even if you get shot you wouldn’t need to go to the emergency room. Whoever shot you’d take their bullet back. ‘I believe you got my property?’
Chris Rock: Never Scared Bigger & Blacker may be more intelligent and have a higher laugh-out-loud ratio but this is still well worth a look: “The number one reason people hate America, the number one reason is because of our religion. Americans worship money, we worship money. Seperate God from school, seperate God from work, seperate God from government but on your money it says in God we trust. All my life I’ve been looking for God and He’s right in my pocket. Americans worship money, and we all go to the same church the church of ATM, everywhere you look there’s a new branch popping up… remind you about how much money you got and how much money you don’t got. And if you got less than twenty dollars the machine won’t even talk to you. The machine is like you better go see a teller. You ever go to a teller and try to take out eight dollars and fifty cents? Oh it’s disgusting… oh man you gotta wait on that long ass line, people doing real transactions in front of you, you get on to the fucking front you fill out your form eight fifty. The fucking teller looks at it she look at you she looks at the check she don’t even take the money out of the drawer she take it out of her pocket, “here you go get out of here.” And here’s something man drugs are illegal but ATM machines are open twenty four hours a day. Twenty four hours a day. For who? Who the fuck is it open for? Have you ever taken out three hundred dollars at four o’clock in the morning for something positive. Shit when you press that machine at four o’clock in the morning I think a psychiatrist should pop up on the screen an go “c’mon man, save your money man. Don’t buy drugs buy some rims. They spinning nigger they spinning they spinning nigger they spinning.” Americans worship money. Shit you know why banks are closed on Sunday? Cos if they wasn’t church would be empty.”Jerry Seinfeld: Comedian As someone who tried their hand at stand-up comedy, I can tell you that this is a must-see documentary for ANYONE who ever gives a second thought to giving it a go. I met people like the obnoxious, arrogant and thoroughly detestable “Ornie” on an almost daily basis when doing stand-up in Australia. What I love about the documentary though is that – when showing us the tandem careers of “Ornie” and Jerry Seinfeld – Seinfeld has everything he could ever possibly want it terms of success and credibility and money, yet he is so hungry, so gracious and so desperate to get back out there, like a true up-and-comer, whereas “Ornie” has nothing, deserves nothing, but feels the world owes him everything. To me, this doc is as great a watch in terms of someone stabbing their own career to death on camera as the Troy Duffy flick “Overnight”. I leave you with one of Seinfeld’s best: “Now they show you how detergents take out bloodstains, a pretty violent image there. I think if you’ve got a T-shirt with a bloodstain all over it, maybe laundry isn’t your biggest problem.Maybe you should get rid of the body before you do the wash.”
Robin Williams – Live On Broadway This genuinely has to be seen to be believed for all of those people who ever try and come out with statements about Robin Williams not being “funny”. Here he is, in the aftermath of 9/11, picking himself up and taking himself onto the Broadway stage to do stand-up for the first time in decades (on the record anyway – rumour has it that he used to go out to back-alley, divey, stand-up clubs in the early hours of the morning and do a couple of minutes regularly!), to simply remind America that it was okay to laugh! I love this stand-up DVD. I watch it regularly. I think he is a comedy god in terms of his stand-up abilities and I urge you all to check this out! “Michael Jackson’s claiming racism, I’m like “Honey, you gotta pick a race first!” What, are you suing for mistreatment of elves, what are you saying? Girl, you gotta pick a gender too! You were Diana Ross, now you just left it all behind! Weren’t you the one who said, ‘Cut me, sue me, woo!’ Movin’ right along! And Michael, you’re not, you’re not a freak… you’re just, surgically enhanced. And you’ve spent more money than the Vatican, so let’s not talk about that right now! Shhhh! In Neverland, there’s a sign that says, ‘You must be this high to ride Michael!’ Obviously, the lawyers at HBO are going, “Fuck!” [mimes writing a check] But how fucked up would you have to be for Al Sharpton to go, ‘I’m outta here!’ If Al Sharpton bails on your ass, even rats would go, ‘Man, that guy’s queer!’”
See you all soon!
9 Responses to “OFF THE SHELF – Issue # 32: THE STAND-UP COMEDY COLLECTION”
I’m not sure if this’ll work…
YouTube Star Wars Canteen
That is a clip of the Eddie Izzard Star Was canteen sketch, animated with Lego.
It’s probably the best way to show the insanity that is Izzard!
GAZZ YOU SOUND LIKE A GOOD MAN, WHO CARES IF SOME CHICK DUMPED YOU, WHINING ABOUT IT IS FLOGGING A DEAD HORSE. EVERYONE’S MOVED ON BUT YOU!
p.s. Cocksplash!
Good times!
I’m here for you Gazz!
Great stuff. I recently picked up Patton Oswalt’s new CD, Werewolves and Lollipops and recommend that heartily. Especially the skit about the Star Wars prequels and Death Bed: The Bed That Ate People. They are separate tracks on the disc and titled so you could probably download them easy, unless you’re one of the five people (myself included) that still enjoy purchasing CDs, ha ha ha!
Cheers Nionix! Thanks for your words of encouragement and thanks for visiting the site too!
Other than that, er… “cocksplash” too! Whatever that means, but I’m sure as shit it’s not a term of endearment!
What DOES ‘cocksplash’ mean?
Well, whatever it means, there’s only one person who does know, apparently, and that is the not so anonymous “Tich”.
I still have to laugh a little about it.
I feel very very sorry for you.
Tich is a guy I work with. Still not seeing the “cocksplash” link though! Anyway, whatever!
Life is too short to get drawn into another random argument with Nionix!
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