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August 27, 10:08 AM

IT'S NOT OVER

When I was a child, my grandfather would ask me, "how's that broken arm healing?" - a reference to the fact that I had not written him a letter in a while. This was back in the days when letters were written on paper with pens, and we all wore wind up watches.

That's a little bit how it's been with that blog. Back then my excuse was that I had been busy playing conkers and cricket and taking part in other British pastimes that were popular in the late 20th Century. My excuse here is that we have been making this show more or less in real time - having complete shows with challenges and reality and stand up comedy turned around in about ten days from shooting to finished edit. I don't recommend it. Our editors are all buying Mercedes and second homes with their overtime money, and none of us has had much time for blogging. So apologies for that.

So how have you been? Enjoying the shows, I hope. Actually, I know how you've been because you are kind enough to tell me in the refreshingly frank and fearless way I've come to so much enjoy. Here are some answers to those refreshingly blunt questions/observations.

Here goes:

Anne writes:
"Is this blog thing over?"

Answer:
No.

Anne goes on to say:
"I agree that semi-professional comedians shouldn't be allowed... and more stand-up should be required. Not having to go head-to-head means not having to perform so someone can win without having shown any comedy? WTF?"

Answer:
I don't agree about semi-professional comedians not being allowed. Believe me, watching an open-miker stretch their 15 minutes of material over several episodes would be painful. You have to trust me on this. Also, this is the first year that we've had 4 out of the final 5 not perform. I wish it were otherwise, but we only got 3 challenge episodes this year. I wish we had 5 like in season 2. Maybe next year, what do you think?

Rex writes:
"Jerry Dee has been horrible, even with editing to try find a scrap of humor somewhere he has said nothing funny. His bogus audition was a pass through by the judges just because he's been on the show twice before...and what does that tell you? Yet he gets to be in the final five, having done nothing, and Matt Kirshen, who is at least fresh has to go home. Please, I'm begging you, make somebody earn their way into the final five, and bring on the new rising stars that are funny. I know I'm funnier than Jerry Dee."

Answer:
Enough of this Gerry Dee is no good stuff. Anyone who saw Wednesday's show can see that he's a very talented comic. I think his material is not as well suited to 30 - 90 second chunks which is what you see in the early stages of the competition, but when you can see his act for more than a couple of minutes you see how well he builds his jokes and develops his premises. As I said before, I wish more people had earned their way into the final 5, but there you go.

Grace writes:
"Your site really sucks and even though it says 'episode posted next day 2AM'...it's a lie.
Thanks for lying to us...assholes."

Answer:
I love that someone called Grace called us "assholes". I don't know the answer to that question Grace, but I'm hoping that by singling out your posting, someone at nbc.com will come to your rescue. And sorry for lying to you.

Tc writes:
"Here is the thing. Love the show. Not crazy about all of the finalists chosen, though. Really disappointed in the head to head competitions. It doesn't seem fair to have two people go home at once and the way those people are chosen doesn't seem right either. Why doesn't the person with the most votes get to choose who he or she goes against? They should be able to have a chance to choose their fate. This whole system seems a little screwed up to me this season. And for what it is worth, I do not think Doug Benson should have gone home!"

Answer:
The original idea was that the home audience would decide who made it through the head to heads, but that turned out not to be possible for a reasons too boring to go into. I would like to go back to having two people in the head to head. I thought that was more satisfying and more dramatic. By the way Benson fans, Doug will be back on as a guest performer soon, so keep watching.

Bipolarcorpse writes:
I loved it when the judges were switched in the last challenge. It really shook some of the comedians up and put them off gaurd. Great Idea. However I was confused or I missed something. Where was the sixth judge? Two models from deal or no deal, a drag queen, a nunn and a clown. Where and who was the sixth judge?"

Answer:
Very observant. We also had a drill sergeant and a biker (we had 5 switched judges for safety), but we cut them out. We're like that. By the way, bipolarcorpse is the kind of posting moniker I want to encourage. As is Danielle Steele.

Danielle Steele writes:
"Being a female impersonator myself i was affended bye the two comments calling the female impersonator a transvestite . Obviously they were upset but they offended me and I am sure I was not the only one. Thank you for having this forum and the opportunity to share my oppinion."

Answer:
Sorry about that. I am a big Jackie Beat fan and I hope she wasn't offended. By the way, who knew Danielle Steele was a female impersonator? Take that "Insider"! Come back soon for more shocking scoops and showbiz tittle tattle.

July 19, 05:27 PM

That's It?!

Last year, my partner and I posted our first blog about the first semi-final of season 4 and were deluged with hate mail and death threats about our choices. This year? 12 posts – many of them complimentary. So we’re off to a better start, or perhaps a more realistic conclusion is that no one, other than the comics on the show, is bothering to read the blog. I hope business picks up.

Apparently one bone of contention – from about three posters – is Debra DiGiovanni or “the cat lady” as she has been dubbed.

Janelle writes:
the cat lady??? are you serious?? come on. over the lesbian? they both basically made fun of themselves but the lesbian was so much funnier in her delivery. ridiculous.

Answer:
I happen to be a huge fan of both the cat lady and the lesbian. But only five comics can make it and I think Debra is hilarious and a real find who really deserved her place in the final 10.

Others felt that Tommy Jonagin was robbed:

Big Doggy writes:
Tonights cut list was awful. I liked the young white kid with glasses. Much of his material was funny and was featured on show bumpers and pro-mo's. He deserved to advance waaaaaay more than the fat chick from Canada, she was awful. What are the producers thinking. I may just throw in the towel on the show. A big disappointment.

Answer:
Please don’t throw in the towel Big Doggy. (Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d type). I agree that much of his material was funny, but is that really a good reason to stop watching our show? May I remind you that your alternatives are “American Inventor” and “So You Think You Can Dance?” (Although you might enjoy repeats of “Top Chef” on Bravo and “America’s Next Producer” on TV Guide Network)

A couple of posters are mad at the format of the show:

Ufc baby writes:
okay is'nt last comic standing usually a house with all of the comedians??? Why is that not happening anymore, That was the best part of the show..you HAVE turned it into amwerican idol. I will miss truly getting to know the comics and seeing the really funny stud that takes place behing the scenes, or the fun taskes the comics did..like one perfoming another being the heckeler, or watching them vote eachother out, now it is like every other show out there right no .two thumbs down for the not housing the comics..i have yet to see an explanation.

Explanation:
This has always been the admittedly rather confusing format of LCS: Open calls, followed by stand up performance qualifiers, top ten move into a house together, top 5 perform for America’s vote. This year, the comics will not move into a house together. Instead they will move into a hotel. We’ll still have the same hilarious and borderline humiliating challenges and dramatic head to head showdowns you love – just no footage of the comics preparing breakfast or playing soccer. Now you have your explanation, Ufc baby, so I hope we can put this unpleasantness behind us.

Billy writes:
This show is totally ruined without the group living together. This edited 3 min spot on stage where we hear repeated jokes from past stand ups is horrible. Some comics have decent material, but there is absolutely no substance to this show at all - NBC continues to screw things up - way to go NBC

Answer:
Haven’t you heard? No substance is where it’s at Billy. Fox is winning the night with dancing teenagers. By the way what repeated jokes? There may have been a couple of repeated set ups, but everything else was new. Unless NBC went and deliberately screwed it up behind our backs. Also, Billy, I’d appreciate it if you and everyone else here in the LCS community could work harder at coming up with ridiculous names to post under. Big Doggy is the only one making an effort.

James Haughten writes:
Dan thanks for your clever and witty insight. I love the judges...Ant and Kathleen crack me up. And I loved that you kept alicia's comments on Ant's hair in the Los Angeles episode...shows he and the show have a sense of humor. My tivo says the semi's are 2 parts. Is this true? LONG LIVCE LCS!

Answer:
I’m prepared to overlook your rather straightforward posting name to respond to these helpful comments. May I also compliment you on your perfect grammar, spelling and use of punctuation? You don’t see much of that in this crazy world we call the “blogosphere”. I am so cutting edge my word processor thinks that’s a typo – catch up Microsoft!

I’m happy to say that your tivo is not lying. Next weeks semi-final has some fabulous comedy and I think you’ll enjoy the show (notwithstanding its substance-free format). See you next week for more disgust, disbelief and threats of towel throwing.

July 12, 11:51 AM

You Asked For It...

First of all, sorry about misquoting Men at Work in the last blog. I can’t believe that the team of NBC.com fact checkers missed that. I kind of like my version better, but Colin Hay is a genius and deserves better than to have his lyrics mangled. I stand by the vegemite sandwich comment.

So I took a couple of weeks off from writing the blog (and we were not on last week – so strictly speaking it was one week). I come back to find that people have started to post in greater numbers, and now that we are 5 hours into the show there are a lot of comments and questions, as well as the simmering vat of angry musings I came to so enjoy last year. So here are some answers to some of your burning questions and concerns.

The first two are regarding our talent scout Ant:

John writes:
aunt needs to go back to his old hair style... looks way to fake and he wears more makeup then tammy faye baker.

Answer:
I can’t tell you how much I love the fact that you think his name is Aunt.

Doc writes:
A note to the hair-club-for-men gay judge: When you instruct a contestant to "exit stage left," don't wave in the direction of stage right. And for the show's producers, you might want to discontinue the promos in which he screws this up.

Answer:
We’ll get right on that. Now shouldn’t you be getting to the Drama club meeting?

Prince writes:
I am wondering who is paying off the judges That Iva La'shawn was seriously funny and they never showed her again after saying we will see you back tonight ...... then ooops no more. Did you think we wouldn't remember someone as hilarious as she was????

Answer:
First of all, Prince, I had no idea you were such a fan of comedy. Iva was hilarious in her audition – she did the thing about the crackhead relative asking for baloney through the letterbox, then in her call back did a set in which there was literally nothing we could put on air. Dick jokes and gags about crabs are not going to cut it on NBC in prime time. However, we loved her crackhead bit so we put it in.

Big Daddy writes:
Hey, my partner (The Goober) and I are HUGE fans of the show, but I have to air our grievances this season. JUST BECAUSE YOU ARE GAY OR A BLACK WOMAN DOES NOT MAKE YOU FUNNY! We are the epitome of non-racist, non-sexist, non-homophobic radical liberal Berkeley artsy folk. But with your gay, lesbian and black "talent scouts" we're noticing a TON of fantastic comics falling by the wayside in favor of more "politically correct" but far less humorous comedians.

Answer:
Are you trying to tell me that Mel Silverback is gay? He claims to have been Dian Fossey’s lover. No one set out to make the talent scouts the Minority Team. They just happened to be very funny alumni of the show. And I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about. Who are all these gay comics that are taking the places that should have been given to funnier straight comics? As you’ll see next week at the semi-finals, the Alex Theater is not exactly overrun by the lavender mafia. I’ll grant you that Doug Benson is kind of gay. By the way, why would two “radical liberal Berkeley artsy folk” go around calling themselves “Big Daddy and The Goober” complaining about too many gay comics? I’m sensing a conspiracy here, and the giveaway is your names. Those are CB handles if I ever heard them. If you’re serious about changing the show I suggest you start a convoy and bring mayhem to the 101 freeway.

Pamf writes, in a similar vein
Why is your show so gay? 6 out of 15 choices were gay, if they were the funniest no problem but...c'mon and what do your judges/producers have against funny, attractive, hetrosexual dames, hey forget the hetro just sexual any little bit of sexuality will do. But, at LCS we like to create the stereotype that women are only funny if they are asexual and of no threat to mediocre and insecure judges and producers.

Answer:
OK you got us. In our mediocre and insecure way we are threatened by attractive female comics. Just don’t tell NBC – they seem to think that the public wants to see beautiful funny women. We know better. Also, please don’t let on about our secret plan to fill the show with gay comics. So far it seems to be working. Let’s not blow it now.

Next week it’s the first semi-final. No doubt some of you may have varying opinions about the comics chosen to move on. And no doubt we’ll be hearing from you. Talk to you then.

June 22, 02:04 PM

WHERE WOMEN BRAWL AND MEN CHUNDER

So this week Last Comic’s global search took us to LA and Sydney, Australia (hence the headline – I could also have thrown in “she just smiled and gave me a vegemite sandwich” instead of the brawling and chundering thing). More on Australia later.

So after last weeks blog I braced myself for an onslaught of bitter criticism… and then this was the kind of response you gave us:

“I really do think that the show has done a great job of picking very talented comics.”

Wow what happened to you guys? Mostly people seemed to like the show, particularly Gerry Dee (who made it to the next round) and Richard Ryder (who didn’t). Mel Silverback seems to be a surprisingly polarizing figure. But seriously how can you not appreciate a Borscht Belt primate? I’ve never seen anything like it.

There was also some debate as to whether the comics who moved on were too seasoned. I disagree. Amy Shumer has been doing comedy for 3 years and was picked to move on alongside Arj Barker – a very successful and experienced comic. This show was never set up like American Idol, to give a break to young performers. Last Comic has always been about giving stand up comics, who rarely get to perform on network prime time television, a chance to show America (and now, the world!) what they can do. The fact that someone like Arj Barker would come out to compete just shows how big this opportunity really is.

So Australia: It definitely does not suck to be able to fly to Australia to watch stand up comedy – although there were a few performers who made us all wish we had stayed. One particularly memorable one didn’t make it into the episode, but you can find him online. He rejoices in the stage name “Ballsack”. I’m pretty sure that this not some kind of pun showing his appreciation for the founding father of European realist literature, the prolific French novelist Balzac. In any case, I’ve never seen Alonzo more enraged. It was not exactly funny, but definitely unforgettable.

You may have noticed the hilarious “business” we shot with the kangaroo. Here’s an interesting behind-the scenes fact: We also planned to get a shot of a Dingo carrying a baby doll in its mouth, as an homage to the famous “Cry in the Dark” line made famous by “Seinfeld”. However, the animal wrangler we hired, who had clearly not read our emails very closely, refused to allow it because she found it objectionable “as a mother and a dingo lover”. I have to say that the dingo was very friendly and quite small, and it’s hard to imagine one taking a real baby.

For the record, it rained throughout our stay in Sydney – so much for Bondi Beach. Also, not only did a dingo NOT eat my baby, no one offered me a vegemite sandwich (although if they had I would have refused it, because vegemite is disgusting). Nor did I see any fighting women or vomiting men. Maybe that song was written about somewhere else in Australia.

June 14, 10:22 AM

We're Back!

Last Comic Standing is back! (As we like to say in our cold opens). Last year in these pages, many people chose to vent and fume about everything they disliked about the show. You’ll be glad to know that we’ve made some changes.

We have a new host. Are there any other reality shows out there that have had 3 different hosts in the space of 5 seasons? I think that may be a record. Bill Bellamy is the best host this show has ever had. He’s funny, energetic, and generous without being soft, a really good guy and a great host. Some of the previous incumbents have not ticked all those boxes.

We also have new talent scouts. The lost winner of season 3, Alonzo Bodden alongside the hilarious Kathleen Madigan and the irrepressible Ant endured hours of viewing America’s most terrible comics in order to find the best. They have been a great addition to the show and were a lot of fun to work with. However, memories of Ant’s high-decibel laugh will linger in the memory for many years to come, and we wish Alonzo well in his brave battle with tinnitus.

This year the decision was made to expand the search to three other English-speaking countries – Canada, Australia, and the original English-speaking country, England. The first episode features Canada – we thought it best to ease you in to the foreign comedy. Debra, Gerry and Mel were the chosen comics from Canada and they are all hilarious, so it seems that the experiment was a success. (This whole blog is starting to sound like one of those Christmas letters about how well everyone in the family is doing. Hopefully next week you will have provided enough vitriolic feedback that we can just respond to the crazy people and not talk about the show).

One thing is worth saying before everyone gets all fired up about who did and didn’t get chosen: Sometimes, when you have to distill a four minute performance down to one joke it is not as funny as it was in the context of a whole set. By the same token, sometimes people who had a very poor set, or who bolted from the stage, or gave us some other reason not to move them forward left us with one hilarious joke on tape. For these reasons it sometimes seems like the wrong people move forward. And as has been noted here before, comedy is subjective so maybe you just don’t like our choices. But this year’s comics are exceptionally strong and it’s going to be a great season.

So there it is. Season 5 is under way. Let’s try to get along this year.