Whip It!

Sorry it's been so long between posts, fans - life's been good but super busy and ye olde blog has fallen by the wayside. But when I saw the trailer for "Whip It," Drew Barrymore's directorial debut about roller derby chicks (starring the fabulous Ellen Page), I had to post it. What do you think?

Entertainment Weekly's 25 Funniest Actresses In Hollywood

Well, it's a good start but by no means diverse or comprehensive. They say:

Anna Farris
Tina Fey
Jane Lynch
Amy Poehler
Jaime Pressly
Kristen Wiig
Allison Janney
Isla Fisher
Jane Krakowski
Octavia Spencer
Ari Graynor
Sarah Silverman
Wanda Sykes
Emily Blunt
Kristen Schaal
Mindy Kaling
Rashida Jones
Leslie Mann
Emma Stone
Elizabeth Banks
Sarah Burns
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Nicole Sullivan
Maya Rudolph
Cheryl Hines

Who else do you think deserves to be on this list?

Thunderant

Under-sung SNL genius Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein make funny, intimate little videos under the name Thunderant. This one will be familiar to all of the humorless feminists out there (and the people who love them):

Prop 8: The Musical

Another entry in the "using your power for good" category -- holy star-studded musical theater activism, Batman - check this shit out:

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

Eve Ensler Presents Offensive Women This Weekend!

The time has finally come! The show I've been co-producing with Julie Goldman for over a year is blowing up big time with the help of Eve Ensler (the only person to whom I've ever written a fan letter - and she wrote me back!). With Eve's backing, we've taken the show from the funky Slipper Room to the funky (but much bigger) Zipper Factory Theatre for a two-night-only engagement that features some of my favorite funny ladies.

For those who think "funny" and "feminist" don't belong in the same sentence, I submit into evidence the following video featuring the show's own Rachel Feinstein:



Here's more about how to get tickets, who's on the show, and like that:

EVE ENSLER & JULIE GOLDMAN PRESENT...
OFFENSIVE WOMEN: TALK IS DANGEROUS
A no-holds-barred, rock-n-roll comedy show featuring the next generation of outspoken, outrageous women comedians!

Friday December 5th @ 8pm
Saturday December 6th @ 8pm

TWO NIGHTS ONLY!

Presented by EVE ENSLER (founder of V-Day and creator of The Vagina Monologues) and JULIE GOLDMAN (co-star of LOGO's Big Gay Sketch Show), this show is guaranteed to be a balls-out comedy throw-down. No subject is off-limits and these hysterical ladies are guaranteed to ruffle some feathers saying the dangerous sh*#t you think but are SO not supposed to say out loud.

With live music by The Totally Offensive Band, host Julie Goldman, comedians Rachel Feinstein, Kate Rigg, Betsy Salkind and Shazia Mirza (all the way from the U.K.), plus the dirty R&B stylings of Wendy Ho and the antics of burlesque superstars The Wau Wau Sisters, put on your party dress and pull up your big girl pants - it's going to be one incredibly funny night.

Produced by Julie Goldman, Erin Keating and Eve Ensler
Directed by Virginia Scott

@ The Zipper Factory Theatre
336 West 37th St. (between 8th and 9th Aves.)

Tickets are $28 at thezipperfactory.com
or call 212-352-3101

This is the perfect "girls night out" for people who think "girls nights out" are lame! Bring your posse and have dinner and drinks before or after the show at The Zipper Factory Tavern! Call 212-695-4600 for reservations.

More about the performers:

Julie Goldman – HOST - co-star of LOGO's Big Gay Sketch Show

Rachel Feinstein - opens for Sarah Silverman, Comedy Central's Premium Blend

Wendy Ho - The Gospel According to Ho, "Bitch I Stole Your Purse" (LOGO's #1 funniest video of 2008)

Shazia Mirza - NBC's Last Comic Standing, BBC's Have I Got News For You, CBS' 60 Minutes

Kate Rigg - NBC's Late Friday, Comedy Central's Women In Comedy, Vh1's Awesomely Bad...

Betsy Salkind - The "Squirrel Lady" from The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, former writer for Roseanne

The Wau Wau Sisters - Jimmy Kimmel Live!, John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus, The World Famous Spiegeltent

More details at www.offensivewomen.com!

Old School Comedy

Even though comedy retrospectives never manage to rate (even on Comedy Central), the comedy gods still see fit to keep them coming, and I for one an thrilled. I caught a great doc this weekend called Hail Sid Caesar: The Golden Age of Comedy that told the story of Your Show of Shows and the comedy writing dream team that made up its staff: Woody Allen, Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, Neil Simon, Larry Gelbart, and other brilliant dudes who dominated the scripted comedy business for the next 50 years. It was great to see - and still find laughs in - clips of Caesar and Imogene Coca (who you might remember as the grandmother from National Lampoon's Vacation films) doing all sorts of proto-sitcom scenes and the first-ever television parodies. Amazingly prescient stuff, considering the show ran in the very early days of TV (1950 - 1954), and TV was only invented in 1945.

This January, PBS will be airing a six-hour series hosted by Billy Crystal called Make 'Em Laugh: The Funny Business of America. The series is co-produced by Thirteen/WNET and Ghost Light Films, each episode spotlights a different American comedy genre and will include interviews from more than 90 comedians, writers, producers and historians including Rosanne Barr, Carol Burnett, Sid Caesar, George Carlin and Chris Rock and many more. Sounds right up my alley.

Here's Carl Reiner and Sid Caesar doing his spaced out Jazz guy, Progress Hornsby. It's over 50 years old and it still feels fresh:

Smart Girls at the Party

From the "using your power for good" department: ON Networks launched its latest show Smart Girls at the Party about "people who are changing the world by being themselves." The people in question are talented young girls, and the series features Amy Poehler interviewing her young subjects Larry King style. Amy created the show with her friend Meredith Walker, former senior producer for Nickelodeon's Nick News, and former head of talent for SNL. Watching this adorable, empowering show literally moved me to tears. To quote Poehler, "You hear that? That's the sound of something awesome!" In a counter-intuitive marketing move, Mattel's Barbie is the show's sponsor.

Check out this interview with 10 year-old writer Cameron K. - I dare you not to love it!

Monty Python on YouTube

I wouldn't be a card-carrying comedy geek if I didn't get all giddy about the news that Monty Python has entered the digital age with their own YouTube channel, which features a ton of clips, outtakes, and interviews. While they're better known for dressing up as women than working with them, these geniuses (geni?) have influenced every comedian since time immemorial. Just a flesh wound? I fart in your your general direction? The lumberjack song? Every sperm is sacred? Not laughing yet? Then I dare you not to giggle at the Python classic Ministry of Silly Walks:

Cusack it to Me!

The inimitable Joan Cusack has a project in the pipeline for NBC, per The Hollywood Reporter. She is developing a comedy about psychiatry based on her own idea in collaboration with the network and Universal Media Studios. John Markus (from The Larry Sanders Show) will write and executive produce while Cusack produces with Julie Yen.

I loved her recent performance in Nicole Holofcener's Friends With Money, and of course her classic roles in Working Girl and Sixteen Candles. To me, Joan is living proof that being a one-of-a-kind is the best way for funny women to have life-long careers in comedy.

Two New Ladies Join SNL

SNL has jumped to fill the post-election, post-Tina-Fey-moonlighting-as-Sarah-Palin, Amy-Poehler-leaving-to-have-a-baby void by casting two new female LA-based comedians, both of whom will make their debut this Saturday night. The comics are:

21 year-old Abby Elliott, daughter of comedian Chris Elliot, whose list of credits is short but you may have heard her as Hipster Girl on King of the Hill or seen her in The Midnight Show at UCB LA. Here's a reel of her doing a bunch o characters:



Groundlings mainstager Michaela Watkins, who you may have seen on The New Adventures of Old Christine. This clip of her as Arianna Huffington tickled me:



Mazel Tov to both Abby and Michaela - I can't wait to see them both shine!