October Stuff

I'm excited for Match Game Live tomorrow. We've got Christian Finnegan, Chris March, Jessica Delfino, Becky Donohue, Robbyne Kaamil, and Eric Kirchberger on the panel. And I'm going to wear a leisure suit that I found at Goodwill in South Bend, Indiana, for $1.87. It's hunter green with white stitching, a real beaut. I wish I had white leather shoes and white leather cap. Maybe I'll find a white turtleneck somewhere today. I think Brandon and Jillian are joining the theme to do some sort of Mod Squad trio... we'll see. Meanwhile, I haven't written a single question for the show yet. Whoops. S'ok. I work best under pressure. It'll happen.

I was just on the Keith and the Girl show on Monday and you can listen to it here. We talked about the Balloon Boy a lot and I sang "Eating Love." They are super awesome. I fucked up and overbooked the Match Game show. They were really nice about it, and offered to bow out so that I wouldn't have conflict with the other comics. That's class, my friends.

Marga Gomez has been visiting New York and she's getting an award on Monday. I think it's some recognition of her being a cool Latina over a certain period of time. I will get to the bottom of it and find out exactly what the award is for. I'm very excited to fly out to San Francisco and play her big New Year's Eve show at the Victoria Theater. It's gonna rock.

I've finalized my plans to play in Austin, Houston, and New Orleans in late December so that's going to be awesome. Really great venues, especially "Le Chat Noir" in New Orleans.

Matt Kirshen, Jessica Delfino, Tanya O'Debra, Marga Gomez, Mike Amato

Matt Kirshen is immediately likable on stage and off. His show is intelligent comedy, storytelling and jokes, taking the piss out of the wrongheaded desire of Brits to watch people fail, constructed into a solid hour show about self-confidence called, Shorter Than Napoleon. Matt was nice enough to give me a pair of tickets. I had a bad night that night, some talkers in the front seats at my show. And then I was late to pick up Chris, visiting me from London. When I was flyering earlier that day, someone called the image on my flyer (a picture of me naked) "disgusting." He repeated himself several times to get his point across. Nice. I was in need of a good laugh, so thank you Matt for cheering me right up. Hilarious. (Judges: 10!)

Jessica Delfino wants to be famous. There's no question about that. But does she want to be my roommate? I don't know. But she is. Until Wednesday. Then she's taking her lovely ass to the Reading and Leeds festival. Am I jealous? You betcha. Saw her show again this weekend. I love it every time. Don't know all of her songs by heart yet, but I'm getting there. (Judges: 10!)

Tanya O'Debra, formerly of the O'Debra Twins, strikes out on her own here in Edinburgh with an original 40s-era radio whodunnit called "Radio Star." I was worried that I wasn't going to like Tanya's theater piece for a couple of reasons: 1. Cafe Renroc (we're at the same venue) doesn't lend itself well to a theatrical production and 2. I had never seen Tanya perform by herself for such a long time. My fears were totally unfounded. Miss O'Debra's "Radio Star" is fantastic. She performs no less than six distinct voices, controls the sound effects with her laptop as well as a couple of live sound effects (a mini-door that she opens and shuts, and shoes for audible footsteps walking to and away from the action). In the end you remember more the strength of her performance than the plot, but the script is loaded with laugh lines. (Judges: 10!)

Marga Gomez in "All that Gomez" is performing nightly to sold-out crowds. I was lucky to get a seat at her show last night where she races between stand-up bits, storytelling, and one-woman show theatrical bits... all hilarious. She riffs about being in Edinburgh, unafraid to not know where it's going for a bit, sure she'll find her comic footing. Marga is a great performer, and it's easy to watch someone so comfortable on the stage. She tells the story of auditioning for a part as a maid in a Kathleen Turner–directed made for TV movie. Though, Marga never wanted play a made, she did want to meet Kathleen Turner, so she took the audition. Fortunately for us, her Kathleen Turner impression is spot-on. So funny. But my favorite character sketch was her Ti-ti (tia, aunt) who tells little girl Marga that she is a dirty little piggie girl (cochina! cochina! cochina), and when her mother dies, little Marga will be all Ti-ti's. Disturbing, hilrious, honest. (Judges: 10!)