Earlier in the evening:

This gives us a chance to revise our predictions. Not entirely fair, but, hey–it’s our website! We both choose Naturman as the choice to replace Norton among our choices of who goes to The House.

They lose Jim Norton due to “contractual obligations” that conflicted with taping dates of L.C.S. But they never say what it is that Norton’s contracted to tape. Sure, it’s on another network, but can’t they plug it anyway?

Previously discarded Jim Wiggins is the luckiest man in show business. Most contests have alternates… what’s wrong with the people at Peter Engel Productions? Why not fly Wiggins into Vegas just in case somebody get sick or arrested… or contracted by another network? But it made for some reality show drama. (Golly! Do you think there’s any of them there aeroplanes flying between Topeka and Vegas?) How cruel is that? One second Wiggins is doing Bullfrog’s in Topeka, the next minute, he’s flying to Nevada to appear in a network television taping!

The big mystery: Why did Mohr go on a talk show (while promoting his book) and say that “a twenty-year veteran wet his pants onstage in Vegas?” Are they sweetening the audience response? DC Benny did the worst of all the contestants tonight (and the only reason we mention it is that he said so himself), but we’re fairly certain that he isn’t the 20-year vet that Mohr referred to. Todd Glass certainly didn’t have a strong set, but he didn’t wet his pants, figuratively or literally.

Making it into The House from tonight’s episode:

Alonzo Bodden
Tammy Pescatelli
Todd Glass
John Heffron
Jay London

Final tallies: Traci correctly predicted 8 of 10 going to The House, Brian got 5 of 10.

Good for Drew Carey for expressing his true thoughts while the cameras were rolling, but the producers goofed up by not making it plain that the celebrity judges’ input was largely ceremonial.

Looks like Dan Naturman has never been in a contest before. He should know that merely killing is no guarantee of anything. Sure, express a little disappointment, but if you make fun of NBC’s little TV show, the suits from the other networks who are undoubtedly watching will be loath to contact you for their little projects, funny or not.

It’s a contest. Some folks get into the house and some of those folks are unquestionably, hysterically. But it’s coincidence. Why? Because it’s a contest; worse yet, it’s a contest within the framework of a reality television show. The voiceover at the top of the show tonight described the contestants as “the 20 funniest comics in America.” Of course, this is sheer puffery. If you believe that, you believe that Dat Phan is America’s funniest comedian. Our point is that Mr. Naturman, funny though he may be, lost perspective. Consider this kids: If, after last week’s show, Jim Wiggins had behaved in a manner similar to the way Mr. Naturman behaved in this evening’s episode, Mr. Wiggins would have been onstage at Bullfrog’s in Topeka, instead of flying into McCarran with 40 minutes to showtime. And, if for any reason one of the ten Houseguests should be bounced prematurely from the show, and hypothetically, Naturman was to be next in line of succession, his hissy fit would have given the producers pause and quite possibly resulted in going over his hot head to the next good sport in line.

We’d bet money that portions of Wiggins’ performance were re-shot. His voice got magically better 3/4 of the way through his set. Hmmm… And the alternate lost his voice–reason to have an alternate to the alternate in our book!

Tonight’s winner: Jim Norton, of course. He got face time on a network show, he never did “lose” to the other contestants, and he got bounced off the show because he was too busy taping other shows to be included in this one! Pretty nice, if you can pull it off!