We headed north, up the 110 to sit in the audience at the Alex Theatre in Glendale for the taping of episode eight of Last Comic Standing— the third episode of the Finals! One comic was eliminated. They’re down to six. One more will be eliminated on August 2nd, then a winner will be chosen from the lucky five. (The five then go on the monster LCS Tour! We hear it’s 60 cities and ends sometime in February.)

The Female Half was familiar with the drill– she was in the crowd during the Male Half’s semifinal taping back on July 5. This taping was much more enjoyable, as it was shot in real time and only took an hour!

One thing we didn’t expect was that other audience members would be excited to see us! (Duh! We should have expected it… after all, the folks in the audience are standup comedy fans in general and LCS fans in particular… and we appeared on LCS, so… we wound up being celebrities in the audience! And we had some nice contact with fans.)

Saleem Muhammed (known popularly as “Saleem”) handled the warmup quite ably. He is a commanding presence, a large, imposing man who is also extremely likable. It a combination that makes for a good warmup comic. The crowd was excellent– especially considering that they lined up at 11 in the morning and the taping didn’t start until noon. Comedy in the daytime? It’s do-able.

East Coasters will discover the outcome in about an hour. West Coasters, about three hours later.

For now, we will say that the show was enjoyable and the taped “Let’s find out more about…” pieces were funny, well-conceived and well-edited.

Of the six who were allowed to perform tonight, they all seemed to be much more confident, much stronger, than in past episodes. The sets seem to be getting tighter as the end approaches. Perhaps it’s because they all now know what’s expected of them. In the earlier stages of the competition, it was sometimes unclear as to just how long the sets were to be. Let comics know what’s expected of them– and when it’s expected– and the results will automatically be better. Tell them how many sets they will have to concoct and how long each set will have to be, and the comics will respond by sorting through material (or purchasing it!), devising sets that fit the criteria and practicing those sets in club settings. (We’re of the opinion that, had the acts all had such precise information– In an email? Prior to the morning auditions way back in February or March?– they would have been able to craft appropriate sets for each step of the way. It’s that uncertainty that causes stress and degrades performance.) In seasons past, some of the finalists showed signs of cracking or fatigue by this point. The sequestering of the contestants in The House cut into prep time… the uncertainty of not knowing if there would even be a performance– it all added up to less than optimum performance.

We had the pleasure of performing (The Male Half) and hanging out (The Female Half) at the Comedy & Magic Club this past weekend. We watched Tommy Johnagin do two, 2-1/2-minute sets there over three nights (and Mike DeStefano doing five-minute sets on that same stage over two nights).   The idea was to do two sets at once– one for this week and one for next week.  Is that presumptuous?  No. It’s being prepared.  It’s good to be prepared in the event that you advance. And the comics wouldn’t be able to do such preparation if they were in a house or if they didn’t know how many sets were coming up or if they didn’t know how long the sets would be. We’re not sure why the producers of a precision-engineered television show– that is often taped down to the minute– can’t let the contestants know exactly how long their sets will be. Or why the times will be set at one length at one point and then– in a seemingly arbitrary fashion– be changed to a different lenght at another point down the line.

This way is better. And it allows the contestant to engage in a bit of strategy. The sets are tighter. America gets to see these thoroughbred performers perform at their very best and the country gets the idea that comedians– professional comedians– are pretty damn good at what they do!

We’re down in Redondo now. Our plan, though, was to meet up with some of the contestants over a bottle of bourbon and celebrate and recap the hourlong taping. But they were still being held captive for post-show interviews, so we packed it in and headed south. (We don’t leave until Wednesday afternoon, so there’s still hope for some sort of get-together.)