Last Comic Standing Finale

by Brian McKim & Traci Skene on August 10th, 2010

Congratulations to Felipe Esparza!

He’s this season’s “Last Comic Standing.”

It must be tough– unbearably tough– to come so close to $250,000 and not get it.  Our hearts go out to Myk Kaplan, Mike DeStefano, Roy Wood, Jr., and Tommy Johnagin.

And, while a quarter of a million bucks might seem like a large sum to someone who has been making the standard road money that’s available out there, it’s small change in the larger entertainment scheme of things.

But the confetti hadn’t even hit the Alex Theatre stage before rumors ricocheted around the WWW about how this season was “rigged,” because Esparza is managed by New Wave… and New Wave is headed by Barry Katz… and Barry Katz is one of the executive producersof the Last Comc Standing.

But we have to ask: Is the fact that he’s managed by New Wave the sole reason that Esparza won the competition?

And, conversely, if management by New Wave were the sole prerequisite for winning the competition, wouel not all of the show’s past winners be comics who are managed by New Wave.

So… not all the winners have been managed by New Wave.  And not all the finalists have been New Wave clients.  So, if you’re going to “fix” the show, and you’re going to expose yourself to all kinds of enmity (or legal challenges), then why not just go whole hog and fix it real good– ensure that all ten finalists are under the New Wave banner and make damn sure that your company benefits from managing the winner, the five touring comedians and the ten folks who get the most primetime network television exposure– week in and week out– over the course of a long summer.

All of this talk of “rigging” and “fixing” only makes sense if we select which bits of data to pay attention to and ignore a lot of other data.

A prime example of this selective focus is illustrated in the speculation that’s making the rounds centering on tortured language from the NBC website.

The heart of the controversy seems to stem from the following passages in the “Voting Rules” section. The same basic rules are then restated in the Voting FAQ. (Note: “The Administrators” are “NBC Studios, Inc., NBC Universal, Inc. and/or Telescope, Inc. and their respective parent, subsidiary and affiliated entities and persons”):

These rules are subject to change at any time at the sole discretion of the Administrators. Notification regarding any such change will be posted at NBC.com.[…]

5. Conditions for Voting:
Administrators reserve the right to disqualify, block or remove any votes from any individual who votes by any electronic, mechanical or automated means, or otherwise tampers with the vote process, or for any other reason, as determined by Administrators in their sole discretion. Administrators are not responsible for any damages to voters’ device(s) that may occur from use of service. Administrators reserve the right, for any reason and in their sole discretion, to modify, suspend or discontinue the voting service without prior notice.

Administrators reserve the right to modify the show’s contest rules, and the terms and conditions of this voting process at any time in their sole discretion.

The amateur detectives conveniently leave out this paragraph, however:

Caution: Any attempt by an entrant or any other individual to deliberately damage any online service or website, tamper with the voting process, or otherwise undermine the legitimate operation of the voting is a violation of criminal and civil laws and should such an attempt be made, Administrators reserve the right to seek damages and/or other remedies from any such person to the fullest extent permitted by law.

Emphasis ours. We’re no legal experts. But this sounds like it bursts the conspiracy theorists’ bubble. It initially reads like something that’s inserted to aid the Administrators in preventing fraud. But we maintain that it could also prohibit fraud on the part of the Administrators. It could subject them to prosecution should they be tempted to manipulate the peoples’ vote.

The other conspiracy theory revolves around the idea that the show is cast. The theory is that the producers of the show very carefully and deliberately manipulate the early rounds of the show to determine who ends up among the forty or fifty “contestants” who vie for the ten Finalist spots.

Of course they do!

Is there an objective way to determine the fifty funniest people in America? Is there a special, magic “Applause Meter” out there somewhere that would precisely and correctly calibrate audience reaction during the evening showcase (ignoring, via some sort of algorithm, the applause from the people that contestant number three packed into the audience through his carefully orchestrated Facebook and Twitter campaign)? Is there a Standup Comics Registry that calculates and maintains rankings via a finely tuned system, like those of the USTA or the USGA?

If the show weren’t “cast,” what means of stocking the show would the conspiracy theorists recommend? Perhaps they have in mind a Blue Ribbon panel of experts. Who, then, would determine the makeup of that august body? Perhaps it would be a carefully chosen panel of universally respected agents, managers and talent coordinators that would submit candidates for inclusion in the showcases. Good luck finding anyone who would fit that description.

And even if great care were taken to pick the hopefuls– using whichever fantasy method you can concoct– could we find two comics who would agree on the legitimacy of even a handful of the choices? No matter which way were chosen, controversy would exist and theories would abound.

There’s no perfect system.

It’s Chinatown, Jake. It’s television. It’s comedy.

And the same data that some folks use to prove the illegitimacy of the contest might be seen by others as proving its legitimacy. One case in point: “Look at the winners over the years! That proves that the wrong people won. That proves that America’s votes were ignored! That proves that those most deserving were shafted!”

Actually, one might look at some or all of the winners and could just as easily claim quite the opposite: “Look at the winners over the past seven seasons! That proves that the right people won! That proves that America’s votes were taken into account! That proves that those most deserving were elevated to the status of America’s funniest comedians!”

Everybody’s all over the map!

Comedy, we might remind everyone for the thousandth time, is subjective. And that tiny sliver of the people who watch the show (and who care enough to go to the trouble to vote for a winner) vote in ways which seem to many people to be illogical or capricious or just plain wrong. Perhaps everyone else in the top ten have fans who aren’t the kind of people who vote ten times on the phone, then cross the room to vote ten times on their computer.

All of which is not to say that Felipe Esparza didn’t deserve to win. No one “deserves” to win. Expunge that word from your vocabulary when discussing this phenomenon. Esparza won. There are people who are ecstatic about that and there are people who are groaning about that. But that would have happened no matter who won. And the people who groan shop around for bits of “evidence” that they (and their favorite) have been somehow wronged.

We are of the opinion that such controversy is good. We stated privately that each of the five remaining finalists were competent enough and handled themselves professionally enough during the finals so that enough of the viewing audience might have voted in such a way as to make any of them the ultimate winner. And that is good for standup. Were there a clear winner– were there no doubt that one comedian was superior and the rest were merely also-rans– it would have been a dark day for comedy indeed, for it would have meant that the contest was a failure and that standup comedy (at least as reflected in the makeup of the finalists) was in a sorry state.

Fortunately, that wasn’t the case. Any of the five could have won.

Are we saying all this to suck up to the producers? Certainly not. (Besides, we’re not so sure there’s any payoff in doing so.)  We’re just trying to introduce a little reality into the analysis of a “reality show.”

As far as the rest of last night’s finale goes, the musical numbers in general (and Gloria Gaynor’s number in particular) were painful. We were particularly nauseated by the shots of the judges “grooving” to the beat and the clutch of remaining finalists “grooving” in the wings. Couldn’t that time been better used to show more comedians? Instead of handing over a bronzed rubber chicken to Kurt Metzger, how about letting Metzger do a tight five instead? We’re not clear as to the connection (other than Craig Robinson’s musical avocation/alter ego) between these musical numbers and standup comedy. (And what was the theory behind dressing the Finalists up in their “Sunday-go-to-meetin’ ” clothes? They looked like some sort of awkward, religious boy band, more suited to entertaining at spiritual retreats or peddling across the country recruiting for the Latter Day Saints.)

And we were struck by the editing of Kathy Griffin’s set. There are rumors swirling that her set was… “enhanced.” There is speculation that the audience reaction was, in television producion parlance, “sweetened.” It certainly seemed (on our 26-in. Sanyo,viewing the local NBC affiliate in HD), that the visual often didn’t match the audio– when an applause break was happening, the wide shots didn’t show a whole lot of people putting their hands together. Indeed, early on in the set, the bursts of laughter seemed too neat and tidy to be real. Three times (at least!) the visual didn’t match the aural. We’d love to know the story behind that!

As for the judges performances last night: That was an untenable situation… as we are fond of saying: “No good can come of it.” The bar was set so high, the expectations so blown out of proportion, due to the previous ten weeks of acting as “judges,” that no comedian could have possibly come out of that experience unscathed.

Unlike a number of our peers, we hope there’s a Season 8 of LCS. There are so few slots on network primetime television for standup comics (doing standup comedy) that we’d hate to see this one disappear. And it certainly keeps people talking about standup.

And, of course we have a personal connection to the show, having appeared on it this season– both Halves of the Staff on June 21 and The Male Half on July 5). People have been asking us if the show has done us any good. We’re not sure how to answer that… yet. At this point, the intangibles outweigh the tangibles. But it also depends on what we do with this credit and this exposure. And that applies to everyone who has appeared on the show– even if only for a second or two or three. Will we do it again next year, if the opportunity arises? Maybe we will, maybe we won’t. There are a lot of comics asking themselves that question right now.

We hope to hang out with the Touring Five when they come to Princeton or Wilmington (each venue being equidistant from SHECKYmagazine.com HQ). (We won’t be able to join them for their Philadelphia-area appearance at the Keswick, as we’ll be gigging in Hilton Head that week.)

from → News • View 27 Comments • Print-Friendly • Back To Top