Yeah, it’s Thursday, but the upload is all about Wednesday.
We got in at about 4:15 or so. Not enough time to check in, hump the equipment up, obtain our press laminates and make it on over to the inaugural Just For Laughs BBQ Bash. (Where the heck is the Club Charlot, anyway? After a cursory glance at the map, we determined that it was too far away.)
In the real world it might be hump day, but Wednesday in late-July in Montreal at the Festival JFL is the day when the pace quickens and the volume of the late-night chatter in the Delta bar is boosted a notch or two. A rather large chunk of this weekend’s contingent arrives throughout Wednesday afternoon and evening.
The Delta has been refurbished somewhat. The scent of adhesive and fresh paint greets us we enter the lobby. There is new furniture in the schmooze corral that doubles as a bar. We struggle mightily to connect the facelift that the Festival HQ has undergone with the rebirth that standup comedy is undergoing. Perhaps we will just leave it at that. (We will have more to say about the rebirth of comedy in subsequent updates. Stay tuned!)
What we will say now, however, is that the WWW is a presence once more– at this Festival in particular and in the business in general. You’ll recall that we noted the preponderance of dot com entities in one of our Fest updates from six years ago to the day:
The back page of the HRSCI (Hollywood Reporter) was purchased by Laugh.com. Half of the lobby is dominated by comedyworld.com’s “cybercast” corral and banners hang overhead touting thefunniest.com and pop.com. The folks at humorvision.com (a division of fastband.com) purchased a quarter-pager and playboy.com has dispatched a representative or two. And, of course, SHECKY! (sheckymagazine.com) is present in the form of editors Brian McKim and Traci Skene. There is an explosion of dot-commers here at the festival this year. Much moreso than last year. And there are many more business cards with email addresses.
And one of the entities that is branding the festival at every turn is MySpace.com, recently purchased by Rupert Murdoch and spending cash like a drunken Australian sailor. The social networking site launched earlier this year and they’re determined to make their presence known.
The internet is good for comics. Bad for suits– TV suits, movie suits, music suits. They’re circling the new technology like a ten-year-old boy circles little Suzy– oddly fascinated, yet still convinced that Suzy is, when all is said and done, “yucky.” The trades are all atwitter over the new technology and how it’s shaping the business. Not all the talk is good.
Some contend that the internet, through its convenience, its reach and its versatility will hurt festivals. From the Hollywood Reporter:
Instead, a growing number of comics find that they can make a decent living after appearing on NBS’s Last Comic Standing and/or by promoting themselves through blogs and websites such as myspace.com and youtube.com
“Deals are being made off of youtube now,” Paramount TV Senior VP Comedy Development Brian Banks says. “These days, you can’t close off anyone simply because they don’t show up at a festival or play the Improv.”
The internet has become the ultimate launching pad for the harried agent who doesn’t even have to leave his or her seat to take in a quick routine.
Stay tuned for a parade of quotes from a gaggle of TV and other entertainment execs that completely contradicts the above statement. (How about this: “Of course, the internet is utterly bloodless and cold. There’s no connection with the performer. We need to see the act, feel the applause, appreciate connection between audience and performer,” says Harry Dumshitz Tantamount TV VP Comedy Talent Development Wetware Division.)
There was a new feature: The Comedy Showdown (“American Idol meets Last Comic Standing meets 8 Mile” reads the official description) sounds like a clusterfuck, but, from all accounts, it worked. We suspect that the competition format (“eight comics, three rounds, one chance to win”) worked mainly because they chose the judges wisely– Andy Kindler, Dom Irrera and Jimmy Carr. And the whole thing was ably hosted by Torontonian Steve Patterson. The winner? Andy Parsons.
The Homegrown Comic Competition at the Cabaret Juste Pour Rire was won by Mark Forward, who was instantly forwarded over to the Comedy Night in Canada at the Nest. So quick was the transition that Forward didn’t have a chance to savor his victory. (“They didn’t even get a chance to have a beer!” was how past HCC winner David Pryde described the rush job.) Forward beat out Todd Allen, Greg Cochrane, Steve Ditata, Steven Crowder, Andrew Iwanyk, Jeff McEnery, Rodney Ramsey and Jeffrey Yu.
Above is The Staff of SHECKYmagazine.com being interviewed by Ernie Butler. This was one of two radio interviews we did in the Delta lobby. The other was for XMRadio’s Canadian-flavored Laugh Attack (Channel 153). Quizzing us on behalf of XM was Ben Miner, Canadian comic. Miner is one of the many people clad in XMRadio gear– mikes in hand, professional recorders at the ready– who are swarming this festival and creating quite a presence for the recently-launched channel. SHECKYmagazine readers may recall that Miner was one of the many folks who appealed to the Canadian radio commission back in December of 2004 when that body was deciding just how to bring satellite radio to Canadians. We linked to a NYT piece on the hearings:
Mr. Miner is passionate enough about the technology that he appeared in November at the radio commission’s hearings, decked out in his only suit – a three-piece pinstripe – and a gold tie, gold shirt, and gold pocket square, to speak in favor of allowing satellite radio in Canada.
Miner is one of many comics in Montreal this week who are up here in a capacity other than standup. When we first came up here in 1999, it felt rather odd that, though we were standup comics, we weren’t up here to do standup comedy. We were here to report on the goings on.
Fast forward seven years later and there seems to be a lot of that happening– Comics in and around the Festival not doing standup but engaged in some other creative endeavor. In the space of just a few hours last night, we ran into Jeff Rothpan and Matt Hurwitz, who were writing skits, wraparounds and other material for the Gala shows. And Scott Faulconbridge, who is doing on-camera interviews (for one of the TV nets up here), buttonholing the performers as they exit the stage at the Gala shows. Emery Emery, up here in the capacity of videographer, working on a documentary centering on standup. Brad Reeder, up here in the capacity of a club owner (Charlie Goodnights, Raleigh).
Then there’s this from the Hollywood Reporter: “The networks and studios all are thinking outside the standup comedy box for inspiration,” Thruline Entertainment manager Willie Mercer said. “The way the whole game has changed, they have to. You’ll go to a Montreal and surf around the web, and what you’ll be looking to do is sign and build a roster of young comedic writers, actors and directors. You’re not just looking for guys who can tell a joke, but someone who might write a great film.” Hmmm…
From left to right, that’s Jeff Rothpan, Matt Hurwitz and Mike Marino (Jersey’s Bad Boy of Comedy). Marino is on the Wise Guys shows along with Mike Birbiglia, Frank Spadone, Cris Nannarone and Rocky Laporte.
It’s a photograph 19 years in the making! Patty Rosborough and Joe Starr smile for the camera. Starr has been trying to have his photo snapped with Rosborough for nineteen years– we’re unclear on the details of the story. (So what does he do? He squeezes the life out of her and turns the pic into a digital grotesquerie! Had not Ms. Rosborough (who is done for the week after having performed on the Nasty Shows and the Relationship Shows.) been leaving town this A.M., we would have taken a proper picture later on today.
We call this picture “Two Craigs.” On the left is Craig Ferguson, who hosted Wednesday night’s gala. On the right is Craig Shoemaker, who hosted the Relationship Shows. (Not sure who the bloke is in the center.)
“I think my eyes were shut,” is what David Pryde (center) said, just after the flash from the above photo died down. He was right. Very right. Pryde, who normally goes about his life as a Montreal comic with his eyes fairly wide open, is flanked by longtime SHECKYmagazine contributor Adam Gropman (left) and erstwhile (and longtime) Atlanta Punchline bartender Joe Satterfield. Gropman is in Montreal representing his short film, “Insight Into The Enemy,” which is part of this year’s Comedia Twisted Shorts program. Satterfield made the trek north to represent his recently formed entertainment management company, TSTalent.
We planted our promotional material on the Promotional Material Buffet Table in the Delta Lobby. It hasn’t gotten chaotic yet. But it will. In addition to planting our self-congratulatory postcards, we also dropped a pile of about two dozen vintage Parkhurst hockey trading cards. They were gone in minutes. (We suspect that someone, thinking that they were actually valuable, swiped them all in one shot! Too bad, sucker! They’re reproductions, people– not worth more than about 3 cents Canadian!)
We held onto Pit Martin (“The softspoken 23-year old Quebec native has a degree in French and history from Windsor College as well as a great future in goal-getting.”) Adam Gropman, who spotted the stack of cards before they were swiped, thought that they were clever faux hockey cards that depicted Canadian comics! Not a bad idea, though!
A nice touch: At the rear of the Delta, around the corner from where the press and logistics rooms are situated, the interview space in the Vivaldi Room has been renamed the Allan Johnson Press Room, in memory of the Chicago Trib writer who passed away suddenly and tragically last winter. “Johnson was a respected journalist and dear friend of Just For Laughs.”