Friday, March 07, 2008

Bitch Salad Retrospecticus

Well... firstly...

It's a dark day.

Everyone's favourite chola boychild, Danny Noriega, got the boot in an unprecedentedly emotional episode of American Idol last night.

I returned home last night from my first night hosting at the downtown Yuk Yuk's club (something, by the by, that I didn't think I'd get to do for years so I'm super excited and happy that I got to and it went fantastically! yay!) only to find that Kady Malloy and Luke Menard were given the boot, to the surprise of no one.

Kady seemed ready. Her song was pretty brutal though. She was madly out of tune. It's like she was a brass instrument and she just went through a car wash 3 times. Eek. Luke Menard, on the other hand, should really consider dabbling in gay porn, or at least gay-for-pay porn. He's kind of hot, not gonna lie.

Anyway - upset no. 1 of the night - Kristy Lee Cook stays in favour of Asia'H Epperson. It was that song, honey. Do me a favour everyone who ever competes on Idol in the future: NEVER SING WHITNEY HOUSTON'S "I WANNA DANCE WITH SOMEBODY". You WILL be kicked off immediately. It was super sad. She was super pretty (in a sort of CW sitcom sort of way), had a fantastic, unique voice and her dad died. Shitty.

However, no one could have possibly prepared themselves for what was coming next. Danny Noriega is passed over for Chikezie. A million homos scream "NO!!!" to the heavens simultaneously. Well, not all of them. But still...

Oooh-howdy I was pissed off. And that's strange. Typically, I've got gallons of haterade and blind jealousy going for gays who are granted access to a public forum - particularly when they define their entire being by their culture and the cliches wherein (*cough*Sean Gehon*cough*) - but not Danny. I loved that little he-chola. He was so ballsy and I liked that. I can relate. Whatwhatwhat.

Anyballs...

BITCH SALAD HAPPENED ON TUESDAY!

Here's my requisite recap...

First things first, the mix I made before hand was amazing. Holy fuck. I outdid myself, if I do say so myself. I fucking LOVED it. Which is great, because that pleases my key demographic and the only person who actually cares about the music beforehand - me. Good grief.

First comic of the night was the one, the only SHANNON LAVERTY!!! Here's Shannon's story: at the age of 21, she moved to Toronto from Saskatchewan, where she'd been hitting the open mic scene for a year and a half. This is the early 90's. Shannanigan's style is loose, sly and sexually aggressive. She's told for years that 'she's too dirty' and 'people don't want to see women on stage talking about stuff like that'. This is a pre-Sex & The City world, mind you - before it was 'discovered' that women actually did talk like that. I think it's so important that female comics today realize the uphill battles she's had to trek and the dead ends she's needed to bust through to blaze that trail. Hmph.

B'aaanyway. Shannon is someone who talks to the audience, and she's the best. That terrifies me. TERRIFIES. I could never - at least, right now - throw caution and my act to the wind, ask someone "where are you from?" and materialize 5 minutes of funny stuff out of that, let alone the half an hour that Shannon can. It's mystifying.

Next up were the thoroughly hilarious Jan Caruana and Stefanie Drummond! So you know that my big thing was "holy fuck! It's the chicks from Mean Girls!"... yeah... guess who COMPLETELY FORGOT TO EVEN MENTION THAT THEY WERE IN THAT FUCKING MOVIE WHEN HE INTRODUCED THEM... ... ... in case there's any sort of confusion there, I'm talking about me. Yeah.

Anyballs, they came up and their schtick consisted of talking shit about Lindsay Lohan. It was hilarious and little more complex than it sounds. The premise was that they'd go up and talk about all these nice things she did while she was in town filming Mean Girls (ie. placing puppies in adoption programs, educating orphans on the street) but make it sound like she was doing these crazy cunty things... it was hilarious.

And of course I got Stef to deliver that line "Everyone thinks I'm a slut because I wear super jumbo tampons. But it's not my fault that I've got a heavy flow and a wide-set vagina". That was kind of the high point of my life. I get the impression that Stef's a little sick of saying it though. I guess her and the "where's the beef" lady have more in common than I had previously thought.

Next up - Rebecca Kohler!!! There's nothing that I love more at The 'Salad than taking a young, attractive, contemporary female comic with fantastic material and sass to spare who I see struggle with a typical 'comedy club' audience that can't digest a female comic who's not Rita Rudner-esque and seeing them KILL IT with the Bitch Salad audience. That was the case with Katherine Ryan, that was the case with Sara Hennessey, and that was certainly the case with Rebecca. It was the only time that I really saw her material done justice by the audience and it was FANTASTIC to see!

She also booked a Video On Trial off of the night, so that's a bonus, too. = ) --- More of a bonus is that I'm on the episode as well. So holy fuck it's just a win/win/win/win/win.

Inessa Frantowski blows my fucking mind. First off - the girl is just lovely. You couldn't ask for a lovlier person, really. Second off - the character she did was AMAZING. I didn't take a picture of it and I'll rue that for the rest of my life. She was bedecked in a short gray wig, a short sleeve plaid shirt and high-waisted kahkis that came up easily past her navel. The character was this really stammery, tangential, over-sensitive middle-aged woman who over-explained and justified things talking about how she wished she could have done something heroic at 9/11. You just had to be there. LOVE! LOVE! LOVE!

In a new segment at the 'Salad, my dear gal-pal and burgeoning comic genius Heidi Brander took the stage to deliver some hard-hitting news through the use of puns. Yes, PUNS. Heidi can weave puns like no other... the feature was called "Headlines: With News Corres-PUN-dant Heidi Brander". In betwixt each item, a slide whistle would sound to absolutely hilarious consquences. Check this shit out:

An historic section of downtown Toronto was destroyed recently, as a fire gutted
several buildings on Queen West. Though the blaze was devastating, firefighters
expressed relief that it did not originate in Greektown… because it’s really
hard to put out a Greece fire.

Relations between the Chinese and
the Taiwanese governments are at an all-time low. One explanation for this could
be that the delegates from both countries have Taipei
personalities.

According to a recent poll in celebrity gossip magazine Us
Weekly, 80% of males aged 18-35 are fans of Angelina Jolie, 60% of women aged
49-65 are fans of Tom Cruise, and a whopping 98% of dyslexic gamblers are fans
of Jack Black.

Development officers have announced plans to set up an NGO
to support the marginalized members of Toronto’s bisexual community. When asked
what the newly established bisexual NGO will be called, officials responded,
“B-I-N-G-O, B-I-N-G-O, B-I-N-G-O…”

Just in time for High School Musical
3, Disney has announced plans to release a life-size Zac Efron doll.
Unfortunately for Canadians, the doll will only be available in the United
States, meaning the Zac Efron doll is likely not worth the cost of shipping. But
it’s TOTALLY worth the cost of handling.
Yes. It was a thrilling debut. I was all too pleased.

Then of course, there's Debra DiGiovanni. What can I possibly say about Debra that hasn't been said? She's one of the biggest names and freshest voices in comedy today. And one of the fucking nicest people you'll ever meet. All too often when you start out - I think, with anything... but especially in show biz - you meet people that you idolize or who've been really successful and you build yourself up for this momentous experience with greatness and you're just COMPLETELY let down about how a.) boring or b.) much of an asshole they are. Not Debra. I first met Debra two years ago - March, 2006. I was doing an all-new material night and she was hosting. I met her backstage right before I went on and she was immediately familiar and gracious.

Anyballs - since then I am just so delighted beyond belief whenever I've had the opportunity to work with her. She's truly a class act. Moreover, the fact that I know her has gotten me laid - on more than one occasion, btw - doesn't hurt, either.

I'm off.

To do things that Andrews do.

Smell ya later,

--- Aj