Thu
Nov
26
I direct Late Night Interview, perform improv comedy with ridiculous geniuses, take photos, make audio recordings, and build websites.
Recently I also try not to fail at things I'll probably fail at.
I'm wearing a wig in this photo.
Fri
Nov
20
Marvin Gaye sings the national anthem at a 1983 NBA All-Star game. Usually I don’t dig it when people change the timing, add a bunch of frills, etc., but Marvin Gaye managed to make the national anthem sound sexy.
Found this video after getting an email from my brother about the British anthem, God Save the Queen. It includes this couplet:
O Lord our God arise,
Scatter her enemies
This is the only such couplet in the song that doesn’t rhyme, but the song dates back to the mid-18th century, so probably it did back then, right? I think I’ve read that one of the way linguists (or whoever studies these things) figure out how people used to pronounce things is by analyzing poetry from those eras. This is cool.
The same verse also includes the lines, “Confound their politics/Frustrate their knavish tricks.” Alright.
Gladstone Advanced
So I feel like a totally douche posting this but I’m ecstatic so you’ll need to deal.
(…)Gladstone, UCB 3 on 3 Semi-Finals: Saturday, Nov. 28th.
Joey Burns and Don Fanelli are bold, hilarious, and endlessly supportive improvisers.
“A SHOUTOUT TO BEN APPLE.” This automatically comes up at the end of my reel as a related video. I don’t know the girls or the Ben Apple they’re talking about.
It still weirds me out that there are other people with my name. Growing up I didn’t know any Apples I wasn’t related to.
Thu
Nov
19
Audio:Music:Recording:
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
If you missed Dreadnought’s “Improv With Elvis” show at Daioh Sushi last night, this two-minute clip will give you a pretty good idea of how it went down.
Today
6 p.m. - Orson Welles’ Basement of Terror at UCB. Frank Hejl’s script is original, tight and funny, Chuck Dauble’s direction has been indispensable, and the cast is hilarious. Also, I’ve shaved (with a razor) for this show.
8 p.m. - Applegoerl at Muffins In The Window, a monthly variety show down on Sullivan. Applegoerl has never had an unfunny show that took place indoors.
11 p.m. - Gladstone at the annual 3-on-3 tournament at UCB. Fanelli submitted this team last year before I even knew Joey, and we didn’t get in. This year we did.
My Director/DP/Editor reel for UCB Beta Teams submission. My only regret is that it doesn’t feature more Brandon Scott Jones vehicles.
I’d be interested to see other people’s reels. benjamincanfly@gmail.com
Daioh Sushi Improv Show
Dreadnought is performing an improv show tonight. Not at Under St. Marks, not at The Creek, or Gotham City Improv, but at Daioh Sushi, a Japanese restaurant across the street from Dallas BBQ on W 23rd St. It sounds ridiculous and awesome.
From Don Fanelli:
Of course there is a back story here. But more importantly, a kind gentleman that owns a sushi restaurant and sometimes gives motivational speeches, is expecting a quality show from an improv group that fully discloses that each show “might be a failure of art.” We will be “performing” in the front window to “entice” people off the street to come in and eat sushi. We already are set up for failure.
I also want to add that when I heard about this show, my immediate thought was: “Shit. I am probably going to be naked at some point and my teammates are going to be eating sushi off my body.” If that was my first thought, I am not sure where this show is going to go.
So if you have never seen Dreadnought perform, this might be a good show to get a feel of what we are about. The organic creation of something magical or the inherent destruction of something beautiful.
I predict this will be a new low in our young improv careers. And we will go down in a blaze of glory.Go to the IRC thread for more information. Also definitely visit the owner’s website to find out how crazy this might get.
We are all winners here.
I love everyone involved in this enterprise.
Mon
Nov
16
Link: My Unfinished Novel
Excerpt:
Most of them are crap, but I saw one about a guy who suddenly stops eating and drinks only milk. I don’t know whether you’d call it a farce or what, but the whole thing was just about the complications resulting from the milk thing. Like the Metamorphosis but with milk. I don’t know whether it was an intentional reference, but I kept thinking, “This is like the Metamorphosis but with milk.” Then on the way out I picked up a program and there was a reviewer’s quote that said, “Like the Metamorphosis but with milk.” When I saw this I felt nervous and started wondering if I had somehow caught a glimpse of the quote on someone else’s program without consciously realizing it. I don’t know whether it’s more unnerving to think that I saw something, forgot about it, and then convinced myself that I’d thought it on my own, or to think that I never saw it at all and that I just had the same thought, phrased the same way, as someone else.
Week 3 (writing a 50k-word novel in a week) recap. Next goal is to learn how to juggle five things at once.
Fri
Nov
13
Week #3 (Novel): Day 5 update
A few times times this week I’ve run into friends who’ve commented, “Shouldn’t you be writing?” I can’t tell whether it’s sarcastic because all of my friends are comedians.
This goal seems more feasible now than when I chose it, and I’m trying to make it my first success. Thursday is over and I’ve only written 1,930 words, but I’m picking up speed as I go, and I’m planning to dedicate Friday and Saturday almost exclusively to writing.
The character I’m writing as is either a slightly weirder version of myself, or a version of myself that’s no more weird, but is more willing to discuss the ways in which he’s weird. I’m still planning to post the full novel when it’s ready.
I haven’t decided yet what I’m doing next week. A few things people have sent in:
- Get a personal thank-you note from a millionaire
- Sit through an entire high school class without being kicked out
- Kiss a B-list or higher celebrity
- Get on a national news show
- Catch some type of wildlife without professional assistance
- Do 5,000 pushups in one week
Thu
Nov
12
Chi blasts
The Wikipedia entry for “chi blasts” - when someone shoots a ball of destructive energy from their hands, like Hadouken in in Street Fighter and Kamehameha in Dragon Ball - includes this:
Outside of fiction, a few martial arts practitioners claim to be able to render others in a state of paralysis with a chi blast, although such claims are disputed by skeptics. Actual able practitioners are, as a rule, not inclined to demonstrate any such ability. Since such (rare) showing off generally causes problems for the practitioner afterwards.[citation needed]
The last two lines have been there since August 5. The entry has been edited twice since then - once to fix a misspelling and once to remove a “spurious space before comma.”
