I live in New York. I am a stand up comic, writer and actor. You may have seen my writing on many reputable websites (The Huffington Post, Hello Giggles, xojane.com, The Hairpin, Splitsider, The FW, etc.). I also write crazy blogs about Game of Thrones, Magneto and Jeff Goldblum. I was formerly member of the PITtv House Team, Codswallop.
You can email me at megsokay@gmail.com.
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
New Girl's Jake Johnson | AV Club
I’ve said it once, and I’ve said it again, and I’ll say it yet another time, but Oliver is a great friend.
I told him about the big decision I made today—I was spread too thin and so I’ve regretfully decided to leave PITtv. I want to focus on my writing, stand up and getting sketches and bits up on a live stage (meaning doing more fun, weird shit at the UCB).
I’ve also had hints in the past week for a big career opportunity, but it wouldn’t necessarily be a creative one. My personal decision there was to remind myself that I love “the doing of it” first and foremost. Anything that compromises my ability to be as creative as possible and in my own damn sweet time isn’t an opportunity that I need to worry about jockeying for.
So, in response to this, Oliver sent me this awesome interview with Jake Johnson in which he expounds upon the differences in the improv scenes in LA, Chicago and NYC and how comedy has changed in the last decade.
It’s a really interesting and thought-provoking interview if you’re into comedy and it also reminded me that I need to catch up on New Girl.
So I go in there one night and he was evoking gods of the East and demons of the West and forgetting what my goal was, why I even came in the first place, I was so mad! He was so creepy. I went up to him and I was like, “You’ve got nerve evoking demons in front of all these people!” No one was protected. No one was white lighted. I knew so much, you know, I was at least a three-week student in meditation. And he said “I protected the building” and I said “You can’t do that!” and he was like “Yes I can!” and I just walked off in a huff. I went “Ugh, that’s not what my goal was at all.
Charna Halpern describes how she first met Del Close
In 30 years, some comedy legend (improv/stand up/writing/whatnot) is going to be asked in an interview how they first met some other comedy legend and the answer is going to be, “Huh…I don’t know…like he started following me on tumblr and he liked some of my posts about Phil Hartman and then I started following him one day and then I disagreed with a post he made about Girls and then we had a minor argument, but then we both liked a gif set from Parks and Recreation and so, when we finally ran into each other at some party in Brooklyn, we were like, ‘Yo. I know you.’ And it was awkward and then we did some dumb show together that fell apart and five years later Fuse gave us a small budget and we made a breakthrough alt comedy show that was cancelled after two seasons.”
We’ll never meet over fighting about demons again.
Rewatched The Critic pilot tonight before bed. 21:22 is when the greatest Seinfeld joke of all time begins.
You’re welcome.
(You should watch the whole thing anyway.)
A lovely reader named Maureen sent me these images of some postcards from the original UCB Theatre on 22nd Street and I felt compelled to share them with you all! She writes -
“So, I was going through my box of high school pictures tonight, and came across these and figured you would appreciate them. These are postcards from the original UCB Theatre on 22nd Street. I started going there when I was sixteen years old, and I am thirty now, yikes!
I hope you are able to see the names on them, but these were the beginning days of some of the best comedians today- Seth Morris, Jake Fogelnest, the original 4, and Rob Corddry.”I love this and I am so excited that Maureen decided to send them on and allowed me to share them with you! You can follow Maureen on her blog, which follows her on her running adventures here.(My e-mail is always open and I love hearing from people, so whether you just want to say “hi” and shower me with compliments or send something interesting along, please feel free!)
Most gay comics either play stand-up shows to tiny audiences or mince about as caricatures in mainstream movies, doing more harm than good. In a 2007Vanity Fair piece, the provocateur Christopher Hitchens infamously claimed that women aren’t funny (although he did give a pass to Jewish women and “dykes,”), a theory that was quickly debunked not only in rebuttals inVanity Fair but by the success of films likeBridesmaids. So where is theBridesmaids for gay men?
Unfortunately, there isn’t one. Gay men in film have historically fit into two roles: the best friends of the female protagonist (The Devil Wears Prada,My Best Friend’s Wedding), or the victims of an untimely death, usually from an AIDS-related illness (Philadelphia) or a hate crime (Brokeback Mountain). If they are kept alive for two hours or manage to evade certain doom for a few seasons, gay men frequently appear as flaming queens—sassy, fashionable, and slightly sociopathic.
“I think Hollywood script writers have just recently discovered the phenomenon of the masculine gay man,” says Adomian, who was a finalist on Last Comic Standing in 2010. “There are a lot of people who are beginning to feel comfortable being themselves and not fitting into the straight narrative, but they may not follow the standard gay pattern of going to the White Party, dancing with their fabulous asses, and having a witty repartee about Judy Garland. I mean, I love Judy Garland, but I also like Johnny Cash. There are a lot of people that don’t really fit into boxes that have been established for them.”
I wrote an essay for BlackBook’s April/May issue about gay men in comedy, and I talked to great guys like James Adomian, Gabe Liedman, Dave Holmes, Eliot Glazer, and Brent Sullivan. It’s up today! Please take a look — I’m very proud of this one!
Tyler wrote a fantastic piece about some fantastic comedians. Read it.
I Has a Performer Page | Geek Week Comedy
It’s like people would pay to see me or something.
David O’Doherty - My Beefs 2011
YES!! This. Magazine articles do this too!
I saw David O’Doherty last night at the UCB and he was brilliant. He had this one bit called “Secrets of the Ladies” that had me laughing so hard I think my spleen almost ruptured in joy. I haven’t laughed so hard since I saw Billy Eichner’s “Billy on the Street” preview at the Live How Was Your Week? show (which is high praise).
He didn’t do this specific joke, though he did close the show with his new “Beefs 2012”. Oh, and he was wearing this specific outfit.
Check him out. Check him out.
Today was a good day to stumble upon this. Now I need to find more of this.
Good news, goons! My pet project for 2012*, a show called Dorothy Parker’s Salon of Spirits, is going to be at the PIT on Sunday, April 15, 8pm.
This show is a big deal to me. It’s going to be a dark variety/talk/sketch show that features me as Dorothy Parker welcoming her famous dead friends into her afterlife apartment to talk about things like art and booze and being dead. Basically, it’s going to be like this clip from Dorothy Parker and the Vicious Circle, but funny.
I need to find out if I can use dry ice at the PIT. Ta-ta!
*My pet project for 2011, Julie Bell on Julie Bell: A Retrospective on Julie Bell, is returning to ImprovBoston’s Geek Week at the end of April. Fun, right?
Creekstarter
If you like comedy and if you like the idea of giving young comics, improvisers, actors, musicians and artists a home where they can perform regularly and without the pressure to compromise their artistic growth for profit, then contribute to the Creek’s Kickstarter.
Help transform what’s already an amazing home for alternative comedy into a legit and lasting comedy club.
DO IT! (I did.)
