Hello there!
I hope you had a great week and you're getting ready for some time off. Personally, I'm excited for January to roll around so I can get back into my routines and structure. But in the meantime, I'm using my free time to take in my first holidays in California. Frankly, there's a downright Australian approach to the season and it makes me uncomfortable. I'm seeing a lot of Christmas lights on palm trees and people in t-shirts wearing Santa hats. I'm used to ending the year with Mother Nature launching a full frontal assault on my existence. I mean how can you call it December if wintry mix is a snack combo you put out and not a horrific weather event that blows directly into your eyes? Nice weather in winter feels like a trap and I'm not letting my guard down anytime soon.
Can you tell I grew up in the Northeast? I'm extremely chill and laid back. Happy Holidays!
Upcoming Events
EVERYWHERE
The New Yorker published a comedy piece I wrote this week, which was very exciting for me. It's my first time shouting or murmuring for them. You can read it here.
LOS ANGELES
Thursday, January 9th at 7:30 pm Due to a scheduling conflict, this show had to be postponed. New date TBA
Wednesday, January 15th at 7 pm at the Lyric-Hyperion. Matt Porter and I are starting a monthly multimedia comedy show called HOMEWORK. Tickets are on sale now. Link
NEW YORK
Friday, February 7th and Saturday, February 8th. I will be back in NYC workshopping a stage show about long term couples and new scientific research on love. Presented by All For One Theater. Link
This week’s list
GREAT:
I grew up poring over Gary Larson's The Far Side books with Talmudic intensity. The cows. The wild inventions. The scientists. The cavemen. I'm still blown away by how laugh out loud funny his cartoons are. And now they're finally online so I won't have to hoard daily calendars anymore. You can start with his excellent letter introducing his work or just dive right into the comics. The Far Side
FUNNY:
Jordan Klepper has been on television in many forms in the past couple years: an earnest correspondent, a conspiracy theorist, an overconfident buffoon. He's very funny in all his characters, but I think he's at his comedic best when he's out in the field with real people responding to the insanity of the world. He's back on The Daily Show for the next few months doing some special reports on impeachment from Trump rallies and the results are hilarious and surprisingly insightful. Trump Supporters on Impeachment
INTERESTING:
Eve Babitz was one of the literary stars of the 1970s, but she never really got her fair due. She's having a renaissance now, thanks to Vanity Fair's Lili Anolik, who profiled her for the magazine and then wrote a fantastic biography called Eve's Hollywood. I've been deep in a Babitz rabbit hole the past couple months. She lived such a fascinating life. She was at the center of the worlds of art, music, film, and comedy. She dated Steve Martin and Harrison Ford. She was friends with Andy Warhol and modeled for a famous photo with Marcel Duchamp. She hung out with Joan Didion but also competed with her. In many ways, Babitz was Didion if she had more fun and liked Los Angeles more.
For a taste of why Babitz's books are so much fun, just look at this description from The New York Times: "When she was just shy of her 30th birthday, Ms. Babitz published her first memoir, 'Eve's Hollywood': stories of adventure, anthropological observation, and charmingly, food (Ms. Babitz would have made a terrific restaurant reviewer). Its dedications ran to 8 pages, and included her gynecologist, the Chateau Marmont, freeways, sour cream and the 'Didion-Dunnes for having to be who I'm not.'" The Eve Babitz Revival
Thanks for reading! If you like these emails, please forward to a friend or spread the word. If someone forwarded you this email but you're not yet on the list, you can subscribe here.
Have a great day,
Chris