CULTUREPHILE: PORTLAND ARTS Blog

comedy

Michael Ian Black’s Best Tweets

Whet your appetite for the comic’s weekend shows with these nuggets of hilarity.

Posted by: Jonathan S Banasky on Mar 03, 2011 at 07:46AM Speech Bubble 2 Comments

Comedian Michael Ian Black: cheeky Tweeter.

Upon hearing that comedian Michael Ian Black would hit Helium this weekend, Bar Pilot blogger John Chandler exclaimed, “That guy has hilarious tweets!” Best known for his role on Comedy Central series Stella, and much-murmured-about as one of the only mainstream celebrities to show up in a crowd at hyperlocal indie-rock fest PDX Pop Now!, Black is also apparently a witty little birdie in the Twittersphere. We asked intern Jon Banaski to find some funny quotes from the noteworthy absurdist.

Ladies and gentlemen…
TWEETS FROM MICHAEL IAN BLACK

~ How great would it be if we really burped bubbles when we were drunk, just like in cartoons? Answer: really great.

~ Gaddafi has the best sunglasses of any dictator.

~ Finally saw ˝The King’s Speech.˝ Thought the end where the Bear Jew killed everybody was gratuitous.

~ No matter what you look like, if you want to feel better about your physical appearance, spend some time at a water park.

~ There should be a professional sport that involves eating a small bowl of ice cream while lying on the couch. I would dominate.

~ Now if we can just get those Egyptians to do something about Kanye.

~ Visited cat shelter. Cat scratched my hand. I adopted the cat just so I can take it to a different shelter to be put down.

Tweets compiled from michaelianblack on Twitter. For more about Portland arts events, visit PoMo’s Arts & Entertainment Calendar, stream content with an RSS feed, or sign up for our weekly On The Town Newsletter!

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Tags: standup, comedy, Helium, quotes

comedy

Tig Notaro Hits Helium

Posted by: Anne Adams on Feb 08, 2011 at 04:00PM Speech Bubble 0 Comments

You might recognize Tig Notaro’s deadpan delivery and Peter Pan haircut from her recurring role as “Officer Tig” on The Sarah Silverman Program, or from various comedy showcases. But did you know that she’s slated to release a comedy album this year on beloved indie record label Secretly Canadian? Or that she’ll gig all weekend at Helium, including Valentine’s Day? For a taste of her stand-up style, watch the clips below. (Safe language, but adult themes.) Tig might be a great no-nonsense alternative to all things sappily romantic.

Discussing her memorable name:

Delivering a Valentine’s Day public service announcement: ¡No Moleste!

For more upcoming arts events, visit PoMo’s Arts & Entertainment Calendar, stream content with an RSS feed, or sign up for our weekly On The Town Newsletter!

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Tags: standup, comedy, Helium, video

comedy

Patton Zingers

Patton Oswalt hits Portland with a joke-and-book one-two punch.

Posted by: Anne Adams on Feb 02, 2011 at 01:00AM Speech Bubble 0 Comments

This comedian and writer indulges a taste for sour grapes.

You might recognize Patton Oswalt’s sarcastic voice and puggish mug from—well, anywhere. In addition to a slew of standup appearances, Oswalt’s appeared in more than 20 films, played “the friend” on several seasons of the TV series King of Queens, voiced a rat in Rattatouille, and sliced and diced at several Comedy Central Roasts. What next? Well, naturally: a book.

Oswalt’s kicking off the post-millenial decade with Zombie Spaceship Wasteland, and during his visit to Portland this weekend, he’ll not only perform standup sets at Helium, but also sit for a signing at Powell’s. Here’s a little taste of his lovably bitter wit:

OSWALT ON LIFE

I had a romance novel inside me, but I paid three sailors to beat it out if me with steel pipes.

If you hit a midget on the head with a stick, he turns into 40 gold coins.

If I actually had a time machine, I would go back to around 1993, 94—and kill George Lucas with a shovel. That’s how I would try to save history.

The Oswalt family crest should be, like, a pair of eyes rolling off to the side, and then a bag of Cheetos, and then the word, “f*ck.”

I don’t trust joy; it hurts my skull. It’s like: Rip! Bleed! Demon! Potato-bug! Every horrible thing comes tumbling out….

Does this washcloth smell like chloroform to you?

ON COMEDY

90% of every art form is garbage – dance and stand-up, painting and music. Focus on the 10% that’s good, suck it up, and drive on.

I have to drink this much to be as unfunny as you.

There were a few years in the early nineties where I really began to hate what was valued as funny and just sort of what was valued in stand-up, period.

I mean, the death [of comedy] in the late eighties and early nineties really shook out a lot of hacks. The pond just sort of dried up for a lot of really bad comedians.

All alternative comedy is, are comedians that have being doing it for so long, that they were relaxed enough to start becoming personal on stage.

According to Helium’s box office, Oswalt’s standup sets are sold out, but you can always spring for the book and get a little face-time with the funnyman at Powell’s. For more upcoming arts events, visit PoMo’s Arts & Entertainment Calendar, stream content with an RSS feed, or sign up for our weekly On The Town Newsletter!

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Tags: standup, comedy, Helium, quotes

phile under: tribute

Farewell Greg Giraldo

Were it not for Wednesday’s tragedy, Culturephile would be posting Greg Giraldo’s upcoming Helium appearance in Weekend Picks. Virginia Jones puts all kidding aside to file the following obituary.

Posted by: The Culturegang on Oct 01, 2010 at 09:00AM Speech Bubble 0 Comments

Greg Giraldo Dead at 44

Comedian Greg Giraldo accidentally overdosed on prescription pain medications in New Brunswick, NJ last Saturday, September 25th, and died on Wednesday, September 29th. It feels close to home in Portland, because he was slated to appear at in Portland at Helium Comedy Club in two weeks, and was the club manager’s favorite comedian. He was a Harvard-educated lawyer, but only spent a year in that profession before pursuing comedy full-time, appearing on Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn, his own Comedy Central specials, and as a regular on Lewis Black’s Root of All Evil, as well as Letterman and Late Night with Conan O’Brien. He was perhaps best known for his participation in Comedy Central’s annual roasts of other comics and performers. He was recently one of three new judges breathing life into NBC’s Last Comic Standing last season. When the overdose news hit the Internet early Sunday morning, premature death announcements flooded Twitter and Facebook. It made the real news on Wednesday harder to take. He was a man who struggled with his own alcoholism, and who was scheduled to appear at a recovery show in New York the day he overdosed. It’s upsetting to see jokes being made about his passing in the comments of nearly every related article on the web. Sometimes people think of a celebrity as being both more than, and less than, a fellow human being with feelings, dignity, and problems.

Giraldo is survived by his three children.

—Virginia S. Jones

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Tags: standup, comedy, Helium, tribute

What to Do

Weekend Picks!

Faeries v Tikis! Air thick! Helium, Pop Now!

(Gibberish decoded below.)

Posted by: Anne Adams on Jul 30, 2010 at 12:00PM Speech Bubble 3 Comments

Tu Fawning will perform at PDX Pop Now!
Though they’d look just as good at Faerieworlds.

PDX Pop Now!
All weekend. All ages. Free. Need we say more? Very well, here’s much more.

Make The Air Thick
If this dance event were not recommended by the personal charm of its choreographer, Danielle Ross, and by the musical contribution of post-pop maestro Jordan Dykstra, Culturephile might dismiss it as flimflam. The press release promises that the work will “examine how structure, control, consistency, inconsistency, lust, progress, approval, and more have seeped into our shared understanding of what we need to feel full.” Hmmm. Let me rephrase that: “This work will attempt to express through music and dance, what cannot succinctly be said in words.” Go find out what these guys are trying to say.

Helium Comedy
Wanna lighten the aforementioned thick air? This weekend, new comedy club Helium, a franchise of a Philly operation that books a large roster of nationally-acclaimed laugh-inducers, opens its doors in Southeast Portland. Acerbic local Auggie Smith will be the first featured performer for this, the opening weekend—not to be confused with the upcoming Grand Opening, to feature Maria Bamford. Watch this space for more details.

Tiki Kon
Totem statuary. Fruity colada cocktails. Eye-popping island print fabric; burlap, thatch, and bamboo. This. Is. TIKI. Well, technically, it’s not; the word actually originates in Māori mythology. But in modern parlance, “Tiki” has become a buzzword for “60s retro island kitsch.” Though that aesthetic may seem festive enough on its own terms, it’s been allocated a special weekend of celebration—complete with a Tiki tour, swanky musical guests, and an art show.

Faerieworlds
Only serious sylphs and nymphs need apply for this subculture spectacle, a convergence of some 10,000 pairs of gossamer wings, just a flutter down I-5 near Eugene. With Celtic and whimsical musical acts like Faun and Trickie Pixie, and vendors of all manner of fairy finery, this event promises to mobilize the fey fringe to new flights of mischief and mayhem.

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Tags: comedy, Dance, Events, Weekend Plans, Live, Helium, PDX Pop Now

CULTUREPHILE: PORTLAND ARTS

Michael Ian Black’s Best Tweets

Tig Notaro Hits Helium

Patton Zingers

Farewell Greg Giraldo

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