The UCB Comedy Blog

Watch Matt Besser in Master Class

2011-08-10T12:13:00.001-07:00

Matt Besser has created a new UCB Series.

Learn from The MASTER.

The students of the UCB Improv Master Class must vote out one member. Part 1 in the series.

The Master Class students must adopt the names of their comedic heroes.

The Master Class students do some gibberish exercises.

Trailer Released for Matt Walsh's "High Road"

2011-04-04T17:52:00.000-07:00

Check out the trailer for High Road -- a "totally improvised comedy...sort of" -- created and directed by Upright Citizens Brigade co-founder Matt Walsh.

The film features a bonkers cast that includes Rob Riggle, James Pumphrey, Lizzy Caplan, Abby Elliot, Joe Lo Truglio, Rich Fulcher, Horatio Sanz, Dylan O'Brien, Zach Woods, Matt Jones, Ed Helms and Kyle Gass.

The film will make its debut later this month at the Newport Beach Film Festival. Keep updated on showings through the film's website and Facebook page.

NBC Orders Presentation from Parham and St. Clair

2011-02-08T10:15:00.000-08:00

According to Deadline, NBC has ordered a presentation of a new single-camera comedy written by and starring UCB superstars Lennon Parham and Jessica St. Clair. Check it out.

Fingers crossed this show will be part of next year's Thursday line-up!

Behind the Scenes with Bored Cops!

2011-01-06T06:37:00.000-08:00

BORED COPS: I Spy	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Bored Cops is a new UCB Comedy web series written by and starring UCBNY favorites Anthony King and Jim Santangeli, as exactly that: cops keeping themselves occupied during a never-ending stakeout.

"From what I understand, cops can be on stakeouts for really long stretches of time," says director Nate Smith. "Sometimes for 20-30 years. Sometimes a detective's whole career is just one stakeout, then he retires."

UCB Comedy grabbed a moment with Anthony, Jim and Nate to discuss their very funny web series.

On set with "Bored Cops"

What was the inspiration behind Bored Cops?

Jim: This idea was Anthony's. He approached me saying, "I have this idea I want to do with you. It's about two cops on a stakeout with nothing to do." I thought that was a fun, simple idea and said, "Sure, sounds fun." Then he said, "Oh my God! Really? You'll do it with me? I'm such a huge fan of yours. You are so funny and handsome AND THIN!"

Anthony: I think I can speak for Jim when I say that if we were not doing comedy, we would be cops. We know almost nothing about what it is really like to be a cop, but the things we've imagined all sound really fun. Did you know that cops get to use guns? Seems dangerous!

Nate: I'm pretty sure Jim and Anthony said to themselves, "What idea would Nate Smith be really good at directing?" And they built the series around that. They had the same thought with Craigslist Caterers.

How many episodes are planning to shoot?

Anthony: We have shot eight episodes so far. We're calling that the "first season" because for some reason things like this are grouped into "seasons." Hopefully we'll make a second season soon.

Director Nate Smith with Jim Santangeli and Anthony King

When have you been the most bored in your life?

Jim: I feel like I am never bored, but then again I think I have bad habits when I'm bored. Like eating, for example. So, I must be bored all the time. Because I eat all the time. This is honestly an innocent question that just made me feel like I need some serious therapy. I will say this, there is an episode about to come out about a birthday cake that we throw away. If I was bored, I would not throw that cake away. That cake could help me kill hours of time (or at least minutes). Thanks for depressing me.

Nate: If there [was] 100 percent more masturbation in the show, then it would feature my primary boredom-fighting technique. But this show is about Jim and Anthony's techniques. There were some cross-overs from their anti-boredom styles to my own, but that one didn't make it. Singing did. I sing a lot. That episode is to come.

I have been super-bored -- SUPER-bored -- in my life. One time I went to a funeral viewing that started at 1pm and ended at 6pm. Five hours of boredom-cake, iced with sadness-frosting. If we had an episode where the guys talk about how they'd like to make a funeral entertaining for five hours, that one would be based on my technique from that day. But this show is about Jim and Anthony's techniques.

Anthony: I believe that boredom is all around us. You just have to look for it.

If you haven't watched all four episodes of Bored Cops, check them out on UCB Comedy. Episodes are released every Thursday.

Interview: Vag Magazine

2010-11-19T06:57:00.000-08:00

Vag Magazine Episode 6: "Revelling/Reckoning" from Vag Magazine on Vimeo.

Today's video releases include the highly-anticipated season finale of Vag Magazine, the web series about a feminist magazine funded by one really spectacular Etsy sale. The series, created by UCBNY mainstays (and sketch teachers) Leila Cohan-Miccio and Caitlin Tegart, has been receiving a lot of Internet buzz, including coverage from Ms. Magazine, The Gloss, Crushable, Tres Sugar, Jezebel, After Ellen and more!

Prior to her foray into menstrual bucket humor, Caitlin wrote the UCB sketch show How Rude: Tim & D'Arcy Find the 90s and the one-act play Waiting for Obama: A Night at the Hall of Presidents. The latter show made a West Coast journey to UCBLA and the San Francisco SketchFest and was featured on Sirius XM Raw Dog Comedy. Caitlin currently writes for ESPN.com's The Pretty Good Sports Show, the weekend sketch show Beneath Gristedes and the Beta team Diamonds, Wow!. Caitlin has also served as writer and director for the Maude team Stone Cold Fox.

Leila currently writes for the Maude team High Treason. She wrote This Is About Smith, a sketch show about Smith College that enjoyed a six-month run on the UCBNY stage. The experience marked the first Tegart/Cohan-Miccio collaboration, as Caitlin directed the show. This Is About Smith's cast now forms the core of Vag Magazine: Sarah Claspell, Nicole Drespel, Jocelyn Guest, Kate McKinnon and Veronica Osorio.

Caitlin Tegart and Leila Cohan-Miccio (logo by Ramsey Ess)

UCB Comedy sat down with Leila and Caitlin and discussed the multiple definitions of the word "partner," creating a web series and attracting corporate sponsorship to their project.

You’ve said that you created Vag Magazine to continue working with the cast of your UCBNY stage show, This Is About Smith. How far along in the run did you start working on the series?

CT: It was about six months into the run or so into working with the full cast. Thank you, by the way, for reading our other interviews.

LCM: An interviewer asked us the other day if we were lesbian partners.

CT: It was so good. She goes, “Are you guys partners?” This was a conference call, all three of us in different places, with the most staticky connection, and it turns out Leila was making a feast at the time and banging pots and pans and shit.

LCM: I was making dinner.

CT: So, the woman asks, “Are you guys partners?” and I think Leila was like, “We work together a lot? What do you mean by ‘partners?' Romantic?” And the woman said, “Anything.”

LCM: I said, professionally, yes?

CT: I guess? Because we wrote this? But not romantically. Then she asked, “Well, so who is a lesbian in the cast?” We were like, “This is not -- OK. Bye.” It was for a lesbian magazine, which you think would be more, I don’t know.

Where did the feminist magazine idea originate?

CT: It was my idea. I wanted to do something about a feminist magazine because I thought they were funny. My friend from college, Lindsy, and I would always make fun of them -- about how it was mostly vegan sweet potato fry recipes and not a lot of feminist content. And we would always laugh about that together, and I thought, “This could be something great.” But I never had the right platform. When Leila first showed me stuff for This Is About Smith, I thought, “This reminds me of some jokes I wrote down for that.” And initially, I was like, “Oh well.” But then I thought, “Wait! We could all do this together.”

LCM: The Smith cast got along ridiculously well and had good chemistry and they’re all such individually unique performers that we wanted to do something with all of them together. As soon as Caitlin brought me the idea, I was so excited because I had been independently making fun of feminist magazines for a long time.

When you created the character of Meghan, the holdover from Gemma (a traditional women's mag), was it your intention to have a character that represents the audience’s “outsider” point of view?

LCM: I don’t think we came into it with that but we approached it as, what could each actor do really well? And [Sarah] Claspell had a little bit of that attitude in This Is About Smith. She’s so funny -- she has one of the best “bitch, please” faces.

CT: I don’t think I thought about it then. But I am so glad we did it. She’s a strong female character that is not part of their craziness, and I think that’s important to show that we’re not criticizing strong women with ideas. The ideas just have to be good. (Caitlin laughs.)

Both of you have addressed the media’s obsession with women working in comedy. Caitlin, you said, “Lucille Ball was a female comedian sixty years ago, why is this still a big deal?” Did all this media attention in recent years discourage you or encourage you to write a series about women?

CT: It didn’t discourage us because we believe in the idea and it’s so funny to us. We’re like every comedian, where if it’s funny to us, we’re like, “Ahhh! Gotta do it.” But it is frustrating that people treat female writers like we’re novel, or “this is out of the blue.”

LCM: Or “whaaaaat?”

CT: The media is only positive to the extent that it means female writers are getting attention. But it’s like, “We’ve been here.”

LCM: I don’t think “I’m a lady writer” instead of “I’m a writer.”

CT: I could see people thinking “oh, you do stuff with women” leading to a possible stereotype about my work. But for me, personally, I’m coming off touring the West Coast with seven dudes for Waiting for Obama, so no one can question my cred with working with dudes.

LCM: And you do The Pretty Good Sports Show.

CT: I have done mostly dude stuff since this project.

LCM: I write real girly.

CT: I’ve heard people say, the reason that there’s so few female writers for late night is because there are male hosts. There is a correlation between behind the camera and in front of the camera. So it only benefits us as women writers to have more women in front of the camera.

LCM: Exactly. When we sat down and started writing this, we didn’t talk about the feminist implications of this show. We sat down and talked about what we thought was funny. But I do think that we’re both into the idea of having a space for women where they could make these huge comedic choices. It bums me out when I watch TV or the movies and the girl is often reduced to playing the girlfriend or just “the girl.”

But we’re also not the only people at UCB working with women. Broad City, obviously. A lot of the stage stuff. And Shannon O’Neill’s show, Prison Freaks, is so -- I’m trying to find another word besides ballsy.

CT: Ha! Vagina-y.

LCM: Shannon O’Neill is vagina-y.

CT: [The Vag character] Fennel probably waits outside of UCB for Shannon to come out and then never speaks to her, runs into Gristedes and sits in there for an hour. She doesn’t want to be embarrassed.

Working with Shannon O’Neill was so awesome and I feel like there are people who are royalty on the stage, and people forget to ask them to be in videos. But don’t ask Shannon O’Neill to be in any videos because I want all of her time.

LCM: All of it.

CT: I do get nervous when we’re represented in the media as the “funniest women of UCB.” Obviously, we’ll take that because it’s good publicity and we love being funny and we love UCB, but it’s like, “This is a FRACTION of what UCB has to offer in terms of female talent.” This isn’t everybody. This isn’t the women’s review of comedy. It’s tiny. When we think about actors -- not even writers or directors we want to work with, which would be a whole other group -- when we think about the actors we want to have on the series? It’s nuts. There’s so many good people; we won’t be able to do it.

LCM: We’ll turn into a later season Will & Grace where every time there’s three guest stars per episode.

You've joked a lot about season two, but is it happening?

LCM: It’s in the works.

CT: It’s going to happen one way or another. It’s so funny because Leila and I have put a lot of work going into conferences on digital media and web series, and everyone is like, “Vag Magazine? Funny idea but won’t get brand sponsorship.” I don’t want to say anything specific, but we’ve had brand interest in representing us.

LCM: We did not solicit that.

CT: That’s been the biggest “fuck you” for us. Having guys -- yeah, I’m going to say it, guys -- tell us that brands won’t like us. And it’s like HA HA!

LCM: And if all goes well, we’re hoping to film season two in January and then hopefully release them next spring.

CT: We haven’t said anything about Zach Neumeyer yet, our director, but he works for UCB Comedy and the UCB Beta team Diamonds Wow, too. As far of the look of the show, and the high standards of what he does -- it’s nuts.

LCM: Caitlin and I were ready to borrow random people’s cameras and get a PA to hold a camera. And Zach was like, “This is a good script. What if we did it right?” We were like, oh, okay!

Talking about process, as you gear up for season two, how do you work on episodes together?

CT: I’m not sure how season two will work. During season one and our halcyon days of not knowing anything, we came up with the idea, outlined it, and sat down and wrote the first episode together.

LCM: In the training center.

CT: And then, I can’t totally remember, but I think I wrote episodes two and four.

LCM: We knew what we wanted to happen in each episode, so we divvied up the middle four episodes, wrote it, but did pretty substantial rewrites.

CT: We gave each other notes.

LCM: It’s funny because sometimes my husband will ask me who wrote a specific line and 70% of the time I have no idea. It helps that we have really similar voices in a lot of ways, so I don’t think it reads like it wasn’t written by two people.

CT: Zach also gave us notes.

LCM: Zach is a total dude, but he’s been totally on board with all of Vag. He sent us a really funny email the other day, because every episode title is a feminist album, and he sent us this ridiculous list of “outtakes.” He was like, “What about Call the Doctor? All Hands on the Bad One? X-Ray Spex Live At The Roxy?”

CT: He was determined to out-reference us.

What has been your favorite feedback from the show?

LCM: My favorite right now is from a comment on After Ellen, which is a lesbian blog that has been great to us and has posted all our episodes. On their episode five thread, someone wrote, “Am I the only person who sees something Meghan and Bethany romance blooming? Meghan obviously wants it.” Which I love! It makes me so happy. I was like, we have ’Shippers! We have people rooting for relationships on our show! I can’t ask for anything more than that.

CT: My favorite comment was one where the person didn’t know Kate McKinnon’s name but said, “I like the blonde weird one.” Or that one guy who commented on Vimeo that it was ironic that he was attracted to the whole cast. We haven’t gotten any negative feedback that has been “women aren’t funny” or “these chicks are idiots” or “these chicks are ugly” -- even on YouTube.

We haven’t gotten a lot of criticism but it is funny when someone my mom’s age will log in and will say, “Thank God someone said it about these young kids” or something. We’ll be like, “This is our age group but okay, fine.”

What has been the response of older generations?

LCM: My aunt-in-law is a lovely person who is a lesbian and a feminist, she was talking to me about the show. And she said, “I liked the show but I was shocked at the name of the rival magazine in episode four.” [Cunt.] I think for older women, that’s sort of more of a deal breaker, because it’s such an offensive word.

CT: That is true. My Dad’s favorite character is Jaybird, but he won’t say the name of her magazine either. Or remember the name of Jaybird. But he’ll be like, “I like the one that sits at the end of the table at the end of episode four.” And then I knew he didn’t want to say the other word. So I said, “The leader of the other magazine?” And he said, “Yeah, her. That’s my favorite.”

LCM: Ms. wrote a nice article about us and there was an immediate response that was a cut and paste from an older feminist that was like “younger feminists don’t appreciate the work we did.” She gave literally no specifics about that.

CT: In person, we’ve gotten awesome support. Susan Miller, who was a writer for The L Word and Thirtysomething and is huge into the web community, she’s been awesomely supportive and interviewed us. There are older generations of feminists involved in Internet culture who seem to like it.

What can we expect from season two?

LC: We get more into the exploration of characters when they are together. Like, what happens if you have Fennel and Meghan in a room together?

We’re also working together on another web series, about elections and a female candidate.

CT: In 2012. This is a long-term project.

Tell us more about Fennel’s menstrual bucket.

CT: Megan Lyons helped with set design and it looks so buckety. It’s perfect. I think she bought it at Kmart. It’s a good place to get props. If you go to the basement of the 34th St. Kmart, it’s like New Albany, Indiana, in there. They don’t specifically order items based on the location in the store.

We have not addressed Nicole Shabtai as an awesome, invaluable producer.

LCM: We started off producing it ourselves, but when we realized how far beyond our heads it was, we decided to bring on Nicole as a producer and I can confidently say this series wouldn’t have happened without Nicole Shabtai.

CT: She came through with our set designer, our location, our art director, our shooter, our gaffer, our make-up artist, Emilia Ademkiewicz.

I can’t say enough good things about Emilia. We did not shoot the episodes in order and Emilia would have to remember and redo their hair and make-up styles. She was a hero.

LCM: We filmed at Gin Lane Media, who have been very kind to us. Get your website done by them!

We shot in June, it was about 110 degrees and we had to turn off the A/C, in a 5th floor office with lots of windows. It was disgusting. Between every shot, Emilia was powdering them. It was crazy.

CT: Going from sketch comedy onstage to video is an adjustment. It’s hard. But I have no complaints about a hair and make-up person constantly being there.

LCM: The other person who deserves a huge shout out for their work in continuity is Stephanie Streisand, who was there for our first five episodes and made sure everything was exactly in place.

CT: She’d be like, “Oh, that notebook was on a different page.” It was crazy.

How did financing the project work?

CT: The four executive producers -- me, Leila, Nicole and Zach -- just personally fund raised it. It was more money than any of us were imagining but when you look at the quality, it wasn’t that much.

LCM: Interviewers have asked us about our budget and been shocked. It’s low for a web series but extremely high for our personal finances. But it was a great investment.

CT: Most people worked for free or cheap, cheap, cheap for the hours they put in.

What would be your advice for people who are interested in writing and producing their own web series?

CT: It’s so hard to give advice for me because we came into this as dum-dums, and we ended up with a product we are extremely proud of, and that’s not always going to happen with every project. I think you have to write what’s funny to you. So much effort and money goes in, so if you don’t love it, what’s the point?

LCM: I think we’ve gotten press and attention that we never would have gotten if we had sat down and thought, “What can we write that people will like?”

On the practical side, just do it. Just go out there and do it. And get a producer. Don’t do it all yourself. It turned out so much better because we delegated stuff outside of ourselves. And surround yourself with people you like working with, because it’s an intense, challenging experience.

CT: Ask people for help. We’ve been overwhelmed with the support we’ve gotten from extras and PAs. People want to do those jobs. They want to learn and be a part of things. Ask for help.

Haven't seen "Vag Magazine?" Watch episode one; the rest of the episodes can be found on the Vag website.

Vag Magazine Episode 1: "Fumbling Toward Ecstasy" from Vag Magazine on Vimeo.

Justin Bieber Gritty Movie Trailer Rivals Justin Bieber's Popularity

2010-11-12T06:56:00.000-08:00

UCB Comedy's Justin Bieber Gritty Movie Trailer is burning up the Internet, currently featured on sites like Huffington Post, Deadline Hollywood, Tosh.O, Best Week Ever, The Washington Post, the L.A. Times Magazine, iwatchstuff, The High Definite, The Daily What, Splitsider, Comedy Central, Hollywood Reporter, and more!

The video was written and directed by the equally-dreamy-but-not-at-all-related Todd Bieber, UCB Comedy's Director of Content and Production. "When people ask me if I'm related to Justin Bieber, I refer to them to the Michael Bolton scene from Office Space," says Todd.

Emily Axford plays the pop sensation, with Neil Casey, Nat Freedburg, Kate Riley, Pedro Lee, Tanisha Long and Don Fanelli rounding out the cast.

"I cast Emily because Justin Bieber looks like a cute girl. That's just a fact," notes Todd. "UCBLA did a Justin Bieber video a few months ago and they cast a woman as J.B. and I thought that was smart. I've worked with Emily Axford on a few videos in the past and she's a talented actress and super-funny. She just seemed like the natural choice."

Other forces behind the gritty biopic include Alex Chinnici, Director of Photography; Julie Gomez, producer; Sarah Scheld, costumes and art; Sean Traynor, sound; Alex Adan and Andy Bond, crew and Adam Sacks, graphics.

Interview: Broad City

2010-11-01T18:57:00.000-07:00

Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer are best friends with hilarious chemistry -- so they decided to write a web series about it. Broad City chronicles the real and imagined adventures of the BFFs "exploring life, love and lipstick in the Big Apple." Together with their partner-in-crime Rob Michael Hugel, who directs and edits the series, Broad City has more than one YouTube user admitting to elaborate fantasies where "Abbi and Ilana are my best friends."

Demonstrating the show is true to life, the Broad City gang finished each other's sentences while talking to UCB Comedy about their writing process, acting with Abbi and Ilana's moms, and their sold-out LIVE show coming up this Fri., Nov. 5 at 92Y Tribeca.

How did Broad City get started?

IG: Abbi and I were the only girls in a long-dead improv troupe known as Secret Promise Circle.

AJ: You don’t have to call it “long dead,” though.

IG: I think it’s funny. It’s dramatic. We became friends.

What year was this?

IG: I think 2003?

(Long pause.)

AJ: What?!

(Laughter.)

RMH: You were like sixteen!

AJ: Ilana, I was in college in Baltimore in 2003.

IG: It’s 2005 right now, right?

RMH: It’s 1981.

IG: What year is it? We met in 2007. I feel working relationships feel so much longer. I was just saying the other day that it feels like I’ve known you guys since middle school. So, the improv team ended and we were like, “We are so cute and funny! What do we do with this?”

AJ: We also wanted to write something for ourselves.

IG: But I really do think it was, as narcissistic as this is, we wanted to do something with our dynamic. Right?

AJ: Yes. We were like “Oh, this is funny. We constantly fight with each other.”

IG: And also, Abbi had this Capes Coaching class that was very inspiring --

AJ: I really wanted to write my own material.

IG: And that inspired me too, because she was talking about writing down goals.

AJ: It was seriously a year ago. My year was Oct. 22. Capes is not paying me for this [plug] but I will welcome that!

IG: Now we’re looking back over a year. So, we were at that pizza place across from UCB and we said, “Maybe we could do this thing about us and our relationship.” We were so stoked. I think you can feel it’s a project that you want to do and when you’re really going to like it. You can fucking FEEL IT!

AJ: We wrote so many ideas of possible episodes. Probably half of our episodes -- even just anecdotes -- came from that meeting. And then so we started writing --

IG: -- but we were like, how are we going to get someone to shoot? And to edit? But then we were like, “Let’s collaborate with people!” And we did that for a while with directors. Initially, we were going pay Rob as an onetime thing.

RMH: For the first episode.

AJ: We were friends with Rob. But not good friends.

RMH: Once a year at Harold auditions, Abbi and I are always in the same group.

AJ: And Rob wanted to do it --

RMH: -- I was just going to edit that one episode.

IG: But over the season, as we worked together more and more, Rob heavily contributed to the voice. We consider ourselves each a third of the voice. Not only was Rob’s editing like, “That’s exactly what we wanted!” -- but the working relationship? Oh my God, I’m getting CHILLS. Inspiring! He was comfortable saying, “I don’t like that idea.” Not that everyone has to work that way, but it matched our way.

What’s the process behind each Broad City episode?

IG: I’m huge into defining the process. They make fun of me because I act like I'm in a college class, like, “Um, Professor, can we define the process?” We’re still finding the rhythm. We were increasingly prepared throughout the season.

AJ: Tried to be, I will emphasis that. But we do leave room to improvise. And while we’re shooting, there’s always something that pops up.

IG: At first I was like, “Let’s make a chart! The first week we’ll do this..." but you can’t set the process until you do it.

AJ: A big part of the series is that we want it to be based on truth: either something that has happened to us, or a friend.

IG: Abbi is the anchor for that. “We’ve got to bring it back to reality.”

AJ: I think reality is funny. It’s important.

IG: On the other hand, I could be like, “And then we get in a hot air balloon!” And Abbi will be like, “Hold up. Good idea but...”

AJ: We write about things that we find funny about our own lives so other people relate to it.

IG: People are like, “Oh my God, that happened to me!”

AJ: So we brainstorm things that we think are funny that happened to us. Most of the time, we’ll write on our own, because apparently we’re never apart in our lives.

A&I: (in unison) We work together.

Wait. Your day jobs are together?

A&I: (in unison) Yes.

AJ: We write a lot, mostly because we’re together all the time, and bring these outlines and scripts to Rob, and then it’s a collaboration from there.

IG: We decompress a lot in the beginning of our meetings, where we like "update" for a half an hour. But those conversations become the material.

RMH: In general, the process starts with a personal story that we think was funny. And then we do an outline, and look at it together, and say, how does this work? And at that point, we have someone in mind who will be “the guest” and know what their strength is, so we know it’s going to be funny -- we just need to find the direction of who the guest will be.

IG: It’s like creating the most ideal improv situation, where we’re like, this guy is going to be hilarious in this situation -- like Johnny McNulty is so funny in the "Laundry" episode as a smooth douche.

AJ: Shannon O'Neill's episode was one that wasn’t based on reality but we wrote that part for Shannon.

IG: We wanted to write for Shannon's strengths -- this really weird character, ambiguous in so many ways.

AJ: She’s one we keep talking about to use in other things. She’s so unique.

IG: We’re like, “How can we get Shannon in next?”

AJ: But there’s so many people that we want to use. We have the whole UCB community to play with!

RMH: There’s a million more people we want to use.

IG: And in some episodes, we’re not even using their funniest part. Like, in "Mom Brunch," Paul Downs is the waiter. Paul Downs is playing the straight man waiter and he is an AMAZING character actor.

Let's talk about "Mom Brunch." Do your Moms have any acting training?

IG: I have to say Abbi’s mom was incredibly impressive as an actress. My mom nailed it as a mom actress.

RH: But they had no training.

A & I: (in unison) No training.

AJ: My mom memorized the whole script. She wanted to be comfortable enough to improvise.

Had your moms met before?

AJ: No, just earlier in the day.

RMH: They were pretty amazing. I wasn’t working on that episode -- I was just there -- and at first they were being side-coached, but then it got to the point they were just going off on their own. And some of the funniest lines they improvised. Ilana’s mom goes, “Abbi’s a fucking drip, and when I took at her, I want to take a nap.”

IG: We were like HOLY SHIT!

AJ: And then my mom goes, “Ilana is such a slut, she should put her phone number on her chest.” And at one point, it didn’t make it in, but Ilana’s mom was just like, “You two should just go fuck each other.”

IG: With like, fuck hand movements. We were like, what??? And Abbi’s mom improvised the last line!

AJ: She improvised the button.

RMH: She did a call back!

IG: "Mom Brunch" is a good example of the following: we wrote a whole script out but we treated the script as though it was bulleted. I never would’ve thought of the word “drip.”

RMH: It’s old timey.

AJ: In every episode, someone has said a line that we could never have written.

What is your schedule for releasing episodes?

IG: At first, we released videos weekly, like, “we’ll keep this up for five years!” But now we’re releasing them every two weeks, just because we have them in the bag. We’re hoping to lock down more of a rhythm in season 2 and be able to release.

When will Season 2 start?

IG: We released our first video in Feb. 15th and within a year, we’ll have 18 episodes and a short film that we’re working on now. I imagine Season 2 will start in Feb. or March.

Can you tell me a little about the short film?

RMH: We’re in the planning stages.

AJ: Some of the episodes tell you more about the characters, while some of them are just snips of their life. This will be a longer journey with the characters -- to sit with them a little bit.

IG: It’ll be an extended version of an episode.

AJ: My hope is that it maintains the same fun --

IG: and the casual tone --

AJ: But the film will be a little more in-depth --

IG: And invested.

RMH: So far, we’ve never really followed a story arc. For this one, that’s our goal: do what we’ve always done, plus a storyline that is a true arc.

IG: We’re considering more emotional storylines for the characters. We want this to be funny. We don’t want it to be sappy --we don’t want to be boxed in as touchy-feely women -- we want to keep it light and funny. Actual shitty, heartbreaking stuff can happen, but as long as we’re like, “bada-dump!," we can keep a casual tone where we don’t take stuff too seriously.

What else is new with Broad City?

AJ: Mackenzie Condon is part of the team now. That’s been fun, working with her.

IG: Mackenzie's vibe, and energy and mind -- she just fit in immediately. And is so helpful as a reference, even helping us with stupid little decisions, like emails and shit, she’s just so fucking good. She’s a bad ass bitch.

Abbi, an illustrator, created the poster for the live show (and Broad City's titles.)

92Y is hosting your big SOLD-OUT live show on Friday. How did you get involved with them?

AJ: Over the summer, we were part of this short film festival there called The Iron Mule.

IG: It was fucking awesome --

AJ: And they didn’t tell us, but they featured us in the NYTimes. So there was a huge picture of us in the Times.

IG: We opened the Times and it was like WHAT THE FUCK! Abbi texted me about it and I died.

AJ: It legitimized everything, everything about New York City, just to be in the Times, and it wasn’t even about us. We were just the intro --

IG: The intro was something like “make them laugh, but don’t take all day,” which I took to mean, “Right, Broad City?”

AJ: We won the Judge’s Choice, which was awesome, and forged this relationship with 92Y.

What can audience members expect from the live show?

IG: Stand-up from our past guests, like the awesome Sara Schaefer from our "Yoga" episode and Jon Friedman and Hannibal Buress from our "Date Night."

We’re trying to invite bad ass bitches, New York women that we know and love, like some comedians and shit or like writers. If you’re a bad ass bitch, we’re like, “Please come.”

Our moms are going to be there.

AJ: The live show is going to premiere the finale and it’s very exciting. It’s a guest director, we shot it a while ago, and it’s very special.

RMH: It’s a break from the format.

AJ: We’re treating the live show like an event. It’s a 70-seat theater and we want the audience to be full of people who have supported us. It’s been a great year and there have been so many people who have gone out of their way to support the show.

RMH: In general, this whole thing has surprised me in a big way because I’ve never felt crazy support for anything like this. People are supportive in this community, but it’s kind of hard sometimes to feel like you have a place --

IG: It’s simultaneously competitive.

RMH: It is. You see other people do great things and you think, “Why haven’t I done anything great?” But it’s just so amazing how supportive people have been for this show, all the comments we’ve gotten from like friends or strangers, people who say really nice things.

IG: It’s like hol-eeeeee shit. I’m such a cynical bitch, when a guy likes it, I’m like, “Oh, you’re a special dude” -- how fucking patronizing, but I really can’t believe it. It’s like, thank you so much! It’s so cheesy, but it’s such a fucking amazing way to figure yourself out, and create a relationship with people. I’ve made friends with people who have said, “I like Broad City." I’m like, "Let’s TALK!” It’s so inspiring. I always say my chest is going to burst because my heart is growing. I say that all the time.

Interview: Chris Kelly and Craig Rowin on "This Show Will Get You High"

2010-11-01T07:14:00.000-07:00

If you haven't checked out This Show Will Get You High, created by UCB co-founder Matt Besser, the final airing is tonight at 4am on Comedy Central. Set those DVRs!

UCB Comedy sat down with This Show writers Chris Kelly and Craig Rowin to talk about writing the pilot. Chris, serving as "senior writer," spent ten weeks in Los Angeles working on the show, and Craig joined the writers room for a month.

Chris Kelly is a staff writer and director for The Onion News Network, which won the 2009 Peabody Award. Chris wrote, directed, and acts in his new one-act play Oh My God, I Heard You're Dying, which is currently running at UCBNY (the next shows are Wed., Nov. 10 and Thurs., Nov. 18). He is also the director of Michael Hartney's one-man show, So I Like Superman, and is a writer/actor on the Maude Team Stone Cold Fox. Chris has a variety of credits at both UCBNY and UCBLA, including ASSSSCAT (monologist), Maude Night (writer/actor), 2Pac: The Musical (director) and Sketch Cram (writer).

In addition to This Show Will Get You High, Craig Rowin has written for Comedy Central's Night of Too Many Stars and contributed to Comedy Central's Onion Sports Network. He is the head writer and director for the ESPN.com sketch show, The Pretty Good Sports Show and contributes to The Onion. He has acted in and written video content for College Humor and wrote and hosted VH1’s webcast, Best Night Ever. Craig has performed in numerous shows at the UCB Theatre including Rory and Craig: Our Internet Knowledge, Maude Night, Killgore: The Resurrection, and many more. Craig performs improv with The Upright Citizens Brigade Touring Company and the UCB house team The Law Firm.

UCB Comedy spoke with Chris and Craig about This Show Will Get You High, how Maude Night prepared them for a professional writers' room, and risking your life in the name of comedy.

What was the writing process like for This Show Will Get You High?

Craig: We’d come into the office to write every day. Matt Besser wanted us to have sketches when we arrived in L.A., and I had my sketches from Maude Night and other stuff. Every day, we’d bring in new sketches and then do notes and rewrites and then read them again. And after work, it was crazy, I probably wrote three sketches every night.

Chris: In the writers’ room, Matt really let everyone’s voice be heard. If you had a sketch and if it wasn’t his sense of humor, he would let you explain it and defend your joke. He made a point of having a bunch of different voices and different people in the room, and I feel like it was very apparent that he had collected people with different sensibilities and I thought that was awesome.

I just cannot say enough great things about working with Matt. If we had sketches that we didn’t think were going to work, he’d be like, “Let me call UCB and get you a slot tonight so you can test it out,” and we would memorize it real quick and perform it ourselves, or he would organize actors to come in and perform it. We would write all day, perform a couple sketches at night, film it, show it to Matt, and he’d say, “Yeah this killed, let’s put it in the show,” or, “This didn’t work, let’s cut it.” And it was such a perfect way to know instantly what was working and what wasn’t. And even though we were only filming for a week or two at the end with the fancy cameras on the official Comedy Central dime, we filmed the entire time we were there, because a lot of the show was the connectors -- the things in-between the sketches.

Craig: The writers room was very comfortable. It felt very familiar, being in this room with all these writers -- it was like doing Maude Night or being in a good sketch class. Building on other people’s ideas, giving notes, giving your point of view on a sketch, making each other laugh -- it was totally similar to Maude and it helped to have that experience of being in a writers’ room. I think Maude Night tries to mimic that -- and by “mimic that,” I mean do exactly the same thing. Rather than doing a stage show, you’re just trying to write 22 minutes or 44 minutes or content for a video.

Obviously there was pressure of “I hope I get something on the show,” but working on this show felt just like how I want writing comedy to feel like: you’re in a room with a ton of funny people, making each other laugh. And that was nice to have that experience, to be lucky enough to get that job and then to be like, “Oh, not only is this a job and I have to work hard, but it’s really fun.” It confirmed that what I want to do, I like to do. It was a great experience.

What was one of your favorite sketches that you worked on?

Chris: John Gemberling has this character “Winnie the Whiny Baby” and it’s just him with a rattle and a bib and a diaper. For those six weeks, I saw him more in a diaper than I saw him fully dressed.

When we went to the Grand Prix, it was sort of a long day and the people were sort of terrible and annoying and we just got frustrated about how un-fun some of the people were. Then, at the end of the day, we were leaving and we saw one of these random Christian guys with a megaphone and big signs about how everyone’s going to hell. Matt or someone said, “John, go out there as a baby and ask him to put suntan lotion on you,” and it was so simple and unplanned and so ridiculous. And John talked to this guy for probably half an hour and was crying and laying at his feet and we got hundreds of people surrounding him, asking him to put sunscreen on the baby. It was surreal.

Winnie and the Jesus Freak	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Craig: I wrote a sketch about a guy who is so enamored with his pet chimp, Mr. Bananas, he won’t admit that there’s a problem -- even when it is literally ripping his face apart and beating him. That was pitched in the room and then Besser had Brett Gelman and I write it up. It was written for Gelman.

I was back in New York when it started filming, but Chris would text me these pictures of Gelman’s face in super-realistic makeup, with his face like hanging off, or the prop cage that had all the bars ripped apart. It was great.

Craig, has a pet ever turned against you in real life?

Craig: Yeah. My pet died. My freshman year of college, I found out -- on the same day -- that the dog I had since kindergarten died and that my parents sold the house I grew up in. I grew up in one day. It was a pretty sad day.

This Show Will Get You High has a lot of warning labels: "Please don't watch this show if pregnant, recovering addict, or while driving." Have you ever endangered yourself watching comedy or doing comedy?

Chris: I think you mean, “Oh, I laughed until I died,” but I have no sense of danger. I’m never afraid of anything. And I mean that not in a brave way, but in an "I’m stupid" way. I’ve been robbed at gunpoint, I walk in front of traffic all the time, I don’t pay attention. I live without fear. My thought is always, “I’m not really going to die. I’m going to have an interesting experience and talk about it later.”

Is this going to be an insufferable interview? “Chris Kelly says nothing scares him and he’s never going to die.”

It didn’t kill me, but the worst experience I ever had shooting was at The Onion, three years ago, and it was like zero degrees and we were filming this press conference in like a wind tunnel down by the river. The shoot was taking forever because there was honking going on. We were all so cold, we were literally screaming and crying. We were bundled and in between takes, we’d be like, “Ahhhh! Ahhhh!” Everyone at The Onion will talk about that day and be like, “I’ve never been colder in my life.” It was freezing and miserable. Even watching it now, I have problems viewing it as a comedy video -- I just get cold and angry.

Craig: The only time I’ve felt nervous doing a shoot for a video was doing the Pretty Good Sports Show, which is the show I do with ESPN.com, and we went to shoot a segment at a Jets game in the new Meadowlands stadium and the atmosphere there can only be described as post-apocalyptic. Like, crazy -- I came late because I was working on something else and I couldn’t believe the amount of beer cans and bottles just strewn around the stadium. I’m used to going to baseball games, and obviously there’s drinking there, but not really a tailgate culture. The whole thing was interacting with fans and people were like screaming into the camera and being super-aggressive. We got to sneak into the stadium with some passes to shoot some stuff, and during the third quarter, it was obvious the Jets were going to lose this opener. The energy was so negative and angry and we had to wake up at 5:30am the next morning to shoot, so I was like, “Let’s. Get. Out. Of. Here.” Because not only do we need to catch the train, but also, I didn’t want to be murdered. That was the most scared I’ve ever been doing comedy. And it turned out hilarious.

Do you have any advice for UCB students who want to make the transition to being a professional writer?

Chris: Jesus. I always feel weird giving advice, because I think I need advice, but the thing I tell my students -- which I know is the most frustrating answer -- is just keep writing more. Oftentimes when I’m frustrated or feel like I’m not doing enough or think, “When are things gonna happen for me?” that’s when it’s been a long time since I’ve written and I should just sit down and write a bunch. And because there was such a long time between Maude submissions, people were saying, “What else can I do with a big packet of sketches?” And I say to have a packet ready, because you never know. And obviously Maude Night helped me get discovered for this show because Anthony recommended me to Matt -- and if you are writing and you have an arsenal of different sketches, you never know what could happen.

I tell my students to find ways to trick yourself into writing. It’s hard to write if you don’t have a deadline. If you’re in a class and there’s somebody that you like their writing style or even think they’re better than you, try to write with them. And you can say, like, every two weeks you’ll bring in sketches because that will guilt you into writing. It’s pretty generic, but I feel like you should be really exhausted at the end of each day.

Craig: I think the same principles stand from being a student or a professional: obviously, work hard and, you know, be funny.

I think a couple of things are important: always write what you think is funny. Some good advice that I’ve gotten is, “Don’t tailor to what you think other people think is funny.” Obviously try to get the voice of what you’re submitting for, but really stay true to your sense of humor. Don’t just shoehorn in other things because that’s what you assume other people want. People want to be able to hear your voice. I think that’s really important.

Also, don’t wait for a break. No one is going to come up to you and be like, “Hey. Write for this show!” You get that opportunity after you’ve put out a ton of your own stuff. People respond to that, knowing that people are making comedy just for the sake of making comedy -- not just to be seen, or to get a job. I think most people that I like working with, or people that other people are drawn to, just love comedy. The other stuff will follow. I hope. I hope! Because I need jobs.

Can't get enough of Chris Kelly? Visit his website or check out Oh My God, I Heard You're Dying Wed., Nov. 10 or Thurs., Nov 18. Looking to add more Craig Rowin to your day? Oh, yes, Craig has a website, too, or catch him every week with The Law Firm.

"This Show Will Get You High" is on Comedy Central TONIGHT at 4am.

Interview: Charlie Sanders on "Death Valley"

2010-10-29T01:53:00.000-07:00

Charlie Sanders has been a UCB performer and writer at UCB since 2002. His sketch group Police Chief Rumble won Best Sketch Group at the Emerging Comics of New York awards in 2004. His other sketch group, Buffoons, went to perform at the Montreal Just For Laughs Comedy Festival in 2007. Charlie's hit one-man show Minnesota Muslim garnered high praise from Time Out NY and New York Magazine. During his time in New York, he appeared in several national commercials and was a regular sketch actor on Late Night with Conan O’Brien.

In 2009, Charlie moved to L.A. and bought the first car of his life – "a Ford Focus, not to brag." He performs regularly at UCBLA in Shitty Jobs and ASSSSCAT. He has landed roles in the feature films A NY Things, When in Rome, Freak Dance, and Cedar Rapids and has appeared on The Office.

Just in time for Halloween, UCB Comedy talked to Charlie Sanders about fighting monsters in his upcoming MTV show, Death Valley.

Can you tell me more about Death Valley and your character on the show?

CS: I can give you a real general description because they don’t want me to say more until the show airs. But in the Valley, in L.A., all of a sudden people start turning into werewolves, zombies and vampires. The city of L.A. has to make the undead task force -- the cops that go fight the undead in the valley. And I’m one of the cops that fights the monsters.

Are you a good cop or bad cop?

CS: I consider myself a good cop.

Do you have any crazy action scenes?

CS: Yeah. It’s awesome. The show is a really cool combination of action and monster stuff. All the monster stuff looks really freaky, really real and really cool, and the comedy is well-written, in terms of the dialogue. I don’t think I’ve ever seen another show like it before -- which is what I’m so excited about this show. The way it balances truly scary stuff and really funny stuff is cool.

We had a fight choreographer come in and he’d teach us how to get hit and punch people and all that shit.

Have you been in any fights in your personal life that helped that process?

CS: I was in one... no, two fights in high school, but those were with humans.

When you were a kid did you prefer zombies, werewolves or vampires? Did you have a favorite?

CS: Zombies I got into later, like with the whole zombie craze we’ve been seeing in the past decade in Hollywood. But as a kid, my brother and I were completely obsessed with monsters, like Frankenstein, The Wolfman, Dracula -- all those classic black-and-white horror movies. We owned every single one and watched them countless times over.

My brother and I wrote this comic book -- it was like a 300-page comic book, written in our notebooks, about a guy that would fight Frankenstein and Dracula. So this is really a childhood fantasy come real for me.

Did you and your brother watch MTV together?

CS: No, we didn’t have cable but my friends did, so I liked MTV. I think Beavis and Butthead was on when I first got into MTV. I remember I would go to a friend’s house and watch eight straight hours of Beavis and Butthead.

What the process for getting the role on Death Valley?

CS: I auditioned for the pilot back in late February or early March. I found out about it because my friend Eric Appel was directing the pilot. He and I had just collaborated on making that Funny Or Die video “Big Dog." We've known each other for years but “Big Dog” was one of our first times working together.

I think I did two callbacks, if I remember correctly, and then they had two or three of us come in and work on the cop roles. It was really fun because they let us do improv.

And then we shot it. We shot 12 minutes for a pilot presentation/proof of concept sort of thing over two days in March. A lot of time passed, like three months. And I figured it was over, you know, “These things come and go.” Then they called us up and said, “MTV likes it and wants us to shoot it, but they’re not giving the green light for a whole series." They wanted to shoot the remaining 10 minutes to make a full pilot. So we had shot these two different sequences and they had to figure out how to write around them to make a full pilot.

And then this guy Eric Weinberg, who was an executive producer for both Scrubs and Californication -- a very hilarious, cool dude -- came in and became the showrunner guy. He worked on that whole process of expanding the script for the pilot and we shot the rest of it in July. It turned out great! I was definitely wondering how they’d write around [the segments] to make a linear pilot, but they did a great job. Finally, I think around Sept. 15, my manager called me and said that MTV had ordered 12 episodes. That was really exciting.

When do you start shooting?

CS: I think late December/early January we’ll start shooting.

Any advice for up-and-coming writer/performers?

CS: The best thing to do is write and perform as much as possible. Create a show with your friends and put it up. I think an important thing to note is that performing a lot should not just mean being in a million improv groups. Improv is important and fun, and definitely do it, love it, and embrace it. But, from my experience, real career progress comes from writing and putting up scripted shows -- polished material you can showcase.

Check out a picture from "Death Valley" on director Eric Appel's Tumblr.

Amy Rhodes at Universal Studios Haunted Maze

2010-10-28T10:35:00.000-07:00

The Ellen Degeneres Show sent Amy Rhodes, their Emmy-winning staff writer (and UCBLA teacher/performer) to check out the haunted maze at Universal Studios.

Amy clearly LOVES haunted houses. So funny.

"Neighborhood Watch" Created By and Starring UCB Comedians

2010-10-27T08:30:00.000-07:00

Neighborhood Watch -- Official Promo Video from Noam Bleiweiss on Vimeo.

UCB comedians Mike Mitchell, Ron Babcock and Jake Regal star in Neighborhood Watch, a new web series written and directed by Noam Bleiweiss, who also directs the Beta team Pantsuit. The series features Dennis Haskins -- yes, Mr. Belding from Saved by the Bell -- in what Noam calls Haskins' "first-ever return to onscreen 'principal-ing.'"

"When I think of comedy in L.A. I think of UCB," says Noam. "It's where the funniest actors are. So when the time came to cast for Neighborhood Watch, I knew that's where I wanted to look. We kind of got to treat the performer page on the UCB site as our casting site for the show. We went through all the performers and picked the ones who we'd seen on stage and knew were funny. Then we could take it a step further and go watch their videos on UCB Comedy. It's so much more enjoyable than auditions. And the great thing about UCB is that if someone you wanted to cast is already booked during your shoot dates, there's so many other super-talented performers to pick from."

Noam notes that Lindsay Hendrickson, UCBLA's General Manager, was extremely helpful -- "she always seemed to email me people's contact information within minutes, which is so convenient when you're facing the time crunch before a shoot."

Neighborhood Watch, which debuts Mon., Nov. 1, is about fool-hardy middle age men living in Sunnyvale, the safest town in America, who start a Neighborhood Watch as an excuse to spend time away from their wives. But, when actual crimes begin to pop up, the men attempt to solve the mystery... very poorly.

Visit the Neighborhood Watch website and check back Monday for the first episode.

Interview: Matt Besser on "This Show Will Get You High"

2010-10-24T12:51:00.000-07:00

Matt Besser is co-founder of the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre. The Upright Citizens Brigade television series ran for three seasons on Comedy Central, and in the fall of 2005, the UCB premiered their improv show ASSSSCAT: Improv on Bravo. Besser teamed up with Method Man and Redman to create and perform in the hidden camera show Stung on MTV. He was also a co-creator and star of Crossballs which ran 23 episodes on Comedy Central; and created and starred in The Very Funny Show for TBS.com.

Besser has guest-starred on The Sarah Silverman Show, Reno 911, Mighty B, Word Girl, Pilot Season, The Bernie Mac Show, Frasier, Late Friday; and featured in the movies Freak Dance, Year One, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, Drill Bit Taylor, The TV Set, Junebug, and the zombie western Wanted: Undead or Alive.

His new sketch pilot/special, "This Show Will Get You High," hits Comedy Central Wed., Oct. 27 at 3am; Thurs., Oct. 28 at 4:30am; and Mon., Nov. 1 at 4am.

UCB Comedy talked to Besser about This Show Will Get You High, what's exciting him about the UCB scene, and Save the Last Dance.

What is the premise of This Show Will Get You High?

MB: The show is a sketch show but we do a performance live on the road -- we did one at a theater in Santa Cruz -- but we also go to a big event and hang out at it. So we went to 4/20 at Santa Cruz, the Long Beach Grand Prix and the Anaheim Comicon.

Costume Contest 2 - James Gandalfini	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

So each episode has the live show element and a big event?

MB: That was the idea but we ended up shooting too much material. A lot of that material will end up on UCB Comedy.

One of the goals of the show was to get the best sketch writers and performers from UCB Theatre. So, the first step was to ask both artistic directors, Anthony King and Neil Campbell, who are the best writers out there? Who is putting out the best stuff? We got a bunch of good submissions. I must have looked at 40-60 submissions and then we ended up whittling it down to around 20 people we really liked and a couple people we brought on to be there just about the whole time, including Chris Kelly, who was kind of our senior writer, and Craig Rowin, who also came out from New York. And there were 15 other writers from the theater, mostly from L.A.

The original idea for my show was to use the entire UCB Theatre and not have a set cast. I thought it was an unique idea -- calling it a 300-person ensemble -- just whoever is best-suited for the scene is cast. But the network wanted to go with a cast where you’d become familiar with their faces, so we went in that direction.

What were you looking for when selecting writers and performers for the show?

MB: For writers, I look for someone who knows the game, which is what we focus on at the UCB. I look for people who know how to find game, know how to find the focus of the scene really quickly and then are really good at heightening that without being too verbose, too, because these days, sketches need to be on the short side. You know, you’d like to have a five- or six-minute scene, but we have to aim for three or less, which is a kind of a whole skill in itself.

I think there’s less attention span now, that people would like you to get to the joke a little quicker. I do think that’s a trend. And that’s okay. It has a lot to do with YouTube and being able to see so much sketch all the time -- so viewers demand a lot more from their sketch, too.

From a performer perspective, I just looked for who is working the hardest on their sketch. There are so many funny people at the UCB, but as anyone who has auditioned for a sketch show, specifically SNL, you know you can’t just show up for the audition. You really got to have characters that you’ve worked on for while and that you know are good. You need characters that you work on all the time, put them up onstage all the time. I’d say there are very few people that are doing that each year. You got to focus like you are focusing for the Olympics, you have to really decide, “This is going to be the year I do characters all the time, I’m getting on stage and I’m working them out.” And I’d say it really showed in the audition. It came down to like 20 people who I think really have it going on in the sketch character category. It wasn’t just up to me, it was also up to Comedy Central, but there were about 20 people I would have been happy with. And then we used five or six.

Did any characters from the auditions get written into the show?

MB: Without question. John Gemberling in particular has this character called “Winnie the Whiney Baby” and it did really well in the audition and ended up getting a full scene in the show and we took Whiney Baby to just about every event. People were loving him.

Winnie and the Jesus Freak	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

A lot of the sketches featured on UCB Comedy involves the cast interacting with real people.

MB: I’ve done a lot of prank shows and I didn’t want to do another prank show but I’ve always liked putting characters out in the real world. We’re not really tricking them or fooling them that John Gemberling is a baby, but it’s funny to see a character interact with a real person. And people react in all kinds of ways. We had rednecks threatening to kick our ass at the Grand Beach Grand Prix, and we had hippies completely tripping out on us.

We went to this 4/20 smokeout in Santa Cruz and Gelman’s character was a Republican and we turned him into a bong and asked stoners if they wanted to smoke out of a Republican. And while they would smoke out of “the Republican,” he would insult their liberal ways. And some people thought it was hilarious, because they’re cool people, and some people got very aggressively mad at us. Like, “Get this guy outta here!” And then some people, he had one guy flip his lid like he was having an acid flashback, screaming.

Wait. The cameras were fully visible, right?

MB: Yes.

But no one got punched or anything?

MB: No. A guy threatened to elbow me in the face. I was playing a character called Nick the Nicknamer. “I’m the guy who gave everyone on the Jersey Shore their nickname, including The Situation, Snooki, Jwwow.” And I nicknamed this guy -- his name was Ludlow -- and he looked really stoned, so I was like, “More like Lud-high!” And he was very insulted by this nickname and threatened to elbow me in the face.

A guy was offended for being called high at a 4/20 event?

MB: No. That was at the Grand Prix.

We also went to the LA marathon and pretended we were one of those “Jesus Hates Gays” groups. We were “Jesus Hates Runners” and we were telling them to stop running. Yelling, “Listen to Kanye’s ‘Jesus Walks’!” There were cameras, but people were buying that we were for real. It was really funny, because they were screaming at us. They thought we were backwards, narrow-minded people.

LA Marathon	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Our original pitch for the sketch show was that it would be in the Middle of America and an old medicine show, in the old days, when you’d just show up and put on a show for people. The original idea was that we’d have a mobile stage but it proved a little more expensive than we counted on.

You’ve worked in many different comedy formats: improv, sitcoms, film, “cable news” parody shows. What keeps bringing you back to sketch?

MB: When I think of comedy, I don’t think of stories. 99% of writers, when they talk about what they write, they always talk about story. Stories don’t really occur to me. That’s not how comedy comes into my brain. If I were to work on a sitcom, I could probably come up with a lot of good ideas -- elements of stories -- but I don’t think my strength is writing stories. So I like sketch. A sketch is not a short story. That’s not a smart way to think about it. A sketch is a sketch -- it is its own entity. It’s about finding a focused game and heightening and exploring it. That’s why I like doing improv, and that’s what I like doing in sketch. I like characters but I also like conceptual ideas. I like parodies. I like the wide variety of opportunities that sketch provides.

This Show Will Get You High has a lot of warning labels: "Please don't watch this show if pregnant, recovering addict, or while driving." Have you ever endangered yourself watching comedy or doing comedy?

MB: I always make sure to wear something over my ears, some sound-dampening device, if I know I’m going to watch something or listen to something that is funny. I’ll put on dark-colored glasses that are hard to see through and try not to hear it, so I’m not affected by the comedy. I’m careful about my comedy, even though I do it all the time. I’m careful so it doesn’t become a problem.

What about the UCB scene excites you right now?

MB: I’m excited that we’re opening a second theater in New York. I think we’ve reached a point where talent is literally brimming over and we need another place to put it. We have such demand from our performers for stage time -- and they deserve it. I think the theater is almost finished and I look forward to coming back and performing there. It’s going to have a more stand-up/solo performance, non-improv focus to it, which is good, because it creates balance. Our theater is kind of known as an improv theater in New York. In L.A., it is known for more of a balance, which I’m proud of. It’s really worked out well for us in L.A.

We’re doing a lot of shows now that we record for podcasts. That’s kind of a new thing. We started doing that for ASSSSCAT, and we’re going to start to do that for other shows in LA., so people in the middle of the country can enjoy our shows.

I like our Beta teams a lot. That’s really great. Hiring someone like Todd Bieber to really get that into gear -- people have been really focused. New York, in particular, has put up some really impressive videos on almost a daily basis. And the quality is so much better than it used to be, it’s really impressive.

How involved is the UCB4 in day-to-day operations at the theaters?

MB: We’re always weighing in via email on something or other. Like the new bar at the new theater is called the “Hot Chicks Room,” and about every day we get a new draft of what the logo is going to look like. It could be something as fun as that, or something as boring as dealing with our accreditation, which is a strenuous process of getting our curriculum in order -- which has taken us years to do it. We get together to work on our improv book almost every morning. Sometimes it’s fun, and sometimes it’s stressful, because you’re putting together a textbook.

When is the book coming out?

MB: I can’t say. It’s been at least a three-year process. We can see the end in sight.

What projects are you working on right now?

MB: There used to be a musical onstage at UCBLA called Freakdance, a parody of dance movies. And we shot it last fall and it has taken us a year to edit. It’s pretty much done. Right now we’re waiting to see if it gets into Sundance. I’m pretty excited about that.

Is it in the vein of Save the Last Dance?

MB: You can’t name a dance movie I haven’t seen.

You’re a big fan of dance movies?

MB: Yes. I hate dancing but I love dance movies. I think they’re funny. There’s movies like Beat Street, Electric Boogaloo, You’ve Got Served, Step Up, where dancing is almost treated like gang warfare. I think that’s funny, all the way back to West Side Story. And then there’s Dirty Dancing and Flashdance and Center Stage, Save the Last Dance -- the more romantic ones. Even within dance movies, there’s all different kinds of dance movies. We tried to pile in all the archetypes into one movie.

Are you dancing in it?

MB: I’m involved in choreography but I’m not breakdancing in it. But we do have real B-boys. We got many of the groups from America’s Next Dance Crew appearing in it, even some of the winners, so we have really good dancers for the movie. One of our regulars was Joshua Allen, who won So You Think You Can Dance.

So, you’re a big fan of dance TV shows, too?

MB: I’ve seen every episode of America’s Next Dance Crew.

Any advice for up and coming writer/performers?

MB: Follow me on my Twitter account and you can see how great comedy is written.

I actually do think Twitter makes people better writers. In the same way, making a sketch writer get their scene down to three minutes, is what Twitter does to get your joke down to 140 characters. I think there’s a discipline there that helps.

Dr. Weed	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Don't miss "This Show Will Get You High" on Comedy Central Wed., Oct. 27 at 3am; Thurs., Oct. 28 at 4:30am; and Mon., Nov. 1 at 4am; watch other videos from the show online.

UCBNY Volunteers For "New York Cares Day"

2010-10-24T10:59:00.000-07:00

This Saturday, a group of UCBNY writers and performers volunteered at a public Brooklyn middle school for New York Cares Day. In addition to painting doors, murals, and doing some cleaning/organizing, UCB raised over $1000 for the organization.

"UCB has such a wonderful community of people, it's only natural that we'd come together to help out for something like New York Cares Day," said Justin Purnell, organizer of the event.

More community service projects are in the works -- stay tuned!

Photos by Ari Scott. See more photos of New York Cares Day in this Flickr set.

Elect the Willfully Ignorant!

2010-10-21T17:31:00.000-07:00

UCB Comedy's video for Babelgum, "Elect the Willfully Ignorant," has been making the rounds online -- including a "thumbs up" from Roger Ebert, who posted it on his Twitter.

Starring Rob Cuthill; directed by Todd Bieber; written by Dan Mirk, Will Hines, Erik Tanouye, and Todd Bieber ; graphics by Ed Mundy.

Dyna Moe on UCB Theatre Podcast

2010-10-19T19:04:00.000-07:00

Have you been listening to the UCB Theatre podcast? The latest features an interview with Dyna Moe, longtime UCBNY performer and illustrator who recently published "Mad Men: The Illustrated World." Check it out!

"The Canadian" Goes Viral

2010-09-21T14:35:00.000-07:00

UCBNY student David Rynn's The Canadian, a parody of the trailer for the George Clooney film The American, has gone viral up north! After Canadian news outlets picked up the video, David was interviewed for the Toronto Star -- and the video even appeared on Canadian television.

In an interview with UCB Comedy, David said, "I thought it would be funny if it was The Canadian instead of The American because we generally think of Canadians as nicer versions of ourselves, which is a good contrast to the dark feel of the film. Also, the first line in the original trailer is 'It's Jack... I want out' -- so it seemed like a natural choice. I pitched it to some friends of mine, workshopped it and my friend Paul Barker co-wrote the script with me. We filmed over three days and then I spent three days huddled up, editing it and composing the music. Production was a bit of a nightmare as we had no budget, bad equipment and most everyone besides me happened to be taking off for vacation a couple days into shooting. Not to mention my editing program kept deleting all the audio off of my edits then saving itself. Good times."

Here's the video that is being paired with a lot of Tim Hortons coffee:

The American spoof: The Canadian	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Check out David's website.

Rachel Bloom's Mother on "Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury"

2010-09-01T10:06:00.001-07:00

If you're a fan of UCB Comedy on Facebook, you may have seen a very special commenter on the post about "Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury:" writer Rachel Bloom's mother.

UCB Comedy asked Rachel's mom what she thought of her daughter's online status as closest rival to Cee-Lo for best use of the f-word in a pop song (about a 90-year-old man, no less).

Her response? "Okay, UCB, I'll tell ye. At first, it was a little disconcerting, but now I still can't get the tune out of my head. I'm very proud of her because she is doing what she wants to do. Also, I'm proud because she actually inherited something good from me -- her musical ability. Okay, now you know. Thank you."

If you're not "Liking" UCB Comedy on Facebook, do it now -- you never know who will pop up in that news feed!

Mande's "Overton Window" in New Yorker

2010-08-27T12:28:00.000-07:00

Don't miss this New Yorker article about Joe Mande's adaptation of Glenn Beck's "The Overton Window" at UCBNY.

Interview: Rachel Bloom of "Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury"

2010-08-27T10:47:00.000-07:00

When a woman in her early twenties asks a ninety-year-old man to fuck her, there's usually an oil fortune involved -- unless, of course, the ninety-year-old man is author Ray Bradbury. Rachel Bloom's poppy ode to the sci-fi master, "Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury," has garnered a million hits on the Internet in less than a week and has been Tweeted by writers like Neil Gaiman.

Rachel, who has her BFA in Drama from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, is a UCBNY student. She is a contributing writer for the Onion News Network and performs improv with her indie group, Mastodon Mattingly. She also hosts a monthly standup/music show called Annette Funicello's Beach Party.

"Fuck Me Bradbury" isn't Rachel's first attempt at song -- a children's musical Rachel co-wrote with writer/composer Michael Maricondi called When Push Comes to Shove is due to tour New England schools later this year. None of the songs in it are about fucking.

UCB Comedy talked to Rachel about putting together your own film shoot, who would be invited to her literary orgy, and dancing alone to Britney Spears in your room.

Q: Tell us a little bit about the process of making "Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury."

RB: I was sitting at home about two years ago during the summer between my junior and senior years of college, and I was re-reading The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury. I was going through a weird sadness/lull on the boy front, and I kept thinking, "Man, Ray Bradbury is so smart...he'd be the ideal boyfriend." I thought it would be funny to do a passionate love song about Ray Bradbury. Then, I thought it would be even funnier to do like, a sexy pop song about Ray Bradbury. So, I sat down at my parents' piano and came up with the essential structure in about an hour. 2 years later, I revisited the song and refined it.

We shot the video at St. Cecilia's, an old Catholic school in Brooklyn. It seems to be the only school in New York City that will let you shoot, because I know of so many other film shoots that have taken place there. The song was recorded in a studio in LA. My friend Jack Dolgen (of the band "Maricopa") arranged the song and helped me record it, along with fellow musician/producer Jon Siebels.

I produced the video myself -- I did all the casting, found the crew, and asked my friends to direct/DP. It was a lot of work, a lot of e-mails going back and forth for a few weeks. I will say that you don't have to be a genius to put together a good film shoot- it's just a lot of work.

Q: What was your reaction when the picture of Ray Bradbury watching your video popped up on the Internet?

RB: It had occurred to me that Ray could find the video just by Googling himself. If I were a famous author, I'd Google myself a lot. Soon after the video came out, though, I started to get a ton of messages/e-mails from close friends of Ray Bradbury, all of whom were praising the video and promising that Ray would see it. So, before I saw the picture, I had some warning, although NOTHING could replace the joy I felt seeing Mr. Bradbury guffawing at my dirty little music video.

Q: The video was obviously influenced by one of the greatest TRL videos ever -- "Hit Me Baby, One More Time." When you were a kid, did you ever dream about being in one of those '90s pop videos?

RB: The weird thing about me as a kid is that I outwardly wanted to be against the establishment, but secretly wanted to be a part of it. I was made fun of a lot right around the time "Baby One More Time" came out, so although I publicly railed against these pretty popular people and their awesome clothes, I privately danced to the song like a fiend alone in my room. I resented the fact I wasn't cool or pretty enough to be a Britney Spears fan, but couldn't deny that I was a Britney Spears fan. I always openly loved 'N Sync, though. Ah, to be 12 and full of contradictions.

Q: If you were doing a whole literary fuckfest, what other authors would be on your list?

RB: I would fuck Kurt Vonnegut, Philip Roth and J.K. Rowling. Those are the top of my orgy list. My current favorite reads are comic books by Bryan K. Vaughan. Just finished "Y: The Last Man" and updated myself on "Ex Machina."

Q: Have you received any marriage proposals from other Ray Bradbury fans?

(Rachel laughs.)

Not marriage proposals, but there is this one dude on Facebook who has earnestly written "I love you. I think I am in love with you." I want to respond with my thoughts on how love is a very complicated concept, but I also think this guy can't speak English very well.

On September 2nd, Rachel has a SPANK at UCBNY titled "Sing Out, Louise!" -- a musical sketch comedy show.

Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Interview: Chris Gethard of "Big Lake"

2010-08-11T06:03:00.000-07:00

In less than a week, UCB powerhouse and all-around great guy Chris Gethard will join Horatio Sanz and Chris Parnell in Comedy Central's "Big Lake," a new half-hour, multi-camera family sitcom about a big city banker (Gethard) who loses his job and moves home to his parents' couch in the small town of Big Lake, PA. The highly anticipated show is produced by Gary Sanchez Productions (The Other Guys, Talladega Nights, Anchorman) and distributed by Debmar-Mercury.

"Big Lake" premieres on Comedy Central Tuesday, August 17 at 10pm with two back-to-back episodes.

Gethard spoke with UCB Comedy about riding the 7 train to work, treating others with kindness, and how the Internet is like college radio for comedians.

Q: How does it feel to do a television show that's filmed out of New York? Especially a show that's shot in Queens, where you live.

CG: I mean, being able to take this step up in my career without having to leave New York City is the dream. I grew up in New Jersey and have never really left the East Coast. My whole family is here. I always felt a lot of anxiety, like "Can I make it happen here or do I need to do the LA thing?" Luckily, after grinding it out for a long time, things came together here. It's one in a million, but it's doable.

On set, one of the guys in the crew asked me what neighborhood in Manhattan I lived in. I was like "Oh, nah man, I live in a shittier part of Queens then we are in right now." Being able to take the 7 train to work each day was pretty cool. So yeah. A lot of people are like "Gethard, you're gonna wind up in LA soon." And I'm kind of like "Yeah, maybe someday, but not if I can keep doing it here. At all." I like being able to visit my mom.

Q: What can you tell us about "Big Lake"? How has shooting been?

CG: "Big Lake" has been fun and intense and overwhelming and an honor to participate in. I hope people enjoy the show. It's a twisted, subversive take on a traditional sitcom -- it looks and sounds and feels like a regular family sitcom, but the jokes are dark and weird and cool and I think if people give it a chance it could really catch on.

Q: Can we expect any other familiar faces on the show other than the leads?

CG: Fans of the UCBT will be pleased to know that Lennon Parham, Ben Rodgers, Billy Merritt, June Raphael, Seth Morris, Michael Delaney, Jon Gabrus and more appear throughout the run of the show. That's all I can remember off the top of my head. It's pretty late. But for real, UCB represents all over this show.

Q: On the show, your character is crashing on his parents' couch after losing his fancy banking job. Have you ever spent time after high school living with your parents?

CG: Yeah, I lived in LA for the first half of 2004 when I was working out there and when I came back I lived with my parents for three or four months. I was 24. It was fine. My parents are cool, funny, supportive people. I dunno. It was weird having food made for me. I haven't cooked a meal in over four years, I'm a lazy bachelor.

Q: How much does the show deal with the financial crisis?

CG: The show deals with very human repercussions of the financial crisis in that my character was at the core of a bank's meltdown. But episode to episode, the show deals more with the idiotic schemes three guys in a small town perpetrate to recover from their personal fallout in the financial crisis. It's that nice balance, I think. Because the financial crisis is only important in that it affects real people -- no one particularly feels sympathy for the big bankers themselves -- and our show is very much about Main Street America and their dealings with these hard times. I hope it strikes a chord in this way -- I think for an odd, dark little comedy show, it really has a good head on its shoulders.

Q: What is it like working with that amazing cast and crew?

CG: All the things you would imagine - intimidating, challenging, and fun. Being on set with Horatio and Chris - I mean, who comes from where we come from and doesn't admire those guys? They just bring the heat every time. Super hilarious and complete professionals. Working with them every single day made me really step up and bring my A game. Horatio and I have been buddies through Asssscat in NYC for years, and getting my big break in a project he was a part of was truly an honor. And Parnell is like - the king. Every time he shows up in a show or a bit, you know it's going to be good. His timing is insane. I feel insanely blessed that I was able to learn from those guys and the rest of the cast every day. Jim Rebhorn and Deborah Rush? Pros on a level I can only dream of. Dylan Blue? He's 14 years old and pulled off a really hard job, that of playing two characters simultaneously, with seemingly no effort at all. I just tried to keep my head above water and keep up with all of those guys.

As for Will Ferrell and Adam McKay, I mean, they are heroes to me. Especially knowing Adam came out of Improv Olympic and Second City and was one of the founders of the UCB, I really felt like - Man, I gotta step up to the plate and deliver and make these guys feel like they made the right choice putting their faith in me. You don't want to let down dudes who do some of the most brilliant comedy in America and have been doing so for many, many years.

But both of those guys, for being the total bad asses that they are - such positive energy surrounding them. Just a real warmth and a real belief in the project and just such an open mind and willingness to fail big and go for broke with the jokes. It was really inspiring to be around them and see how their brains work. Both of them are the types of people that when they're around, you simultaneously feel happier that they are there contributing in such a positive way and in awe of their abilities.

Q: Have you been watching TV when "Big Lake" promos have popped up? What was that like?

CG: Uh, it's weird, dude. I'm a dummy from New Jersey. I'm overwhelmed by all of this and psyched about it in a very genuine way. I try to own it and accept that for the time being this is part of my life now. But I don't know, anyone who knows me through the UCB Theater knows that I'm an easily overwhelmed guy. I just want to try to enjoy this ride as best as possible without letting anxiety get in the way.

Q: Do you feel that making videos with UCB Comedy or having an on-line presence has been a part of your success?

CG: The Internet is invaluable these days. If you really think your comedy is up to par and represents you well, the internet is an amazing tool to get your work out there to people in a very democratic way. There's a lot of really bad stuff out there, so try not to be a part of that. But the Internet for good underground comedy is kind of what college radio was for good underground music a few generations back - there's an actual do it yourself outlet for us that gets our work into the world! I can't believe it when talented people don't take advantage of it.

The fact that there are sites like UCB Comedy around, as well as Funny or Die and College Humor, these places that serve as a nexus for good, reliable comedy, and that they are all embracing the next wave of comedians and giving people an honest shot at getting their work seen? It's sort of insane. One day we will all look back at this and realize what an opportunity it is. Sadly, too many people will see it as a missed opportunity.

One of the biggest turns I took was when Zach Woods, Nick Paley and I made a very dumb little series called "The Most Awkward Boy in the World" and put it on YouTube. I wrote them, Nick directed them, and Zach played the main character amongst a bunch of our friends from UCB. People watched those way more than they ever thought we would. We all got a lot of great attention from them. I know Zach got a lot of calls from them, and some of our other friends were offered movie parts based off of it. These dumb 30-60 second long videos. It's crazy. Between my work with those guys (Cutman Films) and Nuclear Palm, as well as other random things I've put up online over the years, I really feel like I had a chance to get my voice out there into the world in a way that I wouldn't have been able to ten years ago - and I assume will not be able to in another ten years, because anything this good and democratic will be corporatized eventually.

And you would be amazed at how many people STILL talk to me about the Darryl Strawberry Show videos I put up on UCB Comedy in its earliest days. Those were videos Justin Purnell and I shot with friends and students of mine. Each took about 15 minutes to shoot. Now, years later, I still have people ask me about them often. My manager saw those videos before we ever spoke to each other and it was part of why he wanted to work with me. If you can use the Internet, use it. If you can associate yourself and your ideas with a brand like UCB Comedy, recognize that for the asset and opportunity it is and don't waste the chance!

I know I just gave the longest answer of all time, but I hate seeing talented performers and students doubt themselves and talk themselves out of putting themselves out there. You have to make it happen for yourself - no one else is going to! - so use the opportunities you've been given. No more excuses. It's 2010. The world ends in two years! Make it happen now!

The Darryl Strawberry Show: Ep. 1: Texas and Ohio	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Q: The UCB community has been going crazy about you being on the show: the support has been buzzing from every social media network, the green room, etc. How does that feel?

CG: Man, the UCB Theater is my home and I can't tell you how emotional it has made me to see people be so genuinely supportive and excited for me. I have put in ten years - that's one third of my entire life - at this theater. The fact that so many people have been so excited for me - it makes every day that I doubted myself and doubted my life and career choices null and void. It would be impossible for me to explain how much this community means to me. Just impossible. And seeing it return that love... there are no words that can describe the impact this has had on me.

A lot of people have said that if I made it, it makes them feel like they can make it. That means the world to me. I don't get to teach classes as much as I like to anymore with my schedule being nuts, but every time I do - I see that this theater still attracts such amazingly talented people. I know that with what's happening with me right now, really all I did was refuse to give up. Seeing people "buzz" over it - it makes me really happy to see them excited and I hope if they are excited and take away anything from what's happened to me this year that it means that they aren't going to give up either.

Horatio Sanz, Chris Parnell and Chris Gethard

Q: Any advice for up-and-coming comedians who would love to do what you're doing?

CG: Don't. Give. Up.

Also, don't make excuses. Work as hard as you can. If you aren't working as hard as you can, someone else is out there working as hard as they can. Those people who are working harder than you deserve opportunities more than you do, so stop making excuses for why you aren't working hard and just work hard. When you feel like you're working as hard as you can possibly work, work a little harder and you are probably getting close to how hard you actually have to work. Do more shows. Take more classes. Watch more shows. Meet more people. Challenge yourself. Don't expect anyone to hand anything to you. If you aren't exhausted all the time, you probably aren't working hard enough.

Sometimes people get by on talent alone. And it's amazing to see. But more often than not in the many years I've been around here, the people who break through are the ones who are talented and perhaps more importantly, are the ones who know how to put their head down and do the work.

Every time I've gotten depressed about career stuff, it goes one of two ways. Sometimes I get all woe is me and dwell on stuff. This always makes it worse. It doesn't even not help. It actively makes it worse.

Other times, I take those feelings of hitting a brick wall and force myself to get motivated and active and do more stuff. And it always turns into something unexpected and productive and pride inducing.

For years, I worked my ass off at improv. And I felt like I got good. And then that felt like I hit a plateau, and I got scared and frustrated. So I started writing as much as possible. And then in 2007 I eventually got to guest write at SNL. Two of the most amazing weeks of my life. But then I didn't get a staff position there, and that was demoralizing and terrifying -- felt like I missed my shot. So I got back on the horse and got really into storytelling. That led to a one man show that I felt great about, which I took to the Montreal Comedy Festival... and ultimately, I met a lot of people but still, nothing really stuck. So then I started doing The Chris Gethard Show, and that really felt like a good creative thing. And in the midst of all that activity was when Big Lake presented itself. It was ten years of trying any type of comedy I could.

So I guess my point is, don't convince yourself that there's no point to trying. Try as much as you have to. If this is really what you want to do, and you actually have talent, you can do it. But you have to try every single avenue available to you. If I hadn't done all that stuff, I wouldn't have any skills to offer. If any of those things that felt like failures actually caused me to give up, as opposed to finding the next type of comedy to attempt, I would have left comedy about eight and a half years ago.

Even today, with all this stuff happening, I am doing as much stand up as I can. It's terrifying and I'm not very good at it, but I'm just trying to be out there on any stage that will have me. This is because I've realized that when I am doing good, creative work, trying, failing, and getting better along the way, I feel good about myself and the fact that I've chosen to attempt this.

Getting "Big Lake" has been an amazing and mind blowing experience. But doing things I've been proud of along the way has been its own reward. If getting famous is your goal, I have no advice for you. If doing the best, most creative, inventive stuff you can do is your goal, you will feel satisfied by going through that process and if you are lucky, the world will notice. But even if they don't -- and for me for a long time, they weren't -- you will wind up feeling good about what you've been doing.

I too often see young performers emulating things and people they've seen come before. By all means, people should be learning from those who are of previous generations - Lord knows I spent a lot of time stealing tricks from Rob Huebel and Rob Corddry and John Ross Bowie when I started out - but I think everyone needs to turn that corner where they say "What is the thing that only I bring to the table? What do I do better than anyone else? What do I represent when I'm out on stage and how can I embrace that to the fullest?" The sooner you get honest about asking yourself that question, the sooner you will become content with what you are pursuing, I think. That may be super pretentious. I don't know. I just believe it wholeheartedly.

Also, don't burn bridges. Be good to people. John Ross Bowie took me under his wing, coached my early groups for free, let me know he believed in me. To this day, I would do literally anything for that guy. And I've done the same for some of the people I've really identified with as they've been my students, done my best to bring them up, help them find venues for their talents, tried to offer them any advice I possibly can. There is no negative effect caused by being good to people.

I see people get cliquey and exclusive - I am amazed by it. It's such a bad policy, personally and professionally. The level 201 improv student you are being a shithead to at a bar could be the producer of the show you want to work at in five years. That person might be the most talented diamond in the rough you are being rude to because you are in a 600 show and they are only in 201. I don't get it. Be nice to everyone. All the time. If someone seems positive and talented, find a way to work with them. And if that doesn't work out, find a way to support them. And spread the word.

UCB's Elaine Carroll on Mad Men

2010-08-10T06:34:00.000-07:00

Sunday night's Mad Men episode (SPOILER ALERT) featured the "man date" of the century -- Don Draper and Lane Pryce hitting the town! The advertising executives' romp through Manhattan included a menu of Texas-sized steak, a late-night showing of Godzilla, and UCB's very own Elaine Carroll as a "Barnard girl" with a $25 fee.

Elaine Carroll

Elaine recently moved to Los Angeles from New York. She received her BFA in Acting from Marymount Manhattan College, where she got the comedy bug as co-founder of the sketch group Dutch West. Elaine can be seen in numerous videos on College Humor and was formerly on the UCBNY Maude Team Gramps. She is currently a member of the UCBLA Maude Team The Space Program.

Elaine also created the very popular (and hilarious) web series, Very Mary Kate, the unofficial life and times of Mary Kate Olsen. More information about Elaine can be found on her website.

UCB Comedy asked Elaine about working on one of the most buzzed-about shows on television.

Elaine in her Mad Men gear

Q: How did you get a role on Mad Men? What was the audition process like?
The audition process was surprisingly normal. There was only one round of auditions, and the episode was shot the following week. The sides for the audition were different from the actual script. They change it up so that they don't give anything away.

Q: What was it like working with Jared Harris and Jon Hamm?
It was amazing. Everyone was extremely friendly. Jared Harris and Jon Hamm are both really kind and professional. It was weird, though. Jon Hamm kept trying to make out with me. (This is less of a fact and more of a faint, wistful daydream.)

Q: Did you get to meet any of the other actors on set or Mad Men creator Matthew Weiner?
I met all the other actors at the table read. Matthew Weiner was there, as well as the entire staff of writers and producers. It happened to be Christina Hendricks' birthday and Matthew Weiner had the whole room singing Happy Birthday. (The cake was great too.)

Q: Any fun anecdotes from shooting?
I had my own trailer, the hair and make-up crew was great, Jon Hamm kept trying to make out with me. (Still not a fact.)

Q: What does Jon Hamm smell like?
A cigarette burning in God's ashtray.

Q: Inquiring minds want to know about the clothes.
The clothes on that show are breathtaking. They're authentic down to the last detail, and yes, I would have loved to keep the earrings, but I had to give them back.

Q: What’s up next for Elaine Carroll?
There's gonna be a second season of "Very Mary-Kate" on College Humor!

Elaine in the UCB Comedy video, The Undermining:

The Undermining	UCBcomedy.com

Watch more comedy videos from the twisted minds of the UCB Theatre at UCBcomedy.com

Behind-the-Sketch: Chris Kelly

2010-08-04T16:06:00.000-07:00

If you haven't noticed by now, Chris Kelly has had a slew of videos featured on UCB Comedy in recent weeks. Chris also has a new "sketch play" starting its run on the UCBNY stage August 11th-- the hilarious Oh My God, I Hear You're Dying, about seven family members, friends, coworkers and a neighbor of seven weeks accidentally ruining their final goodbyes. (Make your reservation now!)

Chris Kelly

Chris was nice enough to give us the inside scoop on some of his latest work on UCB Comedy.

"How To Make A Situation About You" (UCB Comedy Original Webseries):

CK: So I really just wanted to write something with this type of person. It's maybe my favorite type of person, and maybe I am this type of person, too. Everyone sort of is, right? I love people who veer conversations back to themselves or sigh deeply in your direction so that you'll be forced to ask them, "Oh no, what's wrong?" So that's how this web series started; I just liked the idea of this self-absorbed woman giving tips on how to go through your life making situations about you and never ever for a second being bogged down in the sound of other peoples' voices and opinions. As soon as I wrote this, I thought, "Oh Pam Murphy should play this!," not because she is this type of woman, just because she is fucking hilarious in every single thing she does. However, I will say she has been doing some pretty awesome meta-promotion of these videos. I have been out with her on more than one occasion when she has made the conversation about her my mentioning these "How To Make A Situation About You" videos. It's a delight.

"Crying" Movie Trailer

CK: I wrote this video while working on Matt Besser's Comedy Central pilot out in LA. It didn't make it in the pilot, but he had me get together some people to produce it in LA anyway. The BETA team FIX made it and I think it turned out really well. I came up with the idea because I feel like a lot of these indie movie trailers are just shots of people crying and you have absolutely no context for what this movie could possibly be about in 2-hour form. But I never care, I eat these types of trailers up. I also came up with this idea because sometimes if I'm walking down the street listening to music like this, I'll want to just start running and crying like I'm in one of these trailers. The song they used in the video, the Arcade Fire song, came on my iPhone the other day, and I felt the overwhelming urge to cry and I didn't know why at first. Maybe I did end up crying. Don't worry about it.

Eating Lasagna on the Toilet

CK: I came up with "Eating Lasagna on the Toilet" while eating carrot cake on the toilet, because before I am a comedy writer, I am a class act. If people want to date me, they can email me directly. But seriously, I didn't wanna stop eating said carrot cake but I also needed to go to the bathroom, and then I thought the only thing that would make that sadder is if I was naked and was delusional enough to think I was hosting a talk show in my bathroom. This is another video I originally wrote for the Besser pilot, but it didn't take. I don't know why - it has lasagna, Shannon O'Neill's adorable dog, and copious amounts of crying. Plus, it's got Jim Santangeli's bare butt, so I don't know why Comedy Central would wanna pass on that.

Chris is also a full-time staff writer and director at The Onion News Network and a Contributing Writer for The Onion's new show on IFC. Chris is a writer and actor on the Maude Team "Stone Cold Fox" and a sketch teacher at UCB. He also directed Michael Hartney's one-man show "So I Like Superman," which is currently running at UCBNY.

Visit Chris Kelly's website.

Sneak Peek from The Brig: Craig's List Casual Encounters

2010-07-26T11:09:00.001-07:00

Photos from the upcoming video "Craig's List Casual Encounter" from The Brig!

Matt Walsh in Paste Magazine

2010-07-23T16:19:00.000-07:00

UCB founder Matt Walsh discusses his upcoming improvised movie, High Road (written with Josh Weiner) and his Spike series Players in a great article from Paste Magazine. Check it out!

Rob Lathan's Permanent Nutface Gary in Indie Film

2010-07-22T04:54:00.000-07:00

A lot of comedians hope their Internet videos land in front of directors -- but UCB dynamo Rob Lathan 's video featuring his character "Permanent Nutface Gary" led to a role in an independent film -- as Permanent Nutface Gary!

This March, screenwriter/actor/comedian Ross Patterson sent Rob an email saying that he had seen the video of Permanent Nutface Gary and really loved it. Patterson asked if he could write the character into his screenplay, "Poolboy: Drowning Out the Fury," as a mastermind villain. Rob agreed; filming was in mid-July.

Rob was kind enough to give the UCB Comedy blog the lowdown from the set of "Poolboy":

When I first got the e-mail from Ross Patterson, I was a little skeptical, but then I read the screenplay and thought it was hilarious. It's sort of an insane version of a Zucker Brothers movie, where there's basically a joke in every line. I also figured, what the hell, it's such a great story to have a character I created named Permanent Nutface Gary to star in a movie as a mastermind villain.

So cut to last Sunday, I'm flown out to LA. They paid for my rental car and my flight (in coach - I guess Gary hasn't quite gotten to First Class status yet), and paid me scale. But I would have done if for free.

Nutface Gary and Kevin Sorbo

I went in thinking it would be a small, independent movie. And it was. But when I see the call sheet, I realize Kevin Sorbo (from Hercules fame) is going to be in it as the lead, as well as Jason Mewes (from Clerks and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back), who will be playing Kevin's stunt double (now you get the tone of the movie). We all shared the same trailer in different compartments, so we hung out a little bit on set. I asked to get some picture with the stars, posing as Permanent Nutface Gary each time.

Jason Mewes and Nutface Gary

Things only got better when I discovered that playing the henchman to Permanent Nutface Gary was none other than Danny Trejo, who will be playing the lead in the upcoming movie, Machete. True to his character, Trejo remained shirtless throughout the filming.

Danny Trejo and Nutface Gary

A couple of other highlights from the first day included:

Explaining the premise of Permanent Nutface Gary to Jason Mewes
Performing in a scene with Jason where he says the line, "Who are you?" To which Gary responds in an automated voice, "I am Permanent Nutface Gary."
Witnessing Kevin Sorbo twirl a pool rake as a weapon as if it was nothing
Hearing Sorbo recount at lunch that he'll make more money signing autographs for 5 minutes at Comic Con than he will during the 10 days of filming "Poolboy." But he loved the screenplay, so he signed up for the movie.
Meeting the actor who played Jar Jar Binks on set. He plays a ninja named "Sidney Moncrief" in the movie, and nailed his scene, so it looks like he's moved from his Jar Jar days.
Hearing the director announce with complete sincerity: "We need Nutface's wheelchair on set. Bring the Nutface wheelchair pronto!"
Getting fake blood and Chinese throwing stars splattered all over Gary's Nutface

For the second day Permanent Nutface Gary had a sex scene with actress Alanna Ubach (who's been in Hung, Legally Blonde and a bunch of other things). This scene would explain how Gary got his condition. Also, Gary's backstory in the movie was that he was a famed Russian scientist, so I would be speaking with a Russian accent. I explained to the writer that I don't usually do Russian accents, to which he responded, "Don't worry, the worse the accent is, the better." So Alanna and I did the scene and we nailed it.

Although Rob isn't sure when (or if) this movie will hit theaters, but the film does have a little star power and buzz behind it...especially coming from famed screen legend and notorious villain: Permanent Nutface Gary....

Here's the video that started it all:

Rob Lathan has appeared on "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon," "The Colbert Report," "Late Night with Conan O'Brien," "Human Giant," and "Best Week Ever." Rob co-wrote a self help parody book with Will Hines titled "Get Psyched"! He is also working on a one man show called "A Benefit for Permanent Nutface Gary."

UCB Performers/Writers Nominated for Primetime Emmy Awards

2010-07-19T12:35:00.000-07:00

Many of this year's Primetime Emmy nominees are UCB performers/writers, including Kay Cannon (30 Rock), Wyatt Cenac (The Daily Show), Kevin Dorff (The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien), Eric Drysdale (The Colbert Report), Peter Grosz (The Colbert Report), Peter Gwinn (The Colbert Report), Hallie Haglund (The Daily Show), John Lutz (Saturday Night Live), Opus Moreschi (The Colbert Report), John Mulaney (Saturday Night Live), Christine Nangle (Saturday Night Live), Michael Patrick O'Brien (Saturday Night Live), Ryan Perez (Saturday Night Live), Amy Poehler (Parks and Recreation) and Brian Stack (The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien).

Here's an interview with 30 Rock writer Kay Cannon, part of the UCB Comedy "A Few Minutes with Someone Funnier Than You" series:

And "Thin Walls" by Christine Nangle, a writer for Saturday Night Live:

UCB Comedy Performers Named in Variety's "10 Comics to Watch"

2010-07-19T12:12:00.000-07:00

Upright Citizens Brigade performers Chris Gethard, Garfunkel & Oates (Riki Lindhome and Kate Micucci), Brett Gelman, Kyle Kinane and Chelsea Peretti were named in Variety's "10 Comics to Watch."

Here's Chris Gethard in the UCB Comedy video "Snoopy Lamp":

And Brett Gelman in "Cracked Out: This Is Our City":

Amy Rhodes Wins Daytime Emmy

2010-07-14T13:11:00.000-07:00

Amy Rhodes, a teacher and performer at UCB, won a Daytime Emmy as a staff writer for The Ellen DeGeneres Show. Says Amy, "I spent most of the ceremony trying to take a picture on my phone of Erik Estrada who was sitting a few rows in front of us."

Prior to working for The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Amy was the Director Of Content and a staff writer for Will Ferrell, Judd Apatow and Adam McKay's website Funny or Die. She has written for shows on MTV and Nickelodeon, and wrote an original sitcom pilot for the Oxygen network.

At UCBTLA, Amy wrote and directed the play Three Compañeros, which was recommended by LA.com, Defamer and LA City Beat. In addition, Amy has written and performed in two solo shows and is the recipient of the Emerging Comics Award for Best Solo Show. She co-created and performed in the play Spooky Dog & The Teen-Age Gang Mysteries, which was published by Samuel French, Inc. and is currently being produced in regional theaters across the country.

Amy has also appeared on Late Night With Conan O'Brien, Last Call With Carson Daly, Lewis Black's Root of All Evil and Fuel TV's The Daily Habit. She has performed at The San Francisco Sketch Fest and Las Vegas Comedy Festival. In addition to teaching at UCB, she has been a member of several Harold Teams and has performed in Sketch Cram, ASSSSCAT and with the all-female improv team Mother F'rs.

BP Managing Director Watches "BP Spills Coffee"

2010-07-07T20:07:00.000-07:00

BP's Managing Director, Bob Dudley, responded to the UCB Comedy hit video "BP Spills Coffee" during an hour-long interview on PBS, claiming that the sketch has "deeply affected" employees at BP.

UCB's Bryan Safi Nabs Daytime Emmy

2010-07-01T06:46:00.000-07:00

Bryan Safi, a writer/performer at UCB, won a Daytime Emmy as a staff writer for the Ellen DeGeneres Show.

Bryan is currently a staff writer at Current TV for the half-hour show InfoMania and is the host/co-creator of its popular segment That's Gay. Bryan has also been on staff at "Funny or Die." At UCBTLA, Bryan co-created and co-performed the show Raffie: Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Beets with Amy Rhodes. The show was accepted to the 2010 SF Sketchfest.

Bryan is also a member of the Maude Team Kirkland's Signature.

Check out Bryan's newest video on UCB Comedy:

Sneak Peek from Pantsuit

2010-06-25T06:18:00.001-07:00

Photos from Pantsuit's upcoming UCB Comedy video, "Christian Twister," written by Stephanie Allynne, Scott Rodgers, and Angela Trimbur; directed by Stoney Sharp.

Zach Woods Promoted to Season Regular on The Office

2010-06-18T08:23:00.000-07:00

This week, The Ausiello Files reported that UCB notable Zach Woods (The Stepfathers, TourCo) will be reprising his role as Gabe on the seventh season of The Office -- as a series regular!

Here's Zach in the UCB Comedy original, "Thin Walls:"

CNN: More Coverage for "BP Spills Coffee"

2010-06-17T10:20:00.000-07:00

"BP Spills Coffee" -- the video that has garnered over 4.7 million views on YouTube (and counting) -- was prominently featured on CNN.com in an article about comedians mocking BP. (Read it!)

The article is not the first time CNN has covered the UCB Comedy sketch -- last Saturday, three members of the team behind "BP Spills Coffee" (Kate McKinnon, John Frusciante, and Erik Tanouye) were interviewed by CNN's Don Lemon on the air.

Erik Tanouye recounts the live interview:

I arrived before John and Kate, and I was placed in a dark room with no video monitor. Bright rectangular white lights shined on me. The producer connected me to an ear piece, but I could no hear anything through it. Luckily I asked her to hand me my iPhone before she left.

Then I sat in the darkness for 20 minutes. It felt a bit like an experiment in sensory depravation. Eventually, an intern showed up to check my ear piece. She thought it might be broken. I thought she was correct as I had not heard anything for the entire 20 minutes. But she said it was working fine, then left me alone again. Close to the end of hour, I finally heard some voices through my ear piece. I never saw what was happening on the air. I was asked to count to five, and then 10, and then 10 again, in order to check my levels. Just before we went on the air, I heard John and Kate discussing the commercials that were airing on CNN. I couldn't see them (the people or the commercials). There was some friendly banter with Don Lemon about the sponsors that I could not enjoy. Then Don Lemon teased our segment and told us all to wave. I did not wave.

Perhaps I am a jerk, but I had been sitting in a dark room with no human contact for a long time and as a result did not obey the voice in my ear. Apparently we were all on the air at that time, and as soon as we went to commercial, Don Lemon asked why I didn't wave.

After commercial, Don checked his cufflinks and began the interview. I think that John and Kate had a longer audio delay in their ears than I did, but at the same time, they could see what was on the air while I was still sitting in a dark room. So that might explain some of the cross-talking and audio delays in the interview.

We made it through the interview and I managed to plug both theaters, the website, and our classes, and felt pretty professional as a result. Eventually, I was released from my darkened chamber and I stumbled down a hallway, across a newsroom, and found John and Kate. We took a few pictures, then I headed to Astoria where I watched television with some friends, including Kevin Cragg, who played a BP executive in the video. He is the man who says "Don't worry, it's a small spill on a very large table."

UCB Comedy on "Inside Edition"

2010-06-16T12:32:00.000-07:00

Check out last night's Inside Edition segment about "Crude Humor!" The segment features clips from "BP Spills Coffee" and an interview with UCB's John Frusciante about the video that has been "flooding the Internet."

"This is exactly what we as comedy writers and comics are supposed to do," says John.

"BP Spills Coffee" on Inside Edition: Tonight!

2010-06-15T11:15:00.000-07:00

John Frusciante + a tabloid news show = appointment television -- tune in to watch him discuss "BP Spills Coffee" tonight at 6pm! Set those DVRs!

If you've been living under a rock, here is popular video:

UCB Comedy's "BP Spills Coffee" on TV

2010-06-15T10:08:00.000-07:00

Look who's making the rounds on the cable news networks!

With over 2 million hits to date, UCBComedy.com's runaway success "BP Spills Coffee" was featured on The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC (watch the full segment) -- and a few people behind the video were even interviewed by CNN!

Kate McKinnon, Erik Tanouye, John Frusciante

Here's some behind-the-scenes photos of the gang getting ready for their segment:

Nice UCB t-shirt, John!

"BP Spills Coffee" Popularity Crashes Site

2010-06-10T10:09:00.000-07:00

The video "BP Spills Coffee" is so popular, thousands of people tried to access the video simultaneously and temporarily crashed UCBComedy.com. The website is back in full effect, and the video is popping up on countless websites: Time, the front page of YouTube comedy, Andrew Sullivan, TalkingPointsMemo, and The Huffington Post, just to name a few.

John Frusciante, one of the writers of the video, notes it was retweeted by "Dave Coulier, star of Out of Control, Full House and Alanis Morissette's 'You Oughtta Know.'"

The team behind the video is thrilled at the response. "It truly was a collaborative idea. We came up with it in a Beneath Gristedes writers meeting. [Erik] Tanouye wrote the first draft and then he, Gavin Spieller, me and Eric Scott polished it," says John. "Pete [Schultz, director] and Brandon [Bassham, director] did a great job and so did the rest of the cast."

Stan Lee on UCB's Donald Glover's Spiderman Bid

2010-06-09T19:20:00.000-07:00

The Internet has been buzzing about UCB staple Donald Glover's campaign to play Spiderman in the new franchise -- the Facebook group Donald Glover 4 Spiderman has close to 12,000 members at the time of this post.

Donald, who currently stars in NBC's Community and was previously a writer for 30 Rock, has been involved with UCBComedy.com since its inception with his sketch group, Derrick.

Recently, Spiderman creator STAN LEE weighed in on the Peter Parker frenzy:

Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

Read the full MTV article about Stan Lee's thoughts on Donald.

Behind the Scenes: Overly Ambitious Ensemble Drama

2010-06-04T07:48:00.000-07:00

The Brig's Overly Ambitious Ensemble Drama, written by Zack Phillips and directed by Adam Sacks, lived up to its title: filming took more than 15 hours, with over 35 different shots, 7 different shooting locations and 38 actors, resulting in a 1:34 tour de force.

Check out some of the production spreadsheets that this video required:

"Doing a shoot of that magnitude is kind of like planning a wedding," says Zach. "Tiny problems that normally wouldn’t be a big deal get magnified when you’re dealing with such a large group of people and multiple locations. If one shot takes longer than planned, you’re suddenly behind schedule with 10 or 20 actors."

But thanks to over 20-plus hours of pre-planning, The Brig wrapped early or on-time both days of shooting. Adds Zack, "Adam, the director, did a great job. We also picked locations that were close to each other but had diverse looks to them, so it’d look like we were all over the city. "

And, of course, a smooth shoot was ensured by a cast list that reads like a UCB talent directory. The video features Emily Axford, Keith Bethea, Dave Bluvband, Eddie Brawley, Corey Brown, Alex Charak, Matt Cutler, Shaun Diston, Morgan Evans, Don Fanelli, Kim Ferguson, Matt Fisher, Brandon Gardner, Jason Guerrero, Jon Gutierrez, Amy Heidt, Will Hines, Jordan Hirsch, Amanda Hirsch, Dan Hodapp, Rob Michael Hugel, Dru Johnston, Molly Lloyd, Tim Martin, Matt Mayer, Veronica Osorio, Josh Patten, Amber Petty, Zack Phillips, Ben Ragheb, Ben Rameaka, Adam Sacks, Jason Saenz, Matt Starr, Will Storie, Drew Tarvin, Jeff Wisniewski and Scott Yacyshyn.

UCB and TGS: Jon Gabrus

2010-06-01T05:00:00.000-07:00

Listen up, comedy fans! "UCB and TGS" features some of UCBComedy.com 's funniest writers and performers that play "TGS Writers" on the hit television show 30 Rock. You know, the people on the receiving end of Liz yelling "BLERG"?

"Working on 30 Rock is the only job that I have had where I get pissed if I have to miss a day," says UCB standout Jon Gabrus. "It's exciting to be even a minor part of such a huge, awesome, talented cast and crew. Everyone on that show is nice and awesome at their job -- it's a production like none other."

UCB audiences know Gabrus as a member of the UCBT weekend team The Law Firm and from his performances with the group Outlook of the Poet. His ongoing UCB show, Blackout Drunk, centers around terrible and true stories of things that have happened to him when he has been wasted -- like the time he ate a dead snake.

Reserve tickets

Gabrus eats much better fare on the 30 Rock set, with mixed results. "There is a lot of farting," says Gabrus. "We eat like kings from craft services, and then six guys sit in a small room for nine hours -- it gets a little weird."

Despite any gastrointestinal issues, Gabrus mentions that summer hiatus is making him sad, as he loves kicking back with the other "writers" when they are waiting to be called on set. "I got to know these dudes so much better over the course of the season. I need my Anthony Atamaniuk fix real bad."

Gabrus on UCBComedy.com:

UCB and M.A.D. in Encore Magazine

2010-05-27T10:58:00.000-07:00

Encore Magazine profiled the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre for its current comedy issue, calling it a "veritable training ground for nearly every big player in the comedy game."

In addition, the magazine spotlights some of UCB's funniest performers, the ladies of M.A.D. (Mackenzie Condon, Abra Tabak and D'Arcy Erokan).

M.A.D. glamming it up!

Read the complete articles online or view the whole magazine.

Sneak Peek from Diamonds, Wow!: Who Has The Poison Tea?

2010-05-25T13:06:00.001-07:00

Brian Barrett, Paul Welsh, gravestone of Uebelmesser.

Sneak Peek from The Brig: HUGE SANDWICH

2010-05-18T08:54:00.001-07:00

An upcoming sketch from The Brig features this ridiculous sandwich -- but UCB favorite Jim Santangeli looks like he is up to the challenge. Stay tuned!

Sneak Peek from Diamonds, Wow!: Go to Bed Early

2010-05-10T06:13:00.001-07:00

An upcoming video from Diamonds, Wow! features some fighter dudes. Cannot wait.

Sneak Peek from Diamonds, Wow!: Loving Farms

2010-05-03T06:57:00.001-07:00

Rob Webber.

Farm animals. (Lots of them.)

Get ready.

UCB and TGS: Sue Galloway

2010-04-26T09:53:00.000-07:00

Listen up, comedy fans! "UCB and TGS" features some of UCBComedy.com's funniest writers and performers that play "TGS Writers" on the hit television show 30 Rock. You know, the people on the receiving end of Liz yelling "BLERG"?

Sue Galloway is 30 Rock's resident scene stealer as Sue LaRoche-Van der Hout, The Girlie Show's "Girl Writer" of European descent (French? Dutch? French AND Dutch?).

Sue and Keith Powell, who plays "Toofer"

Sue says of her first day on the 30 Rock set, "I called my boyfriend at the time, John Lutz, because I was pretty sure he was going to be there too. John and I traveled all the way out to Queens from the Upper West Side together for the first day and it was great. The TGS writers spent long hours together there the first few seasons. LONG! But we all enjoyed each other's company. And I enjoyed John's company so much that I married him!"

A veteran of the UCB stage, Sue has been in shows such as the Real Real World, Beneath Gristedes, the Harold team 1985, and her one-woman show Homebody. Her current improv team, The Law Firm, joins the Friday night line-up on May 7, 2010. (Check it out!)

Sue's other New York theater credits include: Free To Be Friends (co-writer and performer - NY Fringe), Beaver (Horsetrade Theater Company) and Rosemary with Ginger (Actors Studio). Additional television credits include: Babylon Fields (CBS), Fat Guy Stuck In Internet (Adult Swim), Munchies (Fuse), and The Nighttime Clap (Fuse).

Sue is also a freelance joke writer for SNL's Weekend Update and a lifetime member of the Actors Studio.

Watch Sue in the video Do You Work Here?:

Late for Lunch:

Sneak Peek from Diamonds, Wow!

2010-04-23T10:35:00.001-07:00

Here's a shot from an upcoming Diamonds, Wow! video, "A League of Their Own Quote Club," written by Caitlin Tegart.

If a sentence including the words Caitlin Tegart and A League of Their Own (!) did not send you into excitement overdrive, check out who stars in this video: D'Arcy Erokan, Morgan Jarrett, Molly Lloyd, Ashley Ann Hale, Nicole Drespel, Marcy Jarreau, Joe Spellman, Brandon Scott Jones, Mike Scollins, Amey Goerlich, Chris Scott, Alex Kane, Virginia Thompson and Will Choy.

A sketch dream team! Keep your eyes peeled in early May.

Behind the Scenes: 4/20 from The Brig!

2010-04-20T04:20:00.000-07:00

Justin Tyler and Rory Panagotopulos

Sometimes, sketch comedy is dangerous business -- for example, the latest shoot from The Brig. Although most of the pot-themed video was filmed indoors, the sketch, written by Adam Sacks, also required the actors to hit the streets of downtown Brooklyn while engaging in some suspicious behavior. Justin Tyler not only had to don booty shorts and a trench coat, he also had to run out of a store carrying half a dozen candy bars -- while simulating lighting up a pipe. Fortunately/unfortunately, Justin did not end up wearing cigarette glasses with Lady Gaga in jail. "The video's not exactly after-school special material," says director/editor Nate Russell.

On set with The Brig

In spirit of the video, this blog was posted at 4/20 at 4:20am. Check it out:

Sneak Peek from The Brig

2010-04-19T07:56:00.000-07:00

If visiting UCBComedy.com isn't part of your morning ritual (like bagels or crying to "Empire State of Mind" on the subway), it's time to start: The Brig's "Overly Ambitious Ensemble Drama" will hit the site in the coming weeks!

Looks fun, right?

UCB and TGS: Nate Smith

2010-04-19T04:00:00.000-07:00

Listen up, comedy fans! "UCB and TGS" features some of UCB Comedy's funniest writers and performers that play "TGS Writers" on the hit television show 30 Rock. You know, the people on the receiving end of Liz yelling "BLERG"?

The role played by UCB powerhouse Nate Smith on 30 Rock has been dubbed "Johnny Reaction" by fellow UCB writer Geoff Garlock. "That sums up my role on the show," says Nate. "No talking, just a lot of looking the way somebody looks after somebody else just said that thing. I love doing it."

On 30 Rock, Liz Lemon once referred to the TGS staffers that surround Twofer and Frank as "the writers who never talk," but on set the "fake writers" are known by another name: "the UCB guys." Nate says, "Having where we come from be acknowledged by the crew feels like a compliment."

Nate definitely fits the title of a "UCB guy." He has been part of dozens of shows on the UCB stage and currently performs with the Harold team Badman. Nate also regularly directs at the UCB, including Cool Your J, Highly Evolved Human, I Laughed Until I Died and sketch shows for Maude team Slow Burn. He is also a founding member of the indie improv and sketch group, Rogue Elephant, who have performed their extremely popular monthly show for over five years. (Their huge fan turnout will soon force them to relocate from Under St. Mark's Theatre.)

Nate recently starred in UCBComedy.com's racy new video, Atheists Having Sex:

He also penned this sketch for the UCB show Beneath Gristedes:

And look for Nate in a lead role in the upcoming independent feature, Hello Lonesome, directed by Adam Reid!

As an actor, writer, director and documentary producer/editor (the man does it all!), Nate has a lot going on -- and his many projects can all be found on his recently launched website. Check it out!

Oscar-Nominated Director on Working with UCB Comedy Performers and Filmmakers

2010-04-14T06:43:00.000-07:00

UCB performers Adam Pally and Sarah Burns appear in the upcoming film, Monogamy, directed by Oscar-nominated director Dana Adam Shapiro (Murderball). The film also received additional editing by Todd Bieber, UCBComedy.com's Director of Content and Production. In an interview with UCB Comedy, Dana said, "Our casting director, Billy Hopkins, brought in Adam Pally to read for the role of Quinny. He looked too young, but his audition was so off-the-cuff and strange in a good way that we wanted to find a way to get him into the movie. So we turned a bit part written for a 'goombah groom' into a much bigger part that allowed Adam to do a lot of improv. After seeing him perform at UCB with Death by Roo Roo, I asked him to recommend a few women that could play his bride-to-be, and he mentioned Sarah Burns. I thought she was hilarious in I Love You, Man and Flight of the Conchords so we met for drinks at the Brooklyn Social and that was that."

Dana notes that he asked Todd to help edit the Adam and Sarah scenes because they gave such a wealth of comedic material. "There were so many takes to choose from, like when Sarah gets mad at Adam for doing the robot like a Nazi. Todd nailed it."

Monogamy, part-mystery thriller and part-relationship drama, stars Chris Messina and Rashida Jones. It will have its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival; tickets are available on-line.

UCB and TGS: John Murray

2010-04-08T10:32:00.000-07:00

Listen up, comedy fans! This is the first post of a new feature, "UCB and TGS," which will feature some of UCB Comedy's funniest writers and performers that play "TGS Writers" on the hit television show 30 Rock. You know, the people on the receiving end of Liz yelling "BLERG"?

Next time you watch 30 Rock, look closely: UCBNY favorite and all-around great guy John Murray has been acting on 30 Rock since the second season. Initially, John thought playing a TGS writer would be a one-time gig, but he now makes regular appearances on the show. "It's a cool job," says John. "I get to work with the best actors on television and hopefully make a scene funnier by reacting to what they're doing. Every day, I learn something new about acting or how a television show is put together by simply sitting back and watching the cast and crew."

For John, one of the highlights of working on 30 Rock was the chance to perform with the cast as part of 30 Rockprov at the Del Close Marathon. "It was the perfect mix because UCB got me the role and there are so many improvisers that work on 30 Rock," notes John. "It was also nice to do scenes with people who star in the show and react by well... talking."

When he's not dodging projectiles launched by Liz Lemon, John lends his acting talents to an array of UCB Comedy videos, including a video with the Beta team Diamonds, Wow! and the new UCB Comedy web series How to Make A Situation About You. He also cites Monkey King, written by former "TGS Writer" Sean Clements, as a personal favorite. (Sean has since moved to L.A., 30 Rock is filmed in New York.)

John Murray is no stranger to the UCB stage, either – he started taking classes in 2004. He recently joined the house team Death by Roo Roo and can be seen performing with them every Saturday night. “Right now, all I do is look forward to Saturday so I can play with those guys,” says John. Prior to joining Roo Roo, John was a member of Bastian, which as of 2009 became the longest running Harold team in UCBT history. He is also a member of the Maude team Stone Cold Fox.

Behind the Scenes: The Brig

2010-04-07T13:17:00.000-07:00

Adam Sacks of UCB Comedy's The Brig wants to give you some insight into creating one of their videos...

From Adam:

Here's a video I directed and did the effects for recently.

Some people asked me how I created the backgrounds for the video, so I figured I'd go over the basics.

In Photoshop I start with flat colors. I try to go with a middle color for each section, that way I can add shadows and highlights later.

Then I add extra layers on top of darker colors to create shadows. It's pretty common for me to use 3 or 4 layers per section to build up shadows gradually, instead of trying to do it all at once. I use different opacities and blending modes on the layers to get the look I want.

Next I do the same thing, but with highlights.

This still looks very computery, so the next step is to overlay photos of textures to get the types of variation in color and value that make something look real. For the wood I added some wood textures (a no-brainer), and for the glass I added some concrete textures to make it look frosted.

And finally I flattened the glass section and warped it a bit to make it look curved instead of flat. In general, it's much easier to work with rectangular shapes (because it's much easier to make rectangular selections), and then when you're done, warp them into the shape you want.

And just to give you an idea, here's a screen capture of just some of the layering that went into making this background.

BEHIND THE SCENES: Rob Lathan and Crazy Legs Conti

2010-04-05T12:02:00.001-07:00

Now that we’ve launched the brand new UCBCOMEDY.COM we are going to make a huge effort to reach out to our community and provide a little insight into what goes on behind the scenes at UCB COMEDY. That said, from now until the end of time we are going to start providing frequent behind the scenes blog-posts will do the following:

-tell the stories about when things went right
-tell the better stories about when things went horribly wrong
-explain how or why we did something
-respond to questions or curiosities
-weave casual meanderings on the topic of the zeitgeist of our culture

To start things off today I am going to tell some of the tales behind the first episode of one our newest series “Rob Lathan’s Impossible Challenge”:

When I was first tasked with the job of producing Rob’s series I was submerged into a world of ridiculous characters and silly business deals. Our first episode was slated to be about competitive eating so I zeroed my efforts in on connecting with the International Federation of Competitive Eaters. Initially the IFOCE was hesitant to agree to put me in contact with their eaters. They didn’t want the eaters to look bad and I had to assure them over and over again that the only one who would look bad would be our own Rob Lathan.

Days turned into weeks and eventually our window for shooting the episode narrowed. I had assumed that the IFOCE wasn’t interested in being a part of the video and I started looking to move on to a new concept. That is, until I received the super friendly and super awesome voicemail from world famous competitive speed eater Crazy Legs Conti. His voice-mail began with him explaining that he just, "finished off a trough of oatmeal" and then he proceeded to give me a quick tutorial on how to eat French fries plain versus French fries with gravy ("they work different quadrants of the jaw")--- all on my voicemail. He left me with his contact information for the Penthouse Executive Club and was extremely open to any of our ideas.

When it came to the actual shoot, Crazy Legs was such and easy going guy and was so comfortable that while we were conducting the post-eating interview he dug around the table of half eaten food and resurfaced with two pieces of wheat bread surrounding a powdered doughnut (the essential ingredients of a doughnut sandwich). As he chomped into his casual doughnut sandwich he decided to wash it down with an entire pitcher of water sitting on the table (as Rob talked Matt Fisher stared in awe as this all took place). This was genuinely one of my favorite moments of the shoot (you can see said doughnut sandwich at the end of the video) and Crazy Legs treated it like an everyday snack-- which it may have been.

The shoot was crazy and fun and everyone involved had a good time. That said, we want to extend a special thanks to the folks at the IFOCE for helping to make this happen, to Crazy Legs Conti for being so awesome, and to the Triple Crown for letting us shoot there. We hope you enjoy the video and definitely stay tuned because we have some new Impossible Challenges lined up.

If you have any questions about this video or any others please feel free to post it on the message boards and we will respond there or if it’s awesome we might respond here!

“Eat all you can” – Crazy Legs Conti

-UCBCOMEDY.com

RELAUNCHED!

2010-04-01T15:16:00.000-07:00

If you haven't noticed the re-design by now -- UCBComedy.com relaunched April 1! Check the site frequently for original sketch videos, web series, live shows, and behind-the-scenes documentaries by the top up-and-coming comedians from New York and Los Angeles. "Our site features the best work of the best people working in the alternative comedy scene today," says Ian Roberts, who co-founded Upright Citizens Brigade with Amy Poehler, Matt Besser, and Matt Walsh.

The new, streamlined UCBComedy.com features a front page with more videos that can easily be shared across a variety of platforms. The site has also introduced a new rating system that allows viewers to add or take away from each video’s “Bucket of Truth,” a nod to the first episode of the Upright Citizen’s Brigade’s television show and ASSSCAT's donations tub.

The site spotlights Beta teams, the website's answer to Harold teams (for improv) and Maude teams (for stage sketches). Beta teams post new videos once a week and have created quite the stir since their January 2010 debut. Beta videos have been picked up by Gizmodo, the Huffington Post and the Jimmy Fallon blog, just to name a few. (Catch up on the latest Beta videos!)

The website overhaul has been one of the first major projects for Todd Bieber, UCBComedy.com's Director of Content and Production, who joined UCB from The Onion News Network in January.

Although the site boasts a new design and added features, UCBComedy.com's mission remains the same: showcasing the overwhelming amount of talent in the UCB community and producing the funniest videos around. "The new wave of comedy is already here and they're doing shows and making videos at UCB," says UCB co-founder Matt Walsh.

COMING SOON: a few minutes with someone funnier than you

2010-03-18T10:03:00.000-07:00

UCB Comedy will soon unveil a new documentary series entitled "A Few Minutes With Someone Funnier Than You"

Each episode profiles a unique comedian (ranging from writers, actors, stand-ups, filmmakers, improvisers, and comedic artists) -- presenting their personal insights into comedy.

Bobby Moynahan - Saturday Night Live cast member

Kay Cannon - 30 Rock writer

Joe Randazzo - The Onion writer/editor

Start getting excited.

BriTANicK featured on Time.com

2010-03-15T08:31:00.000-07:00

BriTANick (Brian McElhaney and Nick Kocher) recently made a wildly popular viral video. Time.com liked it and wrote about it. Check out the article HERE.

Check out some other BriTANKick funny videos from UCBComedy.com below.

Wild Girls Gone - Available today on iTunes

2010-03-08T07:42:00.000-08:00

You should buy Wild Girls Gone now. A new movie from UCB4!

In the Spring Break capital of White Sands, Florida, Sheriff Terry Moran (Matt Walsh) outlaws the town's world famous Ass Contests in a bid to win the elderly votes in his campaign for mayor - even though he is married to the town's former Ass Contest Queen, Doreen (Amy Poehler). Unhappy with how her husband and her town is changing Doreen breaks out of her bored drunk housewife existence to recapture her youth and sabotage her husband's campaign. Meanwhile Stevie (Ian Roberts) a video store clerk and aspiring documentary filmmaker gets goaded into making a movie about Spring Break by his scheming stoner friend Ray (Matt Besser). But Stevie's loft ambitions for a documentary about human behavior are constantly derailed by Ray's offensive behavior, shady connections and criminal acts.

Behind the Scenes: The Brig

2010-03-04T06:59:00.000-08:00

The Brig has been busy. Here's a look Behind-the-Scenes of three of their upcoming videos.

"Hunky" with Don Fanelli, Matt Fisher (pictured), Rob Lathan, and Tim Martin (pictured).

Autobiographical Movie Reviewer, with Dan Hodapp and Terry Withers (pictured).

Sally D with Christine Walters, Tracey Wigfield (pictured), and Achilles Stamatelaky(pictured).

BETA teams produce three new UCB Comedy Originals

2010-03-04T06:37:00.000-08:00

UCB's BETA teams are producing a ton of great videos this week.

Sex Drugs & The Hard Rock Cafe

Oscars In Memoriam: Extras

The Favor

Matt Walsh & Ian Roberts - New Show on Spike TV

2010-02-26T10:11:00.000-08:00

Matt Walsh and Ian Roberts have a new show, PLAYERS, on Spike TV (premiering March 2nd @ 10:30)

We have a few really funny videos to watch on UCB Comedy dot com.

Clip from the show:

Ian Roberts' disgusting attempt at a viral video:

And a few interviews go horribly wrong...

Antenna Magazine features Old Friends

2010-02-25T08:27:00.000-08:00

Old Friends by Tim Curcio and Nick Ross was recently featured in Antenna Magazine.

Check out an episode of Old Friends and then read the article.

Behind the Scenes: Diamonds, Wow!: Kevin Smith

2010-02-23T09:25:00.000-08:00

Below are some behind the scenes shots from the making of Diamonds, Wow! latest funny video

Left to right. Ed Mundy (director), Brandon Scott Jones (actor), Zach Neumeyer (director) recording voices for Kevin Smith - Too Awful to Fly

Huff. Post and Jimmy Fallon love Google Buzz: Revealed

2010-02-21T09:43:00.000-08:00

Huffington Post says:
"About a week ago the all powerful omniscient Google overlords released a new social networking platform: Google Buzz. Check out these great jabs at Google Buzz by some of the most hilarious and pissed off people on the Internet and then vote for your favorites!"

Vote for your favorite Google Buzz video. UCB Comedy Google Buzz: Revealed on Huffington Post

Jimmy Fallon's Blog says:
"The jury is still out on Google Buzz, but mostly it seems like the jury is saying "What!!?" and "Unnngh! No!!" Here's a smart little comedy video about how everyone is taking this whole Google Buzz thing. NSFW language so turn down your speakers if you're at work!"

Check it out here: Google Buzz: Revealed

Jimmy Fallon Show blogs about UCB Comedy video

2010-02-19T13:55:00.000-08:00

Jimmy Fallon's blogger loves us. Check it out their coverage of Numbalex: Depresse Yet? here

New Videos from NYC UCB Beta teams

2010-02-19T08:59:00.000-08:00

Numbalex: Depressed Yet? by The Brig

Watch this depressing ad then take our depression med.

Salinger's Last Book by Diamonds, Wow!

J.D. Salinger's highly offensive final book shouldn't be publisher

Behind the Scenes - FIX Badass

2010-02-17T10:42:00.000-08:00

Badass stars and was written by Hal Rudnick and co-stars Justin Donaldson. It's a badass show about badass technology.

DP - Doug Beatty
Director - Matty Smith
Editor/Effects - Jack Allison
Stills by Jack Allison

Google Buzz: Revealed

2010-02-16T08:56:00.000-08:00

We're not a fan of Buzz.

Written by Chris Kelly and Caitlin Tegart, Directed by Todd Bieber, Featuring Guy Patton, Produced and FX by J.D. Amato

New BETA videos from Fix and Diamonds, Wow!

2010-02-12T07:59:00.000-08:00

UCB's BETA teams just keep on rolling out the videos.

ChatRoulette.com Commercial by Fix

Jersey Shore Explains: The Catcher in the Rye by Diamonds, Wow!

New UCB Comedy Original/The Brig video goes viral

2010-02-09T08:33:00.000-08:00

In the wake of the Superbowl there have been a slew of parody ads. Here is a really funny take on the Google ad from The Brig/UCB Comedy Originals. Today it went viral and has been one of our most watched videos to date.

Google: Parisian Oops

http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/08/mocking-google-super-bowl-commercial/

http://gizmodo.com/5467282/parisian-oops-a-more-realistic-google-ad

http://www.20min.ch/digital/dossier/google/story/11515669

UCB Comedy Videos featured in New York Times

2010-02-06T12:05:00.000-08:00

The New York Times ran a piece on Scott Brown & Anthony King's (Artistic Director of UCB Theatre) "Songs in the Key of Craigslist", which are featured on UCB Comedy dot com. Read the article.

Below are a few of Scott & Anthony's really funny videos that were mentioned in the article.

New LIVE from UCB Theater intro

2010-02-02T21:11:00.000-08:00

We have a brand new intro for Live from UCB Theater videos.

Behind the Scenes - The Brig's "Bachman Turner Overdrive"

2010-02-02T12:42:00.000-08:00

New comedy video coming soon featuring:
Jamison Guest, Amber Petty and John Murray

1 Laptop per 3rd World n00b - New UCB Comedy Original from The Brig

2010-02-02T09:37:00.000-08:00

GIZMODO picked it up.

Diamonds, Wow! - Behind the Scenes of Hard Rock Cafe

2010-01-29T19:49:00.000-08:00

Nate Lang as the late Joey Ramone

Joe Strummer (Ben Rodgers) meets David Bowie (Thomas Middleditch)

Brandon Scott Jones as Johnny Rotten

Spotlight On: Nick Wiger

2010-01-21T14:15:00.000-08:00

Nick Wiger's a super funny guy. At the UCBTLA, he's a member of improv team Last Day of School, a writer-performer for sketch team A Kiss From Daddy, he can be found doing funny stuff for all kinds of shows throughout the week at the UCB, and he's made a whole mess of funny videos. Check a couple out below, or go straight to his performer page!

Burger Auditioner

Wri. Nick Wiger, Dir. Justin Donaldson

The Dumbest Generation

Wri. Nick Wiger, Dir. Justin Donaldson

The World's 1st 3-D Blog!

2010-01-17T22:51:00.000-08:00

You may now put on your 3-D glasses.

AAvvaattaarr WWiinnss BBeesstt PPiiccttuurree

JJaammeess CCaammeerroonn’'ss AAvvaattaarr ttooookk ttoopp hhoonnoorrss aatt tthhee GGoollddeenn GGlloobbeess tthhiiss wweeeekkeenndd,, tthhee ffiirrsstt ttiimmee ssuucchh aa hhiigghh hhoonnoorr wweenntt ttoo aa ffiillmm tthhaatt rreelliieedd mmoorree oonn tteecchhnnoollooggyy tthhaann......

EExxpplloossiioonnss!! HHaanndd rreeaacchheess oouutt aatt ssccrreeeenn!!
AAaarrddvvaarrkk MMiissssiissssiippppii ssppoooonnffeeeedd ssuubbbbooookkkkeeeeppeerr..
You may now remove your 3-D glasses. Here's to a 2010 Golden Globe for Best Post on a Blog - Musical or Retarded!

Lovely Bones Commentary, From the Lady Who Sat Next To Me At The Lovely Bones

2010-01-16T03:17:00.000-08:00

Possible spoiler alert: Because these are all someone's actual reactions to watching the film, you may be able to infer certain parts of the story-- at least, the tone of certain parts. Please take this commentary to the theater with you, as it serves to expand upon much of what is seen in the film.

Title Credits

"Hm."

"Oh."

"Hm."

"Oh no."

"Oh no no no."

"Hm."

"Isn't that awful?"

"Hm."

"Tsk."

"Hm."

"Tsk."

"Hm."

"Oh, I think those are the bones."

"Hm."

"Aw, shoot."

"Hm."

End Credits

"That was a good one, that was a good one."

No response from Peter Jackson's camp if they'll be putting the commentary on the Lovely Bones initial Blu Ray release, or if they'll save it for the Lovelier Bones: Unrated edition.

An Important Announcement from the UCB Comedy Blog

2010-01-15T02:24:00.000-08:00

Sad news today, everyone. It seems like Jay Leno was not satisfied with his time writing for his new blog address, ucbcomedy.wordpress.com, and asked the powers that be to give him this address back. Unfortunately, his request has been granted, despite his tendency to use the wrong form of "they're"/"their"/"there" and his overposting of pictures of his neighbor's shih tzu, Ava, that he likes way too much.

You'll be able to find Becky at her old ~~time slot~~ address, ucbcomedy.blogspop.com, while I'll likely be going back to my old job monitoring site traffic at www.iowacorn.org, the official site of Iowa Corn. Thank you very much for your readership, and we hope to see you again soon.

Jay Leno has also sent us this message, which he asked be passed along to you. It was written by Jay Leno, no lie:

Hey their, UCB Comedy blog readers! I'm very excited to be back, right heir at the UCB Comedy Blog. As you all know, my new job was a bad job so now I want my old job, right thare at ucbcomedy.blogspot.com! I will approach the position with great aplomb, and I know that thayer's a lot of great blogging in store for you in the near future! Also, did I mention Ava?!? OMG SO CUTE.

Also I own cars. More then five! C U L8R!

The Five Best Movies of 2009

2010-01-10T01:42:00.000-08:00

5. Watchmen

Many thought director Zack Snyder had his work cut out for him when he took on the task of bringing the most highly acclaimed graphic novel of all time (one believed to be unfilmable) to the big screen. But Watchmen was a smashing success and surpassed the simplistic nature of the original comic (the Family Circus of the 1980s, as it were), as Snyder told a complex story with absolute subtlety, no confusing or retarded crap that bogged on for days, and managed to give a computerized blue penis top billing without it becoming silly or distracting in the least. Audiences left the theaters wondering how those 162 minutes went by so fast, and especially didn't ask for their money back.

The reason this isn't higher on the list is because they occasionally wasted time not developing the character of the blue CGI wiener.

4. Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen
Many thought director Michael Bay had his work cut out for him when he attempted a squeakquel to his 2007 critically acclaimed original film, Transformers. But Revenge is one of those rare squeakquels that surpasses the original in every way, elevating the franchise from one classic film to a Godfather-like epic work of art, filled with multi-dimensional characters, a subtle approach to action akin to Bay's earlier Bad Boys II, and an intricate and clever plot. Only where The Godfather got boring every now and then because they focused too much on killing horses and having abortions, Transformers 2 was SO COOL cuz they were like TRASNFORM! psshoo pshyoo! Bow bang! So cool.

Dimensions.

3. All About Steve
Many thought Sandra Bullock had her work cut out for her when she wanted to make an immediate squeakquel to The Proposal. But what if I told you that Sandra Bullock was gonna play against type and be a QUIRKY female lead. And what if I told you that she was gonna go against type again and wear RED BOOTS. 'Nuff said.

There's even a part later in the film where she has an UMBRELLA. 'Neff soid.

2. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Sequel
Many thought that Alvin and the Chipmunks had their work cut out for them when they wanted to make a sequel to their family-live-action-CGI-mix-thing movie debut. But those people were stupid, because Alvin and the Chipmunks are fictional characters so they wouldn't be making the movie. Also, making a sequel film where the female chipmunk counterparts sing high-pitched versions of Beyonce's "Single Ladies" and Corinne Bailey Rae's "Put Your Records On" is like the Lumberjack Slam at Denny's: a no-brainer.

Alvin and the Chipmunks on set.

1. A Serious Man

Many thought the Coen Brothers had their work cut out for them in attempting to produce an entertaining film about a man who, for all intents and purposes, is serious. But they took the project very seriously, and made a serious movie on all accounts. A squeakquel has not yet been announced, but you can bet it won't be far off. Seriously, man.

A Sirius Black.

That was stupid. Goodnight everybody!

What 2010 Has in Store... For YOU

2010-01-05T23:36:00.000-08:00

Hello all. I know it’s been a while since I blogged, but I’ve spent some time using my brainwaves to activate an alien body on this mission that I don’t want to talk about.

It’s a new decade. That’s cool. I’m excited that this last decade was over, what with all the tragedy that happened, like NBC’s Coupling.

I have some predictions for you for 2010. Since I have déjà vu a lot, you can be pretty convinced that most of them will be right. I have, like, a million senses more than you, so trust me on this. Okay, buddy?!

Okay, here are some things that will happen in 2010 to you:

- You will go to the bathroom. It’s going to happen. Trust me. When you go to the bathroom, you’re going to be all like, “Oh my God. She was right.” And now when you go to the bathroom, you’re going to think of me. That’s okay. I’m used to it with me being magical and all.

- I will giggle as I type, “go to the bathroom.” When I was younger I used to think the phrase “go to the bathroom” was so funny because of “bathroom”. Since I am alone right now, I don’t feel any shame in laughing. Oh my God! I’m giggling right now. I’m letting out a good guffaw, if you will. I was right. My predictions are true. So there.

- You will do something with your body. The verb that you will do is tattooed on Lindsay Lohan’s wrist after she was in the hospital for an asthma attack.

- You are going to be impressed with my knowledge of Lindsay Lohan’s body adornment and medical history. Even if your brain is telling you I’m a loser, your heart is telling you I’m a genius.

- You will read this blog right now. It’s 2010 and you’re reading this blog so that means it will have happened so I’m totally right on my prediction of you reading this blog.

Done! That’s all my entire psychic eye is telling me right now. I’ll get back to you if I see anything else in the future. For now, Happy New Year!