Movie Review Headline Suggestions: 10/16/09

As usual, reviewers, feel free to use any of these. Just give me credit. And monies.

Where The Wild Things Are

You'll Go Wild For This Thing!

Where The Wild Things Are? More Like Where The Wild Fun Is!

This Is A Movie Based On A Book! Stars!

Where? Here! Is A Good Movie!

This Adaptation of Maurice Sendak's Children's Book Will Send-ak You A Message: That You'll Want Maur...ice!

Law Abiding Citizen

Abide By This: This Movie Stinks!

Abide By This: This Movie Rules!

Abide By This: This Movie Is Okay But Not Great But Still Sorta Okay If You Like This Kind Of Movie!

The Stepfather

Step Away From The Theatre-- We Got a Stinker!

If This Father Were Your Real Father, Then You'd Be The Child Of A Bad Movie And That's Impossible Because Movies Don't Procreate!

Stars! Just Kidding No Stars!

New York, I Love You

New York, I Love You... But Your Movie's A Stinker!

New York, New Stinker!

More Like New York, I Stinker You!

More Like New York, I Love Stinkers! No Wait I Don't Love Stinkers No Stars!

Black Dynamite

Dyn-o-mite!

I've Heard This Movie's Legit Good And I Would Like To See It If It Releases In AMC Theaters Because I Have Coupons There!

I can keep churning these out forever.

Trying Too Hard

The following is a real gchat between Matty and Becky. It's chock full of wit and insight, and trying too hard. This is very special and behind the scenes, like, more behind the scenes than that time P. Diddy video blogged himself peeing. I thought about editing it to make it more interesting, but that'd be dishonest and I'm all about truth in comedy and thinking about writing a book about that. I did add visual aids.

Becky: let's have a funny gchat conversation and then post it on the UCB Comedy blog

all the hip people do that

and... scene.

me: how's the data job?

Becky: you mean... my data job with the president on the moon?

it's okay

(that's anti-heightening)

me: no it's less than just okay, it's so-so

(that's a heightened anti-heightening)

so i'm personally glad we finally attacked the moon

Becky: me too

me: it'll make us better prepared for triffid attacks

Becky: hang on i need to google triffid

holy shit

me: it's a plant that makes everyone blind and attacks, but also from space

Becky: triffids are scary

me: if i remember correct

yeah

shyah

Becky: yeah you're right

Do you know what else I'm scared of?

Humanzees

me: i don't need to google that to know it's terrifying

Becky: like, i'm afraid i'll give birth to one

me: yeah it'd be terrifying

a cross between a hummer, an ant, a zebra, and bees

Becky: i know- a horrible carbon footprint mixed with the least adorable animals

me: hey, zebras are dark-horse cute animals

they'll surprise you

just kidding, they're not dark, they have stripes

hahahahahahahaha

lollloollllll

lmao

Becky: oh my god, when people read this blog post, they are going to think we're hilarious

me: rofl rofl

Becky: LFMAO

me: roflcopter

Becky: United ROFL

me: IMHO, ROF

btw prw

Becky: ROFLercoaster

me: Rofl Nader

Becky: Little Rofl from a Christmas Story

Hi, Souplantation, can I get the clam chowder in a breadROFL?

me: rrrrrrofls have rrrrrrridges

Becky: btw pROFLw

Sent at 11:52 AM on Friday

me: btROFL pROFLw

Baroflack Obroflama won the Roflbel Peace Profl

Sent at 11:54 AM on Friday

Becky: Did you watch the of ROFLice last night!

I'm so glad Rofl and rofl finally tied the rofl

me: did you see last nights the rofls? I can't believe rofl went through with marrying spencer.

Sent at 11:56 AM on Friday

Becky: oh, rofl! i missed it! I instead watched "Rofl and a Half Rofl" on my DVR last night

me: that show's been downhill ever since the third rofl

Becky: i know, but i still like it

it makes me roll on the floor laughing

I also really like How I Met Your GPOYW

me: i do not know what that means

but i chose to read it phonetically and leave it at that

Becky: ok

one more thing

I never told you this before

My favorite movie is What's Eating Gilbert GPOYW

Admittedly, we lost it at the end there. And what was that, a political cartoon? That was pretty unacceptable.

Cats vs. Dolphins

The following is the first in a series of ecologically educational essays that the Discovery Channel will option for a series (with cool zooms and Richard Attenborough's voice), or Animal Planet (with cheap lens effects and Zach Braff's voice) if it's not good enough for that. Matty Smith has no formal education on animals, but he likes animals and animal shows a lot.

Cats. Dolphins. What do we really know about these animals? Most resign themselves to these strange foreign creatures remaining a mystery. But walk with me please, as I take you into the world of...

Cats vs. Dolphins

A Tale of Survival

The biggest question one has when thinking of cats and dolphins-- scientifically known as felines and flippers, respectively-- is what is the difference between cats and dolphins? That's a good question, and you did a good job asking it.

1. Cats live on land, dolphins live in water
Despite their furry outer shell, cats are surprisingly not fit for water living. This is mainly due to them having lungs and not being able to put goggles on. Dolphins, juxtapositorally, don't have hands so they wouldn't be able to open doors, so they live underwater where there are no doors.

2. Cats go "meow," dolphins go "eh-ee-eh-ee-eh-eh-eh"
Being raised on cartoons and Sabrina the Teenage Witch, most Americans believe that cats and dolphins can speak perfect English. However, research suggests that both animals possess harsh accents that make their English almost completely unintelligible. Instead their speech just sounds like weird gibberish, and it's frustrating to play Apples to Apples with either species.

3. Cats eat tuna, dolphins tragically get mixed in with tuna sometimes"
We've all laughed really hard when Heathcliff reaches for that grocer's fish, but unfunnier than Heathcliff rip-off Garfield is the fact that dolphins get so interested in life on land that they often attempt to hop in a Norwegian fisherman's net just so they can snag a ride to the over world, and it turn out to be much more than they bargained for. Most marine astrologists hypothesize that this is because they've seen Splash too many times, or its Garfieldian rip-off The Little Mermaid.

4. Cats are mammals, dolphins are fish
This one's pretty straightforward.

5. Both are jerks.
If you own a cat, you're probably pretty bummed. Likewise, if you've ever swum with dolphins, your swumming experience was probably a big letdown. That's because both of these animals, as the intellectual low points for their respective animal classes (mammal and fish, see #4), are dumb and jealous of the fact that humans know how to program VCRs and cook TGI Friday's appetizers in microwaves. Cats and dolphins are jerk animals, who'd be all too okay with finishing the last Diet Coke in the office fridge without refilling, or blurting out inappopriate comments about your lifestyle to your parents at the Thanksgiving dinner table.

I don't buy this for a second.

Walk with me on this ancient rock point, as that concludes our tour of the animal kingdom, or kingdo anime in science language. Please pass on to your friends this vast array of knowledge, especially if they work for the Discovery Channel or Animal Planet, but preferably the Discovery Channel.

Okay, Guess Which One is Becky and Which One is Matty...

... in this new UCB Comedy Original.

Other Crises Vampires Can Have

On Sunday, I made the smart choice of watching the first half of Twilight, stopping to watch True Blood, and then finishing Twilight. I love vampires. They are sexy and mysterious, but it seems like all of them suffer from the same crisis: they don't want to hurt other humans but they have to drink a human's blood in order to survive.

Ugh!

We get it! Your torn. You're a vampire with humanity. Can we please see something new? I think the real vampires out there are becoming angry that they are being portrayed as one-dimensional. I am sure vampires have a plethora of other crises and dilemmas besides the thirst for blood and being in love with a human at the same time.

If I were to create a vampire character (a male one, mind you), his emotional torture would consist of this:

1.) "I still crave hamburgers. It was my favorite food when I was alive and sometimes I still crave it. Is that weird? Am I, like, a weird vampire with different DNA from everyone else?"

2.) "No, Bella/Sookie! Don't lick me! I'm frozen and dead and cold. No. Oh shit. Your tongue is stuck on my body now. Didn't you ever see A Christmas Story or Dumb and Dumber?"

3.) "A Christmas Story and Dumb and Dumber are my favorite movies. What if the other vampires don't like me because of that? Should I lie and say that my favorite movie is The Little Vampire starring that kid from Stuart Little 2?"

4.) "I don't know why I just said The Little Vampire. It was the first vampire movie that came to mind. I should've said Nosferatu but I get really self-conscious saying it in front of other people because I never think I'm pronouncing it correctly."

5.) "I hate it when my fangs come out and my mouth is closed. It just creeps up on me. I have these sores in my mouth and all day my tongue wants to touch them. It's so bothersome that it just ruins my day. I have a horrible case of OCD."

6.) "Why are the ladies on The View so bat-crazy? And why can I not stop watching it?"

And the Winner is... Me!

Well, according to the accurate and popular poll, it looks like yours truly beat out Bob McBobbob in the quest to find out who has the funniest video out of everyone in the entire world. Land of the Lost came in a very close, yet oh so far, second.

Well, I'd like to thank Matty for helping me to restore my confidence when it comes to the YouTube world. He also offered to have a pizza party in my honor, but I figured this is better.

Summer's the best! Here're some videos not really related to summer!

Hey everyone! I'm happy. Why am I happy? Because it's nice and beautiful and sunny outside, and that gives me an excuse to eat lots of frozen yogurt. And what better activity is there than than kicking back with a cup of Menchies and watching some videos? Here are a couple recent UCB Comedy Originals, the first being one I originally wrote with my Maude team Up, Up, Up! and filled with a bunch of performers from the LA theatre who I know from personal experience are awesome talented people, the second from the New York theatre with a bunch of performers I've never met personally but am sure are awesome talented people. Enjoy!

The Sports Show


The Cornish Game Hen Maneuver


Happy summer!

My Addiction, by Matty Smith

The following is a true story.

It started a few years ago, at my first job in Hollywood. I was workin' for a real bona fide production company-- yessir, the kind of movie company that made fancy movies like Coach Carter, and Norbit. In fact, the company did make Coach Carter and Norbit. I entered my first foray into the entertainment world an enthusiastic, eager and, unfortunately, gullible young lad.

I never thought Hollywood could change me. Turns out, like the millions of others who set out to make it in this harsh mistress of a town, it did.

It started off simple enough. I'd answer phone calls, say hello to Tom Welling when he walked in. The usual stuff. But as the days got longer, and the phone calls from the director of Summer Catch starring Freddie Prinze, Jr. stopped coming in, a different kind of monster rolled into town. A monster named Boredom. Suddenly, instead of rubbing elbows with Samuel L. Jackson and making with the googly eyes with Britney Spears in a whirling Hollywood fever dream, I was rubbing elbows with a big empty desk and making googly eyes with a Windows ME default desktop wallpaper. It was then that I spotted it, that sweet siren's song of a program icon, beckoning me like the serpent to Eve.

One made-up compound word: FreeCell. To some it is merely Solitaire with skill involved. But I know its true face: black magic.

It was easy to control at first. A game here, a game there. Win, loss, didn't really matter much to me. I was just a kid, foolin' around. Three of clubs on top of a four of diamonds here, set the ten of hearts aside there. Easy peasy. But then something dark broke out from inside me, like a wild tiger exploding from a thicket. Suddenly my win-loss record counted. Suddenly that other girl interning there was confused by how much I played the game and why I actually cared if I won. Suddenly I'd go to bed at night and instead of my usual talking dog adventures, my dreams were overtaken by thoughts of compatible card combinations and how many cards I could shift to other piles with given amounts of open spaces.

I had it, had it bad. Addiction.

This riveting story to be continued on a later day...

Here's a great video written by Becky Bain as a reward for putting up with my stupid crap all the time:

We're a bunch of skinny wieners.

For your sake, I hope you got that blog subject reference.

Some of you may remember that, not long ago, we were nominated for those Oscars of New York comedy, the ECNY Awards. We said we wanted an award, and we meant it. Meant it bad. And you know what?

We got it. We won. That's right, UCBcomedy.com is the reigning champion for the ECNY Awards' Best Website. Along with a bunch of other UCB performers who won awards, UCBcomedy.com is inarguably better than other things. Who do we have to thank? You, the viewer/bored guy at work. And ourselves. High fives all around. Now hows about they make a "Best Blog Peripheral to a Comedy Website" award? We want more awards.

And in honor of awards, here's a video related to awards featuring at least one sexy shirtless dude. Enjoy!



We're the best!

One Great Sketch for Monday

Happy President's Day! Which president is your favorite? Mine's Teddy Roosevelt. Becky likes Taft. All I'll say is, one of those fought bears and won, and one fought a bath tub and lost. You decide which is superior.

More important than our nation's history are celebrities, who'll all be on full display this Sunday at the Academy Awards, which are like the Oscars but for movies. To celebrate, here's a great sketch from Up, Up, Up!, one of the UCB maude teams from LA that I'm heavily biased toward because I'm on it. Enjoy!

Memorable Movie Quotes

My Life at UCBcomedy.com

Folks, we've got a present for you today. We know you've been wondering, "what's the glamorous life of a UCB intern like?" Well, we're gonna show you. Right now, yes. Here's the view from Matty's luxurious seat in the back office of the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre.

Oh, man, check it out! Is that a MacBook? Yeah, it is. I get to use it! And that sweet piece of abstract art makes me seem smart. Just a little somethin' somethin' for the ladies. And, to top it all off, I get to use that stapler any time I want. As long as it's business-related. So that's the mustardy-colored front view. WHAT COULD POSSIBLY TOP THIS?!?


Holy crud! A hallway! That's what's goin' on to the left. Interesting note, nobody has ever gone down that hallway, and nobody knows what's down there. My bet's on it being the lair of the Jabberwocky.


How many people are able to say they can spin around and look at the faces of all the UCB interns at once any time they want? How many? Very few. But I can. I can. Also, that Paychex calendar sure comes in handy, mainly because it doubles as just a regular-type calendar.


My view to the right. I don't look there often. No idea who that chick is.


And, not to brag, but on very, very special days, I get a visitor! That's right, it's the UCB's own Harrison Brown! He likes to come in and tell Becky she's doing a really good job. Then I ask how I'm doing, and he just stares at the floor. Then I go home and throw myself one of my Matty Smith-patented pizza n' tears parties, my favorite kind of party. More on that later.


I hope this was as exciting for you as it was for me. You probably work in an office building, with windows and stuff. Talk about banal. If I want to see typical office workings, I can just watch reruns of Working with Fred Savage. Remember Working? They had an episode where they had a Solitaire competition. Haha, Solitaire.

Genius.

Has This Ever Been You?

I saw Ben Siemon's "Date with an Informercial Actress" at Not Too Shabby once and I thought it was the funniest thing I had ever seen. Since then I've been stalking Ben Siemon. However, now that this hilarious sketch is finally on ucbcomedy.com, I can pretend he's my husband from the comfort of my own home/wi-fi hotspot.

Check it out:

Vampire Thanksgiving, Ch. 2: A Twilight Fan-Fiction

If you missed Chapter One of Vampire Thanksgiving, check it out by clicking here before continuing. As it is a two-chapter epic, this will be the final chapter of Vampire Thanksgiving. I would like to thank all of my faithful readers. I love you all. The months of planning, writing, and revising were not in vain.

Chapter Two
Bella was sad because her boyfriend left her, and that makes sense because that's really sad and we've all been there. She went on her Facebook and clicked reluctantly on the "Remove Relationship" button. To top it all off the internet was out and she couldn't fix it because her stepdad was the only one who knew how to fix it and he was dead.

Edward was walking down the street when he heard a sound emanating from some bushes over there. Hmm, how very curious, he pondered to himself in his mind. So he went to the bushes and all of a sudden Buffy the Vampire Slayer jumped out. She was just about to kill him when he explained to her that he was actually one of the good vampires.

"I'm one of the good vampires," he explained.

"Okay good. Say, you're cute, would you like to go out for coffee sometime?" Buffy asked Edward out.

Edward wasn't sure what to do, but he knew that he and Bella were on a break so he went on the coffee date with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. They went to Central Perk and Ross and Rachel were there, ironically. Then they went to Buffy's house and made out a lot but Edward pulled away.

"I can't do this... I love Bella," cried Edward into the raging night winds. He bid Buffy adieu and set out for Bella's place.

But when he got there, who did he find but Edgar, making out with Bella, ironically!

"Stop now! I love Bella!" Edward yelled again into the raging night winds. Edgar and Bella stopped the hot makeout sesh they were having.

"Is that true?" responded Bella with chagrin.

"I'm pretty sure. But who knows what love is?" asked Edward. Bella sighed because Edward was so smart and broody.

"No! This can't be!" lamented Edgar, whose body burst into flames, because true love was his one weakness.

Edward smiled at Bella with his vampire teeth, which actually look just like normal people teeth, because vampires don't have vampire teeth in Twilight. They went inside, made out a few times, and then ate their Thanksgiving dinner. Bella ate turkey, and Edward ate Tru Blood because he was a vampire.

"This is the stupidest thing I've ever read," said Becky from outside the window. But nobody listens to her because she's retarded. Plus, she was just jealous because she wishes she could make out with Edward.

The End!

Special thanks to Brooke Seguin for canonical accuracies.

Facebook Status Helper

Facebook is now unquestionably the most important social tool at one's disposal. It's where you'll solidify your friendship with the dude you met at the big party, it's where you'll brush up on your stalkee's favorite bands, and it's where you'll brag about insignificant things you'd feel stupid telling to someone's face. The key to absolute virtual friendship success, however, is in the Facebook status. Whether it's bragging about how lazy you are, defying grammatical logic, or just proclaiming nonsensical phrases that nobody (not even yourself) could possibly understand in an effort to come off as "thoughtful," you'd better have a solid status to survive this harsh digital environment. Nervous? Well, you're in luck. Here are some common facebook stati that are sure to work every time. Just pick one, and you'll be getting poked and tagged and superficially compared to others in no time.

<Your Name>...
...is too cool for school.
...is in it for the long haul.
...is procrastinating.
...zonked out.
...is CLASS CAN'T END SOON ENOUGH.
...is just misunderstood.
...has a sucky stepdad who sucks.
...is fly like paper, get high like planes, If you catch me at the border, I got visas in my name.
...will never be too cool for school.
...blah.
...thinks you're great!
...CARBO-LOADING ;).
...got another parking ticket.
...is lonely, depressed, and crying out for help.
...is ruminating.
...SLEEP.
...is Ravens 36, Eagles 7.
...can't get enough ice cream!
...http://hampsterdance.com.
...hates facebook.
...is F@$%!
...is...
...NO ON PROP 8.
...is not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.
...is on a serious Mad Men streak!!!
...hearts Don Draper!
...is MAD MEN.
...passed away this morning due to exhaustion after a weekend Mad Men marathon. Please send your love and support to his mother at madmom85@aol.com.

How I Spent My Junior Year of College

It's wonderful what a little bit of pretentious self-Googling will turn up. For me, I found this little gem. I guess I didn't realize at the time, as an impressionable young college student, just how important and timeless my work really was. You're welcome, everybody. Now try Googling yourself. Go on, give it a try. That's right, this is the sort of blog that gives you homework.

But this nostalgic taxi cab ride down memory lane got me thinking about all the great videos I've seen on the site. That was way too mushy sounding, so I'm gonna stop right there, and say here are some of my favorite older videos on the site that are definitely still worth a look:

Horse Lift
Absurd, but in all the right ways.



Prank War
Quick, simple, and funny.



Los Angeles: The Big Apple
Absurd, simple, funny. Like a magic mix of what I liked about the other two.



Hope you enjoy them! Oh, and don't forget to do your homework! Otherwise you'll never get into Yale like your sister.