Tonight I went to see The Thrilling Adventure & Supernatural Suspense Hour at M-Bar on Vine St. This is performed like a radio show, reminiscent of A Prairie Home Companion and stars Paul F. Tompkins, Paget Brewster and John DiMaggio (the guy who voiced Bender on Futurama and is, incidentally, eight feet tall), among other people. Tonight it also starred Amber Benson, Adam Busch and Samm Levine (who is, incidentally, two feet tall).
I shook Adam Busch's hand and told him he was funny. I exchanged understanding glances with Amber Benson when Adam started talking about his band. (They're an item, in case you didn't know. I didn't.) Then I nearly passed out from joy as Adam Busch made a conscious effort to remember my name even though he was about to go talk to someone he actually knew. A truly classy guy. Fortunately that bar makes a Mai Tai that is ninety percent liquor which made me a hell of a lot less self conscious so I didn't act like my usual bumbly self. Amber Benson looks much more beautiful in person than she looked on Buffy. The girl is downright radiant.
The show was written by Ben Acker and Ben Blacker (their real names, I swear) and genuinely made me laugh even though I was slightly distracted by how much the mai tai made me have to pee.
It reaffirms why I love actors. They make their money showing up in front of the camera, but you've got to see the joy on their faces when they get up in front of a mic with a script and their talent and not much else and make a go of it. It's why so many are willing to work for free as long as the script is good. The good ones didn't come out to LA to make money; they came to act.
It's good to go see live shows, just so you remember that LA isn't just about TV and film. It's about the art of story telling and entertainment at its best. This show was way better than that time I went to see the taping of that short-lived sitcom with Fred Savage and Jane Curtin. This one was actually funny.
you're kind of mean sometimes. not funny, mean. two feet tall? so what? reminds me of when you teased that boy in your school. I mean, you usually ARE funny, so I guess I get disappointed when you use cheap shots.
ReplyDeletewhoops, that was me, martha, devoted reader- I wasn't trying to be anonymous.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you expressed your opinion. And I'm glad you used your name.
ReplyDeleteAnd I was going to make all kinds of comments about the double standard of shortness versus tallness and how sarcasm is kind of my second language and how of this entire, overwhelmingly positive post you picked out the one comment that is not strictly about the performance, but I opted to say only this:
If you knew me in the real world you would laugh your ass off at the idea of me being mean to anybody.
Even Little Round Boy.
I see Buffy fans describe Amber like that all the time, and I just don't get it. I'm not trying to be a jerk in your blog, but I just don't understand what the appeal is. Could you explain what it is you see in her? Because I've seen her around LA many times (and relatively recently) and I can't help but think looks ill. She's so thin and so pale and so thin -- I can never get over how tiny she is -- and everytime I see her she looks worse than before. It's to the point where I've seriously begun to worry about her health and well being, and I'm not even a fan of hers! Of course, she's also with her friends, drinking (A LOT) most of the times I've seen her, so perhaps that has played a role.
ReplyDeleteI guess we can all breathe a sigh of relief you didn't call her a nappy headed ho...
ReplyDeleteI didn't know commenting on someone's size constitutes a cheap shot. It's just a comment on a blog by someone who they will probably never read. It's supposed to be funny and if you can't write on your own blog things that are funny - where can you write them?
I was the shortest kid in my class till 10th grade and got called all manner of short jokes - but it certainly didn't make me so sensitive that any short joke sends me off the cliff.
If the 2 foot tall girl is so upset - I'm sure she can comfort herself in her fame and piles of cash.
Let's all take a SHORT breath and relax... :)
Ok I agree that Amber is too skinny. She does need to eat more. It may be because on Buffy she tended to look wide on camera and in this town that's a problem, so she probably overcompensates.
ReplyDeleteBut she wasn't really drinking and she was sweet to me and completely beautiful. I think they always made her look a little plain on Buffy because of her character, and that's why it's so surprising to see just how pretty she is in person.
i wish i was in LA right now.
ReplyDeleteI bet there's not a monsoon in LA.
Sniff... Whine...
ReplyDeleteI'm so devastated by your post that I can no longer comment.
Actually, I wanted to be comment number #8.
I feel all EIGHTISH (8ISH) today.
Unk
Thank you so much for coming to the show and thank you even more for saying nice things about it!
ReplyDeleteThe part of your post with which I would like to take issue is not the teeny tiny little person thing. "The shortest short person can, on occasion, be taller than the tallest short person or the shortest tall person." Ben Franklin said that, and he was our nation's greatest president. And he was of average height. And he was married to women of all sizes.
Nor do I take issue with what people think of Amber, who is altogether awesome. Ben Franklin predicted that. Under the name Nostradamus.
I take issue with the comparison of our show to Prairie Home Companion. Garrison Keillor can go to Hell! He killed Robert Altman, for Christ's sake! Everyone in Hollywood knows that. His junk is hack and tired. His sound effects guy uses his mouth a lot and nobody likes mouth sound effects.
And I am not just trying to "start beef" with Keillor to get on the map. I'm not. Okay, I am a little bit. But so what? Whom does it hurt?
Garrison Keillor is a little bitch.
I stand corrected.
ReplyDeletePrairie Home Companion is a festival of whores and Guy Noire is a dirty perve.
everyone knows short people bite the ankles of taller people while they aren't looking. It's fact.
ReplyDeleteAlso fact: Ben has a Garrison dart board.
Two totally random observations:
ReplyDelete1. Paget Brewster is my #2 pretend-girlfriend. If anything ever happens to #1, I've got Paget standing by to take her place.
2. I'm fixating on the fact that Emily was drinking a Mai Tai. I've never actually been to M Bar, but I've always imagined it as a Martini Bar. So now I have this image in my head of a bunch of people clad in black all with large Dirty Martinis in front of them and in the middle is Emily with her Mai Tai. And it's one of those that have a lot of straws and umbrellas and things sticking out of it. It's kind of a charming image.
I once spent a very pleasant afternoon playing and singing Led Zeppelin songs with Adam and some of the guys from his band in the "green room" of a UK convention, escaping from the Buffy fans.
ReplyDeleteNice guys, I thought.
Ewww! A short person! Step on it! ;-)
As a coda, the show sounds like just the sort of thing I like to work on. Quality writing and good fun. I'll have to buttonhole the Bens when I’m next in LA...
ReplyDeleteps: i'm linking you. You have proved to be a cool chick.
ReplyDelete