Open Mic Improv at The Improv Space every Wednesday night
Last night I went to The Improv Sessions for the second time. This is a weekly open show held by The Improv Space for exactly zero dollars. If you’re part of an improv group or just want to show up alone and get thrown in with others, this is a great way to play and learn from others. Just throw your name or team’s name in a hat to get called up to do 10-15 minutes. Then at the end a bunch of random people are called up for a jam, which challenges you even more to play with people you might be meeting for the first time.
There’s a great energy to the show thanks to the able hosting of Benjamin Crutcher, and all of the players are supportive, and skilled enough to do fun and funny mini-shows. Usually with this kind of format, there’s that guy or that team that’s just kinda painful, but that hasn’t happened yet. (Maybe I’ve just lucked out on the nights I’ve gone. Or… maybe I’m that guy!)
It starts at 9 PM every Wednesday night and runs about two hours. And yes, it’s FREE.
Saturday’s Tag Team Comedy Show to feature lots of stand-up and improv
Improv group Jump Start first to perform at Heyler’s, our new venue
This Saturday, the Magic Meathands Tag Team Comedy Show will be bursting with more funny people than ever before!
We had a great debut at Heyler’s last Saturday with our Family Friendly Show. Thank you to all who came out to help us celebrate our new home! We’ll be there again this Saturday night with our biggest Tag Team Comedy Show yet! Before you know it, Heyler’s will be known as the biggest comedy spot in LA! Or at least, the biggest on Pico Blvd. Surely somewhere between those two benchmarks.
We’re very happy to have three stand-up comics help us kick off the first Tag Team Comedy Show at Heyler’s:
- John Vargas made his debut at The Comedy Store and has been performing regularly at comedy clubs in and around LA.
- Vance Sanders is a Groundlings graduate who works the local comedy club circuit and is the host for the Scoomies, the award show celebrating stand-up comedy in LA.
- Pat Reilly is another regular of the LA comedy club scene, which helps him study sociology at UCLA.
- Ceci Noire came from Haiti to live the movie star lifestyle, and has unlocked the secrets of the universe.
A trio of comedians should be enough to pass the legal requirements of a comedy show, but that wasn’t enough for us! We’ve also got the improv group Distant Relatives! They perform every Friday night at The Improv Space, and now we’ve got them! All they need is one suggestion from the audience, and they turn it into a fully improvised long form show. The group includes former Meathand Eric Chad Ho, as well as Jason King, Tim Limbrick, Samir Forghani, and Stephen Perlstein.
To finish it all off, it’s the Magic Meathands! Yes, us! We perform a mixture of long form scenarios and short form games to create a lively and energetic show. So we’ll have you laughing one way or another!
See you Saturday at 8 PM!
Heyler’s
10659 West Pico Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90064
(one block east of Overland)
Tickets: $7
PARKING: The meters on Pico Blvd. do not need to eat after 6 PM. They’re on a special diet. Yes, that’s right, free street parking on Pico Blvd.! But look closely at the signs if you park on the side streets off Pico.
The above was cross-posted on the Magic Meathands blog. I’ve been a member of the Magic Meathands for over 3 years, performing over 150 shows of improvised comedy. If you’re in the Los Angeles area, give yourself a treat and catch one of our shows.
What are 10 Songs with Awesome Drums?
This month’s theme for Ten on the Tenth is Drums. Be it awesome drum solos, killer fills, tight rhythm sections, or dope beats, (or the worst of all those things), I want to hear your 10 songs. Post them here.
I do Ten on the Tenth every month. So if you love music, check it out and post your own list.
(Yes, I really did use the term “dope beats”. I’m much too white to pull that kind of thing off. I’ll try not to let it happen again.)
Bringing Improv Comedy to The Heyler Space
This Saturday night, the Magic Meathands will debut at our new home, The Heyler Space! Our popular Family Friendly Show with Jump Start Comedy Improv will break in the new performance venue on Saturday, May 12 at 8 PM. Tickets are still only $7 for adults and $3 for children.
Located on Pico Blvd. only one block east of the Westside Pavilion in West Los Angeles, Heyler is owned by Heyler Realty, one of the community’s oldest local businesses. They just recently moved to this great new location and with their interest in giving back to the community, we knew they’d be a great fit for us and our community outreach. Heyler can be easily accessed from the 10 and 405 freeways.
Straight from their Facebook page, below is a peak at Heyler’s spacious offices, which will be transformed into a fun and comfortable theater this Saturday night! Bring your friends and the whole family to witness the start of a new age of madcap mirth-making from the Magic Meathands!
Family Friendly Show featuring improv comedy with the Magic Meathands and Jump Start
Saturday, May 12
8:00 – 10:00 PM
$7 ($3 for kids 12 and under)
10659 West Pico Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90064
(map)
The above was cross-posted on the Magic Meathands blog. I’ve been a member of the Magic Meathands for over 3 years, performing over 150 shows of improvised comedy. If you’re in the Los Angeles area, give yourself a treat and catch one of our shows.
Meet a Meathand: Elizabeth Gill
The Magic Meathands are full of creative, interesting and entertaining people both on and off the stage. That may sound like bragging, but we’re proud of our team, so we thought you should know more about us.
Elizabeth Gill has been a Meathand for a number of years, but when she’s not improvising her butt off, she’s teaching screenwriting at the USC School of Cinematic Arts and the John C. Hench School of Animation and Digital Arts, and winning some gold medals in the Senior Olympics for women’s soccer. She’s also a screenwriter (she wrote this episode of My So-Called Life, along with a number of TV movies) and a poet (Blue Woman: Poems and Drawings). And now she’s an author with her newly released audio book Open 24 Hours!
Find out more about Liz and her book in the first of our Meet a Meathand series:
See more of Liz performing with the Meathands by checking out our Show schedule.
Download Open 24 Hours by Elizabeth Gill.
The above was cross-posted on the Magic Meathands blog. I’ve been a member of the Magic Meathands for over 3 years, performing over 150 shows of improvised comedy. If you’re in the Los Angeles area, give yourself a treat and catch one of our shows.
Blake Living Room Theater: Twin Peaks Episode 7
Hey, how about that! I’ve been sticking with it! I don’t think I’ve skipped a Monday yet. In case you missed the historic news, I’m making my way through the cult favorite TV show Twin Peaks, one episode every Monday night.
I’ve been enjoying the show but I have to say things really hit a new level with episodes 6 and 7. [Note: I'm using the DVD box set's episode numbering, which counts the hour-long pilot episode as its own thing, and then the next episode as episode 1, and so on.] A lot of elements come together, characters take action, some questions are answered, more questions arise, and the sordid web of intrigue gets more and more tangled. And amid all the suspense and creepiness, a touch of comedy remains through the use of the show’s bizarre and awkward characters.
I don’t really want to say too much because I don’t want to spoil things, but my wife Nahleen usually live tweets when we watch and her wrap-up on Facebook was pretty great:
Hank has a lot to say, Hank is everywhere, Hank is trouble, Laura Palmer has serious issues, Leland Leland Leland, Josie arranged for her first husband’s murder?, Bobby’s still a dork, Shelly is naive as ever, Nadine continues to be miserable, Norma is nauseating, Lucy is pregnant?!?!–who’s the father?, where’s Laura Palmer’s mother, creepy cousin is still creepy, red drapes everywhere!, you’re only desirable if you shoot someone when you’re a cop, Katherine is fooled, lumberjack husband gets to play hero, James hears he’s dumb–or at least Laura thought so, AWKWARD!!–Audrey and Daddy?, the business guy is still evil and dealing with everyone and the mill starts to burn…it’s a bad night to be in Twin Peaks!
Audiences Make One of My Favorite Sounds
Not much beats performing live. It’s even better when the audience is a little rambunctious and caught off-guard by what they’re seeing. You can feel the energy, that precarious balance that they might burst out of control but they’re enjoying the show too much.
I think that’s why I love live music albums so much, especially when you can really hear the audience responding. One of my favorite examples is Harry Belafonte’s At Carnegie Hall album from 1959. I guess this was the first commercially successful live album for music (although I don’t know how true that is since Benny Goodman’s Live at Carnegie Hall from 1950, the first double album, sold over a million copies). Either way, there are a lot of nice moments due to Harry Belafonte being a charming and funny presenter, in addition to his beautiful and powerful voice. It’s obvious the between-song patter was pre-written and rehearsed, but he’s good enough that when he messed up and started to repeat an intro for a previous song, he gracefully pulled out of the awkwardness by riffing with just enough self-deprecation.
But the height is the finale number “Matilda”. I guess the call-and-response thing is kind of a cheap gimmick by now but when the energy is just right and the musicians play around with it, each other, and the audience, magic happens. And that’s just what happens here. Harry Belafonte packs a simple song with surprises and playfulness. He playfully singles out members of his band, women over 40 (my favorite part!) and more to sing along to the chorus, and the audience loves every minute of it, chaotically laughing and singing along. You can almost see him traveling around the stage and then to different sections of Carnegie’s seating. He’s cheerfully determined and protective of his audience to make sure everyone gets their moment to sing along. He isn’t even afraid to stop the band cold not once but twice. The first to tease his conductor Robert Corman, and again to let the audience in the way back sing along so they don’t have to worry about the delay in sound traveling from the back throwing things off. So listen closely to the audience, and enjoy 12 minutes of a magical communication between the people on the stage and the people in the seats.
It’s Time for a Sleepcation
Image by Tomaniac (click to buy a sticker)
This week, I’m not having a vacation, I’m not even having a staycation. I’m having a sleepcation!
I was calling it a bedcation at first, but it turns out that fake word already exists and isn’t quite right in this situation. So, sleepcation it is.
As of this past Saturday and until this Sunday, I have 9 days where I’ll be sleeping as much as possible for as long as possible with as much sleep as possible. Because sleep is good. Especially after overdoing it for too long. It’s either sleepcation now or crycation later. You can probably imagine what that entails. Of course, we all can use a good cry now and again, but 9 days straight sounds exhausting.
So, if you need me, my bed and I are going to be getting it on.
And OK, I’m hoping to also edit that video and write that web-series script, two things I’ve been trying to get to for a few months now. You see, as it turns out, I’m not very good at doing nothing. Even when not on vacation, I fill my time up with projects. I hear other people go home after work and watch TV or something. If I want to watch TV, I have to schedule it as a weekly thing and make an event out of it.
So I’m trying to sleep and lounge around and just decompress. So far I can’t say I’ve been terribly successful. While I have slept a lot (I’ve always been real good at that), I’ve also stayed up real late, and during the day I’ve been working on The Comics Observer, done some administrative stuff for the Magic Meathands, and been an obsessive dork about our music library. But I’ve also hung out with Nahleen and Cleo some, watched the Twin Peaks episode 6 (my favorite so far!), and started reading Any Empire by Nate Powell (if you’re a child of the ’80s, read this!). And I’ve kiiinda not been on Facebook a ridiculous amount, although I’m still staring at the computer way too much, which I’m sure isn’t entirely relaxing. But the week has only started. I’ll get this right some day.
Anyway, I can’t believe I just reviewed my own vacation.
How do you do with taking time off? Do you like empty time or do you need to keep just as busy as when you’re not on vacation? Or maybe you’re good at finding a satisfying happy-medium?
Can’t Blog Now, Getting Yelled At By My Cat
Family portrait... sorta
Got the internet fixed (thank you, Verizon tech support, for actually being knowledgeable, efficient and effective).
Then got all set to write today’s blog until I kept hearing this little meow in the hallway. You see, our awesome kitty Cleo recently started this thing at night. Once Nahleen goes to bed she has to sit in the hall and wonder aloud why I haven’t also gone to bed. So I get these little reminders that just demand attention.
This is a recent addition to her nightly ritual where earlier in the evening she rather vehemently yells at the toilet for having its cover down. At no other part of the day does this bother her. Once I lift the cover up, she then heads into the living room to yell at Nahleen through our sliding glass doors to the balcony. Nahleen usually spends several minutes out there each night to read or do whatever Nahleens do, but Cleo doesn’t like this one bit because she’s out there and not in here with us.
So the point is that Cleo is a hilariously insistent kitty who prefers that all three of us be together. And I have no blog post. Well, except this.
About Corey
Corey Blake does things on the Internet, and sometimes even in person.
As a comic book pundit, advocate and educator, he runs the web-magazine The Comics Observer, which covers the sequential art form and its place in our culture, both locally and internationally. It exists as a gateway to curious non-readers or new comics readers interested in the full spectrum of comics, as well as a place for longtime readers looking for a new perspective. He also advises for the award-winning documentary and comics advocacy movement Dig Comics.
As a comedic performer/actor, he specializes in being a goofball.
Corey is an active member of the Los Angeles-based improv comedy ensemble The Magic Meathands. He helped form the sketch comedy group Foe Pa following a memorable stint with The 3rd Floor: LA. Corey has been seen in online videos from The Jeff Lewis 5-Minute Comedy Hour (Best Web Comedy-Episodic, Clicker.com), The Starmind Record (Best Direction and Editing, LA Web Series), and Poopdog Entertainment’s Mayer for Mayor (Funny or Die featured video), short films Tough Love (Official Selection, Festival de Cannes’ Short Film Corner) and Hattie Needs Rehab (Excellence in Performance, Extreme Filmmaker 48 Hour Film Festival), the feature film Chasing Happiness, and the pilot for the children’s show “Imagination Station”, as well as on stage in an award-winning Los Angeles production of Chekov’s Three Sisters and Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Corey Blake also has experience behind the camera. He writes comedy sketches and directs and produces videos for the Magic Meathands Originals sketch web-series. He wrote for the sketch comedy groups Foe Pa and The 3rd Floor: LA. He was a writer for the musical comedy Mission: Improbable, which he also helped produce. Additionally, he helped produce the award-winning documentary Dig Comics (Best Documentary, Comic-Con Int’l: Independent Film Festival; Official Selection, Festival de Cannes’ Short Film Corner) and demo trailer for Voices From Chornobyl.
As if all of that wasn’t enough, Corey also runs the monthly Ten on the Tenth for music fans.
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