Showcase Study 2: Jared Stern and the Accusatory Blog

Just got back from the DC Improv and the monthly open mic showcase. Kudos to Joe Deeley, Dave Kendry, Basil White, and your winner, Dawan Owens. All had solid sets in front of a crowd of increasingly rowdy friends of another comic on the show...and he knows who he is. Which brings me to the tone of today's blog. This blog does not name names, unless it's for something good, like the names I just listed. This blog is a uniter, not a divider. A lover, not a fighter. In short, it's passive aggressive. When it sees an injustice done, it will give just enough detail to hopefully get the offending party's attention and let them know to cut that shit out, without the embarrassing name droppage...kinda like those Chance Meeting ads they run in the personals section of the City Paper... "Hey, saw you at the Improv showcase. Your friends were rude and I think you stole a joke off a website. Coffee?" Ok, so let's get to the vague finger-waving, then I'll feel cleansed and we can all get on with our lives.

Those of you who are familiar with my act (all two of you) know that one of the jokes I tell is about seeing a bumper sticker that asks, "How Would Jesus Drive?" My answer...he would probably hydroplane alot. It's on my CD. I've been telling it since '03. Well, at the showcase, one of the comics made mention that if Jesus were driving somewhere, he'd hydroplane. At the same time, he might as well've punched my pet hamster in the nuts. Best case scenario? It's a simple case of parallel thinking. His ten thousand monkeys, hammering away on their ten thousand typewriters, just happened to write a page of Shakespeare and come up with the same joke. He doesn't know who the hell I am and, but for seeing him tonight, vice versa. It happens. Suck it up, Jared. Worst case? He lifted the notion off of the website where it comes up in the random joke box. That would be disappointing AND shitty. I think what was most disheartening, was that he didn't tell it right, and it bombed. I sound petty as hell right now, I know, but it's like someone took your kid to a party and fed him so much cake and candy that he puked on the gift table, and now YOU get blamed for being a bad parent. Just sayin'...that was not my kid's fault.

Now, I can forgive that sort of thing, but out and out theft is a cardinal sin in the world of comedy. Tonight, at the showcase, I heard what sounded alot like theft(...or rape...joke rape is no laughing matter either). I'll try to give this guy the benefit of the doubt, but this joke was the winner of the DCStandup.com Inappropriate Costume Contest, and I doubt very seriously that his ten thousand monkeys could stop masturbating long enough to come up with this one on their own. Like I stated earlier in the blog...I'm not going to name names without being 100% positive, but this is easily 93%. If you're that needy for material, let someone know, we'll have a canned laughter drive for you...or something.

Enough of the negativity. Either this did some good, or I can go ahead and add two more names to the "People Who Might Hunt Jared For Sport" list. Because white people make lists...and they might be rednecks if they watch NASCAR...and black people have fried chicken with bad credit...y'know what I'm sayin'...?

HAPPY TURKEY DAY EVERYBODY!!!

To be continued...