THE GODS MUST BE LAZY, OR, THERE’S MORE TO LIFE THAN DEATH
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The result is paradoxically a show that is no livelier than previous efforts, but far more vulgar and offensive, as if the cast gave up long ago trying to imitate Mort Sahl or Severn Darden and decided to ape Lenny Bruce instead, but got no further than telling a few “dick jokes” and saying “shit” onstage. Of course, Second City has been in decline for a long, long time now, and it may be too much to ask Close to show immediate results. After all, the Second City of the 80s perfected the corporate comedy revue, absolutely free of satire and controversy, capable of entertaining the most philistine of audiences without a single challenge to their values or wit. But one can’t help but hope for something at least as interesting or as risky from Close as his work with ImprovOlympic or his recent experiments with horror comic books (DC Comics’ Wasteland). Instead we get a revue that thinks sexist and racist jokes are an improvement over the “same old same old jokes” about Wisconsin, yuppies, and male-female relationships.
To be sure, the show has its share of nicely done sketches, including a very charming skit about an eccentric but wise street person (David Pasquesi) who teaches an upwardly mobile but depressed young man (Joel Murray) a few things about life. Though the premise is old hat at Second City, Pasquesi brings new life to this hopelessly sentimentalized stereotype, making him alienated, gruff, and a little angry. Hearing him growl about the day’s headlines is one of the high points of the show. Another high point also involves Pasquesi. In the middle of a mildly funny, mildly offensive skit (sarcastically entitled “Ravinia”) about a trio of NRA types who drive through the countryside killing everything they see, Pasquesi mimes putting his hand out the window and for a few hilarious moments plays with the passing air currents (the way we all have at one time or another). The joke is subtle, simple, brilliant–and simply miles ahead of the rest of the skit, which never rises above jokes about the intelligence of cows (they’re dumb) and how silly it is that they have “four tits.”
The great irony of Second City’s current show is that when the material isn’t incredibly offensive it falls somewhere between so-so and fair-to-middlin’ (as if there were no middle ground between the kind of show that appeals to conventioneers and the kind of show that appeals only to suburban punks). Hence a show that can at once offend you and lull you to sleep. Maybe if Close works with Second City for a while, he can whip them into shape. But as it stands now, the only real innovation in the show is Stephen Kastner’s wonderfully surreal background mural (the first in Second City’s history).
