Kids in the Hall
Last night Christian and I went into the city to see the Kids in the Hall at the War Memorial Opera House. After 10 years following their own careers, they reunited, wrote some new skits and are doing a tour of the USA and Canada. Since they only had one night in San Francisco, we knew we couldn't miss them. The show was very good. It took at least the first skit to get used to them on a stage rather than on a TV, but after that it wasn't an issue. Actually, it's a testament to their comedy skills that they could still be funny in a theater setting. Skits were well-rehearsed, but in their zaniness things would go wrong and they'd improvise them right into the skit. For example, in the Cathy & Kathy skit, Bruce McCulloch's earring falls off and distracts him, so Scott Thompson screams "Don't eat it!" and then they work it beautifully into the funny skit. They reused some popular characters, such as Cathy & Kathy, Buddy Cole, Chicken Lady, and Gavin, but half the skits featured no old characters and they were also extremely funny. It's great that they didn't simply rehash skits from the show. The one exception was the Chicken Lady skit, but that was forgivable since they expanded it in a way that could never be shown on television. There was a lot of crude humor, a bunch of jokes at religion's expense, and a ton of jokes at patriotic America's expense. The show got better as it went on, and the final skit was utterly ridiculous. It had the feel of a cheesy amateur comedy production, but since it was them doing it, it multiplied the humor. They had to have been half-improvising, because they started laughing at each other and the whole skit became totally ridiculous. As an encore, Headcrusher came out with a video camera and crushed various audience members' heads. Then each of the four other KiTH members came out one by one and Headcrusher criticized their post-KiTH career paths. Scott Thompson's head got crushed and in his throes of crushed head agony he accidentally fell off the stage! It was totally unplanned and for a moment everyone was seriously concerned and they put up the house lights so that people could help him. Luckily he was okay. It was a really great experience, the KiTH members are funny and amusingly self-deprecating. It seemed like they might have been filming the concert tonight, so maybe they'll release the performance. It would totally be worth it.