| Dec072008 | Robin Williams at The Paramount |
Maybe I’m losing my mind but I didn’t laugh that much when I went to see Robin Williams perform stand-up this past Friday night. A lot of people left the theater raving about his hilarity but to me his act felt lukewarm and stale.
He started off with a bunch of material about Seattle. It was cute but it felt superficial and almost patronizing. It’s one thing to relate to an audience but I don’t like it when they just mad-lib; inserting local names into an existing act.
I hated all his jokes about the election. His McCain and Palin impressions were nowhere close and he should have left them out considering he’s built his career on hilarious voices and impressions. Nevermind the plain stupid jokes about Obama taking over the White House in a stereotypically black fashion: a “posse”, a car with a loud stereo that bounces up and down, Hillary with a “big booty”. For me, these jokes crossed into ignorance. So many stand-up comedians have far more sophisticated jokes about race, ones that can be offensive but are ultimately insightful and entertaining; Robin’s jokes were just lazy. The same goes for his various stereotypical accents for other races; if he’s not careful he’s going to turn into a racist grandpa.
My other huge complaint can be explained by his DVD, Live On Broadway released in 2002. At the time, I found it hilarious, it killed me. But then I heard the same jokes on Friday night and I was not so impressed. Maybe I was in a bad mood, maybe at this point I was already sour or maybe recycling laughs from 6 years ago and phoning in the rest is just plain arrogant.
Mind you, he did have some funny jokes. I liked when he got real and talked a little about his alcoholism and rehab. I liked his observations on porn (despite the horrified old people in the audience). But overall, I would not recommend this. Robin Williams is a comic who built his routine around impressions and voices; ones that are now either irrelevant or racist.
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