Christian Finnegan in Birmingham
I just came across this very interesting post on Christian Finnegan's blog, and I hope he won't mind if I reprint it. Christian is a great comedian and a very talented writer, and he has a style that I would think travels pretty seamlessly from the NYC scene to comedy clubs around the country. Last weekend, he performed at the Stardome comedy club in Birmingham, AL and, as you'll see below, all hell broke loose. I like the way he writes about this incident. He doesn't really take any cheap shots at Alabamians, which as previously discussed would have been easy and boring, but he does bring up some interesting thoughts about how one might feel the need to tailor their material for a red state audience. In this situation, however, I don't think it would have mattered what he said. This guy was drunk and more than a little disturbed.
- BAD 'BAMA JAMMA
I'm currently in beautiful Birmingham, Alabama, where I'm performing all weekend at a rather beautiful comedy club known as the "Stardome". The weather has been nice, the other comics on the bill are funny and cool, and all of the staff has been friendly and helpful. Why, you could almost say it's been the perfect comedy weekend!
Oh, did I mention during Friday night's show, eight staff members had to physically drag a drunk Marine out of the showroom before he could climb onto the stage and kick my ass? No? I didn't mention that? Oh, well that happened, too.
I can't tell you how surreal the whole thing was. I was about fifteen minutes into my set when a guy stood up and yelled something toward/at me. I honestly couldn't understand what he was saying, so I said something along the lines of, "I'm sorry, sir, but I forgot to bring my Drunk-to-English dictionary with me". People laughed, and the guy got really furious. He started yelling "I'M A MARINE! I'M A MARINE!" This was not a shock to me, as I'd heard someone yell this during the emcee's set, albeit in a far more affable tone. I apologized for making fun of his non-sobriety and invited the audience to give him a round of applause in appreciation of his military service. This choice was inspired both my genuine admiration for our men and women in uniform and by my sincere desire to not get my ass kicked.
Okay, more the latter than the former, I suppose.
Anyway, I'm honestly assuming this was going to be the end of it. But then he begins to approach the stage, inspiring members of the staff to sweep in from various corners of the room. The Marine is now screaming, At this point, he's screaming, "I'VE SPENT TWO YEARS IN IRAQ! I'M FIGHTING FOR YOUR FREEDOM OF SPEECH! I'M FIGHTING FOR YOUR FUCKING FREEDOM OF SPEECH!!!" I suppose the subtext here is, "I fought for your freedom of speech, so now I'm going to kick your ass for speaking freely."
At this point, things get physical. The guy has grabbed on to a railing, as staff members try to drag the guy towards the door. They had help from the dude's two Marine buddies, who for the record seemed genuinely embarrassed by their friend's behavior. At this point, I had to start cracking jokes, because the audience was just sitting there, dumbfounded. The more jokes I would make, the more insanely determined this guy was to pummel the living shit out of me. I cannot stress this enough--this man absolutely would have put me in the hospital. The whole ordeal lasted a solid 5-7 minutes, which felt like a fucking eternity. As he was being "ushered" out, he kept yelling, "I'VE SEEN PEOPLE DIE! I'VE SEEN PEOPLE DIE!!!" Once things calmed down, I got a good amount of laughs talking about the ordeal, and I think everyone was relieved when I got back to doing my prepared material. Still, the event had a rather chilling effect on the set as a whole (go figure!). By the end of my set, people were ready to go home--if for no other reason than so they could get to the business of telling people about how they almost saw a stand up comedian get murdered onstage.
I should mention that the staff were prepared for this guy to be a problem from the get-go. He'd shown up drunk and by the time I took the stage, had been "cut off" by the manager, which is usually when the problems start. And the manager told me when they dragged the guy out to his car, there were two empty bottles of vodka on the floor! Yee-haw! But I have to assume there was something about me specifically that set him off.
Now this is the part where I'd like to make it sound like that this guy hated me because my material was so cutting edge--that I was so unrelenting in my critique of our government and culture that it made this grunt's head explode. A lot of New York liberal elitists would take a potentially violent attack by an Alabama redneck as a sign of indie cred. But the truth is, I had kind of de-balled my set in anticipation of playing to Birmingham crowds. I had smoothed all the rough edges, removed just about anything I thought might be a bit too "problematic" for conservative Bush-loving Alabamans--to the extent that I didn't feel 100% excited about the set I'd put together. But I'm trying to establish myself as a headliner, and The Stardome is very well-regarded club, blah blah blah blah blah....
I'm of two minds on this. On one hand, I really want to be the kind of comic who can entertain any crowd--I really get frustrated with many of my NYC comic peers who can make a bunch of 20-something hipsters laugh, but feel "above" trying to reach the other 96% of the country. You can have mass appeal without being a total hack--Chris Rock manages it. So does Dave Chappelle. And Ellen DeGeneres. But then on the other hand, when playing a city like Birmingham, I feel like I'm forced to play with half a deck. It's not just political material you have to avoid, it's also anything even remotely of-the-moment, culturally. Tonight I asked how many people in the audience owned an iPod. You would have thought I'd presided over a lesbian wedding while simultaneously performing a third-trimester abortion on stage. I don't yet have the career currency to do exactly the set I want to do without consideration of where I'm performing, who I'm performing for, etc.--you can't really get away with that until audiences are coming out to see you, specifically. Remember, George Carlin and Richard Pryor didn't reinvent the wheel until after they'd already become pretty famous using...well, the regular wheel.
Of course, I'm sure that's what lots of hacks tell themselves.
the point is, I was hardly going out of my way to provoke the Birmingham crowd. Still, I guess there must have been something I said to inspire Semper Fi's rage. The disruption started when I was tackling an extremely controversial subject: the board game Monopoly. But I imagine his anger probably started about five minutes earlier when I did a very short, very tame bit about America being like a high school bully. I opted not to point out to the crowd that this guy, someone charged with representing our nation to the citizens of the world, wanted to combat my "bully" premise b y beating the shit out of me. But honestly, I don't think that one thirty-second bit was enough to set him off. No, I think there was just something about me, the way I choose to form sentences that made him say, "Hey, this guy's not one of us". I think I must give off a pungent "Yankee Faggot" scent.
So there you have it--one of the stranger gigs I've had in...well, weeks. Ahhhhh, comedy!
Originally posted by Christian Finnegan here.
posted by Carol at 4:04 PM
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True story: Madison, Wisconsin, around 1986 or so. It's probably 8:00 at night or so, and some friends and I are sitting in a sub sandwich shop having a bite to eat. A drunken Marine comes in and starts yelling, "It's the Marine Corps's birthday! Semper Fi! Semper Fucking Fi! It's the fucking Marines' birthday!" That would have been annoying enough...but he then picked up a smallish metal trash can in the corner, and started alternating his celebratory pronouncements with rhythmically bashing his head with the trash can. (Luckily, it was a light-duty trash can, not sturdy enough to do any real damage to himself. Not that he was in a state to feel a damned thing...) After about thirty seconds of this (which, you could imagine, felt a lot longer...), he suddenly dropped the rather beaten-up trash can, and staggered out the door. A few minutes later, we heard a slightly distant cry: "Semper Fuckin' Fi, man!"
I'm so glad you posted this, Carol! I read your rant on comedians dissing Alabama and then specifically Birmingham. Of course, Christian isn't taking cheap shots at Alabamians in his post, but that didn't stop me from fretting that you were annoyed by his post. =)
Oh God, no! It's lazy joke-writing that I hate, not an honest account of a real nutjob who happens to be from Alabama.
And I'm thrilled that Christian is blogging again, by the way. May the Tower of Hubris grow ever taller!
Okay, I grew up in B'ham and live in Atlanta now and spend a lot of time in both places. I know the people. My immediate response to this was that Finnegan is an idiot.
He's not the first comedian who has had to deal with a drunk, especially after bombing with political humor not matched to the audience--his error. But, to explain it, he turns a drunk's reaction into a degradation of the state and the military. Maybe Finnegan would have become a drunk after getting out of Iraq, too.
Referring to the Marine and others as "rednecks" out to get the "yankee faggot" shows a bias of his that likely came out in the presentation. He should re-write his material or make a note to joke only with the Bush-hating crowds from whence he came.
I disagree with you. First of all, a comedian isn't required to tailor their material for any audience. If people don't like it, he won't be asked back. And most people are savvy enough by now to understand that if they go to a comedy club there is a very good chance that they will hear blue, or even offensive material. That's part of the excitement of comedy. No one gets on a rollercoaster because they want to die. They get on one because they like the rush of doing something that seems dangerous. Comedy should be the same way. That's why I complain about comedians who go for the easy jokes in downtown NYC comedy clubs. "Don't we all agree?" humor is boring.
Second, Finnegan did make an effort to edit his material for this particular show. (I personally think he shouldn't have, but that's his choice.) He wants to be able to perform for a wider audience than just NY and LA, so he's approaching that step thoughtfully. Furthermore, it sounds like despite this one drunk individual, a lot of the audience enjoyed his set.
Third, where do you get the idea that he is using this story to degrade the state and the military? That's incredibly knee-jerk. It is possible to point out that a serviceman or woman might have done something wrong and it not be a comment on the entire military. And I'm sorry, but I can't really cry foul on calling this guy a redneck. People who get wasted and pick fights, no matter what other noble service they may have performed, aren't really acting with a lot of civility. So what he's southern? If he were from Boston you'd call him a Masshole instead of a redneck.
Fourth, at the very minimum and with very few exceptions, a performer should be able to do their set and not have to worry about whether or not they will be physically attacked by someone in the audience. Yes, every comedian has been heckled and they are all used to it and handle it to varying degrees of success. This guy tried to beat him up because he didn't like what he said. I don't care if he was the guy who put the fucking handcuffs on Saddam, you don't do that.
For the record, Christian didn't bomb...he actually did quite well, yes, even with his mild political humor. (I agree, Carol, Christian shouldn't edit his material, but I understand his instinct to want to kill so he's asked back.)
The dude was completely blitzed (two empty vodka bottles were in his car) and it took at least SIX employees to wrest him out of the club. Pretty insane reaction no matter where in the world you live. Clearly the dude has some PTS.
As for the redneck comment, that was bestowed on the Marine by everyone at the club, attendees and employees alike. Well deserved moniker from the sound of it.
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