Anthony Jeselnik goes beyond shock comedy at the Vogue

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      At the Vogue Theatre on Thursday, June 6

      To call Anthony Jeselnik a shock comic suggests there’s nothing more to his act. Sure, on the one hand his intent is to elicit groans and even boos, but he also carefully constructs his clever one-liners so that you can’t help but reflexively laugh before putting on the brakes. He’s such a good writer he could easily succeed as a family-oriented comic should real life ever slap him in the face and he experiences some of the horrors he talks about.

      The star of Comedy Central’s The Jeselnik Offensive emptied his arsenal of tasteless jokes trying his best to get at least a few in attendance at the Vogue on Thursday night to turn on him. After 40 or so minutes of already cringeworthy material (child death, molestation, 9/11, cancer, school shootings, serial killers, miscarriage, race, AIDS, and, of course, the old standby rape) met with nothing but hearty laughter and applause, he took it as a challenge. So he went in for the kill, joking about a kid dying in a fridge, the mentally challenged, and incest, all sure-fire momentum-stoppers at many of his shows. Nope. Didn’t work. Not even saying the Canucks suck could spoil the love-in.

      Without breaking his super-cocky stage persona, Jeselnik gave hints throughout that he isn’t the monster he plays on-stage. He takes glee in giving voice to horribly offensive thoughts and identifies them as such. He advised, “If you get offended by something, you’ll be okay in a little bit.” He related a story of an encounter with NBC standards-and-practices about a joke he tried to tell on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon. They made him replace one racial reference with one that he described as “a billion times more offensive”.

      And in a shot at himself, after a joke about physical abuse, he talked about how he was told this is why women hate his shows. He responded, “No, stupid women hate my shows. Smart women don’t come to my shows.” For the record, the females in the audience all seemed smitten.

      Along with the mixture of new and “classic” jokes (ones that are included on his two CDs), Jeselnik talked about receiving death threats, and almost getting fired because of joke tweets immediately following the Aurora theatre shooting and Boston Marathon explosion. He then accepted drugs brought to him on-stage and took questions from the audience.

      In the middle of the cacophonous queries, someone shouted out, “Has anyone ever made fun of you? How did it make you feel? Inside?”

      Whether it was a joke answer or not, we don’t know, but Jeselnik answered in the affirmative, saying he got into comedy to exact his revenge.

      Mission accomplished, I’d say.

      Comments

      2 Comments

      Earlnelly

      Jun 7, 2013 at 3:56pm

      Nothing beats a good miscarriage joke.

      Somethings in the Vancouver Water...

      Jul 8, 2013 at 10:32pm

      Anthony Jeselnik isn't funny or witty, and the stuff he says really isn't that offensive. All he does is push previously established stereotypes and media symbols beyond the standards of political correctness. Seriously, spend a week at a factory, or on a work crew and you will hear much more clever and much more offensive humor. He was sharp on the Comedy Central Roasts, amid a cast of D-list comedians, but I give him 6-12 months until his name is an old shit-stain in the history of comedy.