Friday, January 4, 2008

Dane Cook’s 7 Hour Stand-Up Act Sets New Comedy Record!

Dane Cook SU-FI logoIs this a joke? I’m not even questioning its validity because it sounds like something Cook would do. What The Blot wants to know is who in the hell is sitting at a comedy club in those really uncomfortable seats for 7 straight hours listening to Dane Cook ramble on about the things Dane Cook rambles about!?! I love Dane as much as the next guy, but after 2 hours my butt would start falling asleep and I’d be glancing at my watch every 10 seconds wondering when his show would end.

Dane Cook
Dave ChappelleIf you haven’t heard or didn’t gleam from the post’s title, “Dane Cook has broken a Laugh Factory endurance record set less than a month ago by Dave Chappelle” by performing for 7 straight hours Tuesday night/Wednesday morning in Los Angeles. (link) The history given by the article is actually pretty interesting. Evidently Richard Pryor had held the record since 1980 with a record of 2 hours and 41 minutes. This record stood for over 25 years until Cook broke it last April with a Stand-Up act of 3 hours and 50 minutes. Chappelle, having none of that, went on to break it twice since then, once later that April and again in December with a set of 6 hours and 12 minutes. (link)

Dane CookI’m just praying this showmanship ends here. A 2-3 hour set is impressive and neat for the audience once in a blue moon (and the comedian is probably still funny to the audience). But, when we’re talking 4-7+ hours then things just start getting silly. It’s not only impossible to stay funny for that long but you know you’ve lost your audience when half of them are asleep in their seats. Either that or they’re not even there for the comedy anymore but instead just the anomaly of seeing a new record set. At that point is it still comedy or has the comedian turned into some twisted version of David Blaine without the cool illusions?

Dane CookDane didn’t end his set until almost 7 a.m. Wednesday morning and there was still an audience, do people not work in L.A.? At least the article says he “sent out for food to keep the audience fed and happy.” (link) Um, I don’t think it’s possible to be happy at 5:30 a.m. listening to stand-up unless you’re really drunk or there was some non-prescribed medicine snuck into the audience’s food. I wanted to go see Dane when he came to Houston on tour, but after hearing about this I’d be too afraid to go in the off chance he wanted to set a new record and I was locked into my seat for the next 10 hours.

Richard PryorWhat the article didn’t mention, but I’m assuming to be the case, is that this is a Laugh Factory record and not an actually documented all time stand-up comedy record. But I can’t imagine a comedian has ever set out to accomplish such a monumental feat as a 7 hour set before, so maybe. It’s just that the 2 hours and 41 minute set by Pryor in 1980 doesn’t seem that ridiculously long that no one in 27 years thought to try and break it. Who knows, maybe we’ll hear some tale of a young Paul Reiser before his rise to fame in My Two Dads performing a set in Butte, Montana to 15 people for 3 hours and 38 minutes. It could have happened, right?
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