Who else is creative buddies with David Cross, Jon Brion, Aimee Mann, et al? And is there other stuff similar to theirs?
April 24, 2004 10:46 PM Subscribe
For the past ten years or so there has been this kind of clique based in L.A. that is producing a lot of movies/music I really like. My impression is that it includes Bob Odenkirk, David Cross, maybe Laura Kightlinger, Aimee Mann & Michael Penn, Jon Brion, Jack Black, Sarah Silverman, etc. Question is, who else hangs with these people that I have not mentioned, so I can check out what they're doing, and is there any other good stuff from this group that I should see/hear? (besides the obvious stuff).
I was also gonna say Anderson (Jon Brion scored his last movie).
rafter, where did you hear that about the Mann songs? I'm not certain, but am pretty sure that I read he wrote the script solo and didn't get her songs till someone else (Fiona Apple?) recommended using them. Then, he added that song all sing to.
If you're keen on Silverman and Odenkirk (I can't stand him), they're both in the latest issue of Chunklet (ie, the Most Overated issue).
Also, Jack Black works often with Kyle Gass who is the other half of Tenacious D but I assume you knew that. Gass was in Elf last year. Dunno what else he's done.
posted by dobbs at 11:29 PM on April 24, 2004
rafter, where did you hear that about the Mann songs? I'm not certain, but am pretty sure that I read he wrote the script solo and didn't get her songs till someone else (Fiona Apple?) recommended using them. Then, he added that song all sing to.
If you're keen on Silverman and Odenkirk (I can't stand him), they're both in the latest issue of Chunklet (ie, the Most Overated issue).
Also, Jack Black works often with Kyle Gass who is the other half of Tenacious D but I assume you knew that. Gass was in Elf last year. Dunno what else he's done.
posted by dobbs at 11:29 PM on April 24, 2004
Oh, and Brion plays here every Friday night and on Mondays they have a comedy night (Silverman played a week or two ago).
posted by dobbs at 11:36 PM on April 24, 2004
posted by dobbs at 11:36 PM on April 24, 2004
Maynard Keenan of Tool did stand-up with David Cross and (I think) the late Bill Hicks in LA. Keenan played Charles Manson on the Ben Stiller show (another circle of people, think in ven diagrams. Odenkirk and Cross were on it), and showed up for several roles on Mr. Show. Tool also did a special song for Run Donny Run [or whatever the fuck that terrible movie was called]. You can look at all the people who do guest roles in that movie [on IMDB] to get some answers to what you are asking.
posted by dgaicun at 12:25 AM on April 25, 2004
posted by dgaicun at 12:25 AM on April 25, 2004
Here we go: Run Ronnie Run. Ben stiller shows up again. Famous comedy is kind of inbred. We can kind of connect the New York scene into it, by a chain of comedy actors and writers who associate. I'm not sure if there is a group per se.
posted by dgaicun at 12:39 AM on April 25, 2004
posted by dgaicun at 12:39 AM on April 25, 2004
This started out smaller and got much bigger ... but the alt-comedy scene is pretty spread-out. I can't speak much to the LA side of it, having just arrived, but the New York connections basically go through Jeff Singer and Naomi Krauss's Monday night show, Eating It, at Luna Lounge on the lower East Side.
Check out the Luna site and you'll find every one of the people you mentioned (Kilmartin's performing tomorrow night). You can get to every alternative comic in the world through Eating It, although many of them would refute the "alternative comedy" label.
Personal favorites include former Chris Rock show writer and Pootie Tang director, Louis CK, Todd Barry, who's had bit parts here and there and Andy Blitz, who writes for Conan. Also, check out Marc Maron, who has also had bit parts here and there, but who may be best know for his one-man show "The Jerusalem Syndrome," in which he brilliantly stated "That’s not smog [over L.A.]. It’s vaporized disappointment."
The alt-comedy world meets the traditional comedy world thanks to Naomi, mostly, who is the Director of Talent at Comedy Central, which means she books everyone who goes on Tough Crowd, where you can see all of the above comics (and a cast of thousands, notably criminally underappreciated Harvard Law graduate Greg Giraldo).
Things get weird from there - Garofalo is really central to the alt-comedy thing, many of whose "founders" trace back to "The Ben Stiller Show, along with Andy Dick."
But she was also in the underappreciated classic "Wet Hot American Summer" (rent it today if you haven't seen it) . WHAS was basically made by The State (particularly Michael Showalter, David Wain and Michael Ian Black, the guys who are now Stella (and who were at the Knitting Factory in LA on Friday the 23rd)). Of course Kerry Kenny and Thomas Lennon of the State (and Viva Variety) are now behind Reno 911, also fantastic. WHAS also involved David Hyde Pierce, from Frasier and former and SNL people Molly Shannon (former) and Amy Poehler, originally of of the Upright Citizen's Brigage . Oh and Judah Friedlander was in WHAS too.
Though they're not in WHAS, Slovin and Allen are SNL writers that are pretty alternative. There's a lot of cross-pollination, too - Ben Karlin from the Onion is now head writer at The Daily Show, and both the Onion and new humor pub Jest have done theme nights at eating it. So has Demetri Matrtin, who even had a story written about him in the New Yorker.
And the guys from the Modern Humorist are deeply connected as well, and from there it gets literary and boring and references mnftiu and mcsweeneys and I'm too tired to do either.
posted by Sinner at 1:15 AM on April 25, 2004 [1 favorite]
Check out the Luna site and you'll find every one of the people you mentioned (Kilmartin's performing tomorrow night). You can get to every alternative comic in the world through Eating It, although many of them would refute the "alternative comedy" label.
Personal favorites include former Chris Rock show writer and Pootie Tang director, Louis CK, Todd Barry, who's had bit parts here and there and Andy Blitz, who writes for Conan. Also, check out Marc Maron, who has also had bit parts here and there, but who may be best know for his one-man show "The Jerusalem Syndrome," in which he brilliantly stated "That’s not smog [over L.A.]. It’s vaporized disappointment."
The alt-comedy world meets the traditional comedy world thanks to Naomi, mostly, who is the Director of Talent at Comedy Central, which means she books everyone who goes on Tough Crowd, where you can see all of the above comics (and a cast of thousands, notably criminally underappreciated Harvard Law graduate Greg Giraldo).
Things get weird from there - Garofalo is really central to the alt-comedy thing, many of whose "founders" trace back to "The Ben Stiller Show, along with Andy Dick."
But she was also in the underappreciated classic "Wet Hot American Summer" (rent it today if you haven't seen it) . WHAS was basically made by The State (particularly Michael Showalter, David Wain and Michael Ian Black, the guys who are now Stella (and who were at the Knitting Factory in LA on Friday the 23rd)). Of course Kerry Kenny and Thomas Lennon of the State (and Viva Variety) are now behind Reno 911, also fantastic. WHAS also involved David Hyde Pierce, from Frasier and former and SNL people Molly Shannon (former) and Amy Poehler, originally of of the Upright Citizen's Brigage . Oh and Judah Friedlander was in WHAS too.
Though they're not in WHAS, Slovin and Allen are SNL writers that are pretty alternative. There's a lot of cross-pollination, too - Ben Karlin from the Onion is now head writer at The Daily Show, and both the Onion and new humor pub Jest have done theme nights at eating it. So has Demetri Matrtin, who even had a story written about him in the New Yorker.
And the guys from the Modern Humorist are deeply connected as well, and from there it gets literary and boring and references mnftiu and mcsweeneys and I'm too tired to do either.
posted by Sinner at 1:15 AM on April 25, 2004 [1 favorite]
Showalter and Wain are pitching a pilot for WHAS TV show to Fox.
posted by dgaicun at 2:04 AM on April 25, 2004
posted by dgaicun at 2:04 AM on April 25, 2004
I second Largo - you must visit Largo and check out Jon Brion's show (amazed he's still doing it!) A few of the people you've mentioned have performed at Largo... others you might want to check out are Rufus Wainwright, Fiona Apple and Grant Lee Phillips.
posted by skylar at 3:21 AM on April 25, 2004
posted by skylar at 3:21 AM on April 25, 2004
I, er, third the Largo rec. Brion every Friday, often with prominent guests. One night I attended, Jack Black appeared on stage unannounced. If you want to have a place to sit down, you need to either make reservations weeks in advance, or show up alone two hours ahead of time and grab one of the four or so barstools as soon as the door opens.
Brion did the score for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, BTW.
posted by bingo at 6:53 AM on April 25, 2004
Brion did the score for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, BTW.
posted by bingo at 6:53 AM on April 25, 2004
(dobbs, I seem to remember Anderson saying as much in the liner notes of the Magnolia soundtrack. I don't have the CD here with me at school, unfortunately, so I can't double check, but the Barnes and Noble online review says:
posted by rafter at 9:46 AM on April 25, 2004
"Now that I've met you, would you object to never seeing me again?" This provocative opening line from Aimee Mann's song "Deathly" inspired Paul Thomas Anderson ("Boogie Nights") to write Magnolia, and Aimee Mann's songs, old and new, provided the source material for the relationships and themes of his new film.But I'm only working from memory and the review misquotes the song anyway, so your mileage may vary.
posted by rafter at 9:46 AM on April 25, 2004
I thought the Ben Stiller show folks along with Tenacious D were all part of something called "the Actors Gang" in LA. The first time I saw Tenacious D live in early 2000, Ben Stiller and the entire cast of Mr Show were among the audience members, so I think they're all just friends that work together a lot and support one another.
posted by mathowie at 11:44 AM on April 26, 2004
posted by mathowie at 11:44 AM on April 26, 2004
This thread is closed to new comments.
I can't speak for the social scene, but Magnolia, at least, was written working backwards from Aimee Mann songs.
posted by rafter at 11:02 PM on April 24, 2004