THAT JEFF GARLIN THING
FOOD, FUN & DEAD RELATIVES
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Or, like Garlin, you have to start taking the kind of risks onstage that only veteran performers can pull off. Garlin has taken Lenny Bruce’s perhaps apocryphal advice to Del Close in the 60s–“Throw away your act”–literally. He has no set show. Instead, he hangs around the lobby asking people as they walk in, “What do you want me to talk about?” Whatever the audience suggests he brings up onstage, even when he knows nothing about the topic, like cyberspace.
Lots of performers in this improv-besotted town say they perform without a net. But Garlin really does. I know what you’re thinking: “Yeah, right. Lots of performers pretend to have no set act.”
Around the time that Garlin was attracting big audiences with I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With, Jim Carrane was performing his wonderful, low-key I’m 27, I Live at Home and I Sell Office Supplies at the Annoyance Theatre. He essentially showed us around the crazy mess of his life–I remember one of the big laughs revolved around his embarrassment at shouting at his mother because she’d failed to buy him diet Coke.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Joe Nicitra.
