COMEDY REVIEW : LAUGHS ARE STRAINED AT NEW IMPROV

There’s always a bit of anxiety over starting out on a new enterprise. But there seemed to be an extra edge of misgiving about the Improvisation’s branching out into the San Fernando Valley on Sunday night, when owner Budd Friedman and an abbreviated lineup of comedians got on stage in a converted meeting room of the Valley Hilton.

After all, to these performers, this was the Valley, that flatland monotonously flooded with ersatz temples of franchise consumption, whose greatest contribution to the culture at large has been a musical sendup of the Valley Girl. Comedians like to entertain the conceit that they’re hip (and so are we, we’re led to think, by virtue of sharing their staged confidences).

For the ravenous, Industry-oriented comedian, fueled with volatile New York cadences and ethnic and sexual hostilities, the Valley doesn’t quite cut it.

That may be why no one came on stage full-bore to address a willing audience. Even Jay Leno spent most of his time in the room heckling Friedman.

When Leno took the stage, it was to parody the apprehension of general decline (“There’s probably a lot of you who remember when the name Hilton used to mean something”). “What can you say about Budd you haven’t seen in a subpoena, eh?” he asked. “This is a typical Improv hotbed of apathy.”

Leno summed up the atmosphere with “I guess the foxy boxing and the wrestling (in the hotel) didn’t work out. Guess you’ll have to see how the Encino crowd works out.”

Leno wasn’t on for more than five or 10 minutes. Maybe he’s at a point in his career where, having suffered privation and insult on his way up, he isn’t about to part with himself freely--unlike the prodigious Robin Williams, who didn’t appear. (Some thought he might.)

He was preceded by Richard Lewis, who instantly hunched over into his Jewish masochist act.

“Look how I dress, Jews for Emmett Kelly,” he said. “I don’t know who I am. . . . I never thought I’d be here tonight until Hitler moved to Brentwood. . . .” He said, “I had a rash on my ankle. I asked my lover (about it). She narrowed it down to somebody in Circus Vargas.”

Much of Lewis’ act was self-destructive; he wasn’t bringing his audience along with him. It was the tacit confession of a non-act. But it’s too late now for minimalism in stand-up.

A tense Rich Scheider followed--he looks like a tall, thin Pat Haden with jump-started nerves--with fairly conventional club material on dating and marriage (“You get home late, you better have a medical excuse”).

Then came Brad Garrett, a 6-foot-9 winner of the TV show “Star Search.” (The success of “Star Search” is reminiscent of the early days of MTV and suggests that the conventional means of locating performing talent may be corrupt--that is, prone to favoritism or very circumscribed taste--or at least inadequate. Or it may be a venue for lowered audience expectations).

Garrett is a likable figure who tells us: “I’m a native of the Valley. My parents are divorced but living together.” He has great promise, but it’s tough to revile where you’ve been (another slam at the Valley) without having an idea where you want to go.

Bill Maher followed, an otherwise bright young comedian who exudes the self-satisfaction that comes from a career of cadging cheap laughs from booze-lubricated audiences.

Then there was a corpulent Max Alexander, with a barrage of fat jokes. And George Wallace’s powerful and engaging presence far exceeded the level of his material.

Carol Siskind, Dan Irrera and Dennis Blair rounded out the show (Blair does impressions of singers suggested by the audience). The sound and lighting are good; a rectangular post in the middle of the room is the only major obstruction.

Friedman was a convivial host who’s done his knowledgeable best to create a club ambiance. Whether the comedians’ occasional condescension proves a draw remains to be seen.