COMEDY REVIEW : Second City’s Efforts Awash in Stereotypes

Tired, unimaginative skits only mildly enlivened by some busy performances marked the return of Second City to Orange Coast College’s Robert B. Moore Theatre on Friday night.

The appearance was the sixth at Orange Coast College for the storied Chicago-based comedy troupe, which sent its national touring company, featuring members from Second City’s Los Angeles branch, to the campus.

The nine-person (three women, six men) satire and improvisation ensemble was done in by routines that lacked fresh premises and relied on stereotypes and comic cliches. Even the improvisational segments, a Second City trademark throughout its more than 30 years, were uninspired and, at times, even inept.

After opening with a couple of fast blackouts (one involving a harried-looking woman complaining of premenstrual syndrome), the group launched its first prolonged skit set in the television studio of one of those early morning “news/entertainment” programs.

The predictability set in almost immediately as the actors brought out exhausted caricatures of newscasters (the smiling, unctuous male anchor; the smiling, bubble-headed female anchor) and dopey weathermen. We’ve been there before, many times.

Soon after, the troupe offered a song about a 55-year-old matron and her affair with a 17-year-old surfer. Kinky, so it had potential, but the possibilities were never plumbed as the gags settled into little more than a labored complaint against philandering husbands.

The original Second City was known for its political humor, taking juicy bites out of everybody from John F. Kennedy to Ronald Reagan over the years. Bowing to tradition, the troupe presented a question-and-answer session with Raisa Gorbachev, portrayed here as a big-hipped, inarticulate peasant, more primitive than First Lady.

The routine failed because it had nothing to do with our perceptions of who and what Raisa is--successful parody, after all, has to reflect reality, not obliterate it.

Second City did redeem itself a little with a few pieces, especially one that focused on a pretentious Valley Girl and a rude-dude heavy metal fan bickering, and then finally liking each other, during a bus ride. Once again, the cliches were in place, but there were also witty passages marked by quality writing.

Perhaps the show’s most disappointing aspect was the improvisation, if you could call it that. Taking ideas, characters and emotions from the audience, the troupe tried to do quick-cut impressions that too often bogged down.

To be fair, good improvisation is always rare--not everybody can be Robin Williams or Jonathan Winters--but Second City came across more like guests awkwardly playing a game at a party than pros who have been doing this for years.