DeGeneres’ Dry Wit Weathers the Storm

Wet nights must be lousy nights for dry humor. Enough to dampen a crowd’s spirit. Which was unfortunate for comedian Ellen DeGeneres at the Improv in Pacific Beach on Tuesday night. Her wry sometimes acerbic material was in fine form.

“My grandmother started walking 5 miles a day when she was 60. She’s 97 today. We don’t know where the hell she is.”

Polite applause.

“You never see big dogs wearing a sweater. My neighbor’s dog has a sweater, but he wears it just wrapped around his shoulders. . . . It looks pretty with his eyes.”

More polite applause.

For a goodly portion of her 50-minute set, DeGeneres focused on health and animals, with a few off-handed detours into first impressions, getting flies drunk or being raised by Iroquois.

But, for the most part, her style is to take a subject and explore it thoroughly.

“My cat is in heat right now. She was my kitten, my adorable little pet that now is a hooker. She’s wearing makeup. . . . (Millions of male cats) are just smoking cigarettes, waiting for her to come out. . . . One of them disguised himself as a UPS man. He had the truck, the packages, everything. I was not falling for that. The suit was just hanging off of him. The little name tag said ‘Fluffy.’ I will NOT sign here. Scoot!”

DeGeneres likes to take a simple premise and develop it until it reaches an absurd ending. She tells about following a guy she doesn’t know home from the grocery store, ending up jimmying her way into his house to check out his lifestyle.

Sometimes such meanderings ended without really getting to a point. Other times, though she takes a while, they ended in fine fashion.

But Tuesday’s full house didn’t seem too impressed by the 33-year-old comedian’s off-beat yarns and somewhat other-worldly observations. The 300 people laughed at the right times, but they just never seemed to get caught up in the show’s flow. It was almost as if they were there just waiting out the rain.

DeGeneres got into comedy 10 years ago in New Orleans when friends persuaded her to work up a routine for a benefit show. At the time, she was working as a courier in a law firm. The benefit led to club dates, touring, six appearances on “The Tonight Show” and three HBO specials.

Unlike many of the comedy club headliners, DeGeneres doesn’t spend 40 to 45 weeks a year on the road. Her thrust now is to get another TV series, after playing receptionish Margo Van Meter in the late Fox series “Open House.”

Tuesday’s show was DeGeneres’ first in San Diego in 3 1/2 years. She figured it was time. Besides, she had found out something on the Discovery Channel she wanted to share.

“I just learned that penguins are monogamous for life, which doesn’t really surprise me that much because they all look exactly alike. It’s not like they’re going to meet a better-looking penguin some day.”

DeGeneres does not take over the stage like more-gregarious comics, but she does have a quiet confidence that matches her subtle humor.

The middle act on the bill is Jeff Mills, an entertaining comic whose well-paced and entertaining 30-minute set indicated he is heading for headliner status.

His at-times-sarcastic material touched on a state (“In Oklahoma, ‘Van Gogh’ is a motoring term”), on learning to make the bed after getting married (“Now, I gotta make sure all the bears and bunnies line up”) and on someone who is a bisexual agnostic (“Now there’s a decision-maker.”)

Ellen DeGeneres performs nightly through Sunday at the Improv, 832 Garnet Ave., Pacific Beach. Opening acts are Ron Morey and Jeff Mills. For reservations or show times, call 483-4522.