Thou shalt laugh until your sides split
YOU’VE probably taken in a comedy show in a club. Maybe even at a restaurant, or in a storefront, or on a street corner. But a church seems a little too pious a place for a comedy in this world of Michael Richards and Don Imus.
The folks behind Lit Up, a performance salon in Studio City, think it’s the perfect place for a little Saturday night fun. They mount their monthly charity event at St. Michael & All Angels Episcopal Church.
Going to a Lit Up show is a bit like traveling to a small Midwestern town. In the church’s social hall, two seniors sit with a cashbox by the door collecting the $10 suggested donation. From the array of complimentary snacks and sweets, patrons find it hard to resist the homemade brownies and fruit cobbler. There is wine, and not the sacramental variety. There is even free child-care.
The show itself offers anything but small-town entertainment. Lit Up draws upon Los Angeles’ deep pool of performers and “curator” Jane Edith Wilson (an actress-comedian who starred in Bravo’s improv-com “Significant Others”) gives them pretty free rein with their material. Each show has a unifying, if loosely followed, theme. “People can do whatever they want to do off the theme,” Wilson says, “as long as they don’t swear their brains out.”
A recent show revolved around the theme “Give It Up and Let It Go” (all themes are riffs of song titles or lyrics). The church setting was quickly forgotten as Anna Becker launched into her humorous quest for Mr. (Jewish) Right, which includes her take on J-Date: “What you would have if your therapist had a mixer.” New divorcee Laura House celebrated her “successful short-term marriage” by observing that “the spouse is always the automatic suspect” in a murder. Cheryl E. Grant later lamented how her son contributed their house-selling nightmare by announcing to prospective buyers that they had tree rats.
Kelie McIver hit a more serious note when she poignantly related discovering a woman’s old diary at a midnight “phantom yard sale.” Quick-witted emcee Gary Lucy conducted several audience participation games; particularly funny was “Top Gun Character or Celebrity Baby Name” (as in, which is “Scout,” which is “Moose”?). Among the musical acts, Zachary Barton and Michael Oosterom stood out with a cover of the Roches’ philosophical tune “Anyway.”
THE theme at this Saturday’s show is “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” with a lineup featuring Dolores Carlaftes, Vance Sanders, Dani Klein, Maria Bamford, Chris Young and Eric Tunney. In coming months, themes will include “Cruel to Be Kind” and “Fortunate Son” (for which Wilson plans to have vets read about their war experiences).
While no glitzy Hollywood night of thousand stars, Lit Up serves up plenty of laughs, as well as food for thought.
And, of course, free brownies.
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Lit Up
Where: St. Michael & All Angels Episcopal Church, 3646 Coldwater Canyon Ave., Studio City
When: 8 p.m. Saturday (and the second Saturday of every month)
Price: Suggested donation, $10
Info: (818) 763-9193 for show details or to make child-care reservation
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