Pat Baer Fights Wolves, Finds Love
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: Pat Baer, creeped out by an awkward drug party around an unfamiliar campfire, escapes into the forest along with the beautiful, straight-edge subject of his unspoken desire. But if there's one thing that history teaches us, it's this: journeys into dark forests produce narrative crisis points via confrontation with representations of the bestial self. So, you know, should have seen this one coming, Pat....
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Michael Hartney Gets a Lesson in Sketch Comedy From Rosie O'Donnell
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: Comedian Michael Hartney was a fresh-faced writer's assistant eager to get a foot in the door of the burgeoning gay and lesbian sketch comedy television industry. Instead, he got a master class on whom not to f*ck with. Rosie O'Donnell, thats whom. Positive energy!
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Ophira Eisenberg Scrapes the Bottom of the Sex Barrel
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: Fresh off bombing her stand up set, Ophira Eisenberg was desperate to turn a bad night into a good one. How to do it? By sleeping with the weird, sad headliner, of course. The guy "who's entire wardrobe came from a t-shirt gun." But how weird and sad can things get, really? Very. Things can get very weird and very sad. Mondays, am I right?...
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Adam Wade and Peter Aguero Tag Team Their Pants
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: The narratorial tag team of Adam Wade and Peter Aguero form the beast with two butts to double down on the old number two. It's a poop story, okay? Two poop stories. Remember a couple of weeks ago when we had the story of comedian wrestling with the urge to contextualize her own abuse? Well, now we're doing poop stories....
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Streeter Seidell Loves Dogs, Re-animation of Dead
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: Streeter Seidell takes us down his twisting path of pet ownership, from the truth of how horrible cats are to the inevitable dark magic ritual that brought a colony of dead mice back to life. Only one of them came back evil!
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Julia Wiedeman On Abuse, and Not Laughing
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: something a little different. For a year now, we've been bringing you stories that we thought were funny, many of which came from disasters, traumatic events in the lives of the storytellers. It's in many of our natures and especially in the nature of the kind of person who gets up on the stage to tell these stories for a room full of strangers, to laugh at the macabre and the dark, to smile and snark in spite of terror. For a comedian this irreverence is her first and prime instinct. A few weeks ago, comedian Julia Weideman took the stage at the UCB East in New...
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Abra Tabak Goes to Bummer Camp
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: Abra Tabak thought she was headed for the idyllic American summer camp experience. She'd be the fun counselor, with rugs and lamps! She wasn't prepared for the grimness, the grief, or the cargo shorts. And yet, somehow, a year later, she found herself returning for another summer at Bummer Camp.
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Joe Mande Loses His Religion and a Whole Lot More
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: Ambivalent Jew, Joe Mande (Kroll Show, Parks and Rec, Best Week Ever) was looking for God in all the wrong places, including a "test passover." But a confrontation and plea for help from another Jewish man in need leads Joe to wager all his belief and a hell of a lot of money on one act of blind trust. Now if you'll excuse me I have to go buy matzoh for my wife....
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John Flynn Cheats and Slap Fights His Way Off the Basketball Team
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: John Flynn was the sort of guy who cares more about the Oscar noms for Les Miserable than sports, until he discovered that a litte cheating and violent subterfuge could lead his highschool basketball team to victory. He had found his place: riding high on the low road. What could possibly knock the dark prince of highscool basketball off his courtside throne? Listen to find out....
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Eliot Glazer and Jackie Mancini Uncover the Cultish Underbelly of the World's Strangest Wedding
A Funny Thing
Our story this week: Eliot Glazer and Jackie Mancini's mutual friend mysteriously disappeared, only to resurface later, wedding invitation in hand. While Eliot and Jackie delight in a surreal and strange ritual, including something called The Incestual Harassment Society Incorporated African Dance Troupe, they uncover a creeping strangeness at the heart of their friend's estrangement....
info_outlineA stranger in a strange land, her mop incarnadine against the native dred, Julia Wiedman wanted what any of us would: simple human connection and a part in the school production of Pan! But what could possibly tie this pale newcomer to the bosom of her adopted tribe? A rope of kindness? A bridge of common humanity? Or early 80's folk troubadour, Suzanne Vega? Listen to find out!
Julia Wiedeman is a writer and performer who can be seen all over town perpetually working on the content of her next project. Follow her @juliawiedeman on Twitter. Special thanks and congratulations to John Flynn, the host of Oh, Hey Guys!, the storytelling open mic from whence this story came, on the one year birthday of the greatest little storytelling open mic around. Here's to many more.