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 Mitch
All Together / Strategic Grill Locations
The world of comedy is normally one filled with smiles, laughter, and an
observation of the absurd banalities of life. Yet on March 30th 2005,
all that was replaced with grief, sadness and a shocking slap around the
face from reality as much loved comedian, Mitch Hedberg passed away.
Despite a multitude of film (‘Almost Famous’, ‘Lords of Dogtown’ and his
own ‘Los Enchiladas!) and TV (‘That 70s Show’, ‘Home Movies’ and his own
Comedy Central special amongst others) credits to his name, Mitch never
quite enjoyed the mainstream success that a comedian of his talent
perhaps should have.
Yet with the type of hilarious, frequently offbeat and regularly deadpan
humour displayed on these two live recordings, the hysterical Hedberg
managed to attract a loyal, passionate following, achieving cult like
status with his fans who look for any opportunity to drop one of his
inane observations into conversation.
For example, anybody who’s heard Mitch’s work can not walk past a broken
escalator without uttering the classic
“An escalator can never break, it can only become stairs. You’ll never
see an ‘ESCALATOR TEMPORARILY OUT OF ORDER’ sign….only ‘ESCALATOR
TEMPORARILY STAIRS… SORRY FOR THE CONVENIENCE”
Yet it isn’t just these sort of blatantly obvious yet stupidly
ridiculous observations such as this and countless others (“I saw a
human pyramid once…it was completely unnecessary”) that made Mitch such
an affectionate comic. Even on CD, it is more than obvious that he was
having the time of his life on that stage, frequently cracking up at his
own gags.
“If I was a locksmith, I’d be pimpin’ that **** out. Like ‘Say, I’ll
trade you a free key duplication…
[Mitch cracks up laughing]
“Hahah, that joke made me laugh before I could finish it…which is good
‘cos it had no ending.”
And when a joke didn’t go down as well as planned, his responses were
equally as funny.
“Haha, that joke’s f****** ridiculous!
Or
“All these jokes have been pre-approved as funny...by me.” Everyone said his
characteristically warm drawl made it impossible not to fall for the
longhaired funny man.
It was Kevin Smith who once said ‘Even God has a sense of humour’, and
apparently he was right; the big man needed somebody to make him laugh,
and couldn’t have picked anyone better than the much-missed Mitch.
Whether Hedberg climbed a stairway to heaven or took a broken escalator,
we’ll never know.
Highlights from the CDs
“You know when people are talking about race and colour, and they say ‘I
don’t care if he’s black, white, green or purple’? well we need to draw
the line somewhere. F*** purple people! Unless they’re choking, in which
case, help them.”
“My flatmate said to me ‘I need to shave and take a shower, who needs to
use the bathroom?’, it’s like some weird quiz where he reveals the
answer first.”
“I opened-up a yoghurt, underneath the lid it said, "Please try again"
because they were having a contest that I was unaware of. I thought that
maybe I opened the yoghurt wrong. ...Or maybe Yoplait was trying to
inspire me... "Come on Mitchell, don't give up!" An inspirational
message from your friends at Yoplait, fruit on the bottom, hope on top.”
“At my hotel room, my friend came over and asked to use the phone. I
said "Certainly." He said ‘Do I need to dial 9?’ I say ‘Yeah, especially
if it's in the number. You can try four and five back to back real
quick.’"
Recommended Links:
www.mitchhedberg.net
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