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Dane Cook is a walking on the ice, change the game kind of guy. Let’s please not forget that. Back in Myspace days he took the folks of Myspacetown on a wild ride and gave the world a glimpse of The New World of Comedy. (Quick plug for my new doc series. Sorry.) Seriously, Dane Cook was and is a stand-up pioneer. Now he’s portaging again through fresh new trails, posting up his great new special on Moment, a platform for content creators to release their own work.

THE NEW WAY

This is now officially the way of the day and the future to come in a big way. This is where stand-up is going. The next level. HBO took it from Showtime, Netflix beat it away from HBO with a giant wallet. Now smart thinking comics with half a brain are realizing what Bill Burr said to me three years ago ‘a Netflix special isn’t special anymore’ and with their new commitment to pay comics way, way, less, and the ability for comics to self release on the level of what Dane Cook is doing, and what Andrew Shultz has done, selling their own specials direct to consumer, that may turn out to be their version of turning over the keys to the kingdom.

Add that in with the serious amount of views comics like Mark Normand and Shultz and so many others have gotten on YouTube and Roku and several other platforms, it doesn’t make sense for a comic to sell themselves for pennies on the dollars to Netlix, or to Showtime, or anyone for that matter. Dane has taken a page from this and tacked into the skid. He’s made a fantastic special with a long-time creative favorite of his, the legendary director, Marty Callner. He shot the damn thing in his backyard. Just turned the backyard of his Hollywood home. (Sorry Hollywood mansion) into a stage for a stand-up special.

It’s actually a really great idea. A guy just telling jokes on his front porch. How back to basics is that? It doesn’t matter that the front porch is like a thirty million dollar estate, what matters is the guy is happy to have his friends over to listen to him jaw.

MARTY CALLNER

Marty Callner did awesome work as always. He’s a true artist. Truth be told it’s not my style personally for a stand-up special to use cranes and swoop as much as this special does. I have a gut preference that the camera work for stand-up should be as simple as hell and pretty much stay the hell out of the way. That’s me. Marty happens to be the master of this style used here and it does give the show spectacle which it may need considering it’s just a guy on a porch, no matter how hoity toity the porch is.

It’s a beautiful looking special. Crisp, perfectly lit and moves like a race car. The sum total of it is a piece that’s big and game changing and at the same time small, acoustic, sentimental, and revealing. It’s quite a feat.

STORYTELLING

I happen to love story telling in stand-up. Robert Klein was one of my idols growing up and was a wonderful story-teller. Chappelle tells great stories. Pryor told a great tale. Sara Silverman has become a first class story-teller. Dane has plopped down on the shelf with all of these comics and showed that he more than belongs. This is a turning point special. You have to understand, he OPENS with a fifteen minute or so story. And it kills. It’s so good. I loved it. It’s a true story and I won’t say much. Just go buy this special and watch it. He follows that with stories about his life, and his fiance.

A 30 SECOND LAPSE

My favorite part of the special though is another really long tale of Dane in his early career having a moment where he wanted to quit stand-up. A moment he claims was singular. One thirty second lapse in belief that he was destined to do this. It’s one of my favorite stand-up pieces ever. I adored it. It’s wild and you don’t know where it’s going and it shows, to me, stand-ups great potential to entertain and more. The story in it’s journey is raucous, sad, inspiring, goofy, silly, and heartbreaking, and finally is everything that needs to be said about what it takes to believe in yourself. It’s truly a magic trick. The special is worth the price of admission for just seeing this piece.

THE MOMENT

https://www.moment.co/

The moment is a platform where artists can sell their wares directly to their fans. It’s their moment. Right now. This is a window opening to the future. This will be how it’s done for so many things. Stand-up, music, series, films, everything. It may very well be a streaming killer one day. We all may very well just buy the items we want rather than pay for the 10,000 shows we don’t want and the executives salaries we don’t need to pay. If you’re someone who has Netflix, HBO, Showtime, etc, you could buy a dozen specials a year, a dozen movies, and and a dozen tv series and still be in the realm of all you’ve spent on the streamers you’re signed up for.

It would also be a better group of shows, series, and specials for you. It would be exactly what you want. And you may just have Dane Cook to thank for helping usher it all in because the game is now on.

Go buy his special. You won’t be sorry. This one is special.

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STANDUPWORLD PODCAST #2

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Check out my new weekly podcast. Standupworld. This is episode #1. It’s obviously going to take some time to get it right, but have a watch.

Thanks,

Mike

Please sign up for our newsletter. It’s FREE and you can download my book STANDUPWORLD, and sign up to win a lot of great free prizes.

In the middle of a stand-up special? Of all the nerve. I mean how honest is stand-up going to get?

Seriously, this is an amazing special. A piece of art. It’s so well made, fully formed and next-level brilliant. Bill Burr told me about it and said I had to watch it. I never would have on my own. I mean even the name Rothanial sounds like some Japanese version of Vick’s vapor rub. “What kind of an arty-farty assed name is that? Why call it that?” I said in my usual idiotic cadence. I won’t give it away, but it’s a beautiful title to a masterful piece of work.

I really didn’t want to watch after Bill laid it out to me the way he did. “It’s so good, the stand-up, the directing by Bo Burnham, makes you want to rethink everything you’ve ever done. Makes me feel like a hack.” Not really what you want to hear from the yud-yud whose last two specials you’ve just directed. The truth is though, he was right.  If for some reason you haven’t seen it, go watch it. I don’t want to say too much about it, but it’s so real and alive. It’s truly beautiful, and there’s so much more to it than his coming out. It’s about family, secrets, and not ever being comfortable until you push yourself to be. Some great, great jokes, yes, some long spells without laughs, but you don’t care. You’re looking into the guys heart and soul as he sits there on the stage spilling his guts to you.

I usually like my stand-up rough. (Maybe I’m gay too?) I love a faster pace to a set, much more crackle and pop. Edge. I’ve said that here a lot. Chappelle, Burr, Taylor Tomlinson, Louis C.K., Whitney, Hinchcliffe, Rogan, Shane Gillis, Rock. That’s the pitch and poke I like a special to have. This at first came off as some of the stuff I’ve hated in the past, like some of the woke bullshit that calls itself comedy specials, but he’s so much better than anything in that vein. He isn’t woke and he also isn’t crass, caustic, or the least bit impolite. To me he’s got a vibe of a young Nat King Cole as a stand-up. Debonaire sleek, and soulful. Lyrically perfect.

Directing-wise, it does in fact make me want to hang it up. It was shot at the Blue Note in NYC and lit like a Vermeer painting. Pools and puddles of light bathe the stage, illuminating Jarrod in a warmth that almost feels like a nightclub that’s filling in as an embryo. Allowing us to revel in Carmichael’s rebirth. Chappelle’s ‘Bird’ special from the comedy store main room is one of my favorite specials ever, but this is so different, silky, honest, from the gut, Jazz. This is stand-up as a little one-man film. As I said, lit perfectly, bathing him in a spotlight, his skin as crisp and bright as the honesty he’s spewing. Seated on a stool, leaning over it, washing himself in newfound freedom.

Bryan Washington, in the New Yorker, wrote, ‘the set is a Rubik’s Cube of self-revelation that consistently challenges and astounds, even as it toys with the ways in which seeking laughter can conceal’. I think that’s right on. It’s pain as fresh air. Walking on coals because you know the other side is going to be a place to finally sit down.

I didn’t use Jarrod in the Comedy Store doc. He did a special there. It didn’t ring my bell. Wasn’t bad at all though, and his next two were two leaps forward. I used Louie C.K. instead who had also done a special there in the same time frame. (Maybe I’m a racist as well? Uh, ‘Maybe???’)   The truth is it’s even better than his last special, ‘8’, which was stellar. In this one though, he’s a different artist, this isn’t growth, this is someone in transition. A great comic identifies as a genius.

Katheryn VanArendonk in Vulture wrote something about Rothaniel that I think sums it up perfectly for me.  “It is a remarkable piece of conceit, craft, performance, and vision, and it’s a truly astonishing way to probe so many ideas that have been bubbling up over the past several years about the role of comedy and how we value authenticity. It’s the kind of special that basically demands you label it “important,” and it is not wrong.”

WATCH’ ROTHANIEL’ ON HBO AND AT HBO MAX.

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 Thanks! Mike