except for maybe 1-2 skits involving dial-up menu options.
The venue? Freight & Salvage, a Coffee House institution in Berkeley.
The Show? Apparently their 23rd Annual Year in Review.
The audience? About 90+% senior citizens defined as mid-sixties and above. It was obvious that most of the crowd were regulars and less than discerning.
The performers were six “comedians” – four men/two women only one of which wasn’t white which pretty much matched the audience if you substitute Asian in the audience for Hispanic on stage.
This was not a performance I would recommend to anyone. Most of the skits had nothing to do with reviewing the past year – and it isn’t like one can’t find a huge amount of political fodder for subject matter…. and more to do with in-jokes, Berkeleyisms and various items that the performers seemed to find hilarious with more than the occasional audience puzzled look. The ethnic/gender related jokes weren’t either new or funny. Consistency was lacking – and more than once the performers spent more time addressing each other than the audience. The miking was abysmal with the volume completely out of control. It makes more sense to let people adjust their hearing-aids than to blast the rest of us who are within 10 rows of the theater back. Head mikes are the standard and can be properly set up ahead of time. Passing around a hand held mike is – as was demonstrated more than once – a recipe for extraneous noise, thumps and variability in understanding difference voice ranges of the performers.
I wasn’t the only one who raised my hand when one of the “entertainers” asked “who is here for the LAST time.”
We left at the intermission. Out side there were a few small huddles of smokers including a couple of obvious fans telling one of the organizers that “this was the best show yet!” Which leaves me feeling that the standard here isn’t very high.
Think more than once about comedy and insider shows here. Stick with the Coffee House music performances by known musicians. Otherwise – avoid this venue like the plague.
