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Me Doing Stand-Up

Norm Macdonald

Comedy Central · 2011 · 42 min

A deadpan examination of death, disease, and the local news.

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Norm Macdonald steps onto a San Francisco stage looking like a guy who just wandered out of a hardware store: untucked shirt, black leather jacket, barely moving. What follows is a quiet, devastating teardown of basic human fears and clichés. He subjects the language of tragedy to his punishing literalism. His opening ten minutes are an exhaustive examination of mortality, questioning why the fragile, violent human heart is used as a symbol for love, and picking apart the idea of “battling” cancer.

Comedy Central aired the set in 2011, marking his first full-length stand-up special. While he was simultaneously hosting a sports television show and doing commentary for televised poker, the recording captures him stripped of any broadcast constraints. He relies entirely on his slow-burn pacing to carry routines about a missing woman named Janice on the local news, the logistical superiority of alcoholism over other diseases, and the Tiger Woods cheating scandal. He wraps the hour with a return to a favorite subject, O.J. Simpson. The performance is so relaxed it feels conversational, but the folksy delivery masks a series of tightly constructed premises about kidnapping, the Grim Reaper, and Uncle Bert’s bowel cancer.

The set list

6 bits

  1. The heart and the concept of death

    Argues that your heart is your body's worst enemy, questions why hearts are symbols of love or compassion, and describes defibrillators as tools designed merely to scare the heart straight.

  2. The phrase 'losing a battle' to cancer

    Deconstructs the euphemism used for cancer victims, referencing an uncle with bowel cancer and joking that framing death as a lost battle makes the last thing a person did in life being a loser.

  3. The missing woman Janice and serial murder fantasy

    Follows his gradual media obsession with a missing woman from the news, methodically detailing a plan to lure her into a van with cheese sandwiches and dispose of her in a shallow grave.

  4. Contrasting male and female behavior during sex

    Acts out men transforming into monstrous, flailing wild beasts during sex while women remain casually aloof, even taking phone calls in the middle of it.

  5. Alcoholics Anonymous secrecy

    Highlights the irony of AA members willingly confessing extreme, degrading acts in meetings while still guarding their last names.

  6. The closer (spoiler). Show it

    O.J. Simpson and prison hierarchy closer

    Observes that murderers hold far higher status in prison culture than someone incarcerated for stealing back their own sports memorabilia and shirts.

How it plays

Tone
Droll, dark, deadpan, and profane, contrasting absurdly mundane musings with frank examinations of mortality and horrific behavior.
On stage
Laid-back, unassuming, and conversational, abandoning earlier snarl for a fresh-faced, bemused confidence while maintaining a sharp, subversive edge.
Pace
Easygoing, patient, and relaxingly paced, allowing premises to breathe and build into short-story-like jokes without rushing to easy climaxes.
About
death and aging, illness and cancer, serial killers and true crime news, sex and animalistic human behavior, alcoholism and Alcoholics Anonymous, prison pecking order

What the critics said

Extremely well-received; critics praised Macdonald's masterful phrasing, understated stage presence, and ability to mine big laughs out of taboo and grim subjects like murder, cancer, and alcoholism.

In the room: Configured like an intimate comedy club rather than a sprawling theater, with audience members seated close to the stage.

Summed up from reviews, articles and listings. Sources: tv.apple.com, avclub.com, movie-trailer.co.uk, web.archive.org, nowtoronto.com, theglobeandmail.com, smartcine.com, en.wikipedia.org, prnewswire.com.

Backstory

Filmed around the time Macdonald was preparing to launch his Comedy Central series 'Sports Show with Norm Macdonald'. At the time of filming, he was secretly living with cancer that he kept hidden from the public.

Details

Released
Taped
The Fillmore, San Francisco
Runtime
42 min
Where
Comedy Central
Director
David Steinberg
Honors
Rated 5/5 ('NNNNN') by NOW Toronto
Topics
Before
One Night Stand (1991)
After
Hitler's Dog, Gossip & Trickery (2017)

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