Last Friday an audience packed tight into a very hot Cedar Cultural Center. The room had the buzz of anticipation, as nobody really seemed to know what to expect. While most of the crowd was made up of people who were familiar with the comedy of Neil Hamburger and Tim Heidecker, you could see the people who had little to no prior knowledge about these comedians. What separated them from the rest of the crowd really had nothing to do with the first timers; it was their friends who were desperately trying to prepare the rookies. Walking through the cramped venue you could hear the friends trying to explain and intellectualize the bizarre style of comedy, but it was a useless task as there is no preparing for the comedy roller coaster of realism and surrealism we were about to embark on.
When it was finally time for Hamburger to take the stage the lights were dim and a tranquil Old Hollywood style song began. The crowd cheered and was at their feet when our first star took the stage. The combination of applause and music created a very cool scene that was broken with a harsh stretch of excessive throat clearing. Neil had three drinks pinned to his red vest with his forearm. The glasses clinked together throughout the performance and would spill over the arm of his coat every time he bowed. Hamburger’s act was built around knock-knock jokes, one-liners, and certainly a lot of call-and-response. The material of the jokes revolved around classic rock artists and bands. While he did pepper in jokes about modern celebrities, everything was mainly centered at classic rock icons and his distaste for them. His set drew a lot of guilty laughs and groans, but his set was well-received even at its raunchiest.
It was then Tim’s turn to take the stage and Paul Simon’s “You Can Call Me Al” began playing. The crowd quickly got on their feet as Heidecker addressed the mic, but the music did not stop. Tim’s friendly tone quickly escalated and he began to try to yell over the music. The music did not stop for what seemed to be a very long time. After the “miscommunication” with the sound booth, Heidecker jumped into his set. The most striking thing about Tim Heidecker’s standup is the commitment to the bit. He is visibly flustered and nervous. It is exhausting and uncomfortable as you watch him pace around the stage, trying to decipher his crumpled up notes. When he yells, you really believe that he is angry, but then you remember that he is a professional and you then don’t know what to believe. He also gave an earful to an audience member that was interrupting the show, but it sounded exactly like his argument with the sound booth. We were pulled down the rabbit hole and fully immersed in a bizzare wonderland. Midway through the night Heidecker pulled a couple onstage and pressured the boyfriend into proposing onstage; we aren’t sure if the couple really is going through with that proposal, but once again Heidecker put us into that sticky discomfort of not knowing what to believe. While Heidecker’s act wasn’t as raunchy as Hamburgers, it wasn’t completely innocent. There was no shortage of colorful language and at the end of the night he got on the piano and played a number of songs about drinking urine. It was a well-rounded show that proved that his special brand of humor translates successfully to the stage.
These two are currently on a tour going west and ending on Nov. 7th in Brooklyn, NY. For more information about Tim Heidecker and Neil Hamburger check them out on Twitter.
