Comedian
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DVD details
Actor: Jerry SeinfeldBrand: Buena Vista Home Video
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 82 minutes
Published: 2003-05-01
DVD Release Date: 2003-05-13
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Miramax
DVD Reviews of Comedian
DVD Review: A great tool for a leadership conference
Summary: 3 Stars
This ends up being less a documentary about comedy and more a character study of a mature and an immature craftsman. The craft here is comedy, but it really could be anything, especially any type of art. A friend and I watched this and afterwards talked about how well Jerry Seinfeld and Orny Adams illustrate the principles of leadership.
Jerry Seinfeld is the portrait of a mature craftsman.
1. He is able maintain a healthy separation between himself and his craft. When a bit is not funny, it doesn't mean he isn't funny, it means the bit needs work. So he reworks it. When a set doesn't go well, he accepts the responsibility (doesn't "blame it on the candles") and figures out how to make the next set go better.
2. He has a life outside of his work. We only see his family for a few seconds; this is a film about comedy, and that's his job, not his life.
3. He views other craftsmen in his field as resources and comrades, not as threats and enemies. It is clear Jerry has a warm relationship with other comics, most notably Colin Quinn, and is able to discuss the craft and refine material with them. He listens to their advice, airs his concerns, and hears their concerns. He learns more about the craft by discussing it with other craftsmen.
4. He is willing to take risks in order to make himself a better craftsman, and produce a better craft. The real story of Jerry Seinfeld here is that he is starting over -- all new material -- in order to sharpen himself, to challenge himself and stay on top of the game. It's a huge risk that makes him a better craftsman.
Orny Adams is the portrait of an immature craftsman.
1. He is unable to maintain a healthy separation between himself and the craft. When a set doesn't go well, Orny takes it personally. It's like the audience is attacking is worth, his value as a person. He believes that if he is not funny, he is worthless. As a defense mechanism, he gets angry. At different points in the movie, he rages at a bad audience, a bad club, and a bad time slot.
2. Apparently, he has no life outside his work. He calls his mom once, to tell her he has one a contest. But it's clear he's unhappy, and it's quite possible it's because all he has and does and is is comedy.
3. He views other craftsmen in his field as threats and enemies. It's pretty clear that other comics respect Orny Adams, but none are his friends. At one point in the movie, another comic tries to give him some advice -- primarily about what I noted in point #2, that he needs to have a life outside of his comedy -- but he gives it like he's giving it to a rattlesnake about to strike. He is constantly verbally backing away, disclaiming, trying to say what he has to say without being struck. And Orny receives it like a rattlesnake. He cannot hear what the man has to say, and instead tells him what he ought to be saying to him. At another point, he says he has respect for Jerry Seinfeld, but it looks more like envy to me. He wonders at one point, if Jerry's success is not simply the result of luck.
(That may be misquoted in the movie. I got a strong sense while watching it that Orny doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut, and that the documentary editors cut pieces of his dialogue from their context to make what he says sound worse than it actually is.)
4. The prospect of taking risks with his craft makes him anxious and miserable. He has to take a pretty minor risk when he goes on Letterman -- he has to change one key word in his set -- and it gives him fits. He rages against the show, and is clearly a nervous wreck afterwards. The sad thing is, the risk worked. The bit was still funny. But his inability to separate his craft from himself (back to #1) mean that this risk absolutely wrecked him.
Orny Adams is a very talented comedian, and in all fairness, if we went back and watched Jerry Seinfeld twenty years ago, he probably would have looked much the same. Here's hoping that he matures into a competent craftsman. My advice to him would be to take some time off -- spend a year away from the circuit, away from comedy, so that he can establish an identity that isn't the craft. Then come back. If not, I have to agree with George Shapiro's words: "Yeah, Orny, I think you'll be big. But I think you'll still be unhappy."
Description of Comedian
Jerry Seinfeld is a working stand-up comic again. COMEDIAN is a candidly revealing, intimately observed, and often very funny look at what it takes to be a comedian. On-stage, Jerry delivers his hilarious brand of observational humor. Off-stage, he struggles with difficult material, confronts self-doubt, revels in small successes, and accepts help and support from friends and colleagues, including Colin Quinn, Ray Romano, Chris Rock, Garry Shandling, Jay Leno, and Bill Cosby. COMEDIAN also discovers the sharp wit of rising young comic Orny Adams -- outspoken, insecure, and fanatical about becoming the "next big thing." What emerge are two fascinating journeys by two contrasting personalities who have some surprising parallels.If you see Comedian expecting a concert film with Jerry Seinfeld, you'll be disappointed. But if you're looking for an incisive--almost surgical--examination of the psyche of a stand-up comedian, this is your movie. Comedian zigzags back and forth between the hugely successful Seinfeld, who's trying to get back to his stand-up roots by developing an entirely new act, and an unknown comic named Orny Adams, whose naked craving for success is almost painful to behold. Adams lays bare his ego to an embarrassing degree; Seinfeld is more subtle but just as revealing about the fears and anxieties that drive him to go back on stage. By following these two through comedy clubs, festivals, and spots on David Letterman's talk show, the documentary cunningly explores how jokes are put together, the in-the-trenches camaraderie (tinged with competition) of stand-ups, and the sheer existential terror of trying to make people laugh. --Bret Fetzer
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