Scott Capurro

I’ve just received these remarks about my comedy show in San Francisco. A guy I apparently met at the baths in Melbourne in 1996 contacted me, thrilled to be in SF during gay pride month, sporting a pink cowboy hat whilst he marched with the gay men’s chorus at that ‘Pride Parade’ people with their children still attend. He came along and watched my set a few weeks ago, at the SF Punchline, then he disappeared. Poof! I contacted him to ask what was up. I just wanted to know if I looked good. Ah, vanity!
Instead, I got this:
Dear Scott, Thanks for your email. I can understand you are curious why we didn’t hang round to catch up. We bolted from the show because we were both in a state of shock: I was embarrassed and Richard was, well, appalled. Much of the content of the show played to every old, outdated possible stereotype of being gay. Eg: Gay = sleazy, sexual predator Gay = aids Gay = child molester Etc etc In Aus we have had to fight long and hard for the mainstream community to understand that these things don’t hold true, so it was surprising to go to a show when they were being milked for laughs. Especially when, as far as a quick glance round the room could tell, most of the audience seemed straight. The next day our shock turned to anger and resentment: to us it seemed a throwback to some of the views we have fought long and hard to influence and change. I am not sure if this is news to you, or not. And no doubt the goal of the show is to shock people, and perhaps there are layers of irony, subtlety or nuances which we didn’t pick up. We don’t take serious pills, and enjoy satire and thought-provoking humour. But unfortunately we didn’t find this stuff funny. I did think about sending this feedback to you earlier as I thought you might be wondering why we didn’t hang round, but as I don’t really know you that well I didn’t. In view of your email I hope it does help you understand our reaction. Take care, and best regards, Tim
I know. He’s relentlessly stupid, or Australian. Take your pick. I should’ve ignored him and his large ears. But I was feeling restless. So I sent this:
Hey Tim, Thanks for the email. I looked you up on line and if you’re the lawyer from Melbourne then you’re NOT the Tim I’d hoped was coming to the show. The Tim I’d expected is blond and owns a boat and lives in Sydney. Do you know him? ‘Aus’ as you call it has such a compact population of gays. Anyway, if you say we’ve met before, I’ll take your word for it. You seem like a very sincere person.
About my material, which, I suppose, you’ve forgotten since we last met: My relationship with the audience is very personal, very intimate, and the stereotypes you mentioned are the types I’m trying to expose and satirize in my act. Sorry you didn’t get the joke. Odd the vast majority of the crowd did, but then mine is not your culture. Whether the audience was straight or not, I’m not sure. But if they were, perhaps their presence confused you and muted your response. Next time, there’s no reason to be frightened. In provincial towns a lot of straights might seem sinister. In San Francisco, really, that’s not the case. Our straights are a docile, easily controlled bunch, good humored and up for some laughs.
By the way, it’s customary, no matter what you thought of the show, to thank a performer for arranging tickets, and not wait for him to contact you wondering where you disappeared to.
OH, one other thing: Pink cowboy hats and the gay chorus? Now those are the stereotypes I’m fighting against.
Enjoy your far-away land.
Scott Capurro
PS: We met at the baths? Talk about stereotypical…

Hey kids, this just in from the San Francisco Weekly! A lovely reporter wrote this delicious bit about my show here. And what a great journey I’m having – a nurse in the front row of last night’s show identified my austism. Who knew? Free diagnoses are the best, because in America they’re the only ones I can afford. I’ve got asberger’s. I’m sure I’ve misspelled that, but it’s all new to me.

Bitter, Sweet
By Tara Jepsen
There’s always a time for a little Mars vs. Venus and a splash of Can’t We All Just Get Along? But it seems the current laff-seeking public is gravitating toward some fabulous weirdos and some deliciously sharp tongues. Perhaps it’s the Puritanical influence on so much of U.S. culture, or maybe most of you were raised by Scandinavian Lutherans. Regardless, there’s a psychic unburdening that goes along with hearing someone just say some messed-up, irreverent, hilarious stuff. If this is your gig, check out the lovely comedian Scott Capurro. He’ll give you some thoughts on the proper use of sex toys, and he’ll talk about being gay in a way that won’t be used in pamphlets for LGBT teens. This is not an event for hysterical reactionaries, but the place for smiling malcontents and all those who have moved far beyond the “take my wife — please” horizon line.

Apparently my racier stuff got pulled, but it’s still a fun interview. But then, like my boyfriend just asked, ‘Capurro, do you always want to be a cunt?’
Now THAT’S the question of the epoch.

Comedy Interview: Scott Capurro

Behind American comic Scott Capurro’s fearless and provocative brand of comedy lies a sharp, subtle wit and a warm heart. Not that the latter is obvious mind, as anyone in the front row will tell you! With absolutely no subject off bounds, Scott has a tendency to upset his gay counterparts far more than the rest of the audience, but he tries to include everyone. Going deeper than just shock-value, Scott’s act has earned him a reputation as one of the finest stand-ups around and he is also a respected actor, author and playwright. As we sat nervously at the front of his comedy chat show we found him endearingly shocking, extremely funny and a master of dead-pan. It was with some trepidation that we set about asking him some questions…

Raised in San Francisco, you were originally an actor and appeared in the hit films Mrs Doubtfire (Aunt Jack) and Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. How did you end up as a comic living in the East End of London?
There’s a lot of work for comics in London; the East End is the most affordable central London location I could find. And I have a lot of friends living nearby. (Read: poor artists.)

Your material could be seen as pretty controversial and offensive. Has it got you into any scrapes and, if so, how do you deal with the fallout?
Most audiences play along. I guess some people might be offended but then the great thing about comedy is there’s something offensive for everybody! Women get nasty, because it’s a comedy club, and all nastiness is allowed. Or should be. After 20 years in comedy I consider babysitting one of my greatest talents, so I have restrained some people, and I’ve been strangled, but nobody ever said jokes were popular.

Generally, what response can you expect from a London crowd? Do you use the same material here as you do over the pond?
I use the same material everywhere. Comedy, like love, is on TV, so it’s universal. The response I expect is laughter. The English find this embarrassing, I know, so I depend on Polish tourists.

Have you got any particular favourite comedy venues here in London, and where do you head out to after a gig in the capital?
In London, I like the Balham Banana, and the Soho Theatre is a great venue. Of course the RVT in Vauxhall is one of my favorites as well. Headliners in Chiswick is lovely. I’m sure I’ve left some off the list. I really only play venues I like. I’m too old to wrestle with a rotten room. After a gig, I go home. Again, I’m old.

What do you think of London’s gay scene?
I don’t know the scene. I read..

Are you playing any of the fringes this year?
The Camden Fringe is fun. I’m doing that.

Scott Capurros Postion, your live comedy chat show at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern, was a roaring success and with guests such as Vivienne Westwood, Stephen Merchant and Matt Lucas keeping you company. Is their another series coming up and who are you going to be asking along?
We’re just now creating another series, starting September 30 and running every Thursday for 6 shows. We’ve not got a guest list yet, but it should be exciting. I really enjoy the chat show format, and even if i shared the stage with David Mills every week and no one else, that would be enough for me. He’s very funny. The audience might not come along, but we’d have some laughs.

We hear you’re a big yoga fan – do you just like being bendy or is there more to it than that?
I like having a calm mind, and yoga helps with that. I also have old injuries which resurface when I skip my practice, so I try to do at least 90 mins every day. Keeps me sane.

Have you ever been sick on the tube?
I prefer cabs darling. They’re the only public transport I support.

Tell us a London secret?
Less than 2 percent of the population are foreign born.

Scott Capurro plays the Camden Fringe, 13-15 August 2010, Roundhouse, Camden Fringe

By Suke in Miscellaneous on May 14, 2010 2:00 PM 0

The ‘as the years go by’ line made me shutter. But I am pushing 48, hard. Have I been around the comedy scene in the UK forever? Or does it just feel that way? Anyway, this review feels good.

Comedy review: Scott Capurro

Published Date: 10 April 2010
By Brian Donaldson
The Scotsman
SCOTT CAPURRO ****

THE STAND, EDINBURGH
AS THE years go by, could Scott Capurro be losing his edge? Track down any review of any of his previous shows, from his 1994 Edinburgh Fringe debut Risk-Gay on through Fowl Play, Loaded and the Perrier-nominated Love and Affection Tour and you will more likely than not read about an audience member or 20 “storming out”.

On Tuesday night, though, as he performed his current show Scott Capurro Goes Deeper, the clatter of the exit door behind another shocked customer was not heard once. Either the San Franciscan is toning it down these days or his audience was too broad-minded. Or, Capurro concluded, having paid for a ticket, there’s no way a Scottish crowd would leave without getting value.

But if you thought he has stopped culling all those sacred cows, you’ll have to think again. There are extended, arguably death-defying sequences about the Koran in this show, stacks of gags about his lustful feelings for Jesus, and plenty of borderline shout-outs for the McCanns, Fritzl, the Holocaust, Diana, Christopher Reeve and Obama.

While no-one in the crowd deemed any of this stuff sufficiently offensive to head for the safety of the street, they did little to prevent themselves from becoming a target: chief among them a Texan who had left her hubby in Houston while she hunts for the Loch Ness Monster.

Whatever anyone thinks of Capurro, there’s little argument that he is a technically-gifted comic with each barb softened by a comedic hug before the set-up empathy has acid poured all over it again. And when it comes to stretching stand-up comedy’s boundaries, Scott Capurro really does go much, much deeper than the rest.

Hey kids, if you wanna catch up on what I’m up to in the Uk, give these a try:
This host is hot and he’s interviewing me on a radio thingy for the BBC to promote my gig in Machester on April 7 2010:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/manchester/hi/

And a podcast for something, like, I dunno, a radio station. or something. This is to promote my new live chat show in Vauxhall (London – DUH!) at the RVT. Loads of celeb guests, the first night, April 1, was amazing. For this chat, however, I’m a guest, and I’m lovin’ the host. She’s smart and fun and gets it. This interview is sort of long ish. 30 mins I think. Strap in, it gets a bit rough in places. I do rattle on.

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/
viewPodcast?id=304888408

Cheerios!

JOKES
Comedian of the week: Scott Capurro
By James Mullinger
For GQ

Since winning the Perrier Best Newcomer award in 1994, Californian comic Scott Capurro has been predominantly based in the UK. Catty, fiercely intelligent and often controversial, it’s no wonder the Guardian called him “the most fearless and technically perfect stand up on the circuit”.

He famously played Robin Williams’ make up artist in Mrs Doubtfire, but it is his work on the London comedy circuit that he is most loved for. Here are some of his funniest (printable) lines, prompting Time Out to say he is “One of the few genuinely challenging acts out there… a thoughtful, intelligent comic whose act has far more to it than pure shock value. He’s not preachy, he’s just camp, crude and incredibly funny.”

1. “Sleeping with prostitutes is like making your cat dance with you on its hind legs. You know it’s wrong, but you try to convince yourself that they’re enjoying it as well.”

2. “In combat if I came face to face with the enemy and he was hot, all I’d be able to say is, ‘OK soldier, on your knees’.”

3. “I’m glad Obama’s president, because it’s time to let the black guy f*** it up.”

4. “Of course Jesus Saves. He’s got no overhead.”

5. “A scruffy Christian handed me a flyer saying ‘Jesus is coming’ and I thought, ‘Jesus is coming and that’s what you’re wearing?’

6. “In America the coastal cities are nice because people in them still read. But the farther you get from water, the dumber Americans seem, but maybe they’re not dumb. Maybe they’re just dehydrated.”

7. “I’m gay, so why would I want to get married? I’d prefer my sex life to continue.”

Scott Capurro is on at the Leicester Square Theatre on Wednesday 14 April at 9.30pm. His live comedy chat show Scott Capurro’s Position, featuring Matt Lucas, Barb Jungr and Gail Porter, is on Thursday 1 April at 8pm at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern.
Published 23 Mar 2010

And it’s about friggin’ time. It’s doing well cuz I didn’t write it. Anyway this is the third review I’m putting up here. Read below for the first two. It’s all happening at OUR theatre. Be there or be, I dunno, dead inside.

CHEERS!
She Stoops to Comedy raises the bar for holiday theater
BY ROBERT AVILA
Wednesday December 9, 2009

It’s hardly news, but holiday shows can be fairly dreary treats. Given such periods of seasonal affective disorder as the theater may present, it’s a genuine surprise and pleasure to discover the wit and wile strutting the boards at SF Playhouse — tucked into a far corner of Union Square somewhere just north-by-northwest of that big Christmas tree — where the season offering is a sparkling production of David Greenspan’s She Stoops to Comedy.
Mercifully, the plot has nothing to do with yuletide or smiling through a bad case of rickets. Instead, it concerns a lesbian stage actress named Alexandra Page (male actor Liam Vincent) who decides to disguise herself as a man and try out for Orlando in a summer stock production of Shakespeare’s As You Like It, in order to play opposite her estranged lover, Alison (Sally Clawson), in the part of Rosalind — another cross-dresser twice over since Shakespeare’s character is a woman disguised as a man in a part played, historically, by a boy.
Playing opposite, in short, is just what Alexandra does, convincing everyone she is a man — including a besotted middle-aged gay actor named Simon Lanquish (Scott Capurro) — while spying on and ultimately seducing, in seemingly old heterosexual fashion, her charmed lover and costar.
Meanwhile, other romances abound in ways at least as complicated: Alexandra’s ambitious young director Hal (Cole Alexander Smith) and creatively frustrated assistant-and-girlfriend Eve Addaman (Carly Cioffi) balance careers and romance in precarious turn. And a highly affected actress named Jayne Summerhouse (Amy Resnick) seeks to rekindle an old flame with her seeming-opposite of the same sex: the literally down-to-earth archeologist Kay Fein (Amy Resnick) — an encounter that promises sparks, not least because it features only one actor.
But gender, identity, and blocking aren’t the only challenges put forth by Greenspan’s play. In She Stoops to Comedy, even the script is up for grabs, rewriting itself as it goes along through the caprice of characters who are liable to speak to, as much as from, their respective roles. (Kay, for instance, changes decades and job titles with relative ease.) Cunningly employing Shakespeare and other literary touchstones — in particular a 1910 play by Ferenc Molnár called The Guardsman — She Stoops traipses over aesthetic and even philosophical ground after its carefree but astute fashion. It’s a self-consciously theatrical enterprise that gleefully eschews expectations, squirming pleasantly under the usual theatrical artifice as if looking to satisfy a really good itch.
A dazzling bit of low-key stagecraft, She Stoops is a tall order for any company. In director Mark Rucker’s staging, the action comes off as a pitch-perfect balance of wit and wonder, a loving riff on acting, connecting, and the role of the imagination in art and life. Heady and hilarious at once, it’s metatheater with a pulse, sporting plenty of fine opportunities for an exceptional cast — beginning with Liam Vincent, whose poise and subtlety in the lead are perfection — and including a couple of memorable scenes of actorly pyrotechnics exquisitely realized by Capurro and Resnick, respectively.

Simply EVERYONE has been asking: When is your next gig? Only they’ve been asking me, not you. Follow me. Anyway, I wasn’t sure why they were so curious. Either they wanted to watch me being beaten; or they wanted to clear town before the shit hit the big gay fan.
Either way, here’s the info. Below, I mean.
Wait, is there a big gay fan? Meredith Baxter Birney I suppose. She’s HUGE. But they all plump up. I’m only quoting Cher’s dress designer.
Read on, ‘tards.

And this from the Bay Times. OH! Read the lower entry first. It tells you all you need to know.

Similarly, as the “stereotyped aging homo” who comes on to the disguised Alexandra, Simon (Scott Capurro) begins as “Silent Simon,” his thoughts narrated by Jayne, only to launch into one of the most wrenching monologues of the play, in which he laments his performance of homosexuality in light of his AIDS, his aging, his adherence to a scripted portrayal of gays. “Who wants another play about him?” he asks.

She then calls my monologue a ’showstopper’. That’s sweet. Though no one jumped out of their seats or anything. And when I read this 3-pager that I do, I thought it was hilarious. Self loathing and seething with anger, about AIDS and cruising teenagers and career failure. I figured, they hired me cuz this has loads of laughs. THEN THE ROOM WENT SILENT. Guess I was wrong, and I’m man (?) enough to admit it.
And now I’m a serious actress. Seriously. I am you guys!

Hey!
Here’s a review from the Chronicle (the biggest paper in this one-pony town) for the play I’m in. That’s where I am, btw, in case anyone in the UK even wonders. I’m in SF, legitimizing myself as a real actor. In this play I’m an aging bitter actor with AIDS. That’s the character, not me, and the research was intense. I don’t have AIDS yet – give me time, I’ve only been in SF for three weeks.
It’s 4 stars. The review. IT IS! For some reason the icon this paper uses doesn’t transfer. More to come, hopefully. Stars. Reviews. AIDS. All the fun stuff.
Read on. NOW!

She Stoops to Comedy: Comedy. By David Greenspan. Directed by Mark Rucker. With Liam Vincent, Amy Resnick, Sally Clawson et al. Through Jan. 9. SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter St., San Francisco. 90 minutes. $40. (415) 677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org. David Greenspan has more fun writing his characters into hilarious meta-theatrical complications in “She Stoops to Comedy” than anybody has a right to. He’s not as successful bringing his backstage high jinks to a conclusion, but by then the SF Playhouse West Coast premiere that opened Saturday has delivered so much laughter that it’s hard to care.

Taking off from Shakespeare’s cross-dressing heroines, Greenspan explodes gender and identity notions with infectious glee. But that’s just for starters. “Comedy” is a romp through every aspect of theater, from overblown egos and out-of-town romance to on-the-fly rewrites. It’s a terrific workout for a very good cast, culminating in a tour-de-force two-character solo by the sublime Amy Resnick.

Just as Shakespeare wrote for boys playing girls who dressed up as men, “Comedy” uses a man as its female lead. Diva Alexandra Page (Liam Vincent in the role Greenspan originated), worried about losing her lover Alison (Sally Clawson), disguises herself as a man to play Orlando opposite Alison’s Rosalind in a summer theater “As You Like It.”

Right, that’s a man playing a woman pretending to be a man to woo a woman playing a woman who pretends to be a man. Which doesn’t include the gay actor (stand-up comic Scott Capurro) who falls for Alexandra’s male persona or the pretentious actress (Resnick) coming on to Alison – until her former lover (also Resnick) shows up, as either a lighting designer or an archaeologist (as the script changes).

There’s considerable added inside-theater comedy, from the way Greenspan puts the plot of Ferenc Molnár’s “The Guardsman” through the “As You Like It” wringer to nods to everyone from Charles Ludlam to Virginia Woolf. Then there are the backstage problems of independent filmmaker turned first-time stage director Hal Stewart (Cole Alexander Smith) and his lover Eve Addaman (Carly Cioffi), who always says her surname first (try it out).

Director Mark Rucker navigates Greenspan’s heady shifts of reality and scene retakes with an ease that lets the hilarity flow. Vincent anchors the comedy with a perfect dry, wry wit, and Capurro shines in a sadly funny monologue about gay roles.

Everything builds to the scene between Resnick’s two roles, which she executes with show-stopping finesse. It’s a hard act to follow. The way “Comedy” peters out to its “Guardsman” resolution is a bit of a letdown, but the joy of its best moments prevails.