Scott Capurro

It’s just a bit from the review for She Stoops to Comedy. A bit about me. Printed before Christmas, but I’m only just adding it to my site, which just goes to show you:
A.) How bored I am in cold, lonely London, and
B.) How busy I was in lovely SF. I miss the cast. And the burritos. And the yoga. Whenever I bring up yoga in London, people smirk. Just a bit. Or maybe they’re burping. Hard to say with the locals.

That leaves us with Capurro’s Simon, who delivers the show’s most electrifying moment. Could it be significant that the play’s best speech is also its least funny one? At about the 60-minute mark, Simon gets the stage to himself, and his monologue is worthy of Jaques’ darkest complaints. Identifying himself as “the stereotype of a self-loathing homosexual,” he excoriates himself for embodying, despite his best intentions, even the most tiresome gay clichés. He retires drunkenly to his hotel room, waking in the morning to take another handful of HIV meds. Set amidst a riot of sexual shenanigans, the monologue is a bleak retreat from the play’s otherwise comic vision: Greenspan, like his heroine, might just be well-suited for tragedy.

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.

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.

Here’s the review from Chortle for my chat show, which appeared during its maiden run at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern. The new run, starting October 1, will be even more exciting. This review fills you in, come see it, I like the show. The new line up will appear on my site soon.

If any chat show is only as good as its guests, Scott Capurro’s new live venture looks promising indeed, with the likes of Ken Livingstone, Julian Clary, Brain Paddick and Graham Norton all lined up to join him at South London’s Royal Vauxhall Tavern.
But guests are only half the equation, and Capurro wouldn’t perhaps be most commissioning editors’ first choice as host, particularly when causing offence is a paralysing fear. Not only is his stand-up act so thoroughly filthy that he’d make the pre-Sachsgate Jonathan Ross look like Mother Theresa’s maiden aunt, but also his persona is so narcissistically self-centred that you’d think it would be well nigh impossible for anyone else to get a word in edgeways.
It turns out that he can be generous with the limelight, and in conversation with Jo Caulfield prompted plenty of anecdotes about her family – especially her brother the Catholic priest (cue lots of sniggering paedophile gags) – and opinions on the perceptions of female stand-up. This opening segment was amicable and moderately entertaining, but with his lascivious wit neutered, there was little to separate Capurro from any other attentive and confident interviewer.
In the second section, all changed. As Capurro interviewed cabaret artist Dickie Beau – following his mesmerising and moving turn lip-synching to a tragi-comic interview with a drunkenly defiant Judy Garland – the tables were turned as the host did more talking than his subject. We learned much about Capurro’s hang-ups, family and relationships – all told with the deliciously biting wit for which he is rightly known, but the talk-show aspect was all-but forgotten as the catty San Franciscan held court.
The balance was better with Jerry Springer: The Opera composer Richard Thomas – not a natural on stage but clearly an interesting interviewee, and the devilish star of that controversial production, David Bedella, who sang powerfully but gave nothing away in conversation.
In the final section came the man most had surely come to see: Graham Norton, hotfooting it from his changing room in La Cage Aux Folles. Waiting for him to travel in from the West End made for a long night – but the wait was worth it, as the ever-charming Irishman proved as cheekily entertaining as an interviewee as he is as an interviewer, regaling the audience with his impishly indiscreet showbiz confessions and pithily expressed opinions on the nature of his job.
The banter here flowed the easiest it had all night; with the well-matched Capurro and Norton batting the conversation back and forth like Forrest Gump playing ping-pong. This might have been Capurro’s first bash at a talk show, but by the end he had found his feet.
The Royal Vauxhall Tavern, however, might not have been the best choice of venue for such an experiment. Much of the well-lubricated audience at this predominantly gay bar, perhaps more used to seeing rambunctious cabaret here, found it difficult to keep schtum, proving distracting at best, disruptive at worst.
But maybe they – like Capurro himself – haven’t yet had time to quite adjust to the mechanics of this format.
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
March 19, 2009

Camden Fringe: Scott Capurro Goes Deeper
6th August 2009 until 8th August 2009 – 9 pm,
Roundhouse, Chalk Farm Road, London, NW1 8EH

If you’ve seen Scott Capurro before you’ll find it hard not to laugh on learning that this Camden Fringe show at the Roundhouse is entitled Goes Much Deeper. That, you see, is what the gay San Francisco comic does. He likes to probe. And ask questions other people don’t dare: Are kids ever really missing? Does swine flu prove the Jews are right? When will Obama wipe off the make-up? Are we using the death penalty in Texas on the right people? Charmingly uncouth, rip-roaringly camp and unflinchingly provocative, Capurro has certainly toned down a notch since being banned on Australian airwaves for “polluting minds” – but only a little. He’s still “vaingloriously poisonous” (The Scotsman) so much so that even The Mirror recently labelled him “evil” and called for his extradition. Audiences find themselves insulted and seduced in equal measure and you may at first laugh out of pure discomfort. But by the end you should appreciate the endearing, nay avuncular side of much of Capurro’s often important work, which indeed goes much deeper than mere shock value.

I’m number one Critics’ choice pick in Time Out magazine. And in the London Paper. And in the Ham and High! (Not sure what that is, but it sounds delicious.) The show, Scott Capurro Goes MUCH Deeper, is meant to be fun and frothy till then end when I, metaphorically, gouge out my own eyes.
The venue, the Roundhouse, is really lovely. But don’t expect air conditioning, or trains that run on time. Brit weather…oy vey. Let’s not spend too much time on it, it’s been done done done but it’s freakish how, when it rains, it’s hot, and when it’s really sunny, it’s freezing. Part of the ironic charm the English pride themselves on I guess. But you’d think they’d have the trains-in-the-rain thing down by now. When the tracks are wet, everything stops. Maybe it’s the english version of a fiesta, only you’re on a smelly, damp train. Where’s the hammock? Where’s the salsa? Where’s the tequila??? And where is that smell of poop coming from? It had better be me!

About my current show at the Roundhouse in Camden, Time Out writes:

There are some topics which just aren’t suitable for comedy. Luckily for us Scott hasn’t worked out which ones they are yet. He’s filthy, camp and utterly fearless. There’s also a huge amount of heart and intelligence at work in this show if you really listen carefully to what he’s actually saying.

See you there.
x

And demanded their money back, after staying and menacing from the front row for one hour. They laughed when I used dirty words, and played along when I flirted with them, assuring me that ‘We don’t have queers in Alabama.’ I know. I sprang a woody too.
Then they waddled off politely like bitches to the box office and begged for their cash.
Why don’t retards go see strippers?

Scott Capurro Goes MUCH Deeper
Recommended
Soho Theatre, 21 Dean St, London, W1D 3NE

Are children ever really ‘missing’? Is Obama really black? Can the homeless get any hotter? Scott is back on the road with a new show, which promises to offend you and make you laugh in equal measures. He’s a filthy and fabulous comic with more heart and intelligence than nearly any other comic on the circuit, which makes him a killer queen! Hot!

Scott Capurro: Goes Much Deeper (Nominated as BEST show on Londontown.com)
Soho Theatre, London
25th May 2009 until 30th May 2009
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Anyone who has seen Scott Capurro live before will find it hard to suppress a wry smile on learning that his new show at Soho Theatre is entitled Goes Much Deeper. Given the charmingly uncouth, rip-roaringly camp and unflinchingly provocative nature of the San Francisco comic’s routines, the connotations are plain to see – especially when you have already witnessed Capurro flirt outrageously with a married Frenchman perched somewhat unfortunately in the front row during one of his gigs. In short, Capurro offends easily but, arguably, endearingly – although try explaining that to the Edinburgh Festival crowds who walked out following his “Holocaust Schmolocaust” quip in 2001, or the one man who he said should “die of Aids”. As he once told The Evening Standard: “I don’t give a shit about those who don’t like my work.” This may not sound like a barrel of laughs, but when Capurro gets it right – and recent evidence suggests he has calmed down somewhat from the controversial figure who was banned from Australian airwaves after being accused of “polluting minds” not so long ago – he really hits the mark. He’s come a long way since starring alongside Robin Williams in Mrs Doubtfire as cross-dressing “Aunt” Jack and picking up a Perrier Award the following year as best comedy newcomer, and if you watch his honest and personal show now, you’ll finally understand that Capurro does in fact go much deeper than you may have first thought.

I think it’s nice. It seems mostly supportive. I dunno, I’ve been very emotional lately, so everything I hear or see leaves a pinched imprint. And I have a hard time reading reviews of my own work. I focus on one word, or wonder why the critic discusses my outfit, which this reviewer doesn’t do, and now I’m totally tangential.
So this is from Chortle, a UK comedy website. Steve runs it, and he saw the first show of my new live chat thingy I’m hosting at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern. Come, it’s light and fluffy and crunchy sometimes, and loads of celebs are stopping by. I’ve called in lots of favors. It runs every Tuesday until April 21.

If any chat show is only as good as its guests, Scott Capurro’s new live venture looks promising indeed, with the likes of Ken Livingstone, Julian Clary, Brain Paddick and Graham Norton all lined up to join him at South London’s Royal Vauxhall Tavern.

But guests are only half the equation, and Capurro wouldn’t perhaps be most commissioning editors’ first choice as host, particularly when causing offence is a paralysing fear. Not only is his stand-up act so thoroughly filthy that he’d make the pre-Sachsgate Jonathan Ross look like Mother Theresa’s maiden aunt, but also his persona is so narcissistically self-centred that you’d think it would be well nigh impossible for anyone else to get a word in edgeways.

It turns out that he can be generous with the limelight, and in conversation with Jo Caulfield prompted plenty of anecdotes about her family – especially her brother the Catholic priest (cue lots of sniggering paedophile gags) – and opinions on the perceptions of female stand-up. This opening segment was amicable and moderately entertaining, but with his lascivious wit neutered, there was little to separate Capurro from any other attentive and confident interviewer.

In the second section, all changed. As Capurro interviewed cabaret artist Dickie Beau – following his mesmerising and moving turn lip-synching to a tragi-comic interview with a drunkenly defiant Judy Garland – the tables were turned as the host did more talking than his subject. We learned much about Capurro’s hang-ups, family and relationships – all told with the deliciously biting wit for which he is rightly known, but the talk-show aspect was all-but forgotten as the catty San Franciscan held court.

The balance was better with Jerry Springer: The Opera composer Richard Thomas – not a natural on stage but clearly an interesting interviewee, and the devilish star of that controversial production, David Bedella, who sang powerfully but gave nothing away in conversation.

In the final section came the man most had surely come to see: Graham Norton, hotfooting it from his changing room in La Cage Aux Folles. Waiting for him to travel in from the West End made for a long night – but the wait was worth it, as the ever-charming Irishman proved as cheekily entertaining as an interviewee as he is as an interviewer, regaling the audience with his impishly indiscreet showbiz confessions and pithily expressed opinions on the nature of his job.

The banter here flowed the easiest it had all night; with the well-matched Capurro and Norton batting the conversation back and forth like Forrest Gump playing ping-pong. This might have been Capurro’s first bash at a talk show, but by the end he had found his feet.

The Royal Vauxhall Tavern, however, might not have been the best choice of venue for such an experiment. Much of the well-lubricated audience at this predominantly gay bar, perhaps more used to seeing rambunctious cabaret here, found it difficult to keep schtum, proving distracting at best, disruptive at worst.

But maybe they – like Capurro himself – haven’t yet had time to quite adjust to the mechanics of this format.

Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
March 19, 2009