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COPYRIGHT 2002 All rights reserved. Reproduced by permission of The Condé Nast Publications Inc.
America abounds with comedy clubs, comedy channels, and situation comedies, but the fact is that comedy, as it is practiced on these shores, is generally a tame thing. The unbridled, murky mischief of a genuine madcap doesn't fit within the polite frame of today's media, and though the politically incorrect guff that comes to us over the airwaves may give citizens the illusion of free speech, there is no dangerous or transgressive thrill to it. Even the term for most comedy acts -- "standup" -- signals the paralysis of the genre. Most of our comedians don't aspire to say the unsayable or to disturb the peace; they just want to get a club gig and a sitcom. To catch sight of an authentic comic, then, is an awe-inspiring thing -- like spotting a snow leopard or a Chinese panda.
Coincidentally, a Chinese panda, albeit a bewildered one, found its way into Robin Williams's hundred and five minutes of hilarity last week at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. (He also played the Beacon, Carnegie Hall, and Avery Fisher Hall, before continuing a two-and-a-half-month, twenty-seven-city tour, which will end in Las Vegas on April 27th.) The panda, Ping Pong, was complaining about being forced to mate with a fellow-panda in order for the zoo to fund a new wing. "I would not fuck her," the panda said, speaking its particular brand of low-key Sino-sarcasm. "I would rather lick my balls than fuck her." The panda was only one of about a hundred characters, including several talking...
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