Friday, July 31, 2020

Live From _______________It's _____________Night (213)

Some days you wake up and it all seems like one giant comedy sketch. A replay of previous shenanigans. A slightly different script but the same ol’ punch line. It feels like there is a laugh-track following me around. The snickers and cackles bellowing out as I read the news. Loud applause as I try to fall asleep. It’s an endless ruckus.

The Ready for Primetime players, a wacky cast of characters seems to be in charge these days: making decisions, setting plans in motion no one wants. It’s the terrifying merge of dark comedy and absurdity. Slapstick behavior, irrational speech, people trying too hard to make the script work for them, anything for the laugh, acting for the words- not the other way around.

Stage directions keep the programming broadcasting, but the endless limerick of selfish minds is barely bringing the audience to attention. Distraction, disappointment, the sudden urge to dim the lights and empty the stage is raging. Yet, the show must go on. Scripts are being written like an assembly line of typewriters, click, click, clicking away into the void.

Every now and then a famous face will appear, great music, familiar themes, and actions. The audience refocuses, searching for the moment when something will be funny. Something will make the cost of admission worth it. But, the same ol’ characters, the same ol’ story, the same ol’ props and lighting. What is the purpose of a comedy sketch show if it isn’t funny?

Yet our tickets, they were not voluntary seating- they were mandatory. We are stuck on an instant replay setting and we must rewatch, relisten. Eyes trying so desperately to avert to normalcy. But the laugh track keeps playing and the lights keep rising, starting another sketch. We, always looking, hoping for a change of scenery, a new stage, a new setting.

Then we hear…. Live from ____________________ it’s _________________night. And the cycle begins again.

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