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"FUNNY & MIND-EXPANDING!"
LA Weekly

Beth weaves story, home-spun philosophy and big ideas into an unforgettable evening of inspirational comedy.

BETH NOT METH!!

The LA Gay & Lesbian Center's Lily Tomlin/Jane Wagner Cultural Arts Center Presents:

"100% HAPPY 88% OF THE TIME"
One night only
SATURDAY, JANUARY 9 at 8 PM
The Renberg Theatre
1125 N. McCadden Place
Hollywood 90038

Net Proceeds Benefit The LA Gay and Lesbian Center's Baby Dragon Fund for Meth Counseling and Mental Health. Tickets only $20. Reservations 323-860-7300 or click here for tickets

There's still plenty of time to get your creative work on track before the end of the year. There are 2 more classes of The Comedian's Way Workshop in December. Get onstage at M-Bar in Hollywood where you can work on your shows, performance, pitches, patter - or change your patterning.

Work with comedy guru Beth Lapides and me to supercharge your creativity. Or give a really meaningful gift to a creative friend!

SUNDAYS, DECEMBER 6 & 13, JANUARY 10, 17, 24, 31, FEBRUARY 7, 21, 28 1-4pm at M-Bar, 1253 N. Vine 90038

Single classes $60
Any 2 classes $110
Any 4 classes $200

SUPER SPECIAL HOLIDAY SALE - Only guaranteed until the end of 2009. Commit to your creativity and get any 10 classes for $400 or any 30 classes for $1000 (that's just $33 each!).

The Comedian's Way workshop for Writers, Performers & Other Humans is the place to develop your authentic voice and deepest material for one-person shows, personal essays, books, scripts, blogs, or just to have a better attitude about life.

There are written descriptions of the workshop on Beth's site and also here on the Un-Cabaret website, but here's a pretty coherent and entertaining video description of what exactly happens and what you can expect from the workshop.

"ABOVE & BEYOND" (The New Yorker)

Beth Lapides' Un-Cabaret pretty much launched the modern comedy storytelling movement which gave birth to Afterbirth, Mortified, Sit n Spin, The Moth, Say the Word, etc. Before that, Beth was a pretty famous performance artist who toured her solo shows all over the world. Now she returns to her roots with a brilliant new show called "100% Happy 88% of the Time".

"A BREATH OF FRESH AIR!" (Whole Life Times)

"A MASTER COMEDIENNE... SMART & FUNNY" (Los Angeles Times)

What happens when a piece of material gets stale? How do you keep the audience - and yourself - interested?

Get some great advice about how to keep your material fresh, find the material that will stay fresh the longest, and tips on integrating this freshening practice into your creative process and your life in this inspiring rap from Beth Lapides at The Comedian's Way workshop.

Audit, register for a single class or get discounts on multiple classes. Upcoming classes: Sunday, Oct. 4 & 18, 1-4pm at M-Bar, 1253 N. Vine St. LA 90038.

Click here for more info about The Comedian's Way workshop or call 323-993-3305.

btw, this video was taken with the new Flip UltraHD Camcorder. Yes, the HD takes a long time to process and upload video, but the resolution and color are way advanced, the camera now holds up to 2 hours of video (instead of the previous version's 1 hour capacity), the sound is a lot clearer and, most importantly, it has retained virtually all its cuteness.

Beth always starts our workshop sessions with a rap about creative process. Here she talks about finding the right context for your work - and how you have to translate a particular piece of material when you adapt it to a different medium or context.

She couldn't do the kind of personal intimate storytelling that she wanted to do in the mainstream comedy clubs and that's why we started Un-Cabaret to begin with.

Click here for more info about The Comedian's Way workshop.

Media critic Virginia Heffernan wrote a column recently about rants in the New York Times, but she completely omitted the comedy rant as a category.

A funny rant is a great comedy technique. It was pioneered (I think) by Lenny Bruce and subsequently practiced by other (usually) angry (often) young (almost always) men including Sam Kinison, Bill Hicks (who actually had an album called Rant in E Minor), Chris Rock, Dennis Miller, George Carlin and Lewis Black. Roseanne did some ranting, but it's a harder form for women to pull off because, let's face it, our culture by and large still likes its women nice and easy, not rough.

The Un-Cabaret has featured some impressive comedy rants by brilliant boys like Patton Oswalt, Bob Odenkirk, Taylor Negron and others. (You can hear some great rants on the Un-Cabaret CDs.) It has also provided a forum for some great female ranters like Margaret Cho and Kathy Griffin. Here are two for your listening pleasure:

I always feel a little silly getting technical and medical and serious about the healing power of laughter.

But with the health care crisis reaching epidemic proportions and people freaking out about the state of the world, feeling a little silly is a small price to pay. In fact feeling silly is The Comedian's Way.

So here are the very serious facts about laughing.

1. People who laugh habitually are 40% less likely to have a heart attack. If you'd like to develop the skills to laugh more habitually and not just when you go to a Judd Apatow movie,  click here.

2. Laughing impacts how well your blood vessels expand. The better they expand, the lower your chances are for not just a heart attack but also a stroke.

Our wildly-effective workshop, formerly known as the Un-Cab Lab, has evolved into something we now call THE COMEDIANS WAY. 

It's a place to develop your writing & performance skills.
To find yourself and your authentic voice.
To tell your story.
To develop your 7th sense - your sense of humor.
To discover your own personal organic comedy style.
To define a funnier, more compelling, more marketable point-of-view that you can use in meetings, pitches, presentations, shows, books, blogs or just to have a better attitude in life.

Follow the path walked by Julia Sweeney, Patton Oswalt, Margaret Cho, Laura Kightlinger, Michael Patrick King, Merrill Markoe and so many other great comedians at the Un-Cabaret. Take the 'ow' out of Now and take your own fool's journey when you learn to live The Comedian's Way with alternative comedy guru Beth Lapides and me, her partner Greg Miller.