Serious about comedy.

 

Home

About Jester

Sketch & Solo Performances

Improv Performances

Film & TV

The Jester Interviews

Jester's Blog

Book reviews

Favorite links

Follow jestershash on Twitter

Facebook

 

The Brothers Not-So-Grimm

The Sklars take advantage of twin-hood to add dimensions to their stand-up

Photo by Pamela Littky

The Sklar Brothers, twins who have performed stand-up comedy together for many years, and seen at Comix July 16, truly entertain with a rapid-fire succession of short bits including a generous helping of pop culture observations.

Randy and Jason have something of a mind-meld going – finishing each other’s sentences at times, talking over each other competitively at others, but all at the service of their collective material. The brothers also give each other comedic punctuation in some of their pieces, as in a long story mocking Andrew “Dice” Clay where they alternated on an impersonation – with one delivering a typical “Dice” line and the other finishing it with a “Dice”-like “Oaoh!”

Their alternating delivery is also effective at giving a unique dimension to other pieces. In one, they recount a “ripped from the headlines” story of another set of male twins, one of whom had a botched circumcision as a baby. His parents and doctors agreed to raise him as a girl, for more than 10 years, until they realized what a terrible mistake that was, after the boy was picked on constantly. The Sklars’ take is that it would be worse to be the healthy twin – because then you can never complain about anything. Playing out this hypothetical, Randy complains about having to wait in a long line at the bank, and Jason says, “Oh, you had to wait a long time for something, huh? I remember having to wait a long time for something too – having my penis reconstructed – that was a long wait!”

These were actually a couple of the – pardon the phrasing – longer bits of the show. The Sklars tallied, at my count, 22 separate fully formed pieces in an hour-long show, hitting on the aforementioned pop culture topics like the Kardashians, the documentary TV series “Hoarders,” Arnold Schwarzenegger potentially going back to action movies, and Pizza Hut commercials. In these and others, the Sklars love to launch into hypothetical scenarios to drive home their points – like imagining what some of Arnold’s catchphrases could be in movies now, or playing out other ways Pizza Hut’s hidden camera crews would deceive Italians into thinking their pasta was homemade and that good.

A few of the pieces were quick and to the point, while others found the Sklars reveling in the topic at hand. Both are fathers, and they describe re-encountering nursery rhymes now, and realizing how absurd they are. The Sklars had fun with this one, riffing on a few different tales, including “Jack and the Beanstalk” and “Snow White.” All together, they kept a constant pace, whether the pieces were short or long, and work together so intimately and innately, all at the service of a distinct comic vision.

The Sklar Brothers perform again twice tonight, Saturday, July 17 at Comix.

 

   

     

Custom Search

                                                                  Feedback? Email shashouamedia@gmail.com or michael.shashoua@jesterjournal.com.

                                                                                     © 2005-2018 Michael Shashoua