“PopSmart NOLA” on WHIV (102.3 FM), Ep. 13: “Arts as Action” edition, with Dana Embree, Stephanie V. McKee & Sunni Patterson, and Paul Oswell & Benjamin Hoffman

Posted on January 22, 2017 by davidleesimmons under radio

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In response to Friday’s (Jan. 20) inauguration, we wanted to take a look at artistic and creative instruction as a response to political and cultural change. Throughout New Orleans and the rest of the country, we’ve seen creative people finding their own voice in terms of protest and action. There’s the New Orleans version of the Women’s March on Washington and the March for Revolution over in Faubourg Marigny. There was Friday’s J20Nola: Anti Trump Inauguration Rally & March. And plenty of other shows that definitely will infuse the night with plenty of protest themes.

So I welcomed a range of guests to this, our “Arts as Action Episode,” to discuss their works — sometimes directly related to the topic, or just because their current work served as a nice jumping-off point.

To that end, we welcomed as our guests:

Director Stephanie V. McKee and poet Sunni Patterson, two of the creative forces behind Junebug Productions’ current show, “Gomela/to return: Movement of Our Mother Tongue,” which opened this weekend over at the Ashé Cultural Arts Center. (Sunni’s work, “Black Back,” opens the show, and I’ve got a video of the entire poem in this post.

Dana Marie Embree, longtime New Orleans-based costume designer for stage and screen and inspirational figure in the very popular, very creative, very artistic and often politically satirical Krewe of ‘tit Rex — which rolls, by the way, on Saturday, Feb. 18. (You can see it if you can crouch low enough.) I pre-recorded our interview so Dana could participate in today’s Women’s March New Orleans.

Paul Oswell and Benjamin Hoffman, co-producers of the weekly “Local Uproar” comedy show at the AllWays Lounge. On Saturday they welcomed Andrew Healan, host of “WHAT A JOKE,” a national comedy festival taking place in 30-plus cities on inauguration weekend to benefit the American Civil Liberties Union — as part of Local Uproar’s weekly show.

SEGMENT ONE: Dana Marie Embree

Dana Marie Embree has parlayed her love of history and dress up into a career, having over 30 years of experience in styling and design for New Orleans, film and television — including costume design credit on several independent films. Embree also studied draping, pattern-making, design techniques at the Fashion Institute of Technology in NY. She reproduces historic costume and fantasy fashion for film and personal clientele. She’s also familiar to many in New Orleans’ cultural community through her work with the Krewe of ’tit Rex, which marches this Carnival season on Saturday, Feb. 18, at 5 p.m. from the St. Roch neighborhood into Faubourg Marigny. Learn more about her work at http://www.danamarieembree.com.

I met with Dana in her Mid-City home, and I asked her to place the election of Donald Trump into her own personal historical context.

SEGMENT TWO: STEPHANIE V. MCKEE AND SUNNI PATTERSON
Our next guests are two of the principals behind a very cool new performance by Junebug Productions — director Stephanie V. McKee and poet Sunni Patterson. They opened their new production, “Gomela/to return: Movement of Our Mother Tongue” over at the Ashé Cultural Arts Center on Thursday and it runs through Jan. 29. It’s an amazing combination of dance, spoken word and music.

Stephanie V. McKee is the executive artistic director of Junebug Productions. She’s a performer, choreographer, educator, facilitator and cultural organizer born in Picayune, Mississippi and raised in New Orleans. She is the founder of Moving Stories Dance Project, an organization committed to dance education that provides opportunities for dancers and choreographers to showcase their talents. In 2007, she was awarded The Academy of Educational Development/New Voices Fellowship, an award for emerging leaders. For the past 20 years Ms. McKee has been involved with Junebug Productions as an artist and educator. Most recently she served as Associate Artistic Director of the first annual Homecoming Project 2011, a place-based performance project that addresses the Right of Return and what home means to communities in post-Katrina New Orleans.

Sunni Patterson hails from New Orleans, and draws upon her local origins, as well as her holistic view on life, to shape her art. She has appeared on HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, performed at major spoken word venues throughout the country, and is a certified instructor of Tai Chi and Qi Gong. Please, please, please watch the video I shot of her reciting her poem, “Black Back” in the preview post I did for PopSmartNOLA.com

Now, I already posted a podcast interview with them on PopSmartNOLA.com that focused more heavily on the show itself, and that post also includes that video of Sunni Patterson and her poem. But for this show, I wanted to focus the conversation more specifically about how artists like McKee (who speaks first here) and Patterson respond creatively under political circumstances like these.

SEGMENT THREE: PAUL OSWELL AND BENJAMIN HOFFMAN
For our final segment for this, I wanted to hopefully end things with a chuckle. And so I welcomed:

Paul Oswell, a New Orleans-based writer, journalist and comedian. He writes for The Guardian US and co-produces two weekly comedy showcases in New Orleans: “Local Uproar” at the AllWays Lounge and “Night Church” at Sidney’s Saloon.

Benjamin Hoffman, a comedian in New Orleans who co-hosts and produces two weekly showcases, Night Church and Local Uproar. Most consider him a sex symbol.

(LEARN MORE: 16 Comedians on the Role of Comedy During a Trump Administration/Vulture)

Together they welcomed Andrew Healan and the touring “What a Joke” comedy festival Saturday the AllWays Lounge, benefiting the American Civil Liberties Union.

(LEARN MORE: Comic Hero: Why Donald Trump’s Candid Rhetoric Resonates With Supporters Listen)

MUSIC
We also got a chance to feature Margie Perez and her new CD, “Love Is All,” which she will feature at her show tonight (Sunday, Jan. 22) at d.b.a. Check it out at the end of the show, and thanks, Margie!

RELEVANT LINK
Last week, I introduced a new segment on “PopSmart NOLA,” and I call it “Relevant Link,” in which I share an interesting story I’ve come across over the past week. I know it’s only a week old, but this week I’d like to divert a little in the interpretation of the title segment and direct you to a link to take action:

Quoting here from an email I received Thursday from the Arts Council of New Orleans: “On the eve of Donald Trump’s Inauguration, The Hill newspaper reported that Trump Transition Team staff intend to recommend that the President-elect eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities as well as privatize the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. This decades-old proposal from the politically conservative Heritage Foundation and House Republican Study Committee is expected to be included in this year’s Congressional House Budget Resolution, as it has in previous years. However, it would be much more serious if it were also proposed by the Trump Administration. Legislative and executive branch action will start moving very quickly now. We need everyone to be prepared, organized, and educated about what’s at stake. Please help us recruit more free Arts Action Fund members, spread the word, and raise some money to support our grassroots activities. The Arts Action Fund will continue sending important updates to you.”

You can take the following four steps, which include links! (Yea, links.)

Share this page with your personal network. Ask at least five of your friends to join the Arts Action Fund for FREE.
Post onFacebook and Twitter to help rally national support to save the NEA. There is strength in numbers and your social media friends can help.
Contribute to the Arts Action Fund to help fund our grassroots advocacy campaign to keep the arts alive.
Register for the Arts Advocacy Dayconference on Capitol Hill on March 20-21, 2017.

OK, I lied. I did have a relevant link. For those intrigued by the Shen Yun performance at the Mahalia Jackson Theater this weekend, I offer this in-depth look at the politics (and seemingly cult-like background) of the New York-based performance troupe — courtesy the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, with this excerpt:

Falun Dafa, often used interchangeably with the term Falun Gong, is the organizational structure behind the practice. Practitioners bristle at being called a cult. But some of their communication strategies carry a strong whiff of cult-like control issues, including avoidance of media requests to explain their side (attempts to reach Shen Yun for this story were unanswered), stringent policing of images that forced the use of a five-year-old Associated Press photo to accompany this story, vague platitudes in lieu of specific descriptions and the assertion that their made-in-America show is a more authentic ambassador of “5,000 years of Chinese culture” than cultural-entertainment exports actually based in China. “The thing that irritates Chinese people everywhere is the specious claim that they’re representing traditional culture,” Ownby said. “They don’t, but they don’t do any harm. I grew up among seven Baptists, and they had strange beliefs, too.”

Interesting stuff. Check out the Relevant Link here.

CLOSING
I want to remind everyone that if you like what you hear on “PopSmart NOLA,” we’re here every Saturday from 3-4 p.m. on WHIV (102.3 FM). You can listen to the archived, podcast version of the show on my SoundCloud account, “dlsnola.” Also, you can visit the website at popsmartnola.com, and like our Facebook page. You can also follow us on Instagram at “@popsmartnola” and I’m yammering away on Twitter at @dlsnola504.

Also, if you like our show, we’d love your support in the form of underwriting; email me at dlsnola@gmail.com for more info.

Thanks again for joining us, y’all. For “PopSmart NOLA,” I’m David Lee Simmons, reminding everyone to keep the intelligent discussion going.

BONUS: Check out Stephanie V. McKee and Sunni Patterson discussing “Gomela” above, and Sunni reciting “Back Black” below!)

5 (hilarious!) questions for Paul Oswell as “Local Uproar” launches into 2017

Posted on January 13, 2017 by davidleesimmons under comedy

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INFO:
“LOCAL UPROAR”
WHAT: Weekly stand-up comedy show from Paul Oswell and Benjamin Hoffman, with New Orleans and touring comics
WHEN: Saturdays (8 p.m.)
WHERE: AllWays Lounge, 2240 St. Claude Ave.
ADMISSION: Free
MORE INFO: Visit the Facebook event page

Over the past decade or so, the comedy scene in New Orleans has enjoyed an amazing growth spurt that might be tracking in line with scenes in other U.S. cities, and the breadth and depth of it can be pretty amazing. On a lark I finally took the chance to sample another one of these: “Local Uproar,” which Paul Oswell and Benjamin Hoffman co-produce for the AllWays Lounge on St. Claude Avenue.

The 2017 debut show on Saturday (Jan. 7) featured a mix of local and touring comics, and a mix in performances as well. Approaches ranged from the absurd (New York City’s Gina Ginsberg) and sardonic (New Orleans’ Alex Luchun) to the subtly subversive (New Orleans’ DC Paul and the hilariously observational (headliner James Hamilton of New York City). (It should be noted DC Pauls’ mother was in the house, and didn’t act too embarrassed by the material.) Oswell hosts the show, deftly dropping in jokes in between sets and keeping the show moving, and Hoffman popped up for a set marked by a likable stoner vibe.

If the show weren’t free (and with free treats from sponsor New Orleans Ice Cream Company, as well as free red beans), you’d think it was still a bargain at most prices. But the goal of the show is to get people into the bar, and while the evening started out modestly enough, by the end, the place was packed — partly because of the popularity of this show and probably from the one following.

Regardless, the 2017 debut offered the opportunity to get Paul Oswell to review the show’s brief history and success, set against the backdrop of a continually growing New Orleans comedy scene.

How’d you get started in comedy, and, by extension, how did “Local Uproar” get started? (Especially against the backdrop of this growing comedy scene.)
I’d been doing long-form one-man shows for the New Orleans Fringe for three years, and someone suggested stand up and I tried to transfer my material and I was pretty awful. I didn’t go up much in the beginning (2014), but the only way to improve is to go up a lot, so I thought a start would be to run an open mic — I always remember some solid advice from Bella Blue: “If you’re not getting booked, produce the show yourself.” Anyway, I looked at what nights didn’t have a show (Saturdays) and what venues had regular slots and would be natural for comedy (The Allways). We started in May 2015. I co-hosted with my friend Tory Gordon and when she moved away after a couple of months, Benjamin Hoffman came on board.

Benjamin Hoffman

It was OK — we had patchy attendance and for open mics, you have to stand by the fact that anyone can go up, so quality was inconsistent. At some point, I thought, this is people’s Saturday night, they (and I) don’t want to sit through very bad comedy, so let’s make it a booked show so we know what we’re putting out. One bad comic can drain the energy for the good comic following them, or people will just leave, so let’s avoid that. We did that about a year or so ago, and we haven’t looked back.

Crowds grew, bigger comedians asked if they could do sets, and now we have bigger names swinging by — they love the venue, and we have a packed, engaged room most Saturday nights, I’d say.

So it’s been an evolving thing, much like the scene itself. Talk about that. In your mind, how and why has New Orleans’ comedy scene become to vibrant and spread out over the past several years? Is this another post-Katrina phenomenon?
People like Leon Blanda and the Henehan brothers (Cassidy and Mickey) have been running comedy shows longer than I’ve lived here — I can’t speak to the early days as I wasn’t there, but the Henehans were there post-Katrina and Leon a couple of years later as I understand it. They laid the foundations and were there to give mic time to people like Mark Normand and Sean Patton. When I started out, the second wave was already in effect, with people like Andrew Polk and Joe Cardosi bringing people from outside New Orleans — touring comics from New York City and Los Angeles — into the scene.

Suddenly Hannibal Buress and Louis CK are dropping into New Orleans mics — and we’re still (to this day) talking about bar shows. There’s no comedy club here in the traditional sense. So I was lucky that other people had done the hard work, and me and Benjamin just kind of slotted in, did our thing and hoped we added to the variety.

A year after “Local Uproar” on Saturdays, we started “Night Church” at Sidney’s Saloon on Thursday nights — another booked show, smaller venue, lower key.

Mark Normand and Sean Patton — local comics who have gone onto great things, just for reference.

How do you book your talent? Just fielding applications on Facebook, or what? And, what do you look for in the talent, and how has your eye/ear for talent improved since starting this?
Our shows are a mix. Firstly, we have trusted locals who go up all the time and are solid comics, week in week out. We have a rotating headlining system, so at some point they can all go up and do longer sets (15-plus minutes). Secondly, we have visiting comics (either touring or on vacation) who come and ask us to go up as they’ve heard good things about us — we’re always open to visiting comics as it gives our shows variety and the regular audience members like that a lot. If they’re bigger names in town for other reasons (Tiffany Haddish springs to mind), we’ll let them headline and promo it. If they’re bigger name touring comics, we’ll think about making it a ticketed show — we’d rather have it be free and give all the tips to comics, but at some level pro comics need a guarantee and if that’s the way we can bring people to New Orleans, that’s how we’ll do it. Benjamin is a much bigger comedy nerd than me (especially for younger US comics) so I take his recommendations mainly. A few weeks ago he bought in Hari Kondabolu who I wasn’t aware of previously and that guy sold out two shows on a Sunday. So Benjamin has a better instinct than me!

DC Paul

Last year we also bought in Joe DeRosa and, Shane Mauss and Billy Wayne Davis for ticketed shows. Sometimes they’re just in town on vacation and they approach us, or if they’re touring and passing through, say, Lafayette, their agents will approach us about adding a date. This year, we have Emo Phillips coming in (in June) And I couldn’t be more excited. We don’t earn much money doing this — we try and cover our marketing costs and pay the comics what little we can (a free show depends on bar splits and tips — we may get $100 on a good night total). This is very important: our great sponsors, New Orleans Ice Cream Company — make it easier for us. They not only sponsor us but they also provide ice cream, which we give away at every show — a big draw for us and we’d have less people without them.

When you’re not hosting and performing, where do you like to go for your yucks?
My favorite shows are many: weekly shows include “Comedy Beast” at The Howlin’ Wolf, “Comedy F*ck Yeah” at Dragon’s Den, “Bear With Me” at Twelve Mile Limit, “Comedy Catastrophe” at the Lost Love Lounge.

Some great monthly shows: “The Rip Off Show” at the Hi-Ho Lounge, “I’m Listening” at the VooDoo Lounge, “Stoked” The at Howlin’ Wolf.

There are so many now, I created a website for listings and occasional news: www.nocomedy.com.

I’m still trying to figure out how comedy became a “thing” in New Orleans. Was it just a matter of a few folks you mentioned previously lighting the fuse? It reminds me of the burlesque renaissance, which obviously is different and had been doing OK for several years (let’s say 1996-2005) but got really big after Katrina.

James Hamilton

I mean, I’d imagine that stand up comedy has grown in every city, but the scene in New Orleans and the respect it gets from very good professional comics, is down to those people I mentioned — not only lighting the fuse, but making sure it stays lit. Stand-up comedy production is a grind — you have to be there week in week out whether it’s a crowd of two people (and we’ve done shows like that) or a full room. Stand-up comedy is showing up, it’s providing a regular spot and doing it in as professional a way as you can to make sure that the audience and the performers have a good time.

The Henehans and Blanda and Polk all worked the coal face, committed themselves to creating a scene with weekly booked shows and open mics, performing and producing even to five people on a rainy Wednesday, and I hope we’re part of the growing scene. They had people like Louis CK and Doug Stanhope and Bill Burr drop in — in the last few weeks we’ve had Sasheer Zamata (from “SNL”) and Hannibal Buress just swing by and do time at our shows, and I think it speaks well of the local scene, and to the people that put in the real work creating it. I feel like Benjamin and I are part of its maintenance, and hopefully part of its further growth. A real change would be for someone to open a downtown comedy club and it would be a risk but it’s a wide-open niche right now.

What’s the rush for you as a comic? What do you dig about it?
It’s an immediacy thing. Instant validation — laughter (or no laughter) is an immediate assessment of your material AND how you’re presenting it. It’s a challenge to match the material chosen and the way you present it to match the room you’re up at. I like that a lot. That said, I know my limitations as a comic and I’m not even top 20 in New Orleans. I’m OK with that, and though I do like the very clear ways in which I’m so much better than I was in 2014, I also think I’m better as a producer and host and that’s more my comfort zone. But I love being around very funny and talented people two or three nights a week and the mutual support our small scene affords itself. There are very few ego-driven spats, people are broadly happy when anyone advances their careers.