This week’s episode comes to you from San Francisco’s Sketchfest comedy festival. Hear comedian Paul F. Tompkins as Ice-T in an episode of Cop Squadron: Spoiler Alert Unit and actor Paget Brewster on Eleanor Roosevelt's exercise cassettes. Plus, comedian Eugene Mirman shows us how wreck a party, Loudon Wainwright III fantasizes about Bill and Hillary Clinton making out to one of his songs, and songstress Nellie McKay performs music that is both timely and timeless.
Paul F. Tompkins is one of the most charming, quick-witted and popular comedians on the scene. Tompkins has recorded four stand-up specials for Comedy Central, and hosts the "Speakeasy" web series. Tompkins is an Emmy-nominated writer for “Mr. Show with Bob and David,” and has appeared in movies including “There Will Be Blood” and “the Informant!” His most recent comedy albums include “Freak Wharf” and “Laboring Under Delusions.”
Brooklyn resident Eugene Mirman is known for playing comedian/mobster Yvgeny Mirminsky on Adult Swim’s Delocated and doing the voice of “Gene” on FOX’s hit animated series Bob’s Burgers. In the streets he’s sometimes recognized as Eugene, the landlord, from Flight of the Conchords. On Aqua Teen Hunger Force he’s Dr. Eugene Mirman and on Home Movies he was Eugene, the Russian foreign exchange student. His hour-long Comedy Central special Eugene Mirman: An Evening of Comedy in a Fake Underground Laboratory premiered in December 2012. Eugene was named Best New York City Comedian by the Village Voice and one of the 10 best comedians of the last decade by Paste Magazine. He has released three comedy albums (the last two on Sub Pop records) and an incredibly funny parody-ish self-help book, The Will to Whatevs. Named by Roling Stone as a “Hot Twitterer,” Eugene also keeps his nearly 300k followers entertained daily.
Paget Brewster can be found on Comedy Central’s “Drunk History”, as Special Agent Emily Prentiss on the CBS crime drama “Criminal Minds”, and various voices on “American Dad”, “The Venture Bros.” and “Dan Vs.". Brewster first came to attention in her recurring role as Kathy, Joey’s girlfriend (and later Chandler’s) on NBC’s “Friends.” She was a regular on “Andy Richter Controls The Universe” and starred as Beth Huffstodt in the Showtime series “Huff." Paul and Paget are Thrilling Adventure Hour's Frank and Sadie Doyle.
Hailed by the New Yorker as “funny and touching, ceaselessly clever and scarily talented,” Nellie McKay just finished an extended run in the off-Broadway award-winning hit Old Hats, and has written two acclaimed musical biographies, "Silent Spring: It's Not Nice to Fool Mother Nature" and "I Want to Live!" Nellie produced her critically acclaimed, debut double album Get Away From Me with Beatles' engineer Geoff Emerick, followed by Pretty Little Head, Obligatory Villagers, Normal as Blueberry Pie: A Tribute to Doris Day, ("among the killer overhauls of American standards” - The New York Times), and her latest, Home Sweet Mobile Home. Her music has also been heard on the TV shows Mad Men, Weeds, Grey’s Anatomy, NCIS, Privileged and Nurse Jackie, and Nellie has appeared on numerous TV shows including Late Show with David Letterman (with the Brooklyn Philharmonic), The View, Late Night with Conan O’Brien, Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, Live with Regis & Kelly and CBS Saturday Morning.
Grammy winner Loudon Wainwright III’s recording career started in 1970 and now includes 25 albums. The latest is Older Than My Old Man Now, which employs Wainwright’s unique mix of poignancy and devastating wit to examine aging. Wainwright’s songs have been recorded by Bonnie Raitt, Johnny Cash, Earl Scruggs, Kate & Anna McGarrigle, Rufus Wainwright, and Mose Allison, among others. Also an accomplished actor, Wainwright has appeared in films directed by Martin Scorsese, Hal Ashby, Christopher Guest, Tim Burton, Cameron Crowe, and Judd Apatow, and can next be seen in the independent film Pleased To Meet Me, and a one-man-play entitled Surviving Twin.