WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif., Oct. 14, 2001– Tim Allen, who began his showbiz career as a stand-up comic, showed he hasn’t missed a beat of the pitch-perfect timing or the everyday-guy sensibility that made him a mega-successful star of film and television as he took the stage at L.A.’s legendary comedy club the Laugh Factory for a show benefiting the Hollywood Wilshire YMCA and the YMCA of New York’s Tragedy Response Fund.
“I have no act,” Allen–who occassionally had to be prompted on the next bit by his entourage–told the room filled with top Industry talent brokers, Los Angeles politicos,
Y boosters and VIPs like his former Home Improvement co-star Patricia Richardson. “I sold it to ABC for $7 billion. With the market today, that’s worth about eleven bucks.”
Still, the comedian managed to have the crowd whooping with laughter with bits on the data overload on the MSNBC TV screen, losing eight inches of his colon to diverticulitis (“You can buy it on eBay right now, but make sure to get the autographed section”) and middle-age medical exams (“At a certain point, everything I’m tested for is in my butt”).
I chatted with Allen before the show, asking the superstar if he thought audiences–even the jaded crowd waiting for him in the main room–were looking to get out and laugh given the current state of affairs in the nation. “I hope they want to laugh,” Allen told me. “Otherwise they’re gonna start throwing food at the stage.” Of course, it didn’t hurt that some choice swag was being raffled off, such as Cartier watches and trips to New York and Hawaii. And there were goodie bags filled with Allen’s signature hammers and a bottle of merlot–both fine if you want to get hammered.
Allen added that he and his professional partner Laura Deibel have been longtime supporters of the Hollywood Y, which has provided health, fitness and counseling services to young people since 1914. He added that he’s never afraid to tap his friends for support, because the Y’s services, which include the “Brighter Future” transitional housing program for single women and single-mom families and the Hollywood Counseling Center that provides therapy for troubled youths, are so vital.
That doesn’t mean the YMCA was immune from a little good-natured ribbing: “Nothin’ like seeing naked men laying in those vinyl chairs in the men’s locker room,” he quipped.
Allen also revealed how the Sept. 11 attacks had affected him professionally, causing the release of his latest film Big Trouble to be delayed due to a sequence in which a nuclear device is smuggled onboard a commercial jet. “I give a lot of credit to Disney,” said Allen, who praised the studio behind the film for being sensitive to the times and being willing to take a major hit financially by delaying the release.
And while the comedian agrees it was the right thing to do, he also thinks that the film, which doesn’t have any major parallels to the real-life tragedy, is ready for release and shouldn’t offend or disturb audiences in the slightest. “There’s really no problem with it,” he said.
The show, hosted by actor John Reilly, also featured such comedy all-stars as Bob Saget, who tweaked his familiar, non-edgy image on Full House with a very racy–but funny–routine. Defending his choice to host the admittedly lowbrow series America’s Funniest Home Videos, he put it plainly: “I bought my parents a house and a car. I had three little rich-bitch daughters to put through school….Nobody got hurt. Except for the [people] who got hit in the balls.”
Veteran stand-up Richard Jeni (The Mask) blew the crowd away with wickedly funny and insightful riffs on the fallout from the Sept. 11 attacks (“If there’s two things I’m against, it’s racial profiling and Arabs flying on my plane”), while Lowell Sanders had some inspired takes on topics like rapper Eminem (“Remember when rap was black? Remember when golf was white? Remember when breasts were real?”). Blake Clark compared his Southern upbringing to his service in Vietnam (“I had flashbacks. In Vietnam.”) and John Caponera tickled the audience with a delightfully silly routine on various stupid ways to die.
