Emergent Arts with Theatre Nova to Host 'An Evening with Barry Crimmins,' 10/4

Emergent Arts Theater, as part of their UNclub series, and through the hospitality of Theatre Nova, is proud to present "An Evening with Barry Crimmins" on October 4, 2015 at 8pm at the Yellow Barn, 416 W. Huron St., Ann Arbor, MI 48103. All seats are $15.

Barry's good friend, Bill Hicks, famously recounted on stage his favorite Crimmins joke of the time; "A disgruntled audience member yelled out, "If you don't love America why don't you get out?"

And Barry retorts: "Because I don't want to be a victim of it's foreign policy."

On the heels of his critically acclaimed documentary, "Call Me Lucky," directed by his friend Bobcat Goldthwait and made possible with seed money from Robin Williams, Barry Crimmins has returned to his standup roots in a new North American tour. Seminal Boston comedy club founder in the 70's, Crimmins fostered the careers of such top comedy talent as Steven Wright, Louis CK, Patton Oswalt, Marc Maron, Paula Poundstone, Bobcat Goldthwaite, Kevin Meaney, and many, many others.

In his own words, "Many people seem to be impressed with my story which I am now being asked to tell again here. OK. Why not?

I grew up in Skaneateles, NY. I went on to note as the founder of the Ding Ho Comedy Club in Cambridge (Ma) and Stitches in Boston. I produced shows. I performed in them. I helped many great comics by treating them decently and encouraging originality. Their names are all over the press about the movie. They are in the movie. They are great comics and greater friends.

I have done concert tours with Jackson Browne, Billy Bragg, Dar Williams, Michelle Shocked, Utah Phillips and my dear, dear pals Steven Wright and Bill Morrissey.

I was a close friend and confidante of the late Bill Hicks. He would endorse me had he not been stolen from us so early.

I am noted as a political satirist as well as a political and social activist. I've failed to stop all the major wars -- and the minor ones, too. My career was greatly augmented by the guidance I received from the late Howard Zinn, who was a very dear friend. Even Kurt Vonnegut was kind to, and supportive of, me.

Mobilization for Survival presented me with the Peace Leadership Award in 1991, the year the Gulf Wars began. Noam Chomsky presented it to me. I received the Courage of Conscience Award from the Peace Abbey in Massachusetts on the same day it was presented to Dr. Maya Angelou. Howard Zinn handed me that statue, which is kind of a left-wing Heisman Trophy."

A fierce defender of the little guy from early days, Barry channeled his sometimes off-putting temperament into both his standup and his real life activism.

"I will no longer provide distraction for the American people," he says in one interview in the Reagan era, "because the world is on fire and one of the primary fuels is the ignorance of the American people."

Smashing hypocrisies and bullies made sense for a man who suffered horrific abuse as a child. Barry's gruff, hard-drinking, curmudgeonly persona sprang from what he'd struggled with since the age of four - the relentless rapes that nearly killed him.

At a benefit for the Southern Poverty Law Center, Barry brought the personal into his political act, with the shocking revelation of what he wanted no one else to ever go through.

Barry found that AOL chat rooms were rife with the trafficking of child pornography. After fighting the perpetrators by posing as children online, he took the evidence to AOL, the police and finally, the senate. Barry became responsible for the first pedophile arrests using online evidence.

In the award winning documentary "Call Me Lucky," Barry's attitude of forgiveness and hope is an inspiring one. From celebrated comedians to his local mechanic, stories of others' own battles with the ghosts of past abuse come out. What began as a personal human story deepens into a far reaching clarion call of disclosure and action for all.

Please join us at the Yellow Barn in Ann Arbor for an evening that is sure to be full of laughter, revelation, and insight from a man who has entertained and inspired so many. We are thrilled and honored that this legend of comedy has chosen us to add to his North American tour.

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