Review: RITA RUDNER Brings Glitter and Guffaws To 54 Below

There’s something unusual happening at 54 Below this weekend.   It’s not completely and totally unheard of, but it is unusual.   There’s some stand-up comedy happening in Broadway’s Living Room.  Usually, the Midtown Manhattan nightclub plays host to music acts.  There have been some storytelling shows, and there has been some stand-up comedy, but most of the time, it’s music, music, music.  In the opinion of this writer, there should be more storytellers and comics on this stage because the spoken word is extremely important, the art form of talking for entertainment and conversation is valid and valuable, and the artists who have mastered the skill need places to showcase it.  It would also open the doors of 54 to a wider audience, one that seeks out the pundits and poets.  Comedy clubs have closed, and storytellers are sought out in group shows and coffee shops.  Let the people talk, and let them be heard.

This week, one of the greatest talkers of all time is in The Basement, and last night she opened her two-night set of shows, the second playing tonight at 7 pm (tickets are HERE).  There is no title to the show, simply a name, a famous name synonymous with the words comedy, laughter, and originality.   The name is Rita Rudner.

Rita Rudner can be read about online, so this writer is not about to give a history of her extensive credits (which are worth reading about online, by the way) - instead, I want to just talk about her show, talk about her talent, and talk about the joy of seeing her perform live.  We can all see bits and pieces of Miss Rudner’s acts over the years with a mere YouTube search, but it doesn’t do the Lady justice.  Like singers or dancers, comedians have a style all their own (if they are lucky and smart), and seeing them live and in person gives one the same thrill of excitement as seeing our favorite music acts.  Rita Rudner doesn’t just have a style all her own; she has a style so original that it cannot be duplicated.  No other comic would dare attempt the dry delivery, the surprise one-liners, the succinct lilt of the vocal timbre, the nearly deadpan facial expression - it is, all of it, unique to the woman who invented it.  As many comics will tell you, this is an act, and they are creating a persona on the stage.  Miss Rudner has created her character out of herself and created her act out of her life, but it is a character, and nobody else can present it in the way that she does.  Seeing that presentation live is like being in the room with a great work of art, to see it in person, and at last night’s first performance, Miss Rudner had the audience in the palm of her delicate but strong hands.

Rita Rudner’s act is built around three things - her life, her opinions, and the state of the world…  not politics, which has never been a particular viewpoint of Rita Rudner’s, but the everyday things that affect us all.  Not to give away any spoilers, but there is plenty of hilarity in this comedy show that arises out of things we all encounter in our daily life - things like tech (think televisions and telephones), things like customer service (think support lines and outsourcing), things like modern-day conveniences that aren’t so convenient (think GPS and worrisome verbiage).  The room last night was filled not only with laughter but nodding heads, as Rita Rudner expressed in ways better than we all could, many things that frustrate us, day in and day out.  The comedy act was not only accessible, it was relatable, and it was always humorous, thanks not only to the delivery of the lines but the writing of the monologue.   It was also accessible because of Rita Rudner’s mistressful ability with crowd work.   For one hour and fifteen minutes, the comedy veteran walked to the audience, making sure to never leave one of the three sides looking for too long at her profile or her back.  Traversing the entire length of the stage for those seventy-five minutes, Miss Rudner talked to the people, asking questions, remembering names, circling back around with names and with punchlines to stories that had been told ten or fifteen or twenty minutes earlier.  The flow of the show was expertly executed, naturally, given the longevity of Rita Rudner’s expertise at comedy - hers is one of the names that the industry has (thankfully!) never lost.  

On the subject of a comedian’s longevity, there are jokes and stories in Miss Rudner’s act that we’ve heard before, and well there should be.  Comedians have been blissfully repeating routines for years because these bits are a part of their act.  Just like you want to hear Betty Buckley sing “Memory” and Andrea McArdle sing “Tomorrow” when you go to see their shows, you want to hear Margaret Cho talk about her mother and Rita Rudner talk about her husband.  These are a comedian’s “greatest hits,” and getting to hear them live is like getting a moment with an old friend.  But there is a lot of material in Rita Rudner’s show that this comedy fan (and Rudner fan) hadn’t heard before.  Indeed, during a brief Q&A after the performance, Miss Rudner answered a question about her process by explaining that she will do her sure-thing material at a show, slipping in new jokes to see if they work, and if they don’t, out they go.  The Q&A was a fun thing to do because it gave us a chance to meet Rita Rudner, the woman, and get to know her a little, after enjoying Rita Rudner, the character, for such a generous amount of time, and in the intimacy of 54 Below, those final moments with the most elegant woman in comedy were a special treat for all.

And special treat is a great way to describe what is happening at 54 Below this weekend.  Having spent a lot of the last two decades in Las Vegas (read about it online), having this comedy great come to our fair city to share her stylings with us is a wonderful thing.  Here’s hoping she comes back, and here’s hoping some of her colleagues from the entertainment world of oration will find their way to The Basement, as well.  They would all be most welcome.

See Rita Rudner tonight at 7 pm.  Get tickets HERE.

Visit the Rita Runder website HERE.

Photos by Stephen Mosher