Review of 11-11-1995 episode (MD-105) ========================================================================== Conference Call: Woman (Nicole Sullivan) places a conference call between her, her brother (Bryan Callen), and her parents (Mary Scheer, Artie Lange). The parents are totally befuddled, and they don't seem to understand that one of their children is in Florida and the other is in Toronto. In the end, the woman can't make another call because her mother didn't hang up the phone. This was OK, though not especially funny. The cast performances were pretty good. Opening Segment: The cast wants to pay tribute to the Mad TV cameramen, who then come out from behind the cameras so they can be on TV, but there's nobody left to man the cameras, so all we see are their butts and legs. This was somewhat funny, though not as funny as the previous opening segments. Interesting is that Dave Herman is wearing that coonskin cap. IZM-Paris: Two gay guys in a gay bar are talking about computers - or are they? When Herman says "I like my internal drive hard," he puts his hand suggestively on the other man's thigh. The show kicks into high gear with this excellent commercial parody. (You remember those IBM commercials where they would show people talking in foreign languages, and interestingly enough, all their conversations dealt with IBM products - right?) Once again, Mad TV uses location filming with excellent results, and this parody is easily as good as the SNL commercial parodies or even better. Also in a sense they are giving equal time here, because in MD-102 they did a parody of PowerBook, Apple's notebook computers, and here they are parodying IBM. Krishna Rock: A Hare Krishna (Dave Herman) who performs at an airport with a group of Krishnas (Orlando Jones, Mary Scheer, Artie Lange, Orlando Jones) wants to leave the group and go commercial, inspired by his girlfriend (Nicole Sullivan), but is then forced to rejoin the group when his girlfriend cancels plans to go on tour with him because she was promoted to manager of a donut shop. Definitely not a candidate for "Best of Mad," (at least not in my opinion), but still a decent sketch and competently executed by the cast. Lowered Expectations (Louise): Mary Scheer plays Louise, the prototypical "older woman" (not unlike Dixie Wetsworth) who mentions as one of her dislikes "men who fall asleep inside of me." This was about average for Lowered Expectations segments. Urine Monologue: This is Artie Lange's third monologue. His monologue (about fishing) is interrupted by Debra Wilson coming onto the set to give him a glass of liquid refreshment, which, as you might have guessed by now, is urine. She then points out that urine is actually quite enriching (full of electrolytes, etc.) and Lange agrees that the urine is good. Although some viewers might find this a bit scatalogical, I give it a thumbs up - it's still not as good as Lange's first monologue (ironic here that like the masturbation monologue, this one also deals with a penile function), but it's somewhat better than the second one. Lange was at his best on Mad TV when he was allowed to be a comedian rather than an actor (at least in my opinion), and this is a good example. Affirmative Crips: Janet Reno (Mary Scheer) forces an L.A. street gang to enlist white people - like some dorky people, senior citizens and a cripple. Though Scheer's Reno is not that authentic (maybe they should have gotten one of the male cast members to do it), this sketch is pretty good, especially when Justice Clarence Thomas (Orlando Jones?) comes out and warns us that affirmative action, if allowed to continue, will "cripple the Crips." Got Urine?: This is a parody of those "Got Milk?" commercials. A man (Orlando Jones) hands a urine sample to a nurse (Nicole Sullivan), who then locks it in a cabinet. He eats a cookie, and then close shots of the man looking as if he wants something with which to wash down the cookie are interspersed with nature scenes of the desert, etc. suggesting aridity. At the very end, we get a close-up of the lock on the cabinet where the urine sample was placed, and the words "Got Urine?" appear on the screen. I thought this was pretty funny, especially the way they edited this one together MTV-style just like real commercials are done. And after seeing the urine monologue only a few minutes earlier, this is all the funnier. Don Martin - Beach Shovel: Man gets sand dumped on him by bully at beach, so he works out, gets really big, and returns to the beach - only to have sand dumped on him by the bully with a mechanized shovel. This is much like the Monty Python cartoon in which the nerd is tired of being intimidated by bullies at the beach, so he orders the Charles Atlas book, gets really big, but then the bully blows him up with an anti-tank gun. The Monty Python segment originally aired in 1969; this cartoon aired in 1995, but some (perhaps most or even all) of these Don Martin bits were based on old cartoons which appeared in "Mad" so I don't know which came first, the Python segment or the Don Martin bit. By the way, this was pretty good. Larry King Gone Mad: Larry King (Dave Herman) crashes a party and bores the guests and others (Mary Scheer, Nicole Sullivan, Artie Lange) with lame little quips which sound like they could have come from King's equally-lame USA Today column. (E.g.: "John Tesh's new CD is going to make him a household name.") I think this predates SNL's Larry King parody (although I'm not sure), and though King has been around so long the idea of parodying him in not that original (in fact, I think Howard Stern did a Larry King parody on his short-lived WWOR series), but I liked this sketch. Lowered Expectations - Hank: A redneck (Artie Lange) outlines his dream date (which includes going down to the municipal dump and shooting rats). This was OK. IZM-Torture: My first reaction when I rescreened this was "Wow, was IBM pushing OS/2 as recently as 1995?" But then I remembered that in 1995, IBM had just released OS/2 Warp (OS/2 version 3.0); hence the parody OX/2 Corp! What we get here is two torturers discussing what kind of operating system to use for their data processing needs, all while their victim (Dave Herman) writhes in pain. This was even funnier than the first IZM segment, in my opinion! Watching them put the electrodes on this guy and flick the switch was a joy. When Harry Met Willy: It's a cross between "When Harry Met Sally" and "Free Willy" - in other words, a movie parody in the tradition of "Gump Fiction," only here the humor is far less successful. Sure, Phil LaMarr (that is LaMarr, right?) does a pretty good Billy Crystal impression, but I just didn't find this segment to be that funny - like all the early movie parodies, it has good production values, which works in its favor, but somehow this one just falls short - maybe it's because in spite of the fact that it's supposed to be funny because they substituted a whale for the woman, but the references to her being a whale are so thin that it might as well be Meg Ryan there. A rare occassion, an early Mad TV segment that misfires. Lowered Expectations - Patty: Patty (Nicole Sullivan) is a college student, and in my day, we would have called her part of the "God Squad" because she is really religious. Her turn-offs include premarital sex and negroes (just the fact that she uses the phrase "negroes" probably indicates that she is living in another time). Well-acted by Ms. Sullivan and overall a very good segment. Midnight Golfer: Office worker (Bryan Callen) is discussing another worker (Artie Lange) with one of his cohorts (Phil LaMarr). Callen makes all kind of innuendoes about Lange (e.g., he's a midnight golfer; he has a license to farm in the city); LaMarr doesn't understand him. Then Lange comes over and thanks Callen for complimenting him. But when LaMarr says that he has all his lamps in one submarine, Lange retorts with "are you calling me gay?" This is much funnier than it sounds; in fact it is quite hilarious, especially Callen's delivery, which invites the viewer to try to find the hidden meaning in all of his suggestive remarks. Mad TV producers, don't ever get rid of this guy! (Oops, I forgot - you already did.) Don Martin - Beach: This time, the wussy-looking guy gets the better of the beach bully by pulling on his face. Good enough for me. Jeremy (Death Row): A death row inmate (Bryan Callen) breaks up with his girlfriend (Mary Scheer) because he doesn't see things working out long term. This was OK; not hilarious but well-executed by Callen and Scheer. Phone Calls: A homeboy (Orlando Jones) and a Valley girl (Nicole Sullivan) are having two separate conversations on pay phones; they are both describing how they broke up with their respective fiancees but the lingo is very different; therein lies the humor in this sketch. I vaguely remember seeing something similar on a short-lived sketch comedy series called "The Newz" (which also debuted in 1995, although I think it was cancelled before Mad TV first aired), but I'm not sure. This was pretty good; interesting how well Sullivan pulls off the performance (after this, we can truly consider this New Yorker "bicoastal"). Lowered Expectations - Jeremy: Jeremy (Bryan Callen) is back for a Lowered Expectations segment. No smokers, please. This was about as good as the first Lowered Expectations segment with Patty. IZM-Drug Deal: This time we have two businessmen (Phil LaMarr, Artie Lange) speaking in English (unlike the real IBM commercials), but although they are talking about computers with multitasking capabilities and easy access to the Internet, the captions describe an illegal drug transaction. This in my opinion was not as funny as the first two IZM segments but was still OK. Celibacy: Debra Wilson talks about how she's been celibate for four years; Bryan Callen comes out to congratulate her and gives her a hug, and she rubs her crotch against his groin just to get off. This was pretty funny, especially the way Wilson rolls her eyes just as she "climaxes." Backstage: One critic once said that the success of the Broadway musical "Cats" can be attributed to the fact that a certain proporation of the U.S. population is stupid. While I tend to agree with this analysis, you don't have to in order to find this parody funny (it involves three cast members of "Cats" [Nicole Sullivan, Mary Scheer, Bryan Callen] rehearsing backstage). Apparently, the Nicole Sullivan character is going out with another cast member, Dan (Bryan Callen), but the Mary Scheer character slept with Callen; hence, the three fight amongst themselves while rehearsing (e.g., "claws and retract; claws and retract"). Again probably not "Best of Mad" material (well, if this were the Hall of Fame, it wouldn't get in on the first ballot, anyway), but a good sketch nonetheless. Spy vs, Spy - Sunglasses: The white spy glues pictures of a bikini-clad chick to the black spy's sunglasses to get him to run into a pole. This was good. Closing Segment: The cast of Mad TV pay homage to the sound crew, and of course the sound goes dead. An acceptable and thematic conclusion. ========================================================================== In conclusion, MD-105 is a strong show - not in my opinion as good as the first four but there's still many notable segments like the IBM parodies and the two monologues. There's a few disappointments like "When Harry Met Willy," but most of the show is good and, most notably, we get a number of excellent one-off segments and the show doesn't have to rely on recurring characters because there are none in this episode - if only the show in its present incarnation could do the same. (7/10)