Alex House

Comedian Alex House said if she shortened her name like J. Lo., she would be A. Ho. House has appeared on "The View" and "Last Comic Standing." The Mirror got a chance to catch up with House before her performance this Thursday in the lower level of the BCC.

The Mirror: One of your influences was Eddie Murphy as Buckwheat. Who are some of your other idols and influences?

Alex House: Carol Burnett from "The Carol Burnett Show," anyone, actually from "The Carol Burnett Show"; Tim Conway; Harvey Corman. My first comedic experience was Bill Cosby. Later in junior high school it was Eddie Murphy, which I know is the complete opposite spectrum [laughs].

TM: How does an art education major end up doing stand-up?

AH: [laughs] Good question! Let's see. I grew up without a TV in my house and my brother and I were constantly trying to entertain each other because we didn't have a box to do that. Laughter was a big part of my family. I don't know, it just always was. I completed a degree in art so I would have something to fall back on, but I knew by the time I graduated that I wanted to do stand-up comedy full time.

TM: You've performed at a number of comedy clubs around the U.S. What's your favorite?

AH: Favorite clubs. Well, I have a new one actually, in New York City, it's brand new; it's called Comix Comedy Club. I like them because they're very professional. They treat a comic with respect. They just make you feel important, as opposed to, unfortunately, a lot of comedy clubs nowadays. The comedian is the last person that they think about, even though it's the reason why they're in business.

TM: How was the audition process for "Last Comic Standing"?

AH: I think we got one or two minutes in front of two guys who just sat behind a table and it was at 10 in the morning and they were very stoic; they hardly showed any response whatsoever. It was just a very unusual circumstance for stand-up comedy because usually you're performing late at night to a bunch of drunks who are ready to laugh.
- The Mirror - Fairfield University

Comedian Alex House helped the students get a good start on their weekend. House was one of the activities held for Weekend Activities and Games.
She has performed on Comedy Central's Last Comic Standing, and has been a three-time nominee of Best Comedians among College Campus'. After the comedian students had the chance to perform some of their own routines. Although no students performed, everyone still enjoyed House's routine.
"I encourage you to look for humor," she said. "Do what you want, laugh a lot, and have fun."
The New York native's material for the presentation included jokes about the drive over from Lubbock to Portales. She commented about how Ground Zero looked like the coffee shop on the sitcom Friends. More material included humor about her Irish Catholic upbringing.
"I have been involved in comedy for 10 years," she said. What really impressed her was the student response. Especially the response of Super Senior DeRon Broughton, she commented his laugh sounded like a girl's.
"She had good punch lines, and I thought it was funny when she hit herself in the head." Broughton said. He believes the WAG is good for students since it gives them a chance to do something over the weekend.
WAG has been going on for the last three years according to Chalise Baker the coordinator of WAG. The activities this semester have been really popular due to the atmosphere and the attendance.
"It helps people to get involved, another reason to get involved whether helping or attending," Baker said.
The best response from the comedian was the students. Students like Terrance Orgain a Sophomore enjoyed the comedian because of her humor.
"It was amazing I had a good laugh from it," Orgain said. "DeRon made me laugh the most."
Sean Evans a Senior enjoyed her unique perspective and different sense of humor.
"Her routine was good she did not use profanity in her jokes," Evans said. "She mentioned her family upbringing, some comedians have used the same old material."
The last piece of advice House offers to the students of the campus is to follow what they feel passionate about doing.
- Eastern New Mexico University

“COMEDY,” Steve Martin famously said, “is not pretty.”

That was never more in evidence than on Sunset Boulevard last week, where Paul Rodriguez, a comedian, was loudly debating a homeless pedestrian outside the Laugh Factory about a certain racial epithet.

“Calling it ‘the “n” word,’ that’s childish, Romper Room,” said Mr. Rodriguez, bristling at the radio hosts, politicians and newly chastened comedians who have reduced the noxious epithet to its first letter when discussing it.

“N-this, n-that, I don’t care if you use it or not,” shouted the passer-by, an African-American dressed in a hooded sweatshirt who declined to give his name but said he was 36 years old. “This is about you and me getting the same bank loan as him,” he said, while pointing at a white bystander. “I want justice. I don’t want to be sleeping on the street.”

It was more than a week after the infamous Nov. 17 meltdown by Michael Richards during what was supposed to be a comedy act at the Laugh Factory. Mr. Richards, the former “Seinfeld” co-star, repeatedly shouted the epithet at a black heckler, and his tirade was caught on a video cellphone and quickly disseminated across the Internet.

The impromptu and passionate street debate in front of the club last week seemed suddenly normal in Los Angeles, where most anywhere that comedians have gathered, a kind of town hall discussion has spontaneously broken out. From spotlighted stages to sidewalks, the comedy world is debating Mr. Richards’s rant, even as the episode moves slowly to the periphery of the public’s attention.

Judy Carter, a teacher of stand-up comics, said she was discussing plans for the annual California Comedy Conference in Palm Springs this weekend with another comedian, Alex House, when they asked themselves how they might have responded in Mr. Richards’s position. “We did some soul-searching on it,” Ms. Carter said. “That’s what comics are doing now. Would I do that? Have I done that? If I were pushed into a corner would I say something so horrible?”

The answer was no, Ms. Carter said, and she was planning a workshop at the comedy conference called “Don’t Pull a Michael Richards.”

“You never hit a heckler harder than they hit you,” she said, explaining a basic rule of comedy.

For many comics, the meaning of Mr. Richards’s outburst is about more than bad comedy technique. Jamie Masada, the owner of the Laugh Factory, and Paul Mooney, a black comedian who used to write for Richard Pryor, have joined politicians and activists including the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Representative Maxine Waters, Democrat of California, in calling for an end to the use of what they call “the ‘n’ word” by everyone, including blacks.

Mr. Mooney, who has used the word for years in his act, said Mr. Richards shocked him into realizing it had an ugly power that was no longer worth wielding.

“I am a recovering ‘n’-word-aholic,” he said on Nov. 27 during a news conference at the Laugh Factory. Mr. Masada, concerned that his 28-year-old club would be branded as racist for merely being the site of Mr. Richards’s tirade, announced a ban on the word. Henceforth any comic who uses it on stage will be barred for four to six months and possibly fined.

But the Laugh Factory’s ban is not sitting well with all comics, including the groundbreaking comedian Dick Gregory, who was set to perform with Mr. Mooney last night) at the Lincoln Theater in Washington.

“Calling it ‘the “n” word’ is an insult,” said Mr. Gregory, whose 1964 memoir was titled “Nigger.” “It should be just as much an insult to Jews if they started changing concentration camp to ‘the “c” word’ and swastika to ‘the “s” word.’ You just destroyed history.”

He will not be joining Mr. Mooney’s boycott. “I’m going to walk out on stage,” Mr. Gregory, 75, said, “and hand my book to a white woman in the front and say, ‘Here, madam, take this “Nigger” to bed with you.’ ”

Mr. Gregory and many others are asking why stop at just one word, if purifying the comedy discourse is the goal. Why stop at protecting one aggrieved group?

In the lobby of the Laugh Factory after the news conference, Jason Stuart, a gay comedian, buttonholed Najee Ali, a civil rights activist, and said, “Twenty-five percent of every black comic’s act is gay-bashing and none of you have done anything about that.”

- New York Times