Mr. Deity: The Everyday Life of the Creator

in Comedy, Religion | August 30th, 2011

Not long after the dev­as­tat­ing tsuna­mi of 2004, Bri­an Kei­th Dal­ton began work­ing on a skit that mor­phed into Mr. Deity, a satir­i­cal look at our Cre­ator and his every­day strug­gle to man­age his new cre­ation. The first episode (above) aired on iTunes and the web in ear­ly 2007, and straight­away, we encounter Mr. Deity and his side­kick Lar­ry bum­bling their way through the Gen­e­sis sto­ry and relat­ed the­o­log­i­cal ques­tions. (Also don’t miss the pair try­ing to fig­ure out how to light their new world.) By the sec­ond episode, we’re already skip­ping for­ward to the New Tes­ta­ment and Mr. Diety recruit­ing a skep­ti­cal Jesus for an impor­tant job. Talk about awk­ward.

57 episodes have since fol­lowed, includ­ing the most recent install­ment — Mr. Deity and the Philoso­pher — released just last week. You can find all episodes eas­i­ly on iTunes. When it comes to the web, Sea­sons One, Three and Four appear offi­cial­ly on YouTube, and Sea­son 2 can be best viewed via this infor­mal col­lec­tion.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Steve Mar­tin Writes Song for Hymn-Deprived Athe­ists

Woody Allen and the Rev­erend Bil­ly Gra­ham In Con­ver­sa­tion

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The Cookie Monster/Tom Waits Mashup

in Comedy, Music | August 17th, 2011

Tom Waits and Cook­ie Mon­ster. They are one-of-a-kind char­ac­ters … and yet strange­ly inter­change­able. Above, we have the body of Cook­ie Mon­ster chan­nel­ing the voice of Tom Waits, singing “God’s Away On Busi­ness.” And if you doubt the sim­i­lar­i­ties, sim­ply give a lis­ten to the all-time favorite C is for Cook­ie…

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via metafil­ter

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Young Terry Gilliam Shows You How to Make Your Own Cutout Animation

in Animation, Art, Comedy, Film | August 12th, 2011

Put aside 14 min­utes and Ter­ry Gilliam, the leg­endary Mon­ty Python ani­ma­tor, will show you how to make your own cutout ani­ma­tions. Gilliam start­ed out his career as an ani­ma­tor, then moved to Eng­land and joined up with Mon­ty Python’s Fly­ing Cir­cus. For years, he worked as the group’s ani­ma­tor, cre­at­ing the open­ing cred­its and dis­tinc­tive buffers that linked togeth­er the off­beat com­e­dy sketch­es.

If you’ve nev­er tak­en a good look at his work, you will want to spend some time with The Mir­a­cle of Flight from 1974, or this ani­mat­ed sequence, Sto­ry Time, from 1968.

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. It’s a great way to see our new posts, all bun­dled in one email, each day.

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Relat­ed Con­tent:

John Cleese on the Ori­gin on Cre­ativ­i­ty

The Mon­ty Python Phi­los­o­phy Foot­ball Match Revis­it­ed

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Jason Alexander Promotes Netflix Relief Fund

in Comedy, Film | July 28th, 2011

Ear­li­er this month, Net­flix upped its month­ly sub­scrip­tion by a good 60%, cre­at­ing what amount­ed to a bour­geois tragedy for many. If you sub­scribe to Net­flix, then fear not. Help may be on its way. Fun­ny­orDie feels your pain, and, with the help of Jason Alexan­der (you know him from Sein­feld), they’re pro­mot­ing the Net­flix Relief Fund. Wink.

If you plan on stick­ing with Net­flix, you can find here a great list of qual­i­ty films, all stream­able via the web. (If need­ed, snag a free one month sub­scrip­tion to Net­flix here.) Or if you’re look­ing for oth­er options, don’t miss our col­lec­tion of Free Movies Online, where you’re pret­ty much guar­an­teed to find some­thing you like…

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Improv with New Yorker Cartoonists

in Art, Comedy | July 27th, 2011

When you think of The New York­er, you think about two things — long-form arti­cles and leg­endary car­toons. The two art forms have gone hand-in-hand since the mag­a­zine began pub­lish­ing in 1925, and, decades lat­er, a younger gen­er­a­tion of car­toon­ists still deliv­ers the laughs. Thanks to the Gel Con­fer­ence 2011 (see all videos here), you can spend 25 min­utes inside their artis­tic world. Matt Dif­fee, Drew Der­navich, and Zach Kanin talk about their some­times con­tro­ver­sial work at the mag­a­zine and draw improv car­toons based on audi­ence sug­ges­tions. Fun guar­an­teed for all. H/T @opedr

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Ein­stein’s Rel­a­tiv­i­ty: New York­er Car­toon Ani­mat­ed

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Impressionist Does Shakespeare in 25 Celebrity Voices

in Comedy | July 20th, 2011

Actor Jim Meski­men has appeared in his fair share of films — There Will Be Blood, Frost/Nixon and Mag­no­lia, to name a few. But he’s per­haps best known for his work as an impres­sion­ist come­di­an. He does the voice of George W. Bush, and Mor­gan Free­man too. But that’s just the tip of the ice­berg. In his lat­est video, Meski­men imper­son­ates 25 famous fig­ures — from Woody Allen to Jack Nichol­son to Droopy Dog — and quite nat­u­ral­ly he has them recit­ing Clarence’s mono­logue from Richard III. Enjoy.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Nine Imper­son­ations by Kevin Spacey in Six Min­utes

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In Honor of Louis C.K.‘s Well-Deserved Emmy Nomination

in Comedy | July 14th, 2011

Con­grat­u­la­tions to the come­di­an Louis C.K. whose half-hour F/X show Louie was just nom­i­nat­ed for an Emmy Award (full list of nom­i­nees here). To cel­e­brate, here’s one of our favorite of his riffs from a 2009 appear­ance on the Conan O’Brien show. (Speak­ing of Conan, don’t miss his Dart­mouth grad­u­a­tion address.)

We love Louis for many rea­sons, not the least of which is that he can build a killer, harangue-free rant around lines like “the foun­da­tions of cap­i­tal­ism are crum­bling.” Enjoy.

Sheer­ly Avni is a San Fran­cis­co-based arts and cul­ture writer. Her work has appeared in Salon, LA Week­ly, Moth­er Jones, and many oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. You can fol­low her on twit­ter at @sheerly.

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Christopher Walken Reads “The Three Little Pigs”

in Comedy, Literature, Video - Arts & Culture | July 12th, 2011

You’ve heard him read Lady Gaga, you’ve seen him rem­i­nisce with his fel­low lov-ahs on Sat­ur­day Night Live, and you’ve heard him sub in for Leonard Lopate on the radio. But we’re not sure if any of Christo­pher Walken’s appear­ances can beat his dement­ed spin on “The Three Lit­tle Pigs.” Mr. Walken’s read­ing of the poten­tial­ly ter­ri­fy­ing sto­ry is unchar­ac­ter­is­ti­cal­ly jol­ly (he’s going for laughs, not chills), and we freely rec­om­mend it for chil­dren. Espe­cial­ly chil­dren from Brook­lyn.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Wern­er Her­zog Reads “Go the F**k to Sleep” in NYC (NSFW)

Sheer­ly Avni is a San Fran­cis­co-based arts and cul­ture writer. Her work has appeared in Salon, LA Week­ly, Moth­er Jones, and many oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. You can fol­low her on twit­ter at @sheerly.

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