REVIEW: Kathy Griffin Reclaims Her Career
3/29 @ The Egg, Albany
“That’s really what her set was all about, wasn’t it? Not just the headlines, the jokes, or the chaos—but clawing your way through the wreckage with a mic in one hand and a middle finger in the other.”
There’s no doubt that comedian Kathy Griffin is a controversial person, and cancel culture ate her alive after her infamous photo holding the decapitated head of the 45th president. It sparked many passionate and important debates about where the lines of free speech and satire got drawn, and without getting too political, at worst those lines have since seemed to have eroded away all together, or at best, moved like goalposts to a different, faraway field of an entirely different sport.
But Kathy, much like her persistent haters, came back from that with equal vengeance, determined to reclaim her voice and identity as a comedian after nearly a decade of being blacklisted and investigated by the Department of Justice. That’s precisely what her tour—My Life on the PTSD-list—was: a comeback. How did she start her set? With a video montage of some of her craziest moments, including news footage of that aforementioned photo—all of which was met with vivacious applause.
I’ve always been generally indifferent to her and have never really given her specials or bits much attention, aside from some of her previous gigs on New Year’s Eve, the intermittent clip on YouTube, or of course the photo “incident.” But I like comedy, so… *checks calendar*... 28 weeks ago when my friend suggested an evening with the comedian, I said, “Sure!”
In her nearly two hour set, we were taken through anecdotes and tangents in a way that seemed haphazard, but was almost certainly meticulously crafted to deliver punchlines in appropriate moments. In her usual style, her content was heavy on her interactions with other celebrities (A-listers, as it were). She focused quite a bit on her time living next door to the couple (at the time) of Kim Kardashian and Kanye West. We heard stories about Jane Fonda’s (in?)ability to make a quesadilla, and a post-facelift girlfriend's getaway with Australian singer Sia to a remote island in Mexico.
In a darker turn of her set, done with equal tact, she discussed her depression, drug addiction, cancer, vocal surgery, and subsequent suicide attempt. It was humorous and done well, I thought. That said, I find myself struggling to find the proper language to describe this part of the set. It didn’t feel like she was making a joke of a very serious subject, but at the same time, it clearly was a joke. There clearly was a punchline. I guess the best way I can think to describe it is that, while suicide is a serious subject and shouldn’t be taken lightly, it’s okay to find a way to laugh at your circumstances. That even in the darkest moments of one’s life, there is a way to find laughter, especially your own.
Kathy’s set was either an ADHD nightmare or a wet dream, depending on who you ask. At times, my pea brain had a hard time following her high speed tangents and the concatenating of all of these stories into one bigger overarching story, like some kind of wired wicker basket of words. But the audience loved her, and hardly a moment went by without laughter rippling through the audience. All that said, as good as she may have been in the moment, ultimately I found her set forgettable—laden with stories that just a few days later I find myself struggling to recall. But I can’t necessarily fault her for that either. Not every tale has quotability or longevity. It doesn’t need to exist beyond the now.
There was something that I did take away from the evening of stories, and it is something that I have continued to contemplate since Saturday evening. Albany was the last stop on her tour-de-renaissance, and she seemed earnest in the way she thanked the audience for her support. As she bid farewell, her tone began to waver. The cracks in her voice weren’t from her loquacity. Rather, it was from a psyche brimming with a mixture of all that complex trauma and gratitude, and finally slipping free. It was bittersweet. It was beautiful. It was human.
Hm. I suppose that’s really what her set was all about, wasn’t it? Not just the headlines, the jokes, or the chaos—but clawing your way through the wreckage with a mic in one hand and a middle finger in the other.
