About.com Rating

June 16, 2010/The Vic Theater

The first major night of the 2010 Just for Laughs Chicago festival (returning for its second year) offered a pretty wide variety of comedy possibilities. There was the latest edition of the Ellen DeGeneres yearly variety show, a wacky Mexican wrestling show ("Lucha Va-VOOM"), movie screenings, a club show with T.J. Miller and more. I opted to check out a live show from Aziz Ansari, part of his "Dangerously Delicious" tour, mostly because I always find him hilarious and his debut album, Intimate Moments for a Sensual Evening, remains one of my favorites of 2010.


While he's quickly growing exponentially in popularity -- seemingly poised to step into the position left vacant by Dane Cook as the favorite comic of the college set -- Ansari remains somewhat polarizing as a comedian. I get it; not everyone appreciates his very specific style and sense of humor. I tend to think he's consistently funny in almost everything he does, and like his energetic, enthusiastic-about-everything style. His approach is to apply wide-eyed excitement to every topic he covers, so that even when I'm not digging on his material as much I'm always liking him. Goodwill can carry you a long way, particularly in a live stand-up setting, and Ansari does nothing if not earn the goodwill of the audience.

His "Dangerously Delicious" show could almost be considered a continuation of Intimate Moments; without repeating any of the same bits, Ansari called back to them and built on them in new ways. That means the show included extended bits on R. Kelly (who is such a self-parody it would seem hard to make him funny, though Ansari is able to do so consistently) and his younger cousin Harris.

It was funny, but in a familiar way. I preferred the newer stuff, including a riff on texting with potential girlfriends and a story about an airplane ride that ended with Ansari shooting puppies in the face (it makes sense if you hear it). Other highlights of his set included a routine on obscure racial slurs and a description of how being on television has affected the way Ansari meets women. Not all of the material worked, and a lot of it felt new and unpolished, but I was appreciative that Ansari didn't just repeat album bits.

If there was a downside to the show, it was that Ansari felt compelled to close it out with an appearance from his "RAAAAAAAANDY!" character (first seen in Funny People). What started as a parody of terrible, audience-favorite comedians has now become a self-fulfilling prophecy; Wednesday's crowd was more excited for RAAAAAAAANDY than they were for Ansari, totally unaware of what the character was originally designed to make fun of. I can't help but wonder if Ansari resents having to do the character at this point or not, or just how soon he'll be able to retire it from his act. It's a funny enough bit, but he's strong enough on his own now not to need it.

Grade: B

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