What I love about culture is that there is always something new to discover and enjoy. A few months ago, Norm MacDonald debuted his Comedy Central effort, Sports Show with Norm MacDonald, and unfortunately, it aired for nine superb episodes before some monkey at Comedy Central didn’t see it making the same ratings as second season Tosh.0 episodes, and it got canceled to be replaced by what? Reruns of Tosh.0. Shame on you, Comedy Central.
That’s a tangent though. This is about Norm, or rather, what Norm exposed us to. On one of his early episodes, he introduced his “nephew” Kyle and a remote segment he did at a UFC event. It was one of the funniest non-Conan remotes I’d ever seen. Thankfully, it must have gotten a great response, because Kyle was back a few episodes later to do another one.
Kyle’s segments are basically him at a sporting event, interviewing athletes or spectators. His interview style is incredible though, it’s as though the character he’s playing is a person with high-functioning Asperger’s syndrome. His speech patterns are so forced, he intentionally slurs his words and doesn’t ask fully-formed questions or even speaks with fully-formed sentences, leaving the interviewee struggling to guess what Kyle is saying or asking them. He is completely socially inept, often hugging people unnecessarily or mumbling his words and then really enunciating when asked to repeat himself. He makes everyone feel awkward and uncomfortable during the exchanges, and wow is it funny stuff. Take a look.
His intro to the segment is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in my life. I found it so funny, in fact, that I went on YouTube to try to find the Kyle remotes once I found out Norm had been canceled. My only luck was that first UFC segment, but on a whim, I clicked on one of the suggested videos on the right sidebar, which I very rarely do. I don’t trust YouTube’s suggestions, but I’m glad I took the risk this time. What I actually found was a video that Tosh had shown as one of his viewer videos of the week. I remember liking it but not until I watched it again that I realized the main funny guy in it is Kyle! So I watched some more videos uploaded from the YouTube user GoodNeighborStuff.
Turns out Kyle is part of Good Neighbor, a comedy group out of L.A. that does random sketch comedy. Granted, lots of their stuff is weird, a prime example being the end of the following “Toast” video and all of the transitions from Kyle’s interview segments. I get that they add to the low-budget, randomness aspect of the segments but I could do without them. But ultimately, Kyle is really the breakout star of this group. Even in the group’s actual sketches he plays a watered down version of his bad interviewer character and it is hilarious. For example:
This whole sketch gets very kooky. Colleen pointed out that it veers mildly into the realm of performance art/slam poetry, which neither of us are crazy about. The best part is Kyle’s struggle to toast to his friends. I’m not sure if I’m laughing more at the outdated phrases he uses like “mofo” and “pimp” or the tone he uses; it’s so earnest in wanting to sound cool and aloof and it comes off completely opposite.
Here are the other videos I found of Kyle and his bad interviewer character. Really funny stuff. I hope he can find another place to showcase this character, because I seriously cannot get enough of it.
Favorite moment: 0:30
Favorite moment: 1:20
Favorite moment: 1:06
Favorite moment: 1:36. I can’t stop laughing at the face face he makes at the end of that little blip.
-Jon
Jon 