{"id":2454718,"date":"2020-02-19T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-02-19T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/?p=321129"},"modified":"2020-02-19T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2020-02-19T07:00:00","slug":"norm-macdonald-back-in-aspen-for-laugh-fest-show-on-thursday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/norm-macdonald-back-in-aspen-for-laugh-fest-show-on-thursday\/","title":{"rendered":"Norm Macdonald back in Aspen for Laugh Fest show on Thursday"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"swift-gallery p402_hide\" readability=\"6.1490825688073\">\n<ul id=\"imageGallery-321129-365\" class=\"gallery list-unstyled\">\n<li data-thumb=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-150x150.jpg\" data-src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1024x624.jpg\" data-sub-html=\"Kelsey Brunner\/The Aspen Times | Colorado Comedy Night host Rebecca Robinson opens the show on stage at Limelight Aspen during the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival on Tuesday.\" class=\"h-100\" readability=\"-1.4285714285714\">\n<div class=\"caption\" readability=\"7.6190476190476\">\n<p><strong>Colorado Comedy Night host Rebecca Robinson opens the show on stage at Limelight Aspen during the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival on Tuesday.<\/strong><br \/>Kelsey Brunner\/The Aspen Times<br \/><a class=\"buy-link\" href=\"http:\/\/aspentimes.mycapture.com\/mycapture\/remoteimage.asp?backtext=Return+to+AspenTimes.com&amp;backurl=https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/entertainment\/aspen-laugh-fest-norm-macdonald-2\/&amp;image=https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1024x624.jpg&amp;notes=https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1.jpg\"><i class=\"fas fa-shopping-cart\"><\/i> Buy Photo<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"row no-gutters h-100\">\n<div class=\"col my-auto\"> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1024x624.jpg\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" alt=\"Colorado Comedy Night host Rebecca Robinson opens the show on stage at Limelight Aspen during the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival on Tuesday.\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li data-thumb=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1-150x150.jpg\" data-src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1-1024x668.jpg\" data-sub-html=\"Kelsey Brunner\/The Aspen Times | Attendees of the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival applaud the comedians as they switch sets during at the Limelight Aspen on Tuesday.\" class=\"h-100\" readability=\"-1.425\">\n<div class=\"caption\" readability=\"7.6\">\n<p><strong>Attendees of the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival applaud the comedians as they switch sets during at the Limelight Aspen on Tuesday.<\/strong><br \/>Kelsey Brunner\/The Aspen Times<br \/><a class=\"buy-link\" href=\"http:\/\/aspentimes.mycapture.com\/mycapture\/remoteimage.asp?backtext=Return+to+AspenTimes.com&amp;backurl=https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/entertainment\/aspen-laugh-fest-norm-macdonald-2\/&amp;image=https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1-1024x668.jpg&amp;notes=https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1.jpg\"><i class=\"fas fa-shopping-cart\"><\/i> Buy Photo<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"row no-gutters h-100\">\n<div class=\"col my-auto\"> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-1-1024x668.jpg\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" alt=\"Attendees of the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival applaud the comedians as they switch sets during at the Limelight Aspen on Tuesday.\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li data-thumb=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-2-150x150.jpg\" data-src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-2.jpg\" data-sub-html=\"Courtesy photo | Norm Macdonald\" class=\"h-100\" readability=\"-1.5263157894737\">\n<div class=\"row no-gutters h-100\">\n<div class=\"col my-auto\"> <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2020\/02\/laughfest-atd-021920-1-2.jpg\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" alt=\"Norm Macdonald\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"caption-toggle\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/entertainment\/aspen-laugh-fest-norm-macdonald-2\/#\" class=\"show-captions\">Show Captions<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/entertainment\/aspen-laugh-fest-norm-macdonald-2\/#\" class=\"hide-captions\">Hide Captions<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Just about every stand-up comic who comes through Aspen feels obliged to ridicule the resort a little bit. Usually they offer a lame and lazy few lines about Aspen\u2019s lack of oxygen and abundance of billionaires.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">But every once in awhile, these obligatory jokes do score.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Maybe the best example of an outsider\u2019s Aspen jokes came from Norm Macdonald, during a 2014 set at Belly Up. In his signature deadpan, Macdonald \u2014 sparking a lighter and mouthing a cigarette he never quite lit throughout his set \u2014 went through the litany of common sense deterrents to human life in Aspen, from the thin air to the common black bear home invasions, and buttoned it up hilariously with how absurd the home prices are.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Macdonald returns to Aspen on Thursday night for a sold-out headlining spot at the Wheeler Opera House\u2019s Aspen Laugh Festival. It opened Tuesday with the annual Colorado Comedy Night and runs through Saturday at the Wheeler and other venues, including the festival\u2019s first event in Snowmass Village and a closing-night performance by \u201cThe Daily Show\u201d host Trevor Noah.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">In the years since Macdonald was fired from \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d in 1998, he\u2019s hit the road for stand-up shows between acting gigs in movies like \u201cDirty Work\u201d and in a string of short-lived situation comedies and TV shows like \u201cNorm\u201d and \u201cA Minute with Stan Hooper.\u201d He\u2019s blunt about why he keeps coming back to stand-up.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cIt\u2019s the only one I\u2019m good at,\u201d he said during a previous swing through Aspen, where he\u2019s performed since the old HBO Comedy Fest days and where he is known to drop in to skate at local rinks during his visits.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">In 2018 he premiered the first 10 episodes of \u201cNorm Macdonald Has a Show,\u201d a sort of anti-talk show deconstruction of the form that opened with David Spade, Macdonald and sidekick Adam Eget talking for 20 minutes about how Macdonald didn\u2019t know how to do a talk show.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">On the second episode, when guest Drew Barrymore doesn\u2019t get Macdonald\u2019s Dracula joke, Macdonald says with a wide smile: \u201cI love when people don\u2019t get it,\u201d which is the closest thing you\u2019ll hear to a Norm Macdonald mission statement. He doesn\u2019t care if he gets the laugh, and that\u2019s what\u2019s made him timeless.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Many argue that he is the best \u201cWeekend Update\u201d anchor \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d has had, and he made a case for himself as a great late-night style host with the Netflix series. But to hear him tell it, he\u2019s a one- or two-trick pony made for doing stand-up and riffing as a guest of Conan O\u2019Brien and David Letterman.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cI\u2019m pretty good at being a guest on shows, but stand-up is the only one that I\u2019m good at,\u201d he said. \u201cThe other ones I just stumbled into from stand-up.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">His classic impressions of Burt Reynolds and Bob Dole on \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d notwithstanding, he admits he\u2019s not an actor.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cStand-up is not good training for an actor,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you do Second City or Groundlings or something, it trains you to be an actor. But stand-up would only train you to do, like, a soliloquy. It\u2019s weird. \u2026 You\u2019re just talking to yourself for an hour.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">His stand-up tends to be pretty dark, with its comedic possibilities turned up by Macdonald\u2019s matter-of-fact delivery and what he calls his \u201cweird voice,\u201d a style that defined his \u201cWeekend Update\u201d years and has recently somehow carried bits as grim-seeming as one about his grandfather\u2019s suicide.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">On \u201cWeekend Update,\u201d Macdonald memorably used non-sequiturs and random references \u2014 David Hasselhoff, for instance, and Frank Stallone \u2014 to pepper the segment. That free-association-as-comedy style has been widely influential, most readily seen in shows like \u201cFamily Guy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">The surrealist approach to the faux news desk, he said, was simply a result of the glut of talk shows in the \u201990s: \u201cIt was because on \u2018Update,\u2019 it had already been done 100 times by the time I did it. There were like 20 talk shows, and all these monologues, so every joke had been done all week long, until on Saturday it would have been stupid to do. How are you going to do a joke about what happened on Monday? \u2026 So I said, \u2018Let\u2019s just do weird jokes.\u2019 Even our political jokes weren\u2019t really political. They were weird.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText Tagline\"><a href=\"mailto:atravers@aspentimes.com\">atravers@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/entertainment\/aspen-laugh-fest-norm-macdonald-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Colorado Comedy Night host Rebecca Robinson opens the show on stage at Limelight Aspen during the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival on Tuesday.Kelsey Brunner\/The Aspen Times Buy Photo Attendees of the first night of the Aspen Laugh Festival applaud the comedians as they switch sets during at the Limelight Aspen on Tuesday.Kelsey Brunner\/The [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2454718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-18 15:00:18","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley&#039;s Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2454718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2454718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2454718\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2454718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2454718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2454718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}