Olson and Boston Comedy
Olson's friends Paul Barclay and Bil Downes started the first comedy club in Boston in 1977. There Olson became house piano player between acts, and also performed as a comedian for the first two years with an absurdist deadpan act. His act consisted of playing the guitar and hosting "a show within the show" featuring other comedians as his eccentric guests. At the club every night for four years, Olson worked for and wrote with the comedians who became his friends - Lenny Clarke, Bobcat Goldthwait, Don Gavin, Jimmy Tingle, Barry Crimmins, Steven Wright, Denis Leary, Steve Sweeney, Joe Alaskey, Sean Morey and many others.
Read more about this topic: Martin Olson
Famous quotes containing the words olson, boston and/or comedy:
“Beware the dead. And hail them. They teach you drunkenness.
You have your own place to drink. Hail and beware them, when they come.”
—Charles Olson (1910–1970)
“The middle years of parenthood are characterized by ambiguity. Our kids are no longer helpless, but neither are they independent. We are still active parents but we have more time now to concentrate on our personal needs. Our children’s world has expanded. It is not enclosed within a kind of magic dotted line drawn by us. Although we are still the most important adults in their lives, we are no longer the only significant adults.”
—Ruth Davidson Bell. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, ch. 3 (1978)
“The actors today really need the whip hand. They’re so lazy. They haven’t got the sense of pride in their profession that the less socially elevated musical comedy and music hall people or acrobats have. The theater has never been any good since the actors became gentlemen.”
—W.H. (Wystan Hugh)