Pound for Poundstone: Stand-Ups Take a Stand

Whether for confronting, coping or merely cackling, topical comedy abounds this week, including three shows within five days at the Lobero. Paula Poundstone sets the pace as perhaps the most politely political of the trio. The veteran stand-up from Boston – now better known for her regular appearances on the NPR news-quiz show Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me and her own podcast – often comments as much on culture and quirkiness drawn from today’s news as on Congress and corruption. But while her stream-of-consciousness musings and rants run the gamut from human hypocrisy to members of the animal kingdom in her own family (including her anti-social cat), her love for TV news is well documented.

“I am still completely addicted,” Poundstone said in our 2022 interview before her previous Lobero show. “I have no question in my mind that it’s unhealthy. And I don’t know why I watch, because the news never changes. If this were a crime show on TV, I would have stopped watching a long time ago because you know the other side is never going to win. But I tell myself that because I’m paying attention, I’m somehow in the ready position to rescue democracy.” 

Does that mean she was unhappily glued to the TV last Monday? Find out on January 24.

Observations about Washington will be even more obvious the following night when self-professed “Liberal Redneck” Trae Crowder comes to the Lobero. That is the moniker for his viral YouTube videos, and part of the title of a best-selling book The Liberal Redneck Manifesto: Draggin’ Dixie Outta the Dark. “Liberal Redneck” covers as well his on-stage oeuvre, as the Tennessee native with a sharp Southern accent has toured coast to coast and appeared on a slew of TV talk shows and news programs. Now an L.A. resident, Crowder has also developed and sold five scripted pilots for Warner Bros TV, ABC, and FOX and co-wrote and produced an hour-long documentary Inherent Good, featuring Crowder and former presidential candidate Andrew Yang, about universal basic income. So we imagine there might be some extended rants about this week’s executive orders in his Santa Barbara debut on January 25.

Marc Maron also makes it to town on January 30 in a reschedule of an August 22 show. Nowadays Maron is most notably known for his landmark podcast WTF with Marc Maron, which boasts more than 100 million listeners annually, as well as a bunch of major acting credits, including Netflix’s wrestling series Glow and the critical hit To Leslie, among other roles. But he’s also a supremely gifted stand up who has released five hit comedy specials including 2023’s From Bleak to Dark. Expect no punches to be pulled when he powers up at the Lobero.