The last installment of the season aired tonight with Uptown Showdown: Text vs. Talk. The uptown showdown finale.
Comedians tackle the great debate of talk vs. text. Two teams 5 minutes a piece argue their case, and then the anchor on each team gets 7 minutes to wrap. The level of audience applause denotes the winner. You probably think the talk team won since the winner was recognized verbally – WRONG. Texting won by a hardly audible razor-slim margin.
Meet the winners in tonight’s debate team Text; Anchor John Fugelsang, Rojo Perez, and Sam Kebede. Tonight, well, those that didn’t win (aka losers) team talk; Anchor Janeane Garofalo, Rob Cantrell, and Carmen Lynch.
Our host Matthew Love introduces everyone and explains that we are about to elevate petty debates into parliamentary prose. Texting, texting, one, two, three … when you cannot hear the result it is not as impactful, “FIRE!”
Carmen Lynch opened for team talk with the premise that a human breaks up with you in person. Texting a breakup leads you to become an as*hole.
Sam Kebede opened for team text highlighting how much more effective President Barak Hussein Obama would have been if we didn’t have to hear all those long pauses, and we could have gotten a text of his speeches. Video provided by the networks was shown to back up his point.
Team talk rebuttal by Rob Cantrell was that text is efficient. It is German. Oh well, that didn’t even solicit a laugh, just a chill in the air. He pointed out his rebuttal was 5 minutes without notes.
Anchor of team text Fugelsang made some compelling closing arguments that might have swayed the undecided and determined the outcome. He called team talk ableist supremacists, asking what if you are deaf? You can’t play the game. I’ve never said that when it’s written you can fight in front of your kids and save on therapy.
Questions were taken from the audience via text. “When the oral Torah became a written Torah, what did we lose?” The crowd had to be from New York. There were no Judaic scholars in the audience that could answer.
The great debates of our time will resume this fall. If you cannot be there in person, comedy is one form of entertainment not lost by live stream.
Uptown Showdown: Text vs. Talk. Live at Symphony Space.
Featuring Rob Cantrell (Girls5eva), John Fugelsang (Tell Me Everything), Janeane Garofalo (Wet Hot American Summer), Sam Kebede (Lack History), Carmen Lynch (The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon), and Rojo Perez (Entre Nos: Spot On)!
We’ve heard that a new season will occur in fall 2022. Check here for upcoming events at Symphony Space
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New York, NY 10025-6990
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Readers may also enjoy our reviews of the New Talent Showcase, The Orchestra Now at Symphony Space, Selected Shorts at Symphony Space, and Queens Girl in the World and In the Trenches.
