Tag Archives: Benedict Cumberbatch

June 16, 2015 · 10:01 am

Comedy Weeds

Comedy Weeds

I’ve been thinking three things about comedy lately:

1) How much I love it.
2) How angry and outraged comedy is making people.
3) I’m not going to list a third thing, because comedy is all about breaking rules.

Up to a point, it’s natural that comedy challenges and upsets people, but I like to think about how and why.

Partially because it makes me feel better about all the money I spent on my liberal arts degree. I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Visual Art, Rhetoric, and Cultural Studies & Comparative Literature. Yes, a BS triple major. It’s an ALMOST useless liberal arts degree.

The one class that has been endlessly valuable to me was a class about comedy theory. A class about analyzing the function and purpose of jokes.

I think about that class every day of my life.

Almost all theories of comedy boil down to this: comedy functions on contrast. We break into laughter when two ideas are smashed together in surprising and satisfying ways. Humans are hard-wired to laugh at incongruity. If you doubt this, go tell a child the sound a duck makes is “moo.” The child will laugh and/or get really mad and hit you with a toy truck.

Every joke has a set-up and a punchline; an expectation and a surprise. Obviously, you can’t just throw two contrasting things together for the hell of it. That’s when you end up with tweets like this:

Citizen Kane and Peanut Butter. #PutTwoThingsTogether

The success of a joke is in the clarity of the set-up and the surprise of the punch-line.

Sometimes, the set-up is an actual line.

Set-up: Why did the chicken cross the road?
Punchline: To get to the other side.

When this joke was new, it killed. The expectation for an elaborate, clever response was set-up and then broken by a simple, obvious response.

A lot of modern technology cracks unwitting set-up and knockdown jokes. For example:

Me: Hey, Google Maps, how should I get to Chipotle from here?
Google Maps: Drive your car into the Pacific Ocean, Joseph.

But a lot of what makes us laugh doesn’t have a literal set-up line. The set-up line is just a “truth” we’ve culturally agreed on.

Back when we culturally agreed that men do not wear dresses, a man wearing a dress was hilarious. Now, not so much. As a joke, it’s tired and expected. As a cultural truth, many of us believe traditional gender norms are changing. Anyone can wear a dress and if you don’t like it you can go drive your car into the Pacific Ocean.

A lot of our humor is getting weirder. Strange cultural truths are being challenged. For example, our long held belief that handsome, charismatic leading men don’t look like otters. But as Benedict Cumberbatch and Tumblr proved, holy shit, that expectation can be broken. And it’s very satisfying.

BenedictOtter

We laugh when we see someone slip and fall on a patch of ice because the sight of another person flailing their limbs in a desperate attempt to stay upright shatters our innate idea of humans as advanced, intelligent beings.

Set-up: I am a dignified, respectable human in control of my body.
Punchline: Ha, ha, motherfucker, you just broke your coccyx.

Comedy, by its nature, is violent. It’s all about breaking, shattering, falling, killing, and driving into the Pacific Ocean.

But just because it’s inherently violent, doesn’t mean it has to be offensive.

I think a lot of outrage about comedy is because of the targets comedians pick. A lot of jokes still function on the agreed upon cultural “truths” that women are whiney or gay people are always flamboyant or all straight men only listen to women talk so they can “hit that puss.” (That last one is an actual joke I heard an actual comedian say out loud on purpose in 2015.)

Sometimes the audience is offended, but often the joke just isn’t funny to a lot of people because we don’t share that truth anymore. The set-up makes no sense so why would we be entertained by the punchline?

People talk about don’t punch down, instead punch up. Which makes sense to me. Don’t make fun of poor people. Instead make fun of the giant asshole corporations that are keeping them poor.

I think that’s a great starting point.

But even if you pick a worthy target for your comedy, it’s still an aggressive violent pursuit. It’s still punching.

If all you want to do with your comedy is punch, that’s great! There are plenty of weeds that need to be pulled out of our cultural garden. If the violent action of tearing a living thing out of the ground can create the positive, healthy reaction of laughter, then we’re already doing well.

Comedy is always destructive. It always will be. It’s always going to rip the weeds out of the garden. But I think clearing the weeds is just the first step. Since we’re tearing shit out anyway, we can plant new shit.

If you’re tearing out privilege, you can be arguing for equality. If you’re tearing out censorship, you can be supporting new voices. If you’re tearing out the idea of gender as binary, you can celebrate new ideas about gender. If you’re tearing yourself out for a bad and stupid habit, you can celebrate the oddity of the human condition that you are probably not alone in that bad and stupid habit. If you’re tearing out an idiot duck that says moo, you can also build up a duck that quotes the “whaaasup?” Budweiser commercials from 1999. You can plant whatever you want.

Just because comedy, by its nature and structure feels destructive, doesn’t mean it has to always be angry, negative, hostile, and confrontational.

I would argue that a person standing on a stage trying to make other people laugh can and should be joyful.

So I think we should attack away, but when possible plant something in the soil you just freed up.

A new idea.

A new truth.

A new way for the chicken to cross the road that no one has ever thought of before.

A joke so powerful, it can pay off all of my student loans at once.

I can dream.

Thanks again for reading! If you enjoyed this, you can help make more comedy possible by supporting me on Patreon here!

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March 30, 2015 · 9:57 pm

MYSELF: Obsessed Ep 74

A special, weird episode featuring host Joseph Scrimshaw discussing his obsession with himself! Featuring guest host Hal Lublin! Thrill to such topics as Benedict Cumberbatch, small dogs, feminism, the best episodes of Doctor Who for cats, spending student loans on action figures, the phrase “dark wiggle room,” and much more. Special thanks to Patreon backers for unlocking this episode as a milestone goal!

Thanks as always to Molly Lewis for our theme song!

AWOOGA! Obsessed is now a part of Feral Audio! Go to Feral now to listen to this episode and subscribe for new ones!

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Listen, rate, review, and subscribe to OBSESSED on iTunes.

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· 6:14 am

My Name is Joseph

MyNameIsJoseph

The name my parents gave me is Joseph Aaron Scrimshaw. When I got married, I took my wife’s maiden name as a second middle name. My current legal name is Joseph Aaron Stevenson Scrimshaw.

While I was growing up, I pretty much let people call me whatever they wanted: Joe, Joseph, Joey, Scrawny Little Asshole, etc. I never corrected anyone. It felt rude. I figured, “These people are seeing me from the outside. Maybe they’re just picking the name that matches what they see.”

As I got older, my name basically settled into being Joe with the occasional Scrawny Little Asshole.

Once I started a career performing and writing, I consistently used Joseph. After a few years, it started bugging me that despite listing my name as Joseph in every bio, program, press release, interview, etc. people in my professional life would still call me Joe.

I decided, over a decade ago, that if I wanted people to use Joseph, I needed to be consistent. I made a point of telling people that for anything professional, it was Joseph. People and publications still called me Joe.

I decided to start introducing myself to any new people I met as Joseph. I began trying, ever so gently, to correct people if they called me Joe.

At this point in my life, I have a handful of very old friends who know me as Joe. Besides that, my name is Joseph.

Joseph feels right. To me, there is a world of difference between Joe and Joseph.

Joe is a big strong guy who lifts weights and watches football. Joseph collects action figures and is pretty sure he’s a Hufflepuff.

Joe likes America and eating raw steaks cooked on the hood of a big old muscle car. Joseph drives a Toyota Yaris and likes to write comedy essays about Aquaman’s feelings.

I am a motherfucking Joseph.

Still, people call me Joe. These days, the Joe-calling mostly happens on social media. So people are literally calling me Joe while responding to my twitter handle @JOSEPHScrimshaw. I think some people feel shortening names is a way to suggest friendship or intimacy. For other people, maybe two syllables just feels like too much work.

Did you know the beloved actor known as Ben Cum originally went by the ridiculously long name, Benedict Cumberbatch? Think about all the mouth time we would have wasted if he’d insisted BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH was his actual, preferred name? Do you know how many syllables that is? Who has time to even count! Thank God for Ben Cum!

I know people aren’t calling me Joe with malice, but it continues to bother me. And I continue to feel rude correcting people. I feel fussy and uptight saying, “No, no, no, you HAVE to use this version of my name. The longer one. The one that sounds like a guy who has a degree in Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature. Yes, the one who has an Excel Spreadsheet to keep track of which Doctor Who DVDs he doesn’t yet own.”

But why do I feel rude asking people to call me by my preferred name?

I think there is a subtle, yet pervasive idea that we should let our identities be dictated from the outside. That we, as individuals or groups, don’t have the right to determine our identities.

Because that’s what a name is. It’s your identity. It’s one of the ways you tell the world who you are. Why would anyone want that taken away from them?

It’s like if your name was Steve and you started working at a new job, said your name was Steve, and then everyone in the office just decided to call you Shithead.

“But my name is Steve,” Steve might say.

“Yeah,” the boss would respond, “But we prefer Shithead.”

“I actually find Shithead kind of offensive,” Steve would say.

“Come on, loosen up, Shithead,” the boss would cajole. “We actually mean Shithead as a term of RESPECT. In our office, we have a long history of calling the best employee Shithead.”

“Yeah, I don’t really care. It’s my name. Please call me Steve.”

“WHOA! WHOA! Way to overreact and take away my freedom of speech, Shithead!” The boss would yell while stomping around and blowing the office air horn designed to shut down further discussion.

Then, ideally, Steve would flip everyone off and use his jet pack to just blast off and fly away. Sadly, we don’t have jet packs yet so this resolution is just a fantasy.

The point is please call me Joseph. It’s my name. It’s my choice.

I know there will always be people who call me Joe out of habit or laziness or even attempts to be friendly and informal. To those people: I know you mean no disrespect so I will attempt to begrudgingly understand.

And if you hear my preference, understand it, and still, without my permission, choose to call me Joe–that is your right.

Just like it’s my right to start calling you “Shithead” in retaliation.

Anyway, thanks for reading this long, sensitive, wordy essay about how our names are signifiers of our identities.

It’s a real “Joseph” thing to write.

If you enjoy my posts, you can help make more happen by supporting me on Patreon. My next post will be about Adult Underoos and thanks to an unlocked Patreon goal it will include photos of me in my underoos. You’re welcome and I’m sorry.

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August 1, 2014 · 11:35 am

A Man and His Incorrect Fact Tweets

For more than a year I’ve been doing a series of daily tweets. First tacos, then monkeys, then daily affirmations, then daily etiquette tips, then incorrect quotes, then fake TV shows, horoscopes, horror, writing tips, holiday tweets, resolution tweets, Hey Girl tweets, Urban Myth tweets, pastry tweets, boring tweets, social media tweets, and now INCORRECT FACTS. Enjoy!

You can also follow me on Twitter to enjoy August’s series of Marketing Slogan tweets!

Day One – Benedict Cumberbatch’s cheekbones weigh 37 pounds EACH.

Day Two – The Fantastic Four is made up of these characters: Rock Guy, Hot Johnny, See-Through Lady, and Mr. Amazeballs.

Day Three – The original name of the Bill of Rights was Ten Amendments You Probably Don’t Comprehend The Actual Meaning Of.

Day Four – Cargo Pants were originally called Storage Trousers.

Day Five – The Batman v Superman movie will be a two hour tracking shot of every single DC character crying in the rain.

Day Six – If you eat #kale but don’t tell anyone about it, you won’t get any nutritional value.

Day Seven – John Travolta, Grumpy Cat, and the ghost of Orson Welles have all been cast in the new Star Wars movie.

Day Eight – Schrodinger’s Banana is a paradox in which he is both happy to see you and also has a banana in his pocket.

Day Nine – If you don’t respond to an email within 7 days, you will be killed by an animated gif of the girl from The Ring.

Day Ten – Coffee is healthier if you put all these things in it: butter, Kraft macaroni & cheese, meatballs, acid, poutine.

Day Eleven – There are several dating sites for comedians who just want to meet crazy people and get new material.

Day Twelve – That plastic bag you saw blowing around the street was an amazing motion capture performance by Andy Serkis.

Day Thirteen – Aquaman has a lot of friends.

Day Fourteen – “A case of the Mondays” is a polite euphemism for syphilis.

Day Fifteen – A lot of people have sex in the back of PT Cruisers.

Day Sixteen – Proposing to your significant other via a LinkedIn message is pants-droppingly romantic.

Day Seventeen – The four food groups are: Meat, kale, Doritos dust, and your feelings.

Day Eighteen – Harrison Ford’s earring is a horcrux.

Day Nineteen – The concept for The Purge is based on Trader Joe’s Parking Lots.

Day Twenty – It is illegal to not have a podcast.

Day Twenty-One – The sound bees make is not buzzing. They are screaming about Nicolas Cage.

Day Twenty-Two – Nothing weird happened in Florida today.

Day Twenty-Three – “Twitter” is a clever anagram for “I’ve wasted my life.”

Day Twenty-Four – If you mix Pop Rocks with Mountain Dew it will kill your D&D character.

Day Twenty-Five – Superman’s motto is Truth, Justice, and Sometimes Murder Is Okay.

Day Twenty-Six – The term #yolo was invented by Eleanor Roosevelt during a UFC bout right before she bit a guy’s finger off.

Day Twenty-Seven – If you blow hard enough on an old Nintendo cartridge, Mario will appear and give you three extra lives.

Day Twenty-Eight – A great name for a middle-aged male stripper is “Sex Ed.”

Day Twenty-Nine – Trough urinals in public restrooms are a great place to make eye contact with strangers.

Day Thirty – If you have an opinion and you don’t put it on the internet you will burst into flames.

Day Thirty-One – Every single episode of The Golden Girls was written by a time-traveling H.P. Lovecraft.

Yours in Ignorance,

Joseph

If you enjoy my work, you can check out all the comedy words and things I’m making via Patreon.

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April 1, 2014 · 10:43 am

A Man and His Urban Myth Tweets

For just over a year I’ve been doing a series of daily tweets. First tacos, then monkeys, then daily affirmations, then daily etiquette tips, then incorrect quotes, then fake TV shows, horoscopes, horror, writing tips, holiday tweets, resolution tweets, Hey Girl tweets, and now Urban Myths! Enjoy!

You can also follow me on Twitter to enjoy April’s series of very important tweets about pastries!

Day One – If you read three correct facts in a row on Wikipedia you will die in seven days.

Day Two – The best way to get rid of the hiccups is to put a bag over your head. The bag MUST be full of bees.

Day Three – If you mix Pop Rocks with Crystal Pepsi and drink it you will travel back in time to 1992.

Day Four – If you feed an American some Poutine after midnight they will turn into a Canadian.

Day Five – If you say your own name out loud three times a life coach will appear.

Day Six – If you go more than 7 days without tweeting about Benedict Cumberbatch, twitter suspends your account.

Day Seven – The average person swallows 300 people dressed as Spider-Man over the course of their life.

Day Eight – If you say the name of “The Scottish Play” in a theater your pants turn into a kilt.

Day Nine – Every truck in Portland is a taco truck.

Day Ten – Dingoes do not eat babies. They love babies. Some of the finest daycare centers in Australia are run by dingoes.

Day Eleven – The Richard Gere gerbil story is ridiculous and untrue. That said, Tom Cruise once put an entire llama up his butt.

Day Twelve – This guy I know once opened a diet coke can and the whole thing was filled with actual cocaine.

Day Thirteen – There is a Taco Bell in Detroit that is owned and operated by a family of raccoons.

Day Fourteen – Benedict Cumberbatch is actually a charming, complex muppet operated by the ghost of Jim Henson.

Day Fifteen – Things you CAN pick up from toilet seats: butt leprosy, full-blown jerkface syndrome, a lateral lisp & toilet rickets.

Day Sixteen – Every time you take a selfie you are stealing your own soul and then giving it back to yourself.

Day Seventeen – Every three leaf clover is EXTREMELY bad luck so the whole world is pretty much fucked.

Day Eighteen – If you pull a normal person’s finger they fart. If you pull a rich person’s finger, quarters come out of their butt.

Day Nineteen – They tease you because they like you.

Day Twenty – If you yell “fire” in a crowded theater you will burst into flames. It’s a cool trick, but only once.

Day Twenty-One – Trader Joe’s Pinot Grigio wine is actually made from sugar and the tears of white people watching The Bachelor.

Day Twenty-Two – There have been mole people living under New York for 100 years but only because the sewers are rent controlled.

Day Twenty-Three – If you listen to any Michael Bolton song backwards you can hear Satan refuse to buy his soul.

Day Twenty-Four – If you hit Reply All to respond to an email your message will be sent to everyone you have ever had sex with.

Day Twenty-Five – Every time you hear a sad trombone, an angel’s wings fall off.

Day Twenty-Six – If you stand in front of a microwave you will slowly develop the power to shoot Lean Cuisine meals out of your hands.

Day Twenty-Seven – If you don’t change your Facebook privacy settings, Mark Zuckerberg can come to your home and poke you.

Day Twenty-Eight – It’s okay to pee in a swimming pool because the chemicals in chlorine wash away your memories of being a monster.

Day Twenty-Nine – Aliens landed in New Mexico in the 1940s and immediately started making great meth.

Day Thirty – If you have a smartphone and you go more than 10 minutes without looking at it, it will start screaming.

Day Thirty-One – If you watch any VHS tape, you will die eventually.

Your mythical friend,

Joseph

If you enjoy my work, you can check out all the comedy words and things I’m making via Patreon.

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January 21, 2014 · 12:05 am

NERF and COMPETITIVE SPEECH: Obsessed Ep 43

Pop pop pop! Tom Reed (actor, comedian, charmer, partner of Anna Weggel aka “Napping Nancy” from our Batman episode) is obsessed with two ALMOST violent topics: Nerf Blasters and Competitive Speech. Thrill to such questions as: Can you hurt a baby with a Nerf Blaster? Is it fun to make people cry? Is Nerf a good analogy for modern masculinity? Can Tom do a minute long informational speech on Hacky Sacks? Enjoy this and much more in a fun hour of “bridled masculinity” with Tom and Joseph!

AWOOGA! Obsessed is now a part of Feral Audio! Go to Feral now to listen to this episode and subscribe for new ones!

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Listen, rate, review, and subscribe to OBSESSED on iTunes.

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March 26, 2013 · 6:48 pm

An Interview with the Easter Bunny: The Lost Obsessed Episode

Are you like me? Have you always wondered if the Easter Bunny is obsessed with the British television series Sherlock?

Well, the answer can finally be revealed! Last December, I did an interview with Santa Claus for my podcast Obsessed and it was great fun so I decided to interview the Easter Bunny.

Not to shatter the fourth wall too violently, but I set up an interview with the Easter Bunny as played by Jill Bernard. She’s an improviser, a co-founder of HUGE Theater in Minneapolis, and one of the funniest humans I’ve ever met.

Unfortunately, we had some technical issues with the podcast recording so it’s mostly loud electronic buzzing, awkward silences, and a bunny talking. In short, it is an audio podcast only David Lynch could truly love.

But all is not lost! I’ve transcribed the interview so the truth about the Easter Bunny and her obsession with Sherlock can be revealed. Enjoy!

JOSEPH:
Hello, Easter Bunny, and welcome to the Obsessed podcast.

EB:
Hi, Joseph! Thanks for having me!

JOSEPH:
Now, Easter Bunny, I wanted to ask you right away, do you like to be called the Easter Bunny or do you have another name, a Christian name?

EB:
Yeah, I like being called the Easter Bunny. Wouldn’t you? Like regular bunnies just get called “Bunny.” But my friends call me EB sometimes.

JOSEPH:
Excellent. And for the people listening to the podcast, can you describe your general appearance, EB?

EB:
Yeah, I’m a small bunny wearing a sharp jacket. And I have a fluffy white tail, fluffy ears, a twitchy nose–but not in a negative way. Also, I travel everywhere with this basket.

JOSEPH:
And can you describe the pants situation?

EB:
Well, there’s an upside to being a bunny. I don’t have to wear pants and it’s not weird. I can just wear a jacket. Who else gets to do that?

JOSEPH:
And can you describe the contents of your basket?

EB:
I just brought some samples for the studio audience. We got some standard eggs, some chocolate replicas of myself, a sticker book collection, and some temporary tattoos.

JOSEPH:
Awesome. So everything that a kid would expect to find in their yard.

EB:
Yeah, I didn’t know if this basket was for a boy or a girl. I could have brought like a Transformer or an Easter themed Barbie.

JOSEPH:
So you still give presents based on gender? Because a lot of parents want things to be gender neutral now.

EB:
Well, I have a gender neutral basket. That basket has, like, elephants.

JOSEPH:
Okay, let’s talk a little bit about the eggs. Because I asked the internet for questions and the big one was “Do the eggs come out of you?”

EB:
Do you really want to know? I mean this is kind of a hot dog factory question.

JOSEPH:
I want to know how the sausage is made, I really do.

EB:
Okay. Yeah. I excrete these eggs.

JOSEPH:
And…and…do you shoot them out over the year and refrigerate? Or is this like a night before thing, you just gotta get in there and groan ’em out?

EB:
You know it’s one of those things that I put a note on my calendar around January that says, “Hey, you should get on the egg excreting.” But then you just put it off, you put it off. I got Call of Duty. And I’m really distracted. So I don’t really get around to it until February.

JOSEPH:
And this brings up another question. You play Call of Duty, a stereotypically male video game, what is your gender?

EB:
Yeah. Well. I’m female. I produce eggs. The stories call me “Mister” sometimes, but I don’t mind. It feels very K.D. Lang to me. I mean, I’m wearing a jacket and no pants. It’s all there if someone wants to look.

JOSEPH:
Okay. I have to ask you about your religious affiliation. Do you consider your work to be religious or secular?

EB:
Um. Well. Here’s the thing. I would be more than happy to bring baskets to all the children of the world, but I’m made of ham.

JOSEPH:
Okay.

EB:
So as much as I would like to reach out to Muslim kids or Jewish kids–I feel the call of their hearts and want to bring them baskets–but I’m made of ham so I can’t go into their lives. It’s heartbreaking. Sometimes I cry.

JOSEPH:
So when you’re delivering baskets do the parents or the kids ever see you?

EB:
No, I want to be invisible like a dim sum bus boy. I want to be unseen. If I could email people their Easter baskets, I would, but you gotta do it in person.

JOSEPH:
Okay. And why do you hide the eggs? That seems like kind of a fuck you to the kids to make them work to find the eggs. Why don’t you just leave them on the doorstep or something?

EB:
I want to teach kids that not everything is instant gratification. If you hand them everything they develop a real lazy ethic. I tried that. I tried it for one year. And all the kids just woke up with eggs in their hands.

JOSEPH:
Was that around 1974? Is that what happened to Generation X?

EB:
Yep! That’s what happened. Also waking up with an egg in your hand is very startling. A lot of the eggs were broken. “Ahh! What’s that?” a lot of people said. I tried it, Joseph, and it wasn’t positive.

JOSEPH:
Well, I’m glad you tried. So, I’d like to get into your specific obsession. We like to have guests on the podcast to talk about what they’re really interested in and you are interested in the British television show Sherlock.

EB:
Oh yeah, I love it. In fact, that’s why I was so late this year on excreting the eggs. ‘Cause I was watching Sherlock again.

JOSEPH:
So that’s not something you can multi-task, the egg excretion?

EB:
Well, not with a show like Sherlock. It takes a lot of focus. If you’re watching something stupid like The Real Housewives of Whatever, you could probably excrete eggs at the same time, but Sherlock, you’re going to miss something, a crucial detail, and you’ll have to go back and watch it again.

JOSEPH:
But you have watched it multiple times, right?

EB:
Oh yeah.

JOSEPH:
So why does it speak to you?

EB:
Oh, man. I like putting together clues. I feel like I’m smart like Sherlock. Like I have to figure stuff out. When I’m in a kid’s house delivering their basket or hiding their eggs, I have to figure out clues. I’m like the reverse Sherlock. Because when I hide eggs it’s like I’m making a mystery. And while I’m hiding eggs I like to think, “Could Sherlock find this egg?” The answer’s yes because I’m hiding them for a small child to find.

JOSEPH:
So, it’s like you’re hiding them for Watson.

EB:
Yeah.

JOSEPH:
So how do you feel this obsession manifests for you? Like certain obsessions you can buy a t-shirt or you can engage in the activity. How do you engage besides just watching?

EB:
Well, I have a tiny violin that I’ve been playing just to be more like Sherlock. And as I go around, I try to solve mysteries the way Sherlock would. So while I’m in people’s homes I try to figure out things about them. Like whose parents are having an affair or was anyone ever murdered here. That kind of thing.

JOSEPH:
So when you figure that out do you do anything with that information? Like if you came into my home and thought I killed someone, would you just be like “Cool, I’m going to go excrete some eggs” or would you do something about that?

EB:
Did you kill someone?

JOSEPH:
No, but you can look at my clothes and try to guess like Sherlock.

EB:
Okay. Well, I see that you’re wearing black pants and a black shirt which means obviously you’re on the tech crew of a high school theater production. You’re wearing red converse shoes which means you were the best man in a hilarious wedding. Your shirt seems relatively well-kempt, but it is not new which means you just did a high school theater production which means you’re about eighteen and a half years old and, yes, you murdered someone.

JOSEPH:
Excellent! That was just like Sherlock. Except you don’t have a Watson to explain it to so the audience will never know what it really means.

EB:
Yep!

JOSEPH:
So, if there were a lot of Sherlock merchandise that you could purchase–let’s imagine there’s British television Sherlock underwear with just a big picture of Benedict Cumberbatch on the front–is that something you would want to purchase and own and wear?

EB:
I don’t know. Because then I’m wearing a jacket and underwear and it crosses the line for people. If there was a little tie with Benedict’s face on it that would be cute.

JOSEPH:
And do you like Benedict? I think a lot of people are drawn to this adaptation of Sherlock because it’s fast-paced and intelligent but also because they really like Benedict Cumberbatch.

EB:
Have you noticed his nose is twitchy and he has little beady eyes? He’s a dreamboat from a rabbit perspective.

JOSEPH:
And to me, that’s a rabbit name, Benedict Cumberbatch.

EB:
Absolutely.

JOSEPH:
Now, if you were offered a role on the show would you take it?

EB:
That would be amazing to be on the show!

JOSEPH:
What kind of role would you want to play?

EB:
I would like to be like some master criminal mastermind that Sherlock has to come to terms with.

JOSEPH:
And would you try to disguise the fact that you’re a bunny?

EB:
Yeah, I’d wear a wig. I want to see this episode now that you put it out there.

JOSEPH:
So how many times have you watched Sherlock?

EB:
Oh, a lot. Probably eight times. That and Call of Duty is why I didn’t start until February on the eggs. Sorry, kids.

JOSEPH:
It’ll work out, right?

EB:
Oh yeah, it always does.

JOSEPH:
So I would like to do some lightning round questions. I got some questions from the internet.

EB:
Oh my.

JOSEPH:
These are just random questions people wanted to ask the Easter Bunny. So do you drink alcohol?

EB:
No.

JOSEPH:
Why not?

EB:
You gotta keep your mind sharp. You gotta stay clean.

JOSEPH:
If you drank alcohol would it show up in the eggs?

EB:
Yeah, that happened one time.

JOSEPH:
What was it you drank?

EB:
Blackberry Brandy. It’s nasty. At first I thought it was delicious which is why I kept drinking it. But then I woke up in a pool of my own eggs.

JOSEPH:
Would you ever wear a utilikilt?

EB:
I don’t know. I like having my lower haunches free and easy. And things get caught on your tail.

JOSEPH:
So you don’t wear a utilikilt because of your tail?

EB:
Yeah, unless I wore it under my tail and then I’d look like a gangsta rabbit and no one wants that.

JOSEPH:
Is Bugs Bunny real?

EB:
No, that’s a cartoon, don’t be stupid.

JOSEPH:
Can you run faster than Superman?

EB:
Oh yeah.

JOSEPH:
Awesome. Next question. Why do Cadbury eggs, not the ones you produce, but Cadbury eggs taste like shit?

EB:
Oh. Well, you have amazing shit. Whoever wrote that question should keep going with whatever their diet is.

JOSEPH:
Excellent. And if you could excrete something besides eggs what would you excrete?

EB:
Mp3 players. Just small ones. iPod Shuffle size. And it would come pre-loaded with sweet jams.

JOSEPH:
What kind of sweet jams? What kind of music do you like?

EB:
Like Bach.

JOSEPH:
And the final lightning round question: Do you own a firearm?

EB:
No. I have paws. Firing a gun with a paw is hard. But for home security I tend to use lasers.

JOSEPH:
So like a grid?

EB:
Yeah.

JOSEPH:
So, is your home like a cave?

EB:
Yeah, it’s a hutch. So I don’t get a lot of people breaking in on purpose. Just like curious Boy Scouts. Or cavers.

JOSEPH:
Is there anyone else around the hutch cave thing? Do you have a man friend? Are you dating anyone?

EB:
Oh, no. I used to try to date within the mythological community and that doesn’t really work out. I get some leprechauns drunk dialing me, though.

JOSEPH:
Understandable.

EB:
I’ve also tried to date regular rabbits. But they don’t really interest me. All they want to do is IT, because they’re rabbits.

JOSEPH:
And you don’t have that same drive?

EB:
No. They’re not going to sit down and watch Sherlock with me. They’re rabbits.

JOSEPH:
So, they only want to have sex?

EB:
Or just stare at you and be terrified.

JOSEPH:
So, it’s sex or terror and that’s it?

EB:
Yep.

JOSEPH:
Okay, EB, I have some final questions for you. These are the serious, pompous wrap-up questions I ask all my guests. Are you ready?

EB:
Yeah, sure.

JOSEPH:
If you could only say one word for the rest of your life, what would that word be?

EB:
Hop.

JOSEPH:
Excellent. If someone made a rock opera about your life, what would it be called?

EB:
Eggs Oh Yeah.

JOSEPH:
What’s the punctuation in that title?

EB:
A semi-colon.

JOSEPH:
So Eggs Semi-Colon Oh Yeah?

EB:
Yes, to imply they are separate but dependent clauses.

JOSEPH:
Like Sex; Terror.

EB:
Yes.

JOSEPH:
And finally, Easter Bunny, what is happiness?

EB:
Happiness is strolling through a meadow filled with hidden eggs and discovering them on a bright, beautiful morning.

JOSEPH:
Thank you, Easter Bunny!

-fini-

Thanks for reading this lost episode of Obsessed! A new episode will be up next week. In the meantime, you can listen to recent episodes with Wil Wheaton and Mike Phirman on Beer and Pro-Tools or Sharon Stiteler and Ari Hoptman on Swearing!

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