Yesterday’s thoughts of Mitch Hedberg made me realize that, while I have pulled many posts from the archives to fill a spot when I was otherwise busy.
Mitch was one of my favorites, and I hate that I’ll never hear another Mitch Hedberg joke for the first time. Still, you can. If you don’t know of Mitch’s work, it can really make your day a bit more pleasant by shaving off a bit of the seriousness of the world. He’ll do your heart good, I think. He does mine. Be well, friends.
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Something called Mitch Hedberg to mind this morning, and I’ve spent the last hour watching clips on YouTube. I don’t know if I’ve ever started my day by watching comedy, but I hope I do it more often going forward. I’m always in a pretty good mood in the morning, but the laughter just made it that much better.
You know, we grew up on Pryor, and Bill Hicks is always a favorite, but Mitch might be my favorite comedian of all time because he’s so easy to recommend. With Pryor, you get, well, everything that makes Pryor so difficult to recommend; there’s just too much of everything that someone might find offensive. With Hicks, you get the foul language and glorification of drug use. You get the drug thing with Mitch, but not nearly as much as you did with Bill.
Most of Mitch’s stuff is more reminiscent of Stephen Wright–another early fave, and another guy we got from Letterman–just quirky musings of a busy mind. And even though I love Stephen Wright’s work, I like Hedberg’s even better, because of the self-consciousness. Wright is pretty unflappable; you might even get the impression that he doesn’t pay the audience much mind,  like he’d be standing there saying the same things even if there wasn’t an audience there. With Mitch, however, the audience takes an active roll in the performance, and his interactions with us makes him seem like this funny stoner dude we knew in school.
Hope you enjoy.
Paulelmo's Blog 
Just saw it. I haven’t seen that many Comedians in cars episodes. Will have to go back and watch the Norm episode.
He kills it, and it’s so easy.
Hedberg is up there w Norm MacDonald as all time favorite. Shame he died so young. Always had great delivery that seemed so effortless.
Interesting. Small world. Did you see which comedian I mentioned in my Laundry List post about Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, and have you seen that episode? If not, check it out; it’ll roll ya.
Chair Lunch Dinner. Genius
Loved that dude. So many of the great ones die too young. Have you ever heard his Schtick on the drycleaner being closed at three in the morning? Love that one. Stuff Stephen Wright might have forgotten to do.
I don’t think I have. I’ll seek it out
It’s pretty funny. Mitch was just one of those cats, man. If you watch an entire concert, you’re liable to see a bit of stuff that didn’t work that well, but it’s always worth it to get through that to get to the stuff that did. So many great insights.
I like how he owned messing his gag up.
Totally, that cat was just in the moment real. It bothered him, of course; comedians wouldn’t do what they do if things like that wouldn’t bother them. Still, he didn’t lose his shit. I’d be a crying mess.