If you missed Jerry Seinfeld's two shows this weekend at the Riverside Theater you missed the return of one funny man. With no introduction, Seinfeld walked slowly onto the stage and rattled off nearly 90 minutes of superior stand-up comedy.
Greeting the audience and calling us "Milwaukee-licious," Seinfeld -- now 47 -- covered most the usual stand-up topics from love to divorce, fashion to football and a hilarious bit on the words "sucks" and "great." Seinfeld's thesis was that the words are very close in meaning, and are used many times in similar context. To wrap this segment up, his example used an ice cream cone. The ice cream has fallen out of the cone, "that sucks." Yet, the word used to express the disbelief that the ice cream had fallen out was a sighing "great."
From the moment he stepped on stage, Seinfeld's top button on his pants zipper was flapping in the wind, my girlfriend noticed it right way. Thankfully, halfway through the 7 p.m. show a male voice in the crowd screamed, "Jerry, your fly is open." Seinfeld made a quick joke about the sheer terror of metal zippers vs. button flies and with a boyish charm turned away from the audience to re-button.
It's pretty obvious that Seinfeld is more than comfortable with his superstar status and his newfound life as a husband and father. Many of his bits focussed on marriage, weddings and the everyday balancing act of having a family.
For this viewer, the funniest bits were the comic's rant on the absurdity of award shows (the praising of actors, how difficult is it to read lines and say them!), his dialogue on the various uses of the word "ass," his talk relating to his daughter. (Babies are cute, they're cuddly, they're wonderful, he opined. But make no mistake: "They're here to replace us!") and the aforementioned "sucks" montage.
The show was extremely funny and entertaining. Even opener Mario Joyner brought solid, if not time-tested, material. Joyner's star is on the rise, and it's nice to see Seinfeld giving him exposure on this tour.
The Riverside proved a worthy host for the evening, despite the problems with the air conditioning, way too many people showing up late and a mini-overflow of popcorn and candy boxes on the floor.
The Riverside is booking some solid acts these days, and as more and more people walk through their doors we hope the management looks to clean up the entrance way a bit, maybe even redo the entire lobby area. And please, there's no need to be selling popcorn and candy.
While we are sure there are decent profit margins on popcorn, the beauty of the theater is greatly reduced by circus-like boxes of the stuff laying all over. Heck, even Seinfeld joked about it, pointing out a pink popcorn box that a front row patron had placed on the stage, asking sarcastically, "they sell popcorn here?"
A life-long and passionate community leader and Milwaukeean, Jeff Sherman is a co-founder of OnMilwaukee.
He grew up in Wauwatosa and graduated from Marquette University, as a Warrior. He holds an MBA from Cardinal Stritch University, and is the founding president of Young Professionals of Milwaukee (YPM)/Fuel Milwaukee.
Early in his career, Sherman was one of youngest members of the Greater Milwaukee Committee, and currently is involved in numerous civic and community groups - including board positions at The Wisconsin Center District, Wisconsin Club and Marcus Center for the Performing Arts. He's honored to have been named to The Business Journal's "30 under 30" and Milwaukee Magazine's "35 under 35" lists.
He owns a condo in Downtown and lives in greater Milwaukee with his wife Stephanie, his son, Jake, and daughter Pierce. He's a political, music, sports and news junkie and thinks, for what it's worth, that all new movies should be released in theaters, on demand, online and on DVD simultaneously.
He also thinks you should read OnMilwaukee each and every day.
