During Louis CK’s 30-year career, he’s transitioned from a very good comic to a great one by changing tack and talking honestly – sometimes brutally so – about his own life. Early material tended towards silly crudeness and surrealism (“Do you think a baby could eat another baby?”), but it was the stuff about his young children and crumbling marriage that sparked the sharpest moments on his specials: 2006’s Shameless and 2008’s Chewed Up. He built on those insights in his award-winning and avant-garde FX sitcom Louie, which allowed him to explore his complicated family situation, while also indulging the dark, dirty and absurd comedy that he always loved.
So it’s been a disappointment, as his star has risen over the past few years, to see him moving away from that deeply personal material, and his Saturday night show at Madison Square Garden continued that trend. His 2013 special, HBO’s Oh My God, dedicated 20 minutes to the familiar world of dating in your 40s, a strong center in an otherwise average hour. His new material, which will probably make up his upcoming special, Louis CK Live From the Comedy Store, focuses even less on his current life.
Instead, he talked frequently about his Boston upbringing with little nostalgia, dismissing the area’s distinct accent as “a regionally agreed-upon stupidity”, even as the elongated vowels snuck through in a section about his childhood dog. Jokes about ageing – “How can any drug be illegal for a 90-year-old lady?” – and eavesdropping on college students were solid, if somewhat standard, fare.
There were glimpses of his personal life, like his complex feelings about his 10-year-old learning to lie, but it lacked the intense intimacy that distinguished his best stuff. Perhaps he’s becoming more protective of his family, since his children are now old enough (they’re 10 and 13) to deserve some privacy, or maybe his increased fame (he appeared in the Oscar-nominated real-life caper American Hustle and Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine) has made his actual life too unrelatable. Or he could just be spreading himself perilously thin. On top of producing this new hour of standup, he’s written a new seven-episode series of Louie, which requires not just material for the narrative, but original standup for the show’s character to perform in each episode as well.
He is still, it must be said, very funny. Saturday’s show was consistently amusing and his star is certainly not diminishing. This was his third Madison Square Garden show this month, each announced with little fanfare to fans who’ve signed up to his mailing list and each sold out within hours. (His fourth was meant to be held on Tuesday, but has been cancelled because of the impending blizzard. “I mean, if you keep buying the tickets, I have to keep doing the shows.”)
That his biggest shows aren’t his best is more an indication of the delay in recognizing his talent. He’s remained a favorite in the comedy community in the midst of his mainstream success because of his continued presence in “real” comedy rooms – he dropped in at Gramercy club The Stand this weekend, and he’s a relatively familiar sight at free alternative shows such as New York’s Whiplash and LA’s Meltdown. If his newer work lacks memorable, punch-in-the-gut moments, he might fairly argue that he no longer needs attention-grabbing, innovative ideas to propel his career. Perhaps now, he’ll settle back comfortably into the life of a very good standup comic.
