2008 Woodie Awards
Comics 'battle' it out at the Rock
By Caleb Pardick
Rocket Editor-in-Chief
Issue date: 1/27/06 Section: Life
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Tuesday night, UPB decided to try out yet another MTV original, "Battle of the Sexes." This time, however, the recreation was similar to its television counterpart in name only.
Several hundred students filed into the University Union's Multi-Purpose Room to take in the comical musings of Lynne Koplitz and Robert Kelly in a contest that seemed nothing like, well, a contest.
"This is supposed to be a battle of the sexes, so I guess I'm supposed to make a bunch of jokes about women being better than men?" Koplitz sarcastically asked the crowd just after she took the stage at 8 p.m. "Is that what we're doing here?"
Koplitz then proceeded to bash and berate the opposite sex for about 30 minutes, telling very few jokes in between rehashing her personal experiences with men and commenting on multiple men in attendance.
Koplitz also explained to the audience the difficulties she has encountered in dating a man 10 years her junior.
"I really don't know half the time when I'm with him whether I'm dating him or raising him," Koplitz, 38, said. "I go to his house and see him standing in the front yard with no shirt on poking at the fence with a stick. That's the kind of things I deal with."
Off and on throughout Koplitz's routine, Kelly emerged from the University Union hallway to comment on or criticize her act, or, more frequently, Koplitz herself.
"That's it, rub it in," Kelly said after minimal applause when Koplitz asked the crowd to cheer if they "thought Bobby was hot."
Soon thereafter, Koplitz thanked the crowd and introduced Kelly.
But just a few minutes into Kelly's performance, at about 9 p.m., a blown fuse caused Kelly's microphone to die. After repeated attempts to fix the problem were unsuccessful, Kelly took to calling a student trying to fix the microphone "Harry Potter," a handle that Kelly used again and again to get updates on the situation.
Kelly continued on with the rest of his routine without the assistance of amplification, using the problem itself as a way to make jokes.
"Does this happen a lot?" Kelly asked the amused crowd. "Do you guys have electricity all the time, or is it just like a luxury sometimes?"
Kelly then went on to question the location of SRU.
"I think they just said, 'Here we go, mountain, nothing, mountain. Let's put the college right in between there,'" Kelly said. "And the worst part about a place like this is that you can get mugged in the street and attacked by a bear in the same night."
Much of Kelly's routine was also based on his own chubby build.
"I really think that fat people should all have their own personal midgets, like how blind people do with seeing-eye dogs," Kelly said before illustrating how the arrangement would work, playing the roles of both himself and the midget.
After Kelly thanked the crowd and called Koplitz back onstage, he was then deemed winner of "Battle of the Sexes" by way of audience applause. Kelly was presented with a makeshift paper crown.
"I know you're all thinking about a fat little kid at Burger King and the crowns they give away," Kelly said upon receiving his award.
Koplitz, who has appeared on a number of shows on the Comedy Central network, said afterwards that her origins in the business differ from those of the average comic.
"Some of my best friends in New York City called around at clubs and everywhere seeing when there was an open-mic night and found out how to get me on," Koplitz said.
Koplitz also said she performs five to six nights per week while in New York.
"I don't do too much when I'm on the road," Koplitz said. "I guess I'm just lazy like that. Not like Bobby."
Kelly, who's currently on a 46-college tour in the Northeast, said that performing at small colleges, SRU included, offers an element that clubs in New York don't.
"I think when I'm at colleges, I have to be more creative," Kelly, 35, said. "There's more pressure to succeed. Really, you never know what you're going to get. I tell myself before I perform, 'I have to make this work tonight.'"
Koplitz agreed with Kelly's thoughts about performing at venues other than clubs.
"I think there's a lot more pressure," Koplitz said, "because I realize that I'm it. I'm the entertainment. I'm the one they brought in and it's all on me."
Kelly and Koplitz, who perform together often, said that they met at the Comedy Cellar in New York City a few years ago.
"I just kind of did it, and I really liked it, and then I just kind of went with it after that," Kelly said of his beginning in comedy. "There was no real time when I decided that this was what I wanted to do. I just went for it."
Koplitz said that, regardless of location, geographically each performance has something new to offer.
"We never know how things are going to go, and the response is somewhere between the sublime and the ridiculous," Koplitz said. "But it's always a lot of fun."
