“My Anvil”

by  Vincent Vescio

I usually don’t do this sort of thing. But I feel I owe it to my legion of fans who broke their backs to come to the 2011 LA Improv Festival to support their favorite sketch comedy group Fine Toothed Gnome. I owe it to you to send out an official apology and an official explanation.

A hero’s journey has many obstacles. I had but one. His name is Joshua Hoskins. Never in the history of competition, whether it be World War 1, the Olympics, or the LA Improv Festival has one human been so destructive to a unit.

The day started as most do…. birds singing outside my bedroom window, an Armenian man shouting at his beagle on their morning walk, and Joshua waking me with a hot cup of coffee “spilt” atop my head like Carrie (2nd Sissy Spacek reference).

I managed to cold water and aloe my way out of any burn marks and we went about our day preparing for the big show. We arrived to the theater early to spend some time relaxing and sharing our fears and excitements. However, Josh spent this time with the members of our opponents’ team; Margot’s Pie.

I heard him make some sour remarks about his own team (“sick of carryng this jagoff like a bag of his family’s pasta noodles”) and some unnecessary hype for his new friends, telling anyone who passed by (“these guys are the best, best, best, best, best”).
A sincere “hey Josh, wanna have a beer and run lines?” was met with a cackling “it ain’t my fault you can’t retain any information in that spaghetti sauce filled blob in your skull!”. He then turned to his new sketch buddies and said loud enough for the whole bar to hear, “too bad he can’t retain lines like he retains water!”. Now to make friends with the opposing team is one thing, but to attack my recent weight gain is something ELSE.

After immediately disposing of my previous meal and a few tears into the iO West house toilet, I cleaned myself up and swore I would do my best to look past Josh’s sudden transformation into Beelzebub himself and have a great show!

I haven’t spoken to Mr. Hoskins in the aftermath of our championship melt down so I can only speculate. Perhaps it was something I said? An unwelcomed hint that his new bride was only in it for the money? A declined offer to watch perhaps the world’s most overrated sketch comedy group: Monty Python? I do not know. What I do know is the feeling of 11 years of friendship being split open on the surgeon’s table that was the iO West Mainstage.

I did what I could. I tried to take over the show. I tried to mask this betrayal to the audience and keep the show light and fun. Little did I know what a masterful foe my friend was. He manipulated his masterpiece like Lexington Steele with a chubby co-ed “first timer”. He even managed to drag the show past its 20 minute limit so that our grand finale had the lights literally blacken our hopes.

So I offer you this insight. Does it heal the wound? Of course not. But sometimes just knowing “why” is enough to get another 20 mins of sleep at night. Enough to drag yourself out of bed at 6pm to watch The Count of Monte Cristo on Hulu. Dreaming of the day you will have the will of Edmund Dantes to avenge your wrong doers.

But until then……..

“The Warm, Wet Facts”

by Joshua Hoskins

I’m accustomed to fear in a man’s eyes. In the sweat on his brow. In whimpers and cries for home. Three tours in the jungles of ‘Nam showed me fear in every possible incarnation.

At least that’s what I thought before Friday night…

Twenty minutes before the biggest show in the history of Fine Toothed Gnome I walked backstage to find Vin Vescio, my friend of a decade, the best man at my wedding, my partner in comedy, afraid as I had never seen a man afraid.

Vin was doing a handstand on the green room couch, his head buried deep in the velvet cushions. Now those who know Vin would agree that he has a tendency toward silliness. Initially I treated this as typical Vescio tomfoolery. But then I saw the fear…

It began as a small, almost cute, spot of urine. But soon this adorable little pee circle was widening exponentially, turning his skinny hipster trousers into a real German Urine-Pants Party Yes (GUPPY).

What was I to do? What was the creative and spiritual figurehead of one of comedy’s hot, up-and-coming sketch groups to do? We only had twenty minutes and my partner was literally peeing in the face of God and himself (gravity).

I shouted at him, “Vin we have to do the show!”

It was difficult to decipher his muffled response, but it was something exactly like “I don’t want to do the show! I’m scared! Fuck the show! I’m tired of being the least funny member of this two-man group! I’m sick and tired of you being the star of all the shows and then you’re always so humble and cool about it afterward! Everyone is going to think I’m a super bitch out there. So fuck the shooooooooooooooooooooow!”
I mean, I couldn’t in good conscience disagree with anything Vin had said about me being so much funnier and cooler and everything. But he had just broken one of the most important Fine Toothed Gnome oaths. Taken directly from the FTG bi laws:

Oath #37: No FTG member shall, at any time or for any reason, openly discuss how much funnier and cooler and everything Josh is than Vin. Just don’t do it.
I suppose a lesser man would have left Vin there, upside-down and micturating upon himself . But then I thought of our fans, the good people who had each paid ten hard-earned dollars to see the uniquely juvenile brand of dick humor that is a Fine Toothed Gnome show. I couldn’t let them down.

It took a near super-human act of leadership and poise to get Vin’s head out of that couch and onto that stage. It also took a good powdering of his bottom and a pair of Dora the Explorer diapers. But I did it. Josh was the hero and Josh saved the show.

And then we lost the show.

Do I blame it on the utter chaos that happened immediately before our big performance? Do I blame it on the stench of urine that radiated from my partner and created a less-than-perfect ambiance for comedy in the room? Or do I blame it on the fact that Margot’s Pie had a really great show and made people laugh, like, a lot?
These aren’t questions a simple, regular schmo like me can answer (see! Humble!). I suppose the answers to these riddles can only be decided by historians in dusty libraries many decades from now. I will leave it up to them.

But there is one absolute truth to be gathered here. One thing that anyone reading this, or anyone who saw our show Friday night, should remember as long as they live…

Vinnie peed his pants. He pissed ‘em good and long.