Cast: Brad Sherwood, Wayne Brady, Colin Mochrie, Ryan Stiles, and Drew Carey

Weird Newscasters: Brad = anchor; Colin = Just found out his boyfriend Brad is having an affair with someone else on the show and he wants to know who it is; Wayne = farm boy defending his title in the finals of the national greased pig roundup; Ryan = first-time mother going from conception to birth
The fun begins early, during Drew's reading of the roles. After Drew announces that Brad is Colin's boyfriend, Brad looks over at Colin to smirk. It's a mistake that Brad will make throughout this game. Every time he looks at Colin, Brad's stage face slips a little and he starts to crack up. It might just be an extra twinkle in his eye, or a slightly wider smile, but Brad has a very hard time staying completely in character whenever he looks at Colin. Shortly thereafter, Ryan jumps in after Wayne's role reading, begging Drew not to say that he is a greased pig. Wayne picks up on Ryan's plea and prepares to chase Ryan who seems amused by his actions. Fortunately for Ryan, his assignment is the greatest of God's gifts, according to Drew anyway, a first-time mother. Finally, the actual game begins with Brad reading the top story about veteran British rockers Roger Daltry, Pete Townshend, and John Entwhistle freeing some Doberman Pinchers from a veterinary clinic. Police now have proof that the Who let the dogs out. The audience groans appropriately while Brad repeats his early mistake, looks at Colin, and loses his focus. He manages to recover enough to name Colin "Barney Smallpants". Watch Ryan's face when the camera pulls back; he's moving his mouth in a "tasted something bad" motion. That motion is usually a sign that Ryan is trying not to crack up on stage.

Appropriately in character, Colin seems mildly annoyed at the new name. But he's too concerned about other secrets to be worried about that item. It seems that investigative reporting has turned up some interesting facts. One of those facts appears to be lipstick on Brad's collar. He is mortified and pauses for a long moment. Brad takes the pause as a signal that Colin has finished his bit and picks up some papers to read from. I think Brad was genuinely surprised when Colin hopped off the stool and strode to the audience. "It's you! Isn't it?" Colin swipes lipstick off of a man in the front row. "Harlot!" (I love that line. When was the last time you heard the word "harlot" used?) Points to the audience guy for not only allowing Colin to swipe his lips but for getting into the act at the end and sassing Colin back with his shoulders. Colin stomps back to the stage, slaps Brad, and delivers a great double entendre, "That's the last time you'll be getting any fresh headlines." Once again, Brad has a hard time staying focused while he struggles not to smile at the line. (PS: Did you notice that what Drew read for Colin's role was more descriptive than what was written on the screen? The screen description did not mention the part about wanting to know who Brad is having the affair with.)

Brad recovers and passes control over to Wayne whom he does not name at the sports desk. Wayne has tucked the front part of his shirt in his pants, and pulled his pants up above his waist. He was trying to look like a farm boy although I thought he came across looking more like a geek. After taking a swig from his jug, Wayne announces that he's going to defend his title for the fourth year in a row. At the phrase "fourth year", he stretches out his hand with his fingers splayed. I'm not sure if he was just emphasizing the phrase. Or if he was trying to indicate the number of years he had been defending his title, intentionally getting the number of years wrong. If Wayne planned the hand motion as a joke, it was only partially successful. Wayne announced that the only thing standing between him and victory was that greased pig, inevitably turning to Drew on that line. The production staff probably intended for Wayne to involve Drew on this quirk when they created it. The set up was pretty obvious; I wish Wayne had chosen another route though. But the people sitting behind Drew were eagerly anticipating Drew's involvement as were my brother and his wife when they saw the episode with me. So I guess that's why I don't write for television. Drew was expecting to be involved too, but not as eagerly as the audience was. Watch him as he stands up, he seems to signal that he plans to run across the stage rather than circle around the desk as he and Wayne sometimes do. I'm not positive but the more I watch Drew crossing the stage, the more I believe that Drew did not intentionally trip and fall. (Colin's reactions are definitely not intentional; I'm sure of that.) Lying face down at Ryan's feet, Drew suffers Wayne giving a wrestling countdown and then slowly rises. Drew looks to Ryan for some support but doesn't get any and makes his way back to his desk. Wayne celebrates his victory only to realize that later he might find out that he's really lost. If you're wondering what Drew was tucking in after he sat back down at the desk, he's putting his battery pack back. You can see the pack hanging down below his coat as he's getting up from the floor. There's another glimpse of it in his hand just before he sits down.

Wayne throws game control back to Brad who oddly decides to give Wayne a name at this point. In an interesting case of thinking alike, Colin begins to sniff Brad seconds before Brad tells him that he could have learned something from that little behavior. Colin: "Why do you smell like pork?" (Listen for Wayne saying "Oh, man" in the background.) Brad: "It is the other white meat." Stunned, Colin stares at Brad. (In the background, you can hear one of the other actors, saying, "Oh ... uh ... oh" at Brad's joke. It sounds like Ryan's voice to me, but it's unusual for him to break character during Weird Newscasters. So maybe it's Wayne? It's definitely not Drew because it's too low pitched to be his voice, besides you can hear Drew laughing a moment later.) Yet another time, Brad makes the mistake of looking at Colin and nearly losing focus. But he manages to recover and introduces Sparky McSpark Spark with the weather.

A drunk Ryan begins to tell us about tomorrow's weather only to hear that it already is tomorrow. Seems that Sparky had missed hearing the last call. Knowing that she was too drunk to drive, she asks someone to take her home. Usually she doesn't let guys come in at this hour ... but she did this time. In rapid progression, one thing leads to another ending with abandonment the morning after. The telephone rings with the surprising news — a baby. At first Sparky McSpark Spark feels a tad uncomfortable, then she's excited to feel the baby kick, but as Ryan's hands portray Sparky's expanding belly she becomes less and less enthralled with pregnancy. Her water breaks, and an ambulance whisks her away to the hospital. Ryan's portrayal up to this point is a nice piece of stagecraft but it isn't particularly funny to me. But for some reason, when he twirls his finger in the air and wheedles like a siren, I always burst out laughing. It's just so odd. In the delivery room, Sparky screams for drugs. And here is where Ryan's portrayal becomes really interesting to me. Up to this point, Ryan has been delivering a nice solo piece of planned improv. By planned improv, I mean that he obviously mapped out the whole sequence while the others were doing their sections. Just then, Wayne comes over and pretends to be the baby that Sparky is delivering. Suddenly, Ryan has to deal with another actor whose actions he hasn't mapped out. Rather than give a set solo performance, Ryan has to interact with Wayne. I think it throws him momentarily. But Ryan adjusts and once Wayne is "delivered", he pulls him in a hug and then hands the baby over to a nonplussed Colin. I suspect Ryan had planned from the beginning to give the baby to Colin, but having Wayne there made the scene work even better. Brad takes the opportunity to add a final comment about mutual infidelity. Then he tells his boyfriend Colin to pack his bags and move out meanwhile Wayne is sucking his thumb and smiling at the unhappy "Daddy". This Weird Newscasters is a rarity in that all four actors worked together to bring the game to an end.

A couple of quick post-game comments: first, did you hear Wayne double-checking that Ryan's back was okay after the game? Second, I really liked Drew's delivery when he was teasing Wayne about the greased pig treatment. I thought "You'll always be my friend ... Wayne Brady" was especially well done.

Two Line Vocabulary: Colin = submarine commander; Brad and Ryan = seamen; Submarine commander suspects one of his seaman of being a spy
Drew calls the three men to the playing area and tells Brad and Ryan their two lines. Brad's lines are "Says who?" and "What the hell is that?". Ryan's lines are "That can't be good" and "When's lunch?". The "When's lunch?" line seems to amuse Ryan. Drew then reads the scene starting with Colin's role as the submarine commander. Drew pauses and gives the surprised Colin a thumb's up. Colin: "You mean I'm not a woman?" Drew comments that Colin is moving up in the world while Ryan points out that he could still be a woman. Colin elects to play the role as a man anyway while Brad bends down and takes a look at Colin's crotch just to be sure he's qualified to play the role that way. For once, it's Ryan and Brad who suffer the audience's snickering after Drew announces that their roles are seamen on the submarine. From his reaction, Ryan must have thought the audience was being childish. I guess he didn't notice that Colin started snickering first.

Roles assigned, Ryan pulls down a periscope and Colin begins the scene by asking if there's anything on the surface. Confused, Brad wonders what the surface is. Colin explains that the surface is the area above the water. The notion worries Ryan, but Colin assures him that the area above the water is good. Brad disagrees and wants to know who told him that. "Says me and ... whoever created the world." With that line, Colin unintentionally set an amusing pattern that would haunt him throughout the game. He would go full-force into a sentence then suddenly blank out and pause for thought midway. It happened to him several times. Fortunately, it was funny every time. After Colin explained how the surface was good, Ryan leaned in and wanted to know when lunch was. Colin brushed him off with more important matters. One of the two seamen was a spy, he announced getting the accusation out in the open. Ryan: "That can't be good." Colin agreed. (Did you notice how Colin prefaced his accusation? He began by saying "look". He used that word a lot in this game. More than he normally does, so it really stood out. Both Colin and Ryan often use the word "look" to ask the other actors to follow their lead in the narrative, I've noticed. Since the narrative was his responsibility, I guess Colin fell into the habit more than usual.) Ryan still had lunch on his mind, but Colin said they would have to wait until the spy was found. Afterwards, they would have a buffet — the idea of a lunch buffet pleased ever-hungry Ryan — highlighted by a greased pig. Neither seaman liked the idea of eating a greased pig, but Colin assured them it would taste good in its special sauce. (Wayne doubles over his chair's armrest while Drew is bemused.) Since most of the last sequence was between Colin and Ryan, Colin turns to Brad giving him a chance to act. Challenging him, Colin wants to know who won the World's Series. Brad wants to know what a World's Series is. After hearing Colin's explanation, Ryan decides the World's Series can't be a good thing although Colin disagrees.

After a small pause, both Colin and Ryan reach for periscopes. (Apparently there are two side by side periscopes on this sub.) Colin backs off to let Ryan set up the sequence. Ryan sees something that can't be good on the surface. Colin takes a look — it's a whole bunch of ships! (You mean like a fleet? Or maybe a flotilla, Colin?) I just told you, a whole bunch of ships, he repeats to Brad's inane question. The submarine commander sees this as an opportunity to root out the spy. They'll torpedo the enemy and the seaman who doesn't fire his torpedo will be the spy because he doesn't want to hurt his friends. The seamen protest in concert. Realizing they'd spoken together, Brad and Ryan play up the moment as if they'd planned it. Colin tells Ryan to take torpedo button [another blank pause] number one. But he's recovered enough that when Brad asks him what is that? Colin can smoothly tell him, it's the one next to torpedo button number two. While Colin and Brad are arguing, Ryan crosses the stage to his torpedo station. If you watch him, you see that he pokes at his torpedo button and starts to bend to pick it up. But Colin and Brad are still talking, so Ryan pauses. Once the others stop talking, he repeats the action, this time going through with the motion of picking up the fallen button. It's interesting to see how he holds back the gag until he's sure the others are free to watch his actions. Colin notices the lost button and is worried. He screws it back in meanwhile Brad's button is falling off as well. At least he thought it was the button. Upon closer examination, Colin realizes it's only an orange but lunch isn't happening yet, he adds forestalling Ryan. Colin returns to the periscope and directs the seamen to aim 20 degrees [blank out pause then a wave to stage right] that way. (I love Colin's use of all the technical terms.) Brad: "Says who?" (But did you notice that Ryan nudged Brad to prompt him to say something?) Colin turns to discover that Brad has his hand level with his crotch, outstretched and upturned. Colin: "What are you doing?" Ryan, throwing his hands up in disavowal: "That can't be good!" Brad's hand position suddenly becomes compromising, and Brad starts to blush at having been caught. Colin: "No, it can't be good!" Brad recovers just enough to ask "What the hell is that?" before Drew buzzes ending the game.

Quick Change: Brad = outlaw; Colin = Miss Kitty; Ryan = sheriff; Wayne = calls change; Outlaw is giving Miss Kitty a hard time in the saloon when the sheriff comes in to sort things out
After the crowd reacts when Drew tells Colin that he's playing Miss Kitty, Drew comments softly, "yeah, I know. Every time." For this reason plus Colin's reaction to the submarine commander role in Two Line Vocabulary, I think Quick Change was actually played before Two Line Vocabulary at the taping. Neither Drew's comment nor Colin's reaction makes sense if Colin had played a man in a previous game. I know that jokes about Colin always playing a woman are a recurring gag on the show, but I still think the comments are more logical if you switch the order of the games at the taping.

Brad quickly gets the scene going by adopting a sluggish drawl and complaining that he had ordered a double whiskey. Miss Kitty thinks the outlaw has had enough and since she's a very strong woman, she doesn't have to do what he tells her too. Wayne: "Change". Miss Kitty's an orangutan in a dress. "Change." Miss Kitty can beat the outlaw senseless with one fingernail. The outlaw is not impressed; he draws his gun and starts shooting at her feet, ordering Miss Kitty to dance. Miss Kitty repeats that she's a strong woman who doesn't have to do anything a man tells her too. But apparently Miss Kitty will dance for Wayne. The sheriff enters the saloon through the squeaky swing doors. "Change." The sheriff enters the saloon through the ding dong swing doors. "Change." The sheriff enters the saloon through the ship's horn swing doors, as Ryan steps down his pitch with each new sound effect. Miss Kitty is relieved to see the sheriff, telling him about the outlaw causing trouble. Fearless, the sheriff tells the villain to leave town. The outlaw refuses ["Change"] then relents wondering which way's out of town? Curiously, the sheriff tells him "You passed it on the way in, right passed the OK corral." Ryan's line always puzzles me because I'm not sure what Ryan meant when he said it. He makes it sound like the way into town is slightly different from the way out of town. The two ways are nearby each other but aren't the same. Maybe the ways in and out of town are like those double swinging doors waiters use in restaurants to get to the kitchen? You go in through one door, and you go out through the other one? Who knows. However you get out of town, the outlaw agrees to go, but first he's going to shoot the sheriff full of lead. "Change." Make that, spank the sheriff with his paddle. "Change." Change that to, ride him like a greased pig. Brad starts greasing his hands; Miss Kitty tells him there's not enough room in this town for the two of them. (Excuse me, Colin, but what prompted that?) The sheriff wonders why Miss Kitty is trying to stop the outlaw. Miss Kitty is ashamed of her hero; so he realizes that he ought to do his duty.

"You see this badge?" It means he's the sheriff. "Change." Ryan: "You see this thong?" Ryan stops and thinks; fortunately Wayne calls before we find out what Ryan's thong means. "You see these sandals? That means someone stole my boots." Turns out that the outlaw stole his boots and his horse. Well, in that case, the sheriff reasons, they ought to take five steps backwards and draw their guns. "Change." They ought to step right up there and Riverdance. From the expression on his face, Ryan was surprised when Wayne didn't call change. So he and Brad step downstage to duel. Miss Kitty is worried. "Be careful, Marshall, he's a champion Riverdancer from out East." I agree with Drew; I think that's a very funny line mostly because it's so typical of what you really hear in B-grade Westerns. The combatants start dancing fiercely; then disaster strikes our hero. The sheriff collapses with a stitch in his side. Miss Kitty rushes to his side. "Change." Ryan's stitch in his side becomes cramps in his thighs. "Change." The cramps move backward to Ryan's butt. Don't worry sheriff, Miss Kitty's a part time doctor. Surprisingly helpful, the outlaw points out that's what the sheriff gets for Riverdancing in a thong. Drew buzzes in and awards all the points to Wayne since he did all the real work in the game.

Scenes From A Hat: all four [scenes = Latin American soccer announcers on their day off, weird things for people to find beautiful, weird things for your grandmother to give you for Christmas, what politicians' wives are really thinking as they smile and wave from the podium]
Ryan delivers the first entry for the soccer announcer scene. He drives up to a fast food window and asks for a cheeseburger, fries, and a COOOOOOOOOOOOOKE. It's a nice little scene. Then he comes back down and does a variant where he's looking through the bag and wonders where his coke is. To top it off, Ryan comes down a third time with still another variant on the same gag. Why three of the same things in a row? My guess — and it is only a guess — is this. At the taping, Ryan did his first joke, then Drew waited for one of the other actors to do a gag. No one did. So to kill the silence, Ryan came down and did the first variant. Drew waited again, but still no one came forward. Once again, Ryan came down to kill the silence, just to have something going on for the audience. I know this happens occasionally at tapings, so it's not unrealistic to guess that it happened here, especially when you look at Ryan's face after the third time. But then the question changes from "why three of the same things in a row?" to "why didn't Drew just draw another scene from the hat?" and to "why did the editors show us all three in the broadcast?" I have no guesses for those questions. I expected Wayne's entry for the weird beautiful things. I didn't know who was going to use Colin, but I knew someone would. It was inevitable. Ryan's love of the sneeze phlegm made me shiver, partly because of how completely he carried out the scene. Normally in Scenes From A Hat, Ryan drops his character as soon as he finishes the gag. He rarely carries it through his walk off. For some reason, he did this time. Ryan walked back to the step blissfully hugging his prized possession. It was a little too convincing. Colin's reaction to Brad's entry amused me more than the entry itself. Brad: "Goodbye, beautiful. Flush." Colin stands there with his hands over his face. Scatological humor seems to be the only humor style that consistently embarrasses Colin.

I wouldn't have put "weird things for your grandmother to give you for Christmas" in the same game of Scenes From A Hat as "weird things for people to find beautiful" if I were picking the topics for the hat. But no one asked me to pick the topics. Wayne's grandmother must have a huge set of dentures. Did you notice how big that box was? When I heard the scene description, I knew someone was going to give grandpa's ashes for Christmas. I'm not surprised that it was Colin who did. I liked how Ryan reprised and enhanced his sneeze phlegm joke. Coming down with a walker, sneezing, and then wrapping the tissue up as a gift was a nice touch. If you didn't understand what I meant when I spoke about how Ryan seldom carries through his gag, compare the two scenes. In the first one, Ryan holds the tissue tight to his chest and ecstatically carries it off with him. But for this scene, Ryan drops the character completely once the present is wrapped. He doesn't even use the walker to leave the camera sight. This is much more typical for Ryan in Scenes From A Hat. The final scene dates the taping to an extent. Politicians' wives would only be a topic during an election year. Plus the wives mentioned clearly set the taping during the 2000 presidential elections. Brad's "Who's that girl under the podium?" and Wayne's ventriloquist dummy as president could have come from any election. But Ryan's "If I was his wife, I'd be Tipper Bush" definitely sets the time frame. Of the three jokes, I think Brad's was the funniest. Ryan's was funny only in that it was pretty lame and he knew it. The kicker of the Scenes From A Hat game belonged to Brad. "I hope my husband licks [censor beeped {Bush}] tonight." Afterwards, Brad stands there explaining to the audience that the joke "is an election thing". Clearly no one from the cast, the audience, or the Standards and Practices department believed him.

Irish Drinking Song: graduation; all four
If you haven't seen the episode, you might think that I incorrectly identified the players for this game. I haven't. There was no Drew game in this episode. In his introduction, Drew asks the far section for a major life event. One man calls out "bikini wax" to the cast's amusement. After selecting graduation, Drew points out that he asked for a major life event, not a major day event. Then he proceeds into a small gag of a woman talking about her day to a friend on the telephone. So even though there wasn't a Drew game, we did get a little piece of Drew improvisation. After Drew finishes his introduction, Laura starts playing. Traditionally, everyone sings an opening "Oh" to set the pitch. For some reason, Wayne found himself singing the note solo. Mid-note he stares at them surprised that they weren't singing. They stare back at Wayne, equally surprised that they weren't singing. But they do join in for the chorus. Wayne sings the first line that today he will graduate. Brad sings about receiving his diploma with the word diploma ending his line. Colin smiles wickedly through his line knowing that Ryan will have to find a rhyme for the word. With a worried look, Ryan manages to come up with Pomona at the end. According to Wayne, the graduate will open a business. Brad says he's going to be rich. Colin thinks the grad will be happy because according to Ryan, he's "going to leave that old Ohhhh" avoiding the rhyme. The grad can't wait to leave high school; he's got a big degree; he'll be on his own; "they won't laugh at me." The grad had a bikini wax; he's really proud; he's got no more hair there, and his mom's yelling loud. The grad walks up to the dean, politely thanks him, everything's a blur. The dean hands him his diploma. Ryan: "That's a really truth." Don't you understand? Brad: "Look, here's my tooth." Brad managed to rhyme, but you can tell he thought it was pretty bad. In fact, he spent the refrain not singing. Instead he was drinking his beer and giving Ryan the evil eye for the rhyme Ryan forced on him. Ryan continues the saga of our high school grad. He got a job; he drives a truck; he's a truck driver (very weak there, Brad), and he transports ducks. (Nice save on the rhyme, Colin.) He's making lots of money, making lots of cash, making lots of ducats, sitting on his ash! This wasn't the funniest Irish Drinking Song I've heard, but it was still enjoyable. Did you notice at the very end that Brad went for the really high note? Only it was so high that it was almost out of his range?

Credits: Brad and Wayne = contestants in the greased pig catching contest; Ryan and Colin = the pigs
This was one of the quietest credits reading I can remember. I don't think anyone said a word which defeats the purpose of a credits reading, I suppose. Colin pours grease over himself, and Wayne starts chasing him. Whenever Wayne catches him, he slips down and off. Brad turns to chase Ryan only to discover that some pigs carry shotguns. Ryan threatens him until Brad gets down on his knees. Wayne and Brad change pig targets. Brad slips off of Colin just as Wayne did. Just as Brad did, Wayne discovers Ryan holding the shotgun. He puts his hands in the air, then hits the shotgun out of Ryan's hands. It flies into the air; Wayne catches it, and hits Ryan over the head with it. This is the first time we hear anything from the actors'. Either Wayne or Ryan makes a small chunk sound when the barrel hits. I think that it's Wayne who makes the noise since he could time it better. Wayne laughs at Ryan's reaction (the only other sound) and then returns the gun to him. Wayne goes back to chasing Colin who throws a little Mick Jagger swagger into his pig impersonation. Meanwhile, Ryan heads upstage twirling his finger to indicate his tail. I suppose this credits reading failed since no credits were read. But I actually enjoyed this more than many of the other four person credits reading where they're all jabbering on top of each other.

Best Game:
Because I wrote so much for Weird Newscasters, you might think that I chose it for the best game. It's a good guess, and I considered Weird Newscasters before deciding on Two Line Vocabulary. I picked Two Line Vocabulary for a couple of reasons. One was simply that I laughed harder and more often during the game. The other reason was the degree of spontaneity in Two Line Vocabulary. Weird Newscasters felt more like a series of solo set pieces. Whereas, Two Line Vocabulary was about three people having to act and react with each other. I realize that Weird Newscasters is designed to be a series of independent pieces but it was more noticeable to me this time than in some other playings. Especially when compared to Two Line Vocabulary. Plus like I said, I laughed in Two Line. And that's always a good indicator.

Overall Comments:
This is one of those episodes that I rarely remember to hunt down. But whenever I come across it, I'm always pleased to watch it. Thinking about that, I'd have to say that this episode is strong but not memorably outstanding. There's not much in it that causes it to pop into mind when I think about this season. On the other hand, there's nothing in it that causes me to wince or regret spending time watching it. So I guess I'd give it a solid B.

© LKK (08/25/02)