The Straight Man

Words by Shelton Hull 

‘My Show, Also My Life’ returns Jan. 29

It was mere days ago that I interviewed comedian Ted Brown, the writer, director, producer, editor and also the star of “My Show, Also My Life,” which has the unique distinction of being a show that is actually fresh, and actually new. True originality in our densely oversaturated media landscape is way harder than you think, but Brown has somehow managed to do so, almost entirely by chance.

The show, also his life, is unscripted. It basically involves Brown walking around as his own sort of one-man “The Truman Show”, wearing a body-cam on his chest and carrying a second camera on a selfie-stick type gimmick, augmented by at least one smartphone, sometimes two. He narrates events in a drowsy, slightly nasal monotone, the kind of voice you’d hear in court or on a PBS pledge drive.

I spoke with Brown on a Monday night about two weeks ago, and we were doing the same thing we always do on Monday nights: sitting at a high-top on the front patio of Rain Dogs awaiting the start of Hot Potato Comedy, one of that bar’s trademark open-mic features, hosted in the back room by another homie Chris Buck. That same venue would host the world premiere of season four, episode five of “My Show, Also My Life” the following week. Even though I am writing this before that event, I can look into the future and attest that I was there, and a good time was had by all.

“My Show, Also My Life” is an experiment in its form with historical antecedents dating back past the rise of reality shows and creation of vlogs, all the way to the very first selfies. He comments on the decaying facade of 20th century capitalism, a dead model that remains the standard by which we define. One feature of the show is a sort of pop-up window called the “Brand Scanner,” which is often deployed to mock certain brands but just as often to promote independent businesses, including a wide variety of the creators he’s encountered, here and elsewhere.

A possible misnomer, earlier in this article, was possibly my referring to Brown as “the star” of his show. Of course, he is … but also not. Whereas most performers doing such a project would truly make it all about them and their wacky antics, Brown is much more comfortable in the role of observer, narrating events as they unfold around him, finding humor in the more innocuous aspects of his life. This comes through more clearly when he’s on the road, having filmed on location in Europe and Mexico over the past year. In fact, our interview took place the night before a trip to Peru, the details of which will be seen in season four, episode six of “My Show, Also My Life.”

It may surprise you to learn that a professional comedian who spends so much of his show, also his life, walking around, often interacting with total strangers, documenting the minutiae of his own existence in maniacal detail with at least two cameras going at all times is, in fact, quite shy. But so am I, and that’s fine. This was a bonding moment in our conversation, as we discovered that we are both shy people who deliberately chose career paths that forced us both to develop certain methods to better facilitate the socialization process, and those methods eventually became second nature. These very similar but also very different life paths converged at that table on that patio. We both found this funny, but not enough to actually laugh at. 

Past episodes of the show can be viewed on his YouTube channel, which is oddly named “lorem ipsumeriam.” What could that possibly mean? Actually, it literally means nothing, or about as close as you can get to pure verbal nothingness. “Lorem ipsum” are the first two words of a passage of randomly assembled Latin words used to help with old-school typesetting and new-school graphic design. Interesting choice, for a guy whose own format of choice is itself a sort of blank slate, a slate on which dreams and nightmares can be projected side by side. That is his show, and also his life.

https://www.youtube.com/@loremipsumerian 

https://www.instagram.com/lorem_ipsumerian/