Mooning the Crowd and Waving Your Balls was Funny—Until It Wasn't
The dressing room was oddly configured and presented the opportunity to swing open the door to the toilet in such a way that he who sat, pants around ankles, was hopelessly exposed to the rest of the cast. While, you know, taking a shit.
Brian was a wonderful actor. He was also a very serious person, more self-serious than anything else. He was so serious that taking the piss out of him in vulnerable moments was just fun. And funny.
For a few nights in a row, he had his ritual; for the same few nights, I had mine. He'd get in costume and makeup and suddenly need to have a pre-show shit. I'd wait. He'd close the bathroom door. I'd give it beat. Then I'd swing the door open and he'd squeal like a child, then yell at me "GOD DAMMIT, DON! What the fuck, dude! I'm taking a crap!" And I would laugh until my ribs ached.
It was stupid. As most truly funny things are, it was at the expense of someone very serious. It was also fundamentally harmless.
When I was a kid, there were few things funnier than Monty Python's Flying Circus and I'd watch it on PBS (long before cable or streaming or even VHS) and laugh hysterically at Terry Jones sitting naked at an organ with his back to the camera. "The Naked Organist" was the character and it solidified one of two rules of comedy that seemed inviolable: few things are funnier than a nude man's ass when combined with a fool's grin and the non-sequitur location.
The first rule involved underscoring anything—no matter how mundane—with the music of Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. Always silly. Always funny.
Jones contributed to my go-to disruption of the status quo comic leanings and resulted in a nearly non-stop barrage of moonings and random public nudity that always cracked me up as those very serious people at the 'butt' of the joke gasped and wrung their hands. Fundamentally harmless, defying convention, funny as hell. Nothing sexual about it. Simply buffoonery.
Years into my days of theater, I still found it hysterical to ask "Is this your gum?" while stretching a section of my nut-sack through my zipper or 'hanging a brain' or my favorite sort of Stupid Human Trick: The Clapper. The Clapper was simple. Turn off the lights. I would go to the far side of the stage, drop my pants, and swing my balls back and forth, hitting my stomach and ass and making a loud smacking sound. As I write that, I'm astounded how stupid it must sound, but it was funny at the time.
It was funny because it was subversive and weird. It was funny because in a society so buttoned up and self serious that nudity is considered somehow forbidden but is, at the same time, the baseline of our existence, absent of costume and exposing our most vulnerable selves, the act of someone naked playing an organ in a field is a flat-out hoot. It was funny because you aren't supposed to do that.
A few years ago a woman who stage managed some of our shows pointed out on Faceborg that The Clapper made her uncomfortable at the time and that it wasn't funny to her. I publicly apologized—not for doing it because I still thought it was funny—but for making her uncomfortable. Given that her discomfort was the point but not to traumatize her by any means, I felt bad that my stupid joke stuck with her as a negative.
I feel a certain simpatico with actor John Barrowman these days.
Recently, Barrowman was embroiled in the allegations surrounding Clarke’s history of sexual harassment accusations when a clip of both actors at a fan convention in 2014—appearing alongside actresses Camille Couduri and Tracy Ann Olbermann—went viral, which discussed Barrowman’s alleged frequent exposure of his genitals on the set of the show, framed as pranks. Following a report by the Guardian about allegations against Clarke specific to his time on Doctor Who, Barrowman released a brief statement to the paper about his own incidents, for which the actor was eventually reprimanded on-set for in 2008.
The article reads: “Barrowman said his ‘high-spirited behaviour’ was ‘only ever intended in good humour to entertain colleagues on set and backstage,’ ‘With the benefit of hindsight, I understand that upset may have been caused by my exuberant behaviour and I have apologised for this previously,’ he added. ‘Since my apology in November 2008, my understanding and behaviour have also changed.’”
I'd argue that if you can't see the difference between someone sexually harassing another and someone flashing his ass and balls for a joke, the issue lies with you not the jokester.
Have you seen a dick? They're hysterical! Like a flabby mushroom connected to a flesh bag. Or a skinny turtle out of his shell. A turkey neck without feathers. Who designed this, an idiot? The vagina is far more practical.
The difference between the days of comic stupidity and today is that in 2021 we are subject to the news of the horrors of the world every second. We doomscroll non-stop and bathe ourselves in the pain and suffering of every victim—real and imagined, genuine harm and outrage profiteering—that the act of finding fucking anything subversive and funny is unimaginable.
Like Barrowman, I stopped exposing myself as a joke decades ago. It just stopped being funny, I suppose. Maybe I grew up some which might be a shame. I still laugh at the sight of Jason Segel getting dumped in Forgetting Sarah Marshall while completely nude and Will Ferrell streaking in Old School. And Ferrell running around in his tidy whiteys in Talladaga Nights. And in Semi-Pro with a basketball covering his package.
I remember thinking the shock of the prudes was hysterical back in the days when the uptight came from the mostly conservative crowd. I'm finding that while the scolds have switched up agendas, that desire to take the piss out of those hellbent on controlling everyone else for the sake of wholesomeness or self righteous definitions imposed by puritanical rule is still healthy in me.
I can't speak for anyone else but in the face of so much horror in the world I'd much rather laugh than cry. So get naked. Especially in the presence of those so offended that their faces screw up and they openly shame you for doing so.
Get naked. I could use a good chuckle.
