Important Things With Demetri Martin Season One DVD Review
Posted by Randy Harrison on 09.19.2009
This is a set.....this is a set...(yes it is)...this is a set....it's a set.....
One of the top young comedians in the United States today, Demetri Martin is one of the most well-rounded comic acts with many talents that he uses to their full extent. Martin's stand-up comedy sets have been known to feature him playing music on the guitar, making jokes based on sketches he's drawn on a large easel pad, using word play to help illustrate his jokes and numerous other props and devices to draw laughs.
Martin's career in comedy began when he dropped out of the NYU School of Law just prior to graduating, deciding that comedy was what he wanted to do and that it didn't make any sense to waste more time doing anything else. He's appeared on Comedy Central on their Premium Blend show as well as his first stand-up special, Demetri Martin: Person, which premiered in 2007 on the network. He's written for Conan O'Brien and appeared as a frequent contributor on The Daily Show, as well as acting in the recently released movie Taking Woodstock, in which Martin played lead character Elliot Tiber.
Amongst all of the various jobs, comedy sets and palindromes (Martin once created "Dammit, I'm Mad", a 224 word palindrome), Martin recently began his own weekly show on Comedy Central called Important Things with Demetri Martin, which has just seen its first season released on DVD. Featuring the same eclectic mix of music, sketch comedy, sketches used for comedy, and stand-up monologues, Martin has stayed true to himself with all seven episodes of the first season. Whether he brought laughs through it all is what we'll take a look at in this review, which begins right now.
Buy Season One of Important Things With Demetri Martin here.
The Season
The premise of the show is for Martin to tackle a singular "Important Thing" and through the course of an episode dissect it for laughs through his various methods of comedy including regular stand-up, sketches, animation, music and more. These things are chosen by Martin himself and the season includes episodes on "Games", "Power", "Timing", "Chairs", "Coolness", "Brains", and "Safety". Each episode begins with Martin telling a variety of jokes on the particular subject in his own inimitable style. While some people may find Martin's joketelling a little dry, he very rarely missteps and every segment that features Martin doing stand-up brings laughs, no matter what the subject is.
Sketch comedy is also a strength in the series, with recurring pieces like "Demetrocles" and "De Mici" (the former taking place in ancient times and the latter taking place during the Renaissance), as well as stand-alone sketches like "Devon Copperfield: Emotional Escape Artist", which rely heavily on Martin's acting ability to help carry them. Luckily, Martin's sense of comedic timing is tremendous and the show rarely fails when it comes to the sketch segments. One perfect example features Martin as Gallileo Gallilei, who through some wacky mishap ends up sitting with Benjamin Franklin, William Shakespeare and a college student writing a paper on all three at an Applebee's-style restaurant. The premise is beyond plausible, yet it's still hilarious to see Gallileo, Franklin and Shakespeare embarassing the poor college kid with their crass come-ons aimed at the attractive young waitress that ends with them being thrown out of the joint.
That sketch, perhaps more than any other, perfectly illustrates Martin's comedic appeal as he takes the ridiculous and turns it into the sublime with his quick wit and ability to get the most from the guest stars in his sketches, in this case Jon Benjamin as Franklin and the equally quirky and hilarious John Oliver as Willam Shakespeare. Benjamin is a frequent contributor to the show, appearing in every episode in one way or another during the season. Benjamin's brightest moment comes in the "Power" episode, where he and Martin engage in a war of words over a parking space, with hilarious subtitles underneath pointing out just how empty each man's threats really are. Again, the sketch borders on ridiculous, but never teeters over into the unfunnily unbelievable range, delivering laughs without sacrificing the show's comedic smarts.
Martin also delivers with various musical numbers, including one memorable performance that sees Martin playing a guitar, a harmonica and foot bells while showing sketches he's drawn and telling jokes about them. While he may not do all of them perfectly all of the time, the fact that he's able to do them at all for the length of the performance is a remarkable feat. Martin even pokes fun at himself during the performance, intentionally falling off time in the song and finally kicking the bells away. The sketches that Martin draws are also a focal point of the show, serving as segues to sketches or as a sketch itself as in the Important Things Things store, where Martin attempts to sell hilarious products based on the theme of the episode with drawings animated off of a chalkboard.
The Presentation:
The show is presented in standard fullscreen format in Dolby Digital sound and the transfer to DVD is very well done. It's hard to harp on the quality of the picture on the show when some sketches rely on grainy film, like Martin's "Folk Singer" sketches. Everything is spot on when it comes to the presentation and Martin's set is as equally understated as the comedian himself. Wood paneling on the walls, plain white carpet and a plush red chair provide both a solid contrast to Martin, who is clad in all blue in every episode, and the perfect backdrop for Martin's laid-back, easy-going style of comedy.
Special Features:
With only seven episodes, it would be expected that the special features would be a little bit light and they are in this case, with only some deleted sketches and a couple of episode commentaries provided. The deleted sketches are sometimes funny, sometimes puzzling, but usually entertaining. As with most shows, there are usually one or two flaws or unfunny jokes that end up forcing the decision to cut the sketch. Most of the cuts here are done rightly as the sketches either don't fit into the theme or aren't quite funny enough to make the cut.
The commentary track features Martin with a variety of his co-stars, writers and others involved with the show talking about the episodes and while it's nice to hear some of the insight into the choosing of the topic of the show or the writing of the sketch, the commentary tracks sometimes meander too far off the tracks with Martin talking about things from other episodes rather than what is going on on the screen at the moment. While I'm all for people telling stories and going off on tangents, there's also something to be said for staying on point and this is one of the rare occasions where Martin lacks slightly.
The 411: Martin's show has been renewed for a second season and this reviewer couldn't be happier. With as funny as the first season was, there is actually promise there for things to get even better during season two, which could push the rating for a future season all the way to the full 10. The only thing dragging this set down from that lofty mark is somewhat lackluster commentaries and bonus features that are less than full. A tremendous season of episodes that is a must-own for Martin fans and for people looking for an off-kilter comedy show with intelligence.
