When I first launched this site, I had high hopes: all of these things I wanted to do, what I wanted ChuckleHutch to be, dreams, visions, aspirations!

Yeah… Then life said, “ORLY?”

Reality kicked in and I found myself struggling to find the time to dedicate to the site in the capacity I originally intended. This got me all frustrated and I kinda gave up for a while. I flew too high on borrowed wings and when I realized I couldn’t do it all by myself, I just put it on the shelf.

Looking at the “About Us” page and the schedule I made for myself, I realize I can’t make this little site into a BWE.tv or AV Club, not by myself, and not while working a full-time job and designing other websites and also trying to perform more.

In the immortal words of Eddie Izzard: “You’re English, Scale it down a little bit.”

But I’m not giving up. I’ve still got stuff to say. My resolution is to reexamine my goals for ChuckleHutch and make them a little more realistic. Instead of trying to cover the entire comedy scene, concentrate on helping out some of my friends and people I’ve seen perform, putting out the good word and helping bring high-quality comedy to more people.

I hope most of you come along for the journey. Thanks for staying with me, and thanks for the encouragement. I promise I’ll make this site mildly relevant in 2011, or kill someone trying!

Each Friday we feature some of the best in sketch, parody and character-based comedy videos. Want us to feature yours? Send us a link to: suggestions (at) chucklehutch (dot) com, and be sure to subscribe/friend us on Youtube, FunnyOrDie, orVimeo, and we’ll stay on the lookout for your newest uploaded performances.

Each Wednesday we feature some of the best new music-based comedy videos. Want us to feature yours? Send us a link to: suggestions (at) chucklehutch (dot) com, and be sure to subscribe/friend us on Youtube, FunnyOrDie, orVimeo, and we’ll stay on the lookout for your newest uploaded performances.

From ABC News:

Police at the Mexico City airport, who detained a man with a suspicious bulge under his T-shirt Monday, found 18 small endangered monkeys concealed under his clothing in a girdle.

Roberto Cabrera, 38, traveled to Mexico City aboard a commercial flight Friday from Lima, Peru, and was searched when he began behaving “nervously,” police said in a statement.

My question is: what was going through this guy’s mind after the fourteenth monkey? “Twelve, thirteen, aaaaaand fourteen. Whew! Done! That should be plenty. Wait a minute. Done? Did I really say “done”? THAT’S PANSY TALK! My dear sweet Papa, God rest his simian-loving soul, didn’t work three jobs to raise a boy who would quit after a mere fourteen primates. Screw that shit! Hand me those other four monkeys, dammit!”

On last night’s Late Night, Jimmy Fallon decided to turn the writing duties over from his crack staff of seasoned (yet apparently overworked) comedy professionals to the hive mind of the Twitterverse.

Tweeters were encouraged to write comedy gems in response to the hash tag suggestion #whydonttheymakethat. The staff plucked the best tweets and Jimmy read them aloud on Monday Night’s broadcast.

While some were funny, and some were familiar riffs on other comedians’ works (compare the “shrunken elephant” idea to Paul F. Tompkins‘ House Bear bit), this begs the question: Is this the future of comedy writing, throwing out premises to the hive mind and airing the best bits?

I don’t think it’s too far-fetched to imagine there’s a suit somewhere in the bowels of 30 Rockefeller Center thinking that they can program an entire hour of clever responses to twitter hash tag premises. They wouldn’t have to pay a writing staff, they could get an easily disposable, easy on the eyes host or hostess, and with millions of Twitter users, they’ll have huge, completely free pool to draw from.

They could even use the America’s Funniest  Home Video model of content acquisition and award some kind of cash prize for funniest tweet of the week. It’s still cheaper than salary and benefits for a whole writing staff.

Comedy writers should be shaking in their collective boots.

» Conan O’Brien just can’t catch a break. After edging out both Jay Leno and David Letterman for an Emmy nomination in the “Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series” category for his stint at The Tonight Show, it looks like the Emmy producers have decided not to broadcast the awarding of that category, according to a tweet by Team Coco writer Deon Cole. While Cole’s tweet made it clear that NBC was not to blame, it’s obvious that someone is concerned with saving NBC from the potential embarrassment of having O’Brien win during NBC’s Emmy Broadcast. [Hollywood.com]

» Comedians James Adomian, Laurie Kilmartin and Maronzio Vance were all booted from Last Comic Standing. It’s now officially at “World Cup after all the teams I remotely care about were eliminated” level of disinterest to me (which, given my distain for soccer, was already pretty low). Yes, I’m sure the rest of the teams are fine soccer players, but my heart is no longer vested in it. Sorry, remaining contestants!

Joe Fernandes

Brian Dunkleman

Adi Blotman

Want your stand-up video featured here? Send us a link to: suggestions (at) chucklehutch (dot) com, and be sure to subscribe/friend us on Youtube, FunnyOrDie, or Vimeo, and we’ll stay on the lookout for your newest uploaded performances.

» Comedian Jamie Foxx apparently decided that crazy is better than balding by tattooing some designs onto his skull. Jason Alexander might want to look into this. [MediaTakeOut]

» In an unscheduled interview  with Punchline Magazine’s Dylan Gadino on the streets of Montreal, Doug Stanhope expounded on his blistering denouncement of comedy classes on his Monday morning website posting. “It’s not like you can’t get some good from a comedy class,” admited Stanhope, “you can learn something anywhere, but it’s all available for free. You’ll never find comics that are hesitant to give you their opinion on fuckin’ comedy.” Dylan also has some great interviews with Todd Barry and Chelsea Peretti posted on his youtube channel that are well worth watching. [Youtube]

» Comedian Donald Glover talks about his new rap album, the failed viral campaign to make him the next Spider-Man, and hints about what season two of Community has in store: “The show is kind of a mirror for pop culture, especially for the characters. So I feel like everything that happened over the summer will probably be played with. So everything we did, whether it’s a Scream 4 reference or a Spider-Man reference, I think like that’ll be in the show.” [nymag.com]

»Sean McCarthy at The Comic’s Comic blog posted his first-person account of Steve Martin’s hosting gig for two gala showcases at Montreal’s “Just for Laughs” comedy festival.

Sometime around 11 PM last night, after hours of intense labor, ChuckleHutch was born. I am now the proud papa of a beautiful baby blog.

Like most fathers, my first reaction is: “Crap! Now what?!?”

My general goals for this blog are rather simple: talk about comedy and shine the spotlight on comedians I know and/or respect. And once in a while, I’ll bore you with my dumb stories.

If you check out the “About” page, you’ll see I’ve got a somewhat ambitious blueprint in terms of the specific goals and features for the site. I’m considering this a “soft launch”, where I’ll be gradually rolling out those features over the next few weeks, and should be entirely up to speed by the end of August.

So bookmark me, add me to your RSS feed, follow me on twitter (@ChuckleHutch), “like” me on Facebook, and I will promise to try to make your visits here informative and interesting. Even if you’re not as big a comedy nerd as I am, I think we’ll both get something out of this.

Unlike my prom night.

The Tonight Show with Jay Leno:

Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson:

The Tonight Show with Jay Leno: