Sam Landman is such a good (and hilarious) writer and actor that it’s doubly fun whenever he’s doing both jobs at once. That was true of the original, profane, deeply offensive and very entertaining edition of A Sad Carousel back in 2010 (which was why it was in my pre-Fringe Top 10 in the #2 spot that year), and I trust that will hold true yet again in the standalone sequel.
As my dear late mother said of the torrent of foul language in the original when she saw it,
“A couple of fucks go a long way with me.”
(She then immediately realized that could be misinterpreted and couldn’t stop laughing, so it’s in the review.)
A Sad Carousel 2: The Timely Death of Herschel Douscheburg
LandmanLand (Sam Landman)
Venue: Rarig Thrust
Show Description:
America's #7 insult comic awakens from a 15-year coma. Now, GenZ-led Komedy Kidz are out to cancel him. If you didn’t see 2010’s “A Sad Carousel,” you’ll still enjoy this satirical smackdown of "safe" comedy.
Genre & Content:
Comedy, Drama, Physical Theater
Warnings (unsurprisingly, nearly all of them):
Adult Language, Crude Humor, Sexual Content, Violence, Loud Noises, Flashing Lights, Gun/Weapon Usage, Drug Content, Abuse/Physical Violence, Other Divisive Content
There is, of course, a hilarious fake backstory for the press (well, partially fake, there was indeed a first edition of “A Sad Carousel” and it was quite out there and enjoyable and popular):
When "A Sad Carousel" premiered at the Minnesota Fringe in 2010, it was the most provocative, meta show in the history of the festival (except for that year when Edison electrocuted that elephant). The breakneck speed of the show's brash, profane comedy actually caused audience members to emit a strange, heretofore unheard-of sound, a simultaneous combination of laughing & groaning, which later coined a term that Webster's added to its dictionary: graughing (pronounced "groff-ing").
The result? Its reluctant star, insult comic Herschel Douscheburg, became a household name because of it. His status as #7 insult comic in the world was climbing to a respectable #6. Fringe goers were constantly quoting "A Sad Carousel" to him on the street. Late in his life, Herschel was finally hitting the "big time" (well, as big as a Fringe hit can be, that is).
Then, the unthinkable happened. On "A Sad Carousel's" encore performance, the venue he was performing in (Rarig Arena) exploded, which is why it was converted from a "theater in the round" to whatever the hell it is now.
Thankfully, no one was killed. But the explosion sent Herschel Douscheburg into a coma.
Now, 15 years later, he's awakened to find himself in the Tyler Michaels King Memorial Hospital, trapped in a world where his style of comedy is considered "old hat." While he's hustling to hit as many open mics & Fringe festivals as he can to get back on top, a new generation of comics (the Komedy Kidz) are using all their GenZ wiles and sanitized comedy chops to cancel him with extreme prejudice. And hot on their heels is the mysterious Matriarch, who has even more devious plans for him.
Is the world ready for the biting, offensive comedy of Herschel Douscheburg once again?
Or, as the title suggests, could this be the end of not only his comedy, but Douscheburg himself?
We hope to offer the same silliness to audiences in 2025 as we did in the original production, along with a few new things sprinkled in:
Despicable characters
Uncalled-for gallows humor
Audience taunting
Good-natured ribbing of safe comedy
Poorly rehearsed sight gags & fight choreo
Reggae horns
A pantsing of 2025's foibles
Ribald & cringey humor (including a potential glory hole or plate job joke)
Sporadic titillations
Unlicensed usage of "Powerhouse" by Raymond Scott
He did a Fringe preview as well, just so we can’t say we weren’t thoroughly warned:
The word “bracing” was invented for such shows as “A Sad Carousel 2: The Timely Death of Herschel Douscheburg,” so I’m very much looking forward to it.
Here’s some handy links to my Fringe Top 10, Top 11 to 20 and Returning Favorites lists for this year, as well as all the coverage of this year’s Minnesota Fringe Festival.
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