Jeff Dunham: Unhinged in Hollywood

He really amazed me, this can't be even remotely easy but he nails it. Fantastic ventriloquism. Coordination with the arm, with the talking, playing two separate characters at once... People seem to underestimate how difficult this probably is.

And eventhough everything was falling apart near the end, he often manages to save the situation and improvise. I actually felt pretty bad watching the last quarter of this, but I won't spoil it. I'll just say I have empathy for the situation and respect to his work.

BIG HOWEVER THOUGH, his comedy is mostly boomer humor and predictable jokes. If you're under 40, this isn't going to be funny to you. It's a special from 2015 so maybe his humor has improved, but I doubt, judging from the trailers I've seen on Netflix.

Jeff Dunham's "Unhinged in Hollywood" is a stand-up comedy special filmed at the iconic Dolby Theatre in 2015 that delivers a hilarious blend of traditional stand-up and his signature puppetry. Dunham masterfully weaves together witty observations, absurd situations, and clever wordplay, keeping the audience engaged and laughing throughout.

Each of Dunham's puppet characters brings a unique comedic style to the stage. Walter, the grumpy old man, is a classic hand puppet with a weathered face and a perpetually scowling expression. Peanut, the tiny, hyperactive creature, is a small, furry puppet that moves with frenetic energy, often bouncing around uncontrollably. Achmed the Dead Terrorist, perhaps the most visually striking, is a life-size puppet with a realistic, almost gruesome appearance, complete with a flowing white robe and a long, flowing beard.

Dunham himself manipulates all of his puppets with incredible skill. He seamlessly transitions between characters, reacting to their comedic bits with genuine surprise and amusement. The back-and-forth banter between the puppets themselves is also hilarious, creating a dynamic and unpredictable comedic atmosphere. For example, Walter's constant bickering with Peanut and Achmed's deadpan responses to Dunham's questions are classic examples of their comedic interplay.

The stage set is simple yet effective, allowing the focus to remain on Dunham and his puppets. The backdrop is a minimalist black curtain, and the stage is sparsely decorated with a few props, such as a chair or a small table. This minimalist approach allows the puppets and Dunham's comedic performance to take center stage.

Several jokes resonated with me on a personal level. Dunham's observations about the frustrations of technology and the challenges of modern relationships were particularly relatable. His humor is often self-deprecating, as when he joked about his own struggles with social media, making him incredibly relatable.

"Unhinged in Hollywood" is a genuinely uplifting and entertaining experience. Dunham's infectious energy and the hilarious antics of his puppets left me feeling happy and thoroughly entertained. The special is a great escape from the everyday stresses of life and a reminder to embrace the absurdity of it all.

The production quality of the special is top-notch. The stage design is simple yet effective, allowing the focus to remain on Dunham and his puppets. The lighting is well-executed, creating a dynamic and engaging visual experience. The audio quality is excellent, ensuring that every joke and every comedic beat is clearly heard.

Overall, "Unhinged in Hollywood" is a must-see for any fan of comedy. Dunham's masterful blend of stand-up and puppetry, combined with his sharp wit and engaging characters, is unforgettable and hilarious.

This "special" is by far the strangest (not in a good way) I have seen as far as "Stand-Up Comedy" goes. And I watch a lot of that. (It will also take you longer, to read this, than it took Jeff to deliver his comedy whilst I was watching him on stage.)

Disclaimer: I don't feel like I have spoiled anything for anyone wanting to see this / "witness" this for themselves. I will describe the format and content of this show. All the funny parts are still intact and anyone having seen anything Jeff has delivered before, you should know what to expect and realize I couldn't possibly have spoiled anything by sticking to that. However, saving someone from wasting time and money... I do hope I do!

Executive Summary: Jeff seems to have felt it is a good idea, to let us get his comedy in YouTube-sized portions, plastered together with nonsense we don't want to watch and actual ad's within his programming, and plugging of completely useless music-bits that are nowhere near being funny. He has also further advanced his "problems", from being doll-related to happening more than 4 times during a show, fixing them and restoring order (making up over half of his actual stand-up time on stage) every time. The simple fact people are paying to see him, Live or from the couch, is to get the "full uninterrupted version" of him. Otherwise we could just turn on AdBlock and watch him on You-Tube! This boggles my mind but I felt like giving a short version of this. . .

Longer version: The show has a running time of 41 minutes, of which the first section of stand-up is 5 minutes long.

"Act 1" is apparently what we are to consider this. After intermissions with useless sketches containing characters and actors customers of this product, have not signed up for or requested. We are at last, greeted by Jeff and he gives a very brief sketch.

"Act 2" thankfully is a few seconds longer than "Act 1", just over 5 minutes. But troubled with him pretending to make mistakes, or is it real because I have never seen him do THIS mistake before (so I guess it has to be real...) ?

Followed by an extremely awkward infomercial of Jeff Dunham's new income-source. He is seriously spending an awful long time, on demonstrating and promoting his $95 doll. Trying to cover over the fact, by using comedy that the whole thing IS very disturbing and by trying to reach out to his customers hearts by saying there are too few doing his profession.

What a load of crap to get showed down our eyeballing-throats. He ends the whole thing by being the only person I have ever seen, running across the stage on all 4, holding a doll that he is chasing.

More interruptions of comedy follows this plug. Now finally...

"Act 3" is given to us and contains some actual content we "came to see". But Jeff fumbles and we only get seconds of actual comedy, instead we are fed like so many times during this show, witnessing Jeff pretending to encounter troubles and correcting them. He cannot consider, people being so ignorant, that they would agree and say "OK, I'll continue to pay for you to do this on a stage"?

So following this trickery is nothing anyone expects, a country- singer I never want to hear about enters and takes over. He gets the most screen-time of any segment! Over 5 minutes! After this they have a segment that ACTUALLY contains dialog saying "and we are in commercial, back in 3"... except this was meant to be a "funny" intermission. But it has nothing to do with Jeff and why people show up to see his show. So we have now been waiting, for over 8 minutes, or 11 if you felt ripped off in "Act 3".

A very expensive looking car rolls in (second in this show), with the face of a known character. It is a cool set-piece but looks more like a giant sign: "Thank You guys for loving and paying so much for my funny acts that I'm currently ripping you off on!"

"Act 4" brings in the biggest star of the show, the one we have been waiting for! We are greeted with TWO minutes of actual comedy, yes 2. Before the star is interrupted by Jeff's brilliant idea to continue enraging the audience with having "problems with the dolls" like hundreds of times before. Completely ignoring that we have all seen this a hundred times. Fine if he wants to always bring with him the "good old stuff" but the entire SHOW is made up of his problems! (It doesn't happen once this time, but after 3 I stopped counting during this act.) This occupies the rest of the show, which is about 3 minutes more, yes THREE minutes left. Before Jeff waves his customers goodbye and runs off-stage to meet his new customers wanting to follow orders (probably "Premium Editions" would be signed during the show?) and buy his dolls.

My mouth was actually open when this was over, I couldn't believe I had just wasted such a large portion of an hour and gotten less comedy than the average news-show (and they are SHORTER in total length!).

And PS: I really like most of his prior work, this one however saddened me.

This is very American, but in a very lovable way, we all know the characters, more or less how the show will go, but this is not as entertaining as previous shows, maybe because it is a bit to obvious.

It is comedy, taking news and stories and putting them into jokes, in this case wrapping it all in a ventriloquist act, it works out okay, but it is very American, kind of like a talk show where the host tells a joke and the audience laughs.

It is okay and I would love to see him live, but it is missing something new, it is the same old same old, still entertaining and give some laughs, but something is off and just not as fresh as it used to be.

Man Jeff, your show went downhill. I remembered watching your shows back then and it was great. Now you're just sad.

Most of your jokes barely made anyone smile let alone "laugh". Everyone in the audience feels like they're being forced to laugh with a sign that's "please laugh" that was cut out from in the dvd. The show became irrelevant when you had did a live commercial in your stand up routine, people skip commercials on YouTube and they're willing to pay extra to get rid of ads in streaming platforms yet you shoved about 10 minutes worth of commercial show act that wasn't even funny?

It pray for the audience who paid money to see this special, they should requested a refund cuz this has been one of the worst specials. Old jokes, and old humor that's disguised with him rushing through his act.