The Highline Festival ended on a high note on Saturday, with the roaring sound of laughter at Madison Square Garden. Ricky Gervais made his American stand up comedy debut there, performing a 70 minute show that sold out in its first day of ticket sales.
A tuxedo-clad David Bowie won some of the first laughs of the evening, though, when he revived the “Little Fat Man” song which he sang on Gervais’ British comedy series, Extras. Bowie, playing the part of himself on Extras, came up with the song on piano after meeting Gervais’ character, Andy Millman, in an VIP club. On Saturday night, Bowie sang the song a capella and invited the audience to join in. Then he envisioned some of the puns that would surely appear in the headlines about the show: “Piggy Stardust,” “Chunky Dory,” and our favorite, “Thin White Duke brings out the Fat White Duck.”
Gervais then took the stage dressed in a black T, jeans and sneakers. The show consisted of his best routines from his past stand up performances, Animals, Extras, and Fame, with topics like kids with cancer, pedophilia, safe sex tips, nursery rhymes, and Nazis. For instance, Gervais told the audience, “People always learn something from my lectures. At this particular lecture, we learned how sharks are better than Nazis. Nazis? Rubbish. Sharks would have found Anne Frank in a day.”
For reviews of the show, check out Newsday.com and The Independent. For tiny photos that are so small they are hardly worth looking at, squinch your eyes at WireImage.com.