PROVO — Oh my H-e-double-c-k” last night I laughed my pants off at Divine Comedy’s semi-annual “Best of Divine Comedy” show. If you aren’t familiar with Divine Comedy, they are a Brigham Young University comedy group who perform scripted sketches spoofing everything from BYU-isms to Harry Potter to Mormon culture. Combine that with rockin’ music, thousands of glow sticks and candy flying at you between skits, it’s impossible not to have a good time.
I went to Divine Comedy during my days at BYU and was a bit nervous that after becoming an alumna, I would be too out of the BYU loop to understand any of the jokes. Boy was I wrong. If you watch movies, read books, know what’s going on in the world, follow pop culture, or any combination of the above you’ll be in the loop. The only spoofs I didn’t quite follow were those on Avatar, a movie I, regrettably, haven’t seen.
Each of the Divine Comedy players are funny in their own right, but I thought a few stood out above the rest. Opening with an on-the-nose impression of President Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Jason Gray, continued impersonating the night away up to our favorite sketch of the night, “Harry Potter-the One Where Dumbledore Dies,” where he played Snape. Wow. His drawling, accented voice was a perfect likeness to the on screen Snape-only it made you laugh instead of cringe.
Whitney Call was another standout performer. She’s one of those people who are funny without trying. If you want to see how talented she really is, check out www.divinecomedy.net and watch her Halo music video. Oh, and Matt Meese, what can I say, he always steals the show. I mean, he makes forgetting to take the mute off the microphone humorous. Putting on a white wig and prancing around the stage as Dumbledore is just icing on the cake.
The one thing about Divine Comedy that you must understand going into it is that they make fun of people, situations and things you may be very familiar with. If you’re a UVU student or a die-hard fan of Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series, you may possibly be offended during the course of the night. But as the DC crew points out on their website, Elder David A. Bednar gave an awesome talk regarding this that all Twilight addicts should read. Additionally, if you bring your children, you will have to define a NCMO, DTR and the evils of facial hair during the car ride home.
The cast and crew, composed entirely of students, have to be applauded for the stellar scripts, lighting and laughs. They are the heart and soul of Divine Comedy and although the people rotate through the years, the quality never does.
Divine Comedy is more than just a comedy group, they are a Utah Valley tradition-and if you call yourself a resident of “the bubble” and haven’t been to at least one Divine Comedy performance you are truly missing out.
