Brian Regan: I Walked on the Moon

by Dylan P. Gadino

The only thing missing from Brian Regan’s legendary 1997 live CD is visuals. Now with the release of his debut DVD, I Walked on the Moon , his flexing brows, rapidly shifting eyes and cool-meets-dork swagger are documented in his performance at The Improv in Irvine, California.

Capturing the Miami native’s physical comedy helps make Moon a definitive, accurate representation of Regan’s entire package. He has the ability to magnify the smallest facet of each of his observations, keep it clean and make it funny. Regan is a surgeon.

He takes subjects with no inherent humor - the construction of a flight confirmation number, for example - splits it open, feels around and pulls out the smallest shard of humor. He picks that lifeless shard apart, exploits the idiocy of it and forces you to laugh at something that, a few moments ago, was far from funny.

The process of buying a refrigerator is hilarious once Regan gives the salesman qualities of a used car pusher: “This refrigerator had a meats drawer. And what you do with that, you would put meats - whatever varieties that you would choose - these would be your meats. So there’s no requirements on the types of meat. You could pick bacon, marbled meats; there’s an endless selection. And this [fridge] had a crisper– for crispy things.”

During the hour-long set, Regan takes care delivering longtime fans classic bits; his musings on why there’s a need for two sets of cooking directions for Pop Tarts, his frustration with UPS needing to know the girth of his boxes before they agree to send a truck over and his fear of eye exams and heavy breathing eye doctors are all included.

While he excels at keeping things light and funny with an endearing delivery, Regan is just as skilled at being viciously sarcastic. He attacks “me monsters,” those who can’t shut up about themselves at parties, airplane passengers trying to fit “a dead yak” in overhead storage and the phone company’s refusal to connect his phone without it causing “hell on earth.” The combination of good-natured joking and gentle cynicism makes Regan without a doubt, the funniest clean comic of his generation. Sorry, Seinfeld fans.