Ali Wong's hilarious comedy special, and a contemporary v. of Berlin Alexanderplatz

A twofer: Last night we really enjoyed watching the spirited hour-long comedy special from Ali Wong, Hard Knock Wife, terrific and memorable not only for her fantastically energetic performance and her terrific comic timing but for the range of her materials, that stretches from a feminist take on a # of issues, especially sex on all its permutations, but also marriage equality, labor, breast-feeding, c-sections, the need for universal paid maternity leave - and on the lower end of the spectrum, fart jokes. She also had a few insights in her Asian cultural/ethnic background (a funny riff on Korean v Mexican culture in LA). The material here isn't really groundbreaking, but the humor, from the rancid to the fervent, is brought to life by a great performance before an enthusiastic audience - and via Netflix we have front-row seats, which is great because Wong's facial expressions and contortions are part of the show. 

Also last night finished watching the 1931 film v. of Doblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz, worth noting because the screenplay was by Doblin himself. In 90 minutes he managed to hit most of the highlights of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's 15-hour BA series, which isn't to say the shorter v is the better. RWF had much more time and space to develop the personality of the lead character, Franz Biberkopf; in fact, RWF is far more cruel to Biberkopf that was Doblin: in the 1931 film, Biberkopf comes off more as a fool and a dolt with a drinking problem - whereas in the RWF v from 1980 FB comes off as an awful man, a brute and a womanizer, full of rage and self-pity. One reason to watch teh 1931 v, however, is that we can see exactly what the scenes looked like at the time of the story (set in 1928); we see the urban bustle, the crowds, the ratty-looking shops and bars, the street cars and auto traffic, and even some of the new developments that were rising in postwar Germany at the time. RWF does a fine job in re-creating the era, but there's only so much he could do in a studio setting.