A single-panel cartoon shows three baby birds sitting in a nest looking up at their mother standing above them. The mother says to her children, “Hello. My name is Stephanie and I’ll be your regurgitator this morning.”
And that recent selection from the daily comic “Bizarro” exemplifies the humorous, genius, and yes, bizarre creativity of cartoonist Dan Piraro.
So, where does he get his ideas?
| Onstage |
| Cartoonist Dan Piraro of ‘Bizarro’ |
| Where: Riot Act Comedy Theater, 801 E St. NW |
| When: 8 p.m. Sunday |
| Info: $15; riotactcomedy.com |
“No cartoonist has the answer for it,” said Piraro by phone from his home in Los Angeles. “None of us know where our ideas come from. It’s a mind-set.”
In celebration of the publication of his 10,000th “Bizarro,” Piraro will appear at the Riot Act Comedy Theater on Sunday. “Bizarro” was first syndicated in the mid-’80s, and Piraro estimates that he’ll publish his 10,000th cartoon at some point in 2012.
“If someone had told me that I was going to do that 10,000 times, I think my head would have exploded,” Piraro said of his start. “I wouldn’t have believed it. Every time I wrote a joke, I felt like it was the last one in me. I remember literally thinking ‘What if my brain only has so many jokes in it?’ ”
Piraro’s D.C. performance is an updated reviving of a one-man show he had a number of years ago, which he hopes to perform elsewhere down the road. The evening will include some stand-up, music, video, prop humor, drawing and a chat with the audience.
“I’ve always had kind of a liberal attitude toward what comedy shows should be like,” said Piraro, who is also known for his veganism. “It’s sort of a one-man vaudevillian variety show where I do a little bit of everything. And some people go home happy, hopefully.”
Jokes in the single-panel “Bizarro,” which is published daily in hundreds of newspapers across the country, fit into no specific time or place. There are no rules of who or what does the action — a recent cartoon implied a motorcycle was writing in its diary — and no constraints. The only guideline is to be funny.
Fans of “Bizarro” will note that there are special symbols hidden in each cartoon, such as an alien or eyeball. Finding them is a game readers play with the creator.
“I started it entirely to entertain myself,” Piraro said of the hidden symbols. “As much as I enjoy drawing cartoons, any job gets boring if you have to do it every day for years on end. I just thought it was fun. People clearly enjoyed it as much as I did.”
