I am running for neighborhood council -- if I can do it, anyone can do it -- I may not change anything, but I can bother my neighbors with petitions and tree-plantings.

Garnering support, I'm learning a few words of language from my closest neighbors:

Goldy and Singh the Liquor Store guys (Punjabi) -- Kee-ha- le (HELLO), Fer-mi-lang-ghi (GOODBYE) and Koo-ta (DOG)

They are in the bag, basically and now I just have to get the Spanish, the Korean, the Armenian and the Grumpy Psychologist Family.

I'll let you know what happens, but until I get into power -- here are some dates and news:

UPCOMING DATES:

April 7th -- CD "Unwanted Thoughts Syndrome" DROPS from Comedy Central (with all episodes of The Maria Bamford Show as an extra perk) Photos with Bert and Blossom have been taken and we're going to have a pancake breakfast kickoff at the Society of the Spectacle (to be announced).

• I'm still on SIT DOWN SHUT UP - though as side characters- Kristin Chenoweth now plays the part of Miracle and is awesome.

• I'm still working on the book about depression and will hopefully have a 2nd draft soon.

• I'm writing on a little animated pilot called "FUZZ and SPARKLE" from the same company that does "WORD GIRL" for PBS (which I am still on)

• I may or may not be in the new Judd Apatow Movie called "FUNNY PEOPLE" as a comedian and that was super fun.

• I did a surreal reading of "YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU" with Tom Hanks, Rita Wilson, Annette Bening, Alicia Silverstone, Martin Short, Captain Kirk and the very handsome guy from MADMEN and the very beautiful young lady from THAT 70's SHOW who are both on fire with career fire. I played the part of the black maid. Without all of the racism, but plenty of maid. It was to benefit UCLA Arts programs and it was super expensive - otherwise, I would have listed it on my site to go to- but it seemed sort of odd and I felt nervous about it, so I told no one except my boyfriend Larry and his friend Allen- who will vouch for it happening. Nora Ephron directed.

Obama can't do everything - so I'm going to give government a shot. Barring election, I will start a gang where we will do graffitti succulent plantings.

P.S. - If you don't see your city on the appearance list below, feel free to "Demand Me"

UPCOMING APPEARANCES --- FOR TICKET INFO CLICK HERE FOR MARIABAMFORD.COM
( http://www.mariabamford.com/tour.shtml )

Jan 22 2009 WORDGIRL LIVE! @ UCBLA THEATRE - LOS ANGELES CA

Jan 28 2009 ROOSTER T. FEATHERS - SUNNYVALE CA

Feb 6 2009 CHICAGO LAKESHORE THEATRE - CHICAGO IL

Feb 7 2009 CHICAGO LAKESHORE THEATRE - CHICAGO IL

Feb 15 2009 COMEDY FOR DOGS Little Tokyo, Los Angeles CA

Feb 19 2009 LAUGHING SKULL LOUNGE - ATLANTA GA

Feb 20 2009 LAUGHING SKULL LOUNGE - ATLANTA GA

Feb 21 2009 LAUGHING SKULL LOUNGE - ATLANTA GA

Feb 22 2009 LAUGHING SKULL LOUNGE - ATLANTA GA

Mar 04 2009 PEORIA JUKEBOX COMEDY - PEORIA IL

Mar 05 2009 PEORIA JUKEBOX COMEDY - PEORIA IL

Mar 06 2009 MANATEE ROTARY CLUB FUNDRAISER - BRADENTON FL

Mar 09 2009 UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS - DALLAS TX

Mar 12 2009 ART THEATRE LONG BEACH - LONG BEACH CA

Jun 12 2009 MaxFunCon - LAKE ARROWHEAD CA

Jun 19 2009 COMIX - NEW YORK NY

Jun 20 2009 COMIX - NEW YORK NY

Oct 09 2009 LAUGHS COMEDY SPOT - KIRKLAND WA

Oct 10 2009 LAUGHS COMEDY SPOT - KIRKLAND WA

Hello Puffalumps!

I'm sending out this email to let you know I'll be in Philadelphia TONIGHT (10/29) and THURSDAY (10/30) at HELIUM COMEDY CLUB (at 20th and Sansom).

Also with me at Helium tonight is Philly Native and Austin TX comic, Kerri Lendo

It's an 8PM show and $15 General Admission or $20 Reserved.

MB

P.S. - If you're not in the Philly area, and don't see your city on the appearance list below, feel free to click and "Demand Me"

EVERY MONDAY MARIA'S IN TOWN - WHAT'S UP TIGER LILY - Loz Feliz, CA - No Cover - 8PM Show

10.29 - HELIUM COMEDY - PHILLY - 8PM - TIX >

10.30 - HELIUM COMEDY - PHILLY - 8PM - TIX >

11.05 - ZANIES - NASHVILLE, TN - TIX >

11.06 - ZANIES - NASHVILLE, TN - TIX >

11.14 - MONKEYFEST - PASADENA, CA - TIX>

11.17 - READ BOOKS - EAGLE ROCKS!, CA - 7:30PM - TIX>

02.04.2009 - JUKEBOX COMEDY CLUB - PEORIA, IL - TIX>

Hello Mindblowers!

Just came back from Minneapolis where there was a lot of support and my 20th class reunion! (There is no Kristy Coombs- who is a cross between someone I knew at Christian Bible camp and a relative and some woman I met after a show in Michigan!) Awesome!

Some news:

Sit Down Shut Up (The Fox animated series slated for 2009 Spring) is on again and we'll record Episode 2 on Thursday! Jason Bateman's character is in love with my character so, we're pretty close now (and when I say close, I mean I've made some furtive eye contact and stood in the same room with him for an hour!) Everyone is very nice and uber funny. There were handmade potato chips. It was blowing my mind, mindblowers.

Also, I'll be on The Root of All Evil- for The Hills and a few other choice topics. It is a beautiful show- great parliamentary debate style (but with more rehearsal) and if you aren't reading anything, you must watch it. Or not.

WORDGIRL - which stars the wonderful Dannah Feinglass as Word Girl- on PBS received an EMMY!!! For Best Writing of an Animated Children's Program!!!!!!! WordGirl ALSO received the Television Critics Award for Outstanding Achievement in Children's Programming. It's very funny and educational and I'm learning a lot of vocabulary. What I really need is STRUNK AND WHITE WOMAN.

Taping new (3rd) CD at the Upright Citizen's Brigade in LA - tentatively titled "UNWANTED THOUGHTS SYNDROME: Meena and the Woof Woofs" We'll see. Come on down!!!!

Also! I'm in the current issue of "BUST" as a "FRESH FACE" with Solange Knowles (Beyonce's Sister!) Awesome and ridiculous!

Thanks for all of your support and coming out to see my showbusiness- I'll be in NASHVILLE in November- for all of the Southern districts!

Create, create, create! Onward and inward and onwardly inwardly onward!

Maria B.

EPISODE 2

These scenes with my mother, the therapist and the temp agency are directly from my one-person show. I feel a little embarrassed about that. Maybe I should have made up something completely new. Recycling- what's good for the bottle, is good for the can. The truth in the following scenes are:

- my Mom did say that I should wear makeup or I'll look mentally ill and that I should wear makeup to Target (though she denies it now! ARGH! )

- I did have a life coach suggest that I call anxieties "goblins". It seemed complicated and I stopped. We talked on the phone once and it cost only $5.00.

- Amy Sleverson doesn't exist, but she's based on a girl I knew in Duluth. She found a long hair coming out of my neck in biology class and kept saying, "It's ATTACHED, it's ATTACHED!"

- The guy from high school doesn't exist- (and, in fact at my 20th reunion I had a lovely time and everyone was warm and funny and I drank a Mike's Hard Lemonade, 2 Diet Cokes and ate a steak. No one was weird or mean and I probably wasn't weird or mean either, which is a benefit of the Aging Process, I think)

- But, 1 young guy said after a show, "You look thinner or something- oh yeah- you're older! Right!" and it was funny (to me).

- Damon Jones thought of all of the shots. My favorite ones were where I could lie down or lean on something. Damon has a wonderful ice machine on his refridgerator and I spent a lot of time going back and forth to that ice machine, while Damon thought of all the shots. Sometimes I got him some ice. Sometimes not. I'd also check out his stuff- check stubs, books, bathroom supplies. Damon gets residuals from the Director's Guild and he has a generous supply of sugar free gum. I took pieces of his gum as needed. His dad was a football coach and he gets Entertainment Weekly by subscription. More details to come…

- I didn't change my make up or hair or anything and I wonder if that was just laziness or an artistic choice. Or, is laziness, in fact, a sort of artistic choice? Stand up is one of the laziest theatrical productions in that- nothing is needed except the lifting of your body on to a platform and amplifying your voice. Hmph I'm going to argue on my own behalf that I am a very hard worker and I don't believe in wigs and make-up because if I am a "real" actress, I should be able to embody the character without those props. (And, it takes so long to get all of that stuff, put it on, find a bag to put it in, carry the bag to my car, etc.)

- Blossom loves show business and posed for the intro/outro credits like a professional. I've tried to take her to personal appearance engagements, but she's retiring and spending a lot of time with her blind mentee, Bert.

Hello Pufflesnugs!

To commemorate the 20-Episode Run of The Maria Bamford Show - which may be taken off the net any day now - I am sending out the episodes in order, with blog commentary for fun and for you to forward to friends, family, invalids, acquaintances, babies, doggies, and The Press. It is not yet available on DVD and my manager, Bruce, is wrangling with the beeswax about it at this time. Enjoy!

Episode One -- "DROP OUT"

This first episode was based on a one-woman show I performed for about 3 years around LA and in Melbourne, Oz and at the Edinburgh Festival. To go "mad" is both my greatest fear and deepest wish in that I fantasize things would be so much simpler living in my parent's attic and working as a temp in Duluth - so the show explored that fantasy and what it might be like. I haven't had a psychotic break, but I do enjoy ongoing clinical depression, OCD and floating anxieties that are manifested in a myriad of ways. There is mental illness in my family, however, and I have experienced 3 panic attacks so I think I'm pretty well qualified to create a fictional internet series about an issue I know little about. The whole deal was a dream come true -- getting to work with someone else, getting paid well (via the Turner Broadcasting Company) and getting to do whatever I wanted. And with Blossom, my wife-partner.

Damon Jones (the director/editor) and I had just met a few weeks before at lunch with the producer Dan Pasternak and my manager Bruce Smith (which sounds glamorous when I read it, but is just eating burritos) and I didn't know him very well and was a little nervous and the first episode is just straight from the stage show and stand-up jokes.

Kristy Coombs is not based on anyone in particular but an amalgamation of things that have been said after shows in the Midwest, some bad childhood experiences and my own opinion of myself. Amy Sleverson is based partly on someone from high school and partly on the ether. My Mom and sister are direct quotes and exacting impersonations of their true selves and I'm just a channel. That is not true. They are extremely exaggerated caricatures of real, lovely and funny people. The impersonation I do of myself is completely accurate.

From Salon.com, "I LIKE TO WATCH", by Heather Havrilesky,

Don't be afraid of the dark

Then Heather discovered "The Maria Bamford Show" and everything changed. This strange Web show, which appeared on the comedy Web site Super Deluxe with a bunch of other strange but less funny shows, appeared to be filmed entirely in the attic of this person named Maria Bamford's parents' house in Duluth, Minn. According to the opening screen of the show's first episode, Bamford had been doing stand-up for several years in Los Angeles when she suffered a breakdown onstage in 2006, and eventually retreated to her parents' home to regroup and regain her sanity.

Bamford spins a strange comic web indeed, playing all of the characters in the sad little drama that is her life as a lost, half-crazy, sometimes depressed single woman in her late 30s. Among the other characters Bamford inhabits with total conviction and authority are her passively judgmental but supportive mom ("Listen, if you want to get breast implants, we will support you"), her skeptical sister, her nerdy dad and a selection of odd but disturbingly familiar acquaintances from the town of Duluth. My personal favorite is her archenemy from high school, who tells her, "So we saw you on TV or whatever. It's just like in high school -- it's like you're not funny, you're weird."

But no recap of Bamford's weird tales or the clever dialogue she writes can do justice to "The Maria Bamford Show," because Bamford herself is such a good performer, churning out hilarious impressions with convincing accents, verbal tics and great comic timing. Her central conceit -- that she's crazy and something of a loser -- is a common one these days, but it works because Bamford is so inventive and giddily odd in her presentation. She manages to expose the most interesting quirks and flaws of her entourage without actually coming out and suggesting that she has a nasty attitude about any of them. Bamford's family, friends and enemies usually get the upper hand, while Bamford herself is continually kicked in the teeth by life's little foibles.

From the Harvard Crimson- "The Best TV You Didn't Watch"
Staff Writer Abe Reisman

"The Maria Bamford Show" (SuperDeluxe.com)

Okay, this one isn't technically a TV show, but bear with me. Maria Bamford is one of the funniest women in America (Sarah Silverman can go to hell and take her shoddy material with her), and has quietly reinvented the entire concept of the sitcom with a budget of roughly $25 and a cast of one. Without delving into the world of "wacky voices," her show features a cast of roughly a dozen characters, all deftly played by the inestimable Ms. Bamford. It all hinges on elegantly cheap editing and rich character illustrationsâ€"oh, and also she's really funny. But what keeps you coming back for more is the fact that, beneath the technical innovation and hilarious writing, Maria's tale of living at home after a series of career failures describes clinical depression in such a frank, open way that you'd be heartless if you didn't feel a deep, cathartic belly laugh rise from your guts. Catch her before she's famous.

I just wanted to write a note - because I got a few messages- but Mary Mack and I are NOT THE SAME!  I am not copying her, nor is she copying me! She's a GREAT COMIC and a LOVELY LADY  and a GOOD FRIEND and beyond sharing high voices, Midwestern heritage, whiteladiness- her style and joke writing is very different and very excellent!  So, please support her in her Last Comic Standing bid and know that I have been mistaken(as have my highvoicedwhitelady brethren) for many other white lady highvoiced comics in the past and you must look past the color of our skin and the tone of our voices and know that we are as different as thumbprints on snowflakes. 

That said, I'm going to fall over and nestle with my pugs.

Hello Friends!

I will be performing at the Punchline in Atlanta on May 20th and 21st at 8pm! Tickets are $20. I've also added a bunch of other appearances, so click here.

Also, the SIT DOWN, SHUT UP Fox Pilot got picked up for 13 episodes and I'm still in it!!!! Still working with The Fonz! Over there on the right is an image from the show.

I am writing a book. Yes. Or, more specifically, I am a channel through which a book is being written by a Higher Being that is taking all responsibility for it's format. H.B. could be (depending on your belief system) The Baby Jesus, Oprah, Quack! Media (its' publisher), Ayn Rand or trees. So, basically, a Native Ghost Pine I'm calling "Mrs. Raup" is writing a book. It is an autobiographical (with autobiographical bits solicited from other comedians with mental health issues) of mental illness and depression- an "He's Just Not That Into You" for the "I'm not that Into Me" set. So, real, funny stories about being sad and confused. It will be completed within 2 (two) years.

Also, Superdeluxe show is over and Superdeluxe itself is over! I hope they will put out a DVD but it is out of my control. Adult Swim now owns it. All we can do it wait and hope. And, then, maybe forget about it and join a soccer team. Soccer is fun.

That - and, It's All Happening! That's right! I made a Vision Board and the Future looks just like the inside of the magazine that I cut the pictures out of to create the Future with! It's got doggies and a bike and multi-cultural couples huggling and kids in their regional costumery! If only we could get a bunch of old Dwells and Interviews and Gaiam Living catalogs into Myanmar. With a few issues of the Economist and a glue stick, they could topple the current regime with IKEA couches and sassy women from MORE, the magazine for women over 40!

Upcoming - (as influenced by Shaki Gawain's "Creative Visualization"- as influenced by the Republic of Haiti's "VOODOO")

I am creating - easily and effortlessly- a CD to be distributed by Comedy Central (under the umbrella of Viacom, under the umbrella of Wealth)!

I am installing - easily and effortlessly- an air conditioner in to 2 windows of my home!

I am joyfully traveling â€" easily and effortlessly-about the country via something called Airtran to see you in Atlanta, Minneapolis, Sacramento, Salt Lake City, San Diego, Duluth and Austin, Texas!

I hope all is well and I am seeing you- easily and effortlessly- in your town soon! (Philadelphia and Denver dates to follow!)

Love,

Maria Bamford (with Blossom's new Brother, Bert the Blind 6 year old Pug)

My lovely Goofballs,

A few things!

First, go check out my sister’s new site- the one who decoupages! And her hilarious and inspiring Blog and Flog: http://www.kitcheegammivintage.com

Second - I need your help! I've got a beautiful new t-shirt design and need to get a general idea as to what size everyone in the world is. Please go to my site and take a gander at the new shirt (designed by valorandvellum.com)

CLICK HERE TO GO SEE THE SHIRT AND LET ME KNOW WHAT SIZE YOU ARE (on that page. not here. it's easier on the poll that my webmistress set up.)

Also, I've added new dates to my schedule, so, once again, go to my site to see!

Mareba