Loud cheers from students, alumni and community members shook Ritchie Coliseum on Sunday evening as they waited for Eric André’s set at at SEE’s Homecoming Comedy Show.
Applause reached a crescendo as André took the stage and continued into his first few jokes. Sometimes sarcastic, other times deliberately absurd, André’s set didn’t pull any punches. His audience interaction and jokes for and about this university made this event a blast.
While André is best known for his surreal and satirical talk show on Adult Swim, The Eric Andre Show, he also starred in his first Netflix stand-up special, Eric Andre: Legalize Everything in 2020.
André’s set included a bit where he referenced the poor English translation on a souvenir he bought while vacationing in Cuba. He performed the translation in a slam poetry style, gesticulating and screaming the words out loud, which garnered hysterical laughter from the audience.
Near the end of his set, André also showed videos of hidden camera pranks from his Adult Swim show, which included reckless driving and pretending to be a wanted criminal while purchasing wigs.
André also consistently referenced his drug use during the performance.
“Every time I drop acid, I jerk off to anime,” André said, adding he believed that was something he thought this university’s students could relate to.
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But a staple of André’s Sunday night set was his ability to poke fun at students.
At one point, he said the audience, composed partly of undergraduate students, must be confused with some of his jokes which referenced parts of his childhood.
“‘We were born after 9/11, dude!’” André said, imagining audience members’ thoughts.
André’s audience engagement especially shined when he took volunteer audience members’ cell phones and texted their mothers using autofill text suggestions. One student’s mother actually initiated a FaceTime call after André sent a string of confusing text messages.
“Did you steal my son’s phone?” the mother said. André claimed the student had been arrested as the audience erupted in the background.
The finale encapsulated the surreality of the whole set. André handed bottles of ranch dressing to two students in the crowd and had them race to chug their bottles in a “ranch off”.
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“You’ve got to prove what it takes to enter the workforce,” André said during the race.
After André’s set, he called attendees back to their seats for a question and answer session. From learning that “challah bread” was Andre’s favorite part of being Jewish to him describing his scent as the “inside of a prosthetic leg,” the Q&A only added to the show’s personality.
One audience member asked André for his towel, and he only gave it to the audience member after they took their shirt off.
If the two shows on Sunday were any indication, Eric André’s set demonstrated this university’s dedication to hilarity.
