Several celebrities have participated in some Literary Death Matches, like author Chuck Palahniuk (“Fight Club”), who judged one in Austin, Texas, recently. The third Kansas City version of Literary Death Match is Tuesday at the Firefly Lounge, 4118 Pennsylvania. Doors open at 7 p.m. The event starts at 8:15 p.m. Tickets are $10 at the door.
Editor's note: This isn't a music story, but if you like comedy and jazz you will be interested.
The Literary Death Match was conceived in New York almost six years ago by writers tired of the same-old at public readings.
The long story short: They cooked up an event that mixes comedy with a novel, improvisational judging format and whatever else might happen, even if it involves a guy bouncing around in a beaver costume.
“There was a trend at the time in New York where people were doing comedy shows as part of literary events,” Zuniga said. “I always felt bad for the guy who followed the comedian. We thought we’d integrate comedy in a way that made sense, which is where the judges come in. Their role is not to be critical but to add levity and their own storyline to the event.”
The first match was in March 2006. Literary Death Match now has chapters in 39 cities, including Kansas City. Next month, it will open chapters in four cities in Scandinavia. Kansas City will host its third event at the Firefly Lounge in Westport at 8:15 tonight.
Jason Harper, Web content developer for the Kansas City Public Library and former music editor at the Pitch, attended the first local match and was a judge at the second.
“What makes it so entertaining is that it features serious writers doing continuously silly things,” he said, “like subjecting their sweat-and-tears work to critique from townie drunks and then engaging in comical card games and spelling contests for the top honors.”
Gina Kaufmann, writer and author of “More Than Petticoats: Remarkable Kansas Women,” won the inaugural match in Kansas City in October 2010.
“I was a little bit afraid of the competitive aspect of it, not because I mind competing with other writers — that’s just life — but because I didn’t know how the judging would work,” she said. Kaufmann, who has a master’s degree in fine arts, chose to read a section of her thesis she’d trimmed to the required seven-minute limit.
When showtime arrived, she said, her nerves got rattled, despite the presence of a sidekick.
“I’m not afraid of speaking to a crowd, but I got all quaky-voiced and nervous,” she said. “At the last minute, if I had been given the option of walking out onstage without clothes on instead of reading my work, I would have taken it.
“Hearing people laugh at the funny parts was so reassuring. But I had the unfair advantage of a belligerent mascot: Pete Cowdin of Reading Reptile in a beaver suit.”
One of Kaufmann’s competitors was writer and actor David Wayne Reed, who, in the spirit of the match, took issue with one of the judges.
“She said that my story was funny and then she later accused me of using post-modernism,” he said. “But when another competitor, Clancy Martin, used post-modernism in his piece, the same judge swooned. Probably because Clancy Martin is really handsome. Regardless, I heckled her.”
The judges at the Firefly tonight will be writers Speed Levitch and Brandon Tietz and actress/musician Kate O’Neill. The writers/readers: Hampton Stevens, Hollie Leilani Hayes, Ben Pfeiffer and Iris Appelquist.
“I was thinking about a ‘how-to’ on home porn: do’s and don’ts,” said Stevens, a contributing writer to The Atlantic. “It should be kind of cool. I’m hoping it’ll be raucous. More like Dave Eggers’ readings. Basically I’m just looking to meet women out of it.”
Zuniga, who will host the Kansas City event, said he recently celebrated his 200th Literary Death Match in Chicago. Several celebrities have participated in some of those matches, like author Chuck Palahniuk (“Fight Club”), who judged one in Austin, Texas, recently.
“Every time it was his turn to judge, he got a call on his cellphone from God,” Zuniga said. “He judged through these conversations with God.”
Other celebrity participants have included writers Jane Smiley and Richard Russo and Mary Lynn Rajskub, who played Chloe O’Brian on the TV series “24.”
Zuniga said in time he’d like to see Literary Death Match on TV.
“I want the same frenzy and excitement about a book release by Wells Tower or Joshua Ferris or Karen Russell as there is about an upcoming season of ‘Mad Men,’ ” he said.
The match format is loose, but it has rules. Four writers compete in front of three judges. Readings are limited to seven minutes. After each pair of readings, the judges do their work.
The judges’ favorites advance to the finals, a slapstick comedy showdown with events like Pin the Mustache on Hemingway and Literary Card Sharks.
“The goal is to have fun, revive the importance of literature and simply to make you laugh,” said Rachel Scott, the event’s producer.
Last year’s winner in Kansas City was Matthew Eck, who beat Sarah Smarsh in the finale: a literary spelling bee featuring hard-to-spell authors’ names.
“I won because I could spell Ondaatje correctly,” Eck said. “LDM is a great place to people-watch with many of Kansas City’s best and brightest in the audience. Morality is high at such shows, which might be why dignity is at an all-time low.”
The finale, according to the Literary Death Match website, “trades in the show’s literary sensibility for an absurd and comical climax.” It also adds to the mission, which Zuniga said is to be “interesting, culturally relevant and funny.”
He gave another example of a finale, one he was employing at a show in San Francisco last week.
“We’re going to do a literary Pictionary,” he said. “Contestants will be joined by people drawn randomly from the crowd. They’ll have to draw the titles of books taken from a list of 100 best novels. I’m still deciding whether or not to include ‘Deliverance.’ I’d like to see how someone draws that.”
| Timothy Finn, The Star
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