Kevin Maher hosts The Oscar Screening Part at the Paley Center

On Hollywood's most self-important night, I hosted New York's only official screening of the Academy Awards, at the Paley Center for Media.   It was a weird night with a most eclectic-audience (not my usual downtown/Brooklyn regulars.) But it made for a fun evening.  Audience members enjoyed plenty of food and booze, while watching the pre-show and the ceremony.

From 8 o'clock until the end of the live telecast, I did comedy bits, movie trivia, dramatic readings of #Oscar tweets. Plus interactive games like "The Google Algorithm Quiz: Oscar Edition" (where audiences had to guess which actor's name brought up certain keywords when being entered in the Google Search enging.  For example, "Which actor/actress brings up the word "terrorist"?  Answer: Mark Ruffalo.) 

On stage  was joined by my old Kevin Geeks Out producer M. Sweeney Lawless, plus old friends from Best Week Ever: Norman Baker and Caroline Waxler, and from Lucky Magazine fashion expert Christina Anderson.  The commented, tweeted and even joined two audience members for a live throwdown battle of "6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon." (In the end it was an audience member who linked Kevin Bacon and Colin Firth in only three degrees.)

During one of our audience polls the crowd was asked:

"Which topic will be the first to be used for a hacky joke?

• Charlie Sheen
• Justin Bieber
• Ricky Gervais
• 3-D

About KEVIN MAHER

Kevin Maher is an Emmy-nominated comedy writer, whose work has been seen on HBO, AMC, CNN, Comedy Central, VH1, TV One, FEARNet, and Nickelodeon.  His short films have been shown everywhere from MOMA to Troma, with screenings outside of Sundance and Cannes.


WATCH KEVIN'S REEL

Working with Kanbar Entertainment, Kevin co-authored seven treatments for animated feature films, developed two animated television series and co-wrote a sequel/Holiday special to the hit animated movie Hoodwinked!

Kevin created three original web-series including AMC's The Sci Fi Department (short-listed for a Webby) and Comedy Central/Atom's Old People News.

On stage Kevin created the multi-media shows Video Vaudeville and Kevin Geeks Out, a monthly confabulation of vintage film clips, guest experts, interactive games and curiosities.  Over the course of the run, Kevin "geeked out" about Bigfoot, Robots, KISS, Video Games,  Dummy Deaths, Alien Encounters and Batman. (For that show he wrote 100 haiku about Batman.) The show was a favorite of critics, from The New York Times to Scientific American.

Before that, he performed solo comedies including the off-Broadway show "Lone Drifter."  Before that, he was one-third of the sketch comedy trio TV Head.

Journalists have compared Kevin to Ernie Kovacs and Jonathan Winters, but his highest praise came from Tiger Beat who called him "funny!"


Kevin Maher's Writer-Producer Reel from Kevin Maher on Vimeo.


UPCOMING EVENTS: 

Kevin hosts the Paley Center's Oscar Viewing Party. (Sunday 2/27)

Kevin screens his short film Puppet Rodeo at the PUNCH Puppet Film Slam (Thursday 3/10)

Kevin co-hosts MEET THE LADY: DREAM SEQUENCES with Tom Blunt. (Friday 3/25)

Kevin emcees MOVIEOKE (that's movie karaoke) at 92Y Tribeca. (Saturday 3/26)

INDEX OF COOL STUFF: 

Kevin Geeks Out: 

Kevin Geeks Out About Shark Cinema

Kevin Geeks Out About Visions of the Future

Kevin Geeks Out About Monkeys

Writing on Film/Pop Culture:

Who Owns "They Live"?

Shock Waves: or How I Learned to Overcome Zombie Fatigue

Werewolf Obituary (Paul Naschy)

Sex Love and Bachelor Party

AMC's The Sci Fi Dept: 

Conquest of the Planet of the Apes

The Barbarella and Other Sci Fi Cocktails

The Monster Self-Defense Test

The Toxic Avenger - the Musical

Oscar Party @ The Paley Center - hosted by ME

One of my favorite places in all of New York City is the Paley Center (formerly the Museum of TV and Radio.  I will always call it that, the same way I'll always call The PNC Bank Center "The Garden State Arts Center") because there's something amazing about communal TV viewing.

You can imagine how flattered I was when they invited me to host their screening of the Academy Awards.  It's going to be a party with food and drinks, oscar voting, trivia and comedy bits during commercial breaks (with me!)  Plus I'll be joined by old friends M. Sweeney Lawless, Norman Baker and Caroline Waxler. 

Rub elbows with film fanatics, TV geeks, drunk bloggers, and media-ecologists like myself as we watch Hollywood's most self-important night. 

2011 Academy Awards Viewing Party

Sunday February 27, 2011

(doors open at 7pm, with a red-carpet walk and historic footage of the Academy Awards)

screening begins at 8pm

The Paley Center for Media

25 West 52 Street

New York, NY 

Get tickets HERE and use discount code "KEVIN" and save five bucks. 

P.S. here's a video I did about OSCAR WINNERS STARRING IN TRASHY B-MOVIES