The first #SethBuyMeLunch lunch in many weeks burst forth through a hail of prawns and mashed potatoes in Culver City yesterday, when Liezl Estipona and I had a much delayed meal after I canceled on her due to illness a couple of weeks ago. I expected to never hear from her again, but she got back in touch because, as she said, “[I simply couldn't wait any longer to meet you, and] I was hungry.”
We met in front of Honey’s Kettle Fried Chicken but eventually opted instead for the slightly less-kettle-fried selection at nearby Tender Greens, an interesting gourmet lunch counter. Tender Greens structures their entire menu around a few proteins of which they grill massive piles and slice fresh in front of you: lovely steaks, chicken, and hulking chunks of ahi tuna. They use the meats as building blocks for well prepared plates,1 sandwiches, and salads. Pretty much everything costs $11, which seemed like a good deal deal for Liezl’s steak plate, slightly less so for my enjoyable grilled prawns salad. Maybe if they called them “shrimp” they could knock a few bucks off the price.
So Liezl works as a graphic designer at a nearby big-wig firm, but she’s best known ’round these parts as a photographer of comedians. A few years ago she started frequenting the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, a legendary comedy performance space and more or less the center of the Los Angeles stand-up universe. She surreptitiously snapped some pictures and quickly went from the weirdo with a camera to the lady that all the comedians want to take photos of them, preferably without her realizing that they’re never going to pay her. Liezl packaged some of her best photos — including ones of superstars like Amy Poehler, Louis CK, Sarah Silverman, and Marc Maron — into a lovely book she designed herself, Liezl Was Here, which you can and should buy on blurb.com. It’s perfect for the comedy nerd in your life that won’t shut the fuck up about Community.
Which reminds me that Liezl and I talked a lot about the recent comedy-nerd phenomenon and in particular how I still have a very hard time wrapping my head around the fact that the comedy fandom scene now very much resembles the indie rock fandom scene when I was in college in the early and mid-’90s. Back then if you told someone that you loved stand-up and spent your free time listening to old comedy albums, people would’ve regarded you much the same way we now regard either a) someone who spends their free time listening to radio from the ’30s and/or wears headwear with feathers or b) this guy. It’s my most grampsish trait that I’m still kind of perplexed that times have changed.
Anyway, like the ’90s indie rock scene, the comedy scene can quickly grow tiresome, and Liezl admitted to occasionally wondering what the hell she’s doing photographing it. But, fortunately or un, performance comedy is more relevant and culturally important today than at any time in the last, what, 25-30 years? And LA is ground zero for it, which makes UCB the diagonal line through that zero. And Liezl’s there documenting the whole thing and documenting it well, and I have no doubt that in a few decades her photos will be looked back on as a vital reference to the time.
Not to mention that Liezl’s smart and curious and smiles a lot, all of which makes her fun to talk to. Plus she beat me to this recap with her own very flattering tumblr post about our lunch, which has single-handedly breathed new life into #SethBuyMeLunch. The general public’s interest in eating with a bearded, mentally ill stranger waned substantially over the last few weeks, to the point that I let the contest flounder and nearly founder. But one mention from Liezl and the entries poured in. I’ll pick this week’s winner soon. And you can win a free lunch from me simply by tweeting #SethBuyMeLunch any Monday.
Meanwhile, stalk Liezl on tumblr and Twitter and oh! I’ve been meaning to say that you can follow all the #SethBuyMeLunch winners at once using the list Viva #SethBuyMeLunch.
----- Which include a side salad and two scoops of golden mashed potatoes. [↩]
