Comedian David Cross. Photo by Timothy M. Schmidt

As he came out on stage at the State Theatre on Friday night, comedian David Cross informed the Portland audience that he was just as unsure about what would follow as we were. It was an understandable approach: When Cross left home to embark on his extensive tour, “The End of The Beginning of The End,” we did not know who would be elected president. With the results now in hand – and this being the tour’s first date since Election Day – he had to reconfigure campaign jokes into postmortem material, and for a left-wing performer in front of a largely liberal audience, how to find the laughter in what are uncertain times for supporters of women’s rights. The only way out is through.

He bookended the performance with political material, opening with a playful needling of President-elect Trump’s “protector of women” speech (laced with uneasy laughs around rising health care costs and the harmful effects of diminishing reproductive rights) and closing with a more somber reflection on the implications of a potential nationwide abortion ban. Lest the mood ever get too bleak, self-pitying or pessimistic, he took left turns into shocking, gross-out imagery or just-plain-wrong gags – ironically, the kinds of jokes that conservatives say you can’t do anymore, minus the punching down at marginalized communities.

In between the political segments, Cross leaned heavily into his considerable gifts as a performer and storyteller, describing anecdotes such as a vacation to Machu Picchu, an unexpectedly erotic massage at a Chinese parlor, and the discarded household goods in a “free!” box on the sidewalk. With the disarming, matter-of-fact voice of a high-school guidance counselor, Cross stretched mundane observations into absurdist territory and reshaped surreal flights of fancy into everyday language.

As a seasoned actor famous for contorting himself into ridiculous scenarios on television programs like “Mr. Show” and “Arrested Development,” Cross expertly made his act seem like the ideas were springing to mind at the exact moment, even when reading prepared material from a sheet of paper. Few comics are as capable of pulling an “aha!” moment out of thin air and selling it with a charming innocence. This character of his delivery transformed his “but it might work for us” line reading from “Arrested Development” into a meme that will live forever online, and it translates well to a live audience.

David Cross rose to prominence in an era when Generation X was putting its own unique stamp on comedy, rejecting the outwardly angry, cruelly cynical and outsized mania of many comics that came before them in favor of a more subdued, sarcastic delivery that scanned as cynical but boasted material that was often positive and quite hopeful under the surface. It was the right approach for its moment, and for this one as well. For the State Theatre audience, during an emotionally charged week in the country – a presidential campaign in which the losing candidate was often criticized for laughing too much and too hard – a bit of laughter, absurdity and perspective was welcome.

Robert Ker is a freelance writer in Portland. He can be reached at bobzker@gmail.com.

COMEDY REVIEW
WHAT: David Cross
WHERE: State Theatre, Portland
WHEN: Friday, Nov. 8