New Rules

 Bill Maher's suitcase is full of food. That's because if he didn't bring his own, he'd be forced to eat the crap that America serves to out-of-towners, and then his stand-up act — a two-hour boxing match between him and Stupidity (that he always wins, by the way) — might suffer. And Bill can't have that. “People buy a ticket,” he says, “and I'm very concerned that they see a real show.” At 8 p.m. at the Fillmore Miami Beach, you have a chance to see what he means, and although Maher is known for the high-intellectual content of his comedy, there's no need to bring a notepad. “This ain't no lecture,” he says.

It's also not the traveling version of his Emmy-nominated TV show, Real Time with Bill Maher, or a rehash of last summer's HBO special The Decider. The King of Cable lays low after a tour in order to let the world regenerate Stupidity, so count on the material being as topical as this morning's headlines and even more passionate than his hard-hitting TV persona might suggest. “I go into things in [more] depth,” he says about his stand-up act. “You're really giving someone an entire worldview.” A worldview that says the planet will be a better place after Dubya leaves Washington, even though Maher will have to work a little harder for material. “Nothing will ever be as funny — or as tragic — as the stupidest man in the world running the world,” he says. In that case, this might be Miami's last chance to catch one of the smartest men in the world at the apex of the world's stupidity ... and laugh hysterically in the process. “When people walk out, they're going to say, ‘Wow, he really brung it,’” Maher says.
Fri., May 9, 2008