Funnyman White just right for a night of delight

Anne Hosier

Friday, Jan. 9, 1998 | 9:38 a.m.

Steve White isn't white.

But most of his audience at The Improv comedy club, where he headlines at Harrah's this week, was.

"Hey, aren't there any black people out there?" he finally cried, peering out at the audience gathered around the cocktail tables crammed around the stage. "I mean, aside from the ones I got in free?"

Featured comedian Diane Nichols had warmed the crowd up for White, delivering a wry act centered mostly on the foibles of both genders. "To men, a coffee table book is a giant coaster. A beer high-chair." Nichols had a sort of world-weary style, tinged with warmth, rather than bitterness. White's humor was also good-natured, but much younger, faster-paced and based primarily on race and sex.

An actor with more than 10 films to his credit, White demonstrated his gift for expression as he writhed his body in imitation of a 90-year-old woman doing the cabbage patch. He also showed a knack for improvisation by working the oddities of the audience into his material. Making a crack about ebonics, he tapped his foot impatiently, and counted to five before parts of the audience would erupt into hysterics. As an elderly woman rummaged through her purse, he hollered "Hey! No drugs during my routine."

Not everyone seemed to catch on to his take-no-prisoners style.

As he forged through a routine about political correctness, poking fun at everything from sexual harassment to handicapped parking, a young group in the back whooped and hollered, a woman in the front laughed hysterically and two couples at the edge of the stage sat rigidly, perhaps wondering if they had walked into the wrong showroom.

But it wasn't the wrong showroom -- at least not for those who were just looking for a good time.

ANNE HOSIER is an Accent staff writer.