Riviera comedians tackle diverse topics

Joe Delaney

Friday, Aug. 13, 1999 | 9:15 a.m.

Joe Delaney

The Riviera Comedy Club is one of the most consistently funny venues for this genre. Johnny Dark, Carol Siskind and Joey Bielaska -- there through Sunday -- are very talented but completely different practitioners of the comedic arts, resulting in an entertaining, ofttimes hilarious hour and 15 minutes.

Bielaska opened the show with 15 minutes of introduction, warm-up and setup that included a nice, easy bantering approach and reveals some years of dealing with audiences that are primarily there to see the better-known comedians. He also introduced the other two acts and did the sales pitch for the T-shirt sale and autograph-signing after the show.

A commercial airline pilot when not doing stand-up comedy, Bielaska's bits included airline pilots, of course, Bruce, an airline host, and a take-off on the "Newlywed Game" television program.

Siskind made the most of the next 25 minutes. Siskind lives in Las Vegas and gave a humorous insight into the facts of life, Las Vegas style. She moved rapidly through a variety of subjects without seeming to be rushing. She talked about parents, relationships, getting old, that it's a man's world, waxed eloquent on the differences between men and women -- familiar areas traversed differently.

Sports, road rage, quitting smoking, junk food, cottage cheese, yogurt and fruit set up a strong closer, getting her off on a high. Bielaska did his pitch and brought on Johnny Dark.

Dark came here first in 1964 as a drummer, part of an organ and drums duo. Dark's musical partner was Paul Lowden, presently the owner of the Santa Fe hotel-casino. Johnny's main showroom debut was as an impressionist, opening for Ginger Rogers at the Desert Inn in the early 1970s.

Possessor of an incredible singing voice, his forte today is creating impressions not of celebrities as much as of ordinary people, some slightly off-center. His timing is impeccable. Few comedians can make better use of pauses and silences. In his opening, he dealt with "doing the wild thing" and the idioms in use by young people today. He had gentle fun with members of the audience between comedy-drama forays.

He also touched upon marriage and divorce from a personal viewpoint. Johnny actually remarried his ex-wife. There was a take-off on an auctioneer making love, the different ways waiters walk, hotel housekeepers, his son, TV news anchors, a Japanese tour bus, a Mike Tyson bit, books by Madonna, Magic Johnson and Wilt Chamberlin and a hilarious operatic tenor piece displaying his vocal talents.

His closer dealt with commercials, particularly those that talk about women's problems, then it was dogs, cats and goldfish. It may sound like a scatter-shot approach but every single shot was on target. This was one of the Riviera Comedy Club's best balanced weekly bills.