Escaping the 'Office'
NBC star BJ Novak draws sold-out crowd to Blackman
Jeanine Budd
Issue date: 1/24/08 Section: The Inside
BJ Novak, best known as Ryan on NBC's "The Office," performed for a full house at Blackman Auditorium last night. With plenty of laughs echoing throughout the hall, Novak and opener Dan Mintz received a standing ovation from the 1,000 in attendance at the end of the night.
The event, which was put on by Kappa Sigma, began around 8 p.m. and finished around 11 p.m. An autograph and photograph session with Novak followed.
"It went very well," said Shawn Wolfgang, a senior communication studies major and the event coordinator. "Everybody got laughs and it was nice to have a feel-good event like this."
The opening punchline came in a joke Novak didn't even come up with himself. Novak said while he was searching around Boston's Craigslist after his six-hour flight from Los Angeles, he found an ad posted by a 23-year-old male college student looking for a female date to Novak's show.
Novak asked the couple to identify themselves at the show, and they happened to be sitting up front. When asked to reveal how she won the heart of the young bachelor, the lucky lady replied, "No comment," giving Novak's joke more than enough fuel.
While most students had never seen Novak perform stand-up before, his routine seemed to impress them.
"I'm a huge 'Office' fan, but I didn't know what to expect from his stand-up," said Dave Freeston, a middler music industry major. "I really liked how he opened with the Craigslist joke. It really set the tone for the rest of the night and it was really original."
Before the show, The News staff was alerted by Novak's management that no photographs were to be taken after the first five minutes of the performance. Somewhere around the five-minute mark, Novak told the audience that every picture taken of a person also steals a piece of that person's soul.
"So, you know celebrities like Britney Spears or Paris Hilton, they must not have - oh my God," said Novak before he paused and contemplatively stared out at the laughing audience.
The event, which was put on by Kappa Sigma, began around 8 p.m. and finished around 11 p.m. An autograph and photograph session with Novak followed.
"It went very well," said Shawn Wolfgang, a senior communication studies major and the event coordinator. "Everybody got laughs and it was nice to have a feel-good event like this."
The opening punchline came in a joke Novak didn't even come up with himself. Novak said while he was searching around Boston's Craigslist after his six-hour flight from Los Angeles, he found an ad posted by a 23-year-old male college student looking for a female date to Novak's show.
Novak asked the couple to identify themselves at the show, and they happened to be sitting up front. When asked to reveal how she won the heart of the young bachelor, the lucky lady replied, "No comment," giving Novak's joke more than enough fuel.
While most students had never seen Novak perform stand-up before, his routine seemed to impress them.
"I'm a huge 'Office' fan, but I didn't know what to expect from his stand-up," said Dave Freeston, a middler music industry major. "I really liked how he opened with the Craigslist joke. It really set the tone for the rest of the night and it was really original."
Before the show, The News staff was alerted by Novak's management that no photographs were to be taken after the first five minutes of the performance. Somewhere around the five-minute mark, Novak told the audience that every picture taken of a person also steals a piece of that person's soul.
"So, you know celebrities like Britney Spears or Paris Hilton, they must not have - oh my God," said Novak before he paused and contemplatively stared out at the laughing audience.
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