Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • Page 27

www.freep.com Call The Way We Live: 1-313-222-6610 Wednesday, August 13, 1997 Section Detroit 4ftcc INSIDE HP! Time out 1 Robert Levine's 'A Geography of Time provides a mystery where we would have least expected to find it. Bookmarks, Page 3D. Television, Pages 5-6D Feature Page, 11D 0 W6 llVC 4 JHONARD In Cartoon for adults: sick, twisted (and funny) Karen Bell-Brege and Darrin Brege, her husband and colleague, perform a skit at the Comedy Castle. 0 7 A Aw Economic strength will lead to freedom uuci ijciucjr noma yuui J) money. He wants it no 1 1 ll ')e'ong t0' DUt specially if you're black.

So what's he giving you for your hard-earned cash? KTil! All i nouimg. miyougeiis satisfaction, the knowledge that you've helped replenish the pool of money from which his nonprofit African-American Community Endowment Fund lends to primarily black inner-city businesses that are unable to qualify for bank loans. And if you wonder why you should give, Jeffrey's got a ready answer. "Churches ask you to do it every Sunday," he says, "and people do it Why can't they give $200 a year to create a job for their children and their grandchildren?" Not that he has anything against churches. Jeffrey is, after all, the Rev.

Robert Jeffrey, pastor of New Hope Baptist in Seattle. I called him up after reading an article about him in the Jewish Forward newspaper, which was sent to me by a reader. The Forward piece spoke of the "string of successes" the 50-year-old black preacher has had since the day, two years ago, that he first solicited investments from the black community and the Jewish community. Among those successes: the launch of a black restaurant and a Samoan market and a bailout loan to a minority-owned construction company. The fund, 60 percent of whose benefactors are black (30 percent are Jewish), has seen its initial $60,000 balloon to $230,000.

But Jeffrey is unsatisfied. He laments the fact that his duties to his church including rebuilding it after a fire have forced him to Please see PITTS, Page 4D Air safety on the Net By Arme Rosenberg Knight-Ridder Newspapers Air travel remains 21 times safer than driving in a car, according to the National Safety Council. A study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that the chance of being killed in a commercial-airline crash is 1 in 8 million. Nevertheless, when a single crash kills hundreds of people, as happened in Guam last week, consumers begin asking, "How safe is flying? How safe is the airline or aircraft I'll be flying on?" With easy access to information both raw data and analysis the Internet is where many people turning. The Federal Aviation jAdministration evaluates foreign 'governments' ability to meet standards established by the United Nations, and reports jts findings on its Web page, but the FAA steers clear of ranking both foreign and domestic airlines by their safety records, fg The Air Travelers Association las used 10 years of fatal-accident history to create its Airline Safety iReport Card, which assigns scores 'io 260 scheduled passenger airlines in 107 countries.

By visiting the Web site, consumers can check the fatakrash histories of specific airlines and aircraft models and can get information on the most recent fatal crashes. The FAA's International Aviation Safety Assessment ranks South Korea home to Korean Air, which crashed in Guam, killing about 225 in Category 1, meaning it meets standards of the International Civil Aviation Organization. Please see SAFETY, Page 2D Where to click. Page 2D. vy.

ni. 1 1 11 llllilllv L' 'Will ifcuiiiirwiurl i nii-iTniin i rf The evil spawn of "Beavis Butt-head" has landed. "South Park" is built for bodacious discomfort. And it's not like Comedy Central didn't know what it was getting into with this potty-mouthed "Peanuts." The chucklehead cable network has proudly described "South Park" and its rude cartoon tales of a raunchy quartet of Colorado third graders as "TVs newest sick and twisted series." Hoo, boy. Some will angrily lambaste "South Park" as, well, sick and twisted.

Others will flock to the 'South Park' 10 tonifht Comedy Central show for precisely the same reason. Obviously, not every funnybone tickles the same way. And "South Park," the latest offbeat creation in a wave of smart, often sarcastic '90s animation that runs the gonzo gamut from "The Simpsons" to "Ren and Stimpy" and "Beavis Butt-head" to "King of the Hill," isn't for everyone. "The show is designed for adults. And we're doing everything we can as a network to make sure that it's adults who watch it," says Comedy Central spokesman Tony Fox.

In fact, "South Park," debuting at 10 tonight, carries the TV-MA rating. That's the same rarely used, mature audience advisory NBC applied to "Schindler's List" and that CBS will affix to "Brooklyn South," a violent new police drama from Steven Bochco. In other words, "South Park" is a show about 8-year-olds that no 8-year-old should watch. Good luck. Both Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the merry pranksters behind "South Park," think their sweet-and-sour cartoon children ring true.

Even the crass gutter language that's too caustic for a major network. "Eight-year-old kids talk like that all the time," says Stone. "That's the big myth." "They talk worse than these kids talk," adds Parker. "I did when I was in third grade." "South Park," inspired by Stone and Parker's own upbringing in mountainous, small-town Colorado, follows the addled adventures of Kyle, Kenny, Cartman and Stan. The series grew out of "The Spirit of Christmas," a Comedy Central animated short that was orginally created by Stone and Parker for a Hollywood executive's video Christmas card.

That animated greeting card created an underground buzz, leading Comedy Central to make the deal for "South Park." Please see SOUTH PARK, Page 5D "South Park" features raunchy Colorado third graders. MIKE Duffy Television KARIN ANDERSONDetroit Free Press Brege and Karen Bell-Brege warm up by following each other's movements. Kirk Hanley (left), Darrin BY MARY BETH COLLVER Free Press Special Writer hat do you get when you cross a stockbroker, a communications specialist, an automotive engineer, a high school administrative assistant, a creative services manager and an animator? Give up? It's Totally Unrehearsed Theater, the troupe-in-residence at Mark Ridley's Comedy Castle in Royal Oak. An improvisation comedy team, its actors make up the scenes as they go along. The audience is in control, choosing the words and scenarios for the actors to perform.

Besides the Tuesday night Royal Oak gig, TUT performs Wednesday nights at Mainstreet Comedy Showcase in Ann Arbor, and has its own show on TCI Cable every Friday night at 10:30. The group's collective resume may seem unusual for a bunch of comedians, but their work and life experiences are what makes them so funny. As professional "normal" people, they know what makes people laugh. Every Tuesday night, when the open mike performers have finished, the actorscomics of TUT rush onto the stage with an infectious energy that quickly fills the room. To warm up the audience, troupe member Darrin Brege explains improv and asks a question like, "Who's your favorite Brady?" Someone shouts, out on their own.

Mark Ridley's club is one of the biggest in town and since they had already been performing there, they wanted to stay. Establishing their own troupe was the best thing they could have done, according to Bell-Brege. Ridley agrees, especially since the duo turned a weekly attendance of 50 people into a crowd of 200 to 300. "I think the world of them. They do a great job.

What's fun to watch is that they celebrate each other's birthdays and things like that. They're like a big happy family you don't see that too much." Members have come and gone over the years, but according to the troupe, this is the group with the chemistry. "It took years of going through different people; people who weren't into it, people who just wanted to play. Now we're making it, we're the group. Everyone works hard," said Bell-Brege.

A former radio disc jockey, Bell-Brege's comedy career began eight years ago when she studied with Second City in Chicago. She has done television and radio commercials as well as voice-overs for industrial films. She now co-directs the comedy troupe, teaches improv classes at the Comedy Castle and does voiceovers for CD-ROMs. Hauser, who earned a bachelor's degree in music at the University of Michigan, began her comedy career in 1989 doing stand-up at the Comedy Castle. Her credits include radio commercials Please see COMEDY, Page 2D Totally Unrehearsed Theater Mark Ridley's Comedy Castle 269 E.

Fourth, Royal Oak Tuesday nights after open mike, which starts at 8:30. Admission: $5, or free with a pass picked up at a previous performance. 1-248-542-9900 anytime Mainstreet Comedy Showcase 3 14 E. liberty, Ann Arbor Wednesday nights after ojxm mike, which starts at 8:30. $4, $2 for students with I.D.

1-3 13-996-9080 anytime "Beaver!" And they're off. The high-energy show clips along from the opening game, Bus Stop, which consists of characters such as Richard Simmons or a boy made of springs; to a crime scene where one of the players is a murderer. The actor has to guess whom he killed, what he killed him with, and where he left the body. Then the performers make a snapping and grooving entrance as cool, ginchy beatniks and spin impromptu poems based on the audience's suggestions. Totally Unrehearsed Theater was started five years ago by co-directors Karen Bell-Brege, then a communications specialist at Chrysler, and Gilda Hauser, who was a stockbroker.

They had been in another comedy troupe at the Comedy Castle and worked well together, so they decided to break I.