Steven Wright Joins Twitter.

Steven Wright, the master of one-liners, is now on twitter. The 140 character limit is a good test of someone's ability to whittle the elements of a joke down to the tightest form. And if a good one-liner is like a molecule of funny, Wright is the Enrico Fermi of jokes.

But the master of the short joke has been telling a story for about a week, with a series of to-be-continued tweets including one (so far) that is goes beyond 140 characters. He's being surreal and unpredictable as usual.

Netflix Instant Nudge: Steven Wright - When the Leaves Blow Away

Back in the early 90's I saw Steven Wright performing in Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor. Before the show, I excitedly told my friend Gary about it, and he shrugged his shoulders and said he'd seen him. When asked about his cool response, he explained that after 20 minutes or so, all the one-liners got old.

I ended up really liking the show. And it was surprising how much Wright reacted to his own material. Not laughing, but pausing and showing moments of amusement, confusion, and even pride. He was a little goofier than I had seen him up to then. But it's true, Wright doesn't switch up the pacing of his material as much as some comedians do. Another friend, Jay, who also saw the show made a similar observation as Gary: 'He's style is so dry. It's hard to keep the energy up.' But Jay didn't shrug his shoulders dismissively. He was still excited about a lot of the jokes, and he kept reciting them with admiration.

When the Leaves Blow Away is worth watching if you think a full hour of stand-up at Wright's pace is too much for you. The stage time is just over 40 minutes. It's a good performance, recorded over two days in 2006 in Toronto's Elgin & Winter Garden Theatre Centre.

The stand-up is followed by a half-hour film called One Soldier (1999), written and directed by Wright. It's the story of a Union soldier in the civil war, thinking back on his experiences and thoughts. The narration comes from the soldier and also from his wife, Becky, who sees him beginning to reel in his mind:

"There came a point where he told me sometimes he didn't know if things were happening, or if they just seemed to be happening. Then he said he realized it didn't really matter if it was one or the other because they were both experiences."

The black and white film is rich both visually and emotionally. Wright uses some of the lines from his stand-up in this story, revealing how tragic a lot of his humor is. Also showing how maddening it must be to be trapped in such a surreal skull.

Don't give up on the credits. Watch all the way to the end.