Defending the Caveman

In Sin City, a show about love and monogamy with a touchy-feely message sticks out like a sore thumb. Making light of some of the more painful parts of human interaction, Rob Becker’s Defending the Caveman uses humor to explore conflicts and misunderstandings between the sexes, a touchy subject that only humor can diffuse.

Vegas’ current showing brings Kevin Burke back on stage as the narrator, talking to the audience and getting them in on the act. While scripted, Burke changes how he delivers each line based on the audience response, making every show unique.

Part of the reason Burke’s performance works is simply the lighting on the audience. Burke can read the audience’s emotions better and deliver his lines more effectively in response. Burke’s performances won him Las Vegas entertainer of the year in 2003. This is a shocker given that Vegas normally likes to keep things light.

Actor and comedian Becker wrote a record-setting solo act that combines comedy with the latest anthropological research, making comedy cocktails more potent with dashes of truth. Becker’s on to something, since Defending the Caveman saw success in 45 different countries and 30 different languages, proving that the spousal conflicts aren’t cultural. The comedy broke records as the longest running solo act in history, mostly because it’s hilarious and highly accurate.

Like the name suggests, Defending the Caveman comes to the caveman’s defense. Becker wrote Defending the Caveman to prove that men have emotions after hearing someone at a cocktail state “all men are assholes.” With humor, he shows how the emotions come across in subtle ways. Men and women can’t help their behavior. It’s in the genes.

Millions of years of evolution have made men inattentive, since they’ve primarily focused on one task: the hunt. Becker argues that men remain silent because these generations of hunting have taught them that noise scares away prey. That biological tendency is still ingrained in them.

For women, talking served as a way to process information when gathering, ensuring that they never missed anything valuable. Women also handle disputes differently, focusing on cooperation, while men rely on negotiation to resolve conflict. Women bond through gossip, information processing and emotional disclosure. When the two worlds collide, Defending the Caveman points out that men usually shrug off differences, while women assume the man is wrong.

The show isn’t a downer, focusing on understanding rather than blaming, allowing for connection rather than the war of the sexes. Becker deliberately tried to insert warmth and an overall positive vibe. This show can appeal to anyone not afraid of graphic language. The relationship stuff only lays the foundation for the play, since the bulk of the act focuses on comedy, pure and simple.

Whether you’re making sense of a failed relationship, searching for answers to your spouse’s behavior or looking for laughs, you’ll be at the right place. Fed up with relationships in general? Not only will you relate, but Defending the Caveman might give you a window into seeing how relationships can work.

Defending the Caveman runs for an hour and forty minutes on a simplified stage with a stone-age TV, an armchair, wicker basket and a spear, with caveman paintings in the background, meshing the world of today with the Flintstones. The show updates its references as older cultural references lose their relevance, such as mentioning “Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader,” “Dancing with the Stars,” and text messaging.

You can find Becker’s show at Harrah’s the Improv running every night at 7 p.m. and running at 3 p.m., Sunday through Monday. The Improv gives Defending the Caveman more intimacy and a more stand up feel than the Golden Nugget and the Excalibur, since the stage is closer to the audience. The stages at the other casinos gave Defending the Caveman too much of a lecture feel, while the new stage emphasizes the obvious: Defending the Caveman is a comedy.