CaltechLive! presents Last Laugh with Elaina Newport, an afternoon in conversation with a Capitol Steps’ founding member on Saturday, May 8, 2021, at 5 p.m. PDT. Newport will be speaking with Michael Alexander, public programming director at Caltech, and Sarah A. Spitz, former KCRW radio producer, about the comedy troupe’s four decades of political satire, providing an afternoon of fond remembrances, storytelling, and laughter. This event is free, but reservations are required.
This past January, the group, known for its musical political satire, announced on Twitter that it had disbanded after 39 years of “putting the MOCK in democracy.” “Like many in the entertainment business,” the statement said, “we simply weren’t built to survive going a year or more without live performances.”
“Still, we’re looking on the bright side,” Newport added. “When we first began as a group of Senate staffers, no one imagined we’d be traveling the country and doing this show for 39 years. Frankly, back then, we thought we’d be told to stop, or get fired, or both! But it’s been a great ride, and our trips to Caltech in the spring were the highlight of each year. We’ve loved every minute of it.”
The Capitol Steps made its first appearance on the Beckman Auditorium stage in 1991 and has closed every CaltechLive! performing arts season since, until the global COVID-19 pandemic halted all live performances in 2020. Fittingly, Last Laugh will serve as the season closer for the CaltechLive! virtual 2020–2021 season.
“Tens of thousands of Caltech audience members have shared almost three decades of laughs at the expense of both the left and the right—of course, to everyone’s benefit,” said Alexander. “Laughter is, after all, the best medicine!”
Newport will be interviewed jointly by Alexander and Spitz, who produced the Capitol Steps for broadcast on public radio stations nationwide.
This is a free event, but reservations are required. Go to events.caltech.edu/capsteps2021
About the Capitol Steps
The Capitol Steps began as a group of Senate staffers who set out to satirize the very people and places that employed them.
The group was born in December 1981, when some staffers for Senator Charles Percy were planning entertainment for a Christmas party. Their first idea was to stage a nativity play, but, as they tell it, in the whole Congress they couldn’t find three wise men or a virgin. So, they decided to dig into the headlines of the day and created song parodies and skits that conveyed a special brand of satirical humor.
In the years that followed, many members of the Steps ignored the conventional wisdom of “Don’t quit your day job!” and although not all of the most recent members of the Steps are former Capitol Hill staffers, taken together the performers have worked in a total of 18 congressional offices and represent 62 years of collective House and Senate staff experience.
About Elaina Newport
Elaina Newport is a founding writer, member, and performer with the political-satire comedy group the Capitol Steps.
About Sarah A. Spitz
Sarah A. Spitz spent 28 years as a producer and publicity director at KCRW public radio, and she produced the Capitol Steps for radio broadcasts on public stations nationwide. Spitz serves on an advisory board of Food Forward (www.foodforward.org), a nonprofit organization that connects fresh produce that would otherwise go to waste with millions of food-insecure Southern Californians.
