Anyone wondering how Louis C.K. would address his controversial return to stand-up in Minneapolis didn't have to wait long.
"I used to play arenas," he said at the very top of his late-night set Tuesday, the first of four straight nights at the intimate Acme Comedy Co, which holds fewer than 300 people. "Lucky for you, I had a bad year."
C.K., looking trimmer and better groomed than before his forced hiatus, went on to tick off some of the lessons he learned since confirming in late 2017 that he committed sexual misconduct, specifically that he pressured female colleagues into watching him masturbate.
"I learned to eat alone in a restaurant while someone is giving you the finger across the room," he said, seeming completely at ease in a club he has long called one of his favorites. "The only advice I can give you is ask first if you can jerk off in front of someone. If they say yes, say, 'Are you sure?' And if they still say yes, then still, just don't do it."
There were other acknowledgments to his Year of Living Disgracefully in the one-hour set. He mentioned that he spent time in France because he realized he needed to leave the country. He talked about how annoying it is when his doting mother still mails him newspaper clippings, even the New York Times article that triggered his downfall.
But those nods aside, it was as if C.K. had never been on a break.
He was confident, if not downright delighted, when practicing his signature brand of humor: defending the indefensible and ripping the revered.
There was nothing Tuesday as squeamish as material he tested earlier this year, in which he mocked survivors of the Parkland shooting. But he came close.
