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David Cross and Bob Odenkirk’s “Mr. Show with Bob & David” is the absinthe of sketch comedy: vaguely psychotropic and a definite acquired taste compared with the light-beer humor of such shows as “MAD TV” or the limping, geriatric “Saturday Night Live.” Cross and Odenkirk met in 1992 while writing for and performing on the critically acclaimed but short-lived “Ben Stiller Show.” Realizing they shared similar ideas, they began developing a sketch show of their own, eventually creating “Mr. Show.” Rolling Stone called it “edgier, smarter and stranger” than other sketch shows, and the Village Voice has said it “deserves its own channel.” Until that happens, it remains on HBO. Their new season begins in October.

What do comics do for fun? Cross: For fun we make fun of other comics. To relax we make fun of comics who make fun of other comics.

Do you have any music recommendations? Odenkirk: Creeper Lagoon. Cross: It’s not that new, but Pond’s Rock Collection is the best album you haven’t heard of.

You’ve been cited as leaders of the “alternative comedy” genre. Is alternative comedy more alternative or more comedy? Cross: It’s just more, and that’s a wonderful thing.

What have you been watching lately on TV or at the movies? Odenkirk: The Butcher Boy and Wild Man Blues. Cross: Ma Vie En Rose and Four Days in September, and anything that starts with “World’s Most Dangerous.” I’ve also been watching a lot of television at the movies. I have one of those portable things. It’s like killing two beautiful birds with one stone.

What are you reading? Odenkirk: The Butcher Boy by Patrick McCabe; Reading in the Dark by Seamus Deane. To understand life, try to get a copy of Charles Portis’ Masters of Atlantis or his The Dog of the South.

HBO’s ads say that it’s “not just TV. It’s HBO.” Really, isn’t it just TV? Cross: It’s actually more like a fancy radio with pictures.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

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