Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show – Part 4

Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show – Part 4
The FINAL Preparations

Anyway, the entire week leading up to the show, I spent every moment in my car working on my routine. This is the only benefit in not having a functional car stereo that I've found. At least an hour and a half a day can be dedicated to practicing routines, writing new material or figuring out how many bottles of beer need to be taken down and passed around to get home.

I finally looked at video of the last real feature spot I had, which was at Taglines in Eldersburg. There was some good stuff, but no surprises. I looked at the notes I made for Vijai's birthday show last year, because that was 10 minutes of funny dick jokes. Again, no real surprises. So I asked around, specifically to my fiancée (at the time), Jenn. I was a little surprised at her answer. I basically asked her to rank 3 of my 2-minute bits in order of how she liked them. 1) Volleyball, 2) Day Camp and 3) Cornhole.

I had also added an introduction which had a joke about the Orioles and the Wire, because local jokes endear the performer to the crowd and current jokes give the illusion that you're just funny and not doing memorized shtick on stage (note the word "illusion"). I also wanted to squeeze in a 3-minute bit about homophobia for MY fans. Some people would be there to see me and I wanted to make sure to include some intellectual social commentary to stay true to my mission statement as an artist. Believe it or not, I'm not just up there trying to make people laugh for 15 minutes. At least not anymore. That's become too boring.

I timed all my bits to make the decision more mathematically sound. And I made my final set list. It read:

1. Intro

2. Dating

3. Douchebag

4. Volleyball

5. Day Camp

6. Homophobia

Altogether, this would last 20 minutes. Truth be told, I figured on taking a little more than my 15 minutes, but I had planned on cutting the 2:30 day camp bit. I just left it on my post-it note as a precaution, in case Aries pulled a mini-Dave Chappelle on me. A very mini one.

And so, still mentally unable to really dedicate any concentrated time on preparing, I started practicing in my car bit by bit. Literally. I would take one entire 45-minute drive and make sure I had my 4-minute dating bit ready. It wasn't hard to get it all memorized since I had already done it all before, but there were a few subtle changes I needed to make. For example, everywhere I used to say "girlfriend," I needed to say fiancée. Also, I wanted to make the order flow and make sense. A lot of comics will just jump from bit to bit. Some even acknowledge that they are up there telling jokes "Man, that shit is funny. You guys suck" or "Whoops, messed up that line" or planned stuff like "I wrote that joke in a Jeepers Creepers bathroom." You wanna do that, it's cool with me. I have made a conscious decision not to. It creates a different mood and in my experience, it's usually one of unprofessionalism. If a joke doesn't hit the way you wanted to, get over it. Make the next one funnier. Again, I want to maintain that illusion of just being funny, not a guy doing shtick.

By week's end, I was sick of my material, but comfortable with it. I even took a few car rides off thinking about it because it was burning a hole in my brain. I put more effort into the new section on homophobia and the opening with the Orioles and Wire jokes to make me feel more comfortable, but it was pretty well memorized. The trick is to have it so well memorized that I wouldn't need to think about it and instead I could think about the crowd or the next joke. For my head to be in front of my mouth so I could be in the moment. Not sure if I knew it all that well.

Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show - Part 3

Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show – Part 3
The Preparations

I had added the Douchebag Dance to the set list and really only had about 8 more minutes to fill. But I went to see Dave Chappelle at UMBC about 10 years ago and he was over an hour late. He said he went to the University of Maryland by mistake but we all knew he was high. Both could be true. For an entire hour, the poor Student Events Board president tried to convince the crowd that he was coming, but the crowd was getting unsettled and angry and were likely already drunk or high themselves. Eventually, when the SEB guy walked onto the stage, the crowd would boo him and yell obscenities. Most of the crowd left before Dave got there, including me. I was determined to be prepared with enough material to make sure that wouldn’t happen to me this time. Only I didn’t want to rehearse. Or write stuff. Or think.

I realized weeks before the show how largely unmotivated to put in the effort to prepare that I was. The stress of planning the wedding, writing my final portfolio for my MFA class and this concert was shutting me down. I would get home and turn on a basketball game and feel guilty I wasn’t rehearsing my material, editing the wedding video or a thousand other things. Something about even looking at my notes from past shows was irritating me. I was mailing it in. I already knew that I had about 4 minutes of high-brow dick jokes that have gone over well for years and a few other bits that could certainly eat up the rest of the 4 minutes I’d need. It wouldn’t take long at all to rehearse. And so I didn’t. For weeks.

“So you nervous yet?” I had to field this question about 17 times a day for a month. I had actually reached a point of nerve saturation where I could no longer feel the anxiety I originally did when I got the e-mail. And I think the longer I put off preparations for the show, the longer I put off the anxiety. I’m not proud of that, but I think with everything happening in that month, I had reached stress level shut-down mode and this was my body’s defense mechanism. Somehow if I didn’t prepare for the show, I wouldn’t be nervous about it. This was, however, at odds with my need to be prepared. The anxiety over not being prepared was beginning to mount a counter-offensive against my anxiety over thinking about the show. It was a storm cloud brewing and only a matter of time before these two fronts collided. And lightning struck about a week before the show when I heard this.

“You should put that in your act.” This is another statement I hear about 17 times a day when people find out I do stand-up comedy. Some people think it must be so easy to be a stand-up comedian. At least in terms of finding material. People will say this to me whenever ANYTHING happens. And in some cases, when nothing happens. True story: I was eating something and dropped it on the floor. “You should put that in your act.”

How – in the hell – could I put that in my act?! Sure, people laughed when it happened and I may have even said something contextually funny at the moment. But this is not a stand-up routine. And the person who said that to me was dead serious and an alleged fan of stand-up comedy. How should I put this in my routine? Should I tell people I dropped my food on the floor? Or should I actually come out with a piece of pizza and throw it on the floor? The second one would probably shock a lot of people, but I don’t think the bit as a stand-alone piece is ready for the stage just yet. At least this incident gave me the jolt I needed to start turning the flywheel.

to be continued...

Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show - Part 2

Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show – Part 2
The Strategy

If you haven't read IHOP Part 1 yet, I recommend it. Of course I also once recommended that we lean a bottle rocket up against the rear view mirror and shoot it from the driver's side of a moving vehicle. You've been warned.

OK, I’ve been in the business long enough to know a couple things. Don’t try to do something that isn’t you – AND – play to the audience. These two things unfortunately contradict each other at times like this one. But I had a plan to compromise. First of all, idiots who don’t know anything about anything and get all their life information from romanticized broadcasts of people who get paid to sell the American Dream will automatically tell you to just be yourself. Funny is funny. Granted I’m not going to try impressions of DMX or Chamillionaire and I’m certainly not going to even wade in the race pool, but I’d be a fool not to think to try to play to his crowd somehow. Potentially 1,500 people are coming to see Aries, not necessarily me – though I’m sure to have a small following too. But I doubted my name made it to the 98 Rock spots. So I started to try to think of what I had in my arsenal that would go over well in front of his fans. I wasn’t about to sacrifice my integrity and resort to low-brow dick jokes. But I wouldn’t have too much of a problem with some high-brow dick jokes. And yes, there is such a thing.

But mostly, I wanted to do something physical. I don’t do impressions, but doing some sort of physical comedy would likely appeal to the same crowd. Unfortunately, I haven’t really tried anything physical in my act since my first few months. At least not in my stand-up act. My storytelling arsenal has quite a decent artifact of physical comedy in it. The climax of humor in the Logic, Luck and Love show is a segment I call “The Douchebag Dance.” It hits every time in front of a crowd predisposed to storytelling. But that doesn’t always translate to stand-up crowds, which are much less patient and forgiving. Thankfully, Vijai and Brad gave me two venues to practice it in the weeks prior to the big show. It went over well enough and I had gotten a decent idea of what I needed to change. And that bit would take 7 minutes, almost half the time I needed to fill. Plus, it was already written and as memorized as any bit I’ve ever done. Check.

I had a good feeling based on the sheer number of people that would be in the crowd that every joke would garner at least a little laughter. One great thing about big crowds is that laughter begets more laughter. Also, people as a general rule, do not want to look stupid. And the easiest way to do that is to not get the joke. So people will tend to laugh if other people are laughing. One way to bring that to a screeching halt is to offend people in the crowd. Some people choose that as their style, such as Andrew Dice Clay and Bobby Slayton, but I don’t have the personality or the testicles to go that route. So as long as everything was serviceably funny and I didn’t offend anyone, there was no way in my mind that I could bomb. Unless I got too drunk.

So my strategy was set. The Douchebag Dance was added to my repertoire and I wouldn’t offend anyone, at least not until I got them on my side. And even then, it would just be a quick jab, then a smile of retraction, more self-defamation and on to the next bit. Oh, and the more dick jokes the better. I knew this would be in front of a lot of UB higher ups, but I also knew Aries would be right after me and nobody would remember any of my crassness by comparison. I don’t have the time to speak in detail of the not-so-subtle difference between TV and live comedy, but it is night and day in terms of raunchiness. Those same people who don’t know anything about anything are probably tilting their head and thinking “wellllll, I’ve heard Chris Rock tell some pretty dirty –“ no you haven’t. It’s not the same, not even close. Sorry, but you don’t understand. Laughter begets more laughter and raunchy dick jokes are more likely to result in belly laughter than the “Ha. That’s an interesting point” intellectual jokes that will translate better on TV. But as I began, that’s a story for a different day. Just make fun of myself and I’m sure I’ll be fine.

Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show - Part 1

Inside the Head of a Performer VI: The Big Show – Part 1
The E-mail

I proposed to Jenn back in September of 2010. Once we decided to plan the wedding ourselves to (unsuccessfully) save a little money, I decided to go on a performance hiatus. Because of how much anxiety I get and mental energy I give to write and rehearse each performance, I figured it would be best to concentrate all my mental energy and anxiety on the BIG performance, scheduled for May 28^th, 2011.

Many of my male friends would joke that I was taking it too seriously and that all I really needed to worry about was showing up, and my fiancée would probably put somebody in charge of that too. I wanted to punch these people in the face. These are good friends of mine. And I really wanted to punch them in the face. If I heard one more of my married guy friends tell me that “Lauren’s had this wedding planned since she was six” or “Kelly’s mom basically did everything,” I was literally going to make a ball out of my fingers and throw it in the direction of their face. And then when I would have to turn down an offer from the unmarried majority of my friends by saying something like “I can’t do car bombs at Tommy Fatso’s roof party tonight, I have [insert wedding bullshit] to do. And it’s Tuesday. And I’m an adult,” the unmarried majority started barking the same hilarious generalities they’ve heard from hack stand-up comics and formulaic romantic comedies. That time I actually did punch somebody in the face. With my mind.

The point is that I was taking a scheduled break from performance. I made an exception for the Logic, Luck and Love Valentine’s Day performance at Atlas because when a con man offers you magic beans, you buy them. And though I was tempted by several Dustin-friendly themes at the Speakeasy and concerned about a nearly year-long on-stage storytelling absence for my casual fans, I stayed the course. I certainly didn’t need to worry about doing another 5 minutes at a stand-up open mic night any time before the wedding. And I was right.

On Wednesday, April 13^th at 3:33pm, I got an e-mail from Brittany Trombly of SEB, who I could pick out of a lineup, but would probably never have to. The e-mail basically offered me more money than I’ve ever gotten to do a longer set than I’ve ever done in front of more people than I’ve ever performed in front of. I hadn’t even finished reading it before I had already given myself an ulcer on the inside of my mouth and shit not one, but an entire litter of kittens. I named them all Brittany.

Once again, another man with more magic beans. I had to buy them. Unfortunately, the event was May 13^th, 15 days before the wedding and the day of the UB golf tournament. Fortunately, it wasn’t on my actual wedding day. Or worse, the day before. Because that would have started a huge fight I’m happy to have avoided. Also fortunately, the e-mail said “upon approval from the Artist’s management,” which gave my brain an out that would keep my ulcer from developing into a Stage 4. The Artist (capitalized like that in the actual e-mail) was Aries Spears. Because when you think of low-brow racial humor and impressions of rap artists, you think Dustin Fisher. I was positive Aries’ management wouldn’t want some “Have you thought about this social construct this way” white comic warming up his crowd. And I was wrong. They couldn’t have been more indifferent.

And so it was written. I now had about 4 weeks to develop a strategy, sort through all my material, create a set list, rehearse and rewrite. It was starting to get tough figuring out what was wedding-related or Lyric-related stress. Oh yeah, the event was taking place at the Lyric. Yeah. The 2,500 seat Opera House. But they only expected about 1,500. Whew!

...to be continued...

Before I Begin

Before I Begin

So I’m assuming a lot of you probably got here from the UB online marketing blitz for the Aries Spears show. Which means I probably work with you or for you or against you on some level. This is a concern.

I was a little (a lot) hesitant to publicly divulge this web address on any UB-related material because though most people know I “do stand-up,” most people don’t really know what that means. Four years ago, I didn’t either. But the UB marketing powers that be thought I would look more professional if I had my own website to promote, which I do. So I figured “well, here goes nothing.”

All comics across the country have day jobs, save for maybe 200 people that can sustain a living somehow. And all those people live in New York or L.A. So we all have to at some point make a decision about whether or not to disclose this information to our day job colleagues and how much of it we can afford to reveal. This is based on three factors: 1) the comedy material one may find, 2) the job one has and 3) the likelihood anyone who you don’t want to see it will see it. For example, people who get up and do holocaust and woman-bashing material should probably just not do more than tell people a casual “Yeah, I do stand-up on occasion.” No websites, no pamphlets, don’t ever let your colleagues know where you’re performing. Secondly, if you are a high school teacher, it’s probably best to hide that stand-up info from people. My buddy has a fake name and two facebook pages and I get confused, but I understand. Third, though the information is out there, sometimes you just kind of assume that certain people won’t find themselves to your website. If wrong however, that could get you into lots of trouble. These same rules apply to mothers, ex-girlfriends, and some intelligent pets.

And so, here I am. Exposing my other life to my work life. I’m sure others before me have involved their personal life in their work life. I just ask that you take it with the understanding that it’s stand-up comedy. And it’s not like what you think it is. There is cursing. There are sex jokes. This is necessary to get started in the business, trust me. I don’t have time to explain it all now, but on a scale of local performing stand-up comedians, I’m among the cleanest. Maybe I’ll have time to explain that all soon enough. But for now, I only ask that you turn on your sense of humor and tolerance and give me the benefit of the doubt. Even Seinfeld tells dick jokes in clubs. And what’s good enough for Seinfeld is good enough for me.

In the meantime, check out some of my videos on the right side of this site. You'll notice a sharp contrast in styles between me and Aries Spears, which is probably not good, but will make for a very interesting night.