Month: November 2015

Why I’m Never Going To Be On SNL

Pretty much everybody I know who knows that I do stand up comedy has at one point said something to me like:

“Wow, wouldn’t it be something if I saw you on SNL one day?!”

Or, “Maybe if you work hard enough, you could be on SNL! Wouldn’t that be cool?!”

Or, “Hey buddy! You on SNL yet?! Ha!”

And I’m like, “Haha! Yeah! Whatever!”

Because everyone outside of the comedy world thinks that SNL is The Pinnacle of All Comedy. Which is totally fine to think; don’t get me wrong, I think SNL is fantastic! But it’s a very specific style of humor with a very specific format. And I don’t think that either the style or format is really right for me.

What I’m thinking in my head when somebody says one of those things to me is: “This person clearly doesn’t understand my comedic sensibility! Even if Lorne Michaels begged me to be on the show…I’d have to think twice about it!”

What I’m saying is that SNL probably wouldn’t ever want me anyways. It’s just not the gig for me. And that’s fine; I’d want to do other styles and formats of comedy that I would enjoy more anyways.

But, if I’m never going to be on SNL, I realized that I’m guaranteed to be a failure in the eyes of pretty much everyone that I know. Which is totally refreshing, and 100% takes the pressure off. I can do whatever I want! It’s SNL or bust. And I am choosing bust.

It’s like if you were to go into a test knowing that you weren’t even going to answer any of the questions. And then after you fail the test, your teacher and your parents and the school are all like, “Why’d you fail the test, Stu? You’re not very smart.”

And you’re like, “Trust me: I’m smart! The test is stupid.”

Louis C.K. on George Carlin

Do you ever see a famous comic and wonder what it would have been like to have been them growing up? Who did they look up to? Who did they want to be?

This is a video from some memorial event for George Carlin. Louis actually gets kind of emotional in his speech. The speech is about ten minutes long and Louis talks about how Carlin elicited his first “adult laugh,” gave him hope as a struggling comic coming from the same background, and inspired him to rewrite his sets every year like he does today. It’s a fantastic glimpse into C.K.’s inspiration for comedy. It’s also a fantastically written speech.

The Most Hated Comedians of All Time

Hey, if I should know anything about anything, you’d think it would be “hating.” Why? Well, for some strange reason I seem to have this effect on people where they either tend to think I’m okay or they completely 100% hate my guts. Luckily, I think the people who hate my guts are very much in the minority. But that doesn’t mean they don’t exist.

I’m not totally sure why, but maybe it’s just a comedy thing. When you look at the world in a funny way, people are bound to think your perspective is wrong.

Starting with Jay Leno, a lot of hated comics have been coming up in my posts and so I thought I’d do some more research on the subject. I found this Gawker article that lists “the most hated comics of all time:” Jeff Dunham, Dane Cook, Carlos Mencia, Rosie O’Donell, etc. I think the article is mostly from the public perspective, since there are a bunch of comics who a lot of other comics hate who aren’t on here simply because audiences love them. I can think of several examples myself. And, the only comics on here are really comics that were popular during the 90’s and early 2000’s, so it’s not a totally complete list. But you get a tiny taste of the hate.

What stands out to me the most from the article is that you can be hated for a wide variety of reasons: joke thievery, hackiness, treating other comics poorly, depending on a crutch, personality, you name it. It was somewhat refreshing to find some comics on there that I’m not a huge fan of for whatever reason. I won’t say which, but is there anything more fun than bonding over mutual hatred? Hardly.

Just hopefully I can be not hated by most people. And try to be a good person. I’ll consider that a win.

People love videos. Here’s a video of “overrated comedians.”

Thievery, Heckling, and Rape Jokes (Oh My?)

I hate that I titled this post how I did, but hey. People connect to dumb things in pop culture like that. Right? It’s a reference to lions, tigers, and bears IN CASE YOU DIDN’T GET THAT!

Patton Oswalt is a comic known especially well for his twitter rants. He’s really good in long form. He’s also good at long-form talking about comedy.

Read this. Oswalt published the piece on his personal website, where you can find a bunch of other great similar content. It’s a famous comic’s inside views on some of the biggest topics in comedy. That’s interesting, right? It is. This is the type of material that really gets me excited to do comedy: being able to see somebody break down the art in such detail. Someone who is on the inside. Joke stealing on its own is such a weird idea that non-comedians just don’t see it the same way. Example…

When I started doing comedy – back in 1988 – I did a joke one night, at an unpaid open mike, that killed.  It killed.  I wasn’t used to having anything in my set, in those first few months of shows, get any response from an audience other than a hard blink and an impatient sigh.

There’s a dopamine rush, for a comedian, when you cobble a thought out of thin air, when you arrange words not as a sentence but suddenly, as a joke.  A for-real, plucked-from-your-skull joke.  Something you created which, when you reach the part you want the audience to laugh at?  And then…holy shit!  They actually laugh?  That’s the spike in the vein that sets the compass for your life.

Well, I’d gotten a taste.  I wanted more.

The only problem was, it wasn’t my joke.

I’ve been there. I know what he’s talking about. I’ve tried a joke and thought, “That joke was too good. I didn’t think of that on my own.” It’s subconscious. But that’s not how people who villainize joke-stealing comics think of joke stealing. Not every joke-stealing comic is a Carlos Mencia or Fat Jew. Most of the time it’s an accident.

See what I mean? See more things from Oswalt’s view. Read the piece.

 

“Scumbag Cult Hero” Kyle Kinane

Kyle Kinane is one of my absolute favorite comics. He’s from Addison, Illinois which is just a little drive away from my home town. And he’s a weird guy. He’s that weird uncle you have with a beard and a beer who is somehow weirdly poetic. I don’t know your uncle, so I’m sorry for being presumptuous, but you get what I’m saying.

Now defunct Grantland did a feature article on Kinane in January, when Kinane was starting to really emerge. He’s had a few albums recorded but he’s still not really a household name by any means. It might be because his style doesn’t translate well to TV in a lot of people’s minds. I don’t know if that’s true, but that’s the only reason I can think of why he isn’t all over television. But he does have a massive cult following. And comics love him.

Here’s a bit from the Grantland article. One of the staff writers actually travelled along with Kinane for several days to write the piece.

“Kyle Kinane is everywhere like farty Jesus. He is in the shower with a six-pack of beer. He is drunk at a Wendy’s drive-through ordering chicken nuggets out of the sliding door of a taxi van. He is the guy at Red Lobster getting into a fistfight with the night manager over whether the moon landing was faked. He is accidentally childproofing himself out of a microwave while trying to nuke Totino’s Pizza Rolls. Then he is berating the microwave, shouting at the microwave to unlock, finally unplugging the microwave and eating the pizza rolls raw, while in his underwear. The next day he is crapping his only pair of pants.”

What an intro, huh?

If that doesn’t convince you to find out more about Kyle Kinane, here’s a Tonight Show set of his from February.

A Documentary On Why Comedians Do Comedy Is Happening

What do you say to a documentary that’s about Bugs Bunny? “Ehhh, what’s up doc?”

Yes I just made that up and yes it’s awful. But it was fun, wasn’t it? Don’t fool yourself: it was.

I found this story in the news this week and the concept really…intrigued me. I’m not so sure how well this doc will turn out.

Don’t let the cool graphics fool you, the idea of following three “regular” people as they try comedy for the first time is one of the worst ideas I’ve heard for a stand up documentary. Why? Well, they don’t know anything about comedy yet. Watch the Fox news video in the link, you’ll see: they talk to one of the “comics” featured in the doc. He is earth-shatteringly boring. No one even wants to hear me do or talk about comedy and I’m decently removed from that hatchling phase.

The only thing you could possibly do to make the doc interesting is also interview other people to talk about what starting comedy is like. You have two options when it comes to that: 1) comics, who will tell you “just do comedy and learn” and 2) professors who have never even tried stand up comedy who have done a lot of research on what’s “funny.” Since I’ve actually done academic humor research I can somewhat fairly say that humor research, although it sounds really interesting, is essentially worthless. Comics are right: you don’t know comedy unless you do it and an hour documentary of interviewed comics saying, “you just gotta go out and do it” and three new comics failing at open mics is not quite prime time material.

As a means of staying more positive (I’m not trying to put anything down), I actually do think it’s great that someone is making a documentary about stand up comedy, no matter what it’s about. There are some pretty decent documentaries on comedy out there, but honestly I’ve never seen one that I thought was “fantastic.” There are some mixed comedy special/documentaries that are pretty cool, but they aren’t quite the same. More filmmakers should be trying. Or comedic filmmakers should try, I think. Maybe the problem is that the comics aren’t really the ones trying to make a documentary.

One great thing that came out of this news story is that it reminded me documentaries on comedy exist and I should post about the better ones that are out there. So here’s to that happening in the future!

I just think the idea of following open mic comics as the premise of a “real” documentary is hilarious. And what kind of name is Morgen Earle? Who knows? It could be really good and I’m a jerk.

How People Respond to the Question “How Would You Best Describe Me?”

So, I decided to ask a bunch of people what they thought of me. Why? Well, It’s a really awkward question for people to answer and it’s fun to watch people deal with that. And I thought it could be funny. And I’m pretty much the worst at describing anything, especially myself. Why not let the masses do it for me?

Continue reading “How People Respond to the Question “How Would You Best Describe Me?”” →

How to Book Your Own Stand Up Comedy Tour

Are you a regularly booked comedian? Have you worked at well-known clubs? Then you’re just a little effort away from a do-it-yourself national tour.

I found this piece a year or so ago when it was exclusively up on Ron Babcock’s personal site. Now it’s featured on Laughspin, a swell comedy news source. Basically it’s a really long piece detailing how to schedule your own tour. Who is Ron Babcock? Well, he’s just some other comic. Or at least he was when he was writing this piece. Which is the main appeal…he tells you how to get booked across the country based only on the credits you have in your hometown. And a lot of other info and tips.

Some people love the idea of touring. Babcock barely broke even on the trip, but says it was worth the experience and meeting people. I’m looking forward to touring one day, so I’ll definitely come back to this piece when it comes time.

Everything You Need To Know About Being A Young Comic

This is one of my most favorite resources on comedy out there. And it’s just a Youtube video with no picture, only audio.

It’s a sit down conversation with Ari Shaffir, a headlining comic who has hosted his own Comedy Central show, This Is Not Happening. All he does is spew advice. For four hours. Yeah, four hours.

If you’re into doing stand up this will be the most fascinating thing ever. If you’re not it will probably be the most boring thing ever.

Learn more about Ari Shaffir on his site.