Long, rambling, incoherent words coming. You've been warned.
In the last week the following has happened: Our Laugh Mafia show, my second anniversary in comedy (the 26th) and out of the thousands that entered The World Series Of Comedy, I was one of the 101 chosen to compete. It's a wildcard spot, but to say I'm honored to even be chosen is an understatement.
That's a lot happening if you ask me. Oh, you didn't ask me.
Our Laugh Mafia show was a lot of fun. This is a blog of honesty so I'm going to admit a couple of things. I don't think that was my best set. I think it was okay, I don't think I killed the room like the great Dean Lewis did.
Dean was a pleasure to watch from the side of the stage. If you've ever wanted to be a comedian, I highly recommend taking his class. It's worth it. If you saw the show, you know he knows what he's talking about. I'm glad to call the guy mentor and friend. If you want to take the class email him at: [email protected].
I attribute my feelings about my set due to a few things.
1. I got way too wrapped up in promotion, interacting with our fans, emailing people, promoting, promoting and more promoting. I also got wrapped up in making T-shirts and DVD's by hand no less this time. I thought, we're only doing 20 T's and 20 DVD's so I"ll do them myself (with my girlfriends help).
I kid you not when I say start to finish each shirt took 30 minutes and each DVD took an hour. That's 30 hours of time I could've focused on writing and tweaking material. It's all about learning from mistakes and what I learned from this show is I'd rather kill in front of 100 people than do okay in front of 350.
2. I'd been fighting off a cold for almost two weeks. I thought I actually might go hoarse the night of the show. The whole week before the show I was taking Dayquil during the day and Nyquil at night. I was very loopy during the show. I literally was on the side of the stage watching Dean and for a second thought I was dreaming. I was that out of it. To say it was a blur is an understatement. And I think my set suffered.
I had people come up to me after the show and say it was a great show and that they really enjoyed my set, which I appreciate. I just didn't, and don't feel that I gave as much as I could. I'm saying this because I think know I can do better. Out of the three shows we've done at the Eisemann I think this one I was least prepared for. I don't think that's fair to myself and especially the people that paid $15 for a ticket, got the baby-sitter, the valet parking and drinks which makes it a fairly expensive night for a lot of people.
"I just wasn't good." - Jerry Seinfeld, on the documentary "Comedian" after having a bad set. I can relate brother.
I'm telling you these things because I promised to be honest here, to myself and to you, the thousands (ok, three) of readers I have. This post is more for me and you can come along for the ride.
3. Material. This show I did 26 minutes. If you don't know my style, I'm what's called a "storytelling comic", some people do one liners or short setup, punchline jokes. I just prefer to do it story wise. It's what feels right to me. Also, if you're wondering, yes, everything I talk/joke about is true. I did a bit about my mom getting botox from her vet, sadly true. I really cut off my childhood sweethearts toe with an axe, I busted my mom having an affair while my hair was on fire, I raised a sheep in FFA and I was mic shy until working in the deli at K-Mart.
Why am I telling you this? I dunno. Like I said at the start of this blog, I"m going to ramble.
Up until Byron and I went to L.A. I thought this whole process was going way too slow. Now, I'm grateful because I know that I need this time to hone my material, time to get better, time to do shit gigs, perform to 4 people at 1:30am and wait 4+ hours to do 3 minutes. It's a process and it rightfully takes time. If you see a comedian on TV or a headliner coming through at the Improv just know they've trudged through some real tough times, crap gigs and just a generally large amount of BS to get where they are. Even if their comedy isn't my cup of tea, I respect the hell out of the person for sticking with it.
Comedy has a built-in system that weeds out the wimps, complainers and people who don't want it bad enough. It's a good thing. There are exceptions of course, people who skirt the system. But for the most part it's a just system because you gotta believe in yourself and your material and be tough as nails. There's PLENTY of great comics out there that haven't been discovered yet and may never get discovered because they don't have "All 3". That's the desire, the delivery and the material. And still that may not be good enough.
It's tough, but like Maronzio Vance, a great comic you should check out said, "If you ain't in it to go the distance, get the F&%# out. You're wasting your time and mine and more importantly you're taking up stage time. Get out!" Harsh, but true.
There's a great mini-series documentary on Netflix called "Circus", that follows a season of the Big Apple Circus. It's reality TV in the realest sense of the word(s). If you watch it, you may see there's parallels to being a comedian. They have a saying "You have sawdust in your blood." It means that you were meant to be in the circus. I'm not sure what comedy's equivalent would be yet. I think it would be something like, "You have to have a mic in your hand." That's the best I've got so far.
