Janet CollinsStanding Up for Comedy
April 10th 2009 00:39
Being a stand up comic must be one of the most difficult things anyone could do. I have trouble standing in front of people talking but I can’t imagine attempting to actually get in front of an audience with the sole intention of making them laugh.
I’ve been to quite a few stand-up comedy shows over the years, although I wouldn’t call myself a regular. They are usually in pubs and often can have some good as well as some not so good comics.
Many of the not so good ones, I think, milk the fact that there are no restrictions in the world of stand-up comedy. They resort to bad taste jokes and smut. The good ones often, to me at least, seem to base their sketches on real life but cleverly string a whole lot of incidents or events together. Most of the time we can relate to them and a lot of the time they have that element of surprise.
Last week I went along to a stand up comedy show to support a friend who wants to have a go as a stand up comic. His first gig was a comedy night in a pub competition. He did pretty well I thought, particularly because it was his first attempt and he had put together a really good routine. What was fairly obvious was that many of them hadn’t actually prepared any material for the occasion.
Many well-known celebrities have found fame and fortune after starting out in stand-up comedy. Jerry Seinfield is one, although he did train at Queens College. After that he spent years on the comedy club circuit before producing his popular TV show, Seinfield, which lasted a decade.
I was always a fan of Seinfeld, although I know he was either loved or loathed. My admiration wasn’t so much about Seinfeld himself but the clever way he worked his stand up comedy act into a show, basing the whole show around the theme of a single comedy performance. I thought this was rather clever and audiences, at least in America and Australia, loved it. The themes were always based around real life situations but making them much bigger and funnier, and that takes real talent.
There have been quite a few celebrities who have made it to the big time after starting out as a stand-up comic. Here are just some of them:
Adam Sandler started his career on Saturday Night Live and went on to become one of the most adored comedians in Hollywood.
Bill Cosby started his career as a stand-up comedian and went on to become a television actor, producer and author, his own show “The Cosby Show” being on of the most popular shows of the 80s.
Lily Tomlin began to stand-up comedy in nightclubs in Detroit after college. She then moved into the stand-up comedy scene in New York City before breaking into television in 1965 on The Merv Griffin Show. In 1969 she joined the sketch comedy show Laugh In. Tomlin went on to star in a variety of movies while still putting her comic talents to work on stage.
Richard Pryer started out as a stand-up comic after returning from two years in the U.S. military in Germany. He went on to become a famous actor after his first film debut in 1967.
Roseanne Barr found fame in stand-up comedy in the early 1980s with her routine about the typical American working-class housewife. This led to her own series on ABC called Roseanne, which lasted nine years and scored her an Emmy. Barr went on to host a talk show and a cooking show before returning to stand-up comedy in 2005. She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Woody Allen didn’t actually start off as a stand-up comedian but fell into it after doing writing stints for various shows including the Ed Sullivan Show. In 1961 he tried his hand as a stand-up comic but shortly went straight back into writing for comedy. Allen has gone on to write and produce numerous films and has a solid fan base.
Eric Bana, who has starred in some unforgettable movies and has become something of a legend, started his performance career as a stand-up comic. He has now gone on to become a sought after actor internationally. Bana’s rise was not overnight. After his stand-up gigs at inner-city pubs in Melbourne he ventured into the world of sketch comedy on TV's long running Full Frontal.
I heard Eric Bana the other day on radio being interviewed. He is in town to promote his latest movie Star Trek. In the interview he told of how his experience as a stand-up comic had given him some of the best training anyone could have. Being heckled and yelled off the stage when a performance wasn't good enough, he said, had given him much better training and experience than any acting school would have done.
Many a comedy performer will never go beyond the pub or club circuit, but there will always be ones that shine amongst them and their talent can for some take them to places they could once only dream about..
Sources: wikipedia
Image credit: City of Sydney
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Comment by Lady Henrietta Muddling
Potter in a Harry
And both of them often speak about how you have to test out your material to see if it works before putting it on screen. How very, very true.
Comedy is the toughest gig. True comedy.
This is the one thing I've learnt about comedy, and I'll stand by it till the day I die:
What works on the page doesn't necessarily work on the screen.
And to me, that is the whole key to comedy on the screen. Test it out on an audience first, because no matter how funny it appears on the page, it can fall completely flat on the screen, and you end up with a talking heads show.
The great thing about Seinfield & Fawlty Towers compared to other sitcoms (which Jerry Lewis refers to as couch sitcoms - like friends - where everyone sits around on couches saying one-liners and they have a laugh track and the morons out in tv world laugh) is that action happens. They don't just sit around on a couch and sprout one-liners. There is action.
And the great Louis Egri would agree. As would (fuck, forgotten his name - best screenwriter in American history - it will come to me just after I finish this comment. I bet).
Comedy is about being unpredictable.
No-one gets my sense of humour at all. But that's okay. I amuse myself. (I wonder if I can put a laugh track on Orble so people realise I'm kidding in most of my posts and comments? I doubt it. Jon is always on holidays. Charles is too nice a person to get anything done. And Jasmine has disappeared).
I find ORble one of the most hilarious blogsites on earth. Everyone takes everything written as serious. Yet they'll talk about how funny Jerry Seinfield is. He's taking the piss out of all of us.
The current head of Sydney's International Film School said Senifeild was a show about four very selfish people who actually liked each other. He was spot on.
Anyway. Finished raving now. Cya.
Comment by Janet Collins
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Nice of you to drop by.
Comment by Morgan Bell
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Thanks for the comment and Happy Easter!
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By the way, I didn't know that Eric Bana a comedy performer here, what a shock indeed!
For your information, you should check up another comedy performer, Hal Sparks. His comedy and acting is incredibly hilarious!
Comment by Janet Collins
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