So Funny They Forgot to Laugh

I have noticed a chilling trait among stand-up comics: When I (a non-comedian) say anything to them that I intend to be funny, they respond in a flat, almost robotic voice, “That is hilarious.” Or, “Oh, my God, that is so funny.” Sometimes both.

But they don’t actually laugh at what I said.

“But Scott, what if maybe you’re just not funny?” No maybes: I know I’m not. So don’t say I am. Unless you can back it up with some laughter, coming from your body.

Befitting a tight little club, they laugh at each other’s stuff, of course, behind closed doors, literally. I found that out when I was standing right by the stage at the show headlined by Sarah Silverman recently in D.C. (see accompanying awesome phone-cam shot proving I was there).

It was actually amazingly raucous laughter, coming from a little room just offstage in which the performers who were waiting to go on were watching a live feed of the performer currently onstage, the kind of laughter that makes you laugh yourself, just based on how crazy it is. They were cracking each other’s shit up.

It was kind of endearing. I wish I had some kind of camaraderie like that with someones.

Another trait I’ve noticed is that stand-up guys and gals never don’t talk like stand-up comedians when they’re in public. Three or four of them in the back seat of the cab, talking among themselves, but always one at a time, no interrupting. Nothing normal-persony about their cadences: Not, in a casual tone of voice, “Hey, should we stop at this 7-11?” Instead, in a Carnegie Hall-filling voice to shame Ethel Merman, “How about these convenience stores in D.C., huh? [Insert topical local-oriented joke here, then riff a little]... AM I RIGHT?”

Stand-up and stand-up backlash are such old news now. I’m not gonna get into it. The debate happened, and like acid rain, the Heenes, what to do about nuclear waste, and other controversies, it faded away while you weren’t looking. Accept it: Stand-up is here to stay. It will never sit down.

I took my friend to the Silverman show with me, even though he assured me that he doesn’t like (“I hate”) stand-up comedy. I guess he didn’t get the memo about the end of stand-up backlash.

He explained that he gets bored with the inexorable twin topics of “shit/sex.”

He stood behind and just to the right of me during the show whispering, “See? That one was about sex. ... See? That one was about shit. Sex. Shit. Sex. Shit.”

As we watched, I was laughing regularly at the jokes, it was A-game time for all but one of the comics, and it felt good to laugh after so much death and heartache, but I had to admit my friend was right.

I guess poop and poppers are the things that make us humans most uncomfortable, so they are the surest bids for laughs. And that’s why a few stand-up stand-ups, such as Jim Gaffigan, never go blue. They pride themselves on not having to. It takes infinitely more effort not to throw F-bombs (whether it be f*ck or f*art).

I tried something similar to stand-up recently, just to see how much stage fright I have. Telling stories, onstage, to an audience. Man, the extent to which I thought I would “kill” (this is showbiz speak for getting lots of laughs and being a big hit) and the amount of non-killing I did were distressingly the same! I marvel at the huge drop from the killfest I had imagined so clearly to the supremely disappointing reality!

In my mind I would own the room free and clear, everyone falling in love with me as I reluctantly leave the stage in a crush of jubilant applause. The reality was a reedy-voiced, nervous little overweight person blinded by the lights, a stranger to the use of a microphone, rushing through his story and so grateful to leave the stage it was ridiculous.

Turns out it’s harder than it looks!

I’ll get up there again soon, because I am a performer through and through, albeit it one with crippling stage fright. But something else is worrying me. I think I lack the requisite hunger for mass approval and the necessary openness bordering on exhibitionism.

I think I really truly generally don’t like “people” and you know what audiences are made up of? People... Audiences are full of them. It’s going to be a problem.

Tags: Heene Family • Jim Gaffigan • Sarah Silverman • Stand-up Comedy • Washington D.C.

Tweet This | Follow Us on Twitter