One of the easiest topics for me to blog about is comedy and I have had plenty of blogs dealing with drunk hecklers, horrible hotels, sound equipment that doesn’t work and all the other fun that comes from performing. For all the times I’ve been underpaid or treated like a walking dog turd, sometimes I get it. Some comedians try their damnedest to ruin any chance any good comic has to succeed.
Last week right here in Ohio (now it’s on YouTube, I won’t link to it to bring any attention to the douche), an open mic’er (a new comic) decided to curse when told not to by the venue and was asked to leave the stage. His response? He punched the host in the face and left. That will probably help get you booked. “The audience didn’t laugh at my closing line, so I set the club on fire.” That seems reasonable. If you want to curse, then don’t take a gig that tells you not to. If you take it, then don’t curse. Pretty simple.
This is an extreme example, but since I’ve started I seen comedians black out onstage, make women in the audience cry (that always warms up the crowd), take notebooks to the microphone and read like a poet because they didn’t prepare. Once I saw a guy tell handicapped jokes to a severely crippled guy in a wheelchair. The last example was probably the most uncomfortable I’ve ever been in my life, and I’ve been described as having less human emotion than a robot. It was even better that he was the opener, so me and the other comedian inherited a room that hated our guts.
In fairness, I’ve had my share of bad shows and mishaps. I also don’t try to dance around everyone’s sensitivities and have a group therapy session, but there is a basic level of effort and professionalism required. Thanks to a lot of scumbag moves, 90% of clubs and bars don’t offer meals or drinks free anymore (one comic told me the feature he worked with the week before got fired taking double free meals back to the hotel, which cost the club $200). Add to it the pay for most comedy shows hasn’t increased since about 1994 and it’s hard as hell to break in with new bookers. One guy I know smashed up a hotel room after a $50 gig – the room doesn’t offer a hotel room anymore. I guess the real takeaway goes back to advice I got when I first started – it takes 2-3 years to even figure out how to start to be funny, 5 years to really know how to do 20 great minutes and 10 years to make any real money. That’s all if you work at it and actually give an effort along the way. Unless you punch the host in the face – you go straight to the top immediately. Everyone loves comedy combined with UFC. It’s the wave of the future.