Variety recently published a column by Brian Lowry about stand-up being in decline. It’s painfully obvious from the column that Lowry has no understanding of the current stand-up renaissance and boy, have my fellow bloggers been letting him have it: here, here and here. (WhipItOut has a slightly different tact here.) They all make great points, so I fear my post might possibly be just that final kick or stomp to something that’s beaten and left for dead anyway. But it looks like too much damn fun not to talk about it.
Lowry’s column states that stand-up is in decline because its no longer a career hop for sitcom stardom. At best, a comic can hope to host a game show. He concludes with this:
Given the potential payoff, there remains a strong incentive to get standup back on its feet as a feeding tube to TV.
And this is the key sentence, because, if anything, this generation of comedians looks at stand-up and television the other way around. Having a TV show is a feeding tube for your stand-up, allowing you to widen your audience and attract bigger crowds. Most emblematic of it is Mitch Hedberg, who, naturally, put this manifesto as a joke:
I got into comedy to do comedy. But when you’re in Hollywood and you’re a comedian, everybody wants you to do other things. They say, “Alright, you’re a stand-up comedian, can you act?” That’s not fair. It’s as though if I was a cook and I worked my ass to become a good cook. And they said, “Alright, you’re a cook. Can you farm?”
Mitch may be gone but that attitude is still going strong. Stand-ups are sticking with the person that brought them to the ball. Many comics who are in stand-up generally aren’t doing it because they want to be famous for doing something else. Those people are gone, now auditioning for reality TV. Stand-up is its own art form again, not one in service to another.
Lowry is measuring on a ruler and seeing failure. Stand-ups are using the same ruler, they’re just at the other end.
I mentioned that The Comedy Festival in Vegas lacked more low-fi shows. Besides the Garage Comedy show I attended, another alternative show going on at the time was a Backyard Comedy Show that I missed. But some footage of it just made the web. Here’s the video featuring Brody Stevens and Morgan Murphy, as well as the show’s founder Brandt Tobler.
Obviously, a little bit of this is had to be there stuff. But I dig the idea a lot. People getting together, probably mostly the comics and the comedy nerds, bringing a lawn chair (yep, it’s BYO Seat) and laughing. This show is something I can really see working over the web. So much of stand-up is presented cleanly - too cleanly. Seeing stand-up performed intimately, emphasizing the communal nature of laughter by making the show like a get together between friends. And then, if you’re going to share it with the world on the web, make it like that same group filmed it with handheld cameras, cell phone cameras, etc. all cut together.
Of course, some people’s backyards are bigger than others. The last show in February, which featured Doug Stanhope had 250 people at it, according to Backyard Comedy’s myspace page. How big is too big for something intimate?
With TBS now holding two comedy festivals, they need somebody to handle the production of them. Hence this listing. A couple of interesting passages from the job description:
Collaborate with Los Angeles-based originals group to develop and produce television programming for national network, VOD, broadband and wireless.
and
Create and lead business development plan to expand revenue sources for these properties (example scenarios: DVD sales, tours).
Which suggests to me that my earlier suggestion that TBS plans to compete with Comedy Central in stand-up might be accurate. It certainly says that TBS sees this fest closer to the business than Comedy Central currently does with its South Beach festival, which, to my knowledge, has not produced any programming or DVDs.
Couple this with Just For Laughs, which is co-producing the Chicago Very Funny Festival, stating frankly that they want to be on American TV. Add in that many stand-up specials are now independently produced and then marketed to networks (primarily Comedy Central, but also Showtime). A lot of these comics may now have another player, an apparently ambitious one, bidding for them.
My only question: how much have network execs learned from the 80s boom, where stand-up became comically ubiquitous at the expense of quality? Good to have a new player. Let’s hope they’re a smart one.
Tommy Tiernan is a big name on the other side of the pond, but here in the States he’s far less known. Overseas, Tiernan lives up to Irish roots with a reputation for hilarious storytelling, often throwing his whole body into his tales. Americans have had limited opportunities to see Tiernan, save for a few appearances on the Late Show with David Letterman. That will start to change some when his special “Tommy Tiernan: Something Mental” premieres on Comedy Central this Friday at 11 PM.
Sadly, my recording equipment broke just immediately prior to our phone interview, so this interview was conducted by email. My short interview with Tiernan touches on swearing and blasphemy, and immediately following is a preview clip from “Something Mental” that gives an idea about why I had to ask about it.
How have your experiences with American audiences compared with British audiences? Are we more uptight about the word “fuck”?
No, you’re more uptight about words like Osama and Twins. Some American audiences are quite literal minded and if you’re not contributing to the great and holy optimism that you work for the devil.
Perhaps the difference might be better described as going from an audience where you’re well known to one where you’re less known. Is it a bit surreal to make that transition?
No, I find the Irish follow me everywhere. They are the world’s most public Secret Service.
How do you think the special will play on Comedy Central, where they bleep the word “fuck”? Are they censoring your Irish soul?
I think it’s gonna sound like I’m on a life support machine. I’m an evangelical preacher with a dirty mouth, that’s all.
You’re a very physical comedian but use your body to punctuate some smart ideas. Most people don’t typically associate physical comedy with intelligent insightful observation. Is that a weird bias to you?
Picture me as the epileptic Stephen Hawking.
You trust the audience will figure out English slang that they don’t already know. Is humor far more universal than people typically believe?
I think if you over explain your references you lose comic impact. People can get the gist of what you are saying anyway. Words that they don’t understand just make you sound erotic...sorry exotic.
Can you relate the how and why you were accused of blasphemy by the senate? Is that just a moral condemnation or is their a legal component to it?
I performed some material on Irish TV that some humans took offence at on behalf of the divine creator. It was basically an impersonation of The Lamb Of God combined with a satirical portrayal of Christ on the cross trying to engage Mary Magdalene in a bit of flirty chit chat. There was a legal component to it but God wasn’t available for the court date. He was busy congratulating Bush on bombing the Taliban.
Storytelling is such a big part of what you do. What’s the key to telling a great story?
I think the teller has to be intrigued by the story himself. That interest hooks the audience. Anybody can make anything compelling if they are consumed by it. For example a donut talking about a fat person.
I was strangely hopeful to discover there a suggestion that Harry Potter’s J.K. Rowling wants to write a novel about a stand-up comedian. I’ve only read a couple of the Potter books… I don’t remember them as especially funny, but they had a good sense of whimsy about them. So I’m not necessarily a fan (or a hater) of Rowling’s work.
However, what I do kind of love about the idea is that there are tons of young fans who are probably hooked on Rowling. If she were to pen a novel focused on a stand-up comic, it could be the first detailed introduction lots of young people have to stand-up outside of the odd Comedy Central special. Sure, they’ve seen stand-up, but had they thought about as an art form? It’s an interesting opportunity.
As Chortle correctly points out, there’s plenty of reason Rowling might be credible at writing a book about stand-up as she lives in Edinburgh, home to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival which brings many of the best international comics working today right to her doorstep. If she’s got a viewpoint on the art form, she’s certainly had the opportunity to see stand-up at its best.
Also, I can’t really think of too many novels where stand-ups are the main characters. The only one that comes to mind immediately is Bill Maher‘s “True Story”, written before Politically Correct and Real Time. I haven’t read it in ages, so I can’t testify to its strengths or weaknesses, but I do remember it being almost a little dismissive of stand-up in a way. The characters are named by what type of jokes they tell - i.e. Dick, Shit, Fat, Chink - which makes for a possibly accurate portrayal of exactly what went wrong with the 80s comedy boom (the book was published in 1994). I don’t think a definitive novel about stand-up has been written yet - but my memory might be spotty. Can anyone else think of other books I’m missing?
Of course, Rowling says she hasn’t written a word yet. So it may never turn up. But I’d read it. Would you?
Last week the question of who will play Barack Obama on Saturday Night Live was the cause of much speculation. It’s ultimate answer being the part-Venezulean, part-Japanese, non-African-American Fred Armisen has caused a little controversy. Some argue that there must be one African American comic out there who would be a great fit for the role.
Though my questions are more about the problems with anyone making a funny Obama impression right now, I can see why some might be disappointed. SNL currently has one African American cast member, and no matter how good Kenan Thompson might be, there’s a lot of the African American experience that just naturally won’t make it to air with only one representative of color.
For those in New York City bothered by SNL’s decision and looking for an alternative, tonight is the last night of The Black Comedy Experiment, a festival of African American comics which is committed to reflect the diversity within that community. A lot of talented young comics are performing, a reflection of that there’s as many ways to be funny and black as there are being funny and white (or any race for that matter). Among the shows tonight:
I don’t have much to say about George Carlin’s new special “It’s Bad For Ya,” because it will be presented live on Saturday Night at 10PM. What I can rave about is this Salon interview with the comic. One of the questions I’ve wanted to ask Carlin about was previous interviewers’ attempts to get him to rebuke the idea of not voting. Carlin in his 1996 special “Back in Town” described voting akin to jerking off except after he jerks off he has “something to show for it.”
Now keep in mind that in the above clip he says, “fuck hope!” In the interview, he, surprisingly, mentions he has some excitement about Barack Obama’s campaign, the interviewer asks right away “are you actually going to vote for him?” Carlin of course says “No”, saying he prefers to stay on the sidelines. Here’s the exchange that follows:
But by sitting on the sidelines, you’re depending on the others to participate, so that you can be a spectator.
Yeah, well, but if it all exploded today or tomorrow I wouldn’t give a fuck.
So you’re really just protecting yourself emotionally from caring about a country and a world that’s falling to pieces.
That’s a great analysis. That’s beautiful. That’s fine. I can’t help it! I’m human.
I’m sure it feels better than giving in to the dread the rest of us feel over the sorry state of things.
It absolutely does feel much better. I see your point, and your point is accurate. I mean, that’s the way I feel.
But I think most people would say that’s an irresponsible stance, too. You’re putting yourself above it and not taking responsibility by saying, “OK, I’m just going to be a spectator to this; my calling is to observe the madness.”
No, I don’t use words like “calling.”
You’re a stickler for words!
I do feel that when you’re born into the world, you’re given a ticket to the freak show, and when you’re born in the United States, you’re given a front-row seat. And some of us have notebooks. Some of us who sit there have a pencil and a notebook, and so that’s what I want to do. Because we’re dealing with an imperfect human animal and an imperfect human system. I’ll never have the ideal form of the thing I’m describing, so there will always be threads hanging out the side of it that a person can unravel and pick at and say, “Yeah, but ...” That’s fine with me, I have to cop to those things. But as close as I can get to having a system where I can operate in this manner, I think I have found a way to do that. But I agree with you, it’s not perfectly ordained. It’s not really ... Uh ...
Rhetorically unimpeachable.
You can criticize it from several angles and good arguments can be made and I respect that. So now I’m the defiant adolescent again. Fuck you people.
What I dig about this is how aware he is of his position. He understands the flaws in it, but it’s who he is. For an uncompromising comic, he understands that as a human being he’s compromised no matter what. One of the reasons why Carlin’s such a good comedian is that he sees through bullshit. What makes him great is that he recognizes his own.
Mike Judge tells MTV he's kinda warmed up to the idea of doing a live action Beavis and Butt-Head movie. He just animated a short segment with the duo for the upcoming "The Animation Show."
Andrew Dice Clay: "I think girl comics are doing better than guy comics today. They're more exciting than guy comics." Later, tells interviewer about a girl coming over who a "10-and-a-half." (AV Club)
The good: CBS adds two sitcoms to schedule. The bad: Mike Birbiglia's show appears to have not been picked up. You can watch previews of what they did order.
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Tommy Tiernan is a big name on the other side of the pond, but here in the States he’s far less known. Overseas, Tiernan lives up to Irish roots with a reputation for hilarious storytelling, often throwing his whole body into his tales. Americans have had limited opportunities to see Tiernan, save for a few appearances on the Late Show with David Letterman. That will start to change some when his special “Tommy Tiernan: Something Mental” premieres on Comedy Central this Friday at 11 PM.
, written before Politically Correct and Real Time. I haven’t read it in ages, so I can’t testify to its strengths or weaknesses, but I do remember it being almost a little dismissive of stand-up in a way. The characters are named by what type of jokes they tell - i.e. Dick, Shit, Fat, Chink - which makes for a possibly accurate portrayal of exactly what went wrong with the 80s comedy boom (the book was published in 1994). I don’t think a definitive novel about stand-up has been written yet - but my memory might be spotty. Can anyone else think of other books I’m missing?
