Publication: MattOnAir.com
Publication Date: 06/06/2000

Derenger Shot #2

Stand Up Comedy 101

No medical or dental.  A good notebook.  A dependable mode of transportation.  An equally dependable pen or two.  A willingness to work in and perhaps drive to North Dakota in January and Phoenix in July.  A clothing rack in the back-seat of that aforementioned mode of transportation.   Residing in hotels and motels, if lucky.  If not, beds of pickups, kitchen floors of a single wide and the barn next to the hen house may very well be your nap area. The ability to stay awake til 5 a.m. because you simply don't work til 8p.m later that very same day.  The ability to accept "call me in 6 weeks" as a booker's final answer.  The resiliency to make that call and the many others like it.  A love for the laundry mat.  The acceptance that killing is a good thing and that bombing is too.    Those are just a few requirements.  If you can live with them, welcome aboard.  You're on your way to becoming a standup comic.

Now I'm sure I left out a few.  Give me some time and Ill experience them and others. You betchya I'll let ya'll know about em.  Damn them shows in Arkansas get ta ya.

This week is an insider's look at standup comedy and the psychos who love it.  Watch . . .Springer will do a show on it.  I know so many of you were wondering just today why someone would choose such a profession.  When you find out, please let me in on it.

The Third Annual Chicago Comedy Festival just concluded this past weekend.  A means by which many comics land sitcoms, movie deals, and solid management.  All the big shots were there looking for the next Jerry Seinfeld or George Carlin.  Or maybe the first Zach Galifinakis - a very funny guy whose name you'll hear a lot  . . . while spelled and pronounced wrong.  Many dreams came true and some simply took a turn down a side street - certainly not a one way street.  You see folks, one way streets don't exist in this business. Sure there may be signs that say "don't do this" or "don't say that" but we don't have to follow them.  They're just there for looks.  That's why we're in this business.  There are no rules.   Trust is an option.  Use it sparingly.   Standup comedy is perhaps Darwin 's "Survival of the Fittest" concept to a tee.  Battling for booking and bragging rights.  Taking tumbles and missed opportunities and learning from them.  It's far from easy.  There are no four year schools for it.  No graduation ceremony.  There is however a passion that lies deep within a standup comic.  And it's not limited strictly to stand-ups.  Anyone is the entertainment business with dreams and a vision.  A writer, a musician, a poet, a director, a producer, a singer - anyone who says "It's one thing to dream about it, but it's another to go chase it."     Nobody dreams of working 50 hours in a cubicle at a job you took for the benefits and 401K plan.  Yet billions of people do it.  And far too few people pursue their dreams.  Sending faxes and memos isn't a passion for anyone.  It's a job and a secure one at that.  Sure we need those people and my hat goes off to them.  They bust their ass to make a living. But why not make a living at something you love doing.  It may not provide the clearest path, but hey, look for a different one then.  There is nothing secure about being a standup comic.  The whole thing is twisted and packed wall to wall with uncertainty.   And that's what drives us.  We have no idea what will happen next.  But if we throw enough lines in the water, something's bound to happen.     Remember in grade school when we had to write a story from scratch   with few, if any perameters.  And when it came time to read them to the class, some were funny, others interesting and some just sucked.  For those that were funny, a future lied ahead.  Futures also lied ahead for those whose stories sucked perhaps in sports or something else they had developed a passion for.  (I hated getting my jock handed to me on the basketball court.)  But imagine, a future and a career in using your mind to write and perform stuff in front of total strangers.  And get paid for it.  No clock to punch.  And that's what it's really about folks - taking something that you believe in and making others believe in it too.  There is no greater high.  "Here's what I think about . . .."  Laugh if you're moved to do so.  If you paid $25 to hear those views and don't laugh, I've gotten over it already!

I have no idea where this career will take me.  I do know that I will do my damnedest to enjoy the journey though.  Remember, just love and laff!