I got into stand up a little over a year ago and below is a video with the fruits of my labor.
[YOUTUBE]vRa5dhTgOow[/YOUTUBE]
I got into stand up a little over a year ago and below is a video with the fruits of my labor.
[YOUTUBE]vRa5dhTgOow[/YOUTUBE]
needs more gypsy jokes.
Hey Stefan,
How do YOU think this set went?
What are you most happy with, when you watch this?
And, in seeing this particular performance, what do you feel you most need to improve (if anything)?
pg--Promises not to be a dick or a curmudgeon in response--seattle
We'll just take the fact that this was too long and that you didn't read it...as read.
There are four things I would like to change this year while watching the video.Originally Posted by pg13
1. Not lean on the mic stand and stool.
2. Remember my god damned jokes without bringing up a set list.
3. React better to the audience
4. Not say "uhm" so much
Let me know your thoughts PG.
First off, I thought you got good laughs throughout your set. For a "slightly surreal one-liner spitter" like yourself, that shows that you're a good writer...as you're getting a good percentage of your jokes over. You live and die by your jokes--luckily, your jokes are usually successful.
There were a couple of times where I was watching and I felt an urge to suggest a tweak or an expansion of a particular joke, thinking my suggestions could improve that material...and maybe they could. However, my suggestions would only work if you were willing to claim some personal ownership, adding some consistent sense of your individual persona into the mix...and that doesn't seem to be what you want
You seem to want to depersonalize your comedy, even more so than Steven Wright, Mitch Hedberg or Zach Galifianakis. Nothing wrong with that approach--although it does put all of your eggs in your joke writing ability basket (and that's a risk.) However, your taking that impersonal approach means that it doesn't make sense for me to give you advice that takes you away from what you want to do. You'll just have to work within your own idiom there.
That approach also makes it challenging for you to interact with the crowd--you're not allowing yourself much "you" in your jokes...so, when you break from your jokes, there's a disconnect for the audience...or, more accurately, an absence...
One approach might be to never react to the audience...but that may be depersonalizing things too much. If you don't react to the audience's reactions, you might as well just film your perfect performance in the comfort of your own home and send that video footage to the club as there's no real reason for you to be there...
One more realistic approach to your crowd interactions that you may want to consider is to "pre-write" common interaction responses. Take the same distant persona, the same perspective and approach you use in your joke writing...and write some imagined audience reactions in that same comic voice. That same abstract, distant, impersonal voice that you write your jokes in--if that's what you're going for--is what you should be able to respond to the audience with...
In this set, you got a common audience reaction to a "kids in peril" joke: you got some people to boo... That'll happen. Rather than respond as yourself in the moment, which is a break from everything else you've done on stage, and hope that you'll somehow make it funny..you should, instead, have a reaction in your consistent comedic voice already written and ready to drop into that situation...so you remain consistent and can handle the situation with your best skill--your joke writing.
(I put absolutely no effort into this attempt at an example, meant merely to illustrate my suggestion: "People who boo a joke at a comedy show are like the people who watch a porno movie all the way to the end because they want to know what happens... You're kind of missing the point. Just jerk off and let it go.")
Write a bunch of these, for as many situations where you can imagine needing an "audience reaction"...and then bend to fit as circumstances occur. That way, you can seem "in the moment" but you don't deviate from your comedic persona...and you play to your strengths.
pg--Oh, and I admit...I did think "Is he holding onto that mic stand so desperately because he's afraid he'll fall if he lets go? If so, he should probably put the beer down..."--seattle
PS--As someone who constructs his sets more linearly...where one topic leads to another, I've always wondered about performers like yourself who seem to have an endless supply of short jokes that never tie into each other. You mentioned not being able to remember your jokes without a set list...I'm curious as to how you construct a set list at all, considering there's no perceived pathway for what jokes you might do in any particular order. I'm just fascinated, like someone encountering an alien intelligence and trying to figure out how they might think...
PPS--I enjoyed your set. As you look at the next few years of development, the thing you want to keep in the back of your mind is: "Is there a reason to see ME perform THESE jokes? Would the same jokes told by someone else be just as funny?"
There's a difference between a great comedy writer and a compelling comedy performer. What the next few years of your comedy development should help you find is a way for you to present your comedic ideas in such a way that people would need to see you, and only you, in order to get the best presentation of your comedy ideas...
You're getting great laughs...and you're only a year in. You'll keep developing your skills as you keep performing--and you'll find answers to these questions as you do...
I think your four point goal for the next year is a great plan...as two of the things you brought up were things that I noticed--and the other two are things that are worth working on as well.
See you in a year, then!
We'll just take the fact that this was too long and that you didn't read it...as read.
I really don't mind the leaning on the mic stand and the stool. Have you seen John Olivier's Terrifying Times? He must spend half the show holding onto the mic stand.
I thought you were really funny but yes, you should react to the audience more.
Keep it up, sir!
Good Job.
---
Last edited by MJD8000; January 18, 2012 at 12:38 AM.
Didn't your light bulb joke used to go "they have over 3000 light bulbs... and a box turtle". I don't know why but I find the specifics in the wording to be funny.
Good set. I liked the ambidextrous high fives and heavy breather jokes a lot.
If you want to remember your set list try this:
1) Get as few topics as possible. Write tags to your jokes So that you can get about 10 topics with 2 tags on each topic. That way you should be able to squeeze in about 30 punchlines in 5 minutes.
2) Write your set list down
3) Repeat the order of the set list ten times.
4) Do it the next day. And then test yourself to see how much of the order you can remember.
5) Repeat this until you remember the order without looking at the set list.
Your memory should get stronger and you should be able to memorize a set list within a few days of a set.
Jay- Yeah the lightbulb joke has different setups to it. I usually say a shitload of light bulbs but was trying not to swear during this set. I also say "it was fucking bread" for my 100% wheat ale joke which works better.
Dawson - I still need to find a way to wait between jokes and not make it seem like i'm waiting for the audience to laugh. I don't have a way of doing it yet other than saying "okay" or "alright" with a smirk on my face. I meant to say button up shirt. Sometimes i tag it with at home I have lots of shirts, with no buttons.
Brian - I guess I've just been to lazy to try and memorize my jokes. Especially ones that are newer and don't work all the time. To me it's like I'm waisting my time in memorizing as opposed to writing
No, I think You misunderstood. I'm not saying to memorize your jokes just your topics. It should take you less than five minutes a day leading up to your set.
Memorizing the exact wording is probably too tedious for you and would make your delivery sound robotic unless the jokes called for very specific wording and timing.
Brian...did you watch the posted set?
Stefan's got the kind of comedy style where it IS about the specific wording of each joke.
You gave some very good advice for most comics, but Stefan's chosen path means he'll have to spend more time on exact memorization than others...
pg--"Robot, robot" (Twigger's Holiday reference)--seattle
We'll just take the fact that this was too long and that you didn't read it...as read.
I think Mitch Hedberg said he didn't like to write his jokes out. He preferred to write a few words and he would know exactly what he meant when he read it later. For example if you look at the booklet that came with Do you Believe in Gosh you'll see excerpts from his notebook like "Jamaica Air. Every Flight's the red eye." or "Popsicles-I hate. I put them in the closet."
Not memorizing his jokes word for word probably helped him to develop such a distinctive timing and delivery.
Also Woody Allen said he didn't like to memorize the words in his jokes because he felt it would be better to deliver them in a more conversational way and he felt it was beneficial to editing live on stage, i.e. dropping unnecessary words.
And no I didn't watch the set, but I've watched previous sets of his.
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