When I was in eighth grade, my friend Chris Hart convinced me to join him on stage to perform stand-up comedy at our middle school’s talent show. While I’d like to block every second of that experience out of my mind, I remember just about everything about it; my horrible crew cut that did nothing to enhance my round face, the mirrored sunglasses we took off while walking on to RUN DMC’s You Be Illin, and the white pants we tucked those shades into. Every joke we did was from the back of Boy’s Life Magazine; the theatre was so silent, the only thing I could hear was my father asking mother, “Is there still time to put him up for adoption?”
Stand-up, though, was something that I always wanted to try. I always had the knack for making people laugh whether it was around the family dinner table or in the office break room and people often encouraged me to give it a shot for real. So, some thirty-two years after bombing at the St. Gabriel Middle School Talent Show, I attempted my first open-mic—and got bit by the bug.
It was CLEARLY a first timer’s set, but I didn’t do terrible. I got some laughs, which I know is the cost of entry, but I also got an education on what to do when you take the stage including understanding the importance of using your three minutes as best you can and to start getting laughs immediately vs. telling witty stories.
I’m going to use this blog to document lessons I’m learning while building my skills as a stand-up. For this first installment, I want to highlight one that I learned the hard way—Less is More.
I have this joke that usually does well when I perform it. It centers around my Catholic identity and how I realize it’s easy to make fun of the Catholic church given scandals and the fact that it isn’t exactly “progressive” on certain issues. The premise is that people stop making fun of the Catholic Church when they need an exorcist.
Recently, I had a bright idea to blow out this joke with more details. On paper, everything was smart/witty and, in my mind, FUNNY. When I performed it, the response wasn’t as strong as it typically is, and here is why: I should have been looking for ways to cut the joke down to its bare bones when I did the exact opposite—I over egged the omelet and lost the crowd. At first I was tempted to blame them for just not getting it or being smart enough but it wasn’t their fault, it was mine.
And here’s the thing, out of everyone I know who is working the open mic circuit, I should know better than to add unnecessary details to a bit because in addition to writing books, I’m also the managing editor of a magazine. I literally work with other writers to trim down their articles to cut out the fat and unbury the lead and here I am ignoring what I know to be a fundamental truth about communication. Physician, heal thyself.
So while I did not do as well as I could have the last time I hit the stage, I came away with a valuable lesson that will make me a better comic in the future—Less is more.
This is the bit I reference in the above post. Right now it is over three minutes and I’d like get it down to a minute and a half.
