Stand Up Comedy: Things You Learn the Hard Way

Dang.

It's true what Jay Sankey says in Zen and the Art of Stand-Up Comedy,

You know how you thought you knew it all by your fifth set and then realized you know nothing? Well that same dance tends to continue for years. Just when you think you've got it down... splat!

I just had a gig like that tonight.

Stage fright, anxiety about the audience, new location, unfamiliar mike stand... It probably wasn't as bad as I thought, but it wasn't good enough for me, and I know I came off like the less-than-5-months-less-than-40-gigs-newbie that I am.

Here's what I learned from it:

• Perform at all kinds of places. There's a point at which you need to perform more places than your "development home," which for me is the San Diego Comedy Coop. One of the benefits of going on the road, which I will do as soon as I have a schedule that allows it, is learning to deal with all kinds of venues, crowds, time slots... when you're tired, moody, underfed, dealing with some life issue, whatever.
• Get familiar with the setup before the show. I'm used to a straight mike stand, but this one was for guitarists, it goes diagonal, and I simply didn't know how to adjust it- it was ridiculous throughout the show. Also, one of my jokes requires a stool, and I didn't have that, nor could I put my set list on it...
  
• Learn how to work without a set list. It's fine sometimes I guess, but it's a crutch, it reduces intimacy with the audience, it breaks up your flow, and means you haven't memorized your set or put it into a natural order. I was doing 15-20 minutes, which I've only done once before, so it's shaky ground for me. If I had to do 5, even 10, I could think of enough of my bits to pull it off. I just have to get up there without a net and see what happens.
• And of course, perform as much as possible. I've written so many bits but performed them so little that I haven't gotten to the make it exciting even when it's old to you stage with most of them. I've probably only done the most used of my bits 10-15 times. Think maybe I put everything in my life under a microscope. Um, yeah!