Here’s The Skinny From A Skinny

Tags: amateur comedians, Saskatoon, stand-up comedy, The Stand-Up Diaries, trevor dean

As most of you may have known, Thursday night marked the first time in almost nine months that I was back on the comedy stage.  I was in Regina as part of a fundraiser for the Regina Food Bank that was held at the University of Regina.  It’s been said that the audience will usually tell you what you are in terms of your performance.  On a scale of 1 to 10 I’d say it was about a 5.

For not being on stage in such a long time I wasn’t sure how quite to feel the moments before I walked onto the stage.  I wasn’t nervous although I did feel sad, alone and angry.

The “comeback” video where I wore my pink shirt in got laughs, but I wasn’t very pleased with how I looked in the video.  I stood in one spot and didn’t really do much to sell the material to the audience.  It may have had something to do with the fact that it was the first time I had performed the material my coach and I used.  I didn’t quite know the material as I had a set list in hand and I uncharacteristically swore a couple of times.  I think in that scenario I was very focused on sticking it to the asshole bully comics, which affected the quality of the performance.

This time around, the bullies are gone, and nine months had almost passed me by while the rest of the world went on getting laughs and having success.  This made me angry to the point where I knew I needed to make a difference on stage.  Every word, every sentence had to have meaning, needed to be there for a reason.  I wanted to make sure that the performance was better.  Even if the material didn’t generate the reaction it needed to, it wouldn’t be for a lack of effort in selling the material.  On that point alone, I consider it a success.  I was more animated, didn’t stay in one spot for too long and the timing was better.

It was a food bank fundraiser, so we tried to tailor the first few jokes towards that subject.  For whatever reason they didn’t go over as well as they should, but the laughs slowly started to build once I got to other material.  Usually my experience has been that if you start out slow it’s difficult to bring the audience back.  However, I didn’t get the big laughs.  They were consistent for the most part but nothing big.  I suppose I should be happy and pleased with the fact I performed better and got laughs, but you still feel like there’s more you could have done in the end.

I think the most important thing I gained from this was the respect I won back from the comics in Regina, after being bullied and disrespected when I first started.  They knew I had a comedy coach to help me, but they didn’t hold that against me.  In the end, I got laughs and that’s the important part.  How you arrived at getting those laughs should be irrelevant.

Unfortunately, some people don’t grow up and realize that fact.

 

p.s.   Please post your comments on what you thought of this newest set.  Be blessed!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30MHnxr9aA8