Copycat
Tags: Saskatoon, Saskatoon comedians, stand up comedy, The Stand-Up Diaries, trevor dean, Trevor Dean comedian, writingTony Robbins said if you want to be successful, you should find a person in whatever area you want success in and do what they do. My comedy coach said the same thing last week, and it’s starting to pay off.
My coach had told me a couple months back to watch a comedy special of whichever comedian I want to pattern myself after. Then watch that special over and over again because the more you watch it, the more your writing will begin to reflect that comedians style.
He suggested Woody Allen, but I wasn’t entirely comfortable with the idea. For one thing he primarily did comedy in the 60s and 70s, and he is the one who married his young daughter.
I am trying to grow from the “creepy” moniker when I started to get coaching. I want to find a comedian who is self deprecating and all about the struggles of life and not quite fitting in.
I found that comedian in Tom Papa.
What I like about him is that his stories have a clear beginning, a middle and an end. More importantly however is the fact that he has laugh points through a joke. Some comics will tell a story and sometimes wait 30 seconds until the first laugh, which by then is the punchline.
I am learning that if you break up that story into smaller, manageable parts then you insert laugh points, now that punchline that didn’t get much of a response gets a better laugh because it was set up by the laugh points in the joke, as if the audience was being conditioned to laugh.
I purchased the Tom Papa special he did a couple years back that was filmed in New York. I watched it a few times now and right after I watch it, I rewrite my material. Some if the stuff I did for the most recent Pass The Hat show was redone. The more I listen to his special the more I am able to pick apart my jokes and put more laugh points in them.
I think some of the material from Pass The Hat this last weekend will form a part of my sets in Los Angeles. Every night I will rewrite the material. I find myself already changing the jokes to make them better.
If I am going to L.A. though, I should talk about being Canadian and being from Saskatoon as well. Over the next couple of months I will put that together then rehearse, rehearse, rehearse because I have a responsibility to represent my city, my province, my country and my comedy coach to the best of my ability 🙂