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In case you still have Internet in the aftermath of Hurricane/Storm/Bitch Sandy, here is something that will make you wish you had lost your Web access: a blow-for-blow account of life on the road last week.  I have not been chronicling my road life as much in 2012 for a very good reason: I have not been getting booked as much.  But last week my luck turned around and my cholesterol went way up thanks to a week that took me from Gotham Comedy Club to Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin to “The Comedy Room” in Wyandotte, Michigan (pronounced “where the fu*k am I?”, Wyandotte is an old Native American term for “Where all the white people from Detroit ran away from blacks”).  All in all it was over 2,000 miles of driving, over 4,000 grams of trans fats and over $20 in profit!  Just kidding, made triple digit profits this week, which means that if I am a victim of Hurricane Sandy’s aftermath relatives of mine will have to divide $125 amongst themselves.  I just hope that the nastiness of the ensuing litigation does not tear my family apart.  OK – here is the epic tale of comedy domination from NYC through the Midwest.

Tuesday Night – Gotham

I went up first on the Comedians at Law show at Gotham because we are experimenting running comedy shows like athletic events at progressive middle schools – everyone gets to close shows like they are participation trophies.  Couple that frustration with some financial arrangements with former group members and I thought it was a bad start to a week (without going into details please watch Michael Corleone in this scene for how I would have chosen to deal with former members):

So I retired for the evening after a surprisingly good set because the next day was the trip to Coldwater, Michigan.  Road work is like a cleansing of the comedy palate – leave and forget everything at home for a week or so at a time.

Road Trip – Day 1 – Joe Pontillo: Road Comedy Warrior

On Wednesday I was picked up by Joe Pontillo.  I have done several road gigs with Joe Pontillo and here is why Pontillo is a great road comedy companion:

• He has a seemingly unlimited capacity for driving, which is good because I do not drive (I have a license, but consider it a serious danger to be behind the wheel).
• He is a funny dude.
• He is a small human being, which always means he has to sleep on fold out couches instead of beds in the event of limited bedding.

We set of for Coldwater, MI which is about 70% of the way from New York to Appleton, WI.  Among the things we learned was that Pennsylvania is the worst city to travel through – it is dark, full of trees and devoid of quality rest stops.  Of course Ohio is the exact opposite – their stops are pristine, contain 24 hour Starbucks and are so safe that the staffs consist entirely of 90 year old women at 2am.  I also began my futile quest to eat at a Buffalo Wild Wings (I always try to eat at places that I see advertised a lot in NYC, but can never find in NYC – I AM TALKING TO YOU SONIC!).

We arrived at the Red Roof Inn (the GPS led us to a quiet abandoned road about 2/10 of a mile from the Red Roof Inn, which was temporarily terrifying and then a great relief) at about 2:30 am and for $48 it was a pretty solid place.

 

Road Trip Day 2 – Appleton’s Reckoning

Joe and I set off for Appleton around 9 am the next day and as we were pulling out I realized that there was a Buffalo Wild Wings behind the hotel (the first of about 5 we would miss by a few feet and/or a few hours of being opened).  We stopped at Wendy’s for lunch where I had a burger, fries and milkshake and was served by a woman whose name tag said “Ms. Nique$$..”  We arrived at the Hampton Inn in Appleton around 4pm and I then met up with my law school buddy Pat Blaney.  We continued a law school tradition by eating dinner at Fuddrucker’s (when my Steelers and Pat’s Packers met in the Super Bowl a couple of years ago we dubbed it the Fudd’s Bowl and bet a $50 Fuddruckers gift card) and I had a burger, fries and soda (because only an animal with a death wish would have burgers, fries AND milkshakes two meals in a row).  Then it was time for the show at Lawrence University.

Lawrence University is a pleasant looking liberal arts college of about 1600 students, not unlike where I went to college.  And when I arrived at the location of the show I was not surprised to see I would be performing at the campus snack bar.  There was a sign of me in the bathroom and I took it as a good sign that there were neither  urine stains nor a glory hole cut out of my mouth on the poster.  Then one student came up to me and said:

“Are you J-L?  I saw your poster and watched your videos on YouTube.  You are really funny!.” And then he left ten minutes before the show and never returned.

I met the student liaisons who seemed intimidated both by my size and my 1970s birth date, but were very pleasant.  Also, to the credit of a small school in the middle of Appleton the student body appeared incredibly diverse. Either they were taking photos for the campus brochure at my show or it is a very richly diverse student body.

But it was not all good news. I was sadly told that there was a campus wide free screening of a small independent film called The Dark Knight Rises at exactly the same time as the show.  So we ended up having 30-40 students at the show and they were a great audience.  Joe did a great job warming them up and then I worked my ass off and had a great set.  And then, like most college gigs it ended in the most anti-climactic way.  You get a hand shake, a few nods from students and then walk out and head back to the Hampton Inn as the students realize that there are more important things than a comedian, such as everything for one example.

Road Trip Day 3 – White Detroit

The next day we headed out around 830 am and passed at least one more Buffalo Wild Wings nearby.  We had lunch at Panera Bread where I had a salad which confused my body which had been trained to survive on trans fats and sugar alone.   We made it to Wyandotte and went to Portofino’s Restaurant, home of the cleverly named “The Comedy Room.”  The show was packed with people because it was a fundraiser for a high school hockey team.  So just in case a few black people had snuck into the suburb and were going to attend the show, “hockey fundraiser” probably lowered their numbers even more to a manageable zero.

The set went well, except when I mentioned President Obama, which became a clash between a table of older, pro-Obama women and a table of younger, female mullet having anti-Obama women.  Sold a bunch of CDs to top it all off for a very successful evening.

The hotel room had one giant bed and one fold out couch and Pontillo gladly took the fold out couch when I passed out on the large bed.

Road Trip Day 4 – Cloud Atlas and the Olive Garden

I woke up the next day to see Cloud Atlas, but had to call a cab to get to the theater (I decided waking Joe up early after him taking the sofa bed would be too much to ask).  So I called a cab at 915am and the dispatcher told me that she would send a cab. At 950am I called back and said I was hoping to get a cab before 10 and she replied, “Oh, we can’t get you one til after ten.”  So if anyone is calling for a cab in Michigan tell them “Please send me a cab whenever the fu*k you feel like.”

Watched Cloud Atlas later, thanks to a ride from the Stockton to my comedy Eaton (gotcha hoops fans!), Joe Pontillo, and here is the review I posted later that day:

Pre-show Joe and I went to Olive Garden (add another item to Joe Pontillo’s skill set – Olive Garden gift card at the ready).  I ate 9 breadsticks, which left me with garlic breath for the next 14 hours.  As we pulled out of the parking lot to head to the last show we of course saw a Buffalo Wild Wings a few storefronts down.  DAMN YOU WILD WINGS!!!!

Final show was pleasant, lightly attended and I performed in a semi-coma. From there we got in the car and got on the final drive of the week – Detroit to NYC.

Road Trip Day 5 – Truck Stop Sexual Predator?

My bladder picked an interesting time to age +/- 30 years because I could not stop pissing.  Joe continued his monster driving going 7 straight hours until he finally decided he needed to tap out for an hour at a random Pennsylvania rest stop.  I opted to walk inside and charge my phone and give Joe an hour of uninterrupted sleep.  But when I got in the rest stop it was just a small room with two bathrooms, a few plugs, three vending machines and no seats.  I was wearing an LL Bean field coat, a flannel shirt and a sporting a no sleep look in my eyes.  And it was dark outside.  So for the next hour I became the worst nightmare for approximately 17 travellers who at random times would come in and see a giant bi-racial dude sporting Sea Bass’s wardrobe sans trucker hat, standing in the corner of a rest stop doing absolutely nothing.

But much like my time as a youth int he Catholic Church, my look turned out to be unappealing to yet another stereotypical pocket of sexual deviants.  Joe removed his Roger Dorn sleeping eye mask when I came back to the car and we made our final 3 hours back to NYC.

Just in time for the beginning of Hurricane Sandy.  Always a happy ending with comedy.

Today has been a day that has been circled on my calendar (yes a physical desk calendar) for quite some time.  I am headed to Boston in a few hours to do a very 2012 (or at least 2010) style comedy show.  I, along with two other members of Comedians at Law, are performing a live stand up show and podcast at Harvard Law School, which for comedy aimed at the legal community is like having an alternative comedy show inside the beards of the guys on Duck Dynasty – a dream location and marketing opportunity.

In addition to performing the show and recording a podcast live (our first time trying this so get ready for a nightmare) we are live streaming the show on the web.  High tech? Yes.  Free to the public? Yes.  Following all the do’s of the cottage industry growing around telling comedians to do cool interactive things with fans in the hopes of some sort of long term monetary growth? Reluctantly, yes.  This is a small monetary risk to the group, but the big risk is that after hyping this event at America’s most revered academic institution to our niche market we still may not expand our reach significantly (in part because as I have learned over the last year of hauling ass to make this entity grow, a lot of our fan base is a bunch of meme-loving tools who only enjoy the novelty of Comedians at Law, but do not actually give a flying fart about stand up comedy (e.g. mediocre meme – 50 likes on Facebook, video clip of us on television promoting a live show – 2 likes).

Sadly, this is actually the positive part of this blog – I am hopeful that the live streaming of the show can expand our fan base and show people our product – and if you are reading this blog – you can watch live from 7pm to 9pm at the home page of Comedians at Law or go to the LiveStream page.

Of course about 10 different faculty, students and administrators have said no to being guests for the podcast, so it could be a horrific and awkward live podcast tonight.   Either way it should be entertaining web viewing tonight.

But comedy has usually found a way to not allow me to savor or feel too much happiness.  Whether it is a friend telling me things like that she “likes the most recent episode of my podcast…much better than the last one, which sucked,” or another friend saying that he cannot make a show where I am headlining at Gotham Comedy club because he is going to a pub trivia night, it always seems that comedy cannot let well enough alone.   A more relevant example is that in 5 days Comedians at Law are performing at Gotham Comedy Club.  Tonight at Gotham Comedy Club? “America’s Funniest Lawyer” competition.  At least we are being given five days for NYC to cleanse its palette from lawyer-based comedy for our show.  What did Rodney Dangerfield say… Oh yeah “put a fu*king bullet in my head.”

But logistical problems/conflicts are par for the course in this business.  But my least favorite scourge du jour is the “everyone is funny” phenomenon in our culture.  As I always gripe, thanks to YouTube, Twitter and our general “everyone is special” aspect to our culture, comedy has become so cheapened that unless you are famous, many people assume that they can do what comedians do.  I do not need to re-hash all the ways people do this (though my favorite was after a particularly good show at some Funny Bone a guy told me that I should meet his buddy from work because he would make me laugh), but the reason I bring this up is that joining/forming Comedians at Law has actually exposed me to a new form of hubris in the “I am funny also” culture.

For some reason, having a law degree from a prestigious university, nearly ten years performing and a national television credit is not enough to discourage people from equating a musical performance at an office party to what my mates and I do.  We have received several inquiries from people who, by their own admission, have been performing for “a few weeks” to join Comedians at Law.  (Not to mention we have been duped by an entire State Bar group into comping 100 people with an implied promise of a private show – post-show emails not getting answered).  But an email one of our members received last night is literally the grossest piece of self-aggrandizing, self-involved, piece of fu*king sh*t e-mails I have ever read.  It almost reads like a parody it is so ridiculous:

        I got an e-mail from the head of my NYC Bar Committee about your group’s upcoming show at Gotham Comedy Club. I’ve been suffering from a super crazy schedule lately & generally don’t do anything without significant notice (I’ve been doing extra work where I got about 3 hours of sleep for 2 days in the past week & will likely have to do it again on Friday; there was also 4 days of Comic Con) but did want to see about networking. I have also performed in City Bar’s Talent Night (mostly singing but I did an original monologue 2 years ago; last year I read the female lead in a radio play). Oh, and I have red hair + most people think I’m an actress when I go to creative networking events. I’ve also been deemed “attractive” by Central Casting while in high school, I was considered an ugly girl & look exactly the same as I do now.
         We may have mutual contacts. I do know some people in that scene, such as——– (he’s done a lot of emceeing at———-, where hubby & I prefer to go). ——- was in one of my film company’s features; that feature was sold to a major distributor though it was a no name, no budget production. I also have the distinction of doing about 3 different things & having credibility in my realm for both creative ability and legal skill (more recently, I’ve been getting writing opportunities & had an essay published on Slate.com’s XX Factor blog a few months back). No one sticks me in a “lawyer” box or really any type of box.

         At my company, my title is Production Exec/In-House Counsel. I’m also on IMDB & have my own rant blog that people tell me is funny. A bland, dry, boring legal blog it’s not since I happen to be an anti-lawyer (someone who’s not the legal stereotypes & has no desire to be).
I’d love to get your general take on bar associations & lawyer networking. Personally, I have a love/hate relationship with the whole thing. I’m actually only involved in City Bar because of my singing voice. I also seem to have finally gotten acceptance for being me & some measure of respect in that community. I’ve been licensed almost 5 years in NY & CT but started at my film company as the CEO’s Exec Asst before getting admitted. I’ve also gotten much more respect in the creative community for being a lawyer & in general than I have from most other lawyers so it’s probably no wonder I’ll do more for the creatives than the lawyers.
         If I get a response, I’ll send a link to the blog. Otherwise, money is tight & husband works until 7 now so I probably can’t go on the 23rd. If you wish to know about my events, let me know. In the meantime, feel free to look all this up.

Needless to say I have not stopped wishing ill on this woman since I read the e-mail at 545 this morning.  This is our status update/Twitter/comedy disrespect culture on steroids.  E-mails like this, which come with alarming frequency (to be honest even 1 of these emails would count as alarming to me, but it has been many more), but this is a new low.  Thanks to a culture which increasingly values the  pathetic and intrusive sharing of inner feelings on Facebook, (when previously prayer and therapy kept those things private), we get to be sounding boards for people’s misplaced sharing of thoughts, feelings and accomplishments.  The only thing that makes this insulting is that it is a roundabout way of dismissing our product because we should really be impressed with her.  I hope her husband is cheating on her.

But this is what our culture is doing in general and to comedy, specifically.  Fame is the respected quantity, not comedy or hard work.  Just out of respect for what we are trying to do and the site and content that we have worked tirelessly to produce you would think people, especially people who are educated and work in business might have the social skills to show a modicum of respect.  But we are no longer that society. Everyone is special, everyone is cool and everyone is funny if they think they are.

So forget my comedy, Comedians at Law or anything else I produce – if you want to meet a red-headed, arrogant, ugly fu*kling who cannot stop talking about herself (first off get rid of that erection if you are a man after this description) then I can get you her info.  Or you can just walk down the street, bumping into people busy tweeting, texting and posting status updates whose heads are buried in their phones because after all, you are not as important as them.

There was a time in my career when I aspired to be the next Greg Giraldo or Patrice O’Neal.  Although my health seems to be headed in the right direction to accomplish that goal, the comedy portion of my career does not seem to be on target.  And then it dawned on me that I was thinking about comedy in the wrong way.  Writing material and performing are secondary sources of content for a successful comedy career today.  That is why my new comedy hero is George Takei.  I will now enter the cutting edge of comedy – Internet memes!

One thing I must give credit to is Facebook.  Internet memes did not seem to be anywhere and then Facebook decided to start making photos larger a little over a year ago (I think – time flies when your career is stagnant). It seems that Facebook decided, very perceptively, that adults, like toddlers, enjoy pictures so they should make them bigger. So as adults we all joined in an adult picture book. Almost instantly it seemed people were posting a lot more pictures on Facebook.

But it was time for us to mature to the children’s books of Facebook – MEMES! Now we could look at a picture and slowly build our comedic reading comprehension.  This should come as no surprise.  YouTube has been a great tool for promoting and spreading content, but it also conditioned people’s response time to 1-2 minutes for content.  But like a people who’s technological capacity is increasing in direct contrast to their attention span, we have now moved on to Memes.  Now you need not spend more than 2-3 seconds to get your humor fix!

Of course part of the meme movement were phenomena like “planking” and “Tebowing” which could be grouped in a bigger category of “stupidity.”  But they helped prove what everyone except comedians think: Everyone can be a comedian and a source of “comedy” as long as we continue to get dumber and more impatient.  But I had not realized how pervasive and how quickly even smart people had been conditioned to prefer memes as the delivery device of modern comedy.

I am a member of Comedians at Law – a group of comedians aimed primarily at untapped, intellectually savvy markets – the legal communities, both professional and educational.  There are not many groups of people more steeped in reading comprehension, education or in need of a laugh.  So we have produced humorous writings on a daily basis that receive varying responses ranging from decent to very good.  Now these are usually writings targeted at our demographic and relatively short depending on how lazy members of the group are feeling.  But what has had an inordinate amount of success among legal humor sites?  Memes.  Some are very funny like the following after the “Obamacare” Decision:

 

But many are marginally funny at best and yet still yield a tremendous amount of shares, likes and other forms of social media appreciation. Now of course an argument could be that “Hey, sometimes people want a quick laugh or don’t have the time to read something or watch something more involved.”  But looking at many of these memes, it feels like people would rather place a premium on efficiency than quality.  Why read a five minute funny post when I can look at a relatively unfunny picture for seven seconds?  And if this is the comedy preferences of legal professionals and law students, where is the average American’s mindset?  I assume laughing at their own boogers at this point.

But the key to comedy in the last decade has been to be ahead of the curve. Dane Cook was with MySpace. Louis CK was with self-producing his own show.  So now what is the next level?  I am putting all my money on bodily sounds and facial expressions.  As society’s comedy expectations continue along the awful crossroad of heightened sensitivity and shorter, less sophisticated attention, is it only a matter of time before farts and buck teeth become the next sensation in comedy’s De-Evolution chart?  Speaking of which, please check in to my website every Friday for J-L’s Sneeze of the Week.

I used to feel like a comedian. Now I feel like an Internet marketing company.  When I speak of quitting comedy, people sometimes take that statement as a mere “I am not making the money I need so I must quit” sort of cry.  And it is.  But truthfully, there is so much involved with a comedy career that has nothing to do with comedy, that it feels more like I want to be a comedian in 1998 – that seems like a cool job.  In 2012 it feels more like I am a cyber marketer who happens to have a sense of humor.

Illustrative of my frustrations along this front is a  conflict that we have had recently in Comedians at Law regarding web traffic.  My belief is that we should offer content that is quality and speaks to us 100% and hope that people who follow us are dedicated because of the quality.  But there is a school of thought within the group, which does produce more significant web traffic, that we should be delivering what people want.  However, the problem with this is that when we offer quality content or radio appearances promoting shows, people who have been drawn to us do not respond with any enthusiasm.  I want to attract moths to a comedy flame, but it feels like we are aiming to draw flies to comedy shit.   And not to sound too melodramatic, but sometimes I feel like this is the battle being waged in comedy since the YouTube/Twitter takeover.  Within 5 years I will be selling fecal samples on my website rather than CDs if this continues.  OK, maybe not my feces, but the feces of someone with hilarious feces.  Mine are a little bit wordy.

This for me, by comedian Andy Sandford, is a great way of demonstrating part of the mental atrophy that is occurring with audiences of comedy.  Even I can fully support this meme.  Enjoy and please only share the meme and not the rest of the blog.

For more from J-L please check out the Righteous Prick Podcast on iTunes or on Podomatic

Please Read The Whole Blog And Spread The Word.

Last week was an extremely busy week for me in comedy – a welcome change from the stagnation that has been my 2012.

First I was on Huffington Post Live to discuss my last blog “10 Things In Stand Up Comedy That Should Be Retired.” I was excited when I heard that the panel had Neal Brennan, co-creator of Chappelle’s Show and Ralphie May, Last Comic Standing finalist.  However, my excitement appeared to have been misguided because I thought we would be having a fun discussion about a list that was about 80% serious and 20% tongue-in-cheek.  Although I tried to make light of it, about halfway through I wanted to yell, “THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE AN EXHIBITION!” in the spirit of Rocky IV.   Between Brennan’s condescending tone and May’s defense of everything on the list, I ended up trying to be humorous on a discussion that was being thrown into the extremely serious.  Had I known that it was a fight to the death I would have come ready to do battle, but I did not want to spoil the general tone of the show out of respect to the people of HPL, who were nice enough to ask me on.

If you want to access the blog or the video – check them out at this link:

http://live.huffingtonpost.com/#r/segment/504f9d7c2b8c2a5536000420

Then it was on to the more traditional, yet dwindling part of my comedy career, performing.  I had two shows with Comedians at Law. The first was at Pace Law School last Thursday, which went great. The second was at a conference in Chicago, which went even better, and allowed me to check in to Midway Airport, which, other than my apartment, a local bar near my apartment and the dessert aisle at my local Food Emporium, has been the place I have visited the most in 2012.  These are not the gigs I want to define me by any means, but it was nice money from receptive people before a big swing of clubs in October.

For a quick clip of me at Pace Law, watch here:

But the biggest part of my week came when I recorded my weekly podcast  with friend and fellow comedian Josh Homer.  As someone almost as angry as me, but even more steeped in comedy business and knowledge, Josh came on the podcast to break down my career and offer constructive criticism, mostly as a way to encourage me to keep pursuing stand-up.  Over the tears of my mother I conceded that I would give myself one more year (as opposed to 8 more months) to try and implement his advice, if only to tell him in a year when I have diabetes and occupy a homeless shelter that he was wrong. For a listen to the podcast (and to subscribe on Podomatic – so you can listen on any computer, not just one with your iTunes account) click here:

http://righteouspk.podomatic.com/

One of the things Josh recommended was to make my movie reviews a little more detailed and engaging. So the first one under the new, still low-budget, but a little more effort plan is for TROUBLE WITH THE CURVE – enjoy:

But more importantly than that – I have decided to adopt Josh’s strategy against my will.  In order to build up my movie review, podcast and blog fans I am going to offer the only thing I can – free CDs (not to mention my plans to record one around my birthday in 2013). Here is the deal (and if you are a friend, a fan or just someone that occasionally reads or watches my stuff you can all help me and I will try to help you).

The Righteous Prick Podcast – I am currently at 17 ratings on iTunes and 16 Podomatic followers.  If I can get to 100 ratings (just click the stars (5 please) on the iTunes page http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/righteous-p***k-w-j-l-cauvin/id504139550) and 65 followers on Podomatic (click the “become a follower” link http://righteouspk.podomatic.com/) I will make my second album, DIAMOND MAKER, free for download.

J-L’s Movie Life – I currently have 31 fans on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/jlcauvin?ref=tn_tnmn#!/JLMovieLife) and 13 subscribers on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/user/JLMovieLife?feature=watch). If I can get to 100 fans and 50 subscribers I will make my first album, RACIAL CHAMELEON, free for download.

Fan Page – I have a fan page for my blog. I currently have 150 fans.  because this is consistently the most visited part of my site I want to raise the stakes and say if I can get 500 likes on this page (https://www.facebook.com/jlcauvin?ref=tn_tnmn#!/RighteousPrick) then I will make my third album TOO BIG TO FAIL, free (again) for download.

When I record and release my next album in 2013 I will come up with something creative for that, but in the spirit of trying to adapt from some of my old school, cranky (pure) ways I offer this to you guys:

 If you are one of my several thousand monthly visitors or one of my super duper 30 or so fans who read, watch, listen and share my stuff consistently I am asking you to help spread the word.  All I can really offer is free stuff that cost me money and a handshake/hug/round of tap waters/the occasional comp of admission when I am in your city. But if any or all of that is stuff you want me to keep creating and sharing then please spread the word about this stuff and get me a bigger audience.

I know the big piece of advice from everyone in this social media strategy business (including Josh on the podcast) is to get e-mails.  You can sign up for my newsletter at my site, but I don’t want to use it as a carrot. E-mail is a sacred place for amazon.com receipts and penis enlargement pill ads and I would prefer you to only welcome me to that world by your own free will.  So I will keep offering free comedy content in all its forms if you can help grow my support. Thanks.

In my monthly or so examination of comedy I have decided after hearing certain things too much that it might make sense to retire them (and to the haters that will read this and comment that “I should retire,” or that “”I cannot retire from a career that is going so poorly,” allow me to say – thanks for reading my blog).  In full disclosure, I did many of the things listed early in my career so this is less judgmental and more aspirational, that we might forge ahead with a better, less hacky, less annoying comedy future (sorry I got swept up in the Democratic National Convention rhetoric last night). So, without anymore preamble here is the list of ten things I would like to see retired from comedy by 2013 (wishful thinking):

1. Tyrone.  In the last forty years black people have gone from Negroes to Afro-Americans to African-Americans to socialists (if you are a Tea Party member looking to vent your racist rage in a socially and politically acceptable way), but the standard name for a non-black comedian to reveal a black person punchline remains Tyrone.  It is time to evolve beyond this.  Perhaps Terrel or Daequon could seize the mantle for 2012 (or at least for 2002).  Or when in doubt just add a D’ in front of a name and hope for the best.  But let’s retire Tyrone, or at least petition the NAACP to have a funeral for it.

2. The White Guy Voice.  The white guy voice is a time honored device of degradation for minority comics to demean white guys. It has been done for a long time with varying levels of success (and for me, my favorite spin on it is Dave Chappelle’s, which sounds less corny and more super serious), but it is time to go. I made this decision while watching George Lopez’ Rosetta Stone Spanish lesson, posing as a comedy special on HBO.  His special consisted of four things in equal parts: Spanish phrases, telling the difference between Latino families and white families, staring bug-eyed while rubbing the lapel of his suit jacket and doing a white voice circa 1977 comedy.  Enough is enough – it is time for a new spin on this one. Retire the old one.

 

3. “Where my ____ at?”  I have heard this line for cheap crowd applause so much that “Give it up for the troops” thinks it is hack.  This is the way to usually shoehorn crowd work in to supplement a joke that is not strong enough or organically arising on its own.  Work on your bit and tell the crowd what is happening – stop asking them and if you have to ask them a question, at least phrase it differently than every hack emcee across the country trying to sound like they have an ounce of hip hop credibility (hip hop no longer has credibility – see Ice Cube’s Coors commercials and 50 Cent’s $500 million Vitamin Water deal).

4. Weed jokes.  A close relative of #3 and in my humble opinion, the best reason to legalize marijuana. Sure, drug violence at the Mexican border might be reduced and it makes little sense to criminalize marijuana at this point, but all I care about is destroying weed based stand up comedy.  I remember when I started comedy it felt like any joke about marijuana got huge laughs (I don’t smoke so I don’t make the jokes).  But I feel like there may be a little more exhaustion from these jokes because “Where my weed smokers at?” (a double violation/double retiree) don’t seem to rile up crowds as much anymore.  The point is smoking marijuana is common place, barely criminalized anymore and has been beaten to death by comedians. Let’s move on to heroin material.

5. “Too soon?”  I know this one will be tough for a lot of people to let go so I will make a deal. “Too soon” still gets some laughs when properly applied (Gary Gulman’s bit about a gunpowder Abe Lincoln scratch n sniff sticker comes to mind), but I would estimate, based on absolutely no scientific data other than my gut instinct, that 90% of jokes that end with a”too soon?” tag are actually written with the too soon in mind.  So instead of relying on the strength of the joke, the so-so joke is in place to facilitate a “too soon.”  Too late “too soon!” This is your pink slip.

6. “Interweb(s)” I believe I first heard this in an early George W. Bush parody, but I could be wrong.  But not much has gone from new to hack quicker.  It was funny once upon a time. We no longer live in that world, so let’s stop saying it.

7. Male vs. Female Funny Debate.  I have engaged this topic with nuanced vigor to no avail.  So I am here to say that I will finally admit that men and women are equally funny and equally capable of being funny. In exchange for this admission on my part I would just like all the people who have always supported this idea to admit that there is not a shred of tangible evidence proving the veracity of this statement.  Great! So I guess we can stick a fork in this one.

8. Instruments, Puppets & Beards – The Unholy Trinity of Props.  If you play an instrument or play with puppets as the centerpiece or sole focus of your stand-up comedy then you are not a stand up comedian and should perform at middle schools and theaters, but not at stand up comedy clubs.  And thanks to Zach Galifianakis, the beard has become a new prop in stand up comedy.  I do not know if lumberjacking (working title for a porn) is still a thriving profession in America or if The Lorax’ hard work paid off, but stand up comedy has shot way past it in terms of becoming the most facial hairy profession.  Now a beard, unlike instruments and puppets does not disqualify a comedian.  However, in a profession that is a safe haven (or used to be) for free speech, the proliferation of facial hair is telling.  Beards and mustaches are often considered hallmarks of someone with something to hide.  But if comedy is supposed to be raw honesty, then all these bearded folks must have something to hide, possibly something besides a lack of punchlines.  Get the Gillette and get to writing!

 

9. The “clubs and colleges” intro.  Even when true this intro no longer sounds honest, especially when the emcee has just done it for 7 consecutive anonymous comedians.  Instead use one of two options – 1) get a credit or 2) be proud of your anonymity – When I did open mics at a taco restaurant named Maui Taco I had myself introduced a few times as “You may have seen this guy performing in the basement of a taco restaurant.”  And then when I had performed at clubs and a college I was angry at being introduced as “clubs and colleges.”  I had earned that one college and it was being diluted by a false quantity of between one and infinity number of colleges.  Next time up I was introduced as “clubs and a college.”  These are just some of your options, but let’s ditch the “clubs and colleges” for good.

10. Stand Up Comedy Classes.  I understand that times are tough and that some veteran comedians can offer some good advice on crafting material and (more importantly in my opinion) ways to guide a fledgling career.  But funny cannot really be taught. It is a cliche, but  worth repeating.  So if you are a young comedian and you are looking for guidance on approaching a career or work-shopping material, perhaps you can find value in a class.  But for every legit one there are scores of frauds so I would throw the legit baby out with the illegitimate bath water of stand up comedy classes.

OK – there it is. I look forward to many of these things being inducted into the Comedy Hall of Shame in five years when they become eligible after retirement.

Be sure to become a fan of Righteous Prick: The Official Blog and Podcast of J-L Cauvin on Facebook for weekly podcasts and writings on comedy and culture – mostly in complaint or debate form.

Last Sunday night I watched a great episode of Breaking Bad, the best show on television by a mile and a show that is only looking up at Six Feet Under in my all-time drama rankings.  But thanks to Twitter, Facebook, E-mail and Adult Friend Finder my television viewing has become a high wire act to avoid both spoilers and requests for immediate analysis at 11:05 pm every Sunday.  This Sunday’s episode was particularly bad because a fairly major event occurred, but because I was 11 minutes behind on my DVR I was treated to an alert on Twitter that spoiled the ending (Yes, I know the solution is to avoid Twitter, but I was not checking it.  It was when I went to look at something else on my computer that the message was up on my screen. The person deleted the tweet which was a good idea because I went looking for the tweet so I could publicly shame them).   So, in keeping with this blog’s love of Breaking Bad, as well as its beloved condescending and angry tone, here are my tips/requests of people who ruin Breaking Bad:

1) You must wait at least 48 hours before revealing significant plot points.  Sunday night has become television’s most packed night. Perhaps you are still cleaning off your vibrator of bad taste and loneliness from an episode of True Blood or enjoying Aaron Sorkin’s Newsroom, the only thing liberals refuse to abort, despite the fact that it endangers the health of the viewer, but Breaking Bad belongs on the level with The Sopranos, Six Feet Under and The Wire (no, Mad Men you may not join this party you pretentious B+ of a show posing as an A+) as Sunday’s greatest achievements (Church and NFL are already in the Sunday Hall of Fame).  But folks, the DVR has been invented!  So people are not watching all their shows from 10:01-11:04, but may start it at 10:15, 10:30 or even the next day!  Granted, if you are a true Breaking Bad fan only military service or the birth of a male child should prevent you from watching it the night it airs, but unless you start at 10:11 pm with flawless fast forwarding skills you will be seconds or even minutes behind the real time viewing.  If you feel compelled to comment on the show (instead of staring blankly at the screen for hours, the way I did after the final two episodes of Season 3 of Breaking Bad) here are examples of acceptable and unacceptable social media posts:

• ACCEPTABLE – “Tough/Sad/Great Breaking Bad tonight””
• UNACCEPTABLE – “RIP ——–(enter name of character)”

Now I believe RIP messages on Twitter and Facebook are usually inappropriate, but reasonable people can differ on that (you are still wrong if you disagree with me). However, RIP messages for fictional characters that ruin plot points for others can not be acceptable in a civilized society.  And this says nothing for people in later time zones who are also victims of these Breaking Bad social media terrorists.  Admittedly I have done this on shows like American Idol, but I have no respect for fellow viewers of American Idol.  Breaking Bad viewers deserve more respect.

And as a follow up to this – if someone is good enough to post an acceptable message, you should not then retweet or comment with information that spoils what the original poster was not revealing.  You are a bad person if you do this because you are both spoiling the show and hijacking someone else’s status update for your own evil agenda.

So I think 48 hours is a good amount of time before openly revealing plot points. Please abide by this out of respect for people who watch television’s best show.  Or you shall be dealt with like Gus Fring dealt with the cartel in season 4:

2) Please Do Not Ask Me For Instant Analysis.  As part of the social media culture we are in a race to declare, opine or explore everything instantaneously.  I am usually bombarded with emails within 30 minutes of the conclusion of a good episode.  I am still wiping the lotion off of my nether regions thirty minutes after a good episode of Breaking Bad, so what makes you think I want to immediately get on my computer, AKA porn machine, if I am already spent?  Besides, Breaking Bad episodes, the truly powerful ones (which is all of them, including The Fly episode – shut up haters!), are meant to linger in your mind and soul and make you question all that is good and bad in the world (or am I taking it too seriously?), so let those thoughts and feelings marinate.  That is why it is called water cooler conversation – because you should wait until mid-morning on Monday to discuss it. In other words, if enticed to ask questions either go to sleep or follow Walter White’s advice:

3) Do Not Live Tweet Episodes of Breaking Bad.  I know AMC has all sorts of “two screen experience,” promotions but dammit,  just watch the show.  This is simply a respect issue.  Like people who play fantasy football and then ruin your experience because they are rooting in your face for a back up running back against your team, simply because their Dungeons and Dragons league is at stake, live tweeters are ruining the show for themselves and you.  Like taking your hat off indoors or holding a door for a woman who is not starting at her iPhone, this should be a time-honored part of proper, mannerly behavior.  I think computers should be rigged to react like Tio Salamanca’s wheelchair here for anyone who live tweets Breaking Bad:

That is it people – really easy steps to making the final 9 episodes of Breaking Bad more enjoyable for everyone.  And sorry if this post spoiled season 3 or 4 for you, but what the fu*k have you been waiting for?  If you read this blog and have not watched Breaking Bad until now and are not at least caught up through Season 4 then it is your own fault. Bitch.

Like many comedians I have YouTube channels (2), a weekly podcast (soon to be 2), two television credits (1 ancient, 1 sort of irrelevant), a slick website, Twitter accounts (3), a decently read blog (according to Google analytics it is by far the most popular thing I do), albums (3), and a gimmick I have been working hard to put together with some other like minded individuals known as Comedians at Law (think Blue Collar Comedy Tour with law degrees, debt and a half-black guy).  I have had some blogs posted on the Huffington Post, which occasionally gets me well-read and roundly criticized by a variety of vegan losers – like YouTube commenters without the courage to use slurs.

So of course the question sort of asks itself – a question I have been pondering for the last year – short of a time machine to make me younger and less formed as a thinker and comedian, what is the next step for me as a comedian?

So the things I have been told is I need to start auditioning for stuff (which of course has nothing to do with making me a better comedian, just a more employable one).  I did take an acting class for a year.  But short of a remake of the Green Mile called The Beige Green Mile (and only if The Rock turns down the part) I feel like I would have a career of “Bouncer 6”, “Bodyguard 3” and “Guy on Hoops bench” (real life training for that).  Of course every thirty years or so one abnormally tall comedic actor is given a golden opportunity – Fred Gwynn begot Brad Garrett, so maybe in 2029 I will be cast in some sitcom or lose it to Gary Gulman.

But acting feels so exhausting an endeavor to start when I have had my guts kicked in (with increasing frequency given the trajectory of stand up comedy, which sort of resembes that of climate change) by stand up comedy.  “Hey, comedy was so fun that I would like to start an equally challenging form of entetainment from the bottom floor!”

And there is an interesting Catch 22 – I actually have fans.  Doing stand up since mid 2003 and travelling the road with fair frequency since 2008 has helped me compile a small, but extremely loyal following.  Now there are probably only 25-30 of them (if I discount friends around the country that have routinely brought people out and given me couches to sleep on).  This is not even enough to field a football team, let alone build a fan base that will get me noticed.  The easy thing, that I have seen other comedians do with some success, is to do the same set – a greatest hits fixed in stone – until someone takes notice or you just become some iritating road hack that younger opening comics resent and mock behind your back. But how can I reasonably expect fans to keep coming back to the same clubs to see me do the same shtick?  For headliners they have already arrived to a certain extent, but for a feature it becomes a tricky balance of establishing yourself with your A+ material, while trying to keep the fans that may help propel you to headliner status, with fresh material that may be A- or B+ material on its way to an A.

So that is the dilemma – in an era where the comedy consumer is king and all the social media gurus tell you to engage your fans, where is the sweet spot where you can keep your loyal fans engaged, while also showcasing your best stuff for newcomers?  Obviously the answer is to keep writing great material, but unless you are Chris Rock writing Bring The Pain, not every bit will be an A+.

In a year (2012) when I was not securing the rate of bookings as I did in the last three years I decided to release my CD for a month for free.  People could download it for free with the hopes they would give it a positive rating (or any rating) on iTunes.  It was downloaded 900 times and I got 65 reviews (Hey 835 people, what gives?).  I also gained a few radio spots and a handful of engaged fans.  But if a six month project that was of really good quality (fu*k false humility), in both content and production value, can only yield 5 engaged fans, what else is there?  I could not get it reviewed by any mainstream comedy sites, presumably because I am not on “Comedy Central’s Comics Whose Taints You Should Lick” list, so like Blanche DuBois I have to rely on the kindness of strangers.  Plus, the increasingly difficult path to getting consistent feature work increases the likelihood of losing those fans.

I guess the real answer for the many comedians who are not young enough to be “fresh” and malleable to whatever their managers see for them is that there are only a few options for a stand up path. Become famous for anything and you will be qualified to headline.  Do it as a hobby, which contrary to my wishes, desires and efforts appears to be what I am currently doing. And the last option is quit.  Is there any other art form that places this pressure on a performer?  If you can sing or play an instrument, all you have to be is good enough at that to make it.  Sure you may have to look a certain way for certain genres, but no one is requiring them to succeed in some other art or want to pursue another art in order to be allowed to work at their art of choice.  No one asked Daniel Day Lewis if he could also do def poetry and no one asked Adele if she saw herself more as a television or film actress.

So all I can say is if you are a fan of what I do, convince one other person to check out something I do (stand up being preferred, but hell the movie reviews or the podcast are ok too).  Then I will tell them the same thing in a year when I am sneaking in a blog post during my lunch hour at whatever job I am working.  Your compliments and support and money spent on shows are all greatly appreciated.  But until my 30 fans can be rewarded by seeing their discovery become a star (or at least big enough to only get hotels and never a semen stained comedy condo)… Comedy as hobby, here I come!

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a blog called “The Death of Stand Up Comedy” (https://jlcauvin.com/?p=4382).  Well apparently I was wrong because comedy woke up and beat the sh*t out of me in the last 6 days.  So maybe comedy is a zombie – sort of dead, but still able to inflict pain and humiliation.

Last Friday night I worked a room in Connecticut.  It was in the back of a restaurant opening for a ventriloquist.  And that was the highlight.  Upon arriving back in  New York City around 1:30 am I went to a bar near Grand Central Station to have a beer.  About halfway through my beer I felt a rub against my leg.  It was a seductive touch that immediately piqued my interest and seemed exactly like what the doctor ordered after closing my window of hope by opening for a ventriloquist.  Here’s a picture:

That is right – a dog was getting awfully frisky with me at the bar.  Perhaps it was my animal magnetism, or the peanut butter I use to wash my genitals or he just confused me for a tree to urinate on. Any of these would have been palatable alternatives to the truth.  The truth was that the dog’s 80 year old owner was about to begin courting the young, depressed buck known as Righteous Prick.  That is right, the gay dog slut was only playing wingman to Cruella DeVille.   She just sat next to me and kept asking me questions, including where I lived.  Naturally, when she went outside to let her dog urinate (at least the urine it had not already left on the bar room floor – what a sloppy drunk) I asked the bartender what her deal was.

Bartender: She is rich.

JL: Really?

Bartender: Big time.

JL: Do you have any date rape drugs?

Bartender: For her?

JL: No, for me.

Fortunately, my better angels won out and I went home alone, but I hope my moderate kindness got me into her will. Though asking people at the bar if they saw her also, to make sure I was not seeing dead people, could have been interpreted as insulting.

Then after the weekend I headed to New Orleans to perform for the Conference of State Bank Supervisors.  The show was exactly as exciting as it sounded.  It was myself and two other members of Comedians at Law performing down there and we made a pact after the gig that our next gig should be for 9/11 widows because we need a more feel good show to participate in to pick up our spirits.  I already wrote the gig up for the Comedians at Law site so enjoy it here – http://comediansatlaw.com/2012/08/01/well-alright-comedians-at-law-go-to-the-big-easy-the-hard-way/

If any comedians want the short story and a tip to walk away with from the New Orleans gig it is that when the organizer of an event greets the three comedians after the show with, “Well… alright,” then something has gone horribly wrong.

Race seems to be the issue that can never go away.  I have a few jokes in my act about how we will know when racism has been eradicated (when the interracial porn genre no longer exists).  President Obama’s election was hailed as some sort of landmark event and yet the two most successful tactics against him are 1) painting him as some sort of exotic outsider without American values 2) or yelling that he is a socialist, with fervor usually only reserved for outright slurs, not proxies for them.  With the election of Barack Obama and the aftermath of that election it has cause me to more deeply examine my own racial experience.  I still can remember Glenn Beck saying President Obama had a “deep seated hatred for white people,”and was “racist.”  That of course struck me as strange (and offensive) because Obama’s mother was white.  The grandparents that helped raise him were white.  But we live in an interesting time racially – we are busy congratulating our society for electing a mixed race president as some sort of baptism to wash away the sins of racism, while simultaneously trying to use that event as a shield from legitimate criticism of a society where discrimination is still rampant. It is still present,  just in more subtle ways.  As the late, great comedian Patrice O’Neal said, the reason there is still anger is because white people have that racism that can’t be proven.

I need to say that this is not meant as some anti-white screed by any means, but my experience between black people and white people who do not know I am half black has been very different. Although there are exceptions in each group, black people tend to be immediately welcoming, whereas white people become immediately skeptical.

Like President Obama I am the son of a black immigrant father and a Caucasian American mother.  I also have a law degree from a prestigious law school.  Needless to say the similarities abruptly end there.  Not only is his major accomplishment of POTUS slightly more impressive than my one performance on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, but he is “black” and I appear “white.”  I have jokes about my race changing from season to season depending on tan and hair length, but my range goes from Italian to Algerian at best.  For most people I am judged as white by their first impression.  Fortunately and unfortunately that has exposed me to a lot of things I sometimes wish I had not been.  Because for every indignity that people of obvious color may still suffer, I get to experience the indignity of being present for all the things people of color do not hear because of the self censorship that occurs nowadays.

The closest parallels that I have come up with are Jewish people and gay people.  These are the groups that, if not bearing obvious hallmarks of their identity, can be privy to the uncensored opinions that they otherwise would not have been if they had sent out signals.  I spent my life in private schools and despite real efforts at diversity at all levels they were still overwhelmingly white places.  So most of my circles of friends have been heavily white.  And they all know my Dad and know that I am half black.  But it is when I meet people I do not know or when I meet friends of friends who nothing more about me than my height that things can often get uncomfortable.  Here are some greatest hits:

• In a bar a few weeks ago (which sort of got me thinking of writing this), a white friend of a friend was chatting with me and told me that some guy’s car was really tricked out, or as he put it “niggerfied.”
• Same night a stranger approached me in a bar and asked if I played basketball. I said just in small level college a while back. His reply was “Well, what do you expect, you’re white.”‘
• In Ohio, the emcee was called up by the headliner to participate in a dance routine for his closer.  I commented to a woman, “Man, he’s really getting into it with his dance moves.” Her response was “Well, he’s black.”
• At a Pittsburgh Steelers game, – just read my write up – https://jlcauvin.com/?p=1212
• A little while back at a bar with a good friend of mine and several female friends of his that did not know me, the song I Will Survive came on. I rolled my eyes because I don’t like the song.  One woman said, “I hate this song. Maybe I would like it if I was a black chick.”
• In college after I had had a slam dunk on guy after my last game, a teammate’s uncle congratulated me with a “Great throw down! You dunked it like a black guy!”
• On Spring Break many years ago I was hanging out with a young woman from Texas most of the night.  I was very drunk, but then a very sobering moment came up and I don’t know what brought it about, but I cannot forget what she said:  “I’m not racist; I just don’t like black people.”
• As a kid, the first memory I have of feeling awkward and conflicted racially was a good friend of mine when we were 10 or 11 years old would always cross the street when young black men were approaching us (even at 4 in the afternoon on a crowded Manhattan cross street).  And this is someone who knew my father, which always made me wonder – is he that oblivious to how that would make me feel, or does he not count me among their numbers?

These are just some of the more salient examples of my life of the last few decades.  Whenever I do tell people that I am half black there is a shock as if I either harbored a secret or pulled of a magic trick. Of course when I say that I am half Irish there is a “Huh, I did not see that,”response, but when I say “half-Haitian” the response is usually more like “Get the fu*k out of here!!!”  And then there is a verification check of “Are you serious?” I have grown accustomed to that.  The one that bothers me is the subsequent question a minute later, “Seriously, your Dad is black?” because then I have no real choice but to be insulted and annoyed.  To me, the nervous incredulity rings off a bell to me that says “modern day racist,” (even if only a product of my own insecurity from past dealings that were more blatant) the same way I cringe a little at excessive usage of the word “ghetto” to mean anything besides an actual slum.  This was what Patrice meant by “hard to prove.”  Granted I have some very blatant examples I have been privy to, and believe me these are not the only ones.  But if I were to get in the face of someone asking me four times if my Dad was black, he could say, “Why are you so mad?  You have to admit you don’t look black.” Then why not the same shock at half Irish?  You don’t think I look Irish, either!  My theory, based solely on personal experience is that black has a certain cache to it, at least in terms of of our pop culture.  It also comes with pitfalls as well; pitfalls I am not enduring (as if I am not paying the tax for the advantages of being part black?).  But most importantly, most black men come with a warning sign – their skin and features.  That skin and those features may lead to forms of discrimination today as obvious as stop and frisk programs or the never-going-away, DWB (Driving While Black), but it also allows so-called good and enlightened non-racists to censor themselves.  How many of those things above do you think would have occurred had I looked obviously black?  None.  And then to put the onus on me as if I am hiding in plain sight with some sort of deceitful purpose is all I need to understand the insecurities that are present in the questioner.

Now, having grown up with one half of my family a blue collar Irish family, I have heard slurs and derogatory comments in and around my house.  And just like the comment of my teammate’s uncle, the comments annoy me.  I do not generally subscribe to the “set in your ways” philosophy about old racists. If there were people around that knew better then you should have known better.  But in older generations and even today I have become pretty good at detecting malicious racism and benign comments worded awkwardly. Unlike most of my white teammates who found the comment embarrassing, I shrugged it off because it felt more like a poorly worded compliment from someone who thought those words weren’t hurtful.  I did not interpret anything he said as ill will behind them towards black people.  I am not saying I enjoyed it, but it did not really bother me.  What bothers me is that most of the experiences I listed above have taken place in liberal places with young white people.  A generation supposedly so much more enlightened, believing that race is completely irrelevant.  Perhaps that is true of teens and young twenties, but it does not feel nearly as rosy in my age demographic (33 years old).

A little while back I defended the show Girls, for its monochromatic presentation of NYC because it felt authentic – white women do a lot of self segregating in this city.  I felt like that was enough to validate it for me.  The only thing missing for me was not the presence of minorities in their inner circle.  Rather, what was missing is them discussing race at all.  I have been in too many bars in conversations and overhearing conversations when today’s modern liberal, enlightened white people are sharing their real thoughts and quips about race (even Carrie Bradshaw dropped a “ghetto gold” reference on Sex and the City).  Of course this is not to say things like this do not go on in other groups, but this is my experience.  Undoubtedly someone will comment or share their own experience of being called a “white bitch” or being jumped by a group of black guys, but that would miss my point.  My point is that the “new racism” as Patrice O’Neal put it is real, or it i snot that new.  Unlike Patrice, I am in more of a position to verify its existence.  This is not some “white people are bad” diatribe (calm down Glenn Beck).  This is merely a response to people (including people I am a fan of like Adam Carolla) who proclaim highly paid black entertainers and a president of color means that our society is so different than it was before 2008 or 1998 or earlier (yes there is a point in our history where we are obviously radically different and better than, but a coach once said to me that the difference between bad and good is easier to bridge than good to great.  I believe we are in the good-to-great struggle now and there is a lot of push back).

I have never identified myself as black or white, except once – law school applications.  My college allowed me to check “all that apply” so I proudly applied as white and black.  However, most law schools wanted only one box checked.  And I checked black. And I felt like a fraud. Not because I did not qualify to check it, but because I do not identify myself as black. I identify myself as mixed race, white and black.  Perhaps this is the convenience of not looking black that I can craft my own racial identity in a country so obsessed with it.  The same way Barack Obama probably never had a choice to not identify as black.  Instead of hailing him as a multi-racial president, which in many ways is even more impressive to the country’s legacy as a melting pot, he has become our first black president.  I completely understand why.  There are times I wish I looked blacker, simply to avoid the annoyance and shame that comes with being privy to racist or racist-leaning comments every couple of months.  It reminds me of The Matrix where one character prefers to stay in the matrix, rather than face the harshness of reality.  If I looked blacker I would face other, more well-documented problems, but would benefit from the self-censorship that many people employ when dealing with “ethnics.”

I suppose the reason for me writing this is not to say I wish I was someone different or looked different.  But it is to say that for all the progress that society has made, do not fool yourself into believing all is well.  I am constantly presented with opportunities where an angry response may  be warranted (or at least I would look crazy if I did), but rather incidents that are  just enough to make me feel shame for not saying something.  In other words if a friend of a friend starts saying provocative things I can ruin everyone’s night by announcing that I am half black and I find the person backwards and wrong or I can do what I normally do which is make a mental note, let it slide and let everyone go on feeling good about themselves.  Which is sort of what we have all been doing.

I have not been blogging with nearly the same regularity as I have in the past.  There are several reasons for this (fewer funny road stories, over-saturation in the marketplace with blogs about everything, lack of motivation, etc.).  Now I have recommitted to writing a little more frequently, but one of the things I probably won’t be writing about nearly as much is the thing that has gotten me the most readers: the stand up comedy business.  It is because I believe that stand up comedy, as we knew it or like to think of it, is dying.  There is such an overwhelming perfect storm of factors that are contributing to destroying the prominence and art of stand up comedy that I no longer view it as a viable career option for myself, nor a community or industry for which I have much remaining passion.  Naturally I still get great pleasure from writing, working out material and then seeing it work in front of “regular people,” but that feeling is the lone positive swimming against a tsunami of negatives.  So let’s go through all the reasons why stand up is on life support:

1. Crushing The Middle Class of Comedy.  As I have written before (please read this one as well – https://jlcauvin.com/?p=2304), just as the middle class of America is being left behind in an increasingly unequal society, feature work – the best way to become a competent and skilled comedian, is no longer a viable way of making a living.  For those of you that do not understand the industry lingo – the feature act is the comedian that goes between the emcee and the person you are there to see.  They receive about a half hour to get the audience drunk and really ready for a long set of comedy.  The fact is that feature work used to be a way to make a modest living if you were good enough (features in the 1980s were being paid as much or more in actual dollars, not adjusted, than features in 2012).  I had an old school booker tell me a couple of years ago that it would take ten years to become an excellent feature.  His timetable feels about right.  Of course for most people in the YouTube/Twitter/Tumblr world this is far too long a time table.  So now, more than ever it is difficult to make your focus and goal to be a great comedian, unless you are doing things other than comedy.  Then, if you are doing enough you will leapfrog the process and become a headliner, but not necessarily because your stand up chops are undeniable or even ready.  So instead of nurturing good comedians, good comedians must develop in spite of the lack of incentives and opportunities.

2. Everyone Wants To Be Heard.  The last year of stand up “scandals” have proven how self-absorbed the comedy community has become with its own news.   The competition to be the first to weigh in on any little blip on the comedy scene is pretty fierce.   Every comedian with six month’s or more of experience  has begun to weigh in on every issue that arises.  I have certainly done my share, but usually in the context of not liking the general trajectory of the comedy business, not for just a gut reaction response to an isolated incident.  Every one of these incidents gets play in the national media as the chatter builds up (the New York Times covered the Daniel Tosh incident close to a week after it had achieved viral status).  For me the Tosh incident should have been a non-issue.  Instead we collectively raised it to the level of a national conversation.  The short summary of this is that comedy is becoming a bunch of people cyber shouting and offering their input (regardless of writing talent or experience in comedy) and not spending time trying to be funny.  Not the best way for talent to develop, but of course the name of the game is to get noticed and worry about being funny later.  As an example – watch the inevitable next time some man makes a comment about gender and humor.  The uproar will be fast and furious from many people you have never heard of, while those who have made it or are on their way will be too busy writing new material and working to weigh in.

3. The Anti-Bullying Culture Joins Forces With Political Correctness.  Our society has become semi-obsessed with eradicating bullying.  I suppose in a post 9/11 world we need to get terror, wherever it lies, including 5th grade classrooms.  I would not want my kids to be bullied, but if a few taunts got my 12 year old to jump off a bridge I would also have to examine my own parenting and whether I had missed signs of severe depression, not just if kids teased him.  Perhaps if we gave 8 year olds fewer participation trophies and stopped making sure every kid at a birthday party, not just the birthday boy or girl, got a present, then maybe kids wouldn’t be so frail by the time they hit 15.  I am not saying there are not cases of individual torment that go into the Stephen King level of bullying, but why have we reached this alleged epidemic/crisis of bullying today?

Along those lines, comedy, once the bastion of free speech like no other art form, is now under attack.  Daniel Tosh makes a rape joke.  Tracy Morgan makes a homophobic joke in reference to his son.  Dane Cook talks about fu*king a woman with a chain saw.  I did not even bother to look at what George Lopez said on his special because I no longer cared what the protesters had to say.  I am a big believer that discrimination is still rampant in this country. As a half-black man who looks Egyptian or Italian, depending on the season, I hear far too many comments that make me sad and frustrated (because the Italian looking dude is probably down with racist stuff too, right?).  But have things gotten so good in America that now stand up comedy has to be sanitized?  People have lost sight of what kind of art form comedy was and now think they can place their agenda on it because they were offended.  It is an art form built, in part, on pushing boundaries and language.  More so, I was particularly disappointed with comedian/actor TJ Miller’s response to Dane Cook’s joke because it meant that not only were ignorant comedy fans treating stand up comedy like school plays, but comics themselves were adding their inside-the-business opinions, thus giving credence to the idea that comedy and speech on stage should be curtailed, or at least making a big show of their disapproval when it did not meet their ethical standards.  In no way does this mean that I approve or like any of the material in question.  But I do believe that outside of incidents like Michael Richards’ Kramer’s infamous N-bomb parade, which was not comedy in any way, anything said on stage is fair game.

So I will ignore these stories from now on.  They simply reflect a society that is growing out of touch with comedy (and thanks to social media – every perceived transgression can now have the effect of an atom bomb on-line) and a growing cadre of comedians who want aggression they disagree with taken out of comedy (e.g. there will be no uproar from the comedy community about jokes insulting faith and religion, but God forbid a joke on gender or race gets too edgy).

4. Not Everything is Stand Up Comedy, Nor Should It Be.  Bill Burr stirred another “comedy controversy” with his comments about alternative comedy earlier this year.  Here is what I think alternative comedy has done. On the plus side it has allowed everyone with any voice to be considered comedy. Some are very funny.  Most are not.  If I had my druthers I would take everyone with an instrument or a puppet operating as comedians and ban them from anything where stand up is performed (of course this is an aside, as no one considers these performers “alt.”).  But stand up has become very inclusive.  Too inclusive if you ask me, which you didn’t.  I would compare alternative comedy to Amazon’s publishing business.  They are making it easier for authors to self-publish, cut out the middle man and reach audiences they otherwise wouldn’t have.  However, the vetting process and the machinery of publishing still give a book a certain seal of approval, as if an official vetting has occurred and it is worth considering.  Now, as I already said, the clubs and the club system have failed as well, but that does not mean that every non sequitur spewing, act out champion needs to be considered the torch bearer for Pryor, Rock, Carlin, Giraldo just because there is a niche following for it in dank basements.  One of the things that made stand up comedy hard, even before the current difficulties, is that it was hard to do.  But it now feels like there is a moral relativism in comedy where nothing can be judged, everything can be funny and just as valid a form of stand up.  So what if you cannot write jokes as well or deliver as compelling a performance – just do something weird with a weird look or fashion sense and there is a place for you!   There have always been character based comedians or off-beat comedians, but with one Late Night Show basically dedicated to alternative comedy and a powerful presence on both coasts, they now have a platform bigger than their quantity of quality can bear.  Sure, you can say that people “don’t get it,” but maybe some of the comedians performing this stuff don’t get it either.

5. Comedy Central.  Imagine if there was a channel called Broadway Live.  And on it you could watch every play on Broadway on basic cable.  More people would get exposed to the theater and this would be great until the theater began to lose its cache.  Then it would be a disaster.  There would be a demand for content that Broadway Live would have to churn out which would dilute the quality of content as well as people’s perception of theater as something t partake in live as a cultural experience.  Watching Comedy Central these days feels the same way.  They had to change the name of “Comedy Central Presents” to “The Half Hour” a not-so subtle suggestion that the signature stand up show on the network had lost its cache and power.  Just as The Tonight Show is no longer a kingmaker for a comedian (the loss of Johnny Carson and the advent of Comedy Central probably played a role in that), Comedy Central Presents does not seem to have the power it once did.  Unlike the first several seasons where every comedian performing on them was either a phenom or a veteran with chops, now it feels very hit and miss.  The benefits of Comedy Central to comedians cannot be understated, but the pendulum feels like it may have swung into over-saturation and under-delivering in quality.  It is the same reason why CNN has to show Lindsay Lohan stories – because they have too much time and not enough news for the time.  This may sound like I have an ax to grind, but I don’t. This perspective was really informed by all the older comics I worked with on the road who noticed a real difference pre and post-Comedy Central.  Once again, as I stated in item #1, Comedy Central is a great platform for the rich to get richer, but the business for many comedians has also probably been hurt long term by Comedy Central’s existence.

6. Social Media.  I am including YouTube, Twitter and Facebook in this.  Now do not get confused. Social media is a great way for people to see your material and learn about you, if you are both lucky and savvy with the tools it provides.  But it has also cheapened comedy to be some sort of instantaneous short attention span exercise on par with a page a day calendar (remember those things?).  Now every comedian has to have some kind of Internet presence and there is both an embarrassment of riches and a rich number of embarrassments on social media pushing comedy content.  The market is so flooded that at the end of a work day people have probably gotten their fill of comedy.  And then people not only devalue the work of stand up comedians, but because of their proximity to them on social media can see themselves on the same level as some comedians.  When comedians lose both their cache and their perception of humor superiority over regular folk, it is not a good recipe for stand up.

7. Youth Over Talent.  In breaking news a sperm was picked for the Just For Laughs Festival because they wanted someone young and fresh with 5 minutes of material.  I remember being told early in the last decade, along with other friends who have achieved small amounts of success, that the key to making it in comedy was to write, perform, gain experience, find your voice and have something to say to people.  Now that some of my friends and I have wrapped up a decade in comedy and have developed voices and material, the comedy business has made a marked shift to youth being the paramount factor.  It seems comedians are being vetted like old Hollywood starlets – give me a face I can market (slightly different criteria for comedians than starlets), hopefully they have a little bit of something to work with and then we will get them on television, then they can headline clubs and hopefully along the way they develop an act.  And maybe this is a good business model (and of course I am not saying that there are not very talented young comics out there), but when the top criterion on many comedy booker/manager/festival producers list is “young,” can that really be in the best long term interests of stand up comedy?  Perhaps we have already reached the point of no return where stand up is now closer to def poetry slamming,

8. Celebrity Culture.  Comedy, like a lot of our culture, is now, more than ever, driven by fame. Here is a piece I wrote last year about Charlie Sheen’s comedy tour and I think it holds up today (https://jlcauvin.com/?p=2254).  I have placed a lot of blame on the inner workings and failures of people within comedy, but we are now living in a Real Housewives/Kardashian world of entertainment.  Celebrity is enough to warrant entertainment empires.  So although #1-#7  are hurtful, they probably are less damaging to stand up combined than the culture shift in general.  Everyone thinks they can be a celebrity because they can be.  So why would they even care about people with talent?  Stand Up comedy is becoming to entertainment was print is to journalism and what manufacturing is to the United States, a relic growing more irrelevant or at least less powerful every year.  Sure there are examples like Louis CK, but the New York Times is doing well, does that not mean that journalism is still in trouble?

As is clear from what I wrote, many of these factors are affecting other walks of life, but comedy is getting hit with most of our culture’s bad trends all at once in heavy doses.  So hopefully some of these things are cyclical, but sadly I think many of them are here to stay and will only get worse.

I’m off to watch Batman die now (allegedly?).  Maybe that will cheer me up.