RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,203
(I studied comedy, pt. 2)
When you come right down to
it, writing about comedy itself
is a pretty dumb thing to do,
It's not 'funny' so it doesn't
exemplify the issues presented.
In many ways comedy is purely
a 'live' at thing - dependent as
it is on the gestures, looks, and
manners of presentation given.
The guy who comes on stage,
for example, as a 'character'
embodying his comedy has,
already, a leg up - visually.
Just reading the jokes without
'seeing' the act sort of dilutes
all that own to nothing. Let
alone those who are 'prop'
comics and who spice their
act with cleavers, fake guns,
or smoke machines. The only
reason I bring any of this up
is because, somewhere, I
began with having a point to
make, now gone.
-
A few things in that first
paragraph bear reviewing:
First off, the use of 'When
you come right down to it,'
is odd. I wonder how that
ever began to be said, and
what it stemmed from? I'd
imagine it once had a very
specific use and reference?
Maybe in 1312, some guy in
a castle-keep, up high, guarding
the moat and the surrounding
countryside (let's call him 'Henry
the Malice'), told one too many
tall tales, so that no one ever
believed him until he was back
on the ground (the 'down to it'),
one time arriving at about the
same moment as that marauding
army of attackers laying siege
to the castle did? Maybe the
attacking marauders has a comedy
crew, to entertain those about
to be slaughtered or garroted.
Or, perhaps Harry the Malice
was drafted for that very purpose
before he too was slain (that kind
of reeks of 20th-century sensibility
though, with Nazis drafting
other prisoners to then entertain
both the camp commanders
and the camp managers, as well
as the other prisoners, all before
'showering.' (Boy, that's cruel,
and what a world!). And, in the
same manner, what does having
'a leg up' mean, and how did that
get started? A dog at a hydrant,
maybe, I could see, but that's
kind of senseless and, besides,
hydrants are only maybe 250
years old at most. Perhaps it's
a young reference, or it once
referred to any animal in the
woods. But then how did it
come to be used to signify
'advantage' for the person
with the leg up?
-
Something that is funny is a
magician. They depend totally
on the visual too. For instance,
their female assistants and the
girls who get sawed in half and
all that, they're always fairly hot
looking babes in sort of revealing
clothes and such. That's very
visual, and of course it's a big
help for the act that fails - if the
rabbit doesn't come out of the hat
he's holding, at least you can look
at her. Or, as with the prop-comic,
get smacked back into attention
by the 'noise.' A regular comic,
up there, dying, can only dwindle,
or go on with something about
his grandmother in the hopes of
smothering the fires of his
collapsing routine.
-
There was a bar once, in the town I
used to live, called 'Oilver's' (the bar,
not the town). It was nothing special,
and had been there for years under
another (rather suggestive) name,
'The Spread Eagle.' No one ever
made mention of what that name
was meant to signify, but, as an
undercurrent to the drinking and
the atmosphere I always figured
the booze-crowd men and ladies
surely must have know. The power
of suggestion drives a lot of screws
into soft wood, if you get my (very
clean) gist. Around the mid-1990's
they began having a weekly 'comedy'
night - New York guys, comics,
coming in for pretty-good-sized
crowds of off-night boozers, who'd
come in for the comics. These were
NYCity comedy-circuit beginners,
trying out or honing a routine or
an act, for their stand-up shows
in weekend NYC. It was pretty
good sometimes. I was heavy into
my Biker days then - in fact, one
late night after I gotten a beating
in a Hell's Angels fracas I'd been
involved in, at the Hoboken MC
clubhouse, Oliver's was where, after
a phone call to friends, I repaired,
all bloody and cut and punched out,
and where they met me with the
rags and swabs, mercurochrome
and gauzes needed. That was a real
fun night for me; of special memory.
-
As I was saying, these comedy guys
(never saw a female do it), would
come in with their routines. My friend,
Pete, and a few others too, but mostly
just Pete and myself, would be in
attendance, as it turned out after a
while, mainly to heckle and belittle
the comic, give him a huge ration
of catcalls and responses and stuff
- to sort of 'toughen' him up for the
onslaught probably due him in his
NYC gigs. The more the beer flowed,
of course (or, perhaps, 'of coarse').
It went back and forth, and a few
times we managed to really piss off
the comic; other times they handled
us pretty well. So, finally one day
the Manager of Oliver's corralled
us and said, to the effect that if we
were such comedy critics and big
shots, and considered ourselves such
funny men, why didn't we take the
stage one night and try it out for
ourselves. His point being that we
weren't exactly 'funny' and in his
opinion we'd crash-land big time
and learn a lesson. Pete and I, a
bit flustered, thought it over and
said OK! (Very weird).
-
We practiced, came up with a routine
of sorts that we liked - one which
allowed, as well, a lot of holes for
the ad-lib and riffs with which (we
thought) the audience-banter would
cause. 'I go, though the way be wild,'
became for us our own Charlie Brown
(a comic strip character thing, back
then), ruling theme-night mantra.
We kept waiting for our date, and it
took a while but the manager finally
came through. To our chagrin, it was
not a gig-night at all. The date turned
out, we realized, to be Easter Sunday!
Whatever this guy was thinking, it
was a flash-bust disaster. Holiday.
Late afternoon floor-time. A real
mess. I won't lie and say we went
through with it, nor tell of the mass
disaster that ensued. Actually, once
we realized what was up, we bailed
on the guy, told him to take his
Easter-Sunday date and shove it,
and to quit trying to con us into
filling his house on an otherwise
EMPTY comedy date. That was,
actually, our last time at Oliver's,
which eventually afterwards closed
anyway, and is now some Dominican
restaurant or something, last I saw,
which wasn't very recent.
-
One last thing: Comedy has led me
into great philosophical depths too.
What I like to call 'Dream comedy.'
Dreams aren't usually funny, but
often enough mine are, and funny
that weird dream-way that is also
deeply philosophical and fraught
with heavy thought. I've mused
over doing stand-up Dream Comedy
often, and I think - if the strands
were put together correctly - it
could maybe work. Here's one:
I found Infinity! in a dream. (This
is true, by the way, not made-up).
I dreamed a crossword-puzzle dream
wherein the puzzle grid was fairly
normal, but ALL the clues were
'Dine at home' - each answer,
'eat in', 'be sated,' 'get full,' etc.
somehow fit, by certain overlapping
letters, to fill the grid, yet each
answer extended the grid as well,
into an infinite program of answers
that - incredibly - all read 'Dine
at home.' It was pretty amazing,
and much less funny in this telling
than it was upon awakening, but
I awoke with the feeling that I'd
found or discovered Infinity - the
endless and expanding realm of
extension by which each word
opened up another realm, but at
the same time brought me right
back where I'd started! Now, if
there's not a stand-up routine in
there somewhere, I'm not funny!
Maybe I just just get a hot babe
to go up there with me and run
this routine - if it flops, there's
always her to look at.
No comments:
Post a Comment