12/06/2016

Middle, the antihero

I added to my comedy routine, bits through the time and cut out others, all the way making sure it looks like a fluid tale. Linking in some way, one to the other. 

Leaving usually the beginning and end as it was. 

It took perhaps 40 - 50 times till I found a better ending and even that was constructed bit by bit. Adding some "top" on one "joke" in fact a daring sentence that came very deep from me, then topping it with bits I found later, and that left the audience roaring with laughter after laughter. 

After I found the daring sentence in a workshop I attended, it took me 3 month to dare to use it.

The story in comedy uses as main character the "unti-hero" the one trying, failing, persisting. Not giving up, trying again and even agains all odds. We feel "it is like us" even if what he/she tells is not what we lived through. But we desire, want, try and many times fail and still persist. Yes, even failing this character does not give up: so it gives a message. 

And many times, by not politically or openly accepted means, he/she wins some battles. Gets to embrace the other problems having and getting in way. 

Very important is the comedian's persona and its Attitude

It is not the attitude of a plaintive, sad, someone who has given up. Sometimes even the audience sees the blows coming before the comedian's persona. Experiment with different attitude way of expressing conveying your point. The good comedian does not just make laugh but yes conveys a point of you on anything he/she tells about or shows. 

What is the persona? A version of myself in my case, but a version you would never meet out of stage. Others create a fictive like an actors persona, I just give voice to a more autrageous self. 

I used the worst experiences in my life to poke fun of but in the way conveying what I think of cheering bastards. Of course, till it was not me. Used for it "shaving" then to link to next part, created three month later, I added (for the whole look in another post at video):

"Of course, we women have advantage over men: we don't shave. (Showing face) True? 
Pause. 
Well, till we get after 50. (Laughter)
Then, (here comes the story all I tried and did not succeed to eliminate hair from my face) finally, I decided to photoshop it out! (Laughter)

That worked, they never come back. but alas only on the screen. 

At my 77 th birthday, my son offered me a bottle. Of shaving cream. 
Shave as a man, me? Never! 
Finally I gave up. 
Looked in the mirror with shaving cream on my face: a clown looked back to me. 
Have you ever seen a woman shaving face? (discussion with audience) Want to see? 
(Show a selfie) here it is! 

This gave sometime a standing ovation and always a very strong laughter.

"After showing this picture, the skeleton was out of the cupboard and I did not care any more I had to shave before all performances." 

From here it goes farther towards one or my last end, as I connect it to what I still was anxious about.

No comments:

Post a Comment